#source: 8 simple rules

[borbi-edits]

Portia: I think the coffee guy had a crush on me. He gave me a free cappuccino.

Delancy: oh, how cute!

Portia (scoffing): yeah, like I'd go out with a barrister.

Delancy: Portia, a barrister is a lawyer in England.

Portia: well, the degree must not translate 'cause he's serving coffee here.

[incorrectstevesagaquotes]

Alex: Illusion Steve, you haven't made any friends out here.

Illusion Steve: That's because everybody is an idiot.

[starry-storms]

Jason: I need you to distract Bruce

Dick: OK. Hey B. Do you notice anything different about me?

Bruce: oh please don't do this to me.

[wannaeatramyeon]

The Crew Heads with Reader: Board Games

G/N. Silly. 4 small scenes. (Jake Kim, Eli Jang, Johan Seong, Samuel Seo)

Bro Code | Dinner | Shopping | Television | Gacha | Board Games | Suits

"What the fuck?" Samuel glares at Johan who returns it with equal hostility.

"It's a word." Johan spits, arms crossed and defiant.

"Use it in a sentence."

"I'm going to kilp you."

"Johan will kilp you," Jake chimes in.

"Samuel will be kilped by Johan," Eli adds.

"Almost," you say, "But Johan I don't think that's a word-"

"3 to 2, overruled!" Jake grins, totting up the points from the Scrabble board. "Ok so that's triple word score too for God Dog. Fuck... he's in the lead."

.

.

"I just said you can't play a +2 on top of a +2 card!" Jake moans, looking at the stack of cards in the middle.

"Says who?" Johan asks, because that rule is stupid

"It sounds like bullshit but-," Eli scrolls on his phone, looking for a source. "Uno officially. The cards can't stack."

You lean over his shoulder, read the rule with your own eyes but disregard it anyway. "The fuck do they know."

"5 to 0, draw your cards asshole." Samuel leans back, smug when Jake add another 6 cards to his hand.

.

.

"You're cheating!" You screech as Jake freezes like a deer caught in headlights.

"No I didn't!" He holds up both hands in surrender. He absolutely did not cheat.

"You grabbed an extra 100 won, I saw you!"

"I didn't!" Jake protests his innocence.

"I saw him too," Eli says as Johan and Samuel both nod vigorously.

"What, owning most of the properties on the board isn't enough for you?" You say, jabbing a finger in Jake's chest. "And now you're cheating?!"

"But I didn't-"

"I don't want to play anymore!" You throw your cash in the air, standing up and stepping over the Monopoly board as the rest of the guys follow suit.

"But... I didn't." Jake mutters, looking at the mess of cash around him.

Ok. So he didn't cheat. In fact, you know for certain that everyone else did. It's just expected with a game like Monopoly. No-one becomes rich fairly with capitalism.

Poor Jake however, did play fair and square, ended up lucky with the community chest and chance cards which led to him owning the majority of the properties.

All of you, getting more pissed off by the minute but not wanting to admit defeat, slithered your way out of it by accusing Jake and throwing him to the wolves.

You promise to make it up to him, somehow. But you are not losing at Monopoly.

.

.

"Are you blind?" Johan growls when Samuel's hand comes down on the 9 that landed on top of the 6.

"Fuck off," he mutters, retreating and putting his own card down - an 8.

"I think Snap might not be for Samuel," Eli grins, placing a King face up, as Jake agrees that Math isn't Sammy's strong suit.

"Easy mistake," you shrug, rising to his defence. You have definitely done something similar many times. Not with these guys though.

You've never played Snap, that simple card game, with them. For good reason-

"Snap!" Jake shouts, hand slamming down after he places another King on top of Eli's.

The table legs creak, then with a sickening crash, collapses under the force of his power. The four crew heads and you are left sitting around a mess of splintered wood, spilled drinks and ruined cards.

"Oops."

Samuel rolls his eyes. "Well done, moron."

-And that's why you don't play Snap.

[holidayking102]

CHRISTMAUS 2024 SUBMISSIONS

Today I am proud to announce ChristmAUs 2024! As you may have seen earlier, I have taken the reigns of ChristmAUs from @fmsdraws / @ut-poppy-askblog (with his permission). Unfortunately, I can not make a game like ChristmAUs 2023 (which you should really play Link here)! However, I do have a big plan for ChristmAUs 2024, and that plan is: Animated Christmas Card!

That's right! Unlike most of the other ChristmAUs collabs, this one shall be animated! Give your AU characters animations to bring them to life for all to see! Of course, animation is a hard, time consuming process. But with over 2 months to work, and with the simple rules on how the characters should be animated, it shouldn't be too difficult to get your character in in time!

RULES: *Submissions are open until Sunday, December 8th, 12 AM! Meaning that they are open through out December 7th and then they close! *Submissions must be in the style of Undertale and Deltarune! *No limit on the amount of characters you can submit, but I may ask you to slow down if I feel you are submitting too many. *The AU character(s) you submit must come from a publicly revealed AU that must have some content behind them other then this ChristmAUs. This includes: Art, Audio, Comic, Animation, Photography, Game, Sprites, Written Sources, or any combination of them. *No content that would be 18+. This is a family-friendly ChristmAUs! *No content that would be harmful or hurtful to anyone. ChristmAUs should be a joyous time, and hate and harm have no place in it. *No content that would violate the TOS of the majority of websites, including Youtube, Reddit and Tumblr. *You must have permission to submit the character, if you did not create them yourself! (UT and DR canon characters excluded; just link UT or DR for them.) Submission Rules: 1: Make sure you've read all the rules! 2: Give your Handle; how you want to be credited in the public. I do not accept anonymous contributions! 3: Share your characters name(s) and AU(s), along with link to the AU/those AUs! 4: Share your characters sheet(s); this should include every frame individually used for the animation, and I will add them in myself. Character Sheets should be 1x1 (meaning a pixel is just 1 pixel). Animations should be based on 12 Frames Per Second and Frames should be based on Multiples of 6! (6, 12, 18, etc.) 5: Share where you wish for your character(s) to be placed on the map. Keep in mind that while I will try to place them where you wish, I may move them slightly to fit the environment better. 6: Optionally, if you wish, include a GIF of the animation so that I can get an idea of how they should look in action! 7: Additionally, for those who can't animate, or for those who want to go above and beyond, there are also opportunities to add static content to ChristmAUs. These include: +Ornaments (20x20 max) +Gifts (30x30 max) +Table Set Pieces (45x45 max, 13 Max) +Pictures (30x18 or 17x18, 15 Max) 8: Characters should not be placed in areas that obviously would not fit them; like a massive character in a tiny area, for instance. 9: No walking animations, or animations that move characters from their standing point. This is to ensure there's no collisions and for a maximum amount of characters on the map. 10: All animations should loop into themselves. No animations should simply end. 11: All art submissions should include your handle/credit name!

SUBMISSION LINK:

I hope everyone has fun with this ChristmAUs! And I hope doing it in animated form works wonderfully for everyone! One last shout out to @mickonline1 for his wonderful ChristmAUs tree submission! I'll see you again through out the month, and ChristmAUs will see you on Christmas!

[colourstreakgryffin]

Oh, my God, of course you can, dear. And to make it interesting to read, make sure that Alastor makes a deal with Bill (that is, with us) 👏

Awesome! Thanks, love! I’m on it. Alastor x Bill Cipher! Reader/Us, genderneutral! I know I’ve been busy but sadly, life gets in the way as much as writer block does. Sorry that this is bad, Bill and Alastor being the best toxic ‘partners’ go brrrrr~

Alastor- the Weirdmageddon

Alastor is infamously known as the strongest, the greatest, the most influential Overlord in Hell’s history… but his power is much more artificial than people ever suspected, yet. He also refuses to accept that as a fact, he wants to believe his power is his. It was only boosted by the figure who owns him, not granted by the figure who owns him

Sadly… that’s not the case. He’s only overwhelmingly authoritative because of you, called under the simple name ‘Cipher’. Making a deal with you, you granted him a alternately-sourced chunk of your immense power in exchange for him serving you as you please

As mutual give and take partners in crime

Alastor despises it… he despises being chained. He despises being the servant of a demonic entity so above him that they can turn him into a decoration banner with a snap of their fingers. Said demonic entity, being you, is a multidimensional threat that Hell had never seen

Often shaped in the form of a big limbed floating one eyed triangle, you’ve never shown your true form. It makes you terrifying in reality; nobody, not even Alastor knows your power’s true vast limits. Alastor always remembers the day he had sold his soul to you so fluently

In 1937, deep within Hell almost four years after his earth-life death, where Alastor barely had any position, any power, any recognition, any influence within this agitating city full of prissy high-ranks. He had to figure out a way to get what he wanted so he stumbled his way upon a library that had a eyecatching journal consisting a number of odd concepts, unknown mysteries but he only cares about one thing

Cipher

A extremely powerful demonic entity, it’s unknown if they are a human soul or a hellborn manifested by Lucifer himself. Either way, they are so strong that a number of this thick dark old journal has urgent warnings of the following ‘do NOT summon at all causes’. Alastor had never been a man to follow the rules, he follows himself so he took that journal and under the cover of the blackish-red night

The soon-to-be-Radio Demon had set up a summoning ritual, consisting of a picture of a victim of choice with crossed out eyes, 8 lit candles placed in a circle as well as the incantation: "Triangulum, entangulum. meteforis dominus ventium”. Alastor knew this was pathetic, a waste of time but if he could possibly steal this Cipher’s power

He’d be unstoppable

As soon as he had finished the incantation, it felt like something had possessed him in that split second of a breath and forced him to mindlessly but passionately repeat another unknown backwards message repetitively dropped down onto a knee by a invisible force

Over and over in a menacing manner until the realm around him turned a slate gray, time slowed down instantaneously and a fiery-ringed triangle-shaped black portal manifested in the space above. Out popped you with a malicious insane laugh upon manifesting properly into existence

It actually worked! In like a blink, Alastor had successfully summoned his new victim! Cipher or you, in your triangle shapeshifted demonic form, floating down before him with an invisible grin. You speak up with a strong charming smooth tone of telepathy, you’re much smaller than he suspected. Whilst he snapped out of the weird brief ‘possession’ trance to gain back his composure and grace as a gentleman

“Wow. It’s been a while since I’ve even seen Hell! Hey, you’re a new face. Name’s Cipher. Tell me, are you the brand new dinner? Haha! I’m just kidding. I know who you are, Alastor”

