#it came on the tail end of all the weird stuff that started happening with bts

[maximura]

Ateez Month: Wonderland 2019

[moneymartin]

MAY I REQUEST FOR LOTTIE WITH A SKATER GF HCS

🦌-lottie with skater!gf hcs

k this has been sitting in my inbox for like a week im sorry zzz also pulling stuff out of my ass cuz im so sleepyt

rich girl yes, she def buys you your gear and shit

if you ask her for a new deck she will literally get it for you no hesitation even if she already got you one

even the clothes and shoes like okayyyy (all brand name clothes for skating r so expensive too omfg)

offering her some help cause she wants to learn just for you

one day before she asked for it though she came home with scratches and a few bruises here and there cause she was trying to learn while you were out of the house :(

cannot balance thats why it happened

when you do end up teaching her though she is gripping onto you so tight it feels like your shirt is gonna rip 😭 she’s terrified of falling in front of you it is literally her biggest fear

teaching her tricks is a whole new level like she cannot pop up the tail properly and always holds on to you cause she sux!

you probably get her the skate trainers so she can do them when you’re gone ☹️

idk if ppl are gonna know what i’m talking abt but having her stand on the board while you hold her hands and she jumps so you can make the board underneath spin

please tell me you guys know what i’m talking abt or i’m gonna sound fucking crazy…

when she gets what she considers good she always calls you out so you can see her do a silly lil pop shuv or a strawberry milkshake 😭

when you sucked at skating you would get hurt ALL THE TIME!!!

lots of blood thats for sure.. lottie tending to your wounds and calling you ‘stupid’ for not wearing a helmet

you tell her “it looks dumb on me” and she ends up smacking you in the area where it hurts just so you know not to do it again and wear the damn helmet no matter how dumb it looks 😒

makes up for that tho fs! kisses your little scratches and bruises while you sleep so they magically feel better in the morning

definitely gives you massages too like she is such an angel oh my god

i think if you broke her arm or leg she’d FREAK!!!

she sees your hand twisted in that weird way but you’re just sitting on the floor holding up your wrist while she’s literally sobbing and calling an ambulance 🤧

same thing with the leg me thinks… your ankle twisted or something like that

when you get your arm casted up she helps you do everything like dress and cook and all that shebang

also she writes all over the cast like she makes it hard for the other yjs to sign it cause all there is on there is her name a bunch of times and a million hearts and doodles

one space on there where the yjs have their names cramped up while lottie’s is everywhere 😕

when it heals and you start to skate again lottie makes you wear a big ass sweater with a shit ton of padding underneath

probably makes you wear big old pants too so she can pad them up as well

gets you a big dumb helmet too so you don’t get hurt

but in reality she just cares about you too much and hates seeing you in pain 🙁🙁🙁

[dee-the-red-witch]

how did you get past “just being gnc”? asking for me, i’ve been in that mindset on and off for years. if you don’t mind sharing

I... okay, look, that's like a question with two other subtextual ones rolled up into it in a donut all at once. And I have an all-day road trip tomorrow, so I don't have a ton of spoons to spare, but I'm still gonna try and tackle all three. And I'm gonna hit the subtext questions first, because they're important and play into it. 1. What's a good way to come out as trans?

There fucking isn't one. For anyone of any gender. There is no perfect way for anyone to come out. It will always be awkward, there's always going to be some kind of price to pay, and you are never going to know that full price up front. It's also just about always less than the price of NOT coming out, though. 2. What's a good way for *ME* to come out as trans?

Okay, this one ties into my own story some, but the shorter version? I don't know. I can't tell you. Because I don't know your details and what's going to work for you or how. What I can tell you is that nobody is going to magically guess it for you, no one's going to give you permission to do it, and you're gonna have to start it yourself. There's folks that will absolutely help later down the line, but you have to initiate and start things, even if it's babysteps. Case in point... 3. ENOUGH SUBTEXT, DENICE, how'd YOU get past just being a guy?

It's complicated. I'd been in denial since the late 90's. so there was a LOT of personal bullshit, and art, and other work, and everything, packed up in and around my gender like mad. Like a wad of gum with a bunch of other stuff stuck to it- and sometimes when a piece finally got pulled free, part of the gum came up with it. Bad analogy, probably. Still. When I finished writing, and laying out, and publishing my first book (and practically screaming HI! IT ME! AM TRANS! in the afterword and other bits, because that's what happens when I write a historical horror novel with a GNC-transmasc-ish protag) I felt empty. Hollow. For months. I was trying and struggling to get a second book off the ground, and having this weight start settling over my head. Only it was like three months early for my usual denial ideation episode. Meanwhile, on facebook, my friend J who was dealing with the tail end aftershocks of a nasty divorce from an even nastier asshole. And of course she was going off about a very rational distrust and dislike of Men and some of their behaviors in particular, and I just had that goddamn black wave of ideation set in on me in full and was mentally internally screaming "But I'm not a fucking man!" and I did the one thing I'd never done in twenty plus years of dysphoria, denial and ideation. I said it out loud. Nobody in the apartment to even hear me. But I said it. And repeated it. And so help me, that depression/denial/ideation wave that I knew was going to end with me hurting myself or worse started immediately fading. I started switching my pronouns over to they/them on my social medias almost immediately. Like I said. Baby steps. But it was enough- one of my partners noticed the update and flat out asked me about it the next time she was over, and that's how I ended up coming out as nonbinary to both her and the rest of my immediate family. And a few days later online all over as well. Realizing I was a girl took a bit, because enby felt right, but not all the way right. I'd started t-blockers already because I knew I had dysphoria issues (just no idea how serious they were) and then started E. All of which was made easier by being in an informed-consent state and having a doctor who had zero issues with prescribing them, and more than a little bit of a mad scientist nature. Three days into Estrogen I just had this one weird moment of driving and hitting a sunny patch of road and suddenly I was happy and laughing in a way I'd NEVER been. That's when it started really clicking for me. When I realized that what had been holding me back was a lot of internalized shame and conditioning that I needed to unpack and get rid of. That's all where I started. (and yes, it meant a whole extra round of comings out and updates and everything, but well, here I am.) I hope that wall of text helps some? But yeah. Take baby steps. Things move from there as you figure it out. But you can't figure it out while you're holding yourself back.

[madychi]

Okay, I’m sorry but I’m very confused because you ret conned a lot of stuff, what is the story at this point?

Alright- no worries, I’ll clarify the whole story (up to the latest part) here.

Eggman attempted to create his own chaos emeralds. But something went wrong. They came out botched, emitting a hazardous mixture of Chaos energy and radiation. Eggman decided to just contain them and lock up the lair they were made in. He completely forgot about them.

Fast forward to sometime after the Metal Virus, Sonic ends up stumbling across this locked down base and busts in to take a look around. He comes across these Botched Emeralds and, not knowing why their so heavily contained, busts them out of containment with the intent to figure out why Eggman is making fake emeralds.

He takes six of the seven botched emeralds. He missed the seventh one. The emeralds react to Sonic taking them. Similar to how chaos emeralds would kinda absorb into Sonic when he goes super, the botched emeralds do something similar. Absorbing into Sonic.

Sonic definitely finds it weird, but nothing seems to happen, so he assumes it was a dud. No harm no foul. He leaves the base, which is no long securely containing the chaos radiation, allowing it to start seeping out.

A few days later Sonic’s noticeably unwell. He knows somethings wrong, he’s got weird sores all over his body, and his face feels numb. So he goes to the one fox he can trust to help out. Tails. This leads to the start of the comic.

Tails is immune to the Chaos Radiation. But he isn’t immune to the actual radiation. The symptoms are similar initially but while infected completely loose their sense of self, becoming mindless and instictual monsters, Tails does not. He keeps his sense of self.

Sonic can tell somethings up with Tails. Ever since he’s come to him Tails hasn’t been well. But Tails is intent on figuring this whole thing out. Sonic is with Tails for two weeks, in which no progress is really made. By the end of the second week, Sonic’s hunger has started to become unbearable for him. He’s tried eating anything he can. But it’s not enough. He even gives in a little and eats a flicky. It’s not enough.

He goes to try and tell Tails that he’s really hungry, but when he gets to him, something kinda snaps in him for a moment. His mind and thoughts are over taken by a deafening static, and all he can think about is his hunger. All he can understand is this urge to consume. He approaches Tails, coming to close for comfort to eating Tails. But he stops.

He notices the face mask Tails had been making for him, and it slowly draws him out of his frenzy. He doesn’t want to think about what he almost did. He’d never hurt Tails- no- of course not.

Tails wakes up from his nap at his work desk to see Sonic had found the prosthetic face he’d made him and was trying it on. He explains how it works, and Sonic brightens up a bit. He feels normal for the first time since this whole thing started. He can’t help but give Tails a headpat. The first physical contact they’ve had since Sonic’s sickness started. If Tails weren’t already doomed, this would’ve sealed his fate for sure.

It’s like being touched by pure polonium at this point. Tails’s eye starts to slip on out, as a reaction to his radiation poisoning. Understandably, he screams at this.

This is when Shadow enters the picture. He joined Restoration HQ to the little town(?) Tails lives in. With Sonic unknowingly around, folk have started to fall ill with weird symptoms. When people started getting symptoms, Tangle had gone out to check things out. She ended up getting too close to ground zero (the Eggman base) and getting infected. By the time she was found, she was already stage 2.

Shadow is here to get Tails and also try and get answers. Surely he’d know something. At least where Sonic is or might be since they haven’t been able to contact him at all. As Shadow’s about to knock on the door, he can hear Tails scream from inside. He bursts through the door, only to met with an eerie silence.

He walks through the house, looking for any sign of the fox, when he hears something. He goes into the very dark workshop, and sees Tails’s Miles Electric on the ground, active, and playing an audio. From this audio recording, Shadow realizes that yes, Tails does know what’s going on. And whatever it is, Sonic’s involved… maybe even the cause.

