#tldr: I'm not dead. Just busy and tired.

[miqotepotatoe]

Am I gonna create an AU/original story that's just an excuse to make Ninago OCs. Yes.

Is it goining to be pure self indulgence for me and only me? Yes.

I'm gonna call it the 10th Genaration because it takes place 300 years after the recent battle with the Overlord and it's been 10 generations since the Ninja. Lloyd is still around cuz dragoni blood, and he's been doing minor ninja business since Ninjago's been at peace since events in Crystalised. Living out his best chill life, until he hears rumours of the four elements of creation and the elements of wojira awakening once again. The green ninja sets of to find these indivuduals, and they become his first pupils.

The new elemental masters are basicaly reincarnations of the ninja + Morro, and after they reach their full potential they somehow are able to speak with the spirits of their past incarnation ala ATLA. The ninja spirits try to give their reincarnations some wisdom but they're just as chaotic as they were in their youth (seriously they are kids the youngest is 12 and the oldest is 16). Lloyd is a tired dad doing his best. Mostly lots of fluff and chaos

Oh and Garmadon is here too. He's the fun chaos grampa that's sorta good but not good but not bad. Garmadon do what Garmadon do. Wu us chilling in the Departed Realm with the FSM and his students.

TLDR; Lloyd's kids are a menace to society because Garmadon keeps encouraging them to do chaos. Also they can talk to dead ninja

[angevinyaoiz]

Love the designs in the new comic! How would Richard's later years look like in the AU?

I actually haven't thought about how the boys would look like or what their lives would be outside of my Humorously Recreating Historical events--especially since the timeline is very compressed so everyone is basically speedrunning 30-40 years of Events in like 1-2 teenage summers lol. I wrote a lot of thoughts below (also going into overthinking of How Burger King Universe even works), TLDR the binary is he'd either be a Dead Teen who rocked out a little too hard and made the wrong random person mad or he'll grow up and become a completely normal guy with no relation or connection at all to the historical Richard the lionheart aside from that tumultuous period, but to do so one has to exit the story I make in my head hahaah

Burger King Edgyverse : In this verse it would prob sort of be one of those really edgy teen narratives that follow the Richard timeline of he goes to the crusade concert, has massive interpersonal drama stemming from the 10000 personal and familial issues that escalates and catastrophizes all the relationships, goes home, tries to fix things, continues to have massive drama, maybe comes close to fixing it but then ends up dying really randomly out of some weird karma situation IDK maybe it's like the legend where some kid who he forgot about HATES him and then idk hit him with their car or smth on Châlus street while he's busy beefing. And then everyone is finally like damn.....he was a hot mess but he did some cool stuff so now we are all going to watch his videos and think Abt his life from another angle recontextualized and we now think he was cool now (PR internet movement gets built up. ). idk I'm a bitch who loves weirdly anticlimactic tragedy so that's one universe.

Kind of is my processing and sticking to the main points of the historical Richard life which always struck me as very Dramatic and almost cyclical, which Is very fun for me. Idk there is something very "cursed" about all the family members and their ends and relationships so following up with that (in a more modern sensibility way) is fun to me.

ALTERNATIVELY:

I also thought about...what if characters in the Bk universe aren't cursed to that eternal return...idk. I had a funny thought earlier like that Geoffrey in BK universe doesn't die, he just becomes self-aware of and chooses to exit bc he's tired of the bullshit hahaa (tv equivalent of actor having to leave the show). In my mind, for the Narrative, some people do have to die, namely in my mind Junior does die in BK universe and shifts the mood from haha sillie goofy conflict to more strained and bitter. After all it IS an AU. Maybe BK Richard can leave being "Richard" timeline behind and be just a guy in an unrelated story who grows up past the predetermined historical event timeline parallels and can be a normal person with average life sort of thing. But that's beyond my scope since I'm mostly interested and focused on reinterpreting specific dynamics in that timeline, and deviating too much is when characters feel less AU and more distant and become different People to me (which would be the point...the historical figure must die for a person to live? Idk.

