#tumblr ruined the quality so do click!

[sun-snatcher]

✷ ― THE SWORD TREE

Near the close of the Third Age, Celebrían & Maedhros establish a re-wilding sanctuary in Valinor, to help elves fleeing strife in Middle-Earth recover & rebuild their lives.

My fanart take on the phenomenally written fanfic by @balrogballs exploring grief, atonement, and healing. Drew this between tears; highly recommend having a sit-down and tea with this story!

[gothamsfinestdummy]

Some Pinkys

[darkmutiewerewolf]

I-I made fanart *hesitantly offers*

i maintain that marvel was so so stupid for not having the avengers wear buyable avengers merch. like why would you not do this. they’re superheroes in-universe. there’s merch of them in-universe. have them wear their own (or each others) merch in the movies and then sell the merch. why are they wearing underarmor and extremely improbable multi-layer bullshit give them a captain america branded hoodie, sell this hoodie, call it a day,

[mochablogger]

Okay guys hear me out-

Did I tell you how much I love Venus? No? Oh okay

Okay okay so. I've been gaining a lot of interest in bats recently and I thought huh. What I combine Venus with a bat. And boom. Bat Venus was formed 💥💥 (grgrgrgr Tumblr has beef with me and it's ruining the quality 💔💔 click the pic for better quality!!)

I've done these doodles at school and who knows. maybe I'll draw him again :3

More info and headcannons abt him below!!

He can't talk properly, he just babbles and screeches. But he can emit ultrasonic sounds that reflect off solid surfaces; in other words this term is called echolocation !! Only Earth can understand him fr fr ❤️❤️

He's nocturnal (sleeps in the day and awake at night) and at night he has a very sharp eye (IK BATS ARE BLIND AF AND THEY SEE WITH SOUND BUT STILL <33)

He can increase the size of his ears and wings according to his will but doesn't do it very often since it frightens the others (but he scares Mercury with them lol)

He has fangs :0

He's a biter and blood eater 😇😇

He sleeps upside down (YES THIS IS ONE OF THE MAIN REASONS I BATIFIED VENUS 💕💕)

When everyone's asleep he keeps watch on them and is very protective <3

If you have a death wish you can wake him up during the day ^^

Has a death stare and he can make you run away in 2.5 seconds 😇 (Don't believe? Ask Mercury...)

He angy

My tablet just restarted when I uploaded this image lololol xd @trashbins-stuff I couldn't upload it in our dms I'm so sorry 💔💔 here's your slop ^^

[pink-vacancy]

Hi ^^

It’s me, the creator of some gifs you like and the creator of many gifs you could’ve probably lived without. A few people have asked me for a giffing tutorial recently so I have made one documenting my normal process! I’m going to gif this Aespa stage in this tutorial because I am still pretty bad at coloring stages. So come struggle along with me 🫶!

Step 1. Getting Sources & Vapoursynth

The worst enemy of the tumblr gifmaker is tumblr itself. You will spend your time making the clearest gif imagineable only for the blue site to reduce it to pixels. But alas, we must gif on. The best way to get good results is have a good source and to precompress your gif with vapoursynth.

As far as downloading from Youtube the best app to use is 4k Video Downloader. 4kVD let's you get download your file as a .mkv which is how youtube stores their 4k quality vids. Only limitation is on the free tier you get only 10 downloads. There are other more technically dubious methods to get 4kvids but I've literally never hit this limit.

10 out of 10 gifmakers agree if you want those good good crystal clear gifs you gotta stick with 4k or 1080p sources. Although if you are a complete sicko like me you can gif 720p and still get pretty good (not great) results.

So now you got your source video but you won't actually be able to open that bad boy up in PS yet. This is where the Vapoursynth step comes in. Vapoursynth will blast that footage into a nice denoised, sharpened and resized little baddie of a video clip for us.

To download VS and get a more in depth explanation of the exact steps on how to use it please reference this post. The basic steps of Vapooursynth are:

Drop your source video on the "vapourscript (drop a video file on me).bat" icon and type in the timestamps

Crop your gif to your liking (I do a lot of 540 x405 or 540x335 for horizontal gifs. 268x480 for vertical.)

Apply the sharpness and denoise (these are the options I use):

copy the code from the white box and paste it into the script like below

I set my denoiser to 1.5 and my sharpening to .5. (I stole this from @hyeongseo lol)

Go to Script > Encode Video. Make sure on this screen to name your file and set the header option to 'Y4M'. (Sometimes this is the step where it crashes and all your dreams are ruined because it can't convert it unfortunately. But 99% of videos are good lol)

You will find your Photoshop ready clip in gifs/output

Step 2. Photoshop

You are now good to open up your clip in Photoshop.

if we export our gif at this moment it will look like this:

Which isn't too bad. They just are pretty washed out and a lot of times at this step you'll see a lot of grain.

Sharpening (again lol) and Noise:

This might sound weird cause we just denoised lmao but stick with me.

We are going to convert our clip to a smart object. If you want to slow down or speed up your clip make sure to do so before converting.

(Often times if i have 60fps clip I put it at half speed, but if the action of the gif is really jerky or flashy at 30fps a lot of times I'll set it to 85% speed)

Convert your video to a smart object by right clicking it in the layers panel and selecting the "Convert to Smart Object" option

Create a copy of layer 1 and arrange it so it is aligned perfectly on top of the first video in the timeline. You have to drag it outside of the video group to do this. It should look like this once you are done:

On the bottom clip (layer 1), select filters -> sharpen -> smart sharpen. Apply the filter with these settings:

Then on the same clip (layer 1) apply the same smart sharpen filter with these settings

Setting up the Sharpness like this makes sure the finer details with stand out with crisp lines in the final product. (Look at how the mesh on her arms is in finer detail now)

Your video might look a little crispy at this point and that is ok cause we are going to soften that.

Now on our top video layer (layer 1 copy) select filters -> Blur -> Gaussian Blur. Use this setting:

Finally apply filters-> Noise -> Add Noise to layer 1 copy with these settings

"Vacancy what the hell? It looks like shit now."

Yeah... But now we'll put layer 1 copy at 25% opacity and it will look less like the shit that it does look like right now I prommy. Here is the current output:

The idea behind all this blurring and adding noise is that it will help create smoother transitions between the colors of the gif and reduce large blotchy bands of pixels that can sometimes show up

PLEASE!!! Save your current step as a PSD file. You can skip having to apply all those filters and just drag the filter groups on to the layers after the smart object conversion step.

Step 3. Coloring

Now to the fun part! There is a lot of trial and error in this step since we only have 256 colors to play with.

Typically my goals for this step are:

Raise the black point (Make Giselle's outfit in this gif black so more color can be used on her hair, skin and the background.)

