#dont know a lot abt tango

[sweetvalentinescandy]

grian live on The Red Tour 2013

[watcheraurora]

u did that reblog abt talking abt ur fics so now ur subjected to me

Tango is so fucking cool in all of your goddamn fanfictions. like every time everything he does is so genuis coded which means your a genuis. genuis in fiction. And i fcuking love how fucking comic codded this is. like cartoonish i love it and i love that you play in that willingly.

and wdym TANGO FROZE THE CUFFS TO GET OUT ughhh i hate that man he should've died in the finale (i dont mean that) and oh my god him coming back as deepfrost ughhh

I love empires studio and Jimmy beign a backround artist and seeing colors in people. colors are so beautiful and soft and that's just so him ya know,,,, I can imagine Tango spent DAYS analysing his work sometimes. He'd go super brained and be like "this color is because of... joel being an asshole!" and Jimmy would be like "it's actually because of martyn..." and tango would be like ughghghghhg

also that clip about tango doing the 288 math in zed's episode. totally thought about your tango then. i was like "does he really have 160 IQ?????" lmfao. i fucking forever love ice walls

you know me and my dang love for healing light and my dang impatience for part two. Im so fucking excted (this goes out to inferna too)

Firewalls. is it evil of me to hope that tango burns Jimmy's wings. even a little bit. just a little bit. for the shits and giggles.

We need more of grian lore i cannot stress this enough grian is like that badass character in a cartoon (maybe bcz he is but oh well)

Foundation is <3 angel is sososo pretty (i have never seen her in my life) and im so excited for the LOREE i keep imaging her and scar in a bus in the middle of the night going to grian's since thazt chapter dropped and UGH.

I'm fine with that XD I love talking about my fics XD

This got long so it's under the cut

Thank you! I try to lean into the cartoonish vibes as much as I can! It helps keep things a little lighter and, to me personally, more fun. I'm really tired of "gritty, grimdark" superhero stories that have come about in recent decades don't get me started on what they've done to Batman and even Superman (sob) so I try to make mine capture the whimsy and fun of "if I had powers, I'd use them to help" as much as I can

As for Tango's genius, I do really struggle with it, but thank you, I appreciate the compliment

Yeah, Tango freezing the cuffs to get out was, I'll admit, a little Elsa-from-Frozen but I didn't even think about Frozen when I was writing it XD I was just thinking "Oh some metal gets really brittle when it gets cold and Tango is cold and he can't freeze" so I did the same thing XD

I don't know why I made Jimmy a background artist, tbh. It just kinda suited him in my head. Not the center of attention but still an appreciated part of the process without which nothing would be as good and immersive. And I liked that for how Jimmy and Sheriff are in this universe. (And, yeah, Tango doesn't always understand what Jimmy's color analysis choices are but he enjoys it nonetheless)

Honestly I think ccTango is a lot more intelligent than he gives himself credit for and I'm perfectly content to perpetuate that in the fics I write. Because, yeah, holy cow that's actually a sheep, Tango /ref that math was fast. Like I can do long multiplication in my head too but not that fast

@infernafiresword Passing along the love for Healing Light! We're working on Part 2 we promise. I just kinda got infected by Perfection/Saint and took a few weeks off every other project to get it finished and written but once it's done (and it's close) I will be going back to Healing Light 2 and Burn Out 2

Oh part 2 of Walls of Fire will have lots of shenanigans, but I can't tell you what happens to Jimmy's wings because spoilers

Oh Grian Lore? Okay. Here's a fun fact about Ice Walls!Grian: there is one (1) very specific reason Grian decided to try having friends again after being mostly alone for thousands of years when a 14-year-old Jimmy declared that they would be friends. I might be toying with revealing it in Walls of Fire 2 though so I'm not going to say what that very specific reason was just yet (but if I don't include it for whatever reason, come yell at me and I'll tell you then lol). It had something to do with Jimmy and his personality, and that's all I'll say

I have also never seen Angel in my life but she's pretty in my head too 😊 It's very dear to me when people enjoy and like Angel - she's my sweetie

[wassupmygays]

ummm hello I would like way more about hunger games au pls I'll take anything wheres Jimmy where's Tango wheres Scar from I will take whatever you give me I will go feral over this thank you

!!!! ok first off i just wanna say u made my day with this ask im so excited that other people r excited abt this and want to hear my explosions (also i definitely want to make individual profile posts for each tribute so this will be. sparknotes of what i have thought up so far :D) Tango - i have tango in district 3, along with mumbo. district 3 is the technology district, and with mumbos redstone contraptions and tango's decked out programming, it felt very obvious placements to me :] i dont think they were very close at all before the games. not in a bad way, just they didn't cross eachothers paths all that much (subject to change but in life series canon theyre never on the same team iirc). theyre cordial in the proceedings before the games but dont train together or plan to team up. tango, skizz, and bigb eventually ally together during the training days before the games! (aka heart foundation) Jimmy - jimmy and scar are actually from the same district, district 11! 11 is the agriculture district, and to place jimmy in this district i pulled from his ranchers and empires sheriff vibes if that makes sense. i also just know that 11 is one of the poorest districts and doesn't usually do well in the games, and we all know jimmy in these games. (i considered jimmy in 12 bc of the canary thing, but skizz and impulse r from there and i figured putting him somewhere else is fun too!) scar - as said above, scar is from district 11! i don't think he is expected to do super well in the games from the reaping, but during interviews its clear that he has the charisma to get some sponsors. i honestly haven't thought up all that much for scar yet but dw i will (he literally wins. how could i ignore him) fun fact! scar and jimmy were going to kind of team together, but during the first day of training, scott (career tribute) makes some joke to gem about how they wouldnt stand a chance if they teamed together bc of their district. jimmy let this get in his head and decided to split from scar, causing both of them to be loners at the start of the games. jimmy eventually finds martyn during the games and they ally bc of reasons (that i can get into if we want to), but scar stays relatively alone honestly most of these tributes and their district placements are pretty set in my mind, except for martyn, cleo, and bigb, who i still can't figure out where to put (if anyone has suggestions pls send them lmao). ive got some bits and plot points from the series already worked out into a hunger games universe, but a lot of it i dont! if theres any specific part of the series anyone wants to ask about, please do!! i work best when someone tells me what to brainstorm on lmao. anyways lol hope yall r liking this! i dont have any clue if it will gain any traction, but i've been thinking abt this au so much since the finale and i wanted to try and share it and talk about it with people :D pls send comments or asks abt any of it if you want to !!!

[moth--moss]

Finally watching Grians video so I'm gonna summarize my thoughts for the hermits as it goes! This is gonna be a long one so all the summaries and thoughts below the cut :]

Ren: Absolutely love what he's doing with the Gigacorp stuff and the like, poisoned terrain and all??? Always a fan of ppl making stories and worldbuilding so we love to see it! I'm not watching Ren's pov but I've seen bits and pieces from other povs so its not completely new to me :] Ren's honestly just such a delightful person, love to see him stoppin by other ppls episodes!

Tango: One of my main povs this season, a surprise to nobody, absolutely love all the steampunk and his factory and everything he's got going on. Unsurprisingly he's found a new hole to live out of but who didn't see that one coming lmao. Tango rightfully has a place in my three-way tie for favourite hermit.

Cleo: this is my first time seeing their base this season! And damn what a shame its been this long cause I'm already really invested in the little story shes cookin up. The wizard tower is just,,,,, so cool??? I love the block palette for it! Not to mention all the armour stand work its so so cool, definitely gonna have to set aside time to watch their pov after this cause I desperately want to get the full story now! All of the spaces have character and feel very real with all the armour stand work and everything, definitely a master of her craft o7

Scar: So ive only seen Scars latest episodes and streams, i didnt watch anything before them, so it's like kiiiinda new? But also ive watched all of Grian's so ive seen most of this like, out the corner of my eye the whole time. Scar's builds always have so much story and character you love to see it, there's just so much soul and care behind his builds??? Ajcjdjacjs I got so scared seeing the creeper test tube thing empty I'm used to there bein a lil guy in there. The train is SO cool and scar is just So good at glass work??? The swaggon hat o7 emotionally i never left season 8. Scars one of my favourite hermits so i had a lot to say

Joe: another hermit i dont watch yet love dearly, hes just so much fun. Joe is just insane (/pos) and just so creative and imaginative in such a unique way, holy shit. I really need to watch more of his stuff cause the vibes are truly immaculate. Also as an aside this finally answers to me where Cubs labryinth is cause i had no idea until now lmao. That thing is MASSIVE btw. Joe Hills,,, just the whole scale of this whole thing is totally insane he deserves so much credit for this. I envy his dedication wowww.

Bdubs: Another hermit i dont watch but would love to, and who i see a lot of through other povs. Bdubs is like beyond any other builder in this game, hes like,,, a true artist, yhe way he uses blocks and everything is just ajdnfjwkdkw true art. Hes like painting, not building. Always absolutely blown away by everything he does in this silly block game. He wants to make ppl feel feelings and it DEFINITELY comes through. THERES WAS EVEN NYLIUM ON THE GROUND WHO DOES THAT! OHH and the FRAMING of it all?? The way this man thinks is just art on its own. I could look at bdubs builds forever i swear. Its phenominal. Note: keralis spotted in the storage cave <3 thats my guyyyyy. THE SILOS??? so so pretty. The way he uses thw bottom edge of the polished diorite to make those solid lines through it??? Aghhh its so cool. Blown away with how he makes depth on flat surfaces, its just insane. AND THE GRASS IS HAND PLACED? THE WATERFALLS??? Always lovely to see bdubs builds.

Cub: i know almost nothing abt what Cubs been up to except for the rockets, always lovely to see him showing up in other povs. Lovely to see him messing with sculk again, hes gone feral for it LMAO. All the sculk stuff is so interesting im probably gonna have to check out his videos also cause i am DESPERATE to know wth is going on with this because hes being so so cryptic with it. The rocket factory is just so cool? I love how much ppl can do now with the crafters.crqzy that he pulled the fireworks permit and decided to make it like a main part of his season. Just ALL IN with it. Respectable.

Etho: etho!!! Another of my main povs this season actually, which is new for me cause last time i tried to watch his season he made the shulker storage thing and it broke my brain and i couldnt understand anything. (This time it made sense though). I really love ethos base this season, even if his roof was still unfinished at this point in time lmao. I love his little pond and garden and balcony and all that. Also its not here yet in the tour but i LOVE the lighting work he did around the mailbox its SO good. Also obligqtory frogger is awesome. When the server download goes up at the end of the season there are gonna be SO many games to play o7

Impulse: impy!! We love him so much. Dont watch his episodes but love to see him around :] did not know his city was gonna be a game?? Thats so cool?? The citys already so cool and im so excited to see it finished cause its already looking lovely and i can tell its gonna be really cool all together :] love the lore and all around the city too!

Zedaph: a hermit i watched quite a bit of last season but nothing yet this one, lovely guy always a fun time :] no surprise at all to see hes doing something else fun and silly this season. This really is a season of minigames! This guy is absolutely wild and just so much fun

Pearl: another i havent been watching, to my own sadness as pearl is one of my personal favourite builders on the server! Her whole solarpunk aesthetic this season is just DELIGHTFUL. Another hermit ive been meaning to watch for a while now cause i just love how she does like,,,, everything? I love Pearl builds just so so much. Absolutely love the sunflowers in the floor of her storage (my favourite flower) and all the yellows just in general its just such a bright build and so so lovely. Theres so much character and all the build flows together so so nicely. Also her dye qnd flower shop??? SO nice with all the layering qnd the glass roofs and just how open and fresh it all feelsand qjdjfjsjdsj i just love how pearl builds so much she is KILLING IT this season

Doc: so im currently watching through docs pov and i kiiiinda dont want to be spoiled on any big projects and crazy farms hes planning, so im actually skipping his segment of the tour. Though i will still say doc is absolutely insane and i love all the crazy game breaking stuff he does, i just want to see it all as it happens :] if i do catch up eventually i may circle back to the tour episode later but for now no spoilers!

Skizz: what a delight! Havent seen his episodes but we love skizz so much, such a big heart on that guy and so glad hes here. Love him and all his gift hoarding and hes just so iconic. His big pyramid is all a big psychology metaphor and stuff and thats,, very very cool i didn't know that! Truly a season of minigames i love it!

Mumbo: ive watched some of the early stuff for his season but i had a solid like 6 months where i wasnt really into anything like at all, so i stopped watching after some of the early stuff, though i do plan to get back to his videos sometime because i love what hes doing this season! (Oh noo some of the stuff id written got deleted so i gotta try to rephrase) mumbos been getting so good at building lately and it really does show with his work this season! I absolutely love all his work with the concept art and everything, its my favourite kind of excessive and "unnecessary" worldbuilding that makes a project feel that much more alive.

Joel: I've seen joels first few episodes but dont really watch him much. Hes absolutely incredible in just how much detail he shoves into every little space. His whole base this season just feels so real and its all so intentional and well planned and thought out. His build feels almost like its just been torn out of a real city and dropped straight into minecraft, theres just so much characters and attention to his builds. Just a place i would love to visit and explore. One thing: i mean this in the best way, but his little songs give me the WORST second hand embarrassment its so hard to listen to LMAO thats most of why i have a hard time watching his videos. Hes so cringe and i absolutely LOVE it. Never change, joel

Keralis: remember what i said about my three way tie of favourite hermit?? Keralis firmly holds a place right up there <3 another of my favourite builders and always holding just the most DELIGHTFUL vibes and just the sweetest face on the whole server. Embarrassingly i am... not fully caught up on his episodes, ive only seen up to episode 10. In my defence i only came back to hermitcraft in the last few months so i have a lot to catch up on! Though unlike with doc i have no qualms about spoiling myself because its not like lovely builds from keralis are anything other than my expectations :] Ive only just started his part of the tour but i know im gonna be smiling the whole way through <3 absolutely beautiful base i want to go here for vacation asap and never leave, beautiful trees and booshes and all the little huts, i love it all so so much. Also i would absolutely love a tour where keralis shows every single tree individually you dont even understand i would happily sit there and watch the entire thing <3 keralis why are you so hard to come up with a good design for i swear ill find one eventually hes just such a bug to me. I just want to sit along the side of one of the paths with a nice tropical drink its just so so lovely. If yall let me talk about keralis i will NOT be shutting up any time soon, if this mini essay is anything to go by. While on the topic id like to also talk about his season 9 base becau[character count exceeded, the following 10,319 characters have been archived and removed from this post (/j)] jokes aside, absolutely love everything keralis does, will never not be obsessed with everything he does <3

Xb: you know i gotta love him, just such a sweetheart. I dont watch him but you tend to see a lot of him if you watch a lot of keralis like i do. Absolutely delightful guy and such a sweet face :] love his little modern starter house too. Ive never actually seen his monument base thing but its so impressive. I, too, love prismarine so so much, and the oranges too its all so lovely, one of my favourite minecraft mobs <3 absolutely love his storage too with the guardian aquariums?? Amazing

Grian: another of my main povs! Love how open concept it is this season, how loose hes playing the game and how freely he's been playing it out this season, its been a really fun watch! Absolutely love the vibes of the chamber of sea critters its so atmospheric. Always love a grian build :]

