#omg like that’s not even the surface!

[goddessofsteel]

🎶✨when u get this, list 5 songs u like to listen to, and publish. then, send this ask to 10 of your favourite followers (positivity is cool)🎶✨

@oldefashioned Omg! I usually listen to my favourite songs on repeat for a while lol but recently they’ve been a good mixture:

“ASTRO (Opium Remix - EP)” the slowed version (I got this from a really hot biker edit on tiktok hahahaha)

“Blue and Yellow” by The Used (all time fave since I was like 13/14)

“Pressure” by OVERWERK (I’ve been back into playing Sims 4, it’s such a fun song)

“Saltwater” by Fytch (got this from a Mo Dao Zu Shi amv on YouTube and I’ve never been the same since)

“Man of Steel (Hans Original Sketchbook)” from obviously lol the Man of Steel soundtrack because it’s such a masterpiece of a 28-minute song!!!! Also where I got the inspiration for my tumblr blog name rofl SINCE THE MOVIE CAME OUT WAY BACK WHEN

BONUS SONG even though I know you only asked for 5 lol:

Bottom of the Deep Blue Sea” by MISSIO (also from a MDZS amv lol)

[heylittleriotact]

No wonder Emmrich.exe stopped working when Rook asks if the tea in the memorial garden at the end of their outing was set up to impress them.

Death-man brought Rook to this place to try and help them sort through some of the feelings they need to confront in order to healthily mourn the death of someone who presumably meant a great deal to them.

The “light refreshment” was waiting at the end as a deliberate part of Emmrich’s care as a death professional. When I was in funerals we had coffee, tea, and freshly baked cookies waiting for every family that came in for arrangements, visitations, services, or after-care meetings: they’re comforting little gestures that people tend to really lean into during a difficult time.

So yeah. Given the circumstances and the reason for the outing to begin with, it would be a lot like someone showing up at the funeral home to make arrangements for their mum, looking at my spread of coffee and cookies and being like “Ooooh… are you hitting on me? 👀”

I would have had the exact same reaction Emmrich did lmao

[official-lucifers-child]

absolutely heartbreaking to see some of my favourite youtubers accept sponsors from betterhelp despite the literal actual federal trade commission stating that betterhelp broke its own privacy rules and pressured customers into giving them personal health information that they then gave to third party companies and fucking social media platforms.

like i understand that betterhelp seems like a mostly affordable, accessible alternative to in-person therapy, but i expected them to actually research the company a bit before accepting the sponsorship? i mean, even the most shallow of searches immediately brings up the legal case against betterhelp which exposed all of their shady dealings and mishandlings. maybe i'm expecting too much, but if a company asking to sponsor me lost a legal case because they sold their clients' medical information to facebook, i would turn down the sponsorship.

[mortysmith]

Fuck you season five episode nine genuinely some of the worst shit they clobbered together

[unproduciblesmackdown]

also "textless" versions of these, wahooo

[imminent-danger-came]

MK: "No way! I may not understand your irrational love of noodles, or working hard, or being angry all the time—but you are always there when I need you, so it's time for me to return the favor! Because Pigsy's Noodles, are noodles worth fighting for!"

(2x04 Sweet'n Sour)

-

Subodhi: "Zhu Bajie was a stubborn one too." Pigsy: "Oh! So you think we're the same just cause we're pigs huh, bet you think I'm just a disgusting little monster too." Subodhi: "Zhu Bajie had his vices, however, like all the companions he grew up. He struggled the most, but he worked hard, not unlike yourself. Although he didn't start out this way, in time he became a deeply caring and protective creature, and a powerful ally—one of the best in fact. The heart you have in abundance, the power? Why, you've barely scratched the surface of your potential! And that's saying something."

(4x09 Roast of the Monkie Kids)

-

Gettin' emotional over my favorite hard working Pig man.

[quirktwerp]

i come crawling out of my little hole, scroll for ten minutes, then hide away again for months until the cycle repeats itself.

