#still... somewhat of a happy ending

[shikan0in-heizou]

i love him so much

[deus-and-the-machina]

I caught up to the oshi no ko manga recently and can I say whatever aquakane has going on is fucking insane good lord. Not platonic not romantic but a secret third thing (fake dating to “I have feelings for you” “I have feelings for you too” *narrator voice* the feeling was friendship to willing to commit a murder so the other won’t return to a spiraling revenge quest, a murder she was 100% down with since the moment it was implied to complicated exes but goddammit I still see through your bs and care about you idiot I’m gonna ruin your clearly self saboteering revenge quest and also it’s all super ace coded)

[just-a-girl-with-a-pistol]

Uni stuff though, have roland and wife

[forcedhesitation]

*wheeze* slowly, but surely, working on art of them all

[drivestraight]

chapter 4 will be posted this weekend/after the race i think 🥹

[fiepige]

Hobie Brown variant OC:

I finally decided to make Symbiote!Hobie (nicknamed SH by Hobie, which over time turned into Sage) his own thing, cause I've made so many changes to him that I've decided he's just gonna be another version of Hobie from another dimension.

I basically came up with him when thinking about what it would take for Hobie to truly bond with a symbiote and this is what I came up with.

While he's technically Hobie too I'm gonna refer to him as Sage in this post to avoid confusion <3

Gonna start with his appearance and then move on to his origins and how he got involved with the Spider-Society:

Disclaimer: I cannot draw so I haven't even attempted at drawing his face cause I know I'd never be able to draw him in a way I'd like- So I did the next best thing:

(He has a normal face I just tried to find a way for me to draw him without drawing his face lol)

Pictured above is Sage and his symbiote K.A.T (and their symbiote form- yeah it's the same as Venom!Hobie cause I like the design lol)

He looks like Hobie but younger- he's around 11 when he's bitten by the spider and fused with K.A.T - he's around 12 when he gets introduced to the Spider-Society

He's got short hair as it was completely shaved off when he got caught by Oscorp - more about this under his origins - he wants to let it grow out after meeting Hobie and being inspired by his approach to his looks (he really looks up to Hobie but don't tell anyone I said that!)

His left iris is white as a result of the symbiote DNA being fused to him. He can make it match his right eye if he concentrates but only really bothers to do so if he feels it draws too much attention

After meeting Hobie he helps Sage get a few piercings of his own

He usually wears a hoodie and/or a mask to hide his face - he's super paranoid and does his best to hide himself from others

Never goes anywhere without his noice cancelling earmuffs - he's got enhanced senses due to his spider powers but they can be a bit of a nuisance since he's also sensitive to loud noises due to his symbiote...

He also usually wears sunglasses to shield himself from sensory overload as he was subjected to it a lot as part of the experiments he was put through at Oscorp - and thus getting his senses overstimulated can result in panic attacks, so he does what he can to avoid it + it hides his eyes as well

K.A.T (Killing Authority-opposing Targets) is Sage's symbiote

It usually stays hidden unless they're alone or around people they trust/already knows about its presence.

If it does show itself it'll usually stay on Sage's shoulder or sit in his lap, it's still tethered to him so it can't go that far without him - not that it really wants to anyways

The reason K.A.T takes this form is that Sage is a cat person and it used it as a method to make him like it more when they first "met" + petting it helped Sage calm down and still does

K.A.T is still made of the same goo as regular symbiotes so it does not feel like petting a cat at all- Sage doesn't mind but most other people get suprised when they first touch it

If it likes someone it'll rub itself against their legs and mimic purring noises - if it dislikes someone it'll hiss and arch its back at them

K.A.T is a more animalistic symbiote and mainly communicates with Sage by letting him feel its emotions instead of speaking to him

To avoid making the post even longer than it's already gonna be I'll link to this post where I go into more detail about the design of thier Symbiote form instead of describing it here too ^^'.

