#i still have a lot of books and subjects to study for university

[hebimoonlightwrites]

Finally after a lot of time spent on my books rushing my studies for University, I managed to finish studying most of the books I had to study! So I officially come back to dedicate myself to this blog and to you all!!! ♥ I missed you all!! Thank you for all the messages and support you sent me in the last weeks! I've appreciated it a lot! Also thank you a lot for all the requests you sent me!

I officially close my inbox for requests at the moment! (it's still open for anons who want to interact, though~♥)

In these days until the 14th I'll prepare all the Valentine's drabbles for you all~ I think I'll post them all on Valentine's day, so... check it out~!

Thank you again for the support and the messages! In case nobody has told you, you're amazing! I'm proud of you all! Keep it up your hobbies, passions or whatever makes you happy!~♥

[xbomboi]

yapping about Briar. fellow Briar enjoyers assemble.

okay okay i don’t make it too obvious (or maybe i do, i wouldn’t know) but briar is my personal favorite character. i think about where the stories of all the characters would go and what their arcs would be a lot, but hers in particular is really important to me.

so i wanna talk about it.

first of all, she’s narcoleptic coded, right. we all know that. but her mom on the other hand reads to me, like, an alcoholic mother? and her dad is just willfully ignorant. either way, there’s a huge sense of neglect going on in that family. i mean go figure why briar would be the one doing most of the work raising her brothers. and of course she’s a party girl, because who’s gonna stop her? her parents? see yeah exactly.

so i don’t think it’s unreasonable to say she doesn’t have very strong parental figures in her life, at least not at home. but, and now you have to really hear me out about this one, i think baba yaga could take up a parental role in her life.

i know it isn’t much, but the seeds for her having at least a hint of a connection with baba yaga are there.

in the webisode “Stark Raven Mad”, baba yaga scolds briar for rambling about her party, and then as the commotion picks up she’s still exercising authority over briar in particular.

then there’s thronecoming, wherein, when briar is sulking at the dance, upon noticing the picture on the projector, she asks baba yaga for answers, who provides them.

and then skipping all the way to epic winter, after the girls become a little creeped out by her mannerisms and book it, briar is the one who makes sure to peak back in and give a parting remark.

so i think there’s potential there to be explored. her feeling neglected at home and then finding solace in another adult at school would be neat.

but the fact that it’s baba yaga is important, so just put a pin in that and we’ll circle back to it.

now, i think out of the core four, she was (at least at first) the hardest to actually pin-point what the future of her story could look like. with raven, i think it’s pretty clear her journey is just continuing to combat the prejudices of the world as she fights for change, apple is now pretty much on a path to figuring out her own future as ruler of a kingdom and what that’s going to entail, and maddie is the goofball that’s there to have fun and be supportive along the way.

then there’s briar. and, let me be clear, no, in my mind that girl is not sleeping for 100 years with where things are heading; in the main universe of the story, briar will be free of the sleeping beauty destiny.

but it’s like, if she’s not gonna sleep, what more is there to actually do with her? what direction COULD her life go in? because if she’s no longer fated to sleep 100 years of her life away, then she can’t just party like there’s no tomorrow anymore. she’d need to decide what she actually wants to do with her life.

and i think i have an idea.

i mentioned her narcoleptic coding at the start with intent to bring it up again. see, you might notice that a lot of the fairytale aspects of ever after high can be read as allegories for real-world problems. for example, hunter and ashlynn’s relationship is treated in their world the same way society may look at queer couples or biracial couples. or how raven’s mom being trapped in a mirror is their world equivalent to not paying child support.

with that kind of correlation in mind, i think treating briar’s curse as a condition could open up an interesting opportunity. i think, in their world, curses as a whole could be viewed as a separate branch of medical specialization, with briar spearheading this notion of thought.

we know briar is well-versed in chemythstry already. in the webisode “Briar’s Study Party” she makes note of the fact that she’s been studying forever-after, and she demonstrates enough knowledge in the subject to enthusiastically teach it to her friends, who all end up acing their tests on it as a result.

i think this is something she could potentially make a career out of. i think she could come to the conclusion that she wants to be able to help break curses for people everywhere, and could pursue learning to develop potions and elixirs to do so.

which could happen under baba yaga’s tutelage.

picture this: briar declares her newfound goal, to which baba yaga offers to teach briar all she knows in order to achieve what she’s set her sights on. briar—with an ounce of hesitance—accepts, and baba yaga officially takes her under her wing with the intent of mastering sorcery.

obviously, she wouldn’t lose who she is in this. she’s still gonna be an impulsive, adrenaline junkie who desperately needs a screentime limit on her mirrorphone. but in this process, she’d be rounded out by baba yaga and would in turn mature a bit from the experience. she’d get serious about life, but she wouldn’t let go of who she is at heart.

this could lead to her becoming the resourceful one in the main group. like on adventures, she’d be able to pull out a potion or whip something up (because i’m not going to let raven’s magic make her too o.p. she’s gotta have limitations) as a solution to problems. she could really have a role that proves useful and important to the story.

that’s my ideal pitch for where to take briar’s character.

[cam3lliaw]

Catching the eye of a prince

-crownprince!gojo x maid!reader

Who would’ve thought getting caught reading a book during work hours one random day would not only make you good friends with the right hand of the crown prince, but also end up making the said crown prince be interested in getting to know you.

contents/ warnings: might be ooc, insecurities( some implied), mentions of stealing, a bit of angst at times to eventual fluff, friends to lovers trope, the main characters are all in their early 20s, tba

word count: 0.7 k words

series masterlist

notes: I've read a lot of jjk royalty au recently and I was inspired to write one as well :) this is the prologue and I don't really know how long this will turn out to be but i hope you enjoy it !! (fic under the cut)

“Need any help with that?” a gruff voice could be heard from behind.

You didn’t need to turn around to know that the voice belonged to none other than Geto Suguru, the crown prince’s right hand, his one and only best friend, and last but not least, your occasional thorn in the side.

“You really like that joke a lot, don’t you, Lord Geto.” you said, still not turning to face him as you continued to hang the sheets on the clothesline.

“And you really like to call me that, even though I tell you all the time that Suguru is just fine. And besides, I wasn’t, and never will be, joking when I ask you that question, [name].” he chuckled.

“You know that my answer will always be no, Suguru. There are some lines that even I won’t cross, and to be honest, it’s absurd to even consider I’ll let you help me.”

“And why is that?” he asked, even though he fully knows the answer already.

“Well for starters, I’m not that stupid not to be aware of the difference in our status, friends or not, it still matters to me. And secondly-” you turn to face him as a smile stretches on your face “You don’t see me coming to your office and telling you how you should do your work.”

“I wouldn’t oppose to that, you know.” Suguru smiled back.

“Like I’m smart enough to even step into a place like that.” you huffed jokingly.

At that he grimaced slightly.

“Come on, [name]. We both know you are way smarter than a lot of the people that work in this palace.”

“Reading a few books here and there only get you so far, Suguru. You, out of everyone, should know that well.”

It never gets easier, admitting that you wish for more. In another universe, you would read all day, study literature properly with someone who actually knows what they’re doing, not only from damaged pages of stolen books from the royal library, books that are about to be disposed not only because the years have left them in a horrible shape but sometimes also because the concepts explained are so old that they aren’t even right anymore.

“You know I could always bring and lend you newer ones right? I told you that on multiple occasions already and I mean it every time.” Suguru said as he approached you and stood by your side.

You also know Suguru would never make fun of you, he really wants to help. But it’s hard enough to get and hide the books in the maids’ chambers before you finish reading them and returning them to the library's unofficial “trash” section. Imagine what trouble you would get in if you get caught with fancy new books. It hurts only to think about it.

“I know…I’ll let you know in case I need anything. I promise.”

Saying this is clearly better than admitting the truth. As much as you don’t want unnecessary problems for yourself, dragging Suguru into all of this mess is even worse.

“This doesn’t look very…straight.” Suguru changed the subject to lighten the mood, as he tried to lightly stretch one of the sheets.

“We both know that’s a bold-faced lie! Don’t mess the laundry! If it ends up falling down and I’ll have to wash it again, I won't talk to you anymore, Suguru.”

“We also know that’s not true.” he chuckled as he gently bumped his side into yours.

You returned the action.

And he did it once again but a bit more forceful.

And the cycle repeated itself for a few more times until you literally shoved him, but before he could fall on the grass, he grabbed your hands and dragged you down as well, falling down a step away from the dark haired man.

“You’re acting like a child!” you exclaimed as you started laughing.

“Says the one who shoved me!” he started to laugh too.

“You started it!”

“Oh that’s such a mature argument, [name]. Impressive, really.” the male continued to laugh as he got up and helped you up as well.

Unknown to the both of you, this whole exchange was watched from afar by none other than the crown prince, who was initially looking for his best friend, but it seems like he found something else instead.

end notes: i hope you liked it! :)

[robin-evry]

Hi, so I love your work and was curious on if I can infodump on SpiderMan/Spidersona!Yuu. I wanted to create Spidersona!Yuu, but I ran out of ideas, so.... is it okay if I do so?

Thank you I'm glad you enjoy it, this gave me a brain rot about spider!yuu so I hope you don't mind me creating a headcanon about them. And sure if you want info dump me.

𝐒𝐏𝐈𝐃𝐄𝐑𝐒𝐎𝐍𝐀!𝐘𝐔𝐔 𝐈𝐍𝐓𝐎 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐓𝐖𝐒𝐓 𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐋𝐃 🕸️🕷️

The Spider-Verse is connected by the Web of Life and Destiny. This is a subsection of the Marvel multiverse that connects all versions of Spider-Man from across the multiverse in a series of shared events and attributes.

Imagine during the dwarf cave mind, yuu was bitten by a spider. When they reported this back to Crowley, he said that they would be fine since the spider that seems to bite them isn't that dangerous and doesn't seem to have any venom in it. So they sleep it off, and when they wake up, they have been greatly enhanced as well as given some magical abilities.

Or spider!yuu was their city's friendly neighborhood hero, saving lives and being a student. During one of their times saving a civilian from a robbery a black carriage appears in their eye sight and everything turns black and then wakes up in a coffin and wearing a robe.

Regardless they will still be their hero self but instead of their city it's in another world.

At NRC, spider!yuu has a regular reputation at school they are well known for being smart at subjects like potionolgy but by far that's it, they don't stand out a lot. But who cares such boring students there's been a new hero appearing at the island.

Using webs to stop robber injustice on the island, this hero manages to become a vigilante on this island as well as a friend on the island for anyone. ( NRC is located in an Island with a town and RSA, you can look up at )

Using the new technology and resources in the world, spider!yuu manage to build themselves a much better arsenal or equipment for them during their time.

