#no but this one little line is. i actually have paragraphs worth of action and expression in my head for this reply i just have to.

[jasnstilnski]

if u ever wonder why a reply takes me a while its bc it sits in my drafts like this for 30 years

[dreamsofbroflovski]

Tolkien Black x Reader - sky's the limit

Also available on ao3!

Summary: You spend the New Year's Eve the only way you want to - in the arms of your favourite person.

Warnings: Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content (everyone involved is above the age of consent), Penis In Vagina Sex, Semi-Public Sex, Wall Sex, Mentions of Alcohol & Drug Usage

A/N: Story of how this came to be: I was listening to Rich Sex by Nicki Minaj ft. Lil Wayne. Then I thought of Tolkien. My brain short-circuited and before I noticed I had like five paragraphs written.

Figured I might as well write a NYE fic then, because I really liked the concept and Tolkien desperately needs more love.

Also, third fic in a row with the 'Semi-Public Sex' tag? What is happeninggggg

It was December 31st, 2024. Still another hour or so until midnight, judging by the 90’’ TV screen on the living room wall, which had been for a while now displaying a countdown to the New Year - a livestream for the Times Square ball drop, so a whole bunch of adults in bumfuck Colorado could go absolutely berserk over an event happening all the way on the other side of the country. Which didn’t even mean much, considering my friends would crash out over damn near anything.

The TV wasn’t the focus of anyone’s attention at that moment; most people around were either dancing their soul away to the crazy beats the DJ had cooked up, threading the line between ‘making out’ and ‘blatant exhibitionism’’ on some corner - or, if they had enough decency, in one of the apartment’s bedrooms -, or getting drunk/high off their marbles to start the new year on a good note. The few folk who still attempted normal conversation needed to do so really loudly, which only added to the cacophony overwhelming everyone’s senses. 

More due to being tired of his friends’ constant begging than out of any real interest to do so, my boyfriend Tolkien had rented out an entire penthouse for New Year’s Eve and the day right after, also forking out the money for a decent party at the place. It was supposed to just be people we knew - which was already a lot, considering our friends -, but the whole thing got so big and so out of control that even people from neighboring towns were coming to attend, and every broken thing or mess I stumbled upon made me wince and sigh out of respect for my partner’s wallet.

That’s not to say it was a shitty party. It was wild, yes, but awesome. Music was blasting, drinks were flowing freely, everyone seemed to be in their best vibes and no fights had broken out yet - which was always a plus. I was having a great time, and, from the glimpses I caught of him around the packed place, Tolkien was too. We didn’t spend much of that time actually together, but I saw him here and there mingling with our common friends, usually looking relaxed and laughing at some joke, a different glass in his hand each time. He would never be able to get all of his money’s worth, but he wouldn’t be able to say he hated all of it, either.

However, even though I was enjoying it all, sometimes a girl needs a break. Being a very involved member of the ‘party planning committee’ - a role basically forced upon me due to being the host’s girlfriend -, I had already spent some energy trying to put it all together, so I admit I might’ve gotten myself tired a bit earlier than everyone else. Not a problem, though - I just needed to take a breather, maybe some water, allow my eardrums to calm down a little before they got permanent damage from the pounding music, and then I’d be back in action without any trouble. So I weaseled myself out of yet another drinking game someone had come up with and made my way to the penthouse’s huge balcony.

In a surprising change of pace for our little mountain town, on that particular New Year’s Eve, it hadn’t snowed. Still that didn’t mean respite from the stinging winter breezes, as I had come to find when they passed right through the thin layer of my pantyhose, making me shiver basically as soon as I stepped outside. I lectured myself mentally for not having thought of it and for prioritizing a cute outfit instead of comfort and warmth, but in my defense, I figured I’d spend the whole time inside of the apartment where it was warmer anyways, so more protection wasn’t needed.

I pushed through the uncomfortable sensation, focusing on the warmth provided by my coat and the other layers of my outfit, and it soon subsided. My feet slowly traversed the area of the terrace, while my eyes took in the well-decorated environment that was still fairly untouched by our friends’ disastrous behaviour - at least until one of them was drunkenly dared to hang out naked outside, which was bound to happen eventually. 

Without even noticing, I had made my way to the farthest end of the balcony, a more dimly-lit area, that had no doors leading directly to it and no large windows overseeing it either. There were few decorations - a coffee table, some armchairs around it, big potted plants just like the others spread throughout the outside area of the penthouse. I ignored all of that, heading towards the railing and leaning against it; that specific part of the railing was fairly tall and made of concrete, hitting just under my chest, in a way that I could comfortably put my weight on it to look down at the city without fear of anything breaking.

For a while, the booming bass of the music and the loud voices inside of the apartment became dull noise as I watched the buildings below, places that I had visited the whole year and that impacted my life so greatly, now looking like my personal Lego city as I saw them from high up. The more commercial parts of town were almost entirely plunged into darkness, only the lampposts and some colorful lights from the most recent Christmas a testament that something actually happened in those areas. So my eyes drifted naturally to the residential regions, which were way more lively; lots of houses had their lights on, their inhabitants surely preparing for a great year, channeling that excitement either in the form of a simple family gathering or a loud boisterous party much like the one I was currently in.

“Ah, there you are. I was wondering about you.”

And just like that, I was taken away from my dream-like state by a gentle male voice - but that did not bother me at all. I had a soft smile on my face as I turned to face Tolkien, who walked slowly towards me with his hands in his pockets and returned my smile in kind.

Despite having already spent time together earlier, I couldn’t help but study his whole body up and down as he approached, taking in his whole outfit with great interest. A beige Burberry trench coat covered up the upper half of his body, ending about at the middle of his thighs, fully closed. The black trousers were also Burberry, but no different than any other run-of-the-mill pants to the untrained eye; the only thing that made them slightly different was a small embroidered design above one of the back pockets - which I only knew existed because I had taken that very same garment off of Tolkien’s body numerous times and watched him put it back on later. The charcoal grey scarf neatly wrapped around his neck had the LV monogram patterned all over it, clearly visible in its contrast even in the darkness of the late night. I couldn’t even begin to remember the brands of his shoes, his belt or his watch, the names sounding too expensive for me when he first told me, like one of those exclusive things that doesn’t even reach the ears of the common folk. Only his whole current ensemble was already more expensive than the full outfits of all the other guests combined, and he wore it like it was nothing.

I always greatly appreciated the way that he dressed. Not because it was all expensive and I liked to be seen with a rich guy, mind you; Tolkien could wear a potato sack and I’d still stare at him like the most perfect sculpture. It was the fact that, under all that expensive wrapping, the real gift was for my eyes only, complete perfection that was irrevocably mine.

The only thing currently getting in the way of that perfection was a pair of flimsy plastic glasses, a staple at NYE parties, according to whatever idiot it was that bought them. The damn things were neon yellow, glowed in the dark, and had ‘2025’ on top of the hollow circles that were the actual glasses. Apparently our friends couldn’t find the version that made the 0 and the second 2 the ‘eye’ part of the design - and thank God for that, or else I don’t think I could’ve kept my face straight for as long as I did while looking at Tolkien.

My boyfriend stopped right beside me and we both exchanged a loving glance at each other before our gazes returned to the town spreading below us. “I just needed a bit of fresh air. You know how it is.” I shrugged.

“So you chose to come outside where it’s freezing,” Tolkien retorted in light-hearted mockery, his arm making its way over my shoulders and pulling me closer against his side, that hand running up and down my arm as if trying to create extra heat over my coat. “So much for ‘fresh’.”

“At least now I get to be close to you like this.” I chuckled, leaning towards him and twisting the end of his scarf lazily on my index finger. “I see Clyde sold you out on the ugly-ass glasses.”

Tolkien’s eyes widened and his other hand quickly flew to his face, tearing away the colorful piece of plastic and throwing it over his shoulder as if it was toxic, his expression shifting into one of embarrassment at being caught wearing such a ridiculous object. “I’m sorry you had to witness that.” He mumbled, slightly dejected.

I laughed and wrapped my arms sideways around his waist. “It’s alright, I still love you.”

My answer was enough for him to lose his mortification and smile once more, turning his face towards me briefly to plant a kiss to the top of my head. He then turned to watch the buildings again, his expression much more peaceful - and beautiful, which he always was, but more so now that he had ditched the terrible party accessory.

“But hey, you’re outside,” I shot him a curious look, “Why’s that?”

“Needed some fresh air too,” it was his time to shrug, ”And wanted to at least try to enjoy the view. You know, the one I paid for?”

There was no arguing with that. For the guy that was paying for the whole thing, he surely didn’t get to enjoy most of the penthouse’s amenities before our friends completely trashed it, and we weren’t sure he’d have much patience for it the next day. “It is a very nice view, though,” I commented, “Probably the best I’ve ever seen.”

I heard the tiny ruffling of Tolkien’s scarf as he shook his head. “I’ve seen better.”

“Oh yeah?” I rolled my eyes jokingly. “What was it? Greece, Thailand, the Bahamas?”

“No, no, and no.” Every word of his negative was punctuated by a light tap of his index finger on my shoulder. “Right here in South Park, actually.”

A huff of disbelief left my mouth. “Baby, I think the alcohol is getting to you.”

He turned his whole body towards me and brought his hands to my shoulders, pushing them slightly so I was physically coaxed into facing him as well. “You don’t believe me?”

“It isn’t that I don’t,” I explained, “But you’ve travelled a lot, Tolkien. Surely someplace must look better than the middle of nowhere in America itself.”

“I don’t remember mentioning a place.”

The intensity of his gaze towards me, the sheer adoration in it, told me what words hadn’t yet. I felt my face getting hotter, internally thanking the dim lighting that might provide me with some sort of cover for the red tint that certainly spread in my cheeks. It was unbelievable - Tolkien and I had been together for a while, he had called me all the good adjectives in the dictionary by now, and still made me blush like a damn teenager every single time with his praise.

“You’re the best sight I’ll ever get to see,” one of his hands came to cup my cheek while the other tilted my chin slightly up, “I don’t really need to be anywhere else, if I can just have you by my side.”

“Well, I already am,” my voice was roughly more than a whisper, the low volume making both of us lean closer so I could be heard, “And I’ll always be. I’m yours, Tolkien.”

My lips met his halfway, closing the gap in a tender kiss, almost innocent as it started, letting our bodies cool down from the still present party energy and bringing us to focus on the serene aspects of our affection towards each other. Tolkien’s hands dropped to my waist as he realized he didn’t need to keep my face in position anymore, stroking up and down the sides of my body, making me wish I wasn’t wearing so many layers to keep warm just so I could feel his touch directly on me. 

When my arms wrapped around his neck and I tilted my face a bit, we both understood those moves for the invitation they were to deepen the kiss, and he sighed against my mouth as he pressed his lips on mine with more insistence. I felt the taste of the champagne on his tongue as it brushed against mine in a languid dance, and found myself yearning for more of that flavor, drinking it like it was the real beverage; I was a complete lightweight when it came to anything Tolkien.

What to me was heading out to be just a sweet couple of kisses quickly took a turn when my boyfriend swiftly pushed me and had my back hitting the railing. My legs instinctively spread apart to keep myself stable and he immediately claimed that space in the middle of them, rolling his hips against mine with our bodies pressed together. His lips started tracing a path over my jawline and down my neck with small kisses - making sure to get that tiny spot behind my ear that never failed to make my breath hitch -, getting to their destination on the crook of my neck, where tiny nips and suckles were added to the mix of his affectionate caresses on my body.

“Here?” A curious chuckle left my mouth as I inquired, though there was not a hint of anger or shame in my voice - it was more the fact that, in all of the time I knew him, Tolkien was always one to prefer the peace and quiet of four walls and a locked door for his more intimate displays of affection, instead of the open air and the sight of the wide sky like the situation we were in now. Being public like this, in a place full of people where anyone could simply walk outside for long enough and catch us, was unusual; but I wasn’t about to really complain.

“All the rooms are full already. I checked,” he stopped his assault on my neck for a moment to pull back slightly and give me a pleading look that could melt even the iciest of hearts, “Please, honey?”

There was no way I was going to deny the owner of those magnificent mahogany eyes anything he ever wanted in life, not when he looked at me like that, like I held the whole firmament that spread above us. I tilted my head away from him to expose my neck more in silent permission for him to continue working on it. “Hm, so you were planning for this.”

“And if I was?” Tolkien smirked, leaning forward and putting his mouth to my neck again, his grip on my waist tightening, “Can’t blame a man for wanting to be with his girlfriend instead of with a bunch of jerks on a beautiful night like this, can you?”

I really couldn’t, especially when said girlfriend also wanted to be with her man, and had the fast heartbeat to prove it. So instead I had my hands do the talking by letting them drift all over the front part of his trenchcoat, skilled fingers opening the buttons and the belt on it to make the work easier for my boyfriend. He helped me out by putting a bit of distance between our bodies so I could actually move my hands between us, but was flush against me again as soon as the last button was loose, pressing me insistently against the concrete railing.

His hand slid under my skirt, taking its time as it glided over my thighs in a velvety caress before making its way between them. One harsh tug at the thin fabric was enough for Tolkien to tear a hole through the crotch of my tights, then a few more for that hole to stretch wider and give him easier access to my still clothed core.

“I’ll buy you another pair,” he said as if reading my mind, his fingers now hooking under my panties to bring them aside and out of his way, “Just don’t want you to be cold.”

“What a gentleman.” It was only half of a jest - he truly was one.

Underwear now out of the way too, there was nothing separating my most sensitive area from my boyfriend’s loving touch. Two of his fingers traced my slit, spreading my arousal all over it, his sensual motions like fuel to the intense warmth that had built on my lower abdomen and was slowly spreading through my whole body. Tolkien brought his right hand around my left thigh and pulled it up so my leg was resting against his hip, leaving my other leg planted on the ground. My hands held onto his shoulders for stability, thumbs instinctively rubbing caresses he couldn’t physically feel over his thick coat but undoubtedly made its way to his heart. 

Seeing me in that position and completely open for him, he was quick to pull himself off from inside his pants - but I didn’t even have time to appreciate that beautiful cock of his with my eyes before he got into position and pushed it to the hilt inside of me, filling me up completely in one move, a hiss of pleasure leaving his mouth at the same time as a yelp of surprise and slight pain left mine. Such speed was another unusual occurrence; Tolkien was normally much more gentle when we made love, he liked to take his time and really feel me stretching around him.

My pain-like reaction was immediately noticed by my partner, and his wide-eyed worried gaze shot up to my face. “Everything alright, baby?”

“Yes, yes, I’m fine,” my reassurance was accompanied by a deep sigh of relief on his part, “Just… Sudden.”

Tolkien nodded, pressing his forehead against mine. “Sorry,” he whispered, “It’s just… the cold, you know.”

I nodded emphatically, understanding his worry. If there was one thing I didn’t want right now, it was to be cock-blocked by Mother Nature.