Gem: another hermit whos building style i love yet dont watch sadly. First of all i just love how gem does the bright coloured roofs? Theyre very bright and i love the gradients she used with the moss and bamboo its so pretty. I didnt know her base was based on Dredge! Thats a game ive been meaning to check out and now im just more interested lmao. Gems another hermit who does just so much story with her builds and its all so interesting, definitely another high up on the list of hermits i really want to watch. Also i LOVE her little starter boat, its so cute and simple and so well executed. As well as the lighthouse! Honestly just seeing the collectors house now its gotta be one of my favourites, the colours and shapes and forms just look so nice? Nothing but praise for Gem tbh her builds this season are just lovely o7

Xisuma: we finally get to the 3rd and final hermit in the tie for my favourite! Despite the fact that... i havent watched like any of his episodes this season... i do tend to watch X more from his streams though in my defence, and hes the watchthrough im planning after i finish catching up with doc tbh. Not skipping his though cause ive already seen a lot of his base so theres not much that feels all that much of a spoiler. Plus i cant miss out on any Xisuma content <3 also to mention, i would love to be able to draw X one day but,,, i cant draw armour. One day o7 back to the topic of the tour though! I love the vibes and palette and everything hes going for this season! Its so structural and i just love the aztec inspiration! Its very natural and overgrown and its just amazing and impressive. X is just always just so delightful :] i honestly love his storage too with the walls of shulkers and all the colours and everything, and all the sorting and stuff its so cool. X does just so much impressive, i envy his organization especially. Honestly such a delightful person and i always love tuning into his streams and videos alike, and hopefully i finish my doc binge so i can watch xisumas season 10 episodes finally cause im really looking forwards to them in particular! He definitely doesnt give himself enough credit as a builder (a common theme among some hermits sadly). I love all the farms and stuff! I really want to get more into farming and stuff in general personally cause i love automation in any way i can, ive just yet to learn it for minecraft. The Golia copper machine is so cool?? I remember the big aging machine from i think last season, where it spread all the stuff out and brought them together when it was aged or something? Idk i love copper farms even if they are a little less useful now... x is just so cool and delightful :]

Wels: Tbh i know very little about welsknight, hes a pov i dont watch and one that doesnt really interact with my main povs, but hes a very pleasant individual! i really like his build and can appreciate a man with a distinct aesthetic! the silhouette and shapes of the castle is really nice! its just a very solid base :]

Beef: i dont watch beef personally but i did see quite a bit of him at the start of the season through... a certain unnamed perspective that i watched when the server first started, and also because he does show up through some other povs i watch too! He's a really nice guy and its always lovely when he stops by other povs :] i really do like how hes done his base this season with the big open farm, hes done it well!

Hypno: Another hermit i really dont know well, for similar reasons to welsknight, since he didnt really do a tour theres not as much i can say because i really dont know much of anything about him, to be honest. his base is really cozy though! ive only ever seen his exteriors as people fly past/over his base, but its really cozy and warm! ive always been a fan of pink and brown together in general :]

False: another hermit i dont know all that much, admittedly, but another lovely member of the server, i also dont really know what shes been up to this season, but i really like it! The colours, texturing, and shapes are all really interesting! I love the industrial underbelly, its so interesting and cool! False is actually another hermit i really would like to check out at some point! I love the vibes :] I also love the little hints of lore! the trees and terrain is also very nice! id like to see more of what shes been working on! if any false fans see this feel free to hit me up id love to know more abt her and all that!

Jevin: another hermit i dont know very well but i do see him on some other hermits streams sometimes and he is also a very good vibe when hes around! ive never seen his base before but i really love the enchanted forest! never get enough of those. plus the ambience and sounds are so unsettling and its just so cool. i love the palette and its very interesting! I love how dark and moody it all is, theres a really nice atmosphere to everything hes done so far!

And obviously finally the shopping district, what a lovely mishmash of all the hermits and their building styles and its all so lovely. Absolutely loved this video even though it took me like two whole days to get through. im so excited to watch more of these povs that ive gotten new interest in, not to mention the reminder that im only caught up on one of my three favourite hermits, im really overdue a few proper binges, huh?

If anyone actually did read all of these little blurbs thanks so so much for bearing with me, I know I definitely gave some hermits a little more time to talk about than others, and i feel bad for the first few because i may not have gone in depth about how i felt about them as i may have if theyd been later on, but i dont want to worry about revising all my thoughts on everything, this has already been a massive little project for me to basically journal these thoughts as i watched and i dont have the time to do it all over again lmao.

I love each and every hermit so so much for all they do, and im so glad grian did this mid-season tour so we could get a full look of the server all in one place! its lovely to get to see all the work everyone is putting in and how everything is coming together, i know theres always so much from the seasons before this i watched that i still know next to nothing about, so its really cool to get to look at it all!

Thanks for joinin me for this essay of thoughts and ramblings if you took the time, again i really do appreciate it! lmk what yall thought too im so curious to learn so much more that i may have missed in my watchthrough :]

o/

[puer-aurea]

been thinking abt a fully fleshed out mercenary au since i posted that oneshot for sixth day of christmas so.... heres a drabble

jimmy and martyn are, ofc, human mercenaries who call themselves the big dogs so they can seem scarier than they really are. theyre mostly homeless theres a rumour abt a witch who lives in the woods and everyone thinks its lizzie but when they show up shes like "oh no thats scar!" and points to her very eccentric and flamboyant neighbor who lives across the river. scar looks NOTHING like a witch but when you go in, you come back out with exactly the potion you wanted, several others you didnt actually need, significanctly less money than what you went in with, and absolutely no memory of actually being inside and making the purchase. hes incredibly suspicious but godDAMN do his potions and crystals work well skizz owns a building plaza named the heart foundation where he rents out sections to people for their stores (yk like those buildings that are connected stores?? i really hope this makes sense). tango is his assistant as well as bigb but bigb is super weird and disappears a lot. tango was the one to suggest the coffee shop idea that martyn overheard. skizz is an angel and tango is an imp lizzie and scar own one of the spaces where they sell very normal things like farm produce and things that would usually be hard for the other members of the community to get like amethyst and food enchanted with elven magic. as well as very specific bones lizzie has found (no, she will NOT tell you where she got them, yes they are organic, she declines to answer if they are ethically sourced). scar is an elf which is why he's able to sell elven enchanted food. the roomies own one of the store spaces and mostly sell wool products but theyve started farming cotton in hopes of expanding their market. they live together on a farm with a fence covered in vines surrounding it so the animals can wander about sometimes. since they sell wool products, they have a lot of sheep, so when they need the sheep back in their pen they hire mercenaries to do it for them. cleo is the only zombie in the community and, while grian was mentioned as an avian in the oneshot, hes actually going to be a fae. everyone thinks etho is a human but he barely leaves home so cleo and grian are the only ones who know for sure whether or not he is gem is the girl who just moved in with the dream of starting a band. she ends up with an imp and an angel both named scott and they call themselves gem and the scotts. they rent one of skizz's spaces for a studio and gem lives in the apartment above it. impulse, scott the imp, lives in a cave, and scott the angel lives in a cottage on the edge of the woods (so not as far in as lizzie and scar) the mounders live in 4 big old creepy houses that look completely different on the inside than they do outside. its also a 'gated' community but they dont care enough to enforce it. mumbo and pearl are both vampires, bdubs is a fae, and joel is an elf. ren is also around to add more people to their little community even tho this uses the alliances made in secret life. he lives in a smaller house a little ways away from scott's cottage. he seems human enough but theres a rumor that he's a werewolf. no one really knows what bigb and lizzie are, scott even introduces them to gem as the 'suspicious weirdos' and cleo and grian joke that not even they know what they are.

[definitelynotshouting]

I have a question about the earlier chapters of LITD, it's been eating at my brain a bit thinking about it.

Basically i've been wondering if Grian would have died without intervention after the weakness potions? All the HC crew made it sound like Grian was dying like on deaths door, and everyone had to work to make sure he didn't in fact die because of the potions. So did Grian underestimate how weak he was and three potion's really might have been enough to kill him? Or did it just look like he was dying from the HC crew's perspective?

(ps also i'm obsessed with the LITD playlist and i'm listening to it nonstop and therorizing what might happen based on the song choices and also you have a banger taste in music aaaaaa)

This is such an excellent question!!! So Grian wasnt actively dying from the weakness potions-- my thoughts on potions and Watchers is that they just kinda interact a bit weirdly with Watcher biology, because they're created with Player utility code in mind and those are two separate codes inside two separate entities. Kinda like if you tried to give an alien aspirin; it might not be very effective, it might just plain kill them, it all sorta depends on how they would metabolize it and a million other factors.

The important point is that Grian took three weakness, which could absolutely kill a Player (and was indeed dangerous for him to take in his weakened state), and since the hermits at this point knew basically nothing about Watchers and Watcher biology, they treated the situation the way they would if another Player took the same amount. That combined with how physically frail and emaciated he looks, it really appeared that he was actively dying from the potions, and they didnt have the information necessary to understand that wasnt the case.

In many ways they still dont know a lot about Grian's situation, so they're coming at his care from the perspective of another Player. Its why Tango is so willing to believe him when he says he'll need five health potions to somewhat recover-- none of them know whether or not thats a lie, bc they know next to nothing about Watchers and how they work yet!!

Sjdbejdjd i hope this answered your question alright!!! This was a pretty long answer but i have to overexplain things or i will Die /silly

(also i am SO happy you like the playlist, i could write dissertations abt this playlist, i curate this playlist SO CAREFULLY and i have wildly specific criteria for it, its a labor of pure love and even unfinished-- bc its missing some VITAL scenes to be represented at this point in time-- it is smth i am still so deeply proud of :] so i am very happy you like it!!!! :D thank you so much for such a nice compliment!!)

[rexregistries]

im quitting smut & everything nsfw!!

like straight up, cold-turkey, quitting. so far, we're 20 hours in.

heres why

this is gonna get REALLLL personal, buckle in.

i know not many ppl will see this, but its nice to just get it out.

tw: online sexual grooming and me being a minor thru it all

basically, im gonna talk abt how this all started (i should REALLY be doing homework right now, but i need to get it off my chest, and i only have 1 assignment left)

please bear with me! i only recently remembered all of this, and most of it is still terribly foggy, and hopefully shall stay that way.

when i was 8, i entered into a friendship with a 26-year-old man on roblox. we met thru our mutual like for percy jackson & the olympians, and i met him on a pjo role-playing game on roblox. mind you, roblox filter about 8 years ago was almost nonexistent.

the man, sam (found this out years into my "relationship" w him, to me he was cookie [cookieflame546]), asked my age when i first met him. i knew about stranger danger, obviously i did, i was born a girl. but i gave him my age anyway. so he knew.

this relationship lasted 5 years. 8 years old to 13 years old.

it started okay! we'd roleplay together, nothing too bad! the real trouble began when one of my ocs went into a romantic relationship with one of his ocs. he asked me if i knew anything about sex (the deed, the dirty, the devils tango, he called it something else that i dont remember) and i said no. obviously i didnt, i was 8.

he offered to teach me stuff, and i said ok. i trusted him for some reason. (NO GIRL STOPPP)

and boy. BOY, did he teach me stuff.

he bought a private server JUST to have sex w me. i'd go online, roleplay a little with my other online friends (who were my age, maybe 1 or 2 years older), and then once sam got on, i'd go to the private server. it happened maybe three times a week, i think? we'd roleplay w other people normally most of the time. i got discord at 10, because he asked me to.

when it started getting really, really, actually terrible (more than it already was) was when i got into the hamilton fandom in 2020. (also, since covid was happening, i was on everyday, so we interacted a lot more)

"kal, y is hamilton important?" well, when i got into hamilton, i got into wattpad. when i got into wattpad, i got into smut. when i got into smut, i got into actual fucking porn. at the ripe age of 12 years old.

i was so proud of my newfound knowledge. i wanted to show him all i knew. the sex got worse. he'd find ways to bypass the increasingly strong filter, and so would i.

the only thing im glad for is that he never sent nsfw pics, and neither did i.

it started tapering off once i got into 8th grade. i had more homework, i couldnt be on as much. we still had those little sessions, but they were more infrequent.

(BUT, in his place, came another friend. his name is alex. hes a year older than me, and we roleplayed almost exclusively sexually together. outside of roleplay, we would also message sexually on discord. some of got disturbing when i look back on it [he said he would find my address, climb into my window, and fuck me. bro i am 12 years old]

me and alex fell out of contact for a long time [something something i used to be really homophobic and our entire friendgroup, excluding him and i, was queer]. we say hi hello when hes online on discord, but we dont talk anymore)

slowly, me and sam went back into a regular friendship. we didn't talk for months, other than the occasional hi, hello, hru, im good. i stopped roleplaying, he didnt.

and then my brain decided "yooooo wait this was kinda bad.......im gonna make them forget it >:]"

and i did! i forgot about it. and then in freshmen year, at a winter camp for school, it all came rushing back. i cried about it to one of my closest friends (they moved, but we still talk. if ur seeing this joey [ur prob not], the second im 18 we r gonna see each other istg!!!!), and they told me to block him. i did.

i havent spoken to him since.

and then my brain did another little silly and said "im gonna make them forget it again!! >:]"

and guess what! i forgot about it again.

until i sat by myself, just having finished a brutal smut fic, crying, because, man, why the fuck was i like this? why cant i stop reading and watching and looking at this horrible shit? because it was ruining me! it really was! (it still is, but we're working on it)

andddddddd it came rushing back again.

finally, an answer! thats why im like this!

my most formative years were filled with sex! thats why im obsessed with it!

i know im partly to blame. i enabled myself by actively looking for nsfw. but im trying to fix that.

thank u for ur time :]

[aquaquadrant]

i dont know if this makes sense to anyone else or if its just me. but villainous thing by shayfer james is So perfect for your hels to pay au. like

"welcome, won't you come inside?"- can be a lot of things, like atlas's welcoming facade to tango and bravo to get them into his trap, and also the whole 'smiling while i beat the everloving Shit out of you" vibe of papa al's mansion

"suddenly you're very near as i prefer you"- atlas keeping tango imprisoned so he can keep his property

"you have always been a delicate disaster / fine of fire and of frame"- other than just the fire part writing itself. i think this can mean the amount of tests hels tek had to do to break tango and just atlas kinda knowing tango doesnt like him but he doesnt rly care

"oh dear, let me see those smokey eyes / 'cause you're a villainous thing / and we cant have you living a lie"- the ...racism?? idk hybrid discrimination all around hels tek aka. how atlas doesnt care abt tango as a person bc of his blaze roots. also just like smokey eyes?? the fire imagery in this song is AH

"while they wait by gates of pearl / we'll be building castles in purgatory"- THIS IS HELS. also this can mean papa al's mansion, hels tek, and any other like monolith in hels bc while everyone else is scraping by to survive they have all the power

"and you'll find no ever after here / it's clear this isn't what you came for / i'll be your puckish puppeteer / on this delightful little detour"- atlas trying to pitch his uh. business model to bravo. aka asking him to do the bidding of hels tek with a promise that he can go to hermitcraft

SORRY IF THIS ASK IS TOO LONG I JUST GOT RLY EXCITED WHEN I LISTENED TO THIS SONG (its very good. also i think the general tone/vibe of it matches with that nasty showman glamour.)

and i love your au, it snuck in the walls of my brain and camped out there so uh thanks LOL /lh <33

OHHHH his this is so cool!!! i’ve never heard shayfer james before, that song has some really cool jaunty vibes 💃 and YESSS i can absolutely see this fitting the au!! atlas in particular matches so well with that shady showman feel like you said, and your analysis is spot on.

and BTDUBS don’t apologize for sending long stuff like this y’all, i absolutely love it!! warms my heart to know ppl enjoy the au <3

[blvenote]

hi yumi!!! my thoughts from the chapter r below the cut as always <3 IM SO EXCITED FOR THE NEXT CHAPTERS THO WE LOVE A GOOD HONGJOONG INTRODUCTION

• WEEENDYYYYY IN THE HOUSE!! also the pigeons r me watching yn get ready like she's the roast beef salting herself to be served on a platter

• ^ because political figures dont like admitting that they're corrupt, and/or that they got help :) and yk... ateez prob does a lot of... unsavory things behind the curtain that normal people disagree w

• wendy sus as hell (in the best way possible lol), but i like how she dodged that question so obviously HAHA

• i think dysfunctional family relationships r so interesting; i love writing them and i love reading abt them ofc as well. the thing u wrote abt how maybe his humanity awakened when he thought abt his children is so interesting too. like where do these awful people draw the line? their own flesh and blood? is pretending they never existed/hiding them away better than killing them altogether?

