#she wanted me to post his full design but I felt weird about posting someone else’s art so I threw this together!

[spittyfishy]

Yo where my boy Makoto at? Where's his remnant au?

For more info and his full design you’ll have to ask @circuscomics he’s in the half of the cast she’s designing lol

[valeriefauxnom]

On the Head Accessories of the Royal Family

There's no grand agenda to this post, more just a few observations I found a bit amusing in the course of research and wanted to share.

So, of the family that does wear head accessories, a pattern seems to emerge: they're mostly metal instead of the incredibly ornate gem-studded crowns IRL royalty liked to flaunt about, kings and princesses alike.

But taking a look at the fam, only Leonidas and Chelle (well, and Zethia, but I dunno how much of that is royal fashion vs Auspex religious-based choices) have any gemstone piece to their circlet/tiara/crown, and Leonidas' isn't even attached to the actual circlet itself. Chelle's also has one, which, for a women who loves to play up being a ditzy party princess to manipulate people into underestimating her, is a bit of a surprise she didn't go full display of riches to me.

Even King Aurelius' lacks ornamentation:

Here's where things get a bit more conjecture-y: given Aurelius seems to loathe vanity, seeing as how he hides away his coronation portrait for this reason, and whether he's following or starting a trend, I think he's tried to raise the kids to be 'modest' in presentation. Of course, this still involves looking proper, but I think he might not have taken well to ostentatious shows of wealth or encouraged beliefs that they were inherently superior than lowly peasants.

Regardless if this is part of the reason or not why everyone isn't porting gemstone-packed crowns, it's still funny that even my best friend WillofWinnie picked up on this enough in her incredible gift in the form of sticky-note fic art when designing a new little circlet for Zethia in its ending scene that I am shamelessly showing off again because it made me so happy to receive fic art!

(it also leads to my next point, being that she also picked up the tendency for the fam to be very attuned to pointy metal accessories!)

Now, I don't have any guess as to why they love plain pointy metal circlets, besides that maybe it's a demonstration of Alberia's militaristic pragmatic might. But it's not the only pointy plain metal head accessory someone in the family wears!

Yep, there's someone in the royal family that wears earrings. Who, Chelle, Zethia, you might wonder? Nope, that goes to Leonidas, who wears plain gold, if pointy metal earrings that disguise with his hair pretty well.

He has them it in all of his versions including his base one, but I felt this was one of the best ones to highlight the contrast that it's not just a weird parting of hair. You go, Leo!

I dunno what fashion expectations are for the royal court in Dragalia, ie, maybe it's considered a masculine (ex: Look at My Manliness for Having HOLES Gauged in my Ears!) or neutral accessory, but hey, it's not too often you see pierced ears in my experience on boys in video games in a more meta sense. Really, the only things that are suggested about court fashion is that Cassandra's clothes are considered inappropriate and Leif believes Gala Chelle's are, too.

But wait, there's more! In somebody else's Gala form, they too gain this. It's also pretty hidden in art, but as you can clearly see on the model...

Gala Emile has gained a singular earring on his right ear that's suspiciously similar to Leo's.

I wonder if he wanted to try and emulate Leonidas but chickened out immediately after his first ear was pierced and then pretended it was a deliberate fashion decision instead of him not wanting to be poked again.

So yeah, two of the royal family wears earrings, and it's Leonidas and Emile, of all people.

[vocalsynthbdays]

im sorry for posting this so late, but happy late birthday to cyber songman(vocaloid 4), Bones(alter/ego), Magpie Batty(utau), and XELTA(utau) !!!!!! [oct 31]

cyman

bones

magpie

xelta (jp design)

cyber songman (aka cyan or cyman) is an english synth developed by yamaha, and released in 2016. his vp has not been revealed, and seemingly neither has the photographer nor model of his image. cyman's v5 released on 12 jul 2018, ands called "Cyber Songman II". hes available on the mobile vocaloid editor and vocaloid neo.

Bones is an english and japanese synth, developed and voiced by Tora-Ouji/ NEUTROGIC, and released in 2016. bones is illustrated by Sleppu. bones is the second default bank for the alterego engine, replacing daisy who was the original default bank. his companion creature is called Diggard.

Magpie Batty is japanese synth created by and voiced by MAGPIE, and released in 2019. magpies imagines were also done by MAGPIE. she has 5vbs (i think).

XELTA is a english japanese synth created and voiced by Dav-P, and introduced on 10 nov 2021. xelta is illustrated by Mirek. xelta is an adult trans man. he is homosexual and demiromantic. he is 167.64cm tall. his character birthday is 31 oct. xelta is south korean. he is also a zombie. he has ptsd (post-traumatic stress disorder)

tw for discussion of bigotry, transphobia, and grooming(?) for the next part.

i was also going to post about Kei Mochizuki(utau) and Dr. Hai(utau) but i decided not to. according to the utau fandom wiki kei is referred to with a transphobic slur in her character profile. however i do not know japanese and i cannot confirm nor deny this. as such, if anyone knows more about kei or just knows japanese and would be able to clarify this i would appreciate it !! either way, as a trans person i did not want to uncritically draw attention to her because of this. if any other trans people want to have a look at her and give their thoughts on kei i would appreciate that also ! im not posting about hai because his character profile describes him as being bigoted, and i felt its a bit weird and uncomfortable to post about an oc someone decided to make bigoted. less canonical, but, on his utau wiki 2.0 page there is a poor mspaint-like drawing of hai by Lasaillax. from what ive seen there is some cross-over/ collaboration between Lasaillax and Dav-P(creator of hai) so i wanted to mention it. on this drawing is text reading "Also this person clearly knew that the victim was virtually a preteen and literally didn't know what they were doing but yet again proceeded to have sexual talks and roleplays with them as if that is socially acceptable we don't stan we we do not". hai has been alive for around 7000 years according to his character profile but looks 27yo. so again, i did not want to post about an adult character who is said to have sexual relation with minors. if this is a misunderstanding or if anyone can tell me if i am misinterpreting this or smthing i would greatly appreciate it !! also, hai was released over 6 years ago, and kei over 11 years ago, so i am not trying to cancel or call out any of the people involved. i just wanted to explain why im not posting them and ask for some further information or explanation if i can !

cyman full image

bones logo

original art by tora

magpie red and honey

magpie brain and death

magpie natural

xelta eng

[solar-halos]

ballad appreciation post

i’m so happy :D. i’ve watched ballad twice this week. the second time i watched it w my brothers i didn’t have anything to say about it bc i was mostly just on edge about not getting kicked out of the theatre but since i teased a breakup over this Boyfriend was on his best behavior so i actually got to watch the movie without anyone asking a million question a scene. in related news we have another lucy gray truther on our side. here are some of my thoughts

1. tom blyth opening screen …. i still got jumpscared seeing him in the nude

2. the way they pronounce lucy grays name still catches me off guard. i’ve been ignoring the “i” completely and just say “bard” in my head (yk bc she’s The Bard). with that being said i know the mayor was in like 2 scenes but i think he did a really good job picking out lucy grays name he looked crazy

3. hunter schafer is my eyebrow inspo. also i’ve mentioned this before w the bathing suits having a 1920s and 50s vibe but she’s giving 1940s to me. but obviously glamor 1940s not war ridden 1940s

4. watching this w someone who hasn’t read the book is so enjoyable. when lucy gray dropped the snake down mayfairs shirt Boyfriend got SO tense “waitwait did she just try to fuckin murder her??” god forbid women do anything

5. okay sorry but the first time i watched it i was trying not to smile (in a laugh-y way) when lucy grays singing part came on. when i read it i thought that part ate but actually seeing it was so different for some reason. i think this feeling might be amplified if you’ve never read the book bc my sister felt the exact same way she said it was kinda fuckin cringe. idk if it was just bc we were at home or she was just feeling silly but she started singing that one camp rock song that’s like “we can’t back down.” which ok yeah that was kinda lucy grays song in a nutshell but it kinda did piss me off bc the “you can kiss my ass!!!!” part was coming on soon and i was stressing over them missing it. also didnt lucy gray have a full on dance break in the book?? god. they should have kept that in

6. okay that scene where she bowed and d12’s nasty ass coal industry being in the background is still one of my fav scenes. ugh loved it

7. wovey idk what it was this time but when she was like “im rlly good at climbing” i almost burst into tears. guys she’s really good at climbing

8. hunter schafer literally killed this. i’d argue that tigris is just as much of a product of her environment as snow is but i don’t rlly know how to articulate that

9. speaking of the reading vs watching thing i mentioned earlier: it rlly jumped out with grandmaam. idk why but when i was reading it grandmaam was SO scary and intimidating to me but watching her so frail and skinny and slightly senile talk about how lucy gray is a killer just seemed so crazy. especially since we know snow believes her

10. “they’re gonna get bombed aren’t they” wtf i walk into every movie clueless how are ppl straight up predicting entire events. but again w the reading vs watching i was GAGGED when they got bombed in the book but in the movie it seemed weird?? like “get the camera on her” and then it just feels like they’re trying to take up space until the actual bombs land. but whatever im being so bitchy i wasn’t surprised bc i literally knew it was gonna happen

11. “i want coral making my latte” and i want tanner on the grill

12. i think it was tanner, but i rlly liked his outfit. i liked all their outfits actually. i’ve been watching so many reels abt the costume designer explaining her inspo for the costumes (like tigris and her 1940s glamor thing going on)

13. okay seriously why did they cut out the kiss… and then when they actually did kiss why did they have lucy gray pull away at first…… i know francis lawrence saying this was a love story was icky but he did a bad job at portraying that so maybe we were worried for nothing (jk we were worried for all the right reasons bc if i had a nickel for every time someone said “i thought they were gonna get married!” about lucy gray and snow i’d have two nickels. which isn’t a lot but it’s weird that it happened twice). also not to be a hater but snowbaird fans actually fucking irritate me. like the fans that are like “but what if it was wholesome 🥺🥺” what if lucy gray tried to kill him and he tried to kill her back? what if he managed to track her down and she bit him again? what if they hate each other so much that they’re only together bc they wanna see the other person suffer? what then

14. tbh seeing billy taupe made me feel a bit guilty 😭😭. almost terminated my ao3 acc but i get that feeling every time someone mentions something im obsessed w in a very casual way so it wasn’t rlly that serious. also someone either on tiktok or insta was like “was i the only person who preferred snows curls to his buzz cut?” and i genuinely couldn’t tell if they were joking bc like. everyone prefers snows curls to his buzz cut. even snow prefers his curls to his buzzcut. with that being said billy taupe needed to lose the cap

15. ngl the ballad of lucy gray baird actually did make me cry a bit… lucy gray was only 16 she needed to be on tumblr

16. where’d she get that guitar from tho

17. i wish they would have kept in the tributes death parade. that part was icky

18. okay there was a scene where lucky had a drink and then he flicked something off it and pup (i think that was his name) flinched cos it landed on his neck that was so fucking funny i hate that this was the first time i noticed it

19. okay seriously why did they make dill get poisoned. also that cornocopia scene. hmph

20. the first time i watched it i remembered being really confused why lucky called mizzen Merciless Mizzen. but omg after he tried chasing lucy gray down in that vent i understood that was crazy of him. and it did seem like he was an actual teenager which actually made it more unsettling. i feel like rachel zegler has a baby face (i actually think she was 17 in west side story and she looks the exact same now) but mizzen’s actor sing singing her name was perfect

21. lamina at the beam… didn’t she manage to kill someone in the book??

22. “does this mean we get to go home??” god i wish

23. but also “please lucy i can’t have killed all of them for nothing” i liked that she didn’t call her lucy gray that was a nice touch. but also. what a crazy thing to ask. i wonder if she thought lucy gray would be chill w that

24. take this with a grain of salt i haven’t read the books in so long but when snow snuck up on lucy gray in the meadow didn’t she level her guitar at him and then be like “sorry lol i still have one foot in the arena :P” they should have had her hit him in the face w it

25. the old therebefore still hits. i wish they would have included scenes where snow is shown to genuinely dislike her songs like in the books. in the movies he seems more disinterested in what she’s doing which is still bad but also it doesn’t seem as overt as him literally hating on her for no fuckin reason. which i guess is bc we have no insight into his head, like i think someone pointed out that in the book and movie he cried over sejanus being dead but in the book we know it’s bc he was scared it was gonna be him next but in the movie it just looked like he was sad. which i get it he’s perceived as nice by other people but the audience is not supposed to be other ppl we know what his motives are. im not sure how that’d be solved, cos i guess it would be pretty annoying to have him voice his thoughts and you also don’t wanna spoon feed ur audience but like. idk. seems like something you’d wanna make super clear bc to me it didn’t seem like you were supposed to like / sympathize with him, but the way it was done kinda seemed half baked

26. speaking of that… Boyfriend did not get the memo that snow was fucking crazy. “i thought he was gonna marry lucy gray in d12” WHY? like why would you even think that. were u not paying attention during the hunger games trilogy marathon where would lucy gray fit into that. since my sister thought the exact same thing she tried being like “see? it’s confusing” but it actually isn’t. that’s still a better reaction than my brother he was actually being a fucking weirdo about it cos when snow found lucy grays scarf in the woods and then the snake bit him this mfer went “she tried to kill him” no!!! but i think there might be something to be said about how snow, completely sober, came to the same conclusion as my brother, who was so high he couldn’t even remember who sejanus was

27. okay that’s a lot of sibling lore so atp i think i better end the post. bye

[blupengu]

Okay, I thought Le Salut emotionally devastated me? Wrong. Weak sauce. I think I inadvertently went in order from happiest to most depressing salvation ending oops…💀

Big fat spoilers for everyone’s salvation ends under the cut!! I’ll add the order I did them in first in case somehow someone finds this and is curious but hasn’t done them all yet

Just wanna say though, thank you Virche Evermore for gifting us with not one, not two, but FIVE(!) long-haired boys, god damn! I would like to shake Yomi’s hand because the art and character designs are so *chef’s kiss,* long-haired anime boys are superior 😂

Also random aside, the first few notes of the salvation theme before the piano comes in gives me such……… indescribable feelings? That underlying dissonance fills me with like such a desperate but forlorn desire to go back to simpler, happier times before the melody becomes more hopeful 😂 (this might be a weird pull, but it gives me Giygas theme prayer for safety vibes from Earthbound 👀)

Adolphe -> Mathis -> Scien -> Yves -> Lucas (yes I saved him for last because I am a Lucas simp I admit it. I saw some comments say it was uhhh not the happiest ending LOL but the heart wants what the heart wants 💀) Boy this is gonna be a LONG post

Adolphe

Love things being solved with guns lmfaooo, guess we’ll go by each scene that the game goes through. Also since I forgot to mention this in my Le Salut rant, I LOVE all of Ankou’s CGs, he is so pretty! The very first one you get stopping Ceres from killing herself? Impeccable. When Adolphe’s pointing a sword at him while his hair’s blowing in the wind? Show-stopping. Him eating the lycoris? Peak *I saw a man so beautiful I started crying* 😩

LUCAS AND NADIA ARE ALIVE! NADIA IS RECOVERING!! LUCAS IS GOING TO THERAPY!!! As mad as I am that ankou died, this is the best timeline oh my gosh the way I (˶‾᷄ ⁻̫ ‾᷅˵) when I heard Nadia, the relief I felt for these two blonde bitches y’all…

LMAO JEAN. Oh my evil hot butler being forced to take care of a baby as his punishment is so *chef’s kiss,* scien has wonderful ideas, I desperately want fan art of this 😂 ah… they did say Rosalie was pregnant though when she was killed, didn’t they… oh now it hurts a little more… I hope he, Mathis, and the kid become a loving family 😔

What the FUCK Yves eating the lycoris bulbs coming in clutch though??? And Hugo still being an A+ Yvesexual I approve 😌

Scien is the BIGGEST mvp though in practically every route my god

This was such like a nice, tight little bow to put at the end of what I guess is the true route? But I love it because all our boys are happy (Ripperoni ankou 🫡)

Mathis

Sweet baby boy, too good for this world… Dahut why tf are you blowing shit up in his route this don’t involve you go away 😂 (still love him though…)

Oh… OH. Mathis was ACTUALLY baby…?? o_o (kinda 😬 how Jean got the cells but uh, let’s ignore that shall we?) Rosalie, Camille, Mathis happy family AU when??? Aaaw Jean did care about Mathis deep down TT_TT (like waaaay deep down), and thank you Scien again as always.

Lmao Ankou’s just casually showing up like, “here take these sweets, it’s made of my blood! Haha no of course I’m joking it’s just normal candy” 👀 Not much else to say about this end, it was cute! I’m glad at least one character got a real happy ending 😌

Scien

Bruh I forgot how disrespectful Scien is to everybody lmaooo, guess we back to sandwich dispenser… I’m glad Dahut’s our friend in this route though!

