#hes more fixated on infinite as a tool than as a person. just like everyone else lol :)

[enginator2000]

fleetfinite posting hours, look at my goobers

[setsuna-maru]

Chapters: 6/? Fandom: 半妖の夜叉姫 | Hanyou no Yashahime | Yashahime: Princess Half-Demon (Anime), InuYasha - A Feudal Fairy Tale Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Rin/Sesshoumaru (InuYasha) Characters: Rin (InuYasha), Sesshoumaru (InuYasha), Setsuna (Hanyou no Yashahime), Naraku (InuYasha), Jaken (InuYasha) Additional Tags: Time Travel, Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence Summary:

After his fateful third encounter with his half-brother, Sesshoumaru meets, not a human girl, but an involuntary time-traveler. Determined to right the path he would've strayed from, the course of history is changed. Years later, an intoxicating scent blows in with the cold gust of a new spring and Sesshoumaru will cross paths with the woman who would've shaped his future.

And possibly still could.

Chapter 6

Sesshoumaru hasn’t seen or heard of the spider hanyo since they left him in pieces years before but he knows that tell-tale miasma stench anywhere. The fact that Naraku managed to survive is somehow less surprising than the fact that he’s confronting Sesshoumaru in person, rather than using a puppet. Or sending one of his detachments.

  Everyone is coming out of the woodwork, he mentally scoffs. First he catches wind of that human's scent and now back comes Naraku and his whole bothersome existence.

 That human woman was turning out to be just like her would-be daughter; a bad omen.

 "Naraku," he acknowledges his newly-reappeared enemy. Sesshoumaru tries to keep his voice as neutral as possible while still maintaining an aura of obvious contempt. Jaken immediately springs into action, cursing the spider and making threats on behalf of his master. 

 "I'm surprised you've decided to show your face again.” A face that had not visibly changed since their last confrontation. Other than being healed and fully-intact, Naraku looked much the same from the days when Sesshoumaru had become entangled in his complicated web. The one that included Inuyasha and his companions, among countless others.

 “When I, Sesshoumaru, and Kirinmaru of the Dawn confronted you years ago, you fled with your tail between your legs and did not return."

 Sesshoumaru had never believed Naraku defeated for good. They had only succeeded in chasing him back into hiding. Inuyasha and his band of friends had attempted to hunt him down and finish what the two daiyokais had started but with no luck. Whatever crevice the threatened spider wedged himself into had proven too dark and deep to find.

 "Only one of us here has a tail, Sesshoumaru," comes Naraku's reply.

 Sesshoumaru smirks. "You'd think with all your downtime Naraku, you would have better comebacks prepared."

 "You’re one to judge, Sesshoumaru,” he scoffs, then chuckles. “Why—You famously have a way with words."

 "How dare you insult Sesshoumaru-sama!" comes Jaken’s squawking defense. "He is a man of brilliant eloquence. That you’re ignorant of that is only based on the fact that such a great yokai would never waste his oratorical gifts on the likes of you!" Jaken shakes his Nintojo at the spider demon during his speech for emphasis.

 "Oh?" Naraku responds, skeptically. "And who  does he share them with? You, little yokai?"

 Jaken sputters as he tries to come up with a response.

 "Well, there's uh...uh...there is no one truly worthy of my master's poetry, you see! No one with whom he can converse on his own level—"

 "Jaken!" Sesshoumaru interrupts him, having had enough. "Silence."

 The imp stiffens and ceases his useless chatter.

 "Naraku; should Kirinmaru and I need to deal with you again? Is that the reason you've returned from whatever sinkhole you crawled up from?"

 "Threatening I, Naraku with the superior Beast King?"

 The spider's tone is ruthlessly mocking and Sesshoumaru narrows his eyes slightly as he imagines his claws bursting out the back of that boned armor.

 Where did this vermin get off, having that attitude? Like he hadn't been scared into hiding for all this time. Like they hadn't had him on the verge of death.

 "Go, Sesshoumaru," he teases. "Tug on Uncle Kirinmaru's hakama and tell Father's friend he needs to fight a battle for you again. I'm sure he's in a charitable mood."

 "This coming from one who so often relies on manipulating others into doing his dirty work for him," Sesshoumaru counters. “Aided or not, you were confronted with raw power and strength. Not detachments and trickery.”

 "Trickery'" Naraku repeats. “Manipulation of others.” His tone is placidly condescending. ‟You are no stranger to these, Sesshoumaru.”

 "It’s true,” Naraku admits. “I, Naraku, will use anyone and anything as a tool. But you, Sesshoumaru, are a  great daiyokai. Shouldn’t you have more faith in your own abilities?"

 “You’re correct that I’m a daiyokai,” he responds coldly, masking his rapidly dwindling patience with this interaction.

 “Unlike you, I don't derive my power from thousands of demon parasites. But all that means is that you have no right to say anything to me. You’re a disgusting thing, Naraku." He adds, "Like all hanyos.”

 Naraku is undeterred by the pushback. Being much too aware of Sesshoumaru's insecurities, he moves to a subject he's certain remains a sore spot.

 "I see you still don't carry Tessaiga at your hip. Am I to assume your half-brother, Inuyasha, retains possession of your father's fang?"