He allowed himself to stay like this for a while, placing various quick yet luscious pecks to my mouth in succession, enjoying the sensation of my warmth enveloping him completely, and letting me adjust to his throbbing length as well. Then the arm he had around my thigh wrapped tighter as he started to move in slow, deep thrusts; his free hand roaming over my clothed body, tracing curves he couldn’t properly see but already knew completely by heart. He started off gentle, his cock massaging my walls with kindness, eyes fixated on mine, gauging my every reaction and letting his body transform the immensely positive feedback into motivation for him to keep going.

Small clouds would leave both our mouths with each exhale - the chemical phenomenon giving physical form to the lustful mist that slowly clouded both my mind and his, protecting us from the environment and also making us hyper-aware of our connection and every sensation related to each other’s touch. I could feel all the veins in his thick length imprinting my walls, my cunt the exact perfect shape for him, as if tailor-made. With every movement, he had his cock pressing against the sweet spot inside of me - it took everything I had for me to not brace myself and beg for him to take me hard and fast, because I still wanted to be with him, to savor that moment, to have it last.

In a surprising move, his hands left my body for a brief moment so he could hurriedly shed his coat and scarf, letting them fall to the floor without a care. Underneath that layer, he was wearing a navy blue Armani dress shirt - which I, completely disregarding his comfort or protection against the weather, undid the remaining closed buttons of as well, letting my nails lightly rake his toned torso as it was bare in front of me. Tolkien didn’t even shudder as the cold hit his now much less protected body, and I fully understood why; between the two of us, we were generating enough heat to make the whole building think it was summer.

“You look beautiful tonight.” I murmured tenderly, letting my hand stop splayed on the left side of his chest, right over his racing heart.

“You look beautiful always.” His eyes fluttered almost closed as he picked up speed on his thrusts, instinctively responding to my soft touch on his skin.

Whines of pleasure left my mouth more frequently with this new pace that chased the perfect middle ground between sweet lovemaking and rough fucking - a middle ground that Tolkien was always capable of achieving and that always had me running back for more of him. I was getting louder and louder every time, taking full advantage of the blaring music from the party, which prevented anyone else from hearing us and coming outside to check. My sounds seemed to reach Tolkien’s brain loud and clear, though, as he brought his face to my ear and started whispering lovely words of praise, his warm breath making the fine hairs behind my neck stand with the goosebumps it created.

In time, we both started to lose our senses of self in favor of pleasure, my arms wrapping around Tolkien’s neck as I tried to melt his body into mine and make us one whole thing. He, on the other hand, was throwing more and more of his caution off the penthouse railing - the sweet nothings he murmuring into my hair turning into slurred curse words I hardly ever heard him use, but that seemed to come naturally to him in that particular moment. The arm he had wrapped around my thigh brought my leg even higher against the side of his body, using the extra space and the slightly different position to pound harder against me; his other hand found itself on the almost non-existent space between our hips, sneaking down to my clit and skillfully rubbing circles on the sensitive nub. Immediately I felt like the whole sky had been brought down to me, breathy moans in quick succession trying to use up all the air in the atmosphere - I was getting dizzy on the way he made me feel so good, logical thought being replaced with utter need for him.

With the new stimulation, I was clenching harder than ever around Tolkien’s cock, and his body responded to all of my touches like it was all just an extension of the most sensitive areas of him, even though he was almost fully covered. I could feel his whole body tensing between my legs, against my thigh, under my arms, every part that he had against me was threatening to snap. His thrusts were all over the place and erratic, and he grunted with gritted teeth like he was one breath away from losing all control. Yet he held on to it for dear life, inhaling sharply as if he wanted the cold air to freeze him so he could last just a little bit longer - if there was one thing about my boyfriend, it was that he refused to cum until I did. 

Not that it would take too long for that. I tugged at Tolkien’s hair, pulling his head away from my neck so that he was directly facing me. His eyes were glazed off, almost completely gone, portals to his blissful mind.

“Tolkien… aaaah… I’m… I’m…” 

Proper words were starting to get lost on me as I tiptoed the edge of my orgasm. Yet, I still found it in me to say, right after, the only ones that would be on my heart no matter the situation as long as I was with him: “I love you…”

“I love you too, honey,” his voice was low and rough with his passion, “So… So much…”

And that simple expression overpowered me. I threw my head back, letting it dangle over the railing as my climax set my whole body ablaze, mouth opening wide in a moan of my lover’s name that was probably heard across the whole state. Opening my eyes and staring directly at the night sky, I saw every single star as close as they could be to my body, their very energy coursing through my skin like countless sparks. Even if thousands of light years away, the whole galaxy was etched deep into my very soul, and yet it was a mere atom in comparison to the size of my love for Tolkien.

I stopped hearing his harsh breathing during the whole time utter pleasure was flashing through me; granted, I didn’t hear much of anything at that moment, but I just knew he was watching my face with thorough veneration as I came. Then both of Tolkien’s arms wrapped around my body with an extremely protective squeeze as his body leaned towards mine instead of away, his hips stuttering frantically towards mine - the sight of my face in utmost pleasure and my walls tightening around him always managed to have him done for, and his release came almost immediately after. While he emptied himself inside of me, his head was hanging over my shoulder, face down, looking towards the streets and buildings dozens of meters below us. 

“Wow, we are so high up right now,” I heard Tolkien murmur with a slightly surprised tone to it, as if he had just been made aware of where exactly we were, despite us having taken in the view before. He was trembling slightly, half aftershocks and half a natural discomfort at the height. “It’s so cool.”

The chuckle that left my mouth with his comment was lazy, mirroring the completely spent state of my body. “So you’re sold on this being the best view ever now?”

He made a hum of disagreement, and when he spoke again, I could almost hear his smile. “Still not. But I guess I had forgotten about what was top 2.”

I knew where this was going, but, in my still slightly lust-drunk mind, I decided I wanted him to say it. “Which was…”

“Your face when you cum,” There it is, I thought to myself as he answered, “Absolutely gorgeous.”

Tolkien slowly straightened his posture, bringing my upper body along with him, his arms loosening around my body but still keeping me close. His cock was now softening inside of me, keeping all of his essence plugged in, filling me up with a type of warmth that had both everything and nothing to do with the hot seed that painted my walls.

When he pulled back a bit and my eyes scanned his satisfied features, I finally saw it - tiny specks of white now peppered his dark hair, creating a sharp contrasting image which definitely wasn’t there before. I lifted one of my hands to his head and gently brushed some of them away, the edges of my eyesight capturing Tolkien’s confused expression for a brief moment.

“It’s snowing,” I explained, hearing a hum of acknowledgement from him shortly after. He echoed my movements with one of his own hands, ghosting over my hair and shoulder, clearing me off of small ice crystals I couldn’t see.

“We should go back inside then,” he gestured with his head towards the penthouse, “We don’t wanna be here if it gets any worse.”

My head moved in a nod of agreement. Now that I didn’t have the fire of lust running through my veins anymore, I was made too aware of how the weather had gotten worse, and we really didn’t need the most intimate parts of us exposed to the harsh cold. We had to separate, make ourselves presentable again, and go back inside the apartment so I could rush to the bathroom before Tolkien’s release could create questionable stains on my ruined pantyhose.

However, despite acknowledging the discomfort of our bodies and the compromising position we were in, despite saying with all the words that we had to leave, none of us made a move. Tolkien was now completely soft, his arms had dropped their hold completely on my body to just let his hands rest on my hips. Yet my left leg was still wrapped around his waist, keeping me in the same position I was when we were making love, keeping the energy of our little escapade physically present with us for just a while longer in the form of that contact. We both distracted ourselves by looking up for a while, the twinkle of the stars present in our eyes, happy and serene.

“Honey?” Tolkien suddenly brought my attention back to him with a warm callout, the volume of his voice still low.

My eyes immediately went to him again. “Hm?”

“I love you.”

Even though my heart was soaring like it always did whenever he said that to me, I still let out an amused chuckle. “You already said that.”

“What’s wrong with saying it again?” one of his hands went to nudge my shoulder in a playful manner. “It’s true!”

“I know, I know.” The hand I had on his hair drifted down to his face, my silk-like touch caressing his cheek. “And I love you too, Tolkien.”

As he poured all those sweet words into my body with a passionate kiss, my resolution for the New Year was made, even though it had already long been completed. I’d spend every day of my life letting this love flow through my body, with Tolkien right next to me, making every single minute perfect for us.

Dividers by @cafekitsune

[mer-acle]

Any tips on what to do when struggling with a chapter? I got this one paragraph that I absolutely despise but it needs to be like this for the plot. You're one of my favourite writers so I figured I should ask you.

Also if you dont feel comfortable answering this, you dont have to.

Okay, this comes at a good time actually bc I struggled so so much with Chapter 23 of Fighting to be loved. I took so long to write it bc I didn't like what I was writing, and once I was done, I hated the flow of it.

What I did was, I printed the chapter (not a necessary step but easier for me) and started highlighting the different aspects in different colors; what's Athena's dialogue, what's Odysseus', what's description of feelings, what's actions/visualization, where are mentions of Pen and Tel (obviously that's very specific to that chapter), so I could see if I neglected one aspect and that made it feel unbalanced (which, Pen and Tel had like two lines in total) Also, whenever a line stuck out to me, I'd write that down. No thought yet of how to fix it, just "No, I don't like this line, fix later"

Basically, what I tried to do was identifying what I disliked. (also if you write dialogue, try reading it aloud, it really helps for noticing where it sounds unnatural)

After I was done analysing I went back to the chapter and rewrote it. I had to edit way more than I had originally highlighted to make my changes work, but it was so worth it.

ofc I don't know what exactly you dislike about that paragraph, whether it's the form, or what happens, but I definitely get the struggle of "can everyone just please do this for the plot, for once, we need this to get where I want" and both the characters and the writer are like "how about no"

Also thank you so much, I'm very honored you like my writing, I hope this helps a little, feel free to ask whatever else you want to know :)

xx

[batboopp]

Batman: I Am Suicide- a comic breakdown (how trauma can shape your life)

huge cw for suicidal ideation and self harm! i seriously mean it it’s not even subtle 😭

another heads up, this essay really only talks about one issue, as that’s the only one that really goes into what i want to talk about! maybe i could do a full comic breakdown in the future. <3

(most of this is written whenever i have some of free time, so please ignore if any sentences/paragraphs are incoherent or run on for awhile 😭😭 i hope you like my batman drabbles :D)

It’s common knowledge that both Bruce Wayne and his Batman persona are very emotionally tortured, usually refusing any help or healthy way of processing his thoughts, emotions, and actions. He’s deadset that nothing but Batman, muscles, and pure determination will save Gotham city-therefore saving any child from having anyone taken from them so brutally, the way his parents were taken from him. You don’t have to be a psychiatrist to know that this black-and-white way of thinking is not a healthy way to process trauma, and some may argue that it borders along the line of insanity or mental illness. Although I’m not here to specifically talk about those parts of his psyche, I DO want to talk about how this extreme way of thinking affects-and even shapes-his entire life and personality.

“A kid and a vow. The ears and the belt and the batarangs and the Batmobile and the gargoyle and the roof and the leather and the armor.”

“How sad. How stupid. How immature.”

“How hilarious. How hilarious all of it is. I want to laugh, too. Do you know how much I want to laugh?”

Starting off strong, we can already see that Bruce has SO much self doubt about himself and a sort of awareness of just how absurd his whole mission is, something I personally see a lot of, but I always appreciate when it’s brought up. A thing about Bruce is that if he has a plan or a mission, he WILL get it done no matter how insane it is, and it’s nice that part of his obsessive personality is displayed here. However, even though he puts his whole soul into his Batman mission, he expresses that he can’t help but feel almost desperately hopeless about it. This might be me reaching, but it seems he wants Batman to be this thing he can sort of lessen by laughing it off. This may be surprising to some, but Batman laughing off and joking about his situation isn’t uncommon. In many comics, he makes jokes about horrible things he’s gone through, he cracks puns at his villains and rouges while he’s getting the shit kicked out of him, and most importantly, he laughs a lot at himself. Bruce wants it to just be-less. It’s almost depressingly ironic that he wants (whether subconsciously or not) this symbol of raw hope, justice, and pure dedication he built with so much effort to be less than it actually is. It’s a lot, so much that Batman himself can barely take it.

“After the alley and the gun. And the pearls. What use was I? After the blood on her hand, what use was a little rich kid who’s mommy and daddy got shot?”

“I was pain. That’s all I was. Everything else, every chance given to me, every promise I’d ever made, all of it was pain. And what use is pain? What use is being all pain? It’s not dignified. It’s not kind. And if it’s not dignified and not kind, then maybe it’s not worth anything.”

“Maybe it’s better off as nothing. Gone. Dead.”

Here, we can see that Bruce thinks he’s worthless, to the point he thinks he’d be better off dead. Not only that, you can argue that he sees his own pain as a weakness, and yet he uses it to shape his life. “I was pain, that’s all I was. Everything else, every change given to me, every promise I’d ever made, all of it was pain. And what use is being all pain?” He goes on to say “It’s not dignified and it’s not kind,” which you can infer he’s talking about himself here, with his ‘I am pain’ analogy. He thinks he’s inherently violent and undignified and worthless because of this pain, even though we KNOW he does not see other’s pain as a weakness. In fact, he is normally comforting of people going through hardships, especially to children or those close to him. This is a very common form of self-deprecating behavior, thinking that whatever you’re going through is automatically less important than the well-being of others.

“I was 10. I got one of my father’s razor blades, and I got down on my knees. I put the metal on my wrist. The edge scratching cold. The blood on my hand. And I looked up. To Mother and Father. I told them I was sorry. I was so sorry.”

“I was on my knees in Gotham. And I was praying, pushing my hands together now, the blood and the blade warm between them.”

“I prayed. And no one-

no one answered.

No one answered.

No one answered.”

“I was alone. Like everyone else. Like everyone in Gotham. I saw everyone in Gotham, all of us. We’re all on our knees, our hands together, the blade and the blood warm between them. We pray. And no one answers.”

“I saw. And I understood. Finally. Kindness. Dignity. I let the razor fall, and I understood, it was done. I’d done it. I’d surrendered, my life was no longer my life, and I whispered-

‘I swear by the spirits of my parents to avenge their deaths by spending the rest of my life warring on all criminals.’”

We have a lot to talk about on this panel. To follow up on my third paragraph, I’ll start talking about his absurd amount of empathy, as I feel like it pairs with when I stated Batman cares about the well-being of others more than his own. This extreme sense of empathy and understanding is developed when Bruce describes self-harming over (presumably) his parent’s graves. “I was alone. Like everyone else. Like everyone in Gotham. I saw everyone in Gotham, all of us. We’re all on our knees, our hands together, the blade and the blood warm between them. We pray. And no one answers.” He describes how he ‘saw everyone’ in Gotham. How all of them are going through hardships. How all of them are alone. And that’s when he understood kindness, love, dignity. And, more importantly, when he decided to give up any chance at a normal life and pursue his crusade, his destiny, of becoming the Batman. He says he swore on his parents dying souls, but he knows he swore on his own, too. 

We can also gather that this is the death of his belief in religion, ‘I prayed, and no one answered.’ The correlation with religion and a sense of innocence or fear in Batman comics isn’t unheard of, and I like to think that’s what the writer is getting at here. Batman is a known atheist, and states this multiple times in many different comics. It’s nice to know the exact time his belief in religion died, and that was when he prayed.

