#i need more ffxiv accounts to follow

[yarpell]

ARR wolgraha my beloved

[coldau]

I need to follow more FFXIV accounts, like this if you're an FFXIV account because i deleted my twitter and that was where i got my main injection of ffxiv

[gatheredfates]

Hi everyone! It's been a hot minute since I did a Compendium update, but I promise I'm not dead. For those who don't know, I got a new job! That meant pretty much the entirety of October was spent wrapping up my old job, going to my new site and trying to learn the new one. I'm on break in approximately two weeks, yay! ☃️

These updates will take on a wintery/Starlight theme to celebrate the season, much like All Saints. I hope you enjoy.

Additionally, myself and the lovely folks at SEAFLOOR are having a Catch up (for) Starlight Challenge! You should join us if you're interested. ❄️

However, without further the following communities have been added to Sea's Community Compendium for XIV Creatives.

LARGE SCALE

The Help Lines—We are a community-based discord to be used to play the critically acclaimed MMORPG Final Fantasy XIV. We host almost all content including DRS and BA, Raiding, Deep Dungeons, Blue Mage and more. Our mission is to create a welcoming space for any individual in need of assistance to reach out and accomplish their FFXIV goals in a toxicity-free environment.

The Aether Entertainer—Founded in 2021 on Aether, The Aether Entertainer is player-made virtual magazine covering music, theatre, art, current events, and Eorzean popular culture.

LORE

Final Flowery XIV—Compiled by ann0yance(bsky)/@sa8oteur, this guide explores the various flowers in XIV, comparing them to their real-world equivalents and meanings.

On Elementals, Accountability and Criticism—An essay written by @morgana96 that explores the lore of elementals and their place in Gridania (and beyond)!

MISC

Vanilla Gpose Tips by Winterdeepelegy—A how-to guide on effectively utilising the vanilla gpose tools to create visually stunning screenshots, written by @winterdeepelegy.

WoL Reference Sheet—Created by @coldshrugs, a handy WoL reference sheet you can build in Canva!

NA GPOSE Studio/Themed Housing Directory—A player-made repository of North American Gpose studios and themed houses!

CHANGELOG

The Scholar's of Nym—The link has been modified at the request of the owner.

Skystone Co.—Has been removed at the request of its owner.

UI Macro Menus—The link has been modified to accurately reflect the bookmark.

Have you thought about joining our Tumblr Community? You can find it here!

Want to submit? You can either fill out the google form here or send me an ask with the relevant information!

Is my space suitable for the Compendium? Most of the time, yes! Below the read more is some more information/stipulations. This is all publicly available on the document. 🦌

Below are the following things I do not accept on the Compendium:

Personal/Single-Character LFC ads. (Though these get posted to the SEAFLOOR Tumblr Community when I find them!)

Content intended for or can be used for bullying, harassment and OOC gossip. E.g. ‘Secrets’ blogs, receipts, callout posts, etc. This does not include IC tabloid blogs or other ventures used to generate roleplay.

Communities that do not have an RP/writing element (large-scale exempt).

Anything I find personally distasteful or goes against the spirit of this project.

Common-sense rule applies.

I want to put my community on the Compendium but we have an application process. Is this okay?

Yes! Just note somewhere in your application that's a requirement. The only thing that is mandatory for the Compendium is that you must be open to new members or have a public-facing/accessible facet. There's no point advertising a community if no one can join it in some way!

I want to put my Community on the compendium but I only have x number of members —

Also totally okay! People don't start with large communities. Activity is a must but, whether your server has two or two thousand members, if you're looking for new people to join, I'd love to help you find people.

I want to put my community/resource on the Compendium but I worry its too niche?

Okay, and? If your Eorzean Fishing Alliance has four members but you roleplay every second weekend, I still want to know about it. The same goes for resources; if it's relevant to the game, it'll be useful to someone.

How active does a community need to be?

If you find a community has not been active in about two/three months, send me a message and I'll take a look at it. Communities have ebbs and flows, especially event spaces that may take hiatuses depending on member interest/life events. I'm not strict in my implementation provided a space isn't dead. If a link or anything is broken, contact me asap!

I have [insert a question not stated here]?

No drama! Send me an ask or use the #Compendium channel in my Discord!

[anbaisai]

About the Blog

Commissions: [OPEN]

Hey there! ✨

You can call me Syder (pronounced like “cider”). This is my art blog where I post my art for quite literally anything - OCs, fanart, doodles, etc. It may seem centered around certain fandoms if I’m into that at the moment, but really it’s just a miscellaneous art blog.

My main blog is over at @part-sadist, so if you see a follow or interaction from that account, that’s me. I can’t follow via this side blog and unfortunately tumblr doesn’t seem to allow me to swap this one to my main 💦

I am an adult, and while this blog is not 18+, I may sometimes talk about or draw content with more mature themes. Please do not follow if that bothers you. If you need to block or unfollow me, please feel free to do so, I will never take it personally.

Other stuff

Pronouns: both she/her and they/them are fine

EN/中文/日本語 OK

Asks are welcome! Mentions are okay, but please only send DMs for business inquiries (i.e. commissions) unless we're mutuals

DO NOT repost my art or use it for AI learning

Current main fandom is Twisted Wonderland, but a few other things I like include: FFXIV, Splatoon, Chainsaw Man, Dandadan, Ace Attorney, otome games, Vocaloid, etc.

Please also note that this blog is not spoiler-free ⚠ I do tag spoilers but sometimes I may forget to, so proceed with caution!

Tags guide, masterlists, & FAQ under the cut!

Tags Guide

(Note that some of these tags will include work by other people)

#my art - All artwork, click this one if you want to see just my art

#oc - Art featuring my own OCs

#others ocs - Art featuring other people's OCs

#twst or #twisted wonderland - All Twisted Wonderland related art

#shiokawa mayu - My Twisted Wonderland OC/Yuusona

#jamimayu - Jamil x Yuu content

#syder txt - Miscellaneous text posts

#gifts from others - Artwork, writing, etc. I received from other people

Masterlists

Twisted Wonderland

Shiokawa Mayu 🍙 (My Yuusona/OC)

[To be continuously updated...]

FAQ

Do you take commissions?

Commissions are currently OPEN, please see this post for more information!

Can you draw [insert idea/prompt here]?

I do take suggestions, but please understand that I can’t guarantee that I’ll get to it.

Can I draw your OC?

Alone or with canon characters (if they’re part of pre-existing media), yes. If it’s with your own OC or a character I don’t know, please ask me first.

Can you draw my OC?

Only if I’m hosting an OC interaction or request event, otherwise I prefer to focus on my own projects & ideas first, sorry!

Can I use your art for a profile picture/banner/etc.?

If it's fanart, yes, as long as you credit me properly - this means visible credit, and not claiming it as your own. However, please refrain from making any edits or modifications to the artwork, such as adding filters. Please also do not use my art for roleplaying purposes.

Additionally, please do not use my OCs, as they are very personal to me 💦 All commissions are also intended for the commissioner's use only.

What do you use to draw?

Clip Studio Paint (PC). I can’t tell you what brushes I use because I downloaded tons and just pick one randomly based on whatever I feel like using that day, but if you ask me specifically about a piece I may be able to recall which one I used 😭

[littlestartemis]

This is like THE thing I'm most annoying millennial about, but I've decided I'm going to make a guide about this instead of just venting to my friends about it for the Nth time. I am not a fan of spotify. On the surface I already didn't like it, the idea of paying a monthly subscription for a media player that requires an internet connection was abjectly backwards imo. Then I actually used it recently, and I'm even more frustrated, because searching for songs doesn't give you any clear indication on if it's the Actual Song you wanted, or just some rando's remix or something. Not to mention the queue and playlist functions just not working 1/3 of the time, and... yeah.

"Man I wish this artist would release on spotify so I could listen to this song."

"Hey are you gonna put this thing on spotify? I'd really like to listen to it away from my computer/off youtube."

Allow me my one snarky comment here because I feel strongly about this and then the rest of the post will be a polite and detailed guide.

I'm gonna let you all in on a secret, you'll never believe this. There's a method, inside your computer (and phone!), where you can listen to music, any music you want... without the internet. Fuckin wild, right? (Making a break because this ended up being longer than I thought it would)

On your computer, even up to Windows 11, you have a thing called "Windows Media Player" that's just automatically on your computer. And if it's not, for whatever reason, lemme make things even easier for you with a link to install it.

You open it up, and you're greeted with this. (yours obviously won't be filled with FFXIV clips and songs by default, just work with me)

Now, I think everything here is perfectly self explanatory, but I've heard as time's worn on that the younger generations are becoming increasingly poorly taught when it comes to navigating computer programs.

Home is just the first thing you get when you open it. Shows all your recently viewed media on your computer

Music Library is your entire collection of songs in your music folder (we'll get there)

Video Library is the same thing but for video files

Play queue is what you have queued up to play in a list Right Now

Playlists is... the list of playlists you've made

So! Good first step, we have a media player. This thing doesn't need an internet connection, it can make playlists, it can shuffle, it's got it all. But like, how do you actually get songs on it, right? Well, we've got a few methods.

If you're a fan of contemporary/pop music, you've got the easiest time of things. If you're already someone who's ok with paying spotify once a month for their service (which is just a media player with always on internet), you shouldn't have a problem with giving that money directly to the artists you already like the work of instead. Not to mention, on streaming services music can be added and removed at the whim of... really any number of people. Whereas if you get yourself the mp3 file, you own that shit forever.

Most every artist offers a way to buy their music from them directly in album form. For shows, movies, and video games, that can be a little more up in the air, but it's nothing a quick google search of "[media name] original soundtrack download" can't direct you to. My first port of call would be to recommend this site here. Despite the name, it carries an absolutely stupid titanic repository of music downloads, the vast majority of which being for things that either no longer have legal means of purchase, or never had one to begin with. You'll have to download them one at a time if you don't/can't make an account and donate to them, but... that's literally just a time investment. Lil bit of elbow grease.

Now, let's say you're willing to put in that elbow grease, but what you wanted isn't here. Well, you've got an ancient, tried and true method to follow suit on next; youtube conversion. It couldn't be simpler. Copy/paste the url (the funny string of letters numbers and characters in the bar at the top of your browser window) into the thing that says "please paste youtube url here", and press the convert button. You've even got options to change the quality (if you need a smaller file size) and trim a length of time off the beginning or end of it! Again, you'll need to do this one at a time, and via this method you won't get premade names (beyond whatever the yt video's name was) or special album art or whatever. But if all you're after is listening to your music of choice without fucking spotify, that shouldn't be a problem.

And I'm not done yet! Circling back to my earlier comment about "some kids just don't know how to work their computers", some of you may genuinely be asking "what am I supposed to do with these mp3 files after they're on my computer?" We'll start with "where even are they" to begin with. You have something baked into your computer called a "file explorer". I keep mine pinned to my taskbar, but you aughta be able to find it and open it up by searching that name in your start menu

This is what the left side of that File Explorer window aughta look like, more or less. You only need to worry about two of these things here for our purposes; Downloads, with the arrow pointing down at the line, and Music, with the music note in the green circle. By default, anything you download, be it from a converter, more illicit sources, or 100% legal "I bought this from the band's website", is going to go into your Downloads first. (side note, if your computer ever tells you you're running out of space and you're like "what the fuck how??", check your downloads, might need to clear that shit out into the recycle bin) You're gonna move those files from Downloads to Music (I only recently learned that file explorer supports additional tabs now, like browsers! That rules). The simplest method of moving them over though would be to click once on the file, then right click, you'll see a row of pictures at the top of the right click menu, you want the scissors (this is called Cutting). Once you click those scissors, you head over to your Music tab, and in the empty white space, you right click, and at the bottom of the menu you'll see a clipboard with a piece of paper, (that's Paste) click that, and it'll remove that file from Downloads, and move it over to Music.

