#but for me I noticed some of the routes don't feel like one full finished story in terms of their relationship

[sunshine-and-her-ikevil-stuff]

*thinking about the villains' tragic fates*

You know, their routes never really talk too much about their fates and how it effects them mentally. Or how the MC feels about it, and dealing with the fear and angst of it with the slight exception of William's route

*eyes widen*

... I think I know what the sequels are gonna be about

[vanesycho]

kinktober day 15 [car sex]

|masterlist|

warning:smut, p in v, unprotected sex, riding

wc:1,1k

You watched Joshua as he finished his performance and came backstage. When the other members came in, you congratulated them all one by one, but your mind was still on your boyfriend. Normally, you had the chance to see his stage so closely many times, but today was different, more than usual...hot? His mood change during the performance, his serious facial expression, the way he licked his lips...It made you shiver.

As soon as Joshua noticed you backstage, a smile appeared on his face, he approached you and pulled you by the waist and hugged you tightly. "Was I good?" he whispered in your ear, you smiled, when you pulled back, you whispered the same against his lips "You were better than good...God, I had a hard time not jumping on the stage." he let out a chuckle, approached you and kissed you on the lips "I'm glad you liked it, my love." he held your waist tightly and squeezed it lightly and soon left the room to change.

Now you were in the car to go back home, he hadn’t missed the fact that you occasionally glanced at him and examined his side profile, he held himself back from laughing “I can’t focus on the road if you look at me like that, babe.” You turned to the front with embarrassment, you had unknowingly examined him too much but you couldn’t help it. The images of the scene that had come to your mind were constantly replaying. Joshua glanced at you briefly and then turned back to the road “What are you thinking? Tell me." He stopped at a red light, turned his full attention to you, he realized that you were avoiding answering, put his hand on your leg, you swallowed when his thumb started to caress your skin “Yeah?” Knowing that there was nowhere to run, you just gave in “I was just…I was thinking about how good you looked on stage. I mean, I already know you looked good but- today..You were so hot.” Joshua threw his head back and laughed. He didn’t know he had this effect on you but he honestly liked knowing it, he leaned in close and placed a small kiss on your neck “I like knowing you see me like this.” His deep voice made you shiver, he pulled back as if nothing had happened and continued on his way with the green light on. A slight smile appeared on Joshua’s face as he continued on his way, turning the car into a deserted alleyway, you frowned upon noticing this. “Are we taking a different route?” Joshua pulled over without answering and turned off the lights. Only the moonlight illuminated the interior of the car in the backstreet where not even the streetlights worked properly. He turned to you, gently placed his hand on your cheek, his other hand went back to your leg and squeezed it lightly. “If you look this affected after every performance..” he whispered, his eyes shifting from your eyes to your lips, he let out a breath, leaning in closer but not kissing you yet, just letting your lips brush against each other. “...We should have some fun off stage to celebrate this, right? Don’t you think your boyfriend is doing a good job? I think you should reward him.” Even before his lips had made contact with yours, he was driving you crazy, his thumb caressed your cheek, the slight smile on his face didn’t leave. “What kind of reward?” he hummed, pretending to think for a moment, then pulled back and unlocked the car door. “Get in the backseat.”

That was all he said and soon you found yourself in his lap in the backseat. Joshua leaned his head back and watched you while you continued to rub yourself against him. You moaned as his swollen cock made contact with your pussy, he tightened his grip on your waist "Shua.. Please, I want you.." you spoke needily, Joshua leaned closer and started to kiss your neck "I know darling, don't worry I'll make you feel good." You felt his cock inside you in no time, a loud moan filled the car. Your hips slowly moved down, trying to take it all in "Too m-much.." He grabbed your hips and made you sit on top of him, kissed your lips to quiet your voice, his tongue roaming around in your mouth as he waited for you to get used to it. He pulled back with a loud kiss "Are you okay?" he whispered against your lips, you nodded "Good. Now I need you to move those beautiful hips of yours darling."

You did as he said, your hips started to move on his hard cock, Joshua threw his head back in pleasure, his mouth taking in slightly spaced breaths, your pussy clenching around him and he loved the feeling so much, "You're so good baby- oh fuck you're gonna make me come early." You held onto his shoulders tightly, his hand not hesitating to roam all over your body. He looked at you, brushed your hair behind your ear and exposed your face, even though he couldn't see much in the dark, he knew exactly how good you looked riding him and that was a sight for him to see. His hand slowly moved from your neck to your breast, squeezing it gently, lingering on your nipples for a while. He pulled you by the waist and made you come closer to him. You felt his tongue on your nipple, he ran the tip of his tongue around it, sucking on your breast while his other hand worked on your other breast. He lightly bit your erect nipple, smiling when he heard your tiny whimper.

Your hip movements started to speed up after a while, Joshua's occasional whimpers and the sounds of your bodies merging drove you even wilder. You let out a whimpering sound as his cock hits your pleasure point, his hands returning to your hips and supporting you. He helped you move on him easily. The pleasure grew inside you, Joshua knew he was close too, your pussy clenching around him making him moan deeply. He smiled to himself and threw his head back again. “Ah- you always feel so good- and tight..I- fuck, I’m so close.” He swallowed hard, watching his twitching Adam’s apple, making you wet your lips. You couldn’t hold back any longer as each stroke brought new pleasure, you came in no time, your juices flowing down his cock, you pulled back and soon Joshua’s juices were flowing down his belly. He looked at you tiredly and let you rest on his chest before moving on. He kissed the top of your head. “I think you should reward me like this after every concert.”

[shatcey]

Dark IF (Harrison)

William Harrison

UPDATE (02/12/24) @.kurishiri made an amazing translation of Harry's 95k story from the first part of this event. It contains spoilers to the bitter endings of the stories from the first part of the event (William, Alfons, Jude). If you don't plan to read or have already read them, I recommend reading this story before my summary. It contains more information about what happened before this moment. But it also contains some hints of what to expect here. So… the choice is yours. @.recycled made an amazing translation of Vivi's 95k story from the second part of the event. This story gives a little more information about Vivi in this story and the surprising discovery that the person who appears in the fairy tale world is not a random one. I recommend reading this story after both parts of the event. I haven't noticed any spoilers about other routes. Just so you could spend more time to think that is "missing piece" actually means. The same information was in Harry's 95k story so… it is rather difficult which order to recommend…

@.archiveikemen made a wonderful translation of the prologue to this event. I recommend reading it in advance so that there are no questions about how we got into this story.

@.kurishiri has compiled a masterlist on this event. I'm doing summaries, so I'm not there. If you prefer to read the full translation, you have that option as well. Not necessarily for this story… This is the main reason why I'm making a summary to fill in the missing parts.

Before I start, I wanna say that for some magical reason (I believe it's fate) I read two stories in which Victor and Harrison are present. And it feels like I'm reading a continuation of the same story. To some extent, this is true. Ally, it's not what you think. I mean, I was destined to read those two stories, not that Vivi or Harry… I don't even wanna finish this sentence…

(clears throat)

This time… there is no feeling that we should read bitter ending first. This is a completely different ending, and it seems final, nothing will remain after it. It's very sad, and if you don't wanna cry, I recommend scroll to the premium one.

Warning(!!!): blood and mention of death.

Kate is running after someone. The glass slipper slipped off her foot, as expected, and the magic changed her dress, but it's not that important. She's running after someone… She follows him into the woods and looks around. There's no one there, and she can't see the castle lights anymore.

Suddenly, a voice asks her why she is here. She looks in that direction and meets the gaze of bright green eyes. Kate honestly replies that she followed him. He looks stunned. Then she asks what his name is. He replies that it is the lying Fox Harrison. Kate thought he looked gloomy when he said that. When he asked her why she followed him…

Here we go… our continuation of William's bitter ending…

Harrison looked surprised for a moment. Kate tried to remember where she might have met him, but she couldn't remember anything. He replied that yes, it is (a liar). But Kate couldn't stop wondering why she was feeling so nostalgic…

He offered her to walk her home, and on the way she talked about herself non-stop. How she appeared here, what she has to looking for, he listened to her very carefully, but he didn't seem to want to talk about himself.

When Kate saw her house in the distance, she suddenly felt lonely and upset. When he said goodbye and turned to leave, Kate grabbed his sleeve. It seemed to her that if she let him go now, she would never see him again.

He asked her if she hadn't talked enough. No, that's not the case, she wanted to thank him for listening to her so attentively. She asked him if she could see him again.

No, no, no, mister! It won't work with us. She remembers you, sort of, and we all know there's nothing to hate you for.

Kate agrees with me and tells him the same thing (the last part). And she added that, of course, she continues to look for what is missing, but she would like to see him every day and talk about casual things so that she can forget about her problems. She thinks that only in such moments she can become herself again. The silence drags on, and she sadly asks if that means "no". But he patted her on the head and add...

You're not stalking her, are you? It's not that creepy if it's you, but still… It's very suspicious that you'll show up as soon as she calls you.

Finally, he released his sleeve from her grasp and left, saying "good night, Kate."

Kate returned to her room. In my opinion, it's too decent one for the Cinderella. She writes in her diary about what happened to her. She has been keeping a diary since she came to this world. By the time she finished writing about the ball, the pages had run out. And she started a new diary with a description of the meeting with Harrison.

And suddenly Kate realized that she didn't remember telling him her name… How does he know that?

A week later

Kate calls his name in the woods. Harrison said irritably: "Again?". Kate remembers that since the day they met, she has been calling him every time something happens to her. He pointed out that she shouldn't spend so much time with him. She still hadn't found what was missing. She feels pang of guilt, but assures him that she is doing her best.

He took the basket she was carrying and asked if she was going on a picnic today. He led her to a beautiful field of flowers.

He mentioned that the prince had been looking for someone recently. The woman who wore the glass slippers. No way! We're in Cinderella, and the prince was looking for someone? Who could it be?

Kate thinks he was looking for her. And in a happy ending, she should marry a prince. And maybe if she gets a happy ending, she'll find what was missing. She noticed how concerned Harry looked and changed the topic.

She can't remember the lying Fox in the Cinderella. No one remembers because… he doesn't have a role. The lying fox has always been hated. He can travel between fairy tales, but he cannot be a character in any of them. There is no fairy tale with a lying fox. Kate was terribly angry. Why didn't such a kind and wonderful person have a fairy tale? She took her diary and started writing something in it.

She tells him that people just don't know how wonderful he is, and she really doesn't understand how anyone can hate him.

The prince appears. Of course, he needed to spoil this wonderful moment.

The prince looked at her and immediately recognized her as the person he was looking for. Kate looked at Harry and noticed how dark his eyes were. She reflexively grabbed his sleeve. I like that part of hers. Don't let him slip away, girl!

The prince noticed Harry and told her that she shouldn't spend time with this "filthy creature". Another person who asks to be punched. This is a rather disturbing tendency.

Kate thinks that despite the fact that she is Cinderella now and should marry the prince, as soon as she noticed that Harry bit his lip, she hugged him. She thinks it's not her happy ending. So she tells the prince that she cannot respond to his feelings.

