#this post is meaningless but also a slay

[anidealistatbestburntoutatworst]

the bsd fandom gravelly overlooks the meme potential of kunikida liking to fish… i’m just sayin

[strixcattus]

Every Ending is a Bad Ending: A Slay the Princess Analysis

I've had this in my drafts since... February. Since the Pristine Cut is in less than a week, and will add an entirely new ending to the lineup, I figured it would be best to get this finished, polished (or at least casually looked over), and posted beforehand.

Slay the Princess is a game that makes zero judgement about which ending you choose to pursue. Sure, some characters may make their own standpoints clear, but aside from the "Good Ending" (and we all know what that ending really means and is) there's never an official indicator if you've reached the "proper" ending, because there is no proper ending. There are six different endings (Stranger variants and And Everyone Hates You notwithstanding—they can be folded into the others), each of which has its own nuanced set of implications and each of which is given an equal amount of care from the developers.

And each of which, when you take the time to think about it from every angle, kind of sucks. A lot.

None of this is a judgement on the game itself. I like it, actually! Every ending forces you to make some form of sacrifice in the name of another priority, which keeps any one of them from being cast in a light as "the best ending." (While there are definitely endings that could be cast as "the worst ending," they're still narratively interesting and there's no shame put on achieving them.)

I. The Good Ending

This is the ending the Narrator wants you to pursue, though it's hardly an ending compared to the others. You've really only got one chance to pursue it—once you've met the Shifting Mound, it's too late to go back, so the Good Ending inevitably means a truncated run.

It also means a couple other things, which are worse. First and most obviously, it means the same thing as A New and Unending Dawn—you've killed the concept of death and transformation, and with that ended both of those things, forever, at the Narrator's behest. His world will persist in stasis ad infinitum, and whatever fragment of the Shifting Mound is within you, whatever change and meaning it preserves, the world will be changed drastically, and it's entirely possible that not all the people within it will think that's for the better. But this is a topic for A New and Unending Dawn.

Besides, the player—which is to say, the Long Quiet, not that he knows he is the Long Quiet, the one on the opposite side of the screen from you, the one experiencing all of this—doesn't know any of that. He doesn't know anything. He's just following orders, and now he's received his reward.

His reward is, as the Narrator tells him, eternal, boring bliss. And so it is—if he perceives what the Narrator says as true, then it will be. He'll be happy, and nothing else, for all eternity.

Doesn't bode particularly well for what's happening in places that aren't the cabin, but I said that was going to wait.

The player's awareness, in effect, ends. Sure, he's going to remain alive for eternity, but nothing is going to happen with that life. He's given up his agency, the possibility for experience, and everything else that might make up the definition of life on a more philosophical level.

Which brings us to a point that's going to crop up in different ways throughout this post. Slay the Princess is a game with more than three characters.

The player is not alone in the cabin, but given enough time, someone else might be.

The Voice of the Hero, your only companion who seems to be unilaterally on your side, is stuck in this cabin with you, and he isn't as happy about it as the Narrator tells you you are. He doesn't believe the Narrator's words, even if you choose to, and so he isn't affected by them as you are. He isn't happy, eternally. He doesn't lose his self-awareness to the now-meaningless flow of time, even though you do. If you choose to set down onto the Good Ending, you can hear him pleading for you to get up and take back your choice, but you can't actually act on his words past the first decision point. You've given up your agency, your self, your possibility to change entirely.

Hero is still there. He's still aware, and he will be for eternity. He'll get to experience time in a meaningful way, his only company an Echo (who may or may not fade, and even if he doesn't he likely won't be very good companionship in the face of a dull eternity) and someone who has completely given up their personhood.

This ending may or may not be apocalyptic for the world, and it may or may not be horrifying for the Long Quiet, but there's no arguing that it isn't torture for the Hero.

II. There Are No Endings

This was the first ending I got, and I will say I felt forced into it. Not by the game itself, necessarily—just knowing what the Princess was, and what killing her would mean, I felt as though the only proper option was to allow her to continue on. Death is an essential part of the workings of things, and transformation as a whole is even more crucial—though, even if all the Shifting Mound represented was death, my actions wouldn't have been any different. The game made no judgement—the only things forcing my hand were my own beliefs.

The exact implications of killing the Shifting Mound and ridding the world of death, I'll save for the ending where that actually happens. The general idea is, it's not desirable. The Narrator's world is going to end, and the healthiest way for the cosmos to go on is to allow the Princess to be what she is and create a new world in the shadow of the old.

For the Narrator's world, this is obviously not ideal. It ends. But there's going to be a new world created when it does, and that world will flourish as it was meant to, and when it dies a new world will be born, on into eternity. The progression of the cosmos is the same as it was before—which is probably the best way for it to be, compared with your other options.

For the Long Quiet, though... this isn't the worst experience he could be having. He could be effectively nonexistent. He could be actually nonexistent. Compared to that, a thousand dawns and a thousand sunsets, each containing a thousand more, with your other half by your side isn't all that bad.

But you're alone. Yes, you have the Shifting Mound by your side, but she's the only companionship you'll ever get for the rest of eternity. I'd like to call some attention to a few of her lines throughout the game at this point, just to highlight why I consider this ending to be just as bad as the next one on the list (though, to be sure, they're not necessarily bad in the same ways or for the same people).

"It doesn't matter if there are. People are too small for us. You and I are the only things that interest me."

"There is a warmth and sadness in me at the thought of people. Fresh tears on a winter's day. They are not like us. They do not last."

These are a couple lines from the fourth time you enter the Long Quiet. Depending on how well you've treated the Princesses you encounter, the Shifting Mound's dialogue changes, but there's always an underlying implication that you and her are more important than people.

If you deny the Princesses their freedom more often than you grant it, you get the first variation (of which there are two versions—the other has her calling people "frail and impermanent"), where you have the chance to ask her if she thinks there will be people in the worlds beyond the Long Quiet. She immediately dismisses your question, saying that people do not interest her.

If you grant the Princesses their freedom more often than you deny it, you get the second variation. Here, the Shifting Mound is the one to ask you what you think you will find, and one of your options is to say that you think there's supposed to be people. Her line above is her response to that. She's more sympathetic towards people, but still describes them as unlike you and her. Even at her kindest, she still believes the two of you to be greater than people—and to be fair, you are—but she never seems to care about people in quite the same way the player does.

"A person. A set of eyes witnessing from one perspective. I think that you are more like me than you are like a person."

She says this the first time you meet, but until you're awoken to your true nature, from your perspective you are more like a person than you are like her. You fear death and experience each iteration of the Construct from your own perspective and no other. And even when you reach the mirror, and remember that you are more than a person, you still remember being one. It's not clear she does the same.

Remember, at this point you're certain that you've witnessed, four times now, the only people you've ever been able to fully trust die. You don't have the option to avoid it. At my first encounter with this line (for context and clarity, it was one of the "It doesn't matter if there are" lines), I was thinking of the Voices when I mentioned people—because that's what they are, by her definition. Singular perspectives capable of death. And she shuts them down, insisting that they do not matter.

To be clear, it's not my intention to and I would never bash the Shifting Mound. Maybe at one time I would, and maybe some of my initial feelings are still preserved in my writing here—I wouldn't be able to tell. But I've grown past resentment on this point—I'm simply outlining the way in which the Shifting Mound seems to view people other than her and the Long Quiet.

What, exactly, does this all mean from an objective perspective? I've only been talking about subjective views on the Shifting Mound so far. Maybe your perspective is different from mine. What's really going on?

Let's start with the world side—moreso recap, but it's been a bit of digression and I think we could use one. As I said earlier, this is probably the best outcome for the world. Yes, it ends. It had to end. There is no good outcome for the Narrator's world—it's either end and be reborn, or persist in a manner I'll save for the next ending.

This might be the best-case scenario. Existence persists in a healthy manner. The cycle of death and rebirth continues. Everything is okay, generally. Life retains meaning. Countless worlds are born and live full lives.

But you? You are alone with someone who does not grasp the value that you place in the people within those worlds. She values that which spans the cosmos—you, and her, and the worlds you create. She does not pay attention to what goes on within them, but you do, because you've lived it.

Or maybe you're willing to embrace godhood and leave behind people. I'm not, but I'm only one person and my opinions are not paramount. The Long Quiet does seem to care about people enough that he always has the option to bring them up, and he's experienced living as one, but that's not enough to base a full argument on. Maybe the god of stasis can change his mind. So let's talk about something that definitely does happen.

Those Voices? Your friends? The collective of people who have been by your side this whole time? Yeah, they're gone. They died at the mirror. You know this.

She is a creature of perception, and you are perception itself. She becomes that which people perceive her to be—which is why you cannot alter her once you awaken. You're not a person anymore.

But you are still perception. The world is that which you perceive it to be. Her vessels are within her, empty—even during your final confrontation, their words (notably, her referring to the Apotheosis in third person) show that they are not speaking, but she is speaking through them. Whether or not they were always a part of her, she sees them as nothing more.

Were your Voices nothing more than parts of you? It doesn't matter anymore. You perceive them as gone, dead at the mirror, and so they are. You are alone, forever, with her.

Maybe you're happy like that. Maybe you looked at the choice between her and the Voices, and decided you'd rather have her. But the Voices are dead either way. They don't even get to persist in a space away from you.

And if you aren't happy, well. You'll have an eternity to try to change that.

III. A New and Unending Dawn

Here's the big one—the full 180 from There Are No Endings. The Narrator's second chance, and this one is, let's face it, probably better for the Long Quiet from an objective standpoint. He's not wasting away alone in a room, and none of the Voices are left stranded as they watch the only other thing they know fade into nothing.

In fact, this is one of only two endings where you don't have to leave behind the voices—either in them persisting while you fade, or in them dying while you persist into eternity, or in you leaving them behind forever. This time, you get to keep them by your side as you rule your eternal kingdom. Hopefully they're not too mad at you.

This is probably one of the better outcomes for the Voices and the Long Quiet, though it's definitely not ideal. You've still been forced to kill your other half, and even though you may have deemed it necessary, it's not a great experience.

And you have no idea what that means for the world.

Sure, you know what you just killed. The concept of death. The Capacity to Change. Transformation, or most of it. Without her, the world will persist for an eternity, and so too will the people within it. There will never be an end of the world. There will never be a new dawn beyond your own.

Or will there be an end of the world? There certainly will be a change in how it functions. Will the small piece of Transformation within you be enough to preserve change and meaning in what is left behind? Most of the Voices seem to have positive reactions to the new iteration of the world, though none of you have actually seen it yet. You don't actually know how things are going to work, only that you have the power to perceive them this time. A step up from the "Good Ending."

Let's go back to the Good Ending for a second. I did say we were going to.

Remember how it goes? You're trapped for eternity, happy, forever. And, to be sure, this partly stems from your own perception. If you believe the Narrator when he says you're happy, you'll be happy. The Voice of the Hero doesn't, and so he isn't, and he has to watch you fade away.

But the fact that this can happen, that it is in fact the Narrator's ideal ending, does not bode well. Is this a fate that awaits some of the people in your new world? Will some of them end up fading away, unable to die or to find meaning in a world that cannot change aside from "happiness forever?" You can't say this for sure, but you also can't deny it for sure.

Eternity is not friendly, or at least it has the potential to hurt quite a bit, even if that isn't guaranteed. The one solace is that, at least, the people you've doomed to it will not be alone. They may miss those who died too soon, and they'll have eternity to continue doing so, but they will not be alone.

Whatever you've done, everyone will get to suffer it together. Forever.

IV. Just as You Once Were Nothing

Let's take a break from the standard endings and consider the implications of what happens when you abandon the Shifting Mound entirely. You refuse to perceive her, and since she is shaped by perception, in your refusal you deny her an existence. Eventually, you run out of time to make any sort of amends, and the two of you persist by sheer force of (your) will until you give up and you both fade to oblivion.

This is probably by far the most uncertain of the endings—every ending carries with it the question of what will happen to the world, but this one adds the question of what will happen to you. What exactly happens after you fade? Do you return to your prior existence as an unconscious cycle? Is this effectively the same as slaying the Princess? Whichever it is, the one certainty is that you won't be around to see it.

Most likely, you and the Shifting Mound's annihilation is a bleaker future for the outside world than any other ending. With her gone, the capacity for death is eliminated, but the player also perishes, taking with him the fragment of the Shifting Mound that was meant to ensure that life would persist in some meaningful form. The entirety of Transformation is wiped out, as is the entirety of the Long Quiet.

What, exactly, is the Long Quiet? It's never stated. He is the other half of the cycle of life and death, the counterpart to the Shifting Mound. She is a creature of perception, and he is the one who perceives. She is that which enables death, and he is that which has the capacity to end it. She is the Shifting Mound, the Ebb and Flow, the Capacity to Change, and he is the Long Quiet, the... capacity to not change? She is Transformation, or most of it, and he holds the rest within whatever he is that isn't transformation.

The two of them, combined, form the whole of existence. And without either, it seems likely that a true end of the world will arise, one beyond which there is not and will never be a new dawn. The exact object of the Narrator's fears made manifest.

Suffice to say, this is not good for anyone. At least the player doesn't have to sit with what he's done, unlike in the previous ending.

Or maybe you aren't annihilated. Maybe you just lose consciousness and become a mindless cycle again. There's no way to know anything except that the Long Quiet, as he is, is now dead.

V. And? What Happens Next?

That is the question. I gather that this is considered in the court of collective opinion to be one of the better endings, and it's easy to see why—I myself, when I first reached it, commented that "as far as I'm concerned, this is the good ending." But there's still a lot left uncertain, and there's still a sacrifice you have to make.

When you leave the final cabin, the Shifting Mound is gone around you, replaced by a starry sky similar to the one in the Construct. You never get to see what lies beyond the door or to get any clues as to what happened to the outside world.

I don't think there's any strong evidence to the idea that you've somehow harmed the world itself by abandoning your godhood. The Princess states that she is separate on some level from the Shifting Mound, and killing Her is a choice you have to intentionally make. But is it unchanged? And will you and the Princess ever get to see the world you chose not to sacrifice?

These questions don't have answers. Maybe the concept of Transformation gets on just fine without a mind behind it—whatever cycle the two of you once were certainly seemed to. Maybe it's altered, somehow. Maybe the Shifting Mound's personhood manages to persist without her heart, even. There's no way to know and not even the barest evidence to support any theory, so I won't consider it any further.

But when you step outside the door, where will you end up? The world outside the Construct is typically represented with color—the green new growth in the Networked Wild's peek behind the curtain and "There Are No Endings," or the orange star in "A New and Unending Dawn." All you get in this ending is a colorless night sky, identical to what you'd see if you were still in the Construct. Are you still there, trapped with no way out now that you and the Princess have both given up your godhood? It's possible. It's also possible that you do have a way out, a way back to the world you've never been able to see clearly.

You don't know, though. You've given up your right to knowing what will happen next. And that's not the only thing you've given up—your Voices, or at least the one or ones you know are still there, remain in the cabin, while you leave them for whatever happens next.

You're just as alone here as you are in There Are No Endings. The only difference is that in that ending, you know exactly what happens to the world and to you.

VI. You're on a Path in the Woods...

...and at the end of that path is a cabin. And in the basement of that cabin is a Princess.

You're here to slay her. If you don't, it will be the end of the world.

This one is a bit different from the rest. It's... not really an ending at all, but the refusal of one. You're pushing your resolution further down the line in the hopes that another you will know what decision to make... or that they'll keep choosing to perpetuate the Construct forever.

There's just as much uncertainty here as in And? What Happens Next?, though it's loaded in different places. You know exactly what happens to you, and the Princess, and even your Voices—this is one of only two endings, alongside A New And Unending Dawn, where you get to keep them with you.

What you don't know is how things will resolve in the end, or even if they ever will. For all you know, you could be somewhere in the middle of a never-ending cycle. And, you know, maybe you're okay with that. But what if a future you makes a choice you aren't okay with?

And what happens to the world in the meantime? The Narrator's world is still dying, and Transformation is still alive. Her being in the Construct isn't going to solve anything—if it would, you wouldn't need to slay her. Maybe the world will die if you keep doing this over again forever. Maybe it already has, and that's a new, worse wrinkle for the endings where you follow through with the Narrator's plan.

Maybe the world will die, and a new one will be born. Maybe the world will die, and a new one won't be born. Maybe you're somehow keeping the world in stasis until you make a choice. Maybe it doesn't matter to you, because you'll never see the world if you keep on like this.

But the things you can see? You, and the Princess, and your Voices, and even the Narrator? You're all still alive and well, and no one has to be left behind, and you will continue to be for as long as you keep choosing to reset the Construct.

You just have to keep forgetting, and to keep refusing to choose a true ending.

Conclusion

In conclusion, every ending in Slay the Princess forces you to make a tough choice and to choose something to sacrifice in favor of whatever you've decided to prioritise.

The Good Ending is one of the most straightforward, and in fact you gain very little aside from the accomplishment of the Narrator's goal—you sacrifice your chance at knowing what's really happening and leave the Voice of the Hero to an eternity alone.

There Are No Endings forces you to sacrifice your Voices and your connections to people, in order to keep the cycle of life and death intact and live an eternity of guarantee with your counterpart.

A New And Unending Dawn sacrifices the Princess and the cycle of life and death, in order to give an unknown vision of eternity to the current world and to retain all your Voices alongside all your memories.

Just As You Once Were Nothing is another ending with heavy sacrifices and minimal or no gains. You give up your Voices, your chance at knowledge, the Princess, and even your own life, and there's no way to know what happens once you fade.

And? What Happens Next? sacrifices your Voices, though in this one you at least know they're alive, and your knowledge of what awaits you post-ending. But it allows you to refuse both the Narrator's desire for eternity and the Shifting Mound's dismissal of people, and to retain the Princess and, presumably, the cycle of life and death.

