#but as more knowledge of how that works came out

[mass-charge-spin]

probably a controversial opinion but my fave part of ep 7 (and the e-soul arc in general) is how yan shu systematically groomed yang cheng into being his asset. like, yang cheng was the perfect blank canvas for him to mold however he wanted, and he definitely took advantage of that.

yang cheng had zero trust value, meaning he was beholden to exactly no one else. trust value is everything in this society so he's as good as legally nonexistent. his first point was explicitly tied to him doing e-soul-style actual heroics.

yang cheng is generally kind, hard-working, and reliable, and very charismatic but only under the mask, so he'd be a believable replacement for the real thing. he also has crippling self-worth issues, which means he's easy to take advantage of if you treat him nicely and he likes you.

yang cheng also trusts yan shu.

yan shu has goons, connections, and a working knowledge of yang cheng's social circle so it's easy for him to set things up to get results. like hey, here's a kid who hero worships yang cheng, they're pretty close, let's arrange a kidnapping so he can go viral doing heroics. yang cheng has a new friend with hero agency connections and a ton of money to dump on him? nice, his boy can get a taste of pro hero life and the kind of material support that entails, and he doesn't have to show his hand too early. hey kid, make this guy your manager, it'll be good for you.

getting rid of shang chao when he did was also a fantastic move on his part because it served three things: 1) getting rid of the competition over who gets to be yang cheng's manager, 2) destabilizing a rival agency because their head is now in mourning, and 3) making yang cheng mad with grief and regret, so he's emotionally vulnerable and easy to manipulate under the guise of being supportive. bonus points for shang chao leaving behind a new suit and a bunch of training equipment they can use.

by the combined power of advertising and word of mouth he manages to get the duel to happen and force og e-soul into creating an opening, ensuring yang cheng comes out on top. it's also great that yang cheng is so consumed by grief and anger that he doesn't ask very many questions about where the ad money came from. (why was that convo so much like "don't worry about it, kitten." "okay 💔 yay 💔" lmao)

xia qing is a complicating factor, but it's nice that she wasn't helping, and left him behind in the end. if she hadn't left of her own volition, i am pretty sure yan shu would also have gotten rid of her at some point. more fuel for his tragic backstory.

so anyway at the end of it all, yan shu has a traumatized, broken-down, beloved hero in the top ten who doesn't have anything else apart from him and the e-soul identity. mission successful, he's perfect. like yeah, this is the kind of guy who would shoot moon in the head with zero hesitation. 10/10, no notes.

[dragoneyelashart]

jock! billie x schoolgirl! reader

୨ৎ smut ୨ৎ

a/n: kinda not proof read (🤓)

you were always the quiet one — the kind of student who teachers remembered for the neat handwriting and the way you always sat near the front. a book was practically a part of your uniform, tucked under your arm like a shield. you weren’t trying to impress anyone; you just liked to know things, liked the safety that knowledge brought. friends came in a tight circle, never more than a handful, but they were real, and that was what mattered.billie was one of those rare few. she was nothing like you — the kind of girl who didn’t have to try to be popular because it just clung to her. captain of the football team, known for her messy eyeliner and the way she could talk her way out of detention with a smile. everyone wanted a piece of her, but she only ever seemed to want to sit beside you.

after billie failed an english test so spectacularly, it was almost suspicious. the teacher asked you to tutor her, and billie, with that crooked grin of hers, didn’t even try to hide how pleased she was. "guess i need a genius to save me," she’d said. you’d rolled your eyes, but something about the way she said it made your stomach flutter. she just wanted an excuse. and she got one — in the form of tutoring sessions, long afternoons in the library where she’d lean too close and pretend not to understand metaphors just so you’d keep talking.now, weeks later, the two of you were tucked into the farthest corner of health class. you would have picked a seat closer to the front, you always did, but billie had begged she looked at you with those eyes, wide and a little dramatic, insisting that the teacher definitely had it out for her and how she couldn’t concentrate up there. you weren’t sure if you believed her, but she’d looked at you like you were her last hope, and you’d caved. the classroom hums with low voices and the dry drone of the teacher's lecture. you're tuned in anyway, scribbling down notes even though you already know the material. you underline a sentence in your spiral notebook, your pen gliding neatly in a straight line. then, you feel a slight brush to your thigh. fingertips against the fabric of your skirt, slow, deliberate. like a question without words. your posture stiffens just slightly, but you don’t pull away. instead, your eyes flick sideways, catching billie out of the corner of your vision.

she’s half-watching the front of the room, half-watching you, a ghost of a smile on her lips like she knows exactly what she’s doing. her fingers don’t move any further, just rest there — a whisper of contact that sends your thoughts scattering. you don’t say anything. not yet. but your hand falters where it rests on the page. your pencil rolls slightly in your grip. you turn your head just enough to meet her eyes — not startled, not annoyed, just quietly asking: what are you doing?

billie leans in, just a little. her knee bumps yours under the desk, slowly drawing patterns up and down your thigh making you shiver. “billie we’ll get caught! stop!” you whisper slightly yelling at her, trying to swat her hand from your thigh. she doesn’t move though planting her hand firmly, the cool touch of her rings adding some cool to the warmth you felt.

billie leans in close, her breath warm against your ear. “shh, mama. just focus that pretty head on your work. i just need something hands-on to understand what she’s teaching,” she whispers, voice dripping with mischief. you roll your eyes at her before going back to looking the the white board to continue taking notes. while you were writing something billie takes it as the perfect moment to slip her fingers in. you grip tightens on the pencil and you glare at billie, trying to ignore how full you feel. she keeps her fingers still for a few minutes slightly toying with your clit, just to tease you. you on the other hand felt so full, the lesson not even being on your mind. when billie shifts her seat slightly her fingers readjust causing you to whimper, but quiet enough for just you and her to hear. billie grins internally, beginning to move her fingers. billie leans in close, her breath warm against your ear. “shh, mama. just focus that pretty head on your work. i just need something hands-on to understand what she’s teaching,” she whispers, voice dripping with mischief.

you rolled your eyes, fighting the smirk that tugs at your lips. of course she couldn’t just sit still in class. still, you turn back to the whiteboard, eyes scanning over the notes as your pencil begins to move again. while you're mid-sentence, billie seizes the opportunity. her fingers slip into your pussy, her forearm resting boldly on your thigh. you tense, grip tightening around your pencil, your body aware of her touch in a way that makes it impossible to concentrate. you glare at her from the corner of your eye, silently warning her—but she just gives you that crooked little grin, smug and unbothered. she doesn’t move her hand much at first, just the barest brushing of fingertips along your skin—enough to tease, to keep your nerves humming. she started out slow, dragging out her thrusts to annoy you as much as she could, but you needed more, and you knew that she knew that you needed more. you pinch her arm slightly begging her to move faster. billie shakes her head, taking her fingers out of you, marvelling at how sweet you tasted. “behave, or i’ll bend you over the table right now in front of everyone,” she whispers harshly in your ear. you buck up your hips begging for anything at this point, even slightly grinding down on the chair, you just needed her to touch you. you take her hands in yours slowly tracing the outline of her rings, leading them to your pussy and pressing them against your clit, a silent way of begging for her touch. she pushes her fingers into you, fucking you faster. sounds from how wet you were echoed through your mind, yet could be heard between the two of you. your mind grows fuzzy, no longer focused on the task at hand, the fear of being caught only adding to the haze.“oh baby, what would miss say if she saw her little pet sitting like this, hmm? would you still be her perfect little student?” billie whispers, fucking you deeper and harder with her fingers. you part your legs a little more, giving her better access, your head falling to the table, lip caught between your teeth, and beads of sweat forming on your forehead as you try to stay quiet, “so fucking dirty, getting fucked in class because you’re my needy slut isn’t that right? always need to be stuffed full” you really did try to keep quiet.

your jaw was tight, your breath shallow, and your thighs trembled from the effort of holding everything in. but billie wasn’t making it easy. her fingers worked at an inhuman pace beneath the desk, every movement purposeful, every curl and drag calculated to unravel you. just as you clenched your teeth to stifle another gasp, she leaned in, lips brushing the shell of your ear. “poor baby,” she whispered, her voice syrup-sweet and cruel. “so sensitive… and i just started.”

a soft, helpless whine slipped from your lips—too quiet for most to hear, but not for the teacher. you heard her heels tap as she turned around, her eyes narrowing. “everything alright, y/n?” her voice cut through the haze, sharp and direct, her gaze settling on you with suspicion. your heart leapt into your throat. you straightened as best you could, willing your face into something neutral, though your skin burned and your breathing betrayed you. you gave the smallest nod, voice catching in your throat. “y-yeah—yes, miss.”

she lingered for a moment, eyes narrowing slightly, then turned back to the whiteboard. your entire body fell with relief, but billie only giggled softly, her breath tickling your neck. her fingers didn’t stop—if anything, they sped up more, becoming more deliberate. “always trying to be the perfect schoolgirl, aren’t you, princess?” she whispered, her tone thick with mock admiration. “bet miss has no idea what her favorite little student’s doing under the desk.” her words burned hotter than her touch. you bit down hard on your lip, forehead damp with sweat, knuckles white where you gripped the edge of the desk.

