#underachieving choices ......

[dendrochronologies]

three sentences attacking me with hammers, from last week's ask polly

[mayoiayasep]

aira literally any kairikibear song cover when

[cagedchoices]

OLD TIMEY COWBOY CREATOR

this isn't part of a dash game or anything i just wanted to mess around with a rough approximation of how i picture caleb might look in a western setting 🤠

[cagedchoice]

i'm looking at my old canon timeline bc i wanna redo it and add it to my carrd and just aaaahhhh the storytelling

March 20th, 2031 - Caleb's mother, struggling with undiagnosed schizophrenia, abandons him at a diner in downtown Los Angeles. Caleb is 8 years old.

February 19th, 2037 - Start of Second Russian Civil War. Caleb is 14 years old at the time.

April 17th, 2039 - Solomon build is first initiated by innovators Jean-Mi and Engerraud Serac. At this time, Caleb would be 16.

July 4th, 2040 - Caleb, at 17 years old, gets into a car accident involving alcohol. He breaks his arm.

December 22nd, 2042 - Caleb enlists in the US military.

[welcometothejianghu]

Welcome to another round of W2 Tells You What You Should See, where W2 (me) tries to sell you (you) on something you should be watching. Today's choice: 沙海/Tomb of the Sea/Sand Sea.

Sand Sea is the 2018 installment of the DMBJ/Lost Tomb franchise, which tells the story of the search for an ancient desert city, a fight against a secretive assassin family, the raiding of more than a couple tombs, and a whole bunch of other action-packed bullshit.

Have you ever watched an anime adaptation that outran the as-yet-incomplete manga it was adapting, necessitating it throw together a largely befuddling ending based on the available clues? That's Sand Sea. At time of production, only ~75% of the Sand Sea novel had been written. As I am making this post, that's still all of the Sand Sea novel that has been written. I finished watching the show and had a lot of questions about its loose ends. I read the book. It didn't help.

So, I'm not going to try and summarize the story, much less try to sell you on the show on the strength of the plot. What I am going to try and do is convince you it's a good time anyway.

As I mentioned earlier, it's part of a larger franchise, but you shouldn't let that stop you from diving in here. Most of the DMBJ shows and books are narrated by Wu Xie, the series' special little birthday boy. Sand Sea takes a different tack -- your main POV characters are completely new to the world of the tombs, meaning that the show explains things to you while it's explaining things to them. Wu Xie's still a major character, but you're seeing him through the eyes of a befuddled teenager who wasn't even supposed to be here today.

I'm going to give you five reasons to watch this series, and all five of them are relationships. I'm pitching it to you this way because, as was the case in my rec for Reunion (one of the other tomb-raiding dramas), I'm assuming you have zero familiarity with DMBJ, which means that any appeals to the larger franchise or its twists and turns will have no impact. Instead, I am here to sell this to you on the strength of character interactions. If you're interested in what the characters are doing, the plot will come.

1. Dudes Rock

The aforementioned teenager narrator is Li Cu, a too-cool-for-school underachiever who lives with his abusive father and has no direction in life. He comes with his two best (and only) friends: earnest pushover Su Wan and neighborhood bully Yang Hao.

They're a trio of problem children who cannot succeed by the metrics of society at large: Li Cu and Yang Hao are both from family circumstances that have hampered their ability to perform academically, while Su Wan, bless his heart, is just not that bright. They do, however, all do well when put in situations that play to their strengths and given appropriate mentorship. (Alas that all of their mentors are terrible people; see point 4.)

They're set up as an intentional next-generation parallel to the Iron Triangle, which is the term DMBJ uses for Wu Xie and his two closest people. Normally, the Iron Triangle would be the core of a DMBJ story -- but since that threesome is broken by Circumstances at the moment, these boys become the substitute triad whose friendship is one of the main bonds holding the narrative together.

They have such teenage boy dynamics, it's great. They're stupid about girls and alcohol and money and homework and all the other things teen boys are stupid about, while also being stupid enough to get themselves entangled in shadowy international conspiracies. Huge parts of the plot are fueled entirely by their dumbass decisions. But they also barely have any competent adult supervision in their lives, so you know, when you're seventeen and basically feral, renting a warehouse so you can beat a bunch of frozen snakes to death actually sounds like a good solution to the problem at the time.

It's not all comedy, though. Li Cu and Yang Hao in particular are deeply traumatized young men even before the story starts, and events of the series make it worse. They're definitely the "feelings are for girls!" type of young men, and they need Su Wan there as their eternally bippy buffer. When he's not, they can get mean.

What's also charming about this trio is that they're all pretty darn straight. In a franchise chock full of (unintentional?) homoeroticism, these three manage to keep their platonic dude dynamics pretty platonic. I mean, I myself come at most things with slash-colored glasses on, and even I'm of the opinon that they're befuddled heterosexuals struggling with how the entire tomb-raiding industry's gay. And even if you assume everyone in this entire show is straight, these boys are still going to get a bunch of real-time lessons in how to love other people, whether they like it or not!

So if you like a Teen Boy Squad of goobers who don't want to admit they're close or have emotions or anything like that, right up until they're all each other have, this may be just the thing for you.

2. The Only Good Het in the Tombs

DMBJ is not known for its high-quality heterosexual romance, to put it mildly. Most of the time, it makes the smart decision to not even try. When it does, you mostly wish it hadn't.

Therefore, you cannot imagine how shocked I was to find myself falling head-over-heels for the incredibly weird canonical love story between horny hot mess Dr. Liang Wan and emotionally constipated 80-year-old virgin and arsonist Zhang Rishan.

Their relationship goes a little something like this: He needs something from her, so he contrives a plan to ask her out. She declares him her boyfriend. He continues the relationship in order to continue getting things from her. She thinks he's hot, so she's fine with that. He warns her that continuing their relationship will involve messing with some very bad members of the Tomb-Raiding Industrial Complex. She's like, again, you're incredibly hot, so that's not a problem. He makes her memorize maps and sends her to a desert. She dresses up like him and pepper-sprays him. And somewhere in the midst of all that, he falls for her and she gets sick of his shit, and they wind up for-real dating as equals.

Part of what's so delightful about their relationship is how awful they are to one another. It'd be bad if that awfulness were one-sided, but man, they each give as good as they get. He's heartless and exploitative, and she's neurotic and insecure. She makes constant demands of him that he's almost too confused by to refuse, and he keeps putting her in situations no sane person should want to be part of. He comes from a cutthroat world of complete bastards, while she wears her heart on her sleeve whether she wants to or not. They're extremely good for one another, because he trusts her competencies and is going to make her demonstrate every one of them, while one of her chief skills is calling him on his bullshit.

It is at this point I need to sing the praises of Liang Wan, hottest of the hot messes. She's one of the principal POV characters for the novel, where she's just as boy-crazy (though for a different boy, because Zhang Rishan's not in this book) and just as far in over her head. The adaptation has absolutely done her character justice. What makes Liang Wan so charming to me is how much she absolutely refuses to let herself be stopped by being completely out of her depth. She doesn't know what the hell is going on most of the time, but fuck it, she's rolling with it. She's just also going to be applying moisturizer and anti-aging serum the entire time, because you know what, sometimes when your whole world is falling apart around you, the one thing you can count on is your skincare routine.

Zhang Rishan is surrounded by people so cool, butter doesn't melt in their mouths. He can be balls-out naked in front of them without batting an eyelash. It is her thirsty disaster charms alone that have set fire to his frozen heart. I love them to bits.

