#i range them anywhere between 16-18

[ravennaortiz]

Please more Coco ( my soul is lost to this man) with 6. Are you afraid of me? , 16. Your scars are beautiful, 22. Make me, 32. You’re mine, 38. Beg.( Sorry if there’s a max on prompts but I think they work well together for something super smutty 😇.)

Welcome back Love!!! I can def get you some more Coco!( No prompt limit, feel free to put in as many as your heart desires!). As Always 18+.

Scars

Coco sat watching you as you made drinks behind the bar and chatted with EZ. The two of you had seemed to be building something but whenever he seemed to get to close you darted away. He assumed it wasn't the biker image since you kept coming around the clubhouse. So he figured it was him. Granted he had a reputation but he had never hurt a woman.

You could feel Coco's eyes on you from across the clubhouse. You knew you owed him an explanation about the other night when you two had been making out on the hood of your car. Embarrassment of that night had you dropping the beer in your hand.

"Your suppose to be helping me not making my life harder" teased EZ as he playfully smacked your arm with the towel he had been drying glasses with. "I can leave if you want?" you replied with a raised brow as you moved to pick up the glass. Before EZ could respond Coco's voice rang out. "Yo Boy Scout! Quit flirting and start working" called Coco his jealousy getting the best of him.

"I'm going to pop outside for a bit" you whispered a few minutes later as you gently touched EZ's shoulder. Once he nodded you grabbed your jacket and a beer and headed out the door. Once outside you inhaled the fresh, cool night air. You were lost in your own thoughts when you felt someone grab your arm.

"Are you afraid of me? Is that why you took off and are flirting with EZ? questioned Coco as he turned you to face him.

"What?" you questioned as your brow furrowed at the insanity of both questions. Coco took a breath and repeated himself.

"No, I'm not afraid of you Coco" you replied with a shake of your head. "Granted you did just grab me in the middle of the night but I put that to poor judgment. Same as saying I was flirting with EZ. We both know he's not my type" you replied with a easy laugh.

Coco couldn't help but let out a sigh of relieve and a laugh of his own. "Fair enough" he replied as he let your arm go but didn't move back away from you. "So you wanna tell me what I did wrong the other night that had you running for the hills?" he asked cautiously his eyes searching yours.

You bit your lower lip as you considered his question. This was inevitable and would have to be talked about sometime. "Things were getting a bit too real and shit. I have...I have" you started before you stopped trying to find the right words.

"If your going to say dick. I'm fine with that" offered Coco making you laugh. "No. Its not a dick" you replied with an eye roll.

"I have some pretty ugly scars and its hard to be... intimate.... with them and feel comfortable in my skin" you replied quietly your eyes looking anywhere but at him now.

"The word ugly should never come out of your pretty mouth. Especially not about this art piece" murmured Coco as he ran his hands down your sides and onto your hips as he pulled you closer. "You should let me show you how your scars are beautiful" he continued as his lips ghosted your neck sending spikes of pleasure through your body.

Feeling emboldened by the hands and lips ghosting over your body you ran your hands under his shirt as you replied. "Make me Coco".

Twenty minutes later the two of you were naked in his bed as his fingers, lips and teeth paint hot trails along your skin. You squirm and whimper as he licks along the raised purple scar that runs under your right breast as his fingers skim between your wet folds.

Coco smiles into your skin as he dips two fingers into you, slowly pushing them up into that sweet spot making you clamp around them. "So fucking beautiful" he murmurs as he kisses the jagged scar that runs down the center of your abdomen. You could feel your orgasm start to build when he abruptly pulled his fingers from you.

"Patience" murmured Coco as he kissed his way back up you body until he was hovering over you. You could feel the head of his cock at your entrance and raised your hips slightly. "Nah Mama" scolded Coco as he pushed your hips firmly back down. "You're mine now. Only good girls get this" he stated as he leaned back and teased you by rubbing his head through your wet folds. "Beg" he ordered gently as his lust blown pupils found yours.

"Please fuck me Coco." you pleaded as you pouted. Coco shot you a smirk as he quickly slid himself completely into you making you both moan. Coco grunted as he gripped your hips firmly, pounding in and out of you. All you could do was moan and take it as Coco held you in place beneath him. Without warning Coco hooked your right leg up onto his shoulder making you clench tighter around him. He smirked as he watched your eyes roll back and mouth fall open in a silent scream. "Be a good girl and cum" ordered Coco as his fingers moved between the two of you to pinch your clit.

Within seconds his name was falling from your lips as your body released around him and your body spasmed uncontrollably. Coco thrusted into you a few more times before pouring out his own release as your body milked him. Coco slumped down on top of you as you both panted.

His hands traced along your scars as his lips found yours. "So beautiful" he whispered as he pulled back slightly.

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[xwingace]

I'm trying to figure out the ages of the Supacell main characters. Mainly because I'm finding it really hard for some of them to get a proper grip on that.

Dionne & Michael: We know how old these two are. We get Dionne's age given as 30 (birthdate in March 1994), and Michael can't be more than about a year older or younger because it's heavily implied they were in the same grade in school.

Sabrina is probably also around that age; maybe a little younger. 28-30 seems like a good age to get to Senior Nurse with a slight delay. She does come across a bit younger when dressed for clubbing, but I think it fits.

Sharleen is the younger sister. We're seeing her working on a dissertation, meaning she's working on a PhD? Or just a Master's? Which I think puts her in the 26-28 range depending on how long her chosen course was and how much delay was caused by her provably atrocious taste in boyfriends (not that Sabrina is much better there) I don't think these two are more than two or three years apart, either.

Andre is older; mid-thirties at least, probably even early '40s. Old enough to have a teenage son without having it be a teenage pregnancy on either his or Aisha's part

But those were the easy ones. The rest is a bit harder to estimate.

Krazy is probably mid-thirties. Not so old that the age difference between him and Sharleen gets really creepy, but a bit on the skeezy side none-the-less. I guess he could be a bit younger, but given that most of the gang he runs with is known as the 'olders' and they all look around that age, it seems a decent estimate.

Rodney could be anywhere between about 17 and 25, depending on exactly when 'getting a hostel at 16' actually happened. I'm going for 22-ish, so on the older end of that because he refers to Tazer as a 'street kid', implying Tazer is younger even. Also I don't buy Calvin as a teenager still. But he's definitely on the young side in his 20's

And then Tazer. Tazer is the hardest to estimate for me. We get Rodney's implication of 'street kid' and he does look very young when he's taking care of his grandmother, but he does a pretty damn good job of projecting bulk and menace otherwise, making him look a bit older. He's still pretty cut up about his mother leaving -- and on rewatch, that happened a lot more recently than I first thought. I thought it was about two years prior, but it could be as little as 6 months or so. Although the most recent picture we see of Tazer and his mother does at least still feature Josh Tedeku as Tazer, and not the younger teenager we see in another pic. Which just makes it harder to tell Tazer's age, really. So although I don't really buy it from the actor, Tazer could be as young as 18. Ultimately I think I'd put his age at around 20 but I'm definitely open to other arguments.

[rist-ix]

I have a question for you what do you think of the quote unquote age gap between Bloom and Valtor?

I had to do alot of research to understand Bloom age when I started to like this ship better than Mr cheater. So here's a brief information dump:

Bloom is 16 in the first episode and its confirm her bday is December 10 (we don't know the the exact year when each girl was born only the fact Stella is the oldest by that logic Bloom is the second youngest out of the group) when we get to season 3 it is confirmed that the girls is in their 3rd semester so that makes Bloom 19 at point. Valtor's age we do not know however I'm going to say at most early 20s from what we know Valtor working with a younger Griffin before he got Popsicled.

Here comes the tricky part. In s4 the girls just finished their semester and graduated making them 20-21. Up until s5 where Nicklodeon had to reboot their age making them 16 again. Flashforward to s8 and that makes Bloom age 19 if you are following the reboot or 23 if you do not follow the reboot. Since we don't know how long Valtor been frozen his mental age is up for debate.

For me personally I don't see Sparxshipping as an Edward and Bella situation as Edward was aging naturally during his years while Valtor was frozen and couldn't age naturally but only mentally.

Okay okay first of all! Your Bloom math checks out and I just realized that I for some reason always thought Bloom is 18 in s3. Which is still possible, I think, I just dont know why I assumed that. Actually no, it works, if she is 16 in s1 she is 17 in s2 and 18 in s3, but we dont know a lot about how the school years work in Magix so I'm gonna jot her down as 18-19 for the remainder of this post.

Still dont know how I passed math btw.

Anyway. Valtor's age is where the real mystery is at. We've got two possibilities in my opinion.

1. He's pulling the ageless immortal card.

My personal go-to for fics and discussions. Love me some 300 year old mommy issues. He has too much practice being a messy bitch, there's no fixing this man folks.

Evidence: There's a flashback showing him with Griffin as a tween: she looks MUCH younger, he looks exactly the same. Unless he also stole the secret magic of the world's most potent anti aging cream, or Griffin's proximity to Faragonda just aged her by three more decades, he does not age.

2. He is the age he looks.

Which, in my humble opinion, would not put him anywhere near twenty. That is a grown man. He's not college age, unless you count college professors under that word. Even if I were good at guessing ages the very stylized art style would throw me for a loop, but im gonna say 40s, give or take. Look at Avalon, look at Codatorta, look at King Radius if u must. That is the age range we're looking at.

Evidence: I dont have any. We're ballin'. I guess it's never explicitly stated he's immortal, which you'd think would be big enough of a deal to mention. If u got something feel free to let me know.

That being said, the Winx Club Wiki page for the canon timeline (ha, good one) puts the time of Valtor's creation in a rough time frame from "Over 17 years before season 1" to "Under 100 years before season 6". So he could technically be anywhere from 17-97, though I'm not sure the upper limit is as reliable as the lower one, given the check-list format of the website. So make of that what you will.

Now that we've got the question of age out of the way, lets get to the age gap. I have no idea what the situation in twilight was to be honest, so I cant compare that.

Realistically, there's at least a decade between Bloom and Valtor. Possibly two decades and change. And that is just from visible age, we can add a few centuries on top of that if we're sticking with the immortal bit. I'm gonna be gonest, I dont think being frozen for 17 years will make a whole lot of difference here.

If you find that icky, which is fair, you can always change that for fics tho! Either turn him into a twenty year old or put Bloom in her milf-era, the options are endless. Personally, I think the age difference is half the fun though, and also the least of their issues. When you're off making out with the objectively worst person in history, wether he's too old for her isnt gonna rank very high on people's list of concerns.

[aihoshiino]

Hello do we know the age if the original B Komachi members? I always imagined them all close to Ai's age, but that means Nino was what, 15-16 when Ryosuke killed Gorou? (Or maybe they weren't involved yet?) Thinking about the new B Komachi, I guess it is also possible that there are older members (although probably not as much of an age gap as Mem & Ruby / Kana). Since Ai joined later and probably around 12 (?), I imagine Nino is older?

I don't think we're ever explicitly told their ages but they're all in the same general age bracket, yeah. It's mentioned a handful of times that the original B-Komachi was specifically scouted from middle schoolers (!!!!!) who were already in the industry, so anywhere between 12 to 15. It's not super clear how long the group had been going by the time Ai joined (Spica tries to say the group was founded the same time she was scouted which we know is wrong lol) but I can imagine Nino being a few months older a most.

I don't think there are any members out of that general age range apart from Kyun who is 18 during the flashback portion of Viewpoint B which takes place when Ai is about to turn 15. But even then, she's not that much older.

[monstersdownthepath]

Monster Spotlight: Torturer Robot

CR 8

Neutral Small Construct

Numeria, Land of Fallen Stars, pg. 59

Looking like little more than ominous floating balls when at rest (much like their inspiration), these members of the Robot line of creatures unfold into horrifying arrays of brutal weapons when 'on the clock,' each sawblade, knife, pincer, and syringe devoted to one thing and one thing only: Making you talk. Like most Robots these creatures are often found in the service of the Technic League in Numeria, where the machines were first discovered, where they're used to interrogate the League's many, many, many enemies and root out dissent. While rare, Robots of any kind can be encountered just about anywhere in the northern Inner Sea, either because they were smuggled out of Numeria, left on their own, or because of whatever plot contrivance your DM can conceive.

Since this is the first Robot we've ever seen on this blog, let's go over some Bot Basics: Most Robots have a Force Field, a shield of shimmering energy visible to any creature looking at the thing. The field acts as a secondary HP bar that must be broken through to damage the underlying Construct, and while the field is in place, the Robot is immune to critical hits. In the Torturer's case, its shield is 40 HP, regains 8 HP a round, and takes 24 hours to reactivate if brought to 0 HP. Their field is important, because Robots are Vulnerable to Critical Hits and are forced to make a DC 15 Fortitude save or be stunned (a condition they're otherwise immune to) if they're ever successfully struck with one; even succeeding the save staggers them for a round! They're also Vulnerable to Electricity, taking +50% damage from Electric attacks.

Robots are all intelligent Constructs, capable of using skills and feats, as well as making tactical decisions and conceiving of abstract ideas or uses for their powers that a normal Construct would not be able to, though most Robots are restricted by specific programming that cannot be easily altered (thus remaining immune to mind-affecting effects). In the Torturer's case, it's given a series of questions by its handlers, questions it repeats one at a time to its victims as it flenses, burns, twists, and breaks them until they scream out an answer that its +19 Sense Motive analyzes as "satisfactory." If they refuse to speak or if they try and lie to it, things get so much worse for them.

The Torturer's primary means of both extracting information and defending itself lays in the quartet of sawblades they employ. It can attack with all four of them as a Full-Attack, each one dealing 1d4+5 damage but having a critical range of 18-20. They can also fire upwards to four Lasers a round, the beams of energy having a range of 50ft, resolving as touch attacks (with +16 to hit), and dealing 1d8 Fire damage. While a single attack isn't a lot of damage, a Full-Attack fires four of them, and Lasers bypass all transparent items between them and their target, be it a physical barrier (like glass or an invisible creature) or a magical/technological one (such as a Force Field or a Forcecage), so any creature hoping to hide behind anything but solid, opaque cover can be cooked all the same.

