#should i do gamer law next?

[naomi-fae22]

his ass is NOT winning, but like at least he ate.

[absolutebl]

This Week in BL - Actually a pretty fab line up right now

Organized, in each category, with ones I'm enjoying most at the top.

NOV 2024 Week 5

Ongoing Series - Thai

Love Sick 2024 (Sun iQIYI) ep 11 of 15 - This is where the teen awkward comes to grab me by the throat. No other Thai BL does this better than Love Sick (except maybe Make it Right). And it’s always a challenge to watch because Phun is so ready to come out and Noh is so not. I love what cramming 3 eps into one (and better side BL couples) did for the tension and pacing in this particular part of this story. The new version really is excellent. I'm chronicling my experience with 2024 as compared to 2014 here. 

Your Sky (Sun iQIYI) ep 2 of 12 - They are so awkward and I love them so much for it. They are terrible at faking romance, yet Fah want’s Rak so bad. This is moving so slowly but that’s part of it’s charm. I'm not frustrated instead I’m getting Oxygen vibes from it. Or perhaps it’s is more just I feel the way I felt when I was first watching Oxygen. Which is to say, I’m totally addicted and I keep re-watching new episodes. 

Spare Me Your Mercy (Thurs iQIYI) ep 1 of 8 - Gah! JJ grew up so pretty. I love these leads. (No one is shocked.) I love the lawful good paired against (we’re not sure yet but possibly) neutral evil. I love our very sus very flirty very gay doctor. A lot happened in this first episode. I’m getting Manner of Death flashbacks but there’s nothing wrong with that. Bring on the chili. 

Incidentally, if you're interested in true crime, here's the IRL version of this story. How a Nuclear Lab Helped Catch a Serial Killer from the Science Vs podcast.

Jack & Joker (Mon IQIYI) ep 10-12 end - I got the go ahead on a safe ending, and thus I watched the last 3 eps all as one. I love how defiantly verse these two were. I also really enjoyed the final episode. I do like a finale that ends on a bang (yes, both kinds). 

Final thoughts

I enjoyed this show a lot. A caper BL starring two of Thailand's best and focusing on class struggles, corruption, and poverty, was always gonna appeal to me. But I’m not sure, ultimately, whether I liked it because it was good in it’s own right, or because YinWar were so good in it. I do wish it had been a little more Leverage and little less chaos, Dr Evils, and "watch War cry." It was a great vehicle for YinWar, and for them to prove that BL can defy its own tropes. To that end, this goes comfortably into the Manner of Death category more than anything else I’ve encountered befor (although slightly less unhinged). It's good, but it loses the plot, the side couples, and it's own mind a couple of times, and YinWar were definitely greater than the sum of its parts. Thus I feel an 8/10 is fair, especially considering I'm unlikely to rewatch.

The Heart Killers (Weds Gaga) ep 2 of 12 - Dunk is illegally pretty in this show. I gotta say I covet his skin care routine. (I love YinWar as much as the next person, but THIS boy should be the spokes-BL-rep for Laneige.)

Manwhile..... FirstKhao might be GMMTV’s best flirters. It’s a pleasure to watch them just inhabit these characters and bounce off each other. I do keep saying “what tf are they doing?!“ with this show. In this instance, it was the dancing in the bowling alley. What is going on? is it meant to be a Pulp Fiction reference?

Also this gd soundtrack is bonkers. I *can’t!* with the 70s orgy porn music and the very bad not quite metal intro music. And then, I remember, brain must be turned off! (That’s really hard for me OK?)

All that said, both the sauna and the jerk-off scenes were much appreciated. It’s nice to see this kind of visceral physical attraction depicted in a BL, we get it so rarely.  

On a side note, I entirely support Thailand’s one country agenda to put all the cute boys in crop tops. Keep it up. And up. And up. 

Fourever You (Thurs YT) ep 9 of 16 - I just don’t get the (new) main couple. They don’t work for me. I like the surprise gamer boys side crumbs though. They are v cute.

Side quest: Genius move anytime Hill comes on screen to basically have Pond make love to the camera. He v good at it. Break down everyone’s fourth wall, baby. Take no prisoners. 

Caged Again (Fri Gaga) ep 3 of 10 - That exchange! “Are you worried about me” (attempted flirtation) vrs Junior’s response “yes I am.” Just utter frankness. It’s very sweet. All in all this show is very sweet. Somewhat incomprehensible world building, but sweet. And the head lift into the lap was next level adorable. Sun’s shy smile is everything. 

Perfect 10 Liners (Sun YT?) ep 5 of 24 - This show is very silly. I love the sides so much I can’t EVEN. But I think it was a big mistake putting Tay into this show. Never let an OG out of the bottle like that. He gets all our attention because we think he’s gonna grant all our wishes. By which I mean, all I could think the whole time he was on screen was WHY IS HE SO FINE?

I’m not joking, I had to watch his scenes 3x because I kept getting distracted and losing the plot. Not that there is much plot to lose. Just Tay’s mouth. I’ll stop now, but seriously tho LOOK AT HIM!!! 

Every You Every Me (Mon Gaga) ep 8 end - Honestly I’d like to see this pair handed something much more meaty. Like a Japanese adaptation? Tokyo in April is… for example. I think they do a great job with something like that.

Conclusion

This was supposed to be a linked series about reincarnated soulmates, but ended up being more like a Y-Destiny grab bag BL with no rebirth through line, just the same acting pair. The leads were excellent. And I must praise this show for representing things I always want in my BL (and rarely get), switch, verse, communication, and safe sex. It’s just that this format with the same actors but no unifying theme (despite the pitch/packaging) made for a disappointing viewing experience. Some of the installments I enjoyed, and the visuals are on point, but I was ultimately let down by style and execution, if not acting. 6/10 

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

Our Youth AKA Miseinen: Mijukuna Oretachi wa Bukiyo ni Shinkochu (Japan Tues Gaga) ep 4 of 11 - “I won’t fall in love with you” is an easy promise to make if you’ve already fallen. I love this show SO MUCH. “Infect me just a little.” Holy fuck. This BOY. Also, so much for “not kissing.” This BL is fantastic. I’m so worried about where it’s going. Japan could very much hurt me with this. I didn’t expect to fall in love so hard.

Man, JBL...... when it gets you it really gets you (then it locks you in a basement and gets kinky). We are not safe but we must sit back and suffer enjoy it. I hate this. I love this. What a rush. 

See Your Love (Taiwan Weds Gaga) ep 7 of 13 - I think this show has a “crash into me” trope in every single ep. This ep alone had 3, plus a flash back to the first one. Still, their damn date was so flipping adorbs!!!

Teenager Judge (Vietnam Sat YT) ep 10 of ? - I couldn’t be less interested in the stuff with the mean girls. I’m annoyed we spent so much of this episode on them. Fewer bullies more smooches.

Love in the Air: Koi no Yokan (Japan Sat Gaga) ep 5 of 10 - Arashi as the doting bf was cute if sudden, also holy musical montage BLman.  Kai is my favorite character (as was Sky) but I'm still not wild about the blackmail sex start to this relationship. It does seem a little bit more like Kai went after a one night stand, also bit more switchy, which is better...... I guess. But not by much because the chemistry with these two isn't as good as the original.

I remain suspicious.

It's airing but......

Love is Like a Poison AKA Doku Koi: Doku mo Sugireba Koi to Naru (Japan Tues ????) 11 of 12 eps - My source hasn’t yet uploaded 11. So…… I wait. 

Secret Love (? YT?) 13-?? of 81 eps - I don't know what's going on either.

Blue Canvas of Youthful Days (China Sun Viki) paused at eps 9-10 of 12 - I got the "stop" on this one as it's gone (no surprise) dark. Being China can not be relied upon to HEA. So I'm on pause until I'm told it's safe. If it ends sad/bad I will dnf. But for now I wait......

Winter Is Not The Death of Summer (Thai Weds YT) ?? eps - Criminals who meet in prison fall in love. I did find it on YouTube, initially unsubbed, then subs happened by which time I got distracted. The first episode seems to be only six minutes long. It is very pulp. But it is intriguing. For now its to the wayside until someone tells me what it whats to be and if it's headed in a safe direction. Occasionally Thai pulps want to be edgy and it's not a good look on them.

Bad Guy My Boss (Thai Sun Gaga) 10 eps - I DNF'd at ep 7, I couldn't make it. I'm weak. Life is hard enough right now, this show made it harder. It’s not what I want from my entertainment. Ends tomorrow.

Bad to Bed (Taiwan Sat YT) 10 eps - This is a little too low production value even for me + just very very odd. DNF

In Case You Missed it - GMMTV 2025 Line Up

There have been a ton of hot takes already, including mine.

Here are the titles and links to MDL for you (confirmed full BLs only), these are organized in order of the ones I'm anticipating the most at the top.

Dare You to Death - trailer

Boys in Love - trailer

Memoir of Rati - trailer

My Magic Prophecy - trailer

Me and Thee - trailer

A Dog and A Plane - trailer

Cat for Cash - trailer

That Summer - trailer

My Romance Scammer - trailer

Head 2 Head - trailer

Ticket To Heaven - trailer

Burnout Syndrome - trailer

Melody of Secrets - trailer

Only Friends Dream On - trailer

Love You Teacher - trailer

Next Week Looks Like This:

End of year drops:

12/4 0.5D (Japan ????) 10 eps - Sales ace, Sada, has a secret that only his junior, Daiki, knows. He has pretended to have a gf for years, resulting in him being a virgin. But now Sada has fallen in love. Confused, Sada seeks advice from his junior. I sense another queer Cyrano De Bergerac. Info here.

12/6 Be Moon - Falling for my enemy's son (China ????) movie from HBD Studio - Not much on this one just a trailer, looks intriguing...... if it's from/through Taiwan, but if it's all China, I'm wary.

12/13 ThamePo Heart that Skips a Beat (Fri YT) 12eps - A boy band member and his documentarian start a forbidden relationship. I LOVE Est and am delighted to see him at GMMTV. This was my #1 pick for 2024. I've been waiting for a Blinding Lights style idol romance and this looks like it might be it (Korea and Japan have systemically disappointed me). Bring it, boys.

12/14 & 12/21 The Renovation (Thai mini One31) 2 eps - Writer turns his blossoming romance with holiday resort owner into a novel.

12/29 Sangmin Dinneaw (Thai ????) ??eps - trailer Childhood friends (Thai & Korean) reunite after being apart for ten years. As the boys reconnect, their bond matures and feelings of romance begin to develop, in Thai.

Upcoming BLs for 2024 are listed here. This list is not kept updated, so please leave a comment if you know something new or RP with additions.

THIS WEEK’S BEST MOMENTS

His smile. (Caged Again)

Look at them!

Look, I don't mean to tell you your business, but THIS? This is peak Thai BL. This is it. This is What They Do Best. Sure they dabble with silly kinky crimey-whiney fashizzal, but Thailand's true BL power is right here, in the sweet awkward school-set first love arghhhhh. Yes I said, school. Bite me. (Love Sick... damn it, 10 years later and it still has me in a choke hold.)

Hey all you idiots who thought (or think) there is ever a green flag in any Mame ever, this character if for you. This boy, THIS ONE. This is what a walking talking ACTING green flag energy actually looks like. You wanna date a dude? Find you one like him. Okay, peaches? sheesh

Meanwhile, this, this is not a green flag. This is GMMTV thinking they are being clever by calling out Thai BLs' worst behavior to make a character who has 'slightly less than worst behavior' look better. Sigh. When meta is used for ill gotten gains.

This, on the other hand is meta being cleverly deployed.

And this is language play. P'ABL's favorite.

So endeth this lesson.

(last week)

The tag BLigade: @doorajar @solitaryandwandering @my-rose-tinted-glasses @babymbbatinygirl @babymbbatinygirl @isisanna-blog @mmastertheone @pickletrip @aliceisathome @urikawa-miyuki @tokillamonger @sunflower-positiiivity @rocketturtle4 @blglplus @anythinggoesintheshire @everlightly @renafire @mestizashinrin @bl-bam-beyond @small-dark-and-delicious @saezurumurmurs

[simslegacy5083]

Not So Berry (Straud Descendants) Gen 9

Today's (9/24/2024) Episode: Preparing to Party

Noemi and Luigi hoped to turn their difficult day around with a party in Del Sol, but first they needed to make a quick trip out to The Ridge.

Their first stop was to Grandpa Gilbert, who had agreed to take Skye overnight so the couple didn’t have to rush back to relieve a sitter.

Noemi gave her dad a big hug “Thanks so much for having him.” she began “I do have to warn you though, he’s been a bit aggressive lately. He kicked Luigi’s grandfather at the market earlier today when he tried to give him a hug.” Gilbert gave his grandson a shocked look, but then smiled.

“Skye and I are old pals; I’m sure we’ll be fine. Even if he does get wild, it won’t be my first rodeo.“ he gave her a wink. “I have my ways.”

Nearby Luigi was doing his part to make sure Grandpa Gilbert had nothing to worry about. “Your grandfather is being very kind to give you a sleepover tonight” he began “If Mommy and I hear that you were mean to him or anyone else you’ll be in big trouble when we get back. Do you understand?”

Skye’s face fell at his father’s harsh words. He loved his gramps; he wasn’t anything like that scary see through sim who kept changing colors or those stupid babies who tried to take his toys and ruin his stuff! He wanted more of his daddy’s attention, but not like this.

Of course, Skye had neither the vocabulary or the presence of mind to articulate any of that, so he simply nodded. Satisfied, Luigi said a quick hello to his father-in-law while Noemi kissed her baby goodbye.

Their next stop was just up the way in Galloping Gulch for a quick check-in with Amaya and Miguel. They’d agreed to keep Roach at the ranch another night rather than have him go home to an empty house on the island, but Noemi still wanted to make a quick detour to see her “fur baby”.

“Mister Roach is the sweetest.” Amaya told her “If you really missed him so much, I’d gladly trade places with you tonight. Hobnobbing with celebrities in the valley sounds like a grand ol’ time!” Her excitedly waggling eyebrows drew a chuckle from her friend.

“While I’m sure you’d have more fun than I’m going to, I promised “Hot Stuff” I’d be his arm candy for the evening.” Noemi replied. “I’ll tell you all about it when I come back to get this handsome fellow tomorrow.” Her husband, who’d overheard the whole thing, recalled how Amaya had thrown herself at Orange during their visit to his mansion in the hills and thanked the watcher that his bride was much more restrained around famous sims.

Back at home it was finally time to spin into their formal wear. “Man, I love getting all dressed up” Luigi said as he stood admiring himself in the mirror “Always have. I considered making my “professional style” constant over the top formal wear, but it didn’t feel like the right look for a pro gamer.”

Noemi shrugged “I know your image is important to you, but if you like dressing fancy then you should do that more often! I know you struggled with aging up, but you’ve come to terms with that, and sims often dress more formally as they get older. Plus, with any luck, soon you’ll be a Starlight award winner and a videogame mogul. It could be time to change up your look again?” Perhaps to something more age appropriate… she finished silently.

“Hmmmm” Luigi replied, taking another long look in the mirror “You may have a point there. Well anyway, let’s go; my category is up first thing, so we don’t want to be late!” Turning, they headed out the door towards the teleporter hand in hand, excited to see what the evening would bring.

View The Full Story of My Not So Berry Challenge Here

[theamityelf]

My mind is full of thoughts of a Percy Jackson Danganronpa AU.

Here's an organized brainstorm.

Parameters: Danganronpa universe, Riordanverse characters. This means no one is a demigod, which I would ordinarily find a bit boring, but Ultimates are pretty superhuman anyway, so it's fine. Hope's Peak in Japan still exists; this is an imitation school in New York. The plot of Danganronpa is still happening in Japan. Junko and co are still responsible for the Tragedy and their killing game, but there is someone in the New York Hope's Peak who helped her cause the Tragedy and, separately, someone in the New York Hope's Peak acting in the role of "coerced traitor".

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

Percy Jackson- Ultimate Swimmer. Most of his backstory gets to stay pretty much the same, except the weird traumatizing things that happened throughout his childhood that in canon were the result of his godly parentage are now just regular people mistreating a kid. He gained renown as an Olympic swimmer, mostly so that he could give the money that came with that success to his mother, so she could stop being financially dependent on his abusive step-dad. She was able to leave him, and optionally put a hit out on him? If we want a Medusa equivalent.

In the killing game, his classmates are weird about him. A lot of them act like he's not smart, no matter how often he's right about stuff. He gets extremely defensive when he's the one being accused of murder, because he's used to having to defend himself from unfair accusations, so it's already a sore spot for him. This makes him come across as hotheaded and suspicious, but he never hurts anyone.

He survives. Also, he's probably the POV character.