I know this feels like a weird distinction to make, and prob plenty of ppl probably see my delusions and think it's ALREADY so deviant but its more internal like in my mind I like having specific connections to historical stuff even if it's a weird tangled thread heheh. In general though, all is in good fun.....it's late so I may write later so apologies if this makes no sense at all but thanks for reading this far if u got it hahaah

[warlock0103]

man... the rp has died down a lot here since mirage left. maybe she was your artistic muse? have you thought of doing a starter call with her?

I got this ask a few days ago, and I was trying to think how best to reply to it, and the more I though about it, the more ranty it got. I'm sure you didn't mean anything rude by it, but I'll do a short version and put a more detailed version under a read more.

Mirage isn't gone, she's just not actively in my mind. If people want to RP with her, shoot me a message or an ask. A starter call wouldn't hurt, but that's for me to decide.

Mirage only left Cronus' village. The man she trusted had lied to her after she gave so much to him. She felt betrayed, used, and had no reason to stay with him. They left on friendly terms, but it'll be a bit before she's comfortable returning to his domain, if she ever does.

Also, around the time Mirage left, I got a full time job. Kinda need money to pay bills and to keep the heat on. And recent reasons for inactivity involve my computer issues as my old one slowly decided to kill itself.

As for RPs in general, my brain is constantly giving me the impression that I'm bothering people, so it's not easy for me to start conversations with people let alone start a story. Even people I've been friends with for years. This is why I usually RP with the same general people. Occasionally I'll send a message to someone new and hope they don't hate me, but I usually spend a day mentally preparing for that.

However, because of this, there's a new recent problem that I'm trying to come to terms with, that I'm just going to say here. Most of the active people I follow are heavily into the Trollhunter's fandom. And I've fallen out of it. I recently finished watching the first series a month ago, it was alright. When I was about to go to 3 Below, I just... Couldn't find the motivation.

The people I met in the fandom are fantastic, and I love all of them. But unlike with the last fandom I was a part of, it felt more like I was on the sidelines for the group as a whole. I was excited for it in the beginning, all the new people, the lore, characters that were fun to interact with, etc. But as time went on, it got more and more draining on me mentally to continue, and eventually I stopped. Some trolls didn't have that effect, like Bonely or Dezoka. I love them to bits and always enjoyed rps with them, but outside of them, my heart isn't in it as much as it used to be.

And on a final issue I've noticed, Tumblr's notification system either doesn't notify people I've replied, doesn't notify me that people have replied, or something. This has been an issue for a while now, but it seems to have gotten worse somehow as of late. Either that or people just get bored and don't tell me. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[bellflower-goat]

:]

[bewareof12metersfrogs]

Warning: long rant. Probably messed up grammar. Not LXC-friendly.

So Pinterest gave me this:

And I was like

Ah yes, Lan Xichen.

I mean, I love that guy, but oh gosh that man is BLIND. Like, man's so blind Xue Yang could use him to slaughter people.

(I'm so sorry for that joke)

I really loved him when I first read the book, esp pre-Nightless City, but then I read it for the second (and third) time and that love turned into "uhh, I guess I kinda like him?"

I mean, in Sunshot Campaign arc, NMJ just got freaking tortured. He just got beaten, made to watch his men die, and his former deputy "betrayed" him -- and then LXC was just like, "oh da-ge CALM down, this is all part of OUR plan, A-Yao's our spy lol put Baxia away don't shout at him smh"

Why didn't LXC say to NMJ that the whole thing had been orchestrated? Okay, I get it, maybe he couldn't risk JGY getting caught, but couldn't he just tell NMJ, "hey, this is the plan. You're gonna get caught at Yangquan by WRH and our spy will take care of the rest of it" ? I'm pretty sure NMJ was angrier about his men getting slaughtered than himself getting beaten. NMJ is kinda like WWX; they were both idiots, but they cared about their people. Pretty sure he cared more about his men than himself. If he knew about the "plan", he'd most likely bring the disciples who were ready to die.

