#ok sorry for generalizing i CAN actually rely on some people

[annakarenina]

people come and go but grief is constant and time is a flat circle

[sillyyuserr]

A longer, more in depth (9 parts all in one) terukane analysis, and/or everything i could find, compiled (one of my better pieces of work imo) ⭐️

Ok so it might be the fact that i ship them so i see a lot of things they do as possibly romantic even when theres no romantic implications, but the amount of times it feels like AidaIro seems to be implying that teru likes akane is getting to a suspiciously high number. Like lets look at this from a non-shipper’s pov (or at least try😭)

Item A: teru looking at akane

Without the context that he’s looking at akane, he genuinely looks like he’s showing something of raw emotion, unchanged by his “fake persona” but a genuine reaction. Looking at this picture at face value one would assume he’s big time crushing. I mean i wouldn’t say “omg hes so in lovveee!!!” But considering he doesn’t really open up to like anyone, i think this is definitely something??

Item B: them going together on a romantic outing

Yes i did make it sound much more compelling then it actually is but cmon man. The school festival is considered a “romantic event” and these two spent the entire time hanging around the school together. Giving the excuse that "it's our job being in the student council" (which i guess it is) but in reality it was because no one wanted to come with them.

Which i mean they also did technically go on an actual date together

nene is so cute here 😭😭

Item C: teru trusting akane more than anyone (?)

Teru likes talking to akane, trusts his intellect, and considers him someone he can rely on but doesn't like it when his whole world starts to revolve around aoi. My guy, that's jealousy.

He is shown to trust him and even show his back to him in multiple instances, knowing he wont hurt him, and he’s someone he can trust (lets ignore what happens on the literal next page)

Even being one of those “i fight alone” type of people. But when akane’s there, he’s never fighting alone.

Item D: not sure if thats whats happening here but im pretty sure he tried glazing akane even blushing n shit like ‘oh no mr judge im not guilty🥺💄💋’

And then got agitated when it didn’t work

Item E: akane knows teru better than we think

When kou and teru were fighting, the reason teru even walked out in the first place was because of the fireworks. And whos idea was that?

Akane’s. He knew he liked fireworks and that they’d lure him out of his room. And again, he was right they did it fact get him to leave

Item F: valentines day event

i dont think i even need to break this one down. Its a picture of JUST them TOGETHER posted on VALENTINES DAY. 2/14/24. THE ANNUAL HOLIDAY THAT CELEBRATES NONE OTHER THAN ROMANTIC LOVE. Also teru’s color being used as akane’s sparkles and akane’s color being used as teru’s sparkles kinda shows that AidaIro arent just showing us two characters, they’re showing us TERU and AKANE, TOGETHER. If it really could be anyone im sure they’d put them in a general setting, but with the paired colors i’d say that says otherwise. Some might say they’re looking at eachother

Okay warning, it starts to get a little unhinged past this point, read with caution

Item G: possible fruit symbolism

first off, this picture.

First lets look at hanako’s. We can see he has two drinks, both red + with strawberries, along with a red straw. While also being pictured near other red fruits.

In this picture, nene’s flower(s) are literally strawberry flowers, putting the association between strawberries + nene out there. Meaning the strawberries in his drink could be purposeful, along with the red undertones. (red being her eye color) (sorry for quality im on iPhone)

Moving on to teru’s, he has one drink, being yellow-ish with pineapple on the side, and chunks in the drink itself. Whilst his straw is orange, while also being pictured around a ginormous pinapple

And this isnt the first time we’ve seen him pictured with pineapples

This god awful picture unfortunately exists so im adding it as proof/evidence for my argument. (Oh and not to mention akane has green pants on so everyone’s a lil funky igs)

notice how as soon they got to his house his outfit changed? This is him when they got to his house (clearly in a long-sleeve shirt, not the hoodie)

this is him with akane + nene going on a date

All within the same chapter i think, but him changing outfits i feel like says something. Like we’re supposed to associate that with something other than aoi (them talking ab how to save her at his house) or his family. Like aidairo are shoving it in your face ‘disassociate teru w aoi!!!’ He even straight up left when they started talking ab how they missed aoi at the karaoke place. (More or so when he left they started talking but ykwim) Since nene is being associated with strawberries it leaves the only other person to be akane, this also making sense also because of the straw color. (The straw being orange; akane’s rep color being orange, as nene’s is red)

also the fact that fruit is literally associated with the queer community

Item H: triangles + queer symbolism

Quick history lesson, A triangle has been a symbol for the queer community, initially intended as a badge of shame, but later reclaimed as a positive symbol of self-identity. In Nazi Germany in the 1930s and 1940s, it began as one of the Nazi concentration camp badges, distinguishing those imprisoned because they had been identified by authorities as gay men. In the 1970s, it was again, reclaimed as a symbol of protest against homophobia, and has since been adopted by the larger queer community as a popular symbol of queer pride. More or so, the upsidown triangle. and guess whos ALWAYS wearing a fucking upsidown triangle

My guy has one for EVERY OUTFIT 😭

Item I: extras

This picture. Him holding akane’s shirt and aoi’s bag really shows that AidaIro REALLY doesn’t want us to know which one he likes 😭 if you’re confused, teru’s supposed crush is supposed to be ambiguous (options: akane, aoi) to the audience (basically just me and maybe a few others).

In the “kiss comic” part of the art book, not only are teru and akane’s on the same page, but they also look like they go together

Thats all i got for now (´-ω-`) MAN this took me like 5 different consecutive days. I wrote like 3 parts on one day, 2 more parts the next, and 1 more part today. 😭 hope you enjoyed and this re-gave you faith that terukane might be canon one day 😔 fake it till you make it

Feel free to comment and tell me ab anything i may have missed!! :3

[mbti-notes]

Anon wrote: Hello mbti-notes. Hope you are doing well and thank you for all your work as always. I am the INFJ from post 642303487006359552. Sorry for asking yet again; I just believe I’m wasting a lot of time trying to figure this out by myself and would appreciate if you have any ideas or pointers.

In the post I mentioned above you pinpointed how I struggled with unhealthy Ni, unreasonable expectations, and lack of patience / emotional intelligence. Your analysis was spot-on, and I come to relate to it increasingly as I go through life, but my progress on these issues has been slow when looking from bird-eye’s view. I think my understanding of them is rather detached / intellectualized and hindered by me being unable to rely on external advice or guidance effectively.

I probably “intellectualize” a lot generally as I rely a lot on external advice, self-help, researching, psychology, etc. to figure out my problems. I don’t know if this is inherently a bad thing—if I hadn’t found many of psychology’s ideas I definitely would hardly be in a good place. However, every time I do this, I feel guilty or afraid that I’m navel gazing, and uncertain whether I actually am. If I don’t do this, however, I feel intractably stuck. Most of the progress I’ve made relied on my own ‘pure’ judgment in some form, but when I continue to tap into it I start becoming delusional or something, and even more stuck. I will detail my problem now and how this happens when I try to work on it.

I have been trying to be more patient, more resilient, and gain awareness of the thought processes that lead to disappointment. On the way, I realized that one of my major problems was immense frustration whenever something ‘went wrong’. I think this is very related to Ti loop and Se grip. If something doesn’t ‘make sense’ to me or if I don’t know what it means for me—such as someone’s mean comments, negative intentions; what makes certain tasks or activities purposeful; whether I’m choosing a good direction in life—I don’t feel my life (presently) is ‘meaningful’ anymore, that my ‘good’ actions are meaningless things that I am ‘forced’ to do to be well-adjusted. I feel an urge to escape from the situation and move into nihilism, perhaps narrowing my point of attention to a very small point so that I don’t have to think about it all. I want to forget about all of the mess. My unrealistic expectations perhaps pile up when I do this.

For example it so happens that I have poor social skills that often leads people to reject me. Of course, it is unreasonable to expect anyone to like me. But when I tell myself ‘it’s okay if people don’t like me’, my frustrations become extreme; I become provoked, implacable. “Why should it be the case that even if people reject me, they think I’m a bad person just for having emotional issues, make gross assumptions about my behavior, etc. etc.” I often resort to thinking those people are ‘shallow’. And it doesn’t help that in reality, I’m getting increasing amounts of evidence that even decent people can be very shallow. I guess it’s not my business and my interpretation is what matters—my judgmentalness here shows my own struggles. And if I’m being honest I’m rather OK with the rejection per se. What bothers me immensely is that the rejection was based on things that indicated that they were first of all looking out for their own comfort rather than mine, that they blindsided my unrealistic expectations of them. I feel exposed for being so out of touch.

But I’ve attempted to be more in touch with reality often, more realistic, but it doesn’t work. All I can think of telling myself is, ‘you should know that people are shallow’, which doesn’t seem realistic at all; it’s just a blanket statement. Or I tell myself, I should go out for your own enjoyment, not necessarily for genuine connection with others. Or even better that I should be more adaptable, chill, focused on mutual enjoyment. I’ve often gone out with these intentions and ended up being totally lost on what to do, acting even more awkward probably creeping people out. This ties back to that things ‘stop making sense’. Like I don’t understand what’s happening around me; I’m here for enjoyment or I’m trying to be adaptable, what does that mean? How does it tie to what matters to me? Sometimes I figure out in the moment why something matters to me practically and act pretty well, but it requires a lot of mental work and tying together all the complex factors quickly, and it happens rarely (though more frequently as I’ve made some sort of progress). It requires thinking of everything at once. And I’m slow when it comes to things like this. It doesn’t help that I feel very angry when I realize that my ‘slowness’ is the thing that’s leading people to misunderstand and judge me. It feels unfair… and then same thing with this, I try to figure out my unrealistic expectation that the world should be fair and reasonable and defuse it, but now it’s double complicated with the original thing.