SALOME WHAT THE FUCK! Oh bruh hell nah, she did not just do that I stg… oh bitch she really killed Dahut huh. YOU JUST KILLED YOUR SON!! GIRL, THIS MAKES ME MAD AF 💀 (this also made me realize they share the same bang style 😭)

Not much else to say about this one either, I’m glad it’s happy (other than Dahut… and they’re never gonna find out about that, huh… ಠ_ಠ), and looks like the kiss CG’s improved! 😂

Yves

Bruh Yves needs therapy so bad, he’s such a good boy though 😂 Ngl his full name is kinda sick, Yves Noirge, guardian of the Lycoris, named after the flowers of misfortune? That goes hard af

Please… please give her the Magic science juice first so you don’t die before you get to her… no? Aight then I guess the power of love stopped you from dropping dead LOL (this kiss CG was also pretty nice! Hooray the artist has improved 😂)

Cannot believe they put in the effort to change Scien’s sprite so he’s missing an arm though lmao, and Ankou just kinda showing up to solve problems is always great

Y’all Yves and Ceres are so mentally I’ll for each other… and two kiss CGs!! They really saved the nice ones for the end huh 😂 Good for Yves! It’s not a super happy ending, but at the very least things are hopeful, and that’s all I can really ask for in this game…

Lucas

I am. Upset. I miss when all we had to worry about was the cage 😂

*internal screaming* Boy oh boy this one absolutely wrecked my shit. When I looked at the flow chart and realized it would split off AFTER Nadia and the killing spree… 😬 like bitch I don’t wanna go through this again 💀 okay okay though, this one’s definitely gonna be long (sorry in advance), I guess I’ll just tackle the scenes chronologically:

Seeing Dahut hiding from Lucas really just made me shout “LOOK WHAT YOU DID!!” at my TV now knowing what we know lmao, but also… why was he unsure about Capucine’s involvement…? Like he knew Capucine was Ortie and he must’ve known that Capucine was running the hospital Nadia was in… also knew he was abusing Lucas and doing fucked up human experimentation, Dahut so why are you surprised??? I would’ve pulled Nadia out if there the second I became friends with her, a huge chunk of this is your fault 😭

But bruh… this is not a salvation end… it’s a despair end with more CGs and trying-to-talk-with-a-slit-throat-while-coughing-up-blood ASMR wtf 💀

(Poor Lucas saying “I can’t do this anymore” was so relatable lmao sweetie the game is doing you so dirty I am so sorry, like oh my god make the pain stop… what do you mean it’s only gonna get worse?!)

I am glad though that even though we stabbed our boy in the throat we are still going after Capucine’s ass together! Seeing him scared was so satisfying aah, GET FUCKED CAPUCINE HELL YEAH YOU BETTER BE AFRAID BITCH!! Even with 0 pints of blood, Lucas is still kicking down doors and kicking ass, what a king 👑 the man must be leaking everywhere (like sir we cut an artery, there must be a fountain coming out of you), love the “man too angry to die” vibes 😌

Bruh the siblings face to face is so fucked. Was not expecting Dahut to have already been there and playing dead though! Even though you’re kinda the reason Lucas and Nadia’s lives got so fucked, I’m glad you helped in the end 😌 get fucked (again) Capucine!! I’m very glad Nadia was the one to claw the shit out of that garbage man 🔥💯

Aha, the touching sibling reunion is SO super duper fucked 😭 they did not have to describe how Nadia can feel the other body parts and how much it hurts… like Jesus fucking Christ honey I am so sorry you’re in this game, this is too much suffering for such a sweet character 😩

God I am so absolutely devastated, his dying CG was pretty at least… ಥ_ಥ this ain’t fair though y’all… what is this injustice for Lucas?? Like this is some Shakespearean tragedy bullshit… Whoever decided his gravestone CG needed THREE variations is sadistic lmao 😭

My crops are dying, my skin is dry, everything is pain… I guess all we can really do is take some solace in the fact that he gets a happy ending with Nadia in Le Salut…

I don’t think the salvation theme music ever even played???? I also realized this motherfucker’s been wearing high heels the whole time while on his murderous rampage??? WORK BITCH damn 💅

Phew this rant for just Lucas probably could’ve been its own post honestly lmao but oh well, the man changed my brain chemistry… guess it’s time to pray for the FD to be localized. Please our lord and savior Scien, let it be soon, Lucas deserves so much better than what he got 😭

Well guess that’s it for my rambling posts about virche evermore!! This game was a wild ride from start to finish and I loved it, time to make shitty memes to cure my brain rot (sorry if this post was incomprehensible LOL)

[ghoooooooooooooooost]

i had to reread n edit this before posting like i was going over an essay jesus christ ((tristamp spoilers))

tldr; i was honestly disappointed but i still don't think it was completely awful + i hope if they do a 2nd season it's better *wants to see milly*.... fuck the director though

EDIT!!! 2nd season was confirmed so you can ignore the points where i question if it will happen lol

EDIT 2 actually idt i'll watch the 2nd season... for reasons that just hit me so.... + fuck night*w as well

most of this was written before the finale eek

the major problems were that the pacing was soooooo weird n some of the changes (both story wise and design wise) they made were questionable esp towards the latter half

my positive points:

i do still think individual eps at the first half were really good

i loved the animation + how they used colors

the backgrounds are cool

the artstyle shift in wolfwood's flashback was cool

i've always been "ok" abt vashwood honestly (sorry) but i will acknowledge they were very yaoiful here. i saw a person who didn't ship vashwood say the ep in tristamp where they literally just met made them ship it which was really funny bc how did that change your mind so fast

i'm ngl the milly + eriks name drops made me *JAWDROP* but that's something that only matters to ppl who watched/read the ogs first

my negative points (uh oh):

white washed wolfwood (+ his skintone is soo inconsistent in merch)

they gave vash no room to breathe n he doesn't get big sillay moments after ep 3

^ this is true for every character except i guess roberto? more on roberto later

^^^ goes with the previous too points but it felt like they were way too focused on the drama n sadness without enough (long lasting) happy or hopeful moments to contrast or balance it out overall - to the point were the characterization of our main cast suffered for it bc there wasn't enough there with them to make that properly work. and THEN the silly moments ended up suffering too bc they start feeling out of place. the drama beats kept happening one after the other at breakneck speed without breaks, messing up the pacing as well (i can kinda blame this at least partially on the fact they only had 12 eps when the og was 26 eps but i've watched plenty of 12 ep series with great pacing so i don't really know what happened here?)

i disagreed with this at first, but the lore with vash being front-loaded really did hurt the story a bit in the long run. obviously they did still spread the full details out over the course of the show but it was :\

specific to "the running man"- it's my fav ep tbh but it was strange how all the townsfolk were partying w the nebraskas with no indication they'd arrest them after they did so much damage n vash didn't even get to fix the damaged plant?? so why were they so joyous when the initial problem wasn't solved?

roberto.... was such a weird character... he managed to be both a dick n a guy w no personality, he was there to give exposition + attempt to be funny? n then die. also the marketing staff fucking hates him he's never in any merch wtf ((edited after the finale: well now we know he wasn't meant to replace milly (i had a whole paragraph complaining abt that lol) + now i feel like they added him just to kill someone other than wolfwood off))

i can't speak much on elendria bc i had so much trouble reading trimax forever ago that i never retained anything abt her other than she's trans, but everything involving her in tristamp felt strange/ like it didn't work. i have essentially same feeling about livio here. they threw legato to the side??

what the fuck was the thing with the plants towards the end. it just hit me what the hell

minor nitpicks:

i miss the old anime's ost :( tristamp's ost isn't bad by any means n there are tracks that i really like it's just idk man. especially with the the op song, i couldn't get myself to not skip the op SORRY. could you imagine how hype it would've been if a new rendition of H.T. or NO-BEAT started playing

i'm fine with stamp vash's design (blasphemous i know) but man would'n've one of his og coat designs worked well in 3d? i feel like it would've ((added after the finale: the new coat did look nice in black + they brought back his old hair in the last ep tho so. MAYBE... IN SEASON 2.... CLASSIC COAT....? *delusional*))

NO LOVE & PEACE?!?!?!?!

one of my nitpick points was that they technically didn't give vash the black hair bc i really wanna see it animated one day but assuming they are teasing a season 2 maybe they will eventually. but then how...?

[sundrop-tetsu]

𝐚 𝐧𝐞𝐰 𝐟𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐝 & 𝐩𝐢𝐜𝐧𝐢𝐜 𝐛𝐚𝐬𝐤𝐞𝐭𝐬 | a. adrien ✔︎

ఌ 𝐬𝐲𝐧𝐨𝐩𝐬𝐢𝐬: how cute! someone created a cat noir blog to appreciate him. his heart fills with joy whenever he reads a new post. he badly wants to be the creator’s friend, and that feeling increases when he finds out the creator just happens to be you, the quiet writer

ఌ 𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬: adrien agreste x fem!reader

ఌ 𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞: major fluff, platonic & a bit romantic

ఌ 𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬: heart attack cuteness

ఌ 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 2690 words

ఌ 𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫´𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐞: week 2 of fluffy february — the great outdoors @fluffyfebruary <33 enjoy everyone !!

"M'lady, don't you get it! Someone out there finally appreciates my beauty." Cat Noir winked playfully.

Recently, a new blog had surfaced and increasingly became popular. Similar to the ladyblog, it was a blog about Cat Noir. Videos about him during battles were posted daily as were cat puns, those were his favorite. Like Alya, your goal was to one day have a full blown interview with Cat Noir. But instead of wondering who's behind the mask, you choose to give him his privacy and instead try to show him that his work was appreciated just as much as Ladybug's was.

"Aren't you over exaggerating? It's similar to the ladyblog. Alya posts things about you as well." Ladybug chuckled.

Cat Noir's smile died down as he blinked at her. She couldn't be serious, right?

"Alya's great and her blog is well made but, it's about you. I'm only in some videos because we're partners. It's nice to know someone sees me as the hero of Paris as well." He gave a sweet smile.

Ladybug's eyes widened at the realization. He felt as if people still looked at him like a sidekick. She sighed before leaning in and kissing his cheek.

"You're a great hero, kitty. After all, saving Paris wouldn't be nearly as fun without you." She smiled before grabbing her yo-yo.

"I'll see you later!"

Cat Noir's face blushed a light red, smiling before giving her a small wave.

"Bye buggaboo!"

That night, Adrien continued to go through the recently made blog made just for him. It was wonderfully designed. Cat puns were posted daily, videos of battles where he was in action were posted, and theories about his powers were written as well. The voice behind the camera in theory videos sounded familiar to say the least, but he wasn't sure where he had heard it before.

"That person is weird. Making a blog for Cat Noir." Plagg commented as he took a bite of his cheese.

"Really?" Adrien teased, "they post recipes for Camembert too."

"Wha-!," Plagg quickly lightened up, "Wait a minute. How do they know Cat Noir likes Camembert?"

"There was a theory video about how Cat Noir's kwami might love eating Camembert because my suit always smells like it." He sighed.

"Oh I suddenly love this person! Adrien, we have to befriend them! They probably love Camembert too."

"They do, why do you think they post recipes for? To eat the food after." Adrien laughed.

"New goal set! I'll find the creator of the blog. They probably carry some delicious Camembert with them to school." Plagg happily flew around the room.

Right, you were a high schooler. It was stated in one of your Q&A videos. You were answering questions about your thoughts on some of the superhero's and your theories on Cat Noir. At some point, someone asked about your age, wondering if you were a teen like Alya, the creator of the ladyblog. You said you were and even went to the same school as Alya.

"Who knows, maybe we can be friends." Adrien smiled at the thought of it.

☯︎ ☯︎ ☯︎

"Alright everybody, today we're going to talk about.."

Plagg tuned out Adrien's teacher before sneaking out of the bag. He smelled Camembert near and just knew that the creator of the Cat Noir blog had to be in Adrien's class now. He quickly returned to his bag again before grabbing the slip of paper that Adrien asked him to put in the creator's bag if he did find them. Towards the back of the classroom, a girl sat next to Nathaniel, quietly pointing to their phone while Nathaniel smiled and wrote some things done.

"Creator found!" Plagg whispered.

Their backpack was similar to Adrien's but it was filled with papers and a booklet that contained pictures of Cat Noir. Finally, Plagg found a container that had a small pie with Camembert inside. He licked his small lips before taking a bite and setting down Adrien's note in a noticeable spot, making the bag shake a bit. Your eyes turned towards your bag as you saw it shake.

"Hold on for a sec, Nate." You smiled at him as he nodded and turned back towards his sketch book.

You grabbed your bag and opened it, looking around to see if there was anything out of the ordinary. A small green note was sticked on top of your booklet of Cat Noir pictures. You grabbed it and set it on your desk, wondering what it was. The bag shook once more and your eyes widened. This time, you noticed it came from your container that held your lunch. You cautiously opened it, and before Plagg could react, your eyes landed on him. ...Tikki was gonna kill him again.

"Meow..?" He tried, hoping you were dumb enough to think he was a small cat.

"Wait a second," you paused, he looked familiar to you, as if you've seen him somewhere, you snapped your fingers before remembering, "your the Camembert thief that Ms. Mendeleiev mentioned a few days ago! When she got akumitized into Kawamibuster."

You left some things out..

When news got out of the new supervillain, you ran to the battle and took some pictures and videos of Cat Noir in action. Hearing their conversations as well, you learned more about Kwamis that Cat Noir and Ladybug had. You were even there when Ladybug got her kwami taken away. But you quickly looked away and went over to a new spot, not wanting to know her identity and respect her privacy.

But you can't say the same for Cat Noir. It wasn't that you wanted to know his secret identity, it's just that you ended up seeing his civilian form when he ran towards the door. You'd recognize that blonde hair and green eyes anywhere. After all, Adrien was someone you saw everyday due to going to the same school and being in the same class. But you kept it a secret, not even mentioning it to the cat himself. The videos and pictures of that battle were sitting on your computer, unpublished so that no one knew you were there during the battle.

Plagg blinked, trying to pretend he was an animal or a bug, begging for you to believe it before he caved in.

"You must be an animal obsessed with Camembert." You smiled.

Oh thank god, you didn't think he was Cat Noir's kwami. He continued to blink at you, pretending he didn't understand what you were saying. You assumed that the Kwami didn't want to get in trouble again for being discovered as a kwami. So you played along, pretending he was an animal.

"I have to put my bag down before Ms. Bustier sees me talking to my bag, I'll put you down. You can take it if you want, I have another container of it anyway that I can eat for lunch. Go ahead and sneak out. It was nice seeing such a cute animal." You put your bag down before turning to Nathaniel who smiled at you.

"Did someone call you?" He asked.

"Yea actually, it was my mom asking if we wanted to eat out during lunch." Which was actually true, she had texted you earlier asking if you, Nathaniel, and Marc wanted to go get something to eat with her during lunch.

"Oh, sure we can. It would be nice to see your mom again." He smiled.

"Alright, I'll let her know." You were grateful you had forgotten to reply to your mom earlier.

Once class had ended, you grabbed your bag before checking if the small Kwami had left. He did and left behind an empty container of your Camembert pie. You smiled, your theory on Camembert being Cat Noir's kwami's favorite was true.

You grabbed the note before walking along with Nathaniel who greeted Marc as you gave him a small wave and smile as you opened the note in your hands.

'Hey! I was wondering if maybe you wanted to be friends. I heard you were a big Cat Noir fan, so am I! If you'd like to be friends, let's meet back in Ms. Bustier's class during lunch :)'

It wasn't signed by anyone but you could assume who it was from. You sighed, Adrien truly was a dummy sometimes. No wonder why his kwami was in your bag, he was delivering a note from Adrien. On the bright side, Adrien wanted to be your friend. He was a nice person in your class. The first time you talked to him was on your first day. He was kind and showed you around the school. You weren't really friends but you thought of each other as nice acquaintances. Guess that was going to change now.

"Guys, I forgot something in class. My mom is waiting for us outside. You guys go ahead, let her know I'll be there soon." You told Marc and Nathaniel.

The two of them nodded at you before you walked off back towards Ms. Bustier's class. Just as promised, there was Adrien nervously sitting in his seat as he wrote something down, more than likely was doing his homework early.

"Hey there, stranger." You playfully knocked on the open classroom door.

Adrien quickly turned towards you before giving a nice smile.

"Y/n! It's great to see you."

"It's nice to see you too, Adrien." You chuckled at his excited state.

"So a Cat Noir fan, huh?" You asked him, taking a seat next to him where Nino usually sat.

"Yea, he's a great hero, don't you think?"

"One could say he's really paw-some." You laughed before shaking your head, "Sorry, it's become a habit. I'm a huge Cat Noir fan after all."

He laughed at your pun as well, grateful that someone liked cat puns.

"Between you and me actually, I have a blog that I write about him." You whispered with a playful wink.

"What? No way! You're the creator of the Cat Noir blog?" He pretended he didn't know.

"That's a paw-sibility."

Another pun, how cute. He chuckled before offering you a piece of paper.

"You know, between me and you, I know a lot about Cat Noir. You could say we're best fur-ends." You both laughed again before he continued, "let's meet up later in the park. Here's my phone number."

You nodded and took the paper, "I'll bring a picnic basket so we can eat. Anything you like?"

"Hmm, oh, Camembert. And lots of sweets." Adrien almost drooled at the thought of baked goods.

The Camembert suggestion must be for his kwami, you thought to yourself.

"I'll see you later then, new friend. It was great talking to you again, Adrien." You got up and headed towards the door, giving him a small.

He waved goodbye to you as you disappeared from the doorway. He grabbed his bag but paused when he noticed a container where you were sitting. He opened it and it had a small Camembert pie inside. He cringed before putting it in his bag for Plagg. You probably assumed he liked Camembert now since he suggested it. But he smiled at how thoughtful you were. A new friend. Adrien really liked the thought of it. Someone who liked both sides of him. He really wanted to make a good impression on you and it seemed he did.

As he left, a groan was heard as Marinette came out of her hiding spot from her seat. She frowned as she watched Adrien disappear.

"So y/n created the Cat Noir blog. Hearing cat puns outside of fighting akumas is even more tiring." She sighed before grabbing her bag.

"Marinette," Tikki shook her head, "you shouldn't have been spying on Adrien and y/n. Her admitting she was the creator of the blog was probably personal. What if she only wanted Adrien to know because he has information on Cat Noir for her?"

"I know, Tikki. I was just curious about what Adrien was writing," she sighed again, "he just wanted to make a new friend. I won't tell anyone about this anyway. Come on, Tikki. Alya's waiting for us." Marinette smiled before walking out.

