#where I’m going has a low cost of living which is the main reason I can justify accepting such a small stipend

[13flowersandfoxes]

I mean grad students are paid like shit so

[charmedreincarnation]

My Boujee wealthy dark academia shifting story

Before I started manifesting money in this reality, I was super obsessed with the old money aesthetic, gossip girl, nepotism babies, and just anything money tbh, because obscene wealth has always been fascinating to me. I was honestly bored and feeling materistlic when I intended to go here solely for the purpose of ending this exploration crave lol. I’ll just list some of the thing I had fun doing and my experiences. I won’t get into specific stories because they’re probably just as you presume.

I’m going to first run through some of the most fascinating things I experienced and before I tell personal stories.

-Going to luxury rooftop bars and having drinks with my friends! This is one of my first realities where I was of age and had an extroverted personality so that was fun

-I Joined a super cool and high class sorority at my college. I always thought the concept of a sorority was cringe but we did a lot of volunteer work, and the communal family you have access to is beyond what I expected.

-Going on fancy night outs and renting the most expensive hotel room to have a relaxing night with friends and/ or throwing a giant high class party was the weekend norm. My ambivert self here is shocked that this is how some people live everyday haha.

- getting to be be a mysterious rich person, and legacy student at my university had its perk.

-my parents owned vacation homes in the aesthetic countrysides of Switzerland and France. Here I didn’t get the reasoning of having multiple homes,but when you travel often, it’s not as impractical as it seems.

-getting used to flying private. Not having to go through tsa and having a corsage of people to have travel be as easy as possible was so fun. I don’t travel often here and when I do it spikes my anxiety. Being surrounded by people and having to do all those checks stresses me out, and not dealing with that made traveling so much more fun.

-my parents created a huge scholarship fund to help low-income families. With a certain amounts of students winning every month. This scholarship covers all fees for college from boarding to school supplies to tuition costs to meal plans. I got to also sponsor an endangered animals. My choice was pandas :)

-getting to go to go to the met gala!

-Buying expensive rare and ancient plants! My dad bought a $20,000 olive tree for my mom to plant on our property, and it’s worth the price. Nature to me will always be priceless

The first thing that I think of when I reflect on what it is like being in the top .01% is the access to resources. Having access to a sizable personal fortune gives me the freedom to purchase anything I want and to travel anywhere in the world. I can indulge in luxuries that some people can only dream about.

It also brings with it a considerable amount of responsibility. As part of this elite group I have an obligation to use my resources to better the lives of those around me. For example, I have been able to make donations to charities and invest in causes that are important to me. I believe this is a great way to use my wealth to make a difference in the world.At times being in the top .01% was overwhelming. There is a certain level of pressure to make sure that my money is invested in responsible and rewarding ways. As well, many people view the wealthy with suspicion and resentment, which can be intimidating at times.

Anyways I want to expand on my experience attending the mega gala, bc that was easily my favorite night.My experience attending the Met gala was super cool, and a night to remember no matter what reality I’m in. I was so honored to be there for the first time ever. I vividly remember I was wearing a gorgeous navy blue satin dress with glittering jewels around the edges. The glittering jewels were a perfect complement to the gold sequins that adorn my dress as I made my way to the main event.inside, I was amazed by the opulence of the venue and how much effort has gone into creating such a beautiful spectacle. Everywhere I look I see incredible art installations, shimmering lights, and luxurious furnishings that all make me feel like I'm in a wonderland. To top it off, there's was incredible live music playing and the electrifying atmosphere that is enough to make anyone want to get up and dance.Of course, it wouldn't be a true Met Gala experience without some of the amazing food and drinks. From delicious hors d'oeuvres to exquisite sweet treats, everything was artfully prepared and presented, definitely making it a night to remember.

As the evening progresses, there was so much more to take in. Celebrities were mingling, taking pictures and making speeches; even just getting a chance to be in the same room with them was an incredible experience.My favorite moment was meeting a person I’m both of fan of here in this reality and that reality as well. I vividly remember Lily-Rose Depp gracefully walking through the hall, meeting people one by one and graciously talking to each of them.finally, it was my turn to meet her. She warmly shook my hand and asked me how I was doing. We began talking, and I found myself instantly at ease around her. We spoke about roles we've taken on in the past, our respective passions in life, and our favorite movies.

I was completely swept away by her enthusiasm for life and her willingness to connect on a deeper level with those around her. As we talked, I noticed that she kept casting glances around the hall- which I later found out was because she wanted to make sure that everyone present was enjoying themselves and feeling welcome. At the end of our conversation, she thanked me for taking the time to talk to her and added that if I ever needed anything, she'd be there to help out. I was holding back my giddy smile, trying to be as normal as possible, as I thanked her for her kindness.

I also vividly remember my upbringing and just how crazy wealthy people live.

Growing up, much of my time was spent attending events and dinners with other businesspeople. Although these were often overwhelming and boring at first, I gradually became more comfortable in such social settings and gained connections of my own.

Meanwhile, I also had access to mentors and peers from well-connected families. This allowed me to gain invaluable advice and knowledge on how to succeed in the professional world. In addition, to no surprise there were times when I was given advantages in certain situations due to my family ties. Doors that may have been closed to others opened up easily for me. This made it easier for me to take advantage of certain opportunities and advance my career. While this is true, it can often be a double-edged sword. Being a nepotism baby can make it hard to prove yourself, as there's always a nagging feeling that you got ahead because of a lucky birthright, but that of course in no ways compares to being born without connections. I think that’s something wealthy people tell their kids so they don’t feel like they didn’t work for anything because even if it’s true you don’t want the people you love to feel that way. Also, there's sometimes an element of guilt present due to knowing that others may not get the same opportunities as you. It can be difficult to separate what you've earned from what was given because of your family ties.

I was also lucky enough to have grown up in a huge mansion in the heart of Los Angeles, with all the bells and whistles that come with it. From the grand entrance walls adorned with family portraits and art to the private screening theaters and sprawling gardens, I'd say it's one of a kind.

The perks of living in a mansion come tenfold; I was on Tik tok the other day and saw people complaining (humble bragging) about the hardships of having a huge home. Growing up in one and having the experience now, it’s actually very common for rich people to portray their life as harder than it is to seem more human. It’s something we’re taught to do when we’re young so when I see it happen now, I’m like eye roll… I know exactly what you’re doing

Anyways I loved my house ! For starters, I loved my sunset pool that overlooks the city. It's the perfect place to enjoy a summer day in California with great views and a built-in Jacuzzi. Of course there's also my personal chef who helps whip up amazing meals for me and my family.

Having house help has made growing up here a breeze. Everyday necessities like laundry, chores and even grocery shopping are taken care of for me, leaving me more time to focus on things that really matter. I could write a list of things I needed, and the next morning everything I wrote would show up just like that, it was actually pretty dope. Not to mention the immense amount of help I get from my parents—they are both incredibly successful, so I'm always surrounded by people who, like them, have achieved incredible success.

More than anything, the best part of living here is that I get whatever I want. Shopping sprees, spa days and extravagant getaways are just a few of the indulgences that come with my lifestyle. I'm truly fortunate to have experienced a life of luxury and opulence—it's definitely given me a greater appreciation for all that I have been blessed with.

Lastly, I’m a big foodie no matter where I go so I’m also going to list some of my fav 5 star restaurants! I’m sure most if not all exist here as well so, if possible I would try them out!

-For seafood lovers, Manresa in Los Gatos, California is sure to tantalize your taste buds. With its commitment to local and sustainable ingredients, the restaurant offers an ever-changing menu that highlights delicious seafood dishes with a Californian flair. From the tantalizing tuna tartare and exquisite abalone dishes to the poached white sturgeon and Dungeness crab preparations, Manresa showcases its tasteful and creative cuisine that people rave about.

-If French cuisine is more to your liking, Alain Ducasse in Paris is sure to transport you to another world of classic French cuisine with a modern twist. During your visit, you'll enjoy dishes such as the butter-poached lobster tail, roasted poultry with Malavallee mushrooms, and crispy duck with crispy crimini mushrooms and creamy potato puree. And be sure to finish your meal with the magnificent desserts like the signature Mont Blanc cake.

-For a top-notch Italian experience, check out Osteria Francescana in Modena, Italy. Here you'll find an unforgettable Italian culinary experience with traditional dishes like beef cheek in Barolo wine, ravioli stuffed with prawns, zucchini flowers and stracciatella, and risotto with king crab. The family-run restaurant has come a long way since it first opened in 1995, achieving true worldwide fame for its simple yet lavish dishes.

-If you're planning a trip to Tokyo, you'll definitely want to make a stop at Sushi Saito. Not only is this two Michelin-starred restaurant applauded for its exquisite sushi and sashimi platters, but it's also home to the world's finest sushi chefs. From the uni and scallop nigiri to the tuna sashimi, each bite here is sure to delight your palate.

-Lastly, don't miss the opportunity to visit Geranium in Copenhagen and sample a unique take on modern Nordic cuisine. Chef Rasmus Kofoed delights guests with dishes that feature locally sourced, seasonal ingredients such as skyr ice cream, geoduck clams, and trout roe. With its innovative approach and bold flavors, Geranium has truly become one of the world’s finest restaurants.

No matter which five-star Michelin restaurant you choose, you can be sure that you'll experience exceptional food and service and leave with lasting memories of your sumptuous meal… but these were the most memorable to me.

Other than that I don’t really know what else to say unless you guys wanna hear specific things. It was a normal life, at least normal to me there because that’s just how I was raised 🥰🥰

[finelinevogue]

Obsessed with your imagines you so when they have 3 kids and they’re all older! What about one where Harry has to have a sex talk with his kids OR y/n and Harry come home to find their kids throwing a party? I think both could be super funny

this has me excited cause i love the idea of them throwing a party when y/n and harry are at date night!! (does contain smut)

oli - 21, felix - 19, belle - 16

“We’re so fucking screwed.”

“Belle, for the millionth time, chill the fuck out.”

But how the fuck was anyone supposed to be chill when there was a full-on house party, close to being a rave, occurring in their house? A house that was their mum’s life work. A house party that their parents new nothing about. A night where absolutely anything and everything could go wrong.

The three siblings stood at the bottom of the stairs, in front of the door, looking around at the scenes occurring between each room. There were girls whispering to each other on the sofas, there was a group of guys playing beer pong in the kitchen and there was a large group of people hanging around by the pool and some even taking a dip. What had meant to be a low-key party had managed to turn into the whole neighbourhood plus the next town over. It was completely overboard.

“Who’s idea was this again?” Belle asked, clearly not understanding the full reasoning behind a full fledged party in their house.

“All of ours.” Oli responded, when in reality it was really just his, and a bit of Felix, idea.

“Nope. I’m not getting grounded because you two dickheads wanted to be rebels.” Belle put her hands up as if to stop this whole situation. She did not want to be a part of this and yet had somehow got screwed up with it all.

“So what are you going to do?” Felix asked.

“Anywhere where this doesn’t have my name stamped all over it.” Belle gestured around her, all of them groaning when they heard something smash from a nearby room. They were actually going to be locked up forever after this.

“Belle, mum and dad are out for the night. Dad said he booked a hotel for them to stay over at, so they won’t even be back until tomorrow morning.” Oli explained, trying to calm down his very nervous sister.

“Yeah, plus if you’re so insistent on leaving why did you get so dressed up?” Felix did have a point. Belle had gone through the effort tonight to be looking as best she could. She was sporting a little black dress with black fishnet tights and her trusty Doc Martens. It was a very colourful outfit, as she would explain. Belle had even gone to the effort of adding glue-on gems to her makeup. Whereas her brothers were just wearing sweaters and trousers and trainers. Typical teenage boys.

“I’ll bet that’s why.” Oli nodded behind Belle and smirked as he watched his little sister turn around.

Megan Dover. Belle’s high school crush and cleverest person in the year. Felix and Oli caught Belle blush when their little sister looked at Megan, waving to her cutely. Belle was a lot more introverted than Megan, but Belle didn’t mind. She admired that Megan was so outspoken and kind and smart, but too bad they didn’t truly know of Belle’s existence. At least, not really.

“Alright fine, i’ll stay, but just don’t say I didn’t warn you.” Belle rolled her eyes and then walked off in the direction of the kitchen - if she was ever going to speak to Megan she’d need at least 4 shots in her system.

“Be safe little B.” Oli waved her off and then the two brothers looked at each other knowingly. “Is Heather here?”

“Not yet no, think she’s coming with the girls in a bit.” Felix checked his phone as his brother questioned him. “What about Bea?”

“She’s upstairs.”

“Why? I thought we weren’t allowing anyone upstairs?”

“Dude she’s my girlfriend, I think she gets a pass.” Oli patted his brothers back and then saunters up the stairs two at a time to go and find his girlfriend and reintroduce her to the party.

Another smash of something glass sounding came from the kitchen, along with a turn of screams and mumbles of oops.

“Fuck, we are so screwed.” Felix muttered under his breath as he made his way to the kitchen to clean up whatever was now broken.

••••

Meanwhile, you and Harry were basking in each other’s presence at a fancy new restaurant downtown called Caste Inn.

Harry decided it was time for you to have a treat and so was taking you out for dinner and then retreating to a fancy hotel, where he would not let you rest for the whole night. He was already being really handsy this evening, but you kept swatting his prying hands away because you were in public.

“Babe, c’mon i’m dying here!” He whined as you swatted his hand away from the skirt of your dress for the fifth time since mains. You were lucky you were in a crescent shaped booth so it was hard for anyone to see what was going on underneath the table, but you still felt so exposed.

“Quit it Harry.” You sniped, returning your attention back to the desserts menu. The restaurant was that kind of place where the portions are sparrow sized and yet cost you as much as it would to donate a kidney, so there was no surprise that you were still hungry and had room for dessert.

“Just wanna love on my wife.” He pouted next to you, keeping his arm slunk around the back of the booth to continue to caress your far shoulder delicately.

“We’re in the middle of a restaurant, you’re crazy.” You snickered, trying your hardest to focus on the desserts; Tiramisu, Chocolate Orange Gateau, Pecan Pie, Creme Brulé and an endless list of more mouthwatering yumminess.

“Fucking crazy for you, yes.” He kissed your cheek once, twice and then bit it too on the third, making you moan slightly at the exposure of it all. “You used to let me do this kind of thing all the time, what happened hey?”

“I got old.” You laughed, but really you felt saddened by the thought of it. You were approaching your forties and you felt as though time wasn’t on your side anymore. Life was all flying by so fast and it was becoming so hard to stop it for a moment to see how beautiful it all is. Harry could tell you were faking your happiness in that moment and he hated that you felt this way. He loved you. He would worship the ground you walk upon. Nothing would ever be too much of an ask for him if it meant keeping your happy. Yes, you were getting older, but it didn’t mean that was a bad thing. At least you were getting older together and becoming maturer together.

“Talk to me, love.” He gently asked, knowing there was something on your mind that was bothering you.

“I just… I just feel like i’m getting older—”

“You are love, yes.” He interrupted you, which earned him a slap to the thigh. He didn’t let your hand go though, leaving it to rest on his tight thigh.

“And then suddenly that’s going to be it. No more Y/N.”

“Don’t say things like that to me, please love.” Harry shook his head, squeezing your hand a little tighter.

“And I feel like i’ll have regretted not doing so many things. Like I won’t have lived my life.”

“Things like?”