Your media player program is automatically designed to detect mp3 files inside that Music folder. So, from here, you just need to work the media player!

Open up that Music Library tab in your Media Player, and everything will automatically be grouped Alphabetically, you can change that with "Sort by:" in the top right. Know what else? If you do buy an album (or download one otherwise), it'll recognize that on its own too! You can sift through your collection by Albums at the very top there! So you just wanna listen to an album, you can pop over there, click an album, and...

Play all, right at the top, the red button.

You wanna make a playlist? Right click any song, and in the right click menu you'll see "Add to+", check that, and you'll be prompted to just add it to the now paying queue of songs, or to make a new playlist. Do that, you name it what you want, and now you can just right click-> add any songs you want to that playlist.

Now when it comes to phones, I know most people have iphones, and in that realm... yeah I can't help you sorry. But if you're not, we're in another "this should be on your phone already, and if it's not you can install it". Samsung Music. Open that bad boy up, and

Damn doesn't this look familiar. On my Samsung phone at least, nearly EVERYTHING I just laid out applies to making this all happen just on your phone with no computer. But, if you only download on the computer, and still want this shit on your phone, there's a VERY easy method there too!

Get a USB-C cord, hook up your phone to your computer, and you remember the method I told you for moving those files over from Downloads to Music? Works the exact same for moving things from your computer to your phone. Hell, your phone even has a Music folder of its own! Works the same.

This has been my very long and hopefully helpful PSA about listening to music via methods that don't involve God Damn Spotify. Go enjoy yourselves. Don't pay for shit you don't need to pay for.

[howdygravytrain]

howdy friends, i'm offering FREE SKETCHES on 🦋bluesky!

i was scrolling on bsky yesterday during lunch and saw a user make a post about offering free doodles of people's wols during these trying times in the US to help spread some positivity. i was so moved by their post that i decided to jump on board to do the same cause we can all use a little pick me up after these past few days

this is only available through 🦋bluesky and those in the united states affected by the thing that happened a few days ago, so if you have an account there and would like a free sketch of your wol/ffxiv oc, then read below the break to see how to get one! 🤠

how to get a free sketch:

applies to only folks in the united states

reply to this post with reference image(s) of your WoL/OC

it's not required, but a brief description of your character is appreciated! (name, personality, likes, class, etc)

repost not needed but welcomed

open to non-followers

i have the cut-off date as November 11, but i more than likely will extend it to give folks who view this post here time to share their character, as well as me just wanting to reach as many people as possible to spread some positivity!

things are pretty scary in the us right now, but i hope that i can at least make someone smile with a silly sketch of their WoL

stay safe y'all and i hope to see y'alls characters over on bsky! 💛

[echodrops]

The Promises I’m Making (2025)

After the absolute garbage fire that was my life in 2024, I'm kind of just sitting here like... "What do?" What do I even try to focus on for 2025? Will the promises I make right now even be relevant in two months' time, given how many plot twists my life has become prone to?

There's also definitely a correlation between not having money and struggling to come up with resolutions. Why does everything in life cost so much?

Please 2025... let me live in uninteresting times...

2025 Promises

1) Ensure the plumbing repairs in the Utah house are completely finished and the ceiling/floors are restored.

2) Pay back as much of the loan I had to take out as quickly as possible to reduce the monthly payments.

3) Have the AC unit in the Texas house replaced and paint the ceiling where there are water spots from the leaks.

4) Clean up the kitchen area of my Texas house; there is a bunch of kitsch accumulating on the far edge of the counters that I just don't need in a kitchen.

5) Get all the bookshelves/books organized in my Texas house.

6) Clean off my back patio/car port area in the Texas house so I can park my car there again.

7) Call a handyman and have the Texas house bathroom faucets replaced.

8) Clean out the Texas house closets and figure out what to do with all the old boxes like my old computer boxes that I've been cramming in there.

9) Put up a shelf in my room for my figures so that they're not completing clogging up the top of the dresser.

10) Fix the damaged spot on the backyard fence of the Texas house.

11) Clean out all the drawers in my desk/side tables/etc. What is even in there???

12) Take better care of the Texas house lawn, like fighting weeds and trimming the hedge more often.

13) Assemble my new display case and actually successfully organize/display all my plushies. I have... too many plushies...

14) Change the burned-out lightbulbs in the recessed lighting in the Texas house ceiling. It’s like twelve feet high and the lightbulb changer stick I bought didn’t work, so I’m going to have to find someone with a ladder. Save me, handyman. Save me.

15) Help my brother reorganize his furniture in the room he's staying currently; dude has never heard of the concept of maximizing space and it shows.

16) Help my parents tear out the carpet in my old childhood bedroom.

17) Actually use the yoga mat I bought forever and a day ago. This year... for sure...

18) Walk the dog more. Even if the dog herself doesn't like walking when it's hot out lol.

19) Lose at least twenty pounds.

20) Do a complete re-read of Noragami and post some of my closing thoughts on the series.

21) This is super nerdy, but my bro got me the FFXIV cookbook and made me promise to actually use it, so I guess I’d better at least try to make something from it. (Years later, I'm still... trying... lol)

22) Take at least one decent picture of a wild sea turtle.

23) Reach the new level cap with all jobs in FFXIV. I'm late, whoops.

24) Spend less on gacha games and Starbucks. Gotta save money…

25) Close out my old credit union account and call to check in on closing any old credit cards I might still have.

26) Fully deep clean and vacuum/detail my own car at home. No more of the “It doesn’t make sense to clean it out now; the dog is just going to go back in it.” The dog is always going to go back in it. Clean it, Echo.

27) Complete my follow up medical appointments and handle all medical situations in a timely manner.

28) See at least three new species of birds. Doesn’t matter where, just three new ones!

29) Get a new battery in my watch so I can go back to wearing it.

30) Waste less food; I buy things all the time and then don't get to them before they go bad. It's the worst.

31) Make use of the Sam's Club membership my parents bought me for Christmas.

32) Repair the lovely one-of-kind ceramic plate that my dog broke with kintsugi. I want to try it at least once!

33) Block more people. I know this sounds odd but I have a terrible habit of getting into debates when I see bad takes on social media and honestly there's no point in wasting so much time. I gotta block and move on a lot more lol.

34) Put all the small prints, postcards, and stickers I have collected in my new mini-print books. I can even use up washi tape to decorate too. (Finally, a purpose for the washi tape…)

35) Get the situation with the IT systems at work resolved so that all data can be correctly submitted.

36) Apply for online adjunct positions to help make extra money on the side.

37) Make sure my classes are ready to go before each semester, including properly scheduling the announcements and everything.

38) Buy birthday cards in advance for everyone so I have them available to send when birthdays come around.

39) Draw more this year. Maybe I won't have time to fully line and color artworks digitally, but I should at least not let my tiny amount of art ability wither into nothingness...

40) Write and post something... Anything at this rate, please.

41) Build the pretty koi paper lantern my brother got me, or the Korean temple model my coworker gave me after his trip to Korea.

42) Visit the beach more often... Need relaxation...

43) Take better care of my kitty. It's not like I don't take decent care of her, but I definitely put more effort into doing things with the dog than the cat and I think she is big jealous.

44) Go see at least one play. Live theater is good for the soul.

45) See about removing the PMI from at least one of my house loans to try to save money. I’ve been paying on these loans long enough I shouldn’t need PMI anymore.

46) Take a day trip to Santa Cruz Island with Kacchan.

47) Read the book that has been on my "To read" list for the longest time. I don't know which one that is off the top of my head, but I will finally finish one that has been on the list!

48) Try to go to bed earlier more consistently than last year; I really punished myself with terrible sleep over the last few months and its not helping the health situation.

49) Go through my bookshelves to find books to donate, then donate the books to people's little free libraries.

50) I will keep my promises! 

Good luck, 2025’s me!

[velnica]

FFXIV Write 2023: #6 Ring

T | Sanson/Guydelot | 1006 words

Sanson swirled the whisky in his glass with a deep sigh before taking a sizable sip. The barstool made for a poor seat for his exhausted body but he couldn’t muster up the strength to move to a nearby sofa. He'd been awake since five that morning and it was a miracle that he even made it to the hotel tonight. His mad dash to the airport had somehow been successful with literal minutes to spare and if he’d missed it, who knew when the next available flight would have been. 

Oh well that was all in the past now, sore legs notwithstanding. Besides he couldn’t really get too angry at Cid Garlond for going overtime, the man was a delight to watch in action and even more so to interview. Sanson had been wanting to do a research piece on the rising adoption of green Magitek technology, and who better to give him intimate insight than the man spearheading one of the largest project—

The sound of glass sliding on the counter in front of him jolted Sanson from his musing.

“May I join you?” a smooth voice followed and Sanson turned towards the interloper. A Hyuran man leaned against the counter, a charming smile on his handsome face as he pushed the drink towards Sanson. “You look like you could use some company.”

The man’s voice was smooth, aye, but not the kind that Sanson needed to trail down his spine. Still he returned the smile with one of his own for politeness sake. Ignoring the proffered glass of liquor he deliberately lifted his whisky up with his left hand, all the better to show off his wedding ring at the flirt.

The motion didn’t deter him; in fact the man now took a proper seat next to Sanson, though at least he had the wisdom to reclaim the failed gift for himself. That was an improvement. Sanson tried to ignore him, he was too tired by half and wasn’t in the mood to entertain.

“Perhaps you and I could get to know each other—”

“I’m married,” he interrupted, manners starting to slip as fatigue seeped in. The alcohol, of course, only emboldened his ire.

“A small detail that’s oft irrelevant,” the man countered. “The name’s Rodrich, and you are—”

“Amateur,” a condescending voice cut in abruptly, interrupting the Hyur the second time. An Elezen man approached them this time and Sanson sighed, this better not turn hostile on his account.

“I beg your pardon?” Rodrich bristled at the intruder.

“Amateur,” the man repeated with a smirk. “You ain’t gonna get anyone with that kind of pathetic pillow talk, and certainly not a married man.” Rodrich seethed and stood up, though the Elezen’s height negated any kind of intimidation factor that he tried to project.

“Well, I’d like to see you do better then.”

Sanson groaned, so much for this not turning hostile. How dare Rodrich involved him in this chest-thumping competition when he’d firmly displayed his disinterest. But still… He downed the rest of his whisky and turned halfway in his stool to face the squaring combatants. Maybe this was just what he needed for a second wind.

The Elezen’s smirk deepened and he turned towards Sanson, amused blue eyes peeking from under a curtain of messy bangs.

“Say love, how about we make a dash upstairs so I can fuck you into the bed until the sun comes up?”

Sanson flushed beet red and Rodrich floundered like a fish, jaw dropping in shock.

“I’m married, remember.” He lifted his hand and flashed his platinum band, unmistakable now in the dim light of the hotel bar.

“What a coincidence,” the Elezen remarked as he lifted his left hand, “I seem to have a matching ring to yours.”