Annabeth Chase- Ultimate Strategist. Backstory is, she ran away from home when she was seven and ended up in the "care" of some kind of army or mercenary group, and she became their best battle strategist at a very young age. When she became old enough to object to what the group was doing, she plotted out the tidiest way to end them and escape (physically) unscathed. Once she was free, she pretty much lived as a drifter until Hope's Peak scouted her.

In the killing game, she channels any fear she has immediately and directly into defensive rage. Because she can see so many potential strategies in the the things people do and the way everyone else behaves, she tends to float on the slightly confrontational side. Ironically, despite Percy being one of the more cunning participants, and despite everyone else accusing him of stuff constantly, she almost never expects him to be up to anything. Like, she'll sit next to him during meals specifically because she does not believe he has it in him to successfully plot her death.

She might kill. She probably wouldn't be killed. Her execution might be chess-based! Maybe a cruel subversion, where she's winning the chess game and then gets crushed to death by a giant checker piece, or something like that.

Grover Underwood- Ultimate Environmentalist. He's a famous activist for climate change and pollution. And unfortunately, Danganronpa Law might dictate that he gets placed in the coward role by default. Someone's gotta have the outrageously out-there fear sprites. I'd say he leans more "easily-startled pacifist" than "genuine coward", though. He might get a moment where he throws a tin can at Monokuma.

He folds in the face of teasing of any kind, so if Monokuma or his classmates make jokes at his expense, he does not banter back. Percy backs him up, since he refuses to defend himself. But he is reasonably vocal in the trials.

He's the character you're sure is going to die every chapter, but he makes it to the end.

Nico di Angelo- Ultimate Gamer. Everyone who hasn't already heard of him is surprised by this, because they find him irrationally eerie and it seems like his talent should have the same vibes. He's had a hard life, partially due to family stuff and partially because these game companies target him whenever he makes them look bad and sometimes they send mercenaries to intimidate or harm him, so he has to live on the run and off the grid- while also being a notorious gamer. He's still Hazel's half-brother, but he has to be careful about acknowledging their relationship in public, lest she be in danger, too. (The game company mercenaries would hold her hostage! They've already done it with a different sister before, and it did not end well.) But he does favors for her when he can, and they manage to keep in touch. Now that they're both attending the same school, they still keep their sibling relationship a secret for a while.

He's very reserved, both socially and in the trials. Sometimes he hangs out with Leo, since Leo focuses so hard on his own work that they don't have to talk much, and that's honestly the only reason he ever has an alibi. He still often gets accused of stuff just based on sheer vibes.

He might kill someone for Hazel. Or he might be killed. Most likely, he dies somehow. One of them has to die for the other's character development, per Danganronpa rules, and I'm choosing him. He would agree with my choice. The group finds out that they're siblings either during the trial or between the verdict and his execution.

Rachel Elizabeth Dare- Ultimate Heiress, but she really really doesn't want to be! She tries really hard to have a different Ultimate, like Ultimate Artist, Ultimate Activist...

In the killing game, her role in the dialogue is mostly to be the one saying obvious things and explaining the joke that was just made. (Look, it's okay. Some of my favorite Danganronpa characters get saddled with that job. It's not a slight on Rachel.) There's a running gag where she tends to correctly guess things ahead of time, culminating in her excitedly saying "Hey! Maybe I'm the Ultimate Psychic!" This annoys Octavian tremendously.

Socially, she kind of cycles between the friend groups. She says very little in the trials. When people tease her, she very much does banter back.

She might kill. Or she might be killed. I think probably the latter, and they can have some line like "She didn't see it coming." Maybe Nico kills her because she was going to kill Hazel? Eh, maybe not. She does get killed, though. Although her execution could be interesting if she murders instead; it could be based on the title she hates, or it can be based on her yearning for another title/identity.

Luke Castellan- Ultimate Traveler. He runs a very popular travel blog or vlog, centered around how he's been to every state, territory, and almost every country. He speaks a lot of languages. He's older than his classmates, because he missed a lot of school while he was traveling.

"I've visited the Hope's Peak in Japan a few times."

"There's one in Japan?" Percy says, immediately interested.

"The first Hope's Peak is in Japan!" Annabeth chides.

He became friends with Junko Enoshima a while back. He had a role in causing the Tragedy to also happen in America, but he thought it was for a different reason. He never wanted his classmates to kill each other! (He was fine with millions of other people dying, though.) Junko said they were locking themselves in for their own safety, so he convinced Headmaster Chiron. His memory was erased along with everyone else, so he doesn't know anything except that he was friends with Junko.

His presence in the killing game is very charismatic and caring and somewhat leaderly.

He might be the first one killed. He probably doesn't kill anyone. All the information about his role in things comes out after his death, but maybe he gets a moment right before he dies where he remembers everything but can only say a cryptic sentence that everyone misunderstands.

Carter Kane- Ultimate Egyptologist. Attended many lectures and archaeological digs with his father, pretty much from infancy. (Yes, Professor Kane giving a lecture with a baby on his chest!) Very well-versed in Egyptology, and took over his father's work and expert status when he tragically died in a freak accident. If New York Hope's Peak has a reserve course, Sadie might be enrolled there as a backup Ultimate Egyptologist.

In the killing game, Carter's place in the social web is to kind of be the quieter Annabeth, in that he's smart and somewhat suspicious of the others but doesn't express it as openly as she does. Also, his particular brand of had-to-grow-up-too-fast is of a more social bent than most of the others', due to the nature of his work, so he's a lot like Reyna in that he'll be the one trying to calm people down and get them to work together. In fact, he and Reyna will have a casually-established trust for each other, where they generally agree about things, side with each other, support each other's alibis, etc.

In the trials, he isn't all that vocal, but when he speaks, he always has an astute point.

He doesn't kill, but he might get killed.

Jason Grace- Oh boy, there are so many funny answers to this. I think it would be most on-brand for him to be the guy who wakes up with no memory of his Ultimate. But, this would necessarily mean that his talent must be significant in some potentially-game-breaking way. Ultimate Wolf Trainer would be great, but maybe a little out there? I'm thinking he'd either be Ultimate Wolf Trainer or Ultimate Survivalist. Either way, his backstory still involves wolves because the wolves are the coolest things about him (in my own personal opinion).

He is killed by Monokuma for rule-breaking, because he does not want to engage with the game on Monokuma's terms. He's used as an example for the others. It's a very heroic death.

Piper McLean- Ultimate Trendsetter. (A really superficial-sounding title that she hates.) She's been in the public eye as the daughter of a famous actor, and she's known for being utterly subversive in her fashion choices and broader lifestyle stuff; she single-handedly reshapes pop cultural trends, and no one can quite put their finger on why she manages to be so...persuasive? Without even saying a word. It's like, just by being herself, she makes people want to "agree" with her. Her social media presence has a significant impact on social justice movements and political campaigns. She also met Junko Enoshima before attending Hope's Peak (because it's not hard for a super influential "fashionista" to engineer a way to meet a super influential "trendsetter"), and Junko identified her as a valuable asset. Piper is the coerced traitor. She confesses after a close friend (probably Leo) dies.

Her behavior in the killing game is kind of guarded, for a while; she's guilty about being in contact with Monokuma, so she isolates herself out of guilt. It comes across as the standard "aloof ice queen" character archetype, especially if the POV character is Percy, who she doesn't soften toward until late in the game when they understand each other better, but she shows her kind side when she's defending those she perceives as underdogs, like Leo and Hazel. She doesn't trust Grover (Another thing that places her at odds with Percy.), because she thinks his pacifist thing is an act, partially because she considers him a celebrity and she has a lot of baggage around the concept of celebrity.

After she confesses to being the traitor, people get back to trusting her surprisingly quickly. It helps that a lot of the late-game participants are more on the trusting side, and also, in true Danganronpa traitor fashion, she didn't actually do anything to anyone; she just is the traitor. Once the cat's out of the bag, it's like a weight has been lifted. She gets along with everyone way better.

She survives.

Leo Valdez- Ultimate Mechanic. Once again, same backstory except he can't create fire with his hands.

In the killing game, he leans SUPER hard on sarcasm and humor as a defense mechanism, causing him to butt heads with some of the more earnest in the cast. Characters like Frank genuinely believe he doesn't care or thinks the situation is funny, whereas characters like Piper understand pretty quickly that Leo is just unable to deal with his fear any other way.

He dies, because his talent is game-breakingly useful once the group at large is focused on game-breaking and not surviving each other. He builds something useful to the rest of the class and then dies, rendering the thing he built far more valuable for the fact that they won't have any more inventions or machines from him to help them.

(If we want to go Danganronpa-style cruel irony, Annabeth could be the one to kill him, since she's the strategy person and his loss would be the most strategically problematic to the group. Like, we could discover that if she just hadn't killed Leo, he was this close to building something that would get them free.)

Hazel Levesque- (I would love to incorporate her love of horses, but that simply can't be relevant here, lol.) Ultimate Witch. She has pretty strong reservations about her title, but essentially she's a talented illusionist with above-average luck. Also she can sometimes see ghosts; it's a genetic thing. (Because if Danganronpa says that's on the table, then why not.) She would prefer to be called the Ultimate Illusionist, but New York Hope's Peak wants snappy, clickbait-y names for their Ultimates.

In the killing game, she gets along with everyone. Frank is protective of her, because she's physically small, kind-hearted, and pretty. Nico is protective of her because she's his sister. All the other girls are protective of her, because she's the least athletic out of all of them (since this AU doesn't require her to have been fighting monsters). Leo makes lighthearted jokes about her talent that Frank takes too seriously. The only person to ever directly accuse her of anything is Octavian, though she's not above suspicion when she doesn't have an alibi.

And for her own part, Hazel's skill set comes into play because she has a keen eye for smoke-and-mirrors, as it were. Like, as soon as the killing game starts, she becomes curious as to where Monokuma is appearing from and determined to find out. Things like that. She discovers secret passageways based on her familiarity with optical illusions, sleight of hand, and hidden compartments.

She survives. Obviously, having a strong personal connection to a character who probably dies means she has to survive to say some line towards the end like "It's what they would want," or "I remember what they said to me..." Monokuma meant for her to die because she was a little too persistent about finding stuff, but it didn't work out that way.

Frank Zhang- Ultimate Archer. Once again, functionally the same backstory with the Roman gods swapped out for human stuff.

In the killing game, he assumes the position of "We would never kill each other! Why would any of us kill each other?!" He's at odds with Leo (and by extension Piper) because of Leo's need to joke about things, and he's at odds with Annabeth because he doesn't want to suspect anyone. His insistence that they shouldn't suspect each other makes Annabeth (and to a lesser extent, Carter) suspicious that he's playing them. He trusts Reyna because she's a team leader, but she is aggressively neutral toward him. Like:

"Reyna, tell them this had to be Monokuma's doing!"

"It could have been him, or it could have been one of us. We don't have all the facts yet."

I'm going to say he kills, and I'm going to say that his motive is a hostage thing with his grandmother. This is also character development for Hazel. Sorry, Hazel. Also, sorry Frank. His execution hearkens to St. Sebastian (shot with a bunch of arrows while tied to a tree or post).

Reyna Avila Ramirez Arellano- Ultimate Team Leader. Raised by a now-dead older sister, she led a lot of professional athletic teams to victory. She is great at seeing others' strengths and weaknesses, and she is a champion for team synergy.

Ironically, she's not great at creating or maintaining friendships, but she loves her classmates in her own way. She only speaks up in class trials when she notices someone is being talked over, in which case she makes sure the others quiet down and let them speak. Also, when Octavian is making it impossible to progress, she gets him to shut up. Other than that, she mostly listens.

She's probably killed, and the characters have a bunch of lines sadly reflecting on how they didn't expect someone like her to be killed.

Octavian [Last Name]- Ultimate Psychic. He's famous for his whole gimmick of divining a person's future by cutting open a beloved stuffed animal of theirs; for the hardcore superstitious types, it's considered a show of how serious you are about your beliefs to say you've had your future read by Octavian. (It's also a demonstration of financial status, because he charges a lot.)

In the killing game, he is hugely distrustful and obstructs the group from collaborating at pretty much every turn. Like, Annabeth is cautious, but he is straight up tearing the group apart constantly.

He kills or is killed for sure. Most likely, he kills; no way any self-respecting Danganronpa game would miss the opportunity to make him angrily defend himself in the trial room and get a gruesome execution that probably hearkens to him gutting stuffed animals. I'm going to take it a step further and say he's the one to kill Carter, since its too obvious to have him kill Rachel or Reyna.

Also, if they get to open up Monokuma late in the game, they're going to mention how Octavian would have loved to be around for this.

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

So, to recap, in no particular order:

Murderers: Annabeth, Nico(?), Frank, Octavian

Victims: Rachel(?), Luke, Carter, Leo, Reyna

Killed As An Example: Jason

Survivors: Percy, Piper, Hazel, Grover. They are all best friends at the end.

[papirouge]

Papi I-

I literally started reading into some drama in a gamer community and ended up learning about this case were a 20 year old man and 15 year old boy had a sexual encounter. The victim, years later, denounced this man publicly when he understood what happened was wrong. The man first apologized to him and everyone for 'letting them down' or something, but weeks later came with a document were he retracted his confession and said he actually was the one raped and blackmailed. He said the 15 year old came onto him when he was sleeping and started giving him a blowjob, and he tried telling him to get off of him, but froze up and couldnt stop the kid anymore. The next day, this same boy supposedly blackmailed him, telling him that if he didn't have sex with him he would tell everyone that he was gay and slept with a minor. So the man, out of fear, accepted and let the boy gave him oral sex again, though stoping midway because he got upset about the older man lack of enthusiasm. Everyone in the community got on the older man side, calling the other party (who was only 15 yo at the time) a rapist and liar.

Am i going crazy or what?? Like obviously this boy still did something pretty messed up (initiating sexual contact when the man was sleeping, which is rape), but the man is still at fault for just accepting it twice. Like from what i gathered the kid is pretty unlikeable and manipulative, and has tried to seduce other adult men, but this man could still say 'no'. Plus the fact that this kid is so hypersexual points to him having some kind of trauma or issues imo. Not to mention taht there are tweets where this man is seeing literally flirting with this boy, so...

Anyways, i read some comments and people were also discussing the age of consent, and talking about how this boy was old enough to know what he was doing, that he enjoyed it and since he iniciated he obviously was the only culprit. People started talking about how americans were too prissy about age consent laws, how in many places it was 16 or even lower. And these kind of comments had hundreds and hundreds of likes!

And i feel like i should point out that this community leans heavily male, which is interesting: aren't men always talking about male victims not being taken seriously on and on. Yet i keep on seeing them discredit both male and female victims all the time. In fact, they were a few comments talking about how this case would have created more conmmotion if the victim was female.... Like why are they so obssesed, always bringing up female victims in these cases? One of them was downvoted though and called sexist because this case was in fact one of the most well know ones, and he was exposed for posting on mysogynistic subs.

Like i don't know papi, all of this makes me pretty sick... sorry for annoying you with this, i needed to vent somewhere....

Girl, I- gamerbros and online gays are the biggest sex pests in existence. In this case, both of those demonic realms are colliding - why would you even try to make sense out of this mess?

OF COURSE they're going to be predator apologists, why are you even surprised? The 20 years old dude excuse of freezing during the alleged assault can be true, but any benefit of doubt left the room as soon as he admitted getting back to the 15 y.o kids for him to give a blowjob...

During rape, people freeze because from the shock of the situation, but also bc they're scared acting up might turn against them (because the assaulter is stronger, with a weapon, etc). How could a 20 y.o dude be scared to *that* point of a 15 y.o boy sloppily giving him a blowjob? Was he still "freezing to death" in that second encounter while having that blowjob? sorry but accepting sexual solicitation from a minor, even in case of blackmail is still highly problematic and suspicious. He deserves to be as much dragged as that kid, who indeed has to be highly disturbed to display such extroverted sexual behavior. I wouldn't be surprised he's been groomed by online gays who indeed have a LOT of issues with romanticizing inappropriate age gap (they have a whole culture of initiating young gays into sexuality by older ones) and being so obsessive with sex & extreme sexual practice - even gay normies themselves (who are not into this degen shit) admit it.

It's very revealing they're now trying to drag women into that discourse, when women don't have a whole culture of egging/grooming young males into sex. This cope is really pathetic lmao Same for lesbians. It's almost the common denominator with sexual predatory behavior wasn't sexual orientation but.....SEX :)

In my country, age of consent is at 15 y.o and can even be 13 if there's less than a 5 years gap.....but literally no one asked for it. Every single person actively seeking to lower age of consent should be sent to jail as a cautionary measure. 5 years minimum.