“Things like riding a motorcycle with you. Things like staying up all night with a bottle of wine and a good bit of Elvis. Reckless things, like skinny dipping or crashing a high school party. Things like, having my husband finger fuck me in a public restaurant. I remember when everything seemed so free and chaotic and I loved it. Now I feel stuck.”

“Stuck how, love?” Harry leaned in closer to you, his eyes full of love and determination because if that’s what you wanted he could give you all those things - especially the orgasm.

“I’m a mum, H. You’re a dad. We’re parents,m. Good ones at that. Aren’t we supposed to be grown up and responsible now? We don’t get to take risks anymore, because we have a family right? God, I sound so pathetic.” You sighed and put the menu down, not thinking about which pudding you wanted to fill yourself up with anymore.

“Babe. If you want to ride a motorcycle and go skinny dipping then let’s fucking do it. Why are you so afraid to hold back? Because we have kids, because darling believe me when I tell you - however much it disturbs me - our kids are out doing just as many reckless and crazy things as we used to do. Maybe we should fuck the prestigious system and show our children, all parents - including us - that adulthood, parenthood, doesn’t define the choices you make. We do.”

You couldn’t stop looking at your husband, drinking in every last drop of his beauty. His words filled your heart with rose petals and chocolates, warming you up delightfully. God, you were so lucky to have him. He helped you through the most toughest of times and continued to stick with you, not because a ring says he has to, but because he loves you. Undeniably and irrevocably loves you.

That was all it took for you to comply.

Quickly, you moved one of your legs under the table cloth so it draped over Harry’s thighs and made an opening between your legs. The cloth hid everything well, along with the dirty napkins that sat upon your laps.

“Wh- what are you doing love?” Harry asked confused, after not hearing a word back from you for his earlier speech.

“Harry I love you, I do, but will you just shut up and fuck my pussy with your fingers already.” You whispered wetly against his ear with your lips. He groaned at the words and tightened his grip around your leg, widening the gap he had to work with.

His hand slid underneath your dress slowly, squeezing the flesh of your thighs in tease, until he got to where your panties were. Or at least where they should be.

“Shit, you’re not wearing any pants?” Harry asked quizzically, pushing his fingers against your glistening pussy and feeling just how ready you were for him.

“Oh fuck!” You muffled out before Harry quickly slapped your slit because you were making too much noise, which only then made you squeal a bit more. He slapped your cunt hard enough the second time for you to get the memo that you needed to be quiet - but fuck was that a challenge. As much as you can be quiet, you just don’t like to be. You like knowing that your moans and whines turn Harry in even more, just as much as you love hearing his.

“Fucking hell, soaked already.” His fingers toyed with the folds of your cunt, feeling how puffy they were between his ringed fingers. “Gotta be quiet for me okay?” Just as he started pushing his delicious fingers inside of you, the waiter turned up at the table with a cheery face and not a bouncing clue what was happening between the two of you.

“Desserts?” He asked politely with his charming smile, but you didn’t see it for too long before having to close your eyes shut at the sudden movement of Harrys fingers. He wasn’t stopping on the waiters behalf, in fact he was more forcefully going for it. He moved his fingers in circles inside of you, thumbing over your clit in the way he knew you desired most. He was insatiable.

Reckless.

“No, just the bill please. Need to take my wife home to take care of some things.” Harry spoke for you both, not understanding why he was being so open with the amount of information he was giving away. But fucking hell you didn’t care because his fingers were providing you pleasures beyond reason.

“Yes Sir. I’ll only be two minutes.” He smiled again before he was gone, taking the menus with him.

“Here that baby?” Harry whispered into your ear, moving his fingers more freely now there was less of an audience, “you’ve got two minutes to cum.”

“Wha—”

Questioning his authority would have to wait, for Harry got to work very quickly and perfectly. His fingers slicked in and out of you so erotically and if it wasn’t for the live music and loud chatter of the room, the sounds of his fingers driving in and out of you would be heard by everyone. His fingers curled to all the right places, touching the most sensitive parts of your walls and hell did it feel blissful.

“I’d say you’ve got about a minute left baby, and I think you can cum for me before then. Can’t you? Or am I not good enough for that kind of release anymore?” Harry taunted you and pressed wet kisses to your ear. You were too lost in euphoric paradise to notice, or even care, whether anyone could see or was watching you both. You were too focused on your husband. Your Harry.

“N-no. I can cum. You’re so good - shit - so g-good.” You stammered out, breathless from the air stolen from your lungs because of this erotic moment. This was so bad behaved of you both that you were starting to get a high off of it.

“Cum for me then baby. Do it. I’ve got you.” He kissed your lips to capture the moan that trailed off your tongue as you reached your high. You felt so high and yet so safe. Harry steadied you as your legs shook and kissed you senseless, to quieten your whines. He admired that you had been so willing for this and he would be lying if he said he didn’t have a raging hard-on right now.

“I love you,” you raced out quickly, “I love you.”

“I love you, Y/N.” He kissed your lips again and withdrew his fingers from your dripping cunt. You picked up a napkin but he quite quickly took it away from you, throwing it to the other side of the table.

“What are you doing?” You whisper shouted, needing to clean yourself up.

“More like what are you doing?”

“Cleaning my mess.” You said frustratedly.

“Leave that to me.” He spoke whilst holding intense eye contact with you, bringing his fingers that were coated in your arousal to his lips and sucking them dry. Every last drop worked its way into his mouth and he salivated at the taste - the smell.

“Harry—”

“The bill Sir.” The waiter interrupted you without knowing. Harry took out his wallet and used his card on the card machine, before signing his name on the cheque as if to affirm that he has paid.

“Thank you.” Harry spoke kindly, completely different to how he was with you all but two minutes ago.

“Thank you Sir, Ma’am. Have a lovely rest of your evening.” And he wad gone again with his smile.

Harry turned to you with the largest grin on his face, “Oh we will.”

••••

“Oli stop eating the leftover lasagne it’s for mums lunch!”

Belle was rushing around trying to chill everything down. The party was so out of control that even Oli and Felix were wasted. Megan was blowing hot and cold with her too, so she had no idea where she stood with them.

People were everywhere. Too many people that it was becoming claustrophobic. Felix was currently playing beer pong with a group of his friends, Heather attached at his hip, whilst Oli was sitting on the kitchen countertop eating cold lasagne. The boy was like chuffing Garfield. Belle was doing her best to keep calm, but as the night progressed it started to become worse and worse as it got harder to control.

As Belle turned to leave the kitchen, her brother clearly not listening to her, she bumped into someone. Kyle. Fucking Kyle. The guy who had obsessed over her to the point where Harry was seriously considering getting a restraining order on him to protect his daughter. He was a straight A creep and Belle hadn’t even realised he’d been invited to this party. Then again, over half of these people had most definitely not been invited.

“Oh hey Isabelle.” He stressed her whole name, knowing how much she hated it. Well, she didn’t hate her name she just hated him saying her name.

“Go away Kyle.”

“But I just got here.”

“And now you can just leave. Party’s ending anyways.” Belle stood her ground, but her hands were shaking from being even remotely close to this guy. He was disgusting to the point where if you were stuck between having to choose between being with him or eating mouldy cheese, you’d eat the cheese on a fucking silver platter.

“Looks quite alive to me.”

“Well i’m shutting it down and you’re going to leave. Now.”

“You need to liven up Belle.” Kyle chuckled through his nose, making him look scary as he towered over Belle, “let me help you.” He leaned forwards to grab her arm but she was quick to push him away.

“No! Leave me alone!” Belle shouted, trying to dodge around him but he was quicker. He grabbed her arm tight and pulled her back to him, chest touching chest. “Get off me Kyle.” Belle squirmed in his hold, which only made Kyle happier - the creep.

“C’mon Bella, live a little.”

“My name’s not Bella and I told you to get the fuck off of me.” Belle pulled back with all her might, whilst kicking him square in the balls - probably hard enough so he’ll never be able to have children - and then drove her knee up to crack his nose - successfully. Damn, that felt good. Heavily badass, actually.

“You fucking psycho!” Kyle held his nose and his balls in pain, straightening himself up as if to launch himself with fury at Belle. Luckily for her the outburst between the pair had caught attention of people - including Oli and Felix.

Oli was quick to step in front of Kyle, Felix just behind him. “You dare lay a fucking finger on my sister and I swear to you you’ll regret it.” Oli threatened, fists curled tight at his sides.

Heather came to hug Belle, comforting as she cried through the after shock of the situation. She’d been so brave and handled herself so well though. “You okay?” She kindly asked.

“Y-yeah.” No.

Everyone was now watching. The music had been muted to the point where you could tell it was playing but you couldn’t tell which song it was. Friends of Oli and Felix were standing close by in case things got messy, which normally only happened between the two brothers and not this way. Doors could be heard opening and shutting as people came in and out from places to watch the debacle occur between the hosts of the party and the unwelcome visitor. Oli and Felix knew they had to be careful though, because one wrong video and it could badly effect their dad’s career. Belle shook in Heathers arms and wished this nightmare of an evening to be over.

“Oh the whore’s not worth it anyways.” Kyle laughed, rolling his eyes as he pointed towards Belle.

“The fuck did you just call my daughter?”

Oh fucking shit balls.

“Dad?” Belle asked warily, seeing his dad stood in the doorway of the front door, her mum standing close behind him with her hand tightly clutched to his. As much as Belle was terrified that her parents had busted them, she also felt safe in their presence.

“Oh and here comes perfect-dad-of-the-year Harry Styles to the rescue.” Kyle teased which made Felix move forward in protest of his words.

“Fix.” Harry sternly called his name, making his son stop and look towards his dad who was shaking his head with a soft smile. Harry walked over towards Belle first, you still clutched tightly to him. “You alright?” He asked sincerely, not looking cross or disappointed at all. Belle nodded quickly and kept her head pressed to Heather’s chest. Harry turned to see his boys, raising his eyebrows to wordlessly ask them the same question to which they nodded too.

Harry dropped your hand, leaving you to stand with your sons, and left your forehead with a kiss before making his way to Kyle. “You okay boys?” You asked again, even though you knew Harry just asked.

“Yeah. Are you mum?” Oli asked, coming to wrap his arm around his mums neck to comfort her. He was so kind and thoughtful, just like his dad.

“Listen up, Kyle.” Harry started, keeping a good distance between him and the boy, “If you ever come near my family again i’m ordering a restraining order. That’s not a threat, it’s a promise. If you break that order you’ll be going to jail. Big league jail too. Again not a threat, a promise. So you’re going to leave my house, this property in its’ entirety and go home to sit in your room and think about whether you would prefer to be in a prison cell instead. Do you understand?”

Okay, you’d be lying if you said his authority didn’t turn you on.

“Y-yeah.” Kyle mumbled pathetically.

“I said do you understand?” Harry repeated again, clearly not satisfied with the answer given.

“Yes Mr Styles.” Kyle said more surely, before scramming from the house, from the party and from the neighbourhood.

“Now everyone out of my house before I call the police.” Everyone knew how that was not an empty threat and dashed out of his house. Some looked at him in awe, because this was probably their once and only chance of being in the presence of the Harry Styles. He sighed as he walked to the kitchen, leaning against the kitchen counter to think.

“Should we—” Belle started to talk but you cut her off.

“No, hunny. Let me go talk to your dad. You lot,” referring to your children and girlfriends who’d kindly stayed behind in support, “can go fetch some bin liners and start cleaning this all up.” You pointed around to the mess that was your house, before walking off to the kitchen.

You looked around at the mess. A broken vase. Litter everywhere. Half-drunken drinks left on the table. Bottle openers you definitely didn’t own before tonight. Trousers? You couldn’t help but giggle at the surrounding sight.

“What’s got you laughing?” Harry asked, still in his fancy shoes and fancy coat, you still in your fancy heels and your fancy coat. Yet, you were both standing in what looks like a garbage dump site. Harry moved his hand away from his face and looked at you with a blank expression.

“You were right!” You laughed.

“Your reaction as if that’s a bloody miracle, love, which kind of an ego crush, but continue.” He rolled his eyes and you rolled yours in response. You clicked your way over to him and wrapped your arms around his waist, he kept his wrapped around his own obviously still closing himself off.

“Our kids are being reckless and crazy.” You recalled dinners earlier conversation, smiling up at him in admiration.

“I didn’t actually mean it, it was just a quick way to make you feel better.” He groaned in frustration.

“Well gee thanks babe!” You laughed at the whole irony of this situation. “Harry, babe, look at me,” you had to used your hand to turn his cheek to face you, stroking his cheek to calm him, “adulthood - parenthood - doesn’t define the choices we have to make. We do. And our children, apart from that last little bit, seemed like they had the most freeing and most brilliant night yet! Let them be reckless H. Let them make mistakes. Just because this happened doesn’t make us bad parents, and it doesn’t make us bad parents if we decide no punishment—”

“Ha like that’s going to happen!” Harry cut you off and you glared at him to just shut up.

“Just shut up, you oaf. Let the kids live while they’re young.”

“You did not just reference one of my songs.” Harry looked to the ceiling as he smiled widely, before shortly laughing at how cheesy that was. “Oh my god Y/N!”

“What? Was is that bad?”

“Yes, babe. Yeah it really was.” He looked back down at you to see you smiling and he couldn’t help but cup your cheeks and kiss you silly. His perfect lips fit yours and you tasted him until you couldn’t breathe. “I love you.”

“I love you. Now go help clean up.” You ordered him, making him look at you confused.

“What the hell have I done to deserve this?”

“You booked the hotel for next weekend instead of this weekend you div. Now go.” You smacked his backside and he strolled back over to you and pushed you into the counter. You gasped at the sudden motion.

“Do that again and let’s see what happens.” He whispered dangerously against your lips.

“Go clean up and then see what’s waiting in our bedroom.” You bit your lip and tugged Harry’s hand to under your dress, giving him only a slight feel of how wet you were before letting his hand go and walking away.

“Kids, hand me a bloody bin bag. Now!”

[artbyblastweave]

It occurs to me that there’s something that sets Amphibia apart from its contemporaries- The Owl House, Steven Universe, Gravity Falls, that whole set.  At a high level, stripped of the context of being a Disney Kids show, Amphibia genuinely feels as though it lends itself by default to an outright tragic ending in service of it’s themes.

It isn’t as front and center, but Amphibia feels like a cousin to Infinity Train in that both shows are rooting around in the guts of narratives like The Phantom Tollbooth and Oz. At a high level, it’s a story about a shy but deeply genre-aware child who deliberately instigates an Isekai plot as a form of escapism, viewing the world she arrives in terms of tropes and RPG plot points- which works well enough that it blinds her to the many sketchy elements surrounding her own rapid rise to prominence, and the ulterior motives of her newfound “friends.” 

 It’s a story about Sasha, an Isekai protagonist whose hypercompetence, social-fu and self-identified role as “protector” launch her in a genre-conforming way from a prison-cell to the head of a rebellion, Elder Scrolls style- at the cost of most of her human connections and at massive “human” cost that she refuses to engage with because she views the Isekai setting as a backdrop to her own status as the protagonist. 

And finally you have Anne, who’s mostly just.... a person, who has the good fortune to land in a relatively low-pressure space where she gets held accountable for her mistakes without being punished, tortured, or elevated to an impossible standard, forms genuine familial connections, stays stuck in one central location long enough that she integrates into a community organically, and generally just... has a reasonably well-adjusted life as the child that she is, with a fantastical veneer. Unlike the other two, she never centered herself as the protagonist or as being more real, and her fuckups don’t stem from a mindset like that. 