Side note: The Lasers mention "plus fire" in their damage description, but neither AoN nor the book itself explains what this means; I assume it's meant to just be "fire" to explain the damage type, as every other Robot's ranged attack has an elemental descriptor.

Against helpless targets, a Torturer can Interrogate them as a standard action; it rolls a Heal check with its +17 modifier, and that creature must make a Fortitude save against the result of the roll. If the unfortunate victim fails, the Torturer inflicts 1d4 points of ability score damage to a score of its own choice, cutting away at them body and mind until it hears what it's been programmed to want. There's no limit to the number of times it can perform an Interrogation, only that the victim must be helpless, so anyone trapped at its mercy... well, they're probably going to look like a velstrac's art project afterwords if they don't start talking fast enough.

While the Torturer tends to have its victims brought to it by its associates and thus they're already restrained, it has its own ways to incapacitate creatures should the need arise. In addition to its aforementioned weapons, the machine has self-replenishing payloads of Nanites waiting to do horrifying things to the biology of any creature they're injected into. As a standard action it can inject the Nanites as a melee touch attack, and can do so to force exhaustion or nausea onto the target, with the nausea lasting 1d4 rounds. If the victim is already nauseated they're paralyzed for 1d4 rounds instead! A DC 17 Fortitude save partially resists the Nanites, causing sickness instead of nausea or fatigue instead of exhaustion, but in the latter case being injected again next round means your save doesn't matter since being subject to a fatiguing effect while already fatigued causes exhaustion anyway.

The Nanites have more than just offensive functions, oddly enough. A dose can be used to cast Cure Serious Wounds, restoring 3d8+10 HP to any creature that accepts the restoration... though this one is mostly used to smack torture victims back into consciousness. The bots can also undo their grievous torture with Lesser Restoration, and interestingly the injections can be used as both Neutralize Poison and Remove Disease. With their native +17 to Heal checks, Torturers ironically make good emergency medics as well, something that hasn't gone unnoticed by the Technic League. They're not only a nuisance in battle, but they also make other creatures on their side harder to permanently put down!

You can read more about them here.

[enigmaticfossil]

Something irking me in this fandom is the constant arguments over Link’s age. This series has been my special interest for a good 25 years so I guess I feel like rambling a little.

There are massive discrepancies in the logic of supposed “canon” references. And even Nintendo, for example, through interviews and written word has said that Link was 9, 10 or 12 in OOT (adult link still qualifies as a child in my eyes since his body was aged 7 years, not his mind).

(Small addition, though I’m aware LOZ is fictional and the world is fantasy, Japan has had a law stating the age of adulthood as 20 since 1896, only recently changed to 18 this year. It does beg to question the concept of “adulthood” in this fictional world and how the people of Hyrule see age. Especially with the longevity of many races.)

Or if you look at Wind Waker, where it states in game his character is the age of the legendary hero which, at the time of release, seemed to reference OOT, we assume he’s one of those ages. But both the amiibo & a statement from Nintendo said he was 12 years old.

Okay—so OOT Link is 12? Still fits, since he hasn’t reached his teens. BUT also, the WW timeline takes place after Link defeats Ganondorf in the 7 year time skip—which he appeared to do as an adult between 16-19, as that is what he is legendary for. And he “disappeared” because he went back to his own time so he wasn’t there to stop what happened.

And again, if their timeline is correct, The Adventure of Link takes place 6 years after OOT, chronologically. Nintendo claims he was 16 in that game.

Making the 9/10 year old OOT Link supposedly accurate, despite the WW claims. Especially if we consider Majora’s Mask Link is the same or, at most, year older than his OOT counterpart.

In ALttP Zelda is 16, and since Link is typically “close” to her in age (it has never said the same age) we can assume he’s anywhere between 16-18, even then 16-17 seems more likely. Which says that in the follow up games he’s around that age too, probably aging up a year or two.

And while we can use things like Toon Link’s model to guess he’s the same or similar age in all Toon Link games, making the 12 year old hero predating OOT in Minish Cap, the “on model” solution doesn’t work for the 5-6 year time skip of BOTW-TOTK. In BOTW we can GUESS that Link is close to Zelda’s age, but that can still range from 17–18 years old at least, depending on what Nintendo deems as “close”.

And according to yet ANOTHER source, Twilight Princess Zelda is 20, and based off of an interview, Link is 17…so what does the unwritten “Link and Zelda are always close in age” rule imply?

Interviews, guides, the games and even the Historia conflict over and over again. These are just a handful of examples that I remember and poked around to verify again.

I’m not saying there aren’t canon instances of Link being CLEARLY a child or CLEARLY an adult or adult-adjacent (what Nintendo deems as adult in these games is convoluted sometimes), and those are important factors. But he’s also meant to be an immersion from player to the game.

Nintendo retcons nearly everything they’ve said or done, and theorizing by following one answer or another is fun, and having Zelda gives us a range to often put an age that’s close to accurate for him. It’s even more interesting to dive into these discrepancies that are just going to exist, Nintendo wrote the stories as they went and that’s okay! It’s fun that they’re trying to tie them all together, inconsistencies or not it’s still an amazing story.

Link is a character many of us literally grew up with, saw or ourselves, as we opened whichever game sparked our interest to start our adventures into this crazy series of wonderful, and magical games!

[erigold13261]

I think Gwen said in ITSV that she’s older than Miles by 15-16 months, so that makes her 16 and Miles 15 YO… (also Hobie would be 17-19, and Noir and Peter Porker are adults? I guess??) (take this one by a grain of salt but I think Miles skipped a grade in Visions so Ganke could be 16 too)

I swear last time I looked up notes age it said 15-16 so I just chose 15. Actually, I know where I got that from, I had looked up Hobie's age and the little paragraph also talked about Gwen and how note is between 15 and 16.

So if you want then Gwen can be like 15 close to 16 or just turning 16. I will keep this in mind if I ever make a google sheets with all kinds of notes for spider characters like I have for NSR characters (which I really should do).

Same with Hobie, it was given an age range of 16-19 years old and I just chose 19 (or was it 19 that I chose? I think I chose 19) because I liked that age for Hobie.

I think I saw a tiktok saying Noir was also 18 or 19. Wiki looking it up says they are 18+. Probably under 21 since they say their like to drink cream soda so some people took that as not being able to drink. I personally see them at like 18 or 19 (Nicolas Cage definitely skewed my idea of Noir's age at first until I saw that tiktok lol)

With Peter Porker, the age seems to be all over the place and there isn't a concrete range anywhere. One source says 16, I think another said 18. I was kinda thinking of just going off the OG Spiderman age, which I think is 17 years old, because both were reporters (or at least photographers for the newspaper), so I think 17 is a good age for them to be in this au.

Ganke's age could be 16, could be 15 and had also skipped a grade. I don't think there is really any evidence for one over the other. I like Ganke being the same age as Miles at 15, but him being 16 is definitely not something that is going to bother me.

Actually I'm surprised you didn't say anything about Peni's age lol. Technically she is supposed to be Miles' age, but I decided to make her a year younger because in the movies I swear I thought she was younger. Like if I was going to be accurate then Peni would also be 15, but I just always saw kit as younger than Miles, especially in the first movie.

I guess also the idea of shipping Peni and Yinu also kinda pushed me to make this decision since I always saw Yinu at being around 13 after the timeskip (love the idea that Yinu was like a week or two from turning 10 when the game happened thanks to a fanfic lol), and having them be 1 year apart instead of 2 years apart was something I preferred to happen.

But yeah, all these ages seem to be pretty malleable. Just like quite a few of the NSR ages (that aren't specifically mentioned). Some people see the Sayu Crew as teens, some see them as college students. Some people see Kayane as an adult while I see her as a late teen.

Similar thing is happening with the spider characters who don't have their age officially given or mentioned (or only have an age range). Some people see Noir and Porker as full adults in their mid 20s, while I see them as late teens, maybe early adults at most.

But I think I will take into consideration Gwen's age! I'm probably gonna keep Ganke at 15, but I think making Gwen (and maybe Gayatri by extension) to be 16 years old.

Thanks for the info! I completely forgot about Gwen being a year older than Miles in the movie! (actually, my point is even proven in the second movie where Miles' mom thought Gwen was old enough to vote lol, though she was probably just being upset and saying rude stuff because of everything that had happened at that point lol).

[the-great-serpant]

Gonna do this for Klover, becuase i want to

1. Do they have Allergies?

- yes, yes they do. They're allergic to most things from earth (especially sand for some reason) yet anywhere elee they can handle it just fine???

2. What foods will they not touch?

- garlic bread

3. What kind of Music do they like?

- Pop, Rock, Phonk, Anything else like that,

4. How are they around new people?

- Really depends on how he's feeling that day, since he's in the middle of being extroverted and introverted, he can switch from an extrovert to an introvert without any warning, so its kinda 50/50

5. Do they speak in an accent?

- Despite being half spanish and half scottish, they speak in a heavy Aussie accent

6. Have they tried learnjng a new language?

- He's trying to learn how to speak Scottish Gaelic

7. How many Languages do they know?

- They know how to speak full spanish and latin, they genuinely love to scare people by speaking to them in nothing but a mix of spanish and latin

8. What is a song that will always make them cry?

- Mama's Boy by Dominic Fike

9. How do they Cry? Heaving? Silently or Sobbing?

- Depends where he is and what happened

10. How do they dress? For Practicality or Fashion?

- He wears any colour of the engineering uniforms. Why? Exposed shoudlers.

11. What is the first thing they notice about a Stranger?

- The way they interact with other people

12. What is their humour like?

- VERY Self Depreciating

13. Do they have scars? What caused them?

- They a massive burn scar on their face due to being shot in the face with an equinox at close range, they also have a nasty papercut scar on their arm as well

14. Do they qear jewelery?

- Only a nose percing, that's it,

15. Are they a Frivolous Spender or a Miser?

- More miser, but they see something they want that they can afford, it's theirs,

16. Do they peerer Luxury or Practicality

- He prefers practicality, mainly due to not being able to sgand luxory since he was the backbone of it due to being a Neon Street-Rat

17. Who would they Quote?

- No one,

18. What could make them change their mind?

- If a whole room of people dissagree with him, or when he realizes he fucked up (whether its a minor or big deal)

19. Who's the first person they'd call?

- Sam Coe

20. How are they around animals? Do they have pets?

- They absolutely adore anything thats classified as a bug or a flyer, or anything lizard-like. If they could, they'd have a pet Ashta, but honestly, between you and me, they're scared shitless of them.

21. What is their favourite childhood food?

- None

22. What is something they've never told anyone?

- They've never told anyone about their Mother

23. Childhood friends?

- None

24. What are habits they've picked up from other people?

- They've picked up this habit of scratching the back of their neck when they're either nervous or need to say something, they picked that up from Sam

25. What are their guilty pleasures?

- He loves to play pranks on Neon Secuity, most of the time it usually ends up with Neon Security having a broken limb or two

26. What is something they're staunchly against?

- they absolutely fucking hate and I mean hate as in wanting to watch it burn, they fucking hate Neon

27. Do they speak a certain way? Do they use contractions? Popular turns of phrase?

- He says "bruh" a lot, alongside sarcastically saying, "Wow!! Amazing!!! You used your brain!! How about you use it more!!!"

28. Can they fall in Love? What does it look like?

- They can fall in love. In fact, when they first joined constellation and met Sam, they fell in love with him right on the spot. They kinda avoided Sam for a little while and just talked about their crush on Sam with Barrett until Barrett eventually passed, ever since they've hung around Sam and managed to deal with their feelings easier

29. What would they rather die than do?

- Going back to Neon, even for a few seconds,

30. What's their biggest mistake? One that they look out to never do again?

- Their biggest mistake was not being there to protect their friend in their childhood, ever since, they've done their best to lookout for everyone close to them, especially Sam and Cora

things to think about for characters

do they have allergies?

what foods will they not touch?

what kinds of music do they like?

how are they around new people?

do they speak in an accent?

have they tried learning a new language?

how many languages do they know?

what is a song that will always make them cry?

how do they cry? heaving? silently? sobbing?

how do they dress? for practicality or fashion?

what is the first thing they notice about a stranger?

what is their humour like?

do they have scars? what caused them?

do they wear jewelry?

are they a frivolous spender or a miser?

do they prefer luxury or practicality?

who would they quote?

what could make them change their mind?

who is the first person they'd call?

how are they around animals? do they have pets?

what is their favourite childhood food?

what is something they've never told anyone?

childhood friends?

what are habits they've picked up from other people?

what are their guilty pleasures?

what is something they're staunchly against?

do they speak a certain way? do they use contractions? popular turns of phrase?

can they fall in love? what does it look like? does it differ between people -- friends vs family?

what would they rather die than do?

what is their biggest mistake? one that they look out to never do again.

[drcharulata01]

Gynaecologist in Jaipur | Complete Details About Gynaecology 

Who is Gynaecologist?

Gynaecologists are experts in conditions affecting the female reproductive system, such as cervicovaginal cancer, pelvic organ, and urinary tract disorders, hormonal imbalances, and breast and breast cancer. When a woman is pregnant, they occasionally collaborate closely with an obstetrician. OB/GYN physicians are those who are licensed in both gynaecology and obstetrics.

Qualifications of a Gynecologist

Due to the intense competition in medical schools, it is crucial to start volunteering, perform well academically, and take on leadership roles in high school and during your undergraduate studies.

A bachelor's degree must first be attained in related science, such as biology, chemistry, or another. You are advised to take the Medical College Admission Test (MCAT) in your final year of undergraduate study. In addition to medical school, a gynaecology residency or fellowship can take anywhere between three and seven years to complete.

What Does a Gynecologist Do?

Their roles include performing annual pap smears, detecting sexually transmitted diseases, and examining the breast.

Gynaecologists frequently identify health conditions that affect sexual function, reproductive organs, and occasionally a woman's urinary system.

Gynaecologists evaluate, identify, and treat patients using a range of tools and machines. Each patient is seen individually, and the examinations or procedures are frequently assisted by an assistant or other member of the medical staff.