☯︎ ☯︎ ☯︎

Later that day, you happily packed some sweets and Camembert goodies for both you, Adrien, and the adorable kwami he had. Some delicious macaroons, croissants, Camembert pie, cookies, and some sweet fruit punch. After finishing up the picnic basket, you grabbed your phone and sent him a text.

You: Hey Adrien :) I'm ready and packed! Would you like to meet up now?

A ping came from your phone a few seconds after.

The Paw-some Hero: Hey y/n! Yea we can meet up right now :) I'll meet you over by the fountain and then we can pick a spot to sit and eat

You: Sounds like a plan, boss man. See ya later!

You chuckled before grabbing your basket and leaving the house, you had told your mom prior to this that you were going to the park with a friend.

Arriving at the park, you noticed most people had left already. It was starting to get a bit late and the sunset was setting in. You sat by the foundation and waited for the great Cat Noir to arrive. You chuckled. Some people would be extremely surprised to learn that Adrien Agreste and Cat Noir were the same person. But honestly, you could see Adrien in both of them. Cat Noir was a part of him, he was just someone who Adrien couldn’t be in his day to day life. You frowned at that. The reason you created the blog was to show appreciation to the great superhero since Ladybug was always in the limelight. That, and he was your favorite hero. You were quite biased in your blog a lot of the time.

After waiting for a while, you decided to pick a spot and laid out a blanket before settling down with the picnic basket in front of you. You smiled at the fresh air and the pretty sunset before catching a glimpse of the black cat heading your way.

“Nice to see you again, stranger.” You opened your basket and started setting out the goods that were inside.

“There you are, I was wondering where you went.” He chuckled before setting himself down next to you.

“No worries, I decided to pick a spot for us. I brought some of my favorite sweets. Oh! And I really like Camembert, as you can tell from my blog haha, so I brought some Camembert pie in case you want some.” You brought out the container.

Adrien sighed before cringing at the cheese, he didn’t mean to offend you or anybody who liked the cheese, but it smelled so disgusting to him and he didn’t understand how you or Plagg could love it so much. He quickly cheered up when his eyes caught sight of the delicious baked goods you brought out of your basket. You nodded and let him know he could take one. He quickly took a macaroon and took a bite.

“This is delicious, y/n! Did you make them yourself?” Adrien asked with a happy smile.

“I did, it seems you like them. That’s good. I hoped I followed my mom’s recipes correctly.” You giggled as Adrien took some more bites.

“So, how are you doing?” He turned to you before finishing the macaroon.

“I’m feline good.” You gave a small smirk.

“You’ve got some purr-sonality there.” He chuckled at both puns before giving you a small smirk back.

Just like Cat Noir. Just like Adrien.

He felt like he could be his entire self sitting here on a picnic blanket, staring at the sunset with a new friend.

But regardless of it, you weren’t someone he could share all of himself with, especially not his double self.

But you already knew all of that. But you wouldn’t tell him that. Not yet at least.

Until then, the great outdoors continued to blossom a beautiful friendship between you and Adrien. Or maybe.. something more.

[theminecraftbee]

Re: your winged!Grian origin post

I joined the HC fandom circa early s7, and I just want to say that I think we as a fandom are sort of retroactively putting importance onto the whole bird symbolism. Yes, it's important and does make some sense, but back then it definitely felt like probably 80% of winged Grians were Watcher Grian (inspired by ATUS) and parrot or chicken or any other wing was the outlier. I understand not wanting to place too much importance on any one particular fic, but it's hard to overstate just how much ATUS was THE watcher fic. No one except the most niche fans had watched Evo, but suddenly this was The One Thing About Grian (the most popular hermit) so everyone in the fandom had to read that to understand any fanworks, basically. And a huge amount of Watcher knowledge that became fanon, especially back then, was extrapolated from ATUS, full stop.

TLDR. yes it's good not to raise one fic on a pedestal but I also think we shouldn't be trying to erase ATUS influence after the fact. Feels like a weird attempt to change history

(Also I swear this isn't ATUS propaganda I only read it the once. I just legitimately think it's an important part of hermit history and am trying to help, so sorry if this comes off mean or anything!)

so, disclaimer, i wasn't there in the fandom at the time, but my own like, editorialized thoughts on this, as opposed to informative (which means my own opinions are in here and you may not agree with them, this isn't meant to be a factual accounting of fandom history anymore):

i don't think you're entirely wrong, which is why i went out of my way to include it; at least on tumblr, i think that fic probably had an outsized influence on how people write watchers and the winged grian stuff. as someone who wasn't around, the main way i know that is "people still discourse about it", "specific design elements that weren't super present in canon (or present at all in hermitcraft canon) are really present in fanworks", and "i know full well that, while people claim cleo said she read atus, she only said that she read a fic where grian had wings and something about how he was sad a lot if i remember right, and the fact that people extrapolated that to mean atus says some pretty strong things to me". like, all of these things together is why i think atus clearly had a lot of influence here.

that being said, i do have people in my comments like "oh yeah i realized he liked flying so i drew him with an elytra a lot, and then i saw people adding feathers so i started doing that". that seems especially common with people who were, say, on the reddit at the time - they didn't have the fandom context that was causing it on tumblr, so they either A) originated giving him wings on their own or B) picked it up from other artists and made assumptions about where it came from.

the thing is that while atus clearly had a huge influence on the older fandom... i bet, show of hands, most of the newer fandom members who joined late season 7 and beyond? have not actually read atus. or, if they have, that isn't their main influence for the winged grian art - other winged grian art is. that's how stuff like this ends up spreading in the fandom. hell, that's what we're seeing with things like xb's fish properties - one or two people who were big in the fandom liked it, and other artists picked it up from them, and it wouldn't surprise me if it really does become a ubiquitous character trait of his that people are baffled by at this rate. the hermitcraft fandom does that a lot.

that newer grian artists don't have that fandom context so they are drawing him with wings because they know he is meant to have them, and are making up the reason they think he should have them. atus has, at this point, been mostly removed from the wings equation. the watcher thing hasn't - he's never losing that association - but specifically atus's influence isn't really a major factor so much anymore. besides, as i said: i see him with parrot wings far more often than i see him with purple ones these days, and it's a little silly to say that that's not because of season 7, when it absolutely is.

all of this is to say that when it comes to the wing stuff atus is absolutely important which is why i included it but i sort of get the sense grian would have ended up with wings even without atus, if only because of the parrot stuff in season 7 when combined with the fandom's specific love of non-humaning people.

as for the watcher stuff... so here's the thing. i think fanon watcher stuff is absolutely heavily influenced by atus and it wouldn't be an inescapable part of grian's character without it, if only because evo just is not that popular compared to hermitcraft and people wouldn't be dragging all the evo stuff up in the specific way hermitcraft fans do if atus hadn't happened. so many of the watcher tropes people use originate clearly from that fic.

and like. okay. i agree with people when they say a lot of those tropes would have cropped up around watchers anyway. i know the "the watchers are evil" thing is a massively debated plot point but it's such low-hanging fruit people would have grabbed it. i have seen the watcher statues, people would have grabbed the angel imagery. people would have grabbed the purple. it's more the specific confluence of ideas that seems to have originated with atus, and more specifically, the popularity of doing watcher stuff in the first place.

once again, to be clear: the watcher stuff has undergone a LOT of fandom mutation. i think most new fans hear about it and don't know about atus, and even maybe watch evo themselves, which is neat. but evo... is not as big as hermitcraft! evo is an old series! and like. yhs or even vault hunters don't get as integrated into the characters as evo does, and that's almost certainly because it blew up at one point. and while i think most current watcher people do their own thing, i think it would be disingenuous to say that atus didn't have an influence on the fact that the fandom does not let go of the watcher thing for grian, just like trying to claim that the superhero fic trend in dsmp didn't come from tommy's unbeatable method. like, yes, the people doing it now aren't necessarily doing it because of that fic, or using the tropes because of that fic; they've picked them up themselves. at the same time, it's hard to say the popularity didn't start there.

i also know it sucks to say that, since a lot of people have some shitty memories related to atus, which i won't comment on because i was really not there for that discourse and i don't want to put words in people's mouths. it also sucks because people hear that and think people are saying they aren't being original/they're making things up, or that it's bad that they do the watcher things, and they want to defend it. i get that. like i said, a lot of the tropes that we attribute to atus probably would have been associated with watcher stuff anyway. its just that watcher!grian would have been a lot more niche without it, i think.

(with the possible exception of if martyn had still done his thing at the end of last life; we have no way to know how much he was influenced by fanon or not on that, given that he and grian were the actual writers for evo lore and all that. that's a different can of worms though we're talking about hermitcraft here.)

this also comes from me as an outsider, someone who really only entered the hermitcraft fandom early season 8, and only started watching mid season 7 (after the turf war, even). this is my observation of the trends as i've seen them. it probably feels different when you're an insider, as well, and were there at the time this stuff came about. and i admit some of this comes from being someone who joined the fandom late and has had trouble picking up the why for the watcher stuff. i get it with the "grian has wings", that's constantly reaffirmed as a headcanon, but a lot of the weird specifics of watcher tropes continue to baffle me as someone who isn't really interested in watching evo and mostly just wants to do hermitcraft stuff. (i use the watcher stuff sometimes as it suits me, as i do with basically all the fanon. i'm mostly neutral to it i actually have stronger opinions about hels stuff than i do watcher stuff when it comes to 'things that are largely fanon', lol.)

anyway atus is also fascinating to me because it's like. reading it now it's like, okay? it isn't bad, i'm not saying that, but it's also not a masterpiece, and it very heavily reads to me as "this fic got lucky to be in the right place at the right time to have the influence it had, by being the first to do a trope other people would latch onto later", and i think that kind of way fics work is interesting as someone who writes fics myself. (for the record, that's kind of how i consider black box too - it's fine, it does what i wanted it to do, but also it is as popular as it is because it happened to be in the right place at the right time and was the first decently-written thing to do a trope other people would latch onto later.) i can see why people would be annoyed to have the stuff they do that they consider unrelated to it constantly attributed to it, especially given the amount that it's just become established fanon by now that people don't have to know any of the original context to be able to use.

uhhh that was long the tl;dr is that the wing stuff almost certainly would have happened eventually anyway from what i can tell and a lot of the tropes we use for watchers probably would have also shown up anyway, but it's also silly to pretend that atus isn't a huge part of why it's as popular of a set of tropes as it is, because it is a part of that. that doesn't make any of the tropes bad or unoriginal though and i think people should keep doing them they're cool

[greysfall]

My 4444-word review of NEO TWEWY (with personal illustration + heavy spoilers)

My overall critical score for the game is 7.5/10, while my personal enjoyment score is 8.5/10. This review is posted as I have 80% completed the game, got the secret ending and achieved the Angel psychic rank. I’ll first start with the main pros and cons as follows.

PROS:

-        Enjoyable as a whole, still upholding the first game’s spirit in world building and sharing the same backbone - which was mostly revealed in the Secret Reports, it’s impossible to grasp the story without reading them.

-        The new cast and new game is charming in their own way

-        The old cast’s return is one of the biggest highlights for sure, it was fun and impactful. Everyone stays true to themselves and also had their own stories wrapped up nicely.

-        Boss designs are cool, new pins are fun to use and collect

-        The connection between the old and new cast is well written and executed, including but are not limited to the tension between the old and new protagonist, the weird but fun interaction between the 2 Composers, the new friendships revealed and formed

-        Sho being in the main cast is something so uniquely TWEWY and uniquely Sho

-        Still good music

-        Still many fun side quests, some of them really uphold the same quirky spirit of the old game and some are surprisingly touching

-        Many new nice stores and yummy looking foods to explore

-        The map is really easy to memorize for me, it’s fun to travel around the “current” Shibuya to see all the differences compared to the past

-        The social network is crazy and interesting to read through

-        Has an anti-frustration system to help 100% complete the game more easily and earn money faster, so post-game is relatively managable.

-        Overall, I really feel the efforts the team poured into making this as their passion project, not just during the development process but for all the last 14 years. They showed the vision of what they wanted to make, at the same time giving something to both the old as well as new fans.

CONS:

-        The biggest problem with the game is scenario writing. The story is so heavily back-loaded. The director himself thought it would be better to balance out the tension flow by adding more at the beginning but gave in to the scenario writer in the end, probably due to time pressure. This results in an underwhelming execution of characterization and lots of wasted potentials for the first half of the game.  

-        I struggle to view it as a stand-alone game, since the backstory and the old cast both play such an important role in the core of the game. If someone plays this game without having played the OG, they can only enjoy it on surface value at best.

-        The new cast is nice but most of them aren’t quite as intriguing as the old cast, maybe it’s cuz they’re all too nice deep down that they lack a little bit of an edge, of that batshit craziness that everyone in the OG used to have? I think some characters (Fret, Nagi) ended up weaker in terms of characterization because the writer is too afraid of making them unlikeable – which kind of backlashed cuz they only became likable in the most expectable way to cater for a specific group of fans. I would have wished for the other team leaders to be more crazy too, had they not suffered 30+ loops of the Game…

-        The CAMERAWORK IS HELL.

-        Gameplay does get tedious at certain points with all the time travels.

-        Shiba is so badly written as a villain, some Shinjuku characters should be given more screentime cutting into Shiba’s– like Hishima or Kaie or even, Hazuki (though his limited presence also solidified his importance).

-        Some of the main character designs, for example Beat’s hairstyle and his food reactions are hilariously bad. What’s the point of covering up most of his unique facial features?

-        Some of the minor/side characters’ design are too cool for them to have such a small role (eg: Ayano, Eiru). Ryoji did get much screentime but is nowhere as fun as Makoto was.

-        Overall the scope of this game is made a little too big for the team to handle as perfectly as the last game that was very compact, it felt somewhat rushed in development too so the missing pieces are clearly there in the final picture

The entry fee versus paying for it all in the end

An important difference between the Neo game and the original Shibuya game was that the Shibuya rule asked for an entry fee that is the Player’s most important asset, stated as a chance the Composer gives them to reexamine themselves. Meanwhile, the Shinjuku rule neither encourages nor allows personal growth and ultimately aims to erase as many Players as possible. It’s a pity we were never introduced to the full Shinjuku rulebook, as it seems like the system there focuses more on building up power and a grand government to compare with the individuality-driven system of Shibuya.

When you have to compare the new game and the original game (OG), this is an important factor to consider. Also, the OG has a serious storyline running through and through, locked with a different partner/GM creating unique atmosphere for each week and you don’t get to see your old partners again until the end. NEO’s team system does not allow such deep insight and communication between the Players. All of your teammates are always there throughout, the dynamic does change with each new addition but it is not as prominent as a partner change.

Another important factor is how the OG was built from scratch for a new platform as “something no one has ever seen before”, while Neo recycled a lot of old unused ideas from the previous development (check out this interview for more details). The development team for NEO lacks 2 key members and had a change of writer so the final product is not as strongly bound together as the last game.

The new cast is definitely inspired by today’s teenagers (from the view of creators), compared to the old cast they’re more sociable and always seem to take whatever works for them despite feeling unstable inside. They are all innocent and genuinely nice kids, avoiding to hurt each other to a degree that they end up keeping some sort of distance. They’re also unable to communicate at deeper levels, always stagnant at this half-baked stage of equilibrium without any motivation to get to the core of things. That is the cost of entering the game without an entry fee, without even dying or having a reason to be there/to fight seriously. These kids were stolen from the RG into a Game that was decidedly the worst environment for them to change or develop, just wandering around cluelessly to find a way “out” until tragedies started to unfold one by one and they ended up being charged the total sum of the price for their actions – ultimately losing everything in the end.

That is, I believe, a story arc which can resonate more to the youth of today rather than of my generation. If the message of the old game was to “listen”, enjoy life to the fullest and accept to trust others, the message of the new game is to “speak up” from the inside, trying to understand yourself and take actions instead of just going with the flow and finally, to take responsibility for such actions.

If Neku was handpicked by the Composer for being the special one with an all-dense soul to ensure victory of the game then Rindo was just a normal kid chosen out of random by Kubo to be his back-up plan, who just happened to have a high enough imagination to awaken the incredible power from his pin. Rindo was then officially chosen by the Composer as Josh picked up and handed the pin to him again, this time not as Josh’s personal Proxy – but as the Proxy to represent the normal people of Shibuya and via whom he could gamble if humans can fight for their own fate.

The underworld heroine and the hero with little of his own

Shoka is for me a refreshing and layered heroine. She’s the kind of character that took at least 3 trials of creators to form as a complete individual – that included Nomura who gave her the base design and Reaper background, Gen who gave a more cunning touch and the writers who made her English dialogues more punchy. Dishonesty equals “tsundere” is such a cliché, so the English writers tried really hard to avoid that trope in my opinion, while still letting her good intention come through.

She serves as the character who is informed of everything the players should have known, and there was almost nothing she could do about it. Almost. Until she met Rindo.

They were drawn to each other by sharing a state of “not having anything of their own”. They both started out with not being able to truly know themselves, Shoka even hated her RG life but also managed to mature from that stage before Rindo. She must have vibed with Shiki’s love and passion in the Gatto Nero threads, initiating her connection with Shibuya and understanding herself more. With Shoka as Swallow, they were able to open up to each other and offer mental support… but was still not getting to the centre of their problems because for all this time, Shoka could not tell Rindo the most important things about herself.