And binding all of these arcs together is that by the standards of fantasy otherworlds, Amphibia really, really sucks as a place to live. It’s a death world where expectations of a short and violent life are baked into the culture. Aesthetically it’s viscerally gross and grimey in a way that even The Boiling Isles (a place made from rotting godmeat!) doesn’t play up to the same extent. They fight cannibals twice in a three month span. The main thing stopping most of the episodes from being straight-up horror is the fact that, again, it’s a kids show- there’s canonically a very large body-count associated with all of this, it just isn’t front and center.

This leads me to the big point I’ve had running through my head- when I talk out the plot of Amphibia at a high level, I feel like I’m describing the plot of a YA novel or webcomic or some other post-modern indie thing written specifically to deconstruct the otherworld fantasy, by centering a grounded protagonist with real emotional connections and giving her foils in the form of two close friends who’re running on escapist power fantasy logic straight into brick walls. 

Good things don’t typically happen to the foils in those stories. They don’t in this one either! Marcy’s deliberately-engineered Isekai fantasy got her extremely dead, and I think one of the big things preventing her from staying that way is the fact that this is a kids show on Disney. I think Sasha’s inevitable turnaround and reconciliation with Anne is gonna be facilitated by the fact this is a kid’s show on Disney. Please note I’m not saying that either of those things are going to be bad or poorly written- I’m looking forward to them- but I do think the thing making those plot points narratively necessary is the fact it’s a kid’s show on Disney.

 After all, Infinity Train is the other big work that went big on unpacking protagonist-centered morality, and book three purchased Grace’s character development with the brutal deaths of half the party and the permanent alienation of Hazel. That kind of genuinely tragic/bittersweet end really is an option for this kind of story, it’s just not one they’re likely to exercise- they can make their commentary on the genre and still pull out a happy ending.

[weaselle]

cooking for people who have no idea what they are doing (or are just, like, real depressed)

Okay, I’m a professional cook, but also, I get depressed. This is the cooking I do when I’m depressed, because I need the simplest path to a whole meal.

This is not for vegetarians, because, while I wholeheartedly support people choosing vegetarianism, and also enjoy cooking for vegetarians, for me, the simplest path to a meal includes meat. Perhaps when I am less depressed I will work on options.

A lot of recipes focus on achieving food that is in some way special, using special techniques, or using a precise list of carefully measured high-end ingredients... and that’s not this, this is all the parts of cooking that are not those things.

First, shopping

Meats Starches Veggies Sauces Breakfast/Snack

For a whole week you’re going to want

3 kinds of meat, with five portions each. So, for example, five chicken breasts, 10 sausage links, and 2-3 pounds of ground beef. Other possibilities include pork chops, salmon, some kind of steak, whatever. 

You’re going to want up to 3 starches. Honestly I usually stick to just rice, but you can go with rice, potatoes, and pasta. If you want to use quinoa or polenta or something, thats on you.

And, you’re going to want about 3 types of vegetables, again, about 5 portions each -- and try to stay green. So personally, I usually get 5 medium zucchini, 2 medium heads of broccoli, and then either yellow squash or mushrooms. A bag of salad greens is also a good option, and I have an easy way to make a good salad, which I will do as a separate post.

Next pick something easy that works as either breakfast or a snack. For me this is a loaf of bread, a jar of peanut butter, and a bunch of bananas. Sometimes it’s nice to have an additional option here, like cereal or yogurt. 

Last, you’ll want 2-5 sauces in bottles. I would definitely recommend a low sodium soy sauce be one of them, and maybe a BBQ sauce for the other. I usually also include worcestershire and sriracha but go with whatever you want, teriyaki sauce, A1, whatever you know you’ll eat. Hell, you can use Italian style salad dressing as a cookable sauce if you really want.

Oh, and If you don’t already have some at the house, you’ll need pan lube: butter and/or some kind of cooking oil. 

Okay! we’re done shopping! Affordability isn’t the main focus here, but is undeniably important -- I live in a very expensive area, this shopping trip is going to feed me well for a week and costs me about $100 bucks. When I was living in Alabama, it probably would have cost me more like $70. You won’t need to get stuff like the sauce and rice and peanut butter every week, so you’re definitely looking at a monthly grocery bill of something like $300 depending on where you live, and that’s not too bad. 

Prep

hell no, I’m depressed, the only prep I’m doing is putting two packages of meat in the freezer and the rest of this stuff in the fridge. You CAN box or bag each portion of meat separately so you can really alternate what you eat -- me, I’m gonna eat chicken for two or three days, then beef for two or three days, etc.

and listen, don’t fuck around with microwave settings or running water on things to defrost them. If you package the meat all up separately, just move a portion from the freezer to the fridge each time you cook dinner. Or, if you do like me, move the whole package when you go to cook your last portion of the previous stuff, and just deal with the fact that it will probably still be a tiny bit frozen when you go to cook next.

Tip: When you cook dinner, you’re going to make enough for lunch. That just leaves you one small meal - I often smear peanut butter on a peice of bread and wrap it around a banana like a taco - fast, easy, practically no dishes, relatively healthy

____________________________________________________________

Cooking (this is going to take about 25 minutes)

You’re going to need

ONE frying pan, medium size w/ lid ONE boil pot, medium size w/ lid knife, a spatula and a cutting board.

If you want to be fancy, you can include a big spoon. Looks like this

No matter what the specific ingredients you’ve chosen, the basic format is going to be:

Start your starch heat pan, put meat in the pan flip meat and add veggies, cover with lid remove meat and add sauce finish starch put everything on a plate while it is still too hot to eat and you are standing in the kitchen anyway, wash the like, 4 dishes you’ve gotten dirty. eat.

Okay, before you even get everything else out, start your starch. For rice this means rinse the rice and put it in the cold water and set it on high heat, for pasta this means put your salted water on the stove on high heat. For potatoes, you can use my perfect mashed potatoes recipe (I’ll do that as a separate post) or, honestly, you can wait until you’re halfway done with the rest of everything and microwave the sucker for like 8 minutes. I would never do that in a restaurant, but trying to feed my lethargic depressed ass? Absolutely.

easy rice: Fill your smallest coffee cup with rice, put it in the pot. Rinse. Fill the same cup twice with water, add to rice. Bring to a boil, give a good stir, turn heat all the way down, put a lid on it for something like 15 more minutes.

Okay, now lube your pan. Butter, olive oil, whatever. You’re probably looking at an amount more than a teaspoon and less than a table spoon of whichever you use. Personally I try to use as little olive oil as possible, so I pour a large coin sized amount (a quarter in the U.S.) into the pan, ear off a piece of the paper towel I’m going to use as my napkin for the evening, fold it up tight, and sort of paint the oil around so a little goes a longer way.

Pan lubed? Great, turn your burner on. highest heat will work but is not ideal, medium heat will work better but is still not ideal. Halfway between the two is perfect for chicken, a little hotter for beef, a little lower for fish.

Now remove two portions of your chosen protein (that way you’ll have tomorrow’s lunch too). By the time you get the packaging open and stuff, your pan is probably hot. If it’s not, let it get hot. You don’t want the oil to start smoking (warning, butter will burn faster than oil) but if you shake a single drop of water off your finger into the pan, you want it to sizzle.

If your pan is hot, put your meat in. The more you do this, the more you’ll perfect the timing, but you’re going to cook it for ~about~ 7 minutes before you flip it, maybe a couple minutes longer if it’s chicken or pork, maybe a couple minutes less if it’s beef.

Now that your meat is in, prepare your veggie. Rinse it off, cut off any part of it you don’t want to eat, and then cut what’s left into pieces the size of a large bite. Don’t worry, it’s going to get a little smaller when you cook it. Take your time, you’ll probably finish in less time than the meat needs.

Time to flip your meat? Great. Do that, and then dump your chopped up veggie in the pan. It does not matter at all if the pieces are not touching the bottom of the pan -probably most of them will not be, a bunch will be on top of the meat, that’s fine.

Put a lid on it. Now add your pasta to the water, or put your potato in the microwave, or check your rice. If following my perfect mashed potato recipe, mash now.

Rice tip, checking: eat a grain, you want zero crunch. If it’s not done and there’s no liquid, add a splash of water and stir. It it’s done or close to done, but it is still very wet, give it a big stir and leave on the stove with the lid off for a couple minutes.

Your meat still has like, at least 4 minutes, so rinse off your cutting board and chef knife, get out a plate, table knife and fork.

 Meat done? Great. Take the meat out of the pan, leaving the veggies in. Add sauce to the pan. I like to also use a little wine, because it’s usually already in the house, if you have some and want to, pour a large swallow of wine in the pan with the sauce. I’ll often mix a couple sauces, like worcestershire and soy (makes something similar to teriyaki) or hot sauce and BBQ

Stir the sauce around with the veggies. This, called deglazing, is an important step for two reasons, 1: it will get up a lot of the flavorful stuff that has stuck to the pan and make your sauce better, and 2: it will make washing the pan much easier. Okay, put the lid back on for one to two minutes, maybe stir a couple times. Basically you want the sauce to stain the veggies.

Your starch should be done, turn off the burner, put a portion on your plate, and stick the rest in a ziplock or tupperware or something. Go ahead and throw the second portion of meat right in there with it. 

Turn off the stove and scoop the veggies onto the plate, and pour the sauce from the pan over everything.

Now, while it’s too hot to eat, and you’re standing in the kitchen anyway, wash the pot, pan, and spatula. It should be very easy because of the way you used the sauce and because nothing has had a chance to harden. This usually takes me about 2 full minutes.

__________________________________________________________

OKAY! it’s been 20-25 minutes, you’ve got dinner and tomorrow’s lunch (just add another cut up veggie, pour a different sauce on, and put it in the microwave for two or three minutes) AND there’s no danger of dishes piling up on you :) You can even add “washing last night’s plate and fork for use tonight” to where you rinse the cutting board to really keep it full circle.

It’s not gormet. It IS accessibly healthy, affordable, and easy.

If you are extra depressed, forget the starch and use more veggies; this cuts what little work there is by up to half

Using this format, you can have three good meals per day and only spend 30 total minutes a day in the kitchen — including clean up! (dishes piling up tends to exacerbate my depression and makes cooking your next meal harder)

And it’s easy to give yourself a wide variety, from soy glazed chicken, zucchini and rice one night; to steak, mushrooms and pasta the next; followed by BBQ pork chops, brocoli and potatoes... I suck at math but there’s probably a hundred options

Just to recap, because I know I was very detailed and this might seem overwhelming, once you read through the above to answer any questions you might have, simply

-Start your starch -lube & heat pan, put meat in the pan, about 7 minutes -flip meat, add veggies, lid, about 7 minutes -wash knife and cutting board -remove meat and add sauce to veggies, re-lid, 1-2 minutes -finish starch, refrigerate extra meat and starch  -put everything left on a plate -wash pot and pan -eat.

[contemplativepancakes]

yarn rants with dandelion

3.5k of Geralt poorly hiding the fact that he knits from his family and, in general, being an idiot, read here on AO3

Geralt slams his laptop shut as his apartment door swings open, causing Eskel to quirk an eyebrow. “Whatcha doin’?” he asks. 

“Nothing,” Geralt says in a rush. 

“Uh huh.” Eskel raises his hands. “Can’t be any weirder than the porn Lambert watches.”

Geralt grunts, scrubbing a hand down his face. “You’re not supposed to be here yet.”

Eskel glances at his watch. “I figured you might want help before the game.”

“I’m ordering pizza,” Geralt says. “Actually, do you want to do it? I have cleaning I still need to do before everyone else gets here.”

Eskel’s eyebrows climb higher on his forehead, and Geralt starts to sweat as he sees Eskel's skepticism. Geralt always makes a spread on game day, telling everyone he’s not going to wait two hours for delivery while they’ll be so busy. 

“Um. Okay.” Eskel stares at him for a beat before finally pulling out his phone. “What am I ordering?” 

Geralt shrugs. “Whatever you want.”

He goes to his room, shutting the door behind him and hearing Eskel’s voice as he talks to the pizza place. Geralt looks to his bed, where a half finished baby blanket is laid out, before hastily gathering it and its attached ball of yarn up and stuffing them in a basket, piled high with various colors and weights. He throws some dirty clothes from his floor on top for good measure before reemerging from his bedroom, Eskel looking at him suspiciously from his spot on the couch. 

“Sure you don’t need help with anything?” Eskel asks. 

“No, I’m, uh, I’m good.” Geralt goes to the fridge and pulls out two beers, passing one to Eskel and keeping one for himself. 

Thankfully, Eskel doesn’t say anything about his odd behavior, just watches the pregame show with him without comment until Letho arrives, followed shortly after by Lambert and Aiden. Geralt’s relieved, because then Eskel’s attention goes to their ridiculous dancing around each other instead of scrutinizing Geralt. 

After everyone has left for the night, Geralt pulls his laptop back out, settling it on the coffee table in front of him and goes to get his blanket. He spreads it across his lap as he clicks play, the sound of a cheerful voice filling his living room. 

“Hey, guys! It’s Dandelion, back with my latest yarn haul! I’ve got some awesome ones, and ones you should avoid at all costs, so watch and see which is which!”

Geralt lets himself stare for a second before he jerks himself out of the trance and looks back down while his needles click together as he starts to knit. 

Geralt lets the feeling of the yarn between his fingers soothe him. That’s why he watches these yarn reviews, after all. He hates going to the store for yarn, but he hates wasting his money on yarn that’s scratchy and uncomfortable against his skin even more. 

Needless to say, he’s grateful to Dandelion for doing all the prep work for him, and he may or may not have developed a crush on the man.  Who watches these videos and hasn’t? Geralt reasons.

Dandelion has an infectious enthusiasm, and Geralt can’t help the soft smile from spreading across his face as he listens.

Geralt keeps knitting until his skein is almost out. When he has less of a ball and more of a tangle left, he casts his eyes around for the next one before looking despairingly back at his blanket when he doesn’t find it. 

Fuck. 

He knew he should have ordered extra; he always does this to himself, but somehow he never learns. He groans as he pulls his computer onto his lap and opens up the website he orders his yarn from. He goes into his history and clicks on the link to his blanket yarn. It’s teal, velvety, and Geralt can’t stop running his fingers over it. When the page finally loads,  out of stock  blinks back at him. 

Double fuck. 

He’s never made a blanket before, and he’s drastically underestimated how much it would take. He’s going to need at least three more skeins. Yen’s baby shower is in a month and a half, and there’s no telling when the yarn is going to come back in stock. What if they discontinued it? 

There’s nothing for it; he’s going to have to go into the store. He looks at the clock. First thing tomorrow, he decides, before it gets busy. He’ll go right when they open, before the store gets noisy and filled with women who always try to draw him into conversation for some reason. 

Geralt huffs at the thought. 

- 

Geralt tugs his scarf a little tighter against his neck before he gets out of the car and heads into the store. There’s only four cars in the parking lot, so Geralt hopes he’ll be able to get in and out quickly. 

Once he’s inside, he makes a beeline for the yarn aisle, trying to hold in his noise of dismay when he sees someone already standing there. Geralt avoids eye contact and feigns interest in the brightly colored acrylic yarns at the end of the aisle. The person is right in front of the baby yarn section, and Geralt tries not to tap his foot. 

Just when Geralt is getting ready to pretend to browse other aisles while he waits, there’s movement behind him. “Lovely scarf,” a man’s voice says. “Looks very soft.”

Geralt turns around, only for his eyes to widen as he comes face to face with Dandelion. 

He’s sure something very intelligent sounding comes out of his mouth, but he doesn’t register it. 