Reduce the overall contrast of the gif. (Darken the lightest lights if possible)

Saturate the colors enough so they stand out but not so much that everything looks gross.

Depending on how we do these steps we may need to subtract frames from the gif. (Which I hope not cause there is exactly 69 frames in the current version lol)

Here is an example of what my coloring difference can look like:

In this case the colored gif is actually smaller because I elminated a lot of the dark greys in the background.

Vacancy's Dumbass Original Recipe thing

This is probably the only thing different that I do from most creators

My first adjustment layer is usually a gradient map. The green and red one to be more specific.

I then change the blend mode to luminosity and set the opacity somewhere between 12 and 20% (Usually 15%).

This step brings all our shades closer together so we have more freedom with coloring later. Also when idols are very white wash this seems to bring out the shadows and skin tone better in later steps as well. If you overdo it though the person in the gif can wind up looking very orange or yellow so less is sometimes more here.

There's also probably a better way to achieve this but you know... oh well

My Other adjusment layers usually consist of:

Levels: With the gradient map applied you can darken the blackpoint of your gif pretty significantly.

Selective Color: This is the most useful adjustment layer. Make sure to expirement with adding to the black slider on the blacks and neutrals color options. Often times kpop vids are over exposed and darkening this can bring out a lot of unseen color.

Hue/Saturation: I use this layer to darken the blues of the background with the lightness slider as well. You can adjust individual colors with this layer and with selective color and that is a very powerful tool for coloring.

Start:

Finish:

Because I darkened the gif so much I was able to add around 6 frames!

Though I’m not 100% satisfied with this gif, this would be my process from the start. You can put those adjustment layers all in a group and save it to the psd as well to skip all the steps to apply them. I used all the same adjustment layers for the header gif of this post as well which saved me a lot of time ^^!

Since every video is different you usually have to play around with the sliders a lot between clips.

Step 4. It Flops…

Jk jk but it does happen a lot tho on this site so don’t get discouraged ☺️

Parting Notes

If you want a really nicely colored fancam to practice on I would see if MIRAI on YouTube has a fancam of your fave idol. Their videos are really nicely color balanced from the start where stages like this tend to be very bright.

I’ll probably make a follow up post with more coloring tips and my thought processes while making gifs but this is the very basics to making hq gifs hope you learned a lot.

You can always hit my dms or inbox with questions if you have them ^^!

[runefells]

First time doing a DTIYS had a lot of fun. Original is here by @eyes-eyes-eyes-eyes-eyes-eyes! (Also tumblr is ruining the quality i think so click to see it better)

[h3llishh0und]

My Hazbin Hotel Redesigns (so far)!! These were made FOR FUN!!! i always do redesigns and such for most fandoms I'm in anyway. Also most likely an AU ?

Info:

Ideas yet but i think i am actually gonna make in my redesign/au whatever the fuck,

Vaggie and Charlie aren't dating yet, AD is her QPR and Cherri Bomb is his bestie.

Vaggie is an Angel thats very slowly seeing the corrupt side of Heaven, and meets Charlie by almost killing her. But obvi doesn't.

ALSO i think I'm gonna rename Vaggie, Cupid bc SUPPOSEDLY it is a mixed mytho anyway and i know Cupid isn't an angel ? But i figured Eros could be the real deal and Cupid is just Vaggie's nickname MAYBE or smth.

Bc i kind of think it would be interesting if Cupid was a fallen Angel .

The spear was her Angel weapon n then the bow n arrow is her later weapon

Ough i forgot to say i just got wrapped up in the sudden Vaggie/Cupid idea but UM

AD is gonna be an Ex overlord bc i said so. Instead of a pornstar.

He's still a SW but pole dancing is for fun more than anything and none of it will be seen as "gross". I'm not taming him down TOO much. Hobby wise etc.

Umm also Charlie is gonna be Grey Bisexual and Aromantic.

Cherri isn't there often bc she still likes the chaos. I like to imagine she used to work for Velvette but then escaped later on bc she wants to do shit her own way.

She loves art, esp like spray paints. Her bombs even have paint inside of them so theres a splatter everywhere she goes.

I think Cherri would also be friends with Sir Pentious in the end tbh. Haters to Besties.

Little details for the characters and their partners:

AD having mint colors + feather for Husk

Vaggie slowly getting blue details as she's in hell, hinting she's gonna be with Charlie

Charlie Having pink make up to hint she's gonna be with Vaggie.

Not shown:

AD and Charlie have matching phone charms

AD and Cherri have matching knives

this is all a WIP but I'll prob do screenshot redraws at some point! I wanna maybe work on making OCs first.

Note: Do not copy (inspiration is fine !!!!), steal, repost, use for NFTs/AI art, Do not trace etc. Okay to tag as kin/ID/fictive/me, okay to make fan art of!! And its 100% okay to have our designs interact and/or our designs interact with ocs !!!!!!

( please click on them, tumblr ruins the quality )

[laismoura-art]

AAAHH! I MADE AN ANIMATION!!! 💙🩷

So three things happened:

1. I asked y'all for outfit ideas for the best girls, Harumi and Lisa!

2. @gwenthefirecracker had this amazing idea:

3. Ibispaint, my beloved, now has a brand new animation feat!

Put these all together and bing bang boom!

You have Scorpion!Harumi being all flushed because her girlfriend is rocking on a new outfit and absolutely destroying their enemies!❄️

Now Fun Fact: Tumblr's dumbass can't read Ibispaint's animation file so I had to make this gif and not only it speeded up the whole thing but also TOTALLY RUINED THE QUALITY!🤡

So as a compensation, please, have the frame by frame set :D

Click for better quality

Final Notes:

Absolutely loved making this outfit for Lisa! It made her look so intimidating and that's exactly the vibe I want for her!

And no, Lisa doesn't believe in pants, pants are for special occasions only! ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Plus: The suit also hints Lisa's Animality👀

On other notes: I CAN DO ANIMATIONS!!! I'M ✨️UNSTOPPABLE✨️ NOW!!!! >:D

@mikka-minns, MA GIRL!! HERE ARE THE GIRLFRIENDS!👀💙🩷

[starryoak]

So! That Dungeon Meshi/Delicious in Dungeon sure is a great show! So much so that I made an OC for it! Please click the link so you can see it where tumblr doesn’t ruin the quality

The thing is, though? I kind of came up with her to fix the most significant flaw I saw in the ending, one that I’m not sure anyone else is going to be insane enough to actually think is a flaw like I do.

The thing is, this flaw is connected to some pretty major endgame spoilers, so if you don’t want to be spoiled, you really can’t stick around; this entire character’s story is intimately tied to the ending of Dungeon Meshi.

Ok! So, to start off, explaining my perspective requires knowledge of one fact; Marcille is my favorite character in the series, for one specific reason. I am extremely thanatophobic. 

