#masoleum

[wandering-cemeteries]

Lafayette Cemetery No. 2

New Orleans, Louisiana

Oct. 2023

[tacticalgrandma]

I’m not the only one right

[gfwooyo]

just went down a roman history wiki rabbit hole after looking up agrippa bc of the time of fever and omg y'all the dramaaaaa

[witchblade]

7 months ago

[winepresswrath]

So much of the locked tomb is about being an adolescent living in a mausoleum filled with prior generations' failures and ambitions and then escaping to a different mausoleum filled with prior generations' failures and ambitions. Nona escapes that fate only to sort of circle around to pointing out that we all participate in society and also under very special circumstances a body can be a mausoleum.

[sasquach-scratches]

Anyways i think i've just about exhausted everything that's currently available in Dread Delusin's early access state (except for that GODDAMN FIREBALL SPELL WHER E IIS IT)

I ended up really liking the worldbuilding and hope that the final game has more than just the one inaccessible island in the east to explore because I need more Lore and story. I'm also wondering how much of said island will carry over the stuff from the alpha demo given how different the lore and story is now. I should really play the full demo, or watch a video of it.

My only dislike is how the saves work because I'm spoiled to how games like TES let you make multiple saves and see the how the different paths in quests turn out. It makes for great replayability but also there's some choices I only want to see and not permanently live with, y'know lol

I don't try many E-A games but this is easily one of the meatiest I've played and can't wait for more

[xnomad]

[theseimmortalcoils]

Unknown mausoleum from @woodlawns_twilight_world

[oliviawebsite]

hey you gotta try this new weed strain its called "above-ground pool". one hit will make you feel a profound sense of ennui and self imposed isolation born of neglectful individualism and the suburban news-watcher's irrational fear of the other, holed up in little-duchys guarded and sealed like living masoleums. you have so many prizes and trinkets but no community to lean on. you have convinced yourself this is normal and okay. your kids all moved to different states and no longer speak to you. it also gives you a gnarly hickory ham sunburn

[fuckyeahisawthat]

While I absolutely adore all the "Viktor acquires Jayce's last name for accidental/practical/non-romantic reasons" ideas, I think Viktor would have had to solve his last name problem for paperwork reasons as a student at the Academy, and if he didn't have a last name, the simplest option would be to steal one.

He figures out within three days of starting at the Academy that he needs a family name.

Introducing himself as "just Viktor" gets him marked out as from the undercity immediately, if missing one of a hundred other social cues hasn't already. "Don't you know no one knows whose kids are whose down there?" he hears someone scoff from down the hall, after he's extracted himself from a conversation that was going nowhere good.

Family, like most things in the undercity, is assembled from spare parts more often than not. Family is who will have your back if someone is giving you shit; who will offer you half of something that is already not enough. His parents by blood are both alive and still live together, but no one knows them as anything other than Iveta and Hal.

But topsiders care about things like bloodlines and inheritance, and they all have family names. Not just the rich kids whose family names are carved into buildings, but the children of merchants and craftspeople and workers.

So, he needs to acquire one.

He can't just make one up. What if he picks something that sounds obviously fake to their ears? Or worse, the name of a real, well-known family that he then has to explain his connection to? No, it has to be a real name, just not one that anyone would care about.

He goes to the cemetery. Not the fancy one with the high wrought-iron gates and elaborate masoleums, but a humble one, in a part of the city filled with the modest homes of tradespeople. He searches until he finds an ill-tended family plot, the most recent date of death a hundred years in the past. A simple man, maybe a baker, judging by the carving on the headstone. That will do.

He makes up a story to go with it (a Piltover family of small shopkeepers, forced into the undercity by hard times several generations ago, but topsiders by ancestry still) and starts writing his name as Viktor Trini on homework assignments and forms.

"Viktor." Professor Heimerdinger catches his attention after class one day, a few weeks into the term. Viktor has a routine for this steep amphitheater-style lecture hall by now. Sit in the front so he doesn't have to deal with the stairs; make a bit of a show of gathering up his books and papers slowly after class, letting the students who are in a hurry get out the door first, without his uneven steps slowing them down.

"Yes, Professor?"

"Excellent work on the last assignment. Inspired problem-solving, if I must say."

"Thank you, Professor." He'd been gratified by the solution he came up with, but it's nice to hear someone else say it, too.

