#faceless background player

[kindahoping4forever]

is ash in the background of the second pic on michael’s latest instagram post? (about the gender reveal)

Hard to say tbh!

[lopposting]

ALSO ALSO!!

Gemini uses informal speech with P, very kind of buddy-buddy. cute

There's a really interesting line by Gemini that is being interpreted, it's during the alchemist tower climb before the manus fight where he says:

"Did you feel that? It's like someone walked across my grave."

Gemini mentioning his physical "grave" piqued a lot of interest for some, while others think that the line is an expression only. I wanted to check what the korean text was to see if the grave mention still exists (because then we might assume that the grave mention is an idiom since it appeared from conveying the meaning of the text, right?)

It doesn't really prove anything, but it's an interesting thought experiment or whatever. Here is the quote in korean:

Gemini's line read in the english version by Rasmus Hardiker:

Did you feel that? It's like someone walked across my grave. I sense Ergo everywhere. I mean, this place is saturated with it... like what you'd expect from a mountain of dead puppets.

The subtitle lines I found from a korean playthrough, with a translation:

느꼈어? 여기 오싹한데... Feel that? It's creepy here... 수많은 에르고들이 느껴져. 마치 시체의 산처럼 가득…. I feel so many ergos. Like a mountain of corpses…

I don't know if a similar expression (walked over my grave, as in a paranormal chill or feeling that is said to be a premonition of walking over ones own future grave in english-language folklore?) exists in korean. [Also, Gemini saying "dead bodies" instead of "dead puppets"!]

btw, I think it's more than valid if people think that the korean version doesn't matter at all, since the official language is english, and the devs still chose to include the grave line in one way or another. I thought I'd share for what it's worth, take it for what you will.

[lionheartedmusings]

bear with me bc this is gonna be a bit of a long one, but i've seen folks talking about how they're excited to get the horrors back on the qsmp and while i totally agree that i miss those blood-curdling, creepy, uncanny valley sort of scenes... i think the beauty of the overall storyline (as much as it's execution can be criticised ) is that we as the audience are seeing things in a vacuum.

the qsmp storyline is a living breathing player alongside our povs, and while we're aware of that, we're also not always engaging with it. we're getting swept up in the day-to-day of it all and getting lulled into a sense of security that ultimately makes us unable to truly comprehend the horror of the last few months until we take a step back and analyze it bit by bit.

children went missing in the night, leaving only their identifiers behind on empty beds. there were no leads. people looked and looked, and found nothing. parents were mad with concern and grief, and the all-seeing, all-powerful entity that rules their lives trapped in this hamster wheel of an island has no answers.

then, the items left behind on those beds vanish too.

then, there's mind-controlling, happiness inducing drugs being pumped into people against their will. still no news of the children. people are falling apart at the seams.

people are led to a maze where a wheel is spun and everything they have left of the children of this godforsaken island is gone. burned up. what does it mean? no one knows. they have to live on.

suddenly, a game is played. a clone of a dead child shows up, leading some of them into the same maze, forcing them to walk through a maze of doors and corridors, only to find a game of dice orchestrated by an unknown entity.

new people arrive, bearing witness to the hopeless, grim, sad reality of everyone who was already there. there's hope — there's always hope — but my god the pain is overwhelming.

there's clues, but there's not. the government keeping them trapped here against their will still has no answers, nothing to point them in the right direction.

faceless bears go missing.

faceless bodies show up on the streets. bloodied. dead. eaten.

suddenly, there's thunder and lightning and oh! oh, their children! of course they'll get on the train, that's where the children are!

but they're hijacked. stolen. once again, their autonomy is stripped entirely as another entity with power they cannot comprehend forces them to split into factions and compete for... something. their children's lives are on the line and they maim and kill those they call family because they fear they have no choice.

everyone went through hell — purgatory was a bad title for what they went through. it was hell, with no salvation in sight.

when all is said and done, when all the murder and backstabbing is over, they see their children through glass they cannot break. one escapes because chance said so, and the rest are left behind as the ceiling collapses on them.

the world is ending and their salvation is one singular boat a thousand blocks away. lovers can't say goodbye, friends run for their lives together, a father and a son dash desperately with no hope in sight. some stay behind, through choice or chance.

the government official that has made their life hell returns the children to them, and brings some new ones. those new children get carted off to new parents without option (again) and suddenly everything's supposed to be fine! nevermind your friends are gone! nothing to see here!

behind the scenes, the all-seeing all-knowing government is breaking apart, there's something far more horrifying and twisted at play in the background... but it's nothing the islanders can help with. nothing they can do. they have to live on and pretend their golden cage is fine and dandy bc at the end of the day, it's their only option.

one-eyed creatures show up demanding something "of theirs" back and bc humanity is strong, one islander refuses to hand someone kind and innocent off to them.

it dooms them, as their humanity has every single time.

now, they're under attack and they can barely defend themselves despite months of prep and having amazing gear — again, they try their hardest but everything is stacked against them. they fight, and fight, but their children are on the line and that's their main concern.

every fight? there's bodies littering the ground and panicked screams. explosions. chainsaws revving, and worry, and it's a war ten times a week.

a child loses a life, and now it's personal, but what can they do? no one listens to them, no one has ever listened to them.

and in the middle of all of this? their family is still gone, trapped in a wasteland, or missing, or... dead.

there was no funeral for q!maxo bc there's no stopping to smell the roses on quesadilla island, not really. where's slime? where's pol? where's the people who they haven't seen yet? gone, yes, but they don't have time to stop and worry about them. they don't have time to mourn losses and grieve their dead.

luffy, who came to try and help their friends, was stolen and hurt.

those eyeball workers? they were people once, maybe good people. maybe the best people we never got to meet, but they got shifted and changed into something monstrous and out of their control.

my point being: the story that the qsmp is telling is innately horrifying. it's not just creepy — it's twisted, and tragic, and absolutely terrifying. it's about loss of agency and running on an endless hamster wheel of someone else's making, and how you just sort of... live with it after a while.

and i think that's really fucking cool, because like these characters we too get used to the tragedy of life, little by little, and forget to see the whole thing from a bird's eye view (pun intended).

[ani-iu]

[𝟑] 𝐏𝐋𝐀𝐘 𝐆𝐎𝐃 | 𝐀𝐝𝐚𝐦 × 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫

𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐬: annoyances to lovers; forced proximity; mutual pining; developing relationship; religious imagery & symbolism; explicit language; misogyny; Adam being Adam; he falls first and harder; sexual tension; eventual smut; religious guilt; explicit sexual content; clingy Adam; happy ending; light angst; character study; not canon compliant. 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐜𝐢𝐟𝐢𝐜 𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐬: a gory description of a character's death, stalking, suicidal thoughts.

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 6,4k.

// what do you think it takes to get into heaven, little ballerina?

𝐘ou were always told that, after God, you should fear men.

The saying never sat right with you. Why did you have to feel that way about either of them? Wasn’t God supposed to be loving and kind? What is there to fear? And then there was the man. If God didn’t frighten you, why would you feel any different about someone created in His image?

In hindsight, you should have simply listened to what you were told instead of burdening yourself with insignificant whys and hows. Sometimes there is no deeper meaning to the words, only a bitter reality — that man is the most terrifying being out there, and God allows him to be that way.

And as much as you desperately want to forget and move on, that reality keeps coming back to haunt you.

Once your ears pick up the faint yet still persistent erratic beat of drums on the other side of the wall, not even the simple pianissimo notes filling the air with the help of a clunky CD player can drown the noise out. And although it doesn’t seem like the other dancers mind the disturbance too much, to you, it causes more than a few misplaced steps in a carefully crafted routine. 

The percussive sound slowly merges with your heartbeat, simultaneously pounding inside of your ribcage until even the clamorous voices of girls inside the studio become overshadowed by the dulled thudding.

Your body becomes frightened to the point you are unable to move. Just like all those times when you would sit with your back against the front door, motionless, and only the sheer forcefulness of the frantic banging — which always started with a deceptively light knocking — would manage to make your body noticeably recoil.

You never tried hiding somewhere in your home because, as hard to comprehend as it may be, the safest you ever felt was when crouching down behind that door. Knowing where he was and what he was doing made you feel like you were in control of the situation, even if you weren't.

Either way, there was no point in trying to hide from him — he knew you were on the other side. You could feel the perverse and sick pleasure seeping through the cracks with every loud thud that human flesh made as it collided with the door's wood, drawing frightened gasps from you.

You kept thinking about all the acquaintances and faceless passersby you might have offended, leading one of them to take such action against you. You never learnt what you did, because one day it all simply stopped.

But even after one year of complete silence, you still can’t find peace. To everyone around you, your stalker simply disappeared, and you need to move on, but you know it’s not that simple. You are just waiting for the other shoe to drop. It was quiet before the storm.

At present, by the time you stumble into the claustrophobic locker room at the back of the studio, you are hyperventilating. Your uncoordinated walk, unbefitting of a coryphée, causes you to miss the entrance, bump into the left side of the doorway, and then bounce to the opposite side, hitting a small table. The sequence of events leads to an empty glass falling and breaking into shards before your feet.

Just like that, the sharp sound snaps you out of your panic attack, and it’s quiet again — only a faint classical piece, barely audible, provides some sort of background noise to the dimly lit room and your overworked brain.

Like a child enthralled by the first snow, you maintain eye contact with the sharp shards of glass. Indeed, in various sizes and shapes, the shards shimmer on the ground beneath the fluorescents, resembling snowflakes.

Mesmerised, you bend to pick one of the pieces — the biggest one, so perfectly curved and seemingly broken off at a perfect angle, giving the edge a slanted look. It would be easy, so easy to just— fuck!

You loudly gasp and put your finger into your mouth. The blood from the freshly acquired cut coats your taste buds with a sickly sweet metallic flavour, and your stomach churns with disgust for yourself — repulsed by your own inner thoughts.

Stepping back, you bump into the edge of the table again, but this time grab it to stabilise yourself. You couldn't believe that you even possessed such thoughts somewhere within your mind. Sure, you could blame it on the moment of weakness, but it was also no excuse to contemplate hurting yourself!

