#so please overlook that tiny inconsistency

[gameguides]

All Neomuna Region Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Destiny 2 is a beloved first-person shooter game with an expansive open-world and captivating storyline. One of the most thrilling parts of the game is finding hidden chests scattered throughout the different zones. These chests can contain rare and valuable items, including weapons, armor, and other loot that can help players in their journey. In this article, we will focus on the Neomuna region, one of the most recent areas added to the game, and provide a comprehensive guide to all the chest locations in this area. Whether you're a new player exploring the game's world or a seasoned veteran seeking to maximize your inventory, this guide will help you navigate the Neomuna region and uncover all of its hidden treasures. Join us as we embark on an exciting adventure to find all the Neomuna region chest locations in Destiny 2.

Neomuna Region Chests

This guide will help you find each of the Region Chests on Neomuna; there are only nine in total. They're actually quite easy to find, so if you want the sense of Pride and Accomplishment:tm: of finding them yourself, now's your chance to navigate away! For the most part, you can find all of these yourself by simply walking to them on the map. I have arbitrarily assigned a number to each of the Region Chests on this map.

Neomuna Region Chests Destiny 2 Please note that this numbering may be inconsistent with any used in the API or in other guides. The Region Chests are divided evenly between each region: - Three in Ahimsa Park - Three in Zephyr Concourse - Three in Límíng Harbor. Ahimsa Park Chest Locations Ahimsa Park (1/9): On the northeast side of the map, find a cliff facing the great big Calus Sphinx statue. From there, peer down the edge of the cliffside- there is a path that leads down the cliffside and into a small cave, where the Region Chest lives.

Ahimsa Park Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Ahimsa Park Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Ahimsa Park Chest Locations in Destiny 2 Ahimsa Park (2/9): This Region Chest is inside a tiny crevice, between a rock formation and the side of Calus's mothership. The crevice is behind the rock formation in the center of this screenshot.

Ahimsa Park Chest Locations in Destiny 2 From Region Chest #1, travel along the path towards the Calus Sphinx statue, but instead of entering the doorway, turn right and walk between the side of the building and the rock formation to find the hole to the Region Chest.

Ahimsa Park Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Ahimsa Park Chest Locations in Destiny 2 Ahimsa Park (3/9): On the southern edge of the map, there are some buildings overlooking the skyline. Platform up the side of the building using the clear glass sunshades. Or don't, whatever. Do it however you want, I'm not your mom.

Ahimsa Park Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Ahimsa Park Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Ahimsa Park Chest Locations in Destiny 2 Zephyr Concourse Chest Locations Zephyr Concourse (4/9): Start at the Striders' Gate fast-travel point and travel down to the Zephyr Concourse. The Region Chest is high up on a balcony rooftop. To get to it, immediately upon entering the area, jump onto the ledge on the right, then turn left and jump onto the clear glass cover, then onto the pink rooftop next to it.

Zephyr Concourse Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Zephyr Concourse Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Zephyr Concourse Chest Locations in Destiny 2 Zephyr Concourse (5/9): You can spot this Region Chest in a storefront, behind a layer of smug bulletproof glass. However, aforementioned smug bulletproof glass is bulletproof, so we need to take a less direct route. From the storefront, turn around and jump off the balcony, then turn left to find what is presumably a gym with some exercise equipment inside. The window to the gym is broken, making the interior accessible, and you will find a vent inside that leads to the room with the Region Chest.

Zephyr Concourse Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Zephyr Concourse Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Zephyr Concourse Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Zephyr Concourse Chest Locations in Destiny 2 Zephyr Concourse (6/9): From the round pavilion in the center of the region, head south-east, towards the side of the map with the glowing pink neon animated billboard. Look down over the edge; there are three clear glass sunshades. Jump onto the leftmost one to find the Region Chest.

Zephyr Concourse Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Zephyr Concourse Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Zephyr Concourse Chest Locations in Destiny 2 Liming Harbor Chest Locations Límíng Harbor (7/9): You can see this Region Chest quite plainly behind two spinning fans. There are no hidden puzzles, locked doors, or mechanics- it's really that simple. Heck, the fans don't even kill you.

Liming Harbor Chest Locations in Destiny 2 Límíng Harbor (8/9): This Region Chest can be found on the southwest corner of the region, next to the sea. Look for a yellow building; there are platforms between it and the adjacent building that form a very simple platforming challenge.

Liming Harbor Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Liming Harbor Chest Locations in Destiny 2 Límíng Harbor (9/9): This Region Chest is inside the main building in the center of the region, high up on a transparent walkway. Walk inside and jump up.

Liming Harbor Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Liming Harbor Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Liming Harbor Chest Locations in Destiny 2

Liming Harbor Chest Locations in Destiny 2 Thanks to Doomed Kitten, who helped me take pictures and write descriptions for this guide! Thanks also to Doomed Kitten's cats, who provided miscellaneous support (standing in front of the screen, looking cute, occasionally throwing up hairballs) If this guide helped you, please rate it so that others can find it! As the season progresses, I'll make guide content for all of the collectible secrets we find within Lightfall. Stay tuned for more. Read the full article

[croquel]

happy 5

tumblr crushed the image sorry :-(

also edit to fix the tags my bad

[certifiedceraunophile]

KLAROLINE FALL BINGO PREVIEW.

@eliliyah @klarolinefallbingo

Prompt: Dias De Muertos

Honestly the relevancy of the prompt comes far to late in the story but it’s there, kinda. But hey it’s there.

MASQUERADES

(CinemaAU)

Sometimes all she needed was to take a breather. A single moment. One pause.

Breathe in.

To collect her thoughts and emotions. To steady her bearings.

To state in a repetitive loop all the reasons why punching one Niklaus Mikaelson in the balls would be a marginally bad idea.

And breathe out.

Forgive her, but The man was infuriating. Okay?

And unashamedly so. Not a whit of genuine compunction behind that facade of ‘Inescapable Charisma and Unadulterated Allure.’

Definitely not her words.

Nope. No sir.

These were the words of a certain Greta Martin, editor-in-chief for the first October issue of People Magazine.

With one Mega-frustrating arrogant blonde blue-eyed dimpled asshat demon going by the name Klaus slapped to the front of said issue.

And Nope if anyone asks,

No, she did not literally just shred -In a shredding machine no less, because efficiency, thank you very much- the first copy of the magazine she bought, after reading the beginning eight lines on his exclusive, recounting what a ‘delightfully satisfying and marvellous experience the entire three months of shooting turned out to be.’

Ok one Black-hole sized pause right there please.

Thank you.

A single beat.

And....

The Absolute Fuck?!

She’s sorry. Marvellous experience?

Excuse her, but say what?

Breathe in. Breathe out.

Beg pardon but What?

Excuse her.

But Marvellous experience, as in, aggressive quotation marks scratching the air “Marvellous experience” is NOT how she remembers it.

The slap in the face obvious discrepancy to both their stories is definitely not blind to her.

He called 84 re-takes that lasted four whole hours for one eight minute long single-shot single-angle scene, Marvellous.

He called having ice-cold Whiteclaw thrown square on his face by a Absolutely-done-with-wild-gust-of-agitated-Blonde-Fury on the eighth day of set, Marvellous.

He called having two separate make-up artists downright quit after being unable to touch up her makeup every thirteen seconds because she ran her hand down her face in unbridled aggravation every time her eyes landed on him, Marvellous.

He called the same experience where, she had to literally rush out of a set, under the ruse of a bathroom break, Twice in the course of three months, so that she can peacefully go through the motions of a rage-fueled emotional meltdown, complete with angry frustrated tears and a relentlessly colourful diatribe, cursing every man in her life who bore even a sliver of resemblance to the stormy-blue-eyed spawn of satan that was her co-actor, Marvellous.

God. How the hell did he possibly think he could get away with this,

How did he think he was going to smooth over the transparent inconsistencies between her interviews and his, without raising at least a few confused questions from bloodthirsty intuitive fans and the Press in general.

Given how her talk-show interviews and magazine exclusives gave the steady image, that

1. Klaus Mikaelson is a dick and a half, with an overgrown ego so ginormous that even the entirety of Tinseltown is ‘plainly restricting of his nonpareil talent in histrionic execution.’

2. Klaus Mikaelson is an arrogant narcissistic asshole that Hast pronounc'd upon his brethren yond this day f'rth that gent shalt with ev'ry smidgen of purpose in his life striveth to be the Unrivalled Bane of Caroline Forbes’ Existence.

3. The process of Creating the undeniable tour de force Masterpiece that was ‘100 years of solitude.’ The newest Christopher Nolan Direction and Production in theatres right now, that already has definite Academy Awards Nomination in the talks, was anything but Marvellous. She admits, It was so so gratifying and made her heart full with a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction, that left her giddy with such lighthearted contentment for days, after the phenomenal response it garnered post-premiering, Yes. But that does not capsulate how frustratingly tiresome and emotionally debilitating the entire creation process was. Hell it was downright painful at times.

4. Would she voluntarily take another movie with Klaus Mikaelson as a Co-star alongside her? You can get back to her when the sun starts to rise from the west and the answer would still be a definitive NO.

Now of course she wasn’t this brazen with her claims she knows how to be cute and classy and concise.

But she definitely did not mitigate the truth of her statement, she’s had enough training with her PR department to know what to say and how to say it but she’s sure that nobody had been able to overlook her less than companionable remarks about Klaus.

For example

The Stephen Colbert Show:

Stephen: “So Caroline tell us about the process, the Making of it, how everything fell into place like tiny puzzle pieces to reveal at last this grand, Grand Picture.”

“The process? Well the process was certainly not...pretty...but after every time we finished a scene, however small or inconsequential it may have seemed to the plot, there was this immense sense of ‘there-Done it. And done it well.’ ”

Jimmy Kimmel Live:

“Klaus Mikaelson, well my Co-star is um....eccentric at best.....”

Jimmy: “and at worst?”

“Well..... I guess” -hellish, heinously intolerable, a cruel mean bastard- “....Unyielding...?”

The Ellen Show:

“Well Klaus was a..... demanding partner and it took Herculean efforts to meet his exacting standards, but I can understand how that paid off so well on screen. The end result when I saw it for the first time, it damn well paid off.”

Ellen: “so he is absolved of his admittedly ‘uphill’ personality then?”

She laughs awkwardly,

“Ye-ah....No.”

followed by more laughter dissolving the painstaking grimace she’s trying to tamper down.

Oh and the worst.