• LMAO KIHYUN AND YN W THE CURTAINS IS LITERALLY MY MOM AND ME 💀💀💀 whenever im home, i always start pulling open the curtains to make it brighter and my mom hisses like she's a vampire... sheesh

• hmmm the contrast and nuance of /types/ of gangs on the streets here is interesting too; like the organized crime groups are different depending on what they did during the war

• I LOVE LIQUOR LORE I HOPE WE GET TO HEAR ABT BLACK SHADOW'S HISTORY

• "could he be holding a scary title as well or was it something worse?" i love that titles are never the "something worse" cuz a criminal is the best when u don't know they're a criminal

• "lieut. yunho is FORGIVING?" im sorry i laughed 😭 i read that like yns eyes went wide like u gotta be shitting me yeo, if ur gonna lie at least try to make it sound accurate 😭 BUT IIIINTERESTING HMMMM why would yunho be the most forgiving? he's just a soft boyo underneath all that lanky-limbed scariness 😔💔

• also where is mingi and jongho and wooyo, we havent introduced them yet right 😭

• ah i love tsundere jihoon . hard, stale rice on the outside, fluffy warm rice on the inside

• YUMI UR BIAS IS SHOWING W THOSE YUNHO DESCRIPTIONS BAHAHHAHA

• I KNOW WHAT ITS LIKE TO BE BETRAYED BY BOTH BLOOD AND WATER ??? OOOOOOO THAT LINE HITS SO GOOD OMG I NEED TO BORROW THIS WHAT

• im tweaking after that last part of the meeting WHAT. like im sputtering like a boiling teapot WHAT we're dancing a tango here and i love it

• hints at the possibility of having known each other before during the war????? i like the smell of this easter egg 😌 love the hints of further backstory slowly coming in to fill in the gaps!! also jaemin is a menace as usual, wbk

• HES LIKE A STRAY CAT FIDNFKDNDKDN IM GONNA CRY LMFAO

• pledis manufacturers??? bites lip more new characters for the ensemble!! very fun

• i Iike the pointing to and connecting of details during seonghwa and yns convo, the finanical aid to the glance at the pearl ring — both r quire observant, which ig is an essential skill to survive in this business (one wrong move can result in ur life ruined) and ive def mentioned this before but THE POLITICAL INTRIGUE!!! the details like the sirens rebel party and ateez-mx pharma being on the "same side" r so good and add so much to the immersiveness

• ODDLY FAMILIAR??? kim hongjoong i see u... i am connecting the dots... also i love that yn gasps at his appearance and we both agree that he is certified yummy

• awh i like how youve developed san and yns relationship to be far more casual now that they arent like directly a boss-employee kind of dynamic, its a nice contrast to have this convo w san in the middle of all the office tension 0_0

• OKAAAAAAY i kind of enjoyed the fencing match btwn joong and yn, tho it was mostly joong making the parries, but yn did have a good handle w that strictland tip kdngldnfk and at least joong isnt an asshole enpugh to completely ignore her warnings. truly i went into this chapter believing he was going to be an asshole AND stupid 💀 BUT CONTACTING THE RV SPIES?? UHHHH NEWSFLASH SHE LITERALLY LIVES W ONE

overall, very VERY intriguing chapter!! i loved the subtle tension that was present throughout the entire chapter, like even tho there wasn't any action like last chapter, i was def still on the edge of my seat. im so excited to see how the plot continues to unfold in the next chapters :')))

The Leaders | Chapter II

"this is the underworld that no one escapes from."

masterlist

ot8!ateez x f!reader, mafia au

chapter warnings: drinking, smoking, illegal businesses, mentions of gangs, war/military and weapons, hongjoong is the designated asshole in this chapter

chapter wc: 10.9k

chapter synopsis: you learn more about ateez from your housemate, wendy, and from kihyun of mx pharmaceuticals who is also the crescent’s business partner. you get familiar with your new job at the crescent company’s main office and learn about their deal with secretary park. wanting to stop them from that harmful deal, you finally speak up only for the boss, hongjoong, to remind you that you are just a bookkeeper. 

prev chapter recap: an attack on the crescent bar prompts you, the bookkeeper of the crescent bar, to carry out yeosang’s order and flee with the contents of the safe. however, you have discovered a secret package which leads you to a confrontation with the underboss, park seonghwa, who has no choice but to kill you. to save yourself, you reveal that you possess some information about the elites that could be useful to them, and that you are willing to exchange this information for your life. that lands you a job at the crescent company’s main office and you have a rocky first day, getting to know the ins-and-outs of your new workplace and colleagues.

For the beginning of a new chapter of your life, which could take a very sinister turn, it sure was awfully sunny today, the pigeons on your window sill taking great joy in the way you would pause in the middle of getting ready and reconsider all your life choices so far. Their cheerful chirps were starting to annoy you and you couldn’t help but shoot deathly glares in their direction. 

It was your first official work day as the bookkeeper in the main office of the Crescent Company, and you were done getting ready– as ready as you could be with your heart threatening to burst out of your chest. It didn’t help that when you exited your room, you immediately had your housemate’s attention who let out a dramatic whistle at the sight of you.

“Woah. That’s quite a formal outfit for the bar,” Wendy said, stopping in the middle of stirring the pot, the fragrant scent of rosemary and chicken broth filling your nostrils. “Also… why are you still home?”

You turned to the full-length mirror in the living room, inspecting your outfit for the day– a pleated navy blue skirt that reached mid-calves paired with a blue tweed jacket, your feet clad in ivory kitten heels. Just the right outfit to make good first impressions, yet it was a struggle to ignore the urge to go back to your closet and restart the lengthy process of choosing another outfit.

“Uh��” you took a deep breath while tucking the stray strands of your hair back in the half-tied hairdo, bracing yourself for her reaction. “I may have gotten a new job at the Crescent Company.”

The room fell awfully silent and you turned to Wendy, finding her deadpan staring at you.

Odd.

“Something wrong?” You frowned in confusion. 

“The Crescent Company?” Wendy repeated and you nodded. It was strange, the soberness in her tone, when you were expecting enthusiastic theatrical reactions from her. “When?”

“Literally yesterday,” you turned your full attention to her, wondering if she was cross with you for not letting her know earlier. “I start working officially from today.”

“How did you get this job?” Wendy asked, finally doing something else other than assessing your form. She turned the stove off, setting the pot on the table where you joined her for breakfast.

“Well… one thing led to another. Some gang attacked the bar two nights ago and when I carried out my instructions– which were to get the contents of the safe and run– they decided… that I am good at my job and would do better in some other environment.”

“I heard about the attack, yes,” Wendy said, munching on a piece of bread. “But I thought it was a fight outside the bar, not an attack inside. Is that how you got these tiny scratches all over you?” You pursed your lips in answer and Wendy continued. “Are you sure this is the right job for you? Because let’s be real– we all know who Ateez is. You should be avoiding that gang– didn’t you want to lay low?”

Ateez. Known throughout all the eight sectors of Eden and its capital, the gang formed after the Battle of the Eight Hills and layed a vital role in the rebuilding of Eden afterwards. Really, you wondered if they had done so much for Eden, why were they feared and labelled as a criminal organisation?

“I am laying low,” you sipped the broth as you said, “It’s just an office job– paperwork.”

“I don’t know, Luna,” she said, clearly worried. “I’m not sure about this.”

“Do you know something you’re not telling me?” You asked but Wendy kept a straight face which meant there was something. “In fact… refresh my memory a little since I wasn’t here when Ateez was at the peak of their career, but who is Ateez? What do they really do?”

Wendy took a deep breath as if contemplating opening her pandora of secrets for you but then she checked her wristwatch to your utter disappointment. “Next time or else we’ll both be late. Just… stay safe, will you?”

“Oh, I will. I keep the gun in my purse, you know,” you smirked and Wendy finally relaxed, smiling back. “See you tonight if you aren’t snoring by that time– my shift ends at the strike of midnight.”

“Heavens, that’s late,” Wendy winced. “What are you doing up so early then? You should have slept some more.”

You should have, but you had a little stop to make before you clocked in at midday at your workplace– the stop being at the office of MX Pharmaceuticals located in the heart of Sector 1 with all the other businesses and offices. It was only the Crescent Office which was situated right outside that hotspot, and you were starting to think that it was a calculated move on their part. With their status, they could be situated in the slums and still be flourishing– the leaders of Sector 1.

It was a bit strange to walk the streets of your block and not allow your muscle memory to take you in the direction of the Crescent Bar. It felt alleviating, even, to not cross the old lady on the pavement selling crocheted goods to make a living. Somehow, she always made you feel guilty about having the privilege of connections. You could very well have been sitting there at the corner of the road instead of her, selling your paintings or embroideries if Kihyun hadn’t helped you land a job when you came back to Eden from Wonderland just a few years ago.

Because your father always made sure you would never be in the spotlight. There was a reason he basically shipped you to Wonderland– though you often wondered if that was justification enough. He claimed that you could study more if you wished to while you looked after your aunt but really… you knew that he wanted to get rid of you because you found out his dark, dirty secrets– things you were never supposed to find out. It was a shame he couldn’t kill his own daughter and bury those secrets along with her. Maybe his humanity awakened when he thought about his children. 

You could spot the MX Office when you took a turn left into the busy, bustling street with corporate slaves ready to sign in for their daily dose of torture. To your demise, you were blending right in. You walked towards the office, which was a brick-coloured building just like the rest of the offices in this street. The guard at the front door recognised you and nodded in greeting, as did the receptionist and a few employees, aware that you had some sort of a relationship with their boss, though no one dared to ask the nature of it.

The boss, Kihyun, was a respectable figure in all of Eden as a powerful businessman and a former gang member. Each connection he made was for a reason, but you were not just a connection. You respected each other far too much to refer to each other as just a ‘connection’. 

You were being accompanied to Kihyun’s room when on the stairs, you encountered Hyungwon.

“Miss Jeon– what brings you here?” He asked. It had been a while since you saw the manager of MX Pharmaceuticals. He was usually found at one of the labs or warehouses that MX owned. “Good to see you.”

“Hope you’ve been well,” you smiled. “I’m here to see Kihyun.”

Hyungwon nodded at the assistant who left and you followed Hyungwon upstairs. “Kihyun just arrived. How has it been?”

“I’m doing good. I got a new job so I was going to tell him about that and discuss a few things.”

“Oh, that’s nice to hear,” Hyungwon knocked at Kihyun’s door before opening it for you. “I’ll send some tea. And you know that if you need anything, we’re here, right?”

You nodded, smiling earnestly at his reminder. “Thank you. Have a good day.”

You entered Kihyun’s room, closing the door behind you. His room was as neat as ever with a variety of indoor plants lining the huge windows that provided a view of Maddox Street. You walked past that window, drawing the cerulean curtains away and Kihyun tsk-ed at you.

“You’re back at it, eh?”

“You need someone who will pull the curtains open every day. I can’t keep doing that for you,” you grinned, joining him at his desk. He was clad in a navy button-down shirt, his hair combed back. “How have you been?”

He spread his arms in answer. “Right in front of you. As good as ever. But I’ve heard you are doing better lately.”

“Heard the news already?” You shook your head. “Once I find your informant, I’m gonna give them an earful.”

“We’re the Crescent’s business partners. I should know the happenings,” Kihyun said, waiting for the assistant to leave the tea for you before continuing. “Tell me… how did it happen?”

“Let’s say I passed a trust test,” you said, adding a sugar in your tea and two in his, just as he liked. “I’m the Crescent’s bookkeeper now.”

“That must not have been easy.”

“Actually, yes,” you took a sip of the black tea. “I almost got killed. I had to win their favour.”

“And how did you do that?” Kihyun frowned.

“I played a few cards,” you admitted and he groaned in disbelief. “It was that or I die.”

“They would not have killed you–”

“They knew we were acquainted, and they were ready to kill me,” you interjected. “I only told them that I’m aware of Assemblyman General Wi’s artefact gallery.”

“Luna,” Kihyun leaned forward, clasping his hands. “You know the game you are playing right now is a dangerous one–”

“I know that I have to keep my identity hidden, and I’m sure they only know what’s on the documents–”

“Let me finish,” Kihyun said in a low voice and you slumped back. “It’s not just about your identity. You know who they are, don’t you? Ateez? They were once a gang, and they always play dirty.”

“So were you, Kihyun,” you reminded him. “Back in your early days, before my father took you under his wing.”

Kihyun clenched his jaw– he did not need to be reminded of his ugly past. “We were not children of war when we were a gang, Luna. The Crescents– Ateez– they are children of war. They served the army when they should have been fooling around with other kids their age or studying. A nineteen year old Kim Hongjoong became a well-known military strategist in the Battle of the Eight Hills. Another nineteen year old Park Seonghwa became a sniper and a medic– a god awful combination, don’t you think? And an eighteen year old Jeong Yunho became an honoured lieutenant colonel, for heaven’s sake. Those are the people you have involved yourself with.”

That was the first time you heard about their achievements during the war and you realised with a creeping dread that Kihyun might be right about this.

“Us? We were just a street gang, Luna. We were kids who rebelled, who got lucky because your father, a politician, saw potential in us and hired us as his informants. Ateez are different, and it would do you better if you stay aware of them.”

You took a deep breath. “Do you think they will dig into my past?”

“I can’t promise they won’t,” Kihyun relaxed, finally smiling and drinking his tea. “But I’ll see if I can do something. Just make sure to stay in the shadows.”

“Until it’s time,” you reminded him.

His expressions didn’t change. “Still conjuring up revenge plans?”

“You know how stubborn I am,” you traced the gold outline on the cup. “I cannot forgive my father for taking my identity and shipping me to Wonderland as if I meant nothing to him.”

