#let's do something fun here
Explore tagged Tumblr posts
crystallizsch · 6 months ago
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okay hi so listen hear me out
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sea snake is a bit too obvious (and too boring)
so i made him based on some kind of lionfish??? (bc something something venomous marine animal) also with a LOT of creative liberties i made with how the fish looks like
let’s also give his fins some rips and tears here and there bc what are the implications of that??? that’s for you 🫵 to decide
anyways chat i lowkey dont know what i was doing
i had no other thoughts but haha funny snake man i turn into fish
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5ummit · 2 years ago
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Important things I’ve learned about the new tumblr polls so far (which are NOT mentioned in the official announcement post):
Once you’ve voted you can’t change it and you can only vote once.
You can only view poll results on the dashboard or in blogview. The buttons are still displayed on custom blog layouts, but if you try to click on them it will automatically take you to blogview.
Responses are completely anonymous. Neither the poll creator nor the respondents can see who voted or what they voted for. The only visible metric is the total number of votes.
Votes don’t show up on your activity feed so you have to go find the poll on your blog if you want to see the results or know if people are even voting.
You can’t view the results of your own poll without participating (clicking on one of the answer choices yourself).
You can’t edit a poll post once you publish it, you can only delete it! I assume this lasts until the poll has timed out, which will either be in a week or a day depending on what you picked This is permanent, so you better hope you got all of your tags and answer choices correct before you publish! This also means you can’t change your poll duration later either.
UPDATE (Jan 22, 2023):
You can send individual polls to someone as a submission, which the recipient can then edit and customize before publishing, but this will NOT give that person the ability to create new polls on their own.
Polls have a maximum of 10 answer choices and each answer choice is limited to 80 characters.
Polls can’t be added to reblogs, only original posts. Additionally, only one poll is allowed per post.
You can add a poll to a previously published original post (that doesn’t have one already), but as soon as it’s published again all editing will be disabled. Also, the poll time limit starts from the original post date, so if you add a poll to a post older than your set time limit, the poll will automatically show up as completed with zero votes.
If you aren't sure if you have the ability to create polls, check this guide. As of right now, according to my current poll, only about 10-15% of users have this feature.
For more detailed info about polls and other currently known bugs and exploits, check out gotinterest’s polls masterpost.
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magicpiano · 4 months ago
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I have seen a few DCxMarvel dimension travel fics, and quite a few of them are of them are Peter Parker post-blip. Which gives me a crack fic idea: everyone who got snapped ended up in the DC universe. Yes, all of them.
The current world population is around eight billion, so half of that would be 4 billion... Yeah that would cause so so so many problems. But the DC universe is used to crazy shit.
Obviously there would be a sudden influx of "new" heroes and villains but with absolutely no context it is hard to figure out who is who.
Batman immediately trying to make contingency plans for all these new heroes and villains as well as figure out their civilian identities but this is very difficult because literally no records exist yet.
Magic users from both worlds team up, but I think they were still unable to fix it, the infinity stones were just too powerful. Also I think Dr. Strange and Constantine can't stand each other.
While I am at it, Wonder Woman and Loki would probably hate each other too. DC is more Greek but it has had their own version of Norse mythology, so maybe they are the same and have beef?
They would struggle to feed and house that many new people, but getting them jobs and integrating them into society would be hard too. And good luck proving anything anyone says. "You swear you have a law degree from Harvard? Okay I guess."
Do doubles exist? Yeah a lot of people probably don't have an alternate universe double, but it stands to reason some do. How do you deal with having a new kind-of twin? Or a dead friend or relative coming back, but different? Or even someone you never knew/doesn't exist in this world insisting they are family.
Some au double ideas I have seen people toss around are: Dick Grayson as Richard Parker, Kara Danvers as Carol Danvers, Steve Trevor as Steve Rogers, and Slade Wilson as/being somehow related to Wade Wilson, but I am sure there are other fun ideas out there too.
The snap didn't just affect humans/earth! So other planets are having the same problems.
Then randomly, five years later, just when people were getting used to the change, they all disappear again without warning. This causes as many problems as the original appearance did.