How did Shoka feel when she met Rindo at the UG? She probably didn’t want to hope that he would live the day until she witnessed the Twisters’ potentials. From the very beginning, they were both incredibly conscious of each other and also constantly frustrated that the person they happened to “notice” was such a condescending bitch/a clueless loser. The Shinjuku Reapers are overall quite drunk in power and uncompassionate to Players, Shoka included. She is also a master of dissociation, which results in her constant boredom, tone swings, haughtiness and subconsciously distancing herself from the friend – the boy she cares about – from false hope, as she judged from facts that it was a hopeless situation where nothing could ever be. Maybe she is naturally a bit of a chameleon just like her name suggests (Shoka 紫陽花 = hydrangea, the color-changing flower), so putting on an act and always dissociating herself from what’s important was easy, while hiding her contradiction was impossible. It was the ex-Reaper Beat who broke it out to her, that she should decide whether she really cared and wanted to do something for a change. He knew how it felt like to cross that line, and knew she wanted to too.  

Shoka is endeared by many of the Shinjuku Reapers and has shown independent acts of kindness (the Shinjuku ghost), proving that her kind and truthful side is as real as her harsh and dishonest side – which makes her a nice mirror to the previous heroine Shiki, who also embraced a dichotomy of self-complex and self-love within her character. In the end, she was the first of the new cast to ultimately accept all that is important to her and independently made the decision to help save Shibuya despite all costs.

She was jealous at Rindo’s interaction with Tsugumi and Kanon but remained silent cuz she wasn’t at a place to have any say about it. She also didn’t reveal about Swallow because that would only add an awkward irrelevance to their current situation, as she was too ready to face erasure at the end of the Game. She only wished to “play a game” with him, be it FanGo or the Reapers’ Game. The tension that the team could only feel at the end, she’s felt it the entire time. The song “DIVIDE” is applicable to not just one bond in the game, but it always makes me think of theirs. There is always a “divide” between her and Rindo throughout the course of their journey, as the living and the dead, as a Player and Reaper, as someone who has a place to return to and someone who doesn’t, someone who knows little but wields too much power and someone who knows a lot despite not being able to do much.

“If only I had the chance to connect with you on the other side

But time goes on, and without us realizing it

The battle is getting heated

Time goes on, and without us realiazing it

Divided again”

To be honest, maybe I didn’t grow any affection for the new main cast from Rindo’s perspective but from Shoka’s. Since I started to sympathize with Shoka, I started to see the boy in a more “real” way. The real Rindo, behind his peaceful façade with others, would lash out on Shoka for her unfairly harsh attitude while none of the others cared. He could also subtly feel that mantle of unspoken secrets from her, her own contradictions, the unresolved chemistry between themselves – and not knowing what to do with it rather than to feel angry with all the unfairness he could not process. (As a Libra too, he’s triggered the most by unfairness!)

It is actually a positive development as he’s at least “reacting” to something strongly now rather than to keep evading his problems. During my replay, I clearly saw the difficult situation Shoka was in, her remaining harshness after the Motoi incident was due to her internal struggle with a mission to save her own life, versus a chance to really be with the team. Her decision was to do both at the risk of losing favour from both sides. Rindo started to accept her layer by layer, as the person who resonated the most to her contradicting nature from the start and knew that via learning her resolve, he has learnt his too.

Later into the game, she even got too much of his attention. Maybe even without knowing she’s Swallow, he’s familiar with her thinking direction and Swallow had always been closer to him than any other friend. It was only after she had to betray her important ones twice that she could start being truly honest. The scene when she died a 2nd time left a strong impression in me, the little reveal let Rindo know that he is also losing Swallow as he’s losing Shoka – and that only death could drive the last secret out of her. Her final “Later, loser” echoed through Rindo as it was the final truth, with only him remaining to hear it: they had actually, already lost everything.

Rindo was the boy who never dared to face all that matters to him until he lost it all, fighting an unfair battle in the faith that they would somehow still win. Shoka was the girl who always knew what was dear to her, but never dared to think she could be together with them ever after and still threw her all into a battle she knew was losing. I think they stir each other on naturally to fill out their gaps, similar to what the Shibuya game partner systerm would have aimed for. The end reward was a little divine intervention to help close up the divide between them once and for all.  

During the game there was not enough space to process anything personal so at the ending when they officially became “friends”, it was an important affirmation of their bond. Some people complained it was friendzoning but it’s not, they just have arrived at the perfect place to start something more. “From now on, we will truly be together” – I read it as that kind of message.  

The heroine from a lost battle, with her story taken away

After reading the secret reports and playing the game to be surprised of how small a role Tsugumi had in the main game despite being the “Hype-chan” thought to be a major character of the next TWEWY installment, many fans would feel sad at a missed opportunity to see the Shinjuku arc in full depiction.

It was shown clearly that, a Shinjuku arc was very carefully planned out and is a vital part of the whole story, yet it could not be made due to various circumstances behind the development scene. I would assume, that the team were not able to make a TWEWY game that ended on a despairing note, but it already happened in their mind, thus becoming a mental burden that forced them to break away from it and started the game anew with NEO. A significant part of NEO became the healing arc for the Shinjuku characters, especially for Tsugumi though I really wished more emphasis should have been placed on her rather than Shiba. We didn’t even get to see her brother – Shinjuku’s Conductor who had a vital role and instead was given the clueless Shiba, who had absolutely no idea what’s going on all the way until the last day in NEO. It’s as if Tsugumi has had her story stolen away from her, because her own battle ended with a saddening loss.

I think every time the game creators look at Tsugumi, they would feel that sadness too. Maybe to them, she is a bigger character than what is seen by the fans, as despite their failed effort to depict her story, she’s lived in their mind for all these years through periods of destruction, healing and rebuild.  Though it is a pity we could not get to experience the full scope of the Shinjuku story, the creators was clear about the place they wished for it to arrive at.    

Individuality, connection and the social network

The team system adapted from Shinjuku rulebook does not allow much room for personal development, as the team dynamic is closer to a work relationship forced to bear results, than a spiritual bond to max out all corners of understanding as found in the partnership system. The old Shibuya system allowed only 1 winner and 1 week limit per game, while the new rule declares for a 1 winning team and only the team at last place will be erased – the other teams will enter another loop. Furthermore, whichever team to challenge the unwinnable Ruinbringers will face the risk of ending up dead last followed by erasure. As a result, the longest-standing teams are most likely not the strongest ever recorded, but the ones who have figured out a strategy to simply survive until something changes, enjoying their newly found social constructs while they are at it. Basically, it is a system to hypnotise players into the illusion that they are still “living”.

Therefore, we as players would not get to the core of each Player individually as fast and directly as we did in the last game. The Twisters were able to stand out not because they’re powerful, they only started to have a real chance after growing enough to each form a meaningful and personal connection to another teammate. It did not come as a team, nor did it intiate from the existing friendship between Rindo and Fret. In fact, I did not find much solidity or anything truly note-worthy about the main team and new characters within themselves until they started clashing with other team members, Reapers and new recruits from week 2 onwards. Rindo found his personal development with Shoka (via a clash with Motoi and pretty much a mini dating sim between them), then via the confrontation of his role with Neku; Fret found his with Kanon then Nagi, the team learned about the real Neku via Beat, Neku entered the UG via Coco’s wish to save Tsugumi… it was not the team but their personal links that empowered them to fight and solve each of their problems.

The other team leaders may have failed because they did not form such personal links, after 30+ hopeless loops Fuya’s team all fell apart to pursue their own interest even at the cost of erasure, Motoi quit his KOL façade to work like a dog for the Reapers (probably to save just his own ass not his team), while Kanon dropped her tricks to find changes via honest cooperation in acceptance of a fair loss. The despairing note in that is huge without making much of a scene because their failure didn’t happen at their best effort to “win”, but in their last attempt to find a way “out”. Even Shiba got his way “out” in the end thanked to his personal friendship with Hishima and Tsugumi.

Something has shifted in the mindset of the game creators in the last 14 years, as both games are about “connection vs individuality” but the last game focuses more on connection between just individuals and this one on the overall network that is formed out of those individual connections.

The introduction of Beat into the main cast was truly the bridge between old and new, they helped each other out in several turns before officially recruiting him. Beat is a character whom a lot of fans including myself have felt somewhat concerned about after Neku disappeared from the RG, so when the new kids welcomed Beat with warm and organic interaction and Beat seemed happy, I started to feel like I wanted to help them out too! I think the overall team chemistry is enjoyable enough for new players, but I could warm up to the new kids more from the pov of a returning character – whom I’m glad to be Beat, as the older brother figure who is genuinely kind, fun, serious and upbeat at the same time; who is needed and needs the kids in return.

The social network is a fun and refreshing feature. You can read all of the crazy tidbits about Shibuya and the links each character have formed with the town people, it’s also fun to visualize how the characters act off screen. Characters’ profiles provide extra insight into their background too, like how it reveals Tsugumi has been friend with Coco during her time in the RG. During the game when not all characters have showed up, you can sometimes guess which empty spot will belong to whom. For example there is a 1 character linking to Neky that is not linked to anyone else, so I could guess that was Joshua, and that another character linking only to Joshua was probably Hazuki, hinting that the 2 Composers are related before either of them even showed up.

Hazuki only showed up for 5 minutes, but his presence is so vital and true to the game that I think he is the most memorable out of the new cast. The two Composers have such an intriguing bond, with their yin/yang or phoenix/dragon themes, opposite color design, the sempai/kouhai tone and the way they keep some sort of distance/work relationship as if it’s mandatory between Higher beings, yet at the same time they can talk so casually because they are truly equal – and different from one another. I have written a separate meta on them here.

Some people pointed out, that all Shinjuku characters’ names and themes are based off Hanafuda cards and the Phoenix in Hanafuda belongs to the Paulownia suit – which is Joshua’s name flower. This is so interesting because it feels like the creators somehow saw it as a sign to interweave the Shibuya and Shinjuku storylines together. Though it doesn’t come out much on the surface, it’s fascinating nonetheless considering both Josh and Haz had at some point interfered with the other town’s affairs.

“Shibuya tour with Haz” was such a special scene, as it happened between 2 characters who do not/no longer have a reason to care about Shibuya, on the subject of what is worth saving about Shibuya. Hazuki carried out the purification of Shinjuku and stepped in to restore Shibuya just as part of his job and unlike Hanekoma or Joshua who both possess profound understanding of humanity, he really didn’t know humans at all. Rindo’s irrational wish invoked in him a sense of curiosity, to try gambling on something irrationally and learning a bit of what his senior have experienced. With all the pieces put together, it provides an overview on Higher beings as a whole, and that Joshua and Hanekoma are really the odd ones out with Hazuki being somewhere in between them and the rest.        

The old friends

It’s easy to have returning characters overshadow the new cast as they have already matured out of their personal story arc and stayed in our hearts for all this time. In the end, I have managed to enjoy both the old and new cast separately and altogether, and they will both find their own place in our memory of this game for the long term.

Sho is truly as crazy as ever, the game wouldn’t be the same if Sho is any less of what he is. Sometimes it doesn’t feel like Neky or Beat is younger than Nagi at all, with moments when it seems like Neky has aged 14 years instead of 3 years. His friendship with Coco surprised me pleasantly, and their interaction together with Beat was fun to watch. Rhyme’s found a new dream and her friendship with Kaie is precious too, especially considering that she can still talk to him online after the game ended. Josh and Neku’s interaction suggested that they have resolved the past and are on equal terms now, they even parted ways in good spirit and I don’t feel any worry about them like I did before.

Neku and Shiki’s reunion scene was beautiful, theirs is such a special bond that it has grown and supported them even without being able to see each other. I am so happy to see them all again and that they stay true to who they are, albeit looking more grown up, cooler and happier than ever before.  

Overall, NEO can’t become a classic on par with the OG, but is definitely a good sequel and a good game in its own rights. I’m happy with whether or not there will be a 3rd game to complete the 3 monkeys theme, but if there will be – I hope the creators can really find the time to learn from the last 2 games and start over with a fresh mindset and strong core.  

[wellntruly]

I rank all the movies I've watched from 2021 (40)

It’s that time again!! i.e. sneaking in just before Hollywood’s Biggest Night 🎩 (lol)

Title links go to my original spoiler-free Letterboxd reviews, followed by another link if I also wrote a longer piece (I always note if there will be spoilers in those, if there is no note you’re good!)

No building up this time we’re just starting at the top:

1. The Souvenir: Part II

When I walked out of the theater after seeing this I felt so fucking alive. [Full review]

2. The Power of the Dog

What I want to holler here I can’t holler for spoilers. Love that in a movie!!! Anyway the phrase that has gotten others to watch it: queer western gothic. [Full review]

3. The Green Knight

Sexiest movie of the year a meditation on death, feels good feels right. Revisionist medievalism re-edited over a pandemic to be longer and mistier. Daniel Hart’s score my most-listened-to album of 2021. The cloak is gold. Catch me on a certain day and this might be my #1. [Full review]

4. Drive My Car (ドライブ・マイ・カー)

Tender! [Full review]

5. Bo Burnham: Inside

Film of the year actually though [Full review]

6. Bergman Island

Interestingly given my love for it, I haven’t really recommended this yet to anyone. Watching Mia Wasikowska dance by herself is something that can actually be so personal..?

7. Pig

We’ll get to it if I post my nominations but Alex Wolff best supporting actor. [Full review]

8. Spencer

Sad girl Christmas! We love a daymare. Crafts exquisite, Kristen also exquisite. Weirder even than I hoped. [Full review]

9. The Matrix Resurrections

Haha go Lana, GO Lana! Wild this movie exists. Matrix Winter was such a time. [Full review]

10. Annette

The thing is this is boldest cinematic imagining I saw all year. I saw nothing else like this. Does all of it work? No! Is anyone else doing half of this? Noooooooo. And for good reason! But thank god Leos Carax will! Simon Helberg also best supporting actor. Why was Marion Cotillard eating so many apples… Fuck! Annette! Remember when Baby Annette!!?!

11. Azor

The Martin Eden prize for stylish, little-seen international feature that I keep bugging people about. “Did you guys see Azor though?” “What?”

12. Dune

If you go to my Letterboxd post you’ll see I only gave this movie 3.5 stars, but I already know it’s raising to 4 when I rewatch it, just on the power of vibes. Now that’s desert power. (God it’s so silly though!) (We can admit that a little bit right?) (Denis??) (Denis can’t hear me over his Rice Krispies sand)

13. Passing

First Harold of a very Harold year, babyyyy! Truly though I read the novella after and this was such an assured adaptation.

14. The French Dispatch

Bananas to say this but people are really undervaluing Wes Anderson, one of our greatest directors. Do you know that only one of his films has ever even been nominated for any crafts categories at the Oscars? Meanwhile no one is doing the work quite like him. And the first and third acts and especially interstitial of this are remarkable.

15. Flee (Flugt)

Sometimes the year's wrenching Afghan refugee story also includes a dance sequence to a-ha's 'Take On Me' five minutes in. Something something humanity, basically.

16. The Tragedy of Macbeth

The stars are lights on a velvet sky!! Honestly the fact that I hold this so high (such as higher than the next one!) is really a testament to how far design elements will get you with me.

17. The Worst Person In the World (Verdens verste menneske)

I did like it but! is it weird she doesn’t have a single female friend? Or…any friend? Renate and Anders very good though. Oslo looks like, restful.

18. A Hero (قهرمان)

I saw a picture of this actor later and I didn’t believe it. Performance!

19. Shiva Baby

I have never wanted to watch someone eat a bagel more. I lived vicariously through every bite of that bagel. Why am I so bagel deprived, shit. Is it because I left New York. Anyway Uncut Gems found in the back of the van under all of Joel’s boxes.

20. Parallel Mothers (Madres paralelas)

I just need to impress on you that in this film Penélope Cruz makes a tortilla española. Wow my top twenty is ending very hungry. (And wlw) (Harold look alive!)

And now the also-rans!

Musicals Corner

West Side Story Cyrano Tick, Tick…BOOM!

I gave all three of these 3.5 stars and they all landed back-to-back and that was not intentional but is: kinda funny. Interestingly I don’t think any of these three directors would begrudge me this. They wouldn’t, would they? They’d all be like aw thanks for the good company, I liked what those guys were doing too.

More 3.5's

The Lost Daughter Zola No Time To Die

This is a weird combo and yet, something about it kind of flows. I enjoy a 3.5! 3.5 is on the whole positive.

Some kinda complicated 3's that I nonetheless do keep thinking about at odd moments

The Hand of God (È stata la mano di Dio) Benedetta House of Gucci The Last Duel

Sometimes 3 means: ambivalent. Wow I don’t know! I think all of these are interesting though, I know that. Also those two Ridley Scotts could really go in either order, have swapped several times just while I typed this up.

3's that were perfectly fine and that’s it

CODA I’m Your Man (Ich bin dein Mensch) In the Heights

Sometimes that’s it!

The Belfast Award for Belfast (2.5)

Belfast

Weirdly, I’m very glad I watched it.

And lastly: I’m sorry ❤️

Nightmare Alley F9

There would certainly be others in this category with them, but I simply chose not to, because I'm not sure that sorry would get the heart.

There were also plenty others I just haven’t got around to yet, nothing personal! I will catch you later probably, C’mon C’mon and The Humans and Wheel of Fortune & Fantasy and idk, Old?? Actually I do still kinda wanna watch Old…why do I wanna watch Old..! Stop me from watching Old.

Also, the rest of the docs I watched:

Summer of Soul Procession Listening to Kenny G The Truffle Hunters

All five documentaries I saw were doing such different things and I like that about the medium very much. Animated memoir, historical concert film, experimental/drama therapy, the only way to do a talking-heads style doc, and a sort of natural-world mosaic with kinda no center but beauuutiful cinematography. A very good year for non-fiction! Actually technically The Truffle Hunters might have been a 2020, but I couldn’t figure it out? I mean is Cyrano even a 2021 and not actually a 2022? Emotionally?? WHAT YEAR EVEN IS IT.

