#making your demon the fang gu

[axolator]

normalize being an absolute gremlin with the Pit-Hag ability. normalize making good Demons to make town waste an execution and cause arbitrary deaths. normalize making good Minions to take abilities out of play. normalize making a good-aligned Evil Twin to extend the game long enough to make a new Demon, or just to win the game off town misunderstanding the interaction. normalize making evil Dreamers and Philosophers and Savants and Sweethearts (not snake charmers, people actually make those a decent amount) to silently drunk info or perfectly bluff something or get weird metainfo.

normalize doing literally anything other than being a slow Baron. normalize doing something which requires a modicum of creativity.

[demonslayerscript]

Episode 6 : Akaza / 第六話『猗窩座（あかざ/Akaza）』

*Green colored words are only in anime, not in original manga, and we usually call them “アニオリ/ani-ori(アニメオリジナル/anime-original)".

運転手「くっ！ええい」

Unten-shu “Ku! Eei.”

炭治郎「ハッ！伊之助!!」

Tanjiro “Ha! Inosuke!!”

Tanjiro “Inosuke!”

運転手「夢の邪魔をするな!!」

Unten-shu “Yumeno jama’o suruna!!”

Train driver “Don’t you dare get in the way of my dream!”

炭治郎「ぐあっ…」

Tanjiro “Gua…”

伊之助「ハッ。刺されたのか！」

Inosuke “Ha. Sasareta-noka!”

Inosuke “Did you get stabbed?”

炭治郎「大丈夫だ!!」

Tanjiro “Daijobuda!!”

Tanjiro “I’m okay.”

伊之助「そんなクソ野郎、ほっとけ！」

Inosuke “Sonna kuso-yaro, hottoke!”

Inosuke “Just forget about that bastard!”

炭治郎「駄目だ、死なせない！」

Tanjiro “Dameda, shinase-nai!”

Tanjiro “I can’t do that! I won’t let him die!”

伊之助「ええい！早く鬼の頸を斬らねえと、みんなもたねえぞ！」

Inosuke “Eei! Hayaku onino kubi’o kira-neeto, minna mota-neezo!”

Inosuke “If we won’t chop this demon’s head off soon, we won’t be able to make it!”

炭治郎「わかってる。急ごう！」

Tanjiro “Wakatteru. Isogo!”

Tanjiro “I know! Let’s get moving!”

伊之助「えい！」

Inosuke “Ei!”

炭治郎「ふっ！てやーっ！」

Tanjiro “Fu! Teyaaa!”

炭治郎「ふっ！」

Tanjiro “Fu!”

伊之助「てやっ！」

Inosuke “Teya!”

炭治郎（まずい、今眠ったら…）

Tanjiro (Mazui, ima nemuttara…)

Tanjiro (No good! If I fall asleep now…)

伊之助「クソが！行くぞ、ついてこい！」

Inosuke “Kusoga! Ikuzo, tsuite-koi!”

Inosuke “Damn you! C’mon! Follow me!”

伊之助（獣(ケダモノ)の呼吸・肆ノ牙。切細裂(きりこまざ)き！）

Inosuke (Kedamonono Kokyu, Shi-no Kiba. Kiri-Koma-Zaki!)

Inosuke (Beast Breathing, Fourth Fang. Slice ‘n’ Dice!)

炭治郎（父さん、守ってくれ…この一撃で骨を断つ!! ヒノカミ神楽。碧羅(へきら)の天！）

Tanjiro (Tosan, mamotte-kure… Kono ichi-gekide hone’o tatsu!! Hinokami-Kagura, Hekirano Ten!)

Tanjiro (Father, please protect me! I’m going to sever that bone… with this blow! Hinokami Kagura… Clear Blue Sky!)

―――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――

炭治郎（ヒノカミ神楽。碧羅(へきら)の天！）

Tanjiro (Hinokami-Kagura, Hekirano Ten!)

Tanjiro (Hinokami Kagura… Clear Blue Sky!)

魘夢「ヒッ！ギャアアア!!!」

Enmu “Hi! Gyaaaa!!!”

炭治郎「凄まじい断末魔(だんまつま)と揺れがっ…!! 横転(おうてん)する！伊之助は…ぐっ！」

Tanjiro “Susamajii danmatsumato yurega…!! Outen-suru! Inosukewa… Gu!”

Tanjiro “Because of its screams and tremors, the train’s turning over! Are you okay, Inosuke?”

伊之助「だっ…お前、腹、大丈夫か！」

Inosuke “Da…Omae, hara, daijobuka!”

Inosuke “H-Hey, is your belly okay?”

炭治郎「あっ…ああ。伊之助、乗客を守って…ああっ！」

Tanjiro “A…Aa. Inosuke, jokyaku’o mamotte… Aa!”

Tanjiro “Y-Yeah! Inosuke, protect the passen―”

炭治郎（死ねない。俺が死んだら、あの人が人殺しになってしまう。死ねない。誰も死なせたくない）

Tanjiro (Shine-nai. Orega shindara, ano hitoga hito-goroshini natte-shimau. Shine-nai. Daremo shinase-taku-nai.)

Tanjiro (I can’t die. If I die, that’ll make him a murderer! I can’t die! I don’t want to let anyone die!)

炭治郎「うっ…うあっ」

Tanjiro “U…Ua.”

伊之助「うああー！おお！どっ、うおっ！ふんっ。ハアッ、大丈夫か!! 三太郎！」

Inosuke “Uaaaa! Oo! Do, uo! Fun. Haa. Daijobuka!! Santaro!”

Inosuke “Are you okay, Santaro?”

伊之助「しっかりしろ！鬼の肉でばいんばいんして助かったぜ！逆にな！腹は大丈夫か、刺された腹は！」

Inosuke “Shikkari-shiro! Onino nikude bain-bain-shite tasukattaze! Gyakuni-na! Harawa daijobuka, sasareta harawa!”

Inosuke “Hang in there! I was lucky I could bounce off the demon’s flesh! Cool, huh? Is your belly okay? Is your belly okay?”

炭治郎「大…丈夫だ。伊之助は…」

Tanjiro “Dai…jobuda. Inosukewa…”

Tanjiro “I’m… all right. What about you?”

伊之助「元気いっぱいだ。風邪もひいてねぇ！」

Inosuke “Genki-ippaida. Kazemo hiite-nee!”

Inosuke “Never felt better! I didn’t even catch a cold!”

炭治郎「すぐに動けそうにない…他の人を助けてくれ。怪我人はいないか…頸の近くにいた運転手は…」

Tanjiro “Suguni ugoke-soni nai… Hokano hito’o tasukete-kure. Kega-ninwa inaika… Kubino chikakuni ita unten-shuwa…”

Tanjiro “I won’t be able to move for a while. Help me others, will you? Was anyone injured? What about the engineer near the head?”

伊之助「アイツ死んでいいと思う!!」

Inosuke “Aitsu shinde iito omou!!”

Inosuke “It’s okay if that bastard dies!”

炭治郎「よくないよ…」

Tanjiro “Yoku-naiyo…”

Tanjiro “It’s not okay.”

伊之助「ええい、お前の腹刺した奴だろうが！アイツ足が挟まって動けなくなってるぜ！足が潰れて、もう歩けねぇ!! 放っとけば死ぬ」

Inosuke “Eei, omaeno hara sashita yatsu-daroga! Aitsu ashiga hasamatte ugoke-naku natteruze! Ashiga tsuburete, mo aruke-nee!! Hottokeba shinu.”

Inosuke “He’s the one who stabbed you in the belly, remember? He’s got his leg stuck and can’t move! His leg’s shattered, and he can’t walk anymore! Just leave him there, and he’ll die!”

炭治郎「だったらもう十分罰は受けてる。助けてやってくれ…」

Tanjiro “Dattara mo jubun batsuwa uketeru. Tasukete-yatte-kure…”

Tanjiro “Then, he’s already atoned for his sin. Help him, will you?”

伊之助「んっ…」

Inosuke “N…”

炭治郎「頼む」

Tanjiro “Tanomu.”

Tanjiro “Please.”

伊之助「う…うううっ…ふんっ！行ってやるよ。親分だからな。子分の頼みだからな!! 助けた後アイツの髪の毛全部毟っといてやる!! フンッ！」

Inosuke “U…Uuu…Fun! Itte-yaruyo. Oyabun dakarana. Kobunno tanomi dakarana!! Tasuketa-ato aitsuno kamino-ke zenbu mushittoite-yaru!! Fun!”

Inosuke “I’ll go for you, then! Because I’m the boss! Because my minion asked me to! After I rescue him, I’m going to pluck out all of that guy’s hair!”

炭治郎「そんなことしなくていいよ…。フ―――ッ。」

Tanjiro “Sonna-koto shinakute iiyo… Fuuuuuuu.”

Tanjiro “That’s really not necessary.”

炭治郎（夜明けが近づいてる。呼吸を整えろ。早く… 怪我人を…助けないと…。禰豆子…善逸…煉獄さん…きっと無事だ。信じろ…）

Tanjiro (Yoakega chika-zuiteru. Kokyu’o totonoero. Hayaku… kega-nin’o… tasuke-naito… Nezuko… Zen’itsu… Rengoku-san… Kitto bujida. Shinjiro…)

Tanjiro (It’s almost dawn. Get your breathing under control. We have to… save the injured… before it’s too late. Nezuko… Zenitsu… Rengoku… I’m sure they’re all safe! You have to believe!)

魘夢（体が崩壊する。再生できない…。負けたのか？死ぬのか？俺が？馬鹿な…馬鹿な!! 俺は全力を出せていない!! 人間を一人も喰えなかった… 汽車と一体化し、一度に大量の人間を喰う計画が台無しだ。こんな姿になってまで……!! これだけ手間と時間をかけたのに…!! アイツだ!! アイツのせいだ!! 二百人も人質を取っていたようなものなのに、それでも押された。抑えられた。これが柱の力…）

Enmu (Karadaga hokai-suru. Saisei-deki-nai… Maketa-noka? Shinu-noka? Orega? Bakana!! Orewa zenryoku’o dasete-inai!! Ningen’o hitorimo kue-nakatta… Kishato ittaika-shi, ichidoni tairyono ningen’o kuu keikakuga dai-nashida. Konna sugatani natte-made……!! Koredake temato jikan’o kaketa-noni…!! Aitsuda!! Aitsuno seida!! Nihyaku-ninmo hitojichi’o totte-ita-yona mono-nanoni, soredemo osareta. Osae-rareta. Korega Hashirano chikara…)

Enmu (My body’s disintegrating. I can’t regenerate. Did I lose? Am I going to die? Me? Ridiculous! Ridiculous! I haven’t been able to go all out! I couldn’t devour a single human! My plan to fuse with the train and devour humans en masse just went up in smoke! And now, look what I’ve been reduced to! After all the time and trouble I’ve taken! It was him! It’s all his fault! Even though I’d taken 200 humans hostage, still I struggled! I was held at bay! Is this the power of a Hashira?)

魘夢（アイツ… アイツも速かった。術を解き切れてなかったくせに…!! しかもあの娘!! 鬼じゃないか、何なんだ。鬼狩りに与(くみ)する鬼なんて、どうして無惨様に殺されないんだ。くそォ、くそォ!! そもそも……!! あのガキに術を破られてからがケチのつき始めだ。あのガキが悪い…!! あのガキだけでも殺したい何とか…）

Enmu (Aitsu… Aitsumo haya-katta. Jutsu’o toki-kirete-nakatta-kuseni…!! Shikamo ano musume! Onija naika, nan-nanda. Onigarini kumi-suru oni-nante, doshite Muzan-samani korosare-nainda. Kusoo, kusoo!! Somo-somo……!! Ano gakini jutsu’o yaburarete-karaga kechino tsuke-hajimeda. Ano gakiga warui…!! Ano gaki-dake-demo koroshi-tai, nantoka…)

Enmu (And him… He was fast, too. Even though he never broke the spell completely! Not to mention that girl! She’s a demon! What’s that about? A demon, joining forces with Demon Slayers? Why hasn’t Master Muzan killed the traitor? Dammit! Dammit! In the first place… it all started going downhill once that brat broke my spell! That brat is to blame! I wish I could at least kill that brat! Somehow!)

魘夢（そうだ、あの猪も!! あのガキだけなら殺せたんだ。あの猪が邪魔した。並外れて勘が鋭い。視線に敏感だった。負けるのか、死ぬのかァ…!! ああああ…悪夢だあああ、悪夢だあああ。鬼狩りに殺され続けるのは、いつも底辺の鬼たちだ。上弦、ここ百年顔ぶれの変わらない鬼たち。鬼を山ほど葬っている鬼狩りの柱さえも葬っている。異次元の強さなのか。あれだけ血を分け与えられても、上弦に及ばなかった……）

Enmu (Soda, ano inoshishi-mo!! Ano gaki-dake-nara korose-tanda. Ano inoshishiga jama shita. Nami-hazurete kanga surudoi. Shisenni binkan datta. Makeru-noka, shinu-nokaa…!! Aaaa… Akumu-daaaa, akumu-daaaa. Onigarini korosare-tsuzukeru-nowa, itsumo teihenno oni-tachida. Jogen, koko hyaku-nen kao-bureno kawara-nai oni-tachi. Oni’o yama-hodo homutte-iru onigarino Hashira-saemo homutte-iru. Ijigenno tsuyosa nanoka. Aredake chi’o wake-atae-rare-temo, jogenni oyoba-nakatta…)

Enmu (That’s right, and that boar, too! I could’ve at least killed that brat! But that boar thwarted me. His intuition is extraordinary. He could sense my gaze! Am I going to lose? Am I going to die? Oh, what a nightmare! What a nightmare! It’s always the bottom-feeder demons who get killed by the Demon Slayers. In the Upper Ranks, the same demons have remained for the last few centuries. They’re strong enough to defeat Hashira who’ve killed an untold number of demons. Do they have otherworldly powers? Even after receiving so much of his blood, I couldn’t reach the Upper Ranks!)

魘夢（ああああ、やり直したい。やり直したい。何という惨めな悪夢…だ……）

Enmu (Aaaa, yari-naoshi-tai. Yari-naoshi-tai. Nanto-iu mijimena akumu…da……)

Enmu (I want to do it over! I want to do it over! What a miserable nightmare this is…)

炭治郎「フ――ッ、フ――ッ」

Tanjiro “Fuuuuuuu, fuuuuuuu.”

煉獄杏寿郎「全集中の常中ができるようだな！感心感心！」

Rengoku Kyojuro “Zen-Shuchuno Jochuga dekiru-yodana! Kanshin-kanshin!”

Kyojuro Rengoku “I see you’ve mastered Total Concentration, Constant. Impressive!”

炭治郎「煉獄さん…」

Tanjiro “Rengoku-san…”

Tanjiro “Rengoku…”

杏寿郎「常中は柱への第一歩だからな！柱までは一万歩あるかもしれないがな！」

Kyojuro “Jochuwa Hashira-eno dai-ippo dakarana! Hashira-madewa ichi-man-po aru-kamo shire-nai-gana!”

Kyojuro “After all, Constant is the first step toward becoming a Hashira. Although, there might be 10,000 steps before you can become a Hashira.”

炭治郎「頑張ります…」

Tanjiro “Ganbari-masu…”

Tanjiro “I’ll do my best.”

杏寿郎「腹部から出血している。もっと集中して、呼吸の精度を上げるんだ。体の隅々まで、神経を行き渡らせろ。血管がある。破れた血管だ」

Kyojuro “Fukubu-kara shukketsu shite-iru. Motto shuchu-shite, wazano seido’o agerunda. Karadano sumi-zumi-made, shinkei’o yuki-wata-rasero. Kekkanga aru. Yabureta kekkanda.”

Kyojuro “You’re bleeding from the abdomen. You have to concentrate harder and improve the precision of your breathing. Make your nerves reach every corner of your body. There’s a blood vessel. A torn blood vessel.”

炭治郎「ハア、ハア、ハア…」

Tanjiro “Haa, haa, haa…”

杏寿郎「もっと集中しろ」

Kyojuro “Motto shuchu-shiro.”

Kyojuro “Concentrate harder!”

炭治郎「ハア、ハア、ハア……ハッ！」

Tanjiro “Haa, haa, haa……Ha!”

杏寿郎「そこだ。止血。出血を止めろ」

Kyojuro “Sokoda. Shiketsu. Shukketsu’o tomero.”

Kyojuro “That’s it. Stanch it. Stop the bleeding.”

炭治郎「ぐうっ。くううっ。あっ」

Tanjiro “Guu. Kuuu. A.”

杏寿郎「集中」

Kyojuro “Shuchu.”

Kyojuro “Focus!”

炭治郎「んっ！くううっ… ハアッ、ああっ…」

Tanjiro “N! Kuuu… Haa, aa…”

杏寿郎「うむ。止血できたな。呼吸を極めれば、様々なことができるようになる。何でもできるわけではないが、昨日の自分より、確実に強い自分になれる」

Kyojuro “Umu. Shiketsu dekitana. Kokyu’o kiwa-mereba, sama-zamana kotoga dekiru-yoni naru. Nandemo dekiru-wake-dewa naiga, kinono jibun-yori, kakujitsuni tsuyoi jibunni nareru.”

Kyojuro “Great! Looks like you stopped it. You’ll be able to do all kinds of things when you master breathing. Not that you’ll be able to do everything, but you’ll become a stronger version of yourself than yesterday for sure.”

炭治郎「…はい」

Tanjiro “…Hai.”

Tanjiro “Right.”

杏寿郎「皆、無事だ！怪我人は大勢だが、命に別状は無い。君はもう無理せず、ゆっくり体を休めろ」

Kyojuro “Minna bujida! Kega-ninwa oozei-daga, inochini betsujowa nai. Kimiwa mo, muri-sezu, yukkuri karada’o yasumero.”

Kyojuro “Everyone’s safe! There are hordes of injured people, but no one’s life is in danger. Don’t strain yourself. Take it easy and rest up.”

炭治郎「ありがとうございます」

Tanjiro “Arigato gozai-masu.”

Tanjiro “Thank you very much.”

杏寿郎「うん」

Kyojuro “Un.”

杏寿郎「んっ!？」

Kyojuro “N!?”

炭治郎「あっ!?」

Tanjiro “A!?”

炭治郎「ああ…」

Tanjiro “Aa…”

―――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――

炭治郎「ハッ！」（上弦の……参？どうして今ここに…）

Tanjiro “Ha!” (Jogenno……San? Doshite ima kokoni…)

Tanjiro (Upper… Three? What’s he doing here and now?)

杏寿郎（炎の呼吸・弐ノ型。昇り炎天！）

Kyojuro (Honoo’no Kokyu, Ni-no Kata. Nobori-Enten!)

Kyojuro (Flame Breathing, Second Form… Rising Scorching Sun!)

猗窩座「いい刀だ」

Akaza “Ii katanada.”

Akaza “That’s a fine sword.”

杏寿郎（再生が速い… この圧迫感と凄まじい鬼気。これが上弦）

Kyojuro (Saiseiga hayai… Kono appaku-kanto susamajii kiki. Korega Jogen.)

Kyojuro (He sure can regenerate fast. This heavy and overwhelming demon aura… So, this is an Upper Rank.)

杏寿郎「何故手負いの者から狙うのか、理解できない」

Kyojuro “Naze teoino mono-kara nerau-noka, rikai deki-nai.”

Kyojuro “I can’t understand why you’d go after a wounded person first.”

猗窩座「話の邪魔になるかと思った。俺とお前の」

Akaza “Hanashino jamani naru-kato omotta. Oreto omaeno.”

Akaza “He could get in the way of the chitchat… of you and me.”

杏寿郎「俺と君が何の話をする？初対面だが、俺はすでに君のことが嫌いだ」

Kyojuro “Oreto kimiga nanno hanashi’o suru? Shotaimen-daga, orewa sudeni kimino kotoga kiraida.”

Kyojuro “What would you and I have to talk about? I’m meeting you now for the first time, but I already dislike you.”

猗窩座「そうか。俺も弱い人間が大嫌いだ。弱者を見ると虫酸(むしず)が走る」

Akaza “Soka. Oremo yowai ningenga dai-kiraida. Jakusha’o miruto mushizuga hashiru.”

Akaza “Is that right? Well, I loathe weak humans, too. The sight of a weakling makes my skin crawl.”

杏寿郎「俺と君とでは、物ごとの価値基準が違うようだ」

Kyojuro “Oreto kimito-dewa, monogotono kachi-kijunga chigau-yoda.”

Kyojuro “Then, it looks like our senses of value are completely different.”

猗窩座「では素晴らしい提案をしよう。お前も鬼にならないか？」

Akaza “Dewa subarashii teian’o shiyo. Omaemo onini nara-naika?”

Akaza “All right, then I have a brilliant proposal for you. Why don’t you become a demon, too?”

杏寿郎「ならない」

Kyojuro “Nara-nai.”

Kyojuro “I will not.”

猗窩座「見れば解る。お前の強さ。柱だな？その闘気、練り上げられている。至高の領域に近い」

Akaza “Mireba wakaru. Omaeno tsuyosa. Hashira dana? Sono toki, neriage-rarete-iru. Shikono ryoikini chikai.”

Akaza “I can tell your strength at a glance. You’re a Hashira, aren’t you? Your fighting spirit has been honed to the hilt. It’s close to the realm of the highest.”

杏寿郎「俺は炎柱、煉獄杏寿郎だ」

Kyojuro “Orewa En-Bashira, Rengoku Kyojuro da.”

Kyojuro “I’m the Flame Hashira, Kyojuro Rengoku.”

猗窩座「俺は猗窩座。杏寿郎、何故お前が至高の領域に踏み入れないのか教えてやろう。人間だからだ。老いるからだ。死ぬからだ。鬼になろう、杏寿郎。そうすれば、百年でも二百年でも鍛錬し続けられる。強くなれる」

Akaza “Orewa Akaza. Kyojuro, naze omaega shikono ryoikini fumi-ire-nai-noka oshiete-yaro. Ningen-dakarada. Oiru-karada. Shinu-karada. Onini naro, Kyojuro. So-sureba, hyaku-nen-demo nihyaku-nen-demo tanren-shi-tsuzuke-rareru. Tsuyoku-nareru.”

Akaza “I’m Akaza. Kyojuro… Let me tell you why you can’t enter the realm of the highest. Because you’re a human. Because you’re going to grow old. Because you’re going to die. Become a demon, Kyojuro. Do that, and you can go on training for a hundred, for two hundred years. You can become stronger.”

炭治郎（今まで会った鬼の中で一番鬼舞辻の匂いが強い。俺も加勢しなければ）

Tanjiro (Ima-made atta onino nakade ichi-ban Kibutsujino nioiga tsuyoi. Oremo kasei shina-kereba.)

Tanjiro (Of all the demons that I’ve met until now, he has the strongest scent of Kibutsuji! I have to help him fight!)

杏寿郎「老いることも、死ぬことも、人間という儚(はかな)い生き物の美しさだ。老いるからこそ、死ぬからこそ、堪(たま)らなく愛おしく尊(とうと)いのだ」

Kyojuro “Oiru-kotomo, shinu-kotomo, ningento-iu hakanai ikimonono utsukushisada. Oiru-kara-koso, shinu-kara-koso, tamara-naku itooshiku toutoi-noda.”

Kyojuro “Both growing old and dying are part of the beauty of being an ephemeral creature like a human. The fact that we grow old and die is what makes human life so unbearably precious and noble.”