[gu6chan]

You know, I realised earlier that a lot of the recurring things with this game seem to revolve around doors. The theme to it even being called "Door to Paradise" is one thing, though I figured it was sort of a way of talking about the relation the protagonist Keisuke had to the game "unearthing" his hidden sadism and giving him the means he wouldn't otherwise get to act on it. Though given Rinne's past, I'm almost curious if it has a double meaning as well... I'm lowkey wondering if something,,,, supernatural might actually be going on here? 👀 which would be an absolutely INSANE twist if it was omg

Additionally, I'm also really curious about the sort of sadist/masochist and underclassman/senior dichotomy I see between Nemu/Rinne and Rika/Natsuki. I wonder where that might leave Kanae? Presumably the other half to Keisuke, but her character seems almost suspiciously underdeveloped for me to make any standing guesses.... 👀 Given she normally pops up as a hostage to Nemu, I wonder if we'll find out a bit more about her during Nemu's route? Which I'm equally excited for askghdfkhjgdfkj Plot twist: Kanae is actually the other half to Miyako in the Matters/Doesn't Matter vein lmao

[acourtofquestions]

"I didn't break," she said quietly. His heart cracked at the words. "I didn't tell them anything."

She didn't say it for praise, to boast. But rather to tell him, her consort, of where they stood in this war. What their enemies might know.

"I knew you wouldn't," he managed to say.

"She ... she tried to convince me that this was the bad dream. When Cairn was done with me, or during it, I don't know, she'd try to worm her way into my mind." She glanced around the cave, as if she could see the world beyond it. "She spun fantasies that felt so real..." She bobbed under the surface. Perhaps she'd needed the cooling water of the lake to be able to hear her own voice again; perhaps she needed the distance between them so she could speak these words. She emerged, slicking back her hair with a hand. "They felt like this."

Half of him didn't want to know, but he asked, "What sort of illusions?"

A long pause. "It doesn't matter now."

Too soon to push—if ever.

Then she asked softly, "How long?"

It took the entirety of his three centuries of training to keep the devastation, the agony for her, from his face. "Two months, three days, and seven hours."

Her mouth tightened, either at the length of time, or the fact that he'd counted every single one of those hours apart.

She ran her fingers through her hair, its strands floating around her in the water. Still too long for two months to have passed. "They healed me after each ... session. So that I stopped knowing what had been done and what was in my mind and where the truth lay." Erase her scars, and Maeve stood a better chance at convincing her none of this was real. "But the healers couldn't remember how long my hair was, or Maeve wanted to confuse me further, so they grew it out." Her eyes darkened at the memory of why, perhaps, they had needed to regrow her hair in the first place.

"Do you want me to cut it back to the length it was when I last saw you?" His words were near-guttural.

"No." Ripples shivered around her. "I want it so I can remember."

What had been done to her, what she'd survived and what she had protected.

Even if the woman treading water before him didn't seem to have vengeance on her mind. Not so much as a hint of the burning rage that fueled her.

He didn't blame her. Knew it would take time, time and distance, to heal the internal wounds. If they could ever really heal at all.

But he'd work with her, help in whatever way he could. And if she never returned to who she had been before this, he would not love her any less.

Aelin dunked her head, and when she emerged, she said, "Maeve was about to put a Valg collar around my neck. She left to retrieve it." The scent of her lingering fear drifted toward him, and Rowan lurched a step closer to the water's edge. "It's why I—why I got away. She had me moved to the army camp for safekeeping, and I ..." Her voice stalled, yet she met his stare. Let him read the words she could not say, in that silent way they'd always been able to communicate. Escape wasn't my intention.

"No, Fireheart," he breathed, shaking his head, horror creeping over him. "There ... there was no collar."

She blinked, head angling. "That was a dream, too?"

His heart cracked as he struggled for the words. Made himself voice them. "No—it was real. Or Maeve thought it was. But the collars, the Valg presence ... It was a lie that we crafted. To draw Maeve out, hopefully away from you and Doranelle."

Only the faint lapping of water sounded. "There was no collar?"

Rowan lowered himself to his knees and shook his head. "I—Aelin, if I'd known what she'd do with the knowledge, what you'd decide to do-"

He might have lost her. Not from Maeve or the gods or the Lock, but from his own damned choices. The lie he'd spun.

Aelin drifted beneath the surface again. So deep that when the flare happened, it was little more than a flutter. The light burst from her, rippling across the lake, illumining the stones, the slick ceiling above. A silent eruption. His breathing turned ragged. But she swam toward the surface again, light streaming off her body like tendrils of clouds. It had nearly vanished when she emerged.

"I'm sorry," he managed to say. Again, that angle of the head. "You have nothing to be sorry for." He did, though. He'd added to her terror, her desperation. He'd— "If you had not planted that lie for Maeve, if she had not told me, I don't think we'd be here right now," she said.

