#but above all it's just a show that's having FUN with its PREMISE | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

mononijikayu · 7 days ago

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chapter (5) — his primadonna!

GENRE: alternate universe - actors/celeb au!

WARNING/S: not safe for work (nsfw), r-18 and above, actors/singers au!, romance, fluff, minor angst, slow burn, humour, slice of life, will they won't they, light-hearted, flirting, playful, possessiveness, teasing, explicit content, possible, kissing, sexual content, innuendos, drama, feels, hurt/comfort, falling in love, love, happy ending, actor/singer! sukuna, actress/celeb! reader;

WORD COUNT: 4.5k words.

NOTE: i really have a hard time finding titles for songs because i listen to so many while doing all these and it just??? i end up finding myself in conundrums of the will i use this or not??? also, yes sukuna is a bit older than reader! the first year trio are in their early 20s, reader is a bit older. there will be more of hey lover soon enough, i promise. other than that, i hope you enjoy this!!! i love you guys!!! 🫶

TAGLIST: @kunasthiast, @midnight-138, @v3nd3ttal3on, @r0ckst4rjk, @theshxaverse, @cheescakebroom, @kariatenoh, @ggukfikz, @sukunadckrider ;

masterlist

hey lover! series

YOU REALLY WERE BOOKED AND BUSY. Immediately after wrapping up another variety show, you were already on the road for another one after you teased the location on your Instagram. People could only wonder what this one could have for them to enjoy. They all started to do a guessing game.

And because you spoiled the location already, some fans figured it all out. So, your agency soon enough announced that your next work adventure was going to be a reality travel show with your other Jujutsu Kaisen co-stars Fushiguro Megumi, Itadori Yuji and Kugisaki Nobara.

It works pretty well, between the four of you. You were all very close, since you all went to the same drama and theater school together. You were only a year or two above them in age, it was hard not to have the same energy together.

The news had fans buzzing with excitement, since they liked all of your dynamics in the show and there were very few scenes of you all together, which the fans were craving for. This trended almost immediately on social media, being reposted by your co-stars and even the Jujutsu Kaisen official social media channels.

But perhaps the most notable was from veteran actor Ryomen Sukuna.

"Excited to see bedhead from my bubs." He quote-tweeted the video from the show's official twitter page.

And of course, almost immediately, everyone was going wild.

The hashtags #y/nsukuna, #HESDOWNBAD, #MYBUBS and #HERBEDHEAD were trending all at the same time.

"HUH!??? SUKUNA??? WHAT KIND OF POST IS THAT???"

"bro is not normal about y/n cause what do you mean he's saying he's excited for her bed head???"

"ARE WE GLOSSING OVER THE FACT THAT HE CALLS HER BUBS???"

"ryomen sukuna is down bad guys like its over for him (hes just like me)"

"guys guys, yall are not thinking about the wider picture......sukuna has pictures of y/n with bedhead"

Of course, Ryomen Sukuna likes to add fuel to the fire.

He quote-tweeted that fan and said, "Of course I have bedhead pics of y/n. There's a folder."

You also were not helping your case when you commented, "Do I at least look pretty in them, darling?"

Within a few seconds, the scarlet eyed man slyly replied. "Bubs, you're always pretty. No need to question that."

You liked the post almost as fast as when lightening strikes.

And of course, the world burns once more as your fans lose it.

➽──────────❥

EVERYTHING ABOUT YOUR SHOW WAS FUN. And you were enjoying yourself at every taping of the episode, because it really did feel like a genuinely planned friendship road trip all across locations the show chose for all of you. You had never had a show be this fun like this.

The premise was simple: you and a group of fellow cast members would explore different destinations, taking part in challenges, meeting the locals, and showcasing each unique place's culture.

Nobara, Yuji, and Megumi were all pros at making the atmosphere fun and welcoming. Even in acting school, they were all like that and you loved that about them. It made everything so much more fun.

With each location, everyone brought their personality to the forefront, and it made for the perfect mix of laughs, banter, and unforgettable moments. You all took turns driving, cooking, and planning activities, making each stop a collective adventure.

Today had been particularly intense, with endless shots, physical challenges, and more retakes than usual. Now, after the long drive to your next destination and running on only a few hours of sleep, you felt the exhaustion settle into your bones.

As the car bumped along the final stretch of road, the warm glow of a cozy cabin nestled in the mountains came into view, and relief washed over the group.

Nobara let out a deep, dramatic sigh as she spotted the cabin. “This place better have decent beds, guys.” she muttered, twisting in her seat to stretch her neck. “I'm not waking up with another crick, or someone’s going to pay.”

Yuji snickered, tossing his bag onto his shoulder once you all arrived. “Trust me, we’re all on the same page!” he replied with a wide grin. “And that reminds me, can I get some sympathy? Megumi here takes up half the bed when we share. He’s, like, dead asleep, but somehow there’s no room for me.”

Megumi’s expression barely flickered, though there was a hint of amusement in his eyes. “Or maybe you’re just sprawled out like a starfish, Yuji.” he countered dryly, adjusting his own bag with a shrug. His usual calm made the subtle quip land even harder, and everyone burst into laughter.

You rolled your eyes, the exhaustion temporarily lifted by the familiar rhythm of friendly banter. Nobara, ever the force of nature, hooked her arm around your shoulders, pulling you into the moment with a grin.

“So, guys.” she began with a pointed look. “You’re on dinner duty tonight, right? Please tell me you’ve got some magic in that suitcase of yours. I’m about to pass out, and the last thing I want is to wake up for ramen noodles.”

A smile tugged at your lips as you took in her expectant expression. “I’ll do my best with whatever we’ve got. But fair warning, if it’s instant noodles, I was never here.”

“Noted!” she laughed, patting your shoulder with faux solemnity. “I trust you’ll deliver.”

As everyone wandered off to settle in, Yuji threw an exaggerated thumbs-up over his shoulder. “Let’s go, resident chef! You’re a legend on camera and in the kitchen now. We're in for a treat!”

After a while, the crew had set up some lights in the small, rustic cabin kitchen where you were stirring a pot, trying to summon the energy to finish cooking.

The smell of food mingled with the quiet, comforting sounds of the cabin settling around you, though you could feel your eyelids drooping. Just as you stifled another yawn, Megumi drifted over, holding a steaming mug of coffee.

“Here.” he said quietly, his voice softer than usual. “You look like you need it more than I do.”

You took it with a grateful smile, letting the warmth of the cup seep into your hands. “You’re a lifesaver, Megumi. Seriously.”

He tilted his head, smirking just a bit. “Only as much as you saved us from yet another ramen dinner. This is... actually pretty good.”

His understated compliment made you laugh, even as you fought the lingering fatigue. Moments later, Yuji and Nobara poked their heads into the kitchen, the smell of food having drawn them in. Yuji rubbed his hands together excitedly.

“Look at this—our pro chef on set! Where did we luck out finding you?” he joked, pulling a few plates from the cupboard.

“Come on, Yuji, don’t distract the one person who can cook!” Nobara chided, though her eyes sparkled with anticipation. “Let’s not ruin our one decent meal tonight.”

Soon, everyone gathered around the makeshift dinner table, the crew even joining in as laughter and conversation filled the small cabin. The exhaustion you’d felt earlier melted away, replaced by the warmth of friendship and the satisfaction of good food.

These simple, shared moments, the laughter, the teasing, the shared triumphs over long days—reminded you why you loved every bit of this adventure. You really felt relaxed, after working in high stakes productions for a while now. This was a deserved break.

As the night wore on, the cabin was filled with tired but happy voices, sharing stories and jokes until everyone drifted off, still smiling. The promise of a new day of filming awaited, but for now, you soaked in the peace, knowing these were the memories you’d cherish long after the cameras stopped rolling.

➽──────────❥

IT WAS ROUGH THE NEXT MORNING. Not only were you driving in the morning, you had to wake everyone up. You already had an alarm set up and everything. But not all of that ever went to plan today, after your phone buzzed over and over. In short, you woke up to a flood of notifications.

Apparently, one of the crew members had captured that moment when Megumi handed you the coffee, along with his rare, dry joke in the kitchen. And of course, it was posted as a Behind The Scene shoot clip for the previous episode.

You expected that, of course. The whole pension house has cameras. The dim cabin lighting made the moment look even cozier, with Megumi’s slightly amused expression as he watched you laugh. Fans were absolutely losing it.

Of course, now that this was all over the place, the world will take over it. Social media was soon overflowing with edits, fan comments, and new ship names. People had screenshotted the entire scene, focusing on every little glance and smile, with captions like #SoftMegumi, #ChefxFushiguro, and #MegumiTheSimp.

"DID Y'ALL SEE HOW HE LOOKS AT THEM? I'M IN SHAMBLES?" one fan tweeted, sharing the clip on repeat.

"HE REALLY GAVE THEM THAT COFFEE LIKE IT WAS A LOVE CONFESSION, GUYS IM NOT OKAY???" another wrote, complete with heart emojis and a collage of your laughing face next to Megumi’s rare, softened smile.

Some of the edits were next level—fans had slowed down the footage, added romantic filters, and paired the whole thing with soft, soulful ballads that made it look like a scene from a romance movie.

The “Chef and Softie” ship was officially launched, and fans everywhere were on board.

Yuji, of course, was all over it. He reposted one of the fan edits with the caption, “Megumi looks happier here than he has in years. Should I be worried? ��😂”

Meanwhile, Nobara was gleefully teasing you about the whole thing. "So, when’s the coffee date?" she teased, holding up her phone with an edit of you and Megumi staring at each other. “I saw all the comments—there are people already drafting wedding invitations for you two!"

Megumi tried to brush it off, but when Yuji pulled him aside to show him the edits, even he couldn’t hide the slight blush rising to his cheeks. He was always such a shy type, especially when he gets teased or praised.

Oh, Gojo would have a field day with this one if he was here. Megumi was lucky that he wasn't even online right now because he was busy with his new film.

“They’re really reading into it.” he muttered, though he didn’t look entirely displeased. "We're friends. I got coffee, you look like you needed it. Of course I'll get you one."

Cue the chaos: Ryomen Sukuna, in true dramatic form, making his feelings known on TikTok.

It all started to get even more worse when a fan edit of you and Megumi went viral on TikTok. The “Chef and Softie” ship was sailing strong, and fans were ecstatic.

Yuji even tweeted it, tagging you both with, “Did I just become the third wheel?? 👀😂”

@ItsRyoSuku:

"So, that’s how it is, huh? You’re into him now? @TheOneY/N”

This, of course, set the app ablaze with fans screaming in the comments:

@FushiguRizz:

“OMG Sukuna’s JEALOUS HAHAHA 💀 #TeamSukuna”

@SoftieXChefEndgame:

“BACK OFF KING OF CURSES, #TeamMegumi4Life 😤💖”

You, sensing an opportunity to stir the pot, replied:

@TheOneY/N:

"Aw, darling 😘 Don't be jealous. You know you’ll always be my #1. Right, bubs?"

The replies exploded as fans flooded the your reply with more chaos and new fan edits, hilarious ship names like #ChefAndCursed, and endless laughing emojis.

@MegumiStanAccount:

“BUBS?! 🤯🤯 @TheOneY/N OUT HERE DOMESTICATING THE KING OF CURSES I’M DONE.”

@LoveTriangleDrama:

“Y’all realize this means we have a LOVE TRIANGLE on our hands??? chef’s kiss 🍿 #ChefAndSoftie #CursedCoffee”

Ryomen Sukuna wasn’t done, though. Minutes later, he fired off a reply:

@ItsRyoSuku:

"Bubs?? If you think I’m letting Fushiguro get away with those coffee stares, you’ve got another thing coming. >:)”

At this point, the exchange has been shared everywhere — especially on Twitter where it was trending with hashtags #TeamSukuna and #ProtectMegumi. Fans had fully split sides, and edits were everywhere.

Even Yuji was horrified—but laughing.