 Sesshoumaru’s mouth tightens. He hears Jaken gasp; appalled by the audacity of invoking Inuyasha’s ownership of the Tessaiga.

 "So it's me you've come to first to announce yourself, and not my hanyo brother," he points out. "Should I be flattered? Am I, Sesshoumaru, your new obsession?"

 “It was curiosity that brought me to seek you out first," Naraku says. "Was it not a human woman I discovered you conversing with the other day? It seemed like she had an awful lot to say to you.”

 Sesshoumaru fights to keep his face impassive. Unless Naraku had used a puppet, he should have been able to smell him or any of his detachments if they had been that close. Just what  form  of Naraku had been watching—And from where?

 “Humans are numerous and unavoidable, even to this one,” he responds, careful not to protest too forcefully.

 Naraku persists. “She approached you without fear or hesitation.”

 “Are you really expecting I, Sesshoumaru, to explain the behavior of a human?” Again, he treads lightly, measuring his response. He will use no more words of explanation than necessary. For a moment, he wonders why. It's not as if he's trying to protect her.

 He’s not.

 Sesshoumaru thinks back to the encounter by the river. The damn woman had been so eager to talk . Would she talk to Naraku?

 On the chance that she did, whether willingly or by force, what of it? Even if she told him all about Setsuna, she was entirely unaware of the girl’s true nature.

 And if Naraku managed to surmise that information regardless...well, it might actually work to Sesshoumaru’s advantage.

 Let the spider think he’d found a weakness of his to exploit. Let him try to use it against him. Sesshoumaru would stand proud, smugly belittle him for having such a ridiculous idea and show the fool just how little he cared.

 Sesshoumaru's hand goes to the battle sword at his left side. In one swift, fluid motion, he unsheathes Sōryūjin and makes a swipe at Naraku. His target dodges the blade and floats into the air.

 "Run to Uncle Kirinmaru," Naraku taunts him, his dark curling hair rising in a curtain above his pale head. "You'll find I, Naraku, will be ready for him."

 With that, the spider hanyo flew away, drifting off into the horizon.

 "Why, the nerve of him!" Jaken huffs.

 His vassal looks up at him, radiating with outrage. "Sesshoumaru-sama, will you go after Naraku? He's getting away!"

 "No, Jaken," he says to the imp's consternation. Sesshoumaru needed the opportunity to consider what action to take. Naraku was nothing but a pest, and if he was going to insist on infesting their lives once more, Sesshoumaru would destroy him for good. With or without the Eastern Lord's help.

Sesshoumaru asked Setsuna no further questions and ceased any appearance of cordiality. As far as he was concerned, this is where his business with her ended. He told her so, and in language he imagined to be as devastating and offensive as the situation deserved.

 (Years later, he’ll try to recall what exactly he said to her. He’d wanted to make it brutally clear just how he felt about the existence of half-demons but, for some reason, he hadn’t really wanted to insult her personally. In the end, he can’t remember if the generic condemnations he’s thinking of are things he’d actually said to   her  or lines he’d taunted Inuyasha with around the same time.)

  Tainted blood courses through your body...A hanyo whose mother is a human is a disgrace to all our kind...Don’t come near me again, stick to humans—It suits you...Infinitely vulgar beings...I won’t fall to a weakness of the heart...What can half-demons do? You’re useless to me...

  His contempt for humans and half-demon’s had stock phrases.

  Sesshoumaru had needed something to keep his mind occupied during long days of fruitless hunting for the Tessaiga. It was easy to become fixated on what had left him in that situation in the first place.

  For her part, Setsuna seemed deeply unimpressed.

  His cruel rejection of her is met by vacant boredom. If anything he had said had gotten under her skin, her face denied it. Inuyasha would have called him a bastard and made several clumsy attempts on his head by that point. Again, he was forced to recognize part of himself in her stoic refusal to be baited into a reaction.

  “Are you finished?” she asked, after one last condemnation of her as existential terror.

  “Do you understand that we are not to come into contact again? That you are to act as if we have no relationship to one another?”

  “It’s not as though that’ll take any getting used to," she replied sardonically.

  “Kirinmaru,” he reminded her. “Leave him to me. You’re not to seek him out for any reason.”

  Setsuna shrugged. “He’s no business of mine. I already told you; I declined that offer.”

  “Then there’s nothing else to discuss. We should not cross paths again.”

  With that, he turned his back on her. As far as he knew at the time, that might be the last he'd ever see of the girl; her back against the tree, arms folded, her face defiantly expressionless. 

  Would she ever make it back to her own time, to her sister? Sesshoumaru certainly wouldn't be worrying himself with such concerns. The only thing he cared about was that she stayed out of his way and didn't draw any attention to herself.

  Farewell, Setsuna; you're on your own.

  He wondered once more if he should go the extra step of ending her life. It would be the most convenient thing to do. He decided against it, telling himself it was because she still possessed pertinent knowledge of future events. Things it would help to know but hadn’t yet occurred to him to ask about. Never mind the fact that he’d just deliberately set that bridge on fire.