You needed some fresh air.

Still slightly dazed, you scan your surroundings for the exit door, only now spotting another person in the room with you. The girl’s grey leotard and matching threadbare leg warmers tell you her name even before she can take her head out of her locker. It's surprising that she remained unfazed by all of the commotion that you have caused.

"Rina?" You try, but it doesn’t get her attention. "Hey, Rina! I’m going for a breather!" 

This time, she at the very least reacts, simply giving a thumbs up and going back to whatever she is doing without sparing a single word. She doesn’t even pull her head out of the locker.

That is enough for you as your hands push the heavy back door of the dancing studio, revealing a seedy alleyway — far from the glitz and glam of the imposterous fairytale fantasy that is ballet. But the state of your surroundings matters very little when you lurch over the railing and dry heave. One deep breath after the other, and you almost calm yourself until a voice shakes you to the core.

"Wow, hey, black swan. You okay there?"

An involuntary shiver runs down your spine as you turn your head to the side to look at a raggedy-looking guy crouched down on the bottom steps that lead to the bar next door.

At first, you ignore him. You distract yourself by slicking a few errant strands of hair back into your bun, but when you notice that he is still waiting for an answer, you feel guilty for unwarrantedly giving the stranger a cold shoulder. You know you don't owe him a conversation, but...

"Got a cigarette?" You brush the sleeve of your leotard against your lips and straighten yourself up.

The guy smiles at you and places his half-smoked cigarette between his lips while pulling a pack of Marlboro Reds out of his jacket. Definitely a musician, you silently speculate. Not to mention the pair of drumsticks peeking from the back pocket of his ripped jeans.

He taps the pack and presents you with a stick, which you take. You place it between your lips, and when your eyes flutter towards the stranger, he already has a lighter waiting for you. So, you lean over the railing, jutting your head so he could light it for you. 

You inhale the smoke, and the simple word of gratitude comes out of your mouth like a puff of smoke that follows it, "Thanks. You work here?"

"Heh, yeah. I play the drums for extra cash." He points his thumb behind him at the back door of the bar.

Called it, they all smoke the same brand.

"Thought you looked familiar."

He chuckles at that, and silence falls between you two. There is no need to break it; however, you can't shake the feeling that his silent stare gives you until he clears his throat and tries to restart the conversation again. 

"So, you’re here for the long run, huh?"

"Sorry?"

"Many ballet dancers have brief careers, or at least that’s what I heard! But your clothes look new. My sister wanted to be a ballerina—"

"What little girl doesn’t?" You cut him off, not liking the way the stranger analyses you, but at the same time, you can't help but berate yourself for assuming the worst from him.

"My point is," the brunet says, flicking the cigarette he’s smoking downward a few times to get rid of the excess ash. "That shit is expensive. You come from money, then?"

"Why? You want me to sponsor your shitty band?"

"Ouch," he chuckles, and stubs out his cigarette, having the gall to try and act coy. "It’s not shitty. And don’t you like that sort of music?"

At that moment, his voice grows lower, bordering on sultry at the end, if not for the insinuation his words carry. They stab you deep into your gut like a knife, and his cockiness seems to be twisting the blade to inflict more damage.

Most people, upon first meeting you, guess that because of your profession, your taste in music is just as classy. And even if, at one point in your life, you would have dismissed the man's words as light-hearted, perhaps even slightly flirty teasing, having a stalker changes a person's perspective on many seemingly insignificant things.

The man wasn’t just a familiar face or someone working in an adjacent building that you might have seen a few times in your peripheral vision to somewhat recognise but still view as a stranger. No, the man had been the source of all your suffering for the past three years. Even in the entire year that he was gone, he still didn’t fully leave — the damage he did to your psyche is irreversible, and no amount of punishment will ever be sufficient. 

You hold your breath, trying to remain calm, but standing so close to him is making you lightheaded. How long was he going to play with you?

"So, um, I was wondering—"

You don't wait for him to finish what else he might add once the awkward silence proves too uncomfortable for him — turning around so quickly it makes your head spin and your stomach curl in on itself. 

You need to get away, and you need to do that now. 

He scrambles onto his feet, the movement followed by the gritty sound of gravel and a desperate call of your name, which you didn't give him. The false saccharine tone is gone, in its place, a commanding warning of what he might do to you if you don’t listen.

You tug on the horizontal crossbar on the back door with frantic urgency, but the latch doesn’t budge. The metal is cold and dotted with raindrops from the morning storm. You hear him getting closer, but you don’t dare to turn and look how close he is. Too close. He will always be too close to you, and there is nothing you can do.

Your eyes blur with tears as you finally manage to pull the heavy door open.

"Rina—" 

But as you come face-to-face with her, the fellow ballerina's unblinking eyes cause you to lose your voice mid-speech. The milky whites of those round eyeballs stare back at you with a sick familiarity — as if you had seen something so bleakly empty before.

You can’t blink either. Blinking would mean you could escape those eyes. Blinking would mean you—

That’s when the whiteness blinks back at you, and that’s when your world falls from its axis — all of this is not real. It's not happening right now; it's just a memory. The stalker behind you won’t catch you, and Rina is not your friend but a lifeless stand-in for a real version of her.

You are in Purgatory.

You are dead.

Suddenly, a familiar figure invades the blank canvas that your view has become, pacing back and forth in a complete state of disarray across your line of sight. You didn't even notice when you got back from... whatever that was. 

"Can you fucking behave for one second?! Fuck, I was about to call Sera!"

The sudden loudness of Adam’s voice pierces the staticky ambience of the void, making you jump in your skin. In a blink of an eye, he towers over you, taking you by your upper arms and shaking your pliant body for good measure, as if the action will magically put your scattered thoughts back into place.

"I—"

Patient, the man is not. He doesn't give you a chance to think, not to mention put together a decent sentence.

"What did you fucking read?!" Adam shakes his hand in front of your face impatiently, which only makes you annoyed. "Hey?! Are you there?" 

"Fuck off, Adam! Can you let me digest everything first?!" You smack his hand away, but that’s when he takes your face into his grip, claw-like black fingers digging into your cheeks and pulling your face closer to his. You scrunch up your nose and furrow your eyebrows as you glare the beast in the face.

"Tell. Me. Everything. This is no longer the time to be petty. Forget everything that happened up to this point and speak, or keep acting like a brat, and I will have no choice but to tame you like one."

"The only one who needs to be tamed is you." You mumble back as best you can while having your lips puckered up like a fish from the way Adam squishes your cheeks. He clicks his tongue but lets go of your face, silently praying that you would start talking about things that matter right now. And you do, because Adam is looking uncharacteristically serious enough for you to comply. It's not as if you don't want to know what the hell was with that nightmare sequence of a memory. "I swear I didn't read anything! You gave me the colouring sheet, and the drawing on it triggered my memory. But it was different from other times. I used to just sort of hang around in the background while it all unfolded in front of me like a movie, but this time I was reliving it. I didn't even realise that I was in one. At that moment, I lived through my past like it was the present."

"It wasn’t all that bad, seeing you are still your insufferable self."

"It’s like looking into a mirror, isn’t it?" You hum, however, there is still something bothering you. "But I have to ask, is the Purgatory an entity and not a place? I feel someone watching me in my memories, and I highly doubt it's God."

Adam stays quiet for a moment. You stare at one another in complete silence until he breaks off the eye contact by turning towards the desk and picking up a page from the pile that is now smaller than it was when all of this began — the unread pile — only to shove said thing in your face. "Doesn’t matter. I need you to do one more thing for me."

However, you turn your head away just at the right moment.

"No, I don’t want to."

"It’s not what you want!"

"Leave me alone!"

"Stop being so difficult and do as you are fucking told!"

"You don’t know how it feels, Adam!" You cry out, facing him once again. He doesn't say a word as he silently stands with his hand on his hip — the dreaded document still in his grasp. "Watching yourself suffer and not being able to look away! My life was miserable! I had an active stalker, and I had to move around, leaving friends and family behind, only for him to find me over and over again! I don’t want these memories! I don’t want to remember anymore! I was happily oblivious until I got a taste of curiosity. I see why it killed the cat now."

"Listen—"

"Did I kill myself? I did, didn’t I? That’s why I’m in Purgatory, right?"

"Pull yourself together, woman! If that were the case, you would be in Hell. No questions asked. It must have been something more convoluted." Adam tries to reason with you, and surprisingly, you don't argue with him, but from the way your eyebrows pull towards each other, Adam knows that everything he just said was nothing but empty words to you. "Well? Are you calm now?"

You nod, and Adam raises the page with a memory again to your eye level, which in turn causes you to screech as if blinded by the sun. And here Adam thought he made progress with you.

But something is not right.

"It's empty." You deadpan. 

"You don't say."

"How did this even happen? I thought you were in charge."

"The memory took you along with the ink on the document. It all evaporated in front of my fucking eyes! Only when you started reliving it did the words reappear one by one. If you are not living through it, I can't see anything. All of the remaining pages are like that." The angel gestures towards the piles. "Nothing like this has ever happened before. The Purgatory... it is an entity of its own — a type of archaic angel, and we are inside of it. But it does have a very black and white view on things, and that's why it needs to have someone who can supervise it."

"Look at you, acknowledging my question when it suits you." Your words are directed towards him, but instead of focussing on Adam, you look to the side, as if by some miracle the Purgatory just spawned the most beautiful scenery for your starved gaze to feast on. It's your petty attempt to piss him off some more for not telling you about the Purgatory when you brought up the topic to him. And speaking of the dreaded place, it looks like Purgatory needs someone not only competent but compassionate as well for it to do its job efficiently, and they decided to put Adam in charge of the whole place? He was about to send you downstairs without a second look!

"You should trust the first human a bit less, little ballerina."

