#life of fal

[ddeserteagle]

Re-reading The Flight of the Eisenstein and making myself cry.

Oh well.

[nokk0]

Finally i got the energy to finish this!

Originally this was supposed to be just propaganda for Valfrey, however, i noticed that Shade and Fal are friends of literal incarnations of life and death

Life is the oc of @shippyo

Shade Knight is the oc of @rosiegardenlove

Valfrey is the oc of @gethoce

@kirbyoctournament

[that-starlight-prince]

I miss being in grad school when I could just do whatever I wanted to all day. Now I'm unemployed and it feels like I have so much to do

[kaynai-sama]

So my dog (the black one) is trying to leave her emo life and now she's joining her cousin into

✨Coquette✨

[nightfal1n]

Me: My schedule is getting tighter...maybe I should continue from that rough sketch from another day----

My recent file list:

.... (´・ω・`) (yeah there's Clip Studio app that shows all files' thumbnail but I hate its load time so much...)

[alullinchaos]

depression sucks but it sucks especially hard when you have to experience All the symptoms at once after not experiencing it like that for Years. anyway I'm totally fine why do you ask

[libraryleopard]

Young adult contemporary romance

When a overachiever Margo kisses another girl during a game of spin the bottle and realizes she's gay, she strikes a deal with openly bi Abbie to tutor Abbie in US history in exchange for learning about queer culture

Opposites-attract romance that explores sex positivity, biphobia, and learning to embrace your queerness

Autistic, Jewish lesbian main charactert; bi, Jewish main character with ADHD; F/F romance

[blazingjackdaw]

I finally sat down and outlined my Hero of Kvatch’s life story (supposedly for fun) and made myself sad in the process.

This is fine ಥ‿ಥ

[flowersandspacestuff]

Seen a painting of a girl, named "America". America is redder, she is not European. She is her own, she is not owned. She cannot be owned, and any who believe so are taking themselves for fools. For what have they enslaved but their own souls to a false god? For what will they gain but the slaughter of their own hearts on the altar of their wants?

[lenorenevermore99]

Why 457 is actually valid af and not just a "joke" ship

I wanna start this by saying that I'm in no way, shape or form convinced 457 is canon nor I think there will be anything remotely romantic between the two of them in season 3. But people seem to think it's just a joke inside the fandom, while actually, their dynamic is pretty fucking valid and I want to analyze that in this post.

One of the most discussed things (if not the most) when it comes to this ship is the stares.

Some think this is the stare of love, others think In-ho just enjoys seeing him suffer. Well, let me tell you it is neither.

But before we delve into the way In-ho stares at Gi-hun, we first have to go back to talk about Hwang In-ho as a character.

As we know, Hwang In-ho is the Winner of the 2015 Squid Game. He went into the games so he could have the money to treat his sick, pregnant wife, much like Gi-hun who did the same for his sick mother. Both of them won the game, but both of them were too late to save the person they loved from a sad fate.

This lead to In-ho becoming the Frontman. We don't know exactly what happened in the timeframe between him winning and him becoming the Frontman, but we can safely assume that after loosing his wife, In-ho lost faith in humanity. The games have destroyed him, they turned him into the villain he is today.

And the thing is, when he looks at Gi-hun, he sees his past self in him. This was confirmed by both Lee Byung Hun (In-ho's actor) and the director of the show himself.

Or to be more precise, he sees his past self. He sees who he was before the games changed him. And this is what led to his fascination and obsession with Gi-hun, because here's the thing; the games traumatized Gi-hun, but they didn't break his faith and hope in humanity, like they did with In-ho himself.

And this is the thing that, in my view, both fascinates and deeply angers In-ho. Deep inside, subconsciously, he is thinking, "Why were YOU able to retain your hope in humanity? Why were you able to remain a good person when I couldn't?"

In-ho was genuine when he told Gi-hun he wished he'd try to be happy after winning (or to better say, surviving) the games. I find it especially interesting when he tells him "Just pretend it was all a dream."

In-ho wishes he could pretend it was all a dream, but he couldn't. Think about it: he's a billionaire, but he lives in a shitty, small apartment. He doesn't talk to his mother, he doesn't talk to his brother, he doesn't even go visit his wife at the cemetery. Pardon me for borrowing the phrase from The Hunger Games, but he's not living the life of a victor. whether it's because he feels guilty or something else, I guess we'll find out in the next season, but that's not the point. The point is, that In-ho wants Gi-hun to do what he wasn't able to do after he won. He wants him to be happy because he sees himself in Gi-hun.