  His rationalization complete, Sesshoumaru’s thoughts turned to what to do about Kirinmaru. He wasn’t sure if it would be wise to confront him. Damn Inuyasha—The Tessaiga was wasted on him. What use did the hanyo have for such a powerful sword? What had their father expected his eldest to do if it ever came time for him to confront the Lord of the East?

  His desire for his own powerful fang was stronger than ever now. Totosai, the old geezer, would still refuse to forge him one. There were other swordsmith’s—None as good as Totosai, but Sesshoumaru wielding would more than make up for any deficiencies in craft.

  He wondered if his Other had ever succeeded in taking Tessaiga from Inuyasha. Or had that demoralizing failure only pushed him even further from his intended path?

  Setsuna might've known the answer to that; if he had thought to ask about it. But it doesn’t matter and it’s not worth dwelling over; he's already returned to the correct path; the roads have already diverged. He was the real Sesshoumaru and it was what he did from here on out that truly counted.

  All the same, the image of Setsuna's face lingered in his mind; it’s fine details memorized against his will. Pieces of their conversation play back to him and the voice that says   "we’re complete strangers"  with nothing indicative of caring is her own low one.

  He thought back to Tessaiga; that sword meant to be inherited by a half-demon; the sword that had protected Inuyasha's human mother. It's the only semi-rational explanation for what his Other had done but...perhaps, Setsuna’s birth had been an experiment. A last ditch effort at taking Tessaiga for himself.

  Lack of compassion for humans was supposedly what had repelled Sesshoumaru from wielding it with his own hands. Would he really have gone that far in pursuit of his father’s fang? If the experiment had proven to be a failure then, that would explain why his other self and his progeny were strangers.

  There was a part of him that would like to believe in that scenario but, ultimately, he can’t. (Hanyo or not, he would never abandon his children.) But again, it doesn’t matter. Whatever the reasons for what the Other had done, that future wasn’t his anymore.

  Regardless, as things stood then and there, Tessaiga remained stubbornly outside his grasp. He still would need a blade sufficient enough to battle any opponent; from his lowly half-brother, to Naraku to, potentially, Kirinmaru.

Sesshoumaru had a notorious swordsmith to seek out. Kaijinbo would craft him an impressive blade, he was sure of it. He just needed to locate a suitable fang.

[lovedreaming]

analysis: how lisztloid is actually a MASSIVE FUCKING WOMAN CHILD bc i need to flesh this out.

like i’ve said 2+ times before: all the classicaloids living at otowakan are children in adult bodies. i don’t think this even needs to be explained given all the stupid shit they do in the anime. they have emotionally exaggerated versions of their past life personalities--children have less control over their emotions. they don’t do chores, they don’t pay rent, they don’t even have jobs and yet they have absolutely no shame in taking up space there--kanae herself says that they just do whatever they want all day--zero sense of adult responsibility. and i don’t mean like a college student going “wehhhhh how do i adult”--it’s literally zero sense of adult responsibility. now this is a fluffy kid’s show and some degree of immaturity should be expected, but the composers’ immaturity makes sense on a logical level because how friggin long ago do you think they came out of those giant test tubes. their bodies can’t be more than 5 years old and it’s tbh a miracle of the musical dimension + past life connections that they don’t act like it too.

              (side note: bach, tchaiko and bada are considerably more grown up,               with bach being the only real adult among the eight, but that’s               because they have actual jobs--and that’s also because, as i               theorized, bach has already transcended to full godhood               which could have made him wise beyond his biological age.)

i could do analyses of childish behaviors for all of the classicaloids if i wanted to, but i’m going to focus on liszt for now (esp. regarding her views on love) since she’s the one i’m roleplaying.

she doesn’t often discuss love in terms of sex--mostly as an abstract concept. you hear “love, love, love” from her a lot and see her swooning over it, but you rarely hear her feeling anything remotely resembling lust. sure, she likes to show off in a sexy way which i will cover in the next bullet point, but when it comes down to actually showing love to someone, she doesn’t talk about seducing or sleeping together or the morning after. she just talks about “love.” hell, even her liebestraum no. 3′s influence reflects this. it makes people swoon over each other in a sexless way that a child might envision, with none of the touching and tongue-kissing that a more adult scenario would include, AND the arrow-shooting cupids allow her to ship whomever she wants so she can throw people together like dolls. (although i took some artistic license with this musik trait of hers--in this thread, la campanella makes people rip off their clothes for her.) yeah she understands what it means to be sexy. she just doesn’t quite get what comes after strutting your stuff. which leads us to…

when she does think of sex or being sexy, she is not shown to handle it maturely in any capacity. she insists on being otowakan’s “symbol” of feminine beauty just so she can get out of doing the chores. when kanae is about to make her idol debut, franzi sends her a text saying “MAKE IT RACY! SHOW OFF YOUR ASS!” with a bikini pic of herself as a reference point. also? the penis. she makes a giant marble penis and wanted it in the bathroom because she thinks it’s an expression of “love.” this is something a young person would think of after they first get told about sex. like seriously. she sculpts a penis and puts it in the mansion bathroom as a monument to love. it doesn’t take a child psychologist to know that this shit is really immature.

