#taken that worldbuilding and used it for something else as well

[aparticularbandit]

Love Is Not A Victory March!

WIP Info Game!

Love Is Not A Victory March is the fourth fic in The Time of Your Life series, which is roughly a soulmate timer AU rewrite of the first season of Jane the Virgin. Perhaps only the first half of the first season, if I'm really honest with myself about the scope of what that series was doing. (There would have been one more fic after.)

The file in question is the entire finished rough draft. It has been finished for three? years? at this point. It is also longer than the other three parts combined.

Love Is Not A Victory March also continued the pattern established by the other three fics, wherein it continued the forward motion left from the last fics (in this case, picking up pretty much immediately where the last fic left off, with Roman Zazo's death) but also focused in some detail on two of the main characters' timers - when they'd gone off (previously or in the fic at present), if they were still counting towards something, if they'd zeroed out and suddenly started counting again for no apparent reason, etc.

The first fic focused on Rose and Luisa's timers. The second fic focused on Jane's timer. The third fic focused on Rafael's timer. The fourth fic focused on Petra and Michael's timers.

Mostly, the intent with this fic once the rough was finished was to reread the other three fics and then do a second write with this one for consistency and cohesion before posting it. I didn't make it through rereading the third fic and didn't get around to the second write, although I keep saying I will - it keeps showing up on my goals for each year! I mean! It's an entirely finished rough draft; it shouldn't be that hard! And yet.

....

It's also nearly 75k and 20 chapters long. >.>;;;;;;

Snippet below the cut!

Point in her favor, Rose didn’t see any empty bottles.  Point lost because Luisa was nowhere to be seen.

Rose took a deep breath.  No Luisa in the suite.  No video of Luisa leaving the suite.

That could only mean one thing.

Rose stepped out of the suite and turned down the hall, only to see Jane staring at a woman she knew all too well – one who shouldn’t have been here at all.  She took a deep breath, shoving the worry and concern that only continued to grow even deeper into the center of her chest, trying to let them combine with her anger into something much more intimidating.  It didn’t work.

Jane glanced up at Rose and raised an eyebrow.  “Rose?  Do you know who this is?”  She gestured to the woman in front of her.  “She says she’s here to see Rafael and that it’s an emergency.  You don’t know her, do you?”

Rose took a deep breath and forced her jaw to unclench.  “No,” she lied, meeting her other soulmate’s dark eyes with the harshest glare that she could.  “I have never met this woman before in my life.”

Mutter just smiled and gave a little nod, glancing up at her in as demure a fashion as she could fake.  “My name is Elena di Nola,” she answered, covering her tracks.  “I’m Rafael’s mother, and I would very much like to see my son.”

[levemetal]

Hi hello, I rushed this and I cannot be arsed to properly render this. I have other things to draw, many of them. But also. I really put too much effort into the flat of this that I kinda burned myself out LMAO

ANYWAY CALAMITY/GHOST KING SHEN JIU DESIGN. Take it, cherish him like I would. I wanted to dress him up like the pretty princess he is <3 Plus, ghost kings a la tgcf gotta slay in all categories so here we go. I'll ramble more about the more coherent thoughts I have but you can tear ghost king SJ from my cold dead hands. ٩( ᐛ )و

His motivations more becoming a ghost king/calamity are fairly straightforward if you're familiar with Shen Jiu and all the funky workings of his mind. It is to be stronger than everybody else and attaining a place that cannot be taken from him cause he has the power for it. So that no one else can have any power over him either.

However this also means that he does not necessarily have any grand plans of what to do with that power. I imagine he'd be a recluse, living off and alone somewhere hardly getting involved in the affairs of the living and gods etc.

If he does, I imagine it might more be in the style of killing slavers and otherwise bad men. Maybe a sort of brothel workers protector, getting rid of the most problematic and horrible clients? Let your imagination wander!

For a title? I have no clue man, I am not good enough at words for this. Something with green or teal as the color and leaves. That's how far I got.

Now the juicy stuff, POWERS. Leaves. Leaves and fans is the tldr version. I imagine he'd use the qi-infused leaves as in canon, just far more deadlier (probably) and conjured rather than just reliant on leaves off trees in the vicinity. For a weapon, if available (read: SY is not possessing SJ's OG body, or Xiu Ya was not obtained) I think he should get to keep Xiu Ya, or otherwise a blood weapon shaped after it. Tho if I had to give him a blood weapon a la Hua Cheng's E'ming, it would be a fan. The blades on it would likely be shift on, both an edge to cut with and places for darts to fly out. Otherwise in terms of weapons I could see daggers very well too for SJ. They'd suit him, as he could get in and get a quick stab or just throw them from afar. With his fighting style that likely has a lot of the ruthless tactics of his youth incorporated, I think it would fit just like a battle fan.

Otherwise, I do see him being a capable shapeshifter, or some sort of abilities to stay in the shadows undetected. If he needs some sort of animal or communication/surveillance skill associated with him, I personally would pick ravens. Spiritually created ravens as a sort of spying network and surveillance method.

Another juicy detail could be cultivation method. Tgcf does mention that the ghosts still have their own form of cultivating their power. For example, He Xuan eats and absorbs the abilities of other ghosts, whereas Hua Cheng is mentioned to cultivate via slaughtering. The xianxia in tgcf is rather vague now that I have a few more danmei under my belt, and specifically Devil Venerable also wants to know has given me a looot of thoughts about some interesting ways to detail this if it is so desired for a setting. Do please keep in mind tho I haven't really researched cultivation and the wuxia/xianxia 101 worldbuilding yet so this may not make sense. Anywho:

For Shen Jiu in particular I'd find it interesting to give him his own form rather than just copying either Hua Cheng (most fitting imo) or He Xuan (bonus eating disorder included, hooray!). So here are some ideas I had in no particular order:

- Take the core melting aspect from mdzs and applying it to ghosts (sorta): dissolving and absorbing the cores/qi of cultivators and ghosts alike, thus claiming the power for his own.

- Blood. Think less vampire and more slaughter. The messier the kill essentially, bleed the victims dry and absorb the blood to transform it into qi. (Thank you returning Dragon Age brainrot)

- dvawtk's Path of Slaughter. It doesn't really fit SJ as it relies on constantly finding stronger opponents to fight and challenge, especially ones stronger than oneself and persevering against the odds. Not his personal choice but it would poetically fit him and his entire life pretty well.

That's all for now. If you made it till here.... have a gold star: ⭐️

[neomel]

Alrighty fellow insane sonic fans i have something very cool for you today: a WORLDBUILDING theory!! this is something that's been kicking around in my head for so long that i forget it isn't something I've shared with many others yet lol

[ This post primarily covers stuff from Sonic Adventure, Sonic Adventure 2 and Sonic Advance, and ignores Sonic Chronicles and Sonic Pocket Adventure as they have been struck from canon (see: Encyclo-speed-ia) ]

[ It should also be noted that this theory is built on the idea that "the world" as depicted in Sonic Forces is not accurately depicting the entire globe, but rather depicting Eggman's takeover of just the island archipelago where the animal cast lives (South Island, West Side Island, Mirage Island, Northstar Islands, Angel Island) as to explain its geography and lack of human characters ]

Right! So, a big theme in the environmental design of the original Sonic Adventure was having the Sonic cast sort of "cross over" into the human world more - the wording on this was initially nebulous, but with updated translations and clearer official word recently, we now know that it means that the "human world" is moreso like a mainland populated by humans that exists separately from the animal-inhabited island archipelago of Sonic 1, 2, CD, 3&K and Superstars (see: Sonic Origins). My immediate first point of comparison - of all things - is something like the first Madagascar movie, where the lemurs are able to be a fully functioning society in a region completely isolated from humans.

Except it's not quite like that movie, is it? We see in Sonic Adventure (and further in Unleashed, 06) that animal characters like Sonic and c.o are able to exist just fine within the human world, to where Amy has flat-out moved into Station Square. Big and Tails, too, have settled down by the Mystic Ruins close to where Angel Island (sometimes) crashes down by, Rouge owns a club in Sonic Battle - you get the gist. Animal characters, the majority population of the islands as we see in Forces and the IDW series, are able to migrate into the "mainland" human societies, but it appears to still be a rarity, likely not even something everyone has the opportunity to do (Big might've been born on Angel Island, Tails and/or Sonic can fly any of Sonic's friends to wherever they want to go, etc.). The most contact humans have with the animal world is through the Mystic Ruins site, or Eggman using his excessive wealth to fly in and try and effectively colonize the islands as we see in Sonic 1, 2, Superstars, CD, 4.1 and 4.2 (for note: CD, 4.1 and 4.2 take place on the same island of Mirage Island)

Sonic Adventure 2's level select is obviously to be taken with a grain of salt as a stylized take on a world map, but it seems to infer the same thing that Origins' main menu and Angel Island's close proximity to the Mystic Ruins both corroborate - the island archipelago inhabited by the animal characters seems to be quite close to the mainland "United Nations" landmass, most evidently close to Rouge's Route 280 level. And given how often Eggman lays his sights on the islands as a primary target for his schemes (Heroes may well also be taking place on the islands, as Seaside Hill is confirmed to be near/on South Island), it would make sense from the United Nations' POV to try and make access to the islands more accessible. For example, to enable easier import and export of goods, help citizens evacuate from possible disaster (eg. how the Metal Virus in IDW described how it was impossible to evacuate to anywhere else but Angel Island), and so on - a way to connect the two societies more smoothly only makes sense.

With ALL that context and preamble out of the way, this is my theory, and where Sonic Advance finally comes into the picture:

Radical Highway in Sonic Adventure 2, and later Neo Green Hill Zone from Sonic Advance, were together depicting a brief attempt to connect South Island to the United Nations mainland.

You may think this is a bit of a nutty conclusion to draw given how little of a story Sonic Advance actually has, but I think there's a lot we can glean from just the environmental design of Neo Green Hill Zone alone. Compared to the original Green Hill Zone, and most of the levels in the Classic Sonic games that aren't just flat-out urban cities/facilities seemingly built under Eggman's control (Star Light, Spring Yard, Chemical Plant), Neo Green Hill Zone's touches of human infrastructure are far more...friendly, for a lack of a better word. There's parasols and wooden scaffolding, a grind rail or two along paved sidewalks, yet the natural beauty of the area is left entirely in tact. Nothing about it appears like Eggman's work, yet it is quite evidently structured for human interests, for tourism and walking/biking rather than all the funky ways in which Sonic's animal cast are comfortable moving around. Then there's of course the name: NEO Green Hill Zone, as if it's reinvigorating the idea for a fresh new facelift, re-marketing it!

But how does all that connect to Radical Highway?

Radical Highway (and Mission Street by extension) have a quirk unique to them when compared to almost all other urban city levels in the series - as you can see in the image above, they're themed around still being under construction. Compared to a level like Lethal Highway from Shadow the Hedgehog (or the aforementioned Route 280 from SA2) the holes and gaps in Radical Highway are presented as being specifically because the winding roads are still under construction. You can see this on the level map above too - Route 280 and Route 101 appear to be part of a long, linear, already-finished stretch of road, wheras the area of Radical Highway and Mission Street is filled with gaps, inlets and breaks in the road. Route 101/Route 280 already appear to fill the function of letting people cross between the two city areas depicted on Adventure 2's world map...so then, what exactly is the construction and general wobblyness of Radical Highway for?

Well, let's look at Sonic Advance again: Specifically, the end of the Neo Green Hill Zone stage, and the way the game progresses immediately thereafter:

The natural beach environment of Neo Green Hill Zone Act 2 suddenly bows out before the Eggman boss fight to give way to something quite interesting: A red bridge extending out from the island's coast. The bridge's architecture doesn't quite match that of Radical Highway, most notably using tall suspension wires hooked up to some off-screen upper portion of the construction, but I think the idea alone is fascinating enough: This is drastically more modern architecture compared to the rickety wooden bridges otherwise seen in Green Hill Zone. We're still a bit unsure of if Advance 1 takes place before or after Sonic Adventure 2, but if it's before - it may also be possible that the work on this bridge began on the South Island end of things *before* the mainland Radical Highway-end were finished with their work, with the idea of joining the two bridges somewhere in the middle.

Let's again also consider where this bridge takes our characters in Advance - to Secret Base Zone, a shockingly urban facility which we still don't really know the location of. Sonic and c.o need to zip-line into its entrance, with a background that only features light and buildings far off into the distance - is it possible that the Secret Base exists sort of like an oil rig in the middle of the ocean, inbetween South Island and the mainland, as some sort of production facility for the UN? Regardless, it serves as a pit-stop in the Advance campaign - after it, we can pretty cleanly chart a roadmap for where the cast travels. Casino Paradise's ocean background seemingly depicts it as being part of the coastline (bottom left of the SA2 map), Ice Mountain is pretty clearly meant to be another area of Ice Cap Zone given how it leads to the Angel Island Zone - which is, in reality, a dilapidated Sky Sanctuary. Effectively, the campaign seems to go from South Island, to the bridge connecting South Island to the mainland, to a coastside Vegas-like casino wonderland built by Eggman, which is near the Mystic Ruins and thus near Angel Island by extension (it may be connected to Night Carnival from Sonic Rush?). And all of it connected thanks to the works of a bridge, seemingly set up in Adventure 2 with Radical Highway being under construction, possibly with the goals to connect the two core parts of Sonic's world.

Whew! That's pretty much all the words I have, and I've now reached the max cap of images per posts. I truly don't know how many Sonic fans care about these granular details and concepts about the environment of Sonics world in games from 20+ years ago, but I hope it got some gears turning - and if there is some merit to this, it may further get you wondering as to why the path connecting the two was seemingly cut off in the end? Given the cityscapes we see in Forces and IDW, it's possible that this mutual relation between the two worlds lasted for a fair while - what could've possibly led to that bond being broken? Maybe Unleashed breaking the world apart had something to do with it...

Thanks for reading this far if you did - and feel free to add your own ideas or things I might've missed in all of this!