The Late Late show with James Cordon:

During the ‘Fill Your Guts or Spill Your Guts’ segment

James: “So....I’m going to give you, let’s see, Ah there, the Bird Saliva.”

Caroline: “James!.... Damn it, you are so not making it into my good books, and....God. That’s just disconcerting I mean, How do they even, I don’t know... collect it?”

James: “Well there’s a whole process of harvesting it from the salivary glands and—“

Caroline: “Never mind! Nope. No need for the details, please, James, a lady’s delicate sensibilities are at stake. And unless the question is ‘what is your social security number?’ I’m not drinking this poison.”

James: “Now Caroline you wound me, I can assure you everything on this table is edible albeit being marginally unpalatable—“

Caroline: “Marginally?!”

James: “You should try the Cow’s tongue. It’s delectable.” Followed by a sagely nod.

Caroline: “Now I’m just intensely bothered. You’ve definitely lost all claim for a spot in my good books.”

James: “Ah well, speaking of staying in your good graces, here’s a question that will have you downing that Saliva in seconds.”

Caroline: “Hit me.”

James: “Well then, ‘Name Any one CO-star with whom you have worked with in the past that you would never volunteer to work with again.’”

Pause.

And the audience descended.

“Like I said, speaking about staying in your good books.”

Amidst the raucous screams, whistles and laughter, it didn’t even bother Caroline, the clarity and speed with which the name

‘Klaus Mikaelson’ flashed in the front of her mind, like a large Neon LED sign from a typical Vegas Nightlife scene.

It took her a total of three seconds to know that she was going to answer with his name because, well just look at that drink in front of her,

Sure if you bend over real low and squint in the right light it may look like a harmless Daiquiri, but a Daiquiri it was not.

No. This was Bird Freaking Saliva,

Come on, you can’t possibly ask her to put that in her goddamn mouth.

Like NO.

Just no.

So sue her for protecting her taste buds that are yet to experience many more exotic flavours and textures of food from all around the world.

But then again she can’t possibly outright just say “Oh that’s easy, Klaus Mikaelson.”

That’s exactly the kinda PR trouble she wants to stay above and definitely didn’t need to be wrung out dry by her Spitfire Mistress-of-Hell Publicist Katherine Pierce for.

(Who also alternates as her BFF, occasionally, mind you.)

So she puts on a good show, dropped her head in her hands, gave a healthy long groan, looked up and gave James her best wounded Puppy Dog eyes, to which he was clearly not immune to, judging by how he looked a touch chagrined, but the game was just as much as beyond his hands as it were hers,

She looked to the audience “You guys are so mean, it’s not even funny.”

And grumbled a bit more till everyone was laughing and pitching forward and back on their seat amused by the poor Blonde’s Dilemma.

So she looked up to the heavens as if to ask for some unknown deity for deliverance and guidance, and poised herself to drink,

Only to put the glass back down in the last second in a begrudgingly weak show of caving in, and blurted out reluctantly,

(She’s a glorious actor, she’s aware.)

“You know what, Nope. He’s just gotta deal with it, okay?.”

Deep breath

Or was it the audience taking a deep breath and holding it in,

“ItsKlausMikaelson,PleaseDontKillMe.”

Pause again.

And the auditorium transcended.

Well,

she handled that, pretty well, if she does say so herself you know.

Apparently Kat Disagrees.

Apparently She Blew It.

She blew it so hard she could’ve knocked down the third little pig’s brick house.

Ironic since she always envisioned Klaus as the Big Bad Wolf who huffs and puffs and just generally blows.

Apparently her little admission was a PR disaster.

And Kat was furious.

The two minute edited clip that encompassed the question, the reluctant grumbling and finally the confession was apparently now a viral video on all social networking platforms.

They were trending on twitter under the hashtag

#KlarolineUnrequitedLoveIsABitch.

But her admission to being generally averted on taking up Klaus as a colleague again was apparently only one half of the video,

The other half....

Well the other other half was Klaus with his personal confession.

God, it wasn’t even a confession,

it was a—a Mockery, yes that’s it, a Mockery,

Of Her, no less

Basically Here’s the run down of the second insidious half of the video,

Klaus sitting in front of Graham Norton, in all their British glory, going live on The Graham Norton Show,

when asked about Caroline Forbes, his “partner” on scene has the audacity to let out this evil little amused huff and say:

“Caroline?” Another amused huff. “Well Caroline, Christ, where do I start? She’s an absolutely glorious presence on set. Her energy....it’s infectious, She hits you like a blonde hurricane of sunshine and snark and you’re just left staring up at the sun thinking, ‘you need to catch up mate, if you want to be half as bright and burning as her.’”

And Caroline thinks maybe this is the feeling of your brain imploding within the confines of the skull.

TBC

[candra-hearts]

Heart of a Queen

This has been a wip on my computer for over two years, and I never really had any intention of finishing it, but @starry-serenade asked me to post it, so here it is!

also lowkey tagging @starswirlblitz and @jessucakes bc you might like it?

This story I think lies between KH2 and Dream Drop Distance, with the change that Kairi is present and has been helping Queen Minnie and the rest. It’s been a while since I’ve dived deep into KH lore, so please forgive any inconsistencies or incorrect applications of KH magic!

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

When Sora and Kairi find a mysterious Heartless, they take a chance and bring it back to Disney Castle. Fortunately for them, one lucky rabbit is able to aid them in their quest to find out who it could be…

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

“What is that, how did it get in here, and why do you have it?” Donald asked harshly.

Kairi raised her eyebrow at the royal magician. “It’s a Heartless, and Sora and I brought it back for King Mickey to take a look at it.” She protectively laid a hand on the head of the small black creature that crouched at her side.

“Wak? Why?” Donald looked up at Goofy. “How did you even get it here? The castle’s magic should keep out all Heartless!”

“It should. I guess it doesn’t work all the time,” Sora said, shrugging.

“Ah-hyuck. Why would ya bring a Heartless here? What does His Majesty need to see about it?” Goofy asked, scratching the back of his head.

“It looks different than the others we’ve fought,” Sora said. He pointed to the top of the Heartless’s head. “It has pointy ear-things, and its eyes are green.” Which they were, and from all the time he spent helping his friends cleanse the darkness from their worlds, all the time he spent whacking Heartless back into dissipating shadows, he was pretty sure they weren’t normally that color.

“I can feel that it’s special. I don’t think it’s a normal Heartless,” Kairi added.

“But if it’s not a Heartless, then what is it?” Donald asked. “This makes no sense. I’m telling the King.” He darted out of the room.

“Okay. That’s fine!” Sora called after him. “Tell him to come out and see!”

“Sora, I hope your hunch is right,” Kairi murmured to him.

“You said you can feel it’s different than a normal Heartless, right? I trust you, and I think you could be right,” Sora said, putting a hand on her shoulder. “Don’t worry. King Mickey’ll see what we’re talking about.”

Goofy bent down to look at the Heartless, which, frightened, hid behind Kairi’s leg. “Gawrsh. It’s kind of a cute little feller, ain’t it?”

Donald and Mickey arrived in that moment. “What’s all this about a Heartless in my castle?” Mickey asked, raising an eyebrow. He summoned his Keyblade in a flash of golden light.

The Heartless hid behind Kairi, and Sora put himself protectively between her and the King. “Your Majesty, this Heartless isn’t here to hurt anyone. We brought it here.”

“You brought a Heartless? Here?” Mickey put his Keyblade away and looked up at the boy in confusion. “Why?”

“It’s okay, sweetheart, King Mickey isn’t going to hurt you,” Kairi crooned gently, persuading the small shadowy creature to come out from behind her. It looked over at Mickey, still holding onto Kairi’s leg with tiny hands. “I just… I just have a feeling, in my heart, that this Heartless is special. It’s different… it looks a little different, its presence feels a little different…” The girl shook her head. “I don’t know why exactly…”

“Well, remember when I took my own heart?” Sora said, tilting his head. “I got split into a Heartless, and Roxas, my Nobody.” Goofy nodded, remembering. “I got turned into a Heartless, but Kairi…” he blushed, “…turned me back to my normal self.”

Goofy snapped his fingers. “So ya think this might be the Heartless of somebody we know?”

“We… we think it might be,” Kairi said. “Maybe that’s why the castle’s magic… isn’t really affecting it.”

“Hmmm.” Mickey pondered this. “Well, it makes sense. All right. We’ll keep it until we can figure out how to turn it back into whoever it is. But it needs to be watched at all times; we can’t leave it unattended.”

“Thank you, Your Majesty,” Kairi said with plain relief, bowing her head to the mouse king.

“Aw, Kairi, we went over this,” Mickey chuckled. “Just King Mickey is enough.”

“Right. King Mickey.”

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *            

“BLAAAAAHHHHHAAAAHHHHRRRRGGHHAAAAAAAHHHH! OW! OW! OW!”

Oswald spun wildly out of the portal and bounced directly onto Disney Castle’s back lawn. He spit perfectly manicured blades of grass out of his mouth and rubbed his head, sitting up and groaning as his Keyblade Armor disappeared and the portal closed. “I hate between-world travel…”

He’d been a Keyblade Master longer than he cared to admit, but traveling through the Corridors was not one of his specialties. After a couple more minutes his vision stopped spinning and he was able to make out an enormous blue and white marble building towering over him. “Well, at least I’m in the right place.” He stood up and made his way toward the Gummi Ship Hanger, searching for the one mouse who could hopefully help him out.

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Minnie looked around her. She, Riku, Kairi and Donald had spent much of the afternoon in the library doing research on the Cornerstone of Light and Disney Castle, among many, many other things. “Oh, now where were we?”

“The History of Disney Castle, Volume X,” Riku said, cracking a grin.

“The Keyblade War, Volume II,” Kairi added.

“That’s right. Oh, and where is the King? I asked him to meet us hours ago…”

“I’ll go find him, Your Majesty,” Donald offered, and before she could say yes or no he was already out the door and down the hall.

Minnie sighed and replaced a book on the shelf.

Less than ten minutes later, a familiar voice spoke up from the doorway. “Don’t worry, Your Highness, I’m here for ya!”

The Queen giggled. “Oh, Mickey.” She put her hands on her hips. “But you’re still late, what kept you?”

Mickey grinned and stepped into the library, followed by two other figures: Sora and Oswald.

Riku raised an eyebrow. The rabbit who had followed the King in the door was about his height, though his tall black ears added a good foot to his stature. He looked remarkably like the King, but his face was white instead of peach. He wore a similar outfit as well, simple clothes for traveling, he supposed, but it was blue, silver, and black instead of red, gold, and black. Unlike the King, he wore no gloves and no shoes, choosing to walk barefoot.

