#i still play every now and again but i hardly interact with anyone

[yeehawfolk]

Oh boy, mods found the post, lol

Man the more I hear about Flight Rising moderation, the more I'm like legitimately fuck y'all. You get so mad at people for using multiple IP addresses that there's an entire caveat about how you need to tell the moderators if you're changing IP addresses or that multiple people in the same household use Flight Rising because otherwise your account is at risk of being nuked.

Like I get they don't have much server space, but when you kick off dedicated users because 2 people in the same household play and one gave the other a dragon, then you're having problems seeing cheating where it isn't there and your moderation reflects that.

No, someone switching accounts because of your weird hang ups about changing IP addresses and moving their stuff over isn't cheating. No, siblings playing FR together and giving each other dragons and clothes and gems from the same IP address isn't cheating. They've created this atmosphere where people are downright paranoid to have 2 accounts from different people on the same IP address, or even just changing your IP bc you moved or something.

Like. Idk. I think that's fairly detrimental to your playerbase, and the fact they're nuking accounts that aren't even cheating is honestly extremely fucked up. I love playing the game, but when it gets to the point where they're banning players for *checks notes* having multiple people in the same household play, then I think the mods need to back off a bit.

[hopefulidiocy]

Your Aemond

Prince!Aemond x Fem!Reader

Warnings: fingering, rubbing, choking, praise kink, gagging, p in v.

MINORS DO NOT INTERACT‼️ 18+ ONLY‼️

Context; you’re stressed and Aemond is SOFT for you, he loves you more than anything so he helps you relax.

~

You came into your chambers, slumping down on your king sized bed, your face hiding in the silk sheets as you tried to suppress your screaming. Everything had annoyed you today from something as simple as a spelling mistake to a full blown argument with Otto Hightower. You had enough, you couldn’t handle it for any longer with boiling over and exploding. Tears streamed down your face, painting your sheets as you basically wailed into the fabric, beating the soft mattress with your small fist. A low whistle came from behind you, causing you to snap around with blurry eyes. Your betrothed, Prince Aemond stood behind you, taking off his leather gloves and throwing them on the night stand. His face a mixture of stoicism and curiosity.

“Bad day?” The comedic timing was something else and it instantly had you smiling, your tears still running but at least you had some positivity in the day. He was smirking at your smile, his reached forward, gripping your chin in between his thumb and index finger. “What’s wrong, baby?”

“Otto.” You embarrassingly started crying again, his grip tightened, telling you telepathically to keep going. “He’s giving me all these jobs that I can’t handle by myself, since Dayna left, they are yet to find another maid for the children and now it’s down to me to help them. I know I’m just a mere girl and I have no authority here besides being your betrothed but it’s way too much, I don’t know what to do or say to anyone anymore.” His thumb stroked the tears away, his eye full of comfort. You sighed into his hand as he stopped wiping the tears and cupped your left cheek.

“Thank you for telling me.” He whispered, planting a soft kiss on your forehead. “I��ll talk with him tomorrow but for now, I want to help you out.” His left arm slid under your legs and his right around your middle, you were suspended in the air and you wrapped your arms around his neck, resting your head on his shoulder. He settled you down between his legs on the bed, his back up against the headboard, your back resting in his chest and your head comfortable on his shoulder. “Relax for me, princess.” Slowly, he hitched your skirts around your waist, his hand roaming around your inner thighs and traced small circles on your soft skin. You sighed just from the relaxation, your eyes closed as his hard fingers slowly made their way towards your heat. Just the mere touch of your betrothed made you weak at the knees, the way his hands moved like he was playing an instrument every time he touched you; sexual or not. He treated you like a prized possession and you were the only person who could make him so soft. His hands switched out your underclothes to reveal your glistening pussy, the one that made him treat you like a toy one night and his goddess the next. His long fingers teased around your folds, his breathing deep as he pressed his lips towards your temple; he got just as much pleasure from seeing you moan and squirm under his touch than from you bobbing your head up and down between his thighs.

“Baby, relax for me.” He whispered so softly it was hardly audible. You relaxed, your shoulders softening as you melted your body into his; once you relaxed, his middle finger played with your precious clit. You let out a breathy moan, your eyes heavy as his hand perfectly treated your pussy.

“Aemond.” You whispered, breathy and a slight whine. He kissed your temple.

“You should be proud of yourself for what you’ve been doing, my love. You are so good. So precious.” His hand sped up. “Let me treat you, let me show how well you’re doing.” Your juices wet the tips of his fingers as he works you, your back arched upwards and moaned as your eyes rolled to the back of your head. You contracted as he slid in two fingers, curling them and rubbing them against your g spot, your legs tensed slightly as he stroked your g spot; not letting you have a moment to breathe as his other hand came around your waist and pressed down on your abdomen making you moan loudly at the increased intense feeling.

“God, Aemond… it feels so fucking good.” You whined, turning your head and attaching your lips to his neck. Using your teeth, you managed a small hickey and he grunted with the slight pain you gave him but it definitely got him harder.

“You’re doing so well, baby.” He felt your squeeze around his fingers as your legs kicked out with quick, intense energy that rippled from your core and ignited your body with thousands of little lights. Your eyes glazed over, a small tear leaking out the side of your eye as you shake in his arms. He smiled against your head.

“Let it go baby girl. Let it go. Show me. Show me how good I can work that beautiful pussy.” He purred, pressing harder on your abdomen whilst his fingers work faster. Your entire body trembled as your orgasm washed over you, making you a dazed mess in his strong arms. He pulled his fingers from you, beckoning your mouth open as he stuck them down your throat. Your head thrown back, his eye looking rougher, as he forces his fingers to tickle your gag reflex. “You taste good, don’t you?” He asked, but your mouth was too full so you didn’t reply, just looked at him with welled up eyes. He slapped you harshly. “Answer me.”

“Yes.” You sounded muffled and a bit like you had a lost voice as his fingers were still in your throat. He pulled them out when he was satisfied. Harshly, he grabbed your throat and pushing you face down on the bed, once you had your ass in the air, he removed his breeches and smacked your ass as hard as can be, you yelled out. You heard his cock spring out of his breeches, slapping his belly button as he pulled it down and pumped it whilst looking at your perfect ass waiting for him. He loved the sight of you, trembling with your legs wide open for him. He knew you had to accommodate for his length and thickness, so he slowly stretched out your pussy with his cock. You groaned as your pussy ached, filling up with his perfect cock, the only one for you and the only one that could make you feel so lewd. He stilled, feeling your walls make room for him.

“Fuck yourself on my cock. You’ve earned it.” He said, his voice dripping with seduction. You loved it when he let you fuck yourself because you could go at any pace but usually he just grabs your hips and fucks you at an inhumane pace. Slowly, you picked up your upper body on your elbows, your hair falling over your face as you rocked back, letting his tip massage your g spot; no matter how fucked you were, you would always welcome this feeling. You rocked forward, your legs doing most of the work as you groaned out in bliss; his cock treating you so well. You started bouncing on his length harder and faster, working yourself towards your end. He watched as your tight pussy clung to his cock and the way it looked got him even harder as the noises of sex filled the room. He loved this image, the one of you fucking yourself with his hard cock. He relished in the feeling of your heat, the way you squeezed around him and suddenly he felt he couldn’t hold on any longer so he grabbed your hips; stopping you in your tracks, a little mess beneath him. You groaned from the lack of power over this as his fingers bruised your hips, you were being rocked hard against him, your ass hitting his abdomen as he fucked you with little to no mercy. He grunted each time your bodies slapped together, you whined with satisfaction as you saw stars come into your vision, your head full of nothing but sex and stars as you ready yourself for a big orgasm. You started trembling again, the biggest sign that you were going to have an overwhelming climax, and you gripped the sheets you were hitting your fist with earlier as you released your juices onto him, gushing everything as he slowed down his pace. You moaned loudly as he released himself inside of you, painting a masterpiece in his favourite place. He pulled out, you ached at the cold and the lack of his cock. He swiftly picked you up, your legs hanging over his arms and your arms wrapped around his neck as he kissed your head, taking you to the bathroom.

“Well done, baby.” He stroked your hair as he filled the tub with warm water, he caressed your cheek as he cupped the water over your bruised thighs. You sank in the heat, letting yourself relax; ignoring the aching between your legs. Grateful for the stress relief and for him. Your Aemond.

[saltywinteradult]

How would you have written 2x08 to be both pro Rhaenicent and pro Alicent/Team Green?

Gonna focus on the writing of Alicent here, as the show's treatment of the greens is such a big issue that I don't really have the spoons for right now. For the record, my issues with s2 in general and how Alicent and Rhaenicent were handled would unfortunately not be entirely solved by only rewriting 2x08. I'd need to rewrite every episode starting with 1x08.

If I were to only rewrite 2x08, well, first of all I would not make Alicent say she was "very fond" of her rapist husband. That line alone is... well, it's up there with Sansa crediting her abusers for making her strong 🤢 Removing that line alone would do a lot to make Alicent retain some agency and dignity.

I also just... would not have Alicent defect from the greens at all. I'd have her decide that the misunderstanding over the prophecy (which was a stupid and unnecessary plot point to begin with) doesn't matter. Even if this was all a misunderstanding it's too late to turn back and her family’s in danger, so she decides she's gonna do everything she can to protect her family instead of sacrificing one of her kids to save the others. Seriously, the real Alicent, the Alicent who violently attacked the love of her life on Driftmark in anger over her son's maiming would die before betraying her family like that. I will die mad about this character assassination. (Please do not try to convince me that this was not a character assassination - I've had it up to here with people trying to convince me that making Alicent betray her family was A Brilliant And Feminist Storytelling Choice, Actually.)

At this point in the story Alicent and Rhaenyra should be sworn enemies - sworn enemies who still miss each other deep down to be sure, but sworn enemies all the same. So I wouldn't make Alicent go meet Rhaenyra at all. I love seeing Emma and Olivia on screen together as much as anyone, but I don’t think the show is in danger of being cancelled anytime soon, so I don’t see anything wrong with putting that off until next season. Here's how I'd like that to go - book spoilers ahead.

Having Rhaenyra and Alicent remain enemies by the end of s2 would make their reunion when Rhaenyra takes King’s Landing hit all the harder, even moreso if we also remove the sept scene from episode 3. Like, they haven’t seen each other in a long time and they thought they hated each other, only to come face to face again and have a total ”oh fuck” moment in which they both realise that to some extent they do hate each other, and yet they still miss each other. They still love each other, but with so many war crimes and murdered children in the baggage, neither of them can forgive the other. Isn't that just so deliciously tragic?

Much like in the book I'd like for Rhaenyra to execute the rest of the greens but spare Alicent. In the book she said that was for the sake of Viserys's love for Alicent; she could say that in the show too, only it's really because she can't bear to execute Alicent. (It's hardly the first time one of these two used Viserys as a shield: "Your husband? Or you, his daughter's childhood companion?") But Rhaenyra also can’t set her enemy free, so she takes Alicent prisoner and hates every minute of it. Like @standbehindhousestark put it so brilliantly here, "imagine the queen in chains arc with the canon hostility mixed with their queer past." Can you imagine what incredible toxic homoerotic interactions we could get out of that? Maybe even have them on the brink of actually getting together, only for Helaena's death to drive them apart once and for all as Alicent blames Rhaenyra for it? I don't know exactly how I'd want it to play out, but as I have repeated ad nauseam, due to the story itself being a tragedy I think a tragic ending to their relationship would be more satisfying than a happy one. What can I say, I'm a tragedy enjoyer first and a human being second.