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ricky-mortis · 5 months ago
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Curtwen Week Day 5: Disguise
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dragondawdles · 1 year ago
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hi been noodling with designs for block guys have some sandy boys
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starry-bi-sky · 6 months ago
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how do you clone a fey? that's trick question; and fey love those!
@the-navistar-carol (<333) brought up a good point while I was talking about my changeling danny au with her -- Dani! How would she exist in this au? Danny's a changeling - a fae. How would Dani, a clone of him, be created? How do you make a fey? Not through any means that Vlad is doing; you can't make a fey through unnatural means, considering the Fair Folk are nature. And Vlad's not a fey himself -- he's a halfa, even if he could make a fey, it's not in his best interest too. He's a powerful ghost, but even the weakest fae can overpower the strongest ghost. He won't want a clone of Daniel to be more powerful than him.
(In a three tier hierarchy it goes Ancients -> Fae/Mythos -> Ghosts. They all live in the Infinite Realms, but on different Planes. The fae live above the Ghost Zone in the Fey Wild, while the Mythos live beside the Wilds or down in the ghost zone depending on where they are. Places like the Frozone, the Athens Acropolis, and other such large islands climb throughout all three Planes.)
(While Ghosts can travel into the Fey Wild, its generally advised against as the ectoplasm tends to manifest differently there due to close contact magic. It can make it rather disorientating for a ghost, and as human spirits, the Fae living there would jump them faster than they could blink. So unless you're willing to play mind games with 'steal thy name eat thy face' fae, most ghosts keep out of the way of the Wilds. Fey can travel down into the Ghost Zone, they just don't bother.)
That's of course, not taking into account if Vlad even knows Danny's a fae himself. Vlad doesn't ring me as someone who really cares much about ghost culture or the going ons of the GZ. He might be aware that fae exist, but the moment he realizes he can't use them for personal gain he just doesn't bother with them. The risk is greater than the reward, and he'd rather not get eaten. But lets assume he's aware by now that Danny is fey, and has to take that into account while cloning him.
So, how does Dani exist? Good question! Honestly; i'm not sure. She might not exist at all, or if she does, she's more halfa than fey. Vlad would need a lot of human dna and ectoplasm to balance out all that fae magic. He manages to steal DNA from Jack and Maddie to do it, and since Jack's fey ancestry is very dormant its much easier to use alongside Danny's DNA.
In turn, it results in a little girl whose more human-ghost hybrid than clone. With that little extra boost in fey magic making her not a fey, but still relatively powerful. Dani is less of a clone and more of a lab-grown little sister. It's a rather tedious, complex process that has Vlad tearing his hair out trying to figure out. But he does eventually figure it out.
#dpxdc#danny fenton is not the ghost king#dpxdc crossover#changeling danny au#danielle fenton#danny phantom#still no mention of DPXDC yet so i'm adding the DP tags if thats alright lmao#how do you clone a fey? trick question! you can't. you can only make something that's not-quite fey but has ties to them.#dani's fey ancestry is an ounce of water compared to the bucket of everything else. which is more than the drop in the pond compared to jac#but not quite as powerful as changeling daniel. whose more fey than human at this rate. which is very fun to think about in terms of#his rogues haha. imagine going into the human realm about to cause chaos only to come face to face with a baby fey. a changeling.#i'd simply pass away a second time. where is your parent. human raised or otherwise?? are they nearby??? shit i thought fey hated urban#cities. what are YOU doing here baby man. im going to get eaten holy fuck. that's so many teeth.#. oh. oh you think you're a ghost. hm. hmhm. i can work with that. lets just. make sure you keep thinking that okay :) great :))#like jumpscare dude. i just saw my afterlife flash before my eyes. hello unsupervised fey child. holy fuck are you teeny tiny.#vlad probably uses some of his own dna to get the halfa effect so really dani's more of a lab grown *half* sister. Danny's gonna end up#stealing her anyways in the end. his sister now :). non-human danny my beloved#catch me using fey and fae interchangeably. my bad#some food for thought sorry if its hard to understand.#steal thy name. eat thy face fey
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teeayohess · 8 days ago
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{ 18 simlish horror-themed recolors of misstiikeri+eir's m2f crooked tee } what a mouthful lmao
i wasn't too sure about how these had turned out at first, but after seeing them in game they actually grew on me, so here they are. thank you @gvaudoiin-tricou for encouraging me to finish them and share! i hope you like them :-)
since this is essentially a mash-up of several people's work (see credits), frankenstein-ed together, it feels pretty appropriate for the theme.... 🧟‍♂️🔪🦇🩸👽 consider this a tiny late simblreen treat, hehe 🎃
these separate tops are for AF only*, since that's what i needed in my game (but the TF/EF meshes should be easy to copy-paste onto) [edit: *added links to an AM version as well]
they are categorized as everyday, sleepwear and athletic (not sure who would want to sleep or exercise in fishnets but hey i'm not judging. also it's really easy to remove them if you like, since they're a separate texture from the shirt)
compressorized, tooltipped, and the files are labeled clearly. the swatch and previews are included in the rar file.
