#like basically going straight to clean lines which is interesting

[cryptic-underground]

Small doodles from a greater doodle page. I like drawing em no bigger than my pinky nail. Especially Stan, love drawing Itty bitty stan

[starogeorgina]

𝐆𝐡𝐨𝐬𝐭𝐬 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐤𝐲

Pairing: Aegon ii Targaryen x reader

Warnings: Swearing

1.05

You and Aegon stand side by side at the stables, watching as Ghost and Sunfyre fly together over the castle grounds; at times their bodies look joined together as they swirl in circles so closely, the gold and ivory blending together beautifully.

“Perhaps they can be our children.”

Aegon scoffs, “The queen wants a grandchild from your womb, not one with scales.”

Your wedding would be held in a week, and Alicent was nothing but persistent that you give Aegon an heir immediately, specifically a male heir, which terrifies you. What exactly would happen if you had a girl? It’s not as if you could choose what gender the babe would be. You didn’t like feeling this type of pressure, and neither did Aegon; he was becoming moody and drinking more than normal.

He observes your cream saddle being cleaned by a stable boy and groans. “How come you don’t need to attend your lessons today, but I do?”

“Because I got permission. Besides, you really need to practice High Valyrian.”

Aegon rolls his eyes. “I know the basics.”

“Our dragons deserve better than basic.“

Sunfyre was the only breathing creature Aegon truly loved; being with his golden dragon was the only time he looked at peace, content even. Even the dragon keepers were mesmerised by how close their bond was.

“And it might be fun; we could speak in a room full of people without them knowing what we are saying.”

“Like badmouthing the guests at our own wedding?” He jests.

“Exactly,” you laugh.

You step up onto the gate so that you can look into the pen. You had always been interested in horses, but it was only recently that you were permitted to go out riding outside the castle walls with a member of the king's guard accompanying you. Your grip suddenly tightens on the gate when you feel it start to move.

Aegon laughs; he was shaking the gate. “Don’t tell me you got a fright.”

“I didn't,” you notice the staff in the stables glancing over. “Aegon behave."

“I have been thus far,” he grins.

“Prince Aegon,” Ser Criston makes his presence known. “Best be going before you’re late to your lessons.”

Letting go of the gate, Aegon mumbles something under his breath, then sulks as he walks away. Ser Criston raises his brows, and you jump off the gate. The knight tries to keep his face straight, but it’s clear he found it funny when a small smile creeps onto his face.

The knight places his arms behind his back. “Time to go, princess.”

—

“Is something wrong, princess?”

“No…”

Usually you enjoy horseback riding, but something Aegon said stuck inside your head and was distracting you. It hadn’t taken long to reach the grounds where tourneys were held; you were surprised to see decorations in preparation for a large celebration had already begun. You watch as three young men struggle to move a large sculpture that’s in the shape of a house Targaryen symbol.

Ser Criston moves so he is in your line of view. “Princess, is it your betrothal that’s troubling you?”

“No, Aegon has been... well, Aegon.”

“You’ve been unusually quiet lately,” he says softly.

“Has it ever occurred to you, Ser Criston, that if a girl is young enough that she needs permission to leave her lessons, that she’s too young to have child? Because it has to me.”

He sighs, “To the left, I wish to show you something.”

“What is it?”

He doesn’t reply. You watch for a few seconds as his dark horse takes him further towards the forest. When the knight and his horse become much smaller than your own, you decide it’s time to start following him.

—

“Just like this?”

“Bend your elbow a little lower.”

A wide smile spreads across your face when the stone you toss towards the lake skims over the water instead of sinking. Instead of going the normal route, the knight took you down to a small lake you'd never known existed. It was a warm day, but the light breeze was enough to keep you comfortable.

When you first saw the knight tethering smooth stones, you doubted this would be enjoyable, but you were wrong. “I must admit this is rather fun.”

“My father taught me to skim stones when I was a boy.”

“Do you miss him?”

“Yes, my mother died when I was young, and it was just the two of us until I became a foot soldier.” He fidgets with the stone in his hand before skimming it over the water. “It can be difficult with fathers; I’ve seen many men regret how they’ve treated their children once they've grown old.”

“I doubt King Viserys will lose much sleep over it. We haven’t spoken since Driftmark.”

There’s a rustle in the bushes close by, but when you look over, a baby deer appears. Its dark doe eyes stare at you until a larger deer comes up behind it, probably its mother. The two of them scurry off quickly to find isolation away from humans.

“I wasn’t at court long before Queen Aemma died, but from what I remember she had a soft face, and she was known to be kind.”

“I’m scared I’ll end up like her,” you admit. “I could fall pregnant quickly after marrying Aegon and die in the birthing bed within the year like she did.”

Ser Criston picks up another stone to throw. “If it’s any consolation, I don’t believe Prince Aegon would make the same decision King Viserys did.”

—

You storm into the king's royal apartments, anger radiating through you so violently that your body shakes. King Viserys notices you and smiles, “Ahh, there’s my daughter.”

“Is it true?”

Otto Hightower and the maester share a look. Your father turns and nods at them, and they both hurry to leave, the few servants in the room doing the same.

Your father looks defeated already. “Is that true?”

“How my mother died. You said it was my fault, but it wasn’t.”

“Do not test me, daughter,” he says harshly. “I will not have my late wife’s name brought up in some childish way.“

You couldn't contain your tears as you struggled to speak. “How could you do this to me?” You choke out between sobs. “Both you and Rhaenyra let me believe my mother died giving birth to me, but she didn’t. She gave birth to me naturally, and then Baelon got stuck, and you chose to let the maesters cut her open so you could have a son.”

“Who told you this?”

Ser Criston was the only one who told you the truth—the whole truth—that queen Aemma was butchered while conscious. You weren’t going to get the knight into trouble by admitting it was him.

“Is that all you care about? What do other people think? What about me?” You may have sounded selfish, but he needed to know what this guilt has done to you. “I’ve blamed myself; I thought I killed her, and not once did you tell me otherwise.”

When he says nothing, you shake your head and go to leave, but hesitantly, the king calls after you. “Rhaenyra never knew; I didn’t want her knowing the truth.”

Your heart hammers in your chest. Learning that he cared more about what your sister thought than you was nothing new.

“Your mother used to laugh because the moment it was announced she was with child, Rhaenyra declared that she was to have a sister; she wanted to name you Visenya, but Aemma disagreed. They went back and forth many times.”

“I’ve always loved my sister, and yet she’s always looked at me and saw the monster that took her mother from her.”

“No, that’s not true,” his eyes start to glisten. “If Aemma had lived, she would have doted on you; she would have cherished and loved you.”

“Perhaps you would have as well, if she had lived.”

—

Curled up in your bed clutching onto one of your pillows, you continue to sob and only open your eyes when there’s a knock at your door. A few seconds later, it’s opened by your lady-in-waiting, who was sitting with you previously.

“Who is it, Flora?”

“Prince Aegon.”

You think about moving but decide it’s too much energy and remain in the same position. You weren’t upset anymore; all of your sadness had turned to anger hours ago, but you had nowhere for that feeling to go.

Flora lets him in, and soon Aegon spots you. He rolls his eyes and sighs, “I could hear you crying from down the hall.”

You say nothing. Aegon comes over and sits somewhat awkwardly next to you on the bed, lifting the pillow your head is resting on and placing it onto his lap. When he feels you relax into his touch, Aegon starts gently brushing your hair with his fingers, which, in contrast to his wild, unkempt hair, was soft and smooth.

After a few moments, you finally speak, “My septa told me true strength lies in silence.”

“The blood of the dragon runs deep, and I fear it is a burden to feel things so deeply.”

Intrigued, you tilt your head to face him. “Do you feel things deeply?”

“No, but I don’t like seeing you distressed. It reminds me of when Sunfyre hurt his wing.”

“Oh.”

He makes a tsk sound, “Viserys is a fool.”

“He is the king.”

“And the king is a cunt. There are no victors for those who want his approval or attention.” Aegon leans down till his lips are ghosting your ear, “The way to stop hurting is by not letting anyone in.”

“That sounds awfully lonely.”

He shrugs, sitting upright and straightening his shoulders. Perhaps Aegon was right, but you liked the thought that one day he would let you in.

[flkwh0re]

Casual

Pairing: Natasha Romanoff x Reader

Warnings: Alcohol/ Drug consumption, Basic sex, Angst, Fighting.

A/n: Based on the song Casual by Chappell Roan, linked below this.

Word Count: 1.1k

Part two

Casual sex. That's what Natasha called it, though nothing about it seemed casual. The way she held you after, the longing looks she gave you. It was all full of love. She'd always invite you over, mostly for sex, but sometimes she wanted nothing more than to just love you.

Natasha and you were sat next to one another, around a table that her friends were gathered around. You didn't much care for them, you liked Wanda and Bucky though. Wanda was the sweetest, always truly interested in your life. Bucky was quiet, but also sweet which you liked in a person. The rest were loud, obnoxious, and just straight up assholes.

Natasha's arm held tightly around your waist, pulling you close to her as her legs rested on the table. A burning cigarette held between her fingers, occasionally pulling it up to her lips. You'd watch her as she's tilt her head back, blowing the smoke into the air.

On the table was an array of different alcoholic beverages, playing cards, and ash trays. You didn't know why she had even invited you to something like this, it was just a group of her and her friends hanging out.

"Whatcha thinkin' about in that pretty li'l head of yours?" Nat asked, looking deep into your eyes. A drunken smirk plastered across her face, how you loved that look she gave you. "Nothin much."

She hummed, turning her attention back to the game of rummy she was playing. Slamming the cards down on the table, all four aces lined up. Everyone groaned, even though they knew they didn't stand a chance against her.

She hopped up and cheered loudly, pulling you to stand. Playfully dancing around with you, your shared laughter filled the air. Natasha pulled your flush face to hers, smiling proudly and kissed you with the most love she ever had.

You knew nothing she gave was real, it broke your heart. You had spent nights thinking about her, crying because you just want her to love you back. To see you as more than just sex.

Natasha pulled away, a guilted look of panic on her face. You never understood why she would even try to show that she loved you, you figured it was some issue with some past partner, maybe her parents. She wouldn’t dare open up to you, or anyone.

“Natasha come sit back down, bring your girlfriend too.” Tony yelled from the room. Natasha let go of you, and walked back. “She’s not my girlfriend Tony.” Nat scoffed at the man. “Doesn’t see like that’s the case, especially the way you talk about her.” He snapped back. “How does she talk about me?” You piped up. Before you could get your answer, Natasha pulled out a plastic bag.

“Who wants to smoke?” She asked, sounds of excitement erupted from the group. Not you though, you just wanted your answer. “You want?” Natasha asked, handing the blunt to you. “Oh, you know I’m not really into smoking.” She chuckled, “C’mon doll, just one time? For me?” She begged, a faux pout on her lip.

You sighed and agreed, wrapping your lips around the blunt breathing in the smoke. You released it from your lungs onto Natasha’s face, her coughing. “Hey, what the fuck?!” You giggled, “That’s what you get.” Natasha stood upright, grabbing you and pulling you to the bathroom. “Nat what are you doing?” She bit her lip, “Getting pay back.”

Her fingers fumbled with the clasp of your jeans, her lips pressed against yours. Passion ignited between you two once again, tongues tangled with one another. Her hand slipped past the band of your panties, her rough fingertips grazing your clit.

Moans slip past your lips, as her fingers pumped in and out of you. Cum quickly coated her fingers, and she slipped her hand out of your pants. Natasha sucked her fingers clean of your arousal, “God I love-“ Your heart rate sped up, “The way you taste.” Oh.

Nat dropped to her knees, pulling your pants down with her. Her mouth attached to your pussy, tongue expertly pleasing you. Her hand intertwined with yours, holding you tightly like she’d loose you.

You had never cried during sex until now, tears welled up in your eyes. She loved you, you knew she loved you so much. Why would she just not allow herself to love you how she wanted to?

Her free hand gripped softly on your hip, her thumb caressing your hip bone trying to sooth your shaking body. With a final push you came undone in her tongue, body almost giving away but she held you up.

She helped you calm down, and clean yourself up. Sharing loving looks with you, soft kisses here and there in your face. “You okay?” She questioned.

“Nat, what are we?” You asked, looking up at her with red eyes and tears spilling down your face.