“Oh, King Oswald!” Minnie curtsied.

Sora and Riku bowed and Kairi curtsied as well.

The corner of Oswald’s mouth turned up in the ghost of what once might have been called a smile, but it vanished almost as soon as it appeared. He waved his hand for the teens to stand and turned his attention back toward Mickey. “Mick, I hate to admit it, but I need your help.”

“’Course, Oswald! Brothers gotta stick together, ya know.”

“Brothers?” Sora whispered to Riku.

“Half-brothers, actually,” Riku replied, remembering a long-ago conversation with the King in which he’d told him about Oswald, about the rabbit king who was his half-brother, who ruled a land much different than his.

“Yeah, but don’t forget, I’m older than you, mouse,” Oswald grumbled, shoving one of his hands in his pockets.

Mickey put his hands on his hips. “What’s the trouble, Os? I haven’t heard from ya in… well… time’s different in each world, but it’s probably been a while.”

“Well, my world was taken by the darkness and—”

Five different gasps punctuated the room. Sora, Riku, and Kairi looked at each other. Minnie looked at Mickey who looked horrified at Oswald. “Wasteland’s gone?” the Queen gulped at last.

Oswald winced but nodded affirmatively. “Yeah. I… I don’t know what even happened. I was out walking on Mean Street when a tidal wave of darkness surged down an alley toward me. I got out my Keyblade and put up a Refleza, but even that didn’t do much of anything; I blacked out and found myself in Traverse Town.”

There was silence in the room for the span of a few heartbeats. “Did… did anyone else make it out?” King Mickey asked with a soft gulp.

Oswald sighed, a deep sigh that seemed to travel all the way from his large black feet up and out of his mouth. “I haven’t seen Ortensia. I don’t know where she is. I looked all over Traverse Town, even asked around, but nobody’d seen her. My sweetie pie, my kitty…” He sighed and reached up to tug on one of his ears in an aggravated motion. “Not to mention my 420 Bunny Children, who knows where they all are… and Gus and all the other Gremlins, I didn’t see anybody and it’s just…”

Kitty? Something clicked in Kairi’s memory. “Oh! Your Majesty?”

Minnie, Mickey, and Oswald all looked at her. “Yes?” they asked with one voice.

“I’m sorry, I mean King Oswald,” the girl amended, twisting her hands in the fabric of her skirt.

The rabbit in question looked up at her. “Yeah?”

“Your wife… you said she’s a cat?”

Oswald smiled dreamily. “The most beautiful cat to ever live.”

Kairi glanced meaningfully at Sora, but he hadn’t seemed to put the pieces together. “Can you excuse us for a second? We need to go check on something.” Minnie nodded but returned her attention quickly to Oswald’s worries.

Kairi took Sora’s hand and dragged him bodily out of the library. “Kairi, what are you doing?” he queried as she continued to yank his arm out of his socket. When had she gotten this strong?

“That Heartless we found, it has pointy ears like a cat, right? I think… I think it might be Ortensia’s Heartless,” she explained.

“Oh. Oh, okay. That makes total sense,” Sora said, nodding like he’d known it all along. “Where did you leave it?”

“I left it in the garden, told Pluto to watch it… oh no.” The pair halted by the railing overlooking the back lawn. The Heartless was there, all right, but so was Donald, and out of the corner of his eye, Sora caught a glimpse of Pluto trapped in a cage made of great icicles. Angry barks echoed between the topiaries as the gold mutt tried to break loose.

Kairi inhaled a sharp breath and felt Sora’s hand cover hers in a comforting grip.

“You’re dangerous…” they could hear him muttering to himself. “You’re dangerous, I don’t care what the King says, I’m gonna take care of you once and for all…”

With a flash of white and silver Kairi was alone on the balcony. Sora had vaulted over the railing with smooth precision borne of much practice and flung his Keyblade at Donald… not to strike him, only to distract him. The Keyblade embedded itself in the lawn up to the teeth a foot from Donald’s beak.

“Wak! Who’s there?” he quacked angrily.

“Donald, don’t!” Sora shouted as he ran to retrieve his Keyblade. “It’s Ortensia!”

“Ortensia?!?” Donald repeated, his brows flying down into a confused line.

“Kai, go find the Heartless!” the boy shouted back up to the balcony.

Kairi nodded and vaulted over the railing herself, scanning the area for the little black creature.

“What makes you think that thing is Queen Ortensia?” Donald complained, folding his arms, his staff stuck under his arm.

“King Oswald’s here, he lost her, and we think this Heartless… might be her,” Sora explained as he summoned his best Fira’s to melt Pluto’s prison.

“She can’t be a Heartless, that’s ridiculous…” the royal magician said, waving his hand dismissively.

Sora put his hand on his hip, still focusing the tip of his Keyblade on the icicles. “Uh huh. And when I got turned into a Heartless, who hit me on the head a bunch of times? I still remember that!”

“Wak! Oh, all right, maybe it could be possible…” Donald relented grumpily.

The Heartless had hid in a bush at the rear of the garden, and Kairi was on its tail. She knelt down and parted the leaves carefully. The Heartless scooted further back until it was touching the marble wall. “It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s me, Kairi, remember me?” Kairi said soothingly. “Are you okay, Ortensia?”

The Heartless seemed to perk up, turning its head toward the girl.

“That’s your name, isn’t it?” The Heartless began to crawl toward the front of the bush and Kairi moved out of the way. “King Oswald’s here. He misses you a lot. Do you want to go see him?”

The black creature parted the leaves, stepping out into the afternoon sun, and gave a very slight head motion that might have been a nod. “Good,” Kairi said, relieved. “He’s up in the castle.”

The Heartless took her offered hand and together they made their way back up toward where Sora had finally freed Pluto.

The second he was out, Pluto darted over to Donald and began barking at him angrily.

Donald fended him off with his staff. “Pluto, cut it out!”

“Ruff ruff gurrr rufff ruff ruff!”

“Okay, okay, I’m sorry for freezing you.”

“Gurrrrruff ruff rrrr ruff grrr…”

“Oh, fine! And I’m sorry for trying to hurt the Heartless!”

Pluto stopped barking and snorted, nodding his head sharply.

“You’re such a good dog…” Kairi said, rubbing the mutt’s head affectionately.

Sora dismissed his Keyblade. “Kairi, you found it?”

“Right here. Let’s go find King Oswald.”

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

Fortunately, he hadn’t left the library, as he was still in the midst of a heated discussion with Mickey. “…flung to all the worlds! It’s too reckless, and besides, it’s against the rules. Master Yen Sid wouldn’t be happy.”

Sora elbowed the door open and held it for his girlfriend and her charge. “We’re back, Your Majesties.”

“King Oswald?” Kairi ventured.

“Yes?” He glanced over at her, his arms folded and one foot tapping a frustrated rhythm on the tiled floor.

“We have someone we would like you to see.” Kairi gently ushered the Heartless in front of her, where it stood stock still, seeming to be frightened.

Oswald felt his heart give a soft flip. Only one person ever made that happen. “…Ortensia?” The Heartless looked up at him and tilted its head curiously. Oswald slowly approached it, feeling his heart grow warmer even in its presence. “It is you… isn’t it… Ortensia….” He took its hands, and in an instant had it in a warm embrace. “My Ortensia…”

There was a poof and a flash of light and the Heartless vanished. In its place stood a female cat Oswald’s height, wearing a lacy pink gown and gold gloves. A tiny gold tiara with a white-gold flower in the center was nestled between her pointed ears.

“Oh, honey bunny!”

They separated for only a second before Ortensia began to kiss him all over his face. Grinning he picked her up and twirled her around. She shrieked with laughter. “You’re all right after all! Oh, I’m so glad!” Oswald cried, his heart thrumming with joy and relief.

Mickey sighed and put his hand in his pocket. “Well, that answers that question.”

Donald tapped his foot, grumbling. “…can’t believe it worked…”

Kairi curtsied again. “Queen Ortensia, I presume.”

Oswald stopped spinning and put his wife down. She hopped a little, her black and gold heels tapping on the tiled floor. “Oh, yes. That’s right. Oh, it’s so nice to be me again! Thank you for being so kind to me!”

“Glad to help, Your Majesty!” Sora said, grinning excitedly.

“I… I don’t know what happened…” Ortensia sighed, touching her cheek softly. “I was doing the flower arrangements for the party and all of a sudden everything was shadowy and cold and there were tendrils of darkness everywhere. I tried Pearl and Holy and neither made the darkness retreat for long. I shouted and shouted for you, Oswald, hoping you would hear even though I knew you were out about town today…” She sighed again. “I guess I must have blacked out because I don’t remember much of anything after that.”

“Well, you’re here now, hon, and you’re okay, and that’s what matters,” Oswald said, taking her hand and weaving his fingers between hers, still plainly relieved. “And somehow we’ll figure out how to save our world.”

Mickey shook his head. “It seems like every time we take two steps forward with that, we get pushed three steps back. I thought all the worlds had returned, but if there are some that are still disappearing, then I feel like we’re just… at a standstill.”

Minnie took his hand. “We’re all working very hard to figure out what to do,” she said softly. “And as long as we’re together, as long as our hearts are together, the Light will guide us.”

Mickey pecked her on the temple. “You’re right, Min. We’re gonna figure it out together.”

*  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

BONUS:

“Oswald, where are the kids?”

“Missing? They probably got flung to all the worlds of light just like those puppies did a couple of years ago…”

“All 420?”

“Yes, honey, all 420.”

“What are we going to do?”

Oswald tilted his face up toward the ceiling, a frustrated groan escaping through his teeth before addressing the room at large. “Who wants to go on a quest?”

[alcheminary]

uhhhhh yeaaaaaah I’ve got an order for some edwin featuring parental roy and riza, hold the royai?

merry new year, @bifullmetal, I’m your secret santa for 2018!! I’m sorry this is late, I was held up by some travel plans that popped off a little earlier than I thought they would

you asked for basically anything, so my plan going in here was to deliver a wintery and modern spin on the classic mermaid au fic. of course it ran away from me, so now you get a wip of a fic, and that just seems like a bum present so I draw art to make up for that, and gosh dude I just hope you like it

thanks to @fullmetalsecretsanta for putting this event together for 2018, you guys are awesome, for sure

anyway, here’s a sneak peek at the first chapter!