3. Enemies to ... ???

This is Sand Sea's Wu Xie. You're not going to like him at first, because he spends the first several episodes tormenting a teen who only mildly seems to deserve it. What you find out as the show goes on is that Wu Xie is having a bad time -- more than that, he's having a straight-up bad decade. He has taken a lot of psychic damage and decided to cope with it by being absolutely insane. He's a bitch with no sense of self-preservation living in constant gremlin mode. He is no longer under the active supervision of his husbands, and he's going to make that everyone else's problem.

The show chooses to start out by inflicting Wu Xie on a bunch of strangers through an arc that's bizarre, lengthy, and mostly completely unrelated to the larger plot. It does introduce a few elements that will matter, though, and one of them is Su Nan.

When Su Nan appeared as the badass head of a mercenary outfit, I was braced for one (or both) of two things to happen. Thing one, I figured she'd die or otherwise leave the narrative after the first arc, which made me not want to get attached to her, if she wasn't going to stick around. Thing two, I was all but certain the show was going to try and make her Wu Xie's love interest, which made me make such a face, because [see last point].

Neither happens. Su Nan is still around in the final episode, and what she becomes to Wu Xie is much, much more interesting.

They're not friends. They're never friends. They can't be friends, because they absolutely can't trust one another. Except sometimes they have to trust one another, and in return they have to allow themselves to be trustworthy.

In the last relevant chapter or so of the novel, Wu Xie gets his throat cut and shoved off a cliff ... and because the novel isn't finished, we have no idea why that happened or who did it. The drama decides that when he goes over that cliff this time, throat unslit, Su Nan needs to go with him. This means they spend much of the later part of the series depending on one another for survival, getting real vulnerable, sharing trauma, and occasionally fucking one another over anyway, because they are both bad and untrustworthy people.

And they're ... kinda into one another? But because it's not textual, it winds up being great. If the show had tried to write their romance, I would have hated it. Instead, it chooses to leave things fraught and unspecified, with the two of them obviously having a lot of feelings but not even knowing themselves what all those feelings are, much less how to react appropriately to them. That is delicious. Pour that right into my mouth.

I also choose to interpret Su Nan as being transfemme (complimentary), if only because that's the most charitable explanation for her dedication to keeping her tits out and her lipstick game sharp even in wilderness conditions.

4. This Man Should Not Be Trusted With Children

As I mentioned before, all members of the Teen Boy Squad wind up paired with adult men who act as their mentors. Li Cu and Wu Xie are the main duo, since they're the main character of this show and the main character of the entire franchise, respectively. Yang Hao winds up in an even more abusive dynamic with a bitch of a man who takes advantage of Yang Hao's capacity for rage. But precious baby Su Wan is lucky enough to be adopted by, well...

If you read my rec for Reunion, you will recognize him as the guy I called "this giant fucking loser" with all the affection in the world. Hei Xiazi is both the worst and the best, which makes him the perfect man to take care of the tender soul that is Su Wan.

Su Wan's a poor little rich boy who is happy to be bullied by his friends, because it means he has friends! He's a dipshit because he's sheltered by his family wealth, and he's also a dipshit because he'd be a dipshit no matter how much money he had. He needs someone to kick his ass in a way that builds him back up again and helps him make the transition from doormat to functional adult.

The circumstances that bring these two together are so batshit, they're not worth recounting here. Suffice it to say that as one adventure arc ends, Hei Xiazi is tasked with taking Su Wan home. Su Wan expresses interest in whatever Hei Xiazi's whole deal is, and Hei Xiazi responds by offering (in a roundabout way) lessons in what exactly his whole deal is.

Hei Xiazi is a terrible teacher, but he's a perfect teacher for Su Wan, who is the kind of boy who would go find the nearest dictionary if you told him the word "gullible" wasn't there. They're preciously weird at one another. The work so well together because Su Wan believes the best of everything, which leads him to see right past the parts of Hei Xiazi that other people (correctly) find inscrutable and offputting. With Hei Xiazi's questionable guidance, Su Wan finds for the first time in his naive, privileged life a goal for himself that is both achievable and worth the effort.

Later books give evidence that all three of the boys eventually go to work for Hei Xiazi, which I think is great, especially since he is somehow the least toxic and terrible of all the mentor characters. ...Man, though, that bar is low. It's a miracle anyone in DMBJ survives into adulthood.

It's also cute to think about how the boys are no doubt context-appropriately homophobic, because it's so easy to picture their respective reactions to finding out that their strong, terrible male role models are queer. Cue Li Ci and Yang Hao's respective no-homo freakouts, while Su Wan just has a million slightly offensive but ultimately well-meaning questions about how bisexuality works.

And I'm just going to say, if you watched the Untamed and loved Xue Yang? You owe it to yourself to see that actor suddenly become the sweetest little butterscotch muffin ever. ...Yes, if you didn't recognize him earlier, that's Wang Haoxuan, and he turns in an incredible comic performance here. Su Wan is consistently one of the funniest characters onscreen. The bit with the saxaphone kills me dead.

Anyway, unlike the first three relationships I've talked about here, this is one you have to wait a good long while for. Su Wan shows up in the first episode, Hei Xiazi appears about a dozen or so episodes later, but it takes their storylines much longer to cross. It's worth the wait, though, knowing that eventually you'll get to see these two weirdos bounce merrily off one another.

5. Everybody Loves Pangzi

This is the Iron Triangle I mentioned earlier. Obviously there's Wu Xie in the middle. The perfect boy in the hoodie is Xiao Ge, who is at the time of this series slightly stuck in what's basically a giant time-lock safe, so you're only ever going to see him in flashbacks. (Xiao Ge is trapped, so you can't have Xiao Ge.) And then, over there on the left is the man whose nickname translates to "fatty," Wang Pangzi.

Hold on to your butts, because I am now going to wax poetic about how much I love this fictional man.

Pangzi is the best. The best. He's funny. He's kind. He's got terrible taste in men and only slightly less terrible taste in women. He's a gentleman. He's the party shock absorber. He's prone to making things explode. He's impeccably dressed. He's charmingly superstitious. He's not subtle. He's got an excitable little stammer and an atrocious Beijing accent. He's a flexible fat man. He's the most fuckable person onscreen no matter who's onscreen with him.

He's also usually the DMBJ everyman character, except Sand Sea has a ton of everyman characters for a change, so he winds up filling the role of a badass insider instead. His job is basically to hold down the fort while Xiao Ge's indisposed and Wu Xie's off being insane. In the absence of both his beloveds, Pangzi's going to do what needs to be done, and he's going to be incredibly hot while he's doing it.

Usually, DMBJ shows serve up a huge amount of Pangzi and Wu Xie interaction. Sand Sea only puts them in the same room near the very end -- but they're collaborating throughout. In fact, the only way the whole story works is if they're basically so much in each other's back pockets that they can function as a single unit even across great distances. The record will show that I read them as husbands -- but more importantly, they're good friends who understand and trust one another completely. As much as it pains me that they're apart for basically the entire thing, they're never really apart, you know?

However, because Wu Xie is physically elsewhere for so much of the show, Sand Sea provides a unique chance to see Pangzi interacting on his own with other characters. Wu Xie is the special little boy who always takes up all the oxygen in the room -- and of course Pangzi doesn't begrudge him this, because Pangzi loves him. Without Wu Xie around, though, we get to watch all the other relationships Pangzi has cultivated over the years.