Similarly I often struggle with figuring out how to find more meaning and purpose in life. I have many meaningful goals, like helping out my family, making progress in my career, learning good things, solving my emotional problems, building a social support system, becoming a better person. I don’t actively feel hopeless as long as I don’t touch on my blindspots too much. But when I try to grow more it comes crumbling down. Like I’ll become disappointed that I think so much about external rewards when it comes to my career. It is pretty clear that I want to be validated for the work I do and it often motivates me, I wonder if a bit too much. But instead of addressing this directly, my mind commonly becomes a mess noticing; I go on internal monologues about how it’s so unfair that I’ve to lose social validation and be judged if I did more meaningful work, or that the industry I work in suffers so many issues, on and on and on until I’ve formed a full internal narrative about how the world sucks.

Anyway, I suspect a window into this issue comes when I try to work on it. I’ll try to make mental models of when my emotions get triggered, what are the ‘underlying issues’ (emotional intelligence, denial, etc.), but if I don’t actively resist by feeling sleepy and detached, I become very frustrated, intellectualize, start reading psychology or researching abstract things like ‘how to solve emotional problems’ lol. I suspect I actually do it right a lot of the time, except with immense self-doubt that interferes with learning. I’ll tell myself, why am I learning about emotions, I should be just doing what I need to do to grow. Also, very often I don’t know where to look or how to interpret what I read, making me more confused. And when I try to ‘handle it myself’, telling myself I myself know what’s best for me, I resort to just ‘powering through’ my frustration, which doesn’t work very well. Either way, my frustrations and underlying hopelessness pile up and I give into some sort of weird entertainment or falling asleep.

I think if I were able to think more clearly and prevent my messy mind I’d be far more efficient. Yet this thought itself triggers me! I become afraid, throughout history, people didn’t really have access to psychology and stuff, or to modern scientific / critical thinking courses, do I not have the resources to handle myself? Am I avoiding or evading my problems? Also, isn’t ‘intellectual development’ going to make my detachment worse? Isn’t Ti loop a problem? I have a lot of evidence now that I should just bite the bullet and work on the critical thinking related to properly sorting out my mind. To be fair I do often start doing this; I’d crack open a book, Google things, or think about my issues more systematically. The anxiety is usually quite extreme though and I don’t learn for long. Sometimes, when I get frustrated or upset I’ll do things that are obviously useless, like Google very very specific questions as if I'm talking to some human expert, lol.

Anyway, you can see how messy and divided my thoughts are here. I guess I would just appreciate some help clearing my confusion and making sense of what is happening to me. I suspect the main issue to prioritize is my pattern / habit of not being able to work through problems patiently. But I’ve thought so for a while and it’s not helped too much, so there's clearly something I'm missing. I’m afraid I'm wasting time digging on this when I could be living a more meaningful and fulfilling life. Sorry this got long, and thank you so much! I am always stunned by your knowledge and insight.

-----------------

In a nutshell: Almost all the thought patterns you've described are characteristic of Ni-Ti loop, with a few examples of Se grip sprinkled in. When tertiary loop exhibits such a prominent role in your psychology, it is a clear indication that there is a serious problem happening with dominant and auxiliary function development.

You've learned enough type theory to accurately identify some unhealthy thought patterns and try to apply a "fix", but you still don't have enough self-awareness to catch the majority of them, so it's easy for you to get swept away by them.

It's obvious you're trying your best to work though your issues, but your best isn't good enough sometimes. If it pains you to hear that, it means you are not in touch with reality. It is a reality for everyone that life cannot only be made up of successes.

The best way to build a strong and healthy sense of self is to realize your potential. The first key point you're missing is that potential isn't only realized through building yourself up for success; a significant portion of human potential lies dormant, waiting to be mined, in every single one of your mistakes and failures. If things don't work out for you, keep trying until you finally become smart/skilled enough to get it right. (This is the Ni component of the problem.)

You are essentially denying yourself very valuable opportunities to realize your potential because of trying to escape or deny the things you don't like about reality. To have "unrealistic expectations" means you always expect things to go perfectly for you. You basically walk around as though you are entitled to perfection from everyone and everything, as though you are owed everything your heart desires. This kind of unreasonably impatient attitude is toddler mentality. Is it not the epitome of egocentric thinking? Unfortunately, this leads you to suffer constantly from self-inflicted disappointments and frustrations.

If living life well were as simple and straightforward as your "unrealistic expectations" make you believe, then we would all be doing it, wouldn't we? You call others "shallow" when your own thinking barely skims the surface of how complicated human life really is. This kind of hypocrisy is characteristic of Ti loop, of a mind that is unable to detect its own errors.

One obvious sign of Ti misuse is the tendency to criticize others as a means to deflect disapproval of oneself. No, it is NOT a "fact" that the majority of people are shallow; this is a value judgment that you came to just because a few people didn't live up to your subjective expectations of them. One of the first lessons they teach you in critical thinking courses is how to tell the difference between facts and values.

Ti loop is insidious because it makes you overconfident that everything you believe is "fact" and thus unassailable. Invincibility feels nice, right? Unfortunately, it is actually just imperviousness to facts. As I explained in a previous post, tertiary loop is tempting and addicting because it allows you to reside in a mental space where you are never wrong. But that constitutes a denial of reality, which is precisely what makes one delusional in the long run.

Tertiary loop is an ego defense mechanism. People use defense mechanisms to avoid facing up to inconvenient, unpleasant, or uncomfortable truths. Instead of using Ti as it is meant to be used - to examine and vet one's own judgment transparently - looping INFJs use Ti to invent "truths" that are more convenient and comfortable to believe in.

Ti misuse in FJs often manifests as shifting around blame by telling cause-and-effect "stories" that patly explain the motivations behind undesirable behavior. Your story of choice uses "shallowness" as the main theme... which means you are the only special "deep" one in the world, yes? Another aspect of "unrealistic expectations" is walking around believing that everyone should be like you or else they are inferior.

Unfortunately, these stories ultimately bring you nothing but a false sense of power, a momentary ego boost. You really showed those people who rejected you by calling them "shallow", right? No, nothing was achieved and no problem was resolved. If anything, it made you less willing to open up and socialize, which only serves to hamper future Fe development. If one doesn't take tertiary loop seriously, one starts to spiral deeper into it, getting further and further away from healthy development.

The first step for ending tertiary loop is to admit that your way of thinking is wrong. If you can't do that, if you're too addicted to the mere feeling of being right, then you'll continue the slow descent into self-loathing. I can't tell you how many INFJs have said to me that therapy didn't work for them because they couldn't handle the therapist implying that their thinking was flawed. Some of them even knew they were wrong but still weren't willing to give up the comfort of faulty beliefs.

For someone who struggles so much internally, it's surprising that so little of what you wrote was devoted to feelings and emotions. It's actually not surprising, though, because defense mechanisms are used for the precise purpose of covering them up.

Underneath the thick web of Ti stories and rationalizations is a boiling cauldron full of negative feelings and emotions, right? Though you keep trying to intellectualize them away, they are still there. And the more you try to intellectualize them away, the hotter they boil. What's in the cauldron? Anxiety, loneliness, alienation, guilt, shame, sadness, anger, disgust, resentment, rage, hatred... what else?

What happens with Se grip is that those buried emotions get the better of you, so you lose control of yourself, and your mind behaves as though it doesn't belong to you. To improve your emotional intelligence requires you to finally take ownership of your emotions.

The second key point you're missing is that as long as you're unwilling to deal directly with your feelings and emotions, you'll need defense mechanisms, basically forced to do all manner of mental gymnastics to escape feeling bad. This is the origin of Ni-Ti loop. You're trying to get away from the reality of yourself and how you feel like a shameful social failure, so you have to invent stories and excuses to soothe yourself. And in the moments you are aware of the fakery, you feel even worse about yourself for being a fraud. (This is the Fe component of the problem.)

What's so wrong with allowing yourself to feel, especially when not allowing it leaves you worse off? Are you not human? It fucking hurts to get rejected, so cry about it. It fucking hurts to feel lonely, so cry about it. It fucking hurts to fall down, so cry about it. And once you're done crying, get on with life. Is that not preferable to getting totally lost in a mental maze of harmful and hateful stories?

Do you really want to be a more realistic person, since chronic loop indicates otherwise? Start by facing up to the reality of yourself and learn to accept what you see. Yes, people suck sometimes and the world sucks sometimes, but so do you, because you're a part of the world - stop pretending otherwise. You may not have the power to make the world suck less, but you absolutely have the power to make yourself suck less.

You can always change your part of the world through being a better member of it, through making better choices - this is the spirit of Fe. "Choosing" tertiary loop means choosing to believe that change isn't possible, that change isn't good, or that change is unnecessary. And where does that leave you, as Ni dominant who needs change to make meaningful progress in life?