“come on bunny, cum for me”

taglist: @amara-eilish @bilswifee @iamnicoke @jayjaywetforbils @bittersuitekim @bxllxebxtch @bitchesbrokenpromises @ijustlovemaths @ilovealiceosemann @bilssturns @peytonglazesbillieeilish | send me an ask, or comment if you want to be added to my taglist!

[wonderjanga2]

Neglected Figure Skater!Reader x Yan!Batfam

Part 1, Part 2 (here)

TW: None? I’d also like to preface that this reader is gender neutral.

So, it turns out, we aren’t banned.

Instead, we went in front of the council… otherwise known as the U.S. Figure Skating Ethics Committee and they ruled that we were A-Okay! After this ruling we went back to doing our thing: training, competing, and generally living up life.

It was nice…

The Batfam had no idea where one of their batlings was. Specifically, they had no idea where Y/N was. It was like they dropped off the face of the earth! Well, not really, Tim pulled up some security feed from a hotel they were staying at, but still!

After Bruce had seen the news story, he had to take a few moments to process it before he stood up and poured his coffee out. He then called Y/N.

The automated lady told him the number wasn’t in service. (We changed our number after some weirdo kept calling us and professing their love. We forgot to tell the family.) Why didn’t they tell them they changed their number? Was it on purpose? Was it on accident? He put Tim to work on digging up what else his child had done without his knowledge.

In the Batcave, while Bruce was worrying (albeit with a blank face), he watched Damian watch the uncensored clip of that… mutilation over and over again on the Batcomputer.

Was his youngest smiling…?

Meanwhile, Damian was just surprised we had that dog in us. His sibling, more accurate to say roommate if we’re being honest, was always quiet and never around, (We were dedicating all our time to training after our mother died. Damian came about a month after that so we were always busy) so he’d never paid them much mind. Not to mention, they weren’t even a vigilante like the rest of the family and he doubted they knew about the double life they lead too. But to think?

It’s nice to know that his only blood sibling could live up to their blood if they so pleased. If only they tried to more often…

Back with Bruce, he’s still wondering when Y/N even left. How in the world did they get to Metropolis without him knowing? When he checked the credit card he’d practically thrown at them when they were younger so they’d stop bothering him, the charges to his card were so blatant. They didn’t even try to hide their leaving. How were they so sure he wouldn’t be mad at them for this? They were supposed to be in school right no—

Okay, so they weren’t in school. Never mind. Tim just told him they dropped out of school during their sophomore year. (Bruce’s heart shouldn’t have been warmed at the thought of them following the family tradition of either dropping out or being expelled from Gotham Heights.) When did this happen?! How was he not notified of this? How did his child drop out of school without his knowled—

Oh, wait, Tim just told him that he was emailed that the paperwork for that had been finalized they had been an official dropout.

…on the bright side, Tim had found their new phone number, so at least that was good.

Y/N was relaxing, sprawled out on their crappy hotel bed, fiddling with the gold medal on their chest. They had about thirty minutes before they had to leave so they could head back to Gotham , and they really didn’t want to get up. They really, really didn’t want to go back to that house because then they’d have to put their newly acquired medal with the others and it’d never see the light of day again from their little trophy room.

They wanted to just bask in this win a little longer.

Bsst! Bsst!

Their hand moved to their pocket and pulled out their phone. An unknown number was calling them. Should they answer…?

Nah. It’s probably scam.

They hung up.

They hung up?

They hung up!

Why would the—

Oh, Tim told him it probably showed up as an unknown number. That makes sense. Speaking of Tim, he told him that apparently Y/N had booked a trip back home.

Lovely.

When they came back, they would be in the scolding of a lifetime. Dropping out of school (while it still warmed his heart, he still wanted at least two children without GEDs. Now it falls to Damian to graduate without one), not inviting him to competitions (they did, he just wasn’t listening), and going all over the country for said competitions without him knowing (again, they did tell him, he just wasn’t listening)!

Point is, the two of them are going to have a little talk when they finally come home.

[ericscroptop]

Dusk Till Dawn

✧ pairing: vampire bf! juyeon x human gf! reader

✦ genre: smut

✧ warnings: 18+ (minors DNI), smut, female receiving, fingering, cursing, kissing, marking, biting, pet names, power play, mentions of blood, vampire au, supernatural au

✦ word count: 2.4k words

✧ synopsis: is dating a vampire all about being loved eternally, or to be used solely as a blood bag?

˚ ཐི ⋆ ☥ ⋆ ཋྀ ˚ ˚ ཐི ⋆ ☥ ⋆ ཋྀ ˚ ˚ ཐི ⋆ ☥ ⋆ ཋྀ ˚ ˚ ཐི ⋆ ☥ ⋆ ཋྀ ˚ ˚ ཐི ⋆ ☥ ⋆ ཋྀ ˚

It was midnight.

Lights in your house were out, save for the lamp by your nightstand that brings some warm-toned illumination to your bedroom.

While the hour is late, a book sat open in your lap, cross-legged in the comfort of your bed. Tiredness hadn’t hit you just yet. Instead, you found the drive to do some light reading before slumber.

Oh how it was a struggle to find motivation to read on your own. It wasn’t until Juyeon came into your life and had inspired you with his wide range of knowledge and introspective thoughts through various texts, that he encouraged you to pick up the books more.

It was like shakespeare whenever he spoke. His vocabulary and intelligence was extensive, and he was also very philosophical. It probably helped that he’d been on earth for decades upon decades, but having the brain he possessed as a man was one in a million.

He was really into classic literature, wanting to share with you all of his favorites. One of them being the famous novella, ‘The Metamorphosis.’

Said novella is what you’re working on finishing, a book that Juyeon has read countless times that he could most likely recite the story word for word.

As you scanned the printed text on the off-white pages, you completely switched into an appropriate headspace. You picked up from where you left off last time, pondering and dissecting the themes of isolation, dehumanization, and nihilism.

As a vampire, you’d guess that Juyeon resonates with Kafka’s writing, and even as a human, you can share some empathy and relate to some aspects as well.

During this dead of night, the only sense of sound came from your breathing being flipping pages and occasionally shifting. The rainfall outside also served as a bit of a soundtrack in the midst of the silence with the pitter-patter of water droplets against the window.

It’s the type of rain that came with peace, not causing much disturbance or obnoxious noise.

At least not until a gust of wind can be heard from outside, something that sounds like leaves rustling and being carried through the air.

It tickles your ears with attention, directing your profile towards the window although it’s dark out and curtains draped over it.

You don’t fret since it’s just the weather, but you’re home alone tonight, making you extra alert towards the slightest bit of noise.

From the left side of your peripheral, you sensed some movement, maybe a bug of some sort. But when you turned to it, there’s nothing there; Your mind’s just playing tricks on you.

You resume your focus back to your book, face falling back into the pages just for a split second before double taking upwards when you felt the presence of a shadowy figure in front.

“God! Juyeon! You scared the shit of me!”

You swear your heart stopped for a couple seconds while you shrieked, heart jumping out from your chest at the jump-scare of your boyfriend’s sudden appearance, as if he came out from thin air.