You're On A Path In The Woods... is the one ending where everything you can and will see, you keep. What you sacrifice here is nothing material, but rather the ending itself, always refusing to move forward.

Every ending forces you to give something up, though some sacrifices may seem more worthy or less devastating than others, and perspective colors them all. But there is no "happy ending" to be found here, no way to have an objectively good outcome, and that is by design. Every ending is a bad ending, and that's one of the things that makes this game so great.

[rogue-of-heart-classpecting]

Mayhaps an explanation on how each class can effect the session? I know kights usally means there's a lack of its aspect but what about the others?

Maids��� sessions are controlled by something. Aradia’s session had doc scratch orchestrating all this bullshit event-wise. Jane’s session has the condesce who had all the power in their universe.

Pages’ aspects are kind of what the players hope their futures will bring post-sburb. The trolls lived in a very unpleasant, highly controlled dictatorship. The kids were kind of thinking they would win without any problems.

Mages’ sessions are full of their aspect. There was so much doom in the beta trolls’ session. People kept dying for no reason. There was basically no way they would be able to get along and play cooperatively. Also karkat creating Jack noir basically fucked everything from the start.

Knights’ sessions have very little of their aspect, so the knight is assigned to protect what little is there. Dave had to haul ass to get rose in the session. There was also just a time crunch to finish in general. All the trolls had different ideas of what they wanted, and their conflicting ideas were hard to keep working together.

Rogues have sort of an unaddressed problem waiting to come up. Rufioh grew up to lead a revolution. Roxy’s session had a lot of unaddressed stuff in general. Lots of misplaced confidence, lack of communication, hidden feelings, etc. There are a lot of times in the trolls session where they have the little heart or spade or clubs symbol in their eyes or over their heads and nothing ever comes of it. Nepeta never god tiered.

Sylphs sessions have a dire lack of their aspect in their session and are charged with nursing it back to health. Kanaya was the lone tender of the matriorb that would ensure the troll race keeps being born. Aradias session I guess is full of meaningless nonsense and plot irrelevant shit. She kind of builds it up for thousands of years or however long and then unleashes it all at once. But… she brings information and plot relevance to her session members and to the combined session.

Seers’ aspects are a resource their team hasn’t tapped into yet. They know nothing about it. Even Dave, who seems to be the most cynical and down to earth member of the gang (besides rose) still does not see his brothers actions for what they are (bad) and clouds himself in a shame induced misidentification of who he is and who he is allowed to be. Terezis team has never considered the consequences of their actions. They never set their sights on a goal and plot a course from here to there. They set one foot forward and then the entropy guides them forward with no brakes.

Thieves... I think the session actually needs a leader in that aspect! The thief's job is to find a hidden resource (and looking at the trolls' session, light seems really unavailable lol.) and draw it out, creating a hub of aspect where it can exert itself. For some reason, Vriska also liked pushing Tavros to be stronger and the best him he can be. Actually, that might be a pitch thing... The Sn0wman told her to "steal his will" because "that's what a thief does" or whatever. But Vriska thought he was capable or wanted him to be capable of mercy killing her.

Heirs have plenty of their aspect all around them to work with. I guess they have to kind of bring that to the session themselves, actually! But they have no trouble doing it. John successfully retrieved his presents, fought his dad, started the game, and just began slaying like a beast and rocketing ahead no problem. The world John was born into set him up with a good place to stretch out. Sburb was created without John doing anything at all. The ultimate escape from earth, right? Equius was set up with a world with arbitrary rules and little independent thought. His hemospectrum placement is high enough to give him a superiority AND inferiority complex. For some reason, he has incredible roboti% skills SO THAT he always has something intelligent and logical to destroy.

Bards seem to have an aspect that is like... I don't want to say an abscess because that's gross... It's like their aspect is under a lot of pressure from being suppressed by the world and their team. Just about every member of the team has rage that isn't fully expressed. Gamzee definitely brings out rage and disgust in Terezi. He also makes the rest of his team very aware that just because it doesn't look like it, his aspect is definitely there. It's just waiting to come out. Gamzee himself is the first thing to express its rage... That no one expected him to have. I read somewhere that Gamzee became an agent of his aspect after he "calmed down." He brought chaos and anger and pain to everyone. He's the one who threw all the bodies of people who hated each other (and fefeta) into the sprites to make them useless. I guess Equius was a sprite by himself but. Equius is pretty fucking useless anyway. He's the heir of useless. Gamzee was taken out of mind control and saw that Terezi was stabbing him, and he decided to trick her by acting like his old self to manipulate her emotions. And as soon as she let her guard down, he went apeshit and beat her crazy clown style. He is like a harbinger of confusion and pain.

Princes. Princes' aspects are overgrown. They're clouding the session's ability to function. Dirk basically successfully exploded the romantic tension between all 4 of his team members. In a very destructive and painful way. If they didn't have a prince, they would have been too distracted by their crushes to finish the game. Eridan is a much suckier person, but he does have the same job. Dirk has a more precise excision style like a surgeon, but Eridan prefers mowing down "enemies" with abandon, which makes it harder for his team. In one fell swoop, Eridan killed the future ruler of the Troll race AND the ability for more trolls to be born. And the only troll babysitter. I don't know why the trolls thought this would be a fun game they could easily win, but Eridan completely took care of that.

Witches have an aspect that needs to be understood in a new way. Like gender. You guys know what I mean by that right. I think this is clearer with Feferi-- wait! No, except Jade has a new way for planets to be created! She's not the first one to PLAY sburb, but she's the one to INTRODUCE us to it as a character. Remember, these roles are about your purpose in the story, not in a watsonian way. Jade finds new ways of creating things. Feferi finds new ways of leading that creates beforus which still sucks but is much better than alternia.

[catsafarithewriter]

Been a bit since we had some angst 👀

"How much more do you need? How much more do you need me to give?"

"All of it. More than you could ever give."

A/N: How dare you throw this angst at me when you know I'm already looking at Slay the Princess AU angst?! How much angst do I need to offer to satiate your thirst?? Anyway, this is not a StP AU, but is loosely based on Moonlighter, an indie game where you play as a merchant moonlighting as a dungeon delver to collect stock for your shop.

I've been eyeing this particular AU for a whlie, so thank you for inadvertently giving me an in for this.

(This, uh, hit 10K, so heads up for a lot under the readmore. I'm gonna post this to AO3 in time, but for now, enjoy this monstrosity here.)

Happy birthday, you menace <3

x

Baron has been gathering dust in Moonlighter's cellar for longer than he cares to count.

This, however, is less remarkable for him than it might be for another; he is built of magic and wood after all, ageless in a way that makes noting the passage of time meaningless.

There is also precious little to mark such time, down in the cellar. There are no windows, no sunlight, not even the changing breeze that might denote seasons. All he has are the brief sightings of Moonlighter's owners – a man and a woman, and in his early days he had seen them come and go often to the cellar, but now their hair has greyed and their limbs have slowed and their detours to the basement are brief.

Recently, it's been only the woman.

Until one day it's not.

"I'm telling ya, there's nothing to be worth selling down there, Chicky."

The voice isn't young, but it is new. From his vantage point on the shelf, Baron can see the light spilling from the doorway is almost entirely eclipsed by the man on the threshold. Another light – that of candlewick rather than sun – bobs past the man and a significantly smaller form begins the descent.

"Maybe not, but it has to be worth a look."

"Your ma told us everything in here was either impossible to flog or cursed."

"Yeah, my mother also worked herself into an early grave trying to run this place solo," the other voice retorts, "so forgive me if I want to deviate somewhat from her teachings."

The second figure nears Baron, and now he can make out a face notably similar to the woman he has watched grow old. Her hair is darker, and her skin is clear of not only wrinkles, but also the scars that had marked even the younger years of the previous woman. Only her eyes show signs of wear – red rimmed and tired.

"Moonlighter was never meant to be run alone," the man says. He begins a cautious descent after his companion. "It was manageable when your pa was alive; then he could delve the dungeon for artifacts during the night, and your ma could sell them in Moonlighter during the day."

"And people wondered why I was an only child," the woman mutters.

"Moonlighter has been in the Yoshioka family since it started–"

"I know. But a lot of those inheritances were sideways along the family tree for good reason."

"Look, Chicky, if yer need any help, Toto and me can run the shop a few days so you can rest between delving. We used to help yer ma out when Daichi passed–"

"You and Toto have your own shop to run though," the woman says. She opens up a chest and finds only moth-eaten breeches. "And I can't just rely on the kindness of others to make this work, Muta."

"'Course you can."

"There's got to be a way to make ends meet – properly." The woman stops before Baron and looks – really looks. There's a fire in her eyes that Baron hasn't seen in a long time. "You're different," she says, and lifts him off the shelf.

The man joins her, and he eyes Baron with distrust. "Don't bother with that one, Chicky."

"Why not? It looks like fourth tier – and no one's been able to get as far as the fourth tier in decades. Someone's gotta be willing to pay up for it."

"Yeah, yer ma thought the same. Only it kept coming back."

The woman turns Baron over, running calloused hands over the immaculate morning suit and painted fur. The callouses are unfamiliar to Baron, earned from daily chores rather than wielding a sword. "Coming back? Coming back how?"

"Depends. If she sold it to a hero, they'd usually enter the dungeon, do pretty well for themselves, and then one day never be seen again." The man rubs a hand across his chin. "They'd always get... weird towards the end, too. Reclusive. And then yer ma would find it abandoned in the upper levels of the dungeon and no hero in sight."

"And if she sold it to someone who wasn't a hero?" the woman asks.

"Then they'd usually complain about hauntings and return the damn thing. In the end, she gave up on it. Guess she could've kept selling it to wannabe heroes, but she felt bad about it."

"Bet it paid the bills though," she mutters, but without any real rancour. She sets Baron back on the shelf and moves onto the next artifact.

That's okay.

Baron can wait.

x

He sees the woman half a dozen more times before he makes his approach.

The second time she enters the cellar, she sets to work furiously dividing the room's contents into possible sales versus the lost causes. Some of the latter she removes – presumably to be thrown – whilst others she leaves to gather dust.

She stares at Baron for a good long while before setting him into the final category.

It is some time before she returns. Baron wonders whether she followed in her mother's footsteps and attempted to run Moonlighter solo. Sometimes he wonders if she sold the shop and left for greener pastures. And sometimes he wonders whether she's died, ending Moonlighter's Yoshioka line once and for all.

But return she does, and she looks all the older for it.

Not older in a temporal sense, although Baron would be the first to admit difficulty in recognising that, but life has been unkind in ways other than time. Her skin is sallow, untouched by sun, and a scar clips her jaw. She moves such a way to make him question when she last truly slept. She doesn't stay long, just long enough to gather up some of the less hopeless causes, and haul them into the upper belly of Moonlighter.

He sees her sooner after that, and the following descents into the cellar become more frequent – and each time, she looks the worse for wear. Every time she looks a little bit more like her mother, and every time he wonders if this will be the last time he'll see her.

On the sixth visit, she collects him up and he sees sunlight for the first time in decades.

The light is low outside – either dusk or dawn – and she sets him onto a display stand. There are no sign of the artifacts previously claimed from the cellar; instead the other stands are filled with low-quality offerings, items foraged from the upper levels of the dungeon. Their prices are notably lower than the value she sets before him.

After writing out his price, she leans against his display stand, staring into his gemstone eyes and evidently seeing something else reflected in them. "Oh, don't look at me like that," she says. "If I sell you, I'll make enough to cover this month's rent and be able to skip a few night's delving in favour of sleep." She sighs, and Baron notes a new scar, running along her throat. "And goodness knows I can't keep this up."

"There are other ways, you know."

To her credit, the woman doesn't scream. He's usually found that to be the most common response to his initial greeting – occasionally paired with a clumsy swing of the nearest makeshift weapon – but, then again, she looks too tired to scream. She merely blinks, once, twice, and then says, "Oh goody, the cursed cat doll talks."

He sweeps his hat from his head and gives a once well-practiced bow. It's a little rusty after all these years, but whatever passes for muscle memory in him remains. "Greetings, miss. I think you'll find that I am no cursed cat doll, but a Creation. When someone creates something with all their heart, then that thing is given a soul, you see?"

"I see that the sleep deprivation is already on the hallucination stage."

Personally, Baron thinks the sleep deprivation is probably a few notches further along than that. But, then again, what would he know? He's immortal. "I assure you, I am no hallucination, Miss...?"

"Haru." She yawns, and there's a tremble in her limbs that the yawn exasperates. "And that's just what a hallucination would say, Mr...?"

"Baron. Call me Baron." He sets his hat neatly back between his ears. "And if I am a hallucination, what harm could come of merely listening to my proposition, Miss Haru?"

"Time. In case you weren't aware, I don't have much – or any – of it going spare."

"And if I were your hallucination, I should know such things."

She blinks slowly. He can visibly see her try to comprehend his words. And fail. "I'm too tired for this. I'm going back to..." She falters, brow furrowing. "No, I'm not. I've got a shop to run."

"And then a dungeon to delve," Baron hazards, "and then a shop to run, and then a dungeon to delve, and so on and so forth. Tell me, Miss Haru, when exactly is sleep scheduled in this busy life of yours?"

"Never. Sleep is for the broke."

"It is going to break you, Miss Haru."

"I don't have much choice," she says. "The pittance I make from dungeon artifacts barely cover a day's rent. I don't have the money spare to skip a day." She grimaces. "Or night."

"That's because you're only selling the artifacts from the very highest levels of the dungeon," Baron says. "If you went deeper the artifacts would fetch enough to tide you over for longer." He pauses. "Long enough to sleep."

"Nice theory, save for one fact." Haru gestures to herself. "I'm a librarian. Or I was, until I inherited this place. If I go any deeper than the shallows, I'll get myself killed." She brushes a hand, subconsciously, across her throat. "Quicker than I'm already likely to, anyway."

"As you are, there's no doubt," Baron agrees. "Not without help."

She blinks again – but this time it's laden with suspicion. "Muta said you only stick around with heroes."

"I do."

"I'm not a hero."

Baron cocks his head. "And yet you enter the dungeon."

She snorts. "For artifacts. I'm a merchant. Heroes go into the dungeon for glory, fighting monsters and suchlike, while merchants are just doing a job. Or, at least," she adds off-handedly, "that's the idea. In theory, a job pays."

"I have little interest in glory," he says. "All I'm looking for is someone who wants help in exploring deeper into the dungeon. In the past, that's only ever been heroes."

"Yes, and look what happened to them."

"Yes, indeed."

Her gaze narrows. "What did happen to them?"

"They pushed themselves too far, too fast. My aid can only do so much; they sought monsters too powerful too soon and were killed in the encounter. But, as you said, you're not in it for the glory. Perhaps your survival instincts will be stronger."

Haru snorts. "Given my life choices so far, that's a bit of a leap."

"Maybe," he admits, "but I've been offering my help to heroes for long enough to no avail. Maybe a merchant is exactly what I've been looking for." He offers a hand. "What do you say?"

Haru eyes the tiny gloved hand. "What kind of help did you say you give?"

"I can unlock a human's potential for magic," he says, and it's true enough. "Over time and practice, your power will grow, enough to face even the monsters of the fourth tier. So long as you take it slowly, you will be at no risk."

The first lie he's told but not, he knows from experience, usually the last.

Still, Haru doesn't take his hand. "Why help?" she asks. "What's in it for you?"

"It's what I was made for. All Creations have a purpose. This is mine."

For a moment, he fears he's misjudged, that she's going to refuse. But then she glances to the windows, where the sun is steadily rising and the flicker of shadow denotes people passing by, and a fresh wave of fatigue passes over her. Baron wonders just how close she was to breaking.

"Fine," she says, and drops her hand against his. Her palm dwarfs his. "I only need to go a little deeper anyway."

Baron smiles. He's heard that before, and no one has ever kept to it. "Good," he says instead. "Now, lock up the shop and tidy yourself to bed. We have a big night due."

x

The entrance to the dungeon is much the same as Baron last remembers it. The dirt track opens out into a dirt courtyard, and a large stone doorway is built into the hillside. Seated on Haru's shoulder as she pushes the door open, Baron can see the interior is also much the same – wooden beams outline the tunnel, deceptively manmade, with lanterns set at regular intervals. It almost looks like a mining shaft, except mining shafts don't usually echo with the sound of tiny skittering feet further within.

Haru falters before entering – as if she's tempted to flee – but enter she does, even if the hand that holds her rusty blade shakes.

"Alright, you promised me magic," Haru says, "so how does this work?"

"Magic works through intent. You must focus your desires and manifest them through intention." He thinks of previous would-be heroes. "Start small; that's all you'll be capable of at this point."

"So don't try running straight to fourth tier, otherwise I'll end up barbecued," she says.

"No, the fire monsters are on third tier. If you go up against fourth tier monsters unprepared, your remains will be less the charred type, and more the type best left to a dustpan and brush."

Haru glances Baron's way, eyebrow raised. "Are you speaking from experience or...?"

"Just take it slowly." He's spent years, possibly decades, sitting on a shelf. If he loses this mortal, there's no telling when he'll next find another willing.

Haru raises a hand, and Baron can feel her focus narrow. He converts the magic as needed, unlocking just enough potential – and a smidgen more – to fulfill her request. It's a modest affair, just a sphere of light that chases away the shadows that the lanterns cannot reach. It surprises Baron – but maybe it shouldn't. He's learnt from experience that too much magic, too soon, can burn out a mortal, but that hasn't stopped previous heroes from attempting more than they ought on day one. He's learnt now to keep a tight rein on a mortal's magic level, but Haru is a merchant, not a hero. Her priorities are based in survival, not glory.

Still, too restrained can be as dangerous as too ambitious.

"You can do more, if you so wish," he prompts. "You'll feel it when you reach your current limit."

"Are you sure?"

"Absolutely." After all, he has no interest in burning through a mortal so soon.