It is 2022, definitely, (checks), and I am finally calling it on the films of 2021. Happy Oscars week.

[ravenadottir]

(i unintentionally lost the ask, but here it is))

so, let's consider all of the endgame li's winners, and the pandemic's impact. because of it a lot of us was more involved in social media, so keep that in mind.

bobby. during the pandemic i think he expanded on his cooking/baking activities by filming them and putting them on youtube/instagram. working at the hospital wasn't the same after show and he was already off. february (wedding episodes) he said he would open his bakery. i think he did but online and kept the once-a-week videos. also, he was on the great british bake off and brags about it on his instagram bio.

carl. he still has his company but has been a guest in several shows. "you're so timid, people would never believe you've been on a show like love island" people say back and forth. i love picturing him becoming friends with andrew smyth after going to baking impossible, saying "i have a friend who would love to be here with me right now." referring to bobby. fame is really weird to him but he's coming out of his shell.

chelsea. opening her own business. giving decor tips on tik tok, attending to girls' videos, like hope's, lottie's, elisa's. she's single for sure, "and never felt so good about it".

elisa. i really think she would be close friends with lottie and developing all those projects, makeup line, wigs collection, commenting on love island season 3. also, she's full on about her channel and inviting different female islanders to beat their face while talking about subjects like the ones hope talks about, minus economy. once or twice she has videos like "my girlfriend does my makeup" and "who knows me better, my best friend (lottie) or my girlfriend?"

gary. i rebuke the fact that he would have a tv show with his nan. no ma'am. what i do think he's doing now, at least once or twice a week, is having a podcast with bobby. from time to time they invite other islanders, possibly branching out to other seasons. i love the idea of gary and bobby throwing shade to season 3 participants by saying how season 2 was so much better and popular. i don't think he works at the docks anymore, and i want to see him on a channel about building/designing/fixing. the name is probably a wordplay with his name and "fixing". name he suggested for the podcast: the woody and the mooshy.

hannah. canonically has her book out. already on her way to write another one and has been posting a lot of reviews on youtube and tik tok, mostly romance and "published fanfics". from time to time invites noah to appear on her channel but he's always "busy".

henrik. he's still an instructor but he makes more appearances on social media. i would love to think henrik now talks about traveling on youtube, while also throwing some cuisine in there. we can't ignore the pandemic and i think that's probably the most reasonable thing for him to do.

hope. making some appearances on people's pictures but what i really think she could do is having a channel to talk about femininity and what it means to be a woman today. various female islanders dropping by to discuss some issues would honestly hit the spot for me. also, talking about the economy and saving up/investing. i know she can and i would click on it so fast!

ibrahim. i want to picture him talking about sports on a podcast with a friend. i would like to think noah is there but i'm not sure how well he would bounce off someone else in a situation like this. he's very timid and making videos, that he can edit, is so much easier. rahim talks about everything, from golf to football. having other islanders over like henrik, to talk about climbing and radical stuff, or tai to discuss rugby, is my ultimate guest list for him, but i know he's having more guests than them.

kassam. working non stop, moving from new castle to london, building a home studio that's bigger and better, releasing new music. almost zero personal pictures on social media, live gigs on tik tok, reddit and instagram. can't wait to go back to touring.

lottie. i don't like the "working in the US" thing, to me it's not canon, so... developing her own brand of clothes thanks to the money she's getting from posing to different magazines and appearances, talking about products that aren't vegan and cruelty free on her social media, video collabs back and forth with elisa, besides developing makeup with her, along with a line of wigs. and i think she and elisa would be perfect to have as hosts of the "reading" part of the pos-show about love island.

lucas. he's definitely investing on his own clinic. with that being said, he loves posing for different magazines, particularly the ones that talk about health. modeling to gather money for his own business? that's really on brand for him. also, using his platform to talk about politics and covid, besides from time to time posting one or two couple pictures.

marisol. studying from home, thinking seriously about a change in her career, "learning" how to relax since she doesn't have much to do around the house. loves to participate on hope's videos and sometimes on the boys' podcast. has a hard time not seeing her family so video chats once a week. has been reading a lot, specifically about psychology, to see if it's a fair change of career.

noah. he's not a librarian anymore. i would love to watch (and it would be my favorite asmr) noah reviewing books on youtube. please, i need it. and i think he followed the advice of a few people, especially with the pandemic hitting. he had to do something after driving himself crazy with nothing to do.

priya. designing, designing, designing. posing for a lot of magazines and talking openly about sexuality and the show. judge on several shows that involve fashion and make up. building her company slowly because the pandemic stopped her progress for a while.

[things-we-cant-say]

pretty little liar

Pairing: Ten x Female!Reader

Summary: In order to get your annoying ex off your back, you tell a little white lie that takes an unexpected turn.

Genre: College!AU

Warnings: Smutty smut, dirty dancing

Word Count: 4,867

A/N: Unable to withstand Ten’s power any longer, I had to start writing about him…or a version of him anyway. Hope someone out there enjoys my first dip into the ~imagines~ pond. ☺️

The party was in full swing by the time you and your best friend Amy arrived, the music so loud it could be heard down the street. It was a wonder the cops hadn’t broken it up yet but hey, the night was still young. Ducking through the arched doorway with Amy hot on your heels, you let her guide you into the foyer where you both stopped to take in the scene. The place was packed with people dancing, drinking and laughing—everyone apparently having a great time. Which was perfect for you because all you wanted to do was blow off a little steam and pretend you hadn’t spent the day fantasizing about committing the perfect murder.

You enjoyed school for the most part and you enjoyed your classes, but really you couldn’t wait for it all to just be over. Two extra years and your master’s degree in linguistics was almost within your grasp. You still weren’t one hundred percent what you planned to do with it (teaching was definitely out) but either way you were ready to dive into the real world. To no longer be stressed out about exams and papers and boring ass professors that constantly seemed to have a stain on their tie.

And to get far, far away from your stupid ex, Adam.

“Uh oh you have murder face,” Amy said as she peeped around to look at you. “What’s wrong?”

You shrugged. “Just in my head I guess.”

Amy hummed. “I get it. That’s why we are here though! To get fucked up and do something we regret in the morning.”

You laughed. “Guess we’re Uber-ing home.”

She grinned and grabbed your wrist, pulling you over to a table loaded with different types of alcohol. The guy ‘tending bar’ as it were winked as you two approached. “What can I get you for?”

“Something with alcohol but where we can’t taste the alcohol!” Amy exclaimed happily. “Oh! And if you’ve got any little umbrellas I’d like one of those too.”

He did finger guns and proceeded to cook something up in two red cups, sticking in two pink umbrellas when he was done. You and Amy took your drinks and after a cursory sniff, took a sip. The tequila wasn’t as strong as with a single shot but you could still detect it just not enough to make you stop drinking. Unlike Amy you didn’t plan to get completely fucked up but you weren’t going to say no to a nice buzz.

Cups in hand you migrated onto the dance floor and fell in with everyone else, bopping to the beat and scream chatting over the loud music.

“I really needed this!” Amy yelled. “Statistics is kicking my cute little ass!”

“I know what you mean!” You shouted. “But hey! Soon we’ll be done and actual jobs will be kicking our cute little asses!”

Laughing, Amy bounced up and down, sending her blonde hair flying. “Is that why you’ve been so grumpy lately? Or is it…he who shall not be named?”

With a sigh you took a big sip of your strawberry margarita. “Yeah. He keeps fucking calling me and leaving me these stupid ass messages, apologizing and shit. I’ve blocked him but he just uses someone else’s phone.”

Amy’s eyes stretched wide. “That’s like stalker behavior! Or maybe he really is sorry for what he did.”

You snorted. “Sorry for having sex with his ex in the backseat of my car? As far as I am concerned he can take his ‘sorrys’ and shove them so far up his ass they come out his mouth as safaris!”

Amy choked a little on her drink, hitting you hard on the arm in admonishment after she stopped coughing. “I hate you! I could have died!”

Her words made you smirk. “But did you? No but for real, fuck Adam. Fuck Adam and anyone who even looks like Adam!”

“Woo!” Amy threw both hands up into the air, yelping as liquid sloshed down onto her head. “Oh shit! Drink emergency I’ll be right back!”

Before you could say anything, she turned and hurried back towards the drink table. Alone in the middle of a dancing crowd, you didn’t know whether you should slink over to a corner or just keep dancing. That last thing you wanted was some random dude trying to groove with you. Of course if you decided to hold up the wall nothing would stop some random dude from trying to hit on you either. At a bit of a loss you drained the rest of your drink and did a I don’t really know anyone two step, hoping Amy would return soon.

The tequila settled nice and warm in your stomach, making you feel more at ease. Most of the people at the party were from your school but not ones you associated with on like, a daily basis. Sure you recognized a few faces from the library or cafeteria but there was no one you’d had more than a surface conversation with.

And then your eyes landed on him. Ten.

Ten was a…different sort of person altogether. He was the kinda guy CW shows thought actually existed in college, except he was very real. And very much fucking gorgeous in that unattainable way CW shows also loved. However, that sort of did him a disservice because as far as you knew, he was just a decent guy who happened to be able to do some pretty awesome things.

For example, he was an amazing dancer. The kinda dancer that just freaking mesmerized you when he moved. Had you wondering how in the hell had he taught his body to do that shit? One minute he was in total sync with everyone else and the next he was performing his solo and blowing your mind. He’d done some show a few months ago with a friend and you’d nearly flipped out of your chair watching him work. The body rolls, the attitude, the way he’d just commanded the stage…whew. Was it possible to be a fan of someone who wasn’t famous?

Then there was his art; things he designed himself or drew from memory. Art class was essentially where you’d sorta came to be acquaintances with him. You weren’t exactly good at drawing but you liked it enough that you wanted to improve, plus it helped you de-stress after particularly hard days. Ten on the other hand excelled and just like with dancing, it was interesting to watch his process. He’d described himself as a sensory artist so he wasn’t always as concerned with the end product as the professor sometimes wanted him to be. From your eye though he’d yet to create anything that wasn’t remarkable. In fact, more than once you’d wanted to ask him to design a tattoo for you, but felt it would be kinda weird. He had no idea what you were into after all. So far your conversations with him had consisted of colors and that one time he’d asked to borrow one of your brushes.

You were pretty sure he’d sold something to an art gallery.

Anyway so Ten could dance and he could draw and he could sing and he was fluent in several languages; as far as you knew the only thing he was kind of shit at was cooking. But who hadn’t set a class kitchen on fire once or twice? Or three times…

If he were an asshole—well people would probably still crush on him—you’d count that as a major flaw and want to keep your distance. But the kicker was that he could do cool things and he was nice. Dorky even especially when it came to cute animals. Was always posting pictures of himself at the animal shelter playing with the kittens and the puppies, or just acting like an idiot with friends. Yet it was that confidence that made him seem untouchable, and also made him sexy as fuck. More than once you’d fantasized about biting his Adam’s apple.

Heh.

Shaking your head, you fanned lightly at your face with both hands. Maybe stepping outside for some fresh air would be a good idea.

“Y/N!” Amy nearly tripped over her pretty sandals in her hurry to get back to you. “Weewoo weewoo weewoo!”

“Um…”

She grabbed your shoulder. “It’s a police siren! We have a code red situation here, I repeat a code red! Adam just walked in!”

“What?” You blinked and immediately looked towards the doorway, brows narrowing when you saw she was right.

Standing there in a white t-shirt in his formerly handsome glory was your ex-boyfriend, Adam. Once upon a time you’d thought the world of him; thought he was the kinda guy you could probably marry someday. The kinda guy you’d introduced your family to. Turns out he was the kind of guy that hooked up with his ex in your car repeatedly until finally being caught in the act. Sure it had been gratifying to make him and her walk home half naked but it had done nothing to quell the pain left behind. Thankfully though your pain quickly turned to anger and now you usually focused on not murdering him when he popped up. There was a lot you could forgive but cheating was firmly in the do not cross zone. Everything you’d felt for him evaporated the moment you saw him with her.

And he’d promised he was over her. Lying piece of shit, you thought to yourself.

“What the hell is he doing here?! Does he even know anyone here?” you asked with a frown.

“I dunno!” your friend said slowly. “It’s possible, big campus and all. Do you want me to help you climb out of the bathroom window?”

“Yeah my boobs aren’t fitting through one of those skinny ass windows,” you replied wryly. “Though to be honest I’m almost willing to risk it. C’mon let’s—”

It was too late. Adam spotted you like an arrow searching for its target, eyes registering shock and then elation. He reached you in three quick strides, opening his arms for a hug that he was damned crazy to expect. “Y/N. Wow you—you look amazing. I’m so glad we ran into each other.”

You huffed. “I’m not. I told you we’re over Adam. Or does me blocking your calls not get the message across?”

He exhaled deeply. “Look I know I messed up but I’m sorry. Classes were just really tough and—and Lucy and I would reminisce about old times…”

“Do I look like I give a shit? You cheated on me and we’re over.” The lie came so easily. “Besides, I’ve moved on.”

“Yeah!” Amy poked him in the chest. “She’s moved on so suck it!”

Adam arched a brow. “You’ve moved on?” He sounded skeptical and that made your blood boil. “Since when? And with who?”

You’d once heard that Hippocrates came up with the saying drastic times call for drastic measures though it wasn’t something you’d be willing to bet money on. However, standing there with your ex eying you like he just knew you were lying brought a whole new meaning to the idiom. You would one hundred percent be damned before giving him the satisfaction of gloating.

Tequila’s kicking in…

Without missing a beat, you put a hand on your hip and motioned to Ten. “Him. I’m seeing him.”

Amy made a sound like a cat having its tail stepped on while Adam gaped at you. “What? I—no. No way. You’re totally lying. I’ve seen the people he’s dated and you’re not his type at all.”

This bitch.

Twirling on your black heels, you strolled across the room to where Ten sat in an arm chair, chatting with a few of his friends. Before you could talk yourself out of it, you straddled his lap and leaned forward to whisper in his ear. “Oh my god, I’m so sorry. I know this is awkward as fuck—I’m so sorry—but if you just play along I will owe you big time. I’ll give you anything. You need a kidney? You can have a kidney.”

Ten’s friends had gone mute and as you sat back to gauge his reaction—or to possibly be thrown off of him—you bit your full bottom lip. His dark eyes were watching you calculatingly, his own lips pursed together like you were a riddle he needed to solve. Up close he was utterly breathtaking, all smooth skin and silky black hair that fell artfully across his forehead. He smelled incredible.

And then he spoke.

“There you are baby,” he said wrapping an arm around your waist. “I’ve been looking for you.”

That was when you figured you owed him your first born but it was fine. “Well, you found me. Sorry to keep you waiting.”

He chuckled. “You’re worth waiting for.”

His friends still looked confused though they didn’t have time to voice their opinions. Adam stalked over seconds later like a man on a mission. “So it’s true? You and Y/N are together?”

Ten tilted his head to the side and you saw the moment the lightbulb went off for him. “Yeah we’re together.”

Adam huffed. “Since when? For how long? Where did you two meet?”

Ten smirked. “Are you taking a survey or something?” He brushed his lips across your jaw, making you shiver. “The only thing that matters is that she’s mine. Let’s dance, Y/N.”

“I would love to,” you replied with a smile. You were also grateful he’d remembered your name.

You climbed off of his lap and took his hand, sending Adam a you thought look before pulling Ten out into the thick of the crowd. Your heart was beating a mile a minute but you felt too giddy to pay much attention to it. Plus, you knew Adam was watching you like a hawk and you didn’t want to let on how nervous you actually were. If he found out you were lying he’d never leave you alone and consider you pathetic to boot. Besides the nice buzz that was finally creeping down your spine told you everything would be fine. How could it not be?

Ten’s hands settled low on your hips and he gave you a little tug, pulling your back to his chest. You fit rather perfectly with him, his chin brushing the top of your head. Picking a rhythm in the song that thumped with bass, you began to move together. You rolled your ass against him and leaned your head back to rest on his shoulder, focusing on his breath as it ghosted across your neck. A silver of light wouldn’t have been able to get between you.

Normally you wouldn’t have dared to do something like this with a near stranger but your desire to make your ex suffer was bigger than your nerves. Besides Ten appeared to be all in on the ruse; his body twisting and curving in sync with yours, fingers on his right hand sliding up between your breasts to wrap lightly on your throat. His teeth nipped at your earlobe and you gasped. Reached around to his side to clasp his shirt for an anchor. You heard him chuckle and suddenly you were spun away from him only to be reeled back in, this time face to face.

The room felt like it was two hundred degrees. You weren’t exactly wearing much—a slinky black dress with tiny ties at the hem—but even that seemed too much. Without missing a beat though you and Ten continued to grind with one another, his thigh just barely pushed between your own. Every time you swayed forward to meet him the denim of his jeans rubbed deliciously against you, sending sparks sprinting through your veins. Both of his hands were on your ass as if helping to guide you, and as you met his gaze you couldn’t help but bite your lip at what you saw there. Desire, lust, hunger—no one had ever looked at you like that before. Like they could just devour you and still not have enough of you.

It made you feel powerful.

You grinned and wrapped an arm around his neck, fingers giving his hair a little tug. He hissed and lowered his head so that he could mouth at your bare shoulder, hands squeezing your ass so hard it nearly hurt. You weren’t sure when you started to get wet—maybe it was the moment you sat on his lap or he decided to play along with your dumb stunt—but you could tell it now. Your panties were sticking to you, your skin was on fire and it was becoming difficult to think straight. Honestly however you didn’t want to think at all, especially not if it meant not being in Ten’s orbit.

“Ten,” you whispered into the skin under his jaw.

