#the Spider Queen looks like she was made for a straight-up horror game

[phoenixdown-and-fairydust]

Replaying Okami and I completely forgot about the boss of Tsuta Ruins in the Agata Forest. Capcom, on what level was this Jorōgumo-Sadako nightmare fusion creature okay? Who pissed the creature designer off enough that they created this, and the project head enough that they signed off on it? Or did the whole team just start having nightmares that it would come for them if not included in the game? I'm not even arachnophobic and I hate this thing, I hate the way she looks, I hate the way she wiggles.

Images after the read more because spider monster, would rather not set off anyone's arachnophobia while just scrolling. I would like to remind you that Okami is not a horror game, it's an action-adventure with puzzles similar to Zelda games and an art style between traditional art and Wind Waker's cute squishy character proportions, where you play as a cute wolf. An avatar of Amaterasu, yes, but still a cute wolf who leaves a trail of flowers behind her when she runs. This is your main character for those unfamiliar.

And this is the first proper boss you face, after mostly squishy looking or comedic enemies before her:

[talesofsonicasura]

LMK Characters with a Comic Artist s/o

What's with everyone flooding the LMK tags in angst and spoilers? People are waiting for Season 3 to come out in English Dub so please either tag spoilers or put them under the :readmore: tag. Anyway, here's some fluff. Can be read as gender neutral or preferred gender.

MK

This man is an artist with a childlike soul. So he's the type to indulge in cartoons than just the Monkey King series.

He first met you at a local Comic Con. You were setting up a booth for autographs when the two of you bumped into each other.

Your cartoons fell in the good ol rubber hose style, the characters always getting into whacky situations that ended silly or wholesome.

Anyways, your sketchbook went flying alongside his which sent drawings everyone. All it took was you two brushing hands and look into the other's eyes to begin your relationship.

MK was honestly grateful ever since that fateful day. Being a delivery boy and the Monkie Kid is stressful but you were there to help him.

Drawing comics with each other, listen to him vent out his frustrations in understanding or give him a hug when it felt like the world was crashing onto his head.

You were always there to keep him grounded so MK did his absolute best to keep you away from the dangers of him being Sun Wukong's successor.

It worked until DBK went on another city wide assault. He had bolted straight to your comic shop ready to protect you. Imagine his surprise that you weren't as helpless as he thought.

Why? Cause you were firing blasts of smoke from your hands and became actual smoke when dodging the Bull Clones.

MK's jaw practically dropped once you launched yourself high into the air before crashing down like a makeshift smoke bomb. Literally exploded into smoke taking every duplicate out in your wake.

He hugged you once you nonchalantly reformed like nothing even happened. Who knew that his partner had typhokinesis, the ability to manipulate smoke? No wonder why you gave warm hugs and kisses.

Mei

She's a streamer that indulges in all sorts of stuff. Mei often showcases her favorite comic books, your comics being her absolute favorite.

So imagine her surprise meeting you one day at the arcade. All it took was a game of Monkey Mech to start your relationship.

To Mei, you were one of the best things to happen in her life. As much as she liked to go on adventures with MK, there were times that she prefer to chill.

Playing videogames, watch bad horror movies, and stream together. You guys even have your own short cartoon series. Couldn't forget the amazing cuddle sessions either.

Mei was immediately worried about your safety when Spider Queen attacked the city. She just wanted a good Lunar Year date!

She was about to protect you only to find out that you weren't so helpless. Especially when you literally turned into paper and threw paper knives capable of tearing through steel.

Apparently you had papyrokinesis, the ability to manipulate paper. It made you even more badass in Mei's eyes, especially when you skewered a bunch of Spider Bots with paper dragons!

She's definitely going to ask for a paper dragon later once you guys get out of this mess.

Red Son

Comics are something he rarely indulges in. They have to be really good to grab his attention.

You met each other at a small restaurant. You were working on your latest comic only to hear a small commotion.

Apparently the waitress made a mistake and gave away the Bull King heir's table to someone else. Sharing your table with Red Son was what lead to the future relationship.

To him, you were a breath of fresh air. An escape from the expectations of his family and weight of his failures.

You didn't care about his heritage or that he's the 'bad guy'. You stuck by his side, always gave him unconditional love and encouragement despite everything.

Red Son often found some doodles you made in his pocket. Every single one always made the heir smile as he could feel your love.

When his father went berserk, he was deeply worried. The worry turning to fear when you came out of nowhere to protect him from his father.

Imagine Red Son's shock as a familiar glitchy shield shoved DBK away. It was a design from his blueprints... You had the power of video manipulation.

He watched in awe as you effortlessly fought his (possessed) father with bolts of data or creating constructs of his different inventions.

Red Son practically hugged you once the whole fiasco was done. You sure gave him a scare but the surprise had been welcomed. Although the conversation with his parents is gonna be a bit awkward.

Macaque

He indulges in stuff like comics more than Red Son but not much. Your comics were a guilty pleasure in all honesty.

The two of you met in his theatre. You were doing a few drawings as you waited for his show to begin.

Macaque was honestly surprised that you were here as your respective arts greatly differed. It was when you caught him staring that the relationship between the both of you began.

For someone who mostly kept to himself, Macaque loved being in your presence. You didn't care about him being a yaoguai or his misdeeds.

Both of you shared your love for art and surprisingly, theatrics. Being able to indulge in grooming and pure affection is something Macaque secretly craved.

Your relationship only made the comics he had feel even more special. That the feelings and thoughts conveyed were more clear.

When Not Mayor had showed up at his theatre, he secretly hoped that you would be safe. Macaque rather not lose the only person he loves.

So imagine his surprise when a blast of hot pink light slammed into the ominous man. The attack had been from you, streaks of that same light around your body like angry serpents, neokinesis or the ability to manipulate neon light.

He couldn't help but watch in amazement as you drove off the fake mayor with consecutive blasts and exploding bubbles of neon light. Or how you grabbed and took him halfway across the city in mere seconds.

Guess that's another reason why Macaque had been drawn to you. Even shadows must have a light.

Sun Wukong

This man indulges in various media, mostly tv shows and comic books. Your comics were his absolute favorite as they never failed to entertain him.

The two of you met at a local comic book store. He wanted to get the latest issue of your comic series signed. It was only when you bump into each other by accident did everything start.

Despite being the Great Sage Equal To Heaven, you treated Sun Wukong like a normal person. Not an almighty god, powerful yaoguai or great enemy but an equal.

Always there when he needed it most. Whether it was movie marathons, help care for the monkeys of his kingdom or comfort him at his lowest, you gave him kindness and love.

He has many enemies so when he got captured by Spider Queen, Sun Wukong prayed you didn't get caught up in the mess.

The Monkey King nearly choked once he saw you run up to his web prison. He was about to tell you to hide or leave only to become silent when something broke his bindings... Concrete.

Concrete shards were circling around your arms in rings. You had the power of betokinesis, the ability to manipulate concrete.

Sun Wukong was impressed at your skill as you continue to cut the bindings of SQ's prisoners. Even formed slides or steps so the trapped yaoguai who were held too high could get down safely.

He couldn't help but chuckle when the two of you led everyone to safety. Guess the Monkey King wasn't wrong about you being his rock.

Have a great Valentine's day and I'll see you back at Megapolis!

[modern-inheritance]

Modern Inheritance: Night Terrors, pt. 1

WARNING: This story deals with torture flashbacks, several of which are specifically dealing with waterboarding. If these scenes would cause any problems for you, please do not read. I am only basing my portrayal of PTSD on internet research and very little first hand knowledge.

Here it is folks. The two shot that started the current MIC iteration. This was one of my first stories for Modern Inheritance (written in 2016 iirc). As such, it’s not totally in line with the image I have for the series and characters now (Early 2021), but it is a solid baseline and actually pretty damn close. At some point I may rewrite it, but for now, I’m happy with this reminder of changes.)