In conclusion, I really like this panel because you can just feel the resignation coming from Bruce. He will give up every part of himself if it means another person doesn’t have to suffer, and I think if you want to make the most accurate Batman possible, it’s important to remember that.

“So that’s what it is. The ears. The belt. The gargoyle. It’s not funny. It’s the choice of a boy that chose to die.”

“I am Batman. I am suicide.”

To wrap this up, Bruce states that he is very aware that being Batman would consume his life, would destroy any chance he had at a healthy future, and would obliterate any healthy way of healing from his trauma. He lets this pain, he lets the Batman, build him and his life and he will never let go. It literally fuels him, as you can see him pummel so many soldiers to the ground without breaking a sweat. Pain drives him. The will to be Batman drives him.

hope you enjoyed my shitty essay! please let me know any thoughts, opinions, critiques, or disagreements you might have, i’d love to hear them 

[monstersdownthepath]

Monster Spotlight: Kamaitachi

CR 13

Chaotic Evil Medium Fey

Bestiary 6, pg. 176

These wicked and fickle fey can appear just about anywhere that there's pain to be caused and lives to be ended. They appear cloaked in their Dust Devils, magical winds that whip around them at all times, carrying their little weasely bodies around like a single spaghetti noodle in a pot of boiling water. Despite how cute and silly they look, they're among the most vicious and sadistic of all Fey, maximizing the fear and agony in whatever creature crosses their path for no other reason than their own twisted amusement. What's worse is that there's almost no warning before they strike; depending on what sort of debris is in the Dust Devil, one may not see the beast within until the wind blows past them and tears the flesh from their bones.

While in their shell of wind, Kamaitachi (which I will shorten to 'itachi' from here on out) can fly at speeds of up to 120ft a round without issue, bending and twisting through the air with the ease of a barracuda in the open sea. Their sole offense is their quartet of Deadly Claws, scythe-like limbs so razor sharp that they can straight up do the Samurai Diagonal Cut at will, but more on that later, for now we'll focus on the claws themselves. Each claw deals 1d6+12 damage boosted by their constant Greater Magic Fang to hit even harder, and as previously mentioned these claws are especially deadly, critically hitting on a 19 or 20 and dealing x3 damage on a successful crit. Every blow also lacerates the target to deal 1d6 bleed damage a round, and the weapons of the Itachi are designed to flay the targets so agonizingly that a struck creature must make a DC 23 Fortitude save every time they're hit or become sickened by the pain for a round.

Able to make upwards to four of these attacks if it manages to Full-Attack, an adventuring party will rarely have to deal with that except against a foolish Itachi. It's got Flyby Attack and no reason not to use it to cut a party to ribbons bit by bit, savoring their slow and terrible demise. It can get away with this kiting behavior, too, because while a cursory glance at its stat block reveals only DR 10/Cold Iron as its primary physical defense, you have to look a little further down to realize that you're going to need to be able to fly or have a way to ground the beast to actually fight it and win, because Dust Devil automatically deflects ALL small projectiles; arrows, bolts, and bullets are utterly useless against it, and any throwing weapon has a 30% miss chance. Magical AoE, lines, cones, and rays all still work, though they have to contend with the wonder weasel's 24 Spell Resistance.

Side note because I'm legally required: If you or a loved one has ever been beaten to death by a creature with Flyby Attack, please remember to regularly apply readied actions to your party bruisers.

Anyway, these vicious weasels have another, far more horrific use for their claws than ripping someone to shreds: blackmail. As I mentioned a few paragraphs ago, Itachi can swing their cutting limbs with such speed and ferocity that the victim doesn't even realize they've been cut until the violent fey blows on them just a little too hard and they fall to pieces. Delayed Doom allows the fey to 'store' its claw hits up on any number of targets, preventing the damage, bleed, and Pain but leaving it on a trigger delay, allowing it to deal otherwise fatal damage to a creature but refrain from killing them outright.

Such unfortunate creatures are walking time-bombs, the Itachi able to cause the stored damage, bleed, and agony to blow up all at once with nothing more than a free action at any point within the next two weeks. This allows the Itachi to wring poor souls for all they're worth in the hopes that it will choose to spare their life, turning friends and family against one another or forcing victims to perform painful, humiliating, dangerous, or otherwise criminal actions at its request... only for many such victims to suddenly fall to bloody pieces anyway, as the Fey has no compulsion to honor any deal it makes.

This also means an Itachi can do a drive-by scything on someone and make them believe it missed, so it can just float in the air above them, giggling to itself as it picks the perfect moment to make their head fall off. Being hit with a Full-Attack causes, at minimum, 52 damage + 1d6 bleed, so an especially sinister DM could have one of these creatures ambush the party multiple days in a row, FA-ing them one at a time before flying off, and then once it's stored up damage on everyone over a few days, drop in and instantly take off half the party's HP with a free action. That, or fly down, hit someone a few times, then fly back into the sky and carefully wait for their HP to drop below a threshold where the Delayed Doom would kill them. Is that unfair? Yes. I only recommend this tactic if you want to be especially evil to your party!

How does it know if someone is below a specific threshold, though? Because Itachi can also cast Status at will, and frequently do so in order to keep track of interesting or amusing victims. If a victim manages to get further than 1 mile from the weasel, or is so amusing to it that it doesn't trigger Delayed Doom for 2 weeks, all the stored damage falls off harmlessly, so the weasel has a vested interest in keeping them relatively close if it wishes to prolong its suffering.

Delayed Doom also ends if the Itachi is slain, and doing so is actually a little bit simpler than it looks... if you have access to specific spells. See, the Dust Devil of a Kamaitachi gives it incredibly offense and defense, but the weasels must maintain control of the wind in order to keep its shields up. If it enters the radius of any spell which controls or alters the winds, no matter the spell's level, it must save against the spell or the Dust Devil dissipates, taking away the Itachi's fly speed, immunity to projectiles, and 6 points of its AC (lowering it from 29 to 23). Alter Winds and Control Weather are both options presented by the book itself, but with such long cast times (and Control Weather being a spell level too high for a party encountering a single Itachi besides), you may want to aim for more practical spells such as Calm Air, Tailwind, Air Geyser, or Gust/Blast of Wind, all of which either end the Itachi's flight or can easily be argued to do so.

The Itachi can still make a saving throw against the incoming inconvenience, but if it fails it has to waste its entire turn using one of its 3 castings of Control Wind on itself just to restart its Dust Devil, giving the party enough time to surround it and beat the snot out of it. Without its defensive tornado it's both less mobile and more vulnerable to being beaten into the ground... and depending on how high up it was when your party invoked the winds, it might already be damaged by the fall. I think, after all the trouble one of these little bastards can put a party through, they may take some satisfaction in seeing it hurl towards the ground, tumbling end over end like a dropped pasta noodle.

You can read more about them here.

[existslikepristin]

Been holding on to this one in a finished/unedited state for a few months now because I wasn't too happy with it. @worldsover did some editing for me. It still feels like something's missing (I'm not going to try to make Levi literally rewrite the whole thing), so feel free to give me critiques and suggestions, even if it's "yeah, I see what you mean and it is a little odd". I don't want to avoid posting it for forever, so let's call it a learning experience.

Regardless, I hope you enjoy! This is my first explicitly stated female reader insert, so that's yet another fun step.

(Also, I know I promised that the next story would be "normal" but you know what? Anything is normal compared to my last fic, so the only critique I will not be accepting is "Waaah, this isn't 'normal!'")

Tags: NSFW, TheLounge, Red Velvet, Irene, Female reader insert, anal, rimming, not a single line of dialogue, canonical silence, ass worship, massage oils, hand holding, yeah you’re deeefinitely the dominant one here

