#elder marisa

[handlebarbs-helmet]

Elder Marisa hehehehehe she's so cute

[twuizzy]

elder MARK? not elder MARISA im trans beaming her ass

[elderscrollsconceptart]

Talym Rend and his son Novos

Art for The Elder Scrolls: Legends

Art Direction: Jonas Andreassen

Artists: Marisa Oh, Joe Meehan, James Strehle, Reza Ilyasa, Bogdan Merica, Luis Lasahido

[stellastra-scribbles]

July 6, 2024 - Artfight 2024 Attack 4: "Really? You interrupted my dinner to tell me that?!"

Karelle and Marisa Telandas for @aldings-stash/@alding-art

[numberonerandomblogger]

Autistic videogames 4 lmao

[devout-khajiit]

Being Both Fandom and Not Fandom: A Pop Culture Paganism Perspective

So, this is more of a personal dive of my own experiences with fandom as a pop culture pagan.

For anybody in the broader sphere of Tumblr coming across this post, pop culture paganism is essentially the worship of fictional characters or other things like a Pokémon species. Sometimes it's based on fictional religions - Like the Nine Divines from The Elder Scrolls, sometimes it's not and is just a collection of characters the pagan likes.

So, I'd consider my experience as partially fandom, partially not. Some aspects yes, other aspects no.

It's definitely an odd experience, because if people asked me about fandom, I don't have a clear answer for them.

To me, I consider PCP to be inherently a partially fandom thing for myself. This is a fairly hot topic for PCPagans, where some believe PCP exists outside of fandom and sometimes that it should exist outside of fandom, with no touch to fandom at all.

I engage with fandom as part of my worship, I create fandom content as part of my worship. I don't just engage with my entities on their lonesome - I create fanfic, I engage in roleplay, I watch fan content, I laugh at memes, etc. It's more than just calling upon the entities as needed/wanted, worshiping them, making offering and devotional, etc.

I also engage with fandom as a devotional thing - if I want to honor my The Elder Scrolls guides, I'll watch videos of the games. I'll write fake myths for them, stories of things they'd probably actually do.

But at the same time, what I do is distinctly not fandom. What I do is not a general fandom experience, and can be identified as something unique from fandom. While some people out there do things like make joke shrines (as in they identify them as jokes), the shrines I make are for actual worship purposes.

I engage with my entities from a very religious perspective. Not everyone engages with them this way, obviously. I've even had experiences where people engage with my PCP blogs from a purely fandom perspective.

While I also write headcanons about Touhous, I also talk to the entities in question and learn about them. Sometimes my headcanons are right, sometimes they're way off, and I keep those headcanons away from the entity in question.

I take great care to tell the difference between the fictional character and the entity in question. Marisa Kirisame the character is a different person to me than Marisa Kirisame the spirit.

As an aside, I think different interpretations of the same character could function the same as epithets - One side of Zeus is of Hospitality, whereas another side is King of Gods. One side of Reimu is quiet and sweet, whereas another is much harsher and can even be cruel.

This is another way that fandom can intersect with PCP.

There is, however, a line. Yes, I can write Touhous, while worshiping Touhous. But I can't act like my version of them is the definitive version. They're a person afterall, who I can get close to understanding, but probably never perfectly. However, I don't have to write them exactly like the them I perceive, they don't care that much anyways.

I also can't turn them into blorbos. I have to acknowledge who they truly are and their agency as individuals, I can't start viewing them only as characters I can write into my silly little fanfictions.

I have to acknowledge them as people, because I worship them as people. I may distinguish between character and entity, but I need to have respect for the entity in question as I move forward.

It's an odd place to be in - Both fandom and not fandom. It applies to all of my practice, where I acknowledge fandom and also do my own thing entirely independent of fandom. Same for canon, actually - Hence why the Molag Bal I interact with is so distinctly different than canon (and fandom) Molag Bal.

Because I acknowledge Molag Bal to be a distinct individual, completely different than whatever his canon counterpart has going on (which is not great by the way!). Same for all of my entities.

I very much, obviously, believe these things can intersect. It's not for everyone, because everyone can do their own thing, but for me! I love engaging with fandom. I don't want to give up engaging with fandom.

I hope this post explains my stance pretty well.

So yeah, I'd say I'm both fandom and not fandom when it comes to PCP.

[zurkdesign]

Marisa Hairstyle for Him

Available for the base game.

24 colors (teen to elder)

Hat compatible

All Lods

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[curiousb]

The Tilney Family Album: Volume XIX

Being an elder isn't slowing Lizzy down. She's still hungry for knowledge...

...and still climbing that career ladder as a result.

Until one day, there's someone there to meet her when she gets home from work...

As Lizzy leaves this mortal plane - through the mailbox - Henry's friend from work Jan Tellerman seems disproportionately upset over the death of someone she hardly knows. But those turn out to be crocodile tears that she's shedding...

With Jan waiting for her moment, Henry takes consolation for his loss in his feline friend.

Henry is surprised and flattered - he never realised that Jan might feel that way about him, although he has just received quite a nice pay-out for the loss of his beloved wife, which could certainly be contributing to his current appeal...

Jan is sending out some rather mixed signals though. It seems she possibly finds his money attractive, but his personal attributes not quite so much.

Over in Sanditon, it's granddaughter Esme's first birthday! She looks so much like mum Eleanor.

~ Capricorn 6 / 7 / 10 / 4 / 7

~ Adventurous / Athletic

With the kids growing up and space in their small bungalow at a premium, Eleanor and Esther decide it's time to get their house in order, and they lay their beloved rescue dogs Max and Buffy to rest in the corner of Sanditon cemetery that has been set aside for pets; and we enjoy a spontaneous romantic interlude between Townies Marisa Bendett and Benjamin Long - aww!