“I’m sure you mean something to him. You are his daughter, after all.”

“I’m sure I don’t, and I don’t need him,” you said, looking at the boss of MX. “You are my family if I ever had one, Kihyun. I am in your debt for everything that you have done for me.”

“Nonsense,” he waved his hand and you stifled a smile at the way he always got a little shy when you called him family or brother. “You don’t owe me anything. I would have done that for anyone.”

“You risked your business and your life for me. You don’t do that for just anyone,” you concluded and he smiled in answer. It was a truth that he could not deny. “You can call it whatever you want, but let me feel about it however I want too.”

“I can see how you might have talked them out of killing you, you stubborn brat,” Kihyun said, laughing. He stared into the distance, taking a few moments to think. “I heard you will be answering to Park Seonghwa and Jeong Yunho. That worries me.”

“It is just work,” you told him, though you were wholly aware that it was not just work. “You don’t need to worry too much.”

After a busy midday shift at the Crescent Office with Eunha and Jihoon, you decided to pay a visit to the Crescent Bar– you were free for the rest of the afternoon and could squeeze in a lunch with your friends. Plus, you were not sure that you could do the night shift without some liquid courage in your system. 

The bar was as lively as it could be during day hours, with people popping in from work to get a drink or a meal. The employees– your old coworkers– warmly welcomed you and you went to sit at the counter with Eunbi and Jeonghan, just like the old times.

“How has it been without me?” You teased Eunbi who wrapped her arms loosely around your waist, snuggling beside you. 

“Boring. Jeonghan is always pretending to sleep so I can’t really talk to anyone anymore.”

“I am actually asleep,” Jeonghan raised his hand as a sign that he was alive. He looked like a corpse, actually, if you could put it nicely. Eunbi gave you a pointed look.

“Got a new bookkeeper yet?”

“Not yet,” she said, going back to the cash register when she saw a customer approach. You walked to the staff room, catching up with Yuju who ordered your favourite grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch with Black Shadow– probably the best wine you had tasted in your life, if you were objective. You knew there was a backstory to how Ateez made that wine their staple, but you figured you would hear about it someday later. For now, you had another purpose that led you to Yeosang’s office.

Yeosang opened the door when you knocked, blinking in surprise. “Aren’t you supposed to be at the main office?”

“Good evening? How have you been doing? How has work been?” You glared at him. “I’m good, thank you for asking.”

Yeosang snickered, letting you in and you took the seat in front of him. You sighed deeply, folding your arms. “I kind of miss this, I won’t lie. I feel like an outsider there, and it’s only my first day. Shift doesn’t start for another hour, by the way.”

“Would you like a drink?” He offered and you shook your head, telling him you just had lunch. “Well, Miss y/n. How can I help you today?”

You passed him the side-eye. “It’s still Luna for you. And I wanted to ask you a few things that I really should have asked before.”

“Ah… is it time for those questions?” Yeosang relaxed back, resting his hands behind his head, his muscles poking out from under the ivory dress shirt. You watched him for a moment, wondering what his accomplishments during the war were. Could he be holding a scary title as well, or was it something worse?

“Yes. You can’t blame me for being curious after the stunt the underboss pulled that night. True to your name, Ateez.”

It was the first time you ever referred to them with their gang name and he only watched you in silence, waiting for you to continue. It irked you that his expressions gave away nothing. Trained to give away nothing, a distant voice in your mind said. 

“Just tell me if there’s anything I need to know for now. I’m reporting directly to Mr. Park and… Mr. Jeong. I really don’t want to make a mistake.”

“You weren’t worried when you started working under me.”

“That’s because… you are you,” you tried to explain, ignoring the faint ache in your heart. “You don’t go around wearing formal suits and looking down on people and being… weird.”

“We don’t look down on people,” Yeosang sighed, though he was smiling at your admission. “Was Yunho weird towards you? What did he do now?”

“How did you– he didn’t do anything,” you told him. It was uncanny how well they knew each other. “I just want you to tell me if there’s something I should be aware of so I don’t make a mistake.”

Yeosang thought it was strange that you were asking such a question. He wished he could ask you what exactly you meant. Just what mistakes were you so afraid to make? Why did you always have to be cautious and walk on eggshells, even around him, even when you claimed that you were comfortable with him?

“I don’t think that you realise that Yunho is the only one of us who will forgive you even if you betray us in the worst possible way– he would still try to understand your reasons.”

Your eyes went a little wide as you let his words sink in. “Lieutenant Colonel Jeong Yunho… is forgiving?”

“I don’t know what you’ve heard about us,” Yeosang leaned forward, speaking gently. “But I can promise you that it’s not the entire truth. We are more than what you people make us to be, if you care to look past the ranks and titles.”

You didn’t understand what he meant by that, and you were too scared to ask. You couldn’t stop thinking about his admission about Yunho. You really couldn’t see it– he always looked so strict, in the traditional sense. Even when he had a hint of a smile on his lips last night, you couldn’t envision him to be someone who could sympathise with the ugliness of the people who were driven into the corner. Perhaps, because Yeosang was his friend, he was able to look past everything and see the lieutenant’s true, unmarred nature, but to you…

To you, he was Lieutenant Colonel Jeong Yunho. And you intended to keep it that way, for everyone’s sake.

Later, when you were at work and taking a breather, having just finished recording the day’s transactions, you reminded yourself that your relationship with Yeosang had turned too casual. Sure, it was the way he was with everyone at the bar– almost everyone. It was different with you, whether you liked it or not. Even though you had wanted to keep a distance from Yeosang, you just couldn’t. After all, you went to him right after hearing about their old gang days. 

You made a mental note to learn more about Ateez and the Crescent Company, and to learn about the extent of their involvement in Eden’s business world. You needed any information you could get your hands on, every detail whether true or not. If you were going to play this game and use them for your goal, you needed to know that the Crescents were not involved with your father and his business in any way. 

You needed to know if what they did was truly moral and right. And if you needed to sneak into places where you weren’t meant to go and possibly risk your life again… you would. 

It took you about a week to fully get the hang of things at the office. While Jihoon was still being an arse– at this point, you were starting to consider that it might be a part of his personality– he never refused to guide you or help you when you were stuck. Eunha was just as helpful and you were actually starting to like her a little. She wasn’t very talkative but considering that she was able to make Jihoon laugh… you were tempted to take pointers from her. Jihoon had worked the longest here and you needed to crack him to get him to talk.

In that one week, you got a chance to go into Mr. Jeong’s room twice, when he was not present to take the report from you himself. You made it quick– unlock the room, unlock the cupboard and place the report inside, look around if you had a few seconds and get the hell out. It was too soon to make a mistake so you only dared to make note of what the office looked like. There wasn’t much to it anyway– just the usual workspace, and it frustrated you that his workspace gave away nothing about him.

Mr. Jeong, you noted, usually came to the office during your shift at the late hours of night, presumably after dinner. You learned that Kim Hongjoong was out of station for some business dealing which was why the office was mostly empty, but also that this was where they usually gathered to meet up and discuss things. This office was sort of a base and if not here, they would be at the bar, though they generally avoided it because of obvious reasons. There was no saying when a drunkard fool, or two, would dare to interrupt them.

Yunho usually locked himself inside his office (Eunha was very suspicious that he usually napped there, claiming to have heard light snores sometimes) and Seonghwa came by twice that week, greeting you and asking if you were adjusting well. Neither of them had interacted with you much during the week but…

You recalled two nights ago when Yunho came back to the office just as it was closing time. You handed him the report and he called you inside his office to discuss a few things. When he was going over the report, he asked you if you had any problems with work recently.

“None at all,” you assured him. “It is manageable.”

He flicked through the pages, the white sleeves of his shirt rolled up over his sleeves, baring his veiny arms. You resisted the urge to trace all those veins on his arms– Jeong Yunho was one handsome man. It didn’t help that he had such beautiful hands either. Why were you assigned to submit him the reports every night? What was this new form of torture?

He caught you staring at his hands but he didn’t comment on it. Instead, he finished checking the report and shut the folder, running his hands over the cover once before clearing his throat to get your attention. You met his stare, pretending that you had not been ogling at his hands and arms– or at least, fake confidence that you were normal about it. 

“You were right about the artefact gallery,” Yunho said and you straightened. “It is indeed a money-laundering business. He is an assemblyman, a potential presidential candidate and, well, that’s a bad look for him with the elections right around the corner. How did you know when even his enemies aren’t aware of this information? And more importantly… do you want us to do something about it?”

“How I know does not matter,” you shook your head, adamant to not tell them your source. “It is just a piece of information that might be useful to you later. I am aware that your leader has been well involved with politicians– for connections, to secure deals. If you ever need leverage over General Wi, here is what you can use.”

Yunho took a deep breath at your response. You watched him scan you slowly, his eyes unreadable. “Is your source Yoo Kihyun of MX Pharmaceuticals?”

You looked down to hide your smile. “I have heard that you are well acquainted with him. He was more of a recipient than a source until a few years ago. The tables have turned now, but we still share information, and I was told that you could be trusted with the information I have. Is that still true?” 

He rubbed his chin in thought. “That depends on how useful the information you possess is. And it also depends on how loyal you are.”

“I am loyal to anyone who is loyal to me,” you said with a certainty that surprised him. “I know what it is like to be betrayed by blood and water both. To me, loyalty is the highest virtue.”

“Higher than morality?” He asked with a certain nonchalance, perhaps expecting to pin you in a corner, but…

“And what is morality, in this era?” You mused. “I’m sure you ask that question yourself often… Lieutenant Jeong.”

You seemed to have hit the nail because his gaze darkened. Perhaps, you should not have reminded him of his military rank, but to be Eden’s honoured lieutenant colonel and possess some fair morals? It didn’t add up even after Yeosang had said all the good things about him.

“I know what my morals are, Miss Jeon,” Yunho leaned forwards, locking his eyes with you and you wish some of his dark tendrils hid a bit of his eyes because that gaze was damning. “Do you? Or do you like to make yourself believe that you are the only virtuous one in the room?”

Maybe it was a dangerous game you were playing but you mirrored his position, your clasped hands almost brushing his as you said, “Oh, I have the lowest moral standards. In order to survive in Eden, especially when you’re on your own… you can’t go around possessing such foolish things as virtue, isn’t that so?”

Yunho looked down at your clasped hands, spotting the fading scar that ran along your thumb down to your wrist– one that you had gotten the night you lost everything. 

And then he ran a finger across it, ever so slowly, sending a trail of fire in its wake before getting up and wearing his coat, indicating that the meeting was over.

Damn him. Damn him and his stupid, beautiful hands–

“Goodnight, Luna,” he said in a low voice and you got up as well, gathering your wits before exiting the room.

“Goodnight… Mr. Jeong.”

And that had been the last time you saw him. It was Mr. Park who took the reports from you the day after, and last night you locked the office yourself about half an hour after midnight– you did not know why you stayed waiting for somebody to show up, but you felt a bit stupid afterwards. You should have clocked out on time.

You did not know why you waited.

You were so lost in your thoughts that you almost did not hear the sound of footsteps skittering in the direction of the office rooms. You looked up, gaping at what had to be a fifteen year old considering his scrawny appearance, moving not towards Yunho’s office but Kim Hongjoong’s. You frowned– how did he get past the guard?

“Oi,” you called but when he proceeded to knock at the boss’ door, you decided you had enough and slammed a hand on the desk to get his attention. “Oi, kid!”

“Is the Captain not inside?” he turned to look at you, looking as surprised to see you as you were. “Who are you?”

“Who are you?” you beckoned him to come nearer and he obeyed this time. “How did you get in?”

“I have something the Captain might like,” he grinned. “Still not back from his little trip to Edenary?”

So that’s where he was. The Capital of Eden, the land of the elites. “Uh… nope. Why you calling him ‘the Captain’?”

“Because that’s who he is?” He shook his head in disapproval. “New here?”

You scoffed in disbelief. “Kid, if you don’t tell me who you are, I’m going to have to escort you out.”

“No need, I’ll see myself out,” he winked at you and you laughed this time. You had to admit he was kind of cute for a kid even though you wanted to smack him on his head. You didn’t recall seeing him on the streets– his loose flannel shirt and newsboy cap was a look you thought you would have remembered. “I’m Jaemin, the informant. I answer directly to the Captain, so don’t even think about asking me what this was about.”

“You could still tell me, it could be our little secret,” you smirked but he shook his head. You stuck your tongue out at him. “Alright then. He’s supposed to come back tomorrow, I think. Should I let him know some kid was looking for him?”

Jaemin narrowed his eyes. “You haven’t met him yet, have you?”

“No,” you said. “Why?”

Jaemin only smiled condescendingly in answer. “You’ll find out. No need to tell him, I’ll be back soon.”

With that, the kid disappeared downstairs, leaving you wondering why he called the boss ‘the Captain’. It didn’t refer to his military rank because you knew that he was an honoured military strategist and colonel. You recently heard from Wendy that he had played a vital role towards the end of the war before the treaty between Eden and Halaland was signed. At such a young age, it was impressive. He was only a year older than you so he must have been about twenty when he earned that honour.

You distantly wondered if you ever came across him during the war. You had volunteered as a medical assistant– almost a nurse– in the latter half of the war. You had spent two whole years training medically and assisting the doctors and nurses. There weren’t many people in Eden so you might have encountered one of the Ateez men there, though you weren’t sure if you would recognise each other now. 

Moments later, you heard another pair of footsteps coming, this time familiar. Mr. Park, dressed in his usual black three-piece suit, met your gaze and sent a warm smile in your direction before he approached you.

“How are we doing tonight, Luna?”

“Good, Mr. Park. How about you?” You asked, taking tonight’s report and following him to Yunho’s office. “Did you perhaps see a kid leaving the building?”

Seonghwa chuckled at that. “You might find it hard to believe but that kid has saved lives with the information he shares.”

So the kid had not lied. “Impressive.”

Seonghwa waited until you took the seat in front of him. “He is like a stray cat who has marked us as his owners. We cannot take him in– he is too young, and he does not need to share the same fate the rest of us did, yeah? But he is a kid that nobody notices, and he uses that to his advantage. Next time you see him, ask him how he struck a deal with his ‘captain’.”

You laughed softly at that. “I will.”

Seonghwa nodded and started skimming through the reports. You told him that the new batch of liquor– specifically Black Shadow– had successfully been shipped to Mist Island. The shipment of their latest copper bullets was on the way too. You were surprised when you first found out that Mist Island was willing to trade weapons for liquor. Mist Island had a strict liquor import ban so the smuggling was being done secretly from both sides. It was impressive what money could buy.

Silence, Jihoon had told you one day when he was in a good mood. Silence of the police force.

You still hadn’t figured out what exactly they were doing with the weapons– you were aware that a lot of their money was being used in their business partnership with Pledis Manufacturers who were producers of machine parts. Your best guess was that they were involved in the weapons business and doing something undercover. You couldn’t question anyone about that yet. It was too soon.

“Good job, tonight,” Seonghwa said his usual words but this time, he did not dismiss you. Instead, he rested his back on the chair to look at you. “There are a few questions about your background that I must ask you before our boss arrives tomorrow, Luna. I’m hoping you will cooperate.”