One of the best is with Xie Yuchen, a.k.a. Xiao Hua. In other series, we see the two interact, but only in the context of having Wu Xie around. Sand Sea presents us with a little window into what is clearly a longstanding friendship. From the tiny bit we get of their interactions, it's obvious they hang out on a pretty regular basis. They're chilling and having spa dates while their husbands are out there getting sandy and fighting snakes, proving that these two urbanites are absolutely the brains of their respective marriages.

...Hold up a second,

I hear you say,

IS this show actually gay? Because you keep using words like "husbands" and talking like it's intentionally, onscreen, boys-kissing-boys gay.

On the one hand, no.

On the other hand: Is Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid gay? Textually, taking it at face value, and especially considering the context in which it was made, no, it is absolutely not gay, nor was it meant to be gay. But when you step back and realize everything it's doing, you kind of can't avoid the really romantic implications. Maybe Butch and Sundance never smooch, maybe they don't even want to, but they're each other's other halves. We would instantly recognize what they are if one of them were a lady. In a narrative setting where gayness is unthinkable, nothing they can do can be gay, which loops around to making everything kinda gay, and ... look, I'm just saying, if Pangzi were a woman, we'd know immediately what she is to Wu Xie (and holy fuck she would be so hot). If Xiao Hua were as female as the opera characters he plays, we'd have no questions about her relationship to Hei Xiazi. Keep everything beat for beat, line for line the same, and there'd be no missing it.

This is something you get a lot with stories about men written by men, this unintentional homoeroticism from male authors who don't realize their misogyny has actually poisoned them against heterosexuality. Remember what I said earlier about DMBJ's regrettable het? So much of it stems from the assumption that getting a girl and a boy together will inevitably to romantic feelings from at least one of them, so there's no reason to bother spending time giving either of the participants any actual reasons to like one another. (Sand Sea does this too! Just with a character I haven't mentioned here, because I'm trying to talk about the good dynamics.) This kind of thinking treats women not as people, but as as basically interchangeable desirable objects. But men are people, which means the male characters' feelings are worth discussing in the narrative! So what you get is these well-developed, intimate relationships between men described in loving detail, sat right next to perfunctory heterosexual couplings -- and we're supposed to believe that one is romantic and one is not based solely on the genders of the participants? Yeah, no, I call bullshit.

And -- if you'll permit me to loop back to the boys for a minute -- we now have a model for how a straight Iron Triangle would behave, and it is not the way the actual Iron Triangle members are about one another. Those teens love one another in a way that is fierce and strong and not what Wu Xie, Pangzi, and Xiao Ge have going. Maybe it could become that, but it's not now. It's not better or worse now for being what it is, but it is different, and it makes by contrast some things very clear (and very queer).

So that is why I feel justified in referring to them as husbands and will continue to do so despite the lack of explicit textual support.

Anyway, back to Pangzi!

Where were we? Right, Xiuxiu!

Pangzi's always at his best when he gets to be a knight for someone he cares about. This time around, that's Huo Xiuxiu, who who only shows up after you've met several of her matriarchal family's other members, all of whom would be at home in a Tank Full Of Dangerous Ladies. Xiuxiu is not a fighter like they are, but she does have an object that means everyone's out to get her, and as such she relies on her Pangzi to keep her safe while she's trying to survive the fucked-up games her family is playing.

And Pangzi clearly loves it. He absolutely thrives on being the big brother/bruiser figure for her. He loves how cool it makes him look to her. He doesn't have Wu Xie around to be a tank for, so he's going to tank for her. In fact, he's even going to bring in reinforcements to help him do it. (What's the deal with the cute Tibetan boy? Look, shh, just appreciate that you've got a cute Tibetan boy.)

Then there's his dealings with the rest of the Tomb-Raiding Industrial Complex, who are a bunch of shady dudes with impressive family pedigrees and expensive suits, all of whom are trying to play twelve-dimensional chess with one another. There's going to be lots of names dropped, of families and of individuals, and the show is going to act like you're supposed to be impressed. And if you're familiar with DMBJ canon, yeah, you could be impressed! Or you could be like Pangzhi, who rolls up in his amazing Holstein shirt, not giving a single fuck what any of these rich bastards think about him.

This is actually some character development for Pangzi, who has in the past been cowed (pun unintended) by the wealthy, mostly due to his own financial situation. That stage of his life is over now. Honey badger has ceased to care. The cool, pretty people are going to try and give him shit, and he is impervious to it. You better believe the Iron Triangle trashed this fancy restaurant the last time they were in here, and if you give Pangzi half the chance, he'll fucking do it again.

No wonder Zhang Rishan likes him. A pair of little firestarters.

Don't let me oversell you on how much Pangzi is in Sand Sea, because he's not. There's maybe a dozen of the 52 episodes that have any Pangzi content, and he's only in small parts of those episodes. Pangzi is a rare and precious event, like an eclipse. Cherish the Pangzi moments and all the wonderful interactions contained within.

caveat: You call that an ending?

Buddy, if you'd seen how most other DMBJ series end, you wouldn't be asking me that. But because I'm assuming you haven't: Yes, I call that an ending, because it actually attempts to do a winddown and conclusion, instead of just wandering off on a cliffhanger. The ending isn't wholly satisfying, but it is an ending. There is a narrative, and that narrative concludes. Does the conclusion make sense and tie up all the loose ends? Absolutely not! But it does follow basic story structure and resolve the action semi-competently.

As I said about the sweet disaster that is Psych Hunter (which was also directed by the guy who did Sand Sea!), I think knowing in advance that an ending sucks makes the ending suck less. It removes the disappointment factor and lets you enjoy what is there, instead of making you grumpy about what isn't. No, you're never going to understand a lot of things. That means whatever you want to be true can be true. The book is unfinished. The series is nonsense. Canon has no hold on you. You are free.

As compensation, here's a picture of Xiao Ge without his shirt on.

Are you feeling like it's Tomb Time?

There are a couple places you can get this one! Try Viki, WeTV, this YouTube playlist (which is missing the first episode for some reason), or this YouTube playlist (which has the whole thing). Note that subtitles vary in quality from place to place. The YouTube versions also have the bizarre, amazing in-character commercials, and it's up to you if that's a plus or a minus for your viewing experience.

I love this bonkers show. It is balls-to-the-wall weird, to a point that will make you question the translation. I got to the part where Zhang Rishan explains that ancient people worshipped fish with snakes in their eyebrows, caught the fish, took out the snakes, and implanted the snakes in their own human eyebrows -- and I thought, surely that's not what he's actually saying. Nope! The subtitles are accurate. It's the show that's off its rocker.

Anyway, once you've watched Sand Sea, scroll down to the bottom of my rec post for Reunion and find out how you can get even deeper into said tombs! Trust me, there's a lot down here.

As those other posts would indicate, this would not be my first choice for how to get into DMBJ. It is, however, how a fair number of people have gotten into DMBJ, so what the hell do I know! Or maybe this post has convinced you that Sand Sea is worth watching, but you'd rather build up to it than go into it raw. That works too! Whenever you get to it, it'll be here: under a bunch of sand, tattooed and inexplicable, and extremely gay whether it knows it or not.

Go to the desert, they said. Find Gutongjing, they said. Solve the mystery, they said. Fuck it, we nap.

