#it's gonna become so fun once i write down all the lore

[westanleovaldito]

I'm bored in a new house, and I really miss my campaign buddies so heres

Spencer Reid vs. Dungeons And Dragons

He's very hesitant at first. He doesn't have a lot of (any) people to play with that he's comfortable with.

But when you look at him with those hopeful puppy eyes and that pleading smile- he decides that he'll just play with your friends.

It's clunky, and he's trying very hard to get into character (a lawful neutral elven sorcerer with an entire backstory you helped with),

But its actually.... fun?

He understands the systems, he memorized his spells and add ons- even some if the other players things!

And the group loves him! He needs time to get out of his shell, but he always brings a snack for everyone when he goes to the kitchen.

If you're DM, he asks you not to go easy on him

"To prevent the others thinking you're biased!"

It's so funny to bully his character for the sake of it. If he's not making death saving rolls twice a session, you're doing it WRONG

At some point he gets the roleplay aspect of it down, but it takes time.

And if you arent DM, he'd try to protect your character.

I feel like if the campaign decides to just fuck around, he'd ask the DM if he could pick flowers for your character

Also, the group teases yall and thinks you guys are cute (which you are).

He always sits next to you, links your pinkies under the table, whispers comments or plans to you.

And if you think he isnt gonna give the group advice on what to do, you are sorely mistaken. It ends up becomming a full council meeting to decide where yall go.

"No- the man at the tavern said that there were conflicts with the druids-"

"But is that more important than saving the kidnapped dragon born? Statistically-"

"Spencer, we know it's your job but you need to let loose!"

Obviously, he can't make it all the time, with cases and everything, so he asked the DM to work all his absences into his character. He ends up a travelling scholar who sells books and holds lectures in the new towns.

Overall, I think he'd have a great time. By the end of the campaign, he's laughing and making jokes, even accepting a few hugs as you and him leave together.

"So... that's not all of it, right?"

"There are other campaigns- we might decide to continue the story, or start a new one. Izzy said something about pirates next time, i think"

"...could i... could i join?"

Edit: Oopsies, forgot to add what Spencer would be like as a DM.

Dungeon master Reid incoming

Once he decides he really likes it, he goes to the next step.

He asked the old DM for advice and they told him to use one of the campaigns made by other people online.

Que a passionate rant to you about how people need to build their own worlds for the sake of creativity, originality, this is what old literature writers would have wanted, why would you short cut such a wonderful bonding experience, etc.

So he does it the hard way.

Or the hardcover way, and he writes notebooks and notebooks of story and plot and new creatures, races, people, magic, a whole entire series's worth of lore.

He works on it on the jet home, on breaks- basically, if he would be reading, he's now writting.

He puts his whole soul into it.

He has one of the other members host, and he feels bad for always cancelling. (Every time he canceled, he promised the group a plotpoint of their choice)

I feel like he would get a spray bottle for anyone off focus, sometimes having to spray himself.

Ngl he is VERY engaging. This is where we get the birth of his teaching personality.

He'd also end up with Garcia in the group and she keeps begging him to do a cyberpunk universe. (He sticks to fantasy, closest he'll go is steampunk.)

He beats up your character, too, because it prevents question of bias.

But he lets you add a few things without their knowledge.

Overall, I think Spencer likes DND. Thank you for comming to my ted talk

[ajastu]

this is a blog made specifically so i can ramble, so time for another one. Been thinking on n off about the concept of a new game in a beloved franchise letting you down in some way, and when expressing that disappointment crosses a certain line.

Like, from personal experience: i was disappointed by dishonored 2. i swear this has something to do with dragon age, bear with me for a moment. The plot fell flat for me, the trailer basically tells you everything that happens in the game, and it really pales in comparison to the way the narrative was crafted in the first game.

HOWEVER, no matter how much of an essay i could write about the shortcomings i, personally, see with dh2, i can still acknowledge that it was a solid fucking game, with care taken in the production of it, and that a lot of people loved it for the exact things that disappointed me, and they are not in the wrong for it.

this got long, unsurprisingly, so the rest ill put behind a read-more 👍

Whenever i talk about what i think could have been done better in the sequel, it is more of a....thought exercise. Because the fact is, we're never getting the dh2 i really wanted, and so there is no need to get upset or frustrated about it. Might as well have fun analyzing it n getting to the core of what it is exactly that felt off, but not in an angry way? more like....having a fun discussion with a friend. pulling a puzzle apart kinda deal. make it Productive, and not just a feedback loop of negative feelings. Find good things in it, even.

So, when i still see people foaming-at-the-mouth mad about veilguard, im not gonna lie, i feel kind of concerned about the mental well-being of some of them.

The fact is. Veilguard is a solid fucking game. Just, objectively speaking. The level design is (to me, at least) intuitive and fun to explore, it does not feel like a slog (looking at you, dai. that one's open world design gave me the most mind-numbingly boring fever dream once), the battle mechanic doesn't make me want to download a 'skip combat' mod, the faction mechanic is fun and closer to the spirit of dao that dai was*, the plot is coherent and has a Theme, and, despite what people like to say, the lore reveals make sense and are consistent with the previous lore in the series 🤷‍♂️. I genuinely do believe that the whole blight origin thing was already thought out before dao came out. thats just how worldbuilding works, usually.

I have a ranking of the DA games in my head, based on how much i liked them. Before datv, it was as follows:

dao (a game of its time, but one i love immensely)

da2

dai (its decent enough, but it never really grabbed me like the other two)

I expected datv to take 4th place. As it currently stands, it might just share the first place with dao, for me personally.

I remember exactly the moment when it clicked for me that playing datv felt like playing dao (it was the first blackthorne mission). And that moment was very special to me. It is also, perhaps, the only game in the series which really actually made me lose my entire mind during certain story missions, but that one might just be because i saw no spoilers before going in.

It is also so so so important to me because of the way they handled the trans and specifically nonbinary representation.

It might not have been exactly what people wanted, but no game will please every single person. like, i am sure that some people dislike the game for exactly the reasons i like it. And the thing is, neither of us is in the wrong. It all comes down to expectations, and how people handle it when something does not meet theirs.

When i went into dh2, it was after a several years long wait for a sequel. I was so excited! I built up this idea of what the game would be like, and i looked forward to seeing it become real. I had Expectations! And the game did not meet most of them. It does not mean it was a bad game. It was just not what i was expecting. I could sit here and pick at it until i start despising it, but that would be a disservice both to me and to the people who put their time and passion into making it.

Before datv's release, my expectations were as low as they could possibly be (because dai is my least fav game in the series, so i was wary about the next one, and because ive heard of the development hell and the fact they were planning to add micro-transactions to the game at some point etc etc). And i do acknowledge that this played a part in how much i ended up enjoying the game. I gave it a chance while not expecting anything, and it let me see it for what it is: a solid fucking game. a good one, even.

I can absolutely see how someone with certain expectation for da4 could be disappointed by the game not addressing the things they wanted to see addressed, or addressing them in a way they don't agree with. I've been there, even! And the fact that i personally liked datv doesn't mean other people can't or shouldn't criticize it.

The difference here lies in where exactly that criticism comes from, and what it hopes to accomplish, and whether or not at some point it becomes more harmful than useful.

When caught up in the spiral of disappointment, it is important to stop and think about whether this is productive. whether this is contributing something to your life. I am no stranger to chewing a bone**. in fact, i am very predisposed to it. Which is exactly why i make an effort to reflect on whether or not it is worth it.

Because, at the end of the day, no matter how much criticism is being put out into the world about datv, or dh2, or what have you, the simple fact remains: it won't change anything about the game that got released. The effort and emotional turmoil is, ultimately, wasted. It is always better to turn that passion into something productive: fanworks, or an essay (in good faith!) that analyzes your own feelings on the topic and what you would want to see differently, or a whole another game/piece of media entirely. It is important to stop coming from a place of vitriol and hatred, because that will burn you out and leave you feeling worse. You have to make a choice to choose joy in your life.

When you see someone enjoying a game you didn't like, and your first reaction is seething hatred and/or a desire to send death threats, you have to ask yourself: is this really worth it?

You're not going to convince people to stop liking a game. Frankly, why would you Want to do that? What will it accomplish in your life? What will it contribute? In the grand scheme of things, a crusade like that is a very foolish thing to burn yourself out over. Put the bone down, and go get a proper meal 🤷‍♂️

________________________________________________

*i dont think that, with the state the current game industry is in, we will ever get another game with a similar bg mechanic like origins had. too many resources needed for that. but the factions are as close as it gets, in my personal opinion

**meaning, fixating on a topic, especially one that causes some kind of negative emotion

[beecreeper]

Durges asks - #23 & #12 (and if you don’t have many thoughts on what actually happened to the physical prayer for forgiveness, any thoughts on at what point in their story they actually sat down and wrote it? (Like, did anything big happen that caused them to write it, or was this just their typical daily diary entry to dad?))

Jesus christ I skipped lunch and wrote 1200 words (positive)

Under the cut!

How exactly does losing Bhaal’s essence impact a being created by him? We holding up well or barely scraping by?

Briar feels so so empty without Bhaal. I’ve said this before but she becomes that stereotype of someone on bad mood stabilizers. Her urge gave her huge spikes of adrenaline whenever she felt angry or excited. Without that extreme heightening, all her normal emotions feel like nothing. Being angry doesn’t feel FUN anymore. There isn’t any BITE to it. No RUSH to it. It just feels uncomfortable. She also spent a long time avoiding any emotions more complex than “fuck you I’m gonna kill you” or “fuck yeah I’m gonna kill you” and she straight up. Does not know how to feel them.

On a completely different hand, though, her spore magic immediately gets stronger! This is represented visually by her tattoos, originally a pale green and imbued with spore magic and turned red by Bhaal as he kinda “overrides” her druid connection. Briar’s druid magic was powered by the cycle of life *and* death, but Bhaal stepped in and was like “actually only the death part” as much as possible, so Briar’s magic was working at practically half capacity this whole time. When she loses Bhaal’s essence, it’s like a blockage being cleared. Not that hollowed-out-no-purpose-no-emotions Briar *cares* about reconnecting with her druid powers, but it is something that she can access in the final Netherbrain fight. I also think the longer she’s without Bhaal, she starts to slooooooowly slooowly come around to it. Like oh shit maybe there actually is a point to all this life stuff.

Without Bhaal, Ferox feels clear headed for the first time in his entire life. However it also feels empty. Like. Too wide. Too open. It’s a highly unfamiliar sensation and there’s a kinda kneejerk aversion to it. He’s used to spending so much mental and even physical energy into fighting the urges that there’s definitely some growing pains as he relearns how to navigate his brain now that he’s his own person. He gets a little more spacy and more randomly anxious for a while. From a physical standpoint, he loses his ability to barbarian rage. When he had Bhaal in his brain, the blind furious bloodlust combined with his natural inclination as observant combined with some divine murder mojo enhancing senses and reaction times would make him both efficient and ruthless in battle. Without Bhaal, he also has to relearn how to fight a little bit, his mind not as fast or as sharp without the urge directing it. Though I think once he does get back into the swing of things, he becomes even more tactical than before.