He tried to rein in the twisting in his gut, the urge to reach for her, to beg for her forgiveness. Tried and tried.

She only asked, "What of the others?" She didn't know-couldn't know how and why and where they'd all parted ways. So Rowan told her, as succinctly and calmly as he could.

When he finished, Aelin was quiet for long minutes.

She stared out into the blackness, the rippling of her treading water the only sound. Her body had nearly lost that freshly forged glow.

Then she pivoted back toward him. "Maeve said you and the others were in the North. That you'd been spotted by her spies there. Did you plant that deception for her, too?"

He shook his head. "Lysandra has been thorough, it seems."

Aelin's throat bobbed. "I believed her." It sounded like a confession, somehow.

So Rowan found himself saying, "I told you once that even if death separated us, I would rip apart every world until I found you." He gave her a slash of a smile. "Did you really believe this would stop me?'

She pursed her mouth, and at last, those agonizing emotions began to surface in her eyes. "You were supposed to save Terrasen."

"Considering that the sun shines, I'd say Erawan hasn't won yet. So we'll save it together."

He didn't let himself think of the final cost of destroying Erawan. And Aelin seemed in no hurry to discuss it, either, as she said, "You should have gone to Terrasen. It needs you."

"I need you more." He didn't balk from the stark honesty roughening his voice. "And Terrasen will need you, too. Not Lysandra masquerading as you, but you."

A shallow nod. "Maeve raised her army. I doubt it was only to guard me while she was away."

He'd put the thought aside, to consider later. "It might just be to shore up her defenses, should Erawan win across the sea."

"Do you truly think that's what she plans to do with it?"

"No," he admitted. "I don't."

And if Maeve meant to bring that army to Terrasen, to either unite with Erawan or simply be another force battering their kingdom, to strike when they were weakest, they had to hurry. Had to get back. Immediately. His mate's eyes shone with the same understanding and dread.

Aelin's throat bobbed as she whispered, "I'm so tired, Rowan."

His heart strained again. "I know, Fireheart."

He opened his mouth to say more, to coax her onto land so he might at least hold her if words couldn't ease her burden, but that's when he saw it.

A boat, ancient and every inch of it carved, drifted out of the gloom.

"Get back to shore." The boat wasn't drifting—it was being tugged. He could just barely make out two dark forms slithering beneath the surface.

Aelin didn't hesitate, yet her strokes remained steady as she swam for him. She didn’t balk at the hand he extended, and he wrapped his cloak around her while the boat ambled past.

But Aelin turned toward them, hair dripping onto the stone at her bare feet. Half a thought from her could have had her dry, yet she made no move to do so. "We're being hunted."

"We know that," Lorcan shot back, and were it not for the fact that Aelin was currently allowing him to rest a hand upon her shoulder, Rowan would have thrown the male into the lake.

But Aelin's features didn't shift from that graveness, that unruffled calm. "The only way to the sea is through these caves." It was an outrageous claim.

"And I suppose they told you that?" Lorcan's face was hard as granite.

"Watch it," Rowan snarled. Fenrys indeed bared his teeth at the dark-haired warrior, fur bristling. But Aelin said simply, "Yes." Her chin didn't dip an inch. "The land above is crawling with soldiers and spies. Going beneath them is the only way."

Elide stepped forward. "I will go." She cut a cold glance toward Lorcan. "You can take your chances above, if you're so disbelieving." Lorcan's jaw tightened, and a small part of Rowan relished seeing the delicate Lady of Perranth fillet the centuries-hardened warrior with a few words. "Considering the potential pitfalls of the situation is wise."

"We don't have time to consider," Rowan cut in before Elide could voice the retort on her tongue. "We need to keep moving. Gavriel stalked forward to study the moored boat and what seemed to be bundles of supplies on its sturdy planks. "How will we navigate our way, though?"

"We'll be escorted," Aelin answered.

"And if they abandon us?" Lorcan challenged. Aelin leveled unfazed eyes upon him.

"Then you'll have to find a way out, I suppose." A hint-just a spark-of temper belied those calm words. There was nothing else to debate after that.

And they had little to pack. The others gave Aelin privacy to dress by the fire while they inspected the boat, and when his mate emerged again, clad in boots, pants, and various layers beneath her gray surcoat, the sight of her in clothes from Mistward was enough to make his gut clench.

No longer a naked, escaped captive. Yet none of that wickedness, that joy and unchecked wildness illuminated her face.

