#i’m like a desert explorer discovering their first oasis

[togglesbloggle]

How We Decided

The day after tomorrow- that is, February 18, 2021- the Perseverance rover will attempt to land on the surface of Mars.  It will enter the planetary atmosphere at an acute angle, giving it as much time as possible to experience drag and slow down from orbital velocities.  Because Mars’ air is so thin, and the rover is so heavy, this will fail- in the best case, Perseverance would still be going almost a thousand miles an hour when it impacts the surface.  To help save itself, the craft will deploy a parachute of advanced design, seventy feet across and able to withstand supersonic velocities.  This, too, will fail.  Even with a parachute, there is simply not enough air between Perseverance and the Martian surface to slow it down all the way.  So this is where the rockets kick in.  Once air resistance slows the rover to a bit less than two hundred miles per hour, the heavy heat shield will be jettisoned, and a system of secondary rockets will fire against the direction of motion until it slows to near-hovering.  In a final flourish, the rover will descend from the rocket-boosted frame on coiled springs, until it touches down in the western part of Jezero crater in the northern hemisphere of Mars.

As it happens, Perseverance’s destination was one of the very last things we decided about it- not until the craft itself was fairly thoroughly engineered and designed.  Formally, the decision was made by the mission directorate.  In practice, they follow the consensus of the scientific community, which in turn hashes things out at a series of open-invitation workshops.  Things began with a call for white papers- an open suggestion box, basically.  In 2015, the first workshop narrowed things down from thirty serious proposals to eight candidates.  In 2017, the second workshop further winnowed the list down to three.  And in October of 2018, after three days of presentation, debate, and discussion, the final workshop selected Jezero Crater from these final three candidates using a simple vote of all attendees, and passed on the recommendation to the mission leads.

I haven’t been in the business for very long, so the final workshop was the only one of these where I actually participated.  It wasn’t a close vote as such, and I didn’t break any ties, and technically we were just making a strongly worded suggestion.  Nonetheless, my vote is one of the reasons why the Rover will be going to Jezero Crater instead of Syrtis Major or Gusev, and I think I’m entitled to feel ownership of this mission choice, just a little bit.

(This is, of course, terrifying.)

Having gone through the experience, there were a few surprises worth noting.  The first was how small some of the numbers are here.  The conference was not very large: only thirty proposals, debated by just a few hundred attendees.  I’ve seen book review contests with more entries, and that are read by a wider audience.  Which is to say, this is a situation that was, and is, extremely responsive to individual effort.  In that small a room, populated by people that are philosophically committed to changing their minds when they see good evidence or a good argument, one person can stand up and change the future in a very real way.

The second surprise was the attendance requirements.  Or rather, the lack thereof.  The project is public, paid for by American taxpayers, to whom I am profoundly grateful.  And one way the process reflected that public-spiritedness is that this is not a walled garden.  A small attendance fee (iirc, $40?), and you’re in.  You get a vote, if you want to use it.  A few non-scientists even took us up on this; there’s one retiree (a former schoolteacher, I think) that’s attended every major conference I’ve been to in the last few years, and sets up a small table in the back with his home mineral collection just for fun.  In practice this open-door policy is limited by the obscurity of the event itself; if you don’t move in research circles, you have to be something of a space exploration superfan to hear about it.  Still, as symbols go, you could do worse.

And now that we’re coming up on the day itself, the same kind of public-facing mindset is making me think about why I was persuaded to vote for Jezero Crater, what it means to explore there, and how I’d justify that choice to those of you that made the ongoing discovery of Mars possible in the first place.

If you want to know what Perseverance is like, and what you can reasonably do with it, start with Curiosity- the two are built, more or less, on the same chassis.  That means you have a mobile science lab about the size of a Volkswagon Beetle.  Add some mechanical improvements (no more wheel punctures!) and a few bells and whistles (microphone!  helicopter for some reason!).  Trade out some of the scientific instruments- raman spectroscopy instead of a mass spectrometer, for example.  And it’s got these:

That, dear reader, is a sample return canister.  Not to be returned immediately, alas, but to be returned nonetheless.  One of Persevereance’s primary directives is to find interesting rocks, collect them, and leave them in place for a sample return mission in the early 30s.  There’s a ton of work we can do in situ, but there’s even more we can do in a clean lab back home; things like isotopic analysis really need a much more controlled environment than you’ll get in the field.  And so a major, major consideration is to optimize Perseverance’s landing site for cool rocks that we’d like to take back home.

The other thing that Perseverance is really good at is astrobiology.  There’s no such thing as a life sign detector as such, but this rover represents an attempt to approach that ideal: instruments like SHERLOC and SuperCam are adept at finding organic compounds and fine-scale mineralogy and chemistry that might be influenced by microbial metabolism.  This is a natural extension of what we’ve been learning so far: Spirit and Opportunity showed us that Mars formed under the influence of liquid water.  Curiosity showed us that this was not just wet, but actively habitable: lakes and rivers at a neutral pH under a rich and temperate atmosphere.  The next question along this line is the hardest, and the scariest: we know it was habitable, but was it inhabited?

If you’re like me, that question makes you feel weird.  Collecting rocks is one thing, but a fossil?  The mind rebels.  We’ve spent the last two generations of space exploration tempering our expectations, reminding ourselves that the other worlds in our solar system are largely barren and dead, learning again and again how precious life is in the cosmos.  It’s hard to get in the mindset of people back in the 40s and 50s who could, somewhat reasonably, imagine that Mars might not just host life but multicellular life, vegetation and robust macroscopic ecosystems.  We look back at the science fiction of the era, swarthy soldiers hopping from planet to planet in silver rockets, and laugh at the naivete.  A smile at the exuberance of youth, if we’re feeling generous.  When we were first beginning, we may have imagined ancient canals on Mars and crystal cities on Venus, but that was when space was a blank canvas for us to paint our fantasies.  We’ve learned so much since then, and if it was less fun, at least it was true.  We did the hard thing and accepted reality over fantasy.  We accept that extraterrestrial environments are hostile to life- cratered, silent, and still.  We’re grownups now.

Unless…

Unless.

Imagine that we were born just a bit earlier.  Say, three and a half billion years or so.  We raise our telescopes to the sky, and we see a sister-planet.  Not red, but white and blue, with an atmosphere full of clouds and multiple large bodies of water scattered across its surface, prominent ice caps and snow-capped highlands, rivers tracing their way down to the lowlands in the north.  (Maybe the water is all under the ice, not open to the air at the surface; maybe the liquid pools are small and limited to craters, not feeding a large ocean.)  Sober scientists might have suggested we shouldn’t get our hopes up too much- after all, the gravity is much lower, there’s no tectonic recycling, and there’s no protective magnetosphere.  But is sterility really the default assumption we should be making here?  Is ‘we are alone in the cosmos’ really the most sane conclusion to draw from this situation?  Is it not worth, perhaps, sending a rover to go see?

We’ve adapted our sensibilities to a dead solar system because in the moment we’re looking, it kind of is.  We’re hopeful for the icy moons- and the evidence keeps mounting there as well- but the terrestrial planets are a grim reminder of the fragility and contingency of our own world.  The thing is, the more we learn, the more we discover that we’re a bit late to a very, very interesting party.  Venus is a hellscape, but it probably didn’t start that way.  Mars is a desert, but once it was an oasis.  What makes Earth special among the terrestrial worlds isn’t that it developed a temperate climate, but that it kept a temperate climate for more than four billion years.  Stability, not habitability, is the party trick that makes us unique in the solar system.  And if we’re really committed to being grownups, to accepting what’s real instead of what’s easy, we have to learn that lesson too.

And life does not need four billion years to begin.  Not even close.

That brings us to Jezero Crater.  The most interesting feature here is a large river delta- based on some clever geology, we’re pretty sure that a large river emptied into the crater during Mars’ wet period.  When the rapidly-flowing water hit the still water of Lake Jezero, the loose sediments being carried along the current all fell out of suspension at this place, forming a large pile of detritus at the mouth of the river that accumulated over the lifetime of the system.  Even more interesting, check out this geologic map:

See those tiny teal deposits to the right side of the image?  Those are also river delta deposits.  Which means the thing labeled ‘delta’ on this map isn’t the original extent- it used to be much, much larger, at least twice as wide.  Which also means that the outer edge of the ‘delta’ that we see here in this image is actually an erosional surface, and we get a natural cross-section of the thing with the oldest deposits at the bottom and the youngest at the top, just before Mars lost its hydrosphere.  By climbing the outer edge, we can move through time across a large fraction of the habitable period.

Here’s another image I’d like you to see:

The crater I’ve been showing you is the small circle in the lower right- color is elevation, covering a span of about 5 km.  The black line is the watershed of that river, the region of Mars that channeled water to the delta.  In other words, the river delta collects sediments- and potentially, biosignatures- from a region hundreds of kilometers in diameter, and gathers them all in one place, neatly sorted by time.

For this reason, ancient deltas on Earth are a favorite of paleontologists.  In addition to being comfortably wet and active itself- plenty of access to biologically important nutrients, fresh supplies of liquid water, and a nice dynamic environment- deltas do the legwork for us.  Rather than exploring a huge fraction of the planet with a tiny rover, hoping that we stumble upon an ancient life sign, we can position ourselves at the mouth of the proverbial fire hose and let life come to us.

This does come with some tradeoffs.  Most importantly, whatever we find, we won’t know the original geologic setting.  If we find an unambiguous fossil of some kind- a microbial mat, perhaps- then we’ll know less than if we’d found it in its original home.  And if we don’t find life, then the samples we take will be similarly uncertain.  They’ll be defined in time, at least relative to one another, but not in space.  In the case of life signs, this is an important caveat, but the bare fact of proving that extraterrestrial life exists is sufficiently monumental that it’s still a secondary concern.  But if we’re just talking about geology, that’s a hard thing to lose; that terrifying multi-stage descent isn’t the only risk we’re taking.  We’re leaning into the astrobiology mission hard with this one.

And the search for life is, in itself, fraught.  That’s putting it mildly.  There’s every chance that any evidence that’s even slightly marginal is going to touch off decades of debate, rather than being some kind of slam-dunk.  As it should!  Life is such a fuzzy concept, and such an important concept, that it should absolutely be held to the highest degree of scrutiny we can muster.  This is why it matters that Perseverance includes sample return- in the highly likely case that the findings are disputed, we’ll hopefully have the chance to subject those samples to the highest degrees of scrutiny.  So it feels like the right time to go hunting.

On top of that, there’s the ‘evidence of absence’ problem.  Strong biosignatures update our priors very hard in the direction of life on Mars.  But what is the correct amount of evidence necessary to convince us that Mars never was alive?  I’m not sure, but failure to find microbial mats in Jezero probably isn’t enough.  So the search for life can succeed, but if it ‘fails’ that doesn’t necessarily teach us much; the best experiments teach you something no matter what, and ideally a commitment this large would meet that standard.  This is, more or less, baked into the search for extraterrestrial life, and there aren’t too many ways out from under that problem.

That said, Jezero in particular has some compensation.  As I mentioned, we’re collecting a lot of good data regardless; and even without the gologic context, there’s a ton of opportunity to sample different minerals and how they formed, and get a nice broad sample of the Martian surface over time.  And, even better, here’s the location of another interesting potential field site, in northeast Syrtis:

Note the proximity to Jezero crater!  And Syrtis is also a fantastic candidate for a sample return mission.  It has exposed mesas with layered outcrops going all the way back to the earliest days of Mars, and extending (potentially) through many of the most interesting periods.  Now, these are not ideal for the search for life, although they’d give us a ton of technical data about surface chemistry and the behavior of the atmosphere during the early, wet periods; it would go a long way towards resolving arguments about the temperature of the early Martian climate, for example, or tracing the early destabilization and loss of the magnetosphere while teaching us loads about the planet’s core.

Those mesas are still pretty far away.  Too far, probably, for a sensible rover lifespan to make it all the way there.  But there’s a plan- called the ‘Midway’ route, as a nod to the compromise nature of it.  See, halfway between Jezero and these mesas, there are a lot of banded rocks that look suspiciously like they’re sourced from the table mesas in Syrtis.  And those, we can get to, maybe.  If we call a specific deadline on looking for life in Jezero, then we can pivot to Midway and hopefully take a really deep look.  So, in the end, we’re going hard for astrobiology research, but we’re not going all-in.

The importance of the search for life is… well, there are a lot of people out there, and we enter the world in a lot of different ways.  Most of us agree that the existence of extraterrestrial life would be a Big Deal, and we tend to have a lot of different reasons for that.  It’s not a bad subject for a future post or three, in fact.  But there’s one thing lurking in the back of my head that’s a non-obvious reason to go looking.  This wasn’t discussed at the workshop particularly, but it fed into my vote somewhat.  Check the logic of this for me, see if it makes sense:

Worrying about existential risks, we sometimes talk about the ‘great filter’.  That is, the mysterious phenomenon which explains the lack of extraterrestrial civilizations reaching out to us.  Now, maybe we’re in a zoo or a preserve or something, and intelligences are out there watching after all; maybe the Earth really is the center of the cosmos, because of the simulation hypothesis or the various religious explanations.  There’s no real way to know for sure at this point.  But consider the space of very real possibilities where the universe actually is material, and actually is mostly barren.  Why?

Stepping through the sequence, it might be that abiogenesis is really hard- going from a temperate world to a living one is almost (but not quite) impossible.  Maybe there’s some hurdle to clear between genesis and encephalization.  Maybe, given encephalization, civilization and tool-use are almost impossible.  Or maybe there are many civilizations like ours, and the great filter is ahead of us- it is almost impossible for technological civilizations not to self-destruct or turn in to lotus-eaters before they reach interstellar civilization.  There are a lot of possibilities for the filter, and for present purposes we’ll divide them into two categories: those which we would have already passed, and those which are in our future.

And here’s the thing: for each possibility we can exclude from the great filter, all the other possibilities increase commensurately, becoming more likely in our estimation.  (Assuming the exclusion is ‘clean’ and doesn’t favor some other possibility, that is.)  Given that the silence continues, if we could somehow prove that technological self-destruction isn’t a big risk, that would commensurately increase our guesses about how hard abiogenesis is.

Life on Mars, especially if we could be very sure that it evolved independently of Earth life, would be a strong argument against the difficulty of abiogenesis.  One biosphere in the solar system, and nowhere else, might be down to luck.  The one biosphere has to be somewhere, right?  Two in the solar system, and nowhere else, is a good bit less reasonable.  If we find a second genesis on Mars, then we’ve learned that life is not rare.  That the hundreds of billions of stars in the Milky Way are likely host to many billions of different living (or at least once-living) worlds.

And as wonderful as that news is, as much as it makes me so happy that I literally had to take a second to cry on my bed for a bit, it also makes the great silence much, much scarier.  Today, we can reassure ourselves by saying that life may be rare in the universe.  But what if it isn’t?  If the cosmos is full of life, but not full of thought, then…

If this is the case, we need to know.  We need to know as soon as possible, and we need to know it while we’re engaged in the great project of technological development and moral progress.  It’s easy to imagine that this particular mission is one that can be framed in purely positive terms- the joy of discovery, the vastness of truth, the love of how things might be.  But I do also have this sense of civilizational fragility, you know?  And understanding the risks that we face and the chances we’re taking- that’s not idle curiosity.  That’s genuinely urgent.

[carnegiemuseumnaturalhistory]

The Strange Saga of Spinosaurus, the Semiaquatic Dinosaurian Superpredator

I’ve been captivated by dinosaurs for as long as I can remember. My parents tell me that I told them that I wanted to be a paleontologist as early as age four. Naturally, then, I had lots and lots of books about dinosaurs when I was a boy growing up during the 1980s. One of the dinosaurs that always fascinated me the most was Spinosaurus aegyptiacus. Found in 1912 in the Bahariya Oasis of the Western Desert of Egypt (could anyplace sound more exotic to a small-town kid from upstate New York?!), Spinosaurus was originally known from a highly incomplete but also very large and extremely distinctive partial skeleton found in a middle Cretaceous-aged (roughly 95-million-year-old) rock layer in the oasis. Among the few skeletal elements known were part of a strangely shaped (for a dinosaur) lower jaw, some crocodile-like teeth, and most strikingly, several back vertebrae that each sported tall spines, some of them measuring nearly six feet. These spines clearly impressed Ernst Stromer von Reichenbach, the German paleontologist who studied the skeleton and gave the animal its name in a 1915 publication. Tragically, however, that original Spinosaurus skeleton—and all of Stromer’s other dinosaur fossils from Egypt—were destroyed during the Second World War, more specifically in a British Royal Air Force bombing of Munich on April 24, 1944. The story of Stromer’s lost dinosaurs found its way into many a children’s book, including several that I read cover-to-cover. As such, the tale took on near-legendary status for me, and, I’m sure, many other young dinosaur enthusiasts around the world. Here was an absolutely extraordinary dinosaur from a faraway land, similar in size to the gargantuan Tyrannosaurus rex, but clearly very different from all other predatory dinosaurs known at the time – and it was represented only by a few teeth and bones that had been blasted into oblivion decades ago and so now existed only as pictures in books.

A scan of my photocopy of plate I of Ernst Stromer’s original 1915 publication on Spinosaurus aegyptiacus, showing some of the teeth and bones preserved in the holotype (= name-bearing) partial skeleton, discovered in 1912 in Egypt’s Bahariya Oasis. Check out the long spines on the back vertebrae at lower left!

Stromer’s conception of Spinosaurus, as depicted in a 1936 publication and on a glass slide of his that colleagues of mine scanned during our visit to the Paläontologisches Museum München in Munich, Germany in 2001. Stromer knew this animal was big, as evidenced by the human skeleton he included for scale. Interestingly, too, he reconstructed Spinosaurus with unusual proportions for a carnivorous dinosaur, such as an abnormally elongate torso and short hind limbs. We’ll come back to those odd proportions a little later…

When I arrived in graduate school at the University of Pennsylvania in 1997, one of the first things I did was make a lengthy list of all the paleontological sites I was interested in exploring, ranked by their potential (in my mind, at least) to produce scientifically significant finds. The Bahariya Oasis and the search for a ‘replacement Spinosaurus’ quickly rose to the top of the list. Amazingly, no one had ever found—or at least officially reported—new dinosaur fossils in the oasis in the more than half-century since Stromer’s beasts were obliterated during that fateful airstrike. A need to keep this post to a reasonable length prevents me from describing the stars that had to align to make this happen, but in January 2000 I found myself in the Bahariya Oasis—one of the places I’d dreamed about going since I was a small child—as part of the first significant ‘dinosaur hunt’ to take place at the site since the early 20th century. It was bittersweet, though, in the sense that we never really found that ‘replacement Spinosaurus’ I’d fantasized about – all we ever discovered of that creature were a few isolated, fragmentary teeth and bones (and, in a very different location, a couple previously unpublished photos of the original skeleton in a Munich archive). We did find and dig up a gigantic new species of long-necked, plant-eating sauropod dinosaur, Paralititan stromeri, a creature that to this day is one of the largest land animals of any kind that’s ever been found, anywhere – but that’s another story for another time.

One of the rare contributions that I personally have made to scientific knowledge of Spinosaurus: a glass slide showing the only known photo of the right dentary (tooth-bearing lower jaw bone) of the original, name-bearing partial skeleton from Egypt. Like all of Stromer’s Egyptian dinosaur material, this specimen (including this bone) was destroyed in a British air raid on Munich during World War II. Several colleagues and I ‘rediscovered’ this photo—which nobody apparently knew existed—in an archive at the Paläontologisches Museum München in 2001. We published it and one other previously unknown photo of the Spinosaurus type specimen in a 2006 paper in the Journal of Paleontology.

A much younger yours truly digging up the incomplete left humerus (upper arm bone) of the gigantic sauropod (long-necked herbivorous dinosaur) Paralititan stromeri in the Bahariya Oasis of Egypt, February 2000. Paralititan is one of the largest dinosaurs ever discovered – a nice ‘consolation prize’ given that we didn’t find much of Spinosaurus during our expeditions to Bahariya. (A cast replica of the complete right humerus of Paralititan is on display in PaleoLab at Carnegie Museum of Natural History.) Credit: Josh Smith.

Back to the matter at hand, meaning Spinosaurus. Fast-forward to 2011. I had the honor of serving as the external thesis examiner for Nizar Ibrahim, a promising doctoral student at University College Dublin in Ireland. I’d known Nizar for years, ever since he reached out to me by email while an undergraduate at the University of Bristol, England, to discuss our mutual interests in African Cretaceous dinosaurs. Nizar’s Ph.D. thesis was on dinosaurs and other middle Cretaceous-aged vertebrates from the celebrated Kem Kem beds of southeastern Morocco, a set of rocks that had yielded a fossil fauna very similar to, though seemingly more diverse than, that of the Bahariya Oasis. Among the many finds that Nizar documented in his colossal thesis were intriguing new remains of Spinosaurus. I went to Dublin to participate in his successful thesis defense, and afterward, he and I hit up some of the city’s finest public houses to celebrate (no surprise for those who know me). Over a pitcher of yummy Irish stout, he told me an exciting story – he and his team had lately discovered not just isolated bones of Spinosaurus in Morocco, but parts of a probable new skeleton. If so, this find would be the first skeleton since Stromer, and moreover would be exceedingly important given how little was known about Spinosaurus, even as recently as the early 2010s. The more parts we paleontologists have of a given fossil animal, the more we can generally learn about it, so the prospect of a new and relatively complete Spinosaurus skeleton—in other words, many bones belonging to a single individual dinosaur—was thrilling to say the least.

Again I’ll skip details for brevity’s sake, but fast-forward once again, to 2014. I was contacted by an editor of Science—one of the foremost scientific journals in the world—to peer-review a paper that had been submitted by (you guessed it!) Nizar and a long list of collaborators describing that new skeleton of Spinosaurus that he’d told me about over beers in Ireland three years before. Nizar and team had revisited the quarry and it had panned out in a big way. From this one, single individual Spinosaurus—again, the first associated skeleton of this dinosaur to have been found in roughly a century—they had bones from the skull, backbone (including a few of those famously long-spined vertebrae!), forelimb, pelvis, and hind limb. More importantly, these ‘new’ bones revealed that Spinosaurus was even more bizarre than anyone imagined! We already knew, from Stromer’s specimen and other, isolated finds made through the years, that the shapes of the skull and back were really weird for a predatory dinosaur. Now, the new skeleton showed that the bones were remarkably dense, the hind legs were oddly short, and the hind feet may have been webbed! All of this led Nizar and colleagues to propose that Spinosaurus may have been semiaquatic; in other words, that its lifestyle was much more comparable to that of a modern-day alligator or crocodile than it was to a more ‘typical’ land-living predatory dinosaur such as T. rex. Other evidence for an affinity to watery habitats had been found in Spinosaurus and closely related dinosaurs (known, perhaps unsurprisingly, as spinosaurids) before, but this was, in my mind, the most convincing case yet made that these animals spent significant amounts of their time at least partly submerged in lakes and rivers. The paper was published in Science a few months later, accompanied by a cover story in National Geographic magazine and a special on the venerable PBS TV series NOVA. Almost exactly one hundred years after it had been named, Spinosaurus had become a celebrity.