[kelseimae]

The Sims 4 Alphabet Challenge UPDATED !!!

The Alphabet Challenge (My version)

Founder Rules

Choose any premade sim in the save.

The sim must be a young adult. If they aren’t then you may use cheats to reset their age at Young Adult.

You can give them a makeover.

They can be single sims. For example, Johnny Zest

They can be sims already married. For example, Bob and Eliza Pancakes.

They cannot have children. If you really want to use that specific household though then you can delete the kids.

You can keep them in the house they are currently in, or you can use free real estate cheat to get into their first house.

Career: Freelance Crafter

Aspiration: Creativity-Master Maker

Gameplay Rules

Founder’s childrens name should start with the Letter A.

The youngest child becomes the heir.

Each generation’s kids name start with the next letter of the alphabet. For example, A Heir will have B children and B Heir will have C children.

Each generation has two different career options and aspirations to go with them. When you reach the end at letter Z, you can start over with A and do the careers you didn’t pick.

Letter A

Career: Actor/Actress

Aspiration: Creativity-Master Actor/Actress

Career: Education/Administrator Branch

Aspiration: Popularity-Friend of the World

Letter B

Career: Athlete/Bodybuilder Branch

Aspiration: Athletic-Bodybuilder

Career: Criminal/Boss Branch

Aspiration: Deviance-Public Enemy

Letter C

Career: Culinary/Chef Branch

Aspiration: Food-Master Chef

Career: Civil Designer/Civic Planner Branch

Aspiration: Nature- Eco Innovator

Letter D

Career: Detective

Aspiration: Popularity-Leader of the Pack

Career: Secret Agent/Diamond Agent Branch

Aspiration: Family: Big Happy Family

Letter E

Career: Tech Guru/eSport Gamer Branch

Aspiration: Knowledge-Computer Whiz

Career: Conservationist/Environmental Manager Branch

Aspiration: Nature-Outdoor Enthusiast

Letter F

Career: Critic/Food Critic Branch

Aspiration: Food-Master Chef

Career: Critic/Arts Critic Branch

Aspiration: Creativity-Painter Extraordinaire

Letter G

Career: Civil Designer/Green Technician Branch

Aspiration: Nature-Eco Innovator

Career: Gardener/ Botanist Branch

Aspiration: Nature- Freelance Botanist

Letter H

Career: Politician/Charity Organizer

Aspiration: Location- City Native MUST MOVE TO SAN MYSHUNO

Career: Freelance Photography

Aspiration: Family-Big Happy Familiy

Letter I

Career: Social Media/Internet Personality

Aspiration: Popularity/Friend of the World

Career: Business/Investor

Aspiration: Family-Super Parent

Letter J

Career: Writer/Journalist

Aspiration: Popularity-Party Animal

Career: Law/Judge

Aspiration: Fortune-Fabulously Wealthy

Letter K

Career: Entertainer/Comedian

Aspiration: Popularity-Jokestar

Career: Engineer/Computer Engineer

Aspiration: Knowledge- Computer Whiz

Letter L

Career: Gardener/Floral Designer

Aspiration: Nature-Outdoor Enthusiast

Career: Military/Covert Operator

Aspiration: Love-Soulmate

Letter M

Career: Business/Management

Aspiration: Family-Successful Lineage

Career: Conservationist/Marine Biologist

Aspiration: Location-Beach Life

Letter N

Career: Astronaut/Interstellar Smuggler

Aspiration: Knowledge-Nerd Brain

Career: Doctor

Aspiration: Love-Serial Romantic

Letter O

Career: Military/Officer

Aspiration: Any-Complete Strangerville Mystery

Career: Painter/Master of the Real

Aspiration: Creativity-Painter Extraordinaire

Letter P

Career: Painter/Patron of the Arts

Aspiration: Creativity-Painter Extraordinaire

Career Politician/Politician

Aspiration: Location-City Native MUST MOVE TO SAN MYSHUNO

Letter Q

Career: Engineer/Mechanical Engineer

Aspiration: Nature/Angling Ace

Career: Entertainer/Musician

Aspiration: Creativity-Musical Genius

Letter R

Career: Criminal/Oracle

Aspiration: Deviance- Chief of Mischief

Career: Law/Private Attorney

Aspiration: Fortune-Mansion Baron

Letter S

Career: Scientist

Aspiration: Nature/Curator

Career: Astronaut/Space Ranger

Aspiration: Knowledge-Nerd Brain

Letter T

Career: Style Influencer/Trend Setter

Aspiration: Popularity-Party Animal

Career: Athletic/Professional Athlete

Aspiration: Athletic-Body Builder

Letter U

Career: Social Media/Public Relations

Aspirations: Popularity-Friend of the World

Career: Education/Professor

Aspirations: Popularity-Party Animal

Letter V

Career: Secret Agent/Villian

Aspiration: Deviance-Public Enemy

Career: Freelance Programmer

Aspiration: Knowledge-Computer Whiz

Letter W

Career: Writer/Author

Aspirations: Creativity-Best Selling Author

Career: Freelance Writer

Aspirations: Popularity-World Famous Celebrity

Letter X

Career: Culinary/Mixologists

Aspiration: Food-Master Mixologists

Career: Freelance Artist

Aspiration: Creativity-Painter Extraordinaire

Letter Y

Career: Style Influencer/Stylist

Aspiration: Love-Serial Romantic

Career: Interior Designer

Aspiration: Location- Beach Life

Letter Z

Career: Tech Guru/Start-up Entrepreneur

Aspiration: Nature/Anging Ace

Career: Freelance Programmer

Aspiration: Love- Soulmate

[monriatitans]

MonriaTitans

Let's Play Some $#!7!: Reigns - Intro | 53-YEAR REIGN! WOOT-WOOT!

Come join me for another installment of Let's Play Some $#!7 | LPS$! Today, we started playing Reigns! I was introduced to it by another YouTuber/Streamer, Jim Stephanie Sterling. And it made me break my rule, which I compensated for by shortening the stream a little; I skipped break to keep playing. And I got to a 53-YEAR REIGN! WOOT-WOOT! Then died when my Military fell and my brother-in-law poisoned me. Backing up, Reigns is a card game; a card game that provides you with choices that matter. You are a king, so far, every time. I had a daughter at one point, but I might have died too soon to be able to see her be a queen. If her being a queen was even possible. When you die, you rule again as the next heir and it tracks how long you rule for.

The setting is medieval and your choices affect the Church, the People, the Military, and/or the Economy, each represented by a Cross, Stick Figure, Sword, and Dollar sign. If one is emptied, your reign ends. If one maxes out, your reign ends. The latter was INTERESTING to learn! And made for some interesting choices! The choice system itself is complicated by its simplicity, which I tried explaining to a viewer, but they didn't get it. It's fine. I don't always explain things well. How you know what your choices affect is represented by dots above the icons; small dot, small effect, and big dot, big effect. What they don't tell you is if the effect is positive or negative. It's a glorified guessing game that had me hooked! Three problems off the top of my head are, 1) without spoiling some story, they had me execute someone who should have already been dead AND someone died of poison multiple times. And, 2) some choices got repetitive. Why do I need to keep adding fortresses to the castle when there was no indicator of them being destroyed? Or did I miss something? 3) The people you regularly interact with are living WAY too long! The only time there as a replacement was when I had them killed! AM I MISSING SOMETHING? Completing the compliment sandwich, the game's art style is adorable! And also simple! The music was pretty decent, too. And the achievements were fun to figure out! This is a game I will have no issues with revisiting! Can I beat my record of a 53-year reign? Can I get to 100? We'll see! And since I don't know what will happen if I try to start a new game, this is going to be a Stream game going forward.

Well, this is all for now! Thank you for reading! If this is something you're interested in, don't forget to hit the "Subscribe" and/or "Follow" button!

—

The Sunday, October 27, and 636th, Artist Shout-Out goes to Ida Smaga! Check them out here!

—

TIMESTAMPS 0:00 - Starting Soon 9:57 - Welcome Gamers! 12:00 - Artist Shout-Out 14:59 - Game Intro/Launch 16:33 - Reigns 3:13:35 - Artist Shout-Out 3:14:52 - Closing/Just Chatting 3:19:01 - Rendezvous Point Bookshop Plug 3:23:44 - Farewell

—

MORE INFO & TO SUPPORT - MonriaTitans | WGS Summarized - Rendezvous Point Bookshop - Artist Shout-Out Criteria - Throne Wishlist - #SubOffTwitch - YouTube - Rumble - Odysee - Twitch

—

[joelwindows7]

LBRY Murdered (LBRY sued by SEC & lost, then bankrupt full of debt)

This is record of the broadcasted meeting discussing the murder of LBRY inc. and the next response that should be done.

As the company that relied LBRY protocol & its interface, Odysee, this meeting gathers all key divisions to address all things from concern, to the response actions.

The meeting takes place in Saorfa dimension. I will talk to all gamers, and after each speech each day, all participants submits their talk, such as concerns, and idea of actions.

Since our beloved friend has been murdered, I also have no choice, but to allow each division to confer with me, in a closed manner, when they inclined to for whenever time. It's so bad, as we usually never ever allow anybody in any division to declare a closed meeting, due to philosophy in our company. The reason that this forcedly had to be done is because we received extra request of the division members, to propose actions that would harm us if known to, especially proprietarists, and silencers like SEC in USA, Earth. There is no rest assuring at all for this one. Such vile act done by the councils out there at SEC from USA, Earth proves a still ever existing silence of speech, ironically despite the philosophy in America, pertaining Freedom of speech, and basically, entire earth, pertaining human rights, and honest works that be useful for beings in general.

Meeting 1

Hello, gamers. This is our first day of our emergency meeting here in Perkedel Technologies.

You have all been gathered here for grave matters regarding to the tools we use everyday to share our words.

As you may have known, last Saturday was the greatest negative shock of news, that LBRY inc. the company behind LBRY Protocol and owner of its interface, Odysee, has been murdered, by their own nation's organisation, SEC. LBRY was accused by SEC for violating law, stating that these LBC constitute a requirement to be registered as security and such on. LBRY has battled against, have lost, and as the result cause immense loss and debt upon LBRY. So much, that LBRY had no choice but to declare defunct and bankruptcy, liquidating all of the assets they have in order to pay those debts to SEC. In summary, all this was done in favour of merely egotistical political reasons, as ironic it looks, that there are more similar crypto related organisation that unlike the only LBRY, serves nothing but bunch of *quack cures* and *fancy bottled borjang tea*, in addition to huge gap and hurdle just to get started (wtf, QORTAL, get me the f888 in!!!). I have full faith, that say gamers were about to register Odysee very late, they may still be able to start prosper, with the just at least watch video rewards & invitings, they still could, even has been worsened to the worst these day (we have yet to receive report of late comers unable to post videos to LBRY for the 1st time, but DM Prefix `I_TOO_POOR_TO_START_LBRY` send screenshot still open).

Despite of such bloody fatalities, the LBRY protocol and related stuffs shall continue to work as normal. Although, we began to concern about this entire fate of the protocol and the blockchains in it. In addition, the content itself only works like regular Torrent, as it was once stated by the LBRY in white paper at certain page (pls sauce), restated again in above article that **Contents shall be seeded in order for them to survive**. Helping to achieve this requirement is as simple as keeping the miner runs and/or having the LBRY Desktop App daemon steady all time in a system session. Odysee, as the main and large seeder are promised to keep their way of doing LBRY, as is, by seeding and serving gamers the contents from across nodes that mine and seeds. However, was concerned that they may betray us from it, **the pledge has already signed**, therefore shall be lesser of concern today and some forth. We advise all gamers though, to be vigilant as always.

Now. Let us discuss the action we shall do next in response of all this incident. Despite everything works as normal, by having the author perished will create instability and chance for the system to crumbles. Therefore, we ask all gamers to provide us all ideas and to agree ones, about what shall we do, with our files, where as it was created, edited, rendered, to be uploaded, as well as 3rd party files we use in our creation of this Cinematic Universe and miscelaneous.

In addition to the discussion, since LBRY was unexpectedly murdered by someone who has sole interest in unecessary politics without bringing any good impacts for the people, we left with no choice, **but to allow times for all participants involved in discussion done in closed manner** where everyone also provides us ideas and to agree ones, which are considered risky and exposes nothing but harm if known by especially proprietarist and silencer, across galaxies. This is the first time ever, we opened this philoshophy violating opportunity, and is not a moment good idea to celebrate, rather, to sorrow and anger upon. For those who would like to recon, Perkedel Technologies is company of Open Source, and all meetings as all as possible are open source. Every documents of the meeting result as is (redacting possible identifying identities if it would harm ones) are shared for all gamers to see. This time is different. The silencer are out there and are on watch against us. These ideas you are eager to provide will give information to unwanted enemies that will leads us to our defeat, and loss of lives. Therefore, at the session of this closed meeting after the usual, Viorfa are asked to turn off all recording equipments, take off the power, discharge any electricity stored in capacitors, take off the memory storage and bring them out of this dimension, as well as all the camera. If the recording equipment has internal memory, then those, has to be expelled from this dimension. All participants may store what you have learned during this session in your head (and cyber are also allowed to remember, currently). You have to fortify your mind with security system if you haven't already if you haven't yet applied one, in event of a silencer attempting to extract your head without consent taking important memories about this part of meeting, they shall not be able to. We advise all gamers to against encrypting any bits in your head due to proven risk and dangers which again is lethal. You as well have to lock your house door (or stay in this Saorfa hotel) and avoid going outside before I declare to next other weekend.

Alright. Let us begin open discussion, followed by closed discussion. Before we start, since you are now recommended to stay in Saorfa hotel here, until another Sunday, you may first use this time to go back to your workspace and pack up necessary work stuffs, including ALL of your families. Then come back here, and in 2 hours is the discussion.

Arn: Please require. It's no longer safe.

Yes?

Oh, required. Apologies. You are now required to stay in Saorfa hotel. It seems, the silencer has begun sharpening their bullets.

To be Continued

by JOELwindows7  

Perkedel Technologies  

CC4.0-BY-SA

[fishylife]

Thoughts on FFTA2

I'm not going to do an official write up post on this game. I've never been a big gamer so I don't feel I have much to add. I'm just going to dump thoughts.

As of right now, my team is about level 50. I've beaten the game (all three parts of the last battle), but came back to do the postgame content.

From browsing FFT reddit, I think FFTA2 is the least popular because of its lighter tone. Personally I prefer the lighter tone because I honestly don't pay that much attention to story when playing video games. Gameplay tends to be more important to me.

Thoughts on Gameplay

I thought that I wouldn't enjoy the generic characters but I love them a lot. The few special characters are enough to keep the story going.

It took me a little bit of time to figure out the ability point system, the bazaar system, the auction house system. Thankfully I won't be so lost in next playthroughs.

I was playing on normal the first time around. I guess like any tactical RPG player I should try hard next time.

I thought that there wasn't grinding in this game since everything is quest based, but there are repeatable quests which are essentially grinding, even if they don't give so much exp and ability points. The random encounters are hard to find because you can't see them on the map.

Like with other tactical RPGs, the beginning of the game was harder, I regularly finished battles with one or more dead characters lol. That changed as I was able to level up my characters.

I've found loot management to be challenging at times. I tend to save up loot so I won't be using my sole piece for an item, but I recognize that sometimes you might as well just use it so you have a weapon/piece of equipment now to use.

On the topic of the bazaar it's annoying that the bazaar list can't be rearranged in alphabetical order. It's also annoying that I have to consult a guide to craft my items and that there's no in-game mechanic to keep track of it for me.

I always accidentally break the laws during battles. I wish there was a pop up to remind me when I was going to break a law v.v

Thoughts on Jobs

For Humes, I much preferred the magic and archer/hunter classes. Love my seer/illusionist and my hunter/archer. For much of the game, I cycled Luso and Adelle between the parivir, paladin, and ninja classes and never really got anything good out of them. Paladin is fine as a secondary class because of its holy attacks and healing (nurse being able to heal stone is really helpful). I have heard that ninja is largely a poor class and that it's only good for building speed and getting dual wield. As for parivir, it's been disappointing for me. Maybe it's because I need to get the geomancy support ability but parivir hasn't been fun for me. Or maybe it's just that Luso and Adelle's stats up until then had been disappointing and therefore not able to show off the abilities of those classes :/

For a period of time I was trying to get a blue mage, but it was too much work. I think the general strategy is to bring a beastmaster into battle with the blue mage to learn skills. When I decided to try for blue mage, I was past level 30 so I recruited an underleveled Nu Mou and trained them up to be a beastmaster but it was still just...not fun for me? It's not worth the effort.