Whatever it was makes Dandelion laugh, sounding familiar and alarmingly close when they’re not separated by a screen. Geralt glances down at Dandelion’s basket to see it piled high with yarn. 

“Nice colors you have there,” Geralt finally manages. 

Dandelion beams. “Thank you!” 

Geralt takes a closer look and realizes they’re rainbow colors. He heaves a tiny sigh. He’s a disaster. Does Dandelion think he’s flirting with him? Not that Geralt doesn’t want to be, per se, but—it’s complicated. 

“Did you make your scarf yourself? Or did a boyfriend make it for you?” Dandelion asks. 

“I made it myself,” Geralt mumbles. He’s not sure whether he’s relieved by this line of questioning or not.

“Oh?”

“No boyfriend.”

Dandelion turns another smile on him, and Geralt tries not to melt. “What are you shopping for?” 

“Oh. Um. A blanket.”

Dandelion turns back towards the shelves with a critical eye before he plucks out a chunky bright yellow and holds it out to Geralt for his inspection. Geralt runs his fingers over it absently. “Feels nice.”

“Right? I love this brand. How big of a blanket are you making?”

“It’s for a baby.”

Dandelion’s eyebrow arches in question. 

“My friend is adopting soon; I thought this would be nice,” Geralt says, crossing his arms over his chest defensively.

Dandelion shifts his basket from one hand to the other. “Oh, my. That is very nice.”

Geralt grumbles as he piles more yarn than can surely be reasonable into his own basket while Dandelion eyes the shelf thoughtfully. 

Geralt finishes putting the yarn into his basket and goes to leave the aisle, but Dandelion stops him before he takes more than three steps. 

“Better get more than you think. I get what I expect to use, and then add 25 percent more.”

That makes Geralt crack a smile. “That makes an expensive hobby even worse.”

Dandelion shrugs. “The curse of being a creative.”

Geralt picks two more bundles from the shelf. “I suppose you’re right.”

Dandelion clears his throat. “Hey, what’s your name?”

Geralt answers, and Dandelion looks him up and down. “Would you like to join our yarn circle?”

“What?” Geralt asks, throat dry.

Dandelion shakes his head glumly. “Nevermind. It’s just there are so few men…”

“I’ll join,” Geralt says, before he fully thinks out his words. 

Dandelion brightens instantly. “Excellent!”

Dandelion follows him to the register, chattering the whole way, and by the time Geralt leaves the store, Dandelion has his number saved in his phone. Geralt can’t help but notice how the women are leaving him alone today, just shooting him the occasional baleful look. It’s a nice change of pace. Maybe he should run into Dandelion more often. 

“I’ll text you, okay?” Dandelion says after he’s walked with Geralt to his car. 

“Um, yeah, okay,” Geralt replies. 

He slides into his car and watches Dandelion walk to a bright yellow slug bug. He quirks a grin. It fits him. Geralt’s just turned the key in his ignition when he realizes he didn’t even get the yarn that he came for. He sighs and shuts the engine off. 

If he reemerges from the store with the yarn for the rest of his blanket in addition to two skeins of blue that remind him of Dandelion’s eyes, well, that’d be creepy, and it’s nobody’s business but his, anyway. 

-

Geralt looks down at his phone.  yarn circle at that coffee place on Main tomorrow at ten! you in?

He saves the contact in his phone, debating with himself before typing  Dandelion 🌼.

He puffs a breath through his lips. He shouldn’t be this worked up about a text. 

See you then  , he types, and goes back to make the  s  lowercase. 

“Who are you texting?” Eskel asks from his spot on the couch, setting down his own phone.

“Who are  you  texting?” Geralt retorts weakly. 

Eskel looks at him, unimpressed. “My girlfriend, dude. Did you finally get yourself one? You know, it’s kind of weird Yen’s replacing you with a baby…”

Geralt grits his teeth. “She’s not replacing me. We just had conflicting goals for the future.”

“And what, pray tell, are these goals?”

Geralt shrugs. “Not kids. I’d be a terrible dad.”

Eskel rolls his eyes. It’s a conversation they’ve hashed out many times before. “Hmm,” Eskel says pointedly, and Geralt gives him an eye roll right back. 

“Are we watching this movie or not?”

Eskel mumbles something too low for Geralt to hear. 

-

The next morning dawns bright and early. Too early for Geralt to reasonably head out to the coffee shop by the time he’s ready, so he takes the time to work on the blanket. He’s inching closer to being done, and he’s looking forward to starting something with the yellow yarn, but he’s not quite sure what he wants to make yet. 

He wonders if he’s supposed to take his blanket to this yarn circle. Do they knit? Or just talk about it? What if they gossip the whole time? Geralt doesn’t have anything juicy to contribute; he doubts they want to hear about Eskel’s latest problems with his goat yoga business. Giving customers ringworm probably isn’t the best breakfast conversation. He takes in a deep breath, trying to stop the panic spiral. 

It’s fine. It’s going to be fine. 

-

It’s not fine.

When he walks in, Dandelion is already sitting at a table, wearing a floral button down that has entirely too many buttons undone to be decent. Geralt tries not to imagine what Dandelion’s chest hair would feel like under his finger tips, if it would be coarse and wiry or smooth and silky. 

Geralt shakes his head and grunts a greeting when Dandelion waves him over. 

“Hello, hello! Find the place okay?”

“No issues,” Geralt says, pulling out a chair and settling his bag with his knitting awkwardly on the ground. 

Dandelion glances down at his phone, and whatever he sees makes his face tighten. 

“Hmm, looks like the rest of the circle isn’t going to be able to make it. Flat tire.”

Geralt arches an eyebrow at him. “Do they...need help? I could go change it.”

Dandelion mutters something to himself before looking back up at Geralt. “I think they already have that covered.”

Geralt laughs and rubs a hand on his neck. “You know, I’m going to start thinking you were just trying to get me alone.”

Dandelion returns the nervous laugh and warms his hands on his mug. “Are you going to get some coffee?” he asks. 

“Uh, yeah.” Geralt stands up before turning back to Dandelion. “What do you recommend? I don’t come places like this very often.”

“Yeah, I bet. You seem like a coffee, black kind of person.”

“I don’t drink coffee,” Geralt admits. 

Dandelion’s eyes practically bug out of his head. “What do you mean you don’t drink coffee?”

“Makes me jumpy. My hands shake.”

Dandelion lets out a sharp exhale. “Wow.”

Geralt scowls. “Don’t make fun of me.”

“I’m not! Well, maybe a little. You just better get hot chocolate, then.”

“Fine. I will.”

Dandelion’s laughter when Geralt returns to the table with a mug piled high with whipped cream is infectious.

He’s not sure what comes over him, but Geralt sticks out his tongue. 

It’s not until he gets home that he realizes he never even pulled out his knitting. 

-

Dandelion starts texting him more and more, and Geralt feels vaguely guilty when he watches Dandelion’s latest video. 

He should probably tell Dandelion he watches them, but he doesn’t want it to turn into a  thing , and he certainly doesn’t read too much into it when Dandelion mentions running into a handsome stranger on his latest yarn expedition. 

He could be talking about anyone. 

Geralt finishes his blanket for Yen, and he starts to think about what his next project should be. The yellow yarn is bright and warm; silky smooth between his fingers. He starts another blanket, because why not? He’s been wanting to practice cabling, anyway. 

He brings it to the next yarn circle Dandelion invites him to, but it doesn’t get worked on, and Dandelion doesn’t say anything about where the rest of the circle is. Geralt doesn’t ask. 

Finally, four yarn circles in where no knitting is accomplished, Dandelion gives up the ghost and asks Geralt out on a date. “That’s not what we’ve been doing?” Geralt asks with a small smile. 

Dandelion shoves him in the chest, a teasing glint in his eye before his hand lingers on Geralt’s pec for a little too long. He jerks his hand back and clears his throat. “Great. I can’t wait," Geralt says.

“I’ll choose to believe that’s not sarcastic.”

Geralt pokes at him. “It’s not.”

“Hmm.”

Geralt rolls his eyes and  hmm s right back. 

-

A few weeks later finds Geralt sifting through Netflix for a movie to watch. “Hey, Dandelion!” Geralt calls from the couch, tugging a blanket up to his chin. 

Dandelion freezes from his spot just outside the living room with a bowl of popcorn in hand. 

“I have some white cheddar for that,” Geralt says.

“What did you just say?”

“I have some white cheddar for that,” Geralt repeats, more slowly this time. 

“No, no, before that.”

Geralt thinks. “Your...name?”

Dandelion blinks at him. “My name is Jaskier.”

Now Geralt is the one who’s confused. “No, it’s not?”

“Geralt, I think I know my own name.” Dandelion’s face pinches. “Wait. You watch my videos?”

Geralt steels himself for the conversation. He had been wondering if he'd just be able to take the fact that he watches them to his grave. “Yes?”

“And you didn’t think to mention this?”

“It seemed...weird," Geralt says haltingly.

Geralt’s still reeling from the revelation. He’s the world’s worst boyfriend; Dandelion has to be playing a cruel prank on him. 

“And it didn’t seem weird to you that you were watching me literally sing your praises last week?”

“I thought it was kind of sweet.”

Dand—Jaskier drags a hand down his face. “I can’t believe this.”

“How was I supposed to know that wasn’t your actual name?”

“Geralt, we have been together for a month. How do you not know my  name ?”

“It’s never come up!” Geralt says defensively. “You’re the one who never even introduced yourself. Talk about bad manners.”

Jaskier splutters, and Geralt can’t help but quirk a grin at the ridiculousness of the situation. 

Jaskier finally rallies. “We’re going to have a talk about online boundaries, but—”

“But what?”

“You’re so god damned stupid,” Jaskier says, before dragging Geralt into a kiss. 

Geralt goes without complaint. 

-

While Geralt ponders the new nature of their relationship, he finally finds a use for the blue yarn he’s been hoarding. The whole time he’s knitting the hat, he thinks of Jaskier. It’s exactly the right shade of his eyes, but Geralt doesn’t let himself contemplate it too hard. 

When he’s finished, he finds an index card and scrawls a message. He wraps up the whole thing and gives it to Jaskier the next time he sees him. 

Jaskier tears the package open and rubs the yarn between his fingers in delight. “You made this for me? No one’s ever knitted something for me before.”

“I’m glad I could remedy that,” Geralt says gruffly, shifting uncomfortably at the adoring look Jaskier is giving him. 

Jaskier notices the card and reads it before bursting into laughter. 

Sorry I didn’t know your name <3

“You’re forgiven.”

On to the next order of business, then. Geralt clears his throat. “Yen’s baby shower is next week.”

Jaskier makes a noise of polite interest, not looking up from where he’s examining the stitches in the hat. Geralt really hopes he doesn’t notice where he dropped one. 

Geralt waits for a few more seconds and sighs. Jaskier is really going to make him ask. “I was wondering if you would want to go with me.”

Jaskier tilts his head up and gives Geralt a bright smile. “Of course I would!” He pauses to think for a moment. “Are you...out to them?”

“Yes,” Geralt grumbles. “It turns out my hiding spot for my play girls when I was 16 wasn’t as clever as I thought.”

Jaskier snorts. “It never is, is it?”

-

In the days leading up to the shower, Jaskier’s anxiety starts to show, but Geralt politely doesn’t comment. They walk up to the party arm in arm, Geralt carrying both of their gift bags. Geralt had told him he didn’t need to get anything, but he had anyway, insisting that he had just happened to stumble across  the cutest onesie, Geralt! What a coincidence!

Geralt can’t help but smile as he looks over at Jaskier. Jaskier’s thumb is compulsively stroking over a spot on Geralt’s hand, and he’s even wearing the hat Geralt knitted him. Geralt’s chest feels tighter than normal. 

“Oh, so this is why you haven’t been such a grump lately?” Triss asks once they walk through the door, taking their gift bags to set on a side table. 

“I’m never grumpy,” Geralt says, and Jaskier has the audacity to laugh, so Geralt elbows him in the side. 

Triss laughs at that, too, before she goes off to find Yennefer and drags her back to them. “Geralt!” she exclaims, rubbing a hand up his arm. “I’m glad you could drag yourself away from your very important activities that you refuse to tell anyone about.”

Geralt rolls his eyes and looks over to see Jaskier staring at him curiously. 

“Ah, and this must be Dandelion!” Yen says, turning to Jaskier. 

“Eskel wasn’t supposed to tell anyone about that!” Geralt hisses, but Yen just gives him a delighted smile. 

Geralt sighs as she moves on to terrorize her next guest. 

“Your friends are pretty brutal, Geralt,” Jaskier says lightly. 

“You have no idea.” 

Geralt leads Jaskier over to where Eskel and Lambert are sitting by the food table and attempts to make small talk. 

Almost immediately, Lambert asks, “What’d you get her?” 

Eskel and Geralt share an exasperated look. “Why so competitive, Lamb? Over compensating?”

Lambert scowls. “I was just curious. You’re not going to be able to top what I got her, anyway. Best uncle ever.”

“You’re not going to be an uncle,” Eskel says. 

Lambert is unconcerned. “Best uncle ever.”

Geralt crosses his arms and leans into Jaskier, trying to block out Eskel and Lambert’s bickering. 

“I hate things like this,” Geralt mutters. 

“Oh, don’t worry, Geralt. You being an unbearable softie is our little secret. I won’t breathe a word.”

Geralt grumbles. “That’s not why.” He pauses, then, “Why do I put up with you?”

“I can think of a few reasons,” Jaskier says, turning his head to press a kiss against Geralt’s temple. 

Geralt flushes at the touch and looks around, but no one is staring at them like anything out of the ordinary happened. Geralt relaxes back against him. 

He’s almost dozing off by the time Yen gets to his gift, and he only realizes it by Jaskier digging a bony elbow into his stomach. He pinches Jaskier in retribution. 

Yen opens the gift carefully, making the appropriate polite noises as she does so. 

“Isn’t it soft?” Jaskier asks as she strokes her fingers over the blanket. “Geralt chose some great yarn.”

Geralt whips his neck around to look at Jaskier so quickly he thinks he heard something pop.

“What?” 

“The yarn! It’s so nice and such a lovely color, don’t you think? Geralt did a wonderful job.”

“Geralt, you made this?” Yennefer asks incredulously, and great, her voice cracks. 

Geralt sighs and tries to accept his fate of all the merciless jokes that are going to be made in his defense. “Yes?”

“And you didn’t think to tell me this?”

“When the fuck did you learn how to do that?” Lambert asks. 

Geralt shrugs defensively. “I’ve been knitting for years.”

Everyone’s eyes are drawn to the blue cap perched on top of Jaskier’s head, and teasing grins spread over their faces. 

Geralt groans. He’s never going to hear the end of this.

As Jaskier takes his hand in his and squeezes, he thinks maybe that’s okay. 

[spacejellyfish3]

So I watched—and loved—Fear Street on Netflix. It’s fun, it’s scary, it’s very well directed, impressively shot, and delightfully queer. I’m also really excited to see where it goes next, since it is a trilogy of films that are APPARENTLY COMING OUT ONE AFTER THE OTHER IM BEING FED VERY WELL

Um…

Ahem…so anyways…I’m super stoked to foray into the 70s for the obviously Friday The 13th homaging next installment. But I as I’m wont to do, I have thoughts, I have theories, I have several analyses bursting out of my brain for zombies to eat.

And so without further ado; here’s my Fear Street theory (and yes, all of the spoilers apply):

So…yeah.