I rephrased it a bit, originally it was "my happy ending is not about being with you" but I think it's more appropriate to talk about the happy ending she was thinking about. Despite the ending of the fairy tale imposed on her, she doesn't consider it happy. Maybe I'm wrong.

She gets up, grabs Harry's hand and runs away. Good girl! if you can't solve the problem, run away from it. Good advice from Ally.

They're running towards the cliff. I don't like this place… this is already a bad sign. Harry tells her to go back to the prince. He told her that if she chose him, she would not find what was missing. But if she chooses a prince, she might find it. She said she knew that. But she's only happy when she's with him.

The prince appears. A persistent bastard.

She wants to retreat, but there's only a cliff behind her. Prince felt sorry for her that the fox had deceived her. And he said he had to kill him, or her, or both. This guy is really crazy. He took a sword and stabbed someone through. Kate and Harry fell off a cliff.

Bitter ending

Harry hugged Kate so that nothing would happen to her as they rolled down the hill. They fell into a shallow river. Kate thought that the water in this river was the same color as Harry's eyes. She looked around and found that he was lying a little away. She gasped and ran up to him. He clutched his stomach, trying to stop the bleeding, but it was no use. He opened his eyes and smiled at her.

No, she's not, but he is… She remembered that the prince's sword was definitely pointed at her, but Harry protected her. And even after that… He protected her the whole time they were falling off the cliff.

He told her that she had been here thousands of times. She was in Cinderella, Alice, Snow White and Sleeping Beauty. And every time she had to find what was missing. She did it over and over again, and he could only watch her.

He explained that in this world, if she had a bad ending, she would return to her original world. And at that moment, her memories are erased.

So he lied… they had met many times before.

He asks her to return to her world, forget everything and be happy. She doesn't want that… He wipes her tears, says he loves her, and… dies.

She begs him to open his eyes, after all, he's lying, it must be a lie. But… he's already gone. She had been crying on his chest for who knows how long. Suddenly she heard footsteps.

Victor, do something!

No, not that!

He told her that this was what Harry had asked him to do. Bring her back to her world and never return her here again. But if she comes back, she'll forget Harry, and she doesn't want that. She said she loves Harrison and that's probably why she's coming back to this world… she wanted to see him again.

Despite the fact that everyone hated him, despite the fact that he had no place in any fairy tale, Harrison was the main character in her fairy tale.

Victor took the small key that hung on Harrison's chest and handed it to Kate.

This is also not what I asked for. I should have been more precise from the very beginning.

She doesn't remember how much time has passed since then. She continues to wander through this distorted fairy-tale world in the form of a lying fox, who cannot be a character in any fairy tale. Unable to change story, she just wishes of a happy ending and is overwhelmed by her helplessness.

After another bad ending, she returns to the river and lies down in shallow waters. In her slumber, she continues to dream of a happy ending that will never come true. "I love you, Harrison".

Premium ending

The prince's sword pierced through her… She was lying on the bank of a shallow river, and Harrison next to her looked like he was about to cry. She looked down and saw that there was a lot of blood flowing down the river.

Harry asked why she was protecting him. This time, the prince pointed the sword at Harry, and the moment she realized it, she stepped between them. No, really, girl, dodge! Fall to the ground, throw the sword aside… Do something so you DON'T die. Why do you always act like you have 9 lives?

Kate answered Harry's question that you don't need a reason to protect the person you love. Harry desperately push the wound on her stomach. The moment he thought that if he died, she would just return to her world world and forget about him. He explained to her that this was not the first time she had come to this world in search of something was missing.

She's been through a lot of bad things, and he's watched her die many times… She finally understood why she was feeling so nostalgic. She thinks that if she dies, she will forget about him.

Harry says that as long as she's happy, it doesn't matter how he feels. But he doesn't want to be forgotten anymore. Oh, no, it's a painful topic.

Oh, no, that's a painful topic as well…

She took out her diary. The lying fox is hated, and cannot be a character in any fairy tale. But in this diary she writes only about him, as if he were the main character. And so, with trembling fingers, she writes "the tale of the lying fox" on the cover. She started to lose her conscientiousness, but she heard Harry's words.

That's cute and all… but… the plot is missing.

And suddenly she's not dying anymore. Her eyesight has returned to normal, and there are no more wounds on her.

Victor! Why didn't you do it last time?

Harry asks Victor why he is here (and not at the theater, as I believe he lives) but Victor explains that a new fairy tale has been born in a destorted fairy-tale world, and it will exist as long as Kate is here. He congratulated Harry on his own story. Kate hugged Harry, feeling incredibly happy, and Harry hugged her back even tighter.

Victor clapped his hands, and the scenery completely changed.

Victor disappears, leaving them alone, and Harry asks her if she will continue to write his story. She's the only one who can do it. She happily answers "yes" and hugs him. They laugh and touch each other, as if they can't believe their happiness.

She tells Harry that she finally understood why she never managed to reach a happy ending. That's because the only happy ending for her is with him.

This is a fairy tale that never existed. Until now. And she found it in a slumber. Their own warm happy ending.

It's going to be a very long… I have a lot to add from myself.

I really love this story. It has several levels of meaning, a concept that is very close to real life. It caused a lot of strong emotions. I thought that Will's bitter ending was good. It's good, but compared to this one… It's too primitive. New clues and discoveries about the characters that were side ones in the previous part of the event. And… how poetically it is written… I have indeed given you a complete translation of one part, but I will not tell you which one, so as not to embarrass myself if it's not quite accurate.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Story is often associated with the life of the person. And we have Kate who writes a story (in the diary). So the meaning is very simple… She's writing her own story, her own life. And her story affects other people's lives so much that it creates a new one. I don't know about you, guys, but the thought gives me goosebumps. We never know how our words or actions will affect others, we never know what people will remember about us over time. So the fact that it can be so grandiose is overwhelming. I have a college whose words I remember for many years, and they became a good motivation for me. I'm sure he doesn't even remember saying them.

There was a part in the premium ending where Harry adds an ending to the story… If you look at it from a relationship perspective… A relationship (from my point of view, absolutely silly and unrealistic) is the work of two people. They both add something to their story that changes both of them and the direction they are moving. And Harry adds something from himself to this story, and only after that a fairy tale is born. Kate kept a diary all this time, but in the bitter ending Victor didn't create a fairy tale for them. If it was him… It only happened when Harry added something. He may have added an ending that's important to any story, but I like to think that's not the case. I like this concept way too much to give it up so easily.

The part in the bitter ending where Harry says he's seen her in every fairy tale hit very hard. I remembered another story and I'll tell you about it at the end, off topic part. I'm surprised what after seeing so many times her bad endings… he can still be surprised, sad, and actually continue feel… Emotions can be quite tedious and painful, and sometimes it's easier to just shut them down. Probably not all people can do this… In fact, I don't recommend doing this…. A world without emotions looks gray. Maybe it was depression… hmmm…

So now I have a vague idea of what was in the Harry's story for 95k in the first Dark IF. But I would still like to read it if I had the chance. Thanks @.kurashiki for the translation. It's a really amazing story.

I really love this Kate. I don't remember her being so pushy or clingy in his route, but her desperate desire to be with him was literally palpable. And it was from the very beginning. And I find it refreshing that there was no sudden revelation "OMG, I LOVE HIM!". It's becoming old. She didn't realize it all of a sudden, she always felt this way and only in her thoughts tried to convince herself that this was not what she should do. Like… "I have a task… I have to do it… but…" In fact, it's very similar to real life again. I didn't expect that there would be so many references of our daily struggles...

I'm even more interested in Vivi. Is he some kind of keeper of this world? Is he as attached to it as Harry is? With the key? But he's more detached from the characters than Harry ever was. Perhaps because of how long he's been here… I don't know. We don't see any magic in him other than changing a fairy tale by clapping his hands, but Harry said he can do it too, so I don't see any difference. And if Vivi didn't create anything, then how was the fairy tale created? Who did this and why?

In William's Bitter Ending, Vivi said he will restart the story. So… he has sort of control over it. And it was he who sent Kate to look for the missing piece… so he should know what is missing.

Vivi is actually very sympathetic here. In the bitter ending, he seemed very upset about Kate's loss and gave her the key so she could stay. I suppose he had no other choice. It wasn't very kind of him, he should understand how difficult it is to be a lying fox in this world, but he still offers her this option as an alternative to forgetting everything. And in the premium ending, he is sincerely happy for them and believes that their future will be bright.

But… Maybe it's just a slumber… To find answers, we need to wait another year. Hopefully when Vivi's story comes out. But around April next year, Vivi's route will be released, and perhaps it will give us at least some hints of what to expect from this event. I'm very much looking forward to it.

And finally. But this is really off topic. There is a game called Mystic messager. If you play it, you know a character named Seven. That's not his name, that's what he called himself. For those of you who haven't played this game, this game in the form of a chats. You have several options to choose from, and based on your choises, you will reach one of the endings with one of the characters. There are a lot of bad endings. The whole game will take you 10 days (if I remember correctly). And less if you've reached a bad ending. Real days. But if you want to reach another ending, you should start over. And all the characters will think of you as a complete stranger... again. Doesn't it sound familiar? There was a theory in the community that Seven was the only one who never forgot. Who remembered her every restart, who loved her on every route. And then I read Harrison's endings… I thought… this is proof that the theory is correct. It doesn't matter that this is a completely different world and completely different developers. It still counts!!!

After reading Vivi's story translated by @.reccyls… I want to add a bit. I feel terribly stupid because I didn't figure out what was missing. It's like I'm truely a biggest idiot. That's how I feel. It was kind of obvious… And I like Vivi even more now. His " There has never been a single person like you before." hit me hard. As if it's really impossible. I don't feel despair from him, just calm loneliness. It's like he's already come to terms with it and doesn't even think that anything can change. This is even more upsetting.

And finally, there was another fairy tale mentioned in Vivi's story… a little mermaid. We don't have any characters from this fairy tale yet. Is this a hint for the next group of boys?…

dividers @.sister-lucifer (recolored with the author's permission)

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🔝 𝕊𝕋𝔸ℝ𝕋 ℙ𝔸𝔾𝔼 🔝

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[chrysanthemumgames]

Hi again!

This time I come back after re-reading the entire thing! Of course, aside from fixes to small continuity error and other stuff like that, it didn't change much from the last time I've read it, so I won't be saying anything new in terms of how much I love it and so on! It's just awesome as usual!

But I have a few questions I'd love to delve into, that I just didn't ask when the book wasn't finished, either because I didn't think of them or because I sort of preferred to wait for it to be actually done.

Sorry in advance for the long post though! It seems I'm unable to keep things short!

On a Hades romance playthrough, especially with a reserved MC who doesn't overtly flirt… Who among the other ROs and other people close to the main cast notices or suspects that there's a spark of "something" between Hades and the MC at the end of book 1? Considering just how much of a slow burn this route is, there isn't much to see yet, romance wise, but I feel like some people may realize something is starting to "shift" there.