However, it soon becomes clear to everyone that the most satisfactory situation all round would be for the family to move in with widower Henry, back in Merybury, where there's plenty of space for the children to grow. Ellis's first priority is to introduce himself to Kobe.

It's been a long while since Henry has had rugrats playing on the rug.

But he hasn't forgotten how to be the most attentive dad/granddad ever.

[apocalypticavolition]

Let's (re)Read The Great Hunt! Chapter 36: Among the Elders

Let's keep this simple. This post? Spoils all of The Wheel of Time. Literally this specific post references the last pages of the final book. You shouldn't be reading this if you don't already know everything or at least don't care about spoilers.

Oh also there's a gif with an incredibly moderate amount of flashing at the bottom. I don't think it should hurt anyone with conditions but I'm feeling overcautious so this is your heads up.

This chapter is another example of the new trefoil leaf icon because we're still hanging out with the Ogier.

A number of Ogier women were watching him, from white-haired grandmothers to daughters Erith’s age, a knot of them talking among themselves but with all eyes on him. His ears jerked, but he looked at the broad door to which the stone steps led down, and nodded again.

Poor Loial really isn't ready for the Pangossipcon of the Ogier steddings.

The Ogier woman in the middle of the dais sat in a chair raised a little higher than those of the others, three bearded men to her left in long, flaring coats, three women to her right in dresses like her own, embroidered in vines and flowers from neckline to hem.

We can conclude here that while Ogier society is a bit dominated by the ladies (almost nowhere in Jordan's world is perfectly equal), it's still one of the more egalitarian and thus thematically functional places.

“I will find the Horn,” Ingtar said angrily. “I must. If you will not permit us to use the Waygate. . . .” He fell silent as Verin looked at him, but the scowl remained on his face.

What are you going to do, Ingtar? Slaughter them all? That's some redemption.

His face sagged, without any expression at all, and his big eyes were vacant and unblinking, not staring, not looking, not even seeming to see. One of the women gently wiped drool from the corner of his mouth. They took his arms to stop him; his foot went forward, hesitated, then fell back with a thump.

It's a shame brain scanning is a long dead technology because I would LOVE to know what's going on with all this. Perhaps Nynaeve will delve into the Ogier victims someday, though I expect that's probably rather unlikely.

“No mind. No soul. Nothing of Trayal remains but his body.”

So what happened to his soul? Did it just get immediately sent back to T'A'R? Is it still rattling around in Machin Shin? Is this a Hopper-esque true death, or will Trayal manage to be reborn someday?

“We do need him,” Verin broke in smoothly. “Few any longer know the Ways, but Loial has studied them. He can decipher the Guidings.”

Verin once again being the useful team member by giving a reason for Loial's presence. Ingtar is continuing to be a handicap at this point. When wtas the last time he actually did something useful?

“I will,” he told her. It had the feeling of a commitment, the swearing of an oath.

Presumably death gets Rand out of his oaths because dude up and ditches Loial as soon as the weaving of the Pattern is done.

“That’s not true,” Mat said, straightening abruptly. “Marisa Ayellin thinks I’m handsome. She told me so more than once.” “Is Marisa pretty?” Loial asked. “She has a face like a goat,” Perrin said blandly. Mat choked, trying to get his protests out.

It's good that they're bantering again. Gotta say though Perrin, I think your standards for pretty are a bit different than most Two Rivers boys.

Around the edge of the clearing the Ogier had built a low stone coping that seemed as if it had grown there, suggesting a circle of roots. The look of it made Rand uncomfortable. It took him a moment to realize that the roots suggested were those of bramble and briar, burningleaf and itch oak. Not the sort of plants into which anyone would want to stumble.

We should let the nuclear waste storage people know about this method because it seems a lot more effective than the whole "THIS IS NOT A PLACE OF HONOR" bs.

“I have told you,” Verin said, “the Black Wind is a creature of the Ways. It cannot leave them.”

With Rand around, anything is possible Verin. Even bad shit. Hell, especially bad shit.

Verin stood with eyes unfocused in thought. Mat was sitting on the coping with his head in his hands, and Perrin watched him worriedly. Loial seemed relieved that they could not use the Waygate, and ashamed at being relieved.

Raise your hand if you've ever felt the way Loial does.

That said, this affair has definitely gone to shit and I'm not even angry at Ingtar for immediately going back to plan "Smash heads until I get what I want."

“What we need,” Hurin said diffidently, “is one of those Portal Stones.” He looked to Alar, then Verin, and when neither told him to stop, he went on, sounding increasingly confident.

Dude really has low self-esteem for someone who is by all rights an independent contractor. I'm beginning to wonder if Borderlander culture is more messed up than the books let on.

“I can find it,” Rand said reluctantly. He felt ashamed. Mat’s going to die, Darkfriends have the Horn of Valere, Fain will hurt Emond’s Field if you don’t follow him, and you’re afraid to channel the Power. Once to go and once to come back. Twice more won’t drive you mad.

"Yeah I said I was only going to use ultra-heroin at parties, but my buddy's coming over and it would make me a bad host if we didn't hit it up a little."

“The Brown Ajah knows many things,” Verin said dryly, “and I know how the Stones may be used.”

I wonder if this is a Brown Ajah secret, a Black Ajah secret, or in fact just a Verin Mathwin secret. Any answer seems possible.

Next time:

[tsarisfanfiction]

The Attack of the Demon Pigeons

Fandom: Percy Jackson and the Olympians Rating: Teen Genre: Family/Hurt/Comfort Characters: Will Solace, Lee Fletcher, Michael Yew, Apollo Cabin After encountering Stymphalian birds on his way to camp, Will had hoped to never see them again. He certainly hadn't expected to ever encounter them in Camp Half-Blood itself. Okay, so I've thrown TSATS out the window for a lot of reasons, but I did like the potential trauma of what happens when the Stymphalian birds attacked the camp in SOM if Will's already had a bad time with them, so I've snuck an encounter with them into my Will timeline and figured I'd write a fic about the SOM attack from his pov. I have a discord server for all my fics, including this one!  If you wanna chat with me or with other readers about stuff I write (or just be social in general), hop on over and say hi!