All those negative thoughts, feelings, flaws, imperfections, and shortcomings are there to help you reach your full potential, because they direct your attention squarely to what's truly missing in your life. It is your job to listen carefully, focus all your attention on what matters most that is within your power to change, and fill your life with the right things... as opposed to dodging and evading, getting distracted by trivial things, and wasting time seeking out empty comforts. The sooner it dawns on you that the worst aspects of you are there to help you transform, the sooner you'll exit Ti loop. And the sooner you can finally chill out and socialize better.

[syyskirjat]

Sueños de piedra (ch1)

Okay, I promised (to myself) to check out whatever media won the ultimate obscure blorbo tournament ( @who-do-i-know-this-man (I wasn't sure whether to tag you or not but in the end I figured I might as well, hope you don't mind I guess))

Turns out that it's a guy from a 2015 Spanish YA fantasy book

And turns out there's a free sample available! Which is lucky for me because I'm currently very broke

Sueños de piedra by Iria G. Parente and Selene M. Pascual

I don't speak Spanish so I'm gonna rely on the translator quite a lot lmao (well I understand some Spanish actually, but definitely not enough to read a whole book)

The title translates to something like "Dreams of Stone" I think?

Once upon a time in a kingdom far, far away, a prince rewarded a wizard for helping rescue a young girl in trouble. Charming. Too bad none of this is true. In reality, the prince dreams of glory and revenge; the magician, with her spells not always being a disaster and the young woman in trouble, with fleeing from a past that torments her... and from the memory of the man she has killed. Once upon a time...

(Yes this is just Google Translate, sorry)

Okay so, prince, magician and a damsel in distress? Prince wants revenge for something, who knows what, magician is having trouble doing the magic, and the damsel is in fact a killer? Ok ok

The dedication goes as follows:

To all those who embark on a direct journey towards their dreams every day. May you always reach your destination.

Okay so Marabilia is a place? That's apparently also the name of this book series. Is this like the kingdom then? So it consists of three islands, two small ones and one big? Or is it supposed to be a continent? It definitely seems too small to be a continent

I know the blorbo is called Arthmael de Silfos so I'm guessing he's from the Silfos area in the north of the big island then. I can see what's probably a city called Duan and a forest called "Merlon Forest". We also have different towers around the big island, one of which seems to be called the Tower of Black Magic. (I didn't even need to use the translator for those yay xD)

Okay the first chapter is called Arthmael so I guess we're meeting our blorbo already, which is nice

— Let me make it clear: are you going to give my crown to a bastard?

Okay..... the very first line and I already think Arthmael might be a bit of a spoiled brat (I assume he's in fact the prince)

Apparently Arthmael just found out that he has an illegitimate older brother but I guess this brother's mother is noble anyway so it's legit? I dunno yet. Arthmael thinks this guy is blackmailing his father somehow and is already considering poison as a solution

And anyway, what kind of a name is Jacques for a king?

lmao, so much shade to all the kings called Jacques

Okay so Jacques's family is very powerful and loved by the people of Silfos and the king fears a civil war if he disrespects his claim to the throne. Alright. Kinda weird since based on Arthmael's thoughts, this society has a similar attitude to bastards as in European history, but okay then. I wonder if Jacques is even actually the king's son or is this some kind of a ruse?

Arthmael is very cheeky and even references his dad's love life directly to his face, his dad is not very happy

The king tells him to just be a good boy and hopefully they'll find him some crown princess to marry so he'll get a kingdom that way

I guess these different areas on the map are kingdoms then, that makes sense. They look like very small kingdoms but this is a small place in general.

Arthmael doesn't seem to mind this idea except that there's only one possible princess like that in Marabilia and that's Ivy de Dione. Not sure what's wrong with her.

Well, who knows? Maybe, if I wait a few moons, some other bastard, in Verves or Idyll, will come out from under a rock and come offer me her hand.

Somebody's very snarky, that's cute

Arthmael is very haughty about how the people have always known him as the crown prince and accepted him as such, Jacques laughs and asks what has he even done for the people. He's like well he hasn't really done much yet because he was planning to do things once he became king, but he's been supporting the local business (taverns) and employing servants (lmao). Also apparently there are some girls he's seeing...

Apparently Jacques's family are big traders and business people (despite being noblemen) and create lots of jobs, and also big on charity, so everybody loves them

Arthmael is jealous of how proud his dad looks when Jacques says this, and how he's never looked at him like that

Well, I guess you're kind of a little shit so it makes sense, Arthmael

— If the smartest thing is to become the idol of a few starving people in order to be king, I can do it too.

Oh my god, this little brat

He declares that he's going to be a hero, to overshadow the charity of Jacques' family, because heroes are remembered by history while philanthropist aren't

So he plans to become a storybook Prince Charming, saving damsels in distress etc.

Jacques finds this understandably hilarious, the king is not amused

Once Jacques leaves, the king again offers to arrange a marriage to Arthmael, specifically with the princess of Dione

I'm almost tempted. I have never been to Dione, but they say that their ships are the lightest and fastest, and that sailors come to their shores from the other side of the sea, speaking strange languages that only they understand. Who come from lands where women wear short dresses, if they wear anything at all. Places where war is so normal that, as soon as a child is strong enough to pick up a sword, they push him to the front lines.

Alright then, I see what he fixates on

Was there anything wrong with the princess then or?

Barbarians. I remove the thought from my mind.

Oh okay. What a charming young man /s

Dione is like right next to Silfos according to the map btw, is this like one of those neighbourly feuds?

Okay he says it's because he doesn't want a foreign kingdom, he wants to keep his home, which is fair I guess

The king is like what do you want me to do, kill Jacques and his pregnant wife? And Arthmael is just like yeah great idea, because he's a dumbass. The king is like wtf

Apparently Jacques' family is from that Duan city that I noted earlier, and his mother died a few days ago and apparently "her loss is greatly felt"

The king regrets spoiling Arthmael too much, and talks about how Arthmael doesn't understand anything about suffering or anything and only cares about girls

Arthmael is already considering faking his death to make them all feel sorry, because of course he is, he's exactly that kind of guy

He says he doesn't want to go try to charm the princess, he'd rather just go off on his own (also there's a whole bit about how only a man can rule Dione or something and the king of Dione won't accept his daughter to become a ruler)

His dad tells him no, just stay here and be a good boy, don't make everybody gossip about drama in the royal family

Arthmael is like hey you managed to hide your bastard son for years, you can hide my disappearance

They fight a bit more but then Arthmael just storms out, grabs a few things from his room and leaves

a change of clothes, a bag of coins, my sword, and my favourite cloak. I do not need anything else.

Okay then, good luck I guess

To be a hero you only need a brave heart. Or so they say.

I feel like you also need to not be a selfish prick but maybe that's optional

Okay end of first chapter!

Our blorbo seems like a real brat!

But I guess the point is probably that he needs to learn some lessons along the way, or something like that, idk. I'm sure there's a reason for why whoever entered him into the tournament likes him so much

I'm guessing the damsel in distress is not the princess? Probably? She wasn't called a princess anyway. TBH she's the character I'm currently the most curious about. The next chapter is from the point of view of someone called Lynne and I hope that's her. Could be the magician too though I guess? No wait, I think the magician is a guy. Altho idk maybe Lynne could be a guy's name, I don't fucking know.

I'm guessing that Arthmael will try to rescue the damsel so he can be a hero, because that's what heroes are supposed to do, but then it'll go wrong somehow? And then the magician will get involved somehow, I have no clue.

That's all my predictions I suppose. Altho I'm guessing that Jacques might turn out to be a villain somehow, I didn't get the vibe that he was particularly great either, just not as much of a brat as Arthmael, and it would then be something for Arthmael to do when he gets back home. Then again maybe the book will surprise me, who knows. To be honest, it would feel a bit like a cop out if it turns out that the guy he hates actually is evil, but it could be handled well, and it's not like I like Jacques either so far. He seems extremely sus too

No guesses as to what the title refers to yet, it could be anything

Idk, like I said, the damsel's storyline is the one that interests me the most rn, it might actually get me to read further (good job, blurb, you got me)

I still have a surprisingly good amount of the free sample left, there's actually nine chapters here, so idk, maybe I'll keep going? We'll see

I'm pretty happy with how much I was able to follow the text even on my own, altho I definitely had to rely on the translator. I would not have had the patience to try to translate all of this myself. But I definitely understood multiple full sentences! Yaaay xD

Apologies to fans of this book series, I hope I didn't seem too rude

[storkmuffin]

muffin, hi hi!!! i love your essays relating to atz, is nice seeing someone else's perspective of their bonds, form of speaking, and overall personas 🫶🫶 feel like there isn't that many space for convos like this on twt or other places

and ive come to ask two things (and an observation related to what ive come to realize after reading your essays)

1. sorry if this is too forward, but how are neurodivergencies treated in korea? :0 did you get a diagnosis or are you selfdx? its something I've wondered ever since seeing tinys or even other kpop fandoms say that "x member is nd!"