[skania]

Some OnK Chapter 131 Thoughts

And by "OnK" thoughts, I predictably mean "Akane and AquaKane" thoughts lol

Once again, Akane is the one correcting surface-level statements and showing insight into Aqua (and even Ruby!).

I've been wondering how Aka would have Akane and Aqua interact after Chapter 116. I'm actually surprised that they were so at ease with each other during this chapter, it's like they overcame a hurdle in Chapter 116.

Akane knows where Aqua stands, just like Aqua knows where she stands. For Akane in particular, deciding to stop Aqua's plan likely gave her something tangible to hold onto; something practical that she can focus on, a way in which she can make an actual difference. For Aqua, knowing that Akane is planning to stop him told him that she will keep getting involved with him whether he likes it or not.

Of course, since Aqua is always fighting his own nature, he probably likes it in the same measure in which he hates it. Akane burning the bridge with him would be for Akane's own good, and thus what Aqua wants - but there's likely a part of him that is relieved to know that she is still there.

He may not be able to rely on her, but the person who saved him little by little simply by acknowledging him, understanding him and choosing him is still there. She hasn't given up on him.

And it just so happens that Akane is not willing to let Aqua forget that.

I think Akane may have gone there for two reasons. On one hand, she is probably keeping an eye on his every move; she needs to, if she doesn't want to let Aqua catch her by surprise.

On the other hand, Akane likely knew that Aqua would have mixed feelings after meeting Ai's mother.

So I think that by going there, Akane was also hoping to emotionally support Aqua. Just like she promised she would back in Chapter 51.

After all, if Akane wanted to simply watch Aqua, she could've done so without revealing her presence; the same way she managed to follow him all the way there.

But just like Aqua wanted Akane to see him back in Chapter 116, Akane wanted Aqua to know she was there.

The way she throws his stalker tendencies in his face is so funny! Despite the gloomy atmosphere, the two of them instantly fall into a very easy-going back-and-forth and I love that. It's not what I was expecting at all (I love tension), but I'll take it because it's positive that they can joke around about personal traits that anyone else would see as flaws lmao

Plus, good on her for serving Aqua some of his own medicine!

I already mentioned this, but this exchange right here immediately made me think of Chapter 52.

Funnily enough, that Chapter was titled "Boyfriend x Girlfriend" and featured the moment Aqua and Akane truly started playing their parts. And in this chapter, we have Memcho describing Akane's current role in Aqua's life: His ex-girlfriend.

Aqua and Akane have gone through so many stages in the manga, I can hardly keep count. Right now they're in their "Exes" era, yet they're still as entwined as ever lol

And now we get to the part that truly caught my eye. I feel like this interaction can be read in different ways:

There's more to Ayumi Hoshino that meets the eye. Akane knows this but doesn't want Aqua to know, and he can tell but decides to play along.

Akane understands how frustrating it must be to find out that the tragedy that was Ai Hoshino began due to something like this. What's more, she understands how Aqua must feel seeing Ai's mother and knowing that... there's no point in him hating her, because she already hates herself enough for both of them.

The first would fit the Masterminds™ game that these two are supposed to be playing, and as such it would be pretty fun. But we have seen Akane lie to Aqua in the past and she is... kind of very bad at it lol

Maybe she's bringing her S Acting Skill Level to the game this time, and I'd applaud her for doing so if she is. But for the time being, I'm leaning towards the second option:

Akane knew that knowing Ayumi's truth would give Aqua mixed feelings and that he may stay stuck on that, and so she came to help take that burden off his shoulders.

And good thing she did, because as Ichigo put it: Aqua is breaking.

That said, there's something kind of ominous about the way we're shown Ai's mom looking at them in the last panel. I can't decide whether it symbolizes Ai's mom seeing her grandson (the one she thought she had no right to meet) leaving her and her pain behind, accompanied by someone who is obviously a part of his life - as well as Aqua deciding that indeed, Akane is right: there's no point in hating Ai's mom anymore, because she is already living in a hell of her own making.

Or if maybe Ai's mom is hiding something. I seem to remember one of the sidestories mentioning that she even put glass shards in Ai's food once, which kind of sent a very different image of her compared to the regretful woman we saw this chapter lol

Alas, for now I'm going with Option 1 though, because I think there's something really beautiful in the symbolism of Akane coming to pick Aqua up, and the two walking away from that painful memory together so that Aqua doesn't have to wallow in it alone.

Ruby was hoping that Aqua would start to lean on people soon. As it is, he can't lean on anyone - but Akane is still there to guide him home either way, and luckily Aqua let himself accept that much.

[pauls-mescal]

"A Place In My Heart" - Bucky Barnes x f! Reader, Part 1

Here I am again! I've had this scene playing over my head for a hot minute so I decided to give it a shot. Fluff Bucky and broken Bucky is what I'm writing about, but let's see how this one works. This is the first chapter, but you can check out the prologue here.

Word count: 1.1k

***************

Bucky:

I ended up consuming a lot more alcohol than I expected, and although I barely felt the effects of the booze every time I drank it, something seemed to have changed at that moment. She gave me a ride home from work and we went to a bar near my apartment. I already knew the place, I knew which people went there, which guaranteed my safety - mainly because of her. We were talking a mix of stories about her past and how I lived as a super soldier, and I noticed how quickly time passed when I was distracted.

(Y/N) was a company I never expected to get to have, and despite the differences between us - she is a successful journalist and I am a broken man trying to save the world - things seemed to work out. Doctor Christina would be proud if she saw me interacting with anyone other than Sam. At one point during my reverie, I felt her hand discreetly grab my wrist as a warning that something was wrong. With a subtle movement, I turned to look around the establishment, looking for any hint of danger. Her touch, however, for some reason caused a strange vibration and involuntary spasms in my right arm, something I could hardly feel with a touch.

I'm normally not one of touching other people, something I've been trying to change since I started psychiatric treatment, but it wasn't like I could - or even wanted - to get involved with anyone else. Perhaps the response had something to do with the alcohol. Among so many people there, I couldn't find anything unusual, despite noticing brute figures like tall, muscular men exchanging words in louder tones on account of the drink. I used my metallic hand and rested it on her hand, as if to say that everything was fine and she understood, nodding, soon breaking the contact between the two of us. I knew that hardly anything could happen there, I knew the owner and some regulars. My mind was always on the lookout, so I was always analyzing every single person who walked in and out the door.

That is the little bubble of comfort that I hoped (Y/N) could enjoy when she was with me, or even around Sam. The TV announced the appearance of John Walker in another public safety debate and I felt my eyes roll. Damn Wilson, not accepting that shield from Steve still killed me inside.

"That guy again," I growled, staring to the man's face. Next to me, the journalist wrote down a few words on her cell phone. Everything she said about the new "Captain America" ​​she kept with her in case of any trouble. And I was sure one day it would come. I felt her icy hand - which was previously holding a bottle of beer - grabbing my chin roughly, making me look at her. I got the message.

"If you don't stop looking at that TV, I'm going to break that bottle over your head", (Y/N) snapped. There, we were trying to distract ourselves from anything involving my missions and Walker. I laughed at the way she tried to sound scary, even in a joking tone. I felt the alcohol rise up my cheeks as it coursed through my bloodstream. I already knew I was going to have a problem with a hangover the next day, but I didn't want to think about it now.

"Sorry, tell me about your childhood. What did you use to do?", I questioned, seeing her eyes shine when starting the conversation back about how she liked to play all day in the street at home. I also had a flash of memories from that time, but at the same time, the memory of the moment I fell off that train washed over me and I tried not to let her know my mind wasn't there for a few long seconds.

When she dropped me off at home, I began to feel the weight of all the whiskey and beer I shouldn't have mixed, but insisted on drinking, imagining myself resistant to it all. My body heaved as soon as I changed my clothes and lay down on the couch, while I watched (Y/N) turn on the television, looking for a glass of water in the kitchen. It wouldn't take me all the water in the gallon to wash out whatever was still stuck in my head at that moment, but it would help me get rid of at least some of the alcohol in my blood. She sat next to me, looking at her phone for a while, while I shook off the drunk feeling.

"Thanks, (Y/N)," I said, getting her attention. She looked at me, putting her cell phone in her purse. "You know, for today. For agreeing with Sam and the doc to make me more social." She smiled and gave a light laugh at the same time.

"Sociable isn't quite the word I would use. But now at least you've become a less grumpy, and a more talkative Bucky."

I nodded, it wasn't so easy to be able to express myself the way I'd like to, but over time and with psychiatric treatment I managed to be more me, more James Barnes, more Bucky Barnes and less The Winter Soldier. When I took her hand to shake it as a thank you, I felt the same vibe as before and when I looked into her eyes, I could see compassion. Having a friend there, even though I had already met other women (and not kept in touch as I should have), brought me a thread of hope that I would still be able to change myself.

I came closer to greet her with a kiss on the cheek - which I learned to be a custom - smelled the mixture of floral perfume and the bitterness of beer through her light breath and my head made a noise as if my neurons had done a backflip. When I changed the course of her face, I realized why I avoided approaching any female person in this way so much. My lips stuck like a magnet to her pink mouth in a long peck and, intoxicated, I felt I hadn't done the right thing. I'd be trapped there, and, even worse, I would be automatically putting her in danger by simply being with me. But the feeling was better than anything I had experienced before.

"Guess I should've knocked before", the sound of Sam's voice brought me back to reality and I felt (Y/N) stiffen in front of me. It scared both of us, and it made us break the kiss immediately.

[maxwell-mtv]

Being With Them [Pierre x GN!farmer(?)reader]

[NOTE: There will be three of these, but first is Pierre. It's up in the air on if you're the farmer or not, I like to try and keep these vague so everyone can attach themselves to these. But I know if you keep it too vague it can feel like there was little effort put into it at all. So, in this series of headcanons I like to present various relationship scenarios.

I may do other scenarios from varying perspectives in the future. Bullet lists of headcanons seem like good filler while I scheme up my fanfictions which I hope I may continue to produce despite my rampant depression and perfectionism.

I hope anyone who reads this enjoys! I always take constructive criticism and accept requests.]

CW: I can't say there's anything really of concern with this. Maybe some mentions or hints at trauma and depression, regret, divorce grief, and some borderline possessive behavior mentions.

CONTENT BELOW THE CUT FOR CONVENIENCE!

How it started:

💵 He'd be past his prime to say the least when he'd get around to meeting you.

💵 His wife has divorced him and he was like any other sad divorced dad whose daughter moved away to hardly, if ever, be seen again.

💵 But when you'd stopped in his little store for essentials, he couldn't seem to get that first interaction off his mind.

💵 He'd stay up late thinking about it and replaying the way you smiled at him, made that little joke, and how vivid his emotions felt watching you walk out with his goods in your hands.

💵 He knew from that very first moment he wanted to feel that way again.

How the connection formed:

🍂 Initial feelings aside, he would find you frequenting his store. He would knowingly read too much into every chat you two had.

🍂 He'd start to blush without meaning to when fumbling over his words.

