#it's a url totally up for grabs

[phantomrose96]

Honestly I recommend everyone learn just a littttle bit of CSS because it really is powerful and just makes bits and pieces of your internet experience more convenient.

Right now I'm cataloguing recipes I've really enjoyed, just trying to get them all in one place. Many of these are instagram recipes and, because I don't trust link rot (aka the possibility that the instagram link goes dead one day), I'm including a screenshot of the recipe along with the link.

But instagram on desktop... looks like this

(Link, for credit. It's a good recipe)

I obviously could just copy-paste the recipe out of there. But a screenshot would be cleaner for how I'm cataloguing these.

And as-is, I'd have to scroll the whole height of that small right-side window about 4 times to fit it all.

But actually... I can just resize that div holding that whole right-side content

Basically I

hit f12 to open the dev tools

clicked the element finder

clicked on an element inside the recipe side

followed it up the tree until I found the element holding the whole recipe side (do this by hovering the div in the dev tools panel way on the right, then hovering upward and up until I find the element which is the highest up that still only contains the recipe-side content)

in the element.style part, set "width: 1000px" and "height: 1500px"

(I notice the width seems to still be less than 1000px, even though it got bigger)

likely suggests there's an element above it with a max-width set

go up the tree higher until I find the element with the max-width and uncheck that style

screenshot ready

Maybe that sounded complicated but it took me probably 20-30 seconds

And this isn't just about screenshotting recipes like.

website with an annoying gif? select gif, delete gif

do you want a clean screenshot of a digital receipt for record-keeping without a large company banner or irrelevant information? delete unnecessary elements, adjust widths, screenshot

SOMETIMES, you can bypass paywalls if they're relying on something like overflow: hidden, or an overlay in the way, or some JS that runs (you can disable JS in the dev tools)

lost the jpg/png file you used for your profile picture and size doesn't totally matter? grab it from the img src while logged in. (you might even be able to find it in a bigger size by changing the url query parameters)

color contrast on an article really bad? find and change background color. find and change font color

want to make a funny fake screenshot without learning photoshop? just edit the page content in the dev tools

This isn't about like being good enough to write scripts or browser extensions. Really if you just have some basic HTML/CSS understanding a hat worth of tricks, you can make so many little adjustments in your favor.

[olderthannetfic]

I thought it would be interesting to see if I could easily determine which ships had the most works updated in 2023.

It turned out to be fairly easy, though a little time consuming. I think these results should be reasonably accurate.

Some points to note:

I did this on my own account, and I have like 2 people muted. So I am capturing the effects of archive-locked works, but my numbers might be off by one or two works due to muting.

Works updated in 2023 is a number that constantly changes as works are deleted or updated again in 2024.

I didn't scrape the entire archive or anything like that, so it's possible I missed a ship that would bump one of these down below 100. I'd take the last few at the bottom there with a grain of salt. But I think we can be reasonably sure the top ones are accurate and that the kinds of numbers that we see at the bottom there (eighteen hundred plus works updated in 2023) are about where the cutoff will be even if we find a ship I missed.

--

As for how I did this, I went to the category tags and the rating tags, filtered for updating in 2023, then excluded ships in the sidebar till I got to 130-150 ships excluded. I also grabbed ships that are big in general from tag search, which you can use to find all relationship canonicals, ordered by frequency.

I combined those lists of ships, cleaned off the works numbers, and generated a list without duplicates. That got me three hundred and something (yes, they were mostly duplicates). I generated the relevant AO3 URLs, opened them in batches with Open Multiple URLs, and copied the works totals into a spreadsheet. Not as tidy as using a script but honestly pretty easy if you know a few spreadsheet formulas to clean up data.

The key here is that if you're only going for pretty good and not accurate beyond a shadow of a doubt, all you need to do is generate a list of likely ships, then check them.

It's possible that there's some much-updated ship that is so evenly spread across these various other tags that it just missed showing up in the sidebar. Hopefully, grabbing more than just the top 100 avoided this problem.

This method also doesn't take into account backdated works. If a whole archive was imported in 2023 but all backdated, there could be some ship that didn't have new works but where AO3 users experience in 2023 was of an influx of content.

I also did this just now, in late March/early April, so some 2023 works have inevitably been deleted or updated again. So the exact work counts don't represent the experience of using AO3 throughout 2023. A fandom active in early 2023 might not have much updating in early 2024, while a fandom active in late 2023 would. This could demote the latter a few places in the rankings since I didn't grab numbers on January 1st.

Even if a person scraped AO3 every day or was monkeying around in the databases, you also have to ask what conceptual answer you're after. Is it works a user could have read at some point during 2023, whether they were deleted by the year's end or not? Is it new-to-AO3 works or only newly-created ones, not including imported archives? Does it matter if the works are fic? If they're in English? What about accidental double-uploads or translations of a single work?

I hope this makes it clear why a definitive ranking is not actually possible.

However, despite these drawbacks, I am confident that the rankings above accurately represent the broad trends on AO3 in 2023. Just don't get too fixated on whether a ship should be at number 73 or number 74.

And, of course, I excluded these from the top 100:

Original Character(s)/Original Character(s) - 20,026

Minor or Background Relationship(s) - 16,187

No Romantic Relationship(s) - 8,052

Original Female Character(s)/Original Male Character(s) - 7,195

Original Male Character/Original Male Character - 6,283

Other Relationship Tags to Be Added - 5,618

Original Female Character(s)/Original Female Character(s) - 3,990

Original Character(s) & Original Character(s) - 3,210

Here's a spreadsheet if you want to see the actual numbers not as a shitty screencap. I left the next few below 100 for context.

[duoatomica]

‼️‼️STOP SCROLLING AND READ THIS PLEASE‼️‼️

In brazil, there's been having a lot of floods in the southern region of the country, more specifically in the state of Rio Grande do Sul

Every day people are dying , cities are submerged, a single city was erased from the map for being totally underwater.

"Sadly the city of Eldorado RS, doesn't exist anymore - The city was totally covered by water"

Everyday, people have to witness everything they've built get lost admist the water, people have to live with floating bodies of adults, children, toddlers, newborns, animals, dogs, cats, elders, every possible life in these cities are being taken away by the floods.

People spend day and night on rooftops, waiting for boats to save them, but not everyone comes out alive.

Hear this audio:

The man says: "Hey Gabriela, deal with what I'll tell you now, there was three children at the boat with me, one of them asked me to pick up a doll that was floating, and I went to grab the doll. It wasn't a doll, it was a baby, a dead baby."

It's the reality of what's happening in Brazil right now when you're reading this.

Sadly, I can't share more than one video here on Tumblr, but theres an audio of a woman thanking her parents for everything, saying she loved them and asking them to take care of her dog Maicon, in the audio, she said she didn't feel her legs, that she felt like she was hallucinating, that the water was almost at her chin, that she was about to die, that her other dog died. After the woman spoke, the sound of the roof breaking and falling was heard in the background, sounds of water splashing, and after the audio was sent, she died, submerged in the ruins of her own underwater house.

We can't do much, but if whoever is seeing this post could donate for help, it would be a step closer to salvation of more and more people.

Here's the link if you want to donate for Rio Grande do Sul: Vakinhahttps://www.vakinha.com.br › a-ma...A Maior Campanha Solidária do RS

https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.vakinha.com.br/vaquinha/a-maior-campanha-solidaria-do-rs%3F&sa=U&sqi=2&ved=2ahUKEwjAgrybp_yFAxUiHbkGHRWMDbIQFnoECDAQAQ&usg=AOvVaw2z2py3rN07FmWV4NePVuOS

Thanks for reading this post, even if only a few people.

[mariacallous]

The flood of text messages started arriving early this year. They carried a similar thrust: The United States Postal Service is trying to deliver a parcel but needs more details, including your credit card number. All the messages pointed to websites where the information could be entered.

Like thousands of others, security researcher Grant Smith got a USPS package message. Many of his friends had received similar texts. A couple of days earlier, he says, his wife called him and said she’d inadvertently entered her credit card details. With little going on after the holidays, Smith began a mission: Hunt down the scammers.

Over the course of a few weeks, Smith tracked down the Chinese-language group behind the mass-smishing campaign, hacked into their systems, collected evidence of their activities, and started a months-long process of gathering victim data and handing it to USPS investigators and a US bank, allowing people’s cards to be protected from fraudulent activity.

In total, people entered 438,669 unique credit cards into 1,133 domains used by the scammers, says Smith, a red team engineer and the founder of offensive cybersecurity firm Phantom Security. Many people entered multiple cards each, he says. More than 50,000 email addresses were logged, including hundreds of university email addresses and 20 military or government email domains. The victims were spread across the United States—California, the state with the most, had 141,000 entries—with more than 1.2 million pieces of information being entered in total.

“This shows the mass scale of the problem,” says Smith, who is presenting his findings at the Defcon security conference this weekend and previously published some details of the work. But the scale of the scamming is likely to be much larger, Smith says, as he didn't manage to track down all of the fraudulent USPS websites, and the group behind the efforts have been linked to similar scams in at least half a dozen other countries.

Gone Phishing

Chasing down the group didn’t take long. Smith started investigating the smishing text message he received by the dodgy domain and intercepting traffic from the website. A path traversal vulnerability, coupled with a SQL injection, he says, allowed him to grab files from the website’s server and read data from the database being used.

“I thought there was just one standard site that they all were using,” Smith says. Diving into the data from that initial website, he found the name of a Chinese-language Telegram account and channel, which appeared to be selling a smishing kit scammers could use to easily create the fake websites.

Details of the Telegram username were previously published by cybersecurity company Resecurity, which calls the scammers the “Smishing Triad.” The company had previously found a separate SQL injection in the group’s smishing kits and provided Smith with a copy of the tool. (The Smishing Triad had fixed the previous flaw and started encrypting data, Smith says.)

“I started reverse engineering it, figured out how everything was being encrypted, how I could decrypt it, and figured out a more efficient way of grabbing the data,” Smith says. From there, he says, he was able to break administrator passwords on the websites—many had not been changed from the default “admin” username and “123456” password—and began pulling victim data from the network of smishing websites in a faster, automated way.

Smith trawled Reddit and other online sources to find people reporting the scam and the URLs being used, which he subsequently published. Some of the websites running the Smishing Triad’s tools were collecting thousands of people’s personal information per day, Smith says. Among other details, the websites would request people’s names, addresses, payment card numbers and security codes, phone numbers, dates of birth, and bank websites. This level of information can allow a scammer to make purchases online with the credit cards. Smith says his wife quickly canceled her card, but noticed that the scammers still tried to use it, for instance, with Uber. The researcher says he would collect data from a website and return to it a few hours later, only to find hundreds of new records.

The researcher provided the details to a bank that had contacted him after seeing his initial blog posts. Smith declined to name the bank. He also reported the incidents to the FBI and later provided information to the United States Postal Inspection Service (USPIS).

Michael Martel, a national public information officer at USPIS, says the information provided by Smith is being used as part of an ongoing USPIS investigation and that the agency cannot comment on specific details. “USPIS is already actively pursuing this type of information to protect the American people, identify victims, and serve justice to the malicious actors behind it all,” Martel says, pointing to advice on spotting and reporting USPS package delivery scams.