2. ...are you planning to make a hj essay soon? i find him a very interesting man ☝️ i even dare say that he gives off the vibe of someone that doesn't want his members (or even tinys) to be truly away from him, like. the fact that his loreteez character is doing so much to keep them together, and if we take the "henry jo is hj from an alternative timeline" theory into account, alongside the guy saying that a lot of the lore is based in some irl aspects... yeah

and the recurrent "dont look at other idols" jokes he makes 😭😭 in my country theres a saying that goes "entre broma y broma, la verdad se asoma" (lit. in every joke, the truth peeks through) and this definitely applies here imo. i just think that he's probably a bit insecure and thinks that many people aren't going to stay with him, or maybe im reading him wrong/too much

and now for the reflection (or conclusion idk)

man. im truly taking bits and pieces of these men in order to build the fictional boy i used to love for many years. (im sorry if that sounds dehumanizing but hear me out)

i got into atz after a past hyperfixation of mine went badly (never get into white gamer men), and i just needed something to keep myself afloat and sane— that "love" ended up being more genuine as time passed, them being less of a "rebound" (im sorry) and more of something i like and im passionate abt, alongside another long-standing hyperfixation ive had with a fictional boy

a few months ago that hyp also went badly. i didn't wanted to see or acknowledge that his author was fumbling him for years, and that he was slowly changing into someone else. it all blew up on me seeing all the traits that i loved about him not being there anymore, he was pretty much a soulless doll that got into a frankly undercooked relationship with his girl best friend. no acknowledgement of his trauma, no introspection, not even some tears (he was my crybaby hero!!! WHERE DID HE GO 😭😭)

but anyways. ever since then ive been getting more into atz, and the more i started to realize how i unconsciously was attracted to members that displayed the most aspects of the fictional character's personality. for ex. hwa's passion for his interests, sn's drive to protect and understand people that are different to him, mingi's live convos taking things like aliens coming to earth seriously... in those moments, i found glimpses of what that boy was for me- i could almost reach out and feel that he was actually real, even if he was cut to pieces and in different people.

maybe the boy i loved was the most basic form of something made for a woman to love and fantasize about, but that doesn't erase that ive spent almost a decade loving him idc

-🧋(im sorry for dropping an entire manifesto here, have a good day xoxo 💋)

OK first of all, I love that you called me MUFFIN :D :D. Secondly, this imaginative way you're using the personas that Ateez is presenting to you and weaving as they go is one of the optimal ways of engaging in fandom. You seem kind of down on yourself about approaching things that way but, Friend, reality is harsh and life can be very difficult, and there's nothing wrong with engaging in fantasy using the publicly presented personas of people who want your attention. You seem imaginative in general, so maybe, eventually, instead of having to rely on other authors (who disappoint), you can create your own blorbo, which then will delight other people.

To answer your questions:

I am self diagnosed. I did talk to a therapist who isn't a ND specialist and she basically said there really wouldn't be a point to getting an official diagnosis, because the therapies available would be of the type that are too rudimentary for someone like me who is already an adult. I had to figure things out the hard way, through traumatizing trial and error, about what NTs will react violently to, but that's in the past. I already know now. I hear a lot about young children now being diagnosed, and it's received and relayed as a disaster, like the child has fallen terribly ill, but these kids are also of the non-interactive, non-verbal, can't-mask variety of NDs. ADHD is caught by teachers very well, apparently, and the children are medicated and given therapy as much as the parents can afford. We did have a very popular K-drama, about a ND genius attorney. I don't watch TV of any country very much so I didn't watch that, but a friend did and she thought it was too idealized and silly. The prejudices and oppression against people who seem odd or are disabled or can't fit in in Korea are about what you'd see anywhere else in the developed world, I think.

The "don't look at other idols" thing is something I've seen Lee Know allude to (though not as directly) from Stray Kids and though my sample is just two, given how differently they're styled and marketed from Ateez, I have come to assume and extrapolate that all boy Idols say this to their fans. I've written elsewhere about the economics of boybands that I've learned from books on the industry, but for the tldr: the boybands survive on financial engagement from their specific fandoms, girlbands go for more 'mass' appeal. It's imperative for a boyband to have the continued attention and loyalty of their fandom audience to survive through the next 'comeback.' They have to say that, and pray that the fandom stay with them.

Hongjoong - I don't currently expect to write about HongJoong. HAHAHA LAUGHING AT MY SELF HEEHEEE HAAAA. I mean. I never thought I'd write about Mingi and then I was live blogging his Lives minute by minute. I did not intend to write THREE separate giant posts about Yeosang, but I did. I'm currently thinking about Yunho a lot.

But (oh here we go, you've gotten me started).

Hongjoong has this Feral Demon Line Participant x Napoleon Complex to the max x Killjoy School Marm x Wants to Make It Worse x I'm The Dictator Father x I'm the Baby x My Work Wife Dominates Me While Pretending Not To x Insane Ball of Creative Energy That Goes Big Every Time x Is the kindest, mildest, weepiest, sweet, sheltered virgin (not literally but you know what I mean) x I Am A Jealous Boyfriend of Atiny / I'm Not Locked In Here With Them, Atiny Is Locked in Here With Me x Milions Love Me x My One Friend In the World is Park Seonghwa situation happening. AND I also read him as being ND, as someone who is figuring out how to be a person and a leader as he goes, where the strengths of being ND in the ways I recognize and the weaknesses too are very illuminating to me.

So even though I don't plan to, I probably will at some point write about Hong Joong. If there's a topic or aspect or some content you (you, just you, Hongjoong Verdad Anon) would like me to add to me 'to be written' roster, I'd gladly take it on.

[spurgie-cousin]

As the kids would say “are the ‘responsibilities’ in the room with us, Jill?”

Traveling responsibilities: ok, stay home? She’s always posting about how much she loves Ohio and the countryside but then they’re traveling 2 weeks every month

Ministry responsibilities: the kids are running the printing business. David does the actual guest preaching and the driving to the churches they deliver to. As far as I can tell, Jill’s main tasks are organizing the ladies retreat, managing the family band (which is shrinking), and maybe coordinating their performances with the churches they travel to.

Business ups and downs: this woman has praised plexus left, right, and center for how many years UNTIL the one time she misses out on a prize and suddenly it’s side eye emojis in their general direction. Kaylee said the lord lead her to switch to selling melaleuca but I bet Jill thinks the devil is attacking because first she couldn’t go on the cruise and now her daughter is ditching her downline (so soon after reaching a new rank and getting subtly insulted by Jill for it). Also Jill you’re part of a pyramid scheme - the entire business model is probably ups and downs.

Or that part is entirely unrelated to plexus and it’s about the ministry business is drying up as the economy is starting to tank, and the churches who hosted and gifted are starting to close their purses and wallets and pull out of the performance stops. Better find those bootstraps and pull yourself up, Jill.

Btw I saw somewhere that Jill is getting a "plan B" prize from Plexus because (according to her) they "overbooked" the cruise? Unless it's a gift of equal value to the cruise, like another vacation, I'm going to stick with my theory that she's making up excuses for not achieving it lol and she got some kind of second or third tier prize.

The "ministry" money drying up feels just as likely as Jill struggling with Plexus sales atm, and maybe with the state of the economy, both things are happening at least a little bit. The types of churches they travel to are always very small, conservative congregations who cater to middle class to blue collar individuals (this isn't an assumption it's statistically just how it is), so it's not likely they're overflowing with money to throw at random singing grifters. I know at my mom's church they've had a dip in tithes, but they're still doing ok because it's a pretty big church. But a congregation of 100 or so people who are all struggling to afford groceries at the moment is going to have to really rein in the spending.

I honestly don't know if they could stop traveling, even with Jill's mlm money I think they still rely on donations to make ends meet. I can't feel sorry for them though, if they were less bigoted they'd have a wider pool of churches to travel to. Even during the days when that was all they were relying on, they could've easily double, tripled their income by just opening up to different types of churches, but they were just too judgemental.

People have speculated that the reason they move home churches so much is because they just bleed these tiny churches dry to the point that people start to have issues with them. Someone on reddit pointed out that they no longer seem to hang out with the Dingus family, who ran the small church they used to attend in Ohio, and that really supports that theory imo......... maybe the Dingus fam just sucks too, but for normal pastor type families or would take SO much for them to cut someone off like that. Especially to the point of actually kicking them out 👀 I have a feeling it was either money related, or Jill was being her usual deeply judgemental self and stepped on one too many toes.

[tia-amorosa]

Hi…

I thought for a long time about whether I should write a personal post again or not. But they usually get lost, literally. That's probably because hardly anyone here knows me well. But I'm writing this post to let off some steam and talk about the situation that's really bothering me at the moment. (sorry in advance for the long text)

I'm in pain. Every day, 24/7. Why? About 4 years ago I had dental treatment with a somewhat unfriendly, older dentist. The treatment was carried out under anesthesia. One of my wisdom teeth and another were pulled. And it may not have been done correctly, which is why I've been suffering from nerve pain on the left side of my face ever since. The pain is so extreme on some days that you just want to throw yourself in front of a car... or jump off a bridge. I've already visited neurologists in recent years, but unfortunately they couldn't help me. After the treatment at this dentist, I had another problem with a canine tooth (top left), which was then pulled. This is also a so-called eye tooth because it is exactly in line with the eye. This time it was a different doctor who had found that there was a small cyst on this tooth. So it wasn't wrong to pull it out. But since then the pain has only gotten worse. I have pain when I look (when I make a lot of eye movements), and the pain goes all the way up to my head.

The sad thing about the whole thing is that the pain is made worse by the fact that I work a lot with my mouth. Because I am severely disabled, I cannot move my hands and work with a special computer mouse that I operate with my mouth. My mouth is therefore an important tool that I use to write, write my stories and operate the computer in general. And it makes me... sad and angry that I am currently going through a phase where I am not making as much progress with my work as I would like because this pain is tormenting me every day. I've tried all kinds of painkillers, but none of them have helped at all. And I don't want to drug myself with any heavy stuff.