You chime out with a cheerful almost child-like glee despite your obvious insanity, tipping off your cute tophat to him in a charming hats-off style bow. Floating before him effortlessly and your single huge eye following his every movements. Alastor may not be under the position he desires but he doesn’t fear you, he will take you out

He genuinely believes he has a chance to manipulate you into serving him… how up his ass he was to think so

“Enough, ‘dream demon’. I don’t have time to play your games when time is tight. I need you to work for me. As partners in crime, perhaps. A beneficial deal, we grant each other power and influence as well as find victims”

Alastor is very sharp-tongued, witty. He’s a good talker, he knows how to trick even the most suspicious people into believing him and siding him and he plans to exploit you and your immense power to take for his own. You’re an old smudge of the past, he deserves that power more than you do

“Ah. I’ve never had such a companion to rule this Realm with. I suppose, I can give your offer a chance if you help me with my something too”

You are not that easily tricked at all, you’re pretending to be. Pretending to be persuaded by Alastor’s charms, with only a few seconds of thinking beforehand. Since you’re equally as good at tricking and sly-talk, you can see the way the deer demon’s blood red eyes shine with delight from under his demeanour. You know he believes you’re more of a joke than that journal says you are

You can hear his thoughts clear as the next day… you know what he truly wants from you and he won’t get it. He won’t get it since you’ll take his soul as you do to everybody who summons you

“Deer teeth! Enjoy, my dear gentleman”

Where the Heaven did you get those? He had looked down at his own radio microphone for like a few seconds as to internally compose his next statement to subtly pressure you further into doing as he needs. Suddenly, you have a pile of freshly removed but in-that hell deer teeth in your soft smaller hands and you offer the pile to Alastor without even asking him or even letting him speak in response

Alastor doesn’t flinch at the fact he’s holding the teeth of a innocent yet cannibalistic doe or buck but the fact you dare to think he even has use with this so he glares right at you, cracking his infamous sharp yet dapper toothy grin and drops the pile on the floor. He’s bold enough to disrespect you since he believes you are now under him

You don’t even respond, just calmly and quietly floating before him with your big eye blinking sparsely at his rather harsh choice. You don’t mind that, it makes you laugh in-fact. You laugh almost a bit immaturely at him rejecting your ‘friendly gift’. You just know that he is a damn fool for thinking the way he is, you can see EVERYTHING

“I’m looking forward to playing with a pretty little face like yours~ hey? Is that skin natural or do you use face cream~”

Was… that your attempt at flirting? It seemed like it, pitiful. Your tone shifted briefly to a flirty smoother one and you leant your hand on your own… uh, triangle flat ‘cheek’. You’re doing it to amuse yourself, you don’t have much opinions of your new soul and only desire to get a reaction. However, you won’t deny… Alastor is a handsome man~

“Nonsense. What I may have is nothing compared to your radiant beauty. Look at you, so unique and important that this city fears you~ it’s my honour to work with you”

Alastor is using more subtle but fake flirting as to entice you, make you associate him with the concept of ‘reliable’ and a ‘friend’ piece by piece. He needs it, he needs to ensure you’re under his charms so you’ll give up your power to him and work for him as his owned soul

He was too clouded by his own confidence over his capabilities to realise you weren’t manipulated into being trapped under his thumb… even when he made that darn deal. He didn’t realise the deal you and him shook hands on that night wasn’t for your soul, it was for his… until too late. You gave him significant amount of power that he became the most powerful Overlord ever known in Hell, and he became your servant

The advantages and the disadvantages of being owned by you, Cipher

Leading him to where he is now, the current year. Parked up in the Hazbin Hotel to seek his own entertainment further. Alastor is on top of Pentagram City, everybody fears him, he owns several other demons, he’s incredibly infamous and terrifying but he had to give up his own soul and he had to rely on you to become so great…

He’s ashamed. He’s humiliated. But he won’t let anybody know the truth about him. Alastor may regret ever picking up that hastily-written mess of a journal almost eighty years ago but he doesn’t really regret what you’ve done for him

You’ve given him a vastly powerful position by just handing over a flame of your supremacy, you’ve given him the afterlife he desired and he supposes with honestly, little payment in return. Just his soul… you’ve let him stand where he is now, up in his Radio Tower. On the air but inbetween a commercial break, as to check over his script

The silence sends him back to that night so long ago, reminding him almost painfully what becoming your partner in crime has befallen on him… it’s bad but it’s good. It’s torturous yet therapeutic. He doesn’t truly know how to feel about his situation— he should be focusing on his show

You could be so much worse to deal with on a monthly basis. You are kinda charming. He KINDA likes you

[smilesatdawnmain]

ETERNAL LMK AU (Part 8) (Interactive Story)

You all want these monkeys to be happy. Fighting for it. Imma give you a touch choice this time~

The rules are simple.: I will give the written passage, and then at the bottom there will be a vote on how the characters act next!

Story: Eternal Au

Ships: Shadow Peach

Macaque's anger melted away, replaced by a deep, aching sorrow. He stood before Wukong, watching the confusion and panic in those golden eyes as they searched fruitlessly for the source of the unseen force. Macaque's heart clenched painfully in his chest.

"You fool," he whispered, his voice cracking. "I'm right here."

With trembling fingers, Macaque reached out towards Wukong's face. He knew his hand would likely pass right through, but he couldn't stop himself from trying. Gently, ever so gently he attempted to cup Wukong's cheek.

It was unsurprising when Macaque's fingers trembled as they passed through Wukong's cheek, encountering no resistance. The familiar warmth and softness he longed to feel was replaced by an empty chill. His hand hovered there, suspended in the space where Wukong's face was.

"You can't even feel me, can you?" Macaque whispered, his voice thick with emotion. "After everything... I'm nothing more than a ghost to you now." Macaque brought his hands back to bury his face against them, wanting to block out the sight by covering his eyes, “Wukong…”

A look of bewilderment crossed Wukong’s face as an inexplicable sensation brushed against his cheek. It wasn't quite a touch - more like the faintest whisper of a breeze, or the lightest caress of silk. But there was an undeniable presence there, one that sent a shiver down his spine.

"What..." he murmured, his hand rising to touch the spot where he'd felt... something. His fingers quivered slightly as they hovered over his cheek, uncertain. Golden eyes focused, and Wukong focused. It took a moment, a deep peer into the void, but for a moment, he saw the impossible, and it made his voice weak.

"...Mihou?"

It shook Macaque to his very core when those eyes fell upon him. When that voice, spoke his name. He panicked, holding perfectly still, his hand still over his eyes. He was positive he had just heard wrong. But he could sense a shift in Wukong’s posture. A change to his gaze. He wasn’t blindly looking, he was focused.

Did Wukong see him?

Wukong had frozen stiff, eyes wide and looking at him so clearly. The gold of his eyes letting him peer through the veil just enough to see- to glimpse the silhouette of the mate he thought he had lost.

Thoughts rushed through Macaque's head. Panic, realization- Wukong’s lower lip trembling, eyes widening with such vulnerability. Macaque had never seen Wukong look at him like this before.

“Moon,” his hand extended out hesitantly, his voice crackly. He can hardly believe it. He seems to understand this is real a second later, and that he cannot let this moment slip through his fingers. With wild desperation he surged forward. “Moon!”

Macaque jumped in surprise as Wukong called out to him. He stepped back quickly as Wukong stumbled and vanished right through them, trying to catch hold of him but failing. If Macaque was alive, he would have been squished to Wukong’s chest, those strong arms tightening around him to hold in a bruising hug…

It was in that moment that Both were forced to recognize that Macaque’s presence wasn’t solid. Both of them froze in shock, each with their own unique feelings of horror.

Macaque's breath comes out in ragged gasps as he stares ahead, his heart racing with adrenaline. Behind him, Wukong tumbles and crashes, the ground shaking beneath them both. Macaque's eyes are wide with- terror, joy, so many different emotions as he realizes that… Wukong had seen him.

Wukong yanked himself to his knees stared at his empty hands- opening and closing them as he swore he had just- why wasn’t Mihou? Wukong whipped around, Panicked when his actions had lost him focus, Macaque fading from view again, “Wait-wait-!” he pleaded for Macaque to stay. To not leave his sight.

His composed demeanor from earlier was rapidly crumbling as he fell into a state of despair. Macaque managed to evade Wukong as the latter stumbled back towards him. Not that it mattered, as Wukong could not touch him, but he would rather not be reminded over and over that he wasn’t truly physically there.

Macaque felt ill as he watched Wukong's desperation unfold. The King's eyes darted wildly, searching for any trace of his lost mate. "Moon! Please, don't go!" Wukong's voice cracked, a sound so raw and anguished that Macaque felt his non-existent heart clench.

For a moment, Macaque considered reaching out, trying to touch Wukong's cheek again to comfort him. But the memory of his hand passing through Wukong earlier stopped him. What was the point? He couldn't truly touch him.

Macaque's heart raced as Wukong's gaze pierced through him. For a brief, shining moment, their eyes met across the veil separating life and death- Wukong could see him again.

Sun Wukong's face crumpled with a mix of desperation and hope, his hand reaching out. "Moon," he breathed, voice cracking. "Is it really you?"

Macaque's throat tightened. He wanted to run, to hide from that vulnerable gaze that threatened to undo him. Several thoughts came to mind at once.

First, a panic that Wukong could see him. What was Wukong going to say? What was he going to do? It half convinced Macaque to turn and flee. He couldn’t get far, he knew, with this string connecting them, but he just couldn’t bare the sight of those eyes. He should go. He should run. H-He… Wukong was going to hurt him again.

Second, joy. His mate could see him. Could potentially hear him or read his lips. A part of him felt elated, wanting to just forgive Wukong as he tended to do, regardless of the pain. The moon so desperate for it’s Sun. The pathetic and weaker side of him, unable to truly ever break away it’s from its mate. It’s soulmate. He was Sun Wukong’s soulmate.

Wukong took a hesitant step forward, hand still outstretched when Macaque didn’t respond righta way. "Moon, please," he pleaded, voice thick with emotion. "Don't disappear again. I-I'm sorry, I'm so sorry..."

Macaque felt cold.

The third and last thought followed. A darker thought.

Wukong could see him, but could do no harm to him. It left the door open to possabilities… whispered opportunity. What could one do to someone so… desperate for them?

Wukong never often revealed his hand, always keeping aloof. A casual friendly demeanor always hiding his real intent, his real emotion. He had folded now, revealing his anguish. Somehow or another, Wukong was- perhaps happy to see him? That quiver in his eyes indicated remorse. He was vulnerable right now.

Words would cut far deeper now than ever before. Macaque had nothing but words now. He could break Sun Wukong. 