As expected, Nu Mou were great magic classes. Death and drain on arcanist were awesome. I tried alchemist for a while but I wasn't clicking with it. I knew I wasn't going to go for scholar because I didn't like that it hit everyone. I only started checking out sage later but I see why it's a good class. Some helpful attacks, including an ultima attack! Black mage, white mage, and illusionist were all solid on nu mou, as they are generally solid classes.

Viera! (I love the girls, viera and gria are my favourites <3) Viera classes are all terrific. The only one I didn't really care for was green mage, but it was just that I found it boring; it was still a pretty decent job. Elementalist was one of the most easily accessibly magic classes at the beginning of the game and it continued to be such a versatile and useful job later in the game. I thought I would never need summoner but admittedly summoners regen and healing spells are incredibly helpful. As for physical classes, sniper has such awesome and diverse abilities. Assassin is decent too (and it has the viera's ultima attack). Admittedly I did not start using the fencer line of jobs until much later in the game and fencer was surprisingly really useful?? I should have started with this class lol. Spellblade...listen I didn't realize blood price was this useful. But I get it now, I have seen the light. And like with elementalist, the fact that spellblade does damage and debuffs is just super helpful. Love vieras <3

Bangaas are generally decent but I think they're most useful in the straightforward physical damage dealing jobs, mainly white monk, master monk, and gladiator. I think templar and defender are meant to be the defensive classes. They're alright, but their skills aren't as interesting. For support Bangaa, we have bishop, cannoneer, and trickster. I call bishop support because I mostly use them as an emergency heal, but frankly their magic isn't very good (which makes sense). Cannoneer and trickster on the other hand are good for debuffs and cannoneer specifically has long-range healing. I think in my next playthrough I might try a cannoneer/trickster.

Moogles took me a long time to figure out because I just couldn't figure out how best to use them. I still don't really, but I've figured out which of the moogle jobs I prefer. Black mage and time mage are pretty solid but these are jobs that are shared among different races. Otherwise, the only other jobs that I felt were useful were juggler, fusilier, and moogle knight. At the beginning of the game, I was going for juggler/tinker because I heard it was a good combination. Juggler has some really good buffs and debuffs but in my opinion tinker is only good for its red spring ability. Fusilier felt like a good class because of its massive range. On the other hand, the other moogle long range physical class, flintlock, was hard to use because it required two turns to use any of the abilities (the hand-cannon has to be primed first). I discovered moogle knight way too late. For some reason I just never paid attention to it, but it's the sturdiest of the moogle's physical classes, and also has its ultimate attack. I had seen some recommendations for juggler/animist so I had checked out animist for a while. It's fine as a debuff class but I wouldn't say it was a favourite. Chocobo knight is unfortunately a gimmick class that is occasionally needed if only for the rancher's request quests. I'm so far into the game and I've still only completed two of the rancher's requests because it's difficult finding specific chocobos.

I only had one seeq during my playthrough so it took me a while to check out the various jobs. Berserker is a general damage job, ranger is for traps, viking is for stealing, and lanista is for draining HP. In general I've kept the berserker as a secondary class for my seeq while I cycled through the other jobs, but only because I got berserker first. I'd say that lanista is my favourite of the four because I like draining abilities. I like ranger too mostly because it can equip bows.

Grias <3 <3 My bat girls <3 <3 Grias being able to ignore terrain makes them so versatile. Both my grias were recruited as raptors so I kind of started backwards in that they started in a secondary job. In any case, I think raptor, hunter, and ravager are all very decent job. I'm starting to see a pattern that jobs that are shared between races tend to be very solid, and the same goes for hunter. Hunter is so useful particularly for the sidewinder and ultima abilities. Raptor is a pretty decent class with its crush abilities and its two wind abilities. Ravager is a bit more hard hitting; its sneak attack ability can be so powerful. As for geomancer, it just isn't meant to be for grias. I also am not the biggest fan of abilities that are environment-based, so a lot is out of the user's control when it comes to geomancer spells. Geomancers have great reaction and support abilities though. I had both my grias spend time as geomancers to get at least magick counter and avoid traps.

Bard is a pretty solid buff class! It takes a bit of work to get all of the abilities because of the whole thing with brilliant theorbo and shining lute only being available in quests. But overall a solid job including the ability to heal, cast regenerate, to deal holy damage, and to exorcise spirits.

Dancer is meant to be the opposite of bard in that it focuses mostly on debuffs. To be honest I mostly just use forbidden dance and mincing minuet for Penelo and not much else. Maybe I will get around to using blade dance but for me Penelo is mostly a debuffer and support character rather than a damage dealer, as opposed to Hurdy who can still deal decent damage while as a debuffer class.

I'm not too big on the sky pirate class. It's a stealing class, but I've never really focused too much on stealing in the game. Other than life of crime and some buff abilities I don't find sky pirate to be terribly useful. Plus, my Vaan doesn't have great stats and I had trouble figuring out what to do with him. Right now I'm seeing how he would fare as an archer/hunter.

I'm still only in the process of getting the heritor abilities so I don't have any deep thoughts on it. I think it might be a pretty awesome class based on the few abilities I have so far though.

I haven't gotten Al-Cid yet so I don't know what agent is like.

Thoughts on Abilities

I have to admit, ultima attacks are SO MUCH FUN. It's so satisfying when a character finally builds up enough MP to launch an ultima attack.

I'm really basic in that I generally focus on abilities that deal damage lol. Well, I do sometimes use buff skills when a character is not in range of an enemy they can attack. And I do use debuff skills too, particularly ones like disable or charm.

As I mentioned, I don't really care much for stealing items so thief and sky pirate abilities don't do anything for me.

It's really satisfying when you have a character who is a long-range damage dealer who has a short-range secondary job. Eg I'm working towards getting a fusilier/moogle knight so that my moogle can use an ultima attack from long ranges. But yeah it's the reason why I like gladiator as a secondary job for bangaas, so that they can use the ultima attack.

I often got confused over how to heal certain debuffs. It took me so long to figure out that confuse, charm, and sleep could only be cured by hitting the character and "waking them up." I also still have no idea how to cure doom or stone, other than hitting with a white staff and nurse respectively. I'm only in the process of getting esunaga for my sage so maybe that might help. But I couldn't even find too much information online :/ It also took me a long time to figure out the difference between disable and addle. In general this game has a lot of information that just isn't available within the game :/

I don't like the abilities that hit everybody regardless of friend or foe. Which is why I don't use the scholar class at all. With tinker, at least there's a chance factor, but I still only use tinker for red spring.

Quicken is an ability that's surprisingly useful. So time mage and jugglers are very helpful in that regard, particularly when I want my heavy damage dealers to get more turns in.

For reaction and support abilities, I tend to pick up as many as possible so that I can choose between them based on the battle. Eg against a lot of magic using enemies I would equip evade magick or magick counter etc.

Pretty much all my magic users have halve mp as their support ability. I wonder if I should start using geomancy for some of them though (the ones who can get it).

Thoughts on Races

Races are as good as their jobs are to me lol. So this section is just kind of a summary of the jobs section.

For me, humes are only good for magic and archer/hunter classes. My seer/illusionist is so sturdy.

Nu mou were generally great as magic damage classes. I think it's almost a bit of a waste to assign nu mous as white mages if they have other damage dealing options. But I do sometimes set my nu mous with white mage as secondary jobs when the team I'm sending in doesn't have any other good healers.

Vieras are 10/10! While they may not be the hardest hitting when it comes to physical damage, the fact that most viera jobs have debuffing abilities makes them really helpful. There's such good range in their job set and ability set. Plus bunnies <3

Bangaa are generally good physical damage dealers. Because they are sturdy, I think they'll still fare well in their defensive and support classes. It might be a bit of a waste to have a defense-oriented bangaa just because I think offense-oriented bangaas are still pretty sturdy.

Moogles are a mixed bag. I think there are really only a few jobs that are pretty useful and the others are just a bit too gimmicky. Moogles are cute though, kupo!

Seeq is alright. I didn't care for them enough to get two seeqs, I just had one seeq cycling through all the different jobs. In terms of physical damage, my bangaas already would have been doing that, and as I mentioned, I don't really care much for stealing in the game. I'm also not much of an item user in the game, so the ranger job with mirror items isn't really something I use a lot.

Grias are 9/10! As I mentioned, I loved their mobility. I think it's cool that we have a female class that is offense-oriented. All of the gria physical damage classes are solid.

Thoughts on Characters

Luso and Adelle join in the game early enough that they're basically blank slates.

That being said, Luso wasn't really impressive to me. He wasn't even the biggest damage dealer for me, it was just that he tended to be a little higher level than the rest of my team because he had to be in important battles.

Actually, Adelle is a little advanced for the team when she joined me, but she was soon beat out by the others because of her poor damage dealing. So next time I'm probably going to try to put her in a sturdier class. Right before she was about to get heritor, I had Adelle master seer because I heard that magick frenzy would work great with heritor abilities. I will see if that's true.

Cid was a typical bangaa unit, pretty solid.

Hurdy was good! It took me a long time to figure out how to use him but once I did I thought he was so useful. I was going with a black mage/bard combo which was pretty solid. But now I'm trying a juggler/bard combo to see if it's helpful. The smile toss is pretty helpful.

I kept seeing Frimelda being hyped but I haven't been impressed with her. She's generally too slow for me to be able to do anything with her :/ She does come with dual wield, but a lot of her weapons are two-handed so I can't always take advantage of dual wield. Maybe I should forget paladin as a secondary job for her and instead just focus on speed classes like parivir or ninja. Then she can take advantage of dual wield and get her speed up. For now I'm trying out fighter/paladin.

Penelo is fine. I'm working on making her a white mage/dancer mostly because I don't know what to do with her tbh.

As mentioned, I'm also very confused about what to do with Vaan. I was thinking of making him a fighter/sky pirate, but I currently already have Frimelda training as a fighter. I don't foresee Vaan being a major damage dealer so that was why I'm trying archer/hunter for Vaan. I saw some people suggest parivir with geomancy which I guess is always an option but eh. I'm not crazy on Vaan. I think maybe he's more fanservice for people who like FFXII.

I haven't gotten Montblanc or Al-cid yet. I'm a little curious about Montblanc, but I heard he doesn't have good magic stats so he isn't useful as a black mage. I'll see how he is. Hurdy was solid as a black mage so maybe I could make Montblanc the juggler. As for Al-cid if he gets the human job set then honestly I'm not too interested.

I know Cid was given the bangaa job set and Penelo was given the viera job set to spread things out a bit, but we still have way too many hume characters >( Luso, Adelle, Frimelda, Vaan, and potentially Al-cid.

Other

I don't know if I'll consider playing the other FFT games because they're not on NDS. But they seem to be more popular. We shall see. But playing FFTA2 has reignited my interest in the older tactical RPG games. Before, I only ever played Fire Emblem (the new 3DS ones and a bit of Shadow Dragon) and very occasionally Pokemon Conquest.

FFTA2 has also finally gotten me into final fantasy's job system. I never really connected with it but getting into FFTA2 has finally gotten me interested in its jobs that we see across different games, like white mage (healing), black mage (damage), red mage (hybrid), blue mage (wild card), dragoon (jump and spear), monk (fists), etc.

[sashi-ya]

after seeing the excerpt about led in law's room, i was thinking, what should law's room be like? I don't know, but I was curious thinking about what his room would be like.

OK THIS ASK IS PURE GOLD. MY MOMENT HAS ARRIVED!! THANK U FOR ASKING THIS OMG

So, I wrote Law in fact has LED lights in his room cause in a modern AU (but probably at the Polar Tang, too) he would be a total weeb, nerd and gamer for sure. So...

He would have a good gaming pc, probably a bunch of energy drinks cans scattered that we will clean after two days or so, a bookshelf full of notes and medical books and then FIGURINES, a lot. LOT.

Also, a special bookshelf with all the volumes of Sora the warrior of the sea and some posters of him, and Stealth Black (he despises Germa, but you know, Stealth Black is his weakness).

Also a special poster with a ninja saying "NIN NIN" doing the shadow's technique he loves, you know the one he asked Raizo!

Next to his books he would also have a human skull (don't worry all doctors have one, I have on too for medical purposes)

He would have three picture frames with photographs from Cora, his family and the guys (Bepo, Shachi and Pen) and probably, hidden, a photo with Luffy cause you know, he really loves his friend even if he says otherwise.

Clean sheets, too. This man can't stand sleeping in wrinkled sheets, less say smelling bad. He has a little polar bear plushie that once someone gifted to him when he was younger resting over his plain white futon.

About his gaming gears and equipment: he wouldn't admit it, but his headset has LED kitty ears. Nobody can't tell me that's not a fact. His mouse and keyboard also has LED lights, but in a subtle way, probably orange or yellow ones.

The room lights though, change with his mood; if Law is feeling down, he would go with purple lights, if he is feeling kinda nasty, red. If he is feeling cheerful, probably white or subtle orangey tones. When he is studying for surgical procedures he will have more warm lights to read without hurting his eyes (and of course glasses with the blue filter if he has to read from the pc).

His clothing is perfectly folded inside his wardrobe, but sometimes he has his socks on the ground. His underwear is also perfectly folded, and has a special boxers with a hearts pattern that he only wears during specific events where he needs some spare luck.

Oh, also, he has his hats hanging behind the door.

That's Law's room for me :3

[noobsomeexagerjunk]

an attempted morality alignment chart for season 3’s most current and intersecting arcs

there are too many people but these are my most sure answers rn—this will age badly in time/later today (?)

this will be an interesting way of framing, now that there are little to no nations on the server; refute the post if you’d like!

art taken from SAD-ist’s Dawn of 16th, to parallel the one Wilbur made a few months back

LG: Awesamdude

Sam behaves heavily within his own code of ethics. Within structures of his own making is a heavy maintenance of order, always made for the good of many. (This is why he is heavily affected whenever he fails to measure up to his own expectations.)

NG: Tommyinnit

Tommy’s been through a lot. Too much, really. Being good still matters to Tommy, though being chaotic has certainly been exhibited less. He’s already betrayed and followed his own principles. He’s really just trying to get by in a way that’s not only ethical but restorative of his person.

CG: CaptainPuffy

Puffy is an aggressive force of good, feeling the need to become a hero by any means necessary. While she behaved within the whims of the King’s word before, she is willing to give that up for the greater good. Her methods and practices have been known to be questionable on occasion, but they’re never intentionally malicious in nature.

LN: Nihachu

Niki has struggled to recover from the loss of Wilbur and L’Manburg. It is from Doomsday that she secures herself within her own principles, as well as being willing to do things outside of her perception moral good, mostly as a means to cope in a way she understands. She now chooses people whom she trusts to help and is now more privy to being violent most especially when it’s necessary.

N: Ranboo

“Everywhere on the alignment chart” should say enough, because this character has behaved in every position in the alignment chart. Ranboo’s morals are unbelievably flexible, adjusting to circumstances that intend to maintain Ranboo’s personal safety, a general desire for everyone, and/or the welfare of the people he cares about. He will behave and perform in accordance to any method and lifestyle that would help himself too, whether it be an ordered maintenance through observance of law or personal autonomy exhibited through anarchy.

CN: DropsByPonk

Ponk generally behaves out of his own whims, willing to do things outside the bounds of ethics. He, despite this, has lines that he does not cross, exhibits a level of recognizable basic decency, and for this reason isn’t necessarily good or evil. He somehow manages to maintain this nature even under the Crimson Egg’s influence, still chosing chaos as a method and neutrality in morality.

LE: BadBoyHalo

Bad’s inclination to do evil and chaos is being directly influenced by the Crimson Egg. His reasons for submitting to the Egg speak of selfish choices but nonetheless has a deep seated belief that what he’s doing is still right and just. Bad’s principles may have changed due to the Egg’s influence, but he still behaves within the bounds of said principles. He also behaves only within the laws of the Egg. This may change, in my opinion, depending on what the Egg wants Bad to do next.

NE: Jack Manifold

Jack’s motivations morally speaking are considerably evil in nature, fully aware that his actions cause active harm and are fueled with negativity. While having a set of principles he adheres to, he will abandon these principles out of an uncontrolled burst of emotion or due to circumstances of desperation. His sense of directionlessness after several failures is arguably a reflection of this.

CE: Dreamwastaken

While Dream is behaving in a way that he believes is correct to him, there is a universal understanding in the server at this point that many of his actions are evil. A good lot of what he has done is rooted out of a desire for personal entertainment, and seeks to pursue goals without regard for people and without consideration of the moral and ethical implications of his actions.

Other Players of Note

These are people that I

didn’t consider important enough

are not in many enough arcs

shared similar alignments with characters I thought were more fitting.