[entryn17]

people can interpret my art however they like and frankly it's not that big a deal but when i made that comic with chara talking to the player about it being its/their/our nature to be curious about undertale i got people calling the player the game's ultimate villain and chara truly innocent. and i heavily disagree with that perspective, especially since in my art i like portraying both as chaotic, complex forces. i don't remember if i've talked about it in more detail here but i guess i'll do it anyways. (for the record before i go on with this - no, i don't think chara is evil or a literal demon.)

undertale intertwines game mechanics with its worldbuilding; it's integral to the story it's trying to tell and how it delivers its messages. often we portray saving, loading, resets and files as very literal and concrete things that exist in that world and while i think that portrayal is correct we seem to sweep the player's involvement under the rug no matter how we interpret the story.

in the first few years of the game's existence the framing of chara as a villain was practically inescapable. that coincided with people firmly rejecting undertale's premise of your choices having consequences when we made shit hit the fan. the player had all the agency in the world until we did something to destroy that world and got called out for it and then suddenly it was chara's fault. nowadays we've moved on from that (thank GOD) but have resorted to pointing the finger to ourselves and while yeah, we do tend to pick through everything with a needle to satiate our undying curiosity, i don't really like how fans tend to portray themselves as the ultimate evil that needs defeating, cause here's the thing

undertale doesn't need a villain. it doesn't really have one either. even if you searched for it.

the game intertwines game mechanics with its worldbuilding and the player is a part of it as well. without us there would be no undertale in a literal and story-wise sense, because we're the force that drives the main events, for whom the mechanics and worldbuilding were created. it's a symbiotic relationship. the game has things for us to do, to see, to try and in return we keep it up and running. it was meant for us and i don't just mean this in a "toby fox made a game for people to play" i'm more approaching this from an in-game, canonical perspective.

the player isn't evil, they/we just are. we're a part of this game.

and chara? well, i think they're a reflection of the player. someone to mirror us and that's why in turn they're also a chaotic force of nature. we name them, they haunt the narrative and we give them a life and finish their story. they aren't evil either. chara is just chara, flawed and complicated. that's it, really.

undertale doesn't have nor need a villain because it's not about "good vs evil". it's about choice and consequence which can be taken in every single direction. i really don't know what else to say

[wangxianficrecs]

🔒 Tricks and treats by apathyinreverie

🔒 Tricks and treats

by apathyinreverie (@apathyinreverie)

M, WIP, 12k, Wangxian

Summary: A fox, Lan Zhan thinks a little dazedly from where he has come to an abrupt stop, Bichen still raised but no longer intent on attack, halfway between the cave’s entrance and the position of the fox by the wall, eyes caught on the tails. Several of them, to be exact. At least six, as far as he can see. Kay's comments: Here with another foxxian fic by apathyinreverie that I hold dear. It's set in the same shifter 'verse as the story that I recced recently, though it's a different story and not connected to the other story. Here, A-Yuan gets found by the Lans during a patrol and soon it become apparent, that there has been someone else caring for him, that something bad happened. Luckily, Lan Zhan manages to connect with the child and learns the truth, that his caretaker, a celestial fox, was injured and caught in a trap, and is in dire need of help. I love, love, love it when foxxian is a celestial fox like in this story, who's rare and coveted but also in danger because of his status. How very fortunate that dragonji found him :D Excerpt: If Lan Zhan were to guess, he’d say the boy is around five or six, seven at most, and he doesn’t seem malnourished as such despite his appearance suggesting an elongated stay in the wilderness by the time the disciples found him. He looks well taken care of, even. If one ignores the formerly dirty robes, the matted hair, and the bleeding fingers. It is those wounds that truly have the healers baffled, unable to entirely make sense of them, except for the fact that they aren’t ordinary wounds, that they are far too sharply cut, far too imbued with spiritual energy to have been made with anything other than some sort of spiritual tool. That fact alone has the entirety of the Cloud Recesses up in arms, furious at the thought of anyone deliberately using spiritual power to harm a child, even more so for such a thing to have happened so close to their home, possibly within their territory. The healers mentioned that the child doesn’t seem to be injured anywhere aside from his hands, that some of the wounds on his fingers are fresh and deep while others seem partially healed, though torn open by newer wounds cutting across those already healing… Which does seem notable. Because, for the wounds to be solely concentrated on the child’s hands… it almost seems like the child might have been deliberately touching whatever spiritual attack or tool caused his injuries. Like he did so repeatedly. Willingly. Lan Zhan lets a slight frown creep upon his face.

pov lan wangji, canon era, alternate universe, animal transformation, fox wei wuxian, dragon lan wangji, phoenix lan sizhui, possessive lan wangj, mates, domestic lan wangji/wei wuxian, worldbuilding, slow burn, romance, hurt wei wuxian, caring lan wangji

~*~

(Please REBLOG as a signal boost for this hard-working author if you like – or think others might like – this story.)

[writingbyshiloh]

Cautious yet Optimistic and Graceful Part 2

Part 1 & Part 3

CW: Morally gray reader, F!Reader, John Wick-type universe (ie, killing, the reader thinks about past injuries from fights. training not descriptive). Not smut but suggestive thinking from both Vincent and the reader, mutual pinning, and worldbuilding but no description of the reader. Smoking, a nonsexual cigarette burn on the reader, brief drinking. MAYBE OCs (Fictional staff for the fictional hotel). NO BETA

Summary: The Marquis de Gramont still annoys you. But he needs help from you(r hotel). Like a good manager, you help. 

AN: PART 2 everyone!!! Thank u for the likes/comments/reblogs! This takes place a few months after part 1. IDEK if this is ooc the man had like 30 minutes of screen time overall and I’ve been writing this for a week. I read it a few times for spelling but something got messed up copy and pasting and a para or 2 got dropped. Part 3 will be out ???? soon(ish)

Something about today had his words bouncing around in your head. Out of all the ways to describe someone, he narrowed it down to three (well technically he used six). 

Cautious. Sure, you can see that. Out of a love of being alive, you tried not to take any unnecessary risks in your fighting days. You also tried to avoid having a marker whenever you could. There was one in existence with your blood on it. A favour for someone you thought was a friend. You held up your end, the bloody fingerprint stored in the New York Continental as proof. 

Optimistic. That also makes sense. You actually enjoy what you do, loving being part of the criminal underworld before and now. You haven't been the manager for too long but would already die for this hotel. 

The part that was throwing you was graceful. You didn't think you were that graceful physically. You have scars to prove that you've taken a hit, slash, or burn many times. Did he mean gracefully with people? Camille did so much for the hotel, you just deal with regular hotel things (like getting Monument Historique status for a collection of French weapons, take that, Vincent). The other part was implanting rules from the high table. Maybe just being graceful and polite when you were resisting the urge to claw your eyes out. 

It could also be flirting. You felt he wasn't the type to hit on someone out of the blue. Sure he was smart and confident, but it seemed like too big a risk for him to take. Unless he is just a playboy, which is something you find yourself tempted to google twice a day. 

You would rather die than admit it, but you almost like when he called you Mademoiselle. Almost. It was like a nickname, plus it brought out his accent more. When you found yourself enjoying.

To make things worse Camielle caught on to your crush immediately. While embarrassing, it did show how clever she was and you were glad she was the concierge. Her knowing also gave you an excuse to just tell Vincent your direct number, so Camille would stop reminding you how frequently he called.

You love the bar in the hotel. It is beautiful, decorated in an Art Nouveau style, with large windows allowing for the sun to filter in during the day. You were almost pleased that Vincent asked to meet you there, allowing you to subtly show off your business. 

Finding him at the bar wasn’t hard, no one else was wearing a dark green three-piece suit, complete with a complexly tied tie and their coat of arms pin. He looks good but tense, one long leg crossed over the other. Plus, you could see Chidi and another guard in their gray suits keeping an eye. You were thankful that you took extra time this morning on your outfit. 

You slid into the chair next to him, after shaking a few hands with other big names down in the bar for a late-night drink. 

“I hear you have a problem.” You say, while not knowing the full details, just that he wanted to meet you in the bar and something was wrong. It kicked your heartbeat up, even if you only told yourself it was the stress of him being here. 

“Correct.”. 

“I’m sure you know because of your love of rules, but I can only help those who are using the hotel services.” 

You didn't care that much, and would absolutely bend the rules to do him a favour, but couldn't resist a chance to get a dig in.

The Marquis pulls out two gold coins and slides them across to the bartender. He orders a top-shelf spirit before his eyes cut to you. Now he's buying you a drink in your own hotel. You would want him to buy you a drink in a different situation but at least he didn't order for you. That may cause you to actually kill him.  

Clearing your throat you order your usual, quietly thanking the bartender when the drink was placed in front of you. 

The bar wasn't loud, but he dropped his head towards you so you could hear him better and to give the conversation some privacy. 

“You have a cartographer here, no?”

You nodded. The cartographer is excellent. He had blueprints for buildings past and present, as well as the catacombs. He also had knowledge and keys to abandoned buildings if something had to be desponded and not be found. 

“How soon do you need him?” While one of the best, he was away for his daughter's wedding

“Tonight.” 

You took a small sip of your drink. You could probably get the information he was looking but you wouldn't be as efficient. 

“While we do have a cartographer, he's gone to a family event. If your plans are that urgent I can try my best to fill in.” 

Content with your answers, Vincent leaned back into his seat taking a swig of his drink. You took the finishing sip of yours before pushing out of your chair. 

“I have spare keys in my office. I’ll meet you back here in five.” 

For how commanding and prideful he is, you never expected him to need the services from your hotel.

The maps room was fairly boring. Three out of the four walls were filled with lockboxes to various maps. Blueprints, and documents for France and even some other countries nearby. 

“Are these your beloved catacombs?” The Marquis asks, studying the paper taped to the wall. You asked the map maker for more information and for ideas on what you could do with them. 

You hum in agreement, deep down thrilled that he remembered such a small part of your conversation ages ago. 

Your eyes jump over the numbered lock boxes in front of you, trying to find the one he needs. 

You half expected him to help you pull out maps and building plans, a blend of chivalry, showing off his height, and getting under your skin. He didn’t, letting you struggle with the lock instead. 

Vincent knew he should help you, but the way your back was arched as you tried to open one of the lockboxes out of the dozens was more interesting. His gaze moved over your legs, before looking at your ass in your skirt. 

Feeling the lock give a turn to the side, you peek inside the box to make sure the plans were there. Hand sliding in, you pulled the thin tube out, double-checking the label on the front to make sure it is the one you need. Leaving the box unlocked you turn to face Vincent, a triumphant grin on your face.

Maybe your grin and pride in getting the correct documents were a bit unprofessional but he didn't care. Not since the small room amplified the smell of your perfume and how the spent the better part of the last five minutes checking out your legs. 

Uncapping the tube, you pulled out the blueprints and spread them on the backlist glass table in front of you.

“Here are your prints,” you state awkwardly. You're not sure why he needs them, and why he personally came here. Chidi is keeping guard outside the map room, despite you repeating the hotel policy of no business. 

The Marquis nods in response already focusing on the table. You flatten a small map from the tube in case he needs context on the area. Not likely since he already knows what to look for, proven by his notebook and the constant sound of his pen against the paper taking notes. 

Watching him study the map may have been alright at first, but three hours later you are tired. There are only so many times you can look at his hair and wonder if he would get mad if you run your hands through, or gently tug it. Or what his hands would feel like, especially with his signet ring. 

The grandfather clock tells you that it's only 2:36 am but you feel like it's later. Even Vincent looks slightly less than perfect, hair falling out of place from where he had gelled it that morning.

He is a guest of your hotel so you're going to keep helping him no matter how long he stays. Just with a bit less optimism. 

“Mademoiselle?” Your eyes snap to his face at the sound of his voice, pulling you from your thoughts. 

“You look tired. You should go to bed,” he comments. 

Wow. Thanks, you think. 

“I’m okay. I’m happy to stay here as long as you need,” you say while hoping he leaves soon. “How are the plans going? The cartographer can help you with the finer details when he gets back.” 

“That is not necessary. I have all I need here.” He slowly stretches and starts to stand. You never considered it but being hunched over the table must have been hell on his back given his above-average height. Finally seeing your chance to go to bed, you quickly make it over to the door, opening it for him. 

“Merci, again.” He thanks you as if this is not your job. 

“Do you want me to walk you to the main door?” You have all your floor plans memorized. 

“We are fine.” He replies. 

He looks at you and you can't read his expression. He's less tense, obviously getting what he needed from the plans. 

“The high table did a good job making you the manager.” 

You feel pride swell in your chest, despite the exhaustion you feel behind your eyes. 

“Bonne nuit, Mademoiselle” 

“Bonne nuit. Bon matin.” You quietly wish him as he leaves, wasting no time putting the plans away and locking the map room door. 

You let out another exhaust of bitter smoke, watching it curl away on the cool night air. You didn't start smoking in Paris, but dropped and picked the habit a few times.

“Fumes-tu, Mademoiselle?” a voice behind you makes you flinch. You didn’t tell anyone that you have a secret smoking place, let alone that you went out to smoke. 

You spin around before relaxing at the sight of the Marquis, clad in a dark suit, his signature pin on the lapel reflecting the light. 

You nod, before realizing he probably can't see you well under the lights in the alcove. He is by your side quickly, long legs carrying him the short distance. 

You tip your head to the small table, where your rolling papers, tobacco and other smoking paraphernalia sit in a silent offer. Vincent looks at the table before facing you again. Guess he's too fancy to smoke you assume while taking a drag.

You turn your head to blow out more smoke, careful not to blow it in this direction, a hard feat considering he was extremely close to you. The smell of his cologne drifted under the smell of smoke. 

You move your cigarette down and out to the side, fully ready to see why the Marquis interrupted you. Watching his face, his eyes dipped down to your lips and then back to your eyes almost a silent asking. The smooth and sophisticated era was still there but there was uncertainty under it. 