PART 1 // Part 2

~~~

Arya never really slept well.

True, her sleep got a bit better once they had arrived at Ellesméra, something she was incredibly thankful for, but being able to sleep through every other night without nightmares or a heart pounding night terror ripping her from her waking dreams was still not good enough to be considered ‘sleeping well.’ If it weren’t for those blessed nights of uninterrupted slumber the elf was sure she would be a walking wreck.

So far she had managed to avoid waking anyone else. Islanzadí, surprisingly enough, would occasionally check on her daughter in the middle of the night, and on nights where she found her sitting at the balcony staring at the stars, the queen would join her in silent companionship. It was a sign their relationship was mending, and if Arya was still stuck, mute and fearful, in her dreams, the slender arm that wrapped around her shoulders and soft humming would pull the younger elf from the darker recesses of her mind.

Something about tonight was different, though. As Arya slipped under the comforter on her bed– having finally gotten used to sleeping in it after two weeks of sleeping on a progressively thicker pile of sleeping bags on the floor– she felt a tingle of distant static dart across the pads of her fingers. When she glanced out the doors to the balcony, a far off thunderhead appeared as a purple smear against the orange and pink sunset. Lightning flickered through the cloud, seeming to rent it from corner to corner before it again returned to the color of bruised skin.

'Good. We haven’t had rain in some time.’ The elf thought as she turned on her side and closed her eyes. She tugged the corner of the comforter under her chin and drifted off into her waking dreams, hoping the sway of the tree would lull her into a peaceful sleep.

~

Arya’s waking dreams stuttered. Something had changed in her surroundings, something she couldn’t quite put her finger on until she realized she couldn’t breathe.

Everything felt heavy and damp, especially around her face and definitely over her mouth and nose. It was pitch black and something was clamped over her eyes, shoving her head back against a hard, flat surface. She couldn’t move, no matter how much she internally screamed at her muscles to do so, and with a terrifying jolt she realized she couldn’t breathe either. Warm water gushed into her mouth and flooded her sinuses, panic filling her chest as quickly as the liquid did.

“We can end this here and now, elf.” A cold voice whispered in her ear, and the fall of water against her face halted. The hand over Arya’s eyes lifted and bright light flared across her lids as a sodden cloth was removed. The demon beside the woman let her cough and choke, trying to expel the water in her lungs but unable to while he still pushed her head back with a hand on her clammy forehead. “What say you, hm? A few words are all I want. Speak them to me, and you will be released from this.” He knew she wouldn’t be able to respond, not verbally at least, but that was part of his game. He knew she would never speak.

Using the little leeway he gave her, Arya managed to scowl, spitting water from between her teeth, and shake her head a few millimeters from side to side. Durza sighed mockingly and slapped the wet cloth back down over her face.

“Oh well. Ready to die again, little elf?“

Lightning flashed across Arya’s eyes as she fell from the bed and hit the floor hard, a strangled cry escaping her throat. She scrambled to kick the tangled blanket off of her legs and dove for her pack to rip her sword from where it was tied to the frame.

A clap of thunder rang out as she pulled the blade free just in time to feel her back flare white hot with agony, lines of fire tracing wounds she knew had been healed. It had been weeks since they closed, hadn’t it? Hadn’t it?!

A fist slammed into her side, cracking a rib and sending her to the floor again, sword still clamped in a white knuckled grip.

'Get dressed. Get out of here. Fight.’ The thought was barely registered as Arya scrambled for the combat pants she wore while with the Varden, another line of pain lancing its way up her right arm. For a brief moment, as she struggled to yank the pants on without giving up her sword, she swore she saw blood dripping from her fingers, trailing from a deep gash that revealed the bones and tendons flexing in her forearm.

She dropped her blade for a split second to yank on a standard issue cotton shirt and then snatched the weapon up again. She tore her pistol belt and combat jacket out of her pack, quickly patting the pockets to make sure the pressure bandage and small medkit were still there, and slung both over her arm. Thunder crashed again, followed by a clap of lightning nearby.

Another blow clipped the elf’s shoulder as she dashed for the balcony, nearly shoving her out the open doors before she caught herself on the jamb.

It was raining. Wet spray splashed up into Arya’s face and she recoiled, feeling her throat tighten and her already rapid heartbeat increase. She couldn’t breathe. He chuckled coldly and pushed her off the table with his boot, watching her vomit up water and what little food remained in her stomach as she convulsed on the floor. All that water and yet it still felt as if her lungs were on fire.

Arya could feel another strike coming, another slash from a whip arcing through the damp air. It was either continue facing her invisible attackers or brave the water.

With a savage growl the elf bounded through the doorway and out into the elements, leaping from the balcony to the tier below, the tier below that one, and finally to the ground. She straightened from the crouch she had landed in, then staggered as the raindrops slammed into her back and sent fresh shocks of pain across her skin. The raw wounds– 'How are they open again!'– and exposed nerves registered each and every drop of water as a lightning bolt that seared its way to her brain.

”Giving up so soon? I expected more of you.“ Arya looked up and saw the Shade before her with a mockingly disappointed expression. She bolted to her feet and struck out at his face, only to be thrown against the wall as if she were no more than a child. Stars and lights exploded across her eyes even as she charged him again, refusing to be led like a lamb to slaughter. She fought tooth and nail until he succeeded in pinning her and the whip slammed into her already mutilated back, and the cycle of torture started anew.

And then she was running, sprinting across the elvish capitol, heart pounding in her ears and a knot of terror in her stomach. Everything was wrong, everything was burning. Smoke filled her lungs as she dashed blindly in a direction that, for some inexplicable reason, promised safety.

A bullet suddenly hissed by her ear, cutting through the raindrops with a high-pitched song, then another shot clean through the muscle of her side with a spray of blood. She gasped and stumbled, then spat out the raindrops she had inhaled, coughing as the taste of copper joined the musky flavor of pine smoke. She yanked on her combat jacket, dulling the pain of the raindrops pounding into her skin, and hoped that the woven spider silk plates in the fabric would protect her from any more stray projectiles. 'Where are they coming from? They can’t have gotten here, not in Ellesméra!’

The fire was simply…gone when she slammed into his door, breath coming in quick, painful gasps. The rain still poured down unabated, an explosion renting the night as a cannonbomb detonated behind her and sprayed her wounds with mud. Arya pressed her forehead to the familiar surface and pounded on the door with the pommel of her sword as the ground shook. "Glen!”

There was no answer.

A flash of light to the left made her whip around, looking for the gun from which the muzzle flash had originated, only to feel a blade sink into her stomach.

White hot knives sliced twin, cauterized slits below each one of her ribs. The muscles of her abdomen flexed as she instinctively tried to pull her arms and legs from where they were cuffed to the wall in an attempt to protect her sides and stomach. Durza smiled at her movements, tracing the outline of the toned muscle beneath her tan skin with a finger as he caught her eyes with his. Disgust welled up in her chest, and if she had been able to spit at him she would have. Being without water for two days straight had left her barely able to swallow.

He saw her expression, though, and his smile widened. He leaned forward and pressed his ice-cold forehead to her fevered one, his sharpened teeth glinting in the light cast by the glowing daggers. A bit of horror touched Arya’s heart as she feared the worst. She couldn’t fend off the advances of a Shade, not in the state she was in.

Then she threw back her head and screamed in pain and Durza laughed in glee as the daggers buried themselves halfway to their hilts between her ribs.

The shock sent Arya staggering back to hit the door again. “Glenwing, let me in!” She shouted, kicking the door with her bare heel. “Glen!”

She smelled hot cinnamon mints and burning batteries all interlaced with the pungent scent of motor oil.

And then she realized she could taste them too, and with a jolt she felt a mouth over hers and a weight on her hips and her eyes flared open and she saw him above her. He pulled back and smirked as he wrenched her head to the side by her hair and she immediately coughed up water and blood and bile. “Welcome back to the land of the living, little elf. You need not worry about dying on my watch. Even in the void, you will never escape me.” And he laughed.

Arya let out a choked sob and slid to the ground, her body alight with pain from wounds that should have been nerveless scars and terror that she had never wanted to feel again. “Glen, please…” She leaned against the door, hugging her knees, and beat her head against the wood, trying to chase out the demons in her skull. “Please, I can't–”

There was so much blood. She didn’t even know where he had hit her this time. He had screwed with her perception of pain again, amplifying it until the barest ghost of air on her cheek felt like a hot iron smashing into her face, and set about whipping her with a short bullwhip studded with bits of barbed wire. She had given up on holding in her screams after the first hour and a half. After the fourth she had given up on screaming entirely, her body too weak and her throat too torn to produce sound. And still he cut her and whipped her and kicked her and strangled her, not even asking questions, only seeking to sate the spirits raged within his body.

Then it was black and she tasted the hot cinnamon again, the flavor reminding her of the mints Jörmundur had tried using to curb his smoking after his son was born, and the overwhelming smell of motor oil pervaded her senses. He wasn’t on top of her this time, and she immediately rolled over and dry heaved, spitting and gasping and trying to rid her mouth of the tastes that she now associated with death.

She felt something hot sheeting down the side of her face, hotter than the rain that pounded down inches away. “I can’t…” She whimpered, weakly raising her sword again and knocked the hilt against the door. Pain blossomed on the side of her head, adding the new sensation to the avalanche of agony that was crashing through her battered and bloody body. “I can’t keep…”

A hand grabbed her bruised side– spat blood into his eyes– guard screamed in agony as she slammed her combat boot between his naked legs with a spray of blood– couldn’t hear, couldn’t see, couldn’t taste or smell, it was all silence and nothing– acid sizzled in the trenches of her torn flesh, smelling like cooking meat– knife diving into her stomach over and over, the wounds healing shut after seconds as he methodically stabbed her, grinning like a child at play– pain like that shouldn’t exist– claw shaped iron dipped down– blood, all that blood– his lips on hers as he breathed life into her body again and again to introduce her to new, unimaginable levels of pain–

Arya threw her head back and screamed into the roaring thunder, “Dear spirits, just let me DIE!”

[weirdponytail]

Modern Inheritance: Night Terrors, Pt. 1

WARNING: This story deals with torture flashbacks, several of which are specifically dealing with waterboarding. If these scenes would cause any problems for you, please do not read. I am only basing my portrayal of PTSD on internet research and very little first hand knowledge.

Here it is folks. The two shot that started the current MIC iteration. This was one of my first stories for Modern Inheritance (written in 2016 iirc). As such, it’s not totally in line with the image I have for the series and characters now (Late 2020), but it is a solid baseline and actually pretty damn close. At some point I may rewrite it, but for now, I’m happy with this reminder of changes.)

PART 1 // Part 2 

~~~

Arya never really slept well.

True, her sleep got a bit better once they had arrived at Ellesméra, something she was incredibly thankful for, but being able to sleep through every other night without nightmares or a heart pounding night terror ripping her from her waking dreams was still not good enough to be considered 'sleeping well.' If it weren't for those blessed nights of uninterrupted slumber the elf was sure she would be a walking wreck.

So far she had managed to avoid waking anyone else. Islanzadí, surprisingly enough, would occasionally check on her daughter in the middle of the night, and on nights where she found her sitting at the balcony staring at the stars, the queen would join her in silent companionship. It was a sign their relationship was mending, and if Arya was still stuck, mute and fearful, in her dreams, the slender arm that wrapped around her shoulders and soft humming would pull the younger elf from the darker recesses of her mind.

Something about tonight was different, though. As Arya slipped under the comforter on her bed– having finally gotten used to sleeping in it after two weeks of sleeping on a progressively thicker pile of sleeping bags on the floor– she felt a tingle of distant static dart across the pads of her fingers. When she glanced out the doors to the balcony, a far off thunderhead appeared as a purple smear against the orange and pink sunset. Lightning flickered through the cloud, seeming to rent it from corner to corner before it again returned to the color of bruised skin.

'Good. We haven't had rain in some time.' The elf thought as she turned on her side and closed her eyes. She tugged the corner of the comforter under her chin and drifted off into her waking dreams, hoping the sway of the tree would lull her into a peaceful sleep.

~

Arya's waking dreams stuttered. Something had changed in her surroundings, something she couldn't quite put her finger on until she realized she couldn't breathe.

Everything felt heavy and damp, especially around her face and definitely over her mouth and nose. It was pitch black and something was clamped over her eyes, shoving her head back against a hard, flat surface. She couldn't move, no matter how much she internally screamed at her muscles to do so, and with a terrifying jolt she realized she couldn't breathe either. Warm water gushed into her mouth and flooded her sinuses, panic filling her chest as quickly as the liquid did.

"We can end this here and now, elf." A cold voice whispered in her ear, and the fall of water against her face halted. The hand over Arya's eyes lifted and bright light flared across her lids as a sodden cloth was removed. The demon beside the woman let her cough and choke, trying to expel the water in her lungs but unable to while he still pushed her head back with a hand on her clammy forehead. "What say you, hm? A few words are all I want. Speak them to me, and you will be released from this." He knew she wouldn't be able to respond, not verbally at least, but that was part of his game. He knew she would never speak.

Using the little leeway he gave her, Arya managed to scowl, spitting water from between her teeth, and shake her head a few millimeters from side to side. Durza sighed mockingly and slapped the wet cloth back down over her face. 

“Oh well. Ready to die again, little elf?"

Lightning flashed across Arya's eyes as she fell from the bed and hit the floor hard, a strangled cry escaping her throat. She scrambled to kick the tangled blanket off of her legs and dove for her pack to rip her sword from where it was tied to the frame.

A clap of thunder rang out as she pulled the blade free just in time to feel her back flare white hot with agony, lines of fire tracing wounds she knew had been healed. It had been weeks since they closed, hadn't it? Hadn't it?!

A fist slammed into her side, cracking a rib and sending her to the floor again, sword still clamped in a white knuckled grip.

'Get dressed. Get out of here. Fight.' The thought was barely registered as Arya scrambled for the combat pants she wore while with the Varden, another line of pain lancing its way up her right arm. For a brief moment, as she struggled to yank the pants on without giving up her sword, she swore she saw blood dripping from her fingers, trailing from a deep gash that revealed the bones and tendons flexing in her forearm.

She dropped her blade for a split second to yank on a standard issue cotton shirt and then snatched the weapon up again. She tore her pistol belt and combat jacket out of her pack, quickly patting the pockets to make sure the pressure bandage and small medkit were still there, and slung both over her arm. Thunder crashed again, followed by a clap of lightning nearby.

Another blow clipped the elf's shoulder as she dashed for the balcony, nearly shoving her out the open doors before she caught herself on the jamb.

It was raining. Wet spray splashed up into Arya's face and she recoiled, feeling her throat tighten and her already rapid heartbeat increase. She couldn't breathe. He chuckled coldly and pushed her off the table with his boot, watching her vomit up water and what little food remained in her stomach as she convulsed on the floor. All that water and yet it still felt as if her lungs were on fire.

Arya could feel another strike coming, another slash from a whip arcing through the damp air. It was either continue facing her invisible attackers or brave the water.

With a savage growl the elf bounded through the doorway and out into the elements, leaping from the balcony to the tier below, the tier below that one, and finally to the ground. She straightened from the crouch she had landed in, then staggered as the raindrops slammed into her back and sent fresh shocks of pain across her skin. The raw wounds– 'How are they open again!'– and exposed nerves registered each and every drop of water as a lightning bolt that seared its way to her brain.

"Giving up so soon? I expected more of you." Arya looked up and saw the Shade before her with a mockingly disappointed expression. She bolted to her feet and struck out at his face, only to be thrown against the wall as if she were no more than a child. Stars and lights exploded across her eyes even as she charged him again, refusing to be led like a lamb to slaughter. She fought tooth and nail until he succeeded in pinning her and the whip slammed into her already mutilated back, and the cycle of torture started anew.

And then she was running, sprinting across the elvish capitol, heart pounding in her ears and a knot of terror in her stomach. Everything was wrong, everything was burning. Smoke filled her lungs as she dashed blindly in a direction that, for some inexplicable reason, promised safety.