she heard about the abusive situation chopin was in with jolly and her first instinct was to urge him into the computer because “IT’S LOOOOOVE.” now this isn’t necessarily a childish behavior because many young adults might also not understand jolly’s blackmailing and exploitative behavior as abusive. but given her general air of naïveté as discussed above, she was probably also totally naïve with regards to what jolly was doing, fixating on her ideals in a childish way: as long as he loves her, he ought to pursue the ‘true love’ he has with her.

she shows a high degree of selfishness toward others, even though she cares for them as friends, and holy hot damn i can do an entire paragraph of this bullet point about her best friend, chopin. in episode 3 she says she had “no idea” that chopin hated performing. but given chopin’s EXTREME asocial behavior, it would take someone completely insensitive to his needs to have “no idea”; considering how stuck-up franz liszt was historically, she was probably so consumed by her own ego that she didn’t pay attention to chopin’s emotional needs. she also treats chopin like a literal pet, someone/thing that she can amuse herself with--she literally has him registered as a pet when she moves into otowakan (which goes back to the “zero sense of adult responsibility” thing--no landlord would allow her to have a human as a pet, but she gives actually zero shits). and who can forget how she duped him in episode 11 in the rock paper scissors game, then laughed at him saying “welcome to the real world”…this needs no explanation. her selfishness also shows up when she spends bach’s money so recklessly, forcing him to constantly generate more--liszt is literally what would happen if you gave a child infinite money. also when kanae lines up all the classicaloids to make them do chores, she is the first to object and acts as though she deserves not to work alongside everyone else. lastly, she calls sosuke “tool” and when he FUCKING GETS REPLACED BY A ROBOT IN EPISODE 18 she doesn’t even NOTICE, she angrily asks why he came home “empty-handed” and yells “I told you to buy me some Calorie Off soda.” sure, none of the classicaloids noticed that sosuke was now a robot, but franzi was once again the first among them to show her selfishness.

she has no filter. she tells kanae not to scare chopin when trying to coax him to become an official tenant at otowakan, but then starts screaming at him and trying to break open his hiding place as soon as she doesn’t get her way. she freaking walks through a clothing store in a bikini because she wants to show off. her hungarian rhapsody no. 2′s musik is all about making people yell out their grievances without any sort of tact or reserve (which the unfortunate victims REGRET afterward) and she sees that as an ideal in relationships. she says “love yourself and love someone else, that’s why we tell the truth” even though some of the truths the people said while under the spell were p. much insults. guess who else has absolutely no filter and will yell anything that comes to mind? children. the only way in which this is possibly not childish is because she believes in doing that out of love for someone else, instead of simply yelling because she needs to indulge her emotions. 

[talabib]

A New Approach To Money.

Everyone can get rich. That’s according to Robert T. Kiyosaki, who spent the last two and a half decades spreading this message through his “Rich Dad” character. But why, then, are so many people still struggling financially?

Rich Dad’s answer? They’re trapped in thinking patterns that prevent them from making money. Where entrepreneurs see rewards, they see risk; where the wealthy see tools, they see hurdles. Success, in other words, is all about your mindset.

This post reveals some of the ideas that made Kiyosaki rich. You’ll discover how applying them may help you meet your financial goals!

Leverage is power.

How do you transform small amounts of money into large amounts? This statement puzzled Robert Kiyosaki in the mid-1970s. Twenty years later, he was a millionaire looking forward to early retirement. He had found the solution. So, how did he do it?

In a word, leverage – or doing more with less. This concept refers to a lever – a tool that uses a beam and pivot to harness the laws of physics, moving heavy objects with minimal force. Leverage isn’t just about heavy lifting, though; it’s one of the principles governing the world.

Let’s take a look at the animal kingdom, for example. Humans aren’t nearly as fast as cheetahs or as strong as bears. Unlike birds and fish, we can’t fly or survive underwater. And yet we dominate the Earth. That’s leverage.

Cheetahs, bears, birds, and fish use the advantages nature has given them, but they don’t multiply them like humans do. On the other hand, we leverage our greatest gift – the mind – to do things our bodies can’t. We’ve built tools, like levers to move boulders or vehicles to move quickly on dry land, in the sky, and even underwater.

The history of innovation is a series of technological leaps that have given our species greater leverage over the natural world. And this leverage has shaped human society.

Around 5,000 years ago, sea merchants realized that attaching large sheets of woven flax to a pole and crossbeam allowed them to harness the wind. The wind’s force propelled their boats. Suddenly, they could do more with less. Sailing was easier and more efficient than relying on a crew of oarsmen. It was also more powerful. Vessels were now able to carry more cargo further than ever before. The merchants and statesmen who embraced this new technology prospered and built powerful empires.

More recent breakthroughs follow the same pattern. Today, entire fleets of container ships can be dispatched to any port in the world at the click of a button. Entrepreneurs who recognized how to harness the internet early on to make this possible are among the richest people to have ever lived.

This post isn’t about technology, though. They’re about the ideas and strategies that will give you financial leverage to do more with your money.

The risk-reward ratio helps you put risk into perspective.

How you see the world shapes how you act in the world. In other words, reality is partly constructed within your own mind, arming you with a unique perspective.