[danmei-action]

Danmei Gotcha for Gaza: Day 3 Update!

Attention danmei fans! Our fundraiser (link) has reached $470 USD for Palestine as of 8/3/2024 - thank you so much to all the prompters ⸜(｡˃ ᵕ ˂ )⸝♡

Notice: We've seen several donations that cover much more than the number of prompts requested! While this is great for our fundraisers, prompters can also use the extra money to request two types of "free" prompts; you can either leave "creator's choice" prompts where the creators are free to make whatever they like (specifying a fandom is optional), or donate prompts for fans who are unable to donate at the moment.

For example, if you want to make a $20 USD donation but only want to request a single SFW prompt for $5 USD, you can specify that you want to donate the other $15 as prompts for the rest of the fandom or let 1-3 SFW contributors pick what to create. You can also consider leaving creator's choice prompts for the fandoms listed below, since they have not received any prompts yet:

Brother | Da Ge (大哥)

Pure White Devil (纯白恶魔)

Drowning Sorrows in Raging Fire (烈火浇愁)

Itinerant Doctor | Youyi (游医)

Jin Se | 锦瑟

Nan Chan (南禅)

The Submissive Emperor | Jun Wei Xia (君为下)

The Wife is First | Qi Wei Shang (妻为上)

Drink, Drank, Drunk! | (千杯)

Global Examinations | 全球高考

Copper Coins | Tong Qian Kan Shi (铜钱龛世)

I Ship My Rival X Me | (我嗑了对家x我)

More under the cut:

City of Angels | (天使之城)

Legend of Exorcism | Tianbao Fuyao Lu (天宝伏妖录)

Dinghai Fusheng Records (定海浮生录)

Seizing Dreams | Duo Meng (夺梦)

Those Years In Quest Of Honour Mine (当年万里觅封侯)

AWM: PUBG | (AWM [绝地求生])

The #1 Pretty Boy of the Immortal Path (仙道第一小白脸)

First-Class Lawyer | Yi Ji Lushi (一级律师)

Judge | Pànguān (判官)

Wildhood Friends | Zhu Mu Lang Ma (竹木狼马)

Run Wild | Sa Ye (撒野)

Qing Kuang | (轻狂)

Antidote | Jie Yao (解药)

Wait for Me after School | 放学等我

PUBG Online Romance of the Century | (PUBG世纪网恋)

I Can Do It | (我行让我来)

Glory [e-sports] | Rong Guang (荣光[电竞])

My Underachieving Seatmate Doesn’t Need Any Comforting | (学渣同桌不需要安慰)

Game Loading | (游戏加载中)

How Did You Guys Become Boyfriends While Gaming | (你們打個遊戲��麼就交到男朋友了)

Fake Slackers | 伪装学渣

Beyond the Outline | (这题超纲了) *The Guy Inside Me

They All Say I've Met a Ghost | (他们都说我遇到了鬼)

After Marrying the Evil God | (和邪神結婚後)

After Being Forced to Marry the Evil Star General (被迫嫁给煞星将军后)

After Crossdressing and Provoking Long AoTian (女装招惹龙傲天后)

The Demon Venerable’s Wistful Desire | (魔尊他念念不忘)

After Crossing Through Ten Worlds, I Failed To Run Away | 穿越十个世界后我跑路失败了

Swallowing the Seas | Tun Hai (吞海)

Breaking Through the Clouds | Po Yun (破云)

Your Distance | Nĭ Dè Jù Lí (你的距离)

Is the Gentleman Feeling Alright? | jun you ji fou (君有疾否)

Encountering a Snake | Yu She (遇蛇)

You Boys Play Games Very Well | (你们男生打游戏好厉害哦~)

Waiting For You Online | (就等你上线了)

I’m Completely Clueless About Sockpuppet Accounts Being Unmasked [E-sports] | (被扒了马甲我一无所知[电竞])

That One Rich Fan of Mine | (我的那個有錢粉絲)

I Just Want To Be In A Relationship | (我就想谈个恋爱)

Heart has Ling Xi | (心有凌熙)

After Getting Gayified, I Swore Off Parody Mashups | (被gay后再也不敢鬼畜了)

Reborn with an Old Enemy on the Day of our Marriage | (和宿敌结婚当天一起重生了)

Transmigrated into the prince regent's beloved runaway wife | (穿成攝政王的侍愛逃妻)

After transmigrating into the book, I picked up the protagonist-shou | (穿书后我捡到了主角受)

Cold Sands | 漠上寒沙

I Know I'm About to Lose You | 我知道我快失去你了

Fanservice Paradox | 营业悖论

Fantasy Farm | Huanxiang Nongchang (不离)

The Emperor's strategy | (帝王攻略)

The Missing Piece | (貌合神离)

I'm using the interstellar live broadcast to raise cubs | (我在星际直播养崽)

Not in Vain | (不枉)

You use a gun, I use a bow (你们用枪我用弓[电竞])

I’m A Male Mom in a Nightmare Game |

I Like Your Pheromones | (我喜欢你的信息素)

Transmigrating Into The Heartthrob’s Cannon Fodder Childhood Friend | (穿成万人迷的炮灰竹马)

Pixiu Restaurant, No Way Out (貔貅饭馆，只进不出)

Mist [Unlimited] | 薄雾［无限］

[mbti-notes]

hi! im an entj and i wanted to know if you have any tips on how to be a better student whilst not thinking too much about grades or results. i feel like i place alot of emphasis on grades and results and i think it often hinders me at times. i often have trouble finding more ''meaning'' in my work and i'm not sure how to add more value into it other than achieving a good grade.

Your question is too vague because you haven't specified what level of schooling you're at and what your idea of a "better" student looks like. This "hinders you" how exactly? What is the exact nature or source of your discontent? What exactly are you aiming for? Without this context, it's hard to craft a response.

Did you know that professors in the US are witnessing a "literacy crisis" in their students that has never before been observed in the history of modern education? While there have always been unmotivated and underachieving students, nowadays, an alarming percentage of motivated students are barely able to handle more than ten pages of text at a time (the average assignment used to be 20-30 pages), nor are they able to analyze and comprehend the meaning, themes, or arguments being communicated in the text.

A literacy deficit poses a serious threat not just to the student's individual success, but also to the integrity of higher education and the functioning of society. Colleges have no choice but to "dumb down" their offerings over time. But more importantly, a successful democracy is difficult to sustain without intelligent and literate citizenry making sound judgments about complex social, political, and economic issues.

One obvious factor contributing to this problem is that many students have fallen behind due to the pandemic. Another obvious factor is the smartphone and the major role it has played in decimating people's attention spans. Extended focus and concentration are extremely important for learning, but endless internet scrolling trains the mind to expect rapid change and crave instant gratification. Yes, anyone who genuinely wants to be a good student should care deeply about the factors that hinder/inhibit their learning process. Increasingly, misuse of technology, such as smartphone addiction and excessive reliance on AI, is a major factor that prevents students from reaching their greater potential.

High school and college students are still in the early stages of ego development. Since their self-awareness hasn't had much time to develop, they don't tend to be aware of their own underlying motivations, for example, they will often just do something because it's just what everyone around them does. Additionally, heavy social media consumption at this stage of life leads them to believe that "success" is just for show or about obtaining likes/praise.

This brings us to the main factor to consider, which is that students are increasingly trained to be motivated by extrinsic rewards. For example, in the US, school funding is often tied to exam scores, so teachers have been forced to focus more and more on teaching only to exams, in order to secure funding. Higher education has also become much more competitive, which means excellent grades are essential for securing a seat in university.