A bullet suddenly hissed by her ear, cutting through the raindrops with a high-pitched song, then another shot clean through the muscle of her side with a spray of blood. She gasped and stumbled, then spat out the raindrops she had inhaled, coughing as the taste of copper joined the musky flavor of pine smoke. She yanked on her combat jacket, dulling the pain of the raindrops pounding into her skin, and hoped that the woven spider silk plates in the fabric would protect her from any more stray projectiles. 'Where are they coming from? They can’t have gotten here, not in Ellesméra!'

The fire was simply…gone when she slammed into his door, breath coming in quick, painful gasps. The rain still poured down unabated, an explosion renting the night as a cannonbomb detonated behind her and sprayed her wounds with mud. Arya pressed her forehead to the familiar surface and pounded on the door with the pommel of her sword as the ground shook. "Glen!"

There was no answer.

A flash of light to the left made her whip around, looking for the gun from which the muzzle flash had originated, only to feel a blade sink into her stomach.

White hot knives sliced twin, cauterized slits below each one of her ribs. The muscles of her abdomen flexed as she instinctively tried to pull her arms and legs from where they were cuffed to the wall in an attempt to protect her sides and stomach. Durza smiled at her movements, tracing the outline of the toned muscle beneath her tan skin with a finger as he caught her eyes with his. Disgust welled up in her chest, and if she had been able to spit at him she would have. Being without water for two days straight had left her barely able to swallow.

He saw her expression, though, and his smile widened. He leaned forward and pressed his ice-cold forehead to her fevered one, his sharpened teeth glinting in the light cast by the glowing daggers. A bit of horror touched Arya's heart as she feared the worst. She couldn't fend off the advances of a Shade, not in the state she was in.

Then she threw back her head and screamed in pain and Durza laughed in glee as the daggers buried themselves halfway to their hilts between her ribs.

The shock sent Arya staggering back to hit the door again. "Glenwing, let me in!" She shouted, kicking the door with her bare heel. "Glen!"

She smelled hot cinnamon mints and burning batteries all interlaced with the pungent scent of motor oil.

And then she realized she could taste them too, and with a jolt she felt a mouth over hers and a weight on her hips and her eyes flared open and she saw him above her. He pulled back and smirked as he wrenched her head to the side by her hair and she immediately coughed up water and blood and bile. "Welcome back to the land of the living, little elf. You need not worry about dying on my watch. Even in the void, you will never escape me." And he laughed.

Arya let out a choked sob and slid to the ground, her body alight with pain from wounds that should have been nerveless scars and terror that she had never wanted to feel again. "Glen, please…" She leaned against the door, hugging her knees, and beat her head against the wood, trying to chase out the demons in her skull. "Please, I can't–"

There was so much blood. She didn't even know where he had hit her this time. He had screwed with her perception of pain again, amplifying it until the barest ghost of air on her cheek felt like a hot iron smashing into her face, and set about whipping her with a short bullwhip studded with bits of barbed wire. She had given up on holding in her screams after the first hour and a half. After the fourth she had given up on screaming entirely, her body too weak and her throat too torn to produce sound. And still he cut her and whipped her and kicked her and strangled her, not even asking questions, only seeking to sate the spirits raged within his body.

Then it was black and she tasted the hot cinnamon again, the flavor reminding her of the mints Jörmundur had tried using to curb his smoking after his son was born, and the overwhelming smell of motor oil pervaded her senses. He wasn't on top of her this time, and she immediately rolled over and dry heaved, spitting and gasping and trying to rid her mouth of the tastes that she now associated with death.

She felt something hot sheeting down the side of her face, hotter than the rain that pounded down inches away. "I can't..." She whimpered, weakly raising her sword again and knocked the hilt against the door. Pain blossomed on the side of her head, adding the new sensation to the avalanche of agony that was crashing through her battered and bloody body. "I can't keep…"

A hand grabbed her bruised side– spat blood into his eyes– guard screamed in agony as she slammed her combat boot between his naked legs with a spray of blood– couldn't hear, couldn't see, couldn't taste or smell, it was all silence and nothing– acid sizzled in the trenches of her torn flesh, smelling like cooking meat– knife diving into her stomach over and over, the wounds healing shut after seconds as he methodically stabbed her, grinning like a child at play– pain like that shouldn't exist– claw shaped iron dipped down– blood, all that blood– his lips on hers as he breathed life into her body again and again to introduce her to new, unimaginable levels of pain–

Arya threw her head back and screamed into the roaring thunder, "Dear spirits, just let me DIE!"

[forasecondtherewedwon]

Wait let me try that again - spideychelle + "Angel in the streets, freak in the sheets.”

You’re absolutely right, Anon, so I’m very pleased that you and @itsjacobperalta picked this prompt! I had a lot of fun with it!

Operation Eight-Legged Freak

Pairing: Peter Parker x Michelle Jones (Spideychelle)Rating: M/NSFWWord count: 2396

Summary:

Despite being nice enough to give a select number of interviews after Mysterio blew his identity, Peter Parker is continually hounded for more. When the media discovers he has a girlfriend, they go after her too. Until now, she’s held back. Until now, they’ve been safe.

Michelle Jones grants a single sit-down interview and, boy, it’s a doozy.

31. “Angel in the streets, freak in the sheets.”

Operation Eight-legged Freak is a go, MJ texts Peter. She spies through the glass front of the coffee shop, searching until her gaze lands on the most reporter-looking person in there. Taking a deep breath, MJ centers herself and hauls the door open.

“Ms. Jeffries?” she asks, stopping at the table against the wall where a woman with decoratively oversized glasses is leaning too close to the screen of her laptop.

The woman straightens up and half-rises out of her chair with a hand outstretched.

“Miss Jones! Call me Elsbeth.”

“Michelle.”

As MJ shakes her hand, she focuses on clenching her teeth instead of her grip; the journalist’s gaze is sliding all over her, sizing her up as she probably internally composes some filler for the article she’s writing on Spider-Man’s girlfriend.

MJ wills the potential descriptions of herself out of her head. Peter’s been helping her practice that, reassuring her every time she comes up with a potential physical or character flaw that the press might hone in on. Of course, a significant portion of what he says is bullshit because he refuses to recognize anything about her as less than perfect. Dork.

“I’m just going to grab a drink,” MJ says, pointing towards the short line to the cash register.

“Oh, no, that’s on me. Or, rather, it’s on the paper. What can I get you?”

“Um, just a latte. Thanks.”

The woman gives her a phony smile and gestures for her to sit while she strides over to join the line. MJ takes the chair across from the open laptop and tries to relax into it. While she waits, she mentally goes over her and Peter’s game plan. Texting him might comfort her, but Elsbeth will definitely be watching. Which adjectives will she use to paint her picture of how MJ sits, how she scans her surroundings? She can’t worry about that. This interview is not about the reporter and MJ tells herself that she needs to remember how value she is.

Since the ‘Peter Parker is Spider-Man’ story broke, her boyfriend’s been under a microscope. It didn’t take a hell of a lot of time before the media found out he was dating someone and, though she hasn’t told Peter this, MJ’s planning unholy retribution against whichever little weasel at their school sold her out for a hasty buck. She suspects Brad. The attention now on her is the only thing keeping Brad’s dick un-punched.

Peter’s played nice―nicer than MJ would’ve in his place―in service of the super-persona the city knows and loves. Basically, he doesn’t want to besmirch the good name of Spider-Man. He’s made himself available for a limited number of interviews (decided upon with May’s guidance), in and out of the suit, always patient and smiling. MJ hasn’t been as accessible. As in, she hasn’t done interviews. Any. At all. Between her boyfriend, herself, her parents, Peter’s aunt, and Pepper Potts (who probably finds their exposure problems ridiculously easy to manage after years of wrangling Tony Stark), they determined that the best move was to withhold access to MJ. Now, being seen or used as an object goes against every belief she has, but this is a power move. They’d keep her as the queen among the pawns, the ace up their sleeve.

Turns out MJ isn’t the ace. She’s the joker.

The strategizing just seemed to go on too long and polite requests for Spider-Man interviews turned into microphones jammed in Peter’s face and photographers slipping into Midtown tech pretending to be parents picking up their kids. So MJ and her super-nerd devised their own plan, quickly realizing her time had come to do her part in shaping the Spider-Man narrative.

Half of what the papers and blogs were publishing wasn’t truthful, so MJ wouldn’t be either. She would grant a single interview and fuck with the press so hard that they would see her as an unreliable source of information (and stop asking questions), be made incredibly uncomfortable by her unprintable answers (and stop asking questions), or maybe just confuse them to the point that they couldn’t scrape together an article out of the array of utter shit she would present them with (and stop asking questions). The tabloid they picked out together for MJ’s interview also happens to already be on the other side of credible, which helps with making every word she says to this woman essentially worthless.

Ah, here’s Elsbeth with her latte.

“Do you mind if I record our conversation?” she asks, pulling her phone from her pocket.

“Please,” MJ says. She forces herself not to smile because she’d probably hurdle over polite and go straight to looking maniacal.

The woman taps her screen the second she’s set MJ’s coffee on the crowded tabletop.

“I’d warn you away from drinking coffee so young,” the woman says laughingly as she retakes her own seat, “but I guess you wouldn’t be sorry to stunt your growth.” MJ stares blandly back at her, gently swirling the mug, until she continues. “Because you’re already taller than Peter.”

She shrugs as Elsbeth quietly closes her laptop and slides the phone into place between them, eyes fixed greedily on her interviewee’s face.

“He likes my legs.” Before the instant spark of scandal in Elsbeth’s eye can be transformed into a follow-up question, MJ adds, “I think it’s a spider thing. Some kind of dark fetish as a result of him getting totally fucked by mutation. And you should call him ‘Mr. Parker.’”

Wrong-footed, Elsbeth tilts her head in discomfort at having to apologize.

“Sorry, yes, that was a slip in professionalism―”

“No, because that’s what I call him.” Now she’s just speechless. MJ raises her eyebrows like she’s explaining this to a child. “When we’re fucking.” An unusually mature child. “Should I have said at the start that his fetishes are numerous? My bad, I’ve never been interviewed before.”

It has now occurred to MJ that a liberal sprinkling of profanities through her answers can’t hurt either. Can’t hurt her. This interview’s going to require more redactions than a copy of Fifty Shades of Grey in a children’s library.

“I… I…” Elsbeth covers herself (or thinks she does) with a quick throat clearing and a dainty sip from her own cup of coffee. “No, that’s fine, I just normally like to begin with something more… general.”

MJ sighs.

“I regret to inform you that Mr. Parker’s tastes aren’t really in the realm of general.” She locks eyes with Elsbeth like she’s confessing a big secret. “He’s pretty fucking depraved.” After a second of enjoying the flicker of horror across the woman’s expression, MJ pretends to take pity on her. “Sorry, would you prefer if I call him Peter? You look uncomfortable.”

The journalist is darting her eyes around now, but, as ever, MJ isn’t speaking overly loudly and most of the customers of this place seem to get their drinks to-go; there isn’t anyone sitting at the tables nearest to theirs.

“General questions,” Elsbeth clarifies too late. “I meant general questions, about anything.” Something behind her eyes is beginning to look delightfully haunted and this time, MJ allows herself a grin and nods like she gets it.

“Right. Well, I’ve know that Mr. Parker―sorry, Peter―was Spider-Man since before we started dating.” Elsbeth visibly perks up because MJ knows what’s coming out of her mouth sounds like the first usable information since she walked into this coffee shop.

“That’s fascinating.”

And she does sound fascinated. MJ reminds herself it’s just the greediness behind getting a scoop, not legitimate interest in who Peter is as a human being or his many private sacrifices in the attempt to keep his secret before that dumb fuck Mysterio showed up.

“And,” Elsbeth probes, feeling around in the bag at her feet before extracting a pad and pen for supplemental notes, “what was it that made think your classmate was moonlighting as an Avenger?”

MJ takes a long drink of her latte and glances contemplatively at the nonrepresentational art print hanging on the wall beside them.

“He’s jacked as fuck.”

Elsbeth, who mirrored her by going for a sip when she did, nearly chokes.

“Anything―” She coughs. “―about his personality? That would make you think he’d lead a double life risking life and limb for strangers?”