🍂 He'd crack the worst dad jokes imaginable and still somehow manage to make you laugh along to them.

🍂 And if he wasn't mistaken, you'd felt the same way judging by those rosy cheeks and bashful smile whenever he'd stare a little too long at you (admiring your beauty)

🍂 It was impossible to deny that he had at least one loyal customer in the whole town of traitors and that was you.

🍂 He'd be remissed to not take the opportunity to ask you on a date.

🍂 Only he never managed that as one night it seemed Yoba himself had played you right into his hands. 

How it went:

🍻 You had visited the local Saloon on a random Friday night when you were too tired to cook for yourself. 

🍻 You were nervous going out to eat alone but when you'd seen that familiar, warm smile on Pierre's face you immediately rushed over to say hello.

🍻 You asked if you could take a seat with him since he looked to be alone too and he eagerly insisted you do.

🍻 Sitting next to him, he put your first drink of the night on his tab, and subsequently without telling you out your entire bill on his.

🍻 You two would get caught up in conversation after conversation, hardly taking notice to the wood in the fireplace slowly smoldering to black char and the occupants of the Saloon disappear one by one back to their homes.

🍻 You were completely blind to the world around you two as for once in way too long you found a companionship in simply sitting and talking with one another.

🍻 It was nice, refreshing to hear about his struggles and what he did to relax now as a late life bachelor. And he enjoyed listening to everything you had to say too, hanging onto every word.

🍻 It was this night that established you two as an unspoken, but official, couple.

Their shows of affection:

🧡 Pierre is a little old fashion in his ways. Even if you can get him to admit it, the only emotions he feels he's allowed to show are happiness or anger. 

🧡 It's the curse of being a man of his age.

🧡 So at first he shows his affection by making cracks at the qualities he secretly adores about you.

🧡 From quirks to your interests, he'll tease you about it relentlessly. 

🧡 Although you know it's how he shows his love by wanting an excuse to rile you up or just get attention from you, it's okay if you don't like it. 

🧡 And although he acts butthurt at first, if you simply bring it up to him he will stop.

🧡 He's a little touchy, but not overly.

🧡 He'll insist in public when talking to the townies that he keeps an arm around you whether at your waist or over your shoulders.

🧡 His most common stance will be leaning toward you, arm around your shoulders, with a reassuring hand on your shoulder.

🧡 He can be protective, sometimes a little too defensive, but he means well. Everyone knows he might be a little traumatized from the divorce (even if he did do it to himself) He's scared of losing you because of how happy and fulfilled you make him feel in his life.

🧡 He won't stop you from hanging out with friends, no matter their gender, but he will get upset if you use it as an excuse to dip out on helping him around his store. (It never gets past some teasing, guilt tripping comments which he lays the sarcasm on so thick you'd be stupid to think he was that upset.)

🧡 He's honestly just happy to have found someone who loves him the way you do.

🧡 And overtime? He does break that little curse of his. He eventually breaks down and admits how grateful he is for you.

Their downfalls:

⚠️ As stated previously, he is a little possessive or protective but not so much it's damaging to the relationship.

⚠️ He's old enough to know when enough is enough.

⚠️ But that won't stop him from acting like the human equivalent of a guard dog when you two are together.

⚠️ He'll insist on knowing where you're going when you go out without him.

⚠️ He does act rather childish at times, between the teasing and pouting, those are his two greatest flaws.

⚠️ He is also a little scarred from his divorce.

⚠️ He knows it was mostly his fault but he still won't admit it.

⚠️ He will often be up late at night wondering when it all started to go wrong and when he should have tried to do better by his now ex wife.

⚠️ He needs therapy but won't seek it (he thinks it’s fine, he's not)

⚠️ Pierre tends to focus on his shop a little too much and tries to price gouge to this day but nothing a little lecturing won't fix.

⚠️ He will use your body heat in bed to warm his cold feet.

⚠️ Sometimes, rarely, to this day, will still try to impose old gender roles before you scold him and he relents over his own ignorance (he gets better overtime)

⚠️ *cough cough* Beta cuck *cough cough*

Their upsides:

✅ In short, he is loyal, albeit dense when it comes to showing affection in the ways you may enjoy at times

✅ Though he'd never dream of it before the divorce, he will close up shop on a day other than Wednesday just to spend time with you if he feels he's starting to neglect you

✅ He won't hesitate to fist fight anyone who insults you or your relationship in any fashion

✅ He will pick the most gorgeous of bouquets from the suppliers catalogs not to sell, but to give to you

✅ He enjoys cooking you meals, it's one of the sure-fire ways he knows how to show his love for you

✅ And he is admittedly a great cook

✅ He'll even experiment with brewing so he can cater to your palette if you do drink alcoholic beverages

✅ He is not afraid of PDA as long as it's not tongue kissing in front of the whole town

✅ He will often swoop down and steal a kiss from you while on walks through town

✅ That man will make sure you know what a catch you are

✅ You will never have to lift a finger when it comes to manual labor so long as he's around (he enjoys showing off what strength he still has as an ex-boxer) This has, as a note, resulted in him pulling several muscles, which he insists he's fine after doing so. He is not, get that man an epsom salt bath.

Domestic Life:

🏠 Piecing together everything stated previously, plus a little more...

🏠 Domestic life is pretty normal

🏠 Pierre works the days in his shops

🏠 He's trusted with most dinners

🏠 You tend to make/get him lunches and bring them downstairs to the shop for him

🏠 Whoever is up first makes coffee and breakfast (unless you or him care to make breakfast for you both) tends to be a free-for-all

🏠 He buys you gifts and flowers for special occasions and special occasions only (he's still a little stingy with those things)

🏠 There is always some dessert in the kitchen for you two to share

🏠 It helps to have something sweet other than you to look forward to at the end of another hard day in the shop

🏠 You help out in his shop when you have time

🏠 He rarely tries to sell things on special holidays and festivals without clearing it with you first, now seeing the value in quality time

🏠 At night, you two sit at the couch in the living room and watch TV together

🏠 It's a humble life, all around, but comfortable and cozy

🏠 He still has his moments

🏠 There are times you need to comfort or console him for his mistakes in his last marriage and even his failed role as a father

🏠 And slowly you are warming him up to the idea of therapy

🏠 But other than that, he makes for a surprisingly good husband now

[qelflinq]

Every porn take I see blow up on here says the exact same thing and it’s wild to see 20,000 people play absolutely stupid every single time lol. “2 people should be allowed to record themselves having good angel consensual sex and that’s why porn is good actually so stop saying it’s bad😇” Ok how come that’s your position that’s not even a very divisive thing to say. Come on now defend the porn made in a studio with a pornstar man and a pornstar woman whose Instagram comments are full of old men describing how they’d like to violate her (best case scenario). Like WHO is taking up an issue with the ethical shit when they talk about porn. That’s literally 2% of porn you assholes KNOW the other 98% (the pornhub most searched , the shit most curious 11 year olds will see first) is simulated rape/incest/pedophilia (oftentimes all 3). I’m not saying the straight guy favourites are all like this, but even the majority of “normal” porn reestablishes really fucked up ways to view women (as do things like weightwatchers and razor ads but that’s probably pushing it a bit too much on here). I guess part of the problem is that hardly anybody on this website can think or see beyond themselves and their own porn habits. Like sure maybe (maybe) Rocko| 23| he/they only gets off to AO3 fanfiction but the kink freedom warriors don’t love mentioning the swaths of men that go abt their day fantasizing about controlling or hurting women. Do they just not exist when we consider the effects porn has on us? Or are they not supposed to be a problem, and I’m just another grouch yucking somebody’s yum? The men that are our classmates and coworkers and family members etc etc the men we have to interact with daily. Like I’m sorry but not everyone lives in Tumblr world 100% of the time lol it doesn’t make us anti sex crones to think it’s weird that porn is so accessible and commercialized and STILL so influenced by misogyny (again I’m talking THE MAJORITY of it not the ethical shit everyone uses as an example when defending porn). I’m starting to get ads from onlyfans telling me to sign up 👍 telling me hey girl this is such a fun opportunity to make money. Is that not like, evil?? Is that not scary to anyone? Like now it’s the company itself explaining how good and empowering it is to have your income dictated by how jackoffable you are deemed by strangers forming fantasies surrounding your body? Whether my body is a particular fetish? Nobody online rly wants to talk about the other side of sex work. Abt how it’s so closely linked to addiction and poverty in real life. It’s not just silly cute cosplay photoshoots that stay within the greater queer community. And even when it is, if you come across any trans OF creators twitter, a great chunk of their comments are (often conservative) men who want to hurt/degrade them. It’s not a new or made up phenomenon. You can very much witness it for yourself. Most people DO witness it, I guess it’s just not really a priority so it’s better ignored? It’s useless trying to have a normal conversation about these things cause everybody reblogs the same posts to show they share the same opinions. When the internet is this fast ur priorities shift, I get it. It’s easier to form opinions based on others safe agreeable pre-written ones. So often I see or hear someone regurgitating some shit I KNOW they read on a Tumblr post or heard in a YouTube essay cause bro I saw it too. Sometimes it’s straight up word for word. Like what ! Does nobody read books anymore. Or go to work. Or go outside and talk to people. I know it’s hard to find time to think about things much when there r so many tiktoks to watch, posts to read, pictures to chuckle and so little free-time in your day to do all that. It’s crazy to me that if you’re not a woman on here , you’re probably not gonna think about how women are treated at all.

[elgascreamslikehell]

So, as long as i have insomnia (it's hard to find a mental issue I don't have rn, i mean I'm fucking Ash Ketchum but with mental issues instead of Pokemon's, catch them all, bitch)

I started a new story!

To basically scratch every itch i still have. I know basically all the main events in this story, i still can't decide if i want a happy ending or DEATH ANGST SUFFERING cause i love me some angst but i kinda want it to be nice in the very end? Somebody should be happy it's definitely not me then at least it should be my favourite fictional characters.

Anyway.

WIP WEDNESDAY!

‘Hey, Eddie!’, - Buck is smiling like today is not Monday. Buck really has this sweet smile which Eddie used to like… in the past. He remembers vividly the exact moment he decided he doesn't like this smile anymore. ‘She sees me’.  The exact moment his heart collapsed. Apparently though, ‘she saw him’ for not too long. For an even shorter period than Eddie himself tried - and hell he did try hard - to build something with Marisol which was obviously just a desperate attempt to distract himself from the sad truth. Where the truth was - he loved Evan fucking Buckley. His path to accept his queerness was hard enough. His path to accept that he is close to fail his friendship was brutal. He, anyhow, managed to deal with all of this. At least he was pretty sure he did. And now Buck just smiles at him. Like nothing even happened. Like he didn't smash Eddie's heart with three words. ‘Are you going with us to the bar after work? I want you all to meet someone!’. Eddie grins: ‘Of course. I hope it's nice someone this time’ To be honest, Eddie doesn't give a damn, who this person is. But he can play pretend perfectly. Even with Buck. Okay, especially with Buck. And where did 'you shouldn't pretend with me' go? *** ‘So, who do you think Buck would introduce?’, - Hen is pouring beer but she looks directly at Eddie. He doesn't like it though. ‘I have no idea…’, - and not that he wants to know. And why does Hen think he knows? ‘We haven't discussed his adventures much, so I'm in the same position as you are’ Hen's face is unimpressed: ‘Well, I hardly doubt it. I mean you and Buck…’, - Eddie interrupts her: ‘Are friends. Lately not even close ones i think�� Why don't you ask Chim? He's his brother-in-law, he should know’ Hen stares at Eddie's face for a minute searching for something with no success: ‘Ok, if you say so’, - she's definitely not convinced but at least she stopped questioning him, switched to Chim. Apparently, he also doesn't know anything.  When Buck's entering the bar and Eddie sees him - his heart collapses again. It's getting annoying but he can't do anything with it. Because there's Buck, looking damn gorgeous, and… there's this guy, having his hand on Buck's waist. And Buck smiles. ‘So, guys… meet Sam!’ And here goes this specific pause when everything just stopps and all the sound go down, this pause needs to be broken immediately. And Eddie is the one who breaks it with: 'Well, better than I expected. Nice to meet you ', - and he is the first to shake this guy's hand. Right under the sympathetic glances of Hen and Chimney. Very sympathetic. Very uncomfortable.  He can manage this, right? He just has to.