He doesn’t get to dwell on this long as he gets tag teamed by Sonic and Tails. He does fight back, using a chaos blast at one point. But ultimately, Sonic takes him down. With Shadow seemingly dead, Sonic quickly covers up as much as possibly to try and seem “normal”.

He convinces Amy that the two of them are just roughed up from an encounter with some “sick” person. And when she asks about Shadow, Tails claims Shadow said he had to take care of something and just ran off. Any believes them, and gets them back to HQ with the rest of the people who are able to be treated.

Amy is… worried. She can tell somethings off with Sonic. He’s not exactly able to hide his changing appearance well. But he helps out and takes care of Cream. That and he refuses to have tests done on him. She can’t force him. And she won’t force him to leave if he’s not causing trouble.

Then there’s Tails, who did agree to testing. The results were… not good. She had to break the news to him that he’s suffering from a very severe form of Radiation poisoning. That it’s a miracle he’s even alive. But that’s not the only bad news she has to deliver him. Amy also has to tell Tails that this radiation has cause a tumor to form in his brain. Since she’s told him this, he’s been quiet, and withdrawn in his quarantine cell. He only eats if Sonic brings the food. Or if they force him to eat.

The two have been with Restoration HQ for about a week now. And things have settled into a nice routine. The outbreak is classified and kept from public knowledge right now as to not cause a panic.

Sonic’s hunger is at its limit. He’s tried everything to quell it but nothing works. He doesn’t want to hurt anyone. But when he sees a hedgehog all alone and heading to bed for the night, he can’t help himself. He silently follows, removing his prosthetic face and cloak outside of the hedgehogs room. After a brief internal battle, he sneaks inside the room.

The hedgehog notices him though. He’d hoped he wouldn’t. But he does. There isn’t much of a struggle. Sonic makes sure of it. Still, he can’t help but feel bad for this guy. This wasn’t really anything personal. He was just unlucky. In the wrong place at the wrong time. So Sonic tries to give the kid some comfort in his final moments by holding his hand as he goes in to finish his meal.

And that’s everything. At least everything up to the current point in the comic. After each part, I’ll likely come here and add onto this post!

[duhragonball]

Dragon Ball Super Manga Ch.100

Yes, Cheelai, we have finally reached the end of the 2023 Dragon Ball Apocrypha Liveblog, but in particular, we've also finally reached the end of the seemingly endless manga adaptation of the Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero movie.

And yeah, this seems like an anticlimactic place to close out the year, but that's kind of how this entire liveblog has been, when you get down to it. I've had fun going through all this stuff, but there's a reason I'm referring to it all as "apocryphal". The Tournament of Power is a lot of fun, and the two DBS feature films are instant classics, but none of it really feels essential to Dragon Ball. From the OAVs to GT to Super, the main theme here is "Hey, remember Dragon Ball? Let's make more of that!" Everything ends up being a sequel or a callback or an easter-eggy kind of deal. And that's not the worst thing that can happen to a franchise, but it's probably fitting that we're closing out on the final chapter of a comic book adaptation of a movie that serves as a sequel to the Android arc that was a continuation of the Red Ribbon Army arc.

Chapter 100 just retells the last several minutes of the Super Hero movie, and I already went over the film, so let's just concentrate on how the manga depicts it differently. We'll start with Gohan's right arm, which got some heat a few days ago when the previews came out.

I refuse to dogpile on Toyotaro, since he's a far better artist than I'll ever be, and I've genuinely enjoyed his art through this entire read-through, even when the writing has been bad. That said... yeah, Gohan's arm looks kind of weird. Maybe while Gohan was teaching himself the Special Beam Cannon, he learned how to do Piccolo's stretchy arm thing too.

I do think it's pretty dumb how chuds on Twitter will nitpick Toyotaro's art as though the original Dragon Ball manga was some kind of showcase of photorealistic anatomy. I've been a fan of this thing for a quarter-century now, and the key to loving Dragon Ball is to make peace with the fact that it's fundamentally goofy and stupid. Sometimes a guy's arm gets drawn longer than his other arm. Sometimes characters scream so loud that their jaws unhinge like when a snake swallows an egg whole. Bulma wasted a wish on the Dragon Balls to make her ass look hotter, because if she didn't, then Frieza would come back and use the wish to make himself taller. Goku grew his tail back by having a guy tug on his ass with a pair of pliers. This show was always a hot mess, so don't blame Toyotaro. It was like this when he got here.

Anyway, Cell Max tries to block the Special Beam Cannon like he did in the movie, but Gohan has a harder time punching through, so in this version Goten and Trunks jump in to distract Cell and give Gohan a boost. In the movie, they were still Gotenks until after the fight ended, but in this version the battle must have taken a little longer, since they de-fused a little earlier.

Of course, this is just a way for Toyotaro to show off the Great Saiyaman X-1 and X-2 costumes one more time. It's kind of pointless, because all of the added Goten and Trunks scenes in this arc have been pointless. Also, Trunks' pose looks really awkward here. He looks like he got sawed in half, and both halves are still kind of flying forward in the same direction, but he's no longer connected.

I will say that I'm grateful for this final appearance of X-1 and X-2, because it gives me a chance to critique their outfits one last time. I hate the superhero undies they wear over their tights. They look baggy and puffy for some reason, which make it look like Goten and Trunks are wearing diapers. I'm pretty sure that's the exact opposite of what the boys were going for.

I mean, the outfits aren't that bad, but what irritates me is how Toyotaro keeps showing them off like this is the coolest thing going on in this story. The designs are presented like they somehow connect all these different things. Goten and Trunks were inspired by Cleangod, and they named their personas after Great Siayaman, and then Dr. Hedo saw them and supposedly based the Gammas' costumes off their look. Except X-1 and X-2 don't actually look anything like Great Saiyaman, or Cleangod, or the Gammas. It's just frustrating.

Anyway, we get the same bit about cosmetic skin alteration from the movie, except Gotenks has already separated in this version, so Bulma can address Goten and Trunks separately.

I also like this part after Pan shows off her flying ability. This segued into the credits of the movie, but here we see Gohan calling out for her to stay closer to the ground. It's pretty cute, since it kind of calls back to when Gohan was a timid child way back in the early days of DBZ. Now he's older and braver, but I bet when he sees Pan up so high in the air he thinks about how scared he was whenever he was up really high.

Meanwhile, some Red Ribbon goons have survived the battle and appear to be slowly getting away. This is nice because I noticed these guys escorting Carmine to safety in one of the previous chapters, and I've always wondered if any of the Red Ribbon guys made it out of the base alive. Pan knocked Carmine out, so it seemed reasonable to assume that he was vaporized during the Cell Max battle. Actually, in the movie, it looked like the entire crater was flattened, but here it looks like the destruction stayed confined to that area.

Anyway, the implication is that Carmine will return to Red Pharmaceutical and try to figure out his next move, but it seems unlikely that he could be much of a threat. Magenta's dead, the base is destroyed, and a bunch of their soldiers either died or deserted in this battle. Remember, even with the base and all those soldiers, Magenta still wasn't ready to make a big move. Dr. Hedo's androids were supposed to be his game-changing weapon, and now Hedo's turned against the Red Ribbon, so what can Carmine possibly do from here?

We get some additional material of the Goku/Vegeta fight in the movie. In the post-credits scene, they were practically moving in slow-motion and we only got to see the final blow. Here, we see Goku and Vegeta each land one last punch before the one that ends it all. These boys look all rowdy and badass and it's great.

When Whis finally responds to Bulma's messages, we get this cute shot of everyone sleeping in the back of her aircraft. Gohan talks about taking her to the amusement park, which seems kind of random, but it occurred to me that this might be setting up some filler story for Chapter 101. Like Gohan and Pan go to the amusement park for the day, and Carmine tries to kill them or something to avenge the Red Ribbon Army. That probably wouldn't be a bad idea, although I really don't want that to happen, because it sounds similar to the "Hedo vs. Goten and Trunks" stuff we had in Chapters 88-90. Everyone thinks Toyotaro has been champing at the bit to get done with this arc so he can return to his Black Frieza business, but for all we know he's been enjoying this whole bit, and he'll blow the next six months on filler stories with Goten and Trunks goofing around with Sgt. Nutz.

Anyway, this is the last page and this was the last little bit of the movie too, so Toyotaro has definitely run out of movie to adapt. Also, Bulma looks really cute on this page, so I wanted to add that to the record.

So that pretty much wraps things up, except for one minor detail. Where's the big twist?

I ran across this last month when I was checking to see if Chapter 99 would wrap up the arc or not. CBR.com did an article entitled "Dragon Ball Super Chapter 100's 'Unbelievable' Twist to Lead to "'Crazy Developments'" The story stems from comments made by V-Jump editor Victory Uchida, who was hyping DBS chapters 99 and 100 while appearing in an unboxing video for some reason.

The video is in Japanese, so I can't just pull out direct quotes from the man, so maybe this was all some big misunderstanding. Maybe it was a mistranslation, maybe Uchida got confused and was referring to material that wouldn't see print until Chapter 101. Or maybe he was just doing a standard hype job for his publication without thinking about what was actually in the magazine. After all, how can Chapter 100 have an "unbelievable twist" when it's doing a shot-for-shot repeat of a year-old movie?

So I assumed this meant there would be some sort of epilogue scene in the final pages, designed to set up the next arc. Sort of like how the last chapter of the Tournament of Power arc had the scene where the Galactic Patrol kidnaps Majin Buu. But Chapter 100 had no such thing. No Black Frieza, no Cell Max suddenly turning the tables on Gohan to win the movie, no mysterious appearance from Purple Turles or Red Bojack. Not even a lousy cameo from Platinum Cooler.