A genuine smile—a rather amused one at that—graced Sanson’s lips for the first time since he arrived. “Would you look at that? I suppose then yes, you can fuck me into the bed until the sun comes up.” He hopped off the stool to take Guydelot’s hand and pulled him down by their intertwined fingers for a fiery kiss, part-fueled by the whisky and part-fueled by the little bamboozle they just pulled.

“Have a good night Rodrich,” he crooned as Guydelot finally stopped nibbling his bottom lip long enough for him to speak. Without waiting for a reply he tugged his husband away towards the first available lift, and as soon as the door closed he pinned Guydelot against the wall and peppered his jaw with kisses.

“Flirt,” he teased as a rumbling laugh came out of Guydelot.

“You were about ten seconds away from decking the poor man if I hadn’t cut in.” Guydelot pulled him into a hug, rubbing his cheek on top of Sanson’s head. “So, how about it? Still up for me fucking you until sunrise?”

Now it was Sanson’s turn to laugh. “You’ve got zero energy after a concert, my love. How about one round then sleep, and you can do it all again in the morning?”

Guydelot gasped, “Sanson Smyth, are you calling me old?”

“Our relationship is old enough to attend university, Guydelot. We are old,” he replied. The elevator stopped then and Sanson dragged Guydelot behind him once more towards their room, opening the door with fumbling hands as Guydelot tried his hardest to distract him with lovebites on his nape. They tumbled into the bed with a soft laugh and Sanson stradled Guydelot’s hips, marvelling at how they still fit together perfectly twenty years on.

With slow deliberate movement he lifted the hem of his shirt, noting how Guydelot’s breath hitched with every ilm of uncovered skin. He threw the shirt aside and bent down to lavish needy licks onto Guydelot’s ears.

“You have one shot, do your best.”

Suddenly Guydelot made a grab at him and flipped their position around, pinning Sanson down with his taller stature. Sanson swallowed thickly as Guydelot hovered over him, grinning like a wolf who just caught his prey.

“With pleasure.”

[equinoxbloom]

To Know You

[FFXIV Write 2024 | Day 4 | Reticent]

She hadn’t realized she hesitated until he told her so, arm outstretched. Her hand descended slowly into this wide palm, featherfall, and she was struck by its warmth. She was always struck by his warmth. Her fingers curled. “Do you trust me?” he asked her, earnest in the privacy of the Borel manor garden.

“Of course,” she said, quickly for once. She hadn’t needed to think about it. After all they’d been through, how could she not? Her stay in Ishgard had been championed by House Fortemps but made possible by the weight of his support - given so delicately she and Alphinaud hadn’t seen it for far too long. Approval offered at a distance without favor; a serene confidence in their virtue that steadied their detractors. She had been implicated in regicide.

His smile was boyishly lopsided, then. “I am glad.” He didn’t tell her it relieved him to hear it. The Hero of Eorzea was as delicate as she was indomitable. He wasn’t certain which had surprised him more.

“Were you uncertain?” she asked, frowning. He tugged her hand, pulling her steps closer even as his gaze skated past her to confirm they were alone. He’d not forgive himself if he ever let her be found vulnerable on his account.

“I admit that, with you, I am rarely certain I understand your feelings,” he said.

“I’m sorry,” she said, though she couldn’t quite bring herself to look him in the eye. She wondered if he was fully aware of himself. Surely he had felt the way the eligible bachelors and bachelorettes of Ishgard followed him with bated breath. Surely he understood the way such an expression would set their pulses racing… set her pulse racing.

He laughed, soft and low. She was an impossibility. He wanted to steal her away. He wanted to watch her bloom. “I am not one to shy away from the effort required to reach worthwhile goals.”

She bit her tongue to keep herself still, levin dancing down her spine. His finger curled beneath her chin to draw her gaze to his, breath lodged in her throat to find his face so very near. Her hand still wrapped in his.

“Aymeric…” his name was hardly a whisper. She wanted to fall into him. She wanted to run from him.

“You so rarely tell me what you’re thinking,” his breath on her lips, she felt herself leaning into him. His hand tightened around hers. “You so rarely say my name.”

He stepped away. She let out the breath she hadn’t known she’d been holding. Her hand was cold.     

[sheepwithspecs]

The Sorcerer & The Moon Bride

|| FFXIV || Rated G ||

Here is my entry for @fauxlorexiv minibang! This Eorzean original(?) is the tale of an ageless sorcerer and his beloved moon bride. Featuring FANTASTIC art by the ulta-talented @trarioven that you can see here! I had so much fun with this!

read on Ao3

Urianger stepped from the dimly lit interior of the Bookman’s Shelves, squinting against the brightness of the Il Mheg morning. The sun, seemingly oblivious to the horrors he and his compeers had faced at the bottom of Malika’s Well only days before, lay warm and heavy on the rolling hills. Longmirror Lake was a smooth sheet of glass, barely rippling at the corners as it lapped onto the shoreline. Far above the submerged city, the spires of Lyhe Ghiah stretched towards the newly-revealed firmament. Fluffy clouds, no longer hidden by a foreboding sheath of Light, drifted lazily towards the distant horizon.

The breeze stirred his hair as he crossed the threshold, pulling the heavy oaken doors shut behind him. The hills surrounding the Shelves were carpeted in a dazzling array of wildflowers, humming with life as morphos the size of large birds fluttered amidst towering stone formations. Pixies darted to and fro above the dewy petals, scampering about and giggling like children in their play.

A well-worn cart path led towards Lydha Lran; he followed it down the slope, breaking away at the last moment to make for the young sapling that grew in the shadow of his borrowed home. The newly-christened Ryne sat beneath its shady boughs, hunched over something in her lap. As he drew closer, Urianger found that she was hard at work making bullets for Thancred’s gunblade. Her lap already contained far more than the gunbreaker would ever need, even with present circumstances taken into account. Ryne lifted her head at the sound of his approach, her worried brow smoothing in welcome.

“How fares thy task?” he asked, taking a seat beside her. The earth was warm beneath his crossed legs, the tree bark rough against his bared shoulders. From far away, his sensitive ears could make out the faint sound of the herd that sheltered in the abandoned stables. “’Twould seem there are bullets enough to furnish the Crystarium guard to a man.” Ryne’s cheeks flushed deep with color at his mild teasing, chin dipping into her neck as she hid behind the long curtain of her hair.

“I want to make sure that Thancred is prepared,” she explained, cupping her fingers protectively around the bullets in her lap. “I remember when he rescued me, how hard it was to escape Eulmore. And now we’re going back…. But we have no choice.” A resolute nod punctuated the statement. Even so, Urianger had the sneaking suspicion she was trying to convince herself of the fact, rather than express it to him. “There’s no other way to save everyone. We all have our roles to play, and we have to succeed, especially now that… that….”

“Ah. Thou art worried about our friend.” He put a soothing hand on her shoulder; the muscles were rigid beneath his palm, fraught with nervous energy. Ryne shook her head, chewing absently on her lower lip.

“It’s just… they’ve already done so much to help us, and it’s clearly starting to take a toll. We need to do more to help! I know the Warrior of Darkness is the only one able to defeat the Lightwardens and contain the Light within them, but it doesn’t seem fair that they’re suffering while we’re sitting around doing nothing!”

“Why isn’t there something we can do to help ease that burden, even a little?” She hiccoughed, turning aside in a vain effort to wipe her eyes without being noticed. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t raise my voice. It’s just that I feel so… so helpless whenever I think about it.”   

“I understand thy frustrations.” Urianger rubbed small circles between her shoulder blades, attempting to loosen the tense muscles. “I too have oft lamented that I should stay behind, in relative safety, while others… bear that burden.”

His heart twisted as the faces of Scions lost in battle flashed through his mind. The happy voices in the Waking Sands, silenced forever by Garlean arms. Louisoix, who bore the prayers of a nation as he faced the primal Bahamut on the bloodstrewn Flats. Papalymo, standing tall on Baelsar’s Wall as he followed his master to oblivion. Moenbryda—

Swallowing thickly, he cleared his throat and tried again to impart what wisdom he could to his young friend.

“Though these words may ring hollow in the present moment: do not underestimate thy own ability. Not everyone is built for the front lines, but there are other ways in which thou might offer assistance to thy comrades. There is no shame in supporting those who fight for our sake.” He picked up a bullet from her lap, turning it between his thumb and forefinger so that the smooth metal surface caught the light. “For instance, would’st thou proclaim the smith who forged these bullets has less claim to a victory on the battlefield than the man who wields them?”

“Well….” Ryne thought a moment. “No, I suppose not.”

“The soldiers of the Crystarium would be remiss in their duties were it not for the food, armor, and shelter provided by those who live there. They who provide succor are not weak for eschewing the path of a warrior. Neither are we the lesser for our more modest roles in our friends’ success.”

“You’re right, of course,” Ryne admitted softly. “Even so, I suppose I just feel… useless, sometimes.” She looked down at her hands, still curled protectively over the bullets in her lap. “I did everything I could to help the Warrior of Darkness to contain the Light, but they were still unconscious when we left the Crystarium. Since the day we met, they’ve done their best to help Thancred protect me. But when they needed my help, I couldn’t do the same for them.”

“If I tried my very best, why does it still feel as though I’ve failed them somehow?” She sniffed, no longer attempting to hide the tears pooling in her eyes. “And what if I can’t—what if I fail the others, too? We’ve lost so many already! What should I do? What can I do?”

Such heavy thoughts, for one so young…. Urianger frowned. Ryne was yet a child in many ways. Her days ought to have been filled with studies, with friends and outings and all measures of happiness. Instead, the universe saw fit to grant her a life of warfare and bloodshed. He cast about for something, anything that might be a balm to her troubled thoughts. But his mind was empty; there was nothing within him that could ease the ache in his own heart, much less hers.

“Failure,” he began slowly, attempting to formulate something whole from the fragments of his thoughts, “does not always mean defeat. Sometimes ‘tis simply….”

Simply what?

Ryne looked up at him with large eyes, keen for answers he could not readily give. What could he possibly tell her that would bear the weight of her hope? Sometimes failure was simply failure. Sometimes one’s best was not enough, never enough.

Work thy fingers to the bone, until thy last reserves of energy are depleted, until thy every breath is a desperate struggle for air. Even that is not enough to keep the ones you love alive evermore. And when they are gone, when their souls have departed this mortal coil, no amount of desperation will be enough to undo what has been done. Fall to thy knees, scream thy grief unto the heavens, pray until thy voice is broken—it matters not. The gods will not deign to answer. Accept this, or go mad with grief: no other choice is at hand.

A simple truth in and of itself, but not the sort of truth a young girl needed to hear. Laid bare, its sharp edges would scour the depths of her soul. But neither could it be sugarcoated; to lessen the blow would be a disservice.

As he pondered the best way to move forward with the conversation, his ears caught the familiar rasp of a long coat against tall grass. A white-clad figure was heading towards them from the direction of Lydha Lran, taking a shortcut through the fields in his effort to reach the Bookman’s Shelves.

“T’would seem Thancred hath returned to us unscathed.” Ryne followed his gaze, her eyes lighting up at the sight of her guardian. She hurriedly scooped the bullets from her lap, gathering them into a leather pouch before racing to meet him as he crested the hill.

“Thancred!” She pressed the pouch into his hand, hovering at his side with a hopeful expression. He greeted her with an absent smile, letting fall the linen sack that hung over his shoulder.

