#and we are unfortunately aware that the reason we are struggling to finish in a timely manner

[mantisgodsdomain]

You may say to yourself things such as "wow, mantis god, you seem really behind for bugtober this year", and you would be right, but what you can't see behind the scenes is that we are actually being surprisingly productive in the hours of the day that are not dedicated to school, it's just that some months ago we happen to have thought to ourself "well, we enjoy learning things, so maybe we should take a hack at school since the grant is decent, get some actual certification on our resume so we can get a real job" and then forgot that the reason we don't already have official certification is because formal schooling historically has had worse effects on our overall mental health than almost literally anything else in our life, and now that's eating 4-6 hours of our life per day with an extra few hours of recovery after which makes it unfortunately difficult to work on art.

[roses-ink-dipped-pen]

iif this is okay ? a villain (kid) who got out of an abusive household and is currently hiding in superhero's house ;; then superhero has a talk w him but villain was too out of it to comprehend what's going on around him like how does he just realized that he wasn't exactly safe in his own house :(

superhero noticed and comforted him ;; SORRY IF THIS IS SPECIFIC anything else is ok u dont have to do tis :3

Okay granted, I may have gone a little off script xP

This doesn't exactly take place in Superhero's house, but I guess the Agency Headquarters is technically their home...? I mean, it is convenient.

I still hope this is a decent little story to read. Enjoy :3

TW: Mentions of emotional/mental child abuse, murder, fire

The superior took solemn strides down the corridors of their headquarters, swallowing their anger after returning from a rather abrupt meeting with the city’s most prized and honored heroes. 

Superhero, as the leader of the band of saviors, stood by good morals and kindred acts of empathy. They refused to ever deny a crook who was willing to amend their offenses a chance at redemption.

Those who shamefully defined the word ‘good’ with scorn written on their faces were to be put to justice. The process was swift, yet ruthless.

“There is no room for evil.” The wisest and greatest victors of the side of good would repeat to their pupils a thousand times over, and the cycle would go on.

But Villain was just a child.

It was a shame, not many heroes understood the point of mercy.

After the leader had finished chastising one too many of their followers, they stormed off into the interrogation room where the unfortunate victim sat. The atmosphere inside was damp, growing tense as Superhero and Villain made eye contact.

Superhero walked in, not bothering to follow any precautions when it came to confronting evil-doers. This was not an interrogation to the commander, they did not think about the orientation, deflection, or threats. They knew that whatever Villain did, was a response to fear.

The young boy cringed in his seat as his father’s rival sat in front of him, the table that separated the two of them was littered with plushies. The only reason why Superhero had a pen and paper was to record anything Villain said that stood out to them. However many cruel works the supervillain has forced him to commit, and how many works were aimed towards him, they would make a check on their tally. 

Superhero was well aware of Villain’s innocence. Even though he worked alongside Supervillain prior to the ‘interrogation’, resulting in the assassination of the city official, Villain was not to be held accountable. Many beg to differ, and that irked Superhero.

“You don’t have to be nervous, I’m not like the others.” 

Superhero grimaced as they referred to their fellow members. Villain nodded, reaching out with a small hand to grasp one of the plushies. A teddy bear Superhero picked out just for them. 

“I’m sorry.” Was all Villain responded with. He’s said that nearly fifty times that day. Superhero heaved a long sigh.

“I told you, whatever you did was a decision made for you, entirely by your father. You had no role to play in the incident, and I want you to go to sleep tonight knowing for a fact that we do not think that you are to blame.” They assured with a gentle grin, anxiously picking up their pen to question the boy about what he had been subjected to under the authority of Supervillain. They didn’t need to ask.

Villain huffed, swallowing the salty taste in his mouth as he struggled to hold back his cries.

“Dad told me he would hurt me if I didn’t help.” The young boy blurted out after a few moments of silence, clutching their shoulders.

“It was my job to burn down the community center, but I was too scared to-” Villain was interrupted by a fit of coughing as he choked on his tears.

Superhero was amazed. Villain was crying in front of them, to them. They must be doing something right. Superhero didn’t wallow in their newfound pride any longer; they had a job to do. 

They got up from their seat to kneel down beside the weeping boy, extending a hand for Villain to hold. Gingerly, they hushed the boy, whose face was already buried in Superhero’s shoulder.

Superhero held on tight to the boy, picking him up in a comforting embrace. 

“Dad left me behind as punishment. He said you would get rid of me for good...” Villain whispered, he was too exhausted to speak up.

Superhero was more than disgusted at this revelation. Like hell they would ever think about putting a child to death. It just goes to show that Supervillain truly possessed a sick and twisted imagination.

Only now did Villain realize that he was never in the right hands to begin with.

“Nothing on this planet would ever convince me of doing such a thing. You are worth more than what you were made to believe, and I won’t stop at nothing to make you feel loved. Do you understand?” Superhero’s devastated tone convinced Villain that he was in the right place.

The two stayed locked in a hug for what felt like an eternity, before Superhero offered them some cookies and a movie of his choice.

Superhero put the ‘interrogation’ on halt and allowed Villain to take a break from the accident. Later that week, it was revealed that Supervillain had committed a total of 21 sins and misdoings, all of them directed towards Villain. The superhero marveled as they thought of 21 ways to get back at him. Putting all morals aside, they went to pay Supervillain a visit.

[aprillikesthings]

can I finish this before I gotta get ready and leave for the Maundy Thursday service let's find out lol

(Edit: Nope.)

THREE MORE EPISODES LEFT

*cries*

s5 ep11 Failsafe

someone hold me

I have to actively suppress the urge to read the synopses of the episodes at this point

oh also lol this is just funny to me, I saw a post Elsewhere Online where someone watched all of spop the first time and they HATED the dumb names everyone has, and I think they mentioned Castaspella specifically.

And like FIFTY PEOPLE responded with "dude they had to use the original names from the 1980's series" and I was the only one there old enough to have watched the original series and I had to point out: the original series was made to sell toys. The vast majority of cartoons in 1985 were only made to sell toys. They gave everyone those dumbass names because it was easy for kids to remember and beg for the toys."

That's also why all the female characters in the original series have the exact same body type. Yeah the body shape itself was due to 1980's-era sexism, but also? It was so much cheaper to animate the show AND make the toys that way!

But also, it's hella ironic to me that the 2018 show has so little official merch!

And now, back to crying over cartoon lesbians:

good question

ugh I hate her

Shadow Weaver: "While you were traipsing around in space,"

OH MY GOD they were saving a few people's LIVES and it was kind of IMPORTANT but WHATEVER

"--some of us have been working to stop the Heart of Etheria from falling into Prime's hands. And we discovered the same thing you did. Rumors of a Failsafe that will break the restraints the First Ones built and set the stolen magic free." Glimmer: "Are you kidding? After everything that happened last time, you're still going after the Heart of Etheria? And you're helping her?" Castaspella: "We're trying to free the magic for all of Etheria so we can be strong enough to fight Prime. I'm doing this for your father and for you. Shadow Weaver is the lesser of two evils."

I love that she says this right in front of Shadow Weaver. Like "girl I hate her too"

nice

okay ngl I have mixed feelings about this one because unfortunately she's not entirely wrong here but also, shut the fuck up

(something something people are responsible for their own actions but also she wouldn't have done all that godawful shit if Shadow Weaver hadn't been such a shitty parent)

but yeah Catra gets up like she's about to fucking throw some hands and Adora's like It's okay bb

;_;

but also they do need the information Shadow Weaver and Castaspella have

so it turns out Mystacor was built on top of a First Ones' citadel? huh

Castaspella: "Beneath Mystacor, there are many secret tunnels and rooms, forgotten and sealed off. No one has been able to access them in centuries, but there are whispers of what they contain." Shadow Weaver: "An artifact known as the Crystal of Arxia, hidden there by a group of traitorous First Ones." Castaspella: "You said I could do it!"

lol they bicker like old marrieds

Adora: "If you figured it out on your own, why come back here? Why do you need us at all?" Shadow Weaver: "Because Mystacor is controlled by Micah, who, you may recall, is controlled by Horde Prime."

they've been TRYING

"If he seizes the Heart, it will all be over."

Stop toUCHING HER

oh god Adora turns around to ask Catra to help out--and she's gone

YOU'RE THE REASON SHE'S FUCKING "SULKING" and you fucking know it, why are abusers always so god damned surprised to find out their kids don't want to be anywhere near them

(I mean I know why, they think they should be able to control you forever)

aaahahaha Adora's just like Nah I'mma go look for her tho

anyway roll intro!

omg look at Netossa and Spinny on the bottom left awwwww

she looks so sad

well okay sad and angry

their conversation here is so good, because Catra's fully aware of why Adora's doing this, but is really struggling to push past how much she (justifiably!) hates Shadow Weaver and hates being around her

I actually do kinda wish I'd kept a list of all the times Adora does the self-sacrificial thing, separated into "someone asked her to do it" vs "nobody asked her to do it" lol

BUT ADORA EXPRESSES A NEED oh nice that's progress

Adora: "Hey, she can't do anything to us anymore. Please, come. We--I-could really use your help."

two things I really love about this: One, she doesn't say that she doesn't like Adora, just that it's not the reason she's going. Two, I feel like Adora knows damn well Catra's not being 100% honest here.

Like, to some extent Catra's saying this as a way of attempting to protect herself a little. She's taking baby steps towards vulnerability, and it's terrifying! And I think Adora can see that and is fine with it--not JUST because she's like "any crumbs are better than nothing" but ALSO because she doesn't want to push Catra.

Because yeah, if there was any actual doubt that Catra does like Adora--

WELL.

Entrapta was able to get Spinerella's chip out but says it had started fusing with her nervous system and they're running out of time to safely un-chip everyone.

But she's been digging around the network that connects all the chips to Prime, hoping to figure out how to disconnect everyone at once, and Bow gives her a little encouragement, it's really sweet.

OKAY so everyone who can, teleports to Mystacor with Melog making them invisible. (Apparently Catra doesn't get motion sick from it anymore which is nice lol)

I love the way they animated them being invisible

oh GOD okay

Catra turns around and says "looks like there's no sorcerers here" while, unfortunately, a sorcerer walks into the room. Shadow Weaver grabs Catra and puts her hand over her mouth to keep her quiet, and Catra (understandably!! but unfortunately!!) jerks away in fury and yells

And her fury causes Melog to drop the invisibility

And now the chipped sorcerer knows they're all there

they manage to duck the attack but Adora goes to transform into She-Ra--and can't do it

she had this issue last episode aaaugh it's not from being near Shadow Weaver she wasn't there

okay but also Adora runs behind a pillar to hide from an attack with Catra and it's cute

girl help why is this giving me so many emotions

y'know it's funny how often I've bumped into posts of people who are confused as to why Adora starts trusting Catra again so quickly, and I frequently wonder if they forget all the childhood flashback scenes of these two. To varying extents they both spent their entire childhoods seeing the other as their only consistent source of comfort and (something resembling) safety, and with some notable exceptions Adora's spent the last four seasons (which was like three or four years) visibly holding out hope that one day she could trust Catra again. This despite the fact that she now has other sources of safety and comfort and love!!! Being with Glimmer and Bow and everyone else was healing, sure; but it never erased her grief over losing Catra. She always, always held out the tiniest flame of hope that Catra would change sides.

And Catra basically tried lighting her own grief on fire (metaphorically and kinda literally) over and over and it just didn't go away, and I feel like when she saved Glimmer and apologized to Adora she had sort of come to terms with the fact that her grief over losing Adora couldn't be burned away, but of course by then she figured she'd fucked up so bad Adora would never forgive her or trust her again. And rather than take it out on other people or suffer any longer she was willing to just die, instead. She really did think that sending Glimmer to Adora was going to be her last act, and she wanted Adora to know she was sorry before she fucking DIED. And I don't think her saving Glimmer was consciously meant to be proof that she meant her apology, but it was. And that's part of why Adora trusts her again.

The fact is, even after everything that happened, both of them had a hole in their hearts shaped like the other. ;_;

And that's why Adora runs and hides behind the same pillar as Catra. (I mean yes, it was also closer, but that's not tHE POINT)

Anyway, this is all why, as I previously noted, Adora's not being pushy. That failed on her, spectacularly; the couple of times she tried it. Asking Catra to come along on this mission is the closest she's come. And even then, it wasn't "you're a good person deep down and you should change sides because I think I know you better than you know yourself," It was "please do this for me, because I need your help." And Catra is fully aware of how hard that is for Adora.

And these two still have a lot to work out post-canon (like, Catra has still got to deal with her need to not just be seen as Adora's sidekick/shadow, and lbh right now some of the rebellion is like "we're only putting up with you for Adora's sake" as if Catra was Yoko Ono) but that's part of why I'm writing a fic lolol

I have so many feelingssss on a related note I spent like fifteen solid minutes last night in bed having taken an edible and listening to my playlist and staring at this gifset lolol

ANYWAY Castaspella knocks out the chipped dude and they run for it

AAAND lol I gotta get ready to go to church. There's still 17:30 left on this episode. Pfft.

BACK FROM CHURCH I washed someone's feet, they washed mine, they stripped the altar, I go back at one or two in the morning for the overnight vigil

In the meantime: gonna finish this episode

(what is my life sometimes)

Entrapta plans to find a bunch of clones so she can figure out how their signals to Horde Prime work. Swift Wind is like Ugh, fine, I'll go with you, someone's gotta save your ass

Entrapta: "Thanks, bird horse!"

lol how many times have they had that convo

A family can be a sorcerer and her evil ex, a girl and a boy, two traumatized lesbians, and a cat

But also it looks like something out of an episode of Scooby Doo

Shadow Weaver opens a magic door

ngl that's PRETTY. like it's obviously about the Heart of Etheria but wow!

(and there's a dinosaur???)

Adora notices how stressed out Catra is and says "It'll be okay...Trust me." ;_;

Shadow Weaver: "There's no time to waste!"

"...disturbance."

The disturbance was your fault, dumbass. I am reminded of all the times my dad got angry at us for being afraid of him. And would hit us. For being. Afraid of him. Because y'know. That's how you stop a kid from being afraid of you. By hitting them.

In any case Shadow Weaver is still trying to get between them and separate them and I just really need this bitch to stop.

(Yes yes I remember she dies later)

Castaspella: "We're on the right path. The Crystal of Arxia was rumored to be the key to reaching deep magic within Etheria."

"But those who hungered for more power have long sought other ways to obtain the deep magic...with disastrous results."

HIT THE IMAGE LIMIT lemme reblog

[olivia-anderson-fanfic]

Dancing 'Til the Break of Dawn - Pt 13

<Pt12

(TWST Zombie apocalypse AU where Yuu beast tames just a little too close to the sun)

His heart pounded in his throat. He struggled to swallow around it.

Slowly, Trey lifted his hands in surrender, giving a nervous smile.

Yuu took a long, deep breath. He realized, abruptly, that he had actually stopped breathing for a second there. Thought that that was probably a bad thing. He took another breath, just to get more oxygen in his system, so the black dots dancing in his vision would stop annoying him.

And then he smiled back, dragging the knife away. “Whoops! Sorry! Didn’t mean to do that!”