Haru focuses again, and the light dissolves into dust. It hangs, suspended in the air like stars, and then begins to dance.

Baron blinks. He's never seen the magic used for that. "What is the purpose of this?"

"Light," Haru answers, and she starts down the tunnel. The lights bob around her, still not using up her current magic potential. "And they're pretty."

"Beauty is rarely advantageous in survival."

"Are you going to be so judgemental the entire time we're working together, or are you just getting it out of your system early?"

Baron begins to reply, but then hesitates. He's never been called judgemental before – but, then again, his own goals have usually aligned closely enough with his current mortal that such remarks are unnecessary... or, if they are spoken, usually readily agreed with. "I don't mean to be judgemental," he says eventually. "I merely am accustomed to a different nature of dungeon delver."

"Yes, and they all died," Haru reminds him. "If I'm gonna be going out the same way, I intend to have some fun with it." She tilts her head enough so that Baron, still seated on her shoulder, can see her grin. "Come on, Baron. You can't say you don't like them."

The lights cascade around him, and from the eddies twirl forms that might be birds. An unfamiliar emotion skitters through his heart.

He suspects it may be bewilderment. Perhaps he had kept with heroes until now for good reason if merchants are all as impractical as this.

He's saved from the indignity of trying to find an answer by a monster dropping from the ceiling.

Each tier has its own biome and, by proxy, its own breed of monster. The first tier carries its facade of man-made origins in both environment and monster, and the creatures here are oft the animated remains discarded by humanity. The monster that attacks Haru appears to have once been an umbrella.

And not a moment too soon.

Baron braces himself for the inevitable overreaction, for the blast of offensive magic and the smouldering remains. Humans always underestimate their power on the first attack–

Haru smacks the flying umbrella with her rusted sword and sends it slamming into the far wall.

It flaps weakly, and then goes limp.

A beat passes. Haru is breathing hard, her face flushed and her sword arm shaking.

"You have magic now," Baron says, eventually.

"I forgot."

Baron glances to the light show, still dancing above their heads. "You... forgot?"

"I've been doing this job a lot longer with a sword than I have with magic," she reminds him.

Yes, Baron thinks, and the sword is definitely showing its age. It looks like it's seen several generations of Moonlighters.

Haru approaches the fallen monster and kneels down beside it. Baron is prepared to believe she's about to perform last rites – he'll believe anything of this not-hero at the moment – but instead she begins to strip it down for parts.

"Most of this will sell," she says, as if she can sense the raised eyebrow. "Attach a piece of the wings to an arrow and it'll fly farther, or use the rods as arrows and they won't break so easily. But the best part to sell is pretty much impossible to get–"

As she reaches further into the monster, the umbrella-creature twitches, and Haru jolts back. Finally – finally – her magic flares into action, and those dust mote lights fire into the beast, where from its body they erupt into vines, twisting and tightening, contorting the monster until it ceases to struggle.

Baron releases a breath he hadn't, until then, realised he'd been holding. "See?" he says. "It's so much simpler with magic."

Haru rocks forward on her heels, and gingerly drops a hand into the mess of vines and umbrella. The greenery parts ways and both wings and rods are mangled beyond use. "Dang it."

"Oh, what a shame," Baron says. "It's for the best, though; anything worth selling is going to be a good deal deeper–"

"Maybe not." Haru cracks open the centre of the main shaft, and a tiny blue stone falls free. "It's a crystal. I've never been able to break open one of these things to get them, but they're meant to be pure magic. Look."

She passes it up to Baron and he does, indeed, look. It emits a gentle warmth, uncomfortably familiar, and he wonders if his own crystal pulses the same steady beat. "Then all the more reason to keep going–" he starts.

"Keep going? This thing will sell well enough to tide me over for a couple of days. No," she says, and straightens up, "I'm going back home so I can catch some sleep while the sun is actually set."

x

Baron's never had this kind of problem with previous humans. It's infuriating. It's ridiculous. It's... stumped him, honestly.

Usually the promise of power or fame or treasure is enough to lure even the most reserved of heroes into the dungeon's depths, and a merchant should have been no different. After all, everyone knows the deeper one delves, the more precious the artifacts.

And yet Haru is frustratingly, impossibly content with the meagre findings she retrieves from the first tier. The gold she makes is just enough to give her days off and a little to spare.

But that's okay.

Baron can wait.

x

The push Haru needs comes from an unexpected source, when the town's herbalist approaches Haru with a peculiar request.

"These roots you sold me," the woman says, setting dried tubers on the counter, "I need more of them."

"They're only to be found in the lowest levels of the first tier, and even then only sparsely." Haru picks up the roots. She hadn't even been sure they would sell, but had taken them on the assumption that curiosity would trump common sense and purse strings. "How many do you need?"

"As many as you can get your hands on. Julian's daughter is sick, and nothing I've tried has helped – but these. She's making a recovery, but I fear she'll worsen if I don't get more."

Baron waits for the gentle refusal – the explanation that such plants are too deep for reliable sourcing, the apology – but instead Haru's mouth curls into a stubborn twist that Baron will come to know well. "I'll see what I can do," she promises.

x

"It was only chance that brought you upon those roots originally," Baron tells her on their next dungeon delve. Usually Haru skips a night and savours the sleep, but tonight she has gone straight from shop to dungeon. "If you want to be sure of finding them, you'll need to descend into the second tier."

"Then that is what we'll do." She glances his way. "Only for as long as it takes to find them, mind you. No more."

He smiles. "No more," he agrees, knowing the oath will never keep. She's already proven a willingness to break such promises, even if she takes longer than most to alter her priorities.

By this point, Haru's magic is strong enough to make the journey down to the second tier almost an afterthought. The monsters that dwell on the upper levels can sense her power enough to steer clear, and most only attack now if cornered.

The monsters on the second tier are a different kettle of cave fish altogether.

The mine shaft tunnels become more natural, more roughly-hewn on the second tier. Here, light is sourced not from ever-burning lanterns, but from glowing moss that clings to the walls and bioluminescent fungi sprouting at the edges. The monsters also alter in appearance, offering threat in the form of carnivorous plants and thorny poison. They are bolder, stronger, than their first tier brethren, and it doesn't take long for Haru to encounter one.

The vines that snare her are uncannily like the ones that spring from her magic, and they are little defence against her new opponent. Baron is quick to leap free – the plants ignore him, as they always do – and even if he was inclined to help, there is little aid he can offer at his current stature.

What he can do is transmute a little more magic her way, strengthening her power.

"You'll never defeat it like that!" he calls. He watches a new wreath of greenery spiral out from Haru and immediately be throttled by the snaring vines. "You must tailor your fighting styles to your opponent! Try fire!"

She stumbles backwards, trying desperately to kick her feet free. "If I lose control of that kind of magic, I'll set everything aflame!" she shouts back.

"You don't have the power to do that!"

"Once it gets going, I mightn't be able to stop it!"

The plant monster lashes out and strikes lucky. Its vines catch around Haru's waist and she is dragged off her feet.

Dammit.

"If you don't do something, you won't need to worry about losing control!" he shouts. Dammit. No other human has ever needed such coaxing; usually he's the one preaching the virtues of restraint. "Attack it, Haru!"

She swings at it with that ridiculous sword, its blade too dulled to do more than dent the monster, and the vines tear it out of her hands almost disdainfully. The vines curl up along her arms, around her shoulders, towards her throat, and Baron remembers vividly the mangled mess Haru's own plant magic had made of that first umbrella monster.

Lesson learnt: next time he sticks with heroes.

All he can do is watch as her feet kick uselessly against the monster, nails scrabbling in vain, face reddening, hands reddening...

Wait.

Hands?

Her fingers dig into the vines about her neck, and now he can see her palms are molten-red. He catches the smell of smoke and firewood, and suddenly Haru is thrown free from the vines. She rolls to the side as a thorn-lined vine slams where she had been only moments before. It hits the ground with enough force that Baron feels the floor shake.

"Baron! In the bag!" Haru yells. She pulls her satchel open and lingers only long enough for Baron to follow her instructions, before she's off running along the corridor.

Thankfully, what plant monsters have in thorns and vines, they lack in the way of feet. Haru outruns it with ease, even injured as she is. When they reach a secure corner, Haru slumps to the floor. Her breathing is heavy, irregular in a way Baron recognises to be pain.

Baron is out of the bag almost before Haru has sat.

"What happened back there?" he demands.

Haru doesn't answer immediately. She has her right arm close to her, her left hand tight just above the elbow. "Plant monster," she says eventually. She proffers a thin grin. "Or weren't you paying attention?"

"Not that. I meant with your magic." He gestures to her obviously injured state. "At your level, you shouldn't have had any such issue with it. Your magic is strong enough, trust me. So why didn't you use fire back there?"

"You're made of wood."

"And?"

She blinks. "You're made of wood," she repeats, slower this time like he's missing something obvious. Like that comment should mean anything in this context, like it should explain why she nearly got herself killed instead of–

Oh.

There's blood seeping through the sleeve of her shirt, ruby-red staining the hand pressed to it. Thorns, most likely. Poison, possibly. And all because she feared she would burn him.

He steps forward, and as he does so, he shifts into a human height. Haru balks, but isn't really in any state to do much more than stare.

"Since when have you been able to do that?"

"I always have. But my role here isn't to fight; yours is."

Her mouth sets into that stubborn line, and he suspects she's thinking of all the time that having another body beside her would have been useful in traversing the dungeon. There's a reason he rarely shows this ability to humans.

"You shouldn't have worried about me," he says. "I'm hardier than I look. But you, it appears, are not." He collects the healing kit out of the bag and passes an antidote to her. "Drink. Not all monsters on this floor are poisonous, but we can't risk it."

She takes the vial and downs it with a wrinkled nose. "These things always taste foul."

"Would you rather risk dying a slow, painful death?" Baron asks. "Or perhaps being petrified. I believe there is at least one monster on this floor whose poison turns one into a chicken. How does that sound?"

Haru snorts, and Baron is surprised by the relief that blossoms in his sternum at the sound. Surprised and... unnerved. His purpose is to find a human capable of reaching the final level, so their survival is always optimum – up to a point – but this feels... uncomfortably personal.

He turns his attention onto safer matters, such as rolling the torn sleeve away from the injury. The skin is equally torn; not deep, but intricate lines mar the arm. He sets to binding the wound with bandages.

"Why did you stay?"

Haru rolls her head away from the wall. "What?"

He hadn't meant to ask that, but now the words are out and his curiosity is whetted. "At Moonlighter," he specifies. Between his fingers, he can feel how soft, how delicate human skin is. He wonders why any mortal would take to this life when it could be ended so easily. So off-handedly. "Surely you needn't have taken over the business, even if it is a family affair."

"Oh. That." She leans her head back against the wall. "Apparently, Moonlighter must be inherited by one of Yoshioka blood."

Baron recalls what snippets he has learnt of Haru's life before. "Yes, but you were a librarian. Surely there were better candidates?"

"You'd think so. But, no; it turns out that having a family of dungeon delvers/merchants is a pretty good way to not have a family before long. The death toll is high and the lifestyle isn't, shall we say, conductive to having a kid."

"And yet you pursued a life elsewhere before coming back here."

"I wasn't meant to inherit this place. That was to be my cousin – but then she got on the wrong side of an ogre, and..." Haru shakes her head. "The only other Yoshioka left is her daughter, all of five years. I couldn't let her inherit Moonlighter so... well, here I am."

"Here you are," Baron agrees. "Would she have really inherited Moonlighter if you hadn't accepted it?"

"There are two things impossible to get out of: fairy deals and legal matters." Haru rolls her head to one side, but this time her gaze lingers on the wound she has been so carefully avoiding until now. "I came, knowing a librarian was never going to be a good owner for Moonlighter but, I thought that I might at least last long enough here to give her a chance to grow up. So maybe she'll be able to handle the job when she inevitably comes into possession of it."

Baron slows in his tending. The resignation in her words sets his heart cold. "Is that really how you feel?" he asks softly. "That this life would be the death of you, and still you came?"

"It's killed pretty much all its previous owners," Haru answered, far too blase for Baron's liking, "and most have been much more capable than me. Sooner or later, everyone slows or errs, and this job isn't the forgiving sort. So, yes, I was pretty sure this would kill me, probably sooner in my case." She glances his way, with a smile Baron does not deserve. "At least until I met you. With the magic you've given me, I might survive this. Perhaps even thrive."

Baron doesn't recognise the emotion that pools in his gut, cold and heavy.

He thinks it might be guilt.

x

After that, Haru begins to venture regularly onto the second tier. If he had thought her close encounter with the vine monster would push her further onto the path of cautiousness, he is very much mistaken – instead, it seems to have emboldened her. She still plays carefully with her fire magic, keeping it close to her skin, even after Baron's assurances that she shouldn't fret over him, but it works well enough against the second tier creatures.

She gathers enough of the root to satisfy the herbalist, but news that Moonlighter's owner is venturing deep begins to get about. More come to Haru's shop with requests – fetch these seeds, find these leaves – and Haru is happy to help. If they merely spoke of a rich payout, Baron isn't sure Haru would be so willing, but the offers she accepts are always for a worthy cause.

Once upon a time, Baron would have been relieved she was finally comfortable delving deeper, but now the thought seems to give him vertigo; satisfaction and grief warring inside him.

One of the owners of the neighbouring weapon and armour shop stops by, and he eyes Moonlighter's array of stock with a wary look. He's tall, birdlike somehow in the way he holds himself, and avian in his sharp eyes. "When Muta told me you were managing, it set my heart at ease," the man remarks, "but I'm startled to see you've been delving so deep. What did you say your profession was before?"

"Librarian," Haru replies.

"Librarian," the man echoes. "You've caught on well, then."

"Thank you, Toto."

His gaze roams the shop, until it seems to find what it's searching for in the form of Baron. He starts towards it, but Haru is quicker. She scoots between them, as if guarding Baron from the man.

"He's not for sale."

"Glad to hear it. Muta did tell you what happened to the heroes who bought it, didn't he?"

"He did."

The frown burrowed into the man's brow doesn't lessen. He regards the stock around him, salvaged from levels even experienced heroes were reluctant to venture to. "Haru, if things are difficult, if Moonlighter is proving impossible to run along, you know you can always ask myself and Muta for help, don't you? You don't need to turn to... alternative sources for aid, you understand?"

"I understand. Muta made it quite clear what happens to heroes who bought the cat doll." Haru smiles. "So it's just as well I'm a merchant, isn't it?"

x

Baron knows it is only a matter of time before Haru braves the third tier.

All it takes, as all it ever takes, is someone asking for something from the fire levels – Baron can't even remember what she needs; all he remembers is that she's one step closer to the final level – and she's venturing yet further than she promised she would.

The third tier is one of fire and smoke, lava flowing in molten-red rivers that home monsters built to scorch would-be heroes to cinders.

Haru almost refuses to bring Baron along.

"And if a stray fireball hits you, what then?" she demands. "Poisonous trees and over-active accessories are one thing, but the monsters on the third tier could really kill you."

"I'm at no greater risk than you have been during our adventures," he reminds her.

"That's different."

"How?"

Haru opens her mouth. Closes it. But Baron has a pretty good idea of the kind of answer she'd like to give – that the standards she set for herself, and the standards she set for other people are two very different things.

She admits defeat, and he accompanies her on her next delve.

This would all be easier if he could convince himself the care she affords him is purely self-serving. And he's met plenty of those sorts over the years. Those who have protected him, as far as they have felt the need, have been doing so because of what he grants them; because if he is destroyed, then maybe their newfound magic will be destroyed also. It has always been a means to an end – and that's worked just fine for him. After all, the exploitation goes both ways.

But Baron has seen the way Haru cares for those around her, sometimes even fetching high-priced items from the dungeon and refusing payment if the need is too great and the cost too dear for the recipient. It is easy to believe that same reckless care has been aligned over him. However ridiculous it may be.

"You needn't worry about me," he assures, all the same. "I've been here before and, as you can see, I'm still here."

"You've been to the third tier before?" Haru asks. Here, the only light to be found is in the glowing lava and ever-burning torches, and it bathes the tunnel and its occupants in an ember hue. Her hair carries a reddish shade that almost looks like her mother's in her younger years.

"And to the fourth and beyond," he answers.

"There's a fifth tier?"

Baron shakes his head. "There's only a single floor below fourth tier."

"I wonder why no one's heard of it."

"It's because all who venture there only meet death."

Haru eyes him. "Except for you."

"Except for me," he admits, "but I, as you have probably discerned, am a special case. The monsters here have a preference for attacking humans over a cursed cat doll," he says, echoing her words from so long ago with a smile.

"So what's down there?"

Nothing, he wants to say. Nothing worth seeking.

"The monster," he says instead.

"Same old, same old."

"No. This monster is the reason this dungeon exists."

Haru stops walking. "What?"

He's told this tale a hundred times, and each time tailored to pique his mortal's curiosity. Promises of riches or glory or power tied to success, and yet none will guarantee Haru's aid here.

Good.

"A long time ago, there was a monster terrorising the world, so great in power that to slay it was impossible. Many tried, many failed, and in the end all that could be done was to trap it away. To create a dungeon for it."

Haru blinks. "I never wondered why this place was called a dungeon."

Baron nods. "Some clues to its history have survived the eons. It's sealed away on the very lowest floor, trapped, but still very much alive and very much dangerous."

"Have previous heroes tried to kill it?"

"Yes."

"And I'm guessing none have succeeded."

"None."

He watches her, wary of the urge to seek out such a danger, but she seems to slot this new knowledge aside and move on.

He shouldn't feel relief.

But he does.

x

The fourth tier is the lowest part of the dungeon – before the inevitable, anyway – and the one that best betrays the abilities of those who built it.

Of those who built Baron.