“What? We’re friends I guess.” She shrugged, more tears spilled. “No Nat, this. What we have going on. The sex, the way you look at me.” She shook her head, “I don’t look at you any differently than I do all the others, this is nothing more than just sex Y/n. Nothing more.”

Your lips quivered as she raised her voice at you. “I told you Y/n, no attachments, just casual sex.” You shook your head, “No Nat! What the fuck are we?! This is not just casual sex! It’s not casual when I hang out with all your best friends, when you look at me like you love me, when you hold my hand when you fuck me. I tried to distance myself but you insisted I don’t! What two people that have casual sex do that!?”

Your voice raised at the final sentence, Natasha’s face contorted to a shocked expression. Her mouth held open, bottom lip quivered as she fought back her own tears. “No, you don’t know what you’re talking about. It’s all in your head, none of that exist!” She shouted back.

“You’re so fucking unbelievable Nat, I thought you thought of me better!” You snapped. “No you just can’t fucking do anything without thinking it has to mean something! Do not ever come around me again.” She yelled, then ripped the bathroom door open.

“Natasha stop it!” You shouted after her, “Please don’t go!” All her friends now rushing to the two of you, Wanda catching up to you first. She gave you a soft sympathetic look. “Goodbye Y/n, please don’t try snd contact me.” Tears slipped from her eyes.

It wrecked you, seeing her like this. You choked back your cried, trying to keep your composure together. The moment she was gone though, you broke down. Wanda tried to console you, allowing you to cry in her arms.

All her friends were shocked, even they knew Natasha had something more for you.

Masterlist

[simpsdept]

Mother Carmilla x gender neutral child reader

Words: 1.5k

“Let’s practice”

A/n: hii! Okay so I saw someone post that this would be a great image! So I decided to try it, (or course with permission)! So hope this is great!

(Idea from: lillonvia)

Info: Basically the reader is Carmillas youngest child, and is trying to learn how to use those shoes Carmilla has as weapons. Readers genderless so this is for everyone! Reader is between the age of 9-12

By the way I tried to make all the Spanish words masculine since it goes for all genders (usually)

Your mother, Carmilla Carmine, was an overlord dealer of the angelic weapons. Which also meant she was pretty much trained to use all the weapons she makes. Your older sisters, Clara and Odette, were also trained, not as much as your mother but still enough to defend themselves.

You ok the other hand, no. You being the youngest of the family made her more protective over you, even not letting you go to close to the weapons. It did make you feel left out.

Your sisters knew how to use the guns and some of the daggers, but those were never really your true interest, it was those ballet shoes your mother wore. Once your sisters told you what your mother did to that exorcist during extermination day with her shoes, you immediately thought it was cool.

You wanted shoes like that. Maybe some like your mother. Though you knew she’d never say yes, it was dangerous, or so you thought she’d say no.

Right now, you snuck into the room where she stored all the weapons. Cases of guns and daggers lined up neatly on the shelves, bullets on all the racks. You’ve never been in the room before, your mother never let you.

You started to look if there were any other shoes that your mother could have. You found some boots with them, they weren’t your size though, you were a kid and most of these clothes and weapons weren’t designed for children. You sigh as you keep looking.

Carmilla just so happened to be walking by to do a daily check on her progress, and you tensed and froze. I’m instinct, being the child you were, you hid. Hiding behind a large shelf that probably wasn’t a good idea to hide behind.

Carmilla walked in, her steps sharp and you could hear your mother’s steps. You hold your breath as she checked the room and weapons that were shipped in. You sighed in relief when she walked over to another area in the room, leaning over a little, but that made the shelf shake…and then it fell. You gasp and froze as the shelf crashed onto the ground.

Carmillas head snapped over to where the shelf fell and saw you. Her eyes narrowed as she walked over. “[Name]? What are you doing in here?” She asked in a stern voice, keeping herself from yelling or raising her voice at the fallen weapons and broken shelves.

“I-uh…” m, You struggled to speak. Carmilla stood up straight and crossed her arms, narrowing her eyes at you and waiting for you to speak up. You sigh and stand up, your head down. “I just wanted to…learn how to use angelic weapons too..like how you and my sisters do..” You say softly.

Carmillas expression softens as she looks down at you and sighed. “Mi amor, do you truly want to use these? They’re dangerous and I’d hate for you to get hurt.” Carmilla said stern but soft.

“Pleeeeeeaaaase!! mamá I really want to! I’ll do anything” You beg your mother and gave her some puppy dog eyes to add to it. Carmilla let out a soft smile and held a hand out.

“If that’s what you want mi corazón..” You smiled back and took her hand. “But, if you want to use the angelic weapons, clean this up. Now.” Carmilla said more stern, pointing to the fallen weapons and the broken shelves.

You chuckle nervously and nod. “Yes mamá” you say and picked up all the angelic weapons. While your mother stayed and watched. She began to ask you a questions.

“Corazón? Which weapon would you like to use?” She asked you gently.

“Hmm? Oh! Uh, I was wondering if I could be taught how to use…shoes like yours?” You rubbed your arm, slightly embarrassed to admit.

Carmilla smiled softly at the response. Clara and Odette never wanted to learn how to use their legs to fight, they preferred blades. Her heart warmed at the thought of her youngest child taking after her. “Of course Mi querido, though I may have to make some of your size. So training will not begin so soon.”

You mentally sigh at that, you wanted to train right away, but knew you’d have to wait. You nod and smiled sadly. “Okay mamá..I can wait.” You say. She came over and pushed up the shelf for you.

“Thank you mi amor” Carmilla said and ruffled your hair a gently with her large claws. You giggle softly and finish putting the weapons in their places.

It took about 6 days for the shoes to be made, mainly since Carmilla wanted them to be more durable for you. She came and got you from your room. “[Name]? I’ve got you a surprise” She smiled and sat on the bed next to you, smiling softly with a box in her hand.

You smile and sit up, sitting next to your mother as she handed you the box. You open it and gasp and smile when you saw the same styled ballet shoes inside. They were like your mothers but just a smaller size. “ay dios mío- thank you mamá!!” You hugged your mother by the side and she smiled back.

“Of course Mi amor..now why don’t we try these on? And we can start practicing if you’d like.” She offered with a smile. You practically bounce up and down as you nod excitedly.

“Yes! I’d love to!” You just to your feet with the box, pulling the angelic shoes out and tossing the body on the ground to clean up later. Carmillas heart warmed up from how excited you were to use and train in those shoes, taking after her rather than using the more dangerous weapons like guns.

You both walk down the stairs, in the middle of the purple room. You looked around and smiled. Carmilla smiled down at you. “Alright [name], let’s put those on and I’ll teach you some ways to use them. But you must listen alright?” She spoke stern but soft.

You not and smile, putting the ballet shoes on (with a little help from Carmilla since you were struggling with the ribbons), and they fit snug. “Okay! I’m ready to kick some a-“ you stop your words when you saw Carmilla glaring at you softly for you almost cussing. You nervously laugh and calmed down.

Carmilla walked over and started to speak. “First of all, let’s get you better adjusted to walking in them. Stand on your toes.” She commands you gently. You nod and attempt to stand on your toes, though you only lasted about 2 seconds. “Try again.” Your mother stood near you, more firm now”

“Dang it..” you grumble softly as you failed again. Repeatedly, you fail over and over again, your mother demanding you to keep trying and trying. “This is too hard..” you complain a little as you became more and more frustrated.

“Patience Mi amor..you’re doing well..just keep trying. It’s all about practice.” Carmilla encourages softly and sternly. You nod and take a deep breath, trying again.

After a while you were able to hold yourself up for about a minute straight, you smiled and looked at your mom. “Look! I’m doing it!” Carmilla smiled softly at you and walked over.

“See? I told you that if you practice you’d get better..now try walking to me while standing on your toes.” She encouraged. “Like this” she walked across the room with ease, she held her arms out. “Soon you’ll be able to walk normally in them. And when you master that, I will teach you how to fight with them.”

You nod and smile, trying to stay motivated. You started to walk to your mother. Though you failed a lot, standing on your toes were hard, walking across the room on them…oof..even harder. But you did have you mother to encourage you along the way. You kept trying and trying and eventually did it, and you celebrated a little.

“Good job [Name]. Now we will practice more and more everyday. Just be patient alright my dear?” Carmilla told you, giving you a smile of approval.

“Yes mamá, I understand.” You smiled back excitedly.

“Good..then i will expect you to be wearing those all the time around the house to practice.” She nods and ruffled your hair gently, walking away to do her duties.

You smiled and nodded at your mother. “You got it!”. You were excited to keep practicing, you were determined and motivated to train and impress your mother. You knew it would be long, but it would be worth it.

A/n: hi! Hope this was good! If I get comments for part 2 I could make it.

[dufferpuffer]

Tom Riddles orphanage is interesting.

1920s/1930s The idea of not putting children to work was quite new. In fact there were still Workhouses until 1948.

Victorian's commonly thought that people were only poor because they are lazy, plus the well-blossoming ideas of eugenics meant poor people were probably just worse genetically. It was 'Christian values' to at least dress and feed poor children, but if you were too supportive of them they would only grow up to continue to be lazy, probably like their stupid poor lazy parents. They will go off and join the workforce at 14, so you shouldn't coddle them too early or else you'll spoil them.

Most orphanages were set up and funded by whichever rich fuck wanted to boast about how many little kids they 'help'. Some really were trying to help - but yknow... eugh. Rich people. Nothing was particularly regulated and abuse against children was accepted and even encouraged.

Plus its fresh after The Great War, poor street kids fending for themselves were hardly rare, infant mortality was high... Lots of kids and not much demand for them. If they could hurry up and grow up to join the workforce... that would be swell.

Experience of the common orphan in a common orphanage: + Crowded eating halls where they usually didn't eat well. + Beds lining the walls, no privacy, everyone in the same room. + No individuality - kids often forgot their own birthdays or names... adults rarely use them, there's too many kids to remember and they keep dying and shit, honestly who cares - if they get adopted maybe they'll be renamed anyway + Education was often light, just the basics + Sometimes they were also put to a little work beyond their own laundry and cleaning etc. + Sundays they get dressed up, cleaned up - to try and get them adopted. Trot them out like little show ponies to try and tempt some rich person. ''They aren't dirty street shits, they're nice and handsome little children who won't embarrass you.'' + In many places child abuse was just... awful. Being made to eat their own vomit, pushed down stairs, locked into rooms and forgotten about, straight up being murdered by their caretakers... if you can imagine it, it probably happened.

...Why do I say all this? Because barely any of that seems to apply to Tom's experience. That doesn't mean his Orphanage was a nice place for him to grow up... but my god, it sounds like a DREAM compared to the norm-!!!

+ Tom Riddle... had his own fucking bedroom. WOAH. + Privacy. Access to books to read. He could READ. + His own WARDROBE, where he could KEEP HIS OWN THINGS. + It's assumed other children could ALSO keep their own things, as he had stolen their stuff - and some even had PETS??? + No real sign that he is put to any grueling work. + He was calm and impolite in his own room - he isn't terrified to talk back to adults. + Though it did anger and scare him, experts were being brought in to try and evaluate his health. + He looked well. Well fed, healthy, clean, normal.

Mrs. Cole the Matron - though she says judgemental things she says and the mention of 'whacking on the nose with a rusty poker' (which I assume is basic physical abuse...?) - seems shockingly involved with the children. She knows their names, their preferences, their backstories... and despite the orphanage being poor, they take the children on a holiday every year. Even Harry thought she seemed alright.

It is BONKERS how nice it is at Wool's Orphanage. That is an intentional writing decision. They author is British, she knows basic recent British history - the 'suffering orphan' is baked into her very bones as a concept.

He COULD have been depicted as: + Just one dirty face in a room of many beds, many children, that Albus had to weave through to take him somewhere private and tell him he was different from them, he was special. + Keep the smaller rooms - but he has to share with five or so other boys... who have all moved their beds as far from his as possible. + He could have only barely even remembered his own name - there's nobody who cares to call him it anyway, so he dislikes it. + A "Yes Sir, Sorry Sir, Of course Sir" little boy - who then breaks out in joy over going to Hogwarts + ...just straight up could have been in a workhouse.