full disclosure, this mesh has a few issues i don't currently have the skills to fix: it has no fat morph (😑), and there is some clipping in places depending on how the sim moves, and a few dark spots (not super noticeable with the black texture, thankfully). if anyone feels inspired to fix the mesh or add morphs, i'll happily update this post and the linked file.
>>> get them here: { SFS } { MF } [edit: AM version here: { SFS } { MF } ]
credits, swatch & unedited pic under the cut.
swatch: (labeled according to the file names for easy id; i suck at reading simlish so 'flash' was all i could understand from that one, apologies if it's incorrect lol)
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unedited preview: (taken in-game, with neutral lighting)
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credits: the77sims & misstiikeri (original male mesh & 3t2 conversion) eir (m2f conversion) trillyke (fishnets), monilisasims (4t2 conversion) littlecakes (graphics), kalux (4t2 conversion) surprisepeach (graphics)
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daisybell-on-a-carousel · 1 month ago
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We should talk more about the fact Jason got swarmed and attacked by a mob as Robin, like??? Hello. He had to be left there because the mob was too violent with Batman near. He had to be taken to the hospital.
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Look at those injuries!!
The next time we see him he's forcing himself out of bed and putting on the Robin costume thinking "I've gotta do what I can to help, even if it kills me!"
The next next time we see him he has walked into yet another violent mob
I cannot stop thinking about this story and the effects it probably had on him honestly. Do you think it's made him nervous in crowds, do you think it made him trust others just that bit less. How long do you think he was being attacked before he was found, the scene had cleared. "I've gotta do what I can to help, even if it kills me!",,,,
Just the concept itself! I don't know about you guys but being attacked and grabbed and trampled into unconsciousness sounds absolutely terrifying! Did he black out, still getting hit, thinking he was going to die? Knowing he couldn't defend himself as his injuries to took their toll? At their complete mercy?
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1986-87 Legends, issue #2 (the attack), #3 (the hospital), #5 (getting up), #6 (defending heros from another forming mob)
2010 DC Universe: Legacies, issue #6 (flashback panel to Legends moment)
#jason todd#jaybin#jason todd robin#comic reference#we need to talk about and acknowledge this so much more its such a fun bit of information n backstory#and i honestly think its a REALLY IMPORTANT jaybin moment. both for him and readers#batman#dc comics#i never see anyone talk about it which is such a shame honestly#fairly confident this is post crisis jaybin. but of course we are in the evil gray area of actually post crisis - before new backstory#but gonna be honest with you guys here i and actual dc writers take from precrisis jaybin alot anyway because he IS still jason#and adds more original comic time for jason#as long at its not like blatantly contradictory i keep a rather lot of his things#and again we are in the grey area of it#plus he calls himself the new robin in the hospital scene so that probably means something#and none of it at all matters anyway because when it comes to comics you do what you want for forever. thumbs up emoji#this is still important anyway. the “ive gotta help even if it kills me!” haunts me#dare i say i wish we talked more about jaybin time in general. like. the stories from it#all i usually hear is ditf and him pushing or not pushing that guy. its a shame i think jaybin has some really fun stories#i think (i think) scarecrow and mad hatter were rogues he faced the most. DEFINITELY scarecrow#two face too if im counting the mad hatter. +plus importance bc twoface he thought killed his dad#he lets himself be kidnapped by two face saying hes the SECOND robin and then insults the guys car#he dresses up as two face once#he saw scarecrow making highly concentrated fear toxin and dumped it on him 😭#sherlock holmes was in a story at some point#its so fun. augh i need to reread jaybin so so bad its so fun i miss it
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demonslayedher · 29 days ago
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I finished posting the unabashedly educational Sword Fic.