I have an intense, all consuming fear of death that used to leave me literally wracked with actual physical pain from the nightly panic attacks I would have obsessing over my own impending mortality, something that only stopped because I take intense mood dampeners, not because I ‘got over it’.

So, obviously, Marcille’s backstory and motivation resonated deeply with me, her fears and obsessions over her friend’s mortality, the omnipresent specter of death trailing behind her stealing all her loved ones away, how she grew up with the looming knowledge of her father’s increasing age and his inevitable passing, something that hit me even harder because not only do I do the same thing, obsess over my parents increasing age, but Marcille’s dad physically resembles my own.

Her goal of equalizing the lifespans of the races, ultimately… I think it’s a noble one! It is the ultimate injustice of living that death is inevitable, one that I genuinely believe is worth solving. I don’t actually know if we ever will, it is probably impossible… but that doesn’t mean we should give up. Back in the 1300s, smallpox was inevitable. Now, it doesn’t exist outside of a lab! For most of human existence, half of all people died before puberty. Now, child mortality is down to less than 5%. https://xkcd.com/1520/ sums it up pretty nicely.

And then, the ending of the series. Well. Look. It’s not just that I disagree with how the series ends with “well, if you just eat right and exercise, that will release you from grasping your own mortality”. I mean, it is a lot that. But I’m used to series ending with some form of “people with a healthy fear of their own mortality are evil/insane/stupid/cowards”, hell, most characters genuinely afraid of their own death in media are villains!

Not only that, to a certain extent, it’s very logical that the series end with a moral about accepting the circle of life. It’s inevitable when the series focuses so much on food, because death is an unavoidable part of that cycle; to eat, we must kill. Even vegetarians can’t escape that fact, with how much we’ve learned about how plants are more alive than we once thought. 

It's not that the series ended with that moral that bothers me, or at least. I wouldn’t be as bothered as I am, if it was just that. There’s another couple aspects to the ending that I feel were mishandled. One of them is one I think that if most people were honest, would also agree, or at least understand why I think it’s a misstep, and one that only someone who’s insane in the exact same way I am would even care about in the first place.

I’ll start with the reasonable criticism first; I think, if they wanted to really sell me on the idea that Marcille is truly changed and has come to accept death as a natural consequence of life like she says she has when they discuss the potential of Falin’s resurrection failing… Falin should have died, then. 

It’s not that I’m not happy she’s alive, or that I don’t want her and Marcille to be together, but rather, it rings extremely hollow to me to have Marcille go “Oh, I’ve learned to accept death, after all of this journey, if Falin’s resurrection fails, I can accept that.” and then have her not have to test that newfound conviction. 

It feels too convenient, like the series couldn’t actually commit to that moral fully. Beyond that, if anything, I would think that the journey they went on would make Marcille more firm in her desire to resurrect Falin, if anything. 

But I can understand the logic they want you to go with, I just think that it feels like a cop-out to try and sell me on this “death is the natural consequence of life” moral, and then go “oh, except for Falin. Falin gets to live, because she deserves it.” 

Why does she deserve it more? Why did you say all that if not to set up the failure? So you could reassure us “don’t worry, Marcille doesn’t have those naive, stupid ideas about improving the lives of the short lived races anymore, she’s learned better! Now she understands that some people just deserve to live longer than others!” Admittedly, that’s me being uncharitable, but it just feels wrong to me.

Now, onto the second, more insane person critique, one that I don’t think anyone but me even thought about, and one that I think most people would think is being too nitpicky. 

But the thing is, it relates to the worldbuilding, and as much as people will likely want to tell me “you’re thinking too hard about a minor aspect of worldbuilding”, the thing is that Dungeon Meshi, above all, is very obviously a labor of love from the creator, and she clearly thinks about her worldbuilding a lot! 

So it feels like saying that I’m overthinking it is dismissing her intricately crafted world as not worthy of engaging with fully. You can’t have it both ways, where you only want people engaging in your worldbuilding if they’re saying something positive.

Anyway; it has to do with a very minor, throwaway panel in the discussion of the history of the Winged Lion/demon’s interaction with the world outside its dimension in chapter 87; where it’s revealed, offhand, that the differences in lifespan between the races is in and of itself caused by the demon granting wishes, as can be seen here. 

And. Well. That sits wrong with me. What happened to the conviction that it’s inherently wrong and twisted to use the demon’s powers? What happened to the conviction that they need to reverse all the changes that the demon forced on the world? Oh, so, since it happened so long ago, it’s no longer a problem? It’s only a problem when someone wants to use the demon to equalize the lifespans?

And I realize it’s insane to care this much about such a minor, throwaway line, but honestly? I think both my complaints about the ending stem from the same root frustration with the hypocrisy of it. Death is natural and worth accepting, except Falin’s death, then she deserves to live because her friends worked so hard for it. The demon’s powers are inherently wrong to use and must be reversed, except when it happened thousands of years ago, then it’s just the way things are and we have to get used to it.

What bothers me especially is how unforced of an error it was. Just have the differences in lifespans be because the world is a fundamentally cruel and unjust place, like it is in real life! You don’t have to ‘explain’ it, because it’s not something that needs explaining. 

But now that you’ve brought it up, suddenly I have to ask, well, why were their demon wishes valid and not Marcille’s? Because you said that the demons powers were inherently warped and twisted and that they had to undo all of the damage it caused. And I do agree that the demon was causing damage and needed to be stopped! I just dislike the hypocritical criticism of Marcille’s entirely reasonable desire to not outlive all her loved ones by centuries.

Anyway. So, how does this tie into my OC? I’ll get to that!

This is Lymsie Bens, and she’s a half-foot mage, something that, if you remember, is actually a fairly rare thing for her to be! So how did this come to be, considering Chilchuck says that most half-foots fear higher magic, on account of them being unwilling test subjects for elves whenever they got too close?

Lymsie grew up the daughter of an older couple of relatively rich and very well off half-foots, Benbur Sams and Pamsie Hobs, living in a town in the Eastern Continent not all that far from the magic school that Marcille and Falin attended, and ever since she was young, she grew up with one thing weighing on her mind; The deaths of her parents. 

Oh, no, her parents are still alive! Even by the time of this picture! 

But she still knew it would happen. She loves her parents, more than anything in the world, and she would look at them every day and count the grey hairs, the wrinkles, small as they may be, considering they’re half-foots, and look youthful for far longer than the other races. 

As much as the other races wouldn’t be able to tell by looking at them, they were old! Or at least, older than most couples usually are when they had children, and Lymsie was incredibly aware of it every time she looked at their faces, and saw them getting older and older.

And that didn’t even get into her own fears. As a child, she tried to befriend the gnomes that went to the private school her parents had sent her to, one that had mostly gnomes and where she was one of the only half-foots, and while racism meant she didn’t succeed very often, the times she succeeded, she would always end up having to graduate friends within the year. 