-----

Beheheh I got some tough ones for you all this time~ Flee and deal with this another time? Continue the toxic cycle of blind forgiveness?? Or begin a new toxic cycle of emotional manipulation??

choose wisely~

Previous

Next

If you are willing, I’m curious what you all voted for in the comments! No worries if you don’t want to though

[tarotwithdanise]

REVEALING THEIR QUIRKS THAT YOU WANTED TO KNOW PT.1

༉ ‧ ₊ ˚ how to choose pile? ✧ . ˚

꒰⠀from left to right ; intuitively choose the pile your mind, heart and soul desire for. if you are having trouble choosing the right pile for you, here’s some tips you can do ; (1) take a deep breath (2) close your eyes (3) ask guidance from your guides (4) finally open your eyes and you can choose the right pile for you by the guidance you ask from your guides. if you are still having trouble by choosing the right pile for you let me know because i am willing to help and guide you.

PILE ONE PILE TWO PILE THREE

rules, disclaimer and notes ☆

[ 1. ] just a quick disclaimer : this reading was made for entertainment purposes only. this is obviously a general reading so takes what resonates and leave when it doesn’t, you don’t need to force your energy to read this and leave such a bad comment just to say it doesn’t resonates with you at all because the answer is very obvious! i don’t own any these pictures i collected them from pinterest so credits to the rightful owners.

[ 2. ] please ignore any grammatical errors on my reading since english is not my first language, thank you for understanding!

[ 3. ] third to the last one, if you are not an avid fan of this kind of readings and not totally 100% agree about the outcome of this pac please just ignore this post and don’t engaged anymore, this pac can contains harsh, hurtful comments about you or the other person that can trigger you if possible, so kindly read at your own risk and take how it’ll resonates.

[ 4. ] lastly, be happy and enjoy reading my works — feedbacks, comments, likes, reblogs and follows are really appreciated by the reader. (that’s me, lol :3)

for tips, donation, masterlist and paid readings ☆

TIPS JAR🫙 DONATION BOX📦

PAID READING SERVICES 🫁 MASTERLIST 🪷

[ ♡ ] check out my second account @danisetarot

SOURCE AND CREDITABLE : all of the pictures are collected and downloaded from pinterest , i don’t own any of them but credits goes to the rightful owners however edits goes and belong to yours truly. i use the editor tools canva and ibispaint for the header and divider.

PILE ONE

can easily recognize suspicious person at the very first time they had interaction with them.

may have braces atleast once on their life.

may act cold for no valid reason, they just feel to act one because they think it's cool (BRAH☠️)

can sleep anywhere and anytime, type of person who would literally sleep more than 8 hours per day if they have time.

always applying sunscreen even though they're not set themselves under the sun. (skin protection is real)

prefer romance books when it comes to genre to read.

may have some white hair even though they were literally young in age.

wear anklet or may have a rose tattoo or just tattoo on one of their feet.

if they find you boring person they won't even bother to listen to you at all, it really to noticeable this about them since they tend to show disinterest.

thin or petite.

always sits on the floor rather than sitting on a chair or coach 😭😭😭

prefer barefooted and simple shoes to wear.

into swimming getaways and might be a surfer.

have wrist bands or hair ties such scrunchie around their wrist.

typically good at mimicking others lol.

type of student who think that is okay to pass rather than to be failed also can be the clown class.

just randomly yells when they're watching tv because they might find the characters dumb or if it's a game show they probably likes to cheer and say the right answer even though they aren't really there.

loves to annoy and tease other people especially their classmates and siblings or family.

can be a prankster.

bed is their weakness and only comfort on their noisy and exhausted world.

Thank you so much for reading, let me know your thoughts, feedbacks as well tipping and reblogs is well appreciated !! ♡

࿙‌֒࿚࿙‌֒࿚࿙‌֒࿚ 𝓞 ops you already reached the end. ࿙‌֒࿚࿙‌֒࿚࿙‌֒࿚

PILE TWO

can split, have a strong and flexible body.

someone who talk, eat or walk fast.

spend their most of the time imagining, illusions or fantasizing with their dream life.

likes to chew gums or bite their own lips.

might have an specific birthmark on their face or arms and hands.

likes to do TikTok or enjoy watching TikTok or YouTube shorts.

someone who is music is life, they have headphones, earbuds or earphones on their bag.

have a weird or distinctive laugh.

someone who have a big hands or feet.

someone who is introverted and likes to be alone and prefer more their own company rather than anyone else.

a picky eater and type of someone who is afraid to order in any food restaurants or fast food chains.

you will be amaze by them, they can do some magic tricks 🪄🪄🪄

likes to ghosting others.

type of someone who avoid eye contacts a lot- they're shy type people.

someone who is into yoga.

someone who likes to watch ASMR videos, they find it very comforting.

type of individual who will literally adopt a stray animals.

promotes equality for everyone.

always carry a bag even it's a small one.

wants to travel but they're broke right now.

havinh a hard time choosing clothes or things that will suits them.

someone who is into anime or manga.

Thank you so much for reading, let me know your thoughts, feedbacks as well tipping and reblogs is well appreciated !! ♡

࿙‌֒࿚࿙‌֒࿚࿙‌֒࿚ 𝓞 ops you already reached the end. ࿙‌֒࿚࿙‌֒࿚࿙‌֒࿚

PILE THREE

wants to be in a relationship but hella don't even get out in their comfort zone.

someone who likes to wear hoodies.

may have freckles or scar on their face.

someone who prefer a partner who is way more unique and different than the rest of people they've known.

prefer to wear pjs, pants or leggings.

prefer the color of black, green, white red and yellow as their favorite color.

have unique or uncommon eye color, their eyes seems like sparkling-you might get drawn.

might be into smoking or drinking alcohol.

someone who enjoys planting plants, vegetables and flowers.

a risk taker not even afraid of change, they think they're ready for everything.

have a mysterious and alluring aura that surrounds them.

likes to licks or bite their nails.

moles on their face.

someone who can stay awake all night- night owl person.

prefer sad songs and hate third parties.

fashion styles that they may prefer are streetwear, boho and casual.

observant individual, typically someone who can witness and see what's happening on their surroundings.

probably on the average or taller of height.

hate liars, cheaters and scammers.

someone who have a strong scorpio, leo, capricorn, virgo, taurus and sagittarius placements.

someone who act as a father/mother of a friend groups even though they just have the same age as them.

have a beautiful and lovely-might be into singing as well.

Thank you so much for reading, let me know your thoughts, feedbacks as well tipping and reblogs is well appreciated !! ♡

࿙‌֒࿚࿙‌֒࿚࿙‌֒࿚ 𝓞 ops you already reached the end. ࿙‌֒࿚࿙‌֒࿚࿙‌֒࿚

© daninixx ── all rights reserved. do not copy, translate, alter, or repost my work.

[fjorn-the-skald]

In one of your recent reblogs you said that "Rings worn on the finger, for example, have often played important roles in Norse legends." Could you please explain more on that?

I’ll have to scold my past self for that one. Not only did I leave the footnote for that statement lacking, but I think I made some assumptions. You see, the Norse usually didn’t distinguish between arm rings and, well, ‘normal’ rings. The same word, hringr, is used for both and only context (which is often lacking) tells us where it was worn.(1) Other words, like baugr, are also used for both bracelets and rings—but with some extra baggage.(2) Some sources use the more specific fingrgull (let. finger-gold), but that really isn’t helpful.(3)

All of that is to say: when my past, less-experienced self said “rings worn on the finger,” I wasn’t looking carefully at the Old Norse in question. As for the legends I referred to in my footnote for that claim, The Saga of King Hrolf Kraki and Otter’s Ransom (contained within The Saga of the Volsungs)—the ‘original’ texts (let’s not even get into manuscript variation, please) both use hringr.(4) With that out of the way, though, I can go a little deeper into the translations (because, let’s face it, my Old Norse isn’t good enough for that level of an in-depth take for this question).

The Ring in Chapter 7 and 8 of The Saga of Hrolf Kraki(5)

This particular passage is a bit too long for me to share it in full. I was tempted, but I don’t want any trouble coming my way from posting too much. That said, I’ll quote the important bits and summarize the rest:

“A ring owned by King Helgi was a widely famed treasure.”

—but his brother, King Hroar, wants it.

“I want the ring, the one that is the best treasure in your possession and that both of us would like to own.”

You’d think trouble would start here, but the brothers settle things amicably—that is, until this guy comes around:

“Next came the news that Jarl Saevil had died and that his son Hrok had then assumed rule. Hrok was a cruel and exceptionally greedy man.”

Remember the “exceptionally greedy” part for the end of my answer. It’s important. But anyway, he ends up being goaded by his mother (another large topic in Norse discourse) to demand a reward from King Helgi for helping him and his brother get vengeance for their father. The only problem? He’s ridiculous.

“He demanded a third of the Danish kingdom or the great ring.”

King Helgi tells him to f*** off. Of course he won’t give such a large slice of his hard-earned kingdom to this loser, but he also shrugs off the whole ring thing with a simple “my bro has it now.” So Hrok goes to Hroar next, obviously. Here’s how that one goes:

“The king responded, ‘I have given so much to get this ring that I will by no means part with it.’

Naturally.

Hrok said, ‘Then you must allow me to look at it, as I am very curious to know whether the ring is as much of a treasure as is claimed.’

Suspicious?

‘That is a small thing to do for you,’ said Hroar, ‘and I will certainly let you look at it.’ He then produced the ring for Hrok to see.

Bad move.

“For a while Hrok studied the ring, declaring finally that there was no possibility of exaggeration when describing it. ‘I have never seen a comparable treasure, and the reason you esteem the ring so highly is obvious. The best solution, it seems to me, is that neither of us, or, for that matter, anyone else should enjoy it.’ He then threw the ring as far out as he could into the sea.”

A bunch of violence, death, and vengeance follows. You know, the good stuff.

The Ring in Chapter 14 of The Saga of the Volsungs(6)

“Loki saw all the gold that Andvari owned. And after he had taken all of it, Andvari still had one single ring, and Loki took that from him as well. The dwarf then hid inside a stone and said that this ring and the gold would cause the death of everyone who owned it.”

In both cases, the ring in question is never explicitly said to be “worn on the finger.” That’s my (past) bad. But, to be honest, it doesn’t really matter here? If we put ourselves in a Norse mindset, a ring is a ring no matter where it is worn. Unless a specific placement is mentioned, I don’t think we’re supposed to care about that. What mattered more, I deem, was the material (gold vs silver), design (size and intricacy probably mattered), and source (i.e. former owner) of the ring.