Does this make Victory Uchida an unreliable source of information? Or has he simply been misunderstood? I feel like his ridiculous yellow wig/hat thing kind of holds the answer to that question.

Anyway, the ultimate fate of Dragon Ball Super lies in Chapter 101 and beyond, but those stories will be printed in 2024, which means they fall outside the scope of this liveblog. So unless Toei or Shueisha has a new movie or anime coming out in the next eleven days, I'm done. This has been the 2023 Dragon Ball Apocrypha Liveblog. Good night, everybody!

[emmett-the-luchino-lover]

And romantic Luchino x reader hcs that you wanna talk about? (Kinda like a “free prompt” for you to have fun with)

YESS!! I tried my best! (ToT) I'm sorry if it's kind of bad, I tried to make it as accurate to him as possible by studying him from his tweets on the official idv twitter account, but overall, enjoy it!! :D

(requests are open! check my rules for more info before requesting!)

LUCHINO X GN! READER ROMANTIC HCS <3 (SFW) 🦎 

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗Surprisingly, he is quite the gentleman! back when he was a human, tonsss of people tried to flirt with him (though he did not quite liked the attention as he is more of a to himself type of person.)

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗But, once he has been a hunter in the manor, and after he became a lizard, no body wanted to even be near him. He was incredibly closed off from everyone, in his room (or better known as his "lab") doing whatever god knows what. But, he oddly liked it that way..

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗Until you came along. During a match, he had his eyes on you, wanting to know more and study you. "What a fascinating human.." he thinks to himself.

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗The way you guys met was when you both were in the manors hunter garden (its giantic btw :skull emoji:). He bumps into you, surprised of the fact that a mere human, let alone a survivor was wandering around the hunter's part of the manor

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗"Human.. why are you here? Do you even know who I am.? I am a terrifying creature… Many mortals fear me…."

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗"Yea, also this is a nice garden!"

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗"….Did you not hear what I just said."

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗After that whole entire mess, he grew to like you more and more, both getting to know each other and you sneaking off to the hunter's part of the manor, often hanging around the garden.

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗At first, he is not too fond of touch. He actually despised it. But the more you guys are around each other, he had this.. weird desire to give you lots of affection, he didn't understand why though.

-In the start of the relationship, how he shows his affection is giving you small gifts like necklaces, flowers, etc. He'd give excuses to sit beside you.

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗When you give him some stuff back, he would be blushing like ALOTT this lizard boy just gets flustured easily.

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗"Thank you so much, amore mio." (he'll say it camly even tho he's like freaking out on the inside.)

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗he loves it when you listen to him geeking out about science stuff and all of that, it makes him feel all giddy inside and makes him fall in love with you even more.

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗compliment his scales and everything. He loves the way he looks, and when you compliment him, his ego goes through the roof lol

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗He also loves chin scratches. Give him chin scratches and he purrs loudly and you can literally feel and hear the vibration from his body.

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗Once the relationship has been going on for awhile, he'll easily get comfortable with hugs and cuddles, and pretty much almost everything.

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗He loves to pick you up with his long ass tail, even just out of no where.

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗He'd also have you watch him with his experiments in his labs. He'll sometimes allow you to join in, but that's on certain stuff. Half the reason is because he doesn't want you to get hurt if anything happens, and also he is a complete control freak, and only likes things going his way when it comes to this type of stuff, so he would go crazy if any experiments is not mostly him doing it.

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗He doesn't mean it in a mean way or anything though I promise sobs on the ground

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗He loves reading some books with you with classical music in the background while you both are cuddling up on his bed.

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗He'd also treat you to a romantic dinner date (Joseph and Leo would be volunteering to do the food and wine for yall considering you guys can't really go out anywhere since you are literally stuck inside a manor r.i.p)

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗He also ADORES kissing with chin scratches if that makes sense, on both ends. He also loves to pull you in and hold you while you guys are kissing (real)

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗Overall, a really great lizard guy 10/10 (I need him right now fr)

[quantomeno]

Equestria Girls: Rainbow Rocks:

Why they 'Pony Up' when they play music

'Ponying up' is probably the weirdest magic-related phenomenon in EG. There are a lot of weird things but this is probably the one that is worst explained or explained, but in conflicting ways.

EG1: they pony up when hit by the Element of Magic's energy

EG2: playing music leads to ponying up

EG3: being true to their element leads to ponying up

EG4: the gemstones are magic and let them pony up

And then from then onwards they wear the gems so we can put it down mostly to that.

So, 2 out of 4 involve Equestrian Magic from items, so ok, weird stuff happens because they directly touched them or they're holding a magic item. Those make sense. The items transfer their magic and so we get ponying up.

EG3's element business is iffier, but they elements are themselves the source of magic and we've seen in fim there needs to be the personification for the magic to occur (vide return of harmony). It's tenuous, especially because it never happens again like this, but I'll let it slide. It's element-related and the other two explanations are as well.

EG2 stands out though. There is no connection to their elements of harmony. There are no magical artefacts. So what causes it?

It's also important to note that it is not simply playing music that triggers it: during Bad Counter Spell, only RD comes close to ponying up and in Shake Your Tail they avoid it by playing '20% less cool'. Similarly, only RD manages to (start to) pony up during Awesome as I Wanna Be (AAIWB). They need to play well.

One might think oh, it's important they play together as friends but no. Everyone was clearly unhappy with Rainbow (to put it mildly) and yet she still ponies up in AAIWB. They also pony up individually by playing solos during the prequel shorts.

So playing music that sounds good leads to ponying up.

I think it relates to a different concept of harmony than the one usually discussed in the show. When I first came up with this idea, I thought they had to play music in harmony to achieve this. But given they can do it solo, I think it is indeed just euphony (good sound) that is needed. It is musical harmony, just not in the music theory way, but in a 'balanced and pleasant' way.

Additionally, there needs to be a sort of internal connection with the playing, a sense of focus and oneness with the music. Or something. Because if you listen to Bad Counter Spell's instrumental, RD's "five minute guitar solo" is actually really good: she's (trying, rather unsuccessfully) to get into the music. Similarly with AAIWB where she relegates everyone else to the boring bits and leaves herself an awesome (and I don't throw that word around loosely) guitar solo.

The harmony is internal, but in a way it is external as by playing good music you bring a sense of happiness to those who hear it: good music brings harmony if it is played with true emotion.

And that is why Shake Your Tail does nothing and why only RD ever ponies up in the songs where they're not all happy.

But wait, we still haven't explained how this actually works. Sure, this is a reason why music is the trigger, but what's the reason anything is triggered in the first place?

Magical radiation left over from the battle with Sunset Shimmer and the Element of Magic.

They got hit with a big beam of magic and so now there's just lingering magic stuff everywhere, but it's especially focused on the HuMane 6 because they were the direct target of the beam and because they are the element bearers in Equestria, so there's some weird sort of connection between universes I don't know.

This is supported by the fact that magic 'leaking' from the portal causes all sorts of problems in later shorts and specials.

Sunset Shimmer also ponies up at the end of the film because 1) she is a unicorn and so has latent Equestrian magic sitting in her and 2) she wore the element of magic so she was also really strongly affected by it. It's mostly reason 1) that explains why no one else ponies up despite Sunset using magic on them. Also 3) she has been chosen by the Tree of Harmony (it's been known to interfere in things so I wouldn't put it past it to do it in a parallel universe) to be the element of 'empathy' or something (or, if not an element, just been chosen worthy of having magic powers). Maybe because she was almost an element bearer herself if she hadn't run away, who knows. The Tree's wisdom is inscrutable.

Anyway, there you have it: the girls have residual magic radiation in their bodies which can be accessed (due to the magical powers of their parallel universe selves) when they play music that brings a sense of euphony in the listener and when they connect with the music. And this causes them to grow pony ears, long hair and (in some cases) wings. And if they all do it together as friends, they can even cause magic lightshows that blast their enemies.

As they say, friendship truly is magic.

[your-talos-is-problematic]

Thank you @skyrim-forever for the tag! Here’s a WIP I started after finishing BG3- I really like my Tav’s ending of [LIGHT BG3 ENDING SPOILERS] being able to teach magic with Gale. I’m not going to lie, I don’t really like the setup for this one and probably won’t finish it- I’ll definitely write stuff about the two of them but not with this premise. Too many new characters I think. Also if anyone wants to send me writing prompts with my TES ocs or my Tav I would be very grateful :P

Tagging @trickstarbrave @notcallherbirdie @jinjieee @katastronoot @throughtrialbyfire and anyone else who wants to join!

———————————————————————— Dear Dean,

We sincerely apologize for the incident that occurred in Illusion class two days ago. We understand that these actions do not reflect the principles of the school, and will take care to ensure that this does not happen again.

Sincerely,

Professor Dekarios

Professor “Tragedy” (Tilia of Tragedy)

Two Days Before

“Waterdeep.” Gale smiled, staring out the window. “The greatest city on the Sword Coast.”

“Clearly. It’s one of the three my family cycles between.”

He I looked up at where I was sitting cross-legged on his desk. “Explain?”

I sighed. “My dad’s family originally started in Baldur’s Gate, but moved to Elturel about five generations before my father because there were more tieflings there. My mom’s family came from Waterdeep, but moved to Baldur’s Gate…” I frowned. “At some point, I don’t know. And then my mom moved to Elturel to be with my dad. Now they both live here.”

Gale looked puzzled, but nodded. “You, of course, have lived in all three.”

I shrugged. “I’m just special.” I lazily swished my tail over his desk, dangerously close to some potion bottles. I turned my head to read off of his lesson plan. “Hells, wizards have to take everything so slow. You really need to work your way up to three Scorching Ray projectiles?”

“Everyone has to start somewhere, Tilia.”

I pouted, resting a cheek in my hand. “Guess that’s true. I started with no scales on my forehead and a much smaller Fireball radius.”