杏寿郎「強さというものは肉体に対してのみ使う言葉ではない。この少年は弱くない」

Kyojuro “Tsuyosato-iu-monowa nikutaini taishite-nomi tsukau kotoba-dewa nai. Kono shonenwa yowaku-nai.”

Kyojuro “‘Strength’ isn’t a word used to describe just the body. This boy isn’t weak!”

炭治郎「ハッ」

Tanjiro “Ha.”

杏寿郎「侮辱するな。何度でも言おう。君と俺とでは価値基準が違う。俺は如何(いか)なる理由があろうとも鬼にならない」

Kyojuro “Bujoku suruna. Nando-demo iou. Kimito oreto-dewa kachi-kijunga chigau. Orewa ikanaru-riyuga aro-tomo onini nara-nai.”

Kyojuro “Don’t insult him. I’ll repeat it as many times as it takes. You and I have different senses of value. No matter what the reason, I will not become a demon!”

猗窩座「そうか。術式展開(じゅつしきてんかい)、破壊殺(はかいさつ)・羅針(らしん)」

Akaza “Soka. Jutsushiki-Tenkai, Hakai-Satsu, Rashin.”

Akaza “I see. Technique Development… Destructive Death… Compass Needle!”

猗窩座「鬼にならないなら、殺す」

Akaza “Onini nara-nai-nara, korosu.”

Akaza “If you refuse to become a demon, I’ll kill you.”

杏寿郎「んっ」

Kyojuro “N.”

炭治郎（目で、追えない!!）

Tanjiro (Mede, oenai!!)

Tanjiro (I can’t follow their movements!)

猗窩座「今まで殺してきた柱たちに、炎はいなかったな！そして俺の誘いに頷(うなず)く者もなかった！」

Akaza “Ima-made koroshite-kita Hashira-tachini, Honoowa ina-kattana! Soshite oreno sasoini unazuku monomo nakatta!”

Akaza “There were never any Flames among all the Hashira I’ve killed until now. And no one ever took me up on my offer, either.”

杏寿郎「ふっ！」

Kyojuro “Fu!”

猗窩座「なぜだろうな？同じく武の道を極める者として理解しかねる！選ばれた者しか鬼にはなれないというのに！」

Akaza “Naze-darona? Onajiku buno michi’o kiwameru monoto-shite rikai shi-kaneru! Erabareta mono-shika oni-niwa nare-naito iu-noni!”

Akaza “Why do you think that is? As a fellow martial artist, I just don’t get it. Not when only the chosen ones can become demons!”

杏寿郎「ふっ！」

Kyojuro “Fu!”

猗窩座「素晴らしき才能を持つ者が、醜(みにく)く衰えてゆく！俺はつらい！耐えられない！死んでくれ、杏寿郎。若く強いまま」

Akaza “Subarashiki saino’o motsu monoga, minikuku otoroete-yuku! Orewa tsurai! Tae-rare-nai! Shinde-kure, Kyojuro. Wakaku tsuyoi-mama.”

Akaza “Watching the hideous decline of someone blessed with extraordinary powers… It pains me! I can’t bear it! Die, Kyojuro… while you’re still young and strong.”

杏寿郎「うりゃ！」

Kyojuro “Urya!”

猗窩座「破壊殺(はかいさつ)――空式(くうしき)！」

Akaza “Hakai-satsu――Ku-shiki!”

Akaza “Destructive Death… Air Type!”

杏寿郎「くうっ…」

Kyojuro “Kuu…”

猗窩座「てやっ！」

Akaza “Teya!”

杏寿郎「ふっ！」（なるほど）

Kyojuro “Fu!” (Naruhodo.)

Kyojuro (I see.)

猗窩座「とりゃあ！」

Akaza “Toryaa!”

杏寿郎「炎の呼吸・肆ノ型。盛炎(せいえん)のうねり！」

Kyojuro “Honoo’no Kokyu, Shi-no Kata. Seien-no Uneri!”

Kyojuro “Flame Breathing… Fourth Form… Blooming Flame Undulation!”

杏寿郎（虚空(こくう)を拳(こぶし)で打つと、攻撃がこちらまで来る）

Kyojuro (Koku’o kobushide utsuto, kogekiga kochira-made kuru.)

Kyojuro (When he strikes the air with his fist, the attack will reach me here!)

猗窩座「ていっ！」

Akaza “Tei”

杏寿郎「たあっ！」

Kyojuro “Taaaaaa”

杏寿郎（一瞬にも満たない速度。このまま距離を取って戦われると、頸を斬るのは厄介だ。ならば―――近づくまで!!）

Kyojuro (Isshun-nimo mita-nai sokudo. Kono-mama kyori’o totte tataka-wareruto, kubi’o kiru-nowa yakkaida. Naraba―――Chika-zuku-made!!)

Kyojuro (He can move faster than the blink of an eye. If I allow him to fight from a distance like this, slicing his head off will be tricky. In that case… I’ll just have to get up close!)

杏寿郎「はあっ！」

Kyojuro “Haa!”

猗窩座「この素晴らしい反応速度！」

Akaza “Kono subarashii hanno-sokudo!”

Akaza “This superb reaction speed of yours…”

杏寿郎「うおおっ！」

Kyojuro “Uoo!”

猗窩座「この素晴らしい剣技も失われてゆくのだ！杏寿郎！悲しくはないのか!!」

Akaza “Kono subarashii kengimo ushina-warete-yuku-noda! Kyojuro! Kanashikuwa nai-noka!!”

Akaza “and these breathtaking sword skills will be lost, too… Kyojuro! Doesn’t that make you sad?”

杏寿郎「誰もがそうだ！人間なら!! 当然のことだ！」

Kyojuro “Daremoga soda! Ningen-nara!! Tozenno kotoda!”

Kyojuro “It happens to everyone! It’s a fact of life for any human!”

炭治郎「ううっ…」

Tanjiro “Uu…”

杏寿郎「動くな!! 傷が開いたら致命傷になるぞ!! 待機命令!!」

Kyojuro “Ugokuna!! Kizuga hirai-tara chimei-shoni naruzo!! Taiki-meirei!!”

Kyojuro “Stay where you are! If that wound reopens, it’ll be fatal! Stand back! That’s an order!”

炭治郎「ハッ」

Tanjiro “Ha.”

猗窩座「弱者に構うな、杏寿郎!! 全力を出せ！俺に集中しろ!!」

Akaza “Jakushani kamauna, Kyojuro!! Zenryoku’o dase! Oreni shuchu-shiro!!”

Akaza “Don’t bother with that weakling, Kyojuro! Come on, give me your best shot! Concentrate on me.”

杏寿郎「たあっ！ふっ！」

Kyojuro “Taa! Fu!”

猗窩座「うっ…」

Akaza “U…”

猗窩座「いい動きだ」

Akaza “Ii ugokida.”

Akaza “Nice moves!”

杏寿郎「あっ」

Kyojuro “A.”

猗窩座「ふっはー！」

Akaza “Fuhhaaa!”

杏寿郎「ていっ！」

Kyojuro “Tei!”

猗窩座「てーい！」

Akaza “Teei!”

杏寿郎「うっ…だあっ」

Kyojuro “U…Daa.”

炭治郎「煉獄さん！」

Tanjiro “Rengoku-san!”

Tanjiro “Rengoku!”

伊之助「ギョロギョロ目ん玉！」

Inosuke “Gyoro-gyoro Men-tama!”

Inosuke “Ol’ Goggle-eyes!”

猗窩座「鬼になれ、杏寿郎」

Akaza “Onini nare, Kyojuro.”

Akaza “Turn into a demon, Kyojuro.”

杏寿郎「ハア、ハア…」

Kyojuro “Haa, haa…”

猗窩座「そして、俺とどこまでも戦い、高め合おう」

Akaza “Soshite, oreto doko-mademo tatakai, takame-aou.”

Akaza “Fight me forever and get stronger together with me.”

杏寿郎「ハア、ハア…」

Kyojuro “Haa, haa…”

猗窩座「その資格がお前にはある」

Akaza “Sono shikakuga omae-niwa aru.”

Akaza “You have what it takes to do that!”

杏寿郎「断る。もう一度言うが、俺は君が嫌いだ。俺は鬼にはならない！炎の呼吸・参ノ型！気炎万象！」

Kyojuro “Kotowaru. Mo-ichido iuga, orewa kimiga kiraida. Orewa oni-niwa nara-nai! Honoo’no Kokyu, San-no Kata! Kien-Bansho!”

Kyojuro “I’ll pass! Let me repeat it. I don’t like you! I will not become a demon! Flame Breathing… Third Form… Blazing Universe!”

猗窩座「素晴らしい、見事だ！破壊殺・空式！」

Akaza “Subarashii, migotoda! Hakai-Satsu, Ku-shiki!”

Akaza “Magnificent! That’s sensational! Destructive Death… Air Type!”

杏寿郎「ううっ、くうっ。たあっ！はあっ！」

Kyojuro “Uu, kuu. Taa! Haa!”

伊之助（隙がねぇ。入れねぇ。動きの速さについていけねぇ。あの二人の周囲は異次元だ。間合いに入れば“死”しか無いのを肌で感じる。助太刀に入った所で、足手まといでしかないとわかるから動けねぇ）

Inosuke (Sukiga nee. Haire-nee. Ugokino hayasani tsuite-ike-nee. Ano futarino shuiwa ijigenda. Maaini haireba ‘shi’shika nai-no’o hadade kanjiru. Suke-dachini haitta-tokorode, ashide-matoi-deshika-naito wakaru-kara ugoke-nee.)

Inosuke (There’s no opening. I can’t jump in. I can’t keep up with the speed of their movements! Those two are in a different dimension! Getting between them would only mean death! I can feel it in my bones! I can’t move… because I know that even if I jumped in to back him up, I’d only be a hindrance to him!)

炭治郎「煉獄さん…！」

Tanjiro “Rengoku-san…!”

Tanjiro “Rengoku…”

猗窩座「てやっ！」

Akaza “Teya!”

杏寿郎「ふっ！」

Kyojuro “Fu!”

猗窩座「まだわからないか！攻撃を続けることは、死を選ぶことだということが！杏寿郎！」

Akaza “Mada wakara-naika! Kogeki’o tsuzukeru-kotowa, shi’o erabu-kotodato iu-kotoga! Kyojuro!”

Akaza “You still don’t get it? That if you continue attacking, you’re just getting closer to death, Kyojuro?”

杏寿郎「うおおお――っ！」

Kyojuro “Uooooooo!”

杏寿郎（炎の呼吸・壱ノ型。不知火！）

Kyojuro (Honoo’no Kokyu, Ichi-no Kata. Shiranui!)

Kyojuro (Flame Breathing, First Form… Unknowing Fire!)

猗窩座「ここで殺すには惜しい！まだお前は肉体の全盛期ではない」

Akaza “Kokode korosu-niwa oshii! Mada omaewa nikutaino zen-seiki-dewa nai.”

Akaza “It would be a shame to kill you now! You haven’t reached your physical peak yet!”

杏寿郎「くっ…くはっ」

Kyojuro “Ku… Kuha.”

杏寿郎「弐ノ型。昇り炎天！」

Kyojuro “Ni-no Kata. Nobori-Enten!”

Kyojuro “Second Form… Rising Scorching Sun!”

猗窩座「一年後、二年後には、さらに技が研磨され、精度も上がるだろう！」

Akaza “Ichi-nen-go, ni-nen-go-niwa, sarani wazaga kenma-sare, seidomo agaru-daro!”

Akaza “In a year or two, you’ll have polished your skills even more, and you’ll have greater precision!”

杏寿郎「くっ…」

Kyojuro “Ku…”

杏寿郎「参ノ型。気炎万象！」

Kyojuro “San-no Kata. Kien-Bansho!”

Kyojuro “Third Form… Blazing Universe!”

杏寿郎「肆ノ型。盛炎のうねり！」

Kyojuro “Shi-no Kata. Seienno Uneri!”

Kyojuro “Fourth Form… Blooming Flame Undulation!”

猗窩座「破壊殺…」

Akaza “Hakai-Satsu…”

Akaza “Destructive Death…”

杏寿郎「伍ノ型。炎虎！」

Kyojuro “Go-no Kata. En-Ko!”

Kyojuro “Fifth Form… Flame Tiger!”

猗窩座「乱式！てやっ！杏寿郎！」

Akaza “Ran-shiki! Teya! Kyojuro!”

Akaza “Disorder! Kyojuro!”

杏寿郎「ふっ！はっ！」

Kyojuro “Fu! Ha!”

伊之助「おおっ、やったか？勝ったのか！」

Inosuke “Oo, yattaka? Katta-noka!”

Inosuke “Did he do it? Did he win?”

炭治郎「ああ……」

Tanjiro “Aa……”

杏寿郎「ハア、ハア…」

Kyojuro “Haa, haa…”

炭治郎（まさか……そんな！）

Tanjiro (Masaka……Sonna!)

Tanjiro (Don’t tell me… No way!)

伊之助「あっ？」

Inosuke “A?”

猗窩座「もっと戦おう。死ぬな、杏寿郎」

Akaza “Motto tatakao. Shinuna, Kyojuro.”

Akaza “Let’s fight more. Don’t die on me, Kyojuro.”

―――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――

大正コソコソ噂話/Taisho Koso-koso Uwasa-banashi/Taisho Secret

炭治郎「煉獄さん！煉獄さん！」

Tanjiro “Rengoku-san! Rengoku-san!”

Tanjiro “Rengoku! Rengoku!”

伊之助「ギョロギョロ目ん玉！」

Inosuke “Gyoro-gyoro Men-tama!”

Inosuke “Ol’ Goggle-eyes!”

炭治郎（…煉獄さん……煉獄さん……煉獄さん！）

Tanjiro (…Rengoku-san…… Rengoku-san…… Rengoku-san!)

Tanjiro (Rengoku… Rengoku! Rengoku!)

―次回、最終話『心を燃やせ』―

Jikai, Saishu-wa ‘Kokoro’o Moyase.’

Next, Final Episode, ‘Set Your Heart Ablaze.’

杏寿郎「俺は、俺の責務を全うする！」

Kyojuro “Orewa, oreno sekimu’o matto-suru!”

Kyojuro “I will fulfill my duty!”

(Continue to Episode 7)

[sergeantsporks]

So... expressive ears and fangs are in too then?

Lol, I'm a biiiiiig fan of making the witches of the BI's less "Just like humans, but with pointy ears and bile sacks!" and more "Oh my Titan, these people may look broadly human, but totally aren't!".

It actually kinda of bugs me that TOH never really leaned into making it's witches less than human. We had plenty of definitely "not human and couldn't pass for human even if they tried" side-characters, but the main cast consists of characters that wouldn't look out of place walking down your street! Any one of them could grab a hat, cover their eyes and no one would be any wiser.

The Hexsquad is especially bad about this. XD And makes it look like Luz just couldn't help but gravitate to the most human looking kids out of Hexside's rather sizable student population. Barring Amity, whose hair obviously isn't a natural color. But that's not even her natural color either, lol

I assume that this was deliberate choice on the part of the character designers, the thinking probably having been that would be easier for kids to relate to Gus or Willow or Lilith or whoever if they looked like someone they could meet in real life. So, I do "get" it. But it's still a touch disappointing - If you're going to make a fantasy show, make your characters look fantastical IMHO.

Oh, expressive ears, my beloved

I'd argue that Eda, definitely a main character, looks a little, hm, at the least, atypical as a human, between the fang, the golden eyes, and the fact that her skin is literally the color of paper, but I get what you're saying. They do mention witches losing their "baby fangs," so here's one for ya: younger witches DO have more "not exactly human" traits that they grow out of and into a more humanlike state. Like tadpoles and frogs. I think there's a theory out there that the first witches were humans who mingled with demons, or slowly evolved traits like pointed ears and bile sacs, which would explain why witches look mostly human.

I feel like too many demons/non humanoid people would have been distracting though, too, you know? Like, you already have King, who's a full on demon (to some extent, you have Hooty there, too, but he showed up less frequently), and then you have Eda, who's visually a little less "typical human minus the ears" than the rest of the hexsquad. Amity has a nonnatural hair color. As cool as having a demon in the Hexsquad would have been (I agree there) putting too many nonhuman features in the group might have made it a little visually jarring to look at when they're all together. You don't want to crowd up the scene with too many flashy, fantastical characteristics

I think it may also have something to do with ease of animation/design, too? Like if you start adding extra eyeballs or arms or complex design, then how those characters move will change, and you have to get their extra blinks in, and there's just a lot of factors to have CONSTANTLY as opposed to sometimes. I'm guessing. I don't actually know a lot about animation.

[fic-heaven]

Random dialogs from the fic: Fangs (Gus x reader) I had prepared and are NOT edited and heavily leaned on Fleabag because I love it

Laswell and Hound

-"How old are ya, Katie?"

-"Fifty." Laswell said. So she's older than Price.

-"How old are you, Hound?"

-"Thirty-three years young."

-"Oh don't worry it gets better."

-"Does it?" Your question was loaded and Laswell knew it all too well.

-"I promise. Yeah, sore boobs, that weird but constant fear of feeling like your biological clock is ticking non-stop until you find someone stable enough to impregnate you,..." Is she self-projecting? "The cramps, the way the weather change seems to affect you even more, you know... "

You looked at her now more invested in this weirdly entertaining conversation.

"It gets better, we women are strong. Men, in the other hand are curious creatures. They make wars for the stupidest of reasons, hurt each other, help each other, fuck each other... And when there is no war to fight they keep to their soccer games, to their rugby, all so they can connect with one another never containing their own demons and needs. And us? We have it all going inside! Our wars and battles with ourselves, how we sometimes struggle to handle our emotions, all the pain we suffer by them, wasted relationships, period cramps... For years and years until we dry and wither like leaves. And just when you feel like you have finally come to peace with it? God drops the bomb and menopause happens. And its-..."

Your eyes widen, she inhales thinking about the right the words.

"Its fucking liberating. Yes, your uterus is now useless, you sweat a lot, no one gives a rat's ass, but then? You are free~... It's like everything tones down. You are no longer a slave for your feelings and your fucking periods, you are no longer a walking twat, you are you. What remains of you, that is. That's why you must find yourself before all this chaos or you'll be having to deal with the circumstances later on."

Laswell rests her chin on her palm, her forearm brushing your shoulder.

-"Shit, I was told it was like hell."

-"It is, but it's amazing. It's something magnificent, Hound."

You smile and chuckle softly eating up all she just said.

-"Go back to that party and have all the fun you can. Flirt if possible, fuck the rules."

This time you crackled. "My gosh! Look at you! Inciting me to break the rules!"

-"it's not a party until someone flirts with you, luv. And I know you've got someone in your mind right now."

Your mind projects a voice, manly but not rough, immature and sweet but respectful and polite. "You've got a good heart, un corazón puro." Gus' say was forever imprinted in your mind.

-"Y'know having thirty three is the fucking worst..."

-"What did Jesus do at thirty three?"

-"I dunno, fucking die?"

-"Right. So go back to that party, and fuck that guy, whoever he is, you could have anyone. Fuck the ghost of Hassan chasing anyone that gets near you. You've got this, (Y/n)."

You nod slowly, with a less amused face. The determination and confidence Laswell had given you with this conversation was overwhelmingly strong.

"Let's go get some ricans." You said drowning the rest of your martini.

Gus and Hound:

(...)

-"What? Nah! I love that you believe in meaningless existence! You make me constantly question my faith and morals and... Otras cosas. (Other things.)"

-"Is that even a good thing?"

-"It is! I've never felt closer to like... Myself. We make a huge contrast on each other, it's very refreshing."

-"Is that why y'hang out a lot with that angry Canadian?" There's only one angry Canadian you could have been referring to.

-"Reyes es mi hermano! He's also very different from me and, yeah you could say that! We um... He's a softie. He just needs someone to listen to him, to make him feel seen, to make him see he isn't hated or despised." He's a therapy latino.

-"Like me?"

Gus gives you the sweetest smile making his crescent shaped eyes crinkle even more.

-"You are not like anyone I've ever met."

You two just left it at that, it's best for now. There's no way you'll be looking for any romance. Not now at least.

-"You okay?" You mindlessly asked and he blinked.

-"Ha. Because of you rascals making me question my morals or because of me hanging out with you voluntarily?" He chuckled "Bueno, I keep my sanity in check." After a short pause, Gus mutters holding your hand. "We're not gonna commit to each other romantically. I know it." You smiled casually squeezing his hand a little perplexed that he suddenly said that. "I like how we're doing. What we're doing. As reckless as it is judging by the rules of our work and all." His moustache rose when he grinned your way.

-"I know that's what you think you want from me, Gus. But it's not." Your voice was stern and sincere but holding a soft tone.

Gus craved to say: "We'll see about that." Contradicting what you both have said. But again, he decided to leave it there smiling at you as you leaned your head on his shoulder.

God he smells so good you'll have to rethink your options.

-"What was that?" Gus asked.

-"What? Didn't say anything."

If he's schizophrenic perhaps you'd actually match together.

-"There, see?" He pointed at your face with amusement and a little squint which got you chuckling confused. "I know when you talk to yourself. I can hear it. But I can't make out the words." Your eyes were wide, a light laugh scaping your lips still perplexed.

Holy shit.

-"No pasa nada (it's okay). I do that all the time." His smile widened. "It adds to your craziness a bit. It suits, makes you even more irresistible."

-"Ohoho, fuck you."

-"Please and thank you~." He purred.

You couldn't help but cup his cheek and give his dumb handsome face a long kiss.

[wr3nns]

Heads up this goes places and I'm not sure how we got there but we sure did

Eda's gold fang growing with the rest of her teeth

Mega Eda has eyebags

Luz subverting the trope of coming back all cool-like with a witty one-liner by still being a little goof

The sound Eda makes when Luz comes back

Did the Collector "fix" the book with Titan's blood. Did he write that in Titan's blood. Did he write that in Titan's blood. Did he

King having a little blue star on his skull crack as almost a mirror to Edge of the World

"A baby could do that. Still, I've never seen an itty-bitty spider do it that way. Not everyone can recognize Titan magic." - The Collector, Watching and Dreaming

VS

"That's nothing. A child could do a light spell. But... I've never seen it cast like that." - Amity Blight, Covention

King's light glyph looks like King holding a light ball:

The old light glyph almost looks like a representation of a witch. Cloak, hat, possibly hands holding a staff:

Judging by the concept art those crystals in Amity's hair are from the Grom crown. But the crown only has one crystal like that, and she's got three in her hair. I don't know if they ever said you could only be Grom royalty once, but if not, it's possible she was Grom queen two more times.

In the dream sequence, Gus is wearing the same suit from Enchanting Grom Fright

After the timeskip, King's back teeth have gotten longer and pointer along with his front teeth

"Now I am King and Queen, best of both things" is from Enchanting Grom Fright. King wore Luz's crown towards the end

Grom!Camila vs actual Camila reacting to the demon realm are very different.

Yes I DID go rewatch the entirety of Enchanting Grom Fright just to figure out whether they mentioned a one-time deal or not. They did not. Yes that IS why I talk about that episode so much here

Also, ASIAS is messing with my brain structure again. I'm not sure how I got here but this is happening now.

At the very beginning, Belos gives Hunter a test. And he fails immediately. Because the coven heads don't respect him, and made a decision to reschedule without him. And Darius sets him up with another way he's failing, so Hunter grasps for another chance to prove himself.