@YujiItadoriOfficial:

“Guys, this was NOT supposed to be my life… #GetUncOffSNS 😂”

It quickly turned into a frenzy, with fans speculating about “The Battle for the Chef’s Heart” and even pitching fictional scenarios of you, Megumi, and Sukuna all vying for each other’s attention. By the end of the day, the “love triangle” had gone viral, with Yuji groaning and shaking his head.

“Seriously.” he muttered as you all read the tweets, “Unc's just losing it. Clearly, he’s only thinking about you.”

You tried to keep a straight face, but you couldn’t hold back your laughter as Yuji scrolled through the comments with an exasperated sigh. Every time he refreshed, new comments flooded in, fans fully invested in the “Chef, Softie, and the King of Curses” triangle that had taken over Twitter.

@BestiesWithCurses:

“Is it just me, or did Sukuna just out himself as a full-on softie under that murder-y glare? 🤔 #CursedSoftieConfirmed”

@MegumiDefenseSquad:

“Megs doesn’t need protecting, but we WILL #ProtectMegumi from all curse-related jealousy out there!! 😂”

@ChefSukunaShipper:

“Listen, they called him DARLING and BUBS. Sukuna’s in the soft-zone for her ONLY, confirmed 💖”

But then came the fan art—a goldmine of exaggerated, hilarious comics and sketches of you, Megumi, and Sukuna in all kinds of ridiculous scenarios. The best of the batch was a comic panel of Sukuna glowering in the background as you and Megumi shared a coffee, titled “The Cursed Love Triangle.”

Yuji held up his phone to show Megumi, who glanced at the screen and immediately looked away, a faint blush on his cheeks. “It’s… they’re really running with this, aren’t they?”

“Oh, you don’t even know,” Yuji laughed, scrolling to another edit with Sukuna in a tux, Megumi in an apron, and you standing in the middle with a confused look. “According to this, you’re both about to get down on one knee.”

Nobara chimed in, wiping tears from laughing too hard. “They even have hashtags for your ‘rivalry,’ Megumi. #TeamMegumi’s doing battle against #TeamSukuna for ultimate coffee rights!”

Megumi groaned, glancing over at you with an embarrassed smile. “Maybe we should just let Sukuna win.”

Of course, Sukuna, apparently with notifications on, took that opportunity to jump back into Twitter tweeting:

@ItsRyoSukuna:

"Nice try, everyone. 😈 The only winning here will be me taking MY seat beside @ItsTheOneY/N Got it, ‘Softie’?”

Fans went wild at this, and new edits started rolling in within minutes. Twitter was flooded with art of Sukuna claiming his “throne” beside you, while Megumi stood off to the side with a coffee, looking exasperated.

You decided to end the day with a final tweet:

@ItsTheOneY/N:

“Who knew coffee could spark this much drama? 😅 #NoTeamJustTea 🍵”

It didn’t stop the fans from picking sides, but it did give everyone a good laugh. The “love triangle” might have been a joke, but you had to admit that seeing the edits and fanfiction of you, Sukuna, and Megumi “competing” over coffee and affection had made the whole trip that much more entertaining.

When Yuji finally got on his account, he was exhausted. This was his uncle after all. Everyone is BEEFING with him. Yuji just can't help but facepalm.

“I just… I’m done. I don’t want to hear about coffee, ‘bubs,’ or anything love triangle-related for at least a week.”

The next day, though, everyone noticed Yuji slyly checking Twitter to see if the ship had started trending again on live television in the next aired episode.

The topic did in fact trend again, much to Yuji or Megumi's liking.

➽──────────❥

YOU WERE EXCITED FOR THE SHOW TO FINISH. With filming almost wrapped up in your last city, you were so ready to finally get back to the comforts of home, and, frankly, to more sleep. As fun as the trip had been, full of late-night laughter and challenges with Nobara, Yuji, and Megumi, you missed your own quiet moments.

But mostly, you missed Sukuna. Between his prep for hosting the music awards and your packed filming schedule, you’d barely exchanged a handful of texts in days.

So, while lounging in your hotel room, a little tired and missing him more than you wanted to admit, you decided to let it out on Twitter.

“I’m super sleepy, but I miss Sukuna. He’s a good hugger! 😴💤 #TravelingAlone #WishHeWasHere,” you typed, hitting “Tweet” without giving it much thought.

And that was that. Except, of course, it wasn’t.

Within minutes, your mentions exploded. “WAIT, does she mean the Sukuna?” one fan squealed. Another posted, “She just confirmed they hug…like a lot. THEY HUG TO SLEEP TOGETHER?!?!”

People were in full-blown fanfiction mode, concocting elaborate stories about you and Sukuna cuddling, secretly sharing hotel rooms, even whispering sweet nothings.

Just as you were debating whether you should tweet a clarification (or maybe just let them have their fun), your phone buzzed again. It was a notification from Sukuna himself.

He’d quote-tweeted you with a simple reply: “Miss you too, bub. 🖤”

That one tweet? Pure chaos. The reactions started pouring in with shrieks of excitement, hearts, and stunned reactions. “He just called her bub?!!” “I didn’t even know I was rooting for them, but here I am, #SukunaY/N!”

Unable to resist, you retweeted his reply with your own message: “Can’t wait to explore this beautiful place, but it’d be better with you here, darling! 😘”

Your castmates had spotted the tweets by now, crowding around and teasing you mercilessly.

“Oh wow, are you two public-public now?” Nobara grinned, nudging you.

“Y/N, this is serious rom-com-level stuff right here, and with Unc too? Crazy stuff!” Yuji laughed, winking.

Megumi looked genuinely contemplative. “This is making me wonder why my love life is so uneventful,” he said with an exaggerated sigh.

Just as you were laughing at their banter, your phone buzzed again—a private message from Sukuna: “So, is this you hinting I should crash your little trip? Because I’m nearby, doll.”

A grin crept onto your face, and you quickly typed back, You totally should! I’d love the company.

A few minutes later, Sukuna confirmed, Alright. Just booked the flight. Pick me up later, sweetheart.

You barely got any sleep that night, excitement buzzing through you. When his flight finally landed the next morning, you were there, half-nervous, half-thrilled, waiting by the arrivals gate.

Sukuna strolled out casually, dressed down in a black hoodie and jeans, but still somehow looking like he owned the whole airport. Tattoos peeked out from his sleeves, drawing a few interested stares from passersby.

“Long time no see, doll,” he murmured, pulling you into a tight hug with that familiar, easy confidence that made you feel instantly at home.

You laughed, “Took you long enough. Thought you got lost or something.”

“Please. I think I’d know how to find my way to you in a blackout.” he teased, arm slipping possessively around your waist as you led him toward the exit.

A few fans who had been waiting nearby looked shocked, quickly snapping pictures, and before long, the hashtag #SukunaAtTheAirport was trending.

Everyone wanted to know why he’d flown out, what he was doing with you, and if there was something big on the horizon. The tension was undeniable, and you could already picture the theories fans would concoct.

As you walked through the crowd, Sukuna leaned down, whispering in your ear. “You know, I could’ve made my entrance even more…dramatic. But I figured I’d go easy on you.”

“Oh really?” you replied, trying to look unbothered. “Well, I’m just glad you didn’t make too much of a scene. Wouldn’t want to embarrass your new favorite travel buddy.”

Sukuna chuckled, his eyes gleaming. “I’ll make up for that later, darling. You’re getting the VIP treatment.”

The thought made you laugh, wondering just how over-the-top his “VIP treatment” was going to be. By the time you made it back to the hotel, fan theories about Sukuna crashing your trip, “spontaneous romantic getaways” and even engagement rumors were spiraling out of control. But with him beside you, laughing and exchanging private smiles, you didn’t mind one bit.

➽──────────❥

SUKUNA MANAGED TO GET A WHOLE WEEKENS OFF. You were excited when he told you all about it. The moment you stepped into the hotel room, the buzz of excitement between you and Sukuna was palpable. You tossed your bags aside and turned to him, ready to unleash the whirlwind of ideas you had for the day.

“Okay, so what’s on the agenda, Mr. VIP?” you asked, crossing your arms with a playful smirk.

Sukuna raised an eyebrow, an amused grin creeping onto his face. “You have a lot of questions for someone who just pulled me out of my busy schedule. I could just take a nap instead, you know.”

“Please, no naps yet! We need to capitalize on your presence here. Let’s explore! We have to make the most of this trip!” You practically bounced on your heels, unable to contain your enthusiasm. “Plus, I still owe you that coffee from when you were busy—remember?”

His smirk deepened. “Fine. Coffee it is. But you’re buying,” he teased, giving you a mock serious look.

“Deal! But only if you let me choose the place,” you shot back, feeling a competitive fire igniting.

“Let’s see what you’ve got then,” he replied, folding his arms with an exaggerated air of skepticism.

As you headed out, the two of you were met with curious glances from the hotel staff, and you could already see a few fans lingering around, whispering and pointing. They were clearly waiting for the latest updates, and your heart raced at the thought of being at the center of the attention.

“Are we about to create some real drama here?” Sukuna asked, noticing the crowd gathering outside. “Should I be on my best behavior, or are we going full chaotic?”

“Let’s keep it cute for now, but I can’t promise anything. I don’t have your special energy,” you replied, grinning.

Sukuna feigned offense, clutching his chest. “You wound me, darling! My energy is unparalleled!”

The two of you walked out into the bustling streets, and your phone buzzed with notifications every few seconds. “You know,” you said, scrolling through the latest tweets, “people are going wild about you being here. They’re already predicting our romantic escapades.”

“Romantic escapades? Pfft,” he scoffed, glancing sideways at you. “You mean me rescuing you from boring coffee shops and dragging you into a karaoke bar, right?”

“Hey! I love a good karaoke session!” you shot back. “But let’s try to stick to our plan first. Coffee, then who knows? Maybe karaoke afterward?”

“Fine, but only if you sing ‘I Will Survive,’ and I want a dramatic performance.”

“Of course! But only if you join me! Two-for-one special,” you laughed, nudging him playfully.

As you strolled through the city, Sukuna’s presence felt electrifying. The way he casually interacted with the environment, his low chuckles at your jokes, and even his light teasing made you giddy. You found a quaint little coffee shop with a cozy vibe and promptly ordered your favorite drinks—something sweet and frothy for you, and a dark roast for him, because “real men drink coffee like adults,” he insisted.

As you waited for your drinks, you couldn’t help but lean closer to him. “So, how does it feel to be out in the wild instead of behind a camera?” you asked, genuinely curious.

“It’s refreshing, actually. I’m usually surrounded by a lot of people I don’t like.” he replied with a wry smile. “But it’s different when I’m with you.”

Your heart did a little flip. “Well, I’m glad I’m on your good side.” you teased, sipping your drink and relishing the moment.

Before long, your phones buzzed again. Sukuna glanced at his and chuckled. “Looks like you’ve got a fan club keeping tabs on us!” he said, showing you a tweet that read, “Y/N and Sukuna getting coffee together? Official couple status confirmed!”

“See? Look at them shipping us!” you laughed, shaking your head. “They have quite the field day with this.”

Sukuna shrugged nonchalantly, his gaze steady on you. “Let them. I don’t mind being their poster boy for their fantasies about us if it means I get to hang out with as my primadonna, bubs.”

Your cheeks flushed, and you couldn’t help but grin. “Alright then, poster boy, what’s next on your agenda after coffee?”

“Maybe we could find a spot with a great view? Something to give them a real show.” he said, his mischievous smile returning.

“Now you’re talking! I know the perfect spot,” you replied, your excitement bubbling over. “It’s a little hidden rooftop terrace I found last time I was here. The view is stunning, and you’ll love it!”

As you made your way toward the terrace, the sun began to dip below the horizon, painting the sky in shades of pink and orange.

The city was coming alive around you, the sounds of laughter and music filling the air, and you felt a rush of happiness at sharing this moment with Sukuna.

Once you reached the rooftop, the view was breathtaking, and you both stood there for a moment, taking it all in.