This was originally supposed to be a short summary but I've realised I'm incapable of making short posts when it comes to stuff like this:

Origin:

Sage is a younger version of Hobie Brown. (11 years old when bitten by the spider and fused with his symbiote)

Sage and K.A.T "met" at one of Oscorp's labs

He was living as a homeless kid (having escaped an abusive household a few months prior)

He was bitten by a radioactive spider while looking for a place to spend the night.

He got very sick from the bite and was easily captured by Oscorp goons looking for new test subjects in the streets

Despite his young age Sage is a more ruthless Hobie variant, in part due to his upbringing and due to his symbiote (and the trauma they both go through at the hands of Oscorp)

K.A.T was a new kind of experimental symbiote that was set to be terminated due to it killing all its previous hosts - Sage was their last attempt at fusing it with someone

They decide to fuse it with Sage as he was deemed indisposable due to him seeming more dead than alive - suffering from the venom of spider bite at the time - and thus it wouldn't be a problem if the symbiote killed him too

Since the spider bite was still changing his DNA as he got fused with K.A.T some of its DNA got fused with him as well as a "side effect" during the process

Due to this it's incredibly hard (if not impossible) to seperate the symbiote from Sage without severely hurting them both

His body develops organic web shooters when it fuses with K.A.T - the webs are black and can be shot from either of his 4 arms when in his symbiote form (they can also be shot regularly while in his human form)

Sage develops enhanced senses and a taste for human flesh after being fused with K.A.T - he also has enhanced senses from the spider bite - making it easy to overstimulate his senses and overwhelm him before he learns to get it more under control

Since Sage's gotten powers from both the spider bite and the symbiote they quickly become the subjects for many inhumane and painful experiments as the scientists futilely try to figure out how to replicate the symbiote (as they're unaware of the spider bite, thinking the symbiote alone is behind Sage's new powers)

The main scientist behind the experiments is this dimension's version of Peter Parker!

Sage eventually manages to escape the lab during one of their many tests- killing as many guards and scientists on his way out as possible - and eating some of them as well

As a result of their treatment at the lab + his past with his abusive foster family, both Sage and K.A.T have developed a deep distrust to other people - at this point they both consider the other their only friend

Sage goes back to living as a homeless kid, avoiding people as best as he can, but he's also got an insatiable taste for human flesh as well!

He will usually target anyone associated with Oscorp when he's hungry (if none are available cops are the next best thing- his dimension is just as corrupt as -138 Hobie's dimension)

He doesn't feel bad about killing but will still try not to harm civilians (emphasis on try- sometimes the hunger gets the best of him)

Due to his senses being extra sensitive + his paranoia from his experiences at the lab and his foster homes, he tries to avoid crowded and noisy places - This all leads to him being more active at night while he usually tries to lay low and hide during the day.

He lived like this for months until a certain event changed that:

First encounter with the Spider-Society

Sage's dimension is blacklisted meaning people from the Spider-Society aren't allowed to go there (cause a spider-person who's embracing their symbiote instead of resisting it is deemed unsafe by Miguel and thus best to be avoided)

Sage does still get introduced to the spider-society albeit through a rather unconventional way:

- One day a portal opens up and pulls Sage through it, sending him to another dimension as an anomaly

Having no idea about what's going on, and being scared and confused about the whole situation, he does his best to lay low and avoid other people.

Because of this he spends a lot of time in the other dimension before the society discovers signs of an anormaly - glitched objects like seen when Kingpen uses the collider in itsv, or the museum that the Vulture appears in in atsv

Sage eventually has his first run in with other spider people when his hunger gets the best of him and he becomes more careless as he turns into his symbiote form to go look for prey

Here he encounters Gwen and Peter B as they're looking for the anomaly causing things to glitch out in the dimension

Not knowing he's a spider person and an actual child, Peter and Gwen attack him as they always do with anomalies - it also doesn't help that Sage doesn't exactly look friendly when in his symbiote form.

He fights back cause these masked people attacked him for no reason so they must be bad guys and of course he's gonna defend himself - it also doesn't help that he's starving and thus not thinking clearly at this point.