Open and Shut Up

~~~~~

No talking.

You can get behind that. That’s totally sexy. What’s less sexy… is a flowchart.

Obviously, you printed it out. Irene is going to be paying you for thi—It’s not payment, you remind yourself. It’s a mutual favor between acquaintances which may or may not involve money or goods/services which require it.

You scowl retroactively at Yeri’s so-called humorous insistence that you are, effectively, a prostitute. Performing sex acts in exchange, one time, for smoked salmon bagels is most definitely not prostitution, as you have reminded her many times.

Trying very hard to put that train of thought behind you, you glance around at the room. Low light, vanilla lavender sandalwood candles, obscenely soft towels, lube options, massage oils, and the stupid fucking laminated flowchart. You sigh—

NO! You don’t sigh, actually! Because the no talking rule was emphasized in great detail during negotiations, and included moans, groans, hums, whispers, grunts, and unnecessarily heavy breathing. And since a sigh is a heavy breath, you fucking hold that shit in tight!

But why do you need to hold in your sighs? Well, because of the final feature of the room that wasn’t mentioned two paragraphs ago: Irene, lying entirely nude on her stomach, on a bed of silk sheets, implying that your job—NOT your job, excuse you—has already begun. You entered the room mere seconds ago, so this should be extremely obvious to you, but you had to take care of a bit of exposition before you could really admire her body or get into the action. Perhaps you should do one of those two things now.

You can hardly believe what you’re seeing. Her slim legs and waist, the expanse of her back easily defeating the silkiness of the sheets she’s on, her elegant neck, her luxurious pitch black hair twirled into a loose bun, and the mild plumpness of her ass, peeking out from above the creases where her thighs meet it. Now, you’ve seen plenty of naked idols, but it’s the prestige that comes with this idol in particular that may have you so excited. Or it’s what she wants you to do to her. It’s hard to say. Point is, you’re wet, and you’re probably going to have to lay down a towel of your own.

On that note, you forgot an important aspect of the exposition: You’re not allowed to touch yourself.

That’s right. You’re in a room with a naked Irene, perhaps the most desired (per capita by fans and/or marketing departments) idol in history, preparing to gape her asshole in exchange for goods and/or services and/or currency totalling in value no less than the approximate equivalent worth of this spa treatment, and you aren’t supposed to get yourself off. But you are supposed to be naked, so you remove your shirt and bra, making just enough noise for her to hear you undressing, since that’s supposed to be how you let her know you’re about to start—

Oh, yes. Did you forget the most, actually, critically important part of your exposition? Oh, you think you caught on to it moments ago? Why, yes. You’re here, specifically, to gape her asshole. No more, except any action that will lead toward said gaping, and definitely no less. You are to take the role of dominant, while she takes the role of submissive. Never mind the fact that, per her instructions, you can’t speak, or make any noise, or touch yourself, or use her body to get yourself off, or choose your own state of undress, or touch any part of her not shown in the diagram on the flowchart, or do anything that isn’t explicitly spelled out on the flowchart… But you are required to spank her if she makes any noises. So yeah, you’re totally the dominant one here. (And, to be more specific, you are to keep track of which buttcheek you last spanked so that you can make sure to spread the ass-slapping evenly between cheeks and preserve symmetry, followed by immediate continuation of whatever action you were in the midst of prior to said spank.)

… Yes, that is the last of the exposition. What? You want to have a flashback to when the verbal negotiations were happening? Absolutely not. That’s dialogue, which is technically against the rules. It’s time to do things to Irene’s butthole. Stop stalling.

Once you remove your skirt, slippers, and underwear, you get onto your knees, noting that the floor seems slightly spongy and wondering what that’s about. Irene’s legs are closed. The crevasse of her ass on its own makes you want to scream, but the centerpoint of the cross formed by that crevasse and her thigh crease . There is the slightest gap at that point which reveals the tiniest sneak peak of what hides between. You bite down on your lips to suppress your instinctual lewd moan. Okay, you’re just getting started. Calm down, or this is going to be impossibly difficult.

You straddle Irene’s calves (without touching them!), take a deep and silent breath, and lean forward, placing your palms first on the flawless globes of her ass, then letting your fingers come to rest as well. They’re such a perfect combination of firm, soft, and smooth that it brings tears to your eyes. The inability to comment on them out loud brings you near-physical pain and certainly-mental anguish. If Irene cares, she’s not making it known. She’s deathly silent, and you only know she’s alive because of the way her back rises and falls with her breath.

Contact achieved. Looking at the flowchart isn’t necessary for now. You had a pretty easy time memorizing steps one through five since they don’t have any branching-off points. Step two is to inspect. You look away and take a couple more deep (and silent!) breaths, then increase the pressure of your hands on Irene’s butt and ever so slowly pull apart.

Within the realm of your imagination, you can see yourself comically hyperventilating. In the real world, you see a hole that you could only ever describe as manicured. Not a hair in sight, and some shade of pink so unrealistically perfect that it probably has a Pantone color named after it (Irene’s Butthole Pink? Pick a hex code). The miniscule folds of flesh are already very slightly gaped, giving you a near-imperceptible view into her interior, as if she’d had someone else very recently do what you’re about to, or as if she’d prepared herself with a butt plug. You wonder if Irene even owns a butt plug though, considering she can probably convince any person on the planet to open up her ass any time she would even want to use one. Or maybe she does have one. The Alexander III Commemorative Fabergé egg is still missing, after all…

You pull a little further, and can’t contain your shudder as not only her asshole opens by another couple millimeters, but her pussy lips spread and eventually split apart when the pressure barely overcomes the moisture holding them together. Your eyes and heart flutter, and you think you might faint. The vagina is one of many areas which is not indicated as touchable on the diagram, which hurts your soul because it’s the perfect number of shades darker than the surrounding skin and—

It’s time to focus! Asshole only! Get your mind out of the gutter!

Keeping one hand in place so she stays half-open, you get a handful of one of the massage oils. It feels room temperature, but you're supposed to hold it until it's warmer, so you stare at Irene's back as you try not to let too much drip away. The movement of her breathing is steady and subtle. In. Out. You try to match her pace. In. Out. In. Out.

When it's ready, you let the oil flow off your hand into the cleft of Irene's ass. She doesn't so much as flinch, which you obviously credit more to your excellent reading of body temperature and less to her ass-trance. But back to the butt in hand.

The oil travels leisurely down her crack, speeding up ever so slightly as the path becomes more vertical, and stopping to pool on top of her hole. You place your oily hand on its designated cheek again and repeat the process on the other side.

It’s time to really get started now… with step three-dash-C.

The tips of your thumbs meet just over her hole and press down flatly so that they do not enter her. You slowly shift them around each other and back, massaging with just the right pressure to stay on the rim. The rest of your hands are for massaging the rest of her derriere. It’s not necessary, but you want to show off your manual dexterity, and you want to make sure she’s as relaxed as can—She’s effectively already achieved Nirvana down there, from the looks of things, actually. The relaxation is for you. You’re the one who’s Nirvous about this anal—Is this a joke to you? It’s time for another spread test. You need to make sure Irene’s ready, because maybe somewhere between steps four-dash-E and four-dash-K you’ll forget to off yourself for that pun… Thank fuck you didn’t say that one out loud.

Step four is the first insertion.

Every ounce of fortitude you have is tested. You hold back your shaking. It’s just a finger. It is just a finger, right? You’ve done this plenty of times, to plenty of idols, no less. Well, not a silent butt-fingering, per se, but you’ve been knuckle deep in other idols before, and often more than one idol and often more than one knuckle! Irene just has a gravitas that makes yo—Don’t you dare say she has a gravitass. Stay. Quiet! And keep her ass spread with your free hand.

You watch the carefully trimmed, polished nail of your forefinger leisurely slip into her asshole. Then you pass your first knuckle. You stop on the second and quietly release your held breath. You don’t recall making an analogy about the feeling of her ass cheeks, but you’ll sure as hell compare the interior of her butt to cashmere. The minor gape you’d noticed previously has no effect on how tightly the hole hugs your digit.

Irene’s back rises a centimeter higher, and falls more slowly. Her pattern is broken. You catch your breath again. Did you do something wrong? Is the massage oil adequate? No, it’s only meant to be the starter. This was the whole intention. Right? You glance at the flowchart. Yes, step three, massage oil only, no additional lubrication. You do your best to relax and drag your finger back.

The way her asshole holds on to your finger is its own story of seduction, affair, and dramatic departure. She (her hole is a she) clearly doesn’t want her (so is your finger) to go, but she has to, lest her family shun her. But she cannot resist returning, leaving again despite all the kissing and languid hugging, and returning once more. One last time, she escapes completely, but after telling the story to a saucy friend, introduces Irene’s butt to them, and suddenly the sordid romance becomes a menage a trois.

Two fingers, two knuckles deep in Irene’s ass, you note your own wetness beginning to trail down your inner thigh. You aren’t sure exactly why the thought crosses your mind that you hope that it will somehow evaporate against your ragingly hot and bothered leg.

Now, out, and back in, out, and back in. With your breath. You match Irene’s. Out, and back in.

You gulp. You’re halfway through step four’s substeps. Next is the addition of another finger and more thrusting at a torturously slow pace for an actually timed five minutes. You find yourself hypnotized by it. The five minutes pass by in something more like twelve seconds, and the clock on the wall gently changes color to let you know it’s time to make the final preparations for step five. It’s not magical. It’s just connected by bluetooth to the phone to your left.

But what is magical? You’ve come this far, so you should know by now. It’s Irene’s asshole. You remove two of three fingers, then reinsert one more from the opposite hand, and as cautiously as you can, pull apart. There’s the magic.

Irene’s butt is open, and not just immediately around your fingers, but in a whole oval shape. It’s not enormously wide, but it’s enough that you could reasonably, without discomfort, insert the tip of your tongue.

… Hey. Wouldn’t you know it? That’s step five.

Rimming is always a questionable thing to do to your nose, ranging from the worst to a merely neutral idea. When you draw in close to Irene’s open ass, however, it’s the massage oil that overpowers your trepidatious olfactory sense. You’d noticed earlier that it was labeled as Fresh Linen, a scent that certainly makes sense given Irene’s reputation for laundry-doing, but it triggers a seemingly unrelated and entirely Loony memory of the smell of coffee. How the smells of linen and coffee are linked in your mind, you may never know. Perhaps you should see a professional about that.

But how’s the taste? Well, bland with the slight bitter spike of chemicals that improve viscosity but shouldn’t be ingested in large quantities. The risk of health complications is extremely low though, and you’d risk significantly more for this specific opportunity.

Irene’s butt cheeks and your face cheeks are still separated by your hands, but as of step five-dash-B that will no longer be the case. For now, your lips and tongue are in full contact, and that would be more than enough. To be licking around and inside the asshole of Irene, the rarely disputed queen of idols, you have to be infinitely lucky. You thank heaven you are.

Your focus is drawn in further and further. No more jokes. No more references to other stories. Even the most obvious pun/reference slips from your mind as you try your best to keep your tongue soft for Irene’s pleasure.

Your complete and total compliance doesn’t go unnoticed by Irene, somehow. The tiniest roll of her hips, that barest indication of her appreciation, kicks your core into overdrive. The trail down your thigh widens and it’s all you can do to beg the universe that you won’t drip on her calves.

It takes more strength than you knew you had not to squeal your desperation into her ass. Your thighs and your lungs and your everything else burn with desire. You know it’s not for want of air since your nose is still free, so it has to be your overwhelming need for Irene’s attention. You’d do anything. You are doing anything. A friendly agreement to gape her hole? No, this is a test, a labor, a trial. You’re proving your devotion.

You’re not licking a queen’s ass. 

You’re worshipping a goddess. 

It’s not a flowchart. 

It’s a divine ritual.

The shifting color on the clock only mostly guides you out of your trance. You pull away with a heavy heart, staring half lidded at the strings of saliva still connecting you with what you now live for. There’s no difference in size, but you much prefer the sheen you left on her rim to that of the oil. Step five isn’t over yet.

Do rituals have steps? You try to think back to any hieroglyphics you’ve seen in old textbooks. There were no numbers… Obviously there were no numbers. They were hieroglyphics. You can’t read that shit—

Stop.

You remove your fingers, allowing Irene’s ass to close once more. It happens slowly. You nearly choke, watching her hole return to its previous shape with your breath held so tightly in your chest that it feels like something is going to burst. Hey, maybe it will, but that can’t happen yet. That would be too loud, and your goddess demands silence, so you open your mouth to simply allow the breath to drift out along with any comments you had on the subject.

You close back in once again, this time letting your face settle against Irene’s cheeks and gently nudge them apart, reattaching your tongue to her rim. You want to dive in, to feel her squeeze you, maybe even cum around you, but that’s not part of the ritual. You need to give her rest. The best is yet to cum—no. Come. You give her the lightest rimming you can, holding your tongue back to merely caress her asshole while you silently revel in the light press of her glutes on your cheeks.

Another slight roll of her hips sends you reeling. Your vision fades and Irene is all that’s left. You can see the movement. It’s not just her breath, but her oh-so-gentle rocking back and forth that makes the light and shadows play across her back like the grains of the Elysian fields waving in the breeze. It doesn’t seem right for you to be allowed to experience this, to taste this, to be treated to a view of paradise, to understand the touch of divinity.

The gently shifting color of the clock, magenta to yellow, broadens your vision again. You back away, taking a deep breath that you only now realize you desperately needed.

Without thinking, finally, you do as Irene has commanded. You place your palms on her ass: your altar. You slide your thumbs into her glorious hole, and you pull apart softly. Her muscles have relaxed so thoroughly that you meet no resistance. She is simply open, as if this is just how she was always meant to be, told in myths that cannot be written. Her soft ass doesn’t try to clench down. It remains a portal that entices you, begs you to enter.

And you could. Certainly, as is the case with other gods, Irene could forgive you for showing her your specialty. You, the heroic champion, could show her an unexpected pleasure. Touch her clit, lap at her juices, grind yourself on the back of her thigh. Her instruction indicated that you’re the dominant one here. Make it so.

You hook the first knuckle of each of your pointer fingers, as directed, inside.

No. You can’t get greedy now. You’re not that kind of hero.

Irene opens further around your digits with no effort. Now you see the depth of her abyss, and it does not try to close. Irene wants you to see into her. Even the beautiful spheres of her ass to either side, her graceful back, her soft legs, her captivating hair… It all fades away. You know what the next step is. You don't need the clock to intuit the moment she's ready. Your higher thoughts and your lust blend together.

Slowly, you pull further apart. Not much. It may not seem like it's so small, but this immortal gateway still needs to be treated with reverence. For every millimeter you actually widen her, though, you see miles more. It makes you feel light-headed, even a little dizzy. And when you slide your fingers out, those feelings become far more distinct. Irene remains open.

Gaping may have been an appropriate word for her to have described what she wanted from you, but it was far too crude to represent what you see now. Then again, you’re not sure what else to call it. It’s been a while since the thesaurus failed you.

Irene's muscles are relaxed. Serene, even. Like this is where they should naturally be. You simply guided them.

You lean back in and gently kiss her rim. It's dangerous, running your tongue around the defined edge of the mortal and everlasting, but exhilarating. The slight rolling of her hips is your indication that Irene is feeling the same passion, for all the hubris it takes to assume such a thing about your goddess. As far as you know, she could just be moving because your tongue and lips aren't in the right places and making up for your inadequacies.

Still, every slight, slow shade of her ass against your cheek is a divine caress, urging you further along the journey. Your kisses are as insistent as you can get them without making the grave error of smacking your lips.

In the foggiest reaches of your vision, a hand reaches out to you along the floor. Irene grasps at the air like she wants something. That’s not part of the ritual. You can only think of one thing in the moment, and you take her hand in yours.

Irene’s fingers close around yours and curl into your palm. They flutter every time you swirl your tongue across her rim, and, after a moment, they squeeze.

It’s terrifying, at first, when Irene trembles underneath you. It evokes thoughts of earthquakes, brought upon by the wrath of the gods. But no, it’s orgasm. Her asshole contracts slightly, but otherwise just quivers against your mouth. It ends almost as soon as it begins.

Irene takes her hand away, and a bit of your soul with it. She lightly presses on the clock, and it shifts to white. You don’t have to be reminded of what that means. Steeling your heart, you back off of Irene’s ass and carefully push yourself up to your feet. Even at your full height, you can see into Irene’s hole. Taking it in with the full picture of the rest of her body is an incredible sight to behold. Knowing that you contributed to it makes it even more beautiful.

As you look over her, your eyes go wide and you have to contain a gasp. Irene’s calves are covered in little wet streaks, right where you had been hovering over her. Embarrassment washes over you. It's hard to imagine being so turned on as to not have felt yourself dripping on her, especially after having worried about that very thing mere minutes ago. You want to reach for a towel to correct your mistake, but you know you're not supposed to touch her. You're supposed to be dressing yourself and leaving, so you step away, and reach down for your clothes.

