#it was already dark xD

[windfighter]

My least favorit place in all of minecraft. Hate it here. Dislike it almost as much as the big caves, but at least it's not as common so it can stay for now and I can just not go there (or quickly skedaddle away)

so anyway I found an ancient city and they're pretty cool once you have nightvision and have managed to get rid of the shriekers x3

[zu-is-here]

♒︎□︎❍︎♏︎

[capn-twitchery]

happy feast of the rose (don't look at the calendar, it's totally still february, i swear)

grace learns that accepting twitch's invite to the ball was a mistake, maybe

(begging you to fullview, veil-less version under the cut bc i like it just as much >:3)

get dipped idiot

[front-facing-pokemon]

[yuriyuruandyuraart]

DARK CREAM WEEK: day 5- punish/reward

idk man i think your threats would work a lot more often if you stopped being so handsome about it fdrgbegh<333

dark cream week and comic are by @zu-is-here

[teecupangel]

Having just watched Captain Laserhawk, I must ask- no, i must Beg- for our dear precious Bullfrog to be descended from Desmond! And to let those poor souls LIVE HAPPILY- and preferably with the other ancestors who desperately need a hug! Dang that show was beautifully deranged

It absolutely was, nonny. I love it.

We’re gonna play fast and loose with canon in this one though. (Spoilers to Captain Laserhawk's season 1 ending)

.

.

Bullfrog was not the only hybrid in the Brotherhood.

But he came from two old Assassin families, a rarity even in the Brotherhood.

He had only heard about it though.

He was told that they were originally created in a modified lab of one of the ancient ones.

Created by the remaining descendant of Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad and, through the Kenway line, Ezio Auditore.

A man that only goes by the name ‘Elijah’.

He was not an Assassin. He preferred to stay away from the war between the Brotherhood and the Order. But he was hunted by the Templars so he had a ‘distant’ alliance with the Brotherhood.

They didn’t trust him and he didn’t trust them in turn.

Elijah wanted to be left alone in peace and anyone who threatened that were killed without mercy.

Bullfrog’s grandparents were born from his lab, ‘blessed’ with Elijah’s blood and the blood of another great Assassin of old, Callum Lynch.

According to his parents, Callum Lynch agreed to provide his blood in exchange for Elijah’s help in one of the more dangerous missions the great Master Assassin had before Eden had taken over everything.

When there was still a glimmer of hope that the Brotherhood could defeat the Templars...

And from the combination of those two bloods, their ability to access the Calculations were formed.

Elijah’s blood held the genetic codes of the men whose fate were closely linked to the Calculations. Callum Lynch’s blood held the genetic codes of a French Assassin who can ‘see’ the memories of his targets.

Modifications had to be made to stabilize them and…

Well.

Like they said, the rest was history.

When Elijah disappeared (dead, he must be dead, it has been a long time), Bullfrog’s family was taken in by the Brotherhood. Bullfrog had grown up having human childhood friends, Hastings and Darcy.

Then…

Eden found them.

And Bullfrog survived because he had been lucky.

Because the Warden saw his potential.

He was sure Eden ordered the complete eradication of the Brotherhood.

The Warden was playing a dangerous game and everything went to head at the end.

And now, here he was, being escorted back to his cell.

At least they were kind enough to hand him a juice box to drink while they walk.

Maybe they were still all confused by the orders they received to stay his execution.

They seemed a bit daze.

There was one more thing that separated his kind from the other hybrids.

Bullfrog had lived his entire life with the whispers of dead men.

Sometimes, he would even stand back and let them control his body.

The Bleeding Effect, the Brotherhood called it.

It was rare though.

The whispers prefer to advise and to talk to him.

They were the ones who suggested he talk to Eden’s puppet.

There was nothing to lose after all.

[Now.]

The moment he heard that whisper echo with different voices, all speaking at once, he threw his juice box at the guard to his right before kicking the guard to his left. He grabbed the man’s pistol from his shoulder holster and fired at the three guards behind them.

Head.

Neck.

The third one moved enough that he was hit on the shoulder and he quickly took out his own gun.

Bullfrog kicked the man he had taken the gun from and ducked, firing two more rounds.