It wouldn't be far-fetched for it to be described like Oliver Twist (set in 1830s, but there was actually higher child mortality in 1930s) Or more of an Annie situation (set 1930s New York - probably better conditions than 1930s England) The Author has never shied away from displaying child suffering before. Just look at Snape and Harry... and even Neville! Yet Tom Riddle very much has an air of being the Top Rooster. + Even the adults don't know what to do with him. + He is rather comfortable as long as doctors aren't being brought in. + He has gone out of his way to MAKE that comfort for himself, through enforcing a harsh pecking order amongst the other kids. + He is, especially for the time, a bit of a brat. Talks back, snappy, sneering and scoffing, talks over adults, snatches...

That's not unreasonable of him, by the way. He IS treated unfairly due to his powers, he is a poor orphan in a world with an abundance of poor orphans... and he's just a little boy. Of course he acts out.

But he could have been made more sympathetic - and more believable, honestly - with only a slightly more harrowing depiction of his living situation than simply 'a little shabby - and the over stressed but tries-to-care Matron likes a drop of Gin.' Instead he is living better than most of the lower class.

Which to me can only mean he isn't supposed to come across as too sympathetic. He isn't a suffering orphan, he isn't miserable, he isn't abused (too badly), he isn't lonely, he isn't any of the things Harry was... despite being in a similar situation, at first glance. He is still sympathetic. Harry and Albus both thought so. But the reader isn't supposed to see his childhood as terrible. Just sub-par. We are happy he gets a chance at life at Hogwarts... ...but aren't thinking 'Oh man, of course he murdered people, he has had such a harrowing life' Snapes life was worse. Harry's life was worse. Neither of them kill.

[seungkwanniee]

TAKE CARE OF ME , I'LL BREAK

pairings : boyfriend!seungkwan x gn!reader

genre : angst

warnings : (episodic) depression , mention of starving , crying , reader is said to have pale skin , naked body (completely inncoent)

wc : 1.6k

synopsis : just you struggling mentally and Seungkwan is by your side

an : if don't know what episodic depression is, its basically depression but that come and go in period that can last weeks or months. !!!please, don't read if you are not comfortable with this kinda of topic!!! I hate the ending but I got tired of writing more...

〔masterlist〕

Seungkwan always know when something is off: he tends to look alot, especially when it comes 'bout you, he looks at every single move and can detect how you are feeling like you are an open book, which it's kinda like that for him. It's so easy to read throught the lines and since you two spend a lot of time toghter, even though he still lives with his roomate Jeonghan and you have your own apartment, he know your habits. You love to have your house all clean, every object at their own place, he even calls you crazy because, yes, maybe you care about it way too much. Sure you never been a lover of hanging out, you enjoyed more inside dates but you would never say no to him and his park dates, especially the long walks near the river talking about everything and nothing.

Now everything is gone: suddently, within a few days, you don't even leave the bed. The house is getting messier day by day, your bedroom floor was covered with clothes you don't have the energy to put back on the wardrobe that stands open since the last time you leaved the house. Some plates and glasses are laying on the desk or on the sidetable, dirty from the little amount of food you managed to eat. The rest of the house was like no one lived here, untouched, like no one putted feet on for a long time and it wasn't wrong at all since you leaved the bed just to not starve yourself completely. Your sleep schedule was insane too, you managed to sleep even for 13 hours straight and you still don't know how you've done that.

Everything was boring and plain, nothing interested you anymore, nothing had your attention. All you do was scrolling on tiktok, instagram or watch video on youtube that you drop not even after five minutes because they were boring as well. Responding to the messages wasn't even an option, the group chat was exploding with messages you don't open since the last four days. Your bestfriend wondering where have you been, and maybe she was gettin lil' angry too but, by now, you would care less. The most important thing was your boyfriend, the only person you managed to text a little two days ago.

<i'm not doing well>

That was everything your fingers succeed to write after you brain told you he was tired and leaved him on read. You know he wasn't angry, he knew everything and there was no reason to get upset at you but you can't help the tears running down the side of your cheeks while your eyes kept staring at the phone riniging. Your body deep down wanted to touch that stupid screen but your brain wasn't in you side once again, you just couldn't do anything like you were paralyzed. You were barely crying, no sobs were coming out from your mouth, just few tears staining your cheeks. You were crying, yes because you weren't answering the person who cared about you the most and making him worry over nothing, but you felt so useless. You were pity, you were pity of youself, how someone can arrive to this state? how you arrived to this state?

You knew that it's something that will appear again and again, but what worries you the most is that you'll never know when. A day you can be the most energetic person then the next day you wake up and you struggle to leave the bed, just 'wanting to sleep a little bit more', and then you find yourself doing nothing all day, and the day after, and the day after again. The difference was that this time you didn't had Seungkwan by your side since he was doing a world tour with his bandmates, with still four days to go. He always knew what to do in these situation, he knew how to make you leave the bed and having a shower, he would prepare a special dinner and eat it with you, he would sleep by your side in the messiest room ever. He was like you second mother, like when you were kid and had got a fever, he made everything a little lighter to deal with.

It was the frist time dealing with it all alone since you got diagnosed and you thought it would be a never ending circle.

[days after]

<love?> a sudden voice fills the soundless house, Seungkwan isn't really waiting for an answer because he knows you are mentally drained, it would just overwhelms you trying to do something that you can't really do in that moment. You were actually asleep in your room, once again that week, but at least it takes you away from the reality. It wasn't bad that you couldn't stop crying or something like that, it was just so empty. The emptiness of your mind was driving you so insane, it was like living for days, all alone in an empty white room.

The soft touch on your cheeks made you slightly jolt, but as you slowly open your eyelinds and flutter your eyelashes you already know who is the person in front of you. His smell is strong and recognizable even after few weeks you didn't saw him, his finger still tracing softly your pale skin that didn't touched sun for days, on his face a hint of a smile but from his eyes it was visible his concern for you. As soon as they landed back to Korea, he sprinted to your apartment that even his luggage were still with him, but he can't help but to be mad morried. He didn't heard from you for almost a week, and he was glad that this happened now, when the tour was almost over and didn't had to wait more.

He wasn't going to say it but your whole room smelled, and the frist thing was you so he istantly grabbed the situation on his hands.

<you feel like talking right now?> he tilt his head to look at your laying on that cushion for how long he didn't even wanted to know, the only thing that mattered to him wss you were now safe under him. When he recives a shake of head back, he nods <it's okay> his smile was wrapping your heart slowly.

<do you think you can stand up? i'm gonna give you a bath, don't you think you deserve it, babe?>

his voice was sweet like honey and so soft that just by that he could warm you up. You stared blankly to his eyes just thinking how can someone can be so sweet, how someone actually cared about you, how he would probably do everything for you that you actually forgot to give him a proper answer, as he can't read your memory yet.

<i'm lazy> was everything that came out of your mouth before adjusting your position to sit more comfortable. His brown eyes were stuck in yours, while his hands started to wandering more now. His thumbs were tracing your cheeks at frist when they slowly made their way to your nose, your warm lips to just to end up into your hair. His expert hands grabbed your pink hair tie to let down your hair that by now theu must be very tangled togheter: you even forgot the last time you messed with your hair, they just sitted here in the messy bun.

<i'll do everything as we always do, mh? you just need to relax under my touch> he moved out of the way the few lock of hair bothering your face after gently grabbing your shoulder, stopping your back from laying on the bed. As you sit down the bed his hands lowered until they met your hands too and then looking into your eyes, trying to give you the strength to move your ass from that mattress that was asking for mercy.

Unexpectedly, your arm wrap his neck, making him lower to your height when a soft kiss is placed on his pink lips. You missed everything of him, his sweet scent to his soft touch and maybe that was one of the reasons of your relapse. Everything was going bad since he left for his world tour, unisveristy was getting more stressing day by day and the multipe failed exam were getting on your last nerve, and don't even start with your social life, you were quenstioning about everyone with the work at the resturant as the waiter just adding fuel.

You don't even realize when you arrived into the bathroom, Seungkwan's arms were too comfortable that made you feel completely safe to not worry what you were actually doing. Your legs dangling from your seat while your eyes were lazily observing his moves. He kneels in front of the bath making the warm water fall and fill it, the hand touching the water every now and then to make sure the temperature it's good for your body after he returns all of his attention back to you once again. His hands slowly caresses your thighs while his lips lends on the tip of your nose laying there a soft kiss, his breath was so near your face making you shiver from the warmness it brings to you. You close your eyes for some seconds at the touch after opening them again just to face his smile. He helps you to get rid of your clothes, making him see yourself one hundred percent now. You're completely naked on his eyes, but not just literally speaking, you always show to him your weakest side and he always know how to take care of it, that was all that mattered to him. You dont even need other people when you have Seungkwan by your side: the angel in person.

[superm4ks]

Austria obvi been a doozy to process but 1 part of the conversation thats always interesting to me is how people are taking Max and Lando's battle as a textbook example of 'dirty' racing and comparing it wid other battles that are seen as 'clean'. Heres the thing tho, the choices both those drivers made in those laps dont have 'clean' alternatives that wud have benefited them in that moment. It was an inevitable type of confrontation. At least for the most part.

Clean/dirty racing in this generation of very wide cars literally just a matter of is there a significant enough delta to give one of the cars lap advantage or not. If there is, u get something like George and Landos lil dance in Spain. One of the cars has better tire wear, is faster, so its just a matter of waiting for the right time to make a move and build a gap. Its clean because its a waiting game, its not a battle at all. But if the cars are more evenly matched, and more importantly, if the driver defending/attacking is actually willing to defend/attack, thats when it becomes too close for comfort and as racing drivers what ur basically saying is, I am willing to take that risk because I need to gain ((or I need to keep)) advantage.

Something thats also been interesting is how people have perceived each drivers role in this particular 'dirty' battle.

I been reading and watching a lot of analysis of those laps and one of the things that jumps out immediately is that theres this assumption that Max had to get out of the way. He just had to. The fact that he didnt is what made the battle 'dirty' and the onus of 'cleaning' it was on him. When u press that narrative, and u ask the simple question of why wud a racing driver even consider allowing another one to pass him, the argument turns into endangerment. It was dangerous that Max didn't let Lando pass. The tactics Max employed to defend his line were dangerous. Follow up question, why does it matter if they're dangerous when ur literally racing cars 200 miles per hour. Oh, because what Max did specifically is not allowed'. And what is that, specifically. Then the 3 ghosts of under braking past come into ur house to offer Max a chance of redemption. And u think, why are they here. Wheres the telemetry, the wheel input, the driver cam, the stewarding precedence, the actual rule, that allows some hypothetical idea of intentional harm to even enter this conversation. But it doesn't matter anymore, because it has set the tone for how ur gonna deal wid Max's role in a 'dirty' battle vs Lando's. Lando will, inevitably, become a victim of Max, not an active participant in a battle for the lead. Max's tactics are dangerous, while Lando's were necessary.

Ant Davidson starts his analysis on skypad by comparing Max setting up a corner to Baku 2018. Baku happened in a straight, and both drivers were reprimanded for it. I personally think Max shud not have weaved in a straight like that, but thats my opinion, its not reflective of the sporting rules. Late maneuvers are dangerous but they're not necessarily illegal, not just when it comes to defending, but also attacking. What Ant Davidson does in this opening analogy is setting the tone of HIS opinion. And its interesting to me that he finishes the segment, in which at several points he talks of Lando's choices in first person, wid 'I rest my case'. The fact that he had a 'case' at all and feels comfortable admitting it is kind of shocking until u realize that the objective of his 'stewarding' is to turn defending into a punishable act because Max was the one doing it, and Max is 'dirty'. In no instance are Lando's late maneuvers questioned because, we go the back to the original point, Lando was entitled to make them. He was entitled to pass. Max, however, is not entitled to defend.

Johnny herbert who was one of the stewards in Austria, said that they looked at Max's defensive maneuvering and it was 'clever' and made Lando's life difficult but it was not clear it was under braking. He said Max positions his car very well but sometimes goes beyond the drivers 'unwritten code'. Then, regarding specifically the incident in t3, he says some people claim Lando could have moved and yes maybe but he was right not to, because it showed Max he was prepared to 'fight back' and he can 'beat Max at his own game'. Lando did not complete a single overtake in Austria. Not once did he get ahead of Max where he didnt have to fall back again. But because they bumped and Max was penalized, this is a net positive for him. The underlying implication here is that anything that threatens Max's position on track is a net positive for the driver, and for the sport. About how this battle will affect Lando, Johnny says, 'up until Austria Max had always won. Now he is not winning. It will be interesting to see how Lando responds. He will now be in a better place after what has happened. He has realized he knows he has a chance of beating Max at his own game.' Lando finished a race pointless the day after he got fleeced in a sprint. I dont think this was a positive grand prix for him. I think he engaged in a few laps of hard racing wid Max that ended in a puncture for both. Thats not important though. He challenged Max. Johnny seems content wid just that.