Lee hadn’t stopped complaining about the chariot race since it was announced.  It wasn’t like Will’s older brother to be so stressed out about a camp activity, and he’d been a little surprised at just how upset he was about the race’s return – at least, until Lee mentioned that it was the reason Marisa only had one arm.  Will remembered the previous head counsellor for Ares well, even though she’d left two summers ago.  The stump of her right bicep had always looked painful.

Now, Will was worried about it, too.  He wasn’t sure why they were even entering – the Vinther twins from cabin twelve had point blank refused, and neither the Aphrodite nor Demeter kids had even considered it – but despite Lee’s vocal dismay they were.

“Be careful,” Lee insisted as Morton and Daisy hitched their two horses up, Michael standing alongside the chariot and counting out arrows.

It was Lee’s insistence that had convinced Michael not to use sharp arrows, too.  “We don’t need a repeat of your first summer,” Will had heard him say.  “There’s going to be enough work for us to do after the race without you adding to it.”  Will hadn’t been around for Michael’s first summer, but he’d heard the stories.  Michael, for his part, had rolled his eyes and made a show out of only adding blunted arrows to his quiver.

Blunted arrows were still going to hurt, but Michael had point blank refused to not shoot anyone at all, arguing that they were certainly going to be attacked themselves so why shouldn’t he return the favour, and bruising was much easier to fix than whatever else Lee thought they were going to have to deal with at the end.  Will very much hoped there wouldn’t be any limbs torn off this time.

He certainly hoped no-one was going to die.

“You’re good to go,” Daisy said to Morton and Michael, completely ignoring Lee as she held the head of the horse closest to her.  She and Morton were the animal-lovers of the cabin – it had been obvious that one of them would be their driver, and Daisy had passed the honour straight over in a sign that she, too, wasn’t happy about the race.

She hadn’t been in camp for the last one, the one that had gone so badly wrong it was immortalised as a golden chariot on a crimson bead on Lee’s camp necklace – Lee and Silena from the Aphrodite cabin were the only ones in camp that had that bead now, the only campers that remembered it happening, rather than simply hearing the stories – but she was one of the rare demigods who had a full-blooded sibling, and her elder sister Emily had been in camp at the time.

Will also didn’t think it was a coincidence that Michael was making up the other half of their chariot team.  Not only was he the best archer in the cabin, but he also healed fast.  Morton was a faster healer than Daisy, too.

“Then let’s get this over with,” Morton sighed, jumping into the chariot and taking the reins.  “Ready, Michael?”

Michael snorted, dropping one last blunt arrow into his quiver and shouldering his bow before lightly springing into the chariot behind him.  Seeing his siblings in the chariot showed Will just how not-safe it looked – there was nothing for either of them to hold onto.  All Morton had were the reins, which he couldn’t pull on hard otherwise the horses would rear up.  Michael had nothing except the side, which he couldn’t hold onto whilst shooting, and his own sense of balance.

“I’ll walk you to the track,” Daisy said.  “Lee, if you say be careful one more time I’m gagging you.  We get it, stop scaring Will.”

Usually, Lee would make some sort of light-hearted protest about how he was the head counsellor when one of their older siblings – Daisy was eighteen and would be leaving camp to start vet college in the fall – told him what to do, so when his shoulders slumped slightly with a sigh, Will found himself even more worried.

“Sorry, Will,” his brother said, putting an arm around his shoulders before raising his head to look at the rest of their siblings, who were all watching Daisy lead the chariot with their brothers in towards the track.  “Let’s get to the stands, guys.  We want good seats.”

Good seats apparently did not equate front row seats.  Lee firmly shepherded them all near the back of the stands, grabbing Nathan and Robyn by their collars when they tried to head to the front.  “Not the front,” he said.

“Aren’t you being a little too paranoid about this?” Nathan grumbled.  Will had heard the arguments about why couldn’t he be their fighter earlier – Michael had won by challenging him to a shoot-out.  Nathan wasn’t a bad archer (he was certainly better than Will, despite only arriving at camp few months ago), but even in their cabin, no-one came close to Michael.

“If nothing goes wrong and no-one gets badly hurt, then you can complain at me for being too paranoid,” Lee told him.  “And I’ll apologise for ruining the race for you.  Until then, we’re listening to my ‘paranoia’, as you call it.”

No-one else complained after that.

It wasn’t just Lee who was notably on edge.  The other head counsellor that had forced her entire cabin as far back in the stands as possible was Silena, and Will saw her and Lee share a worried look as the Aphrodite kids settled onto the stone steps, most of them apparently completely uninterested in the race.

“Your cabin’s competing?” Will heard Silena ask Lee quietly.  “I didn’t think you would.”

Lee’s answer was even quieter and his tone was as dark as Will had ever heard it.  “We weren’t given a choice.”  His tone lowered even more, until Will could hardly hear what he was saying.  “He made sure all the lead cabins in the camp’s defences took part.”

The rest of the campers jostled around on the other steps, all clearly trying to sit as far away from Tantalus as possible, leaving the poor nymphs and satyrs forced to watch as a barrier between them.  Will was glad Lee had made sure they were nowhere near their new activities director.

Daisy made her way up to join them as Morton drove the chariot the last few yards onto the track, into a gap between the Ares and Hermes chariots.  Will couldn’t hear what was being said, but he could see Michael nocking an arrow as he snapped at the Stoll brothers in the Hermes chariot next to him.  Connor was gesturing at the arrow in what looked a lot like protest, but if Lee hadn’t been able to talk Michael down any more than blunted arrows, then someone from another cabin didn’t stand a chance in Tartarus.