,,,,,,, "Teens are probably into the same things as me! Like authority, and rules." THE GUY EVER??

Hunter pitching to a student, rolling his hand when he says "leave your home, friends, and family forever" is the same thing he does later when he says the same thing to the EE

Flapjack socks. 'Nuff said

"Don't let the power get to your head just yet" okay Willow are we saving that for later? Good. Go crazy girl

This scene right here? I think about these shots sometimes. The reflection being emphasized. The reflection being behind bars. Him turning away. How it looks like he's pointing at the mark on his jaw. The half-a-witch relationship. The fact that for her, it's almost like looking in a reflection. "You're like me"

This creature. I love her

Hunter did exactly what Darius said, but he doesn't get the expected reaction. When Darius says "Can you?" he basically says "think about what you're doing instead of just doing it" but without actually dictating anything bc like he is trying to start a secret revolution here but he can't NOT say anything. Before, he commented how Hunter is very good at doing what he's told. Hunter is just sort of confused.

Willow goes on the offensive against Darius first, then when that proves fruitless, she goes for defensive. Both with magic. Both fail. Then she just tries to physically block her team. From a magic scythe arm. Commendable, but what was her plan exactly? Also, she does something similar earlier:

And when Hunter steps in, Darius tells him to move. Hunter knows from the beginning of the episode that Darius doesn't respect him, thinks he got the position through nepotism n whatnot. While Hunter is still technically the superior, he has no guarantee that would get him anything in this situation. There are no credible witnesses. What was his plan?

And Hunter told the EE that he was their friend. And claimed that friends stab each other in the back all the time, citing the coven heads as an example. Which either means he thinks the coven heads are friends with each other, or with him, and one of those paints a worse picture but that's not my point here. What I'm getting at is this:

After claiming that they ARE friends and that backstabbing is a normal friendship activity, he does this. He willingly gets between two hostile parties, both of which have very fresh reasons to be upset with him, and keeps his back to a group he recognizes as powerful for almost 20 seconds straight.

And he doesn't expect this interaction to end well for him. He doesn't move out of the way when he thinks Darius is going to hit him. He's surprised, confused, suspicious, surprised, scared, suspicious. He's untrusting throughout this entire back-and-forth. He stands still and stares for a few seconds when the expected outcome doesn't arrive. Flapjack stays by his side the entire time.

The fact that it is never elaborated on how Lumity reacted to learning Hunter was at Hexside. The fact that he probably didn't even think about running into them there

Thinking about this image on the ceiling of the owl house main entrance room,,, been thinking about this for a while actually. Is that a representation of the Titan. One glowing golden eye, horns, a crown, wings, the star on the chest like in the murals on King's island.

Hunter's eyebags are gone. Healing

Still thinking about how Hunter's season 2 episodes paralleling him to a specific member of the Hexsquad spells HEAL. Hunting Palismen, Eclipse Lake, Any Sport in a Storm, Labyrinth Runners. I will never not think about this, it's one of my favorite things

The show's hidden messages altogether!!

Thanks For Watching,,,,, hhhhhhhn

Dana said Waffles is Flapjack's little sister. Shown in the thread below.

This man. Absolutely delightful

The Hollow Mind portraits are making things so so. SO. They are Making Things SO Very!! They sure Are!!

Hunter pinching his little hair noodle when he gets uncertain. Willow holding herself. Gus touches the back of his neck, or maybe the side of his face. Amity tries to avoid a breakdown. They all react in slightly different ways. They all look away.

Camila rightly pointing out the fact that they're exhausted from running around for days, of course they have magic fatigue. This actually happening and someone actually pointing this out. It's very realistic and satisfying. Feels real. Feels validating. They're just people

Amity getting a side-hug and reassuring pep-talk from a supportive parental figure

Even with all of that, showing that of course Camila is affected by all of this. But she still supports her kids and gives them something to do in all this mess

Things I thought about after Watching and Dreaming, with no particular order. Much of this is pulled directly from my notes document

Hunters tv tropes page says Caleb is hinted to be albino

Lilith may have let Luz fall in Agony of a Witch if Eda hadn't sent Owlbert to catch her

Hunter relaxes slightly with everyone else at the beginning of For the Future when Luz says she's okay after coming out of the portal. He's relieved she's okay, even wrapped up in his own head as he is

Belos lights up the Titan's opposite eye from the one the Titan has lit. The Titan has a functioning left eye but a dim right one, and Belos lit the right one. King has a crack on the left side of his skull, Eda has a grey left eye, Luz has a scar over her left eyebrow. All of the Flapjack tattoos are on the left side except for Hunter's, which is where his sigil was (or is, if they had just started developing that technology and hadn't removed it yet)

The palistrom shortage was not only from Belos taking palismen, but also using the wood to make grimwalkers

Oh no did he ask Hunter to kill the Selkidomus because he expected this grimwalker to be the last and he wasn't giving himself room for failure. He needed to complete his mission, and failure wasn't an option if he couldn't make more grimwalkers. Because he had to have Caleb in the picture.

The fact that the show itself says point-blank that Belos is genuinely delusional and his goals are self-serving (through the Titan talking with Luz)

King never saw the room full of Titan skulls in Edge of the World, so he's seeing it for the first time in Watching and Dreaming

Luz's scene of standing and watching Belos melt while he tries to talk to her perfectly mirrors the scene of ghost Caleb standing and watching Belos melt while Belos tries to talk to him. They have the same expressions, angles, shots. And it's flipped. The scene is flipped. It's literally mirrored. And she has a similar hair thing going on. A fluffy hair noodle.

The speech Belos gave to Luz probably parallels how he tried to convince his brother

Luz's Titan magic orb is like the light glyph. King also had one when he yelled at Belos. Also Luz was zapping around like Hunter, the sound effect is even reminiscent

The parallels between Belos' skeletal form and the Titan's skeletal form

Waffle/s sitting on Hunter's head at the very end,,, feels familiar. No I'm not crying

Alador doesn't hunch anymore, and his belt has three symbols for each of his 3 kids

King finally got to play catch

Willow is definitely about to kiss Hunter in the Grom photo. Also look at his suit. Atrocious. Absolutely wretched. Perfect.

Green fungus vs red grass. Just. The colors in general there's so so so much going on there I have so many thoughts about it

Polly

The fact that Caleb's kindness and forgiveness did not work on Philip. Caleb hugged his brother even as Philip was corrupted and monstrous and it did not work. And the Collector ran into the same problem. Can you stop haunting the narrative for five minutes

Dana as a Hexside student cameo

The earrings exchange

The basilisks!!! At least two others survived!! And maybe reunited with Vee! This is excellent news

The airship with the abomination styled like the way Luz styled the Blight's household abomination to look like a cat

Dana signing Luz's writing scholarship. Luz getting a writing scholarship. Remember at the end of ASIAS when Lumity had the idea of their book club also being a writing club

Amity recognizing Luz quoting Azura in Covention (which Luz also outright states) but not saying anything. Imagine her inner dialogue, must have been so confusing

The kid who introduced sigil application way back when being the one to introduce the removal process. Good for him

Amity and Lilith have a good relationship. They were sort of like a mirror of Luz and Eda's mentor-mentee relationship such a long time ago, but less healthy. Now they're friends

Hunter gets all the family ties. Clearly a Noceda because of Thanks to Them, clearly a Deamonne from Watching and Dreaming, which also makes him a Blight, and he also gets Eberwolf with Darius because of course. If you include being a clone of Eda & Lilith's great-something grandfather AND being Luz's sister AND the fact that there may be a shared guardianship of Luz between Camila and Eda, which also includes Raine, he gets to be a Clawthorne, which also means he gets to be a Whispers. And let's not forget how he's obviously also a Park. If desired, for good measure, you can cite brotherly relation and tack on Porter as well. And don't forget the actual canon where he is adopted by the entire school as the resident cryptid

Hunter is literally a cryptid and I have been thinking about this for a very long time. I wish they got to talk about that more but they didn't, which means it's free real estate

The sheer amount of love and care baked into the finale. It's splendid. The hugs and kisses and words and actions and feelings

Eda and King both got mega evolutions. Then Luz did too

Making a stand against Belos at the site of the DOU. Paralleling prior shots, like looking over the Isles and talking about destiny, the parallels between Luz's Titan mega evolution vs Hunter's possession (there's quite a lot)

How they avoided the feeling of powercreep by keeping a lot of the actions very readable and down-to-earth. Even when they were fighting kaiju puritan with decay laser, there weren't world-shattering mega-powers. Everything was built on what we already understood. We got glyphs, we got Harpy mode and Beast mode and King's powers were heightened but they were still the same powers, we got Luz with her staff and Belos with his usual strategy, Raine fighting back in ways we already understood but also ways which meant more (like breaking their instrument). The archives collapsing and the Collector holding them up with ribbons while standing on the shooting star, we understand those powers because we saw them earlier, it made sense

While the archives start falling, Hunter zips toward Willow before stopping short when they stop falling. Hmmm now where have we seen something like that before. For reference I am talking about COTH

Amity finally using a glyph

Amity using vines, Willow using fire. That's the reversal of their usual things. Amity used the fire spell in Adventures in the Elements, that was tough for her. Willow's got plants down. Hunter using ice. Gus flying around and levitating

Hunter being able to save a palisman

Eda's absolutely MASSIVE smiles throughout

Magic coming from the heart, callback to The Intruder

The massive Titan heart in the throne room appearing way back when, and us all wondering about it, and it finally FINALLY came back with significance. Awesome

Luz burning away the rot before making an ice path to give her a clear shot at Belos. Utilizing the glyphs to their fullest, one after the other, super fast. She's become fluent in the Titan's language

Luz's confident speech to Belos paralleling her prior speeches in a moment of pure epicness as she annihilates him. And that's the last she ever says to him

The Collector crowning the Titan

The Titan acknowledging that he went after the wrong person

Everyone being so very gender

The Collector explaining "Hide and Seek" scene was just so. Intense. Them not understanding how mortals work. How empathy works. They're a young child who was raised by the wrong sort of people, they honestly didn't know any better. But that's when compassion comes in

The way the Collector flinched away from Amity paints a bad picture of the sorts of expectations he has

The Hexside kids are okay!!

Belos obviously tries one last Hail Mary, and Luz Is Not Having It

Did the rain come from Luz channeling the Titan's powers?

You can see scarring on Raine's arm. Almost matching Eda. And someone else we know. They should talk

[drabbles-of-writing]

Movie Night

This is part of my Beta AU

AO3

Masterpost

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

There was screaming in Blight Manor again.

Most neighbors didn’t hear it, beyond muffled sounds in the distance. Hard to hear anything in that Manor when the properties were so big for no discernable reason.

But sometimes the neighbors hear. And so long the screams stay laced with curses, snarling, and the occasional shattering glass instead of bloody murder, they let it be. 

Edric stood by the front door, arms crossed as he stared out at the Manor’s gate like there wasn’t screeching coming from his home. He winced every time the noise raised even a notch.

He checked his watch, frowning as he began tapping his foot. After a few more moments he began to turn, reaching for the door handle.

The front door swung open before he could get to it. Emira said something back behind her, much quieter than the fit coming from inside. Amity all but stormed out right after her, the screaming dying as Emira slipped out after her and the door was quickly shut.

Emira looked tired, and Edric mirrored it, with just a bit more worry in his features. They looked to Amity next, quiet as she shoved the unlocked gate open.

“Well?” Amity spat, whirling around. 

Her glare increased when their expressions turned empathetic. Emira was quick to wipe it off and continued down the driveway, pulling out her car keys. Edric hesitated for a moment as he followed his sisters, beginning to open the door as they pulled themselves into the car.

“I’ll steal your keys back.” He said after a moment, earning a slightly surprised look from Amity as she turned to him. “Not, like, today,” He added quickly. “But, er, soon.” He mumbled, ducking into his seat in the back. Amity had already taken a shotgun and nobody was in the mood to argue.

The keys weren’t really the issue, they all knew it wasn’t. Not even close. But the effort was there, and really, he couldn’t think of much better to offer.

Amity knew. She looked back at him over her seat for a moment, and while her ears were still pressed back and fangs still threatening to show at any provocation, she nodded to him. Edric loosened just a little bit, and Emira relaxed a bit herself as she started the car.

“For a price, of course.” Edric added right after. “But I’ll be nice and just ask you to give me my necklace back. And those dangly bracelets as compensation.”

“Eat shit, Ed.” Amity huffed. Emira offered her a half-empty container of hand sanitizer from the junk in her car and Amity was quick to chuck it at Edric’s head.

“Fine, fine!” Edric poorly covered his head from the offending weapon. “Just the choker then, have it your way!”

“Get it back yourself, all you’re getting is a thumb ring if you're lucky.” Amity snarked, more of a sharp, warning bite to it than probably necessary.

“Eh, I can make it work.” Edric shrugged noncommittally, eyeing her warily before going quiet.

Silence fell over the car again, aside from the quick words shared between the twins. 

Amity kept her eyes either through the windshield or her own doors window. The twins shared worried looks that Amity, for her part, pretended not to notice. She picked at her bracelets until Hexside came into view.

“Gimme the straws if you wanna see something really impressive.”

“Gus,” Willow said calmly, looking up from her half-eaten orange. “Don’t give her the straws.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it!” Gus squeaked, holding the two straws he’d managed to get far out of Luz’s reach. 

“It’s just water! Not like I’m gonna be snorting soda.” Luz complained, rolling her eyes. 

“Why would you want to snort water?” Gus exclaimed, aghast. “Why with straws?”

“Because if I just shove it on my face it’ll look less cool.” Luz said it was obvious.

“I don’t think there’s a dignified way to drink water through your nose.” Willow deadpanned. “You’ll choke on it regardless.”

“Will not, I have practice,” Luz insisted. “Ergo, it’s far less idiotic than if I was doing it the first time.”

“It’s still idiotic,”

“I never said I was perfect.” 

“Hey, Amity!” Gus called, breaking the two girls out of their argument. He waved across the cafeteria, where Amity had escaped the line with her tray of food.

She already looked like she was about to hit something, but then again, she always did. Gus waved her down, and Luz was almost impressed by how quickly he stopped being terrified of her, before she realized Willow was also trying to subtly wave her down. Little shits just wanted a way to stop her from her straw trick, the traitors.

Amity hesitated for a brief moment before storming over, nearly slamming her tray on the table as she stiffly sat. She didn’t really need to be waved over, she sat with them most days anyway, making Luz’s glare at her two friends all the more seething.

“Now that you’re here,” Luz said, deciding that now she was taking the petty route. “Wanna see a cool trick?”

“No,” Willow answered before Amity could, giving her a warning look. “You’ll choke on your fragile human lungs or whatever.”

“I punctured a lung once and survived, so jot that down,” Luz said matter-of-factly. “Second, I was not asking you.”

“Do I have a choice?” Amity grumbled, holding her face in her hand with a bored look.

“Not really, no.” Luz shrugged, already reaching for Gus’s straws again.

Gus was quick to take one of the straws and slide it over to Amity. She blinked down at it in surprise for a moment before rolling her eyes.

“I’m not fighting Luz over a straw.” She said, sounding almost offended.

“Really? Would’ve thought you’d fight me over the proper way to walk.” Luz raised a brow, one hand on Gus’s head as she pushed him down and snatched the first straw out of his hand.

“Keep talking and I just might,” Amity growled, shooting her a glare. “You’re making it quite easy to fantasize bashing your face against concrete.”

“I’m flattered,” Luz teased right back with a crooked, cocky grin. “I might just take you up on that offer.”

Amity flashed a large fang for a moment before grabbing whatever the witch equivalent of a yogurt container was and chucked it at Luz’s head. She yelped and ducked, letting it splat against the ground behind her. Barely anyone noticed.

“If you're not gonna eat any of that, at least give it to me.” Willow sighed, gestring to Amity’s tray. “It would make this horrendous experience more tolerable.”

“Piss off,” Amity snapped back with bared teeth, her hair almost mimicking a cat's hackles rising from how it seemed to spike. “You can live with this for ten minutes.”

Luz and Gus glanced at each other in mirrored surprise. Amity was snappy with everyone, but Willow was...uncommon. A bit gruff and sarcastic yes, but not usually as aggressive. That was reserved for pretty much everyone else save for Gus.

And, y’know, she actually tried to be nicer these days to Willow. Making amends and all that.

Willow seemed a bit taken aback by her snapping too, though it was much more dulled compared to the other two, and harder to notice unless you’re looking for it. She didn’t respond and simply shrugged, going back to eating her own food as Amity seethed, glaring at the table.

Luz looked to Gus. She looked at Willow. Both of whom were worried and confused respectively. Amity had a bad day every now and again, but normally she just...fought Luz in the hallway and got it over with.

Luz thought for a moment, the sudden silence at the table interrupted only by the soft tapping of her foot. She glanced between her tray and Amity a few times, who kept glaring at the table like she was trying her damndest to ignore the sudden tension at the table. Or she just hadn’t noticed.

After a moment or two she jerked her head up, leveling her glare with Luz.

“Would you quit it?” Amity snapped.

“Huh?” Luz startled out of her thoughts.

“Your foot sounds like it's having a seizure. You’re not doing yourself any favors here unless you're some masochist actually looking forward to getting beaten to a pulp later.” Amity growled, the nails of one of her hands digging into the table. Or did they count as claws? Luz would have to ask Guys later.

Luz watched Amity for a moment, hands clasped in front of her face. Her foot tapping had stopped. Amity’s glare turned a bit unnerved, looking around like she thought Luz was staring at something else.

“Have you ever seen human media on witches?” Luz finally blurted, ending the few seconds of silence.

“What?” Amity balked.

“Yeah, I was talking about it with Gus the other day,” Luz said, which wasn’t a lie, he had expressed interest in what humans thought of witches. The boy perked up at the mention of their conversation. “And since this geek here hasn’t seen much human media, I’m gonna go out on a limb here and guess you haven’t either, no?”

“Why in the world would I?” Amity frowned. “We’ve got entirely different kinds of internet compared to them, why would I even care?”

“Because,” Luz said, a mischievous smile on her face as she lowered her hands. “I grew up with that stuff, and lemme just say, from personal experience,” She said, gesturing to the cafeteria filled with witches and demons around them. “You guys would have a field day with it.”

“What, like, witch movies?” Willow mumbled, a hint of recognition lighting in her eyes.

“Movies about witches, movies with witches in them, yadda yadda,” Luz nodded, waving a hand around. “I just so happen to own a few old DVDs, as well as gaining the knowledge on how to pirate everything else,” She said, quickly raising a hand when Gus opened his mouth to speak. “No, not the pirating you’re thinking of.” She added as he slowly shut his mouth again.

“My mami’s gonna be working late today, so we’ve got plenty of time to binge the worst of the best.” Luz continued. 

“And you’re mentioning this why…?” Amity frowned, tilting her head.

“Because I know you’ll get pissed off at it.” Luz said simply, her cocky smile never leaving. Also technically not a lie.

“Of course,” Amity slumped back with a sigh, pinching the bridge of her nose.

“Really?” Gus all but jumped out his seat, eyes shining excitedly. “This is perfect! This could be amazing for my studies on how humans have pictured witches through their current--”

“If you bring anything other than a notepad and pen I’m not letting you in my house.” Luz deadpanned.

Which was a lie, Willow can and would let Gus in no matter what he brought. But it got him to calm slightly and nod seriously.

“Trying to get out of a fight, Noceda?” Amity taunted. “I thought better of you.”

“Could you at least beat the shit out of me after the movie marathon?” Luz rolled her eyes. “I’m always down for a spar or two, but what kind of friends don’t have a movie marathon of questionable tastes on a school night?” Luz said with a raised brow.

“Want us to swing by right after school?” Willow inquired, mercifully saving Amity from her momentary shocked expression being seen by Luz. 

“Nah, give it an hour or so, still gotta set things up.” Luz said. “And,” She gave a pointed glare around the whole table this time. “This time I would actually appreciate it if my neighbors didn’t get worried about someone breaking and entering by going through the window.”

“I got caught once!” Gus complained.

“And this asshole got caught three times!” Luz pointed accusingly at Amity. “We’re lucky they only called the police once before deciding it was normal.”

“Not my fault you argue with me as loud as possible every time,” Amity shot back. “You don’t argue with Gus!”

“Gus made an honest mistake, and it was his first offence.” Luz said, crossing her arms as Willow snickered. “You, on the other hand, are a menace.”

“I thought you’d have figured that out ages ago.” Amity scoffed. “Really, it's your fault for being so oblivious.”

“She’d know all about that, huh?” Willow mumbled, taking a sip of her drink.

Luz contemplated kicking her under the table. She thought better of it. She decided to just relish in Amity’s curt, slightly loosened comebacks. Better than before, at least.

Luz opened her front door only for a moment before darting back to the kitchen. Maybe she had poor host etiquette, but she kind of had some popcorn on the line here.

“Sorry we’re late!” Gus fretted, hurrying in as Willow entered behind him. “I was trying to find the right size of notepad and then Willow took a while to get ready and--”

“Sorry my flytrap got a taste for flesh again,” Willow muttered, rolling her eyes.

“Don’t worry about it!” Luz called from her kitchen, withdrawing her popcorn and frowning when she opened it and found that half of it was burnt. Curse her shitty microwave. “Amity hasn’t gotten here yet, either.”

“Ooh, what’s that?” Gus asked, bouncing into the kitchen and around the island in the middle as he stared at the candy and chips set out.

“Human food,” Luz said, tossing the burnt popcorn aside as she got a new packet. “I’m introducing you to the real stuff. You’re gonna hate the peppermint.” She said with a grin.

“If you try to give me anything with the word ‘mint’ in its name, I won’t hesitate to hurt you.” Willow warned.

“I actually happen to value my life, contrary to popular belief.” Luz scoffed like she was an idiot. “Luckily for me,” She gestured to Gus staring at all her food, clearly not having heard anything they were saying. “I can trick that one and Amity into eating them.”

“Amity won’t make good on her promise of not fighting you until the marathon is over if you try that,” Willow warned her, wandering around the kitchen for a bit before resting beside the sink and leaning against the counter.

“Which means I can hold it over her head when she tries to make me promise I won’t do anything.” Luz said this was an ingenious plan. “It’s foolproof. I win either way.”

“I’m not so sure a black eye counts as winning,” Willow mumbled, but didn’t comment further as Luz shoved the new batch of popcorn in the microwave.

Gus reached for the candy on the island counter before Luz batted his hand away. He gave her a pitiful look and she leveled it with a harsh one of her own they both knew she didn’t mean. He got the chocolate bar anyway.

“Why does it smell like something burned alive in here?”

The three turned, looking towards the front door, that nobody had closed, thanks guys, where Amity stood. Her face was scrunched up at the smell, looking a bit frazzled but no worse for wear.

“Popcorn,” Luz said simply. “And you, Blight, are late.”

“Had to steal Em’s car,” Amity said, wandering in and eyeing the snacks on the counter. “Didn’t feel like explaining to her where I was going to need her car.”

“Don’t you have your own?” Luz said, furrows pinched together as she looked back.

Amity paused for a moment before shrugging mutely and leaning against the counter not too far away from Willow. Luz decided not to push.

“If it burns again, I’m just gonna eat it, ash and all.” Luz sighed, tapping at the glass of the microwave before sitting on the counter beside it, feet dangling off.

“It’s not supposed to look like that, then?” Willow said, picking up the discarded bag Luz hadn’t thrown away yet and peering inside. “I could eat this.”

