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mydearestbeloved · 13 days ago

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Chapter 8 [Draft]

Sung Jinwoo/Trial Player!Reader

CW:

Inspired by @circeyoru ‘s “Future Power Couple”

[Masterlist🦋✨️]

It was inevitable that Jinwoo would introduce you to Yoo Jinho.

As you stood there, the lower half of your face concealed by a laced black mask patterned with butterflies, you had to hide your grin. The mask, enchanted with illusion magic, ensured that most people couldn’t recognize or remember your face easily, except those you wanted to be recognized by.

Perhaps it was because you were mentally older than your physical age in this world, or maybe you were just prone to cuteness aggression. E-rank Jinwoo had been spared only because you couldn’t reveal yourself at the time. But now, facing Jinho, you really wanted to squish his boyish face. Thankfully, you managed to rein that urge in.

You could almost see Jinho’s thought process as he saw Jinwoo with you. Jinho’s tendency to misinterpret situations had been a refreshing comic relief in the manhwa, but now wasn’t the time to focus on that.

“Don’t think too hard about it, Child,” you said, ruffling Jinho’s hair and making him stumble forward slightly. Perhaps you exerted too much force?

Jinho blinked, his eyes wide with surprise. “Ah, uh, yes! I mean, no! I mean...”

You chuckled softly, scanning your surroundings. The people hired just to fulfill the requirements of raiding a gate had already started to mind their own business, used to the routine by now, barely sparing you or Jinwoo a second glance.

That was fine; the less attention, the better. But your gaze caught Han Song-Yi standing a little farther off. You smiled beneath your mask and gave a small wave. But when you saw Han Song-Yi, you smiled behind your mask and waved. She seemed surprised before hesitantly waving back.

You turned to Jinwoo, who was already in front of the gate, waiting for Jinho and you.

As you approached, Jinwoo raised an eyebrow. “Ready?”

"Shall we?" you asked quietly, stepping up beside him.

Jinho, still flustered, scrambled to stand beside you. “Ready, Hyung!”

The butterflies embroidered on your mask seemed to shimmer for a moment as you prepared yourself for the challenge that lay ahead.

---

"It's a pleasure to meet you, Jinho. I'm (Name)."

Yoo Jinho's mind was already swirling with a dozen thoughts the moment his Hyung introduced you. Jinwoo rarely worked with others, so your presence threw him off.

(Name). No last name. A C-rank healer, not widely known, but Jinho had heard a few whispers about you. Word was that you had a nurturing, kind disposition every time the South Korean Hunter Association dispatched you for backup in raids.

His first impression? You looked like a professional. Your combat-ready outfit was practical, and the long coat draped over it hinted at versatility, allowing freedom of movement. There was no visible armor, but the way you held yourself, with your hair styled elegantly yet suitable for combat, spoke volumes. Even with the mask obscuring part of your face, Jinho sensed you were what most would consider a subtle beauty.

"(Name) will be joining our raids from now on," Jinwoo stated matter-of-factly, as if it were the most natural thing in the world..

Wait, what?

His Hyung, who had always preferred to raid solo, was now bringing someone along—and acting like it was a routine occurrence?!

Did you and his Hyung perhaps—

Before Jinho could finish the thought, you ruffled his hair fondly, startling him with the unexpected strength behind your gesture.

“Don’t think too hard about it, Child.”

“Ah, uh, yes! I mean, no! I mean…” Jinho stumbled over his words, clearly flustered.

You chuckled softly, your demeanor warm.

That was how the day began.

Jinho spent most of the raid gawking as you and Jinwoo seamlessly coordinated your attacks. He watched in awe as you effortlessly took down enemies alongside Jinwoo. More impressive was how naturally Jinwoo seemed to work with you, almost as if the two of you had been doing this for years. It was like watching a finely tuned machine in action, with both parts working perfectly in sync.

For a moment, he felt a little lost. What was he supposed to do when his hyung and you didn’t seem to need backup?

Then, as if sensing his uncertainty, you approached him. “Hey, Jinho? Thank you. Jinwoo might not say it out loud, but I’m sure he appreciates your company all this time.”

Jinho perked up at your words, feeling a surge of pride, only to become flustered when he heard you giggle. You were trying to be discreet, but it was clear you found his reaction amusing.

Another time, during another raid, you commented on Jinho’s armor—more out of thoughtfulness than criticism. “That’s some expensive armor you’ve got there,” you remarked, noticing his attire.

Jinho, eager to explain, mentioned the high-end gear he had bought back when he first started working with Jinwoo. His hyung had thought it was excessive, but Jinho wanted to be prepared.

You hummed thoughtfully. “It won’t hurt to be a bit more prepared,” you said, and before he knew it, you pulled something out of thin air—a small, unassuming butterfly brooch.

Jinho’s eyes widened. How did you do that? He had never seen anything quite like it. You pinned the brooch to his clothes with a graceful motion. “It’s imbued with some spatial magic,” you explained. “Try clicking it three times.”

Curious, Jinho did as you said., and his eyes lit up as his expensive armir were replaced by a sleek, high-quality combat suit. The fabric was sturdy yet comfortable, allowing for easy movement. He marveled at how perfect it felt.

“How… how did you do that?” Jinho marveled at the suit, admiring its design and function.

You bring a finger to your lips.

“Don’t worry. Your current wear was just switched out, it’s in there if you want to switch again.”

Before he could offer to pay you back, you raised a hand to stop him. "Just take it as a thank you, for always accompanying Jinwoo. If that’s not enough, consider it an advance payment for your continued help in the future."

From that day on, Jinho started calling you Noona. He couldn’t help it—you had earned his respect and admiration. Plus, you always looked out for him, even when it wasn’t necessary. You had a way of making him feel important, part of the team, even though he knew you and Jinwoo were leagues ahead.

You weren’t just cool. To Jinho, you were someone he could look up to.

Even Jinwoo seemed to tolerate it, though you noticed a slight twitch in his expression whenever Jinho said it, making you suspect that Jinwoo wasn’t as indifferent as he let on.

---

"Woah, who's that?" "She looks so cool..."

You could hear the whispers as you removed your helmet after parking your motorcycle in the parking lot. The students stared, intrigued by the mysterious figure you cut against the backdrop of their daily lives. Your eyes, however, were trained solely on the building in front of you.

It wouldn’t hurt to be a bit more prepared, you reminded yourself, as you often did.

---

Inside the school, Jinwoo didn’t expect to run into you. He had come for Jinah’s parent-teacher meeting, but here you were, in a place that seemed far from your usual.

You spotted him almost immediately.

“What are you doing here?”

"Straightforward as always. I'm here on personal business," you said, offering a brief, cryptic smile.

He raised an eyebrow, the suspicion clear in his eyes. “Personal business? At this high school?”

Before he could question you further, Jinah’s voice broke through the conversation. “Oppa!” she called out, jogging toward them. Jinwoo sighed, shifting his attention to his sister. You, meanwhile, stood a little off to the side, watching the sibling banter unfold with an amused glint in your eyes.

Jinah quickly noticed you standing there, and her eyes lit up with recognition. “Wait—are you the cool unnie my friends keep talking about?!” she asked, her voice filled with excitement. "They said you visited the school a few times!"

You smiled warmly at her. "That might be me," you said, not denying it. “I’m (Name),” you said, offering your hand to Jinah. “Nice to meet you.”

Jinah took your hand eagerly, her curiosity piqued, but you didn’t linger. “I’ve got some things to take care of, so I’ll leave you two to your meeting,” you said, with a nod to both siblings before walking off toward the administrative wing.

Jinah turned to Jinwoo with wide eyes. “Do you know her, Oppa?”

Jinwoo only nodded, his gaze following you until you disappeared around a corner. His instincts told him there was more to your presence here than you were letting on.

---

Later, as Jinwoo sat in the meeting room speaking with Jinah’s teacher, your name came up again—though this time in a different context.

“Miss (Name)?” the teacher asked, recognizing the confusion on Jinwoo’s face. "She’s one of the school’s key investors. A remarkable woman. She funds a portion of the scholarship program for students with financial difficulties. She was here today to inspect how the program was progressing.”

Jinwoo raised an eyebrow at the revelation. He certainly didn’t expect to hear that you were involved in something like that. He had always sensed that you were up to more than you let on, but this? He didn’t imagine you were the philanthropic type—

Okay, he had been on the receiving end of that exact action for the past few years, but still!

After the meeting, at the teacher’s request, Jinwoo briefly met with Han Song-Yi. After they talked, Jinwoo felt a sudden shift in the air. A butterfly—one of yours—fluttered into the room and landed on his shoulder. It was your usual method of contacting him without drawing attention, and he had come to expect it.

---

Jinwoo followed the butterfly, and soon enough, he found you waiting just outside the school, leaning casually against the establishment’s wall, your arms crossed. The street empty.

“I heard from Song-Yi that you're planning to take her into a dungeon soon.”

"Since when have you been in contact with Han Song-Yi?" he said, getting straight to the point.

You didn’t flinch under his scrutiny. “She’s got potential,” you answered casually. “She reminds me of someone… so I decided to lend a hand.”

Jinwoo’s suspicion deepened. “You’ve been helping her?”

“I’ve been making sure she has the opportunities she deserves. Just as I’m helping others.”

Before he could react, you handed him an impressive stack of homemade meals, each one neatly packed for travel. "These are imbued with magic, of course," you said casually, as though giving enchanted meals was the most normal thing in the world.

"...Isn't this too much?" Jinwoo asked, looking between you and the stack of containers.

You scoffed lightly, almost rolling your eyes. “You never know what might happen. Besides, it’s for your other raid members too." For a moment, you could’ve sworn you saw his expression twitch, but it was gone as quickly as it came. Was he annoyed? Amused? It was hard to tell with Jinwoo sometimes. "You can store them in your system’s inventory. I see no problem."

As if that wasn’t enough, you produced a small pouch filled with shimmering stones. "And here. Mana gems, made by me. Break them if you’re low on mana. Otherwise, they’re versatile—use them however you see fit."

Jinwoo stared at the gems for a moment, before closing his hand around them. “You’re not coming?”

"No. Not this time."

There was a brief silence as your words hung in the air. Before he could respond, you gave a slight wave, already turning to leave.

“Have a safe journey, Jinwoo,” you said softly over your shoulder, disappearing into a flurry of butterflies before he could say anything more.

Jinwoo stood there for a moment, watching the last flutter of your butterfly vanish into the distance.

---

You stood at the edge of the red gate with <Illusory> activated, arms crossed as you stared at the shimmering barrier before you. The system’s all too familiar message blinked in your vision, barring you from entering.

[Access Denied, Trial Player.]

Figures.

You had expected this. The system had been unpredictable at times, but this was one of the moments you knew too well—it wouldn’t let you intervene directly when it came to certain pivotal moments in the story, like this red gate.

“Well,” you muttered to yourself, “that’s why I prepared those meals and mana gems.”

You could only hope they would be enough to make a difference, lightening the load on Jinwoo’s shoulders while he navigated the dangers inside. He’d grow stronger through this trial, but you didn’t like the idea of just standing on the sidelines.

---

Inside the red gate, Han Song-Yi took a bite of the meal you had sent through Jinwoo, her eyes widening in amazement. “Oppa, this is amazing!” she exclaimed between mouthfuls. “I’ve never tasted anything like it!”

The rest of the party, seated around their small campsite, were similarly engrossed in their meals. It wasn’t just the taste that astonished them—it was the feeling of being energized, as if the food itself was somehow infused with power.

For a moment, they all forgot they were stuck in a deadly red gate, too busy enjoying the brief reprieve you had provided.

Meanwhile, Jinwoo sat on the outskirts of the camp, watching his shadow soldiers march silently in the distance. He had been taking the opportunity to level up while they hunkered down in a safe area. The enemies within the red gate were tougher, as expected, but that was precisely what he needed to test the maximum potential of his shadows.

It wasn’t long before he had acquired new soldiers to add to his ever-growing army.

As he observed his surroundings, Jinwoo’s gaze landed on the mana gems you had given him. They had proven more versatile than he initially thought. holding them for a few moments seemed to give him a temporary stat boost. The warmth that radiated from the gems was also useful, especially given the freezing environment inside the red gate.