She would find herself outgrowing them quickly, and her friends would look at her with pity, like she was just seconds away from keeling over, like they shouldn’t get too atttached to someone who would die so soon. 

It made her realize something that left her feeling cold and scared; she was going to die. And not only was she going to die, she was going to die far sooner than she wanted. Well, she didn’t ever want to die, but she especially didn’t want to die so soon!

Eventually, she started feeling bitter and resentful about the whole thing, how unfair it was. Not just that the long lived races had all the power and money, but that they had the lifespans they did at all! 

And maybe it would have been easier not to resent them as she grew up if making friends didn’t get harder and harder as she grew up, as kids started picking up prejudices from their parents and started caring about their social status enough that they don’t want to be seen being friends with a half-foot… maybe she would have grown up a little more well adjusted.

As well, while the private school was definitely fancy by the standards of half-foots, it wasn’t a very affluent one for gnomes, and as such, the magic they taught was rudimentary at best. 

The teachers clearly didn’t expect the half-foots to get anything out of the classes, to the point where they were practically left alone the whole period, while the teachers focused on the more ‘promising’ students.

But Lymsie wasn’t willing to let that happen to her, to be left behind like her fellows; she wanted to learn magic if it was the last thing she did. She knew there had to be a solution to her problems with magic. 

So, despite the teachers’ prejudices, she applied herself, and she forced them to acknowledge her skills. They didn’t like it, but they had no choice but to recognize her skills for what they were; extraordinary, especially for a half-foot, a race supposedly predisposed against magic.

After Lymsie graduated from school with the highest honors that the school was willing to give her, she found herself looking for higher education in the arts of dungeon and healing magic, having learned all she could at the level she was at. 

She first tried to apply to the highest magic school nearby, the same Marcille and Falin attended, but there was a problem. The school refused to accept a half-foot, even if she easily passed the requirements.

A half-foot simply didn’t have the raw magical talent that was required for higher learning, you see. No matter how she begged or pleaded, she couldn’t change such a simple fact of biology.

Lymsie wasn’t satisfied. If she couldn’t get into that school, there were others in the world. She simply would have to say goodbye to her parents, secretly fearing, no matter how ridiculously, that they would die before she could get back.

Her parents supported her in her endeavors to learn magic; they were proud of their daughter’s accomplishments and how far she’d come, even if privately they felt her goals unrealistic.

Lymsie eventually found a school willing to teach her, but it was an uphill battle. Magic schools just weren’t made for half-foots; it was a struggle to use furniture made for elves and tallmen, but she refused to give in. Simple setbacks like a little discomfort wouldn’t stop her.

She poured herself into research, defying those who coddled her, cooing over how cute it was she was even trying, when everyone knows that half-foots simply can’t channel the mana required for true magic.

She focused her research on the magic of healing, the art of resurrection had to be connected somehow! She knew there had to be more to it. As she researched more, it became clearer and clearer that there was something missing to the discussion, some secret hidden and kept out of textbooks, and she wanted to find it.

Lymsie’s research deepened, spending her days glued to every book she could find in the library, excelling in her studies and at every test, she was making a name for herself among the school for her talents. 

In truth, it wasn’t exactly a good reputation she was garnering. Her stubbornness and bitter affect didn’t make her many friends, something she eventually realized herself, but it was too little, too late. 

She couldn’t win back people who were determined to see her in a bad light, for having the opinions she did and the skills she had, so she pressed on ahead anyway. Eventually, she had learned everything she could through conventional means, and she had a choice.

She could head back home to her parents, accept defeat against the insurmountable weight of her own mortality, live out the rest of her life content she had beaten the odds and learned what she could. 

Or, she could keep searching. Keep pushing the boundaries she had come across in her research, the walls she had encountered that seemed deliberately put up to stop her from attaining her goals.

There was only one choice for Lymsie, in the end. To keep going. In truth, she already knew where to look, though only because of warnings to stop; dark magic. Of course she had heard the rumors, of powerful magic that elves possessed, of how they would kidnap half-foots for cruel experiments to test the limits of what magic could do.

While she had heard those warnings, the idea didn’t dissuade her; in fact, it excited her. There was potential, magic beyond what she had learned, if only she could find it. It meant there were people out there testing the limits of what could be done with magic!

If she could learn what the secrets were to it, the power could be hers! The idea of being spirited away, of experiments that stretched the boundaries of conventional magic, it was a dream!

It didn’t matter to her that it could be dangerous, it became a private fantasy of hers, to imagine herself whisked away to the land of the elves, to see magic beyond her wildest dreams.

Lymsie would dutifully send letters to her parents informing her of her research, but she kept her fantasies and pursuit of dark magic secret. She knew that her parents would worry for her if they found out she had such dangerous intentions. She didn’t want them to worry, though not enough to stop her search, of course. 

She chased after every rumor of dark magic she could, though she began to learn the art of not being a colossal bitch to everyone she meets, of playing into stereotypes to get what she wanted. 

It never seemed to get her closer to her true goal, the rumors of ancient magic not enough to satisfy her ultimate desires, no elves willing to indulge the fantasies of a single half-foot, until one day, out of nowhere, the sky opened up. 

From massive tears in the fabric of the sky itself, long and terrifying arms descended down and began to pluck people out of their homes and villages, massive eyes peeking out from the dark void beyond the stars above.

Destruction rained, for a brief moment, the world itself seemed like it was going to end. But what Lymsie saw was the culmination of everything she had ever hoped for. Ancient magic, pouring out from the heavens themselves, right there for her to see.

And then it stopped. As quickly as the chaos began, it ended, and with it, Lymsie saw her dreams falling away as well. She knew then, she had to discover what happened. Whatever it takes, she knew that she would do it. Her goals, for once, finally seemed to be in reach!

Even with the desire of elves to keep their ancient magic hidden, in the end there was very little they could do to hide what had happened; the secret of the dungeon’s magic became known. The infinite well of energy that existed beyond the stars, the malevolent will that only desired to feed, and, of course, the entire kingdom that had sprung up overnight.

Rumors flew, of the king who had conquered and devoured the demon, and what was more, of the mysterious mages that had ruled the kingdom before him. The lunatic mage, who rumors say had cursed the kingdom with immortality, it was confirmation; the impossible could be done. Magic could free her from the shackles of her fate.

There were even more rumors, of resurrections and ancient magic, so much that Lymsie couldn’t discern fact from fiction. They couldn’t all be true, could they? She would never know, unless she tried.

She set out to the Golden Kingdom, to uncover the truth at any costs. It was a long and grueling journey to be undertaken alone by someone so small, but her affluence helped lighten the load. Though nothing could keep the travels from being long, it became clearer and clearer as she kept on, that the Golden Kingdom was alive with ancient magic, a kingdom that had been touched so deeply by the past that the very ground was charged with mana.