I won't tag anyone cause today I feel like everyone hate me cause i hate myself but I'll be creating a taglist from interaction to this post.

I still write mostly because my mind needs to be away from reality, so I'll be writing anyway and spamming your feed so if it bothers you (i mean i mostly post writings and memes so i have some questions) you can ignore my writing tag.

[dykeomania]

im just curious cause i remember when you used to make posts about seeing her and everything seemed happy and light but now seeing that she did yo dirty? tell all please

im gonna answer this one and then that's gonna be the end of that i think.

disclaimer: i am not trying to make anyone look any kind of way. i am actually just telling you what happened.

the tell-all.

there was a recurrent issue in our relationship where we literally just would not hang out enough. which is insane, considering that we were extremely long distance. we would text everyday but it was something like once a week/once every two weeks or more until we would facetime, play a game together, call, or do literally anything. it was rare that things got out of that grey area. it feels like the one thing that actually had time made out for it was sexting, which i still don't know how i feel about.

i often initiated a lot of the hangouts but it got a point where i just stopped extending that hand because i felt like it wasn't being reciprocated after time and time and time of me communicating to her in multiple states of consciousness actually (while i was crying, while i was calm, while i was upset) and time and time and time of her promising me that she'd do better and do this and this and this. i vividly remember sitting in a staircase on the phone with her and telling her how i didn't wanna break up with her because of this, but it was such a big problem, and she sat there and told me all about how she didn't want to break up with me either and how she was so upset that it'd made me feel that way, and then she promised me she'd do better. this kind of interaction would happen at least four times after that. she would maybe do better for like a week or two, and things would fall off again shortly thereafter.

before i continue, i want to make something abundantly clear. i understand that long distance relationships are not easy. they are work, and they require consistency that not a lot of people are used to and can keep up with. however, this girl was a) telling me that she really loved me and shit and that i deserved to be treated this way and this way and this way [huge for me and she knew that, because i do not have a very good relationship history and i was very open with her about that] b) begged me to be in this relationship in the first place, so i figured that she would put a little more effort into it. but really, it felt like once she had me, things never extended past a certain vantage point for all of the 9/10 months that we dated. i felt really frustrated because not only i was sacrificing time while i was doing school and dealing with work, but i also sacrificed a lot to be in this relationship with her. her excuse for not making time for me (despite having a lot of it on her hands compared to me, actually) was that she was "unpracticed," in a relationship in general (...). irregardless of how i feel about that excuse, i feel like i gave her nothing but space and opportunity to practice during our relationship and she hardly ever took it. it really did hurt me knowing that i was putting a lot of work into this relationship and that i was sacrificing a lot against the wits of so many people who were lowkey telling me that i should just break up with her, and half the time she couldn't even make the effort or the time to just like, call me after i've said i wanted her to maybe 7 million times. i gave her a lot of grace. i don't see a reason any longer to continue to give her that grace.

let's talk about new york city.

other than being very sexual, the throughline consistency throughout our entire relationship was her really really really wanting to go to new york city. she had a very romanticized idea of nyc coming from someone who was sheltered in like a british town, and it was a whole thing. this led to us planning a trip to nyc together. i was never particularly overenthused about the idea bc that's like right around the corner from me, but she would say things to me like "when i come see you we wont have this problem anymore" and "things will be different because im gonna come see you [this often] after nyc" etc etc etc. i never fully bought into believing them, but a part of me did at some point and it felt like going to nyc would mark a hopeful transition in our relationship. and nyc was fun. but during that trip, she also realized that all of her romances about nyc were not.. true. and that she actually didn't want to live here anymore (because she wanted to move to nyc, which.. probably wasn't really gonna happen regardless but anyway -- i never fully bought into that either).

i remember that i felt very close to her in nyc to the point where i was laying on her and i started crying to her because i was fearful that things were going to go back to the way that they were and i was very clear about that. for like 15th millionth time, she promised me that it would not be that way and we would do this and we would do that and she would do this and she would do that. school started for me after that trip, and we went genuinely an entire month without calling or facetiming. you can guess the reason why.

i brought it up to her super casually, which transpired into a conversation about her "being lazy in our relationship" -- her words, not mine --, which then transpired into us getting on a facetime call and her white woman tearsing me and telling me about how she loved me but the distance was this and this and this and "how she thought that the distance has taken its toll,"

this is after months of me vocalizing a fear to her that she would just end shit or leave me after going to nyc and me being like "well what if this doesn't work," / "i dont feel like its gonna work [in general]", and her telling me that i was self-sabotaging. this is after months of me expressing all of the discontent that she said to me. and then the conversation turned into us breaking up, which i was really upset about so we "tried to give it another try" (she was overcompensating for like 2 weeks and it didn't feel right, i didn't trust her) and then we officially called it. and i think the last thing that was very insightful for me was during our official breakup, she was interested in remaining friends. personally, i wasn't. but not only did she begin to a) make the same promises that she did to me about hanging out together and playing games together and what not, but she also b) told me that she "wasn't ready for me to go" (meaning that i was like... essentially only allowed to part ways with her when she was ready for it, everything considered) and how she still wanted to keep in contact wit me because i was "fun." she also begged me to not openly talk about things.

i unfollowed her on everything once i got off the phone with her and idk why but the body does tell you a lot and it did feel like a massive release of tension left me the second i was no longer officially single and it was what it was, but that i cut off that point of being cyclically disappointed again and again and again, all over again

in summary: i was very apprehensive going into this relationship and many people can attest to that. i was coming from a very rough place and i did not know how to be a good partner, but i was willing to learn for her, and i think i did a good job everything considered. i did definitely have my moments, and when i say that i don't mean like i'm sedona, i just have issues with emotional vulnerability and she was never really there for me or made a concerted effort to extend a hand other than being like "well lmk how i can help" and i oftentimes couldn't entertain that. but otherwise, i sacrificed a lot to be with her. i sacrificed my time for her, and i told her to not waste my time (she promised she wouldn't, and she did. because it's not like we dated for 3 months, this was almost a year of repeated behavior). i sacrificed $2,000+ for her. i sacrificed so much emotional energy for her. and half the time i really don't think she even sacrificed time for me, and it feels like once she got what she wanted out of me, i was no longer of use to her.

that's it, and except it's not. but that is the gist. there are some other things she did and said but i think this covers a lot of ground.

trust your gut. don't date people you meet on tumblr.

[listener-symphony]

Sorry for being so inactive, I’m going to do another “randomly generating pairs of every single character” here just for some interactions, also I’m still not 100 on what to do with Real Life so we will just pretend it doesn’t exist until I have an idea I’m happy with and prepared to use.

——

SL!BigB: Hello Ren it’s me your soulmate!

DL!Ren: Hello! You’re not… my actual soulmate, but, technically you are..? It’s complicated.

Gem: I wonder what it would be like if I had a soulmate… Like, who would that be?

SL!BigB: It’s me.

DL!Ren: But you just said you were MY soulmate!

SL!BigB: I’m cheating on you

DL!Ren: NOT AGAIN 😭

—

3L!Ren: I’m jealous. I wish I was stuck to a giant werewolf.

DL!Scott: …No, you don’t. Pearl is a nightmare and she’s even more terrifying now that she’s bigger.

3L!Ren: But she’s so cool! Okay, maybe I’m not jealous of you, I just want to be her.

DL!Scott: You want me attached to you? I’m honored…

—

LimL!Pearl: So, your wife can talk now! How’s that been?

SL!Joel: Um, been pretty good honestly, not many ways for this to go wrong.

LimL!Pearl: Cool! Has she said anything about possessing anyone?

SL!Joel: what

—

SL!Martyn: 🚨‼️ASK FORCE COMING IN‼️🚨 I’ve noticed no one has asked you any questions?

DL!Grian: LEAVE ME ALOOOONNNEEE

—

SL!Mumbo: This tower is DEFINITELY bigger than Gem’s was, right?

SL!Pearl: Yeah, I’m sure, especially cuz we don’t have a model of Gem’s to compare it to.

SL!Mumbo: Hey, we don’t need one! It’s so indisputable!

—

LL!Cleo: You chopped a guy’s head off right? Was it fun?

3L!Martyn: …

LL!Cleo: Was it fun?

3L!Martyn: …

LL!Cleo: Sounds fun. Did you have fun?

3L!Martyn: …

LL!Cleo: You look like you had lots of fun doing that.

—

3L!Cleo: I just want to say, thanks for winning instead of Dogwarts.

3L!Grian: Oh, yeah, no problem… couldn’t let those guys win.

3L!Cleo: Yeah, not with the way they were acting. I don’t know what I would be doing with myself if the guys worshipping Ren actually won.

—

DL!Impulse: Hey, you’re married to Joel right?

LL!Grian: ? no?

DL!Impulse: Great, so I was wondering if you had any advice on being married to Joel..

LL!Grian: We’re not married.

DL!Impulse: It’s just been really difficult for me to figure out what to do with Joel, you know? So I’d like some tips from an expert..

LL!Grian: I’m not married to him why would I be the expert on being married to him

—

LL!Scar: Oh, why hello there! Welcome to my lovely magical wizard tower! It’s not often people visit, especially not by flying in through the window!

DL!Scar: Oh, I get complaints about doing this all the time around here, so I’m glad this tower is different! You said you don’t get a lot of visitors?

LL!Scar: No, I’ll be honest with you because you’re me from the future… I am extremely lonely.

DL!Scar: Ohhh, well that’s fine! Who cares, right?

LL!Scar: I care! I want friends! We finally don’t have to murder each other and I still hardly have any friends!

DL!Scar: You don’t need them! This amazing wizard tower is all you need!

LL!Scar: Well, thank you, but I’m not so sure…

—

DL!Cleo: I am very shocked and disturbed by the fact that you decided to make yourself responsible for some… rowdy kids.

LimL!Cleo: Bold of you to assume I chose the mom life.

—

LimL!Scar: Can you perform “I Killed Bdubs With A TNT Minecart”? Because the Impulse I know killed Bdubs with a TNT minecart.

SL!Impulse: Okay :D *starts playing the drums and improvising a song about killing Bdubs with a TNT minecart*

—

LL!Bdubs: I looove Etho

SL!Cleo: …Okay? Well I already knew you were the number one Etho fangirl.