You slowly leaned closer, not wanting to make the first move, but you want this to happen. He hand-cupped your face, the cool metal of the ring nice as he shifted closer, leaving a small gap for you to make the final push to kiss him. Just a few more inches and then -

Pain. A sharp burning pain on your pinky finger. 

You jerk back, trying to examine what happened. Your cigarette slipped while you were distracted and the glowing embers of the end dropped only to land on your pinky. 

“Shit. Sorry,” you apologize, letting out a nervous huff of a laugh while holding up your burn. The Marquis was unreadable, hand withdrawn. Does he think you rejected him? 

He reaches for your wrist and you let him take it. Slowly he brings your hand up to the outdoor lamp to inspect your burn. The stinging has subsided but you are sure the flesh is a bit swollen. 

With his free hand, he takes the offending cigarette and brings it to his lips. You can't help but stare, cigarette burns long forgotten as you watch him take a deep inhale, before exhaling over your head, so no smoke blows in your face. Part of you regret not making the final push to kiss him, while another hopes he takes another puff. 

Vincent brings your cigarette down to examine it in better lighting before placing it back in your hand, still firmly in his grasp. 

“It is not a well-rolled cigarette. It is too tight.”

There it is you think. The classic Vincent snark. But you secretly hope he rolls one so you can watch his hands and watch him smoke it. 

“You don’t have to smoke it.” 

“I just wanted to give you this.” He reaches into his suitcoat pocket, retrieving a white envelope. His hands brush yours while you grab it. 

You know his handwriting from the time with him in the map room, and you could easily tell he wrote your name on the front. 

“Thank you?” you weren't sure what was inside but you were being all the things he described you as. 

“I will go, and let you read it.” 

You watch him leave, thoughts racing too fast to try and save the situation.

Do you call out after him? Does he think you rejected him? Maybe not because he still gave you the envelope. 

You ash your cigarette before collecting your things and going back to your office. Maybe things would make more sense there.

Taglist: @heartrot666

[duckiemimi]

i wonder if gege's biggest problem (likely bc of the push to prolong jjk) is that they just threw out the original storyline the second the gojo vs sukuna fights started. i mean, there were definitely problems with the ever expanding cast and spreading them all too thin still, but (as someone who's only loosely been following the leaks since a little after gojo's death) the entire story feels so meaningless now 😭 the build up for everything gojo wanted holds no meaning and i get that gege hates gojo for overshadowing the other characters but like⎯excuse my lack of knowledge about manga culture⎯gojo's been the main character ever since megumi was taken over. yuji's been sidelined for so long and even yuta⎯who's ridiculously powerful and the only special grade in his generation, i believe⎯not making a difference just leaves the story falling flat.

(also: i've never understood the whole push for gojo to be front and center just bc he's the most popular. the mc is *rarely* the most popular character in a manga⎯bakugou (and even sometimes todoroki) overshadowed deku so much in bnha but the story still managed to center deku as the main character. i think people give gege a little too much credit for this⎯it just feels like bad writing or an attempt at fanservice when they write gojo like *this* when they're clearly sick of him.)

(also x2: literally none of the characters have a purpose anymore and sukuna's just screwing around so there's no one with a strong enough narrative left.)

(also x3: shoko deserved better. but that's a whole other rant.)

i think that's possible actually, considering how well-anticipated (and prematurely hyped up) the gojo vs. sukuna battle was! and it was a long and drawn out battle, too, so i have a feeling that was done out of request from publishing (or a third party) rather than something gege actually wanted to linger on!

the culling games to me read like an exploration in worldbuilding. remember when kenjaku started talking to and dealing with world leaders and when the US army (failed to) intervene at one point? it seemed like gege was playing with the boundaries of the jjk universe and while it was messy and convoluted at times, it was still pretty enjoyable for me! it felt like a writer who still wanted to write. it's a shame that gege took on more than he could chew, because there were so many aspects that could've been built upon, even if it would've been inconsequential to the ending message of jjk.

this arc...felt like something owed. to who, i could only guess, but it doesn't read like something he was excited to write. ever since gojo got unsealed (another well-anticipated scene), things have become rather stale. and that's probably why we have an influx of polarizing scenes—to get us to keep reading. gojo being brought up constantly (even after his death) also seems like a request or a push from publishing (or a third party). like you said, it feels like fanservice. (which is so demeaning to a creator, especially if it's put above all else.) i think he's too tired (and now he's sick) to actually attempt to properly tie everything he wrote together, let alone do anything about characterization! which is just such a shame :')

[flamebearrel]

🔬 + 🎵 + 🗺 for that ask game? I don't even go there, I just like to hear what you have to say about things

ACK thank you… you’re the light of my life

🔬: What character do you want to put under a microscope?

I’m gonna go with YouTube! I dunno why I like it so much but it being a relatively original design based on the UI makes it stand out from the other non-stick antagonists. Plus just LOOK at this goofy thing

If I have to pick a stick specifically then Red. He comes up with such unique and clever solutions to problems that no one else even considers

🎵: What’s a song you imagine an AvA/AvM animatic to? What’s the animatic?

Mother Mother must put something in their music to make so many of their songs animatic-able I'm telling you… In The Wings works really well for Purple I think, a recurring character who continuously teeters between friend and antagonist! Picturing the first verse being about their backstory with their parents and the second about the initial part of their arc where they meet Blue and Green (maybe the bridge montages the later parts idk). Relevant doodles attached

🗺: How do you imagine the world works?

I’ve seen on the wiki and in some discussions that people categorize sticks as either “Artificial” (the hollow-heads) or “Natural” (your “typical” solid color) stick figures. Frankly, I realllly don’t like this system because it clumps these guys with entirely different backgrounds together-

-but not these guys, despite living at most in different neighborhoods and under the exact same conditions.

I’d categorize them instead by how they originate: either “Drawn/Animated”, “Website/Game”, or “City/Outernet” stick figures.

Drawn sticks are created local to someone's desktop, usually via drawing program by an artist or animator. The powers and abilities they have depend on the names they are given, as well as (optional) code like The Dark Lord has. They can detach themselves from their original files, but presumably cannot be recovered if they do so and get taken out. These include Alan's hollow-heads, which are the only ones we've outright seen, but it's canon that other people have brought sticks to life too

Website and game sticks originate from the internet on, as you can guess, designated sites/games. The logistics of their abilities, appearances and lifestyles vary wildly depending on the worldbuilding of their source. If they die they can be revived if in close access to their webpage, but if that goes down, they're taken out too. Red, Blue, Green, Yellow and any Newgrounds/Stick Page guys fall into this category

City sticks live in the Outernet, a separate region almost entirely out of human reach. They live a life most similar to people (albeit vaguely, since a stickman is a simplified approximation of a human), being able to age, reproduce, and having their own economy/work systems. No powers, files or code to be attached to. King is shown to be one of these guys; Purple is slightly more complicated since they've lived on a mac, in games AND in the city at different points but they're one too due to their parents

Gates are needed to get from one area to another, using a site or game as the middleman. The only way to go direct from a desktop to the Outernet is the way this guy does

One other thing - For drawn and website sticks, the fundamentals of their characters like age, relationships, whatever are set by the intentions of their creators. So to me the main five are all set in the general "young adult" range (around 18-23), and only Second and Chosen consider themselves as biological brothers due to having a direct link between their programs and code

[welcometothejianghu]

Welcome to another round of W2 Tells You What You Should See, where W2 (me) tries to sell you (you) on something you should be watching. Today's choice: 心宅猎人/Psych-Hunter.

Psych-Hunter is a 2020 drama about a hot young amnesiac who, accompanied by a rich psychiatrist with major daddy issues and a rich girl who cosplays as a cop, uses his Inception-style psychic powers to solve crimes that are part of a shadowy conspiracy orchestrated by a mysterious figure.

True story: Once I couldn't remember the English name of the drama, so I called it "House Haunters," and now my brain insists that's the real English title. If only!

Do not, under any circumstances, labor under the impression that this show is good. It's not. It's incoherent. The writing is bad. The villain is absurd. The vibe is comically melodramatic. People make inexplicable and out-of-character decisions all the time. Countless complex mysteries get set up with no way to resolve them. There's a thin lampshade hanging over it that blurs the line between bad decisions made on accident and bad decisions made on purpose, but the net result is largely the same. This is the show that first inspired my wife to declare something dumb as a guinea pig in a roller skate.

But it's fun. It's a sea of colorful chaos with brilliant pieces that shine through like strange gems. It knows how to work an atmosphere and does so to create some legitimately creepy moments. It spins a wild yarn filled with bizarre and loveable characters. And it has some twists that truly have to be seen to be believed. In the mood for some beautiful nonsense? Here's five reasons that despite everything I warned you about in the previous paragraph, I think this one's worth watching.

1. Psychonauts for Jazz Age homosexuals

Honestly, that phrase alone should let you know if this is the thing for you. But just in case, let me explain the basic premise of the show:

Jiang Shuo, a man who has lost his memory and been adopted by circus folk, is capable of jingling his keys and diving full-body into someone else's subconscious, represented by lovely and thematic dreamscapes. He does this to solve crimes. Sometimes he takes along a handsome doctor who seems like he might know more than he's letting on, by literally tying their hands together with a red string.

Also, when they do this, they get gorgeous steampunk magical girl costume changes, complete with the cutest little pony nub you've ever seen.

This show can be stunningly beautiful. It knows how to manifest dream logic eerily well. Most of these cognitions are gorgeous, and many are done with primarily practical effects, like it's a stage play. ...And it's good it relies on that so much, because the CG it has is kinda cheap and terrible! So, yeah.

(Side note for the DMBJ fans: This is directed by the same guy who directed Sand Sea, which I assume is related to how this both is a visual treat and completely falls apart on the back end.)

The reason I'm a bit surprised that this hasn't taken off more among the creative set is what a great piece of worldbuilding this Psych-diving is. These boys (and, once, the girl) get to short-term manifest bodily in someone else's materialized mental state, where the person whose brain they’re in neither controls the experience nor remembers what happened after it’s done. Were you writing weird Arthur/Eames fic a decade ago? I got a new best thing for you. Can you say freaky dream sex? Because I can.

The base premise should be more than enough to get your gears going. Come ready to get weird with it. There's so much potential here, and so much of that potential is incredibly gay and wearing impeccably tailored suits.

2. Your friendly neighborhood circus family

As I mentioned before, Jiang Shuo lucks into the best possible fate that can befall an amnesiac: being picked up by carnies.

The troupe includes Ventriloquist Man, Really Big Dude, One-Eyed Acrobat, Other Acrobat, Cheerful Fat Girl, Boy Who Looks Like A Kid But Is Actually Played By An Adult So I'm Not Exactly Sure How Old The Character Himself Is Supposed To Be, and Silver Fox Circus Dad, who manages the whole crew. They're a ragtag bunch of performers who all live together in this cute little compound in some very nice slums, and sometimes they open the gates to their lavish compound and put on a circus show for all the common people!

Now: You know this is not going to be the wokest, most sensitive portrayal of body differences, because of course it isn't. But damn, it's pretty not-bad. The show treats all the circus members as valuable people worthy of affection, whose (occasionally exasperating) quirks are no more or less exhausting than those of the non-circus weirdos in the rest of the supporting cast.

I was half-expecting them to disappear after the first arc, but no! They’re a constant fixture through the show! They’re mostly there to support the show’s more comedic moments, but some of them get wrapped up in more emotional plotlines as well. And every now and then you get to see them actually do their circus shit, which is great.

I will admit that my fondness for them is related to how much I generally love fictional Freaks — you know, misfits who have banded together because society considers them unacceptably weird, but together their weirdnesses make them strong. When you find them, they’re usually the bad guys (e.g., the Gung-Ho Guns from Trigun, the Scorpion crew from Word of Honor) whose freak statuses make them formidable and occasionally sympathetic antagonists. But not so here! The Psych-Hunter Family Circus is good guy support all the way through to the final episode.

I know "found family" is a term that suffers from overuse, but that's the best way to describe what's happening here -- really, it's a family that's already found itself even before the show starts, and now they all live together as an unconventional collective of astonishingly flexible people. How did they find one another? Doesn't matter! What matters is that they all love and would do anything for their newest member, and they think it's great when he comes home with his attractive rich friends, who often arrive bringing snacks, which is really the best use for rich people, if you think about it.

3. Two hands, one ring

Now, if you've seen the series already, you know the moment I'm talking about. But if you haven't (and, statistically, you haven't), know that what I mean is the relationship between these two losers.

Together, Qin Yiheng and Jiang Shuo form the emotional core of the series. They're both drawn to one another because of mysterious circumstances that have started to align. Jiang Shuo's memory is missing, Qin Yiheng's dad has vanished, and all signs point to those absences as having something to do with one another.

Very early in the show, we see Qin Yiheng pull a "come with me if you want to live" on Jiang Shuo, giving the impression that he knows just what's going on in this crazy city. Except, no, he doesn't. Or does he? No, we're pretty sure he doesn't. Or he does, but he's forgotten what he knows, if he ever even knew it in the first place. Anyway, time to tie their hands together and jump into someone else's brain!

I'd say they're in love, but that's not quite it. Dr. Qin Yiheng, high-class homosexual, is in love with Jiang Shuo to the point where he's about to murder someone (possibly Jiang Shuo himself) out of frustration about it. Jiang Shuo, on the other hand, is much more sticking his fingers in his ears and going LA LA LA YOU CAN'T CATCH ME GAY THOUGHTS while trying get a girlfriend in an effort to pretend that all the shit they get up to together isn't tremendously romantic.

That is, until the scene that leads to the which-hand ring guessing game, at which point the burden of their relationship falls on Jiang Shuo (and the Inception parallels get unignorable) for exactly as long as the show will allow it to, before it freaks out and has to add another girl love interest just to make sure all the homos got no'd.