What happened to the prayer of forgiveness? Is it stored in a lil chest somewhere in their new home? Did it get burned? Did it get buried? What’s going on here?

AH YAY PRAYER OF FORGIVENESS DRAMA. Gonna give you ALL the lore. Sorry this is gonna get LONG.

Briar wrote the prayer of forgiveness, like, less than a week before she got got by Orin. Despite actively being obsessed with Gortash for like. Their entire alliance. She was *not* admitting that to herself even in the privacy of her own head. Up until then, she was always ALWAYS perceiving him as a game. Or a tool. She was always 100% planning on murdering him, with the plan changing from “when I feel like it” to “when he’s no longer useful” to “after we have control”, but it was always in the plan.

So when one day she suddenly has the thought that she *doesn’t* want to kill him, it completely fucks her up. She hasn’t let herself “not want to kill someone” since arguably her druid circle when she was forced delighted to kill literally everyone she knew. And none of those even hit as hard as this because with her circle she wasn’t really *friends* with any of them. Like she didn’t want to kill them because she didn’t want to be alone but she didn’t really care about any of them personally? Like, she cared about the *concept* of her circle, about being in a group, but not about the individual people. But with Gortash?? One day she imagines killing him, like she’s done literally thousands of times before, but this time she feels fucking sad??? She feels like she would be sad if he was dead. This straight up makes Briar SPIRAL. She avoids him and fucks off to Moonrise towers without a word, writing the prayer and doing a bunch of manic shit to try and make herself stop thinking about the one (1) human emotion she felt for another human being.

ANYWAY when post-tadpole Briar comes across the Prayer under moonrise, she is hit with an immediate, overpowering, visceral gut reaction. It’s been common, ESPECIALLY in and around Moonrise, for Briar to experience like. body memories that have no context attached them. She just feels stuff but can’t place an actual reason onto why because her brain is full of holes (something that she hates hates hates because it makes her feel broken and vulnerable). She immediately understands that this is something that *she* wrote and that it means something but also that every fiber of her being is telling her to destroy this letter immediately and never think about it ever again ever. She doesn't even read it. I think she gets about to “cannot help” before she lights it on fire. Like, both because the buried memory part of her wants it gone, but also because she hates the sensation of being so intensely confronted with the holes in her memory like that.

Ferox wrote the Prayer for Forgiveness much sooner in his timeline. His feelings for Gortash built gradually but steadily in spite of him constantly trying to pull away, with what happened the *last* time he cared about someone always on his mind (rip Myrala). The Prayer was part of this process, with Ferox trying to convince both his father and himself that “no for real I don’t really care about him *please* don’t make me kill him I promise I’ll kill him at the end I promise I promise”. I definitely think there was more than one letter written in this vein, though I’m sure those were lost entirely.

When Ferox finds the Prayer under Moonrise, he kinda glosses over the parts about Gortash. Like yeah name gives him that same sorta body memory missing piece sensation as Briar, but it’s not as intense and it’s the rest of the letter that he ends up fixating on. Ferox gets REAL fucked up reading, in his own hand, that he was promising to slaughter the entire world AND that he's involved in the whole Absolute plot. To post-tadpole Ferox the Prayer is less important for the implications about his relationships with the other chosen than it is as a flashing neon sign that says YOU WERE EXACTLY THE MONSTER YOU FEARED YOU WERE. IN FACT IT’S EVEN WORSE.

Ferox keeps it because if there’s one thing this guy loves it’s fixating on things to feel guilty about. Then when he meets Gortash and the nearest and dearest revelations come out, he revisits the letter with new eyes. It confirms to him at least that Gortash must be being honest about them. Tho I will admit that my ideas for Ferox’s act 3 are still kinda vague and conceptual since I haven’t played through it yet. Like, I mostly know the broad strokes I want but sometimes you just gotta FEEL it in the moment, ya know?

I think, ultimately, he probably gets rid of it after he forsakes Bhaal. As part of forgiving himself for the things he did as a Bhaalist, he has to physically let go of his need for forgiveness from Bhaal, that part of him that was so deep in it that defiance wasn't even an option, only supplication.

[dumbistsmartass]

saying something about every hatchetfield production

spoilers, some nonsense, zero consistency with what I talk about, hurriedly written text, and back Cinderella’s Castle, QUICKLY, the kickstarter ends on May 4th. Also I mostly won’t be talking about the message to take away from all of them because I plan to make that another post.

TGWDLM: the catalyst of it all, it set up many fan favorite characters. Also my personal interpretation is that the musical we watch is actually happening in canon and is being put on by Pokky/Paul. Also how much of someone’s personality remain after infection?

Black Friday: it does pretty good as our first (true) intro to the LiBs it works very well. We get more General Macnmara who quickly becomes one of my favs. It also adds a lot of my other favs to the Hatchetverse, Hanna, Lex, Ethan, and Tom

NPMD: probably my favorite of the mainline musicals. I really hate Dirty Girl tho. The musical version of Hatchet Town is better than the OST version. The characters all have really good chemistry. I love Grace as a warning about the consequences of using religion as a fear tactic, when she sinned and wasn’t instantly punished for it she decided to take matters into her own hands and became a bloodthirsty maniac. The fact we got so close to a good ending if Max hadn’t fallen is darkly funny.

Hatchetfield Apeman: I don’t know how to feel about this one, it’s an interesting story but I think shouldn’t have been the first nightmare time story as it set a bad precedent for a lot of people.

Watcher World: I FUCKING LOVE WATCHER WORLD. The horror buildup of “what the fuck is happening here?” was genuinely amazing. The idea of a paranormal amusement part made for the amusement of an elder god id so cool. I feel uncomfortable saying the work “Sniglet”

Forever and always: one of my favs, the mystery of the two Emma’s is amazing, and the twist of which Emma Paul chose is amazing. It does make me wonder tho, is Emma a robot in every timeline? Also im just gonna assume that Tinky is connected to this one.

Time Bastered: another of my favs, the way it connects with FaA and the very clever time travel writing were highlights. The Ted is The Homeless Guy twist is really clever, and the ending is tragic

Jane’s a Car: holy shit my opinions on this one is so mixed. I love the bonding of Becky, Tom, and Tim is so wholesome. I REALLY hate that scene. Also is Jane turned into a car in every universe?

The Witch in the Web: our true into too Webby. Massive lore dumbs sort of weighted it down for me but it was still good.

Honey Queen: god I love this one. The fact that the LiBs aren’t mentioned until the very end was a really good choice. Both Zoey and Linda going to any length to win was some great tension.

Perky’s Buds: I went into this one expecting it to be kinda mid, and I was right but it was on the high end of mid. Ziggy being NB and played by a real NB actor is great! The bird hive mind is genuinely kinda unnerving despite how cute they are. I personally think they should have died, then content on the rooftop with the fire would have been such a good ending, but the police showing up to arrest them packs less of a punch.

Abstinence Camp: again, one of my favs, I fucking love this one and it also has the best Nightmare Timr song. It’s a fun way of exploring the “if you have sex in a horror movie you die” trope. Grace once again gets some sort of power and abuses it.

Daddy: I have mixed feelings, it’s a genuinely interesting plot but it get pretty uncomfortable. The song at the start made me think it would be a more empathetic take on Sherman Young but it definitely fucking wasn’t.

Killer Track: what is there to say? Killer track is actually so fucking amazing, if you will watch anything from this list watch this. I’m saying nothing else

Yellow Jacket: not at all what I was expecting, but it was great! From what I heard I was sort of expecting a high school drama with Pokky doing his bullshit in the background, but I loved this too. Also the ending hurt me.

Workin’ Boys: Pokky strikes again, but I’m not sure why TBH. Motherfucker just decided to fuck with his one most loyal subject and for what?

[applestorms]

ok, the results of that best/worse grades homestuck kids poll are actually kinda driving me up the wall. “jake would be worst!!” “rose would be best!!1” fellas,

actual real order (best to worst):

JAKE: effortless. absolutely perfect grades. 4.0 unweighted, even higher if accounting for AP/honors. absolutely nobody knows this other than dirk, and maybe jane (from snooping his computer one time) or roxy (from hacking the system trying to change her own grades). this only becomes widespread knowledge literally on the day of their graduation when he’s announced as one of the valedictorians and the entire class collectively goes What

JANE: perfect grades, but only through LOTS of effort. strict ass studying schedule + plans/starts essays weeks or even months in advance + careful planning about the best looking extracurriculars to put on her college apps. the fact that she’s still second Does drive her up the wall, yes. literally none of this is necessary considering she’s gonna inherit the company no matter what, but She cares, and that’s what really matters here.

JADE: also a genius, but slightly more scatterbrained alongside the fact that she doesn’t actually care all that much. flourishes in the sciences, ofc. i like to think she’d also be on some kind of robotics team (maybe with dirk?) and they’d win nationals or something too. art teachers adore her.

DIRK: does his best and his best is pretty good. maybe cheating ever so slightly since he studies with jake & jade sometimes. he likes history. gets flustered in english since he doesn’t like not having One clear answer.

JOHN: oh my darling average boy <3 he does pretty well but only because jane gets on his ass about studying when he’d prefer to just hang out with dave and play video games instead. he really Does Not invest much in grades since he’s got that unconditional fatherly love already supporting him. probably struggles a lot more in college once he’s away from that familial support system.

ROXY: definitely NOT stupid, she does pretty well when she puts in the effort… however. alcoholism. also, depression. i think she starts off high school doing really well but ends up at a low point and then everything starts adding up and she starts skipping class to get away from the stress/shame and it’s like a terrible positive feedback loop of horror that drags her grades way the fuck down. at some point she breaks and asks dirk + jane for help, and together they help her manage to lock in and just barely graduate with her shit together. (and also she maybe hacks the system to make her numbers look a teensy bit better.) she’d do a lot better in college, and especially in grad school.

ROSE: teenage rebelliousness + too busy reading freud and writing wizard fic to give a shit about something as asinine as grades. she Does write some really long-winded, purple prose-drenched, trauma dumping-adjacent essay responses to hand over to her english teachers though. typical gay teen canon event. she simply cannot be assed to give a fuck about anything even slightly STEM related, though, unless it’s related to research for her writing. she likes outdated, conspiracy-adjacent theories just a little too much for most of her knowledge base and understanding of the world to be relevant in a typical classroom.

DAVE: gets taken out of class for like 80% of the year by bro to go through his Alpha Male Apocalypse Hero Training. never stood a chance, really. asks his friends for help but john is a terrible teacher, jade is always too busy, and rose spends the entire time either making fun of him through thinly veiled references to his oedipus complex or rambling about gay wizard sex lore or something. at some point jane tries to tutor him but then bro immediately takes him away for a three week vacation to the mountains so they can stand under ice-cold waterfalls and fight bears with their fists. eventually roxy takes pity on him and ups his grades along with her own so he can still graduate on time w/ everyone else.