Grim work as their sidekick sometimes helps them get out of situations that almost caught or reveal their identity, as well give them enough time to change into their suit.

After a day of crime fighting and studying for a subject, spider!Yuu would swing towards the highest point of NRC, take a deep breath of fresh air and admire the sun rise right there as well looking at the entire island.

During their time at NRC, they have gained and a few trustworthy friends that knew their identity ace, deuce and grim will work as eyes on the ground and idia figure their identity on accident but he promises on not telling their identity as well help them with tech and turning off any security cameras that may become a big problem

Even some students already knew their identity but decided to keep it a secret out of respect for what spider!yuus doing. Rook also managed to find out but decided to keep it a secret as a way of respect and thanking them for saving vil one time.

Malleus and their first interaction, was when spider!yuu was in their hero suit and saw malleus thinking about something and decided to hang upside down and greeted him. This of course caught the malleus off guard but found this situation amusing and they continued to chat for a few minutes until malleus had to leave.

Spider!yuu is also manage to learn how to build and create their own suit thanks to the help of their late-mentor as well some advanced technology. One of their most prizes possessions are a pair of advanced technology glasses.

Under ramshackle, spider!Yuu have built a lair with multiple suits inside for them. That insists on them in any situation, this place also becomes their and first years hang out place, talking about tech and other things, comic books and school it even has a lounge area for them.

Similar to their other variants in other universes, spider!yuu has the same abilities as them spidey sense, enhanced physical body as well the ability to shoot out webs but what makes them different from the others is that they are able to shoot webs using magic or channel or cast magic thru their webs.

Spider!Yuu can alter the properties of their webs with magic, creating webs that freeze, burn, or shock on contact. For instance, they might use an ice-infused web to immobilize an opponent or a fire-infused web to create a protective barrier. As well creating protective barriers, charms and etc. during times of them being busy in NRC they are able to create a clone of themselves to deal with their school or hero work when one of them gets busy. But they only can make one at a time.

Has an army of cats behind the ramshackle dorm, spider!yuu is notorious for feeding and giving shelter towards stray cats to the point they will follow them everywhere even during their hero time, this is almost revealed their secret identity due to the cats being able to recognize their scent.

Even without the suit, spider!yuu is naturally a good person and a mediator, they come across epel being Targeted by many rowdy students who just finish destroying his plant project for a class before it can escalate into something worse, spider!yuu In front of both of them and ask the bullies to go away. Epel was originally mad at them for letting them get away with his plant but spider!yuu decided to give their plant project to epel instead. Surprise by this act before epel can react, spider!yuu has already left the green house. In return epel gave them a crate of his grandparents apple juice as a way to say thank you to them, this is the start of a beautiful friendship.

Spider!yuu hero persona has become some sort of idol towards the RSA student, the student body seeing them as a hero or a knight in shining armor making them to idolize spider!yuu and drive their dedication to chivalry. A mascot and idol towards people in twst

Even tho they save lives and fight crime many people are still suspicious of them saying that their hero persona is nothing but a fake and will try to tarnish their name.

Even tho spider!yuu is accommodating to their new life in twst, they are still worried about their city and family doing without them as well being constantly burned out due to them always trying to balance their double life.

Since every universe is supposed to have a canon spiderman, I have this writing idea that helps connect spider!yuu to the spider verse or web of Destin, so basically spider!yuu dimension already has a spiderman so they don't need another spiderman, and so spider!yuu was teleported to twst to become its canon spiderman. In summary spider!yuu was Destined to become the spiderman of the twst universe and they were destined to come to / be in twst to become its canon spiderman.

[chemblrish]

Maria Skłodowska-Curie. That's it, that's the post.

As per my poll, here's a post on MSC!

This post began as a bit of a messy thing. I wanted to write about MSC because she was a brilliant Polish woman who became one of the most important scientists of modern chemistry and physics and I, as a Polish woman and a science major, admire her greatly. But the whole thing was vague and lacked direction. I received some kindly advice though and decided to focus on this: what was Maria like? Everybody knows she had an exceptional mind, that she had close ties with Paris, that she discovered radium and polonium, that she received the Nobel prize twice… But did you know she was said to have “serious, gray eyes” or that her initial plan was to spend her life working as a teacher or that she loved her homeland deeply? Underneath her doubtlessly exceptional achievements she was a person, and I’d love to take a look at that.

Maria Skłodowska ("skwo-DOV-ska") was born on 7 November 1867 in Warsaw under Russian occupation. Her father was a mathematics and physics teacher, so it may seem natural that little Maria took an interest in science, but as a child she was a phenomenal student in general, no matter the subject; she read a lot of books, and she learnt to read very early. She was considered very gifted. 

Her family wasn’t rich by any means. Maria’s father – a Polish man, a school teacher under the tzar’s merciless reign – knew very well he couldn’t afford to give all his children the education he wanted for them, not to mention neither Maria nor her older sister Bronia were allowed to attend university in occupied Poland. Making their dreams come true – studying at the Sorbonne – depended on the money they didn’t have.

At 17 Maria made a decision: she was going to work as a teacher while Bronia pursued medicine in Paris with the help of the money earned by Maria. After Bronia’s graduation they would switch: Bronia was going to work as a doctor while Maria attended university.

It was by no means an easy task. During the following years Maria had to withstand not only immensely hard work and a longing for learning, but also unfair employers, lack of respect, and heartbreak. But she persisted. She was 24 when finally she was able to pack up and take the train to Paris.

[source]

Soon after taking up her studies at the Sorbonne did Maria realize how far behind the other students she was: they were able to pursue an official education in a free country, something she’d never gotten to experience before. She had been an excellent student back in Poland, a fluent French speaker, but now it turned out her knowledge was lacking. Obviously, this couldn’t discourage her. Bronia’s husband Kazimierz wrote in a letter to her father that Maria would spend entire days at her university, only coming home in the evening. She worked admirably hard to catch up. And she was happy: at long last she could study science and mathematics in depth, the way she had longed to do for so many years.

Of course, money never stopped being an issue. Even with her father’s and sister’s help, she was still poor. She definitely wasn’t eating enough. In winter, she was cold. Other than that, she mostly gave up on her colleagues, refused to waste her time on “insignificant” things: that is, everything but studying, unfolding the secrets of chemistry and physics, practicing her laboratory skills. She was living and breathing science.

[left / right]

Pierre Curie was older, an exceptional physicist, charming and calm, still unmarried at 35 – he wouldn’t love a woman who couldn’t be first and foremost his intellectual partner. But Maria wasn’t looking for love and she certainly wasn’t looking for a marriage. She had a degree in physics, was on her way to get a degree in mathematics as well, all the while working on the magnetism of steel. And indeed, when they met through a professor who thought Pierre might be of help to young Maria, it was mostly curiosity, mutual respect, and primarily a great scientific interest that bloomed between them and brought them closer together.

Maria didn’t give in easily. All along her plan had been to earn her degrees and return to Warsaw, to her elderly father, and remain working as a teacher for the rest of her life. But there’s no doubt that when she eventually agreed to marry Pierre, it was out of genuine, deep love. They had a sincere, precious connection, both emotional and intellectual.

Did you know Maria and Pierre loved to travel the countryside on their bikes? They did. It’s how they spent most of their time together after their wedding. And not for a moment did they forget about their shared passion for science – they discussed it even during their travels. They lived together and they worked together. Their first child Irène – future Nobel prize winner as well! – was born in September 1897, Ève – their younger daughter – seven years later.

Pierre’s family adored Maria, Maria’s family loved Pierre. The two of them would frequently visit Pierre’s parents and they continued their biking trips, but other than that their life was utterly devoted to science. I know, it sounds like I’m exaggerating, but it’s true. Along with the fact they always had very little money, work was all they had.

Radium appeared in Maria’s life when she was working on her doctorate. Her laboratory was cold, damp, and badly equipped, but it seems to me Maria’s determination was inexhaustible. She began by studying uranium, but she soon figured out she had to include other elements in her research as well in order to solve the mystery at hand. It was only after a year of this work that Maria realized she might have discovered an element previously unknown.

Pierre was interested in Maria’s research before, but – save from the occasional advice as an older and more experienced scientist – he mostly left her to do her own thing while he focused on his crystals. At this point however, he was so intrigued he abandoned his research to work with Maria on her project. In 1898 (two years into Maria’s PhD work!) they published a paper together – in it they announced the discovery of a new element: polonium, named after Maria’s beloved homeland. Later that year, they did the same for radium. They coined the term “radioactivity”.

Maria kept a meticulous journal, not only for her laboratory work. She was carefully tracking their spending as well as Irène’s development, the way she learnt to walk and speak and play with their cat.

And so, her life continued: filthy, hard work in the infamous shed, a ton of an ore for less than a gram of product (!), countless papers published with her dearest husband, watching their daughter grow, earning her doctorate degree; then, in 1903, her first Nobel prize (along with her husband and Henri Becquerel).

The Nobel prize brought Maria and Pierre fame – and it was a tragedy. For them, at least. Modest and humble as they were, they couldn’t stand the journalists almost storming their garden, going as far as “describing [their] black and white cat [in the newspapers]” as Pierre said in a letter to a friend. I allowed myself to translate a piece of a letter that Maria sent to her brother in 1904 amid the post-Nobel craze, as it’s both sad and hilarious:

“I wish you health [for your name-day], well-being for all of your family, and for you never to experience the sort of correspondence and assault that we are now subjected to. Ever since that accursed Nobel prize we’ve been unable to do anything, and I’m beginning to ask myself if the money we received will be of any consolation, as, after all, the people who sell me meat, coal, sugar, etc. are richer than me yet they do not experience such sorrows. […] and yesterday some American wrote to me, asking for permission to name a race horse after me.”

Maria’s life took a truly sharp turn when Pierre died in an accident in 1906. Despite the tragedy that irreparably crushed her heart, she never ceased her work. She became a professor, organized classes for her and her friends’ kids, ran the Radium Institute, continued her research, received her second Nobel prize. During World War I it was her mobile X-ray machines that saved countless lives: she was active and involved, operating the machines with her older daughter and teaching others how to do it.

[left / right]

She lived long enough to see her dear, beloved Poland become an independent country once more. To the very end she remained humble and uninterested in fame, hardworking and dedicated entirely to science.

I based this post mostly on Madame Curie by her daughter Ève which I highly recommend!

[helenstudies]

I've seen a lot of "gifted kid burnout" posts and also a few "where do we go to post studyblr stuff when we're bad students and don't get good grades" so I'm here to talk about my own experience of "I've never been a gifted kid and I've never been a good student".