Juyeon chuckles at your usage of the vulgar idiom, smile so sinister as if he’s here to prey on you. Well… who knows where the night will lead.

“You’d think you’d be used to this by now.” he says casually, pushing himself off the wall he was leaning against to walk towards you.

“Yeah, ‘cause sneaking into people’s houses randomly is sooo normal.” you rolled your eyes, voice full of sarcasm. Your expression told that you were a mixture of pissed and startled, face distressed and pulse still racing.

“I’m a vampire, darling. You know nothing is normal about me.” one of his large hands lands on the top of your head, patting it softly before thumbing at your locks.

His slender but strong frame looked down at your own through his sharp eyes. Your cheeks were flushed with hot ears from the unexpected surprise visit, but inevitably your eyes softened upon his touch, looking so small while cozied-up in bed.

“So what are you still doing up late, huh?” he points, although you two have this same conversation every time.

For Juyeon, it was witching hour; He thrived the most during nightfall, able to live freely while most humans are knocked out.

He’d visit you, sneaking into your room during the ungodly hours to check up on you. Sometimes, you’d be like how you were now, reading a book or doing some other activity until your brain checked out for the night. Other times, you actually were asleep, and he’d watch for a bit, the way your chest would rise and fall after every breath and the tired, soft moans that’d come out alongside your body snuggling deeper into the covers.

“Wasn’t tired. Almost done with this book so i’m anxious to finish it.”

“My parents are out of town y’know? You could’ve just told me you were wanting to come over.”

He smirks and tsks, lifting his hand away from your hair.

“And where’s the fun in that?”

Now that he’s here, he settles by removing his shoes and the leather jacket that didn’t serve any purpose of warmth given that he’s technically dead, it was just merely for fashion.

Underneath that leather, he wore a tight-fitted charcoal grey top that ended right where his forearm began. It emphasized his broad, strong chest and highlighted his pecs, practically bulging out from the material.

He managed to insert himself behind you, situating yourself in between his legs, your back meeting his firm chest.

Your heart beat grows stronger once he’s invited himself into your bed, holding you close. Oddly, his cold-blooded body sends warmth radiating all over you, blood vessels in your face dilating and giving your skin a rosy tint.

He reaches for your book that ended up pushed aside to hand it to you, uttering tenderly for you to continue reading peacefully in his arms.

So you comply. He sits upright against your headboard and you melted into his body, leaned back, using his chest as a headrest.

Picking up from where you left off, the smell of lignin wafts into your nostrils, musty with a hint of vanilla and nostalgia. Juyeon’s rugged hands land on your thighs, thumbs brushing over your flesh soothingly while you read.

You were simply reading, but it was everything to him. Your attention remained on the book in your hands; Glasses perched on your nose, dealing with the inconvenience of having to push them up every so often, and the tiredness you blinked away at with the more paragraphs you followed.

It was beyond domestic and cozy to be in bed like this with Juyeon. Regardless of being an undead creature of the night, he was your safe haven. Weirdly enough, his supernatural abilities and strong desire for you made you feel serene. Now that you’re resting against him, you could easily fall asleep.

Juyeon was utterly fascinated with you. He vowed to you and himself to protect you from the worst of the world, treasuring you like a prized gem.

But as much as he strives to protect you, he also is one of the dangers that poses threat to you.

There’s only one thing that drives him to sustain his existence more than you:

Blood.

Instinctively, his lips gravitate towards the pulse point on your neck. He brushes his lips with the faintest touches, then begins to kiss along your skin sensually.

A smirk stretches the lips that tease your neck as he hears you peep out a hushed moan. That encourages him to persist with his lips, cherishing your sensitive soft skin and flesh.

“Juyeon.” you warn, still gripping your book but eyes and brain unfocused once he starts to suck and pull your skin, him humming in amusement.

Subconsciously you find yourself angling your neck into his mouth, shifting and squeezing your legs together from the sensual attention.

It was so easy for you to succumb and give into his needs, especially when you were languid during these hours and like putty when in his hands.

You fall blissfully for his charisma and seductive mischief. Even when you attempt to reprimand him again for disrupting your time and allowing a hand to follow a familiar path under your bottoms, once he slips it underneath, you become distracted with the pleasure that comes with it.

“Ju— mhm.” your hips buck into his fingers when he presses your clit over your damp panties, your hand loosening on the book completely and letting it drop to the side.

The pressure applied through the thin layer has your bud swelling, chills wavering down your spine, hips and core eager for more attention.

“Like that?” he chuckles lowly, giving your clothed clit a couple more generous rubs before finally breaking the barrier to drip his fingers into your panties. He tickles your folds with the pads of his fingers, feeling your moistness through every rub.

You whimpered pathetically, head falling back into one of his shoulders, noises of desperation leaving your chapped lips.

He noses your cheeks, feeling the warmth of your blood rush to the apples of them and smiling devilishly as a result.

His lips brush your tinted skin, kissing you fondly while his fingers inch up into your hole, evidently making you cry out when they push up and against your tight walls.

Juyeon gives you what you want knowing that you’ll give something else to him in turn without hesitating, addicted to his erotic touches.

His face ends up back in the crook of your neck, inhaling sharply with a rumbly groan, still playing with your pussy lazily. His teeth nip at your neck, coloring your skin dark red even with his fangs not out yet.

“You smell so good, baby.” he’s salivating, thirst for your hemoglobin making his throat dry and feel as if it’s on fire. He swallows hard, hungry eyes reflecting a deep red shade.

The pleasing duo of fingering your hole and loving up on your neck gives you a rush, making the beating and pumping of your heart heightened.

Thump. Thump. Thump. The ringing and feeling of your heart pumping the blood was basically taunting him, calling to him.

Hunger gnaws hard at him, the monster inside of him compelled to feed on you.

“Gonna let me have a bite, angel?”

Every tender nip, kiss into your neck, and curl of digits inside your cunt drives your clarity down and urge for more high. Stupidly, you nod your head impatiently with a breathy ‘yes,’ needing that stimulating, high sensation.

“Words, baby. Need to hear it.” Juyeon reminds you, tone like a command. As much as his throat and body was rippling with an animalistic appetence, it was your green light or he’d back off achingly.

“Bite me, Juyeon. I’m all yours.” your voice is breathy, choking on need and lust.

This isn’t your first rodeo. You needed him just as much as he needed you. To have your neck abused and used, submitting to him to have your blood consumed. A testament for one another’s love and bond. Or to others, just an easy snack. His favorite one.

That’s what he needed to hear. His fangs emerged from hiding, your precious heart going nuts when the bloodthirsty canines graze where he’s marked a million times, working you up while his fingers are still digging and curling deep inside your hole.

And then a loud gasp from you gets choked midway, core tightening and pulsing hard once his razor sharp, needle-like teeth pierce your neck.

You shudder with a silent cry from the initial burning sensation of his fangs before it evolves into a numbing sensation, your body going into shock and pussy bursting out cum from the harsh, delectable impact.

Your crimson liquid gets sucked into his mouth, immediately giving him fuel and eyes of the same color glowing with greed. The syrupy blood of yours is sweet and rich to the taste, so good that he growls in ecstasy.

Taking in your blood provides him with an energizing feeling that gives him life again, sucking your own life and color from your body.

Right now, he is the opposite of gentle, soft, and humane. The monster that he truly is reigns, preying on you unrelentingly. You clenched down on his fingers hard from the double pleasure that attacks you. To him, your cries were distant from how choked back they were and from his body not processing anything that isn’t the taste of your blood. You were suffocating beautifully, in a drug-like daze as he takes and takes from you.

“So fucking good. My darling little angel.” he whispers, removing his fingers to move those very digits up to your parted lips, smearing your slick and release all over them messily. All you can do is whimper and moan lowly, punch-drunk and energy out the window.

Juyeon continues to sink into your skin, sucking, swallowing, and gulping down everything he could. You were irresistible. That blood of yours travelled smoothly into his mouth, landing on his tongue and falling down his throat. It was raw and insatiably thrilling, drowning in all the thick liquid you had to offer.