Gynaecologists frequently discuss private topics with their patients, which can be delicate. Because patients frequently feel shy or reserved when discussing some of their concerns, it is critical to establish a relationship of trust with them.

What diseases does a Gynecologist treat?

Although having irregular cycles or uncomfortable cramps on a monthly basis can be common problems for women, this does not mean that women must accept these problems as the norm. If you experience particularly painful cramps, intense abdominal pain, or heavy and/or protracted bleeding between periods or during intercourse, talk to your doctor or consult the best gynaecologist in Jaipur ( Dr CharuLata Bansal) about it as these symptoms may indicate a more serious women's health problem.

Common Gynaecological issues:

Dysplasia of the cervix

Period Disorders

Prolapse of the Pelvic Floor

Pelvic Ache

Ovarian Cyst Syndrome

Obstetric Fibroids

When should I go to the Gynecologist?

Gynaecology is most appropriate if You're curious about or worried about the female reproductive system. This includes the uterus, ovaries, vulva, and breasts. It may also involve a few gastrointestinal or urological symptoms. If you have any inquiries or concerns about menstruation, pregnancy, fertility, or contraception. You're worried about your sexual health. In these situations, it's best to start with the person with whom you feel the most at ease; if they are unable to fully address your concerns, they can then direct you further. 

What is the earliest age that a woman should visit a gynaecologist?

A female patient between the ages of 11 and 18 may visit a paediatrician, a family practitioner, or a gynaecologist.

Delayed menarche, which is defined as the absence of menstrual cycles before the age of 16, or delayed puberty.

Especially if you miss school or activities because of the symptoms or during painful menstrual cycles 

How much does it cost to see a Gynecologist in Jaipur?

For gynaecologists, there are various visitation costs in Jaipur. Gynaecologist consultations in Jaipur typically cost between 300 and 1500 Indian rupees. The severity of the condition and the type of treatment received are additional factors that affect the fee.

Can a Gynecologist perform surgeries?

OB-GYNs (obstetricians and gynaecologists) perform "female surgery" in addition to treating patients and giving birth. Cryosurgery is one type of surgery performed in a doctor's office; cesarean or episiotomies are birth procedures; breast biopsies and stress incontinence surgery are both diagnostic procedures.

How do I find a Gynecologist in Jaipur?

You can use 365 Doctor (https://www.365doctor.in/gynecologist-in-jaipur) to find the ideal and best gynaecologist in Jaipur. 

How to Choose a Gynecologist in Jaipur?

What qualities should a gynaecologist have? Refer to these questions before choosing a Gynecologist in Jaipur- Does the gynaecologist willingly respond to your inquiries? Is she approachable and helpful? Are you able to enquire about her personal medical history with her? Does she appear knowledgeable and up-to-date? Does she pay attention to your worries and respond appropriately?

WHY DR. CHARULATA BANSAL IS A TRUSTED LADY GYNAECOLOGIST SPECIALIST IN JAIPUR

Dr Charulata Bansal has been showered with heaps of praise from her colleagues, seniors and patients. She does not rush with things or cut corners while conducting surgeries. By making the patient feel at home, Dr Bansal ensures that all the medical protocols are being followed. Women find the gynaecological procedures trustworthy and acknowledge Dr Charulata for the precision of work and professionalism. As a highly-qualified obstetrician and gynaecologist, Being the top gynaecologist in Jaipur Mrs Bansal does her work wholeheartedly and addresses the concerns of her patients with utmost urgency.

KNOW ABOUT THE ACHIEVEMENT OF DR. CHARULATA BANSAL AS THE BEST GYNAE DOCTOR IN JAIPUR

Having been felicitated with numerous awards, trophies and medals, Dr Charulata has proven her mettle. Her gynaecological surgeries speak volumes of the sophistication of her work and her ethic. The most significant achievement in her career was receiving a gold medal from the honorary president APJ Abdul Kalam. Mrs Charulata’s immense hard work, courteous demeanour and professional outlook have made her the cream of the crop of the best gynaecologist in Jaipur.

For more information about gynaecology issues or to schedule an appointment with Dr Charu Lata Bansal, click here.

[under-lore]

How old is Frisk ?

One topic often debated about Frisk is the question of how old they are. With the fandom throwing around numbers anywhere between 5 and 16 without any real evidence, this post will attempt to give the most accurate answer possible based on game data and real world science.

There are three factors that can help determining Frisk’s age.

The first one is their physical appearance. The second one is their mentality, this ranges from Frisk’s personality to the things that they know or don’t or to their decision making process. The third one is how other characters treat Frisk and what they expect of them.

We know how average kids of any given age are like both mentally and physically, by comparing what we know of Frisk to this data, we can make an estimation of their age.

First things first, there is one thing that the game makes extremely clear :  Frisk is still a child, they are under 18.

Several characters call Frisk a child.

They are also still young enough to be going to school, Toriel even mentions she could be their teacher.

Gerson too shares that same assumption of Frisk having the age to be going to school. Gerson has the times where humans and monsters lived together on the surface, he would know what humans of different ages would look like.

Frisk also wears a striped shirt, which in the Undertale world is associated with children.

The question then becomes, how young of a child are they ?

The first thing to consider is that Frisk is able to read and write.

Reading is a skill usually developed by children around the ages of 4-5.

Writing is where it gets more interesting. Going by their appearance and by the situation, Alphys believes that Frisk would have been able to have written this whole letter.

That letter was actually written by Undyne, an adult. And one that seemingly has a lot of experience at it too.

This means that Frisk looks old enough for Alphys to assume that they are able to write as well as an adult would in this situation or at least close enough to it for mistaking Undyne’s writing for Frisk’s to be reasonable.

It is also note worthy that Alphys, familiar with anime, could tell what a human child looks like compared to an older adult as well.

The narrator, who can read Frisk’s mind, also believes that they would be able to write letters.

This is reiterated by Mettaton in his fight, where he claims that Frisk could be able to write not just a letter but a whole book after the essay.

While the very basics of writing comes at an earlier age, being able to write full meaningful sentences with proper punctuation doesn’t typically happen before age 7-10, this number can get even higher depending on the country.

Writing skills comparable to that of adults as Frisk would supposedly have however, is something that typically comes in the 10-13 age range.

Considering that Alphys might have gotten to the conclusion that Frisk wrote the letter a bit too fast or that a writing “close enough” to it would probably suffice, i believe it would be justified to accept a year of margin of error on the younger spectrum for that last one. In any case, that would make Frisk at least 9 even if they had learned that skill at a younger age than average.

The next notable detail is that Frisk has no interest in toys at all. They are too old for this.

Children fully losing interest in traditional toys and stopping to use them is something that usually happens starting from their pre-teens or early teenage years.

However when it comes to the topic of playing, considering that Toriel assumes that Frisk could still have fun by playing with the leaves, and that it appears she was correct, Frisk would seem to be more on the younger side of that spectrum.

This isn’t the only instance of Frisk having fun taking part in rather childish activities either. A teenager would most likely not do something like this :

Frisk was also able to climb Mt Ebbot in the first place, which isn’t that small of a feat either.

Sans is pretty good at analysing people going by their faces. On a few occasions, he seems to be assuming that Frisk would find his jokes entertaining and thus and have a somewhat childish sense of humor like he does.

Sans also seemingly assumes Frisk would find those passwords funny as well, which a teenager would probably not.

Gyftrot assumes that Frisk is a teen during its fight as those who decorated it were also teens.

Gyftrot here is suffering from confirmation bias and isn’t a reliable source, however this does seem to hint that Frisk couldn’t be that far from teenage years either.

One of the things that is shown to us several times regarding Frisk’s personality is that they can be intimidated fairly easily.

While the amalgamates are certainly a scary sight that could make this reaction understandable no matter Frisk’s age, Frisk doesn’t really have an excuse for being intimidated by a pie. One can hardly imagine a teen having this kind of reaction.

Another one of Frisk’s center of interest that is particularly relevant to this analysis is their odd affinity with flirting.

Wether it is with a monster they are willing to call mother, with a slime, with a ghost, with a skeleton or with a flying airplane, the flirting option appears considerably more than it reasonably should.

What is also relevant is the way that Frisk flirts.

Sometimes, their flirting seems childish or on a joking tone.

On other instances however, Frisk shows that they know how to actually flirt for real if they want to. Complimenting physical appearance and interests. That is something they are able to do.

Whilst Frisk’s flirting is obviously not actually serious, the fact that they ask burgerpants for romantic advice seems to say that they at least have somewhat of an interest in romance.

After all, they did get the royal guard together thanks to their own idea and helped setting up Alphys and Undyne.

Starting to develop an interest in romance but saying those things without any real intent behind what they say like Frisk does usually begins around pre-teens.

What is also important when it comes to Frisk’s flirting is the way that other characters react to it.

They find Frisk’s flirting more “adorable” than anything. They cannot take Frisk’s flirting seriously because they are too young. If Frisk had been a teenager, these reactions wouldn’t make sense.

This means that Frisk is both old enough to flirt and to know what they are saying even if they do not really mean it and young enough for their attempts at flirting with adults to be cute or “adorable” rather than awkward.

Once again, this is something that the pre-teen range fits best. Any older would be too old.

One more interesting to note regarding Frisk is that they know about certain things in life that younger kids usually do not know about yet.

For instance, We have this dialogue that ended up not making it to the final game and staying as a ‘testmonster’ Froggit dialogue for... fairly obvious reasons.

Im gonna have to agree on the narrator with that one. Jeez Frisk... Really ?

In any case, that is certainly not the kind of thing that any child younger than 10 years old would say. And even that is already an early age for this saying this type of stuff.

We have two other other instances of this that did actually make it into the final game however.

Sans makes a furry joke about Frisk, fully expecting them to know what a furry is and be able to get that joke. Again implying some amount of knowledge when it comes to this stuff.

The narrator also makes a similar joke about the royal guards.

Keeping in mind that the narrator was shown to be able to read Frisk’s mind and that Frisk can hear them, they wouldn’t say this unless they knew that Frisk would be able to understand what their joke was about.

Frisk knows this stuff.

The narrator in general does not treat Frisk like a smaller child either. For instance they do not mind using these kinds of words with their descriptions at all. They do not have any type of “im talking to a little kid” filter.

The next thing one would consider when it comes to finding Frisk’s age would be to find their height and compare it to that of real kids.

Does any of the artwork from Toby or Temmie allow to do this ?

Temmie’s artwork is extremely unreliable when it comes to Frisk’s height. This is something that can be verified by attempting to measure different Frisk’s from Temmie’s arts.

In this artwork, Frisk's height is that of a litteral toddler. A baby. This is obviously not accurate.

The whole point of concept art is to develop character design so that it can be used for a final product (here, the game). Since this art is focused on Papyrus and his puzzle, making them very big but Frisk very small is simply the most convenient way to work on Papyrus’ appearance and the puzzle’s design.

In this one however, they are slightly taller than Ness, who is 14 by the end of Earthbound.

The image with Ness also serves as a great example of the fact that drawing children as being very small no matter who it is or how old they are is one of the key points of Temmie Chang’s artstyle in general. This renders trying to find a characters’ height or age based on her art completely pointless, this is a dead end.

Besides, her art isn’t even canon anyways.

That leaves us with only the game itself.

When it comes to measuring the height or any part of the physical appearance of any Undertale character, the first thing to be aware of is that even if the game is obviously canon, the overworld sprites are not always accurate in terms of sprite size to what Toby’s intention was. This is because Toby put more intention into detail than into height accuracy. A good example of this happening is this scene.

Flowey’s face obviously doesn’t actually canonically triple in size for a few seconds, this was done just for the sake of having a more detailed laugh sprite. Flowey isn’t taller than Frisk.

While the overworld sprites remain good approximations in general, any measurement done with them has a pretty large margin of error due to both what we are measuring and the thing we measure it with possibly being height inaccurate.

However, Frisk’s sprite was the sprite based on which the rest of the sprites of the game were built. In fact, Toby didn’t add any proper sprites aside from Frisk’s sprites until the demo was basically finished.

This means that Frisk’s sprite is actually one of the only sprite in all of Undertale that we know actually is accurate in terms of height, and thus can be measured.

but lets not go too fast, there is still a problem.

The problem is that whatever we choose to measure Frisk with could itself be height inaccurate, which would render the results unreliable anyways.

For instance, basketballs have a standard size in real life, but since those basketball were made bigger than they should in UT for detail purposes, measuring Frisk with a basketball would thus make them seem much smaller than they really are.

For this same reason, measuring Frisk with a door, the human from the intro sequence, a fridge or pretty much anything at all makes for a flawed result.

This problem is easy to see from the fact that all of these attempts at calculating Frisk’s height with pixel measurement made by fans over the years ended up with different answers. To illustrate this, here are some tries from other people over the years who made this exact mistake :

If the reference isn’t accurate, then neither will be the result.

The only way to get a Frisk measurement that would actually be accurate would be to measure them by using as a reference something that is outright specifically called out by the game as being size accurate as well in addition to having standardised real world dimensions.

So... Do we have something like that anywhere in the game ?

Wow, thanks Toby for not making my life difficult this once.

Alright so by using this specifically-regular-sized sink as a measurement system, Frisk ends up being 1m47cm (4ft 10) tall.

(Turns out the Temmie one actually had it right after all...)

By comparing this to the average height of a child relative to their age, we find Frisk is slightly taller than the average 11 year old. In other words, they are right in the middle of the pre-teen range, which already had a lot of evidence pointing towards it.

There is another thing that needs to be pointed out. Children of male and female sex do not always have the same average height depending on age, starting from 14, children of male sex tend to get taller.

Thus, making Frisk 13 or younger allows them to look more androgynous, which is something that we know Toby was trying to do with Frisk’s design.

From their personality and behavior to how other characters treat them passing by their knowledge and capacities or their height, Frisk is implied several times to be at least 10 but also to not have reached teenage years yet.

Thus, Frisk would be somewhere in their pre-teens.

[drbtinglecannon]

I've deduced the main cast of TGAA's birthday ranges and subsequent potential zodiac signs, cuz I'm suffering from brainrot still. And yes I'm color-coding it cuz it's my blog post I can do whatever I want💃

Ryuunosuke, Susato, Herlock, and Iris do not age between DGS1 & 2. Ryuunosuke is 23, Susato is 16, Herlock is 34, and Iris is 10 throughout both games.