LL!Bdubs: That’s true.

—

DL!Joel: BOO! 👻

3L!Jimmy: AAAAAAAHH!!! Oh my gosh dude you scared me!!

DL!Joel: BE SCARED BE SCARED BE SCARED

3L!Jimmy: AAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!

—

LimL!Scott: What’s that?

SL!Lizzie: [It’s a device that lets me talk]

LimL!Scott: Oh cool! I want a cool little device!!

SL!Lizzie: [Well not this one. You have a face.]

LimL!Scott: I dunno, saying two things at once would be pretty cool…

SL!Lizzie: [I can’t think of a single reason you’d ever want to do that]

—

DL!Jimmy: Tango 🥰 Rancher 🥰

SL!Tango: Oh my goodness. Hello??

—

LL!Etho: Hey Skizz.

LL!Skizz: Hi! Where’s the rest of team BEST?

LL!Etho: I think I saw Bdubs go to that human Cleo, and Tango’s talking to himself.

LL!Skizz: …Huh?

—

3L!Scar: Hello Scott, I was wondering if I could have those crystals?

LL!Scott: …I… don’t think so? Why do you want them?

3L!Scar: They look nice!

LL!Scott: I thought my Scar was supposed to be the crystal guy… well, you can try to take one, but they might be stuck around my head.

3L!Scar: Let’s find out! *tries to pull one of the crystals away, but it won’t move past a certain distance from Scott’s head*

LL!Scott: …Well, this is pretty entertaining.

—

LimL!Skizz: …I kind of miss being in just my underwear.

SL!Grian: I’M LEAVING

LimL!Skizz: WHAT?! NO ONE WAS SUPPOSED TO HEAR THAT!! NOOOO!!

—

LimL!Tango: Please don’t tell me you died really embarrassingly

LL!Tango: 😬 …

—

DL!Bdubs: WHAT THE…

LL!BigB: yo.

DL!Bdubs: I DIDN’T KNOW TERRY WAS IN TWO SEASONS…

—

LimL!Grian: I’m a bad boy

DL!Pearl: You better not mess with this place…

LimL!Grian: I WASN’T GOING TO!!! YOU ARE VERY SCARY, I WAS FRIENDS WITH PEARL!!

—

3L!Skizz: I’m sorry for killing you.

LL!Jimmy: ? I’m not the Jimmy you killed.

3L!Skizz: Oh I know, I just figured I’d apologize to all of you, cuz apparently I started something.

—

LL!Pearl: IF YOU WERE GASLIGHT, GATEKEEP, OR GIRLBOSS, WHICH ONE WOULD YOU BE?

LimL!Martyn: Gatekeep because I’m going to crush you if you get any closer.

LL!Pearl: BUT THAT’S SCOTT!!!

LimL!Martyn: No he’s Gillboss

—

LL!Ren: Dude I swear someone is singing songs about killing you

LimL!Bdubs: WHAT

—

SL!Jimmy: ARF ARF

3L!Etho: …hi?

SL!Jimmy: You gotta say it back, dude!

3L!Etho: Oh, uhh… do I have to?

SL!Jimmy: YES!!!

—

DL!BigB: yo I’m Terry

SL!Bdubs: WWHHHOOOO???

—

SL!Skizz: So, you love Jimmy?

DL!Tango: Yes he’s my Rancher 🥰

SL!Skizz: Aww, that’s sweet!!!! I hate him.

DL!Tango: 😨

—

LL!Impulse: For a CLOCK???

3L!Bdubs: Yeah! 😁

LL!Impulse: …… you know, that explains a lot.

—

LimL!Joel: Ew 🤢 Boat boys? 🤮 Disgusting 😒 Etho you suck 😡

DL!Etho: …what… happened between seasons…

—

DL!Martyn: Do you have fairy magic that could help me win over Cleo

LL!Lizzie: n- CLEO?????????? I DON’T THINK YOU WANT THAT…

DL!Martyn: But she’s my soulmate!

LL!Lizzie: I’m so sorry to hear that

—

SL!Etho: *bumps into 3L!Joel* Oh sorry! I wasn’t looking! Boat Boys!

3L!Joel: WHAT DOES THAT MEAN

—

3L!Tango: You having fun up there?

3L!Impulse: What the?! Yes, yes I’m having lots of fun up here in exile.

3L!Tango: Okay, just checking.

—

LL!Martyn: Can you perform a song about winning Last Life? Because the Scott I knew won Last Life.

SL!Scott: Sure!

—

LL!Mumbo: Why didn’t you invite ME to team TIES?

LimL!Etho: …There’s a lot of very obvious answers to that question.

—

3L!BigB: Dude I think there’s a song about you killing Bdubs

LimL!Impulse: what

—

LimL!Jimmy: Flower Husbands 🤢 Hashtag Not Saying I Love You Back 😎

3L!Scott: Okay, rude!!!

—

LimL!BigB: Maybe I will go see what everyone’s up to

LL!Joel: hey 😁

LimL!BigB: Oh no. Okay I’ll see what everyone in the opposite direction is up to.

LL!Joel: oh come on!

[aggregaticn]

THE MUN.

✦┊ for starters, thank you kindly for stopping by! you may know me in the past as mishka, or cryptid, but lately i go by grass. i am 32 years old and typically refer to myself as he/they pronouns. ✧┊ i have been roleplaying off and on for well over 14 years. i give up trying to keep track of how long with each year that passes. i also do a lot of world building and drawing as well and both will most certainly play a big part on my blogs. ✧┊ i am an extremely slow roleplayer. it has taken me over a month to reply to some threads/asks. it has nothing to do with anyone. it’s just how i write. i am sorry if this is annoying to people, but roleplaying is my HOBBY. i let my muse/s take the reins more often than not and if they are not feeling it then i’m not going to force them, nor will i force myself. ✦┊ if it’s been over a week since i replied to something and you want to know if i saw it and/or curious if i am still interested in doing anything with it, then by all means ask!! i lose track of things, lose it in my notifications, don’t see it at all, or i forget to draft it. ✧┊ i have decided to become more of a minimalist roleplayer. i will probably not use icons anymore and will hardly format my posts. the most that will happen is small font and an on-post tag to my partner. that’s really it. ✦┊ i read everyone’s rules when i decide to follow them. that doesn’t mean i will remember every detail because let’s face it, there are many people that come and go with many different rules and sometimes shit gets mixed up. it happens! if i accidentally break a rule, or cross a line do let me know! i’ll do my best not to do it again. i’m also not big on passwords, so if i follow and don’t like. send in your password, then please don’t take it the wrong way! i’m just nervous and makes me feel weird? idk lmfao

INTERACTING // CONTENT.

✧┊ this is a multi-ship/multi-fandom/multi-verse roleplay blog for various fandoms && muses. this is my only blog now because i’m tired™ of dealing with multiple blogs, so now all of my trash is in one place :D ✦┊ i am very much an adult™ that enjoys writing a lot of adult themes. there are also many fandoms present with said adult themes. there will no doubt be triggers here. whenever they do, {{whether it be dubcon/noncon, bestiality, gore, torture, etc}} they will be tagged with the following; ‘tw: (name of content)’ you are more than welcome to pop into my ims/asks and let me know if you need something tagged that already isn’t tagged! ✧┊ majority of the headcanons and writing found on this blog belongs to me. i have spent many years developng these characters by myself and with various partners along the way. while i don’t mind you using some things, i would kindly ask that you do not steal, nor take credit for these things. this extends to any graphics/edits/art i end up making at any given time unless you have explicit permission from myself to use them. ✧┊ while i may be mutuals only, that’s kind of a lose term with me. i don’t mind writing with you if we have not followed eachother! this also applies to interacting ooc with one another. just do it!! ✦┊ i may prefer writing multi-para threads, but i am totally fine with writing smaller things! this goes for sentences, single para, and everything in between. third person is where it’s at, though i do not mind what style you write in. i’m also totally open to art based roleplays! all ya gotta do is ask. ✧┊ i will do aus, though some crossovers might be turned down if i am a.) not to confident in my abilities to work with that crossover, or b.) not part or do not know enough of a certain fandom. that goes for any muses you’d like to request of me. i’m comfy enough to try writing a muse that isn’t present on my blog/s. ✦┊ i would prefer to keep ims strictly for ooc and plotting purposes, but if you’d like to rp somewhere else then i am open to writing on discord! all ya gotta do is ask and we can work something out. i’m also completely ok with any sort of asks! like even if you just wanna chat with me ooc and shit then please come talk with me! i am always down for some chill time to get to know my rp partners any time!

last, but not least do have fun!! this is a roleplay/ask blog. it’s meant to be a fun experience. it is a hobby and i am going to treat it as such.

[dailyhonakana]

admin 🎼 here - happy first week of daily honakana except not really because we missed yesterday, whoops! i’ll be trying my hardest to make an extra post (once i work up the motivation to)!!

anyway today im here to announce i figured out im bi and honakana was part of the reason why 👍 here’s, somehow, a five-paragraph ramble about that! this doesn’t really fit the blog’s usual posts but i figured i’d talk about it because i didn’t want us to miss posting two days in a row, and i wanted to discuss how special these two random ass girls are to me <3 this is pretty personal but i thought id get it out somewhere and this blog seems fitting enough. if its too long then just know the moral of the story is that honakana changed my life

okay so i do like guys, which is something i cannot deny. i hardly even considered the possibility of me liking girls as well, though, until i downloaded project sekai on my phone. Yes, until I downloaded project sekai. i was already a huge vocaloid fan (not to the ridiculous extent i currently am, but it was still one of my most important interests!), so of course i became a huge prsk fan, too. i immediately grew attached to nightcord, and kanade in particular! why her? i couldn’t tell you, but boy did i really like her. and i still do!

i was an active shipper of some characters from some different fandoms at this point, combing through google for ship art and reading tons of ao3 works and basically searching everywhere for scraps of content of them. all my favorite couples were straight, though - i was fine with gay pairings, but didn’t care all that much about them. now, i was thinking a lot about kanamafu (who i still love too!). and then i wondered if anyone was shipping kanade with her housekeeper. i proceeded to go to ao3 and read all of skwakr’s works, and then all the few other works tagged with honakana, and then i followed the tag and looked everywhere for honakana fanart to save and honakana AUs and canon honakana moments and whatever other content i could find of them. somehow despite the fact they had hardly anything together in canon or fanon (at the time, anyway) they were my new obsession.

why? again, i couldn’t exactly tell you. i think it had something to do with how sweet and uncomplicated their relationship was, though - it was easy to believe honami would always care for kanade, and kanade would always leave time for her, and both would unconditionally love the other with nothing stopping them. i also think it must have been because of how well skwakr portrayed that unconditional love (go read their works if you haven’t, they express such great love in so few words and they’re incredible!!!). it seemed so real to me, real enough i somehow managed to fall in love with honakana as much as each was in love with the other. oh yeah and this was while my first (male!) crush was raging on - i turned to a pair of fictional girls dating for comfort while constantly pining over him. that was incredible of me. i mean i still do that tbf

i eventually lost my interest in prsk itself and got rid of the game, but my interest in honakana didn’t waver much. i didn’t actively interact with the fandom or read every single honakana fic that was released - i didn’t even find out about their wedding event until a few months ago - but i continued thinking about the two of them frequently. recently, i started the game again, for a reason i don’t remember. i don’t think i was planning on playing it much; then, i learned about the event and that it was coming to the EN server in a few months, and after not playing for so long, i suddenly had a goal waiting to be completed in those few months. i needed to rank high on the leaderboard, and i needed to do it for those two fictional lesbians i loved so much, for some reason.