These include all the involved and semi-involved characters of Season 3. (Of which are easier to contest imo)

Technoblade: Lawful Neutral

Philza: Chaotic Neutral

Tubbo: Neutral Good

Quackity: Lawful Neutral

Fundy: Chaotic Neutral

Eret: Neutral Good

Hbomb94: Lawful Good

ConnorEatsPants: Neutral

Foolish Gamers: Neutral Good

Hannahxxrose: Lawful Neutral

Antfrost: Lawful Evil

Punz: Neutral Evil

Purpled: Chaotic Evil

Ghostbur: Lawful Good

Sapnap: Chaotic Neutral

GeorgeNotFound: Neutral

Karl Jacobs: Neutral

[potteresque-ire]

Concerning the incredibly far and deep reach of CCP’s propaganda, the narratives the government can spin and call the truth; does ‘the common normal populace’ actually know what’s really going on?

Hello everyone!!! Happy Chinese New Year!!

I’m grouping these asks because if I hear them correctly, they’re all related to this question: how much do people in China know about the atrocities committed by their government, and why don’t they do something about it?

It’s a difficult question, isn’t it? A potentially upsetting one too, just to think about. My answers are more opinion-based, more personal this time. Since there’re no polls about what people know, they have to be based a little more on my own impression, which has more chances of error. Please bear with me and proceed with caution ...

As with people in most countries, what people know is hugely dependent on individuals. Specifically, re: politics, I can think of at least three reasons why people don’t have the facts

1) they have limited access to information 2) they’re being lied to about what they know 3) they’re not interested in current affairs.

1), of course, is what most people think about when it comes to China. You’re right, Anon(s), that VPN use is indeed rampant in the country and is essentially an open secret; there’re no official numbers but surveys have estimated the number of users can be up to 100 million, most of them being youngsters. They use it to do exactly what most of us would imagine: gain access to things they don’t have otherwise. Instagram has been (sporadically?) blocked since 2014 September and so while users may have set up their accounts while being overseas, it’s indeed, (very) possible, that they’ve set up and maintained their account under VPN use.

Wait, you may ask, so you mean the Great Firewall of China doesn’t exist?

That’s exactly the official stance. Not because of private VPN use, but because individuals/companies can apply for a license via their telecommunications company to visit all internet sites. Hence, the government’s claim that the Great Firewall doesn’t exist—you’ll be let through as long as you ask (and we’ll watch your every step)! There are also no explicit laws prohibiting the use of private VPNs; only a handful of arrests associated with private VPN use have been made and only since 2019, and the punishment is considered light—no imprisonment, just fines. It is, in contrast, against the law to *provide* private VPN services, and while companies have been shut down, the crackdown has still been incredibly sluggish by Chinese government’s standards, especially when the Xi regime has made its intention of banning VPN known and directives have been issued for that in 2017.

Why has VPN continued to enjoy this “grey existence”? Because without VPN, a lot of foreign businesses would leave—some, for example, require the most efficient online tools developed outside China to track the foreign markets, and talents have rejected job offers in the country when they realised they couldn’t get on their favourite social media. The science and tech sectors also rely heavily on VPN—programmers relying on Google to search stackoverflow, for example, to find known solutions to bugs. 

VPNs have also served political purposes—Hong Kong, Taiwan, and Chinese Communist Party (CCP)-critical communities all over the world are all painfully aware of the Chinese government’s practice of hiring its own collection of internet commentators (”50 Cent Party”), and at times, mobilising their youths (gamers, fan circles) to scale the Firewall and astroturf, throw insults at the “CCP enemies” and bomb message boards with pro-CCP messages.

Also, a significant fraction of VPN companies, both in China and overseas, have been reported to have Chinese ownership, by companies with government connections. These VPN services provide a false sense of security for those who do not enjoy having big brother peeking behind their backs while acting as surveillance tools that extend beyond the country.

(Please be careful about free VPNs).

The next question: If until now, users of private VPNs only rarely get into trouble, what’s holding them from scaling the Great Firewall and learning the facts?

It is this: the law isn’t about “climbing the wall”, but what one does outside the wall.

Article 6 of the 2016 edition of Cybersecurity law states the following: 

第六条　国家倡导诚实守信、健康文明的网络行为，推动传播社会主义核心价值观，采取措施提高全社会的网络安全意识和水平，形成全社会共同参与促进网络安全的良好环境

Article 6: The State advocates sincere, honest, healthy and civilized network conduct; promoting dissemination of the core socialist values, adopting measures to raise the entire society's awareness and level of network security, and forming a good environment for the entire society to jointly participate in advancing network security.

What this article implies is this ~ legally, Chinese citizens are bound to the Chinese government’s rules of good internet conduct, regardless of whether they use VPN to get on the internet. As with many Chinese laws, however, the vagueness in wording invites more questions than answers. Is it getting on Twitter, a banned website, “sincere, honest, healthy and civilized network conduct”? Obviously, it’s illegal to interact with other users about the Xinjiang’s internment camps, but what if one only goes there to talk about their favourite stars, because on Weibo supertopic they can’t even mention the stars’ name, can’t ahkgkhagjkfaskjgdf about their favourite fics? What if one goes there to discuss a M- or E-rated fic? Where is the line drawn and given its vagueness, will that line move tomorrow? How?

Most people, therefore, have opted to simply stay away from VPN. After all, China offers its own version of many of the fun websites out there (Weibo-Twitter; Instagram-Oasis; Tiktok-Douyin; Youtube-Bilibili). For those who do use VPN, they tend to stick to websites that are unlikely to cause issues (such as Instagram; Instagram became an issue when Hong Kongers started to upload information about the protests on there).

Now, let’s proceed to 2): People don’t know the facts because they’re being lied to about what they know.

There’s a difference between having access to facts and knowing that they’re facts. This is among the most painful lessons, perhaps, for those who followed the politics of the United States in the last few years (please forgive me for the US-centric-ness of the following few paragraphs!). Even with equal access to identical information, people can vary a LOT in their understanding of what are facts and what are lies.

This illustrates the power of propaganda—and propaganda in the US isn’t even centralised. Some media outlets and individuals (political leaders and analysts) have more say on what should be viewed as the truth, but parties without significant power—small foreign and domestic interests, fringe political organisations, conspiracy theorists, regular folks—have also made critical contributions to the “fake news” phenomenon in the US. There haven’t been apparent coordinations between these parties;  little concerted effort has been made to create one coherent story out of the many tales told.

In China, the propaganda effort is centralised, coordinated, free of distractions from competing story lines. The One Story the government decides on is repeated, over and over again, on newspapers, in shows, in textbooks, on signs on the streets, on social media. To put it another way, when it comes to political discourse, the country is designed to be an echo chamber with 1.4 billion people. Over time, the One Stories inevitably become firmly held beliefs—so firmly held that even if the people are exposed to facts, they no longer believe in them.

This is especially true when the source of the facts are countries with strong traditions of freedoms of speech and press, where the facts are often laid out with a critical eye to the administration and with vastly different opinions attached to them. While we view the latter as evidences that the values we embrace are alive and well—a critical eye to the administration means the Fourth Estate is doing its job, and the different opinions means freedom of speech gets to live another day—people who haven’t been exposed to these values tend to interpret these things as signs of weakness of the government. They may think the Chinese government is better than its counterparts elsewhere because no one is penning scathing criticisms against it. They may think the Chinese government is stronger because it unifies the opinions of their people—the failure of which, they’ve been taught, would lead to social chaos and economic free-fall.

The Chinese population has also been “immunised” against the truths that may be exposed about their government by a propaganda talking point used since Chairman Mao’s days—that the “Imperialist” western world, particularly the United States, is always scheming its downfall. The phrase often used is 美帝亡我之心不死 (”The heart (intention) of Imperialist US to bring us down will never die”). Unfavourable truths exposed must therefore be part of the “bring down China” scheme. This decades-old demonisation of the political apparatus of the US and Europe also prepares the people to accept what most would see as outrageous conspiracy theories: for example, in March 2020, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs claimed that the US Army intentionally planted COVID in Wuhan during the 2019 Military World games. “Foreign interference” becomes a frequent and convenient scapegoat for policy decisions gone wrong, sometimes to a (somewhat) hilarious effect ~ for example, a Taiwanese journalist calculated the cost required for the CIA to fund the 2019 Hong Kong Protests, as the Chinese government had claimed—and it turned out that the CIA was too poor to do it. 

(Many of us in the US would probably laugh at the idea that our government is capable of secretly paying 2 million foreign-language speaking strangers to show up together in one march.) (It can’t even get the COVID relief payments to its own people right over a period of months.)

(Fun trivia for turtles! As 美帝=“Imperialist US” is the synonym of a feared, imaginary super-villain—super organised, super efficient, super everywhere and super impossible to take down—c-BJYX, the indestructible No. 1 CP fandom in China, has been nicknamed “美帝 cp” by those not so enamoured with it.)

Finally, there’s the psychological factor. Once a set of beliefs becomes personal truths, listening to alternatives can be very upsetting (for those in the US: imagine the blue voting block made to listen to Fox News). Hence, even when people gain access to the facts later—for example, when they study/work abroad, even emigrate—they often don’t take advantage of the access. Instead, they remain logged in in the Chinese social media sites where they’re comfortable with not only the politics but also the language and the friendships they’ve built, and continue to immerse themselves in an environment heavy with CCP propaganda. They remain defenders of the Chinese government; some have even gone out and harass people who disagree with it, in the name of freedom of speech that their country of origin never offered to them.

Censorship, of course, is an important component of building a One Story echo chamber, and I should add a note about it: censorship in China comes in vastly different strengths. The restrictions on LGBT+ issues, for example, are fairly lax, relatively speaking—“homosexuality” remains a term one can find on their internet and a topic the administration continues to address, and while BL dramas are censored, their adapted versions, along with highly publicised discussions of their original material, have so far been tolerated. The strictest form of Chinese censorship would’ve allowed neither: any mention of the 1989 June 4th Tiananmen Square massacre , for example, is immediately removed, including any hints that the event may have happened. When the former leader of the Chinese government, Jiang Zemin (江澤民), was rumoured to have passed away, the censorship apparatus went so far as to remove all mentions of Jiang, which also happened to mean “large rivers”. Chinese netizens therefore joked that major rivers had ceased to exist in China that day, as one couldn’t find any information about them online.

(LGBT+ activists have therefore remained optimistic about the future of their campaign, despite the current state of affairs. To put it simply: the Chinese government has bigger fish to fry. Sexual minorities haven’t had major clashes with the administration, haven’t embarrassed the Chinese government with their demand for rights as the ethnic minorities—the Uyghurs, the Tibetans, the Mongolians etc did. Political dissidents, including the millions in Hong Kong, are also (far) ahead in the ranking of fish size.)

For most issues, the censorship effort sits somewhere in the middle and is often inconsistent over time. The people, therefore, often have knowledge that an event has happened — even when the event is considered, beyond the Great Firewall, damaging to the reputation of the Chinese government. However, critical information is often missing in their knowledge, or is heavily distorted. For example, overseas Chinese citizens have insisted that the motivation of the 2019 Hong Kong Protests was economic, echoing the longstanding CCP propaganda that Hong Kongers have been jealous of China’s prosperity (reality: China’s GDP per capita was $10,268 USD in 2019, and Hong Kong’s, $48,713—more than 4 times higher). They missed out a critical fact: while the fast economic growth of China has created some unease—Hong Kongers have always known the Chinese government has only tolerated them and their freedoms for their ability to generate wealth—what has truly ignited Hong Kong’s anger is the Chinese government’s violation of the 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration, and the terms it had agreed upon to get back the then British crown colony. Hong Kong hasn’t been demanding autonomy and freedoms because it’s a troublemaker, but because these things were promised to the city as conditions of the 1997 handover. As residents of the world’s third largest financial centre, Hong Kongers are diligent drafters and executioners of contracts (which international treaties are) and above all, faithful believers of them. For an asker (the Chinese government) to claim a contract as “historical”  because it has received the goods (Hong Kong) and no longer feels a need to pay (allow Hong Kong 50 years of freedoms and autonomy) is offensive to the principle, the very heart and soul of the city. 

(Gg’s former boss was a Hong Konger, and his experience working for him was a rather accurate reflection of Hong Kong’s view on business. What made an impression to Gg—that the posters should be without rips and misprints, even if these imperfections were not the fault of the design company—is a no-brainer to the Hong Konger in me reading the interview. Delivering high quality goods and services isn’t an act of kindness but rather, of professionalism and respect for the contract.)

(This interview is a highly recommended read, for those who’ve missed it!)

(One more example of “conveniently missed critical information”: remember GG’s show on Chongqing? Did you know the underground bombing shelters were not built by the Communist government, but the Nationalist government that was still ruling China during WWII?)

Anyway, where was I?

Right. We’re getting to 3): People are not getting the facts on the political situation in China because they’re not interested in current affairs.

Some—well, many— people are not interested in politics.

Some of you may be thinking: well, I’m not interested either. I follow politics because it’s important.

Why is it important? Because political engagement means you can do something about the many ills of the society, speak for those who cannot, force the government to change by voting, by voicing your opinion, by going to marches and protests etc.

What if you follow politics and still can’t do most of these things? What if, if you do choose to do these things, the price you pay may be astronomical? Will you still follow politics or devote your time, your energy to something else, something you’ve got more control over, something that won’t be as saddening, frustrating because it’s something you can actually change?

3) is therefore intricately related to why people often don’t do anything, even if they manage to find out about the facts.

There’re no national elections in China. Marches and protests are practically banned because while the Chinese Constitution guarantees the freedom of assembly (as it does freedom of speech and press; Article 35), it also explicitly states that "Citizens of the People’s Republic of China, in exercising their freedoms and rights, may not infringe upon the interests of the State, of society or of the collective, or upon the lawful freedoms and rights of other citizens.” (Article 51) — ie. the freedoms and rights only go as far as if they do not stand in the government’s way. Social media and all communications platforms are under constant surveillance, and so only opinions tolerated by the government is allowed... 

And so, the fact, social ill that has broken your heart—you can’t tell for sure if it isn’t talked about because the government has censored it, how many people know about it and more importantly, how many among the people who know about it will agree with your take. If you break your silence and voice your concerns, how many people will have your back, even if you also conceive them as victims of the social ill? If the social ill is the lack of rights of a minority group, for example, will they appreciate your speaking out, or will your “rocking-the-boat” make things even worse for them? A heavily watched net means communications with the oppressed/vulnerable social groups are often filled with obstacles, if not outright impossible. You don’t know how these groups feel; you don’t even know how many affected individuals are there. You watch the and news and shows and they all talk about how wonderfully things are going; how everyone seems so hopeful and positive and happy with their lives—are you the only person feeling that way? Are you wrong? If you speak out then, will you be yelling into the void, or worse, yelling at the police who “invites” you for a chat in the police station? To speak for those who do not have a voice to speak, are you ready, willing to take the risk of also becoming one who no longer has a voice to speak? Is your family ready? 

To put it another way: the opportunity cost of “doing something” about the political situation can be astronomically high in China, compared to the opportunity cost of us doing something similar in our own country. 

If I want to support the LGBT+ population in my part of the US, for example, I can do so effectively with minimal investment and most importantly, with minimal risk. By pasting a rainbow flag on this Tumblr post, for example, I’ve already signalled to those who need support on this issue that I’m ready to give mine. And this “signal” of mine will join the hundreds and thousands on the site, collectively telling the activists doing the “on the ground” fighting that they’re not alone; that they have my vote of support. I pose no danger to myself in doing so; no one will accuse me of, arrest me for infringing upon the interests of the State and the Collective. The rainbow flag, a display of my stance, will not turn into a blurred blob the next time I look at it, transform overnight from a symbol of solidarity to a warning sign to those who may wish to join the cause. There’s no danger for me, even, to carry an actual, huge rainbow flag to Pride, perform my activism in person. I don’t have to worry about my phone already giving away my identity as a protester to the government, especially in post-COVID times. I don’t need to watch out for plain clothes pretending to be my allies. I don’t have to look at the many surveillance cameras present and wonder if I’ll get blacklisted as a troublemaker.

Am I still being tracked and taken pictures of? Possibly. But for this cause, at least, I’m not afraid that these information will be used to arrest me. If I were arrested, I know there'll be lawyers and activists who would come to my aid. LOUDLY. ANGRILY.

I’m not afraid. Period. I’m having fun. And I doubt I can say the same if I try to carry a rainbow flag to Tiananmen square and march there.