“You’re witches, you could eat a nuclear power plant if you wanted.” Luz muttered. “I’ll just save the ashy ones for the endless maw over here.” She said, jerking her head in Amity’s direction.

“I’m touched,” Amity said dryly. “What weird human movie are you gonna be subjecting us to today?” She sighed.

“I’m so glad you asked!” Luz perked up. “We’ve got a bunch of horror movies and regular movies, but I figured we could save the horror movies for when it's really dark, so I am blessing the three of you with The Wizard of Oz as an introduction.” Luz said, practically glowing as she spoke a mile a minute.

“Wizards aren’t--”

“I know wizards aren’t witches, I learned my lesson, blame Harry Potter.” Luz said, raising a hand to Gus’s protest. “Which, no, we are not going to be watching. Anyway, there are two witches in the movie! We can save the purely witch-centered movies for later, this is just an introduction.” She said, 

Gus nodded enthusiastically, listening intently as Willow snorted. Luz was quick to go off on a tangent about the different movies she’d sifted through, relishing in Willow’s tired look at the cheesy names from over half of them. She waved her hands about animatedly as she discussed movies she’d known for years and how now she got to properly bully them and--

Amity was very obviously not processing a damn thing she was saying.

She was watching Luz, same as the other two, and she was interested, but certainly not in whatever she was saying. Her ears were drooped back and she seemed just a tad more relaxed, less tense than she was earlier.

Willow, of course, being closest to the witch, noticed first.

She glanced back to the sink for a moment before grabbing the faucet, which she could pull out and appeared to have a spray option on it.

She looked to Amity for a moment, who still hadn’t stopped staring, aimed it, and turned it on.

Amity yelped and spat, jerking back, as the spray got her. Luz and Gus jerked around for just a moment before Luz burst out laughing, hunched over on the counter as Gus poorly hid giggles.

Amity whirled on Willow with a glare and a growl, the witch turning off and lowering the faucet slightly. She gave her a smug look, and, in a tone barely heard above the other twos laughing, said;

“Sorry, thought you looked thirsty.” In a dry, emotionless tone. Her gleeful grin said otherwise.

Amity spat, flushed to the tips of her ears, and took a clawed swing in Willow’s direction. The witch was unperturbed and stepped to the side to avoid a gash to the face.

“Amity, Amity no,” Luz wheezed out, dropping off the counter and quickly wrapping an arm around Amity’s midsection to stop another lunge. “You can’t fight Willow, she will kill you.”

“It’ll be worth it!” Amity snarled, pulling against Luz’s grasp with angry swipes that couldn’t quite reach Willow’s smug face, causing Luz to haul her back with both arms.

“It really won’t,” Luz said, still clearly amused by the whole thing. “The dedication is still admirable, though.”

“Uh, Luz?” Gus peered through the glass of the microwave. “I think it started burning again, it smells weird.”

“Shit!” Luz quickly released Amity, almost sending her toppling to the floor, as she rushed back to the microwave and tore it open.

She withdrew the bag and opened it with only a small wince at how hot it was, peering inside before sighing.

“Welp, it’s the best we’re gonna get.” Luz said, setting it aside. 

Amity flipped off Willow, who only responded with a chuckle, as Luz continued talking about movies and gathered the snacks together to take to the living room, making Gus carry the rest. As the four wandered off towards the other room, Luz paused and looked back towards the front door.

“Jesus Christ, do you guys not know how to close doors?” She hissed, quickly dumping the snacks on the couch before going back to the front door. “Three of you come in and not one of you could remember to shut a door?”

“I got distracted by the smell of burnt failure,” Amity defended, taking the corner of the couch for herself.

“This is gonna be worse for you,” Luz called, shutting the front door and skidding back in. “You have a better sense of smell than me.”

“Not my house,” Amity shrugged as Luz quickly took the middle of the coach before Gus could. The boy gave her a comically betrayed look as Willow took the floor and he had to be squished into the other corner. 

“You’re still getting the burnt popcorn,” Luz said, fishing on the coffee table through the snacks for the remote. “Maybe I’ll be nice and throw you a normal one here and there to spice it up.”

“How sweet of you,” Amity grumbled, crossing her arms and leaning back further on the couch as Luz started flipping on the TV.

“Also, as a heads up,” Luz added as she readied the DVD already mostly set up. “I may have gone on a research binge when I was younger for about seventy percent of these movies, so you’re all going to be subjected to weird facts I know.”

“Are we sure this isn’t a torture experiment?” Willow teased, leaning against the couch between Luz and Gus.

“Torture for you, maybe.” Luz corrected. “I’m gonna have the time of my life.”

Six and a half movies later, Gus had filled out almost every page of his notepad, and Luz had barely escaped getting broken teeth. There were cries of outrage, confusion, and plenty of shouting at the screen for inaccuracies. Lots of ‘look, it's you!’ from Luz at whatever weird or villainous thing the witch on screen did towards her friends, particularly Amity, and receiving bruises on her arms and sides for her troubles. The Wizard of Oz had been the worst, what with her comparing the Wicked Witch’s green skin to Amity’s hair.

They fought over the last piece of candy from a pack, Amity tried sneaking a grab at the un-burnt popcorn pieces and decided she liked the ashy ones better (to which Luz looked rather horrified) while stealing any of the sour patches Willow tried to nab as retribution. Luz introduced Gus and Amity to the peppermint, which almost ended in Amity fighting her right there and then if it weren’t for Willow threatening to beat both of them up if they didn’t quit it. Long, informative rants from Gus the girls all groaned through, Luz going on and on about facts about the movie productions, and a certain instance where they were pretty sure one of the actors in the movie they were watching was actually a witch, and things were finally winding down.

Gus had already passed out, the poor guy, and Willow didn’t look too far behind. Amity was probably only awake out of spite at this point, and even she looked close to sleep. Luz was hardly paying attention to the TV anymore, the volume lowered for Gus's sake more than anything.

“It’s gonna be such a pain in the ass to get to school tomorrow,” Willow muttered bitterly, eyes shut as she leaned back against the couch.

“Nothing important is for another week,” Luz lazily waved a hand. “We can afford to pass out in class.”

“You’re the last person who can afford to skimp out on work,” Amity mumbled. “Gus is already smart, and Willow and I can intimidate the teachers into giving us a pass.”

“Bullies, the two of you.” Luz huffed. “You’re just gonna leave me to rot, huh? Let me fend for myself in this vicious world? I thought better of you.”

“No you didn’t,” Amity scoffed. “Now shut up, you’re too loud.” She complained, batting at the human's face.

“You’re just tired, I’m talking at a perfectly reasonable volume.” Luz rolled her eyes. “Witch hearing isn’t so fun now, is it?”

Amity gave Luz a glare and a weak, croaky growl in the back of her throat. Luz gave a poor attempt at a mock-growl back. Amity was quick to raise a hand and make a grab at Luz when Willow spoke up, still perfectly still even in her half-asleep state.

“Both of you be quiet,” Willow gruffed, immediately getting the two to quickly freeze.

They held still for a brief few moments, glancing between each other and Willow. After a minute or two with Willow not making any other movements or further tired threats, they slowly relaxed back into the couch, Amity giving up on swiping at Luz.

“You’re growling is horrible,” Amity whispered, barely audible above the soft hum of the television. 

“Unfortunately, I was born with vocal cords that don’t let me sound like a crocodile on steroids.” Luz whispered back. “But I spent a good few years of my childhood mimicking cat sounds, so I like to think that’ll give me an edge.”

“Do I even want to ask?” Amity grimaced, giving Luz a hesitant look.

“I was a really weird kid,” Luz shrugged, constantly glancing at Willow to make sure she was quiet enough not to wake her up.

“You still are,” Amity deadpanned.

“Aw, how sweet.” Luz placed a hand on her chest with an emotional expression. “Never thought you had it in you.”

Amity muttered a quick ‘move’ as her only warning before she sharply punched Luz’s arm. The human hissed and jerked away, rubbing at the sore spot.

“You know it doesn’t actually count as a warning if you give zero room for a reaction, right?” Luz grumbled.

“I give you plenty room, you had a whole second there to move.” Amity replied, voice lowered as she leaned against the arm of the couch. “A warning is a warning, be grateful I’m giving one at all.”

“Your honor code is a Roulette wheel,” Luz huffed. 

“It’s not a--”

Gus shifted and the two of them went quiet again. They watched him as he shifted around in his sleep and almost went careening off the couch. Luz shot out a hand and caught his back, holding him right on the edge as he settled down again. She slowly pushed him back onto the couch, and he barely reacted.

They breathed a sigh of relief, laying back against the couch. Amity leaned her back against the arm of the couch and stretched out her legs, kicking up against Luz’s side. She turned to glare at the witch, momentarily caught off guard by the eerie glow Amity’s eyes had in the shifting, dim light from the television. Amity didn’t break eye contact.

She couldn’t help but feel like she was being studied. Like a cat determining whether or not it was worth it to go after a bird in the garden. Her blank face didn’t help matters.

“You’re sure your mom won’t realize we’re here?” Amity spoke before Luz could, eyes never leaving her.

“Uh, no, no, she’s usually pretty tired whenever she gets back, and we’re out of view of the front door, so she’ll just go to sleep and we’ll be at school before she wakes up.” Luz said, the first to break eye contact. “I’m more worried about you guys’ parents wondering where you went off to.”

“Eh, Willow can handle her dads.” Amity shrugged, slowly turning her head away to watch the movie after Luz looked away. “Gus’s dad is the only one we’ll have to be worried about.”

“Really? Would’ve thought a rich girl like you had a stricter curfew.” Luz teased, shaking off the tension from earlier. “They let you party all night, any night?”

Amity didn’t respond. Luz noted the claws on one of her hands slid unsheathed. Alright then, touchy subject. That didn’t surprise her much, considering how she’d spoken of them in the past.

“...I can’t believe you liked these movies.” Amity eventually sighed, scoffing at some scene involving wands and whatnot on screen. “No wonder you were so helpless when you came to Hexside.”

“Hey!” Luz snapped, remembering to lower her voice at the last second. “This ‘helpless’ human has fought the cliche trigger-happy jock and won.” She accused, pointing towards Amity.

“You have not.” Amity scoffed. “It's not a winning fight until someone surrenders or runs off.”

“So you’re saying we end in draws, then?” Luz raised a brow. “I still think that looks pretty good on my record.”

“Your record went up in flames months ago,” Amity rolled her eyes. “You’re lucky you're easy to pity.”

“Going soft on me, Blight?” Luz teased, sticking out her tongue. “Or are you that worried I might win?”

Amity glared at her, claws still unsheathed, Luz noted without changing her face from her taunting expression. Amity’s eyes narrowed for a second and she growled, and that was her only warning before she sprung out of her position and lunged.

Luz choked back a laugh and a surprised squeak as she jerked back, raising her foot and kicking at Amity to hold her at bay. She almost landed right over Gus, just barely missing him as Amity hissed and one of her claws dug into the side of Luz’s leg, ow.

The other hand lashed out to hit Luz before she caught her wrist and held it away just enough to avoid her claws, pushing her leg on Amity’s stomach further out to keep her off.

“Time and a place, Ames.” Luz whispered, cocking a brow as she jerked her head in the direction of Willow still sleeping leaned against the couch, almost definitely bound to wake up if they started a fight now. And Gus.

Amity glowered, lips pulled back to flash honestly ridiculously oversized fangs. Not that she was complaining of course. She looked like she still wanted to tackle Luz despite the poor repercussions that would follow, but alas, she eventually pulled her wrist out of Luz’s now lax grip.

Luz kicked her and Amity wheezed, falling back onto her side of the couch as Luz snickered and drew her legs back under her. She frowned at the tears in her jeans and scratches along her leg and flipped off Amity with her most exasperated look.

Amity’s hair puffed up as she repeated the gesture. They scowled at each other for a few moments before Luz gave up and shook her head, allowing a quiet chuckle at the ridiculousness of the two of them. Amity sighed and lowered her hand as Luz did the same, expression softening as Luz leaned further back against the couch, ears lowered.

“Wake me before I miss the first period, will ya?” Luz asked, right before leaning right across the couch and onto Amity’s arm.

“Not in your life.” Amity hissed, tensing. Her hands twitched and she looked ready to shove the human off, who only gave her a smug look and finger guns in response.

“You're lucky I put up with you.” Amity grumbled, clearly deciding against pushing her to the floor.

“Feelings mutual,” Luz said, waving a hand casually before shutting her eyes. “Just keep quiet and I won’t have to make you sleep in your car.”

“Sure, make me sleep in my car.” Amity scoffed, leaning her head back against the couch and letting her eyelids fall. “Nice one, Noceda.”

“I know, I’m hilarious.” She grinned, not bothering to open her eyes.

Amity rolled her eyes before closing her eyes as well, arms loosely crossed as she let Luz adjust against her side. Luz could still hear the quiet hum of the TV still playing the movie, but decided against turning it off. Too much effort, and the movie would end soon, anyway. It was far too quiet to disturb anyone.

Amity hadn’t legitimately snapped at anyone since the second movie, so really, Luz would call tonight a win.

Though it took only a moment before Amity, also not reopening her eyes, reached out and yanked Luz’s beanie over her face.

“Wh--hey!” Luz snapped, flailing around and managing to land a smack or two on Amity, who, in response, hissed and pushed at her face.

“Shut the fuck up.”

Both of them froze at the sound of Willow’s tired voice, a snarl laced in her tone. They looked over only for a moment to spot her glaring at the two of them with malice before they immediately went back to their previous sleeping positions, eyes shut tight.

None of them moved for the rest of the night.

[tedturneriscrazy]

Another Saturday, another episode! Let's take a look at Keeping Up A-fear-ances!

(Good lord I'm starting to make myself sound like some sort of content creator)

Oh, okay, we're just starting at that level of intensity, huh?

Chest gem origins

Gwendolyn not being satisfied with managing the curse and determined to cure it? I'm sure this won't be a real world allegory in the slightest.

Oh, so Eda literally just stumbles upon the portal? I could call that contrived, but honestly it's not dissimilar to how Dipper found Journal 3. For that matter, the entirety of Lord of the Rings is predicated on an accidental discovery like this and nobody gave Tolkien shit about it.

Was the eye on the portal cracked in previous episodes? I don't remember.

Seems like Gwen is the "well-meaning but ultimately misguided" flavor of mom.

As an aside, I am now quite curious about how Eda's first trip to the human realm went. Maybe a future episode will cover it? At any rate, I smell a new favorite fic prompt.

The screaming alarms in the Demon Realm will never not be funny to me.

Also, that is a worrying number of hearts. Eda is straight up murdering these poor creatures.

For some reason the gold fang being removable never occurred to me as a possibility, and now I feel like a kid who's discovered that Santa isn't real.

Oh hey, the new outfit! I'm also impressed how close to symmetrical that tearing was.

I need to get a screencap of Luz sleeping on that stack of books because she is adorable.

Also, staying up all night researching? This season seems determined to completely eradicate the notion of Luz being dumb, and I am here for it.

I have a feeling the Hexside mug will be making its way to The Mystery Shack in the near future.

Lilith's first experience with transformation and she seems understandably horrified.

The curse acting stronger when stressed? That seems...important.

Ah, so the dismemberment is from the curse! A surprisingly useful side effect from what we've seen so far.

Can I just say that I appreciate how Eda's reaction to Lilith's first taste of transformation is immediate remedy, explanation, and reassurance? And doesn't make any snarky comments along the lines of "now you know what it's like?" Whatever happened in that week and a half must have been cathartic as hell.

"Always. Always curious." Luz is the TOH fandom.

(Also, Eda, you know she is, considering how much she went on about your "mysterious past" at the Covention)

"Magic bird tornado?!" Luz has a way with words that's just *chef's kiss*.

"Gwendolyn." Eda is already just fucking done.

"MOM?!?!" Jeez, Lilith, you're just now hearing all this?

I was charmed by how motherly Gwen was acting toward Eda, but then she kinda just...dismissed Lilith, and now I'm somehwat less charmed.

(Sweet flea as a term of endearment is kinda cute, though might have some unfortunate implications depending on how you want to interpret it)

"Who knows what they put in those nasty concoctions?" OH WE GOING FOR THE ANTI-VAXXERS NOW YESSSS

Luz and Lilith's reaction to that whole exchange is priceless.

Everyone's perspective here makes perfect sense for who they are and what they've been through.

Poor Lilith. Her cursing Eda is beginning to make more sense.

Ah, thus begins the collaboration.

"We'll be consulting someone very special." Why does that seem so...ominous?

Is there anyone who watched this episode for the first time whose bullshit detector didn't go off immediately when Gwen mentioned finding someone who promised a cure?

Heh, Palm Stings.

Nonbelievers will be blinded by the power of the tome? I'm sure they will be, Wartlop.

I must say, as something of a scientist myself (okay that's not true, I'm a QA tech for a food manufacturer, but I do have a chemistry degree), I am 100% here for the swings being taken at faith healing/"miracle" cures/anti-vaxxers in this episode

Oh, we Wile E. Coyote now, huh?

Also, interesting how much apple blood is being played up in this episode.

Lilith please you're projecting your mommy issues on a literal child

OH WE REALLY JUST WILE E. COYOTE HUH?

You're right, Luz, Gwen's bicep game is goals.

(Somewhat disappointed the scars are from questing and not beastkeeping, but eh)

Why do I get the feeling there's gonna be a future episode where everybody stages an intervention for Eda's apple blood problem?

"Those feathers mean we're driving the beast out" Gwen no

Hooty is holding the brain cell? Oh no...

If that ice cream came from the Night Market it would explain why Lilith sounds drunk.

(Side note: I can't be the only one getting flashbacks to Mermista's ice cream binge, right? Different context, but still)

"Abomi-berry" "Franken fruit" "Key slime pie" These are A+ flavor names.

Oh, there's the transformation...

I must say that whole segment kinda rubbed me the wrong way. The way King's opinion on his dad was changed seemed...I don't know how to describe it. I get that they needed a trigger for Lilith's transformation, but honestly if any part of the episode is contrived it's this.

"¡It really is that good!" So that's what an accent slip in written form looks like. (The upside down exclamation point is used in Spanish, in case anyone didn't know)

I keep half expecting Eda to say "Beep! Beep!" at this point.

Luz is finally asking questions. Took long enough.

Ah, the classic "moving the goal posts to extract more money from a desparate family member" technique.

Luz channeling Scorpion, we love to see it.

There is an exquisite irony in Eda's mom being scammed, I must say.

Ah, so that's where the elixirs went. Dammit, Gwen.

Luz is definitely thinking "Are you fucking kidding me right now?!"

Beast!Lilith is massive.

"Sweet flea?" Gwen just realized she done goofed.

"I can see you still need a little time." God Luz is so fucking smart.

The con revealed.

OH DAMN SCARY MAMA

(Also I am terrified of bees/wasps, so extra scary mama in my book)

The scam is revealed, goblins, getting back into the Wartlop disguise is kinda pointless.

She joined the Beast Keeping coven entirely to cure the curse? That's dedication. A shame you couldn't have spared some of that for Lilith.

Still, I do like badass scary mama Gwen. I'd be down to see more of that.

Owl Beast fight!

I am slayed by the fact that the portraits are now officially a recurring gag 😂

Aw, here's The Moment™️

"My turn to drive" Does this imply cars are a thing on the Boiling Isles after all?

Lilith crying almost immediately💔 She was holding onto a lot of pain.

Yes, King, she was trying to do her best. I mean, road to hell or whatever, but at least Gwen got there in the end.

WHAT?! YOU'RE BREAKING UP LULU AND HOOTCIFER?!?!?!?

Terrace, that's just cruel. (Worthless brownie points for whoever understands that reference)

No, seriously, you can't just give me my favorite inter-character relationship in the series after Lumity and just...take it away like that, come on! 😭😭😭😭😭😭

I know I should remark on how Lilith told Gwen about the circumstances of the curse, how Gwen rightfully accepted responsibility for the whole situation, and how Luz finds the big hair aspirational, but...NOOOO DON'T END THE ADVENTURES OF LULU AND HOOTCIFER WHYYYYYYYYY💔😭💔😭💔😭

"BUT I CAN'T HOLD A PEN!"

I will never emotionally recover from this.

Okay, I think I got that out of my system. Anyway...

Not the only human, huh? Cue the "Belos is a human" theorists going into maximum overdrive.

That said, a tantalizing lore dump.

We certainly do have a lot of garbage. Some of it even holds office. HEY-O!

Setting up the next episode, too. Continuity!

Camp's over, huh? That means it's been three months.

Way to misdirect with Camila, guys. That said, we have now seen Camila cry and I HATE it. (In the right way, I think)

WHAT THE FUCK

HOLY SHIT

CREEPY LUZ IS REAL WHAT

OWJEIWHQGIWWOPQ

(It's hard to keysmash on a phone, even with autocorrect off)

That wraps it up! The flaws in this episode seem more pronounced than any others in the season so far, but the good stuff was really good! Overall a solid episode! I know everybody's looking forward to library Lumity in the next one (so am I), but I'm personally eager to see what they do with Gus. His part is the A plot, after all.

Anyway, I'll be back at this next week! Still hard to believe this is a thing, but that's life, I guess.

[hazbinextgeneration]

Safe Haven’s Angel Book1 Ch33

The halls of the royal palace were empty for maybe one of his grandfather's employees every few minutes or so. They would bow, maybe say hi, and then scamper off to do whatever job they had to do. The actions only made him feel better about his position(*cough cough* his ego *cough*), but it was the norm where he lived. The halls came alive with the echoes of his soft humming. It was nice to just stretch his legs and walk about. A loud laugh came from one room up ahead followed by more happy shouts and laughs. He paid no mind to it though, and just casually walked past. Most likely some of the guards on lunch break. They could get a little rowdy when off duty. "I tell yous guys, if all the girls were like this good lookin' piece of a$$...This h*ll hole of a job would be a LOT more worth while! Why don't ya c'mere, Sugar?~" The herd of men cheered in agreement, but he still walked away. It was none of his business if they were catcalling one of the staff. It was Tenta and Hilda's jobs to take care of the female staff. He nearly turned the corner when the other voice made him halt.