[concealeddarkness13]

All's Fair Revamped Powerpoint!

Content warning for mentions of death and abuse. Yes, I have made a Powerpoint for this now-monstrosity of a story. Please see this post and this post for more info. This is gonna be long. Tagging: @maple-writes, @pen-of-roses, @drabbleitout, and @grailfish, also @mr-orion!

[Image Description: A page titled: All's Fair in Love and War (Especially When It's Both)

AKA: I'm revamping All's Fair and merging some of my stories because it's fun. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Overview

So, this has changed a lot

It’s now a cyberpunk story!

Lots of lore

Unsure where to start, lol

This world was dying in the past, and the Celestials had gone to save humans from another world that was dying

The original humans of this world took matters into their own hands, and even though they did not have a seed of Primary like other worlds, they took their source of life and somehow brought a chunk of land up into space, making an artificial moon

This becomes the world of Bring Me That Horizon

The Celestials come back to a dead world, but they brought humans and their seed of Primary with them, so they settled on the planet

The seed of Primary is not able to fully revive this world, and the humans are using the seed as an energy source as well, so there’s just a little pocket of an empire that controls all the resources while the rest of the world is basically dead

The other species are pissed at the Celestials and the original humans for abandoning them, and they had to change into parasites to even find anything to feed on

Both the other species and humans are rich and control what goes on in the empire; the humans have their religion that worships the Celestials though, and the species want to fight the Celestials

Everyone also keeps talking about the “paradise” of the artificial moon, and the emperor has figured out how to bring it back down to the main planet. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: The Species

A little bit different from the original

The original humans: being up on the artificial moon with none of the other species for a long ass time, emphasized their predator-like qualities; they have slit pupils and more carnivorous teeth, and their diets are a lot more carnivorous too; they can eat plants, but they don’t do much for them

The new humans: have more prey-like qualities; they tend to stay in groups and don’t like to be alone, they have pointed ears that help them hear better, and they have an easier time telling when the other species are pretending to be human

The Shades: we’ve done this song and dance so often, everyone knows what the Shades are, lol; parasitic shapeshifters that feed off of human emotions and can control one person if they can see them

The Faeries: a combination of the Snakes and the shadow species I had made; they feed on human blood, and they have snake scales over their skin, fangs, slit pupils, and tails; if their prey is within a certain distance of them, they can give the prey an order, and they have to follow it

The Venus Girdles (temporary name): they are mostly the same, feeding off of human souls with hair that looks like Venus Girdle jellyfish; they tend to keep to themselves outside the empire, stealing humans to feed on. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: The Empire

Formed up once the humans came with a new energy source

The wealthy and influential of the species and humans joined together and made the empire to hoard resources and make people dependent on them; they also include companies that make prosthetics and androids

The rich humans all worship the Celestials

Most of the rich of the other species hate the Celestials

There’s a poor area where most of the citizens live and are demonized, and I’m calling it the undercity right now, but the name most likely will change, lol

They have cops and controlled soldiers through chips in their brains (victims of the prosthetics experiments) to “keep the peace”, which means that they terrorize the undercity, and everyone thinks that anyone who has the prosthetics from the experiments is a soldier, and they see the victims as less than human and monsters. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: The magic

We still have the prosthetics experiments, but in a different context!

The elemental magic works basically the same as before, with both pros and cons, at least to begin with

There’s also the crystal magic from Bring Me That Horizon, where the person who has this magic glows and can turn liquids into crystals that are stronger than diamonds, and that they can control; the Shades on the artificial moon have control of it at the moment

There’s also the Celestial magic a person can get if they are the child of a Celestial, where they can turn into a dragon, anticipate what their opponent will do, and have light and lightning magic

There’s also this opposite magic that comes from a spoiler, where a person can turn into a phoenix, anticipate what their opponent will do, and have darkness and black fire magic

Guess who has those first three? End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: The Rebellion

Instead of the peaceful vs. violence movement, we have the rebellion

The religion preaches absolute peace, even ignoring and not helping the victims of violent crimes

The rebellion wants to fight against the empire and also has a distrust of the religion

The prosthetics experiments do come from this now, but there’s someone who’s using it for other plans

Thorne, Jude, and Irina are part of the rebellion at the start of the story

The rebellion is desperately looking for a symbol of the rebellion, and who better but a “reformed soldier”? End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Characters

Holy shit, there will be a lot

I have merged four stories because I want to suffer

But I love them all, and I do have a plan to at least start this story with all of the POV characters being at the same party, so they’re at least linked, lol

I will first talk about the four POV characters. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Chess

The woman, the myth, the legend

She is my blorbo that I will never shut up about

I have given her all of the trauma

So, her real name is Ezra, and she was actually from the artificial moon and put through the Shades’ training (torture) to receive the crystal magic

So, her parents are actually alive for once!!!

But then Churi, the lead Shade, knew that Aeflin was looking for a weapon, and he thought Chess would be perfect for that, so he sent her there

There will be more about the prosthetics experiments in Naivi and Aeflin’s entries, but long story short, Chess got the Celestial magic and her fire magic, and she was sent to fight and kill some people, and she got epilepsy, and her chip broke, and she lost her memory

Then Ashont was horrible to her for a while, longer than in her original backstory

And now, she’s on the streets, getting abused by so many people, and just trying to survive

She has an awesome style, especially wearing a muzzle and a badass coat

Her hair is still super long and curly, but she has shaved the right side of her head

Still super traumatized about sex and trusting people and having any kind of happiness whatsoever

A black cat she named Mush does follow her around, and they have become very close

She is super overpowered, even if she doesn’t know it at the beginning of the story, but she deserves it

Sassy and flirty and loves stealing, she also has super low self esteem and thinks she probably is a monster.

“Baby don’t forget my name when the morning breaks us. Baby please don’t look away when the morning breaks us.” Bittersweet by Ellie Goulding

“Oh darling get me drunk and make me feel.” I Want to Live by Borislav Slavov

“I’ve been digging up every constellation, travelling galaxies without a station, faithful to my made up mission. I never felt like enough.” One by Kerli. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Vesper

She is part of the Celestial religion and does try to convince people to be peaceful

She advocates for ignoring the victims of violent crimes because the religion believes only when humans are fully peaceful will the Celestials come back to live with and rule over the humans

She is also the religion’s liaison with the other species, and she especially works with Maisa

He is an asshole, but she endures him because she thinks it is vital for her to do whatever to keep good relations with the other species

She is very smart book-wise, but doesn’t really have street smarts

She’s totally autistic

She will learn to grow and challenge her beliefs throughout the story

I love her

Because Chess’s parents are alive, her parents have been killed (joking, there’s a narrative reason for them being dead in this one). End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Irina

Hers is the most personal story with the least amount of worldwide calamity potential

Basically, she’s the daughter of the CEOs of an android company, and she has always thought of androids as people, so she’s been kind to them

Her parents hate that

She finally ran away from them five years ago, with her dog, Briar

But Briar got sick, and in desperation, Irina paid for her memories to be transferred into an android version of her dog, so she has android Briar now

But the company she got Briar from is her parents’ company, and even though she fully paid for Briar, after two years, the company is trying to take Briar back

They send an android named Vortex to take Briar back, but Vortex decides to find some loopholes to stop himself from actually taking Briar

Her parents are gonna get pissed about that too

When she ran away, Irina met Thorne and Jude and became part of the demon trio

They are all three hellions, and I love it

She is a little concerned with the leadership of the rebellion, having seen Aeflin there, and she knows Aeflin is a well-known scientist who’s working with leaders in the empire

I can assure you that Irina and Briar are gonna make it and have a happy ending. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Eclipse

Yes, the Celestial Story is the one that I haven’t talked about merging with All’s Fair yet

Surprise!

Eclipse is from the artificial moon, and their parents were killed, and they were captured by the emperor

They don’t know they have a Celestial parent and have Celestial powers

They’re proper but internally sassy, lol

I love them

A lot of their beginning story will stay the same; the party that everyone will be at in the beginning of the story will be a celebration of capturing Eclipse and bringing the paradise back down so “everyone” can use its resources

They want to kill the emperor and empress

The emperor wants them for their magic, and he also wants to learn more about the secret as to how they remained a paradise, but Eclipse is not even sure. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Creed

Half Shade, half human

Genderfluid, enjoying he/him, they/them, and she/her pronouns at different times (I’ll just use they/them for this slide, to not be overly confusing)

They were picked up off the streets of the undercity and adopted by a rich couple as part of a program that was out to “prove” that anyone can make it in the empire

They have been an overall nuisance ever since

They meet Chess at the party and go make out with her and have sex with her, and they cause a scandal

Which also turns the eyes of the rebellion on Chess to use her as the new face of the rebellion even though that’s the last thing she wants

As an apology, they decide to stick with Chess and help her out

Don’t know much about them for this version of the story yet, but they’re fun. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Thorne

One of the demon trio

He is a little asshole with Jude, with Irina being slightly more diplomatic but still an asshole

He despises the empire and the Celestials

His parents were the controlled soldiers, and they were hurt and thrown into the undercity for having him

There, they were abused and died, and Thorne blames the empire and the religion for it, since he knows the other people in the undercity are just trying to survive too

He likes waxing poetic at times

He’s more outwardly serious than Jude and Irina, but he likes getting into shenanigans with them

His assignment with Jude at the beginning of the story is to capture Vesper

He still captures her with Jude by dancing with her until she’s exhausted. End Description]

[Image description: A page titled: Jude

Also a little shit

He came from a wealthy family, but when he met Thorne when he tried to steal from Jude’s family, Jude decided to become friends and help Thorne, eventually culminating with running away from his parents and joining the rebellion with Thorne

He is super flashy in both his looks and his speech

He loves making jokes about every situation. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Vortex

My boy, he must be protected

He first started out as a pleasure android, but when he killed his owner after being abused, he ran to the undercity and almost got hurt, but Chess saved him

He now follows Chess around like a puppy when he can

It takes a lot for him to get a crush on anyone, but he totally will at least fall in love with Irina and Chess in this story

He’s extremely serious and insists that he isn’t a person

He also named himself Vortex because it sounded cool

Once he is sent to bring Briar back, he checks to see if Irina had been abusing Briar, and when he realizes that she hasn’t and actually loves Briar very much, he finds loopholes so he doesn’t actually take Briar back

He still has to pursue Irina though, but she knows that, he makes it clear to her that he has to

Which is how he falls in love with Irina, by being there for her and helping her keep Briar away from the company and her parents

They will go through some shit, but it’ll be interesting, and Vortex might just finally acknowledge that he’s a person at some point. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Ashira

She prefers to go by Ash

She’s a Faerie and the emperor’s daughter

Eclipse is forced to marry her, and they both want to use the other, and they both think it’ll be a loveless marriage

Lol, JK

They fall in love, especially after Ash tells Eclipse that she wants to kill her parents too

She has been abused by her parents and led to believe that the only way she’ll get anything from anyone is to manipulate them

She is very cynical about the world, but her relationship with Eclipse will help her heal

She’s manipulative and a jerk, and I love her. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Nesri

She’s from the artificial moon, and she received the crystal magic from the Shades around the same time as Chess

So, she knew Chess as Ezra and they were best friends

Unfortunately, Chess doesn’t remember Nesri anymore

When the artificial moon is brought back to the planet, the pirate crew she’s part of will totally be fighting the empire

She escaped from the Shades and joined the pirates and has never looked back

Her new pirate family is helping her heal from the trauma

She adores fighting, and will do anything for her captain Triel, especially. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Triel

The other woman, the myth, the legend, lol

She always must be seen with her wide brimmed hat and long ass coat

I love her so much

Chaotic chaotic

She is a super competent captain who is always two steps ahead of everyone else

And she absolutely knows about Chess from Nesri and wants to help her

She sees the artificial moon being brought to the planet as a perfect opportunity to do so

She will destroy you with her words first and then send Nesri to destroy you physically

Always smirking. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Shine

They are deaf and the best engineer

Holy fuck, I just realized that Shine and Naivi can actually meet, hell yeah

They’re the engineer of Triel’s crew, and they are the best

Super sassy, they love to insult people in sign language

The whole crew knows their sign language, so they mostly communicate in sign for Shine

Oh shit, I just realized that I really will need five POVs (with Nesri) because this storyline will be super important too, damn

Back on track: they have a small dragon named Mina, who responds to sign language

They don’t let anyone else in the engineering room, and they have an iconic sign to keep people out, especially Nesri, lol. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Naivi

Yeehaw, the enemies to lovers is still strong!