Unfortunately it wasn’t long before you became loopy, body growing limp in his hold. He was nearly draining you dry, the color from your face leaving and giving you a pale look.

Even as he feasted on you with determination, he knew exactly how much he could test your limits. Juyeon needed his source of strength and toothsome thirst quencher, but he needed you alive more.

He retracts his fangs back, leaving two, reddish-brown puncture marks that ooze blood. Some of it trickles down the length of your neck, to which he cleans the trail with his tongue, as well as the wound he’s left behind.

Savoring the last few drops, you stop bleeding after his wet muscle’s saliva ceases more blood from coming out with magical properties due to his supernatural anatomy.

By the end of it, your eyes struggle to stay open. Lacking energy, your eyelids are droopy, brain and vision foggy as a good portion of your blood has been consumed and drawn out.

Juyeon allows you to rest in his arms for a moment, kissing your hair and forehead with his blotted lips stained with your blood. He pushes past the unsettling guilt he dealt with after every time he sucked at your skin, looking at your unconscious form, breaths softer now.

It was only in his nature after all.

˚ ཐི ⋆ ☥ ⋆ ཋྀ ˚ ˚ ཐི ⋆ ☥ ⋆ ཋྀ ˚ ˚ ཐི ⋆ ☥ ⋆ ཋྀ ˚ ˚ ཐི ⋆ ☥ ⋆ ཋྀ ˚ ˚ ཐི ⋆ ☥ ⋆ ཋྀ ˚

[mossyswritingcorner]

Hi hi! So, to preface this, yes I am working on a ViriPV pt 2(which btw, thank you guys so much for all the love on that!!! I did not expect it to do so well on here haha), this is just a side project in the meantime. I’m a little less sure of how Sage of Truth Shadow Milk would act, but I’ve always pictured Sage being a clever witted guy who has some lighthearted, teasing sass to him in contrast to Shadow Milk’s biting cynicism and inclination to see everything as a game he’s the player of. For clarity, this is not pre-corruption Shadow Milk(Fount of Knowledge), this is based on the AU costume Sage of Truth from CRK where PV(Truthless Recluse) is the beast and Sage of Truth is the ancient. This one is a bit of a slower burn, if I do continue it, I’d say it’ll be roughly two more parts, this is just kinda intro and creating a fun dynamic between reader and Sage(also I’ll have him get called by his name instead of Sage next chapter, reader just genuinely doesn’t know it yet)

Let me know if you’d like to see more of this one, and also leave any writing requests in the ask box if you have any! Just keep in mind I won’t do nsfw(maybe down the line I’ll make a separate blog for it once I get more comfortable writing it, but that might be a while from now) or any proshipping.

Anyways, without further ado, enjoy Archivist!Reader x Professor!Sage of Truth

The Sage of Truth was an odd cookie, that’s quite certain.

You’d heard all the praises and prose dedicated to the ancient cookie, with many speaking of his unconventional genius and eternal thirst for knowledge for the good of all cookiekind; perhaps even grown to admire the Sage through your passive readings of his published works.

Some of his findings and theories even helped to propel your own research at the college further, with your shifts in the campus library being spent pouring over ancient texts concerning cookie philosophy and biology in between helping stray students.

However, you never would have imagined he would be coming HERE, to your own academy, to teach a semester’s worth of classes to the next generation.

You’d been a prestigious graduate from the Parfaedia Institute just a few years back, and promptly took up the role as one of the institute’s many archivists so you could continue your research using academy resources. However, your days as a student sitting through lectures were long since gone when there was finally a professor you would kill to hear from, and your higher ups at the academy would surely frown on you attending the classes in earnest when you had already achieved your degree.

So, when the day of the sage’s arrival finally came, and the hour of his first lecture ticked idly by, you just so happened to take your lunch break 3 hours early and coincidentally lingered by the door where his class was set to be.

The barrier between you and a substantial academic inspiration of yours was breached only by the sliver of light slipping out of the crack in the closed door and the muffled sounds of the Sage’s speech.

And listening to his lecture was like a dream! All of his musings were insightful and enriching, with his spoken word being just as powerful as the perfected papers he’d pushed out into Earthbread, and he seemed to carry a teasing levity that broke up the complex concepts into something understandable for the young cookie minds waiting to be melded just inside. You yourself couldn’t help a few giggles escaping you at the Sage’s jests, before quickly remembering your precarious position and silencing yourself.

As the Sage uttered his final regards to the class, you scurried off back to your desk in the archives before the doors could be pushed open, completely oblivious to the intrigued quirk of his iced brow at the frantic, fading footsteps just outside in the room.

You continue this routine for the next few days, sneaking out during your breaks to listen to his lectures, with these secret excursions only pushing you further into your own research, the Sage’s words serving as a muse to your yearnings for knowledge.

Yet, there seemed to be…subtle changes in the routine that most likely meant nothing, but you couldn’t help but take note of them regardless. It started simple, with the Sage seeming to project his voice a bit louder than usual, but you weren’t about to complain when it made it all the easier for you to overhear the lecture. Then, he began to leave copies of his lecture notes outside the door, free for the taking; which was most likely just for the cookies who were absent from the class and needed to acquire the notes they missed. Until finally, one day he just started leaving the doors to the lecture hall propped open, which you could only guess as to the reason why for that - though you mourned the ease which you eavesdropped on the Sage’s classes, since now he’d surely spot you listening in if you weren’t careful.

Yet, you didn’t let that deter you as you clung to the shadows, staying out of the sight line the doorway afforded those inside as the Sage delved into the workings of philosophy, “You see, all cookies hold their unique idea of truth, their ideals which shape their outwards actions. Some cookies value standing out above all else, and thus seek opportunities to prove themselves and draw the eyes of others, while others value being unobtrusive and subtle, so they lurk out of sight to listen.” He explains simply, and you swear you hear the smirk in his voice as your dough pales.

What did he mean by that? Was that just a random example? Pure coincidence? Or did he know you’d been listening in on his classes?

“Yet, it is always important to note that neither one of these concepts of living are better than the other, they instead coexist as simultaneous truths that shape our variations - that make our world all the more intiguing. It is in these intersections of truth for which we nuance, and the unmistakable desire to understand those which we don’t know. Every truth has a mystery to unravel, a grand play to unfold on stage, a narrative to divulge into, and I myself have taken the greatest joy in seeking answers in the unusual, in taking my part in this grand back and forth between the unknown and us. Furthermore…”

As the Sage of Truth continues on with his lecture, you’re only half-listening as you internally question whether the cookie was aware of your presence the entire time, and if all the small shifts in routine were actually purposeful.

But that’s crazy, isn’t it? Why would such an important cookie care in the slightest about someone watching him lecture? You were just being paranoid…right?

In fact, you’re so focused on your own thoughts you entirely miss the Sage trailing off into a conclusion, his voice growing closer and closer as he makes his way over to the doors, “Anywho, class dismissed! Until next time, my pupils!” He suddenly announced from what sounded like a yard away, successfully snapping you out of your thoughts and leaving you to hurry down the hallway with far less time than you’re usually afforded, leaving the Sage of Truth himself to steal a glimpse of you right before you turned out of sight.