“Supplies,” he explained brusquely, stretching his neck now that he was free of the burden. “Just for tonight. I thought we might join the others at the Crystarium tomorrow— Still unconscious, I’m afraid,” he added, already anticipating Ryne’s question. “Though resting more easily than before, if Y’shtola’s word is to be trusted.”

“Oh.” She wilted, wringing her hands in the folds of her dress. “Well, at least we’ll see the others tomorrow….”

“Hmph! A fat lot of good that does us!” Without warning, a pixie descended from the treetops, hovering inches from her face. Ryne blinked in surprise, flinching away from the iridescent wings glittering in the dappled light. “If you leave, we’ll have no one left to play with!”

“How rude!”

“Selfish! You people never stop to think about how we might feel!”

More pixies emerged from the flowers, buzzing angrily around their heads like so many indignant flies. Thancred—who had never quite mastered the art of weathering their mischievous antics—swatted at the lithe bodies irritably. He retreated beneath the outstretched boughs, leaning against the sapling’s knotted trunk with a scowl. 

“We would love to stay and play with you, honest!” Ryne said appeasingly, allowing the pixie—Jul Feo, if memory served correctly—to rest on her upturned palm. “But there are more important things we have to do right now!”

“Oh, you’re always saying that!” Aenc Uin groaned, clinging to strands of her long hair.

“Perhaps we should change them all into leaf men!” Wyd Lor giggled. “Then they can’t leave!”

“Yes, let’s! Then we can all play together forever and ever!”

“Oh, no!” Ryne protested weakly. “Don’t do that!”

“Aye, we best not.” Jul Feo sighed, thin shoulders slumping. “They’re protected by the King, after all. You know what they said would happen if we didn’t play fair.”

“Well,” Aenc Uin huffed, “if you’re all leaving tomorrow, the least you can do is play with us today.” Thancred glared at them from beneath the tree, but did not answer. Defeated, Ryne glanced at Urianger, who often played the role of mediator in these sorts of conversations.

“Hmm… very well.” He settled into place, lifting his hands amicably. The pixies descended, clambering over his long arms the way younglings scaled trees in the Gridanian forests, dangling from his fingers before dropping to his lap with peals of laughter. “Ryne and I will gladly play with thee, provided thy antics will not disturb Thancred. Now… what game shall we play first?” he asked, lifting his hand to eye level. “Or shall it be a tale?”

“A story! A story!” the pixies chirruped happily. Though they enjoyed their little games, they seemed to adore Urianger’s fairie stories and tales of grandeur even more. Many a night he had successfully thwarted their mischief by capturing their attention with the same tales beloved by youths across the First.

“Yes, a story,” Ryne agreed, sitting back down and crossing her legs beneath her. The pixies settled in around her, some perched on wildflowers at her side while others braided knots into her hair. “I could use the distraction,” she added with a heartfelt sigh.

“Very well. If we are all in accordance… what tale shall it be? Something from Voeburt legend, perhaps?”

“Oh, we’ve heard all those stuffy old legends,” Aenc Uin protested. “Tell us about the Warrior of Darkness.”

“We’ve met the Warrior of Darkness, you ninny!” Wyd Lor snapped. “Who cares about them? Tell us about the Warriors of Light instead.”

“As if we haven’t heard that story a million-bajillion times over in as many years!”

“What’s your grand idea, then? All you ever want to hear is how the queen looked at her own arse in Handmirror Lake—”

“You take that back or I’ll— I’ll rip your bloody wings off!”

“That’s enough!” Urianger raised his voice just enough to silence them. A hush fell over the small crowd, leaving only Thancred unaffected by his sharper tone. “’Tis clear the classic tales of yore no longer hold thy interest. Instead, I shall enchant thee with a new tale, one thou hath never before had the pleasure of hearing.”

“But you’ve read us so many stories already!” the pixies gasped. “Do you mean there’s something you still haven’t told us?”

“Aye, the very same.” Urianger smiled. “’Tis an old fairie tale from my homeland, which goes by the name of….” He paused, looking around at the little mismatched group. Eager faces stared back at him, waiting with bated breath for the grand reveal. “Erm… the name escapes me at this particular moment. Nevertheless, ‘tis a harrowing tale of an ageless sorcerer and his many heroic adventures—”

“Oh, for the love of—!” Thancred jabbed him in the spine with the toe of his boot. “Would you stop with that already?! I’ve never heard any such tale.”

“I am unsurprised, seeing as thou art no ready scholar,” Urianger retorted plainly, his face an expressionless mask. “I discovered this tale within an ancient tome dating before the rise of the Allagan Empire. Furthermore, I believe its contents may impart some wisdom on those gathered here.” Lifting his brows, he gazed impassively at his friend. Thancred acquiesced with a groan, shaking his head in defeat but making no marked effort to leave their little gathering. “Now, if there are no more question, I shall begin.”

Once upon a time….

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Long, long ago, in a far-off realm known as Eorzea, there once lived a magnificent and ageless sorcerer. Though he hailed from a kingdom beyond the sea, he was known far and wide by the people of this land, for his deeds were the stuff of legend itself.

The sorcerer, it was said, had the ability to conjure amber beasts from the aether to enact his bidding. He could use the power of the stars to protect his comrades. It was even rumored that he could foretell events before they happened, being a master of prophecy. He was adept in all manner of magics, having studied at the feet of the realm’s greatest minds in his distant youth.

And, of course, he was impeccably handsome.

Being a benevolent man, the sorcerer had sworn from a young age to only use his powers for the benefit of the star and its people. Along with his comrades, he dedicated his life to protecting others from wielders of malevolent magics, who used their power for ill-gotten gain. It was their dream that every living being upon the star would know what it meant to live in a time of peace. Though this dream often took them far from home, they were determined to see its fruition.

The sorcerer was just as determined as his compeers to see this dream fulfilled. Though at times he yearned for the serenity of his island abode, he could not deny the inherent value of his work. He traveled to distant lands, and beheld sights that took his breath away with the scope of their majesty. He encountered the best and worst of mankind in equal measure, with valuable life lessons gained from both. Each encounter, each experience gave him cause to expand his knowledge even further, and as time passed his abilities soared to even greater heights.

Upon first glance, one might easily believe that the sorcerer had everything a heart could desire: a handsome mien, a wealth of knowledge, a plethora of tomes at his fingertips. He could travel wheresoever his heart desired, his associates were loyal and kind, his understanding of their star was ever-expanding, and yet….

Although he was eternally grateful for the opportunities provided by his position and his powers, the sorcerer often found himself discontent with his lot in life. Rather, he felt that there was something missing: a deficit that ought to be easily discernable, even unmistakable… yet he had no idea what that something might be.

Sometimes, when he was too tired to apply himself to his work, the sorcerer passed time on a solitary bench near the harbor where he made his home. The rushing call of the waves, the creaking ships, even the seabirds dancing above the glittering ocean all reminded him of his homeland. When he sat there, immersed in his thoughts, he felt closer to those he had been forced to leave behind.

But as he watched the sailors and merchants, at work or milling about in the plaza, the sorcerer found himself envying their existence. They seemed overjoyed as they reunited with loved ones following a long voyage, or spent their meager earnings on food and drink at the market stalls. Some chose to flirt with the dancers that entertained the layfolk, while others retired to their warm beds at the end of another long day. But while their lives were simpler, more piecemeal than his own… why was it that they seemed all the happier for it?

The sorcerer knew that they had the answer to his conundrum, the hole in his heart that would not be filled no matter how hard he tried. But how had they found that answer, and how could he arrive at the same conclusion?

It was not in their profession, to be sure; in any case, the sorcerer had no intentions of trading his livelihood for the life of a dockworker or merchant. It could not be in coin, for he lived a lifestyle that—while not extravagant by any stretch of imagination—left him wanting for naught. They laughed with their friends, pursued their interests, shunned pain and embraced joy. He did the same. At the end of the day, they seemed perfectly content. He… was not.  

What, then, could it possibly be?

More puzzled than ever, the sorcerer sought the help of his most trusted compeers. His closest companion in this foreign land was a sage bard: a man well-entrenched in the world and its workings. After hearing the sorcerer’s troubles, the bard advised him to be more social in his spare time.

“You should spend your time in the company of pretty women! That’ll cure what ails you!” the bard stated confidently. “In fact, come drinking with me tonight. Together, we shall find you a bosom companion to wile away the midnight bells, and tomorrow you’ll rise an entirely new man.”

The sorcerer attempted to follow the bard’s advice, but to no avail. He awoke the next morning a new man indeed: bleary-eyed and nauseated, with the sort of pounding headache that only an overindulgence of ale can provide. The hole in his heart remained.

Next, he sought the aid of a powerful witch, a fellow conjurer who shared in many of his interests. The witch invited him to tea, and listened patiently to his troubles without saying a word. When he was finished, she explained that rest and relaxation was the key to his recovery. 

“You are working yourself too hard, my friend,” she said, the words punctuated with a cryptic smile. “If you would only spend an evening to yourself, with your favorite tomes as your companions, you will find your woes are naught more than a symptom of overwork.”

The sorcerer again took his friend’s advice. However, instead of relaxing and taking his ease, he found that he had more time to fret and worry about his dilemma. He spent a sleepless night pondering the reason for his heartache, and when dawn came he found himself neither relaxed nor refreshed. 

Finally, the sorcerer brought the problem to the Antecedent who oversaw their workings on the star. The Antecedent, rather than advising him to rest, wondered aloud if he might not be working hard enough—or, rather, if his work was taking an unexpected route.

“Perhaps, my dear sorcerer, you find that your mind is not adequately stimulated? When was the last time you took it upon yourself to invent a new spell? Or pursue a new avenue of research? You always seem happiest to me when you are elbows deep in a new mystery to solve; maybe that is what your heart desires.” 

The sorcerer did find temporary relief in applying himself to his work. But the moment he glanced up from his notes—roused to action by hunger, or thirst, or exhaustion—he found his mind again wandering to that ever-present ache in his breast.

At his wit’s end, the sorcerer awoke one day to realize that he was obsessed with finding the answer to his exhausting riddle. The spells and inventions which had once captured his attention no longer held any interest for him. He no longer felt joy in his life’s work, nor did he frequent his bench near the sea. Instead, he holed himself up in his bedchamber, shunning the company of his friends and only emerging when on the brink of starvation. Night after night, he meticulously dissected every aspect of his life in a desperate bid to discover where—if indeed anywhere—it had gone wrong.

One such night, when all hope seemed utterly lost, the sorcerer threw open the shuttered window in the hopes of clearing his mind with the fresh air. The plaza was deserted, the harbor quiet; the ships rocked to and fro on the calm waves, the seabirds nestled in their nests along the cliffside. His only companion was the moon, hanging low over the far horizon. The pale light flooded his bedchamber, calm and serene, at odds with the heaving turmoil in his breast.

In that moment, it seemed as though he was the only person left on the face of the star. Clasping his hands, the sorcerer bowed his head and closed his eyes.

“Divines,” he began, the voice of a man at the end of his tether, “if ever in thy benevolence thou doth heed the prayers of mankind, let it be now. What is it that I crave more than aught else upon this star? Why doth my soul spurn that in which it once delighted? Am I broken? Bewitched? Should this be a simple ailment, with a simpler cure, I beg thee: impart thy wisdom upon thy humble servant!”   