Your arms feel heavy as you pull your underwear up, only getting more embarrassed about how soaked they immediately become.

As you put on your shirt though, Irene moves again. You can't help but stand perfectly still, mesmerized by the smooth motion of Irene getting up onto her knees and sitting back on her heels. Now upright, she's even more statuesque, back curved inward from her generous bottom up to her gentle shoulders. One hand releases her hair from its bun, and the night sky falls past her neck, simultaneously obscuring and enhancing that gorgeous expanse.

Irene’s torso twists a quarter in your direction. It's hard to think that for however long you've been here, this is the first you've seen her face and it's merely a silhouette, not even far enough around that she could look at you out of the corner of her eye. All you can see is her eyelashes, pointed down, to indicate that her eyes are closed. The movement also coyly presents you with the side of her breast, yet another of the endless curves of her body that you have had no opportunity to worship.

One graceful arm comes back. Her fingers find their way to the cleft of her ass and sensually feel their way down. You don't even think to wipe away your drool as you watch those fingers dip inward. They move in and out, unhurried and exquisite.

Your mind reels. Were you not enough? Is she just basking in the remnants of her pleasure? Is she doing this for you to watch? Should you even still be here?

Irene continues to toy lightly with her asshole while at the same time her other hand shakes out her hair from below. 

Your legs twitch. You can't stay here anymore. You practically jump into your skirt, grab your shoes, and you're out the door. You keep the doorknob turned in your hand even as you whip yourself outside so the latch won't click when you close it.

In the hallway, you slump back against the wall. Your body is on fire. You need to be touched. You don’t live very far away. You can get home fast, and if you can’t grab someone on the way, idol or otherwise, you’ll be sitting on a vibrator all night—

The door you just came through opens again. Irene walks out in a shoulderless sweater, just long enough to cover her shorts, and sneakers. How she can look so casual, you’re sure you’ll never comprehend.

She doesn’t turn to leave, though. She steps closer to you, and closer, and closer. The hallway isn’t that wide. Are her steps inches long or is space expanding? Either way, she crosses and stands over you. It doesn’t matter what your height was. Your knees will only hold you against the wall at a height that makes it look like Irene is miles taller.

You open your mouth. You want to ask her to make good on her end of your bargain right now. Or maybe not. It doesn’t really matter. You just want to say something. But before you can, you feel the shock of physical connection. Irene strokes your cheek with the back of her fingers. Her eyes capture yours, holding you steady.

The distance becomes inches, and you’re paralyzed. She doesn’t blink as she gets even closer, but closes her eyes just in time to remove the final gap and touch her lips to yours. She kisses you so softly that you can barely feel it. In fact, the whole of your body seems suddenly light and cloudish, like a breeze could send you away. You even feel a drop of rain leave your eye.

When she retreats, she gives you the coyest smile to ever coy, and as she approaches her full height again, her fingers leave your jawline and the lightness you felt reverses. Gravity crashes your ass into the floor.

Then Irene turns to leave, breaking the line of sight to her eyes, freeing your own to wander. The last thing you see before she turns the corner is that she is not, in fact, wearing shorts under her sweater. You get one last glimpse of your handiwork. Though you can’t see very well and can’t imagine her ass is still gaped now that she’s back on her feet, it is still visibly wet, as are the backs of her thighs and calves.

[8bitsupervillain]

Higurashi When They Cry Hou Ch. 8 Matsuribayashi pt. 50

And now here we are at our gold anniversary. I’d like to take a moment to thank you for sticking with this. I didn’t think it was going to be as long as it has been when I started reading this series.

These kids in the early eighties sure are a progressive lot. Just accept the horned girl on sight, maybe that’s to do with her relationship with Rika?

The hell you say!

I’m sure it’s explained in one of the other chapters, but I do wonder why exactly her horn has that little chip in it. I think they explain it later on when it sort of dives into Hanyuu’s history, but I’m not a hundred percent certain. I’m fairly certain the reasoning behind Hanyuu becoming what is fundamentally a ghost hasn’t been established yet. I just don’t remember if they get into why her horn is damaged at this point is the thing.

There are doujins that are more than happy to have Keiichi show Rena his horn. And Mion, Shion, basically everybody.

I do often think about re-editing these to make myself look smarter. For instance I could very easily just delete two paragraphs ago, and act like I knew this description of Hanyuu in the past was just right around the corner sixteen screenshots from there. But the thing is, I genuinely forgot that this was right here. I thought Hanyuu in Hinamizawa in the past was something that happened far later, after she has a heart to heart with Ooishi of all people.

I think it’s fair to assume that the reason she has the crack in her horn is due to the disaster that happened when Hanyuu and her people first arrived to Hinamizawa. It does make me wonder though, what was the original form Hanyuu and the rest arrived in? Just huge, hulking demonic bodies? Unknowable cosmic horror? A form not too dissimilar from the Martians from Metal Slug?

Also it won’t come up again in this chapter, but I suppose this explains why it is that the Furude family are the chosen family to be the reincarnation of Oyashiro. You know, the whole got the god figure of the religion pregnant in the ancient past, thing. Also also, just to be a bit childish, I guess that explains why the manga of Minagoroshi decided to give Hanyuu a larger chest than all of the other female characters.

There are moments throughout the chapter that has Hanyuu act closer to the version of herself that’s shown in these screenshots. Where she acts a bit more colder than her smaller, doglike self acts with the gaming club. It’s a very fascinating look at the character, that she seems to disregard the act she puts on with the rest of the friend group, and acts more like how one would envision a god to act. More aloof, and distant from her more earthly friends. At risk of repeating myself, I really wish they had played up that angle more with Hanyuu in this chapter. In the tail end of Minagoroshi she gets on Rika’s case for wanting to act like a regular human girl, when she is in fact more than human. It’s not necessarily clear what she means by that, maybe it’s to do with her being the reincarnation of Oyashiro. Or perhaps it’s to do with the fact that by Hanyuu’s actions Rika is able to travel through the Fragments and experience a hundred years worth of life. So I wish that the visual novel had Hanyuu play up her divinity in relation to the rest of the cast. Instead she basically acts like she’s just a regular girl, and not much different compared to everyone else.

On a completely separate note, do you suppose that Hanyuu in the past of Hinamizawa was the size of a full-grown adult? Or was she still roughly the size she’s depicted here? I have nothing against the idea of shortstack Hanyuu, but I don’t think I’m out of line for saying I would like to see an adult Hanyuu.

This is actually a really infuriating thing about how Hanyuu has been handled. The information that Ryukishi07 had changed his mind about how Hanyuu was going to be depicted is out there, but it only makes it worse. Throughout Minagoroshi it wasn’t shy about having Hanyuu remark upon how you couldn’t change fate, and trying to alter it was a fools game. She was a much more passive observer who had seen Rika try and fail to changer her fate multiple times for a hundred years worth of attempts. She seemed accepting of this fate, and she was trying her hardest to get Rika to accept that as well. At the end of Minagoroshi, after everyone died fighting Takano she realized she possesses the power to help Rika defy fate. Only now Hanyuu “can complete a circle that can’t be realized by people alone.” Implying that for the century she’s watched Rika die repeatedly she was aware she could’ve stepped in at any moment to avert her fate.

But earlier, mere moments ago, it wasn’t just Hanyuu. Hanyuu’s people were also hated and abused. She merely decided to sacrifice herself in an attempt to mend the rift between her people and the people of Hinamizawa. Godhood wasn’t her goal.

It doesn’t say anything really about Hanyuu’s people but I think it’s fair to think that they also possess horns like Hanyuu. If Hanyuu was indeed the only person of her entire race/species/whatever that has horns why then did the people of Hinamizawa violently reject them? If they looked more or less human but for the horns that apparently only Hanyuu possesses, why were they so concerned about mixing the demonic blood with theirs?

[user-needs-new-hyperfixation]

Okay, Sherliam for the pairing and for a title...my title gen spat out "Within That Breath" so how about that?

Immediately I see the problem with this prompt, which is that to be able to function I have to spend fifteen minutes finding a song that matches the vibes of the title and then go from there. 😂 I've settled on this. Anyway kinda angsty because I can rarely bring myself to actually write angst but this is an imaginary fic lmao. Also I have very widely interpreted "five lines" and gone with "five paragraphs." And yes I title-dropped instead of finding some more clever way to incorporate the title. 😅

"Was it worth it?" Three days of brooding near-silence culminate in that question. Sherlock studies still-too-frail shoulders and the dark shadow beneath one ruby eye and worries his tongue between his teeth until he tastes copper. "Two steps forward and one step back is still progress," Billy had said, the last time one of these clouds descended. Sherlock repeats that to himself like a mantra and bridles the frustration that comes crawling up his throat. He takes a deep breath, and within the holding of that breath he lets himself think all the things he will not say. "How can you still ask that? Do you think so little of me? How many words and how many actions will it take, for you to believe how much I care? What will it take for you to truly believe that you matter?" He breathes out, and says in a voice firm as stone, "It was."

Thank you for the prompt! 😊

[juuheizou]

Omg now i'm dying to know what are suzuya's trigger textures, and his triggers in general too since I also hc him as autistic<3 also a guide on how to touch him right pleaaase???tyyy

Of course, friend! I'm always down to talk about autistic Suzuya!

Do be warned, in my personal opinion it's no worse than anything in the series, but if you're squeamish about unsanitary things, you might want to skip a couple of paragraphs pertaining to some unsanitary textures and stimming behaviors that I marked with a ** at the beginning of each one.

what are suzuya's trigger textures

He really doesn't like rough, scratchy textures. Tall grass or institutional carpet on bare skin, bristly animals, clothing tags, scratchy fabrics from wool to lace, suits. Anyone would learn to hide their distress at the horrible feeling of a lacy dress if the alternative was Big Madam's wrath, not worth dying over even if it's a close decision, but I think I have a little to back this up when it comes to his canon rebellion against coming to work in a proper suit.

I like to think of his canon dress code violations being a little bit of “stop telling me what to do” but also a whole lot of sensory issues with the material suits tend to be made of. If he could get away with wearing his pyjamas to work every day, he would, and I feel like he would have tried at some point. Unfortunately, what he does actually wear in canon was the best he could pull off and just be lectured by Amon as opposed to more serious disciplinary action even he can't ignore. Some of how he dresses is to have some control and fun with it in a conservative office environment when it comes to how people dress, like his patterned suspenders, but the actual fit and cuts of his outfits, ie too big for him and mostly shorter than they should be, is to minimize how much of it is touching him. His undershirts we see him wear once are probably something he wears all the time and pretty soft, another way to insulate him from that suit material texture.

Also, as an animal lover, this can prove a little problematic. My first thought is of the sheer disappointment of him petting a stray dog and ending up with like, bully breed bristles or something lodged in his shirt. Or going to a petting zoo or something with the squad and he's had a wonderful time nuzzling alpacas, sheep, rabbits, ducklings, and he's too excited to even think through it before he tries to do the same with something like a potbellied pig. Sad times. Very sad times. It's not fair that some animals can look fuzzy but actually feel like a cactus. He's safest sticking with fluffy spitzy dogs and cats haha.

**Messy textures are variable. He's not your (on Tumblr, at least) stereotypical squeamish autistic. Actually, I think he's the opposite and self-soothes by squishing and smearing gross things until Shinohara finally gets him a jar of play-dough or something to stop him from playing with dead stuff he finds on the schoolyard-- maybe being given art supplies to play with instead is what got him doing other art forms as an adult. Before it was stray animal entrails and stuff he found at the Academy, it was human organs, blood, etc. and Madam probably saw it as him learning to be a good scrapper, doing things like fingerpainting with blood or squishing a handful of organs in his hands.

**That being said, as much as he likes these textures in his hands, he has learned the hard way that most of them will make him sick if he were to put them in his mouth. Someone who didn't eat a lot of innards and similar scraps of meat over the years probably wouldn't even think to be so picky, but liver, brain, stuff like that? Good! Intestines, eyeballs, parts that are more slimy and slippery in the form they'd be thrown to him in... he would sooner go hungry, even living with Madam and not being given much else to eat. He might have liked to crush bugs as a cadet, but he probably tried and learned to draw the line at eating them. In the human world, though, he might like some of those things with the sliminess deep-fried out of them, perhaps.

Speaking of, food texture is also a type of texture, and in addition to slimy and slippery, he can't do stringy, fibrous stuff in food, especially if it is both slippery and stringy like some veggies. We know he likes sweets and snack foods, and I do think those are things he truly likes, but things like sweets are also a lot safer for someone who can be hypersensitive to the point of some mouth feels making him physically sick. Some may perceive this as childish, but to him it's just survival when the wrong bite can make him feel so awful. Some foods he just can't tolerate at all, but I can see Hanbee teaching him how to prepare fruits and vegetables in ways that don't trigger his sensory issues, as he would never be able to say “do this, do that” to Suzuya but would want him to get his vitamins and minerals. I could write a whole post about the adventurous, slightly strange eater that would be unlocked once he got a good introduction to preparing food in different ways that truly change the texture of the ingredients.

Not exactly a texture but still relating to his sense of touch, he really can't do light touch, as hyposensitive as he is to pain and deep pressure. To him, light touch is much, much more noxious than pain and he can really lash out against something brushing up against him. Often he grabs or strikes an offending hand or body part to get it away before his mind can even catch up to him, not hard, but how hard he does it doesn't always matter when people around him already perceive him as violent.

and his triggers in general too

As far as his other (sensory, which I hope is what you were wanting to know) triggers and hypersensitivities, he struggles with loud noises although his threshold for them is somewhat bigger than textures-- ie he can handle weapons clashing in battle, loud music when he's out somewhere fun, stuff with an end in sight that either can or does last short enough that it won't become too much before it's over. If it lasts too long, is too loud and piercing, he's having a sensitive day, or any combination of the above, though, it can very much push him to the meltdown point. Piercing, high-frequency sounds or too many sounds going on are also hard for him and will make him clap his hands over his ears SO FAST.

Same with bright lights. There's a threshold, he can handle them to some degree especially if there's a good (to him) reason for him to, but he's still hypersensitive to them. Fluorescent lights at the field office, for example, are another thing he's willing to get on his superiors' bad side for when he doesn't have an office and will just turn off half the lights in the bullpen (I would think they have one of those?) and when people just get annoyed and turn them back on, he would learn to mess with the breakers to where it's not easily undone and looks like an electrical problem. Amon would HATE the sight of him wearing sunglasses indoors and that would make him want to utilize this coping mechanism more. When he is a senior investigator and squad leader who does get a little office of his own, it's just barely light enough for him to read and do paperwork by.

Smells, though, I actually see him being hyposensitive to for the most part. I can see him going into a candle shop, bakery, buffet, anything with lots of options displayed in an easily accessible way and just wanting to pick up everything to sniff it, though he can't always do that because with food that is unsanitary and will get him kicked out. He also has a high tolerance that he hasn't actually found the limit to thus far for filthy crime scenes and rotting gore that even seasoned investigators have to go and vomit at the stench of.

As far as taste, though mouth feel is a different story, I see it also being a more hyposensitive sense for him. He loves to experiment with different flavors of things and is that person who seeks out foods that are really sour, really spicy, really minty, stuff like that that makes his whole face feel the taste of it. Again, would just pick things up and sample them as a stim if it wouldn't get him banned from places with delicious food, and I see him as one of those autistics to whom eating food is a stim. I can also see him liking the taste of alcoholic things for this reason, although on an unrelated note I don't see him as a drinker because he is an angry not-fun-to-be-around drunk; booze is best left as something to soak confections in or savor one single serving of, but he does like the burn.

also a guide on how to touch him right pleaaase???tyyy

As mentioned, he is a mixed bag of hyper and hyposensitivies, and deep pressure is something he seeks out just as hard has he avoids light touch. We see him do a lot of the classic signs of this kind of sensory seeking in canon, such as physically risky behaviors, indifference to pain, and constant movement. As far as sharing physical touch with another person, though, which he don't really see in canon, he has a need to be squeezed.