“You – you didn’t mean to threaten him?” Riddle asked, incredulously.

Yuu lifted his hands in a shrug. “Everyone has moments where they strongly consider murdering someone. It’s just easier when you have a knife on hand. You know how it is.”

“I don’t, actually,” said Riddle.

“That’s the problem,” Yuu said, cheerfully.

“The prob –?! You’re unstable,” Riddle said.

“I mean, I disagree, but who isn’t these days anyway?” Yuu shrugged.

Riddle’s face flushed. “I’m not.”

“You’re living in a simulation of what the world once was. It’s an illusion. And illusions can be shattered. What happens then? That’s literally a textbook example of instability. You like textbooks, right? You should know this!”

Riddle’s grip tightened on his knife.

“Yuu…” Cater said, slowly, a quiet warning.

It was nice that he was trying to help, Yuu supposed. It was unfortunate that the person Cater was trying to advise was him, though.

“You’re not better than us,” Yuu continued to say, smiling. “In fact, you're currently worse than us in pretty much every way. We can all survive on our own, for months, but you? You’d die immediately. How does it feel, knowing all those years of learning what’s ‘polite’ and alllll that pain was worthless, in the end?”

Riddle lunged for him, knife pointed outwards.

So died Riddle’s mental stability, according to his own standards.

Yuu had plenty of time to appreciate the irony, because he had been entirely prepared for this outcome, and dodged the incoming attack with ease.

“You're too easy to provoke,” Yuu commented. “Not a great trait to have during the apocalypse. Things that can be settled peacefully should be. It’s best to play it safe wherever possible.”

The butterfly knife slashed through the air.

“As for your actual fighting prowess. You telegraph your moves too much,” Yuu said, watching the blade flash by his face with a muted kind of boredom. He looped around Riddle, kicking him in the back, watching him stumble. “Don’t even get me started on your form.”

Riddle’s lips pulled back in a snarl.

He whirled around.

Only to find Ace standing over him, a knife pointed directly between his eyes. The momentary surprise was more than enough for Deuce to kick the weapon out of his hand.

The knife skipped across the floor, hitting the wall with a dull thud.

Yuu crouched down, briefly, to pick up the weapon, flipping it closed. He stuffed it into his pocket for safekeeping.

(Free knife! Ace was going to love him.)

“And, of course, your situational awareness could use work,” he finished, crossing his arms over his chest. “Basically, you’re not suited for this world. If I’m able to beat you in a fight, then anyone can. Trey is the only reason you’re still here today. I’d say you should thank him, but it’s partially his fault you’re like this, soooooo...”

Riddle scowled. "So, let's say I'm bad at fighting."

"I just did," Yuu said.

"My talents lie elsewhere. Is that really such a big problem?"

“You would have done great in the corporate world,” Ace said. Then, he shrugged, grinning. “This isn’t that.”

This will probably never be that again.

(Not that Yuu and Ace would say that aloud. Not in front of Deuce, at least.)

Deuce sighed. “What my friends are trying to get at, I think, is that rules are nice -.”

Ace snickered. "I have never in my life tried to convey that rules are 'nice'."

“... and it’s good to have a moral code. But adaptability is important.”

“But – but I –!”

“No one wants to be in the apocalypse,” Deuce said. “But we’re here, now. All you can do is try your best to come out the other side in one piece.”

It was silent as Trey and Riddle took in the new perspective. Considering Yuu had risked a stabbing to explain his point of view, he really hoped that he'd gotten it through their skulls. If that hadn't done it then, frankly, Riddle and Trey could die as victims of their own stupidity. Yuu had done enough to fill his 'good person quota' for the month. He was officially done.

Yuu clapped his hands together. “Anyways!” He said, brightly, as if the argument had never happened. “Do you guys know where the nearest subway entrance is?”

“You’re – you’re just going to say all of that and then leave?” Riddle said, incredulously.

“Yep!” said Ace, popping the ‘P’.

“Aren’t you scared I won’t listen to your advice?” Trey asked.

“Not our problem,” Ace shrugged.

“Besides, Cater’s staying, so even if you do relapse, at least Rosehearts-senpai will have company.”

Cater blinked. “How do you know that?”

“Cater. You had a whole broadcasting station. It's pretty obvious you were dying for some friends,” Deuce said, rolling his eyes.

“And our friend group is already full, so don’t even think about coming with us,” Ace added.

Cater raised an eyebrow. “In the nicest way possible, you three are the most stressful people I’ve ever met. Pass. At least Trey here can bake.”

“At least one of those stressful events was your fault. You shot Yuu,” Ace reminded him.

“Get over it. That was, like, last week.”

“Yeah, honestly, Ace, it’s not like you haven’t tried to kill me, too,” said Yuu. Mostly just for the sake of annoying Ace – it was unlikely that he would ever see Cater again after this, so there were no downsides to pretending he was above holding a grudge.

Trey frowned. “Am I the only person that hasn’t tried to kill you here?”

“Ehhhhhh, Cater wasn’t really aiming at me, so I don't know if he really counts. But, either way, no, Deuce hasn’t tried to murder me. He did try and keep me captive for a while, like you did, but…” Yuu snapped his fingers, turning to look at Riddle. “Oh! Before I forget! Rosehearts-senpai! Cooking oil makes a great accelerant for fire.”

“What’s wrong with you?” Trey asked.

“I be in situations.”

~

“Grim!” Yuu cheered the moment his eyes landed on the zombie, which had been pacing just outside of the apartment complex. He hugged his child to his chest, beaming. “Look at you,” he cooed, scratching him behind the ears. “You’re just as cute as the day I last saw you!”

“It’s been, like, a few hours,” Deuce said.

Yuu sniffed. “Ignore him, baby, he’s just jealous he doesn’t have a super cool zombie cat of his own.”

Ace pulled on his jacket, the tension in his shoulders melting away as he hugged himself. Or maybe he was hugging the knives taped to the inside of the jacket. It didn’t make that much of a difference either way.

“You’re both sick,” Deuce complained.

“You’re our friend! Sick by proxy!” Yuu said, pointing and laughing at the idiot who had allowed himself to be contaminated.

Deuce rolled his eyes, hefting his bat over his shoulder. “I’ve recently learned that you forgive murder attempts. Care to test it out?”

Yuu squeaked. “What, you want to kill me? Then you’d be giving the title of 'least dangerous' to Trey of all people, and I don’t think you want that.”

Grim growled.

Yuu smoothed his bristling fur. “Shhhhh, don’t, you’ll get your teeth dirty if you kill him.”

“Prick,” Deuce complained.

Something occurred to Yuu. He looked at Grim. “Hey, Trey gave us directions and a few recipes, so you can’t kill them.”

Grim sulked in his arms.

Yuu shook his head, something fond tugging at the corners of his lips. He pressed another kiss to the top of the zombie’s head. “It’s just three people. If you’re that desperate for food, you should downsize your army.”

“Yuu, are you a communist?” Ace teased.

“No, I just believe that if you can’t afford to give everyone a livable wage you shouldn’t be in business.”

“... that feels like communism,” said Ace.

Yuu considered this. “Maybe? What is communism?”

It was then that the three teens realized: they had no clue.

“Uhhhhh… bad?” said Deuce.

“It’s that thing Americans hate,” offered Ace.

“I love communism,” Yuu decided.

And, since his plan was to retrace his steps in hopes of finding the convenience store again, and he would therefore be going past his old high school, he might just get the chance to look up his newfound political ideology.

“Everyone ready?” Deuce asked.

Yuu hummed, glancing back towards the apartment complex. No one was in the window.

No one would see, then.

Yuu retrieved Cater’s gun from the bush.

He exchanged smirks with Deuce and Ace.