Morton seemed determined to ignore everything except their horses, even when Murder (Will had never understood that nickname, but that was Ares kids for you) leaned over the side of his chariot to say something before Clarisse pulled him back with a short command.

Next to Will, Lee was almost vibrating, clearly impatient for the race to be finished already.  Will grabbed his hand, and got a squeeze in return.

Below them, the Poseidon chariot’s horses needed calming by Percy – Will guessed they weren’t happy about Tyson, which he thought was entirely fair, the cyclops was big and rather scary – and then finally all the chariots were ready to go.

Movement caught Will’s eye, and he glanced up at the trees.  The chariot race seemed to have even drawn in spectating birds, which seemed a little unusual but nothing completely out of the ordinary for camp.  Crows and doves in particular were common sights, but there was something about these that put Will on edge.

It was probably Lee’s paranoia rubbing off on him, he told himself, especially when he thought he saw a glint of something shiny – too shiny to be a crow or a dove.  He tore his eyes away and forced himself to look at the chariots again as they jostled into their positions on the starting line.  Michael had stopped arguing with the Stolls, but his bowstring now had two arrows on it instead of one.  Morton’s mouth was moving but Will couldn’t tell if he was talking to Michael or the horses.  He certainly wasn’t talking to Clarisse or Murder, who looked like they were having their own last-minute strategy discussion.

More birds flew throught his periphery and he pressed against Lee’s side.  They were just normal birds, he told himself.  Birds that weren’t normal couldn’t get into camp.  They couldn’t.  It didn’t matter that he and his siblings all carried bows and full quivers at all times now because sometimes monsters were breaking through the barrier.  It didn’t.

Lee let go of his hand and wrapped his arm back around his shoulders again, pulling him in tightly.  “Sorry, did I scare you that much?” his brother asked quietly.  Will shook his head, then jumped as the birds started to caw.

It wasn’t, it wasn’t, it wasn’t-

But he knew that sound.

“Will?”  Lee sounded worried, and Will looked up to see his brother looking down at him, dark blue eyes filled with concern.  “Will, are you okay?”

His quiet question drew the attention of some of the rest of the cabin, and Will swallowed.  “I don’t like the birds,” he admitted.

“The birds?”  Lee blinked, as though he hadn’t expected that.  It wasn’t like Lee didn’t know about the birds that had attacked Will and Thistleberry on their way to camp, but his brother had obviously thought it was something to do with the race.  “It’s okay, Will,” he said, a soft smile slipping onto his face as he glanced over towards the birds himself.  “They’re just- oh.”

“Oh?” Nathan asked, leaning in and almost crushing Will.  “They’re just birds, right?  Noisy fuckers.”

“You’ve been spending too much time around Michael,” Daisy muttered.  She was ignored.

“Are you going to tell us the birds are making you paranoid, too?” Robyn added.  “Should we be ready to shoot them if they startle the horses or something?”

Lee sighed.  “Guys,” he said.  “I get it, you’re annoyed at me.”

“I don’t like those birds, either,” Daisy backed him up.  She knew about Will’s history, too, unlike the other two.  “They’re not the normal ones we get around camp.”

The birds were getting louder, and Will burrowed further into Lee’s side.  Around him, the rest of the campers were starting to murmur, so it wasn’t just him that was bothered.  Lee’s reaction made him think that maybe he wasn’t being paranoid – or maybe Lee was being extra paranoid.  Will definitely wished for the second option.

Below them, Tantalus didn’t seem to care about the noisy birds at all as he announced the start of the race, and Will forced himself to watch as the chariots all surged forwards, hoping that the race would go smoothly, that everything was fine-

He shrieked as Travis lurched the Hermes chariot sideways and it smashed straight into the wheel of their golden chariot.

“No!” Lee shouted almost in his ear, but it wasn’t just Lee as they all watched Morton and Michael get thrown out, the wooden chariot splintering.  Caught by the reins, Morton’s fall wasn’t clean and Will saw his wrist jerk, clearly breaking as he crashed into the ground.

Michael, unrestrained, ended up in a roll that looked almost controlled as he landed heavily, flipping over until he was on the balls of his feet, bow fully drawn.  The nocked arrows flew towards the Hermes chariot, but the Stolls didn’t even notice the shafts tangling in their wheels as the panicking horses cut them off, obliterating their chariot in turn.

Both of them were thrown clear, not too dissimilarly to Morton and Michael, and wisely scrabbled away from both the mess of chariots and panicking horses, and Michael as he stood up, nocking more arrows.  Morton was slower to get to his feet, and was obviously cradling his broken wrist as he did so, but next to him, Will felt Lee relax slightly.

They were okay.  Michael didn’t seem to be injured at all, although there were probably some bumps and scrapes they couldn’t see, and Morton only seemed to be worried about his wrist.  Given Lee’s stories, and Marisa’s arm, it could have been a lot worse.

It was Morton that pulled Michael back from shooting the Stolls again, gesturing with his head to the horses.  Daisy was quivering in her seat, and some of the Aphrodite kids – Silena included – were no better, as the four horses kept struggling.  The chariots had to get off the track, and the horses needed calming down, but the moment some of them tried to move to go help, Tantalus’ head swivelled around.

"No interference," he reminded them all, voice raised just enough to be heard above the shrieking birds.  It sounded a bit like a threat.

Will watched as Morton and Michael approached the wreckage, the Stolls joining them – after putting their hands up in surrender when Michael glared at them and snapped something Will couldn’t hear over the birds – and started trying to free the horses.  Morton had the golden touch with the animals, while Michael and the Stolls carefully dodged hooves to cut them loose.  Next to Will, Lee had tensed again, and Will could understand why.  Horses were dangerous – if any of them took a hoof to the head, they could be killed.