THEN LXC just went to NMJ like, "Hey let's be sworn brothers!". Xichen, dude, his wounds aren't even healed. I mean, it's a bit insensitive right?? I think it is. The whole sworn-brotherhood-right-after-shunshot-campaign thing still bothers me. To me, it seems like no one cared about NMJ. I mean, he was the leader of SC, people used his skills, his men, his everything, and then he was just, like, casted aside?? Pretty sure man's got PTSD. Also, qi deviation. Oh gosh I forgot about qi deviation.

Anyway, yeah, LXC was blind throughout the novel. I won't talk about the scene where Wangxian tried to tell him that A-Yao = bad, but I will talk about the scene where NHS decided to "use" his er-ge to kill his san-ge. Was it intentional? Perhaps. Was NHS lying? Maybe. Was it bad? Absolutely. Was it expected? Of course.

Let's put ourselves in NHS' shoes for a second. Your big bro, who is also the one who raised you and the only family you have left, died. People are quacking "oh it's the Nie curse, and isn't it such a tragedy?" BUT NO! One day you be minding your own business and then BAM you found out that da-ge'd been murdered and mutilated AND betrayed. So you started scheming for like a decade. Everything was going great, as great as a 10 years revenge plan could ever be. You just gotta wait for a few more hours, you just gotta listen to your nemesis' retelling his sad background story, you just gotta endure the pain of seeing your dead big bro wrecking havoc, and you'd have your revenge.

Then of course your er-ge, your big bro's best friend, gotta help your big bro's killer. He just gotta treat his wounds, huh? Pretty sure NHS was unstable. He was desperate and maybe even full of wrath. I understand that, at least, the same way I understand that maybe LXC tried to treat JGY's wounds because he still saw him as his brother -- he didn't want to lose another brother. But how about NHS? He was watching the man whom he thought was his brother treating the man who betrayed and murdered his actual brother. NHS was being a dick, yeah, but it was expected.

Think about this for a second. NMJ's corpse was still right there (and gosh, NHS had to sew his big bro's corpse by himself). NHS was RIGHT there, and LXC had the audacity to tend to JGY's wounds after the man himself admitted to his crimes. I think it's understandable if NHS felt at least insulted.

Also, he was perhaps sick of people not thinking that his big brother was as important as other people, that he was also a human being instead of just a war machine or even a mere tool that can be casted aside whenever they want to. Why did his brother have to die because of other people's greed and selfish decisions? Why did he have to lose the only family he had left forever and why did he have to just sit back and accept it?

Most importantly, LXC had been too blind for more than a decade too long.

Also, the bit about "You're Wangji's only mistake":

Bruh.

If WWX is LWJ's only mistake, then (trusting) LXC is NMJ's only mistake. I mean, sure, WWX is as dumb and oblivious as a rock, but can you really blame him?? HE WAS TRYING TO KEEP HIMSELF, HIS FAMILY, AND THE WEN REMNANTS ALIVE, DUDE'S GOT NO TIME TO THINK ABOUT FKING ROMANCE.

Sorry, I got carried away.

Anyway, are we just gonna ignore the fact that LWJ had been acting like he hated WWX since, like, the first time they met?? I mean, I really love LWJ, but his only mistake is his communication skills (or lack thereof).

But LWJ never gave up on WWX. He learned to express himself way better. Man's got dedication and he's not afraid to learn. I really love that about him.

Also, I understand that LXC was angry because LWJ took beatings to protect WWX, but I don't think he had the right to blame WWX for that. Yes, I know WWX did plenty of things wrong; he was extremely reckless and untrusting, but he never asked LWJ to protect him. LWJ did everything voluntarily. Ffs Xichen WWX didn't even know that LWJ did that. You know why? CAUSE HE WAS FKING DYING THAT'S WHY.

TLDR: LWJ was a grown ass man.