In truth, the gods rarely divulge their secrets to mankind, and the sorcerer did not expect much of a response. He had only wished to believe, even for a moment, that a higher power heard and understood his plight.

But the moon glowed even more brightly as he spoke, and when he opened his eyes the sorcerer found that the room was flooded with a near-blinding light. A blast of icy air, far colder than he had ever experienced in Eorzea, sent him to his knees. At that moment, he realized that he was no longer alone.

Standing before him, illuminated in the ethereal glow of the moon, was a woman. Her hair was the color of the northern seas, a glacial blue that harkened to the distant winters of his homeland. She was dressed in regal garments, and upon her brow was a golden crown. Their eyes met, and the sorcerer recognized the divine presence for who she was: Menphina, the Lover.

Amazed and dumbfounded, the sorcerer immediately prostrated himself at the feet of the goddess. He dared not lift his eyes from her sandals, lest she strike him dead for his arrogance. But Menphina smiled, guiding him onto trembling feet with one wave of her golden gauntlet.

“Gentle sorcerer, dearest child,” said she, in a voice that rang throughout the bedchamber like finest crystal. “Thou art most loved.” 

“B-Blessed am I to stand in t-thy presence,” the sorcerer managed in reply. “I-If it should be that my prayer hath offended thee—” The goddess shook her head, silencing him without a word.

“Thy prayer was both earnest and entreating. If anything, it served to move my innermost heart to action. Come.” Menphina sat upon the windowsill, beckoning him closer with a gentle smile. “Place thy woes at my feet, that I might grant thee succor.” The sorcerer was emboldened by her winsome nature and, basking in the glow of her brilliance, he found the words spilling unchecked from his lips.

“Sweet goddess, I am perplexed by this ever-enduring pain in my heart. I hath scoured every treatise, every tome that crosses my path in search for answers, yet there are none to be had. In good faith I asked the guidance of my closest companions, but their many suggestions brought about no relief. Even now, I ache with the want of something—I know not what! Merely that I am without it, and I suffer all the more for its absence.”

As he spoke, his words choked with emotion, Menphina sat motionless before him. When he was finished, his reserves exhausted, she took his hand in her own. Resting in her palm, his long fingers were like that of an infant’s, delicate in their mortality.

“The answer to that question, my darling one, is love.” Menphina smoothed the back of his palm with her unarmored hand in a comforting gesture. The touch of her skin was like freshly fallen snow upon the vast Coerthan plains. “To be sure, there is love in they heart, and in thy life.”

“Thy love for our star drives thy determination to protect it from those that might cause undue harm. In love, thou sought answers from thy companions, with the trust that they should not lead thee astray. ‘Twas love for the Twelve that brought thy prayer to mine ears, and in return my love for thee brought me to thy realm, so that I might offer the answer thou seekest.”

“But the love thou cravest is deeper than that of friendship, or duty. ‘Tis born of understanding, of being nearer to one who sees thee for the person thou truly art. The pang in thy breast is not a spell gone awry, my dear one. ‘Tis loneliness of a profound nature, and its cure lies within true love.”     

As she spoke, the sorcerer found that he had known the answer all along. His comrades loved him, but they did not understand him. His quirks endeared him to them, but what he wished for more than anything in the world was for someone who not only recognized his many eccentricities for what they were, but also made room for them in ways his friends could not. He wished for someone who could know his mind as well as he knew it, perhaps even better.

To be sure, the sorcerer was a man of solitude. But was it wrong of him to wish for more? To see that long days and longer nights might well be spent in the company of a kindred spirit, and long for a time when that might be so?

“I see thy point,” he stated slowly, “but where might such a person be found? In the whole of my travels, I have never known another who was like myself in nature.” Menphina laughed, the sound cascading over him in a refreshing burst.

“My child, the answer is not to seek thyself in another. Instead, it can only be found in one who compliments thy own nature, and is complimented by thee in return. Together, thou art like the two halves of an interlocking puzzle: different on the surface, yet part of a whole.”

“Ah, but I see doubt within thee yet,” she exclaimed, catching a glimpse of his vexed frown. “Thankfully, ‘tis within my power to reconcile.” Rising to her feet, she reached into the sky and gracefully plucked a moonbeam from the heavens. “I will create for thee a bride from my very essence, that thou might understand what it means to love with all thy heart.”

“I shall use these moonbeams for her tresses,” she explained, gathering more of the silken light in her fingers, “and her eyes shall be the brightest stars the firmament may offer. Her skin shall be as soft and white as moon dust, and her strength shall be equal, for ‘tis the power of the moon that moves the tides. So shall this moon bride move thy heart.”

Although the sorcerer had no recollection of falling asleep, or even retiring to his own bed, he awoke in the morning as though from a dream. The night had passed, and through the open window the sun filled the bedchamber with the first rays of a new dawn. Rubbing his eyes, he lifted his head to find that he was not alone in the room. A strange woman stood in front of his desk, studying the papers scattered across its cluttered surface.

“Who goes there?!” Alarmed, the sorcerer yanked the bedsheets up to his chin in fright. The woman turned from the desk, and he saw at once that she was uncommonly beautiful. Her eyes twinkled like stars, and her skin shone far as finest porcelain in the morning light. Long, silken hair fell over one broad shoulder like moonbeams across a rippling lake. She grinned at him, and the sorcerer’s heart fairly leapt in his chest at the sight of her face so animated and gay.

The visit from Menphina had been no dream. Before him, clothed in the pristine garments of an accomplished scholar, was his moon bride.

“Good morning!” she greeted him, in a voice that thundered like the tide. “I suppose you’re my sorcerer then, eh?”

“I-I believe that I am.” He managed to untangle himself from the bedsheets and crept towards her, his wariness overshadowed by his mounting curiosity. When she beamed down at him, the sorcerer saw his reflection mirrored in her pale eyes. Before he could move, he found himself caught in a crushing embrace. His feet left the ground and he was unable to free himself from her tight grip; neither was he entirely certain that he wanted to free himself. No one had ever dared to touch him in that manner, not even his closest comrades.

He found that he almost… enjoyed it.

“I think I’m going to like you.” The moon bride rested her forehead against the sorcerer’s, peering deeply into his startled gaze. “Now that you’re awake, what shall we do first?”

“I… erm… we shall breakfast, I suppose.”  

“Wonderful!”

“Do… Doest thou know what breakfast is?”

“Not a clue!”

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As time passed, the ageless sorcerer found that he was more often than not puzzled by the behavior of his moon bride. He was a calm, contemplative sort of man, not prone to outbursts or fits of wild passion. His life was one of careful order, with the sort of practiced fastidiousness that many of his companions deemed “rigid”.

In contrast, the moon bride found delight in everything that passed through her eager fingers. Being new to the star, she sought to learn anything and everything about its workings; there was no end to her quest for knowledge, and no bounds to her enthusiasm upon finding the answers she sought. She studied the finer details of spellcraft, and after a fashion began to branch out and test new theories on her own. In addition she quickly befriended his compeers; often she could be found in the Antecedent’s castle, assisting others both at work and in pursuit of leisure. But no matter how far she ventured, the moon bride would always return at the end of the day, overbrimming with news of her latest discoveries.

There were times when the sorcerer felt driven to the brink of insanity at her more irrational behavior. More often than not he was called to assist with some scrape she’d gotten into, only to find that his well-meant scolding fell on deaf ears. But for all his new frustrations, he could not shake Menphina’s words: different on the surface, yet part of a whole.

First weeks, then moons flew by, and he found that the goddess had spoken true. The moon bride was not like her sorcerer on the surface. She was loud where he was quiet, boisterous where he was calm, quick to act where he hesitated. Even so, despite these difference they made perfect companions for one another. His patience tempered her enthusiasm, and her vigor mellowed his more assiduous traits. In time, the sorcerer found that he did not wish to spend even a day without her company. He valued her above any other upon the star, and—though he did not know how to properly convey these feelings—his loyalty and devotion knew no bounds.

For her part, the moon bride was almost overbearing in her wealth of affection, both to him and their associates. While the sorcerer was often reluctant to touch her, even in passing, she thought nothing of tackling him in one of her constricting embraces, or peppering his face with more kisses than a meteor shower has falling stars. On the coldest nights, when the ocean breeze rattled the shutters and wailed in the surrounding cliffs, she cozied up beside him beneath the thick quilts and listened as he read to her from his favorite tomes. Then, when they could no longer hold their heavy eyelids open, they passed the night in peaceful repose.

Sometimes, when he believed her to be sleeping, the sorcerer would press his ear to her chest and listen to the steady pulse of life within. I see you, the rhythm seemed to say, firm beneath his cheek. I know you. I love you. In these unfathomable moments, the sorcerer would find himself overwhelmed with the profundity of his emotions, and wholly unable to offer them a proper outlet. It was at those times that he wished himself the sort of man who could pour his love into her the way she poured hers into him, overjoyed exaltation and physical affection in perfect tandem. But it was simply not in his nature to do so.

In the end, it was all he could do to press his lips to her forehead in ardent fervor, wishing that the gesture might leave a permanent mark upon her brow as proof of his love. Each time he would pull away to find her awake, her answering smile sleep-sodden and content. He did not have to explain himself to her; without his speaking a word, she seemed to understand what it was he meant to convey. It was then that the sorcerer knew that he had not misheard the thrum of her heart, and that every word it spoke to him was infallible truth.

To his surprise, the sorcerer soon found himself perfectly happy for the first time in ages. The presence of his moon bride awoke within him emotions he had never before cared to explore, and her opinions on the star—and everything it contained—served to broaden his own horizons, which he was astonished to find were quite narrow. She was his soulmate, a gift from Menphina herself; their entire lives were stretched before them, full of boundless possibility.

At least, that was his thought.

During these halcyon days, the nefarious sorcerers had been working harder than ever to plunge the star into utter chaos. Of course, the moon bride had joined the ageless sorcerer and his comrades in their efforts to undo these schemes, and for a while they succeeded in staving off what some believed to be inevitable.

One day the moon bride rose early, so early that the only other creatures awake were the chittering birds in the harbor. She packed up her latest creation and set off for the Antecedent’s castle, a long and rather perilous journey that would take her the better part of two suns. When the sorcerer awoke, he found the bed empty and a note on the bedside table promising a heaping plate of cockatrice meatballs upon her return.

But unknown to either the sorcerer or the moon bride, the evil sorcerers had discovered the castle’s whereabouts and were lying in wait, ready to attack. The sorcerer was roused from his work by an alarum, a call for aid that sent him running for the nearest chocobo porter. He raced to the castle, forgoing food and drink in his hurry, his heart pounding in his chest. As he rode, he could not help but wonder if the moon bride was already at the castle. Perhaps—he hoped beyond hope—she had been waylaid on the road, and was even now heading back to their shared home with disappointment in her eyes.

By the time he arrived, however, he found that it was already too late. The enemy had stormed the castle, attacking his comrades with ruthless abandon in their attempts to bring about a Calamity upon the star. In their wisdom, which far exceeded the sorcerer’s own knowledge, they had worked out how to reverse Menphina’s spell. They unraveled the moon bride at the seams, returning her to naught but moonbeams and starlight. When he reached the inner sanctum, panicked and panting, he found that there was not even a body left to hold.

The ageless sorcerer was alone once more.