It's not textually gay, because seriously, have you met Chinese television? But it's pretty gay. Or, rather, I think Liu Dongqin (Qin Yiheng) is playing his character as a dedicated homosexual on purpose, and Hou Minghao (Jiang Shuo) is just ... kinda like that? I mean, everything I’ve seen him in, he gets real dreamy-eyed around strong men who pay close attention to him. Maybe it's just his thing as an actor. I'm not judging.

However, the main cast isn't just the two of them. One of the things that led me to this show was the promise of an OT3. And does it deliver on that promise?

Well ... sorta.

Qin Yiheng, Jiang Shuo, and Yuan Muqing are a pretty standard MFM not-love-triangle trio of Male Bestie, Main Guy, and Girlfriend (respectively). There's about five seconds at the beginning of the series where it looks like Yuan Muqing might be into Qin Yiheng, but no, that evaporates almost instantly and is never spoken of again -- and with it disappears most of their interactions with one another, period. So it's less an OT3, and more a case of bisexual cutiepie Jiang Shuo getting both a boyfriend and a girlfriend in a world where censorship will only let the latter relationship exist textually.

But damn if these boys aren't made for one another. Sure, there's a level of conscious comical queerbaiting to it -- I mean, there's straight-up an "only one bed" moment, so you know the show isn't stumbling into rainbow territory on accident. No matter how sexual or nonsexual or whatever you read it as, though, their dynamic is the spine that holds the story together. Really, it's almost sad how often the relationships are set parallel to one another, because when you do that, it becomes obvious how intense Jiang Shuo's bond with Qin Yiheng is, and how largely lackluster and comphet most of his canon romance with Yuan Muqing is by comparison.

Like so.

sidebar: The Girl

I am not going to go into a full-throated defense of The Girl this time, as I am wont to do, mostly because I think Yuan Muqing is full of potential in concept but so badly executed that there's really no hope for her. Her entire personality is whatever they need her to be in any particular scene. It's just that once in a while, what they need her to be is completely insane -- like, seeing-things-that-aren't-there insane -- and it's so great that it makes me mad! She could have been like this all the time! But noooooo

As it is, she has a perfunctory canonical romance with Jiang Shuo that's about as endgame as anything is capable of being (see point 5), and it actually gets pretty cute when it finally gets to the point where it's not just awkward obligation! But alas, it only does that so late in the series that it's not even worth it getting invested in it.

She is a creation of the show. She has no novel counterpart. Her entire function in the drama is to un-gay the dynamic between the boys. You can tell that she was initially supposed to have a different role -- to be the muscle of this trio -- but the narrative forgets pretty quickly that she's got that skill set, and she regresses to being The Girl. She makes dumb decisions that forward the plot. She gets put into danger whenever it's convenient. She demands Jiang Shuo do manly things for her because that’s what a girl is supposed to do, I guess? And then there are moments where she’s cool and crazy and it’s awesome! But they never last.

So if you are going to watch this, be prepared for the fact that the female lead is badly written to the point of frustration. I feel her actor is doing the absolutely best with what she's got; the problem is that what she's got is pretty crappy. Still, Muqing gets some pretty charming moments here and there, and I think it's worth hanging onto those and imagining the character she could have been, if the writers had cared just a little more, or even at all.

4. Powerfully surreal worldbuilding

I'm not even talking about the way people's psyches are structured according to dream logic -- the "normal" waking world is almost equally bizarre. The story takes place in sort of the real world c. 1930, except that a lot of things are off. For example, Japan and England are real locations, but China kinda isn't -- instead, the show takes place in a Shanghai-like city-state run by this moustachioed generalissimo with a faux Latin American dictator aesthetic. The place has its own flag and government and police force (where all the cops have coordinating surnames) and diplomatic relationships with other countries, so it’s clearly its own thing. But what that thing is? What it’s even called? Look, don’t worry about it. Nobody else is worried, so you shouldn’t be either.

You will, at every point in the series, be wondering if the show is trying to telegraph to you that Something's Not Quite Right Here, or if it's just making weird decisions for the sake of artsy weirdness. But don't worry -- there's absolutely no way to tell the difference between the two! Just roll with it.

There's a weird mix of universe rules happening throughout, where everything is mostly period-appropriate for a while, and then somebody builds a clock with levitating parts, or causes someone else to have very specific memory loss — or, again, swings some coins in front of a person’s face and gains the ability to treat their subconscious like a VR amusement park.

You can sort of reconstruct the evolution of this weirdness: The book has actual factual ghosts in it. Well, that’s fine for books, but TV isn’t allowed to have ghosts. But TV can have people who imagine ghosts, so long as it’s all in their heads. Okay, but you know jumping bodily into those imaginations isn’t actually a thing real people can do, right? Well, then let’s make it scientific. How can that be scientific? I don't know, it’s psychiatry. I don’t think that’s psychiatry. Look, it could be. Well, it’s definitely not psychiatry in 1930s Shanghai, and that’s the set we’re allowed to film on. Okay, what if it weren’t actually Shanghai? What if it weren’t actually 1930? What if all of this were at best a weird approximation of the period that adheres to no rules except the ones we want?

Once you’ve thought that, the sky’s the limit.

The show has a very inconsistent grasp on reality, and I am listing that as a pro instead of a con because I am choosing to embrace it as a deliberate choice rather than assume it’s the result of craven incompetence. There's something to be said, though, for how pervasively inconsistent it is. It'd be one thing if there were just a few plot holes here and there (and there are), but this is more along the lines of: We woke up in a mysterious boat and got taken to an island with a giant sea monster skeleton on the shore! What's that all about? Couldn't say! Was it real? Maybe! Moving on!

Let the number of "it's fine! who knows!" comments I've made throughout this rec indicate how much this is the kind of show you just have to roll with. If you are a nitpicker or someone who is troubled by unexplained nonsense, this is not the thing for you. If you love artistic magical realism and high strangeness, you will eat this up with a spoon.

And the lampshade that hangs over all of this worldbuilding is...

5. THE STUPIDEST POSSIBLE ENDING EVER

Okay, usually I am coy about when I think an ending has problems. I am going to drag this one out front and center: Psych-Hunter has an ending so jaw-droppingly, head-clutchingly stupid that I'm actually listing it as a selling point, because it has to be seen to be believed.

When I first watched it, I suspected the show ran out of time or money or something and just had to slap together the quickest possible ending ever. But no! This is the ending they meant! If you go back to the rest of the series, you can see that this is what they were (kinda) setting up the whole time! They just set it up so poorly and decided to make the twist hit at such a late point that not only is it complete nonsense, it actually renders moot the entire emotional stakes of the show! Absolutely incredible!

Now, as I've said before in other places, I don't begrudge the actual twist itself. I mean, it's stupid on its face, but I think they could have done something with it — if they'd had it happen halfway through the series, when the characters would have had time to adjust to the new knowledge. Instead, they slap it on at the last possible moment, when there's no time to have any reaction to it. It's just jarring and baffling, and then the whole thing's over.

I've seen lots of people say "season 2 when???" Season 2 never, friends. There was never going to be a season 2. The only reason you think this was an even remotely acceptable narrative move was that you were assuming that this would be the midpoint, not the end. You're having the same reaction I did, only I can tell this was always meant to be their spectacular dismount.

(To me, it's clear what happened: They J.J. Abramsed themselves into a cool premise for a mystery with no idea how to solve it, hoping they'd figure it out along the way. When they got to the end and still hadn't figured it out, they simply ... opted out of solving it.)

Now, if you want a normal viewing experience out of this show, watch to the end of the next-to-last episode, close your browser window, and have imagination adventures about how you think all the mysteries should resolve. But you're not going to. You are going to continue on to that last episode, and you are going to realize that nothing I could have said here could possibly have prepared you for this. And somewhere, I am going to feel the urge to cackle wickedly and not even know why. Except I'll know why. We'll both know why.

Want to watch this hot mess?

That baby's an iQiyi exclusive! But you can watch the first episode on YouTube, if you feel like getting a taste that way.

Look, I know I may have spoiled my pitch somewhat with that last selling point. After all, why would you bother watching a series if you know it has a shit ending?

I refute your objection thus: Knowing it has a shit ending changes the whole game, because it removes the feeling of betrayal that hits upon your discovering that the ending isn’t what you wanted. You know that already now, so there can be no betrayal. The ending goes from being an unpleasant surprise to being exactly the unexpected thing that you expected. With that in mind, you can dive right in (ha ha) knowing that you’ll never get the closure you crave, and therefore whatever you make up along the way is perfectly valid.

This is obviously a turnoff if you prefer shows that are like seeing someone start a magic trick, perform it without breaking a sweat, and walk off calmly, leaving you wondering how on earth they accomplished such an amazing thing. Think of this more as someone starting a magic trick, accidentally letting the rabbit fall out of their hat, saying “I meant to do that!” like thirty times, and suddenly vanishing through a trapdoor, leaving you wondering what the trick was even supposed to be in the first place — but they were really good-looking and well-dressed, so at least whatever they were doing was nice to look at while it was happening.

See? They're having fun.

[ghelgheli]

17! but also using the opportunity of the ask game to get to know more about the effortless worldbuilding in sff :)

from the end-of-year book ask

17: Did any books surprise you with how good they were?

I think Three Body Problem is the only one meeting this condition this year so I'll have no trouble staying on topic :> but I'm gonna specifically talk about "hard" SF as I conceive of it—I haven't read any analysis so this may just be a jumble of improvised thoughts.

SF, being "speculative" fiction, of course has to take on the problem of speculating and of presenting things that don't (and perhaps cannot) happen. On average this is accomplished thru a healthy combination of scientific grounding and good-natured handwaving: I drop a few sentences about "quantum entanglement" and you go along with my ansible, or you tell me about "positronic circuits" and I agree that you can make a brain with them. This is the compact that makes SF work because you fundamentally cannot expect speculation without, well, ceding ground on reality.

But at least a subset of SF readers are of the kind to really want to grok how it is that this or that scientific feature of the world works or may come about. Every contraption and novel technology is like a puzzle to be riddled out. This is the place where speculation becomes sincere mechanical prediction, and it's why I love hard SF.

This subset of readers can be matched to a subgenre of writers who commit fully to filling in as many blanks in their technological, biological, etc. speculation as possible. The rows of astronomical data can't be left vague—tell me what frequency of light we're dealing with here—xenobiology isn't taken for granted—what is the neurology of your aliens??—and so on. The dots are connected, the rest of the owl is drawn for real, the image is made crisp. Like fireworks for the reader's brain.

When this kind of worldbuilding is executed well imo it looks effortless. Looks, not is, because behind every explanation of near-c travel is hours of research into at least special relativity and time dilation, along with calculations by-hand. Behind every account of an exoplanet's atmosphere is probably a few papers perused on the subject and several articles on scientific american. Peter Watts, in the note at the end of Blindsight, includes a fucking bibliography of a hundred or so references as well as thank-yous to many an academic he split handles of liquor with. And this is only the visible fragment of what has to be a library of knowledge accumulated both passively and actively to make a speculated world feel as concretely plausible as possible.

None of this is necessary for good SF. The aforementioned compact means any author can opt out of this commitment at any time. But it's what it takes to make tightly-written hard SF, where your conceptual hands are kept diligently at your side, waving an idea through maybe once every five chapters when you have no other choice.

So anyway, Three Body Problem is a tour de force in doing this and doing it cleanly. It uses a storytelling device a lot of hard SF employs to make it work: rather than stuffing dense exposition into narration (at which point, just read the source papers) it deploys a cast of characters who more than anything else, really know their shit. We get exposition trickle-fed through experts who are trying, along with us, to make sense of their novel environments and unfamiliar technologies using their knowledge of the present limits of human understanding. This is what Watts does in Blindsight too, by the way: a claustrophobic ship crewed by technical specialists makes first contact, so everyone has something encyclopedic to say about everything and it's only natural.

What astounded me about Cixin Liu's writing is that he made it work just when I least thought he would be able to. I was sure I was being shown things completely inexplicable and necessarily supernatural until he went and explained them in plain terms; better yet, he explained them in ways that made so much sense in retrospect that I was kicking myself for not seeing the answer. This has exactly the flavour of a good puzzle.

The trade-off hard SF makes is that you are often limited in the metaphorical/thematic work you can do through your speculation. I think the contrast between "calendrical science" in Yoon Ha Lee's Machineries of Empire series and Asimov's "psychohistory" illustrates this well.

Yoon Ha Lee has mathematical training, and calendrical science is a speculative field consisting of theorems, conjectures, proofs, etc. in the language of mathematics that stand in for cultural hegemony and power projection. This makes for a great operationalization of soft power: space is filled and distorted by the quantifiable effects of whatever regime is dominant there (the "calendar" here being synecdoche for culture writ large). But obviously he can't fill in the blanks of how a calendar causes spacetime distortions that specifically make one side's weapons more effective, or provide certain formations with shielding effects. This is, I guess, semi-hard (lol) SF—you can see how it's supposed to work, but it's clear that it just won't. What you get in return is pretty politically interesting storytelling.

Psychohistory is the converse: a deterministic-enough lovechild of economics and sociology explained in the Foundation series as using all the familiar methods of linear algebra and differential equations together with unfamiliar innovations of just how to quantify human behaviour in order to make reliable predictions. There are entire chapters dedicated to explaining the conceptual nuance that went into developing psychohistory ("the hand on thigh principle" from prelude to foundation is just about how the theory resolves divergence by reducing insignificant terms to zero) and an entire book to exploring one of its limitations. It's fascinating to read. But you also get little narrative depth out of it, because hard SF, even when done well, is not guaranteed to make a story thematically interesting or politically compelling. This is the Three Body Problem problem too: its political commitments are threadbare and unserious because that's just not what it's about. I couldn't recommend it on those terms, but that's not what I like so much about it. I will say the conceptualization goes a little off the rails in the final chapters, but I think most SF authors were in some kind of string theory inspired fugue state at the time.