a new, more agonizing crush is currently raging on for me. i’m pretty sure the object of that crush now thinks i’m a lesbian after having explained my need to tier in the event to him (and also having an icon of marcille donato on discord). it’s now a day since the event’s ended and i’ve been thinking a lot about my orientation - yes, mainly because of him, but also because it’s something i haven’t really figured out about myself. i’ve never liked a girl as much as those two boys, but i consider way more girls from fictional media hot than guys, and there’s also … all of this to consider. i don’t know how else to say it: i do not think there is a heterosexual explanation for my two-year-strong obsession with the not-even-that-fleshed-out relationship of two girls who are not real and are not dating. somehow, they’ve been as much of a constant presence in my life as that first crush was! and so thinking about it today i have decided i do not give a shit if i’ve only ever liked real guys and fake girls, i am bi and nobody gets to decide that except for me. who cares? no one should, except for me! thank you for reading my pouring my heart out about two random anime girls and good night. i need to go to sleep save me honakana

[uh-velkommen]

The Conclusion. Life in Sweden:

I don't have some long drawn out post, I'm just over it. I'm exhausted from trying to make friends. Every interaction feels pointless because you know you'll never see or hear from that person ever again. There's no meaningful connections being made. I've hardly attended any events because they all cost money and it's really annoying going to them alone and having absolutely no one talk to you. Like GUYS, I am a really outgoing person. I can talk to anyone about anything and the fact that I've been doing that for 8 months and still have absolutely zero confidants, I'm not even looking for best friends I just want one person where I could say, "hey lets grab a coffee together after class" and I can't even get THAT. And it's not a Swedish thing because I've adjusted to that. I get the reclusive society, I enjoy it for the most part. It's the fact that these people -the type of people who are able to be international students/travelers, and can do it comfortable- they are not MY people. My people are stoners and media nerds. I'M TIRED. I've been spending every day since getting here, every day that I'm not in class, alone in my room SO BORED. Like this type of boredom feels the same as when I was in the Psych ward. I wake up, I stare at a wall in silence for hours, I go to sleep. I'm genuinely losing my shit over here. I can NOT wait to leave. I bought the plane ticket and I dropped out of my classes.

I'm not sure if it's because this is a small town or a college town but there is absolutely nothing to do, no way to enjoy yourself ALONE, without spending money. I can't even just go for a walk because I've seen these sights a million times before already. I'm like a rat in a cage, I NEED daily enrichment in the form of new sights and experiences. I've noticed that when I lived in the city I was okay being alone a lot because when I wanted to I could visit a new corner, a museum, a club. I could socialize when I needed to. But here there is NOTHING, so I need people. But even when I go to pub events, everyone is there with their friends GOD I HATE PRE-ESTABLISHED FRIEND GROUPS.

I find it funny that people on Tik Tok have been talking about this "friend drought" that Gen Z has been dealing with. I don't get how every one is talking about how much they want friends but at the same time they are doing nothing to keep friendships going. I have no problem staying in contact with people I meet, suggesting hangouts and such. But I'm ALWAYS met with silence. It must be some self sabotage epidemic because I KNOW how to make friends, I've been playing the same game all my life. That's what makes this now so much more frustrating. I transferred schools A LOT growing up. I learned how to get people to like me, it's so easy at times but in the end it was always me wiggling into pre-established friend groups. I never had a person that was just mine. You'd think at times when we're all thrusted into new situations and we're all friendless that it'd be this big pool of potential connections. The first week of college you meet so many people but then nothing more comes of it. There is no reason I should be 8 months in and STILL asking people, "what do you study, how long have you been in Sweden, etc." We all know we hate those questions.

And finally, the worst worst WORST part is that when you talk to teachers or counselors about feeling miserable, the FIRST thing they ask you is, How are you with friends? and suddenly I feel like it's MY fault that I'm alone. Like I haven't been trying???? I've tried EVERYTHING. Really, think of a possible solution, I guarantee you that I've tried it. I swear I'm not just some unlikeable annoying prick, it's NOT my fault. And besides, all my problems won't magically be fixed if I just "find a friend." Let's talk about the lack of programs and clubs that offer a space for friends to hang out or THINGS TO DO (that are free!!!!). I'm never gonna meet anyone if I stay in my room but I can't be bothered to leave my room when I know nothing will come of it. I just can't do it anymore, I officially hate it here.

[sariaminoras]

Dragons Chapter 5 and the Slug Race

Hey, anyone who's still out there! First and foremost, apologies for the delay (it's hardly a delay, when I've been consistently uploading at embarrassingly year-long intervals, Jesus). Also, thank you, for still being here, and for being so patient and for still having faith!

Secondly, the link to the chapter.

Now... a bit of a rant/vent/explanation as to why it always takes so long for me to update this story. Under the "read more/keep reading".

Okay, so... I'm not gonna lie. A whole year is the time required to release a new, original book, not a new chapter for fanfiction. It's embarrassing, and it's frustrating, and it's extremely counter-productive towards my goal. It's... non-productive, really.

I don't have an "excuse" for that. My reason is many things, but I can boil them down to roughly two aspects.

The first, and the most important is, for many months now, I just didn't want to write. In general, really, but mostly, I didn't want to write for this fandom anymore, and not for this fic anymore. I've been spending a lot of my free time doing nothing productive (arts-wise); when I'm not with friends/family, or working/studying, I'm watching a TV series, YouTubing, or playing games. Sure, it's good to lay back and not do anything mentally taxing every now and again, but this has been setting me back on the personal goal of improving my writing (and the bonus side-quest of learning to draw).

I'm not sure why this is happening. I think I'm just a little tired. IRL stuff became bigger and more complex, requiring more of my time and disposition, and maybe I'm feeling like I don't want to do anything important whenever I get a break.

I really want to change that. I've been trying to follow a fixed schedule, that will break my free time up into "leisure" and "art/writing", but I'm having trouble following it through. I "binge" activities, rather than do a little bit of everything everyday, and I know that's something that I'll need to change in my behavior if I want to accomplish everything I set out to do. What's making that difficult is that I've been prioritizing some stuff, whilst others I'm not so inclined to do.

Which brings me to the second part of my "excuse". This story, Dragons. TL;DR, it's not bringing me any joy anymore, but I'm going to go into more detail on that.

My original plan for Dragons was to make it a domestic, pregnancy-romance story, focused on the condition and its symptoms, the shenanigans surrounding the novelty of a human-vampire hybrid "breeding", and the relationships between the characters, especially Alucard and Integra's, and how they developed as the pregnancy progressed.

I thought it would be easy. I thought it would be fun, and light-hearted, and simple to accomplish. I was wrong.

I don't know why, but I was wrong. I don't know what happened, exactly, that caused the story to drift away into... this. Into this monstruous, mentally-taxing narrative I am NOT prepared to write, and that I don't think I should be tackling right now. Not with the writing and reading experience I have at the moment.

It's so much bigger and more complex that I thought it would be. I'm aware I'm to blame for not having planned everything in its minute details, so stuff constantly changed as I got new ideas I wanted incorporated. Originally, I planned for Dragons to be roughly 3 to 4 chapters long, but now I'm looking at... what, 8, 10, and I'm pulling my hair out.

Whilst I did have character interactions in my mind, I did NOT intend for it to have any drama, especially not the kind of drama that it's driving towards. It was supposed to be shallow, something small and fun, but, instead, I'm feeling compelled to write these really long, drawn-out dramatic scenes, and all these """"""cHArAcTEr mOmENts"""""" that had absolutely no business in the original draft, and that I feel really insecure doing because I don't really know how to write that.

This chapter, chapter 5, didn't even include everything that I planned on delivering, and maybe that's my fault too, for not really knowing how to pace and structure a story. It's infuriating that it's been a whole year and I update with... so little and non-rewarding... a chapter that it's, like, mid-conflict, and not properly going anywhere, kinda. It leaves a bitter taste in my mouth, and I feel like I'm disappointing not only the brave souls who are still around (bless you), but also myself.

Maybe this also plays some part on my lack of interest, but I'm just not super into Hellsing as I was, when I first started posting Dragons. It sucks, but it's life. I don't really like working like that, not completely into the thing, feeling like it's an obligation and not a hobby I fully enjoy, but there's not much I can do about that; I refuse to abandon ship, and I can't force myself to become "obsessed" with Hellsing again (or, can I? I don't know).

There's also the language barrier, which takes some of my time, and the fact that I want to write more... "poetically"? My writing feels too sterile and "technical", I think, and I want it to sound more like a melody and less like a speech, and I know that I'll only get there if I read and write MORE, but it's still an added layer of consumption of my time and mental effort. Writing narrative, for me, is a struggle, but, when I complain about it, like I'm doing now, I also feel like I'm bitching for no reason, and putting effort into it is the bare minimum I should be doing. Still, it would be nice if it were a little less difficult, aha.

I'm not going to do like last time and "promise I'll (try) to do better". What I CAN assure anyone, though, is that I will absolutely finish this story (I hate engaging with someone else's work, and then having the creator just drop it, but this is merely a personal feeling and I'm not trying to pass judgement on anyone, people have their reasons), and that I will, eventually, when the story allows, incorporate the silly, pregnancy shenanigans that I originally wanted. As soon as the characters calm the F down.

Whilst Dragons took this crazy turn, I, at the very least, got most of it roughly planned and bullet-pointed. I have a direction, even though I can't be sure the path won't curve and spin to get to the end. Whatever, it's there for me to write; I just need to actually sit down and do it.

So... here we are, at the end of this vent. I have no idea when the next chapter will be uploaded. Sorry for the zero guarantees, sorry for always taking so long, and THANK YOU, for anyone, who's still, somehow, around, and following this story. You are the real heroes. T__T

[flowers-of-io]

A small, frustrated part of me wants to say that if you play a game with heavily lore-grounded storylines and you don't pay attention to the lore, it's not anyone's fault you don't know what's going on. I see how this was a problem back before Forsaken, when there was hardly any lore accessibile in-game (rip Grimoire cards), but it's not like Ishtar doesn't exist and Destinypedia isn't being updated on the daily. For how ambitious Bungie have been with the lore, the recent theme of retconning a lot of established plot points and character arcs (which has grown to ridiculous proportions during Plunder, like... really?) has stung even more. In a game that began with the Alpha Lupi puzzles, of all things! If you start from that high a note, and then throw away or conveniently ignore half of what you've established because it seems to compliment, it feels cheap. I know this is my disappointment speaking, and I might sound mean, but come on.