An archivist, huh? Well, that makes things a lot more interesting.

~~~~~~~~~~~

You retreat back into your office, letting out a sigh as you slump against your desk. That was too close.

You really should stop here, you were almost caught! Not to mention how humiliating a position it was for you to be hiding away just to listen to some cookie you’ve never even met personally lecture. Cookies were catching onto you, so you had to stop this now!

…but his next lecture was going to be directly related to your research, and his insights would be really helpful in shaping your argument better. You were already getting imposter syndrome regarding the thesis and fifteen page packet you’d concocted over the last few weeks, a very rough draft of the inevitable theory proposal you’d publish, so maybe this one last lecture was the push that you’d need to finish it up?

Besides…what could be the harm in just one final sequence of “pure coincidence” when you still held plausible deniability? You just stopped by his classroom to look at the posters nearby, or you were looking for another professor and thought they might be there, or some other excuse you could surely concoct. Just one more. One last lecture.

So, you kept to your usual routine of sneaking off during your early lunch, only to find the classroom entirely empty once you arrived, with a note attached to the door in frilly, cursive lettering, “Lecture cancelled for meeting, free period”.

You can’t help the disappointment that overcomes you, cancelled because of a meeting? You didn’t hear about any upcoming faculty meetings, but maybe this was for the best. “One last lecture” turned out to be none at all, and this might be your cue from the universe to accept that - to quit while you’re ahead. So, you dejectedly walk all the way back to the library and enter your office without even looking up, tossing your bag down onto the floor and letting out a sigh, “…witches…it’s back to just me and my stupid, shoddy thesis…” You grumble under your breath.

“I actually think it’s quite insightful.”

You jolt at the sound of the all-too-familiar voice, the voice you’d been listening to from the shadows for weeks, immediately twisting your head around to see the Sage of Truth himself standing over your desk - which you left carelessly littered with your notes and enthused writings about your theories, which the cookie seemed all too enthused about reading over.

“It’s a pleasure to finally meet you, my secret pupil.” He grins.

Witches.

[superbecky]

Hiiiiii~ It has been a while! 💜 I have been super duper busy with personal projects and just not really feeling like working on anything else other than those (which is a good thing, actually!) but this idea came to mind and I really wanted to draw it!

I noticed recently how there are many Disney characters who have the ability to contact the Disney Princesses, so I thought it would be fun to draw a few of them together showing off their respective items that help them to see the princesses!

From left to right we have Lily (Disney Princess Royal Adventure), Sofia (Sofia The First) and Isabelle (Disney Enchanted Journey). I decided to call the girl on the right Isabelle since she doesn't actually have a canon name, and to my knowledge her voice actor is Isabelle Fuhrman so... why not just go with that!

I was originally going to draw Kilala (Kilala Princess) instead of Isabelle, but I decided I would much rather draw characters from things that I have a personal connection to. Sorry Kilala fans! If I ever decide to make a sequel to this art then I will draw her there because believe it or not there are even more Disney characters that are able to meet with the Disney princesses other than just these 3!

Anyways... I got to draw cute girlies with sparkles and pink everywhere, so that was lots of fun! ✨💜(´▽｀)

✨Please do not re-post or use my work in any way without my permission! Re-blogging is ok. Reblogging helps me out! :D!✨

[degrees-of-seracchii]

Hii, been following for a while and your latest Sydney's posts made me feel more insane with a rather baseless theory of Syd having one of Ivory Wraith's pale slime in their ear. If I don't spill this out I'll combust, sorry

Still don't know how to feel about it bc Sydney having DID is seems to be Puri's choice when writing them, but in terms of "DoL logic" and NPCs having stats themselves, if Pure Syd has a «Innocence» level of Awareness, then the «Coruption» works the same as the one PC gets when IW puts a Pale Slime in our ears: the Slime's influence starts with 0 and commands you in form of thoughts or urges if you let take over they become more and more uncontrollable.

They must've got the slime during their time at the psychiatric hospital, when Wraith keep them company and hung out by the Tentacle Plains (or just shared dreams) me thinks, or even earlier, but the point is with their Awareness toned down to Innocence and the Temple's teachings, Syd got it under control up until their met us.

Sydney always prays and when pure/neutral is described to "shake their head as if they're ignoring something awful" *(smth like that), I believe that's not Auriga nor the temple's seal on the roof but the Slime commanding Sydney to indulge in lewd behavior. Plus, one of the dialogues when walking to school states how praying helps them to clear up their thoughts, so it's a common occurrence! at lunch, pure/neutral Syd will blurt out having «fits of lust» more than usual (I know it's done more for the kink aspect but still) so the more we corupt Syd, the more control the Slime takes over them. That would explain why they can go from 0 to a 100 with their prepositions and how elated they look when we join(again, ik it's top notch for kink sake but Pale Slime's *rewards* PC with sexual gratification when obeying their demands, and both Syd and PC actions increase similarly: minor misbehaving, then going commando, then promiscuous all the way up and so on) and the Wraith's ominous, Sydney-exclusive dialogue during blood moon "You think you can trust [Syd pronoun]?" regardless PC being a member of the temple or not.

My personal theory is that the Wraith wants a corporeal form (clearly) and I think both Syd and PC are special on that regard not only bc of their past lives with the Acolyte, but bc of the pale slimes. Maybe Wraith has something else planned for both of us?

BUT (big but!) the theory can fly out the window bc the Pale Slimes can be not-so-special if they're the reason ppl get «tainted», but AGAIN what they mean with "the taint" is very confusing to me, I think it's an Auriga exclusive affliction that can be «purged» as a pink liquid according to the confession booth (and advanced taint will turn you into a being like Kylar's parents) and ear slimes are Ivory Wraith's own method of leeching off humans in a parasitic way

OH, and imagine how cool (fucked up tbh) would be if, in order to get rid of the slime, Syd (and also PC too to make it less fucked up) have to lay on the altar under the lake like we do to trigger the tentacle encounter, but a different scenario with a more explicitly consensual ritual feels better

Anyways, that's all that I can word of for now, whenever how delirious this sounds or if you happen to agree, I'd love to see anyone's thoughts on this but I came to ramble to you bc you're a Sydney-extraordinare and I think you're very insightful!! Thank you sm for reading 🫂 have a nice day

D'aww aren't you such a sweet talker. Thank you for the support! 💞

I do not know what Puri had in mind with Sydney, I would love to pick his brain and study it if he allows me to! But I have made an observation that the idea of Sydney having DID is a very common headcanon or speculation.

I am nowhere knowledgeable enough on this topic to comment any further. So I won't!

Embarrassing to admit, I am not experienced with ear slimes and their mechanic!

What I do know is that the NNPC's "stats" may not function the same way the PC's do! I think Sydney's unique stat of "Purity" and "Corruption" just equates to how much they are willing to sway from the Temple's teaching and experiment on their own, or how much ""control"" the PC has over them. It doesn't necessarily mean Corruption the way it does with ear slimes, but what do I know?

And I may have been wrong, but I do not believe there are any plans for any LIs to be under the influence of ear slimes. I recall it being said that the ability to get ear slimes is unique to PC?

Unfortunately, I am unable to find where this is stated, so take it with a mountain of salt. I tragically do not remember anything that doesn't include the word "Sydney" in it!

I tend to avoid speculating the relationship that IW and Sydney had back at the Asylum. Not for any particular reasons, nor would I discourage people from doing so, I just think we don't have enough information to conclude anything. It is fun to read others' takes on it, though.

Personally, I have always understood Sydney's odd behavior while praying as them trying to ignore the confessional seal and the constant reminder of the sinful happenings outside the Temple's walls.

As for corrupt Sydney's behavior, I think that the sudden massive switch is an attempt to overcompensate rather than the effects of ear slimes. This... is something that I am meant to explore in the long overdue post about Corrupt Sydney that I owe the public. But oh well! No harm saying it here.

Straight from my drafts:

Sydney’s corruption is their attempt at turning into something that they think the PC wants of them. PC must have wanted a Sydney who goes against everything they believe in, that must be the only reason why PC keeps encouraging their sinful acts. Increasing their corruption further is essentially rewarding their change in behavior, reaffirming their unhealthy beliefs. And by extention, Sydney perceives their own corruption as a showing of their love and affection for the PC. 

Going through with the Rite of Defilement just further solidifies it for Sydney that this is what the PC wants. Sydney at this point is consumed by their own lust. They can no longer tell the line between love and lust, shown by some of their dialogues before and after the “rite”:

They see sinful intimacy as an expression of love.

As such, I think the reason why Sydney is so excited is because they feel like what they are doing is being rewarded by PC's lewd actions! To them, they are encouragement, reassurance and affirmation that they are doing what's right, and the PC reciprocates their feelings.

I personally prefer it being this way than the effects of ear slimes, cause I feel it is much more romantic in its own fucked up way. Making the reasoning behind it being ear slimes takes away from Sydney's inability to differentiate love and lust for me.

All that said, I don't want this to be seen as me shutting down your theory/speculation entirely, but my two cents on Sydney's characterization. In the end, only PurityGuy knows.

Thank you for your ask! It was an interesting read.

[thenextlordthorpe]

It was obvious where he came from. Tobias knew that he wore who he was so obviously no matter how he acted or pretended to be something else. He could work hard at it to prove to himself and others he was more than the reluctant heir but no matter how far he travelled or who he loved it all came back to it. As much as he’s being read for who he is and how accurate it is for once, he can’t help but grin at the compliment. “All I take from that is that you thought I was handsome from the very moment you saw me even though you were about to die. I had you from the moment you saw me, did I?” The playfulness and flirtatious oozes from his voice as he moves closer to Piet, grinning from ear to ear from choosing to focus on that and thinking how it would have an effect on his new husband. “You really wanted me with a tattoo, didn’t you? Well, make your own mark on me.” Now he was being as seductive as he possibly could. When he was with Piet that way, it was more than sex. He’d never felt closer to anyone when they connected that way, the build up had been there for years. Cultivated by an intense bond from gifted to them from the ocean and repeatedly returned by fate putting them together over and over again even though other forces tried to work against them. They had something stronger. “You know how much I crave it.”

There was no love for his father. None between them and Tobias knew all he was to the man was his heir, feeling like an extension of someone else’s wants and dreams and treated worse for it. Death wasn’t what he wanted for the man, but he did want freedom and one thing he had learned to do on his journeys away from home was how to adapt. This was one of those moments where he’d have to choose between a man, he held no love for and one he loved so completely and more than he valued himself. Lad out simple like that, there was no choice or pretence of it. He heard what Piet said and felt even more in love with him, feeling the deep care from Piet towards himself and breathing heavy because of it. Someone loved him so much that they commit the most final act in honour of that and in retribution of it. Pirates were dangerous, murderous and deceitful but this was his pirate, and all of those more questionable qualities were now being presented in service of their shared love. “Do it,” he says firm and so different to how he said just moments before. Without a word he closes the gap between them, takes Piet’s face in his hand and places a long but gentle kiss on the man. Nobody had protected him or sought justice for him the way Piet had and he wanted to honour that even if it meant both of their hands would be covered in shared blood in some way. “It is hard to embrace something you have fought against for so long. I love you and I want nothing to get in our way of the life together we want, the life we can take for ourselves without limitation. You don’t need it but you have my blessing and will never have judgment about what you do in service of us. We’ve said our vows already but that is one I wish to add on them. I warn you,” he grins, “you’re about to get quite the family because of your marriage to me. And I….” he stops and can’t remember ever speaking about Piets. “…I have no knowledge of yours. Of ours, I suppose it is now. Tell me.”  

PEOPLE CARRIED FORMATIVE MOMENTS IN THEIR SOULS LONG AFTER THEY’VE BEEN FORGOTTEN BUT IT WAS A RARE THING TO HAVE ONE WHEN AGE ALLOWED IT TO BE REMEMBERED. The storm was one of those. Not the first time that death had closely held Piet in its comforting grasp and nor was it the last but it was one of the moments that shaped the rest of his life. “You hate what you are born into but your nobility is all over your face that it stood you out from the crowd. In that, I knew you from first sight. On board the ship my suspicions were confirmed. You’re not nearly enough of the mystery you wanted to be, Tobias.” Humanity wanted their secrets and their mystery as if it gave them purpose and Piet’s could be similar but it was done out of necessity to survive after reputation was growing bigger than he could outrun or bribe. Smart people knew who they were and could use it, those with more awareness could see when time was up and shift to different situations. “A lot gave you away. Your face, as handsome as it is, and very alluring looks noble born but it was the way the other men regarded you. There was respect there but something under it that I could tell you weren’t truly one of the brothers on deck from how they treated you. Familiar but with some distance. Your body showed your hard work, but it was unmarked of ink despite your years of service, and you did not even have the introductory ink on your skin. I never revealed my pirate truth to you, but you knew it and in similar effect I knew of your history without needing to ask.”

No test was required yet it was the resistance that soured the pirate of the intentions between the two of them. “I’ve said before that I will do it but I forgot to mention that I want to do it. Jealous as I am, I have survived my long years before I knew you and after by not letting people get away with stealing or dishonouring me or my life. Men have stolen from me and I always find them. I’ve marooned people without food to ensure their slow starvation. Thieves of my one crew had their ears and nose slit when found guilty to say nothing of the blood my hands have known, blood you have seen covering it. Your father took you from me and his blood will be the next to cover my hands with no hesitation. Instead, there will be satisfaction that you Lords are not used to dirtying yourselves with.” Violent as it were, there was a love for it. The lordly father had to die for the crimes he committed when he took Tobias, took his love, from him. “When he is dead he will no longer be able to taint anything,” and with a smirk Piet returns to Tobias and pulls him for a long and romantic kiss. “Embrace your power for once, Tobias.”

[headfullof-ideas]

Okay, at some point I’m sure that it seems like I’m just coming up with my own versions of AU’s when someone else announces theirs and I immediately respond with ‘oh, I have one of those too!😃’ BUT I SWEAR I’M NOT! I was just left to my own devices for several years, with no way of getting online and interacting with the tiny fandom of The Deep, and so came up with all my own generic AU’s. And only remember I have the small, underdeveloped ones when someone else posts one of their own, because currently I’m only posting about the ones I’ve developed a lot of lore for and have an actual coherent story for.

On to why I wrote that whole fore note, httyd-nerd’s age-swap AU reminded me that I too have an Age Swap AU. Because that’s a pretty consistent AU that some fandoms have in some way, I feel like, so of course I made one of my own for funsies. However, unlike @httyd-nerd, I didn’t do mine with Ant and Alpheus. I did it with Ant and Fontaine.

The gist I had, and then further came up with on my way home from work which is when I had this very reminded thought, was Ant and Fontaine’s ages were swapped. Ant was still the Chosen One, though I hadn’t gotten quite far or dedicated enough into figuring out how he was. Maybe there wasn’t ever the rule of ‘youngest member of the family will be the Chosen One’ in this timeline (which means there’s probably something similar for the Ephymacron; ie anyone in the family can use it). Or maybe it was supposed to be the youngest, but when the Scepter was scoping out its options, it decided it didn’t really like either Fontaine or Alpheus, and then stumbled across Ant and went ‘👀tell me more’.

+

Ant: There ain’t no way my little sister is getting saddled with this responsibility, I’m taking it *doesn’t realize that’s not how it works*

The Guardians, thinking that Ant somehow stubborned his way into bending the rules of the Scepter: *to the Scepter* Why didn’t you pick Fontaine?

The Scepter: Didn’t want that one. Or the other one, that one sucks by the way, what were you thinking?

The Guardians: But…it’s supposed to be the youngest of the royal lines!

The Scepter: Screw that, I want this one. He’s funny

The Guardians: But-

The Scepter: My last one wasn’t the youngest either! You can’t make me pick the other two! This one’s mine!

+

Along this line, Alpheus thinks that Fontaine is supposed to be the Chosen One, and is creepy toward her the same way he was with Ant. And if the youngest rule doesn’t exist, he’s just spiteful toward both Nekton kids because Nereus likes them more so of course it’s all their fault. Regardless of which one, Ant just makes it his mission to keep Alpheus as far away from Fontaine as possible, because there’s NO way he’s leaving that creepy eighteen year old around his baby sister.

In the scenario where it’s assumed it’s the youngest, Alpheus tries to do his whole nemesis shpeel, but is interrupted by Ant kicking down the door of his moonpool and storming the submarine in the Swamp Knight. Every other interaction with Fontaine Alpheus has to try, he’s dragged away by his feet by her wildly overprotective older brother. It comes out that, somehow, Ant’s the Chosen One and Ant’s like ‘finally a better excuse to get this guy alone and kick his butt’. Alpheus sweats when he realizes it’s actually indeed Ant he has to deal with and not Fontaine, and nopes out of the Lemuria business from the fear alone of being left entirely alone with Ant.