Heimerdinger is still holding his problem set paper, rocking on his toes on the small stepladder he uses when lecturing, when he doesn't get too animated and just start striding across the desk like a stage. "You know," he says. "I knew an Aloisius Trini, many years ago. Lovely fellow. He could get a bit gruff with the customers, when the shop was busy, but he made the best meat pies, so nobody cared. I was wondering, might he be your...grandfather perhaps?"

"Yes," Viktor says quickly. "Though I never knew him."

Heimerdinger lowers his voice conspiratorially. "I think you will find that great-grandfather works better, given the math." And he winks.

Viktor's throat goes dry. "Professor, I--"

"Ah-ah. No need to worry, my dear boy. Most people you meet in Piltover won't be nearly three hundred years old." He leans in, drops his voice to a whisper again. "We'll keep this our little secret."

Ah. He understands what's going on now. "Of course. What do you want in return?" He doesn't like this, owing someone who could have him expelled with the stroke of a pen.

Heimerdinger looks surprised at the question. "Nothing!" he says. But that can't be true. He'll ask for something sooner or later.

"I want you to succeed," Heimerdinger says after a moment. "I've seen a lot of students come through these halls, and you're very bright. I predict you'll do extraordinary things."

It still feels like a trap, and maybe it shows on his face, because after a minute Heimerdinger makes a noise of frustration and says, "Fine. If you insist on viewing this as a favor to be repaid, come to my office. There's a lightbulb that needs changing and I can't reach it."

That, he can do. "Thank you, Professor," he says quietly as Heimerdinger hops down the stairs of the stepladder.

"Don't thank me until you've seen the state of this light fixture. I can't reach it to dust, either."

[wandering-cemeteries]

Cemetery high rise.

Cimitero Monumentale di Staglieno.

Genoa, Italy

Dec. 2016

[inky-duchess]

Good day, Your Grace! Would you happen to know anything or have resources about the funerals of royals? My scenario is a king dying after an invasion into the kingdom with his daughter becoming the new queen, and I‘ve been wondering about the specifics like where his grave/tomb would be and just how much time would be afforded to the funeral and a potential official mourning period.

Plus, would it be inherently inappropriate to have the daughter‘s coronation directly following the funeral (might give the impression that she just wants to get it over with and doesn’t pay enough respects to her father etc.) or would it depend on how it‘s done?

He would likely be buried on the grounds of a royal residence or in a designated place like a family masoleum.

Official mourning tends to last anywhere between two weeks and a few months depending on the culture. The funeral, again depending on the culture, would take place within a week of the death, to allow for a vigil where mourners and dignitaries can pay respects or travel for the funeral. The entire funeral and period of national mourning (such as businesses closing and some entertainments like playhouses closing down) would run about two week before things start getting back to normal.

The daughter's coronation would take placeva few weeks or a few months after the funeral, with enough time to be respectful and plan the event.

[koboldfactory]

masoleum attendant makes me feel very very gay

I should draw those funky robots again sometime

[garbria]

Flufftober Day 12

“This is spooky.” Nyx eyed the forbidding walls with suspicion, rubbing his arm as goosebumps rose under his jacket.

“Really?” Cor turned and raised an eyebrow at him. “I thought Galahdans revered their ancestors.” 

“We do.” Nyx returned Cor’s look with one of his own. “What we don’t do is seal them away in cold marble under ground.” He dropped his hand as he leaned closer to Cor.

Cor huffed at him.

Nyx poked him in the shoulder. “Don’t you dare laugh at me.” He poked him again. “I will never understand you Lucians, putting your dead in these giant masoleums far under ground. How do you visit during feast days?”

“We don’t, generally.” Cor looked around. “Especially here. The tombs under the Citadel are for the royal and royal-adjacent. You did say you wanted to come down here.”

“I know.” Nyx sighed and tugged a braid. “You’re always talking about the dead kings, the things they did. I just thought it would be more interesting.”

Cor smirked and poked him back. “You should know better than believe glaive rumors about buried treasure.”

Nyx scowled. “It’s not that, not that Tredd didn’t try his best to come up with some new ones.” He looked at the patterns carved into the black marble. “Crowe has all these theories about the connection between magic and the history of the Lucian kings. She was after me to report back what I found.”

“Remind me to introduce her to Lita in Archives. She’d love a chance to talk obscure magical theory.” Cor placed his hand in the small of Nyx’s back and steered him further down the hall. “There’s some interesting murals further down.”

“Alright, but after this, we’re going somewhere more lively. With drinks, preferably.” Nyx followed Cor’s lead.

“Sounds like a plan.”