Starting with stuff that can be read as conventionally casual and platonic, I have mentioned he likes Akira and only Akira messing with his hair. That's for the same reason anyone else would run away screaming from having their hair done by her: the result might look amazing, unlike Touka's home hair attempts, but we know she's not the warmest character and can be just as insensitive as Suzuya in her own way as a person. As a hairstylist she really gets in there with combs and brushes and will pull to get a lock perfectly detangled or a braid tight enough to stay intact even while fighting for life and limb against an SS-rank ghoul, all while too absorbed in the task at hand to notice her victim is crying. Honestly, someone might see her updos around the office and convince themselves they can sit through it, but it's too much suffering, even for the most beautiful hair of their lives. For him, though, it's akin to a nice spa day, pleasant and relaxing. Horseplay and sparring also count as touch to him, and are pretty hard to go wrong with since that is always going to be heavy, hard bodily contact. Same with those hearty, macho claps on the shoulder I've mentioned before.

Going a little ways up the conventional ladder of intimacy, giving his hands or his shoulder a squeeze is nice and always advisable, especially when he's fidgety and stressed. Giving him a tight bear hug is the nicest, but you can't be scared to break him, or chances are you're not going to hug hard enough. He also loves to cuddle, but someone has to be laying a lot of body weight on the other. Once that is happening, though, it's even better than a weighted blanket or throwing someone to a mat. He could have a rib broken and still just be disappointed that it means he can't be physically crushed that hard again. Just like he relishes one of his cats or a stray animal laying in his lap, he likes to lean against people he knows won't shoo him away, and would also enjoy having his partner fall asleep against his shoulder or in his lap. Kisses are also fun and exciting for him, but he can't do the light pecks on the cheek and brushes of lips; gotta put some pressure and confidence into it, even if it doesn't get deeper in any other way.

Touching the rest of his body is where I see things getting emotionally fraught for him in addition to having the potential to be real overstimulating real fast. These are the areas of his body that are easily hidden by a nightshirt, a scrapper's costume, or a pretty dress without marring the beautiful doll he was supposed to be, so that's where only Madam ever touched him, and all she gave him were scars. This is where his control over the situation is just as important to him as the physical sensation being pleasant. I know my word choices sound sexual, but this doesn't even mean sex.

We know he is into underground body modification for example, but I see him being strictly DIY if he wants to feel the sensation of needles through his skin, which is the real reason he has his own stitches while not having any conventional piercings or tattoos; office rules wouldn't stop him lmao, he just can't do those himself with as much room for error. Sharing a shower or bath would be all fun and games, and he would like to wash someone's hair and body as a gesture of affection, and the hot water would be nice for him, but don't try to return the favor after he's had his fun. He would enjoy kissing someone all over in a merciless flurry, but honestly, the best way to approach something like that is to let him take what he wants and leave what he doesn't. He's direct enough that if he does want something different, he will get it. This is another small reason I think he pairs well with someone as shy to even try returning the favor as Mutsuki tbh

Hopefully it's not information you were hoping for, because I'm going to stop there as far as stages of intimacy that I googled for the purpose of this ask go. I have headcanons and things to say and would be totally cool answering more r-rated and up questions if one were to ask them directly. I just would rather disappoint someone who didn't ask for explicit content but would have liked reading it than blindside someone who didn't want to read it, you know?

[orcelito]

Ok on why ITNL 15 was so technically difficult.

Under a cut for ppl who haven't read it & wanna keep it a surprise

So writing traditional action ends up feeling like choreography. I plan out the steps following the motion that feels the most natural. It can be tricky sometimes, but mostly in figuring out how to describe an action I see in my mind. Overall, I end up writing traditional action really quickly actually bc it's Fun and Exciting and it Flows

What went down in ITNL 15 was not traditional action. Really, it was an unconventional torture scene.

So the trickiness came from multiple things. First & honestly one of the hardest things was getting into the head of a madman. Someone who will gleefully kill a lot of people just to hurt someone psychologically. Someone spiteful, sadistic, and just having so much fun with it (but also not Actually having that much fun, bc he was also just Really Angry)

First time writing him, too. So I had to find a new character's voice On Top of exploring the whims he would follow when literally torturing someone.

And then we get to the actual actions of it. There was no choreography because there was no dance to it. No flow of motion. There was a Burst at the start of the interaction, but then it all just Stops. Vash is forced to take it at Legato's pace as he toys with him.

That was a huge part of how tricky it was. Following the thread of where Legato was taking it & being unable to push things along with Vash. Vash was just along for the ride, existing just to be toyed with. Falling right into Legato's expectations with his reactions...

Except for two parts. And these were some of the trickiest.

When he managed to break out of the control Just A Little Bit. And then when he's on his knees, emotionally stripped bare, and decides to go for the one jab that he knows will Hurt Him just as a stubborn "fuck you", since he didn't have any other way to take autonomy in that scene.

He pays for it. The paragraph where Legato broke Vash's nose was the one that took me 50 fucking minutes to write. Which, on that note, I can show a screenshot of my working through it!

Final paragraph: Legato's face twisted in instant fury. His hand tightened harshly in Vash's hair, using it as a grip to bash his nose into his knee with a sickening crunch.

And the progress pic ^ lmao. Something I do while trying to puzzle out wording is push the old version down & start working on a new version, but not deleting the old yet in case I wanna switch back or otherwise re-use any of the wording.

There ended up being about 15 of these discarded lines. 111 words of discarded text. Until I finally settled on the version in the thing.

Another thing I focus on a lot while writing is the motion of the words, and that was so much of the struggle here. Such a simple moment, you would think. He's just breaking his nose. But describing it in a way that is Concise while also communicating the gravity of it AND the motion of the words themselves. It's a lot to consider. And it's such a miserable moment for Vash, it was so hard to get it to a point I was satisfied with.

I'm pretty proud of how the scene turned out, in the end. Maybe not 100% perfect. There are definitely a few points that feel held together with duct tape and tooth picks. Then other parts where I'm just like "holy fucking shit, I wrote this???" An interesting combination, but I feel like that's writing in general.

And! It seems like my work paid off! People seem to have enjoyed the chapter, which makes all the work feel a lot more worth it. It's a nice feeling to know all that time is appreciated.

Yeah . A Lot went into this scene. Definitely out of the bounds of anything else ive written before. But I think I can confidently call this a success 😌

[gardengobbo]

April 30th 2024

Not much of a garden update here, but I assure you there has actually been some progress. So here's a photo of one of my dove frens I took one the 28th.

Keep readin' if you wanna hear me blab on about the video posts and ADHD. You've been warned, it's long 😂

So I've been enjoying doing the video-style posts instead of typing 90 paragraphs of nonsense, but I don't want to keep recording with my phone since the videos take up a bunch of space. (As well as me having to take off my dirt-coated gardening gloves every time I want to record.) I could just delete the clips after editing into one video, or just all of them after uploading, but I prefer having things backed up instead of just uploaded online.

I know I could back them up to my computer too, but part of the reason I enjoy the quick clips of nonsense slapped together with minimal editing is because it's simple and I can do it all on my phone. Either plugging it into my computer or even uploading them to Google Drive on my phone then downloading them onto the computer adds extra steps.

Extra steps that seem inconsequential, but something I know about myself is I'm very all or nothing. It's very hard for me to only do half of a thing. In this example that'd be editing the videos together and then hitting the block that I've finished that part and uploaded, but now I need to plug in my phone to the computer to transfer the video files. Or if I back them up to drive, it only has so much space before it yells at me to upgrade lol

Drive seems like the most logical option though as it would give me the freedom to at least have more time before I have to download the backups, however I know for a fact that when that point comes I won't record any more videos even if I want to because I need the space to back them up, but I dont want to sit down on the computer to download the Drive backups because I'm doing other things and will get distracted if I do.

This is a struggle for me in a lot of aspects, can't do Z because I need to do X but I can't do X until I do Y, and I need to finish ABC before I can do Y, but all I really want to finish is Z. And worse is that most times to do Z, there isn't any need for the other stuff. It's just me wanting Z done in a certain way that to do it that certain way, it requires all those other steps. This happens in the garden a lot too, so this rant is kinda still relevant 😅

Thankfully all of that hasn't caused an issue with me just not doing garden things because I want to record it, because trust me when I say that's happened a lot in the past too. (That being me wanting to make a little video of something but not being able to figure out how I want to set up the cameras so I don't do the craft or whatever because I want to record it so it just never happens but sticks in my brain as the thing I want to do but can't till I figure the recording process out.) Depression is the reason why I haven't been gardening 🤣

All this to say I have like, 2 days worth of clips I want to edit into a post to show the progress so far. One day is clips on my phone, the other I recorded with a little action camera and I'm not sure how that's turned out yet since that requires me to upload to the computer to see better. (See computer related snag above as to why thats not done!) Today I might go even further and just bring out my small digital camera I got years ago to do vlogs with, that I never vlogged with.

Which leads me to my last point, and Ima make a poll for thoughts on the idea after this post cause I know this is a lot to read and most folks won't care, and that's fine! I think maybe I will use that camera for vlogging finally. I'd have to learn how to use an actual video editing software, and it'd have to be lightweight cause my once-top-of-the-line-parts-now-10-years-outofdate computer struggles hard to play Helldivers 2 right now, I can't imagine trying to run something like Premier Pro. But to be honest all I want to do is add auto-captions like Ive already done previously so I'm sure I can fine some free or cheap program to do so. I'm just not sure if like, amateur gardening vlog style videos where I mutter to myself as I pour dirt is really a genre of content lmfao. And if it is, it's probs better off on here or tiktok but I'm going insane trying to not film landscape everytime I go to record something.

So like, I dunno, I guess youtube? I can probs figure out how to sorta make it acceptable for portrait orientation viewing after the fact? I have no idea but if there's a gap in video updates for today, that's why 🤣

Alright that's all for now. I gotta get up, get sunscreen'd, and get out there! As long as it's not raining still... it was last night 😅

[britesparc]

Weekend Top Ten #573

Top Ten Moments in Spielberg Movies – Updated 2023

Last week I celebrated eleven years of doing this daft blog by going back over nearly six hundred lists and choosing my favourites. And one of my favourites is – and always has been – the very first list I ever did. Top Ten Moments in Spielberg Movies (as Illustrated by a Line of Dialogue). Yes, going back to old Top Tens like this reveals how little I used to write, and sometimes that’s a negative; just a random list of ten things with no thought or nuance behind it. As much as it’s a faff nowadays to find the time, I do think explaining my thought process at least adds a little bit more interest and entertainment should anyone other than me be reading it.

Well, theoretically.

Anyway, sometimes the brevity of those early lists is actually a benefit, and this is one of those times, because I think just illustrating the choices with a line of dialogue could – potentially – make those moments resonate even more. That’s assuming you’ve seen the films and know what the dialogue’s referring to, of course; but if you have, then reading those lines – hearing those words, albeit in your head – transports you back to how you felt when you watched those scenes play out in front of you, perhaps for the first time. It’s a device I’ve used a few times, and the only reason I don’t do it more often is because it’s actually quite hard to think of lists where you’re talking about specific moments like that, moments that can be summed up in a line of dialogue. I mean, think about that three-way lightsaber fight in The Phantom Menace, or – to quote a more recent example – Maverick completing the training run to show his students how it’s done. What are the quotes there? They’re scenes of action and emotion and filmmaking technique rather than wordy-words.

Thank God Spielberg isn’t really famous for action-based set-pieces, eh? I mean, it’s a godsend that he’s not, like, directed a really terrific and largely dialogue-free action sequence where a guy goes through the windscreen of a truck and then makes his way underneath the truck and then climbs up the back of the truck.

Yes, if that last paragraph wasn’t a dead giveaway, I have been suitably inspired by the Ghosts of Top Tens Past to return to the scene of the crime and revisit the one where it all began. Largely because I don’t really remember the “moon on the rise” scene from A.I. all that well anymore, I thought eleven years was enough temporal water under the bridge to allow me to update the list of Spielberg moments for a new generation. After all, he’s directed six films in the interim; maybe there are some moments worth celebrating in there?

And so, in the spirit of that original list, I present to you here my new and improved (well, new) list of Favourite Steven Spielberg Movie Moments, once again Illustrated by a Line of Dialogue. And this time – because I’m nice – I’ve linked to the scenes so you can enjoy them once again. I’m just fab.

“I can do anything, I’m the chief of police.” (Jaws, 1975): probably my favourite scene in all of cinema. World-weary chief Brody sits wracked with guilt, drinking too much, but also finding time to play with his son. Hooper comes in and, with some nicely nuanced and very Seventies-style actorly cross-talk we get character development and exposition and a really subtle, quiet show of inner strength and resourcefulness from Brody as he picks at a label on a wine bottle. It’s also really funny as he pours himself a huge glass. And then, resolute, he declares they’re going to autopsy a shark. “Can you do that?” asks Ellen Brody. And he replies…

“Einstein was probably one of them.” (Close Encounters of the Third Kind, 1977): the entire ending of Close Encounters is one ongoing exercise in shared joy, an entirely secular religious experience. The aliens land, and the scientists learn how to communicate with them via music, and people come off the ship… all the while everyone is on the same page – including Dreyfuss’ Roy Neary. When the long-abducted people debark the mothership, having not aged in twenty or thirty years, one scientist muses that Einstein was right about the effects of time dilation when travelling at near-light speeds. Cue this excellent retort. But really this line just represents the euphoric optimism of this movie’s end.

“Boy, do I hate being right all the time…” (Jurassic Park, 1993): for about forty minutes or so the film slowly builds tension as we assemble our cast and then get them stuck in the rain on the island full of dinosaurs. All of them have their doubts, but especially Malcolm, who has been relentlessly sceptical about the whole affair – “life finds a way,” and all that. And then the film shifts gear into the gnarly monster movie it really is, and Spielberg pulls out all the stops – the glass of water, the sound of the cables snapping, “where’s the goat” – and then we see a revolution in visual effects unfold as an entirely computer-generated dinosaur walks out of her broken cage. Malcolm Was Right!

“One more person…” (Schindler’s List, 1993): although a dark and unflinching look at the horrors of the Holocaust, there’s an optimistic kernel of hope at the centre of this film – of love triumphing out of darkness – and we see some if here at the end, as Schindler prepares to go on the run and is overcome with remorse at all the lives he could have saved, down to selling a pin for one more person. Yes, it’s sentimental, as the Jewish workers crowd round to praise him; but Liam Neeson’s performance as he breaks down over not saving one more life is the stuff of tragic heroism.

“With a little luck, he’s found the Grail already.” (Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, 1989): I really struggled with finding a moment from one of the Indys because, well, there are so many. Some of the action is superlative – the truck chase in Raiders, the tank chase in Crusade – and there are other character moments (“It’s the mileage,”), set-pieces (“Anything Goes!”), or gags (“No ticket!”). But on reflection this is my favourite, a slow track in towards a captured Indy as he earnestly sings the praises of Marcus Brody before one of the greatest – and certainly funniest – jump-cuts in cinema history.

“I’ll be right here.” (E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, 1982): whilst the ending of Close Encounters is emotional because it’s so optimistic, here the ending is bittersweet and tinged with sadness. Yes, they save E.T.; but he has to go. We have the breakneck chase to get him to his ship, and then the tearful goodbyes. “Ouch,” he says, because his heart hurts. But then he reminds Elliot that, to coin a phrase, no one’s ever really gone, because a part of them will always stay with us, in our memories. Sad, happy, beautiful; one of the great weepy endings. Be good.

“Tonight...” (West Side Story, 2021): this movie is just sheer filmmaking craft, an excellently put-together picture from start to finish. Every shot timed, framed, lit, scored perfectly. Here as Tony sings to Maria, he climbs the fire escapes up to her apartment window, the crooning lovebirds constantly separated by ladders and railings and gantries, their faces framed within frames. And it just looks gorgeous throughout, a bunch of people working at the height of their powers. Song’s a belter, too.

“When the horizon’s at the top, it’s interesting.” (The Fabelmans, 2022): the most recent one on this list and the only one that’s not really – not really – up on YouTube to watch (which kinda makes sense as it’s still in cinemas). Basically – spoiler alert, I guess – the film ends with a recreation of a young Spielberg’s meeting with an old John Ford, as Sam Fabelman chats to the man himself (played by David Lynch!), and is given a lecture on how to make a shot interesting. It’s hilarious, but then there’s the pièce de resistance: that exquisite final shot, one of the most knowing and self-deprecating things Spielberg has ever done, and a sure candidate for greatest final shot of all time. I won’t spoil it. If you know you know.