In his foolishness, he had thought himself immune to heartbreak. Many a compeer had been felled by these cruel wielders of magic over the years, and though he was always severely grieved, he had not yet been stricken by the powerless anguish spoken of in poems and prophecies. But at the loss of his moon bride, the sorcerer felt his heart shatter into countless pieces, too small to even make an attempt at mending. He feared that he would die from the agony in his breast, which seemed to choke the very light from the room. Never before had he felt as bereft as he was in that moment; no matter which way he turned, seeking solace and succor, all that lay before him was endless despair.

In his pain, he called to Menphina for aid. When the goddess did not answer, he called to the rest of the pantheon, praying with all his broken heart and shattered soul that his moon bride might somehow be returned to him, and all could be as it was before. But the gods heeded not his cries, his prayers left unanswered. It seemed to him that their silence was at once mocking and cold, wanton in their malice.

His companions were no more able to aid him now than they had been before the moon bride’s coming. They could only attempt to comfort him in his sorrow. The bard sat with him when he could not sleep, plying him with drink and allowing the tears to fall upon his shoulder. The witch scoured the realm for anything that might bring him a modicum of happiness, arriving unannounced first with his favorite foods, than a new tome. The Antecedent spoke to him with calming words of shared pain and solace, taking his hand in her own whenever he felt that he was truly alone in the world.  

The sorcerer loved his friends all the more for their efforts, but their labors were ultimately in vain. He felt that he had fallen into deepest despair, unable to feel anything beyond rage at the evil sorcerers, and grief at the loss of his beloved bride. The void within his heart, which had so recently been filled to overbrimming, was now a gaping chasm—

- ☾ - ♡ - ☾ - ♡ - ☾ -

“Stop it!” Jul Feo interrupted with a screech. “I don’t like this story!” They covered their ears, willowy limbs trembling with anger. “I won’t hear another blasted word, I tell you! I won’t, I won’t, I won’t—”

“Fairie stories are supposed to be fun and… and full of adventure! And happy!” Aenc Uin flew to their feet in a tizzy. “This is not happy in the slightest, not at all! I hate it!” The other pixies voiced their agreement, scolding and posturing in equal measure.

Faced with a less than enthusiastic audience, Urianger turned to Ryne. She sat amidst the buzzing swarm, a serene statue in the face of their growing fury. Her blue eyes were large and sad in her wan face, hands wringing in her lap.

“That… that’s not the real ending, though, is it?” she ventured, when he made no efforts to quell the shrill protest. “Surely there’s a way to save the moon bride, to bring her back… isn’t there?”

Urianger was all too aware of Thancred’s heavy gaze pressing down on him, a terse silence that spoke of action. A moment’s hesitation, one sidelong glance, and he would scatter the pixies with a few brusque gestures. A man all too willing to shoulder the burden of (temporary) villain, if it meant even the shortest respite from the echo of a bone-deep grief. The pixies would be sent scurrying to the flower strewn fields, and Ryne would be assigned some mundane chore of little value, leaving him alone to gather his thoughts as he might.

A welcome relief, to be sure… but it would solve nothing.

“Calm thy anger,” he commanded his little assembly, clearing his throat to mask the sound of his pain. “Settle, and I shall bring this tale to its rightful conclusion with due haste.”

- ☾ - ♡ - ☾ - ♡ - ☾ -

It seemed as though the ageless sorcerer would be eternally mired in his pain. Time passed slowly, the weeks no longer seeming to fly on joyous wings. Day and night held no more meaning for him, nor did the passing of the season. He ate only when pressed to by others, bathed only when could no longer bear the feeling of dried sweat on his skin. Not once did he attend to his many duties, nor could he bear to look at the workbench which he had but recently shared with his departed bride.

One by one, his associated attended to him. They commiserated, cajoled, scolded and pleaded in turn, but for once the sorcerer had no ear for their many supplications. He appeased them in the moment with false smiles, only to sink back into the familiar embrace of his stupor once they were gone. Finally, with all other hope exhausted, the Antecedent left her castle—a rarity for one so imperative to their cause—and traveled to the sorcerer’s home. On bended knees, she begged him to rise and shake off the yoke of grief.

“Without your assistance, I fear we are losing ground,” she pleaded, in tones that plucked at his frayed heartstrings. “Please, we are in desperate need of your expertise! I have lost a dear friend; I cannot bear to lose another. Do it for her sake, it not for ours.” In the end, the Antecedent returned to her castle alone, hopeful nevertheless that the sorcerer in his wisdom would heed her words. The sorcerer had not the heart to refuse her, but no longer did he share in her unshaken conviction.

“Let the star be destroyed,” he muttered as he lay in the semi-darkness. “If I am dead, at the very least I shall no longer feel this pain.”

Well! That’s a bloody awful way to think, isn’t it? And after all we’ve done to stop it from happening? Honestly, I’m surprised at you.

The sorcerer sat up in his bed, his heart a thick lump at the base of his throat. He looked around the empty bedchamber like a man crazed, searching the shadows for the source of the voice.

“Who—? Or, what—?”

Who else? It’s me, you silly old fool.

The voice was his moon bride, but he could not see her. Moreover, her voice did not come from the room itself, nor the world beyond his shuttered window, nor even the corridor beyond his bedchamber. It seemed to come from inside of him, from that place deep within that ached so terribly at the mere thought of his beloved.

“Oh, gods!” the sorcerer cried, clutching at his chest. “Have I gone mad? Is this the end?”

 Not hardly!

“What doest thou want from me?” He shrank into the bedclothes, trembling with fright and not quite convinced that he had not fallen into insanity. “Specter or spirit, fiend or friend, what would’st thou have me do?”

Our friends need you, and you’re not about to lie around feeling sorry for yourself just because I’m not there to drag you out of bed. Go on, get up!

“I… I cannot,” he admitted feebly. “I did always admire thy strength of spirit, but I never possessed the same. ‘Tis… ‘tis too much.”

Oh, rubbish! It’s just a matter of standing up and taking that first step. Go on, take your feet out from under that musty old quilt. The sorcerer obeyed meekly, shivering as the cold night air touched his bare skin. Now swing them over the side of the bed—that’s it! He found himself standing on trembling legs, faint with hunger and exhaustion and heartache. Take one step.

“I tell you, I cannot!”

Just the one? For me?

In that moment he could see her in his mind’s eye, as lovely and radiant as ever, grinning widely as she stretched out her hand for him to take. Do it for her sake, if not for ours.

The sorcerer took one step. Then another, and another. Stumbling across the bedchamber, he finally reached the workbench and stared down at its cluttered surface for the first time in weeks. Tears blurred his vision at the sight of her familiar handwriting, her notes filled with dreams of the future. Ideas that would never reach fruition, hypotheses that would remain unsolved. He picked up her final creation, the key to stopping the evil sorcerers in their tracks. A revolutionary concept, but unfinished, incomplete. Waiting for hands that would never again touch anything with joy or delight.

You know what you must do.

The sorcerer wept bitterly, for he did know what must be done. His moon bride must be allowed to claim her part in the salvation of the star she had so loved, however briefly. If she could not be here to complete it, then it was up to him to complete it for her. He sat down at the workbench, dried his tears as best he could, and began to work.

As he poured over her notes, the sorcerer found a smile on his face for the first time in what felt like centuries. The pain remained, of course, but the sorrow was tempered with something not unlike joy. To continue the work that she had so loved was to keep a small part of her alive in some way. It was proof that she had existed, that those shared moments had not been a figment of his imagination. He had loved, and he had been loved.

The sorcerer’s work lasted him many days and many nights. When at last it was finished, he threw open the shutters and looked out upon the world for the first time in ages. The night was balmy, calm and quiet. It seemed so much like that same night so many moons ago, when he had cried out his pain and the gods deemed it fit to answer. They had been silent since; he knew without trying that should he pray now, they would remain so. A sudden flash of anger flooded his veins and he gripped the windowsill where Menphina had sat with white knuckled hands.

“Why!?” he called to the stars, trembling with rage. “Why grant my wish, when I was ever fated to lose her? Was it a mere whim, or do the Twelve see fit to curse me in mine innocence? What lesson was I meant to have learned? What knowledge did I gain? Oh, that my prayers had never been answered! I wish that I had never known her!”

His only answer was the distant lap of waves, the quiet contemplation of the faceless moon. In the wake of his anger, the silence seemed magnified. He sank to his knees, fresh tears glistening on his cheeks in the moonlight.

“Forgive me,” he whispered, sobbing as the pain swept over him afresh. “Oh, forgive me… I did not mean it! She was my light, my life. How am I ever to continue on without her at my side?” 

“My poor child… my poor, suffering child….” Perhaps the sorcerer had fallen asleep, or perhaps he had been transmuted elsewhere by a higher power. When he lifted his head, he found himself floating in a sea of stars. A light shone down on him from somewhere high above, a comforting presence that seemed to fill all the emptiness inside of him with some to spare. He basked in its radiating warmth, stretching out his limbs to take as much of it into himself as possible. The goddess Menphina had been nothing to this… to Her.

Hydaelyn, the Mothercrystal, creator of all things.

“My child,” She said again, and tears flowed freely from the sorcerer as he beheld Her voice. It echoed all around him, inside and out, thrumming through his blood and organs. How small, how insignificant his life must seem when compared to something so great and powerful as She! But in each word he could hear Her love, the bottomless wellspring that seemed to cup him and hold him the way a mother holds a crying infant close to her bosom.

“Why?” he asked, too awestruck to voice anything else. The Mothercrystal has no face, of course, but he could almost feel the way She drew away, pained by his pain.  

“It is simply the nature of thy existence,” She finally answered. “To live is to suffer. An unfortunate truth, but a truth all the same.”

“But why must it be so? Why… why allow me to know love, and to love so deeply, only to allow that selfsame love to be stolen from me at the height of happiness?”

“Stolen?” She echoed. “My dear one, thy love remaineth! I see how brightly it shines within thee, even now! It is thy misfortune that sorrow maketh love shine all the brighter. Thy moon bride cannot be returned to thee, but she remaineth forever in thy heart. Tell me, hath she not spoken to thee when the need arose? Doth thou not feel her at thy side, even now? So long as thou lov’st, and lov’st true, she will never be far from thee.”

“Thou speaketh true, Mother Hydaelyn,” he ventured after a moment’s reflection. “But thy words heal not the wound which, even now, gapes too wide to be closed. If to live is to suffer, why should I carry on? Why… why bother?”

“Because thou art yet loved, and thou art yet needed. Think of thy comrades, thy friends. Think of those thou hath watched upon the bench in the harbor, or met upon thy travels. We have lost many to the powers of Darkness, but there are many we may yet save. Live, sorcerer. Live so that her memory is honored through thy deeds. Live, and be comforted with the knowledge that thy moon bride waits for thee, even now.”

“She… she waits for me?”

“Death is not “farewell”. It is “welcome home”. One day, when the candle of thy life burns dim, when thou hath breathed thy last, she and I shall welcome you together.” Her light shone even brighter, surrounding him, embracing him. “Thou shalt be reunited in my sea, never again to be parted.”  

“I understand.” The sorcerer’s wiped his eyes, his tears suspended in the heavens as though they were stars themselves. “I shall live for her sake… and mine own.”

“It brings me such joy to hear that. May you walk ever in the light of My Blessing. Know that thou art loved, my child.”

And so it was that the sorcerer awoke upon the windowsill, as warm and safe as though he were still held in Hydaelyn’s calming embrace. Her words did bring him some small measure of comfort, and he found himself with a new determination to live the sort of life that would have brought his moon bride happiness. As time passed, the burden of his pain grew easier to bear. It did not leave him, not entirely, but he found strength in it, for it was proof of their enduring love.