Think of a concept like risk. The perceived risk of a certain behavior often determines whether you engage in that behavior or not. Investing, for example, is often seen as risky – so some people don’t invest. After all, the best way to avoid getting burned is to avoid playing with fire, right?

What about crossing the road? That can be risky too. But how often are you affected by that perceived risk? Fixating on the risk would probably paralyze you with fear, and walking around a city’s streets would become impossible. Fixating on risk alone, then, is counterproductive. That’s why Rich Dad finds the risk-reward ratio much more productive.

Nine out of ten businesses fail – and yet people continue to open new businesses. That’s not just down to hubris. Each entrepreneur simply has a different perspective and appetite for risk. And relying on the risk-reward ratio helps them understand what risk they’re willing to take.

We all know that failure is possible in any endeavor we undertake. But it’s also important to look at the overall balance of failures against successes. Put simply, if every new business fails nine out of ten times but the reward of a successful tenth attempt is great enough, we can afford to fail on the previous nine attempts.

Take it from one of Kiyosaki’s best friends, a New York-based day trader on the stock market. His strategy is built around this ratio. He’ll never spend more than a tenth of his assets to play the market. So if he has $200,000, he’ll put $20,000 aside. This is a loss he can live with should everything go disastrously wrong. But here’s where things get interesting.

When day-trading, Kiyosaki’s friend can expect to make money on one out of every twenty trades. Because of these odds, he only risks one twentieth of his trading fund for each transaction, which amounts to $1,000 per trade. Even if he loses 19 times, which rarely happens, he can still expect to make his money back on the final trade. Since each market move usually makes double or more on his original $20,000 investment, the reward of this behavior easily outweighs the risk.

Your debt and wealth ratios can help you track your financial health over time.

It’s the poor worker who blames her tools, but a person who uses poor tools also achieves poor results. Kiyosaki discovered this Rich Dad wisdom when he was a young man. It has stayed with him ever since.

You see, concepts are the tools of the brain. When you use them correctly, they can help you see things your eyes can’t. Previously, we assessed the risk-reward ratio. Here, we’ll discover the concepts that can help you track your wealth, which is the key to your financial leverage.

Understanding how you’re using positive debt, available assets, and income to support your goal to become rich is the first step toward a successful retirement.

To keep track of the positive debt versus available assets being used as currency, we look to the debt-to-equity ratio. Here’s how it works. Say you have $100,000 in positive debts and $20,000 in equities, like shares. Divide the former number by the latter – so, in this case, 100,000 divided by 20,000 – and you get a debt-to-equity ratio of five.

That figure doesn’t tell you much right away, but it’s a handy yardstick to measure your financial health over time. If your ratio goes up to ten, for example, you’ll know there’s a problem. Your debt might have doubled while your equity remained constant. Or perhaps your debt remained the same while your equity was halved. In either case, this jump is an alarm bell telling you to reassess your finances and steer them back on track. A movement in the other direction, by contrast, is an indicator of progress.

Then there’s the wealth ratio, which helps you measure your passive and portfolio income against your expenses. Here, divide your indirect income by your total expenses. Say you receive $800 from stocks, shares, or rental income each month, and your monthly expenses add up to $4,000. This gives you a wealth ratio of 0.2, meaning your income from sources other than your job cover 20 percent of your expenses.

This indicator tells you how close you are to being able to make bold financial moves like retiring early or taking on a more rewarding job that pays less. When your ratio gets to one, that means you’ll break even. Any number over one means you’ll be making money – even after covering all expenses.

Simple, good habits go a long way.

Dozens of books about how to get rich are published every year. But it’s often hard to say which authors get it right and which don’t. A lot of times, readers are told to take steps that are difficult to put into practice, and so they never get around to testing these ideas.

Rich Dad has a more viable approach: rather than starting with complex models and strategies, concentrate on low-hanging fruit by adopting simple, good habits.

If some habits make you rich and others make you poor, it stands to reason that you should cultivate the former and avoid the latter. And the upside is, these habits are easy to start and will improve your financial position.

Let’s take a look at two of the habits Kiyosaki credits with transforming his fortunes. First up is learning, which is one of the most crucial habits you’ll ever pick up.

We live in a dynamic and fluid information age. This differs from the twentieth century, which was an industrial age. It used to be that most people learned a set number of skills and then spent their working lives applying this know-how. Today, by contrast, we need to keep learning. Change is constant and inevitable; what worked yesterday won’t necessarily work tomorrow. That makes our greatest asset the information in our heads.

Put differently, what really matters is staying one step ahead of the pack and seeing what others can’t. Whether you’re reading books, attending seminars, or just chatting with people in different industries, the key is to stay curious and make sure you’re learning something new every day.

Acquiring new knowledge, insights, and ideas is one way of investing in yourself. It also helps you spot opportunities before others do. With all of these opportunities on the horizon, you’ll probably need to borrow money, which leads us to the second habit: rely on a good bookkeeper.

Most people don’t qualify for loans because they have poor financial records. Ultimately, few people will trust you to manage their money if you can’t prove that you’re able to manage your own. A bookkeeper’s job is to create professional records showing that you’re keeping your income, expenses, assets, and liabilities in order. This helps increase your financial leverage, giving you access to new resources like positive debt.