She was singleminded in her goals, to seek out the truth of what had happened that day, to uncover the center of this grand mystery. And luckily, the kingdom was abuzz with travelers, it seemed that whatever had happened had left the kingdom in dire need of subjects, and they were accepting anyone. 

Moreover, they were accepting anyone, of any race. Lymsie had never met a kobold or orc before in her life, and suddenly she found herself surrounded by them. Not only that, but they were welcome as much as any other. 

Lymsie tried not to hope, tried not to let herself believe that she could be accepted as well, if other ‘lesser’ races had found themselves welcome, could she be as well? It was almost frightening to imagine after how long she had spent being rejected by others.

There came a point, as Lymsie settled into her base of operations (she refused to call it a home without her parents beside her), that she realized there was nowhere else to look but to the castle itself. The newly crowned royals were the center of all of this, she was sure. 

She investigated every rumor, every errant piece of information she could, playing the conscientious citizen who simply needed to know what kind of place she was living in. She was but a small and simple half-foot who didn’t want trouble, you see. 

She received bits and pieces of information that told the story of a small circle of the highest echelons of the kingdom, who had come from nothing; privately, she suspected this to be a falsehood. 

Who could believe that elves would not have swooped in to appoint their own leaders? She suspected that this tale of simple adventurers rising to power through their wits and guile was simple mythologizing, something all dynasties did to establish legitimacy.

The king, who had devoured the demon, who had destroyed the only hope Lymsie had of solving her problems, and the sister who was rumored to have been resurrected from certain death, beyond anything anyone had done before, the half-foot who ran the adventurer’s union, at the side of royalty? It was so unbelievable that Lymsie had to uncover the truth of it all.

The sister of the king, the one who the most fantastical and obviously false rumors had claimed to be a dragon, was clearly the center of what had happened, and Lymsie knew she had to reach her. If rumors of her death were in any way true, she was the key to everything Lymsie desired.

Sneakily, she began to worm her way upward. With her money, it wasn’t hard to establish herself among the elite half-foots, and though she had no real interest in adventuring, she joined the half-foot’s guild, happy to pay their fees if it meant she could learn more about the mysterious leader who supposedly had ties to the king.

Asking around, it became clear, the rumors were true. He indeed knew the king and his mysterious sister. Waiting for her moment, one day, it happened. A woman walked into the guild while the leader was there, and Lymsie knew instantly, this was the mysterious sister of the king.

Mana radiated off of her like a flame radiated heat, and her eyes were a sight that sent Lymsie off, her predatory gaze giving her an unnatural and threatening aura. Lymsie watched as the union leader talked with the dragon woman, something that Lymsie had no choice now but to believe was true.

Lymsie couldn’t interrupt, but she now knew her target. She would talk to this woman. Discover the secrets she had hiding that had summoned the demon into this world. She approached the union’s leader warily, approaching the subject as casually as she could; was that the king’s sister? Were the rumors true?

She kept it as light and airy as she could, that this was mere gossip to her. The leader was cagey, unwilling to give up any information of substance, as he rightly pointed out it was none of her business. 

Realizing she had nothing more she could learn from the leader, she watched as the woman left the union and slipped out as well, staying as far as she could from the very obviously dangerous girl while still keeping her in eyesight, she was surprised to see the king’s sister stop to talk excitedly with another woman… or at least, she assumed she was a woman, given she had so little experience with orcs, she wasn’t sure.

She waited until the king’s sister was long gone, and walked up to speak with the orc woman.

The woman (my friend @vacamariposa’s OC! Thanks for letting me borrow her) introduced herself to Lymsie as Vur, and Lymsie suddenly realized that she had heard rumors about an orc working at the castle, something that many of the Golden Kingdom’s inhabitants found relevant for reasons that Lymsie very deliberately didn’t want to know.

As Lymsie tried to play her usual weaselly and evasive probing game, she found that the orc woman happily would gossip about the dragon woman, whose name was apparently Falin, and about any topic that Lymsie asked. Asking about Falin gave her a veritable wave of information, as Vur was apparently friends with the woman, and she got to hear outlandish stories of how the kingdom’s first feast was apparently made with the body of the dragon that Falin had been transformed into.

But what was more interesting to learn wasn’t anything about Falin, but rather came up when Lymsie asked how on earth a woman could have ended merged with a dragon; she learned of another woman she had never heard of before, an elf named Marcille.

Apparently, there was another mage the kingdom had besides the lunatic, and what was most interesting to Lymsie was how the orc gossiped of the elf’s strange obsessions with ancient magic; neuroses that landed dangerously close to her own.

Though Vur didn’t know her nearly as well as Falin, she still was able to tell Lymsie where she could find this mysterious elf, though Lymsie privately wondered if she should have been so willing to divulge these things to her, she thanked Vur and prepared to meet this mysterious Marcille woman.

Which lead to the fated meeting between minds who, by all rumors, would have to agree. Lymsie woke up early in the morning and headed to the castle. Being a half-foot made sneaking in perhaps easier than it had any right to be and definitely was because they assumed anyone who’d have problems with Marcille would be likely to be another elf, but in the end all it took was some minor trespassing on castle grounds.

And, as Lymsie knocked on the door, she was greeted by the surprisingly unassuming face of the mage who had apparently brought the demon to the surface, and introduced herself as a researcher of ancient magic.

“I sincerely apologize for my actions as lord of the dungeon!” were the first words out of Marcille’s mouth, at the same time as Lymsie asked “Are you still pursuing your research?”, answering her question in a way Lymsie truly hadn’t expected.

What do you mean, you’re sorry? You perform feats of magic that I’ve been dreaming of my whole life, and you’re apologizing!? Lymsie couldn’t believe it! And, alternatively, neither could Marcille!

Marcille, flustered in her usual manner, asked how on earth Lymsie could see what she did as a good thing; all the damage the demon caused and all the lives ruined weighed heavy on her mind.

Lymsie responded that Marcille’s mission, the one she had summoned the demon for, was the most noble cause that she could think of, one that she herself pursued; the secrets of immortality.

Marcille responded, no, you don’t understand, immortality is a curse, watching your friends grow old and die around you, you lose all sense of self, she’s seen it happen!

Lymsie scoffs, of course, how expected of an elf to think of how it feels to outlive someone; newsflash, asshole, she doesn’t want to be outlived either. Marcille sputters in confusion and anger and slams the door in Lymsie’s face.

Well. That could have gone better. Lymsie isn’t giving up, she decides, and she’s back the next day, knocking on Marcille’s door, and shoving her foot in the door before Marcille can slam it in her face. Marcille snaps at the half-foot, why can’t you understand that it’s wrong to decide someone else’s lifespan for them!?

