#sorry I feel like I'm bragging I'm just trying to explain where I fee like my strengths are at

[pigeonstab]

im way to anxiety-ridden to ask this without anon, but are you chill if people just throw their own undertale aus they made at you so you can look at them and give your professional opinions on??? like, you're a huge inspo and i love your collage au and i just want opinions from others about the concepts i have sorry if this is a weird question, feel free to delete

I what??? Yes??? I mean that's insane It's so incredible to hear that I'm an inspo?? I did not think anybody cared that much. Thank you so much that means a lot to me. Gosh I'm so flattered ^^;

Also like, I'm chill. I'm nice, I will most likely answer you in a nice way, I'm just a random dude on the internet do not worry about me or what I think of you lol. I love exchanging ideas with people.

I do want to say though that I don't think I can have a 'professional opinion' on storytelling, or what ideas you have for your AUs so I'll check it out and I'll tell you what I like or think is interesting but I don't think I have any ground to be a helpful critic, in terms of design that I can do though, I'm a visual artist first and foremost and think I have enough knowledge on what makes a design appealing but that's about it. Storytelling wise I'm just as lost as anyone else, I know how to talk about stories from a spectator perspective, not a creator one.

[themousefromfantasyland]

The Yule Man (5/7)

Told by ME

This was meant to be a short story, but it became too big, so I separated it in seven parts. I want to turn my blog in a space where I can share my writting every once and a while.

This is the first time I post one of my stories on a public space. This is the first time anyone besides my sister will be able to read, so I'm pretty exciting and anxious. I want honest criticism. I hope you all enjoy it.

On the Solstice Eve of that year Chris arrived back in Arnsberg close to the old bridge. Once again, he dressed in a long fur coat and dirty beggar clothes, carrying an old bag. He touched his face and discovered his shaggy beard hadn't changed at all. Deep down he still had hoped things to be different.

The town changed even more from the last time. Entire neighborhoods seemed to have withered away. Filthy tenements with shattered windows and people dressed no better than him. Beggars and homeless children scattered everywhere. Pain and sorrow stamped on everyone's faces.

"What happened here?"

He walked faster as he could until he reached a church in a better part of the town. Exhausted, he rested leaning on a statue of the Silver God. As soon as he saw him, the priest shoved him away as a dog. Somethings never change at all.

He wandered in those streets, until an old woman stopped him. She looked exactly like the grandmas in Sophia's picture books.

"You're the Yule Man, right? I know her." The old woman chuckled. "She told me if I saw you, I should send you to this address."

And she gave him the address and went her own way.

"Mia?" He looked to the piece of paper in his hands.

The address lure him to a small building downtown. Candlesticks illuminated the windows. Rows of holly and mistletoe were hanged through it with care. The sign in the door announced the place to be closed, yet they forgot the door open.

A huge man dressed in all black from the head to the toe stepped out of the store. On his way out he bumped with Chris.

"Happy Yuletide!" He took off his bowler hat to greet him, when Chris thought he saw all the evil of the world in his eyes.

He then disappeared in the mundane crowd. Chris entered the store, without knowing what he had saw.

Still confused, he called:

"Is anyone here?"

He saw full-body mirrors, measure tapes and cushions lying on the floor. Pieces of fabrics were scattered everywhere. Some carefully sorted and saved in shelves and cabinets. Others dropped over wooden tables. Someone had engraved dozens of needles on the heads of the mannequins. That unsettled him.

A woman in a purple dress shirt turned to him from the balcony. Seeing her face drove all his fear and worries away. In what seemed like the interval between seconds, he jumped to her arms, which closed tight around his body. He had returned to Mia.

He glared at her. She didn't look like the rich girl he had met. Her clothes showed simplicity this time. Modest and simple. A purple coat and skirt, covering a blue waistcoat.

She served him a cup of hot cocoa. She knew exactly what would fill him with happiness and made him warm. By the look in his face, she did it right again. She brought him to a small apartment over the store. The place stroked as tiny, yet still cozy and not uncomfortable at all. Chris saw a moderate Yule tree with some Yule Goats around, and he knew Mr. Hayek lived there.

They sat by her blue coach. He made a silly face that said to her. "C'mon, tell me what happened."

She took a sip from her teacup and started.

"After the Yule, I took my part in father's inheritance and left the shrew alone." She told him, and both on that room felt deep pride for her.

There was a sense satisfaction in her face. He loved finding that in her. Chris managed to smear himself with the drink and it made her happy.

"You're a tailor now?" He teased her.

"Being a writer wouldn't work out for me." She smirked.

She gave him a white blouse.

"Dress it."

From the bathroom he came as handsome as she remembered him. Mia struggled to keep her good form.

"I didn't say to shave the beard. You can keep if you want."

"I don't want!" He winked to her.

She continued telling him her year.