The first one hit the man between them on the chest at the same time the guard with the bleeding shoulder fired and hit him on the back. The second one hit the hole that the first shot created and the shot goes through the man.

Both men fell on the floor, killed by that single bullet as it hit the chest of one and the head of the other.

Bullfrog jumped the remaining man that he had hit with his juice box, jamming his gun inside the man’s mouth and pulling the trigger as his screams were muffled by the gun in his mouth.

He jumped off the corpse as it slumped on the floor and rummaged their bodies, finding the key to his cuffs in the first man he killed.

The whispers continued the entire time.

[Good job.]

[We must go.]

[Run.]

[Don’t take the elevator.]

Bullfrog nodded.

His hidden blade and other weapons would be near his prison but it was too risky.

He’ll have to find someplace to make his own weapons after escaping this shithole.

That was easy.

One of his whispers knew how to make a hidden blade.

[duckapus]

Pokemon/WarioWare crossover because why not throw yet another Anime Rewrite AU that I say I'll write a fic for and fully intend to but never do on the pile? (i have issues...)

Five years before the start of the series Delia and Ash find a girl around Ash's age with red eyes lost in a park who can't remember anything about herself except that her name is Ashley. Fallers are a bit more common in this timeline than others (though still pretty rare and not yet well understood) so when the authorities investigate they realize her situation pretty quickly...particularly how near-impossible it would be to get a 5-year-old who seems to be from a world without Pokemon (Fallers typically remember what Pokemon are and can name ones they're familiar with, so the fact that she only refers to them by general terms like "cat" or "bird" and is confused by a lot of their behavior is very telling). Delia, of course, agrees to take her in permanently after they break the news to her (she'd already been looking after Ashley during the investigation because of course she would).

So now Ash has a not-actually-a-twin sister. She still manages to become a witch-in-training since she's still got her massive potential for magic and witchcraft is canonically a thing in the Pokemon Anime. She even manages to summon Red and make him her familiar at seven. She's a bit more outgoing thanks to being raised in the Ketchum household instead of growing up more-or-less alone in that haunted mansion, but at her core she's still the grumpy little witch girl we know and love.

Anyway, she and Ash both plan on challenging the Indigo League, though they're going to travel together at least for their Kanto Journey (...yeah they're definitely gonna stick together even after that 'cause this is still meant to be a canon rewrite), partly because they know ahead of time about the Starter shortage and they figure that as long as at least one of them gets a Pokemon they can help the other catch something on Route 1 so they don't have to wait a month for a new set to be available (what, you really think Oak would've left them in the lurch for a whole year if the shortage had been real and not a Timeline Preservation Measure? though given how big a head start that would give the other trainers (particularly Gary) it still makes sense why 10-year-old Ash acted like it was the end of the world).

Of course, their alarm clock mysteriously breaks and they oversleep and end up with a Pikachu who hates them and an Eevee with absolutely no thoughts in its fluffy little head.

Anyway, things are mostly normal for a while aside from Ashley and Red being along for the ride, up until Power of One, where they encounter Wario. Apparently he ended up in the Pokemon World because he found some sort of magical artifact during one of his treasure hunts. Notably, he isn't Amnesiac like most Fallers, and he's not from the version of the Mushroom World that Ashley originally came from, as evidenced by him recognizing her on-sight even though she would've disappeared before ever meeting him. Anyway, he helps them beat Laurence III, then decides to claim the Hikokyu as spoils of war and fix it up to use as the local WarioWare HQ. So he's settling down in Shamouti for the time being.

Meanwhile, back in the Mushroom world, the WarioWare crew and the main Mario cast are trying to figure out what happened to Wario. They eventually manage to create a pipe that goes between Diamond City and Shamouti at some point midway through Johto...and find out that he ran off to Johto with Melody to challenge their League because he found out that Pokemon Battling, especially official League matches, gets you prize money, and he needed funds for replacement parts to get the Hikokyu up and running. So Mario, Peach, and about half the crew are off to fetch him. They don't finally catch up with him until the Alto Maire incident. Ashley's part of the search party, so she and the AU's main Ashley (and both Reds of course) end up meeting and it's a bit awkward at first. They end up going by Ashley K (for Ketchum of course) and Ashley M (for Mushroom, since she doesn't have a last name and Ashley W would be too clunky to say, plus she wouldn't be caught dead naming herself after Wario) for the sake of convenience (the Reds follow suit, of course).