By now, you know that the silence, no matter how short-lasting it might be, is like an open invitation for the shades to make themselves known. Their soft, silky, siren-like voices are akin to the ripples formed by a stone skipping across a pond — each undulating circle, bigger than the others before it, mirrors the way their voices grow louder. Sure, you have gotten used to their breathless, nonsensical whispers, but they have never provided commentary for the conversations you have with Adam.

"There’s no point in trying to pass through anymore. You’re already too damaged. Just like us."

Adam is saying something in the background — you can hear his voice but not the words he’s speaking all the while you continue to stare off into space, unblinking.

"You should stay. It’s a better fate than the off chance of falling to Hell."

"...Is that so?"

It looks like you interrupted Adam mid-speech.

"What?"

"The pages... they are that way because I didn't follow the rules, right? It's all my fault." You speak again after a minute of silence, right before Adam has a chance to. That's a surprise, usually, he's quite quick with his responses, so he must agree with you. Coming up with a soothing lie requires more time than speaking the ugly truth. "Then what's even the point? Just leave me here. I’m already a damaged soul. How useful would I be in Heaven, if I even went there in the first place?"

There is an air of despondency around you, and Adam's stomach drops as he searches your face for something. "…Is that what the shades are telling you?"

Your silence is enough of an answer for Adam.

"Come on, where did that sharp tongue of yours go?" He chuckles, but his smile is too weak and doesn’t infect you. "I’m not leaving you here." The angel declares stubbornly. 

"Stupid choice, really."

Adam is about to argue with you when he notices that, although you might be speaking to him, your eyes move to look to the side at something that is not there in the flesh but rather in spirit. Without wasting any time, he grabs your chin and redirects your gaze back towards him. "Eyes on me."

You don't argue with him. "So, how am I even supposed to trigger the memory if the memory page is empty?"

"Okay, let's see. Is there a dominant smell that you would associate with the previous memory?"

Rotting trash… piss… vomit… the herbal stench of alcohol from broken bottles mixing up with sewage water…

"Cigarette smoke?" You question as if Adam would now. However, he blindly takes your suggestion and goes with it, completely trusting your intuition. With a snap of his fingers, Adam summons a lit cigarette, making you panic.

"Wait! I don’t want to go back to that memory! Adam, don’t you dare send me back—!"

Your desperate cries fall on deaf ears as Adam takes a puff and blows the acrid smoke right into your face, causing you to choke on it.

Inhale. 

Exhale.

Inhale.

You exhale the puff of smoke as you lean against the driver’s side door of your car, mentally preparing yourself for the day before driving to the studio. A pack of cigarettes is still in your non-dominant hand as you look at it, deep in thought. That’s all you seem to be doing these days — getting lost in them.

A picture of a single opaque cornea stares back at you from the squished and torn box as you take another drag of your cigarette every few minutes while maintaining eye contact with the warning label. The cigarettes you are smoking were once your father’s favourite — he buys stronger ones now. When you bought your first pack, you got so overwhelmed by the variety that you picked the ones you had seen your dad purchase when you were younger. Years later, you still smoke the same ones. It’s the last thing about you that is consistent.

"I feel like an imposter at everything I do." You flick the butt of the cigarette to the ground and stomp on it before unlocking your car and getting inside. At one time in your life, you lived a walking distance from the ballet studio; now it takes you an hour of driving through the desolate countryside roads to get there.

Is it all worth it? You don't know anymore.

But even if the drive is long and boring, at least you know that nothing can get to you while you’re in your car, and if someone were to follow you, you could quickly get to safety. To you, boredom is good because it's safe, and your boring, metal safety bubble is the highlight of your horrible days.

Until you hear the click of a gun behind you.

You look in the rearview mirror only to see the man you have been trying to outrun this whole time. The reflection of his wild stare as he holds the barrel of the gun pressed into the skin at the back of your neck is like a nightmare you wish to wake up from. You weren’t secure anywhere, not even in your car. What more can he ruin?!

"You finally opened the door."

His voice cements the nightmare as reality, and your face scrunches up as the realisation of your situation's direness throws you into a whirlwind of despair. You don’t swallow down the scream fuelled by unadulterated hysteria anymore. You throw it up, making the small space of your car impossible to be in.

You don’t want to die. But perhaps your only escape from this — the ultimate solution — is death? Maybe it isn't, but in that split second, you seal your fate.

"You got into the wrong car, fucker. You want to kill me?! I will take you with me."

Suddenly, you press on the brakes, causing the man to jerk forward and lose his grip on the gun. Not wasting any precious time, you press down on the gas and force the car to swerve off the road into a guardrail at full force.

"You crazy bitch! Stop!"

The least you can do now is pray to God for your soul to find salvation. You close your eyes and tighten your grip on the steering wheel, feeling at peace despite your fear of pain and the unknown that awaits you. A death by your own hand will never be as painful as the one done by that monster's. You know for sure that he wouldn't grant you the pleasure of eternal rest inside a cold, dark casket. No, he would torture you, and you will not give him that satisfaction.

The next time you open your eyes, everything in your body hurts — no, burns. The way that ice burns. 

You don’t yell, don’t plead for help — the only sound coming out of you is this sickening hissing sound of a punctured lung as your chest moves up and down with every strained breath your body forces you to take in its efforts of clinging to life.

Near you lays the man's body, mangled without recognition, or it looks that way; the vision in your right eye is gone, so it's hard to tell for sure. Inadvertently, you drag your limp arm towards your face, only for your fingers to disappear inside an empty eye socket. That means that the milky eyeball in front of you, covered in gritty pavement crumbs, is your own. You stare at it until your vision blurs, and all you see is white.

You drown in it. In that white… blinding... emptiness.

"You killed someone."

It's impossible not to hear his growing acrimony towards you as he vocalises your sin. Adam’s voice is the epitome of nothing, devoid of its usual obnoxious tone and a barely noticeable rasp, which becomes more prominent when he hasn't spoken in a while and disappears as soon as he clears his throat.

"He was going to kill me! I—I had no choice!" Your hands shake as you put one palm against your mouth in absolute horror of what you just relived, but you also feel the need to defend yourself against the angel. "I didn’t want to die, nor did I want to hurt anyone! Even if that someone was a person that wished harm upon me! I had dreams, I had a future! It just—" you choke back on tears. "At that moment, I felt like that was it."

You wish you didn't have your memories back. Trying to explain yourself to Adam felt so humiliating, as his imposing height forced him to look down on you. You felt unworthy of his presence.

"You—" Adam feels his throat tighten. He isn't upset with you — he is furious at Sera.

As soon as you mentioned feeling like you were being monitored in your memories, Adam knew that it couldn't be Purgatory because it simply doesn't have consciousness. It's a dormant entity that — when it came into existence — was given simple instructions to either condemn or forgive. A certain seraph, on the other hand, not only had the motive but also a multitude of eyes to assist her. Perhaps Sera's curiosity was piqued by Lucifer’s brat’s childish delusions regarding redemption. That would explain why he couldn’t simply send you down like he did with other souls. You weren't special — you were a test subject. Despite being a truly good person who lived a virtuous life, you committed the ultimate sin, which is a direct ticket to Hell. Yes, you killed a terrible, poor excuse of a human being, but you had no right to do so because it's not up to humans to decide who lives or dies.

Sera wanted to see if Adam could judge a soul without bias.

Adam doesn’t believe in second chances. In that regard, he was no better than the archaic Purgatory. But who could blame him for seeing things as absolutes? Adam had a first-row seat to see what second chances amounted to. Eve, a woman who was created specifically for him and a literal second chance at love, betrayed his trust and left him, just like Lilith before her. But now, the normally clean-cut line between sinful black and divine white has become blurred into an uncertain grey, and as Adam looks at your terrified face, he realises that he doesn’t have it in himself to let you fall. 

No, Adam couldn't send you down to hell. Your doe eyes are too bright, and your skin is too fragile and porcelain-like, almost brittle to the touch — it would break the moment you stepped into the Pride Ring. You looked angelic, even as a human. He couldn't even begin to imagine how beautiful you would look with a pair of wings and a halo.

"Adam?" The said angel could practically hear your lips quivering. He didn't realise he had left you there with your thoughts, which were no doubt eating you from inside. "Adam, you must have someone you care about! "Please imagine them in my place, and then pass judgement on me."

Adam does have someone he cares about, and that’s why he is already thinking about his first kill for the next year’s extermination. You can't read his twisted, vengeful mind and interpret his silence as a sentence to eternal damnation.

"Oh," you say, your voice lower than usual. Not even in the afterlife do you have autonomy. You were stupid for trying to fool yourself into believing that you did. "I’m going to—"

"Shut up!"

You stop yourself mid-sentence from his outburst.

His next words are much softer, like hot milk soothing a sore throat. "I won’t let you go there."

However, before Adam can declare his final verdict on your soul's fate, the Purgatory acts according to its own evaluation. The white ground, which had not a speck of other colours on it this whole time, suddenly begins turning red — bleeding from underneath your feet and growing into a big puddle that surrounds you like spilt blood. You feel the heat emanating from it, and then it cracks.

"NO!"

Just as the ground gives in underneath your weight, Adam catches your wrist.

"Adam!"

"You are never going there." He declares, but you don't miss how his voice trembles a bit at the end. You look away from him and down towards there that he’s talking about, but Adam digs his sharp claws into the skin of your wrist, successfully bringing your attention towards the hurting part of your body. "You keep looking at me. I won’t let you even get a glance of that wretched place!"

And then you have the nerve to smile at him, "I think the choice is already made, and you don’t have a say in it." You ease your hand out of his hold. "I’m sorry that we got into that argument. I didn’t mean to. But you did say that my actions here won’t affect my fate, so I guess that doesn’t really matter."

"Don’t you fucking dare release my hand! You hold onto it, bitch, or I will get you something to be sorry for!" Adam tugs your dangling body up by your hand and hugs you tightly to his chest, wrapping his golden wings around you securely like a safety blanket for good measure. His face presses against the top of your head as you hear his voice booming in your ears. "Evaluation has determined that this soul is worthy of Heaven!"