Gale started to facepalm, but seemed to notice something behind me and looked up. “We have a visitor! Welcome to office hours, Kaliah.”

I turned. I’d seen Kaliah Silentfield in class before- a small, dark-skinned high elf with a talent for written assignments and a fear of fire. Opposite of myself, basically. She was a pretty quiet student, which was a bit of a relief. Some of Gale’s protégés were quite loud casters.

She smiled, looking nervous. “Hello.”

“What do you need?” Gale crossed the room to his desk, side-eyeing my position atop it. I unfolded my legs and slid off the side.

She walked over to the first row of benches and set her bag down on the floor. “One second, please. I need to wait for someone.” She sat down, looking anxious.

While we were waiting, I spied a stray tressym hair on Gale’s shoulder. I noticed a rush of movement in my peripheral vision while leaning over to pick it off. Another student stood in the hallway. I waved them in.

“Hello!” I said with a smile. Now, professors aren’t supposed to have favorite students, but Deo (a shortened version of his much more tiefling-y name, Devotion) was my favorite student. He had the unnecessary confidence of a sorcerer, and the unnerving blue and black eyes of a good old tiefling. There weren’t a lot of students who would understand my random interjections in Infernal, so he was a welcome sight in the classroom. “Two students in one office hour, wow. Normally this place is deserted when you’re not in class.” Kaliah smiled. Deo didn’t. He looked nervous, maybe even angry.

“You’re here, Kali.” He spoke to her without looking in her direction. Weird, because they were usually both very friendly.

Gale looked wary at the Mephistopheles tiefling’s appearance. He swallowed. “Professor Tragedy, can I speak to you privately?”

I nodded, but raised my eyebrows. He looked around for somewhere to go, and eventually just walked to the top of the tiered student seating. I unrolled my wings and floated to meet him- unnecessary, but fun.

“This is bad, Tilia,” he whispered. “Really bad.”

I sat on a desk. “Absolute-level bad?” I mocked.

“Tilia!”

“Sorry.”

“Kaliah and Deo used to date. About a year ago. I’m not aware of the exact circumstances, but apparently-“ he paused for dramatic effect- “it was not good.”

“Have you been gossiping with students?” I intensified my whispering in mock disgust. 

“Now is not the time, Tilia!” He was a bit loud, and Kaliah looked up, concerned. He lowered his voice to a whisper again. “If the two of them are here at the same time, intentionally, together- something is very, very wrong.”

I twisted a strand of green hair in my hand.“Can we just… ask them?”

“Fine. But keep your guard up. We don’t know what we’re dealing with here.”

“Sure.” I flew back down to the desk, then waited for Gale to walk back down.. “Sorry. We just can’t discuss essay grades in front of students.”

“That is a much better lie than I would have thought of,” Gale whispered. It was actually a half-truth, not a lie, but I can forgive wizards for being uneducated in speechcraft. He smiled and turned to the students, who were now sitting at opposite ends of the bench. “What’s the cause for this visit?” 

Kaliah stared at the blackboard behind us, like she was waiting for Deo to begin. Deo haughtily inspected his tail, glancing at her over his shoulder. Neither of them spoke for an annoying length of time.

I ran a hand through my bangs. “Class is in an hour, kids. If you’re not going to talk, can you at least help set up?” Kaliah seemed to consider the offer and eyed the spell components stacked on the bench next to them. Finally, Deo opened his mouth.

“There’s a… situation with the school staff.” Hells. This better not get dicey. I’m barely an actual hire. “Can we close the door?”

I could see Gale wince as he turned to remove the doorstop. “Issues with professors are supposed to go to them or to the dean.”

Kaliah finally piped up. “This is a… different matter. One the two of you would know more about than the dean.”

I ran through the possibilities in my head. Illithids, Baldur’s Gate, possibly devils, ideally fashion sense. “Nothing dangerous, I hope?”

“I hate to disappoint you, Professor Tragedy, but yes.” Deo was dramatic in his delivery. “We think Professor Urilath is a Bhallist. Or replaced with one.” Professor Urilath- I couldn’t recall his first name, but I knew he was a sea elf and an Evocation wizard.

I let the fury of Avernus into my sigh, dramatically plopping onto the floor. Both students looked concerned. Gale laughed at me. “Are we talking ‘might whisper a prayer to the Murder Lord on occasion’ or full invisibility-loving assassin?”

Deo laughed. “Do you meet a lot of causal Bhaalists, Professor?”

I pouted. “No. But I’d like them better than the invisible ones.”

“That’s a very serious accusation, students. What’s your evidence?” Gale sounded genuinely worried. I probably should have been, too. 

Kaliah lightly coughed. “Right. We- I,” with a sideways glance at Deo, “understand the gravity of this situation. And we do have evidence, though it’s all, unfortunately, hearsay-“

Deo cut in. “It’s a dark day in Waterdeep, and Kali and I are heading to our midnight studying. In separate directions, of course.” He held up a hand with a flourish as if to block Kaliah from his view. “All seems to be well, but when we’re passing by the sea elf’s room we hear something strange. A voice- low and raspier even than the ancient professor’s.” Gale rolled his eyes. I wondered if Deo talked about everyone like this behind their back. “Said something about ‘tomorrow’s sunset.’ Today’s, now. Then Kali-“

Kaliah sighed and interrupted. “I swear I saw his hand on the desk and it was white. Like the doppelgängers you described seeing, back in Baldur’s Gate.”

“Sounds legitimate. And time-limited,” I said.  I grabbed a pen and flipped over Gale’s lesson plan to take notes on the back. “Gale, what’s the university’s policy on impromptu investigations?”

“They’re not exactly recommended.” He winced. “But if the circumstances call for one…”

I smiled. “Any chance evocation has the same lunch period as us?”

-

Gale and Tilia inspect the guy’s room and find a bloody rabbit in one of his desk drawers

“Any chance this is just a spell component?

“With this carelessness of storage? I hope not. And if it were intended for use in a spell, it’d be for necromancy. Not evocation.”

-

Gale stared anxiously at the red stain. “Let’s all just be very careful with Professor Tragedy’s blood, yes? To avoid any untimely explosions?”

[thefirstknife]

I think the issue with people complaining about a cliffhanger is that there's different ways to tell a story, and they aren't expecting how D2 does it. For some series, they have an overarching plot but by and large you can pick up entries in just about any order, or even omit some, and get a good experience. Other stories you really have to go through them in order without skipping or you'll be confused. The problem with Destiny is that the cliffhangers try to treat it like the latter, but the simple fact that a bunch of relevant story and lore content is only accessible via write-ups and YouTube videos (so not actually accessible at all to some people) rather than in the game means it's forced, in many regards, to be treated like the former type. Which doesn't work great. It's trying to run something on framework designed for the opposite. So when people hear that story elements get removed yearly (seasons) and entire expansions are gone (vaulting) the reasonable assumption is "every story expansion is pretty much entirely self-contained" except then it turns out not all of them are, and LF ended up having a lot more plot hooks for TFS. Which makes the annoyance very understandable when they looked at the game's model and reasonably expected a different storytelling format. (It still doesn't excuse the vile behavior many people have displayed, but it makes more sense the more i step back from the game and see that it seems like they've evolved themselves into a messy corner with their choices for how they run and unfold things.)

Oh, that's definitely a problem Destiny has always had. Even before vaulting, though obviously vaulting made things worse. Like, Destiny 2 was advertised as a game anyone can pick up when it came to the PC for the first time, without the need to play the first one. This was not the case at all. When I jumped into D2 at launch, there was not a single tutorial or explanation for anything that was happening and I was definitely not gonna watch 50 hours of footage of lore on youtube or playthroughs or buy a console I don't have just to understand a video game.

But the game was playable. Obviously I didn't understand anything, but the game was perfectly playable and is still playable now. Basically, the only people bothered by this weird lore stuff are people who get immediately invested into the lore itself and let me tell you. That is by far not anywhere near any significant level of people. It may seem like something normal to go into the lore section and read the lore, but the overwhelming majority of people never do that.

This is obviously a bigger issue for players that do care but skipped parts or don't want to spend hours and hours of their free time backreading everything. However even with that, I don't think that the cliffhanger stuff could really be handled any differently by itself (vaulting notwithstanding, since that's a whole different problem that isn't tied to Lightfall itself as an expansion). By the virtue of it being a cliffhanger at the tail end of the saga, it's by default not going to be exactly friendly to new players (story-wise). Actually, in some way, by introducing something brand new that even veterans had to learn from scratch (Neomuna, Veil, Cloud Striders, new discoveries of Light and Darkness...), we were all pretty much on the same playing field, veterans and new players alike. But basically, Lightfall had to be a cliffhanger, given its position in the overall story.

I don't think Destiny was ever newcomer friendly, not in at the time I started, not later either (despite having free campaigns in Shadowkeep, every new player I got into the game struggled immensely to understand what's going on). The story of Destiny definitely suffers in a lot of ways due to D1 being locked to console, vaulting and various other issues with lore delivery, though a lot of it has gotten better over time. I still wouldn't expect Lightfall to really be drastically different no matter what, except maybe if the whole structure of expansions and time between them was changed.

These issues certainly didn't help Lightfall (and many other expansions), but I wouldn't say that Lightfall was particularly affected by continuity. In part specifically because it introduced so many new things. Nobody had any reference point for Neomuna or Cloud Striders. We all learned it at the same time. And from a vast majority of people online, I've seen that they didn't even bother trying to learn (I've also seen people being personally offended that they're not getting the veteran's treatment and that they weren't able to immediately understand everything through their vast knowledge of Destiny lore). There are fantastic lore books and quests that follow the campaign that expand on Neomuna expontentially and people have simply not played them. I genuinely believe that a lot of people went into Lightfall thinking it's going to be the big showdown with the Witness and that there's a bigger badder evil behind the Witness. When that didn't happen, people declared Lightfall "worst expansion ever" that "Bungie lied about." It's a very strange situation to me. I won't say that the story was the best ever, as I generally think Destiny campaigns tend to be fairly basic, short and more cinematic. But the response is so overwhelmingly negative in a way that reveals, to me, complete misunderstanding of storytelling.