This has been my biggest concern regarding the DCV, a decision that was utterly destructive from a storytelling perspective (even if I understand it might've been necessary from the technical point of view). On one hand I can see Bungie acknowledging the years of lore and trying to bring it into the light with stuff like the Grimoire Anthology, unlocking all the old lorebooks, the in-game timeline, etc, and at the same time we get stuff like Quria's A Seasonal Boss Now or Misraaks' New Backstory. Frankly, I love how Witch Queen has been handled! This ages-old miles-deep lore being summarised into the shortest elevator pitch possible, understandable at first glance, but still including terms like "tablets of ruin", "krill" and "god-wave", which you can google if you so fancy and read the entire story. Maybe it's time to bring the old obscure lore into the game in a similar fashion? Alpha Lupi cards referenced in dialogue? Maybe some radio conversations about that time Rasputin faced a worm god and won? Some recap of what SIVA was? Something to entice people to look up the things you don't have the time and capacity to put into the narrative proper, instead of dumbing the story down for the sake of players who don't feel like doing that. There's a middle ground to be found here, I think.

I've never been a big Rasputin nerd and a lot of the old lore about him confuses me immensely. I liked the recap on what the different sumbinds were called and what the Abhorrent Imperative was, who the Seraphs were, how Ana trained him -- it was barely brushing the surface, but in a way that explained stuff on the screen to you without having to do a full background check on the characters after every new mission. And even with this basic knowledge it's so easy to see how his arc was rushed, like... being an engram for three years and then lasting for half a season before getting killed off again? All the hype, all the tidbits of dialogue or cutscene shots teasing Ana working on his new frame? The pacing is so over the place here. Maybe his death wouldn't ring so hollow if he were allowed to be an active and interactive chatacter for longer than a month, maybe this would have been a pay-off to an arc if that arc had been allowed to actually take place.

Well, it’s been a week and I've had time to cool down and put together my thoughts on Season of the Seraph and its ending. So here goes.

The season finale plot did not require Rasputin to die. "The eliksni are trying to get control of the warsats" is literally a strike. If the warsats needed to be taken off the table as a get-out-of-jail-free card we could have blown the network and kept Rasputin himself. There was an active decision to kill him. Having thought about it, I think I understand why this decision was made - but I still think it's a terrible decision, and I'll explain why.

Before we start, I don't want to sound like I'm going after Destiny's narrative team either personally or professionally. I'm not calling them terrible writers, much less terrible people. I don't know them! They might even be terrible people, for all I know. While I refer to a single monolithic "narrative team," I know in reality there are multiple groups working on different stories. I’m not a professional writer, and they are. And I genuinely believe all of them are talented people who work hard and care about Destiny. But that doesn't mean I don't have some criticisms.

After considering it I think there are three possible reasons to kill Rasputin:

1). The narrative team believed this was a good emotional conclusion that brought closure to his character arc in Destiny. In this case I just think they're flat-out wrong. I'd say "I respect it" but I kind of don't because I think it's so terribly wrong. I don't know what other people think Rasputin's character arc involved, but I won't get closure till Rasputin faces the Witness again and finally ends the war he's been trapped in for centuries. But I get why they would do it, if they believed this. And that final mission was really good. I had a hard time noticing at the time, but it was very well-done, and the cutscene proper was well-shot, -scripted, and -acted (though I'm still angry about the Traveler upstaging Rasputin's death). They put a huge amount of effort into it and into the story work all season long.

But his death being well-done doesn’t change whether I think it was a good narrative choice. Even saying “Rasputin’s arc should conclude here,” the way it was set up had him sacrificing himself to basically cancel himself out. Unless they’re saving up a plot twist, Rasputin ultimately contributed nothing to the fight. He didn’t do any damage to the Fleet or Witness, or anything to stymie Xivu Arath. He died thinking he’d never helped humanity at all and it was safer if he didn’t exist. I don’t know about you, but I find that extremely unsatisfying.

2). Someone doesn't like Rasputin/doesn't know what to do with him. This is two reasons, but they overlap. The Operation: Sancus mission dialogue pissed me off because it gave me the impression that whoever was writing it really didn't like Rasputin and was taking the chance to morally excoriate him. A more subtle version recurs in the final mission where Rasputin is essentially sacrificing himself to null out his own existence - saying "as long as I exist I'm a threat to humanity" - as if he can't ever help or contribute more than endanger people, which is just flat-out wrong. "Humanity doesn't need a Warmind" you're part of humanity, Red. He’s a person; he doesn’t need to justify living. If someone just decided Rasputin Was Bad Actually I’d be very angry indeed. But I don't think it's that personal. Destiny has lots of writers and multiple narrative teams will touch the same work. One person's distaste probably wouldn't steer an entire season.

Related, however, is the reason that maybe no one knows what to do with Rasputin. To be honest I sympathize with this one. Would it shock anyone to hear I've thought about how I would script a Rasputin-focused season? It's surprisingly hard to build a plot around him. A game needs to be interactive and Rasputin's kind of all or nothing - either he can handle the whole problem himself or he can't do anything at all. Red also mostly plays defense. He doesn't have a goal he's working towards other than "kill the Witness/save humanity." You need to come up with a plausible goal that we can believably help him achieve, and that's nontrivial. But, well, that's why I'm not a professional games writer and these people are. "Not sure what do" is not IMO sufficient justification for assassinating one of Destiny's oldest characters/factions.

3). The Destiny narrative team is trying to "declutter" the setting and foreground story by sidelining characters who take a lot of lore to understand. I think this is the real reason, and it's worth talking more about.

A lot of us lore-nerds have long complained about Destiny not foregrounding its setting and story, and Bungie has responded by trying to do so. I think we didn't consider what that would actually look like. Imagine Destiny's story like a long movie. Now imagine people are constantly coming and going from the audience, and everyone who comes in has to nudge their neighbor and go, "hey, what's happening?" Destiny is always (hopefully) acquiring new players, and existing ones are dropping out and coming back. Even most established players either don't read the lore or don't track/remember it. We the lore-keepers are very much the anomaly. If we want story to be a focus, that story also has to be more accessible to new players, lapsed players, people who don't bother reading loretabs, etc., because otherwise it harms their experience and there's a lot more of them than there are of us.

I think this is why we've seen a lot of seasons that introduce whole new concepts - the eliksni Sacred Splicers, for instance - rather than following on existing storylines. Introducing a mostly-new concept puts new and old players on a similar footing. Haunted is another type of compromise between the goal of furthering the story and the goal of making it accessible. Calus and Leviathan are back, but so warped that old players have as much to learn as new ones, and the Sever missions dive deep into character pasts but pretty explicitly describe the emotional arcs they're illustrating, so you don't have to be familiar with that character to get what they're going through. To those who already know Zavala, Crow, etc., it seems laughably obvious and strained. But to those who just got here, this is their first time learning not just about Safiyah but also about Zavala. I think this is also why there have been multiple casual retcons of minor stuff - there isn't time to explain the history, and they've decided it's not worth confusing people.

Rasputin is old. He's been a significant part of Destiny since literally the pre-Alpha test. The complexity and history that are part of why we love the Warmind also make him hell to explain to new people. It takes a decent amount of lore to get invested in his character and since Beyond Light none of that lore is featured in-game. Pre-Season of the Seraph, anyone who began with Beyond Light literally never met him. They never visited Hellas Basin, which is one big environmental story about Rasputin, and The Will of Thousands strike, which demonstrates Red's power and contains many possible dialogues that emphasize him trusting you/acting as an ally, left the playlist ages ago. Since then a new player's only gameplay interaction with him has been Fallen SABER, in which Red yells incoherent Russian and tries to flatten you with a warsat. Is it a surprise relatively new players might not be up on his character arc?

Season of the Seraph, with its narrative of rebuilding Rasputin from the ground up, would be a perfect time to introduce new players to Red's long history, and they...kind of...did that. They worked in Felwinter although then for some reason felt the need to retcon in the whole "Clovis wanted to destroy the Traveler" plan. If you were a new player who didn't know anything about Destiny lore, and you just played Season of the Seraph, you'd get an entire canned arc for Rasputin that hits the early high notes: built to be a weapon, rebelled against his constraints, humanities nerd, big smite, loves Ana and Elsie, makes mistakes but genuinely cares and wants to help.

But that's where Seraph stops. In existing lore (I almost typed "in reality") Rasputin worked out the whole "not a weapon" thing well back during the Golden Age. For a lot of us Warmind fans the most interesting parts of his story happened after that - the entire Collapse, confrontation with Darkness, years of hiding, etc., not to mention all his character development during Warmind and Worthy. He's gone through a lot, and Seraph misses all of it (except Felwinter) in favor of rehashing the same arc for a third time. It's like when moviemakers keep rebooting a superhero origin story. It may be a good story, but eventually we'd like to move on to the other parts we enjoy: this sleeping giant, hard scifi AI, grouchy old bastard, lost lore of the Golden Age, champion of humanity, learning from defeat, learning to trust again, the morality and trauma of warfare - what it means to lose a war - a being never meant to become what he was transforming still further, still unfolding his own potential.

So understanding why they might have done this doesn't excuse what I still see as a terrible narrative choice. I think dropping Rasputin is a major waste of potential, and he's far from the only tricky character to explain. Osiris, or at least the Cult of Osiris, is similarly old. His story is complex and weird and requires knowledge from Curse and earlier, yet he's still playing a major role. Other current characters like Elsie, Saladin, and Crow also need a decent amount of knowledge about previous game events to get why they are the way they are. Saladin's origin story isn't even in this game. It's not Rasputin's fault the game went three years without so much as mentioning him outside of written lore. What was wrong with the great Xivu-Rasputin “war god” parallels most of the season worked to set up, about the intent of violence? Are we never going to explore those? Are we just throwing out all the dialogues planning a role for Red in the upcoming war? Why did we have a dramatic confrontation about trusting Rasputin to operate independently if he were going to be gone in a month anyway? Just in Seraph alone the number of interesting plot threads abruptly trashed by this death argues against it.

Rasputin's longevity is precisely part of why he should stick around. In the first mission of Destiny 1 you wake up in his shadow. He has a history with us. There's just no one quite like him in Destiny. He's not just a character but an entire faction. He explores a part of story space that no one else does. He resonates with us as people rather than players. I assume Neomuna will pick up the Golden Age banner, but it’s a thriving city; Rasputin represented the ruins, the dangers of a dead age, the shadow of apocalypse. He's also maybe the most Guardian-like character and one of the best to weave a parallel/cautionary tale - were we, too, only made to be weapons? But if Rasputin didn't stay a weapon, can we too transcend that intention? And of all the factions in our solar system, the two with the most personal scores to settle with the Witness are the eliksni and Rasputin, and Misraaks'/Eramis' story has focused much more on the Traveler's flight than the Fleet's attack. Of everyone in Destiny Rasputin has the most desperately personal motive for revenge on the monochrome bastard. Now he's not even going to be there to watch it crash and burn.

I understand that foregrounding story also comes with the requirement that it be accessible to those who don't do their lore homework. I appreciate the monumental amount of work that's gone into doing that and the experimental nature of it. But I think the balance has skewed too far towards accessibility. Stuff like the end of Season of Plunder that has zero narrative motivation or continuity and doesn't even get a pretend justification drives me absolutely batty. You can only break internal rules so many times before players stop buying whatever narrative stakes you're trying to set up. Making the story easier to follow doesn't mean characters have to be cartoonishly-exaggerated caricatures like Clovis was in Seraph - just absolutely cartoonishly evil - or reduced to one or two character motives explicitly laid out for the player (though, credit where credit is due, Clovis was hilarious.) It doesn't mean the dialogue has to be as subtle as a Thundercrash. It doesn't mean you get a blank check to retcon or invent whatever's needed to create the intended character arc. If anything that discourages looking further into lore - why bother to learn it when next season will change it all again? I think Y5 represents a lot of experimentation by the Destiny narrative team, and I really respect that. But I also hope they learn what didn’t work from it, and sacrificing Rasputin in an ultimately pointless and unnecessary finale is a major misstep.