As for the “important roles” they played in Norse legends, it kind of depends. Norse rings typically embody one’s status (wealth, resources, position) or social relationships (connections to other powerful people, places, etc.). In the case of the legends recounted above, however, they both act as symbols of greed (at the surface level); but there’s an important commentary being made when you put those two things together (aka look a bit deeper): the authors of these later medieval sagas used stories with old roots and objects everyone would be familiar with to show that these rings (and social structures) destroy bonds as much, if not more than, they create them.

But that’s just my personal take.

I hope that clears things up a little, though, my anonymous friend! If not, feel free to send another ask. There’s a lot to say about Norse rings, but I’d rather not write a giant essay all at once (anymore).

�� fjörn

Footnotes

To be clear, this word is used for literally anything ring-shaped.

This term, baugr, is usually used in the context of money, kings, and the ‘gift-giving’ economy. The function of a ring described with this particular word, then, is even more transactional. To share a quote from an article: “The term baugr proves the existence of a special type of fee or wage for particular persons who were retainers (and maybe poets?) of the king or ruler. The baugr itself was only awarded by the ruler himself.” See Antje Wendt, “Viking Age Gold Rings and the Question of ‘Gefolgschaft’,” Lund Archaeological Review 13-14 (2008): 75-90.

I say “not helpful” because this term, while interesting, is used far less often than the more common hringr or baugr.

For the ring in The Saga of Hrolf Kraki (chapters 7-8): “Helgi konungr átti hring…” and The Saga of the Volsungs (chapter 14) : “…er hann hafði fram reitt gullið þá hafði hann eftir einn hring…” Although I obtained these versions from an Icelandic site (snerpa.is), I think it still satisfies our needs for this discussion.

Jesse Byock trans., The Saga of King Hrolf Kraki (Penguin, 1998), 109-113 (chapters 7-8).

Jackson Crawford trans., The Saga of the Volsungs with The Saga of Ragnar Lothbrok (Hackett Publishing, 2017), 26 (chapter 14).

If I’m wrong about something, please call me out. Nicely, if possible—but always with sources.

Send Fjorn a tip for his toils?

[jellogram]

Evangelicals like to say that we should have the ten commandments taught in schools because it's "the basis for America's laws" but like. in what way. No really, let's dissect this statement. I have time.

You shall have no other gods before Me.

This contradicts the concept of religious freedom, which is enshrined in the constitution's bill of rights. One of the first laws ever made in this country was verbatim against this rule.

2. You shall not make idols.

See above. Also we literally have a whole singing competition about this!

3. You shall not take the name of the LORD your God in vain.

Very simple rule, very not illegal and never has been as far as I can tell.

4. Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.

This would actually be a nice one. Let's outlaw making minimum wage employees work on Sundays. Let's see if the evangelicals even want that to happen.

5. Honor your father and your mother.

This one's admittedly sort of a law, though not the way evangelicals intend it. Children have no rights and are at the whims of their parents 99% of the time. We'll call this one half credit for the evangelicals, even if the original rule didn't really imply the way its enforced.

6. You shall not murder.

Ding ding ding! That's a real law! However, it was a law before the commandments (see: the Code of Ur-Nammu, written centuries before Exodus)

7. You shall not commit adultery.

We do have laws against this, believe it or not. They used to be more common but nowadays only 17 states still have them and they are rarely enforced. When the law was adopted will vary from state to state, but it's definitely not a vital structural law in the US, which is their claim, so I'm not counting it.

8. You shall not steal.

See number 6.

9. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

Half credit on this one. Perjury is a crime, but evangelicals like to expand this commandment to cover all forms of lying and the legal system disagrees.

10. You shall not covet.

Come on now. Coveting is like, a core component of capitalism. The United States was, much like number 1, built on the opposite of this rule.

Final score: .5 + 1 + 1 + .5 = 3

So 30% of the commandments are even vaguely related to laws we have in the US, and that's being generous. Especially when just as many are blatant contradictions.

I think what this means is that evangelicals don't actually like, know anything. The commandments were the first rules they were ever taught as children and they were also taught that the United States is godly and holy, so clearly it must have been drawn from the world's sole source of godliness and holiness, the Bible.

[faux-ecrivain]

Welcome

Welcome, My Dearest Darlings, please enjoy your stay. This is a placeholder post, tomorrow I shall post something official. There will be rules for this blog, but I’m sure you’re big enough to handle them. Most of my posts will be yandere headcannons, stories, fanfics or blurbs. I can’t promise five star posting, but I can promise yandere that are obsessed with you! Kisses! 💋💋

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[Posting Schedule]

Sunday- 0 to 1 posts

Monday- 1 to 2 posts

Tuesday- 0 to 1 posts

Wednesday- 1-2 posts

Thursday- 1 post

Friday- 0 posts

Saturday- 1 to 2 posts

[This is my schedule, it may change but for the most part I will abide by this schedule.]

[Notice; Requests are open, if you want me to write a story, headcannon or Drabble then send in a request through the ask system.] [You have a high possibility of having your request accepted and then written, but please do not expect to be chosen and remember that I have every right to reject your request.]

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[Mutuals] @idanceuntilidie

@emxzz

@robarrazi

@i0could0think2b

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[Anons] (yes, I will do emoji anons) Anon 1

Anon 2 (Also known as 9 cat anon)

Anon 3

Anon 4 (Also known as najma anon)

Anon 5

Anon 6 (also known as Doll)

Anon 7

Anon 8 (also known as ૮₍ ˶• ༝ •˶ ₎ა anon)

Anon 9

Anon 10

Anon 11 (Henceforth referred to as Banana Bread Anon)

Anon 12 (._. Anon)

Anon 13

Anon 14

Anon 15

Anon 16

Anon 17

Anon 18

————- [Socials] Wattpad (@CuddleBuddy3) Quotev (https://www.quotev.com/ForgetfulFerret) Main Account (@circularcatinspace) ————

Masterlisturl (https://www.tumblr.com/faux-ecrivain/738086533063655424/masterlist?source=share )

————

The Rules

Do not spam requests, asks or comments.

I reserve the right to reject any requests that make me uncomfortable.

Do not share any personal information on this account, that means don’t share your name, address or anything similar in a request or comment. 

If you want to request something, or send in an ask, please offer details, such as pronouns, the setting, the year and basic info about your requested yan. (Eg; could you make a yan that hates their darling and only obsesses over them because they look like yan’s ex?)

I will not do smut, I can’t write smut and the most you’ll get is a suggestive tension. 

If you send in a request, ask or make a comment, and it has triggering content, please label it with the symbol TW.

Do not send any asks, requests or make any comments that contain derogatory remarks towards a certain group. (In simple terms; no bigotry, which means prejudices towards a certain group.)

Do not rush me, but do motivate me. (which means I accept compliments, analysis of my works and comments of a similar manner)

That’s all for now, more might be added later, remember rules are subject to change.  —————————————————-

[Fun Facts About Me]

I don’t like making grammatical errors, they are irritating and embarrassing (in my opinion). However, mistakes are part of life and I have to learn to how to move on. That said; if you do see some grammar mistakes please let me no and I’ll try to fix it. (Ugh, it’s embarrassing that I was born, and live in, Mississippi yet I make numerous grammatical errors. I’m so bad, most of the time, at English, it’s hilarious.)

I have a tendency to ramble, over explain and procrastinate. I can also appear quite pushy, this is probably because of some deep seated worry that I haven’t yet uncovered.

I love mysteries, they are my favorite genre and I especially love the femme fatale mysteries or mysteries with a female lead.(IE; Miss. Fisher’s Murder Mysteries, Murder She Wrote and there’s more but my mind is blank right now.)

I have a soft spot for cute fuzzy cats and I like taking photos of scenery that I believe to be beautiful.

Alice in Wonderland is one of my favorite books, it was a childhood favorite and it still is to this day. (The animate movie and the book are my preferred versions of Alice In Wonderland.)

—————————————————- (Below are some tags that may be used in future posts)

[astro-royale]

The Role of Planets

In astrology, different planets are believed to influence different phases of a person’s life. Here’s a simple breakdown:

1. Moon: It governs during our early years, from birth to about eight years of age.

2. Mercury: It rules during adolescence, roughly from 8 to 20 years old.

3. Mars: Governs our young age, from 20 to 32 years.

4. Venus: It rules over our young middle age, looking after you from 32 to 45 years.

5. Jupiter: Rules during your middle age, offering guidance from 45 to 60 years.

6. Saturn: This planet is like a guardian for your entire life, especially ruling during old age, which is beyond 60 years.

Source: https://karmaastro.medium.com/which-house-indicates-short-life-8033972aa8cf

[aspiringtrashpanda]

WHOOPS I GOT CARRIED AWAY WITH DAY 8 for @obeymetournaments' Obey Me! Month. Here's a little snippet, but read the full fic HERE!

Find the prompt list HERE.

── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ──

DAY 8 Prompt: Curse Featuring our favorite demon brothers, gender neutral MC and some good ol' fashioned Truth or Dare

The crackling fireplace was hot at your back, though you knew the sight before you was the source of the warmth in your chest. There were few things more comforting than lounging in the living room, in the presence of all seven of your housemates. The addition of a high stakes party game that even Lucifer and Satan agreed to join swelled your heart to the point of bursting.

“Okay!” Asmodeus clapped, his smile brighter than the fire in the hearth as he made himself comfortable on the carpet. “Does everyone know the rules?”

“What rules are there to know?” Not bothering to lift his head from his pillow, Belphie’s frame a lump breaking the uniformity of the circle in which everyone else sat, he drawled, “It’s truth or dare. You either answer truthfully or do something embarrassing.”

“I’m going to need you to dial up the enthusiasm, hon,” Asmo chirped, Belphie’s attitude failing to dampen his excitement. Beel’s brow creased in concern, and he leaned forward to peer at Belphie’s expression. When Belphie rolled his eyes, Beel offered him a spicy newt chip. 

Belphie accepted with a sigh. You didn’t miss the affection that softened Lucifer’s quiet observation from the armchair they had worked into their circle. 

“Besides, there is one rule,” Asmo held up a perfectly manicured index finger. You nearly flinched as his sunset eyes slammed into yours, a mischievous smirk all faux reassurance. “All seven of us have to go first before we get to ask our darling dove.”

“Huh? Why?” Mammon blinked, his expression mirrored on every other face in the room. You were confused, yourself. The group text message had implied that you would all be playing together. Oh no, was this about to get concerningly competitive? Or were they hosting an intervention about your recent obsession with otome mobile games? You’d been promised party games!