Unfortunately for him, these guys have high frequency equipment to deal with symbiotes and thus they manage to subdue him, but not before he manages to fight back, revealing his organic webbing which tips Gwen and Peter off to him having spider powers as well

He's subdued and forced into an electric cage (which brings back a lot of unpleasant memories from his time at Oscorp) and sent to the Spider-Society afterwards

When he arrives at the Society he quickly gets overstimulated and has a panic attack and lashes out in a desperate attempt at escaping his electric cage - also seeing the face of the scientist who tortured him for months everywhere certainly didn't help

Gwen then uses a high-frequency device made to combat symbiotes to force him to revert back to his human form

She immediately recognises him as a young version of -138 Hobie

Her and Peter both panic cause 1. They realise they basically beat up a kid and locked him up. 2. That kid has a symbiote! 3. That kid is a younger version of another spider-person they both know (and who they both know has a very long and strained history with symbiotes!)

Miguel gets involved and a discussion begins about whether they should try and seperate Hobie (Sage) and his symbiote

- The other spiders mean well by this but Sage and K.A.T both panic at the thought of being separated - at this point they really view the other as their only friend as it's been them against the world ever since they fused

Sage, still panicking, tries to protest but they won't listen as they view him as a kid who doesn't know what's best for him

Sage is taken to the room with all the villains while they discuss what to do with him

Here Margo sees Sage and K.A.T comforting each other, K.A.T manifesting physically in Sage's lap, being hugged tightly by Sage as he promises it he'll never let anyone separate them

Seeing this, Margo takes pity on them and 'accidentally' sends them home before the other spiders get a chance to try and remove K.A.T from Sage.

Relationships with other spider-people

Some time later Sage has an encounter with Hobie who found out about the whole mess - despite Miguel ordering Gwen and Peter not to tell him

While Hobie isn't exactly a fan of symbiotes he first and foremost sees Sage as a traumatised homeless kid in need of safety and stability

Hobie offers Sage to stay at his boat whenever he wants (as long as he promises not to eat anyone while he's there), he also gives him one of his bootleg watches so he can come and go as he pleases (and explains that he can also use it to get home to his own dimension if he's ever unwillingly sent to another dimension again)

Sage declines at first but over time he slowly opens up to Hobie and begins to trust him

(He also secretly looks up to Hobie once he trusts him, cause who doesn't? He's an older version of himself who's got a place to call his home, one that he opens up to strangers in need such as himself, he uses his powers for good and not just to survive. He's not afraid to be who he is and draw attention to himself - something Sage has been too afraid to do ever since his time at Oscorp. He's got friends and people he trusts. - all things that Sage wants too but doesn't believe he'll ever have) Also he'll never admit that he looks up to Hobie but he can tell anyways

Hobie's the one that gives Sage his nickname, it started as SH but over time it turned into Sage instead, though he doen't mind being called Hobie as well, it's just easier to go by Sage when both he and Hobie are present.

He still doesn't trust people, especially not the Spider-Society after their first meeting, which made it very awkward when Gwen showed up to visit Hobie while Sage was there - luckily Hobie managed to interfere before they beat each other up too much...

(He trusts Margo a bit as well since she 'saved' him from the Spider-Society - also it's nice to be around someone who doesn't smell like food since she's an avatar and not made of flesh and blood)

He currently lives at Hobie's boat, switching between it and his own dimension as he pleases

Hobie did his best to hide it but he was rather freaked out by K.A.T's presence in the beginning, he did his best to supress it cause he genuinely wants to help Sage

Hobie mentors him in how to use his Spider Powers and tries to give him a moral compass to at least prevent him from eating civilians when he gets too hungry - He usually targets cops or people working for Oscorp but the hungrier he gets the less picky he is

Another reason Hobie took him in is because he knows ostracising someone won't make them a better person and while Hobie doesn't believe in deciding what's best for others he still knows life will be a bit easier for Sage if he doesn't just kill whoever he wants whenever he wants - impulse control is important when you have a cannibalistic symbiote in your body.

- Hobie still dislikes symbiotes but he respects Sage's choice to keep his and does his best to help him control some of the more violent urges that come with a symbiote.