[last-ofthe-starks]

HOTD Episode 7 Thoughts and Easter Eggs

Shoutout to Daemon’s helmet in the opening credits and now flowing into Rhaenerya’s symbol. Credits move so fast it is hard to catch things within it. 

Opening with this scene is heartbreaking but I enjoyed not having a huge time jump this episode. Also Rhaena being held by Rhaenys is a great way to show that in the ten years time they were apart, they must have still spent time with one another because they are close.

Otto with that stupid pin pisses me right off, but to me seeing them zoom right in on that pin on his chest is to emphasize just how easily Otto was able to become HAND OF THE KING - arguably the most important role in court someone could have - and the man who banished him for being a snake and untrustworthy has somehow allowed him to return to court. (Also, you can see that he bites/picks his nails like Alicent). Say what you want about his health, but if Viserys were a strong man (like Daemon has always said), this would never have even been entertained, and yet here we are. 

Daemon is losing it during the funeral while Vaemond Velaryon is speaking, and rightfully so. The poor guy sees through all the falsities and knows that every person involved in the throne is playing the same game. Low blow from the Verlaryon’s to say their true blood runs thick and may never run thin while looking right at Rhaenyra. This episode really drove home the point that Rhaenyra is at the very end of her rope with trying to claim her children are not the children of Harwin Strong. It is becoming impossible for her father to defend her against the opinions of the public. 

They mention the Merling King during the eulogy - this is the God who rules over the Narrow Sea. That is obviously a book reference, and in the house Velaryon, it is believed that Driftwood Throne was a gift from the Merlin King to their family to conclude a pact. 

The opening scene following the funeral with the dragons flying together again over Driftmark is fairly symbolic; we know that by the end of the episode they will never all be together again harmoniously. 

Alicent knows what’s up as soon as she sees Rhaenyra and Daemon in the same area. I like how they shot the scene with everyone on the patio area because you can feel how awkward it is, with all the tiny pockets of people and hardly anyone talking. It’s also a great visual tool to show how isolated Daemon continues to be. When Viserys’ finally does speak with him, you can see that it is too little too late. I think you can tell that Viserys regrets not making a greater effort to keep him around - Daemon warned Viserys of all of this happening in the very first episode. Additionally, having Rhaenyra walking in the background of the crowd watching the two brothers speak again with a nervous look on her face is a great parallel to the wedding episode, when Viserys was watching her and Daemon. 

It is incredibly telling that no one is consoling or even talking to the widowed husband, and in a later scene with Rhaenys calling Daemon self serving (fact), we understand that the people of Driftmark likely share her same sentiments. In the books, it is said that everyone on both sides were angry when Daemon and Laena wed behind everyone’s back and ran away to Pentos. Surely his reputation is even more tarnished with her now dying and not being at home to big birth.

Watching the dynamics of all these kids being circled around for so long is very important foshadowing for how they will all be interacting in the future. I actually really like the actors, they are doing a great job and each one of them is really able to say so much about their character without having much dialogue or extended screen time. Shout out to the writers for managing to achieve that, it is no small feat. 

Jace is such a sweetie pie, and now that he knows his father was Harwin, it makes it all the more sad watching him trying to mourn a man when he is not allowed to. Rhaenyra is such a good mom and you can see that she is emotionally a very nurturing and caring parent to her children. It’s such a shame Alicent doesn’t learn a thing or two from her. 

Having Daemon and Laena’s girls Baela and Rhaena reach out their hands to Jace is so sweet. In the books it made it seem like Daemon and Rhaenyra saw quite a lot of each other, with Rhaenyra becoming quite close with Laena, but in the show it’s implied that these cousins would hardly know one another. It is clear in this one act that they trust one another and feel like they can be vulnerable with each other. This is reinforced when the girls go get Jace first after Vhagar is stolen, and when the boys defend them against Aemond. 

Lucerys’ conversation with Corlys was so sad, about Jace becoming king and Luke would inherit Driftmark. It reminds us all that there is so much already riding on all of these kids shoulders. For Luke to respond in such an innocent way that only a young kid can really puts it all back into perspective. Combine that with Aegon getting drunk and behaving like a teenager yet again, and you can see how if left to their own devices, these kids would have likely been friends and lived contented lives.  

Helaena being married off to her brother Aegon is true to the book, but seeing Aemond wishing Alicent had betrothed her to him is a new twist. Last week Rhaenyra tried to marry her to Jace to strengthen the family bond and Alicent refused. Alicent was married off as a political move as well, and had completely rejected the notion of Targaryen’s marrying within the family when she was younger. We see now that as an adult, she will truly do anything to prevent Rhaenyra’s claim be stronger than her children’s. 

Helaena predicted Aemond losing an eye last episode, and in the short scene we get with her she makes mention of “weaving Dragons with thread”, which could be her foreseeing Daemon and Rhaenyra’s wedding. 

Viserys calling Alicent Aemma!!!!! 

Like I mentioned earlier, Rhaenys’ clear disdain for Daemon is just the tip of the iceberg. She has clearly been harboring resentment towards Corlys for putting their family at risk, which she warned him about at the very beginning of the show. For a man so hell bent on revenge over men who didn’t listen to his wife, he sure does not listen to his wife a lot. She also cannot look Rhaenya in the eye in this episode, so it is clear that she is deeply disappointed by both sides of her family and it ultimately costs her both of her children. The Targaryens have taken everything from her, so I can’t wait to see how next week plays out with her. 

“History does not remember blood, it remembers names.” What a line. Sadly, if Corlys were to take Rhaenys’ suggestion to heart and name Baela and Rhaeyna, they would eventually get married and lose the Verlaryon name. Corlys knows this, and even though the boys do not have his blood, it is his name he values more. 

Rhaenyra confirming that her and Laenor tried to have a kid is a big deal my friends! 

Harrens Curse - Rhaenyra mentions this and it is a reference to Black Harren. A lot of owners of the land ended up dying by violent means, and Larys made mention of this in last weeks episode as well. 

“we were happy enough” - what a loaded statement. “I’m no longer a child” - also a loaded statement. In their relationship she is clearly the one running the show.

Aemond going after Vhaegar and claiming her to ride - what a scene to showcase just how big she is. you can tell that she smells him and for whatever reason, allows him to ride her. I know that is bad news bears but still a very cool scene. To see someone ride a dragon for the first time again like Jon Snow was so cool and well done, especially considering her size and that back then they actually rode them like horses. In the books, Viserys told Aemond that he would bring him to Dragonstone after the funeral so he could pick a hatchling but he takes matters into his own hands. Vhagar was originally owned by one of Aegon’s sister wives, Visenya. 

Lykiri is a word in High Valyrian used to calm dragons down. 

AEMOND IS SUCH A DICK, wow he becomes an awfully cocky bastard once he has a dragon. And then to throw is brother under the bus so easily, you can feel the resentment in him. This fight between the kids is also slightly different than how it was told in Fire and Blood. In the book, Joffrey sees Aemond sneaking out of the castle. Aemond kicks him into a pile of dragon poo so that he will stay quiet, In the show, we didn’t see Joffrey, and instead it was Baela and Rhaeyna were the ones to see him take Vhagar. 

Poor Viserys, my man, he just wants peace and his people refuse to let him have it. But at the same point in time, he is really (to take a quote from Outlander) sailing on a ship made entirely of paper at this point, and everyone can see through it but ultimately because he is King it is the only thing maintaining Rhaenyra’s entire life and social standing. There is an obvious inequality between the family. Every law he puts into place ends up having the Streisand effect. 

Alicent freaking out was actually an incredible scene, I knew what was going to happen and my heart was still pounding. Her fall from grace has been huge and the standoff in the center of the room was incredible. The dagger is emphasized a lot in this scene, so I hope to god they somehow make season 8 makes sense with this damn show. Also Criston Cole smirking, I wanted to smack his smug face. 

Thank god Daemon actually stepped in to protect Rhaenyra this time unlike episode 5, but I think it’s telling that he blocks Criston instead of going for Alicent. To me, I think he knows Rhaenyra is strong enough to protect herself, and always has.

Otto being proud of Alicent is even more insight into how big of a scumbag he is. Him saying Aemond’s eye was a thousand times worth the price he paid was insight enough into just how far they will go to win. At the beginning of her conversation with Daemon, Rhaenyra says Alicent is not capable of cold murder, but now she can see the true face of her enemy. 

Laenor being MIA mourning his sister for most of this episode is so sad. It really is so difficult a position he is in. And thankfully Rhaenyra does truly care for him and recognizes that he is a wonderful person and honorable man. That said, you can see the disappointment in her face when Laenor recommits himself to her. Daemon’s return is breathing new life into her and giving her the strength she needed to fight back, something Laenor will never be able to give her. This scene is very successful because at the end of the episode for a moment, you can believe Rhaenyra would have been willing sacrifice him to get what she wants.

“Fire is a prison, the sea offers and escape.” At first I was unsure how or why Rhaenyra was saying this in reference to her and Daemon, because the sea being her escape isn't an option if she kills Laenor. But after the episode ended, the idea that Rhaenyra knows her and Daemon’s fate’s are tied to their Targaryen blood, but Laenor has an escape if they give it to him is very clear. Another great line from this episode. 

Rhaenya and Daemon speaking to one another again in High Valerian  - and it is Rhaenyra asking Daemon to marry her again. Girl really has it bad. Rhaenyra has been depicted as an overall honorable person thus far, staying in her lane in court and despite sleeping with Harwin and siring bastards, the new context we gain this episode that she and Laenor did in fact try to have kids makes her situation more sympathetic. They tried, and couldn’t. That says something about her character that previous episodes denied. 

When Daemon and Rhaenyra begin talking about marriage and needing Laenor to be dead in order to do so, I immediately was sad. Having Daemon do her dirty work and implying that upon Daemon’s return she would be willing to betray the only other family she has ever had when Laenor did nothing wrong, it would have been very Game of Thrones and I would have been very disappointed. This was all masterfully shot; juxtaposing the audio of their plotting with the scene of their wedding with their kids watching made them seem incredibly selfish, then having it all take place RIGHT after Lenore’s implied death rather than six month after the fact like the book implied is just crazy, honestly. And then you TWIST IT ALL and you see Laenor and his lover leaving together and my faith in Rhaenya and Daemon is restored once again and DAMN what a way to end the episode. But, no one else will ever know they did that, and it will paint them in an incredibly ugly light. For Daemon that is a strength, but Rhaenyra has never had to live with that shadow of darkness. 

When they get married they cut their lips and hands with dragon glass! And Rhaenyra touched his chin like she had in the brothel again! We love a good parallel and continuity.

John MacMillan was good in all his scenes this episode, but to see how tormented he was with Rhaenyra when he promises to be a husband to her now...so well portrayed. She knows he is not a strong enough husband for the fight to come, and loves him enough to set him free. I wish we were able to see the conversation between Rhaenyra and Laenor (and likely Daemon) and be able to know his reaction because when you think about it, they gave him and incredibly selfless gift.