What I would love to see (and I'm sure exists) is hard SF that also has interesting politics. Unfortunately that's an intersection of two already-narrow intersections.

ty for ask✨🐐

[crystalninjaphoenix]

The Wider Paranormal World

Shadow City AU - Chapter Four

A JSE Fanfic

I've been pretty busy this week, so here's another Shadow City chapter that I wrote a while ago ^-^ It's pretty much all a bunch of explanation about how the world of this AU works, so if you're a fan of worldbuilding this is the chapter for you! Jack moves into Chase's house, and the two of them get used to each other. And then, since Chase keeps asking about all the rest of the supernatural things in the world, Jack invites his friends over to visit and answer questions. Maybe Chase will make some new friends in this whole situation. Anyway, I hope you all enjoy <3

First Chapter | Second Chapter | Third Chapter

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It was so strange for Chase to see someone else moving into his house. He wasn’t opposed to Jack being his roommate, that wasn’t what was strange. It was that he was still living here, and yet the landlord was not acknowledging him. Well—not living here. But existing here. Watching all of his things get moved out and moved around without his input. He didn’t mind Stacy taking most of his things, but it was just... strange.

Over the course of the past week, Chase had spent about half his time practicing his ability to touch and hold things. He was getting better, slowly. Though he still wasn’t able to move things, he could at least consistently lean on the wall and poke things and stuff. The other half of his time was spent in that strange not-sleep meditation state. 

Jack stopped by every couple days to check on Chase and also take care of moving business—signing papers and such. Chase always had a bunch of questions for Jack, and he answered them all promptly and clearly. 

Was ghost hunting real? “To an extent, I guess. A lot of the videos you see online and on TV are really exaggerated and even fake, but the actual instruments they use can work sometimes.”

How often did ghosts ‘move on’? “Maybe about half the time. Often if ghosts don’t get their unfinished business taken care of quickly, it gets harder and harder to help them. Like—if a ghost’s business was to confess their love to someone, that’ll be hard to do if that someone moves town or even passes away. A lot of stuff is like that.”

Did Chase have to worry about other beings moving into his house? Like demons or some shit? Did demons even exist? “Uhhh kind of? They’re not what you’re thinking, not like—Christian demons. There are malicious spirits out there—but don’t worry, I’ll make sure the house is protected. You’re such a strong spirit that you could probably fight one off, anyway.”

Were ghosts made of ectoplasm or was that made up for movies? “You’re more electricity than anything. But I think you do have some sort of... physical stuff. Ghosts can affect scales and weight detectors, so there’s something there. It’s not ectoplasm like Ghostbusters slime, but that’s as good a thing to call it as anything.”

If he figured out how to eat something, would he be able to taste it? “Honestly I have no idea. I guess you could try it yourself? I think the food would just pass through you anyway.”

Though there were some questions that Jack refused to answer. Mostly whenever Chase brought up this “larger supernatural world” that Jack had hinted at. With the fucking werewolves and shit. At first Jack said that was because Chase had to still get used to being a ghost, but near the end of the week his explanation shifted to “I think it’ll be easier if someone else explains that.”

“Wait, what?” Chase had said the first time Jack gave him that response. “Are you going to like—introduce me to people?”

Jack had smiled. “If you’re okay with that. I was thinking about inviting some friends over a bit after I moved in. Is that fine?”

“Y-yeah, I guess.” Chase wasn’t sure how to respond to that. These friends... Jack was implying they’d be part of this supernatural world. Did that mean they were witches? Werewolves or vampires? Something else? He probably could have asked Jack those questions, but he wasn’t sure he wanted the answer. Even if he was a ghost now, and therefore not at risk of dying, it would still make him feel weird to know for sure that a fucking vampire was going to come to his house.

Though... legally, Jack was the tenant now. Which was... weird to think about. Hey, if Chase didn’t have to deal with Mr. Wood anymore, that was a good thing in his book, but... he wasn’t being acknowledged. And that felt... he didn’t know how it felt. Just strange. And bad. But not bad bad... Ugh, he wasn’t good with feelings.

But now Jack was fully moved in, and things were starting to feel like a weird sort of normal now that Mr. Wood wasn’t constantly coming around to check on things for the new tenant. Chase had lived with other people in the past, mostly roommates in university. After he graduated, he and Stacy had moved right in together. So he definitely knew how to share a space with someone.

In a way, this was even easier than those previous situations. Chase didn’t have to worry about Jack stealing his food or using his shampoo or anything like that. He had no “worldly concerns” anymore. But sharing a space with someone as a ghost still came with its own challenges. For example, Chase had gotten into the habit of wandering around the house and going straight through walls in the past week. He had to unlearn that quickly after accidentally walking in on Jack while he was getting dressed. 

The house didn’t look too different now that Jack was here. He was doing his best to maintain everything the way Chase had, to keep him comfortable. The general spaces—the living room, the kitchen, the dining room—were the most similar. But even with Jack’s efforts to leave things untouched, things were visibly different. The bathroom and bedroom had changed the most, Chase’s towels and blankets and clothes replaced by Jack’s. Chase’s recording room was different too—more like the home office it was meant to be before. Even though Stacy had taken his computer, Jack had replaced it with a PC of his own. She’d also taken a lot of his knickknacks and things that his fans sent him. The room felt pretty empty without them. As bad as Chase was with feelings, he knew that seeing the blank space on the shelves made him feel sad. A heavy sadness... grief, for the life he had cut short.

He sometimes wondered who’d done it. Who killed him? Why? He wasn’t anybody special. Why go out of their way to kill him? He didn’t think he’d wronged anybody... Maybe it was a robbery gone wrong? Had someone broken in that night? Nothing was taken, though... you’d think they’d at least have grabbed the one nice watch he’d had, if his computer and game consoles were too bulky. But no, everything was in place. Stacy had been able to take everything home with no problem, no doubt keeping them to give to Declan when he was a bit older.

The question ate at him when he thought about it for too long. He tried to avoid it—to get used to ghostliness like Jack kept insisting. But he couldn’t forget about it entirely. Of course he couldn’t. He wouldn’t be in this situation if he hadn’t been killed. But... what could he do about it? He couldn’t even leave his house. He should focus on the present for now. On his more immediate problems.

Like for example—

“Hey so is it okay if three of my friends come over tonight?”

“Hmm?” Chase snapped out of his not-sleep trance. He was sort of floating idly in the corner of the hallway (that was something else he and Jack had to work around, since Jack apparently found it a bit off-putting to see someone staring into space in the middle of the room.) “Oh, uh, yeah, sure.”

“Cool.” Jack nods. “You’re not going to be overwhelmed or anything by there being more people here?”

Chase laughed a little. “Why would I be overwhelmed?”

“Well you haven’t really been around a lot of people as a ghost.”

“I’ve been around three people before, Jack. It’ll be fine.” Chase paused. “Are these... these the people who could answer some of my questions?”

Jack looked at him seriously and nodded. “Yeah. They’ll be able to, between the three of them. Try not to, uh, barrage them with questions, though. It might be a lot.”

“I wasn’t planning to,” Chase said. “Uh... is there anything I should do to get ready for them?”

“Hm... did I explain what this mirror is for?” Jack pointed to the side. He’d hung up an old-looking mirror on the wall by the door. Its frame was coppery, carved in swirls and whorls, but it wasn’t actually copper, because its tarnish was black instead of the green rust copper gets. “I don’t think I did. It’s a Mirror of Revealing.”

“What’s that?” Chase asked, drifting over to look at it. He could see his reflection in it, but he could also see his reflection in the bathroom mirror so that wasn’t special. 

“It shows supernatural things,” Jack said. “Like ghosts and stuff. So, even though you can’t be seen without concentrating, you’ll always show up in the mirror even when you’re not focusing.”

“Oh!” Chase blinked in surprise. He waved his hand, but it still looked like this normal reflection to him. 

“Here, look at this.” Jack walked over next to him. “Concentrate on being seen right now.”

Chase nodded slowly. This was the part he still couldn’t quite get a hold on. How do you concentrate on being visible? Well... maybe he just needed to think about what he looked like? He narrowed his eyes, taking in his reflection.

...

Yep. It was still his reflection.

Though... maybe it was a bit... faded? Yeah, he was pale. Not like a normal kind of pale, though. It looks like everything about him is tinted with white. His skin, his hair, his clothes, everything. And... in the side of his head... He quickly looked away from that. How did he not notice that before?

“Yeah.” Jack nodded, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly. “I thought it could help you practice. Your reflection will look more pale in the spots where you’re visible to other people. And the, um... the wound will appear. Of course, to everyone else, they’ll only see the pale parts, and you’ll be translucent. Unless they look in the mirror then they’ll see you there perfectly fine. Does that make sense?”

“Uh... yeah, it does.” Chase nodded slowly. “Um... wh-when will your friends be here, by the way?”

“Well, uh, sunset is at about 8:30, and I asked them to be here right away, so... given travel times... 9:10, maybe?”

“Sunset is important, then?” Chase asked, a bit nervous. He had an idea for what Jack’s friends were...

“Yep.” Jack nodded. “It’s traditional for the supernatural stuff to happen at night. That’s why it’s sometimes called the shadow world. Or the shadowed world. Either.”

“Hah. O-okay then.” Chase nodded back. He looked into the mirror. Right now, he looked normal... But... he wasn’t normal. So he shouldn’t... pretend he was. And besides, it would be awkward for Jack’s friends to talk to someone they couldn’t see, wouldn’t it?

He spent the next few hours practicing... or at least, that’s what he told Jack. In reality, he tried on and off for a little bit while occasionally drifting off into a not-sleep trance. It was... hard. Hard to see the way his reflection turned pale. It was also weird to think about his own appearance constantly. Yeah, that was his problem. He couldn’t concentrate. That was definitely it.

Suddenly, there was a knock on the door. Chase started in surprise and glanced out the front windows to realize it was suddenly really dark outside. “Coming!” Jack shouted, walking down the hallway and into the living room. Chase quickly moved over to the far corner of the living room, standing next to the TV. He heard a hum as the speakers from the sound system flicked on—that was weird, but he didn’t think much about it. Jack glanced back at him. “Are you ready?”

Chase nodded silently.

“Alright.” Jack opened up the front door.

“Jack!” A man in a red hoodie immediately bustled onto the room, giving Jack a tight hug before heading into the rest of the living room. “Good to see you! Wow, this place is different from your flat. A lot bigger!” He took a deep breath. “Smells like tea, a bit.”

“Are we on time?” asked another man, one in glasses and wearing a long brown coat over a cream-colored sweater. He stayed on the threshold, looking into the room, scanning it.

“Yeah, you guys are right on time,” Jack said. “You can come in, Schneep.”

The man on the threshold—Schneep, apparently—nodded and stepped inside.

Jack closed the door. “So now we just have to wait for Marvin. But, uh, in the meantime, feel free to get comfortable.”

The man in red was already sitting on the sofa, spreading out across it. “Don’t mind if I do!”

“Jackie get your feet off the sofa,” Schneep said. “Jack is renting the place, you know. If your dirty shoes get the cushions messy the landlord will charge him.”

“Mr. Wood isn’t that strict,” Chase mumbled.

“Oh, sorry.” The man in red—Jackie—quickly moved his feet off the sofa. “So... where’s this ghost, Jack?”

“There.” Jack pointed. “He said that the landlord wasn’t that strict, which he’s right about.”

Jackie and Schneep looked to where Chase was standing. “Ah... we cannot see him,” Schneep said awkwardly.

“Yeah, I figured. Chase?” Jack gave Chase an encouraging smile.

Chase imitated a deep breath, the motion calming some of the nervousness in his stomach. Well, time to see if his scattered practice was working. He started really thinking about what he looked like, concentrating on it.

“Holy shit!” Jackie jumped slightly, almost falling off the sofa.

Schneep took a step back, but tried to be more polite. “Ah, you are Chase, yes? Chase Brody? It is nice to meet you.”

“Hah... yeah.” Chase nodded.

“Oh he’s going again,” Jackie said.

“I’m what?” Chase looked down at himself.

“Chase, you have to keep concentrating,” Jack said. “No matter what else you’re doing... or how they react.” He shot Jackie a dirty look.

“S-sorry.” Jackie sat up more straight. “I just... wasn’t expecting someone to appear out of nowhere, all pale and with black eyes. I-it’s unexpected.”

“Black eyes?” Chase asked, confused.

“You have to concentrate on letting your eyes be seen, too,” Jack explained. “Or they just look like holes.”

“Oh that’s freaky as fuck.” No wonder Jackie and Schneep reacted that way. “No hard feelings, guys, I would’ve been, uh, uncomfortable, too.” Chase imitated another deep breath and kept concentrating, this time trying to remember every part of his face and body. “Well.. how do I look? Normal?”

“More normal than you did before,” Jackie said. “Though, uh, still not perfect. Jack, is this normal for ghosts?”

“Well what are you guys seeing?” Jack asked. “He looks like a guy to me.”

Schneep cleared his throat. “Right now, we are seeing someone’s upper torso, very pale. The rest fades away.”

“Huh?” Chase blinked. Man, he really wasn’t as good as he thought he would be.

Jack laughed. “I guess you’re not very aware of your legs, are you, Chase? Yeah, that’s normal. Don’t worry. Keep practicing, Chase. Having these guys here should help you.”

“R-right.” Chase nodded. He slowly moved closer. “Um... hi. I’m Chase. Nice to... nice to meet you. Who are you guys?”

“Jackie! Jackie Sheach.” Jackie grinned. “And this is Henrik, but you can call him Schneep.”

“It is based on my last name, von Schneeplestein.” Schneep walked farther into the living room and sat down on the old leather armchair.

“Oh. So you’re... German?” Chase guessed.

Schneep smiled slightly. “Ha, indeed I am.” Wait a minute—his teeth.

Chase gasped.

“Oh shit you disappeared again.” Jackie said. “Uh, sorry, are we... upsetting you? I’ve never met a ghost before, I-I don’t really know how this goes.”