I obviously can't get into the shoes of someone whose first interaction with Destiny was Lightfall and I've seen people who were put off as well as people who got immediately hooked. I can only say from my experience with vanilla that I spent a year with zero information and references and the only way i could've gotten them was to go watch youtube and it didn't really bother me all that much, since I didn't care a lot about the story in the first place. The game worked fine gameplay wise without understanding the story. And when I did get interested, I still had to go watch youtube to understand it. There's no summary in the game and never was. Lore books are exactly informative of the basics or the timeline or things that happened in the past. My ordeal of learning about Destiny lore is actually largely what made me make the blog so I can help others.

But yeah, no matter what Bungie advertises, Destiny has never really been friendly to new players story-wise. It's actually one of my biggest pet peeves because it would be super easy to create some kind of in-game encyclopedia with detailed summaries of everything that unlock as you play the game. You know, kill your first dreg in Trostland, unlock "Eliksni" entry in the encyclopedia. I hope that whatever is coming after TFS the first thing they're working on is the ability to NOT vault anything. Like, that's first priority to me. When this saga concludes, whatever is coming after, it has to be set up from the start in a way that we don't have to ever lose any story content or render it unplayable. On my knees begging.

I'm not sure if this would've helped Lightfall as I don't think there would be any new player or returning player going through 20 seasons worth of content and 5 expansions just to hop into Lightfall. I think that no matter what, there's always going to be people disappointed in the story as it nears the end. I just wish people gave it a reasonable chance and if they were able to accept that maybe they got it wrong and that their first impression is not entirely grounded in reality (mostly because I'm 100% sure people missed stuff on their first playthrough. As an example, people were mad about "how does Osiris see what's happening to our Ghost at the end! It makes no sense!" meanwhile as you get into the facility, Ghost has a line saying he'll be directing "visual feed" to Osiris to help them navigate. There are a lot of details like this that people repeat over and over as "proof" that Lightfall's story made no sense. It relies on no previous knowledge. To be clear, I missed things too). As usual I'll say that my critique is that a few things could've been structured better and a few more details added to make things tighter for understanding what's going on.

This is definitely a conversation worth having more than any other mindless critique online that's borderline Cinemasins level of engagement. I'd actually be interested to know what's the split on how veterans and new players perceived Lightfall and what were the specifics that confused them or that they disliked, and especially with a combination of how much they were into lore before and after Lightfall.

[oitommothetease]

The Arrangement (3)

Pairing: Carol Danvers x Female reader (Modern AU)

Word Count: 1.2k words

Warning: mob au, Carol is lowkey dark, more like soft dark

It wasn't technically hard to find you or everything about you. In fact, it was quite easy. After two phone calls, Carol knew it all—from your favorite restaurant to your favorite Pringles flavor. Well, the latter took more than a few phone calls, but surely, you wouldn't know that she had men tailing you wherever you went.

There was also another thing among the list of things you didn't know, Carol paid a visit to your ex-boss - the one that fired you—for a conversation and with a price that made him call you back and hire you.

And when you received a call from your old boss to rehire you, you were more than surprised—somewhat shocked even. It was so unlikely that it made you doubt it, but then you shrugged it off as your good luck and happily accepted your source of income back. There was also a raise in your salary—not enough that it would seem suspicious, but enough that it seemed odd. When you questioned it, your superior brushed it off as an apology and said everyone was getting a raise. So again, you overlooked these things and by the next Monday, you were back at the school.

Going back to work was just about the same, but you started having this weird feeling that someone was around you—following you. You felt the same way when you packed your stuff from the classroom and now as you reached your apartment. Initially, you assumed it was a kid playing pranks or a parent waiting around to talk to you, but the feeling still retained after almost a week. You weren't confrontational at all. And even if you were, you wouldn’t dare to think anything of this paranoia because it has been just that—you were being paranoid. It was not real.

As you made your way towards work the next day, you noticed a car—a very familiar one. Instantly, you remembered it from that night—you recalled how Carol whispered dirty thoughts in your ear as her hands explored your body in that same car. The mere thought of that night was enough to run a shiver down your spine and instinctively, you clenched your thighs together as the memories of that night came rushing back.

It couldn't be her. Why would she even come back? The only logical reason for why she would return was to end you. You knew something about her identity that would jeopardize her freedom. So if she were back, it would have to be to kill you. You immediately shoved that thought aside, ignoring the fear that was blooming in your stomach now. Tons of people have that sort of car, you reasoned.

You collected yourself and made your way inside the school. The rest of the day went by as usual. And when the day ended, you plugged your AirPods in and started collecting your stuff—packing for the day. Placing your laptop in the bag, the answer sheets you needed to mark were safely put in your drawer when you felt hands around your waist. Before you could react, The person pulled your body closer to theirs as they peppered your neck with kisses.

“God, baby. I missed you,” the person, Carol—you could recognize her voice anywhere—murmured as her mouth made its way towards your jaw, showering more kisses there.

“Carol,” you took hold of her hands as you tried to pry her away from you and once that happened, you turned to look at her. She looked the same—it was dumb to think about because it had only been a few weeks since you last saw her. People don't change drastically in a short period. But you noticed that under the light of the sun, she was more gorgeous during the day. “What are you doing here?” you inquired, looking around for people like you were a high schooler meeting somebody you weren't supposed to be with.

You gasped in surprise when she ignored your pondering and landed her mouth on yours, taking the opportunity to invade your mouth with her tongue while her fingers started unbuttoning your blouse. This time, you shoved her off not so gently, “What the fuck are you doing here? This is my workplace,” you raised your hand in an exasperated manner, “There are children out there for god's sake.”

Your temper did not seem to rub off on her as she smiled slyly and took your hands in her as she suggested, “Tonight, then? My place.”

“No.”

“No?” She looked taken aback, letting go of your hands as if she finally understood and took the hint. But the look on her face stung you. It made you feel like shit for disappointing her.  You remembered how proud she looked when you did as she pleased, and it made you feel really good, so to see her disappointed in your answer—in you—had you leaning towards her and apologizing.

“I’m sorry. I just have a lot going on,” you explained, “I don't even have my own roof over my head and I just got my job back and money is tight-”

“I will pay you.”

“What?” you scoffed, offended by the suggestion.

“I can pay for you,” she insinuated each word slowly, and before you could open your mouth to reject or argue, she spoke again. “It won’t be like a debt and you can return the favor in a different form.”

You folded your arm around your chest, “And what form would that be?"

“ Well," she suggested, "Think of it as a mutually beneficial arrangement. You live with me in my house and enjoy the luxuries and easier life with no struggle for money. And I—well, I get you.”

“Does this mutually beneficial arrangement of yours,” you queried, quoting the term in the air. “Gives me the liberty to say no.”

Carol looked at you with a clear offense on her face. She wasn't going to force you. It was true that she wanted you in more ways than she could comprehend, but she desired you to want her—beg for her—cum for her and eventually, fall for her. And all she needed to do to get you to play by her rules was a little persuasion, and she only intended to do that. “Of course, angel. Everything that happens between us will be consensual.”

At your hesitation, Carol spoke again. “I can get it documented that would protect us and we can sign it. That would make you feel sure and safe. And you can end it anytime you want. No strings attached.” She looked at you expectantly, waiting—and when you didn't speak she added, “Do we have an arrangement?”

You were hesitant and scared. You liked to think that you had some sort of control over your life, and you wouldn't give things like money more importance than your values. But on the other hand, her offer did seem tempting—you wouldn't have to sleep on your friend’s sofa anymore and in your head, you were winning both ways because you would get all the fancy stuff you've always wanted- and mostly you would get Carol. You didn’t know what her offer encompassed of, but you would be lying to yourself, if you said you weren’t intrigued by it. So, without thinking further, you nodded, “Yes, we do.”

⁓⁓

TAGS: @bubblespeare @bananapipedreams​  @step-intoyour-power

[original-character-championship]

Bracket B Round 1

Poll 32

Felix (@oopsie0503) vs. Luna (@goblinoid-wretch)

127. Felix (@oopsie0503)

He/They

They're my favorite traumatized transgender homosexual little creature. He is so tragic. He is such a kind little soul who wouldn't hurt a fly, he just wanted to be accepted for who he was! His family didn't accept him when he came out as trans and he was in a horrible place when the God of the Sun came along and told him he could give them a better life. Of course when a God, respected and worshipped, offers to give you the life you've dreamed of, you'd take it. Then a lot of really shitty stuff happens to him, I won't get into it here because some of it's really sensitive but you can find all his lore on @lux-loquitur plus some other characters from his lore. He's got two kids, and he loves them both unconditionally even if they are both in some way direct results of his trauma. He gets betrayed by his husband (Moon) who saved him from his abuser, (Sun) and he ends up trapped in a 'star room', or a depiction of his last movements which were so confusing and tragic in so many ways that they ruined his afterlife. He is stuck here for centuries, unable to interact with any of the objects in the room including pictures of his daughters, as well as himself and Moon. He can't figure out why he'd killed him, it's lost on him. Slowly he goes insane, his mind snapping, until he is summoned by Moon after the God finds a strange orb (which the universe itself may or may not have had some role in delivering). Felix, now the only Lux to ever visit the living realm from the afterlife, is more powerful than even the God of Creation, killing Sun, his abuser, and taking on the position of God of the Dead and the Stars.