Initially, Smith says, he was wary about going public with his research, as this kind of “hacking back” falls into a “gray area”: It may be breaking the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, a sweeping US computer-crimes law, but he’s doing it against foreign-based criminals. Something he is definitely not the first, or last, to do.

Multiple Prongs

The Smishing Triad is prolific. In addition to using postal services as lures for their scams, the Chinese-speaking group has targeted online banking, ecommerce, and payment systems in the US, Europe, India, Pakistan, and the United Arab Emirates, according to Shawn Loveland, the chief operating officer of Resecurity, which has consistently tracked the group.

The Smishing Triad sends between 50,000 and 100,000 messages daily, according to Resecurity’s research. Its scam messages are sent using SMS or Apple’s iMessage, the latter being encrypted. Loveland says the Triad is made up of two distinct groups—a small team led by one Chinese hacker that creates, sells, and maintains the smishing kit, and a second group of people who buy the scamming tool. (A backdoor in the kit allows the creator to access details of administrators using the kit, Smith says in a blog post.)

“It’s very mature,” Loveland says of the operation. The group sells the scamming kit on Telegram for a $200-per month subscription, and this can be customized to show the organization the scammers are trying to impersonate. “The main actor is Chinese communicating in the Chinese language,” Loveland says. “They do not appear to be hacking Chinese language websites or users.” (In communications with the main contact on Telegram, the individual claimed to Smith that they were a computer science student.)

The relatively low monthly subscription cost for the smishing kit means it’s highly likely, with the number of credit card details scammers are collecting, that those using it are making significant profits. Loveland says using text messages that immediately send people a notification is a more direct and more successful way of phishing, compared to sending emails with malicious links included.

As a result, smishing has been on the rise in recent years. But there are some tell-tale signs: If you receive a message from a number or email you don't recognize, if it contains a link to click on, or if it wants you to do something urgently, you should be suspicious.

[terraliensvent]

A blast from the past: terras and ip grabbing

so im sure some of you have seen this post over on csmingy, and zaga had actually reached out to me here to post on their actions in terras as well

for the uninformed, zaga (creator/former owner of isopups) was the original site coder for terraliens. recently, they've decided to come out about the circumstances surrounding the original terra vent blog and the ip grabbing, stating that THEY were the one who originally did so after pressure from civ and coy. (and if you weren't here for the doxxing issue, just read through this)

and as an aside: from my personal recollection of actively following the original blog and even having post notifs on, i dont remember any death threats being posted to that blog. what i do remember is the original discussion on kinah being that they were "greedy" for dropping an adopt batch on their birthday, and others bitching about petty shit to that effect. my memory could be wrong, but even at the time i thought the content of the original vent blog was blown way out of proportion.

anyway, on with the screenshots:

(edit to specify: in this screen i say Kinah was the one to influence zaga to IP grab, but later zaga corrected me to state that it was mainly civ and coy, with kinah's situation and attempt influencing them, not kinah directly)

along with this, i was given an imgur gallery of screenshots (lemon and tuna = zaga)

here are some i thought were interesting:

Later on civ says this:

more incriminating shit:

this proves they definitely did have a fucking spec-ops investigation to ip grab nearly everyone involved with the blog, getting people's locations and making spoofed urls. honestly, im not even totally sure how they landed on the people they did as the supposed owners of the blogs, seeing as they were going based off of location and there are a lot of people living in australia. additionally you can see civ blowing things out of proportion on a few messages like this one:

which, that is a completely reasonable thing to say!! if youre making attempts on your life over a closed species, maybe it would help you to remove yourself from that space, just a thought.

and finally the cherry on top of the shit sundae:

they didnt even ban the right fucking person

i highly recommend reading all the screens, it's a whole rollercoaster and not once do either of them think theyre in the wrong for being incredibly invasive, using spoofed links to grab IPs, picking out a random person because they said they lived in melbourne (which has a population of over 5 million) and then doubling down saying "erm but guys we didnt release the info we just used deceptive means to ban them but it turns out the person we banned wasnt even the right one oopsies!"

in fact, according to zaga, the IP they got wasn't even linked to a home address, it was tied to a satellite ping tower, so the user who's IP they tracked could have very well not even been in melbourne. so they just caused a shitload of anguish to Mal for no reason and refused to take it back, even after they realized they fucked up. full explanation here:

finally, zaga did link me to their apology doc regarding isos. i wont go in depth on it because this isnt isopups venting, but ill drop it here anyways for anyone who's interested: link

overall, i dont want to bash zaga crazy heavily over this, seeing as it looks like theyre on a pretty big apology tour right now for their actions here as well as in isopups. they stated in my dms: "I also want to clarify while I wasn’t sorry for it last year, it’s been a long time since this and I feel immense shame and guilt for it, which is why I’m coming out about it," and given their current actions of laying everything out here + the iso doc, i want to say that theyre making a change and i cant knock them for apologizing.

i will say though, that these messages are incredibly fucking damning for civ and OG terra staff, and i will absolutely criticize civ for them since their actions here are pretty consistent with their behavior in every single following controversy: doubling down, blowing shit out of proportion while simultaneously downplaying their own actions, and "everyone is at fault but me"

what a great throwback thursday

[sanrioomiku]

Tobidei week day 1: fanboy

———————🩷🩷🩷——————

I feel bad i don’t have anything to post so here’s a draft of a fanfic i wrote when i was 15-16. I still think it’s kinda cute lol and i think younger me was pretty funny for coming up with this.

Content warning: not established tobidei…yet. Other ships mentioned, cliffhanger

Obito glanced to the digital clock on his desk. Six minutes to the show, and here he was stuck in his office. He nearly begged his boss, Madara to let him go early but Madara deemed watching a livestream of your favorite boyband wasn’t a good enough reason to leave work early. In fact he called him pathetic. Obito inwardly sighed as he typed away on his computer. His eyes drooped. What a miserable job. Typing away for eight hours. He glanced at his clock again. Two more minutes. He glanced around his office. He then peeked over his cubicle. Everyone was hunched over their desktops. The pile of paperwork stood menacingly in the corner of his eye. Of course he ignored it.

He’d do it…later. He pulled out his phone, typing in the exact url to the website where their dedicated fans uploaded photos, videos, and even live-streamed for the ones who couldn’t make it to the actual concert. Obito had made a vow to himself that one day before he died, he’d go and actually see them perform, too bad his job was the only barrier keeping him from achieving that dream. There were already four hundred viewers when he clicked on the icon. Obito’s heart jumped seeing the members on the stage. He ignored Sasuke, Sai, and Hidan and only focused on his bias, Deidara. 

He cringed as the man started screaming Deidara’s name when the pop star blew a kiss to the crowd. Obito had to turn down his volume as the man behind the camera wouldn’t stop screaming. The guy was totally incompetent. The man was too busy jumping up and down and waving his light stick that Obito couldn’t even see the stage for more than half of the time. At one point the guy even dropped his camera. When he picked up the camera Obito nearly jumped in fear seeing the man’s face. He was one of the top contributors to the website. Calling himself Randamuna kashu’s biggest fan.

Though Obito had seen his face several times he could still never get used to it. It made Obito feel a little better about himself. The guy clearly didn’t take care of himself, with the greasy skin and pimples. Obito couldn’t imagine the smell of the guy. This guy was a different level of degenerate. He was in his late thirties and had an odd obsession with band members, even making pillows of them. He had posted a picture to one of the forums of his bedroom where it was just filled with 4star’s merch and their pictures plastered on his walls. Obito liked the band too but he wasn’t that crazy over them. He shut off the stream. 

‘How useless’. He thought. He couldn’t see the band members or hear them from the guys' loud antics. Hopefully in a few hours more videos will be uploaded plus it was time for him to checkout. He grabbed his briefcase, stuffing in the work that he didn’t do. He stepped out his cuticle happy to finally go home and be able to watch the reruns of the show. If he hurried he might be able to watch the last few minutes.

“Obito!” He turned to see Konan waving at him. 

“Ah, Konan,” he greeted. She fixed her purse on her shoulder. 

“Hey. Me and a few coworkers were going to go for a drink. Want to come?” Obito couldn’t stand his colleagues nor did he want to spend his evening drinking with them when he could be watching 4star’s show. But he also didn’t want his colleagues to think he was a hikikomori. He couldn’t ignore their invitations for much longer. One hour then he’ll head home. He forced a smile.

“Sure.” 

——٩(｡•́‿•̀｡)۶—

 The table was raucous. The mix of alcohol the cheerfulness of it being Friday made the unusual stoic group buzz with excitement. Konan’s blouse was unbuckled and her usual crisp bun had fallen apart. Kisame and Obito had their ties either heads. The only one who remained put together was Sasori and Itachi who stayed quiet sipping their drink. From what he observed, Itachi and sasori could handle their alcohol while Konan and Kisame couldn’t. Konan draped her around Obito’s shoulders pulling him closer.

“Say, you’re not as bad as I thought,” she slurred. She poked his chest. “I thought you were some weird degenerate like Kabuto.” Obito’s face flushed redder than it already was from the several shots of sake he took before as her breasts pressed into his arm.

“Why would you think that?” Kisame barked out a laugh. He pointed at Obito with his cup. It sloshed around dangerously as he moved recklessly. Sasori eyed the larger man warily, even scooting a bit to the wall. 

“Don’t take this personal, but you like the type of guy who watches perverted shit and has a collection of anime figurines.” Obito frowned. It sounded more like the guy with 4star obsession. He respected Deidara enough to not beat off- what the hell was he thinking?

“I’m not perverted and I’m not one of those otaku’s,” he protested. Konan giggled.

“Oh come on, you can admit it. We don’t judge. Sasori collects anime figures too.” Sasori set down his drink. 

“It’s not anime, they’re Rushton dolls. Antique,” he said matter of factly. Konan scratched her ear.

“Still weird. Aren’t you like almost thirty?” Sasori sucked his teeth.

“Says the one who’s almost thirty and still unmarried.” Konan turned bright red.

“That’s so impolite! Don’t you know you should never talk to a woman like that?” Obito nervously laughed as Konan and Sasori continued to bicker. Obito looked over to Itachi who was nibbling at a chicken skewer seemingly to be unbothered by the entire ordeal. 

“Gah! Whatever.” Konan turned to Obito again. “Obito, are you married?” 

“Ah, no.” 

“How about talking to someone,” Kisame wiggled his eyebrows. Obito took another sip of his drink. He only left his house to work and the only people he talked to were the people on the 4star’s forum. He didn’t put himself out there nor did he make the effort to talk to others. The last time he tried to put himself out there he was rejected. He’d rather be alone anyways. Alone in his sad apartment watching reruns of his favorite concerts. 

“No,” he eventually said. Konan nudged him.

“Aww why not? You’re handsome enough.” 

“Probably because he’s too busy watching hentai,” Kisame snorted. 

“I’m not a pervert!” His slurred words made his voice sound even more pathetic. Kisame howled with laughter slamming his cup onto the table. Konan glared at the broad man.

“Kisame stop. We just got him out of the office. You’re going to scare him away,” she frowned. 

“Looks like we’re all in the same boat,” Sasori muttered. 

“Single and overworked,” Konan hiccuped. “Gah! Madara has us working twenty four seven. I have zero time to even go on some blind dates. Goddammit! I should be married by now!” she shouted.