There it was. They must have been done with the background check now. You wondered how much they found. “As best as I can while protecting myself, I will.”

Seonghwa smiled at that. “It’s not that I don’t trust you. Neither is it that I trust you already– Yeosang did, but that was different. You are now involved in the heart of the business that the Crescent Company does, so I have to make sure you’re suitable for this job, right?”

You were glad it was Mr. Park who was asking you these questions right now. Something about his presence was utterly calming and you could relax a little while talking to him. If you were objective, you could say that perhaps, it was his strategy to get you to lower your guard. But still… he was always soft spoken and kind. That did not change. 

“I understand, Mr. Park,” you assured him. 

“I could not find the records of your family… Miss Jeon,” he emphasised at your surname and you nodded. “You’re not a Jeon, are you?”

“It is a surname I borrowed around the time of the war, but I can assure you that I am from Eden. I was born here and have lived here all my life, at the Sector 1 border… save for a few years that I was not here.” Almost the truth. You had lived in Edenary, at the outskirts that met with Sector 1.

“And where were you? Where did you go in 1963?”

You exhaled. “Wonderland, to look after my sick aunt and get some further education.”

“Where, in Wonderland? Can I confirm that?” Seonghwa asked.

“The capital, Wonder City” you told him. “I’m not related to that aunt. She’s just an acquaintance who was willing to take me in. I looked after her and she gave me the financial help I needed.”

“Financial help,” Seonghwa repeated, glancing at your pearl ring that you always wore. He had an eye for things, and he knew that the pearl could not be in the hands of someone who was struggling financially. You could not have worn it so proudly if you had stolen it, so was it a family ring? A normal middle-class family could not afford such a pearl.

Just who were you?

“Yes,” you confirmed, willing him to trust you. “I might be wearing a pearl from Maddox & Co., Mr. Park, but that does not mean that I was showered in luxuries all my life. You must have found out that I was desperate for a job when I came back in 1966.”

Seonghwa nodded, swiping his hair back and exhaling. “Alright, I’ll let it be for now. You only need to tell us if you are related in any way to our rival gangs or the Sirens Rebel Party.”

“I am not your enemy,” you confirmed. “I cannot be acquainted with Yoo KIhyun and be in cahoots with any of your enemies. You have the same rivals.”

“Today’s friend is tomorrow’s rival,” Seonghwa mused. “Today’s enemy might be tomorrow’s lifesaver.”

“Then it is up to you, whatever you want me to be,” you smirked. “Rival or friend.”

Seonghwa nodded in thought, a bit amused, proceeding to pour you both some wine. While he downed it in one gulp, you sipped on it slowly, anticipating his next move.

“Do you perhaps have another tip for us?” Seonghwa raised a brow, amused.

“I might have, regarding your latest dealings with General Wi, but I will wait until both sides are clear.”

“Good,” Seonghwa shut the folder in conclusion. “I will take the leap of trust in you, Luna. Maybe you can do the same for us?”

“For you… yes, I can,” you told him. “I have one favour to ask, though.”

“Another one, already?” Seonghwa teased.

“You have a meeting scheduled with Secretary Park Byung Eun on the 14th, right?” You asked, the name leaving the most bitter taste in your mouth.

“President Lee’s secretary, yes,” Seonghwa nodded. “Do you know him?”

“Everyone knows him,” you said. While he was the President's current secretary, his name was well-known before that as one of the most successful businessmen in Eden. “You must be meeting because of a potential pharma-collaboration?”

“That’s right,” Seonghwa frowned, anticipating what was next.

You took a deep breath. “Do not reveal all your cards to that man. Do not let them know what you are up to.”

“Is that your way of telling us to be careful?” Seonghwa snorted. “We never show all our cards in the first meeting, Luna.”

“Neither do they,” you warned him and his smile fell. “Secretary Park’s team has a penchant for tricking you into deals. I’m just asking you to think this deal through. Whatever they are offering you won’t be very beneficial in the long run.”

“And how do you know that?”

“That doesn’t matter,” you told him. “If you need sources, or funds, you don’t need to rely on the Secretary Park.”

“You don’t know what business we conduct here, Luna–”

“I don’t need to know to warn you,” you insisted, feeling that tight knot of frustration build up in the back of your throat now. “I’m only asking you to think this through and take my words into consideration.”

“Your words, Miss Jeon, lack credibility right now,” he stated in a finalising tone, a pang of hurt shooting through your chest for a moment. He was right, though. They had no reason to trust you and to them, you must be seeming like someone who was looking to jeopardise their deal. “If you really want us to take you seriously, you would have to start giving us more.”

“I cannot give you more if I don’t know what you will do with the information,” you told him, sighing deeply. “Forget it, just… can you please let me know what you will be gaining and what you will be losing after your meeting with Secretary Park?”

“You’re assuming we will lose something,” Seonghwa noted. You didn’t answer and Seonghwa scanned your face, almost detecting fear in your eyes. Just what were you so scared of? “Is there any way you can trust me and tell me what this is about?”

“Not so soon, no, sorry,” you smiled sadly. You wanted to trust that man, you wanted to trust someone, anyone. “I don’t know what I’m waiting for, if I have to be honest. I’m probably asking too much considering that I am a mere bookkeeper.”

“We may have ranks here but we’re all equal, in the end,” Seonghwa said and his words tugged at your heart. There was rarely anyone who didn’t bring rank into everything. “I know you have no reasons to trust us either. Let’s work through our differences first before we make such demands, alright?”

You smiled at him and got up to leave. He followed, locking the doors and you both exited the building together. You shivered when the chilly night wind hit you. 

“The weather is getting colder. Bring a jacket or a scarf next time, will you?” Seonghwa said and you nodded. “Goodnight, Luna. I hope we are able to overcome all that is keeping us from mutual trust.”

“Goodnight, Mr. Park. Thank you for taking my words into consideration.”

He nodded, patting your back affectionately before you separated ways. That night, when you went home, you found Wendy getting ready to go to sleep. You didn’t get much of a chance to talk to her the whole week, considering your conflicting schedules, but you needed some answers right now so you sat at her bedside and she groaned in defeat.

“You need to tell me every detail, every rumour you’ve heard or any information you have on Ateez and what they do. Now.”

It was quite the busy day at the Crescent Office today. 

During the midday slot, you were packed with the new reports you had to make regarding the recent trade dealings with Mist Island, and you also needed to compile a transaction history before the Crescents were going to finalise their new deal with Utopia– both dealings happening undercover. You realised just how much work this job was– you had to create a pretty seamless legal report that was going to be used officially and make it seem like all their money was being circulated in their manufacturing business or the liquor business.

Seonghwa and San arrived when your shift was about to end. San waved at you, promising to catch up later and Eunha looked at you with a scandalous smile.

“Do you know the Choi San?”

“I literally worked at the Crescent Bar, Eunha,” you laughed. “I had to work with him.”

“He’s never waved at me like that. I’ve been here for a decade,” Eunha pouted. 

“Maybe you need to work as a cashier at the Crescent Bar in order to earn that privilege,” you told her, though you felt a bit pleased to hear that San had formal relations with the staff here.

Why were you pleased to hear that? You wondered but not long enough to make sense of it, soon getting caught up in more work. 

You went home after your midday shift, hoping to get some rest before your night shift because you knew it was going to be packed. You had no idea when the boss was supposed to come to office but you just hoped you would go unnoticed today– you had far too many thoughts that needed some sorting from everything Wendy told you last night– another reason you wanted to get some rest because her words kept you awake for the most part of the night. 

You made sure to dress properly today though, in any case. The weather was starting to get a bit chilly– summers were usually chilly in Eden. You wore a grey plaid suit that you kept for days like these, when you needed to make a good impression. You had fond memories with the two-piece– it was the first gift Wendy got you and it was more than she should have done, but she insisted she earned enough to buy gifts like these for the few friends she had. That made you wonder why she lived in a lousy shared apartment. You knew that her actual residence was in Sector 8 and she sometimes joked about how she lived here because it was ‘convenient’.

You wore white net gloves over your hands before going out, donning a matching grey hat. Eunha noted the new additions to your outfit and whistled as she shut her registers, groaning in satisfaction when she stretched her back.

“You did right with the gloves, but it’s a shame the boss isn’t here to appreciate them.”

“Eunha,” you glared at her and she giggled. She had warmed up to you– a bit too much, if you had to say, because she made jokes and teasing remarks like these often now that she was comfortable with you. You took off the gloves and spread them on your desk, grinning at her.

“I think they look pretty good from here too.”

You both shared a grin at that and Eunha wore her overcoat, saluting mockingly before leaving. Just before she was about to go downstairs, she turned in your direction, her doe eyes gleaming.  “Luna!”

“What now?”

“If you see the boss… don’t take his words to heart,” she said. “He may sound like a complete arse but he cares for all of us.”

“It can’t be any worse than Jihoon, can it?” You joked.

Eunha was right, though. At around 10 pm, you finally heard a few sets of footsteps ascend up the stairs and you took a deep breath, fixing your gaze on the stairs. To get to his office, the boss would have to walk past you so you fixed your half tied hair and arranged your desk a bit. Yunho’s head was the first to pop up, followed by an unfamiliar man and Seonghwa. They went inside Yunho’s room first, absorbed in heated discussion and you took a deep breath.

It was clear as day who Kim Hongjoong was. If it was not his appearance that betrayed him– dressed in a luxurious three-piece suit with the chain of a golden pocket watch visible, dark brown curls falling stylishly over his forehead– it was his unmistakable aura, the way he carried himself and his confidence. You felt it even if what you got was only a glimpse. 

A few minutes later, the trio popped out of Yunho’s room to go into Hongjoong’s room. You continued scribbling this time. You were going to remain in the shadows and go unnoticed–

“Get me the tax files,” the boss said. “I will personally make sure everything is seamless because I cannot have anyone messing it up– ah. Who is this again?”

Seonghwa cleared his throat. “Miss Jeon y/n. The bookkeeper– I thought Yunho told you already?”

Yunho looked guiltily at Seonghwa and you stood up in greeting, meeting the boss’s sharp eyes and internally gasping because oh, good heavens. He was inexplicably gorgeous–

“Good evening, Mr. Kim. If you need the tax files, I can get them for you.”

Hongjoong’s eyes betrayed him for just a second as he scanned your form, finding something oddly familiar about you. But his steel expressions returned and he shrugged lightly. “Yeah, well. I’ll have Yunho deal with that. You can get back to work.”

With that, he went towards his office and only waited a moment for the others to follow before he shut the door.

What a snob, you thought. His new bookkeeper and he didn’t even acknowledge you. Had Seonghwa and Yunho really not told him about you, or was he above these meagre details? You were aware that you would have to work with the boss now that he was back, but… how? 

Later, you found yourself at the Crescent Bar instead of your room. Perhaps, here you could get something that would make the bitter aftertaste in your mouth after tonight’s shift seem like nothing. Eunbi’s shift was over so you just found an empty spot in the corner and instructed one of your old colleagues to get you some Black Shadow and to make sure no one would bother you. He gave you a thumbs-up and a few minutes later, you were sipping at the rich drink while recalling the events of today.

Kim Hongjoong. Ateez’s boss, the brains behind the entity of the Crescent Company. A force to be reckoned with. A trickster, a manipulator, a true businessman, you had heard a while ago from the mouth of the elites who came here to drink. A man of his principles, Wendy had told you last night. He was rigid with his principles and that was what got him so far. You supposed he had to be all of that in order to survive after coming back from the war. 

Wendy said she wasn’t worried that you were working with him– at some point in this small sector, everyone had or would encounter him at least once in his life, directly or indirectly. However, she was worried that you would catch his eye, because according to her, you did not want to be involved with him personally in any way. He was a calculating and ruthless businessman with an ambition, and according to Wendy, that was something you were better off staying away from.

You considered everything you knew about the Crescent Company now that it had been a week working with them. They had partnered with Pledis Manufacturers to produce machine parts but you now knew that it was an undercover business for their weapons assembling. They had recently signed a new deal with Utopia to export these weapons in exchange for the Utopian wine– Black Shadow–  which was a trademark of the Crescent Bar. 

And it was Mist Island that provided the Crescents with the bullets and some metal for weapons production in exchange for Eden wine. It truly was a well-thought out business.

But that could not be all. You still did not know what the small packet– the powdery thing that got you here– was. Was it just a drug they used for pleasure purposes? You had never seen them in such a state, nor did the Crescent Bar tolerate druggies, though deals happened there, just like at any other bar. Nobody seemed to talk about it, there was no record of such an object being traded or produced– so what was it? Why had they almost killed you when they learned that you saw it?

And if it was a drug, why did they need to make a business deal with Secretary Park Byung Eun and have him fund MX Pharmaceuticals, of which they owned shares of? Kihyun knew that Secretary Park was not a man you should involve yourself with, so was he not aware of this new venture or was he turning a blind eye to it because they needed Secretary Park? Why would they need him of all the people in this world? 

“If you glare at your glass any longer, it will shatter,” a familiar voice said and you looked up, mouth parting in surprise.

“San!” You got up, straightening your clothes. “What are you doing here?”

“Uh, I literally own this bar?” San chuckled, noticing the almost empty bottle. 

“I mean, here here,” you pointed at your table. “I was just… drinking, as you can already see.”

“Long day?”

“Kind of,” you nodded. 

“Can I join you then? I’ve had a long day too.”

“Sure,” you said and he settled down in front of you, tossing his jacket on the other chair, now in a half sleeve black shirt. You poured the drink for him and he swirled it a few times before downing it in one gulp. You filled his glass again and motioned one of the waiters to get you a new one. 

It felt a little strange to have him seated like this in front of you. Sure, you had shared drinks countless times, but that was when you worked here and were serving him. There was also a shift in your interactions ever since that fateful night at the bar– somehow, that had turned your conversations more casual. He caught you staring at him but he didn’t comment on it.

“I’m assuming you met Hongjoong?” San asked and you exhaled, making him snicker. “What?”

“He’s… definitely the boss,” you laughed shortly. “He scanned me once and was like, okay, time to move on.”

“That’s him,” San laughed. “But that little scan he does means that he has memorised who you are and won’t forget. He’s got quite the memory.”

“I would expect nothing less, but San,” you sighed. “I miss being here. Even though I acted all professional here for the sake of formalities, it wasn’t ever suffocating being here.”

San frowned at your admission. “Do you not like where you are now?”

“It’s not that,” you shook your head. “I like the new job. It’s testing my capabilities, and I like challenges. It’s just that… you aren’t there. Yeosang isn’t there. You both are Crescents too. You both are also Ateez, so… how are you two so different from the rest?”

A smile creeped up on San’s lips and your heart did a little somersault– you hadn’t forgotten how handsome he was, but it had certainly been a while since you admired his charms. “Just say you miss us and move on, Luna.”

You laughed at that and San joined, the two of you chuckling for a few moments. “Yeah, I kind of miss being here and reporting all the gossip to you,” you said. “I miss working in silence with Yeosang too– don’t tell him I said that. It’ll get to his head.”

“I won’t,” he grinned. “Shall I tell you the gossip?”

“Oh, please, I’ve been starving,” you said.