This is the most important point in this post.

Now I wanna focus on these moments. During the second game, during mingle, and during the lights-out massacre, we see Gi-hun being absolutely destroyed over the players that were killed. He's undoubtedly blaming himself for it. And here we see In-ho staring at him, not with the look of love, not with joy at his suffering, but with sorrow. He's sad for Gi-hun, because he could have spared himself further suffering if he didn't stubbornly decide to go back into the games.

What In-ho is thinking right here, in my view, is; "See? There is no hope. There is nothing you can do. Stop torturing yourself, just give it up already. How much more pain do you have to go through before you give up? Accept you can do nothing and go on with your life. Try to be happy."

Now you might be asking, okay, but what does that have to do with romantic love?

Well let me tell you that these feelings I just described can easily and quickly turn into love.

Many philosophers over the centuries have come to the same conclusion; we see part of ourselves in the people we fall in love with.

"The Front Man believes that Gi-hun is wrong in his way of thinking, but perhaps, he reflects on himself through Gi-hun. He does want to destroy Gi-hun's belief. I felt that a small part of him, unknowingly, might be hoping for Gi-hun's thoughts to be right. And rooting for him in some way."

These words Lee Byung Hun said about In-ho, makes me think of Jacques Lacan's theory in particular (which is a rather complex topic and I will try to summarize as shortly and as simply as I can).

For Lacan, love, at least in the beginning, is essentially a form of narcissism. When we fall in love, we're also falling in love with ourselves. We see ourselves in the other person, but we also see in the other what we subconsciously think we are lacking in ourselves. Which doesn't mean the other person will fix us because, at least according to Lacan, this lack is something that can never actually be "fixed".

And I think that's exactly was is happening with In-ho. He sees in Gi-hun what he's lacking in himself. They were traumatized the same way, but reacted in two completely different manners. In-ho became cruel and disillusioned with humanity, while Gi-hun still believes in humanity and wants to save everyone.

I know that this way, 457 seems like a one-sided kind of love, but that's honestly my personal interpretation of the ship. I think Gi-hun could have fallen for Young-il, for the person In-ho was before the games, if they had more time. But the Frontman In-ho? The person he became after becoming the Frontman? There's no way.

Not all loves are meant to happen, not all lovers get to be lovers. Some are meant to just leave us wondering what could have been. Which is what makes transformative works so fun and interesting! From the canonverse toxic fics to the wholesome alternative universe flower shop fics, I think their dynamic is valid as fuck.

I rest my case.

[pretty-little-mind33]

James Potter x fem!reader

KINKTOBER 2024

summary: You need James as soon as you wake up, and he needs you.

warnings: SMUT 18+, unprotected sex, quickie, swearing

The morning light shines onto your face from behind the large, sheer, curtains in you and your boyfriend's bedroom. James's head is tucked against your chest, his breath tickling your neck as you stir awake, your tired eyes adjusting to the sun. 

James's stirs as a chain reaction to your movement and you freeze. "Sorry, love," you whisper and hold a hand behind his head, scratching his scalp as he hums with pleasure. James just shifts closer, hiking his leg onto your hip as he attempts to become more comfortable again.  

Even in your sleepy state, you're very aware of his morning wood against your thigh. 

You grin, blinking yourself fully awake as you turn around and straddle his stomach now. James grunts, finally opening his eyes as he lays on his back, messy curls splayed across the pillow and his hands slowly find your hips. 

"Mornin'," he says, his voice hoarse from sleep. 

You press your hands against his bare chest, leaning down and capturing his lips in yours. He responds immediately as his hands tighten around you and you feel like the luckiest girl in the world.

"Hi," you mumble against his lips, rocking your hips ever so gently against his happy trail. 

James's eyes narrow and he smirks. "What's this, mm? I didn't forget my birthday, did I?" he teases lightly, knowing damn well your sex life doesn't require birthday sex to be amazing. 

You shake your head, drawing small hearts on his chest as your rocking continues. You peek at his boxers from underneath you, seeing his dick straining against the material and you smile. "You look needy this morning. Wanna help you," you say. 