Obito took another swig. It seemed his colleagues were going through the same problems as him. All being in their mid and late twenties spending most of their time in work with little time for relationships. Konan nudged him.

“Hey, maybe we should hookup?” Obito choked on his sake. A woman suggesting such things to him was the first. Konan giggled.

“Awwww! He’s shy!” Sasori picked up a chicken skewer.

“Konan, do you have to flirt with every man you see?” Konan pulled Obito into a tighter hug.

“We’re just joking. Aren’t we Obi?” Obito flushed at the nickname.

“Yeah, just jokes,” he coughed. Konan smiled with a flirty tint.

“Good, now hand me your phone.” Without much thought, he gave her his phone. The moment it landed in her manicured hand he froze. Life seemed to go in slow motion as his phone turned on revealing his 4star wallpaper. He shut his eyes. No way this was happening. Konan stared at the phone for a second before she burst into laughter. She turned the phone to the rest of the table.

“Obito likes boy bands!” Obito covered his face as his coworkers heckled at him. 

“I knew he was one of those otaku’s!” Kisame banged his fist against the table. Obito peeked through his hands. Even Itachi was smiling. Itachi, of all people, was laughing at him. In fact the entire izakaya seemed to be laughing at the humiliating situation.

“My cousin did that!” He tried to argue. 

“Oh please. Let’s not blame it on your innocent cousins,” Sasori snorted. Konan typed away at his phone.

“Ah hah! I got it!” Obito’s eyes widened seeing that Konan had successfully gotten into his phone. 

“Hand it back!” He tried to reach over her but his coordination was off from the past drinks, instead knocking over the pitcher of beer onto his lap. 

“Shit!” He desperately tried to wipe the stain off his crotch. Sasori rested his face in his hands.

“So which member are you in love with?” Obito opened his mouth but closed it. 

“It’s obviously this blond,” Konan spoke up. Konan scrolled through his phone then showed it to the others. Kisame awed.

“Oh, so you like blonds?” Obito nearly died. He quickly grabbed his phone from Konan.

“I like brunettes,” he mumbled. He didn’t really have a specific preference but it made sense to say at the moment. Konan giggled.

“It’s okay. I agree he’s a cutie.” Kisame leaned back in his chair.

“Yeah, I mean I like chicks but he’s definitely attractive. It’s no wonder they’re so popular.” Sasori nodded his head. Obito couldn’t believe what he was thinking. Did they think he liked men? He shook his head.

“That’s not! I just like their music.” Konan took a deep drink.

“You know what the issue is? Everyone is obsessed with pop stars while us normal people rot! I mean what’s the point of obsessing over someone you’ll never be with when you can be a real woman!” She looked over to Obito. “Or man.” Obito put his face into his hands. This was humiliating. He should’ve stayed home and watched the reruns of the concert. Itachi sighed but remained silent as Konan drunkenly ranted about her failing love life. 

“Like am I not beautiful enough?” She pushed her boobs up with her hands. Kisame’s eyes bugged out his head while Sasori looked embarrassed. Of course Itachi seemed indifferent as he poured himself another drink.

“Hey guys!” Rin stood in front of their table still dressed in her work attire. Obito’s mouth went dry. He cut a glance to himself. His crotch was wet. His face was flushed and in general looked like a mess. Rin made eye contact with him. They both looked away at the same time. Obito mentally prayed that she didn’t notice the spot on his pants.

Konan picked up a half full cup.

“Hey! Come sit with us!” Rin glanced at Obito who still had his eyes glued on his lap then back at the rest of the drunken crew.

“Um, I don’t know.” Her eyes kept glancing at Obito. Konan reached across the table and pulled Rin in to sit beside Itachi, directly across from Obito.

“Oh come on! Let’s celebrate! Join the single club! konan slurred while pushing a cup of beer towards Rin. Rin nervously laugh but took the cup.

“Well, I guess I can stay for a bit. My friends will here in a bit though.” Obito gripped his knees under the booth. Rin was staying and he still hadn’t found a good excuse to get himself out of this awkward situation. The beer soaked pants didn’t help either. At least the topic of his weird hobby of liking boy bands. Still, he felt stuck. If he got up now, she would most definitely see the stain. The table went into their conversations while Rin and Obito sat quiet with them occasionally distracting themselves with their drinks. Obito had gotten over the rejection from a few weeks ago but seeing her in front of him was anything then pleasant.

“Hey, I hope things aren’t awkward between us,” Rin started. Obito rubbed the back of his head.

“It’s not. No worries.”

“Oh good.” They both looked away clearly lying to one another. Rin opened her mouth to say something else but Obito felt his phone buzz against his thigh. A notification of the forum caught his attention. A fan meet up. He opened the notification to see a girl posed in front of a stage with the members in the background. Obito narrowed his eyes. One of the buildings looked familiar. He paused. They were his city.

Obito abruptly stood up, completely forgetting about the wet spot on his pants. The rest of the table looked up in shock.

“I have to go.” Konan stood up also.

“Wait! Give me your number before you go!” Sasori pulled her back into the seat. Rin watched as Obito rushed out the bar, her eyebrows furrowed.

—————-

Rereading this. I can’t help but laugh. Obito/ Tobi is such a degenerate! I will come back and post the second chapter where he finally gets to meet his idol 👀🤭🩷 anyways happy tobidei week! Hope everyone has fun! :p

[sunboki]

✶ fourteen. — jake and the elephant in the room

— 0.5k words

“Is this something Music Bank arranged for us?” You’re laughing now, scrambling to catch up to Jake’s fast steps headed somewhere you couldn’t guess.

He turns to face you, rolling his eyes like he always did when you were younger(and got in trouble for) despite smiling incessantly.

“Yep, totally. We’re filming on top of a skyscraper today.” You scoff, muttering “Asshole” under your breath only to watch him lift his eyebrows dramatically.

It’s like he hadn’t changed at all.

Finally you reach a quiet corner store, fishing money from your wallet before being hushed by Jake who willingly pays for both yours and his snacks.

“What a gentleman~” You muse, greedily snatching the gimbap out of his hands as he settles down in the chair across from you — clearing his throat quite profusely at that. Calm moments never seem to stay.

Oh no.

“So.. I love the fact that you’re.. um.. feeling better. But I feel like even if we’re y’know, normal now it wouldn’t be complete if we still have the elephant in the room.”

Yikes.

Alright, play dumb and if worse comes to worse you can just explain yourself. Right?

Wrong. Worse came way too early.

“And the elephant in the room is..?”

“Ghosting me for two years? Or did you just happen to forget?” You can see the veins beginning to strain on his neck, anger creeping so close you feel the need to scoot back in your chair.

“I didn’t forget Jake I didn’t have time to answer I was training-“Oh so this was about training? Are you serious? You could’ve replied during I don’t know, breaks?! Was I really that insignificant to you?”

“Would you just LISTEN TO ME? You’re not insignificant to me I’m telling you I didn’t have time Jake please It’s not..”

He’s giving you a nonsensically upset look and you want to cry, want to run away to anywhere that isn’t here.

“It’s not what? What is it not, Yn. Thinking about it, what even am I to you? Am I just here for you to drag me along and rip me apart after all this time?“

That’s it. This is going nowhere and you’re millimeters from wailing. If he won’t listen that’s his problem. ‘Doesn’t mean it doesn’t suck though.

“Sim Jake if that’s how you want to play this I give up on explaining myself and you can just take your sweet time figuring things out by yourself.”

You grab your phone and half-eaten gimbap, wincing at the squeal of your chair as you begin storming away back to the dorms in hopes you don’t have a meltdown in the middle of the road. Except his voice breaking the loud silence stops you.

“Leaving me here to figure things out by myself, just like what you did back then huh.”

You can’t look back, can’t let him see the ugly tears steaming down your cheeks. You need Yeongmi, need the girls. God you need a fresh start.

However the battle is far from over.

PREV · NEXT

pinky promise — 심재휸

SYNOPSIS — the last summer you spent with Jake Sim was the beginning of a disaster. And it all began with a pinky promise between you two. You left Australia a few days before high school to become a trainee under BigHit Entertainment, sending you far away from home, from Jake. Well, you didn’t know it back then, but Jake had also come to Korea as a trainee a year later, and fate worked its magic when you’re both selected as KBS MC’s together. The pinky promise in question? A promise to be together till the end.

␥ NOTE — Jakey is a bit of a jerk here m sorry :(( i promise we’ll have a resolve .. eventually

TAGLIST — @aki1e @pureaaa @ionlyhearnct @dearnjm @viagumi @hanniluvi @invusblog @hafsa-hoofsa-heefs @forever-in-the-sky2 @lylovw @lvrjjun @certainyouthpeanut @woonierkiz @lalalalawon @ahnneyong @sumarchived @astrae4 @lcv3lies @dimplewonie @myjaeyunn @wondering-out-loud @fatoompie @theskzvibe @mesopret @byvrn @sd211 @bluxjun @elakari @02zluvbot @whippedforbeomgyu @lilab00 @felinows

* if your url is italicized it means i couldn’t tag you!

all rights reserved by @sunboki. repost and plagiarism will not be tolerated.

[fraudulent-cheese]

Just got hit in the face with a Zoerra fic idea...

It's a No Total Drama AU, takes place in a roller skating rink. Zoey's been taken there by Dakota insisting that she should learn it (this was after she overheard the red head saying she never tried it before) while Sierra's been taken there by Heather because Sierra wanted to do something fun together and not at the mall, and they'll have the perfect excuse afterwards to grab a coffee and talk school gossip/rumors.

Sierra's having a ton of fun and seperates from Heather who isn't the best at it, while Zoey's trying to move on her own, Sierra doesn't look where she's going and they run into eachother. With some stumbling, Sierra manages to get Zoey back on her feet and they're both super apologetic, and Sierra notices Zoey's not super stabble in general so she offers to acompany her for a little bit. Zoey's a little unsure, but the other girls looks really excited about it so she accepts!

So they hang out for a bit, skating around; at some point early on Zoey asks if she could hold Sierra's hand to stabilize herself and Sierra lowkey has a crisis about it while accepting it. She is soooo developping a crush on this random girl and she is equally excited about it as she is nervous about fucking it up. Then afterwards they talk and they realize they're both a fan of the same series and talk about it for 20 minutes until Heather calls Sierra over. Then they exchange Tumblr urls.

Zoey finds Dakota pretty easily afterwards (she's fully decked out in bright pink and neon greens and yellows, she's hard to miss) and confirms she's had a pretty good time!

Heather immediately clocks the fact Sierra's somehow more excited than she was before they went there and is determined to figure out why. When she realises Sierra got a crush on Zoey, she's frankly unsurprised (Sierra would like nerds) but is still gonna be critical about it (why her???). Would be funnier if Zoey previously had a crush on Heather too...

[notasapleasure]

My least favourite kind of work is definitely compiling an academic bibliography from a pile of URLs. People fling links into their fucking citation software and it grabs information it thinks is relevant and craps it out in uninformative references with jumbled authorship/title/website info, often totally missing a named author on, e.g., a news report. Fixing it is the worst combination of mind numbingly repetitive (sorting syntax and adding access dates) and awkward in the details (the syntax is wrong in different ways, the access date is different, the webpage doesn't have a date of publication, the journal doesn't have page numbers)...