I'm currently trying to find a dentist who will continue the treatment. A lot of things need to be done, restoration, etc. I've already found a practice and asked them about it. A video consultation was supposed to take place last week. I waited half an hour in front of the screen and the loading bar until someone answered. After that I disconnected the connection. I then wrote an email to this practice. There was no response... I called them today and they said they hadn't noticed my email. OK, that can happen... Then they gave me a new appointment for a telephone consultation, also today. That was supposed to take place at around 2:20 p.m. Do you think someone called me? NO!

They seem to have forgotten about me. I was so angry... I'll call them again tomorrow and ask what's wrong with them. Above all, it is a practice that is well suited to people with severe disabilities. And I actually rely on sensible advice and treatment. They haven't even seen me yet. And I'm having real problems with my teeth at the moment. One of them is open and I have to be careful not to chew on the wrong side because otherwise more of it will break off. This will only put more strain on my nerves, I'm really fed up!

I wish we could turn back time, then I wouldn't have gone to that horrible doctor who started this pain. I wish I had found a better doctor, but it's difficult to find the right doctors in my situation. I'm also suffering from a urinary tract infection at the moment. It really hurts. I suffer from it often, but the pain in my face is just much worse. I can only do something on the computer on days when the pain is bearable for me. Before the whole thing with the first dental operation, I was incredibly productive and got a lot done. Now I can't even manage half of it. As I said, it makes me sad and angry. That's why my story is progressing very slowly at the moment. Sorry about that.

I hope I haven't annoyed anyone with the long text, but I just had to get it off my chest so that people might understand me a little. I would also like to write more, but my concentration is exhausted for now. I'm passing the time with Netflix, so I don't have to do much or think about it.

Now I wish you a nice evening/day. Greetings and hugs from me to you.🥰

[meoproject]

Ok. Sorry. I’m in my ”make ref sheets” phase, I’m doing commissions and planning bigger stuff, but sometimes I just wanna show off my dudes with updated ref sheets.

This is Miralle. Yes. It’s embarrassing. I have two elf characters (out of four elf characters total) who are hot blonde women with green eyes (well, Val has heterochromia, so only one of her eyes is green, but), beauty spots on their face and who are into men at least three times their size. Leave me alone. In my defense, Miralle (as a character) is a lot older, so they aren’t like back to back characters with designs that can be sorta shortened to being really similar.

(And you didn’t ask, but the two remaining elves are a lanky redhead who is into shorter men, and a rugged rogue dude, who might be getting a ref sheet at some point. So it’s not all blondes!!!)

Anyway, this is Miralle. Used to be a fandom OC, but like with Evelyn, I’m fully moving her into original story verse (and also giving her a design that can work more as a generic elf). More under cut!

In my fantasy ‘verse, Miralle is an elf from Avalonia (though her family is originally from somewhere near the region of Serenzia.) She is technically a trained Mage, having studied magic (and being able to still use magic) but never pursued the title of Archmage. Instead of pursuing a career with magic, she completely changed course and these days she actually works as a journalist.

Her personality is… not great, if we’re being honest. She can pretend to be sweet if it’s useful, but her actual personality is kinda… prickly. She doesn’t really believe in mincing words, and in many ways, she is a contradiction. She likes looking good and is careful about appearances, but is often foul-mouthed and disrespectful. She likes to be seen as competent but hates it when people rely on her too much.  It’s possible to work through her spiky exterior and find out there is a softer person inside. She has troubles articulating her feelings, however, and often expects people to just "know" what she means when she gives gifts or performs actions, without actually telling people what's actually in her mind.

No one quite seems to know what her exact backstory is. She sometimes mentions a brother she can't stand, and never seems to be miss any of her relatives, nor does she seem to have a like a hometown she wishes to visit.

Miralle likes expensive wine and tobacco. She's not above over-indulging, especially when it comes to drinking, and she's not as light-weight as you'd think from her size.

Extra notes: > She is a pencil skirt enjoyer but would wear pants in a situation where it’s appropriate, such as when traveling or hiking or exploring. > Her eyebrows are darker in color than her hair. Not black or dark brown, but they should never be as light as her hair is. > Smokes cigarettes. Can also be drawn with a cigarette holder, especially in fancy situations. > Her eyes are a very intense, bright green. Base color should NOT be neon green, but the intensity should rather come from highlights. > Eyes should be somewhat narrow. > Earrings can be changed and mixed around. Main color should be gold, but green or blue gemstones can also be included. She can also be given other jewelry (rings, necklaces) that matches her earring style.  

[katyspersonal]

I'm either blind, great at being oblivious, or just dumb, cuz I legit didn't know that there was any soulsborne fandom bullshittery or toxicity. I only kinda found out about that because of your posts (I think). Grant us eyes, but not for me, I guess.

dhsdhfdfds Anon I can't blame you, because I actually can relate to only finding out about some bad happenings in a fandom via someone else talking about it

Like, I shit you not, for a considerably long time (before Elden Ring's DLC came out) I never once saw even a bit of the whole "dudebros being misogynistic about Malenia" or "dumb evil Miquella takes that ignore a lot of his character". I swear everyone, and I mean EVERYONE, was going on about it. Meanwhile all I've ever seen personally was trashing on Radahn for just the misfortune of becoming favoured by proclaimed subhumans (aforementioned dudebros) and being toxic to everyone who dared to see Miquella as anything but pure, perfect, one-dimensional little angel. I questioned whether all my mutuals posted from a parallel universe, until only much later I've personally came in contact with the bad takes they were going on about this whole time and could sympathise!

Like... I am sorry if I am making you see bad sides of the fandom that otherwise looks like nothing but chill and happy place to be at. In my defence, my friends are doing the same thing with me by kindly sharing some awful stories or Reddit/Xitter posts with me sdfsd fds If I am really your only source of information on bullshit that happens to me or the people I meet and see you should feel free to block me, knowing this information is only """useful""" if you are willing to argue with people who say all this nonsense! Otherwise this is just unneeded stress.

Bitchy popular artists with extreme Mean Girl auras regardless of their gender claiming any interesting and canon-accurate reading of a female character is an automatic misogyny, people who are so insecure they rely on having moral high ground in fandomry by clowning on characters like Godrick or Rykard or D twins in the tags or reference posts, petty assholes organising dodge Discord groups to shun the "heretics" and make clueless small accounts question their sanity and why everyone seems to avoid them when they just wanted to exchange art and headcanons, cultish jerks going as far as making blacklists of nAstY iNcEsT sHiPpErS :(((( of the fandom on their servers and force their mutuals to block them Or Else, purists acting like fans who correctly acknowledge dark topics in the dark fantasy are some rats that infested THEIR promised perfect safe palace, blown up hatred towards characters like Malenia Fia or Ranni for daring to be the complicated female characters up for morally questionable cases when male characters get analysed with the cold head by the same people, accounts whose whole content now is trashing on SOTE (and people that like Elden Ring in general) to the point of accusing Miyazaki of claiming that genocide is a good thing (🤦‍♂️), weird aggression towards Rellana x Messmer shippers, people who hate fans for trans headcanons, people who on the other hand hate fans for not shipping Finlenia, fans of any character pretty much valuing feelings of this character over those of real people they hurt in their name,

sdjfhsdf dsf sorry I had to, this joke works for several reason in this reply lmao XDDDD (ok maybe not I feel like only Crow will appreciate how many layers it has fdjfjds)

Generally, it certainly matters a lot how much of the fandom you are exposed to, which corners you dwell in and how active you are in checking various social media! When Soulsborne fans are not pulling dumb high school drama bullying nonsense over headcanons and ships, they are being toxic to each other over ways to PLAY the darn games themselves! It is always something.

You are not blind and you are definitely not dumb in any case! I am just going to make a wild assumption that you have a circle that just does their own thing instead of always looking for what the rest of the fandom is up to, or even something as drastic as you having a life fdshfdsh (Well, so do I, and you can tell from how rarely I am posting nowadays that I am full stuck irl and it will be not long until my online friends just forget about my existence, but you know what I mean lol)

[abchavenforanon]

Trigger warning for child abuse, psychosis, dissociative disorders

This one is going to be extremely unpopular, I feel, and also very very very long. (All "you"s are for the general public btw, not yelling at the mods that'd be rude asf)

So actually beyond exhausted of extremely lonely kids online pretending they have DiD so they can dissociate from their lives that they don't like for one reason or another and pretend to be their favorite character. It's a major issue online generally, but it's bad in this fandom. Like REALLY bad in this specific fandom. I haven't seen this many attention seeking kids claiming to have this insane amount of blatantly fake fictive alters since 2021 DSMP Tiktok, which is saying something. It's just outright embarrassing. It's disgusting, it's belittling, it's harmful, and it perpetrates every single stereotype we have DESPERATELY been trying to escape for CENTURIES.

I PROOOOOMISSEEE that you can use the word kin, it's not as embarrassing as you think. It's certainly less embarrassing than this. I promise you can use the word roleplay. I promise, unless at some point your life has been ACTUALLY CRIPPLED by it, or if your world view and self identity haven't been completely destroyed by DiD, you probably don't fucking have it I'm sorry not sorry lol. I promise you, if you ACTUALLY had that many parts, odds are if you aren't on antipsychotics literally right the fuck now as you are reading this, you would not be lucid. You would not be safe. You would be in so, so much danger. You would be blackout in a ditch, or worse. I promise you can be an interesting person without just on a whim deciding you have one of the most critically life ruining, horrifically stereotyped, misunderstood, and under-researched mental disorders to ever exist.