I'm not a gifted kid. In fact, there was no "gifted kid" system in my country at all. And instead of multiple choice questions or true or false questions, we had to memorize pages and pages of our textbook and write them down during three hour exams. You can't get "a" and "the" wrong or you lose points, that's how much memorization we had to do. We didn't get electives until our last two years of high school and the electives were "biology or economics?" Yeah, those were the only two. Even at my university, I didn't get to choose my own electives. Everything came in a neat little box that you can never escape. And we never, EVER get full marks in Burmese or English. 80 out of 100 is considered phenomenal and no one's ever gotten more than 82 in either subject. So our matriculation exam's full mark is 600 but the most you can get is 550.

Suffice to say, the education system sucked and I don't like memorization so my grades were 50% at most. I failed my math and physic classes with 28 marks out of 100 for a whole two years, only barely passing on midterms and end of year exams. For my matriculation exam I got 340 out of 600, which is SUBPAR. That's 2.0 GPA btw. I never thought of myself as educated or a good student and I still don't.

But I love languages and I realize that while languages seem hard to learn and have strict rules, they actually don't. You can move them around and learn them however you like. So as an avid reader, I started learning languages so that I will be able to read books in those languages and I found studying liberating. Why not? I'm no longer memorizing 600 pages of text book and writing them down.

I realize that I love learning and studying when I get to choose what I learn. So I stopped caring about grades and started learning things that I love. Hey, do you know what's the biggest side effect of learning things that you love and not caring about grades? It's that you actually start to learn and your grades start to come up. I realize I perform badly when I am stressing out about my grades. This is why you're seeing all my 100% grade and 80% grade all over my walls. It's not because I'm a good student. It's because I've let go of the notion that I HAVE to be a good student.

I can talk about my bad grades as freely as I can talk about my good grades. I can tell you that I've been learning Japanese for ten seven years and I'm only JLPT N3 level. Honestly, you know what? As a generation, we're due to appreciate our process and progress instead of our achievements. It's fine if you're a bad student. It's fine if you are a gifted kid who fell off the wagon. It's fine if you've never been a gifted kid or a bad student. What matters is you're here studying and learning and appreciating yourself for doing all that.

So post your good grades, post your bad grades. Post your good stuff and bad stuff and messy notes. Post about your good days and your bad days. Talk about your productive days and talk about your rest days. Keep going and keep learning!

[matrixbearer2024]

Also how old are the Stan twins by the time Dipper and Mabel are 12? I’m assuming they’re in college but feel free to correct me.

By the time Dipper and Mabel are 12, the Stan Twins are out of college(technically). If we place the AU in 2024(they were born in 2003) they're already 21, and considering that most undergraduate programs could typically last 2-6 years- their undergrad courses (BSBA[Bachelor of Science in Business Administration] for Stan and BS(CMB)[Bachelor of Science in Biology with specialization in Cell and Molecular Biology] for Ford) are 4 year courses. They haven't been delayed or are late in any educational progress so they've only got a year left of undergrad.

They study in Graviton University Oregon, because I didn't have gravity falls "exist" technically. The town exists and that's where the university is, just more urbanized and without any of the wtf weird creatures that reside in the town from canon.

By the way, the niblings haven't been born yet considering that Shermie isn't even married yet. I plan on Shermie getting married by new year of 2025 and settling down in Piedmont with his girl, and the niblings will be born the year after around the same time the Stan Twins finally finish undergrad.

That's not the last of it though since they both still plan on moving up to masters and Ford wants to get a Phd(he starts with one and then starts collecting them like Pokémon) and it's mostly where they diverge paths as Stan throws himself into more of accounting/enterprenurial and Ford into researcher/biologist.

I don't really think Stan uses his knowledge on business too much at the start however since I do plan on him being scouted for a sports team(Haven't decided between basketball or baseball yet) before he graduates and while building his career as an athlete he finishes his masters(he takes 3 years to do it instead of the usual 2).

Ford had his fun in undergrad, so he fully commits to studying at this point and like in canon is pretty damn advanced compared to the rest of his peers. The curriculum and subject weights have definitely shifted from canon but I still do think it would only more or less take him 7-8 years to get his first doctorate.

By the time the niblings are 12, the Stan twins are 34, Sherm's 42.

Stan's spotlight as an athlete is waning and he's mostly helping run Fidds' family business, he's practically acting CEO in Fidds' place and is very comfortable with the pay he's getting. Stan wasn't really hardcore into sports anyway, he just took the opportunity because it presented itself to him and frankly he's okay with that. He starts drawing comics again as a hobby and with Fidds' help eventually becomes a comic-book artist part time since a businessman is his main gig post sports stardom. Much like some iconic artists and writers in DC and marvel, he ends up joining them when people like the series he puts out and the more "retro" artstyle.

Ford is making innovations left and right in the realm of genetics and biotechnology ever since graduating at 30 and he's got Fidds and Bill to help him with the more techy parts of his work. Ford hasn't stopped studying entirely though and honestly collects honorary PhDs to keep himself well rounded, not to mention he consistently attends seminars or science conferences to keep on top of the newest discoveries or updates to what's going on in the world. It wasn't his dream or intention of becoming one of the "greats" that go down in history but he really might at his pace, it's not something he thinks or cares about though.

You could argue that their life is practically being fast-tracked here but honestly, I think the pace fits them. It's a lot less chaotic compared to canon but considering how driven these two are, I think it's a pretty comfortable pace.

By the way, despite the busy life and all that- Ford tries his best to go to all of Stan's games live even when Shermie or Caryn miss it, despite the fact he doesn't really know anything that's going on just which team his brother's playing and if he's winning. Similarly, when Ford is called to give conferences to explain his findings or research Stan is more than happy to fly out to where he is and sit in just to give his support despite not knowing a damn or understanding whatever the hell his brother is talking about LOL

They're still very close considering that they didn't ever have a fight that tore them apart, they respected each other's wishes and interests and just talked. They always talked. I suppose that's ultimately what makes the big difference.

[ancha-aus]

RealAgeAU Drabble - Third time the charm?

I am back! @spotaus

Look I got the week off and I am sick. there is very little else I am going to do except game, write and watch vods. So here I am again!

Back to filling up the, in my mind, holes in the story so far before we continue on!

First Drabble Prev Drabble Next Drabble

*------------------*

Dust looks at the many books before him as he tries to think of what to get for Nightmare. Nightmare meanwhile is being a good babybones and stays by Horror eating ice cream.

Dust continues to stare at the books. Trying to think back. What did six year olds have to learn at this point anyway? And how far ahead of that is Nightmare?

Dust knows that Nightmare is smarter than the average six year old. That is a given. Dust knows his vocabular and reading skills are also far above average.

Dust just isn't sure how far certain skills and knowledge got reversed for him.

"Still no luck?"

Dust blinks out of his staring and looks up at Horror "What?"

Horror nods to the books, Nightmare easily held in one arm against his shoulder. Nightmare looks even tinier in Horror's hold and Dust already thinks Nightmare is smaller for his age than he should be.

Smarter but smaller.

Dust shrugs and turns back to the shelf he had been searching "Not sure on his skills."

Horror hums and looks at the books himself. Dust turns back to the options and thinks. They are still moving and universe hopping a lot making it impractical to take too many. One or two at most. That way they can at least start with some classes.

Horror turns to him and Dust looks up to show he has his attention. Horror nods towards the shelf "test level?"

Dust shakes his skull "I could but to specific." if he happens to pick a subject Nightmare still knows about it would set Nightmare up for more difficult classes, even while Nightmare may not be ready for all of those.

Horror hums in understanding as he searches the shelf.

Dust turns back again and thinks. They should at least get a math book. Math is after all to train your brain and problem solving skills. Which would be helpful. Probably basic add and substractions. He searches the shelf and picks out the book that looks promising.

Horror looks at the book before nodding and turning back "What else?"

And that is the problem isn't it? Because most subjects are still too complex for Dust's taste to get. history and geography while both would probably interest Nightmare both are very universe depended and just teaching him stuff about a world they may not even stay in would just be a waste of time.

Horror nudges his shoulder and once Dust looks at him he nods towards the english section "He likes poetry."

Dust blinks and nods. Maybe that is fine? He is already for ahead with english anyway. Maybe giving him something to work and read which is familiar and liked by him while they struggle through math together will be good for his motivation? Dust nods to Horror and walks over there.

Dust frowns at all the titles. He knows very little about this kind of stuff. He searches the story and finds a store clerk and walks over to them "Hello."

The person jumps and turns quickly "oh! Hi! I am sorry i didn't notice you... euh... what can i help with?"

Dust nods to the poetry books "Want a book."

The person blinks and nods "okay.... are you looking for a theme? Or a certain writer? A specific age or focus?" they walk towards the right shelf and look back at Dust.

Dust frowns and glances over at Nightmare nad Horror. Nightmare shrugs and hides his face while Horror looks unsure himself. Dust thinks for a moment "Need a book for the babybones. He already has one." Dust can't remember the name or writer of the book.

The clerk smiles and takes out a thin book with easy rhyming "This should be fine!"

Dust takes it and studies it and it doesn't feel the same. he shakes his skull and hands it back "There was a line in the book... of a poem he reads a lot..." and Dust has read a lot to him. "It went something like 'The dark goes deep but it is no end. Because in the night broken things mend. A time to rest and time to heal, it is the moment when we have a meal.'" Dust frowns as he tries to continue "something something... then later 'The night holds and the night protects. hidden away with all its gems. Holding the stars and letting those shine. until...' and that is what i remember from that..." and he waits.

The clerk frowns "That kinda seems like a few writers from the great depression..." they search the shelf and pull out an older looking book. They hand it over and frown "It seems a bit complex for a tiny child though..." and they shoot a smile in Nghtmare's direction. Not that nightmare is looking at any of them.

Dust looks through the book and nods "I think this will work..." it seems more on par of the book that Nightmare has been reading.

They go to the counter and Dust pays for the two books.

Dust and Horror leave the store together. The person says something but Dust isn't paying any attention to them as he checks the math book. the poetry book already in his bag.

Horror looks a bit embarrased and Dust frowns "What is wrong?"

Horror shrugs and rubs his cheek sheepish "Just... the what that person said."

Dust frowns as he glares back at the shop "Something bad?" he can go back and make them pay easily enough-

Horror holds up his one free hand "no no! Nothing like that... just..." and he shrugs as he keeps a tight hold on Nightmare. Seems like Nightmare is getting fussy. meaning either he is tired or hungry and he goes to acting grumpy because that is easier to hide behind than admitting he needs something.