And in the scenario where Alpheus has some decency and doesn’t act creepy with the little girl, it’s because he decided that she’s not nemesis material and definitely not the Chosen One (this would be in the scenario where the rule of youngest doesn’t exist, so the Guardians aren’t sure if it’s Ant or Fontaine). He has requirements for a nemesis, and this pesky little girl doesn’t meet any of them. So he focuses on Ant, who takes it if it means he stays away from the rest of his family, but there’s a running gag where Alpheus just gets SO annoyed with Fontaine because she buts in and just makes herself a problem anyways by kicking his ankles or pressing all the buttons on his chair and control panels and being a general nuisance, and he just wants her to stop.

Finn and Maddie would also be swapped here, because if Finn and Fontaine still had their baby romance plot it’d be creepy if Finn was still the same age (though the thought of ten year old Maddie beefing with a fifteen-sixteen year old Ant is hilarious, and very in character). This is where I’m not sure where the ages in this AU would lie, because Finn and Maddie have a different age gap than Ant and Fontaine, and I want them all to be somewhat around the same age as their respective pirate/Nekton. So it would probably be Ant and Maddie being 16-17 respectively at the start, with Ant being fifteen and then turning sixteen early on in the show while Maddie turns eighteen much later. And Fontaine and Finn would be 12-13, with Fontaine turning thirteen much later on when it’s her birthday. This also makes it slightly better regarding the Alpheus and Ant situation, though Alpheus is still Alpheus and we all know how he is.

Maddie would be the First Mate of the Dark Orca, and Finn’s the baby pirate who doesn’t really know if he actually wants to be a pirate, and has a little more leeway and freedom because Maddie’s the perfect pirate and Hammerhead doesn’t pay much attention to him. Maddie sometimes resents Finn a little bit, because she feels she had to take over as ‘Mom’ for him, especially as one of/the only woman on the whole sub, which means she’s also fighting tooth and nail against all the male crew members who don’t want a lady running things when Hammerhead retires. She still dotes on Finn and just thinks he hasn’t filled his pirate boots yet. All the older boys at the Floating Market deal with a huffy little brother standing in between them and Captain Hammerhead’s pretty daughter. Maddie being the older sibling takes care of Finn a lot, with a mix of genuine care and also internalized resentment at being the one to take care of Finn instead of their Dad. She throughout the series starts to develop some angst with Hammerhead about it, and eventually resolves to get Finn out of the Dark Orca if he doesn’t want to stay when she finally takes over.

Maddie once babysat for Fontaine as a favor for Ant, though Fontaine doesn’t quite realize it was her because they were both so much younger, and Maddie hadn’t started wearing makeup and jewelry and quality pirate boots at that time. It was around the time that Ant and Maddie were the same age as they are in canon, in which Fontaine and Finn weren’t old enough to be involved in any shenanigans. Ant and Maddie met each other before Finn and Fontaine because of this, and had their whole ‘i despise you and want nothing to do with you -> wanna hang out and talk about sea monsters’ arc before their little siblings got involved. They were best friends by the time Fontaine and Finn were old enough to start getting involved, and have all sorts of inside jokes. They got a little dismayed when they found out they have to start keeping an eye on their respective siblings during their families interactions, instead of just chilling in the vents and talking about the latest events in their lives and sea monsters. Kaiko and Will found out about Ant and Maddie a few years after they started to get along, and almost grounded Ant over it. Eventually, they acquiesced to not doing anything about it when Ant pointed out he didn’t have many other kids his age that lived a somewhat similar lifestyle to talk to. They turn a blind eye, a bit judge mental about Maddie’s lifestyle but aware that she and Ant seem to be genuine friends. Ant’s made a point to not make them aware of the fact that he’s been letting Maddie into the Aronnax to take home leftovers for her and Finn for years. Hammerhead is still wildly and blissfully unaware of it all.

Fontaine and Ant are like a ‘Overly cheerful and optimistic older brother and teenage angst filled little sister’ dynamic. Fontaine thinks Ant is childish for his age and SO embarrassing in public. She tells everyone she meets that she’s an only child. Ant thinks she needs to lighten up on the teenage angst and drama and tells everyone all about his adorable but angsty little sister. He’s also got about a hundred photos of her in his phone because her facial expressions are fun to turn into memes and mood boards, and not just because it drives her nuts every time he does it. Ant’s the older, loving, semi-responsible but genuinely caring brother, and Fontaine is at the age where her personality makes her a little bit of a jerk and an absolute pain and twerp to deal with (listen, at the age she’s at, with her personality and flaws? She’d be kind of a butt, let’s be real)

Jess and Ant’s relationship is also swapped here along with Jess’s age, but not in the same extremes that it is in canon. Jess has a bit of a crush on Ant, in that she thinks he’s really nice and super cool and not bad looking, BUT it’s just a puppy crush, and she’s aware he has a girlfriend and is self-aware enough to know that their age gap isn’t great. BUT. She makes it out as a bigger thing than it is because she KNOWS how much it drives Fontaine nuts when she sweet-talks Ant and acts weird around him, and she feeds off of chaos. Especially at her bff’s expense. Fontaine is dying over her best friend talking about how cute her older brother is because he’s NOT, he’s SO ANNOYING, STOPPIT JESS!! Ant wasn’t immediately aware of Jess having a puppy crush on him until Kari pointed it out, but he knows that she knows he has a girlfriend and he knows that it’s not a serious thing. And he knows she’s using it to her advantage to mess with his sister so he just laughs about it with Fontaine. (Jess also thinks Kari is super awesome and cute too, developing her own baby crush on Kari when she finally meets her in person too)

Ant angst, because it’s me and I have to! Ant is considerably older than Fontaine, and slightly parentified-eldest daughter syndromed. But! Not because Kaiko and Will did that to him, they’re good parents and this isn’t slander. It’s just that Ant is considerably older than Fontaine, and so capable of helping with more aroudn the Aronnax than she is, and so deals with a lot more of the actual running and maintenance of the ship than she does. He helps with more risky missions and he looks after Fontaine when Kaiko and/or Will are busy with their own work, because they DO have jobs, the Aronnax needs funding somehow. He’s got some Eldest Daughter Syndrome, and he’s internalized some parentification, but it’s not because of his parents, it’s because the lifestyle he grew up in caused it to happen.

Fontaine is oblivious to all of this because she’s an angsty lil’ bean living in her own world of teenage angst and drama. Because all of her friends live on land and go to the mall and school, and she’s stuck on a submarine doing admittedly cool things, but she’s stuck with her ‘over-bearing’ older brother and doesn’t get to do cool land things like everyone else her age. Nobody understands her! (Said with an angsty little undercut because she’s just So Dramatic like that) It isn’t until all the Lemuria stuff starts to happen, and Ant doesn’t want his baby sister to deal with all of that so he automatically just takes the responsibility himself to save her from it, because these Guardians are weird, and set off a little warning bell in his head. Fontaine thinks he just wants the glory of the Chosen One and is so full of himself, and the Guardians think Ant is so certain of his role and ready to fill it. When in actuality, he’s just trying to keep his little sister out of a potentially dangerous situation, and so throws himself into it instead because he’s her older brother, and that’s his job. Fontaine doesn’t realize how much Ant actually does around the Aronnax and how stressed he was before all of the Lemuria stuff happens, and it gets worse and she starts to notice how tired and stressed he is. Cue the guilty angst, with Fontaine trying to step up and take a little of the weight off his shoulders.

(Little sibling feeling helpless while watching older sibling try to take the weight of the world and refuse help angst, enter stage left)

I should also mention that Fontaine doesn’t think Kari’s Ant’s girlfriend. She knows of Kari. She’s hung out with Kari. She loves when Kari comes over. She thinks Kari’s the coolest person ever in fact. Which is exactly why she doesn’t think Ant and Kari are dating. Because there’s no way that Kari, the super awesome girl who dresses really cool and has a pet lizard which is a little weird but Kari makes it cool, would be into Fontaine’s dorky dumb older brother. She’s devastated when she finds out that Kari is indeed into Fontaine’s dork dumb older brother, and that it was him who got her the cool lizard to begin with. Ant and Kari didn’t know that Fontaine didn’t know. They fully thought she knew. They don’t do too much/any PDA around her (at least none she notices), and they don’t go around announcing that they’re girlfriend/boyfriend. They don’t hide it, but it’s not the first thing they announce to the room. And because they were friends before they started dating, Kari had been coming over for years. And they’re super comfortable with each other without having to kiss every seven minutes, and totally fine with just lazing on the couch in sweatpants binge watching a show and munching on a party size bag of chips.