“Wow, bubs." Sukuna said, leaning against the railing, “You weren’t kidding. This is amazing.”

“I’m glad you like it!” you said, grinning as you pulled out your phone to snap a few pictures. “Let’s get a selfie to commemorate this.”

“Selfie time? My Instagram’s gonna blow up, don't you think?” he teased, striking an exaggerated pose, pulling you close.

You snapped the picture, laughter bubbling up as he made a silly face. “Now that’s a winner! This will make them go wild!” you said, showing him the shot.

“Just make sure to tag me, or I might feel unloved, bubs.” he joked, but there was a hint of sincerity in his voice that made you smile wider.

As the evening continued, you both settled onto a cozy ledge, enjoying the soft breeze and the distant sounds of the city.

The atmosphere was perfect, and you couldn’t shake the feeling that this was the start of something special—not just for you and Sukuna, but for all the fans who were eagerly following your adventures.

“So, what’s the plan for the rest of the trip?” you asked, leaning against him comfortably.

Sukuna turned to you, his expression softening. “Honestly? Just more moments like this. The coffee, the views, and you.”

You felt your heart flutter at his words. “You know, if we keep this up, we might have to face the fans’ expectations for more.”

Sukuna chuckled, his eyes glinting with mischief. “Let them think what they want. I don't really care. As long as I get to hang out with my favorite person, I’m game for anything.”

You smiled, the world around you fading away as the two of you shared a moment of connection that felt like it belonged only to you.

And as the sky darkened, dotted with stars, you couldn’t help but think that maybe, just maybe, this was the beginning of something even more incredible.

Later on, Sukuna asked you to send the pictures to him. He wanted to post them.

His caption?

'My primadonna.'

77 notes · View notes

infernally-fond · 5 months ago

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Orb of Infernal Envisioning - Unused Lines

I hadn't seen this mentioned prior - but there are some (to my knowledge) unused lines for the Orb of Infernal Envisioning in Helsik's shop for any interested.

Disclaimers, disclaimers -- if something doesn't make it into the final text of the published work, it's perfectly reasonable to ignore it for the sake of implications/theories that result from what is explicitly in the text/game itself.

This is just for fun. As is, you know, *all* of this. So.

If Raph's alive:

Narrator: *Your reflection looks back at you, smiling. As the skin burns and peels from its skull, the smile grows wider and wider and wider...*

Narrator: *The ball shows you a vision of yourself so lewd and blasphemous that your soul feels stained.*

Narrator: *Within the crystal, you see the devil Raphael sipping from a goblet of blood-red wine. He smiles as he catches your eye - can he see you?* [[the line we normally encounter]]

Narrator: *The image within the ball drifts through the corridors of an elegant house. Corpses hang from the walls.*

Narrator: *With the clarity of truth, you see an image of yourself laid out on a table like a suckling pig, ready for the carving.*

If you've been a Bad Client (TM):

Narrator: *You see the corridors of the House of Hope. Bloated flies buzz lazily around the corpses of imps and debtors.*

Narrator: *The ball replays the final moments of Raphael's life over and over and over and over...*

Narrator: *Within the ball you see Raphael, broken and bloody, dangling above the maw of the archdevil Mephistopheles who is preparing to devour him.* [[the line we normally encounter]]

Screenshot of the above:

I'm by no means a lore repository - no amount of hyperfixation can make digesting it en masse particularly easy for me. But! I'll tie my thoughts to this nonetheless.

First, we have our canon line: "...He smiles as he catches your eye - can he see you? *denotes: final phrase as incredulous and a little scared"

So we have the writers prompting us to at least entertain the idea that Raphael is placidly aware that you (or someone) is looking in on him - and he smiles! No big deal, favored client! Cheers to you, etc, etc. You're meant to be ill at ease here. I doubt any of us do - but, you're meant to. The average person would.

We'll block these out temporally because it was my first instinct to do so. :)

Past Events -

We have the play-by-play of Raphael's last moments. (GLaDOS voice: "You know, after you murdered me?")

To any player who would have seen this, this is real. Verifiable. The orb is showing you a true thing that happened, and you know because you were there. Doesn't get better than that.

Even if he doesn't ultimately die and there's some grand plot hitherto unseen, the beatdown replayed on the big screen is correct. You'd know if it wasn't.

Premise 1: The orb can show you accurately represented events.

Current 'Events' -

Example: Your reflection has a lab accident moment.

The use of reflection is critical to establish the point in time. You move to the left, it moves to the left. It's right now. And, right now, your skin seems to be melting off your face.

Unless there was an intended accompanied face-melted ending that would have accompanied this dropped line, this was written to be scary and provably false. Tav, touch your face. Exactly.

So:

Premise 2: The orb can show you grotesque illusions not bounded by fact.

Future Events

Ex 1: "*With the clarity of truth, you see an image of yourself laid out on a table like a suckling pig, ready for the carving."

'With the clarity of truth' is an obvious bid to double check any accusations of falsehood, and we're diligent enough to play along.

The only condition to checked to trigger this text is for Raphael to be alive -- regardless if you take his deal, go to his home, etc.

For all roads to lead to Player-Character-buffet seems unreasonable. Impossible, even. Unlawful. I'm calling a lawyer, hang on-

And so we hit a debate on how to interpret the sense of 'truth' you feel from the orb. I think this line reads best from the equivalence of failing some Wisdom check -- you are very sure it's true, but it's an Orb of Infernal Envisioning. Click again. You just saw your reflection melt.

So I think this is a lie.

So we expand Premise 2 a little.

Premise 2, v2: The orb can show you grotesque illusions not bounded by fact. This includes false visions of the future.

Ex. 2: The Blasphemy.

*The ball shows you a vision of yourself so lewd and blasphemous that your soul feels stained.*

Right.

So this has to be the future, because unless you are electing to do some very wild shit while looking into the orb, this is not the current situation.

There is a lot of vagueness here - but, I think that because it is so vague and any variety of Tav/Durge/Origin character can see it and have this response. This is a run-of-the-mill, customized vision of torment meant to get the desired reaction.

It's not about truth, it's not about warning. It's just the infernal variation of a jump scare.

If the content of the vision can be customizable in this fashion, it reveals something else - it's not a specific lie, a specific truth, or any quality of the content itself that 'matters' to the orb. No, what matters is the reaction. Your soul feels stained, doesn't matter how.

Varying Perspectives

Across these, we see the vision in the orb take the perspective of someone following/viewing Raphael (Wine-Snob-Hour, Looped-Death, Saturn-Moment), following/viewing you (Lab-Accident, Dead-Dove-Do-Not-Ohhh Yikes), some unanchored POV that isn't dead-phael ("You see the corridors of the House of Hope. Bloated flies buzz lazily around the corpses of imps and debtors.")

The visions mostly occur in the House of Hope; Cambion dinner is in Mephistar, your reflection is presumably in the Devil's Fee on the Material Plane.

We're not fixed to see any specific time, in any specific realm, to see any specific person. And we're not even guaranteed to see any specific degree of lie.

So what's the point of this fucking thing?

Provable fact is used one time across this set - the first thing we covered. You killed Raphael.

The only time the orb tells you the verifiable truth, it does so "over and over and over and over..."

Because it hurts you. Or, well, it's intended to.

That's it, that's the whole thing. The only time it evokes the (known) truth is when said truth torments you. Otherwise, it's scary what-ifs, cheap jump scares, and the corpses of imps and debtors you had a hand in creating.

All of this can be context to slightly reframe the vision of the moment before filicide with Mephistopheles. All of these visions are brief and so what one selects to provide details of is very revealing.

In this vision you're granted two adjectives:

You see Raphael, broken and bloody, about to die again.

If we stick to the expanded interpretation that the orb shows only what will get the desired reaction, this isn't narrative to resolve a loose thread. It's not closure. It's shown because the orb manifests what is expected to make you suffer - or at least take pause and sort of steep in the disquiet of the consequences for a moment.

Reaching waaaay across the narrative and very out of my lane for this post, so much of the tone in the HoH arc is campy humor, but I don't think this was meant to be.

The specific call out to watching him die 'over and over and over and over', to his 'broken and bloody' form is not flippant language. It's certainly not campy.

I think the tonal shift for this conclusion (while pretty jarring, I gotta admit) is meant to be pretty somber for Raph.

But many players have just bounced down the sequence of "lol he's a bottom" to "Haarlep said that's twice as long as-" to "omg he sings his own song" to victory and, then -- "wtf someone's eating him?"

It's an odd pivot. People have to be primed for sympathy, and I certainly didn't read the writing for the orb as intending to pull at something uncomfortable in the player post-HoH when put in context with the high-score-streak of chamberpot-humor. I can only back into that interpretation when looking at the full set of narration the orb was set to provide at some point.

Kinda wild.

#bg3 raphael #raphael bg3 #raphael the cambion #house of hope #bg3 house of hope #bg3 mephistopheles #I'm not gonna reread this now and resign to the fate of finding some sort of indecipherable screed tomorrow in its place

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cloud-somersault · 6 months ago

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Something that absolutely destroys me about shadowpeach is just the fact that they weren't "good" to each other. They loved each other, sure, but sometimes love just isn't enough.

They are "right person wrong time." They helped each other unintentionally go into a self-destructive paths, and the worst part is that only Wukong managed to get out of it before it ruined him.

Its just so fucked up, imagine you love someone and they love you but they are undeniably going into a path with no return but they do change and they become better, but only after you're gone.

Yeah, I think shadowpeach is compelling and interesting for the layers of tragedy it has. I really do think they're the "right person, wrong time" type of dynamic. If they met each other later on, there wouldn't have been any major problems; just ones they could address as they come up.

But I think...it's a great showing of how people can change each other. A chance interaction can change a person for life. We, as people, are made up of those interactions, the pain, the hurt, the love, the joy we've been shown and what we've given to others.

Wukong and Macaque were doing what they felt was right. In the way they felt was right. And they didn't know how to address it or be better, because confronting the communication issues and lack of respect and value means admitting there's a problem, and neither of them wanted to do that.

I don't think Macaque wanted to, he just wanted to put up with it and stay on Wukong's good side. He disregarded his own hesitations and doubts and believed in this person wholeheartedly instead of making his own decisions and choosing to go against the grain. It's hard to say "no" to the Monkey King, admittedly, but Macaque, probably, felt as if he couldn't.

In s4, he subtly tried to remove himself from the uprising against Heaven, but Wukong dragged him back in on the premise that they're "bros" and it'll be a fun "whatever" kind of time and not a life or death situation. Macaque saw that truth; Wukong refused to.

And that's a lot of Wukong's whole story - thinking he's invincible, that he's above everyone, that he's the handsomest and strongest and best ever. he was entitled and didn't like being told no. Very haughty and spoiled. A brat. He had sense and was funny and showed kindness when he needed to, but he was selfish, also.

Against all that, Macaque's in an odd position. They're friends, but Macaque is quiet. He's subtle. A shadow. Introverted and observant, he probably never felt as if his voice mattered or would change anything. But getting the attention of the Monkey King is a high honor!

And Wukong just thought Macaque was cool, another strong guy with shadow magic that he could get into mischief with. Someone like him!!

It reminds me of a dynamic you see a lot in media. The adventurous main character paired with a more shy and scared secondary character. The main character drags them around unwillingly into situations, assuring the secondary character everything will be fine. And, eventually, it takes the secondary character standing up for themselves for a change to occur.

And that's what happened in that cave.

There is tragedy...in someone you love changing after you're no longer in their life. But...it's more important that they changed at all. A lot of people don't. It's difficult to change. And Wukong was traveling (and was trapped) in this journey with people, learning and humbling himself along the way, learning friendship and love. It took that specific environment and discipline to change him, because changing the Monkey King?? Is a huge task, something that Macaque by himself couldn't do.

And that's said around this fandom like it's a bad thing. I know Macaque would see it as one, because that's his character, but...I don't know. I don't see it as one. Maybe you're not what that person needs, not at that moment, not at that time. And that's..okay. I think that's something we gotta accept.