But Asmo eased your worries with a dazzling smile and a simple, “Because I want to ask them everything, which means all of you want to do the same, right?”

Devil crickets could be heard outside the windows. 

“I knew it!” With a wink your way that sent your heart spinning out in surprise, he declared, “It’s only fair that we all go first before we gang up on the cutest exchange student ever~”

Considering his words, you actually felt cool relief trickle down your spine, a delightful contrast to the warmth of the fireplace. “Thank you, Asmo. I think that’s a good plan,” You rolled your shoulders and shot your most innocent smile to the circle, “Now I get to watch all of you suffer for my entertainment.”

Levi squawked, his hands flying up to cover his face. Beel hummed something that sounded like cautious optimism, though perhaps you were confusing it with satisfaction from the freshly opened bag of spicy newt chips in his lap. Lucifer said nothing, appeared as indifferent as ever, which only made Satan straighten his posture and attempt to look just as unperturbed. 

His anxiety near palpable, Levi’s eyes narrowed towards the nondescript empty demonus bottle in the center of the ring. “But the curse is active, right?”

Satan nodded, “Yes, as long as you are touching the bottle.”

“Ain’t the bottle for 7 minutes in heaven?” Mammon scrunched up his nose. “I ain’t kissin’ any of ya.”

The resounding shouts functioned as both violent agreement and protest towards the audacity of the suggestion. You snickered under your hand, trying to hide your amusement. 

Asmo, however, shrugged. “It’s multi-purpose.”

Levi gasped, “A 2-in-one game pack.” 

There was a beat, a moment of hesitation hanging thick in a smog just above your shoulders, and then…

“So, no one can lie?” The reality seemed to hit Mammon all of sudden, fear lancing like lightning through his sapphire eyes. 

Lucifer pinched the bridge of his nose, “That is what a truth curse implies, yes.” 

“No more fussing!” Asmo’s teeth glinted, a dangerous grin cloaked in pink gloss, “It’s time to spill our secrets! Satan, truth or dare!”

The defeat in Satan’s shoulders made you chuckle. He reached forward to grab the bottle, which pulsed a soft blue in his hand. “Truth.”

“How cute do you think I am? ♡”

Satan frowned. Opened his mouth. Closed it. Shifted in his spot, a wildly confused yet simultaneously concentrated expression pinching his face. 

“Asmo, did you break him?” Beel mumbled, pausing his chewing. 

“Oh c’mon! He’s not supposed to be able to lie!” With a pout, Asmo threw his hands up in exasperation. 

You waited, glancing around at the concern sparking throughout the room. Levi was already searching how to break a truth curse on his D.D.D. Lucifer seemed entirely unbothered. Belphie had already fallen asleep. 

Satan finally spoke, “I genuinely do not have an opinion on the matter.”

The bottle shone a brighter shade. He shook it, “See? Not a lie.”

You patted Asmo’s shoulder sympathetically. He crossed his arms and muttered something about the game being rigged. He then gestured for Satan to continue. 

“Hm,” Satan beamed as he made eye contact with Lucifer, “Truth or dare?”

── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ──

✨FULL FIC HERE✨where you can KISS THE BROTHER OF YOUR CHOICE!!! OOOOOO!!! EXCITING!!!

OBEY ME! MONTH MASTERLIST

[torchship-rpg]

Dev Diary 9 - Harm & Healing

Space is dangerous. A huge portion of the rules space in Torchship is given over to various ways it can hurt you, but before we get there we have to establish how being hurt works, and how to get better after it happens. 

Harm and Healing is the first in a section called Detailed Systems, which is a catch-all section for systems which, while not foundational the way Core systems are, will still come up fairly frequently. The book ‘unspools’ in this way, starting broad and getting more specific as you go through chapters.

Of these, Harm is the one that will be most likely to come up for many people. 

Harm Tracks

Every character has four Harm Tracks on their character sheet, abstracting the various ways you can get messed up on your missions. You can, if you must, think of each slot on the track as a Hit Point for this sort of Harm. The track has 12 slots, but this is to account for characters who are tougher than average; most people only have 8-slot long Harm Tracks, and you shade out the parts you aren’t using.

However, if you’re playing a very tough alien, you might have more Injury tracks, while a Baseliner has a longer Toxicity track than their genetically-modified peers whose metabolisms run leaner. Conversely, some Traits will shorten your track instead; genetic Augments can end up with shortened Toxicity tracks, for instance. 

The four kinds of Harm all have slightly different effects and happen for different reasons, but follow the same basic mechanical rules in terms of how they are inflicted, recorded, and removed. They are:

Injury, for actual physical damage to your character. This is the one that can kill you directly, so its management is really important!

Stress, for the mental and emotional strain of the job. Stress is the easiest to take, and the easiest to remove, over the course of gameplay.

Radiation, recording the progress of radiation poisoning, should it happen. Radiation is unique in that you never take it directly from radiation sources; you always take it as Ongoing.

Toxicity, your body’s ability to handle potentially dangerous substances. This can track poisons, but is mostly used for restricting the amount of pharmaceuticals you can stuff in your body.

Taking Harm

Broadly speaking, you can take harm in two ways. The first is to take it directly, where you simply get told to fill in a number of spaces on the track.

That’s simple enough, but there’s a further twist. Every time you take Harm, you also have to roll something called a Shock Check, which is rolled using one of your Universal Abilities. Powering through Injury is a roll of Wild Animal, while keeping calm and collected after radiation exposure tests Cosmonaut. Failing has a variety of effects, but most put you temporarily out of action.

The second, and often much more dangerous, way you take harm is taking Ongoing Harm. Every hour in-game, you increase your Harm Track by the amount of Ongoing Harm you’re taking. That gives you some time to work with, enough to come up with clever solutions like the space cadets you are, but left untreated your Harm Track will fill up. Atop that, Ongoing still inflicts Shock Checks, so if you’re bleeding from Ongoing Injury, there’s a chance every hour you go into shock!

As you climb the tracks, you face increasing negative effects to your character. Injury is the most direct, inflicting increasing amounts of Disadvantage (we renamed Complications btw) and making your checks harder as you deal with the consequences. High Stress makes using Unity more expensive, which can hurt a lot given that Unity is one of the primary ways you remove Stress.

Finally, Toxicity and Radiation both have the same effect of downgrading your rolls on Checks, effectively representing the way the mounting illness and the accompanying psychological impact makes you less able to use the skills you have. Don’t worry though; 6s are always successes, no matter how bad it gets.

Filled Tracks

Once you fill your track, each one has a special penalty. For Radiation and Toxicity, you start taking Injury; this takes the form of untreatable Ongoing Injury for Radiation (you’ll need to lower your Radiation before you can heal it), while any further Toxicity you would take when the track is full just becomes Injury.

For Stress, a filled track means your character just can’t function anymore; they’re either panicking too badly to act rationally, or they’ve just shut down from the stress. Don’t worry; this is a good chance to take over an NPC using the B-Team rules until your character gets back on their feet.

When your Injury track fills up, you die. 

Healing

To avoid your tracks filling up, you need to use the Healing rules. Because Being A Doctor is a whole 1/8th of the character skill archetypes in the game, we made sure that doctoring has some teeth to it, same as filling out Investigation Checklists for researchers or hacking for Signals (we’ll get into that one next time we do a mechanics diary). You don’t just get to lay on hands and Cure Light Wounds (which would be very handy in a setting with lasers, where light can cause a lot of wounds) but rather you have to actually address the problem the way a doctor would.

Because of this, there are four ways that healing works in Torchship. Characters have a degree of passive healing that slowly removes Harm; it works on Stress and Toxicity automatically, heals Injury so long as you’ve gotten some treatment, and doesn’t do anything for Radiation.

Still, this is not really practical for most gameplay purposes, though it works a little better than in most games as you really can just quantum leap to another crewmember and leave Captain Archer recovering in his quarters. Fortunately, it’s the future, so faster healing is available.

Harm Stabilising is first aid, where you remove Ongoing Harm. When people have been hurt, especially in a mass casualty situation, this is the priority; prevent people from getting worse. This is done as a simple Check using the responder’s medical Tool dice pool; if you get at least 3 Passes (that’s successful dice rolls, we revised that language too) you remove 1 Ongoing, while further Passes remove more.

Stabilising is difficult, especially if the patient is in a bad way. It’s harder to do the more Harm Factors the patient is dealing with, and there’s a chance of inflicting more Harm if you mess it up. For that reason, it makes logical and mechanical sense to attempt some Harm Management before Stabilising. 

Management is what you do in the field to suppress the effects of Harm; it’s painkillers, anti-nausea drugs, and so forth. No Checks are needed; you simply take some medication, which is either the pre-designed stuff from your stockpiles, or custom Harm medication you crafted with the pharmaceutical crafting rules. You take some Toxicity from the drugs, and the Harm Factor effects are gone!

Harm Management suppresses penalties, but doesn’t actually remove Harm. Once the duration of the meds are up, the effects come back, and if you keep popping pills to stay functional you’ll reach max Toxicity in short order. You need to actually deal with the Harm directly, and that’s where Harm Recovery comes in.

Recovery is a Check you can perform on a patient after they have been Stabilised. Successes grant negative Ongoing Harm, healing the patient over the course of hours. You can’t go faster than that (yet), but getting somebody from the brink of death back to fully healthy in the space of eight hours is still pretty impressive! Every time you perform Recovery Treatment, the patient takes 1 Toxicity, so you may have to wait for their Toxicity to reduce before going on with it.

Death

As mentioned earlier, characters can die. Any character, not just the ones working in Security. Fortunately, it’s the future, which means that a lot of circumstances we might call Dead are, in fact, Only Mostly Dead.

Which means they’re a little bit alive.

Curing Death is a special Check that doctors can do which simply requires they roll as many Passes as the character has Injury. As this is going to be more than you can roll dice in most situations, you’ll need to get every advantage you can. With a specialised, emplaced tool for bringing back the dead, you can roll 8d6, which will be enough in most circumstances if every one is a Pass. That means you’ll need every scrap of Unity you can to reroll until you get it.

It also gets harder the longer somebody’s been dead. Having a frozen compartment on board (which you might, for smuggling things past tachyon sensors) also means you can keep a body on ice to buy you a few more hours; you can always build a freezer in an emergency. If you have Sleeper Pods aboard your ship, you can use the advanced cryogenic chambers to keep a character around indefinitely, until you develop the technology to bring them back.

Just remember to be waiting outside the pod in your weirdest clothes, ready to yell “WELCOME TO THE WORLD OF TOMORROW!”