Yet it should be so simple:

Author/entity responsible for content, 'title of content', title of thing hosting content (book/website/journal), plus relevant info about any editors of thing hosting content. Publication info (place and date), pages or url of the thing you're citing, and access date if needed.

This info is there for two reasons, neither of which are important to the citation software: 1) to make it easy for others to follow up your references and 2) to give credit where it's due to your sources.

Anyway, my whole job is about accuracy, consistency and clarity, and citation software truly does it worse than anyone.

And the current report I'm working on has 20 pages of mostly this kind of reference 🙃🙃🙃

[riacte]

Can't believe that Ren stream was catered to you specifically 🌌💙

Hiii Ani 🥺🥺💙💙 I started the stream with Treebark and it had False in the middle and it ended with BRR I’m sooooooo 🥺🥺🥰🥰😭😭 BRR my so beloved. I can’t believe it’s been this long. I’m happy and sad to see it grow up. Best believe I’m never leaving the damn raceway. I even grabbed the tumblr url 😭 I’m maining BRR now sorry Blue Bats sorry Treebark

Anyways that stream was such an emotional journey. It has everything— totally normal pining for Martyn, random singing, snarky False comments, yet another story of Ren trying to impress girls, genuine life advice, and it’s just 🥺💙🥺💙🥺💙🥺💙🥺💙

[hazygrains]

It's time to wrap up my Siargao trip posts. I realise these entries are lengthy and may seem somewhat uninteresting, but I really like to record mostly what happened that day before the tiny details fade away. The brain is a fickle thing, y’know. That's why I like to jot down everything here on my blog, thus the URL — thememoriesarchive. Anyway, I'm looking forward to revisiting this blog in the coming years to read these adventures; I just hope Tumblr sticks around.

Day 7 - May 3, Wednesday

It was time to buy pasalubongs! At 8 am, we grabbed breakfast at one of the carinderias near the local market, then we went to buy dried seafood and local vinegar. Unfortunately, the vinegar was not allowed inside the aircraft, so it was such a waste. We also went back to White Beard Coffee to grab our coffees—this place was always packed! Anyway, we booked a massage appointment at Siargao Island Villas resort. It was soooo so good. Asis mostly enjoyed it; I even heard him snoring! Lol

As soon as we finished, we headed to CEV: Ceviche & Kinilaw Shack, which was what I had really been looking forward to that day. If ever I return to Siargao again, this place would be at the top of my list. And that’s about it – we explored around, making the most of our remaining time and our scooter rental.

That day was also a celebration of our 8th-year anniversary. Although initially planned for the actual date, yesterday (May 2), we decided to celebrate it on the second-to-last day of our stay on the island instead.

Day 8 - May 4, Thursday (The last day)

On our last day, we went back to the Lokal hub to grab breakfast and, again, to White Beard Coffee to get some fuel for the day. We returned to our place to pack our bags, making sure we didn’t leave anything behind. Around quarter to 1 pm, we were already at the airport, waiting for our flight. Maaaaan, I was really hoping to see President Nadine around Siargao, and I was losing hope. But lo and behold, she was on the same flight to Manila, and even Andi Eigenmann’s daughter, Ellie, was in the same flight and the same row as us. It was unexpected. I wanted to have a photo with Nadz, but nope, I didn’t want to bother her and invade her privacy. So, yuuup, we arrived home around 6 pm, totally exhausted from our trip back. It was so not nice to be back in the urban jungle.

To wrap up this Siargao trip, we really did have a great time. To be honest, though, we didn’t want to think about our expenses during our 8-day stay because everything there was overly expensive, and we thought it was not reasonable. If you were to ask us if we would like to return, of course, we would answer yes! Because the island is just beautiful, and we really haven’t explored it all—Taktak Falls, Alegria Beach, Corregidor Island, Bucas Grande. But if we consider the expenses, we would say no, not in the next 5 -10 years. It was enough for us that we had the opportunity to visit the island. So yea, I’m finally done with the Siargao trip posts. It was such an adventure. I can’t wait to visit more of the Philippines. Until next time!

[olderthannetfic]

How I would do 2023 ship stats

You know, normally, I don't bother to do much with top AO3 ships stats. That's partly because someone already does it and partly because I think they're stupid stats that just lead to people gloating about their blorbos "winning". But I do routinely have a look at what's new and popular when I'm doing things like making a dance party playlist for Escapade Con, just so I know what fans might be getting into lately. I have to say, collecting these is not hard. It's not even particularly time consuming.

Doing it super efficiently would be easier with a script, yes, but most fandom stats aren't actually collected with scripts, and if you're only looking for the top 100 ships, you can more or less do that by hand. How I would set about it for you, the random fan who's curious but not curious enough to learn to code, would be to log into AO3 and then find tags where you can see the sidebar. They should be tags that encompass the whole archive and that are mandatory and unique… in other words, ratings.

Since every AO3 work must have one and only one rating, you can just check these five and get a good sense of what's on there. There are some minor wrinkles to iron out, but it's a good preliminary research step.

The way you want to do it is to start with a spreadsheet. Open up your ratings URLs (and also paste them in the spreadsheet for convenience—google sheets will make clickable links). Copy all the sidebar top ships into a list. Filter out all of these ships. Copy the next set, etc. After a while, you'll have a good list that's longer than 100 ships but that most likely contains everything really popular. (Filter for things posted/updated/whatever in the past year if that's the data you're after. Filter for f/f or whatever topic you're interested in if that's the question you're asking instead.)

Use your spreadsheet to generate the actual links for each of these ships. AO3 URLs are predictable: you can generate them from knowing the exact spelling of the tag and the normal format of this type of URL. (There are a bunch of standard spreadsheet functions that can be used to get rid of the work count numbers you've copied from AO3 to get just the pure ship tags. I'd use things like =right() and =left().)

Open the links. Copy the work totals back to your spreadsheet. Voilà!

One drawback of this method is, obviously, that it's boring and tedious, but if you didn't like boring and tedious, why were you collecting fandom stats anyway?

A more important drawback is that in using exclude filters, it's possible you could miss a ship. If the posting patterns are just right, there might be something that has its numbers reduced by excluding other ships that should be on your list. You could have a similar issue if the ships on your list are mostly one rating (so higher in those searches) and some other slightly larger overall ship is spread more evenly. I would try to ameliorate this problem by looking at the sizes of the smallest ships you're covering. They will likely be bigger than the entire fandom section for most fandoms. Taking another look at the bigger fandoms that could be hiding a small-end-of-big ship can help double-check that you haven't missed anything. Grabbing the top 130 or 150 ships in some search while only looking for the top 100 will likely find most of the edge stuff too.

Add any ships that look like they should be double checked to your spreadsheet. Add their work totals. Re-sort your list.

Another thing to consider is that AO3 keeps track of the most recent update date on fics. That's what's easy to search by. If you're only interested in when a work was first posted, easy manual filtering isn't the way to go… However, if the objective is to see which ship tags were active in a given year, most recent update date is the relevant piece of data anyway.

You're not going to recreate centreoftheselights' exact analysis unless you collect data year to year, but you can come up with something pretty similar that answers a similar question, and you don't need to be a programmer to do it.

In the end, accept that some data require hard collection methods that a site doesn't easily offer you and you might have to scrape multiple times a year with a script if you want to know that particular thing… or you might have to randomly sample and hand-count as with FFN shipping stats. (Yes, I've done it. It can be done. It's just annoying.)

So when you're setting out to look at some stats question, the big first step is to decide what you're even asking and why and whether you're just wimping out and going with what's easy to collect instead of what you actually want to know.

...now I'm kind of curious. Maybe I'll go pull some 2023 numbers.

[justkpopjokes]

Rune & Written Wizardry

Ft. Jeonghan + gender-neutral!reader

AU: magic bookkeepers

Word Count: 963

A/N: Leave it to me to make a 1 word prompt into an unserious-but-still-totally-serious fantasy au lmaoo. @loving-doyoung​ you requested this so long ago that your url is different LMFAO

It’s a quiet day at your family’s bookstore. Not many people have come in today—go figure, it’s a Tuesday morning—so your father sent you to the back of the store to take inventory of some older books. Predicting a slow day, you invited your friend Jeonghan over to help.

The both of you were upstairs in the attic; Jeonghan is cleaning some shelves while you’re re-cataloguing books so to be moved downstairs.

The next book you’re logging is a cookbook:

Signora Orechietta’s Razzling Recipes… Mmm, pasta.

This isn’t an ordinary cookbook, though, which is evident as you open to a random page and the warm smell of pie hits you in the face. Another page spread has a richer smell of soup. It’s almost like the food is right below your nose—every word your eyes take in is like another tasty bite.

Smells just like Mom’s cooking…

Your daydreaming about lunch is only interrupted by a loud “OOF!” followed by echoing thuds.

“Are you…okay?” You ask aloud, leaning back to look through the doorway beside you.

“Do I sound okay?” Jeonghan grumbles, kneeling down to pick up the stack of books he had dropped.

“Har har,” you say, rolling your eyes. “Okay, but like, seriously.”

“Yes, I’m fine. I finished clearing out that bookshelf over there,” Jeonghan responds.

Jeonghan walks up to you, adding the books to the precarious stack accumulating at your feet. There’s a lot to sift through, which is exactly why you need an extra pair of hands.

“Why’d you need my help, though?” Jeonghan sighs, reclining on the slightly dusty (but comfy nonetheless) armchair behind you. “Wonwoo would love this place! We both know he’s more bookish than I am. Why not ask him?”

“Mm, I like you better,” you tease.

“Okay, but like, seriously.” Jeonghan replies, mirroring your previous words.

“Because he’d get distracted and forget the point of what we’re doing,” you laugh, “and besides, he doesn’t know about the family business.”

“I’m sure he’d understand.”

“Maybe, but my dad wants to keep this as secret as possible. You found out by accident, remember?”

“True. Introducing him to magic books will probably be a disaster, anyway. We’d have to drag him out of here!”

You laugh, closing the cookbook, which cuts off the smell of home cooked meals. Picking up a pen, you jot down the details of the book in a logbook.

TITLE: Signora Orechietta’s Razzling Recipes

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: August 12, 1957

CONTENTS: variety cookbook

ODDITY: enchantment; can smell recipes by reading the words

Once the cookbook is properly catalogued and sorted into a stack, you pick up another. Your family’s selection had anything from flying books to spell books and everything in between. You had read most of them throughout your childhood, though your parents prohibited you from reading any high-level spell books for your own safety. Taking inventory may just be your chance to take a peek at some more complicated magic…

Before you can attempt to grab an even remotely dangerous book, your father shouts something from the staircase.

“We have a problem!” Your dad yells, stumbling up the steps.

“Careful, Dad!” You shout, running up to him. “You could’ve tripped on the way up!”

“It’s the Society, they said—wait, who is—?”

“It’s just Jeonghan, Dad. He knows about the Society already, remember?”

“Hi, Mister L/N,” Jeonghan greets, having sat up straight once your dad came into the room.

“Oh. Right. Well, good, because we have a problem! The Grand Grimoire was spotted just earlier today!”

Your heart drops at the name—black magic was at play.

“Who’s that, a magic criminal?” Jeonghan raises a brow, “You act like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“What, not who. And, demon, actually,” your father quickly corrects. “The Grand Grimoire is one of our Society’s most feared books. It gives the reader control of black magic and can summon otherworldly demons, which is why I need to make sure it’s here!”