Only when Adam sees the familiar surroundings around the two of you does he allow himself to loosen his grip on your body. Thank God that Purgatory doesn't have any influence on angels, because otherwise, he would have thought that he's dreaming this all up.

"Happy rebirthday, gorgeous. Welcome to Heaven." The greeting is nothing like the one he gave you when you first met in Purgatory.

But when he doesn't get any kind of response, not even a twitch out of you, his fingers gently stroke your cheek, hoping to get some kind of reaction out of you to make sure that he wasn't too late and didn't accidentally bring a shade into Heaven.

You are shaking like a leaf under his touch — terrified, still gripping onto Adam’s robes with white knuckles as if the possibility of falling is still there. As if you can’t feel the white wings sprouting out of your back and don’t see the shimmering, iridescent glow of your halo above your head casting a subtle shine on your hair. Your skin tone is a few shades lighter than it was when you were in Purgatory, but for the most part, you still look more or less very human. Adam is quite certain of that. After all, there is nothing in his way that could hide anything unusual from his eyes.

"I don’t have anything on." You finally tilt your head to look up at the first man with those big, infuriatingly beautiful eyes of yours.

"I have eyes, angel."

A thin layer of golden blush coats your face as you press yourself against Adam in hopes of hiding away. "Don’t look!"

His hands, resting on your naked hips, barely noticeably move up and down your body and supply Adam's starved mind with the most vividly descriptive images that no amount of ogling could ever successfully manage to capture.

"I won’t."

Adam would love to stay like this forever, but Heaven isn't a time capsule like Purgatory is, and although in the afterlife time is meaningless, there is more tedious bureaucracy to be done.

"Do you mind if we take a more scenic route? I doubt you are in any shape to use a portal."

"Walking is fine, but, Adam, I'm naked." You hiss, as if what you just said is the most blasphemous thing Heaven has witnessed. The real sin is that Adam can't enjoy the view.

"I will carry you, no worries."

He could conjure something for you to wear, but Adam doesn’t specialise in dressing up women. He has significantly more experience in undressing women, but that's unnecessary since you're already naked. And what you don't know won't hurt you. You can't be mad at him for not dressing you up if you don't know he can do that with a snap of a finger. But the lack of clothing doesn't seem to bother you too much.

Mesmerised, you peek your head out of Adam's embrace to look all around yourself. Having become accustomed to the stark whiteness of Purgatory, you are overwhelmingly awestruck by all of the pearlescent colours surrounding you. Heaven looks quite futuristic, unlike anything you imagined. Truthfully, you don't know what you expected — perhaps something more traditional-looking, Gothic even. It looks as though everything is made out of vibrant stained glass, from the sharp-looking corners and pointy sky-piercing roofs to the glassy ground. The entire promenade resembles a hall of mirrors at carnivals, easy to get lost in.

The building you two enter is commodious and bears a striking architectural resemblance to a Gothic cathedral, while still maintaining the soft pastel colour scheme of Heaven. The sound of Adam's heavy footsteps travels through space, catching the attention of small animal-like creatures who, you guessed, work here.

Adam carefully lowers you to the ground until your bare feet are flat against the cold marble. His next move is to open up the cocoon he made out of his wings, a decision which you are against until you notice that you are already dressed up in a white linen tunic that reaches your knees and completely hides your arms under its moderately wide sleeves.

While you are busy guessing where the clothes came from and wondering why you haven't felt them on your skin until now, Adam can't help but curse himself out inside his head. He couldn't believe he got jealous of the freaking cherubim getting a chance to see you naked that he took it upon himself to dress you up. But all self-deprecation disappears when you turn to face Adam with an excited smile. For a minute, he fears that you somehow read his thoughts.

"Well, do I look worthy of Heaven?"

"Why don't you see for yourself?" Adam shrugs, grabs you, and twirls you around to face a shiny column. It's the first time you see how you look after becoming an angel, but nothing surprises and excites you more than the wings — soon you are arching your back and twisting your neck just to look back at them.

"I can fly?!"

Before Adam has a chance to respond, the small cherub guides you by hand towards the front desk and offers you a leaflet. "Everything you need to know will be found here! And if you have any questions, don't be afraid to contact our headquarters. That's why we are here!"

"Oh, I thought," you are about to turn towards Adam, but the cherub swiftly seizes your attention once more.

"You’re in Heaven now, which means that you are under the care of our department, dear, not the first man. And after we are done with a few more documents, you will be free to live your afterlife as you please!" The little creature gestures to a desk behind them, and you noticeably shiver at the sight of the paper pile. Not again…

You turn back to Adam, feeling an ache in your chest that is difficult to ignore. You got used to Adam’s presence. As much as he could be an annoyance, he is the reason you are safe here.

"Oh, so... I guess this is goodbye? Will I ever see you again?"

"Hm, I don't know. I’m a busy guy, and you're not the only angel in heaven. You're gonna have to make an appointment if you want to come for a chit-chat." However, based on the way your face falls at his words, Adam’s joke is seemingly not as amusing as he thought it to be. With a sigh, he outstretches his arms, and you move in for a hug without any hesitation. "You are losing your edge, angel. Don't tell me you got attached or something."

You remain silent in response, then, after a few minutes, slowly move back and offer a small wave as a goodbye.

"Bye, Adam."  

I'm a huge fucking hypocrite, Adam thinks to himself as he watches you go.

"Bye, angel."

[cupidseok]

things that evoke memories of riize

💒 — SHOTARO AS

the bittersweet tug of homesickness, the aromatic smell of freshly ground coffee beans that first hits you upon stepping into a cafe, unexpectedly meeting a high school friend you really missed on the streets, the solace found in being able to comfort you, the warmth of sunlight kissing your skin, ties with cute little patterns on them, the click of film cameras while taking photos of you, the lingering feeling after a hug, getting bungeoppang in the winter and chatting with the street vendor while waiting for his order, carrot cakes, a large collection of bucket hats, love countdown by nayeon, wonstein

🩰 — EUNSEOK AS

soft ballad music playing in the background, the gentle warmth of intertwined hands, early morning strolls, the adrenaline rush coursing through you while riding roller coasters, holding hands in haunted houses, long facetime calls spent in silence, brushing his lips over your forehead, trembling lips as he lets himself be vulnerable to you for the first time, exploring a place he has never been before, the feeling that you’re going to know each other for a long time, a handsome stranger you saw on an overseas trip once and never again, watching studio ghibli films together, carbonara pasta, breathe by lauv

💭 — SUNGCHAN AS

texts to check if you’ve eaten, greeting dogs that pass by, wandering aimlessly in an art museum, purposely stepping in a puddle of water just to splash someone, playfully fighting you for the tv remote but letting you win in the end, opening jars for you even though you can do it yourself, letting him play with your hair until it’s all tangled, the chime of school bells signalling the day’s end, taking photos with friends on the last day of school, the soft brush of elbows while writing side by side, keeping your hair tie on his wrist, eating vanilla ice cream on sunny days, 爱你 by kimberley chen

✨ — WONBIN AS

late night walks under the moonlit sky, someone’s hand slipping in yours, dark chocolate, dazzle of fireworks illuminating the night, reflecting on his eyes, learning how to play a new instrument, a faceless photo of you and him on his lockscreen, watching a drama together and rooting for different male leads, putting on a facade of toughness to impress you, gently reassuring him that perfection isn’t always necessary, clothes that fit you just right, love at first sight, matching earrings, only letting you touch his guitar, the reluctance to bite into cute chinese piggy steamed buns, wish you were sober by conan gray

💌 — SEUNGHAN AS

sweet goodnight texts, good luck charms handmade with endearing clumsiness, trying new food, finding something you thought you lost, autum leaves rustling in the wind, holding the door open for you, exchanging affectionate words endlessly, winning a soft toy at an amusement park on the first try, patiently teaching you how to play games, looking through his photoalbum when he misses you, doodling shinchan on the corners of your worksheet, taking a bite of your spicy bibimmyeon, then complaining that it was too spicy for him, die for you by the weeknd, ariana grande

👒 — SOHEE AS

shopping for caps together, a tranquil morning greeted by a gentle breeze, buying a new fuzzy blanket, curtains billowing in the wind, waiting for you to come home to him, the comfort of oversized plain white shirts and grey joggers, playing rock paper scissors to divide household chores, needing to pause and go outside for a breather every time he realises how down bad he is for you, trying to order a kids meal at a restaurant and getting embarrassed after the waiter doesn’t allow it, getting tteokbokki together after school, candy by baekhyun

🎧 — ANTON AS

wired earphones connected to an mp3 player, warm beach towels, trying to make an asmr video, eating cake off the floor so you wouldn’t feel bad for dropping it, constantly sending you tiktoks that remind him of you, water parks on hot summer days, classical music, old books with yellowed pages and worn covers, putting on sheet masks together, reading children’s storybooks for you to help you fall asleep, making eye contact across the room, the moment where you realise that he feels the exact same way that you feel at the same moment, snow on the beach by taylor swift, lana del rey

© cupidseok — do not copy / repost / translate my works

[mydearestbeloved]

Reader strongly reminds me of Seele from Honkai impact 3rd. More specifically, her Herrscher of Rebirth form. They both have the flowers and butterflies thing going on, the whole persephone vibe, even similar powerset as Seele's thing is Life and Death. Now I can't stop imagining Reader with Seele's face.

To clarify before I dive into this discussion: This is a Reader-Insert, so you all can imagine Trial Player!Reader in any way you want. Below are just my ideas of her if inspired by the inspo this dear Anon mentioned.

Yes, YeS, YES! I really love Seele’s Herrscher of Rebirth design. It was just so… beautiful to me. If we’re talking about Trial Player!Reader—though, of course, you all can imagine her however you like because this is a reader-insert story—if she had a form inspired by Seele’s Herrscher of Rebirth design, I imagined some tweaks.

For one, less of the blue color scheme and more gold, with hints of silver. We can keep the hint of purple as a nod to Jinwoo, and the flowing outfit would be a balance of white and black, with the black blending into a glittering effect as a nod to the starry sky. The flowers stay, though I’m leaning more toward red spider lilies, and absolutely adding more butterfly motifs both in the clothes—maybe settling onto the flowers—and her aura, which could replace the deer. The branches can remain as they still relate to plants.