The most surprising discovery, however, was that the gems could recharge themselves. Even after they had grown cold, they would warm up again in an hour or two, ready to be used once more. Jinwoo eyed at the small, glowing stone between his fingers, his thoughts drifting back to you.

How does she do it? Jinwoo wondered, turning the gem over in his hand. It glowed faintly with residual energy, pulsing slightly as if alive. The craftsmanship was unlike anything he had seen before.

Jinwoo pocketed the gem. There was always a sense of assurance that comes with you. The meals and gems you had provided, along with his newly strengthened soldiers, he knew they stood a better chance at survival.

With each passing moment, the line between curiosity and fascination grew thinner.

---

You knew how things would unfold, like in the story you once knew. Still—

Stay strong, Jinwoo, you thought, turning away from the gate. You had done everything you could from the outside. Now, it was up to him.

---

In the heat of the battle with Baruka and his army of ice elves, Jinwoo instinctively crushed one of your mana gems, expecting the usual mana regeneration to help keep his shadow soldiers going. What emerged, however, wasn't just an influx of replenishing energy but dozens of your familiar butterflies.

They swarmed out with a grace Jinwoo had grown accustomed to. While he focused on defeating Baruka, the butterflies spread through the battlefield, weaving between the ice elves. Some of them fluttered around the elves, casting illusions that confused their enemies, while others began draining life force, transferring that energy to Jinwoo's shadow soldiers, all while simultaneously regenerating Jinwoo's mana. It was an unexpected but welcome bonus.

Then something else that happened: a few butterflies, glowing faintly and without hesitation, imbued themselves directly into his daggers. The familiar system notification popped up.

[System Notice: Trial Player’s summons have used <Indwelling>. Your weapon has been enhanced.]

The magic now coating his weapons shimmered, adapting to the weaknesses of the enemies Jinwoo faced. The attack stats of his daggers surged, responding fluidly to the situation at hand. With each strike, the butterflies seemed to anticipate Jinwoo’s movements, boosting his strength at just the right moments.

The thrill of battle coursed through his veins even more intensely than before.

---

After Baruka’s defeat, Jinwoo tried to extract the ice elf’s shadow. To his irritation, the extraction failed, leaving him frustrated. But something else quickly caught his attention.

He noticed the butterflies again—fluttering around his shadow soldiers. The red one, always lingering near Igris, hovered quietly. But Jinwoo’s eyes were drawn to two new butterflies: one settled on the newest addition to his soldiers’ nose, making the large shadow blink in confusion, while another perched on the biggest shadow ice bear’s ear, which twitched periodically in response. It was subtle, but these butterflies seemed different, more distinct somehow.

If I can't extract Baruka's shadow, Jinwoo thought, can I at least make use of his remains?

His musings were suddenly interrupted by a voice that wasn’t his own.

“We can make a mana reservoir of his left-over life force, for future use, Sire.”

Jinwoo immediately stood on alert, scanning for the source of the voice. Was there another enemy nearby?

“At ease, Sire. We’re under orders from our Mistress to assist you.”

The realization hit Jinwoo like a tidal wave. Slowly, he turned his gaze to the red butterfly, now fluttering in front of him, its delicate wings moving calmly, as though it were the leader of the swarm.

Did... did your butterflies just...?

“Correct, Sire. We can communicate with you using the sub-skill: <Sensory Illusion>.”

The red butterfly drifted closer to Jinwoo, its shimmering wings catching the light of the dungeon. Even Igris seemed momentarily shocked by the sudden speech coming from one of the familiars, his shadowy form tense.

The red butterfly hovered in front of Jinwoo, as though bowing slightly before him. It spoke again, this time with more clarity, its tone eerily reminiscent of you. "Let us confirm, Sire. Would you like us to make a condensed reservoir of the enemy’s remains?"

It paused for a brief moment, as if allowing Jinwoo to process the information. Then it added, “With Our Lady’s current skills, she can surely make something of it that will be helpful to you in some way.”

Jinwoo's eyes narrowed slightly. This butterfly was sly—cunning, even. He smirked slightly. Even your summons had your subtle charm.

"Do it."

The butterfly bobbed once, almost like a respectful bow, before flitting away to relay the message to the rest of the swarm. Jinwoo watched as they began their work, weaving magic that siphoned the residual energy from Baruka's remains.

Once again, you had surprised him, even in your absence.

End Note:

Unedited Draft of [020/10/2024] -

#solo leveling #solo leveling imagine #solo leveling x reader #sung jin woo x reader #sung jinwoo #sung jinwoo x reader #yandere sung jinwoo #only i level up #solo leveling jinwoo #fanfic #solo leveling fanfic #fanfiction #fem reader #x reader #reader insert

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blacknedsoul-blog · 1 year ago

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My bets on Nevermore's development

In the middle of the arc and with the White Raven divorce beginning, I think I feel comfortable betting on how all the story lines the comic has laid out so far will play out. A mixture of analysis and theories.

Duke and Montressor

I don't think Duke will die. For several reasons (one of which I'll explain below), but the main one is that Duke is a character who still has a lot to give: they've gone to the trouble of giving him a name, a past, a personality, and yet none of these things have been properly explored. The comic wouldn't really benefit from Duke dying because he still has a lot of interesting things to bring to the story.

Coupled with the fact that we're still learning how Spectres work, and with Duke unable to manifest, it's the perfect time to flesh out that part of the lore and give us a cool moment to show us his Spectre.

That said, I have a hard time seeing a way for Montressor to stay in the game once this issue is over: he's proven himself to be a menace that won't stop and an unmitigated sadist. The guy is just evil, and frankly, he didn't seem to have much more backstory or anything new to bring to the table.

My bet on him is that he'll die, maybe Lenore will go with the group in psycho-killer mode, Duke will confront him with his spectre, Morella will go against him to save Ada, Annabel will try to make merit so Lenore won't be asked for a divorce, or the Deans themselves will see him as a problem they need to take care of. If the comic thinks murder is irredeemable for its characters, maybe he'll have a Frollo-style death where it's his own ego that kills him (what if he becomes one of the creatures roaming the school?).

I think this because, besides how satisfying it would be to see him die, I think it would be a good time for the comic to show you the consequences of death within Nevermore. We know that going to the Land of the Dead is a terrible thing, but we don't know exactly what it entails. And seeing it would make any future threat seem more terrifying.

Post-Divorce

The White Raven will reconcile. This is obvious: the comic is about their relationship, the publicity for the comic has them together, and much of the appeal of the work comes from their romance. It's not a question of whether it will happen or not, but how it will happen and what the consequences will be.

Maybe some extraordinary event will happen to bring them back together, or we will have the equivalent of the Greenhouse 2.0 scene where they have a whole conversation about why, even if Lenore understands Annabel reasons, this is a situation that can never happen again.

One thing I want to point out here: I don't think Annabel did this out of jealousy. Maybe she feels it, but this story has made a consistent effort to show you that while Annabel is hypocritical, manipulative, and Machiavellian, she still has a moral compass: her reaction after when Montressor makes Ada bark and when Prospero is about to have a breakdown indicate that her limit is to hurt others gratuitously. She won't defend them if it puts her in a problematic situation, but this clearly pisses her; by that logic, it would even be out of character for her to try to hurt Duke because she's jealous, and more importantly, it would do irreparable damage to her relationship with Lenore (which is why I don't think our favorite Frenchman dies).

Understanding that, there's one thing these two haven't really talked about: for Lenore, getting her friends out of here is not something optional, she's completely determined to do it, and given this moment, it's very likely that the next step will be for Annabel to join the "save everyone" team: she thinks Lenore is capable of anything, and so she's going to put all her faith in her being able to pull this off.

Coupled with the fact that the plan to keep Lenore as a harmless figure went to hell after the incident in the tower, she's going to have to adjust things. And my theory on this is that Annabel is going to expand her rivalry plan to the group level.

I believe this because the logical conclusion after the banquet is that the Deans, for some reason, want the students to fight, to foster an atmosphere of competition among them. So far, giving them what they want has worked perfectly for them, so they would suggest that it would be helpful to pretend that things are going exactly as they think they are while they try to figure out how to get out of this place, at least until they can think of something better.

Yes, I assume Annabel will join the Misfits. She'll probably be like Zuko from Avatar, begging for forgiveness and winning them over one by one in individual arcs.

Another important development that will come out of this is that when Lenore is fed up enough with her bullshit, she will remind Annabel of her promise about how they both get their memories back: they are already right in the middle and it will be time to start putting the puzzle together.

However, I have reason to believe that Annabel will manage not to talk about the exact way they both died for a very simple reason: whether Lenore was Annabel's executioner or not, they died together. Lenore was there, and she will most likely blame herself because "if I hadn't gone looking for her, Annabel would still be alive" and for "not protecting her".

But by the time they have this conversation (or she finds out otherwise), the comic may be starting to address one of Lenore's major conflicts as a character: because of her fear of abandonment and her feeling that she is undeserving of love, she has no qualms about putting herself in danger to protect others. This is a terribly damaging perspective in the context that the Deans have created: not only is it naive to think that she can always protect her friends or Annabel from getting hurt, but Lenore unwittingly carries the feelings of the people who love her by endangering herself.

My head canon

Everything I've said so far is based on things the comic has shown and storylines that may not be explored in this specific way, but are more or less on the comic. But there's a lot of nonsense out there that I'd really like to see, even if there's little or nothing in the artwork to indicate to me that any of those things will come to fruition.

Annabel vs. Montressor

I would love to see Annabel vs. Montressor precisely because Annabel has no chance against Montressor: she has no experience in a fight, even if her spectre is a powerful one, Montressor would wipe the floor with her. But I think it would be a nice way to put a point: Annabel and Montressor are not the same.

He enjoys torturing others, she will be a villain to protect what she loves.

I can also think of two interesting things that could come out of this encounter: Lenore having her moment where she thinks Annabel is dead, parallel to the maze scene (for Lenore, Annabel is an unbeatable queen, so she could use a little reality check), and a conversation along those lines:

-L: Did you think that by putting yourself in danger like this I was going to forgive what you did?!

A: I didn't do this because I thought you would forgive me. Deep down, I know you already did, even though that doesn't mean I shouldn't face consequences for my actions.

-L: ...Then why?

-A: Because I promised you I would. I said I would distract our enemies, that I would protect you from my allies, and that's exactly what I did. I knew I couldn't handle him, but I was distracted and wounded enough to get the job done.

This would finally establish one thing that has been up in the air about Annabel: yes, she really behaves and acts like a villain. But after something like this, there would never be any doubt (for the readers or for Lenore) that she always keeps her promises.

Imagine the delicious drama that could come from establishing that so forcefully.

Eulalie is a Lennabel shipper

Come to think of it, the two of them haven't done a very good job of hiding it: we go from Lenore running all over school to take care of Annabel to watching them fight for no apparent reason.

I like to think that Eulalie seriously suspects something is going on between them, and when the Misfits inevitably find out about Annabel and Lenore's relationship, she'll be like, "Oh, you guys hadn't noticed?" while saying things like, "Oh, so you're the one who took us to the haunted mansion!"

Annabel and Berenice as unlikely friends

I love the image of Berenice physically threatening Annabel with the knife and saying something like "You're a posh bitch, but you've got style" after she doesn't react in fear. I also think Bernice would be the first to admit that while she won't easily forgive Annabel for putting Duke in danger, she wouldn't have hesitated to throw Annabel, Prospero, Ada, or Will under the bus to protect any of her group of friends if necessary.

Also, the idea of Annabel saying, "She's a violent slur. I want her around" is oddly hilarious to me.

Prospero as the ultimate "tired friend"

If Annabel takes Prospero with her, I can imagine the guy banging his head against the wall all the time because he sees all these idiots who are strangely competent when you get right down to it, but choose to spend their energy doing stupid things when no one is dying.

A terrible deal between Duke and Annabel

Remember that wonderful scene in Avatar where Katara threatens to kill Zuko if she thinks he's going to hurt Aang? I like to think that Duke and Annabel will have a scene like that:

-D: They didn't see the look on your face when they put up the wall, but I did. And I can assure you that I won't hesitate to act if I think you're going to hurt my friend or any of them, cherie.