The other chariots were still thundering around the track.  Beckendorf and Jake were trying to regain control of their chariot after failing to pull something on Percy and Tyson, while Annabeth and Conrad were barrelling into the lead, pursued by both the Poseidon and Ares chariots.

Will barely noticed any of that, though, because that was the moment the birds attacked.

Someone screamed.

Several someones screamed.

Will was one of them.

He knew these birds, knew those beaks that were tearing at him, getting caught in his hair and digging at his arms as he tried to batter them away before Lee pushed him down, crouching over him as Will curled up into a defensive ball.  He was vaguely aware of his siblings moving around him, nocking arrows to strings as further away the cries of shields! came from where the Athena kids had been sitting.

“Stay down, Will,” Lee said, his voice tight.  He sounded hurt, and blood dripped onto the stone by Will’s face.  Next to him, he heard Nathan swearing.

“I can’t get a clear shot!” one of his other siblings cried – Will thought it might have been Lear but with so much screaming it was hard to tell.

“They’re too close!” someone else shouted.

One of the Aphrodite kids screeched almost as loudly as the birds.

“Group together!” Lee ordered, and Will found himself pulled into a mass of bodies.  “Daisy- Michael?”

“I can’t get a fucking shot from the ground!” Will heard Michael yell back.  He sounded close, and out of breath.  “And I need arrows with fucking points!”

Will’s own quiver dug into his side.  He didn’t know where his bow was.

“Michael!” he shouted, fumbling with the strap.

“Will, stay down!” Lee shouted.

“Fuck, Will!  Where-”  Will unfurled himself enough to spot familiar boots and grabbed at Michael’s ankle.  Immediately, beaks tore into his exposed arm, and he half-screamed, half-sobbed.  “Fuckers!” his brother swore, lashing out with his other foot and kicking away the birds.

They went for Michael instead, but aside from a constant stream of curses, his brother ignored them as he fought his way past Nathan – who hadn’t stopped swearing, either – to duck down underneath where Lee was still looming over Will.  Michael didn’t bother asking if he was okay – he knew, too, about Will’s history with the birds.  He staggered, as though something had hit him from behind, and over his shoulder Will saw massive dark wings.

“Stay down,” he snapped when Will tried to move, realising that between Lee and Michael and someone else – Daisy, maybe – he was completely hemmed in by his siblings.  Protected by his siblings.  The realisation made tears well in his eyes.

“Arrows,” he said, fumbling with his quiver again.  He didn’t know where his bow was, couldn’t shoot well enough to take down the birds even if he could – he thought he could, when he’d trained and trained and trained, but now the birds were here and all he could do was cower and tremble and hate himself for being so scared – and Michael needed arrows.

His brother understood.

Michael’s small, deft fingers – they were smaller than Will’s, now, and it had always been obvious that he was going to out-grow Michael one day but he still hadn’t been ready for the day it happened – pushed his out the way and with a quick twist had the buckle loose.  “Stay down,” he said again, somehow fastening the quiver around his own waist and dropping his own in the process, before grabbing his bow again.  “I’ve got some birds to fucking kill.”

He stood up, amid shouts of no clear shot from their siblings, and snarled.

“Be careful!” Will heard Lee caution.

“Everyone’s got plenty of fucking holes in them already,” Michael snapped.  “A few more won’t make any fucking difference.”

“Michael!”

Anything else Lee had to say was drowned out by the sudden explosion of ear-splitting violins at maximum volume.  Will recognised one of Chiron’s CDs when he heard it, although he didn’t know which album it was.

The identity of the music was much less important than the cry of “archers!” from somewhere below – Annabeth, of course it was Annabeth that had thought of it – and the ripple that ran through his siblings as they shifted from crouching and cowering to standing up straight.  Will poked his head up as well to see the birds fleeing in a dazed cacophony, colliding with each other.

Michael was the first to shoot, what looked like half a quiver nocked to his string.  Every single one turned one of the birds into an explosion of dust.  Lee was half a second behind him, multiple arrows on his own string, and Will fumbled for his own bow – spotting it lying abandoned where he’d been sat – and arrows from Michael’s discarded quiver as the rest of his siblings followed suit.

Will could only shoot one arrow at a time, and all he had were Michael’s blunted ones, but he still forced himself to join his siblings in sending a hail of shafts into the sky.  It turned out that even blunt arrows could hit with enough force to dust some, although they couldn’t do what Michael’s sharp shots were doing and occasionally piercing several with one arrow.

It felt like an eternity before they were all gone, a layer of dust covering the ground and remains of the Apollo and Hermes chariots all that remained of those that hadn’t managed to get out of range fast enough.

The campers were a mess.

Will looked down at his exposed skin, where blood was trickling down from where he’d been pecked, and then at everyone else.  No-one was unscathed.  Lee had several deep gouges in the back of his neck, and Daisy’s hands were riddled with holes, while Michael’s face dripped red.  No-one else was any better off, and Will sank down to sit on the stone steps again shakily.

A warm arm wrapped around him and he looked up to see Lee sitting next to him.

“They’re gone now, Will,” his brother told him.  “It’s over.”

“I am going to shoot all fucking birds on sight now,” Michael grumbled on Lee’s other side – Daisy immediately protested, but went ignored, much like the entire Apollo cabin was ignoring Tantalus declaring Clarisse the winner.  Will tried to listen to see if he was saying anything about organising triage, but he only seemed to care about talking nonsense instead.

Lee nudged him softly, picking up his arm where it was bleeding and scrutinising it carefully.  “Let’s get you healed up,” he said.  “We’ll need your help patching everyone else up.”  He chanted a prayer to their father, and Will watched as his cuts stopped stinging so badly and started to heal up.

“I’ll start rounding people up for triage once he’s finished loving the sound of his own voice,” Daisy said, jerking her head towards Tantalus, and Lee nodded.