Hobie introduces Sage to his punk ideologies and slowly introduces him to the punk community

Hobie also introduces him to some of his friends but it's a slow process due to Sage having a hard time trusting people - especially spider-people after his Spider-Society encounter

Some of the spider-people also have a hard time opening up to him because of his symbiote

But Hobie's good at making a safe space for Sage to feel like he can slowly start to open up to others

For the first time in years Sage feels like he has someone (besides K.A.T) he can trust and over time he starts to view Hobie as his older brother

And that's that folks! (at least for now)

To the one person who actually bothered to read all of this - know that I'm infinitely grateful that you took your time to read about my boy <3

- I initially tried to keep this short but I gave up cause Sage has been living rent free in my head for weeks and it feels so nice to finally flesh him out and write about him!

You know I couldn't resist making my first oc angsty - but at least he ends up doing better than where he started.

Hopefully you guys like him too! If you have any questions please let me know, I could talk about him forever <3

[lemongogo]

vash w this hairstyle is literally so cute.. .. wolfwood matchies or smt T__T

[gu6chan]

maybe its sample bias but i think it's kinda funny how most people I've seen who've played drakengard because of nier are making ending e THE endgoal and more often than not the main if not only reason they're playing the game at all and when they finally get it they're like "this is it the single most impactful, greatest moment of all gaming. im wiping tears from my eyes this is it" and then you see the drakengard fans who've played drakengard because they like drakengard and you ask them about ending e and they're like "eh. it was okay, i guess"

[coldduckweaselkid]

christopher korkian i want to save you

[kdramakitty]

[nekobami]

Gay old man with gloves. HAHA.

Gay old man.

Also called guard Rick J-591

Also WOOOOOO episode 4. Yay.

[sotogalmo]

11:48

Clockworker- Recollective Musicbox

"the springs of the music box became warped, golden and red from who it was for. The melody of love to you no longer plays, and can't be replaced.

The woman who died as soon as she fell, and the crying woman as well—

They both were loved equally by my own self, I had loved them both and yet...

The music box made of my love no longer plays and can't be replaced."

(this all makes me think of Tov, Tallis and Himei.... / Tov as Kiril Clockworker- the one mainly singing the song. Tallis as the woman who died as soon as she fell, with Himei being the crying woman— @ivanttakethis & @lookatmysillies .)

[seaofreverie]

I actually made 9 drawings in 2 days

[skitskatdacat63]

Yaaaayyyyyyyy vettonso wip!!:

THEY WON'T LEAVE ME ALONE!!!!!!

I barely ever use my physical sketchbook, but now there is literally 12 pages just of trying to figure these guys out....

But hey happy to say I can actually draw Seb's face from memory!! I like it better when I can draw from memory than having to stare at ref pics. Nothing wrong with using ref, I use it all the time, but it causes me to think about it way too much. Fernando I've really only drawn one other time so I kinda just copied off my last one as a placeholder 😭 so I should probably just stare at pictures of him for a while, like I did with Seb, until his face is eventually burned into brain

This is like, first joint portrait into the arranged marriage type vibe sjfkfl

[lupinuslepidus]

last couple of weeks of fieldwork happened but were filled with chaos that included a crew of interns, hiring nonsense, permitting nonsense, and extreme weather including both a record-breaking heat wave and thunderstorms. we were bouncing up and down the east side of the sierra (at one point we crossed the CA/NV border, like, six times over the span of two days because the mountains we were in were very precisely bisected by it.) the epic highs & lows of fieldwork included:

sampling in Death Valley National Park during the heat wave. this was actually less bad than when we were sampling across the way from Death Valley, because 8000 feet vs. 5000 feet of elevation is a very noticeable difference when it's over ninety degrees out.

we had a team of interns who were remarkably good sports and helped tide us over when our crew was briefly down to just 2 people!

i later found out that the interns had been, uh, maybe misled about how much work they'd be doing, which went a long way to explaining why they had a chronically exhausted air about them. that's academia for you i guess

got to see the ancient bristlecone pine forest on our days off!