All mental disorders come in different severities, yes, sure, but DiD is fundamentally by definition a PSYCHOTIC BREAKDOWN that, as far as medical, psychological, and psychiatrical studies know thus far, ONLY happens between the ages of 5 and 10, when children are severely and repeatedly abused while the brain is still developing. Even sill, it's a very, very rare response to that trauma. And hey, guess what, if you're a faker, you're actively ruining that extremely important medical data, so really, super cool of you to do that and screw over our future hope for help, thanks tons for that!

You DON’T get to dick around pretending you have one of the most torturous, mind breaking, miserable, intense, awful, HELLISH and LIFELONG realities a person can have, just so you can misuse a Discord multiplicity bot to pretend and be the fucking state of New York. You do NOT get to stomp all over the despicable horrors of childhood abuse so you can put a cute little "OSDD-1 uwu" in your fandom blog bio and say all 50 states are your fictives just for fun.

You have no idea the pain, confusion, and torture people who developed ACTUAL DiD from the worst chptst and cptsd a person can even feasibly imagine feel on the daily. You have no idea what it's like to black out and find notes in your own handwriting, written to you, signed by a different name. You have no idea what it's like to go through your own text messages with a friend and realizing they weren’t talking to YOU. You have no idea the weight of it, the true reality of this disorder, and the further distortion of reality it causes.

Go say you have childhood cancer, see if it makes you feel good about yourself. See if it makes you lots of cool, fun, roleplay friends. You won't? But why? Because it's a life threatening illness that relies heavily on medical interjection for a healthy and continued life? Oh... Well, ok then, say you're in a wheelchair, see if it makes you feel special. You won't do that? Because making fun of and belittling physically disabled people by roleplaying as one isn't fucking cool? Wow, who'd have thought. But you'll do it with an intensely crippling mental disorder because...you would much rather pretend to be an idealized version of a character you attached your entire personality online to than to respect actual childhood abuse victims.

If you truly, genuinely, with all your heart, believe you have parts of any kind, seek help. If you are hearing voices, or blacking out regularly for hours, or finding things you don't remember ever being there before, or hear from friends and family that sometimes you jarringly start talking about "yourself" in the 3rd person and you don't remember that conversation, then seriously, please, seek help IMMEDIATELY. You are experiencing symptoms of extreme psychosis. Before you or somebody else get seriously, SERIOUSLY hurt, get help.

Signed, a diagnosed motherfucker who's been admitted to a mental hospital for this shit. It's literal hell on earth not knowing who you are. It isn’t a game, so don't mess around and play with it. Thanks! 😊

this is a heavy topic but a very important message. always be respectful, folks <3

[carriehobbs]

*running at vampire speeds into your inbox* future poly au? 👀

ok so i have actually talked about the future poly au and alina's relationship with adam briefly before, so some of this will be a rehash of what i've said in other posts (sorry!!). i'll link the posts when they come up 💕

boring stuff out of the way at the top: i want to clarify that when i talk about the future poly au with adam/nate/alina i don't mean it in a "it's an 'au' or a headcanon because it's not an option in canon, but if it was i would take it" kind of way. the future poly au is really firmly an au in my mind, and when i envision alina's future post-book 7 it's with a romantic relationship with nate and a platonic relationship with adam. i'm also not likely to ever write it (especially the how-they-get-together part), since i think doing it justice would require something far more expansive than i'm really prepared to tackle, so it mostly just exists in the form of little posts and jokes to myself here and there.

all that being said!

i'm going to start by talking about alina and adam's platonic relationship, which is part of their "canon" future relationship (the point of divergence between their "canon" futures and the future poly au is after alina becomes a vampire, so there's 10+ (ish, please don't ask me how old alina is when she becomes a vampire) years of relationship to expand upon first). their platonic relationship is the foundation of their relationship in the future poly au (and the future poly au actually originated when i was trying to understand their friendship better! i was thinking about how they felt about each other as they got closer and where that could go and then said "wait a minute!!" and the future poly au was born 🥰).

so to start: alina hates adam's guts in book 1. she really does not have a good word to say about him. for someone who generally tries to be a team player and collaborator as much as alina does, it says a lot that she takes just about every opportunity she can to fight with adam. over time (through working with him and through deliberate effort to get along with the guy she likes's best friend), her relationship with him starts to improve. in book 2, alina and adam mostly treat each other with begrudging (professional) respect and tolerance.

book 3 is where major shifts start happening. it's at this point that they start to really see each other differently. to bring up something i've said about their relationship before:

over the course of book 2 and into book 3 they developed this slow, learned respect for each other [...] these 2 people who are very different in their approaches to the world around them and their work who learn to appreciate and even rely on those very differences (adam's stubbornness becoming steadfastness, alina's naivety becoming compassion).

in book 1, alina saw adam as stubborn, callous, and generally unpleasant to be around. by book 3, she's able to appreciate the qualities that she had dismissed before: adam is persistent, direct, and precise. similarly, in book 1, adam thought alina was naive, irresponsibly optimistic, and unworldly. by book 3, he views her as compassionate, hopeful, and curious. he is steady and reliable, and she is loyal and kind, and in each other they find someone who they can always count on to show up for them (even if they disagree and argue the entire time). over the course of books 4-7 (i say, knowing that these books haven't been released yet and so i don't really know how their relationship will develop during those books), their friendship only grows stronger.

(by book 4, alina's starting to realize that adam is kind of actually her friend instead of just her work friend/her boyfriend's best friend. when he shows up to fetch nate in the first chapter of the demo, she's frustrated and annoyed that her day off with nate was ruined, but she's not frustrated or annoyed with adam. she's actually kind of amused by him being there and the way he tries to rush nate out, as it's so quintessentially him.)

not to talk about my own wips, BUT: the excerpt of the alina turning fic i shared the other day kind of displays how their friendship has grown over the years. there's familiarity and a kind of quiet ease to the way they interact with and understand each other. it says a lot about their friendship that alina goes to adam to complain and to seek reassurance when she's nervous.

(and, to go on about my own wips a bit longer: it's not explicit in this excerpt, and i don't think i explicitly state it anywhere else in the fic, but alina very specifically does not want to talk to nate about this problem. she doesn't talk to nate, or farah (her best friend), or morgan, or her mother. she specifically chooses to confide in adam because she knows that he will offer her the kind of support she wants in that moment. that line about how alina takes a big drink and then says nate is off with the kids? while what she says is true (he is with the kids and they have gone over things together already), that is alina buying herself time to come up with an excuse as to why she's talking to her friend and not her husband about her feelings.)

so after all those years, adam and alina have had the time to go from hating to respecting to appreciating to genuinely liking each other. only now do they have the unshakable foundation of their friendship off of which we can build the future poly au.

i view the future poly au as having multiple moving parts. the first part is adam/nate. in this au, adam and nate are kind of in love and have been for a while. for centuries, their relationship has been toeing the ambiguous line between romantic and platonic and is defined by a depth of devotion and understanding that only comes from lifetimes worth of companionship. crucially: they are not aware they are in love with each other. put a pin in this for later.

the second moving part is adam/alina. both adam and alina quietly (and secretly) have this moment that i described the last time i talked about the future poly au:

it would definitely be a slow creep of feelings for both of them [...], with a realization one day that you look at this person you know so well and the feelings you have for them haven't been solely platonic for a while. their love would be born out of a deep mutual appreciation and respect.

they both respond to this revelation (that they have feelings for their best friend's wife/their husband's best friend) by promptly deciding to try and distance themselves from each other and let the feelings go away without ever addressing it (which i described here, in what might be one of the first posts i ever made about the future poly au).

for alina, she's trying to avoid the realization that she has feelings for someone who isn't nate and, while she would never deliberately be unfaithful to him, she struggles with this attraction to adam even as she is determined to never act on it. i mean, she's been married to nate for 10+ years and they have 3-5 children (please don't ask me how many children alina and nate have. or their names. or their ages) and she's a vampire so they've been planning on living out the rest of their forevers together and suddenly she has feelings for the worst possible person she could ever have feelings for. she tries to manage keeping her distance from adam and hoping the feelings will die on their own without letting anyone (nate, adam, or farah) know that anything is going on with her.

for adam, i had to consider both how he acts on the lt route (or what i understand he acts like on the lt route - i've never actually played it) and how he acts on his own route. my understanding of a on the lt route is that (despite the fact that nate and the detective could be in a relationship, depending on player choices), adam is more expressive about his feelings for the detective than he is on his own route, where he constantly tries to push away the detective and deter them from pursuing a relationship with him. in the context of the future poly au, however, i think adam would behave more like he does on his own route than he does in the lt: in the lt route, even if the detective and nate are together, it's a (relatively) new relationship. it could still be ended (if it's even been started) and adam could, conceivably, end up with the detective. in the future poly au, nate and alina have been married for 10+ years and have 3-5 children. the ship has sailed on "getting with alina" (alina has already chosen and firmly committed to nate) and the betrayal of trying to steal his best friend's wife of over a decade is (arguably) much worse than trying to steal his girlfriend of a (few? by the end of book 7? who knows when you will have to choose in the lt) year(s).