Felix is a part of a species called the Lux, with dark skin, freckles, a long tail with a tuft of fur at the end, and long pointed ears. His eyes are a vibrant electric blue, matching with the glowing bits of his antenna. His hair is cut halfway down to his neck and is a dark brown. His usual attire consists of a crescent moon choker, a sleeveless crop top, and a pair of dark blue shorts and an arm band depicting hearts. After death he comes back as a spirit (and eventually becomes the god of death) and he is a slightly opaque, vibrant blue. His eyes are a dark cyan and parts of him which once gave off light are now dark. His death wound on his neck as well as his mouth and nose bleed for centuries. His arm band depicts broken hearts and he is able to have either a wispy, genie like body or legs as he pleases.

128. Luna (@goblinoid-wretch)

She/her

I have put her through enough goddamn trauma for both iterations of her life. She has suffered through capture by the faux-SCP Foundation of my universe, had like maybe five years worth of time with her brother before he got killed because she let her guard down for a second, spend maybe another year trying to come to terms with this (with the support of her girlfriend <3) before she was forced to kill her girlfriend (</3), then got like a week to start processing all of this before the end of the universe.

AND THEN THE UNIVERSE RESETS BECAUSE THE CORRUPTED GOD FRAGMENT (there are 3 creator fragments btw) ABSORBED ANOTHER ONE OF THE FRAGMENTS AND MADE A FLAWED AND NONSENSICAL REPLICA OF THE OLD UNIVERSE!!! So now Luna has to deal with inexplicably working for the Foundation after escaping as a D-Class equivalent years before while being haunted by a strange anomaly that she can never remember (her brother acting as a guardian angel). She gets a different girlfriend this time around, who is also helping her through her problems, but because it's the Foundation where everybody has to have something wrong somehow, the girlfriend is intrinsically linked to an exploitative demon that takes control occasionally, exploiting the weaknesses that Luna has shared to further damage her mental state. She also has to cope with their weird hollowness left over from the unresolved feelings pre-universe reset, so there's that.

She just desperately needs a win right now. She's got the anger of a poorly-adjusted teen trapped in the body of a 20-something year old, a theoretically biting wit that often fails her whenever she's trying to make any sort of clever remark, and a seeming curse of absolutely horrendous luck.

She has been my main failgirl-poor little meow meow-scringo for the better part of 4 years now after countless character developments (she started off as the child of two fnaf ocs when I had a brief intersection between interests in fnaf and scp and she just stuck around forever) and I just desperately want her to have some kind of award before I spring the third universe reset on her (sorry luna).

Being demonic in nature, she has dark grey skin, black eyes, and red pupils. Her hair is white, as is her brother's, and she dyes it with orange streaks. She has two horns that break through the hair which extend about three inches out from her forehead and curve. Each horn comes to a slightly curved T-shape split, where the arms of the T extend about an inch below and five inches above where the horn sprouts. Her blood is blue, a color which comes through when she blushes. She has acne scarring on her face across her cheeks and her nose, as well as down her back and on her shoulders. She also has several scars from various battles on various parts of her body. She has a fairly muscular build, though when she initially returns from the Foundation she is somewhat malnourished. She stands at approximately 5'7, a good 7 inches shorter than her brother (a fact that he teases her about regularly), and weighs about 164 pounds.

In the initial timeline, she always wears a black jacket with grey faux fur that her brother got her when she showed up st his doorstep immediately after escaping, which she continues to patch up and wear to this day. She tends to wear cargo pants (for more pockets), sneakers, and t-shirts of various designs, though while going off on missions under the guidance of the fragments she tends to don her old Foundation jumpsuit (inexplicably - she seems to have fond memories, or may be wearing it because of a promise.) Her hair is fairly unkempt,  and tends to fall over her left eye.

Post-reset, she wears her hair pulled back in a low ponytail to keep it out of her eyes. She uses makeup to hide the acne scarring on her face. What she wears changes depending on her mission, but most of the time while she's on the job she wears a black two piece suit with a white work shirt, black dress pants, black dress shoes, and a black tie (the standard uniform for agents within the site where she works.) Her casual wear tends to be the same as pre-reset: t-shirt, cargo pants, sneakers. She also wears a black hoodie as opposed to the pre-reset back jacket, as her brother technically never existed post-reset. The hoodie still makes her feel remorse and nostalgia, though she can't quite place why.

[doritoplayz-xi]

Probably not the first person to say this but bullying feels like it’s been far too normalized for what it is. It’s often a plot point in a coming of age story and treated like a usual thing, or the bullying is minimized by the plot saying the bullies have something going on at home. Like okay, still doesn’t excuse the bullies actions.

Personal story time:

I’ve been bullied a lot. Don’t remember how often because eventually it just became normal. It was normal for the kids in school to whisper behind my back and not want to talk with me.

But as I’ve grown into my identity the bullying has shifted to just straight up transphobia at points. What used to be “look at how fat name is” became “oh sorry it’s” said like I’m a freak or something.

Side track, sorry: strong believer that there are no pronouns that are prematurely dehumanizing (I.e it/it’s) it’s how someone uses those pronouns.

Back on track. Sometimes the transphobic mixes with the bullying. Like my second day of school I’m in biology, in a seat I picked out before some boys came in. They sit at my table. Fine whatever we don’t have a lot of group work that needs my input.

Attendance is called. I usually raise my hand or wave cause speaking sucks ass. But the teacher was looking down and well I felt okay speaking. I say here, but at the same time one of the boys mocks my voice and does a high pitched thing. Teacher doesn’t notice.

And I don’t really want to bring it up because someone could easily say I’m overthinking or overreacting. It’s not like last year where I had a god send of an advisor and world lit teacher.

Adding on to that, last year I did speak up to my world lit teacher. Not much really happened because my evidence mostly was “boys I don’t know are laughing at me and mocking my pronouns, plus not respecting the heavy subject we’re reading”.

It’s easier when it’s a teacher I trust. And I think that’s another problem with bullying. Personal story number two: in fourth or fifth grade some, really most, of my classmates did not like me. I was the kid who talked a lot about stuff I liked and had this “weird obsession” with cats. (At the time I had three. Sue me for loving them)

I’m in some gifted and talented program, don’t recall what for. (Probably being gifted and/or talented). I semi trust the teacher for the program and speak up on how I’m kind of uncomfortable with how some girls in class treat me.

Teacher says that “they tease evreyone” and that it’s really no big deal. Now that I’m writing this I’m sure it was fourth grade but it could have been early fifth. But teasing everyone is still bad. It’s fine with friends if your friends are cool with it, but a whole class of kids? Someone (me) is going to internalize that or its feeling.

This ramble really is just me saying, if you as a teacher can’t see that a kid may be genuinely upset about the “harmless” stuff (especially on elementary where things are more likely to stick) you are kinda maybe failing at your job.

Not to say that every teacher who doesn’t notice that is failing. Elementary teachers usually teach all the subjects and are with the class all day. But if a student comes up and voices their discomfort, don’t brush it off.

Real personal, heads up mention of suicide:

In the tail end of fifth grade I was diagnosed with clinical depression because i wrote a suicide note. It wasn’t fun. The most I remember is I got a Wendy’s frosty, a small fear of hospitals and I missed out on a cookie rally.

When I came back everyone in my class was nicer. Started treating me like I had feelings. Because they felt “bad”. I’m going to go on a rant real quick but, oh you felt bad? I threatened to kill myself and now you realize your actions have consequences? You didn’t think calling this kid weird and insulting them was bad until the consequences of your actions were laid out in messy handwriting? Yes I did write the note at pick up time. Story for later. I’m really sorry it took my mom rushing home from work the minute she was notified for you to realize your words have impact. I’m so sorry your head was so far up your ass to see that shit. Sorry you forgot the fucking golden rule.

Sorry, I clearly still have strong feelings about this. Some more personal tidbits I want to get out before a big old conclusion.

Some kids asked me why I changed my name because my dead name was pretty, had never spoken to me before this. I have a hard time accepting any genuine compliment unless it’s from internet strangers, because y’all don’t know how “ugly” I am. I did lose a majority of my friend group due to a joke poorly explained which I probably blogged about. So now I’m like 2 close friends, 2 friends and one acquaintance. And it will not change. Mocked for my “crushes” in elementary because i latched on to the people who didn’t treat me like a freak. Also thought romance was non-optional.

Okay, sorry one more rant that I think fits more to online spaces. Covid totally changed the way people interact on the web right? Like before fandom was for the nerds and even the more popular shows had nerd filled fandoms. Seen several people talk about it but Covid just kinda opened up fandom to everyone, because what else would you do. Watch paint dry?

And so now fandom is more trendy and people hate on simple stuff like self or crack ships. As people far more invested in fandom space than I have said, the popular kids started to get in but they didn’t respect fandom rules. They just kinda wormed in and because their popular expected things to go their way. Idk, just thought it was fitting.

Oh and I’m not touching how bigotry overall is being normalized with shit like “womp womp” and “the world kept spinning”. Also not touching zero tolerance policy because by god is this post long.

Okay. Conclusion. Maybe.

My take? Bullying is normalized and treated like nothing despite most schools championing a zero tolerance policy. It’s often ignored or swept under the rug.

Since most of my bullying was in my early years it stuck with me that although it was wrong, no teacher would stand up for me. That’s fucked up. If kids are basically taught tell no one it won’t matter either way, something bad is bound to happen.

I’m lucky I have a great family and a therapist to talk to about this. But some kids don’t. School can be a safe space. Don’t let it be ruined.

In a perfect world no one would bully anyone and we’d all be fine with people having differences. But unfortunately life sucks. People are jerks and sometimes it’s easier to just keep your head down and say nothing.

Don’t listen to that advice though. It sucks and is probably why I’m on antidepressants.

[creativia10]

Request crack fic! Willow goes to see Hunter over the latest carvings but finds a humanoid blonde wolf-cardinal hybrid instead. She puts two and two together.