-A: Promise?

-D: ...

-A: That you will be there to protect her no matter what, even from me. I wouldn't mind you holding the sword of Damocles over my head if it proves to me that you can protect her from any threat.

-D: You have my word.

In conclusion

So that's my bingo on how things will go in the comic from here on out. There are some things (like Morella's development, what's going to happen with Ada, or when the hell we're going to get some backstory on Will) that I don't think I have enough information on to theorize. But here it is.

#annabel lee nevermore #annabel lee whitlock #lenore nevermore #lenore vandernacht #nevermore webtoon #white raven

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pacthesis · 1 year ago

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our vietnamese tea ceremony

some may or may not know i just got engaged to a weird guy i met in college that (to put it lightly) i wasn’t too fond of but after like 2 years of snubbing him he somehow won my heart i guess

i scribbled a comic about it cause whenever people ask how i met him they sometimes get invested haha

some people also may have seen him on america’s got talent or cbs news or jimmy fallon or on tiktok doing his pizza man shenanigans lol

people often ask if he pulled me with his dough skills and i have to clarify i didn’t even know about the dough spinning hobby until after we started dating and he didn’t do the tv/media appearances until like 6 years into our relationship 🤣

my parents were both boat refugees from vietnam (they fled during the war when they were teenagers and met as adults) and i’m american- but we’re not really that “traditional” i guess

i think many viet people don’t get married or commit without having a tea ceremony haha

a hetero buddy asked who were my bridesmaids and when i told him i don’t have any he asked why and i just said “i like my friends” 🤣 (my childhood friends were there as guests though!)

i also didn’t want/ask pizza man’s family to bring the customary gifts cause i didn’t wanna cramp my style

basically the purpose of this event was for people to witness us getting engaged and be an opportunity for our families to meet one another!

5/23/2015 is when we started dating

for our first anniversary i got our initials and anniversary date stamped onto a penny and pizza man still carries it around 🥺

so 8 years later we got engaged on 8/5/2023

8 for august (8 years later)

5th of august (5 for the month we began dating)

year of 2023 (23 for the day we began dating)

i think people often go to a fortune teller or someone who knows what they’re doing to schedule important dates using the stars and other factors but my grandpa doesn’t believe in that and the rest of us aren’t really superstitious

we wore áo dài- it’s a vietnamese ensemble consisting of a tunic with a long front and back panel that is worn over pants

áo means “shirt/clothes” and dài means "long"

a lot of the time the bride wears red and the groom wears blue i guess but i wanted my outfit to look bridal when i imagine an american bride or a vietnamese bride!

i also wanted to wear a gold khăn đóng headpiece and to incorporate pearls to resemble what my mom wore when she got engaged to my dad

sunflowers are also my fav

(after we started dating i thought pizza man was tall and sunny like a sunflower haha 😭)

my makeshift shoebox altar- or as i like to call it: my “spirit pager” 😤

the double happiness symbol is two copies of the chinese character 喜 (xǐ) which means joy/happiness and red symbolizes luck for the couple

my mom asked if we should put up pictures of our deceased and i was like i don’t wanna make pizza man’s parents go out of their way to bring photos 😭

i think we were supposed to ask our ancestors for permission to get engaged or married or whatever but since my mom raised me to believe my life is mine to live i just announced it to em

as far as i know it’s not really a buddhist thing- ancestor worship is more of a vietnamese thing apparently

my mom said vietnam is a country with a lot of war and death in its history- so imo it makes sense how they incorporate the dead into their culture and traditions

after introducing each of our family members and friends- we lit a couple of incense to (casually) announce the news to our deceased grandparents and relatives

apparently burning incense is an invitation to ancestral spirits and to deliver wishes to predecessors

smoke from the burning incense guides people to safety or safe passing when they die- it also guides em back home on days like these

the spirit(s) depart when all of the incense has burned

next month is my grandma’s "deathiversary” (giỗ) so we’ll be paging her again soon

we used a tea set that was used to celebrate my 1st birthday to pour and serve (my pick) of vanilla caramel black tea to my grandpa and our parents

pizza man’s mom doesn’t like tea so i was happy i picked something she did enjoy!

but when my mom brought her family to america from vietnam- she asked them if they could bring a tea set specifically for me

my mom said it’s meant to be used to celebrate any of my special occasions

then me and pizza man said some nice words to each other and exchanged rings

my ring was pizza man’s grandma’s- his grandpa initially proposed with a smaller diamond but after he saved up enough he got her this bigger one

i don’t listen to any comments that suggest or imply this carbon rock is not humongous 🤣

pizza man paid to get it resized and to repair its prongs (it was well worn by grandma mercedes 🥺)

also found out my ring size is 3.25 (US) haha 😭

he also decided to get his grandpa’s ring resized and to wear it too!

my mom put this necklace on me- she says it reads “happiness” (i can’t confirm lol) but she received it from her mother-in-law when she got engaged to my dad

my mom was too scared to wear it after their tea ceremony cause it’s 24 karat gold and she didn't wanna wreck it

she said 24 karat gold hasn't been combined with other metals so it’s soft

i guess couples at viet tea ceremonies often get 24 karat jewelry- the idea is they can quickly sell it/melt it down for hard times

my mom also passed down her favorite jade bracelet and my grandma’s favorite diamond earrings to me 🥺

and on my 1st birthday my mom got a special ring made to celebrate my birth- she put it on a chain so the person i marry can wear it close to their heart

my mom also got a special ring necklace made to celebrate my sibling’s birth and gave it to their fiancée during their tea ceremony

it’s just the two of us so no more shiny token trophies up for grabs! 😤

i laughed when pizza man had to squat down so low so my mom could put the necklace on him

after the ceremony i asked him if he wanted me to help him take it off (my sibling's fiancée keeps theirs in a safe cause she’s too scared to wear it daily) but pizza man was like "no i like it 😄" and wore it to sleep and showered with it and hasn’t taken it off since 😭🤣

at the end of the ceremony we lit the candles on the altar to represent the union of our families!

then we ate lots of food haha

my parents both cooked! egg rolls, fried rice, lo mein, bột chiên (fried taro rice cake)

my mom was excited because she knew many of our guests weren’t very familiar with vietnamese food and wanted to share that with them 🥺

and my dad was just so excited for me and pizza man and had so much fun getting the supplies and decorations 😭

my aunt and uncle and sister-in-law brought vịt quay (peking duck), heo quay (roast pork), gỏi tôm (shrimp salad), bánh hỏi (rice vermicelli), xôi gấc (sweet red sticky rice topped with coconut, peanuts and salt)

and pizza man’s mom and family brought lots of desserts

we have always been so amazed with how good their sweets taste and look! 🥺

we also got an ice cream cake

i wasn’t thinking and asked em to write “nicholas and amy lễ đính hôn” and they called me and were like wtf is this and i was like oh no it’s ok haha don’t worry about it! 😭🤣

we had some photos displayed but my sibling took lots of nice pictures of the whole thing!

i was happy i actually got the chance to spend time with and talk to everyone who came!

it went so well and we had so much fun that we’re thinking of doing something similar for our wedding- probably a backyard wedding haha

i was telling pizza man apparently some tea ceremonies have the first half take place at the bride’s home and then the later half is at the groom’s home 🤔

anyway reminder that leftover egg rolls can be reheated in the toaster

#vietnamese tea ceremony #lễ đính hôn #đính hôn #đám hỏi

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brooklynisher · 5 months ago

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Here's a bunch of old sketchbook doodles I made y'all

Stick around bc this includes my first SPG drawings!! (Before I joined Tumblr)

Riveting start

I'll start off with little drawings I made of myself. And my god do you see what I'm doing with the anatomy? Do you see how tiny those joints are? That's horrific. Why did I build everyone like that? But Yugo is where I began to find my art style. Will love them forever for that. I've got to go back to simple-shaped heads one of these days and blush/eyelashes on everything

We've got some lovely Smile For Me-related doodles. First is a Flower Kid design. Second was not smile for me specifically, but Face Love (by the same devs). And the last two were my earlier attempts at making comics and scenes. Ft. lancer for some reason.

Here are a couple of abandoned OCs. Pretty boy (Basil) is supposed to be yellow. We've all had that OC whose only trait was being a hot person and that's what he was all about. Didn't develop him much in terms of character which is sad because I kinda like his design. He was created when I was doodling random designs in FireAlpaca. I'll have to show the other doodles in a different post (If you are interested).

THIS GUY I WOULD LIKE TO BRING BACK! Might be kinda basic in terms of like "Weird Core" designs but I still love him. His plot keeps changing though because his design is so strange yet so simple to the point where I could put him in just about any world I wanted to had I gotten bored of the old one. Which is silly bc he's just a depressed news anchor man.

Anyway bc of that, Basil used to be his bf, but isn't anymore. He got replaced with fat peppermint man who fun fact: was inspired by the song Brass Goggles BEFORE I even got into SPG and learned what it was about! How silly is that! Peppermint boy is technically my first SPG OC!

She was a fun one, but I abandoned her too. I think she was too influenced by Frye's character from Splatoon. She was a warrior of sorts. Sort of tribal I suppose. She spoke fast, and in her tribe's language, so many people struggled to understand her. She was very bouncy too. Jumping all over the place. If you know Frye, you'll probably notice that they're a bit too similar to each other. That's usually why I abandon my OCs. When they're too similar to another.

Critter I doodled. Not really an OC, but I still think she's cute

Don't ask me about the first guy. The girl was a mii that was born in Tomodachi Life! Her name is Lily. She is the child of Kris (Deltarune) and Hatsune Miku. She looks silly which is why I love her.

I'm Picasso. Kinda vibe with this ngl. Not sure if I could ever turn this into anything though

Here are some low-effort doodles. Enjoyed the design of the big lady more than I thought. I was practicing drawing bigger bodies at the time. Joints are still KILLING ME but it's not bad considering I had the worst anatomy method imaginable

Here are some higher-effort doodles. Aside from the abhorrent anatomy (WHY DOES THE PIG ZOMBIE HAVE TWO DIFFERENTLY SIZED SHOULDERSS????) I quite like these critters. That mermaid girl had lore too. She could control the dead of the sea. She was lowkey evil. Never turned her into anything though. Also, you can see by that guy at the bottom of the first one, that Bunny's art was starting to take an influence on me.

Lots of stuff going on over here but LOOK! MY VERY FIRST SPG FANART! IT'S OF VI POINTING AT AN APPLE AND YELLING AT IT

I was inspired by Bunny to make these monster-ish-looking people

More thingies! There's the goopy robot which I initially drew as a first attempt at drawing a robot, but then I made it black and goopy bc that's what it was giving. The star guy appears and disappears a few times. I think I wanted to keep them, but the design was very similar to LightLazer so I felt a bit weird about drawing them.

More robot shenanigans. First time drawing Rabbit and The Spine! Cannot believe that my first Spine drawing was in a dress oh my god.

More Bunny-inspired drawings and I'm REALLY kinda digging that weird tiny robot critter. Looking at it now, it's kinda like Spring in a few ways, but it's also completely different from Spring in so many other ways. The limbs are retractable. I kinda like this thing actually. I Oughtta do something with it.

These ones are more SPG-specific. You'll have to forgive me, most of these are from memory. Don't ask me why Rabbit looks like David Bowie in the first one.

And finally, some Rabbit and Spine doodles! Rabbit's doing the "Hey Andy Sweetie" meme. I could totally reattempt drawing that today actually.

Anyway, hope you had fun. I did. Ugh this is so sillyy

#steam powered giraffe #spg #the spine spg #rabbit spg #zer0 spg #peter walter vi #spg fanart #my stuff #art #smile for me #s4m #spg fanbot #oc stuff #yall let me know if you're curious about any of my guys or doodles #gg the giraffe

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snowbellewells · 4 months ago

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Fandom Birthday Rec List for @jrob64

Happy Birthday, dear Joni! Happy Birthday to You!!!