Baron may be a more complex Creation than his bellicose brethren which occupy the fourth tier, but he is still a Creation, and his artisans didn't deviate far from previous forms. Although all monsters in the dungeon run on magic, those on the fourth tier most obviously owe their existence to it. Living statues, living suits of armour, living gargoyles... they all call the fourth tier home, and are so clearly built for that intention that it is only a matter of time before Haru looks to him and wonders.

They sit in an offshoot tunnel, lit by lanterns that glow blue, and Haru has been quiet ever since taking down a statue with a feline face. Baron sits beside her. He's been taking on a human height more often than he ought recently – more often than he ever has before – but for some reason he keeps coming back to it.

Haru runs a thumb over one of the gemstone eyes she looted from the statue. It's a glittering red, and sure to fetch a good price in Moonlighter... but Haru doesn't seem to be seeing that in it.

"Who are you, Baron?"

He offers the smile that has reassured many a hero before Haru. "I told you before: I am a Creation. When someone creates something with all of their heart–"

"You misunderstand me. I didn't ask what you were. I asked who." She looks to him, and suddenly he's wondering if she's seeing his own eyes echo so closely that of the statue, save for colour. "When I first saw you, I said you looked like fourth tier, but I didn't really dwell on that. I didn't really think through the implications." She rolls the gemstone eye in her palm. "Who created you, Baron?"

For all the heroes he's encountered, he's only had this conversation with a handful. Few seem to care exactly what or who he is, so long as he can benefit them.

He doesn't have the practice for this.

The truth – or as close as he is allowed – it is then. He inclines his head towards her hand. "I think you have a guess."

"Is it true, then?"

"Yes."

Her thumb rolls past the stone, and instead carresses the scar that runs across her palm. "You're not like the other creatures in this place thought," she says. "You don't harm."

Oh, how wrong she is.

"They're made for a different purpose," is all he's allowed to say. "They are designed to challenge heroes, to slowly increase the difficulty so that only the strongest of fighters reach the final floor and, perhaps, will be strong enough to slay the monster trapped there."

Haru considers this. "The dungeon is a test."

"And the monsters are the questions," Baron says.

"So what does that make you?"

The guillotine, Baron thinks. But that would warn Haru of the final step in his purpose, and he's forbidden from such truths. "I was designed to find such a hero," he says instead. "Or, more exactly, to make one. The final monster is beyond any mortal's ability to slay it, therefore I was tasked with finding a willing hero and giving them that power."

"Why?" she asks. "If the final monster is trapped for good, then surely it can just be left as it is, no need to throw wannabe heroes at it, unless..."

She goes quiet, and Baron suddenly realises with awful, heart-wrenching guilt, he knows exactly how to get Haru to the final floor.

"The monsters have been getting worse, have you noticed?" she asks. "Even on the first tier, they're more dangerous now than they were in my mother's time. Back then, the boldest heroes could make it as far as fourth tier – not often, mind, but still, it did happen – but it's been decades since anyone's delved this far." Except for herself. She doesn't voice the thought, but the words still hang in the air between them. "The town used to be bustling, but now even the firrst tier is a risky business."

Baron nods. "The binding wards are weakening."

It's true, but he wishes it were not. Not because of the threat it poses – but because he fears Haru's reckless selflessness, the care that has thrown her as far as fourth tier, breaking her own imposed limits again and again.

"What wards?" she asks.

"The wards that keep the final monster trapped. It was always going to happen – no magic lasts forever – but my creators had assumed I would have found a hero by then."

"The monster is waking up," Haru translates.

"Its power is rejuvenating," he corrects. "And with it, the power required to slay it is increasing. So the rest of the dungeon is adapting accordingly – in order to create a hero able to slay it, the other levels must increase in threat also."

"So, eventually even first tier is going to be too dangerous for anyone to enter..." Haru says.

"And the monster will one day break free," he finishes. "Yes."

Baron has been searching for a hero to slay the monster for longer than he cares to count.

It has been long enough for him to forget the faces of those who made him – and his memory is sturdier than most – and their voices may be gone, but never their words. Never the purpose for which he was created. For in his chest there lies a crystal, a condensed heart of magic, and in that crystal is his purpose carved. He can no more disobey his purpose than he can tear out his crystalline heart and live.

He's never wanted to.

Until now.

"You can still walk away," he says. "There's time."

"If I do, you'll merely find someone else to take my place," she replies. "Won't you?"

He wishes he could deny it. Not because the truth makes him sound fickle – although it does that also – but because Haru's humanity has crawled under his skin and the idea unsettles him. How could he offer his aid to a human, knowing he was just leading them to their death?

And yet he would, because that is the way he was built.

He doesn't answer, and apparently that is answer enough for Haru.

"Maybe the next person will succeed," Haru says, ignorant that success will kill as surely as failure, "maybe they won't. Maybe," she continues, not looking to Baron, "you'll one day offer the same deal to my cousin's daughter. Assuming, of course, the binding wards last that long."

"It's what I was made for," he says, voice hoarse with apology, but unable to deny it. "All Creations have a purpose. This is mine."

"That's what I thought," she says, and there's no anger in her words. He wishes there were. He wishes she would rage, wishes she would hate him as she should, but there's only sorrow.

"Tell me truly, Baron: do you think I could do it?"

"You are nearly strong enough to defeat it," he answers, "and, when the time comes, I will grant you enough magic to succeed."

Ask me if you'll live, he wants to beg. Ask me so you can see me lie, so you can see the truth.

But, of course, she doesn't. She trusts him too much by now to doubt, to search for hidden truths. She cares too much to ask after her own wellbeing.

He wishes she could be just a little bit more selfish.

Haru looks to her rations. She has, as always, been careful with her magic and supplies, and despite the long journey down, there's still fire in her veins. "Then I guess there's no time like the present, huh?" She grins, and Baron's heart wishes to break. "Let's go slay a monster."

x

Baron has been to this final floor only a handful of times. More than once, the hero's eagerness has overtaken sense, and Baron has watched them be scorched into oblivion. The first time Baron got a hero this far, it was his own underestimation of the monster's power that killed them.

But, more often than not, it is the hero's own magic that kills them in the end.

Baron's never spent this long with a single mortal, and Haru's magic reflects that. It's no longer the messy instinct that reacts without thought, but is instead more akin to muscle memory, honed through practice. It moves with her, responding to her needs the way a hound follows the subtlest of its master's orders.

He has created many monsterhunters over the years, but Haru is the first he actually believes will succeed in the task.

It doesn't matter. It'll still kill her in the end.

Even after all this time, she still carries that damn rusted sword at her side, despite the fact that it's even more useless now than it was in the beginning. Her hand flies to its hilt in some remnant self-defence when she sees the creature she plans to slay.

"It's a dragon?" she whispers to Baron.

"Yes."

"You couldn't have told me that?"

"Would it have made a difference?" he asks.

"...No. But it would have been nice to know." She drops her hand away from the sword and flexes her fingers. Magic – that iridescent blue – sparks between her fingers. She inhales slowly and the magic retracts, drawing close under her skin, carefully reined in. "Right. I'm guessing this is a fire-breathing dragon–"

"Magic, but it comes to the same sort of fate," Baron amends.

"Either way, you're staying back."

He bridles at that. "I can–"

"You said it yourself – your role isn't to fight," Haru reminds him, "so you're staying out of the way. Or has your purpose changed since we last talked?"

Baron scowls, but there's little he can do against the truth. He's not sure his purpose will even allow him to intervene – but he wishes he could at least try. "There's still time," he tries once more. "You can walk away."

"I can," she admits, "but we both know I won't."

"I know."

She leans in quickly and kisses him – brief enough to be little more than a breeze brushing him – and she grins that that daring grin that he knows so well. "I'll see you on the other side," she whispers, and then she is gone.

She moves quickly with a speed honed from the delving, and is nearly upon the dragon before it even notices her. She flings her arms out and vines spring up from the ground. They wrap around the beast, thick rope-like shoots binding it down, and already she's moving onto her next stage of attack. Fire simmers in her palms, hot enough to burn blue and she slices through the air with razor-thin flames. They slice through the dragon and it–

It doesn't even notice.

Haru rolls to the side as the tail sweeps towards her, lined with spikes that will kill with a single blow. She tries again, this time with balls of ice, thick enough to be fatal for most monsters.

Again, it shakes it off, this time with a wing that smacks into Haru. She catches herself with her magic – air swirling beneath her to form a cushion – but that damn sword spins out of its sheath and skitters to a halt close to Baron.

Baron can't stand this any more. He steps out into the cavern. "Forget elemental attacks!" he cries. "The only thing that will cut through a dragon's skin is pure magic!"

The dragon swings its tail again, and this time it strikes the columns nearest Baron. He leaps out of the way – but not wholly. Chunks of stone slam into him and he feels the fracture that runs through him. And as he gathers his senses back together, he hears Haru scream.

She screams, but it's not one of pain or terror. It's a scream of rage and grief, and magic erupts from her palms. Jet streams of pure, unaltered power slams into the dragon's chest, and Haru stands before it, hair crackling and eyes glowing, and in that moment she looks as monstrous as the creature she was tasked to slay.

And then the magic runs out and she slumps to her knees, terrifyingly mortal.

When the light has dimmed, both can see the beast is down, a death rattle wheezing through its charred body.

"It's nearly dead," Haru rasps. She tries to rise to her feet, but the strength has gone from her limbs and she doesn't understand why. She looks to Baron, and he braces for the betrayal, but there's only reckless determination. "Magic. Baron, give me more magic like you promised."

The dragon is inches from death, but already it's beginning to stir. The blistering skin is bubbling, healing. This is the way Baron's creators made his own spell to work – the dragon can only be killed by using up everything a mortal had to offer. Even as Haru's magic is regenerating, so is the dragon's, perfectly matched to end them both.

"Baron!"

He knows what his purpose is. He knows he was made to create a hero capable of slaying a dragon, and now success is so close, he can almost see it.

But, more importantly, he can see Haru.

His purpose demands he gives her the means to slay the dragon.

And he refuses.

Baron's magic is carefully crafted to his role. It's designed for exactly two things: to keep him alive, and to transform life force into magic. He isn't designed for combat, and that's a feature, not a flaw. He was never meant to do anything more than watch.

But the dragon is so close to death, perhaps that doesn't matter.

He kneels down to the rusted sword by his feet, and its weight is alien to him, balanced in a way his cane is not. Dulled but still, possibly, deadly.

He starts into a run, aiming for the chest where the scales are still soft from healing, and where the muscle is still so thin he can see the heartbeat pulse within. He hears Haru shouting, but he can't make out the words. All he can do is duck as the dragon swings claws and wings at him, running for his life – for both their lives – and stab the rusted blade into the bubbling flesh.

The sword sinks into the marred skin, past warped ribs and melted muscle, and he feels the give as it pierces the heart. The dragon writhes. Baron clings on, suit tearing and gloves bloodied, and when he is finally thrown free, he feels something crack when he hits the wall.

He watches through fractured vision as the dragon contorts, screaming and curling in upon itself and then, finally falling still.

A silence settles. It settles so deep that he can feel it rooting through him, even as footsteps echo across the room. Haru drops down beside him, her face pale and her limbs shaking, but alive.

He waits for his purpose to remind him that shouldn't be – that he has one more duty to perform – but the silence prevails. He follows Haru's horrified gaze and sees the reason why.

A crack runs down his chest, split open from throat to stomach as cleanly and bloodlessly as a log struck by an axe. He presses a ruined glove to the opening and cradles the fissured crystal as it falls from his shattered chest.

"Ah," he says, and he can already feel his magic drying up, the ebbing tide tugging at his lips. "That would explain it."

"You idiot," Haru rasps. "What did you do that for? I had everything under control; you had just given me that little bit more magic like you'd promised, instead of leaping into the fray yourself–"

"Haru–"

"Hold still, I can help."

"Haru–"

She presses her hands over his, over the shattered crystal, pushing it back into his chest, and he can feel the magic begin to pour out of her, trying desperately to do the one thing it was never designed for – to heal.

"Haru, don't–"

"I can do this, if you'll just unlock that last bit of magic–"

"I can't–"

"You can! Why won't you–"

"Because it'll kill you."

Haru's frantic movements falter, and at last there is that doubt he has deserved all this time. "What?"

"I lied." He curls his hand around hers and gently peels her hold free of his chest. She lets him, too numb to press back. "I don't unlock your potential for magic. I convert it from life force. From your life force."

"What?"

The sight flickers in his left eye. He blinks, and Haru's face falls back into focus. Despite everything, for some reason she's still here, still by his side. "My creators never intended for the hero to live," Baron says, and every word is a truth he was never meant to reveal. But now his crystal lies shattered, and the purpose written within it lost. "From the moment you took this deal, it was designed to be the death of you. No one powerful enough to defeat the monster could be allowed to live; you'd be a threat greater than the dragon you slew." He draws a shuddering breath, but Haru should hear this. She deserves to. "And so the spell I was given was to transmute life force into magic, so that anyone powerful enough to defeat the dragon would have to drain their own life in order to succeed."

He waits for the anger, for the betrayal.

"How much more do you need?" she asks instead. "How much more do you need me to give to heal you?"

"All of it," he replies softly, softly enough he is sure he can hear his nonexistant heart breaking. "More than you could ever give."

"Well," she says, with a twist of her lips that is part smile, part stubbornness that he both loves and hates, "that's not quite true. More than I could give and live, sure... but not more than I could give."

"Don't–"

She untangles her hands from his and presses them back to his chest. "I can't," she agrees, "at least, not without your help. You're the only one who can give me the power to heal you, to create me into someone who can – so let me."

He shakes his head. "Why would I do that?"

"Because I can save you."

"At the cost of your own life," he rasps.

Haru's gaze lingers on her own hands, grazed and bruised after the fight, blood caught beneath the nails, and brushes her fingers over the crevice nearly cleaving Baron. Even now, she's emitting a steady stream of magic, just enought to keep him from collapsing altogether. It's only a temporary remedy; once she stops, it'll only be a matter of time before the inevitable.

"Do you love me with all of your heart, Baron?"

"Yes." And in that moment, he realises it to be utterly, indeliably true. "Yes, of course."

She grins, bittersweet. "Don't forget that. Now, please, just trust me. Let me help you."

When she asks of him such, how can he refuse?

"Don't let me regret this," he says, and transmutes the last of her life force to magic.

Haru heaves a shuddering breath and collapses forward. Baron catches her as she falls into him, but her hands are still pressed against his chest. The magic flowing into him sputters. Flickers once, twice, and for a heartbeat its extinguished entirely.

Then it's like a dam has burst, and the power that sinks into him is like the sun compared to the candlelight of before. The surface of his wound springs to life, greening until branches grow across the fissure and knit it closed, while the crystal within reforges, setting into a new shape, untouched by the purpose once carved into it.

And still Haru is folded against him, her skin glowing with the sheer power held within.

"Haru, that's enough–"

He goes to grab her shoulders, but his hands jolt away, burnt.

No, not burnt. He runs his hands over one another, but there's no sign of scorching. He cautiously reaches for her again, and this time recognises it as intense cold instead, like that of ice, or snow, or...

Or metal.

His hands realise the cause before his head does, and by the time he's fully registered just what Haru's plan had been, he's already reaching to her with his own magic. It's crazy. It's reckless. It's trusting him with far too much heart, and yet – and yet it has to work.

With his own magic, he shapes the raw magic that runs rampart through Haru, and begins to herd it together. He condenses it down, smaller and denser, until he can sense that where Haru's heart used to be is now a crystal made of pure, solidified magic, just like his.

When the light dies down, he's holding in his arms a knight in shining armour. Where once there was skin, there's now only silver, soft flesh traded for metal, and a heart traded for magic. But when she stires – and she does – it is still Haru who stares out of those glittering gemstone eyes.

"Well," she says, and the metal face resembles her own, the metal shifting in impossible ways to facilitate speech. She pauses. Twitches her mouth experimentally. "Well," she tries again, "this is different."

Baron pulls her into an embrace, and the body fits all wrong, too many angular shapes and ice-cold surfaces – but it's her. It's Haru, alive in the closest thing they could be granted a happy ending. "Reckless, crazy, foolish," he mutters into her shoulder. He draws back to see the face again – and those eyes, still hers. "How could you possibly have been sure that would work?"

"I didn't," Haru says. "But you said it yourself – when someone creates something with all of their heart, then it is given a soul." She passes a gauntlet along the line of her jaw. "You were told to create a hero and it seems you succeeded."

"It was incredibly risky."

"I know. But some things are worth the risk." She sighs and glances to the dragon's corpse. "So now what happens to this place?"

Baron follow's her gaze. "Now, the dungeon will begin to degrade. It was made to bring about the monster's death, and now it's succeeded, it has no use."

"Moonlighter will close without a dungeon to maintain it," Haru says.

"Does that sadden you?"

"No." Haru rises to her feet, steadied with Baron's aid. "No," she repeats, "Moonlighter claimed enough lives. It's time us Yoshiokas got to choose our own futures."

She smiles his way, and even amid the metal and magic, Baron still knows that smile.

"And I think I know what my future holds."