“Oh sure,” MJ concedes easily. “Peter’s kind of a nerd, but he gets along with everybody. You know, one of those people who can be casual friends with a kid in every social clique? People in the neighbourhood who know him as Peter Parker love him too. He’s very nice.” And then she drops the anvil. “Angel in the streets, freak in the sheets.”

Really, Elsbeth should get into comedy. She’s great at abruptly shifting her expression from relieved to panicked. Jim Carrey made a whole career out of his ‘elastic face.’ This woman should totally find an agent.

“Haven’t you heard that expression?” MJ asks innocently, sliding two fingers through the handle of her mug slowly enough for Elsbeth to notice and potentially take as subliminal messaging.

“I’ve…” The woman trails off, lowering her pen again, and devolves her response into an awkward nod.

MJ laughs as though to herself. When she leans forward conspiratorially, planting her elbows on the table, the journalist flinches. She’d feel bad if the whole pack of media people in this city didn’t suck ass. Peter’s never done an interview with Elsbeth’s paper, and for good reason: one of their photographers followed him around for a week trying to get a shot of him changing in an alley as if he weren’t only seventeen years old. Yeah, today’s interview is more than a little about MJ protecting her boyfriend.

“We do shit you’ve never heard of,” MJ offers without being prompted. It doesn’t look like poor Elsbeth’s up to asking questions anymore. “In Peter’s bed, a missionary’s just a traveling priest and G-O-T stands for Game of Thrones, which we never catch up on because we’re too busy tearing another page out of the Kama Sutra.” She laughs like, isn’t this great? We’re having girl time. “Actually, I shouldn’t imply that G-O-T has never stood for ‘girl on top,’ because Mr. Parker does enjoy me riding his cock from time to time, but if we do that, I’m also wearing nipple clamps or I have my hands tied to a ring in the ceiling or something. That freak fucking loves his accessories.”

She takes a tranquil sip of her coffee. It’s actually pretty good and strong enough to keep her bouncing along through this interview. MJ respects an establishment that doesn’t skimp on the caffeine in favour of a mountainous topping of whipped cream. She might actually come by here again sometime.

“Ok,” Elsbeth says with sudden sternness, face contorted in a smile that hints she’s trying to convince herself that, somehow, everything will be fine. “We’ve covered all my questions―” MJ nearly snorts coffee out her nose at this barefaced perjuring. “―so I’ll just,” she explains, shoveling her things into her bag, “give you a call if I need anything else.”

MJ smiles as the journalist gets to her feet.

“Sure thing. I’d shake your hand,” she says, looking up at Elsbeth from her chair, “but you don’t want to know where mine have been. Or, if you do, that’s something we can cover in that phone call.”

The woman gives a nervous laugh and puts her palms up to ward off a handshake.

“No, that’s… we’re good. We’re all set.”

“‘K, great.”                  

“Thank you for your time.”

The disturbed look mounts Elsbeth’s face before she’s completely turned away from MJ, which just adds to MJ’s delight when she gets to call out to her.

“By the way,” MJ says as the journalist turns, fight or flight likely seconds from kicking in judging by the tension of her stance. “You know I’m a minor, right? So publishing anything I just told you would look pretty bad.”

The woman probably suspected this in the rational part of her brain that MJ’s spent the last half hour scaring into hiding, but she certainly looks irritated by the reminder.

“I guess you’re right,” she acknowledges tersely.

MJ nods to agree that, yes, she is 100% correct, and swallows the last of her coffee.

“Also, because I know you work for the kind of place that likes to share tip-offs with other scummy publications, I’d like you to feel free to spread the word that Spider-Man and his girlfriend are not to be fucked with. And neither is Peter Parker.”

After the woman flees, MJ slumps back, hand shaking as she rotates her mug in its saucer. When the quiet grinding noise breaks through the pounding of the adrenaline-accelerated heartbeat in her ears, she reaches for her phone instead.

Tell me how it goes, Peter texted.

She’s too jittery from confrontation and caffeine to sit any longer, so she pushes away from the table and calls her boyfriend instead, raising the phone to her ear once she’s on the sidewalk with her hood pulled up; it’ll take a little time for the warning to be distributed and, in the meantime, she doesn’t want to be recognized. One interview was enough.

“MJ?” Peter asks from the other end of the line. “How was it? What happened?”

She’s silent long enough to realize she actually isn’t sure how to put it into words.

“I’ll tell you everything when I see you, but there is one thing you should know right away.”

“What is it?”

“I think I made up a sex position.”

The truth―the real truth―is that they’re seventeen, missionary has been a trusted friend, and MJ’s only ever made brief eye contact with a copy of the Kama Sutra from across a display table at a bookstore. She hears her boyfriend inhale sharply before responding with obviously forced coolness.

“Oh yeah?”

“Mhmm. We’re gonna try it.” If her adrenaline’s up, so is her bravado.

Peter fumbles his words, communicating nothing at first, then, “Why was that something I had to know right away?”

“Because,” MJ says, straining to make out the signs above the upcoming storefronts, “I’m planning on stocking up at the sex shop in the next block and I need to know if we’re going to have your apartment to ourselves when I get there.”

[zippdementia]

Part 85 Alignment May Vary: An End to Demons

At the end of last session, the PCs managed to put together the pieces of Alyss’ memory to discover she was not the queen of some ancient Satanic city, but rather a noble’s daughter, kidnapped and turned to the worship of Asmodeus. Furthermore, she bore Asmodeus’ child, Karina, who was a major Player Character in our campaign before she reached the hallowed halls of NPCdom.

Now the PCs are whisked back to the present, where they find themselves in the stone hallway again, the “behind the scenes” area of this layer of the Abyss and Esheballa’s game. And indeed, they have a game to finish.

(The artwork below is by Ryan Durney, from his Mirrors of the Abyss module. It’s one of my favorite of his pieces! For the full module, go here.)

Breaking the Rules

With the PCs at this point is Hecate, pulled from her destruction at the hands of the pit fiend moments before she could be crushed by its baleful wrath, and also Alyss. Puck is gone, but Alyss explains that he is “with her now,” the last bit of Asmodeus contained within her, safe in her restored mind until she can bring it to where it needs to go: Esheballa’s inner sanctum, where she keeps the “trophies” of the defeated Demon Lords and Devil invaders, who died during the Blood War’s destructive finale.

Alyss tells the PCs she will reach the sanctum and open a portal so they can join her there but that she needs two things: First, Daymos needs to go with her, as she needs his power to open the portal and also to travel the Abyss unnoticed, as he is now a demon. Second, she needs the PCs to keep playing Esheballa’s game for a little longer, so she doesn’t get suspicious and discover Alyss’ plan.

What is Alyss’ plan? To revive Asmodeus within Esheballa’s sanctum, bringing back her "husband” and the true lord of the devils.

The only other thing Alyss gives the players is a card from Abbraxus, meant for Imoaza. It has a curious riddle on it, telling her that in order to forge a weapon capable of defeating a god or goddess like Esheballa. It reads:

To the Snake Lady:

You will not be able to defeat Esheballa without the power of the realms combined. Solve my riddle and forge the greatest weapon in creation. It was meant for the one whose life you cut. Now its power will be yours to claim. Four realms will come together to craft this blade:

The Eternal Fire of Hell

The Cutting Darkness of the Abyss

The Power of an Elemental God

The Forbidden Knowledge of the Far Realms

Without this weapon, you shall perish and Esheballa shall make a trophy of your skins and a prisoner of your souls. Even with the weapon, your chances may be slight, but darkness flees from even the slightest light.

The PCs jump back into the game after this, doing one more room of Esheballa’s “Mirrors of the Abyss.” Esheballa herself is overjoyed to have her playthings back. 

“Ah, there you are!” Esheballa’s girlish voice emanates from mirrors all around the group. Then her voice darkens and lowers: “I thought you had tried to cheat your way out of my game.” Then a high pitched giggle again. “Or that you’d died, hee hee! Well, I’m glad you are back. There’s so much more fun to show you.”

The next room is a favorite room of mine from Ryan Durney’s crazed campaign, a room where the PCs are forced to split up and each tackle a different puzzle or challenge in a hallway of mirrors. Imoaza and Hecate end up in one hall, Milosh in another, and Ruz in a third.

Ruz has played Esheballa’s game and survived it before and he remembers this mirror puzzle. It was here that he and a fellow traveler met the horrible “Bloody Mary.” Mary was the architect of many of Esheballa’s magical mirrors, but when she tried to escape the realm, Esheballa took offense and punished her horribly, by putting her through the “grater” and then keeping her alive, suffering eternally from her wounds while trapped in the very mirrors she helped construct. Now Esheballa uses her as a monster against those who cannot solve her riddles.

For Ruz, this means solving the steps of a complicated ritual. Fortunately, he has the experience of past failure on his side and is able to avoid the mistakes his old companion made and complete the puzzle. As he exits the mirror hallway, he turns and sees Bloody Mary in one of the mirrors. Something about the look the horrendous apparition gives him makes him think that she knows what he and his companions are about to do. She nods solemnly as if in support, and disappears.

Presently Imoaza, Hecate, and Milosh join him. Milosh looks the worse for wear, but Imoaza and Hecate seem alrite, except for a trickle of blood running down her shoulder. The group doesn’t share their experiences, but I will, briefly.

Imoaza and Hecate end up facing a puzzle involving a sphere of annihilation which requires the proper sacrifice to pass. This is actually a pretty fun little mechanic, where sacrifices let Imoaza roll a d20 to change the effects of the sphere, supposedly turning it eventually into a portal that will let her and Hecate leave this hall. But the trick is that the sphere is never good, and really the goal is have it disappear and reveal the true exit. But this still requires sacrifice.

Milosh, meanwhile, is given a choice in his hallway: face a horrendous monster or set it on one of his fellows. Milosh has been changing ever since entering the abyss and especially since losing Carrick. He is losing his amicable, naive nature and reverting to something more primal inside of him. An old personality is emerging. And that personality wants to live. It sics the monster on Imoaza and Hecate.

This ends up being a boon for the snake relatives, as when they are attacked by the huge, deformed fox creature that Milosh sends at them, Imoaza uses powerful magic to blast it backwards into the sphere of annihilation. The sacrifice is accepted and the sphere disappears! 

An End to Demons

Passing through the mirror trap buys Alyss and Daymos enough time to open a way to Esheballa’s inner sanctum. The PCs leap through the portal that appears for them at the end of the mirror hallway and end up somewhere completely different, a great emptiness that is spanned by a massive bridge leading to the hollowed out corpse of the mighty Demogorgon, defeated during the Blood War and left here to house Esheballa’s most sacred treasures: the conquests of the Blood War.

Note, for this section, I’ve left the module Ryan Durney designed behind, but I want to say that it was a really unique dungeon, and one of the only ones I’ve ever read that really felt like an abyssal adventure. Ryan’s attention to detail really brought Esheballa and her realm to life. It is a deathtrap of a dungeon in the vein of Tomb of Horrors, maybe even deadlier, but also an experience lined with melancholy and moral dilemma. Very interesting stuff! Overall, the Planes in Dungeons & Dragons don’t get enough attention. They have been left as sandbox arenas for innovative DMs to play around in and let their imaginations run wild. But that’s also a lot of pressure on a DM. You have to create a compelling story, pick from myriads of monster lists and obstacles what the players are going to encounter, and somehow make the whole experience feel different enough from a standard game as to make it memorably part of a planar experience. Mirrors of the Abyss is one of the only modules released for 5th Edition that I feel does that, and the only one that does it for the Abyss.

That said, Mirrors could take up many more sessions if I play it straight through, and it is time for us to return to our main storyline. The players enter Demogorgon and make their way into one of his skulls, where Esheballa has built a museum of sorts. Here are paintings all over the walls, each containing the soul of a dead Demon Lord. One painting contains the soul of Asmodeus.