James looks down and groans, helping you rocking now. 

"You cheeky minx," he grumbles, voice thick with arousal. "I'm the needy one, huh? Did'you know that morning wood is completely normal—and that means you're the needy one, climbing onto me like this." James's hand travels up your nightdress and into your panties as he teases your skin where the hem is. You moan, leaning down and kissing around his pecks. 

"Jamie, please," you plead as he checks you.

"So wet already?" he chuckles, fully awake now as he admires how the sun hits your skin. "Don't even need to prep you, darling." 

You nod, needing more friction to your puffy clit. "Had a dirty dream about you," you admit shyly, "Please. You're being mean." 

"Mean?" James's hands tighten around your waist and suddenly hoists you up by your thighs, flipping you over. "You're the one who woke me up to your pussy pressed against my stomach, getting herself off. So, hm, how am I the mean one? How was that fair?" 

James scolds you playfully and slides your panties up your legs, throwing them to the side as he pulls down his boxers. Your eyes are wide and needy when you see his dick and your nails dig into his arms. "Please."

"Shh," he whispers as he easily guides his cock into your slick folds, your pussy so wet you offer no resistance, "There, shh, baby, shh. There. I got you, fuck, you feel so good." He's praising you and you feel like you're in heaven. Instantly, you wrap your legs around his hips as he thrusts into you just the way he knows you like in the morning. 

"My beautiful girl," James whispers as he kisses you, pulling on your lip as you use his arms to ground yourself. He loves the soft moans you're making. 

James groans, gripping the headboard above you as he curses. "Fuck, c-can't last very long—I–"

You nod, "I know, love. I know." You know he doesn't last long in the mornings and you don't care. Neither do you. You're both so goddamn horny. 

You focus on his thrusts and how he groans from above you, his eyes screwed shut in pleasure. Your pussy clenches around him and that does it. You're lost in pleasure you don't even register he's spilled his cum inside you until you come down from your own high.

"Shit," James mutters, falling onto the mattress next to you as his chest heaves. 

You turn to him, an equally tired look on your face and you nuzzle into him, resting your head on his bicep. James smiles, pulling you in closer and kissing your forehead. He shuts his eyes for a moment. "As much as you know I love this, it isn't the best way to get us to wake up," he points out. 

You smile, eyes fluttering shut. "That's the point, my love," you whisper sleepily.

James chuckles and his hand which is massaging your scalp gradually puts you into a peaceful sleep and when James's head falls onto yours, you're both sleeping soundly again. 

tags: @mischievousmoony, @sayitlikethecheese, @longlivedelusion, @fangirl-swagg, @fruticake,, @siriuslycaptainofthedawntreader, @2dloveshp, @simplyreflected, @desi-brownie, @aunicornmademedoit

[nokk0]

out of nowhere,Fal saw himself in the middle of absolute nothingness, a darkness, or a void, until a bright light appeared from behind, out of nowhere, a huge pale figure, it was life, but.

even without being able to see a clear face in her, disappointment and anger could be noticed.

"I know what you did and was beyond unacceptable Fal. Apologize to your victim,you know very well to who. Inmediatly."

cleary she won't repeat twice

“Wh-o...!?”

Fal, in panic, turned around the moment he heard Life's voice, and as soon as he saw her… Fal felt fear. He was afraid? Maybe it was a feeling of inferiority. It could be something else, but Fal couldn't put it into words. But it wasn't good. Definitely not

Fal tried to act calm, but it was a hard task pretending in front of Life

“A....Apologize... To... Oh...”

Hiding behind the excuse of "it was just a joke, it's no big deal" would do nothing more than fuel the fury of Life herself, however Life's presence and her obvious anger silenced him. She was beautiful, and imposing despite her lack of notable facial features. He couldn't tell how he hadn't rebooted yet. Her presence was something beyond his comprehension, even overwhelming

Fal asked for this by sending that Gem Apple, there were no excuses. He recognised that. There were no "buts" he just had to apologize... That's all she wants, isn't it? Normally he would obey without hesitation, normally he would try to repair his mistake the best possible, however… Just thinking about apologizing to one of them sickened him

[falindankovsky]

Thinking about stuff and I think it’d be really cute if Falin picked up certain speech patterns from Daniil, and whenever he catches himself talking like how he would Falin just immediately gets super flustered and stops talking completely

[asha-mage]

I think the philosophical difference between Wheel of Time and Game of Thrones's class politics is best shown in how they depict their servant characters.