Okay, when I set out to make this list of my favorites of your works, I had a couple in mind right off the top of my head, and thought "This is a no-brainer! It'll be easy!" You would think I'd have known better after the massive list I created when Krystal asked for our favorite fics overall a couple years ago and I ended up making a Sweet 16 style bracket to even narrow mine down. Needless to say, I ended up with a solid dozen stories on my paper, instead of the five or six I needed, and discovered a few hidden gems from way back before I knew you that I hadn't even read!! However, my very, VERY favorite has never wavered and is still exactly the same - you'll see! ;)

Anyway, I am so glad I found your wonderful writings, have gotten to know you in person, text with you, travel with you, and become genuinely good friends. Your are a blessing in my life, and I hope this gift brings a bit of a smile to your face as I try to celebrate the joy you've shared with us all in creating further adventures for our pirate and princess. Happy Birthday!!!

**Top 6 Favorite @jrob64 Fics (in descending order)**

#6 - "One Thrill Ride Leads to Another" (my own birthday fic! ;p )

This five part (six, with the epilogue) story is pure fun and chemistry and sweetness overload. I adore it more than I can really say, and am beyond flattered that a handsome sight and chance comment of mine helped to birth the original idea. And no, it isn't even just because this one include an alive and happy Graham as supporting character and a hilariously hot secondary Red Huntsman plot line -- though it certainly doesn't hurt!! ;) My rambling can't really do this one justice, so if anyone reading this has missed it, I beg of you: Check it out for yourself! It's a perfect summer treat!

#5 - "Silly Songs With Killian" (Modern AU one shot - adorable!)

Okay, I realize that I am using a valuable spot on this list for a fluffy little one shot, but it's just that much fun and has that much heartwarming power. I dare you to get the image of Killian playing VeggieTales on the guitar for a wildly enthusiastic audience of one small boy who is madly excited by the effort out of your head! You won't be able to - it's gonna stick with you and make you smile every time it floats back in!! If you've had a bad day and need a pick me up, this is your fic right here!

#4 - "Taking on Mrs. Jones" (hilariously hot silver fox one shot)

This is another more comic/lighthearted one shot, but I just can't resist it. In fact, I re-read it in making certain of my list, and I love it all the more. This one features a slightly older, professor Killian (one of my serious weaknesses) and a married version of CS. Plus, when he gets an overly flirtatious new co-worker who makes him uncomfortable - Emma comes perfectly to the defense of her man and teaches that girl a lesson.

#3 - "Ghosted" (a WIP supernatural modern AU MC for @cssns24)

This story is still in progress, but it has very quickly jumped the list to become one of Joni's best, best offerings (in my humble opinion)! I love the unusual and intriguing plot and can't wait to see how it will turn out. The inclusion of Will and Belle as secondary characters (and a secondary love story) is wonderful👩🏻‍🍳 *chef's kiss!* And a ghostly version of Liam absolutely tugs on my heart. Definitely check this one out if you haven't yet.

#2 - "Always in my Heart" (5 Part Modern AU, so feelsy and angsty and deep)

This one moved me to tears in the process, way more than once. I loved the long lost friends reunited aspect of this story, right from the start. I loved the sense of adopted family Emma has with David and MM, and most especially Ruth. (I always loved David's mom in canon, and the chance to see a lot more of her in this fic, and to see what this version of her means to Emma was priceless, even if heart wrenching too.)

#1 - "Sowing Seeds of Trust" (and its extra chapter "Marco's Legacy")

This story was the first one of yours I discovered, Joni, and I was completely captured! It was wrapped around my heart from the very first chapter. I loved the vulnerability and need, but also strength and resilience, in this version of Emma. I loved Killian's support, understanding and love in how he reached out to her. I love the friendships with David, MM, Ruby, and of course MARCO!! (He steals the whole show here, honestly!) The faith and restoration and perfect "happy beginning" after trials in this story are original, unique, and unforgettable. It's always going to be my favorite, I think, as it lead me to your writing to begin with, and it touched me deeply.

*Honorable mentions - if anyone is curious - also not to be missed:

"Snowstorm Confessions"

"Lonely No More"

"Faultline"/"Seismic Waves" (Liam x Elsa)

"Where Her Heart Belongs"/"Her Heart's Home"

"For the Sake of Henry"

Hope you enjoy your little list - and an absolutely wonderful day!!! Very Best Birthday Wishes to You!!!

#fandom birthday rec list #birthday fave fics #happy birthday @jrob64 #fave cs fics list #top six @jrob64 fics #such a talented shipmate ⚓️💕⚓️

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bleaksqueak · 2 years ago

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Okay! I said I'd do a quick little tut for the chromatic aberration effect to the anon who asked, so here you go. Above is the raw panel, so from here, you'll be duplicating the canvas/panel by choosing "Copy Canvas" from the wrench button. Once copied, paste it into your folder and select the layer options to turn on Clipping Mask to your base panel. If doing the whole canvas, you can just paste as-is

I prefer to duplicate it once in preparation and then again each time I make a change, that way the effect can be toggled on /off or have its opacity lowered to mix with a previous effect if needed. From there, select the magic wand/effects and adjustments menu and click on Add Noise. Important: Pretend I took a screenshot of the drop-down menu, because rats must keep up appearances.

I prefer clouds with maximum octaves and low-no turbulence at a fine scale... however, play with the options and find one you like (or don't use it at all! I like the grain for a mild texture and for harmonizing the art's elements, especially on quick panels or rougher drawings.) I'm going at about 5% here. Just enough to give the desired effect, but not too much.

Once it's to your liking, duplicate your canvas/layer and select your new layer to work off of. On the magic wand menu again, select Chromatic Aberration.

We're working with the displace method, so select that instead of Perspective.

In procreate, the tool works by shifting your cursor in the direction you prefer at the distance you want. I never travel far, and I often use the warm/cold to play off of a reverse of my light source colors. I do that just to create a softened edge and a subtle color pop. Just like with the added noise, I keep the effect on a more subtle side often. Blurring at around 5 - 12 % will give your lines a soft glow and get rid of any (say, hideous pencil lines that you use as inks because you hate inking. Not that I do that. Not me.) Transparency can be bumped up or left alone, does what it says on the tin and strengthens the effect or subdues it.

Now, you might find some important detail is now too hazy? Too blurry? Too CHROMBERRATED? If so, gently erase what you want to be crisp. For Maia here, I just erased the front hair curls and her eyelashes.

Keep it or erase it, it's up to you. Play around and see what you like. Now, once all is said and done, and you like the effect, adding a few specular pops of light on a new layer can aid with bringing back in some focal points. Eye color, rim lighting, or just a couple of little metallic flecks. I use the light pen tool for this when feeling lazy, but you can use any brush you like, either on a raw Normal layer or on any of the light adjugement style layers. I chose a pale green to compliment the warm, red hues and balance the bluish shadow in her hair. Just a tiny little speck on her glasses, lips and on the rim light of her nose just to keep the anchor points of her face clear. Don't over do it (unless you want to, in that case, by all means, the light is yours to command.)

And that's the final. Hidden in the darkest shadows of voidcraft, I applied a textured brush to my canvas on Overlay because I do that for every comic page. Except for those that I forget, may their tears one day dry.

I hope that helps! The effect is subtle on this panel, but the desired effect to soften and marry the art, thus fooling the viewer's eye into thinking I super meticulously rendered this with careful prim and polish, is achieved! Hooray!

#solivaga #pu art #tutorial #art resources #art process #procreate #comic panel #digital art #artists on tumblr #art reference #mmmmmmmmaia #sorry about my handwriting

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drifting-pieces-blog-blog · 9 months ago

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Breaking down the comics: Soldiers (Punisher Annual #2: Knight Fall)

You guys. YOU GUYS.

I am so excited to bring you this next one for SO MANY REASONS.

The first reason is that this is the FIRST Moon Knight comic I ever read.

And this comic os pure WTFer set off an obsession that has directed the course of my life for over ten years now.

Marc Spector: Moon Knight

Punisher Annual #2: Knight Fall. 1989

Written by: Mike Baron

Art by: Bill Reinhold

Gerbil: Tom DeFalco

(Tom is the editor in chief for Marvel at the time)

We got ourselves a Punisher Annual with a Moon Knight guest appearance!

Now I’ve talked about guest appearances again and again and again. It usually means that the guest star is going to show up HUGE on the cover with some dramatic depiction in an attempt to lure in more new readers to the title comic.

But look at this comic cover. This isn’t Moon Knight showing up to save the day or in a little blurb bubble or box. He’s battling Frank! This looks more like a cross-over style comic! Those always depict the main character FIGHTING the other guest star! And damn if this cover isn’t amazing. Look at those two locked in close quarter combat! And that dagger! This might be a Punisher comic, but Moon Knight isn’t about to roll over!

Now, as we all have come to expect, when you have a crossover for the first time, the two characters always spend the first couple pages fighting in some misunderstanding before they make up and team together to fight the real bad guys. But Punisher takes no quarter and Moon Knight is grumpy at best.

Alright, so we open up on a Long Island Petshop where a Mr. Morton is purchasing Gerbils for their kids.

For those that do not know, a Gerbil is about the size of a large mouse with a long tufted tail and kangaroo like hind feet. They're fast, bite hard, and are fun. (I used to own them as a kid for many years and loved them).

They actually aren’t that well known, even though you can always find them in pet shops next to the hamsters. I wonder why they chose gerbil over say, mice or rats or hamsters. I get the feeling there was some inside joke among the writers here.

…..Oh.

Snake guy. Got it.

MARC.

Marc… “That man just ate a gerbil! Why does it set off all my emergency alarm bells?”

Marc…

So... After that... Marc calls up Frenchie on his radio and tells him that he's tailing a car and gives him details on the vehicle.

"Oui, Marc, what's up?"

"I'm not sure... Maybe nothing."

MARC SPECTOR. You just watched a man eat a gerbil in a pet shop....WHOLE. What do you mean 'Nothing'?!

He tails the car to an old run down mansion .

"That's the old Borgwardt estate--It's been taken over by something called Save Our Society... Time to head home."

Frenchie confirms the car info with Marc. It is registered to the SOS non-profit agency that is privately funded by physicians.

"Sort of an east coast version of the Betty Ford Clinic. Why would a man eat a gerbil?"

Marc… You have fought werewolves. You fought a literal rat king. We’ve seen you fight ghosts and get your ass handed to you by a snake.

AND WHAT ARE YOU WEARING!? Does Steven know you’re wearing his clothes?

He asks Frenchie to dig into the petstore's files and get him a credit card for the guy that ate the gerbil and an address.

Meanwhile, we meander on over to the star of our show:

"Punisher's War Journal-- I've been on the trail of Ralph Newton, a junkie who makes a living ripping off old ladies' social security checks. Two weeks ago he pushed a seventy year old woman down a flight of stairs and she died. Newton seemed to have disappeared, butt now I have a lead--This shooting gallery in the Bronx."

For those of you unaware of the Punisher, here's a brief howdy-do for you!

The Punisher, AKA, Frank Castle. Originally a VietNam vet who came back with a little PTSD. His family (wife and child) were murdered by the mafia and Frank decided he'd had enough of evil in the world. He makes it his life's work to hunt down and kill anyone that makes it a living to hurt people.

Historically, the other heroes (ESPECIALLY DareDevil and Captain America) despise Frank and often rally the other heroes to try to hunt him down and stop him from continuing his war on crime.

He got his start in a Spider-Man comic of all places and branched out from there.

Frank is a pretty gruff and serious man and depending on who is writing him and what series you are reading, he can be pretty violent.

War Journal was a very popular series where he drives around in his Battle Van and writes about his missions. It works nicely because Frank isn’t much of a social man. So if you rely on the story conversations, like in all the other comics, you aren’t going to get much. But having him writing things down in his journal you get a beautiful narration that reads like a Noir film and you also get a fantastic way to get to know Frank and how he thinks. I appreciate it.

Often when Frank meets up with other heroes, there is a fight with them telling him he's wrong for killing and them eventually trying to stop him.

Now, we know he's going to meet up with Marc in this. And I am so excited for you guys to see this epic encounter.

So we see Frank in his usual attire walk up to a safe house and knock on the door.

He gets the guy to open the door posing as a seller.

Yeah. By now, everyone knows what it means when they see that skull design.

"Junkies. I swear they don't feel pain. You've got to break something before they stop coming at you."