Because we can't fix everyone. We can't hold ourselves to that standard. Just as I said before, people are collections of their interactions with others, and maybe those other people...are what Wukong needed at that moment. Maybe Macaque wasn't at a point in his life, maturity wise or life experience wise, to direct Wukong on the path to change. Maybe that wasn't his burden to bear.

Sometimes it takes a specific person to say something. With how people weave in and out of each others lives, I think the takeaway should be more "I'm glad you changed. I'm proud of you. You did it!" Like, let's focus on the end result, because...if people change for the better, than they can help others change, and maybe Wukong is the right person at this right time to help Macaque change.

#ask #anon #long post #i feel like i didn't quite respond to this correctly but #i dunno #i did my best LMFAODSJA #lmk shadowpeach #shadowpeach

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dirt-piper · 5 months ago

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The TF2 problem

Don't take anything I say here as gospel - much of it is my own speculation and musings.

TF2 is my favorite game of all time. I started playing it wayyy back in 2012, and while I don't have that many hours racked up total (a meager ~1K), I can at least consider myself to be a few rungs above 'total n00b' in terms of familiarity with the game. I've experienced the best and worst eras of the game - from the Love & War update to the current botting crisis, and I have loved TF2 every step of the way.

But just because I love it, doesn't mean I think it's flawless!

Around 2015-2016 I noticed (alongside damn near everyone else playing TF2) that TF2 was changing, and not in a particularly good way. Love & War was in many ways a perfect update for TF2 - it gave attention and goodies to both the highly casual and the highly competitive ends of the playerbase, with a fancy new taunt system bundled with some pretty fun new weapons. At about this time, Blizzard announced the imminent release of their new game Overwatch, which was directly inspired by TF2 - and now presented itself as being a direct competitor to TF2 in its own niche. This, of course, turned out to be bogus - Overwatch is its own game with its own niche that has a playerbase nearly wholly separate from TF2's.

A common trend amongst the TF2 playerbase at the time was this sense of dread regarding Overwatch - either that it would suck up the entire TF2 playerbase, leaving the game to die, or that Blizzard would try their damnedest to manifest such a reality. Either way, a ton of die-hard TF2 fans began to absolutely loathe Blizzard's new game (before it even came out, I might add) for so much as daring to 'unthrone' TF2.

This entire premise is stupid. It's stupid now, and it was stupid then. But the fear became so pervasive throughout the community that, eventually, it seemed like VALVe was getting scared too. The tone and focus of TF2's updates began to shift far more heavily towards the competitive end of TF2's playerbase - which has never been the majority - as VALVe appeared to try to pivot TF2 into a stance where it could better "compete" with the upcoming Overwatch. Bits and pieces of this started showing with Gun Mettle and Tough Break, before Meet your Match completely revamped the game into a more competitive-focused format.

Why they would do this didn't really make sense - if VALVe wanted to compete against Blizzard's new AAA FPS with a competitive scene, then why would they try to remodel TF2 to position it as a "more valid competitor" to Overwatch when CS:GO was already a proven champion in that space? TF2 doesn't need to compete with Overwatch. It never did. So why would they expend so much effort to change TF2's course when, frankly, it was doing fine as-is?

Looking back now, with nearly a decade of hindsight and a bit more insight into VALVe actually works, I think the picture is a bit clearer, or at least the one I've formed in my head is. I don't think TF2's sudden drastic shift in focus was the result of VALVe scrambling to shore TF2 up against the onslaught of Overwatch - I think it was, rather, the TF2 team scrambling to shore TF2 up against VALVe.

VALVe is not a normal game studio. VALVe is not only lucky enough to be their own publisher (therefore making them a completely independent studio - yes, VALVe games are 'indie'), but also extremely lucky enough to be the de-facto publisher for nearly the entire PC game industry, thanks to Steam. VALVe makes money off of every single game sold through Steam whether they made it or not, essentially guaranteeing them a constant stream of exorbitant income regardless of their own output. They have a complete vertical monopoly of their own industry - they own themselves (VALVe has no shareholders whatsoever), they own their products, they own their publisher, they own their distributor - and now, with the Steam Deck, they own their hardware platforms too. VALVe answers to nobody but themselves, because they own everything that could possibly impact their business.

VALVe is, in a lot of ways, in a somewhat similar situation to AT&T (aka 'Ma Bell') back before the breakup of the phone company back in 1982. AT&T owned the entire phone network - from the switching equipment to the phone lines to the handsets plugged into them - and they charged every person in the country who leased phone service from them (you couldn't own a phone back then!) a subscription fee. AT&T, then, had basically infinite money to do whatever the hell they wanted with (though the government strictly regulated their commercial activities so they could not compete in any industry but telephony). As a result of this, Bell labs, the core Research & Development branch of AT&T, was in a very unique scenario - projects undertaken by Bell labs researchers weren't given budgets - they were given quotas.

AT&T didn't care how much money or time was spent on a project by a Bell labs researcher, so long as it ultimately resulted in something that benefited the company. And this model worked very, very well - Bell labs' researchers gave the world the transistor, the laser, the CCD, the Unix operating system, the C programming language, and received 10 Nobel peace prizes.

VALVe, through Steam, has a free, infinite revenue stream. VALVe's staff, then, effectively have infinite money and time at their disposal to make whatever they desire - so long as it ultimately results in something that benefits VALVe. Or, at least, so long as the people who hold the most seniority at VALVe think it would benefit VALVe.

It's no particular secret that the old guard at VALVe are, largely, unenthusiastic about TF2. Remember - Team Fortress is VALVe's oldest franchise. The original Team Fortress mod was released in August of 1996 - a mere one month after the Nintendo 64's initial release - a full 2 years before Half-life. Sure, VALVe didn't initially create Team Fortress, but they bought Team Fortress Software for a reason - Team Fortress was insanely popular. And it's not just TF2 that has absurd longevity, it's the entire Team Fortress franchise; here's a match from a Quake Team Fortress competitive tournament that is currently ongoing as I write this post:

youtube

VALVe acquired Team Fortress software with the premise that the sequel to Team Fortress would become an expansion to Half-life, thereby increasing Half-life's desirability by attaching it to the sequel of one of the most popular FPS games available at the time. TF2, of course, took a bit longer than expected - so Team Fortress Classic, a more-or-less direct port of Team Fortress to goldsrc, was released in 1999 to satiate people until the real TF2 came out.

That took another 8 years.

When TF2 finally released, it pioneered the concept of games as a service - that you could buy a game once and it would receive new content, features, fixes, etc. indefinitely - for free. These were not paid expansions or DLC, these were actual updates made directly to the game that anyone could get access to so long as they happened to own the game. And, once TF2 went free to play, the deal became even better. This model was utterly groundbreaking in 2007 - it's the standard for how most games operate today, sure, but only because TF2 proved how well it could work.

The issue, of course, is that VALVe was eternally working on TF2. By 2015, Team Fortress 2 had been in development in some form or another for 17 years. With this perspective, it seems understandable why some of the more senior members of VALVe would have grown sick of Team Fortress - they'd been doing or dealing with the same game for nearly 2 decades.

But, of course, newer hires at VALVe would have nowhere near the same level of fatigue - many of them were likely still very passionate about the game, and eager to continue its lifespan - but when the people who sign their paychecks and review their employee performances are sick and tired of hearing about Team Fortress, it becomes less and less attractive to pour effort into the game, no matter how much they may personally wish to.

Under these circumstances, the tonal shift TF2 experienced around the release of Overwatch appears more as an internal struggle - the remaining TF2 team trying desperately to prove to their seniors that TF2 was not yet ready to be phased out, that the game could modernize and remain relevant in the modern competitive gaming scene, that just because they were sick of TF2 didn't mean that everyone was.

So, they gambled. They bet TF2's future on a new revamp to adapt it to the then-modern world of competitive e-sports... and fumbled it pretty hard with Meet your Match.

The problem with the TF2 team's attempt to make TF2 more suited to the modern world of competitive gaming was that they seemed to overlook that, to the average non-competitive TF2 player, the game as it was was perfectly fine. Through Quickplay, any player could be automatically placed into a server matching their desired criteria and just... play. A server would stay on a given map for roughly 45 minutes (though players could vote to extend the map timer) regardless of how many rounds there were, meaning that everyone got the same amount of time to play the map regardless of how good or bad either team, as a whole, performed. This game players plenty of time to just... have fun playing TF2. There was no rush or hurry or incentive to play the game in any way other than how you wanted to.

This made TF2 very unique in the FPS world - the truest example of a "casual shooter". There were no ranks or rewards or incentives to play every day beyond random item drops and the enjoyment derived from simply playing the game itself.

The TF2 team's attempt to 'modernize' TF2 in Meet your Match effectively ruined this.

In addition to the introduction of a new, dedicated 6v6 competitive mode, Quickplay was replaced with 'Casual' - a matchmaking lite that tried to find a middle ground between the chaotic ad-hoc freedom of Quickplay and the more rigid, competitive structure of Competitive. It didn't work. Most TF2 players just wanted to play TF2 - casual forced them to stop and wait for the matchmaking system to find a server for them matching its desired criteria, stop and wait every other round for the server to change maps, stop and wait for matchmaking cooldowns to run out if they left a game in progress - so much time was spent stopping and waiting to play the game that hardly any was left to play the game itself. Yes, some of these problems have since been smoothed over, but Casual still forces the play to spend less time playing the game than Quickplay did. In my opinion, Casual, as it was released, could have been perfectly fine if Quickplay was kept alongside it. Instead, in one fell swoop, the way the vast majority of people played TF2 was effectively removed from the game.

In fairness to the TF2 team regarding this gamble, they were under enormous pressure - not just from a TF2 community growing increasingly paranoid about TF2's future due to the imagined threat of Overwatch - but also from the higher-ups at VALVe they were trying to convince.

However, the TF2 team snuck a back-up plan into Meet your Match - the Heavy vs. Pyro war. By outright promising a future major update (or perhaps two, even!), the TF2 team could at least insure that, no matter what their 'bosses' thought, they could justify their continued work on the game as fulfillment of a promise made to the community. And, if the new update was enough of a hit, it could perhaps inspire their 'bosses' to let TF2 continue to live on, at least for a little while.

So, the TF2 team pulled out all the stops for the next update. Jungle Inferno had an animated short, new maps, new weapons, entirely new features (ie. the contracker), it had a massive hype-spiraling 4-day-long update announcement, major weapon rebalances and overhauls - they clearly tried their damnedest to make the best TF2 update possible.

Whether or not the team managed to convince their superiors is unknowable. Jungle Inferno was followed by the fanfare-less Blue Moon update in early 2018, followed by radio silence. The TF2 team may very well have still been hard at work on the elusive Heavy update, but the double-whammy of the all-hands-on-deck push to get Half-life: Alyx finished and released immediately followed by the COVID pandemic likely reset whatever momentum or motivation the TF2 team had left.

This scenario, as described, is painful enough. From the outside, it appears as though VALVe had rebounded from Meet your Match, and was doing its best to improve the game in the wake of their own missteps, only to suddenly drop TF2 with zero explanation given. TF2 was left in a state of indefinite limbo with no clear outlook whatsoever on the future.

What made this infinitely worse is that VALVe had left the game in a state that wasn't just unfinished, it was broken.

TF2 has literally always had a botting problem. For the first span of the game's life, this generally manifested as idling/trading bots, but later on more and more bots began to appear that sought only to disrupt gameplay. Micspam, false votekicks, aimbotting, speedhacks, etc. - purely for the sake of irritating real players. Until Meet your Match, these cheating bots were relatively uncommon - real players could very easily either kick them from the game or simply join another server via Quickplay. Their impact on gameplay was no more than a minor, brief annoyance, and thus they were considered a non-issue.