Sara Fiers is not the villain. She most definitely is not.

That’s pretty unlikely given the intensely unsubtle foreshadowing in the opening credits ALONE.

No…the witch isn’t the villain at all.

Sunnyvale is.

It’s particularly interesting to me how much the high key in your face opening credits establish very clearly the dichotomy between Shadyside and Sunnyvale; one town full of murder, mayhem, and misfortune, the other prosperous, picturesque, and peaceful. It’s the difference between Killer Central USA and The Sunniest Place On Earth. And that, in my opinion, is—forgive the pun—shady as all hells.

In fact, it’s so very much and exceedingly reeking with suspicion…

It’s stated extremely plainly throughout the film how Shadyside has continuously descended into a pit of death and suffering as the years pass by, while Sunnyvale remains rich and pleasant and as safe as can be. That cannot be a coincidence—especially in a horror movie, a genre where almost nothing is ever coincidental.

And if Buffy the Vampire Slayer has taught me anything at all, it’s that supposedly idyllic towns that market themselves as “sunny” are never ever to be trusted at all costs.

Ever. Never ever ever.

The main reason I find Sunnyvale sus is pretty obvious, however: if they weren’t, why even mention the difference in the towns’ wealth and safety? Why bring up that conflict? Why even have two towns in the first place? What would be the point if there’s no relation? Sunnyvale’s entire existence within the story, and their relative prosperity in comparison to Shadyside, seems very much like a clue that they’re involved in some freaky deaky dealings and possible black magic. They wouldn’t bring up these details if they weren’t gonna matter in the long run; you don’t spend that much time and effort just to set up a red herring.

Unless it’s just bad writing, which might be probable but seems unlikely for this specific property at least…

Another big indication comes in the witch’s supposed motivations…which don’t seem to exist beyond “muah ha ha murder” and “generic revenge” if we’re being completely honest here. But that flimsiness made me take a closer look into the visions Sam got after her blood seeped into Sara’s grave and as she got closer to death: a swarm of bees, red tinted almost like blood got splashed onto the camera, a girl screaming into the ether, an image of the Witch’s Mark, and who I presume to be Sara yelling “YOU! IT’S YOU!” over and over again. But when I look at that and put it in context with the motives the 1994 cast comes up with, there’s not much cohesion, is there?

Revenge as a motive wouldn’t explain why Heather was killed in the cold open. It also wouldn’t explain the weekly tragedies that befall Shadyside. If Sara wanted revenge on the town that tortured and killed her, why all the drama? Supposing she can possess the dead, why not just necromance an army of unkillable zombie monstrosities to raze the town in one go and get all over with? Why is this bitch out here doing the most? It doesn’t add up and it doesn’t make sense.

And if you take all that in tandem with the various tragedies of Shadyside—the ways people were murdered, the consistency of the massacres over the years, etc—it starts to paint an intriguing picture:

These deaths aren’t passion filled or emotive or generalized, they’re targeted (at those whose blood has mixed with the witch’s grave) and more importantly: they’re low key ritualistic. It screams of the classic sacrificial deaths and equivalent exchange. Sunnyvale’s peace and prosperity is very likely rooted in a demonic ritual that both feeds on the suffering of Shadyside as well as directly cause it as a sort of feedback, taking the brunt of the bad luck, poverty, and decay meant for Sunnyvale only heightened and magnified to insane degrees. It’s why so many deaths have happened over the years: it’s a clear method of perpetuating that state of perfect, suburban idyllia.

And honestly if this theory does turn out to be the case, it’d serve as an excellent metaphor for wealth inequality, possibly gentrification, and most definitely exploitation of the lower classes of the socioeconomic hierarchy by the upper crust elite WASP 1% so as to perpetuate the status quo of the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer and continuing to suffer. That itself is kinda sorta already supported by the text of Fear Street too in that Sunnyvale is made up of mainly privileged white suburbanites who live in antebellum architecture style houses and manors blanketed by green grass and white picket fences whereas in contrast Shadyside is home to a clearly diverse and multiethnic population that is disenfranchised, poor, low in prospects, high in death and suffering, and living in relative squalor…

So imma leave that here and I hope y’all add your own theories and observations if you can and want to. I’d love to read them so please don’t hesitate to reblog with your additions and stuff!

[natromanxoff]

Record Mirror (July 14, 1979): 119/?

THE QUEEN BACKLASH ENDS HERE

WITHOUT DOUBT Queen are among that elite number of bands universally hated by the rock press.

The rancour is, make no mistake, mutual which is understandable. If you find yourself on the receiving end of an inveterate dislike at the outset of your career and watch it being nurtured and carefully cultivated over the next six years you’re bound to retaliate.

Queen’s hatred manifests itself by their continued habit of ignoring the music press i.e. refusing to give interviews. There is the occasional token “chat”, pointless as it is innocuous, but in the main it amounts to a blanket “No.”

One of the last interviews Freddie Mercury gave was the last nail in the perspex coffin. Under a headline which boldly asked ‘Is This Man A Prat?’ the king of the leotards was demolished by one of the old school Queen haters and Freddie obviously came to the conclusion, in its wake, that interviews in future would be both superfluous (he was popular enough) and detrimental.

The curtain, velvet naturally, closed.

Roger Taylor, a little wary, a little weary, sits stiffly in an armchair. The juggernauts rattling the Chelsea Street outside create a sonorous buzz bomb hum in the room.

You expect a member of Queen to look elegant. In fact Roger is only wearing a wine colour mohair jacket, black shirt and blue jeans.

He apologises for being a little late and explains how he went to the wrong address. Roger seems to be the only member of Queen left who is prepared, albeit rarely, to open his mouth in the presence of a hack. A question springs to mind . . . why?

“We all sat around a table before I flew over from Munich to discuss the press situation and we agreed I should be the one to represent the band. Freddie is very uncompromising and refuses to have much to do with journalists.

“Obviously, he’s had a few raw deals with them in the past,” observes Taylor.

Roger himself has a rather low view of the music press.

“Most of it is rubbish. There was something I liked recently, a piece on Malcolm McLaren, but in the main I think I’m the only one of Queen to actually read the music papers.”

Why does he think the band are systemically slagged?

“I think it’s because Queen have always come across as being a rather confident band. We seemed, to other people at least, to be very sure of ourselves. I think the press may have misconstrued the confidence, mistaking it for a form of arrogance. Hence they became wary of our motives which bred a dislike for our music.”

Now that’s what I call a neat conclusion.

At the risk of being sent to Coventry by my colleagues I’d like, if I may, to come clean. I love Queen (you’re fired, Ed).

I think it all began with a simple pre-packed but indisposable line – “Dynamite with a laser beam” and has continued uninterrupted (despite the occasional flaw) right through to ‘Queen Live Killers’.

A combination of reasons, Freddie Mercury’s lascivious lisp – the most attractive intonation known to man . . . Brian May’s reel ‘em off rococo riffs that would, in his capable hands, transform the theme music for ‘Waggoners’ Walk’ into a meisterwork . . . John Deacon’s almost stoic stance, incongruous yet integral . . . Roger Taylor’s intense power, so unexpected from one so slight . . . the ability to go over the top without failing into the trap of caricature . . . a desire to give the punters what they want without pandering . . . that cast iron confidence . . . those nine glorious winter weeks of ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ which kept the cold away from my soul . . .

Yes, I love Queen.

Roger explains the story behind ‘Killers’ which features just about every Queen classic which ever found its way into a silk lined memory bank.

“We always knew that one day we would make a live album. I think it was well planned. About 90 per cent of our last European tour was recorded on a mobile unit and we then spent weeks sitting through the songs in the studio.

“The result is a 100 per cent LIVE album. Nothing has been touched up in the process of selection, I think that’s pretty rare these days. Many ‘live’ albums are tampered with.”

The choice of single is unusual – ‘Love Of My Life’. “It’s not so unusual when you hear the way it came out. The song seems to have such a wide appeal. Everywhere we go the reaction to it is the same. The audience are just bursting to sing along.”

The result is Queen’s best single since ‘Don’t Stop Me Now’ (that was their LAST one crawler, ED)

As I mentioned earlier the band are currently residing in Munich where they are “experimenting” in the studio.

“We are recording in a totally different way for us,” says Roger who speaks with a delicate London accent only typical of cockneys with dramatic training and David Essex.

“Every time we entered a studio in the past we had a good idea of what we were going to do. This time we started from scratch and the result is amazing. The music is nothing like anything we’ve done before, I guess you could say it’s much simpler.”

And this novel approach to their music also extends to their shows. On their next British tour – in the late Autumn – the band will be playing much smaller venues than they are accustomed to.

“In London for example we went to play to audiences of about two or three thousand in different areas. I think it’s much fairer to the fans.”

But won’t this affect their stage show which is after all a crucial factor for any powerpomp outfit?

“Not really. We will just scale down the show accordingly. Besides,” he says taking another bite out of the biscuit, “we haven’t used dry ice in years.”

The monkey on Queen’s back, as corpulent and cantankerous as ever, has been put there by those who firmly believe the band can never emulate past achievements. Roger is cognizant of its presence but refuses to unpeel its bananas.

“That all began after ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’. When it stayed at number one all those weeks we were kindly informed that we would never be able to make another single to rival it both artistically and from the point of view of sales.

“Yet ‘We Are The Champions’ sold a great deal more and has since become the biggest selling single in the entire history of Elektra Asylum – our label in the States.

“We don’t do the amazingly complex things any more because we’ve moved on from that. We concentrate on the music we are doing now and we intend to do it the best we can, it’s ridiculous looking behind and and what you’ve done.

“There’s nothing like going back on the road to re-unite the bond between the four personalities and strengthening our belief in the band. We are a real working unit and, in my experience of the music business, one of the most democratic bands around today.”

A statement like that cries out to be expounded.

“People think every member of all the bands, not naming any names, are treated equally that is get the same money as their colleagues. That’s rubbish. In many bands there are a couple of guys that get all the money. The rest are on wages. Queen share the profits equally.”

And they don’t have a manager taking his cut either, John Reid departed a couple of years back and now the band themselves make all the major policy decisions. Why did they decide to dispense with the services of a manager?

“Basically because we were fed up with giving other people money. Y’know it never ceases to amaze me how naive those guys are in bands who have just had their first hit. After all this time I’ve forgotten just how naive we must have been at the beginning.

“I mean, everything seems so great when you get into the charts for the first time. You’re living on cloud nine and nothing else matters. But in truth that hit means absolutely nothing. So few people achieve any amount of financial success in this business.

“Oh, you think, you’re really living . . . for a while. Somebody gets you a flat in Chelsea and it’s all free. But one day the rent stops being paid for you and you realise you’re skint.

“Since John Reid has gone the four of us have always made a point of discussing everything together. We have various people working for us but all the important decisions are made by us alone. That way we get freedom of choice – and financial independence.”

My attention is suddenly diverted.

“FORTY-LOVE!” Wimbledon, the Persil White opiate for the hoi polloi squashed in a strawberry crush wrings out its perspiring petticoats on the TV in the next room.  Roger’s girlfriend, an extremely attractive French girl called Dominique, is engrossed. The couple have lived together for two years. Crippled old marriage questions permeate the air.

“I don’t believe in marriage,” says Roger. “It’s simply a contract and the fewer contracts I enter into the better. If you get on well with someone then there isn’t any harm in living with that person – but marriage is something else again.”

They live in a six bedroomed Victorian house just outside London, which is set in 20 acres. Roger has a “tiny” town house in Barnes as well. What’s it like having a bank full of money at the age of 29?

“I don’t hide away from life. Queen have never been one of those ‘being grabbed in the street’ type bands. It may happen when the four of us are together – but when we are out alone we are seldom bothered. That gives me the opportunity to enjoy myself. I go to clubs a lot. I like having a good time. I don’t think you could describe any of the band as leading sheltered lives.

“But I have completely lost touch with how much things cost. When you find yourself living in hotels for so long you never really deal in money as such. Everything is available whenever you want it – but you never see the cash actually being handed over.

“I’ve forgotten what it was like to be penniless which Queen were for years. I guess that must happen to many successful rock bands.”

Another thing that happens to many successful rock bands – they quit the country. But not Queen it appears.

“We have always based ourselves in England and I see no reason why we shouldn’t continue to do so. We could leave at any time but we choose to stay. People believe we are tax exiles because we spend a lot of the time out of the country recording in studios all over Europe and touring.”

And what will happen when the band finally trudge wearily down the road leading to that  ivory strewn elephants’ graveyard . . . ?

“I know it’s bound to happen one day. I suppose I’d take a long, long holiday . . . and then make a solo album.”

[kuroosweakness]

pouring rain | miya atsumu | pt. 1

summary: timeskip!atsumu: in which atsumu meets you for the first time 

word count: about 1,900

a/n: my first mini fic without an established relationship :) i’d love love love to what you think of it!!

atsumu scoffs and skids his shoe across the sidewalk. small rocks fly up in the air and tumbles down back on the concrete. is he really off his game today? no, it just seems like his teammates couldn’t do their job and just score. oh no, he’s going back to the same toxic mindset he had in high school. only this time, osamu isn’t here to kick him back to his senses. 

with a heavy sigh and hands deep in his pockets, atsumu reluctantly turns back towards the gym. his head hangs low as he feels people’s eyes staring at him in judgement. atsumu lifts his head to glare at them, only to find no one’s looking at him. he sighs again and slowly turns the door knob to the gym entrance. a wave of warm air hits him. he forgot how warm it is inside the gym compared to outside. 

“tsum-tsum, you’re back!” bokuto exclaims, jogging over to him and giving atsumu a big pat on the back. atsumu narrows his eyes at him, trying to find some snarky remark to say but decides against it. 

“yeah, i am,” he quietly says. his eyes dart around the almost empty gym. “where’d everyone go?” 

“home. it’s said to rain soon and since the practice game’s over, they headed home early. it’s just hinata and i.” 

right on cue, atsumu’s eyes find hinata waving at them while drinking water. 

“we need a setter to practice with us-” 

atsumu waves him off mid-sentence. “not today. i’m gonna head home.” 

hinata dashes over and atsumu quickly puts on an even grumpier face to resist hinata’s cheery eyes. 

“you usually always stay after practice,” hinata points out and starts doing high-knees in place, then arm circles. 

“well, today’s different.” atsumu reaches down for his bag and slings it over his shoulder. he needs to get out of the stuffy gym as soon as possible. “see ya guys later,” he calls and pushes the gym doors open. 

“see ya!” he hears bokuto and hinata call. 

oh he can’t wait until he gets home. when he gets home? and then what? by ‘home,’ he means the little apartment he recently moved into that’s always cold and dark when he goes back. not a very welcoming place, especially not with today’s grey, cloudy weather. 

atsumu trudges across the sidewalk and waits for the walking signal before crossing the street. a crowd of people walks towards him so he walks to the very right to avoid any contact. just four more blocks until he gets home. 

the near distance is the main reason atsumu chose the apartment. the short walking distance between home and the gym is nice, especially after tedious hours of practice. what’s even better is the fact that ‘samu’s restaurant is only a couple blocks away. 

oh, ‘samu! atsumu’s eyes widens as he straightens his posture. the thought of biting into a warm, delicious onigiri is enough to make his stomach growl and his mouth drool. only three more turns, he thinks, pacing his steps to avoid stepping on the sidewalk cracks. he suddenly remembers the way he’d laugh at osamu when they were children everytime osamu stepped on a sidewalk crack. 