When dining with Hera during her visit in chapter 6, if the MC tells her they like the Undeworld and what not, she ends up commenting "A shame". This line always had me reeling, but I didn't re-ask about it after first reading the entirety of the book so I'll do it now. Did she know what Demeter had planned to do? I always wondered why she'd think it's a shame, and it's pretty clear from the climax of the story that Zeus prefers the MC to stay in the Underworld, so I don't imagine it would be something like Hera knowing her husband wants to bring the MC back against their will. And there is no reason for her to have wanted MC to be unhappy for whatever reason. So it only leaves the option of her knowing about Demeter's plan in my mind, but maybe I'm missing something?

After the whole Eurydice and Orpheus thing, Hades says "There are some fates which very much deserve the fight. I know not what yours is, but if it turns out to be one you don't want, I am glad you have the power to change it. Not that this means I wouldn't do everything I could to help as well, of course." - it makes me wonder… Since for the duo of lovers their fate should have been for Orpheus to fail and that changed in my playthrough's case with my Dionysus' influence, I was wondering if in the scope of this story, the MC's "fate" should be the original outcome of the Persephone myth, with the "spending half a year in one realm the other half in another", and any other outcome is a result of having changed fate? Or is this not a part of their story that's truly decided by Fate in this interpretation of the myth? Also side note if it's the case, I think it's funny and kind of poetic that my MC basically traded his fate with Eurydice? Because his fate should have been spending half a year here and half there, and her fate should have been being separated from the one who came for her again after he failed and returning to the Underworld alone. But here, she managed to make Orpheus sort of succeed thanks to MC and now THESE TWO will spend half a year in one realm and half in another, while my MC managed to make Demeter fail and make it so he could go back and stay in the Underworld full time.

And final one! How much did Pirithous and Theseus get to know about what happened after Demeter dismissed them? At the very least in a scenario where they actually kidnapped the MC, not one where MC followed willingly. Not only I'm curious of Pirithous reflected upon his actions, but I'm also intrigued as if Theseus was "satisfied" of sorts that MC managed to go back (if that was indeed the case), considering he seemed against the kidnapping at least to a degree. If they even COULD keep informed, since they are demi-gods living as mortals as far as I understand their situation. I was just always interested in these two since they only appear in that short part of the story but what they do is HUGE.

And that's it. Sorry again for such a long post, and thanks for indulging me if you decide to answer even only some of the questions!

So!

I think a few of the others have picked up on things. I would say Charon and Hekate definitely know something is going on there, and friend!Hermes might have picked up some vibes as well. Even Alekto might have had a passing suspicion, though she doesn't quite consider it her business, and so doesn't devote much thought to it. People will tell her things when they want her to know them, you know?

Hera didn't have specific information about Demeter's plans, but she did know that it was likely she would take some form of drastic action. From her point of view, the arranged marriage was something Zeus did to screw with her (Demeter), and he was likely to reverse his decision once he'd had his fun with it/gotten some kind of concession from Demeter. So to Hera it seemed likely the PC had just found someplace they enjoyed, but their being taken away from it was basically a given.

There isn't really an assumed or default end for the story (or rather, not one that is more mechanically likely than another), but sort of yes! The PC ending up with a different outcome from the source story could be seen as their fate-subverting power at work. :)

Pirithous and Theseus are basically aware of the trajectory of events after they left, and this is because they're eventually brought to the Underworld for trial by the Erinyes. This is dealt with in the first chapter of the sequel.

Thanks as always for your kind words, and no worries about the questions!

[summer-nights19]

You don't know me part 1

Daiki Aomine x fem reader

You looked down at the court from the elevated corner of the Touo academy stadium. Despite the glaring lights, the corner remained a place of partial shadow, hiding your face as you watched. It had been three years since you were last on the court- 3 long, painful years full of bitterness and yearning, so, as a general rule, you tried to avoid watching games- for the most part, all they did was remind you of what you'd lost. However, whenever you heard that one of *them* was playing, you just couldn't seem to be able to control yourself. You had to go and watch.

The generation of miracles. Once your closest friends and companions. While Teiko was known for its dominating boys' basketball team, a it was little known by most that they also had a pretty strong girls' basketball club. You'd played as a shooter for that club for the majority of your middle school career, climbing your way up to the top and taking your team with you. After practice, you'd often hung out with the boys in the gymnasium and on the way home, and, over time, you'd become good friends. At least, that was how everything had been before that wretched day near the end of your 3rd year. The day that brought your career to a grinding halt.

With the start of high school, everyone had taken separate routes and you'd lost touch with them. Even though you acted indifferent, part of you couldn't help but feel a little sad about that- you'd loved hanging out with the guys: going to town or visiting clubs with Kise, sharing Atsushi's snacks, poking fun at Midorima as he lugged around his "lucky item" for the day, discussing the season's basketball highlights with Kuroko, lounging around and talking with Aomine after school... you hadn't realised how much these moments had meant to you, how much they'd filled up your life, until they were gone. You often wondered if they felt that way too.

Generally speaking, you hated watching basketball nowadays. It was a painful reminder of what you'd lost. When you'd been asked to coach the basketball team at your school, Seirin , you'd declined without a second thought. However, it always felt different when it was one of them playing. When you watched them, you felt like you were on the court with them, moving as one. You forgot for a time.

It was no different tonight as you watched Aomine play some B-tier school during the opening bracket of the Winter Cup. He was agile as always, weaving his way in between his opponents before they even had time to react and shooting one basket after another. His own teammates barely had the chance to touch the ball. You smiled to yourself, remembering your many 1v1v matches with Aomine back in middle school. Whenever you two needed to settle anything, it'd be done on the court. You needed a favour ? sure, if you could score 10 points before him. He wanted the answers to last week's assignment ? You'd give them to him if he managed to beat you. You pretty much never beat him- you came close sometimes- but he was quick at regaining the upper hand. Despite this, you'd improved greatly thanks to your 1v1s, something that even Aomine admitted. He'd often teach you new techniques or give you advice on how to improve your form, and, though he wasn't very patient, you learned over time.

"Why are you always teaching Y/N-chin those techniques ?" Murasakibara asked him one day when you guys were eating lunch together. Aomine had gone red and averted his gaze

"Playing against her gets lame if I win all the time," he'd replied, still not looking at you.

The buzzer sounded for the end of the first quarter, the familiar sound snapping you out of your thoughts. It was time to leave now, before they had time to notice you. You couldn't face seeing them again, not yet.

Making sure no one was looking, you crept out using a side exit while the players were still ambling off of the court. Every time you finished watching one of their basketball games, you were overcome by a strong feeling of nostalgia.

You always wondered why you did this to yourself, yet somehow you could never seem to stop.

Unconsciously, you began to walk faster as the cold night breeze sliced past your skin, anxious to get out of there before the memories completely took over your mind.

"Y/N ?" The voice that calls you is deep and rich, yet somewhat lazy.

Before you can even process what is happening, you're turning around and setting your gaze on the source of the voice.

Daiki Aomine.

Possibly the last person you want to see right now, especially after everything.

Masterlist

[eponymous-rose]

This is basically journaling at this point, right? Monday!

I'm trying a new exercise program that meets remotely and just seems to be full of cheerful and kind people - today was strength training for arms, shoulders, and upper back, and it was a really fun hour! Actually worth waking up an hour early for, which is a good sign... so I decide to sign up for the next five weeks or so. Class is an hour long and five days a week, which is a huge commitment, but it's easier to find time in the morning and they have three separate class times to choose from each day, so it doesn't keep me from sleeping in a bit when I don't have to be on campus. The focus really seems to be on strength, flexibility, and just moving a lot, and the class size is small enough that I feel like my form will be corrected if I ever get myself in trouble. Should be fun!

Then, e-mail! My potential postdoc found an error in our application that has a deadline two days from now, and another project needs some paperwork from me... I get a little overwhelmed, so I close my laptop and enjoy my coffee. Better just to go in to work and figure this out there. I do a little schedule-swapping when I realize I've double-booked myself over the Thursday lunch hour and opt to take the faculty candidate that day out for dinner instead of lunch (which I thought I was doing anyway? I got real confused).

Class time goes really well - I noticed students glazing over on Friday when going through my lecture (it's an entire lecture dedicated to deriving a single equation - it's very, very dry but necessary to understand the entire second half of the course), so I pivoted to something a little more fun and left the tough stuff for today. I spent a lot of time letting them work in small groups on chunks of the equation and gain a little ownership of the derivation that way, which seems to have been the way to go - we're a little behind schedule, but students are doing great. I also had a student point out that I had class scheduled for Monday, but it's a long weekend holiday. Whoops! There's luckily a lot of leeway baked into this course, so it'll be an easy fix, but I'm not used to running this far behind! I'll extend the deadline for the next homework as well.

Lunch and e-mail and grading, oh my! There is a very dramatic battle going on in this highly specialized work listserv I follow (a very cruel and unlikable person in the field has finally drawn enough ire that it's become a pile-on of dozens of people telling him exactly what they think of him), which makes for entertaining lunchtime reading. The stressful e-mails kind of resolve themselves: the missing document for my postdoc is one that I actually have the authority to write, and only takes about 20 minutes once I sit down to do it. The other paperwork doesn't even apply to me, as it turns out! Phew. I grade my students' next assignment, which is great as always.

Awesome meeting with my MSc student - for the first time, he tells me he's actively planning on staying for the PhD unless an absolute dream job pops up in the next three months or so. I rejoice, tell him he'll do great, and suggest he chat with my nearly-finished PhD student, who did three separate paid internships over his PhD to get a sampling of academic, private-sector, and public-sector jobs. He's really excited at that best-of-both-worlds prospect. He's also stunned when I tell him that his first paper draft is sufficiently rigorous to get him credit for a Master's en route to his PhD - I think he was expecting to have to write a full separate thesis, but our department recently switched so that students continuing on to the PhD just have to do a brief check-in and showcase one publication-quality work as a qualifying exam (alongside a 2-hr exam/conversation with their committee). He's getting his account set up for the supercomputer and I put him on to a textbook (basically a Jupyter notebook collection) about some advanced stats methods that'll serve him well - I need to go through the textbook myself!

Next up: my PhD student's weekly meeting! As I type this, he's fifteen minutes late (not super unusual - he's very hard to get out of a flow state when coding or writing, so he's not always great about letting me know when he's running late or can't make a meeting, and honestly I don't mind much since it just means I have a free hour to work on stuff; after almost six years working with this student, I know he will get the work done even if it means rescheduling the odd meeting), but I really want him to come in today so I can ask about his postdoc interview last week. I ping him on Slack. He reminds me that he told me he'd be out of town today. Whoops. It's me, I'm the problem. I ask him about the interview anyway. He says it went great and to let him know if they check his references, since that will probably mean a yes. I would be SO excited for him for all sorts of reasons related to his future career... and also because he'd get to move to Hawaii for a couple years!