“You were on the Indianapolis?” (Jaws, 1975): good Lord, two moments from Jaws? And neither of them are about a bigger boat? Shocking but true, but then again how could I overlook this, one of the most famous speeches in history. This whole scene is tremendous, the subtle acting from everyone – drunken singing, the scar comparison (Brody looking at an appendectomy scar), Hooper’s “mother” joke – all leading up to Quint’s speech. The complicated history of its writes and rewrites, its multiple fathers, and above all Robert Shaw’s performance and Spielberg’s unshowy direction lead to a truly chilling, iconic moment of cinematic history.

“Here’s where it gets truly slippery...” (Lincoln, 2012): an oddly overlooked masterpiece, Lincoln is a stagey, theatrical film where terrific actors get to deliver a tremendous script, and Spielberg sensibly gets out of the way but also knows that it has to look really pretty, Janusz Kamiński’s cinematography making it look like a sepia-tinged painting come to life. Day Lewis’ Lincoln delivers a sprawling monologue about the ethics and legality of his Emancipation Proclamation, diverting to deliver aphorisms and daft gags and only tangentially-related stories. It manages to be a dense and layered investigation of executive power but also oddly tense, Lincoln himself both folksy and threatening. It’s a stunning performance, a tremendous moment, and another example in relatively recent years of Spielberg as a master craftsman who just knows how to put a film together.

Well, that was incredibly hard. I kinda wish I’d not bothered trying to find links as quite a few of those don’t do any justice to the photography of the films themselves. And there’s so much I’ve not had room for – Omaha Beach, “Everybody runs”, “I think we’re back in business”, the glass scene in The Lost World, the bike chase through the library in Crystal Skull, “Jesus is sexy”, “Smile you son of a…”, singing under the bleachers in West Side Story, the truck helping the schoolkids, the Tintin tank scene, Tim Robbins in War of the Worlds, even – I have to say it – pretty much every Bob Hoskins moment in Hook. And I guess “moon on the rise” from A.I.? I should probably watch that film again.

[a-dragons-journal]

Page said most of what I would've already, but I really want to zero in on your second paragraph and dissect it, if I may.

Even if we were just talking about self expression. As a disabled person, does being radically accepting mean I have to accept nonhumans who are not disabled (who have said they are not disabled) using medical equipment to express their nonhumanity (i.e. someone using a cane solely for the purpose of showing they should not be bipedal). Because, it’s their right to express that way but it doesn’t sit right with me that I’m watching someone use medical equipment as an accessory. It’s not harmful but it’s also not something I can agree with.

I'm going to ask a bunch of questions for the purpose of deconstructing this, so sorry if it gets a little repetitive, but it's a tool for examining one's own worldview and I've found it immensely useful.

As Page touched on - why can't you agree with it? Simply because it "doesn't sit right with [you]"? Why does that justify thinking that it's wrong, even when you can admit that it isn't hurting anyone?

For that matter: Why doesn't it sit right with you? What about it makes you uncomfortable? Do those reasons actually stand up to scrutiny on their own?

(The most obvious answer I can guess at - obviously I can't know whether it's true for you, but it makes for a good example of deconstructing this - is "it feels like trivializing or mocking the disabled experience" - but is it really? What about someone choosing to use a mobility aid for one reason is trivializing or mocking someone else using it for a different reason? It may only feel that way because people have used mobility aids to intentionally mock disabled people - but that doesn't mean anyone using a mobility aid for the "wrong reasons" is mocking.)

And returning to an earlier question because it's worth reexamining once the "why doesn't it sit right with you" line of questioning has been run through - why does this justify thinking that it's wrong? Assuming we accept the principle of "whether or not an action is wrong is determined by whether it harms people," which I think everyone involved in this conversation seems to, why is this an acceptable exception to that rule?

(And for that matter, especially if you can't come up with a compelling answer to those questions: what other things might you be applying the "this makes me uncomfortable, therefore I can't support it" framework to? Is it justifiable there? Is it harmful there?)

You don't have to answer those questions in public or to me, but if you can't answer them satisfactorily to yourself, you may need to do some thinking and decide whether opinions like this are actually consistent and coherent with the worldview and ethical principles you hold (or aspire to hold). Which is tough, but that's why all the questions are good. (And fun! It can be a fun challenge to dissect things like this, at least for me.)

(And, as Page said, it's a skill that being beastpunk - or any other group based in "we will accept anyone who is not actively causing harm" - kind of requires.)

I’m heavily pro-endo so that statement was meant literally (polytherian does not experience any form of plurality but calls themselves a system purely based on having multiple theriotypes).

Even if we were just talking about self expression. As a disabled person, does being radically accepting mean I have to accept nonhumans who are not disabled (who have said they are not disabled) using medical equipment to express their nonhumanity (i.e. someone using a cane solely for the purpose of showing they should not be bipedal). Because, it’s their right to express that way but it doesn’t sit right with me that I’m watching someone use medical equipment as an accessory. It’s not harmful but it’s also not something I can agree with.

I guess my point is. Where do you draw the line with radical acceptance? If we believe everyone about everything, if we accept every form of expression, at what point can we recognize what is harmful and not? If a couple people are hurt by it, is that harmful or just a personal opinion?

By no means is any of this meant as an attack. I’m really just trying to figure out where the radically accepting folks come from (as I once thought myself to be RA but found it brought on much toxicity and drama to spaces that weren’t that way before). As I said. I love Beastpunk for all its other qualities… just not the radically accepting (basically blind faith in my opinion) part…

Look, as someone who walks with a cane and wishes it was as well-loved and accepted an accessory as glasses currently are, so I'd get less shit about using one and accessibility for canes would be more baseline, I think you seriously need to reconsider why you can't agree with that. And why, even though you openly admit it isn't harmful, it's still being used as an example in this scenario.

Let's open the doors on this-- we're talking about a concept where we are trusting people to know themselves better than we know them, and where we are accepting the aspects about people that they cannot change, and where we are accepting people's non-harmful forms of self-expression. Where does any of that suddenly scoop your ability to think critically and deeply about information being presented to you out of your skull? I'm hunting through my essay and, you know, I simply just can't find the part where we yoink out your common sense or ability to question others.

Beastpunk is against plenty of harmful ideaologies and communities-- like pshifting, for instance, for historical reasons as outlined in the essay. You can be beastpunk and have opinions about what constitutes harm and what doesn't. But, as I said before, you're conflating radical acceptance as spoken of here with tucking tail and showing off your throat and belly, so to speak. You are confusing radical acceptance within this framework with an inability to confront others and to dig in deep to question why you are uncomfortable with something to decide if it really truly causes harm or if it's just internalized shit you need to unpack (re: the cane thing). And look, I cannot give you that skill. And being beastpunk requires that skill.

I cannot in good faith recommend beastpunk to you when you have so blatantly misunderstood what it represents, and seem to have a total inability to grasp one of the underlying, core principles of it.

Other folks are also welcome to chime in.

[nbmahoushoujo]

A Guide to Star Guardians for Non-League Players

So... if you like magical girls and you’ve seen Star Guardians around, you might have wanted to see what it’s all about! The problem is, Star Guardians is a skin line in league of legends so the actual content for it is split up in different places and it’s not clear where to start if you don’t already know a lot about it. So I’ve compiled all the official Star Guardian content that I know of in mostly chronological release order, and I’ll offer explanations and context about each part where I can! Some stuff is links to videos and stories, and some is screenshots from the games for small in-game things. I might over-explain some things so I apologise for how wordy this is!

First of all, I’ll be talking about 3 separate games here:

League of Legends - The main game, has been around for ages, I’m sure you’ve heard of it, very toxic gamers, etc.

Wild Rift - The mobile version of League of Legends, has only been around for a few years so it doesn’t have all the same characters/skins yet, sometime has unique skins that aren’t in league of legends

Legends of Runeterra -  A card game with the same characters and world but entirely different gameplay, in this game a “skin” is just different card art and sometimes a single different level-up animation, there’s no character model you play with to put a skin on

As this story universe is based on in-game skins as a starting point, new lore and content comes every time new skins are released, which is usually a new team of guardians. 

Since these characters are just skins, no knowledge of the regular characters in Runeterra (the name of the world in the regular universe) is needed! For example: many people will know Jinx from Arcane, but Star Guardian Jinx is an entirely different version of the character made for a different universe. Same goes for K/DA and True Damage members in the music skin universe who a lot of people know only in that context.

When I list new characters, I’ll link to their official character profiles which you can read to get to know them before watching/reading any videos/stories they’re in. Trust me, they’ll make more sense that way!

2016

New Stars - a short story

Now, this is only a few paragraphs long with some images but I can’t for the life of me find where it was officially published. Great start, you’ll have to make do with some screenshots of the same content on the wiki:

Skins released:

Lux (Was actually released before all of this, the whole skin line came from the success of her one-off magical girl skin)

Jinx 

Janna 

Poppy 

Lulu 

Burning Bright - Animated music video

Star Guardian Jinx Interactions

Jinx has something called a legendary skin, which is a more expensive type of skin that has more unique features than a regular one. The main differences are unique animations (normal skins have to conform to the animations of the regular character) and more importantly for the lore, unique voice lines. Star guardian Lux, for example, has the same voice lines as regular Lux which has nothing to do with Star Guardians. So this means that legendary Star Guardian skins have voice lines that can give insight into their character. Some will be generic things to say when performing actions in the game, but the lines they say towards other characters are at least worth hearing I think. They’re mostly not technically canon, but basically “what if this character met this one”.

For all legendary skins, I’ll link to videos by SkinSpotlights who kindly compiles them!

2017

Skins released:

Ahri 

Miss ‘Sarah’ Fortune (In the main Runeterra universe her name is Sarah Fortune but she’s referred to as Miss Fortune)

Soraka

Syndra

Ezreal 

A New Horizon - Animated video

Starfall - Short story

Star Guardian Ahri Interactions

Invasion - PVE game mode

This was only for a limited time which I wasn’t there for, but I found a video of the gameplay.

2018

This year’s Star Guardian skins were a little different in that they were just versions of previous Star Guardians in onesies themed around their familiars! They don’t have separate profiles since they’re the same characters so you can see them all below: 

Miss fortune, Ezreal, Lux, Lulu and Soraka

The Slumber Party Summoning - Short story

2019

The Twilight Star - Short story

Skins released:

Neeko

Xayah & Rakan* 

Zoe

*The character profiles don’t represent Xayah and Rakan at this point in the story, so I’ll link them later. For now what you need to know is Xayah and rakan were members of Ahri’s original team who were killed, revived and corrupted by Zoe. They now fight against the Star Guardians because they believe that their friends left them to die on purpose. Also they’re very in love, which is why they’re always paired together. Xayah’s Familiar is Saki (left) and Rakan’s is Riku (right)

Light and Shadow - Animated music video

Star Guardian Xayah and Rakan Interactions

2022

Yes that’s right, there was nothing new for two years, only for the biggest Star Guardian Event yet which is only just coming to an end! There’s a lot of content across games which means different stories lines were released simultaneously, so I’ll just be putting it in the order I think makes most sense!

Return to Valoran City - Short animated event teaser (worth watching for the pretty art and to get a feel for the setting)

Before looking at the new skins I recommend reading this first:

Twin Stars - Short story

It introduces a few of the new characters a year before they become guardians and their story starts, and sets up what’s going on with the previous characters currently!

Skins released in League of Legends:

Kai’sa

Akali

Taliyah

Ekko

Sona

Rell

Quinn

Nilah

(Star Nemesis) Morgana

(Star Nemesis) Fiddlesticks

Everything Goes On - Animated music video

This sets up the simultanious stories, with Kai’sa as the main character in League of Legends and Xayah in Wild Rift. Next I’ll list the League of Legends content, and we’ll come back to Wild Rift.

Another Sky - In-game visual novel

This is the meat of the content, it has 5 chapters including the epilogue for the main narrative, and shorter side stories for each individual member of the team. The visual novel is only available in the game client, and after the event it won’t be playable anymore, so I’ve linked a playlist of uploads to youtube. 

This does mean you can’t see all the different dialogue options, but I couldn’t find an upload that shows all of them so I’ll update this if any pop up. There’s only a few different lines after each different choice before it goes back to the same content. It’s not a “your choices have consequences” kind of thing.

The main story and character stories are mixed together weirdly in this playlist, but the video titles are clear enough. The side stories can be read in any order, before, during, or after the main story.

Shadow of a Doubt - Animated Video about Akali

Set around the middle of the visual novel, but it doesn’t really matter when you watch it.

Star Guardian Kai’sa Interactions

Star Guardian Akali Interactions

Taliyah Sessions -  A playlist of copyright-free music by a mix of artists with Taliyah as the face of them. This is something riot’s done with other champions, Vi and Diana, and it’s good music for studying and stuff like that! If you don’t listen to it I hope you at least watch the section with the song ‘SIDE 2 SIDE’ so you can see Taliyah’s cute little dance moves. She’s the best. I love her.

Skins released in Wild Rift:

Seraphine

Senna

Orianna

(Redeemed) Xayah

(Redeemed) Rakan

Wild Rift Visual Novel - In-game visual novel

This is the other main story, following Xayah’s newly-formed team and taking place at the same time as the other visual novel.

New Dreams - Vlogs by Xayah’s new team:

Seraphine

Orianna

Senna

Star Crossed - Comics adapted from the same story as the visual novel. It covers mostly the same events, plus Xayah recruiting the members of her team at the start which was not in the vn. In my opinion it’s the better version of the story!

Skins released in Legends of Runeterra: 

(Gwen is the only Legends of Runeterra exclusive, the others all overlap with the other games so I won’t bother linking to the same profiles again!)

Gwen

Jinx

Lulu

Soraka

Kai’sa

Quinn

Taliyah

Senna

Legends of Runeterra has less content overall. Each character has 2 pieces of art with flavour text, as their art changes when they level up. A few of them have unique level up animations too. Here I’ll share my own screenshots from the game to make sure the flavour text is included!

Star Guardian Gwen Level-up Animation

Star Guardian Jinx Level-up Animation

Star Guardian Kai’sa Level-up Animation

Additionally, Star Guardian Kai’sa is the only lor skin so far to have unique voice lines, but they’re really not much. Here anyway:

Star Guardian Kai’sa Voice Lines (Starts at 14:21)

Thank you for reading this! I hope it helped, I just had fun talking about the characters I love!

I’ll finish off with other related info/trivia and thoughts that I want to share:

Star Guardian ages are confusing. Some of them are teenagers who have just become guardians, while others are hundreds of years old and just pretend to be a regular human age. It’s not always clear which is which to be honest! Lux’s team is mostly teenagers but Janna is implied to be much older. Ahri’s original team seem to be a lot older, but I’m not entirely clear on her new team. Syndra, Zoe and Gwen are from the original first Star Guardian team so they’re the oldest. What confused me was that Xayah’s new team is made up of old guardians according to the comics, yet they all pretend to be high schoolers and then complain about high school as if they didn’t choose to disguise themselves that way??

A lot of people were really getting their hopes up for the return of Star Guardians PVE because apparently it was really fun in 2017, but alas we just got some other regular game mode that no one cares about. Apparently PVE doesn’t drive engagement enough for riot to do that anymore even though everyone wants it. Video titles that aged like milk:

Similarly, from the teasers a lot of people thought Kai’sa and Akali were going to be a couple in this universe. With all the hand holding and gazing lovingly into each other’s eyes, it was a little disappointing that they went with the ‘very close gal pals’ route. It would have been wild to make Akali canonically queer only to ship her with anyone but Evelynn, considering Akalynn was the biggest ship before Arcane came out.

Regular Taliyah was originally intended to be trans by the writers/artists that worked on her, but as is typically the case in this game, they weren’t allowed to do that. In more recent content there’s been a clear effort to code her that way. When Neeko was released she got a voice line towards Taliyah that says “Neeko not the only one who changes”. Neeko changes because she’s a shapeshifting chameleon, so in what way does Taliyah change? 🤔 I think Star Guardian Taliyah has the most clear trans coding so far with her whole thing about wanting to figure out who she is, and feeling more herself when she transforms, etc.

On the topic of Neeko voice lines, Neeko was the first out lesbian champion in the game, I love her very much, please listen to her! I wish she had more Star Guardian content.

If you know Akali, Kai’sa, Ahri and Seraphine from K/DA, you may notice Evelynn’s the only K/DA member who’s not also a star guardian. It doesn’t mean anything, but there’s been a lot of memes about her feeling left out and a some really good Star Guardian Evelynn fan designs!

If you only know Jinx from arcane and wonder who that random blonde girl is that people keep shipping her with, that’s regular Lux. They’ve never met in Runeterra, but their dynamic in Star Guardians translates well to the base characters too. To sum it up, Lux thinking “I can fix her” and Jinx thinking “I can make her worse” is why they make a fun pairing in any universe! 

Ezreal is boring and he's the worst Star Guardian. This is just opinion but I’m right. /j