Meet your Match's new Casual system, however, dramatically restricted the player's ability to hop to other servers when bots arose. Not only this, but the ability to switch teams at will was disabled on Casual servers, meaning it was now impossible to deal with bots on any team but your own (previously, if the other team was too slow to kick their own bots, it was possible to just wait for an opening on the other team, hop over, and call a votekick against the offending bot that would usually end up succeeding). Now, the disruption caused by a single bot was far more impactful than it had been before - because it was a far greater chore to either kick the bot or find a different server. Moreover, Casual outright incentivizes players to stick to the same server until the end - awarding them extra points the more they play, and nullifying any progress they've made towards a given contract that match if they leave before it ends. Players are thus, in effect, forced to play even when bots have made the game unenjoyable.

This resulted in a feedback loop - bots were now more irritating, so people complained about them more, so bot hosters hosted more bots, making them even more irritating - and that feedback loop has continued nearly unabated until modern day.

The TF2 community has been begging for an end to the botting problem for ages - and there have been genuine efforts from the TF2 team to try and fix the problem, but they have been too small and too infrequent to make much impact. And, to be frank, there is no way to effectively, permanently remove the bots. Attempting to keep any and all bots from the game would require enormous, constant effort from the TF2 team - something which is a very tall ask given VALVe's attitude towards the game for the past decade.

What can be done, however, is to simply make the bots less impactful. To let players more easily avoid them, to let players enjoy the game for longer so the bots are no longer such a nuisance, to let players have enough freedom in how they play that they are no longer forced to suffer through games with bots. It won't outright remove bots forever, but it will make them so much less of a nuisance that bot hosters will likely lose the incentive to bother with them. As soon as that happens, the feedback loop will be broken, and the botting issue will decline in severity as their potential impact on players' enjoyment of the game is neutered.

The simplest way to do this is to make Casual just as free as Quickplay was.

45 minute map timers, extensible by vote.

An Indefinite number of rounds per map.

Ad-hoc joining, leaving, and team switching.

Progress on contracts not erased by leaving mid-round.

These are not overwhelming changes. If anything, it's something of a return to form - not outright bringing back Quickplay, but making Casual into a suitable replacement for it - at long last.

And - most importantly - it's a one-time fix. It does not require an eternal arms race against bot hosters, nor a full return to frequent, massive content updates (though those would be nice).

One update to make TF2 more fun, to make the bots less impactful, and to give the game a better standing for the future.

One update to fix TF2.

-DirtPiper

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perexcri · 1 year ago

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fic recs!!

i woke up to being on a couple of fic rec lists and really appreciated it, so i wanted to capitalize on the nice energy and make a list of some of my own favs that i've read recently that i didn't necessarily see on the other lists :D check these out because they have some of the best prose/plots/characterization that i've read in the fandom :] 💜

one soft infested summer (M, 18k+, 3/7 ongoing) by @wheelersboy - this one is perfect for all the highler fans out there! it's got stoner byler of course, a music festival, lots out camping, and some really amazing writing! i started it just for the fun stoner vibes because Why Not, but i'm staying for the beautiful writing and the really complex and delicate relationship mike and will have in this one

Light Sleepers (T, 15k+, 2/6 ongoing) by @helioleti - WillEl-centric fic set during the time gap between the end of s3 and the beginning of s4 that explores their dynamic and their respective problems with mike, all while trying to cope with moving across the country from everything they know. each chapter is meant to reflect a certain stage of grief, which fits so well with all the complicated emotions everyone is going through!

drank my poison all alone (T, 4k, one-shot) by silverluminoqity - mike gets vecna'd and has to face his past self who's ashamed of who he's grown up to be, and my dudes the writing goes SO HARD. by far one of the best mike gets vecna'd fics i've read with such a good take on his character

star eater (T, >1k, one-shot) by @lowlightt - another fic where the writing does not play. honestly if you have a few minutes, READ THIS FIC. it's mostly just a confrontation between will and vecna, but it's so so powerful and impactful. and again, i cannot state it enough: the writing is AMAZING

tell me again (you said yes) (M, 32k, 3/3 complete) by @willow-lark - hey remember when cleradin was like a Thing for a brief second a few months ago? well if you miss those vibes, or if you just like great writing and some of the best weaving of canon into a fantasy au i've ever read, please look no further than this fic (and it's first part, fireball him! (cast protection)). i love this one dearly and enjoyed the wonderful ways Lark wove canon (specifically s1) into such a different setting, plus it was nice to see many of the other characters play a role in the events. beautiful, astounding, heart-wrenching - and did i mention there's an elopement 👀

In Undertow (M, 17k+, 3/6 on-going) by @souverian-are-we - this and one soft infested summer have become my summer byler reads~ when i say i love this fic, i mean you will have to pry it from my cold, dead hands 🥰 we've got estranged byler, jancy engagement with some stoncy going on in the background, and most of the characters still reeling from the consequences of their final battle with the upside down. it's all set at a lake house, which provides some breathtaking/atmospheric writing that this author uses to their advantage. it has some of my favorite scenes i've ever read in fic too, ones that have literally taken my breath away

california show your teeth (T, 77k+, 10/19 on-going) by @fireflywitch - what if the Byers and Hopper families were from Lenora and moved to Hawkins? this fic takes this one simple premise and turns it into one of my favorite fics i've ever had the pleasure of following along with. it essentially functions as a retelling of s1 and s2, gives almost every main character that's been featured in the show thus far a lot of time and space for their own plots, all while culminating into one larger story underneath. i don't think i've read a fic quite like this one in terms of its scope, plotting, and characterization, because there are a lot of moving parts, but this author goes above and beyond. i cannot recommend it enough

all i know is pouring rain (and everything has changed) (T, 3k, one-shot) by @willelfanpage - i think i read this one at the beginning of my workday while i was running some report on my computer and had to go about the rest of my day as if everything was fine ahah :'D seriously though, it's 3k words that pack an emotional punch all while examining will's relationship to rain. the writing is just gorgeous, and it's a character study that i haven't really seen done before, which was quite enjoyable~

Chasing Heartlines by (T, 7k+, 1/2 on-going) @cherryisgone - if you liked Tip-Toeing on Lilypads then may i direct you to its sequel, which features so much pining mike that he might as well be a tree? again, if you like cleradin/fantasy aus, then Cherry my beloved has you covered 💜 it fits so neatly with Lilypads and provides some fun contrast between will and mike~

Touch Me Like You Know Me (M, 15k, 4/4 complete) by @starsarefire824 - this exists in the rare pantheon of fics that actually made me cry. imagine an estranged byler reunion with all the emotions turned up to an eleven, and lots of lingering on lost time and how life sometimes takes us places we never thought we'd go. it's absolutely beautiful and is a classic to me :]

come back to me and forgive everything (T, 78k, 18/18 complete) by @howtobecomeadragon - i saw a lot about this one when it was on-going but am only just now getting around to reading it, and all i can say is why did it take me so long to get to it :') this author does such a good job of writing will and mike's relationship with a lot of nuance and complexity while still managing to make them feel like the teenagers they are. basically, will has to spend every july at lonnie's house in indianapolis, and for this summer in particular, the event is a lot more emotionally impactful for both mike and will. there's lots of emotional depth, the complexities of coming out and/or realizing you're queer, and, at the heart of it, how two friends try to mend things between each other. it's so soft and sweet

that's all i've got for now!! i'm quickly running out of time on my lunch break :'D also haven't been writing as much, but it's been fun to read more and relax a bit. hope you guys enjoy these because they're genuinely some of the best stuff i've had the pleasure to read in a while 💜💜💜

#fic recs #actually that last paragraph is a threat everyone had better read these now or i'll. blow up tumblr #byler #(< intended audience)#stranger things fic

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fuckyeahisawthat · 3 months ago

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Got tagged by @chaotic-neutral-knitter to share my favorite fics I've written and I feel a little bad not putting any of my 3 OFMD fics on the list. But in my defense it was very hard to choose between my 116 slutty slutty children, and while I like my OFMD fics a lot (especially Learning and Remembering) I decided to limit myself to five fics across all the fandoms I have written for over the past nine (!!) years, and there are some that stand above the rest.

Maybe I'll Show You the Way (Dune, Paul/Chani). Maybe my recency bias is showing but I really think this is one of the best things I've written. Paul and Chani's whole "falling in love while fighting side by side in an anti-colonial armed resistance movement" romance in Dune Part Two felt like it was designed in a lab to appeal to me specifically, and I just wanted more of it! What started with a simple "5 times they fucked in between fighting the Harkonnens" premise has become a novella-length character study about war, politics, solidarity and resistance to oppression in all its forms, interlaced with a very sweet, youthful first-love romance that always has a bittersweet edge because we the audience know these characters are living in a tragedy. This fic is one chapter from completion and I've been stalling because I really wanna stick the landing on this one, but it will get finished!

a narrow door, swiftly closing (Dune, Paul/Duncan) Different ship, different era (post-Dune Part One) and a very different vibe. The fun of this ship is the multiple power imbalances running in different directions (younger/older, student/teacher, lord/vassal, end product of a 90-generation eugenics program with a mind that can bridge time and space/Just Some Guy). It's also got that chewy age gap thing where the older character has watched the younger character grow from a child to an adult and has to wrestle with the realization that they find them sexually attractive now. Peak forbidden romance and mutual pining in this one and not just one but two of my favorite finally-crossing-the-line kisses I have ever written.

Three Times Is a Habit (Trust, Primo/The Other Paul) Ah yes, my "which doomed curly-haired teenage twink heir to a powerful dynasty named Paul are we talking about?" era. For a hot second (most of 2021) I was really into this hidden gem FX limited series Trust, based (with many creative liberties taken) on the real kidnapping of John Paul Getty III in Italy in the 1970s. The fun of this fandom is that every ship is an absolute garbage fire of bad decisions, and writing the trainwreck emotional logic that leads to a traumatized teenager repeatedly hooking up with his kidnapper was an adventure. There's also a fun meta layer at play in the relationship between our reality, the fictionalized "true" version of the kidnapping that happens in the show, the lies the characters tell about the fictionalized version of the kidnapping in the show, and the version of the characters I'm writing, some of whom are based on real people and some of whom are made up. (Is this RPF? You decide.) This fic will make zero sense if you haven't watched the show. But you should! It's a wild ride with a great cast (Donald Sutherland presente!)

Salvage & Scrap (Mad Max: Fury Road, Gen) Two minor characters who have a combined total of maybe five minutes of screen time produced what was until recently my longest fic on AO3. This fic was based on a fantastic prompt: what if Ace (the older war boy who seems to be Furiosa's second in command on the War Rig) and Valkyrie (Furiosa's Green Place gal pal) both survived their violent vehicular encounters and met each other? The idea was immediately appealing to me because they both care about Furiosa but have known such different versions of her, and the way their worldviews would clash seemed like great story fodder. I still love the imagery of them meeting at the place where their worlds have literally collided--the wreck of the War Rig in the Rock Riders' canyon. Also I recently reread this and I forgot how devastating the tiny glimpse we get of Furiosa is in this fic.

Fightplay (Mad Max: Fury Road, Max/Furiosa) You know this list wouldn't be complete without a smutty Maxiosa fic. It was really hard to pick one piece of the 127k smut novel I wrote about them in non-chronological order over the course of about 3 years (2015-2018). But Fightplay was definitely the start of writing uhhh a certain kind of dynamic for them. The prose is very spare and exacting in a way that I still find hot 9 years later.

Tagging @thebyrchentwigges, @thetardigrape, @nandamai, @bethagain, @demolitionwoman-blog and anyone else who wants to do this!

#fanfic #writing #dune #trust fx #mad max #mad max fury road #thanks for the tag nat!!!#i always take forever to do these things but i appreciate being included :-D

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vonev · 1 year ago

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The Executioner (and the judge) I

Simon 'Ghost' Riley x reader

Chapter 1: end it all, where it started;

Part I Part II

Words: 2.2k Warnings: Graphic depictions of gore and violence Summary: You somehow end up in an unforeseen predicament, now facing the horrors and fears of your past, meeting old faces, would it all come crashing down? Maybe after seeing his face again, it'll all make sense.

a/n: this premise was so fun to write, please enjoy the prologue!