And then they took off running, laughing evilly to themselves.

~~~~~

Pt14>

[heartofspells]

20 Questions for Fic Writers

Thank you for the tags, @brandileigh2003 @tracingpatternswrites & @mycupofrum!

Username: heartofspells

1. How many works do you have on A03?

96, all of them HP except for one lonesome Supernatural fic

2. What’s your total Ao3 word count?

1,685,584

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Harry Potter, though I've dabbled in a few others, only one fic of which is still available for Supernatural

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

At the Healing Edge of Broken

Prick the Craving, Watch it Seep

Multiplying Parents

How to Succeed in Business

The Tying of Canines

5. Do you respond to comments?

I used to. Hardly ever anymore, and unfortunately, I've got solid reasons for that. I will respond to them if someone asks a question that legitimately needs answering or similar. And while I maybe don't respond to them anymore, I do read every single one multiple times. I love comments, and I'm so grateful for everyone who takes time out of their lives to leave them for me <3

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Ah...heh. That's really not an easy question to answer for me. I guess, coming from a personal stance, knowing everything I put into it and the build up that led to then ending, I'd have to say Wasteland. That's the one that's still lingering with me to this day.

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

That's also hard to answer, because as much as I love flooding my fics with angst, I have a lot that end very happy or hopeful. Narrowing it down to longer fics with more character arc throughout, I'd probably say This Way We Fall because it leaves them on such a high note after all the struggle.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Unfortunately, yes, but that's part of it, I guess. I've become better at ignoring it.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

I do, but at the end of the day, it's mostly just typical smut when I look at it, though I do have a few kinkier ones scattered in there (ceiling smut, er...inter-species stuff). There's also the...not entirely nice stuff when it comes to smut as well simply because I like exploring all aspects of most everything.

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

Haven't so far. Doubt I ever will, but you never know.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I'm aware of. I hope not.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nope

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

I have! I co-wrote Family on the Mend with @tracingpatternswrites and it was so much fun! I'd love to co-write more fics in the future!

14. What’s your all time favorite ship?

It's gonna have to be Wolfstar just because that's where my heart has rested for years, but there are others that run as close seconds.

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Oh god. YOU. It's not posted anywhere, still only exists in my docs, but I'm convinced that fic will haunt the rest of my life.

16. What are your writing strengths?

I always struggle with questions like this, but that also means I've spent a lot of time thinking about it over the years. I think, mostly based on reactions I've had and what other people have said, that I'm quite good at capturing heavy and deep emotions, hopefully enough to not only grip a reader, but to plunge them into the heart of a scene and make them feel those emotions as well.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Details? There are times I think I'm terrible at this, and not just in fiction writing. It's in everything. Something might exist in my head, and I sometimes manage to forget that not everyone can see my exact thoughts and know what I'm thinking, so I leave important bits and pieces out of things and explanations that only end up confusing people - or worse, makes me seem not so great in general simply because I forgot the inclusion of a very important point when it mattered most.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I'm not against it, though it's not something I generally do because I don't know any other languages and that's a risky game to play. I'll only include it if I've spoken to someone who speaks that language fluently and has agreed to translate for me. But having other languages in a fic is a wonderful thing, especially if you're trying to include other cultures, though speaking as someone who has to rely on things like Google Translate that aren't always accurate, included translations are always appreciated.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Harry Potter

20. Favourite fic you’ve written?

This changes constantly for me. I'm not sure how it couldn't. I love most of the fics I've written, and it's like choosing a favorite child sometimes. However, I think right now I'd have to say it's a toss up between CRuSH (i'm just so proud of this one) and Multiplying Parents (also very proud, and this one was so much fun and makes me grin every time i think about it).

Open tag! Because I'm very late to this and I've got the feeling most everyone has done this by now.

[coffeewithcutcaffeine]

How the Ink Flows: 2024 scribbles by one Miss Lin ✨

Because my uni schedule has been kicking me in the butt constantly these days, I have decided to write this post to let you all know (as well as to make myself try to stick to my goals) what I am currently working on and what I would love to share with you this year! ❤️️ Also, at the end of the post under the cut, there is an important question regarding my taglist -- please, read the info if you follow my works and/or want to read some of them!

VOIEVOD

Vlad Dracula will most definitely remain my number-one priority for this year. So far, the update on the upcoming works for his story looks like this:

I am currently working on Second Chances, the work that maps one of the epic battles of Vlad's life, namely his spectacular duel with the former Voivode Vladislav II that marks the beginning of his second (and longest) reign. I have had to put my writing on hold for a while as I tackle my new uni schedule but will do my best to get back to the WIP as soon as possible!

Next, there is Novus Rex, Nova Lex which deals with the beginnings of Vlad's rule, and the tensions between him and the boyars. This WIP is also a strong homage to the wonderful Romanian movie Vlad Ţepeş (1979) as I have decided to borrow a fabulous scene from it and use it for Vlad's story. Hopefully, I will do it justice!

I would also love to focus on the beginnings of Vlad and Cătălina's relationship. You have already had the chance to meet the wonder of a woman, but the start of their love story and all the circumstances that lead to it definitely deserve to be told chronologically.

If all goes well, I would try to also dip my toes into Vlad's years with the Ottomans and try to explore the Drăculești family. A certain Mușat will most likely also make an appearance.

OPEN HEART

The world of Dr. Laura Levchenko has currently been put on hold for an indefinite period, mainly because I am heavily struggling with the overall story and some characters in it. I would also love to drift away from her role in the romantic relationship and explore her character as an individual. I think there is a lot of work to do for me to reassess what I want to say through my writing and what I want to do with the plot.

If all goes well and inspiration kicks me in this universe, I would love to delve into a series mapping her life directly after the maitotoxin attack. If you want to see Laura away from Ethan and shine individually in her pain, then this might be for you. ❤️️

CRIMES OF PASSION

I have been planning to finish a few works I have in mind for this story since summer but, unfortunately, the WIPs keep being abandoned by their negligent writer! I want to heavily redo and expand what we have been given in canon and turn it into something more serious and personal -- being from Eastern Europe, this story hits very close to home, and I would love to give it the levity and portrayal it deserves. So far, the WIP that I would love to work on more is called Silence, Silence, Dry and Black and explores heavier cultural and political themes. I am aware it might not be everyone's cup of tea but hope you would give it a shot nonetheless.

THE WAYHAVEN CHRONICLES

I am still exploring the story and toying around with my M!MC but, if all goes well, I have a very particular idea for a fic I would love to write this year! I am still not sure if I will make a single work from it or divide it into two shorter fics, but I hope to make it happen. Expect pure indulgence on my part as this will be my inner romantic pouring her heart out.

TAGLIST

This way, I would also like to share that I am thinking of creating a taglist for those who are still willing to read my word vomit! I would use it to:

tag you on my Voievod works that I post both here and on AO3,

tag you on my TWC fics that I will most likely post both here and on AO3 when the time comes,

tag you on posts regarding my OH and CoP fics that (for reasons) I have decided to post solely on AO3. However, I have chosen to always make posts with an AO3 link attached to them so that you do not miss a heads-up whenever a new fic is published.

Please, do not hesitate to write a comment under this post or send me a DM if you want to be added to my taglist! ❤️️

[luckylolabug]

Tagged by the lovely @starwritingbri <3 <3 1. How many works do you have on AO3?

Currently 17, after I yoinked some down. We won't talk about how many WIPs I have that aren't posted haha.

2. What’s your total AO3 word count? 150,958

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Uhh, multifandom girlie here so. Lockwood & Co, the DCU, Yuri on Ice, I currently have a folder of Six of Crows stuff getting ready for Whumptober but they're not posted yet, sometimes I one off and write stuff for Star Wars or TAZ: Balance. Ive got a big project going for Heartstopper that isnt posted yet, and I have a secondary account for MHA stuff lol. Also some joint stuff for FMA with Bri eventually!

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

In So Many Words- Yuri!!! on Ice

Sorry, This Page Cannot Be Reached- Yuri!!! on Ice

Slow Dancing in the Dark- Lockwood and Co

Barrels and Bootlegging- Lockwood and Co

Shimmer in the Haze of Winter Lawns- Lockwood and Co

5. Do you respond to comments?

For the most part, yes! I can get behind on them a bit, but I do try and keep up with them because the support is important to me.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I don't write a TON of angst??? But I want to say Heaven is Not Fit to House a Love Like You and I just for the context. Ask me again once I get my Whumptober stuff up in October and that's going to change, though.

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Most of the stuff I write has happy endings! It's hard to pick just one?

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Unfortunately. Weirdly, most of the fandoms I've dabbled in that have reps for being "the worst" have been the nicest to me as far as fics go, but I've gotten some very nasty comments on things for certain fandoms that don't have that kind of reputation. Fan culture is weird. I wish I could say it doesnt affect me buuuuut. There's a reason I stepped back from writing so much L&C and tend to drift with other fandoms more now.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

I have a few times, and I'm not like. Directly opposed to it? But it's not really my Jam a good 99% of the time and honestly I prefer just keeping most of my stuff Fade to Black or vague and not in depth if it comes up. I like focusing more on other stuff, but I don't think smut is bad either!

10. Do you write crossovers?

Not as far as I'm aware. I have like. Some AU type stuff thats "This world but with these characters" but its not a direct crossover where the characters from multiple universes interact. I guess unless youre counting the DCU as a whole but??? Lol?

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

To my knowledge, no? But it could have been, I guess.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nope! But I'd be cool with it! My mom helps me with Spanish in a few things for the Heartstopper project I have going since she's fluent, but those are just a few lines.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Not anything POSTED, but eventually that'll change!

14. What is your all-time favorite ship?

Y'all, I am in too many fandoms for this lol. I don't know that I even HAVE an all-time fav that shoots above the rest? I have favs in fandoms, but not as a whole????

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Uhhhhh. Probably Barrels and Bootlegging??? I hate even putting this out there but fandom politics and the amount of BS just was draining the hell out of me when I was working on stuff so I don't even really have any plans to go back to finishing any of my stuff for L&C at this point. I'm happier writing other places, right now!

16. What are your writing strengths?

uHHHHHH???? Bri says its details, so I guess that? Putting details into everything?

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

All of them. LOL. No, but honestly, I struggle with the editing process most because I think I end up re-writing things a good 5 or 6 times before I decide its fine and even then I struggle after stuff is posted just because I want to try so hard to keep things cohesive and correct. I spend way too much time Googling shit that shouldnt even really matter, but the small things matter to ME.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

The only thing I've really done it with is throwing in some stuff in Spanish, and I was only okay with that because my mom is fluent and offered to look it over for me to make sure it was correct. Otherwise I'm like.....Google Translate is inaccurate a lot and the idea of putting something in a fic that could be WRONG freaks the hell out of my OCD and I can't do it.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Oh, jeez. Uhh. Honestly it was either ATLA or the Halo games? I don't fucking know, it was pretty mid 2000s. I still have my log in for FF.net and LiveJ but I dont really want to go look because Im sure I'll hate it.

20. Favorite fic you’ve written?

This feels like a shit answer because it's not POSTED YET. But I really have been eating up everything I've written so far for this "Six of Crows but make it Modern" thing thats sitting at about 40k words right now. So probably that??? If its one that I have POSTED, then I think it's probably one of the 5+1s I did for Yuri on Ice just because those were really fun and light. I'm TERRIBLE at tagging people so uh. @fluffypinkkitties @twiilys and @chibiosaka I guess????

[mamamittens]

WELP, Christmas was nice! Great to see my brother again and I collected all the animal crossing museum shit except the art pieces but that's not something I can force without an excessive amount of effort so like, I'm good lol

Ah, hopefully I can gather the energy to do an event piece tomorrow. Orders slowed down and we get out at our normal time so I guess we'll have to see. There's hope yet I'll finish them all before 2024 lol

Ramble time, you know the drill lmao

So, there's a fun thing I used to experience often when I actually left my house where I was typically mistaken for a guy. A younger, possibly cute guy if that hilarious encounter in highschool is any indication (I'm a bit blind to my own level of attractiveness, not going to lie, which is a pretty big step up from hating it.... Anyway!)

Something about my relaxed posture, baggy hoodie, and short hair. Not entirely sure, but it is impressive given the fact that I've had a considerable bust size since early high school. I assume they never looked closely at my side profile lol

Anyway! It would be fun to adapt that a tad for Nikia, but more cause with that devil fruit able to adjust her size. I imagine she'd have an easier time taking a leadership role while presenting more masculine, even if it's incidental. Especially since she's not typically confrontational.

The change isn't something she needs to hold onto, thankfully, but it is more relaxing to settle into her natural form. So there's no danger of her forgetting what she actually looks like. Usually reserved for when she's locked into her cabin for snowstorms alone. Curling up in her freshly preened wings.

Her usual 'work mode' appearance is smaller bust (less weight jostling about during motion, did you know that you can break your collar bone with sufficiently sized tits when running? Horrifying), taller, and snapping open her natural wingspan when she wants to cut an argument short. It tends to scare the shit out of people when paired with an RBF and her wings going from little cherub size to dwarfing her frame in a fraction of a second (steam slipping from her teeth from the sudden change).

Hella whiplash when she uses her customer service voice. Really freaks people out more and she abuses this to throw people off when they're being difficult.

Unfortunately, with her own cabin and few reasons to socialize with people, her social skills get pretty rusty. Including the habit she usually has of exaggerating her expressions to clarify her intent or communicate. She still does it, but not as often as she should, so she's left faltering a little when people act negatively to her when she's trying to lighten the mood. She means well though, she's just not big on strangers being around her a lot.

This difficulty expressing and communicating emotions also unfortunately means that she has a hard time controlling her temper when it finally runs loose. Often getting overwhelmed and crying before shutting down. Obviously, she prefers to avoid this when possible, so tries to maintain a chill attitude that skews towards permissive. Mostly by accident.

This attentiveness towards her temper is also why she doesn't typically participate in competitive incidents as she's aware that her attitude is less than favorable during these events. Her difficulty with a social filter can often lead to her saying very harsh things without thinking.

All this leads to quite the unexpected series of events leading up to Marineford, as she doesn't fully trust herself to go rouge, doesn't believe she was the right to handle Teach, and struggles to cope with the (perceived) loss.

[goldislops]

Why People Procrastinate, and How to Overcome It

To stop putting off tasks, think about the positive

High angle view tired businesswoman with hands behind head working at desk with a laptop, papers, and open books

Amr Bo Shanab/Getty Images

To stop putting off tasks, think about the positive

By April 12, 2024—three days before the deadline for filing tax returns in the U.S.—more than a quarter of American taxpayers had yet to do so. Procrastination—delaying something despite an awareness of associated negative consequences, leading to discomfort—is a common experience for many. Unfortunately procrastination tends to carry significant costs. For instance, completing a task when rushing to finish can impact the quality of one’s work. Moreover procrastination is by its very definition stressful, and naturally such stress can take its toll. Chronic procrastinators tend to report more symptoms of illness, more visits to the doctor, lower overall well-being and even greater financial struggles.

So if procrastination is so costly, why do so many people regularly do it? Years of research have provided a reasonably comprehensive list of psychological factors that relate to procrastination. But it’s been unclear what mental processes underlie the decision to start or postpone a task. When faced with an upcoming deadline, how do people decide to initiate a chore or project?

To shed light on this question, we conducted a series of studies examining task delay, the behavioral component of procrastination in which people put off completing something despite lacking any objectively strategic reason to do so. We found that people with a negativity bias tend to delay tasks more, especially if they tend to be poor at self-control.