But different!

So! Naivi is half Venus Girdle half human, and she escaped from their city where they treat humans like pets

It was all really bad

But she gets to the empire, and she’s demonized by everyone, she learns to hide her non-human features, and she learns to hate the religion even more

She hates the Celestials and thinks that they are horrible gods and should be killed for how they let this world get so bad, that if they’re killed, humans will stop waiting for them to come

She devises the prosthetics experiments to make an army to fight the empire and the Celestials

One problem: Aeflin takes interest and “helps” her

Which means Aeflin takes away the victims and sends them off to be controlled soldiers which will be doing the exact opposite of what Naivi wants

She realizes this and makes a secret army without Aeflin knowing

Except, JK! She does, and she sends her own weapon, Chess, to devastate Naivi’s army (this is where Chess loses her memory and gets her epilepsy)

Chess does destroy Naivi’s army, but that just makes Naivi want to use her instead as a one-person army

Not sure how, but Naivi doesn’t know where Chess went, so she’s searching for her, and it’s when the rebellion decides to use her as their face of the rebellion, that Naivi finds where Chess is again

Which means she can totally start manipulating Chess into fighting the Celestials first and then the empire

This will turn into enemies to lovers, but there will be some fun stuff first of course

Naivi is honestly so obsessed with her own idea of justice that she’ll hurt any and everyone to get what she wants

At least until it’s the person that she has a crush on who almost dies, then she starts rethinking everything, yeesh. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Aeflin

The epitome of being a mad scientist trope

She’s a Shade who really just wants to be evil for the science reasons

Wants a weapon who will kill a Celestial so she can dissect said Celestial

She actually doesn’t care about any of the politics of the other antagonists, she just wants to do science, is that so wrong?

She’s tortured and killed and ruined so many people for science

All with a smile and a bubbly personality

I love to hate her. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Maisa

The asshole Shade who wants to be evil for politics reasons

He despises the Celestials and wants to kill all of them

For different, but actually similar reasons, than Naivi

He’s also super horny, in an asshole way

Has tormented Vesper all for his game

He sees humans as pawns in the Celestial’s game, and thinks that he’s equal to the Celestials (just realizing this), so he sees humans as pawns for himself too

Lots of fun. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Ashont

Ass-ont, am I right?

He’s the only straight character in this whole story, lol

And he’s awful about it

He’s the first person Chess meets after losing her memory, and it’s not a coincidence

He abuses her and calls her a monster and tries to hold onto her, but she finally gets to escape

She actually hurts him before she escapes, and which scarred his face

He is now even more obsessed with Chess and wants to capture her again because he’s a creep

I hate him so damn much, don’t even love to hate him. End Description]

[Image Description: A page titled: Ares

My child, she is the best ever

But she technically will be an antagonist for most of the story, so she needs to stay in the antagonists

An 18 year old who had her life ripped from her when the artificial moon was brought down to the planet

When the emperor sent soldiers to kill Eclipse’s parents and capture Eclipse, they devastated the city around the palace

The soldiers killed Ares’s parents while she was hiding but hearing their screams, and when she left her hiding place, she found that everyone else she cared about was killed too

She blames Eclipse and their parents, and she decides she wants to kill them

She stumbles upon Triel’s crew, and she’s part of the big lore reveals, and she gets the phoenix magic in order to kill Eclipse

She’s so angry and so valid

She has all the righteous anger of a teenager fighting a god

She won’t remain an antagonist, but she’s tons of fun. End Description]

[altarianchildren]

Alright Tumblr!

Time to meet some OCs!

These two in particular hold a very special, very close place in my heart! I'm gonna make this a sort of "ask the oc(s) anything" post, interaction is encouraged!

Trypo and Tueri Harrows, of Coumarine, Kalos.

Below the cut is oc lore and more art!

I'm saying this now, their story is a sad one, but I find it intriguing! They've become something of comfort characters for me, especially in the way their dynamic works. Trypo (the trainer) was born into a noble house in Kalos! Tueri (the abnormally tall Bisharp) was assigned to protect her when she was born. He was originally her mother's guardian! Now he's at Trypo's side.

Being bigger than most of his kinds makes him quite intimidating, though to his lass, he's got quite the soft spot. He has several ways of showing affection to his partner and teammates, some physical, some otherwise. Physical means towards Trypo ranges from carrying her, resting his chin atop her head, pulling her against his torso to loom over and guard her more closely, letting her cling to his arm, and even sorting through her hair to pick out debris (usually after a battle or in the morning, or situations where her hair gets messed up.) It's his own means of like- returning the favour of grooming, since Trypo will sharpen his blades for him and keep his metal polished and in good condition!

Did we mention Tueri communicates via Telepathy?

I headcanon that certain types are susceptible to using telepathy! Psychic (obviously-) ghost, and dark are those types, especially for more humanoid mons, or mons based heavily on pretty sentient yokai or entities (like Zoroark being based on the shapeshifting aspect of Kitsune!) Anyway that hc is for a different ramble a different day-

Tueri uses telepathy to communicate to others! He can also read and write, thanks to Trypo's father teaching him how to do so before Trypo was even a thought in that man's mind.

Speaking of her father.

Lumin Harrows.

Is the entire reason Trypo and Tueri are on the run in the first place. Lumin decided, after Tueri failed once (1 singular time) to guard the girl from a preventable situation, that he had to be. . . Disposed of, for something better.

Trypo didn't want to let Tueri go, much less know he'd get killed for one failure that was very much her fault to begin with. So, what did she do to prevent his death?

She took Tueri, took the shield (an heirloom that she shouldn't have had until 20,) gave the shield to Tueri, snagged some cash, and fled Kalos, hitting Unovan soil first, where their whole runaway story begins.

Lumin starts giving chase when he realizes they fled Kalos, and it leads to a multi-region chase across the world, with Lumin under the mindset he's saving his daughter from a silver-tongued, manipulating monster, and Trypo on the run for her partner's life.

Lemme hit you with another fun bit of trivia that Lumin isn't aware of, and that the Harrows Shield here is slightly aware of but doesn't understand.

They're soul-linked.

(This is a mechanic from conquest that I put my own spin on to add to these two!)

If one goes down, they both do.

Now, suddenly running for his life, is running for hers too, no?

Tueri protecting her so vigorously, so acutely, is also guarding his own life, no?

Of the two, their personalities are a good mix of opposing forces, that balance and check each other. Trypo is meek, shy, riddled with anxieties thanks to her father hunting them down, and rather antisocial because of it. She's fearful, to the point it would consume her if it weren't for Tueri. Tueri is bold, unshaken, he's adamant and brave. He's level, where she's chaotic. He's cold and calculated in battle, even seeming cold to others outside of battle, save those he'd consider a friend. His steel-cold exterior is balanced by her open compassion, by an unwavering heart trying to keep all sides held together. She leads the team by tactic and heart, where he leads via tactic and example. He's the force to her words. The calm to her storm, she's the caution to his "I have to act" sort of attitude.

Trivia time!

》It took them several years to get a tent. Before then, they'd sleep up in trees, in pokémon centers, back alleys, or on a very rare occasion, even take refuge by the kindness of someone taking them in for a night. Now that they have a tent, they almost exclusively sleep in that or in pokémon centers.

》Teammates are as follows, caught in this order!

Anima ♀️(Gardevoir, megastone holder!)

-Mina ♀️💫 (Gained from another trainer as a Vaporeon, shiny!)

-Aeternus ♀️(Mudsdale- she carries all the cargo on the saddle, such as camping equipment and medical supplies)

-Iroha ♂️(Noivern)

-Relle ♂️(Ceruledge)

》Tueri holds Trypo between his blades when they sleep! Due to selective breeding, his physical traits were altered a bit as a result, one such being a wider gap between the blades on his torso. He pulls Trypo in and kinda wraps himself and his cloak around her when they rest, guarding her even in their sleep. If she stirs for whatever reason, he will start to make a sound akin to metallic purring to calm her down and lull her back to a quiet sleep.

》Trypo's left leg still has lasting effects from the initial injury, due to. . . Unknown reasons.

》"My Little Versailles" is Tueri's little nickname for Trypo when other people aren't around and their situation is calm + stress free for a spell.

》Trypo refers to Tueri as her partner, her knight, her other half, and her crimson sentinel.

》Tueri is an absolute sucker for spicy food ong. Give him ghost peppers and he will eat that shit like candy. Trypo cannot tolerate the same level of heat he can, but she also enjoys spicy foods!

》The Harrows Shield is a name/title for the both of them combined, as opposed to a title specifically for the trainer or for the pokémon.

》They eat off the same plate! Tueri will take food from it first, especially if it's food from someone else. His steel typing means he's immune to poison, thus can safely tell if something would be toxic for his person to eat or not. Even when they eat, she seems to be guarded by him in every way.

》Tueri has articulated hands! Also a trait thanks to selective breeding.

》Don't let his sharp expression and scary looks fool you. Tueri is so very soft with friends and his teammates. . . You'd almost think you're looking at two different entities if you saw him around a stranger vs a friend.

》Tueri is never inside of his pokéball unless unconscious from battle. He absolutely hates being inside it, and will not willingly go in. He has broken a pokéball in the past by forcibly busting out of it despite the lock in place, which resulted in Trypo getting a dusk ball for him as a replacement capsule.

》Tueri thinks the dusk ball is a lot more comforting than the luxury ball he used to be in. He claims the luxury ball felt "cold and unforgiving." He still hates being in the dusk ball, but it doesn't make him feel out of place.