While there is nothing wrong with extrinsic motivation per se, there is something wrong when a person is only motivated by extrinsic rewards, to the point where they are completely ignorant/neglectful of intrinsic rewards. The research strongly suggests: People who are more intrinsically (than extrinsically) motivated tend to be better learners because they assign their own value to learning and understand the inherent virtues of intellect, knowledge, and skill, apart from their real-world applications. The topic of intrinsic motivation comes up often, I suggest you read past posts.

Before you asked me for "tips", did you put in a reasonable effort to inquire into yourself and figure out why you overemphasize extrinsic rewards? Could you come up with the reasons/causes on your own, through self-reflection? It's difficult to find the right solution to a problem when you don't understand its origins. This is an important point because a common symptom of extreme extrinsic motivation is abnormally low self-awareness due to having little to no inner life. How's your inner life?

With regard to type development, people who are very extrinsically motivated tend to a) be too easily influenced by environmental factors, and b) lack introverted development. The answer to your question already lies within you, specifically, in the state of development of your introverted Ni and Fi functions:

1) Extrinsically motivated people tend to believe that their life lacks meaning because the world lacks meaning. What they don't realize is that meaning starts from within, so the actual problem is that they aren't able to generate enough meaning on their own.

Ni is a key function for constructing meaning, usually through patiently exploring context and connections to a bigger picture (of life as a whole and/or the world at large). As such, lack of Ni development commonly manifests as:

dislike of ambiguity (due to preferring clear categorical answers)

impatience for complexity (due to wanting easy answers)

superficiality (due to not going beyond the known/obvious)

lack of vision (due to overemphasis on rapid results)

Since you didn't provide any details about function development, I can't speak to how much you struggle with the above issues. The only thing I can say is that all of them are detrimental to learning. Clarify your aim: Do you want to be a good student in school or a good learner in life? Do you know the difference? It is the difference between lower order versus higher order learning, which I have already explained in previous posts.

A good student wants to know the final answer. A lifelong learner uses ambiguity as an opportunity to explore more nuanced truth.

A good student can handle some challenges but stops at the most difficult point. A lifelong learner takes the initiative to unravel complexity and eventually encounters profound wisdom.

A good student reads the book all the way through. A lifelong learner is intellectually curious, which leads them to discover new realms of knowledge far beyond the book.

A good student follows instructions and is reasonably competent as a result. A lifelong learner sees the greater potential of the field as a whole and gradually becomes an expert as they attempt to realize that potential.

If a certain activity or subject matter doesn't hold any meaning for you, is it because it's boring, or is it because you haven't really given it a proper look? This isn't to say that you have to be an expert on everything; it is only to say that you won't be able to truly appreciate something until you dig deeper into it and actively nurture appreciation for it. This brings us to the second point...

2) Extrinsically motivated TJs tend to believe that "utility" is the only measure of value. What they don't realize is that value is inherent to existence, so the actual problem is an inability to recognize value.

Fi is a key function for assigning value, usually through forming uniquely personal and intensely emotional attachments. As such, lack of Fi development often manifests as:

taking things for granted (due to not honoring their value)

dismissive attitude (due to lack of emotional attachments)

passionless existence (due to fear of emotional intensity)

Again, I can't speak to how much you struggle with the above issues. I can only inform you that they also tend to be quite detrimental to learning:

Human beings need to stay fed and sheltered in order to survive, but they also need activities that affirm their humanity and enrich their life. What happens to learning if your only concern is securing a comfortable material life?

Human beings learn best through feeling deeply moved and inspired by the best of what humanity has to offer. What happens to learning if you remove the human component of knowledge and only treat it as "data", just another object for your consumption and disposal?

Human beings discover themselves and express themselves through their varied interests, which is how every subject comes to have its fans, devotees, and experts. What happens to learning if you refuse to take an interest, downplay enthusiasm, and temper or repress passion?

If a certain activity or subject matter doesn't hold any value for you, is it because it is "worthless", or because you are blind to its value? This isn't to say that you must love everything; it is only to say that you won't be able to know yourself truly and feel energized about learning as long as you have a habit of dismissing every aspect of life that isn't immediately or practically "useful" to you.

Having intrinsic motivation basically means you generate your own personal reasons for learning. Nobody can force you to care or take an interest. Becoming an adult means you have to be the one to realize the virtues of going above and beyond whatever is required to ace exams. It may all sound very abstract, but this makes the difference in determining whether you will end up being just another cog in the machine of society or whether your life will always feel imbued with a greater sense of meaning.

[bengiyo]

Cherry Magic TH Ep 2 Stray Thoughts

Last week, we began our foray into the GMMTV take on Cherry Magic, and it started strong. They kept all of the early setup recognizable from the Japanese adaptation. Achi just turned 30, is an underachiever at work, and is a virgin. He is bombarded by everyone's thoughts when his powers manifest: he hears the internal monologue of anyone he touches. At first he is overwhelmed by this, and surprised to learn that Karan, the office star, has a crush on him. He's been helping a new junior, Rock, and decided to stay late at work to cover for Rock so he could see his partner. Karan also stayed late to help Achi, and has taken Achi back to his place to stay the night.

Overall, I'm enjoying the changes so far.

I'm glad GMMTV has been including the nicknames for the actors in English, since that's how much of us find and follow them.

Wait, Square Enix has rights on this story?

The room is messy? I'm going to fight him.

Tay and New were actually the best choice for these characters. Newwie is better modulating his performance than he did as Kao years ago. The pajama scene is really excellent.

HE EMBROIDERED A REFERENCE TO HIS MOLE ON THE PAJAMAS. OMG.

I knew Karan wouldn't let me down by kissing a sleeping person. I appreciate them letting us have a peek at Tay's chest though.

Take notes, babies! You gotta practice your cooking so you stay ready for your crush.

I like that Achi is internally mulling over how someone acting on their crush feels for him.

This tie scene is new, but I love it.

Oh, I like mirroring Rock's breakup with Achi wondering if it's okay to let Karan care for him. People should consider the role of reciprocity in love and affection.

The audio mix for this show is surprisingly good. Sounds are coming from the correct speakers.

Wondering if we'll flash back to the boss's thoughts later.

I'm so happy to see Mark again. I love the way he's playing this version of Minato so far.

Okay, reading the cat was funny. I like Jinta.

Oh, Achi, you're giving me secondhand embarrassment.

Newwie looks good in this brown suit.

I don't mind how much more explicit about feelings this version is being. This episode directly exploring what the polite boundaries are around crushes has been really good.

I like the not-date turning into a company hangout, though I wonder why Karan and Achi weren't originally invited.

Pai definitely knows something's up with Karan and Achi.

Two rooftop scenes two days in a row? I need OffGun to come through for us tomorrow too.

Will Rock come running up next week like Rokkaku? I kinda hope he doesn't.

Tits next week!!!

This is a good adaptation so far. I like the way this episode meditated on the social politics of a crush, and how an unexpressed crush can be painful for both parties. Karan is carefully toeing a line and afraid of making Achi uncomfortable, and Achi is worried about taking advantage of Karan or leading him on. We end on Achi assuring he doesn't view Karan negatively, setting us up for the next phase of this. I'm deeply impressed.