Last meeting of the day! My undergrad senior research assistant is back at it with some really cool events for our high-latitude lightning project. We spend most of the time geeking out over storms in Iceland last week, then move on to talking about the project she's going to present at the undergraduate research symposium!

All day I've had a terrible feeling I forgot to write a letter for someone last week, but searches of my inbox turn up nothing except letters successfully written last month. ???? AND THEN IT HITS: my first-year Master's student wants to attend a summer school learning about new data coming in that she'll likely be using for her project. I offered to write her a letter of recommendation and completely forgot about it! Luckily it turns out not to be due until this Friday. I quickly write that up so I don't forget again, then send it to her co-advisor to get his sign-off on it (I'm the one who offered to write this letter because he's the one paying for the summer school out of his grants!).

Up later this week: TWO faculty interviews, two days each. Phew. Luckily, I'm not the one hosting this time around, and hopefully the weather will cooperate (last week was rough - I was in charge of the candidate's schedule and the university closed due to weather both mornings... and then the public schools all closed for the full day, effectively trapping all the parents in the department at home). I'm honestly most excited about going for lunch with tomorrow's faculty candidate... because we're going to my favorite hole-in-the-wall bahn mi spot near campus. And also for the science and stuff. I guess.

Stuff I gotta do this week: write comments on my MSc student's paper draft and finish my grant proposal!

Time to head home and do a different kind of prep! I'm vending at a two-day card show this weekend and I am SO EXCITED. I've nearly got all my cards into a spreadsheet, including the 1,000+ freebies I have to give out (the best thing is asking a kid their favorite Pokemon and pulling out three or four extremely pretty cards of that Pokemon for them to take home, but it's tough to do if stuff isn't organized properly). Also excited to look like a wizard the next time someone tells me they're looking for cards by a particular artist (fairly common!) - I've cataloged by artist as well. Finally I have found a hobby that sates my love of collecting silly things, my love of puns, and my love of spreadsheets.

[runnning-outof-time]

Escaping the Ashes | Modern!Tommy Shelby x Reader

Request: no - written for @shelbydelrey ‘s Peaky x Lana Festival

Pairing: Modern!Tommy Shelby x reader

Summary: (Y/N) reflects on her time spent in the limelight. Although she left it all behind, she can't say she regrets stepping into it; for it brought her the one thing she loves the most.

Warnings: drinking, brief mention of a car crash

Word Count: 1912

A/N: I think I can safely say that I throughly enjoy writing stories based off of songs I’ve never previously heard. This was a bunch of fun to write — thanks for assigning it to me, Isa! I decided to take the modern AU route for it….I hope you don’t mind. Enjoy! :)

A/N 2: this is based off of the song Wild At Heart by Lana Del Rey…I tried to weave some other elements of the song in. I didn’t use the lyric you chose verbatim because it didn’t fit with the speaking pattern, but I’ve got it in there.

PLEASE LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK!

Comment/Message Me if you’d like to be tagged in future stories similar to this one!

(Y/N) raised her hand slightly, waving to the bartender to get his attention before she motioned to her empty glass, signaling that she wanted another drink. He nodded before getting right into making a second Jack and Coke for her. It was ready within seconds and she thanked him for it before bringing the glass up to her lips to take a sip.

She heard footsteps coming from behind her as she set the glass back down on the wooden bar top. Those footsteps led right up to the empty stool next to the one she was occupying. She kept her eyes fixed on the television hanging above the bar, sighing as she felt someone sit in the seat next to her.

The bar was nearly empty, which is why she decided to take up a temporary residence there, so the fact that someone would choose the seat right next to her confused, and slightly irked, her. She just wanted to be alone!

The voice that belonged to said person answered all of her questions. "Figured you'd be here." It was her fiancé.

"You finally figured out where I spend my Thursdays now," she responded, not yet looking over at him, even though she could feel that he was looking at her.

He chuckled at her statement, noticing the dry nature of it, and he called over the bartender; ordering some of the top shelf whiskey, before he spoke to her again, "couldn't stand waiting back at home?"

"No," she answered, shaking her head as she fixed her eyes on the glass in front of her, "mind gets the best of me there."

"Sorry work ran late..."

"It always runs late, Tommy," she cut him off, brushing off his apology before he even had the chance to finish it, "I know how it can get sometimes," she finally looked at him as she finished speaking, smiling slightly as she took in his appearance. If he wouldn't have said that he'd put in a full day's work, she wouldn't have thought that he did...how he could look so effortlessly attractive still blew her mind daily.

Tommy grimaced at her statement. Her 'late days' looked different than his, sure, but they were taxing all the same. "Still should have been home earlier for you," he didn't let the thought go.

"Let it go, Tommy," she dismissed him yet again.

"I don't like leaving my fiancée home, alone; to her own devices," he continued anyway.

"You make me sound like I'm crazy," she giggled slightly as she teased him. He was happy to see her smile.

"Aren't you?" he teasingly quipped back, making her fully turn to face him with wide eyes and her mouth gaped.

"Thomas!" she exclaimed in surprise, smacking his thigh as she tried to hold her façade up and keep back the laughter that was threatening to escape. He said nothing in response and just winked at her as she grumbled something along the lines of how if he wasn't so attractive, he'd ‘ve gotten an entire earful just then.

Silence returned as their laughs faded off, and (Y/N) turned her body back so that she was sitting properly on the stool once more. She picked up her drink and took a sip from it before setting it back down and deciding to occupy herself with spinning the glass around.

"How are you handling all of this?" Tommy spoke up after a few moments had passed, finally getting to asking what they'd been dancing around from the second (Y/N) realized he was sitting next to her.

She exhaled a sigh before speaking, "I'm handling it," she shrugged, "I...I'm happy to be away from all of it, you know."

"I wouldn't," he answered honestly, making her remember that there truly wouldn't be a Tommy Shelby if he didn't have his work, "but I'm happy you were able to get away before it got to be too much."

(Y/N) exhaled a sigh and nodded. She again began to wonder if she'd made the right choice. She'd spent her entire life wanting to create and share her music with vast audiences, and now she'd finally gotten the chance, she was backing away. The four years she'd spent in the business were catching up with her. She didn't like the other things that came with fame, and they were getting to be a bit much for her to handle. The part she loved had been essentially placed in the shadows of the camera flashes and the engagements that seemed to book up every hour of her day. It was too much to the point that she backed out of her record deal and moved out of the city, escaping the ashes that were starting to fall around her; before the ashes were all that was left.

"You're thinking again," Tommy cut into her thoughts, knowing that her mind was going a mile a minute by how she was staring absently at her glass.

"I am," she admitted dryly, seeing no need to lie. He could always see right through her anyway. She turned her head slightly, seeing that he was looking at her expectantly. "Was it the right move?" she then asked him the question that had been pestering her mind.

"Do you think that it was?" he flipped it back onto her.

"I'm asking you the question, Tommy!" she groaned, frustration flashing across her features.

"If you feel better now that you're away from it then I'd say 'yeah, it was the right move'," he gave his opinion, shrugging slightly.

"But I took you away from London," (Y/N) pointed out, a slight frown forming on her face. Tommy was a prominent businessman, and London was one of his major home bases.

"I've got a car, love," he brushed her statement off, flashing a grin in her direction. She shook her head slightly upon hearing his response, "I'm still able to do my work just fine from here...you were having a hard time doing anything in London," he pointed out then.

This was true. She really wasn't even able to leave their apartment with the aforementioned paparazzi always wanting to capture every little snippet of her life. The fact that there was an air of mystery around Tommy and his business dealings didn't help either. The 'famous musician dates business bad boy' headline was one the paps were always trying to sell, no matter how corny it sounded.

She couldn't leave Tommy though. No. The two years that she's spent with him have been the best of her life. So these serious talks of stepping out of the limelight began one evening after dinner when the incessant flashes caused her chauffeur to get into a minor car accident. Both (Y/N) and Tommy were fine, but she reached the breaking point. They decided to purchase a home and move out to the outskirts of London, where the paparazzi wouldn't find her. It was the reason why she was able to sit in this bar, alone, whenever she wanted to.

"Being stuck in that city was a lot," (Y/N) spoke on her thoughts after a few moments had passed. Tommy nodded in agreement with her as she took another sip from her glass. A momentary silence then fell around them as she turned to look over at him. He kept his gaze on her as she studied his face before dropping her eyes to her hands, looking at the engagement ring that was sparkling back at her. "You still love me, yeah?" she asked him then, her voice soft as she glanced up at him through her eyelashes.

"Course I do, love," he answered her like it was a no-brainer, his brows furrowed in confusion because he wondered why she would have asked this, "why would you question that?"

"Because I've stepped away from singing," she answered him, her voice still soft.

"You're more than just a pretty face on the stage for me, (Y/N)...way more," he told her, his eyes showing his seriousness. "You've stepped away from that, but you've not changed one bit. You're still...I love you because you're still wild at heart."

(Y/N) bashfully looked down at her lap as she heard what he had to say. She still wasn't used to him saying things like this. To have someone profess their love to her and actually mean it was something that she really wasn't used to; being in the circle she was.

"Have I made (Y/N) (Y/L/N), the woman who has something to say about everything, speechless?" Tommy questioned after a few silent seconds, a grin apparent in his voice.

"Oh shut it, Tommy," she said to him, knocking her knee against his as she looked up at him again. Seeing the smile on his face made hers break out from behind the glare she was trying to hold up.

"It seems as though I have," he stated smugly, making her roll her eyes at him.

She shook her head, looking him over again like she had before. "You know...if I had to do it all over again I would..." she trailed off, her words making Tommy's eyebrows raise in intrigue.

"You would?" he asked, surprised that she would say that, "why's that?"

(Y/N) cracked a smile before she laughed slightly. "Because, in the end it brought me here to you," she admitted, knowing full well how corny she probably sounded. Tommy cracked another grin as he chuckled slightly at her words; not because they were funny, but because they'd struck something inside of him.

He wasn't embarrassed to admit that he stuck around the club one night after she'd finished the set she was performing. Her voice had mesmerized him, and her beauty was something unlike he'd seen in his entire lifetime. She entertained him when she realized that he'd been waiting around for her, and that was when he really fell in love. It was safe to say that he’d never met anyone like her. He made it a point to go to the next few shows so that he'd get another chance to see her afterwards, and he hadn't stopped following her since.

"It's corny, I know," (Y/N) admitted to the cheesiness, "but it's true. I'd do it a thousand times over if it meant I got to meet, and be with, you." She was able to lean in closer to him due to the proximity of their stools, and she waited until her lips were just inches from his to speak again, "I love you, Tommy," she said, feeling the grin as it grew on his lips.

"I love you, (Y/N)," he repeated the sentiment, not allowing her a second to respond before he matched his lips with hers.

Their kiss was kept brief, and (Y/N) giggled as she pulled away, reaching up to wipe the smudge of lipstick from his bottom lip before anyone would notice. Tommy just grinned at her, managing to kiss her knuckles before she brought them away.