Barok, Gina, and Kazuma, on the other hand, do all age between DGS1 & 2. Barok is 32 when we meet him in DGS1-3 and 33 by DGS2-3. Gina is 17 when we meet her in DGS1-3 and 18 by DGS2-3. Kazuma is 23 at the beginning of the game in DGS1-1 and 24 by DGS2-4 (after we find out the masked apprentice was Kazuma anyway, he might've been 24 sooner but there's no way to know short of bdays being officially stated which AA doesn't do)

Seeing as the events of the games went from DGS1-1 being on Nov 22 all the way to DGS2-5 being on Nov 4 the following year, that means Ryuunosuke and Susato's bdays are both between Nov 5 - Nov 21 since neither aged between games and were both present for the entire story. (Also that leaves the extremely sad truth that both had their bdays away from their British family & Kazuma on their way back to Japan post DGS2 :( ... But hey at least Mikotoba was around for them) That means both of them would be Scorpios.

When we meet Herlock in DGS1-2 the date is Jan 9, meaning his bday range is between Nov 5 - Jan 8. That means he's either a Scorpio, Sagittarius, or Capricorn. [EDIT: Someone very kindly pointed out to me that Sherlock Holmes does have a canon bday, which I absolutely did not think about when thinking about Herlock, so his bday should be Jan 6! Which does line up with this range, making him a Capricorn! This does unfortunately mean he spent his bday away from Iris :( ]

As for Iris, she's the only one with a stated bday range, with the wiki saying it is either June 16 or 17. Which...doesn't add up, because she would've been 11 in DGS2 if that were the case. Either that was a mistake on the wiki's part, or the game just fucking forgot to change her age (which I can't say isn't possible). If we ignore that and base it on when we meet her vs the date of the last case, she first appears in DGS1-3 but isn't properly introduced until DGS1-4 on Feb 19, that leaves her bday range to be between Nov 5 - Feb 18. If Iris was born June 16/17 that would make her a Gemini, but if she was born between Nov 5 - Feb 18 then she would be either a Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricorn, or Aquarius.

The 2nd DLC case takes place on Barok's actual bday (ofc it doesn't tell us the date tho), which is during the 6 month banishment Ryuunosuke had from British court following DGS1-5 on April 16, and since he's 33 by DGS2-3 on Oct 22, Barok's bday is between April 17 - Oct 21. That means he's either an Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, or Libra.

Gina was 17 in DGS1-3 on Feb 18 all the way until DGS1-5 on April 16, and when we see her again during DGS2-3 on Oct 22 she's since turned 18, meaning her bday is also between April 17 - Oct 21. (wouldn't it be hilarious if Gina and Barok had the same bday lol) That means she's either an Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, or Libra.

And lastly, Kazuma was 23 at the beginning of the game on Nov 22, and by the time we see him again and actually know it's him in DGS2-4 on Nov 3 he's 24. Since he's absent from the game events between DGS1-2 on Jan 9 until DGS2-3 on Oct 22, Kazuma's bday could be anywhere between Jan 10 - Nov 2, giving about 10 months of range it could fall in. That means he could be any zodiac sign except Sagittarius.

So recap!!

Ryuunosuke

Potential bday range: Nov 5 - 21

Zodiac sign: Scorpio

Susato

Potential bday range: Nov 5 - 21

Zodiac sign: Scorpio

Herlock

Potential bday range: Nov 5 - Jan 8 [EDIT: Official bday of Sherlock Holmes is Jan 6, thus it's safe to assume it's Herlock's too]

Potential zodiac sign: Scorpio, Sagittarius, or Capricorn [EDIT: if Jan 6 is his bday his sign is Capricorn]

Iris

Potential bday range: Either June 16/17 OR Nov 5 - Feb 18

Potential zodiac sign: Either Gemini OR Scorpio, Sagittarius, Capricorn, or Aquarius

Barok

Potential bday range: April 17 - Oct 21

Potential zodiac sign: Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, or Libra

Gina

Potential bday range: April 17 - Oct 21

Potential zodiac sign: Aries, Taurus, Gemini, Cancer, Leo, Virgo, or Libra

Kazuma

Potential bday range: Jan 10 - Nov 2

Potential zodiac sign: Anything but Sagittarius

I know the game doesn't specify the actual years, but I always thought it took place during 1899-1900, given the Great Exhibition being at the "turn of the century" and lining up when Soseki was in England while Queen Victoria was still queen, so that would mean going by these dates the years everyone was born would be: Ryuu 1876, Susato 1883, Herlock 1865-1866, Iris 1889-1890, Barok 1867, Gina 1882, and Kazuma 1875-1876.

Anyway hope y'all enjoy this for like, idk bday or zodiac HCs, or just as something interesting to read that I spent far too much time on. 💖

[triangle-strategy-notes]

When you pick up Roland’s wanted poster, it states that he’s 20 years old. Based on that info and maybe speculation, how old do you think the other characters are?

Aha okay so I’ve thought about this a ton! Like you’ve probably noticed, Roland seems to be the only person with a canon age, so a lot of it is speculation, but I do have my own guesses that I’ve been putting together based on in-game info.

In this list I’ve got, I differentiate the canon stuff from my Subjective Opinion by tacking on a “SO” label, and I’m assuming that all of these ages are from the beginning of the game. If I’m missing anyone you’re curious about, or if I got any lore stuff wrong/missed any lore stuff, feel free to let me know.

Readmore for spoilers--many of them are pretty significant, and they span a lot of the routes/character stories.

Piccoletta: (SO 13 years)

Quahuag: (SO 14 years)

Jens: (SO 28 years) (SO 17 years)

Edit: After watching his recruitment character story, I noticed that he’s referred to as “Young Smithy” before we learn his name, and Serenoa also calls him “lad,” implying that he’s a fair bit younger than Serenoa himself is.

Cordelia: less than 20 years (SO 18 years)

Cordelia is younger than Roland, who’s 20 like you mentioned. Given her maturity + everyone’s relative acceptance of her betrothal to Gustadolph, I usually range her between 16-19 years old, but I don’t think there’s anything in canon that gives a firm lower limit for her age.

Thalas + Erika: (SO 20 years)

I headcanon them as twins, but as far as I know there’s no in-game evidence for this. I feel like somewhere it’s mentioned that they’re younger than Frederica, but I also can’t find a source for that. Edit: via @miraclebean in the notes, “Frederika's character bio says she's the eldest daughter, so at least Erika is younger.” Thanks!

Roland: ~20 years

This is stated explicitly in that wanted poster you mentioned, which I’m pretty sure you can pick up during an exploration phase in Wolffort demesne before choosing whether to give him up or defend him. If you want to say he was 19 at the very beginning of the game and had a birthday somewhere between then and the Aesfrosti invasion, you could, but otherwise 20′s a hard number.

Trish: (SO 21 years)

Serenoa: (SO 24 years)

Hughette: (SO 25 years)

Given her status as Roland’s retainer, I’m assuming she’s older than him. But given the softly-implied feelings she has for him, I wouldn’t say they’re too far apart in age.

Frederica: ~30 years old (SO 26 years)

I have a lot of thoughts on Frederica! Lady Orlaea was theoretically handed over shortly after the end of the war (I forget when this was mentioned in-game, but in some of my personal notes, I have that Lady Orlaea was handed over to Hyzante because they threatened to otherwise pin total responsibility for the war onto Aesfrost). This would make Frederica at least 30 years old. But, just going purely off vibes, it feels like she’s closer in age to Roland/Serenoa, who I imagine are somewhat younger than 30. So, I theorize that, while the ceasefire was put in place 30 years ago, figuring out the finer details of blame and compensation stretched on for several additional years during peace talks, allowing Lady Orlaea to stay in Aesfrost longer, and therefore for Frederica to be younger than 30. But if you’re going for lore accuracy over vibe accuracy haha, I’d put her at 30.

Frani: (SO 28 years)

I imagine he was born after the Saltiron War and is also older than Serenoa, but I can’t find any source that proves that.

Dragan: (SO 29 years)

I headcanon Dragan as being born shortly after the end of the war, but that’s not stated anywhere in canon.

He makes a lot of references to being part of the ardent youth, so it makes sense that he’d be on the younger side of the cast.

A fun fact about Dragan + Avlora: during the exploration phase before the tourney, he talks as if he’s never met Avlora before, or at the very least doesn’t know her very well. However, during her character story, Avlora claims that Lord Svarog took her in when she was orphaned. If you’re assuming that Lord Svarog personally helped raise her, it’s weird to think Dragan and Avlora have never met. My explanations are a) that it was more of a “Lord Svarog served as a benefactor and ran the orphanage Avlora was in” scenario, b) Dragan was raised somewhere away from Twinsgate, or c) there was a significant age gap between her and Dragan, and they weren’t raised at Twinsgate at the same time. 

Anna: ~30 years (SO 30 years)

During one of her character stories, it’s said that she was adopted by Benedict after the destruction of the Jackes clan, which was said to be during the Saltiron War. She’s described as being swaddled up, so likely only a few months old at most. That’s about 30 years + how many years before the end of the war that you think the Jackes clan’s destruction took place, which I put towards 0-1, assuming it was towards the end.

Milo: (SO 31 years)

Sycras: (SO 32 years)

He’s married with two young kids, as shown in Roland’s ending. 

Decimal: ~30+ years (SO 32 years/3 years)

Decimal was created as a prototype for the Hierophant, who was created sometime during the war by Lyla Viscraft after the last Hierophant died. This would have been sometime around Lady Orlaea’s escape, so whenever you’d place that, that’s how old Decimal is. However, given that Decimal doesn’t seem to have stayed with any of his few masters for very long, I headcanon that he was turned off for some significant amount of time during this period, giving him a physical age of 32 but a mental age more like 3.

Exharme: (SO 35 years)

Exharme is considered a young and upcoming minister, so it’s definitely possible he’s younger than even 35. For me, I think my 35 estimate is influenced pretty heavily by his English VA, who seems to voice him as older.

Avlora: ~30 years old (SO 38 years)

The most defining fact with Avlora is that she’s stated to have been orphaned during the Saltiron War, which should put her lower limit at around 30. But some other things to consider:

If you pick to negotiate with her when you recapture Whiteholm Castle, you get a side story in which she argues with Thalas and Erika and Thalas remarks that she’s an orphan who doesn’t even know her “true name.” It’s unclear what this means—it could imply that she was too young to speak at all at the time she was orphaned (which would mean someone else, perhaps Lord Svarog who took her in, named her Avlora) or it could just mean that she was old enough to know her first name, but not her family name. In any case, I’m assuming she was probably three or younger when she was orphaned.

In her character story, she also mentions that she “never knew her parents,” which further supports that she was pretty young at the time.

Knowing all that, I put her upper limit at something like 38 (30 years + the duration of the war + 3 years old), and her younger limit at around 26 (30 years - the duration of any potential peace talks + 0 years assuming she was a newborn). Like Anna, Avlora likely doesn’t know her own age, so that’s pretty flexible as well. 

A fun fact about Avlora + Dragan (already wrote this under Dragan, but cross-referencing it here): during the exploration phase before the tourney, he talks as if he’s never met Avlora before, or at the very least doesn’t know her very well. However, during her character story, Avlora claims that Lord Svarog took her in when she was orphaned. If you’re assuming that Lord Svarog personally helped raise her, it’s weird to think Dragan and Avlora have never met. My explanations are a) that it was more of a “Lord Svarog served as a benefactor and ran the orphanage Avlora was in” scenario, b) Dragan was raised by his mother somewhere away from Twinsgate, or c) there was a significant age gap between her and Dragan, and they weren’t raised at Twinsgate at the same time. 

And as a special note on this one, I know a ton of people ship Avlora/Cordelia, and I think there’s a valid argument to be made that the writers intended Avlora to be younger than she lore-wise has to be (in general the TS timeline is pretty inconsistent, so I’m not sure they were all on the same page haha). I personally like putting her on the older side of the cast and imagining her relationship with Cordelia as more of a familial/mentoring one, which is where my 38 comes from, but that’s probably not the popular fanon age for her haha. Given the way TS doesn’t give us a firm age for anyone but Roland, I think we’re all entitled to a little artistic license. If you want to imagine her as younger than 26, you could probably put together a justification for it, so go with whatever else floats your boat.

Gustadolph: ~35+ years at the least (SO 35 years)

Another weird one! The biggest two things we have for Gustadolph’s age are a) during a cutscene you get if you give up the Roselle, he says he remembers some stories that Lady Orlaea told him as a boy, and b) when he’s telling Avlora to go kill Landroi, he says, “[Landroi] had the pluck to fire at your master during the war. Do you think you can best him?” This could arguably be about Groma (who’s implied to be a mentor to Avlora) or Zigmunt or someone else, but from context it seems as if Gustadolph is speaking about himself. With those in mind, I give his age an approximate range of 35-45: at 35, we’re assuming that Gustadolph really was a child at the time he spoke with Lady Orlaea but that Falkes also shot at a child, OR at 45, we assume that “boy” referred to a teen, and that Gustadolph maybe fought in the war at some point.

I’ve gone towards the younger end of the spectrum because it makes me feel marginally less terrible when I think about Cordelia’s situation. If you want to lean into that, you could also use my Lady-Orlaea-stayed-through-the-peace-talks theory and make him more like 30 or something (although that does lend itself to Landroi shooting at an actual infant after the ceasefire, so you gotta pick your poison I guess!).

Ezana: (SO 36 years)

Medina: (SO 37 years)

Julio: (SO 38 years)

Silvio: (SO 37 years)

I don’t think we ever get any explicit confirmation that Silvio was in the war, so I’ve got a headcanon that the original Lord Telliore was Silvio’s father, and that Silvio is his air-headed son. If we assume that Silvio fought in the war, he would likely be around 50 years old.

Sycras: ~23+ years old (SO 30 years)

In Roland’s ending, it’s shown that Sycras is married with two young children, so assuming they’re at least 5 and that he was married at 18, I put his minimum age at 23, but you can assume his kids are older/younger, or that he was married older/younger as well.