About an hour passed over gossip and drinks, switching from wine to plain soda. San told you the latest happenings of the area– they had a little fight with Chan’s gang and had settled the matter about the attack on the Crescent Bar, making them pay for the damages. Yuju had gone to different bars to do a survey of what was trendy and come up with nothing, and you joked about how she was only good at doing what she knew– managing the staff, something she was an expert at. San said he would be sending Jeonghan and Mingyu next– perhaps, they would come up with a better report. 

It was the first time you talked to San as a friend, and though you had always found it quite easy to talk to him, you liked that just like Yeosang, he didn’t make it feel like there was a distinction between you two. Perhaps, you wondered, it was because of the nature of your work- after all, you couldn’t be too formal in a place like a bar. Maybe if there was no Crescent Bar, you really would have found San intimidating and unapproachable, just like people claimed he was. You still couldn’t believe them– not when he had the softest gaze when he paid attention to you, not when his eyes curved into moons when he smiled or laughed, and certainly not when he whined like just another adult with problems. 

When you checked the time on your wristwatch, you whistled– it was almost 2 in the morning. “Well. Time flies.”

“The night is still young, but we’ve both got to get up early, don’t we?”

“We sure do,” you nodded. “Well, this has been… a pleasure, San.”

“Likewise,” he propped his chin on his hand as he looked at you. “We should do this again.”

“Complaining about work?” You laughed. “Complaining about my bosses slash your friends?”

“Oh, so when you do it, it’s complaining, but when I do it, it’s whining? Noted,” San shook his head in disappointment and you grinned. “Can I tell you something, Luna?”

“Sure.”

“The hyungs– Yunho, Seonghwa and Hongjoong… they’re just like me and Yeosang. You just don’t know them yet.”

You looked at him for a moment. “I would have believed you if you had not included Seonghwa in that list.”

“Why?”

“You’re nothing like Seonghwa,” you joked. “He’s far too kind and refined.”

San’s loud laughter filled the room and you looked around, making sure no one was being disturbed. You leaned forward to tap his hand and make him stop laughing.

“I’m not lying, Luna,” San wiped his eyes. “Seonghwa… he may look refined but he can be very playful and childish when he wants to be. Yunho… well, once he warms up, you’ll know that he is the best kind of person you can have by your side.”

Somehow, his words wrapped around your heart like a promise. “You care about them a lot, huh?”

“I do,” he nodded. “They’re my friends, a part of my heart. I would do anything for them.”

“And… Hongjoong?”

“Hongjoong, well…” San smiled. “You find that out for yourself.”

“Not helping, San,” you folded your arms but he shook his head.

“All I can tell you is that if you’re lucky enough to break his walls… if he takes you under his wing, he won’t let anything hurt you. That’s the kind of person he is. He is the boss but he acts like a shield for us, and I wish I could do the same for him.”

You took note of his words. Did you trust San? A bit, yes. If he said all those things about Hongjoong, they must be true– at least according to his perception. But could you trust Hongjoong? Could you act as a shield for them so they could protect you in the future?

You made the decision before you slept that night. 

During your night shift the next day, you waited for the office to get a bit emptier. When there was only Seonghwa and Hongjoong on the upper level, you took a leap of faith and knocked on the boss’s door. It was now or never, and you had to make your move.

“Come in,” Seonghwa’s voice sounded and you opened the door. Seonghwa was seated at the couch while Hongjoong was at the end of the room in his chair, scribbling on paper, not bothering to look at you.

“Can I talk to you for a moment?” You asked Seonghwa.

“Sure, have a seat,” he motioned to the couch in front of him and you did, sliding the report to him and glancing at Hongjoong once. “Is everything alright?”

“It is, but… I must warn you of something. You cannot proceed with the deal you’re making with Secretary Park Byung Eun.”

Seonghwa settled the pen he had been playing with on the table, taking a deep breath. “What is this really about?”

“Secretary Park is aiming to become the Minister of Health, isn’t that right? All of the ex-president’s team has either retired or left their posts, replaced by President Lee’s people,” you said. “Is that why you need Secretary Park? Because you have no other option?”

Seonghwa narrowed his eyes– how did you find out that he was aiming to become the next Minister of Health? It wasn’t publicly announced yet– he had yet to sign up as a candidate for that post. 

“You must have one hell of a source,” Seonghwa looked amused, glancing at Hongjoong who was smoking a cigar and now looking at you with mild interest. You gathered your nerves before continuing.

“He is not a good candidate for the position, but that is not what matters right now. I would have gone to Kihyun but I decided to confirm with you first because I’m not sure if he’s aware of your plans, but… you must need Secretary Park to approve some drug in the future, right?”

Seonghwa’s brow rose ever so slightly and you jumped a little when Hongjoong slammed the pen that he had been holding on the table. He cocked his head as he glared at you. 

“Miss Jeon,” he said in a warning tone. “If you don’t stop talking in circles right now and tell us what this is about, I’ll have to deal with you myself. You don’t want that.”

You gritted your teeth, unafraid for the first time in a while. “Do you want this business deal with Secretary Park to be legal? Just answer my question first, Mr. Kim.”

“That’s right,” Seonghwa answered for him. 

“You should know that Secretary Park already has some business deals with Strictland officials going on,” you said in a low tone and the two looked at each other in surprise, clearly unaware. “You know how it will look for you if word comes out– Strictland is already an occupied state on the verge of military dictatorship. You can try to verify it for yourself if you want, but whatever deal Secretary Park has going on with Strictland… it’s not legal in any sense, neither is it moral.”

Seonghwa took a deep breath. “Our meeting with Secretary Park is scheduled for tomorrow.”

“And I thought you should be aware of this before the meeting,” you locked eyes with him, hoping he could see the desperation in them. 

“Jeon y/n, was it?” Hongjoong called and you looked at him. He was squashing his cigar in the ashtray on his desk. You nodded and he finally smiled, though it looked almost devilish. “Why would you care to tell us this information?”

“You must have heard from your underboss,” you said. “I am willing to trade information with you in return for protection.”

“And power,” he pointed out the missing part. “You mentioned power.”

“I only desire power in order to survive in Eden,” you said.

“So why protection?” Hongjoong asked. “You can’t be a powerful figure in Eden and not have everyone targeting you.”

“Being a part of the Crescent Company is protection enough, I suppose,” you rested your hands on the soft material of your black pants, subtly wiping the sweat off. 

“Protection from whom?” Hongjoong asked, his gaze set on you. You found it overwhelming almost to the point that you considered answering– he had a commanding presence. 

“I… can’t say. Not yet,” you said and Seonghwa shook his head, having already known your answer. “I don’t expect you to tell me what the deal is about– after all, I’m only a bookkeeper. But I can give you better options– ex-president Mr. Son, for instance, or Assemblyman Kim Jooheon.”

“Assemblyman Kim is a nobody in the political scene if we are being objective,” Seonghwa said. “I don’t think he will have much to offer to us.”

“He will have something to offer to you if you give him something in return– maybe something that pulls him out of the shadows and into the spotlight of the political scene,” you said, recalling how the politicians in Edenary always thought Assemblyman Kim had the potential but lacked the resources. 

“Why would Mr. Son ever associate himself with us?” Hongjoong got up from his seat, slowly walking towards you, hands in the pocket of his striped black suit. “We may be owners of a legal business company now, but everyone knows of our mafia ties and background.”

“You are an honoured military strategist who played a vital role to end the war, isn’t that true?” 

Hongjoong chuckled at that, nodding slowly to confirm that and settling down next to Seonghwa. “Not everyone is aware of that, Miss Jeon. I don’t like people talking about it.”

“But Mr. Son was the president at that time, and he honoured you with a badge,” you kept his gaze. “I think he will agree that a person who did everything in their power to end the feud between two nations would not be making a deal that would harm his motherland and its people… don’t you agree?”

Hongjoong stared at you while considering your words. “You have a lot of audacity to come in here and make claims about a business you are not a part of, and people you don’t know enough about. Possessing such audacity is what almost cost you your life that night, and what is tempting me to retract the deal my partners made behind my back.”

And there it was. A stark reminder that you may have struck a deal with the queen, but you were still just a pawn in this game of chess where the king ruled. Weak and expendable– that’s what you were.

“Hongjoong,” Seonghwa began but Hongjoong raised his hand in the air to stop him from speaking further, his eyes still locked with yours. You didn’t feel shame nor fear in that moment– just regret that maybe you had trusted the wrong people.

“You are a bookkeeper, and you can remain so. Goodnight, Miss Jeon.”

You nodded slowly, letting his words sink in and then you got up, bowing in greeting. “Good night, Mr. Kim, Mr. Park. Thank you for hearing me out.”

With that, you left the room and Seonghwa looked at Hongjoong. “You did not have to put it like that. I know she got you.”

Hongjoong slumped down on the couch in front of Seonghwa, cracking his knuckles while he thought about his next move. “Is there any way we can verify the information about Secretary Park without anyone getting a whiff?”

“I don’t know,” Seonghwa admitted. “I’m wondering how she knows that– if that was the truth. If Secretary Park really has a business deal with Strictland officials… I don’t think even his wife would know about that. If anyone gets a whiff of that, it could cost him his position and cause President Lee significant harm too, since Park Byung Eun is his secretary. You know how Strictland is still a sensitive topic after the war.”

“Then how does she know?” Hongjoong looked at Seonghwa. “Is she a spy?”

“She can’t be,” Seonghwa shook his head. “Luna worked as the bookkeeper at Crescent Bar for two years–”

“Luna?”

“That’s what everyone calls her,” Seonghwa said, a hint of a smile on his lips.

“She could be a mole, then,” Hongjoong sighed. “But no. Even a mole could not possess this information. What do we do?” 

“Kihyun was Secretary Park’s former business partner. I’ll ask Yunho to check with Kihyun and confirm if Secretary Park is the right man for this deal, but that means we will have to let Kihyun know that we are intending to make such a deal.”

“We were going to tell him anyway, let’s proceed with that plan. And Seonghwa?”

“Yeah?”

“Contact the RV spies and get any information you can on your little bookkeeper.”

-> apply for the taglist here! (check your privacy setting if the tags don't work)

taglist pt 1:

@lorensonebraincell @sungbeam @waywardstaytiny @lluvia1415 @woohwababes @jjaemasung @fruithoughts @fancypeacepersona @propinquitypsithurism @kyomiingi @ateezswonderland @janetsarttrove @thenopekid @justconniez @daniela-f-uwu @hwasbestlover @vcutparis @missbangtangirl @zaynsfl4m3s @beabatiny @slowitdownmakeitb0uncy @alliethequeen @lavishloving @haowonbins @franbowesax @klllerwaifu @katerade23 @selfishw4ltz @paramedicnerd004 @atzlordz @curse-of-art @meowmeeps @intowxnderland @faeriehwa @staytiny-yaps @ishz @dumplingsyum @bunnychui @kandy108 @chanst1ddies @softsanglix @yongility @sang-09 @sweetinsaniiity @a-teez-4-exo @omgsuperstarg @saintriots @bihwabi

[digiships]

4, 8, and 11 for the smfs ask game with john doe!! >:))

AAAAUAUAUGAHA OH I HAVENT TALKED ABT DOE IN SO LONGGGG DANNY YOURE EVERYTHING. THAN K YOU FOR GIVING ME THE EXCUSE

4: "Fake Out" - It’s 3 AM. What are you and your f/o doing at that time? Are you asleep? If you’re awake, what are you doing?

doe is awake. i can tell you that no matter what doe is very much awake bc he shrimply doesnt sleep. she likes to watch Me sleep. unblinking. for hours. if im awake though im probably playing the sims so they kinda cling to my back like a koala and watch over my shoulder

8: "I Am My Own Muse" - What are some lyrics you believe perfectly summarizes your ship with you and your f/o?

ok you have to forgive that these are creep ass lyrics but its bc doe is a creep and i love them for it . stalkers tango is the obvious choice but also the chorus to Meant To Be Yours (specifically the west end version To Me i know the lyrics arent different but the Performance jamie muscato gives is much more doe to me). like "You were meant to be mine! / I am all that you need! / You carved open my heart! / Can't just leave me to bleed!" HELLO? YOU CARVED OPEN MY HEART?? VERY DOE TO ME

11: "The Kintsugi Kid (Ten Years)" - What’s one thing your f/o has learned from you? It could be a skill, a certain topic you know a lot about, anything really. And vice versa— what’s something you have learned from them?

he learned how to. Brush. in general. his teeth And his hair. she doesnt like to do it very often but theyll brush their teeth at least once a day now However Briefly . they also learned A Lot abt computers :)

he taught me how to find my way around the city :) cus yk. uncanny valley is kinda hard to Map and its very easy to lose your way if you dont pay attention. and i think also how to cut up an animal

[calibornedits]

Can you possibly do some 3rd/Last/Double Life characters as Homestuck/Vast Error panel edits please?

Specifically Desert Duo(Grian + Scar), Treebark Duo(Martyn + Ren), Rancher Duo(Jimmy and Tango) and/or Murder Trio(Grian, Scar and Mumbo)? :3c

All as trolls if you can! Sorry if that’s a lot (^^;)

Take your time and don’t stress yourself out with them too! I just found your art today and I’m in love :D

i would do all of them but i started running out of ideas 4 designs smh. spreading my jade scar and purple grian propaganda

ranting abt my designs and whatever lore i have for this au under the cut :dances:

ok ok so. i have a lot of stuff 4 grian so far so im gonna start with him.

first of all his horns r supposed to be somewhat like the evo symbol. shortly after the last edit he got kicked out of the brooding caverns early and they just kinda gave him over to whatever cult represents the watchers here. also it's my au and i get to decide what old grian content is canon. yhs is too. one of his horns got ripped out by sam while they were both like 3 sweep olds. also he dresses like a rust instead of a purple (w the makeup instead of facepaint. slay) because something something not wanting to associate with the other purplebloods.

for scar uhhhh. i just think he fits rlly well as a jade. cannot explain why. maybe it's lanque but he just gives me male jade vibes. also jellie is his lusus and thats important and everyone needs to know this. his whole story with jellie is kinda like crytum and platycat (if u havent played all of sbb, he never had a lusus and then got a cat one for emotional support after moving to the stronghold). scar's horns r also based off allay wings and i think they r rlly cool :D

i made mumbo a gold and i was gonna make his eyes red like redstone, but i thought he fit more like jentha with whatever the fuck she had going on. his horns r supposed to be redstone torches. dunno where he fits in the present though (ie second edit) maybe he died idk.

i have less 2 say abt ren and martyn since i dont remember much from 3l but i am so insane abt them. ren as a rust and martyn as an indigo :shoutpole: GET THIS. ren takes sestros place as ceo of the world basically but his second in command is on the complete other side of the spectrum. idk if the differing lifespan thing is canon in ve (like it is in aleph null) but it WOULD be funny if it was.