"I don't want to sit in you- LET GO OF ME!! You filthy A$$HOLE!!" "......heh." Silently he turned on his heels and walked back towards said room. Curses, laughs, and shouts continued to spill out from the slightly ajared door. A pink hand was placed against said door before it was slowly pushed open. The group of men laughed and shouted amongst each other as one of their friends cooed and firmly held a struggling female in his lap. Most of the men were still in their usual armor holding giant mugs filled with what he assumed was some kind of alcohol. The one holding the girl laughed at her attempts to get his larger hands to let go. "Y'know. I like my girls feisty and screaming.~" She gave him a deadly glare and bared her tiny fangs at him. Which only made him give off a lust filled growl and showed off his fangs, She instantly regretted her descision and started struggling again. Making the men laugh. The watching figure leaned against the doorway with calculating eyes as he decided on what to say. Finally deciding on- "You know what I like?" All the men froze or looked behind them at the new figure who now leaned against the doorway and stared at them with his usual grin. But something behind that smile and calm demeanor throbbed darkly. He reached up to scratch at his cheek." I like seeing my girl in my arms-" He pushed himself off the door and casually ran his hand through his red hair. "-all cute with her giant hair-" "Excuse me?!" The girl took the opportunity to yank herself finally out of the man's loosened grip while he was distracted. She took a good few steps away from the man, rubbing her paws through the fur on her body where he gripped her. She glared at the newcomer. "My hair isn't that big!" He shrugged walking over to where the guard was. "Whatever you want, Dove," he said drapping an arm around the guard. He gave him a smile too nice for any sane person to accept, "I see you made a new friend." She scoffed. "That's an understatement." "Oh? That can't be right." His arm lowered until it was more around the poor guard's neck than shoulders. He was visibly uncomfortable under the dark prince's gaze. His buddies all but silent. "With all the laughing and stuff...Im SURE these guys wouldn't do a thing like that." His arm slowly squeezed around the guy's neck. He made a small gasp and reached one beefy hand up to grab at it. "You must've been mistaken....Surely anyone would know what I would do if I found out someone.....'touched' you to put it lightly.~" The demon gulped down the lump in his throat. "O-Of course not. I-I was only joking around with the little lady." The prince only squeezed tighter. "Oh, I sure hope so for your sake. Sometimes jokes can go too far-" "Helsing." He stopped and his eyes shot to the girl a little ways from him. "Yyyyesss?~" "Uh.." Her eyes darted between the two demons. "Didn't you want to me? Outside? Away from these guys?" He stared at her a moment, but smiled wider and started to slowly unwind from him. The guard gave a visible sigh and rubbed his hand against his neck where it was gripped. "Sure, Sugarcube. Lets 'talk'" He leaned all the way back up. Tucking his hands into his jacket pocket before walking over to her. Hooking an arm around her body and pulling her against him. "We have some stuff to wrap up.~" He gave the group of men one last look. "......I'd get back to work if I were you. Dunno when someone might find ya." He gave off a dark chuckle that sent a shiver down her spine before he guided her towards the door. She was taken out of the breakroom and down the hallway before she was able to look at him. "Giant hair? Really?" He shrugged. "Eh. Ya can't say Im wrong with those luscious locks ya got.~" To make a point, he reached up the hand that was around her to run through her head of silky hair, but stopped when she jerked away. "I thought you were supposed to be at a friend's?" He shrugged and began to lean back to where one would think he would fall only to pop up a moment later in mid air. Hands in pockets and legs crossed. He gave a wide smirk. "Look. No legs." She gave off another huff and began to walk away with him floating next to her. "Sooooo*tch* What were you doing in the kitchen? Last time I checked, you were Hilda's little errand girl." "A friend of mine got sick and asked me if I could cover her shift," she said not looking at him. He clicked his tongue in thought and looked her over. She only gave him a look. "....What?" "What what?" "WHY are you staring at me?" She stopped. "Can't I admire my girl?~'' At this, she wrinkled her snout up. "I am NOT you're anything." "Oh, c'mon." He swiveled to where he was floating in front of her. "Would being my date really be that ba-" "Yes." She cut him off. He stopped momentarily surprised, but relaxed back. "What's so bad about me?~" "Anything and everything," she replied bluntly. A small silence followed, His smile slowly faded until he gave her a look similar to hers. "Why do you say that? It's because Im a demon, ain't it? Dad always sad mortals were skittish." "No!" She threw her arms up. "Your ego is bigger than H*ll itself and you're a big jerk!" "Oh! Well, that's not a problem. I'm always like that.~" "Exactly." She side stepped around him and took a few steps. Something tapped onto the floor, but she kept walking. "Hey, Marge! Margy! C'mon! I wanted to talk to you!" She rolled her eyes. Helsing was more trouble than she would've liked. Talking only seemed to stroke his ego mo- "Margo! As prince I command you to STOP!!" She froze. A small silence followed before footsteps slowly approached from behind. She gulped down the lump in her throat and stared straight ahead. Did Helsing really just.....yell at her? He was a demon, and (as with all demons) he had a bad temper to match. But unlike most demons, Helsing preferred to show his anger through force than voice. Hearing him yell(not to mention use his prince title) was a rarity most wouldn't live to see..... Which meant she f*cked up. The footsteps continued until he came to a stop next to her. She didn't move. "Hey." His chill voice was back. "I just wanna talk." "........." "I'm serious. Why don't you like me? I'm not that 'bad'. Ask Lacey if ya don't believe me." ".....I don't 'don't like you.' You just don't seem to get that I'm not interested in dating you." She gave him a side look. "Well, why not!?" He flared both arms at himself. "I know I'm not the most..." He gave a quick glance at his missing chunk of tail. "....-intact person, but I ain't ugly either. It's the related to the Devil thing, isn't it?" "......." "Margo. C'mon. Cut me some slack. Your silence act is killin' me." "You never told me why." "What?" She gave him another annoyed look. "Look. You are a PRINCE OF H*LL for crying out loud, Helsing. Hundreds of people would kill to be with you, and some of those people have a BETTER reason to be with you." "You really think those bimbos are worth my time?! You're more beautiful than they could ever be-" "That's my point!" Her sudden yell and volume made him lean back and blink. She gave him a look that meant defeat. "All I ever hear is beautiful this and beautiful that! And I hate it!" Margo stared him directly in the eyes. "I'm NOT some trophy wife to be paraded around on your arm like a prize winning horse!" She pointed at herself. "I happen to have a great personality and.....And I'm learning how to cook too! D*mmit!" He stayed silent and continued to stare at her angry, panting form. "......I know." He slowly smiled again. Though this time it seemed more real than usual. She gave an uncertain look at his sudden upbeat look. "Now that I know what's wrong, I can work on it! But between you n' me....I never saw you as eye candy." ".....Is that supposed to be an apology?" He shrugged again and slung an arm back around her. "Take it as you want, Heart eyes.~ But, you still owe me for savin' ya.~" "Of course. What do you want." "A date." ".....What?" She looked up at him. "Now?" "Nah. Julian's gonna get a date soon and I promised to tag along." "And I'm the tag along date?" "Exactly!" ".....You're terrible." He only chuckled and buried his head into her hair. "I know."

[popculturebuffet]

The Owl House Reviewcaps: Through the Looking Glass Ruins or Be Gus Do Crimes

Hello All You Happy People! And welcome back to my Owl House coverage.. man i’ts been a hectic.. few hours. Yeah since I was on vacation I didn’t get around to the last review till right before watching today’s episode. And if you came for Lumity.. oh boy oh boy are you going to get it with this week in ways i’ll get into under the cut. Needless to say this is the most Lumity episode yet. We also get a lot of my boy gus in a sequel to an episode I never saw because god insists on punishing me for my episode skipping hubris. So join me under the cut for a full review/recap of this episode. 

We open.. with Gus dispondent and Luz coming by to comfort him/explain the scene that was clearly cut out of this episode for time to the audience: Gus was trying to help Willow with some Pixies, strong like Bill Bixby, but his illusions only pissed them off more and they took it out on Willow who got a wholloping. So now he feels bad and feels bad his illusions aren’t enough. Luz comforts him and tells him it’ll be fine by tommorow. Cue Gus waking up tommorow and cue our theme song. 

 Anyways  Gus is in a funk and lying on his bed depressed starring at the ceiling.... when did Gus become a younger me? Anyways Willow calls but Gus lets it go to his inbox, and we get to see his answering video message, which is the best answering message since....

And Gus used that for his last message. His current one is having a VERY reluctant king introduce him as Gus The Illusion Master. Willow is calling because Gus sent some get well soon illusions that are projecting his overcompesating for feeling he got hurt she politley wants dispelled which makes him feel worse. He summons and destroys them of course but he feels extra super duper shitty. 

So Luz comes by.. to transparently butter him up to use his library card. Yeah apparently she’s been doing this a lot, having now fully realized she has feelings for Amity and AMity has feelings for her and Gus has clearly been their buffer for a while. I’m sure Willow would react with just as much suprise if she could move her face right now. 

But this time Luz just dosen’t need his card to woo a lady, she needs it to look up the human Gwendy mentioned last episode. Frankly Gus probably would’ve agreed anyway: he pray for death but death won’t come anywhere. 

Gus is questioning being an illusion witch. It’s not that he’s not good at it, he’s fan fucking tastic... it’s just with it not being able to MAKE things, he feels he’s less in comparison to other witches and wants to branch out. While Luz is all for trying new stuff, it’s why she choose “all of them” for her magic major, she gets his reason for doing so isn’t healthy. As if to prove Gus’ lack of self worth right, my faviorite extra nearly gets ran over by a thing. If your wondering who that is.. you clearly didn’t see the image up top but as a refresher it’s this lil guy:

Yes Braxas, that adorable little kid with the fangs made for eating throats and with the voice of an demon that just swallowed several angels. I loved the kid just from design but his adorable scene with Amity clinched it for me. So naturally him getting anothe rmajor scene being adorable and saved by three well meaning teens from Glandus High made my fucking week, which was pretty good honestly. And to sweeten the pot we meet his dad!

They are so fucking cute.. and terrifying.. but also cutteeeee. Just look at them, LOOK AT THEMMMM. I love them both so much. I just want a spinoff abotu them, their domestic adventures, the sheep they clearly eat whole to steal their sheepy power, all of it. Give me this series disney you cowards! You wasted three minutes of my life with “The Good, The Bart and the Loki” on the promise of an actually funny marvel spoof, you wasted my pateince by making Helen Fucking Lovejoy, the worst simpsons character, Captain Marvel, and you wasted Tom Hiddleston. Give me my teeth monster family show!

Where am I? Ah right, So Gus goes to introduce himself to the cool kids: Brea (Freckled Girl), Gavin (Tall kid) and Angmar (Some yellow creature thing), who are from Glandus High and are going on a quest and invite gus along. THeir also running with their old buddy and current Hexside student Matholomule: aka “That asshole whose episode I haven’t watched because I forgot to”. Yeah a huge oversight on my part and I should’ve figured missing an episode would’ve come back to haunt me and that ghost is in the face. I did read about it though so I didn’t miss anything. He’s also as fond of gus as ever despite the kid saving his lfie and mocks him with Gus planning not to go on the quest due to his self esteem. God he really is a young me.. except black and with a bright future ahead of him. But Luz interupts as she was using the invisiblity glyph to give them space and h ypes Gus up as a super witch and while he really DOSEN’T know any othe rmagic, Luz gives him her Glyphs she brought with her, because she’s prepared dammit, to fake it till he makes.. out with Brea whose clearly into him. And to show Matholmew  up since he sucks and she’s fine with showing up jerks. 

So our two stories diverge and while I know your all chomping at the bit to get to the Lumity Story your just going to have to wait a sec because Gus’s plot is the a-plot, The LUmity Plot closes out the episode, and I want my boy gus to have a chance to shine so

The Gus Plot I”m Sure Most of You Want to Skip But Please Don’t:

So for the two of you who stuck around this plot goes how you’d expect at first: Our heroes brave deadly dangers, Gus uses the Glyphs to cheat his way out, Mattholmule is humilated. The natural order of thigns for a liar revealed plot. We do find out though that Glandus runs on a Survivial of the Fittest sort of doctrine and that Brea wants to make things better by getting the stones. Also she clearly has a thing for Gus. Eh it interupts my ship but it’s fine it’s not like she’s evil amirite? We also find out more about the group: Gavin wants the power up to get his dad’s love and Angmar wants it to build a garden because he’s clearly ont a bad person deep down. 

So our heroes find the target of their quest: some powerful stones that amp up magic. So basically the Power Infinity Stone. Good to know. Anyway our heroes dink around with it till Gus makes a horrific discovery: these stones are on illusionist GRAVES. 

Sadly what was a budding ship for me becomes a big dollop of no as it turns out Brea and friends are a bunch of assholes. I mean they saved my precious baby angel but i’ts disapointing: I liked these kids and they turn out to be team rocket. That’s never a good feeling. A giant monster shows up to seemingly end the conflict.. but it turns out that itself is an 

As it’s caster disapates it when Gus tries to counter it with his own monster. Turns out Illusionists were set to guard the stones because since the stones don’t enhance their powers. .because they “can’t enhance what isn’t real”

Okay this makes no sense to me as ... wouldn’t it just make the ilusions real? or give the caster the ablility to make BIGGER illusions or more convincing ones, like maybe not solid ones but ones with breath or something? It just makes ZERO sense that something that just increases power.. woudln’t simply because “it creates illusions” epsecially given this episode shows just HOW powerful illusions can get in this reality. Did they just not want to break the story by giving Gus the power of a god if he went to this old man to borrow a stone? This area is out of the way, not TOO far from bonesburough and clearly these stones are there if he truly needs them so their not any less of a plot hole if they have ot prepare for a big fight, have time to get them and don’t. This entire part of the episode just takes me out of what is already a decent if fairly well trod plot.

Gus gets tied up by the threeasslbellros and is depressed he seemingly can’t do anything.. but he gets help from an unlikely source: Matholomule whose not only super not happy to be back into the same bullied dynamic with is old “friends”, but despite not being able to show it he DOES genuinely appricate gus and the lesson that he taught him: that even “weak’ magic can be strong. So with our heroes free they need a plan. The Old Illusionist has a pretty good one...

I’m not even joking.... that’s the episode’s joke. I wish he had, I love dogs even terrifying ones. But no, Gus has a better idea.. and procedes to show why you do NOT fuck with the illusion master.  He starts small first though, using the facts he learned earlier to lure Brea’s minons away with a butterfly and Gavin with a mustache because that’s apparnetly what their dad actualy looks like

Brea isn’t fooled.. but gus COUNTED on that and pulls a full fucking Thanos in Infinity War.. okay he dosen’t make her die by dust cloud but he does pull the EXACT trick Thanos did on the guardians, crafting an area wide illusion of zombies, spooky atmosphere and Brea herslef crumbling to dust and turning to a statue. 

I didn’t know he had it in him. And he does this WITHOUT the mind stone, meaning it was all under his own power. I shoulld’ve realized he was capable of this though. Mastermind is able to do a LOT of stuff over in X-Men, currently part of X-Corp, I just didn’t think Gus could go this far but he did. The Illusion Master points out that Gus has a keen eye for people and detail.. and he coudl be a master himself. The master decides to bury the graveyard but gus offers another solution: he and Math will come back on weekends to help shore up defenses. The guy likes that, and the tow are KIND OF friends now. A happy ending. And as for me.. eh I already have my other ship ready for gus. I think. I’m not sure he’s 12 anymore. (Shrugs) Frosta will just have to find someone else I dunno. Okay let’s get to what you came here for

What You Actually Came to See:

So we transition from Gus being pretty fucking ungodly powerful when he wants to be to the Gays Winning even more as Luz watches Amity wrap up story time for the day watches Amity with her hair down and finds she really REALLY likes it while Amity bargins with that kid from the season 1 credits to read her whatever she wants if she gets her hair tie back. “Yay i’m going to learn how to summon the dark lord!” Well Dormmamu DOES love to bargin but I think he’s a bit busy at the moment little angel. 

And why yes that is a planet sized Dormmamu and why yes you may void your bowels now. Thank you. Eh maybe she’ll get to meet the guardians of the galaxy and ride on his giant planet head. Who knows? And again yes Dormmamu really is fighting the guardians of the galaxy. Things like this keep me young. 

Anyway it’s then that the disaster bisexual twins notice Luz drooling and interupt her for their own personal amusment. Also Amira is riding Edric piggyback for some reason. 

Since this is their first proper apperance this season I can say I love these two big shits. Especailly now they’ve gone from being unintentional bullies to loveable tricksters genuinely looking out for their sister and new friend/sister’s crush. Dosen’t mean they won’t needle poor luz though Luz: You here to pick up Amity? Amira: No looks like you got that covered.  Edric is actually here for skincare he has a date with.. someone. They don’t specificy gender: could be a boy, a girl, gender fluid or non-binary. This show is progressive as fuck and the twins both strike me as bi or pan as shit. He also apparently accedently texted a poem to his date’s mom something Amiria REALLY needs to stop telling people. I do like how the two have slowly developed their own personalities though: Amira’s a bit more mature but also willing ot turn their antics onto her own brother, and Eldric’s a bit goofier if still suave. I like it.  Once Amity actually enters the scene and sees Luz the diaster twins make tracks to go do something.. over there. The not even remotely ambigiously gay duo make eyes with each other and blush and i’ts very adorable before Luz gets to the point: earlier before oggling amity she searched “Human’ in the library computers... crystal balls.. same deal (We also found out Movies exist in this universe and god do I want to see one before the series is up. ) and found out that the Human Gwendolyn mentioned (I thought it was the library because the weekend I watched that episode was very tyring), living in Bonesborough donated his journal. And no he didn’t have 6 fingers. Sadly we’re not getting the obvious crossover yet. 

Anyways, the good news is they have it.. the bad news is it’s in the forbidden stacks. The worse news is ironically enough Stacks does not work in the forbidden stacks so they can’t rely on the stump kids for help. The forbidden Stacks are the domain of Amity’s boss and head librarian Malfus, who on the outset looks like some creepy glowy eyed abomnination thing. Amity agrees but tells Luz they have to be extra careful or she’ll loose her job. Because this is a job now and not just something she does on the weekends. I dn’t know and your about to not care. 

So the two have to sneak around silently and get some ship tease having to duck down, then blushing like crazy then talking things over, as Amity is worried they’ll get fed to the Book Worms.. which Luz , while pointing out in the human world “is a cute term for nerds”, is experinced enough at this point to get it’s some horrible blood eating creature. 

But Luz offers to show Amity around the human world.. and thus makes it VERY clear both just how MUCH she values her crush, and that she has no intention of abandoing those back in bonesborough when she gets home. She’s just worried about her mom.. whose currently at home with a doppleganger she knows nothing about because this season is plotty as hell and I am here for it. 

Anyways our heroines continue their journey, which as @jess-the-vampire​ pointed otu was framed as some epic indania jones style adventure in teh solicit for this episode. .but is really more about two teenagers grappling with both their feelings for one another and their tendency to do really dumb shit because of those feelings. Case in point upon finding a mouse ate everything Luz screams in frustration and their found. Malfus reaction is understandable. 

Actually his reactoin... is easily the funniest joke of the entire series so far. And I don’t say that lightly this series is funny as hell.. but my god the timing on this one... Malfus turns his gaaze toward them shrieks out Amity’s name.. then hard cut to him talking about how disapointed he is to her like he’s Mr. Vandriesen.  So yeah Amity’s fired and not happy about it and Luz blames hersef.. and has become clear now that’s a pattern: Luz blames herself for EVERYTHING: For being trapped here, for Eda being cursed, for this very gay shenanigan. It’s honestly a clever turn for the character: things like being an outcast at school, her mom turning her back on her, the various slipups she got into SEEMED like it just sorta slipped off.. but it didn’t. It all gunked around her heart till it started eating her alive and we’re seeing that now. 

As someone with both autisim and anxiety.. this honestly hits REALLY close to home. I did have a better school: mine at least TRIED to help.. but at the end of the day the program I was in had teachers who while they WANTED to help me, mostly had to try and get me back to class rather than tackle the roots of my anxiety or rage issues that were causing my freakouts. Luz dosen’t even seem to have THAT: her school just wants her to “be normal already” when that’s clearly not an option for her, and I feel her acting out and the abundance of snakes is her simply not getting it and simply getting punished over and over instead of actually trying to reach her as a person. It’s not like she didn’t ge tinto trouble at hexside too, but the diffrence is bump eventaully listened: he let her back in then gladly changed the tract system simply because it made logical sense to. Bump actually invested in Luz as a person instead of just a problem to solve. Her whole life.. that’s what Luz has been to people and no wonder she feels like that. Evne Camillia, who i’m sure has TRIED to be nice with her.. just wants a NORMAL daughter. I’m not saying Camillia is a BAD person, she’s a single struggling mother with a unique and somewhat difficult child... they clearly love each other.. but instead of understanding her she tried shoving her in a box and got a doppleganger out of that box instead. She so dosen’t try to understand luz.. she can’t see a replacement for what it is. No one before Eda really TRIED to understand her so it’s no wonder when things go terrible Luz blames herself and ONLY herself. 

Amity dosen’t accept this though and points out it was her choice... but isn’t that much more healthy, wondering WHY she does Dumb stuff around luz and wishing she didn’t... and Luz admits she does the same.

Amity gay panics and runs away from the situatoin. So after we finish up the other plot we cut to that night where Amity’s in her room with the diaster twins, with Edric apparently fiddling with some pimples and Amira comforting Amity whose still at a loss, admitting these feelings are new and scary. And that’s.. shockingly and refreshingly realistic. Romantic feelings someitmes can scare the shit out of you. Amity is also confused as she never USED to be like this.. but Amiria ponits out the obvious: Sure.. but she wasn’t HAPPY like hse used to be. Luz makes her happy and made her a better person. 

As if on Cue Luz shows up at the Window, beaten to all hell and having gotten Amity her card back. As it turns out Malfus isn’t unresonable.. he just made her go through some trials that involved sorting books and taming the paper dragon. Awww.. now I want to see the paper dragon. She also understands if Amity never wants to see her again and leaves. Amity is abssolutely touched by this.. and when Amira asks if she wants her roots touched up.. Amity decides against it. She goes not with Green, the color of her abusivie waiters nightmare of a mother or her absentee enabling dad.. but of HER. Of abominations.. and of Love.

So yeah Amity has a whole new hair style complete with having her hair down and it being a light purple. Looks neat, took some getting used to. So Amity goes to talk to Luz, and tells her what she did was sweet etc with Luz happy to have her back but bemoaning the fact the mouse ate all her book. Turns out though said mouse is an Echo Mouse, a mouse that literally eats the contents of books and can play it back. 

As such it plays back the first chapter in a REALLY beautiful paper cut out style. I’ve always loved this style of animation, it’s always so beautiful and jarring in just the right way and always makes things look extra awesome for flashbacks or exposition. 

So we find out the first visitor to the Isles was Phillip Whitbane, a gentleman who stuided throughly and by the time of making the diary, had gone on a quest to construct a way out. He was clearly enchanted by the place, though if he got home remained a mystery. What isn’t.. is that HE made the door, and the diary, which he donated as a thank you for the denzins of the boilling isles helping him, is his record of HOW. Luz has a way home. 

Before we move on to the biggest moment, yes bigger than conforimation there WAS another human, naturally everyone assumed Phillip was Bellos including my good friend Jess. As usual with this sort of thing we talked over the hell out of this. Jess still thinks it’s Belos, as it matches up perfectly and while Phillip has a diffrent va... the creators aren’t THAT stupid and knew we’d check that. But the voices are similar. 

A lot of people though think Belos is Phillip’s descnedant and I agree.. just not in the way some are saying. Some say Phillip had a child on the isles.. I disagree as even if it was century’s ago a half human would’ve been SOMETHING people woudl’ve noticed and Belos came out of NOWHERE. He’d have to have killed his entire family to hide it, which is possible.. but I have a better theory: Belos is Phillip’s HUMAN descendant. Phillip made it home, wrote of his journey and simply kept the door. Given that would’ve been the 1600′s, that means Belos likely got obessed or curious abotu his ancestor and his tales and 370 years later, found the door and went there himself, likely leaving the door in the ruins of Phillips house, as Jess expertly pointed out a fact I missed: that the place Eda found the book was NOT her home, meaning wherever it was wa slikely repurposposed by the healing coven and Belos simploy didn’t make a stink about it because he didn’t want to tip his hand or simply coudln’t find the door , it being lost in the 50 years since he go there. There’s a lot of vagueties and either theory works, I just wanted to throw mine into the ring. 