He hummed, the sound vibrating through your body. You plastered your hand to his chest and pulled it down, nails catching on the thin material of his shirt until they were brushing along the zipper on his jeans. You gave him a quick squeeze—he was hard and straining—and he cursed loudly. Between one second and the next he was dragging you down a dimly light hallway, past kissing couples and one guy passed out drunk in the doorway of someone’s room. He swung you both into the first vacant room he came to; a lavish bathroom at the very back of the house. The door was closed with a swift thump and the lock clicked shut.

You licked your lips as he crowded you back into the counter, looking down at you with a tiny smirk. That part of your brain that yammered on about bad decisions was surprisingly quiet, so you figured it was beyond okay to pull him down for a kiss. As with most of the stuff he did, Ten was a damn good kisser. His mouth was soft and warm, his tongue playful and coaxing. He kissed you like he’d been waiting to kiss you for a long time. Until it grew deep and sensual. Until you were both panting with the need for air but neither wanting to let go of the moment.

With a gasp you tilted backwards a bit, your knees suddenly weak. “Fuck me,” you said absently.

“Can I?” Ten asked, chest heaving. “Can I fuck you?”

“God yes,” you replied, already pulling your dress up until it hitched around your waist.

Ten hooked his thumbs onto the band of your pink panties and slid them down your legs, laying them next to the sink. He looked you over with that same eye he used for his art but you could tell he liked what he saw. You grabbed his hand and brought it between your legs, spreading them wider for him. Two of his fingers slipped inside of you without any resistance to find you damp and aching, already so hot for him. He started a lazy rhythm—in and out, in and out—like he was in no hurry at all. Like he wasn’t driving you crazy all the way down to the tips of your toes.

He kept his eyes locked onto yours as he touched you, lips slightly parted like he couldn’t believe this was happening. That rang true for both of you. Never in your wildest dreams did you think you’d ever really be friends with Ten, let alone about to hook up with him. It was like you’d stumbled into some alternate universe.

Bringing his free hand up to your cheek, he smoothed his thumb across your lips, pressing lightly until you let him in. You sucked his thumb into your mouth and gave it a little nip, smiling when he smirked. When he deemed it wet enough, he pressed it to your clit and you moaned, your hips stuttering upward with a will of their own. He began a firm massage, working your clit this way and that, fingers still thrusting in their maddening motion. Of course he’d be great with his hands. Of course he’d be able to play your body like a finely tuned instrument.

Pressure started to build low in your stomach. “I—I’m…”

“Turn around.” Ten took a step back and made a show of sucking his fingers into his mouth, tongue darting out to lick between them like he wanted to savor every drop.

You whimpered but did as he requested, your eyes finding his in the wide silver mirror. You watched as he unzipped his pants and pushed them along with his dark colored briefs down to the floor. You hadn’t seen him pull out a condom but he had one; ripping open the packaging with his perfectly straight teeth before rolling it onto his hard cock. It was a delicious looking thing you had to admit, long and thick with a slight curve. If you’d had the time you would have gladly went to your knees for him.

A low breath shuddered out of Ten’s lungs as he pushed inside of you, his hands gripping your waist so strongly you were bound to have a few bruises later. “Fuck, you’re tight.”

It had been a while since Adam and nobody after him until now.

When he assumed you’d adjusted to the size of him, he pulled nearly out before driving back inside of you. You moaned and pushed back to meet his thrusts, feeling the pleasure shattering through you. Your breasts bounced as he moved and he reached a hand forward, tugging down the top of your dress so that he could cup one. He rolled your nipple between his fingers and pinched, bending over you so that he could bite down onto the tender skin of your shoulder. The motion sent him even deeper and you both groaned at the feeling.

“Te—Ten,” you stammered, losing your train of thought when he rolled his hips liked he did on the dance floor. “Oh fuck! Fuck!”

The picture you made in the mirror was a very erotic one; you could see every single expression on Ten’s handsome face. The utter enjoyment he was obviously finding in fucking you was written all over it; there was nowhere for it to hide. His head was tipped back, eyes fluttering closed only to pop back open so that he could watch himself shove into you over and over again. He had you up on your tip toes, nose just an inch from the mirror itself. He was always sexy but tonight that word took on a whole new meaning.

All you could do was try to give as good as you got.

You slapped a hand onto the sink to steady yourself and clenched around him, reveling in the low whine that escaped his throat. It kinda sounded like your name.

And then he was pulling all the way out, dick bouncing as he stumbled backwards. You blinked in confusion. “Wh--what’s wrong?”

Ten ran his fingers through his hair. “C’mon. I want you to ride me.”

He sat down on the closed toilet seat lid and you straddled him without a second thought, sinking down onto his dick with a full body shudder. With your dress around your waist and your breasts jiggling in his face as you bounced up and down on his cock, he traced his tongue around your nipple before lightly biting down. You tangled your fingers in his hair and panted out his name, letting out a squeak when his palm connected with your ass for a hard slap. Planting his feet on the floor, he leaned you backwards a bit as he drove into you repeatedly, eyes watching how well your pussy took him.

“You’re beautiful,” he murmured against your collarbone. “Gorgeous—you feel so good.” He bit you again, this time on the side of your neck. “So good.”

With one hand on his shoulder to brace yourself, you rose up and let yourself come down hard over and over again, feeling him pound so deep it was almost criminal. Had the music not been so loud you knew exactly what you would have heard; the sound of skin hitting skin as Ten fucked you like he owned you. Just for tonight, maybe he did.

You weren’t sure how long it went on but when you came it still managed to take you by surprise. Your body lit up like a Christmas tree from the inside out and you cried out Ten’s name, clenching around him, your nails digging into his shoulder blades. He muttered a drawn out fuuuuck and pinched your clit with this thumb and forefinger, making you jerk so hard you nearly tumbled off his lap.

“Ah! Ten!” You shouted as he kept it up. “I—no—oh god—”

Your pussy tightened around him again and he shivered, thrusts growing erratic as he came with a grunt. You trembled through a second orgasm almost in disbelief—usually the only thing that could get you off twice in a row was hidden under your bed in a shoe box.

Seconds later you flopped against him, attempting to catch your breath. He was still rolling his hips just a tiny bit, making all the too sensitive areas ping.

“Whoa,” he said breathlessly, wrapping both arms around your waist. “That was…”

You chuckled softly. “Yeah…” Chancing a look at him, you admired the way strands of his dark hair stuck to his sweaty forehead. He was glistening, shirt sticking to his chest. He smelled like hints of your perfume and you smelled like hints of his cologne. It was all so intimate.

Reluctantly you sat back and gazed at him, wondering if things were about to get awkward. But Ten just smiled and ducked his head a little, a barely there blush creeping up into his already flushed cheeks. It was so adorable you couldn’t have resisted kissing him if you tried. From the way he melted into you, he’d had the same idea.

After a few minutes of just enjoying the feel of his lips against yours, you forced yourself up off of him. Your legs shook; you had to grab the counter to keep from tripping in your heels. You could already tell you’d still feel him tomorrow and the thought made you kinda dizzy, but in a good way. Blinking at your reflection—your hair was a dark mess—you knew there was no way you’d be able to hide the love bites that adorned your skin. They stood out stark red and purple like a bruise.

Ten remained slouched on the toilet for a couple of moments before removing the condom and tossing it into the trash. He dabbed at his dick with a handful of toilet paper, and then pulled up his underwear and jeans. “So…can I ask you something?”

You fixed your dress. “Sure.”

“Who was that guy?” he inquired with a grin. “The one you obviously wanted to get away from.”

Oh shit you’d forgotten all about Adam! “Oh he—he’s my dumb ex. He jumped stupid at me and I—I wanted to show him that he’s an idiot. That I’m totally over him. I—I’m sorry for getting you involved.”

He laughed as he patted down his hair. “No complaints from my end. I think he got the message though.” Reaching behind you he handed you your panties. “Don’t wanna forget these.”

It was ridiculous to be embarrassed considering what you’d both just done, but you couldn’t help it. You took them from him and pulled them on, keeping your eyes on the ground. “Thanks… Look Ten—”

“I’m hungry,” he said interrupting you. “Have you ever had grilled dried pollack?”

“Um yeah once I think,” you replied uncertainly. “It was pretty tasty.”

Ten motioned behind him. “I know a place that makes it if you wanted to go. And…maybe afterwards we could just hang out. Talk.”

That sounded amazing. “I’d love to. But…”

He picked up on your meaning. “Y/N I sit next to you in all of our art classes. I make conversation with you for no reason. Do you really think I of all people forget my brushes? Honestly I’ve wanted to ask you out for a while but you’ve always seemed…disinterested.”

You were dumbstruck by his admission. “Me?! That’s just my face! You’re the unattainable ingénue or whatever!”

Ten chuckled, folding his arms across his chest. “Oh please the only thing standing between me and being a serious cat dad is having an apartment that allows animals. However, this conversation is pointless. You owe me and I’m collecting…if that’s okay?”

You huffed but couldn’t stop grinning. “It’s perfect.”

The walk from the bathroom to the living room had everyone staring with a few people letting out loud whistles. Adam had disappeared but Amy was there to give you a big thumbs up. You promised to call her later and then let Ten pull you outside into the warm night air, your fingers happily entwined with his.

[whatifyoulivelikethat]

mango, m | jjk | 1

pairing(s): jungkook x reader

summary: A love story between bad boy Jeon Jungkook and a strange girl with mango eating obsession.

warnings: rated M (18+) - please be warned this story will eventually touch on parental abuse and suicide; suggestive words/actions; mentions of nightmares plaguing the reader; non-idol!AU - university!AU; badboy!Jungkook x sociallyawkward!reader, ft bestfriend!Hoseok and friendly!Namjoon

yes it’s MAMA 2020 JK, it do really be like that

–

You felt a tap on your shoulder.

“Did you do the Chemistry homework?”

You chewed the piece of dried mango in your mouth slowly. You knew that smooth voice. It was hard not to know it. Everyone at this university knew that voice, for better or for worse. You put down the book you were reading for your seminar class – Neuromancer, by William Gibson, translated into Korean. You turned your head, only a bit. Not facing him.

“I’m not about to let you cheat right in front of the professor, Jeon Jungkook.”

You heard rustling, rearrangement, and the seat next to you was suddenly filled with leather and denim, black hair with too much gel in it, and cheekbones higher than your GPA, which was quite high, both weighted and unweighted.

“Come on,” he whined in his deep voice that was not meant for whining. “You always sit in the front now. Move a couple rows back so I can copy.”

You reached into your messenger bag and pulled out another piece of dried mango. Placed the orange fruit in between your teeth and held it there, moving it from side to side. Jungkook was watching your mouth with his dark chocolate eyes. You sucked it into your lips and chewed.

“Why do you think I always sit in the front row, hm?”

You lifted your book again and continued reading, Chemistry homework right in front of you on the lecture hall’s narrow table. You didn’t bother to look up again until the teacher called for attention. Jungkook was no longer sitting next to you.

-

You had your eyes closed, leaning back against the wall, Samsung buds tucked safely in your ears, violins serenading you. Chemistry was going to start soon, but you had gotten here far too early. You wanted to read more of Neuromancer, but the class discussion was going to be on chapters one to three and you were already on chapter ten.

It was a bad habit, but you had many of them.

You felt movement next to you. Opened your eyes.

“You look different today,” Jeon Jungkook remarked. Smirking, with his black hair slicked back, different leather jacket, weird silver-coated pants. Holding his backpack by one strap, far too deflated for it to be containing much. Your messenger bag was smaller, but full of papers shoved into folders.

You tilted your head and reached into your bag. Pulled out another piece of dried mango, sticking it in between your teeth. Turned it around with your tongue, coating it with the sugary outside.

You were wearing a high-necked black dress, long-sleeved with a short skirt. Velvet, patterned tights with thorned roses and black boots with a ten-centimeter platform.

You sank your teeth into the softened mango and sucked it into your lips.

Jungkook raised an eyebrow.

You closed your eyes and didn’t open them until you heard the professor opening the lecture hall with his keys.

The outfit you wore last Chemistry lecture was an oversized purple sweatshirt and short black skirt, with opaque purple tights and black sneakers.

-

You were standing in the school store, picking up three packs of dried mango.

You brought them to the counter, to the student cashier. She rang you up and handed them back to you. You walked out, shoving them into your bag. Catching the eye of a certain someone.

“You shouldn’t eat so much sugar,” Kim Namjoon teased, nudging you with his arm.

Your eyes shifted to him and you slowly opened a bag. Shoved one in your mouth.

“They’re not that high in sugar,” you replied. “Read the nutrition facts.”

Namjoon rolled his eyes. “Added sugar. Fruit is still sugar.”

“Mother Nature wouldn’t try to kill me.”

Namjoon raised his eyebrows. “Um, viruses? Bacteria? Other human beings?”

“Viruses and bacteria are objective. They do not have desires or motivations,” you replied calmly, chewing. “Human beings are an abomination.”

“Still natural.”

“Then ‘artificial’ would have no meaning.”

“Artificial is defined as made by human beings.”

“Human beings are made by other human beings.” You stopped at a door, the seminar class. “The line is blurred.” You opened the door and entered, seeing the ten other students as you sat down in the middle, pulling out Neuromancer. Namjoon sat down next to you, pulling out his dog-eared book, wrinkled from being dropped in puddles. It was a stark contrast to your pristine copy.

“Did you finish reading?”

“Yeah,” you said simply as the lecture began.

-

Today, you wore pants.

Baggy, black, thick denim jeans with an oversized black sweater. A thick black belt, tight around your waist. No graphics. Hair down, too messy to have been brushed. You turned in your Chemistry homework at the front of the class and went to the far right. Sat down next to the wall where you knew the seat next to you was broken.

Last night was plagued with nightmares. You hadn’t gotten any sleep at all. You missed the first bus and, instead of your usual habit of being early, you ended up being on time today. In your book, on time meant late.

Nothing was going right today.

You watched the professor collect the homework.

You looked away, pulling out another book. Prey, by Michael Crichton. It was taking you a while to read this one. You had to look up words. English wasn’t your first language and the book was heavy with scientific terms. You cursed your lack of knowledge. It felt like you were losing some of the meaning by not knowing English well enough.

“I had to look for you today.”

Your nails curled into the softcover of the book.

Jeon Jungkook slid into the seat below you, grinning. Too much slicked black hair, leather creaking as he settled. Eyes dark like a starless sky.

You reached into your messenger bag. The plastic rustled as you felt around. Only two pieces left. Sigh, of course. You pulled one out. Placed it in your teeth. Spun it with your tongue. Jungkook watched, looking up at you. You snapped your teeth into it.

The piece sticking out of your lips fell.

Jungkook’s right hand shot out and caught it before it touched the ground. Ink black tattoos winked at you. Small ones, one of a smiley face with x’s for eyes, one of a heart, another of a king’s crown. One by one, his long fingers curled open, revealing the small piece of dried mango.

You chewed, eyes flickering to his face.

Jungkook smirked and pulled his hand back. He inspected the fruit, the curved part where your teeth had sliced into. Then he popped it into his mouth, eyes shifting to you.

But you were already reading your book, nose deep and ignoring him.

-

“Just let me try.”

You frowned, but held out your hands.

Jung Hoseok, your childhood best friend, inspected your nails. He had a row of tools in front of him. You were in his shabby little apartment. He didn’t attend university. He was a street dancer, sometimes a backup dancer for idol groups. He choreographed for a few lesser-known idols too. You knew Hoseok was going to get his big break soon.

You two rarely saw each other anymore.

He asked last week if he could practice painting your nails. He had odd hobbies like that. Hoseok liked fashion too. He was wearing colorful beaded bracelets, vintage white t-shirt, and loose gray sweatpants. Pink headband and a green hair tie holding up his bangs like a sprout.

The only reason Hoseok was your best friend was because you didn’t have any other friends, thus making him the best by default.

He began to file your long nails.

“Do you have a preferred shape?”

You blinked at him. “I don’t care.”

Hoseok smiled. “I think pointed nails would look good on you.”

“Okay.”

You were still wearing your baggy black jeans. Hoseok’s honey brown eyes went from your nails to your legs.

“Are you okay?”

You gave him a blank look.

Hoseok put down the glass nail file. “I’m sorry I haven’t been a good friend.”

You shook your head slowly. “You’re busy. I think all your hard work will be noticed soon. You’re blowing up on Instagram.”

Hoseok’s eyes went wide. “You made an Instagram?”

“Only to follow you. I haven’t posted anything.”

He gave you a grateful smile. The tiny dimples on the sides of his lips appeared. “Thanks.”

You nodded. The sides of your mouth moved up robotically. Hoseok nudged you, picking up the glass nail file again.

“Don’t pretend smile. I can tell.”

“Sorry.”

Minutes passed. Hoseok blew the filed keratin away gently and wiped your nails with some acetone. He held out the colors. All bright. You picked the violet and he grinned.

“You can talk to me.”

“It’s always the same shit, Hoseok.”

He frowned, painting cautiously. The harsh scent of nail polish filled your nose.

“Even if it is,” Hoseok murmured, trying not to disturb his careful work. “Talking about it will help you vent.”

“Catharsis is scientifically proven to be completely useless and sometimes amplifies the condition.”

Hoseok gave you a displeased look.

“Sorry.”

He sighed at your apology. He had told you many times before to stop apologizing for nothing. You just did automatically. Trained from repeated years of trying not to be a nuisance. Trying not to be there when you were obviously there. Hoseok tapped the purple against his palm, trying to prevent it from getting goopy.

“You can stay here,” Hoseok remarked. “I said you could.”

You shook your head. “You can barely pay your own electricity bill. And you’ll never get laid if you live with a ghost.”