Your dad begins looking through a bookcase to the right of Jeonghan’s armchair, with you waiting behind him. You lock eyes with Jeonghan, the younger man starts feeling the tenseness of the room.

“Why would it be here, Dad?” You ask. “How could we possibly have it?”

“Y/N, our family is the world’s longest and strongest bloodline of Rune and Written wizardry. They entrusted your great-great-great—actually, forget it. The point is, it was locked in this very building decades ago! I need to check if it really has been stolen.”

“But—but you just had black magic hidden under here? This whole time? I grew up in this place! I could’ve—”

“I know, honey, but if we told you, it would only put you in more danger.”

Jeonghan stands up beside you awkwardly, tapping your shoulder.

“So, should I…uh, leave?” He whispers, not wanting to distract your dad.

You can’t find the words to respond, so you take Jeonghan’s hand instead, squeezing it tightly.

“I’ll take that as a no.”

Before you can argue with your father any more, he finds a particular book that slides the bookshelf further to the right, revealing a small opening in the wall. You have no recollection of the opening being there, even though you swear you’ve checked every corner of this place.

The opening reveals a curving stairwell heading to a lower flower. Your dad peers down into it, carefully. He doesn’t even need to take a step before he turns back to you, his face already pale.

“Dad?” You ask, squeezing Jeonghan’s hand tighter.

Your dad quickly moves the bookcase back.

“It’s gone,” he stammers, “I don’t know how anyone could’ve gotten down there! Oh, what is the Council going to think…”

You turn to Jeonghan, nibbling on your bottom lip. Jeonghan has only one thing to say:

“Oof.”

[druidx]

Find the Word Tag - Alexis Dalliance vs the Evil of Titan - Part 1

I have a lot of Find the Word tag games. So I decided to put them all together to make me edit the Alexis Dalliance vs the Evil of Titan, a NaNoWriMo novel from 2012 based on the first TTRPG campaign I participated in the Fighting Fantasy World of Titan setting.

There was a total of 145 words to find so I've split these into batches of ~50. I've not removed any duplicates, and where there's not an exact match I've used synonyms instead.

I've grouped the words by the original tagger - though some of these are old enough the tagger has changed URLs...

Fair warning before you click:

I have tried to keep the snips short, but at ~7000 words, this post is 'colour of the sky' long.

Well, if we're sitting comfortably, I'll begin.

➤ @aquadestinyswriting

Bother

The dragon tilted its head, red scales flashing like fire and blood as it looked at her from another angle. "Well, if that's all it was…" It said, in a descending tone. Alexis nodded fiercely. "Then I suppose I can let you off… But I want you to do something for me, first." "And what would that be?" Richard asked. "There is a Blackguard," the dragon said, "who has been making a nuisance of himself in my territory. I would like him killed.” The dragon sniffed the air, gaze landing back on Richard. “A job, I suspect, for you, holey one.” "Why should we fight your battles for you?" Richard asked. Alexis hissed at him, but the dragon just. chuckled. It crossed its paws, laying its chin down, considering. "Quite frankly," it said finally, "why should I? Why bother sullying my claws when you have appeared at the perfect opportunity to rid this pest for me?" Richard pursed his lips, then gave a sharp nod.

Kettle (Tea)

While Kassandra stoked up the fire and set water over to boil, David, Richard's brother-in-law, bustled around fetching plates and bread for the travellers crowded around his kitchen table. When all had a cup of nettle tea and a plate of bread and jam, David settled into his explanation. “They came a few weeks back,” he said. “They told the village elders they just wanted to practice their new religion in peace. The elders agreed and gave them land to build a chapel. After all, there’re so many gods already – what could one more hurt? “Of course folks are curious. They dropped in to see what this new god was about. And these new priests started converting them.” Bastet raised an eyebrow. “That’s the problem?” “Doesn’t sound like it does it?” David gave a bitter laugh. “But something happened to the folks they converted. Became mindless and mean about it. Our neighbour Sam – you remember, Rich? The fella with the lazy mouser? – he always let me borrow his post-holer, and I’d always let him use my ploughshare. But I went up to ask him for it and he threw me out on my rear, saying the new god didn’t approve of it.” He shook his head. “We never had much, but we had each other. We were a community, see? Now, we haven’t even that.”

Language (Accent)

CW Swearing

Alexis paused at an intersection with Bastet and Victor on her heels and looked around. She couldn’t make head or tail of the street signs, so she grabbed a passer-by. "Excuse me, I’m looking for the trade district," she said. The woman she had caught looked down her nose, brushing away a wave of well-coiffed hair, from where it had fallen at her sudden stop. "It would be over that way," she said, gesticulating to the east. "Thank you," Alexis said, but the woman was already walking away, brushing at her sleeve as though something nasty had landed on it. "Spoiled bitch," Alexis muttered, turning to stick out a tongue at the woman’s back. Bastet winked. As the snooty woman passed, she stuck her foot out, causing the woman to trip. "Oh, my. So sorry," Bastet said, in mimicry of the woman’s polished accent. "I didn’t see you there." The snooty woman spluttered from where she sat on the cobbled street, as Bastet and Victor walked on. Alexis let them catch up and smacked Bastet lightly on the arm, but she couldn’t help smirking at the woman’s comeuppance.

➤ @corkythewriteblr

Citizen

Loyal

"We need to leave," Bastet said. "We don’t know who’s loyal to Dire. These people have their hands full right now, but it won’t stay that way.” "She’s right," Richard said, unfolding from his crouch. "Come on." Mute, Alexis stood, trotting to keep up with the others as they made their way down the castle bailey and into the city, swerving through the chaos of screaming townsfolk to retrieve their mounts from the Inn.

Qualify

Sand (Blacksands)

"Sirs," Richard said with a sharp salute. "I can confirm that both Zharradan Marr and Balthus Dire are dead. We have liberated Troll Tooth Pass, and the city of Castle Dire." "Excellent," Hengar said, his tone relieved. "This is just what I needed, some good news to cheer me up." "Good news? You mean there’s been bad news?" Alexis asked. "Yes, sadly." Hengar sat back in his chair. "Master Yastromo, if you please?" Yastromo inclined his head, long white beard swaying with the motion. "Of course, Captain." The old wizard sighed. "I am sorry, my children, to send you straight out again. However whilst looking through Zagor’s effects, I discovered something disturbing." He held up an amulet depicting a stylized eye in a circle. "He’s still dead, right?" Alexis said with trepidation. Yastromo gave her a sad smile. "Yes. I’m afraid this could be much worse. It seems Zagor was part of a cult called the Eye of Myurr. I have also received word that this cult of Myurr is gaining traction in the town of Port Blacksands. We do not know their aims, but given they worship a demon prince from the Pit, it is surely not anything good." Yastromo glanced at Hengar and stepped back.

➤ @talesfromaurea

Cliff

Desert

CW: Blood, animal death

"Very well. Good luck," Nicodemus said, gesturing at Cee-Jay. "Apprentice?" The boy nodded. With a flash and a jolting motion, the group were surrounded by torch-lit sandstone walls and wailing lizardmen. Victor sent a ball of flame rolling through the crowd, Richard close behind, cleaving a path. Bastet and Jay ran, Victor and Alexis, covering their rush towards the portal. Richard had turned aside, making his way through the press of bodies flung against his sword, towards the lizardman elder whose blade was already slick with the blood of desert rodents, and a wavering chant could be heard through the scrum for fighting.

Ocean (waves)

"Bast!" Alexis shouted. "I need you. Richard’ll take care of Victor. I need help now!" Goregut lifted Bastet around, dropping her next to Alexis. The two of them hunkered down, Gorgut shifting splintered planks as Bastet and Alexis lashed them together as best they could with freezing fingers in the torrential rain. It was a small, pitiful thing, but better than not having anything at all. The three of them tied themselves on long halters to the raft, and then with a joint effort, launched themselves into the heaving waves.

Storm

As is often the case the morning after a storm, a blisteringly clear blue sky beat down upon the sandy shore, with only the merest breeze to ruffle the black braids of the shipwreck survivor. Alexis coughed out sand and rolled over, pawing at the salt crusting on her eyes. She dragged out her water skin and washed off her face of sand and salt before taking a long drink. When she felt slightly more alive – certain that the Great Ever After wouldn’t leave her with crusty eyes – she stood up and started to explore the island and see if she could find her friends.

➤ @whimsyqueen

Fascinate

Alexis clenched her free hand as he walked towards her and forced a smile across her lips. "Most feared Lord Dire," she said. "We have come from the Fort at Trolltooth Pass, sent by your brother in darkness, my Lord Marr, to bring you this gift." "Now, isn’t this a treat," Dire said, stepping around her and Three, his eyes feeling as though they lingered on her as much as the patchwork construct beside her. Dire stopped in front of them, taking a few steps backwards. "Please, show me what it can do," he asked, his silken voice and sickly sweet perfume writhing about her, like the snake of temptation in books of yore. Alexis stepped away and glanced at Richard. They hadn’t planned any of this out, and she wondered how long she could keep the charade up before Dire would know something was wrong. Richard dipped his head, his eyes skittering to where Bastet was signing at her in thieves' hand signals. It was a pattern, followed by the sign for someone getting flattened. Alexis cleared her throat, brushing her nose, signalling she understood. “Three,” Alexis said, addressing the construct. “We’re going to play a little game.” "Goody! I like games," he said. “Please take two steps backwards, and then four forwards for me.” “Okay,” he said, and, squinting at his feet, walked back then forwards, quietly counting his steps. Delighted, he looked back at Alexis. “Done it,” he said happily. “What’s next, ‘Lexis?” “One step right, one back, two forward.” “Okay!” Again, Three’s face scrunched in concentration as he counted his steps, stopping right in front of Dire. “Fascinating,” Dire said, staring up at Three. “You can control it even without it’s crystal.” Alexis glanced back at the others. Victor shrugged. Richard loosened his sword from its scabbard. “Yes,” he said, “it’s a new system my Lord Marr is trialling. Woodling, show him the final command.” Alexis murmured her assent. “Three? Smush!” she yelled.

Gentle

Breakfast finished, Alexis slipped outside with a plate of raw steaks and headed towards the stables. “Good morning, Three,” she called. “Hullo, ‘Lexis,” he said, giving her a wave. She knelt beside her riding dog, placing the plate of steak in front of him. Neisk’s tail beat back and forth as she peeled one steak off and passed it to Three. “Eat,” she commanded, ostensibly to the dog, but Three also devoured the steak as Neisk gave a chuff and settled down to eat. “How are you this morning, Three?” she asked as the construct licked his fingers. “I’m fine,” he said, giving her a big goofy smile. “Your doggy is cute.” “Yes. My to'mae is a very good boy.” Three gave Neisk a gentle pat as the dog was licking the plate. “Listen, Three,” Alexis said. “Me and the others have to go into the city, but we can’t take you. You, um, stand out, a bit. Are you okay staying here with Neisk?” “Oh,” Three’s face fell. “Okay ‘Lexis.” Guilt gripped Alexis’ heart, so she reached over and hugged his arm. “I’m sorry, honey. We’ve got some very important work to do in the city and it’s… difficult when you’re with us.” She looked up into his big, trusting, mismatched eyes. “It’s okay, ‘Lex. I understand.”