They thought it was super obvious. Kaiko and Will know. They don’t go around hiding the fact either. Ant even brought it up at dinner when they first started going out. He brought Kari over for dinner as his official girlfriend one night. Fontaine however, is an angsty little tweenager who lives in her own world of angsty teenage drama, and just totally missed that Ant and Kari were dating. It’s one of the worst things she’s ever learned when she finally realizes the fact.

Thaaat’s the big majority of it I think. I only ever did a few drawings, and I might do updated ones now. Maybe a fic some years down the line. But i have now shared and eased my conscience of my own version of the Age Swap AU

[feelo-fick]

I WANT ENDLESS BLISS!!!

HALF-AWAKE, HALF-DEAD, HALF-LIFE CRISIS

ALL NATURAL POMEGRANATE PULP.

FERMENTED TO PERFECTION, SAVOUR YOUR SAVIOR.

Q: What's your favourite food? A: THE ALE THEY SERVE AT THE TAVERN!

other versions : )

[can-of-slorgs]

The other researchers are also here! (magical edition!)

[dukemeropide]

In a whirlwind, the harrowing confrontation was over. At least temporarily. Those monsters still roamed the countryside, able to appear without warning through rifts in space, wanting nothing but destruction and blood, and that knowledge kept Wriothesley on his feet while the Iudex rested nearby. If he were a more outwardly emotional man, he'd be pacing right about now, but despite the buzz of frenetic energy under his skin, and the slow ebb of the adrenaline that had flooded his system only a few seconds ago when he'd seen his life flash before his eyes, he managed to keep himself still. Working under pressure came with the territory of a prison warden, but the danger this time was different. It put all of Fontaine at risk, and he'd seen how powerless he was against their technology firsthand.

He crossed his arms, the fingers of his right hand tapping against his bicep as he studied some whorl in the tree past Neuvillette's shoulder, unable to quite look the Iudex in the eyes, yet unable to entirely look away either. He kept sight of him indirectly, knowing cerebrally that someone of his power could still have weaknesses, and yet unsettled all the same by the seared streak across his shoulder despite how it had already nearly healed itself shut. The navy fabric remained tattered and burnt as a lasting reminder.

"I won't say I didn't believe you," Wriothesley started, meeting Neuvillette's concerned and guilt-ridden gaze for a second, "but dangerous or not, I had to see it with my own eyes before I could grasp the scope of it."

In other words, he didn't hold it against the Iudex for not doing more to stop him. They both knew that anything short of a second trial wouldn't have stopped Wriothesley from tagging along, and even then, his respect for the law was tenuous at best.

"Wouldn't have made it out of there if it weren't for you though. But one of them got you pretty good," he nodded toward the healing wound, "so you should be asking if I'll ever recover from the sight of the Mighty Iudex taking a bullet. That's not something you see every day. Maybe not even in a lifetime. The Fortress doesn't have therapists on staff for that sort of thing."

His voice straddled a line somewhere between joking and serious, not that Neuvillette had ever been especially adept at detecting the difference between either. Still, it served to illuminate one thing: that the "Mighty Iudex" was not infallible, and that these monsters could overpower a dragon in the right circumstances. What did that say about the general populace? Wriothesley didn't like the thought of that.

"Anyway, all jokes aside," just in case Neuvillette didn't catch it, "brute force isn't going to cut it with these things. I'm not going to leave you to deal with them alone, so let's think of some other way than confronting them head-on again. Do you happen to know what they're after?"

When Dark Meets Light

Wriothesley & Neuvillette - Crystallize | Antimatter Legion

[itspileofgoodthings]

also I had a breakthrough today that I had in fact overthought a Specific Problem to Death and that I had created a monster in my own mind and that’s why it felt like I was being eaten alive every time I tried to solve it.

[cheswirls]

hhhhhhhhhhhh saboace royalty au. ace was crown prince but can’t use magic which is necessary to become king, so he renounces his title and becomes infamous for his eccentric tendencies to play up the illusion that he’s truly not meant for the throne and that his younger sibling has full rights to the title of heir.

sabo is born to a family serving in the royal court, has been a genius magician since he was a child, and is the perfect example of a young man fully educated to serve at the king’s side. which is why he’s allowed himself to be tied down into a loveless political engagement with the king’s heir, putting the whims of his family before his own and resigning himself to become the future ruler’s consort/spouse to legitimize his role as an advisory right-hand man.

but then the heir grows rebellious and denounces the engagement with sabo in public and ace swoops in to save the day (and sabo’s reputation), demanding his father give sabo to him instead. he steals sabo away and challenges his sibling’s right to the throne, intent on earning back the title not for himself, but so he can make sabo (who is heavily qualified to rule) the king - and since they’ll be wed, no one will be able to undermine sabo’s position as he will technically be part of the monarchy that governs the kingdom.

[abyssalpriest]

if i disappear after saying that ive been assassinated no jokes aside if i take that down its not bc i disagree with it, you can still pin it on me as a belief that i think that shit should be said and ill put my whole ass behind it, but saying shit like that has consequences lmfao. also theres a time and a place to bring that up

[complainblogforthevoid]

I've finally figured out an argument that convinces coding tech-bros that AI art is bad.

Got into a discussion today (actually a discussion, we were both very reasonable and calm even through I felt like committing violence) with a tech-bro-coded lady who claimed that people use AI in coding all the time so she didn't see why it mattered if people used AI in art.

Obviously I repressed the surge of violence because that would accomplish nothing. Plus, this lady is very articulate, the type who makes claims and you sit there thinking no that's wrong it must be but she said it so well you're kind of just waffling going but, no, wait-- so I knew I had to get this right if I was gonna come out of this unscathed.

The usual arguments about it being about the soul of it and creation fell flat, in fact she was adamant that anyone who believed that was in fact looking down at coding as an art form as she insisted it is. Which, sure, you can totally express yourself through coding. There's a lot more nuance as to the differences but clearly I was not going to win this one.

The other people I was with (literally 8 people anti-ai against her, but you can't change the mind of someone who doesn't want to listen and she just kept accusing us of devaluing coding as an art) took over for I kid you not 15 minutes while I tried desperately to come up with a clear and articulate way to explain the difference to her. They tried so many reasonable arguments, coding being for a function ("what, art doesn't serve a function?") coding being many discrete building blocks that you put together differently, and the AI simply provides the blocks and you put it together yourself ("isn't that what prompt building is") that it's bad for the environment ("but not if it's used for capitalism, hm?" "Yeah literally that's how capitalism works it doesn't care about the environment" she didn't like that response)

But I finally got it.

And the answer is: It's not about what you do, it's about what you claim to be.

Imagine that someone asks an AI to write a code and, by some miracle, it works perfectly without them having to tweak it---which is great because they couldn't tell you what a single solitary thing in that code means.

Now imagine this person, with their code that they don't know how it works, goes and applies to be a coder somewhere, presenting this AI code as proof that they're qualified.

Should they be hired?

She was horrified, of course. Of course they shouldn't be. They're not qualified. They can't actually code, and even if by some miracle they did have an AI successfully write a flawless code for every issue they came across that wouldn't be their code, you could hire any shmuck on the street to do that, no reason to pay someone like they're creating something.

When actual engineers use AI what they do is get some kind of base, which they then go though and check for problems and then if they find any they fix them, and add on to the base code with their own knowledge instead of just trying different prompt after prompt until they randomly come across one that works.

People who generate code like this don't usually call themselves engineers. They're people who needed a bit of code and didn't have the knowledge to generate it, and so used a resource.

And there you go. There are people who have none of the skills of artists, they don't practice, they don't create for themselves. When they feed the prompt to the AI they then don't just use the resulting image as a reference point for their own personal masterpiece, and if they don't like it they don't have the skills to change it---they simply try another prompt, and do that until they get something they like.

These people are calling themselves artists.

Not only that, these people are bringing the AI generated thing to interviews, and they are getting hired, leaving people who slave over their craft out of the job.

And that is the difference, for the tech bros who think AI art isn't a big deal.