[areumchelle]

👩‍🏫 Run into the World of a Student pursuing an English Major👩‍🏫

Being a teacher is difficult because tons of school papers are being done not only in the classroom but also in their houses, and I'm fully aware of that since our family course is teacher.

Flashback 🕰️

I was in junior high back then when I decided that I would take tourism as my course, but unfortunately, my parents declined due to the fact that it was out of budget and would take time to pursue. I was unhappy until my aunt and her daughter, who was a teacher, told me that there's a huge advantage and benefit teachers have, which led me to decide that I would take education as my course. I then took English as my major because this is one of my weaknesses, and I want to enhance it so that I can work abroad, which is somehow connected to what I really want, which is to work in my dream place, South Korea.

My first year seems unreal. My journey finally starts, and as it begins, I'm a bit struggling with what I should do and how I can improve myself, especially since I'm new to this world. English was my weakness back when I was in high school, and as I'm pursuing English as my major, it makes me nervous since I'm afraid of public speaking. I later began to question my decisions, like, Does this course fit me? Is this what I really want? and many more. Even though I'm lacking and still coping, I didn't give up and still did my best in this course. Late night snack, or what I must call late night dinner, due to the deadlines I must finish, breakdowns that I always feel every time that I question myself, sleepiness nights, and improper bed routine, and these are the things that I experienced during my first year, but as I always do, everything happens for a reason, and I always pray to God that I will overcome these years without fear of failure. I didn't have friends when I was in 1st year since we were conducting our classes online, but I still have contacts and am chatting with some of my classmates to avoid being an outcast when face-to-face classes occur. One thing that I will not forget about when I was in my first year of college is the challenges that I thought I would not overcome, but God is good because all of my hard work and struggles paid off, and that concludes my first-year journey.

The new learning modality came when I was in my 2nd year of college, wherein we do classes in both online settings and face-to-face gatherings. The 2nd year for me is the happiest college year of my life, wherein I met my true friends and was also able to get familiar with as well as socialize with my other classmates that I've never met and talked back to when I was in my 1st year. It was fun, memorable, and full of obstacles. During this year, I first experienced crying over grades that I didn't deserve, but of course I looked at that as a positive thing and believed that grades don't define who I really am. My 2nd year is indeed the happiest year, but also the hardest year at all. I experience a lot, like no dinner at all, because of the deadliest deadlines I must finish within that day; I also experience being awake for 24 hours just to finish a video presentation; and lastly, I was sadly under a lot of pressure from my family and also scared to fail them. I thought back then that I wouldn't be able to come through and pass my second year, but I was wrong because I was recognized as a lister in both semesters. The lesson I've learned in my second year is that every challenge has its equivalent outcome. Yes,  it seems hard at first, but trust the process, and you won't think that you've finally overcome it. 2nd year is something I would treasure in my life because in here I learned a lot that helped and became me nowadays.

Time flies so fast, and now I can't believe that I was in my third year of college. All of my relatives and acquaintances say that the 3rd year is the hardest year of all in college, and I don't believe that until I experience it for myself. It feels suffocating and bombarding now that I'm in my 3rd year, wherein simultaneously deadlines, back-to-back reporting, research, and all of the other things I must accomplish to get a passing grade. I was in the first semester of the 3rd year, but it seems that I was in the 4th year because of the much more pressure from my family and aunt because they already know that I have a boyfriend. I always think positively every time I feel suffocated, and I think positively every time I am at the lowest point of my life. 3rd year is the hardest year, but I can say that this year is also the important year wherein you will learn a lot that will help me when I become a teacher. I was now more than half way to the finish line, and giving up is not my vocabulary anymore; crying is only the one that will help me to be better, and being positive as well as being with God are my partners at all times. Still far from what I should become, with more improvement and more pressure to come with all of my learning, I will be successful one day.

Experience, pressure, and struggles are the one that will mold me, and through these, I know that I will become a good teacher and will help the students one day.

"PADAYON FUTURE EDUCATORS"

[nobodieshero-main]

okay so i've finally finished the part where ahuru convinces keika to help atlas and stuff and i dont really know if it's like. paced right?? i wanted it to be a Struggle but i also didn't want to drag it out

His impromptu vow of silence splintered like thin ice, and he rounded on her, for lack of a better target. The container met the bench with a crack that might have broken the clay, had Keika not already reinforced his crockery with magic. 

“Why?”

Rather than flinching, Ahuru only rolled her eyes. His temper had never meant anything to her. 

“Because people only end up in this town when they’re desperate, but no one is ever desperate enough to come looking.” She reasoned, stepping forward. “I don’t know their reasons for wanting to get to those woods, but it has to be important right? They had to have travelled far to find us, and long enough to go following ghosts to a town that shouldn’t exist.” 

"Why don't you take them? Why does it have to be me?" He tried, suddenly aware of the way he was losing control of the conversation, his stubborn refusal smothered by his sisters steady logic. 

Despite a childhood of adventure and accidental trouble-making, Ahuru would never attempt to convince him of something unless she was sure it was worth it.

Keika just… he hated not knowing. The uncertainty about why Toa had sent them away, and whether she'd welcome either of them back, itched like dirt under his sleeves.

He wasn't sure he could trust his sister about this.

His sister who sniffed primly, and offered “Because I have a shop to run,” as her excuse.

Keika warbled in disbelief, eyebrows pulling down as Ahuru shrugged. 

“Well I have a library to run.” He challenged, aware that he’d lost the battle but not quite willing to stop fighting just yet. 

“The library can take care of itself.” 

She wasn’t wrong, unfortunately. 

“You only have to take them as far as the river.” She promised.

And Keika would keep saying no, would tell her to go to her own house and watch the travellers leave in the morning but… he remembered being 5 and sitting on wooden steps and feeling the not-so-gentle tugs of Ahuru braiding feathers into his hair. Remembered an 11 year old Ahuru stubbornly practising the common tongue so she could become the healer's apprentice because all she wanted to do was help people. 

Whatever these travellers wanted with the Mahina Woods wasn’t Keika’s problem, but Ahuru had made it hers and that… that kind of did make it Keika’s problem in a roundabout way. 

“Why are you pushing this so hard?” He asked again. “We don’t even know them.”

Ahuru tilted her head, looking out the window at the darkening streets. “I don’t know, it’s just a feeling I’ve got.”

Keika scoffed and finally began scooping tea leaves into two mugs, letting the steam from the kettle curl around his jaw and leave it damp and warm as he poured the hot water. 

“I’m not doing it.” He finally decided, ignoring the bristle of feathers in his periphery. 

After a long moment of silence, she sighed, wings drooping. "You're too stubborn for your own good," She said, tired. But she let the topic go, accepting her mug of tea with a quiet thank you before launching into a recount of her day.

Later, long after the sun had set and Ahuru had headed back to her roost, Keika found himself staring at the shadows of his ceiling, playing her words back in his head. 

You’re too stubborn, she had said, and she wasn’t wrong. It was, he could admit to himself, partially a matter of pride: he’d already said no, he couldn’t just take it back because Ahuru made a good argument. 

He just- he was an adult, he didn't have to do it just because his sister said.

He didn’t want to go.

He didn’t want to go all the way back to those trees, to the comfort of that never-ending night, just to be turned away at the shoreline, left to crawl back to his burrow reeking of a poison named nostalgia. How cruel could Ahuru be, to send him home knowing that he may not be welcome?

But Ahuru is the furthest thing from cruel, a voice whispered. Another truth.

Keika sighed from the very depths of his lungs until it trailed off into a groan and then slammed his pillow over his face in an attempt to smother himself. Maybe if he lost enough brain cells from a lack of oxygen he’d forget about the travellers entirely.

He clicked his tongue against his back teeth. Fuck.

[thelegendofhino]

While i do enjoy zelda games and zelda lore and whatnot i have only played 6 zelda games... i know there are a lot more than 6.

Obviously ive played breath of the wild and tears of the kingdom. I dont really know what made me want to play breath of the wild. It was very unlike other games id usually play. Especially since i tend to just play the same few games over and over again... but im glad i did, because i enjoyed it immensely, to the point where i played it twice, my first time being on the wiiu.

I think one of my earliest attempts of playing a zelda game that i can remember was wind waker on the gamecube. I never managed to beat it partly since the console was at my grandmothers house and partly because i got stuck at dragon roost island because something odd had happened with the collapsing stairs that i was unable to progress. I dont know if i had gotten actually softlocked or if it was just a skill issue on my part. I was kinda young at the time. I did end up playing and beating wind waker hd later on. Then i tried to play it again on the gamecube but for some reason i lost interest at the part where i had to find the iron boots to progress.

Ive played four swords adventure way too many times. More times than id care to admit. More times than i can count. For no reason other than it was the only zelda game we had for a while and i just loved playing the gamecube and it was not a very difficult game (there was one time when i was younger i did get stuck on one level for. Possibly hours, driving my parents insane because i just kept going back and forth trying to figure it out) and it was just a fun game. As much as ive played it i absolutely would not consider it my favorite zelda game. Its a fun game but its also boring at the same time. Probably just because ive already played it so many times.

Ive attempted minish cap twice and beat it once. My first attempt i couldnt figure out how to beat vaati, but in my defense, everything else in the game with singular eyes youre supposed to shoot them with arrows. So naturally i never once thought to swing my sword at vaati because he is just eyes. And eyes = arrows. And it just never occured to me to try and hit him normally until i replayed it earlier this year. Other than that, its a fun game, and i love how it looks.

I played links awakening dx. I dont remember much about that game actually. I enjoyed it. It looked cute. I had no means of playing the original. Thats all i have to say about it.

Now. Those are games that ive finished a playthrough of. Ive also attempted twilight princess. Unfortunately i attempted it right after having played botw for a while, so i had to get unused to being able to climb things. And... embarrassingly enough, i got stuck at the very first temple of the game where you get the boomerang. I just couldnt figure out where to go. And being very aware that this was so early in the game and i already got stuck did make me feel discouraged. Not that i thought the game was too hard, but that i shouldnt be struggling as much as i did... nobody was watching me play but i was still embarrassed anyway. So, perhaps in the future ill give it another shot.

Now i am playing ocarina of time and will hopefully play through majoras mask. I have a feeling i may not end up ever beating majoras mask, but... i will at least try.

[headcanonrepository]

Thoughts on Final Fantasy XII

I've been replaying Final Fantasy XII lately. I say replaying - I never actually finished it the first time around, yet have proudly denounced it as my least favourite entry in the series for years. But I decided that to be fair to that, I should actually finish the game, so I picked up Zodiac Age for cheap with the idea that I can show my wife exactly why I rate it so little. Definitely a 'get drunk and bitch about it' kind of idea. (So uh, sorry if this is your favourite game, but this is a pretty negative post, just FYI)

My original criticisms still hold up, for the most part. Vaan makes no sense as the main character - aside from stealing the first stone at the beginning of the game, his impact on the actual plot is nonexistent. The plot is something that happens around him, not something he drives and impacts. In fact, apart from Ashe and Balthier, it's really difficult to justify anyone's connection to the plot.

Compounding this is that no one ever really talks to each other or comments on the situations they are in. There are a few cutscenes, brief and far between, but for the most part, there's an immediate 'what next?' after every section that just serves to point the player in the right direction. We learn next to nothing about who the characters are as people - what do they think? What are they passionate about? What do they hate? We just don't know.

While I'm ragging on the plot: it's a dense opening with many kingdoms named, important leaders, and characters, all before you take control of a single one of them. It's a struggle to remember so many plot points introduced so rapidly, let alone care about them. The density of information continues throughout, where you are expected to remember who is part of which kingdom, who is an ally and who is foe and how different people's agendas are playing out from one scene to the next. It feels a lot like the prequel trilogy of Star Wars - lots of information introduced relatively quickly and without spending a lot of time memorising it, working out how and why things are happening is borderline impossible. I had a similar critique of the prequel SW movies: good plot and ideas, terrible execution. Unfortunately, FFXII doesn't have a whole miniseries to help the player comprehend the politics of Ivalice.

I really disliked the Gambit system the first time I played. It felt very much like getting the game to play itself and if that's the case, why am I playing a game? I'm just running from fight to fight. I appreciate it a little more now - mostly because I am a tired adult with limited game time so automatic fighting for 99% of the time combined with 2x speed (which honestly the original game should have had, it's been permanently on throughout this playthrough) makes it more palatable to grind and get through some of the longer travelling sections of the map. I also think it's partly because my expectation has shifted from 'strategy is what I choose to do in a fight' to 'strategy is how I prepare for the fight' - I was already aware of the gambit system and how to make it work so I could start having fun with trying new things.

However, the descriptions for some techniques are just ludicrous. The in-game text for Traveller lead me to assume that it gets stronger based on the total amounts of steps you've taken in the game (and similarly Horology for time spent in game). The wiki dispelled that illusion and confirmed that both attacks were pretty much useless unless you were micromanaging to a degree that I am simply not willing to do. Lots of the gameplay information is similarly vague and unhelpful. I feel like the only reason I understand what I'm doing is because I have played other Final Fantasy games (so I already know what the spells are supposed to do) or other RPGs (so I can guess that equipment will behave in a particular way or puzzles will react in a certain way). Even then, I've had to search for the odd solution (wait, you mean I have to summon the guy to open the door, not just touch it with the person who can summon him?).

The hunt sidequests are just tedious. There’s no need to pick up a hunt, then confirm with a separate NPC that you’ve accepted the hunt, then go to a third location to find the hunt (often with a stipulation that the mark can only be found when the weather is just right, which is largely random and results in you loading and unloading an area repeatedly to get the conditions right) and then go back to that NPC to claim the reward. Especially when none of those objectives are ever marked on your main map, and you can only access a reminder by opening up the main menu, selecting the clan primer, selecting hunts, scrolling through every hunt you’ve ever accepted (even completed ones) to find the current hunt, to see a description and on one very particular screen, you can open a map that has the hunt’s current objective marked. Unless it’s a hunt where it just gives a vague location for you to search. Those exist, too.

Speaking of tedious, the Great Crystal was a section designed to force you to use a guide. Prima must have bribed them for that, because I swear that place is impossible to navigate without a VERY detailed map - no ingame map, switches to open doors (on a timer) and multiple doors per switch that can actually wind up blocking access to areas later, so you have to retread old areas to reactivate the switch and open the right door (still on a timer) and do this while running past enemies and hopefully going the right direction, with no real visual clues or references? Either you grew up playing old school dungeon crawlers and you’ve drawn your own map, or you’ve bought a guide. Or googled, but back in 2006, you probably didn’t have ready access to the internet while you were playing.

On a really annoying ‘we want you to buy a guide’ note for me - Libra seems mostly useless as a skill. It allows you to see enemy data and traps in the world, which would be useful, except there’s a large swathe of enemies that are unreadable. Those would be the bosses and hunts - the powerful enemies you are most likely to want extra information on. Given that you have used resources to both learn and acquire the skill, plus the resource of time in the field to use it, it is really frustrating that it’s so useless when you really want it, and I can’t see a compelling gameplay reason for it except forcing you to use an external guide. Given that a large part of the combat is adjusting your strategy to suit the enemy you are facing, purposefully withholding the information is just forcing you to use trial and error or brute force. Or a guide.

The game thinks it's better at writing ye olde English than it is. I'm willing to chalk it up as difficulties in translation, but most of the dialogue is very stilted and formal regardless of who is speaking and what their actual background is. A third of the party are guttersnipe orphans, a third of the party are pirates and a third of the party are used to royal formalities - they should not all have the same vocabulary and manner of speaking. Similarly, the voice acting has some very weak moments that I absolutely chalk up to localisation difficulties - voice actors have to fit the dialogue to mouth flaps rather than the other way around, and they have some awful dialogue choices to work with, especially in fast-paced cutscenes.