Okay. So, do I hate LXC? No. But do I find him flawed? Yes. But that's why I like MXTX's characters, including WRH, JGY, and LXC (the only exception are perhaps JGS and MXY's fam, and I think we all know why). They all have flaws. For me, LXC is too naive and blind, JGY is too power-hungry and selfish, and NMJ is too stubborn and unyielding. NHS? Well, he's a lot of things. He's manipulative, unsympathetic, and IMO he's got a problem with obsession too. He and JGY are alike, in my opinion. The main difference is their goals: JGY seeks power, NHS seeks revenge.

Everyone has flaws. LWJ and WWX have flaws too; they're EXTREMELY flawed. Heck, even our lord and saviour Shijie also has flaws, as much as it hurts me to type that.

Then why do I get so worked up about LXC's flaws? Honestly I don't really know. Maybe it's because I'm tired of (almost) the entirety of fandom treating him like a god, maybe because I'm tired of people who treat NHS like the devil himself, or maybe because I'm disappointed in him. I mean, JGY's our main villain, but I still love him so much. Heck, I love him even more than I love LXC. Bruh, nowadays I even like WRH more. At least that guy is downright evil and he looks cool while doing whatever evil things WRH does (I'm talking about the novel and donghua mmkay).

Anyway, this is the end of my rant. I apologise if I'm offending you, this is just something that's been bothering me since the first time I re-read MDZS. This whole thing is like a plot bunny but instead of a "plot", the bunny is shaped like a "rant". This is a rant bunny. I need to get this outta my head. I've edited this thing like four times already because I keep finding errors and stuffs. I also added like two new paragraphs.

I'm sad now.

[janiedean]

Man, you have no idea how much I hate you. I hate you so much that I’m going to force you to choose between THREE songs to analyze. “Shut out the Light”, “Gypsy Biker” and “The Promise”. I’d wish you best of luck, but I so highly dislike you, that I wouldn’t DARE to offer you such a kindness. (Also, I'm just not sure if you've analyzed any of those yet so I'm covering my bases.)

HELLO ANON THIS IS AN OLD ASK BUT SPRINGSTEEN DAY IS COMING and therefore I’m going with my favorite out of the two I had left (I’ll do the other one asap tho!

*DRUM ROLL*

So: The Promise is one of those mythical songs from Bruce’s vault, in the sense that it’s from the late seventies and everyone knew it existed to the point that it was supposed to be the title-song instead of Darkness on that record but instead he never properly published it because it was too personal and he could never find the right version, which is why there’s like fifteen different takes of it in between the one on tracks, the one on the promise boxset with all the darkness outtakes, the ten live versions and so on - basically he was reworking it for literal years. So I’m just going with my favorite version - I mean I love them all but this one to me is.. just… IT SPEAKS TO ME MORE THAN THE OTHERS? idk but I love this one above all others ;_; (I think I like that it starts slow and goes into full band while the others tend to go either all band all piano idk)

Now, context: in order to get what’s behind this, you need to know that post-Born to Run he ended up in a trial with his former manager of his first two records out of contractual reasons (tldr: the contract he signed at the beginning was shitty and the manager didn’t want to settle for new conditions he found more favorable/fair) that lasted two years and during which he couldn’t publish anything because in the contractual drama there were also song rights involved. So: it was not the best time of his life and he felt it as a betrayal of sorts since he was actually close to the guy and considered him a friend.

With that said, let’s go at it:

Johnny works in a factory and Billy works downtownTerry works in a rock and roll band looking for that million-dollar soundMe sometimes I don’t do nothing, some spend a lot of time aloneSome nights I go to the drive-in and some nights I stay home

Now: the two people in the first line are probably imaginary and they’re there to establish a situation, in the sense that factory and downtown are two types of job that he could have had and his friends could have had, while the third one is relevant to our discussion because he works in a rnr band looking for that million-dollar sound, which is what *he* was doing up until he actually published Born to Run and hit it.

And then, he doesn’t do nothing, spends time alone etc., which is (according to his autobiography too) what he was doing when he couldn’t write or record music thanks to the trial and when he was starting to hit a fairly bad phase in his life. So: he’s basically staying on his own with his thoughts. Not good.