》Trypo likes to make little grass and flower crowns if they have down time whole camping. Tueri has been subjected to many crownings of forest floor foliage.

》Don't tell the world he actually cherishes that deep down in his soul.

》Thanks to their soul-link, emotions bleed to one another a bit! Trypo's rage can make Tueri on edge and itching for battle, or Tueri's calm in a situation can subconsciously ease her anxieties into a state of calm as well. Seeing her cry breaks his heart. If emotions are polar opposites, it can actually cause some strain and make it feel like their hearts are hurting!

》Despite everything, they could not ask for a better partner, a better friend, a better combination. They're each other's world. </3

》I actually view these two as my comfort characters because of the softer moments in their dynamic. Their story is filled with turmoil and hardships, but when they get time to rest, and rest easy, it just feels particularly special. They earned good rest, they savor it so genuinely when they can lay in a sleeping bag and not have to worry about the world outside the tent. Rain is usually melancholy, but to them, it's safety, and it's calm. Even the thunderstorms feel safe compared to what they run from. I think maybe it's because Trypo characterizes a turmoil-filled era of my life, and Tueri is like. . . The anchor I wish I had in that time. He is the calm to the storm. The reason the boat doesn't drift so far out to sea. But I think it's also because while he so openly and blatantly guards and defends his lady, she's also trying to protect him in less visible ways. She chose to run away with him to save his life. She keeps his blades sharp so in battle he never has to worry about his blades chipping or a dull strike deciding a match. She's soft with him to keep his mind steady, to ensure he stays okay in the mind and heart despite all that follows them. They protect each other in their own ways, and both sides are equally as appreciative and aware of the other's side of it. They're precious to one another. So very, sincerely, dearly precious. They're not perfect- but they take the flaws in each other openly, and in stride. "This is my crimson knight, who will never openly speak of any weakness he has- but I know his weakness, and I know his fears, and I walk beside him anyways." "This is my lady, and though her fears paralyze her and make it seem impossible to step forward, I hold a hand out so I can lead her through the fear, and walk together." I just. I love their dynamic. I love them a lot.

》I might end up doing a comic series for these two and their team??? Start from the beginning and work from there? Or do comic strips of different situations They're in with no real timeline? Debating this tbh.

》Trypo is still very afraid of Relle considering he's the newest member + there's a bit of a language barrier + Relle is. . . Aggressive as fuck and it scares her

》Tueri and Relle had MAD BEEF for awhile I won't lie. Big brawling hours for a hot minute. Relle now understands why Tueri is in charge. Poor boy is still trying to figure out why Trypo is somehow in charge of Tueri. She never acts like it.

》Tueri is not afraid to fight dirty in actual threatening scenarios. He will pull every nasty trick in every book just to ensure victory in the wilds, ensure that team eats, lives another day, what have you.

》Tueri will not discriminate, those hands are rated E for Everyone.

Once again, this is functioning as a "hey look at my ocs!" A mini art dump and also a "ask the ocs anything" sort of post. Interaction encouraged, give me reasons to draw these two more I beg---

If you read through all of that ily

[unofficially-ace]

Ivypool’s Heart liveblog yay

So far really enjoying this book, the prologue slapped and I actually feel a sense of mystery with this vision. Even though it’s a travelling book I’m still excited for it

If there’s one thing the Erins can actually write well it’s grief, and they’ve got a lot to play with in this book

The travelling gang is so fun, love all of these guys

Chapter 4 genuinely almost made me tear up, Ivypool and Icewing bonding over their shared grief just got to me ok

Honestly if Rootspring gets with Wrenflight by the end of the book I’ll scream

Ivypool why would you antagonise cats who are giving you information…literally so stupid

Beach the MILF hunter

I’m gonna need everyone to stop hating on the Sisters right now omg they literally have the most interesting culture out of everyone

Aughhhh I’m sick of the Clan cats always being in the right stop trying to make everyone into a Clan!!!! Let them be different I beg

Slate and Beach are basically incompetent uni students and I love them so much, they’re so silly

Why are they giving romance advice to these random guys what is this book

If the Sisters have no fans I am dead

Why do they also call humans ‘Twolegs’ and housecats ‘kittypets’ though…especially when Slate and Beach called them Twopaws earlier??? And greencough???? Why can’t they have different words for things oh my godddd

Warrior cats vs seagulls let’s goooo

Why do they feel the need to explain past plot points to me whenever they come up. I promise I didn’t start reading warrior cats at Ivypool’s Heart

Best part of warrior cats hands down is the attempt to describe human things in the way cats would. Erins when they have to describe a sandwich

I can’t picture this cliff/lake/beach combo for the life of me

Another Jake? Were no other names available?

The cats go to a zoo!

I need to know what type of wildcats these are, are they going to destroy the ecosystem if they’re released

Oh joy, I love retconned lore, welcome to the party Stormclan

If you took a shot every time Ivypool says “Run!” you would be dead

Why are the cats gendering the humans? How do they have any concept of human sex/gender?

Why is there a map at the front of the book that pretty much spoils the whole plot…I mean it’s pretty helpful because I haven’t been able to picture this journey at all but still

TARDIS tree

THE GANG DOES TIME TRAVEL?

This feels like a fanfiction, who tf let their OCs into warrior cats

You’re telling me two whole clans were combined and then left the territories and nobody in Starclan remembers this???? And it was never brought up before?

My enjoyment for this book is rapidly decreasing

This feels like if Once Upon A Time did Warrior Cats

Also we literally had this clan combination plot happen in VOTS are the erins lurking on minecraft roleplay servers or something

At least the characters also think it’s wild that this was all forgotten so I hope we get some answers

Rootspring tries to eat a poisonous jellyfish and fucking dies /j

Power duo Ivypool and Icewing let’s gooo

Ivypool your lesbian is showing

Criteria for any female character in this book is that you have to have at least one dead child (unless you’re Whistlepaw)

I do like the idea that double dead spirits become part of the real world, at least we finally have some explanation for where all these forgotten cats are, but does that also count for the evil guys?

There is literally no good reason for the elders to not believe them are you serious

The river of spirits…yet another lore drop that should’ve been extremely important and relevant before this, and yet this is the first time we’re hearing about it

Wtf is tallstar doing here

If all living cats forgetting someone causes Starclan to forget them too, I feel like there should be far less cats in Starclan

Cats can just be re-remembered back into existence????

Okayyyy overall thoughts: I think it was generally a good book by warriors standards, the character growth was done really well, but aughhhh the retconned lore changes physically pain me and I will not accept Stormclan as canon thank you

[8bitsupervillain]

Higurashi When They Cry Hou Ch. 7 Minagoroshi pt. 10

Come to think of it, this is probably the most emotion we've seen Rika display in any of the arcs up to this point. Also, this section shows that Shion Sonozaki might actually be dumber than Keiichi.

I wonder if Japan has a fundamentally different interpretation of what a witch is compared to your more traditional European style witch? Or maybe I'm just woefully out of touch in that regard and the idea of a witch being basically immortal is the more commonly accepted idea.

Hanyuu and her nice new bag of I told you so's. Now, I know I've said this before in regards to the characters in the past, but Rika is such a dramatic child. She suffers one singular misfortune and she writes off all of her accumulated good luck as just gone forever. I'm not saying she's wrong for feeling that way, I'd be lying if I said I never experienced days where if one single thing went wrong I would start thinking everything was ruined forever. I'm just saying she's been such a rather optimistic character lately that this change to complete and utter defeatism is kind of darkly funny.

If Rika gives up and loses her last shreds of hope and becomes something that's no longer Rika, does that mean that Hanyuu was born from a similar situation? They've said multiple times that she's existed for a lot longer than Rika, so was Hanyuu formerly a human? I don't know if that's the case at all, but it's a fun little thought experiment I think.

Skipping ahead a little, Rika goes to school the next day in the vain hopes that Satoko will be there as well. When she's not she let's her despair takes over and starts being Rude Rika, telling Chie to shut up and she's going home. Chie then takes this thoroughly morose Rika to the teachers office and gets the skinny from Rika about how Teppei has come back and is basically making her life a living hell.

The rest of the main cast eavesdrop and overhear about Satoko's situation.

Say what you will about Keiichi, and I have, at length, and will again. But at least when he decided to plan, and then carry out a murderous plot he at least had the good sense to not scream it out loud in front of witnesses. Sure, everyone knew anyway because despite the idea that people remember the past arcs has only really become a thing as of Tsumihoroboshi everyone somehow knows everything everyone has ever done in this series.

Wanting to put a delay on Tatarigoroshi: Shion Edition Chie drives off to Satoko's home. Would Tatarigoroshi: Shion Edition give her the ability to kill people with her mind, do you think? I think it would. Anyway, she arrives at Satoko's house and is immediately screamed and shouted at by Teppei. Upon being yelled at that yes she's here, no you can't see her, she's just sick, trust me Chie goes back to the school.

Shion rants and raves at Chie's uselessness in this scenario and once again talks about "come on guys, murder!"

Rena proves once again to be the brains of this outfit, because honestly, if you're gonna kill the guy just do it, don't yell and scream about it. Shion decides the next logical course of action is to beat anyone who gets in her way with a chair. Which she does. She smacks Keiichi around with the chair until he convinces her to quit giving him brain damage and to calm down for a second.

Something that I like so far in this chapter is the fact that the TIPs are back to being more than just documents. I recall in chapter one the TIPs would have these extra documents yes, but it also had scenes like Rena and Mion talking secretively about how Ooishi is a servant of Oyashiro and the like. Then up until Minagoroshi here, the TIPs were all just extra lore building documents. So it's neat to see them go back to extra scenes and actions outside of the main narrative.

I'm trying to be more upfront with what I like so far with this chapter, because in very short order I won't have much positivity about it. Once the narrative switches back to Keiichi as the viewpoint I had a pretty miserable time of it, up until it switches back to Rika's perspective.

[mightys12]

How me write good?

Well, if you’re asking for writing advice, I might not be the best person to ask but I’ll do all I can!

The most important thing to improving at writing is just practicing a bunch. You don’t have to be good, you just have to try. This is gonna sound like a little strange advice, but one of your best bets is to find a larger fandom. I started out in the BNHA fandom, and because there were so many molds to fit into and so many people reading, posting and commenting it had a lot of benefits. Notably, if your primary catalyst to keep writing is comments/kudos, a big fandom helps to keep that up while you learn to write for fun (gradual process, some people never really do and that’s also fine). But just writing over and over and over again will make you improve. If you don’t want to put out low quality work on your main, take the time to make an alt and pump out lots and lots of content.

While you’re making that lots of content, try to go basic in terms of improving your writing. Look up short videos on the Oxford comma, read your writing aloud and figure out where you’re missing commas, toy around with your writing to figure out where periods should replace commas, watch videos on dashes, or take a look at how semicolons are used. These short videos aren’t about a sharp guide on how to write. Writing is something with a lot of style and unique ways to convey your voice with writing. Depending on the media you consume, that will alter how you write as well. Use these not to force yourself to write in a certain way, but to become familiar with the tools in your toolbox. Learn punctuation so you have a useful wrench to piece together what you want to convey.