Hoseok laughed. He had a fun laugh, a great one that was real and genuine. “You can joke around.”

You smiled.

Hoseok could always make you smile at least once.

-

Today it was a tight black leather skirt with a baggy white dress shirt. Black tights with a pinstripe design, silver and black ankle boots. Black turtleneck under the white shirt. And your purple fingernails with yellow smiley face nail stickers, done by Jung Hoseok himself.

You had thought about wearing your baggy jeans again, but seeing your painted nails made you change your mind for some reason.

You sat in the front row of the Chemistry lecture hall. Pulled out Prey by Michael Crichton once again, phone handy to look up translations. You had ten minutes.

The creak of leather squeaked next to you. Instantly, your left hand slid down.

You left long fingers encase yours suddenly, stopping you from reaching into your messenger bag. Your teeth sank into your lower lip. The strong fingers held you tight, stroking your knuckles. Slight calluses, filed and well-kept nails.

“I like your nail polish.”

You ripped your hand out of Jeon Jungkook’s grasp. Shoved it into your bag and pulled out a piece of dried mango.

Didn’t look at him.

Just put it in your mouth and chewed, staring straight ahead.

“You look cute today.”

Chewed.

“Did you–”

You stabbed your finger to the desk, taking your book from it. Didn’t say anything.

He copied your homework.

-

“You alright?”

Namjoon stood up as the seminar class ended.

“You were quiet today. Usually, you have a lot to say.”

You placed your papers in your folder mechanically and looked up at him. “Was I?”

Namjoon nodded. “Kind of missed having your devil’s advocate point of view.”

Your head lowered. You stared at your left hand for a second. Remembering the feeling of Jeon Jungkook’s hand clutching yours.

“Have a lot on my mind.”

-

There were no packs of dried mango on the shelf.

None.

You went to the cashier. Asked when they would restock.

“Some guy bought all of them.” The cashier frowned. “I’m sorry. I know you’re the only one who buys them. I’ll reorder and keep extras behind the counter from now on.”

You stepped out of the school store. You only had a few pieces left. You took your phone out of your pocket and checked the nearest grocery store. It was only a few bus stops away. You began to walk out of the student common area, calling the number. Asking if they had dried mango in stock. They did. Could you keep three bags behind the counter? They could. You said you would be over right away.

Black leather right in front of your face.

You walked around it.

It followed you.

You stopped and hung up. Slowly raised your head.

Jeon Jungkook stared at you. He was holding a bag from the school store. It was filled to the brim with packs of cellophane-wrapped dried mango. His black hair was slicked back, eyebrow raised. Eyes so dark that they reminded you of a bottomless pit. No smirk this time. Serious, his dark brows furrowed.

You gave him a black stare. Then you tried to move around him.

He grabbed your upper arm tightly, shoving the bag into your chest. You recoiled, but he grabbed your other arm and clamped it over the plastic. You pushed it back at him and he planted his hand down on your forearm, firmly.

You felt a little tick in your face as a muscle tensed. You did not look at him.

“Call them back,” Jungkook stated. “Tell them you don’t need it anymore.”

Your eyes shifted back and forth.

“I don’t need your charity.”

“Do it.”

His hand was immobile on your forearm, fingers burying in the loose white fabric of your dress shirt. Your other hand held your phone. You awkwardly redialed the number and brought it to your ear. Told the pleasant lady that you found some dried mango, but thank you for holding it. She said it was no problem and told you to have a great day.

Jungkook let you go.

You ran away, clutching the bag.

-

When you arrived to your own shabby apartment, you dumped the packs dried mango all over your bed, a rainstorm of crinkled plastic. You were panting from running. Heart beating so fast you thought you were dying.

You lived in the poor part of the city. The apartments were like coffins, one room, tiny kitchenette with one stovetop, one sink. A tiny bathroom with a shower. No living room, just your twin bed in the center. You lived alone, because your mother worked overseas to pay for you to go to university.

The other parent could never come looking for you anymore.

You stared at the packs of dried mango. Why had he done that? You didn’t understand.

You didn’t understand Jeon Jungkook.

The landlord came by, knocking on the door. You backed away from the pile of mango and opened the front door, seeing the old man’s face.

He smiled at you. Thanked you for paying for in advance. You nodded mutely. He looked past you, at the bed covered in dried mango. Asked you how you were doing, if you were okay. You nodded again, not replying.

The old man smiled at you, somewhat sadly. Pity in his eyes. But you couldn’t speak to him. You couldn’t reply. You didn’t have a pack of mango with you, so you were voiceless.

He told you that if you ever needed anything to let him know.

You nodded, silent.

The old man bowed and let you be.

You closed the door, locked it. Back flat against it, breathless. Winded from nothing. Your eyes flickered to the bed. Something came over you. You stalked over to it. Then you shoved the plastic bags of dried mango away, off your bed, throwing them everywhere. Watching them fall, one by one, tumbling, tumbling, thundering plastic all around you.

You panted hard, staring at your hands. At the purple nail polish, chipping a little.

You wondered when the nightmares would finally go away.

-

You sat in the front row in the Chemistry lecture.

Red skirt, oversized grey sweater. Opaque black tights. Black sneakers.

Staring straight ahead. Chewing on a piece of dried mango.

Trying to hold on.

You hadn’t slept at all last night. Maybe it was fear. Maybe it was apathy. In the morning, you had thought about wearing baggy pants again. But those purple nails winked at you, only a few smiley faces clinging on. Hoseok would have told you to wear something nice, if you called him then.

So, you wore a skirt and waited for lecture to start, chewing.

You reached into your bag, fishing for another piece. It wasn’t there. The plastic pack of dried mango was gone.

You jerked your head abruptly. It was being held out to you, from the tattooed right hand of Jeon Jungkook. He stared at you. Dark eyes so intense it felt like hellfire. Hair slicked back with too much gel. Leather jacket over a black shirt.

He did not speak this time.

You tried to take the bag, but he held it tightly. Pried open the opening a little wider, tipping it to you.

You reached in. Grabbed a piece.

Jungkook watched you. In between the teeth. Turning it with your tongue, licking off the sugar. Sucking it in, making it disappear into the pink canal.

He lowered the packet, putting it back in your messenger bag. Took out your book, handing it to you.

He did not speak.

Your hand grasped the softcover copy of Prey. Jungkook kept staring at you. Your eyes went to the book. To the words on the page. Away from Jeon Jungkook and his piercing eyes.  

-

“Did you get compliments on your nails?”

“One.”

Hoseok smiled cheerfully as he gently took off the purple nail polish. It still stank of acetone though. “Oh? Did it feel nice?”

“I don’t know.”

Hoseok tilted his head, frowning. “What do you mean, you don’t know?”

Your eyes shifted. “I don’t know because I don’t know if it was a genuine compliment or a ruse.”

“Ruse for what?” Hoseok quipped, planting the cotton ball on your nail and holding it down.

You thought of that slicked black hair and those corrupting black eyes.

“Hoseok.”

“Mhm?”

“Why did you suddenly have an interest in painting nails?”

Hoseok paused. His honey brown eyes flashed up to you. Then he looked back down at your hands.

“Because it is a frivolous thing.”

You blinked at him. He wiped your nails clean. He tapped the bottle of base coat, along with a top coat and the same bright colors.

“It is something purely for fun and vanity. It has no real meaning and is only good for self-care.”

“Did you rehearse this?”

He held up the bottle of base coat and frowned at you, closing his eyes and trying to remember the rest of his speech.

“It is something you won’t do for yourself, so I want to do it for you.” His brown orbs found yours. There was something conflicted in those eyes. “I want to spend time with you. I want you to know this. I want you to remember you have a friend when you look at your hands.”

Your lips parted.

“I can’t be there and hold you when you wake up from the nightmares.”

You looked down, down at your lap of your red skirt and grey oversized sweater.

“I know I cannot make them stop. I know I cannot change what has happened to you or make it better.”

Hoseok held your hands tightly, even though you weren’t looking at him. Held you, voice apologetic and hurting for you, feeling for you when you tried so desperately to feel nothing at all.

“But I want you to remember, every time you look at your hands. You have a friend.”

-

“I like your nail polish.”

Your nails were neon pink and green, with small flower stickers. Hoseok said the top coat should keep the stickers on better this time. He was learning. He said YouTube helped.

You reached into your bag, but a piece of dried mango appeared next to your lips. Your eyes traveled up that those well-kept nails and the tan hand with the tiny tattoos, up the leather sleeve, to the slicked-back black hair and angular jaw of Jeon Jungkook. His pink lips had a tiny mole under them. Those dark chocolate eyes stared at you.

“Eat it.”

Your hand reached for it, but he shook his head once.

“Eat it,” he repeated.

You leaned forward, the fabric of your purple sweatshirt bunching. Caught the dried fruit with your teeth, pulled back. Turned it in your mouth. Sucked it in and chewed.

Jungkook seemed satisfied. His eyes went down to your black leather skirt and black pinstriped tights. Black and silver ankle boots. Eyes back up, stopping at your thighs. Then he looked up at you.

And for once you weren’t nose deep in Prey.

You were staring at him.

“Give me your phone.”

You unlocked your phone and handed it to him.

Jungkook found the messenger app and typed in a new message. You watched him. He typed your name into the text bubble and sent it to a number. Then he handed your phone back to you.

You took it.

-

2.

--

masterpost

[shirophantomvox]

First Date with Chrollo (Human Diary)

Hello everyone! I am back with another “First Date” post featuring the Prince of Darkness. This was an anon post but I can't find the ask anywhere! I have been watching JoJo’s Bizarre Adventures lately and it is a very interesting show. Dio turned into a zombie and he’s so mean to Joseph. Anyway, let’s get into the post. The end is a bit angst-y but I did that to take a slight turn from all Fluff. I hope you enjoy! Part 2 coming sometime this week.m

It is common knowledge that Chrollo loves to read many books. When he was a child, he had time to read and that provided a great source of comfort. Although he seems to be ruthless, every human has the ability to seek compatibility and compassion. Both Hisoka and Chrollo enjoy the romance genre except Hisoka prefers to watch movies while Chrollo loves to read stories. You've known Chrollo since elementary school. You were fortunate enough to be able to move out of Meteor City and attend a better elementary school. As a child, you were an outcast and made few friends but on occasion, Chrollo would see you at a local arcade. Of course, your mother paid for the both of you to have fun but once it was over, it broke your heart because you knew about the conditions he’d return to once he left.

As time went on, you entered college and decided to invite Chrollo on campus so he could be something like a driving force for future success. You’ve been accepted into Yorknew University planning on majoring in Computer Science with a minor in Digital Art. Reaching Chrollo posed a challenge. He never responded to a few messages but on the third try, he answered with an excited response.

“Please forgive me y/n for not responding soon enough. I am more than happy to visit you. I am proud of you and your accomplishments. I do not see myself as a college man but, hey, don’t knock it until you’ve tried it right? I’ll be in touch.”

-Chrollo

At exactly 7 PM on a calm Fall night, standing outside of the campus’ most prominent book store, you began to sweat and your makeup began to drip. Just as you were about to wipe it off, you heard a voice call your name.

“Y/n? Is that you?” He chuckled as he questioned your appearance.

Turning around, you jumped a little at the sight before you. This wasn’t the same Chrollo you remember, of course. He had grown several feet, his face was much sharper, his arms were much bigger, had a bandana tied on his forehead, and he had a few rings on. He was dressed in a white polo shirt, black pressed slacks and black dress shoes. It’s weird. It felt like an arrow was shot through your heart.

“Are you ok? You act as if you’ve seen a ghost.”

“I’m fine! I’m just---You--look…”

“Ah, I see. There’s no need to be flustered. I am the same as when we were kids.”

The Yorknew Sailor Store was designed something exactly like a Barnes and Noble except the walls were painted to match the school’s colors.

The bookstore had a perfectly designed Starbucks, with a wooden finish, black and brown metal tables, beige tile floor, and glass doors.

Chrollo immediately noticed the change in behavior, one he wasn’t used to.

The students were snooty according to him and reminded him of how the city council would act towards him, his family, and those who were like him.

First, you offered to buy him a drink. The good thing about Chrollo is that if you or anyone else offers to buy something, He will not reject it. There is no such thing as having too much pride regarding him.

“Do you drink coffee?”

“Of course I do,” he replied. “But I don’t think I’ve had any of these drinks. A Caramel Macchiato? That sounds good.”

“Order it then! That will give you just the right amount of energy for today’s reading!”

To you, this was just two friends reuniting with each other but something else told you that Chrollo thought it was something more. He only dressed up like this if he was going out with someone special and even then it wasn’t an expensive Polo Short, It was his best t-shirt and jeans.

It boggles your mind how Chrollo acquired his expensive clothing but maybe he obtained a great job and is able to make a living for himself.

“I’d like to order a Caramel Macchiato.”

“What’s the name for this drink?”

“Chrollo,” you responded.

“And for you?”

“I would like a caramel Frappuccino with soy milk and no whip cream.”

“Alright. That’ll be $15.00.”

Chrollo glanced at you wide-eyed.

“It’s ok. I got it.”

You take out your card to pay and as you move out of line you bend over to whisper in his ear. “Maybe you can pay for dinner though.”

He laughed and smiled. “Of course, y/n.”

The bookstore was full of comfortable furniture ranging from light blue, dark blue, white in the lounge area. Both of you decided to sit across from each other on the blue chairs that swallowed you both as you sat.

As he read, he’d point out any interesting points in the book. He got tired of yelling across the table, so he decided to share a chair with you. He could feel the heat radiating from your body.

It was almost obvious that you all were involuntarily flirting with each other. The school was full of couples but occasionally seeing the goofy couple was the highlight of everyone’s day.

“This man was so devoted to a woman that does not know that he exists.”

“Sounds pointless,” you say, still trying to read your book.

“Well, she knows he exists but she is ignoring him and making him look like a fool in front of everyone. He says that there is something about her that he has never seen in any woman.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s her eyes, smile, intelligence, the shape of her lips, and her perfume powder aroma. Those are things that drive men wild.”

You smiled and laughed but came to a quick halt when you felt something along the ridge of your neck made you still. The hair on your neck stood up still as the invading force came in contact with your skin. It was Chrollo grazing his nose against your skin, slightly sniffing in your aroma; slowly breathing in and out.

Closing your eyes couldn’t make your sudden arousal fade. At this point, nearly everybody was looking at you both and looked away. This behavior was innocent for college culture, but it was taken as a cute gesture rather than naughty.

You blush. It was quite surprising that your childhood friend viewed you as something of the sort. It was both flattering and scary.

There’s no denying that Chrollo is handsome but if you dated him and the relationship didn't last, it could ruin your friendship.

At this point, Chrollo had his right arm resting lazily behind your back as his head and next aimed in a position that would allow his nose to lay carelessly on your neck.

“You smell delightful. I didn’t know you wore such expensive perfume. Is it….,” He sniffs again, “Flower Rose?”

“Yes! How did you know? Does your mother wear it?”

“She does now. I bought it for her a week ago and now the guys in the city can’t stay off her.”

Wow. The City. Even though it was a hell hole, it was your hell hole. How is everything? How is your mother? How did you manage to have such an expensive taste in clothing and fragrance?

Chrollo enjoys making others flustered. It's amusing to see them stutter when they’re either aroused or nervous.

On the flip side, seeing Chrollo flustered was the highlight of the century! The bad guys are used to being “bad” but expressing softer emotions makes it amazing and a reminder that they can experience them too.

Grabbing Chrollo’s left hand, you gently kiss it a few times and wink at him. He smiled, hiding his dumbfounded expression, and blushed slightly.

“I see you catch on quick.”

“I was raised in Meteor City. Just because I’m here doesn't mean I have forgotten where I come from. But I didn’t know you liked me.”

“You were the only one that trusted me and played with me when no one would.”

It felt like two magnets were pulling you closer. If he kissed you right here right now, you could just melt into a puddle but before anything happened, Chrollo’s phone rang loud and echoed throughout the bookstore.

Glancing at his phone, you saw an unknown number call, and judging from his actions he stood quickly to his feet.

“I’ll only be gone for a second.”

Hmm. That was odd. During this short intermission, you continue to read your book. Ironic enough, you weren’t into romance novels per se, you enjoyed action and comedy books!

Once Chrollo returned, his face was flushed and his soft demeanor had suddenly disappeared. He looked as if he was going to punch a wall.

“What’s wrong, Chrollo?”

He glanced at you with a somber smile, hoping to convince you that he was alright. “I am fine, y/n.”

“Are you sure?”

“Well, if you count my mother being seriously injured, then yes.”

“Oh no! We can leave now, it’s fine.”

“No, it's ok. She wouldn’t want me to leave you all by yourself at this time of day.” He pointed to the night sky.

Wow! That was quick!

“What do you mean?”

“My mother predicted that I could end up with you...she also predicted that someone would be hurt or in danger if that prophecy was fulfilled. It’s sort of like give or take. In order to make someone happy, someone has to surrender their happiness and I guess it was her.”

A single tear dropped down his cheek and nothing more. He didn’t care if other men singled out his “weakness” because he’d destroy them all and he didn’t want y/n to know about his abilities until later.

The comfort of your warmth against his head provided more than comfort. He felt safe, welcomed, not judged, and vulnerable. He knew that you wouldn’t make him out to be a bad person but instead welcome him home with open arms. You were his human diary.

[ashintheairlikesnow]

Misread Details, Part One

CW: Death talk, BBU, dehumanizing language about Box Boys

A Box Boy Serial Killer On the Loose? Part 1 of 3

r/LetsTalkTrueCrime

•Posted by u/oshaycanyousee 1 month ago

Hello, r/LetsTalkTrueCrime! 