The humanoid being in Seele’s design could be one of TP!Reader’s butterflies' manifestations, but with less distinct details like hair. Faceless, but maybe with closed eyes that only show eyelashes, giving off a more ‘serene’ vibe. Definitely, the wispy outfit could have butterfly wing motifs. Background-wise, a starry sky is the way to go, with clear water as the ground beneath and red spider lilies as a reference to the surreal realm in Chapter 20, where she brought Min Byung-Gyu back to life. I already like the circling ruins in Seele’s design, which could represent TP!Reader’s realm or garden. If they’re more portal-like, it could also be a nod to her origin as an isekai. Oh, and instead of a scythe most of the time, she would wield her scepter-like staff.

I’m still on the fence about this, but adding a veil and head jewelry also kind of works. Not over-the-top jewelry, certainly, but silver jewelry draped over the body could look beautiful (see the image below of the switched body of MC from Secret Kiss with Knight otome). Thigh and leg jewelry, if her legs are exposed, maybe. Barefoot or wearing heels—both still look good, I just can’t decide. I’m also unsure about this, but as a nod to how she first ascended from the Trial to the ‘Trial’ stage, maybe tips of her fingers to some part of her arms, and toes to legs could have inky marks that blend into butterfly shapes? Or just make her nails black—that works too. The ribbon-like elements in Seele’s design could instead look like 'fabric of the universe'-like pattern for TP!Reader.

Seele's Herrscher of Rebirth design for comparison:

Some of the jewelries inspirations from Secret Kiss with Knight otome:

_____

I got too overexcited, my apologies, everyone.

Thank you, Anon, for mentioning this wonderful inspo! I’m already flattered that you can imagine TP!Reader in a design inspired by Seele’s Herrscher form, which, I admit, has never really left my mind since the first time I saw it. I don’t play Honkai Impact 3rd, so I avoided mentioning the similarity in powers that you brought up because I don’t know much about it. I didn’t want to give my commentary based on limited research, just in case of misunderstandings, and out of respect for the original.

Thank you for your interest and support in this story of mine!

[bbuzz28]

Separate

Another Note-app fic import, please enjoy :)

(Setting is mid-80's post portal incident, the Mystery Shack is mostly up and running. A *lil* angsty but mostly comfort--which is my personal favorite flavor of Fiddlestan.)

As soon as the day began, Fiddleford knew it would be a long one. When he and Stanley had gotten up that morning, they immediately knew something was wrong. They could hear something-something no one should be able to hear. Alarm bells. They were muffled, but considering where they were coming from was what was worrisome.

After some investigation, they found that a gang of gnomes had made their way into the wiring for one of the primary satellite dishes outside the Shack. Their sharp teeth fraying and stripping the copper connection wires woven inside the base; all of which was connected to a dozen different sensors underground in the secret basement laboratory. The damage to the satellite had resulted in absolute chaos. The alarm bells were so loud in combination with each other that Stan and Fiddleford could hear the noise through the several layers that lay between the main house and the secret basement. There should be no way that could happen unless every single alarm was going off at the same time.  

As soon as they opened the door to the basement, with the litany of blaring sounds calling out for attention, a tour bus pulled up in front of the newly renamed “Mystery Shack”. Wordlessly they looked at each other and knew what they had to do: they had to separate. It would be a first for either of them; Fiddleford had been in the background for the handful of previous tours- making sure different elements went off at the correct time or making sure stragglers weren’t wandering off into the rest of the house.  Stan would always be the face of the Mystery Shack, he was a born showman, but he always had Fiddleford as a buffer if he needed him. As for their work in the lab, it would be the first time Fiddleford was in the lab alone since…well. Since Stanford had been on this side of the dimensional rift. Stanely had been the only reason he had been able to cross back through the threshold all those months ago.

Stan put a large hand on Fiddleford’s shoulder- a painted smile on his face that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “It’ll be fine Fidds. We both know I’d just be all thumbs with whatever is going on downstairs- just gettin’ in your way like usual.” Fiddleford tenderly wrapped a hand around Stan’s forearm. “Stanley, now ya know you’re the only reason anythin’ gets done ‘round here- includin’ in that damnable basement. I know you’re gonna do great with the tour, ya don’t need me t’ make that happen.” Stan paused, moving his hand to trace up to the back of Fidd’s neck, his expression intensifying. “If you need me, I don’t care if I have to run every one of them outta here myself; you come get me.” Fiddleford nodded, knowing he wouldn’t listen. They absolutely needed the cash flow that the tour group outside would spend—he would have to brave the lab by himself whether either of them liked it or not.

He reminded Stanley to put the record player at full volume to drown out any basement noises and slipped behind the old tapestry of Ford’s they had haphazardly installed to cover the door downstairs until they came up with a better solution. As Fiddleford slipped behind it, he could almost feel the faceless pyramid watching him enter the dank stairwell that led to the elevator that would take him below, the only witness to their secret.

The silver lining of the overwhelming amount of noise in the laboratory was that it helped Fiddleford hyper-focus on his task. Even with a pair of safety earmuffs he grabbed from the connected office on, his sense of hearing was entirely engulfed by the pulsating rhythm of the alarms. There was no part of his brain that could focus on anything but his task in this current state. He was able to completely ignore the giant triangular portal glistening in the glow of the flashing lights, along with the little odds and ends that remained of his former research partner. A dried out BMU mug on its side, his notes in his recognizable handwriting spread all over the floor and desk, his attempts at his own inventions while Fiddleford had been…when he was gone. All remained as it had been at the far end of the room, almost as if Stanford could walk through the door and pick it all up again any minute. Both men avoided the area like the plague; one in reverence of the space and the other in hopes not to trigger any connected memories.

After unsuccessfully attempting to disconnect the intricate wiring, he simply chose to dismantle all of the physical components to the alarm systems. He knew he was causing himself a lot more work in the future, but he needed to stop the noise more than anything else. If anyone discovered this place, the tenuous grasp they had on normalcy would be gone. He knew his truth-Fiddleford was the best version of himself if he was able to fix something.  He needed to be useful; it was one of the only things he had left after everything had fallen apart.

One by one he worked around the room ripping the mechanics of the alarms out of the walls until finally he was left in the eerie silence-without even the background hum of machinery to keep him company. A bead of cold sweat rolled down his back as he removed the earmuffs; he had no idea how long he had been down there. The lack of noise brought the world back into focus and it could have been an hour or four-he had no frame of reference in the windowless room. The alarms may have now been off, but he could still feel the pulse of them reverberating throughout his body-like an echo of what had been.

Suddenly the quiet felt overpowering; memories trying to push their way back through the dense fog of his mind. Flashes of conversations overlaying each other; laughter and harsh words alike trying to break through. Normally when this started, he had Stanley nearby to distract his spiral-but he was alone. Fiddleford was alone in the room where it happened. The room that had ultimately tore apart his friendship, and more importantly took his friend from this fabric of reality. He clutched the side of his head, his fingers raking through the longer hair he had grown to cover his star shaped scar and let muscle memory lead him to the stairs. I need to get to Stanley was the only conscious thought he let himself focus on. He left everything he had dismantled out, a voice that sounded familiar in the back of his mind chiding him for leaving such a mess of wires and debris. It didn’t matter-he had fixed the problem.

                             - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

By the time he reached the top of the stairs he had managed to calm himself down. He just kept repeating what he thought Stanley would say in his mind: you did it, it’s over now, you’re done. Over and over, he repeated those words on his long journey leading back to the surface. A large part of him was ashamed with himself. He was an adult; it was impossible for him to expect to be able to be with Stanley every second of the day-that didn’t sound healthy. They weren’t kids; he shouldn’t need someone to hold his hand. But he had done it; the person he was just a couple of months ago wouldn’t have been able to take the elevator by himself let alone do any work. Fiddleford had survived being in that awful basement, and if nothing else that was something.

He silently edged the door open a crack, listening to hear if anyone was in the immediate vicinity. He closed his eyes and distantly heard Stanley in another part of the Shack they had deemed the ‘museum’ saying something about the prehistoric “gorr-icken”, of which they had fossil evidence. They didn’t, of course; but if you gave that man a glue gun and half an idea, he could make some of the most incredible things Fiddleford had ever seen. He had often wondered if the Pines brother’s creativity was a genetic condition.

 Fiddleford inched himself out of the door, still concealed behind the tapestry, and silently closed it behind him. He could see two figures through the fabric who were aimlessly walking in the opposite direction of Stanley’s voice and towards the room he was in. It was currently their overstock room, that Stanley was hoping to turn into an official gift shop for the Shack.  

“This is boring dude” one of them said as they picked up one of Ford’s remaining specimen encased in glass from a table in the middle of the room. Fiddleford narrowed his eyes, burrowing them into the back of the young man’s head as his companion looked at something else on the table next to him. “ Oh, I don’t know man, some of this stuff is neat. Plus, it beats sitting on that bus with my Aunt Mildred.” As the two young people faced the opposite direction of the doorway, Fiddleford slipped out from behind the tapestry. Noiselessly he walked up behind them and waited. “I just thought it would be scarier. Plus, I am pretty sure most of this stuff is fake. Not to mention that ‘Mister Mystery’ guy is so over the top-like we get it. You’re some weirdo who lives all alone in the middle of the woods- bet your mother’s proud.”

Fiddleford hadn’t let himself feel angry in a long time-but he found it easily enough as he straightened himself to his full height. How dare this insignificant little pissant insult his Stanley. Stanley that put so much effort into putting a good show on for these people? Stanley who worked all day long, just to turn around and work far into the night to bring his brother back?