Take Lini and Lars as really good examples: they are a nurse and cook respectively, and lack any sort of structural power or protection at all, something they both are very aware of. But despite their relatively low place in society they are still principled, intelligent, women who the narrative treats with a lot of respect. Lars's acts of mercy and courage come up repeatedly- from refusing to be part of what she sees as unjust punishments of novices in The Dragon Reborn, to smuggling Siuan, Leane and Min to safety in The Shadow Rising, to being ready to break Egwene free of her imprisonment herself in Knife of Dreams. Keyly, Lars does all this not out of any loyalty to other more powerful characters, but entirely because of her own sense of right and wrong. She has no concern for the shifts in Tower politics because that is completely out of her control and she knows it. Rather she makes choices based entirely on what she thinks is right, refusing to be complicit in something she thinks is wrong and taking huge risks to do what she can for others whenever the opportunity presents itself.

In the same vein Lini, while personally loyal to Morgase and her family, is one of the few people in Morgase's life who is willing to treat her as a human being first and a Queen second: speaking her mind even when she knows it will upset Morgase, giving honest advice and wisdom, and generally refusing to acknowledge the huge power gap in their relationship- and Morgase not only allows this but clearly values it, even when it makes her angry, because with Lini she doesn't have to have any pretense, and she can trust the sincerity of Lini's words in a way she can't with courtiers and other rulers. When Lini helps Morgase escape the palace in The Fires of Heaven, she isn't doing it out of fealty to her Queen the way the rest of the team is. She is doing it because she cares for Morgase as a individual, and as a girl she helped raise to adulthood. As they continue on the run, the nuance and complexities of their relationship are explored more heavily- particularly after Morgase abdicates, and Lini's loyalty endures, because it was never about Morgase's throne or her power, but her as a person.

Contrast that with the way Games of Thrones depicts it's servants. The only ones who receive any real depth of character exploration are a few of the House Stark servants, and even then they exist largely as extensions of their masters. Old Nan and Hodor lack agency of their own, and they are not treated as having value by the narrative as independent characters, or having interior lives, motivations, or relationships to complexly explore. Even if we stretch the definition of servant to include a clerical tutor like Septa Mordane and the (presumably) commoner born Knight Rodrik Cassel this picture doesn't improve- because the primary role of both is to suffer and be harmed as a way to hurt other, more important characters.

And this is something you can walk out to pretty much the entire way the two worlds are built. Every time Jordan shows off a new place from Fal Dara to the Waste he remembers to answer the question 'who is cleaning the chamber pots and cooking the meals the sweeping the streets'- and some of his most interesting world building details from the Aiel gai'shain, to the structure of Borderlander's households via the shambayan and shatayan are born of his answers. More over he remembers that those people have humanity: their own wants, needs, and beliefs that are important to them even if they aren't important players in the scope of the narrative. Even if our heroes are stopping at a random inn for a single night, Jodan doesn't forget to show that inn is staffed with people who are going about their own lives entirely independently of the main characters who just wandered in.

By contrast the commoners in Westeros are largely invisible except when they are being impacted by the actions of the noble characters. The idea of the 'small folk' is presented as this nebulous concept, a vaguely homogeneous monolith that in theory is supposed to matter to the nobles but in practice doesn't really- which would an interesting class commentary if the narrative didn't also treat them that way- as if their only real value is being the foundation on which these power struggles are being fought. We're not encouraged to empathize with the cook, or the street sweeper, or the maid gathering laundry because we're not directed to notice them unless they are being a problem, which is exactly how all the nobles in Game of Thrones behave. There's also no nuance or complexity to the relationships between servants and their masters- it is only an expectation of simple obedience, and no energy is ever expended on the relationships between servants at all.

Wheel of Time from the beginning takes the position that everyone maters- maybe not to the fates of nations and the path of destiny, but to themselves and to the story that is being told. Game of Thrones takes the position that only nobles matter and everyone else matters only in relation to them- which for a story ultimately about an aristocratic civil war is fine, but it limits the depth of the world and the ability to say anything meaningful about class or society.