[homestuckreplay]

Webcomics at Day 100 #5: Bob and George

Pages read: 4/1/2000 – 4/5/2002; 718 pages (including author’s commentary)

Reason for selection: Bob and George was a pioneer of the ‘sprite-based’ comic genre, where video game sprites (or custom sprites) are used in place of original character art to reduce the artist’s workload. B&G is also famously meta, almost entirely disregarding the fourth wall.

Original run: 4/1/2000 – 7/28/2007; daily updates with 2658 total pages. Completed before Homestuck began.

Content warnings: homophobia and mild ableism (comic), cultural insensitivity, centrism, and severe ableism (author’s commentary)

Overall thoughts:

‘Now, there is something to say of the nature of creativity. How creating a fictional world makes you akin to a creator god. You could say that, sure - if you were fucking nuts. It's a fucking story. It's not real. I don't give a fucking dick's shit how many readers there are, how fucking huge it is - every fictional world is exactly that, fictional.’ – John S.

‘The jokes are bad, the art is plagiarism, and I firmly believe the only people that can appreciate this comic are 14 years old or younger.’ – Cesar R.

Some people on the internet like to spend large amounts of time talking about things they hate, and both of the above quotes come from Bob and George reviews on blogs dedicated to discussing webcomics the authors think are bad. I don’t personally have much respect for the Avowed Hater, but I cannot express how much I love these quotes.

However. I think this webcomic rules.

Here’s a brief overview. David Anez invents two characters – the titular Bob and George – in middle school. Aged 20, at the turn of the millennium, he decides to make a webcomic about these characters, despite having no idea how to draw. He plans to start on April 1, 2000, but can’t source a scanner by then, so begins making placeholder comics using 8-bit and 16-bit sprites from Megaman games, telling a potential audience that the comic isn’t ready yet – meaning that from day one, Megaman knows that 1. he’s in a comic created by an author, and 2. he’s not supposed to be the main character.

Months later, Anez sources a scanner and begins to draw Bob and George. They’re two college aged brothers who are also a superhero-supervillain duo. By this point the strip already has readers, and they don’t like this format as much. It’s also more difficult for Anez to make, so he returns to the Megaman sprite comics, but also edits some sprites into representations of both Bob and George, who become characters transported to the Megaman universe from another dimension. The story cycles through ‘retellings’ of the first six Megaman games interspersed with original storylines, dimension hopping, time travel, predestination paradoxes, alternate versions of characters, fan created characters, at least two characters who are explicitly the author, and other characters reading the comic they’re a character in. It goes from a simple story about George passing the days at his summer job before college, to a huge, whirling, spiraling mess of continuity and temporality.

In July 2007, after just over seven years, Anez brings the story to a conclusion, goes through the archives to add author’s commentary to each and every strip, and then… disappears. He focuses on his day job and his wife, and he never does another internet project again.

I genuinely love amateur art. I think Anez can be too self-deprecating in his author’s commentary – because he’s right, the jokes can be repetitive and don’t always land, the hand drawn art is ridiculous, the characterization is inconsistent and the ideas are unoriginal, but art can be all those things and still be meaningful. ‘I could have made this’ should be a compliment. It should mean: this makes me think I could create; you have achieved something and have inspired me by doing so, because this is within my grasp, too.

Unlike Cesar R. above, I don’t think sprite comics are plagiarism – these are firmly transformative works. Anez rearranges the Megaman sprites, gives them dialog and puts them in situations, and recaps and expands on the game storylines. He credits Capcom with the sprites’ creation, and wrote a homage to the games, not a substitute for them. However, due to the copyright issues, sprite comics are famously un-monetizable. Some original-art comics were occasionally able to turn webcomics into income, but even when Bob and George was at its peak of 25,000 daily site visitors, Anez wasn’t able to sell character merchandise or books and could only source small donations via PayPal. In this way, he sits among hundreds of big name fans who have created wildly popular fanfiction and fanart that’s almost entirely unpaid labor.

Anez’ author’s commentary is sometimes highly problematic but gives fascinating insights into his process. On October 19 2001, Anez included the Author - an established character - in the day's comic, wearing a helmet for the first time. In the author's commentary, he states that 'the Helmeted Author was never intended to be a new character' and that the helmet's inclusion was necessary due to artistic limitations with the sprites. However, the Helmeted Author stuck around and became a separate and important character. Similar instances recur in the commentary, where an accidental continuity error or an out-of-character moment ends up being folded into the overall story, becoming smooth and seamless in retrospect despite being entirely unplanned. It’s an open and honest look into how serial narratives work in practice.

An ice cream joke followed immediately by a self-deprecating joke is pretty standard issue for this drivel. Seriously, look at yourself. You're reading a sprite-based webcomic with Megaman characters, and they were just arguing about the merits of ice cream. I can't believe you read this stuff. Hell, I can't believe I wrote it. That being said, it's a fun way to waste your time, isn't it? – David Anez (author’s commentary for 10/23/2001)

Relevance to Homestuck: [ooc – vague spoilers for the entirety of Homestuck]

Bob and George feels like a rough draft for a LOT of things Homestuck would end up doing in (relatively) more artful, complex ways. It’s often painfully explicit about what it’s doing, hammering its own themes and experiments into the ground via the small amounts of dialog there’s space for instead of advancing a plot – but it’s the earliest webcomic I’ve personally looked at that’s actually testing what the medium is capable of. Anez begins with a simple four-panel strip, and primarily sticks to this style throughout, but from early on he thinks that some strips would look better animated and that the fourth-panel punchline format is a ‘severe restriction’, especially with battles.

As time goes on he begins to experiment with art size, style and aspect ratio, animate part or all of some strips, include interactive strips where readers can click through the panels at their own pace, and include panels in the wrong orientation or that aren’t physically connected as they should be – all elements that would become hallmarks of Homestuck. Characters even comment on the change in panels, and in art style (such as their own change from 8-bit to 16-bit to 32-bit sprites). In commentary for July 2nd 2001, Anez says, ‘I suppose these comics are my non-animated contributions to the infinite canvas nature of webcomics, huh?’

B&G never reaches the extremes of Homestuck, but it’s still a multimedia story. It recaps its own storylines, celebrates its own anniversaries, and folds fan contributions into its main arcs. Prominent fan creators have custom sprites made of them which are included in panels, including the Second Party arc, where a character ‘interviews’ fancomic creators and references their work and their activity in the forums and chatrooms. As such, to have a complete understanding of B&G, it’s necessary to also read prominent fanworks, and to understand its surrounding community – much of which is no longer archived. ‘Subcomics’ are differentiated and elevated from officially-hosted ‘fancomics’ which are again differentiated from fancomics which didn’t make the cut, and a hierarchy based on official recognition is born in the community, not unlike the elevation of Homestuck fanartists to official contributors.

B&G is similar to Homestuck in themes as well as form. From early on it asks questions about the meaning of ‘reality’ and an ‘official’ or ‘canon’ timeline, and explores ideas of what it means to have free will (or not) when you’re a character in a story, you know what’s going to happen next, you’ve met the guy who wrote it, and that guy may or may not be dead. It’s about physically two-dimensional characters who are in both a video game and a comic, and continually blurs the boundaries between those mediums. In both comics, an author – born in 1979 – has grown up witnessing the birth of technology that is going to change everything about how the world operates and break down our interactions with physical space and time, and they’ve made weird, longform, and often technically ‘bad’ art exploring what that means. These comics are holding hands as two links in a chain of a broader artistic movement.

Continue reading? I cannot WAIT to read the rest of Bob & George.

[yiga-hellhole]

TFTK CHAPTER 18: RECONAISSANCE WITH THE TWILIGHT KING

hello again everyone! sorry for the delay of the chapter illustration, Yuga took the forefront for a moment there. you understand. anyhow! shorter chapter this time. many thanks to @bulgariansumo and @orfeoarte for giving this chapter the once-over, and of course, to everyone for reading!

Ganondorf receives a visitor.

ao3 mirror

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13

The land of Hyrule had always been an isolated country. Steeped in self-righteous legends, of Creation myths and earth-shaking tyranny. It was the World’s holy ground as much as it was avoided as though plague-ridden and abandoned. For in being blessed by the Goddesses, so too was it cursed. By holding the world’s greatest source of power, conflict drew to it like moths to a flame. The Triforce did corrupt. Under the weight of the responsibility thrust upon it, the Royal Family of Hyrule was no exception to this. Time and time again, they would buckle, either under the weight of their hubris, or torn down when too weak to defend against those seeking its boons. Each time its end threatened to draw near, its Arbiter would be born, together with a Hero to fight them, and the Maiden as their mediator. This was a feud that would never end. One of greed, of cruelty inflicted under Holy name, and a Cycle of retaliation that had spiraled on since the very dawn of time.

In short, Hyrule was the tabletop of the Gods, where virtue and vice were ripped from mortal bodies by the tendon. 

Surrounding countries simply watched, hoping that the next Cycle would be as merciful as the last. Each of them prayed that the fickle Empire would once again uphold the status quo and keep their lands from ruin.

This vapid comfort was no longer. As if all the world had drawn a bated breath, it all bursted out in fraught cries. All ruling creeds, be it kingdoms or counties, scrambled to commune with either side of the war. For the first time in centuries, the Triforce had fallen into the hands of the Demon King. Something as simple as a wish exploded the world into a flurry of letters, laughably spewed forth from every corner, to beg for mercy. Sending a piece of parchment was far easier than crossing into actively hostile territory, certainly. Much less to fall to one’s knees and grovel before the deadliest man currently alive! The cowardice of it all annoyed Ganondorf, but he was glad for it all the same. Such pitiful displays of royal visitation would stop being amusing after mopping up the drool, tears, and blood of, give or take, the fifth diplomat.

The Hyrule Royal Family, and their commanders with them, predictably withdrew into hiding. Given the circumstances, though, surrendering immediately would have been a far more logical approach. With the current state of their army, any struggle was only procrastination of the inevitable execution. After suffering a crushing defeat, their pieces of the world’s most prized artifact were now seized by their fated nemesis. 

Said nemesis, too, sat in his office chair, laying surprisingly low. Hyrule Castle was not yet seized and would not be for some time. Ganondorf looked up from his stacks of correspondence, his gaze straying to his left hand. Ever since completed, the mark of the Triforce had been resting visibly on his palm, glowing persistently. Reclaiming the piece of Power had felt natural, or at least, like something that belonged. Every incarnation before him had possessed it, falling only into the collective hand of Cialana in this era. As for why this injustice had occurred, he couldn’t know. It didn’t matter either way. The magic of his birthright had returned to him all the same.