No one did notice though, which was another reason why she was grateful that she escaped the life that she was hurling herself into before it got to where she was in too deep. Now she was able to be the person she desired to be. The person that was, definitely, wild at heart.

Tagged: @mgcldydrms @the-anxious-youth @cloudofdisney @look-at-the-soul @elenavampire21 @mrsalwayswrite @julkaamazing @evita-shelby @lilyrachelcassidy @notyour-valentine @shelbydelrey @december16-1991 @onlydeadcells @peakyswritings @just-a-blackhole @watercolorskyy @strayrockette @peakyduchesss @alexxavicry @captivatedbycillianmurphy @yummycastiel @dark-academia-slut @tommystargirl @stevie75 @lyarr24 @signorellisantichrist @zablife @anotherblinder @midnightmagpiemama @cillmequick @rangerelik @dandelionprints @letal-y-poetica @raincoffeeandfandoms @itscheybaby @gypsy-girl-08 @insanitybyanothername @depxiety @dragons-are-my-favorite @acewritesfics @forgottenpeakywriter @cilliansangel @cljordan-imperium @areyenotfondofmelobster @little-diable

MASTERLIST

Listen to the song Wild At Heart by Lana Del Rey:

Here.

[aley-nag]

Bumpy road, pretty result

Whoaaaa. This one...

The next fanfiction I bound was Cinder and Smoke by @thelittleblackfox. I lover their work to pieces. They write incredible thought out Stucky!AU's with a lot of fantasy aspects or really good scifi and I wanted badly to do one of their fics, but waited til I was a little happier with my results and could make a pretty cover. We decided together on this one and I started formatting... And then I stopped for a long while because Word is the devil.

Cinder & Smoke is a western!AU and just about the most romantic thing I've ever read. It has yearning and a little angst and a very distinct vibe that feels like Fernweh and wilderness and change. Go read it!

I worked on it between June and December 23 and Christmas was the only reason I finished it this quickly, but I did not want to leave it unfinished for the turn of the year.

Sadly I don't have a lot of pictures, but when I'm finished with my copy I'll post some more.

Now we'll come to the journey it was to finish this!

It started out rather uncomplicated, because I thought I had gotten the hang of formatting and then, when I tried adjusting the font and overall look of the text body Word kept killing the italics. And I googled and tried and experimented and I just couldn't get it to stop. I was so frustrated, oh god. It put me off a little and I had to leave it for a while. When I came back around to it I found a slightly butchered solution, that works though so I won't question it. After that formatting went smoother and I was able to bind it. I used paper from that same supplier that fucked up my paper order for the covers from the notebooks. But only after I had it printed I noticed that it was cut crooked and wouldn't cleanly fold in half. I despaired a little, said fuck it and hoped it wouldn't be to noticeable. I think it's alright.

Binding went really well and I think that's the cleanliest job I did to this date.

Did the endbands by hand to match the color scheme I was aiming for. Because of the title I wanted to invoke fire and used primarily black and red for the coloring.

Then came the cover. First of all, don't use black bookcloth. You will see every. single. mistake. Also dust and glitter... I brushed this thing so often, you wouldn't believe it.

And I tried different vinyl. I couldn't find the right shade of red I wanted, it's a little hard to source it around here so I went an entirely different route and used golden glitter vinyl. What I didn't know until after I plotted the design: The glitter has texture. I couldn't see a single cut-line. I had to keep the picture open to work along the edges and not rip the letters. Still lost all of the i-points 😭

The flower was pretty easy though. Glueing it on was also quite hard because it just wouldn't hold and I got glitter everywhere. Which let to more brushing but I'm afraid mailing it destroyed all that work :D

Anyway. I am sooo happy with how it turned out I instantly forgot about all annoyances and was able to mail it before the end of the year and that was a really satisfying last project, so all is well :)

This was also the first time I had the idea of choosing a little icon for the author's penname because most of the time I don't have enough space for the entire name. I reworked all of the other books to accomodate that.

Binding Details

Body Text: Garamond, 11

Half Title/Chapter Heading: Gold Lines Trial, 20

Full Title: Carnivalee Freakshow, 48

Word Count: 57.197

Pages: 232

Paper: publishing paper A4, 90g, 1,5x volume (from the retailer from hell :/)

[zombeebunnie]

Trembling Essence [Extended Demo]:💙Quality of life changes + Q&A.💙

Hello and welcome new followers! To show my appreciation for all the support I've received again, here's one of the Valentines Day concept drawings finished! A big thank you to everyone that has continued supporting this through a like, re-blog, fanart, comment, tip jar, share, etc. :,]

I wasn't expecting it to take as long as it did but I'm very happy with the result and how much I've been improving! I'm not too good at drawing angled faces so being able to get it to look just right made me very happy! :,]

I still have this one to go so hopefully at some point I'll have it done!

Quality of life changes:

*Please note that these changes aren't in the [Extended Demo] yet! It'll be something for me to work on adding and I'll let it be known in a update post!

Now that it's been two weeks of the [Extended Demo] being released, It's time to go over some changes to help the player out when going through the game!

I noticed from comments and playthrough's that certain Bad endings/Neutral story progressions were difficult to find, especially the full afternoon route. I don't want players to feel burnt out from trying to search for everything.

I want to add a check-list menu that shows all the Bad/Neutral endings you can get while playing so it's easier to navigate the game.

2. For those that are new or have been here for some time, entering the cabin with Noah starts Day 3 due to the player(Y/N) being lost in the terrain for 2 and a half days which Noah mentions. Sometimes this can get confusing since some consider it Day 1 while the game considers it Day 3.

It's still up in the air about how I'm going to go on about this but I'm thinking about adding a little notification tab in the upper left corner of the game to notify the player(Y/N) of what day it is in the game to resolve confusion.

3. I talked about this last week but I didn't know until recently that the tags I use for Trembling Essence were very unorganized and hard to search through.

I went through and tried my best to re-organize all of the lore and art about Noah/game posts. I also cleaned up the #Trembling Essence tag since it was flooded with game development posts and not much else. I'm also working on a master post and plan on creating some reference sheets of Noah which will be placed under a different tag! :]

#Get to know: Noah : This will be filled with answered asks and lore dump. Sometimes(?) there's random dev-logs that have lore attached to them too. #TE Updates : This only includes dev-logs/updates about the game and development progress. #Trembling Essence : This tag is mainly used to post fan art / art and anything else in general that might belong here which includes lore posts. I really want searching through the tag to be enjoyable and not filled with a bunch of dev-logs.

Q&A / Ask box is open:

If you have any questions about Trembling Essence/Noah feel free to ask here please. This makes it easier for me to see and answer accordingly! I would really like to hear from you guys!

I really wanted some of the lore to be found through playing versus me just answering everything. :]

If you've already sent in a ask, I did see it I just need time to answer since I like to respond with doodles/drawings and helps me practice. :]

That's all I have to share right now! Thank you for the continued support, I wholeheartedly appreciate it. :,]

[blackstarchanx3new]

Creations AU, But I obnoxiously over explain it PT 11

Pages 301-330

Again thanks to @akdrawsandwrites for helping with some of these pages, I can't remember which but I recognize a few of them as theirs. X'D They did a great job lining and coloring a few of these. Apricate it immensely.

We hitting end game what I have page wise guys.

Thanks for baring with my nonsense. I hope to finish the FNAF 1 arc. But I will post the other side comics and long winded explanations of those. X'D Hope you've enjoyed Creations so far! It was a labor of love because I love FNAF. A lot...

Can I just say I like Freddy and Mike's dynamic.

I like Freddy a lot in Creations because he's like, so NOT fannon Freddy in all the ways that hits me in the "Aww yeah that's good shit" way. X'D

He's a flamboyant full of gender slut that is scared of ghosts despite BEING A POSSESSED ROBOT lmfao. His design just hits my brain in a nice way too. He's so cute.

He gives sassy drag queen vibes and I like him.

I am not really a fan of fannon Freddy unless it's like super specific circumstances.

I'm going to dip into "I hate this trope" territory but keep in mind you are not obligated to write around my preferences. Or even force yours to fit mine. That'd be dumb. Write what makes you happy I'm just talking about shit I don't enjoy personally.

Bitch mode activated:

If you're going with him being possessed by a child, which a LOT of people do to stay cannon it makes ZERO sense for him to be a sensible leader type unless you like GIVE HIM A REASON? Which most people don't. Most people also make him a bitch which I hate.(And not in a campy gay bitch way like Creations Freddy that makes the queer part of me laugh and relate to) I'm not sure I understand the idea of making Freddy so damn unlikable in a story based on the franchise ABOUT HIM??? Like...It's so fucking overdone I'm sorry lmfao be a bit more damn creative. Don't be lazy? Give him a damn personality outside of "Cunt for no reason with a stick up his ass" like? Idk? Be FUN with him! Does he feel the NEED to be the leader because he's designed that way by the company? Does the stress EAT at him? If you DO go the route of making him posessed by a child: Did he feel the need to grow up and act more adult. How often does he fail at this task? What are the consequences? People's bad writing makes me think of reasons for him that aren't in the text 99% of the damn time. Quite frankly: I am not a fan of popular fnaf comics. Like any of them. X'D They feel really soul-less a lot of the time in a way I can't quite describe...

A lot of the creators hate working on them, hate their fanbase and hate the games past a certain point so that's probs why lmfao. I've gotten pissed at the fans on Webtoon, and gotten pissed at how much of a slog some scenes and I've considered quitting once or twice, but never cause I hated the actual games, or the comic and story of Creations, just cause some scenes are annoying to work on from a writer's perspective or cause people misinterpreted the story so bad they had no clue what was going on. I fucking love FNAF and wanted to make a fan story that you could tell came from a place of love.

Here's some pitfalls to avoid:

Don't start hating your own characters. It will hurt your writing. I've noticed LOTS of FNAF comic makers start to hate their own damn characters. PUT. THE. COMIC. DOWN. I AM SERIOUS.

If you start to despise your own work. STOP. TAKE A BREAK. REFELCT. Maybe it won't be PERMINENT but until you can sort out what your deal is STOP.

You are doing NO ONE favors by continuing to the point you start actively shit talking everyone and everything that comes into contact with this story that way.

If you noticed: I STARTED FALLING INTO THAT SHIT. OH GOD BLACKSTAR HAS FLAWS! O.O

Me doing THIS, talking about how I love my own comic appreciating how much time and work I put into it: all the goofy fun stuff I put in as easter eggs the characters ex, was a way to reinvent my feelings towards this comic because I WANT TO FINISH IT and it's helped a lot. FIND JOY IN THE PROCESS OF CREATION. ;)

If you aren't liking FNAF as much as you used too: Literally just go back and watch smth you liked about it before. The ruin DLC sparked my shit back into gear, watching old lets plays and listening to fan music also helped. Just. Idk. Engage with the thing you're making a damn comic about? Like, find out what you loved to begin with.