It includes a detailed (but hopefully beginner-friendly) explanation of all the steps of making a Nichirin blade from a sunny mountain like Mt. Youkou, a touch of swordsmith and metalworker folk lore (including demons), meta about what must make Kimetsu no Yaiba's swordsmithing methods different from real life methods, some character exploration for Haganezuka and his polishing method, vocabulary and additional resources in the chapter notes, and hopefully, an endearing, silly POV character to learn this all through.
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#my fics#SWORDS SWORDS SWORDS#would you like a story about the years of background of this fic?#I was not very well-versed in metallurgy until recent years but my study of the Japanese language goes back to#well#longer than some of you may have been around#I always liked samurai and swords for the aesthetic but started to take more of an interest when I lived in Shimane#and on a day when I had a friend taking me around to rural sites associated with a legendary monster she was like#let's go see the sword museum while you're out here#but that museum was closed (it comes back into this story though)#so we went to a different one that no longer exists but that was my first encounter with how much work it takes to make the sword ore#fast forward years later#I am writing this blog and it becomes known as a fun place to read about Japanese culture as seen in KnY (thanks glad you enjoy)#I decide that I must tell people how hard it is to make the ore and finally visit that main museum on a trip back to Shimane#I collect material and struggle to do more research and wrap my head around it#and I write the first version of Teppi's story that focused mostly on the smelting and glazed over the forging and polishing and stuff#meanwhile I am in a job situation I have already long since wanted out of and soon I want out a lot more desperately#job searches were disheartening but then I found THE ONE I WANTED#and on that first interview when I was already like PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE#they asked if there's a Japanese cultural topic I could suddenly explain in great detail if asked#and without mentioning this blog I said I had recently written up something for fun about tatara smelting methods (and they forgot this)#fast forward again and I very happily got the job and was very nervous as I got the rundown on a very large annual nerd project#and when they announced the topics for that year I saw that tatara smelting methods in the region I knew them from was on the list#and I was like#asudyaiusdyuasdyuahduahduhsdhuPLEASE GIVE ME THAT#and i got it and when I went out there for research people were like#...why do you know all this...???????#and since I dared not mention my KnY blog I was like#...I lived in Shimane...#it seems I broke the tags because the rest of the story got cut off but hi yes you get the idea
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poorly-drawn-mdzs · 1 year ago
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Decided to take the leap and post the little fanfic I wrote at the start of the month to AO3. The Yiling Laozu takes a break in the burial mounds. Also, there is a worm.
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bmpmp3 · 5 months ago
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finding out ur coworker is way older than you thought and having to very quickly reorient how you talk to them
#art#traditional art#watercolour#fanart#synthv#synthesizer v#genbu#kasane teto#rikka is also here :) i think she likes to cause problems sometimes. because all the adults in her life are dweebs#and very easy to cause problems with <3#anyone else have this happen before. im older than a lot of my university peers and i always have been#because i took 5 years in highschool and my undergrad has been like 6 years and counting#(hashtag learning disability <3 ) and like thats chill to me i dont mind#but now i usually assume everyones way younger than me and i get shocked when theyre not. a buddy in some of my classes#when i first met her i absolutely and completely assumed she was like barely 19 and talked to her as such#like i dont talk down to people or anything but i do soften the way i talk a bit and give a bit extra patience with younger peers#cause yknow. i remember what it was like being 19. being 26 is WAY easier lol so i wanna give em a bit of leeway yknow#anyway a few months after meeting her i found out she was actually a year older than me and a grad student when she ended up as a TA in#another class i took. i felt so bad. we bonded tho and she didnt mind she thought it was kinda funny when i was like WAIT UR A GRAD STUDENT#i thought she was like a first or second year undergrad..............#also yeah im a 31yo teto fan. i dont mind the popular fanon that she has a separate age that makes her actually 15 and#i dont mind that more interpretations have her like that BUT for my internal canon she is a grown ass woman because i think its fun <3#she pays taxes. she goes to work parties. she can rent a car. i love it#let teto rent a car. let her rent a car.#yknow im exicted to be 31. i still got a few more years of being a 20 something which is fun. but being a 30 something sounds like it rules
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starflungwaddledee · 1 year ago
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offering three cookies 🍪🍪🍪
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(<< part 1)
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krikidilly · 5 months ago
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akagiyuu… akagiyuu..