Dust blinks back and nods at Horror "If you are sure-"

"Horror! Dust! Wait up!"

Dust freezes and glares "Oh are you fucking with me." That are the fucking stars. shit. He looks at Horror and sees that Horror made the same conclusion and that Nightmare is frozen in his hold.

They share a look. Dust is holding unto too many things to do the same as he did before and he doubt he can use the same tactic twice to get them out.

They have both been spotted.

Horror looks at Nightmare and clearly gets an idea as he pulls Nightmare back a bit "Stay still and don't move."

Some confusion brekas through the panicked look but Nightmare nods and that is all Horror needed as he lifts his shirt and just puts Ngihtmare under it nad IN his ribcage.

Moments later horror has the shirt on normally again and Nightmare isn't in view at all.

Right. Nightmare is small enough to be hidden like that-

running steps and Blue and Dream stop by them. Blue pants "FInally! Am I happy to see you!"

Dust and Horror share a confused look and Dust frowns "Since when?"

Blue looks a bit sheepish and looks at Dream. Dream looks very uncomfortable as he rubs his hands "I... euh... I was wondering... euh..." he looks around and spots the books Dust is holding "oh! Getting things for your little one?" and he smiles.

Dust nods and only after agreeing he remembers what Cross said last time they came across the Stars.

Dream nods once he realises that Dust isn't going to speak "Right! Yes. That is amazing! I... I see everything is well? How is the little one?"

Blue nods "We realised you never told us the little guy's name..."

Dust knows he is glaring as he speaks slowly "He is doing fine." and he stops there. shooting them a challenging look.

Blue coughs in his hand before looking at Horror "sup!"

Horror however looks many times more annoyed then Dust feels. Probably because Horror right now feels the nervous and anxious magic of Ngihtmare a lot more directly than they feel when they are just holding him. Putting him more on edge.

Blue gives a slow nod and looks away "Right..."

Dust raises a brow "Did you want anything specif or just wanted to waste our time?"

Dream flinches before smiling "I... I did have a request... I was... I was wondering... If you guys could ask Nightmare to meet with me?"

Dust freezes for a moment before his glare gets worse "Why the fuck would we do that? Just so you can lure him into a trap? Hunt him down some more?"

Dream shakes his skull quickly "I just want to talk..." he rubs his arm. "It is... personal."

Horror crosses his arms "I remember this happening once before." Dust nods and glares himself. it had been a whole thing where Dream tried to stage an intervention about Nightmare needing to be better and see that there are other ways to continue on instead of this path of hate he had set on.

The fact Dream had gone it to an adult Nightmare was bad. The fact that they now knew that their tiny babybones boss was in there the whole time just makes it worse.

Drema looks pale and shakes his skull "It isn't liek that! and... I know i shouldnt have done that back then either! I... I didn't have all the facts and information but I need to talk with nightmare about it-"

Killer appears and has his knife right by Dream's chin "Don't bother. You try to go near Boss ever again and we will end you." Killer's voice is low and dangerous. "We haven't been doing shit to your precious multiverse. leave us alone."

Dust watches the standoff when Cross joins his side and looks him and Horror both over worried and anxious. A small whine starts to leave his throat when Dust signs that Horror has Nightmare hidden. making sure to use their personal coded signs for it. Cross relaxes and leans against him as the tension disappears.

Dust looks back at the standoff to see that Dream has backed up, still looking pale and now heartbroken as well. Blue seems to be trying to reason with Killer but you have more luck reasoning with a pig in the mud than trying to get Killer to stop doing what he wants.

Dust raises his voice a tiny bit "We are leaving." the other three nod and Dsut looks at the two Stars "Stop bothering us." this was already the third time they happened to be in the same universe and Dust did not want to make it a fourth.

They quickly leave and once out of sight make a portal somewhere else. They hide away and quickly check on Nightmare. dust watches as Killer coos and nuzzles Nightmare and feels a bit calmer.

It is fine. They will not let anyone get their babybones.

*----------------*

And the third time the Stars came across the gang and Nightmare! (one of which they didn't fully notice but it still counts!)

First Drabble Prev Drabble Next Drabble

[ewansnose]

34+35

Michael Gavey x Reader!Fem

summary: You need help with math and your best friend suggests getting help from your classmate Michael Gavey.

WARNING: smutt, a little cuteness, hanging, finger twisting, unprotected p/v sex, oral sex (f receiving), spitting, and a lot of slutty. Be happy 🫶

MINORS DO NOT INTERACT! i will block you immediately.

English is not my first language. Hope you enjoy!

The days at Oxford University weren't easy for you. The semester was about to end and you hadn't achieved the required grade in one of the subjects in your course. You spent day and night studying the content, but it never seemed to get into your head. You were a person who was easily distracted, if a fly landed on your book you would look at it and stare at it until you remembered what you were doing and went back to studying. The hours in the college library and the late nights in his room weren't working, nothing was working.

You definitely needed help.

“— Y/n, you need to ask someone for help. Math doesn’t enter your mind and you need that grade.”

You had your head down on the patio table, muttering about how useless and stupid you were.

“—Talk to Michael, he can-“

"- NO!"

You shouted with wide eyes, catching the attention of the other students around you. His cheeks turned red when he realized he was receiving attention and he laid his head back on the table.

“— I can’t ask him for help.”

"- Why not? Just because you're attracted to him doesn't mean his help isn't worth it to you.”

“—That’s exactly the problem, Riley.” You lifted your head and faced your best friend and roommate. “— He will distract me.”

Riley rolled her eyes. “— Everything distracts you, y/n. Absolutely anything. Your test is in a week and you can't study, give him a chance.”

You raised your head and leaned back in the chair, biting your lip, then huffing.

“—Okay, I'll talk to him. Well, I'll try to talk to him, since he and Oliver don't sit still.”

“— Well...you can try your luck now, the big boy is entering the courtyard alone.”

Your eyes widened and you placed your palms on the table, shaking your head at Riley.

“—Don’t even think about-“

“—Michael! Michael Gavey! Oliver's grunt! Can you come here quickly?”

Your cheeks heated up again and you wanted to choke your best friend. You heard the footsteps approaching your desk and tried to maintain your posture, trying to keep your slight attraction to Michael from ruining everything. You sighed as his soft scent entered your nostrils and looked to the side only to see him with a small smile on his thin lips.

“—What do you want from me, Riley?”

Her voice, how you liked it. Whenever he started talking in the classes you shared, you stopped what you were doing just to listen to him. The accent, the soft yet thick tone, the way he always smiled when he spoke. You would do anything to be able to hear his voice in your ear, just for you as he squeezes your-

“— Isn’t that right, y/n?”

You shook your head and frowned.

"- What?"

Riley rolled her eyes and kicked her leg under the table.

“—I was talking to Michael about helping you with the material.”

“—Oh! Yes, yes, I…I’m having trouble, some help would be nice.” You finally looked at him, noticing that his glasses were on top of his head, making him even more handsome. “— But if you can’t, there’s no problem, I can do my best and-“

“—I don’t mind helping.” he cut you off. “— I don’t have much to do until next semester, since I passed my classes. When is your test?”

“—Next week, Tuesday.”

He nodded, taking out his cell phone and handing it to you.

“— Write down your number, we can see when you will be available to study and decide on a meeting point.”

“— She’s always available, cute.” Riley winked at him and he put a smile on the corner of his lips.

“— I’m available at any time you are too. This matter is my priority.” You typed your number into your cell phone and gave it back to him.

He analyzed the number and typed something, his cell phone then beeping with a message.

“— I sent you a message to let you know it’s me. Then we’ll talk later, okay?”

You smiled and nodded. Michael got up from the table and put his cell phone in his pocket, putting his glasses on his face.

“— Save my number, I’ll message you soon.”

He pulled away and you could finally breathe normally again. You returned the kick you received from Riley, hearing a grunt in response.

“— I can’t believe you did that, what a shame.”

“— I give you a chance to finally be alone with the hot nerd and this is how you thank me? I need to start reviewing my friendships.”

His eyes rolled playfully and you got up from the table, grabbing your bag.

“— I'm going to take the books from my room and return them to the librarian before she kills me. You will stay?"

“—I’m going to meet Travis in a bit.”

“—Riley…”

“— We’re sorting things out, okay? We agreed that we would do it slowly this time.”

His eyebrows arched.

“— It’s okay, just…don’t let him make a fool of you again or I’ll finish him off.” You walked around the table and kissed your best friend's forehead. “— I’ll send you a message.”

You left the courtyard and headed to the dormitory blocks, going to yours and taking the calculus books, putting them in your bag and heading to the library. You left the books with the librarian and checked the time on your phone, seeing that it was time for your last class of the day. Before you could put it in your pocket, it beeped with a message.

“Did you save my number? I hope so! I thought we could study a little tonight, what do you think? It's good for you?"

You bit your lip and responded quickly.

"It's great! You can find me at-“

You stopped typing to think. It wouldn't be a good idea to take him to your dorm, not with your conditions, it would be too distracting to imagine the things you could do in your bed.

“Can you meet me at the library later? I’m going to my last class now and then I’ll be free.”

His response didn't take long.

“In the library at…8? The librarian doesn’t mind leaving the key with me, I’ve spent the night alone in the library.”

"Perfect. I’ll let you know when I’m leaving.”

"Anxious."

You bit back a small smile and put your phone away, realizing that you were about to be late for class and rushed to class, thinking about the night of studying with Michael.

[…]

You had sent a message to Michael to let him know that you had left class and were going to the library, he didn't respond back and you were afraid that he had forgotten and left you waiting alone in the library, but that didn't happen. When you arrived, Michael was talking to the librarian, a woman in her 60s. She caught their attention as she approached, and the lady handed Michael a key.

“— Don’t forget to lock it, if something happens here I’ll lose my job.”

“— Let’s not forget, Monica. You can watch your soap opera in peace.”

Monica patted Michael's arm and gave you a small smile, picking up her things and leaving the place, closing the door. Leaving the two of you alone and in silence.

Their eyes met and their cheeks automatically burned, and Michael noticed this as a smile appeared on the corner of his lips.

“— I picked some books before you arrived, I thought if we stopped to look it would take a while.”

"- No problem." you smiled.

"- He comes."

He placed his hands in the side pockets of his pants and began walking to one of the tables with you following him. You left your bag on the floor and picked up your materials, placing them on the table while he opened one of the books.

“— It’s going to be a long night, I hope you don’t have commitments tomorrow morning.” He said in a joking tone.

“— I had to cancel some super important commitments, but I think they can wait.” You joined in, earning a low chuckle from him.