Pitter-patter

Wet footsteps reverberate in the echoes of the empty hallway, its pace set to a slow, cautious tempo. A stained rifle clutched in your hand; eyes trailing the narrow hallway, subconsciously drinking in the cracks and dents in the walls around you.

It’s quiet, silence becoming its own company, with only the muffled tap-tap-tap of your boots avoiding the limbs of the corpses fills void where once voices were: people’s chatter, the ghost of their laughter teasing the air like a past lover’s touch. There but, not there.

Blood pools on the cold concrete floor. Some dried, some still rather fresh, mix with water dripping from the ceiling above: you get the disgusting squelching noises under you.

Soon—the sight of an entry greets you as you round a sharp corner. Pushing the squeaky door open with your fingers, you take in the sight that you’ve grown familiar with.

Bodies. Laying out like a feast at a ball; limp figures decorate what was once a lively lobby, red from the people painted over walls that used to confine an entire organization, families, friends—teammates.

You find that your soles lead you further into the room, painfully bright fluorescent lights flicker overhead; the air is biting, despite the slowly crumbling walls keeping out breezes from the outside with its best efforts. Somewhere along the way, a beeping from a still functioning telephone rings, piques your full attention.

Your body functions on auto-pilot: and you, a mere bystander, watching the way your body moves closer to the source of the ringing.

Right down the vast lobby, through the tight spaces of the cramped hallway, in a room you remembered to be storage—sitting prettily next to the busted ceiling remnants is someone’s personal phone: you take in the cracked screen as you neared, shards of glasses crunches under your boots, head tilting slightly to the side in amazement at how it was still alive.

In this building, only you breathe the soiled air.

The handphone vibrates violently on the floor, its screen showing a pop-up of the caller. A middle-aged looking woman who wears a smile that could rival against even sol itself.

You don’t pick up.

It goes straight to voice-mail, a sign that you’ve stood there over the phone longer than comfortable.

“Hey honey, I know you’re busy, but I just saw the news.”

Silence.

Ruffling of fabric: skin on clothes, the sound of the constant shuffling around on the other side of the phone indicates the nervousness of the woman’s demeanor—without even seeing her face.

“The explosion wave was so close to your building, I’m worried, son. I knew you shouldn’t have signed up for that—“

A quiet, trembling groan.

“—to leave me all the way here and move out to that country, your poor mother, and now I don’t even know—“

‘If you’re alive’ was most likely the drifting words caught in her tongue. Pure denial laced in her voice: as if not muttering the words would stop her son from waving at the grim reaper himself.

“—I hope you get this, and when you do…”

The quiet sniffles of the mother reach your eardrums, you hold in your breath.

“—Please…please call me back okay?”

She chokes out in her sobs, full-on heaving over the voice-mail, her tears could be felt even through the small speaker on the phone.

“I love you.”

With a shaky breath, the voice-mail ends.

Drinking in the quiet murmurs of the wind that found its way through the crack of the door behind you, your eyes soon register the bloodied hand next to the tiny gadget.

Nose scrunching up in disdain, you take in the brain matter that splattered all over the floor, the hand you previously noticed connects toward the body that has been swallowed up by the heavy collapsed cement of the ceiling, unrecognizable even if you’d try to piece the little remains of the body together.

Somewhere out there is a mother who would never see her child ever again. Struggling to mend her broken heart over the loss of her child, just as those families and friends who would never find their loved ones’ bodies that disappeared underneath the crumbled walls.

And somewhere out there, is someone who will never find peace with the cruel world—it takes, it takes and takes. A one-sided exchange; for the universe could care less about a freckle of dust in the swarm of many millions.

You’re on your own—

—loneliness tastes bittersweet on the tip of your tongue.

The town was in shambles.

It was a miracle you survived, out of the tens of thousands who fell victim to the catastrophic disaster that struck.

Why?

No clue.

The universe loves playing sick jokes on you—always taunting, relentless, never giving an ounce of mercy in your name. You nick the skin around your fingertips, the fireplace cackles in front of your figure, its warmth engulfing you like a mother’s embrace. Dazed, mesmerized by the swirls of the flame, your mind wanders off.

It has been a couple of months since you resided in the bunker near your home, luckily for you, due to your father’s paranoia; you’ve always had a stacked basement full of all the necessary resources. Canned foods, water, weapons, everything. Except for a comfortable mattress to sleep on.

You know, just in case—and this is the case.

Papers strewn across the mahogany desk you’ve spent countless sleepless nights at. The desk lamp a soft glow, illuminating the pages underneath its sturdy body. Glossing over the words on the file, eyes scanning every word on every inch of the paper.

Months ago, you had taken a long stroll around what used to be where your town sat, now instead occupied by the distraught of conflict; of war. Ashes contaminate the air, fallen buildings and bodies laid about—the vehicles weren’t spared of the mercy either, joining the abundance piles of rubbles outside. It was a sight alright.

It’s the natural devastating result of wars; of national conflicts.

There’s always a price to pay.

Unfortunately for many, innocents are usually the ones at stake: they pay with their lives. Their blood bath spilled the most out on the field, not the soldiers, not the perpetrators—the civilians. It has always irked you, an annoying itch in the back of your head, a bothersome subconscious thought.

You click the pen held in your palm against the hardwood table, the steady rhythm of it occupies the silence of the room.

Viktor Romanov.

A name that sings despair, injustice, dismay.

The stacks upon stacks of jumbled files sitting at the corners of your room says a lot. You’ve done your fair share of research; surface insights regarding his whereabouts, the predicted state of conditions. Being ex-military specialized in combat and intelligence has its benefits at times, picking up good intel skills has gotten you far, far in life.

7 years of service since 18. All reduced down to being able to dig dirt and shoot better than the average person.

It wasn’t particularly an easy task prying into his past; but having had worse experiences, you make-do, adapting to the poor circumstances you’re dealt with.

Whew. You’re in for a ride.

He was the sole reason behind your early ‘retirement’ at the age of 25 instead of your original plan to serve 20 years (free healthcare for life, woo!) and banished from the military for good. It was all against your wishes.

Also the same man that bombed your town.

A small, rather secluded town. One built up from its traumatizing past of warfare and bloodshed, just to end up where it started: in the gutter. A place where you originally ran to after hardships and scars that still haunts your nightmares—somewhere safe, sound and definitely away from prying eyes. Yet, they found you. Even after years and years of covering your tracks, practically having your presence wiped off of everywhere. They still found you. After all this time, he’s still obsessed with you: why else would he drop a bomb in the middle of nowhere in Argentina?

Him.

You’ve got to give it to him—to the public eye, he’s got a clean slate. He doesn’t scream ‘I murder innocents for breakfast, lunch and dinner’ but rather ‘I will solve all your problems with one look’. Hence why the public opinion loves him: to them, he's sweet, caring of his people and always gives back. They're unaware of the dirty business ran behind their backs; the lives he's casually taken out of spite and for the fun of it. Anything to satiate his thirst for blood, for power.

Deceit runs in his blood, and his family, in fact.

Throughout the decades, he’s managed to scramble his way out of the numerous controversies his family was involved in—infidelity, assassination attempts, scandalous involvement with the opposing units. You name it, he’s got it all stamped under Romanov’s name.

A tainted sheet; yet now clean of its impure past, only a goody-two-shoes mascot in the place of a new form of tyranny.

You yearn for his downfall; watch as the power slips away from in front his eyes, observe the way the structure he’s built crumbles under his very gaze—you seek revenge.

Where would you start, though?

“Fucking nuisance,” you grumble under your breath. Spinning around in your office chair, head tilting back as you stare up into the ceiling, defeated. Sometimes, you ponder the trajectory of your life if everything had gone according to plan: retire after 2 decades of hard work, maybe start a family, or live a fulfilling life of content and peace. Something to look forward to every morning you awake, every breath you take in the field; it would make all the heads you’ve dropped worth it. Yet it didn’t.

It didn’t; because of a single silver-spoon fed toddler who happened to be born from a family of riches, connections and power. Power of authority, of the absolute his words wield. ‘Yes Viktor.’ ‘I will do that for you, Viktor.’ ‘Anything you’ll ever wish for, Viktor.’

His word goes, and so does his command.

Which begs the question: what would be the most satisfying way to tear a tyrant from their throne?

You never truly believed in the death sentence in law—as sadistic as it sounds, you’ve always been a firm believer of having the person suffer the same amount of agony they put their victims through. Let their suffering be drawn out for all to see; to deliver justice for those who were deserving.

Maybe you’d rip out his eyes from the sockets, a deep knife wound puncturing dangerously close to his heart; or maybe, even lure him under a false sense of comfort, just to pull the rug from underneath him and make him fall into the abyss, the realization that he will live a life of anguish. Maybe even strip his skin bare and watch his face contort in pain no one has ever—

—your alarm blares in your ears, making you flinch back into full consciousness. You dart your eyes around the room, as though your guilt would manifest into a being and eat you alive; lucky for you, it doesn’t.

A sigh escapes your lips.

“Maybe I should get therapy.”

Days, weeks, months go by. Not a single day where you had taken a proper rest, nor eaten a true meal that doesn’t consist of dry sweetened cereal, tea and your saliva. No, you feed on the twinge of revenge at the tip of your tongue for fuel, for motivation. All to pin his location down—

—as you stare at the doodled map under your gaze, you feel lethargic; giddy, even. You finally found him. Not just his estimated location, his exact position. You could even picture the way he’s relaxing in his armchair, unaware of the catastrophe gradually approaching him. A smirk teases the end of your lips, threatening to break through with every passing second at the thought of his life in the palm of your hand.

You’ll end it off where it all started—

—Urzikstan.

You had been preparing for the fight ahead: a backpack packed full of guns, pocket knives, a grenade or two and some rations; anything to get by. But first, you’ll have to take another way of travel; god forbid the international airport hunts you down for bringing in weapons to traverse the international water. Luck was on your side though, because you know just the person to contact. An old friend; where you both used to share laughs over drinks and nights spent pouring your hearts out, someone that always has a place in your heart.

As you punch her number into your throwaway phone, you bite your lips in anticipation.

Would she still remember you? After all, you should be dead, not alive and breathing hiding away in a bunker no one else knew existed. A part of you feels like you’ve been lying to her; that she would scoff and turn away at the sound of your voice—because technically, you did leave her without a second notice nor a proper goodbye, and to everyone else: you were dead. Or worse, what if she changed her numbers? Your efforts would’ve been absolutely futile.

But if she picked up, it would mean seeing the people you’ve abandoned, the way their eyes would scrutinize you for leaving them—you were a team, after all.

The 141.

And him.

The image of a skull printed balaclava flashes across your mind like a fleeting memory, you feel the corner of your eyes wet, the back of your head dulls as his face now taunts your mind. You taste iron on your tongue: your blood. You had gotten carried away and somehow bit yourself in nervousness. The blue screen shines on your face, the numbers written across the screen; all you have to do now is to press the green button, to call.

And you do.

The dial indicates it’s going through; that she still has the same number even after so long.

…

Okay, why isn’t she picking up?

Maybe your fears came through: that she still has your number memorized and saved, thinking that some stranger is behind the other side. Or maybe she grew tired of you, that she wouldn’t need your presence back in her life. Maybe—

“Hello?”

—maybe it was worth it all.

#simon ghost riley #simon riley #simon riley x you #simon riley x reader #ghost x reader #cod mw2 #cod x reader #angst #call of duty

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tolnas-vault · 6 months ago

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Announcing The Wroot of Romance Fic Collab.

Show Your Love For Barcus Wroot By Participating In This Collaborative Fanfiction Series of Barcus Wroot Ships.