Nizar Ibrahim and colleagues’ initial conception of Spinosaurus aegyptiacus in the flesh, released to coincide with the publication of their Science paper in 2014. Two aspects stand out: as Stromer already knew (see his skeletal reconstruction above), the animal is enormous, but it was more oddly proportioned than even he had imagined. Note also the ‘regular-looking’ (for a dinosaur) tail, and read on. Credit: Davide Bonadonna.

Semiaquatic Spinosaurus chowing down on a tasty lungfish in what is now northern Africa some 95 million years ago. Italian paleoartist Davide Bonadonna has produced some of the most beautiful and accurate modern depictions of this extraordinary dinosaur, and I’m grateful to him for letting me reproduce his art here.

But the story didn’t end there. Some prominent paleontologists criticized Nizar and colleagues’ semiaquatic interpretation of Spinosaurus. These opinions weren’t a final judgment. Instead, this is just how science works: we scientists propose ideas, or hypotheses—in this case, that Spinosaurus lived and behaved more like a crocodile than your garden-variety carnivorous dinosaur—and then test these hypotheses by reevaluating the existing evidence and/or bringing new information to light. If a hypothesis repeatedly stands up to testing, then it gradually gets incorporated into the body of knowledge. Other paleontologists presented evidence that they claimed refuted the semiaquatic hypothesis, but Nizar and team eventually countered with new data of their own. In late 2019, another prominent scientific journal—this time it was Nature—came calling, asking me to review a second paper by Nizar et al. on Spinosaurus. What, I thought, could these researchers have to say about this dinosaur that they hadn’t already said before? Well, as it turns out, Nizar and colleagues had kept digging at their Spinosaurus skeleton site, and incredibly, they’d continued to find important new bones belonging to the same specimen. Among these post-2014 finds was the almost complete tail. When I saw what it looked like (via an illustration in their paper), I literally laughed out loud with surprise and delight. Somehow, the shape of the Spinosaurus tail Nizar’s team had discovered—the first even reasonably complete tail of this dinosaur to have ever been unearthed—was simultaneously both unexpected and predictable. It looked really dissimilar from the tails of other predatory dinosaurs, but it was nearly exactly like what one might expect for a dinosaur that used its tail to propel itself through water. In other words, the tall, fin-like tail of Spinosaurus looked more like that of a supersized alligator or newt than that of T. rex.

Nizar and team’s Nature paper on their Spinosaurus tail was published this past April 29. Is it the last word on this dinosaur and its mode of life? Most certainly not, but the evidence is now stronger than ever—in my opinion, very strong—that Spinosaurus spent more time in the water than any other non-avian (= non-bird) dinosaur that we currently know about.

The modern view of Spinosaurus, not as a ‘regular’ predatory dinosaur, but rather as a specialized semiaquatic hunter that spent much of its life in the water. Self-serving side note: the three smaller, spiky-looking fish are Bawitius bartheli, a polypterid (an archaic, still-extant group of thick-scaled ray-finned fishes) that several colleagues and I named in 2012 from fossils found in the Bahariya Oasis. The larger fish at lower left is the giant coelacanth Axelrodichthys (sometimes called Mawsonia) libyca. Credit: Davide Bonadonna.

Two Spinosaurus invite the sawfish Onchopristis numidus to lunch in what’s now northern Africa some 95 million years ago. Look at those fin-like Spinosaurus tails! Credit: Davide Bonadonna/National Geographic.

Nizar (who’s a Research Associate here at Carnegie Museum of Natural History), myself, and our many colleagues and collaborators are continuing to study the mysterious dinosaurs and other fossil vertebrates from the middle and Late Cretaceous of northern Africa. Indeed, Nizar and I have several collaborative papers in the works right now, and I’m also working with an amazing team of paleontologists at Mansoura University on multiple new Egyptian fossil finds. It’s a good bet that African Cretaceous dinosaurs even stranger than Spinosaurus are still out there, waiting to be discovered!

Further reading/watching:

Nothdurft, W. E., with J. B. Smith, M. C. Lamanna, K. J. Lacovara, J. C. Poole, and J. R. Smith. 2002. The Lost Dinosaurs of Egypt. Random House, New York, 256 pp.

Smith, J. B., M. C. Lamanna, H. Mayr, and K. J. Lacovara. 2006. New information regarding the holotype of Spinosaurus aegyptiacus Stromer, 1915. Journal of Paleontology 80:400–406.

Ibrahim, N., P. C. Sereno, C. Dal Sasso, S. Maganuco, M. Fabbri, D. M. Martill, S. Zouhri, N. Myhrvold, and D. A. Iurino. 2014. Semiaquatic adaptations in a giant predatory dinosaur. Science 345:1613–1616.

Bigger Than T. rex (NOVA documentary): https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/video/bigger-than-t-rex/

Henderson, D. M. 2018. A buoyancy, balance and stability challenge to the hypothesis of a semi-aquatic Spinosaurus Stromer, 1915 (Dinosauria: Theropoda). PeerJ 6:e5409.

Ibrahim, N., S. Maganuco, C. Dal Sasso, M. Fabbri, M. Auditore, G. Bindellini, D. M. Martill, S. Zouhri, D. A. Mattarelli, D. M. Unwin, J. Wiemann, D. Bonadonna, A. Amane, J. Jakubczak, U. Joger, G. V. Lauder, and S.E. Pierce. 2020. Tail-propelled aquatic locomotion in a theropod dinosaur. Nature 581:67–70.

Matt Lamanna is Mary R. Dawson Associate Curator and Head of the Section of Vertebrate Paleontology at Carnegie Museum of Natural History. Museum staff, volunteers, and interns are encouraged to blog about their unique experiences and knowledge gained from working at the museum.

[lucyhblack]

Summary:Wait! What do you mean "fossils"?

Well, let me explain!

"What do you mean fossils?" You must be wondering, after all, as I said at the beginning of this guide, pokemon as well as Monsters turn to dust when they die.

The “mummification” or "fossilization (if we can call it that) is only possible due to certain special conditions that allowed the pokemon in question (or parts of it) to remain even after its death.

Out of curiosity, I'm going to report the two cases of Colossal Pokemons (even if one of them is not within my jurisdiction) or more precisely, their “fossils”!

Colossal Gasterblaster (Colossaltale - @pdubbery)

Hotland is a large extension of our continent and it contains some of the hottest regions on our planet. There lies the vast and almost impassable Hotland Desert and the incredible desert gem Oasis Primavera.

In the vast expanse of area that is the desert we can reach the Dragon Ruins, and beyond the territory of the rare and wild Pokesans Gasterblaster, and it is there that we can find the largest fossil in the world!

Discovered by prestigious Elite 4 member Arthurus, better known as Rus, as a young explorer, this fossil is so gigantic that it would allow you to build a house in your rib cage (a small, but still a house).

Although we classify it as the fossil of a pokesas (if we can call it a fossil, when even living pokesans are all made of bones) there is a lot of debate as to whether it really is a pokemon, or the remains of a gigantic blaster.

Some argue that, due to the fact that pokesans turn to dust when they die, it's more logical that it's a blaster, as these can still remain for a while (depends on how much magic has been deposited in the blaster) after the pokesans die.

Opinions differ because, unlike today's blasters, the fossil has a skull (very similar to Gasterblasters, and yet with slight differences), spine, ribs, and lower limb rectus (the upper part of the torso was heavily damaged, but there is evidence to indicate that the fossil had upper limbs) and some tail bones.

However, if it is actually a blaster, that would indicate that in the past blasters could be summoned full body. On the other hand, readings indicate that there is no magic left in his bones, and since blasters are manifestations of pokesan magic, it's a little hard to believe it's actually a blaster if there's no magic left.

(Not to mention that blasters usually have their sizes proportional to the pokesans that summon it, and considering the size of the fossil, imagine what size the pokesans that summoned it would be! At the very least we would have to create one more size classification to frame a pokesans so big!)

Due to the fact that it is impossible to move it and attempts to obtain samples end up in their disintegration, it is practically impossible to examine it in depth and determine its true nature.

What we know so far is that this "fossil" is thousands of years old (and is even reported in legends of nomadic peoples in the region) and composition tests only indicate that it is real bones and not something created by monsters (some kind of ancient sculpture, for example).

And, unlike the next exemplary, there is no explanation of how this specimen (either a pokesans or a blaster) exists, since the desert does not provide the same preservation conditions as the environment of the next specimen.

The truth is that this fossil is one of the greatest mysteries of our world and you can find this wonder with a good dose of courage and determination (to face miles of scorching sand, wild and inhospitable pokemon and monotonous and disorienting landscapes). If you really want to see this magnificent specimen with your own eyes, I strongly advise you to get a guide at Oasis Primavera first.

(or like me, just appreciate it for photos and videos)

Temmie (Swapaxefell - @uhhbananafrappe and @azulandrojo)

The second specimen that I will report belongs to a Poketemmie and is found in the depths of a cave in Walterfall, one of the most beautiful regions of our continent.

This cave has an extensive cluster of tunnels forming a treacherous and elaborate labyrinth. There you will find one of the vastest clusters of Magic Crystals inside. The deeper you go, the bigger they get and it is because of this that we have the chance to be able to find such a specimen still preserved.

Apparently this prehistoric Poketemmie (research indicates that it is a poisonous type) crawled through the caves (many even believe that he was the one who dug a large number of tunnels that permeate the cave) feeding on all the life it found by way until it was so big that it was impossible for it to get out of there.

At one point it ended up falling (literally and figuratively) at a point it could no longer get out of. It is believed to have “Falled” for a long period of time before it death, which allowed time for the cave's magical conditions to crystallize it, preserving him for the most part.

The Poketemmie is almost as big as the Gasterblaster fossil in the HotLand desert and, although ancient, this "fossil" is somewhat more recent than the one from Hotland.

Cave paintings suggest that this Poketemmie was known to ancient Monster ancestors who feared and revered it, sometimes leaving offerings or sending sacrifices to it.

Even this incredible discovery is due to legends, that have survived to this day, about a horrible being that haunted these caves and would devour anything that dared to enter them.

As with the Hotland fossil, removal of Walterfell's “remnants” is impossible (for the same reasons (its size and complex location and the fragility of the specimen itself).

Anyone who is willing can visit it, but it is advisable to ask for a guide (again), or fill up on Escaperoute, as many were the ones who ventured into the underground labyrinths of Temmie Cave and never returned.

(Particularly I don't think the sight of the creature is worth the trouble. Unlike the clean and pleasant Hotland fossil, the Temmie Cave fossil has a look... not very digestible to put it in simple terms. But if you like semi-decomposed corpses covered in evil-looking red mushrooms encased in crystal, well then good advantage!)

And with that I close the study part focused exclusively on pokesans. From now on I will focus on the Pokesans vs Trainer relationship.

What? I told you it wasn't over yet, and don't even think about dropping out of course now! If you think you are ready to go out into the wild and capture your pokesans I can assure you that there is still a lot to discuss.

Don't you want to know which is the best pokeball to catch your first pokesans? Not interested in knowing the difference between a trainer, coordinator and a breeder? Aren't you curious how bonds work and why you can't be a trainer with a pack of 30 pokesans?

So sit down and stay with me through the fascinating world of Pokesans!

***

And finally we see some of the other AU that I have included in this universe!

A special thanks to everyone who contributed and continue to contribute to this vast and incredible fandom!

[memes-in-a-half-shell]

Arabian Nights AU (Turtle of choice x F!Reader)

This is mostly a test so far. Maybe I’ll use that as a first chapter, but that remains to be seen. It will spread into different chapters where the reader can choose who they want to romance.

Inspiration music

((Female Reader))

You woke up, feeling numb. The last thing you could remember was walking in that damn desert, the endless sand dunes making you groan forever. The sun had hit you hard enough to make you lose consciousness. ... And now you were in a bed of silk and comfy cushions...

The sun was only starting to rise, softly lighting the room you were in. Large columns were separating the interior from a large balcony, no windows or doors inbetween. Feeling capable enough, you decided to get up and explore this strange environement. Am I dead? You thought. Adjusting a silk dressing gown you found nearby around your body, you dared to step into the light, out in the open. You gulped, discovering palm trees and bushes. And especially water. An oasis, to be precise. You appeared to be in a sort of palace, suddenly wondering if you were alone. As you eyed the water below, you couldn’t stop your feet as you rushed to the stairs that led down to this flourishing garden. You were so thirsty! The water was crystal clear, shining with the early sun rays. Kneeling down on the shore, you did not hesitate to cup some of it, feeling the greatest relief as the liquid finally passed your lips and slid down your throat. A long sigh escaped you, closing your eyes as your head hung slightly backward, finally feeling at peace... At least, until you felt the cold touch of a sharp blade against your throat. Your eyes snapped open, first noticing the scimitar so close to your skin. Then your gaze trailed along the weapon, noticing a large hand holding it. Three fingers? And then a massive form partially hidden by a palm tree’s shadow. But those blue eyes. Piercing. Haunting. You couldn’t move, somehow hypnotized.

“Get up,” said the male stranger.

You obeyed, never looking away, his blade always close to you.

“Follow me and don’t even try to run away. There’s an archer aiming at you right as we speak. He will not miss.”

You nodded weakly, finally feeling the scimitar lowering, allowing you to breathe properly. A green hand gestured you to come and move, the newcomer getting out of the shadows. A turtle, you first thought as you saw his shell on his back. Also a giant, as you were sure he was was standing over 6 feet tall. You were certain that you died now. You were in this strange afterlife, filled with strange beings.... It had to be it! Otherwise this was all crazy!

You were brought back inside the palace, walking alongside the creature through a large corridor. You took time to silently - and secretly - eye him. A blue mask was wrapped around his head, leaving two openings for the eyes. His green, reptilian pebbled skin could only translate a primal force, his muscles perfectly toned. Tattoos were adorning his biceps and forearms, safeguards of some personal history. His twin scimitars were hanging crossed on his shell, the hilts standing like watchtowers behind. Bandages were wrapped around his palms and knuckles, leading up to his wrists, ready to assist him in case he’d need to throw in some punches. And you couldn’t help but gulp as your eyes slowly trailed down to his hips, noticing how his black harem pants were tantalizingly hanging low - just at the right height. At first you couldn’t help feeling scared by his sole presence, but you couldn’t deny that a strange enticing aura was coming out of him. I’m dead after all, better appreciate whatever I can, you thought.

Arriving at large, ornated doors, you slightly jumped as another presence jumped in - another turtle. The archer, you observed as this one was holding such weapon in his hand. He was a bit smaller than the first one, although nonetheless impressive in size. He was adorning an orange cloth around his head. A sand colored scarf that could serve as a hood was hanging around his neck and shoulders, his whole appearance ornamented with gold trinkets and chains. His light colored pants contrasted with several colorful loose belts, one of them only holding tight as it carried his quiver and arrows. His baby blue eyes studied you with a stern look, only to soften up with a light smirk.

“Not bad, when seen up close,” he commented.

“Not now, Mikey,” warned the other.

The blue clad turtle opened the doors, giving view to a large room. At the end of it layed a seat surrounded by cushions, on top of fancy rugs. The smell of incense got to you, somehow calming your nerves. At one corner you spotted a table to which another turtle was seated nearby. Surrounded by books and parchments, he seemed to be studying a map, his golden eyes behind hand-made glasses only drifting up when he took notice of your entrance. A small “oh” escaped him as he got up, his height instantly surprising you - he was by far the tallest of them all. He approached you, not hesitating to gently move your head around and taking your pulse. This one was wearing a purple bandana, a perfect complementary color to his green skin. He was not extravageant in fashion, but still adorned utility belts that held vials, small daggers and compartments for scrolls. He seemed more of a scholar than a soldier, although you couldn’t help noticing the impressive spear that was resting near the table he was previously at.

“She just woke up,” explained the blue one.

The tall one nodded, holding one side of his wrist against your forehead, taking your temperature.

“Am ... am I dead?” you finally asked.

“Hah, no,” started the purple clad turtle with an amused smile. “You got one mean heatstroke though. That trip of yours in the desert wasn’t very kind to you.”

“Raph, our brother, found you during one of his patrols,” added the orange one known as Mikey. “He first thought you were dead, but as soon as he got a pulse, he brought you here and Donnie worked his magic,” he ended in a playful tone.

“And now she needs to answer some questions,” said another voice coming this way.

You couldn’t help your gasp, noticing the newcomer. As much as was slightly smaller than that Donnie one, he was by far the largest. A mountain of muscles that screamed strength. A red cloth was adorning the top of his head, stopping at the bridge of his snout. His dress code reminded more of a mercenary, two long curved daggers resting at each sides of his hips. His green eyes were stuck on you in this constant scowl, judging any moves you would make or any words you would say.

“We must await father. He is the one that will be asking questions,” mentionned the blue clad turtle.

“Don’t boss me around, Leo, I know that,” grunted Raph. “It’s just ... are you really expecting me to believe that a human like her could survive that long in the desert? She has to be a spy or something. Few are the people who can find the oasis.”

The conversation was cut short as another door was opened, all attentions snapping to the source. You were expecting a fifth turtle, yet all that came was a small rat man. Strange. You saw the creature make his way to the throne-like seat, instantly seeing the turtles bow to him. You didn’t know what to do, too mystified by the whole situation. The rat’s eyes laid on your form, his traits calm. “Come forth, child.”

You obeyed, detaching yourself from the four brothers. You stopped a few steps away from the other, unsure about how to stand or behave yourself. “Do not fear, your life is not at risk,” he continued. “My sons may look and sound intimidating, but that is only for good measure and protection.”

“This all feels like a dream...,” you said in a low tone.

“I have no troubles believing that. After all, we are secluded from the rest of the world, surrounded by a sea of sand. ... May I ask where you are from?”

Your brows lightly furrowed, suddenly remembering your previous predicament.

“I come from a small village that is placed north of the Great River. There’s nothing really special happening there - mostly farming and a couple of sheperds. ... But then the raiders came.”

The rat nodded in understanding.

“... You are a long way from home, child. What happened with those raiders?”

You gulped, one of your hands instinctively rubbing the back of your neck, knowing that lower, on your back, was engraved several whip wound scars...

“They were planning to bring me and a few others to a slave market. Their caravan was crossing the desert, heading for the west coast. I was able to escape during one night where the guards had a little too much alcohol...”

“But how did you find this place?” came forth Raph, his tone urgent.

The rat only had to lift his hand to stop the other, his gaze stern for a slight moment. But as soon as he looked back to you, kindness was back once again.

“Forgive my son. We do not receive many visitors and only a handful know about this palace. ... You must have many questions yourself.”

Where to start?

“Are you gods? Half-human, half-animal gods?” your first said.

Light chuckles escaped the creatures.

“No,” answered the rat. “Although many will always claim as so! We are the products of strange circumstances - but that is all I will say for now.”

“What is this place, does it serves any purpose?”

The other extended his arms in a presenting manner, gesturing the whole space.

“This palace was once an ancient ruin. When my sons and I found it, we restored it and now we call it home. ... As our beings are much different from human standards, this secret haven in the middle of the desert seemed like the perfect hideout for us. But we do have one purpose,” he next gestured towards his sons. “These four brothers are the peacekeepers of the desert. No bandits or outlaws escape their grasps.”

Your gaze lighted up.

“Could they retrieve the raiders and help the people from my village then?” you asked eagerly.

“This is dangerous,” started the one known as Leo. “Raiders are usually regrouped in large numbers - unlike bandits who prefer to travel alone or in small groups. ... This situation needs preparation.”

The rat seemed to agree: “My son is wise. We must not head blindly and risk innocent lives. We will need to gather more information before we decide on any action to take.”

He got up from his seat, approaching you so he could place a reassuring hand on your shoulder.

“We will bring justice to your village, child, do not worry. ... May I ask what is your name?”

As you were about to speak, you were cut at once: “Who cares, she’s still an intruder,” said the red clad creature.

“Rude,” commented Mikey.

The rat sighed, jokingly commenting only for you to hear: “And this is why sometimes I wish there were more people around here!”

((Next chapter))

[jarmes]

Mirage

In a world gone to hell, a man journeys through the desert.

The horse trots through the desert at a slow pace. Its rider kicks it in the side, telling it to speed up. The horse ignores this command and instead collapses, falling into the white sand. The rider brushes the sand off his coat and looks down at his horse. The horse is thin; weeks of walking through the seemingly endless desert have taken their toll. Skin clings tightly around the horse’s ribs. The rider peers into the horse’s black eyes. Judging by its empty stare, the horse is dying of thirst.

The rider grabs a canteen from his pack and takes a sip. The cold water rushes down his throat, quenching his thirst like heavenly nectar. The rider wipes his chin, grabs his gun, and fires, putting the horse out of its misery. The rider kneels down, pulls out his knife, and starts cutting.

The last time he saw another person was three weeks ago. Deep down, he doubts that he’ll ever see another human being. The desert stretches for a thousand horizons in every direction. The unrelenting wind blows away any footprints he leaves, destroying any trace of his existence.

He takes another sip from his canteen, finishing the last drops of water. He sighs. The last time he was dying of thirst he was lucky enough to come across a man with a horse and several canteens full of water. Back then, his gun had four bullets. Now it only has two. If he doesn’t find an oasis or another traveler soon, he has a feeling that he’ll use one of his remaining bullets.

The rider cuts the horse into slabs of meat and dries them using the sand. He takes what he can; the rest he leaves for the buzzards. Food isn’t something he’ll have to worry about, at the very least. He munches on the horse jerky as he marches through the desert, searching for salvation.

After two days of walking, he sees what looks to be sparkling blue water. He races towards it, ignoring his screaming legs. When he reaches the “oasis” and realizes that it is nothing more than a mirage, he collapses to his knees and starts crying.

He spends the night under the stars, dreaming of raining. In the morning, he sets out again. After a few hours, he collapses. His lips are chapped and swollen. His mouth tastes like sand. He struggles to keep his eyes open. With a sigh, he grabs his gun. He places the barrel on his temple.

He takes one last look at the world. He sees a person walking towards him. The rider ignores this as nothing more than another mirage. He falls deep into unconsciousness before he can find the strength to pull the trigger.

When he comes to, he is lying in a comfortable bed. His sweat soaked clothes are folded neatly in a pile at the foot of the bed. His pack sits by the door of the small bedroom and his gun sits on a small nightstand.

Sitting next to his gun is a large pitcher of water. Without thinking, the rider grabs the pitcher and pours himself a glass of ice cold water. As the water rolls down his throat, he starts to wonder where he is. After downing three glasses of water, the rider grabs his gun and slowly exits the bedroom. He explores the small house, discovering several plain rooms. Finally, he finds the front door and walks out into the scorching desert once more.

An old woman is sitting on a bench, reading an old book and sipping a glass of tea. “Hello dearie,” she says. “Did you have a nice rest?”

The rider draws his gun and points it at the old woman. She laughs. “There’s no need for that,” she says.

“How did I get here?” the rider asks.

“I found you out in the desert and brought you here.”

“Who are you?”

“I’m just a kind old woman, trying to survive in this messed up world. Would you like some tea?”

The old woman hands the rider a glass of iced tea. He begrudgingly takes a sip and tries to ignore how good it tastes. The old woman returns to reading her book. The rider sits down next to her. “Where am I?” he asks.

“My home.”

“Your home?”

The old lady takes a sip of her tea. “You are not the first man to try and cross this desert, nor will you be the last,” she says. “My family and were like you once, weary travelers crossing an endless sea of sand in search of paradise. We came across this oasis a years ago and decided to live here.”