Using debt to buy assets can give you an infinite return.

Wait a minute – debt is a form of leverage? This claim might sound counterintuitive. After all, most people spend a great deal of time and energy trying to get out of debt. But, used in the right way, debt is a useful tool that can make you richer. It all depends on whether you’re getting into good or bad debt. So, what’s the difference?

In a nutshell, good debt generates income, while bad debt eats away at existing income. In the first case, debt is working for you; in the second, you’re working for it.

Many people borrow money to acquire liabilities – things that cost them more money. They use credit cards to finance expensive holidays and take out loans to buy cars. Servicing this debt takes a hefty chunk out of their paychecks. But debt can also be used to buy assets – things that create an income.

One of the best assets to buy with debt is real estate. This could either be property you’re planning to resell, or a place you can rent out. Let’s look at the first real estate deal that Kiyosaki financed with debt to see how it works.

In 1974, Kiyosaki found a small beachfront condo in Hawaii, which was being sold for $18,000. Back then he was broke, so he borrowed the cash. His bank gave him a $16,000 loan, and he used a credit card to cover the $2,000 down payment.

After acquiring the property, he rented it out. The amount didn’t just cover Kiyosaki’s loan and credit card repayments, interest, and expenditures, though. It also generated a monthly income of $25 – the equivalent of $130 today.

Now, that isn’t exactly a king’s ransom, but the principle is important. Remember, Kiyosaki hadn’t spent a dime of his own money, yet he was still generating an income after covering all his expenses, including the loan. In finance, this is called an infinite return. We might as well just call it free money!

The lesson here is simple. If you borrow in the right way, you can use other people’s money to make yourself richer. In practice, that usually means investing in income-generating real estate, which is the topic we’ll look at next.

If you want to find the right property, you have to look at a lot of duds.

How do you find a great deal for a real estate investment? It’s simple: train yourself to spot what others miss! Don’t worry, that’s not as daunting a task as it might sound.

Although it has its quirks and unique bureaucratic hurdles, real estate isn’t all that different from other things you buy. Just like finding the best possible deal on a holiday, an appliance, or a pair of sneakers, you have to look around and compare offers before taking the plunge.

So, if you want to understand the real estate market, you have to view a lot of properties. Rich Dad recommends the 100:10:3:1 method to assess any potential investments. That means looking at one hundred properties, making an offer on ten of them, having three sellers agree to your offer, and – finally – buying one of them.

The 100:10:3:1 method doesn’t just teach you about how the market works. It’s also a fail-safe way to steer clear of making painful mistakes.

Take it from one of Kiyosaki’s friends, a lawyer who decided to invest in real estate without using the method. She bought a beachfront condo near San Diego after looking at only two units, both of which were in the same complex.

Two years later, she was losing over $450 a month – the homeowner’s association had raised its maintenance fees, and it turned out she couldn’t charge as much rent as she had originally hoped. Even worse, selling wasn’t an option since she bought the condo for $25,000 more than anyone was willing to offer. She would’ve been able to avoid all of this if she had simply taken the time to research the local market.

The moral of this story according to Rich Dad: you have to kiss a lot of frogs before you find a handsome prince. A lot of folks don’t spend enough time comparing potential investments. Instead, they act on impulse, hot tips, or hearsay. But as we’ve seen in the case of Kiyosaki’s friend, people who don’t like kissing frogs often end up settling in an unhappy marriage with the first amphibian they encounter!

Problems can be opportunities.

Every fisherman has a story about the “one that got away.” Real estate investors, on the other hand, have a story about nabbing the perfect property that everyone else overlooked. Robert Kiyosaki and his wife, Kim, are no different. For them, it was a small mountain cabin they found while on vacation in Pennsylvania.

The Kiyosakis are no strangers to putting the 100:10:3:1 method into action while on holiday. You never know where opportunity will hit, and why not see what’s up for sale in other towns?

This property they found didn’t just end up being a cash cow. It also taught them an invaluable lesson about investing in real estate: just because a property has problems doesn’t mean you can’t turn those problems into money.

When they were on a hiking trip in Pennsylvania in the late ’90s, the Kiyosakis visited a local realtor’s office to see what homes were for sale. Only one property caught their attention – a run-down cabin with 15 acres of land, listed for the unusually low asking price of $43,000.

Why was the cabin so cheap? The property’s well didn’t produce enough water to sustain full-time occupants. Undeterred, the Kiyosakis took a look for themselves. After poking around, they consulted a well expert. It turned out that the well did provide enough water. The actual issue was that the amount of water it produced depended on the time of year; some months got a lot less than others.

There was an easy fix for that – installing 3,000-gallon holding tanks to store surplus water for leaner months. Keeping this knowledge to themselves, the couple offered $24,000. The owner, who had been trying to sell the cabin for years, accepted. After closing the deal, Kiyosaki returned to the property with the well expert. The two holding tanks ended up costing him a mere $5,000.