Another useful thing is to step back and read your own story from a readers perspective. What are they missing that they need to know? What might’ve been a little unclear? What misconceptions could arise? Scatter the answers to the questions throughout your text - avoid large lore drops and characters monologuing where you can.

Something notable is character interactions. If you have two characters interacting, you have to remember to keep their “voice” in mind when piecing together their respective bits of dialogue. Are these characters strong-willed? They’ll look for a disagreement with each other, then, most likely. Is one more meek compared to the other? He might be a bit of a pushover. Their “voices” are influenced by their circumstances, too. Even meek characters gain stronger voices when surrounded by people they know care for them. Strong-willed characters may back off in situations where they feel uncomfortable, or they might press forward being inconsiderate. Remember, if you struggle with these “voices” the “OOC (XYZ)” is your best friend : p

Find someone who enjoys your work. This is a later step. Once you’ve gotten the basics down, written enough to improve your general abilities and understand your toolbox well enough a great step to take is find a beta reader. Someone interested in what you want to write. I lucked out with an amazing beta reader in the form of @bluginkgo who I cannot appreciate enough (sorry for the tag!). They helped me make leaps and bounds in my writing, and once you have an established enough ability to write, a beta reader is a great next step to elevate your writing in the short and long term.

Finally, read. You pick up tricks steadily whether it be from reading good fanfiction or reading high quality literature. You learn to watch out for issues you find a little gross on the eyes. Things like repetitive word use, not enough action included in dialogue (even something as simple as making a character scratch the bridge of their nose), or the plot becoming unclear all become easier to identify as a writer by seeing others mistakes and successes from the lens of a reader.

[youve-doomed-us-all-jerk]

and finished it ,got dat true ending yes def had a great time on the game 8/10 (but yeah performance def docked some points as well as some writing threads that felt kinda dropped, but am trying to in good faith piece it together in me mind so just gonna ramble spoilers under the cut:

when people said this is what they wanted the original DD to be i can see that but like i feel like the lead up to the game kept hearing people who know more about the originals history talk about how "40-60% of the original vision was cut down" from dd1 and i feel like my brain unfortunately interpreted that as "oh cool so were gonna have 100 new vocations like the monk and 100 monsters and the parallel worlds(technically true☝🏽🤓) and the moon stuff, neat" thats on me lmao but yeah removing those expectations and seeing it for what it is, its def the spirit of the the first game but its systems deeper and more fleshed out not good at all the techny terms but im not very into or good at action games but this one made me want to be cuz the combat was fun haha hmm writing wise there was a point where i felt like everything just suddenly got dropped once the godbane stuff started happening and youre suddenly barreling to the ending while everything else just wasnt important anymore lmao, but trying to interpret the story as a story the pathfinder is weaving, i think its meant to feel like that cuz we see the pathfinder essentially write us out of problems, give us a griffin to escape slavery, gives us a clue to where were supposed to go and the big one he like straight up changes ambrosius mind about giving us the godsbane when it wouldnt make sense for him too, the old man by harve even alludes to this by saying the real world is much messier when hes telling you about how fake everything is, like the watcher said everyone there is there to play a part in a tale hes laid out and i think he wanted to get to the ending faster. It's definitely another layer they added from the first games cycle, but do wish if that is what theyre going for(and if im not delusional lmao) that they did more like the ambrosius thing just watching as he ass pulls us out of dead ends making us feel what rothais felt when he realized all his feats and hardships didnt matter, also just would have liked more sidequests with fun characters lmao.

Also did enjoy the endings of the 3 major peoples in the unmoored world and felt like their side quests really fleshed them out and led them there to their endings well,mostly, very cool idea to bring it all together like that. elves wanted to stay isolated but they needed outside influence to break tradition, to save their tree and how it all built to them agreeing to seek refuge with the other races rather than die with their way of life. Ironic that disa was half right about sven needing to inherit the throne but ofc she was also half wrong cuz she a tyrant and wants him to have it mainly cuz of blood, but he deserves it cuz his sidequests were about him getting to know the common folk and becoming self assured lmao battahl tbh full disclosure i messed up the queen nadias sidequest to the rose chateau, tried to scare the dick head shopkeeper into giving me the medicine for the beastren and got arrested so idk how that one ends(will find out in NG+ lmao) but based on the ones i did do, it seems like the nations whole thing was about always being in conflict with each other and how the unmoored quests there are about making people put there differences aside and band together, including the arisen teaming with phaesus. Also like the irony of their view on pawns being right at first but by the end of the game they end up being wrong. but yeah do feel like they didnt get into that more, along with what the lambent flame is? (googled that there was lore texts you can find that explain how an earlier emperor is deceiving the people about it and what it really does) they also dont go into the fact vermund was a nation of beastren, started by a beastren and then history was wiped?? and how theres vermundians fear of beastren and human children always look like beastren and yet wilhelmina is a direct contradiction of this?? that seemed like a really juicy plot point but they didnt really do anything with it. and lastly idek where to start with the pawn and arisen ending, found out theres slight differences in the affinity ending (got the high affinity one cuz reds my my gurl i always revive run straight to her to revive her🤗) but watching them talk about how happy they are to have their own will while saying theyd still do anything for you filled me with something, dont even know what but was crazy.

oh also before i forget another way its in the spirit of the first game for me is just like in the original i also forgot to talk to the person i was romancing and giving them flowers before the endings and got diff people appearing there just like my first playthru of the dd1 lmfao( got manela with grigori and sara in the true ending, was going for ulrika this playthru lmfao) def gonna NG+, maybe do a magic archer and get the stuff i missed and try and get the other endings. Also hoping for another expansion/dlc like they did with dd1 down the line with more vocations and monsters.

[ciaossu-imagines]

Thank you so much and yeah, what you’re saying reminded me of your Eric post. Which I loved so either way, it’s good content. And wow, knowing that you also kill characters makes me interested in your stories that you plan on writing since I presume you probably plan on killing someone in some of those as well. Or at least the Ever Young story. Thank you so much 😊 I am. Bandō’s taken a bit of a backseat now since it’s time for some of my other OCs to shine but he’ll definitely have a chapter again once they’ve had their conversation. And gods, yeah, same. Like as an example, in one of my stories because of what the characters were saying I thought it was going in one direction but then something else was said and I was like “Well, that’s not gonna happen anymore. Have to do something else now.” and it turned out great in the end because I really liked what happened so nothing was lost.

C

You’re very welcome! And I’m, again, so glad that people liked that Eric post. I loved writing it so it’s gratifying to see it well received. And, not delving into heavy spoilers, because while I have the outline really done up, I know the story will take its own twists and turns, but there will definitely be a form of character death in The Ever Young…saying form because, as mentioned in the lore, bodily death is stopped in that realm. It kind of goes into my own fears there because your body living while your mind is gone, such as when people become ‘vegetables’ or even dementia is honestly a huge fear of mine. And I’m glad you seem to be having so much fun writing your story! It’s always fun when you’re writing and it all is just coming to you nice and easy and you’re enjoying the act of writing it all down, which you always seem to.

[oscartwofoxtrot]

[kicks down the door like the kool-aid man]: hi oscar talk to me about your favorite scene that you’ve written?

Sorry this took so long to answer, I was, apparently, writing an entire thesis. You Have Been Warned.

Oh my god uhhh. My favourite scene…okay, if I had to go with one, it’d probably be the scene from The Valiant Never Taste of Death I unofficially refer to as ‘Everybody’s dying bitch, let’s get you some peanut butter’. This comes about a quarter of the way through the second (proper) chapter, Requiem (NB: if we’re going by AO3 numbers then it’s Chapter 3, since there’s a Prologue chapter as well, but I don’t tend to count that numerically), and it’s the bit where Nate gently bullies Brad into sitting down and having a snack. And then uno reverse-cards him into talking about his childhood trauma. [Slaps scene] This bad boy can fit so many emotions in it!

For those unfamiliar with Halo 4 (which in all likelihood is most if not all of you), you should know that for the most part, I tend to hew fairly closely to the story and plot structure of the game when writing Valiant. But linear first person shooters don’t offer the characters a lot of opportunities to sit down and talk about their feelings, so this scene is an oscartwofoxtrot original! Sure, the action scenes can be fun, but there’s nothing I love more than getting to write Brad and Nate in their quiet moments, and I crowbarred this one in here to really dig into that Deep Halo Lore and hopefully use it to get at some of the complexities of their dynamic in this AU.

Speaking of complexities, you ask me anything at all about Valiant and I am not so much going to unpack the suitcase as start pulling hat stands and potted plants out of it Mary Poppins-style, so…this shit’s gonna need an itemised list.

1. Nate: [Basically refuses to acknowledge his own mortality, but you better believe he makes sure Brad remembers to eat and take a break every once in a while]. Also, Brad displaying just how whipped he really is. They may not have the same relationship dynamic as canon, but Brad pretty much lets Nate tell him what to do most of the time. tbh I think he likes it.

2. We get another hint at the circumstances surrounding Nate’s capture by the Gravemind. I alluded to this event in the prologue but have thus far avoided going into too much detail about it, so you’d better believe it’s a Surprise Tool That Will Help Us Later. One of the biggest challenges of writing an AU based on the fourth game in a series is finding the Goldilocks Zone of exposition – too much and you lose the current plot thread as well as the attention of literally everyone reading; not enough and the whole thing is virtually incomprehensible to normal people who don’t spend all their time on Halopedia. Trying to get that balance right is, shall we say, an ongoing struggle.

That said, I have been having way too much fun throwing out passing references to stuff like this – and this particular occurrence is a Big Deal in the world of Brad and Nate, because I think it may be the only time they’d been apart for more than like 24 hours since they started working together. (The backstory of their first meeting is a whole other essay in its own right, so I’ll just slap a sticker on this that says ‘Ask Me About My Canon Timeline In The Very Unlikely Event That You Are Interested’). Nate had become such a permanent fixture in Brad’s life, I doubt Brad understood what it would even feel like to miss him until he was gone.

And now that Nate’s life is in danger again, Brad has a very clear understanding of the stakes involved. Almost losing him the first time…it wasn’t The Moment of Realisation (more on that later), but it certainly did crystallise some deeper level of awareness on just how important Nate is to him. Of course, last time, the problem was one of distance – Brad was light-years away and couldn’t immediately get back to Nate, but there was a fortress to storm and a dragon to slay so he could save him. This time, Brad is right there, and he can see Nate suffering, and there is absolutely nothing he can do about it.

