#another tag I got to first

[kply-industries]

[favoure]

"do the opposite of what people tell you to do"

[curseofdelos]

mentally I'm still here:

Nico insisting that neither of them are going to be sacrificed/left behind to satisfy the prophecy is a perfect encapsulation of his growth over the series and it makes me SO soft to think about

Nico as a character - particularly in BoO - doesn't have a lot of self-preservation. He doesn't really care what happens to him as long as the mission gets done. We see this most explicitly after he almost fades into nothingness after the Bryce Lawrence incident:

And again when he considers shadow travelling into Octavian's tent to assassinate him:

(Nico himself notes here that it was unlikely he would survive another jump. If Will hadn't stopped him, he probably would have died.)

In both cases, Nico was willing to risk death for the sake of ending the war. He puts very little value on his own life, and repeatedly argues to Reyna, Hedge, and Will that the possibility of saving camp (a place he never felt welcome at, might I add) is worth the risk of losing his life.

Even before Nico went on the quest with Reyna and Hedge, the others were concerned about his safety. Percy tried to remind him how unpredictable his shadow travelling could be, and Hazel notes that he has been acting strangely lately:

It's not quite clear what Hazel is worried about here, but my interpretation of this scene is that she's concerned that Nico isn't thinking - or perhaps, isn't caring - about what effect the constant shadow travelling will have on his wellbeing. Between Tartarus, the jar, and the Cupid incident, Nico's mental state is at its worst at this point in the series, and I think Hazel is worried he'll do something reckless - something he can't come back from.

And so in TSATS, when Nico is told that he's going to have to leave something of equal value behind in order to save Bob, the old him would have had zero issue sacrificing himself if that's what it took to ensure Will and Bob's survival. This version of Nico, who's been going to therapy w/ Mr D and opening up more and built a little support system for himself, can't fathom it.

Nico in BoO did not have a future. He had fully convinced himself that nobody cared about him or would miss him if he was gone - not Percy who fought for him at every turn in PJO, not his sister Hazel, not his new friends Jason and Reyna. He was ready to leave both camps behind because he couldn't see himself ever being happy there. He couldn't see himself being happy at all.

But now, in TSATS, he has a boyfriend that he loves, he has friends that he loves, and he has a community in Camp Half-Blood. He has experienced so much loss that losing someone else is his worst fear. The old Nico would have considered sacrificing himself to protect Will and Bob. At the very least, he would have kept that option in his back pocket as a 'just in case'; he wouldn't have sworn on the Styx that he wouldn't stay behind.

This Nico, however, is doing much better - not perfect, but better. He loves Will, and he wants a life with him, and he's not willing to give that up for anything. Nico has hope for the future, and he's clinging to that hope with everything he has. He sees a light at the end of the tunnel, and he wants to reach it. He's not willing to sacrifice himself because it means losing that future.

Gone is the cynical pessimistic Nico who assumes the worst because the worst is all he thinks he can have. Here is the Nico who has had a taste of happiness and is willing to fight to keep it. He's not going to sacrifice himself because he wants to live. He's not just fighting for Will here; he's fighting for himself too.

And seeing him go from "if it kills me, it kills me" to "it's not going to be me" makes me so ASDFGHJKL

[fintrafeatherfall]

petra. thank you for coming to my ted talk

[seiwas]

cw: suggestive, just iwaizumi being hot in a muscle tee, use of 'baby', sweat, unedited sawry (this is my pure carnal desire for this man)

iwaizumi hasn’t worn a muscle tee in years—

it hangs off him like a singular piece of cloth, haphazardly cut to show off as much skin as possible. slutty, the way mattsun and makki had intended for it to look when they gifted it to him in his third year of college.

which, to be fair, maybe he was one—a slut, that is. whoring himself out completely with those ‘subtle’, ‘lowkey’ thirst trap instagram stories on his fitness account. the way his skin flushed a darker peach after your joint gym days was always borderline inappropriate, the strands of his hair sticking up in what you could easily mistake as sweat-matted sex hair.

iwaizumi’s muscle tee days are well associated with him being the image of absolute sin.

but it was all for you anyway: the instagram stories he set on ‘close friends’ only, the hours he kept free so he could align his gym schedule to yours—

“oh! that’s perfect!” you beam at him, your smile completely unaware.

“yeah. it all worked out…” he casually brushes it off.

—it was oikawa's idea in the first place.

"you have to sell yourself better iwa-chan," the brunet whines over the phone.

and so he did; followed every embarrassing idea oikawa came up with, posed and posted in ways extremely un-iwaizumi, and stocked up on muscle tees. a lot of them. only for him to be called—

"simp," oikawa snorts on the call. iwaizumi groans, rolling his eyes.