He’d had no trouble growing accustomed to this. The arcane had no secrets left to keep from him; it’d simply been a matter of adjusting to his greater strengths, honing the claws he’d grown. His success in Hyrule Field was a testament to the importance of this thorough preparation. Now bearing two more shards, each unfamiliar to him, he knew he could not afford to cut corners. With his new powers came new insights, some of which informed, inversely, about their risks. The truth of the matter was that there was much to be done once he established his kingdom amidst the carrion of Hyrule. Should he use the full potential of the Triforce now, he would not be able to predict its effect on him. The ancient, dark forces that dwelled deep within him were well within his control now, but should they be fed any more…

He did not fear it. Caution simply had to be taken. The ghostly whisper, elusive and chiming like a bell, that slipped in between every conscious thought, could not be left unattended. The Triforce yearned to be used, to fulfill his wish, and coaxed and purred for it insistently. It wasn’t meant to dwell in the mind for long – but Ganondorf was no mortal man. He would make it wait.

His other Kingly duties, however, were of a more timely sort. Even domestically, he had his hands full with governesses who demanded the most up-to-date state of affairs that he could divulge. Not to mention the political promises he’d made for his lieutenants, which still needed attending. As loyal as they were to him now, soon, they would come to demand their own fattened seats among the oceans of spoils. Such was the nature of war. But unlike other royals, he had more than mere advisors to depend on. Those scheming lot often had their own selfish goals hidden behind their backs. No, he had a far more dependable source to fall back on. He carried the accumulated knowledge of dozens of Demon Kings before him, deep within his soul.

A knock at the door interrupted his train of thought. It snapped him back to a present reality, where his quill spilled a fat drop of ink on a document he still debated on signing. He bid whoever waited outside to enter, rubbing his brow with budding exasperation.

Slipping his way in through the door, clutching a stack of documents to his chest, was Zant. He waited not a moment to dawdle and went straight to his desk, prattling away. “If I might have just a moment of your time, King Dragmire. Our mail couriers are swamped with work, as you know, and there are quite a few letters I wish to discuss with you.”

Ganondorf raised a brow at his bold, blabbering approach, but allowed him his whims. Placing his quill in its holder, he straightened in his seat to meet the Shadow Lord at near-eye level. “Speak. It must be urgent, for you to disturb me in such haste.”

“Well, Master. To start, the War has been getting quite the attention from overseas,” Zant announced, dropping meticulously re-folded envelopes on the desk with the rest of them. He chose the top-most to review, handing it to him for perusal. “We have received correspondence with the Duke of Tarn. I found it quite a promising offer – enough grain to fill our stocks for months to come, in exchange for peace. Of course, I would make no such drastic diplomatic decisions without your input, Sire.”

Ganondorf took the proffered letter and began skimming it with a nudge of his spectacles. Tarn… From his own few centuries of lingering in this world, such a place left little impression on him. Further down, however, something reflexively growled at the name. The unraveled threads of a past self for a moment braided together, clinging fiber to fiber to once again take to the lectern. What spewed forth was incoherent, but gnashed its teeth, growled with naught but grudge and disdain. Affronted not by a betrayal, but abandonment much more cold and mundane. 

Ganondorf could hazard a guess. Wrapping these threads back around their spool, he banished that building inherited rage, and considered his judgment, “A promising offer indeed,” he proclaimed, his eyes trailing over the curling letters out of meditation. Not to read, per se. Perusing the words was no longer necessary; he’d made up his mind. That state was one of many to have wronged him and those following him in the exact same way. Zant needed not to be lectured, they were similarly motivated men, after all. 

But he could do with a reminder. “I have but one question. Where was this Tarn when the women of my tribe were being slaughtered, mere centuries past? Punished for the mere crime of survival. Did they not stand idle when we required their aid? Yet, now that we pose a military threat, they come to me on their knees, begging to be spared?”

Zant’s expression darkened. Watching it be carelessly flicked back across the desk, he took the envelope, folding it back to its former state. Just like Ganondorf expected, he understood. “... As you say, Master.”

Furrowing his brows, the Gerudo reclined, perusing the map to trail back his fragmented memories. It was difficult not to burn bridges, but Zant ought to walk out the door with at least some positive correspondence. He raised his face again, which Zant met with his own gaze reflexively. “By any chance, have we received correspondence from the Zuna?”

Zant perked up, immediately picking up his stack to sift through the envelopes. Impressively so, he seemed to have memorized the wax seals. He plucked out a single envelope and held it out. “Indeed we have. They offer us an initial deposit of one-hundred tons in milled ore, paired with shared access to their mines, asking for our protection and mercy in return.”

Ganondorf raised his brows again, reviewing the contents of the message himself. The offers were relayed to the letter, along with some other favors that were perhaps less monumental, but still to appeal to him as King. 

He nodded briskly and handed the letter back to him. “The Zuna were most charitable to the Gerudo prior to my banishing in the age of Twilight, as you may recall. Accept their terms.”

A smile returned to Zant’s face, who looked greatly pleased. As if he had any choice but to be. “I will have it signed, Sire… Though, do you not think it would make these new compatriots, shall I say, nervous, to see their neighbors slaughtered?”

“Either that, or it will prove to be a lesson,” Ganondorf growled, but in his ponderings, his eyes strayed back to that letter from Tarn. He slid it back before him and unfolded it, before snatching his quill back out of its holder, and dunking it in the inkwell. Paper nearly bled under the scratch of his nib. “As an alternative, I say we increase the grain offer and demand a sum of their soldiers to fight alongside us as we take over Hyrule. Perhaps we will not attack them outright, but they will not escape this war without loss. Such is the price I demand for their negligence when we required their aid.”

Zant nodded, retreating his hands into his sleeves in his usual fidget of excitement. “An excellent arrangement, indeed.”

The corner of Ganondorf’s lips crooked into a grin at his praise. None of his lieutenants were short on compliments. Frankly, most of it slipped past his notice these days. Yet, sitting across him, filing through these letters, something struck him as peculiar. Ganondorf set his quill back in its rest and leaned back, forcing their gazes to lock so he could pry about. “... I must express my surprise, Zant. I did not expect the man who so swiftly conquered all of Hyrule in cold blood to be so concerned with peaceful negotiations.”

Zant narrowed his eyes, bearing a somewhat wistful, bittersweet expression. He sighed, his once happily twiddling hands now falling limply by his sides. “Such negotiations were commonplace in the Palace of Twilight, Master, and I’ve grown to be proficient in them. Resources were scarce, and to divide them fairly among our people was a sensitive affair. When you are so few, you simply cannot risk war, lest every House tear itself to the ground.” Zant paused for a moment, wrenching himself free from their mutual gaze to glare down at the map. The ferocity with which he eyed down the depiction of Hyrule Castle could have burned holes in the parchment. “I did not deem Hyrule deserving of those mercies, as it was the reason the scarcities existed in the first place.”

Ganondorf grunted in return. So, an odd sense of mercy yet lingered in that broken mind. For all his eccentricities, he made for a fine tactician, indeed. His curiosity now satisfied, he allowed the both of them a slight smile and reached out, palm upturned, for his next letter. Zant took not a moment’s rest and orated every last offer that he held in his hands, for them to scrutinize and entrap in their final verdict.

After falling into a short silence, the cracking of a wax seal shattered Ganondorf’s line of thought with a single pop. His eyes widened, staring down at his desk in perturbed silence. In the almost automated rhythm of their negotiations, as natural as they were like the ebb and flow of the sea, Ganondorf had failed to notice they breezed through the stacks of correspondence Zant brought along. And now, the Twilight King took the liberty of taking their next task from the pile Ganondorf had lain there for himself. 

How long had he been doing that? How many had he already taken, browsed, and picked apart right under his nose? Ganondorf looked up after composing himself, staring up at the one across his desk. The moon that pulled at his waves, but now left them in a sudden harsh standstill, looked back at him curiously, cocking his head. 

Wordlessly, he took the envelope from Zant’s hand, who let it slip through his fingers as if it’d turned to dust before him. Ganondorf eyed him suspiciously, before turning his attention to the piles of correspondence and the freshly opened envelope now in his hands. Losing control over a situation, as harmless as it may have seemed, was unheard of to the Demon King. Let alone in his own office. He cared not for if Zant intended to do so – it was an affront. He knew the man to be careful and explicit in his words, as much as it contrasted with the way he carried himself in battle. As such, he could only come to one troubling conclusion. 

Zant had sensed a moment of weakness and slipped by on purpose. 

Setting down the envelope, Ganondorf leaned back in his chair and beckoned him. “Come hither.”

Zant’s expression did not change. Perfectly on command, he stepped on over to stand by his side, interrupting his stare only to blink. 

When Ganondorf’s hand reached for him, he flinched some, his glazy pupils darting between the approaching palm and his Master’s face. Yet he did not recoil, only squinted his eyes shut with a peep when broad fingers slipped under the edge of his coif. With the leathery fabric gradually tugged down to bundle at the base of his neck, his ears flopped free, sticking out between meticulously cut locks. 

As he remembered, one of those ears was significantly shorter. Ganondorf’s eyes strayed to the pale blue scar tissue that besmirched the Twili’s right ear.

Feeling his stare trying to capture him Ganondorf addressed him, nodding toward his injury. “Does this ail you, still?”

“No, Sire. It has healed splendidly.”

Ganondorf hummed in return, withdrawing his hand from the bunched-up fabric at his neck. “You took my warning seriously. Your efforts at Hyrule Field did not go unnoticed, Zant.”

A brief smile flashed across his face, but Zant’s expression soon turned blank. His ear twitched a moment in his consideration. “I would have been a fool not to, Sire. I believe I am many things, but a fool, I am not.”

Zant spoke with the cadence of telling a joke, but his face showed no tellings of a smile. A sense of unease bristled the hairs on the back of his neck, leading Ganondorf to consider the events of that day again. There was no mistaking it – facing off against Princess Zelda, Zant was at a disadvantage at every front, but still he prevailed.

No matter how reserved he was, Zant never disobeyed a command. Ganondorf simply had to look into his words carefully. Resting his chin on his knuckles, he inquired. “I have been toying with an idle curiosity since that day, Shadow Lord Zant. How did you defeat her? When we saw her magic rain from the sky, we were certain you had perished.”

“I took some inspiration from an old friend, is all,” Zant grinned, lacing his fingers together in a talkative gesture. “Perhaps you would find the method dishonorable, but faced against such a foe, I could not exactly play fair.” 

He was being vague... Ganondorf growled. “Cease your colorful language.”