3. Couldn’t resist throwing in a version of the Peanut Butter MRE Temper Tantrum lol. I am at heart a giant sap and I do love writing them joking around and just being incredibly fond of each other. Because there’s no officer-enlisted divide here, it gives them more room to develop the casual familiarity and vaguely flirtatious banter we see hints of in the show. The spectre of Nate’s Rampancy does cast a pall over the whole thing, but it wouldn’t be Generation Kill without some serious mood whiplash. Speaking of which…

4. Hello and welcome to my impromptu TED Talk on the Insane Fucking Lore behind the SPARTAN-II program! (On all levels except physical I am this Brian David Gilbert Unraveled video). That’s right: the Spartan-IIs were kidnapped from their families at the age of six and, to avoid suspicion, replaced by clones implanted with their memories who would die within months due to congenital health issues caused by the cloning process. And as Nate points out, the UNSC didn’t even have the justification of the Covenant War, because that hadn’t started yet! They did this shit because various colony worlds wanted independence from the United Earth Government – but that would negatively affect the economy, so apparently the only two options available were ‘bloody civil war costing billions of human lives’ or ‘covert military operations to quash nascent insurrectionist uprisings, carried out by fucking child soldiers who we put through brutal training and experimental bio-augmentations that killed or permanently maimed like half of them’.

So, uh. That’s fucked! And what’s wild is that even though this has been a feature of the expanded universe since the beginning, it’s something that’s barely ever touched on in the games. Nate only knows about it because he went snooping for Brad’s unredacted file not long after they met for the first time (based on Cortana doing the same in the Halo prequel novel The Fall of Reach). For what it’s worth, Brad’s stated mindset is pretty typical of how the Spartans themselves feel about the whole thing: it’s been normalised for them because it’s the only life they know.

Nate, meanwhile, is understandably horrified, and it’s clear they both recognise the parallels between their experiences – the UNSC took away Nate’s autonomy too, by the very act of his creation. In between the Gravemind and the Rampancy, it’s something he’s been increasingly struggling with: that he was brought into being as a fully-formed person to serve a specific purpose, with the knowledge that he’d only have an operational lifespan of seven years before his systems started to decay irreparably. I can’t put it better than the Gravemind did (courtesy of the Halo short story Human Weakness by Karen Traviss): “Your creators made you separate. They placed a barrier between you and the beings that you would be encouraged to protect, a wall you could never breach. They even gave you a human to centre your existence upon, a human to care about, yet never considered how you might feel at never being able to simply touch him. Or how he might feel about outliving you.”

Damn are you guys seeing this shit? This is fucking crazy! Anyway I’m Rod Serling

5. Rule number one of Valiant: Brad does not know that he’s in love with Nate. Ya boi is pining without even realising that he’s pining. This isn’t a reflection of how I most commonly interpret canon – I look at show!Brad and I’m like ‘yeah, there’s a guy who’s 100% self-aware that he’s simping for his platoon commander’ – but in this AU, the Spartans’ lack of normal human socialisation has left him without any practical life experience of things like romance, so he’s just not quite able to put a name to those feelings. Yet, anyway.

As for Nate? I’ve been writing under the assumption that he is aware of his own feelings, but isn’t totally sure of Brad’s. I reckon he probably has a good enough read on Brad to at least suspect that Brad might reciprocate if made aware of the situation, but without any way to be certain, Nate’s unlikely to bring it up. Even I’m not fully decided on when Nate’s Moment of Realisation was. I do have a few ideas, but it’s not a detail that’s ever specifically relevant to the fic, so feel free to speculate.

In conclusion: …idk man, it’s been a year since I wrote this and I don’t completely hate it yet so. that’s probably a good sign, right? sorry for rambling it will happen again

[femkon]

writing bc i did (i just wanted to share this)

uhh. im just writing my bullshit bc im bored and i can guys. first ting is gonn be bout my weird god killer thing on janitor. like, i just pulled that shit out of my ass and now i have lore? what the freak

(the intended audience of this is either tumblr or my friends to be made fun of) (and maybe Ao3 for reasons)

ASSUMPTIONS TO MAKE UNLESS SPECIFIED OTHERWISE: every character is aroace pan-leaning unless said they fuck

so we gonna start with the rules of like the religion and shit!!! its called “Raynism” and is centered around these three gods and their children. the main gods are Kilun, Hilna, and Yali. they’re time god, planet god (bc there’s more than earth THANK YOU VERY MUCH), and life/death god. Kilun makes sure that everything is progressing fine on the worlds with intelligent life, Hilna creates the planets for said life or just for fun (usually taking around 5 millennia each), and Yali creating the life whether it be plants animals or aliens. they each have children (not really cause they didnt like do it with anyone. the kids just kinda appeared) for each little thing. i will make them up as i go along bc infinite children ig

and these children are called demigods (obvi) and can actually be killed unlike their parents bc slightly mortal. and bc of this possible death, there are some who rebel and become things known as “Guara/Guaru” (meaning god killer in the... ranyi language) (idk man) depending on the amount of demigods killed. Guara is one that has killed under 3 demigods. Guaru are over three. thats about it. they can also be mortals tho, ones that maybe take a guara(u) as a mentor and learn the magic n stuff. two main Guaru, Zanar and Thorlo. Zanar is just a little silly goober and loves pretending to be an Rayni (the worshipers of Raynism that make it to this version of heaven) (basically just angels) with the whole wings and purity, while actually being a black panther bastard who kills demigods for fun (and once got really close to killing Kilun. but like. thats a god. xey couldn’t kill it) because xey’re just that cool man. and the other. Thorlo, actually has honor and does it to like corrupt demigods and blah blah blah n stuff. they both have passionate lesbian sex bc i think i wanna give them female anotmy if any. there’s just a whole lot of sexual tension maybe. yeah, no one gets genetalia ive decided

also!!! just remembered an important fact!!! gender is not a thing assigned at birth to the gods and demigods!!! its completely chosen by the entity when they’re 100 years old!!! until then its they/it!!! i will now tell you the main fives pronouns bc im epic like that. Kilun (its/they/xem) (any other than he/she), Hilna (they/she), Yali (they/them), Zanar (xey/xem/xyrs) (included that last one bc sometimes i forget lol), and Thorlo (he/they). ive stripped them all of anything down there bc i decided they can decide if they wanna have it at will. they ever get a partner who prefers a peener? boom. they’re hard. want a coochie? they are the ocean. thank you for coming to my ted talk guys

just kidding, this rests for no one. especially not me. i wanna just like add important events to this. first one is creation of earth!!! and... we are literally an accident. like, Hilna was just fucking around and didnt mean for earth to foster life but the conditions were rlly good so Yali was just like “freak yeah” and threw some germs on here and aided with evolution a bit (bc we believe in evolution here guys!!!) and then there were humans. and it was like the first actual intelligent life to make stuff and not just be animals so that was cool. so they kept watch and then a whole bunch of bad shit started happening, like discrimination, slavery, captilism, wars, racism, naxis, pedophiles, necrophiles, werid people who do creepy things, hunting for sport, polution, corporations, and just general other bad things. and they were like “woah. thats weird. i thought these little guys were neat” and tried to kill humans, but they survived n shit and Hilna and Yali were like “???” and thats why shits fucked right now

urm anywaysssss, it’s 2 in the morning now bc i just bingewatched content for 2 hours due to not being able to fall asleep. back to events ig??? nvm i fell asleep and woke up at 5:30 to take a shower and get back to work!!! LETS FUCKING GO

so basically, this segment is about how Zanar almost killed Kilun. it was in the heaven-y part of the world and there are like shrines to different gods n stuff, the main biggest ones being to the og 3. and the 3 spend a lot of time in their shrine. so one day, Zanar finds Kilun in its shrine, observing a planet design that Hilna was making, and xey decide “y’know what? i should pretend to be a Rayni and sneak up this... one? idk what one” and just shifted into a Rayni, getting the whole angel vibes. so xey sneak up behind Kilun and kneel next to it, getting a look from it before getting some pats from it (bc it is very loving guys). and they stay there together for a few hours, before Zanar looks like xey’re going to leave and xey walk to the door, before locking and closing it, shifting into xry normal form. xry normal form is a fluffy creature with black panther markings, and xey got a tail, ears (on top of head, absent from sides), claws, and fangs!!!

so this thing sneaks up behind Kilun and bites into its neck, causing golden blood to start flowing out of the puncture marks, and also knocking it out. that may not be anatomically correct, but i dont care. these are MY characters, not YOURS. also im stupid. pls lower your expectations if u want this to be correct in any way shape or form. i dont wanna describe the rest of the scene in detail, but it basically just ends with Kilun’s body getting spread across a web like substance and having organs visible, skin turned out n shit. thats all for now until i get bored

guys... i got bored. time for another event <3 this one is gonna involve Zanar AND Thorlo bc ive decide they’re frenemies who maybe sometime go out for drinks and then have aggressive gay sex. Thorlo is bottom (power) and Zanar is top (not… power? idk the correct terminology). but the normal dynamic is that they kinda fight over which demigod who kills and maybe work together on tougher ones. and then they go out to a bar, Zanar drinks some fruity little COCKtail (emphasis on COCK) and Thorlo just broods in the corner sipping wine directly from the bottle. they would then go home and have (consensual) sex. that phrasing makes it sound like they live togteher. and now they will. they live in an apartment together and have two cats, Louie and Queen (louis mcclung and drama queen reference bc im gay???) who dont interact and are just kinda coexisting. also a dog named Layzie (guys i love shoving my commentary ytbr’s into a thing) (layze reference btw) who barks an awful lot.

i should prolly give yall (myself) a desc of these characters shouldnt i? Kilun, Hilna, and Yali are all just indescribable beings of light that manifest themselves as the most boring man you’ve ever seen. he looks like his name is kyle. but that’s just for earthlings!!! if your oc (this is an invitation to shove your oc’s in this pls bro) isn’t, make them just some guy from their planet. or not a guy. gender is a concept and their plans havent started. Zanar is, as previouly mentioned, just a black panther goober. by technicality, xey can be any animal and take on those traits, such as a coyote, shark, moth, goat, bear, or anything else! including other animals from other planets. Thorlo looks either like one of those edgy older man characters (long straight white hair, suit, scars, red eyes, kinda looks like a mafia leader) or a steriotypical transmasc (not saying this is what ftm peeps look like but you know people love stereotypes) (the fluffy brown hair, baggy clothes, neutral tones, earthy, this mf def has a fake tail). sorry for shit desc

new character alert!!! Junig (he/she) (mainly he) (she is used mainly by enemies)!!! demigod of water and to be more specific, rain/thunder and hes a bitch!!! theres some sympathy, but hes kinda an asshole :/ maybe gonna make him a bit homophobic n stuff, like a bully from your high school grown up. hes gonna be a dick to everyone except for Yali who he is immensely loyal to for reasons that make sense (they’re basically his parent bc as i mentioned demigods just kinda appear and dont have a parent? they still get raised based off who they were closest to when they appeared) (maybe including other demigods if theyre considered mature enough?)