Basically, my head canon here is that in the final days of the Blood War, Asmodeus took some of his highest ranking devils and a huge army and invaded the Abyss. Every single Demon Lord died that day and the power of the Abyss was sealed away by Asmodeus’ power. But using this power drained Asmodeus of his life force and while he could not truly die, the Devils that accompanied him were killed and Asmodeus’ body destroyed. Damaged, his soul fled back to Hell, where one of his disciples, Alyss, found it and nurtured it into a semblance of health. It became Puck. Not strong enough to reveal who he truly was, and with his power only sustained by Alyss’ fervent belief in him, Puck could do naught but watch as Hell was left to the squabbling of those Devil Kings and Queens who had stayed behind from the front lines, turning hell into a capitalistic mecca in the process and more corrupt than ever before.

Meanwhile, The Blood War ended, but the Abyss survived. Dreadfully wounded, its ability to touch the world and open portals to draw poor souls into it was lost. The Demon Lords, from Lolth to Demogorgon, were destroyed. And into this vacuum of power stepped Esheballa. She was a very old goddess of fertility, whose worship had long ago corrupted into lust and blood and then eventually into dust and forgotten rituals. Now she claimed the Abyss for her own playground, feeding on what soul stuff of the dead Demon Lords she could siphon, trapping the rest in paintings to adorn her new sanctum, the hollowed out shell of Demogorgon. She kept a piece of Hellfire, kept alive here in a magical furnace. 

Into this furnace Milosh now places his broken gun arm and the spider mechanical creature that Abbraxus gave him, which is actually one of the old mechas of hell, designed to be able to forge using Hellfire. Milosh also feeds the fire a few special items he’s picked up around Esheballa’s realm, most notably the crown taken from the battle with the Lich. Flames flare up and the spider bot begins working at blinding speed, until it forges a new gun arm for Milosh, a gunarm filled with the powers of the Abyss but also the ability to turn those powers against demons: the Abyss Breaker.

The Abyss Breaker (requires Attunement)

As a bonus action, can transform from a hand into a drill or into a cannon.

As a hand, has no special stats (but it sure looks cool!)

As a drill, it cannot be used to wield a weapon or manipulate objects like a hand could. It can act as a +1 adamantine spear (user has proficiency) and can be used to help break through rocks and other materials. It can also be fired like a grappling hook as an attack action, with a range of 20/60 feet and can deal damage in this manner or be used to grip surfaces or objects (attack roll versus the object's AC to hit and grip an object). If it strikes, an immediate bonus action can be used to pull the user to the object or creature, after which point the target is no longer considered hooked.

As a cannon, it acts like a +3 heavy crossbow, dealing force damage instead of piercing. It can also cast the following spells, once per day per spell as an action:

Cloud of Daggers (PHB 222), Delayed Blast Fireball (PHB 231), Destructive Wave (PHB 231), Vitae Devourandem (a spell created by Ryan Durney which drains a target of their life and feeds it to the user)

The following spell can be used twice a day:

Modified Magic Missile (PHB 257): casts five darts for 1d4+1 force damage each. When a dart hits a target, that target is pushed 1d4-1 squares away in a direction determined by the roll of another d4. 1 - away to the left, 2 - away to the right, 3 - straight back, 4 - knocked prone in place.

Also, the wielder of the cannon can approach the body of a recently slain spellcaster (must have died within the last five minutes) and can store one spell that the spellcaster knew inside of it, to be used at any time. Once this spell is used once, it is gone. Multiple spells can be stored in this manner, up to 6. To store more than 6, one of the other spells must be discarded. The same spell can be stored multiple times, if taken from different spellcasters. This ability cannot be used on the same spellcaster multiple times.

Once per day, when the wielder of the cannon is a target of a spell, they may make an Arcana (Int) check equal to the spellcaster's DC. If successful, the spell is stored inside the cannon as per the ability above. On failure, nothing happens. This has no effect on the spell currently being cast.

And our fun with this weapon-maker isn’t over yet! 

Imoaza thinks back to Abbraxus’ riddle and puts the following items in the fire:

The Necronomicon

The Rod of Storms

Her Drosselgreymeyer Scythe

There is a terrific flare of heat and light and when the spider bot finished its work this time, the Eternal flame of Hell that feeds this furnace does the impossible: it goes out. Emerging from the flame is a shockingly familiar sword. It announces itself as “Blackrazor.” Only this is Blackrazor before it became the sword they all know. It is the original source of Blackrazor and the power of all of the Abyssal weapons that Imoaza and her Yuan Ti tribe have wielded for ages, including Drosselgreyer. We name it Blackrazor “Alpha.” How the sword’s origins begin here, aeons after the sword has already had a history, is a mystery yet to be solved.

“It’s gonna be timey-wimey stuff,” one of the players said. They probably aren’t wrong. “We are gonna go back and give birth to ourselves or something, aren’t we?” another asks. I’m not so sure about that.

The scene wraps up with a big battle. Alyss, Daymos, and Puck arrive and head to the painting of Asmodeus, and begin to form a new body for him, pulling his essence out of the painting where Esheballa had trapped him after the Blood War. But Esheballa also arrives and takes on the form of one of the demon lords she had previously defeated, the Demon Queen of Witches, named Rangda. The stats are taken from a Kobold Press publication (their Tome of Beasts and Creature Codex have gotten mention before, but they deserve mention again as the best third-party monster manuals for fifth edition).

The fight against Esheballa in Rangda’s form is a pretty fantastic one. Imoaza is immediately polymorphed into a serpent by Rangda but that doesn’t stop her from latching on to Rangda’s leg and dealing... well... about 3 damage a turn. But it’s something.

This leaves Hecate, Milosh, and Ruze to deal damage to Esheballa. Milosh has his Abyss Breaker, and Hecate has her gun arm, and Ruze has powerful magics, but it is a very close fight nonetheless. Hecate is nearly killed, and Milosh is about to face a deadly barrage when Ruze’s chaotic wild magic unintentionally turns the tide. Ruze is a Wild Magic sorcerer, and every once in a while he unleashes a random burst of magic. It can be dangerous, turning his powers on his allies... it can be pointless, like giving him a feathery beard or turning his skin blue... but it can also be powerful, like in this case, when it boosts the power of his magic and deals a devastating final blow to Rangda’s form. Esheballa is ejected... but the goddess is far from done with the group. Destroying Rangda’s form was simply like removing a bit of armor from Esheballa. Her true essence stands tall, ready to smite these poor mortals who dared to challenge her.

Only, this whole battle was just a distraction, meant to buy Daymos and Alyss time to channel Asmodeus back into Puck. That process completes now and Asmodeus returns to life. As he does, the power that was keeping the Abyss at bay is sucked back into him and the Demon Lords also are reborn, emerging from the paintings around Esheballa and pulling her, whom they consider a traitor and a rival, into their midst to tear her apart.

Asmodeus says the Blood War is about to begin again, and it is time for everyone to return to their homes, he with his new queen. Then, as Asmodeus draws Alyss in close for a passionate kiss., the PCs are sucked into a portal he creates and the world swirls into color around them.

They next open their eyes to see a canopy of leaf studded trees stretching above them. And that is for next time: Back to the Future.

[ssentiwsavonej]

Game of Thrones: Battle of Winterfell Dead Pool

*mostly conjecture, but spoiler warning to cover bases*

Ok, so: after watching 8.02, I’ve been thinking a lot about the looming largest battle sequence out to film, and obviously given the happy moments in the lead-up, a lot of our faves are gonna bite it next week. So I wanted to put my thoughts to paper, as it were, and talk about the major players, where they’ll be, and what could happen to them.

Jon Snow

Location: atop Winterfell battlements, then eventually in the thick of it, because Jon

Outcome: ALIVE. C’mon, I barely have to say anything here. Jon Snow/Aegon Targaryen is far to pivotal to the titular game to die here. Plus he’s gotta sort things out with his girlfriend/aunt Daenerys. Speaking of...

Daenerys Targaryen

Location: based on previews, she’s gonna be all over Winterfell: atop the battlements, viewing the battle from afar in the nearby hills, and even in the TOTALLY 100% SAFE NOT-AT-ALL DANGEROUS CRYPTS

Outcome: ALIVE. Literally same reasons above. She’s key to the Game and she’s gotta deal with Jon’s poorly timed bomb drop. Plus she’s gotta survive here to potentially become a villain herself down the way as the Mad Queen/Night Queen

Ghost

Location: probably three feet from Jon at any given moment

Outcome: DEAD. “Whaaaat? You mean they’d really bring Ghost back for five seconds this week, just to kill him next week???” You’re goddamn right they would! And for a very utilitarian reason that every major crew member has said many times over: those Direwolves are hella expensive to make (somehow more so than dragons? I’m guessing because they still have to use live wolves, so getting the animal to behave just so, and then enlarge them in post is likely a bigger pain than straight CGI? Anywho...) so Ghost is gonna be badass and rip some throats out, probably save some asses, and then get the shit wrecked out of him like Summer did.

Sansa Stark

Location: She’s gonna be in an interesting spot, too bold to hide in the crypts, but not a fighter. So she’s gonna probably try (and fail) to stay high and dry.

Outcome: ALIVE. I don’t have as strong an argument for her survival, but I just have a feeling. She didn’t have any serious revelations or resolutions in 8.02, aside from flirting/fighting with Dany, so her death wouldn’t be AS heartbreaking as some others.

Arya Stark

Location: in the battle with her new weapon, though also from previews she ends up in the crypts (and looking fucking terrified)

Outcome: DEAD. It hurts to say this, but Arya is very likely going to be done saying “Not today” to the God of Death. She banged the hell out of Gendry KNOWING THIS COULD BE HER LAST NIGHT ON THIS PLANET, and ignoring that cardinal cliche, something in the crypts is going to scare her shitless, and to do that to Arya, it’s gotta be something BAD (more on that later) **EDIT: I also think her death next week would go down as the ultimate prank, because when she went on Jimmy Fallon and “accidentally” let loose a spoiler as an April Fool’s joke, the (supposedly) fake spoiler was that Arya died in episode 3. What greater troll could there be than her fake spoiler not being fake at all?

Bran Stark

Location: in the Godswood, seated in the perfect spot to make awkward eye contact with the Night King

Outcome: ALIVE? The situation with Bran and the Night King is interesting, and undoubtedly won’t be as cut-and-dry as “two men enter, one man leaves.” Like, obvious the Night King ain’t going down here, but I feel like the Three-Eyed Raven is too cosmically important to not survive this. So I feel like if/when these two meet, it may not end in death, but change of some sort. (If the Night King even shows! Speaking of...)

Night King

Location: outside Winterfell *MAYBE*

Outcome: ALIVE (generally speaking). As I said before, the Night King is too big a deal to go down here without more of Westeros dealing with him first. So if Bran’s plan works, something more nuanced is gonna go down in the Godswood. But here’s the thing: what if the Night King isn’t even here? In the preview we see a line of White Walkers on horseback, seemingly in the lead position of the army. But no Night King, no Viserion. He knows where Bran is, so he’s in no rush; what if he’s taken his dragon (and some of the army) on past Winterfell, marching instead directly on King’s Landing? Bran had previously seen a vision of a dragon’s shadow darkening the skies of King’s Landing - what if this was the Night King, not Daenerys?

Theon Greyjoy

Location: in the Godswood with Bran and the Ironborn (aka the bait)

Outcome: DEAD. Theon has had a very very strong arc over this show: we’ve liked him, hated him, felt beyond bad for him, and then grew to care for him again. But with this week and Sanaa’s hug, his arc is complete. Plus, if the Night King does show, he’s at GROUND. ZERO. He’s fucking toast mate.

Jaime Lannister

Location: on the flank with Brienne and Podrick

Outcome: ALIVE. Our second-favorite Lannister has had a lot of character development (which usually means a tombstone), and he’s not a super capable fighter on a dangerous fucking part of the field with Brienne. Despite all of that, the Kingslayer’s probably gonna see the other side of this battle, because he’s gotta A) deal with Bronn coming for him and Tyrion, and B) fulfill the prophecy Cersei has obsessed over and be the “little brother” that kills her.