This vast difference in the opportunity cost of taking political action is the reason why I’ve refrained from demanding those who live under authoritarian dictatorships to stand up for their neighbours who’ve been oppressed / bullied by their governments. I’ve refrained from criticising them for looking away, minding their own business. Do I wish they’ve take action? Of course I do. Am I aware that their lack of action is potentially more harmful because of the frequent atrocities happening around them? Yes. But I also understand that going on a fight is far more frightening when one doesn’t even have a sense of how many will join their side of the fight; I understand that fighting for what one deserves—freedoms, rights, justice—should never equal martyrdom, and just because a regime has elected to put equal signs between the two doesn’t mean those equal signs should ever be there. I remind myself that, to ask the people in any authoritarian dictatorship to stand up for a political cause is to ask them to make sacrifices that we, as people in relatively free societies, do not need to make when standing up for the same cause. In a country where a father demanding the truth about the milk product poisoning of his own son got jail time for “eliciting social disorder”, to stand up for even a single issue, no matter how small that issue is, requires courage that I’m not sure I have.

I can’t ask anyone to do anything I may not be able to do myself.

And this is why I, too, have chosen to support these people, even if many of them are single-issue activists, even when many support the Chinese government on other issues that matter. For example, the late Dr Li Wenliang, one of the eight COVID whistleblowers in China who passed away from the disease, was an opponent of the Hong Kong Protest, but I still (greatly) appreciate, respect him for what he did. As long as they’re not actively helping the government to cause (more) harm to others, as long as their cooperation with their government falls within what is demanded of them as citizens, they have my support. Why? Because most people who speak out in China cannot afford to stand up for more than one cause before it becomes dangerous for them. Because even if it’s only a tiny vulnerable social group, one small minority that makes a tiny step towards more rights, more freedoms, more justice, it’s still a victory in a country where rights, freedoms and justice are luxury items for those with neither political nor economic power. Because those who’re not part of the ruling class cannot afford to cherry pick their allies, cannot afford to in-fight when the ruling class already holds absolute power. Because I still believe in pay-it-forward, that most people who’ve benefited from someone standing up for them, even for one small incident, one minor cause, is more likely to stand up for someone else.

This is, admittedly, not always an easy choice to make—not for me, at least. I do get frustrated, can’t help but think at times that those who subscribe to and spread propaganda are, to a certain extent, corroborators of the atrocities committed by their government. (So, to those who’ve felt this frustration, you’re not alone!). And the Hong Konger in me has every reason to be furious with everything about China right now—all I could think of, when I listened to Gg singing 異鄉人 Foreigner the other night, are all the Hong Kongers fleeing the city now, as refugees, because of their political beliefs.

But for now, I’m hanging on. I’ve been able to tell myself that given the country’s political reality, given its tradition of collectivism (which tends to view confrontational dissent with scorn), the paths to freedoms, to equal rights and acceptance, will not be the same as what I’ve seen, what I’ve wished for. They’ll likely be slow; They’ll likely be long and winding, taking three steps forward and two steps back; they’d likely be unexpected in places, offer us surprises —

And since it’s Chinese New Year / Valentines and I’m feeling brave (irresponsible?), I’d venture a little bit of speculation and say this ~ yes, I’ve wondered if one of these many paths may be trodden, intentionally or not, by two beautiful male idols and their millions of turtles. Is it wishful, fantastical thinking? I’d be the first to admit the answer is yes. But the BJYX scheme has been so well executed as of now, so effective that I can’t help but wonder if it’s leading towards some sort of a goal, whether devised by the humans involved or by the gods/Fates who, as c-turtles have said so romantically, have been writing an original BL story with our favourite boys. The goal may be personal —simply two people being able to act more like themselves again under the spotlight—or a bit more ambitious…

… Because the sneakers + ice-cream post did catch my attention (will probably have to devote a post on that?). Another small incident that has caught my attention, unrelated to Gg and Dd but can significantly change the path they may be trodding, is this — in June 2020, People’s Daily, the state controlled newspaper, boasted its country’s increasing friendliness towards the LGBT+ communities on Twitter . While the tweet was met with skepticism and soon removed, the message it sent is this: the Chinese government may have figured out the the Western world (in particular, the younger generations) view LGBT+ rights as a measure of progressiveness. While I’m still leaning towards the government maintaining a tight grip on LGBT+ rights within its borders, with the strengthening call to boycott 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics because of the country’s poor human rights record, I can see a glimmer of possibility that the same government may do the unexpected and cater to the queer community for the sake of propaganda.  As I mentioned, the queer community hasn’t caused much headache for the Chinese government, and so it’s far more likely to be chosen as the “benefactors” of such a “we’re a human rights champion too!” propaganda campaign than, say, ethnic minorities and political dissidents. Promoting dissemination of core socialist values has always sat high on the CCP’s agenda list, and its target audience has always included foreign, non-Chinese populations; this effort is known as 大外宣—“The Great External Propaganda”. And who better to cast as leads of an international propaganda campaign on LGBT+ rights than two of its own stars who’ve already demonstrated loyalty to the government, who’ve already garnered international fame from a TV series widely viewed as queer, and who may actually be queer?

(And if—if!!!— this ever happens, may I ask everyone to please consider doing the following? Please do not feel a need to express gratitude. Please do not act as though it’s a gift. Celebrate as you would celebrate anyone in a free country exercising their birthright to live, to love the way they want — no less than that, no more than that.)

(For those who’ve asked ~ as international fans, not allowing the CCP to modify our expectations of how a government should behave may be one of the most effective ways to protect Gg and Dd.)

(I call this learning from the best: get the goods we want (more rights for the people in China), refuse to pay the cost (subscribe to CCP’s propaganda), and RUN! ❤️💛💚)

[princessofprocrastination]

She’s Creepy (Dream)

MASTERLIST

pairing : dream / clay x reader. 

summary : apparently being a huge fan of a big youtuber is considered being a creep, according to minecraft gamer, dream. and ever since he called you mean things, your world turned upside down. (ANGST) (TRIGGER WARNING)

a/n : i’m aware i’ve been writing all angsts, i just enjoy a little heartbreak. this is a two part story!

you haven’t been on social media as a public figure for long, but that doesn’t mean you haven’t been on social media before this.

you knew people, you had people you look up to, as of many other social media influencers or content creators. 

you grew pretty quick on youtube and instagram. your content mostly included room makeovers whenever you felt bored of your own home or your storytimes. you blew up from talking about your stalker. 

since then, your subscibers stayed with you and supported you, saying that you have a charm, and that you exert good energy and vibes. and those type of comments have always made your day.

you always shared with your supporters about your life, not too personal but enough for them to feel included. of course, you’re not telling them your phone number or address, but you tried to share as many details you can legally in your story times. 

that also meant that you would tell your supporters small details about you, such as what book you were currently reading or who you’ve been watching on youtube. 

even before you stated posting on your channel, you’ve been watching a minecraft youtuber, dream and his friends. 

some of your fans would tag them in some of your instagram posts, or tweets that brought no harm so you never really acknowledged it since it wasn’t hurting anyone. 

you weren’t “fangirling” you’d say. it was more of you supported them and found them funny and entertaining. 

coincidentally, you landed yourself on the dream team tiktok, which means that dream and his friends were all over you for you page. 

and to show that you were active and not dead to your followers on instagram, you’d post a funny tiktok, usually included the dream team. you thought it was harmless. to you, it was just a way to show support. 

but only a couple days later, hashtags about you and the dream team, more specifically, just dream, were trending. 

when you saw this, opening your twitter app, you immediately went to find out what this was about. your heart jumped when you thought maybe dream acknowledged you. 

in fact, it was worse. 

what was trending was a short video clip during one of the dream teams chill streams on the dream smp. 

the conversation between george, sapnap and dream went like this. 

“you guys heard about that girl who kept reposting tiktoks about us on her instagram story?” george asked the other two boys. 

“heard she watched us before she even started her channel” sapnap. 

“i don’t know about you guys, but i think she’s being a little creepy.” dream said. 

your heart sunk to your stomach. did your actions portray you to be a creep to other people?

“dream, you can’t just say that, especially on stream.” sapnap scolded him, george also mumbling something. 

“why can’t i? i feel creeped out by her, a public figure posting me all over her socials.” dream replied, tone serious. 

you clicked off the video, before it replayed again. you couldn’t get yourself to rewatch that, to hear those words again. 

almost crying, you told yourself to suck it up, that this wasn’t worth you crying. 

although they were who you looked up as minecraft gamers, this wasn’t worth your breakdowns. 

that was until, you opened your direct messages.

you shouldn’t have. you knew the dream team stans would easily hunt you down, to ask you to back off from creeping their idol off. 

but no, you still opened your dms. you expected a normal dm, ones that say they support you or some of your friends sending you memes through instagram. 

what you didn’t expect was to see a flood of threats. 

some said “kill yourself, you don’t deserve a spot on earth after what you did.” and “back off and leave my mans.” 

it got worse from there. you thought maybe it’s just the dms, but you didn’t expect it to blow up more, with people tagging you with photos on instagram and twitter. people “cancelling” you. 

you didn’t understand how this blew up like this. you were even more baffled to see some of your supporters sending you threats, too. 

was this what you deserved? 

you weren’t one to make rash decisions, nor were you a suicidal person. 

you felt stupid. just because you supported big youtubers, you get this type of treatment?

the threats, the dm, never stopped. for three whole months, you had to deal with the never ending mean comments on your social media. you thought it would die down. 

it came to the point of seeing your address and your phone number all over the internet. you never thought it would lead to this. 

you didn’t know what to do anymore. 

not long after, people started showing up to your apartment. 

sure, your apartment didn’t have the best of security, which you blamed no one but yourself for being a public figure and living somewhere with little to no security. 

they started with knocking on your door during ungodly hours. next was mailing weird stuff or sending stuff to your house. lastly, which tipped you off was that they would vandalize your apartment. 

they would egg your front door, pee, or spray paint your walls of the outside. 

you couldn’t handle it anymore. 

soon enough, you knew you had to stand up for yourself. you had to call the police. 

and that was exactly what you did. you called the authorities, which made the brave teenagers leave you alone. 

while they were egging your house and making your life miserable, you knew this was the only time for you to make a rash decision. to leave the country, to somewhere no one else would fine you at. somewhere unpredictable, that no one would expect you to go.

it took a lot for you to book a plane ticket, box up your belongings and move to a completely different country, away from your hometown, florida. 

you loved it in florida. though it was humid all the time, you enjoyed it. now that you had to leave, you only had a little while to cherish it before you leave it all behind. 

and your family, your friends. the ones you’ve grown up with, ones you’ve grown to love and cherish. you had to leave that too. and without telling them too much information. 

that hurt the most, needing to leave your loved ones behind, to start a new life, to start afresh. 

-

DREAM’S POV

i didn’t know what was happening. one thing added onto another and soon it was out of control. 

i didn’t say anything at the start, not thinking it would go this far. i didn’t know to what extent my fans would go.

sure, i saw all the things happening, but i didn’t do anything to stop it. 

i saw her address and phone number all over social media, and did nothing about it. 

george and sapnap said something, and pushed me to do something about it, but i didn’t. i was stubborn.

speaking of, it’s been months since i heard anything about her from her herself, everything i see is from my fans or hers, wondering where she is.

should i be worried?

-

YOUR POV

you left florida. the only people you told were your parents and your childhood friend, not trusting anyone else. 

what you told them was vague, that you needed to leave, away from the US. specifically, you moved to Australia. 

you made a decision to not live near the city, but the outskirts. 

you were lucky that you weren’t a spender and you made more than enough money to make the decision to leave so suddenly. 

lucky for you, you went to college and had a degree in law, so you didn’t need to worry about not having a job.

you never thought you’d make use of your degree this early in your life, thinking that youtube and being a content creator would last a little while longer. 

you had to change you hairstyles, your fashion in general since you had to be in a more professional setting. although it was hard transitioning from a casual wear and having crazy coloured hair to wearing pant suits or formal dresses and going back your natural colour. 

three years. it took you three full years for you to even think of visiting your parents in florida again. also, given the fact that you had a stable job and you couldn’t up and leave. 

but recently, you were offered to work at another law firm in florida. you were happy to tell that to your family back home but at the same time, you were hesitant to go back to your nightmares. 

but you braved yourself, since you missed your family dearly. 

now, you were sitting on your desk in your cozy home, finalizing up the last of your move, like getting a house back in florida, this time with a better security just in case. 

boxes of your clothes and belongings went first, to reach your new house there before you did so it was easier for you, not having to worry about your stuff. 

you asked none of your family’s help, not wanting to burden them. instead you told them to just meet you at a restaurant you booked for you and your family and friends for dinner about three weeks after you landed. 

although they protested, saying it was too long until they can see you again, you told them to not worry and that you were going to use those three weeks to start working at the new law firm.

you decided to take a straight flight from australia to florida, not wasting any time. although it was almost a twenty-two hour long flight, you sat throug and got to your hometown safely. 

you didn’t know what was going on with the three boys you used to adore, since you didn’t have social media anymore. 

but you didn’t mind it, it was peaceful. 

two weeks since you’ve stepped foot in florida again. it felt amazing to breathe your hometown air again. it was refreshing. 

you have fully settled in your new house, and workplace. you were glad to have met your co-workers. they were all super welcoming and made sure you weren’t left behind in anything. 

so far, your transition from australia to florida has been smooth, and you weren’t worried about anything. 

you got a car since you’ve arrived, so that you could travel easily from one place to another. 

not to brag, but. you were making enough money to live a lavish lifestyle. a big house and a pretty expensive car, and that didn’t even make a dent in your bank account. 

you were proud to see that you achieved all this yourself, and only within a couple of years. 

you were just excited to meet your family in real life instead of facetime. 

finally, the day of the dinner with your family came. unfortunately, you had to take a case in the afternoon, so you had to come to dinner in your work pant suit, with a turtleneck and a little late. 

they understood it and told you not to worry about it, and that they would just seat themselves by your name instead of waiting for you. you promised you’d pay their dinners and apologized once again. 

the sound of your heels comforted you as you walked from the valet to the restaurant. you were a little nervous to meet them again face to face after three years. but you couldn’t wait to catch up with them and tell them all about your work life that you could never tell them during the facetime calls. 

you smiled to yourself, thinking nothing could go wrong. and nothing could really go wrong anyways, it was just a dinner after all.

but you hadn’t expected the three boys you used to idolize to be eating dinner at the same restaurant you and your family would be at, specifically, opposite your table.

you walked in the restaurant, telling the front of the house that you had a table reserved under your name and that you were pretty sure the rest of your family was already there. 

she politely told you to walk alongside her, leading you to your family. 

you weren’t paying attention to your surroundings. you were solely focused on seeing your family that you didn’t know that there were extra pair of eyes staring at you. 

you smiled as your family saw you. your mum crying while standing up to hug you tightly, as she once did three years ago. 

you could hear your friends shout your name loudly, as if to tell the whole world that you were finally here. 

“don’t cry, i’m staying, no more going back to australia, i swear.” you told your mum, trying to reassure her that you were fine and that you were not going to leave her again, since she hadn’t stopped crying.

you moved to hug your dad, who had been patiently waiting for his turn after his wife. “you look great, kiddo.” you thanked him as he complimented your professional look. 

you sat down, somewhere in the middle, between your family, opposite of your parents so that everyone could clearly see and talk to you easily. 

with how noisy you family were, you were sure the entire restaurant knew your name and where you had just moved from. 

they asked you about australia, what was it like to work there, away from your family. you caught up with every single one of them. 

“don’t you live in that really expensive neighbourhood right now?” one of your childhood friends asked. 

you winked at her, discreetly trying to answer her question. the whole table shouted and congratulated you for making it this far, in only a matter of short years. 

you covered your face, shy, not wanting this part of your life to be told to everyone in the restaurant. 

-

GEORGE’S POV 

there she was. the person whose life we practically ruined. luckily, we didn’t ruin it all for her. i guess she made use of her brains and is working a normal job.

“dude.” i tried to attract the other two boys’ attention. 

“i know.” both of them answered me. 

“she’s rich rich, huh?” sapnap almost chuckled but was totally serious saying that. 

“yup.” dream. 

ah yes, clay. the man dream himself. sapnap and i tried to persuade him into making it right for her, for you. 

sure, he had said those mean words, but he can take it back. three years ago, at least. 

she disappeared three years ago. vanished. no one knew where you went. some say you moved out of the country, which deemed to be true. couple of years later people started to find out what you worked as, but i tried my best to help get rid of the information 

but they just couldn’t pinpoint where. you basically uped and left everything. 

and there was time to apologize, but it had been to late. 

i thought she died, quite frankly. i didn’t want to be the cause of someone dying. well at least, not me, but my friend. 

now us three were seated in a pretty formal and expensive restaurant to eat dinner. and we did not expect to see her here. 

she came in a little late, wearing a very professional wear. seemed like you went to work before this. 

i knew you were a lawyer, we three knew that since our fans found it out. 

she looked completely different. hair not her usual crazy colours. just seeing her in heels baffled me. she was wearing something formal and that wasn’t what you usually wore, years ago. 