She stands up and grabs the rider’s hand. “Come, let me show you around,” she says.

She leads the rider away from the porch, guiding him to a spring surrounded by trees. “When the seas dried up, this region became a hostile land. My family heard rumors of a paradise beyond the sands. We found this Oasis.”

“There’s an underground well that flows into this spring. I’ve been here for years and it still hasn’t gone dry,” she says. “My family decided that this place was as close to paradise as we could find. We built our house using wood from the trees. We made this place our home.”

“This is amazing,” the rider says. “What do you eat?”

The old woman leads him to the house’s cellar, where tables lined with potted plants sit. Bright lights hang from the ceiling, illuminating the room. Jars of canned meat line the walls of the cellar. “I was a botanist, before the world went to hell,” the woman says. “Over the years, passing travelers have left me with the things I needed to make this garden. Pieces of metal, glass bottles, the occasional seed, you get the idea. It took a long time, but I eventually managed to make this garden.”

“Travelers?”

“You aren’t the first person I’ve ever found passed out in the sand. Every few weeks someone makes their way through here. They never stay long, but they do give me what I need to survive.”

“I grow potatoes, lettuce, cabbage, and a few herbs,” she says. “It isn’t the most flavorful diet, but I manage.”

The rider notices a pot filled with pink flowers. “What’s the point of this?” he asks.

“You’ll figure it out eventually,” she says.

When dinner rolls around, the old woman invites the rider to have dinner with her. She serves him a bowl of delicious soup that melts in his mouth. “This is amazing,” he says. “What’s in this?”

“Cabbage, water, and a certain secret ingredient,” she says.

“Can I ask you something?”

“What?”

“Why did you save me?”

“Because you're a person. It would be a terrible waste to let you die out there.”

The pair finish their meal and the woman leads the rider to her parlor. “This house is enormous,” he says. “How did you build this place?”

“My husband was a carpenter. He put his heart and soul into building this place.”

“Your husband? Is he-”

“He’s dead.”

The old woman sighs. “Johnny was a kind man. Too kind. That’s what did him in, in the end.”

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to pry.”

“No. It’s fine. Why don’t you tell me more about yourself?”

“There isn’t much to tell. I wanted to get away from the reds, heard about the hidden city, and decided to risk my life by crossing the desert.”

“I have heard that exact story a thousand times from a thousand different travelers. Sometimes men, sometimes women, sometimes children, all chasing that dream. A paradise where the water runs freely. A place where the reds don’t dare visit. A mirage.”

“A mirage?”

“I was like you once. It took the death of my children to realize the truth. There is no paradise beyond this desert. If you leave, you will die. Please, stay with me.”

The pair go to their respective bedrooms. The rider lies in bed. Even though the call of sleep feels so enticing, thoughts swirl around in his head like a whirlwind, keeping him awake. He grabs his gun and sneaks out of his room. Being sure to not make a noise, he creeps into the old woman’s room. Through the darkness, he sees a vaguely human-sized shape lying beneath the covers. He raises his gun and fires.

The gun just clicks. He looks at it, confused. The old woman opens the door to the bedroom. “I took the gun apart when you were unconscious, making sure to leave a few pieces out when reassembling it,” she says. “Not that it matters, of course, judging by the fact that you just tried to shoot a pillow.”

The rider aims his gun at her and fires again. Once more, the gun simply clicks. “You’re a bandit, aren’t you?” the old woman says. “A man who kills others for the supplies he needs.”

“So what if I am?”

“Let me tell you a little story. I was like you once. I heard of the hidden city and convinced my husband and children to come with me. As we traveled, our supplies began to dwindle. That’s when the bandits showed up.”

“I wish I could say that they killed my children,” she says. “That would have been so much more bearable. I attacked the bandits. I killed them. It felt good. One of my children died at the hands of those bandits. The other one died of thirst three days later.”

“My husband forced me to keep going. Then we found this place. This oasis. Our salvation. We built a home here. Then others showed up. My husband, the kind man that he was, invited them to stay with us. Of course, there wasn’t enough food for all of us. Back then, my garden was only a figment of my imagination.”

“Those people killed my husband. They didn’t kill me. Since then, I’ve found a lot of people lying out there in the sand. Trust me, cabbage soup is much more palatable with a little meat in it.”

“You’re probably wondering why your body feels so numb. Remember that pink flower? It’s called valerian. It’s a potent natural sedative. I slipped a little into your soup earlier. Don’t worry. You’ll be asleep, so you shouldn’t feel anything.”

“Wanna know how I know the hidden city is fake? Because, much like this “oasis”, human kindness is nothing but a mirage.”

[bakudekuficlibrary]

hi there!! I love the blog, it’s so helpful when I’m in a fanfic mood. I was wondering if you had any bkdk royalty au’s? preferably completed! thank you so much! :)

Hello! Here are some Royalty AU’s 😊 I’ll separate the ones that are complete and the ones that aren’t! 

-Ellie

24 Works.

Completed

the last dragon-blood king by claimedbydaryl ( E | 107,009 | 13/13 )

Katsuki Bakugou was the alpha heir to a forgotten throne, reigning lord and warden of the Fyre Isles, a famed warrior of vicious repute in the Western Seas, and he would be wed to Izuku Midoriya by the day’s end.

Ignite Me by Kreativekilljoy ( M | 2,249 | 1/1 )

The flames steadied and warmed them both.

An Oasis for You and Me by SecretKiwi ( E | 5,309 | 1/1 )

A prince and his retainer form a bond and grow closer than expected.

Don’t Threaten Him with a Good Time by Philander_Jack ( M | 7,031 | 1/1 )

It wasn’t supposed to turn out this way.

The thought crossed his mind at a million miles a second as the Berserker Prince Bakugou looked down on him, in the most literal sense. He was just supposed to deliver a message to the prince but if the prince kept on glaring down upon him like a rat under his boot he was sure that he’d meet his doom soon. What happened to the saying “DON’T kill the messenger”?

Well, he’d learn from the prince himself that the he does have the decency to take heed of the saying, but there’s no saying stating you shouldn’t or couldn’t fuck the fiery messenger boy with green hair and eyes.

SeriesPart 1 of Caught by a Red String

I Like You Deku, damn it by AjhayLee ( T | 8,364 | 1/1 )

Bakugou Katsuki dreams about his past self as a prince and liking his attendant childhood friend. The thing is, he couldn’t confess his feelings and he wasn’t able to tell him. Upon realizing that he also like the present Midoriya in the process, he does what his past self couldn’t do the fourth time he woke up from the dream.

[Major Character Death]

silk by holdingoutforahero ( G | 669 | 1/1 )

Katsuki is anxious, Izuku can recognize that even from the slightest signs. He is going to snap any second and this time Izuku has to let it slide instead of letting out a weary sigh and a sharp “Kacchan”. Katsuki’s hand is slightly trembling as he ties the obi of his inner underrobe. Izuku steps closer to him and pulls the narrow belt out of his hands.

“Here, let me.“

Katsuki-hime(dere) by TouchofFever (UntappedChaos) ( M | 661 | 1/1 )

Prince Izuku is a total deredere and it’s why all the kingdom of Yuuei adores him.

Grand General Katsuki is a total himedere, and they’re still working on that.

SeriesPart 2 of AU Tropes: BNHA

WIP/On Hiatus/Abandoned

[On Hiatus] And He Was Magnificent by Skaii, SugarbabyIzuku( E | 4,134+ | 1/? )

Midoriya Izuku is an omega slave, born into a life of subservience. He’s trapped, never to reach his dreams of something more; until he’s thrust headfirst into the world of Bakugou Katsuki, the crown prince of Incendium Kingdom. Now, Izuku must adjust to a new life as Katsuki’s slave—while a war that threatens to shake the land looms on the horizon.

[Graphic Depictions of Violence]

Remember Me by Blue_Writer ( M | 59,287+ | 22/? )

It had been years since Bakugou was exiled from his home and became the savage dragon king, but one good thing finally came to his life when he met Izuku again. The only issue, is that he doesn’t remember him.

[Graphic Depictions of Violence]

Eyes on Fire by glamour_weeb ( E | 11,020+ | 3/? )

Izuku is the ruler of a peaceful city, a city that stands no chance against the Dread King Katsuki and his barbarian horde. In order to save his people, Izuku hatches a dangerous plan to seduce the King. What he does not know is that he is exactly what the Dread King Katsuki has been searching for this whole time.

The Rarity by bittybitt39 ( E | 29,111+ | 8/? )

Midoriya Izuku had been promised at the age of four to his once dear friend, Bakugou Katsuki. Their mothers thought it smart to betroth the two in the hopes that Izuku would be protected and taught in the safety of the guards Mitsuki could provide until the day he was old enough to come to the south kingdom. After all, it was not everyday that the rarity of a male omega was born within these times.

Izuku grows up knowing he is promised, and has vague memories of his alpha from his younger days. He is also gifted, in more ways than one when his teacher Toshinori confronts his mother with Izuku being named as his successor. But a war breaks out between the kingdoms of the north and east, and the betrothed are separated far longer than the royal family would have hoped. But the war raging keeps them separated besides a few letters that are received from those that were brave enough to run through the war lands.

For the Sake of Peace by MochiUs ( T | 38,922+ | 9/? )

Some marry for love. Some marry because it was arranged for them. And some marry for the sake of peace.

Forsaken by FeatheredKit ( E | 28,393+ | 4/14 )

While on a journey in the forest to find a magical herb, Izuku becomes entangled in a less-than-ideal situation and is forced to accept help from none other than his old flame — the warrior king.

Needless to say, today isn’t going as well as Izuku had hoped.

Selected by Currently_Underrated ( E | 3,229+ | 1/? )

The day that the letter came was the day that Izuku’s life changed forever. Prince Bakugou Katsuki was finally of age to take a mate and a queen, but this Selection would be different because the rare male Omega’s could finally participate in the selection process.

But what if Izuku didn’t want to be a royalty?

SeriesPart 1 of BNHA BakuDeku Selection Ft. Omegaverse

Death of a Berserker by Philander_Jack ( M | 26,033+ | 3/? )

It had been three days, three days since he had met the berserker prince, three days since he lost his virgin status to said prince.

He was pissed yes but he’ll find out soon enough that he has bigger things to worry about when the might of the Black Alliance rises like a black shadow across the Dragon Liege’s land of Sagevsal. He’s going to have to fight his hardest alongside the desert people with the help of his comrades and All Might himself to fight off this calamity.

Toss in some mention of the fact that he’s also found out to be the soulmate of the Berserker Prince Katsuki Bakugou and yeah, life from now on is going to be one hell of a ride for him.

SeriesPart 2 of Caught by a Red String

[Graphic Depictions of Violence]

[Abandoned] Uneasy Lies the Head by Valainistima ( T | 2,808 | 2/? )

They say a crown bears the weight of the people. Wearing it alone is a challenge itself, but two heads are better than one, right?

Papa said to knock you out by kewltie ( G | 7,270+ | 1/? )

Midoriya Kasumi may be only eight and a quarter year old but here are what she already know: one, she’s the prettiest and most charming little girl in the world; two, her Papa is the best and deserves only the best so that’s why the gods blessed him with Kasumi in the first place; and three, the constantly scowling man that often appear on their TV screen is her other father.

SeriesPart 8 of Gravitation

[On Hiatus] drabbles and drabbles by Agent_Fluff ( Not Rated | 4,977+ | 9/? )

A collection of writing prompts sent to me on my tumblr! Typically gonna be BakuDeku prompts, but other pairings may pop up as well. Not all will be canon compliant either!

[Underage]

Tearstained Petals by FeatheredKit ( E | 10,370+ | 2/? )

Upon returning home for the first time in years, Izuku expects things to be the same as when he’d left, but they aren’t. Not only has the village he once knew so well become an economic wasteland, but now the entire kingdom is under the rule of his childhood best friend—who no longer seems to give a damn about him.

Handful of Courage by ChestnutPatronus14 ( M | 5,035+ | 2/? )

Izuku Midoriya is one of the rare few who cannot use magic, but he had always wanted to travel. Ever since he was little he was always exploring, and when he is finally able to travel to the capital city, he is beyond excited. His plans are thrown away when he meets the prince of the Dragon Lands, Katsuki Bakugo, laying injured by the side of the road.

Izuku makes him a promise, that he would get him home no matter what, but Bakugo is having a hard time trusting an outsider. What neither of them expects, is what happens once they return to the Dragon Lands.

SeriesPart 2 of Into the Dragon Lands

His Kingdom by ElopeToTheSea ( M | 6,038+ | 2/15 )

"The kingdom or him?” Ochako asked. Her voice was low, full of disdain. “What will you chose?”

Izuku smiled, there was no fear in him. There was nothing he could ever regret in that second.

“My answer hasn’t changed, princess,” he responded. “And it never will.”

Her eyes narrowed.

“Pitiful.”

[Graphic Depictions of Violence]

The Dragon King’s mate by twilightwings ( E | 16,765+ | 5/? )

Izuku decides to go after a rare flower that only grows, on a mountain in the Dragon King’s territory. She discovers someone from her past living with the dragon, she is plunged into his world where she fell in love with him all over again. however there a noble knight who wants her hand in marriage. But However, there something sinister in the wake, when is a threaten force from the past is threating to return.

[Graphic Depictions of Violence]

[Abandoned] flame of love by howitzerimpact ( T | 2,854 | 4/? )

The Dragon Kingdom has braved through decades, centuries even: reigning as formidable yet compassionate above all else.

But when the wars start, everything becomes a ticking time bomb - the kingdom, its peace and its young heir’s need to take action. Heavy is the head that wears the crown but the prince is not alone. What will he learn of his companion, and will he regain his world once lost to chaos?

Will Bakugou Katsuki and his army be able to withstand the race against time? Or will his kingdom fall with all efforts futile?

Ever Ever After by Agent_Fluff ( T | 1,265+ | 1/10 )

Izuku is from the enchanted land of Yuuei, where he spends his days chasing the happily ever after he saw in his dreams. After being rescued from a troll by a handsome prince, Izuku decides that maybe this could be it. However, King Endeavor is not yet ready to lose his crown, so he banishes Izuku to a place where there are no happy endings: New York City.

SeriesPart 1 of Enchanted AU

[behind-the-screen-of-bangtan]

The colors in BTS’ works - a noob study

I tried to see if there was anything worth analyzing about the colors and here’s what I came up with. As the title implies, I have no knowledge in color theory nor any observation skill so take it with a grain of salt and don’t hesitate to correct me if you see something wrong^^

When I talk about the main color of a video, I don’t mean it’s the only color used, I just mean that it’s the color that appears the most. It’s obviously completely subjective. Same goes with the identification of the colors: whether it’s a greyish blue or a bluish grey is up to everyone. Again if you disagree, don’t hesitate to tell me!

I’ll mainly focus on the MVs Lumpens worked on since they did the majority of the videos, including the BU ones. GDW did almost all the other MVs, they are usually a bit darker and more action-focused, think “Dope,” “Not Today,” or “Mic Drop”.

I also won’t talk about the Japanese MVs but usually, they have the same color pattern as the Korean version.

There’ll be five parts:

The creation of the world

The red string of fate

The Butterfly dream

The temptation of the Green Fairy

Finding New Neverland, namely accepting the world

The creation of the world

If there’s one dominant color in 2 Cool 4 Skool, it’s black. Be it the boys’ outfits, the background or the lighting, everything is mainly black. And it’s the case in the MVs and the photo concept. They just wear some gold accessories.

In O!RUL8,2? it’s the white that dominates. Interestingly, the two comeback trailers announcing this album start with black as the main color but end with white, like to make the transition between the two albums.

We can consider the boys are associated with the black color (2 Cool 4 Skool and their black uniform in O!RUL8,2?) while the outside world is white. They rebel against this world in “N.O” and win.

However, against all odds, they don’t turn the world in black, they themselves turn in white but with hip-hop outfits and gold accessories, like a white version of their 2 Cool 4 Skool selves. Where the black uniform seems to represent the world trying to force its ideal on the boys, to mold them to its convenience, the white hip-hop outfit could be the boys accepting the outside world without losing their soul, the white cover them like a second skin without hurting their core, namely hip-hop.

Now that black and white are at peace, they can coexist in Skool Luv Affair and Dark & Wild. Other colors will also start appearing, but everything remains quite monochromatic. The only notable color is the light/greyish-yellow, coming mostly from the lighting. Skool Luv Affair also has hints of green in reference to the chalkboard.

While we’re here, doesn’t “Danger” feels like the night version of “Just One Day”? In both, the boy is asking for the girl’s company but one is all black and the other is all white.

In parallel to those albums, we got two concerts: The Red Bullet and BTS Begins. The VCRs follow the aesthetic of an almost monochromatic world with low luminosity and a lot of black. The only exception is the outside scenes in BTS Begins when they all go to school and that have slightly more vivid colors - possibly because it is the outside world that they haven’t explored yet (but they will during 화양연화).

The concept photos also follow this idea. First black, then white, then the two together, then colors. From 2 Cool 4 Skool to 화양연화 Pt.2 we have:

The world stopped being a blinding white for the boy in black who’s now standing in a yellow desert.

The red string of fate

There’s one color I haven’t mentioned until now but that still appeared in a significant way: red.

Since this part is a bit long, I’ll rather redirect you toward A study in red, an old post I rewrote for the occasion.

To make it short, the theme the boys question during an era (happiness, love temptation...) has often a red color.

The boys alone in the desert finds a red string. He starts to follow it, hoping it will lead him to the sea.

The butterfly dream

They finished school and are ready to discover the other colors existing in the world. This way Hwa Yang Yeon Hwa doesn’t have a dominant hue but rather a more or less bright color palette.

What retained my attention was the green and the blue.

Note that I’m probably influenced by the Peter Pan references making me associate green with Peter himself and Neverland and “Sea” where the lyrics explain that the boys are searching for a sea in the desert.

So let’s rather just say the boys explore the outside world and so there are many colors.

One exception to this explosion of colors is “Save Me” with its grey tone. However, in the Concept Book, there’s a note saying “Save Me 화양연화 Pt.0.” And indeed the videos before 화양연화 had also a grey tone so it would actually connect well.

As You Never Walk Alone is the events between 화양연화 and WINGS, I’ll put it here. We still have a palette of colors, maybe slightly paler.

But the MVs have a dominant tone this time: green for “Spring Day,” pink for “Not Today.” I won’t detail “Not Today,” but you can consider its color like the pink of AWAKE or the purple of “Boy Meets Evil”

Interestingly, this green color is associated with the motel Omelas. And I just said we had a green Neverland in 화양연화. We could thus consider that the Omelas the boys are about to leave is the Neverland from 화양연화, the paradise where they thought they could stay young forever.

Where it gets beautiful is that the scenes outside have two main colors, yellow and blue, which mixed make green and that can also be connected with the yellow of the desert and the blue of the sea.

As they have blue and yellow maybe they can try to mix them to find back the happiness from Omelas/Neverland? Sidenote: in the NOW 3 in Chicago Dreaming Days, there’s a part called New Neverland and shot in a park with lots of green and blue. It tends to validate the idea above.

The boy found a green oasis on his path, but it’s not the blue sea he’s searching for.

The temptation of the Green Fairy

So actually the outside world isn’t all that great. Black makes its comeback but it doesn’t represent the boys anymore, it could represent the hostile world, the bad sides of life.

The Short Films are a good example. Four are mainly black: BEGIN, STIGMA, FIRST LOVE, and REFLECTION. LIE and MAMA are white with a hint of blue (sidenote: J-Hope and Jimin are a 화양연화 pair). AWAKE is blue. If we consider each short film as a step in the Demian progression, we can find an explanation:

the four black ones (Suga, RM, V, Jungkook) are still wandering between youth and adulthood, lost

the blue one (Jin) has reached adulthood, namely the blue sea. Note that considering the light blue of the room and the possibility Jin is the bird from Demian, we could also see it as a blue sky, the one you fly through to reach Abraxas.

J-Hope has almost reached the AWAKE stage so he has a white background with a blue pajama. Jimin lies and pretends he’s also near the final stage when actually he’s not.

We have a possible epilogue to J-Hope’s progression in “Boy Meets Evil.”

“Boy Meets Evil” is neither red (temptation) nor blue (AWAKE stage), it’s purple, right between the two. In the same idea, the hallway Jin crosses in AWAKE is pale pink so it seems that before reaching the final stage, you have to go through this pink/purple/red path.

“Blood, Sweat & Tears” (and the concert trailer for The Wings Tour actually) seems to be the same thing, but for the remaining boys. The temptation appears in hues of red and purple. And we even have a blue room, like in AWAKE.

But now let’s talk about the elephant in the room.

There’s green in “Blood, Sweat & Tears”. Like a ton of green. So much green, Jungkook actually mentioned it in the Episode.

You may remember I named this part “The temptation of the Green Fairy”. Green Fairy is one of the names used to designate Absinthe, the green liquid RM drinks in the MV. Basically, it’s associated with decadence, death, and poets.

So it seems this time the green color isn’t related to Neverland/Omelas/Youth but to the theme of the album, namely temptation. But why the change then? Usually, they have the red color for the theme of the album.

It’s just my guess but since another theme of WINGS is the end of youth, it could be that the boys are too old for Neverland and so it becomes toxic for them: they have to let go of their childhood (and find the New Neverland/Blue Sea).

Red is the general idea of temptation - think about the red apple - while green would be the temptation to live in the past - funny for a time travel story, isn’t it?

The boy misses the green oasis, he wants to step back rather than searching for the sea.

Finding New Neverland, namely accepting the world

And finally, we reach Love Yourself era. While it’s pretty clear all the colors are brighter than in any other era, it’s hard to find dominant ones. Be it the Highlight Reels or Euphoria, we have a color palette like during HYYH, probably meaning the boys are exploring the outside world.

But it seems yellow and blue are slightly more present in the MVs for the main tracks. You can also think about the blue mold and the yellow blanket in “Serendipity”.

They accept to renounce to the green and to rather live in a world with yellow and blue, namely the desert and the sea. Like they accept to love themselves no matter how imperfect they are, they accept the world.

The last hints of green are in “Serendipity” and “Epiphany”. In the first one, it’s probably a remaining illusion. Tear proved Her is a lie:

the black “Singularity” invalidated the green “Serendipity”. They’re still trying to escape the world of temptations like in WINGS

“FAKE LOVE” going from the blue sea to the yellow desert invalidated the illusion from “DNA” where blue and yellow existed together

The green in “Epiphany” is most likely Jin's last attempt to change the past: the current time is grey, it turns green when Jin travels back in time and goes back to grey when he reaches the same future. I said it’s his last attempt because at the end when he goes out, the colors stay grey and it fits with the lyrics.

As this time they accepted their destiny, it seems the yellow and blue co-existing in “IDOL” is for real this time.

The boy found the blue sea. He doesn’t hate the yellow desert anymore. He has reached the New Neverland.

As a picture is worth a thousand words, I’ll use an ugly one for my conclusion:

Nota Bene: it’s interesting to consider those colors based on the Teageuk. The red is associated with the negative cosmic energies and the Earth: it’s the dystopian world from where the boys started. The blue is associated with positive energies and Heaven: it’s the ocean the boys dream to reach. Yellow represents humanity: the boys are in the desert and eventually they realize it’s from this desert that the ocean comes from. Combining the yellow humanity with the blue hope gives green, which represents youth in Bangtan’s works according to the WINGS Concept Book.