[everythingbutresolved]

The Bear, third installment: a review

The Season at a first sight is purposely underachieving, spiralling in neverending dialogues and spoon fed acrimony. Fortunately, the writers played a terrific card with the last episode, which is The Last Supper of a remarkable show for many reasons already. Overlapping the anxious wait for the restaurant's first review with "Sidney's Choice" and letting them cook until their simmering finale was a stroke of genius. And the Funeral Party! The gravitational force of people attracting and circling each other - the laugh, the relief of friendly faces, the life in those scenes!

Being a person who has suffered, years ago, from panic attacks, I remember to the last detail the doors breaking open in your mind when the shouting becomes too much. I'm very sorry they had to push Syd to this point, and I hope the decision was supported by an actual progression of the story in the next (hopefully last) season.

Now I need to go eat some frozen pizza.

[qqueenofhades]

Doesn't the US already have class-based affirmative action?

Of course it does. It's called legacy admissions (wherein the children of alumni get special/preferential treatment in admissions consideration, especially at Ivy Leagues and other prestigious colleges), paying for private tutors, and all the other ways in which the system is explicitly designed to reward and reinforce wealthy families throughout generations. So you know, like the rest of capitalism.

The recent affirmative action case in front of SCOTUS was explicitly designed to strike down race-conscious admissions, and to do it particularly to hurt African-Americans, who are already one of the least likely groups in the country to be able to attend a prestigious college and will only be further set back by this (which was exactly the point). It was deliberately designed to insist that by having race-conscious admissions, or taking an applicant's race into account when deciding to offer admission, Harvard and UNC (the two schools named in the suit) were somehow actually discriminating against high-achieving Asian-Americans by supposedly offering their place to academically mediocre or underachieving African-Americans instead, so if you objected to them, surprise, YOU were actually the racist one! Gotcha! Why do you hate Asian-Americans? Etc. etc.

This was and is bullshit for several reasons. First, ending race-conscious admissions, while it is deliberately and primarily anti-Black, hurts ALL racial minority groups, and pulls away the ladder for all non-white students regardless of their identity. Second, it's the usual bullshit right-wing divide-and-conquer tactic where they weaponize anti-racist goals and ideals against itself by creating a deliberate Sophie's Choice: if you think Black applicants deserve special consideration due to their especially horrendous history in this country, and might have circumstances relating to this discrimination wherein their accomplishments and potential are not fully captured in a traditional K-12 public education, you must hate Asians! This isn't true at all, but they deliberately set up the case this way so you couldn't object to the premise without ALSO looking like you were racist. But the only outcome of this, as designed by both the people who brought the suit and the far-right SCOTUS that continues to fuck us over at every opportunity for the next 50 years, will be to benefit white students. They don't care about Asian-Americans or any other minority, and this was not remotely offered in good faith or about expanding access in a "color-blind" fashion (which is still incredibly stupid, because yeah). They just want to use them as a tool to hurt all people of color and to weaponize the left against itself (and the left always, ALWAYS takes the bait, because frankly, it sucks).

The hypocrisy of ending race-conscious admissions (or rather, at least not legally requiring an institution to take race into account) while leaving legacy admissions in place was immediately obvious and called out by everyone. This ruling was engineered directly to punish Black students, because there is a virulent anti-Black strain of racism in America that the right wing has put all its effort into pushing in the last few years particularly. SCOTUS and its cronies don't actually have a problem with an institution offering preferential treatments to applicants due to their race/background, as long as those students are white, applying as legacies to a fancy school, and otherwise the kind of people that SCOTUS thinks are, in fact, people. So yeah.

[toxisoda]

Dear Toxisoda,

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Also is there any hope for a girl who had to look up how to spell acquire?

(P.S. i miss tumblr fanmail it wouldve been perfect for this)

Thank you!!!

Thirstily,

L.G.

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When it comes to the difficult spelling of words such as "acquire," we have a suggestion: Have you tried "hiring" an unpaid intern to spellcheck your messages for you? We highly recommend this method, as spellchecking software can be used to spy on your Sensitive Proprietary Information™. With a few choice words in a contract, you can effectively enslave an unpaid intern for the rest of their short and pathetic life!!!

Now that's value!!!!

[loser-female]

I unironically wish there were more underachievers/losers/underdog women in the media. I would have less of an impostor syndrome right now.

And not underachiever/loser/underdog in the form of manic pixie dream girl or the perpetual victim, or the stupid hypefeminine vapid woman.

Just, you know, someone that is not the best at everything, that sometimes fails and makes bad choices just because she is a human being.

[the-malfunctioning-somnambulist]

Okay, my own Tedward Lobo boohoo post incoming, thanks to the deleted scenes. Sorry for retelling the plot ig.

As a rule, the most horrible stuff in a movie happens to comic relief characters (looking at Kevin, the "he can control rats with his mind" guy). And "Renfield" is a horror (!) comedy (!!), which makes things worse.

Teddy's family and, on a larger scale, the city itself is a rather closed system. And in this environment the only way to prove oneself is the kind of violence Teddy can't stomach. The deleted scene with him and Mandy downstairs makes it clear that Mandy is Bellafrancesca's favourite, the one who will probably inherit the empire because she /is/ ready to go far enough (regardless of if she's been conditioned or if she's just that brand of Weird Little Girl TM). Maybe Teddy has been behind the white curtain too and knows he'd rather not step in there again.

And yes, he tries to prove himself in small ways (like terrifying one specific cop), but the existence of Mandy as viable competition explains why he's always that high, why he brags so much, why he desperately wants to be taken seriously by Rebecca: he knows he's lost the family game. He's smart enough to know he's a failed cause, and he tries to drown that out and be more of a clown than he actually is because that feels safe. Because from this underachiever clown position you can still sometimes surprise people with your Lobo ruthlessness and feel, for a moment, that you're enough.

He can be a decent talker, and he probably thinks it's his strong side, because he constantly uses that as self-defense with his mom, Rebecca, and especially with Dracula to buy some time or soften the blow. That's the behaviour of someone who considers himself bad at /doing/ stuff. He really has internalized it.

But then there's Dracula and Renfield's divorce.

Dracula is historically the kind of villain who draws on the subconscious and brings out the worst in people. Cage's Dracula is less of a symbol and has quite a lot of personality, but everyone around still projects their insecurities onto him: Renfield knows he's not a good person and chooses to blame Dracula for all of that, and Teddy ends up as ""susceptible"" to Dracula's powers not because his mind is actually weaker or whatever (god that whole piece of lore was so antisemitic). Teddy simply gives himself up to Dracula because he already thinks he's worthless.  As in, worthless by himself, only good for someone else's business, a husk that doesn't stop being a husk because it was filled. It's a semi-conscious choice, but not a character flaw like Renfield's commitment issues. Teddy is less in it for the powers of a familiar (but sure, let's just call a visibly Jewish guy "greedy") and more for the security of being and /doing/ enough instead of just crashing and burning and bullshitting his way through life.

And again, Dracula is someone to whom you prove yourself with violence, as Renfield has done over the years while bringing him victims. And again, Teddy fails and gets killed in a pretty horrific way, played for coolness like a fighting game fatality hit. He can't be enough for the system he lives in, and he can't escape it even by giving his loyalty to an outsider (which he was genuinely ready to do because his mom's ally is his ally), and this internal conflict kills Teddy even before Bobby does.