A month after the installation, the Kiyosakis put the cabin, which now came with enough water to meet an entire family’s annual needs, up for sale. It was snapped up within weeks by a young couple who were delighted to find their dream home in the mountains. Final price? $66,000 – that’s a $37,000 profit.

It’s a lesson the Kiyosakis have never forgotten. With a little patience and creative thinking, “problem” properties can reward investors with huge returns.

Leverage makes the world go round, so it’s not surprising that it also helps explain how successful entrepreneurs make their money. Some entrepreneurs leverage ideas, like the risk-reward ratio – a cognitive tool that illuminates the true risk of an investment. Others leverage credit. Despite its bad rap, debt can actually help you make money if you spend it on the right things. Take it from Robert Kiyosaki, who made his fortune by using other people’s cash to buy income-generating assets like real estate.

[zsor1722-blog]

Above, Below, Beyond| Prologue: Home

Eons ago…

Heaven. The Shining City. A floating world of purity and of light amidst infinite space. Bastion of the true, the good and the beautiful. Home of angelkind.

He watched from a distance as hundreds of wings fluttered, hovered, sped and went about their respective duties in the City. Every angel was given a task to fulfill, and as of the moment everyone seemed to be busy. Everyone but him.

He had nothing to do, for his task had been accomplished years ago. Sitting on a ledge protruding from a wall of the Sanctus Domae, he cracked his fingers then rested his head on a knuckle.

Boresome, he thought.

The Sanctus was, by far, the largest structure in the Heaven. Two leagues across, as wide as it is long, Sanctus Domae seemingly glowed as the most majestic gem at the very center of Heaven. Tall, towering spires made of the purest, white marble adorned the top of its blue jasper walls which reflected the eternal radiance of the City itself. Made of sardine stone, the stairs at the façade led to the two-door entrance which, like the walls, also reflected images of those who ascended. Whether from the steps or the walls, the reflections from the gemstones proved to be too dazzling for some angels. Often their attention was robbed by the grandiose of the Sanctus’ design perfectly laid by the Creator’s Hands. In order to avoid being distracted, some chose to fly above the steps instead of using them.

Glancing back at the wall behind him, he saw himself on the reflection as well, as he had for a thousand other times. With a white but not a pale complexion, his body was handsomely built and he had luminous, short, blonde hair. He wore a shining, white robe matched with heavenforged gloves and boots, and his head was topped with a halo of yellow light. 0Two blue, piercing eyes stared back at him – blue not only because of the rare jasper, but because he was gifted with eyes that were as blue as the backdrop of Heaven itself. Protruding from his back were three pairs of golden, feathery wings which glowed much like his hair. He stretched those wings, and then jumped off the ledge.

Mere moments before he hit the rich, delicate grass field of Paradise, he spread his marvelous wings, which caught air, allowing him to fly.

He flew past his brethren. There were messengers who hurried with scrolls, some were scribes who sat on the grass as they wrote, others were wardens who plucked fruits from trees and cut the grass where it grew too tall. Some of them waved at him as he passed by. Off in the distance was a battalion of seraphs; their weapons tipped and thus blessed with heavenly fire. The plains was also littered with numerous tiny, spherical structures – personal quarters of angels – which floated a few feet from the ground. His flight went undisturbed until he heard a friendly voice call out to him.

“Another glorious day in Paradise.” The loyal Asmodiel, also known as Asmos, extended a hand to greet him. They looked quite alike, although in truth every other angel had a subtle resemblance to him. The main difference was that Asmodiel had two wings, whereas he had six. A handshake? He thought. Though his rank is considerably lower than mine, he feels comfortable enough in my presence.

He folded his wings and graciously landed on the ground with a thud. The soles of his boots crushed the grass beneath him. Despite the objections in his thoughts, he shook Asmos’ hand. “Truly,” he replied. “Though something tells me there is more to this day than the usual.”

“Aye.” Asmodiel said as he pulled up a scroll. “Was sent by Chief Scribe to spread the word.”

“Gabriel?” he wondered. “Then it must be urgent.”

Asmodiel nodded. “Metatron is to come with news from the Beyond. An assembly has been called.”

“Where?” He asked after reading the parchment.

“By the Scion, behind the Sanctus. Hurry, the others are on their way,” Asmos answered as his two-wings flew him up.

And I just left the Sanctus, he thought. “Michael? Has he heard about this?”

Though already flying some distance away, the two-winged messenger replied that he had not seen Michael yet. “Must be at the Forge!” Asmos added.

Oh, Michael. He thought with a sigh. Whatever should I do with you. He took off but this time, he headed west.

He flew towards the Forge – the designated area where Heaven’s finest warriors trained. Though far less refined and far less majestic than the Sanctus Domae, the Forge was a place that embodied strength; a place of rock and fire, smoke and stone. Its interior was hollow space, carved off from a crude, spiky limestone formation. From afar, he realized that it simply looked like a huge, fire-lit hole in a huge, smoking rock. He always thought that the gray Forge did not look as pleasing as the other wonders in Heaven because the Creator’s Hands despised stubborn rock. It was a pain to work with.