[liloinkoink]

a few weeks ago i went thru the “where is your rider” 3L animatic by @aroaceacacia​ frame by frame in DMs to a friend to explain what i liked about, uh, nearly every image in the animatic, so just for fun ive collected and cleaned up my comments on it. i expanded on a bunch of the stuff i said previously and made it all sound more coherent. that said, this is a mix of analyzing the actual content (by someone who is not an artist) and just. pointing at frames i liked. 

we’ll start with these opening red frames! i am not fast enough to grab individual screenshots w how quickly they change (i just hit screenshot randomly and this was the one i got), but i think theyre all super pretty and i love the way the images changing is set so neatly to the song itself. plus. the red fading into black vignette and the slight smoky texture of the overlay is rlly nice. one day ill slow the video the hell down to see what the individual ones are, but the tnt minecart’s a favorite of mine, personally 

...i immediately went back and slowed the video down to minimum speed to look at the frames. here are some favorites

the tnt minecart! i mentioned it before but i am such a fan. for all i love the red army this IS still my favorite kill, sorry ren. this is a fun angle on it, too. it looks so small like this. i also think its really fun this is the frame which first gets the title 

i had never noticed this one before slowing this down but i love the inclusion of tango’s minigame! and the no pearl rule martyn got added, lmao

cleo beloved. this one is just looks nice. shes so pretty....also just fun considering this bit seems to include a bunch of significant moments from the beginning-to-middle of the series, inciting incidents for the red king to rise. cleo asking ren to keep this secret is definitely one of the bigger parts of that, so this is a neat one

when this one zipped by i’d assumed that it was cleo taking pizza, but looking at it now im realizing this is probably scar’s hand, isnt it? there arent stitches like cleo’s hand has, but there’s a scar more reminiscent of, well, scar. love when you can tell someone thru smth like that kinf of small detail 

this is the first panel of the entire animatic, which, fitting enough. ren gets his bloody crown. love the way the blood looks on this frame. (also, bc i was just talking abt minor details to identify hands, love ren’s watch)

i really love the way fire is drawn in this whole video. i dont have important commentary here i just Love fire. 

the brush texture for a lot of this whole video is rlly nice, i love the splotchy texture a lot of the backgrounds have / the fire here has. i dunno what its actually called but it reminds me of like, a sponge (i remind you i am NOT an artist)

obsessed w this frame. disembodied hands comin out of the grey. the & placed nicely in the middle of the handle of the axe. simple and very nice. also i love the edges getting lighter. this is just a real fun frame to me

now that pale white horse is our and we know this video is like, very much supposed to take place right after the trap set by the desert... like i know i knew this lyric was abt ren’s now-yellow eyes, but i dont think it really stood out to me till seeing it Right After pale white horse

MARTYN IN THE REFLECTION OF RENS GLASSES. scream. 

something im always fond of in writing is imagery about smiles when relating to a person’s identity... got a whole tma oneshot with a dozen and a half lines about smiles from a monster wearing the face of a friend. so i love this line, and i love the smile paired with ren’s glasses covering ren’s now-changed eyes. his eyes are different, but his smile’s the same...

love this frame also for obvious reasons (Guy Who Is Obsessed With Ren’s Execution) but god i just love the red mist on the axe. looks cool and is So effective in conveying how actively malicious this axe and the obligations attached to it feel. 

plus like. i know this animatic uses a limited color palette so blue isn’t in it. but it almost feels like the mist is so tangible it’s drained the blue color out of the diamond axe. which. Nice. 

also the angle is so fuckin nice for this too like. also, a down-below angle like this is one which i’ve heard in the past be referred to as the "hero's angle" (least when ive used it in photography?) and thats just. a fun detail to me, personally, for this shot

god. the axe looks so fuckin BIG when you do it from this angle. absolutely lovely shot its a favorite of mine probably (if i say that a lot dont call me on it)

i think me calling out this shot was definitely predictable Considering My Writing but [screaming and cheering] THIS IS SO GOOD. BOTH HOW ITS SET TO THE MUSIC PICKING UP AND ALSO THE FACT THAT THE CUT AND BLOOD SPRAY ARE SO CLEAN. THATS A CLEAN ONE HIT SHOT CONVEYED WITHOUT SHOWING THE ACTION AT ALL. I LOVE IT. another absolute favorite frame for sure

also love the red hair tie and streaks of red in his hair. but god. what a damn powerful hit this would have to be

i dunno what it is about this shot in particular but i love it. maybe the hair over his face? his posture? not sure but i am a really big fan. it looks like, idk, creepy? in a way the other ones of ren immediately following it arent (tho theyre also quite good) also the red lines on the crown make me think his crown is full of blood like. a cup. which is fun [since writing this i have set this frame as my icon on twitter] [i have also since realized that the red lines do indicate the crown is, in fact, full of blood]

i love him your honor

also the smoke coming in darker/thicker with ren as ren gets closer. ren’s face as Just The Teeth (wicked shape to your smile...).

the gesture he’s doing is also really fun like. very showy. its one i see in... a lot of scar fanart, honestly? which i think is fun. it feels really showy, absolutely screams arrogance/bravado. 

ive written before how i think a lot of the red king act ren put on was fear-fuelled theater, like. the red king was a defensive measure, a prey animal fluffing itself up to look bigger and scarier to fend off something that might devour it. a banner for a bunch of terrified people to band together under to be less afraid. that’s what this gesture is in my mind

JUST REALLY NICE. love ren as a red silhouette and martyn as a green one.

i reference this a lot later one so ill just say as much here: i love this animatic’s commitment to this limited color palette of red/yellow/green + monochromes. lends to some really clever stuff, especiallt when the colors are used to denote what life a player is on

OKAY. THIS SHOT...

AND THIS ONE

love the red mist/smoke at the edges. im so fuckin obsessed w that, it looks cool and ive made my opinion on this texture/effect very clear already, i love it. but also, i love the way martyn appears to be clearing it all away with his hand

like. this is the mist from the axe at the start. this is Red Life Bloodlust. this is ren hitting martyn and saying “go ahead, kill me again, you have the ability.” this is red name bloodlust encroaching in on martyn and ren. in the first of those two frames it’s closing in and then the second one hes waving it away 

none of that can make him hurt ren again

(...also i like that martyn’s hair is lined with red. looks nice)

and then the next frame its all gone. there’s not really any red at all.

...also this is such a good frame. look at ren's face ill fucking cry. the lighting in this is so good. i love it. i love the bright white moon, i love the shadows on ren and martyn, i love that one of the brightest points is ren’s dumb fond face, i love his hand on martyn’s cheek and martyn holding it there...

also im just realizing that those are phantoms and not clouds.

AND RENS CROWN. it IS full of blood [see. i got there eventually]

anyway love that the next two frames after this really nice calm one are the sandcastle fucking exploding

LOVE THE WAY FIRE AND EXPLOSIONS LOOK

I SAID THIS W THE FIRST FIRE FRAME BUT I LOVE IT. ITS SO NICE. feels like you dipped a sponge in paint and smushed it onto the canvas, which is a very wet and not-at-all firey way of making fire look, which makes it super interesting and very enjoyable

youd think with the writing ive done that id have a high stomach for injuries but i actually dont have any stomach for it at all, so, every time i see this arrow thru the head sequence it makes me gasp. love it. esp the blood coming out of the eyes, WHAT a detail. simple yet Very visceral to me. esp since it starts w them both looking like, pretty bored? it just GUTS you despite being relatively clean. same with his hand up in the air there as he falls

love this frame. martyn's run looks slightly goofy to me which ALSO makes the next frame of him being shot a gut punch. also the looming trees and brush textures are So Good. this is also another really fun example of the limited color palette being used to show lives. usually martyn’s drawn with his hair colored blond, but here, as he’s about to lose his green life, the only color available to him is green. also, not coloring his hair makes the fact his eyes are green stand out way more. this is the first frame ive really noticed it

also i like that martyn gets shot on the line “rested while living.” its funny

ABSOLUTELY ADORE THIS FRAME ITS SO FUCKIN GOOD

just. cleo’s eye being red and yellow. the harsh red line in the center bisecting the frame. everything about the skull half. i love this. ive got no analysis for this one its just sick

love the eye coming into the moon obsessed. also it took me till now to notice like... i keep pointing out how much i like how this animatic only uses green/yellow/red plus monochromes, yeah? something i think is fun is cleo’s frame prior to this doesn’t use green, even tho cleo’s green-tinted. there’s just yellow and red. but this one w the zombies does. 

this frame’s always been a little jarring to me and i think its just... this might be one of, if not The, most green frames in the animatic. the entire lower half of this one’s green! i dont have anything super analytical to say about that i just think it’s neat

i love this one too the dogs are so cool. i love joel’s red stripe and his fuckin... red mist. return of the mist! 

i also like that the mist-wisps dog shapes in the bg have red eyes. it could easily be the same sort of vignette background that this animatic has plenty of (which is what i think i processed the white edges behind joel as the first time i watched this) but instead they have eyes. theyre dogs, hinting Many More Dogs. all very good.

IN LOVE WITH THIS FIRE ASPECT SWORD

i just. my favorite color is red. my second favorite color is gold. my favorite palette is red/gold/black/white. this is a very me-bait frame. also the angle of the sword just feels like someone’s walking with it held out to the side/down. while that makes the epee fencer in me want to yell (put your point on target buddy....) it does look sick as hell

this frame is perfect no fuckin notes 10/10. fantastic and recognizable scar silhouette. fucking evil looking scar. i just love the super simple but super fuckin evil eyes/mouth. he looks unreasonably threatening

...and grian in the bg the frame after grinning just as evilly despite having yellow eyes. love it. love his hands on his hips its just fun. also the rings of grey behind them are so neat. 

also i love grian so every time he shows up i am like [points] <3

my favorite color is red so any very red frames will have my approval. love this. 

im also just realizing it sorta copies the fire aspect sword frame. sword’s helf at the same angle, but now we’re not preparing for war, there’s not fire ready to burn. we’ve had war and we’ve won it

the dead joel frame. he looks so fuckin small. hes got no dogs. hes on his own, hunted down in the desert, no help and no one hes even really gonna miss him. top tier. very sad

also... smth abt the dogs being white wisps before and there’s just grey lines away. very neat. im also realizing right now as im looking at this, is it the crater in the desert? the lines feel like he’s in a hole, the slightly sandy edges giving way to a grey dip feels like a burned-away hole/crater... fun 

...forgot to get the scott frame but i love how its green yellow and red. its a really pretty frame

GOING TO CRY. LOOK AT THEM..... LOOK AT MARTYN AND HIS FLAG..... ABSOLUTELY LOVELY.

fuckin. whats the word im looking for. starts w a v. valorent? v... VALIENT. ...valiant. i spelled it wrong [this was sent as like 6 texts and i condensed it into one line. just wanted everyone to see me spell this word so very wrong]

also like that ren's crown is noticeably bloodier

the bright yellow sunlight coming in from the side... the color/angle its at feels reminiscent to me of golden hour, which is my favorite hour to take photos at and also, on occasion, makes me emotional simply by Happening. i have teared up just by standing outside somewhere pretty during golden hour on more than one occasion in my life. so i like this frame a lot

the few seconds of the flag swaying in the wind. very clean animation. very nicely timed to the music. really nice to look at. feels vaguely lonely bc of the music its set to being so forlorn. rlly effective tone switch

gen is very good at using very simple visuals to effectively do and convey very complex and interesting and emotional things and also kill me dead

such as this.

i think so much abt them leaving dogwarts empty at the end bc they simply couldnt defend it anymore (and how coming to try to reclaim it is what kills them) and all those feelings are conjured up right here. it looks so small man. that’s their home and they left it

forgot this was the next frame. double what i just said.

every shot of the red army makes me [sobs] look at ren... look at him face...........

also i like that ren's crown is no longer gold, JUST red. everyone only gets the colors of their name, now, and the lack of gold makes the blood in ren’s crown stand out SO much more now that its the only color. even when his head is tilted back and thus his crown is harder to see, the blood stands out. 

plus. yknow. the yellow is for bigb, while the other red names get little red details (we have once again confiscated martyn’s blondness). plus the vibrant red banner next to them

also i. rlly love the stringy look of everyone's hair? and the fluff on ren's cloak. texture... esp etho’s hair i love etho’s hair so much

and ren. i said look at him face already but Look at him. ill cry. look how fond he is. i love him. how could we ever let anything bad happen to him

also as always love the background. i know its kind of minimal but its very fun. Texture......

i know this is the thumbnail but im in love w it. props for putting the red army to the line about armies

martyn's face... i love him look at him look at his SMILE. the little blush on his face. the golden buttons on his coat. AND his hair. love the swoopy bangs

and etho. etho my beletho. look at him..... going to hold his face in my hands. i love his little red dot eye and his hair

and bigb!! he looks so proud. i love the halo the moon gives him w the bit of green and the little blushes. this is a zero analysis panel i just love the red army 

ALSO LOVE THE BG HERE. REALLY NICE. the vibrancy of the moon and the shading on the trees are both rlly fun, same w the bright moonlight catching on the water

skizz. crying

ETHO MY BELETHO. I JUST LOVE THIS FRAME A LOT

...ive got to stop saying etho my beletho im Absolutely incoherent

anyway. god i just love this frame. the clean, strong red is so good against the whites and greys. its just so nice to look at

also etho's expression like i know theres not a lot there but also i really like the quiet fondness as he looks at his flags. and his hair. ive pointed it out three times now but i really like his hair

RETURN OF BIGB’S GREEN HALO... not the moon this time! just how to indicate hes a green life when his skin doesnt have any green in it! really clever

also the blond hair and gold crown!

...and now its time for pain speedrun

MARTYN BEING CLEAN AND THEN BLOOD SPLATTERING ONTO HIS FACE IS SO. WAHHH REALLY NICE I LOVE IT. visceral without even showing whichever death it is that happened. So fuckin good. 

also like... this frame following the frames before it its really fucking jarring. this right after the bigb frame? the red army frames? and then just immediately martyn, covered in blood? they didnt get to win! they didnt get to spend like any time together! they gathered together and they died!

i think another thing that makes this frame so jarring (and thus effective) is like. martyn’s core colors are green and yellow. blond hair and green clothing. both in his skin and primarily in this animatic. this is basically the first time we see him (not as a silhouette) without them (the only other one is the golden hour one, so. he doesnt have yellow inherent to him, but hes still got some yellow), which makes it even like. worse. subtle and devastating!

wrote all that and have much less to say abt this frame except like. bye etho </3 the way gen draws fire is still pretty

the music video being mostly static, even when fire is shown, until now, this fire burning and moving as it does. rlly adds smth. makes it all more real. also Real Nice

i also like the arrow in the middle is still visible. you can make out the shape of it, just vaguely. sick as hell

WAILS

also god the fact that as far as i can remember to this point all the blood in the mv has been CLEAN and fully opaque. that ren's blood on his clothes (and martyn’s on his clothes the frame before) is like, not fully opaque? its the spongey texture, not clean red pen. this isn’t paint. this is soaking into and staining his shirt. its really fucking nice

images that cause me immense pain. ive got no analysis here. tho i do like that the “will” that should be red is black bc its written over blood

IMAGES I THINK ABOUT EVERY DAY OF MY GODAMN LIFE IMAGES THAT REWIRE MY BRAIN CHEMISTRY IMAGES THAT RUIN MY DAY IMAGES I AM IN LOVE WITH AND WANT TO PLASTER EVERYWHERE ON EVERYTHING

THEY WERE SO CLOSE. THEY WERE SO CLOSE.