Gwen was a doll who became human, but her joke animation in league lets her transform back into the cute little dolly version of her. In Legends of Runeterra, you can have this doll as a guardian (little buddy who sits next to your cards and does cute stuff if you click on them) and there’s a Star Guardian variation:

If you’re interested in learning more about League of Legends lore and it’s alternate universes, check out Necrit! He’s known as the lore guy at this point.

If you’re interested in the character designs and animation you’ve seen, check out TB Skyen! He’s done some animation breakdown videos of Star Guardian Stuff and recently done a stream ranking and talking about the skin designs.

[thecarnivorousmuffinmeta]

I know you’ve talked about how all the Cullen pairings are eventually going to implode - glad someone said it - but I was wondering if you wanted to talk a little bit about what you think Meyer INTENDED with the pairings - tropes and whatnot? And what you think would have to change in her narrative to make what was intended what we actually saw on the page? Or — what do you think each cullens’ Perfect Spouse would actually look like?

Anon is referring to this post.

And well, you've certainly given me quite the challenge.

Some Musing Ramblings Before We Begin

Sort of like asking me to make Dramione work, I'm not sure I'm the person to ask this. Anyone who reads my work knows that... well, that's a lie, every story I secretly write is a love story. But it's not Twilight in any way shape or form.

Twilight simply isn't a story I would set out to write. This isn't a good thing or a bad thing, it just is, which means that asking me to make Twilight work the way Meyer intended is probably not your best bet.

But I'll try regardless, it's what we're here for.

Bella/Edward

Meyer intended Bella Swan and Edward Cullen to be the best and brightest of all the pairings in Twilight. They have the love and devotion of Carlisle and Esme, the physicality and sexual attraction of Rosalie and Emmett, and are such a grand love that even depressed Marcus takes note. This is the love story that drives the entire series.

Edward is an improvement upon Carlisle, a Carlisle with even better control, and the most beautiful man you ever did see. He's also a gentleman, a man of his time and from an era where chivalry was alive and men courted women. Bella is one of those disturbingly altruistic people who makes you feel bad about yourself just by being in the same room. She's incredibly selfless, kind, and also quite brave.

Together, despite their ups and downs and the many obstacles in their way, they're disgustingly perfect.

However, that's not what we get. On Edward's end he's... Edward about loving Bella. On Bella's end, she has no idea who Edward even is but she does know he's beautiful and special.

And to get what Meyer actually wanted... Christ, Anon, I'll try.

So, the first problem, if Edward was truly a good person then Twilight would never happen.

Edward would have his first day of Biology, miraculously maintain control, and flee to Alaska as he does in canon. However, he would not return. Edward in canon returns due to his budding obsession as well as his wounded pride, in fleeing Forks he feels he has lost to Bella. When Carlisle later points out that a girl's life is on the line, that Edward is foolishly endangering this girl solely for his ego, Edward refuses to acknowledge this.

A good man would never have returned from Alaska, the Cullens would have moved in short order, and Bella may or may not have died in a parking lot or in Port Angeles.

That said, what if Bella is not, in fact, Edward's singer? Then there's not this constant debate of him eating her or his creepy, budding, obsession with his personal brand of heroin.

Well, the trouble with that is that Edward would then never notice her. Even were Edward not a colossal dismissive dick, required per this ask, Bella is one mortal out of many and someone he shouldn't grow close to. Associating with her just exposes her to unnecessary danger from him and his family. Edward is a guest in our world, nothing more, and a kind Edward might chit chat with her in Biology but even if he had a growing crush he'd keep his distance.

As he tried and failed to do in canon, actually.

Basically, change Edward alone, and it's not enough. The Edward Meyer wanted would never get together with Bella. At least, not without a lot of AU-sauce.

But let's look at Bella for a moment. Bella's character also has to be entirely stripped down. The Bella of the books is extremely depressed and her infatuation with Edward is fueled in part because of this. Edward's obsession with her gives her worth.

Obviously, in this new and improved edition of Twilight, Bella can't use either Edward or Jacob for validation. She has to be able to stand on her own two legs. If she does use either for validation, then the relationship must come to an end, as she and her significant other realize just what it is Bella's doing.

The trouble is, what does this not-depressed Bella have to fall in love with? Yes, Edward's beautiful, and that certainly goes a long way, but in canon he's a dick. Bella even thinks to herself that he's a complete dick (even when he's trying to be charming). Luckily for Edward she later decides that this is cryptic and therefore appealing.

Well, in AU land, Edward might be so damn charming that Bella likes him anyway but we come back to Edward keeping her at a polite distance.

So, what we need is a terrifying villain. Let's call him Angelus (though per Twilight this would probably be James). Angelus is a vampire that will force Edward's hand. For whatever reason, he decides to torment and ruin Bella's life, ending the hunt in either eating her or turning her into his bride. Angelus' existence forces Bella to be in the know and for Edward to have to take extreme action.

The pair become closer, grow through undoubtedly horrific trauma, and through said trauma Bella understands not only the pros of being a vampire but the terrifying cons.

Basically, it'd be this story. Just replace the name "Carlisle" with Edward and "Edward" with James.

Alice/Jasper

Alice and Jasper are supposed to have this ineffable, mystic, connection where they're together because... Alice saw them together. And in a way, that's true, but it's supposed to be a thing of beauty, soulmates if there ever were any, and instead it's this dumpster fire with nothing holding them together.

This one's easier in a way, well, sort of. Alice would have to be a completely different character and we'd have to see a lot more of Jasper.

Alice has a bad habit of treating those around her, even those she loves, as chess pieces. She'll put them in significant danger, court their misery, so long as it gets her the future she wants.

And she's extremely controlling.

Right away in the opening of Midnight Sun we see this and how it affects her and Jasper's relationship. The novel opens with Alice hovering, scanning the future for Japser fucking up, while Jasper just sits there in misery. Due to her obsession on making sure Jasper doesn't eat students, she actually misses Edward's plan to massacre Biology and his many plans to eat Bella Swan.

Even if she wasn't, this isn't good for anyone to live with. Jasper has very little concept of free will, whatever happens to him, whatever he'll do, Alice tells him and the worst possible option is always on the table.

For Jasper/Alice to work either Alice's gift needs to go (and that's... sort of all Alice is) or she has to tell no one any vision ever unless under extreme circumstances.

Which would be devastating for Alice. Rather than this mostly well-adjusted, perky, girl, Alice would be crippled by her gift. The weight of the world, everyone's free will, rests on her shoulders and she has to constantly avoid temptation to simply pick everyone's future for them.

Without the attitude Alice has in canon, I think she'd go mad with such a gift, or else be consumed by the responsibility of it.

Then we get to the mess that is Jasper. Jasper's complicated, and I don't want to get into it here, but his love story would have to be... too large to be put to the side like that. The redemption he'd need is not one that can be shoved into a few paragraphs told to Bella, it's frankly the kind of story that would drive an ordinary story.

So we'd have to see a lot of Jasper and Nouveau Alice. Which, of course, detracts from Bella/Edward which is the main point of the story.

Honestly, I take it back, there's no salvaging this relationship. They would have to be completely different people to the point where they're entirely different characters wearing nametags 'Alice' and 'Jasper'. Alice couldn't have her gift, which informs her entire character, and we'd have to see way too much of Jasper who is ultimately a tertiary character.

Carlisle/Esme

Thoughts on Carlisle/Esme.

Carlisle and Esme is a very 'spiritual' relationship per Meyer. They're... mom-bot and dad-bot. Alright, fine, they're the perfect parents with this deep love for each other and a very parental bond with Edward especially. It's the relationship Edward admires the most in his paired off family.

I don't even know how to fix this one.

Again, they'd have to be such different people. The trouble with Esme and Carlisle is that they share no values and are plagued by massive miscommunication. The Carlisle who is perfect for Esme... No, wait, this Carlisle is perfect for her, but that's because she's in Esme Land.

The Carlisle that would be perfect for a grounded Esme is not the one that exists. She'd want someone who would always put the family first, who would treasure her above all other things, that's not Carlisle.

Carlisle, similarly, would want someone that truly shares his ideals. That's not Esme.

So, we're back to nametag land, because one or both have to completely change for this to work. (Not to mention that Esme's probably not supposed to be Esme).

So, I've got nothing for this.

Rosalie/Emmett

I actually think these two are what Meyer intended. They love each other but are mostly held together by attraction. They're a very physical couple and good for the most part but inherently lesser than Bella/Edward.

Sure, I'd argue that they're the most put together couple in the house, but I think they're meant to have flaws. They work well together, but every other relationship in the Cullens has to be a step up or at least have something more to it.

Something Edward and Bella can be better than.

Conclusion

Dear god. Did I only manage to somewhat address Bella/Edward? Was that it? This was worse than I thought.

[gay-snom]

contextualizing lwj’s coming to terms with his feelings subplot!

i wanna talk about the role of confucianism in this subplot because i think it’s something some western fans might not pick up on. basically, the sociopolitical climate of confucianism in his character arc, and a little bit about his interaction with the public image theme.

disclaimer: i’m not chinese but i do have a double minor in chinese and asian studies and have written a few papers on confucianism.

we’re gonna be talking about the novel bc i feel its a little more in-depth and nuanced than lwj’s “what is black, what is white” monologue in cql. namely the tension and misunderstanding in wwx’s first life and how lwj got his scars. i feel like it’s pretty well accepted that wwx made lwj reconsider his world view, so i’m just gonna expand on it. also i want to point out it's pretty unspoken in most of the text, but lwj is also affected by/used to explore the public image themes, as his image the is ideal confucian scholar.

confucianism is centered around the ideas of how to behave “good” in sociopolitical contexts. basically it boils down to a belief system on how society should be run. if everyone follows confucian beliefs, you will have an ideal society. the main text is the Analects, which you can read here. it’s been around for a few thousand years (like around 200 BCE ish), had a huge revival in the tang dynasty (618-907 CE). it was put on imperial exams, the emperor’s cabinet had confucian scholars, etc. this is just to say confucian values are important to historic society, especially upper-class scholars, which seems to be a role cultivators commonly fill in xianxia. here are some basic tenants:

being a gentleman/scholar/superior man (君子 jūn zǐ) : partly being learned in the arts, literature, music, poetry, etc., mostly behaving righteously and dutifully.

filial piety: usually described as obedience. it's not simply obeying everything elders tell you, it includes doing it with reverence and thankfulness for their sacrifices for you.

leading by example: if leaders/the government is righteous, the people will follow. lwj has his flock of juniors that are all strong cultivators and the lan sect is just generally known for being moral and good.

rites/rituals: a focus on politeness and holding proper ceremonies, sacrifices, and funerals

speech: there’s some great meta about the register he speaks in here, i just want to touch on think carefully before you speak, only speak sincerely, etc.

tldr; lwj is THE perfect gentleman (even his title contains the character suffix 君 -jūn, like lxc. which, while this character is not uncommon for cultivator titles, it wasn’t chosen carelessly either. also not to be confused with 尊 -zūn). seriously, look at almost all of book 10 and you'll see don't do/consume in excess, don't talk during meals, sit only when your mat is straight, etc.

okay, so Why is understanding his feelings for wwx so troublesome?

1.2 "They are few who, being filial and fraternal, are fond of offending against their superiors. There have been none, who, not liking to offend against their superiors, have been fond of stirring up confusion... Filial piety and fraternal submission! - are they not the root of all benevolent actions?"

in other words, people who are filial will never create political tension. so like, morally, wwx should be considered horrible person! he’s not only snubbed the jiang sect. he was a head disciple who undoubtedly had younger students looking up to him. and then he goes and stirs up some huge political issues! he is now a bad role model for the people below him and disrespected the people above him. lwj has an entire image to uphold, he has poured his entire life into following these rules and beliefs, and then wwx comes along. would continuing to be in wwx's life taint lwj? there are some contradicting teachings in regards to interacting with wwx:

15.4: "Do not take counsel with those who follow a different Way"

15.28: "When the multitude hates a person, you must examine them and judge for yourself. The same holds true for someone whom the multitude love."

15.36 "When it comes to being Good, defer to no one, not even your teacher."

this is part of the reason lwj had so much trouble accepting his feelings. he didn’t know how to handle this situation, making him appear distant during/directly after sunshot. if he judges wwx's intentions to be pure, it's then not wrong to be friendly with him. but wwx still is morally wrong by society's standards. now, lwj has to not only figure out his feelings, but also reconcile this with how he still thinks wwx is Not a bad person, despite everything. what if he does get "tainted" by wwx? will it hurt the reputation of his sect? that would be un-filial, right? he spent his whole life memorizing rules that are probably extremely similar to sections in the Analects, and now these mixed messages (coupled with the relatable gay panic) are overwhelming.

onto the next! there’s something unspoken in the scene where wwx discovers why lwj has the whip scars. as other posts have mentioned, lwj taking wwx back to the burial mounds and nursing him is high treason. however, this action is also extremely un-filial. also his entire image is built around being a perfect gentleman, if this were to get out to the public he would lose absolutely everything. he would be just as irreparable as wwx.

“I was worried if those from another sect found you first, WangJi would be considered your accomplice. The best scenario was his name being forever tainted, and the worst was his life being taken away right then. Thus, along with Uncle, we chose thirty three seniors who had always thought highly of WangJi... ”

there’s no way lwj didn’t know what would happen if he did this. obviously as lxc says, if this got out, he would lose basically his entire face. and even though lxc didn’t mention this, it would definitely lose a lot of face for the lan sect as well since lwj is so prominent. the decision about what elders to bring is also notable.

“...As if he knew all along he would be discovered by us, he said that there was nothing to explain, that this was it. Growing up, he had never talked back to Uncle, not even once. But for you, not only did WangJi talk back to him, he even met with his sword the cultivators from the Gusu Lan sect...”

so yeah, he obviously knew they would come for him and what the consequences would be. and he still talked back! that’s already not a good look for the lan sect. but attacking them? totally unforgivable! lwj gives up how he was raised and the importance of filial piety, what he has held on to until this major plot event. since it's basically the biggest "fuck you" to his uncle and his clan, this was not a decision he made lightly. lwj shows them he cares more about wwx and His Own ideas of right and wrong than the sect’s or society’s.

Wei WuXian dug his hands into his hair, “...I-I didn’t know... I really...”

when was the last time wwx was at a loss for words? wwx spends a few paragraphs after this lamenting how he hurt lwj, but he's not unaware of the gravity of what lwj did. it's an underlying assumption from being raised in the culture. i would argue his first instinct is "oh god he gave up what for me?" since those lamenting paragraphs are after lxc finishes speaking.

"But he said... that he could not say with certainty whether what you did was right or wrong..."

this is something thrown around a lot in the Analects, that not even confucius can say for sure what is right or wrong. what better way to show lwj is still a perfect confucian than have him paraphrase confucius himself?

“...WangJi was a model for the disciples when he was young, and a prominent cultivator when he grew up. In his whole life he had been honest and righteous and immaculate--you were the only mistake he made!”

here’s the confirmation that the world and even his family thinks of him as a perfect gentleman, the top tier of society, and it was all thrown away for wwx. this is just so heavy. the mistake thing? thats not only because lwj is fraternizing with an enemy. lxc and the rest of the sect who knew are terrified this will forever corrupt lwj personally, not just publicly. lwj was so devoted to believing this was the right thing to do he offered up everything he had. the gravity of this decision is insane. it’s very obvious that he loves wwx, it’s just that he struggles a lot internally to accept everything that is happening.

as for helping wwx leave after the massacre, is this gentleman-ly of lwj? was it actually in-line with his image? is it more honorable to save someone who is dying, at the cost of your own health, than to look away? isn't looking away a form of resentment? i wasn't able to find a specific passage about bystander-ness, but personally i think it qualifies as "bad intentions." there is also this passage for what it's worth, originally it was about government suppression:

12.19: "...What do you say to killing the unprincipled for the good of the principled?" Confucius replied, "...why should you use killing at all?..."

lwj is always more actions than words, and he was not fucking around. his core beliefs really haven't changed, and remain very strong throughout his life. he is still righteous enough to accept his punishment, graceful enough to search for wwx's body since there was no one else to do the funeral rites (10.22/10.15), caring enough to take in a-yuan, upright enough to still spend his years going where the chaos is.

just with this one action, the audience knows he has come to terms with realizing that authority isn't always just, and neither is the public opinion/opinion of other gentlemen. he has reconciled. this is him standing for what he believes is right. this is his devotion. this is his own choice. just. poetic cinema...

anyway that's it for my first meta post! i would love to hear your thoughts, feelings, opinions, discussions, other meta ideas, whatever! thank u for reading! <3