Now: he goes to the drive-in.

I followed that dream just like those guys do way up on the screenRode down the Challenger down Route 9 trough the dead ends and all the bad sceneWhen the promise was broken, I cashed in a few of my own dreams

Key elements we have here: dreams and cars.

Now: follow that dream is the title of another seminal mythical Springsteen bootleg which also sums up a lot of his philosophy, and it’s in a few other songs of his, but in this case: he followed that dream the way people did in the movies, meaning, making music, but that can also apply to anyone trying to make their way through life following some dream they have.

Now: the Challenger is a car which is one of his most basic metaphors, and in this case he rides it ‘through dead ends and bad scenes’, but it’s kind of obvious that it’s about his music, not a car, which he brought through dead ends and bad scenes meaning all the false starts he had until he could actually publish his records.

And then the promise was broken and he cashed in a few of his dreams, meaning that when the legal drama started, he saw it as a broken promise which eventually ended up having to sell his music ie his dreams, which was not what he was hoping for when he went into the business. Actually:

Well now I built that Challenger by myself, but I needed money and so I sold itAnd I lived a secret I should’ve kept to myself, but I got drunk one night and I told itAll my life I fought the fight, the one that no man can ever winEvery day it just gets harder to live the dream I’m believing inThunder Road, here one ride in the morning till it turns lightThunder Road, there’s something dying out on the highway tonight

‘I built that Challenger by myself’ = I wrote that music by myself obviously, and ‘I needed money and so I sold it’ = ‘I signed a bad contract also to survive and bring it to the people’, but that goes into the main narrative of the *fictional character* he’s singing about who has built that car and then sold it. But what’s the real deal in this is the middle section ie I fought the fight no man can ever win + it gets harder to live the dream I’m believing in, as in, we’re back to the main themes of the album consisting in how following your dream doesn’t necessarily means getting what you want nor the end of your problems/fights (the fight that no man can ever win) and living in it can turn into a nightmare (because it gets harder).

Now: the Thunder road part in the refrain has another double meaning because it’s, again, both the title of one of his most iconic songs and the title of a noir movie (remember: he goes to the drive in and wants to live his dreams like people on a screen from before), and we have a) one ride in the morning until the light comes (hopeful imagery), b) something dying on the highway tonight (negative imagery), so that dream he achieved - or anyone else - can either end up hopeful or wrong and it can even be both at the same time, or maybe you can hope it goes well while in truth it’s wrong. Who knows. IT’S UP TO THE INTERPRETER.

Well now I won big once and I hit the coast, oh but somehow I paid that big costI feel like I was carrying the broken spirits of all the other ones who lostWhen the promise is broken you can go on living, but, man, it steals something from down in your soulLike when the truth is spoken, but it don’t make no difference, something in your heart grows coldWell I followed that dream in the southwestern flats to the dead ends and a two-bit barsWhen the promise was broken I was far away from home sleeping in the backseat of a borrowed car

And now we’re at the big guns.

‘I won big once and I hit the coast’: general enough that you can see yourself in it if it happened to you, but if you know the backstory you know it’s about him finally getting to publish his music and somehow paying that big cost anyway (count that in between that, the previous contractual conditions and having to pay off contracts and so on he was half-broke at least until the River tour);

‘the broken spirits of all the other ones who lost’: he feels like even if he won or partially won, he’s still feeling a kinship with anyone else who went through the same situation;

‘you go on living but it steals something down in your soul’: whenever someone breaks your trust in such a bad way when you were intimate friends or partners or whatever even if you go on it breaks something in you that might never change back and it’s actually… a very… universal thing I mean it’s true that if you get betrayed by someone you’re close to it’s usually a bad blow, which goes hand in hand with the ‘something in your heart goes cold’ the moment someone tells you the truth and for you it changes nothing when it should;

the final line is more his fictional character than him, but it lines up with the rest because we have again following a dream through dead ends and he sleeps in the seat of a borrowed car, because he sold the one he made with his own hands and so the breaking of that promise goes with having to sleep somewhere that’s not his and that he can’t relate to and that he feels like has been stolen from him - and he’s also far away from home ie in the place he should feel safest/more at ease.