Lymsie spits back that it’s awful convenient for her then, that Marcille is doing just that by hiding the research she had worked on from the world! This back and forth goes on for hours, Lymsie getting more and more infuriated by how Marcille doesn’t seem to grasp the potential she abandoned, while Marcille grows more and more conflicted.

Everything Marcille thought she had learned over her journey, flashing before her eyes; the acceptance she had felt she had over death was slipping away, clawed from her tooth and nail by Lymsie’s acerbic arguments.

Marcille began to doubt, really, as they argued, whether or not she really was as over it all as she thought; she knew that her friends said that the secret to a long life was simply eating well, exercising and staying healthy, but her father had done that, and she still vividly recalled how he had withered away in front of her despite his supposed ‘health’. All the health in the world couldn’t erase the simple fact that death was inevitable.

Lymsie could tell her rhetoric was working, she didn’t necessarily understand the intricacies of Marcille’s neuroses, but she could see Marcille faltering, the elf not being one to hide her emotions on her face.

As the arguments continued, Marcille lost much of the acidity in her retorts; part of how she knew that her quest to conquer death was wrong was that the citizens of the Golden Kingdom already had immortality, and they had become miserable and listless over the thousand years the kingdom remained buried.

Lymsie counters that many of the citizens returned to the surface and had resumed their lives, though now aging, clearly they weren’t miserable anymore. Maybe, just maybe, they were miserable because they were trapped in a single place under the watchful eye of a lunatic who took any complaint and punished them severely for speaking out of turn; perhaps that had something to do with it?

Marcille couldn’t deny the sense that Lymsie was making, but ultimately, her friends didn’t want to live forever, they wanted to grow old and die, as much as that frightened Marcille, it wasn’t her right to decide for them that they should live alongside her; she couldn’t use the demon to make versions of them that would stay with her forever, that’s what she had learned.

Well, Lymsie huffed, that’s all fine and good for them, they can die all they want for all she cares. Marcille gasps in offense, but Lymsie presses on; you’re right, you don’t get to decide who lives or who dies or for how long. But why can’t she decide for herself? Why does she just have to accept her lifespan? Can’t there be some middle ground here? 

Marcille feels a little pit in her stomach, realizing that she agrees. She’s terrified of that fact, though, terrified of falling into the habits and allure of the demon; and then Lymsie counters, why do we have to use the demon? Why can’t we research a way to live longer using the magic that already exists? Falin had been saved, hadn’t she?

How come Falin deserves to live and Lymsie’s parents don’t? As Lymsie asks that, Marcille’s heart breaks. She sees the despair on Lymsie’s face and recognizes it intimately. Lymsie explains, finally, a little softer, manipulatively; her parents are old, and she wants to spend as much time as she can with them. It’s not fair that she doesn’t have much longer with them.

As Marcille’s eyes begin to water, Lymsie realizes she might have gone too far, even as her rhetoric clearly worked, she clearly touched something deep inside Marcille she hadn’t known would hit.

Marcille sighs; she says  needs some time to think this over, and shuts the door on Lymsie, who isn’t sure if she’s won or lost this argument, as she realizes she has tears on her face as well.

Marcille spends the night ruminating on everything Lymsie said; she had always thought of the difference between lifespans from the perspective of outliving everyone she knew. She had never thought about what it would feel like to be someone on the other side of the equation; living your life knowing there were things you could never do or see, because there simply wasn’t enough time.

Marcille had always seen the length of her life as a curse, as a burden she had to carry, but seeing someone who saw it as a blessing… she had never encountered that before.

Even with how King Delgal had feared death so much that it had become forbidden in his kingdom under Thistle, she had seen that as simply an obstacle to Falin’s resurrection, background dressing to an adventure and nothing more.

She knew what she had to do.

The next morning, Lymsie shows up at Marcille’s door, and instead of having to force her way in, Marcille opens the door and invites her in. Please, why don’t we have breakfast together, so we can discuss our research together?

Lymsie gasps, she can’t help but reach for Marcille’s hand and shakes it as hard as she can. Oh, thank you thank you thank you, so so so much! She knows they can do it! You were a powerful enough mage to resurrect a woman from only bones, she’s heard!

Marcille is, admittedly disconcerted how much Lymsie apparently knows about her adventure, but that’s not important, she can find that out.

Now, Lymsie and Marcille work together to find a way to equalize and extend lifespans, for the shorter lived races first, but even elves; everyone in the world deserves to have the choice to live as long as they want; healing magic should theoretically be capable of this; if they can bring people back from the dead, there’s no reason that they should just have to accept old age.

In the end, they may or may not succeed, I haven’t decided. But they certainly contribute to the nascent field of what is known as “science”, magic written down for the masses, when previously science was the domain of elves alone, and they test the boundaries of medical magic together.

Lymsie doesn’t get along very well with any of the other members of the main cast; she blames them for how Marcille was almost convinced of the divine right of longer lived races to rule over the shorter lived ones, and while Marcille protests that framing, that’s really what it boils down to, right?

Longer lived races just deserve to live longer, the shorter lived races just have to accept their fate; nobody should try to change those facts, because what if I personally like shitting myself and dying?

… yeah, Lymsie still isn’t a very polite woman. She knows Falin is important to Marcille, and she’ll act civil enough around her as long as the subject of their research never comes up. And the less said about the rest of the group, the better. Their dynamic with Lymsie is… volatile, much like her personality.

As well, the dubious spy work that she did to infiltrate the castle eventually earns her heat from the vizier, Kabru, but it’s not exactly her problem they had prepared for elves and received one angry little half-foot, she says. Kabru is simply incensed that such an egregious gap in their security existed in the first place. What if Lymsie had ill intent?… did Lymsie have ill intent? He still isn’t sure, but it’s Marcille’s choice to work with her at all, not his.

Essentially, Lymsie is my answer to the ending of Dungeon Meshi and the failings I think it has. I don’t hate everything about the ending, I truly think almost every other aspect of it is perfect, even defeating the demon itself. I just resent the framing of how equality between the races is seen as a bad thing; and no, they don’t frame it that way, but that’s what it comes down to, isn’t it?

If a real life ethnic group had a life expectancy a tenth of the upper class, that would be considered the gravest injustice in the world; hell, to a certain extent, life expectancy is a matter of class; the rich can buy their health while the poor suffer and die, when we have the technology for that not to be the case!

I understand that I’m taking fictional worldbuilding entirely too seriously, but I find it fun, so I’m going to do it! This is my podium and you all are my audience to preach politics.