[starite-wishes]

new and improved pinned post!! again!!!

hi. you may call me starite, marrow, or mehri. whatever works

i use it/he

i post about spiders very often. make sure you have #spiders filtered if you don’t want to see images of spiders. if you hate spiders get out of here (if you only fear them you’re fine. you can stay)

this is where i dump shitposts, fandom related stuff, and my own meaningless rambling (found under #my posts). nothing too special. on very rare occasions i will also post art, mainly of my ocs (found under #my art and #starite’s oc stuff)

i’m not exactly the best at tagging things so content warnings and the like tend to be tagged inconsistently. if you need me to tag something for you, feel free to ask !! i don’t mind whatsoever (i usually can’t tag spoiler warnings though, i’ll only tag with the relating fandom)

i vent a lot. simply filter out #vent if you wish not to see that stuff

okay that’s the basic stuff. you can find extra info on me and the fandoms i’m into below :]

random extra info

i’m something along the lines of a bi trans boy that is very, very alterhuman :]

please know that i AM incredibly shy and awkward but i don’t mind asks and DMs!! feel free to interact however you like i love that shit!! even if i’m not always able to respond . .

im incredibly forgetful and pretty much always at least a little low on energy so doing much of anything is a struggle

spiders are one of my biggest interests. i fucking love spiders PLEASE talk to me about spiders

tetris is another special interest of mine (specifically modern tetris!!). i’m not particularly good at it yet but i will teach u how to t-spin

i am not an adult

my favorite color is pink !!!

along with it/he i also use these neoprounouns:

cel/lun/nur/les/luncelf

bee/bud/buds/buzz/buzzelf

don’t forget them !

fandom stuff

main fandoms: slay the princess, ultrakill, hollow knight, omori, the stanley parable, puyo puyo, tetris? does tetris count, minecraft: story mode, more to be added as i remember them

i’m also into pressure (the roblox game), ace attorney, and splatoon but you’ll only see that occasionally for now

extra blogs

@mx-mehri — the alterhuman blog. i post a lot abt my own identity and the odd shit i experience and interact with the rest of the community there. also contains reblogs of photos and gifsets and whatever little things that make me feel happy or give me swag nonhuman vibes, yknow?

@wishes-oc-dump —the blog where i ramble about my OCs however i want and do those little “tag the oc” posts for fun. i’m too embarrassed about my own creations to talk about them a lot on main and i didn’t want to clog people’s dashes, but at the same time if i don’t talk about my characters i will literally explode, so that’s what this blog is for. there’s a SLIGHT chance i post a little doodle or even a little snippet of writing but honestly don’t expect anything coherent from here

[guhmblr]

Ok, spoilers for this year hellfire gala. This is going to be an overall gush, probably barely coherent. I’ll try to intercalate positive and negatives?

What in the actual fuck?!

First of all, the Kamala resurrection was exactly as meaningless, corporative and boring as expected. I just can’t wait to see what stupid power they come up with as her mutant gift (supposing of course that the terrigen/x-gene incompatibility will be solved trivially on an artificially convenient moment [like her whole death and resurrection was]). Also (and I’m jumping the horse a little, but this is a really meaningless nitpick that just stayed on my mind) how does she know the X-men red triangle psychic resistance thingy?

Scott wearing his old Champions suit? Complete flop. He can’t sell it at all. But I do find it cute and endearing, and this is exactly the pathetic Summers behavior that I’m here for.

The G.O.D.S. cameo was really clunky. I mean, I know nothing about those people, apart that they didn’t help at all on the whole thing (and maybe they have a reason for that. I wouldn’t know) and that Wyn is hot. I may give it a chance for more Wyn.

Speaking of hot, David? Slay. Emma? Slay. Jubilation? Slay. Kate? Omega slay. Like, if this is the last hellfire (and I don’t mean this on a “wow, this could have everlasting consequences” way, but a “yeah, I don’t think they should try to sell this idea again for two or three years”), at least they could serve until the end. Imagine how funny all the Charles drama would be if he was wearing his stupid baby pope atire from the first gala?!

The avengers? As pointless as expected. Nothing new under the sun, and I actually appreciate that they are useless on X-titles.

About the New York Arbor Magna thing, can we please have Cyclops leading the team on a wheelchair for like… this whole phase? It would be so weird, and fun, and iconic! Like, having Charles walking around (or, I don’t know, dying alone on that freaking beach? I would enjoy that.) and Scott brooding on a chair? Absolutely fantastic. I do think Emma and Scott leading again could be a nice echo to last time.

Because… we are having a new (supposedly) mutant genocide again. Imagine being resurrected from Genosha, or Decimation, or the Terrigen stuff, and immediately dying again? Lol. The concept is so so overdone at this point. It doesn’t preserve the impact at all.

On the other hand, you know that post about how every queer person has a universe-appointed C tier X-men character to love and cherish? I do think my baby Explodey-boy is dead know. Absolutely homophobic behavior.

I do enjoy Stasis and Nimrod very much. At this point, I would devour an orchis tittle if they promised me absolute lack of Moira and Feilong (as they are, in fact, shit). When Stasis said that Charles understood powers of ten? And the dancing? Send me shivers. Talented, brilliant, incredible, amazing, show stopping (…).

I also think Jean stole the scene a little bit. I’m not usually a Jean stan, but god dammit she is so strong. And like, not only in the Omega Telepath Phoenix way, she has so much presence and name, inside and outside the world, that so much can be supported by her. I feel like the whole story is hanging by her absoluteness of a character. And Maddie holding her??? Aaaaaa

That’s it, I guess… just wanted to do my overall first impression. I do like the Krakoa era very much, and the last decade or so have taught me to take apparent big status quo changes with a grain of salt (I mean, Emma is supposed to marry flop Stark in four or five chapters, right?! Things should probably be relatively stable by them), but I can see myself enjoying the change of pace a little.

By far the worst gala? Yeah. For sure. Like, criminally bad chapter. But I do see some things planted that could end up being really fun.

[lonesomedotmp3]

it's like 1 is the craziest insane slay of all time 2 is EXCELLENT in terms of deaths + alex death reveal (NOT a spoiler don't even worry about it) but so atrocious in terms of the world building I have to disregard it from canon so it doesn't render the entire series meaningless 3 is just great god bless it's not beating alex but it's as close as it could get 4 SUCKS SHIT and it's cgi and we just lost a really hot milf and I'm still pissed that they stole the only interesting death from chuck palahniuk but it doesn't mess with the actual core of the series which is more than I can say for 2 so whatever I guess also there's a dog called browning in this one so true movie even if you suck so bad :) and then 5 is pretty solid but loses itself in the third act and you think it's fallen into the same trap as 2 (except better because it's inherently more interesting) until the very ending which is quite literally the greatest film franchise ending of all time to me it's iconic it's true to the series it's shocking the viewer because for a moment you really thought they found a way but actually they've been dead from the very beginning they've been dead since before the movie even began and it plays in a perfect cycle where even as we watch any of the previous movie characters fight for their lives they're basically already dead and always have been. this was always going to happen that's the DESIGN. it's so insane it deserves oscars for the ending specifically AND!!! it let's me see alex again for two seconds it's crazy. oh this is longer than it meant to be and I'm not proofreading all that and POST! and good night!

[laylanightingale]

ApoRE-2024 Masterpost Part 2:

[godsnameisjoy]

DON’T FORM WORDS

Date: 29 April 2024

Duration: 64 minutes at 11:25 PM

Depth:

Roughly the first half of the meditation was spent in relatively shallow depths of mind. When I say ‘relatively shallow’, I mean specifically to be meditating at a depth of mind that doesn’t have a deeply interiorised sense of hearing but is full of peace. Peace was overpowering all the restlessness my attention was picking up from the shallow parts.

I am assuming that the second half of the meditation was spent in my best depth. My latest best depth comes after more than 2 decades of the practice. In phases, I hope, pray and sometimes beg my Higher Self to bless me with a depth that’s better than my running best. I am assuming stuff about the second half of last night’s meditation because I can’t recall much of the second half.

It’s almost as if I have been visiting those depths of my mind where words don’t form. These are places where the prequel of meaningful words are simply meaningless sounds. The depth of mind where words are formed, imagery isn’t far behind in following up. Imagery of any kind is a sure sign of some or the other words being formed. It’s true even when the imagery is wordless (like TV on mute) and loaded with peace.

Our dreamless, deep sleeping minds are silent enough to not provide words that the subconscious can weave desires around. It’s likely that I have begun visiting my deep sleeping mind while seated in meditation. Time lapses while I meditate and I come around from the depths without a single memory of where my attention had been.

I am closing today’s blog post by adding a bit of the blessed character of Arjuna from the epic Mahabharata. I just want to list out the warriors Arjuna slays in the battle of Kurukshetra. The slaying is in the following order:

Bhishma

Bhagadatta

Jayadratha

Sudakshina

Karna

Susharma

Please note that Arjuna’s grandfather Bhishma is said to be the personification of human ego or body consciousness. Bhishma has the boon of dying at will. And so he does when he thinks it’s the right time to. As far as Jayadratha is concerned, I have written many blog posts about him alone. I have interpreted Jayadratha as the personification of the faculty of fight or flight. Please also note that the main character on the Godless side of the battle is Duryodhana and he isn’t slain by Krishna’s number 1 devotee, Arjuna. The reason I have gone on about Arjuna is really to mention Karna. Guess what ‘Karna’ means? ‘Karna’ means ‘the ear’.

I guess we just have to cut off our hearing to the point that we find ourselves in a mind space where no words are formed. The spot where our attention can deep sleep is in such a mind space.

[000life-is-meaningless000]

TEEEENNNNN THOOOOOOOUSSSSAAAND !

Years ago, you were the hero that slayed the demon.

. . .

He's got your whole life for this is what your destiny this with your Fate, you slayed the demon.

You took up arms and went to war that you wore a warrior your entire Essence and energy and spirit was revolved around this.

It was great and mighty warrior and you went out and one day you had a super battle with a demon it was more epic than any video game ever it was apocalyptic but you ended up slaying the demon.

You killed whore the dragons with many armies you had to rally up and you went to war with the demon but that was 10,000 years ago.

. . .

10,000 years later it doesn't matter in an alternate timeline the demon one and got their way and you were killed.

. . .

And you end up in a reality we're both faiths happen in the past and they come into a new reality where it doesn't fucking matter where you want or not doesn't matter if the demon one and got their way or the hero one and got their way it doesn't matter if all the people lived and had children are they all died the result of the fate of time still comes out play either way.

. . .

I don't know what life is and what the purpose for it is and what the meaning for it is but life is fucking meaningless and I'm trying to figure out what's the purpose of why does it Exist ?

Getting your way, doesn't matter each and every fucking day, I mean in the moment it is for you and there is that for the spirit but the same time it makes me deeply fucking think and wonder why is it that victory and defeat some way somehow end in the same reality and yet in other reality you get the opposite whether you lose or win ?

This is the kind of shit they make that boggle's my mind it makes me wonder what the fuck is anything ?

. . .

Not quite sure what reality, is, I'm not quite sure at all ?

? ? ?

But I can certainly tell you one thing there is something to reality there is a -> Thing <-

But, What that Thing, is I do not know

. . .

And yes that the recap to this post it doesn't the hero will the hero one the end result 10,000 years later is the God damn same the demon one the end result is identical to what happened to the hero would have won the nature ended up the fucking same

And, in both incidents there is no goddamn proof of either them ever existing cuz it's been too much fucking time that went, by . . .

To make matters fucking worse it actually in reality the lady fuck they did anything done somehow was the one that built the town and the other instance the one who knew how to build towns and study greatly and it was a master architect couldn't build the fucking town and every time he did it just fell apart ?

God is a Looney Tune ?

. . .

Some way somehow a fish made the whole world and in a reality there was a bug also known as a worm and a reality the whole world was created by a bird ?

. . .

In another reality you did everything right and you still lost and no reality who did everything wrong and you still won and another reality you don't even exist and everyone worships you

And many other realities you did everything right and everyone hates you

@God <- your creation fucking sucks !

Hey shit for friends why don't you do an update to your fucking creation and and install software called : purpose <- why don't you give my existence is some fucking meaning and some rationale and some reasonability and some kind of logic and grounding why don't you make reality what it really is stop fucking with us we get it your own knowing and all powerful quit fucking with all of us !

There isn't a single deity Olympus whose mind can come anywhere near you God and there's no mortal in existence I can even comprehend the greatness and the brilliance of your intelligence and/or of your spirit or Soul however the fucking said

Some called it a : Pnuma

. . .

How about yourself fucking with us, @God

Seriously, Quit Being, A Dick !

[jonnywaistcoat]

So, I think this take is quite common among STP players (and obviously it's a very funny post), but to my mind it misses a lot of the nuance to Narrator's actual motivations.

(Also, oh my god I realised I can actually talk and theorise about this game if I want to - I'm not the creator, it won't be misconstrued as Word of God, I'm just some asshole who did a bunch of silly voices in the game)

But as someone who obviously spent a lot of time in the head of the Narrator, I do have some thoughts.

[MAJOR Slay the Princess spoilers under the cut]

So, there are many things you can find out about the Narrator in the final mirror sequence, and you can never ask all these questions in a single run, so a lot of players might not have all these pieces of info, but the thing that to my mind is at the core of the Narrator is desperation.

To create this machine, he had to kill himself. This man (bird) who hates and fears death with every fibre of his being killed himself to create the construct. That's not a plan you come to first. That's a plan you come to when you are out of every single other option.

Because his world is dying. It is imminently about to end and everyone and everything he has ever loved is about to vanish forever. Not even their memories will exist anymore. There is maybe going to be another world afterwards, maybe with new people in it, but who gives a shit? He refuses to accept thet everyone he loves has to die and be erased forever to allow some abstract philosophical 'cycle' to continue.

And, of course, the futility of it all is that by trapping you in the machine, this can only (for you) be an abstract matter of philosophy. You never see the people, you never have to be confronted with their actual deaths or the ending of their world. Your only option is to spend your time focused on the masturbatory sadomasochistic relationship you have with the other half of your being, so obviously that's where your sympathy lies. I don't think the Narrator is blind to this, and I don't think he even truly believed his machine was going to work, but in his mind the hope that it might was the only option he had left.

As for the nature of the "stasis", I think there's a lot going on there. Firstly, I don't think he actually knows what it will be like, I think he just believes it must be better than oblivion for everyone he loves forever. Second, I don't think the boredom you experience after slaying the princess the first time is actually representative of what it would be like for the rest of the world - you're basically a god, you can't take your experiences as equivalent to those of mortals. The Narrator at one point describes it not as freezing in place but as a "beautiful forgetting" (I think that's the phrase). I suspect he imagines it like those moments where you're sitting quietly on a sofa with a loved one next to you, content and happy, those moments where time does become meaningless and you simply exist, contented and loved and happy.

Crucially, I think the Narrator had that, once. I think he had that blissful, timeless peace and love. And I suspect death took from him the person that was its source. And while he knows he can never see the world he creates, he has convinced himself that this is what he's giving everyone. Who knows if he's right, probably not, but I think he'd still say that whatever form the changeless world took, it has to be better than everyone he ever knew and loved dying and disappearing forever.

So that's my take on the Narrator: a desperate, broken man (bird) who sees no choice but a bizarre hail-mary play, and whose echoes get increasingly exasperated when the player is, understandably, only interested in smooching the thing that is going to kill everyone he has ever cared about.

honestly the narrator is so funny. only person in the world that unironically likes eternity in stasis. professional gaslighter. accepts his fading away as the echo yet hates death even though that's pretty much the same thing. presumably a mortal that just really hates change and had the audacity not to *kill god* about it but to rip god apart and force god to kill itself. sitting really still forever is eternal happiness to him. he does not see that there is no difference between this and death. i need to study him

[marlaluster]

The celebs in devil land are an example of winners winning and a celebration of perfect people at their most perfect moments. Devil land is so one dimensional and lacking in depth. It's also lacking in the people having anything interesting to share. The people value and support and encourage people to be private and not to tell about things happening with themselves personally. Challenges and problems are too negative to share and are things to hide, according to the people, it seems to me. It is so shallow and pointless here in devil land.

Part of the reason stuff is so pointless and meaningless is because the way things are in the world is horrible and things are not supposed to ever change. That's why the people don't share about their supposed challenges going through life. It's because they are to not ever have change or have anything of any concern for a person to address other than to look perfect. I guess also the people are not real people and if they shared things that are to be kept private according to popular opinion they would start to be fleshed out as real people and the people are not supposed to be real people.

Here is my (covertly insulting) comment about how perfect people rule and are so awesome on an Instagram post supposedly by devil land actor Chris Hemsworth that in my opinion celebrates perfect people, specifically a supposedly perfect couple: Cool kids -- like Elsa and Chris AND THEIR FRIENDS!!! -- SLAY SO HARD!!! They choppin' up these HATERS and eatin' em for breakfast!!! How does it feel to be who everyone wants to be??!!! They livin' the life and we little guys are JUST LOVIN' IT!!!! Pays big to kick bad guy butt in movies and we little guys WOULDN'T HAVE IT ANY OTHER WAY! We are small but we are the many and we are MIGHTY in our rule of this world, we little guys, fans, supporters, etc!!! We god!

[adlbeay]

I wanted to talk about the themes in the Walk in the Dust event. The story of Arknights has always had a high level of thematic consistency, but it’s especially prominent in this event. I feel like a lot of the discussion of the story in certain places comes down to “lore” and surface-level plot details, so I wanted to get this out there somewhere.

The two big ideas that are covered in Walk in the Dust are that of revenge and the homeland. Let's talk about revenge first. Long post and story spoilers under the cut.

In the beginning, we are introduced to Elliot, aka Passenger, who by the time we meet him, is an aimless husk of a man. He is utterly empty inside despite being the most powerful figure in the Reefsteep black  market, with vast wealth and political influence under his thumb. Having completed his decades-long quest to slay everyone who was involved in betraying his teacher, he has no more goals for his life. After killing  the Lord Ameer of Ibut, the last of his targets, he realizes that the revenge he had been pursuing was ultimately empty, that the weapons he built and the schemes he engineered to that end no longer moved him. Even the death of the Lord Ameer didn't matter one bit in the political landscape of Sargon.

As for the Sargon army... We live in different times now. The ruling  Padishahs simply care not about what is happening here in this barren  wasteland. My guess is that it matters not to them whether it's the  father or the son that's in charge. Actually, to tell the truth, it  hardly matters to me either.