Holy

CW swearing

"Yeah… It's some kind of powerful magical item, for sure," he said. "It’s glowing bright blue, but I can’t work out what it’s been enchanted with. Give me a sec, I’ll cast Detect Alignment to find out if it’s evil." Once again the rest of them exchanged looks but kept silent as Victor wiggled his fingers in a slightly different pattern. "Revelux in denomination!" he commanded. The wind sighed. Sand scuttled. Victor screamed. He dropped the dagger, falling heavily into the sand, and covering his eyes. "Holy mother of fucksticks!" Bastet rushed over to him and Alexis swiped the dagger. "What happened?" Alexis said. "Are you okay?" Bastet said, cupping the wizard’s shoulders. "Vic, talk to me?"

Ritual (Rite)

Nicodemus raised an eyebrow. "Indeed." He gestured to the viewing mirror again. "As you can see these cultists are devoted and stubborn fellowes. They have almost finished clearing the temple and preparing for their heinous rite which will allow them to open a portal to the demon dimension, or as you might call it ‘the Pit’, bringing their foul lord Myurr through to wreak whatever havoc he wishes on our world. We can not let this happen. As such I am sending you back with this." He handed Richard a cylindrical device, then waved a hand to bring forth a man in pale robes. "This acolyte will transport you back to the temple, and assist you in sealing this portal forever."

➤ @eli-writes-sometimes

Heir (Prince)

"Are you okay?" Bastet said, cupping the wizard’s shoulders. "Vic, talk to me?" "I… I’m all right. I think," he said, his voice shaking. "So. Um. Yeah. That thing is pure evil. As evil as a prince of evil in the dimension specially reserved for really evil things." "What did you see?" Richard asked. "Red," Victor said. "Only red. That thing is giving off an aurora of evil so strong that I see nothing but the waves of light from it. Give me a moment – I must wait for the spell to wear off."

Humanity (Human)

"Richard!" came the delighted cry of a woman. The door flew open and out sailed a middle-aged woman, long braids of ashy-yellow hair streaming out behind her. "Kassy!" Richard cried as the woman threw herself into his arms. "Kassy, what’s wrong?" Her fingers dug into his shirt, her face pressed against his chest for a long moment, before she looked up with reddened, haunted eyes. "Oh Richard, it’s terrible," she said, tears in her voice. “What is? Kassy? What’s happened?” "Richard?” Sticking out from around the door was the head of a human male. His eyes were heavy and his thatch of dark hair was in disarray. With one flickering glance, he took stock of the mismatched adventurers on his doorstep. “Richard, are these people your friends?” “Yes. David, what-” The man pushed the door wider. “You need to get inside now. Hurry!”

Take

"Ho! Whoa. You hold up a moment there, lassy," the captain called. Alexis stopped and turned back, arms folded and head tilted with a glare. The captain grabbed a line, swinging from the ship to the dockside, and landed, silken waist sash fluttering in the breeze. He struck a pose, one hand on the hilt of his sword. "Are y'trying to suggest that I, Captain Dragan Bloodbeard, of the beautiful Oaken Rose, is not fit to take a couple of poncy humans over the seas to Khul?" The captain took a few, stalking, steps forward, glaring down. "Well, are ye?"

Tough

(Word edited out for better prose) CW: Slavery

Once all the women had eaten, the guards unlocked their cell. The slaves filed out and, one by one, were locked to a long chain. The chain was dragged by a guard down to dim pits where veins of opalescent stone ran through the rock. The chain was locked to a staple on the wall, and pickaxes handed out. The other slaves began to attack the rock face. With a glance at Bastet, Alexis followed suit, struggling to even lift the pickaxe.

➤ @thewriteflame

Erase (Remove)

Alexis must have slept at some point, as she woke in a dog pile of small children and blankets. The sun was burning its way through the hall’s high windows, promising a fine day; what little the weather cared for mortal tragedy… She lay back, staring at the wide-beamed ceiling, exhausted down to her bones. At least it would make assessing the damage easier than if they had to manage it in the rain. Her thoughts turned to Richard and Ithanor, passing buckets in the rain, and to Bastet who’d vanished into the dark, and to Victor, throwing magic and water around with only one care. She should, probably, go check on them. Alexis slithered out of the warm pile, pulling the blankets over those who were left shivering with her departure, watching the children with a fond smile as they snuggled together, filling the hole she’d left. She adjusted her armour – apparently never having managed to remove it the night before – and found her travel pack and weapons close by. On soft feet, she padded out of the Town Hall and into the courtyard.

Flight

"Thank you, so very much," said the dragon. "I’m afraid I was in over my head there. If you kind folks hadn’t come along when you did, I would have been dragon kebab for sure. Thank you again, for saving me, Kypris of the Copper Dragon Flight. Is there anything I can offer you for your excellent service? Alexis instinctively held out her hand. "It’s very nice to meet you, Kypris," she said. The dragon extended a talon and they shook "Why didn’t you use your acid breath attack?" Bastet asked. "My my, you’re very knowledgeable, aren’t you little drow. Well…” Kypris scuffed a foot into the sand. “I was taken by surprise and they tangled my mouth shut before I could use it. I sadly haven’t yet learnt the full way of magic. So I couldn’t do much against those wretched little creatures. Now, please! What can I do to repay your kindness?"

Sleep

CW smoking/ drug use

Slowly they all woke, grateful to find both their necks and belongings intact. “Usually I do not let people sleep here,” the barman said, taking a suck from a long pipe, huffing out a cloud of scented smoke. “But I see you are new here, with no place yet to rest your heads. For the service of keeping the braziers lit and protecting you through the long night.. Eh, I will give you a discount for your newness. Two silver bits each.” He waggled his eyebrows and held out a hand. “Thank you, good sir,” Richard said, passing over his money. “Your kindness in protecting us while we slept is greatly appreciated. You are a godly man.” Silently, Alexis passed over her money. As the coins slipped from her grip, she signed in Thieves Cant, ripoff. The barman grinned widely. With a little prodding, Victor and Bastet also parted, grumbling, with their coins. "Now we’re all friends," Alexis said, "perhaps you can help us further. We’re looking for a ruined temple, somewhere deep in the desert. It’s rumoured to contain a portal to other worlds. Have you heard of such a place?” The barman shook his head. “I have not. But there is a man who sells maps from the marketplace. His name is Hassan. Perhaps he can point you the right way.” “Thank-” Alexis began, but stopped when the barman held out a hand, rubbing his thumb against his forefingers. “The desert is cruel,” he said. “A silver bit.” Alexis scowled. “Two copper is all that direction is worth, and we both know it.” The barman grinned as the copper coins landed in his hand. “Assamarra go with you, tree-child.”

Sound (Hearing)

Before she could get her answer, Richard came pounding over the hilltop. "She shall give it up over my dead body!" he roared, launching into the midst of the cultists, blade flashing in the sun. Fire roared from overhead, arrows zipped through the azure sky. Alexis felt like she’d blinked, and all the cultists lay dead, bleeding into the sand. “Greg damnit!” Alexis snapped, rushing over. “Why in the Pit did you kill them all? We could have gotten information from them. Like why they only wanted the dagger!” Muttering she began to riffle through the bodies for clues. “They… They were cultists,” Richard said, shrinking down. He toyed with the hilt of his sword. “Evil-doers. They were trying to kill you. You’re so small, and you hurt easily. I was just trying to keep you safe.” Alexis looked up, hearing the upset in his voice, and gave a heavy sigh. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Thank you, for saving me. I just don’t understand why they wanted the dagger. It’s a piece of junk. I only wanted it because…” She shook her head. “I don’t know. I just wanted it.”

Space

"Arts, I want you to show these lubbers to their quarters, then report back to deck. We’ll be setting the sails in half a turn of the clock." "Aye, Cap’n. Passengers, if ye’d follow me?" the First Mate said, leading the way below decks to show them to two cabins. "Ladies, ye’ll be in here," Arts said, pointing to one. "Gents, this'll be your cabin." He pointed to another. "I'll leave ye get settled. It’d be appreciated if ye could stay in your quarters till the Oaken Rose is underway. Dinner will be shortly after then." With a nod, he left them to their quarters.

"Well this is cosy," said Bastet, as she and Alexis arranged themselves in the cabin. It was indeed a tiny space, with narrow bunks on one side and a small tin sink, recessed into a dresser, on the other. Opposite the door was a porthole, letting in the smallest amount of light, over which hung a hurricane lamp. "Mm," Alexis agreed.

➤ @the-writing-rat

Boiling

"Yes!" she said. "We have been sent to rid your menace from the face of Titan." To her surprise, Zagor laughed. "Oh my," he said, wiping away mock tears of mirth. "What an adorable notion. Whilst you all look the part, I doubt you have the skill. So you are welcome to try, but do not think you will succeed." "We have might and right on our side!" proclaimed Richard, raising his sword. "We cannot fail!" At that signal, he and Ithanor made their charge The villain’s smirk dropped and his black eyes became those of death. He flicked out a hand and the last thing Alexis felt was the hissing and boiling of an orange inferno headed straight for her.

Charity (Offering)

"Excuse me, good sir," Victor called up to the pirate. "We are looking to secure the services of a boat and a captain to take us to the continent of Khul, the new land of adventure. Might your good self be available for this service?" "’Sir’?" the pirate looked around as if confused, and his crew laughed. "Ain’t no ‘sir’s here. Ain’t none but us brigands and rouges." Alexis ground her teeth. The seaweed under the hot sun was pungent, the lack of beer from the ridiculous rules of this cesspit pounded at her head. “Your h'excellency might be in the wrong place, eh lads?” “Enough!” Alexis snapped. “Brigands and rouges it is, if you can’t even see your way clear to not making fun of someone offering you good manners. C’mon Vic, these fools aren’t fit to take us up the street, let alone to Khul in this rickety old tub.” She turned on her heel, marching away when the laughter ceased.

Puzzled

She sat down next to the former barbarian, his hair and attire neater than she had ever seen it. "So what of you, old friend?" she asked. "Business booming for you too?" "Oh aye," Ithanor said. "As if I wasn't busy enough with the repairs and upgrades on the town, they've got me drafted in building a host of new homes. All these new bodies want places to live." "That's excellent news." "Oh and," Ithanor said with a shy smile. "Roderick’s not the only one with a new addition to his life." "Oh?" Alexis gave a puzzled smile. "Yeah. I, ah, managed to find myself a wife as well. Very soon after you left actually. Her name is Maeve, and we’re expecting a child, late spring of next year." Ithanor fiddled with his tankard. "I’ve got us a cottage close to the northeast wall, if you ever want to pop on over."

Succinct (Terse)

It wasn’t until evening chow when the winds picked up, large globs of rain hammering into the deck and soaking through anyone foolish enough to not have an oilcloth. When Richard stood to offer a hand, Bloodbeard held out a hand, saying, "I do thank ye for yer help, these past weeks, and by the end of the voyage we'll have made crewmen of you, I’m sure. But for now, let my boys work. Go down to yer cabins, and kindly stay until the all clear’s been given." With a terse nod, Richard led the way below, the First Mate's orders receding as they did.