So with that Luz is happy to have both a way home an da new friend.. and we get to the moment we’ve been waiting for: Amity tells luz “You always have a way of getting into people’s hearts”.. and gently kisses her on the cheek. it’s fucking precious, it’s magical and it’s oh so sweet. Not too much too soon, but still just enough to show yeah, this is finally happening and to make it WAY to clear to easily avoid what’ she feels. Eldric approves the “bold move” and Amity.. naturally goes back int ogay panic mode saying “goodbye forever” and asking why she did that while Luz collapses in a lovestruck heap. I couldn’t of planne dit better myself. Fucking perfect. Also the episode just.. ends right there. I don���t THINK the next episode will follow up on this right away. but given it does take place at hexside there’s HOPE. Even if i’ts mostly about other stuff. But just.. HOLY FUCK was that adorable. 

Final Thoughts:

HOLY FUCK WAS THAT ADORABLE. 

Also this episode was pretty good. While Gus is my boy... his plot was sadly pretty stock and while I didn’t see the Glandus Trio’s betryal coming, I SHOULD’VE as the “I want to make it a better place” line was WAY too vauge. Still it was a decent enough plot that showed off Gus’ strengths as well as Isaac Ryan Browns, who REALLY gets to shine with this one and show off his new voice. Matholomule ending up an ally instead of a fuckwit was also a nice turn.

The real show of course was the Lumity subplot... it was just a really nice, emotoinal, adorable ride, with great suspense, the best gag of the series and genuine, honestly written romantic tension. Robles and Whitman just have pitch perfect chemistry and getting an episode essentially just the two of them showed it off to the best it’s been so far, and the payoff to it was utterly adorable.  This isn’t just a delightfully visable queer romance from a company that is homophobic on a regular day and a creator who fought hard to make it happen.. it’s just a well written relationship in general: there’s no drawn out will they or won’t they crap or misunderstandings or any of the usual relationship pitfalls: no “Oh they wont’ be intresting together” bullshit. Just a well written, chemstiry filled realtionshp built up slowly but surely till it finally bubbled over here with more room to grow. Amazing stuff. 

Next time: Golden Guard Episode! I know one person who will be excited.. and two because i’m also excited. 

If you liked this review and this accurately reflects your need for more content from me that’s owl house or disney related in general. 

Then consider donating to my patreon, patreon.com/popculturebuffet. Right now i’m having a membership drive and have adjusted my stretch goals. this means if you join for just one buck a month in addition to getting acess to exclusive reviews, I will also review a thing for each person that joins up and once I get three more (I currently have two) I will review ALL of season 1 of owl house in two meaty posts! Other stretch goals include reviews of Gravity falls and bonus goals just for this rally include reviews of ALL of Infinity Train and Steven Universe  so if ANY OF THAT interests you hop on over, sign up. Just doing so RIGHT now and being the first to do it will unlock Season 1 reviews of Tuca and Bertie, Amphibia and the Great North and guarantee a review of Tuca and Bertie Season 2 when it wraps! If you want to see all the juicy rewards check out THIS POST HERE.  Until that tell the whole town i’m bouncin. 

[flowersandskeletons526]

“The Harshest Future We Could Have Imagined” - Lumity Future AU Fanfic Part 1

This is set about five years in the future after “Agony of a Witch.” Luz returned home through a broken portal and couldn’t return, but in four years, without the portal being fixed, Amity and the others had to focus on their lives in the present, including the rebellion they started. Now, what will happen when Luz returns to the war-torn world she used to love?

(Link to Ao3 --- https://archiveofourown.org/works/28305051/chapters/69356406)

----

“You really have to go?”

“I do.”

Luz squeezed Amity’s hands, standing before the portal with her backpack and her cloak. Amity kept her eyes down. She struggled to fight back tears, clutching Luz’s hands like a lifeline. They knew this was going to happen. Both had dreaded it all summer, ever since Luz revealed her exact situation to her friends. Willow and Gus already composed themselves - well, Gus was attempting to - and Eda and King were trying and failing not to cry downstairs. Lilith was somewhere rolling her eyes and hiding her emotions. The twins waited outside to bring Amity home once all their goodbyes were said.

Amity glanced at the fractured portal. After finding that Emperor Belos had managed to put it back together, yet another espionage mission was mounted to steal it back. Now, Luz could get back, but she only had this one chance. It killed Luz, having to leave but knowing he was still in power. Especially with Eda and Lilith rendered magicless after the failed petrification… nothing was certain now. Nothing but the fact that Luz had to leave.

Reading Amity’s mind, Luz touched her cheek and turned her head away from the portal. “Amity, I’m going to come back,” she said. “I promise I will.”

“How?”

“I don’t know. I know that I will, though. I got here before, right? I can do it again.”

“When the portal worked. What if we can’t put it back together? What if there’s no way to fix it, w-what if Belos gets it again, what if-”

“Hey, don’t think about that.” Luz pulled her in, wrapping her arms tight around her. Amity buried her face against the crook of Luz’s neck. “I’ll be back. Don’t worry, okay? You’re not going to get rid of me that easily.”

“Promise?”

“I promise.” She pulled back and pressed their foreheads together. “Don’t go soft on me just yet, Blight.”

Amity giggled through her tears. “In your dreams.”

“Look after this place for me, okay?”

“I will.”

She cupped the witch’s cheek. “And Ami?”

Amity blushed at the nickname. “Y-Yeah?”

“Don’t forget me.”

“Never.”

Luz planted a quick kiss on Amity’s cheek and pulled her into a tight hug. Amity held onto her hand as long as she could as she turned to the portal. Hiding her tears, Luz waved and flashed one last bright smile over her shoulder. She disappeared through the wall of light.

The shaking portal collapsed into a pile of smoldering pieces. Amity collapsed in a heap of silenced sobs.

****

Amity took a deep breath as she approached the Owl House. Hooty, distracted by a bug, perked up when he spotted her.

“Hoot! Hi, angry green haired friend! What’s that? Cupcakes? I looooove cupcakes! Hoot!”

Amity bared her fangs. “Don’t touch me, bird tube!”

“Alright! Hoot!”

“Sorry. Here, that one’s for you.” Amity tossed the treat in the air and cringed when Hooty swallowed it whole. “Can I come in?”

“Sure, you can! Wait, was the cupcake a bribe?”

“It’s a peace offering.”

“Okay!”

The door swung open. Eda and Lilith sat at the kitchen table, chatting idly, while King slept curled into a ball on the couch. They paused and looked up when she took a step inside. She swallowed her fear and waved.

“Hi, Eda. Ms. Clawthorne.” The latter greeting was delivered with just a twinge of venom. After hearing about how Eda was captured, about what happened to Luz, Amity still harbored a touch of resentment, even if everyone else seemed to have forgiven it. “Is it alright if I come in?”

“Sure, kid,” Eda said. Any hatred towards the Blights as a whole had been forgiven in Amity’s case. Amity attributed that to Eda’s constant subtle teasing about how she acted around Luz. Although now it just sounded like pity in her voice.

Amity stood beside Eda and set a pack of apple blood boxes on the table next to her.

Eda frowned. “How did you get your hands on this?”

“Emira.”

“She’s one of the twins I almost died with, right? The smart one?”

“Yes.”

“Ah. Well, thanks, kid.”

“You’re welcome. Luz mentioned it.”

Eda nodded and turned aside. Amity swallowed the lump in her throat and stepped over to the couch, kneeling beside King. She gently shook him until he woke with a quiet, “Weh?”

“Hi, King.”

The little demon scowled. “Hello, offering killer.”

“About that.” Amity set the cupcake on the couch in front of him. “I’m sorry.”

He sat up, inspecting the offering. “What’s wrong with it?”

“What? Nothing. It’s to make up for your cupcake I squished. I’m sorry.”

King tilted his head. He looked between Amity and the cupcake for a minute before pulling the sweet closer to him. “Offering accepted. I retract any curses I laid on you.”

“I, uh, thank you?”

“You’re welcome.”

Eda beckoned to Amity as she stood. “C’mere, kid. Come sit. Now, not that I’m complaining, but I have to ask. What’s up with all this.”

Amity took the offered seat and bowed her head. “Luz. She… she wanted me to stick around. She told me to before she left, so I figured it would be good to at least try to make up for what I’ve done. You are her family, after all.”

Eda sighed and rubbed her eyes. “Right. That’s right. Well, look, you don’t have anything to make up for anymore. You and the other two troublemakers are always welcome here. I know Luz will want to see you all when she gets back.”

“Do you think she will come back?”

“Of course. I mean hey, it’s already been what, a month? And we’ve already got all the books possible on fixing the old thing.”

“Four weeks, two days, and five hours,” Lilith interrupted. Amity and Eda stared at her. She cleared her throat. “I’ve been keeping track.”

Eda smirked and squeezed her sister’s hand. She turned back to Amity, reaching out to touch her shoulder. Amity flinched beneath the gentle pat. Eda paused, just long enough for Amity to relax, and tried again. This time, Amity just sighed as Eda rubbed her back.

“She’ll come back. It’s Luz, after all. Knowing that kid, she’s already got a new portal halfway finished in the human world.”

“You really think so?”

“Absolutely.”

****

“Absolutely not!”

“But Mom, I-”

“Amity, that is enough!” Odalia Blight slammed her hands down on her desk, looming over her youngest daughter standing across from her. “You are forbidden from returning to that den of criminal activity ever again. Do you understand me? If I ever hear about you so much as heading in that direction again, you will be sorry. Titan, I should have known this would happen after that fiasco at the petrification. That Clawthorne woman never should have been in the Emperor’s coven to begin with, considering her criminal sister.”

“Eda isn’t a criminal! Okay, well, technically, but not for any good reasons! And Lilith isn’t bad either, not anymore. She’s better than she was when you approved of her!”

Odalia scoffed. “Please. I know what is best for you, young lady, and I have made my decision. You are not to return to that place ever again or associate with anyone connected to it, including that half witch and the reporter’s runt.”

“But Luz-”

“Oh, the human! That’s where this began! I should have put a stop to this behavior as soon as Boscha’s parents told me you were hanging around her. This is what is best for you.”

“No it’s not!” Amity hollered. Odalia froze at the outburst. “Luz is my best friend and I’m not going to let you talk about her like she’s nothing! Not her, not Willow, and not Gus! They are better than anyone you ever picked for me and care about me more than you ever did.”

“You will do what I say! I am your mother!”

“I want what is best for you!” Odalia protested.

“You want a perfect daughter as head of the Emperor’s coven,” Amity retorted. “I’m not abandoning them like I already abandoned Willow. And I’m not abandoning the Owl House, either. You can’t make me.”

“I don’t care!”

Amity regretted the words the moment they left her tongue.

Odalia froze. Her face went deadly cold, eyes like ice as she leveled a vicious glare at her daughter. Amity shrunk.

“You don’t care that I’m your mother?”

“I-I… I didn’t mean…”

“Hmph. Fine. Then our name shouldn’t matter to you. If you are going to keep associating with the Clawthornes, you can take their name instead. Anything but Blight.”

“What?”

“Get out of this house, Amity.”

“Mom!”

“Get. Out.”

Amity took a step back. Tears burned her eyes. She clenched her fists and scowled.

“Fine.”

She spun on her heel and marched out. Flying to her room, she slammed the door behind her and grabbed a bag. She shoved a few regular outfits inside, along with her books, her school uniform, and her box of keepsakes with her Grom tiara in it. She shouldered the pack and bolted out of the house.

The twins intercepted her before she reached the door. Their ever present smiles disappeared when they saw her face, streaked with tears.

“Mittens, what’s wrong?” Emira asked.

“Ask Mom.” Amity shoved past them.

“Wha- Amity, wait, where are you going?”

“The Owl House!”

The massive doors of Blight Manor slammed shut behind her.

Casting a light spell, she ran through the Isles all the way to the Owl House. She never stopped or looked back, even as hot tears poured down her cheeks. When she reached her destination, Hooty let her in without so much as a hoot.

Eda gave her just a passing glance as first when she marched in, then whipped her head around when Amity’s appearance registered. Amity stood in the doorway, shaking and panting, clutching her pack to her chest. She scrubbed at her face and scrambled to regain some of her composure.

“Eda, Lilith, I, um… C-Can I…?”

“Kid, what happened?” Eda asked.

Amity shook her head. “My mom kicked me out. She told me I had to stop coming here and said I had to do what she said because she’s my mother and I told her I didn’t care so she kicked me out. I just… Can I stay here? Please? I-I don’t have anywhere else to go right now.”

“Of course. Come on, you’ll stay in Luz’s old room. Lilith, help me get her set up.”

That night, Amity cried herself to sleep in a sleeping bag on the floor, clutching her pillow and cursing all the years she spent in that controlling hell already.

The next day, the twins came by with the rest of her belongings, most of them dirty and broken.

“She threw them out the window?” she asked when they told her what happened.

“Well, she had the servants do it for the most part, but yes,” Edric replied. “Look, Amity, if you just apologize-”

“No,” Amity snapped. “I’m not apologizing to her. I’m staying here.”

Emira put a hand on her twin’s shoulder. “Ed, drop it. Look, Mittens, we’re here if you need us, okay? We’ll see you at school.”

The two hugged their baby sister and waved to Eda and Lilith sitting in the living room. Amity watched them disappear down the trail before shutting the door silently. She leaned her head against the wood for a quick moment before straightening.

“You okay, kid?” Eda asked.

“I’m fine.”

The next morning, Amity approached Lilith with a pair of clippers in hand. “Lilith?”

“Yes, Amity?”

“You do your own hair, right?”

“I dye it on occasion, when the orange roots start to become noticeable.”

“Will you help me cut my hair, please?”

“Of course.” Lilith closed her book and stood. “How did you want to cut it?”

“Cut off all the green dye.”

“Are you sure? That would make your hair quite short.”

“I’m sure. I just want it gone. I’m not going to let anyone force me to dye my hair again.”

Lilith frowned. “Your mother-”

“Please help me cut it.”

“Alright. Come here.”

****

“Okay, these are the outposts we know of so far.”

Gus spread a map over a rickety table. Orbs of light hovered in the tunnel above them, illuminating the little meeting place dug beneath Hexside. Willow and Amity knelt on either side of him and watched as he gestured to little markers on the creased parchment. Emira stood behind Gus, watching over his shoulder with Viney and the rest of the detention kids.

“Belos has squads of guards here, here, and here, and then multiple roving patrols through the marketplace and around Hexside. As long as we stay in the tunnels for meetings, we should be fine.”

Amity idly ran her hand over the short sides of her undercut, with the long part on top pulled into her normal short ponytail. With Lilith’s help over two years ago, she cut out all the green dye and never touched it with a drop of pigment afterwards.

After the meeting, the group said their goodbyes and took off down different tunnels of Gus’s making. Willow and Emira hung around with Amity as she extinguished the light orbs.

“Has Eda made any progress on the portal?” Willow asked after a moment of silence.

Amity sighed. “No. Nothing. We haven’t even gotten a flicker from it. I…” She shook her head and extinguished another light, trying not to think about the missing human. “I don’t know what we’re going to do.”

“How long has it been?”

“Too long.”

Willow nodded and touched Amity’s hand. “They’ll find a way to fix it.”

“I hope.”

Willow took off, leaving Amity alone with her sister. Emira leaned against the wall with her arms crossed. Amity stopped and turned to her sister.

“Have you heard anything from Edric?” the elder asked.

“Nothing. Has he been talking to you?”

“Not a word. He hasn’t told Mother and Father, I know that, but he stopped talking to me as soon as he learned about this. He doesn’t even play pranks with me anymore.”

Amity scoffed. “He’s trying to become their favorite child.”

“I think he is, at this point.”

“Right.” She held a light orb between her hands. “I heard they made Dad the leader of the emperor’s coven.”

“They did. It’s no wonder Edric is trying to get in so badly. I still can’t believe he’s doing all this.”

“Me neither. Look, I have to get back to the Owl House and keep helping Eda with the portal.”

Emira bowed her head with a tight lipped grimace, watching Amity with pity in her eyes. “Mittens, do you really think you’re going to get her back?”

“I know I will!” Amity snapped, but the anger faded quickly. “She promised she would come back.”

“Not all promises can be kept.”

“I know that, but we’re going to find a way. We have to.”

“Okay.” Emira hugged her sister and kissed the top of her head, still so much taller than her even after the years that had passed. “You’ll figure this out, Mittens. They can fix it.”

Amity just nodded and hugged her sister tighter.

****

Edric stood on the edge of a crumbling roof. Fires raged around him in the burning marketplace, littered with the bodies of fallen Emperor’s coven soldiers and wounded rebellion fighters fleeing the scene. His white cloak was stained red, and his sharp beaked mask hung around his neck. He leaned heavily on his staff.

In the street below, Amity wielded her own staff with its snarling tiger palisman. She growled at her brother while her friends fell into line behind her. Emira stood at her side, watching Edric not with anger, but heartbreak in her eyes.

“Ed, please!” she called. “This isn’t you!”

“Enough, Emira!” he roared. “I’m done being the stupid twin. Now it’s time for me to do what you and Amity failed to. I’m going to lead the Emperor’s coven after Dad and my career is going to start with ending your stupid rebellion!”

“You know Belos is wrong!” Amity protested. “This isn’t going to end how you want, Edric. Please just come with us.”

“Never!”

Amity shook the tears from her eyes and cast a spell circle. “Fine.”

A pink flame lit in her hand. Emira grabbed her arm.

“Mittens, no!”

“If he’s not going to join us, he’s against us! Belos is going to fall, Edric. Belos, the coven system, all of it. Including you.”

“Grow up, Amity. It’s time all three of us started acting like Blights. If you two won’t, I will.” Edric lifted his head. “Soldiers, retreat!”

Amity watched her brother flee with the rest of the soldiers. She gripped her staff and turned to Willow and Gus and the others standing behind her. “Everyone out of here!” she ordered. “Before they send reinforcements back. At least we know our enemy now.”

“Our brother,” Emira said quietly.

“Our enemy,” Amity repeated. “Willow, Gus, let’s go.”

The pair followed Amity back to the Owl House. They walked in silence, all three contemplating the day’s battle and the new development. There were suspicions of Edric’s involvement, but they hadn’t known the extent. And the fact that he was leading a command…

Amity, although hiding it beneath her rage, wanted to weep and curse at the sky. Her own brother! After all those years of him and Emira goofing off, never conforming to their parents’ expectation, leaving all the vicariously realized dreams to fall upon Amity, she never could have imagined him becoming so fed up with Emira’s jesting that he would turn his back on the both of them. She cursed under her breath thinking about it and forced the thoughts from her head. She couldn’t afford getting stuck in her thoughts now. She had the rebellion to think about, the rebellion that Willow founded and the two of them now led together. The rebellion, keeping the Owl House hidden, fixing the portal…

Titan, she couldn’t even afford to think about the portal anymore. Four years passed without anything working, and then the rebellion started with Willow’s attempted assassination of Belos a year ago.

Amity glanced at Willow beside her. A long scar wrapped around her eye from her forehead down to her jaw. She cut her hair short and wild to display it with pride. They all bore scars now, but Willow’s scarred face had become a symbol of the rebellion with her wanted poster plastered all over the Isles. Amity, although a leader herself, didn’t envy the responsibility Willow gained. Her speech all those years ago is what sowed the seeds, after all.

Hooty greeted them when they returned and flung the door open. Amity sighed and rubbed her eyes as they stepped inside, keeping her head down. She hadn’t noticed Willow and Gus stopping in their tracks by the door.

“Eda, Lilith, we found the new commander Belos has,” she said.

“Amity,” Eda said, rising from her seat. “Look up.”

She did.

Standing across from her was a tall girl with rich dark skin and fluffy brown hair pushed out of her face. Wide, fiery brown eyes locked with her golden stare. She was taller now, finally overtaking Amity, and her weak nerd arms had developed built and defined muscles. Her gently rounded ears were pierced with multiple golden rings. Despite everything, her bright smile was still the same, and it still sent Amity’s heart racing.

Amity sucked in a sharp breath.

“Luz?”

The girl grinned.

“Hey, Amity.”

[lampmanliveblogs]

Episode six, let’s go!

Oh wait, sorry, I must’ve clicked on the wrong thing or something. This is that U G O anime I’ve heard so much about

Uh-oh. That’s not good.

Say, um… Eda, you really were only bluffing last episode when you told Lilith the curse was getting worse, right? You were just shamelessly trying to emotionally manipulate your sister as all siblings do, right? The curse is not actually getting worse, right?

Aw man, I sure do wonder if this title is a reference to anything or something.

Prediction time! Eda is out of elixir and has to get more but for some reason, they can’t exit the house, so Hooty will sprout some legs or something and walk the entire house to where Eda can get more elixir.

Or maybe… okay, another idea; King and Luz goes to get more elixir, and Hooty has to watch over Eda, who gets increasingly more troublesome.

I suppose it kinda makes sense for this magical world to have anti-curse elixirs just readily available at the market. Wait, is this a shopping episode? Neat!

Demon hunters?

Uh, King? Maybe you should, like… not be here?

Luz, you’re baby too, you don’t get to ”baby” other babies.

Alright, but who hurt them? I just wanna… have a talk wit that person.

Ah, so Amity has a small girl squad, because of course she has.

”See, this is why I don’t have any of the mainstream social networks. I only have a tumblr and I only follow cool fanartists and livebloggers. Oh, and I also support The Lampman on patreon.” -Luz, probably

”I have no idea what you’re talking about.” -Gus, probably

Oh wait, slumber party episode then? Nice.

Oh hush up, less cool version of Tien Shinhan. Or did you not notice that one time Willow covered the entire school in vines and kicked Principal Bump’s Principal Butt?

Amity, you were there! You saw Willow defeat the principal and all the abomination you sent after her!

Or… she’s looking to the side and she told the others to knock it off… hm… Say, are those people really her friends, or are they just ”friends?” Could it be that she is afraid to show any weakness or admit to any wrongs in front of them, so she is trying to shut down the teasing without telling them that Willow is actually super strong?

Or am I just looking too deep into this? What do you, the people at home think?

Hey Gus, what exactly are you going to use that tunnel for?  And why would you want your beard to be haunted? And you still haven’t lost your baby fangs? Pfft, Luz wasn’t wrong before, you really are baby. Literally.

[axolator]

Script-A-Day #11: Bait and Switch by Jeremy

Shenanigans beget shenanigans beget shenanigans

Featured characters: Lycanthrope, Magician, Goon

Jinxes:

Lunatic/Mathematician: The Mathematician learns if the Lunatic attacks a different player(s) than the real Demon attacked.

NOTE: It’s a little unclear how to run Mathematician when the Lunatic didn’t wake up on a night the Demon did, and vice versa. Some STs (like myself) will ping the Mathematician only if the Lunatic actually attacked someone (since that’s the malfunctioning ability in question), while others will ping the Mathematician on any discrepancy in the kill selections. Make a decision, and tell your players how you’ll run this jinx before playing.

Fang Gu/Scarlet Woman: If the Fang Gu chooses an Outsider and dies, the Scarlet Woman does not become the Fang Gu.

Complexity: Intermediate-Advanced. Recommended for players who are here for a good time, not a long time, and those who enjoy lying for fun and for glory.

Database link (find the PDF and JSON for running it there!) - Note that the most recent version (v6.0.0) is one that I don't think holds up as well. v5.0.0 is my preferred version of this script to play and run.

Writeup below the cut!

Bait and Switch is a silly, goofy time centering around the Lycanthrope and Evil’s various methods of defusing it. Good has some very strong info and potential to control the night deaths in Lycanthrope, but if evil can take advantage of the misinfo they have access to & can outfox the Lycanthrope through clever Innkeeper, Goon, or Recluse bluffs, it can lead the good team down some very, very wrong tunnels.