Akagiyuu... akagiyuu...
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When the guy you're suppose to be revenge battling is actually kinda....aleetle..
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akkivee · 22 days ago
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I DIDNT FORGET WHOSE SPECIAL DAY IT IS THO HAPPY BIRTHDAY SASARA 🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡🧡
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rain-on-wax-feathers · 3 months ago
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nonhuman burr, washington, and eliza!!!
#okay yes proportions r funky ignore that please its design explaining time#burr has a squirrel tail bc he reminds me of the squirrels on the road when ur driving towards them and they panic. not really#i thought itd be funny. he has a deer nose and when he was younger had had those fawn spots on his cheeks. v cute#he also is like stony around his joints. uhm. bc he's grounded and unchanging and it just fits yknow#and then he has the horns that form a halo. he got that from his grandfather.#okay now washington isnt just eagle wings i promise he just hides everything else bc of some leadership physiological thing#he probably has some tree shit going on. maybe a dog idk yet#if yall have ideas let me know#okay so eliza !!!!!!! i wanted to give her wings from the very beginning so here you go#(does alexander have a thing for wings..... idk you'll have to wait and see my maria design /hj)#uhm horns and flowers/plants bc i felt like it???#she has lightning down her back btw. and a feather tail. cant see it bc dress#and she also has those orbs around her. for fun. its like those spirit lights you see in ghost/alien footage#i added the lightning bc of her personality from what i can tell.#amrev#amrev au#elizabeth hamilton#elizabeth schuyler#eliza schuyler#guys which one do i use she has a lot of tags#aaron burr#aaron burr fanart#george washington#george washington fanart#.... is that not a popular tag#anyway#amrev fanart#digital art#art#if youve read this far comment “i love eliza's flowerrr” or something similar.
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hulloitsdani · 1 month ago
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i want to know your anna thoughts so bad hi.
Hullo! Sure I can provide some Anna thoughts! I have so god damn many. Some other characters are also going to work their way in here too, if you don’t mind. And buckle up, this is gonna be a long one. I got a whole short story for y’all here.
Without further ado, I present to you: The Commander Anna Post
Let’s have some fun, shall we?
So in the age discussion of the feh main cast from a while back, I mentioned how I accounted for Anna’s bizarre position in Askr’s military by making her a child soldier. She has been fighting since she was a young teenager and has logged a decade of combat experience at this point.
I want there to be some fun consequences for this. For example, Anna is rocking some very serious injuries that will likely be with her for the rest of her life. Most notable being her left shoulder. Just by looking at her in full commander regalia, it’s not obvious that there’s any kind of issue. But Anna can’t lift her left arm all the way anymore. Her armor does an excellent job covering up the inconsistency, as it doesn’t allow for that level of mobility anyway. But take the armor off and you can see her shoulder is an absolute mess. It is, and I quote, “the worst healing job I’ve ever seen” according to Veronica.
It’s a bizarre sight for the kid. It’s not the type of thing she expected to learn about an enemy commander. Perhaps THE enemy commander. But in this situation that hardly matters, as she is the group healer as they all trek deeper into the realm of the dead. And Veronica is tending to her wounds only to find the pitiful scarred skin, warped and uneven from a hastily rushed healing process. It’s from a long time ago, she explains. From when she was still just a foot solider. But that… doesn’t make sense does it? Was Bruno not her ally? He has the capacity to heal— he was the one who taught Veronica the little she knows. Even his worst attempts were leagues better than the work done here.