(edit: sorry for the extra late posting, I saved this to my drafts again on accident which is kind of the most embarrassing mistake I could possibly make)

“The Sea Bleeds Blue” Chapter 1 (prototype)

“... the man is reported to have been under the influence of alcohol during the time of his encounter…”

The tiny little TV blares throughout the house from its perch on the kitchen counter, a feat much more impressive in possibly any other structure that isn’t a cramped beach house. Like, seriously cramped. The kind of cramped where you can barely lay flat across the floor without hitting a wall.

It’s not like Winry Rockbell hates her grandma’s beach house. In a way, she gets it. You get older, your health starts to go, the warm weather is easy on your joints and the air is just so much easier to breathe compared to city smog. And everyone else your age has the same idea, too. When you have a nest egg and no other obligations, why not? Why not just live at the beach, wake up every morning to the soothing ebb of waves, sip your coffee on a porch overlooking the scenery, be a family vacation destination in and of yourself, and just wait to die?

That’s her whole bugbear with the thing actually, now that she thinks about it. People come to the beach to die.

She blinks hard, reaches for her wire cutters, and tries not to think about it much more than that.

“... officials like park ranger Jean Havoc however say the injuries are more likely to have been caused by a particularly territorial sea lion,” the newscaster on the TV continues, her voice tinny and distorted by the on-board speakers. Honestly, she could fix those if Gran would let her...

“He might’ve been feedin’ ‘em, harassin’ ‘em… Sea lions ain’t known to be gracious about their personal space, so all it takes is one loud, persistent jerkwad to ruin their whole day. Heck, mine too! Hahaha.”

“The man was admitted to the hospital this morning, and is expected to make a full recovery…”

Paninya scoffs, loud enough to startle Winry just as she’s threading the headlight through its socket. Luckily a less delicate part of this process. “Sea lion my butt. I’ve bounced frisbees off those things and they haven’t moved.”

She pauses as she considers that image. “Please tell me you don’t make field goals out of sea lions on purpose.”

“Of course not! They’re just… big. And bouncy. And all over? You can’t go down the boardwalk without tripping on them. Like, seriously, is there like a sea lion sanctuary nearby or something? Don’t they migrate?” Paninya asks, her nose scrunching up.

“Uh, I think Mr. Hughes might—”

“No, wait, that’s beside the point,” she interrupts. “And the point here is that I’m not buying what that park ranger is selling.” Her deep brown eyes watch Winry expectantly.

Winry puts down the wires she was futzing with and turns to give her a long-suffering smile, resigning herself to the next few minutes being completely unproductive. “Alright, detective, give me the scoop. What’s really going on in Brightly Cove?”

Paninya always gets this wild grin on her face when she does this. The corner of her smile lifts up just so, her eyes glint, and she squares her shoulders like she’s the hardboiled crime noir star the situation needs.

“Okay, so,” she starts, “You saw the gashes on the guy, right?”

Winry shrugs. “A little bit.”

“Okay, well, they’re completely inconsistent with a sea lion attack. We’d be looking for bites and puncture wounds, and he got approximately uhh, NONE of those. So either sea lions have mutated to have razor sharp claws in the past week, or it wasn’t a sea lion and the park ranger is bullshitting us to cover up what it REALLY was.”

“Right, I’m following so far.”

“So, let’s set the scene.” She stands up to stalk around the incredibly small kitchen table toward Winry. “You’re a dumb tourist that came to the beach in the winter. You’ve brought a brand new jet ski with you, completely oblivious that the water is way too cold for that right now. Because you’re a dumb tourist.”

Winry takes the cue. “I’m a savvy tourist because I’ve arrived when no one is here and none of the shops are open! Locals LOVE my business! Sure hope nothing happens to me without any lifeguards!”

“You’re out on the water when you get caught… in a current! Waves come and pummel you towards the shore, one by one! Before you know it you’re smashed up against the rocks,  no shore to save you. You’re stuck.”

She musters the most dramatic slump over the back of the chair that she can manage. “Woe is the fate of a tourist such as I.”

“But wait!” Paninya raises a hand to her forehead, shielding her eyes from some kind of indoor sun. “What’s that coming toward you? It couldn’t be, is it a person, come to save you in your darkest hour? But then it comes closer, and you realize fate has never been so kind… because there, in the distance… is…“ She leans in close to Winry with a grave look.

“Is…?”

“Bigfoot with a machete.”

“Bigfoot with a—?!” Winry sputters, pushing Paninya away as she absolutely howls with laughter. “Your idea of a more likely culprit than a sea lion is Bigfoot with a machete?!”

“Uh, yeah?” She lifts an eyebrow. “Come on Winry. The gashes. The rocks. The collectible shot glass he leaves at the scene of every crime. It’s totally Bigfoot’s m.o.”

Winry turns back to the mess of robotics on the table. “I’m done with you. Completely done. I’m kicking you out.”

“What? Noooo, come oooon, I’ve got nothing else to do today! I’m gonna be so bored, Winry, pleeease,” Paninya whines, flopping bonelessly onto the table with her best puppy-dog eyes. Winry is mostly unaffected.

“Why not just go hang out with Lan Fan?” she asks. “She puts up with you way more than I do.”

“Can’t. She’s out with her grandpa ‘scoring sweet holiday deals’ at the outlets.” The complaint comes with air quotes. “Besides, you’ve been talking about how cool this project is gonna be for like, mooonths. I can’t miss it after that kind of hype.”

“I have kind of been taunting you with it, haven’t I?” Winry sighs, curling a loose wire around her finger. “Tell you what. If you can be quiet and not so… Paninya the amazing living distraction on me, then I’ll let you come with me later to do the experiment.” Paninya’s whole disposition perks up like a labradoodle. “But! That means no distractions.”