“step on a crack and break your momma’s back~” atsumu would say as he held his stomach in laughter. his laughter quickly died down when osamu calmly reminded atsumu that they have the same mom. 

the skies are darkening. the clouds appears to be getting thicker. it’s only a matter of time before rain starts to pour down. good thing i beat the rain here, atsumu smiles and opens to the door to osamu’s restaurant. 

as usual, he walks over to the very end of the store and settles himself on a stool. good thing no one has taken his spot. he places his bag on the empty stool next to his right gives it a small pat before hollering out for his twin’s name. 

“‘samu! your favorite sibling is here~” 

osamu’s figure appears behind the counters. he’s wearing a black shirt and black pants with an apron covered in flour placed over them. on top of his head is his usual black cap. 

“and my least favorite sibling,” the cook chuckles before frowning at atsumu’s face. “why do you look so stupid?” 

atsumu pulls back and huffs. “stupid? is this how you greet me after a long day?” 

osamu’s lips slowly tugs upwards. he reaches down and dries a bowl with a grey towel. “care to tell me what happened?” 

“let me have some food first.” 

osamu rolls his eyes and places a plate with three beautifully wrapped onigiris on top in front of atsumu. atsumu’s eyes immediately glows as he snatches an onigiri and chomps down. 

“you didn’t even wash your hands.” osamu sighs and reaches for another bowl. 

“my sets weren’t so good today,” atsumu mumbles, setting his onigiri down and looking into the distance. “and so i got mad at my teammates for not scoring. they got mad at me and said that it wasn’t them, it was because of my sets. i don’t know why i’m not on top of my game like every day.” 

osamu goes silent. his drying pace slows down. “...’tsumu, you haven’t taken any breaks since you joined msby. maybe you ought to slow down and take care of your health.” 

to osamu’s surprise, atsumu doesn’t defend back. he just heavily sighs and takes another bite. “i guess so.” 

“oh look,” osamu nods towards the nearest window. “it’s already sprinkling.” 

“good thing i never remember to unpack my bag so my umbrella’s on me. gotta work smarter, not harder~ ” atsumu smirks and slowly steps out of his seat. “better get going before it rains even harder. bye ‘samu, thanks for the food.” 

osamu nods. “i’ll see you later.” 

atsumu slings his bag over his shoulder and heads toward the front door, only to see you also head for the door. who goes first...? atsumu awkwardly gestures toward the door. “you first.” 

you take in the sight before you. a tall, muscular, blonde guy who looks ... well, a little weird. handsome? yes. also really dumb. it’s so cold today, yet he’s wearing a sleeveless top. you scoff, it’s probably because he wants to show off those arms, isn’t it? 

from his frown, you realize your scoff was a little too loud. before embarrassing yourself any further, you give him a small nod and opens the door. as you step out, you leave a hand on the door to keep it open for him. he gives you a small nod as a thanks and steps out under the roof a few feet away from you. 

the sound of pitter-pattering is all you hear. water droplets skids down the brown roof and plop, onto your shoes. at least it’s not pouring, you think as you pull your hood over your head, ready to dash into the rain all the way home. 

as if right on cue, the swaying of the tree speeds up. the pit-pattering turns violent. 

“i um, have an umbrella if you want to ... share.” 

you turn to look at him in surprise. he unzips his bag and pulls out a small black foldable umbrella. with a press of a button, the umbrella opens. 

“if your home is in walking distance, i can drop you off,” he says with a shrug. he places the umbrella over your head and gives you an awkward smile. 

trusting a stranger to walk me home, what can possibly go wrong? you sarcastically thought. “you’re osamu’s twin, aren’t you?” 

“so you’ve heard about me,” he says with a smug smile, possibly one of the most annoying smiles you’ve ever seen. annoying, because they’re hard to resist. 

it’s hard not to when there are billboards with your face on them all around here. “yeah, i have. you’re... miya atsumu?” 

“that’s right. and you’re ...?” 

“y/n... maybe you can drop me off at a convenience store so I can buy an umbrella there and walk the rest of the way home. where i live is pretty far away...” it’s not that you believe he’ll murder you, but that he’ll have to walk all that distance and back just to drop you off. you can’t have a stranger go all that way for you. 

“are ya sure? the umbrellas in convenience stores are always expensive. i’m not looking forward to heading home anyways so don’t worry about me.” 

... “well, okay. my apartment’s across from ‘hug a mug’ cafe, if you know where that is.” 

to your surprise, atsumu chuckles. “yeah i know where that is. i can’t but laugh everytime i hear their name.” 

“it’s cute,” you defend. “you know, like getting a warm, toasty hug along with a cup of coffee.” 

atsumu blinks at you and appears to what you said into thought. “i guess i should go to ‘hug a mug’ more often then, shouldn’t i?” he steps out into the rain and waits until you step under the umbrella to start walking. 

“yeah, you should. business has been slow for them lately. every time i go, there are barely any customers.” you look at to avoid stepping in puddles, and to avoid walking too close to him. every time you inch a bit further from him, he just seems to center the umbrella with wherever your head is.

“i should recommend ‘hug a mug’ to my teammates then. i’ll have to go try it out first, of course, just to make sure i’m not recommending anything bad,” he chuckles along his last lines. 

“...atsumu, your shoulder.” 

“my what?” he whips his head in your direction. 

“you’re not covering your shoulder,” you point out. water’s running down his right arm. 

“it’s fine,” he replies, and leans back to peek at your shoulder to make sure it’s not like his. “osamu and i used jump in puddles and compete with each other to see who could make the biggest splash. whenever i made a big splash, osamu would pretend he didn’t see it.” 

you softly laugh under your breath. the puddles ahead of you are quite tempting. but you know better not to jump in, for the possibility of splashing on his shoes and pants. who knows how much his shoes might cost? he’s a professional volleyball player, afterall. 

“just one more turn, right?” atsumu asks. “oh look, the rain has slowed down.” 

little droplets of water slides off the black umbrella in front of you. “yeah, you can drop me off here, i’ll walk the rest of way since it’s barely raining anymore-” 

he huffs. “drop you off at a random corner? and what happens if it starts pouring again?” 

... with a few more steps, you spot hug a mug across from the street and points it out to him. “see? we’re here. my apartment is just on the second floor. i’ll get going now, thanks for sharing your umbrella...” you give him a small wave before speed-walking up the stairs to your apartment. 

halting in mid-step, you turn to see if he’s still there, only to see a bare sidewalk with water running down the drains. he must’ve left already. 

as you unlock the door to your home, atsumu’s walking back home with a stupid grin spread across his face, finally letting out the breath he’s been holding in since he left his brother’s restaurant. if only if he had walked slower, then maybe the conversation with you would’ve lasted longer. 

[sylver-drawer]

... I ranted in discord again, and it turned out to be an essay. So here’s another Syl Tea, let’s fight.

Spoon Deviating from the Novel’s Plotline

Readers have been complaining for a while. It started in the amnesia arc, and still continues on to current times. Complaining, insulting, begging and begging, all for Spoon to stop changing the story.

But it’s been getting worse recently, the complaining comments shouting louder than those of praise and positive reinforcement, and I’m sick of it.

Part One: The Source Novel

Suddenly Became a Princess One Day (SBAPOD) was a novel written by Plutus. That is what Who Made Me a Princess (WMMAP)’s source material. In the story, Lee Ji Hye after taking too many sleeping pills one day, transmigrates into the world of a novel called, ‘The Lovely Princess’ (TLP). In TLP, it features two heroines. One is the main heroine, Jennette, who was loved and adored by all. With her sunny and angelic disposition, she melted the icy cold heart of her father, the emperor, Claude De Alger Obelia.

The girl, the baby she had reincarnated into however, was the second heroine, Athanasia De Alger Obelia. In TLP, Athanasia was born from Claude and a concubine named Diana. She grew up unloved by her father in the ruby palace, the palace of concubines where Claude had commit a genocide. She met had briefly met her father when she was nine, and had become obsessed with him and trying to earn his love and affections. Those affections, however, went to her half sister Jennette, who was introduced at the debutante.

TLP ended with Athanasia getting executed for a crime she did not commit. Jennette had been poisoned by her aunt and fell into a coma, and Claude had immediately blamed Athanasia for it. Without an investigation, he had killed her. It was then revealed that Jennette’s aunt, Rosalia, was the perpetrator, in which Claude had reacted with no remorse. Rosalia went unpunished, and Claude had forgotten Athanasia’s existence as if she had just been a fly he had swatted. The only one who mourned and grieved over Athanasia, was Jennette.

Lee Jihye refused to die again. Her actions, however, as the reborn Athanasia, had led to somehow gaining the affections of her father. SBAPOD had ended with Jennette being exiled for being the product of black magic and an unintentional threat to the royal family, leaving Athanasia to live in a Happily Ever After ending with her father and magician lover, Lucas.

I’m going to have to say a very unpopular opinion within the fandom. Plutus is a terrible writer. And I don’t mean by skills in writing. Plutus cannot... write a good story. Taking example from their other works, Beware Of The Brothers (BOTB) which takes place in the same universe as SBAPOD. Hari, who had went back in time, spent half of the story trying to fix her relationship with her adoptive brothers. As she was severely neglected and downright abused by her step brothers in her previous life,s he strived to be accepted as their family.

It seems nice right? A story of a girl trying to improve her relationship with her family. She eventually succeeds, and her brothers defend her and call her their precious sister.

But here’s the catch. She marries one. Yes, marries her brother, and another one of her brothers also fall for her. If that wasn’t bad enough, she’s the carbon copy of their dead sister. She was adopted for the sole reason of looking exactly like their sister, who had died. That was why their parents took her in. The eldest son, the eldest brother, fell in love with a girl who he had abused and neglected in the past out of jealousy and childish hate, a girl who looks exactly like his dead sister. What’s even worse? Hari chose her elder brother, someone who abused and neglected her in the past for no reason, over a sweet guy who she was actually engaged to. When half of the story was about being seen as their family, acknowledged as their sister.

But I digress, this post isn’t about BOTB.

Plutus is a bad writer. They have countless issues in SBAPOD as well. For example, characters. Plutus cannot for the life of them, build and develop their main characters, nor can they write a stable plot.

Let’s give an example. Lee Jihye as Athanasia does not... develop. For context, Lee Jihye was an orphan in korea. She grew up alone and had to fend for herself for her whole life. This premise is common, but can be interesting if well done. SBAPOD falls under the reincarnation category of, ‘their past life has no impact’. By this, I mean, none of the characteristics from her life as Lee Jihye carry over to her life as Athanasia. It was fine in the beginning, when she strived to survive no matter the cost. For someone who was struggling by herself in Korea, of course she was greedy and hyper focused on survival and having back up plans. She was flawed, but human.

This changes. For someone who had to grow up alone and fend for herself, the moment she gets too comfortable? That doesn’t matter anymore. All of her instincts, gone. When Claude gets amnesia and threatens, humiliates, and almost kills her—

She comes back. She comes back to the man who has tried, and she knows is the most capeable from reading TLP, to kill her. You don’t need to be an orphan to know that if someone is trying to kill you, you run and never look back. Even before then, her instincts have completely faded. Claude had taken a liking to her so she can live comfortably now, but who knows what would happen? In the modern world, especially for people of low income, money and wealth can easily fade away. She never once checked on her secret stash of gold and precious items, was never conscious or had any struggle of the ‘what if Claude turns around and tries to kill me earlier’.

It was as if her life experience of orphan Lee Jihye only mattered for when she came back to claude because she’s never had a family.

See, Plutus has this constant theme in their work of, ‘there is no such thing as found family’. I’ve explained a bit of it before in my post about the theme of WMMAP, about Family Bonds. This is prevalent in all of Plutus’ work. Beyond Jennette’s naivety, TLP Athanasia had the exact same mindset because she wasn’t alone. Lily. Lily was her caretaker, her nanny, who loved her the most out of anyone in this world. Yet Athanasia craved for the love of someone who hated her, and paid no mind to love of the woman who raised her like her daughter. Because there is no such thing as found family in Plutus’ work.

Plutus is not a very good writer, as they can’t write a well developed story. It isn’t just a fault in Athanasia’s character, it’s also a fault in all of the characters in Plutus’ work. Claude, Ijekiel, Lucas—their purpose in SBAPOD was solely to benefit the main character, Athanasia. Claude never developed. He remained as he was in TLP, an emperor who threatens his people for the simplest things. Just because he’s kind to Athanasia, doesn’t mean he’s changed. This was proven in the novel’s amnesia arc, as the moment he lost memory of Athanasia, he immediately threatened to kill her. And when she returned? He threatened to kill everyone at the festival if she ran away again. There was no development in his character. His character is just to give Athanasia a reason to stay. Same with Ijekiel, who was never truly explored other than the fact he was the ‘princely’ second love interest for Athanasia. We didn’t know his drive, his reasons, his interests his character. All his traits are, ‘princely’ and ‘loves Athanasia’. Lucas is in the same category. Lucas, the almighty powerful magician, solves all of Athanasia’s problems. Athanasia is afraid fo Claude dying? Gives him immortality, which coincidentally returned his memories. Aeternitas is the villain and has been causing Athanasia and Claude pain this whole time? Just kill him, and he’s no longer a problem. Jennette has a mental breakdown because her whole world has been torn apart and her magic burst is a threat? Takes her magic away, and would have killed her had Athanasia not told him to spare her life. Lucas had solved all of Athanasia’s problems, and inadvertently prevented Athanasia from improving.

The side stories in SBAPOD had solidified the ‘everyone was made to make the main characters look better’, as the whole timeline had become scewed because Plutus had added information that didn’t make sense. Backstories and changing characters to the point where they didn’t even seem like the characters Plutus had wrote earlier in the story. Claude and Diana’s whole backstory revealed in the side stories at the end was made just to justify Claude’s horrible actions and make him look better. Diana, who was a dancer sold to Claude and became his concubine, suddenly had a tragic and downright depressing backstory. And apparently Claude saved her from it when he still was engaged to Penelope? Even though they met after he killed Anastacious and Penelope had escaped? And it tried to justify his genocide of the ruby palace, by saying some concubines poisoned Diana which was why she died—even though it was revealed earlier on that Athanasia’s mana killed Diana. And it still didn’t justify Claude killing everyone in the ruby palace, the concubines he himself kept and let live there as well as the countless servants, just because a few supposedly poisoned Diana.

Plutus was a bad writer, who wrote a poorly developed novel, and fans bash Spoon for not following it.

Part Two: Spoon’s Character Development

While finally on the topic of Spoon, let’s start what this post was supposed to be about before I got off topic.

Spoon is often ‘criticized’ (ie, my posts on criticism and suggestions) for changing the story to the point it’s apparently ‘boring’ and ‘not making Lucas strong’ (and yes, specifically Lucas, my dears).

When really, Spoon has... improved WMMAP? Especially in the most recent chapters? From a development standpoint in comparison. People have been saying it’s been really slow, which is understandable, but isn’t it because we get updates once to twice a month? When you binge read it, it’s not that slow. For readers who read it the moment it comes out, it feels slow because you take days and weeks between chapters.

But, especially now when the plot has actually sped up significantly, people call it boring? More boring than season one where all Athanasia and Claude did was have tea parties? I mean think about it.

In SBAPOD, Athanasia never had a proper interaction with the villain. Bad things kept happening, but Athanasia never really had a direct confrontation with the one causing all of her problems. If I remember correctly, she never questioned it either. When you think about, Athanasia, other than Claude, never had any struggles. No internal conflict, no doubts or worries, and no questions despite her past as Lee Jihye. And when she did, Lucas took care of it.