He plucked the glass casing of the specimen from the young man’s grasp, reaching over his shoulder and intentionally eliciting a yelp of panic from him. “Who the hell are you!?” he asked, stepping away from Fiddleford and pushing his equally as surprised friend away with him. Fiddleford felt a dark smile form on his face as he towered over the young man, pushing his hair up to show off his scar “this here is the Mystery Shack. I’m what happens when ya run your mouth about things ya have no business talkin’ bout. Now, unless you wanna end up as an exhibit yourselves, I reckon ya both should rejoin your tour group-now how’s that sound?” Wide eyed with fright, the two young people scrambled back down the hall towards the sound of Stan finishing up his tour.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Hours later, they were finally getting ready for bed. Fiddleford could still feel the slight pulse from the alarms behind his eyes when he closed them and hoped he would be able to fall asleep quickly. Stan flopped into bed, hair a mess and eyes heavy himself. He opened his arms and gave Fidds half a smile in invitation. Fiddleford effortlessly granted him his wish as he eased himself into bed, throwing an arm across Stan’s chest and settling himself against it as Stan wrapped his other arm loosely around his waist. It had been a long day, longer than most, but this moment and those like it made it all worth it.

As he was on the edge of sleep, Stan said “Fidds, I’ve been thinkin’ .” Keeping his eyes closed, Fiddleford responded as he nuzzled deeper into his partner’s chest. “That sure can be a dangerous thing dependin’ on whatever the rest of your sentence is Stanley.” He felt more than heard the rumble in Stan’s chest as he chuckled. “I was just thinkin’…we could…we could always just walk away” he said quietly. Fiddleford stayed completely still for a moment and let the sentence hang in the air. He didn’t know what response Stan wanted him to give.

“Where’d we go?” he finally asked as he opened his eyes to stare at Stan’s chest, curious where this train of thought was going. Stan breathed out as though he’d been holding his breath. “Wherever you wanted. We have a little money now. We’d just need to make a stop in Vegas, I should be able to double it.” It was Fiddleford’s turn to laugh “isn’t the entire state of Nevada off limits to you?” Stan tightened his grip on his waist as he said “yeah, but not to Stanford. Just one last good round of poker and then we could go anywhere. Get away from all of this. No one would come lookin’ for us for a while, and they’d just think he- I went crazy. I’ve already laid the groundwork for that pretty well with this whole ‘roadside attraction’ bullshit. We could seal everythin’ up before we went- or hell, blow it up- no one would ever have to know the truth.”

          Fiddleford couldn’t help but be seduced by the thought. He wouldn’t have to wince when walking by certain rooms in the house, wouldn’t have to be in that damned lab again, never have to face the possibility that their hard work would pay off and he would come back into their lives. He finally angled his face up found Stan was watching him, trying to read his expression. Fiddleford moved his arm along his partner’s chest and traced Stan’s jaw with a finger, letting himself have the fantasy of walking away for one more moment before saying “ya know how I know you’re lyin’ right now, Stanley Pines?”

Stan looked panicked for a moment before recognizing there was no malice in Fiddleford’s voice. He felt Stan’s thumb start tracing small circles on his waist as a smirk grew on his face.“ I’d guess because my mouth is movin’ ?” Fiddleford smiled “because, if ya really wanted t’ leave, ya simply would’ve already. Ya wouldn’t be doin’ all a’ this with me or the Shack if that was ever a real option. You’re too good of a brother t’ just disappear, no matter what anyone might have told ya before.”

Stan’s smirk disappeared and was replaced with a look of concern. He readjusted them so that they were forehead to forehead now, pulling Fiddleford closer. “Yeah well…I wanna to be good to you too. I hated leaving’ ya alone when ya needed me today. We’ve made a lot of progress from where ya started but I…I know it’s still hard. And I’m not worth much if I can’t keep the one person still here safe. We don’t even know if we’ll get him back Fidds. You…ya never signed up for any a’ this.”

Fiddleford looked at Stan and tried to find the right words. “No, I s’pose I didn’t-but you didn’t neither. N’ I’m not made a glass anymore-thanks t’ you. There’ll probably be a hundred bad days for every good one. That’s just the truth of this life we’ve found ourselves in-but I’m here in it with ya Stan. Willin’ to stand with you for as long as you’ll have me.” Stan looked at him like he was gift, drawing him even closer to his chest. “Well then, I guess you’re never gettin’ rid of me cowboy” he whispered as he leaned in. The kiss that followed was deliberately deep, as if they were both apologizing for needing the other as badly as they did. And boy, did they need one another.

          Fiddleford knew they couldn’t live in the what if’s; he had been there and done that in more than one way for the better half of his life. What if he never answered the phone that day, what if Stanford had just listened to him about how dangerous the portal was--what if he never invented that damn memory gun? The only thing anchoring him in place was this: in this strange, confusing and sometimes devastating life, he chose to be in it with Stanley-who wholeheartedly chose him back.

[mamasplat]

I know you've mainly been focused on other stuff like getting the Rotomblr blog set up, but is there anything interesting going on with the Kalos VS Amour shipping au?

Oh my god i totally left that in the dust didn’t i? I’m so sorry my mind has been elsewhere

Alright let’s retread the plot real quick!

Calem is shown as a faceless character during Summer of Discovery! Along with Trevor Tierno and Shauna, watching from the sidelines and just narrowly dodging Serena’s gaze as she can feel someone watching her. He’s the camera man and isn’t there of his own will.

He continues to make silent cameos as a background character with no role in the episodes, simply standing amongst other nameless set decorations.

He is first officially introduced in Party Dancecapades! Where it’s revealed he’s with Shauna for the event and he’s been traveling alongside her (acting as a mirror to Alain and Mairin) and that he and Serena were neighbors. He waits to get the chance to dance with Serena, Serena waits to dance with Ash, and the music cuts before either can get what they want

And then he goes on to become a main player in the story as team flare becomes a constant and the storyline ramps up

Before the climax Calem would be removed from the plot, needing to focus on protecting Shauna who has continued to antagonize team flare causing them to go after them. Before he splits from the main cast he has a one on one moment with Serena. Expressing that he’d really rather her follow him for her own safety, and that when she left without saying goodbye to start her journey he was incredibly worried. Before being able to finish his sentence with a “I don’t want to lose you again” he is cut off by Serena who expresses her determination to fight by Ash’s side and commit to something for once, as her mother once doubted her. Seeing the passion in her he relents, he only says goodbye to her before leaving.

He would then show up in the championships but seems to avoid much in terms of interaction with his neighbor (shattered ego.) but they share a few smiles to give some hope for their future.

Of course the main purpose of this beyond simply inserting Calem into the anime would be to establish a more complex shipping dynamic at hand

Calem likes -> Serena.

Serena likes -> Ash

Shauna shows interest in -> Calem

And Ash is oblivious all together with Bonnie being the main narrator to the hijinks that follow, recapping all she’s picked up on between the four chess pieces on the romance board.

Oh- Tiernos there too. He likes Serena but it’s played more so as a gag so no one takes it too seriously.

Five chess pieces.

[hexxter]

Player 2:

- not even out yet

My brain:

OK but Player 3 would be lit

They could be Sora, Yozora…

Or a background faceless character we didn’t knew about in the games till will point out later

They could be a character in Quadratum as they’re pretty much dead so

They could have their heart resting in another’s person (subject x for example)

Idk just give me Player 3.. Player 2 is confirmed dead anyway 😔

[reversemoon255]

5th Review - Ohsama Sentai Kingohger

I have watched 14 seasons of Power Rangers, and 18 seasons of Super Sentai, aaaaand…this is the best. Like, I don’t even know if anyone else even competes. It’s that good. Which is weird, right? This is the CG-heavy bug season, and yet it stands above all the others? It’s truly a marvel of Tokusatsu that they can take these bizarre, wacky concepts and forge something fantastic out of them. But we’re not here for my platitudes, we’re here for me to give my thoughts on a show.

The Good: Something I really like about the characters in general is they all embody a negative characteristic of leadership, but turn it on its head, allowing them to display both the the negatives aspects on occasion, but also how you can spin those impulses for the betterment of yourself and the people around you.

Gira is Power. It’s not uncommon for stories to portray a character as seeking power for the purposes of protecting others. In fact, it’s very common. But Gira portraying himself as the villain, acting as the tyrant, added a nice flavor to it that made it stand on its own. Gira does fill the role of the red chosen one in many ways, but because of the show’s focus on unity and teamwork, he always feels more like a perspective character, which I think is a positive. On top of that, he’s very kind, earnest, and the most down-to-earth of the kings, adding to that perspective character role. His kingdom of Shuggodom also had a lot of side characters, such as the orphans, his brother and attendants, and the angry yelling guy. “He’s louder! He’s the real one!” was such a great payoff to that character’s existence. Also, any Sentai character that can unironically say “I will hear you scream,” is pretty cool.

Yanma is Pride. He rarely backs down or bows to anyone else. And while this can sometimes get him in trouble, the people he stands up to are always more powerful than he is. It’s often more determination than anything, and that determination gets the team through many tough situations. As for characterization, Yamna is a genius, but also very childish and a bit petty. The pranks he pulls are always very silly. His aide, Shiokara, was also a nice foil; childish in nature, but serious in role. And it was nice how he and Gira really did end up being good friends by the end.

Ran is Selfishness. Unsurprisingly; she says it all the time. But while she occasionally displays true selfishness, it is often used as a mask for selflessness. She selfishly wants to help people, but is portrayed as selfishness, which is funny in many situations. She was a majoritively serious character, which made the moments she leaned into humor all the funnier. I also liked that she was part of two goes-nowhere romances with both Yanma and Rita. She’s the beautiful one, so it makes sense romance would be part of her themes, even if underplayed. And Sebastian was one of the sillier aides, with a ridiculous backstory to match that silly nature.

Kaguragi is Deceit. We all expect those in power to lie, and Kaguragi does frequently, constantly switching sides and misinforming his allies to get his way. But at the end of the day, everything he does is for the sake of his people. And because of the scope of his deception, he is privy to more information than the rest of the cast, being aware of both the teams’ and Racles’ plans. Speaking of Racles, his sister was also a surprisingly big player at times, getting more attention than his personal aide, even if not seen as often. And his aide, Kuroda, being a Kuroko, filled his role as more of a background character, though did have a distinct personality that worked with his faceless appearance.