Ultimately, no one cared if the Lord Ameer was murdered or simply  died in an accident, not even Elliot himself. Sargon continues to be exploited by the Columbian military and the ruling Lords. Professor Thorne remains dead. His research, once entrusted to Elliot to prevent  it from becoming a weapon of war, has nonetheless been used by Elliot  himself to bring even more death. Now, 22 years later, Passenger sees  finding Kal'tsit as his only path to salvation, so that she can once  again give him a purpose like she did when she rescued him the first time.

Folinic's mom, Lillia, also shares the same kind of story. Her husband was killed in Chernobog when the count decided to purge the researchers working on the sarcophagus device. Among the children of the families broken up by this incident are Lyudmila (later Crownslayer), Alex and Misha (later Skullshatterer), and Luisa (later Folinic). Lillia finds Kal'tsit after months of searching, intending to take revenge on  Grand Duke Vanya not just for her husband, but also for Luisa, who never got to know her father because of it. Kal'tsit tries to talk her out of  it, even during the final phases of the plan, but Lillia's mind is set.  She entrusts Kal'tsit with taking care of both Luisa and Lyudmila, as  she knows she won't be able to come back to live a normal life after  this. And... she succeeds. Although it is Kal'tsit who ultimately administered the poison, their plan works flawlessly and Duke Vanya is finally dead.

Except it still ended up being completely meaningless. The Grand Duke was in a glorified nursing home already near the end of his life, and if Kal'tsit didn't kill him then some other conspirator from the Ursus  political backstage would have done it anyway. He was already crippled and blind, and as we find out during the confrontation with the Emperor's Blade, even Kal'tsit only agreed to Lillia's plan because it  defused the conspiracies of other powerful figures who would have used  the Duke's death to spark another rebellion. The only thing that Lillia ended up accomplishing was making sure that Louisa would grow up without both a mother and a father, and Lyudmila would never get the answers she really wanted about her family's death. And, although she ended up not doing it, she was even also planning to go back to Chernobog to kill  Sergei, Alex and Misha's father, for his betrayal.

And this carries on through the future outside the event. Crownslayer ends up joining Reunion because she thinks it will give her the answers  she wants and avenge her father. Folinic almost lets her anger at Atro's death get her into a confrontation with Wolumonde. In the end, Crownslayer is stopped by Kal'tsit and Folinic is calmed down by  Suzuran, but we might be able to imagine what would have happened if  they managed to carry out their vengeance.

The theme of homeland is one that's intrinsically tied to Kal'tsit and has at least a bit of relation to the broader story outside of the event. It's harder to talk about since it's not clearly  split into individual stories like previously, but there's at least one character that exemplifies this theme the most: Old Isin.

Old Isin is appropriately to his name, old as rocks. He remembers being a servant to some lord of a long-lost city that very few even know once existed, and spends his time telling fortunes while trying to seek out people who, like him, also share that past. According to Kal'tsit, the city's people were scattered when it was destroyed, and now only Isin even remembers the origin of the name "Reefsteep". Even then, Isin only has vague memories, and believes it to be his unforgivable sin that  he has forgotten so much about the city.

Old Isin originally helps Kal'tsit and Elliot because he hopes that  she can help him remember about the lost city, and thus absolve his  "unforgivable sin". And Kal'tsit indeed does help him. Isin begins to recall the conquests of armies a thousand years ago, something even with  his age he should not have been a part of, much less remembered.  Kal'tsit dispels the illusions clouding his memory, and reveals that  what Isin remembers is only the stories that the padishah recounted to  him, that the glory of his old city was only a memory of another memory. In truth, the city in Old Isin's memory was merely a stepping stone for the padishah's ambition to conquer the uncharted deserts, and was abandoned just as easily when that campaign failed. His homeland's glory was just an illusion created in his mind by the padishah's charisma.

Which brings us to the Emperor's Blade. Wherever he stands is the dominion of the Empire of Ursus. Whatever he does carries out the Ursus Emperor's will. Or at least, that's how the Royal Guards imagine themselves, single-handedly carrying out their homeland's legacy. Kal'tsit lays it out clearly:

Kal'tsit: Tell me, what does the current Ursus Emperor think of the Pine Valley affair? Or do you mean to tell me the seeds of that uprising, the origins of the crisis were all the will of the Emperor? Feel free to keep deceiving yourself, but the truth is the young emperor is unaware of the events that transpired there. You believe he has no  need to know. You... all of you seek a bygone era. You are just caught up in the former emperor's grand vision!

As does Patriot in Chapter 8:

Patriot: I fought with your fathers. Your strength and tactical acumen are no less impressive than theirs. But you look at the Ursus of those times with rose-colored glasses. What you see is nothing more than your wild fantasies.

The Royal Guards are described in not too unclear words as soldiers  who probably believed too much of their own grandiose affect. They are unparalleled fighters, to be sure, but it isn't hard to infer that those words about executing Ursus's will and each Royal Guard being his own nation are words intended to strike fear into their enemies rather than  statements of any real truth. Indeed, if you know anything about the internal politics of Ursus, the idea of "Ursus's own will" can be seen as more of a nostalgia at a bygone era when Ursus was, or at least seemed, united in conquest under the previous Emperor. The perceived glory of their homeland is what motivates the Emperor's Blade, but like with Old Isin, the truth behind it is shaky at best.

We also have the contrast between the retired veteran at Pine Valley  and Grand Duke Vanya. While talking to Witte, the veteran cuts off one of his own fingers, claiming that the scars he has suffered in Ursus's wars, once considered symbols of his glory and honor, were ultimately meaningless, and he wants this self-inflicted wound to be his only legacy to Ursus. At the same time, the Grand Duke is postulating about how the seeds he had sown in the winter would give birth to beautiful flowers. Even though his actions and the crimes he committed never bore fruition, he is convinced even in death that Ursus's soil will bloom.

The issue of a real or imagined homeland, and its loss, is also  shared by the Sarkaz as a whole not only in this story but in the main story and many other events. It's even arguable that Rhodes Island's mission to help the Infected was originally inherited from Babel's goal of establishing a stable homeland for the Sarkaz. After all, as pointed  out in many places, the Infected and Sarkaz share much of the same discrimination.

Sarkaz Mercenary: Home...? How could us devils... us Infected possibly have one... Kal'tsit: The Sarkaz have tried to rebuild 'Kazdel', their home for centuries, though they have never succeeded. Everyone has a different idea as to what the term 'homeland' means, but as it stands right now,  Kazdel is perhaps as close as you can get to the term's original meaning.

And in Twilight of Wolumonde:

Armed Infected: We’re going home? To what home?

Mudrock: Kazdel. There may be no place for Sarkaz outside of Kazdel.  But in Kazdel, there is a place for you. Not because of tolerance. But because there is... nothing there. Kazdel... is where the homeless go. A land of rootless people.

So what does all this have to do with Kal'tsit?

In the ending cutscene, Passenger asks Kal'tsit whether this "Rhodes  Island" is yet another passing persona to be used to accomplish a goal and discarded when it's complete. Like the persona of the Trusted  Advisor, or the Servant, or the Laterano Cleric, will she abandon Rhodes  Island as well? Kal'tsit initially puts up a front saying he has no  right to ask, then bluffs about having thousands of answers, but is pushed by Passenger saying he'll even accept a lie. In one of the only times we get to see Kal'tsit faltering, she actually has no answer to this.

Unlike the other characters we see throughout the story, Kal'tsit has no homeland. No matter how fake or illusory it is, Old Isin and the Royal Guard have something to believe about a place where they can belong. The nobles in Victoria, as incompetent as they appear from the outside, are dedicated to defending the peace of their home despite having no ruler. Even the ostracized Sarkaz can ultimately go back to Kazdel, as unpleasant as that might be. But while Kal'tsit wanders the earth to keep the homelands of others from falling into chaos, she has no homeland of her own to go back to.

In one of the trailers for Chapter 9, we hear a recording from Theresa, addressed to Kal'tsit: "I hope this Rhodes Island can be a place to call home, a place you can always return to."

[findingjoynweirdstuff]

Dream SMP Recap (December 6/2020) - End of Week

What started as a sad but calm day ended with a revolution where morality was questioned and blood was shed. The server’s first canon death since the three lives rule was implemented occurred, and all hell broke loose.

Dream’s motivations have started to be laid bare, but whether or not he’s in the wrong or right remains foggy as ever in a world where everyone’s morals are gray.

Also, the prison’s construction continues and some strange red corruptions called “Blood Vines” have sprouted up on the server.

A short summary of the week’s total events is at the end of the post.

---

- HBomb hosts Niki and Wilbur’s L’Cast

- Fundy continues work on the chess board

- Ranboo is leaving a book with messages to communicate with Tommy

- Fundy and Ranboo visit Tommy and help him through the Nether to find blaze rods. It’s a very...interesting...time... Fundy fills Tommy in on the fact that Dream is officially recognizing L’manburg as a country.

- Tommy falls in lava and loses all his stuff

- Then he burns to death

- Then he falls in lava and loses all his stuff again

- He FINALLY gets an ender chest

- Lazar asks him for help since he’d fallen in lava and needed help getting out. As Tommy does so, Lazar questions why Tommy hasn’t turned against L’manburg. Tommy says it’s because Tubbo is there, but Lazar points out that Tubbo was the one who exiled him.

- Ghostbur comes on and says he has a gift.

- Tommy attempts to rescue Lazar from the depths of the lava pit. Techno starts arguing with him.

- Tommy falls in lava and loses all his stuff again. He gives up on helping Lazar, who is understandably annoyed at him.

- Philza joins the call wondering wtf is happening and why Tommy keeps dying, but Tommy just ends stream

- Psyche! After credits scene. Ghostbur asks Tommy to return to Logstedshire so he dies in lava to fast-travel back. Ghostbur gives Tommy a lodestone compass named “Your Tubbo” that points back to L’manburg at all times. Tommy puts the compass in his ender chest right next to the discs, saying he’ll keep it close to his heart.

- Thunder’s frustrated that Tommy got exiled exiled because the Prank War he was setting up between Dream and Tommy can no longer happen and Thunder’s great villain arc has been cancelled - he is no longer a villain now.

- Now, he wants to do the clay prank to George instead to try and get Dream and George to turn on each other as revenge for Dream burning his house.

- Puffy builds Tommy a second Christmas Tree.

--- Note: From this point on I tried to include more specific details than normal since it’s an important and confusing event ---

- Quackity declares war on the Dream SMP from Mexican L’manburg. He gets George, Sapnap and Karl on to help. He’s rigged TNT under Eret’s castle bridge and wants to invoke the same ideas as the Mexican Revolution. He wants to put M.L. on the map by staging an assassination and using George’s dethronement as an excuse to start a political movement.

- Sapnap wants to take on Technoblade but Quackity tells him that they have to take things step by step and that it’s an extremely bad idea to do it now.

- Eret asks Hbomb to be one of his knights. HBomb agrees.

- George wants his kingship back 

The explosion goes to plan with H and Puffy as witnesses.

--- ---

CANON DEATH: KARL 

Cause: Death by explosion and falling

--- ---

- George distracts Eret while Quackity, Sapnap and Karl steal his throne. Punz joins Eret’s side as one of his other knights.

 - The M.L. side reconvenes in L’manburg and drink invisibility potions. Dream is in Mexican L’manburg. He is tearing the dirt to shreds. Meanwhile, Eret gives a speech to his Knights as they head to Party Island. Dream, alone, is invisible in Boomerville.

- Sapnap gets Dream to log (he says it’s lag). The Dream SMP faction blows up M.L. with TNT. The Mexican L’manburgians kill Puffy. 

- They want to head to the Holy Land. Dream says he wants to talk. They collect at the Church.

- They argue. Dream threatens to kill Quackity permanently and make sure Mexican L’manburg can never rise again. (Also Karl’s acting is genuinely good holy shit)

- Sapnap tells George that he thinks Dream has completely turned against them, and that they’re better off disowning him.

---

Dream: “You’re painting me as this tyrant when I’m just trying to maintain peace.”

He refers to it as his castle, his throne. He calls the people of M.L. “terrorists.”

---

He says that in his eyes, Mexican L’manburg does not even exist, and that he’ll speak to Tubbo about making sure he sees that it doesn’t exist as well.

M.L. argues that putting a human life above a few blocks of gold is more important.

Dream refers to himself as the “ruler” of the Dream SMP, the “leader,” letting it slip that “king” is a meaningless title.

He says that Quackity is causing the most problems, the number one “enemy” of the SMP right now. Similar to how he referred to Tommy defying him.

He says that Quackity is not like Tubbo, who is a “fair, just ruler” and that is why New L’manburg is recognized and Mexican L’manburg is not. Tubbo would never do what Quackity did. Wilbur and Jschlatt and Tommy would. He says that he waited until New L’manburg had a reasonable leader to recognize it.

- “Un-killing” is implied to be a thing, where the person who gave you your canon death can take it back. 

---

 Dream: “The king is a figurehead and he knows that!”

Eret: “I do.”

Quackity: “So that’s what you are Eret -- a puppet--”

Dream: “Yes! -- no he’s not a puppet-- h-he has no power and I have - and - it’s the same thing and--”

(Dream proceeds to deny Eret being a “puppet”)

---

- Quackity decides to dissolve Mexican L’manburg for a clean slate and call it something else. He wants the server to have a precedent of establishing new countries without having to go to Dream for recognition every time.

- Eret agrees to recognize Quackity’s new country if they apologize and return the throne.

--- ---

CANON UNDEATHING: KARL (?)*

* Dream says that the death is still canon later since plot was based around it. I don’t know what Karl considers his death count to be? 

--- ---

- Sapnap declares that he no longer wants to fight Techno but Dream instead. He says he wants to slay Dream in front of everyone.

- Overall, Dream and Eret declare it a “failed coup” and say that the destruction is just a consequence of “what happens when you don’t plan anything” but Quackity is satisfied that his new country has been “put on the map.” 

- Quackity declares the country to be named “El Rapids” in honor of Cedar Rapids.

- Punz no longer wants to be an official Knight.

- Quackity misses Ghostbur and wants to speak with him. He tells Ghostbur about the war. Ghostbur asks if it was a revolution - Quackity says yes! Ghostbur also informs Quackity that he burnt the sacred texts - How to Sex 2 - in lava.

- Karl streams with the intention of rebuilding and preparing for Pokimane’s visit

- Karl steals Eret’s Museum Llamas and gets caught in the act. Fortunately this doesn’t spark up the war again. They take a llama to Party Island.

- They get into trouble at Boomerville and Lazar joins.

- Dream comes online and asks Sam about the prison’s progress. Bad gets annoyed at Sam for destroying the beachfront property value, and he didn’t authorize the seizure of the land. Dream is there helping to shovel but Bad wants him to stop. Bad is angry about the prison being built and starts shouting at Sam.

- Bad tries to negotiate with Dream. Dream refers to the prison as containing a “prisoner.” Singular. And that the prisoner would have nothing, and Bad would be in charge of helping to guard it. There are going to be multiple “layers.”

- The prison will be in the middle of the ocean bit, and Bad would have a terraformed beachfront property. All of the land would be considered property of the Badlands - including the prison.

- People are going to have to go through PORTALS to escape the prison.

- Bad starts to come around to the prison idea. Dream tells Sam he thinks they need more hands to help, potentially Ant and Eret.

- A strange, giant red “egg” has appeared in the corner of Bad’s statue room. He feels a strange aura coming from it, and he’s unable to bring himself to break it.

- Dream says Eret can’t help with the prison but he can help make the beach nicer. Bad says he might want to put Tommy in the prison but Dream says no, Tommy’s already exiled. So the prison isn’t for Tommy.

- Once the prisoner is in there, Dream says they would only be able to be let out “by the server.” It’s got certain secrets that only Dream and Sam know about. Sam says that he could potentially escape from it, but it will be so impenetrable that even if you know the secrets it would still be difficult to escape from.

- Bad shows Dream the Egg. Dream gets creeped out by it.

- Another Red Corruption has appeared near Hutt’s Pizza, and another at the Mansion. Everyone swears that it wasn’t there before, and there wasn’t enough time for someone to place all of it manually in the time that they were down there.

- Bad stabs Dream for trying to “hurt it.” He likes it for some reason.

- Bad asks Dream about who the prison’s for. Dream says “if you can’t kill somebody, you need to lock them up.” He mentions that it’s one of the more powerful people on the server, someone who either provides a threat now or in the future. He has someone in mind.

--- ---

Dream explains to Bad and Sam that the reason he switched sides in the Manberg-Pogtopia War was because Schlatt gave him something.

And that thing is “a card up his sleeve” until he needs it.

A book of great value.

It puts Dream in danger if people know of it, but also gives Dream power.

The “most valuable thing on the server.”

Something pertaining to the prison.

Something where they wouldn’t believe Dream if he told them what he was given.

--- ---

- The corruption grows AGAIN despite Dream, Sam and Bad all being in the middle of the ocean

- Another corruption appears on Tommy’s Power Tower

- The water level in New L’manburg has risen again, covering George and Quackity’s mushroom house

- The prison is going to be as tall as a MOUNTAIN

- Dream proposes the idea of Bad giving him the disc to piss off Tommy. Bad says that Skeppy has it so he’ll have to ask some other time. He might trade some information about Schlatt’s book in return for the disc.

- Bad says he likes the name a dono came up with for the corruption -- “Blood Vines”

- Dream and Sam removed the Blood Vines on the Mansion to Bad’s dismay. Sam burns the Vines and Bad goes on a murderous rampage against him.

- Technoblade got a “Bee our guest” achievement

- Dream burns down the Eiffel Tower again.

- The prison will be reinforced with 15 layers of obsidian, and the guards will have Ender Pearl Stasis Chambers that are alarm-activated.

- The Blood Vines have sprouted up from Schlatt’s Grave.

The prison’s unofficial name as of right now is “Pandora’s Vault,” but it is subject to change.