Tyrion Lannister

Location: In the completely ironclad safe crypts

Outcome: ALIVE. I’m gonna talk more about the crypts later on separately, because it’s gonna get a bit contradictory. Obviously the crypts aren’t safe, but there are a solid couple of charcters down there that I think will make it out. Tyrion’s safety is twofold: A) they made all that fuss of everyone, especially Jorah, telling Dany that Tyrion should remain her Hand. That would be a lot of wasted runtime if he dies here, and B) like his brother, Tyrion currently has a former traveling buddy coming for him with a crossbow, and Game of Thrones is known for many things, anticlimax not being one of them.

Samwell Tarly

Location: on the battlements, ready to go balls-out, apparently.

Outcome: ALIVE. Despite Sam being a not-at-all capable fighter, I think he’s going to live by simple fact that somebody has to finish that book at the Citadel about the history of Westeros to present day (and totally title it A Song of Ice and Fire), but he’s also gonna have to do some mourning of his own...

Gillie

Location: those ironclad crypts of solitude

Outcome: DEAD. Gillie and Sam has their happy moment, and frankly, Sam is more important than her. So she’s gonna die, and to distract himself from the grieving process, Sam is gonna lock himself away in the Citadel to finish that damn book.

Jorah Mormont

Location: probably protecting Dany, then breaking off at some point when it goes to shit

Outcome: DEAD. Jorah’s has quite a ride, in and out of the friend zone with Dany from the beginning, and as of now he’s accepted his place and even gone to bat for Tyrion as the better man for his job. Couple that with his reunion with his family, and Sam passing on his family sword to him, and Jorah is going down swinging (and those swings are probably gonna save Sam’s ass, because it would be poetic to save the man who gave him the sword)

Sandor “The Hound” Clegane

Location: in battle somewhere (ideally far from fire, if he had his way)

Outcome: ALIVE. Though the Hound has solid development and actual dimension as a character this week, he’s gonna see it through for one simple reason: CLEGANEBOWL! This is something book fans AND show fans have been teased with for years, and this battle is likely the last hurdle between the Hound and burning his undead brother right the fuck back.

Varys

Location: the crypts, because lol at the idea of Varys fighting and not hedging his bets

Outcome: DEAD? I was more certain of his survival initially, because come onnn it’s Varys! The Spider played things in the shadows better than Littlefinger, and always knows how to avoid the God of Death. However, since my first thoughts, I was reminded that Melisandre mysteriously told him he would die in Westeros. So, the crypts could likely become his tomb.

Gendry

Location: swinging a big ass hammer somewhere, no doubt.

Outcome: ALIVE. I debated on Gendry’s survival for a bit, considering he was recruit to smith, and he did his smithing (not to mention the horror movie trope of “you fuck, you’re fucked.”) However, I think he’ll see it through just because he’s still Robert Baratheon’s son, and could therefore complicate the line of succession for the Iron Throne once Cersei is finally knocked off.

SER Brienne of Tarth

Location: on the flank with Jaime and Podrick

Outcome: DEAD. Also painful, but after this week, the writing is on the wall is tears and giant’s milk for our favorite honorable knight. She is officially a knight of the seven kingdoms, saved Jaime’s ass from a barbecue, and noted that she’s fulfilled all of her oaths. She’s going down, but she’s not gonna go down easy (probably going to be the reason Jaime survives).

Podrick Payne

Location: on the flank with Brienne

Outcome: DEAD. Pod’s golden pipes and magic cock can’t save him here. He’s noticeably better with a sword now, but even Brienne said he’s not there yet. Plus he got to sing that song to the drunk sharing circle. Pod’s going down, and I’m betting he’ll be one of the first.

Grey Worm

Location: in the battlefield somewhere nasty

Outcome: DEAD. Not much to say here: Grey Worm promised to take Missandei away after the battle, wherever she wanted, and they can be happy on a beach. He may as well have said he’s two weeks from retirement.

Missandei

Location: the danged ol’ crypts man. Can’t say much else here without repetition.

Outcome: ALIVE. This is by a razor-thin margin in my head, but everyone’s favorite translator is going to live for one reason and one reason alone: she’s the perfect candidate to cry over Grey Worm’s body after the dust settles. Because let’s be honest: they made the cardinal mistake of talking about their futures, so (at least) one of them gotta die, and Grey Worm is a soldier on the field.

Dolorous Edd

Location: atop the battlements, for now anyway.

Outcome: Edd’s DEAD, baby. He survived the wall coming down, made it back to warn his friends, and hugged it out. Jon said it himself: the Night’s Watch has no purpose now, meaning Edd has nothing to be Lord Commander of. His watch is ending next week.

Tormund Giantsbane

Location: somewhere in the thick of it, with a belly full of giant’s milk

Outcome: WILD CARD. Honestly, I couldn’t peg down Tormund, and it’s just because he’s so damn bonkers. Like, he survived the wall, and we got more insight to his (alleged) upbringing, and his surprisingly liberal ideals when it came to Brienne’s status, which could spell death. But he’s just such a crazy bastard that if anyone could defy the writing on the wall, it’s him.

Davos Seaworth

Location: on the battlefield, giving everyone a good what for

Outcome: DEAD. He’s had a good run, but it’s time to say goodbye to our dear Onion Knight. He said it himself: he’s been through a lot of battles and he’s not even sure how he’s made it. He’s been a mentor, but they’ve all gotta spread their wings, plus he had those moments with the reluctant militiamen and the adorable Shireen stand-in. He’s going out like a damn champ.

Beric Dondarrion

Location: somewhere out there with his medieval lightsaber

Outcome: WILD CARD. I couldn’t pin down Beric because he’s in a very unique position: Rhllor the Lord of Light has brought him back from the dead 13 times. Despite his weapon being covered in something very effective against the undead, there’s no doubt he’ll fall in battle. My question is: which side will he fight for when he gets back up? The Lord of Light could bring him back, but the White Walkers also have a knack for putting corpses back on their feet. Or even crazier, will he become some sort of halfbreed, with tht eyepatch covering a glowing blue eye? (Probably not, but it’s a fun idea)

Lyanna Mormont

Location: the front? The crypts? I don’t know, she does what she wants.

Outcome: WILD CARD. I’m leaning slightly towards the dead end of the scale with Lyanna, because despite how sharp her tongue is and how big her balls are, she’s still a small child fighting an army of zombies. She’s a badass and could make it, but she’s a child and could just as easily eat it.

Bronn

Location: somewhere between King’s Landing and Winterfell

Outcome: WILD CARD. I can’t even say if Bronn will show up for this battle, but we do know he’s on his way with a big ass crossbow called “poetic justice” (according to Cersei). So he totally could show up and off one or both Lannister brothers while they’re distracted by zombies, or he could learn the true meaning of friendship and forsake the money to help out. And possibly die saving them. Or he won’t even make it there until afterwards. Who knows here man.

Now, a little more on the crypts, and why they gave me problems. So, they put the non-combatants and the children in the crypts, because it’s underground and by all accounts, safe. However, sollowing cinematic rules of foreshadowing, repetition is the surest sign that something’s important. EVERYBODY said the crypts are safe, repeatedly. Couple that with the shots of a very frightened Arya running from something, and it’s shaping up to be bad news bears down there. Many have guessed it, but for the sake of thoroughness, here’s the issue: the crypt is full of DEAD STARKS, and we all know how fond the White Walkers are of raising the dead. Provided they’ve got the range, Arya could be facing down the dead wearing the faces of her family. And given that, we could figure who it’s likely going to be. Ned is headless (plus it’s been mentioned that his bones were returned, implying there’s not much to bury), Robb is also headless and possibly not even buried in the family crypt, considering his body was paraded around on horseback with his wolf stitched onto his neck, so aside from ancient Starks, that leaves two candidates: Rickon (which, let’s be real, nobody cares about him and he’s not that intimidating either), and Catelyn. We don’t know if she made it to the crypts either (because Red Wedding), but she’s the strongest candidate for a truly unsettling foe for Arya, as well as an in-point for the TV show to introduce a skewed and twisted interpretation of Lady Stoneheart from the books into the show.

So yeah, with this information the Crypts could have a much higher principle death toll, but I think Arya being in the crypts sets up a heroic sacrifice scenario where she can ensure the other (important) people get out alive.

With a score of 11 - 11 - 4 the Battle of Winterfell is shaping up to be a potential Thanos Snap for our cast of characters next week. I can’t say how right or wrong I am on this, but this is the most thought I’ve put into predicting character deaths since Negan whistled his way onto the Walking Dead. So regardless, I’m excited to revisit this after the episode goes up on Sunday!

[grailacademy]

Welcome To Grail Academy - Chapter Eleven: Young And Beautiful

He read the note over and over again, the letters cut from magazine clippings rearranging themselves in his mind. Esmerelda paced the room frantically.

We have Mazarine

We know about the Boost

If you want to keep your secret & your girl

Meet at the Cosmos Hotel

Come alone

Bernard and Nico came running back into the room. “We couldn’t find them anywhere!” Esmerelda rubbed her temples. “Maybe they were taken as well. Or maybe they got a letter too”, she said. Nico panted and huffed, his eyeliner turning inky from the sweat of running around the entire building and dripping down his cheeks. “Couldn’t she have at least gotten herself kidnapped AFTER the dance!?”

“We have to get Madehold,” Esmerelda declared, starting towards the door until Yorick grabbed her wrist. “No.”

“Yorick.”

“If we tell her, she’ll find out about the Boost. I can’t get expelled again.”

“Your friend’s life is in mortal danger and you’re worried about your SCHOOL RECORD!?”

“Esmerelda, listen.” Yorick stepped in front of her to block her path. “I know I’ve been a jerk. I’m sorry. I really am. But you have to trust me on this! I’ll….I’ll quit once this is all over. We can handle this on our own. I’ve seen you all fight, I believe in you.”

“I can’t allow you to-” “Please. Help me.”

The three of them shared a silent look between each other, coming to a decision that was signified by simple nods. “Fine. But you have to PROMISE us that you’ll quit the Boost.” “I promise.”

There was a pause of silence before Esmerelda reached down and, with a swift hand movement, sliced the bottom half of her gown off so it would be out of the way for combat. The scraps fluttered to the floor as she grapped her claw rings and slipped them on. “Alright, boys. Operation Lost Kitten is a-go.”

“Congratulations, team BRVI, our prom kings and queens!” Miss Pearl presented the four students on the makeshift stage with shiny (most likely plastic) crowns, and the other students dancing and sharing concessions in their suits and dresses cheered. Iris did the royalty wave she had been practicing for weeks, Vert nodded and smiled, Rowan hugged his combat instructor, and Beau stuck her tongue out at the members of SAND, who were drowning their sorrows in fruit punch. Music blasting, kids laughing, lights flashing, this was the true event that everyone was excited for.

In the back stood the faculty, Professor Kismet, Miss Pearl, Mr.Kaa, Headmaster Madehold and her assistant. The woman who was never seen without her clipboard leaned to Madehold and spoke just loud enough for her to hear over the music, “I told you it would be a success.” The blonde woman only rolled her eyes and smirked, rolling her sleeves up. “Don’t push your luck, Divine. There’s still next year to plan.” They chuckled together, and Divine checked the attendance list on her paper. “Strange. BRSQ and EBNY don’t seem to be here, I would think the competitors would want to at least want to celebrate with the others.”

“EBNY? Gods, if they’re not here I would be more worried about which classroom we’ll find TPed and egged in the morning.”

“Clover, relax. You’ve done your job. Go, enjoy the festivities.” Her secretary offered her a gentle smile. It had been so long since someone had called her that. Madeholds tense shoulders lowered down as she followed the advice and went to retrieve a glass of punch. She could get used to being called Clover again.

“Who would even want to take her? Who’d you piss off?” None of them had time to change out of their dance gettups, so when Nico tried to gather more information from Yorick on the train ride to the Cosmos Hotel, there were lots of odd looks from the other passengers. “I don’t know, maybe a supplier? Or someone Rettah knows?” The four of them bounced theories off each other on the way there. The Cosmos Hotel was on the edge of the city, a portion full of abandoned buildings on the border of the suburbs where most resources had been cut off. By the time they got there, the only other person on the train was an old man in a dirty coat who was mumbling to himself. The building looked straight out of a horror movie. Boarded up windows, vines crawling up the walls, bricks and litter scattered across the ground, and the imposing red light of the neon Cosmos Hotel sign on the roof illuminating the ominous shadows of nearby tree branches swaying in the brisk air of the night.