I have like 4+ comics I work on in rotation when I'm not in the mood to work on one. Variety helps me too.

Another thing I'd advise against: Don't make a big diaper baby blow out scene about "Leaving" a fanbase. It's fucking embarrassing. If you don't feel the spark, you don't feel it. That's FINE. As an autistic person: My interests change like a girl changes clothes.

But don't literally shit your pants and make a scene about it people will look back at you as the person who shat their pants in front of everyone and embarrassed themselves.

If you're asking yourself "Is star talking about X artist?" honey I'm talking about at least 4 different ones I've seen do this exact thing and I got second hand embarrassment every time. If you resent the popularity you got from certain fanbases: I'm sorry the best thing to do is move on. Yes. Again I speak from experience. (Not FNAF, but a different fanbase)

If you don't get as much recognition on your OG works: Tough shit I'm sorry that's how it is. As someone who does OC comics I've accepted "Some people just won't read this cause FNAF isn't attached, and that's okay. I am the same way. You cannot expect people to love everything you create"

As a child/teen, watching actual adults do this shit made me the person I am today but deciding: "Nah that's dumb, I am getting second hand embarrassment and I am not behaving that way"

Childishness is something big artists need to learn is a problem before they get big. Temper tantrums aren't a cute look for anyone.

It's okay to get in over your head with shit. Just try to be calm about things here's things that overtime I've learned help me cope with huge projects:

They're meant to be fun. If you aren't having fun: Figure out why and change it. You aren't obligated to finish them. You can always come back. Another reason to not "shit your pants" as I call it. People will love to see more from your comic if you put it down and come back. :) It's more embarrassing to shit your pants and then come back like you never did and try to keep going. Keep doors open if you would. My "Shit your pants" moment singlehandedly keeps me away from one fandom lmfao avoid it if you can. Try not to be a cunt about the thing that GOT you popular. You will look like a class act clown I guarantee it. If people don't understand your comic and that is causing frustration, I genuinely advise making a "Director's commentary" style thing like this. It's a lot of fun. X'D And it might give people perspective into your madness.

This doesn't help if you're just a control freak tho lmfao.

Anyways, enough of my blabbing about my history watching old fandom artists assassinate their own characters for all to see in the most embarrassing and violent fashion, and how that irreversibly changed me as a person, back to the actual damn comic.

Interrupted. He has no respect for Mike.

So Freddy describes typical haunting behavior for ghosts. Smells and SOME people are spiritually inclined while some aren't. As we've seen Mike for example can't see ghosts unless they WANT him to see them.

Sammy apparently can see ghosts and is considered "Insane" we can kiiiinda see why from earlier. X'D

It's safe to say Mike took that personally.

Awkward.

Default to insults Freddy, it's okay we understand you're perfect- Freddy you stupid idiot you should have kept your mouth shut it's not nice to call mentally ill people "Freaks".

Mike REASONABLY asks if the ghosts are REAL and considering we know 1 is for certain Sammy's not "Bonkers" according to Freddy.

Freddy just showing off his personality like usual.

Freddy he can't make eye contact. HE'S AUTISTIC.

Anyways even Freddy's noticed Sammy's eyes are weird.

Okay funny thing: Freddy was going to make a dick sucking joke but none I came up with were very funny.

If I remember right one was smth like "You always sound like you just choked on a dick" or something like that??? Something this vulgar makes sense from Creations Freddy but I decided to tone it back a little. X'D I also felt it was very mean.

Freddy's mean enough as it is lmfao.

Freddy stop sexualizing the night guard-

Uh oh-

Your daily reminder Mike is short-

Freddy is the worst. But I love him.

Chica giving sass for that. She doesn't apear much but I like her.

Foxy got thanos snapped lmfao I had no idea what to do with him in this comic ngl. X'DDDDDDD

Maybe he'll show up later...Maybe.

He showed up in the OG shitpost version of this comic and Bonnie sold him out for cigarettes.

Our boys meet up once again. :)

Michael couldn't see him the previous day for whatever reason.

PFF. JUST LIKE AN ANIME MAN!

Also Mike that's harassment...

Lmfao. I don't remember exactly when I decided Mike was trans but I know it was FAILRY early on. Not there were many references to it.

The fact color wise: he's a walking pride flag is kinda a clue I suppose. X'D

Oh mah goodness. Oh my damn. It's the other Freddy.

HAHA OH WHAT MIKE?

Well shit there's a TON of victims then.

Bonnie. Your buddy is a murderer-

Hehehe yeah but you're also a short king buddy-

Hahaha. So this thing eats children nice to know.

Mike being a smart boy like usual.

Hehe. Face plates. :)

Mike doesn't wanna be around this thing, and I can't blame him. Also I find it genuinely hilarious how half the panels in some of these pages are drawn by me, and half are drawn by AK.

We get into pages I can't be bothered to color the remaining pages are colored kinda randomly. Funtime Freddy as you can probebly tell is ANNOYING to color. He has SO MANY COLORS it got very overwhelming trying to color him. I'm sorry but that's how it is lmfao. X'D I wanna be done with the FNAF 1 arc:

Cool thing tho, if I ever want to color em the characters are white so I can just slap a multiply layer on and go brrrr with color.

Anyways, they both decide to leave at the same time.

I'm sure nothing will come of this. :)

Hehehhehehe he knows something....

OH GOD.

Oh fuck. Mike got vored.

I'm sorry I have to make this joke, vore is terrible and I hate it I've made that very well known and joking about how much I despise it is how I cope.

Having said that: I love the stomach hatch idea/being trapped inside an animatronic.

It's like the Springlock mechanic taken to the next level lmfao. Complete and utter hopelessness on the end of the person inside, claustrophobia, IMANENT DEATH, IT'S HORRIFYING AND I LOVE IT. >:)

A+ Horror idea.

OBVIOUSLY: this is based on COUNT THE WAYS from the 1st Fazbear's Fright novels.

Can I just say, Luring and trapping people this way is so fucking creative I LOVE THE SL ROBOTS. Like, it's just so cool of an idea because it already kinda plays off the idea from FNAF 1 that there's children STUFFED inside the FNAF 1 robots. (As a way to hide them)

but SL robots do that, but TRANSPORT said children/use their chambers to KILL said children and harvest remnant. THAT IS SO DARKLY AWESOME.

IK we're all hyping up the MIMIC and it's ability to copy people's voices but uh: FUNTIME FOXY DID THAT SHIT FIRST FROM THEIR BLUEPRINTS.

I'm sad to this DAY people don't use Funtime Foxy's voice mimic mechanic in fan content. THAT'S AWESOME.

I like the trap mechanic and how it's used again for the twisted ones. It's such a great idea to make a robot that's friendly on the outside but is basically a fucking iron maiden on the inside. Like DAMN. THAT GOES SO HARD!!!!!! I LOVE IT!!!! :D

Also all the short jokes have a purpose: Mike's small enough to fit inside Funtime Freddy. Because he's built to capture kids.

Something I worry about with Funtime Freddy:

He is a FAN FAVORITE In Creations. Like. People like him. A LOT.

I made a lot of side comics with him and Bon Bon. Where Bon Bon is his emotional support bunny rabbit. People really liked that. Because Funtime Freddy was showing relatable autistic behavior (He struggles with shit I do lmao.)

I'm worried about 'Ruining' his character for people hah.

He's a butt-

GUESS WHO GOT RE-ENVIGORATED TO DRAW PAGES.

Me. After the movie.

Mike's having a harder time keeping his composure.

I feel like the reason is obvious: SL robots are literally only built to kill people, he's in the most dangerous part of the building, and Funtime Freddy's a wacko.

Haha. Word play. Funtime Freddy did not detect the albeit minimal exaggeration in what Bonnie said. Poor dude.

Haha will to live.

Funtime Freddy's out for blood.

More confirmation who our villain is.

So if you're not a Creations AU veteran, Funtime Freddy is just easily swayed by someone calming him down.

Mike's pretty good at faking shit.

Bon Bon isn't here rn, so Mike's taking on the role of "Calm the giant anxious bear down"

WE HAVE ALSO REACHED IMAGE CAP. SO WE WILL CAAAAARRYYYY OOOOOON-

Ending note: watched the FNAF movie again last night.

[dragonmasterhiccup]

(dude Arvid is about to GET ITTT 🤣🤣)

Faintly narrowing her eyes at him, she decided to accept his answer, knowing full well that he probably went a day or two not getting the proper sleep he needed. "Uh-huh… So, if I notice you acting all groggy for a day, you're going straight to bed."

The corner of her lips pulling up in a brief smile, Freya considered what might've happened if things took that route instead. "…I mean, either way, if you hadn't came into both of our lives like you are now…I'm sure Ayla wouldn't have a very strong reason to change my mind back then." She added a witty comment after her short pause, dramatically muttering: "Plus, with how much you two have grown to know each other, she wouldn't allow me to hate you anymore even if I somehow still did!"

Sparing a glimpse towards the fireplace, her voice came out as a slight mumble. "Really? I can't see myself doing that all on my own…Dad, he's..he's always been intimidating to some extent… Honestly, I'm shocked I actually stood up to him."

"Yes, like that, dork!" She leaned back, hiding her reddened face in the palm of her hands as she tried recomposing herself. His next words didn't help her feeble struggles to do so. Burying herself further into the blanket, she spoke with a muffled voice: "This is so not fair. You can't just--you can't…do things like that and, and expect me to remain okay as if I didn't witness you having…the brightest smile ever.."

'Feel differently..?' She was puzzled for a moment, confused as to what he meant until he finished. 'Oh..' Of course, she didn't enjoy knowing those scars most likely came from something unpleasant, hurtful, but she wouldn't allow her aversion to the matter step in between them. "Hiccup, I may not like that those scars made you feel some sort of pain, but it won't change what I said. They're a sign of how strong you are…and I love that about you, how you're able to endure so much…sometimes I think without realizing it.."

Recovering from the flutter of her heart, Freya humorously lifted her cup, pinky extended in a mockingly proper demeanour. "Just right."

Blazed grumpily huffed, what appeared to be a pout on his face as Hiccup drew near. The Sand Wraith's throat rippled in fulfilment as the future Chief rubbed his scales, shifting closer to him in hopes he wouldn't stop.

The dragon secretly hid the smugness that came upon him as he was complimented on his abilities, faking a pitiful grumble to get more scratches. However, once he had permission to go outside, he jolted up and grinned. His previous attitude disappeared, darting through the door with a joyful roar.

--------

No matter how chilly it might have been, Freya always enjoyed visiting the cove; its scenery even in the winter time captivating her attention. It stood true as she almost missed what her boyfriend said, glancing at him again as she tore her gaze off of the pond - which was practically frozen. "Mhm, that's what you told me. And I'm perfectly okay by it."

Yawning, she stretched one of her arms, shaking off any remnant of grogginess. They chose to confront Arvid somewhat in the afternoon, but it felt as though she barely woke up. Which is how Hiccup's comment on the Dragon Blade quickly startled her awake. "You…you're what?"