Also, there are so many different non-human races and different human cultural backgrounds - which I love in theory - but they don't really explore anything in great detail. Either the beast races like Garrif and Viera don't want contact with humans and so give very minimal details on their culture and way of life, or they are like the Seeq and Bangaa - they integrate with humans so well that they might as well have been a human in a costume. Even the humans from vastly different places seem to not have any major differences between their ways of life, which considering a large motivation of the plot is war, you would think to see some kind of resistance or protest purely against losing their heritage or way or life. As it is, an NPC in Rabanastre is largely the same as an NPC in Archades.

There’s some really cool aesthetics in the background of Final Fantasy XII that were probably a result of Star Wars (personal hover-transports that absolutely aren’t speeders, the vehicles in Archades that don’t look at all like Coruscant or the huge dogfights between airships that definitely aren’t an action sequence from any movie franchise we can think of, no way…) but otherwise inaccessible to us as the player. Oh, you wanted control of a speeder? How about a chocobo? An airship? Uh, you can get one sometimes, if we want you to, but you don’t get to drive, and most of the time, you’re on foot, bucko. I’m not saying a little speeder chase section would have made the game amazing, but it would have been cool as all hell if we had something like the motorcycle chase sequence from FFVII to break the game up a little bit, you know?

Despite all this, I did have some kind of fun with the game. But it's definitely one where I'm brought my own fun. Like trying to work out how I would rewrite the script to make it more compelling. There are definitely seeds of something interesting, just never really explored.

Things I actually liked, in no specific order:

Balthier and Fran’s whole dynamic. I really like shady duos who have shared history, with the man as the brains and the woman as the brawn of the operation. Optional points for the woman being athletic, agile, and a woman of few words. If I had a nickle for every duo who met this standard…well, I’d have two nickles, but it’s weird that it’s happened twice. (see Roman and Neo from RWBY)

The fact that Vaan and Ashe didn’t wind up romantically entangled. Like, I was really worried that was going to be a thing. Especially as the game kept setting up ‘Ashe sees dead ex-husband’ followed immediately by ‘but anyway, here’s Vaan’. He is so young and childlike in comparison to the weight on Ashe’s shoulders, I was really squicked to think that this was a direction they might be going in.

The vierra in general - I just wish we had more of them and their culture. Just give me about 20 more cutscenes where I can appreciate tall bunny ladies who can step on me, please and thank you?

That’s about it. The team dynamic was underwhelming, to say the least, no one really bonded or connected with each other on-screen in any way the player could appreciate, they all just bounced around from plot point to plot point reacting (barely) to circumstances as they came up and never really had a proactive plan or goal.

If you did really like Final Fantasy XII, I'm actually really interested to hear why. If you read this and disagree, and want to point out things you really liked, please do. My opinion is not going to change, but it might help me appreciate an element of the game I had disregarded.

[heart-ur-art]

hello, out there ~

pls excuse my lack of pfp, header or anything of the like, i promise this is a blog by a human and not a bot account.

i don't remember when i made this blog, but i had originally created it with the intentions of not only trying to help other artists slow down and appreciate all the hard work they put into their creations since the surge of 'hustle culture' is forever prominent on social media platforms these days in order to have any hope of presence and consequently, i feel causing artists to feel less value in the work they accomplish, sadly, but to also help myself be more aware of and actually celebrate the advancement of my own skill and hard work that i put towards my art and hobbies.

unfortunately, as is quite apparent by this empty blog that's been floating around in my list of blogs for some time now, i think i've hit more of a wall in my creativity than was previously known.

i've always struggled a lot over the many years (probably close to around 15 now) that i actually have tried to actively improve my art skills to work towards specific goals in that i struggle in knowing exactly HOW to practice art, as far as good fundamental/foundational knowledge is concerned, but i also... pretty much only have WIPs and next to no finished pieces of art (and this is also true for many other hobbies i do; hardly anything ever gets finished).

it's incredibly demotivating and disheartening, especially with the new modern day expectation of artists (or creators of any kind, really) to churn out art as if they were machines and seeing people's quick improvements and new discoveries of skills. i constantly feel behind in the art world. and yes, i'm aware that it's not a requirement to put out art in this manner for hobbyist artists; slow artists are valid and can be very successful and fulfilled, too. but i think we've all felt the pressure to create more and more, faster and faster than before even if it's just for validation purposes.

and it's almost become a requirement if you wish to have any hope of obtaining any monetary compensation for your work (which, i have hoped to obtain even small scale as extra funds for years when i was abled enough to work, but even more so now that i find myself at a higher needs disabled status and unable to work + mostly home-bound and would like to sell my art skills for even a little bit of financial independence after being forced to move back in with my parents for unforeseen personal reasons). i think this is why i tend to find myself crawling back to sites where things WERE slower years ago when i first started to get into the art world.

as is also the motivation for wanting to create this blog. to encourage us all to remember, it's okay to take our time and experiment and learn at a pace that's enjoyable again and just share our achievements in pure enjoyment for creation and less for the sake of getting stuff out there as quick as possible or the first to jump on new trends/popular content for the numbers.

so i guess we start here. in a position of where i find myself unable to create despite.. wanting to on an almost daily basis.

im often wondering how so many people ARE able to create daily, how do they stay motivated and focused? what keeps them inspired to always have ideas to put down on canvas?

this is especially the case for anyone who is of any neurodivergencies that affect energy, focus and motivation and are able to create consistently because this is seeming to be a very significant struggle with myself (i'm assuming has always been but have only more recently discovered that i'm VERY much ND) as of late.

i'm certain i'm not the only person out there feeling this exact same way or very similarly. so, please, i invite anyone interested in taking a breather away from social platform expectations and growing more peacefully in skill to join me in trying to discover how to achieve this.. together.

i can't say for sure what exactly i have planned for this blog and how we can all come together to bring more genuine joy back to creating, as i often have many ideas, but i tend to be quite lost as to how to follow through with them. maybe we'll figure it out along the way.

anyone of any skill level and any medium of art is welcome to join. (i will say up front, i do not consider any ai made anything to be a self-made art-form as it is imitating works of real human artists, so that is not an acceptable 'medium' here. you're welcome to pick up a pencil, stylus, brush, sculpting material, whatever if you'd like to actually participate and learn a skill from this space)

i suppose what i'm asking of this first post is.. how is it that YOU create? how or what do you do for practicing or warm-ups? what do you do on days where there's less focus or motivation for drawing or creating? what inspires your work?

very interested in others' creative process, and please those who deal with road blocks from neurodivergent disorders, lemme know how you work around them in order to do what you do ~

feel free to reblog this with commentary or tags explaining, drop a comment on this post or i'll even open the ask box if preferred to respond that way (no anons for now; i've not had great experiences with anon asks in the past)

please remember to always be kind, to others and to yourself. wishing you happy creating ~

[kirathehyrulian]

💚🧡Wayward Sons Zine 2022🧡💚 🌧️Alleyway Rendezvous🌧️

(Please do not edit/alter. Feel free to reblog, but please do not repost. At the very least please give me credit.) | Zine•Tumblr | Zine•Twitter | Zine•AO3 | Zine•Download |

Summary: Sam and Dean meeting up in an alleyway for a hunt on a late rainy evening. [Ao3]

For more art from me please check out my “myart” tag here on Tumblr. 👇(Art Notes and Bonus Art below the cut) 👇  

 Art Notes: I've been stuck in a drawing rut so bad lately. It was a struggle making this piece. But, I signed up as a pinch hitter, so I was determined to keep my word when they called on me. It's funny because I find drawing younger Jared/Sam and younger Jensen/Dean to be so intimidating because there's just a big limit on references from their younger years. But, then the mods made a post about being worried people would drop and that worried me. I'm a supporter of gencest and wincest things so I did want the zine to succeed.

So, I signed up as a pinch hitter with half of me hoping that I can do something at least half way decent if they call on me and the other half thinking that they probably won't even need me. I'm just a back up in case someone else can't do their work. But, come to find out for some unfortunate reason someone did drop out of teen section and I was called to make good on my promise. And for what it's worth, I did make good on it.

The mods gave me somewhere around, I guess, 2 months? I got most of March and then all of April to finish. Starting from March 5, I started brainstorming questions and ideas right away. I asked if there was a collective zine theme besides the boys being teens. The mod told me the main theme was them growing up together. And I was going to go for gencest (though if people want to see it as wincest Idc, go ahead) I chose the option to have the boys doing regular teenager stuff with a hunter twist.

After that I asked if there was any additional info I needed and if I needed to be aware of what others were creating so we all didn't create the same stuff, mainly because the last Zine I was in the mods were worried about that. There wasn't any additional info that I needed, but the mod I was talking to did say go ahead and run any ideas I had about what I wanted to do by them and they'd check if I was doing something too similar to another artist. So, five days later I came back with two ideas that I was toying with, "a hot summer day stuck in a cabin/house/motel, or Sam and Dean in some kind of a dark back alley with neon lights". The response I got back was that the latter idea was the most unique. So, I went forward with that idea.

So, before I started sketching Sam and Dean, I obsessively searched for refs of young Jared and Jensen and saving what I could find to my drive for ease of access. In the zine guidelines the teen section said 15-18 years old, which didn't specify if that meant 18 for Sam or 18 for Dean. I took it as 18 for Sam. Which even though gives me a bigger range to work with, ends up making Dean technically a legal adult than a teen. But, I don't specify the ages in this piece so I feel like there's some plausible deniability with Sam being somewhere in his later teen years but before Stanford.

Anyways, I tried to concentrate on refs around those times, but Jared's youth on the internet is pretty much non existent especially compared to Jensen. But, I tried my best even though I ended up mainly using refs from when Jared and Jensen were young adults. I did try to make them look younger than the refs tho, especially Sam. I shortened his chin a smidge and made him noticeable shorter than Dean who's leaning against the wall, not even standing at full height. I also had to brainstorm what kind of hairstyle I wanted to put on Sam. I decided to give him something similar to his main season 1 hair, but a little shorter in length. And that's mainly because I wanted this to look like Sam, rather than Jared and his other roles. I'm not sure how I feel about the final results. A lot of this work was me not really having concrete directions and me just playing around, for better or worse.

When I started, I sketched Sam and Dean first and then tried to sketch out a background that made sense for their positions. I keep trying to do backgrounds, but I don't know if I'm getting any better at them. It's definitely not my worst, but I feel like it could be better somehow.

On March 30th, the first check in was due and I had pretty much finished my sketch. I changed my mind on it being nighttime with neon lights in the background and wanted to color it with daytime in mind. I thought daytime might be easier to color and render. And, I told the mods that "I feel good about my progress, and I'm pretty sure I'll be done before April 25th," which was the final check in on the schedule.

After that I made the line art and colored in the base colors. I put a free texture on the brick wall, and copy, paste, and vertically flipped a reflection of the background building for the background pavement. I added in the signs and fonts with Photoshop Elements 15. But, when I started to add shading and lighting, I changed my mind again. I wanted it to be raining, and the boys are taking cover by some kind of overhang in the alleyway. But, I still wanted it to be daytime, but on like a really cloudy evening where light is barely shining through the clouds. In the end, it ended up being darker than I initially was going for. So, it like full circled back to nighttime by the end.

As some late additions, I added water drops to the foreground, because sometimes water gets stuck to the camera lens, windows, glasses, or eyelashes in rainy scenes and I thought it'd be cool. And, I added a faint passing car light to be the main light for Sam and Dean's shadows on the wall, or at least that was the idea, anyways. I also did try to add graffiti to the wall too, but it felt really distracting so I ended up making it really faint.

Towards the end, I pretty much got sick of looking at and fiddling with it. I get somewhat obsessive sometimes, where I can't let things go. And, it's like the little things in this piece would be driving me crazy, but I couldn't figure out what it was. I was at that point where continuing to try to fix whatever I was bothering me had just as much a likelihood of making the piece worse. So, on April 18th, I turned it in. And then, I waited for May 2nd when the Zine would be officially posted. The next day after I made and submitted my personal art posts. And that's pretty much everything.

Looking back at it now, I'm pretty happy with how my Sam and Dean turned out. I need to work on my background and composition skills (those seem to be what I always struggle with the most) but overall I feel pretty good about the whole thing. I probably need to force myself to experiment more with free flowing, simple, blurry styles instead of my go to where everything has a defined shape. But, saying it vs actually breaking out of my comfort zone is an up hill battle.

Bonus Art:

This is just a peek behind the curtains. I took out the rain, reflection, fog, atmosphere filter, some of the lighting, the car light, and one shading layer. In some ways this version is better for being less complicated, but I do like the moodiness in the official version. I'm mainly sharing this to compare and contrast with the main, and to show that yes, I did intend for daytime initially when coloring, lol.

Enjoy, if you can!♥♥♥

[kyovtani]

𝒔𝒕𝒊𝒍𝒍 𝒊𝒏𝒕𝒐 𝒚𝒐𝒖 – 𝒊𝒘𝒂𝒊𝒛𝒖𝒎𝒊 𝒉𝒂𝒋𝒊𝒎𝒆

࿏ pairing: iwaizumi hajime x chubby female reader ࿏ genre: fluff, smut, angst; best friends to lovers!AU ࿏ word count: 11.6k (at this point i have no explanation, im sorry) ࿏ warnings: swearing, mentions of body image issues, self doubts, anxiety, bullying, fat shaming; as well as violence and blood (iwa gets into a fight mwah); ddlg (daddy dom-little girl) dynamics, soft dom!iwa, body worship, praising, sugarcoated degradation, spitting, choking, fingering, face riding, unprotected sex

࿏ Summary: After four years of trying to get over your stupid crush on your best friend, said male finally comes back home and all of a sudden all of those plans are thrown overboard...

Even though you‘ve known about it for so long now, you still feel your heart skip a beat when Matsukawa mentions his return to Japan and no matter how hard you try to, you can‘t help the way the disgusting mixture of anxiety, nervousness and excitement starts filling your veins.

After all it‘s been literal years since you‘ve last seen him.

Iwaizumi Hajime, former Seijoh Ace, now freshly majored athletic trainer, your best friend of ten years and — love of your life.

However, of course he doesn‘t know about the latter and as pathetic as it may sound, you‘re quite proud of yourself for hiding your feelings for him so well that he hasn‘t suspected anything in all these years the two of you have been friends.

Of course it‘s painful and basically nothing but literal torture to watch the guy you‘ve lost your heart to years ago, move on with his life thinking he‘s nothing but a friend to you, but you know you‘d always choose this pain over the one of rejection and shame.

Because after all you‘re not his type or what he looks for in a partner and you're very much aware of it.

And no matter how many times you daydream about a life as his girlfriend, you won’t ever forget about the fact that Iwaizumi Hajime, basically a literal athlete, would never date someone who looked like you.

Growing up on the bigger side, physically wise, has always been difficult and something you're struggling with to this day. You had always hoped for those extra pounds to disappear once you hit puberty, just like it had happened to all of your friends but those hopes were quickly destroyed when you still found yourself hiding from full length mirrors to avoid having to look at your own body in your third year of High School.

By the time you turned eighteen, you had tried every kind of diet in hopes of losing weight but all of them just ended with you losing motivation and every bit of your happiness and even though you still struggle with it in your mid-twenties, you‘ve come to terms with it.

This is who you are and despite taking literal decades to realize it, you‘ve slowly but surely started accepting it.

However, when it comes to relationships, you‘ve given up completely.

After years and years of being rejected, hidden, fat shamed and disrespected by men who hated their own attraction to bigger women, you stopped wasting your time and energy on dating. If you wanted to hear someone shame you for being big, you could just go home to your family or back in your memory to remember all those mean things the skinny girls in your school had thrown at you.

Or you could just look in the mirror and let your brain do the job after eating literally anything.

Just thinking about a guy like Iwaizumi looking at you in that way has you chuckling coldly and every time you imagine confessing to him, it ends with a broken heart on your side because your brain loves to keep things realistic and never once have you considered the possibility of him liking you back.