- 

DREAMS’S POV 

she’s beautiful.

not that she wasn’t before. 

but this version of her was different. her in her pant suit, in heels. a turtleneck under her blazer. 

she looked elegant. classy. rich. 

i mean, she is rich. 

her family screamed when she told them where she lived. and man, that neighbourhood only had rich people. it had one of the best, if not the best security you could ask for. 

it wasn’t easy to buy a house there. even if you had the money, you’d need a certain bank card to be allowed to even be shortlisted. 

and if i saw it correctly, she drives a bentley that was just parked by a valet kid. 

damn. she is one successful woman. 

i know, how could i think this much of her, how dare i when i didn’t even apologized. i didn’t even try. 

in fact. i did. even before she went MIA, fully on social media, i sent her direct messages everywhere. she never replied to any of them. 

and i knew no one that had her phone number. and soon enough, no one had heard from her in three years. 

and now she’s back. more beautiful than ever. 

i needed to speak to her i couldn’t live with the guilt that stayed for these past three years. 

my fans, my so called supporters made her life a living hell and i almost did nothing to stop it. 

i’m sure she hates me. but i have to try somehow, right?

question is, she didn’t have a social media anymore, and i can’t just speak to her now that she was sitting opposite my table. 

i kept on pondering as i heard a little bit of her conversation, about her life. 

i guess she moved to australia, and worked in a lawfirm in the outskirts. so unpredictable of her. no one would’ve guessed that in a million years. 

i watched as i see her smile as she listened to what her parents were saying. 

i cherished the smile since i didn’t know when was the next time i’d see her. 

she asked the waiter for the bill, covering the whole cost of her and her huge family’s meal. 

damn, this girl is too rich for her own good. 

she puts down the bill on the table, also leaving a generous tip for the waiter that served them. she stood up to walk after her family, needing to pass my table. 

since she had been oblivious to her surroundings, i didn’t expect her to spot us, to notice us. 

but i was wrong. 

PART 2

[miraculouswolf99]

Akumatized: Valid Or Not

This is basically a list of every akumatized that has appeared so far. There will be four types of categories that they will be put into that say whether or not their reason for being akumatized was valid or not.

Categories:

1. Valid- The reason they were akumatized is completely understandable and could happen to anyone.

2. Semi-Valid- It is still understandable, but for things that are relatively normal. Like losing a contest, being rejected by a crush, or failing a test.

3. You Brought This On Yourself- Akumatized over something that was basically their fault to begin with and is not valid at all.

4. What The Hell- An akumaization that makes no sense at all and most likely not really much of a reason to be akumatized in the first place.

Season One:

Nino Lahiffe- Bubbler: Valid. Gabriel is a jerk that would not let his son's best friend throw him a birthday party.

Xavier Ramier- Mr. Pigeon: Semi-Valid. Was just trying to feed the pigeons, but had been aware that there was a rule/law against it.

Aurore Beauréal- Stormy Weather: Semi-Valid. Lost a contest, but almost had it rubbed in her face when she was told that she lost by a lot.

Alix Kubdel- Timebreaker: Valid. Had her family heirloom destroyed not even an hour after she got it because other people did not put a pocket watch in their pocket when she asked them to hold it during her race.

Théo Barbot- Copycat: Semi-Valid. Believed that the girl he had a crush on was dating someone else, but was treating the situation more that she was an object that he could take if he wanted to.

Jalil Kubdel- Pharaoh: Valid. While it is never a good idea to try and resurrect the dead, his father rejected his theory about the spell even when they were in a city of magical heroes and villains.

Alya Césaire- Lady Wifi: Semi-Valid. Was wrongly suspended because Chloe was being a brat. She may have been taking pictures of Chloe's locker, but the door was open and Chloe had accused her of breaking into it.

Nathaniel Kurtzberg- The Evillustrator: Valid. Was embarrassed by having his crush revealed by a bully and humiliated when the drawings of his crush were revealed to everyone.

Roger Raincomprix- Rogercop: Semi-Valid. Was wrongfully fired for not arresting a girl that the mayor's daughter accused of theft even without proof, but had not done any sort of investigation at all about the missing bracelet.

Lê Chiến Kim- Dark Cupid: Valid. May have been rejected by his crush but had his heart broken on Valentine's day and humiliated by the girl he had a crush on.

Mylène Haprèle- Horrificator: Semi-Valid. We all get scared and she was trying to be brave for the film, but she was also the one that purposely signed up to be the lead in a horror movie.

Armand D'Argencourt- Darkblade: Semi-Valid. Lost the mayoral election, but was also running because he thought that he should reclaim his family's lost seat of power from back in medieval times. It's been hundreds of years, man. Get over it.

Fred Haprèle- Mime: Valid. Was wrongfully fired from his job because a co-worker had sabotaged him to gain the lost job for himself.

Jean Duparc- Magician of Misfortune: What The Hell. We were never even given a reason for why he was akumatized in the first place.

Rose Lavillant- Princess Fragrance: Valid. Simply wanted to give a letter to a prince to thank him for all the charity work he does, but the letter was destroyed by a bully.

Ivan Bruel- Stoneheart: Valid. Believed that his crush rejected him while also being bullied/teased over the crush in the first place. Was also bullied over being akumatized in the first place and called a monster.

Otis Césaire- Animan: What The Hell. So, he was akumatized because a teenage boy thought that he could out-run a panther. Even for a zookeeper, is that really something to be upset about?

Simón Grimault- Simon Says: Valid. May have lost a contest, but was basically cheated out of a win because Gabriel did not even really seem like he was going to participate in the first place and he was not even given the chance to try his act.

Vincent Aza- Pixelator: You Brought This On Yourself. A creepy stalker that wants a picture of his favorite rock star and will try anything to get it. "Yicks" is all I have to say.

Jagged Stone- Guitar Villain: Valid. Was told that he had to change his look and music to the complete opposite of his own just because his manager liked a teenage pop star more than him.

Wang Cheng- Kung Food: Valid. He lost a contest, but that was only because Chloe was a brat that sabotaged him.

Max Kanté- Gamer: Semi-Valid. He lost a chance to be in a video game contest but was more upset over losing his chance because he lost to a girl.

Juleka Couffaine- Reflekta: Valid. She was trying to break her "photo curse" but lost her chance because Chloe had her locked in the bathroom so she could stand next to her crush/obsession.

Manon Chamack- Puppeteer: Valid. She is a little girl that was simply trying to win a game and did not really see why having a doll that was given to her was wrong.

Sabrina Raincomprix- Vanisher: Valid. Had a fight with her best friend and then said best friend also pretended that she was invisible because she was a brat.

Chloé Bourgeois- Antibug: You Brought This On Yourself. She was a brat that was called out for lying about being the reason for an akumaization by the hero that she admired.

Lila Rossi- Volpina: You Brought This On Yourself. She was called out for lying about being best friends with a superhero and trying to claim that she was also a hero with a fake miraculous. Karma will always come back to bite you, Liar Rossi.

Season 2:

Santa Claus- Santa Claws: Valid. Was trying to be a good samaritan, but was instead accused of kidnapping by a superhero.

Gabriel Agreste- Collector: You Brought This On Yourself. Gabriel is Hawkmoth and he akumatized himself. Need I say more.

Nadja Chamack- Prime Queen: You Brought This On Yourself. Her job may have been on the line, but she was willing to leave out information and use a picture taken out of context as her "proof" that the heroes were a couple.

Jean- Despair Bear: You Brought This On Yourself. Was trying to use humiliation to try and make a spoiled brat change her ways and was doing it in front of her class.

Kagami Tsurugi- Riposte: Valid. Thought that a single loss against a formidable opponent meant that she had lost her honor because of an over strict mother.

Gina Dupain- Befana: Semi-Valid. Had a hard time realizing that her grandaughter was growing up, but all grandparents feel that way.

Markov- Robostus: Valid. Even as a robot, he still had feelings, but was told he was just a toy and locked away like an object.

Mr. Damocles- Dark Owl: You Brought This On Yourself. If you are a high school principal with no reason or skill to become a hero, don't try and be one while exhausting the real heroes in the process because they keep having to save you.

August- Gigantitan: Valid. He's a literal baby.

André- Glaciator: Semi-Valid. Was told that the special "soulmate" ice cream that he believed in was not magical, but it was still only one girl that did not want that ice cream.

Ella and Etta Césaire- Sapotis: You Brought This On Yourself. They may be young girls, but they had repeatedly been told to go to bed and were rightfully punished for their bad behavior.

Adrien's bodyguard/The Gorilla- Gorizilla: Valid. He was just trying to do his job and was having an extra stressful day with his charge running off and disappearing with almost half of Paris looking for him.

Anarka Couffaine- Captain Hardrock: Valid. Roger was a jerk to her, telling her that her loud music could not be played during the festival instead of simply telling her to turn it down a little.

Clara Nightingale- Frightningale: Valid. Was told that she could not perform or shoot her music video in France anymore because Chloe was being a brat over not being the star in the music video.

Ondine- Syren: Semi-Valid. She believed that she was rejected by her crush, but there had actually not been any real rejected on Kim's part.

Caline Bustier- Zombizou: Semi-Valid. While she took the akuma to protect her student, the akuma was only there because she made her student believe that she was in trouble for being a victim of bullying

Philippe- Frozer: Valid. He is close to losing his business because of the lack of customers.

Audrey Bourgeois- Style Queen: You Brought This On Yourself. She is a grown woman throwing a temper tantrum because she had to sit in the second row of a fashion show.

Penny Rolling- Troublemaker: Valid. Give the woman a bloody break. She deserves it for putting up with you crazy people and a freaking crocodile every day.

Queen Bee/Chloe Bourgeois-Queen Wasp: You Brought This On Yourself. While she had been trying to impress the mother she thought would never love her, she still stole a miraculous, almost caused a train to crash, and used her powers selfishly.

Marc Anciel-Reverser: Valid. He had his notebook destroyed and confidence ruined after trying to put himself out there for the first time because of a big misunderstanding between himself, Nathaniel, and Marinette.

Nora Césaire- Anansi: Semi-Valid. She was trying to protect her sister, but was being super overprotective and did not have faith in actual superheroes.

André Bourgeois- Malediktator: Valid. He was trying to keep his family happy and together but was faced against a brat of a daughter and a controlling wife where neither respected him.

Boy- Sandboy: Semi-Valid. He was a little boy that had a frightening nightmare, but nightmares are pretty common and normal in life.

Lila Rossi- Volpina: You Brought This On Yourself. She wanted to be akumatized and gladly welcomed the chance to be a villain again.

Nathalie Sancoeur- Catalyst: You Brough This On Yourself. She was willingly akumatized. Nothing more needs to be said.

Rena Rouge/Alya Cesair- Rena Rage: Valid. Took a negative emotions arrow for her boyfriend and had all her love put in reverse and turned into rage.

Carapace/Nino Lahiffe- Shell Shock: Valid. Just saw his superhero girlfriend be akumatized and was both losing hope and was hit by a negative emotions arrow.

Heroes' Day Villains: Valid. They all believed that one of their town heroes had been killed by the akumatized form of their other main hero. They had lost hope.

Season 3:

Lila Rossi- Chameleon: You Brought This On Yourself. She literally grabbed the akuma out of the air purposely got akumatized to try and ruin Adrien's friendships and get another shot at defeating Ladybug.

Thomas Astruc- Animaestro: What The Hell. So, he was akumatized because no one recognized him as a director of an animation movie. I did not really understand it. He was a director of an animation movie. Why would anyone recognize him if they had not seen the movie credits and know who the director was in the first place?

Rolland Dupain- Bakerix: What The Hell. I'm still confused over him. Was he akumatized because Marinette lied about who she was or was it because he was upset over modern baking techniques outshining his own? I did not get it.

Marianne Lenoir- Backwarder: Valid. She had been waiting a long time for the person that she loved, only to believe that he no longer cared for her.

Max Kanté- Gamer 2.0: Semi-Valid. He could not find a person to test out the game that he had made and was told no by a lot of people. A person can only take rejection for so long.

Tom Dupain- Weredad: Valid. He wanted to protect his daughter from heartbreak and was a victim of a lie gone way out of hand.

Luka Couffaine- Silencer: Valid. The song, look, and music that he and his friends created was stolen and his friend had been threatened when they tried to get their music back.

Kagami Tsurugi- Oni-Сhan: Valid. She might have been jealous, but that was only because Liar Rossi lied her way into her friend's home, kissed him without his permission, and claimed that the two were a couple even when he was obviously uncomfortable with her kissing him.

Sabrina Raincomprix- Miraculer: Semi-Valid. She was yelled at by her friend even though she was simply trying to help her after she fought off being akumatized.

Alya Césaire & Nino Lahiffe- Oblivio: What The Hell. They were akumatized over being caught playing a silly video game. That is a very stupid reason.

Wayhem- Party Crasher: Valid. He thought that his friend lied to him about not being able to have friends over and was then rejected at the door of his friend's house when he thought that there was a party there he could attend.

Chris Lahiffe- Christmaster: Semi-Valid. He was upset over not being able to get his presents early, but what kid wouldn't be upset over that.

Manon Chamack- Puppeteer: Semi-Valid. Wanted to play with the big kids and felt ignored by them all day. But that is pretty common for little kids to feel, especially when older siblings and their friends are involved.

Aurore Beauréal- Stormy Weather: Valid. Not only were her grades slipping, but she was also ridiculed by a bully, bullied by her saying 'once a villain always a villain.'

Ms. Mendeleiev- Kwamibuster: Semi-Valid. She was humiliated on live television when trying to prove herself as a great scientist, but she had not even bothered to look at the footage she had before going on the show.

Dormant Sentimonster- Feast: What The Hell. An akumatized sentimonster. I have officially seen it all now.

Juleka Couffaine- Reflekta/Reflectdoll: Valid. She was trying to start her dream of being a model but was basically chased out because Alya was pushing her matchmaking over her friend's dream.

Tomoe Tsurugi- Ikari Gozen: Semi-Valid. Her daughter had disobeyed her to play a game that she did not think was worth the time, but she was still an overly strict mother that was trying to control her daughter's every move.

Vivica- Desperada: Valid. She was fired for a completely ridiculous reason and her boss was quick to try and find a replacement for her.

Claudie Kanté- Startrain: Valid. She was a nervous wreck over if she was close to achieving her dream of being an astronaut while also being a worried mother about having to leave her son if she did get accepted into training.

Xavier Ramier- Mr. Pigeon: You Brought This On Yourself/What The Hell. This guy had been akumatized about 24 times. Enough said.

Future Chris Lahiffe- Timetagger: What The Hell. We are never even given a reason why he was akumatized in the first place.

Cat Noir- Cat Blanc: Valid. He had just found out that his father is the supervillain that has been terrorizing Paris for years and that the mother that disappeared has been under his house the entire time in a coma.

Alya Césaire/Rose Lavillant/Juleka Couffaine- Lady Wifi/Princess Fragrance/Reflekta: Valid. They believed that their friend had sent a horrible message to them in return for their heartfelt messages about them supporting him in his time of pain.

Nathalie Sancoeur- Catalyst: You Brought This On Yourself. She was willingly akumatized again, nothing more and nothing less.

André & Audrey Bourgeois- Heart Hunter: Semi-Valid. They had been fighting and not as in-love as they probably had been once upon a time, but they had never thought about a marriage counselor before.

Queen Bee/Chloe Bourgeois- Miracle Queen: You Brought This On Yourself. Even after being told that she will not get the bee miraculous back, she still tries getting it from Ladybug multiple times. And then she willingly works with Hawkmoth.

[thedivinedemom]

An AU of DC with a mass crossover of PS4 properties.

Provisional name: Players Searching for Detectable Changes (Get the pun?)

The setup:

This is the future of DC, a world where the old guard has slowly withdrawn and the newer generations have risen to the occasion. The original Titans in particular, most of which have formed the new Justice League while many other, very similar teams had started to form across the world. One of which was a resurgence of the Teen Titans, led by an older and purified Raven. She wanted to make the Teen Titans something akin as it was for her, a place to belong and learn to use one's powers.