Frank shoots all but one. He tells the remaining guy he's looking for Newton.

Lucky for the junkie he says he last saw Newton going into a rehab clinic saying he was going to get straight.

So Frank heads up to the clinic. It's a Save Our Society clinic.

"The place reeks of sweat and stale cigarettes, ashtrays filled to overflowing."

Man that's good Noir.

Frank walks up to the main desk (in his street clothes, which just means he put on a turtle neck and a coat).

"Department of social services. I'm here to verify our use of federal funds."

"I'm sorry, sir. There must be some mistake. This clinic is privately funded --we receive no federal funds."

"*SIGH* Sounds like another department screw-up. Could I speak to your director?"

(What works about this is that no one actually knows what Frank Castle looks like! He doesn’t need a disguise. Everyone knows him by what he wears. They see the giant skull and the guns. It WORKS. And Frank is surprisingly good at acting. He knows the system.)

He's told that the director isn't in. She's Leona Hiss. (Hiss? Really? We're going there?)

Frank heads to get info from Microchip. Hey! Microchip! I missed him!

Microchip was Frank's old tech guy. He was the man in the van that would give Frank info and hack into things for him.

I'd say they were good friends...But Frank doesn't have friends. I'd give you spoilers on what eventually happens to Microchip but... It's kinda a BIG spoiler and maybe someone here wants to head on over into Punisher land. So I'll leave it at that. (I came to Moon Knight from Punisher land. It was all thanks to this crossover comic… so I guess their ploy really does work sometimes.)

Anyways... Microchip looks up this Leona Hiss person.

A widow of an anesthesiologist who started the clinics to help drug addicts. He goes on and on and tells Frank it "Smells like a smoke screen. All her life, the lady shuns publicity. Now all of a sudden she's a big philanthropist?"

Man, look at that light and shadow in the first panel. This art team is amazing.

Frank sets up position on a roof across from the clinic.

"Clock Street's eerily alive at two A.M. I see a knife fight, several drug deals...Lights are burning in the clinic but no one's entered or left. There are guards on the roof. Better move.

I take position a block away, behind the clinic. I can easily make my way back over the rooftops--Nobody's watching back here. Overhead, a faint Whoosh. Some kind of high-tech chopper."

Oh boy. Oh boy. Oh boy.

(This art. This art is SLAYING.)

Oh man. Look at this meet up. Frank and his shotgun, Moon Knight facing him down.

They know who each other are! Every time Moon Knight meets up with someone he has to introduce himself! No one knows who he is! But Frank knows him. And Moon Knight doesn’t call him Frank. He knows who he is dealing with.

Oh man, that cover called for such an epic showdown. Both ex-marines. Both know how to handle themselves.

Uh.

“I presume we’re both interested in Save Our Society.”

“Right this afternoon I saw a man eat a gerbil. He came from here.”

“What’s his name?”

"Helmut Snead. He used a solen credit card. Six feet, brown eyes, scar above his left eye."

"Ralph Newton--A Junkie Murderer. What's he doing on Long Island?"

"I don't know--But he didn't look like a junkie. I want to know how he got out of the South Bronx and into a fancy clinic."

"How would you take this guy out?"

WHAT IS HAPPENING.

This is incredible. You have no idea.

Frank doesn't have friends. Frank doesn't do team-ups. Frank is brutal and tells it like it is.

And this isn't Frank being the victim to a new writer making nice in someone else's ball park. This is a PUNISHER comic. Moon Knight is the visitor.

And on that note... MARC doesn't have friends. MARC doesn't play well with others. We literally just came off of him being a part of the West Coast Avengers and leaving because he doesn't team well!

And here these two are, meeting for the first time and being BFF.

In fact, the fact that they already know who one another is despite never meeting means that they have heard others talk about them. And when people talk about the Punisher or Moon Knight, they generally don't have good things to say!

So these two heard "Yeah he's a brutal lunatic" they went "I gotta meet this chap."

I can't stress enough how amazing this is.

Frank is even asking Moon Knight to show how he'd take down a guy. He wants to see how Moon Knight works. And Moon Knight is letting Frank go first.

THIS in itself is amazing. Why? Because we have two highly skilled specialists from a high combat militarized zone that were both known for ambush settings and traps.

They know everything about this building isn't reading right, they have seen some guards and they don't know what's going on inside. So they are essentially walking into an unknown through a closed space doorway into a stairwell with numerous blind spots and possibilities for traps/ambushes.

If it were anyone else, Marc would go first to clear the way and possibly take that first hit because he knows he can take it.

BUT. If you REALLY look at it, Frank is older than Marc. Frank went to 'Nam. Frank has been at this longer and has turned New York into his own personal jungle.

He offers Frank the lead out of respect AND because he knows and Frank knows that if anything is out of the ordinary, Frank will spot it FIRST and deal with it.

This is grade A military tactics and my lord it’s beautiful.

And you know what?

Frank’s history is that he was team leader. And when Marc gives him lead, Frank takes it and Marc RESPECTS him. They are both used to working in this sort of setting.

And when you think about it, Marc was NEVER the leader. He followed other people. Bushman was his leader. Marc joined other groups and let other people tell him what to do. If he didn’t like it, he went off and joined a new group.

So when Frank says “Hold it….!” he is treading Marc like an officer under him and he has now automatically accepted Marc as following him and thus putting him under his protection. This is beautiful. I could wax on about this all day you guys.

Uh… Back to the comic. So… Frank spots a Black Mamba that’s sluggish from being in a cold setting.

Marc makes light chatter (he’s kinda of a goof and light chatter is what he does.) Frank quiets him. He knows there’s trouble ahead.

In the next room, we find a junky going through withdrawal and begging the doc to hurry up.

The 'doctor' injects him with something just as Frank and Marc bust in.

"Hello, Ralph. I didn't know you had a license to practice medicine... And only last week you were a lousy junkie..."

"Punisher!"

"Drop the needle."

"I don't think so.... SSSST!"

And the 'Doctor' suddenly has a snake tongue and snake eyes.

This bodes well.

Frank opens fire on his target and it hardly phases him.

"What have we stumbled into? They move slowly but they don't feel any pain." Moon Knight calls out while pummeling one of the snake guys.

"It's the cold. [....] Reptiles. The colder it gets, the slower they move. You saw Ralph eat a gerbil--Snakes eat gerbils. This place looks like a herpetology lab."

Very astute Frank.

They manage to take down all the snake guys and Moon Knight asks if he recognizes any of them.

Frank recognizes a couple of them as crackheads and various junkies.

They find Ralph to be a card carrier for S.O.S.

"Last week he's a junkie with an armful of holes and this week he's front man for a fancy long island cure club."

"I think we know where to go next. Why don't you come with me in the chopper?"

"Thanks, I will."

(WHY ARE THEY SO POLITE TO ONE ANOTHER. IT'S SO OVER THE TOP.)

So... Frank takes a ride in Marc's chopper.

"Nice set-up. How do you keep the engines so quiet?"

"It's a new kind of fiberglass packing."

And they arrive back at the mansion.

"Come on in--I've got a war room. We'll do a little digging."

"This place is a little ostentatious, don't you think?"

"There are so many private choppers flying in and out of the neighborhood nobody notices mine--Especially at night. The surrounding mansions and trees also cover our entrances and exits from the concealed hangar."

I don't think that's what he meant by ostentatious, Marc.

Inside, Frank, Marc, and Frenchie stand around a table with some maps.

Marc tells Frank about the Borwardt estate he initially tracked snake man to earlier.

"I ran a check on cult leaders and you'll never guess who was released from a federal prison last month--Viper."

Frenchie tells Frank who Viper is.

"She used to head up zat facist group Hydra, zen she went solo. She was busted in connection with the so-called snake riot in washington last year...[....] A mass hallucination where people believed they turned into snakes. I also learned that Viper was recently sprung from prison by a Dr. Tyrone."

We head on over to SOS where we see a green lady, "Madam Viper".

She is in a room of snake men who are 'newly converted'.

They say they are hungry and Viper tells them that they have "a rabbit, five hamsters and a gerbil. We'll have to make another run to the pet store soon."

She has a bit of a thing for hitting people with a whip and demanding that they all call her 'Madame Viper'.

She is then informed that the other clinic was hit and that Newton is dead.

She sends the new snake men out to the yard for guard duty. She's pretty sure SHIELD is out to get her. Which makes sense since she worked for Hydra.

Unfortunately for her, it's far from shield.

Overhead, we find the Moon Copter flying by and Moon Knight drops in with his cape and Frank drops in on a glider.

The guards immediately open fire on them and Frank returns fire.

FRANK. DO NOT ENCOURAGE HIM.

….I don’t know if I should count this as a window dive or not. It’s tempting. I’m not going to count it. He decides to abstain from window entrance for once.

Unfortunately for Frank, he runs in without checking around and Marc isn't there to watch his six.

Madam Viper jumps him and injects him with a serum.

Now... Unfortunately for her... Frank has never responded well to drugs of any sort. He's got a history of this not going well for people that try to drug Frank Castle.

He doesn't go down.

In fact, it actually makes him go a little berserk. A berserk Frank Castle is NEVER something anyone wants to face.

He’s doing fine.

She makes a run for it.

Elsewhere, Moon Knight is fighting his own snake man army.

"Lets of gunfire and then it stopped! The time to start worrying about Punisher is when the gunfire stops.

Viper injects one of her larger helpers turning him into a very large and strong snake man.

Moon Knight faces off with the big snake guy. His usual methods of just 'hit it as hard as I can' doesn't work. They don't feel pain thanks to the drugs.

He's wearing a heat pack to keep him moving so Moon Knight decides to take this outside and....WINDOW! WE GOT A WINDOW!

I mean… This one was legit. And he was exiting with a good reason… But I’m still counting it.

Heat pack removed and out in the cold air, the lizard guy goes down easy.

Moon Knight goes to find the Punisher now.

He finds a room full of bodies and Frank in the middle having a lovely hallucination time.

In the window outside, Marc watches a rocket thing take off with Viper escaping in it to fight another day.

Marc manages to distract frank with his crescent darts, moving them around and letting the light reflect off of them in a hypnotic way. This lets him get close enough to take away Frank's gun.

At this point, Frank calms down and the adrenalin that was coursing through his system and probably helping to stave off the toxic affects of the drugs wears off.

Frank goes into convulsions and Moon Knight moves to get him out of there. Not to mention the cops are starting to show up and they need to leave.

The cops have never been fans of Punisher (Despite what the right wing wants you to think when they put punisher logos on their giant trucks) and Frank has never liked the cops. Time to leave!

Marc takes Frank back to his mansion and puts him to bed.

I kid you not.

This... This is a thing that happens a lot. He did the same thing to Jack Russel. Just... Take the drugged up guy home and let him sleep it off in his big bed in the mansion.

Frank has a rough night, hallucinating and putting up a big of a fight but he sleeps it off.

The next day, he wakes up feeling a bit better.

And it ends here. Frank heading off to his next mission and Marc casual as hell as he watches his new buddy leave.

Again I’m going to say it. WHAT.

You don’t understand just HOW bizarre this issue was. ON BOTH SIDES. Frank was so…NICE… Marc was so amendable! They acted like long lost friends! WHAT WAS WITH THE CONSTANT REFERENCES TO GERBILS?! Why does Marc keep putting drugged up men in his bed? Why was he wearing Steven’s clothes? I have so many questions.

And from this casual weird encounter… An obsession was born.

ALRIGHT. Let’s talk about why this works. (This is gonna get long. You can stop here if you don't want to hear me ramble and are just here for the comics).

In the Marvel universe (616), we have a lot of veterans of different wars.

WWII has Captain America, Bucky, and Nick Fury

Vietnam has Frank Castle.

Wolverine....a lot of wars. All the wars. Every war.

Apparently Charles Xavier was in the Korean war (I didn't know that)

Ben Grimm was in the Marines before his space accident (Awww. Another thing for him to bond with Marc over.)

Then of course you have Carol Danvers who worked for the CIA in the cold war.

Rhodes (War Machine) who was in Afghanistan and Vietnam.

There are a LOT of veterans of different wars and different time periods (Marvel time is a soup).