Coughing as he inhaled smoke, he dropped to the ground and heard the clang of heavenmetal hitting heavenmetal. Here, hundreds of warriors sparred with swords and shields and spears. Scattered around the Forge were smiths who refined body armors, restored wing-guards and hammered weapons. Though these smiths were allowed to create weapons, their blades failed in comparison to weapons created by the Creator’s Hands themselves. For the Hands alone were capable of crafting weapons with souls embedded within their essences.

There were other angels who sharpened their weapons or took breaks from training when they saw him. One by one, they knelt in his presence. The sounds of metal hitting metal stopped. All around him, the angels knelt. Eligel. Ramiel. Usiel. Walking past them, he greeted each and every one or at least all those who were near enough the path that he walked through. Since he was in a hurry, there was simply no time to greet them all.

Smiling, he motioned for all the kneeling angels to stand up, and they did. He asked them where Michael was, and they replied all at once.

“One at a time, brothers,” he said with a chuckle. “One at a time.”

“Lord Michael is inside, Lord Firstborn,” a four-winged Lahabiel eagerly replied.

“Training his wings off,” said a two-winged Furniel. Realizing his mistake, he added, “Lord First.”

He thanked the two and entered the mouth of the Forge. Some of the angels trailed him. Others also followed but kept their distance.

The sight inside the gray rock that was the Forge did not differ greatly from what was happening outside. Only here, there were more smiths, more noise, and yet only two angels – Michael and Uriel – were fighting. All the other angels who were not forging weapons or armor sat in a huge circle as they watched the two battle it out in the center. He stood near the circle of watchers. Some of those who followed him from outside stood behind him. Others hovered nearby.

Fixated at the fight before them, the crowd did not bother to even glance at the newcomers. Surely, he thought, they would greet me if they saw me arrive. Not that he cared one bit for this lack of attention, for he did not want to disturb this sparring session between two of Heaven’s finest warriors.

Michael was assigned by the Creator’s Hands to train and to lead the four-thousand-strong army of Heaven. Since the day their duties were given to them, Michael became known as “Heaven’s Sword”. Why Heaven needed an army was beyond anyone’s knowledge at this point in time.

In order to fit the role, Michael was given a white, hallowed broadsword created by the Hands themselves. Only falling short to be as wide as his halo, the sword was as wide as Michael’s head, and it was almost as long as Michael is tall. The heavy blade could only be lifted with the strength bestowed upon six-winged angels, who were the upper echelons – the strongest – of angelkind society.

Michael’s adversary at the moment was Uriel the Swift, and he too was six-winged. To him was given a longblade which ran the length of his wingspan though its width was less than half of its broadsword counterpart. The longblade sparked and crackled with lightning as it received, countered and returned every blow from Michael’s own.

Both weapons – Michael’s broadsword and Uriel’s longblade – possessed a soul. Soulcrafts, the

weapons were called. The souls within the Hands-made and Hands-given weapons acted as the guardians of true power that lay dormant within the weapons. By training and becoming one with their weapons and by treating them as extensions of themselves and not merely as tools to their own ends, the angels became one with the souls within their soulcrafts. After becoming one with the given soulcraft, it was possible for an angel to unleash his untamed power.

He looked around and realized that the circle of angels watching the fight did not yet achieve this feat of becoming one with their soulcraft. Thus, they have a lot to learn.

Michael slammed his sword forward – an effort which Uriel easily dodged – and the broadsword hit only the rock of the Forge, which created a small shockwave. Uriel then quickly countered with three swings of his own. Michael blocked the first with a shield in his other arm, spun and stopped the second with a parry, and dodged the third by back-flipping through the air. Guided by six wings, Michael gently landed on his feet.

The crowd cheered.

Once again smiling, Heaven’s Firstborn was unable to contain his excitement as well and he clapped his hands.

Those who sat in the circle and were near enough turned and recognized him. He shook his head and gave a prompt, “Sssh!”, which the others clearly understood. After some courteous nods, they turned once more to the fight before them.

“Truly quick,” Michael said in that booming voice of his. “But you have yet to become one with your soulcraft”.

“Aye,” the smirking Uriel said as he raised his sword. “That is why I wish to learn from you.”

Dropping the shield to the ground, Michael closed his eyes and held his sword with both hands. When he opened his eyes, white light shone from them, then his broadsword glowed with the same radiance.

Brace yourselves, the Firstborn thought, raising his hands to protect himself. Fight’s over.

The broadsword once more struck the ground and created a magical wave which radiated outward to all directions. In a flash Uriel was down, and all the spectators sitting in the circle were thrown back and they landed on the ground. Last to be hit by the wave, the smiths were slammed against the walls of the cave-like space as everyone in the Forge experienced power that could only be described as lethal.

Very lethal. If Michael wanted it to be.

Only the Firstborn saw this attack coming, and only he was able to withstand the powerful magic that was just used. Michael smirked and looked around. When their eyes met, Michael knelt.

“Luciel!” Michael said as he fell on his knees. “Firstborn, I failed to noticed your arrival.”

Uriel, the spectators, and the smiths realized this as well and, in an instant, were all on their knees.

“Ha-ha. I had no intention to disturb your sparring, brothers,” Luciel said. “Rise, all of you. Lord Gabriel has called for an assembly.”