The issue is not that Lando isnt a victim because Max is, nor that pundits are not allowed to be biased, or that Max shud not have been penalized. Whats been bugging me about the reaction to Austria is that once something like that happens and it involves Max, its no longer about what actually took place or the dynamic between drivers that allowed it to escalate, its about deciding whether or not the battle was dirty, and how is that dirtiness attributed to a single actor. It takes motor racing and turns it into the weighing of souls. And Max's will always be heavier.

[theybe-kaz]

Alrighty. So. Below the cut is an opinion piece on Liam and the Red Bull situation. This is written by a kiwi who wants Liam to succeed, but also someone who has been successful in elite sport, has 3/4 of a degree in sport management and is a hardass realist.

If you want to an echo chamber ripping Liam to shreds, this is not a piece you’ll be interested in. If you’re salty over Daniel or Checo losing their seats, also not a piece you’ll be interested in.

Open to debate and differences of opinion, but keep it clean.

Basically don’t be a dick lmao

To start off I will put my hand up and say I don’t know the ins and outs of Red Bull and how the team operates. But to me it would make sense to swap Liam and Yuki if Liam continues to struggle the way he is currently.

For Max to come out and say the car is difficult and Liam would be better in the VCARB says a fair bit on his opinion of the car, and I think a key part of developing junior driver is protecting their confidence. Look at Albon and Gasley, once the confidence was gone they couldn’t come back from that at Red Bull and it was a long hard slog to rebuild it over time.

So why not put Liam in the VCARB and give him a solid year of driving and developing himself in what looks at this stage to be a reasonably competitive car (ignoring shitty strategy calls)? He’s spent the best part of two seasons as a reserve driver while the rest of the rookies have come straight from actively competing in F2 which in itself will be another disadvantage.

If Yuki does well in the Oracle, then great. Give Liam and Isack another season in the junior team to get some more experience behind them. If Yuki doesn’t, then

a) that will shut down some of the shit Liam is getting.

b) you have two drivers coming up behind that could pick up the seat in ‘26 (or both seats depending on what Max does).

As much as it would’ve been nice to see Liam go like a bat out of hell straight out the gates I think it’s important to remember that he’s starting off in arguably the hardest seat in the sport in a car that’s notoriously twitchy.

I love to see the very kiwi attitude after quali where he put his hand up and admitted that he wasn’t good enough today and I think the fact that he’s willing to own it and not blame the car or the team will go a long way in how much they’re willing to help him.

Ultimately it looks a lot better for him and his career if he takes the step down to VCARB and is able to consistently finish in the points vs fighting with the Oracle all year the way he currently is.

On the other hand Red Bull seem to be backing themselves into a corner. If they bring Yuki up and he can’t produce results then they’ll struggle to martyr a driver and increase the risk they lose Max.

If they leave Liam there then they run the risk of irreparably damaging the confidence of a junior driver, potentially ending his career and ruining his professional reputation, and that’s not even starting on the court of public opinion.

Gasley, Albon and Sainz are proof that there is a life after Red Bull and while they may not be in top teams currently they’re still on the grid and still chasing opportunities. The path to the top is very rarely a straight line, and Red Bull needs to face the fact that Max won’t be there forever.

[fagboyfriend]

i rlly like ur composition, i wanna know about your process :D

thank uuu !! yeah so like. composing a scene for me generally begins with a vague idea that i want to get down as quickly as possible- and for me that usually starts with finding a setting. I knew that i wanted to draw a) a group of roomates gossiping in a crowded kitchen and i wanted there to be b) one figure in the extreme foreground and c) lots of plants. i do use some tools to figure out perspective, mainly the csp perspective ruler. Usually i start by finding a picture i like similar to the vibe im going for- but instead of referencing anything else- im purely interested in perspective. sorry to anyone who is shocked i dont generate all of my perspective purely by myself- i can draw in perspective fairly well but i struggle to make straight lines and this is easier to make grids with than the line tool lol ^_^ i try to use it kinda more like spellcheck on typos than like something to fully rely on. this is the video i learned this trick from:

i saw the left photo and realllly loved how the cabinets alligned with the wall- so i used my ruler tool to draw out my inital plotted points from the image- basically the linear movements i was most interested in and then i turned off the image layer and worked with those lines and the ruler tool to move on. eventually i had this:

which was enough for me to put my characters in for the inital round. if you notice- i made a looot of further adjustments as i go on. this sketch is not a final layout, its so my characters have somewhere to be! i cannot draw someone standing on a floor if theres no floor, nor leaning on a table that doesnt exist. i can’t draw my characters without a background, but i also cant finish my background without accounting for how my characters can comfortably exist in it!!

this was the like.. very basic start. i knew the positions of two characters- but i needed to change a lot not only to fit them better but to allow for the other two figures i had planned.

okay.. a little better. i widened the kitchen, closed the fridge door.. added a chair and fit in all the figures.. but this is waaay too dramatic. only two figures are actually interacting- and they are at wildly different energy levels!

this is where things started to make a little more sense characterwiss, so i was ready to refine backgrounds and figures and unite the two.

inital base sketch. much better layout.

okay- this is where im getting my footing but things seem.. really really off. You can see me working on my framing here- theres some good linear movement from left to right here- but not vertically. It’s hard to notice the figure in the far back, so i need to redirect the viewers eye to move upwards as well!

this is where i decided to zoom out, add an interesting vertical element to the left of the image and make it clearer whats happening in the foreground. i had to account for some stuff by adjusting the cropping, but i paid attention to that as well.

annnd- thats what a clean sketch looks for me! i have all the elements of my scene accounted for, and things are clean enough to read.

the next step for me would be transfer! essentially- I print the image of my sketch out, resizing and taping pages together so my sketch matches the size of the paper i want to paint on, and then i use a lightboard to transfer my sketch with pencil onto my paper. Then i refine the sketch a few times on paper before stretching my watercolor paper (essentially just prepping for painting) and inking with a brush and colored ink before going in with watercolor, gouache and ink, then usually finishing with marker, colored pencil, pastel and ink. it’s a lengthy process but a lot of fun lol. but sketches for me can be like.. 15 layers of different roughs until im happy with just the sketch. there were more images but im on mobile and theres a 10 image limit 😭😭 im a bit masochistic but i believe that if i dont have a good sketch i dont have a good painting!!

[lovewritteninthestrands]

thought i’d make a post showing/teaching my animation process for my most recent finished project!!! animation is really fun, it’s my absolute favorite form of art in the world and i love sharing how i approach it! without further ado, let’s get into it!

1. roughs

the goal here is to establish the big things in the animation. what are the main movements? what is the timing? what’s the general layout of the space the animation is occurring in? in my roughs, i like to use multiple colors to keep things separate and clear. you should also not be focusing on the details either!!! you are trying to get the most basic, fundamental forms down and moving before adding ANY detail. trust me, no artist on earth can crank out a finished animation without first taking this messy, less-than-pretty step.

2. tie downs

at this point, once the movement is down, you can start adding more details and clarifying things. in the tie down stage, you’re refining things— medium details, faces, character clothing, etc. you’re not trying to make it super clean. THIS IS SO IMPORTANT DO NOT TRY TO MAKE A CLEAN ANIMATION STRAIGHT OFF OF THE ROUGHS YOU WILL MAKE MISTAKES THAT ARE INSANELY ANNOYING TO FIX THAT LATE IN THE PROCESS!!! worry about perfect cleanliness in the next step!

3. final lines/cleanup

NOW i start worrying about how clean i want it to be. this stage sucks i am not going to lie. it is tedious and slow and agonizing because every single line has to move in a way that makes sense. DO NOT JUST INK OVER THE TIE DOWNS. if you do that it will look terrible and wobbly. you have to make sure everything is on model, that forms and lines move in a way that makes sense, and that there is no jitter or “sticking” (happens when lines are drawn over lines from the previous frame, which makes the line appear to “stick” in place). additionally, you’ll notice the red lines— these are color separation lines that will not be visible in the final animation. i use these for sappha’s stripes and hair highlights, as well as her two-tone irises. while not visible here, there is also a separate animation layer for final shadows.

4. coloring

and then comes color!! I do my cleanup and coloring in clip studio paint. If you’ve done everything correctly and there’s no gaps between lines, CSP’s fill tool will allow you to pretty quickly and easily fill your cleaned up animation. for this animation, i also threw together a shitty messy background in about 20 minutes and then gaussian blurred it (im not good at painting lol).

5. compositing

once the coloring is done, i move into my fully legal copy of After Effects, and begin compositing. this entails taking the animation elements (cels, backgrounds, etc) and combining them, color grading them, and adding effects like blurs, gradients, and light bleed. your two most important effects in AE are fast box blur and gradient ramp— honestly, you don’t need much more than those two to make a well-composited animation (besides some color stuff like gamma/pedestal/gain). once that’s done, i export it as an MP4 and a PNG sequence, import the sequence into CSP or Toonsquid (my favorite animation app for the ipad), and then use that to export a gif of my final animation!

and that concludes the most basic rundown i can give without writing wayyy too much. if you’ve got any specific questions, please hit up my inbox, i love talking about art and animation with people interested in learning!

[gengarguy27]

Sky Reads Pact: Bonds 1.4

I finished toweling myself dry and wrapped the towel around my waist before I opened the shower curtain.  I used my fingers to comb my damp hair away from my face before approaching the mirror.

I could see Rose’s reflection, her hair pressed flat where the back of her head pressed against the other side of the mirror, looking the other way.  The mirror in the upstairs bathroom was a part of the pedestal sink, surrounded by florets.

Imagine never being able to see your reflection again. That's deeply uncomfortable in a way I can't articulate. Also your reflection is now replaced with a sentient genderswap of yourself so have fun trying not to make showers and baths awkward.

I hiked up the towel to be sure I was safe, made sure it was secure, and then said, “It’s fine. I’m decent, and it’s not like we’re not related, right?”

I don't know man I don't think that's the issue here.

Rose said, “I know Molly about as well as I knew Callan or Roxanne, which isn’t much at all. Then the ‘granddaughter only’ thing came up, and that was that. We were rivals.” “It doesn’t upset you that she’s dead?” “It does!” she said, “Really, it does. But… if you told me Mrs. Niles died, I’d be about as upset. Someone who was a small, peripheral part my life is now gone. It’s sad, it’s a reminder that we’re all very mortal, and there’s obviously a lot more going on besides that, with you as the heir for the property and me as… this.”

Interesting that Rose didn't have that strong of a relationship with her even without the fortune hanging over their heads. Wonder what was up with that.

She gave me a funny look. “Aunt Irene pulled strings to screw up Paige’s chances of getting into University, and she almost succeeded. Uncle Paul went crazy, Paige went crazy, and we had four straight months where I was genuinely afraid. My car got vandalized, and they emptied a can of orange juice concentrate under a seat. The frozen pulp you mix with two cans of water. By the time I realized what was going on, the smell was so bad I couldn’t drive the car, and no amount of cleaning would make it any better.” “Doesn’t sound like Paige.” “That one was Ellie, I’m pretty sure. She made a comment, then alluded to my brake lines, and I basically stopped driving after that. When I think of family, that’s the first thing that comes to mind.”

This family is a bunch of psychopaths! How much is the house worth for them to go through all that trouble?

I opted to shave anyways, tearing the can off the bottom of the drawer. Sure enough, the razor nicked me no less than five times. They had been there for so long that temperature had bent the blades. I preferred to bleed and be clean-shaven over the alternative. Without a reflection to go by, I had to be meticulous.

Never liked shaving, part of why I grew a beard. I was always worried I'd cut my throat or something. Couldn't imagine doing it without a reflection.

“Apparently I don’t sleep,” she said, and she sounded somewhat distant, even disconnected. “I don’t get hungry. I don’t really breathe. I barely have a heartbeat.”

Im sure this won't lead to any dysphoria or disorder about your body!