She didn't understand if it was right to feel a little excited, nervous, apprehensive, and eager all at once. 'He's serious..?' It wasn't new knowledge to her that the Chief's son could absolutely defend himself and have every right to be at least a bit angry with someone who not-so-subtly had a fancy for her - and yet treat her as if respect didn't exist.

Blaze rumbled out a quiet laughter, anticipating for something interesting to occur. He entrusted this human to his best friend, so he was expectant to see what would happen. He attentively watched as she stepped forward and poked his shoulder, talking in a more softer tone. "Just…don't get too upset, okay? You have to make sure I don't do that.."

-------

It was much easier said than done.

'What is this fool doing..!?' Freya internally groaned, lightly hitting her face by the palm of her hand as Arvid immediately tried to…impress her, or something, in the middle of the training grounds, only to trip over his feet. Right when she entered the arena, he strived to do a specific move he watched her perform.

Obviously, he failed.

Hastily straightening his back, he stood tall and 'strong' like he committed no error, fixing his orange locks as he didn't yet notice Hiccup. "Freya, I didn't know you would be coming toda--" He paused, blue eyes finally landing on the one beside her. His pompous smirk began to fade as he recognized who it was.

Blaze observed the whole scene from a small distance away, holding himself back from walking up to them as Arvid casually strode to the couple, ignoring Hiccup. "So, other than my small mistake, what'd you think of that move I did? It was actually something I've seen you do bef--"

"Yes, I know. I'm the one who came up with it." Freya muttered, facial expression blank and unamused as she folded her arms. "And you did terribly. Your footing was completely wrong, you angled your sword incorrectly, you swung too high, and--"

"Okay, okay. Let's move on from that, shall we?" He interrupted, turning to sneer at Hiccup. "I get why she may be here, but…why are you?" He spoke with such contempt, it astounded Freya to the point of making her stare at the floor, anger and discomfort filling her mind as she resisted the urge to outrightly punch Arvid.

His jaw dropped, a look of betrayal on his face. "Wha--straight to--now hang on just a minute! There are more reasons to be tired than just lack of sleep, you know!"

Chuckling, he nodded, "Yeah, that's a good point...but, if I recall correctly...Ayla was hanging around the forge pretty often, before I crash landed next to you... maybe it was always meant to turn out like this?"

Hiccup was quiet for a moment before answering, "I think you found you already had the resolve to do it, but only when someone else was in the same position that you've been in... It's--it's like...okay, say you're holding on to this rope, yeah? You're dangling off a cliff, but the rope is there, you just have to wait it out. Until, you see someone else hanging on to that same rope with you. Well, suddenly you find yourself utilizing the strength needed to pull not only yourself out, but the person next to you. Does, does that make sense?"

Laughing, he knew nothing could possibly wipe the smile off his face as she tried to explain away how this was a 'problem'...which it definitely wasn't. Lowering himself to meet her eyes, he asked innocently, "And why not? Shouldn't I be smiling brightly when looking at my girlfriend? Especially when she's making me fall even more in love with her than I was before? Put yourself in my place and see if you can resist smiling! I don't think you could, it's just--it's impossible."

At the word 'love', he turned to meet her gaze. He'd heard her tell him that she loved him before, but he still hadn't gotten used to it. In this case however, it took him a moment to fully comprehend what she'd said.

Clasping her hand a little tighter, he looked away. "If you saw them...I don't think you'd want to know what they're all from...though I'm sure you could probably guess the origins of a handful of them."

Turning towards her again, he added, "I just, I don't want to upset you, is all..."

As Blaze shifted closer, Hiccup continued to give the dragon scratches, now moving to pet under the sand wraiths chin.

Toothless grumbled, getting a little jealous that his best friend was giving such attention to another dragon.

Huffing loudly, the Night Fury plopped himself down within Hiccup's reach, and soon he had one hand on each dragon, scratching their scales.

Toothless did happily follow Blaze outside, having forgotten his little tiff from moments before.

----------

"My sword will be out, and on fire," he repeated, a little more detailed, "Listen, this guy has a huge chip on his shoulder, and he won't take this seriously unless I give him no choice."

"I'm not going to hurt him," he clarified, "I'll just...make him think I will, but only if he doesn't leave you alone or show you some respect."

Nodding, he fiddled with his armor. "I've stayed level headed in worse situations. It'll be fine."

Toothless tilted his head, sensing the Hiccup wasn't feeling quite as confident as he sounded.

The future chief knew how to keep things in control, he just needed to be able to anticipate just how far Arvid would take things.

-----------

Hiccup shook his head, seeing Arvid attempt to show off. He recognized that particular move as well, knowing full well it was Freya's.

He stayed quiet for a few moments, and as Arvid finally noticed his presence, a confident grin grew on his face.

Biding his time, he waited to see if Arvid might have changed, but found himself disappointed.

Looks like they'll have to go through with their plan.

His eyes widened, revealing thinly veiled anger as Arvid so rudely interrupted Freya. After glancing at his girlfriend, his resolve strengthened upon seeing her gaze cast to the ground.

Reaching for her hand, he matched the other vikings glare, and stated, "What, it's not uncommon for a guy to be found with his significant other now, is it? It shouldn't be any surprise to find me by Freya's side. After all, I've been her boyfriend for a few months now." As he spoke, his left hand unholstered the Dragon Blade, casually tossing the hilt, spinning it into the air before catching it once again.

"Actually, I was hoping we'd run into you. There's something we want to chat with you about."

[gwyns]

tbh with you after finishing acosf and the bonus chapter for the first time, all I knew was I didn't want Elain and Azriel to end up together. I wasn't remotely passionate about Gwynriel and Elucien but I definitely knew E/riel isn't going to happen.

Mainly bc through out the whole series even if 3.5 books of it was from Feyre's pov and first person I didn't felt any spark between them. between Nesta and Cassian? NO DOUBT I new they were mates. as casual reader you can feel they're mate material. but even that rescuing scene everyone keep talking about that it's the main reason they're going to end up together fell falt for me!! bc Lucien wasn't there and I'm sure if he was... no one could've stopped him.

like acosf was the last nail in their coffin! sjm could've made me believe that they're endgame specially when it's 3rd person but she didn't even try lmao. but still I was like well... she made me like Nesta! she made me fell in love with her and understand her in a way it felt personal. she made me fall in love with Nessian and Feysand so she can definitely write E/riel that I might change my mind about them... but I was unsure and I was trying to convince myself lol (the way I kept telling myself that it's gonna be okay lmao)

but then I read the bc and it was over... I was done! the way Azriel thought about Elain made me cringe multiple times. the way Elain felt so small in that scene made me uncomfortable and the way he questioned Cauldron as he has some claim on her? oh all I could see was red!!! so that's why I was sure E/riel won't happen and even if it does I was done with this series I'm not even kidding...

so yes this was my experience with the book! and I brought this up bc I saw one of the E/riels say that if they didn't join the fandom they would've known people shipped Az and Gwyn and their irl friends also didn't know that...

honey sorry to break it to you but you need to raise you standards. bc if you didn't notice how toxic that interaction was... I feel sorry for you</3

i agree with you so much! like i admit i have days where i think "am i wrong? am i the delusional one?" because e/riels are just so loud and they get in your head sometimes you know, but then i remember all the canon text and that sjm loves her mates and... well... i feel way more confident. like it's so clear to me what sjm did in that bonus chapter but others don't see it? and az even said in hofas that he doesn't have a mate, so clearly he's given up on that nonsense lol

that rescue they like to bring up is so funny when you remember that the only reason az went was because nesta said he couldn't do it. that's literally it. he didn't care at all until she brought his skills into it. cassian volunteered first, but he didn't go only because his guts were spilling out. but you know, elain and az are true mates, even tho both times she was in danger he didn't react at all. yet they'll say he didn't care about gwyn when she was in the rite, but at least he actually did react to that

that's something i've said before, i may not care for e/riel, like at all, but if sjm did go that route i'm sure she could make me like it in some capacity. she's known for her romances! she can write it!! yet she didn't. she chose not to. instead she gave page time to gwyn and az taking glances at each other and bantering. huh weird... a new example i like to use is helion and the lady of autumn, they didn't even speak in acowar and yet they have that spark and insane chemistry, and all sarah did was tell us their backstory!!! so clearly she knows how to write a romance that'll get you hooked with nearly zero interactions and just a few lines of text. yet, again, she chose not to with e/riel

pretty sure i and others have said it before but if it were lucien calling elain "the third" we'd never ever hear the end of it, but because it's the hot broody bat it's uwu and sooo sexy and romantic!!!!! his part with elain gives me the ick, full stop. i've been sexualized and treated like an object (i had a friend who, after we stopped being friends, i found out had saved pictures of me and got off to them) and let me tell you, it doesn't feel good!! i don't get why they'd want that for elain. i don't think az is a bad person at his core, he's just... going through it right now but that's not elain's problem and she shouldn't have to be reduced to being his fantasy and nothing outside of that

here's a little message to the e/riels that think the average reader doesn't ship anything but e/riel. my irl friend is the most casual reader, she hasn't even finished acowar yet, she doesn't even go into fandoms of things she's passionate about and when i told her people shipped elain and az without any context or bias (i literally just told her they were shipped) she looked at me confused and said "why? elain and lucien are mates. elain and az are too similar, they wouldn't be good together" and by "too similar" she means they wouldn't push or challenge each other and well... she's not wrong lol. she also ships gwyn and az based solely on the "see you tomorrow, shadowsinger" quote i sent her so, clearly casual fans can see it too!

[shatcey]

Do you replay a route in EN server that you have already read on JP server? Do you get the same amount of dopamine considering the you already know the spoilers and all?

In short, yes.

The reason is simple. I don't know JP. The translation gave me only basic information… the plot, the background… just the facts. But I definitely missed the small details. Or I could misunderstood some fragments. And, of course, I failed to notice the elegance of the text. And I really like the narrative in this game and the differences in character formulations. They really feels like different people.

And because of this, the impression of the route can be not full.

For example… I love Ally. I fell for him back in JP server. I read his route twice where. But… I started to fully understand him ONLY after I read and analyzed his route in detail in EN (I still haven't finished writing about it, it's so easy to distract me).

On the other hand… I really didn't like Roger's route. So I'm looking forward (moderately, not impatiently) to the opportunity to read it in normal English. Maybe… just maybe… it's not as bad as I think.

And despite the fact I'm aware of the spoilers, for me it's like a director's version of the movie. The extended version. It helps me to better understand the facts that I already know.