But with all that insecurity going on, Teddy is loved, if in a condescending way - and he KNOWS that he's loved. One deleted scene that hurt to see was the moment when Teddy returns to the Lobo mansion and everyone is overjoyed, not just because of the money he throws around but because, well, he's still part of the family, their lovable doofus and the life and soul of their parties. And he strolls upstairs, confident that his mother will welcome him - and hearing the opposite actually comes as a surprise. He is loved, but not /trusted/ in the way Mandy is. He is not respected. Maybe if there was no love, he'd have a chance at leaving, but to those who love him, Teddy is loyal to the death where Renfield is a cheater trying to make his former family into a sob story for Rebecca.

Teddy's tragedy is that he could thrive and just be a fun dude in a different environment but he cannot see himself in any other context. He desperately affirms, again and again, "I'm Teddy fucking Lobo!" - both claiming he's a valid member of the family and announcing himself as a person. Except even in this case he doesn't use his full name, doesn't own its ridiculousness - he lacks the self-confidence for that. Always a Teddy, never a grown-up Tedward. Always a son, never the head of the household. From Bella to Mandy, the Lobo family might well be turning into a matriarchy anyway.

Tragedy is always about a person in the wrong circumstances, and this is highlighted by the yin yang thing: Teddy wants to inspire fear instead of pity, and Renfield wants to inspire pity instead of fear. Teddy wants to pretend he has more agency than he does, and Renfield wants to pretend he had less agency than he did. Teddy could probably enjoy some normal parties with no bloodshed involved, and Renfield could fit right into the Lobo family with his habit of self-righteously terrifying and dismembering those he kills/brings to Dracula (mind you, Dracula himself never mutilates the bodies that much, he usually does the bare minimun to kill a person).

It's all just kinda sad.

tl;dr Teddy makes himself more obnoxious on purpose because he's the loser older brother in a society he doesn't fit into and he knows it and copes through aggressive clowning but cannot get out except in death.

[dailycharacteroption]

Pop Culture Builds 13: Sailor Moon

In many a fantasy story, destiny is sometimes inscrutable, but always seems to pull through in the end, be it a terrible doom or an unlikely hero rising to the occasion and saving the day.

If Destiny was an entity in the Sailor Moon series, however, you might be forgiven for assuming that they were completely off their rocker when they deemed that the fate of the universe rested in the hands of Usagi Tsukino.

A lazy and selfish girl and chronic academic underachiever (and a bit of a crybaby), very few would assume that she was hero material at all. (perhaps this is why she could get by with a Kentian-level secret identity of a simple outfit change) However, she is in fact the reincarnation of Princess Serenity, and the current bearer of the title of Sailor Moon.

With the divine power granted to her by her cat advisor Artemis and the transformation brooch, she (reluctantly) took on the mantle of a Sailor Senshi and fought for justice, and in time, grew to become a true hero, casting aside her cowardice and indolence for bravery and determination alongside her fellows.

Usagi is more or less the character that serves as the flagship for the “Magical Girl” genre of manga and anime, and while she was not the first, she is a lot of people’s first image of the archetype, so let’s have some fun building her in Pathfinder!

Usagi is human, but that need not be the case for your build.

My first thought with Sailor Moon was to make her a magical child vigilante. It only makes sense right, given that the archetype is directly based on the genre. However, the more I looked at it the more I realized that the magical child’s spells really just did not gel with what the character’s capabilities are.

As such, I elected to do an alternate build, specifically the zealot vigilante archetype, which grants her access to the divine magic of a cleric, which as we’ll see is much better at emulating her blessed cosmic powers.

As far as talents go, perhaps the most essential is Transformation Sequence, which grants her the same flashy quick-change abilities as the magical child archetype! Additionally, she should take the Redemption Inquisition from her zealot archetype, giving her a way and an imperative to offer those who were turned to evil by sinister means a way back to goodness. Beyond that, consider the channel energy, empower symbol, and zealous smite talents from the zealot archetype, and the harsh judgement and returning weapon (for her tiara, which we’ll get to later) for her other vigilante talents. As for her social talents beyond transformation sequence, I’d recommend beginner’s luck, case the joint, feign innocence, gossip collector, many guises (thanks to her disguise pin), notorious fool, obscurity, skill familiarity (perform: sing), and well-known expert (exclusively in regards to manga and video games).

As far as feats go, Iron Will, Familiar Bond, and later Improved Familiar are important to grant her a cat and later silvanshee familiar as a stand-in for Artemis. Meanwhile, she should also take Improved Unarmed Strike for those times she fought hand to hand with the forces of evil. Beyond that, feats that improve her divine magic and abilities are a good idea.

As a divine caster that uses both offensive and healing magic, Sailor Moon should be packing the cure spells, as well as dispel magic and other spells that can remove negative conditions and enchantments. Additonally, holy smite and spear of purity, as well as other attack spells based on light and untyped damage are all good choices. Atonement is also a good idea as well.

Usagi does have some signature equipment at her disposal, such as her tiara which doubles as a throwing weapon, easily represented as a glamered holy chakram that gains the returning property from her vigilante talents. Meanwhile, Usagi has wielded a number of magical rods which mostly served to channel her powers, but essentially any magical rod that can also double as a light mace can work here, adding it’s power to her arsenal, though a liberator’s rod, rod of steadfast resolve, or scepter of divine providence make the most sense thematically. Beyond that, equip her with armor and magic items befitting her needs.

If that doesn’t appeal to you, you could always go back to the obvious choice of the magical child vigilante, or perhaps a chosen one paladin. Alternately you could go full cleric or warpriest, using disguise self items to represent the transformation. If going for a 2E build, the vigilante is an archetype for any class in that edition, making pretty much any caster an option there, though obviously cleric, oracle, or a divine-casting witch is the natural pick there.

The fact that the transformation sequence talent exists means somebody knew that magical transforming heroes deserved better than the spell list that the magical child is stuck with. So feel free to use this build with any sort of magical vigilante hero, not just an Usagi-expy!

[polyphonical]

Dragon's Head - Restlessness and Injustice

[ View on site for better experience♪ ]

Location: Break Room

Kuro: Hm? What, they’re outta water? Guess I’ll just have tea.

Glug glug, Hahh…… That hits the spot. I was sweating a lot during the strength training.

I should get the guys in the trainin’ room some tea too. Uh, how many bottles is that……?

Idol A: ――Those guys at Starpro……

Kuro:  (……Hm? I hear people talkin’. Did they say somethin’ about the guys at Starpro?)

Idol B: ―― Is it okay to be doing something like this……?

Idol C: ――It’s final.

Kuro: (It seems like a buncha suspicious talk.)

(Where are theyーー Aah, they’re in that hallway over there. I should hide myself.)

(Those guys… I think they’re from the same agency as I am.)

(I don’t know ‘em personally, but I’m pretty sure we passed each other a few times in ES. Just what the hell are they talkin’ about in that corner?)

Kuro: ………

(It’s no use. I can hear bits and pieces, but I can’t hear the whole thing. But they way the were actin’ was just too suspicious.)

Idol A: It’s fine. If no one finds out, we’re in the clear.

Kuro: ………

(They left……)

(What did that guy just say? What’d he mean, “if no one finds out”? He’s shady.)

(……Okay. I gotta go follow those guys.)

Location: Forested Path

Kuro: They went to back around here…… I thought there was only a storage room for props here though.

What could they do in a place like this?

Location: Set Piece Storehouse

Kuro: ………

(Okay I think I see someone in the backーー Yeah, as I thought, it’s those guys.)