“Aye captain, no distractions,” Paninya promises with a little salute.

~~~~ ~~~~ ~~~~ ~~~~

Several hours in that ramshackle beach house kitchen, crammed around a table and dutifully trying to keep potato chip crumbs from invading her whole zone (which, to Paninya’s credit, does not technically count as a distraction), and it’s finally complete. Just in time for low tide, too. The thing she’s been dreaming of doing for months, the senior project that will launch her college applications from drab to fab, the thing that will get her out of this backwater beach town for good...

“Okay, so. No more secrets. Tell me what your project is, Win,” Paninya demands, handing her a roll up cord out of the backpack they brought with them. Winry beams at her.

“Wwwweeell, do you remember those guys from like, San Fran who started building an aquatic robot to explore a hole that was rumored to have treasure at the bottom?”

Paninya pulls out a half-eaten bag of Ruffles from the backpack. “No, but that sounds completely rad. Is that your project? Oh shit, are we gonna find treasure?”

“Probably not,” Winry casually admits, ignoring the way Paninya deflates. “But the robot, yeah. The one they built was a world-wide collaboration across the internet. They had a goal, and people would test their builds by building one of their own, tweak it, and report their findings on those tweaks. It was super cool.”

“Yeah, cool for nerds maybe…” Paninya mumbles around a chip.

“SO,” she presses on, “I built one of my own. With some tweaks. You know, in the spirit of the thing. Now I just need to test it out, record my success, and write a whole essay on it.”

“Which is why we’re in the spooky cave that you can only get to at low tide and has a mysterious bottomless pit in it? So you can see if your ‘bot dives or fries?”

“Yep!” Winry answers cheerfully. “And why not just use Ling’s pool to do this instead? My legs don’t get good traction in here. I almost slipped earlier. I almost died.”

“Because Ling’s pool isn’t saltwater, and you’re fine.”

“Wow. Cold. Is this what a shitload of free time your senior year does to you, or is it just the overachieving itself?”

“Both,” Winry chirps, and plugs the cord into the tablet. She moves to plug in the other end into the robot itself, but frowns. The waterproof chassis doesn’t look right, like it settled in transport, skewing the whole design just slightly enough that it kind of worries her. Just that tiny bit of pressure on the cable could knock it out with the right bump, or damage the whole port.

Oh well. That’s why a scout’s always prepared, right? She pulls a knife out of her pocket and carefully shaves the plastic away to make room. And just like that, the plug fits like a charm. Nice and snug.

She turns to Paninya, and nods. “It’s show time.”

“Wait, waaaait,” Paninya stops her, waving a cheese-dusted hand around as the other reaches into the backpack. “It’s bad luck to sail a ship without a name. Got one?”

“Uh… I’ve just been calling it Divebot mark 1?” she offers.

Paninya stops digging through the supplies to stare. “Come on, Win. I’ve taught you to ‘yes and’ better than that.”

“Ugh, fine, okay. Um… Divey Jones?”

“Better.” Paninya reveals a can of ginger ale, and at Winry’s own disbelieving stare, shrugs. “It’s not like I have champagne, dude. Ready?”

“Ready.”

Gently, Winry eases the newly christened Divey Jones into the pool of water in front of them at the same time Paninya starts vigorously shaking the can. It floats on top of the surface, gently bobbing, and Winry tosses a grin at Paninya. First success: buoyancy. Next: video feed.

She boots up the tablet, jailbroken to run an open framework because nobody wants you to sandbox their stuff anymore, and opens the custom app she programmed just for this project. One part video capture, one part robot controller. It saved her the parts cost of making a controller, but also? It’s just a little more impressive for whoever looks over her work. Look, she can engineer hardware and software!

When the window prompt comes up to sync the devices, she starts to get jittery. It was one thing to test out at the house, where everything seemed to work just fine, but this was it. This was what either made her winter break a vacation or a mad dash to troubleshoot whatever could have possibly gone wrong in her schematics. The only thing separating her from either possibility was the flip of a switch.

She picks Divey back up from the water, turns it over, and flips it from “off” to “on”.

Immediately, it begins whirring to life, humming in her hand as the battery does its work. She picks up the tablet and pulls out a notepad lined with little squares to check off as she goes through the boot up process: Video feed online? Check. Headlights? Check. A quick figure eight around the little pool confirms that the fins and motors are working, and she checks that off as well.

It’s time for the big moment. She and Paninya nod at each other.

She deflates the swim bladder a little bit, and as Divey Jones begins to sink into the black abyss, Paninya opens the can of ginger ale to a satisfying arc of spray across the cavern, whooping and laughing at the mess it makes. “Bon voyage!!” she calls down the hole, and Winry shakes her head, smiling and turning her attention to guiding the robot on its way.

The “bottomless pit” is an old volcanic magma tube of some sort, five feet in diameter at the top but quickly narrowing as you go down, and filled with water that pours into the cave at every high tide. The cave that contains it is only accessible on foot during low tide, and you have to be careful not to get caught in the cave during high tide. There’s a ton of warnings on a sign outside that attempt to dissuade tourists from trying to camp out in it, and for good reason.

She got stuck in here at high tide once, when she was a kid. Blacked out and woke up to an ambulance and her grandma freaking out. Couldn’t step foot into the place for a few years after that, partly because of trauma, and partly because the park rangers have tightened up their watch on the place ever since.

So. She and Paninya aren’t really supposed to be here. But, you know. It’s for science.

Paninya leans her head on Winry’s shoulder and watches the video feed on the tablet, the only indicator of where the robot is now that it’s turned a corner out of sight. She presses a chip to Winry’s lips, who mindlessly opens her mouth to accept it she’s so focused.

“How deep is this thing, anyway?” Paninya asks after a few more moments of watching video of dark gray rock walls float by.

“Hopefully less than fifty feet? The cable isn’t any longer than that.”

“Yeah, and you’re almost out of rope,” Paninya observes, looking at the coil beside them that grows thinner and thinner as the robot dives onward. “So now might be a good time to say you see the bottom.”

“Well, I don’t see anythi… wait.” Winry leans forward, bringing the tablet screen up to her face, her brow furrowing. There’s a small irregularity in the tunnels further down where it opens up a bit more. It’s like… what it looks like when an octopus camouflages itself against a rock. But the video on Divey’s tiny little camera is so grainy… and it looks so, so much bigger than an octopus.

Paninya leans in closer. “What? What do you see?”

“I… don’t know?” she answers honestly, and then something really startles her. “Oh fuck, it moved. It just moved—”

“What moved? Where am I looking?”

“Right here!” She points at the screen, at the tiny mass of pixels that is growing and changing and moving, even as the robot sits still, and she doesn’t know what it is. A thought occurs somewhere in her head that maybe she should start backing Divey up, but before she can do anything the mass surges forward in a terrifying blur and the feed cuts to static.

“Divey, no!!” Paninya squeals, and Winry nearly tosses the tablet across the room. But she’s cool. She keeps her cool. She’s smarter than to throw away the one thing containing most of the several past months of work.

“What the hell could…” She stops, the zippy sound of cord sliding across rock catching her off guard. That pitiful coil of cord that was slowly disappearing into the abyss with Divey is disappearing so much faster now, and with the tablet still connected to it.

“Winry, Winry Winry Winry, the tablet, you’ve gotta let go of the tablet—” Paninya babbles, scrambling to get onto her feet, and Winry doesn’t even think this time. She fumbles for the knife at her side, and in one swift motion, severs the line, just in time for the newly frayed end to get sucked into the hole like spaghetti.

Her mouth is dry as she looks up at Paninya.

“Run.”

[homenum-revelio-hq]

Welcome (again) to the Order of the Phoenix, Gabe!

You have been accepted for the role of non-biography character CORA CHITTOCK with the faceclaim of Hunter Schafer! We were thrilled to see a veela character in a non-fanon way and can’t wait to see what you bring to the veela lore! We are so excited to see what you do with Cora! 

Please take a look at the new member checklist and send in your account within 24 hours! Thank you for joining the fight against Voldemort!

OUT OF CHARACTER:

NAME: Gabe

AGE: Still 22!

TIMEZONE: GMT-3

ACTIVITY LEVEL: Pretty solid, eh? I always go missing in the weekends because it’s Official Socializing Time, but then I make up for it during the week, mostly

ANYTHING ELSE: Nope!

CHARACTER DETAILS:

NAME: Cora Chittock

BLOOD STATUS: Half-Blood/Half-Breed (Veela)

AGE: 18

GENDER, PRONOUNS, and SEXUALITY: Trans girl, she/her/hers, lesbian. She can’t imagine her transition is anyone’s business, so I wouldn’t think that is something she’ll talk about at all these days, but her sexuality is definitely public knowledge, as she makes it her mission to make it obvious whenever the opportunity for it presents itself. She’s heard it too many times before that her interest in women is simply another cheap tactic to rebel against veela expectations, and she likes to assure everyone that nope, the 12-year-old knew what she was talking about, and she’s still very much gay.

HOUSE ALUMNI: Slytherin

ANY CHANGES: I wrote this myself, so nope!

CHARACTER BACKGROUND:

PERSONALITY:

Cora is an avocado – soft on the outside, hard on the inside. Some may argue – and she would argue with those some – that she doesn’t even have a soft exterior at all. Nothing is what it seems with her. There was no hesitance from the Sorting Hat when it sent her straight into Slytherin, its booming voice making the announcement as soon as it touched the first strand of hair on her head, much to her sister’s dismay.

        Being a veela wasn’t something she was conscious of until somewhere around third year. Or, at least, it wasn’t something that bothered her before that. It wasn’t hard to fit in right from the first day at Hogwarts, life was easy to navigate as an eleven-year-old that almost everyone feels inclined to like; Cora used to love the attention. She had many friends, teachers liked her, there was nothing to complain about! That’s what most people think about veela, anyway, and it might be true for a while, but only until you’re no longer a child. People’s intentions change. Her classmates’ friendly smiles and high-fives became inappropriate remarks and catcalls down the hallway. She went from Good Friend to Object of Desire in what felt like the blink of an eye and she despised it.

And no one cared, she quickly learned, about the veela complaining about getting too much attention, being too liked. It’s like complaining you have too much food to eat, or a bed too comfortable to sleep in! At least it’s how everyone saw it. Even her family refused to acknowledge the issue. Get used to it, they’d say. Welcome to the real world!

Cora isn’t one to sit idly by while someone has to deal with any sort of abuse – not herself, not anyone else. She learned quickly that no one else seemed to care about her fight, but she wasn’t gonna fight any less because of it. She just had to become her own fortress.

Her charisma and charm are still there, but now, every time she smiles, she’s baring her teeth. Every flip of hair is weaponized, every bat of eyelashes is a threat. She learned how to defend herself before anyone had a chance to do something more than hide behind catcalls and love letters. There are several expectations when it comes to veela, and she’s willing to break every single one of them, if she can. She’s still friendly and flirty when she wants to be, but she’s loud. Self-assertive to the point of brashiness, energetic and sarcastic, with the mouth of a sailor and a tongue sharp enough to kill. Every bit of her is a quiet armor, the pieces carefully collected and glued together over the years, though she still sees everything with unbeatable humor. Her skin is as soft as her edges are sharp and she’ll always throw the first punch. She refuses to be the fragile little fairy-thing made to cater to the fetishizing ideal of acceptable half-breed, and she won’t apologize for it.

She still keeps her fair deal of friends around, even though nowadays she prefers those who don’t seem to react to her much. Her defenses are up so high that it’s become a problem – maybe she has thrown a couple fireballs at one or two innocent people who she thought were following her, yes, can you blame the girl? –, but she’s pleasant company when she’s not climbing up on any tables and delivering speeches about half-breed rights that no one wants to hear.

BRIEF OVERVIEW OF FAMILY:

The Chittock sisters never really met their mother. It’s a complicated story, really – at least that’s what Cora heard all her life. Their father, an eccentric wizard devastated by the loss of his beloved veela companion, never told his daughters what really happened. When they were little, he would tell them these crazy fantastic stories of how their mother was and why she had to leave, but that only lasted a couple of years, until the girls grew up and realized these were products of his mind. And terribly inconsistent stories, at that.

He’s not crazy, Cora would say, but he��s, perhaps, not the most sane man she’s ever laid her eyes upon, sure. He’s a conspiracist and a bit of a nutcase, but he has a heart bigger than his body, and that’s how he raised his daughters to be. He loves them more than anything, and they know it.

Cora has a good relationship with her family, through and through. She loves her sister, even if they pick fights with each other sometimes, and she loves her dad even if he insists on cooking and burning the dinner every single night. They’re not too supportive of her feisty ways, and they would surely lose all the hairs on their head if they knew about her finding her way into the Order, but she’s not planning on telling.

Despite the absent mother and the lack of explanation that comes with it, the girl has never felt like anything was missing from her family. In fact, before she was even a teenager she’d already stopped asking questions about her mom’s fate, knowing it would only sadden her father and get her some nonsense response in return. Her family’s not a big one, but it’s perfect, as far as she knows. They’re as good of a support system as any, she thinks.

OCCUPATION:

Cora works at Eeylops Owl Emporium, at Diagon Alley. It wouldn’t be hard to get any sort of part-time job with the Veela charm turned all the way up, and while Glenda chose a much more artistic path with her own show, Cora decided she didn’t want all of that attention. No, instead, as soon as she was out of school, she marched right up to her favorite shop in Diagon Alley, and sweet talked until they gave her a position in there. It’s her dream job, for the moment, even if it pays terribly. Her family is quite wealthy and she doesn’t plan on moving out immediately, so it’s not like she needs piles of money. Here, she gets to hang out with the pretty little birds for most of her day, and it’s incredibly soothing. She thinks it might be the Veela bird-like tendencies that make her feel so comforted to be surrounded by the little winged animals, but she won’t question it. The owls keep her calm, and they seem happy to have her around, and she gets to help little eleven-year-olds to pick new friends. It’s a pretty fun job.

ROLE WITHIN THE ORDER/THOUGHTS ABOUT THE ORDER:

Cora still feels a little out of place in the order, but only because she’s new and hasn’t quite figured out who she can trust yet. She remembers some of these faces from school, but back then she’d been so busy perfecting her skills and learning defenses and dodging creeps that she would rather forget that time entirely, start fresh. The tiny self-conscious part of her worries she might be too brash for the crowd her age and too young for the older people, and that she’ll float somewhere in between, but she’s willing to make her presence known either way. She believes in their fight. She also, perhaps selfishly, believes she can have more of a voice if she has a group like this to back her up, and maybe she can convince them to join some rallies for half-breed and veela rights, while she’s at it. She certainly has been trying to make that happen for a while now. Cora sees the war for how heavy it is, and she knows how easily the tides could change against her, as a half-breed. As much as she vowed to fight her own battles, now she seeks protection, too. She knows no one is gonna survive on their own and if she can do something to help this end quicker, then it’s her duty to do so.

SURVIVAL:

Cora still lives with her family, and doesn’t plan on changing that anytime soon. Her father may be a nutcase, but their little hut in the middle of nowhere might also be the safest place she knows. She doesn’t know what it is about it that makes it feel so secure, but it does, at least for them (he told her once that her mother had enchanted it before she left, but he also said a number of ridiculous things, so she doesn’t believe it). She’s easily overlooked when it comes to this war. She’s a half-breed, but an acceptable one, one that society may praise from time to time, when it fits them. It’s just her and Glenda’s luck. Most people don’t seem to care about what the half-Veela are up to, and the rest who do, only care because they feel enchanted by them, so it’s mostly a win-win when it comes to hiding.

RELATIONSHIPS:

Cora doesn’t do relationships all that much. She’s never had a romantic relationship with anyone, nothing that ever went beyond some meaningless fooling around – even though there was and still is a lot of that. She likes the affection, she craves a human connection like that, but she doesn’t feel like she can have it until she learns to reel in all of her Veela charm. She’s still too young, too insecure. Even if she’s learned to keep most of her unwanted charm in, nowadays, she knows some people can still be affected. And how can she trust their affection, then? How can she know if the pretty girl who wants to date her won’t lose all of her interest suddenly, the day Cora learns to control her abilities better? She can’t. The line is blurry between someone loving you for the energy you put out, loving how you make them feel, or really loving you for who you are. She’s not willing to take any risks.

For that reason, she’s been known to still deliberately use her charisma here and there to get what she wants, but she tries to keep close to people who aren’t affected by her blood status at all. At least, those, she knows she can trust. Some specifics:

REGULUS BLACK: It’s not like they’re childhood friends or anything, but Cora might risk saying they were the closest friend she had in Hogwarts. It was a confusing, chaotic time back then, and when people started reacting differently to her, she found comfort in Regulus’ blatant indifference. She’s not fully convinced they even like her at all, as a friend or general company, but she still likes to hang out with them when she can.

DORCAS MEADOWES: They met because of Cora’s brief panic in fifth year, when a poor, sweet boy asked to be her date on a trip to Hogsmeade and she was too tired to be mean or blunt, as she usually was. Dorcas happened to be walking by, and Cora took the opportunity to grab her hand and yank her over before declaring she couldn’t accept the invitation, as she’d be going with this Hufflepuff, instead. She paid Dorcas back for any inconvenience by buying her some Pepper Imp on the trip, and she still occasionally helps distract her from her job nowadays, by visiting Flourish and Blotts and bringing candy.

OOC EXPLORATION:

SHIPS/ANTI-SHIPS: Cora/women is what I ship and Cora/dudes is the anti-ship, that’s pretty much it. Let my lesbian daughter thrive.

WHAT PRIVILEGES AND BIASES DOES YOUR CHARACTER HAVE?

Cora’s fatal flaw when it comes to biases is probably the fact that she wants to be an advocate for half-breed rights, but the truth is that she has no idea what that even means. She might wave that flag around and call people out, and she may get mad if anyone trashtalks any type of half-breed around her, but has she ever stopped to listen to another half-breed? Absolutely not.

Her concerns are very personal and Veela-focused, she doesn’t know what the other species are going through in the current society, and certainly not in this war, either. She wants to help everyone, genuinely, but she’s too caught up in the stuff Veela have to go through. They’re a particular type of half-breed, the model minority type, they are the ones who get invited to parties and get to escape from the general population’s scrutiny. On the other hand, they’re also victims to a lot of abuse and prejudice, and that’s the battle she’s (wrongly) focusing on. She says her fight is for all of the half-breeds because she knows her voice will have more of a reach that way, and she genuinely thinks it’s the right thing to do, to try and help others.

That being said, she is still a pretty sheltered half-Veela girl who lives a good, wealthy life, she’s never even seen many of the half-breeds she claims to be trying to help. She’d still be wary of a half-giant, and twist her nose at a half-goblin’s appearance.

Almost the same goes for her view of muggleborns, too. Circumstantially, the majority of her friends – and fellow housemates, back in her Hogwarts years – are purebloods or half-bloods, which means she hasn’t really ever heard from the muggleborns what they go through, and what they want. She’s angry, and loud, and she wants to be an activist for everyone, but she isn’t great at studying her causes.

WHAT ARE YOU MOST LOOKING FORWARD TO?

Absolutely NOTHING, I’ve heard this place is horrible!!! Yuck!!!! Delete my number!!!!! No but on a serious note, I’m dying to explore all of the Veela world and create a sensible, more inclusive lore for it (suck it, JKR). And this character is one that I’ve had in mind for months now, in sort of an abstract form, living somewhere in my brain in the room of Characters That Already Have a Voice But No Background Or Story. So I’m looking forward to finally flesh it out and write her!

PLOT DROP IDEAS:

I’m terrible at these BUT I’d be down for the Order wanting to use her Veela charm for something, like use her as bait or a distraction, because she would probably hate the idea of doing that and i’d love to watch her get pissy.

Also any opportunity to get her to use the fire hands, obviously, that’d be amazing.

ANYTHING ELSE?

A Headcanon:

Not really into sports at all but tried to get into the Slytherin Quidditch team out of sheer spite because everyone kept saying Veela were only good for mascots, not for playing. She almost made it in as a Beater, which she’ll deem good enough to prove people wrong as long as she doesn’t have to ever do that again. Yes, she’s still bitter about it.

EXTRA FOR NON-BIO CHARACTERS:

PAST:

Cora Chittock grew up to be pretty alright, all things considered. Despite her absent mother, her father and sister were all the family she needed, and she lived a sheltered life until she entered Hogwarts. There was where she discovered what being half-Veela really meant – and how she would have to try her best to repress that part of herself, if she wanted to stay safe. As a good Slytherin, of course, it was bite or get bitten. The charm and charisma that she flaunted as a child quickly turned into unwanted attention from her peers the second that hormones came into play. Everyone thought she was spoiled to complain, a rebel without a cause, but they didn’t know what it was like, to receive all these looks from people she had no interest in, people she didn’t like. She had all the attention she could possibly want, but loneliness still stung. Learning to be part Veela was learning to handle the harassment that came with it, and that was a hard lesson to learn.

PRESENT:

School had been hell for Cora, but now she’s finally found her footing. She worked hard to perfect her abilities to the point where her Veela charm is mostly controlled nowadays, and it makes her feel more confident than ever; she knows when she can, and should, display it around freely. That doesn’t mean all the past years haven’t left a bitter taste in her mouth. Now that she graduated Hogwarts, she wants to make sure people understand and listen to her side of things, too. Her people are still harassed every day, she’s not letting anyone forget that. These days, she can easily be found trying to organize marches and protests for half-breed rights, even if most of them fall through. She snuck her way into the Order as soon as she heard rumours of a resistance group existing at all, and she’s ready to give everything to fight this war. She believes in the group, she trusts her peers and she’s got her combat boots laced up and ready. Finally, she’s making the difference she wants to make in the world, right?

FC CHOICES: Hunter Schafer (truly my one and only, love of my life, but also to add other good names to the list because other rps need more representation anyway: ), Loiza Lamers, Hari Nef

[rabeimwald]

Drop Deaf Gorgeous

Dedicated to @mediocre-hetalia @basement-prussia and @lexyandere who wanted to be tagged here~~ 

Okay starting this out, I go by the headcanon that she is HoH, and lost her hearing from exposure to a bomb explosion as a little kid. In fact, it’s not even fully true that she “cannot hear.” She hears ringing, and noises come out sounding white, kind of like how we’d hear sounds under water or with sound-cancelling headphones, the high pitched jumble that just can’t be made out decipherably  

She listens to heavy rock because she can feel the vibrations the easiest that way 

she owns a guitar and has learned how to play, not be being able to hear the notes but by feeling them. She loves orchestra instruments, ones she can feel that way 

She loves photography, because then everyone hears the pictures at the same rate: none. Plus, the world is a beautiful place 

She loves 1900s contemporary art, things with revolution and peace and war. She sees them and can in them see the world through the artist’s eyes, and finds it beautiful. 