And sometimes I notice differences in translation (one thing seems completely normal, the other completely unreasonable). And this experience helps me to immerse myself deeper into this world. I think if I find the enjoyment in doing so, it means I'm still like the game. I can't say the same about the Princes. The events I read in JP now appear on the EN server, but I force myself to read them. Maybe I should take a break…

I hope I answered your question.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

🔝 𝕊𝕋𝔸ℝ𝕋 ℙ𝔸𝔾𝔼 🔝

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

[ticktockmyclockworkhart]

I'm perhaps one of the most easy to please Pokemon fans ever. I wouldn't identify myself as a nintendo fanboy or anything even though I love a lot of their IPs (largely because the number one prerequisite to being a "nintendo fanboy" is hating Nintendo more than anything on earth it seems), but I will be the first to admit my standards are much lower than they should be. I eat up everything Pokemon related like the blindly eager little consumer I am, I've beaten every main series game and damn near every spin-off.

All this to say I think it says something when even I haven't beaten BDSP yet, and not for lack of trying. But the game bored me to tears. I've reset my saves on that game more than any other I have in the hopes that "well, maybe the next file I'll be more attached to". I can eat my way through new Pokemon games when they first come out in a few days and never put them down, but whenever I'd put BDSP down I'd have to reset my file again when I picked it back up because I no longer cared about whatever I had going on.

I've been grappling with this for a long time, trying to figure out what it is about this remake that makes it the one Pokemon game someone as easy to please as me couldn't care enough to finish. I'll be fully honest when I say I'll happily take whatever table scraps Game Freak cares to toss me and I'm not proud of that fact lol. I love Gen 4, it's one of my favorite Gens, and I actually like the BDSP artstyle too, I think it's a fun way to keep the spirit of the original games, though it really would have been cool to see Sinnoh at full scale and free to explore in 3D.

But today after another attempted replay I think I figured it out. It's the dumb. Fucking. Experience Share.

Pokemon is a turn based RPG, battling is literally the main gameplay loop and I found that I kept putting the game down because I would get so incredibly bored by the battles. None of them felt necessary and all of them felt way too damn easy. Pokemon Scarlet/Violet had this problem too, I noticed, but what got me to finish those games was I'd never experienced the story before and I wanted to see it finished. But with BDSP I know the story, so why should I finish it if the battles are such a drag? In the original Gen 4 I'd make a point of battling every trainer on every route. I'm very meticulous about my leveling and my Pokemon all need to be within one level of each other, lol. So my incentive for fighting every trainer was to keep my team at a high enough level and also to keep my levels rounded out. But with that EXP share they're always rounded, or god forbid they have different growth rates and I have to keep putting Pokemon away to prevent overleveling which just bothers my OCD more than anything lmao.

It also makes me care so much less about my Pokemon. I cared about my team because I took time to individually raise and train each Pokemon, and if I don't care about my Pokemon then frankly I barely care about the game. In Scarlet/Violet where trainer battles have become entirely optional for the most part I barely did any of them! And in BDSP all I am is annoyed by the trainer battles. There's next to no new content to keep the game interesting and give me a reason to keep playing, and when the main gameplay loop isn't even fun anymore, why would I play at all?

I was worriedly thinking that maybe I'm just getting old and it's hampering my enjoyment of the games (Terrifying thought) but I have just as much fun with ROM hacks that I did with older games. Most notably, there's no broken EXP share. Can't we at least get the option to turn it off? I get trying to find a solution to make grinding less of a miserable drag, because grinding is always the worst part of playing Pokemon, but the broken exp share hasn't made grinding less tedious, it's just made battling as a whole feel hollow and boring.

I still want to beat you some day, BDSP, I really do. Nothing makes me feel sadder than being bored by a franchise I love and I know can do better.

[scienceoftheidiot]

@his-alpha-vixen I hope you too don't mind me replying this way!

So I am going to go the opposite route to what I usually do with my WIPs here, which is try to keep the mystery and all. I'm going to give a detailed answer, for two reasons :

I have two very big WIPs I want to finish before I start writing this for real, even if I can't help plotting it, I don't want to dive into the characters and this setting while I'm still handling two other hard to write stuff. So it could take time, and sharing about it keeps me in the momentum to write it one day.

I don't mind spoilers myself. If you tell me where the story is headed and what is going to happen I still want to read the story, because what I want to know is HOW we get there, I want to live it and feel with the characters. So just giving out the structure of it doesn't bother me that much.

I'll keep it under a read more though in case some people aren't like me and want to avoid seeing plot points (and that makes the post appear shorter lol).

Roy and Riza stop piloting after a mistake of their own causes the destruction of their jaeger, injuries to themselves and above all the death of thousands of innocents in the outskirts of the city they were supposed to protect.

They are tasked to protect one big city, but they take too much time to kill the very big and too powerful kaiju before it reaches it, and it is entirely their conscious fault for plotting and hesitating, and they eventually have to kill him right there to save the bigger part of the city, crushing and burning thousands in the process.

Their boss (Bradley!) and the overall public don't give a shit because the places destroyed were slums.

Riza gets severe burns on her back, Roy on his hands while trying to save her (he starts wearing gloves at all times starting then). Roy and Riza alike feel tremendous guilt for the killing of thousands of innocents, but are shunned whenever they want to talk about it, because "they did their job".

Once they are (physically 🙃) healed, they try to go back to piloting, but during their first training session with a new jaeger the drift goes wrong. Both are anxious about messing up again and killing people and seeing the other being hurt, and they get stuck into a feedback loop, putting their whole crew and more in danger. Roy is the one who manages to pull out and bring Riza back, but they are then forbidden by Bradley to pilot together again, for safety reasons. Riza decides to become the mechanic for Roy and his new copilot - Havoc, whom Roy is drift compatible with, even if the connexion is nothing like what he had with Riza.

Flash forward a few years, a new pilot team appears: two young genius brothers who have been noticed for building their own jaeger with scavenged spare parts. The older has lost an arm and a leg (I take it that in a world with the technology to build giant robots connected to the nervous system of their pilots, there is a good equivalent to automail) and the younger never takes out his full pilot suit. They are great at fighting and friendly with most.

What the Elrics won't tell is that they were casualties of Roy and Riza's mistake. They were injured while trying to save their mom from the destruction.

*

One last point that has nothing to do with the story - and thanks already if you read until here, hope you liked these ideas :

Like everyone, I am wary of people stealing my ideas if I share them like that, but come on. This is fanfic. I can't whine about it. And while all the plot is there, I know my forte isn't plotting AT ALL, this is pretty easy to come up with if you're familiar with both source material. It's just a synthesis of both. My thing, what I'm good at - at least I think I am lol - is characters feelings and dialogues. Angst, for example. Which you don't have here lol. So eh feel free to just do the same thing, if it strikes your imagination, two authors with the same guidelines will never come up with the same stuff. The more the merrier.

[hummingbird-games]

Dev Diaries

March 5th, 2024

So. We're 3 months into the new year. Huh.

Updates from me? I started a new job! I've been reading/catching up on a toooooon of manga lately (I'm also sloooooowly making my way through a nonfiction read and can't help thinking how Corey would heavily sympathize with me. Sigh.)

I also got another free month of Spotify (lol, I think I'm the only person I know who only uses the free plan because I'd rather spend that money elsewhere??) so I've been on a listening spree and flagging songs for a writing playlist I will use for the majority of the HSDJY 2 drafting process moving forward.

I still have yet to play BG3. My family gifted me the physical edition, so I've been impatiently waiting for it to ship out. It's been 84 years JFJEHFJHJF!!

Hmmm...nothing else interesting has happened to me (that I can publicly share ☠️) so on with the game development updates!!!!!

What Has Gemini Been Up To? -> TKD (again)

March 16th!!! Y'all, this is the deadline the team and I are working towards for a finished and published game 😭 unfortunately my plans for full voice work won’t be realized by then (but they will be realized. Just in a few months. Honestly, it wouldn’t surprise me if y'all get the updated HSD 2 demo before the fully voiced TKD….)

What Has Gemini Been Up To? -> HSD:JY and Ko-fi

Ko-fi first!!

It’s only been a few months (since November??) but I’m super proud of my posting consistency! Granted, I’m a little anxious about how posts will look moving forward once I start moving major updates and general silliness to Tumblr. But. We shall cross the bridge when it appears.

March snuck up on me and I only have the free and any-paid-support ready, but the subbies are just There™️. That being said...when I'm quiet or posting non-Hummingbird content here, there's 99.9% chance I've made a free post on ko-fi.

Tumblr is looking like the other social media platforms right now with its flagrant support of AI, and it gives me a headache trying to decide how to keep everyone informed as well as share posts from my peers and new kids on the block. Anyhoo!!!

High School Daze goodies??

At the time of this post, a couple things have been happening that I haven't had the time (or the energy) to talk about. The obvious? HIGH SCHOOl DAZE: JUNIOR 2 HAS AN ITCH.IO PAGE!! I...have no idea when the full game will be out. I have an idea...but I don't want to say it and feel obligated to make that deadline just so I don't disappoint players. (I'm well aware that some people took one look at Crushed, went "Aww, that's nice, Gemini. Now where's HSD??" 🤣)

The first round of sprites have been commissioned!! If you peeped the key art (also done by my sprite artist, heehee she's lovely) you might notice some new outfits, some new hairdos. Fingers crossed I'll be able to update the page--to mirror the debut game's page--at the same time the new demo goes live (which will showcase all of or at least 75% of the common route of the full game. Stay tuned to find out if we'll focus on the friendship route or if I can defeat the Coding Monster to include all the variations for the romances too aha).

Writing wise? Five of the six total routes are outlined. (Florence's I've…barely started 🥲…this pre-production thing is kicking my ass). I’ve started drafting out the friendship route too, as seen by the random posts I’ve made about HSDJY 2. Well, a combination of friendship route + the common route with its lovely variations that aren’t a nuisance at all. Nope. *eye twitch*

I alsooooooo discovered that all the raw and edited music I created for HSD and for personal projects over the years using GarageBand were deleted. And I never backed them up. So. The tracks I made, the jingle for the splash screen, the main theme and it's 2 variations, and alllllll the little cute things I made that are as old as my own high school days are....gone.

Poof!

If I sound very calm about this, what an astute observation! But my anxiety is being used elsewhere, and I decided that I while I can't go back to the original files to tweak them, I've backed up the other files. And I don't mind starting from scratch with this.

But also y'all, please back up your shit. Please. Don't be caught slipping.

That poll I made a while back that now has results and I totally didn't forget about?? The boys won!! And I'm not surprised 🤣 I haven't decided yet if I'll do a live developer stream or a prerecorded one, but either way it'll happen closer to October, the 2nd anniversary date.

What Will Gemini be Up To?? -> Rest?!?!?

I assumed a lot of things about what would be done or not done by March, and that led me to loosely block out March as a 'rest' month. I wouldn't work on any projects, and instead would read, play console and computer games, and basically take the break I didn't take in December.

Well. The Knight Dance is still in production. And I commissioned sprites earlier than expected. And I didn't plan enough ko-fi content to be scheduled in my absence. LOL and I started a new job!? 🥹

But!!! But but but, I do need to take some type of break so I'll do my best to be scarce in this space (and lower the temptation to work because I see y'all are working LOL). Cool? Cool!

- Gemini 💛