Schneep raised his hand to his mouth. “I think Chase just noticed something. Interesting. Most everydays do not notice the fangs, not unless they are a meddie like Jack.”

“So your friends are vampires!” Chase said, looking at Jack. “I knew it!”

“Whoa, hey, just because Schneep’s a vamp doesn’t mean I am too,” Jackie said. “I’m the exact opposite, in fact!”

“A werewolf?!” Chase asked, half-joking, half-serious.

“Yep!” Jackie smiled. “In the flesh!”

Schneep rolled his eyes. “Those stupid books convincing everyone that werewolves and vampires are ‘opposites’ or ‘enemies.’ That idea was not around before they were! We have more in common than not. Some vampires can even turn into wolves as well!”

Chase lets out an involuntary squeak. Luckily, it seemed like Jackie and Schneep couldn’t hear that. He didn’t expect to be right! But he quickly cleared his throat. “So... what about this last friend? Marvin?”

“Marvin’s a witch,” Jackie explained.

“Are witches... human?”

“Uh—they start out as human!” Jackie said. “And their DNA is still human and stuff. But once they start learning magic... I dunno, something shifts slightly. If they learn enough of it they become like... human plus. Like a superhero or something! Like, Spider-Man can do things regular people can’t, you know? He’s more durable. Witches are also more durable. Does this make sense?”

Chase nodded slowly. 

“Hey, your head became really solid right now!” Jackie said encouragingly.

“Are we alright with talking without him?” Henrik asked.

“It’s fine, we’re not going to start any activities or anything, just talk for a bit,” Jack said. “I was thinking we could play some video games or something eventually, if you guys wanted. And Chase can get to know you guys while you answer questions about all the supernatural stuff.”

“Cool.” Jackie nodded. “Alright, Chase. Ask away. You’ve got to have a million questions.”

Chase laughed. “I do, but honestly, I’m having a hard time coming up with them right now. It’s just... so weird. I-I can’t really believe it. But I mean... I’m a fucking ghost. You’d think I’d be used to strange things like this by now.”

Schneep chuckled. “Well, it can be very difficult to get used to things like this. Trust me, the two of us have been where you are now before.”

“Well not exactly,” Jackie corrected. “We’re still alive—oh fuck I shouldn’t say it like that, should I? That’s so insensitive, I’m so sorry.”

Chase laughed. “No no, i-it’s fine, rip the bandaid off. I know I’m not... uh, not going back. But... at least Jack says I’m a strong ghost?”

“Oh yes, you are.” Schneep nodded. “I have only met one ghost before, and you are clearly different than she was.”

“When did you meet a ghost?” Jackie asked, interested.

“It was when I first came to England. The house we moved into was haunted. It was a bit unnerving to see the ghost, but it was the first time I realized that there was more to this supernatural world than just the vampires.”

“Yeah um so—vampires.” Chase nodded slowly. “What’s... what’s the deal with them?”

Schneep laughed. “You will have to be a bit more specific, there are a lot of ‘deals’ with vamps.”

“A-are you, um...” Chase cleared his throat, even though he didn’t actually feel anything in there. “Are you... really... old?”

Jack walked around to sit on the sofa, pushing Jackie’s legs aside for space. “Actually Schneep is pretty young by vampire standards.”

“I am forty-five years old,” Schneep said. “And for fifteen of those years, I have been a vampire.”

“I’m thirty.” Jackie raised a hand. “I don’t age weirdly or anything. Well... there’s a slightly longer life expectancy. But that’s just for old age and stuff, it doesn’t include accidents or any other cause of death. I think with those included the life expectancies for wolves and everydays even out.”

“I, uh... I see.” Chase nodded. “Life expectancies. Huh.”

“Oh shit was that another thing I shouldn’t have said?!” Jackie gasped.

Chase laughed. “No, no, you’re fine! It really doesn’t bother me!” He looked at Schneep. “But uh... so. Vampires... live forever?”

“In the most technical sense of the word,” Schneep said slowly. “I do not know if you can count vampirism as a form of being alive. We consume, but we do not grow. Does that count as life?”

“You’re alive enough to annoy people, bitch,” Jack said teasingly.

“Ha!” Schneep barked out a laugh. “That is true, that is true. But, ah, yes, essentially that is it, Chase. Vampires will live until they are killed by other means.”

“By like... garlic and sunlight and stuff?” Chase asked hesitantly. Is it appropriate to ask someone what will kill them?

“Garlic has no effect,” Schneep chuckled. “The bulbs, at least. The blossoms are an ingredient for a sort of repellant. But sunlight—well, that is a different case. It does more damage to a vampire as they become older. At my age, I could last a day in the sunlight, though it would be terribly painful and I would not be in good shape by the time sunset came around. But as you get older, you become more sensitive, until eventually even a single second of direct sun will turn you to dust. But you must be very old for that to happen. Well over five centuries, I believe. But I have not met a vampire that old so do not take me at my word.”

“...huh.” Chase nodded slowly. “So... wooden stakes?”

“It has to be a special kind of wood,” Schneep said. “And directly to the heart. Here, let me run down the myths for you. Religious symbols do not work. Silver does work, though it hurts werewolves much more.” Jackie made a face. “Beheading does not kill a vampire but it will cause them to go completely limp until the head is reunited with the body. Fire works but it is no more effective than it is for a human. Lack of blood will kill a vampire eventually, but we will go into a mindless frenzy first. You do not want to be near a frenzied vampire.”

“And... mirrors?” Chase asked. “Do you show up in them?”

“Yes, most of them,” Schneep said. “Not in ones with silver backing. For the same reason, we will show up on digital cameras, but not old-fashioned silver film.”

“Interesting...” Chase said. “Do... do werewolves have weaknesses?”

“Not as many as vamps do.” Jackie gave Schneep a smug little look. “In fact we’re pretty tough! Definitely tougher than a normal non-magical wolf, in either form. But we do have that big silver weakness. Can’t even touch the stuff. Luckily you’re not going to find a lot of silver in places unless you’re like... a jeweler or a technician of some sort. God, imagine being in one of those lines of work, then you get changed. That’d fucking suck.”

“Yeah,” Chase said. “So, uh... h-how does one... become a werewolf? Or a... vampire? Do you just get bitten?”

“That’s how it works for werewolves,” Jackie said. “You have to get bitten on the full moon. For me, it happened in uni. I was walking to the bus stop after work, going to take it back to campus, when all of a sudden this huge fucking wolf appeared and bit me! I had to call the hospital to come get me because I immediately didn’t feel good—that’s the first sign, you feel dizzy right away. Easy to mistake for shock or blood loss. For the next month, things will feel weirder and weirder, and then you transform on the next full moon and boom! Werewolf forever. Becoming a vampire is a bit more elaborate, though. Right, Schneep?”

Chase looked at Schneep. “Yeah, uh, what’s that mean?”

“Well...” Schneep leaned back in the chair, crossing one leg over the other. “Let’s say that becoming a vampire accidentally is much rarer than becoming a werewolf accidentally. First, you must be drained of most of your blood, to the brink of death. Usually this is done when a maker vampire drinks most of it, but you can bleed out by any methods. Then, before you die, you must have vampire blood in you. Again, traditionally a maker vampire will feed that to you, but it can also be injected through a needle.”

“A... ‘maker’ vampire,” Chase repeated. “Is that a special type of vampire or something?”

“No no, that is—The vampire who gives you their blood is your maker,” Schneep explained. “Any vampire can make another.”

“Oh. I’ve heard the word ‘sire’ used a lot in vampire media.”

“That’s a human invention,” Schneep dismissed. “‘Maker’ has been used for far longer. There are some vampires who will get mad if you use sire.”

“Vamps put a lot of stock in tradition,” Jack explained.

“Because they’re all old,” Jackie added.

Chase laughed. “Uh—so, keep going, Schneep. You need to have vampire blood in you, then what?”

“Then you... well, it looks as though you die,” Schneep said. “But really your body only enters a pretend-death state, in which your body and brain do not work but your soul is still there. This state will last for thirteen days. In this state, you must spend a full day, sunrise to sunset, enclosed.”

“Enclosed?” Chase repeated, confused.

“The coffin or casket is traditional, but it could be in any box, or buried in the earth, or even wrapped up tightly enough in blankets or a bag. If you are not enclosed in time, you will simply die as your soul leaves your body. If you are enclosed in time, you will awaken at sunset as a vampire, fighting out of the enclosure to search for blood.”

Chase tried not to shudder. He failed.

Schneep nodded. “It is a... upsetting moment, when you first wake up after being made. Even if you wanted to become a vampire, the differences are sudden and the new hunger is... not a good sensation.”

“See, I never understood this,” Chase said. “Why would anyone want to be a vampire?”

Schneep shrugged. “To live forever. And some people think it is cool to be a creature of the night, but I don’t think those people really understand it.” He paused. “Ah, but do not misunderstand, I am happy being a vampire. Even if it was an unhappy start.”

“R-right. Of course.” Chase nodded. “Are you, uh... comfortable talking about how it happened?”

A pause. “Well, ah... I was thirty years old,” Schneep said slowly. “I was starting my hematology fellowship. That is the last step to become a hematologist—a blood doctor, basically. Though there are many doctors that work with blood—anyway. Th-there was an English woman working with me by the name of Elizabeth. I only saw her at night and she said it was because she had a sensitivity to sunlight. She even made jokes about being a vampire. But it turns out, the jokes were not so joking. I went to her house one night, and there—well. I was not expecting it.”

“...oh. O-okay.” Chase could tell there was more to the story, but he could also tell that Schneep didn’t want to share anything more than that. So he decided to drop it. “But you came to the UK eventually?”

“Yes, ten years ago. It was then I learned about the Night Councils.”

“The Night Councils? Are those like... the secret supernatural government?”

“Basically,” Jackie said. “There’s multiple of them scattered across the country, though they don’t cover everywhere. Each one is based in a city and keeps tabs on it and the surrounding smaller towns. The goal is to make sure everydays don’t find out about the shadow world.”

“But why?” Chase asked. “I never understood this in stories. Wouldn’t it be better if the normal people—the everydays—knew about supernatural stuff so they could defend themselves against it?”

“Well, uh...” Jackie coughed. “There are... already everyday groups dedicated to defending themselves against the supernatural.”

“Monster hunters,” Jack said.

“Monster hunters?!” Chase gasped. “I thought you said that those weren’t real!”

“I said that ghost hunters mostly weren’t real,” Jack corrected. “Monster hunting groups did exist, and do still exist. And they’re assholes.”

Schneep nodded. “There was one group in Germany, the Helsing Gruppe.”

“And there’s one in this area, too,” Jackie added. “The Brotherhood of the Iris. Usually we just call them the Iris. Luckily they haven’t caused any trouble in Scuabyrg, but there’s always a chance they’ll show up.”

“And... do what?” Chase asked nervously.

“Uh... bad stuff,” Jackie said slowly. “You know... hurt people. But even if monster hunters didn’t exist, I don’t trust the military with knowledge that you can make super-badass wolves by having one bite a person. Anyway! You didn’t ask me how I became a werewolf! Why’d you only ask Schneep, huh?”

Chase blinked, then laughed. “Well you sorta already explained it. You were walking back from work when you got attacked.”

“Well yeah, but there’s more to it!” Jackie said. “The next full moon, the wolf who bit me found me and apologized, then said ‘hey now that you’re a wolf anyway, wanna join our pack? So I did, but those guys were a bunch of assholes, so I left and moved back home to Scuabyrg, where I found a new pack!”

“So—werewolves form packs, then?” Chase asked.

“Mm-hm!” Jackie nodded. “Not really sure why. It’s just... easier to group together, I guess. I think it’s because becoming a werewolf really amps up your need for socializing.”

“Humans already pack bond with stuff all the time,” Jack laughed. But then he stopped. There was a buzz from his pocket. He reached in to take out his phone, scanning the notification that appeared. “Oh. Marvin says he’s gonna be busy tonight, guys.”

“Did he get a lot of customers at the shop?” Schneep asked.

“Not sure. He only said something came up.” Jack began texting. “I’m asking him if everything’s alright.”

“He can probably deal with it,” Jackie said, somewhat dismissively.

“Be nice, Jackie,” Schneep said. 

“I am! I’m just saying, he’s pretty powerful, he can probably deal with it.”

“So... do you not like this Marvin guy?” Chase asked carefully.

“No, I—that’s not exactly it,” Jackie said slowly. “He’s... he’s a good guy, really. Chill and fun. I like hanging out with him. But it’s just... his magic is weird. I’ve never smelled anything like it, and he refuses to explain it. Like, just tell me if it’s nature magic or emotion magic or what, at least.”

Chase stared at him. “You can smell magic?”

“Oh, uh... kind... of?” Jackie said slowly. “Werewolves have really good senses. I-I can’t really smell magic once it’s... out in the open, but witches have a magical scent to them. It’s different depending on where they draw their power from, and Marvin’s weird sour smell is... completely unique. He’s definitely the only witch in the city drawing from whatever that is.”

“...Drawing from...?” Chase repeated, confused.

“Ah, perhaps Marvin is better suited to explaining that part,” Schneep said.

“Marvin says he’s fine, by the way,” Jack reported. “Looks like something’s happening with a customer of his. I’ll give him the time.” He put his phone away. “Alright. So... video games?”

“Ooo what do you have on here?” Jackie asked. “Wait, can ghosts play video games?”

“Uh, I don’t know,” Jack said. “Maybe. At the very least if we give Chase a controller he could practice pressing the buttons.”

“Oh, so I always wondered how this works,” Jackie said. “Chase, why can ghosts sometimes touch things but not always?”

“Well, uh...” As Chase answered Jackie’s question—as well as all the questions that followed, all of which Chase himself had asked Jack in the past—Jack went about setting things up. Soon, the console was up and running. “So what are you playing?” Chase asked.

“I was thinking Smash or some other fighting game,” Jack said.

“I do not think I’ve ever played the Smash games,” Schneep said slowly.