It is said that the ageless sorcerer and his associates went on to have a great many more adventures, and—lest anyone remain in doubt—they are probably still having them to this very day.  

- ☾ - ♡ - ☾ - ♡ - ☾ -

“The end.”

For a long moment, there was silence. Then—

“That’s it?!” Wyd Lor groaned. “Cor, that was the most boring fairie story I’ve ever heard! There wasn’t a single swordfight!”

“The bad guys didn’t writhe about in their blood or anything!”

“We should have just asked to hear about the Warrior of Darkness again. At least thathas sin eaters in it.”

“At least give it a happy ending!”

“I am afraid I understand not thy meaning,” Urianger asked, blinking in feigned shock. “’Twas a happy ending if ever there was.”

“If you were going to make it that boring,” Jul Feo concluded, “you could have at least had the moon bride brought back to life as a revenant or something.”

“Oooh, yes!” Aenc Uin giggled. “With her blood and guts hanging out about the place!”

“She wouldn’t have blood and guts, you idiot! She was made of moon dust!”

“Oh, what do you know? Anyway, come on Ryne.” They rose into the air. “I’m tired of all this ancient fairie tale rubbish. Let’s play tag instead!”

“Yes, let’s do!”

“Well?” Urianger said, rising to his feet and holding out a hand for Ryne. “Doest thou share in their discontent? I fear I may have bored thee with my tale.” Ryne did not reply, instead rushing forward to wrap her arms around his torso in a tight embrace.

“I loved it.” Her voice was muffled by his tunic as she hugged him even tighter, as though attempting to squeeze the life from his bones. “Thank you, Urianger.” From the way she clung to him, it was clear that she was grateful for far more than a simple fairy tale. Still a child yet….

“Thou art most welcome.” He patted her head fondly, his surprise melting into a calm smile. “Now run along, and enjoy what remains of the sun. I fear it may be the last calm afternoon we see for some time.” She nodded, returning his smile before racing off to join the waiting pixies.

“Don’t fly so high, Aenc Uin! That’s cheating!”

Thancred joined him on the rise, the two of them silent as they watched Ryne and the pixies tumble amidst the wildflowers. For the moment she was a young girl, engaged in a lighthearted game with her friends. All was as it should be, and yet….

“Do you ever wonder?” Thancred began, crossing his arms with a pensive frown. “If one day she’ll think of us the way we think of them. Moen and Minfilia, I mean.”

“She will.” Perhaps one day, Ryne might draw strength from his memory the way he drew strength from the memories of those long departed. His love would remain etched onto her heart the way others were etched onto his: Moenbryda, and Minfilia, and Louisoix…. But these were somber thoughts for such a sunny afternoon. He turned to Thancred, offering a nugget of his finest wisdom:

“I would believe Ryne loath to ever forget her dearest bodyguard for his curmudgeonly nature, if naught else.”

“Cur—! On that subject….” Thancred advanced towards him, a sinister grin lifting the corner of his mouth, “sage bard? As though I were sitting in some tavern with a pipe dangling from my lips and a lute in my hand? And on that note, I don’t recall telling you to drink that much—you did that yourself, seeing as you can never remember to stop after the first tankard!”

“What?” Urianger rolled his shoulders in a nonchalant shrug. “I cannot discern thy meaning, Thancred. As I said, I discovered that tale in an ancient Allagan—”

“Allagan my arse! I’ll wring your neck first, before I hear it again!” He scowled, but his lips quivered in the beginning of a true smile. A chuckle escaped his lips before he could hold it back. “Ancient sorcerer, really?”

“Ageless sorcerer. There is a difference.”

“Shut up.” He fell into real laughter, and Urianger found himself joining in despite his attempts to remain stoic. It was a welcome relief after the stressful events to simply be, laughing with one’s friend, enjoying the fresh air, the troubles of tomorrow pushed to the side.

This was how she lived, he thought to himself, wiping his eyes before the tears of mirth could fall. This is how she would want me to live, too. Urianger turned his face to the heavens, gazing up at the perfect blue, unimpeded by Light. He lifted a hand to his heart, taking a deep breath.

I am grateful to have known thee, he thought, not for the first time. I am grateful to have loved thee. To love thee still… my Moen. Somewhere far away, perhaps in the aetherial sea, perhaps betwixt the pages of another star’s tome… she repeated the words back to him.

The echo of love everlasting.

[halsins-herbal-underpants]

my writing ~

hello I just wanted to share my writing today, i think lots of people followed me probably from art they saw but I write too! here are some things i've written you might like to check out:

my Ao3 account everything is there! including things I'm not mentioning here ~ if you read something you like, feel free to comment! I loves them

Baldur's Gate 3

Red - Wyll x Astarion

- A oneshot based on a fun prompt in which Wyll jumps to the wrong conclusion, much to Astarion's delight

- 860 words

- short and sweet (and cute!)

Control - My Tav x Halsin - A four chapter short interlude between Acts 2 and 3 in which a struggling Tav (my Ranger drow Dayan) needing some kind of catharsis he can't name, goes down by the river (lol) to blow off some steam, but is found by a concerned druid, who might have just what the healer ordered to help his anxiety-ridden mind. - 16k words - A little characterization, a lot of smut. Fea. bottom submissive Halsin and Entangle-based shibari! One of my favorite things I've written. (I've also rewritten some sections, give it another look if you read it awhile ago.) Considered very hot by some. uwu

Between Want and Need - Astarion x Halsin

- One-shot of some hurt/comfort between Astarion and Halsin, a slow realization, some fun party banter and a sweet sentimental ending.

- 6k words

- Entirely written as an excuse for me to make a gaming joke about a concept that didn't even originate from the genre of the game the characters are from, and I even change the name of it in the fic to be less funny. I am a genius. But very sweet, honestly.

--------

Final Fantasy 14

Desert Heat - original WoL x ffxiv OC

- My very first fic ever! A queer Miqo'te x Miqo'te heatfic that's about 40% plot and 60% smut, with a myriad of kinks. Trans femme character! Bisexual catboys! Which is kinda redundant to say! I'm insanely proud of this it took me over 3 months to write.

- 57k - it is an actual novelette lol

- The chapters are a little long bc I didn't really know how long a chapter should be at the time, they end when it feels 'right'. But there are nsfw images included for illustrative purposes in each chapter! If you like mating cycle/heat fics, threesomes, dp and cat people you may like this. Talks about events in game.

A Body in Need - original WoL x Fanow (just...Fanow) - Spoilers for Shadowbringers expac. This is another heatfic, with Viera (rabbits) this time lol. One lone male bun against an entire village of Viera women in heat. What's a boy to do...? - 7.5k words - A shameless smutfic all about nearly an entire village of hot Viera bunny girls ganging up on the one guy in their midst during their heat cycle. Pretty dang hot I do think!

The Price of Regret - several FFXIV NPCs

- One of the fics I'm most proud of which of course means its the least read lol. But! I think you can read it without knowing a thing about FFXIV, most unknowns can be figured out through context clues. So if the synopsis at the link appeals, give it a try!

- 44k words

That's it! hopefully more writing to come after this, I've been on an awful writing block lately but I hope to start writing the full Dayan x Halsin bg3 playthrough soon.

[absyyynth]

⚠️ !! word vomit incoming! be warned !! ⚠️

okay time to follow up on my dt thoughts now that it's not midnight and ive slept on it. i didn't get into the details before bc i didn't have the energy but now i wanna. let's start with my biggest problem- sphene.

sphene! (or rather, "the queen eternal") where to start with sphene? by all accounts i should love her; she's cute, she's creepy, she's kinda sinister, and she wants to kill me. she's got all the ingredients for a top tier villainess! but despite it all she fell flat. let's break it down

so first off. her status as a construct born from the memories of the living sphene and imbued with the unquenchable desire to protect her people. that's interesting! it puts me in mind of glados from portal (construct imbued with the essence of caroline and given a compulsion to endlessly 'test') and i love glados! what sets them apart and what makes glados work and sphene not for me is that without caroline glados is still a fun character, but the queen eternal is just nothing without sphene. there is no character there beyond the desire to "protect her people." and like, okay, that's clearly intentional. the choice of making the queen eternal nothing but a hollow wish of those who created her is very much an intentional one. but it's a choice that makes it very difficult for me to care and connect with her actions at the end of the game. deleting the memories of sphene so she can better perform her duty and not get bogged down by sentiment? makes perfect sense. i just don't care. there's nothing left for me to connect to.

which leaves me with only the resolution to the queen eternal/sphene's story, which uhh also did not land for me. wuk lamat breaking in during the trial (which is it's own thing that honestly i'm fine with for the most part) and connecting with the vestigial memories of sphene could have worked if we'd gotten to learn more of who sphene was as a person, but in the end all wuk lamat could do was appeal to sphene's sentiment for the alexandrians with wuk lamat's own sentiment for the turali. it ultimately doesn't work for me because sphene and the queen eternal are too closely aligned in desire; if there had been more tension between what sphene's memories wanted and what she was compelled to do as the queen eternal, with wuk lamat pushing and straining that tension to a breaking point, i think i would feel very differently about the ending. it can be argued that that is what happened, but sentiment alone cannot carry a story dealing in themes as heavy as the themes of the final two zones. there needed to be just a little something more.

speaking of the final two zones, i'd also like to dive into those for a little bit, because i have some complaints there as well

so. heritage found. there's a lot to like here honestly. the interdimensionally fused setting is cool. the way souls are treated as a commodity is cool, especially in the context of how souls and reincarnation has already been established in the world of ffxiv. it's unsettling on a very fundamental level both for me and the characters which i like! that being said, i wish there was more tension there. for as horrifying as it should be to the characters (and they are horrified) it's also undercut by the constant refrain of "oh we must learn and respect their culture even if it is gross". which is a genuinely good message that i agree with! but it comes too easily! the struggle to accept what is going on should have been given more weight; it's certainly not ignored but it also does not go far enough to satisfy me. and then. there is the Big Issue. the one i have a much harder time ignoring. which is: why the fuck is solution nine there in the first place?

here's what we know (and perhaps i missed a crucial detail but i don't believe i did): the world alexandria is from was ravaged by a calamity of lightning. embroiled in a war over electrope during said calamity, they erected the everkeep to preserve the memories of those they had lost and recycle their souls to keep the living alive longer. they also at some point sealed themselves inside a dome of lightning (unclear to me where the energy for said lightning was coming from but whatever) to protect themselves from the calamity and the war. what's unclear to me is exactly when the everkeep was interdimensionally fused with other realities. we know it got fused with the source for 30 years but it seems to me that it must have been somewhere else before then, because otherwise the 'top floor' actually being on alexandria's reflection of origin doesn't make sense- memories were being sent across the rift directly into living memory for a LONG time, or at least that's how it seems? if the everkeep was on the "unlost world" as the game calls it, where on that reflection was it?? surely it could not have been too far from living memory, right? my first thought is that it was just chilling on the reflected version of the northern continent but that's SO far away from the gate in the skydeep cenote. anyways after zoraal ja travels through the gate he must have spent a little time on the unlost world before convincing sphene to fuse the everkeep with tural, and from that point on things make a bit more sense to me. bleghh. sorry this line of thought got away from me.