I’ve posted this write-up in a couple other reddits, but someone pointed me to this one as being a good place for discussion, and this is a really weird set of three unsolved murders (well, one death and two murders? Maybe?) and I wanted to see if any of you have some thoughts or maybe more info on these cases.

Three men died within two years in three different cities. 

While each death is unique, all of them have one thing in common - fingerprints and DNA from a single human pet was found in every single location. 

Let’s start with the first death.

Nathaniel Matthew Benson, who went by “Nanda” (a childhood nickname given to him by a younger brother who couldn’t pronounce his full name as a toddler, apparently), was forty-one years old at the time of his death. 

He was born and raised in North Dakota by very strict religious parents, and had three younger brothers and one younger sister. There is some disagreement here about whether his home life was peaceful or not. His younger sister claims that the environment at home was strict but fair, and the family was mostly happy. Two of his three younger brothers tell a different story, about a father who put too much on their shoulders, especially “Nanda” as the eldest, and the pressure they felt to be perfect.

His other brother, the youngest of the family, has never given a public interview beyond a short statement that he and Nanda were not close, and he did not feel able to speak about his character. There were nearly fifteen years between the oldest and youngest childrens’ births, and Nathaniel had moved out of the house by the time the youngest was four years old, so this makes sense.

By all accounts, Nathaniel was an excellent student, getting all A’s throughout his years of education. He was considered quiet and shy, and most of his high school classmates don’t have many standout memories of him. He graduated valedictorian of his high school class, then surprised everyone by stating he wouldn’t be attending college, and instead would be taking a “gap year” to travel the United States using money from his graduation party and also some he’d saved up from working part-time retail and restaurant jobs.

Between ages 18 and 19, he took his small secondhand four-door vehicle around the nation, calling home every week or so to give his family updates, sending postcards, etc. After about six months, though, the phone calls and postcards became fewer and fewer, and eventually he told everyone he had gotten a new job and decided to forgo college entirely.

His family was shocked - and by all accounts his father was furious - but Nathaniel refused to budge. 

There was apparently a very hostile phone conversation about one year after this decision which was the last time Nathaniel Benson spoke to his father directly until his death.

After this, his family received only sporadic communications sent from a P.O. Box located in central California, in a mid-sized city known as Dosaba. He never did give anyone an actual home address.

He occasionally called them, mostly his sister and one of his brothers, but surviving family states that the phone number he called from was different every single time, and usually didn’t have a California area code.

“He used burner phones for everything,” Nathaniel’s sister Samantha told WNDR, a local news station, shortly after his mysterious death. “And he would never tell us what job he did. We asked and asked and Nanda would just say ‘oh, this and that’, or ‘I do contractor work’. Just answers that don’t tell you anything. It was all very mysterious, very secretive. You know, we talked about how maybe he’d gotten into drugs or something, but my brother wasn’t a drug user, ever. It just seems so out of character for the brother I knew.”

“He was always reading his Bible when we knew him,” Younger brother Timothy stated. “But you know, I asked him once if he had found a home church wherever he was living, and he laughed and laughed. Then he just said, ‘they’d have a lot of opinions on how I live my life if I did that’, and changed the subject. So I knew whatever he was doing, it probably wasn’t good.”

There has been a lot of speculation by investigators that “Nanda” had indeed picked up employment within some kind of drug smuggling group at this time. Evidence found after his death has even opened the possibility that he worked as a high-end hitman.

There’s a lot of international travel during this time period, far more than can be accounted for unless travel was part of his workplace responsibilities. Employment records show him working as a sales manager for a company called Sunrise Investments, but this is believed by many to be a shell corporation hiding something much, much darker. 

However, all of this remains speculative, and there’s never been any proof that Nathaniel Benson did anything but the financial sales the company claims. No one ever did much work with him, and other employees at the company stated contact with him occurred entirely by phone and fax (and then e-mail) at this time. 

When investigators pored over the documents after getting a warrant, they weren’t able to find anything suspicious - and that in and of itself seems suspicious to some.

For years, Benson seemed to simply drop off the map entirely when it comes to local information - investigators did find that he owned a vintage Corvette that he fixed up himself (found via vehicle registry and taxes listings, which is public knowledge), and that about two years before his death he bought a large five-bedroom house with a basement in Dosaba, which he renovated in total secrecy. I was able to find records of him paying home taxes through his mortgage company, and that he spoke to local contractors and building companies, paying for consultations about the renovations he undertook. 

None of the companies he spoke to kept any kind of detailed notes about these consultations, but you’ll see why it’s relevant when I discuss what was found after his death.

Nathaniel Benson’s life came to an abrupt end on August 16th, 20XX, but nobody would find his body for more than two days. 

On August 18th, his cleaning lady arrived for her usual weekly visit to discover him crumpled at the foot of the stairs, face-up. She called 911 immediately and first responders arrived within twenty minutes to her white-faced and nearly silent. 

First responders noted that Nathaniel’s eyes were closed, unusual for a violent death. A wet cloth had been laid over them to help them stay that way. The medical examiner stated later that this would have to have been done within the first hour after he died, before rigor mortis could stiffen muscles and lead to them opening again. 

That whoever witnessed his death knew to do this is deeply unusual, and may be a sign of affection or grief. 

The autopsy found that Nathaniel had met his end approximately 36 hours before he was found, and had died due to an undiagnosed heart defect that had resulted in cardiac arrest. 

Sounds like any sudden death that can simply be written off as sad but natural, right? Well, there’s a few details that make things a little murkier than that, and have led to his death being listed as “undetermined” officially, and possibly including foul play.

For one thing, Nathaniel hadn’t simply collapsed next to the stairs - he had fallen, or been pushed, and showed evidence of bone fractures and head trauma consistent with the fall. A bit of blood was found on one step that came from his injuries. This head trauma would likely not have been fatal if he had received medical attention, but cardiac arrest ensured death even if head trauma didn’t. 

Did Nathaniel Benson suffer a heart attack and fall down the stairs, dying only when he reached the bottom? Maybe. 

Or maybe he really was pushed, the shock of it is the reason he went into cardiac arrest. 

There’s one more unusual fact that makes foul play a possibility in this mysterious death. 

Nathaniel Benson owned a legally purchased Box Boy, no known legal name, who went by his original purchase number: 334235. The Box Boy was a Romantic designation, and was purchased from Facility 001 in Berras, a city in Southern California, where the WRU headquarters is located.

WRU, when contacted by investigators, easily agreed to meet and provide detectives with information regarding the Box Boy’s purchase, as well as the DNA and fingerprint samples the company keeps on file. 

According to WRU’s internal records, this Boxie was not only a designated Romantic, but a specialty Romantic, trained for ‘masochism’. This tracks with multiple books on, shall we say, somewhat salacious interests that Benson had for his love life.

As Benson never seemed to date anyone or maintain a relationship, it’s theorized that the Boxie was his way of dealing with the stress of his work. WRU noted that Benson had contacted them after the purchase was complete to give his compliments on the Boxie’s training and note that he was ‘perfect’ and they ‘got along just fine’. 

The Box Boy’s fingerprints were found all over the house, which is totally normal. He was living there full-time, after all. But investigators also located something a bit more unusual: a secret room within the home that the cleaning lady had never seen before, hidden behind a carefully camouflaged door.

This is what Benson had been working on when he ‘renovated’ his newly purchased home: He built a secret dungeon room with stone walls and a concrete floor, outfitted with a dip and a “drain”, plus a garden hose hooked up on one wall. 

The room also had rows upon rows of cabinets full of various tools consistent with a ‘hard BDSM lifestyle’, according to one detective. I wasn’t able to get ahold of the actual list of items found, but was able to determine that whips, knives, ‘unspecified implements purchased from adult stores’, and other things were found.

Tests done on the walls and floor showed that blood had been spilled nearly everywhere in the room at one time or another, and large amounts of it. There was also evidence of blood found in Nathaniel Benson’s bedroom, primarily on the floor and in the bed. A small faded stain was found on the headboard just below a set of cuffs hooked into it.

A few small dried bloodstains were also found around the master bathroom sink, and investigators were able to determine the blood matched the DNA of the Box Boy, and was left there much more recently than the rest of the blood in the house, possibly even on the day of Benson’s death. 

Here’s the thing, though: the Box Boy himself was nowhere to be found. 

Was this Box Boy tired of being used as a human pincushion? Did he take matters into his own hands and commit the ultimate crime a pet can do, killing his owner? If he did, he no doubt knew what happens to pets who kill their owners, usually either being ‘put down’ or wiped clean to be resold.

Is our Boxie a killer right from the start? Or was he only a witness to a natural death who panicked and ran away?

Without locating the Boxie himself, it’s impossible to know.

The cleaning lady remembered him, and gave a description: Somewhere between 5’8” and 5’11”, wiry but with some muscle, usually dressed in just a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt when she was in the house. He has short dark hair, brown eyes, and an angular face. She mentioned visible scars on his arms, but none on his face. She was told to call him only “pet” if she needed to speak to him. She stated his voice was slightly hoarse and rough, as if he had a sore throat all the time. 

They had only one significant interaction, where the cleaning lady inquired about a large bruise on the Boxie’s face and bandages on his arms. He apparently told her, at the time, that he ‘liked the reminer’, but thanked her for asking after his health. They never spoke directly again. 

The detail about his face being unscarred will become incredibly relevant in parts 2 and 3.

Neighbors, when asked, mentioned that they had seen someone matching that description walking away from the house somewhere around 4 and 5 pm on August 16th. The medical examiner believes Benson died around noon, so this leaves about four or five hours between the death and the Boxie leaving.

He appeared to be walking very quickly and one neighbor noticed he was holding what looked like crumpled cash in one hand and a plastic shopping bag in another.

He was spotted waiting at a nearby bus stop, and footage from a camera mounted inside the bus shows someone matching the Box Boy’s description riding the bus all the way into Dosaba’s historic, artsy downtown. There, he was again captured on CCTV purchasing a one-way train ticket with cash. The train station employee who sold him the ticket remembers offering him a round-trip ticket for a discount, which she always did anyone who asked for a ticket to another city, only to have him “nervously” say he wouldn’t need to come back. She mentioned that he scratched at the side of his neck, and that when he walked away, he looked like his shoes were a little too big for his feet.

It is believed, as Nathaniel Benson was found barefoot but wearing clothing that suggested he had been outside doing yard work just before his death, that the Box Boy stole his shoes.

The fleeing Box Boy is captured one more time on camera as he arrived at his destination, Red Hills, approximately a two-hour train ride to the south. He walks past the CCTV quickly, hunched over as if trying to hide his face.

After that, he disappears.

Red Hills is a significantly larger city than Dosaba, with nearly a million residents within city limits and another 600,000 filling its suburbs and outer neighborhoods. Red Hills is a city that has seen better days, and it would be easy for a runaway Box Boy to simply fade away into its seedier districts. While Red Hills has had more than a dozen runaway Boxies picked up over the years, mostly Romantics who engaged in prostitution to make ends meet, it’s not believed that Benson’s Box Boy knew this when he chose the location.

As Romantic Boxies usually can’t read, it’s believed he simply chose a location he’d overheard someone else say, knowing nothing about what he would find when he got there.

Two days after his death, Nathaniel Benson’s debit and credit cards, Driver’s License, and a folded-up note he had written to himself about buying toothpaste were found in a plastic shopping bag tied-off at the top, were found inside the bus the Boxie had ridden, stuffed between the edge of a seat and the wall. The Boxie’s fingerprints were on everything.

But the Boxie himself wouldn’t be seen again until more than a year later.

Nathaniel “Nanda” Benson’s death for a time remained a one-off unsolved mystery. A little on the unusual side, but entirely possible that no foul play occurred, just some details that need filling in.

The shocking murder of a Red Hills man known locally as “Brute” would bring this Box Boy back into law enforcement’s line of sight, and open up questions about whether the Box Boy had simply been running away from Nathaniel Benson’s death… or leaving to find a new victim.

I’ll post Part 2, about “Brute”, shortly! Then Part 3 will be about a third murder, in which our potential Box Boy serial killer takes out… another serial killer. 

I told you this one gets interesting.

-

@astrobly @finder-of-rings @burtlederp @whump-tr0pes @raigash @orchidscript @doveotions @pretty-face-breaker @eatyourdamnpears @boxboysandotherwhump @whumptywhumpdump @whumpfigure @outofangband @thehopelessopus @downriver914 @justabitofwhump @butwhatifyouwrite @newandfiguringitout @yet-another-heathen @nonsensical-whump @endless-whump @gonna-feel-that-tomorrow @oops-its-whump @cubeswhump @whumpiary

[whatthehelliswrongwithme]

Voltron Part 29

Okay, guys, gals and nonbinary pals. It's time for the season 6 finale! As always I'll also put my thoughts bout this season as a whole into this part. Hope you enjoy!:

Lotor, hows the weather like in there? You know? Up your arse. Because you're so fucking full of yourself

Is Keith's scar-thingy permanent?

Lotor: "Omae wa mou shindeiru"

Voltron: "NANI?!"

This asshole is worse than Abra with all these teleports

Remember when I said that this show couldn't get more anime, when Sailor Moon appeared? Well now they've got a sword...... that's on fire

Pidge you just send you lion head/Voltron's fist flying towards Lotor. Weren't you sitting in that?

Allura, why won't you leave Lotor in the quintessence-realm? Do you still have feeeeliiiings?

Is it done? Is the ass dead?

Let the joyous news be spread, that wicked old ass at last is dead!

Good. Won't miss him

Noooo! Not the castle!

Sailor Moon hasn't said a word the last few episodes. But simply by standing next to Allura, I know that this ship exists

I love the idea of them saving the universe, while having all of their shit packed into the lions

They're just glorified U-haul trucks now

Hunk, what kind of eagle-eyes do you have to have seen this castle-diamond-thingy?

I don't really care about Shance. But I appreciate the scene of Lance angsting over Shiro

Heeeeey!!! "Shiro" is Shiro again!

But why the fuck is all of his hair white (gray?) now?

Also, wouldn't it feel fucking weird to just like not have your body anymore. And instead someone else's. Even if it's an exact replica of you....

But, also: SHEITH!

They're finally going to earth!!!! I've predicted it since season 2 and now it's finally happening!

Thoughts on the season as a whole:

I really, really liked this season

Seriously, better than season5 and much better than season4

Many good episodes, fave was probably "Cheaper by the dozen, but it's just Shiro" because of !Sheith!

But the DnD episode was also really good

I disliked that Keith aged 2 years on the space whale, to bond with his mom

Because it wasn't acknowledged AT ALL. Even though 2 years is such a long time!

I'm still conflicted about this whole "Shiro was actually a clone" thing

Might actually make another "Rant"-post about this

(Also, in terms of foreshadowing: Apparently "Kuron" literally means clone. So I can see how that theory existed.)

(I just knew, that "Kuro" means black. And I thought that this was supposed to mirror the Shiro-white thing)

{Huge thanks to @living-for-fiction and especially @non-plutonian-druid for explaining!}

It's nice to have Keith back in the MAIN-main cast. Feels good to have him back. Missed him

Shiro is his own whole situation. I'm glad to have him back. I just hope that the writers won't fuck his character up

Lance had some serious self-reflection since season1. And I actually kinda enjoy him now. Being so smitten by Allura is kinda cute

Allura is weird. She's got that whole angst/confidence issue going on, because she was fooled by Lotor. But honestly, she's kind of right. She really should have been more suspicious of him

(Also: Why didn't you "die" this finale?)

Pidge is my sassy, unhinged nerd daughter. And no one can take that away from me

Hunk is my nerdy, sunshine boy who's a little bit too much into cooking. But I still love him, and he had some good scenes

Lotor's dead. Good. Finally. Hated him from the start. He was irredeemable ever since he killed Furry

Moustache man is great. I'm still mad that the fandom gave Shiro the title of "Space dad", when he's clearly so much more deserving of it

Krolia, Sailor Moon and space wolf..... seem interesting? They haven't had any real time to shine

Though I still absolutely love Sailor Moon's design

Sheith! There was so much Sheith! And that's great! So much content! And honestly, these two just have the best dynamic between all the characters

Allurance is cute. And I'm kinda rooting for it now. I just hope, that it won't be as one-sided anymore

Lotura had a kiss! But also, one of the people involved in this ship died. So.... I'm sorry for any Lotura shippers

Klance, Plance and Punk had a few crumbs here and there

Shallura starved the past few seasons, and is now a skeleton in the corner. It's cute, but there's like no canon content/potential anymore

Predictions/Hopes for season 7:

Are they gonna do a space road trip to get to earth? Will they make truckstops, sit in a diner and drink milkshakes?

When Voltron combines, do you think that everyone inside can just walk from one lion to another? I want them to just, float through space, combined as Voltron, living out their lives.

Seriously, just imagine them, basically using their giant-murder-robot as a house

Sorry, Allura. But I want Keith to replace you again. You can do your own thing with this castle-diamond-thingy and the team-constellation of S1 and S2 returns

ACTUALLY ACKNOWLEDGE THAT KEITH AGED 2 FUCKING YEARS!

Season 1+2 felt like one big arc, and it ended in a mech battle against Zarkon. Season 3-6 felt like one big arc and ended in a mech battle against Lotor. I'm gonna guess that S7+8 are the next big arc, which will also end in a mech battle, probably against space witch

I'm honestly expecting the worst, because everyone seems to dislike S7. So.... maybe I'll be positively suprised

I've noticed that the parts, where I just review 1 episode are getting more notes? Are these smaller, bit-sized parts better to read?

Anyways! Once again, thanks for all the support I've been getting! It's really fun to read your guy's comments! Appreciate all kinds of notes! Love Y'all!!!❤