Corentin: (SO 45 years)

Tenebris: (SO 45 years)

Patriatte: (SO 47 years)

Maxwell: ~35+ years (SO 47 years)

Maxwell is one I’ve definitely overthought, because despite him being Glenbrook’s finest warrior, I haven’t found a line yet that says he was involved in the Saltiron War. It seems like if he were in the Saltiron War, they would have talked about it a little bit more, the way they do with Regna and the three high houses. I’ve put his minimum age down as 35, assuming he was at least 20 when he began training Roland around an estimated age 5, and that it’s been 15 years since then, so 20 + 15. However, that might be a little young for him to go gray, assuming that isn’t his natural hair color—a quick Google search tells me that mid-40s is when men usually begin to go gray, and Maxwell’s braid seems to be fully that color. So you can easily imagine him as being older but that his involvement in the Saltiron War isn’t publicized for some reason (perhaps because he changed his identity/name when he donned his mask?).

Geela: ~50 years (SO 47 years)

Geela doesn’t look terribly old, but assuming that Frederica was really born at the end of the Saltiron War and is 30 at the beginning of the game, and assuming that Geela had spent some time studying in both Hyzante and Aesfrost, she was maybe 25-ish when she began teaching Frederica at a young age (I’m guessing 5, like with Maxwell and Roland), which would give them 25 years together as mentor/pupil, which brings us to 50 years old in total. But if you go with my peace-talks theory, and assume that Frederica is a little younger, you can play around with that number.

Travis: (SO 52 years)

He’s old enough to have a relatively old daughter.

Flanagan: (SO 54 years)

Erador: (SO 54 years)

Lionel: (SO 55 years)

Hossabarra: (SO 55 years)

She says her son Theo died in the war, and that he would “be a man grown now” during her character story. Assuming she was an adult when her son was born, and that her son was killed as a child, 55 seemed like a good number to me (30 years for the war + 20 for her age at Theo’s birth + 5 year old son).

Lyla: ~50+ years (SO 56 years)

Lyla’s the one who developed Decimal/the Hierophant automaton, which means she likely had to be at least 18 at the time of the last hierophant’s death, and it’s possible that she was already a minister (or at least a renowned scientist) if Idore trusted her with the task. That’s 30 years + maybe 2ish years for the time between the hierophant’s death and the end of the war + whatever age you think she developed Decimal at, which I put at 24. That feels like a young age for a minister, but taking into account that she’s Quahoug’s mother, who seems to be a child or young teen, it’s hard to make her much older than that, since that would put her at well over 40 at the time of his birth.

Regna: 51+ years (SO 55 years) 

Regna doesn’t really look that old, but he was the one who worked with Zigmunt to instigate the Saltiron War. So assuming 30 years since the war + Regna being at least 18 when the war began + the war itself “raging on for many years” which I’m assuming is a minimum of 3, that gives us an overall minimum of 51. I headcanon the war as about 5 years long, and Regna as being 20 (Roland’s age) when the war began, so 30 + 20 + 5 gives us 55. 

Symon: 51+ (SO 57 years) 

A lot of the same reasoning as ^^ Regna, but I think of him as a little older, the way Serenoa seems a little older than Roland. 

Landroi: 51+ (SO 67 years)

A lot of the same reasoning as ^^ Symon and Regna, but given his appearance and authority, I pin him as older.

Sorsley: (SO 60 years)

Benedict: (SO 60 years)

I imagine him to be older than Symon, but otherwise I’m just going off the white hair.

Kamsell: (SO 63 years)

Svarog: (SO 68 years)

Idore: (SO 74 years)

He was a prominent figure during the Saltiron War, and appears to be older than most of the cast. I assume he was about 44 at the end of the Saltiron War.

Groma: (SO 75 years)

It’s implied that she’s older than the majority of the cast, and I’m going with 75 assuming she was 45 at the end of the war, and that it’s been 30 years since then.

Archibald: (SO 81 years)

It’s implied that he’s older than the majority of the cast. I’m assuming he was 51 during the first Saltiron War, and that it’s been 30 years since then.

[kim-poce]

Bloodbag Neo and Celeste

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11, Part 12, Part 13, Part 14, Part 15, Part 16, Part 17, Part 18, Part 19, Part 20, Part 21, Part 22, Part 23, Part 24

(CW: pet whump, multiple whumpees, female conditioned vampire whumpee, broken bones, fear of punishment, implied past non-con)

Alex made a timely reappearance, saving Tobias from having to figure out how to explain the intricacies of human pet dealing. The vampire made sure to ask the boy if he would prefer to leave, once again showing that strange level of care towards a human bloodbag.

Alex looked over Tobias's broken arms critically. “I’ll get started, but I don’t have much experience with this. So you’ll need to explain if I do something wrong,” he said as he set the first aid kit down on the table.

Tobias nodded. Made sense; vampires don't exactly need the same kind of care humans do.

“I’m sure Evelyn’s venom is wearing out, right? It isn’t like she would give you enough for a long time anyway, so maybe I should give you some before-”

“M-master,” the kid interrupted, voice worried but stern.

Alex turned to look at him.

“Y-you- you not- you know,” the kid said, losing his nerve and looking down again.

Alex sighed but agreed that using his venom wasn't a good idea. He opened the kit and started pulling out items, giving Tobias an expectant look.

Tobias tucked the interaction away in the back of his brain for later examination, and started giving instructions on how to set his broken bones. Unlike the vampires, he did have experience with this, unfortunately.

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

Ma'am Evelyn used the various cushions and pillows from the room to make what might be the most elaborate pillow fort the vampire had ever seen. She even added a blanket on top as a sort of roof, making the whole structure enclosed. When she finished, she stepped back and gave the fort an approving look.

"I'll put you there now," she said as she picked it up from the chair she had set it on, now the only piece of furniture still in possession of its cushions and pillows. "Like this, try to get as comfortable as you can, okay?" she asked.

Her voice was sweet. The vampire couldn't help but think that it was almost too sweet, like honey added to hide the taste of poison. Either way, she was giving it luxuries beyond what it could possibly have hoped for, so it would just try to enjoy them while it could.

Next

Crossovers - Masterlist

CW: mild (?) disassociation.

=-=

Alex was never an exemplar vampire, much less an exemplar Fortery. He smile bitterly at himself while Tobias gave the instructions; Alex Fortery is obeying a human while carefully treating his wounds instead of hunting as a proper vampire should do.

"I hope words of this never met mother's ears," he said to himself, not even realizing their words were spoken out loud. If she were to see... He shook his head at the thought, trying to quiet his now slightly shivering hands, she can't find out, not even Evelyn would be able to stop her if she knew he was listening to a human.

Alex blinked a few times and focused on the task at hand, following the instructions given between hisses of pain. At some point his mind was wandering off, his body was still there, following the given words, moving as someone expect him to, but his mind was elsewhere.

Even when he finished the task he was still there, holding the remaining bandages and waiting for the next word, which didn't came if he wasn't so out of it he would think that Tobias wouldn't dare to order him around past the –requested– instructions.

Alex flinched back when his cellphone rang, he turned his head to the source of the sound, picking it up immediately after reading the name on the screen.

"Evelyn," he said, blinking several times in an attempt to ground himself to reality, "No, not busy..."

=-=

Evelyn had left the girl and was nowthinking about her next steps, there was no pre-taken drugged blood anywhere so she would need to take a human –or several since she doesn't have a reason to kill them for such an avoidable thing– drug them and take the blood.

She could take any human in the nearest town, they don't fight back there, not when they are only allowed this close if they give their blood away. They also won't have a say if they accept to be drugged or not.

Evelyn paused at the thought of going to the town; a place full of humans, full of human blood and smell. She can barely hold herself back with two humans around. Maybe I'll need to drink something before I go.

The issue was: no human blood around. Well, there was the blood inside both the hunter (who would die if she feed on him) and the blood bag (who would freak out a lot) but they were no options.

She tsked her tongue and picked up her phone to call her brother.

"Evenly," he said after picking up.

"Are you busy right now? Did you find something?" She asked, knowing that he would drop whatever he was doing if he were.

"No, not busy, and yes, we know where to go, just waiting for the word."

"Okay, do whatever you need about it, but before you go, bring me some blood."

Alex paused at the instructions, not sure if he heard it right, "Blood? You want me to get you blood?"

"That's what I said, you have blood on stock and I want it."

"Is it for the girl?"

"No."

"So you are saying that you want to drink the blood I drink? that blood? You from all people want to drink this blood?"

"Alex, didn't you make me repeat myself enough already?" Evelyn asked menacingly.

"Yes, yes, sorry, I'll take it. I'll be there in a bit."

=-=

Taglist: @neverthelass, @latenightcupsofcoffee, @rose-pinkie

[snowdice]

Big Bang (Sort of) Editing Story [Day 95]

I started writing this fic while editing my Big Bang story, but am going to continue doing it for other things now that Kill Dear is out. I will write and publish 100 words of the story every time I finish doing whatever task I’m doing. If you’d like to block these proceedings, please feel free to block the tag proofread stories. I will reblog this post with the parts of the story I do today. Edited chapters are linked; everything else I’ve done so far is under the cut.

My Master Post Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12 Part 13 Part 14 Part 15 Part 16 Part 17 Part 18 Part 19 Part 20 Part 21 Part 22 Part 23 Part 24 Part 25 Part 26 Part 27 Part 28 Part 29 Part 30 Part 31 Part 32 Part 33 Part 34 Part 35 Part 36 Part 37 Part 38 Part 39 Part 40 Part 41 Part 42 Part 43

Just got back from vacation and got to do some stuff, but also tired. Let’s see how long I last.

Chapter 44 (Thomas)

Loraine had called Thomas down to the stables in the morning to talk about a concern that had cropped up with their grain stores. They’d found mold in one of the grain bins which had, of course, soiled everything stored there. Luckily, it ended up being one of the smaller grain bins, but it still provided some concern for getting through the winter. As it was, they would be able to make it through, but a lot less comfortably.

Thomas mostly trusted the three who ran animal husbandry on the castle’s lands to deal with it, but he still provided his opinion when asked.

The meeting had taken a few hours. When he’d come down to the stables, the sun had been shining. It had still been cold, but not as freezing the last few days, though he was under no illusion that winter was anywhere near over. A point which was emphasized when he stepped out of Loraine’s office and glanced out of a window only to see what appeared to be a blizzard happening outside.

Great. He wasn’t exactly enthused about walking back to the castle in that. Wanting to delay the trip as long as possible, he turned away from the window and walked towards the other end of the stable.

He grabbed an apple along the way, intending to feed it to Mr. Apples while convincing himself to make the jaunt back up to the castle. To his surprise, Mr. Apple’s head didn’t pop into the hall upon hearing someone enter his domain (aka the hall outside of his stall). This was odd as Mr. Apples was a territorial bastard who was always sure to be prepared to confront anyone who came within range or eat an apple if the person invading his space happened to be one of the few he wouldn’t attempt to bite on sight. Yet, no white nose popped into sight.

When Thomas approached the stall, he figured out why. There was someone in the stall, but unlike most instances of someone being in a stall with Mr. Apples, the person was not being bitten, spit at, or anything else. Instead, Mr. Apples was standing there calm as day as Virgil ran a brush over his flank.

Thomas stared at them for a moment. He found himself wondering if Mr. Apples had died and someone had replaced him with another white horse, so the royal family didn’t get upset, like one might replace a child’s dead goldfish if it dies while they’re away.

However, then, Mr. Apples realized Thomas was there. The disdain in his expression upon catching sight of Thomas told him this was no imposter. He apparently by some miracle had just found another person he liked. Which… did pose an issue for Thomas.

Virgil had calmed down around Thomas a bit ever since Thomas had found the boy hiding in the castle, but he wasn’t sure how Virgil would feel about being confronted by Thomas’s presence without warning. In the past, he’d been rather jumpy. If Thomas startled a person Mr. Apples liked in front of Mr. Apples, the tentative peace between Thomas and the horse would surely be over.

He debated simply walking away like Mr. Apples’ expression was insisting, but before he could, Virgil glanced up at him. Thankfully, he didn’t jump. He looked at Thomas for a second, seeming a bit unsure. They hadn’t been alone since he’d stopped being completely terrified of Thomas’s existence after all, but eventually Virgil settled on saying, “Uh, hello your majesty.”

“Hello Virgil,” Thomas replied with a small smile. “You can just call me Thomas if you’d like.”

Virgil didn’t seem to know what to say to that, so Thomas dropped it for now.

“Mr. Apples seems to like you,” he said.

“He’s a good horse,” Virgil said, patting Mr. Apples’ side. Mr. Apples sent Thomas a smug look. Well, this… was a very familiar conversation, Thomas thought, his heart squeezing just a bit.

Having learned long ago not to bother arguing his case, Thomas just said, “He doesn’t like many people.”

“Logan said that,” Virgil said.

“Where is Logan?” Thomas asked, curious. Usually, Virgil wasn’t too far from him or Patton, but Thomas hadn’t seen a sign of them in the stable.

“He’s studying in his library,” Virgil said, “but I wanted to come to the stable since the weather was slightly nicer.”

“And Patton?”

“He had a meeting with your advisor.”

“Makes sense,” Thomas said. He was glad Virgil was apparently comfortable enough now to go places without one of the other boys. He reluctantly supposed he had Mr. Apples to thank for that. “I brought him and apple. Would you like to feed it to him?”

“Sure,” Virgil said.

Thomas smiled and handed an apple slice over the stall gate to Virgil. He fed it to Mr. Apples. Once the horse was finished with that slice, Thomas handed him another.

“Don’t you want to feed some to him?” Virgil asked.

“He’ll enjoy it much more from you,” Thomas replied.

Virgil frowned, but Mr. Apples threw his head in agreement. Virgil ended up feeding the rest of the apple to the horse.

“Would you like to walk back to the castle with me?” Thomas asked once the horse was busy chowing down on his last slice.

“Sure,” Virgil replied. Thomas smiled at him and helped him put away the brush and other supplies he’d been using on Mr. Apples.