Rita is Authority. Not only is she a king, but also the world’s judge, holding power over even the other kings, making her the absolute authority on Terra. But she never abuses her power; always seeking to be a neutral party in all goings-on. Also, this series got pretty sapphic at times, and Rita was always at the center of it. Good to know the writers are back at it again after all the mandates they suffered through with 40-42. And while there were some off-and-on moments with Ran, most of the time it was with Morphonia, who was, again, a nice foil, being much less motivated and more prone to her own desires. Though, of all the aides, she probably grows the most, eventually accepting her role as the next king of Gokkan, which she was less interested in accepting compared to everyone else.

Even our main villains follow these trends to some degree. Deathnarok shows the negative aspects of all these traits, but is later shown to be doing so begrudgingly, while Dugded also does, but in a very childish way. Which is almost worse than just being a normal bad king, because it’s weirdly more sincere?

And Jeramie is Eccentricity. He is aloof and wordy and doesn’t act like a good king would, playing a role more similar to one of a king content with his power, but his attitude and ability are separate things, as he is shown to have great battle prowess and leadership abilities. Jeramie has his own things going on with being half Bugnarok, so it was really just flair given to his character, and to add a bit of confusion to his introduction. And while Gerojim wasn’t as present a character as the other aides, he did provide a very distinct visual compared to everyone else, especially after all the Bugnarok were relegated to just the foot soldiers. I’ll also add, having Jeramie be the narrator, even before his introduction, really helped everything feel cohesive and intentional.

Speaking of that cohesion, that’s part of what makes the story so great. Every episode contributes to the ongoing story. Even those episodes that seem like filler have at least a small addition to it. Especially after the last few years, where episodic has been the priority, this drastic shift is very welcome. And there are tiny hints at the bigger picture even in the early episodes, like Racles missing all of Gira’s vitals for instance. I may go through the show a second time to see how many instances of foreshadowing I can find at a later date.

And while the finale was good, the penultimate episode was amazing, calling back to almost every character we met over the course of the entire show, including ones only seen in the movies and Racles’ mini-series. It was a great way to cap off this already good show.

And lastly,  I love the presentation of this season. So much of this season is filmed on green screen to both amazing and hilarious effect. It’s honestly very impressive some of the stuff they managed to accomplish. BoonBoomger seems a lot more grounded, so it’s unlikely this trend will be further polished in the next season, but they did very well in the time they had.

The Bad: While the effects and sets are a lot of fun, they aren’t always great. They sometimes have difficulty tracking walking or running while moving the camera. Some other effects, such as wide shots, or fire tend to not look good, but it doesn’t take away from the overall experience.

Also, more than any season in recent memory, the action was occasionally hard to follow. All the effects, plus the CG backgrounds, plus the constantly more ridiculous and interesting camera angles Sentai likes to use add up to some very messy scenes on occasion.

I’m also a little sad we dropped the gear gimmicks. While I’m not upset to see them go, I was kinda hoping we’d continue with it until the 50th anniversary where we’d have a big payoff. It may have originally been in the cards, but I only say that because of the rustic machine nature of the Shugods and the general design work or Shuggodam. Remember, toy development takes a while, and while I don’t know the over-under on BanNam’s cycle, I know Hasbro has gone on record that if they rush a product they can get it done in 9 months. Kingohger was probably in the concepting phase during early Donbrothers at the latest, so it wouldn’t be surprising if a few small references to the idea were still there if it was the original intention. And out next season is a vehicle season, which is perfect for mechanics and gears.

Though I’d say the biggest issue is it’s just Super Sentai. For all my praise and bravado about it at the start, it’s not like Shin Godzilla, where I can show it to someone who normally wouldn’t be into Tokusatsu and have them walk away enjoying it; if you don’t like Sentai, this season isn’t going to convince you otherwise. For example, I tried showing it to @jaybuilds, and he just wasn’t into it. It’s fine, it happens, but don’t expect that one person you’ve always been trying to convince to watch the show to see it and have it convert them, is all.

The BoonBoomening: I actually haven’t seen anything for BoonBoomger yet. Just the costumes and toy listings. And as someone who focuses on the toys, I’ve seen quite a few gripes that BoonBoom Robo isn’t articulated. But, like, it’s a heavily gimmicky toy, so I get it. If you’re not going to do a gimmick, articulation is fine, but I can understand getting rid of some articulation for a fun play pattern. These are for kids, remember?

Overall, this was a great season. While I enjoy most seasons of Super Sentai, this one in particular had everything I tend to love and want out of a season. Makes me slightly less upset at myself for buying every Megazord associated with this season. Slightly.

As for my usual Megazord recommendations, this is a real all of nothing series. Either go for King-Ohger alone, or everyone for God King-Ohger. You only really need one of each, so you can skip all the premium versions, unless the colors do it for you. And the new Kyoryujin and the upcoming remolds are their own beast to consider separately to the rest of the line.

[sonofthesaiyans]

To the gal who is most deserving of a second chance, Happy Birthday Ymir. 🎂

There is so much to be said about Ymir, she is without at doubt one of the most intriguing and and perplexing characters in Attack on Titan. There's so much we don't know about her, even her real name remains a mystery. For me, Ymir was set up to be a much bigger player in the war to unravel the mystery of the Titans, and her story to me is one that demands an urgent continuation in some form.

Ymir definitely holds a special place in the story, she often comes off as cold and distant, and one to take particular pleasure in messing with the few friends she has in the 104th. Her motivations are never clear and she's an incredibly hard person to read, but then again many of my favorites elsewhere also fit that bill. Her one constant companion is Historia, and to call them an odd couple would be a huge understatement. It is however very entertaining to see how they play off each other, with Historia constantly in a balancing act with Ymir's more jaded attitude towards all that's going down with the Scouts.

While Ymir may be cold, distant and detached a lot of the time, she isn't without heart and has come through for Historia and the others several times when it really mattered. She has been through hell and back, having easily one of the most messed up backstories of any of the Scouts. Literally everything Ymir knew from her past life in Marley is long gone, she doesn't even remember her own family. And was condemned to an existence by Marley that nobody should have to suffer. Ymir literally has nothing to lose, with the people of Paradis being the first chance she has had to escape her long personal hell.

Ymir as the Jaw Titan was an impressive reveal, and she could seriously have helped level the playing field against the Warriors and the Marleyans. Her unique bond with Historia would have been all the more interesting to see develop after Historia assumed her rightful place as the Queen of the Eldians. And let's be real, nobody wanted to see Historia end up with some nameless , faceless farmer who she may not even have been attracted to in the first place. Ymir and Historia both have similarly tragic backgrounds where they essentially had no family left to turn to, with only each other to fill the void. Theirs was a rocky relationship that nonetheless shone brightly......Certainly more than Eren and Mikasa ever did, and I stand by that, people.

For me personally, Ymir's long absence and ultimate fate was one of Titan's biggest bad calls, we all expected more. And we absolutely deserved more, she is undoubtedly one of the story's biggest missed opportunities. And now we're left to fill in the blanks as to what the full story behind her is.

There's something really compelling about Ymir, even at her worst she was still a good person deep down, and one who deserved that chance to escape the insanity that robbed her of so much. I wanted to see her relationship develop with the other Scouts, and to see how she evolved as the Jaw Titan. Feels like the story we should have gotten with all that was set up around her was sacrificed for something that denied her her chance to shine.

I want to know more about Ymir, I want to connect with her more strongly, I want to know what her whole story is and see what might have been. I think Ymir could've easily carried a plot of comparable caliber to Eren's. It was all there, they had everything they needed.....Now somebody needs to step in and do what Hajime Isayama failed to take advantage of. Show the man how it's REALLY done.

For now, best wishes to the girl who so richly deserved a second chance to live a life that was all her own, to find the freedom she never had. I only hope one day she truly does get another chance. 💚 ⚔️ 💚 ⚔️ 💚

And to close that out, a special shoutout to the incredibly talented Elizabeth Maxwell, who we have to thank for giving her voice to this amazing character. I can only hope she too might one day get another chance to do so again.

Thanks for the amazing picture, Liz! It was truly an honor to have shared our appreciation of Ymir with you. ❤️

[greenbloods]

🔥 harrenhal play

im assuming this refers to my earlier post about play adaptations of asoiaf, specifically what one taking place in harrenhal might look like?

harrenhal is the convergence point of westeros; king's landing may be larger, and oldtown older, and winterfell may loom larger for the storyline of the starks, but history has a way of coming back to harrenhal. harrenhal/the godseye was where the pact of the first men and the children of the forest was made. it's where black harren and his sons were roasted alive, placing the castle under a blood curse from which it's never recovered (if you believe in blood curses, which i do). it's where maegor slew aegon the uncrowned, and where aemond and daemon danced with dragons. it's where the tourney of harrenhal happened where all the key players of robert's rebellion met together and jaime was knighted and rhaegar crowned lyanna his queen of love and beauty and ned danced with ashara and the knight of the laughing tree and--

harrenhal's important. thematically it's the gothic castle haunted by ghosts and the sins of the past, feudalism in a nutshell. so the story has to have these themes at least in the background. confining ourselves to the main series timeline, the best time to focus on these themes is probably 1) the occupation under roose bolton (arya, ghost of harrenhal, etc.) or the occupation under vargo hoat (jaime and brienne's captivity), and the best genre is probably going to be black comedy or tragedy, or maybe a musical. tragedy is too obvious, so let's go with black comedy.

probably a black comedy romance revolving around a love story between a bolton soldier and a scullery maid as they attempt to stay alive during the occupation and shifting political alliances, all the while being haunted by ghosts that roam the castle. one ghost tries to wingman each of them while arranging trysts in the godswood. the story ends when the soldier reveals sorrowfully that theyre actually a faceless man, and the maid reveals theyre a faceless man too.

[flickys-courage-club]

[CW⚠️ WEIRDCORE/DREAMCORE]

Courage The Cowardly Dog characters if they were in Weirdcore/Dreamcore AU.