Anna can only shrug, a motion made mostly with her right shoulder. He didn’t reveal that he was a mage of any kind while he was with them. So, even if he wanted to, there’s a chance he could not afford to. Veronica doesn’t know what to say to that. There’s this… uncomfortable knowing between the two of them. They know now, in retrospect, that swallowing down the truth like that must have ate Bruno alive. Just another reason for his sorry state that they didn’t catch until it was nearly too late. Add that to the pile of tiny behaviors that now make sense, right? The intensity of his expression as he insisted Veronica learn how to heal despite her protests and the daggers he’d stare into the intricate scaring on Anna’s shoulder. Throw them all in. Every last piece.
Commander Anna looks at the princess and unexpectedly breaks the tension with a laugh. You see, it’s funny, because this is exactly how she started to figure out Zacharias was Bruno. Very few know about her shoulder. She’s not exactly brazen about it, nor do the people she interacts with have the medical knowledge to glean how serious it is. She doubts even Kiran knows, to be honest. The only person who knows without a shadow of a doubt is Zacharias, because he was there when it happened. He’s probably the reason why she survived that day at all. So, you must imagine her surprise, when a masked stranger targeted this weakness and forced her to fight left handed. It was the most bizarre fight of her life! Fighting someone who clearly knew her, but she herself could not place!
Veronica was not there, but she can picture the lunacy of it. Bruno fighting his comrade as the commander attempted to fight a stranger. She hasn’t really seen Anna entirely thrown off before, but knowing that her brother managed it brings her satisfaction. She deserves it after all the times her and the rest of these fools have done it to Veronica. Feels like comeuppance. She chuckles. They both do. Gods she’s having a moment with the enemy commander. What has the world come to?
Fjorm has a far less positive reaction to piecing it together. After the events of book 2, she knows her time is short. She… cannot face the remains of her family in this state. It would be a slow painful death to rot away behind castle walls and wheeze into soft silks. No, she would much rather die on her feet. Put her body to good use while it’s still able.
So she trains. She trains until she feels her bones threaten to snap. She must have been at it for hours before the commander offers to spar her. With how busy Anna normally is, it’s a rather rare opportunity to spar one on one. Fjorm instantly leaps for the chance.
So they fight, and Fjorm can see it. The way her left arm lags and the scarring that curls out from beneath her sleeve. Burns maybe? Possible electricity? Clearly an old injury from a mage. A weakness in her defenses that she can exploit, surely.
Anna makes no such thing possible. Maybe she learned since her fight with Bruno or maybe Fjorm isn’t fast enough to take advantage of it, but Anna easily evades any attempt to use this against her. Focusing her left just seems to earn Fjorm a swift jab in return. From there, the fight might already be over. Anna’s left arm might be lacking but her legs and mobility sure aren’t. She takes the opportunity to effortlessly bully her way into Fjorm’s space and renders her lance useless. It’s infuriating, but Fjorm is learning. She can do this— she has to. Ten losses deep is when Anna calls it. They put good work in and it’s time for lunch!
Fjorm is ready to throw her lance into the sun.
She insists she can keep going, but the commander is not budging. Still, she tries to push her luck. But once a look of annoyance makes a home on her features, Fjorm knows that’s it. Another disappointing loss. Damnit. She turns to find someone else to spar, but is very surprised to find Anna will not allow such a thing. They are both going to take a break, or Fjorm might find herself barred from the training grounds. She states that if Fjorm cannot be trusted to keep her own wellbeing in mind, then she cannot be trusted out here at all.
However, Anna provides her with a singular counter offer. This can all be avoided if Fjorm tells her what’s wrong. Because she isn’t stupid, something is clearly amiss. And Fjorm— at wits end and most definitely exhausted, dehydrated, and starving—flips her lid a bit. Begins to go off. She’s angry at Anna, and her stupid backswing with her axe, and her own inability to deal with it despite her inherent disadvantage with a lance, and how she keeps failing in front of the people here, and how weak she must appear, and how even the commander of an army in Askr is outclassing her as a warrior and leader, and how she can’t even hate her for it because Anna is just doing her job, and how that all means that the problem must lie within herself!!!