Lymsie’s design is inspired by several characters, though surprisingly not Frodo Baggins, despite appearances. Her hair was inspired by Barbara and Barbie from a manga called Shadows House, as well as a little bit of Rei from Persona. One aspect you may notice is that she has the same white eyes as Marcille, something IIRC no other character has, to symbolize that she sees the world in the same way as Marcille! Her outfit was inspired by the uniform of the magic academy Marcille and Falin went to, but with different sleeves, because I couldn’t figure out how to make them looked swamped on her. Maybe someday I’ll be brave enough to try long sleeves. Her clothes meant to look somewhat baggy on her, like they’re made for a child of a different race, not her size.

A lot of her personality was inspired by a specific song; “Show Me The Way” by Billy Talent; despite the song not necessarily being meant as being about the inescapable inevitability of death and only mentioning it in passing. It also works with her dynamic with Marcille, like, I can see an animatic in my head of it; I’d go into it further, but the post here is already so long that I think I’ll just save it for another time.

[luvvyd0vey]

Fanfiction has absolutely ruined traditional books for me in the best and worst ways possible;

It’s made my expectations of the pace and amount of dopamine I should get from each and every scene skyrocket

It’s made me grow addicted to basically being able to find the exact very specific concept I crave at any moment because all I have to do on websites like Ao3 is put in the pairing or fandom and the tags I want and I can scroll however long I want until I find something that really peaks my interest, especially cause I have the luxury of passing by fics that don’t grab my attention and run away with it

Not only that but the long wait you have after hearing about a book and having to order it into your local library which could take weeks and so either a) the anticipation is building and so you either thoroughly enjoy the book or are greatly disappointed or b) by the time you get the book you are much less enthralled about it and instead of being really into it and are really just reading it for the fact you had to wait so long for it - but with fanfiction as soon as you read the tags and summary (not only can you see the amount of views, likes, comments, words and chapters) the excitement is already there and you are hit with rush after rush of dopamine.

And if the fic turns out to be disappointing or unfinished, it’s quite likely you can find a very similar fic to fulfil your needs almost immediately so you don’t stay disappointed for long.

And you get to directly interact with the fic writer which on its own I love.

Fanfic writers always have just so much love for their fic and you can often see that in their work, which with a lot of traditional writers it seems like they are dragging themselves to finish it off.

And it’s super easy to get into a fic whether or not you’re in a fandom as often you don’t really need much knowledge on the cannon material, but if you do and loved it then that strong emotional connection to characters is prebuilt, whilst with traditional writers they have to build that up which is where a lot of books fall flat, whereas if a fic writer made the same mistake then it’s okay because you already know the character from the original material.

The most mid quality fanfics often beat what I would consider 4 star books.

Also when I first discovered fanfic just so happened to be the time I was going through my first book slump (which then lasted 7 years) and I don’t know if the rush I got from fic only encouraged my book slump or if it would have lasted this long anyway, but it definitely raised my expectations and made slow-starting books difficult to bring myself to open.

Also a lot of my favourite writing concepts are things entirely found in fanfiction or just little stories/oneshots I read here on tumblr and NEVER in official published books. And if there ARE hints of them in traditional books they are usually minimal and badly written, and/or almost completely ignored in favour of smut.

And that goes onto my next point which is in fics, I know what I’m getting into before I even click on it; I’m immediately shown what type of content I’m about to consume (as in rating, the pairing(s), if there’s smut or hurt/comfort or what) whereas with books I often have to really dig to find out what sort of content is in it without buying the book and seeing the content warnings on the first few pages, which is an issue if you are trying to avoid a smut scene which was in no way hinted at in the blurb.

My main reason to try get back into traditional books is reading new content with new characters, be able to talk about it with my family (without having to explain the concept of fanfiction), and maybe possibly to put on display in my home.

But as I’ve been picking up books to read, I’m realising how much fanfic has raised my expectations for writing and having the best pick for whatever storyline I’d like and have come to the conclusion it has honestly ruined me, and possibly my attention span.

I don’t know

I’ll probably post several more-coherent posts about this later but for now enjoy my raw thoughts.

[aldercaps]

14, 19, and 20 for end of year asks!

14: Favorite book you read this year?

i cant remember if i read it this year but ANNIHILATION!!!!! jeff vandermeer i love you. i finished authority recently and am loving what i have read of acceptance so far.

19: What’re you excited about for next year?

🎉🎉TOP SURGERY!! 🎉🎉 IF everything goes according to plan i will hopefully be getting it next year! nervewracking because its a major surgery but also this is something ive thought about every day for so many years. absolutely no thanks to my GP she sucks ass and is completely useless i had to do all the work myself.

20: What’s something you learned this year?

etching!! in my printmaking class earlier this year we covered some printmaking techniques but my favourite was probably the etching. the process of printing with it is very meditative- rubbing in the ink, wiping it off with mull, putting it through the press. playing around with plate tone was also delightful.

here are two of the etchings i made! tumblr has ruined the quality, please click on them :'(

[interroblog]

(a colored sketch of four characters. from left to right there’s Gene who has dyed green hair and an orange jacket, Casper who has long flowing hair and pale skin, Saint who wears round sunglasses and a simple T shirt, and Tab who has curly orange hair and snakebite piercings.)

(tumblr compressed the hell out of this, click for higher quality)

It’s far past time to introduce the main characters for the moon book (intro) so I can finally talk about them! I’ll be sharing plenty more about them as I develop the story now, but here’s some basics for now.

Saint 🌙 19, he/him, 4w5, ENFP, the protagonist!

Saint has a rich creativity and passion for storytelling. He loves to play piano and sing, the latter of which he’s supernaturally good at. He’s not very talkative and doesn’t share his stories often, but whenever he does there’s a gravity to his voice that pulls listeners in.

Saint’s best and only friends are Tab and Gene, but sometimes he feels like they’re just humoring him. He feels like an outsider around anyone except himself.

Because of a medical condition, Saint has periods where his senses are dulled to the point where he can’t perceive the outside world. So he turns inward. That’s what caused him to have such a weak sense of belonging, as well as surround himself with stories.

Tab 🪐 19, they/them, 3w2, ESTJ 🏳️‍⚧️

Tab loves academia and used to excel in every class- until their senior year. They’ve got a great memory and will happily learn and repeat back information all day, but the second the advanced classes they took got into more abstract ideas, they started failing. They can be inflexible, stubborn, and a bit blunt, but damn if they don’t get things done.

Now they’re retaking their senior year, which has ruined their hopes of getting into a good college. That was, until they met Casper who got them into the supernatural and ghosthunting… if they can find concrete proof of the things that exist beyond earth, they’d be able to get into whatever college they want.

Tab has a lot of friends that come and go, but the closest to their heart are Saint and Gene. They also have a rotating cast of passions, but their most consistent are history and guitar- which they learned to spend more time with their friends by starting a band.

Gene 💫 17, he/him, 9w8, INFP 🏳️‍⚧️

For most of his life, Gene has neatly fit into the persona of a quiet nerdy academic that the world projected onto him. But as he’s growing up, he’s starting to realize it doesn’t fit as well anymore. He’s an idealist with strong values, and a deep optimism + compassion. He’s young, he’s still growing into himself! He wants to change the world!