[impossible-rat-babies]

Oc as a child meme!

Dar’theneras “Dimitri” Enallasani

Been seeing this meme around, but @elvenbeard tagged anyone who wanted to do this, so I’m doing this for Dimitri! (He’s about 14 here. Poor kiddo hasn’t grown into his ears nor is he ready for the storm coming his way.)

I’m gonna tag: @pavustive @smolpocketsmonsters and anyone else who wants to do this! Tag me back in it because I wanna see your oc’s as children!

1. Who named them/significance of their name:

He doesn't remember the name he was given when he was born because when his magic manifested his name changed to Dar’thenaras by the Keeper when he became First. It was a rather large ceremony involving the whole clan and quite the celebration. It’s an elvish conjugation of the words “dar” to/be and “theneras” dream. It’s both a name and a title to refer to mages since they are ones who dream as in ones who have vivid dreams/interactions with the Fade. After his clan died, he took the name Dimitri so it would be easier for him in human lands. He already stood out quite a bit with his tattoos, dark sclera and white hair, so he didn’t want to attract further attention because of his unique/different name.

2. Home they grew up in:

He was raised within his semi-nomadic clan as they roamed between ancestral oasis locations in the Anderfels from the Weathered Pass to the Feral Fjords and the hills/mountains surrounding Weisshaupt Fortress. They would occasionally draw close to the Tevinter boarder, but they never stayed long. They never strayed close to cities, but did have interactions with Orth people of the Wandering Hills when they needed to trade for goods they couldn’t create themselves. They nomadic lifestyle and the fighting they experienced from raider groups and roving bands of darkspawn made for a tough childhood where the safety of everyone in the clan was dependent on each person pulling their weight. It was a very tight knit clan however where parents and siblings were more than blood relations. It was common for children to refer to other clanmates as mother/father/sibling even if they weren't blood related.

His “home” was more in his possessions and people, but he had fond memories of the back of his father's sled-like araval where he brewed potions/toxins for the clan along with white tents and pavilions pitched around watering holes with blue and green patterned blankets and tapestries with stories illustrated across them.

3. Relationship with their parents:

He was very close with his mother, Fisianna, and his father, Atsas. She was the clan’s master hunter and took her role very seriously; she was the one in charge of their protection. She cared deeply for each member of the clan and particularly her own children. Dimitri has very precious and fond memories of her holding him close, smiling and laughing at his smallest accomplishments. He credits her with teaching him strength lies in yourself and how there is no weakness in relying on others for help when you need it. He also shares her protective instinct. 

His father was a little more distant in his way, but Dimitri didn't feel any less love from him. He fondly remembers sitting perched in his father’s lap while he explained how each potion/toxin worked as he mixed them by memory and purely touch. (His father was blinded and lost his one leg before Dimitri was born.) He spent many days hiding away with his father to get out of practice lessons with his mother. He would often tell her that there was no harm in him learning a few things from him to compliment the skills she was teaching him. (He does have a basic and rudimentary knowledge of potion crafting because of his father. He has a special recipe that makes wyvern venom twice as dangerous and unable to be cured). His father taught him resilience, caring and how to look past one’s and other’s perceived deficiencies to see how they are capable in their own way.

4. Three words to describe them as a child:

Curious, inquisitive, stubborn.

5. Childhood Friend(s):

Many of the other children in his clan were de-facto siblings, so he readily had friends about to spend time with. He did have a few rivalries with some of his friends, most notably Tassal. They butted heads a lot and were in the business of trying to one up each other quite a bit. They aged out of it, but always had that competitive spirit between them. He grew apart from some of his clanmates as his magic manifested and he was taken as First. At that point he was always busy with his lessons and he had his “adult” title in life. He was bitter for a while at “adulthood” being forced upon him while everyone else got to be just children.

6. Favorite toy:

One of the other mothers in the clan made him a small hand knitted Varghest toy when he was three years old. It was made from wool dyed green which they could only get by trading with humans. He treated it like it was his most prized possession and obsessively took care of it. He wouldn’t let the other children play with it and once threw an incorrigible tantrum for several hours when one of the older children took it from him. He grew out of always keeping it beside him, but it always had a safe place tucked onto the shelf in his father’s araval and remained a prized possession. He would’ve given it to one of his children if the clan had survived.

7. Childhood Trauma

Life wasn't really easy in the Anderfels with the occasional raids, wildlife threats and darkspawn. He saw his share of people die, but the clan always had a healthy regard for dealing with the trauma of their lifestyle. If they could recover the bodies, they would decorate a pyre with any number of desert flowers, herbs and tapestries and burn the bodies late at night. This way, the smoke would carry their souls back home.

The most notable incident directly related to him which spawned his fear of darkspawn and the start of his phobia of being chased was when he was fourteen and him and his fellow clanmates found some abandoned ruins hidden beneath a trapdoor in the sand. They made it into a sort of hideout/place to store hidden items. But one day they were exploring too deep into the ruins and they discovered a large trapped group of darkspawn that chased the group all the way to the surface. Everyone made it out alive, but Dimitri tripped on a rock while running back to the clan and fell. The darkspawn were nearly upon them when they bursted into bright blue flame and then to dust. It was how his magic first manifested.

8. Hobbies:

Categorizing his father’s potion/toxin ingredients, reading old scrolls from the Keeper, trying (and failing) to whittle wood and engrave metal, tending to the halla, caring for the Keeper’s Hart named Ghilan. This is beyond his set duties of keeping watch, preparing food and hunting game like any other member of his clan.

9. Childhood Fear(s): 

Tevinter slavers (he saw the effects of their abuse upon many of the clanmates who were former slaves), Darkspawn, Varghests, Wyverns, venomous snakes (he’s fine with messing with nonvenomous snakes; he actually likes them quite a bit), being chased in a malicious manner.

10. Quirks: 

Even as a child he had a penchant for organizing things and counting things. He would count each of his toes and fingers when he would wake up in the morning; he once counted each of the varghest and wyvern teeth that made up his mother’s weapon. (there were three hundred teeth). He would click his tongue a lot and as his sharpened canines came in after he lost his baby ones, he would run his teeth over them. When he would get very nervous, he would run his tongue over them until he would cut himself.

Wanna know more about Dimitri’s clan? I’m slowly working on a guide for it and the tag can be found here: X

[aion-rsa]

How Star Trek: Discovery’s Anthony Rapp Found Dungeons & Dragons Again

https://ift.tt/3eRzqpi

During the pandemic, one thing has become clear: the need for play is great and can’t be denied. The nerds of yesteryear who played Dungeons & Dragons, grokked Spock, and looked for ways to express their geekiness, have found themselves in this time, reaching out and finding their people online to resort to playing a game they all knew well and loved

“I guess it all started in junior high for me. In the early 80s, I was part of my ‘nerd crew,’” Star Trek: Discovery actor Anthony Rapp, who plays science officer and chief engineer Paul Stamets in the science fiction franchise, tells Den of Geek when we virtually sit down to discuss our mutual love for Dungeons & Dragons. “We were reading Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, and had our own little weird literary magazine. We were playing computer games and I don’t know who it was in our group who introduced it to us, but then Dungeons & Dragons became our thing. I was reading The Hobbit and watching all the Trek films and was a total comic nerd. All of it! We immediately fell in love with the Advanced D&D books like The Monster Manual, The Dungeon Master’s Guide – and spent hours just reading through them.”

Like many of us, Rapp has found the time and space during the pandemic to return to nerdy passions of his youth.

“One of my fiancé Ken’s friends talked a couple of years ago about playing a game, but he lives in L.A. and I live in New York, so you know, we weren’t doing virtual then,” says Rapp. “But in the middle of the pandemic, he decided that he would run a campaign via Zoom and invited me to join. So, I created a character that I would have done, back in the day, a Halfling Rogue … but that was one of the first characters I created, that I always wanted to play. In the meantime, they’ve come out with the Arcane Trickster! You know, Halfling Rogue who loves a little bit of magic.”

It’s the creation that’s part of the fun with this game, but it rests on two foundations: a love of storytelling, but also on one that’s based on play. 

“I love playing games.” Anthony tells me. “I love board games, video games, card games, Poker – but while I anticipated enjoying the game aspect, I did not anticipate how much I would love the role-playing. Because, I’m an actor; I thought, I get the satisfaction of that from my work. You know, playing games for different reasons! But it has been at least, if not more satisfactory playing these creations. I’m in two official campaigns right now but I’ve played a couple of one-shots, played on some podcasts and played for charity.”

Play, for simply the fun of it, is a concept that a lot of gamers overlook sometimes. To be lost in the joy of one’s own creative expression is pure play and is an aspect that gets lost in the strategizing, the social dynamics or simply due to competitiveness. I asked Anthony about this dimension. 

“To just dream up scenarios is a joy,” he says. “In a few months, I’m biting the bullet and going to come up with my own campaign. I’m going to DM an ongoing campaign with friends back in New York when I return from shooting Season 4 [of Star Trek: Discovery]. I’ll be creating my own world, governmental-societal stuff. What I’m finding, is that I’m loving the collaborative story-telling aspect of it. I’ve done writing on my own, and I do enjoy it, but it’s solitary.”

“What I love most in creative projects is collaboration,” continues Rapp. “As an actor, I am a collaborator. I’m working with the writer, the director, my fellow cast members. But as a DM, I get the best of both worlds and then working off what my players bring. Their backstories spark wonderfully exciting new ideas and I weave them in. It’s long-form storytelling that also fits into the themes.”

Of course, work and play often intersect. 

“One of the games I’m playing is with my castmates and friends from Star Trek: Discovery,” shares Rapp. “Noah [Ryn, married to Mary Wiseman] is our DM. He’s been home-brewing stuff and using some published stuff as a springboard. [Adira actor] Blu del Barrio, my fiancée, Ken, [Gray actor] Ian Alexander, and [Keyla Detmer actor] Emily Coutts are all in it. We work together and we play together. We’ve always been a very close cast and get together often to play games but this has been a great new addition to how we connect with each other.”

Read more

TV

Star Trek Villains Who Actually Had a Point

By Ryan Britt

TV

How Star Trek: The Next Generation’s Killing of Tasha Yar Became an Awkward Mistake

By Joseph Baxter

Has Rapp ever channeled aspects of previous characters from his own career into his role-playing in exploring more of how Star Trek intersected with his D&D experiences?

“One of the great things I’ve enjoyed about my roleplaying is that I’m creating for myself,” answers Rapp. “I’m glad that, when I act, I get to interpret a writer’s words about a character, but there’s something extra-special about finding that person within myself, discovering in the moment who they are when I play them. I had an acting teacher years ago who used a metaphor that I love to use in describing acting. It’s almost like you have a mixing board, like when you’re in a sound studio, and you are turning up the frequency on that part of yourself you use to play one character. So, it’s kind of like always using yourself as the raw material, but to transform, you have to amp up your aggression or your sweetness.”

I had to know what characters Anthony’s Star Trek: Discovery castmates play… 

“They play characters that are totally right for them,” says Rapp. Apparently, Blu del Barrio is a wizard, Mary Wiseman a Barbarian/Ranger multi-class, Emily Coutts is playing a Cleric, Rapp himself is a Druid. “Even Sonequa [Martin-Green] and her husband guested in one of our games and she played an Aasimar Barbarian – like an Angelic being,” says Rapp. “How she embodied that character was exactly right. It was so Sonequa.”

Rapp loves the process of seeing his fellow players develop their charactrs.

“Far be it for me to say what character somebody should be,” says Rapp. “If I’m a DM, I want that person to play a character that they really want to play—not because they think it’s the right decision but because it’s a character that really speaks to them. In creating this character, they need to lean into playing it and bring it to life in a way that’s exciting and meaningful. I am so not interested in my players optimizing the shit out of everything. I want them to make these choices because they resonate. You can make any combination of skills or abilities, powerful. It’s not about winning. It’s a game.”

Rapp’s world building for his first campaign is reflective of the ideals in Star Trek. His first setting is a lone city in a desert. 

“I started out thinking about this idea for the campaign I’m going to run for my friends in New York,” explains Rapp. “It’s a literal and figurative oasis. It was founded in the desert as a defiant symbol that it can be made beautiful anywhere with magic. I want to make it a haven for all people and it is difficult to get there, so you have to really want to be there. But it’s an attempt at a utopia in a harsh environment. I don’t know where this idea came from, but I’ve started to branch it out and seeing what else is in this world, in this northern part of the continent. I’m thinking about power structures and want to address power, inequity and racism … so those are the themes that I’m working with.”

Read more

TV

Why Star Trek Needs More Characters Like Captain Lorca

By Lacy Baugher

TV

Q’s Return on Star Trek: Picard Season 2 will Follow “Significant Trauma”

By Joseph Baxter

It is the joy of playing. But, this type of creativity also can be channeled into positive influences in the world. Anthony shared with me about his involvement in the upcoming “Jasper’s Game Day” event happening this week. 

A reaction to the loss of two friends to suicide within the span of ten months, Fenway and her dad, Aaron, initiated this event to bring attention and awareness to mental health. A week-long celebration of game play and fundraising, Rapp is lending his presence to this event to indulge in play for the love of it but for also a worthy cause. 

“Jasper’s Game Day was started by Fenway Jones,” says Rapp. “She started this ongoing series of game events to create fundraising opportunities and a greater sense of awareness around suicide and suicide prevention. I learned about it in the D&D Community that exists on Twitter … I’m new to the Twitter-sphere/D&D Community but I everyone that I’ve interacted with has been phenomenal. There’s a spirit of generosity and camaraderie and collaboration that’s really special.”

For Rapp, many of those experiences have come during his D&D campaign with the DISCO crew. He describes a really intense battle during a session in which his character, who Rapp describes as “justice-driven,” started a fight that escalated into an entire session during which three characters almost died.

“It was a real-high stakes game that was really enjoyable, with total surprise and totally improv,” recounts Rapp. “But then there was the follow-up session in which there was a clean-up of it between our characters. Because my character had behaved in this way, and he almost caused our deaths, people were upset with him. But we really played it all out. Like fully, and [DM] Noah gave us the time and space to process the trauma and messiness of how people navigate things like this. I mean, I had to say to Mary, ‘Are we all good? Because that was just my character!’ And she was like, ‘Of course!’ But it was really good and meaningful to have a safe place like that to do that. That was probably the most rewarding and enjoyable experience I’ve had to date.”

Nerds find a way. They tell stories and invite others to join them. They live to make sense of the world they live in, and in their chaotic and creative ways, change it for the better. Rapp’s work and play come together through his celebration of nerdy ways. We’ve all experienced it and we know it makes the world a better place. 

cnx.cmd.push(function() { cnx({ playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530", }).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796"); });

The post How Star Trek: Discovery’s Anthony Rapp Found Dungeons & Dragons Again appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/2PUyLuT

[howtomakequickmoneynet]

21 different websites like Craigslist to purchase or promote

Disclosure: This page contains affiliate links through which we may receive a commission. However, this is free of charge for you. For more information, see our Privacy Policy.If you ever wanted to buy a used car, buy a dishwasher for little money, or buy a trampoline for your kids that doesn't break the bank, you've browsed the classified ads in your local newspaper.But all of that changed in 1995 when Craigslist was launched - apparently out of nowhere.For better or worse, it revolutionized the way people lived do their buying and selling.25 years have passed since the platform was catapulted for the first time in the public consciousness.At that time the location was a mecca for both for sellers who have to get rid of goods and buyers who are desperately looking for a product very much.Craigslist is still very popular these days.As far as the website is concerned, it shows only minor traces Popularity behind such internet leviathan as Facebook, Google and YouTube.Craigslist, the originator of the “collective virtual flea market ”has pioneered so many innovations that we now stand for granted.For example, it was one of the first companies to try to replicate a real business in cyberspace.Which of course consisted of running newspaper advertisements and building a digital business.It was able to survive when there were so many other dot.com Companies have bitten the dust.One of the reasons for its unprecedented popularity is the user-friendly interface that organizes ads by geographic region.When Craigslist first did this in the 90s, it was nothing short of revolutionary.Even in the age of self-contained online Marketplaces, there are advantages to using classified ads to buy yours Fan Shop.One of these advantages is that you don't have to pay Service fees or worries about having given your financial resources to a company Information.However, this means that you have to spend a lot more Strive to make a deal.And if you end up with a fleece, Craigslist the most will probably not come to your emotional salvation.Site issuesCraigslist is a mess and everyone knows it.The design of the site is very primitive and reminds of the past to the earliest days of the internet.All kinds of problems have hit the site lately.One of the problems is that within minutes of posting Your entry will be buried deep down on the second, third, or even fourth Search results page.This makes it difficult for potential buyers to see it what leads to missed sales opportunities.For this reason, the sellers were disappointed Your profitability has dropped drastically.And increasingly it is an oasis for all types of Scammers.These are people who love to capture the naivety of them clueless.For this reason, scams are widespread and local Administrators often react slowly.Another problem is that the website resists vehemently external pressure to modernize.This means that it hasn't changed exactly with that Something like a technological dinosaur.For some people, this is a plus.This is because Craigslist is for these users insist that you no longer have eye-catching graphics or videos that play automatically. and other techno games are like a welcome rain shower in the dry Desert that is the internet.Does Craigslist Really Want To Stay? Relevant?Craigslist released its first mobile app in December - eleven years after the Apple App Store was born.There have been many third-party apps over the years.However, this is the first official.One wonders how much Craigslist is invested in stay relevant!Discover the unknownEven with all of these red flags, you could still use them Craigslist instead of visiting other sites like Craigslist to haggle over yours Were.Perhaps that's because you're used to it and don't want to dive into the unknown to explore other options.I'm not blaming you because trying something new can be scary.But don't worry, I've considered some of these other options for you.So, read on and find the "professionals" and "Disadvantages" of everyone.After hearing what I have to say, you may find Try one of these alternatives.Who knows, you might find these alternative websites work much better for you than Craigslist has ever done.If that's the case, I've done my job and can die (not really) as a happy man.I will go into exhaustive details with some of them Websites like Craigslist because they deserve more than superficial attention.But I make others short, also because they are either too generic or too fraudulent to spend a lot of time on it.So join in, I'll give you an overview of the best the Craigslist alternatives - including some that you should definitely avoid.The benefits of buying localI firmly believe in hyperlocal buying and selling, This is all of your trade with people who live nearby.This promotes a sense of community and maybe also You can even make new friends.This is an antidote to the corporatization of America, where large corporations gobble up corner shops and seem to find a Walmart on every corner.This rampage of capitalism devours the nation Soul and makes our merchandising cold and impersonal when it should be anything but.Hyper-local buying and selling tries to reverse everything The.Another reason for your trade with local buyers and seller is that you know exactly what you want to buy before you buy it.This saves you the inconvenience of having to send it back if you don't like it.It also helps boost your city or town economy instead of sending your money far away.After all, you are more environmentally friendly because you don't pay a company to send your goods home Country.