The Premise

The idea is that Barcus is going to go through the game timeline and meet a lot of different people. Some of these encounters will cause some canon divergence, but the game timeline will be mostly kept. There will be smut, fluff, friendship - whatever you want to write! Each chapter will focus on a single partnering, with a title relating to it in the format “The Wroot of _____” in which the blank relates to the partner or the relationship between them. Writers signing up can volunteer for a listed character or add a new character to the list that they want to write about, and after the sign up period we will check the assignments and decide an order together.

How To Sign Up

Join the Tolna's Vault Discord Server (invite link above) and follow the link to the sign up spreadsheet featured in the Wroot of Romance event description, and pinned in the #the-wroot-of-romance-collab channel.

You will also need to have an AO3 account and share your username with us - there is a second tab in the spreadsheet with a table to add your aliases!

The table should be pretty simple to use. If there’s a character not on the list that you’d like to add, put them in a new row! You can also add title suggestions if you think of something fun, and we’ll all agree on the final titles that fit best when the event starts. There’s a column to volunteer to write a character, and you’re welcome to add your name here as long as you don’t remove anyone else’s without their permission - for now keep it to your Discord username from Tolna’s so we know who you are! We will add a column for AO3 names and other aliases later.

Each character will get one chapter written by one writer (unless two or more agree to collab on a single chapter together), and if several people have interest in the same character we can work it out in the server together.

Event Timeline

Sign ups will end on the 1st May to allow us a day or so to ensure we have the writers set up with their pairing(s). Then we will work together on an order/structure together so we know the chronological story - and release - order of everyone’s works! The next deadline is the 10th May - by this date you will need a bullet point summary of your fic plan. That way, you can coordinate with the writers before and after you to ensure we have a cohesive story structure. We might also be able to reference - or even add foreshadowing! - from each others ideas so we can even have some real character development for Barcus as he goes on a very sexy adventure across the sword coast.

The first batches of submissions will be due in by the end of May, and the release schedule will be one chapter every few days through June/maybe July to stagger them for readers but also keep a nice steady flow until we reach the end.

It’s best to publish these as a Series on AO3 with each chapter as a new work (so your “chapter” can have multiple chapters if you need to, particularly if it runs long or you feel it needs a split in the middle to be more reader-friendly). This also means each person’s submission will have its own tags on it, and will be easier to find for those just looking for each individual pairing they like.

The Concept So Far

A chance encounter with Abdirak in act 1 will kickstart this fic series, as this crack ship sparked the idea. Abdirak (in his own unique way) will encourage Barcus to open himself up to new possibilities. And thus we begin Barcus' journey of self discovery and relationship building. Some of his encounters will be romantic, some platonic, some simply smutty. You get to write what you feel is best for the ship you choose.

The Rules

The main thing is to follow all the rules listed in Tolna’s server, make sure your works are tagged appropriately, but otherwise follow your hearts and dreams! Want to go full Dead Dove? Do it! As long as it fits the event, it’s fine. You can also go pure SFW fluff if you want, you don’t have to make it smutty at all unless you want to.

Do be mindful of the people following you directly in the series. You should be able to summarize the "important events" in your fic with as few triggers as possible so people can follow up from your story even if your content isn't to their taste. If you can summarize all your Dead Dove elements with "they had a wild night." you are free to write anything you'd like happening that night in the fic proper. Please try to stick close to the deadlines, but if you are struggling let someone know ASAP and we can work something out! Otherwise? Have fun!

#baldur's gate 3 #barcus wroot #rare pair #rare char #fic collab #bg3 fic collab #bg3 discord server #tolnas vault #bg3 barcus #the Wroot of Romance #bg3

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pesterquestrewritten · 9 months ago

Note

Sorry if this is an inappropriate question to ask, but why do you want to rewrite pesterquest? Was there anything wrong with its original version, or are you just doing this for fun?

brain is a Lil Loopy rn so please excuse if this answer is semi incoherent - recovering from ankle surgery rn.

im gonna try to not harp on the original pesterquest as a project/talk about my percieved issues with it. from what I understand about the work environment where it was developed, it was hell -- poor communication, tiny budgets, little overall direction. plus every artist/writer involved was likely busy with other things at the same time (for example finishing the development of Hiveswap Act 2). they had so much going against them, and... it sorts shows in the final work, which isn't their fault. the original PQ team was passionate and cared and like. the absolutely last thing i want to do is disrespect them.

(generally also stating for the record that calling the original PQ "trash" or "replaced" is like. not good vibes. please don't do this if you're trying to enjoy PQR -- the last thing the original postcanon team needs is more harassment.)

anyway.

pqr is fanfiction, fundamentally.

i started making pqr because in september i was sick with covid, i wanted to learn renpy, and i wanted to study homestuck more. i wanted to figure out what made PQ tick, literally, figuratively, all of the above.

plus i really wanted to write a different story arc for mspar.

i also really love the side characters in Homestuck, and wish they all got more time to shine. the pqr prologue including a set of Spades Slick sprites just for a brief encounter i think helps establish what i want to do with the like. raw potential of the premise of a Homestuck visual novel.

damara is the other big thing -- i've wanted to make a story with her in it work for ages. (if anyone remembers the old MEGIDO hades mod, that was my first big public attempt. she was gonna be the protagonist, breaking out of scratch's mansion. turns out coding in renpy is WAY easier LMAO)

like. the plan wasn't even initially to have the prologue be a full damara route? i just let the writing take me where it wanted to take me. it's been deeply fun and cathartic.

the prologue's "bad end" has some incredibly intimate themes of like. inevitability, and worrying you've let everyone you love down, and i showed it to a college friend who i hadn't spoken to for ages and she set a screenshot from it as her background.

like. to me. that's pqr. that's why i make it.

pqr is the laundry room ending of rose's route, a deeply personal look into my own fears and anxieties as an author reflected back through this girl's circumstances. pqr is also the retcon ending of rose's route, a wildly stupid and indulgent romp through my own past fanfiction for a silly gag that people seemed to really love.

pqr is about dave and myself looking for a place to stay simultaneously -- pqr is about jade leaving prospit, and how i was adding to that part of the game in real-time as i dropped out of college, changing both of our destinies to something unexpected but hopefully better, at the same time.

pqr is also a silly extended sleepover scene. it's just fun to see them interact.

pqr is an excuse to turn over corners of homestuck and see if we can't peek behind them. what was it like for roxy, to think she lost joey and then find rose's meteor barely a year later? of course she'd think it's impossible for her to succeed as a mother. pqr is about finding empathy for yourself for your own mistakes, reflected back at you through homestuck characters.

because really, isn't that what we're all here for?

pqr is me coming back to my last long-abandoned attempt at an act 5 rewrite. pqr is an excuse to watch my girlfriend grow in confidence and style as she makes all the endcards and incidental art (except for joey route pt 2, but THAT was an excuse to work with a NEW friend!!!!!!!)

pqr is a friendship simulator that i am winning by having an incredibly supportive and collaborative group of friends in the dev thread who are cheering me on with every segment of text i post, friends who will hop in vc to check out the newest segment. friends like @dare0451 who literally yesterday rendered out some new audio to upgrade the June route to be even more fucking amazing and terrifying than it already was, AND DARE HASN'T EVEN PLAYED IT????? IT'S LITERALLY JUST. IT'S FRIENDSHIP MAN. PQR IS FRIENDSHIP

what the hell was this question again.

oh right.

yeah it's been fun basically. that's why i do it lol

#pesterquest rewritten #pqr #homestuck #fansim #hom3stuck #asksbox

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clarythericebot · 10 months ago

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How to Rewrite Wish

I made a chart! :) I'm not great at chart-making yet, but I wanted to make a visual description on the major decisions people who decide to rewrite Wish usually have to make and what those individual decisions connote. Mostly because I'm also thinking of making a Wish rewrite^^

Explanation of chart under the cut:

I think the most significant decision you make about a Wish rewrite is how happy the Kingdom of Rosas is at the beginning of the film, because that in turn limits the choices you have of the dynamic between Asha and Magnifico.

Here are the options:

The Kingdom of Rosas is genuinely happy - Asha is misguided and must correct her worldview - King Magnifico is a sympathetic antagonist. This would frame Magnifico's actions in the film as actually good (and there can be an argument about that - you're essentially trading your ambition for a lifetime of security and a *chance* to get your wish granted - even if you disagree with it) or, you'd have to shift the nature of wishes and Magnifico taking them to be less sinister in the film. This choice lowers the stakes and may paint Asha in a pretty bad light, considering that it'll be her actions that disturb the peace. However, this storyline arguably gives the most room for internal growth, and the stakes can be heightened in different ways (for example, the kingdom is happy, but the people dearest to Asha aren't). You can also make full use of Magnifico's tragic backstory here and what led up to the building of the city of Rosas in the first place.

The Kingdom of Rosas is a secret dystopia - Asha is correct and must find a way to correct other people's worldview - King Magnifico is a sympathetic antagonist. This is essentially the original's set-up, though it failed in its execution by never quite committing to its premise. I suggest, then, that people who select this choice double-down on it to avoid Disney's mistake. Make Rosas' dystopia-ness a secret, and not something someone could figure out if they thought about the kingdom's wish-granting system for more than ten minutes. Probably make it more sinister while you're at it--for example, one YouTuber added that taking away wishes drained your life force. Have Asha be determined to free all the wishes from the get-go, and to get people to rally behind her despite her doubts. And have King Magnifico follow through on his redeemable qualities (maybe pairing his need for control with his chaotic past). Also, Asha still needs to grow somehow. I think this is a good reason why many people seem to like making her personality shyer in their rewrites--her goal is to rally the people, and she just doesn't have the charisma of Magnifico. That's one example of a good internal and external obstacle for this plot line.

The Kingdom of Rosas is a secret dystopia - Asha is correct and must find a way to correct other people's worldview - King Magnifico is completely evil. The above, only this time, you make Magnifico an all-out villain who knows exactly what he's doing. The best way to do this is probably to cut out his implied tragic backstory, or to reveal later that he was lying about it the whole time. That way, you could lean into Magnifico's malevolence in a fun, classic Disney way without being hindered by the thought that he might actually have a point. You also now have the opportunity throw evil Amaya and their cat into the mix.

The Kingdom of Rosas is blatantly sad - Asha is correct and must find a way to correct other people's worldview - King Magnifico is completely evil. In this version, there is no chipper 'Kingdom of Rosas'--the sadness exists here without a facade, as a powerful sorcerer king forces everyone to give their wishes over by the age of eighteen to fuel his power and there's nothing anyone can do about it. It's a much sadder beginning, and you have Asha start in a position more similar to Cinderella and Snow White, but on a larger level. However, that could show her holding on to hope no matter what, and trying to save both herself and her people. I would also argue this is the version where having the Star Boy iteration of Star would make the most sense. While he's a definite possibility in all versions, in the other ones, the conflict is mostly focused on Asha and Magnifico. Because Magnifico in this case is a more flat character (in this case, all he has to do is be fun, like Ursula! Not much depth required in that) Star Boy can function as the character that challenges Asha the most--for example, how this Tumblr user suggests that Asha could've ultimately been pessimistic despite being desperate enough to wish on a star, and Star Boy coaxes hopefulness out of her. It would then be matter of working together to take down Magnifico.

I hope this helps somehow, if you're thinking of doing a Wish rewrite! I'm definitely not saying these are the only options--I just put this together as what I think would be the most logical conclusions depending on which Rosas you pick.

And if you're curious--

The iteration that appeals most to me is #1, mostly because At All Costs sold me on how Magnifico ultimately has good intentions (and the movie never takes that nor his tragic backstory back). I'd have his Asha be his and Amaya's daughter--who sees that the vibrant peace and prosperity of Rosas, the way people willingly give their burdens and their wishes to her father, and thinks, I want to do that. She, unfortunately, is not nearly as powerful as Magnifico (that's where Star Boy comes in). I'd have Asha and Magnifico then have twin desires for power, both with the best of intentions, and twin tendencies to be a touch arrogant. I'd also have Magnifico and Amaya be 100% devoted to each other--I know everyone is wishing for a Disney villain couple, but I for one would adore a good!couple that are in love years into their marriage. The book still plays a role in turning Magnfico evil, though it wouldn't be as permanent as the film. And I'd want the theme to be more blatantly the difference between wishing for yourself vs wishing collectively with others.