Now he’s just been accepted into a fancy college that’s sure to lead to a promising tech career. The only problem is, it’s across the country and he’s starting to feel a growing unease about leaving his friends behind to sit behind a desk taking orders from a boss for the rest of his life.

Gene adores his brother, Saint, and he’s been friends with Tab since they were kids. He plays the drums in their band and follows Tab around on all their adventures.

Casper ⚡️ 22, he/her, 7w6, ???? 🏳️‍⚧️

Casper is a high energy person who loves to experience new things, meet new people, do everything she can regardless of how good of an idea it may be. He’s always doing something with his hands; that means fiddling around with technology and more recently, crocheting.

After getting to a bad accident, Casper’s soul left her body. But before her body died, it replaced that soul with a rogue bit of cosmic dust that was similar enough to work as a replacement. He’s doing his best to recover as fast as possible so he can go back to his normal life, but it’s becoming harder and harder to pretend that’s an option. Casper isn’t able to do many of the things she used to, she doesn’t even feel like the same person anymore…

Meanwhile, the person that became her new soul isn’t pleased about this situation, either. Being stuck in a body is horribly limiting, their similar feelings of frustration bleed together and make the separation of the two even harder to maintain. But that’ll all be fine if they just ignore it :’)

Powehi 🌟???, it, 7w6

Powehi is an alien, the intangible manifested consciousness of humanity’s collective voice. It dives from body to body, seeing the world through earthling eyes until it stayed too long in Casper’s dying body and was trapped. It thinks very highly of itself and the things it can do, so to be condensed down to such a limiting form is… difficult. It’s mostly been sulking and ignoring everything.

Saint is its favorite earthling, so it blessed him with a piece of its power and visits him in his dreams. It hasn’t been able to do that recently, and even though Saint doesn’t realize Powehi is more than a figment of his imagination, he cares for it and is starting to get worried.

Powehi never had a name before meeting Saint, it’s usually just called the Voice.

[geules-de-loup]

*ೃ༄ ꒰ ᴀʟᴇᴀ ɪᴀᴄᴛᴀ ᴇꜱᴛ . . .

My first try at doing more complex art

(Tumblr ruining the quality again so click for a better view)

[shima-draws]

Idk why im doing this but I just wanna say you're a huge inspiration for me hence why I started my art account on here and other medias! Though a quick question, how do I not make like tumblr or like instagram not ruin the quality of my art/drawings? I don't know how to fix it and I just want a clear clean image to show off my art in its truest form.

🥺 Omg...I'm so happy to hear that anon, good for you!!

I know tumblr is a bit more lenient with picture quality? At least from my experience. It might show up a bit blurry on the dashboard but if you click on the image it should be in full resolution there.

As for Instagram, I use the Imgur app to upload all my full res art to a private folder so I can easily download it to my phone and upload straight to IG from there. Unfortunately IG is a bit more picky with that; there's this app called SquareFit that I use to resize my art and make sure IG doesn't cut off the borders of anything.

If anybody else has more knowledge on the subject feel free to chime in! Wishing you the best of luck with your online art journey, anon 💕

[bells-art-blog]

A paid commission I just finished! The person I worked for was so sweet and wonderful! This was a $10 com. This is NOT MY CHARACTER, PLEASE DO NOT USE, REPOST OR TAKE INSPIRATION FROM THEIR LOVELY CHARACTER! That being said, please click for better quality 😔 tumblr ruins it a little lol

[transmonstera]

In regards to your posts about ao3 and how vile it is in actuality, I wanna say thank you. I've not put much thought into the website I've been using but this has put things into perspective. I no longer want my work (work that I am proud of) on a website like that. Ao3 doesn't align with my values and I'm assuming many other people's who use the site.

Do you have any suggestions on a better site everyone can use?

(Side note: I absolutely adore your work!)

sure thing!

while there are no websites quite like ao3 in terms of filtering, curation, bookmarks, likes/comments etc there are a few alternatives out there!

Wattpad - I know people make fun of this one because it's where all the rpf for bands went back in the day but it is still operating and many people use it so you'll likely just switch viewers from ao3 to wattpad pretty seamlessly

Tumblr - you can always post directly on here! there is a character limit i believe of 4k so it's great for showing previews or even cutting up a small fic into parts 1, 2, 3, etc. a little clunky but it's an option if you only write short stuff! (Twitter threads can even be an option for this though again, a lil restrictive and works better for super short works!)

Google Docs + Linktree - if you have a linktree account you can always just link a view only (make sure people can't edit!) google doc of the fic! having the fics on a linktree still give people the ability to see all of your work in one place, and you can even see on linktree the click statistics for each fic! while it doesn't give the reader the ability to like/comment, you can always encourage those who do like it to leave a message on your tumblr!

Discord (or any groupchat tbh!) - similar to above you can always set up a discord server and post your fics view docs links there! it gives a curated experience and you can see the comments of people directly in the server

AO3 has seemingly made people believe that each and everyone one of their fan creations must be thrown out into the void where you hope everyone sees it and loves it. I think this has really stifled people's abilities to truly be creative in terms of making content of their favourite medias (and even with transitioning to making original work!) because you may subconsciously be adhering the current trends and whatnot of everyone else, even if you don't really like it yourself! I mean look at how common modern/high school aus still are today when I have yet to meet anyone who actually likes them. Look at how many books that have been published lately that painfully follow AO3 tag systems, where they don't even havea blurb anymore and instead just have "friends to lovers meet blah blah blah! read it now!". (Not to mention the quality of the books being published is fucking atrocious)

AO3 has ruined publishing and I am being entirely serious about that.

But back to where you wanna go with your fics now. Don't be afraid to restructure how you interact with your hobbies! It doesn't have to be so exposed and vulnerable to anyone and everyone having their say on it. I used to participate massively in fandom and I'll be honest, it made me miserable. I constantly felt like I couldn't keep up, that my ideas were wrong because another idea was more popular, and I really struggled. So I took about a hundred steps back and only interact with the media I like through my friends who also like it! And it's a lot better! You may not get hundreds and thousands of likes on fics from here on out if that's what you're used to, but I guarantee you'll have more meaningful interactions that you actually hold dear to you far more than any "a guest has left a kudos on your work" notification.

(Also just a pre-emptive thing of anyone who wants to defend AO3 on this post because "it's an integral part of fandom!" or "they need that much money because they run a site with no ads!", or you want to try and tell me that the fics on there are fine because it's fiction regardless of what the fics is (including literal fucking CSAM), just know you are completely unserious and I don't value a single thing you say. So don't even try it. How about you donate to a marginalised person's mutual aid for the first time in your life and you'll calm down.)