“So what’s the game plan?”

“Split up. We can cover more ground that way.”

“No. We seperate and we’re easier to pick off.”

“Best to avoid the front door. Find a back entrance or an open window. And stay together.”

Nico wedged his bo staff underneath the frame of a window in the back of the pool house, his friends crouching below to stay out of sight. “I can’t believe I’m missing the Cupid Shuffle for this.” A splintering crack, a click, and they had their way in. They crawled through the open window and tried to get their bearings in the darkness. Esmerelda could see just fine, being a puma faunus, but the boys were left to stumble around with their arms outstretched. She sighed, rummaging in a desk drawer until she found a box of matches. She struck one, lit a candle mounted on the wall, and motioned for them to follow her. She held her finger to her lips, making sure they were quiet so as not to alarm their enemies.

The wallpaper was peeling off in strips, and the paintings of flowers and rolling valleys that hung above torn up furniture were moldy and grey, devoid of any color they once retained. The rattling of the radiator in the hallway muffled their footsteps, along with the draft that rustled old newspapers and grocery bags. “This plan is bound to go tits up”, Nico whispered. Nobody bothered to respond, or even shush him. They were all on edge, especially Yorick. He knew it was a trap, it was too well-timed not to be. But his friends questions still rattled in his head. Who could have done it? What could they want from him?

It was the weeping that got his attention. He stopped walking, pressing his ear up to a wall. It was her. It had to be. He pushed the metal doors open, and the rest of the team followed him into what looked to be an indoor pool. The pool itself had been emptied, mold growing on the tiles. Beach chairs were stacked up in a corner, and the soft blue floor lights illuminated Rettah’s figure in the pool, tied to a chair and shaking. She was the only thing they could manage to see in the darkness, and when their eyes locked she gasped. “Yorick! Help me, Yorick! They’re insane!” It didn’t take more than a second for him to start running, completely disregarding Esmerelda’s warnings about staying together and being cautious. She tried to chase after him, as did Bernard and Nico, but was forcibly stopped. All of them were, and as they struggled to move their arms and legs, the blue lights shifted to reveal the large, complex web of wires that had been strung about the entire room. It was like walking into a spider’s nest. “Help! Oh, help me!” Rettah’s tone began to change. Her weeps turned into giggles, then she threw her head back and laughed, crying out sarcastically, “Save me, Yorick!”

Out from the tenebrosity stepped Scarlet, no longer wearing his usual red hoodie. Instead, he wore a striped shirt that hung off his shoulders, the sleeves cut off in wrays at his wrists, and a series of studded belts that matched the bracelets and necklaces he wore. His smile was eery, sly, half hidden by the darkness and his messy bangs. He draped an arm over Rettah’s shoulders and freed his partner’s wrists from their bonds, the two of them watching EBNY writhe in smug joy. “What is this!?”, Esmerelda winced, clenching her fists and trying to pull down. As she did, the wires only tightened around her and slowly twisted small cuts into her arms. Scarlet wagged his finger at her and pulled out something from behind his back. It was a simple yo-yo, and he dropped it down and let it spin back up into his hand. But the rest of the string seemed to be the same wire they were trapped in, and with a single tug he unraveled the web in its entirety. The end of the wire retracted itself quickly into the rest of the roll in the yo-yo, and the victims it had caught all dropped to the floor.

Esmerelda kept a hand over her stomach, her other on Yorick’s shoulder to hold him back from running off again. Bernard rubbed his wrists and helped Nico to his feet. “Why?”, Yorick pleaded, searching Rettah’s face for any sign of sympathy, or even an explanation to the betrayal. He found none. The floor lights brightened to reveal Buck and Queenie standing in the back by the pile of beach chairs, and Queenie narrowed her eyes at the group.

“It looks like we’re in for a fight.” Bernard pulled his bladed whip off his belt, Nico twirled his bat in a sweeping motion, Esmerelda let the claws on her hands grow, and Yorick reluctantly placed his hand on one of his guns on his hip. “Remember, stay together”, Esmerelda cautioned her team. They all nodded, and BRSQ began to equip their own weapons. All of them were ready to pounce, but their enemies never made footfall when EBNY charged. That was their mistake. Right at the edge of the pool, hidden between the cracks in the tiles, was a series of playing cards with glyphs on them that were now glowing bright orange once Esmerelda stepped down on one of them. “Oh, crap.” Once one card was activated, it ignited the rest of them in a domino effect, and they exploded with a force so powerful that all of the students in that pool were launched in different directions.

When he came to, Nico awoke face-down on a circular banquet table. he looked over his shoulder and saw the hole in the wall where he had been thrown, and got to his feet in the empty ballroom. The sound of a record scratch. And quietly, a song began to play. Someone was humming along to it. he followed the noise to see Rettah dropping the needle on an old record. As classical waltz music rang through the ballroom, she grinned and spun around to face him, her dress somehow still as clean as it had been when he first saw her. He grinned as well.

“Hey there, pigtails. Let’s dance~”

“Okie dokie! But I have to warn you, I took three years of tap.”

They both took a moment to bow and curtsy before rushing each other,  jumping over tables to close the gap between them across the room.

Esmerelda felt around her new surroundings. She stood in a dilapidated kitchen, large and full of rusted cooking utensils. Standing over her on the floor was Queenie, three cards slipped between her fingers. “It’s time you and I had a rematch.”

Bernard blinked awake. He was laying in front of an old elevator, and he watched it sideways as the doors closed, with Buck inside. A dainty ding signifying the moving floors, and he jumped to his feet. It had already closed, but he dug his fingers into the entrance doors and grunted. It took all his strength, but he managed to pry them open. He looked down the elevator shaft. The car was already 3 floors below him. He sighed, held his breath, and took a leap, jumping into the shaft and falling until he slammed down on the roof of the car, shaking dust from the ceiling onto Buck’s head in the process. He wasn’t going to let him get away that easily.

Yorick’s ears were ringing when he regained consciousness. He was slumped against a door sitting adjacent to a wall, broken off its hinges in a stairwell. In the dim light he could see Scarlet’s tail swishing behind him as he raced up the stairs. It took him a while to stand up, but Yorick got to his feet and began the trek after him. He needed to know why. Why.

[nealdanderson]

I actually really liked Samus Returns. What were your issues with it? Also, there's always AM2R to fall back on. It's on the Internet forever, whether Nintendo likes it or not

I’m glad you liked it!I have a lot of issues with it, so prepare for a lengthy answer, haha. And just a disclaimer to everyone- I played through the entire game and beat it 100%, so no one can say I didn’t give it a fair shot. Since it is a remake, it can’t be judged as entirely separate from the original, so here goes. Spoilers ahead.1. It largely misses the point of the original. Metroid 2 for the GB is far from a perfect or even great game, but it is an ambitious sequel as far as tone goes. M2 is easily the most ‘horror’ feeling entry in the franchise, and it directly correlates to how to the game treats your objective and how the map is laid out. Metroid 2 doesn’t feel like a heroic quest- you’re playing a character committing mass genocide of a species incapable of intergalactic travel and as she travels increasingly downward through the planet, the more desolate, lifeless and lonely it gets. Upon killing the Queen and finding the Baby Metroid, it is a somber moment and retroactively, the most unique ending in the franchise(no thrilling escape sequence, no enemies…etc.). Samus Returns abandons most of these unique aspects and paints your quest in a generically heroic light, the darker atmosphere is completely done away with, and the ending is totally botched. These tonal problems may only be a problem to a few people, and may come across as nitpicks to many, but I think it’s worth mentioning. 2. The map and item placement doesn’t make for an enjoyable experience. The original Metroid/Zero Mission, Super Metroid and Metroid Fusion have maps that are designed in a clustered fashion, meaning that traversing from one major area to another and backtracking to get previously unobtainable items feels organic and convenient. Metroid 2 on the other hand has a directly linear path descending through SR388. Due to this linearity, the designers didn’t implement the backtracking for items that the series would go on to be known for. I know this is a criticism Metroid 2 often receives, but this approach makes sense given the game’s map design. Samus Returns instead tries to encourage more backtracking, but due to the map not being designed for it, it always feels tedious to go back and find these items(usually normal missile packs that are extremely useless so late in the game). The teleporters only further illustrate the lack of organic interconnectivity the map has and feel like a lazy solution(this is something AM2R handles much much better). Basically, Samus Returns tries to make the original Metroid 2′s map do something it was not designed to accommodate.

3. The enemies and bosses are extremely repetitive, boring and/or tedious to fight. This is definitely a valid complaint and massive oversight on Nintendo’s part–Samus Returns’ enemy variety straight up sucks, which is made more pathetic due to the fact that its 25 year old gameboy predecessor and even the NES original have way more. The parry mechanic is cool to start out with, but after a while, it really becomes the only way to dispatch of enemies, and it is used the exact same way every single time- wait for tell, parry, kill enemy in one hit.  The Metroids, well, let me say that they’ve always been the weakest aspect of Metroid 2- they’re boring, silly looking and really only serve to be an irritation. Samus Returns gives them a much needed visual facelift, but doubles down on how much of a chore they are to fight. Meeting a new Metroid form for the first time was pretty neat, but after fighting your 20th gamma, each fight taking longer than it should, it isn’t any fun. Each encounter is basically a tedious game of waiting for the Metroid to be parried, but if you miss that parry window, it makes the fight drag on way too long. And then to ‘mix up’ the experience a bit, the designers decided to have Gammas run away like cowards mid fight, only for you to play a very irritating game of hide and seek with the damn thing. The few bosses Samus Returns has aren’t that memorable or enjoyable, the robot in particular spends most of the time in a state that can’t be hit(like the Metroids), reducing the fight to being 90% running away and dodging. Ultimately, these boss fights and Metroid encounters don’t feel challenging and feel more like a test of patience.    4. The graphics are rather subpar or inconsistent and the overall aesthetic feels rather uninspired. Some rooms look really cool, while others are just ugly. Samus’ Redesign looks too edgy, haha. I love Super Metroid, it’s my favorite game ever made, but lately, most Metroid games just try to recycle moments, areas and music from it, and it really annoys me. Metroid 2 has a very unique soundtrack, but inevitably, they replace its tunes with more upbeat or heroic remixes, and and its worst, replace tunes with Super Metroid themes. 

5. Ridley. Why. 

—-

So yeah, I’m not saying I don’t like Samus Returns just to be a contrarian, I genuinely found the entire game to be a rather tedious and unenjoyable experience. I will commend the few things it does well- actually implementing different abilities in boss fights(like the spider ball), implemtning new uses for old abilities(spider ball+power bomb), the DS being a perfect fit for Metroid with its map and inventory screens, and the overall engine having a very solid and fluid feel.AM2R handled everything better, and the few things it misses the point of regarding the original Metroid 2, it still handles much better than Samus Returns. Just because AM2R exists and will continue to do so doesn’t make Samus Returns exempt from critique. Even if I thought that Samus Returns’ announcement was badly timed after Nintendo’s DMCA on AM2R(which was completely unnecessary, learn the difference between trademark and copyright), I was still excited that Nintendo, after 13 years, was finally making another 2D Metroid game.  I’m more just disappointed that the company who created this genre, a genre that may be more popular than ever, generally refuse to capitalize on it, and when they do, it’s a sub standard effort. I may be harsh to Nintendo, but they’ve objectively treated this franchise like crap over the past decade, and I have a very hard time trusting them anymore. To those telling me to ‘lol, calm down dude’, like, I’m perfectly calm, I was never planning on ever buying a switch anyway, but Nintendo should seize on the opportunity to mend fences with the gaming community outside of their devoted fanbase(I’m a Metroid fan, but I’ve never been what you’d call a Nintendo fan). Since I’ve never been a Nintendo fan, E3 is really the only gaming event I’m fully aware of, and I felt it was a wasted opportunity for them to even merely mention that Prime 4(which isn’t even it’s final title, lol) was still being worked on.   I highly recommend watching The Gamer’s Toolkit and Gamingbrit’s videos on Samus Returns, they illustrate the gripes I had with the game in ways more eloquent than I could. 