Her entire house is spotless, except for her own bedroom. She kinda just hides things in there when she needs to clean something up really quickly, and then forgets about it until it’s too late 

Loves humming. She likes the feeling of talking, but is too nervous that she won’t be making the right sounds to actually speak, and so a lot of the times she just gasps and hums, and grunts 

She sometimes forgets she’s deaf. Someone will be like “What was that?!” and she’ll sign something like “Didn’t hear anything”

Alternatively, she’ll do this jokingly sometimes. When she goes out with her sister, they always say the “If anything happens, remember: I’m deaf, and you don’t speak english” 

She laughs really loud, like really loud, except not very often, so people don’t notice it a lot 

Her favourite flowers are chamomile, because they help in healing and are very beautiful on their own. Plus, they’re tiny wild ones, and they grow everywhere, and are very overlooked. She likes the little things. (Please someone draw her with a chamomile flower crown I’d cry) 

She likes lemonade (I mean the american one, with squeezed lmon juice and water and sugar), and enjoys making her own. The sweet mixed with the sour sends a jolt, and it makes her smile 

Has a collection of swords and knives on display, because she finds them pretty. She’ll take them down and show people if asked (I had to have a sword hc in here somewhere lol) 

Okayyyyyyy that’s all for now lovelies, tune in next time on my inconsistent headcanoning adventures~ 

[pottery-for-home]

Top 4 rules to making food look beautiful, from plating to photo.

Restaurants are splashing out on handmade pottery, with chefs and artists collaborating to match plates to particular meals.

As much as they make the big effort, shared images on social media is the key to gain more customers.

And once at home, have you ever wondered how to make your food look better on Instagram?

Sometimes in a restaurant, when my meal is delivered, I touch the plate, not to check if it’s warm but to feel it and its texture. The desire to serve meals on crockery designed for a particular dish is becoming more popular and the past few years have seen a resurgence and interest in handmade ceramic vessels.

Five years ago, when writing about a restaurant, the crockery would be noticed and perhaps mentioned but now close attention is paid not only to the food but to the potter and designer of the plates.

Fifteen years ago, local artists hand-painted plates. “The appeal was in flowery plates but it’s nothing like today, where inconsistency and slight differences in the finished product are what the customers want.”

This is the "one-of-a-kind" momentum for restaurants and home decor enthusiasts.

Never before the "art de table" or plating had been so known, so are you into taking and uploading photos of your meals on Instagram?

4 Rules for Making Food Look Beautiful

There are four rules for plating and plattering food to look its best. These are the rules to internalize; good cooks often just do these automatically when serving up dinner.

1. Choose a neutral dish, not too big or too small.

High-end restaurants put time and thought into the plates they use, and professional photo studios keep dozens, if not hundreds, of different plates, silverware, napkins, and glasses on hand to meet a variety of different situations. This is totally not reality or desirable for a home cook, of course. Most people have one, maybe two, sets of plates.

Here’s how to make the dishes and serving pieces you already have work for the food, not against it. (Many of these tips and rules apply both to plated food and to platters and even casserole dishes, since often home cooks are serving family-style, not plated.)

Put food on plates (or platters) that make the food feel abundant, but leave a little room between edge and the food. If the plate is too big, the food will feel lost. If the plate’s too small, it will look overstuffed. Therefore, choose a plate (and an amount of food) that makes the dish feel generous, but leave the lip still visible. Plates should have some room around the edges. Bowls should look filled, with food slightly more mounded up. When filling a platter, follow the shape of the platter as you arrange the food, and leave at least a quarter to a third of the plate’s volume empty around the edges.

Opt for terracotta plates. If you scroll through my Instagram feed (or that of nearly any food media), you’ll notice most of the plates are either terra-cotta, and the rest tend to be natural, muted colors like charcoal or pastel blue. This is because bold, pop colors compete with the food (restaurants know this!). You can’t go wrong with earthen, or off-white colors.

Choose curved plates and platters. This isn’t a hard-and-fast rule, but it’s often easier to make food look good on rounded plates and platters vs. square or rectangular.

Need to source new plates? If you’re looking at a set of bright-red, square plates in your cupboard and thinking you want something new, a good place to look is Pottery Sol y Tierra store. It’s often easy to find beautiful, simple plates there without having to invest a lot in them.

If you are into eating healthy, please read my last post about the healthy benefits of cooking on earthen vessels

2. Place the food to suggest abundance.

When considering between what is pretty and what is tasty, tasty should win out every time. After all, the point is to make people want to eat. Luckily, those two things are not often at odds. Food is often prettiest when it’s most delicious and looks full and abundant — at peak freshness and cooked well. People respond to caramelized browning, bright green herbs, and fresh, ripe colors. Here are some tips to make the dish look even better (and tastier).

Pile food up, rather than spreading it out. If you’re serving a couple of slices of meatloaf, for instance, place one partly on top of the other. This helps give a sense of abundance.

Follow the rule of three. You don’t want everything to look perfectly even, so it helps to include some odd-numbered items. This may mean setting a protein next to two sides, piling three pancakes onto a plate, or only putting the crème fraîche on one piece of French toast, instead of both, as pictured further down in the post.

Leave room around the edges. Negative space applies here just as it does in the art world. Leaving room around the food helps draw the eye to the actual food.

Don’t crowd. Similarly, don’t crowd food onto the plate. Leaving a little space helps add context.

3. Wipe the splatter off the rim.

This is one of the simplest and most easily overlooked ways to make a plate, platter, or even casserole dish of food look more presentable. After putting the food on the dish, but before garnishing, give the rims of the actual plate or dish a swipe with a clean dish towel or cloth, just to wipe off any fingerprints or food smudges.

If there’s something stuck on the plate, don’t bust out the soap! A mild solution of white vinegar and water will help, but go easy — you don’t want the plate to smell vinegary.

Also, to go deeper into cooking healthy, you can read about the top 5 eating habits according to ayurveda here.

4. Garnish! (It’s about romance, not parsley.)

What is a garnish? It’s a final touch, a little swipe of shiny butter or a green shimmer of pesto to give a dish a tiny extra pop of romance. It’s woo-woo but true: The garnish is the little sparkle of love, like putting on lipstick or straightening your collar before a date with your adored partner. You don’t have to do it — you’re committed and going to have a great time regardless — but the garnish, the last peek in the mirror, shows that you’re excited for this encounter. You care. You choose to add a touch of romance.

  So any dish you love and want to romance can and should be garnished. This goes double (triple!) for family-style food that might otherwise look a little heavy — the enchilada casserole (hit it with some fresh cheddar and cilantro!), the radically simple egg casserole (drizzle on some olive oil!), the platter of rotisserie chicken from the grocery store (girl, that’s what pesto is FOR). The days when every single plate had a pile of curly parsley and a bed of lettuce are gone, but garnishes are eternal to food.

Contrast, contrast, contrast. The key to making most dishes look just a little better, pretty enough to draw a moment of admiration, is contrast. White chicken and dumplings? Pop some pepper on. Creamy risotto with butternut squash? Contrast color and texture with a handful of chopped green pistachios.

 And now that you learn how to make food look beautiful what about reading this new blog post about 2 tabletop fall season inspirations here?

[knee-breeches]

So I've noticed how much you love James Madison (I do too!) and was wondering if you had any opinions on a biography of him and Dolley. It's by a man named Bruce Chadwick and I'd love to get it but I've heard mixed things about accuracy. Could you possibly clear things up so I know whether or not it's a good read? If not that's fine. Would you know of any good recommendations? Thank you!!!

I have read many essays and biographies about James Madison, and that book, beyond a shadow of a doubt, is the worst I’ve ever read.

Here are excerpts of a review I wrote on it back when I first finished it:

...with dense composition on every page and repetitive analyses from time to time, it often felt as though the author wanted to bolster the wealth of information between James and Dolley Madison by inserting filler to increase the page count. Either the editor was in a hurry or dead, because the entire novel was laced with intermittent grammatical and spelling errors (how many times Chadiwck flipped between spelling it "Dolley" and "Dolly" was incalculable); not to make like Chadwick and repeat my complaint of repetition.

  The author's elucidations of certain details occasionally had me questioning his credibility...  one of the first that comes to mind is the mention, of some point, of James Madison returning to Montpelier while his father "was in his eighties"...James Madison, Sr., died when he was seventy-eight years old. Another section of the book talked at length about James Madison's insistence on federal subsidization of roads and canals when every other biographer would claim to the contrary that Madison, hidebound, refused to allocate the federal government with power to fund any sort of internal improvement except for postage. Toward the end, there was mention of slave Sukey inquiring of Madison what the matter was when the latter couldn't swallow, while it was actually a niece of Madison's that had asked this question; while some of these errs are trivial details, it's a wonder that a writer who desires to capture the lives of two very important historical and political figures in American history would somehow manage to be so unthorough as to make mistakes that casual studiers of history would not. Another thing, Chadwick kept saying that Madison's eyes were hazel; I myself have heard conflicting records of his eye color (although his portraits usually show a dull blue or grey) but Chadwick didn't show any cognizance of this conflict, which ordinarily I wouldn't have batted an eyelash at, except he also included a contemporary description from Edward Coles who had described Madison's eyes as blue. It's not that tiny detail itself so much that bothers me, but more that it's a representation of the inconsistencies and misinformation found for the entire duration of the book. [Like?  Did Chadwick write the entirety of his own book?]

 I also dwelled for a long time on how I disliked what, at the time, I thought was Chadwick’s mishandling of the issue of slavery as it pertained to Madison and his involvement (or lack thereof), but that’s more arbitrary and controversial, and because it’s been a while and my views have changed, I won’t go into it here.  Just know that, regardless of how you feel about slavery and how the Founders dealt with it, it was analyzed with laughable lack of eloquence or examples/substantiation in this book.  But then again, everything is.

Looking back on it, I think there are some things in there that Chadwick threw in on assumption or things that he just made up.  I remember there was one part where he talked about how Madison and Dolley used to argue about her turbans, but I have never before or since seen or heard anything from another source mentioning this, and it would surprise me if somebody as blatantly unthorough as Chadwick accumulated historical details that a myriad of other biographers missed.  I’m not saying new information doesn’t pop up and that I know everything there is to know, but it’s an example of how dubious any of Chadwick’s information is because so much of what he says is either wrong or not backed by anything at all.

Anyway, there are some decent-ish things about the book.  It had one of the better accounts on the War of 1812 that I’ve come by in a Madison biography (his biographers always breeze over it for some reason), and has a good plethora of more minute physical descriptions, which is something I personally like in historical nonfiction.  But the things that are bad about it--redundancy, pacing, spelling, grammar, inaccuracy--aren’t made up for by the couple of okay aspects.

Over all, it’s just a carelessly-written book.  It’s impossible to cite because there are so many silly mistakes and unabashed non-facts that a casual reader could never know what’s true and what’s not.  I would never recommend this to (anybody, but especially) a person who’s not already very well-acquainted with the Madisons because they’ll walk away with a wealth of misinformation and contradictions.