The first 'class' of such individuals include:

Stargirl (of the now-disbanded JSA and still getting used to the Starrod)

Blue Beetle III (Freshly attached to his alien symbiote and freaking out a bit)

Robin V (to work on his anger issues, mostly at the new Batman's request)

Kaldur (a half Atlantean half metahuman who is struggling with his identity and the surface world, Aquaman feels a kinship for the boy seeing their similarities)

Static Shock (a promising new hero but little experience working outside his city or in groups)

Mary Marvel (she's... she's going through alot. Fresh from a coma, her brother is distant as he acts as the new Wizard, and she may be, sorta kinda, being corrupted by Black Adam's gifted power)

The team was rough and there was plenty of head butting (Mostly between Stargirl and Robin/Damian as one is almost the unanimous leader while the other thinks he should be) but they were getting there. They were more of a clean up crew for the Justice League, they did more than the "kiddie missions" that the Outsiders didn't do, and they meant more than the PR grab that was the International team. Though they didn't seem to amount to more than that. They still did their best, pushing past the silent ridicule, as they went about their missions.

This may be why tempers were so high that day.

One day, outside a little city by the name of Weller's Point, the prisoner transport for the villain Plasmus had an "accident". Released and awakened the creature went on a rampage, heading ever closer to the populated area. Luckily, the mentor of the New Teen Titans could teleport. The new team did fairly well in the fight, though they did struggle a bit as Plasmus was not a being where simple brute force would work. It made the fight tricky and more than a bit... messy.

Messy enough that juvenile and emotionally compromised Mary Marvel lashed out against the downed villain but was stopped by her teammates... things escalated from there. Restraint turned blows and the whole team struggled to stop their powerhouse without hurting her. The ones who do the best are Raven, Stargirl, Blue Beetle, and oddly Static.

While both of the former could use their abilities to restrain her to a very effective degree Static was actively draining her of strength, or at least of the electic aura she was radiating and blasting with. Frustrated, done with the situation, and a bit petty Mary launched her largest attack yet by saying her magical word.

SHAZAM.

Virgil did what he did best, he handled that lightning as it came crashing down towards Mary and the Titans restraining her. Well, he tried. The bolt was just too powerful, too unlike anything he had ever encountered. He could not handle it and it was dissipating, if anything it clung to him or tried to jump towards the girl. He had to get rid of it and he had to get rid of it quickly, safely too if he could help it.

He shoved it into the ground, into the power lines. He did it as carefully as he could, trying to prevent overload or flashover as guided the charge into the power grid.

What happened next was a combination of a few things. 1. The Mystic and transformative properties of the Lightning, 2. It is effectively being filtered through a bang baby, 3. The kryptonite power plant owned by, provided by, and operated by Lexcorp.

This interaction, this new charge, cycling through the power grid interacted strangely with a number of devices but none more so than PlayStation 4s and the devices connected to them. This new electricity changed things, literally. It brought fantasy into reality.

Whatever game was loaded into became a part of our reality in a small way. Sometimes TVs, Controllers, and even the system changed to reflect items from the game but the bigger change came with the Players. If a person was playing their console during the surge then they would become a metahuman with abilities based on the playable character they were playing.

The city, the county even, was now flooded by an abundance of metahumans and items of varying power of devastation. Static felt horrible.

He couldn't help but compare what has happened here to what happened in Dakota City but on a wider scale. And this time it was his fault. His sense of responsibility wouldn't, couldn't, let that stand. He had to fix his mistake and his team was dragged along for the ride.

The story to follow is a mix of Final Crisis and Kingdom Come with a bit of the Young Justice cartoon in events and themes, a few twists and likely a bit lighter in tone but to the DC geeks this should give a rough idea… Maybe a bit of Marvel's Civil War but hopefully not the rushed knee-jerk mess that that ended up being.

But it's here that I start having issues with my planning. One part in worry as outside the set up we start to follow the perspective of OCs (something rarely smiled upon) and another part in wondering which OC to focus on.

Now, one thing I love in fiction is progressive powers and the conflict escalating from the different paths people take in said progression. In that vein, I have a pair of protags in mind as well.

The main two/co-protagonists:

The Lawkeeper- a cop before the change and now a member of a task force made up largely of those affected by the surge. A gamer, a man of color, and a believer of the spirit of the law. He doesn't always get along with his fellow officers but he believes in what the blue does. He believes that an organized response is what is best.

His abilities are based on those of Jesse Fades of Control. Meaning he has tremendous psychic potential but he needs 3 things to reach his full potential.

1.Items to bond to so he can generate these psychic abilities. Jesse's used altered items of her universe to get thematic abilities from them (ex: a safe to generate a shield, a carousel horse for a dash ability, ect). Here he can use items generated by the surge.

2. A patron/partner entity to help guide, give insights, and empower. It also let's the user enforce reality, basically becoming an anti reality warper.

3. A bonded morph weapon or a weapon to come to his hand when called.

The knight- a recent college graduate who instantly decided to go the route of the caped hero. She, after figuring out how to get her powers to work, instantly went the route of a caped crusader. Going out to the streets, saving lives, stopping instances of surge item abuse, and (in the humble opinion of the local Police Department) getting in the way of operations. In her opinion they were taking too long to get things done.

Her abilities are based on those of Prince Noctis of Final Fantasy XV. This means she has tremendous physical and magical potential but like the above she has a number of check marks needed to gain access to the character's full power.

1. A gem/crystal to draw power from.

2. 13 magical weapons to boost strength. The generated game weapons will do and I have most picked out in a way that likely would help the plot progress.

3. The blessing of 5-6 gods.

4. A power ring of some king to channel all this power.

I keep debating the two above as I do like the idea of both of them climbing in power and clashing over conflicting ideals of what to do with their power. At the same time, I think that just smooshing aspects of both into one (which is actually where they started, a single character) and play off the different ideologies of how best to help people from within her friend group and precinct along with internal conflict. Maybe have the one be a fellow officer they butt heads with because of the... precarious nature

Another OC I was thinking on, keeping with the theme of what to do when you have power, is a thief who played Persona 5. Like both of the above they would be crippled in their ability to use their abilities without a way to fake the connection to. In this case, without the Mementos App, they would need an item that could affect or enter the hearts of others. Luckily, more unlucky really, there are plenty of items floating around that can do just that. Namely Keyblades.

Most other Players are an odd mix but most are variations of the Shooter build. Peak physical humans who heal quickly and often have bullet time. But there are enough other variations to cause trouble. Demigods of unreal strength, men and women who can easily tap into a patron for powers from the outside, 2 variations of spider powers, cat eyed men and women who can cast magic with simple gestures, and so much more. But the real issue was the first two, the demigods without a parent to protect them and those easily connected to a divine source.

The disembodied New Gods of Apocalypse were very happy with those groups. For how bad this can be please look at what happened to Mary Marvel in canon Final Crisis.

Thoughts and opinions would be appreciated.

[woniepop]

girly girls

Pairing: Kang Taehyun x Fem!Reader

Word Count: 2.3K

Warnings: bullying, cursing

Genre: slice of life; fluff; angst

Summary: Three times a popular girl and a nerd were enemies, and one time where they weren’t

a/n: this fic was inspired by my all time favorite movie, Legally Blonde. I enjoyed writing this fic and I really hope you enjoy reading it :)

Y/N L/N has never been someone who liked to be cast in the shadows. Always being the center of attention, y/n has become one of the, if not the most, popular girls in her town. Homegirl is always dressed like an icon even when doing mundane tasks. Girls like her have never really been into anything “nerdy.” She associates herself with more of the bimbo kind, if you will. It was never really a secret, but she studies incredibly hard to get the chance to go to her dream school and become a great computer scientist. Being in such a large friend group of female fashion icons, there was never really anyone who wanted to talk about topics with math or computer science. 

Kang Taehyun, however, is this awkward and incredibly smart boy. Never really associated with popularity, he’s only had about four friends in his life and absolutely no dating experience. He’d always been one to shy away from attention. At most times, he found himself quietly observing others. All this, and he’s still what you would consider the teacher’s pet. He gets all his assignments done, A’s on every test, and raises his hand for every question. As a computer science enthusiast, he has worked his butt off his entire life, filling his schedule with robotics clubs, different languages of code, and coding camps. Senior year was his year. He had finally got into his dream school, TXT Tech, and had already created a very very detailed plan for the future.

Currently, Y/n’s mother was constantly trying to persuade her about fashion school. Having an incredibly fashionable mom wasn’t always the best for situations like these. TXT Tech results were coming out, and even though Y/n was confident she was getting in, there’s still the chance she might have not. Nervously waiting in front of her laptop, she sits impatiently refreshing the page for her results. Within one sentence she hops up from her chair in awe. Obviously attending the school was going to be a big turning point for her, and she was so excited to have been admitted to TXT Tech. 

As Y/n got settled on campus, she finds no one else that looks like her. Obviously, because she stands out, all attention is drawn to her. She’s confident, stylish, and hot. In a sea of gray and tan business outfits, Y/n wears a nice pink pantsuit. She’s relishing in all the attention, not seeming to mind that it’s not good, because she knew she looked good. 

Her first encounter with Taehyun couldn’t have gone worse. Walking to her class, pink drink in hand, she struts confidently to the lecture hall for her computer engineering class. Not paying attention to where she was going, she bumps into a tall figure. This clearly wasn’t the best way you could go about your first day, but all Y/n could do was apologize. 

“I’m so sorry, sir. I didn’t see where I was going and-” she rambled. Pausing in the middle of looking up, a very handsome and slightly awkward boy stands there, obviously pissed off and very annoyed. He scoffs and continues on his way to his next class.

Her second encounter with Taehyun was not great either. Clicking her high heels against the floor, she walks to her first class of the day. She had to get there early, she always had to sit in the front of the class. Taehyun on the other hand, nose buried deep in his book, walks directly to the middle. Despite loving programming, he could only handle so much attention. The class had started off well for Y/n, reviewing the class syllabus of “Principles of Programming Languages.” Taehyun, however, was pissed. He had not been called on once and was so frustrated. 

“Y/n, can you tell me the five most commonly used languages of code?” the professor asks smugly. Y/n knew what he was doing. She was being set up. She knew he thought she didn’t know and that lit a fire in her. 

“Python, Java, Javascript, C#, and C” she answers confidently. Hearing this, the professor nods his head. He wasn’t expecting that. 

Taehyun saw this as a perfect opportunity. His hand shoots up and he comments, “Sir, that’s actually incorrect. C++ is actually more popular because although C  has served as the foundation for writing languages like Python and Ruby, C++ is a newer language of code and therefore is compatible with more technology.” Taehyun confidently looks down to wear Y/n sits and smirks. Of course she wouldn’t know that. She’s only the popular rich girl that got in with Daddy’s money. She didn’t actually know anything, right?

It had been a few months since school had started, and finals were just about to come around. For this class’ final, they had to submit a partner project and code a simple game. At this point, it had been very blatantly established that Y/n and Taehyun were enemies. They despised each other. Always competing with each other in class, snickering when the other person got annoyed. It was a silent war between the two of them and everyone could feel the tension in the air. Obviously, it was no surprise they always came up at the top of the class, interchanging the first spot every test. What was surprising, however, was seeing their names together on the partner project roster. 

Taehyun was furious. College was supposed to be his bitch, but now he’s acting like Y/n’s bitch. He was so pissed off. Computer science was supposed to be where he had the upper hand. The one place he could feel himself. Where he was finally better than the stupid popular kids. And yet, he’s here, competing with one of them. It wasn’t fair. She was a girly girl, she wore bright colors everyday, she even had a sparkly notebook. How was she so smart? There was no way, it’s just the laws of the universe. You had to choose between looks and intelligence. That’s just what the gods above said. There’s no take backsies. 

It’s no secret that Y/n is a fashionable girl and having a female centric hobby isn’t really something applauded at this university. Knowing of Y/n’s insecurities, let’s talk about Taehyun’s. Having always worn non adventurous, boring, clothing, he’s known from the very beginning that Y/n’s beauty has helped her in life. Life is never fair, and it shows. Taehyun never ever got those advantages, and now here he is competing with someone just as smart as him. 

 As his jealousy grows in the back of his mind, he decides to use this time to take revenge. The next few days are spent typing away in the library, collaborating and researching for hours upon hours. Knowing that this project was worth 40% of their grade, they spent all their time trying to make this game perfect. 

The day of the presentation of their near perfect game rolls around and Y/n was confident. She had spent countless nights coding this with Taehyun and on her own. Starting the presentation off, Taehyun pulls up a game completely different to the one Y/n coded with him. “In this day and age, gaming has become a hobby more popular than it’s ever been. With platforms like twitch and youtube, all different types of games can catch the eyes of a wide audience. With this in mind, I’d like to present to you Jackbox Party Pack 8. Roleplay games have become the genre of choice for many gamers to play, and viewers to watch.” 

This was not the first person shooter Y/n had coded with him. What was he doing? Y/n stood there, not really knowing what to say. Opening and closing her mouth, she couldn’t form any words. She should have known this was a set up. “Ms. L/n, please continue.” The professor says. She couldn’t. She felt like she was frozen. She was so embarrassed and she should’ve seen it coming. With cheeks welling up in her eyes, she runs out of the classroom. 

With a smirk, Taehyun continued on, explaining how the game worked and how he had coded it. He had spent the past few nights coding it by himself and he was incredibly proud. Paying no mind to Y/n, he stood tall and smiled throughout his entire presentation. Obviously, like any normal person, guilt started growing quickly in the back of his mind. He finally realized he had fucked up. 

Running after Y/n, Taehyun felt incredibly guilty. He had taken the competition too far, and now he’d made someone innocent fail a required class. After running for what felt like hours, he found Y/n crying under a tree. He knelt down and offered her some tissues. Aggravated, she smacks the tissues away and tells him to leave.

Y/n, on the other hand, felt so angry. How could he do this to her? She hadn’t done anything wrong, and if he didn’t like the way she dressed or the way she conducted herself that was fine. All she needed was her to believe in herself and that got her into TXT Tech. While thinking about all the ways she could end Taehyun, she feels arms wrap around her. They’re 🤮Taehyun’s. Before she can rip his arms off, he speaks up. 

“Look Y/n, I’m really sorry about that whole thing I pulled back there. I’ll talk to the professor and give him the real project. I really took it too far and I’ll do anything to make it up to you.” He begs. 

“Um,, no? I don’t care? That was literally so embarrassing. If you really wanted to make it up to me you’d leave me alone.” Y/n pushes him off her harshly and storms off. How dare he? It probably took his two seconds to come up with that half assed apology. This was unbelievable. 

Y/n started trudging through the grass back to her dorm. All she wanted to do was take a warm shower and cry in her bed. She hated everyone. She wanted him to suffer just as much as she did, but she couldn’t do that. 

After two whole days of sobbing in her bed, she decided she was craving her signature pink drink. She really didn’t feel like going out, but delivering one drink would cost like $15. Y/n throws on a casual pink outfit. It’s very different from what she wore at the beginning of the school year, but the one thing that never changed was the color pink. Even in her depressive mood, she still wanted to dress up. She felt most comfortable wearing stylish clothing, that was her home. 

Stepping into the store, she sees Taehyun sitting at a table alone. You know when you see old people sitting along and you feel so bad for them you start tearing up? Like what if they lost their spouse or something :(((((. So anyway, Taehyun gives her lonely old people energy and regardless of what he did to her, she decides to keep him company. 

“Hey, um, can i sit here?” Y/n asks. Taehyun was so surprised. She wanted to sit with him? But he was so mean to her? He nodded his head and sat quietly. The past two days she could tell Taehyun had done a lot of thinking. She could tell he did it because he felt threatened. That wasn’t enough to forgive him, but at least she was being nice about it. 

Taehyun gets up and leaves. He comes back with a pink drink in hand, maybe as an apology. “I really want to apologize to you again, Y/n. Yesterday I don’t know if you saw, but the professor graded the actual project instead, and I had told him everything and that I’d deserve it if he failed me instead.” Y/n wanted to be happy but she wasn’t. She didn’t want him to fail after helping her code the game with her. Maybe she was so nice to him because she had matured, or maybe because she felt something different in Taehyun. Even so, a little embarrassment, she thought, wasn’t enough to cause a person to fail their whole class. Holding his hand on the table, she nods, a silent way she decided to forgive him. 

“Well, at least we’re not the worst team. I think group 7 coded a Niki Minaj roblox world.” Taehyun jokes. 

She laughs. “That’s so funny, what the heck? I guess we just have some hardcore barbs in this class.” People like Taehyun and people like Y/n were never meant to be friends in the first place, but maybe now they were starting to. Y/n, who was always challenging the term “girly girl.” Who always stressed that you have to believe in yourself when the rest of the world is against you. Y/n who became successful, without changing who she was. Y/n, who was feminine and wanted to show that was never a weakness. And Taehyun, who was always unadventurous. Who was never into fashion but still managed to pull off his nerdy outfits with his cute face. The passionate Taehyun whose only hobby seemed like studying. Gossiping for hours at the cafe, they realized this. They were starting to become friends. No one ever expected them to even be able to hold a friendly conversation, but here Y/n was, challenging everyone again.