The sites

So, without further ado, here are 21 alternatives to Craigslist that could improve your online buying and selling experience:1. Your personal Facebook pageMany people resell much more conveniently Facebook than they would ever be on Craigslist.This is due to the fact that people who used Craigslist as a means of enforcing them have publicized crime on a large scale.You can even sell something on Facebook with a simple one Status update.To do this, publish a photo of the item you want to sell along with a convincing description.And then, with the incredible exponential power of social media, you hope that your post will be shared far and wide.2. Facebook marketplacePeople are increasingly using the power of Facebook to buy and sell goods.That's because almost everyone has one these days Facebook account.So it's only natural that a lot of things are traded there.Facebook Marketplace is safer than Craigslist because Buyers and sellers must use their public profiles.This saves fraudsters and fraudulent phishers considerably.Much of this trade takes place on Facebook Marketplace.To get there, just click on "Marketplace" the left side of your homepage.If you do this, you will see all the goods in your sell local people.If you want to focus on certain goods, enter Search term in the field at the top of the page.For example, I did cross-country skiing in my youth.Lately I've been thinking about reviving my old one Hobby.So I entered "cross-country skis" in the field Search box and dozens of options with prices of $ 10 appeared up to $ 150.Here are the exact steps to post an entry on Facebook Marketplace:ADD A PHOTO: Unlike some sales sites, Facebook Marketplace does not charge you for posting more than one photo. Add as many visually appealing images as possible to an entry on the Facebook marketplace so that potential buyers know exactly what they are getting. The limit is 10.ADD YOUR TITLE: Next, add your title. No more than 100 characters can be entered. Ensures that the seller is informed exactly what item it is.CRAFT A KILLER DESCRIPTION: Next, add a description for your item. Add as much relevant detail as possible to keep buyers hungry for what they're looking for.HIT A PRICE ON IT: Try to find a price that will make you a good profit without harming anyone. Once you've decided what that is, Facebook will list it in your local currency.ADD CATEGORY: There are a number of categories under which you can list your article. Choose the one that fits what you sell.ADD: Add the location where you sell the item. This way, people know how far they have to travel to take it.If you do all of these steps correctly, Facebook will do so Activate your object so that it is visible to other people.Congratulations - you have just published your first entry on the Facebook Marketplace!3. Private Facebook groupsThere are also private groups that you can join to get rid of of all the stuff that just hangs around your house and collects dust.I live in Pittsfield, MA and my local group is "Berkshire's Day Sales."However, if you join one of these groups, you should become familiar with it themselves with their rules.You don't want to be kicked out because you forgot Read the guidelines before putting your garbage up for sale.In my private group these rules are listed in the Files section.One of these provisions is that desktop users are limited to five entries per hour.The day I checked the website, I saw some fabulous lamps with a tiki flower print on the screen.Since I'm obsessed with everything related to Tiki, I could do that too I have to throw my money down and buy it!3. LetgoIn my opinion, Letgo is a hip reissue of the horribly archaic Craigslist.It's what you would get if you took your crazy old cousin and gave her a stunning new makeover. It is definitely an upgrade from its much older version Competitors and Google even listed Letgo as one of the best apps of 2016.If you want to see for yourself how much better it is as a craigslist, take it out for a test drive.Letgo is one of the fastest growing apps for hyperlocal buying and selling.It has been downloaded over 100 million times since then it was offered first.Many people report that they get a lot more Reply with this app than ever with Craigslist.His entire right to exist is based on observation "The stuff we have is not the stuff we need to live the life we ​​have." want."A great thing about service is that there is No buying or selling fees.Another reason is that everything is organized beautifully in nice, small and appealing categories like cars. " "Electronics" and "Used Movies, Books and Music".It is much safer than Craigslist because it is different from Craigslist, you need to use google or facebook to check your user profile.And with their extremely useful reviews and reviews, You get a pretty good idea of ​​a buyer's or seller's reputation.Great chat abilityAll communication takes place via this in-app function. It is extremely easy to share information safely and securely with others for sure.It is much faster and more efficient than the way users Connect on Craigslist.Ability to post videosA difference to similar websites is that you are not only allowed to post photos, but also videos.This gives potential buyers a much better idea of ​​what You will get.registerOkay, I sang the praises of this great app long enough.Now let me tell you how to register for it Start it up.First you need to download the app (it is available for Android and iPhone) .Enter your email address. Set your password. Add a photo of yourself.Once you've followed these steps, you can Browse the offers if you are a buyer or create an offer if you are a seller.How to put something for saleTake a look around to see other people's ads before you create your entry.Find the best of the best and analyze them thoroughly Detail what it is about these listings that make them so striking.Once you've figured that out, you want to include it the same things in your own ads.Next, it's time to create a description for your website Article that drives potential buyers crazy with desire.Include all the powerful benefits that the customer will have if he only buys it IMMEDIATELY before another second passes.This also includes the more prosaic details, such as Condition, brand, model and dimensions.These are the boring details that aren't all that sexy, but still necessary to include.If you're selling something for which you have the dimensions you want and no tape measure is lying around, download the awesome Airmeasure app.All you have to do is focus the camera on whatever You want to measure and augmented reality does the rest.I think it's so cool to do that!A few years ago, this seemed incredible - like something from the pages of a science fiction novel. Next, you need to arouse visual interest with professional-quality images. Just like on the Facebook marketplace, you can add with Letgo up to 10 photos.Take them from different angles and convince yourself that they sell the sizzling excellently.This means arousing the emotions of potential buyers on a visceral level.Letgo has cool image recognition software You don't even have to add a title to your entry.If the software can recognize your image, this will be done to you.Finally, you have to find out the price.You can either choose a specific amount or leave it at that as negotiable if you don't mind haggling.However, if you do, you will not publish your final sale Price because you don't give leeway to potential traders.At this point your entry should be ready and ready to live.I hope you have paid so much attention to that It is a humble artistic masterpiece.Well, as much as an ad that sells a physical object can be a masterpiece.After you are absolutely sure that your entry is as follows: Tap the "Done" button.Now it's time to show your entry to everyone World.It only takes a second or two because of Letgo really streamlined the process.Just click the "Sell" button above The page and your entry will be displayed on the website shortly and are ready to unfold their magical effect.What to do if your entry is not successful? LifeThis can take up to 40 minutes.If after that time it's still not on the Contact the customer service team to find out why.You can do this by clicking "Help". Tab.Then scroll down to "Tech Support & Bug" Click the "Reports" button at the bottom of the page and fill out the "Contact Us" field Form us ”.How to edit an entryYou can also edit an entry after you have published it.To do this, click on the "Sell" tab.Find the pencil icon at the bottom of the screen and Click on it.Then make the desired changes and press "To update."See who's looking at your articleYou can check how often one of your articles is available was displayed by going to your profile and tapping the "Sell" tab.Click the item you want to view and select the item Click the "Learn More" button at the top of the screen.The total number of views is shown directly next to the symbol Eye icon.Know the rulesMake sure you are familiar with all of these other websites yourself with the rules.One is that you have a list of items that you are forbidden to sell.If you try to sell anything from this list, yours Listing will be canceled immediately.Another reason for a canceled listing is when you add multiple posts for the same article.Security concernsFor safety reasons, bring a friend with you when it's time close the deal personally.This should be in a public place, like next to a police station Station, or in a cafe or fast food store.Make sure that you thoroughly examine the item before making any money changes hands.And if you are the seller, request payment immediately if Your dealer wants to buy what you sell.This should only be done in the form of cold, hard money.This means that under no circumstances should you accept checks. Money orders or bank transfers.One of the best ways to avoid fraud is to Make sure the payment and delivery of the item match.Be careful if the other party makes an unusual request like offering to send a check for much more than the asking price.Or a seller where you can't see an item in front of you Buy it.Report any user you are concerned about.And definitely avoid all non-verified users, those who send you spam and anyone who refuses to meet you Person.There are reports from users who present themselves as a car So be aware of dealers who buy junk cars that they use to try to defraud people of this.Make it a habit to always check that of a potential trading partner Profile page and its ratings and reviews.This will give you a better idea of ​​his reputation before you do business with him.There are a lot of people you can do business with Guy seems dodgy, drop him like a hot potato and move on to the next one.Never give out your email address Address, phone number or other personal information to everyone on the website.Most users are reputable, but there is still a fair one Lots of ripped-off artists who will rake you over the proverbial coals.Submit a review to receive a reviewGive your customers a rating and they will most likely give you oneYou know how it works - quid pro quo, tit for tat.You have to make payments yourselfLetgo's purpose is to bring buyers and sellers Together - not a secure way to process transactions.So you and your trading partner have to get out the payment details themselves.This means that Letgo is not responsible for issuing refunds if You get a raw deal.If there is a problem after purchasing an item, the The buyer should contact the seller to discuss any refunds.Show buyers you started track recordYou can view potential customers on this website You have an established track record.And that's the "sold" category.So if you are selling something, add it here.This gives you a permanent record of all goods People bought from you.Buyers can see it and see if they are impressed with your product Satisfying your customers is the likelihood that they will continue to She.Time delay problemsSome users have had lag time issues with the App.So they received their messages long after they were received were originally posted.And even though they reacted immediately when they did finally got the message, her call was irrevocably damaged by then.5. SwappaWhen selling or buying consumer electronics is your "thang", take a test drive with Swappa.This is a site that specializes in new technologies All kinds of equipment.The company was founded in 2010 and has built an excellent reputation over the years as a point of contact for people who want to purchase high quality consumer electronics at affordable prices. You can buy or sell phones from the four major providers. These are AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile and Sprint.You can also buy and sell tablets, fitness trackers, watches and many other things.A living communitySwappa is not a typical e-commerce website.Instead, it's a vibrant community where you communicate directly with your trading partner rather than the company as Mediator.So they cut out the middleman and saved you a lot of money in the process.When you sell at Swappa, you make more money than you could on one of the trade-in pages.That's because all of these other places make their money by buying an item from a seller and selling it to a buyer for a significant amount Markup.And because they see themselves as resellers, they you can expect a considerable profit at your expense.Not so with Swappa.You are not so greedy.Swappa LocalWhen you buy goods from a seller who lives long You can have this product sent to you some distance away.But if you live in a big city, you can also go to Area of ​​the website known as Swappa local.Here you can see all offers from sellers who live right in your neighborhood (or near it).This allows you to pick up your goods yourself so that you can You don't have to pay a cent for shipping.This not only protects your wallet, but also your wallet good for the environment, as only one article less has to be shipped clear across the country.Once you have completed the sale online, the seller will Choose a specific meeting point.All that remains are the two who decide exactly At what time should the money and the item change hands?All buying and selling is done by PayPalRegardless of whether you send your goods or have them picked up in person, the purchase and sale takes place via PayPal.This is a good thing since PayPal has some excellent ones built-in security measures to protect you from unscrupulous incidents Scammers.However, there are some people out there who despise it for reasons I can't imagine.And if you are one of the haters who still want to use Letgo, you have problems.This is because this is the only payment option available for this app.What are the fees?If you are a seller, you do not have to pay any fees.But if you are a buyer, you have to cough up ten Dollars and shipping costs once all the details of the sale are complete.How to become a buyerBefore you can plunge your money for one irresistible doodad you decided that you can't live without, you must first register to use the site.When you are finished, log in and click on the desired item Purchase.Sometimes the listing photos are pretty crappy.You don't have to put up with that.If the uploaded photos are not of outstanding quality and If you want better ones, ask the seller if they don't mind taking a photo Revision.It is not uncommon for buyers to buy this type of Inquiry.Better than getting to the intended meeting point just to realize that you made a terrible mistake!Sell ​​iPhoneIf you want to sell an iPhone, click “Sell on Swappa ”in the upper right corner.Then click on the photo of your phone type Sale.You can see the sales criteria that all apply Conditions that you must meet before you can offer it for sale.Once you have ticked all the boxes, make sure that meets all strict conditions, you are ready to have it checked by a Swappa Employee.If you're selling an iPhone, you'll need to upload a photo written on a piece of paper with your confirmation code, this may be done.The confirmation code will be assigned to you after you Click on "Create list".Photos are used to check the condition of the goods be sold and they must be of the actual item you are selling.After a listing is approved, the staff adds a comment the end of the listing, informing everyone that the listing has been officially verified.What’s great is that when you sell something, You are paid immediately instead of waiting for a check in the week or longer mail.Returns PolicyThere is no official right of return for Swappa The company leaves it up to each seller to develop his own trade fair.6. RecyclerIn Southern California, recycler is legendary, with one long and illustrious history.It started in on a muggy July day 1973 when two Canadians named Gunter and Nancy Schaldach came up with the idea the idea for the magazine.They were inspired by the popularity of a similar one Publication in Vancouver and wanted to see if they could replicate its success south of the border.With the dream of making sales easier for people With their old stuff, they settled in the land of celluloid dreams, Mickey Mouse Dreams, and Six Flags roller coaster screams.The original name was "E-Z Buy E-Z Sell".But because recycling was just taking hold At that time, they decided to change the name to "The Recycler".The usual way to make money from a publication like that They started running ads.But Gunter and Nancy wanted to turn this model upside down Place most of the ads for free and invite people to buy the newspaper.Your idea was a complete success, and until 1975 They made a decent profit.Over the decades, it was even the daily newspaper for people who want to start their own band.Some of the legendary musical outfits that the Guns and Roses, Hole and Mötley Crüe include paper as the launch pad.One of these people was Lars Ulrich, founder of Metallica.He recorded an ad in the "Music Search" section Musicians ”section of the rag.It just said: “Drummers are looking for others Musicians to start a band. "A guy named Hugh Tanner answered the ad and brought it with him a thin child named James Hetfield with him.Lars and James understood each other immediately and the rest is History!Your missionRecycler is committed to “being the best and the most trusted marketplace on the web. "I think they did it admirably in that regard. because of their longevity and rabid fan base.They have a good reputation and are considered that Gold standard for classified ads.From the sea to the shining seaThe publication has come a long way since its inception Days in sunny Southern California.And now their range extends from sea to shining sea, with over 18 million users scattered across the country.There are dozens of city pages on the website, including those for Boston, Atlanta and Philadelphia.11 product groups11 product groups are currently offered for Sales such as "Cars and Vehicles", "Pets" and "Sports and relaxation. "And under each a number of sub-categories.I recently thought about collecting old camera equipment.No particular reason - the idea just came to me Skull one day.I could start buying a 1954 Kodak Brownie camera You advertise on the website.Does anyone know if eighty dollars is a reasonable price? For something like that?Seamless integration with social mediaRecycler has seamlessly integrated into such social networks Media networks like Twitter and Facebook.This gives users the opportunity to take advantage of the possibilities of social networks to expand their reach and maximize their visibility Advertisements.So if you enable social media sharing, your listing will will appear on Facebook at the same time as it goes live on the Recycler website.7. OfferUpOfferUp is often referred to as the "Craigslist" Challenger ”and is consistently a top app for both IOs and Android Shopping categories.It has never been as big as some of its rivals.But with 80 million downloads and counting it is Popularity is really starting to increase.In 2016 it was awarded the renowned “App of the year ”at the GeekWire Awards 2026.People love it because it's like a high-tech garage Selling with a layout reminiscent of Pinterest.It combines the best features of eBay, Etsy and Craigslist zu einem herrlich synergistischen Ganzen.Listing hinzufügenWenn Sie wissen, was Sie tun, kann dies nur 30 Sekunden, um etwas aufzulisten, das Sie verkaufen möchten.Machen Sie zunächst ein Foto von Ihrem Artikel.Klicken Sie dazu auf das Kamerasymbol oben rechts Ecke der App.Sie können auch das Menü aufrufen und dann auf klicken "Posten Sie einen Artikel."Wählen Sie dann "Foto aufnehmen".Wenn Ihnen die Ausgabe gefällt, klicken Sie auf "OK".Geben Sie Ihrem Widget einen eingängigen Titel, wählen Sie die Kategorie Sie möchten, dass es unter aufgeführt wird, und schreiben Sie eine Beschreibung, die so überzeugend ist, dass die Leute es tun Schlange stehen, um es zu kaufen.Als nächstes schlagen Sie einen Preis auf Ihren Doodad.Es gibt eine Option zum Hinzufügen des Eintrags zu Facebook ganz wie du willst.Schließlich klicken Sie auf "Post Item", um potenzielle Käufer können sehen, was Sie verkaufen.Super Responsive MessagingMessaging in der App ist viel unmittelbarer als viele andere Marktplatz-Apps und Websites.Sie hören oft von Interessenten innerhalb Stunden oder sogar Minuten.Aber bei Craigslist und eBay kann das Tage dauern.Überprüfen Sie Ihr Konto, um Vertrauen aufzubauenSie können also Käufer durch einen Verifizierungsprozess führen werde dir mehr vertrauen.Und wenn sie dir mehr vertrauen, kaufen sie mehr von She.Um Ihr Konto zu verifizieren, klicken Sie auf "Beitreten" TruYou “unter„ Mein Konto “.Der Überprüfungsprozess wird entweder durch durchgeführt Facebook oder mit einem Führerschein.Dies hilft Ihnen, sich als echte Person zu etablieren, die es nicht ist suchen, um jemanden zu betrügen.Setze deinen StandpunktLegen Sie Ihren Standort fest, damit Sie alles verkaufen und kaufen können Aktivität bleibt hyperlokal.Lassen Sie die App entweder Ihren Standort finden oder geben Sie Ihren ein Postleitzahl selbst.Neue Funktion "Angebot halten"OfferUp ist seit jeher ein Pionier.Zum Beispiel waren sie die erste Marktplatz-App, die es gab Apple Pay und einige andere mobile Bezahl- und digitale Geldbörsen integrieren Dienstleistungen in ihre Dienste.Und sie geben weiterhin erhebliche Anstrengungen auf Wege finden, um den gesamten Verkaufsprozess ihrer digitalen Produkte zu rationalisieren Plattform.Aber selbst als sie daran arbeiteten, beschwerten sich die Leute Dass sie Geld zu einem Rendezvous mit einem völlig Fremden bringen mussten, brachte sie dazu unbehagliches Gefühl.So stellte das Unternehmen im vergangenen Jahr einen Weg von Abschluss von Transaktionen, die dieses Risiko ausschließen."Hold Offers" ist diese völlig neue Methode Dinge.Damit bezahlt ein Käufer seine Ware innerhalb der App vor dem persönlichen Treffen.Dann ist die Transaktion offiziell abgeschlossen.Jetzt muss der Käufer nur noch seine Ware abholen QR-Code scannen.Durch die Beibehaltung der Zahlungen in der App erhalten die Benutzer Schutzmaßnahmen, die das Unternehmen zuvor nicht anbieten konnte.Integrierte digitale Zahlungen sind Standard in der traditionellen Markt, sind aber immer noch eine relative Seltenheit in der digitalen Marktplatz.Dieser Schritt von OfferUp ist also klug.Facebook einen Lauf für sein Geld gebenDie Menschen scheinen die Zeit, die sie verbringen, zu verlängern für OfferUp ausgebenSo sehr, dass es mit der Zeit der Menschen konkurriert Ausgaben für die großen Social-Media-Apps wie Facebook.Das ist unglaublich und ein klares Zeichen dass Benutzer beginnen, sich für den Service zu begeistern.8. KijijiKijiji ist eine Online-Plattform für Kleinanzeigen 100-prozentige Tochter von eBay.Es wurde ursprünglich ins Leben gerufen, um Menschen zu geben, die in der Region leben Gleicher Bereich eine unterhaltsame, einfache und profitable Möglichkeit, mit anderen zu handeln.Im Februar 2005 begann das Firmenleben.Erstens war es nur in Montreal und Quebec City.Aber im November dieses Jahres breitete es sich auf einige aus andere kanadische Städte.Und jetzt ist es in ungefähr 11 Ländern.Hier sind die Länder, in denen es verfügbar ist:KanadaFrankreichItalienDeutschlandChinaIndienTaiwanBelgienSchweizÖsterreichJapanIn Italien ist Kijiji unter diesem Namen tätig.In Südamerika heißt es alaMaula.Es hat für kurze Zeit in den USA gearbeitet, aber Potenzial Benutzer konnten sich nicht von Craigslist abbringen, um die Website zu verwirren.Es erlebte jedoch einen beispiellosen Erfolg überall sonst.Tatsächlich gibt es allein auf der kanadischen Website zwei neue Anzeigen gepostet jede Sekunde.Unterschiede zwischen Kijiji und CraigslistEs gibt viele Unterschiede zwischen Kijiji und Craigslist.Zum einen ist der Verkauf von Haustieren auf Craigslist untersagt, da Personen, die Hundekämpfe veranstalten, die Website nutzen würden, um ihre Tiere zu erwerben.However, Craigslist lets you “re-home” an animal and charge the new owner a small fee.There are no such restrictions on Kijiji, and you can sell and buy pets outright.Another way it differs is that Kijiji has a more fashionable, chic vibe than Craigslist does.Kijiji is also known for its stringent content filters to weed out would-be scammers, whereas Craigslist isn’t.Kijiji in CanadaIn Canada, it’s organized as a centralized network of online communities arranged first by province, and then by city and urban area.It’s the most popular online classified service in Canada, with city pages for over 100 Canadian cities.It’s in the top 15 of Canadian websites and draws three times the site traffic that Craigslist gets in that country.Kijiji PortraitsLots of people have used Kijiji to kickstart their entrepreneurial dreams.To watch some of these inspiring stories, check out Kijiji Portraits.Here, you’ll find people who have used the service in some startlingly original ways.For example, a fifteen-year-old boy named Tyson had the drive to make a little money while he attended school.And since he was too young to get a traditional job, he used Kijiji to fulfill his teenage entrepreneurial dreams.So, he asked his grandfather to show him how to use the site.His elder also taught him some valuable life lessons that will serve Tyson well for the rest of his life.These lessons include always surround yourself with positive people and influences.Also, that you can be an entrepreneur at any age.Tyson once bought a bedroom set for $200, and within three days, sold it for $1,600.Just two weeks after his fifteenth birthday, he put a down payment on a townhouse.With the money he made from Kijiji, he was able to do that all by himself.There’s also a woman who wanted to change her life.Her name is Joey Beauchamp.So, she went on Kijiji, sold a bunch of stuff, and used the money to buy a van.Now she travels all over Canada with her cat, makes vegan food, and indulges in her photography hobby.All she needs is her small kitchen and her camera stuff, and she’s good to go.She can go wherever she’d like, and post from wherever she happens to be.She went from nine to fiver to photographer and vegan food star in just under two years!So, not only can you use these hyperlocal marketplace platforms to do your buying and selling.You can also use them as a launchpad for your entrepreneurial dreams.9. GumtreeGumtree is also owned by eBay.It’s the very British equivalent to Craigslist and currently operates in the UK.It has seven categories you can dive into: “MOTORS,” “FOR SALE,” “PROPERTY,” “JOBS,” “SERVICES,” “COMMUNITY,” and “PETS.”These are displayed at the very top of the home page, followed by “Top picks.It’s the UK’s largest website for local community classifieds and is in the top 30 sites there.Simon Crookall and Michael Pennington founded the site in 2000 as a way for New Zealanders, Australians, and South Africans new to London to get help with accommodations and employment.“Gumtree” was chosen as a name because it’s what Australians call the eucalyptus tree.The originators of the site loved the symbolism of roots and branches connecting everyone into a real community.Most listings on the site fall under the “FOR SALE” category.However, there are also a large number of automobiles (“MOTORS”) listed at any one time.Like other sites, users can pay to bump up their ranking in the listings.10. BookooBookoo was started by two brothers by the name of Adam and Austin.They came from a humongous family of nine children.Because there were so many mouths to feed, their parents had to scrimp and save so they could afford to feed everybody.They watched all this and learned the fine art of frugality at a young age. Part of this education involved spending a lot of time at garage sales. And when they grew up, they wanted to help others experience the singular joys of being frugal by finding a way to recreate the tag sale experience online.On that day, Bookoo was born.It’s not in every city in the United States.In fact, in Massachusetts (my home state), it has only one city that has Bookoo—which is Brockton.But if you have one of these online tag sales in your area, you’re going to have so much fun.It’s a super-easy way to meet your neighbors while converting your old junk into cash.And since all your running around is going to be online, this means less wasted time and gas.Simply contact the seller, meet up, exchange the item, and then be on your merry way!11. GeeboGeebo strives to make online transactions less dangerous by something they call “SafeTrade.”This is where buyers and sellers agree to conduct their transactions near local police departments.Their tag line is “safe community classifieds,” and they also claim they make it safer to search for merchandise on their site.So clearly, they’ve made safety a selling point.It’s currently in 160 cities and has much the same functionality that Craigslist has.In fact, it looks so much like its much bigger rival that I think that it’s more than a little derivative.The only significant difference is that it’s a little more aesthetically pleasing than Craigslist, but that’s not hard to pull off.12. Penny SaverIn my younger days, I remember picking up the Penny Saver from the grocery store.I would avidly read it cover to cover.I desperately wanted to find ways to make money so I could afford to buy some of the delightful secondhand treasures I found in its pages.Penny Saver has been in existence for over 50 years.It reaches the over 11.2 Americans every single week who hope to find “The Best Local Values—In Print & Online.”Bob DeMarco started the original in 1962, which was called the Huntington Beach Pennysaver back then.And now, PennySaverUSA’s online classifieds brings everything that made the print publication great into a new digital age.They must be doing something right because the website is visited by one million unique visitors every month.13. Ads GlobeAds Globe is a buying and selling platform that’s very much in the same mold as Craigslist.So, Ads Globe should have a comforting familiarity to it if you’re a regular user of the platform that the site strives to emulate.Like many of these other sites, you’re allowed to post unlimited free ads.;There’s even an option to remain anonymous and let users contact you through Ads Globe.14. ClassifiedAdsThis is another site with a clean and easy to use interface.However, it’s a bit on the generic side.The team at classifiedads.com emphasize that they take great pains to monitor their site so they can filter out irrelevant and objectionable content.Not wanting to take their word for it, I checked it out for myself.And more or less, that’s what I found.Little objectionable or irrelevant content.Unfortunately, I didn’t find any ways they’ve differentiated themselves from a dozen other Craigslist wannabes.15. Us Free AdsUS Free Ads has been in existence since 1999.Its very basic-looking layout is quite archaic and will remind you of 90s websites.If you ask me, I think it’s in dire need of an update.With a free membership, you’ll be able to post up to two ads at the same time.If you’re a frequent seller or need more advanced features, you’ll have to splurge for a higher tiered membership.One of these is Gold Membership, which costs $10.00 for 25 simultaneous ads.There’s also Premium Membership.For $9.99, you’ll be free to post as many ads as you want.But if you’re only a buyer and not a seller, you won’t have to pay a single cent.16. LocantoLocanto operates in over 60 countries, and most major US cities have a Locanto board.These are their categories:ClassesCommunityEventsFor SaleJobsPersonalsReal EstateServicesVehiclesAll ad posting is free if you post on your local city page.However, if you want to extend the reach of your ad to other municipalities, you’re going to have to shell out some money.Placing your ad at the top of the search results so that more people will see it is also going to cost you.How to SearchType the item you’re searching for in the search box at the top of the home page.Then, type in your zip code or location and a search radius.The city that’s closest to me is Albany, NY.And since I still haven’t found the cross-country skis I desperately want, I decided to search for it here.And unfortunately, the only thing that came up was an ad for L.L. Bean to buy my gear there.Also, an ad for a book with a delightfully retro cover on how to cross-country ski.I guess I’ll have to keep searching!The Curious “Currently Happening” BoxOn the right side of the home page, there’s a “WHAT’S CURRENTLY HAPPENING IN ALBANY?” box listing all the newest ads.I don’t really see the usefulness of this, but some might disagree.It evens tells when someone upgrades to a premium account.Why would anybody need to know this?17. TrovitTrovit is an aggregator site with the tagline “Search for the life you want.”Basically, it’s a search engine for all the local selling sites that exist in cyberspace.Enter your search term, and its hard-working search spiders will start crawling through thousands of websites just so that it can bring back precisely the information you need.They have three super simple categories—” Homes,” “Cars,” and “Jobs.”That's it.If its cars you’re looking for, you can either search by make or search based on your geographical area.