I nodded, toothbrush in my mouth. On a level, I was glad I had an excuse to stay silent. I was bothered, that she was ahead of me, that she would likely stay ahead of me, without a need for sleep. How could I even articulate that? On a level, I wanted us to be on the same page, so we could cooperate, play ideas off each other.

I wonder if this is also insecurity on Blake's part. On the one hand he doesn't strike me as the kind of dude bro who hates the idea of a women out competing him. On the other its possible that all of the family posturing rubbed off on him to some degree, what's in the cat is in the kittens after all.

All of the most foolish and brutish Others have been captured, slain, consumed, driven off, or tricked away. Recognize all Others for what they are, and know that they, by a process of elimination two thousand and six hundred years in the making, are cunning by nature, they are slave to those who are, or they were made to be cunning to better serve in their duties. Wit is the greatest defense and the sharpest weapon, on battlefields such as these.

Like a supernatural survival of the fittest. I saw a shit post on here recently about how Parahumans made Wildbow so adverse to Powerscaling that he wrote Pact. And if this is an accurate reflection of how pact will play out going forward I'm very intrigued.

What was Rose, if not an Other? New enough she wasn’t bound by the old rules that forbade lying and mandated oaths, but still an Other. Not of mortals or the mortal’s world.

Maybe I'm naive but that's dangerous thinking Blake. You need all the allies you can get and right now Rose might be your most valuable. Wait a minute, didn’t Rose say not to contact the lawyer? Despite the fact she was supposedly send by him? Oh oooohhh now I'M not sure if I should trust Rose...

“I really like your tattoos,” she said. She fumbled for words for a second, which caught me off guard. “I’m… actually envious. I couldn’t pull that off, but it’s the sort of thing I’d get if I could.”

I looked down. Small birds perched on tree branches, in pale grays, whites and yellows, against a backdrop of reds, in watercolor hues. “Thank you.”

Were we similar in some respects? In tastes? Or was this a manipulation from a cunning Other? What was there to guarantee that she was really me, with one not-so-small change?

Hmmm, right now I'm gonna go with Occam's Razor and assume Rose isn't up to anything. Though she hasn't awakened yet so there's nothing stopping her from lying at this juncture...

"Take a look,” she said. Or it was all she could say, before there weren’t any surfaces for her to communicate through. I made my way into the living room, and saw her there, waiting for me, in the mirror I’d taken from the bathroom. The book lay on the coffee table.

I said in an earlier post that I was surprised that Rose wasn't an exposition character and here she kind of is but one who is actively learning as she goes alongside the main character, she just has a headstart and the advantage of not needing sleep.

Essentials, chapter eight. Dangers a practitioner faces. I pulled on pants under the towel as I leaned over the book, reading the headings aloud. “Being forsworn, betrayal within the coven, betrayal by familiars, covens, crusades, death, demesnes, execution, exquirere…” “Skip ahead.”

At first I thought "What do you mean death? Shouldn't that be obvious and then I realised that this could be referring to capital D Death. Which makes sense given how grim this world is.

She spoke to me from the toaster. “I get a say in this, you know.”

You should but as Blake demonstrates several times throughout this arc you really don't.

“You think. Either way, I’m the one who got injured,” I said. “I’m the one who has stitches in my hand and a cut on my face.”

“At least you’re alive,” she retorted.

Im really curious how this conflict between rose and Blake is gonna escalate throughout the story. Blake has been shown to be suspicious of Rose several times and the lingering resentment she feels from constantly being dismissed by him might lead to a self fulfilling prophesy in her eventually lashing out at him. After all vindictiveness seems to run in the family with the Thorburns and Blake at least has both shown and admitted he's not above it even if he wants to. I'm betting Rose isn't much different

Relief hit me in a wave, even in the moment my heart sank.

Good line

The other man spoke first. “I’m RCMP officer Pat Macguin. This is Chief of Police Laird Behaim.”

So Behaim is gonna be a notable figure in this arc going forward and one of his ancestors will pop up in the interlude. I'm just now realising the implications of one of the members of the other Practitioner families being chief of police in a small town. Ugh Blake is in for a bad time.

When in doubt… honesty. “The car broke down, and coming here seemed like it was less hassle overall. Molly wasn’t here. I thought I should stick around.”

Better get into the habit quick, Blake. Even if this sequence of events dose make you look pretty suspicious. Then again given the fact the whole town hates you and the fact this guy Is a cop he's probably actively looking for a reason to arrest you.

“I’d like to have a moment to talk to Mr. Thorburn here, if that’s alright. If he’s telling the truth and he has inherited the property, I wouldn’t mind the chance to talk this through with him.” The RCMP officer didn’t seem happy with that. “You’re aware of the time constraints?”

Oh don't you worry, officer. Mr. Behaim is very good at managing his time I hear ;)

Together, we watched the RCMP officer trudge away through the snow, his boots squeaking. When he was gone, Laird withdrew a pocketwatch from his coat. He popped it open, looked, and then closed it, holding it in one hand.

So dose Laird cast a time spell everytime he opens the watch? Because looking at this chapter in retrospect this seems like the perfect time to cast a time spell

“If you’re worried, I can promise you my protection for as long as you’re in my company, I’ll take you somewhere where we can talk, then bring you back, as safe as I can manage it.”

It's interesting watching the little half truths and loopholes you can get away with as a practitioner. I find it ironic that instead of being more honest, practitioners just become way better at lying. The best lies are partially true after all.

“If you’re interested, I’ll wait while you get your coat and whatever else you deem necessary.”

Likely a test to see if Blake has a familiar or an implement yet

“In this scenario, we’ve got a situation involving a number of countries. If you will, there’s America. I’m rather interested in America for the purpose of this discussion, but that’s just me. Powerful, perhaps overly proud, large, keepers of the peace.”

I know that this analogy isn't meant to be perfect but it's funny hearing America being talked about in this light given the current geopolitical situation.

“Fair enough. Can we call her Maggie, or is that mucking up the metaphor?” “We could call her that. Maggie Holt, I believe.”

Good old Maggie Holt. Can't wait to learn more about her

“Yes, to the north, Mr. Thorburn. I would like to see the small southern entity with the proverbial nukes be a very stable, calm, country for the time being. America would protect it, and things would be very calm and very peaceful for long enough that the wealthy newcomer might fade in his glory.” “So it isn’t really friendship, is it? It’s… buying time. Then there’s nothing to stop America from crushing the little country.” “It would be a temporary alliance, I’m afraid. I don’t believe there’s a way around it.”

Pretty bleak scenario for Blake here. We're gonna see Blake consider using the proverberial nukes later on and I can't blame him. A nuclear power is dangerous enough, a nuclear power that feels backed into a corner with nothing to lose is even more so.

I looked for a mirror and found one, meeting Rose’s gaze. I still felt numb, cold, a little less like a complete person than before. Slowly, surely, this situation was chipping away at me. A little warmth in the form of good coffee would go a long way.

This line is way sadder in retrospect given that Blake doesn't even get that coffee.

[littleeyesofpallas]

Alright, here I go with another one of these posts where i just poke around the japanese names and see what lines up and what got lost in translation... This time it's the pixie line, because.

Warning this one's a lot longer than the first...

PIXY[ピクシー] is just pixie, nice and straight forward. actually go figure i found some obscure official art from the GBA games that actually seems to confirm the romanization as PIXY.

DIXY[ディクシー] is also just Dixie, or maybe Dixi?I don't know why it's named that... Just the D- from Dino and -ixie from Pixie? That feels too simple?

VENUS[ビーナス] is an interesting one... Maybe supposed to be the feminine aspect of Pixie and the earth element of Golem, even if one of those is "earth" in the sense of rocks, and the other in the sense of the planet. (I've seen it suggested it's a nod to Venus de Milo being a statue as a famous statue of a woman, but i don't know that fully buy that.) Anyhow, it got renamed "Vixen" for MR1 and "Granity" moving forward. (Kind of surprising that they never opted for a version that was just full stone texture, or even like a clean white marble.)

MINT[ミント] was in fact just called Mint. I'm not really sure why... I've seen it suggested it's a play on mint blue being an icy blue and general icy flavor of mint as an herb as a reflection of Tiger's ice element, but she's also just not mint blue?

But it's later changed to AELLO[アエロー] which got misromanized as "Aero" in English. Aello[Αελλω]: "Storm" is one of the four named harpies in Greek mythology, but also a name of one of the dogs of Actaeon.

NACHTFALTER[ナハトファルター] is the German word for "moth" lit. "Night+Flyer." IN MR1 it's localized as "Radar," but later renamed to "Nightflyer" as a bit of an overly literal translation of the real name.

SUEKO[スエコ] the Sue- is from Suezo and the -ko is the Japanese naming suffix -ko[子] that generally denotes girls' names, so her name is basically "Suezo-girl."

NAGISA[ナギサ] is from the Japanese word, and name, Nagisa[渚]: "Water's Edge," which also generally refers to, like, a beach or a shoreline. It was called "Nymph" in English at first, but MR2 they actually just used Nagisa.

SÉPIA-LIÈVRE[セピアリエーヴル] is a weirdly elaborate one. It's just French for "Brown Hare." In English they called her Mopsy , which is actually pretty cleverly borrowed from a character in Beatrix Potter's Peter Rabbit. She was renamed to Lepus which is just the genus of hares.

ANGEL[エンジェル] was just Angel.

PRISM-SHADOW[プリズムシャドウ] was shortened to "Prism" for the first game but past that point the English named it "Silhouette."

LAVENDER-KIR[ラベンダーキール] I've seen some people romanize that last bit as "Keele" but I think it's supposed to be "Kir" like the cocktail. In any event it got renamed to "Allure" in English.

LEAF[リーフ] in MR 1&2 but English called it "Serene" and "Serenity."

BUNNY[バニー] Is just Bunny.

PLATINA[プラチナ] platinum, like a platinum album, because she's a pop star.

EVE[イヴ] Obviously named after the biblical Eve, but she is a little demon woman. She seems to be kind of a blueprint for the eventual Pixie/Joker hybrid, Lilim. For some reason her monster book entry has Astarte, from another Tecmo game, Deception: Invitation to Darkness, in the background.

DYNA[ダイナ] as in Dynamite, as in fire and explosions. but in English they went with "Daina" like a girl's name.

UNICO[ユニコ] similar to the Sueko thing it's a name equitable to "unicorn-girl." It's also the name of the unicorn in Osamu Tezuka's classic manga, Unico.

JIL[ジル]called Jilt in English for some reason. I assume just the name "Jill." Given she's the Pixie/Chucky hybrid you'd think it'd be a name more directly referencing some other type of doll or haunted doll character. But I can't think of anything that fits the bill. Jack and Jill maybe, not a doll per say but keeping with the toys and kid's rhymes/play shtick? but then would the Japanese even be familiar enough with those nursery rhymes to make that kind of reference? (Notably it's not the same as the monster JIIL[ジール])

JEANNE[ジャンヌ] as in Jeanne d'Arc/Joan of Arc. English awkwardly localized it as "Janne."

FUR[ファー] really straight forward, if awkwardly Engrishy. Called "Kitten" in English.

JINNIYYA[ジーニヤー] romanized as "Jinnee" for english. I don't actually know what to make of this. [ジーニー] is how the Japanese would write "Genie," and that's clearly part of it, but the YAA(YER?)? Genier, as in "one-who-genies"? No clue... It was pointed out in the comments that it's definitely just the japanization of the Arabic, jinniyya[جِنِّيَّة] which is a feminine form of the root, jinn.

FUTURE[フューチャー] just what it says. Called "Futurity' in English.

YUKI[ユキ] literally yuki[雪]: "snow". Clearly a play on the Yuki-Onna, lit. "snow woman" a yokai that appears as a beautiful woman in snow storms to lure men to theirs deaths. "Snowy" in English.

LILIM[リリム] as in a category of demoness from which the apocryphal Lilith is derived. There's a long history of misused and appropriated lore tied up in that that I'm just not getting into here. Moving on...

FOREST[フォレスト] straight forward. Named "Dryad" in english for obvious reasons.

POISON[ポワゾン] is technically correctly written in the English games, but notably that's actually the French pronunciation the japanese is working off of, not the English.

KASUMI[カスミ] is just Kasumi and she's a reference to the main character of tecmo's fighting game series Dead or Alive

MIA[ミーア] appears to be an anagram of "ami," mononym performing name of Suzuki Ami, the singer and idol who worked on Monster Farm 2. Apparently she designed the outfit herself, but I don't know if it's something she ever wore in real life.