I also have the idea of having the Hikokyu set up shop in Orre after it's been made skyworthy again and fully converted into a second game studio, then having the WarioWare crew stumble into and run roughshod over Gale of Darkness's plot with their own brand of glorious mayhem while just trying to introduce their games to the fresh new audience the Pokemon World provides.

[brainrotgoverner]

Well, AO3 is down and will be down for hours, so I'm going back to my roots and opening fanfiction.net XD Does anyone have any storm hawk fics they like? The majority of this fandoms fics are in there lol

[blackjackkent]

Z'rell is waiting for them when they push inside Moonrise Towers.

All of the massed forces of her god stand behind her and at her sides, this Disciple of the Absolute. Her face is twisted with rage. Her body shimmers with magic.

Rakha stands at the top of the steps and looks down at her. Flame sits in both of her hands, but she does not strike, not yet.

"You dare show yourself here, after all you've done?" Z'rell bellows. "You have betrayed me! You have betrayed General Thorm! You have betrayed our god!"

Her lips curl out, showing the full extent of her long, fierce tusks. "And for what? These Harpers? Moonrise will be their tomb - and in death, you will all serve the Absolute!"

Rakha's friends have taken up positions on either side of her - Wyll and Jaheira to her left, Lae'zel and Minthara to her right. "I will never serve the Absolute again, Z'rell," Minthara growls. "And I will take your prattling tongue as a reminder of this moment."

Still Rakha doesn't move, doesn't speak. Something is itching at the back of her mind, something inarticulate and familiar about this conversation, just as it did the last time she and Z'rell spoke. Every time they have faced each other, she has had the distant sense of re-enacting an old scene, reciting a script already written for her, as if she has clashed with this woman a hundred times instead of twice.

Perhaps it is simply that she has met so few other half-orcs like herself. Seeing Z'rell is something like looking into a mirror. It is like the dark reflection of herself that she saw in the Gauntlet trial - even down to the scar that marks their right eyes, the blankness of the eye below it, the dark hair and dull olive skin and general air of visceral and undirected rage.

Perhaps that is why she would be so glad to kill Z'rell at this moment, even more than the other Absolutists. And perhaps it is why, to her own surprise, she offers a single moment of mercy.

"Step aside, Z'rell," she says, a cold flat monotone.

Z'rell does not accept it, of course. Rakha did not really expect that she would. "Where's the fun in that?" the Disciple says with a sharp, feral smile. She draws the axe from her back and brandishes it forwards, lifting her voice in a war cry.

"Boys! Make this traitor bleed!"

-----

(A/N: This fight is just as annoying for Rakha as it was for Hector. Z'rell's Black Hole/Slow and the cultists' Hunger of Hadar are a massive pain to deal with and all the Absolutists apparently have the constitution of oxen. But we got there in the end, thanks in large part to several judiciously placed fireballs.

Interestingly - MIG WAS NOT IN THIS FIGHT! Ghourik - Z'rell's ogre buddy from upstairs - is here instead, because Z'rell never did the demonstration for Rakha about how she could magically cause all of Ghourik's veins to explode at once. I really hope this means that Mig got the hell out of dodge and is going to escape the cult and live happily somewhere eating lots of meat.

Overall the good guys came out pretty okay; we lost one Harper and one Flaming Fist, but Jaheira is alive which is mainly what I was concerned about. In actual fact, Z'rell fell about halfway through the fight, but I am gonna take some artistic license for a more dramatic resolution to this particular subplot, because it's my story and I do what I want. ^_^ )

-----

Z'rell screams in rage as the last of her minions fall around her. The room is soaked with blood. Rakha's head aches and the beast roars; it cannot feast on innocent death, but it will take this battlefield of corpses if it must.

She sprints forward, catches Z'rell by the collar, and slams her into the nearby wall. Her hand goes to the blade at her belt, rips the knife free of its bindings.