Everything went smoothly until he and Virgil moved to leave the stable. The second that Virgil’s eyes saw the weather conditions outside he paused. Thomas did have to admit that he also wasn’t a fan of what was going on outside. The castle was only a dark blob in the distance when the snow was falling that fast.

Yet, there was something different about Virgil’s expression. It didn’t just seem like reluctance to get cold and wet. Thomas had unfortunately seen Virgil terrified a few times before and it was definitely fear flashing in his eyes right now.

“Are you alright?” Thomas asked softly. Virgil jumped at his voice, but for once Thomas didn’t think he had himself to blame for that.

“I…” Virgil hesitated. “I’m just going to stay here for a while.”

Thomas looked at him and then at the snow outside. “You don’t like the snow, I assume?”

Virgil curled one arm around his waist, gripping the opposite wrist. He shrugged a shoulder. “Bad experience.”

“Oh,” Thomas said, “I see.” The child was looking away from Thomas as well as from the snow outside. His eyes were fixed on a bale of hay. “I guess we’ll just stay out here for a bit.”

Virgil’s eyes shot back to him. “You don’t have to stay,” he said. “It’s fine.”

Thomas shrugged. “I didn’t really want to go out in that anyway.”

Virgil bit his lip. “You’re king,” he said. “You have important things to do. You don’t need to sit out in a horse stable with me because of my issues.”

“You’ll be amazed how much time I’ve spent sitting in a horse stable in my life, king or not,” Thomas said with a rueful smile.

Virgil still seemed unsure. “You don’t have to,” he said. There was no way Thomas was going to leave a child who was afraid of snowstorms alone in a horse stable during one even if he wouldn’t technically be alone with all of the workers about.

“It’s fine,” said Thomas. “I’m sure the stable hands would be willing to share some of the tea in their breakroom with us. We’ll wait for a bit and then see if the storm decides to let up later.”

“If you’re sure,” Virgil said.

“I am,” Thomas said with a smile before leading him towards the staff breakroom and away from the sight of the snow falling outside.

  Chapter 45 (Virgil)

The king led Virgil to a small room in the center of the stables. Two people were sitting in the room talking and playing cards when they entered. They looked up at their entrance, but didn’t spare them a second glance, going back to playing their game. This both made sense because the king should be able to go wherever he wanted without question and didn’t make sense because Virgil had assumed most people working for the castle would jump into asking if the king needed anything when he entered a room.

Instead, the king walked over to a small counter at the side of the room.

If Virgil did not know he was the king, he probably wouldn’t have been able to guess right now. He’d clearly dressed to be in a horse stable today. There was no crown or any jewelry really in sight except for a necklace. His clothing was perhaps of better quality than most who worked in a stable would wear every day, but not by a large margin. He could have just been a stable manager or something if Virgil did not know better.

He glanced back at Virgil once he’d grabbed a few clean cups. “What would you like to drink?” he asked.

“I don’t care,” Virgil said.

“Have you tried hot apple cider before?” the king asked.

Virgil shook his head.

“Well, it looks like they have some cider being kept warm here,” he said touching a small barrel that was sitting on the counter. There was a slight glow to the barrel that Virgil recognized as a heating enchantment.

“Sure,” Virgil said. “I like apples.”

The king smiled and turned to pour out a glass of the drink through a spigot on the side of the barrel. He offered it to Virgil. The king was serving Virgil a drink. That was… really weird. He was a weird king.

Virgil took the cup. It was warm from the hot drink inside of it, and Virgil felt some of the tension that had been in his shoulders since he’d seen the amount of snow outside release as his fingers warmed up.

“It has more spices than things like apple juice,” the king said. “Mostly cinnamon, but also things like cloves, ginger, and nutmeg.”

Virgil didn’t really know what any of those things tasted like off of the top of his head other than cinnamon and, of course, apples. He took a cautious sip anyway.

“Like it?” the king asked, a smile growing on his face quickly in response to whatever face Virgil was making.

Virgil nodded vigorously.

“Good,” the king said with a chuckle. He turned to get another glass of the apple cider for himself. “Let’s sit,” he said motioning with his head to a couch. It was the only free seating available other than one extra chair at the table where the two stable hands were playing cards.

Virgil did as he was told, walking over to the couch, and taking a seat. It was an old, but comfortable couch. Most of the things in this room seemed pretty old, though all in good condition. It made sense that they wouldn’t want to have a bunch of new furniture when people were just using it to take a break between cleaning horse stalls.

It was a nice little room all the same and warmer than the rest of the building. The two stable hands had slung their light coats over the backs of their chairs, and the king took his coat off before sitting. Virgil kept his on.

There were a few hooks where it looked like the workers kept their heavier winter coats for when they left the stable as well as some bags and a couple of paintings.

“That one looks like Mr. Apples,” Virgil pointed out.

The king glanced at the painting. “It is Mr. Apples actually,” he told Virgil. He smiled a bit. “He was absolutely impossible to keep still for it. He went back and forth between trying to bite the artist to trying to show off for his owner. I’m pretty sure the artist made his eyes red if you look close enough just to express his displeasure somehow.”

“Logan?” Virgil asked.

“Oh, no,” said the king. “That was when my husband was alive.”

Virgil immediately internally cringed. Externally he said a quick “Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” said the king. “He’s not a taboo topic to me.”

Virgil searched his face, but he really didn’t seem mad. There was maybe a bit of sadness around his expression, but he wasn’t angry.

“Logan always seems upset when he mentions him.”

“He’s mentioned him to you?” the king asked, sounding surprised.

“A few times,” Virgil said. “He said the hairpiece he let me borrow that one time was his favorite and, when he realized I didn’t like the snow, he tried to convince me it wasn’t all bad by telling me how they used to play in the snow when he was little.

“Logan doesn’t usually talk about him much,” the king said. “He was just a child when he died. It hit him very hard.”

Virgil had noticed that himself.

“It’s good he’s talking about him at least a bit.” The king mused, taking a sip of his drink. “He was the son of a stable hand here, actually.”

“You married a stable hand’s son?” Virgil asked and something about his tone made the king laugh.

“I did,” he confirmed. “We met when we were teenagers about your age. His father had come to work at the castle, and they lived in one of the houses out back. There weren’t many kids in the castle at the time and we both liked the gardens and the orchard, so we ended up friends.”

This knowledge just reaffirmed to Virgil that the king was an odd king. From what little Virgil knew of princes, they were not supposed to befriend the children of stable hands they met in the gardens and kings were certainly not supposed to marry them. Then again, Logan was also a prince and he had befriended an assassin he found in his bedroom. In fact, now that he thought about it, Patton was now a royal advisor in training, but even he was just the son of a chef.

Perhaps the royalty of Prijaznia were just like that. He was once again glad he hadn’t managed to kill the king.

He’d been glad for a while now. At first it had been because he’d gotten to know Logan and knew killing his dad would have made him sad. Now, though, he thought it was a good thing he didn’t kill the king because the king didn’t deserve to die from what Virgil had seen. He was nice.

He even got up and got Virgil more of the apple cider when he finished his first cup of it. He continued to sit with him and talk to him about different things like what Virgil, Logan, and Patton had been doing in the past few days.

Eventually, the king went to go check if the weather was any better, leaving Virgil to finish his third glass of cider.

“It’s snowing less hard now,” the king told him when he got back, “but it’s still snowing. It’s also going to start to get dark soon. Do you want to try to go back?”

Virgil didn’t really. He didn’t want to be outside when it was snowing at all, but he also really wanted to be back at the castle before it was night. He’d much prefer to sleep in a bed or even in his closet than somewhere in the stable.

“Yeah, we can try to go back,” Virgil replied.

“Alright,” the king said. He grabbed his coat off the couch from where he’d set it. Virgil had also taken off his coat eventually, so he grabbed his as well. Once they were both dressed, they walked back to the stable door.

Virgil hesitated when he saw the snow. It was better than it had been earlier, but it still was falling fairly hard. He shifted nervously. That was going to be cold.

At least now he could see the castle clearly, so he didn’t have to worry about getting lost in the snow and dying… probably.

“Here,” said the king. He reached for Virgil slowly and Virgil tensed but allowed it. The king took off the hood Virgil had put up and readjusted the cloth hat under it, so it was over his ears before putting the hood back up. He pulled on some strings that Virgil hadn’t realized until right then were designed to tighten the hood so it wouldn’t fall off his head in the wind. Then, the king took off the scarf around his own neck and wrapped it twice around Virgil’s head, so it covered his mouth and nose. The only exposed area of his face was now his eyes.

“Now that will help you get the least amount of snow on you as possible,” the king said.

“Thanks,” Virgil said. It came out a little muffled.

He smiled at him. “Do you,” he asked, sounding a bit awkward, “want to hold my hand?”

He didn’t particularly. He’d held hands with Logan and Patton before, but that was different. This was the king. Then again… he looked out at the snow. He really didn’t want to risk getting lost in the snow and he was less likely to get lost in the snow if he was holding onto someone, especially someone who knew his way around the castle grounds very well.

Biting his lip behind the borrowed scarf, he decided he’d already taken way too many liberties when it came to the king. He shook his head no. “No, thank you.”

“Alright,” said the king. “Offer is open if you change your mind. Ready to go?”

Virgil nodded, grimacing as he stepped out into the cold, the king at his side. Even with the nice winter coat from Logan and the king’s scarf, it was still noticeably cold. Still, he was not cold enough to justify the icy chill that went down his spine and the way his lungs felt frozen solid causing him to pant trying to take in air. It shouldn’t be this way. He’d been in much colder weather for much longer and with a lot less.

“Are you alright?” the king asked when Virgil couldn’t help but slow down to a stop, shivering.

Virgil looked up at him. Unlike Virgil’s face, he had no scarf to protect him from the weather, but he didn’t seem concerned about that. He seemed much more concerned about Virgil. His reddening face was pinched, and he didn’t look like a man as powerful as a king. He looked like… well, he looked like a concerned father, like Logan’s father.

“Can…” Virgil choked out. He held out his hand.

“Of course,” he said. “Like I said, the offer is open.” He reached forward and wrapped his fingers around Virgil’s. Virgil immediately felt the warmth of them, though it may have been more in his head. There were two pairs of thick gloves between their skin.

Logan’s dad led him by the hand all the way back to the castle.

  Chapter 46 (Patton)

Patton hadn’t been aware until Virgil came along what exactly Mr. Deknis did in the winter. Most of his staff had gone home or had winter tasks unrelated to gardening to do, but Mr. Deknis and a few choice members of his staff still apparently did a lot despite not being able to plant anything.

He frequently invited Virgil to join in on these tasks, and Virgil often accepted. Patton wasn’t sure why he seemed to enjoy things like deep cleaning gardening tools and checking over equipment, but he did, so Patton was glad.

“Alright, that’s enough of that for today,” Mr. Deknis said once Virgil finished brushing off the paste that had been applied to remove rust from a hoe.

“Are you sure?” Virgil asked. “I have more time to work. Even if you need to go, I can still work on something. Unless you don’t want me messing with things without supervision…”

“I’m not telling you to leave, Virgil,” Mr. Deknis said with a half-smile. “I just thought you might want to help me out with something else today.”

“Oh, okay. Sure,” Virgil agreed, sounding just a touch excited.

“Let’s put all of this away,” Mr. Deknis said.

Virgil and Patton helped him put things away, though Patton felt more like a hindrance as both Mr. Deknis and Virgil seemed to know exactly where everything in the room went whereas Patton wasn’t sure about some things.

Patton didn’t always come with Virgil when he was helping Mr. Deknis. Sometimes Logan would come instead, and Virgil had been coming alone with increasing frequency over the last month or so.

He seemed to like it. He always seemed to look forward to spending time with Mr. Deknis and not only because Mr. Deknis often bribed him with snacks of dried or pickled fruits and vegetables.

Once the tools and cleaning equipment were stored away, Mr. Deknis led them down the hall. Mr. Deknis had an entire hall to himself on the first floor of the castle which included his bedroom as well as places to dry and can things.

Where he was leading them now was a small study next to his bedroom. Patton had never been there before and by the way Virgil was curiously looking around, neither had he. It was a cute little area with a small desk and a bookshelf full of books that seemed to all be on plants.

“I’m starting to think about what I want to grow in the gardens next year,” Mr. Deknis explained as they crammed into the small office. He pointed to a large piece of paper on his desk.  “This is the plan at the moment, though it’s nowhere near finalized.”

He pointed at an empty square sketched on the large paper. “I was thinking I wanted to plant something new here, but I don’t know what. It’s just a small patch between the vegetable and flower garden. It’s sort of by the one three teared fountain. I usually use that patch for newer plants, so it could be a vegetable or a flower. I was thinking you could help me pick out something to put there.”

Virgil looked up at him, eyes wide.

Mr. Deknis smiled at him. “Would you like to?”

“I…” Virgil said. “I wouldn’t have any idea what to put.”

“Well, I have a few different books of plants you can flip through,” he said. “Any idea what kind of plant you’d like to grow?”

Virgil shrugged.

“I’ll just give you a few for now,” Mr. Deknis said, selecting three different books. “If you can’t find anything you like, just let me know and I’ll give you another book. There are plenty of different types of things to grow. This is just a start.”

“Thank you,” Virgil said, eyes staring down at the field of flowers drawn on the cover of the book on the top of the stack in his arms.

They spent the afternoon on the floor of Mr. Deknis’ living room. The gardener made them some lavender tea and let them eat some candied walnuts and then retreated to an armchair to read his own book about plants.

Patton and Virgil laid on the floor flipping through the different books. Virgil still wasn’t very good at reading, so Patton would read the descriptions of the plants that caught his eye to him. One of the books was about different vegetables and one was about herbs, which of course, did catch Virgil’s attention a bit because of his love for edible things. Yet the pictures of flowers seemed to interest him the most.

They ended up eventually looking only in the flower book. A while after that, it became clear that he preferred flowers in the orchid family verses composite flowers because he liked the shape of their petals better. So, then they focused more on looking at the different types of orchids that existed.

“There are a lot more types of orchids than I knew there were,” Patton said.

“It’s the second largest family of flowers,” Mr. Deknis told them from his chair. “There’s a lot of different kinds, over 28,000 species at least. Vanilla comes from an orchid plant. If there are none in that book you especially want, I could get a book specifically on orchids.”