the third part is how these feelings get revealed. on one hand, (based on my understanding of the lt) nate would eventually figure out on his own that something is going on between adam and alina. however, (also based on my understanding of the lt) nate seems pretty willing to deliberately ignore the signs he's seeing because he does not want to read them. what i think is actually more likely is that alina, upon finding out that her feelings for adam are not simply disappearing like she wants them to, would eventually confess to nate that she's been developing feelings for adam. she would not be pitching this as a "so maybe we should all date" thing. she would approach the conversation as a "i love you and would never be unfaithful to you, i don't know why i'm having these feelings for adam and i've tried to make them go away, what do we do about this problem in our marriage" thing.

the fourth part is how they bring adam into all this. the first option is that they go to adam together to try and talk about the situation. this will go poorly. there is no way on this earth that adam is going to admit to both of them that he has feelings for alina and risk interfering with their marriage. he will not be the reason that milton looks up at him with big brown eyes and asks "uncle adam? why don't mom and dad love each other anymore?". not happening.

the other option is that alina's confession prompts a brief awkward period in their marriage wherein alina feels guilty and nate tries to deal with this revelation and meanwhile realizes that, hey wait. he might be in love with adam too. in this version, nate and alina would talk for quite a while first about what they want to do about the situation they find themselves in. because they're both in love with adam, but does adam feel the same way? would they want to pursue something with adam? would adam want something with them? how do they maintain their friendships with adam if they bring up being together and he doesn't want to, or if they don't bring it up and just know that this is something between them? how do they make sure their marriage remains intact throughout all of this, and how do they minimize any (potential) fallout for their children (who all love adam and have known him their entire lives - adam is even milton's godfather!). they would ask all these questions and then (because this is the future poly au and not the future almost-poly au) decide to talk to adam.

if i can be honest, i have no idea how they convince adam to admit his own feelings for alina, or realize and then admit his feelings for nate, or then after that agree to be in a relationship with them both. i haven't gotten that far yet. i have to assume it involves a lot of initial denial, yearning, private conversations between nate and alina about how to handle the situation, and more yearning.

eventually they all kiss. and then everyone's happy forever and ever.

[bropunzeling]

☕️ fav fantasy books/series and what makes them so good and so For Jess. bonus for thoughts on what makes a less good fantasy fall flat

oh Boy okay alright!!!!

fantasy series i love/are excellent/peak For Jess: radiant emperor duology by shelley parker-chan (point: is it fantasy or just historical-ish fiction with some supernatural elements? counterpoint: i fucking love it and this is my list). the lumatere chronicles by melina marchetta. the daevabad trilogy by s. a. chakraborty. queen's thief my beloved!!!!! piranesi aka one of the best novels i read in 2020. tortall series by tamora pierce (but protector of the small quartet is the best of them).

honorable mentions: the raven tower by ann leckie; sharon shinn's elemental blessings series isn't like, as sharp as the top tier, but i really enjoy every reread; earthsea (but mostly the ones about tenar); it feels like cheating to say discworld but again: my list; the divine cities by robert jackson bennett; the stravaganza books were not quote unquote good but they did change my brain chemistry when i was 13; goblin emperor books (but more witness for the dead bc u kno me, i love a murder mystery). lotr would be here except i read them all once as a 6th grader and have yet to return. i still need to read the oleander sword but the jasmine throne kicked ass.

ok what is the unifying factor here lol. strong world building is very important i think; a real sense of a distinct place and culture/mix of cultures rather than Generic Medieval European City. there was a really good post going around that was like, where does the food come from (aka have you thought about how all of this actually works?), and a lot of these series think about Where Does The Food Come From. differences in cultural norms among different groups within the world AND from the audience. plots strongly rooted in politics/the inherent people-ness of people rather than everything relying on magic (not to say i don't love me some magic/divine plaything stories!!!! but they hit so much harder when the conflict comes from a place of innate human foibles). a dash of wonder and the inexplicable. if an answer is needed, it fits in the schema of everything else, but you don't feel the author trying to answer literally everything (when an author is sweating to show their work u can tell imo). most of these have at least one set of people where i want to see them kiss on the mouth, but most of the time that is not the Point; the best fantasy for me treats romance as a subplot/b-plot where it informs the stakes but is not the stakes itself. and ur basics of a good book in general: good writing, good pacing, et cet er a!

what makes them fall flat? world building inconsistency; new magic springing up because well, the author NEEDED it (aka those moments when you can see the seams lol); when the romance is the a plot (sorry but romantasy = not for jesses!!!!!); i think also authors get tripped up both by not planning ahead enough AND planning ahead too much when doing series (if you get a deal for one than one book you should have more than one book's worth of material; however if you can’t change and move then you can be stifled! see ursula le guin revisiting the gendered magic of earthsea in tehanu years later, or tamora pierce going oh shit there are normies in tortall in protector of the small). also this is a ME thing but i fuckin hate purple or twee prose. fantasy does not mean break out the thesaurus.

sorry for the novel. im gonna think of like six more books as soon as i post this

[austinslounge]

Girl I’m back lol so I just wanna say you answered really well to the anon upset abt AP and idk if this is a age thing because I’m Austin’s age and we’ve come from the height and dangers of insane paps and gossip magazines being on the shelf when your trying to buy your food in EVERYONES FACE, it wasn’t even about if you had a social or followed fan account pages it was just there and you had no choice but to read the heading lol so we’ve, my generation and older have seen the worst of it and yes social media is a beast in itself but 90% of ppl do not really care or live their lives by social media posts and reels, im not sorry we just don’t lol. All the drama that happened over the years with house hold names and look at them still fine and ok.

That anon should take some time like you said bc if you let it it will drive you crazy. I also don’t think it’s embarrassing for Austin at all, it happens more then we know it’s bc we’re fans of Austin and follow fan pages that tell us all the news that we really even know anything. But I could ask 1000 ppl right now in person what they thought abt it and I guarantee the % of ppl who actually know or care is very small and wouldn’t change Austin career or success especially when he’s wanted by so many directors.

I’m proud of Austin and I trust that grown man who’s been taking care of HIMSELF for a long time who’s been through so much to continue to make the best decisions for himself and I really hope and pray social media or so called fans never make him feel insecure about his choices bc honestly fuck yal and leave our mans alone 🙄 social media can be a tool for ruining people (and not always) but that’s usually ppl who rely on it for their success (aka influencers and such) and most talented actors don’t outside of promoting their things. Movies and actors were huge before social media and will continue to be so after.

Life is good and im sure Austin knows that and appreciates his life that he’s works very hard for.

Rant over 🙂

Thanks for your input on this girl. 😊

And yea, I'm around Austin's age too, so I do remember the days before social media lol.

Honestly? Most celebrities get hate online. It's sad, but it's just a fact. We can't control what people say about Austin online, but we can surely control what we choose to focus on and give our attention to.

I always say that an actor's work will eventually speak for itself, and everyone who is a hater will eventually turn to liking them. Austin is just going through a momentary hazing phase that a lot of younger, nice-looking, talented male (and even female!) actors go through as they get a lot of success.

I watch documentaries on lots of celebrities from the past, so I've seen media footage on how people used to treat Britney Spears in the media (when she was just a teenager! 😭), Leo DiCaprio also got massive hate when he was younger, etc. I even personally recall when Anne Hathaway was getting massive hate online, and everyone said she was "annoying" and a "pretentious theater kid".

Now look! Everyone loves Britney! Everyone loves Anne. Leo is regarded as one of the greats, and everyone coming up behind him in the industry wants to have a career like his. He might still get clowned online and in the media for his love life lol, but the point is, he's now looked at with respect. The same will happen with Austin, just watch and see. ☺️ He's too talented and too kind not to.

What it all boils down to is jealousy tbh.

Like you said, when you ask most real people out in the real world (those who aren't chronically online getting their minds poisoned by Twitter 🙄), people love Austin, and find him massively talented! Just the "Elvis" fandom alone loved what he did in that film.

I wish fans would take a break from social media and online forums and just talk to real people for a change. Preferably, people who haven't had their minds influenced by Twitter or TikTok. 😒

[lilywalkers]

DISSECT SYBILL PLEASE

YESS OK !!! sybill is one of my favorite underrated characters she's literally SO full of things to talk about.

!! not proofread !!

i think she was raised in a middle class household trying to hold onto its former wealth / notoriety, particularly being known for their divination skills. however, i don't think any of them are actual seers. they may be able to read tea leaves or see crystal balls accurately, but sybill is the only true seer. from a young age she was made to help her family pretty much scam people — both muggles and wizards — by offering prophecies and protective spells. this, along with only having phony divination teachers, made her become the unreliable seer she is in canon.

she suffers from chronic night terrors, sleep paralysis, and sleep walking, but most of the time she can't remember exactly what happened, except that she was scared. this makes her never want to go to sleep, so she's always sleep deprived and relies on tea (she would only drink coffee in private — has to keep up her tea drinking perception !!!). she's known as a freakish loser, and only really gains friends later in her school years. this is mainly from how other people see her, but also because she's kind of pretentious and doesn't think other people are worth her time.

her eventual friends i think would include peter, xenophilius, and possibly some other minor characters that i can't think of rn !! but she's not really connected with any of them. she mainly smokes pot with them, and sometimes they have group trauma dumping sessions. xenophilius definitely ADORES her. i see him as being at least a year above her in school, and she would fascinate him sm i genuinely would love their dynamic. he'd see her as both a creepy little pet and the sweetest, saddest girl alive.

she was definitely bullied a little, but i don't think she really let it get to her head, so people kinda gave up on that. some of her bullies may have been the slytherin group (barty especially), james potter, maybe mary and marlene slightly? and just general gossiping and rumor spreading. but again, she didn't notice and / or didn't care.

she wasn't academically smart per se, but she was fairly people smart — she just dgaf lollll like in theory she could be very empathetic or whatever, but i genuinely don't know why she would be... she doesn't care about these people !!! this does cause very strained relationships with her family and the majority of her friends though.