That’s, uh, wow. That’s more than Anna bargained for. She briefly internally wishes that Kiran or Sharena was here right now, as they’re far better at this type of thing. Maybe… she should just go for the most obvious one, yeah? Yeah! Anna isn’t a leader. Commanding people and leading them are vastly different skills. Complimentary! But different.
Look, on ledger, the order entirely under her name, but in practice it is run by four people. Alfonse, Sharena, Kiran, and herself. And it very much HAS to be. The order operates at such a large scale now that the division of labor was necessary. Anna is not so egotistical to think she could run this whole operation by herself, either.
This includes the actual leadership position of the order. Anna is very good at telling people what to do and when to do it, but actually rallying people to a cause? That’s wayyy above her pay grade. Hardly has the force of personality to pull that off. But the others do, and so does Fjorm. Hell, Fjorm has that is SPADES. Despite having lost just about everything, she managed to rally her broken beaten homeland against Surtr and Muspel through sheer force of will. That’s kind of insane, and it’s a little bizarre to the commander that the savior of Nifil can’t see that.
Besides, she’s not a better fighter than Fjorm either. She quite physically can’t be! Fjorm is angry that she couldn’t defeat her in less than ideal circumstances, but let’s be real, all she needs is a little practice. And maybe a full eight hours of sleep. And some food. And water. Can you see what she’s putting down here? The only real leg up Anna has on Fjorm is that she’s going to ask for help, despite the heavy hit to her ego. It’s why the order exists as it does, after all.
That conversation leaves Fjorm with a lot to think about. Both as a person and of her view of Anna. She apologizes for behavior and swears to do better. As proof of her determination, she takes her up on the offer of lunch, much to Anna’s amusement.
Much later down the line, Sharena learns— PROPERLY learns, within the realm of dreams. She’s not blind though. Over the years she has noticed the scaring and the favoring of her right hand. Soooo, Sharena makes an effort to cover her! Stick by her left! Her massive shield is more than capable of protecting her too! And that’s the routine they fall seamlessly into as they follow Peony through Freyr’s dream land and Freya’s nightmare.
Anna generally deals with the challenges of that place better than the rest, for the aforementioned reasons. She knows her limits, she asks for help, and she talks her problems through. The vulnerability may be uncomfortable for her at times, but it is not enough to prevent her from doing so in order to progress smoothly. It might hurt her pride a little as commander, but Sharena and Alfonse are her friends, no? She can say that now, after walking through literal hell and back with them. So she doesn’t mind if they are the ones to see the child she grew around to protect.
Rather angry kid, if you can believe it! Stubborn too. Getting split and copied throughout time and space as a result of Askr and Embla’s never ending war had that effect. And Sharena gets to see that little girl, stubbornly clinging to her axe, bleeding from a wound on her leg that she knows one day will scar over.
It’s from one of the first battles she was ever in, Anna explains. As a merchant, her dad saw it fit to train her in order to defend herself from bandits. And she had put those skills to use before— but not like this. Never like this. It was the first true fight for her life. Not very pleasant, as you can imagine! She still gets nightmares sometimes, as you can see. Happened a few times in the realm of the dead actually. But, luckily, it no longer haunts her as much as it once did. It’s just a scar on her leg now!
The sentiment doesn’t comfort Sharena much. This is, frankly, awful! She hates how scared she looks! A-and how large the wound on her leg is! She hates how… unaware of it she personally was! Why didn’t Anna tell her about this sooner? To which Anna can only shrug. Nobody asked, and if she’s being honest, she probably wouldn’t have told. Not the whole truth anyway. She can admit when she needs help but… she’s still human. It’s a lot easier to admit she had a nightmare than admit that she finds the very thought of bleeding out a worse death than drowning. Still gets her the help she needs, without being more vulnerable than necessary. Sharena rests her head on her shoulder.