This AU has their designs made morbid based on a type(s) of aesthetic(s)

Courage is a dog puppet with stitch marks all over his face and body. He can't talk since his mouth is stitched shut, he has buttons sewn into his eyes which are bleeding out of them. His design is based on plushies with button eyes and marionette puppets

Muriel and Eustace are faceless

Katz has spider features such as having six eyes and spider legs on his back. His design is based on cats, spiders and horror aesthetic

Le Quack is a duck accordion toy that plays his background music, based on those monkey cymbal toys

Cajun Fox's appearance is of an actual fox

Bunny and Kitty are both plushies made of cotton and wool. Kitty's mouse toy is a living mouse and appears on her shoulder

Banana Suit Dealer is faceless

Ma Bagge's face isn't shown but it only shows her glasses

Fusilli is a ventriloquist dummy with four crocodile eyes

Black Puddle Queen has a more monstrous siren appearance along with her outfit and hair covered in coral, shells and pearls. Design based on ocean academia

Clutching Foot's faces have hundreds of eyes

Shirley has a crystal ball head

Computer is a computer head

Weremole is more werewolf looking

Dr Zalost has rat features and Rat is a reanimated ragdoll plush

Benton Tarentella is a camera head

Errol Van Volkheim is a picture head

Courage's parents/Henry and Teresa are ragdolls

Mad Dog has chains around his arms. His design is based on hatecore aesthetic

Cruel Veterinarian's design is based on digital horror aesthetic

Freaky Fred's pupils are dilated and has a large unsettling grin. His design is based on analog horror and Sweeney Todd

Banana Suit Dealer is a faceless banana

Charlie's design is based on foodie aesthetic

General and Lieutenant are both faceless

King Ramses's design is based on horror and analog horror aesthetics with his slab attached to his chest and has scarecrow like features

Cat Thieves/Jim and Paul are conjoined twins

Schwick has a human body with beetle features

Di Lung has features of the Chinese lion

The Empress's design has features of the Chinese dragon

Goose God is a lightning bolt head

Storm Goddess is a cloud head

Hunchback's only facial feature is his eye

Bigfoot's face has hundreds of eyes

Newsman is microphone head

Duck Brothers are all conjoined together

Dorothy Bagge is faceless

Stitch Sisters are ragdoll puppets

Space Chicken's design is based on spacecore

Dr Gerbil has a human torso with rodent features

Dr Vindaloo's design is based on analog horror aesthetic

The Perfectionist Teacher's face is blurred

King of Flan is a flan head

Velvet Vic is a record player head

[restlesscrow]

random thought dump bc new hyperfixation alert

TW for death and frightening/distressing elements below!

Since I'm fixated on the idea of Pokepasta (pokemon creepypastas) and just video game horror in general, we need to expand on some of the ones that exist already outside of their source material.

Let's take the 'Faceless' glitch in Genshin. Sure it's a graphical glitch or a weird occurance of Ayato/Itto/etc found in a 'pirated' copy from a sketchy site, but what if it could be a virus that could infect the REAL copy of Genshin?

Imagine. You're playing and you come across a random, t-posing character you don't have, but when you go near the entity the game crashes or all background ambience/music just...stops.

There could also be a story a la Strangled Red with Ayato and Itto. Some sort of betrayal leads the oni (rather than Ayato) to strangle his best friend to death and occasionally break the 4th wall.

My other thoughts involved a weird screenshot of Kaeya I found that I drew, along with a glitch my lovely friend Foxy found with Aether. I'll be making art/writing of that soon (note: MY WRITING IS NOT THE BEST, but it fits the cliche creepypasta format. lol)

As someone who has loved internet horror since they were a wee lad on the internet, I adore finding other ways to make things horrifying moreso than they already are.

---

Cutting that ramble off, I have a few ideas for these! Since I have the time lol

The Faceless is a virus group that eventually hacked into Genshin's master copy and infected thousands of new users and old users via 'update' that fixed certain things with Ayato. However, it gave Ayato self awareness, and they also released a fake patch involving Itto. These copies of the two characters often cannot render with their head model in the game. The story follows an unsuspecting Genshin user downloading this patches and experiencing the horrors that ensue.

Disintegrated Kaeya is based on that weird screenshot I found. This follows a user discovering an odd document in the game files and using it to their advantage, causing (again) Kaeya to notice he's just a game character and eventually killing off the main cast in frustration that only he came to this realization.

Alternate Aether (YES THAT KIND OF ALTERNATE) is a glitch within one of the quests (I think it was Albedo's first one? I don't remember) where you see an Aether without the glowy elements of his outfit. Slowly, this Aether impersonates the player and eventually makes the game no longer playable for the player.

If anyone would like to contribute ideas PLEASE tell me. Be it via message or askbox! Especially for Honkai Star rail good god.

[fevotinggauntletreal]

Clash of FE Classes Opening Round - Match 8

(pictured: a Dancer icon from Thracia 776, a Thief icon from Shadow Dragon, and a generic Wolfskin's portrait from Fates, on a GBAFE arena background)

introductions to the classes, other closely associated classes, and explanations under the cut

Dancers are the most typical incarnation of a very distinct type of support unit, which can also manifest in such ways as the Bard, the Heron Tribe Laguz, or the Songstress. the common thread there, besides musical performance, is that these classes have the often unique ability to grant their allies an additional move per turn. this is an incredibly powerful ability that invariably cements these characters' worth as units, even if they generally can't hold their own in combat (and many can't defend themselves at all, in fact). Dancers have exclusively been female for much of the series -- although male characters have figured in the other variants of the class -- until Three Houses made it possible to reclass male characters into Dancer, and Engage subsequently introduced the series's first canonical male Dancer.

Thieves are the series's premier utility-oriented staple class. usually armed with swords, sometimes settling for daggers instead, characters of this class have on occasion proven to have combat mettle -- especially the ones who can promote into classes like Assassin or Rogue -- but fighting isn't really their raison d'etre. they're more at home breaking away from the struggle to crack open the locked doors of the world and loot treasure chests. they're also frequently given additional utilities as well, such as stealing items off enemies' inventories and seeing farther ahead in Fog of War. enemy thieves are a well-known nuisance, what with their penchant to race the player to points of interest; left alone, they will carry treasure away and destroy villages. dealing with them is usually worth it not just for securing the bounty, though, but also for the great amounts of EXP that defeating them is worth. other closely associated classes include the Whisper from Radiant Dawn; the Trickster from Awakening and Three Houses; and the Ninja, Master Ninja, Outlaw and Adventurer from Fates.

the Laguz from Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn -- Cat Tribe, Tiger Tribe, Lion Tribe, Wolf Tribe, Hawk Tribe and Raven Tribe alike -- started out as unique additions to the specific Tellius setting, and had (or, more often, were held back by) a unique Transformation Gauge mechanic that set them apart from the dragon-shifters of the series's past. since then, in Tellius's wake, other titles have played with Beast-shifter classes, albeit usually in a vein more reminiscent of the Manaketes; thusly, the Taguel hare-people from Awakening, the Nine-Tails and Kitsune fox-people from Fates, and the Wolfskin and Wolfssegner wolf-people from the other side of Fates. the definition could also easily extend to cover many of the monstrosities in the series which use natural weapons, such as the Bael and Elder Bael giant spiders of Sacred Stones, the fist-fighting Faceless and Stoneborn of Fates, or a majority of the giant beasts from Three Houses. Fire Emblem Heroes took until its third year of runtime to introduce these beast-type units into their system, but since then, the game's roster of original characters has definitely come to contain a colorful menagerie as well.

[cljordan-imperium]

Fairy, king, and prophecy for the fantasy WIP ask game, please!

Thank you for sending the asks! 💜 I am going to answer one now, and the other two in separate posts to help keep length down 💜

Fairy- What kind of side characters do you favor?

The center of the "Web of Lives" that is The Imperium Chronicles are the Four Horsemen, but especially Abriella and Cruz. So, I guess you could say that all of the other characters are, in a way, side characters.

My OC's tend to find friends and bring them home. I never know when one is going to show up and what they will be. Which ones get to be in the story, well, I do have ultimate control over that. I want characters that are going to add something, not that are just there. There has to be a reason for them, otherwise I keep them nameless and faceless so that they blend into the background. Even if they are a temp side character, I need them to be fully formed.

I'll use Damien, Kaylin's father and Lucifer's son, as an example. While he will be around for a little while, he is not going to have a redemption arc (I know, anyone whose read that storyline is SHOCKED!), and then his story will come to an end as part of the greater story as a whole. He has a purpose, he is fully fleshed out in having a backstory, a reason for being in the story as a whole, and his departure will again add to the story. He's not just there to add words. He will interact with more than just Kaylin and Asher, he has already created a ripple affect that has hit Abriella and Cruz when Asher and Kaylin showed up, and his existence and actions will continue to cause ripples that hit others.

I want side characters that have bonds and connections with other characters, even if they are other side characters. Horace and Visalus are connected with everyone in Casperius' sphere. They are not major players, but they will be important at times, and there is a reason for them being there. While they will never be the focus of a chapter, the reader will learn more about them through their connections to Casperius and Cormoran, because they are important in their lives.

A friend once said that I could write books alone on each of my side characters, and I can't argue with that too much. But I want it that way because I don't want them to seem flat and like they're just thrown on the page so that the center of the web isn't there all by themselves. No one exists in a vacuum and the "side characters" of our lives all have lives and stories too, so I like the ones in my stories to have them as well. Even if it is fantasy, I want the interactions and relationships within the story to have a sense of realism to them as well.

I hope that all makes sense. My brain sometimes only makes sense to me.

THE IMPERIUM CHRONICLES TAG LIST - @ceph-the-ghost-writer @kjscottwrites @writingpotato07 @saltysupercomputer @careful-pyromancer @late-to-the-fandom @autumnalwalker @perasperaadastrawriting @fearofahumanplanet @jessica-writes22 @dogmomwrites @mjjune @verba-writing

Let me know if you'd like +/-