Weather

Eventually, Bloodbeard came below, his hat drooping with the weight of water and his beard hanging in a sodden mess as he put his head around the door of the larger cabin which they’d stuffed themselves into. "Ah, you’re all here. Good, good. We seem to be having a wee bit of a storm, lads and lassies. But ‘tis nought to worry about – this ol’ girl’s weathered her share of rough seas.” He patted the bulkhead. “It’ll just get a bit bumpy at times. If you could remain here for the time being, that’d be grand. Can’t be having you lubbers out on deck, under me crew’s feet while they try to save her…” Bloodbeard’s eyes darted, and he forced out a chuckle. “Or risk ye being swept off to the briny deep, eh?”

➤ @sleepyowlwrites

Settle

The dragon clapped its paws again. "One moment then, please." It stood on its hind legs, squeezing its eyes tightly shut. The sand around it kicked up in a sudden twisting wind, knocking Alexis over as the others coughed and struggled to shield their faces. The wind died as suddenly as it came, dust settling around a handsome man with golden-tanned skin in the clothes of a travelling merchant. Alexis blinked and Kypris winked at her, his eyes – slitted like a cat – flashed with copper flecks. "Neat trick," said Victor appraisingly.

Sideways (Open-sided)

"Thank you," she said. "We should find someplace to sit and study this thing… Wait a sec." Alexis stopped, looking around with a frown. "Where the hell did Bastet and Victor go?" Richard glanced around, a hand shading his eyes. "There." He pointed to where a group of people congregated around a low table. On dusty cushions sat Victor on one side, his competitor – a dark-skinned elf – on the other. On the table were a set of bone tiles and a large stack of cash. Victor, in his bright robes, was frowning down at his hand, while Bastet stood behind him, hands on his shoulders, cheering him on. "They appear to be playing a game.” Alexis squinted up at Richard. “For money." "Yes, thank you. I know what gambling is. They can use their money however they wish." "They’re probably cheating." Richard pursed his lips and huffed. “Be that as it may, the fate of the world takes precedence over the immoral actions of our friends.” He gestured to an open-sided tent. “Let’s get something to eat while we look at the map.” They took a seat under the awning within sight of the gambling table, and a waitress brought them a tray of hard cheeses, nuts and cured meats. ”I assume you know how to use the map to find the temple?” Richard asked. “If the map is good, then yes, easily," Alexis said.

Sound

Outside, the day was warming up quickly. The four of them wandered through the tented village in search of a marketplace. It wasn’t hard, following the sounds of hawkers and hagglers, to reach the center of the oasis and the packed market. Narrow lanes bordered with awnings and tents, were filled with people and livestock, braying and hollering. Trestles covered in a dazzling array of food and goods, bright fabrics – soft, diaphanous, silky – dangling from racks, piles of skin and fleeces. The smell was incredible: sizzling meats, perfumed flowers, woody spices, offal and dung. Bright fruits alongside mounds of powders in umber and terracotta. Weapons and clothes and scents Alexis could never have dreamed of in a million years, sold by people of all creeds, their dialects and languages swarming into one joyous conglomeration. It was like nothing she’d ever seen before. Alexis trailed along behind the others, dipping fingers into pots of spice to smell the strange new smells, running her eyes over glittering treasures, laughing and playfully batting away the small children who thrust trinkets and flowers at her.

A lull in the tumult of sounds made her pause. Something like a whisper, a gut-feel, a tickle on the back of her neck made her look back at the stall she’d just passed. Under a lean-to awning of red and yellow were stacks of chests, some open with the papers inside spilling out. "Guys?" Up ahead Richard looked back to see Alexis wandering back to a stall of some wordsmith. “Victor, Bastet! Alexis has found something,” Richard called out, with a huff adding, “I suppose her ‘treasure sense’ is tingling.” Richard returned to her side, as Alexis was scanning the stall. Crackling stacks of papyrus, held down by painted stones, and rolls of parchment lay across the stall’s table. Idly, she picked up one of the rolls, peeking at its contents – a map, of some kind.

Spacious (Space)

Alexis reached out to place a hand on her shoulder, but Bastet shrugged her off. "It’s okay," Alexis said. “You tried, at least.” "When we get out of here," Bastet hissed at her. "That one is mine." Alexis backed away to give her some space and went to find the elven woman. "Nassurae," Alexis said “Yes, sá itil?” "I don’t know night from day down here, but I’m told you do. If my friends and I are to free everyone, I need to be awake three hours before the guards come to take us back down the mines. Do you think, if I sleep now, you’ll be able to wake me on time?" Nassurae looked thoughtfully at the other elven women in the cell. Each nodded, gripping hands, their eyes alight with hope. “Yes,” Nassurae said. "We can accomplish this. We will take shifts and wake you when it is time." “Thank you. I’ll rest now.” Alexis glanced at Bastet. “I would recommend leaving my companion for now. She’ll sleep when she’s able, and I’ll rouse her when it’s time.” "Quiet dreams, eshen," Nassurae said, as Alexis lay down and closed her eyes.

Supposedly

CW Racial slur - black american

A rustle came from behind them, causing the group to turn. Richard and Ithanor drew their blades as a human and a black-skinned elf emerged from the scrub. "Who are you?" Ithanor demanded, levelling his blade at the newcomers. "Umm, hi?" said the drow. "Well?" Nathardrin said. The human stepped forward, brushing down his shabby robes. "My name is Victor, with a monocle. It seems we both have had the same idea: to sneak into Firetop Mountain and destroy the evil Zagor who lurks within." "And what are you supposed to be?" asked Richard pointing at the drow. "Some kind of pointy-ear coon?" The drow straightened, shoulders pulling back as she looked down her nose at Richard. "My name is Bastet," she said coldly. "Despite your manners, I, and my comrade here, wish to assist you with your venture into the fortress to defeat Zagor." "Oh really?" Alexis said. "Yazty-" She turned back to where the wizard had been standing, only to find the patch of rocky grass empty. "Oh. Well, I hope one of you’s a spell-slinger." "Indeed, little one. I am the mighty Victor with a Monocle!" said Victor, swaying a little. "I will astound you with great acts of wizardry and maybe even set alight to some things." "And I am a fighter of great renown," said the drow. Those from the militia shared dubious looks. "Well, there’s not much point us standing around debating it," said Nathardrin. "We may as well get on with this."

Sweep

(edited the word out for better prose)

As the stablehand led their mounts out, Victor slipped him a silver. "We were never here, okay?" he said. Wide-eyed, the boy nodded, grasping his broom and vanishing into the stalls to send out little puffs of straw dust.

➤ @drabbleitout

Accept

Soon enough their packs were ready and armour had been donned, and now they stood in the blustery morning, the dirt of the courtyard underfoot. To one side their mounts stood patiently, as Hengar ran through the lists of evils they may face: Goblins, orcs. A bugbear, if they were unlucky. While Alexis listened with half an ear, she studied the mounts with concern, and when the captain was finished, raised her hand. "Yes?" asked Hengar. "Sorry, Captain. None of those mounts are short enough for me to ride." "Do not worry, little one," Yaztromo said, coming from the door of the Town Hall, tugging on riding gloves. "We shan’t make you walk. You’re to ride with me, if that’s acceptable?" "Oh." Alexis flushed and dipped her head. "I’d be honoured." Hengar tilted his head at Yaztromo, his eyebrows raised. Yaztromo replied with an allowing flourish of his hand.

Bark (growl)

"What did you find?" Ithanor asked. Quickly, Alexis outlined the layout of the fort, the two sets of stairs, and the pattern of the patrolling goblins. "We should take them out," Richard said. "Are you stupid?" Alexis growled. "What part of 'stealth reconnaissance' did you not understand?" Richard blinked. "Uhhh…" Alexis could see on his face that he didn’t understand, but before she could snap the answer, Ithanor beat her to it. "It means we go sneaky-sneaky-sneaky," he said, pantomiming a person stepping carefully. "We can’t take them out because it’ll make too much noise, and risk them raising the alarm. We just have to be like little mice, trying to steal grain." "Oooh," Richard said, in a rising tone of understanding.

Borrow (scrounge)

Alexis rose closer to noon than she would have liked, rolling out of bed with a series of groans. Her head felt ten times heavier than usual, and her mouth was as dry as pound cake. Aside from the snoring of the night watch, the barracks were empty. Victor, she supposed, was still in the pub, but where Bastet and Richard were she had no idea. By the neat folds, Richard would have risen early. Bastet, on the other hand, might have woken just before Alexis by the state of her bed, or been just as hungover. After dunking her head into the water ewer, Alexis wandered down to the mess hall to see if she could scrounge up something to eat.

Dry

CW Blood

Zagor was sitting in a chair by his desk on the far side of the room. He smirked at them as they entered and fanned out. "So. You’ve come back for more?" he asked, his voice the rasp of two dry sticks being rubbed together. Slowly the lich unfolded himself from his chair, as Victor darted around to fire off a Magic Missile. Zagor’s robe singed, but the creature inside remained unharmed. While Richard and Ithanor charged in, Alexis and Bastet took up flanking manoeuvres. The battle was arduous, but between the five of them, they whittled the lich down until finally, the pale creature lay deformed in a pool of its own black blood.

Fine

Slowly the group made their way down to the ground floor, exiting through the now open front gate and into the fort’s courtyard. "Yaszty!" Alexis cried, spotting the wizard perched on the back of a wagon. She hurried over to him, the others trailing behind. "I am fine, little one," he said, raising a tired hand. "I assume you were successful?" Alexis nodded. "Yep, we got that bastard and his phylactery. Is Lieutenant Nazaretian around? We should report our success to him." Yaztromo hung his head, letting his shoulders slump. "Sadly, the Lieutenant perished in the battle, taken out by an uncannily well-aimed goblin arrow. The men here have nearly finished their clean-up efforts, so I shall be returning with them to Toreguard soon. I shall convey our success to Captain Hengar on my return.” He cast an eye over the group, taking in their dented armour and bloody scars. “You should take some time to rest before returning. Now the Firetop is free, there is no rush.”

Large

"It doesn’t look like they managed to crack the combination," Marag said, running her hands over the outside of the vault. "Good ol’dwarven engineering, that. Everything inside should still be there, then." With that, she began to finagle the door mechanism, until, with a soft noise like a sigh, it opened. Marag pulled open the door, and Alexis’ jaw dropped. The walls of the vault were lined with gold and platinum ingots. The floor was filled with chests, weapons racks and armour stands, upon which hung the most beautiful items – plates of pale, glistening, silvery metal; bladed hilts crafted with tiny jewels; crossbows engraved with strange runes. Magar stepped into the room, gesturing for the group to follow her. With no regard for the horde of treasures, she went to a chest pressed against the left wall and threw open the lid. Inside, nestled in neat rows on trays, were hundreds of gemstones. Maga scooped up a handful, and moving through the group, doled out a large ruby to each. "I hope this will be compensation enough f’helping us. And as advanced payment for taking out that velskkus, feel free to choose an item that’ll help you in your coming fight."