Virgil, having already flipped through the book multiple times looking at the orchids in it, looked up at him with a bit of excitement in his eyes. “I would like that,” he said. “Yes, please.”

Mr. Deknis’ eyes softened on him, and he got to his feet. “I’ll go see what I have in the office.”

“Getting to grow something in the garden is exciting,” Patton said once Mr. Deknis left.

“Yeah,” Virgil agreed. “It is.”

It was very nice of Mr. Deknis too, Patton thought. He didn’t have to offer to let Virgil plant something, in fact, him happening to have an empty patch in his plans was probably a little bit of a fib, but it was a nice one.

Virgil liked plants, and it would give him something to look forward to over the winter and then something to do in the spring and summer. Honestly, Patton couldn’t wait to see him experience the castle in the spring. He’d already loved it in the fall, let alone when things started to grow. Patton had a feeling he’d be spending a lot more time outside this summer.

Mr. Deknis came back with a good-sized book filled with pictures of flowers. “Why don’t you take this with you for tonight,” he suggested. “It’s almost dinner time. We can talk about it more when you come to help me again on Saturday.”

“Thank you,” Virgil said, taking the book. “I will see you Saturday then.”

“See you Saturday, Virgil,” he said with a smile.

  Chapter 47 (Logan)

Logan and Virgil had gotten into the habit of having reading lessons in the afternoons 3 times a week. They would sit in the small library near the royal wing for an hour or two and do different things. Logan had started with just teaching him letters, but he’d memorized those long ago at this point. Now, Logan would spend most of the time having him read simpler books out loud and correcting any mistakes he made along the way. Improvement was surprisingly fast, though in truth, Logan hadn’t had any measure for how long it would take a teenager to learn to read and Virgil was quite dedicated.

 Usually, their lessons ended with Logan reading a more complicated book while letting him follow along. The last week, they had been reading the library book Virgil had chosen for himself, Into the Mist. It was an interesting book to read to Virgil, though Logan was unsure if it would be as interesting if he were to read it on his own. In truth, it was a good, but rather ordinary fantasy book. Virgil, however, seemed incredibly fascinated by it. He had never heard a high fantasy story before in his life and he was constantly comparing and contrasting things in the book to things he understood in real life as well as asking Logan about them.

 It also became clear that Virgil did not quite understand real life fully. He attributed the same amount of awe to hearing the ocean being described as he did to the main character’s climb up the sky to a cloud city in hopes of saving his love interest’s life. In fact, he seemed more in awe of Logan’s explanation of the ocean since it actually existed. Logan had a sudden intense urge to plan a trip to see an ocean at some point in the future. Lamir was a costal country and its castle sat on top of a cliff that overlooked the sea.

 It would be easy enough to take a trip to their ally’s country at some point.

“So, cloud mites don’t exist?” Virgil confirmed yet again.

“No,” Logan said. “They don’t. In fact, their existence would go against all magical laws since they are sentient without being alive.”

“But crabs do?” Virgil asked.

“Yes.”

“How?”

“Crabs do not go against the natural order of things,” Logan said.

“But why?” Virgil asked.

“I… don’t understand the question.”

“They don’t have the right number of legs.”

“W-what do you mean by that?” Logan asked, confused.

“Animals can only have an even number of legs on either side.”

“No,” Logan said. Virgil nodded vigorously. “What about beetles? Those have 6 legs. Three on each side.”

“But beetles are bug,” Virgil pointed out.

“Bugs are animals,” Logan argued.

“No, they’re not.”

His face was so serious, and he was so sure, that it was funny. “Bugs are animals,” Logan said.

Virgil seemed confused by this. “But they have 6 legs.”

Logan couldn’t help but laughing at that. “Virgil, what do you think and animal is?”

“Well, I don’t know,” Virgil said, pouting slightly at being laughed at. Logan leaned over to bump their shoulder together which seemed to pacify him. “Cows. Birds. Frogs.”

“I think we need to get you a tutor. You are missing some fundamental building blocks in your education.”

 He huffed, peering at the book.

“It’s no fault of your own,” Logan assured. “You are not born with information like that. People were just negligent in teaching you these things.”

Virgil nodded. “That actually reminds me of something.”

“Mmm?” Logan asked.

“There’s something I need to teach you.”

“And what would that be?” Logan asked.

“Survival instincts.”

“What?”

Virgil slammed his hand down on Logan’s desk. “You have no survival instincts,” he declared. “I bet you don’t even know what hemlock tastes like.”

“Isn’t that poisonous.”

“Yes,” Virgil said.

“Then of course I don’t know what it tastes like.”

“Exactly! That’s the problem.”

 “I don’t need to know what poison tastes like, Virgil,” Logan said.

“Yes, you do,” Virgil argued. “It’s an important skill.”

“I think your view of what constitutes as an ‘important skill may be skewed,” Logan said.

“You’re a prince,” Virgil said. “Knowing about poisons is an important skill for you.”

“It’s really not though.”

“You’re at war,” Virgil reminded, “and they already tried to assassinate your father. Do you think they’re not going to send someone else when your father is alive at winter’s end and they’ve heard no word from their assassin? Do you think if they realize you’re not easily manipulatable, they won’t come for you too?”

 “Well, I mean…” Logan said. “You do have a point there.”

“And you need to learn how to climb things and catch things.”

“Why do I need to know how to catch things?”

“We’ve already had this discussion,” Virgil said. “In case someone throws a knife at you.”

Wait. When had they had that conversation?

“And while we’re on the topic of knives, you need to know how to use a knife effectively.”

“I know how to use a knife,” Logan climbed even though he knew he didn’t know how to use a knife in the way Virgil was talking about.

 Virgil, despite having no concept of taxonomic classification, was no fool. “Chopping things for potions doesn’t count,” Virgil said. “I’m talking stabbing lessons. For you and Patton, though to be honest, Patton has an advantage already over you when it comes to using weapons.”

“Why does he…” Logan thought. “Because he managed to get a hit on you with a cookie sheet one time?”

“His reflexes are better,” Virgil said, “as well as his ability to use his environment to his advantage. You’re always completely oblivious about what’s going on around you.”

“Excuse me. I am incredibly observant,” said Logan.

 “How many chairs are in the dinning room we walked through to get here two hours ago?” Virgil asked.

Logan thought for a moment. “I’m not sure.”

“Exactly! You walk by them every day and you don’t even know how many chairs there are in that room.”

“I have no idea what that has to do with anything.”

“How would you know if someone tampered with the chairs if you don’t know how many of them there are or their positions.”

“Tamper with the chairs?” Logan asked. “What are you talking about? I filter out unnecessary information. That doesn’t mean I’m not observant.”

 “Yes, it does,” Virgil said. “Plus, half the time you don’t even know where I am when you know I’m in the same room as you,” Virgil said.

“Well, that’s because you climb on top of things and hide in walls!” Logan said. “That’s hardly fair.”

“You mean I’m quiet and good at hiding like… an assassin might be.”

Logan pursed his lips. Virgil tilted his head and smiled at him. “I am plenty observant,” Logan insisted once again.

“Prove it,” Virgil said.

“And how should I do that?” Logan asked. “Beyond simply memorizing the furniture arrangements?”

Virgil shrugged. “I’m sure you’ll get an opportunity soon.”

  Chapter 48 (Thomas)

Thomas was leaving his office when he ran into his son. Or more accurately, his son almost ran into him. “Is everything alright?” Thomas asked.

“I…” Logan said. His hand came out to grasp Thomas’s shirt sleeve, odd behavior for him at least at this age. He used to do such things when he was very small. “Yes,” he said anyway. “Everything is perfectly fine.” He glanced behind himself down the hall.

Thomas looked at him and then looked down the hallway, concerned by his strange behavior. “Are you sure?” he asked.

“Yes,” Logan said, but he wasn’t letting go of Thomas’s shirt.

 “You seem a bit anxious, Logan,” Thomas said.

“I am not,” Logan denied, releasing his shirt. Thomas caught a glimpse of something moving above their heads. The hallway Thomas’s office was in had large pillars along the outer wall that really no one should be able to scale despite there technically being grooves in them. Yet, there Virgil clung to the chapiter of one of them. Even more bewildering, he was gripping a pouch of some kind in his teeth.

The met eyes briefly. Virgil tilted his head at Thomas. Then, he removed one hand from the pillar. How was he up there? He made a motion with his hand that seemed to be telling Thomas to step back.

 Thomas looked back at his son. Logan hadn’t noticed Virgil, too busy glancing behind him and not looking up. Thomas looked back up at Virgil and took a big step back. The moment he did, Virgil grabbed the bottom of the pouch with his free hand and let go with his teeth. The pouch flipped upside down dropping its contents right onto Logan’s head.

Logan gave a high-pitched shriek that Thomas didn’t think he’d ever heard from him before. “Virgil!” he yelled, now absolutely soaked.

“Learn to look up,” Virgil said seriously, still clinging to the pillar.

“I hate you,” Logan replied.

 “Don’t say things you don’t mean in anger,” Thomas reminded. He was a bit worried Virgil may overreact to Logan saying things like that to him, though he seemed perfectly calm at the moment.

Logan scowled at Thomas. “You’re on his side?! He just dumped water on my head!”

“He needs to be trained to be more observant!” Virgil said.

Logan turned his scowl to Virgil. “Come down here, you intolerable creature! I’m done with your so called training!”

“And what would you do if I did come down?” Virgil said arching an eyebrow, wholly unconcerned. “Quote facts about animals at me?”

 Thomas was unsure what about that comment angered Logan, but it apparently did.

“You little…”

“Boys,” Thomas interrupted. “What’s going on here?”

They both immediately started speaking at once, doing their best to talk over each other. Thomas didn’t catch much of either rants except something about ‘training’ and Virgil ‘stalking the halls’ and an exploding muffin.

“Okay, okay,” Thomas putting a hand up to tell both of them to be quiet. “One at a time. Virgil first.”

“Really?” Logan asked.

“Logan,” Thomas scolded.

He mumbled something under his breath, but he did quiet down.

“Virgil,” Thomas started again. “What’s going on?”

 “I’m training him,” Virgil said.

“Training him?” Thomas asked. “Training him for what?”

“For life,” Virgil answered. “He isn’t observant enough.”

“Ah,” Thomas said, still fairly confused. “And how are you training him?”

“Right now, we’re doing situational awareness training,” Virgil said.

“And how does that translate to you dumping water on his head?” Thomas asked.

“He wouldn’t have gotten water on his head if he’d noticed me,” Virgil answered, seriously. Thomas tried not to laugh at the look on his face.

“That is, perhaps true,” Thomas said. “However, dumping water on people’s heads is not nice. Perhaps there is a nicer way to do this training?”

 “People trying to kill them won’t be nice,” Virgil said.

“No one is trying to kill Logan,” Thomas said.

Virgil just pursed his lips. “Maybe,” Virgil said. “Not yet.”

Thomas was unsure where this fear had come from. Perhaps he had heard about the successful assassination of Lamir’s late queen. Thomas hadn’t exactly publicized the fact that the queen had been killed and not simply died when he’d returned, but he had told certain people including Logan and Patton. It was possible one of them had let it slip and Virgil had freaked out about it.

“Well,” Thomas said. “It still isn’t nice to ruin someone’s day over a threat that doesn’t exist yet.”

 Virgil just huffed at him. He was being surprisingly petulant which actually made Thomas smile just a tad. He’d not even been able to imagine this side of him a month ago. “Why don’t you come down here,” Thomas suggested. “We can talk through the issue and come to a compromise.”

Virgil stared down at him with skeptical eyes.

“Perhaps with tea and cookies?” Thomas suggested.

Virgil tilted his head and slid down the pillar until his feet touched the floor. “What kind of cookies?” he asked.

“We’ll have to see what Helen has made lately,” Thomas said. He turned to Logan and frowned. “You should probably change before you get sick being wet and in the cold.”

72374

Logan nodded and shivered a little bit and rubbed his own arms. Despite the castle being warm, it was no fun to be completely soaked during the winter. Thomas wasn’t even sure if Virgil would have thought to not use freezing cold water. Even with heating elements, the water in the castle could be very cold if you didn’t wait for a bit for it to warm up. Thomas didn’t think Virgil would have thought too far ahead in this so called training.

“I’ll take Virgil down to the kitchen and get some tea and cookies for all of us,” Thomas told Logan.

 He gave his son a look trying to communicate ‘I’ll talk to him.’ Logan pursed his lips, but nodded, seeming to receive the message. “Why don’t we meet you in the royal dining room, so the conversation is more private?” It would be a much calmer environment than the main dining hall or the kitchens.

“Sure,” Logan agreed, turning to walk off in the direction of the royal wing. The poor thing was huddled in on himself and cold.

Thomas looked over at Virgil and smiled at him softly as Logan left. “Let’s go see what cookies Helen has ready,” he suggested.

  Chapter 49 (Virgil)

“So,” King Thomas said as they walked through the halls towards the kitchens. The path to the kitchens from pretty much anywhere in the castle was familiar to Virgil now. Food was abundant in this place and there were no restrictions on Virgil eating it. There were no restrictions on anyone in the castle eating it, unless you counted Patton’s mother insisting people eat a more varied diet than only cookies. Personally, while Virgil did like cookies, he had no complaints over that matter. “You and Logan seem to be having a disagreement,” Thomas continued.

“I’m right,” Virgil insisted, and he was.

 However, explaining why Virgil was right to the king was a bit difficult when Virgil was hiding why he knew Logan developing survival instincts was important. It was clear that Virgil did not get his point across correctly because the king laughed slightly.

“Everyone believes they are right during a disagreement,” Thomas said. “I’m sure Logan has his own ideas about who is correct.”

Virgil frowned at him. “I am.”

“Perhaps you are both right,” the king suggested.

“But…”

“You cannot dump water on people’s heads in the castle hallways, Virgil,” the king scolded, but it was a gentle scolding and Virgil forced himself to not climb the wall and disappear. He had a point to make. “Especially not in the winter.”

 “He’s the prince,” Virgil argued. “He needs to know how to protect himself in case of danger.”