THEY DIED SO CLOSE. THEY DIED IN THEIR HOME. THEY DIED TOGETHER BUT NOT TOGETHER AND THEY WERE SO CLOSE TO WINNING AND THEY DIDNT

AND AGAIN. THE SMUDGIER BRUSH/SPONGE BLOOD. I LOVE IT. suddenly its not paint its THEIRS and its REAL and its. augh

everything i find compelling about renchanting duo is contained succinctly and wordlessly in this specific frame and it means everything to me ever

also its just really pretty to look at. harsh red/black/white/grey is the ideal color palette and i love how its used here. same w the gradient there at the edge of the altar

artistically and symbolically flawless

i Would eat this image given the opportunity

[wyvern-of-whimsy]

Mortal Toys is a good angsty jim fic abt his toy-ness

The empires superpowers au is VERY MATURE and angsty but honestly the writing is impeccable. MAKE SURE YOU READ THE TAGS THO!! (Also flower husbands)

Ghosts!! is a good phasmophobia au featuring rancherduo, you dont have to know abt phasmo to read

Icy Hearts and Gentle Fires is another rancherduo (can u tell i like them) where jimmy and co get stuck in Decked Out 2

You are Gold to Me by the same person as the one before this is rancherduo where tango lives in the nether. Great worldbuilding here

The first chapter of Missing You is Bittersweet (Wouldn't Miss You for the World) is rancherduo angst, jimmy isnt here directly but its sad. Also this was a gift for me from an event!!

I havent read what lurks in coal mines entirely, but its definitely angsty! :)

Honestly just going thru the jimmy is a toy tag will get u a lot, but b warned theres a lot of body horror

This is just what i had in my bookmarks/what i read recently, hope it helps!!

Side note while i was scrolling thru my bookmarks i remembered this gem: A Romance Route for the Doomed Villain?!? is not jimmy-centric, but its a hilarious fic abt ren/martyn isekai in a bdubs dating sim XD

anyone got any good jimmy angst fic recs? or just cool empires fic recs?

[liamannt]

I followed you for your it content but I dont know these minecraft youtubers are looking really intresting any recommendations or how do I get into them?

Oh boi! this is the best question I've ever gotten tbh but here we go So the thing I'm into rn, and what I've been posting about for the last few weeks or so is called Last Life. It's a hardcore SMP (survival multiplayer) where every player is assigned randomly from 2 to 6 lives at the beginning. If they die and reach their last life their names become red and their goal is to kill others, all alliances with that person break. They do all of this until just one remains. That's a very in short summary of what really happens. Also it has 9 episodes and depending on who you're watching the episodes are 20-40 minutes long so it's a quick binge. So Last Life is actually the second season of Third Life which has a similar premise but it is a bit more lighthearted, where ppl can make alliances with the Red Names. My advice is to start with Third Life and I think the best person to watch for that is Grian (that's how i started watching it as well). Him and Scar have an amazing dynamic, and their story is very enjoyable. But everyone's povs are very enjoyable so if you have interest in others you can go on their channels and watch their pov (that is one of the things I love the most abt this). Once you're done with Third Life, I recommend watching Last Life from Etho's pov, but Grian's and Smallishbean's povs are rlly good as well. But whoever you end up watching you have to watch episode 7 from Grian's pov because it is the best one by far. I also should warn you that there is a lot of angst so be ready for that lol. Now when I first watched Third Life it was really hard for me to get into it bc I didn't rlly know anything abt most of the players. So I'm gonna make a small list explaining the players so it's easier to understand everything (I'm making this assuming you don't know any of them but also trying not to spoil anything):

Smajor1995 (Scott) -in Third Life he has an alliance with Jimmy, people also call them Flower Husbands. In Last Life he has an alliance with Pearl and Cleo and they're called Gatekeep, Girlboss and Gaslight. He's all around a loyal and fair player, I would say definitely Lawful Good. Outside this series he is known for organizing the biggest Minecraft event called Minecraft Championship. So he is a pretty big name in this community

Skizzleman (Skizz) - In TL he was allied with Ren, in LL with Bdubs, Etho and Tango, forming team BEST. I don't know a lot about him but I would say he is definitely a Neutral Good. He is pretty wholesome, and the glue in the BEST team. GoodTimesWithScar (Scar)- in TL he is teamed with Grian, in LL he is mostly alone but on good terms with everyone. He is an interesting charachter for sure. He is a bit of a scammer and an arsonist but we love to see it. I would say he's Lawful Evil but that's my personal opinion. Grian- in TL he is teamed with Scar and in LL he is part of the Southlands, which is made out of Mumbo, Martyn, Jimmy and Impulse. He is a gremlin. Chaotic Evil. You will love him and hate him at the same time. Smallishbeans (Joel)- in both TL and LL he isn't really part of any teams. Lone wolf. He is very lovable despite being chaotic as all hell. He is a pretty funny dude tho. Neutral Evil for sure. Rendog (Ren) - in TL he is the king of Dogwarts, teamed with Martyn (his closest ally) and Etho, in Last Life he is part of the Shadow Alliance with Lizzy, Cleo and BigB. He is very into Roleplay but it is rlly fun to watch tbh. ''King daddy of the server''- Etho, Third Life. Neutral Good

SolidarityGaming (Jimmy but some ppl call him Timmy which is confusing and no one rlly understands why) - in TL he is teamed with Scott and in LL he is part of the Southlands. He's a pretty silly boy, if we were on twitter ppl would call him ''baby''. He is Neutral Good. EthosLab (Etho) - in TL he is teamed with Ren and Martyn and in LL he is part of BEST team. Ppl are afraid of his PvP skills so they dont start beef with him. He loves his trees but Scar keeps burning them down. He is Chaotic Neutral. TangoTek (Tango) -in TL he is an honorary Crastle Member (formed out of Cleo and Bdubs), and in LL he is part of team BEST. Angry boi, he is also very funny. He is Chaotic Neutral. InTheLittleWoods (Martyn)- in TL he is Ren's right hand man, part of Dogwarts, and in LL he is part of Southlands. He is also into Roleplay, and he has cutscenes and stuff that make his story a bit more complex, so if you're into that definitely check him out. A lot of ppl are into the lore that he does in his series. He has fun interactions with everyone. I would say he is a Lawful Neutral.

ImpulseSV (Impulse) -in TL he changes alliances, and in LL he is part of the Southlands. He seems innocent but looks are deceiving, especially in TL. He is a True Neutral. BdoubleO100 (Bdubs) -in TL he is teamed with Cleo and they're the Crastle Crew, and in LL he is in team BEST. Whoever he teams with he fights for them til death. He's a loyal man and Etho ppl make fun of him for being short. He is Chaotic Good. Bigbst4tz2 (BigB) -in TL he sorta does his own thing and in LL he is part of the Shadow Alliance. I also don't know much abt him but he has some angsty but cool moments with Cleo in LL that are worth watching. He is a True Neutral. ZombieCleo (Cleo) -in TL she is part of the Crastle with Bdubs, in LL she begins in the Shadow Alliance. You don't want to have her as your enemy. Chaotic Neutral. LDShadowLady (Lizzy) -she joined in LL and she was part of the Shadow Alliance. She's married to Joel so if you see them flirting that's why. I would say she's pretty Chaotic Neutral.

Mumbo Jumbo -joined in LL and was part of Southlands. Definitely a great addition to the series and him and Grian have a great dynamic. I would say he is also a Chaotic Neutral but I might be wrong. PearlescentMoon (Pearl) -only joined in LL, allied with Scott and Cleo. Best one at making traps so far tbh. She is a crazy lady but we stan. I would say she's pretty Neutral Evil. That's all of them, hope it helps shape them a bit. I also wanna add that half of the people who play in this series are Hermitcrafters, which is also smth else I've gotten into bc of Last Life. So if you enjoy watching Scar, Grian, Mumbo, Etho, Bdubs, Ren, Pearl, Cleo, Tango and Impulse, you can watch their Hermitcraft series, which is a minecraft server where they build crazy stuff and have fun interactions. And the rest of the players you can also find either on the EmpireSMP or playing in MCC! Tl;dr Third Life and Last Life is a rlly enjoyable series, with fun dynamics, interesting story, heart-wrenching angst, complex characters and most importantly murder! Also another tip is to check out fanart on Tumblr, Twitter and Reddit bc it's really good and the content will suck you in fast. Otherwise if you have any questions feel free to dm me! I would also love to hear your reaction to all of it and know if you managed to fall into the Minecraft Roleplay deephole or you survived it :))

[astronomical-bagel]

ok so i just went and listened to "you can't talk about bruno" bc I wanted to know what you were talking about and oh pls elaborate

SAJDHFSJF AAAAAAA TY TY FOR ASKING OKAY OKAY SO:

The reason why i originally thought of this was how scar like made all those contracts and still ended up alone and friendless, for one reason or the other. Everyone just kinda... avoided him, and either they didn't trust him or they were just too busy with their other alliances. Hence: We dont talk abt Scar. Kay? Kay. this might get a liiiittle lengthy and a tad incomprehensible so the rest is gonna be under the cut ahaha

So the castings are:

Pepa: Etho

Felix: Bdubs

(also if you havent watched the movie you NEED to watch this clip bc i LOVE their energy and etho and bdubs 100% do the tango while singing their part)

Dolores 1 (the "grew to live in fear of Bruno stuttering or stumbling" girl): Joel

Camilo ("seven-foot frame, rats along his back"): Ren

Isabella ("He told me that the life of my dreams"): Scott

Dolores 2 ("He told me that the man of my dreams would be just out of reach"): Grian

And Mirabel ("Um, Bruno/yeah, about that Bruno"): Scar himself

OKAY now we got the main casting lemme tell you WHY i cast them. (IMPORTANT: these guys are dissing on Scar to an unknown inquisitor, it doesnt matter who their talking to lollolol):

ethubs: I wanted to see them dance. WELL thats not the ONLY reason-- y'know the whole thing when etho got scar to give bdubs a life, PLUS all the fighting and burning of trees that happened w them? Etho's portion his him bashing on scar bc of that, calling him a swindler and stuff bc of the contracts (the "looks like rain" part is abt the tree arson haha) (ALSO this ties into the marriage counseler joke scar made lmao)

Okay and delores' first part is joel gossiping about scar basically. Since scar is his upstairs neighbor, he can "always hear him sort of muttering and mumbling". Scar's all alone despite doing his best not to be, as well as doing his crystal wizard stuff, he probably talks to himself a lot. OH and the "sound of falling sand" part is SO GOOD bc you can translate that into the clinking of crystals, the shuffling of papers, or YKNOW ACTUAL SAND BC DESERT DUO <3333. it works vv well and i love that line.

OH AND RENS BIT SLAPS SO HARD (A seven-foot frame, rats along his back/When he calls your name it all fades to black/Yeah, he sees your dreams and feasts on your screams) THAT FUCKS!! anyways i chose that for him bc 1.) Scar took ren's final life in third life and 2.) ren took scars final life in last life and 3.) that mean ren kinda has a grudge and you KNOW he likes to make any adversary of his seem as intimidating as possible (cough cough "his name is Mumbo Jumbo" cough cough). Hes such a theater kid too, it's perfect

OKAY and i didn't cast these up above bc theyre not named characters lol BUT its a bunch of people blaming more or less random things on Scar. "He told me my fish would die" could go to lizzie (i mean. im PRETTY sure shes the one w the axolotl), and the other ones could be jimmy blaming the fact that he died first again on him, and hmmm idk about the third guy BUT THAT DOESNT MATTER you could pick any grievance bc the point is that its not actually scar's fault lol

AND ISABELLAS PART is scott and listen this is one of my weaker castings okay. i almost made it grian but i REALLY wanted grian to be dolores's second part so this is just scot being all sparkly like "I won tee hee :3" ig??

(also the "Óye, Mariano's on his way" is pearl lol. Mariano is joel and grian sneaking into their base once again lololol)

OKAY AND DOLORES'S SECOND PART this one is grian because GOD i love sand duo and it features grian staring longingly at monopoly mountain bc theyre not allowed to team up bc of the new season ("just out of reach" and all that)

AND SCAR also doubles as mirabel bc idk it fts. Hes like "ahaha about all that...." AND AND AND i have this scene during the whole bangin medley part where everyone's singing at once where he has a whole bunch of contracts and crystals around him and theyre all doing their thing around him in like a circle (like ethubs doin their little dancy dance, ren doin his spooky story telling, ect ect ect) and the camera angle is like circling around him and the contracts whip up like a tornado AND ITS RLLY COOL AND ANGSTY AND DRAMATIC OKAY and it kinda reminds me of some Good for You animatics if that helps u imagine the visuals

OKAY THATS ALL OF MY RAMBLINGS THANK YOU FOR ASKING ABOUT IT

[puer-aurea]

mercenary au relationships

enemies, romantic, familial, etc ykyk key: big dogs ren heart foundation mounders roomies gem and the scotts lizzie and scar

romantic first ranchers enjoyers arent gonna be happy w this one bc uhhh jimmy and tango arent together! im a big fan of the canary and his miner so uhhh jimmy and mumbo <3 (do we have a name for them or is it just the canary and his miner?) tango and skizz are in a relationship and they both have a crush on bigb and want to ask him out but hes always coincidentally disappearing when they have enough courage to ask him lizzie and joel are dating, but marriage is a lot different for elves than it is for most other species, and since joel cannot for the life of him figure out what lizzie is, he hasnt proposed bc he knows nothing abt her marriage beliefs martyn has the biggest crush on ren and its obvious to everyone BUT ren. martyns super broke tho while ren seems wealthy enough so he thinks ren is out of his league jimmy and scott are exes. scott is still hung up on jimmy but convinces himself jimmy's the one hung up on him (based on scott referencing flower husbands in secret life while jimmy was just doin what joel told him to do) gem and pearl are ace lesbians. no more info needed impulse and scar have no romantic relationships, impulse bc he just isnt interested in anyone and scar bc hes aroace i havent fully figured out what i want for the roomies + bdubs in a romantic or familial sense. i know for sure bdubs and grian are fae brothers, and cleo and etho have no kids, but beyond that idk if i want cletho or ethubs or roomies polycule, or ffs etho/grian. idk yet man! its hard family like i said, grian and bdubs are fae brothers pearl and scar say theyre siblings but dont elaborate on how ones a vamp and ones an elf jimmy and martyn are biological siblings and lizzie found them one day when they were all younger and decided she was their sister. theyre probably the only ones who have an inkling of a clue as to what she is cleo and gem were siblings when cleo was fully alive, whether they still are depends who you ask. (they both still say they are) pearl acts like a mother to all the mounders none of the heart foundation have family in their little village and neither do either of the scotts enemies sorta the big dogs do not have a good relationship w the heart foundation bc martyn broke into it looking for a place to stay but refused to accept skizz offering them a temp place for free bc it made him feel like they hit a whole new low scar thinks most of the village doesnt like him but theyre just suspicious of him since no one can remember actually buying from him bigb acts like hes suspicious of everyone but hes just anxious and weird lizzie and joel both have a slight dislike of scott but for very different reasons on that note, lizzie also has a slight dislike of skizz for the same reason as scott (angels are more perceptive than most, but still not enough)