But in WMMAP, everything is happening at once. Claude is in a critical condition, Athanasia has to temporarily take over and confront the nobles, and in the middle of it all, the villain makes his dramatic entrance in front of everyone. And for the first time in a long time, Athanasia has to think about how to survive and protect not just herself, but others. And if she doesn’t think it through, she will lose everything.

And that? That in itself is an extreme improvement. The problem isn’t just between her and one person like when Claude had amnesia. This issue potentially involves and impacts everyone in obelia. Athanasia can’t worry about and stay in her little bubble of protection now. She’s forced to learn, because Claude is in critical condition.

Athanasia is actually preparing to learn how to rule a kingdom when she never did in the novel. Never, did she have to confront the nobles by herself. Even in her debutante, Claude had to threaten a crowd for staring at the only princess as she debuts, before even taking the first step. And Athanasia never needed to learn politics. The magic branch made her dad immortal so she never needed to learn. Which means, Athanasia never grew or improved as a character. She remained the same as when she reincarnated into the infant Athanasia.

Spoon even improved Athanasia’s connection with her peers. She seldom connected with the other noble girls, and never had anyone she was close to other than Lucas. But because of the whole Amnesia arc in WMMAP? She has Jennette now. Jennette, who in the novel she perceived as uncomfortable and a mild threat, is now one of her only friends that she regularly wrote to. Athy, who didn’t care about anyone else outside of her little bubble, has people to protect and fight for. Her character is already miles ahead of what Plutus had made her, and it’s because of Spoon.

And it’s not just Athanasia getting focus and development.

In SBAPOD, no one, minus Claude and Athanasia, was explored at all. The villains were shallow, the side characters were there only to add more to the main characters and were never expanded upon as people.

But in WMMAP? Ijekiel is having more drive and isn’t just a character meant to be Athy’s second love interest anymore, despite how he was for majority of the story. He had addressed and established his character of wordlessly obeying his father early on, and the novel never dealt with that. But now? He openly expressed bitterness to his father’s plan. And he’s currently going out of his way to tell Felix what’s been happening, essentially backstabbing his brainwashed father and risking possibly being labeled as a traitor for harboring a threat. This little change that Spoon made had already improved Ijekiel’s character. Because he isn’t just there, he has his own motives and thought process, like an actual human would.

Aeternitas who was the sole villain and’s only purpose was ‘Lucas look at me’ was changed almost completely to a villain that has depth. Anastacious, who actually has motivation and reasons why to be such a big villain has more development than Claude.

Spoon’s new character having more development than Claude already shows what a good writer she is—because Claude’s doing exactly what he’s done in the novel, what Plutus wrote for him. It’s lazy writing, but putting Claude in a coma is one of the best ways Spoon could have continued the plot. He has no character development left. He loves Athy again, so bringing his memory back right away completely contradicts the whole amnesia arc. The amnesia’s whole point was so that it could display that he doesn’t need his memories to loves his daughter (which I personally still think is badly written because TLP contradicts this). He can’t become less of a jerk because that’s literally the base of his character—his murderous demeanor towards everyone was a plot point Plutus permanently set into his character and can’t be changed without changing Claude’s character entirely. Spoon can’t work with the Claude Plutus created at all, so she made the best choice of sending him asleep to move the development of the others.

Lucas? Instead of everyone else gaining characteristics, she took away points where his character had to display his ‘almighty-ness’.

And that? That’s the best thing she could have done to a character who Plutus had set up as an ‘all powerful’ wizard. He was renowned as a great and powerful wizard in the history books, but in reality, he’s just a talented kid. He’s not godlike. He’s not the strongest in the world. And that’s good. We’ve already established how talented he is in magic, season one already proved that.

Compare Lucas to Gandalf from LotR. Gandalf was renouned as one of the strongest wizards, and displayed his power, but he wasn’t almighty nor did he ever help Frodo on on his mission. He was a guide, but never the answer. But that didn’t mean he was useless, and we never thought of him as that. He didn’t need to help the main character with their problems for us to know what good of a character he was. In the end, Frodo did his duty, solved his own problems himself despite how small and weak he was without Gandalf’s (or any of his comrades assistance). Did it make Gandalf weak because he didn’t throw the ring for Frodo? No. That’s the kind of Lucas we needed, not some Deus Ex Machina like in SBAPOD.

We don’t need Spoon to show us more of something we already knew, and Spoon knows that. And he is getting development, and people are so blind to see it. Even in the most recent chapters, it’s right there.

It’s Athanasia verbally telling him, ‘killing won’t solve anything’ to his immediate response to just kill the villain, which attributes to development for both her and Lucas. It’s small, but you have to treat him like a child. Because emotionally, he was deprived of growth. You have to tell him straight out what’s wrong, and Athanasia did that. And she’s still changing him. Athanasia trying so hard for Claude, and Athanasia confessing her knowledge of Jennette being her cousin and not doing anything to endanger her— those little actions are making Lucas see the importance of family. Someone who was deprived of a healthy family, someone who was abandoned by their only father figure, this is incredibly important. And people label this as useless?

Part Three: The Reader’s Backlash to Spoon

Spoon has single handedly given nearly everyone development, and people refuse to see it because other Manwha and SBAPOD had ruined them and heightened their expectations. That’s why they take it out on Spoon, the outlier. The exception. They take it out on the artist/co-writer/current writer of the story for not living up to the story others have created.

It really makes me wonder how the fandom would be if no one was spoiled and just read WMMAP like it was supposed to be read—by not being spoiled and just enjoying the story without having ruined expectations from something else.

But it’s not Spoon’s problem, it’s theirs. Because the moment they comment about how [Spoon] has ruined the story? That’s where no sympathy is given. Because the problem was never Spoon. It was the disappointment of their expectations, and taking it out on an amazing person who’s trying their best. And they? They don’t even care what they do to Spoon’s health. Those repeated comments of ‘Spoon made this story trash’, and, ‘Spoon made X character useless’ can seriously damage someone’s mental health. If not, severely stress someone who’s already placed under countless deadlines but still provides quality art every 10-20 days. They have no concern over Spoon, because as long as they get what they want due to the expectations set by other Manwhas and the Manwha community? Spoon could die for all they care. As long as they get what they want, what they were spoiled of? Who cares what Spoon wants.

It’s tiring and frustrating as an artist and writer who can hardly pick up my Apple Pencil and get the motivation to do what I love. To berate Spoon so badly because of their selfishness? When Spoon does so much more than what any of us could ever imagine to do? It’s entitlement, and just rude. And what’s worse? Spoon will never bend to them, but will still see those comments. She won’t change the story to their tastes, but her health will still be impacted. She’ll still know that her readers? Hate what she’s doing, what she loves to do. No ones going to win. No one will be satisfied, and their complaints won’t help anyone. It’s pointless, and incredibly sad.

Spoon doesn’t deserve this, and we aren’t entitled to anything. Our opinions are pointless, and that’s the truth. We have no say at all in what happens in the story. You paid money for it, you chose to read the story knowing that Spoon won’t give you what you want.

The company is promoting slips of color. You know you’re getting a color, and you want a specific color. Are you gonna take it out on the company for getting red in the mystery box when you wanted gold? When you know the chances of getting gold is nearly impossible? When gold was never guaranteed, and the company stated that there wouldn’t just be gold in the box? That’s what’s happening. You paid for it knowing you’ll disappoint yourself, you made the decision to spend money on something you don’t need. And you made the decision to bully Spoon for what you did to yourself.

[themollyjay]

The Myths of Forced Diversity and Virtue Signaling.

In my novel Mail Order Bride, the three main characters are a lesbian and two agendered aliens.  In my novel Scatter, the main character is a lesbian, the love interest is a pansexual alien, and the major side characters include a half Cuban, half black Dominican lesbian, a Chinese Dragon, a New York born Jewish Dragon, and a Transgender Welsh Dragon.  In my novel The Master of Puppets, the Main Characters are a lesbian shapeshifting reptilian alien cyborg and a half black, half Japanese lesbian.  The major side characters include three gender fluid shapeshifting reptilian alien cyborgs, and a pansexual human.  In my novel Transistor, the main character is a Trans Lesbian, the love interest is a Half human/Half Angel non-observant Ethiopian Jew, and the major side characters include a Transgender Welsh Dragon (the same one from Scatter), a Transgender woman, a Latino Lesbian, an autistic man, three Middle Eastern Arch Angels, and a hive mind AI with literally hundreds of genders.  In my novel The Inevitable singularity, one of the main characters is a lesbian, another has a less clearly defined sexuality but she is definitely in love with the lesbian, and the third is functionally asexual due to a vow of chastity she takes very seriously.  The major side characters include a straight guy from a social class similar to the Dalit (commonly known as untouchables) in India, a bisexual woman, a man who is from a race of genetically modified human/frog hybrids, and a woman from a race of genetically modified humans who are bred and sold as indentured sex workers.

Why am I bringing all of this up?  Well, first, because it’s kind of cool to look at the list of different characters I’ve created, but mostly because it connects to what I want to talk about today, which should be obvious from the title of the essay.  The concepts of ‘forced diversity’ and ‘virtue signaling’.

For those who aren’t familiar with these terms, they’re very closely related concepts.  ‘Forced Diversity’ is the idea that characters who aren’t neurotypical cisgendered heterosexual white males are only ever included in a story because of outside pressure from some group (usually called Social Justice Warriors, or The Woke Brigade or something similar) to meet some nebulous political agenda.  The caveat to this is, of course, that you can have a women/women present as long as they are hot, don’t make any major contributions to the resolution of the plot, and the hero/heroes get to fuck them before the end of the story. ‘Virtue Signaling’, according to Wikipedia, is a pejorative neologism for the expression of a disingenuous moral viewpoint with the intent of communicating good character.

The basic argument is that Forced Diversity is a form of virtue signaling.  That no one would ever write characters who aren’t neurotypical cisgendered heterosexual white males because they want to.  They only do it to please the evil SJW’s who are somehow both so powerful that they force everybody to conform to their desires, yet so irrelevant that catering to them dooms any creative project to financial failure via the infamous ‘go woke, go broke’ rule.

What the people who push this idea of Forced Diversity tend to forget is that we exist at a point in time when creators actually have more creative freedom than are any other people in history.  Comic writers can throw up a website and publish their work as a webcomic without having to go through Marvel, DC or one of the other big names, or get a place in the dying realm of the news paper comics page.  Novelists can self-publish with fairly little upfront costs, musicians can use places like YouTube and Soundcloud to get their work out without having to worry about music publishers.  Artists can hock their work on twitter and tumblr and a dozen other places. Podcasts are relatively cheap to make, which has opened up a resurgence in audio dramas.  Even the barrier to entry for live action drama is ridiculously low.

So, in a world where creators have more freedom than ever before, why would they choose to people their stories with characters they don’t want there?  The answer, of course, is that they wouldn’t.  Authors, comic creators, indie film creators and so on aren’t putting diverse characters into their stories because they are being forced to. They’re putting diverse characters into their stories because they want to.  Creators want to tell stories about someone other than the generically handsome hypermasculine cisgendered heterosexual white males that have been the protagonists of so many stories over the years that we’ve choking on it. A lot of times, creators want to tell stories about people like themselves.  Black creators want to tell stories about the black experience. Queer creators want to tell stories about the queer experience.

I’m an autistic, mentally ill trans feminine abuse survivor.  Every day, I get up and I struggle with PTSD, with an eating disorder, with severe body dysmorphia, with anxiety and depression and just the reality of being autistic and transgender.  I deal with the fact that the religious community I grew up in views me as an abomination, and genuinely believes I’m going to spend eternity burning in hell.  I deal with the fact that people I’ve known for decades, even members of my own family, regularly vote for politician who publicly state that they want to strip me of my civil rights because I’m queer.  I’m part of a community that experiences a disproportionately high murder and suicide rate.  I’ve spent multiple years of my life deep in suicidal depression, and to this day, I still don’t trust myself around guns.

As a creator, I want to talk about those issues.  I want to deal with my life experiences.  I want to create characters that embody and express aspects of my lived experience and my day-to-day reality.  No one is forcing me to put diversity into my books.  I try to include Jewish characters as often as I can because there have been a number of important Jewish people in my life.  I include queer people because I’m queer and the vast majority of friends I interact with on a regular basis are queer.  I include people with mental illnesses and trauma because I am mentally ill and have trauma, and I know a lot of people with mental illnesses and trauma.  My work may be full of fantastical elements, aliens and dragons and angels and superheroes and magic and ultra-high technology and AI’s and talking cats and robot dogs and shape shifters and telepaths and all sorts of other things, but at the core of the stories is my own lived experience, and neurotypical cisgendered heterosexual white males are vanishingly rare in that experience.

Now, I can hear the comments already.  The ‘okay, maybe that’s true for individual creators, but what about corporate artwork?’.   Maybe not in those exact words, but you get the idea.

The thought here is that corporations are bowing to social pressure to include characters who aren’t neurotypical cisgendered heterosexual white males, and that is somehow bad. But here’s the thing. Corporations are going to chase the dollars.  They aren’t bowing to social pressure.  There’s no one holding a gun to some executive’s head saying, “You must have this many diversity tokens in every script.”  What is happening is that corporations are starting to clue into the fact that people who aren’t neurotypical cisgendered heterosexual white males have money.  They are putting black characters in their shows and movies because black people watch shows and spend money on movies.  They are putting queer people in shows and movies because queer people watch shows and spend money on movies.  They are putting women in shows and movies because women watch shows and spend money on movies.

No one is forcing these companies to do this.  They are choosing to do it, the same way individual creators are choosing to do it.  In the companies’ cases the choices are made for different reasons.  It’s not because they are necessarily passionate about telling stories about a particular experience, but because they want to create art to be consumed by the largest audience possible, which means that they have to expand their audience beyond the neurotypical cisgendered heterosexual white male by including characters from outside of that demographic.

And the reality is, the cries of ‘forced diversity’ and ‘virtue signaling’ almost always come from within that demographic.  Note the almost.  There are a scattering of individuals from outside that demographic which do subscribe to the ‘forced diversity’ and ‘virtue signaling’ myths, but that is a whole other essay.  However, within that demographic, lot of the people who cry about ‘forced diversity’ see media and content as a Zero-Sum game.  The more that’s created for other people, the less that is created for them.

In a way, they’re right. There are only so many slots for TV shows each week, there are only so many theaters, only so much space on comic bookshelves and so on.  But at the end of the day, its literally impossible for them to consume all the content that’s being produced anyway.  So, while there is, theoretically less content for them to consume, as a practical matter it’s a bit like someone who is a meat eater going to a buffet with two hundred items, and then throwing a tantrum because five of the items happen to be vegan.

The worst part is, if they could let go of how wound up they are about the ‘forced diversity’ and ‘virtue signaling’ they could probably enjoy the content that’s produced for people other than them.  I mean, I’m a pasty ass white girl, and I loved Black Panther.

So, to wrap out, creators, make what you want to make, and ignore anyone who cries about forced diversity or virtue signaling.  And to people who are complaining about forced diversity and virtue signaling, I want to go back to the buffet metaphor.  You need to relax.  Even if there are a few vegan options on the buffet, you can still get your medium rare steak, or your chicken teriyaki or whatever it is you want.  Or, maybe, just maybe, you could give the falafel a try. That shit is delicious.