“Thanks,” he said.  “Michael, how badly were you and Morton hurt in the crash?”

Michael huffed.  “I’m fine,” he said.  “Don’t worry about me.  Morton’s wrist is fucked and he got a few scrapes but he’ll be fine, too.”

“I take it you didn’t look at Travis and Connor?” Lee asked, sounding a little bemused.

“Of course I fucking didn’t,” Michael grumbled.  “Fucking assholes.”

Lee laughed a little.  “I’ll catch up with them later,” he said, as Tantalus finally stopped proclaiming how the whole thing was Annabeth, Percy and Tyson’s fault – yet somehow not Conrad’s, despite it supposedly being the Athena and Poseidon chariots to blame – and dismissed them to clear up the mess.  “They look fine from up here.”

Will glanced down to see the Stolls taking charge of the Hermes cabin.  They had the same red specks as everyone else, but otherwise Lee didn’t seem to be wrong.  “They can wait,” he agreed, and Michael smirked.  Lee shook his head, but he was smiling, too.

“We’ve got a lot of work to do,” he said.  “Michael, you’re on arrow collection duty with Nathan.  Don’t shoot anyone, including each other, and if anyone comes to you guys for healing send them to the triage nicely.  Even the Stolls, although I think they’ve got better self-preservation than to go near you right now, Michael.  Will, you and Robyn are with me in the infirmary.  Everyone else, triage – if it’s not bad enough to need healing, clean punctures, put band-aids on and send them towards the other head counsellors to help in clearing this mess.  Anyone worse, to the infirmary.  No-one’s cleared to give out ambrosia or nectar – if they need it, infirmary.  Start with each other.  Lear, take over organising the campers from Daisy – I know she’d rather deal with the horses.  And make sure Morton comes to the infirmary rather than the stables!”

Will pulled himself to his feet as his siblings dispersed in groups of two or three, checking each other over as they headed for the bulk of the campers.

“You’re hurt,” he said, looking at Lee’s gouges, and his brother smiled reassuringly at him.

“It’s fine,” he promised.  “Let’s get to the infirmary first, then you can patch me up, okay?  I want to be there before patients start showing up.”

Will eyed the blood dubiously, but Lee pulled him along before he could say anything else.  Robyn had already run on ahead, nursing her own wounds as she did so, and Lee forged a path straight to the Big House, dodging around Mr D. when the god made a brief appearance, took in the state of the camp, and disappeared inside again.

All around them there was activity.  Silena was pacifying some of her distraught siblings and nudging them towards where Lear had taken over from Daisy in corralling the camp.  Will could see why Lee had picked him to do that – he and Daisy were both eighteen, but where Daisy was average height and more interested in making sure the horses were okay, Lear was tall and muscular and willing to wrangle campers.  Much like his older brother, Brandon, who had left camp two years ago – like Daisy, he was the younger of a pair of rare full siblings – he was going to be headed straight for the basketball leagues in the fall.  Lear was impossible to miss, and difficult to disagree with when he put his foot down.

Clarisse was organising the Ares cabin.  None of them had even considered approaching healers, and Will wondered how long it was going to take Lee to hunt them down, but despite their wounds, they were all grimly reorganising what sounded like camp defences.  Beckendorf had taken the lead on organising the clear-up of the racetrack, complete with the debris from the destroyed chariots, and from the sound of it was welcoming volunteers from all cabins.

It was almost a relief when they made it to the infirmary, away from the chaos of the camp.  Robyn had got there first and was already pulling out bandages and antiseptic wipes in preparation for the long line of patients they were no doubt going to get, and Will made Lee sit down as he inspected his older brother’s wounds.

“You didn’t have to shield me,” he said as he cleaned them, trying to ignore Lee’s wincing.  “You or Michael or Daisy or-”

“The older ones shielded all of us,” Robyn interrupted him, depositing vials of nectar on the desk.  “It wasn’t just you, Will.”  She gestured at the wounds on her own arms.  Like him, now that Will looked closely, she didn’t actually have many.

“Older sibling prerogative,” Lee shrugged, wincing again as Will dabbed a bit more at a particularly deep gouge.  “Daisy was trying to shelter me, too.”  He reached for Robyn’s arm.  “Let me look at those while Will deals with me.  Don’t think I missed you running on ahead without getting checked out.  We’ve talked about this, Robyn.”

“I wanted to get the infirmary ready,” she protested, but obeyed anyway, letting Lee wipe her wounds and chant another little prayer to Apollo.  Satisfied that Lee’s wounds were clean, Will hummed his own healing hymn, watching the gouges seal up beneath his hands.

He was done just in time for the first patients to limp through the door.

Despite Lee’s earlier orders that only the seriously injured come to the infirmary, most of the camp passed through their doors at some point.  The Ares kids had to be hunted down – Murder’s fingers had been pecked to the bone when he’d apparently tried to hold a camouflage net over himself and Clarisse as a defence, but he hadn’t walked in until Lear had all but picked him up and thrown him through the door – but most came willingly.  No-one, it seemed, wanted to run the risk of being scarred by birds.  Even most of the Ares kids didn’t seem to think that being pecked was a particularly badass scar story to tell and caved to medical attention eventually.

By the time they were done, Will was exhausted, and Lee and Robyn didn’t seem much better.  Their siblings had come to join them once initial triage was over – even Michael had ended up hanging out in the corner after he and Nathan had retrieved all the arrows they could, although most of what he did was to snap at anyone who tried to push ahead in the queue and threaten them with more holes if they disobeyed – but treating the entire camp in the space of a couple of hours was still a tall order.

Tantalus and his side comments about demigods being wimps nowadays didn’t help, either.

Will missed Chiron.