“A blight, Master,” He blurted out after a beat of silence. “A withering curse. After I infected the Princess with it, I only had to beat her in a battle of endurance. The arrows were her last resort, and I simply dodged out of their way. I struck her down mere seconds after.”

Ganondorf hummed, the skin of his cheek denting under the pressure of his knuckles. With how the Princess looked last he saw her, Zant appeared to be telling the truth. 

“I no longer concern myself with matters of ‘honor’, not since Hyrule has abandoned all of theirs,” the Demon King grumbled, waving his hand dismissively. “You fought well. Nothing more than that is expected from you. Ah… You may fix yourself,” he muttered, gesturing for the coif still bunched around Zant’s neck.

Zant perked up at this command and set off to tend to himself, tucking his hair and ears back into place. His headdress now properly framing his head, the Twili peered at him with what would be expectation, but…

Not a single emotion could be read in those eyes. It was the same empty, invasive stare that bored into him when he gave him the very scar he just hid away. His sword carved through skin and cartilage like paper, and Zant hadn’t so much as flinched. The same man who cried and yelped as freely as he breathed stood dead-silent before him, blood running down his cheek. His golden eyes quietly filled with tears but his gaze was piercing and unrelenting. They only parted from him for a moment to glance at the dismembered piece of flesh as his Master tossed it on the ground beside him.

When Ganondorf dismissed him, he spoke not a word. The Lord of Shadows bowed at the waist, turned, and slipped right out of the tent. Only when he left did the torches in the room stop shuddering, and burned brightly as normal.

There was something deeply wrong with the lieutenant. Not in the way that typically defined a madman, for he wore those telltale signs on his sleeve, plainly for all to see. No, it was in these quiet moments that Zant’s behavior began to unsettle him. His co-lieutenants had a particular spark in their eyes; one of admiration and unwavering loyalty. Zant lacked it thoroughly. Once, that very first day, it glittered with promise in those amber globes, and he did not recall when exactly it disappeared. But his eyes were not empty. On the contrary. When their eyes locked, it felt like there were two sets staring back.

Ganondorf didn’t fear him, no. Since acquiring his new power, not even the passing worry he once had dared to rear its head anymore. Zant simply was not to be trusted. Certainly, he was a fine addition to his army. Among all of them, the Twili was the most cunning. A deeply learned man on all fronts, he bore knowledge rarely rivaled by others not yet in their third decade. Each time they shared a space, he so freely shared his pearls of wisdom with his Master without the slightest complaint. Yet, all the time they spent, sharing tales of justice and diplomacy, made Ganondorf all the more aware of his many flaws. He was fickle, easily distracted, and, hidden behind a gentle smile, deftly manipulative. 

Those vices were contagious to the rest of his men. Ghirahim in particular seemed susceptible to him. The trouble he’d given him at his recruitment turned to blind loyalty nauseatingly quickly. Once, Ganondorf doubted him, thinking that his flattery and devotion were a trick to worm under his skin. But as he’d proven to him, Ghirahim clung to him like a dog would its Master. Dedication so obsessive that it bordered on the selfish, he had long abandoned the thought that the sword spirit was in any way the ringleader of this bout of frivolity. All signs pointed to the one standing by his side, peering outside like it was his first time seeing the sun. So long as those hands were occupied by their present worship, Zant was meek as a kitten, eager for his praise and happy to serve. Ganondorf had no interest in discovering whether his fragile mood would one day shatter and make an enemy of him, instead. 

Running his fingers through his beard, Ganondorf turned back to the matters on his desk. A low grumble escaped him as his eyes wandered to the map. Many preparations were still in order: frontlines to secure; resources to manage; alliances to forge. He wondered what shreds of them he could still thrust into the hands of the man beside him.

Zant watched his machinations in silence for a while, until he realized Ganondorf paid him no mind any longer. Hands clasped behind his back, he retreated, opting instead to linger by the window and gaze out toward the training fields.

There was no denying it. Among the lieutenants, they stuck out like sore thumbs. Zant and Ghirahim were loyal, and even if they hadn’t been, they were no threat to him. But slithering as a viper under the grass, beyond their assigned duties, the party enjoyed one too many ambitions that strayed them from their path. Perhaps they were under the impression they were acting in secrecy, but it was not so. Ganondorf was perfectly aware of their little escapades. Wandering off like squabbling children was one thing, but to do so behind his back, where he knew not where they lingered… Whether it was an attempt at sabotage was irrelevant. Their disobedience was enough to draw his ire, to whittle away his trust. 

Ganondorf’s fingers curled around the armrests of his seat, its wood creaking ever so slightly under his grip. Yes, he was certain of it now. He had no need for these boys any longer. His power was greater than ever, and what he himself could not do, his remaining lieutenants would serve him well. 

One last mission. They were to chip away at the Hyrule’s bastions, before enemy troops would ultimately overwhelm the pair of exiles and release him of their burden. Ganondorf deployed them in such a way before, he recalled. They failed him then, and they would fail him now.

And should they succeed in their defense, he would do away with them himself.

When he looked up from his ponderings to turn back to Zant, he met with golden pupils that had long been staring at him. 

If he had the nerve to suspect his King, enough to be emboldened into such an accusing gaze, he had another thing coming. Zant’s life was in his hands, his to command – he had known this since he first ripped his soul from the Quiet beyond, and had no right to protest it now. 

Ganondorf would punish him as he saw fit. And so, he beckoned him over. “There is one final matter I will discuss with you, Zant.”

Zant’s expression grew ever so slightly colder, but he approached without hesitation nonetheless, joining closely by his side. “Of course.”

Carefully setting his previous commitments aside, Ganondorf cleared the surface of the map on his desk. Zant closely followed his every move as his finger slid across the grid. Now was the right time to ease some of his lingering worries, and take care of some other problems, in one fell swoop. 

“As of now, the war is at a standstill. But soon, Hyrule will come looking for me. Their first target will be our base of operations at Gerudo Palace, and we cannot let them raze it to the ground.” Pausing for a moment, he glanced over his shoulder to see his lieutenant still attentively clinging to his every word. “I intend to send you and Ghirahim to stop their advance. The Desert is our home. Since I enlisted you both to reclaim it, I will trust none other to defend it during our final stand. With Hyrule’s troops then occupied, I will seize their Castle, and all of the lands will be ours.”

Zant paused. His intrigued expression turned blank until he withdrew into silent contemplation. “Understood. We will not disappoint you, Master.”

If there was anything more telling of Zant’s character than his nearly constant shouting, it was his silence. Ganondorf took note of the tone in the Twili’s force. Coldly compliant, hiding something bitter underneath. Something hesitant. For a mission so crucial, he could not use hesitation. At this stage, the urge to struggle bordered on the stubborn. On refusal. This he would not accept. If anything bothered the lieutenant, he would let him stew in it, if only to make it more difficult for him to deny his reluctance. 

Ganondorf sat back in his chair, reclining with his eye on the map, before interrupting the silence with a demand of his attention. “You seem displeased.”

There – Zant swallowed a moment, averted his eyes. It was subtle, but his conflict was there. Zant responded. “There is simply the matter of Ghirahim, Sire. Hearing that he will once again be parted from you in such a climactic moment… It will surely break his heart.”

Now that he did not expect! Ganondorf burst into laughter; a cold and mocking sound, heard only by the last lingering punters at the gallows. “Spare me. Break his heart? He does not have one.”

Zant stood and watched him laugh, grinning softly himself. But it was an empty one. “... Of course not. Nothing more than a figure of speech, Master.”

“You indulge him too much, Zant. I’ll not tolerate any more weakening of his spirit. Or must I discipline him again?”

He responded a little too quickly. “That will not be necessary. Our Blade is sharp and strikes true. He will not fail what he is made for.”

Ganondorf leaned back in his chair, narrowing his eyes as he judged his expression. Again an alarming itch in the back of his mind urged him to put him back in his place. Zant stared back unmovingly but flinched at his next words. “And this is your promise to make?”

Face downcast, the lieutenant pondered for a moment, before answering with a determined clench of his lips. “Perhaps not. But I am confident that he will listen to me.”

“Then you shall be my conduit to him,” Ganondorf said, rising from his chair, it whining in protest under his massive frame. His fingers found the sharp slope of Zant’s chin and tipped his head back, forcing them back into a stare piercing enough to make their ears ring. “I expect nothing but carnage from him. Feed his bloodlust, perhaps then will he abandon his wretched drive to be my lapdog.”

Zant blinked up at him, for a moment frozen in place. Light poured in through the windows just darkened by his towering shadow, catching blushing-pink strands in his rosewood locks. Wide-set eyes soon narrowed, and squinted under the grin that stretched across his face. For the first time that day, Zant smiled at him genuinely, giggling with what could only be bubbling excitement over the death he would soon spread. Still laughing, the pallid creature nigh cuddled up in his robes and raised a hand to lay it over the one cradling his chin. Affectionately, he cupped it, and pressed a kiss to the jewels on his Master’s rings.

“I promise you just that, Your Majesty,” he tittered. His eyes, having closed in his act of worship, fluttered back open. The Triforce on his palm glittered golden in his pupils.

“Then you are dismissed.”

Relinquishing his grip on his left hand, Zant gave him one more broad grin, the slits at the corners of his mouth tugging and fluttering. He bowed at the waist and retrieved what little he had left to sign from the desk, then briskly made his way back over to the door.

Only to then be startled by a sudden knock. Both men perked up, one more caught off guard by the other. Already on his way out, Zant peered through the opening.

“Zant? You’re here,” inquired a feathery voice beyond the door. 

The makeshift doorman seemed equally pleasantly surprised. “Yuga,” he exclaimed. “You have returned to work already? Well, I should not pry.”

Doubtlessly already shooed out of the way by a burning glare, Zant somewhat nervously looked back into the room. Suddenly, the imposing man from earlier vanished entirely, instead making place for the skittish young apprentice that stood waiting for his approval now. 

Ganondorf couldn’t help a chuckle at the sight. He nodded, gesturing for his new guest. One lieutenant made room for the other, and in entered Yuga, his approach announced by one more tap than usual. He bound his way to him on crutches, each painted flashily – no doubt in his spare time. 

“Oh, that boy,” he huffed. “He’s been buzzing about the Temple all day. A smart one, he is, but I swear he’ll be the death of me!”

Ganondorf chuckled warmly, not quite yet meeting eyes with the man across his desk. He knew if he would, he wouldn’t be able to escape his gaze for quite some time. Dipping his quill in its ink, he took one last document in front of him, and signed. 

“Not to worry. He will not.”