“Oh, I just know you’ll get into it, despite how you look like the sorta guy who’d never like any games ever,” Jackie said.

“What is that supposed to mean?!”

Chase laughed. “Yeah, no, I agree with Jackie. You look like you’d say ‘Calling Duty’ instead of ‘Call of Duty.’”

“What is that supposed to mean?!” Schneep huffed, offended. “Alright, I will show you both how good I am at video games. Give me a controller.”

After that, it was amazing how normal the evening felt. Despite how different everyone was, they acted normal. Sure, Chase might not have been able to hold the controller for very long, much less press the buttons, but he was happy just watching. Jackie and Schneep soon got really competitive, while Chase and Jack made jokes.

...He hadn’t had an evening like this since he was in university. It was sad that it took him dying for something like this to happen again. 

But he tried not to think about that. And soon, he was able to forget all about the strangeness that surrounded him and have some fun for the first time in a long while.

[kafus]

ok i've decided i want to infodump about vee and nova a little after all! because uhh not only am i impatient because autism but i also. want to dip my toes into talking about this. just days ago i was still terrified but now i am Tentatively Brave... if i can talk about it here casually like this then i should be able to write a more formal summary later some other time

i've tagged this post appropriately (at least i think i have, feel free to suggest if i should add more) but also a heads up here too before i keep talking that while i'm not going into graphic detail on anything there are STRONG themes of organized sexual abuse of a child, sexual abuse of animals, and grooming! (there are no disturbing visuals in this post, just text)

IF YOU CAN'T READ THIS POST THAT'S OKAY I STILL LOVE U

takes a deep breath alright so the deal with these two. back all the way in 2021, i decided i wanted to make "vent ocs" as in i just wanted some concrete/consistent designs i could use in vent art drawings that weren't a direct reflection of what i envision myself to look like or whatever. i was going through a lot in 2021, in december 2020 i had just gotten my first big repressed memory back and my life was in a whirlwind of change and heavily increased PTSD and DID symptoms, so i was using art a lot as an outlet. in the end i settled on this drawing, based on the design taste i would have had as a young person (god the quality is so old now LOL i've improved a lot but anyway)

i was intending for these two to be just visual designs and nothing more than that but i got attached and actually ended up giving them a whole storyline and everything, which is something i admittedly hadn't done in a long time up to that point so that's cool.

the reason i preface explaining the premise of the storyline with this is because i think it's important to acknowledge that these two are intrinsically tied with my real life and the feelings i experience as a CSA/OA survivor. not because i think someone has to go through awful things to write or draw about them necessarily, but because i am passionate about expressing myself. it's important for me to be seen in some way, to be heard after years of silence. it is not safe for me mentally to share the exact details of my abuse online rn (and please don't ask for them!) but i also don't want these two to be removed from the message that i survived something and this is me making art about that in an abstracted and magical way with a fictional universe that brings me a lot of comfort. i hope this makes sense lol

oh and also with that in mind if you think for even a second any of this is a weird sex thing for me or some shit please stop reading this post and go do something else with your time. this is my trauma expression and i don't need to be compared to the people i was abused by when i was a literal toddler thank you!

AANYWAY so! premise! gonna be point blank with it! vee (not her original name but shh) is born as a normal 100% human girl, aka without the eevee ears and tail. she is groomed from a very young age (like, toddler age) and eventually abducted by her groomers which happen to be members of... well right now it's team rocket because i haven't spent the time to worldbuild a new villainous pokemon organization yet. roll with me here. she is taken to a remote facility out in the middle of fucking nowhere and is never returned to her previous life or family.

Why? well i'm glad you asked! the org is running a bunch of different experiments in this facility and one of them happens to be trying to enable humans reproducing with pokemon. this doubles as both a money thing and a power thing. they seek out a child as the victim of these horrible experiments because children are easily malleable. way easier to control a child than an adult who already has a firm identity/self.

vee is the child they chose. surgery is forcibly done on her to give her working eevee ears and tail, and also like, fuck with her body chemistry and stuff. she's biologically part eevee now. yes this is bullshit pokemon magic science LMAO but she is kept in this facility and chronically sexually abused for a few years by pairing her with various mons and trying to get eggs to happen.

the experiment isn't working though so they hypothesize that giving her a dedicated partner, especially of the same evolutionary line, would help, and they raise nova from birth as an eevee to take on that role. eventually the two of them are paired together. despite the acts they are forced to commit on each other and the abuse they endure, they actually become inseparable very quickly cause like. they don't have anyone else. and also they just genuinely care about each other. additionally at this point nova has evolved into an espeon and has telepathic powers, so him and vee can communicate linguistically with each other, so you know that helps

generally my current focus of this story is in the early years, when vee is 12 and younger, before they start realizing that shit is fucked up and they need to escape (up until that hypothetical point they have been successfully groomed into believing everything happening to them was not abuse/was normal). i have left out a metric fuckton of detail here just to get across the basic premise. i am constantly exploring vee's psyche, nova's psyche, it's like an in depth exploration of the mind of an abused child in horrific circumstances and god it's cathartic. i love these two so fucking much

btw i guess this art has more context now huh haha after i infodumped off the plot to my sister they looked at this art again and was like. OHHH THIS IS EVEN MORE OMINOUS AND HARD TO LOOK AT WITH CONTEXT. AND I WAS LIKE YEAH!!!! YOU SEE THE VISION!!! THE SYMBOLISM!! ETC!!!!

uh yeah if you read this far thank you and i just wanna say i've been building up the courage to talk about these two for GENUINELY two years, it has been over 2 full years since that initial drawing, and i am nervous and jittery posting this but i do not want to die without having shared my work with the world and i'm willing to take the risks to get my voice out there. so you reading it is very much appreciated ur like my first step into being more confident as a survivor lol

oh and fwiw despite these guys being so correlated with my trauma it's not offensive to make headcanons or ask me questions about them or compliment darker art of them however you want, in fact i love that shit!! please i've been holding these guys back for two years i have so much to say that hasn't been said. as much as i am nervous i am EXCITED

[galenationcore]

Welcome to GaleNation's CORE site, new recruits.

This blog is run by the site's document keepers. We will answer any questions you may have about the job, site, company, or ourselves. Please note that any information one of us may give is checked by all four, and some answers may end up censored.

Hello! Welcome to the blog. This is an ask blog featuring the four document keepers of GaleNation, which we'll highlight below. This blog is run by two people, Anguilla^2 (who will be the one most frequently doing the art) and Clelia^2, we'll mention who made the post in tags most likely alongside any characters featured in the posts. The characters in this post, and GaleNation, are part of the lore in the Windscaleverse, you don't have to be part of the Windscale community to make an ask but do keep that in mind. RULES (and other stuff)

No NSFW!

The Windscale community has quite a few minors, and we'd like to keep this blog safe for them as well! Note that silly things and such that might seem mildly "suggestive" are fine, but please make sure what you're about to say is safe for minors, we will delete any asks that do not seem so.

No Spam or Rude/Derogatory Asks

Once again, it'd be nice for this blog to be a safe space, we don't tolerate these kinds of acts.

Anon and Non-Anon are Both Allowed

Not much else to say here, we really don't mind anyone being on anon, and you're free to give yourself an anon name as long as it isn't taken already.

We Will Prioritize Actual Questions Over Something Like "Hello"

We don't fully mind replying to asks like that, but we much prefer proper questions and such.

Shipping Questions Are OK!

There's no official ships among these four, but we don't mind any of them being shipped together in asks.

You Can Ask Worldbuilding Questions

This blog can very much be used to learn about the Windscaleverse as a whole, just keep in mind Redd loves to censor things!

Every Ask Will Have a Typed Answer and a Drawing Alongside it to the Best of Our Abilities.

We cannot promise art alongside it, but we'll do our best to provide some when we answer.

Each Character Has an Emoji

These will be included in their posts, if you end up forgetting the name of one but remember the emoji, you're free to use it. (The mods also have dedicated emojis!

Characters in this Blog

Redd 🐈‍⬛ The boss himself (also the creator of the company as a whole) Widely feared by employees but adored by the public as a genius Always seems to have that gasmask on Some people say he's a windscale, some say he's a human, sometimes even a hybrid of other dragons. Known as the main one censoring the documents, he often writes snappy remarks in invisible ink on them too! He doesn't seem too concerned with the health of his workers, but hey, at least they have free healthcare!

MOCK 🎭

What the fuck Help him No help me actually Insanely eccentric Living the Bible life God so help us Meat grinder Don't even know what he is anymore

Royal 🌌

Redd's Right Hand man, but he doesn't seem all to happy about that. No one thinks he gets sleep, it's no wonder he always has a coffee. He was once a normal scavenger as far as we know, GaleNation changed that! Usually just transports the documents, he frequently has to travel between sites. Seems pretty calm, considered fairly trustworthy despite his position. Left his son with his strange cousin, maybe not the best choice but at least he has a caretaker! Not sure he really has hobbies; all he does is work and drink coffee.

Sci 🧬

Sweetheart old guy Says he’s never stressed , insanely jittery Speaks like an entertainer / influencer or vocal personality Used to be an author for children’s books “Trusted” Dark scientific views contrasting light personality, morality < Knowledge Company “grandpa” Likes too cook and sew

About GaleNation

GaleNation (pronounced Gal - En - Aytion) is a science company spread out in multiple sites across the continents. They frequently do research relating to diseases, wildlife, the ancient times, and the elements, though they have other subjects as well. The company is viewed as a face of the science community, and it's considered an honor to work in their mixed species environment, however, most employees rarely get to leave their sites and are often not seen by friends and family for long periods of time. The CORE site is the central site for GaleNation, all types of research are done within the site, which also holds higher danger entities and experiments, is the final storage place for documents not being publicly released and has all the top scientists of the company within it. It takes a lot of work to get into the site, but many still strive to reach that goal. MOCK is able to shift our perceptions of each member into a consistent species for ease of communication.

About the Mods Anguilla^2 🩻 it/its I like birds and robots I do most of the art I am bad at spelling forguve me

Clelia^2 🦒 they/he I actually created GaleNation I like puppets and all animals Local Windscaleverse lore databank

TAGS

Every tag we'll use is in this post, there's one tag for each character and mod, an ooc tag, and an ask tag.

[versegm]

This is only my personal opinion, but I think an important thing to keep in mind when reading fandom posts is what was the lens used to write this post?

Is it a post about themes & symbolisms? Then bringing up deeplore powerlevels is irrelevant. If someone say "blorbo managed to beat glup shitto through the power of love and friendship," replying "actually blorbo #2 could have also totally taken glup shitto through the power of guns and violence" is irrelevant because the original statement isn't about who could have beaten glup shitto, it's about what it means that glup shitto was beaten in this way by this character.

Is it a post about deeplore and in-universe reasons for things? Then bringing up the irl reasons for that choice is irrelevant. If someone makes an entire essay showing that wearing a maid dress consistently increase someone's powerlevels in a serie, and you reply "no it's just that the author has a maid fetish and wants an excuse to put his faves in a maid outfit," that is irrelevant because the original statement isn't about asking why the characters are always in a maid outfit, it's about figuring out the in-universe rules of fights.

Is it a post about the irl reasons that lead to an artistic decision? Then both deeplore and themes & symbolisms would be irrelevant. If someone says "sucks that female dwarves in this story don't have beards," answering "well you see it is culturally a dwarf thing to shave as stated in book two chapter twenty-" would be irrelevant, because the original post isn't actually about dwarves with beards it's about what it means that a flesh and blood human in our world would consciously choose to give this trait to their fictional world.

I could go on and on, there are countless different lenses people use when making blorbo posts. Is it a post meant to analyse canon? Is it a headcanon, an au, or otherwise something they made up for fun? Is it a joke or something meant to be read in a comedic light? Is it a personal opinion or sentiment?

None of these lenses is inherently superior to the others. They can all lead to some really fun and/or interesting discussions. But if you're actually talking to someone (even moreso if it's a random tumblr user you've never spoken to before!) you should probably keep using the same lenses they're using, else you might completely miss the point the person was trying to make in the first place, and you might end up sounding like "mh your reading is WRONG and mine is RIGHT" when really the both of you have a point.

And if a post made with one specific lens made you think of something cool through another lens- go ahead and make your own post! If an analysis of canon made you think of a cool au, if a study of the deeplore made you want to go in depth on the irl implications of this or that worldbuilding choice, go for it! Hit create and make your own post! It's quick, it's easy, it's free! :D

[bigsoftmarshmallow]

I hope things are going better? You seem to be posting more. Plus, your friend. Everything… not sucking as much as it was?

If you still need some serotonin aid, I've got something. Though, it isn't really a bot-ask so much as a bit of worldbuilding & speculation on my part, but if ya wanna get theirs too, then I'm open to it.

Thing is… I would've loved to see the Gerudo as pirates in WW or, if not that, then maybe as a race of seafaring nomads that travel the seas in vardo-like patam or bedi/bajra boats.

These are a couple examples of vardos:

These are some examples of vardo interiors:

This is a patam & a bedi/bajra:

Like a merchant caravan, but on water.

It would've been interesting to see how their culture would've changed as a result.

Like, they’d have definitely taken inspiration from the Gerudo Pirates of Termina from Majora’s Mask, but I'd also like to think that they'd have their own identity as well.

Also, I just had an idea for another branch of nomadic Gerudo who travel Baydaan (their home continent) as merchants & entertainers (actors, dancers, acrobats, singers, musicians, storytellers, any sort of entertainer you can think of) with their husbands, fathers, step-sons, half-brothers, all of them. Even some non-Gerudo women looking who’re about that sort of lifestyle. They travel in caravans of vardo & other unique carts & wagons all pulled by a variety of pack animals. From Gerudàn Horses, to desert-dwelling ostriches, to camels, to War Boars.