BONUS PEBILL for the shippers out there:

i don't ship these guys that much sorry 🫣 BUT i have Thoughts.

i think they both teach each other something. sybill teaches peter to be more individualistic as well as showing how his friends aren't always as nice of people as he thinks they are. peter shows sybill compassion, and as a result she gets to be more in touch with her own emotions.

she would totally send him on little excursions in rat form to pick up gossip that they would later talk about. she would also LOVE to freak him out by reading his palm or checking his tea leaves, and then watch in glee as he was paranoid for the rest of the day.

i think if they were to actually date, they would be a very cute couple. she's the scary but secretly sweet and soft girlfriend, he's the friendly guy who shows her off to all his friends. she definitely influences him a bunch, and he will use any excuse to bring her into a conversation; ie, "i think it's going to rain" "i'll go ask sybill then 😊"

when she gets grumpy or upset or scared, he knows how to make her feel safe and comfortable, and when he feels frustrated or dejected, she can make him laugh.

guys wait i kinda ship it

[theinfiknight]

ASKS BE UPON YE!!!!!

1, (post a pic of ur current favourite blorb) 4, 7, 11, 27, 35, 40, 49, aaaaaaaaaaaaand 56!

Ok ok I've put this off long enough

1) Selfie of me:

Me with the pals (the post never specified the selfie had to be irl)

4) What are you looking forward to

Weeerrllll, I might eat some real nice spicy korean noodles tomorrow and even better, I might get to read the Avatar Roku novel next week! Yippee!

7) What was your life like last year

Hmmmmmm, kinda bad actually. I had taken a gap year from college to try and start HRT but couldn't find a single psychiatrist willing to take me seriously. I was basically just rotting away in my room while also running around the city humoring people who were trying to psychoanalyse me with an archiac and invalidating framework. Things are a lot better now in comparison.

11) Are you listening to music right now?

Yeah! It's Keiran's theme from Pokemon scarlet violet. My favourite pokemon rival since N

27) Things I hate

Hoo ok. Brace yourself.

Power outages. Hot food that's gone cold. People who are thoughtlessly mean, people hating on something you like after you told them you like it. People who live entirely inside their own heads. Random old men for some reason being allowed to decide your life. The inevitability of entropy. The fragility of human existence. Stupidly low catch rates on pokemon (whyyyyyy does magby or mantyke or sudowoodo need to be nigh uncatchable). The after effects of colonisation that define my life. Planned obsolescence. Vanilla ice cream. The fact that anything you can think of has been done better by others before you. People who spread hate and fear on an industrial scale for personal gain. Stories that treat characters as archetypes or plot devices instead of people. Random old men for some reason deciding that people on the other side of the earth need to die and then directly causing their deaths and facing no consequences for it. Comphet. The way Fushiguro is being treated in jjk. The way Sasuke and Sakura were treated in Naruto. The trivialisation of super Saiyan god immediately after it was introduced. Wasted potential. Random chance. The lack of any sort of higher justice. The fact that you have to pay separately to access Nintendo online services. Paid dlc that costs more than the base game. The short lifespan of hard drives. Too much nutmeg. The fact that you can randomly lose abilities you've had all your life. The Police. JKR. The power parents have over children. The anime pervert trope. Gender essentialism. What the main continuity Marvel comic writers have been doing to Spiderman for the last few years. The inevitable enshittification to the point of unusability of every company we rely on for society to function. The stock market. The intricacies of punctuation. The desecration and reanimation of long beloved works of art for the sake of short term profit. Monopolies. Teachers who do not see students as people. Generative AI. The incredible height of the skill ceiling of today's industry standards. The power shareholders wield over public utilities. Authors who cannot or more often do not bother to write female characters as people. People who treat real world problems like thought experiments. The fact that scissors get gradually less usable with time. Doctors who can no longer see humans as anything but cases. The disproportionate power of the USA. Having to 2D animate. Guns(sorry, I know you like those). The oversaturation of absolutely everything. Surveillance cameras. Visas. The trend of making characters who had bad parents also end up as bad parents to their kids. People's egos. Games with chairs and benches that do not allow the player character to ever sit. Organised religion. The pokemon diamond and pearl remakes. Songs that require more than two hands to properly play on the piano. Airport security. Gender segregated queues. Things that were once free, now costing money. Social media algorithms. Myself.

So yeah. You asked.

35) Favourite subject

Mildly embarrassing because I don't have very much in depth knowledge on any one subject but I have surface level knowledge of many. So my favourite subject would be maybe Pokemon or well done high fantasy. Or really just any engaging story with characters that feel organic. Bonus points for a well thought out magic system, more points if the story actually has a message, and even more points if the writing is smart, funny and well thought out. Needless to say I consider Terry Pratchett to be the absolute peak of literature.

40) Favourite memory

Ooh this is a tough one. Hmmm.

The exact moment when you defeat Giratina in Pokemon Legends Arceus and you think the battle is over and then the flatline plays and the music changes into its Pokemon Platinum theme and it turns into its Origin Form and you're just there staring at the screen and physically yelling with excitement.

Apart from that I had some pretty good times back when I lived in hostel, staying up overnight playing smash bros with my two then best friends. I miss those guys and those times.

49) Where I want to be right now

Honestly I'd be entirely satisfied being exactly where I am now, only without the uncertainty ruling my life.

Aaaaaaand

56) Favourite foods:

Buldak noodles, naan and paneer butter masala, a good spicy burger with spicy mayo and jalapenos, anything chocolate based that's well thought out, chilli chipotle chicken rice bowl, nachos with salsa, a nice spicy paneer or chicken wrap, chilli mushrooms or baby corn, Lotus stem when it's prepared dry, underbaked chocolate cake with ice cream, a nice spicy salad, just chilli paneer/chicken in general. Also a decent pizza. Or a good spicy vegetable sandwich.

[halfmoth-halfman]

I'm trusting you when you say canary is gonna have it light from here on out but I do wonder how the 141 will like react when they find out they betrayed someone so close and loyal like the one thing they're very big on is unconditional loyalty especially to family and to find out they did the very thing that they despise I'm excited to see how they deal with it I'm also excited to see how gaz personally will because he's been loyal to the end so I can imagine him being like " wtf guys this is what you did to my bestie apologize 😕😤"

but idk something in me say's some of them probably don't see what they did as wrong like I feel like someone is gonna deflect and be like " well shit we had reason to we saw it with our eyes" like that's an excuse especially since it's like... well what did you think he was gonna do let her parade the stage like a beaten potato? Ofc he lied to you and made her seem ok! He's a liar!! You fool

And I also think price knows this and won't put with anyone treating her bad from here on out and I can only imagine how shitty he feels like yo best girl just thrown to the wolves by your own accord because you fell for the same lies she warned you about (major trust issues see a therapist bro) like I'd die from guilt

Also he said something about "finding her" like dude where the hell were you looking?? And for a long time??? You didn't think to check the few places she mentioned or where graves was?? As if she literally didn't run away because she knew he would come for her and literally told you that she couldn't be there because of that and was in danger like??!?!??!!???!!!? Also going back to that no one followed her ?? No one tracked down the car ? And saw the scene?? Like there was to many things backing up her case for everyone to just turn on her especially after all that she explained even if it was a tiny bit someone was doing overtime to make sure she looked as guilty as possible

But yeah Sorry if this was mad long but I'm literally throwing up, chewing my nails, rocking back and forth, and kicking my feet this such a juicy heart racing story 🫶🏾🤍

that's actually going to be a very big talking point in the next few chapters because family's the most important thing to them, right? it's family above all else, the money, the business, everything. and a big part of that is because price doesn't run his business through fear and manipulation like makarov and graves, he relies on trust and loyalty which makes for a stronger crew. and now, here's someone who has been unconditionally loyal to them (moreso than some of their own people) and they've not only betrayed her but outright mistreated and punished her. that's going to cause some major in-house problems esp regarding gaz who has never once doubted her.

there will be talks about both sides, because yes, from their side it can look suspicious and there's just enough evidence for them to make that leap in deduction, but i don't think anyone would excuse what's happened just because of that. i think the bigger issue would be admitting that graves was able to manipulate them enough to think canary was a traitor, esp when so many of them think they're smarter than him.

i know we've all established that canary and ghost are gonna go through it™️, but oh man price. he's gonna need to have his own healing journey just from the guilt and the blame he's (rightfully) putting on himself. like to straight up accuse canary of lying about what graves put her through while she's sitting there trying to hide the bruises from him??? i can imagine he wouldn't stand for anyone mistreating her, but i also think he's gonna have a hard time facing her.

there'll be more on that and what the 141 was doing in general during those five months in the next couple of chapters, because you're right!! it's incredibly suspicious that no one found her, that no one tracked the car, or that looking into graves wasn't the first thing they did 👀

no worries, i enjoy the long asks and all of the theories and questions!! makes me feel like kicking my feet and twirling my hair 💜