(Hm? Is that the dragon boat we’re usin’ for the project? Was it kept here?)

Idol B: Hey. We really can’t get caught here.

Idol A: I know that! There’s no point to it if we get caught here. The boat has to sink for unknown reasons durin’ that race.

Kuro: ! Those guys…!

Hey! What the hell are you doing!?

Idol A: ! That hurts! What the hell!?

Idol C: You…… You’re Akatsuki’s Kiryuu aren’t you?

Kuro: Didn’t I ask what the hell you’re doin’?

Idol A: I didn’t do anything! Let go of my arm already!

Kuro: It’s useless to play dumb now. I heard what ya were talkin’ about earlier. You’re gonna drill a hole through the bottom of Starpro’s boat, right?

Don’t go doin’ somethin’ stupid.

Idol B: Stupid……? It’s not stupid! We got no choice but to do this! We try our best, but it never matters cuz Starpro just goes and steals our jobs!

You get it, don’t you Kiryuu!? I mean, you’re from Rhylink too!

Ah, I get it. The top idols at Rhylink don’t care about what’s happening to the underachievers in the agency, right!?

Idol A: It’s no good to wipe the stuff that was in that weekly magazine. It’s fine that we don’t get along.

Being good friends with Starpro? Don’t make me laugh!

Kuro: Hahh…… Quit all the yappin’. You’re too noisy.

‘Course I know what it’s like while workin’. I get how frustratin’ it is.

But there’s no point in ventin’ your frustrations like this.

There’s a buncha stuff that don’t go the way ya like in this industry. Small fights are even normal. But being an idol means taking the frustrations ya get from workin’ and using it to do your job even better.

Idol B and Idol C: ………

Kuro:  Look.

Idol A: Guh……! Damnit, stop twisting!

Kuro: I’m pretty much done here. Ya should be grateful I’m not beatin’ you to a pulp.

I’ll just report it to the higher ups this time. But I’ll at least include that it wasn’t that serious since it was a failed attempt.

Idol B:  W-Why……

Kuro: ……Well, everyone has moments where they lose their footin’. But it doesn’t change what’s been done. Ya need to reflect on your actions and become better people.

See ya.

Idol A: ――Don’t fuck with me……!

Location: Training Room

Tetora: Ah, Taishou! Welcome back. Practice is just about to start ssu~

Kuro: Sorry for comin’ back so late.

Tetora: Don’t worry about it. But it was a very long break.

And your mood is a bit different from usual, Taishou… Or well, it looks like you’re in a bad mood or somethin’… Did somethin’ happen?

Kuro: ……It’s like ya can see right through me, Tetsu.

Tetora: Eh? What’d you say? I didn’t hear what you were sayin’……?

Kuro: Nah. It’s nothin’, don’t worry ‘bout it. It’s just some personal business.

Tetora: …… Sigh. Taishou is really just like Morisawa-senpai ssu.

Kuro: What was that……?

Tetora: I didn’t say anythin’ either. Then, let’s start practicin’, Taishou!

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[aspoonofsugar]

Hi! I really liked your post about your favorite siblings in stories. I was curious if you might expand on it--are tehre any other siblings you'd want to talk about?

Hi!

Thank you for the nice words! So, it has been a while since I wrote my fave siblings post. Here are some new siblings' relationships I love!

Ruby and Yang (RWBY)

Their dynamic has grown on me! Yang and Ruby are sisters, who could never be "just sisters" because of Summer's disappearence.

Yang feels she has to be Ruby's stand-in mom, jump in to protect her and always be emotionally available:

Dream of anything; I'll make it all come true. Everything you need Is all I have for you. I'm forever Always by your side. Whenever you need a friend, Never far behind.

She has to be strong like Summer.

Ruby feels she has to be Yang's hope, to be a perfect Huntress and to always be optimistic:

Past Ruby: That’s right! It’s up to you to make things better, isn’t it? Everything all depends on you! Your sister needs you, your friends need you, the whole world needs you to keep fighting, forever and ever, against an invincible monster that took your mother!

She has to be perfect like Summer.

Basically, they are both trying to be like their mother to the other, even if in different ways:

The petals scatter now Every nightmare just discloses It's your blood that's red like roses And no matter what I do Nothing ever takes the place of you

So, their shared arc is about moving on from this internalized mentality, so that they can become two independent people who still love each other.

Ame and Yuki (Wolf Children)

I love their siblings yin yang dynamic! Yuki and Amer are very well characterized and have wonderful complementary arcs. They have to choose if to be wolves or humans and of course they come up with different answers.

The best part, though, is that their respective developments lead them to take a path very different from the one you would expect initially.

At the beginning Yuki is energetic and enjoys spending time in her wolf form, while Ame is shy and dislikes moving around. Still, they both find something they wish so much they are willing to change for it.

Yuki craves human companionship and someone who would accept her for who she is. Ame is fascinated by nature and wants someone who would teach him about it. In the end, Yuki chooses society, while Ame the forest. It is this difference, which also leads to their final fight. There they both try to force the other to see things from their perspective. They want the other to make their same choice. Still, this is impossible because they are not the same. They take different paths and separate because this is the only way they can truly be happy. This doesn't mean they love each other or their mother any less.

The Russos siblings! (Wizards of Waverly Place)

Tbh... they are some of my favourite siblings EVER! And it is a crime I forgot to put them into the list :P Well, time to fix this mistake!

I love Wizards of Waverly Place and that is mostly because of the dynamics among the three siblings (+ Harper, who is a found sister to ALL the Russo kids and not just Alex). In particular, the crux of the series is really Alex and Justin's bond, which is great and my favourite relationship in the story.

Alex is impulsive, a delinquent and an underachiever. Justin is lawful, a star student and a hardworker. Alex is heart, while Justin is mind. They bicker all the time and never get along and yet they love each other and need the other to get their respective happy endings.

Alex learns magic from Justin and grows more responsible and hardworking by observing him. Justin mentors Alex and through her he discovers his true calling, which is to be a teacher. With time, we see this dynamic changing as Justin starts to mess up more and Alex is the one helping out. This is all part of growing up and discovering who you are.

Alex grows smarter, but keeps being motivated by her emotions and big heart (she puts in the effort for the competition, so that she can stay with Mason - an inversion of her Jerry giving up magic for Theresa)

Justin must deal with his hidden feelings. He must face his darkest side, like his jealousy, his pettyness and even how his deep love for someone can lead him astray. He has to accept all this if he wants to keep choosing the right thing

So, Alex realizes she can be more than just Justin's bad little sister and Justin has to face he can't keep building his own identity on being the smart one of his family. That is because all 3 siblings are smart (yes even Max), but go at it in different ways and have different talents.

Throughout the series, their final callings become clear. Alex's is wizardry, Justin's is teaching and Max's is business. All three get what they need and want.

As a cherry on top, Alex and Justin's arcs are foils and inversion of each other at any important step ;)

They have 3 important love interests that follow specific literary themes (Beauty and Beast for Alex and Romeo and Juliet for Justin). They have to learn when to let go and when to fight for the person they love, just in different ways and at different times.

They both fall behind in the wizard competition because they are trying to help people and they both get back in through the other.

In short, Alex and Justin are very well made siblings yin yang (yes by looking at this least you get it... I have a type). To this, you add some very funny sibling rivarly, clever burns and pettiness between them and Max and you get some of my favourite siblings.