clarifying the pronouns bc i will forget all about these if i dont. for gods and demigods: he (maybe she for rlly old demis who arent in communication with him and know him as she) Thorlo and Zanar: she bc theyre assholes (and ofc he uses the wrong ones for them too dont worryyyy)

so as i said, dickhead to everyone except Yali, who he’s loyal too. and i mean LOYAL. this guy would probably castrate himself for them. and like, good for him? it’s fully platonic bc theyre basic parent and child, you freak. def a one sided obsession tho. reverse boy mom if you know what i mean (cough, emotional incest, cough). Yali has no clue what they did to Junig tho, they’ve raised so many children that they kinda just forget about a lot of their children. bc that’s such a power move and they’re a power bottom (if they fucked) (these gods dont have sex) (theyre asexual beings what am i yapping about)

Yuna (he/they) is a demigod of poisonious plants on earth. there have to be so many specifics. anywayss, hes decent. not special or anything, hes kinda just there and does things. people on earth rlly like him tho bc why wouldnt you? hes done nothing wrong and is just a goober. i like to think he has one consistent form for all mortals; a completely black robe that covers his whole body and a hood over his head. he does not have a form and is just a swirling mass of shadows. very cool :D hes also known to kidnap cats (or cat-like creatures) if he visits a planet

im gonna add an example of what a mortal worshipper of Raynism is, taking one in specific named Vivi (any/all). all it is is being considerate and accepting of everything and everyone, other than those who cause direct harm to groups of people or creatures. politics cannot be swayed by Raynism, as being a Raynist means that you swear off such mortal coils as money and anything like that, they are not your priority. you can still have them of course, but it shouldnt be your aspiration to have the most. and you may still be involved in politics and things like that, but using your religion as an excuse isnt valid while having your beliefs be about acceptance

but these are the worship that happens for believers!!! making shrines in the fall months (using items such as flowers, various other plants, figurines, bones, photos of thing dear to you, and jewelry), praying to the (main) gods daily for luck and demigods for specifics, being vegan/vegetarian depending on how devoted they are, or at least think of the animal before eating the meat products, and meditation bc i think thats a thing that would be good for people

another demigod bc i love characters. Seraphyne (agender, just use name) is the oldest and original demigod. Seraphyne is a demigod of fire, to be specific the god of forest fires. Seraphyne is distant from every other god or Rayni, living in an place simply known as “the inbetween” that not many know how to get to. so Seraphyne spends all day in Seraphyne’s space, watching the planets and listening for prayers. none ever ask for a forest fire tho, so Seraphyne just spends the time preventing them from happening if they can. sometimes the fire is needed or too harsh to be stopped by Seraphyne.

Seraphyne, like Yuna, has a constant form with mortals, just a thing made of fire. like, genuinely, Seraphyne’s form is really just them walking around as a ball of flames contained by some straight-legged jeans and a checkered sweater-vest (Seraphyne’s preferred outfit, on occasions with reading glasses) (for the non-exsistant eyeballs) that dont burn for reasons. if they make sense or not is up to you.

i

i

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anyway time for obviously tumblrcoded interactions so i can get attention!!!

Zanar: dont worry pookster, junig will have no clue what hits her

Thorlo: that doesnt mean you can hit her with a comically large hammer. she’ll be able to tell its you.

Zanar: :(

Kilun: i feel fine, i have no clue why you’re bringing me to the medics

Yali: Its just for your safety.

Medic: Oh-! My holiness’s, what makes you come to our fine clinic at this time???

Kilun: Some dude took my organs out *lifts shirt to reveal hollow chest with golden blood coating the cavity walls*

Medic: Goodness. *passes out*

Thorlo: *fighting and actually tying to show corruption and the flaws in what a demigod has been doing*

Demigod: maybe... maybe i was wrong...

Zanar: *fighting and literally making jokes when xey hurt a demigod and calling it names*

Demigod: bitch.

notes from goober interactions so far: Zanar fights with goofy weapons, such as the affermentioned comically large hammer, but could be such as a musical saw (or other musical weapons), comically large or small weapons of various kind, and maybe bare fists? Junig is a demigod, im thinking water based and just kinda a bitch, kicks puppies type evil. Kilun/Hilna/Yali do not feel pain and have no concern for their corporeal forms. demigods and everything else in this universe curse so so much. demigods hate Zanar, and that’s valid!!! also this is just a note from a thing i wrote, Zanar eats people. and enjoys fucking with peoples minds before they do so. characters use modern slang and tend to do so without noticing (they just like me frfr!!!)

[parksprout]

Sprout Journal 11/4/24

Wow! What a day! I have so much to say about today, but I'll try to keep it brief. So first of all, I hate the time change more than almost anything else in existence. That stuff messes me up so bad!! I woke up at 5am dude, what on earth is there even to do at 5am? I ended up cleaning my room for a lil bit before the sun rose and got dressed for school extra early, so that was nice at least. I somehow managed to rush out of the house early and forget to grab my breakfast, so my banana oatmeal will have to wait another day ToT

On my walk to school I listened to the rest of the first Ghost album and oh my god! I am becoming such a big fan of them so quick, their music is so striking both instrumentally & lyrically. I need to actually read their lore and become a real fan but so far I am LOVING this band. Tobias Forge's accent is also so nice!! That lil bit of Swedish that comes out as he sings adds such a twist to his style. But after my walk to school, I settled into Spanish class for my oral exam - which I think I did pretty dang good on! We had three random prompts that we could've been given, and I unfortunately got the one prompt I didn't have time to practice before the exam, but I aced it anyways! I didn't stutter once, I conjugated all of the verbs in the correct tenses, and my professor let me use the e ending because I'm nonbinary instead of the a (feminine) or o (masculine) ending which made the language work a lot better for me! After Spanish class I had Creative Writing class, which I unfortunately am behind on. I didn't read the chapters in the novel we're supposed to be reading for the rest of the semester. We actually had a different professor today and will have a different one for the next three weeks! Our main professor had his baby last week. He seems like such a good father, apparently he's taking full time care of the baby while his wife rests ToT how adorable??? If I ever have a kid I wanna be like that, taking care of my partner while they recover. Anyways our new professor introduced herself in such a funny way. I could hear the distinct clop of her faux alligator skin platform shoes echoing down the hallway from a half mile away, and she burst into the classroom late with a flourish then SLAMMED the door behind herself. She's so quirky and chic. She was wearing this seashell patterned dress shirt, fancy ass corduroy pants that I really am jealous of, and even more jewelry than I wear each day! She led us through a really fun discussion in class.

After that, my Anthropology professor called off so I had an almost four hour period of downtime during which I told myself that I was gonna do a bunch of reading, but instead I ended up just posting to tumblr and texting my [REDACTED]. We talked so much this morning and it was so fun ToT I know I shouldn't be ridiculous and hope too much about things so soon, but at the very least we're communicating a lot better than we have in months regardless of what we are. I do keep finding myself sending them hearts, or messing up and saying a pet name. I called them babe earlier out of reflex and deleted the message super fast, I don't know if they even saw it? I think that if we do become a couple again I'm gonna find myself laughing over how awkward I've been while trying to keep my natural inclination towards affection repressed. Either way, our conversations were super fun today, but I started getting both too feelys and wanting to say things I shouldn't like the big four letter word, and also I started getting a bruuuttaalll headache. I had to buy myself a water and some acetaminophen and put my phone down for a while.

Archaeology class was after that, and it was such an interesting lecture! We had a guest lecturer today and she discussed the actual process of applying for, obtaining, and working field jobs specifically within Cultural Resource Management. So, CRM is this pseudo-governmental job in archaeology that typically requires you work with both state governments and construction agencies. Basically, anytime there's a state or federally funded construction project it's legally required that the construction company and state pay for archaeologists to examine the site to make sure that no artifacts/cultural materials are being damaged. It's the bulk of all field work conducted by archaeologists today and probably what I'm gonna end up doing as my career!

Gosh this is turning out to be a lot. After that I went to the gym and worked my ASS off. I wrote down what I did so here it is :3

15 minutes (two miles) on the elliptical as a warmup

3 sets of 10 shoulder press reps at 85 lbs

1 set of 10 shoulder press reps at 110 lbs

3 sets of 10 leg raise machine reps at 140 lbs

1 set of 15 leg raise machine reps at 200 lbs (I MAXED OUT THE MACHINE MY LEGS ARE SO STRONG OUGH)

3 sets of 10 incline bench machine reps at 85 lbs

1 set of 10 incline bench machine reps at 110 lbs (this one I barely managed omg)

15 minutes (two more miles) on the elliptical to finish off strong!

I was sweating so much by the end omg. I ate a protein bar and had probably 1.5 liters of water while at the gym aklsdjfhaksdjf but I'm loving the effect that working out has on my mentality for the rest of the night after I get home. Also, the people are starting to recognize me there and someone even cheered me on today!

This is a lot. Besides that, I called my sister and got some super solid relationship/self care advice, got stuff to make the bnuuy their christmas presents in the mail, and played a bunch of bass! I also recorded myself singing along to two songs I really heavily fw and sent it to the Bnuuy as well, and got myself some food at my favorite local restaurant for the first time in a while!

It was a very good day <3 thank you for listening tumblr, I love you! Have a good night everyone

[byoldervine]

Personally I started by looking at other media and saying “I like this aspect of it, I’ll take that and try to add my own customisation to it” and, more helpfully in my case, “I don’t like this, they had such a good idea but they botched the execution, I’m gonna do it my way”

Another thing I did, which is actually known as ‘filing off the serial numbers’, was to take a fanfic I’d previously wrote, remove anything tying it to the fandom (words exclusive to canon, canon character names, anything like that), and rewriting it to work as a standalone story

And then I went ham in Notion creating fact files and lore and worldbuilding. I made a page for each character with a sheet of information on them. I made a page for each setting and location to get an idea of the world I’d be writing in, as well as its history. I made a page for each power or item or species that might have its own separate history or rules or significance

And from there, the plot kind of writes itself; a whole lot of the story isn’t even similar to the original fic now, and that’s largely because I worldbuilt the hell out of it before I even attempted to write it

And then we get to plotting; once I got an overall idea of how I wanted the story to go, I bullet-pointed each chapter out. One bullet point per plot point, then additional bullet points underneath the big bullet point to flesh it out further. Don’t be shy to write random stuff in these; nobody needs to see them except for you, and coming back to a bit of a laugh makes it more fun and engaging to work with. I like to call this method ‘scaffolding’, but I’ve seen other names for it

I prefer plotting and scaffolding in groups of five chapters at a time; it gives me the room to go off-script when inspiration strikes without forcing me to rewrite all of my plotting and scaffolding that’s now become obsolete. I also like noting down at the start of each chapter plotting note page what I’m wanting the chapter to accomplish, so I can stick to that guide

And after I’ve got my plotting, I start writing for real. I hope this wasn’t too long or too poorly worded, best of luck with your writing!

guys how do yall make plots for your books. i want to write a book but i have no idea what tf could happen. all i made so far is that there's a god for each of the five elements, water and earth being goddesses while fire and air are gods. and they're kinda nice. and there's also abyss, the goddess of the dark and related things who is probably not evil either. inspired by "if you stare into the abyss for too long, it stares back" bla bla bla but what about the goddamn plot. any writing tips appreciated