UNDINE[ウンデイーネ] obviously named after the prototypical water spirit of western alchemical lore. But also a clever revivial of the short lived Undine type monster from MR2.

MISCHIEF[ミスチフ] It's just "Mischeif."

OTOHIME[オトヒメ] from japanese mythology, princess of the undersea dragon palace.

FEREERIA[フェレーリア] I don't know what this is really meant to be. English called it "Faerilina" as kind of a spin of "Feral," "Fae" and a feminizing name suffix. But I think the original Japanese is supposed to be more of a play on FERRET[フェレット], but again I don't really know what to make of the rest of it.

MIKU[ミク] after Hinasaki Miku, protagonist of Fatal Frame, also by Tecmo.

COLOMBINA[コロンビナ] I think it's supposed to be named after the Comedia el Arte archetype? (aka "Columbine.") Likely chosen because she's the more obvious feminine role. Although, gender aside, you'd think with the obvious clown motif inherited from Piroro she should've been named Arlecchino/Harlequin.

KUNG-FU[カン・フー] huh... i thought for sure that one would've been some janky english localization thing, but no it's actually just "kung fu" It's wearing Bruce Lee's iconic yellow striped bodysuit from Game of Death.

I wasn't going to at first but I guess I'll tackle the MR3 pixies as well.. Enough though none of them are technically hybrids. First of all... Angel, "Windine" and Nightflyer are all just the same Angel, Undine, and Nachtfalter we've already seen. But beyond that,

NYMPH[ニンフ] is Nymph, but also pretty clearly a derivative of previous Pixie/Plant hybrids

FAND[ファーン] I think this one is supposed to be named after the FA-2(FAND II) "Fairy Fighter" fighter jet in the Yukikaze sci-fi franchise. Without that context though the English localization just called it "Farn."

BANSHEE[バンシー] just waht it says. it was mistakenly transliterated into "Pansy" in English.

FAN-CHU-KA[ファンチューカ] I don't know what to make of these phonetics. Clearly from the design it's meant to be Chinese, but I don't know enough to take a guess. English just went with the vague transliteration "Fantuger"

VALKYRIE[ヴァルキリー] straight forwardly named after the Norse mythological figures. This one actually reappears in MRA2 and for some reason is the basis of an entire secondary style of pixie, but we'll get to those in a sec...

(Oh and Fay actually was an English language original so there is no Japanese text to work from.)

And then weirdly there are a few random fusions exclusive to the GBA games that didn't actually use unique sprites, just recolors of a basic pixie model.

NYAN[ニャン] Pixie/Mew kinda funny that this wasn't a fusion in any of the actual main games, or ones with generally better graphics than the GBA games. The Mew breed is called Nyaa[ニャー] in Japanese as in your typical catgirl noise, kind of a funny play on how to 'feminize" the cat element.

LIP-PINK[リップピンク] pixie/mocchi. Obviously a play on Mocchi's big lips and pink color.

VIVIANE[ヴィヴィアン] Pixie/Arrowhead technically could've been any spelling of that same phonetic name, but I think the most common use of this katakana is specifically Vivienne Westwood. No idea why girl + crab = fashion though... Oh I've seen the interesting idea that it's supposed to be named after the Lady of the Lake in Arthurian lore, which doesn't really have a concrete spelling (and also just has other names that aren't vivian depending on the source), but could any of a number of alternatives including; Viviane, Vivienne, Vivian, and Vivien... I don't know that I see the direct link withthe crab, but I guess if you really want to stretch the claws = sharp = sword, and just the super broad water affiliation of crab and lake i can sort of see it justified?

XYLOPHONE[ザイロホーン] pixie/momo. Erroneously transliterated as "Xylohorn" in English.

RINKA[リンカ] pixie/suzurin. A play on suzurin's name being made up of suzu[鈴]: "bell" and rin[鈴]: "bell". Suzurin[鈴花]: "bell flower" is a girls name but could also be pronounced rinka[鈴花]. (Oddly this one gets reworked into a totally different main type later, as Zan/Suzurin.)

SUN-TURN[サンターン]Pixie/Octopee you would think it was supposed to be "Suntan" but that sustained TA~/TER/TUR[ター] sound is definitely not how the Japanese would approximate "tan"[タン]. But I think Suntan is a better name for an ocean/ beach themed pixie anyhow.

AMAZON[アマゾーン]Pixie/Mogi yeah, i dunno man... Mogi's whole thing is dreadlocks and DJing? Vague associations of black culture with amazons?? but the Amazon itself is in south america not africa, and the mythic amazons are greek, so like where's the connection really? I dunno... Considering it's got no art just like the others there's literally nothing else to go off of.

NILE-BLUE[ナイルブルー] Pixie/PsiRoller appropriately named after the exact shade of blue the PsiRoller is.

ARLAT[アルラト] Pixie/Antlan named after a kind of minor historical mongolian tribe??? No idea how that came from girl+ ants

TSUKUYOMI[ツクヨミ] Pixie/Zan, named after the Japanese Moon god, although oddly that god is male and the pixie line has otherwise stuck to pretty strictly female names and references.

ULTIMA[アルティマ] is a play on Ultraman, something the MR franchise actually does quite a few times over the years, even before the explicitly Ultraman crossover in Ultra Kaiju Monster Rancher

CARMILLA[カーミラ] after the vampire in the novel of the same name by Sheridan Le Fanu.

And then an array of miscellaneous pixie/???

BONDAGE[ボンデージ] renamed "Fetish" in English.

HELL[ヘル] just what it says. Same in English.

STREAM[ストリーム] yet another straightforward one...

THUNDER-WOMAN[サンダーウーマン] renamed "Truenos" in English. I don't know if this is supposed to be a reference or just a literal description

AYANE[アヤネ] is another Dead or Alive reference to go along side Kasumi.

SERAPHIM[セラフィム] is what it says on the tin. Seems a little redundant with Angel being a thing, and even available int he same game.

APSARAS[アプサラス] named after the hindu/buddhist celestial beings. (For some reason Japanese always pluralizes this name, even though the samslrot is just "Apsala.")

KALI[カーリー] is also hindu in origin, a powerful goddess of death and destruction.

goddamn that took way longer than i expected it to when i started...

[louisisalarrie]

"louis leaked the weed video to daily mail and you cant convince me otherwise"

the weed video is so funny to me, I wasn't in the fandom back then so I don't really know how the fandom reacted. But looking at it now is so funny considering how he has a song high in california and even harry has admitted doing drugs not to mention his lyrics. but the funniest part about that video is that zayn says "i know you like dick"

Hello anon!! This was meant to be a lot shorter, but… yep. Here we are. It’s been a while since I’ve done one of these but, well, welcome to the show…

It was sooooo clearly planned. And hilarious. And at the time, because a lot of us were on the younger side, we were shook at this video. tried to rationalise it by them being excited about the actual food chicken, not coke, and there were more than a few people who unstanned. People burned physical concert tickets, deleted their blogs, sent nasty tweets to the boys… It was not something we were expecting, particularly because it just came out of the blue one day, and a lot of us were too young to have dabbled in the devil’s lettuce.

but yeah… louis filmed for a long time, clearly putting the joint in the middle of the frame multiple times so we wouldn’t miss it, spoke super loudly so we’d know it was him, kept talking about how they were smoking weed, and basically removed all plausible deniability. and there wasn’t really too much attempted clean up afterwards. things just kinda kept going on as normal, even after the video was leaked.

SC did a half assed attempt at saving face, Liam made a series of tweets to try and save their butts (as per usual, he cleans up haha), TMZ said One Direction’s lawyers were getting involved because someone stole that video and leaked it (which like… how? It was literally filmed on louis’ phone, and im sure there would be much more interesting things to leak off there), and then articles about how upset Harry was at Louis for the whole thing were planted the next day to a) push larry further apart and continue their enemy thing, and b) push harry for another reason for a solo career.

BUT the thing is… SC’s statement, came roughly a week after all the articles had come out. It wasn’t straight away. And you wanna know why I think that was?

This article from the BBC.

Plainly put, it’s a short speculation piece about whether or not One Direction were still happy. That was a massive thing that came out of that video… was just like, Zayn and Louis being annoyed that they were putting out ANOTHER book, and that it was just the same old boring stuff that the fans had seen and read all before (I have all the books still, and yes, he is correct). I think that probably encouraged a statement from SC, because what’s the best way to show you’re unhappy and wanna step away from your brand and get back at your big boss who has full control over your career? You guessed it! A scandal.

While they certainly were smart enough to do this while in a country where it is legal to have a small amount of jazz cabbage for personal use, to avoid further complications with the law etc., and never actually using any explicit terms like “cocaine”, it got them off the hook enough that this leak was successful while still protected them from “going too far”. And I 100% stand by that it was Louis who planned to film and leak it, and that’s why “I know u like dick” came out, too.

Precious Mr Tomlinson has always been a bit of a mastermind with a master plan, and he knew that by posting this, the media would jump on them doing drugs more so. That was meant to be the main feature, with a splash of hating their brand and wanting to do more for fans. But for us Larries? Well… zayn saying he knows louis likes dick and then a loud louis cackle was pretty huge. Louis encouraged it and probably suggested zayn say something along those lines just to stir the pot (pun intended) some more. This video truly had the trifecta: hating SC/the 1d brand, doing drugs, and encouraging gay rumours.

And theeeeen SC hit louis with a punishment, which was Eleanor was to accompany louis for the rest of the tour because she’s a “great influence on him” (lol) which was announced on the same day of SC’s statement (coincidence?).

That same article then commented on how louis was so upset about the video because he was trying to make a deal to buy the Rovers at that time and didn’t wanna jeopardise it (he knew that vid wasn’t gonna jeopardise shit lol).

I think Louis saying the N word (which we all argued about whether he said it or not for ages bc damn louis) is totally inexcusable. That was by far the worst thing that came out of this video, and the media noticed it too. I don’t think he intended on it being in the video leak, because regardless of how much he wanted to piss off SC, I don’t think he’d ever intended to hurt anyone else and him saying that obviously did. I won’t excuse that and I kinda think well did he even watch it back before leaking it? Did he rewatch it still stoned and didn’t think twice about it? Either way he shouldn’t have said it regardless of being on camera or not and he did really hurt a lot of people. It was stupid.

The vid still available online is cut exactly at 5 mins, and is chopped up and doesn’t show the whole thing (I think there was a longer version somewhere that came out too and it was like over 8 mins but didn’t have the cuts in it? Idk I remember there being a longer one that disappeared???) but yeah… it truly was a time.

[lunas-otome-blog]

Luna's Review: Sympathy Kiss

Official Summary:

About a year has passed since Akari Amasawa started her new job as a designer at Estario, a mobile app maker. While she doesn’t dislike her job, she’s not deeply passionate about it either. After her yearly performance review, she’s given the opportunity to join the Estarci team.

The company’s namesake app, Estarci is a news app that made a big splash when it launched, but has since fallen behind rival apps, including apps run by Estario itself. Management has decided to give the app one last chance before shutting it down for good, and Akari and all of her new co-workers will need to give it their all to save the app from the chopping block.

Will Akari find true love? Will she find what it is she wants to do in life? Will the app get shut down? Wait, was Akari only given this opportunity because the company was looking for an excuse to fire her?!

Business and pleasure mix in Sympathy Kiss, a thrilling office romance and slice-of-life drama!

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Luna's Rating

Plot: 6/10

Gameplay: 8/10

Characters: 7/10

Art: 9/10

Overall: 7/10

Luna's Fave Character: Higa, Usui

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Luna's Thoughts (Spoiler Free)

Sympathy Kiss is a predictable but cozy office romance, offering a varied panel of love interests and a low stakes storyline.

Like Amnesia Memories and Mystic Messenger, Sympathy Kiss is one of those games where the protagonist doesn't speak much, making it feel like characters are largely talking at her. In fact, MC Akari isn't given a single line of dialogue, instead summarizing complex thoughts into a few simple sentences. It felt really weird at first, but I got over it eventually.

Sympathy Kiss has a total of eight love interests — five playable from the get-go, one that unlocks after your first route, and two secret routes that branch off from other routes. Despite this many options, they all have pretty distinct storylines and none of the routes felt too rushed, minus the three shorter routes which I feel deserved more fleshing out.