[witchblade]

I wish elden ring had increased drop rate hours like an mmo

[gailynovelry]

Catacombs Formidi || Short Fiction

Well, I don’t actually remember why they put me down here. I did something wrong. Of course I did; that’s the only way it happens. There’s no prying the lid off of the masoleum entrance by mistake. I’m sure you remember it better than me. The door is like a coffin, isn’t it? It has to be heavy, it has to be so far above the hallway floors, it has to fit into the ceiling like a glove.

Yes, it’s to keep us in.

No, I don’t think you can find it again. It won’t do you much good if you do. You do smell . . . recent. Do you remember what you did?

No, you don’t have to answer that.

I don’t care what you did. Maybe I was better, maybe I was worse. Now I am worse.

This is the warning you will want first. You can’t die down here. Trust me. I don’t know exactly when we stop being strangers and start being denizens, but you’ll cross that line before you ever find some fabled exit. It doesn’t let go of you that easily. You think you’re on the brink of something — starvation, exhaustion, dehydration. You taste dust, dust, dust. And then you keep going. And going. And going.

The needs burn, but they’re just noise, alright? Alright. Ignore them now. Satisfaction is temporary. Existence is long. If you do something you’ll regret, you’ll have forever in the darkness to think about it before you start to forget again.

What are you besides your needs?

It’s not a trick question. You’re going to be asking yourself this a lot in the coming centuries, and it’s too easy to be changed by ruminations.

Yes, I do have reasons to lie to you. Trust me when I say that I am ignoring them.

If you feel your way along the walls long enough, a few days or a few decades depending on how quick you are on the uptake, you’ll realize that the skulls aren’t real bone. It’s stone, carved. The writing is real. Incantations? Spellwork? Laments? No, I don’t know what language it is. Old. Old. Old. Some other civilization was doing it long before us. You’ll encounter their own mistakes in here, and the language barrier would be easy enough to learn around if they hadn’t been here, specifically, for so long.

Yes, I suppose they would be dead if they weren’t here. Again — it’s not a blessing. We can call it undeath, sure. But there’s more to it than that.

No, I don’t know why anyone would make this.

But why the punishment?

Give it a few centuries. The pointlessness will sink in.

I did speak correctly. There are others here besides me, and this is my second warning. If you are recent, you will not want to meet them.

Malicious? Some are just jealous, actually. Some are afraid. Some will want to put you out of your misery, not yet knowing that it can’t happen here. Some are just . . . hungry. So, so hungry.

Wait until you are not recent. You will know it eventually. It will hit you one day, as you shuffle through dry air and over broken rock; you will realize that you have been in here longer than you had ever been out there. You will be comfortable feeling your way through the darkness, and the idea of light will make you nervous. What would you even do with it? You see yourself more clearly without it.

Yes, I’ve met some of the others. They’re monsters. This is not a comment on their character, necessarily.

Like I said — who are you, divested of your needs?

A lot of people are their fears.

You become things, down here. I shouldn’t give you the specifics. I can, if you insist, but not in any great detail. I will tell you about the ones that I do not think — that I hope — you will not become. I brushed up once against someone who was nothing but sharp edges. Warm, wet edges. She was quiet. Quieter than you. I think it hurt her to move.

There was one who hated himself, hated me, hated company. He couldn’t do anything about it but screech. He’d shriveled in some way. Practically a worm. I don’t think I have a reason to fear his fate, not as I understand myself.

The ones speaking in old tongues, intelligible or no, almost never have human shapes. I think it’s a little scarier when they do.

I met— I met a pair once, who had been secretly afraid of being too reliant on one another, afraid that their devotion had doomed them. They had become conjoined in some way. I . . . did not ask.

Meeting people might affect you, yes. Might give you their fears, their shapes.

What am I afraid of?

. . .

Best not to speak it into truth.

. . .

I do have an idea of what I look like. I’ve never seen myself, not since coming down here, but I know it better than I knew myself when I had the luxury of mirrors. Best to keep it to myself. You should thank me, I suppose.

No, please don’t touch me. You don’t want to do that.

Yes, I do want it. I want it very, very badly.

Shhh. That’s enough. They threw us in because we are repugnant to them — criminal, yes, that’s the story — but I’ve been here long enough to realize that people are more complicated than that. Monsters too.

I am so sorry. You cannot show me that kindness.

Look, the talking sates my hunger for a while. Company takes the edge off, but it’s still there. You smell recent. You smell human still, and I can’t help the longing.

You should leave now.

Trust me.