—"baby," you stop dead in your tracks, your breath on hold.

yeah, he thinks, it was all worth it because this is what you call him now.

"is that—?" you inch closer, mouth falling slightly open. he thinks there are stars in your eyes as you ask, "are you wearing—?"

oh.

iwaizumi looks down at the muscle tee hanging off his body and feels a little bit exposed. he just came from the gym and he hasn't worn a muscle tee in years, his collection of them having dwindled over time. the only reason he kept this one is because of its sentimental value, and the fact that it came from makki and mattsun.

compression shirts are his thing now, which you approve of very much, but you're both in the middle of moving, and some of his clothes are still in boxes.

you approach him slowly, "is this a comeback?" the smirk on your face grows when you reach him, your hands fiddling with the fabric.

this is the same muscle tee he was wearing the first time you told him you loved him.

he moves away before you can come any closer.

"sweaty," he scrunches his nose as he takes your hands into his, kissing your fingertips.

you scoff, pressing yourself right into his chest, "even better."

your hands cling to his sides, slipping underneath the damp cotton of his muscle tee as you rake your fingers down planes of taut muscle. he shivers, breath hitching as the heat travels up his body, flushing the sides of his neck deep peach.

you peer up at him and grin, placing small pecks at the areas of his collarbone that peek through.

fucking—

his hands grip your waist, keeping you in place as he tilts his head low, lips grazing just the tip of your ear.

"don't tease," he warns, voice low and hoarse, but his hands show no signs of moving away.

notes: i would like to thank @pastelle-rabbit for asking me the hardest question of all time, otherwise this little blurb wouldn't exist

[tullecake]

some silly metal doodles because i looooove them ^^

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

with Luo Qingyang and Lou Binghe having the same last name I got start thinking of an au: like what if lbh was her little brother

tho what's funnier lbh in the mdzs universe or that means tlj is lou qingyangs dad in that au

I wanted to give this a genuine answer but I kept getting distracted by Lou Binghe...so...yeah.

[littledemo0n]

Excuse me im just gonna spam all of these over here...(part 1 [yes there's more])

[knockknockitsnickels]

I think this is one of my favorite lines from the Wraith route because of (imo) how much the meaning changes depending on if you got there via Spectre or Nightmare. For Spectre, it honestly strikes me as a genuine question. Why are you doing this to her? If you're on the Spectre route, you presumably already know the Narrator can't really be trusted, since you had to reject his reward to get here. What are you hoping to gain from continuing to hurt her? For Nightmare, it honestly just makes me sad. As the Shifting Mound describes her, "She desires only companionship, but the only thing she knows is how to hurt." This line feels like a plea from someone who genuinely doesn't understand why you keep rejecting her. She wants to be with you, but she just can't understand how to do that in a way which doesn't hurt you.

[tomaturtles]

Happy Campus Apocalypse volume 1 16th anniversary here's something to celebrate

[xxplastic-cubexx]

if i said i picked up this issue for anything but drunk erik i fear i'd be lying

(Wolverine (2020) #3)

[coolnonsenseworld]

Realized I never published this piece for Cursed Love story. Lance is performing a protection spell 🕊️

Last day for 15-20% off prints

Linktr.ee/mezzy

[wannabemasterofwindintraining]

Following up on the story didn't take me a whole year this time yippee

Next

Wait what story?

[coern-art-very-cool-and-nice]

the end is so, so close, you can almost taste its sweetness on your tongue

[redrobin-detective]

Something I wonder about Simon and Betty's relationship is how long they were together before the whole crown ordeal. But they were engaged, you say. My aunt (in)famously met my uncle and had a ring on her finger in 8 weeks. We've seen that both Betty and Simon were both weird outcasts, crazy determined and a pinch insane. I would not be surprised if they decided they'd met their one true love and got engaged super quick.

My point being, Betty's shifting to revolve around Simon and Simon's rose colored glasses of their relationship feels very much like New Love. They're people who love each other and love being a couple but still haven't quite figured out how to coexist together, as two people in a partnership. I feel like if they'd known each other longer, lived together longer, some of the issues we're seeing would have probably self resolved.

I don't think their relationship is toxic nor is it totally perfect. It's two lonely, most likely neurodivergent people in a relatively early relationship still figuring out how it works. Everything that happened afterwards: the crown, the seperation, the time travel, the magic/madness/sadness just exemplified issues they had both as individuals and as a couple.

[hrokkall]

FREE AT LAST