As the last patients – the Stolls, who had been left until last because they weren’t that badly hurt and had made the fundamental mistake of upsetting the healers by knocking two of their own out of a chariot – finally left, Will flopped down onto one of the beds.  Robyn flaked out on the floor, while Lee slumped into a chair next to them.  Michael shoved a small vial of nectar at each of them, and Will gratefully drank his as he watched Morton, wrist freshly casted, slink out of the door to no doubt join Daisy in the stables with the horses.

“Fucking chariot races,” Michael muttered into the blissful quiet of the emptied infirmary.  “I won’t be doing that again.”

Nathan, who had flopped on the floor next to Robyn for no reason other than to keep her company, perked up.  “Does that mean I get to be fighter next time?”

“There will be no next time,” Lee grumbled.

“Be my fucking guest,” Michael said at the same time.  “See how you like getting thrown out of a fucking chariot.”

He’d refused medical treatment until everyone else – except the Stolls – had been treated, and wasn’t impressed to find out that he’d actually got a light sprain to his ankle which he’d somehow completely missed during all of the excitement.  Will and Lee had both chewed him out for not letting them check him over earlier.

“There will be no next time,” Lee repeated firmly.

After that morning, Will was firmly on Lee’s side.

“How are you doing, Will?” Lee asked him after a few moments.  He wasn’t asking about Will’s post-healing exhaustion and they both knew it.

Will’s hand curled into a fist.  “I was scared,” he admitted.  “I couldn’t-”  He’d trained to fight them but he’d just hidden.

“Nothing wrong with being scared,” Michael told him bluntly when he broke off, before Lee could say anything.  He perched on the side of the bed Will was flopped on.  “You still shot them down.  I saw you.  With fucking blunt arrows, too.”

He hadn’t realised Michael had even been paying attention to his shooting.

“Not as-”

“If you’re about to say not as many as me, I’m going to stuff these bandages in your mouth,” Michael threatened, gesturing at the ones wrapped around his ankle.  Will’s mouth shut with a clack.  “It wasn’t a fucking competition, Will.  You stood up and you shot those fuckers even though Lee and I both told you to stay the fuck down.”

Was Michael telling him off for disobeying them?  Indignation flooded through him – sure, he’d been scared, but if Michael thought he was really just going to hide under them like a coward-!

Will pushed himself into a sitting position, only to see that his older brothers were both smiling at him.

“You were scared but you didn’t let that stop you,” Lee told him.  “That was really brave, Will.”

Will felt his cheeks heat up.  “But I-”

“But nothing,” Lee said.  “None of us are Herakles – we can’t take down a flock of those things single-handedly.  Not even Michael.”

“I could,” Michael grumbled quietly, and Lee shushed him.

“You’d get torn to shreds by a flock that large before you killed half of them,” he pointed out.  Michael threw an unused roll of bandages at Nathan when the younger boy laughed at him from the floor.

“You’d get torn apart first,” he snarled at him.

“Wanna bet?”  Will couldn’t see Nathan, but he could hear the cocky smirk in his voice.

“No,” Lee intervened before Michael could reply – and probably accept it, if Will knew his brother at all.  “Both of you, stop it.  Neither of you are having a competition to see how many Stymphalian birds you can shoot down before they kill you.  Or any other substitute for them, either.  Anyway,” he stressed, turning to look at Will again, “my point is that we’ll always have to work together to take down some things – a lot of things, actually.  So it’s not a bad thing that you can’t do it alone.  You’re not alone, Will.”

“Damn straight you’re not,” Michael agreed, nudging him in the side with an elbow.

Will knew he wasn’t alone.  He hadn’t been alone since he’d arrived at camp and discovered he had twenty or so half-siblings.  Even in the winter months, when most of them went home, there were still several – Lee, Michael, Daisy and Robyn among them – that stayed.  It was harder to find somewhere alone than to be with someone.

He still found himself bursting into tears, reaching out blindly for one of his siblings.

It was Lee that wrapped him up in his arms, almost pulling him off of the bed and into his lap, but there was a hand in his hair that was too small to be anyone’s except Michael’s and more hands on his shoulders.  Will sobbed into his brother’s shoulder, clinging to Lee tightly in turn.

The birds had been terrifying and he was exhausted from several hours of healing, but his siblings were proud of him and he hadn’t run away, had been brave, according to Lee.

Will still didn’t feel very brave.  But right then, he felt safe.

[gensokyogarden]

@alchemistdetective replied to your post “I think I mentioned it on the other blogs but have...”:

not that I know :D))

​So when I first got into Touhou which was ... I guess about two years ago now. Maybe a bit less(?) I decided to check it out chiefly because one friend was a fan. But I approached it, uhhhh, maybe strange from how most people did.

At first I just looked at some funny fanart and watched some walfas videos or fan animations like rampaging sakuya(tm). Then whenever I started actually getting into it. I mainly just looked at games and manga that interested me.

So I checked out EOSD, SA, UM, read Foul Detective Satori, and chatted with folks that were way more involved in the fandom than I was. But it was all in a limited scope. For example I did not touch Ten Desires at all. My entire knowledge, up until I had made my Satori blog, of Ten Desires was just from things I vaguely picked up from fanart or overhearing others talk about it.

And from that was born: Lis's Ten Desires. A horrible misconception of what Ten Desires was about and who its cast was. It goes a little like this. Ahem

Reimu and her allies encounter a pair of mysterious priests who have traveled to Gensokyo. They are a pair of boys named Miko (elder mentor) and Futo (Priest apprentice) from China. The two are Taoist-priest exorcist cool bois that hunt evil spirits. You know. In China I guess. But they've had to travel to Gensokyo because an evil spirit that has been sealed for one thousand years has reawoken.

That evil spirit is Seiga Kaku (final boss of the game) who is a powerful ghost. That was sealed somewhere (China) but escaped her little sealing jar and escaped to Gensokyo. Reimu, Marisa, Miko, and Futo join forces to defeat her. Which eventually they do (putting her in a little jar).