ditched some gear in the field at one point bc i didn't feel like carrying a long metal thingy through an Active Thunderstorm while we were a couple hundred feet off a mountain peak

ditched our camp overnight bc didn't feel like taking the car back up a muddy road following an Active Thunderstorm, since the tires had real bad traction on mud

got told by a motel manager the night that we ditched camp that i? smell like pine? which. was not the worst thing. and makes sense given my constant layer of pine sap residue. but sure was an interaction that happened

got to swim in alpine lakes on our days off!

stopped taking my lunch breaks because it was the only way to even slightly keep up once our crew was back up to 4 people

and by 'keep up' i mean i was still consistently finishing 30 minutes behind the other

i don't. recommend this

a couple nights in various spots, we heard coyote packs yipping somewhere around our camp, which is a haunting and unexpectedly lovely experience. genuinely highly recommend waking up to the sound of coyotes at three a.m.

[tearlessrain]

the thing about karlach's ending that pisses me off is that it doesn't make sense if you do everything you can for her though. the gondians are master workers of infernal iron, and if you liberate the house of hope, and make sure dammon lives, you have all the ingredients needed to help karlach's condition improve. it simply doesn't make sense for her to say that she will NEVER EVER go back to avernus even when you have a safe place to set up an independent hellforge and work on a new non-explosive heart replacement. it frustrated me immensely that in my playthrough because i didn't choose to romance her and i had wyll become a baldur's gate bigwig, she chose actively to explode and die... when i had everything i needed to save her life. to go on the terminal illness theme, it felt to me like she had cancer and i had chemo and she was rejecting it and choosing to die horribly instead of get it treated... which totally does happen IRL, but isn't exactly FAIR to her as a character. it's good writing because it makes me engage emotionally with it to this level but it's frustrating because i felt like i should have been able to save her with the pieces available in the game.

this is all also leaving aside that gale has a scroll of true resurrection in his fuckening satchel. WHY can't i immediately use it on Karlach after she 'plodes lol is Gale really that selfish?

okay fuck it, I'll bite. yeah, it IS unfair and frustrating and she doesn't deserve any of it, and that was kinda the whole point and it's why I think they did such a good job with Karlach's arc. because, again, it was a pretty clear metaphor for terminal illness and the associated grief/helplessness/denial/scrambling for solutions that comes with dealing with it. your chemo metaphor is interesting because as you've mentioned people DO often choose not to go through chemo, because chemo itself is miserable and draining and wrecks your body and is not guaranteed to work, and some people would prefer to just remain as active and present as possible for as long as possible and then go out when it's time, especially if the cancer is aggressive and terminal and chemo may not do much. kind of like going to Avernus would be miserable and draining and dangerous, and Karlach stated many times how much she hates Avernus and would rather die than go back. how on earth does it not make sense that she wouldn't choose that, especially believing as she did that she would immediately be shanghaied back into Zariel's service indefinitely after so many years of being desperate for freedom.

though ironically, people in real life sometimes react to cancer patients choosing not to do chemo or other procedures that suck/are invasive and awful the same way you're reacting to Karlach not wanting to go to Avernus. sometimes, and for some people, it's not about just extending your life as far as possible at any cost. there's a point at which it isn't worth it, and that point is different for everyone. and BOY does that make some folks upset when a loved one's "it's not worth it" point is different from theirs. It's why DNR is a thing, and it's also why you should think very carefully about who you want making medical decisions for you if you're incapacitated and have a talk with that person/clear instructions written up.

I already mentioned in the post that they sort of dropped the ball on not explaining why all those potential avenues don't work so I don't know what you expect me to say about that, but I stand by my previous statement of "all I really need them to say is 'yeah the gondians agree, this thing is fucked' and I'll accept that." I would love for them to add that in. but I don't think it should be fixable.

finally, considering that the scroll of true resurrection was intended to be used on Gale during that quest, yes it's on Larian for letting you revive him in other ways and keep the thing, but it's still metagame-y and I don't think it qualifies as a plot hole so much as a game design flaw. it annoys me when people bring up "why didn't they account for my cheesing in the story" arguments as writing critiques.