However, some of the routes feel like they were copied straight out of fanfiction, with pretty much every trope in the book used across the game. Because of this, I feel this game is aimed at a much younger audience, featuring more paradigms of "adult-style" relationships rather than a realistic look at romance. Not that I expect these games to be realistic lol.

The best praise I can offer Sympathy Kiss is that it is cozy. There aren't too many surprising twists and turns, and things tend to work out quickly, without a lot of effort. There's little angst outside of the usual romantic pining, and the "bad guy" characters usually end up apologizing, wrapping everything up neatly. Each route has three endings — "Work," "Love" and "Perfect" — and none of them are bad, or that different from one another to be honest.

If you're at all familiar with the tropes in these games or indeed any sort of anime-style love story, you'll find Sympathy Kiss extremely predictable. But sometimes it's nice not to worry and just enjoy a basic, pleasant romance, so if you just want a sweet, simple otoge to play, this may be for you.

In short, I thought this game was fine. I don't think I'll linger on it, but I'm glad I played it.

Please find below my thoughts on each route in the order I played them.

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Tainaka Nori Route (Spoilers)

"Ugh" is the best way I can describe this route. The plot was stupid, Akari's actions make no sense, and I disliked Nori immensely.

Akari meets Nori at a bar, where he spills water on her, halfheartedly says he'll pay to have her clothes cleaned, and then immediately admits he has no money. She runs into him later, drunk off his ass and sleeping in the streets. Nori's route begins if Akari lets him crash at her house for a few nights.

Already, this is a dumb premise. I refuse to believe the writers couldn't have come up with a better way for her to agree to host a total stranger. At any rate, he ends up moving in with her indefinitely, doing chores in exchange for money, which is not really equivalent IMHO but whatever.

Nori claims to conveniently have amnesia, which Akari doesn't even believe, but she still lets the liar stay at her home. A few weeks into their arrangement, he admits he "found" a phone in his backpack, implying neither he nor Akari thought to check his things for hints to regain his memories. The writing is so lazy, it made me furious.

We find out he's got some baggage around food, because he can cook well but doesn't want to share his food with Akari ... even though it's her food?? She literally paid for it??? She also asks him for help with a cooking video and he gets so mad that Akari thinks SHE needs to apologize, even though he's staying in her home FOR FREE. Like, the LEAST he could do would be to help her.

I was so fed up with this guy the entire time. He also sneaks into her bed and hugs her even though she's uncomfortable. Ick. I hate this type of character, but what I hated most was that Akari did nothing about him and let him steamroll her into submission.

Nori is basically a lesser version of Shion from Variable Barricade, who I also didn't like, but at least Shion was written well. The one bit of praise I can give Nori is that he does finally get a job at the end, and also decides to move out of Akari's house so he can figure himself out for a while.

Still, one good move doesn't make up for this extremely frustrating route.

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Yoshioka Rokuro Route (Spoilers)

I chose to play Yoshioka's route next because he's the princely type and I figured it would be kinda boring. And wouldn't you know it, I was right.

Yoshioka is the typical wealthy guy character, right down to the overbearing parents and the aggressive fiancee. The only unique thing about his route is that he and Akari were childhood friends, which is discovered very early on and basically used only to endear Yoshioka to Akari super quickly.

Every lick of dialogue in this route is hackneyed, from Yoshioka's father arguing he should marry his fiancee for the sake of their family's business, to the fiancee declaring that Akari is in the way.

When Yoshioka is placed under house arrest, Akari and the rest of her work team rescue him with literally no consequence or issue at all. And after he's out, he literally just talks to Akari a bit and then goes home???? What was even the point of rescuing him??

Yoshioka tells his fiancee's parents he won't marry her, and then later in the route, he has the same conversation with them AGAIN. Why do this twice? In the perfect ending, the fiancee actually apologizes, which felt forced considering how much of a bitch she was just a scene earlier.

I feel like this route could have been easily rewritten like this — Akari finds out Yoshioka has a childhood friend he's in love with, and also that he has a fiancee that he doesn't want to marry. Through the route, she helps convince him to stand up to his parents and his fiancee, all the while angsting over the fact that she's falling in love with him. Meanwhile, Yoshioka is attracted to Akari because she reminds him of his childhood friend. Eventually, they figure out Akari IS the childhood friend and they both take a stand against his parents.

It still would have been predictable, but at least it wouldn't have been as disjointed as the actual route. Instead, Yoshioka's route is small conflict after small conflict, each quickly resolved with no impact. I was not impressed.

On a side note: It makes me absolutely enraged that this dude wears a fucking bolo tie with a turtleneck. Who approved this outfit? He's supposed to be fashionable but that is egregious.

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Saotome Mitsuki Route (Spoilers)

Saotome is billed as the genki character in the common route, but the first chapter of his route reveals that a lot of people — including Akari at first — think he's kind of an ass. He's always disappearing from the office and doesn't really want to work with a partner.

Of course, the misunderstanding is cleared up quickly, as Akari finds out he's not actually and genius and just works harder than everyone else behind the scenes. Due to a traumatic past event, Saotome acts superficially friendly while keeping everyone at a distance, until Akari worms her way into his heart.

The main plot of this route involves rumors circulating around the office that Saotome is bullying Akari, which of course parallels the aforementioned traumatic past event. Saotome tries to fix it by creating distance, but Akari isn't going to let him make decisions involving her on his own.

This was the first route I didn't find extremely predictable, and it was also the first route that felt like a quintessential office romance. Writing wise it was pretty solid. Unlike in Nori's route where I just hated the guy, and Yoshioka's route where they were into each other right away, Saotome's route has just the right push and pull of affection. I also felt his trauma was more believable than Nori's.

I wasn't wild about his character (a little too flirty for me), but that's just a personal preference. Overall, this route was fine. It didn't stand out to me, but I have no major complaints.

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Kobase Yoji Route (Spoilers)

At first, I thought Kobase was gonna be like Jumin from MysMes, because he's the dark-haired boss with little expressiveness. But it becomes pretty obvious, even in the common route, that he's much kinder than Jumin. He also smiles more.

Kobase endeared himself to me right away, as Akari makes a few mistakes and he gracefully supports her from behind the scenes. He doesn't shy away from scolding her, but he isn't actually upset about the mistakes — just that she didn't come to him for help first.

Kobase believes himself to be somewhat scary because of his face and mostly stoic expression, so he thinks Akari is afraid of him. But she's just trying to hold her own and not trouble anyone. I enjoyed their dynamic in the first chapter of his route.

The next few chapters, however, are back to predictable fanfic tropes, as Akari ends up temporarily moving in with Kobase. We get the usual "oops I saw you in a towel," "oops I hugged you while sleeping" and "oops, I kissed you while drunk and forgot," and Kobase is kind of weirdly aggressive instead of embarrassed the way I thought he'd be.

I figured he'd be more the "we can't do this, I am your boss" kinda guy, but instead he's just kinda wishy washy, coming onto her and then pretending it didn't happen several times before they make it official. At this point, we're only halfway through the route.

We find out Kobase did something bad in the past and rumors start at the company, but it all felt silly to me because it was something he allegedly did when he was in middle school. Even so, his teammates back him up, which was nice — until they reach the conclusion that he probably is just trying to cover for someone. What sort of lesson are we supposed to be learning here?

It gets really weird from this point on, as Akari and workmate Oe drive to *checks notes* Kobase's hometown (??) and just happen to randomly run into someone who can help. He directs them to a guy claiming to be Kobase's best friend, but apparently he's not important enough to get a sprite. Anyway, it becomes obvious that he's the guy who made the mistake and Kobase got blamed for it, and the rest of the route is exposing the lie.

This route started off strong but the morals got mixed along the way, and I didn't like how Kobase was pushy with Akari. It would have been cuter if he was nervous and didn't know how to handle his attraction to her. It was also weird that the only side character with a sprite was the sister of the victim.

Idk, the storytelling was a little uneven in this one. It went from sweet to bland to just weird. I liked Kobase as a character but he could have shined on a more focused route.

.

Minato Kohei Route (Spoilers)

As I predicted, Minato's route starts out with him being a dick to Akari because he doesn't want to work with someone. He's shown to be considerate by helping her, but plays it off as an annoyance. I knew he'd warm up to Akari, because he does so in every other route, but it's fun to see the transformation up close.

Ultimately, we find out he's not distancing himself from her because he's a jerk, but because he doesn't want to get her involved with some sketchy shit he's being forced into.

Like Saotome's route, this one had really good pacing. Though the attraction between them is apparent pretty early, Minato and Akari don't get together until the very end. When they do, he even apologizes for giving her mixed signals throughout the route.

My biggest issue with this route is that the resolution to the main conflict was really short. We don't even get an in-person confrontation with the big bad like we do in the other routes. It felt too simple to have Minato hand over some documents and then everything is fine.

While you could say Akari gave him the motivation to do it, I wish she'd gotten the chance to tell him directly. Instead, it kind of seems like everything resolves on its own, and it falls flat because it feels like Minato could have done it at any time.

But I liked this couple a lot. I do wish Minato was more squirmy with his attraction to Akari, but I say that about pretty much every character in these games lol. Anyway, this route was more or less a win for me.

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Secret Route 1 (Spoilers)

I didn't know this game had secret routes going in!! I actually discovered the other secret route first, but I opted to save it for later. This one branches off of Tainaka's route and I guess I just missed it my first playthrough.

This route focuses on Higa, who works for a partner company. You get introduced to him early on and he basically doesn't appear in any other routes for more than a few seconds. His initial appearance is forgettable, but fortunately his route was not.

Higa's route was really lovely. It's shorter than the main routes and like a lot of the others, I thought it wrapped up a little too early and neatly. But ultimately it was really sweet.

Higa is a single dad, and he begins to fall for Akari as she bonds with his five-year-old son Hinata. Akari is attracted to Higa as well, but fears the lingering presence of Higa's deceased wife. Meanwhile, Higa worries he can't give Akari the relationship she deserves. He's older than her, and he can't handle a casual relationship this late in the game.

I don't typically like child characters in these games, but Hinata was such a good little matchmaker in this route that I didn't mind him. Higa is a great dad and easily the most respectful character in the game. The candid conversations he has with Akari were charming and also oddly realistic. I cried when he and Akari asked Hinata for his blessing.

There's also the fun discovery that Higa was a former idol and wanted to become an actor, and Akari gets to help him restore that dream. Unlike some of the other side plots in routes, this one was foreshadowed really nicely.

All in all, this was my favorite route in the game. Never thought I'd fall for a single dad, but here we are.

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Secret Route 2 (Spoilers)

This route branches off from Yoshioka's route and focuses on YOFY, the secretive freelancer who works with the Estarci team. His identity is obvious after Yoshioka's route, though it matters little.

YOFY is, initially, the tsundere character I was hoping for. At first aggressive and rude, he quickly comes to view Akari as cute and warms up to her under the guise of working more efficiently. He's also the prettiest character in the game, and the youngest at 19.

After he falls for Akari, though, things get weird, and he quickly pivots into yandere territory. He does some pretty despicable things, including stalking her, biting her and drugging her. While I normally would have been really disgusted with this route, knowing YOFY is 19 helped me to not judge him too harshly.

I actually think the writing is handled better here than in a lot of otoges. Akari doesn't forgive YOFY right away, and YOFY deeply regrets his actions and apologizes properly. And playing such a warped route after Higa's wholesome route was kinda fun in a depraved way.

While I def preferred his tsundere side to his yandere, I thought YOFY was a cute character who is ultimately a slave to his own emotions. He's still a kid, so I'm sure he'll grow.

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Usui Shuya Route (Spoilers)

I love an age gap route, so I decided to play Usui's route last. While Higa is allegedly a bit older than Akari, you get the sense he's probably only 8-10 years older than her. Usui, however, is a full 20 years older, which makes for some delicious angst as he struggles with his attraction to her.

Akari, of course, falls for the older man right away, and is really irked when he dismisses any implications of a relationship. This is the only route where she is 100% the pursuer, and honestly I'm here for it.

Despite being billed as a main route, Usui's route is shorter than the other five main boys, the same length as the secret routes. That was a bummer for me because I'd really have liked to see the full version.