I offered you mercy. I do not even know why. But now you will not have it. Absolutist. I will bleed you for everything you have done. The words are hers and the beast's at once, mixed, melded.

Z'rell grunts with the impact against the stone. Her expression is manic with fury and she struggles against Rakha's implacable grip. "Let go of me!" she snarls. "You will pay for this, for all of it! You will die screaming and deserve only that it might have been slower! You are nothing! NOTHING!"

Something twinges deep in Rakha's head, yet again - something like memory, the echo of quarrels unremembered in a life lost to her. With a sudden, sharp jerk she spins the knife in her palm, angles it upward, and sends it up through the soft underside of Z'rell's jaw, up through her throat and into her brain.

She screams, and dimly Rakha is aware that she herself is screaming too, in rage and fear and loss. But as the blade slides home - in that brief eyeblink moment before death, something clears in Z'rell's eyes. Some blank film that has overlaid her gaze drops away and she looks at Rakha with a pure, lucid intensity that is just as saturated with rage.

"Sister--" she croaks out. "Why...?"

And then she dies, pinned like a tapestry against the wall of the fortress of her god.

[bandtrees]

two conversations i want to have about "dead dove do not eat"

it's annoying how people treat it as a genre or descriptor in and of itself when it hypothetically should have no ties to "problematic" or "dark", it literally just means "what you see is what you get with these tags" - which is a concept that can encompass any kind of writing. in an ideal world dead dove is not a Type of fic, it is literally just a neutral descriptor, and i think it's very annoying how it got largely co-opted by proshippers who think it's shorthand for Dark And Twisted Porn™ and treat it as some kind of genre in and of itself

it just sounds incredibly lame. what's wrong with just saying "yeah heed the tags this is serious" instead of assuming everyone knows about a nonsense vaguely-artsy meme phrase. can we not just use our words

[zu-is-here]

Happy birthday, xoxo event ♡

Cross from xtaleunderverse by jakei95

Dream by jokublog

UPD: I had NO idea that Jakei chose this art TOO??

[itsamenickname]

Cue another Bowuigi fanfic idea from me where King Boo kidnaps everyone (Mario, Peach, the Toads, and even E. Gadd) except for Luigi and Bowser and the two lovebirds go on an haunted adventure together.

But the fun part is that there are two ways I can see this prompt go:

Luigi and Bowser were planning to use this vacation (or something along those lines) as a way to put Mario and co. in a good mood before they reveal that they're dating.

OR

It's more of a slowburn where Bowser and Luigi don't really get along at first (It was Peach's idea to invite Bowser because she wanted to make peace between the two kingdoms.), but when Luigi and Bowser get into an argument that leads Bowser to storm off and eventually gets himself captured by a mini boss (not King Boo), Luigi (the kind-hearted and sweet boy that he is) rescues Bowser and the big bad Koopa King starts to realize, "Hey, maybe this Green Mario is not as incompetent as I originally thought," and starts respecting Luigi more. (Which eventually turns into love as the ghosts start to get tougher.)

[bereft-of-frogs]

so the 'Qimir/the Stranger is actually [ insert high republic character here ]' theories have started to escalate, Imri was one thing, today I saw someone suggest the Stranger is Cohmac and I laughed out loud.

But also sure. The Stranger is Cohmac. XD Why tf not. Except for all the, you know, 'humans don't live that long' and 'their descriptions and official character art do not match Manny Jacinto at all' 'it doesn't actually make sense' but people keep countering that with 'energy transfer' so I guess Qimir really could be anybody.

Wouldn't it be fucking hilarious if it was Azlin Rell. Fucking Azlin. That would be SO funny if he energy-transferred himself into Qimir to live another hundred extra years, to continue being the worst. It would be so funny. Absolutely no one else would find it funny but I would personally find it absolutely hilarious if 'scenic route guy' is Qimir