[recentanimenews]

Crunchyroll Favorites 2018 Part Three: EVERYTHING ELSE!

 This is it--the final installment of CRUNCHYROLL FAVORITES 2018! In our first feature, we talked about our favorite anime and manga of the past year, and yesterday we shared our favorite video games. Today, we wrap up with one of my favorite parts of CR Favorites: "EVERYTHING ELSE!"

  Instead of posting individual articles for everybody's favorite movies, books, music, TV shows, sports moments, life moments, and so on and so forth, we just pile them all here into the "Everything Else" installment and share what's important to us that isn't related to anime, manga, or video games.

  Just like before, the rules are simple: only stuff that came out in 2018, or continuing works that had a major milestone last year. You're gonna get to see a lot of different lists from different people--let's get started!

  Nate Ming

The Night Comes for Us- Timo Tjahjanto brings most of the gang from The Raid and its sequel back for this absolute onslaught of perfectly-choreographed action that refuses to let up--or look away. This one's for the hardest of hardcore action fans, and absolutely not for the squeamish.

Mandy- Nicolas Cage teams up with the stylish and totally gonzo Panos Cosmatos for a trippy, violent ride that starts as a horror story and ends up as a wild action/revenge flick. A friend of mine pointed out that Mandy is the closest we'll probably ever get to a live-action Berserk, and y'know what? He's right.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse- It's rare when, while watching a movie, I don't want it to end. It's almost as rare when it wraps up and I immediately want to watch it again. Into the Spider-Verse has it all: pure emotion, an outstanding soundtrack, action that's like greased lightning, and characters I want to spend even more time with. More like this, please.

Fighting in the Age of Loneliness- Jon Bois--already known for his insightful, fun breakdowns of sports minutiae--teams up with Felix Biederman for a deep dive into the stories that make the history of mixed martial arts. Even people who aren't MMA-heads will dig this--check it out and learn why people fighting in a cage for money is so compelling.

Amanda Nunes vs Cris Cyborg- And speaking of that, in just 51 seconds Amanda "Lioness" Nunes took down the undefeated Cris Cyborg, trading shots until Cyborg caught a huge overhand right and dropped. What a showdown--women's MMA has always been great, but now is the time of legends.

Honorable Mentions: Braven, Creed II, Hereditary

Nicole Mejias

A more stable life- 2017 and 2018 have been very trying years of my life, and I’m glad I made it through in one piece. Depression is something I’m still battling with, but it’s something I’m thankfully more in control of these days. I’m very grateful for my close friends who helped me when I felt I was lost; without them I wouldn’t be here. Thank you! Let’s conquer our goals in 2019!

CEO x NJPW show- I talked about this show briefly in my CEO 2018 report, but my goodness, it was quite the mind blowing show! I never expected NJPW to make it out to Florida of all places, and I certainly didn’t expect the world of fighting games and wrestling to come together in beautiful harmony! It’s a show I’ll remember for a very long time.

Crunchyroll Expo 2018 experience- It was my first time going to this event, and I was very impressed by pretty much everything the convention had to offer! Add in the bonus of meeting up with colleagues face-to-face for the first time and network with amazing folks, and it was an event that I was very happy to be a part of. I’ll be back again this year!

Working for Crunchyroll- The biggest highlight of 2018 was when I got the chance to work here, which was something I didn’t think would happen. Started as a video script writer, then moved on to becoming a features writer and editor! This job has helped me out in so many countless ways, and I’m really blessed to be here and that I’m working with such an awesome group of people!

Daniel Dockery

Beginning My Crunchyroll Writer Journey- Writing about anime for a lot of websites usually requires some handholding (“Hey kids. Have you heard of anime? Before I begin my actual article, here’s a half page about what anime actually is.”) Luckily, Crunchyroll came along and has let me geek out about One Piece for six months. God bless them.

Creed II- After his awesome performances in Universal Soldier: Regeneration and Day of Reckoning, it was only a matter of time before Dolph Lundgren became the heart of a major blockbuster.

Deadwood Movie Hype- It’s finally happening. The Deadwood movie that’s been talked about since 2006 is going to be in front of me in 2019. I don’t want to say that the power of my dreams made this happen, but I will. You can thank me all now.

Shrimp Tacos- Have y’all had these? They’re great!

Peter Fobian

Shonen Jump- I promise I’m not getting paid to tell you that Shonen Jump made history in 2018. They made the most popular comics magazine in the world FREE. They’re selling access to one of the largest collections of comics in the world at a pittance. This is the best deal in the history of comics, hands down. I’m only one month in and have already burned through over 20 volumes of manga. I’m actually going to catch up to One Piece. This is unreal.

Annihilation- I almost missed this movie since they did very little way in the promotion, and man am I glad I saw it in theaters. An awesome sci-fi horror film with a great premise, great cast, some fantastic effects, and a legendary ending. Even if you were underwhelmed by the majority of the film, those last 15 minutes aren’t going to leave your head anytime soon.

Wanikani- Various life circumstances have made it hard for me to continue in-class Japanese studies so I started up Wanikani in January at the recommendation of a friend. It’s the easiest to keep up with language studying app I’ve managed to main pretty consistent all year, finishing off 2018 with a 2000 written word vocabulary is pretty good, I think. I really want to hit max level...

Ricky Soberano

All of the wine I’ve drank- Cheers to speaking about the difference between organic, kosher, vegan, and orange wines. Biggest cheers to figuring out my preferred wine region (Piedmont) and enjoying every Barbera and Barolo I had the privilege of consuming.

The streetwear collabs that mattered- Thank you, universe, for finally getting it. The same people that love manga and anime can also love fashion and finally have a means to show it off to the world. This is why the Primitive x DBZ drop popped off. This is what made the Uniqlo x Shonen Jump collection so important. I can’t wait to see even more in 2019.

Crazy Rich Asians breaking the world- Everything was riding on this film to do well. The future of Hollywood’s treatment towards Asian casts, writing, and films hung in the balance and it slayed the box office. The phenomenon surrounding it was as electric as the film itself.

Japanese Breakfast’s article on H-Mart- My uncle had passed away a few weeks before one of my favorite singers published her first article for The New Yorker. It’s a beautiful testament to coming to terms with identity as an Asian-American, mourning, and food.  

Everything that Childish Gambino has blessed us with this year- This special supernova doesn’t need to go so hard on every project that he works on but he does anyways simply because he can and if you can’t appreciate that then you can enter that black hole over there.

Emily Bushman

Victoria Schwab- One of my favorite authors because she writes fantastic stories, and her new YA book, City of Ghosts, is no exception. It’s like a cross between Stranger Things and the best parts of Scotland, with just a DAB of Harry Potter, and I love everything about it. Her other new novel, Vengeful (sequel to Vicious), also soared high for me with three superior villains who plotted death and destruction, all the way to a satisfying conclusion.

Supernatural- I’m late to the game... but why does it feel good to do something as bad as binge-watching 13 straight seasons over a three month period? To be fair, my friend and I are only on season 9, but we’re getting there. Slowly. Steadily. The checkout lady at our local grocery store approves. And if I’ve learned anything from this, it’s that everyone should have a moose in their life. Get your moose, people. Get your moose.

Haunting of Hill House- The original book by Shirley Jackson (of “The Lottery”) was a favorite of mine, but the Netflix adaptation took it to a whole new level. Love the book, love the show, and love the questions about what it means to be a family, what can happen when a family turns against itself, what it means to be a ghost, either alive or dead, and, most importantly, how the trappings of a perfect life can turn into the ties that bind us down.

Sticky Toffee Pudding- This is a British thing, but I live and die for it and was recently reminded of how much I love it when my best friend begged me to make it for her, gluten free. It’s the perfect gooey sweet sheet cake, with to-die-for caramel toffee sauce. Please try this. This is my favorite recipe, from my favorite queen of internet food blogging, Deb Perelman. You can make it with Cup for Cup, a gluten free flour substitute, and it tastes essentially the same. >> http://bit.ly/2fE1OvW

Strange the Dreamer- Written by Laini Taylor, it’s a YA novel about a boy named Strange, the Dreamer. It’s a weird mix of pseudo-Egyptian Gods, alchemic research, and impossible puzzles that is both fascinating and, well, dream-like. It is unusual, the outlier in a field of run-of-the-mill stories, but it entranced me, and I eagerly await the sequel.

Nick Creamer

The Haunting of Hill House- Ostensibly based on the classic Shirley Jackson novel, Netflix’s Haunting of Hill House abandons the book’s narrative entirely, and instead tells a story about family, forgiveness, and the meaning of home, all filtered through the profoundly haunted titular house. Though the film’s dialogue can get a little clumsy, its evocative cinematography, psychologically scrambled cast, and sharp understanding of horror make it satisfying both for its thrills and its sympathetic emotional core. In a year I’ve spent binging whatever horror anthologies I can find, Hill House has risen to the top.

Offerings- As the follow-up to the staggering concept album White Lighter, Typhoon’s Offerings had some serious shoes to fill. The resulting album absolutely blew me away, with its comparatively stripped-down sound offering a harrowing journey through the steady disintegration of a fraying mind. Lines like “the part of you that I love is still in there, even if it doesn’t know my name” cut to the heart of watching a loved one fade away, and offered understanding in a very tough year. Offerings is a difficult listen, but it’s worth it.

Cooking- After a former housemate gifted me and my roommates a slow cooker last winter, we embarked on a lengthy journey to actually learn how to feed ourselves. After a long and arduous year of training, I am proud to say I can probably avoid incinerating a chicken at this point, and perhaps even prepare a soup. Getting there!

Kara Dennison

Black Mirror: Bandersnatch- I will never stop talking about this, and you can’t stop me. It’s my happy union of Charlie Brooker’s hardcore video game geekdom, my love of choice-based gaming, and my inexplicable desire to disturb myself at every given opportunity. It’s been at least a year since I lifted my hands off a keyboard and walked away because I was so affected. That’s how hard it got me.

Gabutto Burger- A recent trip to visit a friend in Illinois ended up with us at this anime fan-friendly burger place, run by a Japanese family and branded to the gills with mascot characters. It’s as close as I’m going to get (for now) to going to a collab café, plus the food was amazing.

The Night Before Critmas- I wish I had time for the full Critical Role experience, but their one-shots are just right for my schedule. This Christmas-skinned D&D campaign told the flipside of The Nightmare Before Christmas, with dangerously-skilled elves setting out to retrieve Santa from a legally-distinct talking bag of bugs. Their Crash Pandas campaign was no slouch, either.

Crunchyroll Social Media- This year I got to stick a toe in our social media department, running accounts for shows like Magical Girl Ore and How NOT to Summon a Demon Lord. I’ve loved getting to see what the fans enjoy and find more for them between episodes!

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And that's a wrap for Crunchyroll Favorites 2018! Thanks for joining us for this three-parter, and we'll see you next year! If you're in the mood for more CR Favorites, here are the links to past years' features:

Crunchyroll Favorites 2017 Part One | Part Two | Part Three

Crunchyroll Favorites 2016 Part One | Part Two | Part Three

Crunchyroll Favorites 2015 Part One | Part Two | Part Three

Crunchyroll Favorites 2014 Part One | Part Two | Part Three

Crunchyroll Favorites 2013 Part One | Part Two | Part Three

Crunchyroll Favorites 2012 Part One | Part Two | Part Three

Crunchyroll News' Best of 2011 Part One | Part Two

What were your favorite "everything else" parts of 2018? Remember, this is a FAVORITES list, not a BEST-OF list, so there are no wrong answers--sound off in the comments and share your favorites!

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Nate Ming is the Features Editor for Crunchyroll News and creator of the long-running Fanart Friday column. You can follow him on Twitter at @NateMing. His comic, Shaw City Strikers, launches January 15, 2019.

By: news+feed@crunchyroll.com