“That is true,” Thomas conceded. “You are probably correct that we should be making sure the royal family is well protected and can protect themselves. We have been safe for a long time, but there is always a risk.” He seemed contemplative for a moment. “However,” he continued. “The way you are going about it is not correct in my opinion. Clearly, it is not in Logan’s opinion as well.”

“But…”

“You risk making more problems than solving with your strategy,” the king said.

 “Like what?” Virgil asked.

“Well,” Thomas said. “Getting someone wet when it’s cold is never a good idea even inside a castle.” Virgil… could agree with that. “You also could accidently ruin something important by getting water on it if you don’t give warning. Even if you are doing something besides pouring water on his head, if you continue to do things to ‘train’ Logan in the same vein, he is likely to become more paranoid than vigilant.”

“What’s the difference?” Virgil asked.

“Being vigilant means you are prepared for danger around every corner. Being paranoid means you are expecting danger around every corner.”

 “There doesn’t seem like there’s much of a difference,” Virgil said.

“There is,” said the king, as they pushed through a set of double doors. “Take any of the royal guards,” he gestured subtly at the two people guarding the room to the hall they’d just come from. “If a guard is constantly worried that every little sound is a danger and every new person is an enemy, they will waste all of their energy and time chasing down stray rodents and interrogating maids that decided to walk a different path to their destinations. When real danger does appear, they may be too worn out or distracted to react.”

 “However, if the guards are calm and instead of instantly overreacting to every small thing, they make a note of it in case it ends up being something they need to react to later, then they will be prepared to act if there are any actual threats.”

Virgil bit his tongue to stop from mentioning that he’d managed to sneak by the guards to the royal wing the first night he was here. A boy with a cookie sheet had done more against him that King Thomas’s guards.

“That’s why I make sure everyone who works for the castle, especially the guards have not only time off to sleep and eat, but time off for leisure where they are not expected to be hypervigilant.”

 “All people need to have a time and place to feel safe, even the ones whose jobs it is to keep others safe. Logan’s job is not the same as the guards who keep the people in this castle physically safe, but he is training to be king. He needs time to perform his duties and to relax between them. Harassing him all day with survival training is not going to help him.”

“People don’t need to feel safe,” Virgil argued. “They need to be safe.”

The king stopped walking and turned to him. Virgil couldn’t help but cringe a bit as the king studied him.

 “You haven’t had a chance to feel safe very often in your life, have you?” the king asked.

Virgil shrugged, looking away.

“What would make you feel safe?” Thomas asked.

“Logan being safe,” Virgil said.

“Logan is safe, Virgil,” the king tried to argue.

Virgil scowled. “I don’t trust your guards. Even the best guard won’t be able to help if Logan gets trapped alone with someone. He needs to learn self-defense.”

“Well, I’m already planning to up security in the castle when spring comes. Would me asking if he’d be willing to do self-defense training with someone help?”

[tokkiheart]

Short Drama Recommendations

Got a short attention span? Have ADHD and just want to squeeze one more K-Drama in before going to bed after binge-watching 16+ hours of another K-Drama? Just want to watch something between class or during a work break? Well, here’s a list of some short K-Dramas that I’ve watched that can be finished in less than a day and some under 3 hours.

Semantic Error

This is a cute enemies-to-lovers school (college/university) BL drama with a good OST that's available on Viki. This drama is based off of a webtoon of the same name. It has 8 episodes, each ranging anywhere from 17 minutes to 28 minutes. The entire show is 185 minutes and 1 second long, so roughly 3 hours long!

Splash Splash Love

This is a great super short fluff K-Drama that I love to recommend. It only has 2 episodes, each one being about 1 hour long, so it’ll only kill about 2 hours of your day/night.

This K-Drama is about a high school student who escapes the pressures and stress around school and the important test she’s supposed to take. Where and how does she escape? Well, she escapes into the past via a puddle on a rainy day, winding up in the Joseon dynasty. In order to survive, she pretends to be a eunuch and a mathematician to help the king.

Queen of the Ring

This is a short webdrama that I literally just watched for Ahn Hyo Seop. I’d say this is about middle ground for me, it’s not a favorite, but it’s also definitely not the worst thing that I’ve ever seen by any means lol

To sum this show up very briefly, girl loves boy, boy is in love with some girl he had a chance encounter with (who turns out to be the FL’s best friend) who he doesn’t really know. Girl gets magic ring from mom that allows her to, in the eyes of the person she likes, look like their ideal type (in this case, her friend). Basically, the message of this show boils down to “don’t judge a book by its cover.”

7 First Kisses

This is quite literally the weirdest thing I have ever watched of my own free will and this recommendation is partly a joke and partly because I want to make sure it wasn’t all just a weird fever dream lol

Anyway, this is a web series k-drama (with an extremely misleading title) that is basically a giant ad vehicle for some duty free store/company (I don’t even know what a duty free is, but it seems to just be a big mall/department store). I kid you not when I say that this thing is literally just some y/n fanfic brought to life as a choose-your-own-adventure style show. You could watch the whole series if you want to, or just watch the first episode + whichever episode stars your bias + their corresponding ending episode and call it a day. You can find this show on YouTube where you can watch them all mashed together in one video or watch from a playlist. There’s 15 “episodes,” with the episodes in which the FL meets the male leads and figures out the AU she’s in having a run time of anywhere from 8 minutes and 21 seconds to 12 minutes 51 seconds and the ending episodes for the choices being only 1 to 2 minutes long. If you decide to watch all of the episodes and all the ending possibilities, you’ll kill 1 hour and some minutes of your time, if you just want to watch your bias, you’ll kill less than 25 minutes of your time (anywhere from 18 to 24 minutes depending on your bias).

I will readily admit that the only reason that I even watched this thing was for Lee Jong Suk. Do I have regrets? I genuinely don’t know. This thing was wild lol

Soundtrack #1

A short, four episode long romantic drama that you can find on Disney+ (or your favorite illegal streaming site).

This drama is a best friends turned lovers drama set around winter. The female lead has two weeks to write a song for singer Seo In Guk, I mean Jay Jun, about unrequited love. The only problem? She’s never experienced unrequited love, so she recruits her best friend who she knows is currently experiencing it with “Jennifer.”

The Sound of Magic

This is on the upper end of things in terms of length/run-time. This K-Drama is a musical on Netflix that has 6 episodes, each at about an hour long, which puts the total run time for this drama at 6 hours and 51 minutes, so about 7 hours.

This show has a good OST, it’s a bit darker/serious than most if not all of the other dramas on this list, but it’s got some great light moments.

This show is about a girl who was forced to grow up too fast in order to provide for herself and her little sister, who one day meets a magician who is very much still a child at heart. There’s some intense themes in this show, including an attempted r*pe of a minor, so just be aware of that going into the show.

This ended up being a short list since I haven’t watched a ton of short K-Dramas yet, but I will add to it some more when I watch more!

I will say that outside of shows that I’ve seen, I can say that just about every BL K-Drama tends to run on the short side and can be finished in a few hours. I think they typically tend to range from 6 to 10 episodes in length, with episodes of 30 minutes or less. Outside of those, web series tend to be your next best bet for something short to watch!

[fluffveebee]

i brainstormed a professor layton and stardew valley crossover au on discord, and i want to share it here too, so here’s all of my current ramblings and ideas i’ve had so far, almost completely copy-pasted word for word. very long, very headcanony, very self-indulgent, just as a heads up

anyways yeah. professor layton/stardew valley crossover. idk why or how but this is something ive been brainrotting. i’d imagine the layton family (hershel, luke, flora, alfendi, and katrielle) kinda take the place of the farmer/move onto the farm. idk i just think they deserve a quiet life in a small town.  i’d imagine it takes place after the original two trilogies- the ace attorney crossover, mystery room, and mystery journey don’t happen in this au. hersh’s probably 39-40 (old man...), luke’s probably 15-16, flora 18-19. alfendi’s probably somewhere between luke and flora and kat’s around 6-7. these are nowhere near the canon ages but fuck you it’s my au i do what i want. uncle luke isnt a thing here theyre all siblings. dont ask me about clark and brenda idk also i’ve always sort-of imagined the younger marriage candidates as in their late teens despite the fact they’re probably supposed to be at least in their twenties in canon. abi, emily, haley, maru, penny, alex, sebastian, and sam i view as probably anywhere from late 17-early 20, leah and elliott anywhere from 20-22, with shane and harvey older than them but no concrete age range really.  so that’s reflected here too layton might fish and take care of animals, probably help water crops too. luke would probably plant crops and take main responsibility for watering them but he'd also probly run around town doing requests and other tasks. flora would probably like going into the mines, layton could probably teach her swordfighting lets be real. alfendi.... idk what he'd do but id see him getting along with seb tbh. id like to imagine kat hanging out with vincent and jas but idk if she'd get along with them honestly, i think she might end up being too much for them idk i think they all deserve to live on a farm and relax love the idea of flora being friends with maru and abigail though. flora would bond with maru over robotics and with abi over adventuring. abigail deserves "accidentally ended up friends with multiple laytons" rights (like lucy /j). like yeah bc abigail would probably end up friends with alfendi thru seb. then would probably bond with flora (THEY COULD GO INTO THE MINES TOGETHER)!!! luke she'd probably become friends with bc luke would likely love videogames, they could play journey of the prairie king together. can you tell abigail is one of my faves but ngl. i also like the idea of alfendi becoming friends with leah. idk how thatd work but the thought popped into my head and it wont leave. alfendi layton trading one redhead for another /JOKE. alfendi rambling about his mental issues while leah's all like "STAY STILL" "alfendi layton, have you ever thought about therapy?" "have you?" “🧍” “🧍‍♂️” the professor wouldn't drink but he'd probably spend time at the stardrop saloon i think. gus asks him why he chose to move out to such a small town and he ends up going on this long winded but vague rant about the shit he's gone thru that leaves gus going "holy fucking shit. what" internally by the end of it "you sure you don't want a drink?" “[layton, having flashbacks to randall's dad] no thank you i don't drink haha" pierre: abigail i want you to stop hanging around those layton kids so much abigail: what why pierre: you're starting to sound british pierre would be unironically britphobic /hj anyway honestly layton and shane would probably fuckin. not like each other. layton could probably be the voice of reason that shane needs though, but at this point i could very much see layton as being tired of being the voice of reason after everything he’s gone through. i dont think theyd like each other but i could see them fuckin ending up having late night discussions- i have this clear image in my head of them near the river in cindersap forest? layton’s probably fishing and shane’s probably got a beer and theyre just sitting there talking about whatever the conversation turns to i think luke would probably be well liked by everyone bc like. who cant like luke. some people would probably find him annoying but they wouldn't necessarily dislike him. id like to think about him and emily being friends, she might teach him to sew and he wouldnt give a care about her being the ""weird girl"" type. he would probably talk to the parrot she gets in year 2(?) as well (do yall think luke'd be able to talk to the junimos before meeting the wizard? ik theyre not animals but itd be a neat concept) attack dog luke would probably scare off clint too which good for him, emily deserves better than clint. luke would. not like clint. which me too, i also dont like clint i think he'd also be friends with penny but in a casual, 'we can share the same space quietly and not be bothered' type way. i think they’d end up having a little book club but it’s only comprised of them two. i feel like they'd have like, a system of each one of them picking a book per every two weeks, they take a week to read whatever book they picked before swapping and taking another week. it'd probably start off as a little unspoken thing that quickly develops into regular routine tbh.  luke, giving penny his book: oh you're gonna hate this one penny, giving luke hers: oh good. so you're gonna love this one (later- luke, reading it: oh i fucking hate this penny, reading it: oh i love this) imagine they're reading books in the same room and one of them goes "WHAT THE FUCK" and the other just laughs and goes "oh did you get to that part?" they’d probly look forward to the end of the second week bc they like sitting down and discussing the books with each other regardless if they enjoyed the book itself or not idk what the official term is for it but oh my god yall know how elliott's a writer? oh my god penny and luke could basically like beta-read elliott's books id like to think about katrielle and haley hanging out but in the way like the oldest cousin gets attached to the youngest if you get what i mean haley would fucking love dressing up kat, and kat would probably like being dressed up (inspired by the fact kat has multiple outfits she wears in both the game and anime) i also think haley and emmy would get along if they ever met. like they'd probably clash at first but if they ever got to actually know each other i think they'd like each other especially because they both have the photography thing. idk i like to imagine if people like emmy or des ever came around it'd just be like, them staying for a visit. yknow? anyway layton would go nuts over the amount of fossils n shit in the valley, it'd probably take so much self-control for him to not completely dig up the farm. he'd probably be the one who donates most things to the museum, he'd also probably have his own collection. flora would probably leave gems that she gets down in the mines for him to donate and she'd probably let him crack geodes too. flora gives him geodes and he gives back stuff like gems and ores he doesnt need caroline also has a sunroom where she has tea- consider: caroline and layton having tea together also i think jodi and flora should spend time together. like i think jodi should teach flora how to cook. flora loves cooking but isnt good at it- not to say you have to be good at things you enjoy but i think it'd be good for her to learn how to do something she enjoys well. and you know how people'll like send you recipes in the mail? people'd probably quickly learn to address them specifically to flora or be like "i know you're not really gonna use this, so feel free to give it to flora" abigail plays the flute and luke can/is learning to play the violin.... they could play together!! haley is friends with alex so i could see haley bringing kat around, i think alex would take to her tbh. kat'd probably be a more rambunctious kid but i think he'd be able to keep her attention and probably help tire her out tbh. i think he should teach her sports. evelyn would probably dote on katrielle too. evelyn would dote on everyone in the family actually. like layton'd pop by to take kat or whoever home and evelyn would pull him inside as well and go "are you eating enough? here have this i made too much last night and we're not going to eat it, just make sure to bring back the container" layton'd walk up with literally nothing and leave with whatever kid he stopped by for and an armful of food, luke would probably help her tend to the plants in town too i dunno. i think they'd be able to bring like. the perfect amount of liveliness to the valley, and they deserve to be able to just chill out and live. this is all i really have (so far) but if i come up with anything else for the au i’ll probably add it on in a reblog hdndhdn