Upcoming events:

- Karl will be touring Pokimane around soon

Potentially Scrapped:

- Elytra Challenge

- Bad and Skeppy’s plan to burn the disc *

* Bad mentioned it on stream, but it’s unclear if it’ll still happen

END OF WEEK RECAP:

11/30: Fundy bonds with Wilbur, Cursed Lore Day

12/01: Creation of Mexican L’manburg, Girl Dream visits, Mexican Manhunt

Note: not sure what’s up with 12/02. Probably messed up the dates? Whoops.

12/03: Sleepy Bois Family splits in half, dethroning of George

12/04: Day of the Exile, Badlands start to divide

12/05: Tommy’s first full day in Logsted, Sean’s visit

12/06: The Mexican L’manburg Revolution, end of M.L., start of El Rapids

---

!!! SPOILERS AHEAD !!! 

- Wilbur had two special lodestone compasses in his inventory. He didn’t want HBomb to see, but H looked anyway.

[wynsnerdyrambles]

Kyojuro mentioned that Shinjuro suddenly lost his spark, surely he would've guessed it was because of Ruka’s death. But what if there was more to it, maybe Shinjuro was berated by his father/mother-in-law for failing to support Ruka, maybe during one of his missions he lost his demon slaying friends, or failed to save some people from demons (hence why he thinks only sun breathing is the strongest). I might be looking into it too much, but I think there was more to it than Ruka dying.

The source of Shinjuro's depression is fairly vague by Kyojuro's understanding; he only notices the fact that his father has lost his passion for swordsmanship, but despite the fact that it's only a dream sequence (and therefore cannot be used as a 100% accurate replica of real events), I think Shinjuro's remarks are pretty telling as to what is going on.

Ruka's death is definitely a part of this. Losing someone you love, especially a spouse, is one of the hardest things you could go through emotionally speaking. But, I'm not seeing any significant evidence that there was an external factor berating Shinjuro for his failure in this regard. I personally think Shinjuro berated himself for this. Being a Hashira in the Demon Slayer Corps is likely a tiring position, and one that demanded Shinjuro to travel far, and for long periods of time. He likely wasn't able to spend as much time with his wife as he wanted, and likely already felt like he was at a deficit in that role. In all honesty, I don't think Ruka was actually much bothered by this. We know from Kyojuro's memory that she highly values people using their strength to save and protect those weaker than them.

I personally like to think, in a twisted, angsty headcanon, that Ruka passed away when Shinjuro was gone on a mission. So, his anguish and grief must have been so sudden, and he would have negative feelings that he could specifically associate with his role in the corps. And while I think that's part of the fuel to the fire (pun most definitely intended), what fanned it is talent, or rather, Shinjuro's perception of his lack thereof.

Gyomei Himejima was 18 when the temple incident occurred, and if I'm remembering my facts correctly, he, along with Muichiro, became a Hashira in 2 months. Given that Himejima is 27 at the time of the final arc, we can assume that he is the most senior of the Hashira, having survived in that rank for 9 years. But when he first ascended to that rank, he would have likely been Shinjuro's junior.

Himejima is one of the strongest 'swordsmen' since the time of Yoriichi He's talented, skilled and strong. Is it any wonder that Shinjuro, who was likely already suffering from feelings of inadequacy from Ruka's death, was now presented with the idea that this blind kid was stronger, and a better Demon Slayer than Shinjuro would likely ever be, and simply decided to give up? So now, him not being present for Ruka's death is now further made meaningless, because he cannot perceive himself as having any talent as a swordsman. In Shinjuro's twisted mindset, he likely perceived this as meaning his time as a swordsman was totally worthless, so now he's failed as both a husband, and as a Hashira.

Personally, I believe that Shinjuro likely quit only a month or two after Himejima became a Hashira. Without any purpose, his only recourse is to ruminate, and remember his own failures. Once a man who valued passion and drive, he's become convinced that talent is everything. He's stuck in negative thought patterns regarding his own self worth, and this is what leads him to start to drink. He's not in a state of mind where he can rationally process his own emotions, or examine his own worldview as flawed.

Ironically, while it may have been Ruka's death that started this downward spiral, it is Kyojuro's death that starts pulling him out. At first, he's in no position to deal with the grief, spiraling deeper. But at the same time, Tanjiro's delivery of Kyojuro's final request begins to force himself to re-examine his definition of worth, talent, and success. Kyojuro's death is tragic, but it is also nigh unto a martyrdom. He starts to see that 'talent' is ephemeral, and that even those not in possession of it can succeed, and protect the lives of 200 innocents. Shinjuro still feels guilt, but it's no longer despondent guilt, but rather, a guilt that pushes him to atone, to try and make up for his foolish decisions, and to correct his course. In fact, I believe that if Muzan had not been defeated when he was, Shinjuro would have taken up his old title of Hashira again.

Well, Anon, I'm sorry that this post ended up being more of a full blown Shinjuro analysis, but I hope it has answered your question.

[hardkinkbardkink]

hi babes x so this isn’t a prompt, but i started this fic some months ago with the intention of posting it to my regular ol account. i just finished it in a fit of divine intervention & thought it might fit here better x

it’s a fuck or die in which geralt gets cursed with a knot and goes into rut, please don’t think about the logistics too much because there’s about two paragraphs of setup and then nearly 6k of porn x

as a sidenote i fucking Love the idea of just a regular witcher-human verse and only the wolf witchers have knots, like,,, that’s mint mate honestly

a prompt fill should be up tmrrw but for now please enjoy this xx (it’s also on ao3)

***

He's—fuck, so warm.

Like he'll sizzle out of his skin. Burst at the seams and set molten iron to spill in his stead.

The day is chilly, he remembers vaguely. Frost had caught in his hair and his fingers had gone numb, stiff around his sword, but a thrill had settled in his chest, kept him warm through the fight. The sun in his eyes, a faint crackle of magic on his skin, raising the hair at his nape. And then the gentle swish of his blade through the air—the steel one, for humans rotten beyond saving. The spray of arterial blood high towards the heavens. Silence.

Each chance he gets to kill a mage, Geralt enjoys it greatly.

Mages with their meaningless chanting and knowing grins, like they find the prospect of death enthralling. Mages that have more merit to them than the mindless beasts he's used to slaying, yet feel less human, more—deserving. Mages with their perverse spells, parting curses that he can never quite catch. Nor avoid, for that matter.

Geralt fucking hates mages.

It's the last coherent thought he remembers having.

He doesn't recall much after he'd pulled his sword free, slick and glistening red. Suddenly each breath was a gulp of scalding hot water in his lungs, flooding his insides from head to toe, to the very tips of his fingers.

Mounting Roach had been a feat bordering on impossible, achieved solely by force of habit. He rode hard and he rode fast, not entirely sure of what it is that he's chasing but unable to go another excruciating second without it.

It's not a tangible heat, not one easily done away with. He leans his cheek against a wall; the stone is cold, but brings him no relief. He shrugs his swords off, flinching as they clatter on the floor. His own desperate hands tug at the straps of the armour that's so oppressively tight, even though it'd served him time and time again without such issues.

Geralt presses the heel of his palm over his cock. Rubs it through the leather breeches. Fuck.

"Fuck."

It helps, a bit, or maybe it makes everything worse.

He should've ridden straight for the brothel, he—

His clothes are stifling. The air sits too heavy on his skin, catches at the back of his throat. He gives his cock a desperate squeeze, and for a heartbeat he can breathe.

Fuck, but he's hot.

He's halfway through tearing out of his undershirt when footsteps sound in the corridor. They set his mind racing. The thought of being seen like this—no, gods, the very thought of another person, of a warm body, of—

"Geralt?" Jaskier calls as he shoulders the door open. He doesn't knock, of course he doesn't, when had the man ever done anything decent? "Everything taken care of?"

The linen shirt rips beneath his fingertips like it's nothing more than aged parchment.

He should've ridden for the brothel, and he didn't. Mistake, mistake, mistake.

Jaskier doesn't turn, doesn't leave. He lets the door fall shut behind him. He stares. He gawks. He—

"Don't," Geralt says when Jaskier crosses the room in quick strides. "Don't touch me," even as his body screams the opposite, screeches at him to take take take.

He feels Jaskier's gaze heavy on him. On the shirt clinging to his shoulders. On his cock hard and straining against the fastenings of his trousers.

"Are you—" Jaskier swallows anxiously, but his eyes stay calm. "Quite well? Shall I fetch a healer?"

The pink of Jaskier's slightly open mouth is enticing. Geralt wants to reach out and touch, trace his lips with gentle fingers, bite down and draw blood. He takes a breath to steady himself and fuck, he doesn't mean to groan out loud, but he'd never quite realised just how divine Jaskier smells. He wishes he could touch his cock, just to take the edge off, take it out and shove it between Jaskier's perfect lips—

"Don't know what's happening," he chokes out as he scrambles to move away, away from Jaskier, away from the deliciously sweet scent of him.

"Geralt," and he comes closer, the fool, closer and close until Geralt's head spins and his mouth waters, and maybe he can sneak a hand down between his legs, just for a second.

Jaskier touches his forehead, an innocent gesture that Geralt would scoff at on another day.

"Oh." Both of Jaskier's hands move to his cheeks. "You don't always run this hot, do you?"

He turns his face slightly, presses his nose against Jaskier's wrist. Inhales. It's intoxicating. It's overwhelming. He wants and he needs and—

Jaskier jerks away with a startled noise before Geralt realises his teeth had sunk into the thin skin.

"Sorry, sorry, I didn't—"

He stumbles back in a daze. The backs of his knees hit the bed and he collapses onto it without much grace. Geralt frantically gathers the sheets in dire fists, hoping to regain the control that's escaped him. Hoping to rid his mind of Jaskier's scent.

It's absolutely beyond him why Jaskier stays so close. Why he takes a tentative step toward the bed. Why he swipes his tongue over his lower lip, like he's tasting Geralt's desperation.

"Can I help?" The words are barely out of his mouth before Geralt barks a sharp no.

The bed dips, creaks under Jaskier's weight.

"Why do you never listen?" It comes out a breathy thing. He turns his head away from Jaskier as his nostrils flare. There's not much fight left in him, but he clings to the shreds of it all the same.

A hand on his knee nearly burns a hole straight through him.

"Geralt." Jaskier leans in, his breath hot in Geralt's ear, sending an electric current through his spine. "I hope you realise that there isn't much I wouldn't do for you." The hand moves up, up, up his thigh, dangerously high—

"Whatever you need."

Vesemir would strike him, had he known how little self-control Geralt would grow to display. How easily he'd succumb to the temptation laid in the curve of Jaskier's jaw, or the timbre of his voice, or the warmth of his hands.

Grabbing a fistful of Jaskier's hair, Geralt hurls him backwards, crawls over him driven by instinct more than purpose.

"You smell so good," he groans, face tucked behind Jaskier's ear. His scent is so much stronger there, so much more alluring.

When his lips claim Jaskier's in a kiss, it's like breaking the surface at last after being underwater for too long. The air in his lungs had turned lead-heavy, but the swipe of Jaskier's tongue forces a new life into them and he can breathe again, and it's everything he'd ever wanted, and he craves more.

He's kissed plenty of people before. Fucked plenty of people. More than he can count, more than he cares to recall. But it was—never like this. Never this real.

Never Jaskier's hands on his bare shoulders, pawing at his back, never the heated whisper of anything, anything you want.

And Geralt does, he does want, he wants so incredibly much when Jaskier reaches down to unlace his breeches and the mere brush of his fingers is enough to set Geralt rutting, grinding his hips into the pressure and fuck, fuck.

He growls when his seed spurts from between the laces, onto the embroidered silk of Jaskier's doublet, and he wishes, he needs it to be on Jaskier's skin instead, so he snatches Jaskier's hand and presses it against the head of his twitching cock and he comes, he comes on his palm and his wrist and it—

"Fuck, gods, fuck—" because it brings him no relief, only makes him ache for more, so much more and he has to take it, he'll take it from Jaskier, he will.

He'll wreck him, he thinks, and the concept leaves him ravenous.

And Jaskier doesn't say anything, when Geralt continues to helplessly thrust his still hard cock against him. Jaskier lies under him, quiet and trusting, his eyes wide, his chest rising in quick pants as he accepts whatever Geralt gives him, and it sends Geralt's head reeling.

But then Jaskier takes him in hand, strokes him like he doesn't mind, and Geralt's arms shake, struggling to support him.

He keeps his eyes on Jaskier's face in a bout of unadulterated adoration, so he sees the shift when Jaskier looks between them, when his eyes widen even more and his hand falters.

"Geralt, what—"

Geralt glances down as well. He's—he's had this body for nearly a century, now, he's fairly certain he knows what he looks like, and this—surely he's just delirious, burning with an improbable fever, surely—

But Jaskier sees it, too, and his breath hitches as he studies Geralt's face, and,

"It's a—a knot," he says before he can think about it, the words popping into his mind, rolling off his tongue like he'd been born knowing them.

"A knot," Jaskier echoes breathlessly, like the concept isn't wholly, utterly mad. His fingers tighten around Geralt's cock, around the—

"Like hounds have," Geralt adds between desperately ragged pants.

And he hangs his head in shame, his skin burning in an entirely different way, with embarrassment instead of need, until Jaskier, the cunning bastard, says,

"Like wolves have."

Geralt moans at that. He does so again, when he sees Jaskier's eyes glaze over, his lips part. He smells—gods, indescribable. Geralt feels half-feral with it. Why do curses have to be so carnal in nature?

Jaskier squeezes the—the knot, and it's a punch to the gut like he'd just downed a potion, like he's seeing colour for the first time in his life, everything sharp and vivid and he collapses heavily on top of Jaskier as his arms finally give out.

"Does it feel good?" Jaskier asks as if it isn't apparent in the way Geralt groans right into his ear.

He remembers, through a thick haze, remembers a night, months, years ago, when he'd stepped through the door, found Jaskier on his knees and elbows and the inkeeper's son balls-deep in him. Remembers the arch of Jaskier's back before he scrambled to cover himself. Remembers pretending before him and before himself that he didn't enter the room on purpose, that he couldn't hear Jaskier's moans from downstairs. Remembers coming into his own fist behind the stables thinking about exactly what Jaskier would let Geralt do to him.

He needs that now, he realises. Nothing will quench the dreadful heat except the tight clutch of Jaskier's body. Geralt trembles at the thought.

So he rolls off of Jaskier, laying flat on his back, chest heaving unnaturally, cock throbbing. He throws an arm across his face, shielding his eyes from the sun that steals into the room.

"Jaskier," he says to the air, to the ceiling above them, to the gods who'd abandoned him and the ones who still listen.

Jaskier shifts next to him, sits up. Geralt can hear him undressing, the sound of fingernails on ivory buttons and the rustle of cotton that follows.

"Anything," is spoken, softly, and the fever spikes so suddenly he nearly chokes on it.

Incredibly, blessedly, Geralt feels the weight of him when Jaskier settles astride his thighs. Warm hands guide his wrists to press into the mattress above his head, timid, doubtful, and Geralt thinks, this isn't right, but his eyes snap open and he can't think at all, anymore.

Because Jaskier—he's—

"Like it, do you?" and there's a teasing lilt to his voice even though his chest heaves still. "You got me pretty damn well."

And he had, he very clearly had, because there's a bruise, dark and swollen, spilling up the side of Jaskier's ribcage from when Geralt jammed the hilt of his sword there to get Jaskier to run, to get away, and suddenly Geralt can't shake the thought of mine mine mine from his clouded head, and it's hard to breathe again.

Jaskier's grip on his wrists isn't hard, is far from unbreakable. It makes it so deliciously easy to snatch his hands free, to push at Jaskier until he tumbles back on the bed, underneath Geralt, where he belongs. So easy to press his famished mouth over where Jaskier's skin is purpled and tender. So easy to dig his fingertips into the flesh, listening to Jaskier's hiss of pain and,

"Careful there, wolf," his voice quiet, breathless.

But there's no careful, not anymore, only need and hunger and undoing Jaskier's wretched trousers in a frenzy to get at his cock, so he can bury his face between his legs and smell him, scent him, fuck.

And he smells so, so good, like the most decadent feast, and Geralt has to taste him, he has to or he'll perish, surely, so he fits his mouth over the head of Jaskier's leaking cock, hears Jaskier whine above him—

"No, no, don't, Geralt, too close, I'll come, I'll come," and there are fingers twisted in his hair, pulling him away, except Geralt has never wanted anything as much as he wants to make Jaskier come, right now, to wring this pleasure out of him like he never had before, and then to do it again and again until Jaskier can't give him any more, until he has to take more, has to pry it from between his trembling thighs.

He will. He has to.

"Geralt—" Jaskier sounds distressed, he sounds panicked as he tugs roughly at Geralt's hair.

Geralt, for his part, had never been this desperate to suck dick. The pain of having his hair nearly pulled out serves only to make him go faster, to rut against the bed and take Jaskier's cock so very deep he'll feel it when it's gone. He'd choke, if he could, but as is he merely lets the head pop into his throat and out with a satisfying shift. He thinks he moans, maybe, but it's difficult to hear over the rush of blood in his ears.

"Geralt, Geralt, Geralt—" Jaskier's got such a pretty voice. Even prettier when it climbs up high, breaks around Geralt's name. He burns with a scathing desire still, but the noises Jaskier makes when he's coming, the feel of it on his own tongue—it makes something release in his tight chest, drives a horribly possessive part of him to satisfaction, if for a moment.

He doesn't want to move. Jaskier struggles underneath him, twists his hips and claws at his forehead, but Geralt relishes the taste, the weight of him. It makes the heat almost bearable.

"Mercy, mercy," Jaskier breathes, and regretfully, Geralt releases him.

He's so hot.

It's worse, somehow, than before.

Geralt doesn't remember the last time he'd been dizzy, but he thinks he is now. The bed spins and the room spins and fuck, he needs to come again, so he rests his cheek against Jaskier's thigh, gets a too-tight fist on his cock, and he'd cry if he could. Maybe he can. He feels like he might.