You crossed your legs and started paying attention to what he was saying, trying not to get distracted by whatever was trying to distract you, especially him.

Hours had passed since the two of you started studying, and you were exhausted. Not only exhausted, but apprehensive, since even with Michael's explanations, mathematics didn't seem to want to enter her head.

“— …so you need to add 34+35 together with the root of 2 and…Hey, how are you? Do you want to take a break? Am I explaining too quickly? I can try to lower the-“

"- No! It's okay, I just…” you sighed “— I just don't think I'll be able to take this test. Mathematics doesn't enter my head at all. I’m wasting your time, I’m sorry.”

Michael frowned and got up from his chair, going to his side and placing his hand on your shoulder, gently caressing the area.

“— It’s okay, don’t worry. I also had a lot of difficulty when I was younger.”

You laughed nasally. "- I doubt it."

"- Do not believe me? I'm serious!" Michael laughed. “— You know…you should relax. If you stay tense like that, you won’t be able to concentrate.”

“— And how would I relax? Smoking a joint?” You let out a laugh, staring into his face.

“— A joint is good every now and then.” he wet his lips “— But I wasn’t talking about that.”

“—Hmm. And what would you suggest, Michael?”

Michael's free hand rested on your pant-clad leg, his fingers running up and down the thick fabric. You felt your breath hitch, and his eyes dropped to stare at his thin lips.

“—Michael…”

“—Ask me to stop.” he whispered while wetting his lips “— If you ask…I’ll stop and we’ll go back to studying.”

His noses brushed against each other, their breaths coming together.

"- It says…"

His chest rose and fell rapidly, his eyes moving up and down his face.

"- Screw this."

You broke the distance by pressing your lips to his, your hands cupping his face, your finger caressing his soft skin. His hand went up to his waist while the other held his neck, their tongues intertwining with each other. Michael pressed his hand on his neck, his mouth opened a little due to the lack of air and you could feel the smile on his lips. His nimble fingers went to the buttons on his pants, quickly undoing them before he entered the fabric with his fingers, touching her pussy through her panties.

“— You’ll be good to me, won’t you y/n?” his lips trailed across his jaw, biting the flesh of his neck “— So good…”

He swirled his fingers around your covered pussy, making you let out a sly moan. You could feel his smile on his skin as he kissed and nibbled on his neck. You grabbed the side of the chair and hooked your free fingers into the blonde strands of his hair, pulling them tight when he pressed his fingers there.

He pulled away and held your pants by the sides, making you lift your hips so he could lower your clothes a little, taking your panties with him. He separated his legs, leaving them wide open for him to have access to. Michael moaned in satisfaction at the sight of his pussy glistening, her fluid wetting his eager fingers.

“— Is that all for me?”

"- Shut up…"

Michael bit his lip and got up from his chair, moving the books away from the center of the table.

“—Sit on it.” you gave him a look of confusion “—Trust me.”

You did as he asked and sat on the table, letting Michael completely remove your pants. He spread her legs wide, squeezing the flesh of her thighs, then kneeling down. His chest rose and fell rapidly as he watched his every movement.

His lips trailed down each of his thighs, his eyes never leaving his. Michael ran his nose over your pussy, creating some friction, making you shudder a little from the contact. He let out a small laugh, the cold air coming into contact with his wetness.

"- You need to relax."

Michael completely engulfed her pussy, his tongue swirling around her pleasure point. He sucked and rolled his tongue all over your flesh, eliciting desperate moans from you. The sounds got louder as Michael sucked and licked you, making you cover his mouth. He pulled away and removed your hand from your face, giving you a small kiss before kneeling again and lightly slapping your pussy.

“— I want to listen to you. We are alone, don’t hide.”

Michael penetrated you with a finger, taking you by surprise, taking him to his spot inside your tight pussy, adding a second finger afterwards. His moans became loud just as he had asked, and they increased more when he used his mouth again, speaking against her pussy, bringing vibrations to her.

“—Michael…by God.”

His legs shook and trapped Michael's face between them. He ran his free hand up her stomach to one of his breasts, squeezing it hard through his t-shirt. His fingers moved in and out at an absurd speed, driving you into a frenzy. You brought your fingers to his hair and pulled hard when you felt yourself reaching his peak, closing your eyes tightly and feeling weak. You came with a scream, moaning his name loudly, echoing through the library. His legs slowly opened and he got up from the floor, running his hand over his face and wiping away the traces of fluids. He grabbed your chin and kissed you desperately, holding your face tightly.

“— The days I spent watching you. The days I spent watching you walk around in your provocative clothes.” he mumbled against your lips, his glasses fogged up, rubbing his erection against your bare pussy. “You're going to pay for every dirty night I spent jerking myself off. My y/n…my sweet girl.”

You listened in silence, shocked by his words, his confession. That made you want him even more, and you wanted him like hell.

“— I’ve wanted you for so long, Michael.” you pushed your hips towards him, wanting more contact “— Please…”

He bit his bottom lip and smiled.

"- Please what?"

You swallowed hard.

“— Please fuck me. I want to feel you. I want to feel all of you.”

Michael smiled and opened her mouth with his finger, lifting her chin and leaving it wide open, pouring some saliva onto her tongue. You swallowed without hesitation, making him proud with your attitude.

“—My good girl.”

His voice was calm and low, just so you could hear, even if you were alone in the library. He unzipped his pants and freed his fat dick, spraying the precum from the tip. Michael passed the tip between her already lubricated lips again, playing with the tip at her entrance.

“— I’m clean. I want to feel you."

He smiled and hugged your waist, pulling your body closer to the edge of the table, positioning his cock at your entrance, entering slowly. You both moaned softly when he entered completely, filling you. He left and came back again, coming in harder this time. You put your hands behind you, supporting yourself on the table as he moved slowly.

Michael lifted her black shirt, her breasts being exposed to him this time. His lips captured one of them, nibbling and sucking on the nipple as he moved inside you, his moan making your chest vibrate. With his other hand he squeezed her other breast tightly, pulling her nipple between his fingers. You caught his fingers in your blonde locks, pulling them every now and then with a certain force.

“— Such a good girl for me…so tight. Fuck, I'm going to fill you with my cum. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

His eyes closed as he gripped your waist tightly, his nails digging into your flesh. Michael moved in and out desperately, with brutal force. His body swayed, his chest rose and fell and his moans filled the library as well as the wet noise of his hips brutally colliding.

Michael stared at his body, completely entranced by the beautiful sight in front of him. Sweat running down the side of his neck, your hair sticking a little to his face. It was a sight he had imagined for a long time, but even better. He looked around and remembered that there was a shelf behind him, an idea came into his head. Gavey pulled you onto his lap and you gave him a confused look that soon became clear when you realized where he was taking you. His back hit the shelf, and before you could say anything, Michael was back fucking you, your face hidden in his neck as you screamed for him. His back hurt from the shelf, but at that moment you didn't care about the pain, but rather the pleasure. Michael caressed her pearl as he continued penetrating, her pussy clenching around his dick.

“— You’re coming, huh? Come on, baby, spill on my dick. My good, beautiful girl.”

You were losing consciousness. His eyes rolled back and you closed them tightly, screaming and cumming on his dick, becoming completely soft. Michael held you tightly, fucking you harder and harder, his mouth attached to your ear, your moans becoming more and more breathless. He gave one last thrust before his cum filled you completely, the hot, thick fluid being completely dumped inside you.

Michael laid his head on his shoulder as he tried to control his breathing, you ran your fingers along the back of his neck, caressing the hairs in the area. He lifted his face and dragged his nose down her cheek before kissing her lips slowly this time, stroking her tongue. Gavey pulled out of you, a sigh leaving both your lips at the lack of contact. He sat you down on the chair and picked up your panties and pants from the floor, helping you put them on and getting dressed afterwards. The two of you were silent, but not an uncomfortable silence. His eyes met each other's eyes and he smiled, placing his glasses on his head.

“—We made a mess.” you said and let out a laugh, being joined by Michael.

“— Yes, we did. But that’s okay, we’ll fix it.” You nodded.

Michael got up and closed the books, taking them back to the shelves while you put your materials in your bag. You bit your lip and quickly smiled.

“— Are you ready to go?”

You nodded and got up from the table, slinging your bag over your shoulder. The two of you headed to the exit of the library, where Michael locked it and kept the key in a small hiding place for Mrs. Monica to find the next day.

“— Can I take you to your dorm?” he asked, scratching the back of his head.

“— You don’t need it, it’s close by and-”

In fact, you wanted to. I wanted him to accompany you, I wanted him to stay.

“— You will go back to yours alone.”

He put his hands in his pants pocket and shrugged.

"- Yes I will. Unless you invite me to spend the night in your dorm. You know… I might get kidnapped on my way to the men's block, I don't know…”

You smiled at each other and then laughed. You approached him and cupped his face, leaving a light kiss on his lips.

“—Riley won’t be sleeping in the dorm today, if you’re interested.”

Michael hugged his waist and caressed his face with his other hand.

“— You can be sure that I am very interested. Maybe we can continue to study what the result would be like if we added 34+35 and took the root of-“

You rolled your eyes and cut him off by kissing his lips once again, laughing against them.

“—We know what the result is.”

“—We definitely know.”

[literary-motif]

Encomium

Andrew Marston x Reader

If you care at all about philosophy, literature, and history, I highly recommend Professor Michael Sugrue’s lectures on YouTube. Here is the one on Plato's Symposium.

Andrew reflects on his love for you.

Andrew closed his book with a sigh, settling deeper into the couch and rubbing his tired eyes. He had been leafing through the pages for a while and, thinking about it, had not understood a single thing. 

His mind was wandering and he was once again preoccupied with a thought that had plagued him ever since he had heard Isaac laugh as they were alone together for the first time, looking at him with a fondness in his eyes that had made his breath hitch: What is the nature of love?

It was no easy question. Philosophy and literature had tried to answer it since the beginning of history, and the Symposium currently resting in his lap, although being a remarkable piece of writing, had not been able to account for all the feelings Andrew had had these past months. 

Tilting his head to rest on the back of the couch, he took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, trying to loosen some of the heaviness he felt was weighing him down. Andrew glanced to the side, looking at you huddled in a fluffy blanket with a book of your own in your hands. You were completely enamored in the pages and he could not fight the soft expression creeping onto his face as he watched you read.

The heaviness in his chest only increased. It was not your fault in any way, but Andrew had started feeling lost and out of his depth with the overwhelming tide of feeling washing over him whenever you were near him or he so much as thought about you. The love he felt — while in no way suffocating or troublesome, on the contrary, it was the purest feeling he had ever felt — was just new to him. 