The rest of their party waited on the boat, seated on the benches built into its high-lipped sides. Fenrys and Elide both sat as seemingly far from Lorcan as they could get, Gavriel a golden, long-suffering buffer between them.

Rowan lingered at the shore's edge, a hand extended for Aelin while she approached. Each of her steps seemed considered—as if she still marveled at being able to move freely. As if still adjusting to her legs without the burden of chains.

"Why?" Lorcan mused aloud, more to himself. "Why go to these lengths for us?"

He got his answer—they all did—a heartbeat later. Aelin halted a few feet away from the boat and Rowan's outstretched hand. She turned back toward the cave itself. The Little Folk peeked from those birch branches, from the rocks, from behind stalagmites. Slowly, deeply, Aelin bowed to them. Rowan could have sworn all those tiny heads lowered in answer.

A pair of bony grayish hands rose above a nearby rock, something glittering held between them, and set the object on the stone.

Rowan went still. A crown of silver and pearl and diamond gleamed there, fashioned into upswept swan's wings

"The Crown of Mab," Gavriel breathed. But Fenrys looked away, toward the looming dark, his tail curling around him.

Aelin staggered a step closer to the crown. "It—it fell into the river."

Rowan didn't want to know how she'd encountered it, why she'd seen it fall into a river. Maeve had kept her sisters' two crowns under constant guard, only bringing them out to be displayed in her throne room on state occasions. In memory of her siblings, she'd intoned. Rowan had sometimes wondered if it was a reminder that she had outlasted them, had kept the throne for herself in the end.

The grayish hand slipped over the rock's edge again and nudged the crown in silent gesture. Take it.

"You want to know why?" Gavriel softly asked Lorcan as Aelin strode for the rock. Nothing but solemn reverence on her face. "Because she is not only Brannon's Heir, but Mab's, too."

A throwback to her great-great-grandmother, Maeve had taunted her. Who had inherited her strength, her immortal lifespan.

Aelin's fingers closed around the crown, lifting it gently. It sparkled like living moonlight between her hands.

My sister Mab's line ran true, Elide claimed Maeve had said on the beach. In every way, it seemed.

But Aelin made no move to don the crown while she approached him once more, her gait steadier this time. Trying not to dwell on the unbearable smoothness of her hand as it wrapped around his, Rowan helped her aboard, then climbed in himself before freeing the ropes tethering them to the shore.

Gavriel went on, awe in every word, "And that makes her their queen, too."

Aelin met Gavriel's gaze, the crown near-glowing in her hands. "Yes," was all she said as the boat sailed into the darkness.

[lixbf]

ive been playing so much hades 2 atp i feel like the first Big early access patch is gonna legit change my life....

[korixae]

nonononononono bcs that was SO GOOD like sooooo good bro you don’t understand i adore 14. i adoreeee him like i literally like him more than 10. he’s like if 10 wasn’t so sad and depressed yk?? like he said donna’s his best friend in the whole wide universe and her loves her (and even he acknowledges this is new for him to be saying) and he says he loves wilf and he’s so- he’s so sillyyy like yes 10 was silly but 14 is like if 10 was allowed to be happy. at the end when he runs around his new tardis (which i love sooosososo much btw like i’m obsessed with it i’m so glad it’s staying around for ncuti’s era i’m already dreading seeing it leave again) and him and donna do that cute little scream together like those stereotype teenage girls 🥹 oh i loved it i loved it i loved it AND! that’s not even talking about how “woke” (ugh hate that word) it was!! like it’s gonna piss sooo many people off omg i love it. him asking the meep’s pronouns? the whole binary-nonbinary-binary? the you wouldn’t understand bcs you’re a male-presenting we can just.. let it go? LOVE the representation had me frothing at the mouth i adoreeee. rtd <3 thank you <3 it was perfect <3 couldn’t have asked for more <3

[werebutch]

ur dads comments sound GROSSSSSSS like so gross. he’s trying to make u change ur mind about ur own reality but he’s just making u resent him. some people have to learn how to be a good parent after their kids fuck off and go no contact 🤷

They seriously are like AUUUGHHHH 😭😭😭 I developed tics a couple years ago from anxiety and also withdrawal and they’ve mostly gone away EXCEPT for when I’m around him. Bcuz again my tics are anxiety based . HE FR FREAKS ME OUT 😭 I feel bad for resenting him so much but he seriously does not try to improve our relationship at all..