[studentbyday]

my 🧠 feels like ✨cHaOs✨ and so this post will be ✨cHaOs✨

I went to the biochem Q&A sesh today

and OMG DID I HAVE SO MANY QUESTIONS I DID NOT EXPECT TO HAVE THAT MANY but I'm glad I attended, else it would've taken longer to get a response but now I have to revise (and by that I mean cut) a LOT from my paper and re-think how I'm doing it, if I'm doing it right or veering off topic (bc one thing when you're researching a disease new to you is that there's sm info out there and you're like 🙌🏻 EVERYTHING IS RELEVANT 🙌🏻 but no- only the biochem-related aspects of the disease are relevant for this assignment). idk how off-topic i actually am or if i'm pretty on the mark, but ngghhh tHe FiRsT dRaFt Is DuE On TuEsDaY *frantically waves arms, noodle-like* 🙌🏻 that doesn't feel like a lot of time to write the whole thing in all the detail i want so i can get useful feedback 😫

catching up on psyc notes (total ch finished this week: 2/5)

idk why but pomodoro and perky jazz music is the only thing keeping me focused for this.

fixing biochem paper

i read somewhere on here about having a document of your cuts in case you need it again later. useful advice, that. 👏🏻 also, i think what i should do first is make notes in a separate doc and THEN decide what to do with all that info...it might sound like it'll take longer but it's more efficient than writing a whole bunch and then realizing half of it is info you don't need. my stupid panicky brain couldn't realize that in the beginning (even tho that's what it had done b4 for other "essay-like" assignments) and was either stuck in analysis paralysis or just editing and re-editing, but better now than later (i haven't written THAT much beyond the intro anyway 😅)...

in other news, i got enough sleep for once bc i went to bed super early and ACTUALLY FELL ASLEEP BEFORE 12AM LIKE WHAT IS THIS MADNESS (ig i finally tired myself out enough these past few days 🤷🏻‍♀️) and despite waking up multiple times throughout the night bc i'm not used to the schedule, i am well-rested 😌 and my back is still being annoying but at least it's a little better than yesterday + i get to study while cozy in bed 🥰

[victorluvsalice]

AU Thursday: Valicer In The Dark -- Fun With Trauma

Hi all -- it's time to talk about my VITD trio again! Specifically, today we're discussing their Traumas! :D Now, "Trauma" in Blades In The Dark refers to a condition your scoundrel picks up when they max out their stress during the course of their adventure -- once they fill up all their stress boxes, they have some sort of mental break, can no longer participate in the rest of the current score, and develop a new specific personality quirk that will haunt them for the rest of the adventures. A character can develop four traumas before they have to be retired from life as a scoundrel (either literally retiring or being thrown into jail as a sacrifice to the Bluecoats). On the plus side, each new trauma is also a chance to earn extra XP -- if your character struggles with the side effects of a trauma during a score, you can mark a point or two of XP for it and level up your character a little bit faster. The book has eight potential traumas for scoundrels to pick up -- Cold, Haunted, Obsessed, Paranoid, Reckless, Soft, Unstable, and Vicious -- but as I've thought about my trio and where I want them to go (and what other systems in the book I'd like to use), I've come up with somewhat more bespoke traumas for them:

-->Alice: Our favorite Cutter actually starts with a trauma -- as I've mentioned before, I looked at the description for the Haunted trauma -- "You’re often lost in reverie, reliving past horrors, seeing things" (pg 14) -- and went "yeah, that pretty well covers her hallucinations of Wonderland." (It's the reason she also gets two starting abilities instead of just one -- trade-off!) As for her next potential trauma, I was initially considering Vicious -- "You seek out opportunities to hurt people, even for no good reason" -- but then decided that perhaps a slightly more logical one would be a tweaked form called Overprotective -- "You make sure everyone knows that what's yours is yours, to the point of violence." Alice is, of course, protective of Victor and Smiler even before she picks up this particular trauma, but afterward, she can get a little overenthusiastic about keeping danger away from them, simply because she doesn't want to lose the people she loves again. That house fire where her family died did a number on her head, after all! The pair probably have to rein her in sometimes to make sure she doesn't accidentally cause them more trouble trying to keep them safe. I don't have a specific scene in mind for what triggers it, but I know it would have to involve Victor and/or Smiler getting hurt and her just letting loose to protect them.