The main conflict in this route, other than Usui trying to ignore Akari's come-ons, is that his parents ask him to come home to take over their family inn. This is after we're told he had a falling out with his parents, but we don't get to hear about them reconnecting, giving the impression that Usui's parents just called their estranged son when it was convenient for the business.

Had this been a full length route, I think Usui would have probably invited Akari to his home and we'd have gotten to meet his parents and been part of that healing process. As the route stands, Usui takes a phone call off screen, and then later decides to go back to his hometown on his own.

I wish Akari had been involved more. It would have been so fun to have him introduce a girl 20 years younger than him to his parents and watch them fall in love with her, too. Alas.

Regardless, I did really like this route, and it felt really good to play Usui last because he's always been there, supporting Akari and her team from the very beginning.

[arinmoss]

Feel like venting about a very stupid thing that's been happening in my life that i keep vagueing about so feel free to ignore lmao. this is so tmi and also stupid long lol. i just, idk need to type it out.

but basically, me and my mom live below the poverty line. She makes barely $20,000 a year. My grandma knows this. She knows we're on snap ebt, and what that means. She knows my mom has no money and that when my dad died he left us nothing but his debt.

Now my grandma? She owns land, and leases it lol. She has a son who lives with her and i imagine pays for things, cause he's the one that runs their business. She also owned a beach house, however technically speaking her and her husband and all 5 of her children own a part of that property. However, my dad is dead so technically his part is now owned by my mom. Legally, she owns part interest in that property, and if my grandma were to sell it (which she did) she would first have to get my moms permission, and then some of that money would go to my mom. Which didnt happen. because my grandma didnt want to give her any of the money, even though it was legally hers and also she fucking lives in poverty.

Like when my grandma found out my mom owns part of it, she told my mom to sign over interest to her (also my mom didnt even know she owned it until my grandma asked her) and my mom said that she would if she gave her some of the money from the sale. cause you know. POVERTY. my mom is straight up broke and makes barely any money cleaning houses!!! and you know what my grandma said???? NO! that she needed ALLL the money and that it was ALLLL hers (which is legally not true lmao)

Like my grandma was so awful to my mom, blaming her for not signing it over to her since my grandma had technically already sold the house lmao. And whats crazy is my grandma made it sound like in order to sell the house, my mom NEEDED to sign her interest over to her and that she's why everything is going wrong. But mom could have just sold her share to the ppl buying the house herself!!!!! but at the time she didn't know that she even had the power to do that, she didn't know that was an option and my grandma certainly wouldn't have told her if it was since that would mean my mom would get part of the money.

but since my mom never properly claimed the property, since she honestly was confused on the whole thing, she then lost ownership and then it defaulted on to me and my 2 brothers. i think i was 18 or 19 when my grandma started shoving papers in my hands to sign and to give the property to her. again, i owned part of the property, but i was a teen so that literally meant nothing to me. And the way my grandma explained the situation, she made it sound like i HAD to sign over my interest to her in order for her to sell it. Which wasn't the case, she just wanted full ownership of the property so alll the money went to her, even if legally me and my brothers owned part.

she kept acting like this was all my moms fault, one of my aunts even got drunk and started getting mad at my mom, calling her fucking greedy of all things (like surrrreeee lady my mom living below the poverty line is greedy) she did apologize afterwards, but my mom certainly didnt forget this.

And back in july i think, me, my mom, and my 2 brothers got served. The ppl buying the property were filing a suit against my grandma, and we were confused cause every time my grandma shoved those stupid papers in my face i signed them like an idiot, despite my mom telling me not too. but apparently none of those times counted since the papers needed to be notarized. and so even my brothers started bugging me about getting the papers signed and notarized.

hell, my grandma had planned to drive over to my apartment and drive me to get the signature notarized, but my brother told her i didnt have an ID (which i didnt at the time lmao) and that you need to show one in order to get it done. She then was like what is her mother doing, why isn't her mom helping yada yda blah blah whatever. Anyways i did end up getting my id in time to get it notarized since every one kept bugging me, and everyone made it seem like this would end and the ppl suing would drop the case if i just sign over interest to my grandma.

I remember the day i handed those papers to my grandma. I asked if we had to go to court since i finally signed, she said no and that this would solve it and they just sent those papers as a scare tactic to get things done faster. lmao. i remember she hugged me after and told me she loved me. i also remember a little before that, when she asked how i was doing i mentioned that i still didnt know what i was gonna do about my apartment situation, and she swiftly changed the subject to her dog lmao and i just. went with it. Basically im gonna lose my apartment by the end of the year, and my moms moving back to mexico to live with family since she cant afford any apartment, but i didn't want to move to a different country just to escape homelessness.

so i asked my grandma if i can stay with her for a bit. she basically gave a long winded answer that was pretty much a no, saying something about like i shouldnt have to depend on other people that thats not what she wanted for me, and like how shes not in the mental head space for this or whatever. mind you she has like 4 empty rooms. plus she mention my aunt was gonna move in and i thought oh so she can but I cant? lmao and she has money but i dont.

whatever anyways she ended with "we'll talk about this later" which we never did. tbh one of my biggest anxieties right now is that i still dnt know where im gonna go. i really dont want to move to mexico, even for a few months. i shouldnt fucking have to. plus when we come back, all i'll have waiting is my moms friends couch lmao. since my moms friend offered up her couch to us. some random lady ive never met would let me sleep on her couch cause she cares about my mom.

i think thats what broke my brain a little bit, ya know? like ive never met my moms friend. but she offered that. because she loves and cares about my mom. but my grandms does not view my mom as family, hell when i lsot my house when i was 16 she straight up told my mom, to her face that if it wasnt for me she never would have taken my mom in. thats her fucking daughter in law. Her daughter in law, who is not only HOMELESS but also a WIDOW! in fact my dad died like 3 months prior to us losing our house.

whatever anyways. even though my grandma said we didnt have to show up in court, my mom did. she talked to the lawyer and he gave her some information. We then got served! again! for some reason! So my mom wanted to talk to this lawyer again to see whats going on, and we had a meeting yesterday. he explained how i own part of the property, and that the suit against us is ridiculous since we didn't sign off on the sale, and most notably how i dont have to give over my interest to my grandma. like technically my grandma was right that i need to, but i needed to in the sense that in order for her to have the full title and get all the money she needed my signature.

but i could have just sold directly to these people myself. he explained, legally i own part and these people, whether they be the ppl buying it or my grandma, have NO RIGHT to compel to do anything!! that even though he works for my grandma, he told me that the best thing would ne to sell my part my self and then i'd get money! which technically should have been my moms to begin with. but a wins a win.

except now im confused. cause i signed over the interest already, even though i wouldnt have if i fucking knew any of this, but the ppl suing still served us? so maybe we still got it wrong and the paper i signed doesn't count, or it does and the people dont know yet, or the lawyer just doesn't know yet since my grandma has another lawyer for out state we live in. idk. this whole thing was awful and strange, and lawyer himself said that things didn't have to become the mess it did if she just listened to him lol. he kept telling her to not just sign ever paper those people put in front of her. and she really had no right considering she didn't fully own the property.

so theres a good chance she just fully owns this property now. and she did tell my brother that she'd give us some of the money, though the only reason she offered this now in 2024 was because this thing had been going on since 2018/2019 and she wanted this over with and i imagine she plans to give us less than what we'd get if we sold directly to the buyers. but idk. idk either way that should've been my moms. that was my moms. my mom wasn't even asking for all the fucking money, just the portion that is LEGALLY and RIGHTFULLY hers. and my grandma made her feel so bad about it. even my brothers. even i would get annoyed, but my mom was right the whole time.

and like. its hard not to feel like racism didn't permeate through this whole thing. like my mom is a brown Mexican immigrant, she moved here when she was 19/20. and my grandma is an avid fox news watcher, complains about the border and claims she "doesnt see color" she's racist in that "nice" "polite" subtle New Englander way. lol.

and idk. i just hope she does give me some of the money so i can give it to my mom. but if the paper work was once again some how faulty, then i have no interest in handing the property over to her. i never would have if i just really knew what was going on. she made it sound like i had no other choice, that this was the ONLY way to sell the house. she made my mom feel awful like this was all her fault. and for what? for some more money? to uphold her comfortable white life? lmao. this whole thing makes me feel so strange and weird and a little sick. i keep crying cause like. idk.

is this something a grandma would do? is this something your grandma would do to you? would your grandma, knowing that you are poor, knowing your mom is poor, refuse to help you? knowing that she could help you? is this something grandmas do? Am i being insane? am i being irrational? is my anger and sadness irrational? and im blowing this all out of proportion? cause sometimes i feel like maybe i am. and then i sit with this for a while and start to cry.

like i thought families are supposed to help each other out, pool their resources together, be there for each other. i thought. i dont know. i just hope that she keeps her promise. its not gonna be the money im actually owed, im sure, but anything would help right now. but that doesnt change that none of this needed to happen. my mom shouldnt have to suffer the way she has been. i just feel so strange and awful all the time. and im sure the next time i see her im just gonna smile and pretend im not nearly as hurt as i am.

you know she's my only living grandparent? and she did house me for 2 years. like i do think she loves me but i cant help but feels there's some unconscious bias in the back of her head that sees me in some aspect differently than her other fully white grandchildren. its hard not to think this after everything. and i keep crying every night.

anyways this post is so fucking long and i dont think a single person is reading this whole thing. i just needed to type it out. i have literally no one to talk about this with. and i dont. i dont really know what to think or how to feel. its just a bit overwhelming. i dont feel like im really family...but also maybe im being ridiculous. idk.

[erazonpo3]

I'm a little late to the #webcomicday party but I still thought it'd be fun to break down my process a little bit using the latest Way Out chapter as an example!

So I have a rough outline for the whole comic but I don't go into too much detail planning each story arc until I'm about to get stuck into it. The rough outline is for jotting down ideas as they come along, acting as a skeleton for what will eventually happen, while the more detailed arc outlines are for plotting and pacing the story beats.

Planning each chapter out like this means that each one feels like its own mini-story, and more importantly, stays on track and achieves something to further the story or character progression. You'll notice that the chapter notes are still pretty barebones, which leaves me room to fine tune the smaller beats within the script.

Then, it's scripting time! I'll only have a script for the chapter I'm working on and a script for the next chapter, so as I'm currently working on Chapter 66 I have a script for chapter 66 & 67 but not 68. This is ideal for me in keeping the story flexible, allowing me to take a chapter in a bit of a different direction without feeling tied to a whole arc's worth of scripts that I'll need to rework otherwise.

Around 20 panels is the sweet spot for a chapter of Way Out; there are some with fewer and some with more, but shooting for that number makes me think about whether a scene ought to be extended or cut down in order to meet that goal. If I only plan out 18 panels then I can probably squeeze something extra in, while if I plan out 23 panels, I have a look and see if there isn't anything that can't be condensed.

The scripts themselves are pretty sparse, mostly just dialogue with basic action notes that I highlight as I finish. I'm usually pretty good with visualising things in my mind so the notes are more of a reminder to self about angles & expressions more than anything- if this were a collaborative project I'd probably put more effort into making it descriptive, but it's not.

I've never been one for thumbnailing, which is bad comic practice, I know. But once I have my script I just want to get stuck straight into drawing and don't like slowing down to jot down what is already pretty vivid in my head when I can just. draw the thing.

(a large part of why I started my first webcomic in the vertical format is because you don't need to consider variety in panelling and page flow, which is something thumbnails are very important for).

And so the sketching begins! My sketches are rarely pretty with little focus on anatomy and shape and more focus on blocking and size. I use Procreate to draw the panels and its resizing tool has a tendency to obliterate the quality, which I can sharpen in small amounts but it saves a lot of pain if I plan it all out in the ugly stage.

In some ways I often prefer the sketches to the clean lineart, but that's mostly the stylistic scratchy-ness of it that I have to do away with in favour of clean lines. I'm not always super proud of the art in the end but not every panel needs to be a masterpiece and it's all practice. I think a quantity over quality approach is kind of necessary if you want to make a comic and not lose your mind.

I sharpen up and clean any spots up as I go, but once they're all done I glue all the panels together on my desktop so that I can adjust the spacing between them, then I cut them back up again into smaller slices for posting! And that's the whole chapter process!

I also have a quick (and by quick I mean 4 minute) rough timelapse of chapter 65's coloured panel I can post, if anyone would be interested in seeing that, but it'll probably need to be its own post bc it'll crash this one.