18th AdLandPro

AdLandPro has been offering free classifieds since 1998.Users who have a free membership can post up to 20 ads at one time.Although their basic ads are free, they also offer premium options that can give your ad more exposure.Placing new ads will just remove older ads if you exceed the 20-ad limit.If your ad is renewed regularly, it can remain indefinitely in their database.If it’s not renewed, it’ll be removed after four weeks.

19th Varagesale

Varagesale’s tag line is “Sell simply, buy safely.”In 2012, a Torontonian woman by the name of Tami started the site.She was expecting, and while waiting for her baby to be born, she decided to declutter her home.So, she went through every crevice and cranny of her house to round up junk she no longer wanted.She found that selling on most social media platforms took more effort than she was willing to expend.So, she enlisted her programmer husband Carl to streamline the whole process.And, she solicited feedback from her local buying and selling group on how to make the site user-friendly.This group eventually became incorporated into Varagesale.Soon, other communities wanted to be part of the whole Varagesale experience.So pages were created for these geographic regions.Tami feels she brought a small-town vibe to her pet project, despite there being over a million people all over the planet who now use the platform.Tami continues to balance her career as an entrepreneur with being a wife, mom, and elementary school teacher.It sounds like she’s busy!Emphasis on SafetyFrom its very inception, Varagesale wanted the site to be family-friendly.To that end, a dedicated administrator makes sure stringent standards are upheld on every local community page.And members must use their real names, photos, and identities.And most importantly, everybody hoping to become a member goes through a review process before they’re allowed to buy and sell.Still No Skis, But Lots of Other Interesting StuffI checked for cross country skis here, but alas, I still couldn’t find any.However, there was a lot of other stuff posted I can’t wait to check out.For example, I have a lot of books, and always in the market for bookcases.I found one on the site 10.7 miles away from me.Best of all, it was free!20. AdoosAdoos is a marketplace platform only available in the United Kingdom.It’s based on the eBay model, but it doesn’t get nowhere near the same number of visitors.For buyers, this means there won’t be as much merchandise for sale compared to its much bigger rival.For sellers, this means there’s much less competition.If you need a service (such as web design) that doesn’t require it to be bought locally, Adoos has the capability of doing a country-wide search.21. Los Angeles AdsIf you live in the Los Angeles area, check out Los Angeles ads.It cost $2.00 to post a listing.If this is something you want to do, you’ll have to choose your city on the home page.These are the areas you’ll have to choose from:West Los AngelesNorth Los AngelesEast Los AngelesSouth Los AngelesCentral Los AngelesGreater Los AngelesAnd then, under each of the areas are listed the cities in that geographical region.Click on a city.And then, choose the category that your item belongs under.Finally, write a killer ad that’ll lure them in droves!The site posted some tips for greater selling success:INCLUDE AT LEAST ONE PHOTO: To get people to buy your merchandise, you’ve got to lure them in with a visually appealing photo. So, include one or more in your ad.MAKE SURE YOUR PHOTOS ARE CLEAN AND FOCUSED: Ihre photos should look like a professional shot them. This means having excellent composition and a sharp, clear image. The only thing that potential buyers should see in your photo is what you’re selling.HAVE A COMPELLING DESCRIPTION: Ihre description should be written to entice people to buy. So, overcome their resistance by emphasizing all the compelling benefits of your item. Include as much detail as possible, including condition, brand, and model. Also, spend some time crafting the perfect title.LET PEOPLE KNOW IF THE PRICE IS NEGOTIABLE: Wenn you’re flexible on price, let people know this upfront. Lots of people won’t even bother responding to an ad if the seller isn’t flexible, and the item is out of their price range.LET PEOPLE KNOW WHERE THE ITEM IS LOCATED: This way, they’ll know how far they’ll have to travel to pick it up. By including this information in your ad, you won’t waste your time or the buyer’s time if it’s too far to travel to pick it up.TELL ALL YOUR FRIENDS ABOUT THE SITE: The more people know about the site, the more responses you’ll get to ads you post.These tips work well for other marketplace platforms too.

Wenn You Still Want to Use Craigslist…

Some people can’t be persuaded to use an alternative site despite all the problems with Craigslist.If you’re one of the unpersuadable, you should at least familiarize yourself with some of the more common scams.This way, you won’t get taken for a ride.Don’t be one of those who think it can’t happen to you!This misconception could end up costing you big time.Scammers are very creative with their ruses, and even the savviest of users can be duped.The same technology that makes it incredibly easy to find what you want to buy also makes it easier for scammers to bamboozle you.There are a lot of technological innovators looking to streamline your online experience and make it easier.But there are also a lot of scammers out there whose mere existence turns the technological marvel that is the Internet into a den of cyber vipers.The sad fact of the matter is getting scammed on the Internet is unfortunately becoming epidemic.Scams on Craigslist have become particularly rampant.So, for those Craigslist diehards, here are some of the more popular scams and how to avoid them:· WATCH OUT FOR FAKE OR CANCELLED TICKETS: The art of making tickets that are virtually indistinguishable from the original has gotten a lot more sophisticated in recent years. So much so, that scammers are even to make fake watermarks and holograms. If you fall for this deception, there won’t be any way to get your money back. To avoid getting this happening, never buy your tickets through Craigslist. Only go through Ticketmaster or the actual venue.· IF THE AD ISN’T LOCAL, DON’T BUY: Don’t buy something advertised in a nonlocal ad, because you won’t be able to inspect the item personally. What you see in the ad might not even exist! Also, you’ll have to send money through an online platform, which won’t be as safe as getting your cash in person. Besides, nonlocal ads aren’t against the Craigslist terms of service, so if you see one, it somehow escaped the scrutiny of administrators.· BE WARY OF THOSE WHO REFUSE TO MEET YOU: Wenn your trading partner lives in the area but adamantly refuses to meet you in person, this is an excellent indication he’s a scammer.· DON’T SUCCUMB TO FAKE CRAIGSLIST SITES: Some fraudsters have created fake Craigslist sites that people fall for. These are sites with domain names similar to the actual one.· FAKE MONEY ORDERS OR CHECKS: Fake money orders or checks are another scam. Fraudsters send a very official-looking fake check and expect you to send them the item before the check clears. The “buyer” might also make out the check for more than the actual item amount and ask you to send them the difference. A bank will cash these checks and hold you liable for them.· STEER CLEAR OF FAKE ESCROW SITES: A buyer might ask that you put your funds into an online escrow service, promising that your goods will soon be handed over to you. The only problem is that most of these sites are fraudulent and operated by the scammers themselves. So, of course, they never give you the merchandise—leaving an empty hole in your bank account where your money should be.· KNOW THAT CRAIGSLIST “PURCHASE PROTECTION PLANS” DON’T EXIST: Another scam is a “Craigslist Purchase Protection Plan.” Craigslist doesn’t involve itself in actual purchases, so offers like this are fraudulent from the get-go. Don’t let yourself get victimized by them!· DON’T USE WESTERN UNION TO SEND MONEY: Fraudsters asking you to wire them money via Western Union is one of the oldest tricks in the book. Don’t ever send money to people you don’t actually know. When someone requests wire service transfer via Western Union, there are usually a lot of red flags that come with this. For example, the deal seems too good to be true, or the rent is way below market. Or the rental may be local, but the owner is relocating or traveling and requests that you wire money to another country.· NEVER GIVE OUT YOUR FINANCIAL INFORMATION: Handing out your bank account details to random strangers is asking for trouble.· TURN AWAY ANYONE WHO WON’T COMMUNICATE VIA PHONE: The scammer might pretend to be unable to communicate by phone. That’s because fraudsters prefer to operate by text or email.· REFUSE BACKGROUND OR CREDIT CHECKS: If you’re in the market for an apartment, don’t consent to a background or credit check unless you’ve already met your prospective landlord in person. Fraudsters use this gambit to steal people’s Social Security numbers and other sensitive information.· BEWARE OF RENTAL SCAMS: One of these scams is renting an apartment at an unbelievably low price. The seller will collect first and last months’ rent, a security deposit, and any other fees he can think of. When it’s time to move in, you’ll find that the landlord has conveniently skipped town.If you suspect a scam, contact the Internet Fraud Complaint Center.And if you’re defrauded by someone you know, contact your local police department.

Final Thoughts

If you’re getting sick of Craigslist, you now have a solid list of other websites like Craigslist that’ll help make boredom associated with your merchandising activity a thing of the past.Or maybe your problem isn’t boredom.Maybe your problem is that you’ve found that your ability to sell on the site has drastically decreased, and it’s no longer worth your while.Whatever the issue happens to be, explore the dizzying array of Craigslist alternatives that exist in the cybersphere.Take one of these challengers for the Craigslist crown out for a test drive.Then try another, and another.You might find one that really clicks with you!Some of them are uninspired Craigslist clones—as banal and as generic as can be.Others take problems that users had with Craigslist and solve them in a way that streamlines the whole trading process.And does it with a creative flair and pizzazz!These are the ones you want to go with because they’ll help you accomplish your trading goals while being a joy to use.Just remember to acquaint yourself with the rules of each site, so you don’t inadvertently violate a rule.This could get you forever banished.Now, you could possibly survive getting kicked off one, two, or perhaps three of these sites.But any more than that and you’ll be severely limiting your trading options.So, be a good boy or girl now, will ya?Wer weiß?You might be one of those who has a real flair for selling.Then, you might be inspired to use one of these alternative sites as a launchpad for your entrepreneurial ambitions! Norm Tedford Read the full article

[shannrussell-blog1]

Adelaide is a growing hotspot for tourism, and rightly so. The South Australian community are passionate about keeping things local, and that gives it the essence of a small town in a big city.

There are many things that draw big crowds to this southern city; stunning wineries, great walks, mountain ranges, wildflowers and, of course, a coastline like no other.

It might be icy, but it’s hard to resist the crystal clear water, the promise of an ocean feed and the potential to swim with some salty sea creatures.

From Adelaide, the Fleurieu Peninsula is most accessible with the other two peninsulas taking a fair bit more travel time. Don’t get the impression you can see all this in a week’s holiday.

Swim in the clear blue waters when visiting SA.

Fleurieu Peninsula

Deep Creek Conservation Park – Boat Harbour Beach and hike

Camp the night at the

Hike through the greenery to get to the beach.

Rapid Bay – Second Valley – Carrickalinga

There are a lot of secret spots between Rapid Bay and Carickalinga: rockpools, secluded beaches and great fishing. Take a kayak or a SUP and make your way around the headlands. Take a picnic and take your time. Squid is a popular feed in the area and you will have most luck from your kayak or SUP over the weed beds.

Head to Rapid Bay and along the way, you’ll discover so much.

Kangaroo Island

We love Kangaroo Island. Head on over here to read all about it, including a 7-day itinerary.

Sellicks Beach

A popular city beach that you can drive on, and is accessible to most cars, including 2WD. It is the perfect place to set up for the day. The ocean is calm and it’s blue contrasts against the carved orange cliffs that peel down toward the beach.

Hopefully, you will catch the local family taking their goat for a walk, cause that’s the kind of thing that will only happen in Adelaide.

You can drive on the sand at Sellicks Beach. 

Yorke Peninsula

Port Julia

Oh, ocean, you wonderful provider! We stood on the jetty at Port Julia and we literally watched the crabs walk into our pot. Within an hour we had more than enough to share around. There’s a council run campground a block back from the beach that’s affordable and has toilet facilities.

The Yorke Peninsula Council has a range of camping options and you can pay for a week and camp at any of their campgrounds, mix and match. We could have stayed here for weeks and lived off crab and squid.

Fish for crab and squid off the jetty at Port Julia.

Innes National Park – Dolphin Bay

Innes National Park has a lot to offer. On one side the limestone cliffs drop dramatically into the ocean and the waves ramp up with terrifying force, but over to the west, you’ll find small bays with inviting smooth water and protected rock pools.

Dolphin Bay was just one of our favourites and Shell Beach Campsite is only a few hundred metres away.

There is so much on offer in Innes National Park. 

Point Turton – Ocean Pool

This one was such a good find. Not far from the Len Barker Reserve Council campground you will find this breathtaking spot for a dip and a good place for snorkelling. There is a concrete walkway out into the water and a ladder, just like you’d find at your local pool. It would be rude not to jump in.

Take a dip into the cool waters of the ocean pool in Point Turton.

Port Broughton

This one is another of our favourite fishing spots. The locals in town are super friendly and we would highly recommend the small caravan park at the northern end of town, where you can watch the sunset over the water. If you have a boat, this place will be even better.

Not far out, along the channels running parallel to the markers you’ll find salmon, King George Whiting and blue swimmer crabs.

On low tide, the shallow weed beds become more accessible if you’re keen to wade around and pull up some razorfish.

When the tide is low, you can try and catch some Razorfish. 

Chinaman Creek, Winninowie Conservation Park

Okay, get ready for some serious talking. The caretaker here knows how to spin a yarn. If you have been here before you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about. He does an awesome job taking care of the place and is more than happy to lend you a hand, or some fishing gear.

The creek here winds toward the Flinders Ranges and offers kilometres of exploration. Once again we stumbled on another great place for crabs, and dolphins often swim these waters. Chinaman Creek is an oasis in the desert.

Our bounty of abalone. 

Eyre Peninsula

Louth Bay

If you’re keen to take it back a notch, take some long walks on the beach and wind down, then look no further than this sleepy town. A short drive from Louth Bay is Point Boston that boasts excellent swimming on both the northern and southern side.

To access the beach on the southern side you may need to walk the 4WD tracks as they are often cut off to vehicles, but you will most likely be rewarded with a beach all to yourself.

September Beach, Port Lincoln National Park

Port Lincoln has a few different campsites but I’d suggest finding somewhere between Spalding Cove and Surfleet Cove for protection from the wind and amazing views. Check out September Beach and try rock hopping your way around the coast toward Carcase Rock.

There are plenty of places to jump in and a really nice bay only 100m from the main beach. Dolphins and seals love this area.

The secluded Memory Cove is worth the drive. 

Memory Cove

It’s a fair journey to Memory Cove, and you’ll need a 4WD. Signs say it will take you an hour to get there but let me tell you, it’s going to take a whole lot longer. Numbers are limited into Memory Cove (which makes this spot even better) and you’ll need to get the access key from Port Lincoln Visitor Information Centre.

It’s a peaceful spot, stunning water, and has good fishing just off the rocks.

This insta-famous spot is well worth the visit. 

Point Brown Rock Pool, Smoky Bay

This little spot just got crazy with Instagrammers. A perfect little pool carved out of granite. When you pull up at the headland at Point Brown and go to walk down at the pool you won’t be able to see it and if you’re like us you’ll probably feel defeated straight away. But keep walking down and there she is.

Camp out on the dunes at Tractor Beach. 

Tractor Beach

Abalone. Oh, so many Abalone just offshore. Tractor Beach is delicious. There are so many tracks in the dunes to camp if you are self-contained. Granites around the corner offer up another lovely rock pool and a small surf break

Get out there and explore SA

There are so many places I could list off here but I’ve just kept to our favourites for swimming, fishing and camping. Get out there and explore.

There are just a whole bunch of cosy little towns with friendly people, quirky sites and wild history. And just about every town claims to have the best bakery so why not test them all out for yourself.

  How many of the three peninsulas in South Australia have you explored?

The post The Best of South Australia’s 3 Peninsulas appeared first on Snowys Blog.

[allyinthekeyofx]

Perpetual Motion 1/1

I planned on writing this anyway but decided to kill two birds with one stone. Written for a fanfic challenge on Facebook for @wildwingsuz and her group in response to a photo prompt (A swing by a pond/lake) but also included is conversation prompt #19 for the anon who said the prompt “I’m okay”……..”You don’t look okay”……..”Well stop fucking looking then” sounds ‘totally Scully-esque’.

I agree wholeheartedly and this is the result.  

Set during Revival and also recounts events pre IWTB

PERPETUAL MOTION

We had first discovered this place when we had already been living in the farmhouse for several months, happening upon it one fine Spring day when we finally began to properly explore the land that surrounded us on all four sides; the warmth of the weak sunshine tempting us to walk farther than we had during the frigid winter months where really,  we had been far too preoccupied in trying to find a way to heal the wounds we had inflicted upon each other  amid the confusion and uncertainty of our time on the run, than in venturing outside to map out our domain.

We knew there was a lake somewhere on the property – the real estate deeds had spoken of just such a thing – rather grandly called ‘Pioneer’s lake’- I’m guessing it was a man made relic of times gone by.

I’m not sure I would have called it a lake though because although large enough to house a small wooden dock which creaked ominously even under Scully’s slight weight, to me it was nothing more than an over-sized pond complete with a family of fat brown ducks who squawked an indignant warning amidst much ruffling of feathers at the pair of interlopers who had disturbed their quiet sanctuary.  And sanctuary, as it turned out, was a pretty good description for this cool green oasis because from the minute she set eyes on it, Scully fell instantly in love.

To see her truly happy for the first time in months twisted and pulled at something deeply primitive that lay slumbering inside me and which I had thought had been quieted forever; namely my need to protect her, to give her whatever it might take to quiet the demons which plagued her so mercilessly and which had forced me to make the decision to finally stop running before I lost her forever.

We had found ourselves in a small town in Nevada in those final few weeks;  sparsely populated, it had enough amenities to make life a little easier.  No longer moving constantly as we had right at the very beginning we had, for the previous year or so, settled – if you could call it that – in similar non-descript places for just long enough to find some paid employment to boost our rapidly declining finances; a few weeks at a time where we found something cheap to rent and stopped to catch our breath.

Scully was usually the one who managed to find work – mostly waitressing, cleaning or bar work - menial labour that reduced her faith in herself just a little more each time.  My beautiful brilliant partner with her quick mind and singular ability to rationalise the unimaginable was reduced to mopping piss from toilet floors or forcing herself to not react when the latest smarmy middle-aged yokel made eyes at her tits with barely concealed hunger as if she herself were a special on the menu.

And even though I tried to make things better for her, it became painfully obvious that somewhere along the way, the woman I had known for over a decade was steadily losing sight of herself piece by painful piece; becoming just a little quieter, just a little more insular as each nightmarish day melded seamlessly in to another.

The only position even remotely available to us where no awkward questions would be asked of us and which, more crucially paid in cash, in that shabby desert town had been a waitressing gig at the local ‘adult entertainment’ joint.

And whilst I had initially baulked at her willingness to take the job, the fact that we were literally down to our last few dollars pretty much removed any obstacle I might have laid down in her path and actually, as it happened, Scully seemed to enjoy that particular job more than she usually did, finding herself strangely comforted by the camaraderie shared by the girls who worked there and who immediately accepted her as one of their own.

She never found herself in trouble there either despite my fears to the contrary because the heavyset bouncers who patrolled the patrons did their jobs well, making it abundantly clear as to what was acceptable behaviour and what wasn’t.

Scully was floor staff and therefore strictly off limits and as the weeks passed by, I began to breathe more easily.

Until one night when she arrived back at the shabby one bedroom apartment we called home, hours earlier than she should have been, the paleness of her skin contrasting sharply with the blue black hair that hung past her shoulders and which, out of all the colours she had adopted since we became fugitives, I knew she hated the most.

She was shaking when she slammed the door shut behind her, leaning heavily on it as though she were being persued by the devil himself, blue eyes huge and darting wildly around the small room, skimming over me as though I weren’t even there.  Her breath came in huge ragged gasps, each one hard fought and obviously painful for her as she just stood there, one small step from hyper ventilating in response to her panic and rendering me almost paralyzed with fear because of course, selfish bastard that I was, my first assumption was that they had found us, had found me.

I had called her name; a question that hung suspended in the air between us, the atmosphere suddenly so highly charged that I could literally feel the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

She had shaken her head from side to side, misinterpreting me and assuming I was concerned for her rather than for myself, repeating over and over again in a high pitched mantra that was so unlike her that I knew then that this was something different and that whatever this was, it was about her not about me.

“I’m okay….I’m okay….I’m okay….”

Over and over again she said those words while all the time twisting her fingers together as though she was unable to still, that this one connection to herself was the only thing keeping her from falling apart in front of me.

And I think I was more frightened for her then than I have ever been before or since, because it was clear that whatever had driven her to come home in such a state of extreme agitation had sent her headlong to the edge of the praecipe and only the barest thread was keeping her from toppling right the hell over it.

I had gone to her of course, covering her hands with my own in an attempt to still her movement and to some extent it had worked, her eyes finally meeting mine with a measure of surprise that I was even there with her at all.

“I’m okay.”  She had repeated and if I had been thinking on any rational level I would have given her some space, backed right off until she had calmed down and the blankness of her expression had lifted again.  But I was so fucking afraid for her at that point that the words were out of my mouth before I could prevent them.

“You don’t look okay.”

And that was enough to send her fleeing from me, snatching her hands from mine before pushing me roughly away, her expression so wretched, so hopeless that I don’t know how I managed to even stay standing, the pain radiating from her almost tangible and only equalling the venom which laced her response to my slightly clumsy assertion.

“Well then stop fucking looking.”

I winced at the sound of the bathroom door slamming shut behind her as she sought to distance herself from me, and winced all the more when the sound of her desperate weeping filtered through the flimsy barrier she had put between us, ignoring my every effort to get through to her until finally, I had simply kicked the door inwards, the force of my concern literally ripping it from its hinges and sending me headlong into the small room. The sight of Scully, naked and shivering, curled into a protective ball on the cold linoleum floor had literally stopped me in my tracks for a moment, until finally, she lifted her tear streaked face and held out her arms to me as though she were a small child in need of comfort.

It had taken hours to get the full story out of her but finally, finally, I had understood the events that had led to her arriving home in a state of such extreme distress.

A baby, brought to work by one of the girls when her sitter let her down.  A request that Scully watch him for a while, stay with him, hold him. A baby boy, around nine months old and his name…his name was William.

I had almost thrown up as she explained, in between anguished cries and hitching breaths, how she had simply walked out of the club with him cradled in her arms, the feel of his solid warmth evoking such painful memories within her that she didn’t stop even once to think about what she was doing, because right then, at that moment he was William….her William and she just wanted to take him home where he belonged.

The rest of her account disappeared beneath the force of her distress, lost in a haze of tears and snot and desperate clawing of her hooked fingers against my skin and I had rocked her in my arms, whispering nonsense to her as my own tears scalded me like acid and the shame I felt for every wrong I had ever wrought upon her bubbled up inside me and blocked everything else out.

It was right at that moment I knew that this had to stop.

So the next morning while Scully still slept exhausted and heartsick, I placed the call to Skinner that I probably should have placed months before, giving him permission to access bank accounts that had been dormant for almost two years and to set the ball in motion that would eventually lead us to a simple farmhouse in rural Virginia where we could at least start to try to heal ourselves.