Growing up the way he did, isolated from the people around him and therefore crushingly alone, he felt like there was a lot of experience he lacked regarding social interaction and relationships outside of a professional setting. He had always been able to excel in his academic career, and he knew how things worked in a classroom and how to work with his fellow students toward an end goal, but outside of that he simply lacked the experience. 

Isaac had been just as unused to it all but hid it well under a cold stare and a nonchalant appearance. They were perfect for each other, learning together and experiencing what it felt like to truly love and be loved in return. It was good for as long as it lasted. 

When you walked into his classroom and looked at him with inquisitive eyes, so eager to learn, so passionate about the subjects, it was hard for him not to notice you. After reading your first essay, Andrew fell in love with the way you expressed yourself and thought about the things he himself had spent hours pouring over. If it was difficult not to fall in love with your mind, it was entirely impossible not to fall in love with you as a whole.

Andrew had often tried to be as stoic as Isaac but found himself always falling short of grasping complete control of his feelings. Still, you had made the first step in the bold essay you submitted and now the two of you were here, sitting on his couch and reading in comfortable silence. 

He never thought he’d be so happy. It was because he loved you, of course. Andrew sighed, looking down at the book in his lap. Love. 

Plato’s Symposium was the sort of literary masterpiece he had read to entertain himself when the mandatory reading of his classes at university was a bit too exhausting to get through. After first reading it as a simple pastime, Andrew had started beginning to get interested in the corpus of the platonic dialogues on his reread and, now, having studied it thoroughly already because it interested him, he had only picked it up again because he was in love for the second time in his life. 

Somehow, only needing to look at you, smell your scent, or read something you wrote made Andrew incredibly sensitive to the love blossoming in his chest. It made reading the Symposium all the more interesting because he could analyze his own feelings and thoughts about love — an aspect that was such a relevant element in his life — and hold them against the ideas of ancient philosophy. 

Having an academic debate about love, its properties and function, was of course entirely different from actually understanding it. 

Andrew reached forward, putting the book on the coffee table and picking up his cup of tea instead. He turned slightly to look at you, resting his shoulder against the back of the couch so he was facing you, still oblivious to the outside world as you read. 

As could be expected from Plato, Socrates’ idea of love was the one that rang the truest. 

Love is the yearning for eternity. It is a connection on a metaphysical level, a connection of souls. With love, we try to create something permanent, something beautiful that quite literally transcends this life and stretches beyond death because when we fall in love, we do not fall in love with their body or their beauty, we fall in love with their soul; and since the soul is eternal so is love, stretching beyond the boundaries of life and making it possible to love someone who is no longer living.

Andrew had fallen in love with your soul and the pressure in his chest was simply the yearning for completion, for eternity that love made him feel.

“What are you thinking about?” you asked, startling Andrew out of his reverie. You had looked up from your book to see his gaze fixed on your face with a concentrated look in his eyes that made you wonder what kind of ideas and thoughts he had come up with. 

Andrew answered, expressing the first thing that came to his mind. He did not want to put the weight of his philosophical musings on you and truthfully, he did not feel ready to share his incomplete and innermost, scrambled thoughts with you quite so soon. “The fall of the Roman Empire.”

You laughed as Andrew's cheeks turned pink. “Are you serious?” you asked, reaching out a hand to run your fingers through his soft hair, “I thought you were more of an ‘ancient Greece’ kind of person?” Andrew leaned into the touch, closing his eyes and humming in contentment. 

“I don’t think you can have one without the other,” he said, taking your hand in his and placing a tender kiss against your palm, making you chuckle. “I love you,” he murmured.

You smiled fondly at him, cupping his cheeks to tilt his head upwards and kiss him. 

[loser-female]

Math masterpost!

So you want to learn math. Good. Math is amazing. I studied physics for two years and I miss it SO MUCH. Learning math isn't just cool, but it's a great way to improve skills such as:

Resilience: sometimes you will get stuck for a while on a problem - this is absolutely normal for college-level problems. You won't start from here though;

Self confidence: mastering a subject known to be difficult is fun;

Problem solving: you will be less likely to just sit down and do nothing if something comes up in your life, you will be able to try to find a solution.

It will change your approach to failure as you will become more flexible in your thinking.

Unfortunately most people never learn how to properly study math. We all probably know how to study a book over humanities. We start by reading the material, then we take notes of the keypoints. But this method doesn't work with math, and math teachers often don't really know either.

For the basics I've made this post here. To sum it up:

Please don't start with "but i suck at it". Because then your brain will actually prevent you from learning (self-fulfilling prophecy, anyone?);

Realise that you need to master one topic before covering the next one or you won't be able to progress;

Really, the methods you use for things like literature or psychology or whatever won't work

Now I'm not a genius, I always was and I always be a terrible student. I have adhd, depression and chronic pain, all of which add a difficulty layer with learning.

I feel like most people fail because of the first point. I've seen this with people I've tutored IRL, people I try to fix their pc... Don't be the person that gives up before trying because no one likes that. Just don't. Remember that you are learning on your own and no one is going to grade your excercises. Now take that and make a poster out of iy.

Now, resources Where To Find The Stuff.

Khan Academy. I didn't follow this courses becuase well, university, physics, but everyone references them.

Professor Leonard

The Math Sorcerer

3b1b (curiosities in math)

Vsauce2 (fun)

numberphile (this for understanding math memes)

r/learnmath resources are great!

A great study method

Proofs? Proofs.

A 3 page document on learning math (but it's cool)

Terry Tao's famous post "there is more in mathematics about rigour and proofs"

Remember that, even if you don't like a specific youtuber, source or anything it has been a while since college and high school teachers started to upload their own material. Generally, looking for like "calculus pdf" will give you a lot of resources. Youtube is full of university courses of every kind and it's so good to access all of this knowledge for free. I cannot recommend you anything regarding textbooks because I still have my high school one. Also yes, i've used the Rudin as a complementary textbook in university but that's a bit too much.

I really, really want to emphasize the mentality part. Leaning formula is useless if you feel like garbage because you weren't able to solve the first exercise you picked up after a decade not doing anything.

My personal and sparce advice:

Unless you have dyscalculia don't use the calculator. I know, I KNOW. But this "lazyness" will make everything 10 times more difficult.

Beware about overlearning. Basically, when you solve everything at the first attempt and you keep doing the same thing over and over because it feels good, but the truth is that you are wasting time. This is the time to move forward.

Try to differentiate between a knowledge error(did I actually study the subject?), a conceptual error (did I understand the material), or a mere calculation/distraction error (fo example a missing sign, writing the wrong thing etc)

Try to solve the problems in different ways if you can.

After a certain time, It will be useful to review things done in the past, (ref: spaced repetition method).

Write everything down. Reasonings, steps etc. It will be easier for you to review them.

This posts keep crashing so I have to call it quits now.

but:

have fun

[specialagentartemis]

hi artemis! a friend I made during artfight who doesn't have a tumblr account asked me to pass a question on to you!

they're wondering if you know of any good resources for researching more modern history. This is what they were interested in specifically:

"i am trying to think of somewhere i could find information about when cars started appearing in songs and i am absolutely blanking on how i could find things about this

i know the library of congress has a LOT of stuff [and a really good system for filtering the search results] but… i don't even know what i would enter into the search bar sjdhgj. cars?? songs?? the spread of motor vehicles??"

i know this isn't your specific area of expertise but i thought you might still have some thoughts, or be able to point them to someone else who could help. also, they asked me to tell you that you're very cool and they like your posts :) (i concur)

Aww, thanks! <3

Hmm unfortunately, this is not really a topic I know anything about. This is a combination topic/time period I don't study, and a method (corpus analysis) I haven't really done.

But I can talk about how I would go about it, because starting research from scratch is a specialized skill and it is Daunting.

First, I go to Wikipedia on my topic--let's try the Wikipedia page for "Lyrics." The "Academic Study" subheading has no references--pity. Ignoring most of the article text, I scroll down to the references. Scanning them, they're not that helpful, but "Further Reading" suggests Moore, Allan F. (2003). Analyzing Popular Music. That looks potentially useful! File that away.

All right, now I go to academic databases. My own university's library database and JSTOR are my first options. Let's try some keywords--technology in popular music. Hm, no, that's mostly turning back books and articles about the technology used to make and disseminate popular music, not references to technology in the lyrics. Wrong tack. Try technology popular music lyrics. Little bit better--it turns back The Bloomsbury Handbook of Rock Music Research, that sounds promising. The Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of Popular Music of the World, sounds like it could be a useful reference too. Still, this turns back a wide variety of things, none of them about cars. All right, "technology" was too broad a concept. We want to know about cars. Try cars popular music lyrics and automobiles popular music lyrics.

Aha! Here's some good stuff! "Sentiment analysis of popular-music references to automobiles, 1950s to 2010s" (Wu et al. 2022); "Experience economy in the making: Hedonism, play and coolhunting in automotive song lyrics" (Askegaard 2010); Driving Identities: At the Intersection of Popular Music and Automotive Culture (McLeod 2020); "Communicating cars: television, popular music and everyday life" (Alam 2020, a chapter within the book Race, Taste, Class and Cars). Now this is what we're talking about!

And reducing my search terms to cars in popular music, I turned up a book called Popular Music and Automobiles. Jackpot!

Tbh research is trying various keyword strings, and then sifting through a dozen irrelevant result for every relevant one. Identifying relevant-looking books and articles from titles and abstracts is also a skill. JSTOR is good but arbitrarily limited; Google Scholar is pretty good; Library of Congress has records of nearly everything but is in my experience kind of overwhelming unless you know precisely what you're looking for. University library databases are the best, if you have access to any.

However, once you've hit on something specific, the LOC is really, really good in this way: you can go to the page for the book you found--here's "Popular Music and Automobiles"--and then look at the subject tags. Automobiles--Songs and music--History and criticism is its own subject tag! You can see what other books have that subject tag!

... looks like, including Popular Music and Automobiles, it's only four. (and one of those is also McCloud's "Driving Identities," lol.) But, hey. That's two more books about the topic you didn't know about before!

These are the tactics I use when I want to research something new! Hope some of this was helpful.

[yuurei20]

Hey! I was wondering how animal linguistics works— is it technically a form of magic, or is it something that even our magicless prefect could learn?

Hello hello! Thank you for this question, it led to many interesting places!

It might not technically be stated anywhere that animal linguistics requires magical proficiency, but as NRC is a magic school it seems like the two would be related. But we also don't really know that every single class at NRC is magic based--there are cooking classes, for example, where magic seems to only rarely come up.