The initial problem was which war. And this is where we are going to once more step onto the Drifting Pieces History soap box.

We all know the saying “There’s no good war”. But that’s not right. Not according to politics and public opinion.

To be a veteran of WWII was a noble and good thing. You fought a clear cut enemy, (nothing worse than a Nazi) liberated suppressed people, and most important, you came home a winner.

What’s that? There was another war? In Korea? Never heard of that one. We totally didn’t go to Korea and fail miserably and we certainly aren’t going to talk about what happened over there.

Oh look, Vietnam! The first publicly broadcasted war. Not like “The Whole World is Watching”. Oh no, the average citizen is suddenly getting their first look at what happens in war. Oh no, it’s not as nice and pretty as it’s supposed to be. No one talked about the atrocities that were committed by the good guys in WWII! And the Korean War certainly didn’t happen.

This was the first war where American soldiers came home and were shunned. They were booed. They lost their jobs, lost their homes, and lost their families. Disgraced and forgotten by their country and their people.

So we have nice shiny Captain America. A literal representation of the good of America and ideal soldier, punching Nazi and saving people in WWII.

Then we have Frank Castle, a dirty soldier from Vietnam. I’m sure people screamed “Baby killer” at him fresh off the plane. What’s that? Frank served THREE tours in Vietnam?! He was the sole survivor of a huge ambush? He was awarded the Medal of Honor, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Navy Cross, Silver and Bronze stars, and four Purple Hearts? That don’t mean shit to the average citizen that only cares about two things: 1. We lost. 2. We shouldn’t have been there in the first place.

So he comes home, one of the best Marines in the business, and he’s got nothing.

He gets married to a sweetheart, has two kids (a little girl and boy), and settles in living an ideal life. A quiet life. Too quiet. Frank’s got a little PTSD going on and he was very good at what he did. He didn’t want to leave. He was good over there. He was respected. He was needed.

But he’s doing the best he can. Until that’s taken away from him in an event he’d seen over and over again in war. Blazing gun fire and his family is gone.

He gets revenge. But there’s a problem. He isn’t seen as a loving family man that takes down the people that murdered his kids and wife. He’s seen as a violent ex-soldier from Vietnam that’s gone crazy and is shooting up the place.

They say that for Frank, “the war never ended. It just changed missions.”

And all these other Heroes that are also veterans? They came from good wars. Captain America spouts speeches of being a Good Soldier at Frank. He doesn’t know what it’s like to question if the bad guy really is the bad guy.

If Frank hadn’t of been such a family man, he would have made an amazing mercenary. The best there was.

But then you have Marc Spector. He went to war to escape trauma. He was good. He was VERY good at what he did. And dollars to donuts, he heard about another Marine that was also very good named Francis Castiglione.

But Marc could only be good so long as it wasn’t obvious that his mental illness was a thing. Even if he lied signing up for the military, when he took the jobs working for SHIELD and the CIA, they HAD to know about his history in the mental hospital. But the second he starts to dissociate in public, he’s kicked out. Can’t have a mentally ill person hanging out around all those weapons, right? I’m sure that’s what they told themselves as they kicked him to the curb.

Marc could have gone home here. He’d have been a disgraced hero, sitting on the side of the road on a Veteran hat asking for change. But Marc was still running. He didn’t have a childhood sweetheart waiting for him. He had trauma.

So Marc carries on the mission and he’s GOOD. And he’s a follower. He likes being told what to do. It prevents him from thinking and taking responsibility. If people get hurt, it isn’t his fault.

Now Frank is very thorough. There’s a chance that the first time he hears about a new Superhero showing up in Manhattan he immediately looks into it. He’s got access to SHIELD info. He finds out who Marc Spector is and he sees another soldier that was let down by his country. Another soldier that was looking to make a wrong right despite how the war went.

And Marc? Frank’s a hero. He’s tough. He does what needs to be done to keep people safe. Frank’s a leader and he takes care of his soldiers.

They look at one another and see soldiers struggling to find their place here in the normal life again because they never HAD normal lives to begin with.

Moon Knight is the only one who can probably understand where Frank is coming from and not judge him.

Much later on in the comics, when Moon Knight is desperately trying to fit in with the Avengers and be a better hero, we see him come up against Frank again. Frank understands what Moon Knight is trying to do and he asks him if he really thinks it’s going to work.

And despite how everything else was going in that particular run (a lot. A lot was going), it was a very real moment. Frank saw through him. I’ll get more into it later when we eventually get there. But man… These two together both make me so happy and also break my heart.

ANYWAY. Uh… Long extended explanation over! I love this issue with my whole everything.

This writer? This artist? Why couldn’t THEY have been the ones to take over the Marc Spector run? They get it! Look how pretty they make him! Look at all that cape action!

They even get the dichotomy of Marc in this time. We may not have STEVEN, but did you see the way Marc was dressed in the mansion? How very Steven -esque. Even the way he treats Frank at the end there.

UGH I could go on about this all day. I’m going to stop here before I write a dissertation. I HAVE FEELINGS ABOUT THIS OKAY.

#Moon Knight #Moon Knight comics #Analyzing the comics #Marc Spector #Jake Lockley #Steven Grant #Frank Castle #The Punisher #They deserve to be friends #These two disasters #Why was there so much Gerbil in this #I love this issue #I could wax poetry about it all day #Two reviews in one day? Spoiling you

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termagax · 1 month ago

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If I want to get into tf, especially the comics, what do you recommend starting with?

if you're 100% new, i think the easiest comic to start with would be the current run! Transformers (2023) published by Skybound Entertainment and written by Daniel Warren Johnson, it's some of the strongest work to come out of TF in recent years, extremely strong thematically while riffing pretty hard on the 80s cartoon in terms of its plot points. Also, it's only got like what, 12 issues of backlog right now? So it's an easy jump in to see if you'll like what the comics bring to the table (see: violence, more complex thematic discussions, ect.)

From there, most people start and end their tf comics journey with More Than Meets The Eye (2015), a phenomenal run by James Roberts back during the first run of comics published by IDW. It's interesting and funny, with promising worldbuilding and one of the most memorable and complex casts in Transformers history. I don't reccomend this as your very first book just because of its complexity wrt lore - this was published as a "soft reboot" but still majorly builds on the worldbuilding, lore, and events of the decade of IDW tf comics that came before it, and has several plotpoints and crossover events that struggle to hold up if you aren't reading the other (much worse) comic that was being published simultaneously. That said, it's not too confusing, and most people do start here. It's where I started, and if you're not afraid of spending some time on the wiki or asking a friend to learn terminology, or you're just used to not fully knowing whats going on in comics, it's a great jumping off point to get into IDW's first run! (which is a mixed bag in terms of quality - MTMTE is definetly considered the crown jewel of all that.) And it's just plain good. it's so good, it changed the way Transformers was written forever afterwards, and was one of the main players in terms of advancing LGBT content in the franchise. I think it's actually still the leader on that front? First gay kiss, first gay "I love you", Four major same-sex couples and a handful of minor ones, an extremely respectful representation of two!!!! trans cyberyronians. MTMTE absolutely has its stumbling points, places where it dropped the ball, publishing issues that messed with the final product, ect. and should probably come with a trigger list stapled to the front, but overall its a really good exploration of what transformers can be, and its influence on the franchise really cant be overstated.

Outside of comics, i would also genuinely reccomend the 1984 cartoon and it's accompanying 1986 feature film. You can watch the film on it's own if you're not into cheaply produced, poorly animated Reagan-era american superhero cartoons, but it's worth checking out at some point in your TF journey! The new animated film Transformers: One is also a good starting place because its just fucking phenomenal, though if adult-oriented films are more your style Rise Of The Beasts (2023) was also really good. Once you've got a good grasp on the basics of transformers, there's a cartoon or anime for basically every niche. There's also video games, novels, webshows, manga, trading card games, a gacha game, and 40 years worth of on-and-off western comics published by various entities. so you've got a lot of options for where to go next!

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across-every-universe · 2 years ago

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OC Intro: Kieran

Important Note: This character sprung from me thinking “y’know what, some villains seem to champion narratives that would be very convenient for Hollywood to demonize, don’t they?” and my subsequent clumsy attempts to reclaim that trope, centered around one of my own passions. Kieran is decidedly not meant to achieve that same goal of demonization, but it also goes without saying that I do not condone all the murder stuff. I am not a writer, I do not have experience or expertise at the deft handling of sensitive political topics, and at the end of the day Kieran is just a silly little guy I cooked up in my head!

Name: Kieran (chosen/alias)

Age: 24

Genre: Comic-Book-Style Universe

Occupation: Kieran likes to call it “vigilante justice”. Some would call it murder. In Kieran’s opinion, those people would be misinformed.

Profile: Loading…

…

Unauthorized.

user_Kieran: override_key(REDACTED)

Profile: If you’d asked [_____] about her occupation a few years ago, she would’ve told you she’s a student in her university’s Department of Climate Science and Sustainability, and that she’s working for the team in charge of a weather satellite as a part-time job. Unfortunately, working for those “eyes in the sky” brings some extra eyes of your own on you, these days.

After a run-in with a power she doesn’t understand leaves her with some… unusual alterations to her biology, [_____] was “rescued” by the government-run Exobiology Division. Deemed a danger to society and a risk to her own safety, she was declared dead on any official documents and kept in a special hospital (for her own safety, of course. Purely for her own safety).

Mass chaos breaks out within the hospital a few years later when a gap in security is found by one of the “patients”. [_____] escapes along with most of the others.

She finds herself suddenly out on the streets with no real allies, no legal identity, and no way of continuing the life she once had without endangering their old friends and family. She has nowhere to turn, and no ordinary human would trust her and take her in with the way she looks. Except… there’s the people all those ordinary humans gave up on already. The ones who’ll take in almost any type of person willing to work. The villains.

[_____] doesn’t want to hurt people, but she doesn’t want to die either. She figure she’ll just join these guys for now until she gets on her own two feet. But a couple weeks turns into a couple months, and she’s in too deep now. She even finds a new name for herself: Kieran. She’s kind of getting used to this exhausting, but free, way of life. Still, even though she’s just doing small odd jobs — a small role in a heist here, a bit of hacking there — the guilt of working as a villain is starting to weigh on her. She needs to work towards something better, something big.

See, back when Kieran went off to university for environmental sciences, she had these grand aspirations of helping to save the world. She was hoping to do that in a more above-board manner, but those days of data sets and engineering solutions are laughably out of reach now. But the way she sees it, we’re all still hurtling Mother Earth flaming off of a cliff, pretty much. We’re all still dying.

Kieran’s sick of waiting around for the guys in charge to decide when she’ll die.

This new world Kieran lives in doesn’t have so many rules, now. She’s smart, she has applicable skills, and she has a little more emotional intelligence than some of her new “colleagues”. She knows she just needs to climb the social ladder of this loose network of self-proclaimed “villains” for long enough. Then, she can get connected to some people who have a bit of real power.

From there it’s info. Names of the ones in charge, the ones who hurt Kieran. Lists upon lists. Whose finances are held up by whom? Which organizations are subsidiaries of the other? Who’s really calling the shots? As her hunger for illicit knowledge drives them on, Kieran meets a couple old hats in the organization who aren’t so bad, actually. One takes her on as a protégé of sorts, teaches her the ropes.

Then it’s security — the targets’ and Kieran’s. How to cover your tracks. How to uncover someone else’s. How to buy secrets. How to take over that out-of-the-way warehouse without actually putting your name down on paper.

Hey, don’t look at Kieran like that. She needs a home base, and she was sick of staying in that compound with those insufferable supervillain wannabes. No one was using that old warehouse anyways.

From here, Kieran can really start planning. She’s beginning to get their head around it all now: who hurt her and why, and who’s in charge of running this sinking ship underneath the waves.

Kieran will teach them all why what they did was wrong.

And all of them will listen.

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vohtaro · 2 years ago

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3, 8, 19, 21 for the ask game :-]

weirdly specific artist ask game !