What Howls Can Also Caw

Pairing: Hunter/Willow

Wordcount: 2060

Notes: I have never written crack before. How well this turns out will determine if I ever attempt it again.

Willow was going to visit Hunter where he was carving palisman. Because that’s what she did now. She supposed it was expected for her to do, seeing her not-official-boyfriend-since-it-was-never-confirmed-but-might-as-well-be.

She hummed as she got off her palisman to walk over to where Hunter was usually crafting.

“Hey-“ But she paused at seeing something unexpected in Hunter’s usual place.

A blonde humanoid mishmash of two different creatures? Wait, she could figure this out. She narrowed her eyes to take in the details. It was certainly not what she would consider to be a natural combination, honestly.

There was a smattering of blonde fur and feathers from the top of his neck, going down his arms to the wrists. Some peaked out under the cuffs of his pants as well. The feathers at the front of his neck were black, but most of the others were red. His nose protruded some, with the end being rounded and black. In a canine-like way.

The ends of his fingers were black claws that were curled in some. Willow also noticed he had red wings of a familiar pattern, the ends a darker red, folded up against his back. Which made the also blonde furry tail coming from his tail bone look out of place. The tail went down to just below his knee caps.

Was this a wolf-cardinal hybrid?

The hybrid turned to face Willow, revealing of course that he was Hunter, now that she could fully see his face. Because who else could it be? Hunter was currently Dell’s only apprentice. No not the old computer type. Although, Willow shouldn’t really know what that is anyways.

Hunter smiled a bit sheepishly.

“Oh, hey Willow…” He said.

She looked down to see the ends of dark brown talons poking through the front of his shoes.

Willow looked back up to face the other.

“Hunter?” She asked, because she still felt the need to ask. Weird stuff happened on the Boiling Aisles after all.

“Yeah?” He said.

Willow gestured at all of him.

“What is this?”

Hunter sighed.

“It appears I am now part wolf and cardinal along with being a grimwalker.”

Willow gave him a look.

“I can see that, Hunter. How did this happen?”

“Ah, well…” Hunter started, “I don’t know.”

Willow paused.

“…you don’t know?” She asked in exasperation.

“Yeah,” He said.

“Were you doing anything out of the ordinary?” Willow asked.

Hunter furrowed his brows.

“I mean, I don’t think so? I came here to carve like I usually do when I usually do.”

“Okay, but when did this happen then?” Willow asked.

“Uh, I’m not sure,” Hunter said glancing away. He set down what he had been carving and folded his hands in his lap, carefully to avoid the claws. He tended to take a break when Willow visited anyways.

“How are you not sure?” Willow asked.

“Well,” Hunter began, “I was really focused on what I was doing. Sort of in the zone.”

Hunter wasn’t sure whether Willow would understand the creator’s mindset artists can get into or not.

Willow still seemed exasperated, so it was unclear whether she did.

“And you didn’t feel that anything was different?” Willow asked incredulously.

Hunter shrugged.

Willow sighed.

“Well, how do you feel right now?” She asked.

Hunter shrugged again. “Fine?”

“Nothing else seems off?” Willow asked.

“I mean,” Hunter gestured to some of his new physical features. “I can tell I have extra appendages, but nothing seems to be hurting me if that’s what you mean.”

Willow nodded.

“Well…hopefully that’s good then. You know, I figured you’d be a bit more freaked about such a drastic change than you seem to be. Especially if you don’t know the cause of it.”

Hunter thought for a moment and then shrugged.

“Palisman-carving helps me stay calm,” Hunter said. Willow’s face went a bit soft at that. Which made Hunter face away to hide his blush.

Hunter cleared his throat.

“Uh, besides. I’m kind of used to crazy stuff happening by now. We live on the Boiling Aisles after all,” He said.

Willow let out a huff of a laugh at that. “I suppose that’s fair,” She said, “So, what do we wanna do with this?”

Hunter hmmed.

“I don’t know.”

“How about we try to learn more about it then?” Willow asked.

Hunter smiled a bit.

“Yeah, that seems like a good idea.”

He turned over to his mentor.

“Hey Dell, am I good to go for now? I want to figure out what’s going on.”

“Huh? What do you mean?” Dell looked up from the palistrom tree he had been tending to. His eyes widened when he saw Hunter.

“Goodness!”

“I don’t suppose you would have any idea what would have caused this?” Hunter asked.

Dell hmmed and tapped a finger to his chin.

“Not sure.”

He turned to Hunter.

“What were you in the middle of carving?” He asked the other.

“Uh,” Hunter looked over at the unfinished wood carving he had set off to the side. He squinted at it.

“It looks like it could be something close to a frog?” Hunter said unsurely.

“You don’t know?” Willow asked, confused.

“Ah,” Dell nodded then faced Willow.

“ Hunter has always been more of a feeling palisman carver. He relies more on almost magic instincts than I normally see though. So he may only know what he is carving while he is carving it,” Dell said, “So let’s change the line of questioning then. What were you thinking about?” Dell asked. Hunter scrunched his face in thought. Admittedly, the wolf nose made it look cuter than normal, in Willow’s opinion.

“I…don’t know?” Hunter said.

Willow blinked.

Dell hmmed.

“That is really getting into the zone then if you don’t remember what you were thinking about. Makes it a bit harder to figure out what was the cause then.”

It was a bit hard for Willow to tell how Hunter felt about that.

“Well, thank you anyways, Mr. Clawthorne.” Willow grabbed Hunter’s hand, mindful of the new claws.

“We’ll continue to try figuring it out from here.”

Dell waved them off as the pair set off. Hunter rode with Willow on her palisman staff this time.

“How are you feeling about all of this?” Willow asked.

Hunter hummed noncommittally.

“I’m still not sure.”

After a moment he let out a little laugh.

“The only thing I really care about is if it will affect my palisman carving.”

Willow rolled her eyes at that but smiled.

“You really do have a one-track mind sometimes,” She said. He didn’t bother arguing.

Willow took them to the empty flyer derby practice field knowing it would be available. The season was over after all. She supposed they could have done magic research related to animal transformation. But she didn’t feel like reading. Besides, some activity could be good for them.

Hunter got off the staff and looked around in confusion.

“Why are we here?” He asked.

“We’re going to test out what you can do as a hybrid,” She said. “Like abilities that would go with the animal traits you now have.”

“Oh, ok,” Hunter said. “What should I start with?”

Willow hmmed.

“Well, does anything feel natural to you?” She asked.

Hunter thought, closing his eyes as he did so.

“Honestly, several things. But they feel more instinctive.”

Willow nods. “Well, just do something I guess?” She said.

Hunter’s nose twitched. Then he crouched down on all fours. His face twisted up before he started lifting his legs and shaking his feet.

Willow watched in confusion for a moment before remembering what he was wearing.

“Did you want help getting your shoes off?” Willow asked.

Hunter nodded with a gruff. Willow went over to pry his shoes off, a bit harder with the talons poking through. After doing that, she took a few steps back, unsure what he was going to do next.

He crouched the way he had started to do. Then he arched his back and let out an,

“AWOOOOOOOOOOO Tweet!���

Hunter stopped and then blinked at what had come out. He and Willow started to giggle at the funny combination of sounds he felt like making.

He flattened his back again and let out another gruff sound before he started running on all fours. Having bird feet and clawed hands made the four-legged run a bit out of sync though. It sort of looked like he was bobbing up and down. After a few minutes of the disjointed running Hunter stopped with a growl. Then he curled up on his stomach and whined.

Willow frowned and caught up to him.

“Hey, it’s okay,” She said. Willow sat down by him and held her hand out to see if he was okay with pets. Hunter nodded and batted her hand with his head in emphasis. She giggled again and started petting him. She pet his hair first, even though that part had remained unchanged. But he had always liked getting his hair pet anyways even before transforming.

Hunter began to pant and wagged his tail.

“…you can still talk, right?” She asked.

Hunter nodded and woofed. Perhaps she should have clarified that she meant a human language like English.

“Okay.”

She scratched behind his ears and he leaned into it with his eyes close and tongue lolling out. It was absurdly adorable.

“Hey,” She said, “Do you want to try flying now?”

She moved her hand to make sure he was listening. He whined for a second and then tilted his head in thought. Then he nodded.

Willow stepped back as Hunter stood up on his two legs again.

“Did you want help with anything before starting?” Willow asked.

Hunter shook his head. Then he spread out his wings. The wingspan reminded Willow more of a larger bird. Then again, Hunter was bigger than cardinals normally were.

He crouched again, this time just with his legs though. Then he started running, almost on the tips of his talons, his wings flapping as he did so. After a bit he hopped into the air, wings flapping harder. He managed to fly in the air for a moment before rolling head forward and falling to the ground.

Willow gasped and quickly went over to him.

“Are you alright?”

Hunter groaned and sat up.

“Not sure,” He said.

“Not being sure of things seems to be your catch phrase for the day,” A new voice added in. Hunter and Willow both turned to see Eda there.

“Where did you come from?” Willow asked.

Eda just pointed behind her instead of giving a better answer. She then walked over to the pair.

“I reckon it’s hard to do things like fly with your combination of animals,” Eda said. Hunter pouted at that.

“How did you even know to come here? Also, why are you here?” Hunter asked.

Eda rolled her eyes. “I stopped by to see Dell when he didn’t join us for dinner. He mentioned what happened with you. When you didn’t show up at the Owl House, I figured you’d be somewhere else I know you both like. And I might have an idea to help.”

The pair both perked up at that.

“Oh? In what way?” Willow asked.

Eda gestured to Hunter on the ground.

“I might know a way to summon a ghost who may have tips on how to use the features of your type of hybrid. Someone who also had an interest in wolves and cardinals.”

Hunter gasped at that.

“Was he one too?” Hunter asked.

“I’m not sure,” Eda said, “We’d have to ask him. Pretty sure he was obsessed with the creatures though.”