We never spoke of that night in Nevada again although for a while I hoped Scully might talk more about what had prompted her to walk out of that club holding someone else’s baby; but she never had and frankly I was just too afraid of what I might reveal if I scratched at her wounds too fiercely.

So with a disavowal so typical of us both we simply pretended it had never happened at all.

But that first Spring, the Spring we discovered the pond, was the start of a few years of simple pleasure that began to make us both believe that maybe, just maybe, we could actually play the game and win this time.

I had built her a swing in response to her assertion that the old oak tree that stood tall and proud at the edge of the lake was just crying out for one, that she had always wanted a swing when she was a child but had never lived anywhere where there was a tree big enough to support one.  Plastic playground swings for Scully just didn’t cut it.  She wanted a swing made of rope and wood, one which would weather the seasons and with care, would last for a lifetime; something constant and reassuringly solid in a life that, thus far for her had been anything but.

And of course I had obliged her, risking life and limb to knot the thick rope around the ancient bough, not quite ever managing to get both sides completely level no matter how many times I tried.  But that was okay because it seemed slightly fitting somehow that it wasn’t quite perfect because God knows, we weren’t perfect either.

She had loved it of course just as I knew she would and that first summer she had spent hours just swaying back and forth as the sun warmed her skin and the soft fragrant breeze lifted her hair off her shoulders, hair that was now back to its natural colour and which seemed to lighten with each day that passed.  And somehow, as she spent so much time in a state of perpetual motion, her feet barely grazing the grass beneath, propelling herself gently back and forth she began to heal,allowing both of us to enjoy a few blissful years before the darkness came once again – not for her this time but for me; consuming me from within and reducing everything we shared to a paranoid mishmash of hurt and pain and recrimination. 

The swing became her safe place I think; a place to escape from me for even a short time as she tried desperately to reach me even as I blocked her out and refused her access.

Inevitably, eventually, she could stand it no longer and she left.

Dark days in my life where I shut myself away and allowed the paranoia to take full reign of me once more.  I don’t know how I survived without her; I don’t know how I even allowed myself to and truthfully, I had almost forgotten about this beautiful little glade with its shimmering body of water where the wind whispered secrets of days past and which had become such a part of her that I think I had simply hidden it in the dark recesses of my mind, buried deep inside with the rest of the hurt I refused to face.  It had taken me months to realise that there was no one left to help me and that my only remaining option was to finally help myself; to fight for her in a way I never had before.

Thus began a painful journey for me where I finally accepted outside help, laying myself bare to various health professionals as I fought with myself to admit I needed help; that the only way to get well was to acknowledge just how sick I had become.

I discovered something I thought maybe I had lost forever - namely a sense of pride in myself and even more than that, I knew deep down that she was proud of me too.

My Scully.  Always my Scully even when we were unable be together.

And when she quietly told me that she wanted to come home, tears streaking her beautiful face that was still as exquisite to me as it had always been, the first thing I actually thought of was the swing; waiting until she had left to go back to the city and her soulless apartment before I took a trip into town, buying new rope to replace that which had aged and frayed over the years I had neglected to take care of it, laughing that same afternoon  at the small scruffy terrier who sat below me, evaluating the work I was doing before taking off after a butterfly that danced across the lake and out of his reach.

It took a lot longer to fix the swing than I had expected, but time has mellowed me somewhat and I was content to take my time, to get it right.

And when I finally led Scully along the flattened trail that led to that beautiful, timeless woodland glade, twining my fingers with hers and rejoicing at the feel of her beside me, giving her a first look at the swing that, despite my best efforts was just as crooked and inexact as it has ever been, I felt more content than I think I ever have before.

Because I knew she wouldn’t care.

That to her at least, it would be perfect.

End

[dont-ever-forget-the-tears]

I’ve been too busy playing for an update. I guess I should fix that.

After my earlier adventure into unknown territory ended in a terrified retreat, I got myself back on the proper path and arrived in Hateno Village. Before I checked out the lab, I explored the village and found a nice dye shop that could dye my outfit, so I experimented with that. And then I found this very obviously gay guy:

He was a builder and he and his people were tearing down this unused house. And there was an offer among the conversation options to buy it from him? Of course, it was waaaay too expensive... But Bolson offered to bring the price down to 3000 if Link also brought him 30 bundles of wood. ...Which was still too expensive at this point in time. I explored the town some more and discovered a furnace with blue fire. There were a bunch of torches around town, so I set about lighting them all, and eventually found my way up to the lab where I was actually supposed to be going and lit the furnace there. That was apparently what I was supposed to do, because the little girl inside commented on it. And she recognised Link!

This little cutie was actually over 100 years old! She looked like a kid because of an experiment gone wrong, which I found out by reading her diary was because she had tested an anti-ageing rune on herself. Which she had been working on use on old soldiers to build up the Hyrulean army before Calamity Ganon arrived. And she’s the one who put Link in the Shrine of Resurrection and, as I later found out, Impa’s older sister! Using the power from the furnace I fixed, she repaired Link’s Sheikah Slate which added the Camera and Hyrule Compendium. There were a bunch of photos already on it, and Purah said that Zelda had probably taken them, and directed Link back to Impa for more info. She could also upgrade some of the slate’s features for Guardian parts! The only one I couldn’t upgrade was Stasis because I had never even seen the Ancient Cores required. And speaking with her assistant linked my Sheikah sensor with the Hyrule compendium so that I could take photos of things and then use the sensor to search for them! A very handy feature. :3

At this point I thought I’d try out some of my amiibo. Obviously, the first was my Wolf Link amiibo, which I made sure had full hearts the day before I got this game. I tried out the Smash Zelda amiibo I had too, and they gifted treasure and resources. But I got something special from the Link one:

So I took her to the stables and:

So I’m guessing this is why there were conflicting reports about Epona being in the game. She’s only in it if you scan her in. (Presumably. I don’t know if you can find her somewhere else and this is a way to get her early.) Also:

Hee.~ I returned to Kakariko, and Impa suggested visiting the places where the pictures were taken in order to see if it’d help his memory return. While I was in the village, I found this guy who had a lead on where one could find a Great Fairy who was said to reside nearby. He wanted a picture of her fountain in exchange for the information. I found her easily enough, but her power was much reduced. She wanted 100 Rupees to restore her power, and fortunately I had more than enough to do it. And it’s just as well, because she provides a valuable service:

Handy.~ After those enhancements, I returned to the guy and showed him the picture. I was also able to show him another picture, one of the ones that Zelda took. He was able to identify the place as being at the base of Mount Lanayru to the north. I’d also come across another person who had suggested that Mount Lanayru was important: there was a Spring of Wisdom up there said to have been used by Zelda herself.

But instead of going there, I wanted to explore the western regions of the map. While I was heading there, I found a sidequest involving these guys looking for treasure:

lol. And!!! While I was investigating that, this happened:

YOU CAN RIDE BEARS!!! ...Of course, you can’t register them at the stable and they’ll run off as soon as you jump off, but it’s still fun! Anyway, I moved on to the west and ended up near Lake Hylia. And it was around that area that I stumbled on my first memory, completely by accident. I spotted a glowing area and went up to investigate. And it triggered a memory of Link and Zelda taking shelter from the rain. Link was practising with his sword, and Zelda complimented his commitment to his training.

And then she asked what if, one day, he decided that he wasn’t meant to be a fighter, but people around him said that because he’d been born into a family of the Royal Guard, he had to become a knight no matter what. And... Yeah, you’re talking more about yourself here, aren’t you? :(

Also, speaking of Lake Hylia, look what I spotted there:

DRAGON!!! ...I wasn’t sure if it’d try to fight me or not, so I went carefully around the lake. Further along I found some guys camping. One of them mentioned rumours about a GIANT HORSE which I just had to investigate. ...Of course, the guy also mentioned seeing a monster that looked a lot like a horse when he went to check it out himself, which meant a LYNEL. So I took the careful route of approaching from the mountaintop and sure enough there were TWO Lynels along the way. At the dead end of the area, I found the largest herd of horses I’d seen so far, along with one big one, and went down to try to catch him. But he was clever and always ran off when I got close, even when I was sneaking up.  Eventually I went back up the mountain and glided down onto his back from there. I required a Stamina Elixir to break him, but in the end I was successful!

This one is very obviously a descendant of Ganondorf’s horse! Of course, I then had a new problem: this beast of a horse would not go faster than a canter, and I had two Lynels to get past to get it out of here. Instead of doing that, I tried forcing him up the mountain, bit by bit, and I successfully got him out of there! And I found another stable nearby to register him at! I called him Demise. :) At that stable, I also did a little horseriding minigame that got me a fancy new saddle and bridle to use, and there was a girl there who would swap out gear and change your horse’s mane, so I prettied Boon up:

Couldn’t change anything about Epona though. (Not that I’d really want to!) There are also options to give your horse a mane in blue and pink etc, it’s amazing. I also found a new GreatFairy Fountain in this area. The fairy there needed 1000 Rupees to regain her power, but she also provides a valuable service:

I wandered around this area a bit more. I explored Faron Woods for a bit and found Lake Floria, where I spotted that dragon again. There was another stable in that area. And I found a nice little fishing village further along the path, and did some sidequests there. Then I returned to Lake Hylia and went north.

Up there I found another stable, and that guy from Kakariko again. He looked at another of my pictures and directed me to some nearby ruins. Another person mentioned a white horse belonging to the royal family being there too, so I went to check it out. I caught the horse first and took her back to the stable:

I named her Hylia to go with my Demise. :) When I showed her to the guy who told me about her, he gave me the royal saddle and bridle to put on her! Then I returned to the area to find the memory spot. It featured Link and Zelda riding their horses, and Zelda thanked Link for giving her advice on how to handle her mount. Then things got serious, and she talked about praying at the springs of Power and Courage, and how they hadn’t awakened anything within her. But she had hopes for the third:

After this I took a good look at the pictures to see if I could identify where some of them might be. One of these was obviously Gerudo in origin, so I took it as an excuse to head out to the desert. Sure enough, I found a stable along the way and Pikango was there again and pointed me to Kara Kara Bazaar, an oasis outside of Gerudo Town. And at the stable, I spotted my first Gerudo lady:

Oh yeah... I know all about them. One thing I learned on my exploration was to always be wary of unnamed travellers. Because they are always not what they seem. They take on the guise of regular people you may spot on the road, but when you speak with them they’ll fight you because they’re actually from the Yiga Clan, a bunch of Sheikah who split from their people to serve Ganon. But they always give Rupees and bananas after you defeat them, so they’re worth fighting. ...The first one I fought took me by surprise and nearly killed me, though.

On my way out into the desert, I ran into this lady:

Different body types among Gerudo... :’) When I approached the Bazzar I got my first look at one of the Divine Beasts:

Of course, I didn’t go anywhere near it. I went to the Bazzar and found the memory spot. It was a memory of Zelda being attacked by the Yiga Clan, and Link swooping in to protect her:

I went around talking to people, and found a Goron and a Rito, and this OLD Gerudo lady:

And I spoke with a Gerudo who was looking for the love of her life and was disappointed that no men saw the appeal in her tailoring abilities. She gave the exposition about how men are rarely born into the Gerudo and how they have to travel to find mates. Also, this lady is relatable:

After I finished exploring this place, I took another look at the photos and left to find another place. I did think about continuing on to Gerudo Town, but that would’ve required some heat resisting clothing or food, which I did not have. I checked out a spot I thought I could manage to find because Hyrule Castle was in the background and after narrowly avoiding a Guardian, I found it! It was a memory of a ceremony for Link as the chosen hero. Zelda was reciting some words as he knelt before her, and all of the Champions were there too. And Zelda looked STUNNING:

SPEAKING OF GORGEOUS WOMEN:

Oh my godddd. Oh my gooooddddd holy shit i’m in love. Those muscles tho shit my god. Please take me now.

...aNYWAY. The Champions were watching the ceremony and Revali said that he was on the same page as the princess regarding Link, suggesting that Zelda didn’t really like him. And then Urbosa said Zelda saw Link as “ a living reminder of her own failures”?

After this, I thought I should return to Impa to see if she had anything to say about my progress, and she gave me a gift!

I returned to the road and found Hestu again near a stable! He’d tried to find his way back to the forest, but had gotten lost. He expanded my inventory a few more times before he remembered where to go and left again. And I found Pikango again and was pointed to another memory. In this one, Link and Zelda were headed to Goron City, and Zelda was talking about making adjustments to Daruk’s Divine Beast. And then she stopped and asked Link if he could hear the voice of the Master Sword on his back.

And I was pointed to another memory, and this one hurt so badly. Link and Zelda were fleeing, and Link lost his grip on Zelda’s hand. Zelda was despairing. The Guardians and Divine Beasts had turned against them. Mipha, Urbosa, Revali, and Daruk were all trapped in their Divine Beasts and she and Link had fled and left everyone to die. She blamed herself:

I hope all those people who saw her like this in the trailer and called her a weak crybaby without understanding what she was going through are having really bad days. 

I explored more after this and found the Lost Woods. I tried to find my way through it, but the fog kept rolling in and sending me back to the entrance. I gave up eventually. I’m sure I’ll find some hint about the correct pathway somewhere... And I found another memory of Zelda patching Link up after a battle, and look at all those monsters he destroyed, holy shit:

Zelda talked about her fear that the increase of powerful monsters was an omen of Calamity Ganon’s return.

After all this, I ended up returning to Hateno Village and buying that house! And then I could buy some furnishings for it. After I bought him out, Bolson added a heap of additional furniture for the place for free, and I ended up with this:

From here, I figured I should probably finally head up to Mount Lanayru to find this memory. ...Of course, since I approached from Hateno, I ended up missing the gate I was looking for and just went straight up the mountain. As I approached the peak, the music started to get ominous, and I thought that was a weird change. But once I actually got there, I realised why:

A voice from the goddess statue here said that the dragon was Naydra. It was supposed to be an attendant of the spring, but it had been infected by Ganon’s Malice. After I shot one of the eyeballs on it’s head, it took off flying, and I had to fly after it to continue destroying the Malice on it’s body. It was a very athesetically pleasing battle, but not much of a fight. After I destroyed all the Malice, it was free:

I was told to shoot an arrow at it and, when I did, a scale dropped lose. I was then instructed to offer that scale to the statue, and that unlocked a new shrine! Seeing Naydra made me realise that the dragon I had seen at Lakes Hylia and Floria must be the Faron dragon, and I probably have to do the same with one of it’s scales at the Shrine of Courage. I’m pretty sure that dragon isn’t infected with Malice though, so it should be easier to claim a scale from it. Finding the shrine is probably the difficult part...

After this, I headed back down the mountain and found the gate I was looking for. There was a memory about Link and Zelda returning from Mount Lanayru to the waiting Champions, and it was revealed that Zelda felt nothing at the Shrine of Wisdom either. Urbosa comforted her, and Mipha spoke for the first time, trying to offer Zelda some help by describing what she thinks about when she’s healing, but they were interrupted by a tremor. Revali flew into the air to take a look around, and Calamity Ganon had returned and was at the castle. Revali flew down to relay this news, and Daruk spurred everyone into action. Urbosa wanted to protect Zelda:

But Zelda was not in favour of that idea:

This got long, so I think I’ll stop here. I also found out that one of the memory spots is actually at Hyrule Castle, but there’s no way I’m heading anywhere near that place yet.

[pokemaniacal]

Pokémon Moon, Episode 11: In Which I Perform an Exorcism

With no other clear direction obvious to me, I leave Malie City and wander south.  The southeast coast of Ula’ula Island is dominated by extremely rough, rocky, arid scrubland.  Although the Z-Crystal that I earned in Sophocles’ trial gets me through the Island Challenge barricades on the southeast road, it doesn’t take long before the rocks become totally impassable.  Fortunately, Hapu (who is almost certainly very important, though I’m still not sure why) is on hand to offer me the solution: she allows me to freely summon her Mudsdale as a riding Pokémon.  Mudsdale is slow compared to the other Tauros and Stoutland, but can move effortlessly over rough terrain that would reduce them to uncoordinated stumbling. Hapu points me in the direction of Tapu Village, at the base of Mount Lanakila, for my next trial, then bids me good luck and farewell.

The southeast road curves along the barren, rocky coast of Ula’ula Island until it finally reaches a ramshackle settlement made up of a motel and a few broken-down mobile homes huddled around an oasis.  Is this… Tapu Village?  It’s… kind of a dump.  Hau has arrived here just ahead of me, brimming with energy as always.  As we talk – or, more accurately, as Hau bubbles at me cheerfully – a voice cuts across from behind me. “You only have one volume, don’t you?” it asks disdainfully.  I turn to see Gladion, the strange pale boy working for Team Skull that we met on Akala Island. “Gah! He’s back!” Hau cries.  Gladion makes a face at him. “Haven’t you ever heard the expression that silence is golden?” “Believe me, dude, I’m with you on that one,” I tell him.  Hau looks upset, but Gladion ignores me and continues speaking. “Listen, Team Skull is looking for a Pokémon called Cosmog… Do you two know anything?”  Hau’s eyes widen and he starts spluttering. “What!? N-not that we’d tell you!” “Hau, shut up and let me handle this,” I hiss, shooting him a quick cautionary glance. Gladion fixes his gaze on Hau, like he’s staring right through him. “So you do know something.” “What if we do?” I ask.  Gladion keeps glaring at Hau, who is rapidly wilting under the pressure.  “Hey.”  I snap my fingers.  “Look at me when I’m talking to you.”  Gladion rolls his eyes and turns to me, and Hau breathes a sigh of relief.  “What if we do know something?”  I give him a conspiratorial smirk.  “How much is it worth to you?”  Hau looks shocked, but Gladion just grunts. “Ugh… Look… Cosmog isn’t even a strong Pokémon.  But it has the potential to summon Pokémon so terrifyingly strong that you don’t even know.”  Summon…?  Like, through an Ultra Wormhole?  Can Cosmog create Ultra Wormholes?  But then- then Lillie must already have what she needs to summon the Ultra Beast that she was researching in the Malie Library!  Unless… no… no, it has the potential to, Gladion said.  I can still stop Lillie’s plans if I can find out what will unlock Nebby’s potential and stop her from getting it… but I can’t let her realise how much I know.  “If something like that happened, it would be a disaster for Alola,” Gladion continues. “A disaster?” Hau exclaims.  “Like… a real disaster?  Then what’re we supposed to do about it?” “Protect it!” Gladion answers, exasperated.  “If you do know where Cosmog is or if you do find anything out… just keep it safe!” “Safe from what…?” I ask, fishing for more information.  “You said you work for Team Skull.  Why would you want us to keep Neb- uh- this ‘Cosmog’ Pokémon safe from them?  What’s your real angle here?”  Gladion tenses up slightly. “Working for Team Skull doesn’t mean I always have to agree with them.  You’ve met Guzma.  Can you even imagine what he would be like with Cosmog under his control?” I stare at him intently. “You’re lying,” I state matter-of-factly.  The truth is, I’m actually not sure this time, and I certainly don’t want Guzma to be able to summon god-killing abominations from the Endless Void at will – but there’s no reason to let Gladion know that. “Something else is going on here. They’re looking for Cosmog for someone else… or… to keep it away from someone else?”  He doesn’t take the bait. “I know I might be working for Team Skull right now, so you may not trust me or even care, but… I’m going to tell you this just once.  You have to protect Cosmog!  No matter what!”  He turns and leaves, ignoring Hau’s attempts to ask more questions. 

Well, at least I know one thing for sure: the saintly Aether Foundation has nothing to do with this.  After all, Lusamine seemed so nice!  Her foundation couldn’t possibly be involved with anything as disreputable as a turf war with Team Skull, let alone Lillie’s apocalyptic plans to summon Lunala and plunge Alola into eternal night.  Nope; that is one Alolan faction that I see no reason to investigate whatsoever.

Now that I’m free to explore the oasis, I quickly discover that this is not Tapu Village at all.  The “village” is a blasted ruin to the west of the oasis, at the bottom of the trail that leads up Mount Lanakila, where only a Pokémon Centre and a few stone totems are still standing.  The cluster of beaten-up mobile homes seems to be a makeshift settlement of Alola’s assorted hopeless and dispossessed.  Honestly it seems like this is just a place where the Alolans ditch people they don’t want to think too hard about – a campervan graveyard on the edge of the unforgiving Haina Desert, where the local deity, Tapu Bulu, is said to live in isolation.  So… if I’m understanding the situation correctly, the Tapu of Life lives next to a cemetery, and the Tapu of Abundance lives in the middle of a desert.  I can only assume that no one has ever offered the Alolan pantheon any sort of image consulting.  Among the societal debris of this alleged settlement are several members of Team Skull, who seem to own one of the campervans.  I guess this is their home, making me the intruder this time, but they make no effort to make me feel unwelcome.  They even talk to me for a while, satisfying some of my curiosity about who they are and where they come from.  Team Skull, apparently, had once been led by an Alolan Kahuna, but fell out of favour after they “got smacked down by the wrath of the Tapu,” which, to be honest, I can sympathise with.  I’m rapidly starting to feel like Team Skull may be the victims in all of this (or at least, many of their members; I have yet to develop any particular compassion for Guzma).  Alolan society and tradition have left them behind, casting them out to the edges of civilisation, and now Kukui’s revolution is threatening to do it again. There’s some straight-up classism just below the surface here.

If Professor Kukui’s Lanakila League ever takes off, then Tapu Village might become a thriving settlement again thanks to the tourism, but for now, it barely even qualifies as a village.  Aside from the Pokémon Centre, there’s just a big abandoned supermarket, sitting just back from the black iron-sand beach on the south coast.  Apparently it was built on sacred land, drawing the wrath of the Tapu, and is now overrun by Ghost Pokémon.  It’s also a trial site, but its Captain – presumably that Acerola chick who was conspiring with Lillie at the library – isn’t here.  Out in the bay, there’s a ruined lighthouse, and there’s no word on what happened to that.  Maybe Tapu Bulu just has really terrible aim?  Outside the “village” to the northwest is only other location of any importance, a gleaming white building in the distinctive cuboid architectural style of the Aether Foundation: Aether House.  The sign outside proclaims it to be a place “where people and Pokémon huddle together” – a refuge of sorts, not unlike the Aether Paradise, though Aether House also seems to harbour human children (orphans?).  Despite the name, and the golden trident-like logo of the Aether Foundation prominently displayed above the reception desk, there don’t seem to be any actual Aether Foundation employees present.  There is a receptionist manning the desk.  However, this receptionist is an Oranguru.  No one questions this.  When Hau and I first arrive here, we manage to get into a fight with the unusually warlike children who live in Aether House with their Pokémon, but it doesn’t take long for Acerola to show up and reassure them that we aren’t their enemy. She seems to work at Aether House in some capacity, but I’m not clear on whether she’s part of the Aether Foundation – if so, it’s odd that she’s working with Lillie.  Perhaps she’s a double agent working for Lillie’s terrorist cell to bring down the foundation from within… The plot thickens.  Acerola formally invites me and Hau to take her trial at the abandoned Thrifty Megamart, which should be a good way to get the measure of her properly.