(answers got long oops)

3. What ideas come from when you were little

in general, i don't know that i really use ideas from when i was little. but i do have one example that comes to mind: i remember when i was innnnnnn 3rd grade? i drew a tiger for some assignment. it was a tiger drinking from a lake, and i remember being so proud of myself for how i had drawn it. i mean, really, i'd basically stared at a reference and copied it. it wasn't divine ingenuity or anything KDJGHSK. but, it really made me love tigers. for some reason, drawing that tiger made me so appreciative of the animal and i became rather obsessed w them for a while. i genuinely wish i still had that drawing somewhere. i'd love to just how wonk that tiger i drew really was LMAO

the reason i bring that up is that this past year was the year of the tiger, and to celebrate tigers, i drew this . the idea was very fun for me and reminded me of a long-ago dream of mine which was to become some kind of animal caretaker.

8. What's an old project idea that you've lost interest in

-glances nervously at my wip graveyard-

there are a couple stand-out ones in my head. there's a comic idea i've had since february (oh almost a year ago 🚶‍♂️) about the specific moments in which madara changed from the moment of izuna's death to the point he decides to investigate the tablet. it's born from the "you've changed" dialogue from VotE bc madara says it towards hashirama but i was thinking about how madara had changed too and particular/episodic moments that caused a shift in him. the idea exploded from maybe 3-4 pages to like 17 and i have never made a long-form comic before, so i got overwhelmed the more time went by. there are so many pieces i like but my utter inexperience has essentially killed the project for now. i'd like to come back to it one day, but it may be a long time from now. to say i've lost interest in it isn't quite true, but i haven't been pursuing it because i often open what i have and get frustrated and stop LMAO

19. Favorite inanimate objects to draw (food, nature, etc.)

c-can i say none KDSJHGJKS

i think it's obv that i'm very comfortable drawing figures… perhaps a little too comfortable. this is a feeling i've honestly been wrestling with the past few weeks. i do genuinely wish i liked drawing nature especially. i feel like i could really enjoy that, but i haven't given myself the opportunity to explore that, and every time i think about doing it, my discomfort becomes painfully clear to me to the point i scrub any evidence of it from things i do finish.

21. Art styles nothing like your own but you like anyways

yoshitaka amano is an artist i really enjoy. i found him through a friend on twt and have enjoyed exploring what to me is such a vastly different approach artistic expression. his devaloka series is particularly fascinating to me and has inspired some personal work.

example from devaloka series (more can be found here)

yayoi kusama is a traditional artist who really just has an insanely diverse portfolio. there is a great documentary called "yayoi kusama: infinity" which not only explores her life but also the concept of infinity through her artistic vision. (the documentary has some heavy subject matter, so please be advised)

i am personally fond of her infinity nets (image from this article)

#opens-up-4-nobody #asks

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ryutarotakedown · 2 years ago

Photo

[ID: A comic featuring Maya Fey and Franziska von Karma from Ace Attorney, done in a loose, realistic style.

The first few panels show a cell phone ringing. Maya looks over, surprised. The caller reads, “Fran (sparkles emoji).” Maya picks up and says, “Hello?”

On the other side of the phone, Franziska says, “Maya Fey.” Maya responds, “Franziska von Karma.” Franziska says, “I need your help.”

“Oh?” Maya tilts her head, puzzled. “Need to talk to a murder victim or something?” Franziska blushes slightly as she says, “…Not quite.”

She leans against a wall and begins explaining: “Recently, I’ve been using a significant other with unusual working hours as an excuse to get out of social gatherings and other… troubling affairs with coworkers.” A panel shows Sebastian Debeste looking teary as Franziska stares him down and emits a “no” symbol.

Maya looks exasperated on the other side of the phone. “Fran, that’s a new level of antisocial.” Franziska says, “Shut up.” She looks embarrassed even as she scowls: “I don’t enjoy social gatherings, okay?! I always feel out of place. It’s easier to lie.”

Maya dips her head and concedes, “Okay, okay, point taken. So what’s this got to do with me?” Franziska says reluctantly, “…There’s a New Year’s party at the office soon. They want me to bring my supposed partner.”

Maya sandwiches her phone with her shoulder as she counters, “Why not just say they can’t make it?” A small anger symbol appears next to Franziska’s head as she hisses, “Miles Edgeworth. That foolish brother of mine told everyone he was sure my partner could make it! There’s no backing out now! He’s ruined me!!” Maya says, “Heh. I guess all siblings like to tease each other a bit.”

She turns and clarifies, “So you want me to be your fake girlfriend at this party?” Franziska says, “…Please.” Maya says, “I can do that, I guess. Why me, though?” Franziska looks embarrassed again as she says, “You’re the only person my age I can stand.” Maya grins — “Wow, that’s high praise coming from you. See you on New Year’s, then?” Franziska responds, “…Yes. Thanks, Maya.”

A color gradient forms a transition to a panel labeled “New Year’s Eve.” Maya stands in front of an apartment door and rings the bell: ding-dong!

Franziska, dressed in a dark purple suit, opens the door. “Maya.” Maya smiles, slightly abashed, as she says, “Hi! Sorry I’m a little late.”

There’s a full panel showing Maya, wearing a dark purple skirt and jacket, underneath which is a lighter purple shirt. She asks, “Do I look okay? I wasn’t sure exactly what to wear, so I took one of Mia’s old shirts.” Over this, Franziska thinks, ‘Maya Fey, she… I don’t think I’ve ever seen her in anything but her acolyte outfit…’ Then, ‘Ah.’

The camera pans back to them standing at the entrance. Franziska is slightly flushed as she responds, “You… You look… Beautiful, Maya Fey.” Maya smiles. Franziska thinks, ‘This may have been a very, very bad idea.’

The last panel is much more doodly, without a background. Maya has her arm looped through Franziska’s and says cheerily, “Ahaha! We look like a real couple already, don’t we?” Franziska blushes and grips the strap of her shoulder bag as she thinks to herself, ‘What did I do to deserve this.’ End ID]

franmaya week day 2: fake relationship

tfw you tried to get a fake gf so you don’t have to have conversations with your coworkers but you end up actually falling for her 😔

#<33333333 #g: ace attorney

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sweaterkittensahoy · 4 months ago

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OH MY GOD I THOUGHT I'D LOST IT

In trying to find an old NaNo novel (the outlawed comics one--if you saved a copy, please let me know), I went to my lj to see if it was there, and I found my Aristocrats joke! It's 1500 words. I'm very proud of it.

Absolutely NSFW and utterly terrible. If you are not familiar, "The Aristrocrats" is a joke meant to be as awful and gross as possible. It's best just to send you to wikipedia for an explanation than try to do a better job than them.

This guy walks into a talent agent’s office. He’s in a top hat and tails. He stands in the middle of the office and taps his cane on the floor twice. “I have the show for you!”, he tells the talent agent.

The talent agent looks him up and down and decides to give him a chance. “What’s your act?” he asks the man.

“It’s a family act, sir,” says the man. “Let me bring my family in here.” He walks back over to the door and opens it. A woman, two children, an older couple, a dog, a cat, and a ferret walk into the office. The woman is wearing a beautiful beaded dress cut down to the bottom of her breasts. The children, a boy and a girl, are dressed in dark blue suits. The boy is in pants and the girl is in a skirt. They are both wearing black dress shoes. The elder couple are dressed in a fine tuxedo for the man and a long red dress for the woman. The dog, the cat, and the ferret are all wearing diamond studded collars. The man gestures to each of them in turn. “This is my wife”, he points to the woman in the beaded dress. She performs a perfect curtsey. “These are my children,” The boy and girl bow and curstey. “And these are my parents,” the older couple bow and curtsey. “And these are our pets. The dog is Majesty,” the dog jumps on his hind legs and takes three steps forward, then three steps back. “The cat is Tybalt,” the cat takes a step forward, performs a triple somersault, and lands on the dog’s back. “And the ferret is Prince Valient,” the ferret climbed up on the talent agent’s desk, balanced on its front feet, and flipped onto the back of the cat.

The talent agent was unimpressed. “Is that it?”

“No, sir. We’re just getting started.” The man walked up behind his wife, flipped up the back of her dress, and started fucking her doggy style. She, in turn, grabbed her father, ripped open his pants, and started sucking his dick. The older man grabbed his wife, spun her around, and started fucking her up the ass with a twelve-inch black dildo. The older woman grabbed her granddaughter lifted up her skirt, and shoved a fist into her cunt. The daughter grabbed her brother, ripped off his pants and started fucking him in the ass with the cane the father had used to walk into the room. The son grabbed the dog, lifted its tail and started fucking it. The dog started eating out the cat, and the cat started blowing the ferret. They are one long fuck-chain, starting with the father and ending with the ferret.

Suddenly, the father pulls out of the wife, smacks her into a wall, pulls the grandfather away from the grandfather and starts fucking the grandfather in the ass. The grandfather yanks the dildo out of the grandmother, slams it into his granddaughter’s mouth, and starts fucking the grandmother in the cunt.

The girl pulls herself off of her grandmother’s fist, takes the dildo out of her mouth, and walks over to the wall. She smacks her mother across the face with the dildo and starts eating her out.

The son keeps fucking the dog, grabs the cat but the tail, spins it around, and sends it flying across the room. The cat hits the mother and takes a huge dump in her mouth. The mother takes the shit, shoves her daughter away from her, walks across the room and smears the shit on her husband’s face. The husband pulls out of the grandfather, pulls out a pair of white gloves, slips them on and proceeds to perform a black face routine.

Meanwhile, the grandfather pulls out of the grandmother, cums all over her tits and face, and starts fucking his grandson. The grandmother walks over to the man, grabs him by the ears, and starts slamming his face against the talent agent’s desk. The mother takes the cane the daughter had been using on the son and shoves it up the cat’s ass. She then walks around the room proclaiming herself queen of the cats.

The son pulls out of the dog’s kicks it in the teeth, and shoves the ferret up his ass. The daughter straps on a sixteen-inch dildo and starts fucking the grandmother while the grandmother starts sucking off the father. The father wipes the blood off of his face from where he’s been beaten against the desk, and uses the blood to draw swastikas all over the grandmother’s face. The mother takes the cat on the cane and starts hitting people in the back of the head. She takes the other end of the cane, shoves it up the dog’s ass, and the dog and cat run around the room with the cane hanging between them. The grandfather grabs the cane and spins it above his head like a baton. It gets stuck in the ceiling fan.

The grandmother finishes sucking off the father and starts screaming racial slurs at the top of her voice while her daughter pulls an American flag out of a bag and takes a huge piss on it. She then grabs the son, shoves him onto the piss-soaked flag and starts fucking him while cutting him with a rusty razor. The daughter pulls the ferret out of the son’s ass and shoves it down the grandfather’s throat. The grandfather starts sucking the ferret like a dick while the granddaughter takes a huge shit on her grandmother’s chest. The grandmother takes the shit and builds a sand castle, which she tops with a Nazi flag.

The father takes a plant from the corner of the room, a large ficus, digs a hole in the dirt and shoves his dick into it. While he fucks the plant his wife pulls a cactus out of her bag and shoves it up his ass. She then goes to the daughter and starts beating her with a leather strap. The grandmother vomits into the son’s mouth and jerks him off. He cums all over her tits and face, and she smears it into a portrait of George Washington. The grandfather picks up the dog by its back legs and starts eating it out while the cat climbs onto the daughter’s back and starts ass-fucking her while her brother spits the vomit into her cunt.

The father yanks the cactus out of his ass and blood and shit spew everywhere. The mother takes an aloe plant out of her bag and shoves it up his ass to stop the blood and shit. The ferret jumps out of the grandfather’s mouth and slides around in the shit and blood. He lands on the flag and starts humping it. The son grabs the ferret by the balls and shoves it up his sister’s cunt. The sister smears her brother’s blood all over the walls and starts jerking off her father and grandfather while she sucks off her brother’s dick.

The ferret wiggles free of the girl’s cunt and shoves itself up the grandmother’s ass while she straps on a dildo and starts fucking the girl up the ass. The mother straps on a dildo and starts fucking the girl up the cunt. The brother, father, and grandfather all come at the same time and shower the mother, grandmother, and daughter in cum. They sing “It’s Rainin’ Men” in perfect pitch as they are covered in bukkai.