which leaves. the unlost world, living memory. i found this zone to be so tonally strange. i personally really don't like the ideas being presented and i felt pretty uncomfortable the entire time, which i do think was intentional. the desire to see departed loved ones again is one i can very much understand but the actually doing so? no fucking thank you. i don't want to bring anyone back. i would much rather she had kept living. taking a dead soul's memories and storing them in a server forever and occasionally letting them wander around a holographic paradise disgusts me on a fundamental level, i guess. the only real emotions the zone evoked were lots of disquietude, some sadness, and frustration. frustration because it seemed like none of the characters you were there with were on the same page as me. i wanted to shut down those terminals as fast as i could and each one was a relief. yes i felt sad for evenville and krile but not sad enough, i was more angry that this was a situation those characters had to deal with at all. i understand what the developers were trying to achieve with living memory and far many it seems to have worked but it really really didn't for me. one of my favorite things about ffxiv is exploring new zones and i think living memory might be the only one where i actively wanted to spend as little time there as possible. it ended up being a very upsetting zone and not in a good way like ultima thule (my by far and away favorite zone in the game) was.

i'm also a little confused about the state of the rest of the reflection that living memory resides upon. where is everyone? surely the entire world wasn't destroyed in the calamity because that doesn't line up with what we know about calamities, and like. living memory is a giant glowing cityscape that's been just sitting there for multiple centuries. did none of the native inhabitants of the unlost world ever wonder what the hell is going on there? i guess sphene could've kept them out with robots but now that she's gone and the cityscape is barren are they just gonna leave it be? in fairness i expect this stuff to be elaborated upon in the future so it's not as big an issue for me as everything else but it does bother me at the moment.

ending this post here bc i don't wanna keep rambling but uh yeah. the entire alexandria plotline fell flat for me and as a result the latter half of dawntrail ended up being pretty lackluster. i know i'm gonna be in the minority with this opinion but i vastly preferred the rite of succession and exploring tural and kind of wish the entire expansion had just been that. perhaps alexandria could've been the post-dawntrail msq or something and it would've worked better for me. i dunno. i'm hopeful for the future because there's some interesting stuff they can do with the key and all but i'm not nearly as hopeful as i was before dawntrail released. really wish i could have liked it more :(

[coffeeknife]

blog reintroduction

the last time i used this account was when i was still a teenager. didn't feel like deleting and remaking on this handle though so uh. hey, i'm robin. i'm a married butch lesbian in mn. mostly logging back in so i can archive stuff on here where other people can see if they want

stuff i might post abt (under the cut)

managing physical/mental disability (my wife and i both have eds)

being broke and maintaining sanity/quality of life

it stuff. i have a cluster of servers at home running a lot of stuff to automate life. some stuff replaces subscriptions but i also do some budget smarthome stuff to make our living situation a little more accessible. i've also dabbled in backing up my personal healthcare record

more generally, extending the lifespan of (sometimes much older) tech & bending it to your will

some interests, though i tend to stay out of fandoms: trigun, dunmeshi, pokemon, ffxiv, persona series (but i dont touch that fandom with a ten foot pole) and a few others im sure i cant think of rn

also, feel free to send me asks about random tech things. i'll post some of my stuff later, but a quick rundown of my daily stuff

JUST replaced my phone. i only got my head out of the apple brainrot very recently, but my phone is a refurb'd note20 ultra that i intend to use for a very long time

desktop i built on the cheap. i5 (dont buy intel new, theyre zionists), intel arc graphics for video encoding

working on moving from a 2018-ish macbook air that's somehow barely runing to a 2010 thinkpad i salvaged from an ewaste bin. it's running pretty well on arch with a cheap SSD but it needs a new battery and a better display (and a modern wifi card eventually)

my server cluster that i've built over the last 10 years or so:

the manager computer is a 2017 imac i cut open to put more ram in. it was my primary computer until this year

2 raspberry pis that the manager dishes out tasks to. one is hooked up to an 8tb hard drive that it serves to the other 2 computers. the other has a zigbee receiver to handle cheap smarthome devices

3rd raspberry pi dedicated to networking. outside of the cluster, hosts a vpn so i can get into my stuff from anywhere without exposing it to the internet

salvaged two acer EEE laptops that i really want to convert into parts of the cluster bc i'm running out of cpu. they didn't come with power supplies and i have yet to get them to turn on

part of my goal for being active on here is to put some accessible resources on home servers out there. bc imo theyre insanely useful and learning how to do this stuff in general is good in the age of technological walled gardens

ok bye. follow me if you want ig, send me asks abt it stuff and i'll probably have something to say

[asteriuszenith]

An Update on Everything

Hello! It's me, Aster, who's basically unfortunately not doing really well on the financial side right now. To give an update on the water dispenser thing, I decided to just buy the important filters first since that's basically the important stuff in making sure that the water's going up and then make up for the other stuff with well... Credit card.

Thanks to you guys however, it's not that much! It's not as heavy as it could have been than if you guys hadn't given me some help! Which... Thank you!

However, that's not really the end of our troubles right now. See, my grandmother lives with me and well... We DO have a budget every month but lately, my grandmother's state has been... Deteriorating. Her dementia's been getting worse so her control over her body is also getting worse.

She has her own pension and whatnot but that's already immediately used up for her medicines (and it's not even an entire month's worth of medicine...). So it's also been digging into our budget which... Isn't that much every month anyway.

My job's more of a project based sort of job but I do get some money from there. It's good enough for ME but it's not good enough to keep my grandmother comfortable.

So as much as I hate keep asking you guys for help, any dollar that you guys give goes a long way in easing the financial difficulties we're experiencing right now.

To copy what I said last time...

I would be willing to write you a 250~ words story of your own idea/prompt if you give me 5 coffee (the equivalent of 5 dollars)! Any additional 100 words will have an addition of 2 coffee and so on!

If you do want to commission me for a story then please dm me! Then we can talk about the specifics. If you'd like an example of my own writings please head on over to my writing blog. Here is my AO3 account if you'd like to parse through my fics easier.

Another way you can all support me is to come visit and follow my twitch channel, even participate during streams! Come say hello and vibe to me grinding some FFXIV activities or other games. I generally stream everyday as much as I can with Sundays (in my time) as my break time.

I'm really so sorry for keeping asking you guys for help but having to make sure my grandmother has everything that she needs and whatnot has been really digging into the funds lately. Her children (my mom and the rest of her siblings) will come home here on May so by that time, my budget and funds will be able to breathe easier. For now, however, I really need some help. However much you can give, I will appreciate it.

If you can't do any of the previous options then there's also the option of sharing this post! Thank you so much for lending me your time and ears(eyes). I hope you all have a good day!

[mommaghost]

holy shit, a main blog

hi, it's ghost again. nonbinary, they/them, 25+ maternity, whump, and bumps

My Accounts are as follows:

My sideblog/original MG blog is mommaghosted

I do have an 18+ snapchat. Proof of age required.

Rules

➡️ Minors (anyone under the age of 18) should not follow nor interact with my content. I block on sight.

➡️ I'd prefer only 21 years old and up here.

➡️ Follow-Unfollow-Block as needed. I well and truly give not a single fuck.

➡️ Any kind of TERF, RadFem, Gender Critical, Fascist, etc, etc: there is not a goddamned thing for you here except broken teeth.

➡️ Not here for tradwife or fakey-tumblr-dominate bullshit. Mutual respect and consent or bust.

➡️ Not seeking a dom or sub. Considering allowing wishlists or tips on the blog for funsies.

Preferences

Fandoms: FFXV, FFXIV, K//H if I feel spicy and brave

Kinks, Tropes:

Mpreg, including TMpreg

Omegaverse

Labour partners/fluff

Lactation

Omorashi

Home/Water births

Breech

Twins

Impregnation

Realistic Symptoms (that a lot of people neglect to mention)

Comfortable birth partner

Panicky birth partner

Polyamoury

Found Family

Pregnancy fears, woes, complications.

Hurt/Comfort

Whump:

Bondage

Edgeplay (CNC)

Fear then comfort

Illnesses (Fever, body pain, generally feeling Gross)

Limits

Squicks

Quads+

Vore (general)

Cum facials

Hard Limits

Hard Vore

Hyper-preg

Hyper anything

Deathly harm to infant/new parent

Parasites (worms, wormlike)

Feeder/feedee, feederism in general

Rapid growth/preg

Boundaries

Do not harass me in my DMs

No, I won't roleplay with you

My one true love is the block button

Don't be weird.

BumpBunny's Belly Kink TierMaker

Tags

ghost posting

ghost responses

Will be adding more

[wildstar25]

[slight shadowbringers / lv 80 summoner job spoilers]

So I was having a very normal amount of thoughts regarding the summoner class the other day. Mostly how as your character learns the job with Y'mhitra they are taught to summon specific primals outlined in ancient teachings; but the moment your WOL is given the chance to create a summon on their own, they come up with Phoenix. assuming your WOL went through the coils storyline and has any connection to 1.0 stuff, that's a really personal choice for them to make!

Though the lack of fanfare when you receive that skill does make it feel like you get the summon to call back to the widespread accounts of Phoenix sightings at the Battle of Carteneau. I feel like that might be more of a product of how there's no longer job quests when you hit ShB. Though I enjoyed the stormblood follow up content for that lv 80 quest, I wish they had made it about how the WOL created demi-phoenix...

Anyways, it got me thinking about how instead of ifrit, titan, and garuda, summoner WOLs could instead use egi's that they have a more personal connection with. Of course this means I started thinking about what Arsay's egi's would be. Which also means of course I had to sketch them out. These are super quick designs obviously and I haven't gone through the effort of a proper design cycle so bare that in mind lol. Content under the cut!

Ruby summon: Egi-Ifrit -> Sapphire summon: Egi-Leviathan

The first primal Arsay ever saw, though that memory has been lost to time in the aether stream. It was his appearance in the Rhontano sea that prompted the meeting between a new adventurer and a scion of great import to her. Even if their minds have forgotten such events, the summoner's aether has not. Aetherial element: Water

Topaz summon: Egi-Titan -> Pearl summon: Egi-Bismark

Despite the beast itself creating yet another roadblock in her adventures, Arsay can't help but be reminded of more immediate and positive associations. Her favourite eatery in Limsa of whom he is the name sake, the always perfectly timed arrival and rescue of her friend Cid, and of course the gentle reflection who provided aid in their time of need. Aetherial Element: Wind

Emerald summon: Egi-Garuda -> Fluorite summon: Fluorite Carbuncle

Though the power of a third primal might be tempting to most, Arsay knows a carbuncle can be as powerful as the summoner wills it to be. Plus it's much cuter! Using a crystal she gathered around Revenant's Toll as a focus, she called forth from the aether her own form of carbuncle Aetherial Element: Lightning

Obviously by lv 90 you swap your egi's for the real deal so instead her carbuncle would get super charged ✌️

Again I thought way too hard about this (as per usual). I wanted to have the elements line up with what you have access to as Ninja. Since that's her main job it would make sense that her aether would be more likely to lean towards those elements. Phoenix covers fire, so unfortunately the only one missing would be ice. There's more wind-coded abilities than ice, so I went with that. Which is for the best because it lines up with the aether elemental chart flow! Water goes to wind goes to lightning.

Idk if all these ideas line up exactly with the ffxiv summoner lore - I've been doing the best I can to absorb all the info I get from the job quests but very possible I missed something along the way lol

Have a gpose for making it to the end o/