“How do you know?” Willow asked.

“Because I look into a lot of weird stuff. I’m wacky like that,” Eda said.

Well, that certainly wasn’t unbelievable.

Eda continued, to Hunter, “You may want to decide what you want to do with this, though. We would probably need to start working on a solution if you wanted to be all human-like again though.”

Willow looked to Hunter.

“What is it you want to do?”

Hunter shrugged. “I like cardinals and wolves. I just may have to trim my claws for carving though,” He said.

Willow let out a laugh at that.

“Alright then.”

It was certainly different,  but Hunter was just as endearing in this other form.

[rustycottoncandy]

We've been waiting one hour for our food to come and I'm uncomfortable with most people here so I'm gonna do what I told myself to do last night before going to sleep and talk about Ethan.

Okay so we know - well, I know - that Ethan and Henry have one friend in common, who is Leonard, but how come he's friends with Leonard and not Andrew or Edward? He met Henry's entire friend group, after all.

Well, mostly because he's the one he talks to the most. Sure, he may share some words with Ed and Drew occasionally, but Leonard and him have common interests and similar personalities, so they talk often. And also because Henry sometimes has to babysit Sam, who is Leonard's son, and Ethan likes to tag along when he does. I should draw these three some day.

The food still hasn't arrived so I'll go with Jan now.

Henry despises Jan to no end, mostly because of the way he looks at Ethan and their general interactions. Jan is someone very clingy and Henry is a very jealous person, so whenever Ethan brings Jan home or leaves home to hang out with him, comments are expected from Henry.

What does Jan think about the coffee-haired guy, though? A.P? Henry?

He wants to get along with him, but at the same time doesn't really like his personality, since all he's seen of Henry is him giving him sharp glances or trying to separate him from Ethan. So far, Henry seems very rude and possessive to him.

Actually, the only positive things Jan'd ever heard about Henry have come from Ethan's mouth, but that's it.

Imagine having to make them team up. That'd be fun. I know it won't happen but it would be fun.

The food still hasn't arrived. I've spent around eighteen minutes writing this.

Here's how Cocoa views the people around him and stuff.

- He thinks it's weird that humans brush their hair and doesn't understand how it works, either, nor why they do it, because Ryan only brushes his hair occasionally, Henry brushes his hair extremely often, Ethan uses a special brush and Daniel doesn't brush his hair. The cat doesn't understand how hairbrushes work.

- He sees Henry's room as a jungle due to how messy it is.

One plate just arrived!!! Without cutlery though and it isn't mine so I'll keep writing.

- He thinks there's a monster living under the bathtub and that the water is its claws. He wants to befriend the monster.

- He thinks coffee is some sort of second sun and that it gives a divine kind of energy to whoever takes it and that that is why Henry takes it so much.

- He used to think Ethan smells like lavender because he covered himself in lavander for 10 minutes a day and then came back home, then he learned what perfume was.

- He thinks of the fairy lights in Ethan's room as tiny moons and believes they are magical.

- He sees the sofa as a huge mountain and sometimes imagines he's a lion when he climbed on top of it.

- He likes ants and once befriended one that was called Martha.

- He doesn't get why humans have no tail and thinks somebody cut them off when they were still kittens.

- At first, he wasn't sure if Ethan was a male or a female. He knows he's a male now, but still forgets sometimes.

- He doesn't chase his tail often because he thinks that it had feelings of it's own.

We're all still hungry here, it's been like half an hour since I started writing and one and a half hour since we got here.

MY FOOD ARRIVED... ALSO WITHOUT CUTLERY-

Bye

[sn0tcl0wn]

wish and the star boy we never got is proof of my long standing theory that disney (and animation as a whole) needs to bring back cute boys. they stopped featuring them as much back when frozen came out to focus more on famalial love and i respect that. however, that was the tail end of an era where animated movies were almost always guaranteed to have one super cute boy. this was the thing that brought audiences in. i swear to god until i was like 18-19 if an animated movie had a cute boy, i and all my friends were there opening night. a movie could look like pure garbage and if a boy was cute we were there. and of course there are other factors like the other character's designs and music if it's a musical, but cool designs didn't go anywhere and i, as well as many people, can overlook a bad musical if the animated dude is pretty (quest for camelot is a movie that exists). like why do you think anime really became so popular amongst preteen/teenage girls? they'll outright tell you, just go in the tags. it's the cute boys. cute boys bring in audiences.

it's not sexism, it's not heteronormativity, it's not "teaching girls all they're good for is marriage" or whatever the fuck people were complaining about ten years ago when disney made the executive decision to step away from having cute boys and by extension started a trend of studios doing that; it's the simple fact that people, especially girls, tend to like cute animated boys. and yeah people like pretty and cute animated girls too but that's kinda the whole point of disney princesses. we don't even need cute boys as love interests, in movies like treasure planet and rise of the guardians there is no romantic subplot for either of the movies' cute boys. it's just cute boys doing cool stuff with other well designed characters.

i feel the overwhelming response of disappointment when the star boy concept art was released is proof that, at the end of the day, animation fans want more cute boys. and i agree. you wanna actually sell that shit to your main demographic of kids, specifically girls, aged 10 and up? cute boys worked every damn time for decades. it only became less prevalent in the 2010s when people decided we for whatever reason didn't need the cute boys and nixed them completely in an attempt to seem progressive and not "reduce" any girl protags to love interests. which is an awful way to refer to writing a love story btw, we need to work on that because that gets said every time this happens and it's weird people can't fathom a strong, independent girl who also has a boyfriend. and yes, yes it's better if she has a girlfriend but there is still a desire to see a cute boy character on screen. the best animated movies from the 90s-2000s all had them and everyone vividly remembers a time where that drawing was their husband or literally them. it's important for some weird reason for cute animated boys to exist and the star boy proves that these movies would do way better with cute boys.

and the "boy" in question doesn't even need to be human or whatever. you think zootopia sold because the trailers actually looked good? what about sing? god no. no matter how much i like those movies, the trailers made them look like trash, but the power of cute boys prevailed even when the "boys" are a fox and a gorilla.

ik this rant is long and it seems pointless but i feel like i cracked the code for why so many animated movies have been sucking harder than ever and it's because for almost two generations we had cute boys to soften the blow of a bad animated movie and now we have more evidence that they're actively making decisions to cause that. i said this about five years ago when i realized the majority of cute animated boys were furries or anime boys and now i see this star boy shit. and i'd been saying how ugly i think the star is for months beforehand too when merch started popping up.

i just feel like they could have avoided fucking themselves so hard if they just let the cute boy exist. i genuinely feel people would at least be more likely to see the movie but most people didn't even bother and the people who did say don't bother. but if a cute boy was there and they used his song as the trailer? we'd wanna know what this little magic man was about. we'd wanna see how things panned out between him and hero girl. and if it ended up being bad we'd all say "yeah but the designs were good" or some shit and disney would get that sweet, sweet centennial money. but that's not what happened because some moron somewhere decided girls don't want to see cute boys in their princess movies and a chain reaction started that won't stop until disney undoes it and gives us a goddamn cute boy. and that's not even a joke. that's my honest to god theory for how to save mainstream animated movies. we saw a glimpse of this with spider-verse. like those movies ate but a big draw for both of them was the fact that there was a cute boy for everyone to crush or project on. we need cute animated boys now more than ever.

[ask-obt]

Isn't a Shinx/Luxio/Luxray tail tip supposed to be star shaped? Malachi does seem to have a different shaped tail tip just like at least one other member of his tribe. Am I just remembering my shapes wrong?

Malachi: Some Shinx lines like to style their tail fur that way, but my family and I always preferred the "natural" look.

// short and simple for malachi's answer here, but I wanted to add on an ooc bit to the end!

any longtime readers of OBT know that the comic has gone through several iterations over time, the style developing with it. back when the reboot started, I was really into integrating irl animal anatomy into my designs so they'd feel more "real"- hence the shinx line not getting rounded ears with star stamps on them.

but over time I've found I actually like to embrace design traits from the official art more... like how I'm much more willing to give characters cute little dot eyes which helps bring some of the more anatomically odd pokemon out of uncanny valley

but while this works for characters like chimecho, who showed up for the first time in the comic when I was already stylizing pokemon this way, Rune and Malachi have been there since the beginning, and went through a great deal of already drastic changes. I guess at the time this was all happening I thought changing certain design elements as well was a step too far? (I know people were already complaining about me rewriting and rebooting things and were certain i'd be trapped in that loop forever, but I swear the spirit of it was closer along the lines of "I just needed more time to revise the intro and let it cook since the rest of the story hinges on the opening". that is a ramble for another time lmao)

but the long and the short of it is that rune and malachi's designs (and consequently, all vulpix and shinx in the comic) are the result of a long game of telephone with myself. so most of malachi and rune's design elements (normal lion tail and ears with fluff for malachi, and eyes with a visible sclera vs no sclera for rune) do carry over into other members of their species

Dielle and Inigo would probably been impacted by this too, if their debut came sooner than it did! Dielle especially. for a while I considered making her head coin into a marking (because I guess in a world of dogs that breathe fire I thought a coin on a cat's forehead was too far):

and then made her coin into a headplate........... thing. it was a weird time for me

so this is where you'll find that for new characters in OBT, or when I do other art, such as commissions or just stuff for fun, I actually stick closer to the canon design elements. I like how they look, and I'm more confident drawing them without feeling weirdly conscious!

if I rebooted OBT again for some weirdfuck reason (hell will freeze over before i do that LMAO no more reboots i'm very happy where i am), and I still wanted to continue my game of "rune and malachi design telephone", they'd probably look something like this

though more realistically, i would take their designs/species back to the drawing board entirely. the only reason i would reboot at this rate is if someone gave me 1 million dollars and a fridge with an icemaker installed in it (the peak of luxury)