A lot of the good team is highly synergistic with each other. Lycan/Ravenkeeper in the same bag can let good proc the latter at the perfect time, and the Mathematician picks up on a surprising amount here, often being the key to solving the game. In exchange, the Witch and Cerenovus can kill and silence the info-gatherers the good team needs, the SW can give the Demon an out, and the Poisoner can make a right mess of everything.

There is no Spirit of Ivory on the script, so be careful when putting Fang Gu and Goon in the same bag. I’d avoid it entirely in smaller games, and would advise you to be very mindful in larger games. With the Goon in general - make sure both Good and Evil can turn them. 3/4 Minions choose a player each night, and there are only so many Fortune Tellers, Innkeepers, Lunatics, and Lycanthropes to go around.

Some notes:

Consider running the General on a 5-star scale (introducing thumb slightly up/down ratings for good/evil slightly winning) to more comprehensively capture the state of the game. There's a lot to pick up on, both socially and mechanically - your General will appreciate the clarity!

Make sure you know how to run the Lycanthrope + Pukka interaction! If the Lycanthrope kills a player, then the Pukka poisons the Lycanthrope, the previously poisoned player will die, resulting in a doublekill that night. This is very powerful for the good team, since it confirms the Demon is a Pukka and hard confirms the Lycanthrope. This will probably happen if you put the two in the bag at the same time, so be prepared for that and build the bag accordingly.

How do we feel mid-way through Mathematician week? A math "ping" is +1 to their number:

If a player gets false information due to Recluse misregistration or external drunkenness or poisoning, it pings the Math.

If a mechanical ability (e.g. Innkeeper, Lycanthrope) fails to function due to misregistration or external drunkenness or poisoning, it pings the Math.

If a killing ability fails to kill someone due to them being unable to die that night (via Innkeeper, Lycanthrope, or Goon), their ability pings the Math.

If the Fang Gu can't jump to an Outsider due to being Innkeeper-protected, the Fang Gu pings the Math.

Oh, yeah, and the Fang Gu / Scarlet Woman jinx does not ping the Math. There's an argument to be made that jinxes count as an abnormality, but it's kind of silly in this case - I wouldn't.

That's kinda it, actually? The Mathematician isn't particularly hard to run here. :P

This writeup was written before the Lycanthrope ability got updated. If you’re using that version of the ability (not pictured but mentioned in the Lunar Eclipse post), here are some quick interaction notes with the Faux Paw (the one good player that globally misregisters as evil):

They cannot misregister meaningfully to the Clockmaker

The Empath sees them as evil

The FT’s red herring cannot be on them

They must misregister to the Savant (so be careful with how you craft your info!)

The Seamstress sees them as evil

If they choose the Goon and become drunk, the Goon turns evil

Important: as written, the Faux Paw must misregister to the Mathematician, meaning that none of these interactions ping them. Strongly consider houseruling this so that the Mathematician can track it.

That's it from me! This script is super fun and very silly - take it for a spin! See you tomorrow!

[k7l4d4]

Midnight Striga: Fairy Tail/Owl House Cross Fic Episode 5 Part 6

Once more, we delve into the world of Midnight Striga! Everybody Clap Your Hands!!

Eda roared, leaping toward the man, the monster, who had just casually murdered a child right in front of her!! Whipping her staff down to crush his skull, she was caught dumb when he casually leaned out of the way, a frost clad fist slamming into her face as she fell forward. A gasp of pain burst out as she was sent sprawling. Luckily, Eda had been in plenty of brawls. Gathering her wits, she tucked into a roll, coming up flat on her feet.

“If you think I’ll go easy on you ‘cause you’re human, you’ve got another thing coming!!” She shouted, eyes glancing at Lily, still prone against the wall. What was up with her, this was an emergency!! She growled, shifting herself to spring between Lily and the goons following that monster.

“Go... easy... on me? Pfft HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!!” The bastard laughed, actually laughed!, at Eda’s claim, as if the idea that she could beat him was so utterly ridiculous it deserved nothing but ridicule. The fact that his goons echoed him was like rubbing salt in the wound. “That- That was truly amusing!! In exchange for that wonderful jest, allow me to introduce myself.” He bowed, a mocking leer stretched across his face. “I am Rudolph Cranwin, practitioner of the most noble art of Frost Magic, not that I ever really cared about the alleged nobility of it; twas but another tool for me to kill with, nothing more. I look forward to seeing how long I can drag out your demise!!” He said cheerfully, as if her death would be the highlight of his day.

‘To this piece of shit, it might very well be.’ Eda bitterly thought to herself. Her thoughts were cut off by his next words.

“However,” Rudolph mused, “This crowd truly is far too large. Better to thin it out a bit before I let my precious brethren have their fun.” He raised his hand, a cold wind building into a ball in his palm. Eyes widening in shocked comprehension, Eda lunged forward, a massive ball of flames building along Owlbert. She had to get there in time, she needed to! If she didn’t… Rudolph gave her a mocking smile. “Too late, Owl Lady. Winter Spite.” With those two words, the ball exploded in all directions. A huge burst of extreme cold, so deep that it effortlessly extinguished Eda’s building spell, ripped through the stadium. In an instant, the entire place was coated in frost. Just from what she could see on the ground, Eda saw several Demons and Witches in the crowd frozen in place, ice and frost coating their bodies; from the few she could clearly see, at minimum twenty had died, a quarter of which were children. The smallest she could see looked to be about five. As if some signal had gone off, the hoard of Mages lurking behind Rudolph burst forth, screaming in bloody rage, sickening grins coating their faces, spells primed to rip and tear.

“Tree Shot!” “Big Head Blast!” “Sword Beam!” “Wind Cleave!”

Eda braced herself for the attacks; a tree root tore out of the ground, ripping across Eda’s ribs, a spell shaped like a giant head rocketed past her, a beam of light shaped like a blade cut into the stadium, and slashes of winds tore at the bystanders. And more. So many more. They weren’t all incredibly powerful, but they all had something in common; the palpable desire to hurt leaked out of each and every one. Bearing her fangs, Eda whirled around, launching a wave of magic upwards, cutting off as many spells as she could. Her quick timing was used against her, however, when a blast of cold smashed against her back, sending her flying.

“Ah, ah, ah! No interfering with the games, Owl Lady!” Rudolph mockingly chided. She turned her head towards him, eyes burning with hate. He merely grinned. “If the crowd wishes to live, they must defend themselves, or have one of their own act as a champion! You, and your sister I suppose, are my prey.” Rushing into her guard, his palm glowed. “Winter Punt.” A burst of frigid air formed underneath her gut, angled upward, and as it released, Eda choked on her own air as it drove her into the sky.

What was with this guy!? She had decimated Lily earlier, and while she was feeling some of the effects of pushing herself that hard, that quickly, she shouldn’t be this hampered. She sighed, freezing up as she saw her breath, as if she was in the middle of winter. She looked down, and saw her limbs coated in patches of frost, weighing her down, slowing her reactions, and who knows what else. She genuinely didn’t even feel the cold, not really, but her body was acting as if she was naked in a blizzard!!

Rudolph smirked. “I see you’ve noticed.” He chuckled, slowly stalking towards the Witch and her prone sibling. “Yes, a fun little aspect of my magic is that it clings to the body of those it hits, slowing them, filling them with cold, stilling the flow of magic. The longer our fight goes on, the slower, weaker, and more feeble you will become.” He cocked his head, a look of mockingly fake sympathy playing across his features. “Oh, how tragic, to be cut down so short.” He cackled, an uproarious sound that resounded through the arena.

“Bastard.” Eda bit out, trying and failing to flake the frost off her limbs. “If I wasn’t dealing with this, he’d be flatter than paper!!” She glanced back at her sister, still stuck in that pose from where she had dropped, dead to the world, tears pooling at her feet. ‘What’s up with you, Lily? We don’t have time for this! ...Please, whatever’s going on, I’ll help you, but you have to snap out of it!’

Luz growled as she and the others passed by yet another corpse, this one bearing the distinctive signs of Retic’s harvesting; the chest ripped open, organs carefully partitioned and severed from the surrounding tissue, and the corpse tossed aside like a rag doll, whatever body parts he didn’t take flopping uselessly. The others stoically pointed forward, steadfastly ignoring the gore and death surrounding them; they knew that if they stopped, they wouldn’t continue. But with each corpse, each tragedy they passed, the burning rage built up within them.

“So…” Willow drawled, trying to distract them from the horrors surrounding them. “You mentioned you were a member of this group. What was that like?” She instantly felt like kicking herself, but it was the only thing she could think of off the top of her head.

Luz snorted, but decided to answer; it would come out eventually. “I wasn’t a member of the Black Dog Squad specifically, but I often got saddled to them; they provided a big, bloody distraction, I completed the objective, whether it was stealing a priceless relic, assassinating an enemy, or just setting the pieces for something bigger in motion, I got it done. I hated every second of it.” It was truly the most painful chapter of her life, bar nothing.

“If you hated it, why did you join?” Amity stated more than asked. Truthfully, Amity cringed at the accusatory note in her voice; all of this pain was like nothing she had experienced before. The fact that the girl in front of her, that snarky, selfless, free-spirited girl had been in any way connected to a group capable of this? It was jarring. She had to know why.

Luz gave a small chuckle, the kind of empty, hollow ache that only came from someone trying to humor the most tragic and heartbreaking of requests. “I didn’t exactly want to join. Suffice to say, I entered Oroboros’ field of vision when I interfered in a few of their operations, not that I knew it at the time. They ended up deciding to pay me a visit. The reason? Join them, or someone will die.”

Gus cocked his head in perplexedness, deciding to ask what he felt they all were thinking. “Well, you didn’t seem to have a problem sacrificing yourself earlier.” He hoped he didn’t sound accusing, but it really was confusing to him.

Luz snorted, morbidly amused. “I never said I was the one being threatened with death.” She calmly replied, causing the others to pause for a second. Luz continued, nonchalant. “Yeah, whenever Oroboros decides it wants someone in its ranks, but they have a few too many morals, they take a hostage, someone that person cares about dearly.” The others felt a sinking feeling at Luz’s words, as she rambled on. “Whenever the recruit talks back, their hostage gets beaten. Whenever they fail, their hostage has a limb broken. Whenever they succeed, the hostage gets a wonderful meal, after having been deprived of all but the bare minimum of food and water needed to keep them alive during the extent of the mission of course. Every aspect of an Objectionary Recruit’s time with Oroboros, someone like myself, is intertwined with the health and safety of their hostage. If the Recruit dies, so does the hostage.” She finished, walking on.

The others exchanged alarmed glances, before Willow spoke up, voice loaded with uncertainty. “Then… did you leave your hostage behind?” She didn’t think Luz had, none of them did, but the only other alternative…

“HAHA!!” Luz cackled, as if what she asked was funny. “No. No I didn’t. They begged me to leave, to save myself, to do the right thing. But I didn’t! I stayed. I killed, and stole, and ruined countless lives, for the life of someone dear to me. But, ultimately, it was for nothing. A guard, one who would’ve been a perfect fit for the Black Dogs if it weren’t for his lack of magical training, decided he wanted to have some fun. My hostage took exception to that. An hour later, their bodies were found. The guard had been strangled with his own belt… my hostage had a knife slid into her liver.” She turned her head towards the others, an almost beatific look on her face. “It’s hard to threaten someone with a hostage when they’re dead, afterall.” And then, Luz laughed, the broken, empty laugh of someone who didn’t know how to find any other way to make it stop hurting.

And so the group moved onward in silence, the Witchlings carefully ignoring the splotches of tears that followed behind them; they didn’t want to tell Luz she’d been crying ever since she started talking.

Boscha growled, hastily ducking under another clumsy swing from the disgusting pile of fat in front of her. With a roar, she leapt into the air, an axe kick launched for the fat thing’s head, a curved blade of bloody flames trailing in its wake. She yelped when he caught her kick, slamming her into the ground with a painful Crack! Cursing, she bobbed under another lunge, slamming a burning fist into his stomach, something that prompted a horrific squeal from the disgusting beast.

His smile dimmed, Fatso charged Boscha with a roar, his mouth distending into the massive chasm of flesh he used to swallow his foes. Screaming in challenge, Boscha belted out a burst of flames, gushing from her mouth; it was an honestly surreal experience to be literally breathing fire!! Fatso squealed, flailing back from the flames that avoided his colossal mouth. Boscha smirked. ‘So I just have to keep him from eating my attacks, eh?’

“Try and eat this, you fat fuck!” She shouted, unleashing a wave of flames. Even if he ate some of it, the rest would scorch him badly, something Fatso was apparently smart enough to realize. With a shocking level of agility and strength, he hurled himself into the air, beaming in childish delight. Out of the line of fire, he opened his maw, inhaling with all he had; the massive wave of flames was sucked into his gut. Boscha cursed. Why wasn’t this working!? Her flames, her damnable flames, the one thing she could reliably use, were worthless against this creep!! Whispers started creeping in, the sound of screams building in her head. She shook it off as best she could; she knew trying to fend it off was temporary, but she couldn’t afford to be distracted.

“Oooooohhh you’re a funny one! IIiiiiiiii’llll have lots of fun tenderizing you!” Fatso cheered, rushing up to Boscha, slamming his corpulent fists into her legs, a scream of agony ripping out of her throat; he had definitely snapped a bone or two. Before she could move, he gripped her by the skull, violently slamming her against the stone. “Iiiiii’mmmm gonna have so much fun with you, and when you get all nice and tender, I’ll get to eat you all up! Wooooonnnnn’ttttt that be fun!?” He kicked her in the stomach, her lunch spilling out in response. “Aaaaaawwwww, you lost all that food! Tttthhhhaaaaattt’ssss no good! Nooooowwwwww you won’t taste as yummy when you get in my tummy!” He whined, hurling her away in annoyance. He pursed his lips, placing a pudgy finger on them. “HHHhhhmmmmm maybe I’ll have better luck if I try finding that scarf girl?”

Boscha’s eyes snapped open. Shakily rising to her feet, she screamed. “YOU KEEP AWAY FROM HER!!” With a roar, she rushed him, only for him to dismissively backhand her away, not even bothering to look at her.

“YYyyyoooouuu’rrrrrreee no fun anymore.” He said without a glance, waddling off. “Aaaaaaalllllll you can do is throw that stupid fire. Nnnnoooooo fun, no fun at all eating the same stupid trick.”

“Fun?” Boscha whispered, eyes widening in incredulousness. “You think this is supposed to be FUN!?” She half-screamed. Tears started building in her eyes. “HOW IS KILLING US, ATTACKING US WHEN WE’VE DONE NOTHING TO YOU, SUPPOSED TO BE FUN!?!?!?”

“Hhhuuuuuuuhhhh? Wwwwwhhhhaaatttt kinda stupid question is that? IIiiiiiittttt’ssss fun because I’m strong, and you’re weak.” He said, as if saying that the sky was red, or that plants were purple. “Tttthhhheeee boss said that, because I’m part of Oroboros, I can do whatever I want, eat anything I want, anyone I want, because I’m strong and they can’t stop me, so whatever I do is fun, because I say it’s fun!!” He cheerfully explained. “Eeeeaaaaatttttiiinnnnnggg is so much fun, I could eat forever!!!! BBbbuuuuuuttttt when I eat people-meat, it’s even more fun, because they give the bestest screams when they go in my tummy!!” He patted his gut for emphasis.

Boscha’s blood pounded in her ears. Strong? This… fat piece of TRASH thought he was strong!? No… he didn’t know the meaning of the word. She had seen real strength. He might’ve been powerful, but he wasn’t strong. If he faced someone with real strength, he’d be crying like a bitch. Boscha pulled herself to her feet, utterly indifferent to her previous pain, nothing but burning rage flowing through her veins at the moment. Flames sparked, sputtered… and raged. Boscha wasn’t sure if she was fully conscious at the moment, but she didn’t care. This bastard had threatened one of the few things in this life she actually cared about still, and he had the balls to pretend he knew what strength was, and that he was strong?

Flames pooled at her feet. In a burst of heat, Boscha zipped to Fatso’s side, fist cocked back. With a roar filled with the rage of a wild animal, Boscha slammed her fist so hard against his gelatinous face, she would swear later that she felt his bones bend around her fist. “You think you’re strong?” She asked, the deathly calm doing nothing to hide the burning hate hidden within.

As Fatso rocketed back, eyes snapped wide open in disbelief, Boscha rushed in, flame-clad knee slamming into his gut, watching in grim amusement as he coughed up a mix of blood and miscellaneous bits, whether the blood was his own or not was up for debate. “You don’t know anything about strength.” She ducked under his clumsy swing, landing a clean blow to the throat, prompting him to choke. “Strength isn’t about lording what power you have above someone else.” She slammed across his face, knuckles landing a solid hit to his eyes. “It isn’t acting as if you’re above the same rules and laws everyone has to follow.”

He grunted, and roared, swinging both arms down towards her skull. She leaned back, letting the attack whiff by, slamming home a kick to his chin. “It’s about making a difference.” She caught his next punch, her eyes narrowing at the panic in his gaze. “It’s about looking after what’s precious to you.” She twisted his arm to the side, prompting a squeal of pain. His eyes furrowed, before he lunged forth, attempting to swallow her, only for her to catch his face with her free hand, fingers covering his eyes and digging into his temples, arresting his movement. “It’s what happens when you stop standing on the sidelines to cruelty, or acting to further cruelty yourself.” Flames started licking up her arm, prompting Fatso to start struggling.

“I don’t think you’ve ever seen real strength before.” She casually continued, ignoring his screams as the flames scorched his face. “I wonder, if I had never seen real strength, would I have turned out as something like you?” She pondered, even as Fatso begged and pleaded for her to let go. “Even so…” She murmured, glaring at Fatso, even as his skin blackened and peeled under her grip. “How can you call yourself strong… when you’re losing to someone AS WEAK AS ME!?!?!?!?” She screamed, wetness pouring down her face. She screamed and screamed and screamed, all while the skin, fat, flesh, and what little muscle remained of his body all turned to ash, tears pouring down her face all the while. When all that was left was his scorched, pitted, blackened skeleton, Boscha fell to her knees, tears falling in pools. “I’m so sorry I’m weak. Maybe if I was stronger… you wouldn’t have had to die so slowly.” And with those words, Boscha fell, her strength spent.

[mtlcbgc]

CBGC Chapter 44 “A New Chapter”

TN: If anyone has any corrections or feels like the translation is incorrect, feel free to send me an ask so we can figure it out, because I'm flying blind here. -----------------------------------------------------------------

A sword fell, the momentum was magnificent, devestating, and invincible. The stars of the sky are gathered in that sword, condensing them, and those eyes looking at Tian Cefeng from afar.

Li Xinmei couldn't see the situation on Tian Cefeng, but she could see the sword. Fang Dingyuan sat on his knees stupidly. He saw Li Xinmei looking up hard to see the main temple, so he lifted her body slightly and let her head rest on his leg.

The sword fell, and the light flowing in her eyes dimmed. Fang Dingyuan could not calm down. After a long time, his shoulders could not stop shaking, and his eyes burst into tears.

The man should not kneel lightly, and the man does not cry easily.

Obviously this was a rival that he had lost, and he used to look down upon her, but now, she has made him feel like he has been stabbed with a knife.

Throughout his life, he couldn't do what she had already done. Not impossible, but unexpected. She was bent on going out of the Wuliang Sect to see the land. He never thought that one day, she would use the formation method to draw a sharp sword and cut it to the main temple, where Wuliang Mountain and Elder Gu were.

Will Wuliang Sect be stunned by this? Fang Dingyuan had no other thoughts at this time, he just lowered his head and reached out, gently closing her lost eyes for her.

...

When the supreme sword ray smashed towards Gu Fengyang, the suppression put on Su Tingyun's spirit also weakened instantly.

Su Tingyun soul was extremely weak, but at this time, she remembered that she had to pull someone back. Quickly getting up with the extinguished flame, she didn't even fear the sword rays from the sky, she rushed directly to Gu Fengyang, stretched out her arms and tackled him.

The giant sword fell, and Su Tingyun was shrouded in bright sword light, but she didn't feel any extra pain. Is it because the pain was so extreme that she could no longer feel the pain of the giant sword's chopping?

However, in that light, Su Tingyun seemed to hear a soft call.

"Grannie ..."

Her heart seemed to be tightened momentarily, and an indescribable sorrow arose. Just then, Gu Fengyang's screams sounded, his body, his soul!

The flesh, which had already been exhausted, could no longer handle it, and was split into two sections by the sword. His soul was again severely damaged by the blazing flames, and Gu Fengyang's ancient soul flew away from the body, and entered the hall just before Su Lijiang flew past.

Liu Feizhou, who had been nailed to the stone pillar, had not died, and he was desperately trying to stuff medicine in his mouth.

A blow from an elder in the Crossing Tribulations period made him feel like he had been broken. If he had been seriously injured before this Crossing Tribulations Elder, and his mind was not on him, Liu Feizhou's life would be gone at this time.

But now he is also alive, and fortunately he has brought a lot of medicine.

Although Liu Feizhou was very weak, when he saw a real person entering the hall, and the ancient elder's spirit came out, he still shouted with all his energy, "Be aware Su Lijiang, he wants to posses your body! Madam Wei was almost refined into a human pill! "

If it is a surprise attack, the Su Lijiang will be more likely to be possesed because it is hard to defend, but a reminder from Liu Feizhou makes Su Lijiang vigilant, the soul is tense, and wary.

A thin camel is still larger than the horse, and at this time Gu Fengyang, although the soul was seriously damaged, he still had more strength than Su Lijiang.

Golden light rushed into his head, Su Lijiang's figure was motionless, and his face was stupefied.

"I saved you and brought you here just to take your body!" Gu Fengyang shouted sharply, "It's like that Wei Yun saved you, just to force you and humiliate you!"

When bringing Su Lijiang, he discovered the weakness of Su Lijiang through a magic array. So after he went out, he ordered Su Lijiang to get people back.

It's better to be alive, then dead, and good news to get dead.¹

But if he could do it again, he would never bring that mark of disaster into the cultivation world! Now that the matter has come to an end, he can only forcibly lose his body, and also loses his cultivation realm, otherwise Su Lijiang's body won't be able to bear his soul.

However, the soul's damage recovered very slowly. If he lost his body according to the original plan, and combined his strength of soul and spirit with the gathered resources, he could use the body of the Su Lijiang to break through the Crossing Tribulations period again within a hundred years. As long as the news of the Supreme Elder's fall is surpressed, Wuliang Sect is enough to stand tall.

But now ...

No matter what, he must succeed. Su Lijiang's conviction is unsteady, and his soul will be completely devoured by himself.

Hearing Elder Fengyang's words, Su Lijiang was shocked in his soul. Anyone who knows his esteemed master turned out to be a hungry wolf in sheep's clothing. He saved his life and led him to cultivation, just to take his body. It would take a while to accept.

He always thought that Elder Fengyang asked him to take Wei Yun in order to hone his mind, but now he knows it is so he can be disturbed by the mental demon.

At that moment, Su Lijiang even lost control of his body, and Elder Fengyang, who had seized the opportunity, immediately shouted, "Chu Yu, what are you still doing? Kill Wei Yun!"