It‘s not that Iwaizumi, or any of the Seijoh Volleyball boys, have treated you badly or even slightly differently in the three years you were their manager, but after having to deal with fat shaming your whole life, it has become quite difficult for you to believe that anyone found you attractive at all.

Especially people like the widely known Seijoh third years who also happen to – still – be your closest friends.

And unfortunately, as glad as you are that Iwaizumi remains rather oblivious to your year-long crush on him, the other boys, including the professional athlete to be, Oikawa Tōru who’s currently living his best life in Argentina are pretty much aware of your feelings for the trainer.

So, just as usual whenever the topic of Iwaizumi Hajime enters the conversation between the other two, you’re met with pitying stares from Takahiro and a lot of teasing coming from Issei. But at this point you’ve gotten quite used to it and don’t mind the brunette’s words, whereas you still find yourself growing absolutely annoyed at the way Makki stared at you.

“Stop staring at me like that, Hiro!”, you hiss and roll your eyes, the pity in his face so evident, if you didn’t know any better you’d think he’s mocking you.

“Just confess to him already!”, the strawberryblonde hisses, running one of his pale hands through his locks before he takes a big sip from his beer.

“Yeah, sure!”, you spit back, your words dripping in sarcasm and annoyance as you try to avoid your chest from growing even heavier at the thought of your best friend coming back after all those years.

“He broke up with that blondie months ago”, Matsukawa begins, his naturally sleepy gaze roaming your face attentively, “and he’s coming back to Japan. Now you really have no excuse left, Y/N”, and just as usual his words hit the right spot and all you can do is let out a shaky sigh before the intensity of your insecurities breaks down onto you like a huge wave.

“I‘m not his type, Mattsun”, you hiss, the bitter taste of reality coating the muscle of your tongue in the worst way possible, “and I‘ve had enough males reject and– or fat shame me. If I have to add Hajime to that list as well, it’s going to break me.”

You feel the two males’ soft gazes on you, whereas you can‘t help but focus on the napkin in between your fingers in hopes of distracting yourself from all those dark thoughts by nervously pulling at it.

“Iwa‘s not like that, Y/N”, Makki replies, brows furrowed in irritation; something you've grown quite used to seeing whenever the topic of your body image issues occured.

“Has he ever dated a big girl before, hm?”, you reply and look at him with arched brows and your lips pressed into a thin line. At the lack of response from the two men in front of you, you just lean back and nod.

“That‘s the point”, you take another deep, shaky breath; the tears threatening to spill from your glossy eyes at the thought of your pretty faced best friend and only men in your heart, “nobody likes women who look like me in that certain way, my loves. Every guy I‘ve been and slept with wanted to hide me or the relationship we had because they didn‘t want to be seen with a big girl.”

Suddenly you‘re hit with the memory of all those times you went home after any kind of intercourse with a male who had brought your hopes up with sugarcoated lies. Only to receive a harsh reality check when they asked you to not tell anyone about it, knowing it‘s simply because of the fact you aren‘t part of society‘s beauty standards.

“Y/N, we-”, “I‘m not talking about you two”, you‘re quick to interrupt Hanamaki, giving him a soft smile, “I know you don‘t care about it and sometimes I find myself wishing I would have fallen for one of you instead of the professional trainer”, you let out an empty, coldhearted chuckle before you finish your glass of wine in one go.

“I would fuck you without hesitation”, Mattsun shrugs, his plump lips stretching into a playful smirk and the tiny hint of seriousness in his gaze has you rolling your eyes with a soft scoff.

“Oh, shut the fuck up, Issei”, Makki hisses and gives his best friend the same reaction as you.

“What? I‘m being serious! You know this isn‘t the first time I‘m offering this to you, pretty one”, the brunette replies and this time you can‘t help but chuckle softly at his words, showing him your appreciation for his ability to make such heavy topics vanish from the surface so easily.

“Thank you, Issei but that guy I met on Tinder has been ghosting me for two weeks after we fucked and that‘s why I‘ve had enough dick for now”, and just when you let your gaze roam over the brunette‘s handsome face, you watch Hanamaki‘s face brighten up suddenly and furrow your brows in confusion.

“Hearing Y/N talk about dick is definitely not what I was expecting to come back to but it‘s surely a surprise!”

And upon hearing the familiar voice of your best friend, you understand the reason behind the change in Makki’s expression.

You watch the other two get up from their chairs, approaching the freshly majored trainer with the biggest smiles plastered on their faces whereas you try your best to stay as calm as possible.

However, the simple thought of Iwaizumi coming back had already stressed you out and having him stand behind you in all his glory made the tightness in your chest and the struggle to take proper breaths intensify just like that.

After what feels like an eternity you finally get yourself to stand up as well, turning around literally convinced you‘re ready to see him again after all these years only for it to be the exact opposite.

Your heart skips a whole beat at the sight of Iwaizumi and for a quick second you feel yourself getting dizzy from the lack of oxygen in your lungs.

“Hey”, he mumbles, his voice deep and raspy, something you‘re used to since the two of you have been talking regularly on the phone over the time yet hearing it in person again sends a jolt of hot arousal right into your core.

You nervously let your eyes roam his face; taking in the sight of his features, which have become even sharper during his absence. A soft sigh falls past your lips when you find the little scar right underneath his eyebrow which he had gotten back in middle school during one of his volleyball practices. The familiarity and feeling of security in the soft expression of his pretty, dark green eyes calms you down in an instant and by the time you feel your muscles ease up a bit, he‘s already approaching you with open arms.

Different than you’ve expected from yourself, you‘re quick to wrap your arms around his slim waist, taking him into your embrace with the intention of never letting him go again and at the feeling of his big hands on your body, you can‘t help but tear up a little.

You sniffle softly against the crook of his neck, Iwaizumi letting out a breathy chuckle at your sweet reaction as he caresses your back gently, subconsciously massaging your soft flesh to calm you down even more.

“Seems like someone missed me a lot more than she wanted to admit on the phone, hm?”, Iwa mumbles softly, placing the sweetest kiss on the top of your head as he holds you tight.

Matsukawa and Hanamaki let out a row of deep chuckles, partly laughing at your obvious reaction and partly because of their best friend‘s blatant oblivion.

“Shut up”, you reply with a sniff, taking in the light yet intense smell of his aftershave as well as the scent of detergent you had missed oh so much.

“Enough now, Y/N”, Mattsun huffs, “you can cuddle his stupid ass some other time, let‘s catch up with Mister America”, he adds and you know too well the tall brunette simply does it to stop you from falling even further into this dark hole you‘ve dug yourself; all those years ago.

Throughout the whole night, you stay rather quiet; listening to Iwaizumi‘s stories, more so to his voice but definitely his stories, too.

And every time he mentions some random girl he hooked up with or one of his ex girlfriends, you can literally feel the way he‘s avoiding your gaze; his eyes moving away from your face to focus on the guys as his voice turns a little less enthusiastic. You try your best not to read anything into it, knowing he‘s always been more hesitant towards you when it came to topics like this and in some way you find yourself appreciating it because it definitely helps to make the pain in your chest a little less heavy.

The atmosphere between the four of you remains calm; the familiarity something you‘ve always missed despite you and the other two boys spending just as much time together as you used to back in High School. Having Iwaizumi in your little circle again definitely has changed the air and it‘s in times like these you realize just how close you all actually are.

However, when Hanamaki and Matsukawa both stand up, cigarettes firmly placed between their plump lips, telling the two of you to give them a few minutes, you feel yourself slowly wandering into a state of anxiousness and slight panic.

It‘s not like you haven‘t talked to him alone during his stay in America, but the thought of having to look him in the eyes as you speak has always been something you‘ve struggled with.

Iwaizumi has this certain expression in his beautiful, dark green eyes, which makes it so much harder to not fall for him even more.

You don‘t know if it‘s the confidence and lack of insecurity or the mixture of softness and home which have the butterflies in your stomach go absolutely crazy.

Neither of you say anything for a good minute, your eyes glued to your phone screen which continuously lights up; Oikawa‘s name appearing several times.

You excuse yourself to give the professional athlete the responses he‘s waiting for, rolling your eyes at his way of telling you to shoot your shot at Iwa and “get that D”.

“Are you still talking to that one guy you told me about?”, Iwaizumi suddenly says, his eyes never once leaving yours and with a soft chuckle, you shake your head; enjoying the amount of protectiveness dripping from his words.

“We fucked and then he ghosted me”, you say casually, not realizing that it‘s not one of the other two boys you‘re talking to and with a soft gasp of embarrassment you try to mumble your way out of the situation.

“Iwa, I‘m-”, “Why the fuck would he even do that? Give me his fucking address so I can introduve his kneecaps to my baseball bat”, he‘s quick to interrupt you harshly, his tone filled with anger as his eyes gleam with wrath.

“It‘s okay”, you smile softly, placing your hand on his balled fists to calm him down again, “he told me not to tell anyone that we did it so his intentions have never been good. And on top of that – his dick game was so bad, I didn‘t even get to finish but had to take care of it myself, so it‘s definitely not worth the headache.”

You watch Iwaizumi‘s expression darken even further, his beautiful dark green eyes roaming your face with irritation oozing from his gaze and for a second you like to believe that there‘s even a hint of jealousy in between all those intense emotions but just as usual you find yourself shaking it off rather quickly.

“Why did he ask you not to tell anyone? What the fuck is even wrong with that guy?”, the brunette spits, downing the rest of his beer in one go.

You know why he‘s this angry and at this point you can’t even blame him anymore. Iwaizumi has never really understood why you put up with guys who treated you like absolute shit; continuously telling you how you deserved so much better and even though you wanted to agree, you simply couldn‘t. Because in your head, all those men who were ashamed of being with you yet still found their way to your door were exactly what was meant to be your life.

“Because being with a woman like me isn‘t anything he‘s proud of, Iwa”, you sigh, the words heavy and bitter on your tongue as you struggle to voice the hard reality.

“A woman like you?”, he replies and you see the genuine confusion on his handsome face, making his oblivion sweet almost.

“A big woman, Iwaizumi. Guys don‘t date big girls because we don‘t fit into society‘s beauty standards so being with us is something they‘re ashamed of because God forbid someone thinks they find us attractive“, you nervously play with the hem of your skirt, not having the courage to look into his face as those thing leave your lips, too embarrassed to meet his usually so welcoming and soft, but now wrath-filled gaze.

“That‘s bullshit”, Hajime is quick to spit back, hating the way you belittle yourself like that because of a random guy.

You smile, a soft scoff falling past your lips before you take a sip from the glass in front of you and even though you know you‘re going to regret those words, you still can‘t get yourself to stop from leaving you.

“Then why have you never dated a big girl, Haji?”, your voice is slightly shaky yet you remain the eye contact like a champion, never once averting your gaze from his handsome face even though the thrumming of your heart in your throat makes it so much more difficult to stay focused.

Iwaizumi seems taken aback; your words obviously hitting a place he wasn‘t expecting and that‘s when the feeling of guilt reaches its peak.

“I‘m not- It‘s not because I don‘t find them attractive I just- I uhm-”, the freshly majored professional trainer stumbles over his words like a two-year-old who just started learning how to speak and at the sight of a deep blush covering the apples of his cheeks as well as the tip of his nose and the whole of his neck, you let out a soft sigh.

“You don‘t have to explain yourself, Iwaizumi. I wasn‘t trying to accuse you of anything or offend you in any way, I promise. It’s just a topic I‘ve grown really tired of in the past few years”, you explain, making sure to choose your words carefully and when the tall male suddenly starts calming down again, you know you‘ve got him.

“Y/N, look-”, “Hey, Y/N the weak-dick-game guy is sitting at the bar with his ugly friends, just for your information”, Matsukawa‘s deep voice quickly cuts Iwaizumi off, his words sending shivers down your spine in the most disgusting way possible and with an almost painful roll of your eyes, you down the rest of your best friend‘s beer.

“Wait- What? Which one is it?”, Iwaizumi grunts, the calmness from a few seconds ago completely gone as you look at him with brows furrowed in slight irritation and annoyance.

“It doesn‘t matter, Iwa”, you say and wrap your fingers around his tattooed wrist, making him look into your eyes with another soft exhale, “he‘s not worth it. Just let it go.”

“Y/N, I said”, Iwaizumi is quick to place one of his big hands on your cheek, the dominance in his aura and the authority gleaming in his eyes has you gasping for air and just as usual you feel your panties growing wetter by the minute, “which one is it?”

His words don‘t leave room for protest; so strict and demanding, no matter how hard you try to think rationally, his naturally dominant persona has you submitting to him in a way no other guy has ever managed to.

“T-The one with the long, dark purple Hair”, you quickly reply, pulling your bottom lip between your teeth at the sight of Iwaizumi‘s anger and determination.

“Good girl”, he mumbles and pulls away, not even aware of the way his praise has your cunt throbbing like crazy and you absolutely hate him for it.

For a second you can‘t even get back to reality, the haze of arousal and longing for the tall male standing in front of you completely taking over your consciousness.

However, as soon as your brain registers Makki‘s panicked voice, you‘re quick to snap back and without missing another beat, you grab Iwaizumi‘s arm and look at him with pleading eyes.

“Please don‘t make a scene”, you whisper, knowing oh too well how much he loves to get himself in trouble because of his friends.

“He fucked then ghosted you all that while saying he doesn‘t want anyone to know he was with you because you're a big girl? That ugly fucker needs a fucking reality check because he can count himself hella fucking lucky to ever get a go with a woman as amazing and hot as you”, Iwaizumi hisses, his words filled with anger yet so, so sweet that without giving it another thought, you simply let go and try not to show him just how flustered he‘s gotten you.

“Are you guys about to kiss right now?”, Matsukawa suddenly says and with an almost audible roll of your eyes you lift your hand up, showing him your middle finger before you watch Iwaizumi‘s brows furrow even further with visible irritation.

“Then don‘t fight him”, you sigh, “please, Hajime, don‘t get yourself in trouble for a guy who‘s not worth it.”

“We‘ll see about it”, is all he says before he moves out of your tight grip, leaving you to stand at the table like that.

You feel your heart picking up its pace at the sight of the love of your life approaching your ex-hook up; several worst case scenarios popping up in your head within a few short seconds. And unfortunately every single one ends with Hajime throwing his fist into the guy‘s face because of his raging anger issues; something he‘s been trying to handle throughout his whole life.

“Makki, please do something”, you whimper and look at the strawberryblonde with glossy eyes; shivers running down your spine at the sudden sound of Hajime's deep voice cutting through the music of the bar.

“Not into you my fucking ass”, Takahiro hisses and follows Iwaizumi with quick steps, whereas Matsukawa remains next to you, watching the scene unfold with the fattest, shit eating grin on his face.

And while you‘re worried about Iwaizumi‘s well-being, said male can‘t even seem to think straight. The only thing he manages to focus on is the raging anger and hot wrath rushing through his veins at the thought of some random, small dicked guy treating you like dirt. With every step he takes, it seems to get worse and at some point the professional trainer is worried about his physical health because of the pace his heart is hammering against his rib cage with.

Iwaizumi has always struggled to understand why you put up with males who are literally unworthy of your presence yet every time he had asked, you simply shrugged and told him that this was how you were meant to be loved. Behind closed doors, hidden away from the world by people who literally worship the society‘s beauty standard.

And all of that when you‘ve had him right in front of you for all those years, ready to love and worship every bit of your body and soul.

Of course for you to let him love you he might have had to tell you about his feelings but as the years passed by, Iwaizumi slowly started to lose every bit of hope he had left. During his four year long absence you‘ve had your fair share of boyfriends and after the third one, the only choice he had left was to force himself to move on or else he would have lost his mind.

It‘s not like he never wanted to confess during High School but there was just something holding him back. The thought of losing you was heavy on his chest especially because Iwaizumi was very well aware you didn‘t feel the same. So for his own sake he chose not to tell you about his feelings for you; not even bearing the mental image of going through such rough times without you by his side.

He‘s already lost count of the amount of times he wanted to scream at you about how he would treat you just how you truly deserved to be treated and not like those douchebags who liked to use you for their own pleasure just to throw you away like a used tissue once they were done.

And after not being able to physically do anything for you because of the distance, he‘s finally got the chance to show you that no, those guys‘ behavior is not okay and yes, putting them back into their place is absolutely worth the headache.

“Hey”, the trainer hisses, coming to stand directly in front of the tall, purple haired guy, Rin Matsuoka,  who‘s quick to harden his expression upon seeing the brunette.

“What can I help you with, big guy?”, Rin mumbles, placing his bottle of beer on the counter with his brows raised in curiosity.

Iwaizumi doesn‘t even waste another minute as he harshly grabs the collar of Rin‘sblack leather jacket, pulling him closer to himself. His friends  rather quickly, yet Hanamaki and this time even Matsukawa are faster, coming to stand right next to each one of them with their arms firmly placed in front of their bodies to stop them from intervening.