[hauntingblue]

The theme around memories and how they make people human is compelling actually

[sarah-sandwich-writes]

Woolen Hollow sounds so intriguing and draws me in!! Tell me about it!!

Okay so Woolen Hollow is my fantasy novel that I got 10k into and then realized it was boring so I set aside the draft and started over but this time in 1st person POV (which I've never written in before) to give it a more engaging voice and I started with them already on the road rather than dinking around at home and I like it sooooo much better now. Unfortunately I've only written just over 1k because other things have the priority rn

But there is magic! The kind you control and the kind that controls you. And there is love! The kind between siblings (for better or for worse), between two boys lost in the woods and the world, and between a girl and her sheep. And there is a conniving lying cheat of a fiance who thinks she's hot shit but is ultimately going to be taken down by a closeted shut-in who will carry the guilt of scrambling her noodle for the rest of his life. There will be choices and consequences and lots of bickering and banter because I'm still me.

Anyway, meet Midge and Jax!

*

“Sweet soil, Midge. Keep it down or they’ll think we raised you with the sheep.”

I don’t pause my cursing for a second as Jax squats in front of me where I’m sat, filthy and tear-stained, at the base of the tree that did me wrong. He reaches for my arm but a hard boot to his knee knocks him on his ass and gives me precious seconds to come to terms with the hot, sharp pain radiating from my forearm.

Jax shakes his hair out of his eyes and glares. “The longer you drag this out, the further behind we’re going to fall and you know none of them will wait for us.”

“You’re not even supposed to be here,” I spit. I draw my arm against my chest and press back into the tree as he gets to his knees. “This is my thing. You should be at home in your closet.”

“Did I hallucinate your last ten birthdays? You sound like a child.” He reaches for me again. “Hold still. I need to see how bad it is.”

With grit teeth, I hold very still.

Jax sighs. “You are the most obstinate— Let me see it.”

With great reluctance, I uncurl from around my arm and hold it aloft for him to see. It looks fine. Normal. There’s some blood on my sleeve but that’s from earlier when I had to chase Sarsaparilla out of the bramble. I’ll be up for hours tonight combing the stickers from her wool while she’s too drowsy to put her usual fight.

With deft fingers, Jax unties the leather cord that keeps my sleeve flush against my skin, both for insulation and to keep from leaving tattered bits of cloth all through the forest, and rolls back my sleeve.

I suck in a sharp breath and look away. Blood I can handle. Feces, fine. Snot, sweat, sheep urine, and other various oozes and slimes—bring it on.

But bodies bending where they should not? Lumps that speak of damage unseen under the surface, broken with no clear simple treatment? It makes my skin crawl.

Jax clicks his tongue. “You got yourself good, smidgling.”

“Take your dirt nap, jaxass.”

He ignores me. “I have some [APOTHECARY STUFF] in my pack. It’ll help with the pain and swelling. If you take [MORE APOTHECARY STUFF] and let me splint it, it should be usable by next week.”

“That’s forever. There’s so much I have to—,”

“I can’t work miracles,” he snaps. “I’m telling you what I can do.”

He juts to his feet and towers over me, but not in an intimidating way. More like a stick bug—all bones with no meat—or a single reed in a field of clover, doomed to be slapped around in the wind without the protection of a bed. If he didn’t hole himself up with his cauldron day in and day out, he’d be as broad as Ham. Instead, he’s thin, whippy, and about as threatening as a cooked noodle.

I stagger to my feet and don’t bother trying to swat away the dirt that clings to my pants. Sudden movement makes a shooting pain fly up my arm, through my shoulder, and into my teeth. You only chew tin foil once before you learn to not fucking do that.

“Let’s catch up to the group. Maybe Ham can grow me a new arm. I bet it’ll only take a minute.”

Jax makes a sour face and turns on his heel. His long-legged stride takes no consideration for my short quick steps. “If we’re lucky he’ll grow you a new head while he’s at it.”

The rock I kick ricochets off his ankle and disappears into the forest but he doesn’t give me the satisfaction of looking back.

Brothers.

[perikiro]

Its missing your gaanaru drawings hours

aaaahhh I am touched that you like my art of them enough to miss it jhsdfghds 🥺💖 but don't worry there will be more!!! I've got two gaanaru WIPs that have already been sitting in my folder for a while now (and more ideas too omg). I'm taking a little break from drawing anything atm because I realised I was getting really burned out, but once I am back there will be some otp content on the way....!!! 🥰