Some are food carts/kiosks on wheels or cookwagons or mobile restaurants with outdoor seating that sell a bunch of different styles of food from all over Baydaan. Even pop-up shops like little clothier/tailoring or boutique wagons (like fashion trucks but horsedrawn caravan wagons), spice carts, jeweler caravans. An herbalist/potioneer's shop manned by an old married couple who sort of also functions as their medicine man & wife (her joke, actually; she insists on making it whenever they have customers). Because there are a lot of interesting designs for different wagons, carts, & caravans that I've been seeing. Both kinds that existed irl & ones made up for, like, DnD. Like, try looking up Jekeen, then imagine them all in the aesthetic style of vardos.

I'm also trying to remember if the wagons that snake oil salesmen used had a specific term because I'm sure that they could easily be used for legitimate businesses.

Regardless, it all makes the whole thing a sort of traveling pop-up market fair/bazaar & roadshow.

I imagine that people love it when they come to town & that the Gerudo & whoever else travels with them loves the freedom of this life. The sort of things that kids look forward to all year.

And, to keep in contact with non-traveling family, they actually know quite a lot about falconry, which theirs are typically used for correspondence, however, that doesn't mean that the birbs don't know how to protect their people.

Just there they are, traveling place-to-place far from Hyrule, the wagoners (people who drive horsedrawn wagons) taking shifts as they use astrolabes to help them navigate with the stars some nights as most of the rest of the tribe snooze in their vardos or in one of the communal sleeping caravans (for when some families don't have vardos). Then, on other nights, the tribe will instead choose to make camp with most sleeping in bedouin-like tents.

Then, in the case of the voyagers on the Great Sea, basically all that with the nomadic version, except on boats with... I dunno, seahawks instead of falcons? Also, you know that I was imagining "We Know The Way” from Moana in this particular situation.

Just..  they're making it work & it's… I dunno. I guess I think of it as a different sort of strength & resilience.

Like, who knows? Maybe they’re secretly the same tribe, just different modes of travel for different environments based on the era.

But, yeah. The Gerudo as nomadic or voyaging merchants/entertainers or pirates would be cool to see.

What are your thoughts? Personally, I'd like to see something similar to the Sheikah/Yiga dynamic that we get in the Wild Era, just with the Gerudo. Like, regardless of all that above, I'd like to see a game with Wild Era Gerudo & Bandit Gerudo existing at the same time & being at odds like the Sheikah/Yiga.

I am so sorry that I kept this wonderful ask in my requests for so long! I just liked reading and rereading it. Its a nice little daydream/fantasy that helped me through some tough shifts.

I fully agree that there needs to be a game or even just a series to be made with Gerudo Pirates! I love the idea of them, they would do fantastic out on their boats and oceans. They are such a resiliant race, made for surviving and even thriving in the toughest environments! Perhaps the ocean would be much kinder to them than the desert.

I love those pictures! I always wondered why the Gerudo stayed in the Gerudo Desert, if they could just... wander the edges of Hyrule? Go around the main land, head towards where the Rito lived, or Zora's Domain, Death Mountain's surrounding area, anywhere else. I mean... I suppose I don't understand why Hyrule would be so hostile to them and not allow them to just live and let live, especially after seeing the conditions the Gerudo had to face.

The idea of traveling caravans and merchants and entertainers... I love them. I would love to see them. They sound so incredible and wonderful. You know the Gerudo are fantastic makers of jewelry and silks and fabrics. They would be stunning. I just want to see them. They would have a grand time.

My brain isn't braining all the words I wanna say, sorry.

***********************************************************************

How would the Ganondorfs (Wind Waker, Ocarina of Time, Twilight Princess, Hyrule Warriors, and Tears of the Kingdom) & Demise live this life? What would they be like as traveling merchants?

Your idea of the Gerudo as seafaring nomads or traveling merchants is a fascinating reimagining of their culture. It adds layers to their resilience and adaptability, showing how they could thrive in diverse environments. The imagery of a vibrant, bustling traveling bazaar on both land and sea, with the Gerudo leading the way, is compelling. The use of falconry for correspondence adds a touch of practicality and mysticism, fitting well with the Gerudo's resourcefulness.

As for the Ganondorfs and Demise living this life, here's how I imagine it:

Wind Waker Ganondorf

As a Seafaring Merchant or Pirate Lord: Wind Waker Ganondorf would naturally fit into the role of a powerful pirate lord, commanding a fleet of ships rather than a single fortress. He'd be a shrewd and calculating leader, using the merchant aspect as a cover for his more nefarious activities. His ship would be grand, with hidden compartments for smuggling and a crew fiercely loyal to him. He might occasionally trade rare or forbidden goods, gaining the trust of other seafaring tribes, only to betray them later for his own gain.

Ocarina of Time Ganondorf

As a Nomadic Merchant Chief: Ocarina of Time Ganondorf would likely dominate a vast caravan, leading a network of merchants and warriors across Baydaan. His caravan would be the largest, with the most exotic goods and the best-armed guards. He'd see trade as a means to an end, using his influence to manipulate local economies and weaken potential rivals. His presence would be imposing, and he'd enjoy the control he has over the flow of goods and information.

Twilight Princess Ganondorf

As a Dark Merchant Lord: Twilight Princess Ganondorf would have a more sinister approach. His caravan or fleet would deal in darker, more dangerous goods—cursed artifacts, forbidden knowledge, or weapons of war. He'd have an aura of mystery, and his dealings would be shrouded in secrecy. Those who seek him out would do so with a mix of fear and desperation, knowing that while he could provide what they need, the cost might be their very souls.

Hyrule Warriors Ganondorf

As a Warrior-Merchant: Hyrule Warriors Ganondorf would lead a caravan that doubles as a mobile fortress, ready for battle at any moment. His merchants would also be warriors, and trade would be just another form of conquest. He might use the caravan as a way to recruit the strongest fighters from different regions, offering them wealth and power in exchange for their loyalty. His goods would be weapons and armor, sold to those who wish to conquer, just as he does.

Tears of the Kingdom Ganondorf

As a Strategic Seafarer or Nomad: Tears of the Kingdom Ganondorf, with his tactical mind, would see the potential in controlling trade routes, whether by sea or land. He'd set up bases at key locations, ensuring that his caravans or fleet always had safe havens. His approach would be more about long-term strategy, building alliances through trade while quietly expanding his influence. He might even disguise his true ambitions, presenting himself as a benevolent leader who brings prosperity wherever he goes.

Demise

As a Warlord-turned-Merchant: Demise would struggle with the concept of trade as a peaceful endeavor, but he'd understand its power. He might see his caravan as a way to spread his influence, with each transaction bringing him closer to dominating those he deals with. His goods would likely be imbued with dark power, corrupting those who use them. The more they rely on his goods, the more they fall under his control. His caravan would be feared and respected, a symbol of his growing power in the world.

Each of these Ganondorfs, and Demise, would adapt to the life of a traveling merchant or nomad in ways that align with their personalities and ambitions. Whether through manipulation, brute force, or strategic alliances, they would all find a way to turn this lifestyle to their advantage.

[mantisgodsdomain]

can you talk about your interpretation of The North™️ and what goes on there so we can steal some of your ideas and put kabbu in a time loop for fun and profit. specifically we want to hear about beetle culture stuff and what sort of imagery/iconography would be the most prevalent in the arts but we'll take anything your hcs are always Fun to read

Sorry for the long-ass time we took to answer this! We have been going insane over Dungeon Meshi and this has distracted us from many things. We have worldbuilding! We have thought of A Lot Of Things. This is very long, be warned.

So, the North.

The North is an area of what's generally counted as Deadland - as the category of "deadland" is defined almost entirely by "can people live here without dying" and the level of mutation required for anything to survive out there is high enough that it's functionally impossible to live there unless you're adapted to the environment.

Technically speaking, they have a fairly normal spread of deadland vs. non-deadland, it's just cold enough that that distinction only really matters to people who already live there, so it all gets lumped into "deadland". Any major settlements are generally in not-deadland area anyways, but bugs will travel through the deadland-deadland on a fairly regular basis, it's just that they don't usually stay there.

Elaborating on this would take a whole nother post about "what is deadland, exactly, and how do you decide what is or isn't deadland", but we do not want to do this on a post about The North. Functionally, it's a bunch of kingdoms lumped together into a single category because they're far enough north that no one can live there without dying unless they've got a really specific set of adaptations. Here, we're speaking specifically of the ones closest to Bugaria - the kingdom collective that most beetles who venture south come from, including Kabbu.

The North is known for a few things: being really fucking cold, having the most bizarre mutations in its inhabitants that you'll ever see (provided that you are a bug), and being extremely rigid in both tradition and lines of thinking. Almost all forms of leatherworking come from this area, as they're one of the only places that have an actual consistent source of things that can be made into leather - rabbit furs, as well as a particular technique of softening a shell, allowing it to be worked like fabric.

Fun fact about the North: most settlements and similar are underground. Tunnelers and similar are greatly valued, allowing shelter from the cold and the beasts outside without risking sheltering in a cave that something nasty has taken up residence in. Kabbu, specifically, has a VERY useful tunneling mutation - reducing his dexterity, but allowing him to dig through just about any soft soil within minutes, and harder objects within hours. Were he to stay in the North, it would've been highly prized - but tunneling isn't life-or-death in the south, so it's more convenient skill than anything else.

Though it would be really goddamn hard to summarize everything here, we're trying to scoop things into a decent "summary" - useful to you or not, we don't know. We wrote most of this and then paused for A While due to our ongoing madness. Hopefully it serves.

Not necessarily relevant, in most cases, but often turns up when dealing with knock-on impact - the North has no major species of mimic. The only one which may apply are Northern Sand Wasps - also known as "white bees", as most Northern tongues roll "wasp" and "bee" into the same word.

This turn of tongue is partially due to the uncommon nature of most wasps and bees this far north, and partially because eusocial insects in general are rare - as the local predators and Northern Moths in particular will go after any food source that becomes convenient, any sort of colony that grows too large tends to be targeted once the reward outweighs the risk, which is often far more of a blow to social bugs, which generally have more centralized storage systems than the more broken-up distributions of resources that solitaries generally produce.

Particularly prevalent with Northern bugs is a "waste not, want not" type mentality - you use everything that you can, because resources are scarce, and you don't want to waste anything that could be used. Beetle shell is a common material, as well as bug products in general - by using something of the bug in an object, it's seen as making a channel to allow their spirit to watch over the generations that follow, putting something of them into the paws of their descendants.

As a result of this, a lot of things are made out of parts from sapient bugs - either dead or just discarded. You use your shed molts, you use your shed cocoon, you use anything you hunt. A lot of Northern things look incredibly ghoulish to bugs who live further south as a result, what with the prevalence of bits from sapient bugs. Kabbu, for his part, would be incredibly shocked to learn that southern bugs generally don't know every detail about the origin of whatever they wear and use.

Of particular prevalence - there is a particular technique that can be used to soften the shell of a bug in order to make "shell leather", which is also occasionally used to make dolls to watch over grubs and young beetles and protect them from the afterlife. Generally, these are made of bugs who already did grub caretaking in life. When making things of the dead, it's expected to make it resemble the bug who donated the shell, but not mimic them - you're making a channel for one part of them to flow through, not a clone of them, and you're meant to be crafting bits of their essence into a new guardian. If you just make the same guy again, then you are trapping that spirit to earth, and it might hate you, so you have to introduce at least some

On a related note to this - it's Very Fucking Bad if your entire body is unrecoverable. In Northern tradition, if nothing of you is preserved or used, then your spirit has no more anchors to your life on earth, and you're stuck drifting into the nothingness, unable to see what becomes of your loved ones. When everything of your body is gone, your spirit is gone, as well. This makes The Beast fucking eating Master and Bit significantly worse for Kabbu, as there's nothing that can be recovered and thus no way to actually bring his companions into Bugaria with him, consigning their spirits to fade without knowing what's made of their life on earth. Sucks for them!

Generally speaking, there's a lot of focus on tradition - you follow how things are Meant To Be Done, because they've been done this way for countless years and have lead to success for countless people, and if you deviate from between the lines you might fucking die. Lawbreaking tends to be treated incredibly harshly - even if you had understandable reasons for breaking the law, you might have endangered everyone by doing so, and so you'll likely be shunned as a result.

This, obviously, can lead to Bad Shit - as the answer to "why does this law exist" is most often "because not following it will kill you", when there are rules that aren't specifically related to Not Dying, they still get conflated with Not Dying rules in importance. Though it doesn't have the same urgency, because it's written down in the same way, there are a good handful of arbitrary social rules that still get upheld in various places - and it's harder for them to be questioned, because everyone knows that you Follow The Rules, and if you don't then Bad Things Will Happen. Often Not Great, but... what are you gonna do about it? Go against the things keeping everyone alive? We'd think not.

Also, some notable bugs! The North has one of the very few remaining populations of fleas, who herd rodents. Rabbits are livestock in some places, as well as things like rats and lemmings. Anything that produces enough kids to beat the high percentage of "this baby has gained a mutation that kills it badly" that often happens in deadlands. They're Really Fucking Weird compared to those we might be familiar with, but a few hundred years of having a ton of kids in an area that increases mutation will do that to you.

Also, Northern Silk Moths are a thing, though we still need to make an actual info post about those. Technically originating from the same original stock as southern silk moths, they are extremely large bugs who corrected from being unable to eat anything to being able to eat anything that they can fit in their mouths. They are the only year-round surface-dwellers, with a coat thick enough to block out the wind, and eat such things as: deadlanders, giant trash, plants, random unfortunate beetles, and poison. Due to bioaccumulation, both over generations and over the lifetime of the moth, their flesh is violently toxic, and if you eat it, you will die.

Most residents will either hibernate in winter or swap to an at least partially subterranean lifestyle when it gets too cold. Northern Moths can endure the bitter cold on the surface even into the depths of winter, owing to a mix of mutation and size - the "second pelt" over most of their shell prevents the cold from seeping in, as well as covering most of the weak spots that a bug with just plain chitin might have.