[alexanderwales]

Someone on my discord said that it didn't seem like it would take all that much work to worldbuild a plausible Age of Piracy that lasted for a thousand years. I somewhat disagree, but I think it's an interesting challenge.

To start with, some boundaries:

Piracy is the act of a sailing ship attacking another sailing ship carrying goods for the purposes of ransom, robbery, and taking on new crew from their number. I will also allow some coastal raiding, even if that's not technically piracy.

Any system/culture of piracy is going to have to consider at least two things: supply of ships and supply of pirates.

Any system/culture of piracy is going to have to have some kind of prey. The snake cannot eat its own tail.

The pirates cannot be primarily state-sponsored, though the ecosystem can have privateers in it, and there can be other tacit approval of piracy from higher powers one way or another (especially e.g. bribes).

The age of piracy needs to be relatively geographically contained and relatively continuous, rather than moving from hotspot to hotspot.

So where does this leave us? What are the big problems to solve?

We need a continuous source of trade for pirates to plunder from. This has to be a trade route, or set of trade routes, that's incredibly stable, surviving political and economic disruptions, and has a high enough value that it persists in the face of piracy.

Sort of inevitably, the people trying to move goods from one place to another do not want them stolen. We probably have to model this thousand years as a series of changes in pirate tactics and trade tactics, but also as something that moves slower than in the real world.

As above, you need a source of ships. You can potentially get these from "pirate havens", but that gets dangerously close to being state-sanctioned if this is in fact the source of ships and pirates. So I actually think you're mostly fine if no one is building ships exclusively for piracy (or only doing that rarely), and instead most of the ships come from the major powers building ships. This is historically accurate, with capture and mutiny being the main source of pirate ships.

As above, you need a source of sailors. Being trained as a sailor took some time, and there's not that much room for on-the-job training for a pirate crew, though there is some. So the source needs to be navies or merchant fleets, and they need to be pretty terrible such that piracy offers the better option. And in the real world, there were lots of indentured servants, slaves, etc. who could get a better life by taking to the seas, though they wouldn't start with skill as sailors.

So we are, I think, starting to sketch out some features of the Thousand Years of Piracy just by implication.

We have a few major continents that are separated from each other by major oceans, maybe with some smaller islands between them to serve as pirate havens, secure harbors, etc. These continents have huge amounts of trade with each other that lasts for a millennium in spite of pressure for them to go local, which means they probably can't. They have incompatible climates leading to incompatible crops, they have different mineral wealth, etc. This trade is super profitable, enough that piracy only puts a dent in profits, and is "cost of doing business".

Macro technology is stagnant for whatever reason. The Scientific Revolution was not inevitable, I think all you need are pretty regular wars on the main continents that rip through institutions of learning, or purges of philosophers for ideological reasons, or just political fragmentation that means there's not quite enough stability to get thinkers together. (Yes, we're using instability to create the stability of stagnation.)

Micro technology is ... probably fine? At some point in the 1,000 years, there are changes to the sails, copper sheathing on the hulls, different shape to the bow, all probably fine. Cannons can get better, rifles and pistols can get better, any of this still falls within "1,000 years of piracy". Certain things are there to stay. Other things fall out of fashion.

What is a problem are changes in tactics. There needs to be no particular thing that can cost-effectively be done about piracy for a thousand years, or at least not in all cases. It's easy to imagine pirates as being a part of the risk-reward calculation for merchants, for pirates to be hunted by navies interested in securing trade ... but if they're to stay pirates for a thousand years, then there needs to be no way for them to get into a stable non-pirate situation. It has to devolve into pirates, even if there are points in this thousand year history where pirates get stomped in every now and then.

One of the big risks is cooption or institutionalization of deviance. What prevents the pirates from all taking deals to become privateers, getting letters of marquee from the major powers and agreeing only to attack one side or another? We want a thousand years of piracy, not a thousand years of privateers. What's stopping the formation of a pirate kingdom, or a pirate monopoly, one that stops any upstarts and forces everyone under the same banner?

And all this I'm much less sure about. I think it's plausible, I guess, but if I had to go fill in an actual worldbuilding document where I mark down all the twists and turns, if I had to think through all thousand years of people trying to stamp out the very practice of piracy, all the things they tried and the ways they failed, that's where I think some cracks might start to show.

[nightfal1n]

Hated by Life Itself / Mafumafu