#clary scribbles #Wish #Wish rewrite #Magnifico #Asha #Princess Asha #Amaya #Star #Star Boy

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ladyloveandjustice · 1 year ago

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Summer 2023 Anime Overview: Undead Murder Farce and My Happy Marriage

Undead Murder Farce

Premise: Our story takes place in Victorian times/the Meji Era. Tsugaru is a half-oni (demon) and half human as a result of a mysterious man doing horrible experimentation on him. He’s approached by Aya Rindo, an immortal woman who has been reduced to a head (transported in a birdcage by her combat-saavy maid Shizuku) because the same man beheaded her and stole her body. They agree to team up to find the man and hopefully get Aya’s body back. As they look for the man, they travel Europe and to solve mysteries related to monsters and inhumans.

Undead Murder Farce was definitely my show of the summer season. It’s a fun mystery series starring three asshole weirdo protagonists, it’s bursting with monsters and demons and bizarre people, full of references to Victorian literature and rakugo and all kinds of nerdy stuff, it’s got stylish, slick direction from Mamoru Hatekayama (you know him from Kaguya: Love is War, and Rakugo Shinju) and it’s really gay.

The trio of Aya, Tsugaru, and Shizuku all have really have a snarky comfortable friend dynamic and their banter as they solve vampire murder mysteries, try to outsmart Arsene Lupin and a gang of Victorian literary monsters, and investigate a werewolf village and it makes for an entertaining watch. Aya will never stop making stupid jokes about how she’s just a head in a cage, and we love her for it.

The “let’s stuff in every Victorian public domain character we can” arc is where the show really starts to shine (though unlike some others, I do still really like the vampire murder mystery arc a lot—I just love the idea of a vampire murder mystery, and we really get a good feel for the cast. It’s definitely the weakest arc of the series, though). UDM gets to whip out all its literary nerd credentials. The case involves: Sherlock Holmes, John Watson, Arsene Lupin, The Phantom of the Opera, Carmilla, Frankenstein’s Monster, Aleister Crowley, Phileas Fogg and two surprise characters.

And yes, they remember that Carmilla is gay, which automatically puts in above 99.9% adaptations of the character. They do make her older and WAY more of a sexpot than the novel version, which, eh, but she’s 100% the ultra-campy Blueprint Problematic Lesbian Vampire she deserves to be. Like in the novel, she exclusively feeds on and seduces women and she gets into a deeply sapphic rivalry with Shizuku, who she tries to subdue and toy with using her vampire powers. (As you can expect from the character, there is the assault stuff that comes with that territory, though they don’t go too far with it, she kisses Shizuku's neck and messes up her shirt a bit).

But also, we find out Shizuku is used to making love with someone who has “centuries” on Carmilla and is “far more experienced ”, which can only be Aya. This is further confirmed when Shizuku shows jealousy over Tsugaru and Aya’s transactional kiss in the next arc and Tsugaru has to reassure her. And then Shizuku just CONTINUES to stumble into sapphic situations. She gets surrounded by naked ladies and bonds with them like twice in the last arc. It’s great. Everyone thought it might be be Aya/Tsugaru at the beginning, but turns out UDM is For the Gays and it straightbaited you. Amazing.

It's not just Carmilla that UDM shows off its nerd (and gay) credentials with—there’s the interesting choice to make the Phantom of Persian descent, which is clever as a reference to the Phantom’s time in Persia in the original novel AND adds an extra layer to the “unfairly treated as an outcast” element of the character. (Lupin and the Phantom also team up in the story and give off such strong gay energy (Lupin especially) that a lot of people ship them). And like in the novel, Frankenstein’s Monster is smart and even functions as the more level-headed one in the villain gang.

All of that stuff is catnip to me, but the best part of UDM is following it’s convoluted mysteries and seeing Aya strut her stuff figuring the them out while everyone gets in cool fights. It’s very good at what it does, and it’s a fun romp with some interesting themes about being on the margins of society and what makes an outcast simmering underneath. I had a great time with it, and I’m aching to see more of these scrappy misfits and their adventures. If you’re here for a campy but intelligent mystery series about lovable weirdos with a side order of gay, absolutely check this one out!

My Happy Marriage

Premise: Miyo was born without supernatural talents despite her father's expectations, and after her mother passes away, her father and stepfamily treat her abusively and use her as a servant. Miyo's family sticks her with an arranged marriage to Kiyoka Kudou, a man with a reputation for being cold and cruel. However, she quickly finds he’s not what he seems, and she slowly begins to gain confidence in herself.

My Happy Marriage is a straightforward Cinderella story, but one that actually focuses on the psychological effects of being abused and the slow recovery and healing journey of its protagonist. Even if she's not with her abusive family anymore, Miyo still has completely shit self esteem and even just running into her Evil Stepsister ™ in the street sends her reeling back to where she started, consumed by fear and sadness. The story is about her finding a place where she’s loved and supported, and slowly gaining confidence, and her and her husband learning to communicate. She’s still shy, domestic, and very devoted to being proper for her husband throughout, and sometimes needs help, but her learning to let herself be loved and learning to find her own strength and power is the focus of the story. It shows how many obstacles you have to bravely face just to move forward after trauma. And in the end, Miyo finds her own way to save the day. I think that’s really valuable.

Though, like in the original Cinderella story, there is the issue of the pure, domestic woman being contrasted with evil, conniving, social climbing women (though at least there’s no “and they’re also ugly” thing going, and they have her dad be shitty too). It wasn’t bothering me too much--even the ‘training to be a proper wife’ stuff Miyo decides to do since it wasn't out of place in the Meiji era setting-- until Miyo met her sister-in-law. Sis is a divorced woman and a little more “modern” and forward than Miyo and I was excited at first, because hey, a woman in this story who doesn’t fit either the ‘demure’ or ‘evil’ archetypes. But then it turned out her tragic backstory was that she’s a shitty cook and therefore failed to be a proper woman for her husband’s family and her in-laws drove her to divorce, which she 100% blames herself and her lack of domestic skil and 'unwillingness to compromise" with her mean in-laws for. She’s not challenged on this attitude at all. I can easily see a future plotline where she reunites with her ex-husband and he reveals he didn’t mind the cooking or something, but as it stands, it’s pretty disheartening and I don't see why it was a thing.

Still, Miyo’s arc is cathartic and well done, and the animation absolutely beautiful throughout. It’s nice seeing a story focusing on recovery that focuses on the small triumphs that come with learning to see your own value after being told you’re worthless. The supernatural element is a fun touch. It’s already been renewed for a second season and I’m definitely here for the rest.

#undead murder farce #undead girl murder farce #my happy marriage #summer 2023 anime #anime overview #my reviews

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laufire · 6 months ago

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april reading meme!

BOOKS

We Will Devour The Night by Camilla Andrew. The version I read is available in the author's ko-fi (aninkwellofnectar), and the final version will come during fall of this year. I've talked about this saga before (The Essence of the Equinox), and I still recommend it to those of us who like complex characters (especially female characters), gothic horror, and lush prose. This is a sequel, and I like it even more than the first instalment. It gets deeper into the darkness of the world and it's an amazing read. The third and final part has started been posted on ko-fi as well, for anyone interested.

Why Does He Do That? Inside The Minds of Angry and Controlling Men by Lundy Bancroft. I wish I could make everyone read this book. It wouldn't fix everything, because it runs against a lot of people's deep-seated belief systems, but maybe it would make SOME of them start second-guessing those beliefs... Anyway. A MUST read in terms of abuse and intimate partner violence.

Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë. I read the book for the first time about 15 years ago, and only reread it now. I loved it even more than the first time. The atmosphere, the revenge tale, the love story between Catherine and Heathcliff, all the ways these families' lives affect the others, how you have to parse through Nelly's account of events... I still wish I could hit Lockwood in the head with a stick lol. Just once. Not even too hard! But hit him in the head, I would xD

COMICS

Batman: Huntress/Spoiler - Blunt Trauma. One of those "it could've been so good if it was good" comics. It would've had to NOT been written by Dixon, of course. His ideas about these two characters are palpable here. He's met real women and girls, I know this, but he's completely failed to take anything from these meetings into account to understand them as people. And boy, does it show in his writing.

Green Lantern: Willworld. I've had this comic in my list for aeons and I moved it up when I found out its author would be writing Jason's upcoming ADITF "what if" story starting July. I really liked this one, and how it showcased Hal's character. It's not a guarantee I'll like his Robin Lives run, because comic writers have biases and blind spots and huge gaps in their knowlege regarding certain characters, but "he seems to be a good writer" is already a huuuuge leg up compared to most modern Jason content lol.

JLA: World Without Grown-ups. This was interesting because I've watched the Young Justice (cartoon) version of this premise, which is VERY different, from the villains to their goals to the handling of the crisis (since the cartoon had an established teen team), down to the emotional beats (the Zataras). They're too different to be compared, tbh. This one was quite fun though, and it made me feel very fond of Bart. Also Tim's parasocial relationship with Jason's memorial made an appearance LOL.

Colin Wilke's appearances. I am MOURNING this kid. He has like 9 appearances (and a couple of them are barely a few pages) but each one is gold. Bring him back. Make HIM Damian's best friend. Integrate him in the storyline!! His character and his dynamic with Damian had so so much potential. I am definitely going to include him in my fics.

Batman: Li'l Gotham. (plus the two stories introducing it in Batman Annual #27 and 'Tec Annual #11). A couple of things conspired (including me finding out there's a version of Colin in this lol) and I ended up reading it while I was sick. It's mostly fun fluff (as opposed to just corny fluff) and a quick read without much meat in it, but a few things nudged the inspiration muscle and Dustin Nguyen's art is adorable.

Batman Tales: Once Upon a Crime. I liked this one more than the above! It follows in that universe (a Gotham where everything is smaller and cuter lol), mixing it with some fairy tale vibes. Pinocchio!Damian is A Concept. Although my favourite story was "The Snow Queen", with Mister Freeze. The art goes into a whole other level in all of these, but especially that one.

Batman: The Chalice. Bruce Wayne receives the Holy Grail. I read this one in my list of Talia appearances and hers is the part that interested me: Ra's wants the Grail to make her immortal, like him, and Talia tells him that she has no desire to live forever. Her words are "Having lived my life in your company, the prospect of eernal life is not the attraction for me it might be for another." There are A LOT of things you can read into that sentence, and one of them, to me, is the idea that death to Talia would be an escape from Ra's, which is... interesting. Sidenote: this one was written by Dixon, who once in a while gets his wired crossed and is not wholly terrible with female characters xD

Ghost/Batgirl. I hadn't heard of Ghost before but I'm kinda curious after reading this mini run. I found a lot of the concepts it worked on (resurrection, mind control, etc.) quite interesting, although I ended up feeling the execution didn't delve too deeply into them. It's an story I might want to reread and pick apart at some point, though.

JLA: Tower of Babel. Yeah, THAT arc lol (also part of my Talia-reading). I also read JLA Secret Files and Origins #3 (in May, though), which shows Talia's whole thoughts on it as she steals the plans + some of the consequences the whole thing has for the other bats whose teammates no longer trust them (Dick, Tim, Barbara) + the wording of Bruce's contingency plans (which btw includes acceptance of lethal methods against Clark lol)... he certainly got off easy after this añsdlkfjasdf. Honestly, imo, the most selfish, cowardly thing he did was walking out before the JLA could tell him they'd voted him out. I know he and the comics probably won't frame it like that afterwards, but that's how it felt to me. The very least he could've done is face his teammates.

#reading meme #books #comics #dc comics #my thoughts #dc thoughts #id in alt text #captioned #the essence of the equinox #why does he do that #wuthering heights #batman: li'l gotham #colin wilkes #jla: tower of babel

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