But Miko and Futo find that they have become trapped within Gensokyo. So this nun lady named Byakuren helps them to find a home not far from her temple (and then I guess Miko and Byakuren kiss a lot). But also the seal on Seiga's jar isn't perfect so sometimes she pops out to bother Miko and Futo.

That's about what I thought the plot of Ten Desires was.

[handlebarbs-helmet]

If you think transfem Mark HC is bad because "y'all want Davidmark to be a straight ship so bad" DNI PLEASEEEE

[twuizzy]

lazy elder mark doodle im going insane

[elderscrollsconceptart]

Solitude Stalwart

Art for The Elder Scrolls: Legends

Art by Marisa Oh

[the-little-fox-in-the-box]

Do you have any Ancient Rome book recommendations?

*big breath* Well...

If we're talking about ancient works of the authors of the past I'd say Martial's Epigrams and Pliny The Elder's Natural History to show how Romans viewed the world and their daily life and troubles. And of course Catullus' Poems and Poems of Horace, they're pretty good ones. Perhaps Seneca's Deification of Claudius, Petronius' Satyricon and Apuleius' Golden Ass are also fun if you're into more humorous works. If you wanna find out about Roman history through the eyes of the ancients you might wanna check out Tacitus, Suetonious and Cassius Dio (but they may not exactly be subjective, one being an aristocratic buffoon, the second one a notorious gossiper and the last one being a Senate Boot-licker). Cicero's speech against Catilina and Cicero's Letters are also absolutely fascinating and worth checking out. You might also wanna check out Apicius' De Re Coquinaria, it's a really interesting read that shows how the Romans dined.

If you're into more modern works though L.J Trafford "How To Survive in Ancient Rome" and Garrett Ryan's "Naked Statues, Fat Gladiators and War Elephants" are a GODSEND about the daily lives of roman citizens and I'd reccomend starting from those two, they're my personal favourites. As for other sources I'd say Thomas R. Martin's "Ancient Rome", "Jerome Carcopino's Daily Life in Ancient Rome", Lidia Winniczuk's "Dictionary of Culture of Antiquity", Jerzy Beskidzki's "Sex and Power" and Time-Life Books' "Anciet Rome" to name a few.

As for more kid-friendly, yet still entertaining books Horrible Historis "Rotten Romans" and Chae Strathie "A So You Think You've Got It Bad? Kid's Life in Ancient Rome" are a wonderful lecture.

...though as for personal recommendations about my favourite Ancient Roman Emperor Richard Hollands' "Nero: The Man Behind the Myth", Alexander Krawczuk's "Nero", Philip Vandenberg's "Nero", John Kay's "Nero", Marisa Panetta's "Nero", J. Kraszewski's "Life under the Rule of Nero" and both books by Margaret George about Nero particularly "The Confessions of Young Nero", though these ones are more of a historical fiction, though VERY well adapted.

...Aaaand that's about it for the start. Happy Reading!

[devout-khajiit]

Here to return the asks. I really like the questions, it gives me points to focus on answering.

Have you ever had a bad experience with an entity?

Are any of your worked with entities "controversial" so to speak in the fandom? Why? Are any of your worked with entities essentially fandom-wide blorbos?

If you could, what aspect of your series would you change?

And any two other questions that have not been asked yet.

~Elias

Ask game here.

Well met, internet traveler! Thanks for the questions!

Have you ever had a bad experience with an entity?

Not any of my PCP entities, but I was dealing with a haunting for a looooong time. It's hopefully resolved now, as I keep saying, but it's a bit hard to really tell if it's properly handled or not.

Are any of your worked with entities "controversial" so to speak in the fandom? Why? Are any of your worked with entities essentially fandom-wide blorbos?

Quite a few are controversial, Molag Bal being the main one, that's obvious for everyone who is into The Elder Scrolls. Basically, think of the worst possible guy you can. Now make him ten times worse. Canon Molag Bal is still worse than him.

Milk Cookie also has a bit of discourse within some parts of the fandom, but that may have died out by now. But essentially, people were mad that he was, apparently, a Holy Crusader... but he's actually more of a paladin than a crusader?

Goblin Cookie is also controversial but for better reasons to the point I'm unsure if I wanna do anything with him. To make it simple, he's got a few staples of Jewish stereotyping, but not much, so he's been deemed "thin ice at best" by the community. It may not have been on purpose by Devsisters, but that's not the point, they still made Goblin Cookie a Jewish stereotype.

As for fandom-wide blorbos, I'd say Marisa Kirisame from Touhou Project. She's so beloved by everyone, lmao. She deserves it.

If you could, what aspect of your series would you change?

I'd change The Elder Scrolls so that there'd be more canon information and canon instances about actual worship. We know a lot about the Nine Divines and the Daedric Princes, but how one would actually worship them is relatively unknown!! We also barely at all see actual Nine Divines worshipers or worshipers of the Princes, so we don't get much information about that either.

WILDCARD (I used a randomizer for this): Would you build/have you built a spell based on a pop culture source that you don't care much for?

Not really, because the way I like to work this basically has me both engage with sources I already like, and take any new source I feel like doing under my wing for general stuff. So I doubt I'd end up doing spells for series that don't evoke much for me.

WILDCARD (also randomizer): Quick! Make a quick, easy spell you could theoretically perform now/soon!

Uh uh uh oh gosh uh.

Let's take Firaga from Final Fantasy.

I have carolina ghost reaper pepper powder (what a mouthful), so I could do a spell where I use that energy to set someone seriously ablaze somehow. What this would do in practice I'd have to think further on.

Get a taglock of who I want to do it on, put it in one of my many envelopes, fill it with some pepper powder, seal it well, shake it up, leave it somewhere safe for a while before disposing of it when I feel like the spell is done for.