Mercy

"And how much will this map and information cost us?" she said, squinting. "Ah ha! I see the little miss is shrewd, as well as beautiful," Hassan said with a wink, and without breaking stride, added, "Three hundred gold pieces." Alexis gave him a flat look. "Fifty" "Fifty! No no, I can not go lower than two hundred, seventy-five." "One hundred, and you throw in a compass." She cast her eyes over the pile of treasures. A beautiful curved dagger with a jewelled hilt caught her eye. "And this." "All for one hundred golden bits? No no! Lady, you are crazy. That dagger is five hundred gold alone. Two hundred and twenty-five, and that is like cutting my own throat." "Please," Alexis scoffed. "That dagger is thirty at most. You think I can’t spot coloured glass just because the sun’s brighter here? Two hundred and twenty-five for the map, information, the compass and dagger, and one misdirect should anyone ask about us or our destination. Agreed?" Hassan threw up his hands. "Gods have mercy on me! Beautiful, shrewd and cruel, tsh." He shook her hand. "It is agreed."

New

Twilight was falling, the sky banded with pastel rainbow shades, as Alexis returned from the market with her haul of fresh supplies. As she walked along the dirt track towards the pub chomping on a newly harvested apple, she passed a pair of elders gossiping over a fence about some scandal from a few villages over. She slowed down to listen in as one of them complained about the reign of terror from a monstrous elf who claimed to be a paladin. Back at the inn, Alexis knocked on the gent’s door. “Heads up,” Alexis said, tossing him an apple. Richard glanced up from where he was trying to buff out the dents in his armour and caught it with one hand. “Ah, we haven’t had apples in ages.” He sniffed the skin. “Makes me feel a little homesick. How was the market?” he asked, placing the apple aside and returning to his armour. “About that,” Alexis began. Richard’s head shot up. “No, not the market. The market was fine. I got everything we needed. I meant, um. The village you’re from. What was it called again?” “High Creek. Why?” Alexis bit her lip. “Um.” Richard’s brown eyes creased in concern and he set aside his work. “Alexis?”

Peel (skins)

"Hey," Bastet said, calling her back to reality. "I think there's someone in here." Alexis looked over to see Bastet peering through the bars of the cell door. "Hello?" Bastet called through them. From the other side of the door came a blistering string of curses in a harsh language. "Whaddaya dirty green-skins want with me now?" the voice said in common. "I think it is a dwarf," Bastet said, glancing at Alexis. "Whaddaya mean, ye think it be a dwarf?" asked the voice mockingly. "I most definitely am a dwarf, ye lousy stinkers." Alexis shrugged at Bastet. "Sounds like a dwarf, yeah." "You can pick locks, right?" Bastet asked. "Yes. You go get the others, and I will let the very angry dwarf out of his nasty cell." "'His'! I'm very much a ‘her’, ye cretin." Bastet tilted her head. Alexis nodded, making shooing motions. Baset shrugged. "That’s right," the angry female dwarf called, as Bastet hurried off to find their comrades. "You’d better run, ya mangey beskur!" "Hey, enough with the name-calling," Alexis said, looking up from her investigation of the lock. "You keep that up, and you can stay in there." "Och! Now I’ve heard everything. Yon gobbo thinks keeping me in here’s a threat!" "I’m not a gobbo. I’m eshen." "What’s that?" Alexis sighed, spitting the word. "A woodling." "A woodling? Tch! Can’t be. Woodlings never come out the Darkwood." "Well, this one did. Now will you please be quiet so I can concentrate."

Work

Tentatively, Ithanor moved forward, placing a hand on a tall warhammer. As if that was their signal, the others moved forward, selecting what they wanted. Richard selected a suit of plate mail, Nathardin a recurve bow, and new swords each for Bastet and Victor. "Excuse me," Alexis said as Marag was finishing up with Victor. "I don’t see anything smaller than dwarf-size…" "Ah, now, let’s see. What’re you after, hen? A weapon or armour?" "Armour, if possible?" Maga squinted thoughtfully. "Aye, aye. I’ve got just the thing for a quarter-pint. A masterwork project it is, and a bit of an experimentation for the crafter. I doubt he ever thought it’d be worn." Marag chuckled, pulling from a chest a beautiful set of supple black leather armour, studded with that pale, glimmering metal. "Aye, this should see you right well, hen." Quickly Alexis changed. The armour fit like it was made for her. She grinned at Marag. "Thank you."

[akamaru01]

Akamaru's Guide To Being Your Very Own Clip Queen On Twitch

I've been making a ton of clips on twitch in the last year or so and I have learned a lot so it's time to share what I've learned!

1: The total length of time grabbed when you hit the clip button is 90 seconds. Keep in mind the end of the clippable time is actually a couple seconds AFTER you hit the clip button, whether live or in VOD.

2: Clips max out at 60 seconds, and have a minimum of 5 seconds. Sometimes if you try to publish a 60 second clip it'll give an error, so just trim a fraction of a second off the beginning or end.

3: If the clip page video freezes, or doesn't show the timeline properly, refresh the page instead of closing and hitting the clip button again. This saves the 90 seconds you were working with, and hitting the clip button will make a brand new clip while the old one is saved as a default. That said, sometimes it will break and not even be saved with default settings, so just be weary.

4: Moving the play head for the start of a clip will restart the clip video, but moving the ending will not. However, if the clip is playing, moving the end to where the current time is will end the clip and loop it as normal even while still holding the play head.

5: If clipping live, be fast or else you'll lose the moment. Once 90 seconds pass it's gone. However, if a bit is going long, try to hold out as long as you think you can to catch as much of it as you want, assuming it fits within a 60 second time frame.

6: Also for clipping live, you don't have to edit the clip immediately. The tab will keep it available for some time before it saves the default settings and trying to save edits won't work. This allows you to wait for a quiet moment to quickly edit the clip if you don't want to look away from the stream too much. Unfortunately, I don't know what that time limit is

7: When live, if you're editing while still listening/watching the stream, i recommend lightly turning down the volume of one or the other so you can distinguish what is live and what is clip.

8: When clipping from a VOD, you can always pause before hitting the clip button, or even go backwards so you know exactly what you want in the clip.

9: Titles can be whatever you want, though keep in mind Twitch has a filter for a lot of swear words and other "vulgar" words. This can be easily bypassed with * or a space or a - or a number.

10: I always try and make titles of clips funny and accurate. This can be a direct repeat of some of what's being said, or as if responding to the situation, or anything really. Titles can also be changed later on by going to your personal Creator Dashboard > Content > Clips > Clip's I've Created. The url is https://dashboard.twitch.tv/u/[YourUsername]/content/clips. Here you can also see every clip you've made, the channel, category, when it was made, and view count. You can delete and share them from this page too.

11: When making a clip, try and allow a brief bit of quiet at the beginning and end. This ensures it won't start or end jarringly. Unless you're going for something jarring, but that's up to personal taste and context.

12: If you think it's funny, if you want it clipped, CLIP IT. Don't worry too much about what you think other people will enjoy. Just have fun with it.

13: Keep in mind a streamers rules and preferences in regards to clips. Some embrace out of context quotes, and others will find them less favorable, so keep this mind. Streamers and their editors can delete clips made in their channel as they please, but not rename them.

[dpreacherman]

"Unlock the Power of Done For You SEO, Drive Massive Traffic" with DFY SUITE 5.0

There is no need to install any software or undergo extensive training. It is designed to be accessible to users of all skill levels, even those without previous SEO knowledge or experience.😋😋

DFY Suite 5.0 provides a comprehensive range of features to boost your online presence.

👉CLICK HERE TO GET A DISCOUNT OF DFY SUITE 5.0 +MY SPEACIAL EXCLUSIVE BONUSES

What are the key incentives for making an immediate purchase of the "Done For You" SEO ranking and leads generation service?

Why should you buy it Right Now?

DFY Suite Is The Powerful, Done-For-You, Social-Syndication System That Allows You To Dominate Google AND Youtube Without Doing Any OF The Work Yourself!

DFY Suite will allow you to Get FREE, Targeted BUYER-Traffic In 48 Hours Or Less By Leveraging The Power Of High-Quality Social Syndication With their NEW, Done-For-YOU System!

With DFY Suite:

✅You can submit ANY Url. It can be a video, a niche site, an Amazon page, an eCommerce store, ANYTHING!

✅It’s 100% Done-For-You so ZERO work is required on your part once you submit your keywords and URL

✅You can schedule how FAST or how SLOW you want your syndication to be done

✅You can supply the content if you’d like (this is 100% optional)

✅You can let our system generate the content for your campaigns FOR YOU

✅You’ll have FULL access to your syndication report once it’s been completed... 

✅And much much more...

And right now you can get everything for a surprisingly low one-time cost. So this is the perfect time to grab a copy. Plus you are getting our special trainings and softwares as Bonuses.

👉CLICK HERE TO GET A DISCOUNT OF DFY SUITE 5.0 +MY SPEACIAL EXCLUSIVE BONUSES

Don’t Miss the Opportunity, You May Never Get Another Chance!! Grab this opportunity!!DFY SUITE 5.0

Frequently Asked Questions:-

Q. Is there any software to download?

No. this is a 100%, done-for-you service where we do ALL the work for you. All you have to do is submit your URL and keywords.

Q. How Do The Credits Work?

Simple, 1 credit = 1 Backlink. You choose how many links to send to each url that you submit with a maximum of 200 links with the Pro license and 500 if you upgrade to our Agency+ level. With 5,000 credits you can send 100 backlinks to 50 (yes, FIFTY) different videos, niche sites etc.

Q. Do I have to pay for Proxies or Captchas?

Absolutely NOT! The reason we made this system was so you don’t have to worry about ANYTHING! Just submit your info and we take it from there.

Q. Are there any Upgrade offers/OTO’s?

Yes, we have 4.

Upgrade #1: Lock-in your discounted rate for monthly credits.

Here you’ll have the ability to lock-in your discounted rate you just got and ensure you have credits every single month. If you wait till later, credits will be a LOT more expensive. $1 Trial for 30 days then $47/m. You'll also be getting a BONUS of 2,500 credits EACH month AND INCREASING the # of links you can send to each url from 200 up to 500! In total, you'll be getting 7,500 credits EVERY month!

Upgrade #2: DFY Indexer Platform

Here you will be able to supercharge your campaigns by unlocking our DFY Indexer system so that your campaigns get put through our proprietary link indexer so that your syndication carries a MUCH stronger punch. Every seo marketer knows the power of getting links indexed. The more of your syndication that Google is able to be aware of, the stronger your campaigns will be. $67 one-time payment.

Upgrade #3: Special Offer for MyVideoSpy

My Video Spy is our powerful platform that allows you to uncover untapped niches, analyze your competitors, accurately gauge how much traffic you can get from your target niches, and much much more! It’s the PERFECT fit so you can complete the ENTIRE Page-1 traffic circle. $47/quarter

Upgrade #4: Access to Video Chief

Video Chief is our membership site of over 1200 done-for-you videos that you can use right away to start securing page 1 video rankings. We’ll be removing the need for you to create videos by doing it for you as well! With this upsell, we cover ALL the bases! Syndication, niche research and video creation. $47 one-time.

>>>>👉CLICK HERE TO GET A DISCOUNT OF DFY SUITE 5.0 +MY SPEACIAL EXCLUSIVE BONUSES<<<<<

The only risk you face is missing out on DFY Suite...

And kissing ALL of the easy page 1 rankings that can result in sales,

new clients, and new subscribers, GOODBYE

Don’t risk that. Don’t let your websites and videos go stale and produce ZERO results.

Don’t bother putting in effort and energy into new niche sites and videos that will never get all the views and social traction they deserve.

Give DFY Suite a try instead – and prepare to be very impressed and happy