“Are all of your scars like this?”
Anna… blinks. No. They’re not. Not even the one on her leg is all bad. She was saved by this elderly couple and their son, who saw the fighting and began dragging injured soldiers off the battlefield. They made awful puns the whole time they stitched up her leg and gave her the best tea she ever had. Anna has bought a lot of different teas trying to find it, but to this day, she has no clue what it was. Makes it better, to be honest. Sharena looks at her expectantly, waiting for her to continue.
Ah, story time then? Okay. Well. Uh, this line on the inside of her elbow is from a bandit. Rather nasty encounter, but she returned the favor by shoving an entire container of expensive makeup powder into his eyes. Her dad was so mad but god it was so worth it. And this scar on her thumb is from one of her first times cooking in the road. She was pealing a potato but one of her sisters slammed into her and nearly took off her finger. This nick on her clavicle is from the first battle she ever won. When the enemy finally retreated she screamed so loud that her voice was raw for a week. Then there’s this scar underneath her chin, which has to be the most embarrassing ones she has. Zacharias and her had some leftover money one week and decided to treat themselves to a drink or two or five. In trying to make it back to the barracks, they both fell. Hard. She walked away with this, but Zacharias fully fractured his wrist. Explaining what happened to the healers the next morning was dreadful. And… and then there’s the one on her shoulder. Anna was actually recovering from it when she met Alfonse and Sharena.
The princess sits up for that one. Really? Gods she didn’t show it. And it’s because, on some level, she couldn’t. It was from the last battle before the shaky truce was called between Askr and Embla. The one Veronica will inevitably break. And the truce was called for good reason. The battle was hell on earth. Anna… nearly died there. She should have died there, frankly. A point blank strike from a lightning mage with metal armor in the rain should have been the last mistake she ever made. But by some miracle, it wasn’t.
… In retrospect, she thinks it’s because of Zacharias. Things got hazy after she went down, but knowing what they do now, he must have used his own magic to kill the mage and heal her. She didn’t walk out unscathed, but it was enough.
Haha, gods, she will never stop feeling guilty about him, will she?
Anyway, the injury was pretty bad. Her shoulder never moved the same again. But seeing as they were both recently hired to be Sharena and Alfonse’s retainers, they couldn’t exactly let Gustav know how serious it was. Might cost them the job. So a truly comical level of shenanigans went into ensuring it was kept secret. Including this game she created where every time Zacharias accidentally touched her injured shoulder, he would pay up 10 gold. He was not a very touchy guy, but even Sharena knew that this was something he just did. A tiny reassuring shoulder pat to convey that he was listening. So this was, perhaps, the best money making scheme Anna ever came up with. His apologetic look would shift so quickly into one of so much instant regret. And Sharena, upon reflection, remembers this.
WAIT WAIT WAIT SHE REMEMBERS THIS. THATS WHAT THE NOTE PASSING THING WAS!!!! Alfonse had pointed out in one meeting that the new retainers were passing something between each other and Sharena insisted it must have been notes because of how boringgggg it was. BUT NO IT WAS GOLD. ZACHARIAS TOUCHED HER SHOULDER EARLIER IN THAT MEETING AND SHE WINCED. HE THEN WAITED A WHILE BEFORE PAYING UP TO NOT MAKE IT OBVIOUS. THATS HILARIOUS!!!
Anna starts cackling as Sharena begins to line up all the pieces. The nightmare fully dissipating as she shares in this silly secret. There’s a chance she would have died with it. Hell, we know of a world where she probably did. This is not a story she’d even give to her family of merchants, who despite being direct reflections of her, do not share the scars she’s littered with. Never had to be, and thus don’t quite understand. But, Sharena does. All her friends do. And it feels weird to say that because real friends have always been in short supply. But gods this is too good. How absolutely absurd it is, that they are in the realm of dreams trying to find their missing friend and defeat the goddess who took them, and Commander Anna of the Order of Heroes is about to pop a lung laughing as she tells Princess Sharena of Askr about the fallout from the time she nearly died.
It’s dumb! This is dumb! And it’s possibly the happiest she’s ever been.
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