And:

Thunder Road, here’s one for the lost lovers and all the fixed gamesThunder Road, here’s one for the tires rushing by in the rainThunder Road, remember me and Terry what we’d sayThunder Road, we’re gonna take it all and throw it all away

We’re back at the Thunder Road refrain, where it stands for: a) lost lovers/fixed games ie all the relationships he lost and all the *games* that he hadn’t thought existed before going into the business, b) tires rushing by in the rain ie an image of someone running away in a car under the rain which is not exactly a good omen but still is about getting out of a situation you don’t like, c) something he and the friend in the band used to say, which is d) we’re taking it all and throwing it all away which is the exact same idea as the it’s a town full of losers and we’re pulling out of here to win of Thunder Road’s ending, except that TR’s is optimistic, this one is more ‘we said we would do it and then look at how we ended up’. It’s probably interesting to note that Terry is also the name of the friend in Backstreets with whom the protagonist has a falling out thanks to a supposed betrayal:

Blame it on the lies that killed us Blame it on the truth that ran us down You can blame it all on me Terry It don’t matter to me now When the breakdown hit at midnight There was nothing left to say But I hated him And I hated you when you went away Laying here in the dark You’re like an angel on my chest Just another tramp of hearts Crying tears of faithlessness Remember all the movies, Terry We’d go see Trying to learn to walk like the heroes We thought we had to be Well after all this time To find we’re just like all the rest Stranded in the park And forced to confess To hiding on the backstreets

I mean, coincidences? We just don’t know, but I DON’T THINK IT’S 100% A COINCIDENCE that the name is similar and that this is the guy who gets mentioned again at least here rather than the other two. Anyway that’s me doing speculation lmao.

Anyway: this song had endless versions and it only ever was published two decades after the fact because it was Too Personal and he couldn’t find the proper, but even if it’s really personal it still manages to be relatable thanks to those key passages in stanzas 2 and 3 (the fight that no man can ever win/when the promise is broken it steals something from down in your soul) and while I don’t know if it’s The Best Springsteen song as a lot of people rightfully think (BECAUSE IT’S A FUCKING GREAT SONG) it’s definitely one of the most intimate, raw and beautiful Springsteen songs exactly for how his experiences are made relatable to everyone else in a way that’s imo heartwrenching and bye I love this and I love all of the other versions and BRUCE IS GREAT OKAY? okay. ;__;

[hive-worm-on-a-string]

gotta love getting that motivational juice when you're dog tired heh.

anyways....I was making some of my ocs in sims & wanted to show off one of my ocs I don't think I've ever talked about....Laviska Till :). Yes, she's the mystery person in my destinyverse, her relationship to Jolyon being that she's his sister. I haven't nailed down her personality *entirely* yet (when do I ever nail down oc personalities lol), but she's fairly similar to Aerith from FF7, just a bit more unhinged lol. She's super bubbly and all over the place & I love her :). I'm crafting up a job for her that's something akin to a historian. Basically, Mara assigned her to travel to Earth and gather information about human history by blending in and talking with the various pockets of humanity that exist there. I could go on more about what all this job entails/how it's possible but that's a rant for another time

She's also has an adopted daughter, Nui, whom she loves to the far reaches of the solar system and back. TLDR w/o rambling about Nui's lore, but Laviska always wanted a child to share her love of exploring the unknown and ancient history with, so when Jolyon showed up at their house and said (basically) "hey - Uldren found this kid, you want her?" it took her less than a second to say "yes." This sounds kind of weird w/o explaining Nui's backstory up til this point...but that's a whole chapter in and of itself, so just trust me that Uldren had good reason to take her away from the place she had been living in.

anyways. we all know she dies because Laviska is dead in lore and shehas the dead anime mom hairstyle LOL. but how???......that's for another time. or a lore book. when i get around to actually writing in approximately 2 business years.