“You‘re gonna listen to me and you‘re gonna listen good, did you fucking hear me?”, and just like a few minutes ago, Hajime‘s voice is cold and distant, not leaving room for discussion all while making sure to keep his tight grip.

The confusion and immense irritation is clearly visible on Rin‘s features; brows furrowed, jaw tensed and eyes gleaming with some kind of unnameable anger.

And the longer you watch the situation unfold, the heavier the anxiety in your system becomes and as you struggle to take proper breaths, you find yourself approaching your best friends; not wanting him to get his hands dirty on a guy like Matsuoka.

“What the-”, “Iwa please, he‘s not worth it..”, you say and wrap your fingers around his wrist, trying to find his gaze with desperate eyes only for him to gulp harshly and calmly tell you to take a step back.

“You?”, Rin spits, his dark eyes boring into your side as you try to ignore him; the amount of humiliation and shame washing over your body way too overwhelming to handle.

“Haji, let‘s just go, please”, you whisper, taking his face into your hands, his skin literally burning underneath your fingertips.

“No, Y/N, this stupid bastard has to understand that you can‘t just go and treat women like absolute dirt and get away with it”, Iwaizumi moves out of your soft touch, making Rin shift his attention back on you before the deep voice of one of his friends cuts through the tension.

“What the fuck is he talking about, Rin? Do you know her?”, the blonde says, his tone rather degrading when talking about you and at the way his eyes roam your body with a rather opposed expression show you exactly why that‘s the case.

“N-No, I don‘t!”, he‘s quick to defend himself, his eyes shifting to his friends with sheer panic filling the dark color and you feel your heart sink and the disgusting feeling of shame rushing through your veins.

“You‘re such a fucking piece of shit, Rin”, you hiss and swallow your tears; the taste bitter as the realization of being sometjing to be ashamed of hits you yet again.

“You definitely weren‘t acting like this when you fucked me”, you add and roll your eyes, taking a step back as the anger overcomes you and you basically give Iwaizumi a silent free pass to do whatever the hell he needs to, “or better said – when you tried to. It wasn‘t like I came with your weak dick game anyway so..”

“You fucked that fat bitch? Oh, yikes”, the other friend suddenly says, his words hitting you in the face like literal bricks and before you can even take your next breath or shift your eyes to the face the voice belongs to, the guy suddenly falls to the floor, holding his bloody nose.

You let out a shocked gasp, your eyes falling to Hanamaki who‘s busy shaking his hand, his knuckles already reddened and slightly bruised as he looks at you with a satisfied grin, “no one gets to call my best friend a bitch.”

“I was full on drunk and- do you really think I‘d fuck her sober?”, Rin tries to talk himself out of it and with a cold chuckle you throw your head back.

“How the fuck dare you talk to her like that”, is the last thing Iwaizumi spits before he throws his fist right into Rin‘s face with a deep grunt.

Another loud shriek escapes your lips and suddenly the anger and anxiety seem to leave your body and a huge wave of adrenaline hits you at the sight of your ex-hook up falling to the floor and Iwaizumi quickly moving with him.

For what feels like a whole hour but is probably nothing longer than a minute, you‘re literally frozen; your eyes the only moving part of your body as you watch your best friends break their knuckles on the jaws of literal strangers to them.

The following hour passes by in a blur. You can‘t really remember how or who separated them from those guys, or how you got yourself to call an uber and manage to get the four of you to your flat.

By the time the adrenaline stops making the blood rush in your ear, you‘re taking care of Matsukawa‘s wounds with shaky hands; the two others holding ice packs to their faces to ease the swelling of their bruises.

“Stop sighing so much”, Iwaizumi suddenly says, his dark eyes focusing the movements of your hands before he looks at you with a slightly softer expression, “we did what we had to do. And I‘m glad we did it. Those guys already looked so fucking punchable”, he explains and with a scolding scoff you press your lips to a thin line.

“You‘re back in Japan for how long? Two days? Yet already got yourself in trouble, a physical fight at that, Hajime. You‘re not your High School self anymore, start behaving that way, please”, you reply and hand Mattsun a plastic bag filled with ice cubes, softly caressing his bruised cheek before you stand up from your place on the floor.

“You got yourself one hell of a mouth while I was gone,  huh?”, he replies cockily, poking the inside of his cheek with his tongue before he follows you into the bathroom.

You feel your body heating up at his words, the sexual tension laying underneath the surface slowly finding its way to you again and with a soft sigh, you ignore the brunette.

“How was I supposed to let him say all those things to you and not do anything, Y/N?”, Iwaizumi replies, a pouty word of gratitude leaving his lips when you take his big hand into yours and start cleaning up the blood on his bruised knuckles.

You try your best to stop your thoughts from wandering to sinful places yet images of those pretty, tattooed fingers wrapped around your throat and knuckle deep buried inside of your cunt have already filled your mind by the time you lower your gaze from his face.

“I‘m used to-”, “That does not make it okay, Y/N”, your best friend suddenly says, taking your chin in between his fingers to lift your head and look at you with those beautiful, dark green eyes.

“You deserve so, so much better and I‘m glad I can finally tell you this in person after all those years. Please stop letting douches like him take advantage of you”, he sighs, taking your hands into his and pulling you a little bit closer to himself.

“It‘s that or Matsukawa‘s cock and I‘d rather have a stranger emotionally pain me than my best friend, so-”, “What? What the fuck are you talking about?”, Iwaizumi interrupts you harshly, your words obviously irritating him.

“After my last boyfriend dumped me a year ago I‘ve only had casual flings because I got tired of using my hand to get off and Matsukawa offered to take care of it instead. But then again, it‘s just a lot less complicated with a stranger than it is with your best friend, that‘s why I‘m putting up with shit like this”, you explain to him and walk back into the living room where Mattsun and Makki are currently busy with your leftover take out from the previous night.

“So if it wasn‘t for that, you‘d let him fuck you?”, Iwaizumi‘s tone has turned cold again, the softness gone and replaced by something a little thicker and more intense than anger. And when you turn around to look at him, you see literal jealousy gleaming in the green color surrounding his iris, basically leaving you speechless.

“Why do you even care, Iwa?”, you reply, dramatically throwing your hands into the air as his tensed demeanor sends you in some kind of haze of irritation.

“Answer my fucking question, Y/N”, is all you get in response; the brunette closing the distance between the two of you with a few small steps and it‘s the lack of space between your faces that has you realizing just how unevenly he‘s breathing.

Your heart starts slamming against your rib cage with rather brutal pace, your head spinning from the sudden adrenaline shooting through your body and on top of all of it you feel your cunt clenching around nothing like crazy as Iwaizumi’s heavy scent fills your nose.

“Yes”, you say and feel your voice breaking, “yes, I would fuck Matsukawa because why not? Hm, Iwaizumi? There‘s nothing else stopping me from it other than-”, “You can‘t and won‘t fuck him”, he suddenly interrupts your outburst, his expression as dark as ever as he softly pushes you against wall.

“I think this is the moment where we‘re supposed to leave”, Makki mumbles, pulling Mattsun from the couch before they gather their things and leave the two of you to yourself.

As the silence surrounds the two of you, the tension grows even thicker, heavier, more present than before and with every breath you take you feel yourself growing more and more aroused.

“And why is that, hm? I can and will fuck whoever I want”, you spit back, trying so hard ot not let the arousal get to your head yet the disgusting urge to submit to Iwaizumi‘s naturally dominant personality slowly starts overwhelming you.

Hajime chuckles deeply, his eyes lazily roaming your face, pressing his strong body even further against yours as your head starts spinning more and more with every second passing by.

“Iwa…”, you whimper softly, throwing your head back and harshly digging gripping the soft fabric of his shirt; the close contact makes you a lot more nervous than before.

He slowly takes a deep breath before he bends down to let his nose graze your jawline, and eventually letting his mouth find its way to your ear.

“Because no one can fuck you like I can, pretty one”, Iwaizumi whispers, his voice a whole octave deeper than just a few seconds before and you hate the way every single one of his words sends a single, hot jolt of arousal right into your core.

“And”, you hear him inhale sharply, his hands finding their way to your hips, groping the soft flesh firmly in his palms before he takes a short break and then pulls away to look at you again, “no one can love you like I can.”

At the sound of those words, your eyes snap open within a second your heart skips a literal beat.

“W-What?”, you whisper, your throat completely dried up, your head desperately trying to process what he’s just said and just as your body is about to fall into some kind of haze, you feel yourself drowning in a wave of anxiety at the thought of having misheard him.

“I love you, Y/N”, Iwaizumi says just when those thoughts are about to take over you.

“Ha-Hajime…”, you mumble; your bottom lip starts to quiver as tears pricker at the corners of your eyes, the first few finding their way down your cheek in an instant.

A few seconds of silence pass in which you two just look at each other, Iwaizumi’s pupils blown out, cheeks tinted in the deepest shade of red and plump lips parted as he also tries to understand what just happened.

After all these years of imagining what it might be like to hear these kind of words from the love of your life, it’s finally become reality and the longer you look at him, the lighter the weight on your chest becomes.

“I’m sorry if I ruined our friendship with this but I just – couldn’t keep it to myself any longer. When I was in America I had promised myself to confess as soon as possible when I’m back so here I am. Those men don’t deserve you. Neither do I but I would have hated myself forever if I didn’t at least try. So”, he finishes his sudden explanation with another deep exhale before he takes a step back, his glossy eyes wandering from yours down to the floor, “thank you for everything and please take care.”

And fortunately your body acts a lot faster than your mind because while you still try to process his soft, sweet words – the words you’ve been dying to hear for so, so long – you find yourself tightening your grip on his shirt and pulling him back into you with a soft sob.

“I love you, too”, you whisper against his lips, pressing your forehead against his as your eyes flutter shut at the overwhelming warmth coming from his body.

“Fuck, baby”, Iwaizumi chuckles breathlessly, wrapping his arms around your body and burying his face in the crook of your neck, “I’m one lucky bastard, aren’t I?”

You smile brightly at his genuine and soft words, the feeling of coming home – a place you’ve longed for literal years – slowly breaks down onto you in the form of waves and for the first time in a really long time, you don’t mind being overwhelmed like that.

“So that means that you’re mine now?”, Iwaizumi whispers, pulling away and taking your face into his big hands, the smell of blood grazing your nose yet easily gets overshadowed by the way he’s looking at you as if you were holding the whole world in your hands.

You nod and move further into his touch, enjoying the feeling of being so safe and secure in one’s hands after not even feeling comfortable with anyone in years.

“T-Thank you for loving me, Iwa”, you gulp harshly, looking at him with teary eyes at the memory of all those who had managed to break your heart in the past years.

“No, baby”, he sighs, pressing the softest kiss right onto your lips, “thank you for letting me love you. When I say you’re literally everything I’ve ever dreamed of, I’m not even exaggerating because that’s what you are to me. A dream come true”, those are the last words Hajime mumbles before he pulls you into a proper kiss; not giving you the opportunity to reply.

The kiss starts off slow and calm. As if both of you were still trying to understand that this was actually happening because despite the hesitant movements, neither of you can hide the intense hunger lingering underneath every soft peck.

Iwaizumi, just as usual, lacks the patience to keep it going like that, not even trying to take it easier for even longer as he pulls your chin down and calmly pushes his tongue into your mouth, easily eliciting a soft moan from you. Your fingers find home in his brown curls, pulling at the thick strands and finally making him grunt right against your tongue; the deep sound sending vibrations and sweet little jolts of excitement through your whole body.

You slowly feel his hands wander; first starting off caressing your back, groping the soft flesh of your waist as well as the fingers of his right hand softly digging into your skin and for a second. You allow yourself to fall deeper and deeper into the perfect feeling of his touch until suddenly a mental image of his most recent ex-girlfriend pops up in your head and you stop functioning completely.

Iwaizumi lets his lips wander down your chin, placing a row of open mouthed kisses on your jaw before he moves to your neck and pulls the sensitive skin into his mouth without wasting another minute. The feeling of his hot tongue on your skin has your eyes rolling into the back of your head as you desperately try to distract yourself from your anxiety‘s attempt to ruin this for you.

You let out a soft whimper when Hajime wraps one of his big hands around one of your tits, harshly groping the flesh while rubbing his hard, clothed cock against your thick thigh.

His deep grunts and needy touches have you ruining your panties in no time to the point where the lacey fabric is literally sticking to your hot flesh in a rather uncomfortable way.

“Need you, baby”, Iwaizumi grunts, the movements of his hips rather sloppy and rushed yet so, so genuine and sweet, you can‘t help but smile softly.

“You got me, Haji”, you reply and take his handsome face into your hands, caressing his cheeks with your thumbs, “I‘m all yours.”

“Fuck, baby”, he moans and suddenly pulls away, his hands finding their way to the hem of your dress before he meets your eyes and wordlessly asks for your consent.

You give him a quick nod, pushing the voice of your anxiety all the way to the back of your head as Hajime slowly pushes the fabric up your thighs, revealing more and more skin before his eyes roll into the back of his eyes at the sight of your black lace panties.

He doesn‘t waste much time; quickly pulling the rest of it over your head and then taking a whole step back to let his greedy eyes roam your body with lust and nothing but adoration.

And when you realize your current, exposed state you take a deep breath to hold those insecurities back, however they‘re a lot faster than you are.

You nervously try to cover your naked body with your arms. Just the thought of him finding you and your body disgusting breaks your heart into pieces and with shivers of shame rushing down your spine, you lower your gaze.

“L-Look, I know it‘s not what you‘re used to and I- you don‘t have to touch me. I can just suck your cock or give you a handjob if you feel more comfortable that way”, you say, your voice a mere whisper and eventually breaking at the end when you give in to the tears.

“Baby…”, Iwaizumi sighs, pain evident in the tone of his voice. He calmly takes your wrists into his big hands before he pulls your arms away from your body, softly asking you to look at him and after what feels like an eternity, you manage to lift your head only to be met with nothing but warm, dark green eyes.

“You‘re fucking perfect”, he whispers and places a tiny little kiss on your lips, leaving you longing for more as he pulls away right afterwards, “there‘s literally nothing I would change about you.”

At the sound of those sweet words, you simply cannot hold back your tears any longer. You look at Iwaizumi with a quivering bottom lip as you let out a row of soft sobs; digging your nails into the skin of his wrists because you simply don‘t know what else to do.

For the first time in your life, your brain isn‘t protesting against a compliment and you know if it wasn‘t for him, there would be no way you‘d believe it.

“B-But your ex-girlfriends are the exact opposite and-”, “They don‘t matter, baby. You‘re you and it‘s all I could have asked for. I‘m in love with every part of your body and that has never been any different”, Iwaizumi interrupts you with his calm voice, placing his hands on your waist before one of them finds its way to your barely clothed ass.

“But-”, “No more buts”, the brunette says, a lot sterner and more determined, groping the flesh of your ass and then landing a firm spank on the soft flesh which has you whimpering into the crook of his neck.

Iwaizumi chuckles and pulls you into another deep kiss, sucking at your tongue, nibbling on your bottom lip all while his hands make sure to graze every bit of naked skin they can find. He pushes his leg in between your thighs, pressing it right against your cunt and without even wasting another second you find yourself grinding against the strong muscle. The fabric of his jeans rubs your throbbing clit in the best way possible, eliciting a row of needy whimpers from you.

You feel yourself soaking through the fabric of our lace panties and you know you‘re currently leaving a huge stain on Iwaizumi‘s pants but the pleasure clouding your mind makes it so easy to just ignore it.

“What a needy girl you are, baby”, Hajime mumbles, caressing the slightly dampened skin of cheeks with his thumb before he moves to graze your bottom lip and eventually pushes the digit into your open mouth.

Your lids fly open at the taste of his skin on your tongue, twirling the muscle around his thumb and then sucking on it softly, followed by some muffled moans of his name.

Iwaizumi watches you attentively for what feels like an eternity. His beautiful eyes wandering from the way you‘re rubbing your clunt against his clothed thigh to your perky nipples and then up to the way your lips look wrapped around his thumb like that and from the way his expression keeps growing darker and even hungrier, you know he‘s more than just enjoying your despair.

“I want to spit in your mouth”, he says, using the dominant tone you‘re oh so used to at this point and there‘s no way you‘d ever say no to him.

Something about being claimed in such a lewd way by the man you‘ve been dreaming of for years has you grinding your pussy into his thigh even harder; making sure to hit your clit with every rushed drag of your hips.

“Yes, p-please, Daddy”, you beg, not even overthinking any of your words as you part your lips and look at him with big, needy eyes.

When you notice the rather shocked and slightly overwhelmed expression on Iwaizumi‘s face, you gulp harshly, tilting your head to the side with your lips pushed into a concerned pout.

“What‘s wrong, Iwa?”, you whisper, way too scared of his response.

“You called me Daddy”, he replies and licks his plump lips, whereas you freeze completely at his comment.

“D-Did I? I‘m so sorry, Iwa”, the apology falls past your lips almost instantly at the realization because you know that not every guy is comfortable with such dynamic and even if Hajime definitely has a natural dominance to his personality, you should have waited a little longer before bringing this particular kink up.