After Su Tianyun burned Gu Fengyang, she could not support it anymore. The flame radiating from her body seemed to be the last glory of her soul. The flame of fire was extinguished, and her body was invisible in black. The whole person fell to the ground, and in front of her was a handful of black ash, which was the remains of Gu Fengyang's body.

"Get up, get up!" Liu Feizhou was nailed to death. He was desperately struggling, and started bleeding from the wound that had started to heal after taking the medicine, but even so, he couldn't move half an inch. His soul was suppressed by Chu Yu, who was holding a sword, and he could not do anything.

"Damned old lady, get up!" Liu Feizhou continued to shout, knowing that at the next moment his throat was tight, his head looked down, and his throat was bleeding. He did not even see her drawing the sword, and she already cut him.

Before entering the hall, Liu Feizhou she cut off his eyelashes, and a blood line was cut off his neck. This time, it is no longer just a line of blood.

But Chu Yu could completely kill him with a sword and completely cut off his head. Why didn't she do this? Liu Feizhou didn't have much time to think about it, because he saw Granny Wei slowly lifted her black head that could not be seen, and the long sword in Chu Yu's hand pointed directly at her skull.

At the critical moment, Su Lijiang snarled in his throat, and he shouted, "Don't!"

Chu Yu's hand trembled slightly, and she did not look back, but she could see Su Lijiang's struggling expression, his red eyes and pained face, his trembling body.

"Dying and yet still struggling!" Gu Fengyang soul violently rallied, crushing towards the Su Lijiang with a strong spirit power. At the same time, he gained control of the body again, "Chu Yu, what are you still doing? Don't forget, you have my soul imprint on your soul!"

Chu Yu's shoulder trembled slightly, and the sword in his hand stabbed forward. At this moment, Su Tingyun's finger burst into flames again, shocking Chu Yu, and she jumped a few feet away. After this time, Su Tingyun's ring became dim and dull, and the aura that was constantly flowing into her body re-injected some strength into her body like back light and then became completely silent.

Chu Yu's face turned pale, and the sword in her hand was destroyed by the fire.

Chu Yu's sword is Her destiny magic weapon, this time, her primordial spirit was wounded, and spat out blood.

Su Tingyun, who fell to the ground, had some vitality again because of the cool aura that finally poured out of the ring. Gu Fengyang's body was destroyed, and his soul was in the Su Lijiang. Now she was weak and barely regained consciousness. She didn't know what to do.

Her only strength was the fire in her soul. Now, she was so weak that there was only an almost soy-bean sized light left, and the ring could no longer provide her with any help.

Is she waiting for death?

"Run." Liu Feizhou's throat was still bleeding, he only said this word.

Su Tingyun stood up and ran out subconsciously. When passing the Su Lijiang, she yelled out, "Su Lijiang is alive and well, you can live well after so much pain, why give up now?"

Su Tingyun stumbled and ran out, and Chu Yu got back up at this time and chased her with a sword.

Su Tingyun panicked and ran, but she didn't know where to run.

She found that Chu Yu's sword behind her forced her to go in one direction only. Su Zingyun thought for a moment. This is Wuliang Sect. It is impossible for her to run away as she is now. She is going now. The only place to escape can be the forbidden horizon.

There, no one will chase in.

It is death, entering the forbidden horizon, but there may be a line of life. This Chu Yu, is it trying to force her past the forbidden horizon ...

Forbidden World is not far from the main hall, Su Tingyun has not arrived long before running. Chu Yu's cold sword directly behind her. she did not hesitate for a moment, and jumped directly off the cliff.

The ears are whistling wind, the tip of the nose is an indescribable smoky smell, and when the body falls it is as if it is cut by numerous small blades of wind. Su Tianyun is extremely weak, and she can no longer hold on to conciousness. She faints.

Chu Yu stood beside the Forbidden World, her eyes dim.

Just then, a strong wind came and fanned her directly.

Su Lijiang stood by sullenly, "You deliberately forced someone to come this way here, why didn't you just smash her into pieces?"

Chu Yu got up and knelt in front of Su Lijiang. "Elder Hui Hui is the elder, and after suffering from my deceased person, Chu Yuerong is suffering from her. I hope to take revenge on Wei Yun slowly. Sealing the beast within the bounds of the earth will definitely smash her corpse into pieces and peel her skin off it. "

"Humph."

Chu Yu thought that the Supreme Elder had succeeded in winning the house, and there was a trace of sadness in her heart. But the next moment, she suddenly saw Su Lijiang's face change again, at the same time, she heard an outcry, "Junk, don't give up!"

The battle between Su Lijiang and Gu Fengyang Yuanshen for the body is still going on. The head of Wuliang Sect has already reached the main temple, and they don't know what happened.

The array of battlefields was full of people. Everyone was confused. They don’t know why the mountain guards attacked their own people. Several elders of Wuliang Sect, including the Lord of the Rune Palace, were badly injured. They were afraid that it would take them to decades in seclusion to recover.

But before seclusion, they have to figure out what happened.

"What are you doing here?"

"Child, what are you doing here?" The scolding man was the Law Enforcement Elder, and he glared at Fang Dingyuan and the girl in his arms, yelling loudly.

At midnight, it appears near the map! It's just that these two disciples have low strength, and it is impossible to be the one who starts the mountain guard array.

"Speak!" Seeing his disciple kneeling in a daze, Fang Dingyuan's Master couldn't help but remind him.

At this moment, Fang Dingyuan calmed down, "Xiao Mei said she was leaving Wuliang, and said goodbye to me." He looked dull, and his eyes flashed with tears. "She was going to leave, not coming back."

The Law Enforcement Elder asked Elder Fudian, "Is this correct?"

If a person wants to leave Wuliang Sect, he must have the sect's consent. Such a big event must be known by Elder Fu Dian. Ning Xuzi quickly said: "This is true, she just said goodbye to me."

"Then why did she die?"

"A lot of sword rays came out, and we were very close." Fang Dingyuan cradled Li Xinmei firmly, and couldn't help crying.

He wasn't really sure she was dead, and there was always a hint of hope in his heart. He always feel that these are masters of medicine, and it is not difficult to revive someone, but now they all have said that she is dead.

Even if he died, he had to protect her and conceal the things she did. He had to protect her, even if it was only her body.

"It doesn't seem to have anything to do with them." The Law Enforcement Hall Elder came to the conclusion that although the sword array first attacked those with higher cultivation, there were also some disciples with low strength who were unable to avoid or panicked and got hit by the sword rays. There were many casualties.

The death of a Li Xinmei was irrelevant at this time.

"The dead are thrown into the forbidden horizon."

For thousands of years, the rule of Wuliang Zongzong has this rule. The dead are left to the Forbidden Horizon. The purpose of this rule is unclear. The time is too long and the years have distorted the history. However, it seems that there is a beast that is sealed underneath.

Someone came to drag Li Xinmei's body, and Fang Dingyuan held on tightly, "She is dead, she is dead ..."

"She is already dead, and a golden core cultivator is dead, so don't hold her so tightly! Let go, you're welcome."

Fang Dingyuan could only watch the corpse be dragged away. He looked up at the direction she was leaving, and looked at her floating skirt corner. It had not moved for a long time, like a stone sculpture standing in the dark.

...

There was white fish belly² in the sky, and the extremely fierce and cruel night finally passed.

Yaoyang jumped out of the mountain stream, but did not dilute the darkness shrouded in Wuliang Mountain.

Such a huge change in Wuliang Sect is unknown to many people in the practice world. But many of them did not include him.

"Your Highness³ doesn't seem very happy today." Ren Jia pinched his companion Ren Yi, who stood beside the bucket, with a small elbow.

The corner of Ren Yi's eyes twitched, his heart couldn't help growling, and royal him was wearing such a thick mask, how could you tell that he was unhappy.

Ren Jia smiled, "So I'm A, you're B."⁴

The cultivator sat on the stone steps. Next to him was an emerald-colored jade bowl with a crystal-clear grass growing in it, as if carved from jade.

If someone else saw it, they would exclaim, "Langa grass, what a rarity!"

At this moment, a cultivator rushed to report: "Most of the orchid tongue grass in the entire cultivation world died overnight. It was finally found that the orchid tongue grass planted in the large gates such as Haoyue Sect were found!"

It's no wonder that royal him is unhappy ...

It's okay, the grass is gone, but it can grow again!

But the old woman who could tell a story and had a rough voice was gone.

-----------------------------------------------------

1) Yeah I gave up on that line, if anyone has any idea, tell me. 还活着更好，死了，得到个死了的消息也不错。

2) 天边泛起了鱼肚白，那无比凶残激烈的一夜，终于过去了

3) Google said monarch, so I changed it a little.

4) 任甲呵呵一笑，“所以我是甲，你是乙啊。”

back | toc

[thederailedtrain]

The Mark of Oblivion: Loose Ends [Three]

Like every other incubus and succubus, Cedric liked his sleep. He needed it to function - even more than humans did. Sex wasn’t the source of his abilities, just the energy he drew from. Sleep, dreams; these were the things were the center of his power. Perhaps even the center of his being. Scientific research into that theory was decidedly slim.

Once, when they’d first started working together, Kira had jokingly likened him to a cat. “Because you would sleep twenty hours a day too if you could,” she explained with a wry smile.

Kira wasn’t smiling now. Cedric wasn’t even sure if she was aware of the expression on her face right now, much less anything else. Loss of attention; one of the major warning signs of sleep deprivation. It shouldn’t have been this severe after only twenty-four hours, but most tables on the subject didn’t factor in magical exhaustion.

However, being an incubus meant Cedric knew what an accelerated time table looked like. Moreover, he knew how to deal with it. A spell was out of the question. Kira was using every ounce of neutral magic she had left to keep the Mark sealed. Enough magic that Cedric wasn’t sure he’d know where she was if he couldn’t lay eyes on her. But there was more than one way to lend someone magic.

“Stay right here,” Cedric said. He placed a hand on her shoulder, both to steady her and reassure himself of her presence. “I’m going to brew a potion that should help keep you awake.”

As Cedric turned to leave, Kira nodded in reply. It wasn’t until halfway up the stairs that he heard her voice once more. “Well, it’s not like I’m going anywhere.”

A beat later, Cedric realized she was replying to his last remark. Cognitive delays. That shouldn’t be apparent for another day at least. Cedric took the rest of the stairs two at a time.

When he finally made it back to his apartment, the first thing he noticed was Toni crouched in the doorway of his spare bedroom. “What are you…?” He began, before the answer became apparent. He spotted the chalk in her hands, recognized the runes she was drawing on his floor. A quick peek into the room told Cedric she’d already finished the ones inside. Looked like Toni decided to create the anti-magic and sealing wards the hard way.

“The quicker I get the done, the quicker I get to go home,” Toni explained, focus mainly directed at the floor. “And the quicker I can get the hell to sleep.”

“Theme of the hour,” Cedric muttered under his breath. Toni gave him a rather flat what? and he let out a sigh. “Nothing...I’m going to fix Kira a potion that will keep her awake until we can get this all sorted out. Are you all good here?”

Toni gave him a thumbs-up with her free hand while Gus replied, “Should be!” After sharing a quick nod, Gus turned back to the man he was guarding. Cedric beat a hasty exit before his eyes landed on the other occupant of the room.

“Have fun!” Toni called after his retreating form.

This wasn’t fair, Cedric couldn’t help but think. That after everything she’d been through in the last twenty-four hours, Kira had to deal with this now too. And she would have to continue dealing with it until Cedric worked out a more permenant solution. He already had a few ideas, but right now he needed to focus on making sure he didn’t mess up this potion.

Strictly speaking, he’d never made a potion to keep someone awake and ease the symptoms of exhaustion before. Cedric just threw in any ingredient he hoped would work. Everything from aubergris to coffee grounds found their way into the cauldron. In the end, it was just a sludgy grey-brown mass that was enough for three portions when passed through a sieve. Okay, that gave them about seventy-two hours.

He finished bottling the finished solution just as Toni was completing the sealing wards. Before Cedric could check in, Gus practically jumped into the hallway, letting out a small gasp of surprise. “That anti-magic spell is really weird,” he said, shaking off a chill. His eyes suddenly lit up gold and Cedric watched as he ran a tongue over his fangs, like he was checking if he was still a werewolf.

The moment he was free, Toni closed the circle around the sigil she’d drawn. Magic rippled in front of the door briefly before fading. Cedric couls still feel it there, charging the air with the barest electric hum.

“There,” Toni said, brushing off her hands as she stood. “No living being should be able to pass through this room from either side of the barrier.” She looked up at Cedric. “Please, boss, will you send me home? I’ve racked up so much overtime and my bed gets awfully lonely when I leave it for so long.”

Clever, but it’s wasn’t enough of a distraction. She placed the chalk in her pocket, where Cedric could still see the outline of the talisman. He held out a hand. Toni rolled her eyes, but handed it over without any more complaints. “Did you pick this up from Dustin?” Cedric asked, examining the object while it was dormant for this first time.

“Oh, he and I go way back,” Toni grinned. “I met him through Jasper even before he joined the Harbingers. Never liked that asshole, though.” She waited just long enough for Cedric to open his mouth in reply before adding, “So I have a night shift and I’d like to at least take a nap before-”

“Not so fast.” Cedric held up a hand. “Even after I get these potions to her, someone still needs to watch over Kira. And,” he added quickly, that hand rising again in anticipation of Toni’s protest. “You’re the only one who can use transference quickly enough if something goes wrong.”

The look on Toni’s face might’ve gotten a laugh out of him were the situation not so dire. “You expecting me to hang around here until Kira can stop herself from blowing shit up? I have a life outside this. Calling out of work tonight’s gonna be enough drama. How long is this gonna take?”

Cedric was barely able to hold himself back from saying something he’d regret. Sleep deprevation was not a good look on him. And he had to remember this was something they were all going through together - even if his demonic nature was making this a little harder on him. Only a little. “Look, you’ll still be able to get to your job tonight,” he said once he’d calmed down. “I only need you for the next few hours while I run an errand. Then you can take that nap you were hoping for.”

Okay, he might have still been a little testy. In any case, it still seemed to cool Toni’s protests. She shut her lips tightly, shaking her head.

“Alright, fine. Where’re you headed?” Toni sighed, but didn’t say anything more.

“I know an enchantress. She has a shop not too far from here and it should be open today. I was planning on making a surprise visit,” Cedric explained.

“Oh, you’re talking about Ravid, right?” Toni asked.

Cedric had to blink away his surprise. He nodded, unsure of what else to say. Then again, Toni had presumably been operating in the Otherworld for years before their paths had recently crossed. Maybe it wasn’t such a shock that she knew one of the most prestigious talisman-crafters in his Ward.

“And do you need me for anything?” Gus spoke up. Cedric found himself having to refocus his eyes to get a better look at him. Gus had been so quiet, he nearly forgot he was there. “I can, you know, guard Mill or whatever.”

“You don’t think my seals are airtight?” Toni spun around to face him. It could’ve been an accusation, but all Cedric felt from her tone and body language was teasing. Interesting.

Gus wound up floundering anyway. “No, I- I just…” He trailed off, suddenly slouching. Until that moment, Cedric hadn’t realized just how tired he looked. “Kira’s my bloody best friend. I can’t just stand here while everyone else helps out. I have to do something.”

Ah, so that’s what this was about. “Well, you’re welcome to join me when I go out,” Cedric suggested. He could sense Gus perk up. The werewolf nodded enthusiastically. “Alright, let’s run these downstairs, shall we?”

While Gus ran ahead and Toni followed behind, Cedric found himself hanging back. This whole time, he’d managed to avoid looking into the room right next to him. Now, without anyone else to focus on, it was all he could think about.

He could feel Mill in the other room. Maybe he was just paranoid and hypersensitive - the anti-magic barrier had cut off all his sensing abilities - or maybe Mill was staring at him. Cedric couldn’t bring himself to turn around and check. Just the thought twisted his gut. Yeah, it was probably for the best that he didn’t.

Breathing in deeply, Cedric forced himself to unclench his fists and begin the trek downstairs.

Along the way, his eyes caught his reflection in the mirror hanging by the door. Well, he’d certainly looked better. His hair was beginning to fall out of the coif he’d styled it into the day before and his beard...This was normally the day he shaved. Tomorrow, then.

The thing that Cedric focused the most time on were his eyes. There were the beginnings of dark circles under each, but that wasn’t what concerned him. He got as close as he could to the mirror, desperately searching his irises for any trace of red. No, still blue.

Thank the gods, Cedric thought, sighing audibly as he leaned his head against the mirror. Only another couple hours, he reminded himself, and then he could sleep again. The cravings hadn’t started yet. He had time.

Pulling himself upright again took more effort than Cedric was willing to admit. He gave himself another once over in the mirror, nodding reassurance to his reflection. However, as he did, another image came to mind. The vampire coven they’d seen on Kira’s accidental first Otherworld mission; no whites left in their eyes, every tooth pointed and dagger-like. Cedric tried not to think about his own eyes looking the same.

For Kira, Cedric reminded himself as he made his way to the shop’s basement. If nothing else, you have to do this for Kira.

By the time he got to the door, he could hear voices coming from the other side. “No way! Is that from when you blew everything up earlier?” It sounded like Gus.

“That’s my best guess,” came Kira’s response.

When Cedric made it in, he found everyone gathered around something in Kira’s hands. Once he was close enough, he realized it was her phone. By the time he was standing amongst them, he realized what had grabbed their attention. The device looked thoroughly fried.

He looked up from the phone and found its owner already staring back at him, expectant. Kira looked better than when he’d seen her last, but she still didn’t seem like her usual self. Full of life, confident, glowing-

Cedric erased the thought from his mind and focused instead on the reason he’d come down in the first place. “I made these for you,” he said, handing the vials to her.

“They’ll keep me awake?” Kira asked, inspecting the potion contents.

“That’s the intention,” Cedric replied. “And, hopefully, mitigate any ill effects of sleep deprevation. Just take one every twenty-four hours.” He paused to wince. “It...probably won’t taste great.”

“I was a freshman once upon a time. I’ve probably had worse,” Kira shrugged, opening one. She plugged her nose and downed the contents like a shot of cheap tequilla. The next second, she was coughing, which managed to draw laughs from the room’s other two occupants. “Nevermind. Forget I said anything.” When she stopped, she looked up at Cedric once more. “Thank you.”

Already he could see some of the light returning to her eyes. Cedric thanked the gods once again. “It was no trouble,” he assured her. “Now, I have to run out and see if I can find a more permenant solution. Toni will stay with you to make sure you’re okay.” Said ex-Harbinger gave an unenthusiastic wave. “But if there’s anything you need in the meantime - from your apartment or wherever - don’t hesitate to let me know.”

“Thank you, Cedric. Really,” Kira repeated, offering him a smile.

Tired and beaten down as she was, Cedric could still get lost in the curl of her lips. Could stay there for hours if he let himself. All he wanted was a moment alone with Kira, without Gus and Toni for a peanut gallery, but he knew that wasn’t a smart decision and they needed to get a move on besides.

Instead, Cedric told himself to be content with a nod in reply. Then he turned to Gus, gesturing towards the door. Gus didn’t need to be told twice. He took off running up the stairs with goodbye and a wave thrown over his shoulder.

But Cedric couldn’t bring himself to leave so casually. He had to say something. He made it to the bottom step before turning around. “We won’t be gone long,” Cedric promised, hesitating while he tried to figure out something more substantial to leave them with. “Just...stay safe.” He turned around, hurrying up the stairs before he really did get lost down there.

Gus was already at the door once he made it into the shop itself. All of the battle participants who had been nursing their wounds in the lobby had since gone home. He bounced between his feet, like a jogger stopped at a streetlight. Sometimes, that eager attitude of his was contagious.

“A moment, please,” Cedric chuckled, grabbing his coat from the end of the counter where he’d placed it earlier. He shrugged it on as he made his way over.

“Lead the way, boss,” Gus said, following behind as the pair made their way out onto the street. The bells above jingled twice before the door closed behind them.

It was still early, but the sun had already risen enough to fully brighten the street and cut though the early spring chill. This is just about when the shop is supposed to open, Cedric couldn’t help but think. He turned back around, but the lights of the shop were still off. It was unlikely they would be on before the following morning. Guilt wedged a knife into the space below his ribs. He was failing in his duties as a Warden.

Only by the time they made it to the end of the street was Cedric finally able to tear his eyes away. He had to do this, he reminded himself. Not just for Kira, but for the Otherworld as a whole. He had a duty to them and he would honor it. But this really was all about Kira, wasn’t it?

[axolator]

Script-A-Day #28: School of Alteration by Skaggs

Where your character is ever-changing and your information can be seriously screwy

Featured characters: Snake Charmer, Farmer, Pit-Hag

Complexity: Intermediate-Advanced. Recommended for players who can keep up with chaos and can follow their heart and their social reads through it all.

Database link (find the PDF and JSON for running it there!)

Writeup under the cut!

[Quick note: this is going to be the first of two posts today, since I wasn't able to post a Script-A-Day yesterday. Enjoy the double feature!]

School of Alteration is all about players changing characters and gaining other abilities. The Pit-Hag is the star of the show here, getting up to a frightening amount of nonsense, but other characters like the Farmer, Snake Charmer, and Barber can similarly plunge the game into chaos if too many swaps happen all at once. To track all this, the good team has some stellar info: the Dreamer can narrow down who's who at a particular moment, the Mathematician can track Pit-Hag Demon changes, misregistration, and poisoning, and if all else fails town can see if they trust in a Mayor win amidst the chaos.

Bag-building School of Alteration requires some care: like Star Pass All Stars, a random assortment of tokens will often end up evil-sided. Keep the level of misinformation manageable between Widow, Poisoner, Vigormortis, and Recluse: even if there's a Mathematician in the bag, it can feel hopeless if evil is able to drown everyone in poison. On the other side of the coin, make sure your good team meets evil where they're at: Outsiders like the Golem can prove devastating to an evil team without ways to escape a punch like an Imp, Fang Gu, Pit-Hag, or Barber, while townsfolk like the Empath and Oracle can be incredibly strong when not accounted for in the balancing.

Some notes:

Make sure you're precise when someone with the Snake Charmer ability hits the Demon: they swap characters and alignments, and then the former Demon is SC-poisoned. This means that a Cannibal-Snake Charmer who procs turns the former Demon into a SC-poisoned Cannibal, not a Snake Charmer. Oh, and don't proc a Snake Charmer swap on the Recluse. It's not fun for anyone on either team.

Mathematician notes! Here, a math "ping" is +1 to their number:

If an ability works abnormally due to misregistration or external droison, it pings the Math.

A preached Minion failing to use their ability (like a preached Widow not poisoning anyone or any of the others not waking) pings the Math each night they're preached.

If the Mayor bounces a Demon's attack, that Demon pings the Math. Some STs differ on whether the Mayor failing to bounce a kill due to Assassin or external droison pings the Math. Given that it’s entirely ST discretion, I personally rule that the Mayor failing to bounce never pings the Math, but both rulings are common; let your players know beforehand.

If the Recluse registers as a Minion and starts Vigor-poisoning someone when killed as a result, it pings the Math each night the Recluse is registering that way.

Base script interaction, but still notable: If the Pit-Hag makes a Demon (causing arbitrary deaths), and that protects a player from a Demon's kill, that Demon pings the Math.

I think that's about it from me today, actually! There aren't that many corner cases for me to cover with this one. This script can go crazy sometimes, with Pit-Hags turning their fellow Minions into evil Farmers and Golems to "confirm" themselves, in addition to the typical plays it can pull in S&V. Anyway, I'll see you later today!