I gathered together some of what it is that we have seen of animal linguistics in the game to see what it is we know:

Jack has said that he is poor at animal linguistics, citing the fact that he is still a first-year student: "I know a few words in wolf, but other animals? Forget about it."

Rook, Leona and Azul might be skilled at it, but in Azul's case it may have been an ability that he acquired via a contract that he lost in Book 3 (this is unconfirmed).

It is Ruggie's best subject (as well as Grim's, with Grim capable of understanding Stitch during "Lost in the Book"), and neither student seems to be particularly adept at magic, from what we have been told.

Ruggie calls himself a "middling mage" while Idia says that Grim is as "lackluster with magic as he looks," which seems like a decent argument in favor of animal-linguistics-talent being independent of the strength of one's magic. But this doesn't technically mean that someone with no magic at all would be capable of learning it.

Jade has a comment about potionology that seems to relate to this topic, saying, "When it comes to potions, intelligence trumps magical power. That makes it the perfect subject for you, yes?" insinuating that the potionology might not require magic, and Riddle says that "The freshmen curriculum is more focused on magical theory than practice" (thank you @enderfore and @been-taking-muay-thai-classes!) so it seems the school does have classes that do not require magic, it may be possible that Animal Linguistics is one of them! :> And this opens the door to a lot of possibilities!

Do magicless schools in the Twst universe also offer animal linguistics and/or potionology classes? Or are they considered arcane subjects, even if magic is not technically required to study them? Is talking to animals no different from speaking a foreign language in this universe?

And then there is Silver!

While I'm not sure if it has been confirmed that Silver understands what animals are saying, they seem to understand him--possibly without the use of a foreign language, like we see Rook teach to Ace?

Could Silver have been born with this ability, or did it come from his childhood growing up in the forest, making him a polyglot?

Rook's comment on mole language being understood by hedgehogs seems to insinuate that "animal linguistics" is something of a blanket term to describe a variety of languages that might vary by species, yet Silver seems to talks to many different animals at once in one language that is also being understood by Kalim and Jamil, rather than speaking in a foreign language like Rook does.

And Rook and Silver aren't the only characters who use light-magic during battles and have also been shown possessing inter-species communication abilities (credit for this discovery to this twitter user):

Kalim says that he is "great with animals," with Jamil confirming that he has had empathy for animals since he was a child.

In a vignette Kalim seems to be corralling a menagerie of different animals together by himself, but it is revealed that Jamil is talking to the animals in the background, so we cannot be sure how successful Kalim would have been on his own.

I am not sure there has ever really been any commentary on Kalim's magical abilities (unlike what we have heard about Ruggie and Grim), though we have been told that he is a poor student, so maybe his ability to commune with animals is being bolstered by his magic and/or natural talents?

There are far more questions to be had than answers, but it is so interesting to think about! :> Thank you again!

[abitohoney]

Bend and Break (Not Just the Rules)

Chapter 1 of 5 - More Than Just a Crush AO3 link

CH1 || CH2 || CH3 || CH4 || CH5

Sevika x female reader

Rating: Explicit, MDNI, NSFW

Tags: Sevika/Reader, Modern AU, College/University AU, Professor Sevika, Student Reader, Humor, Porn With Plot, Eventual Smut, Teacher-Student Relationship, a lot of this is probably super cliché and a bit silly, but I don’t give two shits cause it’s fucking hot and funny, Drinking, Masturbation, Smoking, Teasing, Size Difference, Enthusiastic Consent, Dom Sevika (Arcane: League of Legends), Sub Reader, Light BDSM, Impact Play, Praise Kink, Degradation Kink, (yes I like the emotional whiplash of both kinks), Vaginal Fingering, Strap-Ons, Orgasm Delay, Choking, Multiple Orgasms, Cunnilingus, Aftercare

Word Count: 2.6k

Summary: When a hot professor in your field of study enters your radar, you’re quick to jump at the opportunity to get closer by taking her class. Temptations eventually lead the two of you to bend and break more than just the rules.

AN: This is already in process over on AO3. Trying to catch up here. Dedicated to the sweet and lovely @frooopsen (who makes much wiser choices in life than our silly reader does here 😆) Banner used with permission from @gabrielsellesty. You can find their original post here AAAnd one more thing. If you haven't seen it yet, please check out @sevikascrown's gorgeous artwork of Professor Sevika here.

The first day of a new class was always nerve-wracking, but there was one class that really set your nerves aflame, just in an entirely different way than one might expect.

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

You were the first one to arrive that day, and chose a seat closest to the professor’s desk. Nothing out of the ordinary, but you were rather excited for this class in particular. Not for the subject matter. Hell, you’d already taken the class the previous semester and passed with flying colors. But there was a new teacher that had taken over after the previous had retired. One you’d been dying to have a class with since you’d first spotted them when passing their office. Professor Sevika.

Though she was by far the most feared professor by a majority of your peers, known for her stoic appearance, short temper, and damn near impossible to pass exams, she was- at least in your mind- the most alluring woman you’d ever laid eyes on. She was the epitome of tall, dark, and handsome, only she also held all the softness and delightful curves of a woman.

So when she strode through the open door, her attention on the pile of textbooks and papers in her arms, you couldn’t help but beam at her. You just prayed she couldn’t see how your legs bounced excitedly beneath the table.

“Evening Professor!” you chimed.

Sevika, not expecting anyone attending one of her classes to ever arrive early, glanced towards you in restrained surprise before her signature scowl set back in place. She continued towards her desk without a word before dropping her books on it with a dramatically loud thump . Without looking your way, she murmured a curt, “You’re early,” and took a seat at the desk.

So I can have more time with you.

“Just excited for this class,” you replied, still beaming and hoping she’d give you at least a small glance.

She did, but only that. Her gray eyes peered over her reading glasses your way briefly before dropping to one of the textbooks she’d opened. A murmured, “Hm,” was all she offered you.

Short on words. That’s fine. Plenty to just look at.

You fidgeted with your pen, slowly clicking the button to extend and retract it while you let your gaze wander over the woman before you.

She wore a dark red button-up blouse that fit snugly over her chest. Though you couldn’t see it from her seated position, you knew she always wore it tucked neatly into her pants. The sleeves were rolled back to reveal a sneak preview of biceps that she could easily use to crush a man’s head, or a woman’s- specifically yours if you had your way. She also donned a simple golden chain that hung teasingly low, slipping beneath her blouse and most assuredly resting between her cleavage. Gods, you were damn near salivating at the sight of her. How on earth did the other students not see this? Granted, most of your fellow students were male, and you were quite certain your professor was only into women. Not to judge a book by its cover, but her cover screamed ‘LESBIAN’ in all caps and bright neon letters. Mind still wandering over all those reasons, your gaze rose from her chest to her face, only to be met with a narrowed pair of gray eyes.

Shit!

She caught you gaping at her fucking tits.

“Do you mind?” she grumbled.

Your cheeks could not possibly get any hotter as you fumbled stupidly for an apology- an excuse- anything to cover your shameful mistake. “I- I’m so sorry I-”

“If you need something to keep that hand busy, I suggest you review the first chapter of your textbook.”

Wait. What? Keep that hand busy?

Your attention dropped to your hand, which you only then realized was rather frantically clicking the pen in it.

Oh. Oops.

You immediately set the pen down and mumbled another feeble apology. As suggested, you quickly opened your textbook; Fluid Mechanics. Yet another thing about her that drove your infatuation to such a high level. The fact that she taught such a class- that she was that fucking smart- was just so… hot .

Try as you might, you couldn’t focus on any of the text before you. Your mind was reeling at the sound of her voice in your head. At the words she spoke.

If you need something to keep that hand busy…

Dozens of alternative endings to that statement rolled through your head in that low, rich voice of hers, none of which were by any means appropriate for a professor to speak to their student. 

Curious if she had returned to her task, you slowly peered up from your textbook, only to quickly look back down when you found her narrowed eyes still on you from over the ridge of her glasses. Good god did she look good in those glasses too! But you could understand why most of her students were scared shitless of her. Given her large stature, noticeably toned muscles, and a stony glare mean enough to put even the mouthiest punk in their place, she was definitely a scary lady. However, to you, that was undeniably attractive. Hell, maybe you even preferred your women a little mean .

So began your silly little crush. Always the first to arrive to class, and always the last to leave. Greeted her each time with a big smile and received at least a glance from her, and at most a succinct reply. It did little to deter you though. If anything, it encouraged you to keep at it. Urged you to try breaking through that rock-hard exterior of hers. To find a weak point and grab her attention and approval. You started asking more and more questions during class- questions you already knew the answers to. You were the only student to excitedly raise their hand at any of her difficult questions. Surely she’d be fond of a student so engaged, eager to learn, and capable of proving they have learned.

It wasn’t until nearly halfway through the semester that you had the sudden realization that this had become something more than just a crush. That this had turned into a dangerous infatuation. One incident, in particular, became the real eye-opener. But, by that point, you were too far gone to go back.

In your typical seat front and center, you found yourself struggling to focus on the lecture. Not because it was boring or old news to you, but because Professor Sevika had apparently been rather warm that day, having undone one extra button on her blouse. Try as you might to keep your eyes locked on hers as she lectured, your attention repeatedly fell to the bit of cleavage revealed and the shiny gold chain that rested between it.

Her words quickly started to blur together as your mind drifted into a daydream. A fantasy .

Your eyelids eventually grew heavy as your surroundings began to blur and fade until it was only you and your professor in the room.

In your mind, she was no longer giving a lecture. She was speaking directly to you.

You couldn't quite make out what exactly she said, just the sound of her deep, sexy voice. You licked your lips as you watched hers move when she spoke. They looked so dark, soft, and… kissable .

She walked around the front of her desk to lean back against it, gray eyes on you as she spoke.

Your gaze drifted down to her legs, covered in the most deliciously tight gray slacks. They hugged literally the full length of her legs- from her toned calves to her thick thighs. Thighs you could imagine your head between. Thighs you did imagine your head between.

You could see it play out behind your closed eyes so vividly.

She sat at the desk chair, thighs spread wide as always. Her scowl quickly faded into a cocky smirk as she peered down at you from where you knelt between her legs. You eagerly, but obediently, waited for her approval to touch her. She ran the back of her hand- her so delightfully large hand- gently across your cheek. “Such a good girl. So patient,” she said softly. The praise left you rubbing your thighs together, trying desperately to relieve some of that ache- that desire. She gave you a simple nod and your hands immediately went to the tops of her thighs to run along the muscles beneath her pants. If only you could feel the skin beneath. Your gaze darted to the dark leather belt that rested along her curvy hips. You weren’t sure why she even needed a belt given how her pants fit like a damn second skin, but more importantly- it was an obstacle. Something preventing you from removing her slacks, from getting to that rich, brown skin of hers.