When I leave Aether House, Lillie is just outside – shouting at a member of Team Skull. Oh dear. “Your bag was moving!” the grunt accuses her.  “Right in front of my eyes!  And I’m just supposed to ignore that?!”  That bag is where she hides Nebby when they’re in public. Ohhhhh dear. “Even if it’s not that rare of a Pokémon, I bet I could still get paid, yo,” the grunt continues.  Lillie feigns terror, cowering with her bag held protectively behind her, but he clearly sees through her flimsy ruse and takes a step closer to her, looming threateningly. “Damnit,” I mutter under my breath.  If this idiot forces Lillie’s hand, then either I’ll be railroaded into a confrontation with her right now, or Team Skull will get her Cosmog, and I’m not sure either of those scenarios end well. I recognise him as the grunt with the Drowzee that I battled a couple of times on Melemele Island, so I decide to step in and try to defuse the situation. “Hey there; what’s up, uh… homie?” I say cheerfully as I hastily insert myself in between Lillie and the grunt.  “I’m sure we don’t need this to get violent, right?  Why don’t you and I just leave the girl alone and I’ll, uh… buy you a nice Tapu Cocoa down at the Pokémon Centre or something?”  He looks at me suspiciously. “You again?  I remember you – you’re that numskull what B keeps talking about.”  I blink a few times. “Yeah, I- um.  Wait, he does?  Really? Like… what kind of things does he even say?”  Lillie cocks her head and stares at me in abject confusion.  I give her some frantic hand signals behind my back in hopes of getting her to scurry into Aether House. “I dunno, he just, like… never shuts up when we’re all hanging out at the boss’s crib. It’s mad distractin’, yo!  Homie needs to check himself ‘fore he wrecks himself.” “Well… no, I mean, yeah, I get it, just… like, for example…?” I ask, doing my best to appear casual while simultaneously progressing my hand signals for Lillie to more insistent and obscene levels.  My strategy is working in one respect at least; the grunt is now getting far too mystified with my line of questioning to pay any attention to her. “Uh… I guess last time we was all chillin’, he kept talkin’ about how you beat the boss in Malie City.  It’s like that numskull don’t even know what Guzma’d do to us if he heard someone mouthing off like that!”  My reputation is spreading!  At this rate, Guzma will have lost control of Team Skull by next Thursday!  Meanwhile, as the grunt talks, Lillie slowly creeps up the Aether House front stairs.  “What’choo even care for, yo?” “Oh, well, I don’t, I just- Well, the more of you know how strong I am, the easier it gets to keep you from causing trouble, right?”  I pause to think.  “Not that that’s stopped any of you from trying to fight me so far…” Lillie has made her way inside, and is now nowhere to be seen.  Mission accomplished.  “Do you think you could give B a message from me?” I ask, trying to keep the grunt’s thoughts disrupted as long as possible. “…sure?” He waits for a few seconds. “So…?” “Um. Just… tell him I said hi?”  I suggest.  “And, uh, maybe tell him to tone it down when Guzma’s around?  You know, check himself before he wrecks himself?” The grunt looks at me like I just told him I want dancing lessons for my Walrein because it’s the wrong shade of orange. “Whatever, homie,” he says with a shrug.  “I gotta split.  Laters!” He wanders off, still looking baffled. 

…what? It worked, didn’t it?

Acerola meets me outside the defunct Thrifty Megamart, as promised, and explains the rules of her trial.  All I have to do is find her Ghost-type Totem Pokémon within the ruins of the store and take its picture with the Rotomdex’s camera.  Easy, right?  She even offers me a hint: the Totem Pokémon will probably be hidden, but should come out to “join the fun” if it sees the other Ghost Pokémon enjoying a photo op and gets jealous.  Well, this should be refreshingly straightforward.  Acerola bids me good luck and, with the Rotomdex hovering at my side, I enter the abandoned store.

…wow, this place is a dump.  Empty storage boxes and overturned shopping trolleys blocking half the aisles, piles of canned food that no-one ever bothered to claim, bare shelves coated with dust, windows gone dark from years of neglected grime… No Ghost Pokémon yet, but that’s not surprising; most Ghost-type species prefer to observe humans on their own terms before engaging.  I walk softly past a collapsed shelf of decaying magazines, scanning the store for movement.  Somewhere to my left, I hear a loud “clunk,” and one of the checkout conveyor belts starts moving on its own.  That’s… not normal.  I go to examine the checkout. “Zzzzt! What are you waiting for?” the Rotomdex buzzes, floating around in front of me.  “Take a photo!”  It waves its ‘arm’ at the empty air in front of us. “…dude, you’re glitching again.  There’s nothing there.” “WooooooOOOOOOOooooooOOOOOOOOO!” “You were zzzzzzzaying?” “...it’s the wind.  Probably.” “You really can’t zzzzzzzee that?”  I shrug helplessly.  “Juzzzzzt look through my camera!”  The Rotomdex boots up its camera function and hovers right in front of my nose.  I blink, uncross my eyes, and peer at the screen. The Gastly floating overhead laughs and pokes out its tongue.  The Rotomdex clicks loudly and snaps a photo of the Gastly, which immediately turns itself visible and attacks.  Startled, I yelp, tumble backwards over another checkout counter, and fumble for my Golisopod’s Pokéball.  A quick Payback attack is enough to see the Gastly off, leaving Golisopod to wonder what her trainer is doing upside down on the floor of a derelict supermarket. 

“So you can see Ghost Pokémon even while they’re out-of-phase?” I ask the Rotomdex as I creep further into the building, my Golisopod in tow. “Zzzzt! I’m a Ghost Pokémon too, remember, bosszz?” “And you can project what you see onto your display?”  A discarded trolley starts rattling, and we move to investigate. “Close enough.  My cameras can pick up all the same thingzzzz my eyes can.” “Oh, that makes sense.”  We detect and dispatch a Haunter in the same way as the Gastly before it.  “…wait, you have multispectral cameras?” “Zzzzt! Sure do, bosszz!” “Um… why?” I ask. “What do you mean, why?  I’m a top-notch rezzzearch tool!  I’m zzzztate of the art!” the Rotomdex responds indignantly. “Jeez, it was just a question; no need to get your circuits knotted.”  It buzzes at me with irritation.  “Although… you’re not really, are you?” “What’zzz that supposed to mean!?” “Well… the body that the Professors gave you – the Pokédex – that’s where all your useful functionality comes from. You’re just… kind of an annoying tour guide.” “ZZZZZZT!  Without me, thizzz thing is just a glorified Kindle with the battery life of a suicidal Voltorb!  I’m the one that allows new information and data analysis to come out of your random stumbling around Alola!” “Random stumbling!?  That- well, okay, that’s fair, but… hang on.  Analysis?”  Over in the back corner of the store, I see a Pikachu doll and a Marill doll levitate off their shelf. “Who do you think writezz all those Pokédex entries!?  Zzzzt!” “Wait – you write… yourself?  Every one of your entries is your original work?”  The Rotomdex is silent for a moment, then gives an embarrassed buzz. “Not exzzzactly.  I’m the… ethereal spark that lets the Pokédex’s AI function.  But I don’t really know how it works.  If I want to know something from my database, I can juzzzzt… think of it, and it’s like I knew it all along, but I don’t know how I know it or where I learned it.” “…trippy.” “Zzzt! You’re damn right it is, boss! But I wouldn’t pass it up for anything! While I’m living inside this box, I’m the zzzmartest thing in the universe!” “Whatever; don’t get a swelled CPU.”  We snap a picture of a Gengar, walking on air and controlling the floating dolls.  The Gengar attacks, and my Golisopod smacks it through a wall with Payback.  We’re at the back of the store now, and nothing else seems to be moving.  The whole place is eerily quiet.  Suddenly, there’s a voice behind me. “Piiii-pikachu!” I spin around and see a little Pikachu in a gloomy corner.  It runs off alongside the back wall of the store and ducks through a door that… I’m almost certain wasn’t there a second ago. “Oookay…” I say out loud.  What would a Pikachu be doing in a place like this?  I walk slowly towards the door.  It’s ajar, and swings open with only a slight creak.

The room beyond is… tiny, barely large enough for me and Golisopod. The stark concrete walls are decorated with a dozen or more child’s drawings of a Pikachu with a little girl. “What… is all this doing here?” I ask. We’re in the back room of a supermarket, why…? “Pi-ka!” I turn around.  The Pikachu is standing behind us. “Hello there…” I say cautiously.  The Pikachu cocks its head.  “Could you help me?  I’m looking for a Totem Pokémon, and-” The Pikachu suddenly starts laughing, a scratchy, high-pitched sound that seems totally out of place. “Uh… boss?” the Rotomdex asks.  “Who are you talking to?” “The-?” I blink.  “You can’t see-?”  I look to the Rotomdex, then back at the Pikachu.  It flickers for a moment and then vanishes.  The tiny room’s door slams shut and the lights cut out. “Ohhhhhh god…” The Rotomdex turns up its display brightness, and I catch sight of the Pikachu again – only it suddenly looks very wrong.  Its skin is freakishly pale, its head lolls to one side, its ears are bent and crumpled, and its face looks scribbled on with a marker.  It laughs again, and I snap.  “OH SWEET JUMPING CR@P!” I shout, and roundhouse kick the not-Pikachu in the head.  It just keeps laughing as its neck goes limp and its head dangles uselessly over its back. “KILL IT KILL IT KILL IT!” I scream at my Golisopod, who clumsily tries to attack around me, leaving several dents in the concrete walls in the process.  With another deranged, maniacal laugh, the not-Pikachu leaps onto Golisopod and beats her senseless.  I hastily call on my Toucannon for a Beak Blast that burns the not-Pikachu and starts to seriously crack the walls, but it just pops a Lum Berry in its mouth, grabs my Toucannon and slams her to the ground.  “ARCEUS I’VE ALWAYS BELIEVED IN YOU!  I’M SORRY FOR BEING TERRIBLE!” I shout as I send out my Salazzle. Panicking now, I perform a flailing improvisation of Kiawe’s fire dance and command an Inferno Overdrive.  That does the trick, blasting the not-Pikachu right through the wall, leaving a gaping hole in the back of the supermarket. Unfortunately, it also fills the tiny cubicle with thick smoke and concrete dust.  Coughing and hacking, I stumble outside into the light and collapse on the ground, exhausted.  A minute later, I become aware of a curious face peering at me from above. “This one’s going straight on my instagram,” Acerola says cheerfully.  “Hashtag spooked!”

Ridiculous quote log: 

“I want to do business with Pokémon.  For example, I could use the pincers of Crabrawler, which grow back constantly.” Wait, use them for what?  Are you going to torture Pokémon to produce an endless supply of crab meat?

“Lana put her soul into the fishing rod she made.  Er, don’t you think that the rod is Lana herself?” Um. Well, I didn’t until now, but you’re saying that with such conviction that I’m not sure anymore… and I’m going to start watching what I say around my fishing rod… 

The team:

Tane the Decidueye Male, Timid nature, Overgrow ability Level 35 Steel Wing, Razor Leaf, Synthesis, Spirit Shackle

Rhea the Toucannon Female, Lax nature, Keen Eye ability Level 34 Screech, Roost, Beak Blast, Brick Break 

Ashley the Psychu Female, Timid nature, Surge Surfer ability Level 34 Discharge, Hidden Power (Ice), Nasty Plot, Psychic

Hypatia the Slowpoke Female, Hardy nature, Own Tempo ability Level 34 Psychic, Yawn, Façade, Scald

Joanna the Salazzle Female, Timid nature, Corrosion ability Level 35 Flame Burst, Nasty Plot, Dragon Rage, Toxic

Sigourney the Golisopod Female, Careful nature, Emergency Exit ability Level 33 Brick Break, Payback, First Impression, Leech Life

[patchigler-blog]

Dungeons and Record Keeping Texas-0.5

I’m just gonna use this blog to log what all happens in my D&D games

This chronicle will be about the high school group i started and for this specifically ill detail everything thats happened so far in the game I have with people from Texas, starting with their backstories...

Characters

Grant: Couch, The Aasimar Bard

            Couch’s namesake is apt if nothing else, he first achieved consciousness whilst in a bard college, where he listened to and picked up on the talents of the students at that time. At some point he changed from his couch form into a humanoid. From there he set out on his journey to discover who or what had created him.

Couch looks like Fabio, in that he has long blonde hair, a strong jawline, and a need to be shirtless at all times. Its gotten to the point where any armor he wears only covers his legs

Daniel: Wes10, The Warforged Artificer

            Wes10 is a hybrid of sorts, an artifical being that was created for the purpose of exploration. A machine that required no loss of life to complete dangerous missions in the name of science. At some point during his objective, he woke up. He is unsure how he came to life, but his body was altered from its original creation. Where previously he only existed as a machine, he found that with the life breathed into him he also took on a more human air. Where muscles there was a fibrous wood that functioned in a similar fashion. He does however operate with a distinct lack of visceral that would constitute a normal person.  He now wonders in search of his creator to find his purpose.

Wes10 takes a little bit out of the iron giant book with his look and demeanor. He really doesn’t understand much about social interactions (much to his party’s detriment) but is doing all he can

Chase: Indigo, The Tabaxi Rogue

             Born in an age long forgotten Indigo was born of a nomadic race of cats  that lived in a desertous region. Taking the color of a panther his tribe was one of simple living, they hunt their own food, and keep to themselves. The age Indigo was born in didn’t respect such niceties. For the Gods still roamed the material plane, and the mortals suffered for it. During a small break at an oasis Indigo saw something began to erupt from the ground. An enormous worm-type creature broke the sandbar and consumed indigo in but the breadth of a moment and was gone. He had been taken, be a demon, and had been trapped in the abyss. He fought and wandered his way to freedom, but when he reached the surface he saw that more time had passed than he initially thought. (it was a few thousand years, not specifying)

Indigo is shorter than most tabaxi, and is slightly more stocky, his head is more of an apparition. Completely intangible, but he does have a neck hole that he uses to drink and breathe.

Addison: Celeste, The Human Fighter

             The Emerald Hunters, a group dedicated to the destruction of any and all monsters that plague the Prime Material plane. A group of specialized mercenaries that take pride in hunting only the most dangerous game in the world. Among these breed of fighters was Celeste Tarth, whom eagerly took to the lifestyle just as her family did for generations now. When one wayward night the family was contracted to take on a vampire that had been terrorizing a small town. The contract itself was a trap, set by the vampire to rid himself of any possible “issues”. Celeste, her 2 brother, mother, and father were all captured. Celeste was the only one to escape, but she did not do so unscathed. She contracted Vampirism from Lord Vindel Cor’vik Anderson. She now seeks out the vampire to free her family from their imprisonment.

             Celeste has  pale skin, thick black hair that falls just past her shoulders. She has bright green eyes and full lips. (think Esmeralda--Hunchback of Notre Dame)

Kristina: Bareea, The Tabaxi Cleric

             Upon the continent of Shundara there exists a vast expanse of desert that is home to many a creature. Civilization has sprung only along the coastlines, for the center harbors no land for irrigation. Some creatures do manage to thrive in the arid climate. Such is the fate of Bareea’s tribe. A basic hunter society that moves around trading, stealing, or bargining any time they are allowed such pleasantries. Bareea was but a child when she was taken from her home. It is unknown to her if she was sold into slavery, or stolen. She had many new masters over her short time but eventually settled in a city in Demanaca where she was sold to a big game hunter and kept as a pet for his Daughter. Whenever the hunter held one of his extravagant parties she would be paraded out to do tricks or wear costumes. One of those nights a cleric of some minor note was in attendance of the party and his morality would not allow him to leave Bareea in this state. He took the young tabaxi and they fled for the border of Nalus, where she became interested in his craft. After a few months of learning, one day, the cleric told Bareea that he had to go take care of something and that he would return that night. He never did, and Bareea set off to where ever. Shortly thereafter she was captured, a bounty placed upon her, by the hunter whom had bought her. 

[tumblunni]

More random thoughts about this game idea! But this time its Worldbuilding And Things Part 1

* I still need to settle on exactly how many nations there are in this world and give them all names, but I at least have two now!

* Britain-inspired evil empire villains from the snowy mountain continent are now called Wesnar! And I think their fashion sense is gonna be pretty much a 1 to 1 match with ye olde britain, except maybe mashing up all different timezones and like.. more attention given to the winterwear, and such. General people’s appearance would of course be white, cos lol I hate fantasy plots about predjudice that put the predjudiced-against people in the role of the oppressor like ‘look how bad it would be if they turned the tables!’ Or when its like hey we’re gonna use this fantasy species to represent black people or asian people or whatever but not have any black or asian people in the story. Like, I think that even if you wanna do a fantasy equivelant metaphor its possible to do it without REPLACING the original people who are actually affected by the thing in real life... So anyway yeah be happy in the knowledge this will just be an uncensored screaming pile of Bunni Calls Out Their Own Country’s Shittiest Historical Things Oh but to make this culture a little more fantasical I’ve decided that monochrome hair tones are their Exclusive Thing! Like grey hair = blonde, in that its very common and is sort of the stereotypical white people thing that’s uncommon/nonexistant in other races. And white is the equivelant of ginger, in that its That But More Recessive Geney. And then black could be like black/brown hair in that it’s something they have in common with everyone else, but I don’t want them to actually have brown hair cos that’d break the monochrome aesthetic.

* Random interjection to say that the deity of Wesnar is gonna be the Goddess Of Oaths, cos I had a cool idea for that. It could be good for symbolizing how people mistinterpret and twist religion to justify their own misdeeds, yknow? Like reinterpreting ‘oaths’ to mean like.. everyone else owes a debt to us. And cultural values of Honor And Promises being a thing that Never Ends. They feel justified holding a grudge for a stupidly long time, and paying back their revenge to the descendants of the descendants of the people who wronged them, people who have NOTHING to do with the problem! And this is also why they developed a similar patriarchal child abusey family structure as traditional britain, its all part of the ‘son inherits the sins of the father’ viewpoint. Your aim is to make kids who can carry on your grudge, and you want to force those kids to be Exactly Like You and be raised from birth to fit very specific roles and carry out long term plans that serve your interests and not your own. And then you’ll probably be dead by the time they succeed in that thing, and nobody will even be remotely happy in the end. And then we have people who lie and distort these ancient passed-down oaths to suit their own current-term predjudices, and shit gets even shittier! Like if you wanna conquer some neighbouring country to use their land to build more mansions, just make up- umm, i mean DISCOVER- an ancient prophecy that says that land belongs to you, according to the goddess. And now they are the bad guys somehow, and you’re the proud and kind nation ‘civilizing’ a bunch of ‘uninhabited’ land by clearing it of the ‘savages’... ... Basically, real life britain is a history of bullshit, but in fiction you need a unified plot with some actual consistancy. So here’s an attempt to make our victorian metaphor guys a bit simpler and have like.. at least an EXCUSE of an actual motive for what they’re doing, yknow?

* And then on a less depressing note, the other country I have named so far Is Andel! (or possibly some other spelling, or something else ending in del?) They’d be the fabulous industrious desert country that’s like the marketplace of the world! Cos like their local magic resource is.. magic without magic? They have abundant resources for mining magic stones since this is a desert, but the element of this continent is ‘aura’. (or soul or heart??) It governs healing and buffing but doesn’t have any offensive applications. So this place wins at battle without battling- nobody ever even thinks of trying to conquer this giant super country with regenerating soldiers and crazy future weapons! (since without offense magic they had to become super inventors, yknow?) So yeah the net result of all this is that they’re very successful and had a lot of valuable stuff everyone wants to trade for! This place represents like The Big Happy In A Sad Plot, out of all the various countries that’re all flawed in their own way, it’s an oasis in the desert to find a place that’s just... normal and good and has a non corrupt ruler and everyone actually listens to you and look you can buy some interesting imported furniture. They’d play a bigger role in the bigger game that I plan to make someday, they’d be the final step on the journey of this big ol hero army that’s gonna fight the evil doods, and like it’d represent the ideal world that we want to someday make for our own country. Also the hella catharsis of going “yo dude please help we are under attack” and getting a ruler who says “HOLY SHIT DUDE WE’RE ON OUR WAY”! No having to prove everything in ball-busting quests! But since this game we’re currently talking about is my more basic prequel learning-how-to-program-stuff dating sim thing, there’s not much of travelling to other countries and getting involved in the revolution. Its just gonna be a slice of the civilian life in the same setting, yknow? So you wouldn’t be visiting Andel but you’d be meeting characters who’re from Andel, and hearing general news about the place, and hopefully getting excited to see it someday ^_^ Oh, and also this place is where anime hair comes from! I’ve decided that their Fantasy Appearance Trait is all having bright primary colour locks and equally vivid eyes. You can still see variants of these scattered across the world though, because Andel is such a great trading hub and it’s also so far away on the edge of the world with a thousand roads to everywhere else. There’s a lot of Dellian immigrants and mixed race descendants in every country all over the planet, and countless great inventions originated there! But that doesn’t stop Wesnar being imperialist fuckos that try and pretend their ‘national drink’ of tea wasn’t stolen from Andel in the first place. (ha ha actual real world fact humour, lol)

* Oh, and yeah, plurals! I decided that Andel people = Dellians, and Wesnar people = maybe Narcians? cos it sounds like narcissism (HA HA ACTUAL REAL WORLD FACT HUMOUR, LOL) And like lol now I have two guys whose plural follows ‘drop the first syllable’ rules so i feel like I either have to make all of them be like that or have no more ones who are like that...? Ehh, I’ll figure it out!

* Also, for reference, Blair and [currently unnamed sister] are Dellian, and Morty and [currently unnamed mayor] are Narcian. Cos this is a prequel set it a place that’s not currently threatened by Wesnar. I felt like if the game presented the threat of Wesnar and then had no conclusion to it then it’d make people annoyed, like I mean at this point I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to finish that more ambitious second game idea, so it’d be a shitty move to drop a bunch of really huge sequel hooks for something that might never happen. So, thus, my conclusion was to just have some subtle hints here and there that Wesnar might be a little shady, and that politics are very tense at the border between them and [whenever i think of a damn name for protagonist country lol]. And I decided to make Morty and his dad Narcian so they’d be an example of some not evil Narcians to balance it out. Also cos my other colourscheme idea of him with black hair made him and Mallory look too similar. (His tux was blue instead of pink) Also like, Morty’s plot has a lot of stuff about his struggle with the expectations as a (relatively) higher class person in this village, as the mayor’s son. like, that could be enhanced even more if he’s descended from the ruling class of some big uppity britain land, and his family is considered a bunch of low class degenerates by them even if the people in this village consider them high class. And it could be super interesting to have cameo references to them if I ever finish The Bigger Scope Game, it’d be really interesting to think how morty’s descendants might return to their home country someday, as part of the revolution taking it down!

* Anyway I Do Not Know What Protagonist Country Is Called I actually haven’t even decided which region this game would be set in, lol, its just A Nice Town From Somewhere I’m pretty sure its not gonna be the same country the protagonists are gonna be in the Greater Scope Sequel Game Idea, tho. Cos that’d be a waste, why even make a bunch of countries if you’re not gonna explore them all? I was thinking possibly if every country is tied to a specific elemental magic, then maybe this place could be the plant element I guess? like, so its a country that has extra abundant farming and thus there are many nice and cute rural towns and here have a nice and cute rural town to live in. or maybe it could be the water elemental place and have the same principle but with sailing and fishing instead! nice rural fishing village! could have many cute scenes with your datemates going swimming or sailing or just hangin around on some picturesque beach that’s perfect for Dramatic Love Confessions~