The father pulls the aloe plant from his ass, pisses in the pot, and throws it against the wall. The grandfather reaches into the mother’s bag and pulls out a small box with a lock. He grabs the grandmother, shoves a hand up her cunt, and pulls out a key. He uses the key to unlock the box and pulls out a ball gag and handcuffs. He shoves the ball gag in the granddaughter’s mouth and starts beating her with the handcuffs.

The granddaughter comes and squirts vomit and ejaculate from her cunt. The grandmother grabs her by the ball gag and uses it to throw her against the floor. The mother and grandmother start beating the shit out of her with a spare chair in the office.

The son pulls another chair across the room, sits down, and starts reciting Hitler’s greatest speeches while fucking the cat in the ass and getting fucked in the ear by his father. The father comes in the son’s ear and uses some of the cum to draw a Hitler mustache on his son’s face. The son jumps up, and keeps fucking the cat while he goosesteps across the room with one hand held up in a ‘heil’ position.

The daughter drags herself up off the floor from her beating and starts reciting the collected works of Edgar Allen Poe while she pulls a crucifix out of her mother’s bag and shoves it up her cunt. The mother pulls out the Bible and starts ripping out pages while reciting the twenty-third Psalm and taking it up the ass from the dog.

The grandfather starts fucking the son who fucks the father who fucks the ficus. He strips the leaves off one end of the ficus and shoves it up the grandmother’s ass. Then he puts the plant down on the floor and leaves the grandmother impaled on the top while he bends over, grabs his ankles, and does a somersault that makes the grandfather’s dick pop out of his ass.

The mother finishes ripping up the Bible and throws it against a wall. The daughter walks over to the Bible, takes a huge shit on it and uses the shit to draw Satanic symbols on the wall over the Bible. She then takes the tattered remains of the Bible, folds them in half, and sets them on fire. She throws the Bible onto the flag, and the flag, covered in piss, shit, vomit, and blood, goes up in flames. The whole family jumps on the fire, writhes around screaming, and jumps back out, covered in burns. They then smack each other on the burns while screaming obscenities in seven languages and taking turns fucking the animals. The ferret dies while the grandmother fist fucks it, and the grandmother uses it as a puppet and performs the second act, third scene of “Romeo and Juliet”.

The dog lifts his leg and takes a piss to put out the fire caused by the Bible and the flag. It eats the burned remnants of the Bible and the flag and shits them out so that they spell out the first book of the Book of Mormon [it was a huge shit]. The cat climbs on top of the ficus, knocks it over, and rearranges the dirt so that it is a likeness of the Marque De Said. The whole family pauses for a moment, bows to the portrait, and then starts fucking a trio of midgets that have dropped from the ceiling on rip cords. After the midgets have been fucked in the ass, they start performing a tumbling routine in the piss and shit and vomit and blood and end in a stack that is three-high. The grandmother pulls out a crowbar and knocks each of the midgets in the back of the knees. They go flying, and the grandmother shoves the crowbar up the end of the grandfather’s penis. The midgets pull themselves up off the floor and overpower the grandmother. They shove their dicks into her cunt and fuck her in perfect three beat time.

The grandfather yanks the crowbar out of his penis and slams it into the back of the granddaughter’s head. She falls on her face in the shit, stands back up, and performs her own version of the blackface routine. The rest of the family smears their faces with shit and jumps into the black face routine. They stand in a row, with the three midgets standing in front of them, and break into a rendition of “Mamee” as the midgets put on Ku Klux Klan hoods and piss in a triple arc. They piss in the shape of a cross, and the dog clamps a match in his teeth that he lights on the floor and places on the piss cross. As it burns, the cat jumps into the middle of the flames and goes up in a flare. The flames go out and the cat is laid out in a representation of Jesus. The father steps forward, places a crown of thorns on the cat’s head, and the whole family bows to the cat.

The family stands back up, circles around the dog, and starts stabbing the dog with rusty knives. The grandfather starts beating the dog with the crowbar before picking up the cross that the daughter had used to fuck herself, and using it to brain the dog. The dog falls over dead, and the family cuts it into pieces and eats it raw. They then grab the midgets, spin them around by the their heads, and slam them into the walls. All the midgets die.

The family lines up again, performs a triple backflip in unison, and ends with the grandmother fucking the grandfather with a dildo, the grandfather fucking the mother, the mother fucking the father with a dildo, the father fucking the daughter, and the daughter fucking the son with a dildo. The son fucked the cactus. Everyone came, spewed cum everywhere and ended in a split.

The talent agent raised an eyebrow and leaned back in his chair. “What do you call this act?”

The family, one after the other, stepped with one foot out and spread their arms. The father spoke, “The Aristocrats.”

#the aristocrats #i should try to record this honestly #but i laugh every time #i think i'm hilarious

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parkers-gal · 4 years ago

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masterlist

requests | closed to complete current requests <3

last updated | aug 5th, 2021

do not repost my work anywhere !! respect this please. | fics are not ordered in any particular way. these headers are mine so pls don’t use/take them

tom holland

insomnia - reader can’t get to sleep; tom finds out why

driving in the rain - fluffy dinner date and rainy drive back home

workouts and warmth - when all tom wants is some after-workout cuddles

from across the living room - announcing your engagement to your families

the one - you want to move out and get your own place as a couple, but tom doesn’t. nikki talks to him.

anything for the twins - tom massages reader’s boobies during her period

moms, makeouts, and mishaps - nikki walks in during your makeout sesh

simple acts of intimacy - a fluffy 3.1k words worth of blurbs

silver surprises - the reader surprises tom at a premiere

twenty questions - questions ensue after tom & reader get stuck in an elevator

my gut - spinoff of twenty questions with claustrophobic!reader (tw/ anxiety + attacks)

stealth mode - tom & reader scaring each other

unicorns vs pegasuses - tom shuts the reader up by kissing them

a good story - tom meets reader at a meet & greet — friendships blossom to lovers

deal breaker - tom wants kids, but the reader does not

his lap - reader asks for help in overcoming an insecurity; tom misreads the situation

pool day - pool day w/ tom + the boys

hot - the reader picks a certain song that reminds her of tom - the boys go wild

grounded by rocks - tom talks about you in an interview for cherry

your hands - when all he wants is a simple head massage

late flights - in which tom takes too much time with the fans

nobody wanted to - where only one person makes it out alive

way more than 50 - the hollands trick the reader into thinking they did something they weren’t supposed to

why [ pt ii ] - sweet cupcakes, and a not so sweet breakup

what looks suspicious - nikki doesn’t exactly approve of tom dating the reader

something sweet - reader drops off small gifts while tom’s on set

he remembers - when tom finds the letter

missed you - reuniting w/tom after four long months

soft gangsta - tom tries to dress edgy; the reader is unconvinced

the shoe game - reader & tom play the shoe game at their wedding

too much - when the reader has a rough time with work, tom comforts them

losing grip [ pt ii ] - a losing battle between the reader and a hereditary disease causes heartbreak

your captain america - protective!tom holland of young reader (age gap)

sexy genius - reader is a fan of (and meets) jake gyllenhaal

teddy bear cuddles - tom wears an oversized hoodie

nonsense - the boys think the reader is meddling with tom’s work

circles before yourself - rule #2 - osterfield!reader gets caught with tom

seventeen times - when the reader is having a hard time in lock down, tom tries to help (TW // depression)

pixie dust hair - tom assures insecure!reader that the pixie haircut looks good <3

a few more months - reader passes out during a run; tw // excessive exercising

tiktok au’s

body ody ody - tom gets a little jealous over a few social media comments

sweats in the supermarket - getting tom hard when he wears sweats

put your records on - trying not to kiss each other first

mood killer - saying dirty things into tom’s ear

say it back - pranking tom by not saying ily back to him

two different ways - tom choking the reader to get two different reactions

brutal - doing the “did you mean to post this?” trend on tom

worst thirty minutes of my life - playing a drinking game with tom to see who gives into cuddles first

my girl’s cuddles - crawling into tom’s lap

even - buying hot leggings & taping tom’s reaction

goofball - a silly way to reveal reader’s pregnancy to tom

end the debate - “i found out why my boobs are small” trend

slam the car door - doing the car door prank on tom

water bottle wars - the boys ask you and tom questions about each other. wrong answers result in sprayed water

get you back real good - you & the boys prank tom after watching a scary movie

peachy - sighing / moaning in front of tom playing video games to get his reaction

my princess - tom does a tiktok where he guesses all your answers to everyday questions

dad!tom

needles and needs - when scarlet has to get shots, you realize she may not be the only one that needs comforting

all my girls - scarlet meets her baby sister for the first time (dad!tom)

everything i love about u - tom is afraid baby red might hate him for leaving home too much

a little extra help - stepdad!tom being the best dad to your daughter

through the tears - pregnant!reader goes into labour, and baby holland meets the family

first feed - tom watches you breastfeed for the first time

warmth from the love - baby holland’s first Christmas

first words - baby holland speaks for the first time

breaking the internet - when your pregnancy announcement crashes multiple apps/websites (pregnant!reader)

breaking the internet... again - when baby holland breaks the internet

boyfriends and brunch - when jade brings home her boyfriend (aged!up)

big sister + how are babies made - telling scarlet about the baby on the way (pregnant!reader)

too many kids - the reader’s dad has some commentary about the twins

mumma’s girl - tom gets jealous when scarlet isn’t a daddy’s girl

angels - a little skin to skin time with his best girl

family man - after a nasty breakup, tom finds out you had his child

cheesy uncles - telling paddy he’s going to be an uncle

ag!reader (more to come !!)

y’all really get nasty - tom and the fans discuss ag!reader’s songs

my favorite things - ag!reader performs in front of the mcu cast at the grammy’s

34 + 35 - the boys react to reader’s new song(s)

34 + 35 remix - the boys reacting to the remix

his remedy - the boys react to positions deluxe

neglected - AG!reader breaks up w tom because of their job; tom searches for answers

low-key wants him - reader talks about how much nonna (+ her fam) loves tom

see u soon - reader interacts with tom while on stage for the swt

a few spilled secrets - AG!reader performs on jimmy fallon’s show.. tom and her confess a few secrets

for the first time - when the reader breaks down crying while singing about her ex, tom is there to comfort her

dance with me, rain on me - reader has a hard time on set, tom to the rescue

every tomorrow - the first album release night after your breakup

here we go again - introducing tom (+ the boys) to your celebrity friends

condoms or safety nets - the boys react to AG!reader’s song “safety net”

we’re not engaged - AG!reader announcing to the world why they no longer have a fiance... (fluffy)

the late late show - AG!reader & tom do spill your guts or fill your guts

pain from pleasure - dad!tom goes through a birth simulator — controlled by the reader

never have i ever - tom & the reader play a game on the late late show

fluffy hair - ag!reader has a zoom interview with zach sang. tom makes an appearance

fighting off the haters - ag!reader and older!tom holland (age gap) attend an award show after going public

run your hands thru my hair - tom reacts to ag!reader’s song “my hair”

stick to acting - tom tries to make a beat for ag!reader

practically twins - reader meets sebastian & anthony at comic con

damn lucky - black!reader wears her hair naturally during an interview

what a piece - reader talks about tom related songs & tattoos

flip it - tom talks about reader in an interview

at the door - older!reader & tom fight off haters

a headcannon of ag!reader being a marvel cast member

a headcannon of tom & the reader attending the avengers endgame premiere

styles!reader (more to come !!)

bathroom kisses - makeout sessions with tom and styles!reader in the bathroom

yeah, he is - tom holland x styles!reader meet the styles family; protective older brother harry makes an appearance

unparalleled love - older brother harry styles makes a speech at reader’s wedding

grilled - date night for tom & styles!reader is a bit difficult with two kids; older brother!harry to the rescue

baby showers and brothers - dad!tom & styles!reader are going to be parents

potential boyfriend - tom has a crush on the reader when they first meet

ts!reader (more to come!!)

trust me - tom & the reader defend her after nikki doesn’t approve

your london boy - tom & co. + the world reacts to “london boy”

boy of my dreams - tom being proud of the reader for winning a grammy

rapper!tom

tom records your sounds during sex for his music (hc)

tom talks about you in an interview

concepts: one , two , three

professor!tom

my pretty girl - tom gets jealous when reader gets many valentines