“None of my boyfriends liked it and I don‘t like using it with completely strangers so I g-guess I just feel really safe with you and it slipped and I- oh, God, I‘m so sorry.”

You pull away from Iwaizumi with shaky hands, tears threatening to spill for the nth time within such a short period and you try your best to look everywhere but his eyes.

However, Iwaizumis seems to have other plans.

He takes your chin into his hand and pulls your face closer, nudges your nose with his own and then sucks your bottom lip into his mouth; making you whimper rather loudly.

“Say it again, baby”, he whispers, “tell Daddy how badly you want his spit.”

As his words echo inside of your brain, you let out a loud, high pitched whine, harshly trying to press your thigh further together ss the throbbing of your cunt becomes unbearable.

“Please, Daddy”, you reply, pushing his hand down to your neck and smiling softly when he wraps his pretty fingers around your throat, feeding right into every single fantasy you‘ve been imagining for so long, “spit in my mouth and on my cunt, I don‘t care. I just need it.”

“Good girl”, Iwa growls softly, “open up then, pretty one.”

You part your lips almost automatically at the sound of his demand, sticking your tongue out slightly and looking up at him with anticipation and such eagerness, if it wasn‘t for him, you would have never been as comfortable as this.

Iwaizumi smirks at you, keeping his grip on your throat firm but not too tight as he gathers his own saliva and spits into your mouth with a loud, lewd sound that sends shivers of pleasure straight down your spine and right into your core.

You can‘t stop your lips from stretching into a big smile when his taste coats the muscle of your tongue, swallowing it all in one go before you open your mouth yet again to show him it‘s all gone.

“Good fucking girl”, Iwaizumi praises you softly, caressing your cheek before he lets fo of your throat, “I got myself a perfect little doll, hm?”

“Thank you, Daddy”, you reply quickly, the intense urge to obey to his every word and submit to his every move absolutely overwhelming  at this point, but you would never want it any other way.

“Look at you, using your manners for me. You‘re welcome, princess. What about a little reward for being so good for me, baby? Wanna sit on my face so I can eat that pretty pussy of yours?”, Iwaizumi takes you hand into his, intertwining his fingers with yours before he guides you to the couch, letting himself fall into the soft cushion whereas you try your best not to panic at his words.

Of course the thought of having his mouth on your cunt is more than just tempting but you've never sat on a guy‘s face before; the fear of literally suffocating him with your weight making it impossible for you to even think about it.

“C-Can‘t you just eat me out like this, Daddy?”, you whisper, looking down to meet Iwa‘s hungry gaze and stopping him from pulling your panties any further down your thighs.

“I‘m too heavy”, the explanation follows right away, not wanting him to think it has anything to do with him or his wishes, “I don‘t want to hurt you.”

“Baby, I want you to sit on my face so I can eat your pretty pussy. That‘s it”, Iwaizumi says, his right hand finding the clasp of your bra and quickly getting rid of it before he takes both of your tits into his big hands; toying with your nipples and attentively watching the way your gasps grow louder with every pull on the perky buds, “you don‘t have to if you don‘t want to but don‘t you dare worry about me because this has been a dream of mine for literal years. Oh, how badly I want to be squished by those pretty, thick thighs of yours – you have no idea.”

“I want to! It’s just that I’ve never done this before. A-Are you sure? Please don‘t think you have to want this to make me feel better, I‘m okay with whatever you‘re comfortable with”, you whisper, not trusting your voice when you suddenly feel Iwaizumi‘s fingers tracing patterns on the inside of your thighs.

“Enough of this, pretty one”, his words are accompanied by a firm spank on your naked ass cheek; the pain of the sting leaving your pussy a spasming mess and with a soft moan you tighten your grip in his hair, “now sit on my face or I won’t fuck you.”

“N-No! Daddy, I‘m sorry, I promise I‘ll be good”, you whine quickly letting go of him so he can lay on his back only for Iwaizumi to get rid of his black shirt; revealing his strong, well trained body and all those dark lines adorning his tanned skin to your hungry eyes.

It takes you a few good seconds to gain enough confidence to actually spread your legs over his face, your whole body shaking with nervousness. But once Iwaizumi wraps his strong arms around your thighs and pulls your body even further down to his face, you slowly start easing up.

The feeling of his hot breath fanning against the wet flesh of your cunt sends goosebumps down your back. And the sight of his pretty face between your thick thighs, something you‘ve always been so insecure about, seems to slowly take a place as one of your favorite images to ever exist.

“Look me in the eyes, baby”, Iwaizumi mumbles and sucks at the skin of your inner thigh, his tongue on your skin making more and more juices gush out of your already drenched cunt as you allow yourself to meet his hungry gaze.

And just when your eyes meet, Iwaizumi sticks his tongue out and licks a long stripe over the hor flesh of your pussy before he gently pulls your little clit into his mouth and starts sucking on it.

You let out a loud groan; the sudden stimulation on your needy clit sending literal shock waves of pleasure through your body and without even realizing you slowly grind yourself further against his mouth.

Iwaizumi moans into your flesh, the deep bass of his voice sending vibrations right into your core, making your cunt clench even harder around nothing and if it wasn‘t for the intensity of his stare, you would have looked away already. Yet just as usual, there‘s something about the way he looks at you which has you feeling at literal ease – even in such a situation.

“Come on, baby”, Iwaizumi suddenly grunts, letting go of the sensitive bud with a loud sound before placing an open mouthed kiss on your clit and landing a harsh spank on your ash which has your body jolting in antica, “don’t be shy now. Ride my face like the good girl you are, make me proud…”, he adds softly, his words encouraging you easily and with a sound of affirmation, you start grinding your hips to meet the hot muscle of his tongue.

The following minutes are filled with loud slurping noises, high pitched moans and deep grunts as well as more words of affirmation and encouragement all while Iwaizumi continues to switch between thrusting his tongue into your tight hole and sucking on your clit before he eventually starts fingerfucking you with two of his thick digits.

You can't help but throw your head back at the immense amount of pleasure; your body and mind slowly reaching a point of complete haze as you lose yourself in the feeling of his touch.

And by the time you finally feel the taste of your high coating the tip of your tongue, your grip on Iwaizumi‘s hair tightens and a row of loud, choked out begs fall past your bit swollen lips.

“Look at your greedy little pussy clenching around my fingers like that”, Iwa chuckles deeply, picking up the pace of his thrusts as he keeps his mouth way too close to your throbbing little clit, “and those pretty begs. Gosh, baby, you‘re going to drive me insane.”

“S-So close, Daddy”, you choke out, your eyes flying open when you feel a third finger joining the two inside of your tight cunt, the pain of the stretch in combination with the pleasure of your upcoming high making your head spin.

“There we go, that‘s my baby”, he takes a deep breath and starts kneading the soft flesh of your ass in his palms, “want you to cum all over my fucking face. Show me what a good fucking girl you are.”

And those are the last words your brain manages to register before you feel the first wave of your orgasm hit you. Your sight turns pitch black and then white for a good second, your whole body tensing up at the feeling of coil in your core finally snapping.

Your thighs are shaking, your breath continuously hitching as you desperately try to regain your composure and if it wasn‘t for Iwaizumi‘s touch on your sensitive pussy, you‘d stay in the beautiful haze of your orgasm.

“You came so hard for me, baby”, Iwaizumi grins and pushes his fingers into his mouth before you finally find enough energy to get off of his face.

“W-Want more”, you whisper, your voice raspy and breathy as you tell him your request; low-key scared of being too greedy yet at the sight of Iwaizumi‘s eyes sparkling with excitement, you know he‘s not one to deny you anything. He‘s never been, after all.

“How about we move this to your bedroom, baby? I‘ve been dying to press your face into the mattress and ruin that little pussy of yours.” You feel a jolt of excitement blooming inside your chest at his words, nodding eagerly before you reach for his hand and guide him down the hall to your bedroom.

“Do you want me to suck you off?”, you say when the two of you come to stand in your room, your eyes focusing on the huge bulge in his pants, which manages to scare you slightly with its impressive size.

You always knew your best friend wasn‘t on the smaller side when it came to size yet you still can‘t hide just how surprised you are by its actual size. And suddenly the three fingers make a lot more sense to you.

“Let‘s save that for another time, pretty one. I‘ve been dreaming about pumping your cute little hole full of my cum for way too long. I can‘t wait any longer”, Iwaizumi replies and finally starts unbuckling his belt.

You take the few seconds he‘s busy to let your eyes admire the beauty of his perfectly sculpted body. You follow the dark lines of his chest tattoo, take in the sight of his stone hard abs and veiny arms as you press your thighs even more together to ease some of the pressure on your cunt.

“Are you done eyefucking me, pretty one?”, Iwaizumi suddenly chuckles, casually pushing his jeans as well as his boxer briefs down his meaty thighs and exposing his hard cock for your hungry eyes to devour.

He wraps his pretty fingers around his throbbing length, the tip an angry shade of red as precum continues to leak out; making your mouth water at the mere thought of having him in your mouth.

“Everything about you is so pretty”, you sigh and look into his eyes, the genuine appreciation in the green surrounding his iris making your heart grow warmer before he comes to stand in front of you in all of his glory.

“I love you so much”, Iwaizumi replies calmly, taking your face into his big hands before he places the softest kiss on your forehead.

“I love you, too”, you mumble and get up, pressing your lips against his and sighing into his mouth when he pushes his tongue past your lips without missing a beat.

Just when Iwaizumi starts letting his hands wander over your naked body, he halts his movements and pulls away slightly, “my pretty little baby, make sure to face the mirror so you can watch while I fuck your brains out. I want you to see just how perfect you are.”

“Yes, Daddy”, you whisper, your lips stretched into a big, big smile as you move out of his strong grip to position yours on your knees just as you were told.

Your heart suddenly starts racing again when you bury your face in your arms, making sure to push your ass as high as possible to give Iwaizumi easy access to your glistening cut. The excitement in combination with the pleasure and deep, deep longing finally manage to take over your brain; shoving the anxiety alongside all those insecurities to the very back of your head and making it easy for you to put your whole focus on the tll male behind you.

Iwaizumi’s rough hands caress your bare ass softly, kneading the flesh and lightly spanking it a few times before he lets a thick drop of his spit fall right onto your clenching pussy; sending goosebumps down your back at the feeling of it sliding down your flesh and mixing with your leaking juices.

You feel the tip of his thick cock nudging your entrance, the memory of his size making you tense up subconsciously and just when you’re about to hold your breath, Iwaizumi’s deep, calming voice echoes through the silence of your room.

“Take a deep breath, baby”, he whispers, knowing you’re going to follow his orders just like the good girl you love to be, “Daddy’s got you, okay? I’m gonna go easy, I promise.”

You lift your head to meet his comforting gaze through the mirror in front of you and without another beat passing, you feel yourself calming down again; the feeling of being absolutely safe and secure in his hand making it the easiest task.

And when Iwaizumi feels the tension in your body easing up, he lines himself up with your entrance and slowly pushes his thick tip into your tight hole. You whimper at the delicious stretch, the pain easily overshadowed by the sound of Iwaizumi’s heavy breathing and little moans.

“I’m gonna go all in, baby or else it’s going to hurt a lot more”, you appreciate his warning because as he’s saying it, Iwaizumi thrusts the whole of his impressive length into your spasming cunt; pushing every bit of air out of your lungs and pushing you way too close to your second high of the night. You can’t help but whimper loudly, tears already streaming down your cheeks because of the beautiful feeling of pain and pleasure mixing inside of your veins from the intensity of the stretch.

Iwaizumi, as always the gentleman, gives you all the time you need to adjust to his size; only growing slightly impatient as you still whine softly after two whole minutes yet you’re quick to lift your head again with quivering bottom lip and teary eyes, begging him to just fuck you.

“Please, Daddy”, you sob, moving away from him in a desperate attempt for some kind of friction; your cunt spasming around his thick cock like crazy and you know you’re only a few thrust and some clit stimulation away from your next high, “please, fuck me.”

“My greedy little whore”, Iwaizumi grunts, pulling his cock out of you astonishingly slow with the sole purpose of teasing you, “you’re going to take what Daddy gives you, did you hear me?”

You moan as the feeling of his tip dragging alongside your spongy walls, your eyes rolling into the back of your head only to find your way back to reality with a couple of harsh spanks on your already sore ass.

“Good sluts answer when being talked to, pretty one”, he warns, thrusting his cock back into you with one quick snap of his hips; burying himself balls deep inside of your overly sensitive cunt.

“Yes, Daddy, yes”, you cry and look up at him with glossy eyes, “just please, fuck my stupid little cunt, please.” Iwaizumi lets out a row of deep chuckles followed by raspy groans in response to your perfect answer before he nods at you and mumbles a few soft praises right into your ear and then straightens himself again.

“Alright then, pretty one.”

Loud grunts fill your ears so beautifully, echoing through the thick air of your bedroom and in combination with the sound of skin meeting skin in a constant rhythm, you feel the exact way your body is slowly falling into the beautiful bliss of another high.

Iwaizumi fucks you fast, harsh and rough. There’s nothing soft and romantic about the way his hips are meeting yours in a steady rhythm; making sure to hit that sweet spot deep inside of your pussy with every single one of his thrusts as he continues to use his whole strength on your burning ass.

But not once do you even think about telling him to go easier on you; this iwaizumi the one you’ve been imagining for all those years.

It doesn’t take long for him to wrap his strong arm around your chest to pull you up, his fingers also finding their way back home around your delicate throat.

“Look at you, baby”, he groans right into your ear, making you open your eyes and meet your own reflection in the mirror, “you’re so fucking beautiful, I can’t comprehend it.”

You stare at yourself with your lips parted in awe, eyes falling to the sight of Iwaizumi’s thick cock stretching your tiny cunt before you go back to trying to recognize yourself.

Because for the first time in literal years, you don’t hate what you see and even if it’s because of IWaizumi’s strong body right behind you, you still feel this certain type of warmth blossoming in your chest.

"Feels so good, baby", he groans, throwing his head back as the movements of his hips start to become slightly sloppier, a little more uncontrolled, "so tight and warm, so fucking perfect", Hajime’s voice breaks at the end of his soft praise because of your walls clenching around his cock even more the closer you get to the edge.

You start feeling dizzy, your sight turning into a blurr and at some point you can’t even in- or exhale without letting out a shaky moan.

Iwaizumi looks at you with wide, hungry eyes, the feeling of your walls gripping his cock like a goddamn vice sending him into an ecstatic state and the longer he watches you getting lost in the pleasure, the more he struggles to keep his rhythm.

You’re mumbling incoherent sentences, desperately trying to tell the brunette about how close you are whereas the pleasure makes it absolutely impossible for you to form a proper sentence.

“Are you going to cum for me again, baby?”, Iwaizumi grunts, tightening his grip on your throat, making you gasp for air as you nod in response to his question.

“My perfect little slut”, he sighs, his hand reaching down to rub your hard, throbbing clit with two of his rough digits, “fucking do it. Cum for your Daddy like the good whore you are.”

And just like a few minutes prior, those words are the last straw and eventually make you stumble over the edge head first. Your walls start spasming around Iwa’s cock like crazy, your loud moans and soft cries are the only thing he can focus on and without missing another minute, Iwaizumi also lets himself get consumed by the beautiful feeling of relief.

Iwa hips still, his cock buried deeply inside of your tight sex as he coats your walls with his creamy cum. Your new boyfriend gets lost in the feeling of finally getting to cum inside of you after waiting for so many years; feeding the fantasy of getting to claim you in the most intimate way possible. He buries his face in the sweaty crook of your neck, his rapid breath fanning your skin as the two of you try to calm down from your intense highs. Your hand finds its way into his dark hair, massaging his scalp with your eyes closed and your legs still shaking from the aftermath of your breathtaking orgasm. Without pulling out of you, despite his own release leaking out of you and down the sides of his cock, Iwaizumi makes you lay down with him; just tightly holding you in his arms.

A few minutes filled with nothing but soft breathing pass by before you finally find the strength to move again; the sudden need to look at Iwaizumi’s completely fucked out face overwhelming you in the best way possible. And when you turn around to look at him, you’re met with a breathtaking sight.

Messy strands of sweaty hair falling into his flushed face, swollen lips and glossy eyes sparkling at you in a way you’ve never seen before and in that moment you feel yourself falling in love with Iwaizumi all over again.

“I’m so in love with you”, you whisper and caress the soft skin of his cheeks, loving the way he moves even further into your touch.

“Always and forever only yours, pretty one”, Iwaizumi sighs and presses his forehead against yours.

࿏ A/N: And here it finally is! My first x chubby reader fic!! As a chubby someone who’s been reading fanficion for a long time, I’ve always craved some kind of representation and now I finally got to join this side of the community and I’m more than just happy about the way it turned out. I genuinely hope you guys will enjoy this and find comfort the same way I did while writing this. Please feel free to leave any sort of feedback if you enjoyed it and thank you so much for everything.