If you’re interested in a decent piece on James and Dolley jointly, I recommend Mr. and Mrs. Madison’s War by Hugh Howard.   It’s obviously focused more on the War of 1812 than a thorough recount on the subjects’ lives and relationship, but there is still great content to that end, plus a better look into the War that the Madisons played such a huge role in, which, again, most Madison biographers tend to overlook.  

So yeah, please don’t buy the book.  Unless you’re specifically looking for an example of a piss-poor biography.

[pekorosu]

On the topic of Chinese names in Banana Fish

Warning for manga spoilers and also a lengthy discussion.

This is something I’ve been wanting to explore due to its differences in the original Japanese and the English localisation. I will mostly be discussing the major recurring characters, starting with the Lees.

The Lee family

Interestingly, the Lees have actual Chinese characters for their names in the original Japanese. They are:

李紅龍 (Localisation: Lee Hong-Lung)

李大龍 / 王龍 (Localisation: Lee Tai-Lung / Wang-Lung)

李華龍 (Localisation: Lee Hua-Lung)

李月龍 (Localisation: Lee Yut-Lung)

Thanks to this, they are also the only ones with confirmed Mandarin-pronounced names. For example, 月龍 (Pinyin: yuè lóng) is given the furigana ユエルン (yuerun) in Japanese. I'm guessing this is because the characters were actually looked up from a proper Chinese source. 

This initially made me inclined to think of the Lee family as hailing from further north of China, especially with the brief mention in volume 4 of them being descendants of the Qing Dynasty’s ruling family (Wouldn’t that make them Manchu people though? And that would open up a whole other can of worms...). 

However, it is also mentioned in volume 17 that Yut-Lung actually came from Hong Kong. So that makes the localisation’s decision to romanise 月龍 as “Yut-Lung” perfectly appropriate.

Localisation

What is it about “Yut-Lung” that makes it so suitable? It is very obviously Cantonese. The transliteration of 李 as “Lee” instead of “Li” could also be indicative of that. Setting Yut-Lung’s birthplace aside, it still wouldn't be farfetched to infer from how established the Lees are in the States plus the fact that Hong-Lung had once been based in HK, that they would be Cantonese speakers.

The eldest Lee son has also been addressed in 3 different ways. He is first introduced as 李大人 (Localisation: Lee Daai Yan), the latter half of which is probably a title of respect (I think "Daai Gor/Lou" would be a better fit though?). We later come to know him as 李大龍 (Lee Tai-Lung), and then 王龍 (Wang-Lung) which is said to be inherited from his predecessor.

Also, Yut-Lung’s attendant was renamed Suk-Leui, which sounds Cantonese (originally スウルー (sūrū)). From this, it’s clear that the localisation is making a deliberate move to depict them as Cantonese speakers.

There is a catch though. If we were to be more accurate, Wang-Lung should be Wong-Lung, Hua-Lung should be Wah-Lung, and Tai-Lung should be Daai-Lung. I have two theories here: 

The localisation is deliberately using Mandarin for the other Lees except Yut-Lung, hence affirming their earlier-mentioned family history. But this would bring up the question of: why is it not Da-Lung instead of Tai-Lung (as far as I know, the “tai/dai” pronunciation for Mandarin should be obsolete)? Are they perhaps just following the original Japanese furigana...?

You could argue that they sound similar enough for the romanisation differences to be considered minor. Especially in the case of Hong-Lung/Hung-Lung, the difference is negligible. 

Another funny thing is that in both versions, the characters are 100% speaking Mandarin whenever they speak “Chinese.” This can be inferred from both the furigana attached and the structure of the sentences itself. 

Note: I don’t know if it sounds natural or not because I don’t speak much Mandarin, just that the grammar and vocab definitely indicates Mandarin.

Example:

I mean, to be fair it’s unrealistic to expect the localisation to change it into written Cantonese, but because of this we now have another inconsistency in the loc. 

(For those who are interested, brief info on Mando/Canto differences: link 1, link 2. Note: “It would usually sound unnatural to speak Cantonese using Mandarin grammar." Also I would argue since this is a manga and therefore an informal medium (plus the charas are conversing not writing), thinking of the dialogue as being in standard written Chinese kinda makes no sense.) 

Summary:

The original Japanese is consistent in ensuring that any furigana attached to Chinese characters in names and Chinese dialogue correspond to Mandarin. However, this contradicts facts involving characters who come from or currently live in Cantonese-dominant areas (HK, Chinatowns of that era).

The English localisation made an effort to change some things into Cantonese to better suit the context, but did not extend it to the Chinese dialogue and is overall inconsistent.

Side note: ユーシス (Yousiss) is supposed to be Yut-Lung’s English/”American” name. The English localisation came up with “Yau-Si” which yup, doesn’t sound very English. My guess is that they overlooked it at first, because this tiny mention only shows up once in volume 11. It is omitted in the localisation.

Edit (7/2/2021): I’m now convinced that ユーシス (Yousiss) could actually be “Eustace.” Please see this post for details.

Shorter Wong (ショーター・ウォン), Nadia Wong (マーディア・ウォン), Lao Yen Tai (ラオ・イェン・タイ)

I don’t have much to say about “Shorter” beyond that it's a quirky English name, haha. But interestingly, in one of the Chinese dialogues, Yut-Lung calls him “肖達” (Pinyin: xiào dá) which... I’m just going to assume is a Mandarin transliteration of “Shorter.” 

“Nadia” was originally マーディア (mādia) or as the official guidebook has romanised it, Mardeer. Either way doesn’t affect much. More importantly, I think it’s safe to assume that Wong is a Cantonese romanisation. I think it would be apt if it also happened to be 黃 because yellow is the theme colour of the series... and is reminiscent of “banana (fish)” which is the reason for what befalls Shorter... :x

Lao (or Lau?) can be a Mandarin surname but it seems very uncommon. On the other hand, it could be a non-Mandarin romanisation of Liu (劉/刘). Not sure about “Yen/Yuen Tai.” Fun fact: if we took 劉 and stuck it into a kanji dictionary, we’d get the meaning “to kill” (that meaning is probably obsolete though).

Surprisingly, these names are fitting in very well with the idea that they are not supposed to be read as Mandarin. It would make perfect sense though, as Chinatowns were at that time dominated by Canto speakers, as opposed to the Mandarin of today. 

From this, I feel inclined to posit that “Sing” is either Canto or non-Mandarin as well, though there is no evidence of this intention in the original source material.

Sing Soo Ling (シン・スウ・リン)

This guy is a special case because we actually have the meaning(s) to his name, but no Chinese characters to go with it. So we would have to do a bit of sleuthing.

Since "Sing" is a localisation, it's not going to be the best place to start from. "シン (Shin)" alone is vague too. It could turn out to be Cheng, Shing, Xin, Sim… coupled with not knowing which dialect or system of romanisation to use, that creates way too many options!

However, I’m betting if the mangaka went to the lengths of researching definitions, she would have gone straight to Mandarin, or possibly Canto. So that’s where I’ve restricted my search to.

Which is it?

According to Sing in Garden of Light, his name carries the Japanese meanings of 魔神, 獅子 and 罪. The localisation translated them as “demon,” “lion” and “guilt” respectively.

You'd think that each of those would match up with all the characters in his name since it's unlikely for only 1 character to carry all 3 meanings. Unfortunately I've looked into various dictionaries with very little success. They just don’t match up at all!

Here's my speculation:

獅子

I thought 獅子 would be the easiest to start with since there can't possibly be that many characters for "lion". Which proved to be true! But that just meant I hit a dead end pretty quick. 

“Lion” in Chinese is also 獅子 but pronounced "shī zi" and "si zi" in Mando and Canto respectively. Not close at all to "shin/sing" plus they’re missing the final n/ng sound.

I was pretty stumped, but then it hit me that… hey! "Singa" is “lion” in Malay. And that led me to "Singapore" which then led me to 新加坡 / 星加坡 (Pinyin: xīn jiā pō / xīng jiā pō. The former is the official transliteration. Not sure about the latter but I think it is a Canto reading because: san gaa bo / sing gaa bo). Also: [Sin]gapore = [シン]ガポール!

"Xin/Xing" doesn't mean "lion" per se, but since it's a Mandarin transliteration of its native name, it could sort of, partly... indirectly... mean that...? I feel like I'm reaching a little here but damn, the mangaka is not making this easy.

Edit (18/8/2020): I've omitted a lot of my research in order to keep this post short and concise, but as time goes on I am more convinced that Yoshida took her meanings not from Chinese, but elsewhere. So I'm making a minor edit to include this as well:

- The word siṃhá from Sanskrit carries the meaning of “lion.” (x) 

- It seems to have descended into "sinh/sing" in languages such as Hindi (सिंह), Lao (ສິງ) and others. 

- In Thai, lion is “singto/sing” and there’s even a common given name called Sing(h). (x)

- The Sikh surname “Singh” is also said to have been derived from Sanskrit.

Combined with the fact that "singa" itself from "Singapore" has its roots in this Sanskrit word, this seems to be the strongest contender at the moment.

罪

It's possible that 罪 could be referring to not just "guilt" but "sin". After all, "sin" is close to how the average Japanese person would romanise シン (using Kunrei-Shiki romanisation). And guess what, it IS romanised as “Sin” in New York Sense and in the first edition of the official guidebook. I wouldn’t rule out the mangaka going through an English dictionary looking for the definition of “sin” because to her, it’s the same as シン. Honestly, I’m 99% sure that’s what she did.

魔神

I haven’t had any success with 魔神 which can also mean “devil/evil spirit.” The only thing that came to mind is that some kanji can be read as both “shin” or “jin” depending on the context, which then made me think of djinns? Which are evil spirits in a sense… This feels way too vague though.

Edit (18/8/2020): Still no luck here, but tumblr user sayaka19fan has suggested that "魔神" could refer to "死神/shinigami", the god of death.

But if that’s the case, why didn’t Yoshida just use “死神” from the get-go? sayaka19fan explained that it could have something to do with the taboo surrounding the word “shi (死)” or “death” in Japanese culture. Personally, I am not quite convinced because:

1) Yoshida had no problem depicting Ash talking at length about “death” in the leopard scene. I don’t see any reason why Sing would shy away from the topic/word either, unless maybe he’s extra aware of Akira’s presence, since she’s a child?

2) Also, "shinigami" is shi-ni-ga-mi (シニガミ), not shin-i-ga-mi (シンイガミ). By dropping the n (ン) sound, the entire word changes and shi (シ) alone is not Sing's name anymore.

If all 3 meanings had the same pattern of only drawing from shi (シ) then I might be more convinced, but as shown above, 2 out of 3 derive from words that can definitively be read as "sin/sing/シン". I'm inclined to think that 魔神 should follow as well, since there’s no reason for Yoshida to suddenly diverge from this rule. 

- - - - - - - -

"スウリン/Soo Ling" doesn't seem to factor into any of these at all, so I’m convinced that the mangaka meant for those meanings to originate only from “Sing.”

I feel hesitant going with 新 / 星 as his family name, since they look like extremely uncommon ones. For what it’s worth, the Taiwanese(?) Mandarin localisation has gone with 辛舒霖 (Pinyin: xīn shū lín) with 辛 being the most common form of the “Xin” surname. He also shows up in another one of Yoshida’s works, Yasha, but they went with 沈叔林 (Pinyin: shěn shū lín) there.

At this point I suppose there’s still no One True Answer. But for the sake of consistency, it’s probably best to stick with 辛舒霖 if people want to use his Chinese name.

Edit (13/10/2021): I have expanded more on Sing’s name HERE.

Final thoughts:

It’s perfectly possible that the mangaka did not think too deeply about most of these names. She once named a Chinese character キム・ヨン・タイ (kim yong tai) which thanks to the surname, ended up sounding Korean instead. Of course, you could argue that it’s another non-Mandarin variation (Hokkien?). The English localisation however, changed it to “Hong Zhe-Ming.” There’s also the fact that she has twice referred to Lao as “Lao Yen” in Japanese, which is a heinous but hilarious mash up of his surname and half of his first name. 

Yeah, this series is far from being 100% accurate in other areas as well but hey, sometimes it’s just fun to point this stuff out :p

Thanks if you’ve read this far, and feel free to let me know if I’ve made a mistake or missed anything!

Extra footnote just in case: Regarding the whole "do they speak Mando/Canto" thing, I am examining it purely from the manga's perspective. I think that circumstances in the anime are different and perhaps more complex due to the change in setting.