Jaskier touches his other cheek, and it almost sizzles. He feels Jaskier's gaze on him as he fucks his own hand.

"Gods, will you—breed me? Fill me with your pups?" Jaskier's voice rings clear through the fog in his head, makes him snap up to look at him.

"Jaskier," Geralt growls in response. His own voice sounds foreign, too deep, too threatening. Jaskier squirms against him, eyes wide.

"I want it." And he tips his head like he's inviting. "Want your knot. Want your pups. Want you."

Geralt marvels for a second—that Jaskier is so eager against all odds, that Jaskier wants him even with this bizarre curse (he doesn't dare wonder if he'd be wanted on another day, on a normal day)—but takes the invitation. He leaps up the bed, puts his lips to Jaskier's bared throat, to the place where his pulse rushes loud and hot. An angry red mark remains in the wake of his mouth, and he knows, he knows it'll bloom into a purple matching the splotches on his side, except higher, where everyone will see.

Everyone will know.

They'll look at Jaskier, prancing around, draping himself on fair maidens, rugged blacksmiths and distinguished lords—and none of them will want him, because they'll know Jaskier is his. They'll see him marked and bruised and they'll know Jaskier belongs to the scary witcher they all cower before.

"Mine," he rumbles into the skin of Jaskier's neck, just to be certain, and follows it with a scrape of teeth.

"Yours."

Fuck. Is it hotter, now that he's so close to having?

"Jaskier." Please, he almost adds, but that would be too much. Too dangerous.

He helps Jaskier kick his trousers off and to the side, before he gets his hands under his thighs, pushes them blindly apart far as they'll go. Settles between them, and his dick drags against Jaskier's, and Geralt doesn't whine, not consciously, but he wants to.

"Ge—eralt," Jaskier does whine, voice cracking around the name just as his legs tighten around Geralt. "I've—I've done something indecent. Naughty."

Geralt can only look, mesmerised, as Jaskier's mouth moves, his pink, wet tongue peeking out, threatening to drive Geralt wild. He traces two fingers along his lower lip—thinks, fuck it, and pushes them in.

Jaskier's eyes widen but he seems to fall calm, sucking on the fingers, licking between them. Geralt moves his hips in little aborted moves, thrusts his heavy cock against Jaskier's abdomen as he watches, listens to the contented moans Jaskier gives. Fuck.

Geralt doesn't often dream, not good things, not pleasant things. He dreams of death and suffering and loss, because that's what he knows. But now, now—Geralt thinks this could be a dream, the way Jaskier sucks his fingers as if they are a cock, the way he lets himself be kissed breathless when Geralt takes his hand away.

He rubs spit-slick fingertips over the head of Jaskier's half-hard cock, just to make his bard writhe in sweet agony.

Geralt doesn't whine, but when he manages to slip two fingers inside Jaskier without any resistance he thinks he might scream.

"Jaskier."

He needs to touch, and he needs to be close, and he leans back all the same to watch Jaskier's greedy hole open and eager for him.

"I've, ah—I had a bath, while you were gone," Jaskier breathes.

Geralt can't tear his eyes away from where his digits dissappear into the intoxicating heat of Jaskier's body.

"Just my fingers, and I—I thought about you. I usually do."

His skin is prickling, itching to touch, to have, to claim, his blood threatening to boil over in his veins, and still he just looks. Jaskier is moving his hips, up and down and up, fucking himself on Geralt's fingers, moaning like he can't get enough.

Jaskier—fuck, Jaskier touches himself waiting for Geralt to get back, thinking about him. He leans in close. Lets his fingers slip free. Red-hot sparks of static crowd his vision, multiply until he's blinded. He thrusts against the crease of Jaskier's thigh. Presses Jaskier's leg closer to his chest, makes it tighter for himself. He goes faster. Jaskier is looking up at him with clouded-over eyes. Faster.

Geralt's second orgasm proves more satisfying, only because it paints Jaskier white from his hip all the way to the hollow of his throat.

"Fuck." It shudders out of him. He shudders all over.

His come glistens on Jaskier's skin, caught in his chest hair. It rolls off the side of his ribcage, over the bruise that's bloomed there. Geralt wants to lick it up. He wants to rub it in, brand Jaskier with it. Make it stay. Fuck.

The knot's filled again. Geralt doesn't feel it, not really, not until Jaskier's fingers come to squeeze around it. Then he feels like he's dying, like he'll never breathe again. Like he doesn't ever want to.

"It's so big."

And Jaskier sounds—amazed. Awestruck. Geralt sees how the tips of his long, shapely fingers don't quite touch. Fuck, it is big. Every time Jaskier's hand tightens around it, Geralt feels like he's coming all over again. Maybe he is. It pulses out more of his spend. Gods. And Jaskier said—

Want your knot.

He'd said—he'd asked Geralt to put it in him. Fuck, Geralt wants that. He needs that. He'll stuff Jaskier full of his cock—his knot—and he'll keep him round with seed and he'll never let him up. Maybe it'll take.

He thinks he's about handled it, even if each insistent touch leaves him breathless, weak with a dizzying surge of pleasure. He thinks he's about handled it, but then Jaskier looks him in the eye, his pupils blown entirely black as he says,

"You're such a good pup, aren't you?"

And he looks confused, is the thing—like the words crawled up his throat, forced themselves on his tongue. The perfect words, the exact words that send Geralt into a frenzy, that make it seem as if the whole thing hadn't been frenzied already. He whimpers, whimpers and lets his teeth nibble on the corner of Jaskier's jaw. The skin there is rough, like Jaskier hadn't shaved in a few days, and that makes Geralt even more mad, somehow, more desperate.

"Jaskier," he says, and it sounds like a plea. Maybe it is. His hands shake. They—they never shake. He slides them over Jaskier's sides and they come away sticky. "Jaskier."

"You can—fuck me, Geralt. Have me."

Have the bitch, a voice calls from the darkest corner of his mind, a voice that sounds too much like his own. Take him, take what's yours.

Geralt groans as the last dam holding him back creaks, splinters, shatters in front of him.

He should've ridden for the brothel, and he didn't, because he knew Jaskier would be here, waiting and willing.

His eyes slip shut for a moment against the realisation. Geralt takes a steadying breath, drowning in desire that belongs as much to him as to the beast that claws at his skull and cries for him to breed, to own.

Jaskier tells him something—unimportant, Geralt wagers, because it's accompanied by the press of an ornate glass bottle into his trembling palm, and then he's got a slick hand on his cock, and Jaskier is holding his legs wide open in the filthiest invitation, and Geralt blacks out for a second when he pushes in.

It's a different heat entirely, the sweetest fever he wouldn't mind succumbing to.

He'd go slow, normally. He'd pause to let Jaskier get used to the stretch. He can't. He can't. The last of his fragile composure slips as he thrusts forward, quick and rough.

He barely feels Jaskier's nails rake down his arms, the sting secondary, irrelevant against this pleasure. "Geralt—"

Geralt knows what Jaskier wants to tell him, he knows—but he can't give that to him, can't stop, can't slow down, can't hold back or he'll die, fuck, fuck.

"I'm sorry, sorry, Jaskier, sorry—" he mumbles against Jaskier's temple when he tastes tears. They burn on his tongue, pierce his soul with an ugly guilt. He licks them up all the same, drives his cock deeper without meaning to. Faster. Fuck.

"It's fine, it's good, you—" Jaskier sobs, a horrible, shuddering thing, but his palm comes to rest on Geralt's cheek. It's—grounding, somehow. "Don't hold back."

Claim the whore. Yours. Yours.

Geralt prays for strength, then. For clarity and restraint.

He finds neither.

Instead he finds a bottomless, insatiable hunger—so overwhelming it steals his thought altogether, leaves him mindless and weak and craving to scratch an impossible itch.

Jaskier feels so good around his cock. There are tears of his own threatening to brand his skin. It's—

Jaskier's so tight, oh, so tight and warm and—

Heat had been the thing that drove him to madness, before, but now, now—

It's a cure, a blessing, it's—

"Do it," Jaskier whispers as he surges up to press his parted lips against Geralt's. "Put it in me, knot me, Geralt."

"You want it? You want it?"

"Fuck, I want it—"

"Beg for it," he manages before he has to start kissing his bard again. Yours. "Beg for it."

Jaskier nods, his teeth pinched around Geralt's lip until it nearly splits. "Please, please, I want it, I need it, give me—your knot, put it in me, oh, oh—"

The knot swells, and Geralt thinks he might go crazy. The knot swells, and he thinks it might tear Jaskier to pieces. The knot swells, and it presses close close close against Jaskier's rim, and it pops in, and then he doesn't think at all.

Can't—can't think even if he wanted to. He'll never hold a thought again. Not a single thought other than how blindingly good it is to have Jaskier tight on his knot, to be locked together as he fills his bard with come. His teeth ache, so he clamps them down on Jaskier's shoulder. It doesn't help much. It's almost like—like there's another place he should mark. A place he could sink his canines into that would bind them, somehow.

His head spins. He's vaguely aware that the knot expands inconceivably more as it pulses. He grinds desperately forward. It feels so good. He whines. Maybe this'll never stop. Maybe he'll float in this impossible ecstasy until the end of time.

The flutter of his heart is the first thing that filters through his dazed mind. It's not meant to flutter.

As though across a dream, he hears Jaskier calling his name. He laps at the dents his teeth had made. Yours.

He doesn't expect Jaskier to get even tighter around him. It knocks the breath straight out of his lungs, and that's not meant to happen either.

"Gods," Jaskier whispers somewhere next to him. Geralt agrees.

The air is thick around them, but not with the curse; it's heavy with sweat, with unwavering arousal. The smell of Jaskier's spend. Fuck.

"You—" he says, voice hoarse.

Jaskier laughs, breathless, and Geralt can—he can feel it around his cock. "Sorry."

A look down the length of Jaskier's body, the sight of his bard still covered with seed—Geralt's, his own—sends him rutting forward without much say in the matter.

"Fuck. Fuck."

Geralt doesn't allow himself pleasure often. Only if its lack proves distracting. This, now—he doesn't know how he's ever done without it. He doesn't know how he'll manage to let Jaskier off of his cock, his knot. Perhaps Geralt just needs to keep him like this. Always open, always ready. Always dripping with come. Always—

His head feels clearer, maybe. Clear enough to keep his eyes focused, to see the wince twisting Jaskier's features. Dread grips his heart in a vice, his throat growing too tight to breathe.

"Jaskier."

The only thing more frightening than the thought of hurting Jaskier is the sudden, cold shiver of realisation that Geralt couldn't get himself to stop. Not now, not if Jaskier cried and begged him to. Not at all, not ever.

Gods, Jaskier's big blue eyes, rimmed-red and gleaming even more as he chokes on tears, chokes on pleas and protests, but Geralt keeps taking his pleasure in spite of it all, keeps—

"Geralt?" He snaps back to a feverish reality and finds his fingertips resting against the wet skin of Jaskier's cheek. "Oh, don't worry about it. Four orgasms in one day will do that to a man."

Fuck. Geralt has to grit his teeth to keep still.

"—four?"

The smile Jaskier gives him is almost bashful.

"You were gone a long time."

Geralt bows his head to mouth absent-mindedly at the soft, bruised skin of Jaskier's neck.

"Not—not that I'm not enjoying myself, but—why now? What brought this on?"

Don't ask, Geralt thinks miserably. Don't ask lest I slip.

"Curse," he manages to say. It's the truth. Part of it. Should've ridden for the brothel.

"O—oh. All of it?"

"Hm."

"The, uh. The kn—"

"Hm."

"Ah. Pity."

Pity, Jaskier says, because he's not really interested in Geralt, only the horrid, monstrous part of him. A part that's not even his own.

Geralt knew this isn't real, and he—he'd still—

"I'll—" It chokes him, but he's already come this far. He'll see it through. He'll see it through, because he'll die otherwise. Just for survival, this. "I'll need you. Again. In a minute."

Jaskier mutters something at that. Geralt sees his lips move, but he can't hear the words. His vision swims, like a heatwave, melting Jaskier's expression into a soft, malleable thing. Could be anything. A burning want, not unlike Geralt's own. Fascination, maybe.

Love.

No. No.

He pulls out too harshly, too quickly. The knot is still half-swollen, the drag of it the sweetest torture. The only thing sweeter being the sight of his seed gushing onto the sheets in his wake. Gods. Gods.

"Take whatever," is what Jaskier tells him as Geralt plugs his stretched hole with two shaking fingers. "Just don't—don't make me come. Please. I am but a mere mortal."

He sounds eager, still, if tired. Geralt is tired, too.

And so, so very hungry for more.

Rolling Jaskier onto his front is the easiest of tasks. Geralt grips knuckle-white at his hips and his hair and drags him up onto unsteady knees. A growl rises in his chest as he watches his spend drip down Jaskier's thighs, his pert balls. He'd never been quite so interested in—in breeding someone like this, planting his seed, marking Jaskier up inside and out, and now, now—

"Fuck."

He pushes back in and it feels like coming home.

Like it's meant to be.

Like Destiny, in her infinite wisdom—

"Fuck."

The snap of his hips knocks the air out of Jaskier, a little hitch of breath that slips into moans and whimpers. Time ceases to exist. Geralt isn't even certain that the inn still stands where it'd been—they might be floating in a bottomless void and Geralt wouldn't know. He wouldn't care.

Maybe it's that, that he doesn't care. Maybe it's because this isn't real, beyond the raw carnal need, because it doesn't matter, that he asks through clenched teeth,

"… talk to me."

Jaskier's got his fist shoved halfway in his mouth, Geralt sees now, so all he gives in response is a confused hum. Damn him.

"Say you—say you want this." Say you want me. Lie to me.

The bed's frame creaks dangerously, yet Geralt can't get himself to slow.

"I want it so much, gods, my wolf, have mercy, I—" a gasp, a whimper, the slap of their skin, "Your knot feels so good, so—" a tremor in Jaskier's shoulder, twitching muscle and wet moans, "I want it in me forever, please, I'll stay on it and you—you—"

He lasts longer, this time, the pleasure cresting slowly, but Jaskier's words make his hips snap forward brutally, his knuckles white around Jaskier's hips.

"—you can breed me full and keep me tied to the bed and I'll thank you for it, gods, just let me have it, let me sit on your knot until I can't remember what it's like not to be full—"

It's too late, when his release hits him like a punch to the chest; the knot's already full, fuck, it'll never fit, except, except Jaskier's asked for it so sweetly, so beautifully, and Geralt squeezes his eyes shut and throws his leg over Jaskier's hip and forces the bloody thing in with a roar.

Jaskier screams. Geralt can barely hear it through the buzzing in his ears. He watches Jaskier's thighs shake, his fingers twist tightly around rumpled sheets.

They pant together for a moment, desperate gulps of air. Then, when Geralt's cock finally stops pulsing come, when thinks he's picked up all the pieces of his shattered composure,

"Can you fuck me with it?" Jaskier asks in a small voice, sounding drunk, fucked-out.

Geralt's head spins. Surely Jaskier doesn't mean—

"It's—so much when it pops in. But—" He shudders. Geralt can see it in the curved line of his spine. "Please. I'm sorry. Please."

Red bleeds into his vision. Jaskier arches his back more, shakes his hips and makes Geralt near-delirious.

He tries to pull out. The knot won't budge and it's—so fucking good. His hands shake, again, and he braces them at the base of Jaskier's spine and pulls out with considerable effort. He watches Jaskier's hole stretch so incredibly wide around the knot, watches it pulse and flutter around the thickest part of it. He keeps still. Just looking.

"Fuck," Jaskier whines feebly. "Fuck, that's—"

Geralt pulls his hips back, slipping out of Jaskier's body completely. Jaskier stays open, gaping, leaking spend. He shivers violently.

Pushing his swollen, oversensitive knot back in is a feeling so intense Geralt nearly doubles over.

Jaskier says something, his voice hoarse, but Geralt can't hear it, can't hear anything but the pounding of his own heartbeat. He puts his thumbs against where their bodies connect and pulls out again, slowly. The muscles in Jaskier's thighs spasm.

"Geralt, Geralt, Geralt—fuck, that's so good, so—please make me come again, please, oh—"

The echo of Jaskier's words sounds in his head, asking him precisely not to do that, and when he reaches to touch Jaskier's cock he finds it only half-hard. Jaskier squirms away.

Geralt squeezes the head of Jaskier's prick harshly and shoves the knot it again and Jaskier goes so very still before he spills over into Geralt's palm.

The vice-tight grip of his body makes Geralt lose his bearings and he collapses forward, forces Jaskier to splay flat on his belly with Geralt plastered to his back.

"Gods," Jaskier wheezes, and Geralt's so horribly hot all over again.

He grinds the knot forward, tries to get it deeper, deeper, deeper, feeling like he might come again even before the knot's gone down. Jaskier still contracts around his cock, and Geralt's—so close, so close, and he ruts frantically forward, and he sinks his teeth in the back of Jaskier's neck and spills again so violently that tears roll down his cheeks, the smell of ozone heavy in his nostrils, a faint crackle of Chaos against his skin.

It takes a long moment for his heart rate to trickle back to its usual sluggish thud, but when it does, when Geralt releases the skin between his teeth—

The fever recedes so suddenly, it's like he put his head in ice-cold water. Frigid air rushes to his lungs, cools the sweat on his skin. At last he can think clearly.

He tries to roll off of Jaskier, but finds them bound together still, Jaskier's ruined hole clinging to him weakly. Seems like the knot is a permanent feature, then.

"Leave it there," Jaskier mumbles, sounding on the edge of consciousness when Geralt goes to pull out as gently as he can manage.

An overwhelming exhaustion seeps into his bones at once. Geralt settles on his side, still inside his bard, pulls him close to his chest and drifts off into a calm, dreamless sleep.