-->Victor: My initial ideas for a trauma for our lovely Whisper were Paranoid -- "You imagine danger everywhere; you can’t trust others" -- as the result of a particularly dangerous score that spooked him badly, or Obsessed -- "You’re enthralled by one thing: an activity, a person, an ideology" -- as the result of him getting a little too much into studying the dangerous magic of Duskwall...but then, while researching the Ritual special ability to figure out how to create new rituals for Victor to use, I found the sample ritual "Portal to the Depths" -- which involves singing an ancient song to open a portal up into the Void Sea, swamping anyone unlucky enough to be in front of it with its dark water filled with mysterious starlight and dragging them into the cold depths. The thing is, whenever someone uses this ritual, along with taking six stress, they must also tick a progress clock called "Seduced By The Leviathan's Song."

Cue me coming up with a scene where Victor, having filled up that progress clock, is with Alice and Smiler at The Docks (yes, this the name of a neighborhood in the city; it is self-explanatory) -- and ends up getting mind-controlled by the song of a nearby Leviathan into nearly walking off one of said docks to either drown or get devoured. Fortunately, this is after the trio have started playing with hypnosis in their private lives, and Smiler and Alice are able to stop him in his tracks by invoking their control over his mind -- but the experience leaves Victor with the custom trauma Phobia -- "You are terrified of a particular person, thing, or place and refuse to be near it." As you might imagine, Victor's terror revolves around the ocean, and he refuses to be anywhere near it if he can -- no more scores involving The Docks for this trio!

-->Smiler: Deciding on any trauma conditions for our cheerful combination Leech/Slide was a bit tricky for me at first -- not only is Smiler a naturally-cheery person who takes a lot of things that would stress out others in stride (see them very casually talking to ghosts in "Start At The Beginning...Sort Of"), they also of course end up in possession of the ability Functioning Vice, which allows them to adjust how much stress they clear when indulging their Vice and makes emptying out that track between scores a lot easier. I really wasn't sure which of the ones on offer would actually fit them --

And then. While reading through the "Changing The Game" section of the book, I stumbled across the "Forgotten Gods" section in "Advanced Abilities and Permissions." Which details what happens when your character opens their mind to a forgotten god -- including access to the ability Glorious Visage, which allows the character to hit everyone in the vicinity with an image of the god's form, costing them three stress and causing everyone around them to at least flee in fear or be paralyzed with dread. The more traumatized the character, the more harm they can do, up to killing a specific person by shattering their mind. I was like "Oooooo, wow, creepy but neat" --

And then I was like "Smiler's already been touched by their god..."

Cue the creation of the custom trauma Vessel -- "Your body is capable of hosting the will of a forgotten god -- and they know it." The way I see this working for Smiler is, the first time they overmax their stress, their god Mar-Mal sees this, is like "!!! Let me help!" and straight-up possesses their body for the rest of the score. Fortunately they do leave once the danger is passed -- helped by Victor and Alice going "It would make us VERY HAPPY if you gave us Smiler back" -- and Smiler recovers from the experience, but the door has been opened in their head, and it's not being shut anytime soon. The trauma automatically gives them access to the customized special ability Joyous Visage -- where Smiler can use Mar-Mal's power to stun people with happiness (it works a bit like the "Hysteria" power in VTMB's version of the Dementation discipline, with people getting completely incapacitated by laughter) -- but every time Smiler uses that power, a die must be rolled. On a six, they use the power safely and only take two stress; on a five through two, they use the power but Mar-Mal takes an interest in the proceedings, forcing them to take three stress; and on a one, Mar-Mal is like "time to take over again!" and possesses their body for the rest of the score. On the plus side, Mar-Mal automatically succeeds at everything they do while in control of Smiler's body (they are a fucking god, after all); on the minus side, when they leave, Smiler has to deal with Level 2 "Post-Possession Exhaustion" harm (because hosting the power of a god is no joke). Smiler has mixed feelings about this whole situation -- on the one hand, they're super excited that they can host the will of their god and not die, but on the other...they are a little scared that maybe, one day, Mar-Mal won't give their body back...

And there we have it -- three lovely traumas for my characters to suffer with! I don't know yet when they'll come into play during all the various stories I have planned, but they are there when I need them! I'm sure the trio are thrilled. XD

[unhonestlymirror]

My favourite song