"I bought this place from an old woman. She wanted to retire and pass more time with her family. She actually helped a lot setting all this up."

He turned to her.

"Was she the woman who bring me here?"

"Possibly." Mia gestured with her shoulders. "I told everyone that I knew that if they saw you, they should give you the address of this place."

"And who was that man I saw getting out of the store. He creeped me out."

Mia grew quiet. She exhaled. Talking about him never brought her any pleasure.

"It would be Franz Müller, the Cat’s-eye. He's a loan shark who thinks a lot about himself. Each month me and all business in the neighborhood have to pay his fees. Don't think much about him, most of the time he just takes the money and leave us alone.

The question frightened Chris.

"What happened to the town?"

Mia shut her eyes.

"Economic crisis, and my father can't help them this time."

"What about the ball in the Hayek’s mansion?"

She raised her voice to him.

"Which ball!"

That sudden change of mood made him jump out of his place.

"Sorry, mother closed the gates of the mansion to the town. She's still rich. Made a deal with my father's business partners. She guaranteed hers but forgot about everyone's else." She said full of deep resentment.

"I kind learned this by myself because you. I don't want to brag, but I'm good at this." She continued. "I bought this place. Learned a trade. Started to work."

"So, you're a working-class woman now?" He smirked.

"It's what it looks. I still have part of my father's inheritance. And with the work I got I can sustain myself quite comfortably for quite a while."

Night had come. Chris released his bag over her terrace, filling the sky with the magical snowflakes. All the town saw the light and cold dash up into the clouds. Billions of ice crystal dancing and flowing through the air. Mia never got tired of seeing that scene.

She launched the Yule Log into her simple fireplace, and they both sat close by it.

"I want to give you something."

She gave Chris a box. A beautifully wrapped present.

"Happy Yuletide." She couldn't wait to see his reaction.

He opened the box. A tiny bottle full of shiny white sand inside, and little seashells keeping it in good company. He knew exactly where they were from. His eyes filled themselves. He started to cry, to sob even, and still laugh of happiness. He hugged her, and he didn't let her go. His first Yule present ever.

They sat on that place for hours, and still hadn't ran out of things to say to each other.

"Your mother?" He asked.

"Still angry with me. After a time, I stopped trying to save our relationship. It wasn't worth it in the end. I still get to see my siblings. Will take them to Yulesing tomorrow. Without the Solstice Eve Ball, I worry how they will spend the holidays."

Mia explained to Chris how things had got different. This year she couldn't take him to party through Arnsberg.

"I don't care. I only want to be near you."

They stayed hours doing completely nothing. They enjoyed each other's conversation and company in general. The cold was the best sensation ever and the room was as cozy as it could be.

In the end of the night Chris tasted Mia's lips. She had thought they would never come to that. She led him to her room, where she felt his body in hers. Soft, tender, perfect.

They stayed in bed hugged to each other. Through the window in the wall opposite to them they could see the snow slowly dressing the world in white.

"I love you." She said resting her head on his chest.

He felt physical pain saying that:

"This isn't love. It's just a romantic fantasy. What you have for me isn't real. I'm not real. You can't love a person you only spend thirteen days within the whole year." He forced a small laugh.

Her mouth twitched.

"I can if it's true love."

His forehead puckered.

"You don't have to put up with me for the rest of the year. We don't go through the same stuff other couples go through. When the holidays are over, I'm gone. I'm won't think, I'm won't feel, I won't remember a thing. I won't be."

"Chris!"

"Sorry. What we got are only moments."

"So, why are you so against enjoying them. In general, everyone's life is just a moment. They live, they die, and it's over. At least I can enjoy a time with you. For me it's already worth it."

He closed his eyes.

"I'm dying to go to Lichthafen City with you."

He gave her a faintly smile. The room then became quiet.

In the next day they went to take the Hayek children to Yulesing. Mia knew very well that Chris loved it more than the children. Her siblings were nothing more than an excuse for doing that. Yet, he loved her siblings. They stayed with them for half of their days together. They had fun.

In the other half they stayed alone in Mia's apartment over her tailoring shop. Cuddling in her bed, eating sweets, and watching the world through that window. Best days ever, for both of them.

The Yule Log turned to ashes. Time to go again, and again in the next year he returned, in the exact same manner. Time passed, and he left, and left, and still returned to her. Each year, thirteen days only.

Chris watched the town change and change around him, and only he stayed the same. In a wink of time, Sophia, Fritz and Thomas started to leave childhood. How much that stroked pain in him. Even Mia started to look more like his older sister than his lover.

Poverty spread through the town as if a disease. Good and respectable neighborhoods crumbled to ruins before his eyes. Organized crime and urban violence turned Yulesing a thing of the past. Mr. Müller became much more than a simple loan shark.

Everything changed, less him.