Your vision started to lose focus and the image behind your eyes blurred until you found her thighs positioned directly in your line of sight. That damn gold buckle on her belt taunted you. It made your fingers twitch with the urge to loosen it, remove it so you could slowly peel back her pants and reveal whatever treasures lie beneath. Your half-lidded eyes drifted further down, to the apex of her thighs where her pants fit so fucking tight .

Then, you heard your name- spoken in that low, sultry voice of hers- and as if with a mind of its own, your hand slipped between your thighs to ease the sudden throbbing that induced. Your lips parted, allowing a quiet, soft mewl to escape. Your eyes slowly drifted up to your professor’s, and you realized entirely too late that your little fantasy had gone way too far. That it had bled into your reality and you had made a terrible scene.

Without warning, Sevika’s hand came crashing down on your desk. The loud, resonating slap echoed through your muddled head and instantly ripped you from your little reverie. You were thrown back into reality, hit hard with the realization that you were rubbing your thighs together, touching yourself beneath the table, and fucking moaning while ogling your professor.

Oh god, shoot me now.

“I’d like to have a word with you after class,” she said sternly.

You peered up at her meekly, feeling terribly ashamed, cheeks red hot with embarrassment. "Y- Yes ma'am," you managed to quietly squeak out.

To your surprise, she didn’t really look angry. Just… confused? Concerned? Either way, it did nothing to ease the nauseating feeling that took over the earlier pleasant ache low in your belly.

As Sevika made her way back to her desk, you glanced around the room. It seemed none of your classmates were privy to what exactly you had done, but all eyes were wide and honed in on you.

You’d need to come up with a damn good excuse for your behavior, but as your eyes darted to the clock on the wall behind your professor, you found that was unfortunately not going to be possible.

“Test this Friday,” Professor Sevika called to the class as she took a seat.

While the entire class erupted into simultaneous groans and sighs, you sat quietly panicking over what the hell you were going to tell your Professor about your behavior. How the fuck do you cover up the fact that you were touching yourself to filthy fantasies of her?

As the rest of the class quickly filtered out of the room, you slowly gathered up your items and stuffed them into your bag, all while trying desperately to avoid eye contact with your professor or anyone around you.

Once only you and your professor remained, you reluctantly made your way to her desk, head hung low and eyes on the floor.

From her seat at the desk, Professor Sevika simply peered up at you, brows furrowed. In complete silence .

You’re not sure how long she let you simmer there like that, watching as you nervously shifted from one foot to the other, but it was long enough that you decided to finally lift your gaze to meet hers. You instantly regretted it, because she then removed her glasses, drawing your attention to those smoky gray eyes, which she had trained on you. Any words you’d had prepared to explain yourself vanished. Poof! Just like that. Gone. Replaced with useless thoughts. Thoughts that would only get you into deeper trouble.

Her eyes are so intense. So pretty.

Thankfully, your professor finally spoke up, breaking the awkward silence and disrupting your trailing thoughts.

“You’ve been paying less and less attention in class over the past couple of months, and I understand why now.”

Your heart sank back into the pit of your stomach again. You’d been caught acting horribly inappropriate and you were about to get chewed out for it. Maybe even kicked from the class. Your gaze dropped again and the heat returned to your cheeks.

“I’m so sor-”

“However-” she interrupted, grabbing your attention again, “-you’ve been outperforming your peers. Your test and quiz scores have been near perfect. I’m… impressed.”

Your eyes darted to hers.

Did- Did she just say she was impressed?

You remained silent, just waiting for her to get to the part where she scolds you for fantasizing and touching yourself during class.

“I looked at your transcript this morning. I see you’ve already taken this class. Passed with the highest grade even, so I can understand why you wouldn’t feel the need to pay attention.”

Wait- what?

You tried not to let her see how baffled you were, but it was damn near impossible to hide when you’d been so damn sure the conversation would go in an entirely different direction. How could she not have noticed what you were doing?

“What I don’t understand is why you’re taking this class again.”

Relief washed over you. Not only did she apparently miss your little show, she also seemed calm, not angry. She even seemed… intrigued ?

Thankfully, you were able to come up with something quick-witted, because you sure as hell couldn’t tell her the real reason.

“I needed extra hours for insurance purposes, and I really enjoyed this class.”

She simply stared at you for a moment– and good god that heated gaze of hers was somehow both terribly unnerving and incredibly arousing at the same time.

“Your talent would have been put to better use in a class you haven’t taken yet.”

You thought hiding your shock before had been difficult, but she’d just dropped the second compliment in the short span you two had been talking.

“I- I suppose so, but this is my last semester. I don’t need any more courses.”

“Hm. Interesting,” she replied, and you could have sworn you caught those dark lips of hers pull up at the corner just a bit, but it was gone so quickly you weren’t sure if it had just been in your head. “Well, I’d like to ask that you at least pretend to pay attention so as to set an example for the rest of the class.”

“Understood, ma’am. Again, I’m terribly sorry.”

With a simple nod, she dismissed you and turned her attention to the pile of papers on her desk.

You left as quickly as you could, desperately trying not to look as crazy as you felt.

CH2 >>

[booksandwitchery]

Personal Correspondences

After studying witchcraft for about 18 months now, I am finally getting around to recording my list of personal correspondences. If you ever feel like you're getting witch imposter syndrome, remember that witchcraft, paganism, and occultism in general are so multifaceted and multidisciplinary. You can be heavily immersed in your path for a long time and still not have the basics down. I'm not necessarily saying that personal correspondences are basic, but I sure feel silly that I am just now taking time to establish these for myself.

I've always had a hard time with Llewellyn's Complete Book of Correspondences and similar literature because of the pure subjectivity of everything in life. For example, I am not partial to the color purple because of bad memories from my childhood. Many other people will feel that the color purple is calming, welcoming, or friendly. If humans are all so unique and diverse (and we are), I can't agree that any list of magical correspondences is universal or should be trusted at the sacrifice of personal experience and/or intuition. I must say that this of course excludes medical or evidence-based properties of plants, herbs, chemicals, and so on.

This is just the unfinished flower section, but I've covered a lot of ground (crystals, herbs and spices, plants, trees, metals, scents, animals, etc.) and I'm excited to keep chiseling away at this master list.

I'm interested to know if any of you have made a list of personal correspondences, or if you're cool with the books just spelling them out for you. Let me know!

[bubbloquacious]

Do you have any recommendations for texts for a first reading of category theory? :))

So this is a super common question and I think it's a little hard to give a good answer to! I'll tell you what I did.

Back in the summer of the beautiful year 2019 I had just finished my first year of university mathematics education. I don't remember where I had even heard of the subject, but the first math book I ever self-studied out of was Mac Lane's Categories for the Working Mathematician (the second edition, specifically). It's a good book, I think! But I only really appreciated it on my reread (i.e. my more-than-the-first-three-chapters read) last year. For one, I had not done a lick of topology by this point, and I really do recommend knowing basic topology and basic abstract algebra before getting into categories; it gives you a nice two-pronged approach to view every construction.

So I washed out of that one pretty quickly. I learned the basic definitions of categories, functors, and natural transformations. I could work out what it meant for a product to be the limit of a discrete diagram (super neat when you just learned what a group was five months ago!), but if you asked me to give an example of a pair of adjoint functors that wasn't in the text I would've been stumped (natural transformations between hom-functors? what?).

Over the course of the next semester I got familiar with the basics of topology (and I made this blog!). Now I could see why a lot of Mac Lane's examples were so nice. Compositions of homotopic maps are homotopic, so you can take a quotient category the same way you take a quotient group. The fundamental group is so useful exactly because it is functorial. A map into a product space is continuous precisely when its composition with the projections is continuous. And so on. I sampled some more books. I read the first few chapters of Awodey's Category Theory and of Adámek, Herrlich, and Strecker's Abstract and Concrete Categories. Each offers a slightly different perspective, but every time I would wash out after the first several chapters.

But it was exactly rereading all of these different perspectives that made me grok what it was all about. How to work with these structures. I had limits and colimits pretty much down by this point. Ah, it's not a coincidence that the least upper bound and greatest lower bound are categorical limits, they're expressing the same idea. I realized on my own that not only is the discrete space functor to topological spaces left adjoint to the forgetful functor to sets, the indiscrete (or chaotic, or trivial) space functor is right adjoint. The abelianization of a group or the completion of a metric space are left adjoint to the inclusion functors of abelian groups and complete metric spaces, because a map from a group/metric space into an abelian group/complete metric space determines a unique map (in fact it factors through this map) out of the abelianization/completion. Even though the abelianization makes the group smaller, and the completion makes the space bigger, they're expressing the same relationship.

This went on for a while. I read Bartosz Milewski's blog on Category Theory for Programmers, but I didn't know Haskell so that didn't get me very far. I read a lot of nLab pages (I still do). I read a small bit of Borceux's Handbook of Categorical Algebra, which is very nicely written if you can get your hands on it. I spent a summer in a reading group for Tai-Danae Bradley's Topology: A Categorical Approach (this one's probably a good pick for you in particular!). Like two years ago I played the Natural Number Game (which they changed recently apparently!), which got me really into Lean and proof assistants in general. Playing around with Lean gave me a great appreciation for what category theory brings to the table for logic and computational mathematics. Reading Dan Marsden's blog on monads got me really into monad theory, which is just super cool and I love it very much. I had a brief fling with bicategories, mostly because of the monads. Around this time I made a bunch of explanatory posts on the things I was learning about, and that was just terrifically helpful for my understanding. I read Mac Lane and Eilenberg's original paper introducing categories, General Theory of Natural Equivalences, and it's fascinating to see the perspective that it takes. Last year I got really into sheaf theory by reading Mac Lane and Moerdijk's Sheaves in Geometry and Logic, which finally made me understand the Yoneda Lemma.

These last few examples are what I would call pretty intermediate, as far as categories go. Somehow by reading all these different sources (and progressing in my studies in other mathematical subjects!) I had gathered up enough experience to understand the higher-level structures built on top of the basics. I still don't understand Kan extensions (though I tried reading Riehl's Category Theory in Context to understand it) or fibrations, or model categories, or co/end calculus, but I'm sure I will once the need arises.

So that's my advice! Read as many different introductions to the subject as you can, in as many different contexts as you have the experience for! The power and beauty of category lies in the bridging over the gaps between these contexts. Any of the books I mentioned I would recommend, but really the most important rule of category theory is to have fun and be yourself :-)