[cassandraclare]

Hi Cassie, ever since I started reading your Shadowhunters books I've loved the world you created and I'm amazed at how you manage to build it out more and more with every book you write. Do you have any tips or tricks regarding worldbuilding? How did you go about creating this amazing world?

I could write a whole book about world-building — in fact, there are lots of books about it! Every book, even contemporary fiction, requires world-building: you are always creating a sense of place, time, and character in a story, which is essentially what world-building is.

Obviously fantasy has specific elements of world-building that other genres don’t have, so that’s what I’ll talk about — briefly — here. These are a few steps you need to consider when you’re building a fantasy world, be it an open world or a closed one.

1) What’s your normal? 

You’re always going to establish what the norm is in your world before you do anything else. You don’t have to get into the nitty-gritty, but set your basic ground rules. Is there magic? If so, what’s the cost of magic? (Power is never free — it always costs in effort, knowledge, body parts, etc.) Does everyone know about magic (in which case yours is an open fantasy world)? Is it a secret (closed fantasy world)? What’s your time period? Tech level?* What are the major antagonists of your world? What are the biggest dangers? And finally, what’s the main thing your character wants? That may seem like character work, but it’s intrinsic to world-building. If your character wants above all other things to be King, for instance, then you know you have a monarchy. 

*Remember Clarke’s First Law: Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. In other words, you can usually have magic or super-advanced technology, but not both, because they do the exact same thing in a story. Location spells are pointless if you have GPS tracking devices implanted in everyone. If you are going to have both, you have to figure out how what they do is different. Otherwise you are giving Spiderman the power of flight, thus rendering his web-slinging useless. So give it thought!

2) Make your rules.

Otherwise known as internal consistency. Our world is governed by natural laws that determine what people can and cannot do. A world you make up must be the same. What if only some people can do magic? Then you have to figure out who they are, why they can do magic, what rules govern the practice of that magic, how the rest of the population feels about them, and what that magic is based on. While you don’t need to — and shouldn’t — explain every detail of these rules on-page, your characters have to abide by them. We need to believe these are real people who are governed by an internally consistent set of strictures that shape and define their behavior. If your main characters live in a walled city that closes at night, show us that by having them worry about getting back before the gates shut.

3) Break your rules.

Half the reason you established your normal is so you can fuck with it. Stories are about conflict. They’re about the moment things go wrong, not about things going right. They’re about things suddenly not conforming to expectations. If you have a land ruled by a benevolent King everyone adores, assassinate him. (Even better if your main character does it.) If you have a world where women can’t do magic, you need a badass sorceress to rise. If parabatai can’t fall in love, make sure two of them do. If Shadowhunters are the descendants of angels, what happens when one is a descendent of demons? Once you build your world, your first question should be, What is this story going to do to change it?

4) Everything hews to a theme.

Think about the thematic implications of your world. If you’re building a low-tech, high-nature faerie world, think about the way not having tech, and having nature magic fill a lot of those uses, will influence the way the characters talk, the expressions they use, what they wear (nothing with zippers, nothing mass-produced) the way they live their day-to-day lives (alas, no flush toilets). For instance, the thematic character of the Shadowhunters books is defined by the overarching mythology of angels and demons. Seraph blades, which have to be activated by speaking an angel’s name, hew to that theme. Everything the Shadowhunter characters do is defined by their belief that they have angel blood (or fear they have demon blood.) Whenever I build new mythology into the Shadowhunter world, I have to think “Does this fit with who the Shadowhunters think they are, their priorities, beliefs and history? Is this something that could or would happen in this complex, small, militaristic society?” 

It can help to think of it as an aesthetic, as if you were putting together a house. Does this piece go, or does it clash with everything?

5) Small details. 

Little pieces that feel unique and true help build out a world. Rather than spending your time detailing the entire history of the Royal Family for a thousand years, create a room in the palace where the faces of royal enemies are dried, stretched and mounted in glass. Now we know the Royal Family is creepy, which is more interesting than knowing everyone’s grandparents’ names. Stuff that isn’t momentous is fine if it’s interesting. Random stuff I know about Castellane, the city in Sword Catcher: interior light comes from carcel-lamps, dentures are made from the teeth of dead soldiers, the Queen loves kalamansi fruit, and if you fall in the bay, a crocodile will eat you.  Think of the big world-building details — names of countries, the type of religion, the way magic works — as the walls, beams, and floors of your house. The small details are your paint, wallpaper and furniture. One is a structure; the other is the sense and character of that structure.

There’s a lot more to say about world-building, and I’m always happy to answer writing questions. It offers me an amazing opportunity to procrastinate. :) Good luck!

[mountain-man-cumeth]

How would you rewrite Muriel’s route?

This is the 3rd question I got with similar vibes so imma begin by saying that I am not a writer. I am a reader, a decent one, but I’m not the idea guy. I will try, though, since it seems like people are interested for some reason.

First of all I'd make some baseline changes to set the backstory proper;

Muriel chose the mantle of Lucio's executioner willingly, him and Asra had no other means to survive so they willingly worked as indentured servants under Lucio. He reasoned with himself thinking these are bad people and that he has no other skills to offer. (There might be a threat on Lucio's part that they can be replaced, he doesn't have to had given a villain speech for the implication. He is a rich tyrant and they are street kids, it the service they provide isn't up to par Lucio can easily look for alternative options.) Let me be clear, Muriel was not a gladiator. Gladiators are compensated generously for the entertainment they provide and often due to the amount of investment made on them, fighting to death wasn't a common occurrence. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Muriel, or rather the Scourge was well known and probably liked by the crowd, there's literally no reason for Lucio to utilize him otherwise. He wants people to enjoy the show, if everybody hated Muriel what use is he to Lucio?

Kokhuri are alive. The tribe had to relocate but they left Khamgalai to tend to the graves. They are nomadic and matriarchal people who likely don't adhere to mother-father-child kind of European family structure. The children are raised communally.

Muriel's curse has nothing to do with myrrh, there's a rune that can counter it and only he knows how to make it, he figured it out by himself for Asra. Any magic that can nullify a spell by Major Arcana is no doubt strong as fuck.

I'd start similar to main 3, MC is tasked to find Lucio's murderer. They find Muriel's brush or loincloth or whatever early on which leads them to the forest but because of the protective spells and the curse they get lost. They ran into Muriel or Inanna and she leads them to Muriel hunched over the corpse. They try to help, like the canon, and have a brush with Lucio's goat ghost. They tell him they were looking for the Scourge and Muriel says there's no Scourge here.

The day after they forget about Muriel but remember the rest and relay that information to Asra, who gets agitated by Lucio's return. He thinks Lucio is here for MC's body but doesn't explain anything, instead begs them to leave town until he figures something out.

They go to see Muriel and he reluctantly agrees to accompany them to the outskirts of the forest, on Asra's request.

Some point on their road trip Asra water-calls them to inform them that Lucio is looking for hearts and the Magician (or whoever else Asra consulted) implied they might find answers South. MC still doesn't know anything except maybe some comments Muriel could have made that painted Lucio in a bad light but they decide to investigate regardless. Muriel opposes, eventually caves (either thanks to MC or Asra). He lets out that he's been tailing MC on Asra's behalf for years so it shouldn't be that much different.

They go from town to town, MC helps Muriel ease into dealing with people again and it's easier since nobody knows jack about Scourge. They learn that he enjoys card games and collecting trinkets from different cultures. He might even get a little too enthusiastic about plants and gives random advice to a gardener.

We might learn here that Muriel doesn't like feeling that he's on a display or that he's performing. He prefers to lay low and blend in, not necessarily completely shut off the world.

They run into Morga(maybe they encounter raiders or a barfight or something alike), who's also been tracking Lucio. She proposes to work together. She berates Muriel for being a coward and convinces him to fight as that's all he's good for. (I think it's better if MC trains on magic rather than archery, I'm seeing alot of disabled MCs.)

She tries to train them but Muriel doesn't respond well to fighting and eventually Morga leaves. Valdemar or Vulgora catches them, Lucio's still trying to get MC's body. They escape just barely, MC gets hurt, Muriel beats himself up over it, some angst some fluff, you know the drill. Maybe he has a panic attack because panic attacks are usually not as on the nose as "Oh No I Gotta Fight Someone With a Knife". Looking for a shelter and aid, they find a cottage which turns out to be Khamgalai's. She helps them out, teaches Muriel how to heal using the techniques of their clan, I assume MC helps since they know some restorative spells too. She tells Muriel his family sent him away when they got ambushed so he wouldn't have to live on the run as Morga's clan was on a war path to conquer South. We get sad, lots of tears. Kisses might ensue.

Somehow it's revealed that this is the answer they were looking for and not Lucio (because I think the whole "Lucio's clan" plot was redundant) and Morga was just using them as bait to get Lucio out of Vesuvia.

Morga catches on to them, we learn who she is, Muriel and MC confront her but Khamgalai says her warmongering already costed her everything. She says she's trying to make up for it by killing her son and she needs MC to lure him out, they agree to work together, begrudgingly. (MC's past can be revealed here since they need to learn what's the deal with Lucio's obsession of them at some point)

Around this point MC might realize the mark's fading, Muriel brushes it off.

Instead of Lucio, Devil comes and tells them about Lucio's plan to do the ritual again. They go back to Vesuvia to warn people

Masquerade happens, people remember Muriel, Nadia or MC or someone give people an ultimatum. But oh no it was a TRAP all along, Devil told them of the ritual to get them right where he wanted. Lucio gets in MC's body, Asra sends them to the Arcana realm, same story as main 3.

MC forgets Muriel on the Arcana realm but through the power of love and maybe some guidance from the Hermit they go "oh no i forgot my boy". They return to find him in the Coliseum. What?! He was the Scourge?! Who could've thought. (this reveal wouldn't affect MC's opinion at this point since they already know he's a cinnamon roll)

This time Lucio's blackmailing him with MC's body. He says he needs hearts to make himself a new one and if Muriel grabs some for him MC can get their body back.

Story diverges to Upright/Reversed

Upright, if MC encouraged him to take it easy, but take it: MC snatches the body of someone he's suppose to fight to change his mind, he decides not to do it and instead go with defeating Lucio on the Arcana realm plan(curtesy of their friends). So here we can have a romantic scene like in Nadia's route where his chains are broken in the Arena.

They fuck around in the Arcana realm facing their fears and stuff, they bond, defeat Lucio, petrify the Devil etc. I like to think Muriel finds the forest spirit here, too, and maybe manages to heal it or learns that it's damaged but with enough time and care it will regrow. (a metaphor? in my arcana game? its more likely than you think)

Morga is charged for war crimes by the Kokhuri, the Coliseum is demolished and the love birds travel around doing their thing.

Reversed, if MC encouraged him to be strong and uncaring: MC fails to convince him and he decides to go through with Lucio's plan. He kills Morga and some more important spirits and fucks up the world. Which turns out to be a bogus plan anyways, Lucio only needed the hearts to settle his deal and Muriel kills him, too (I am untethered, and my rage knows no bounds!)

Without a body MC is stuck in the other realm so Muriel and them retreat to the magic dimension, defeat the Devil and live the rest of their days.

There might also be a 50 first dates situation going on inwhich they get stuck in a loop where MC constantly meets and falls in love with Muriel only to forget him in a couple of (magic realm)days.

idk man this aint my job im just spitballing here, im writing this long ass thing so ill look like im working

[jiangwanyinscatmom]

[1/?] Sorry for venting. I just saw some bad takes that gave me a lot of feelings. Personally, JC stresses me out every time he comes on screen, but I don't mind it when JC fans say fan-typical things like how they like JC because he wears purple, or is grumpy, or they think he's hot, or that they ship x*ch*ng because the cql actors have nice jawlines. They're harmless, fun takes, and while I don't agree with some of them, I see where they're coming from

Hello there anon, vent away as that is what my blog is open for as I love/hate on Jiang Cheng as he is in the plot, as well as all of my beef with what has been done to him for the EN side of the fanbase! I am more than fine listening and engaging with the unsavory "unpopular" discussions of his canon behavior and this goes for anyone of course that needs an open play area. I'll try to engage with what you have sent point by point as succinctly as I can.

[2/?] (some of these are obviously crack, and I am a fan of a few problematic faves). But then there are stans that just have to put other characters down to make JC look good. Like, I think some fans take their freedom of interpretation for granted because most of these takes aren't even labeled 'headcanon,' 'ooc,' or 'crack' anymore. Stans feel that their interpretations are valid, and while they are, valid =/= canon, and they're treating these takes as canon, which becomes popular fanon.

I enjoy Jiang Cheng for what he is, however as I had said it took me another reread to get to my stance of him being the negative mirror to Lan Wangji's positive and my comfort with that for the story once I realized what purpose he served. He is only insofar tragic in regards to his circumstances, but it does not absolve him for what he is at his core (no pun, but I can make a very nice metaphor that even with a piece of Wei Wuxian in him he is still forever unable and unwilling to stand by him equally all while stagnating where as Lan Wangji is able to flourish, grow and mature with nothing of import left from Wei Wuxian in a technical sense). As for ships, I am a little dirty Xicheng whore for fun and can say there is a sense of entertainment for me making it work with two people where one is wildly ignorant and the other wildly rabid. But that is outside of what is established as canon in the work and I always try to keep the two strictly separate due to the skew fanon perpetuates.

3/?] And now, it's not clear what part of the fanon references canon JC or the canon events of mdzs. JC is an asshole; I don't like him as a person, but I do think that he's a complex character motivated by many issues (sup, YeeZY), which makes him fascinating to explore. Unfortunately, erasing his culpability also removes his agency. JC should be allowed to be an asshole character who makes his own decisions even if they're the wrong ones. He has made his own tragedy by constantly casting Wei Wuxian as the villain of his life.

Now thanks to you I will be using YeeZY to forever and now to acknowledge Madam Yu (this is your fault for the new tag). From a standing from storytelling I agree that he is complex in the Jianghu for MDZS. Where in the usual political intrigue of Wuxia, he would be the mustache twirling villain that is outright unforgivable in narration, it is by favor of Wei Wuxian's narration that has an early steeping of empathy for him. And he is not meant to be seen as ultimately sympathetic, the work builds up his hate against Wei Wuxian who tries to rationalize it all several times until he is finally unable to. Jiang Cheng is the antithesis to Lan Wangji and the false bait to get attached to in Wei Wuxian's first life. I will make the note their meeting in Yiling is lukewarm between both as they exchange nothing really in terms of conversation and all pleasantries are left in terms of Jiang Yanli for Wei Wuxian. By this point Wei Wuxian has already switched his yearnings of platonically wanting a part of Jiang Cheng's life, to subconscious romantic inclinations about Lan Wangji and the perceived loss of being in the other's life.

The very point of Jiang Cheng as the deconstruction, is that he has no passion in life despite his apparent exploits because he put a shadow to hang over himself as an excuse to say others think he is not good enough. He has no deeper motivations than pure selfishness by the end of the work and is pure frivolity that he has built up losing the meaning of his sect as a tradition. He had his agency (more than anyone I might add in the work due to his social position) that he used to build his reputation as a passive rich sect leader that has little to do with civilian problems.

4/?] And I think a JC, somehow, that realizes that he did something wrong and is working hard to change for the better and gain self-actualization to become that UWU best jiujiu the stans want him to be, who is ready to talk (not yell at) with WWX, apologize to him, and create a better, healthier relationship with him is a much more powerful reconciliation and happy ending than 'everyone is wrong and mean and they all apologize to JC, which magically gets rid of all his issues'.

He is forced out of culpability in reconciliation because simply put, his audience do not like the reality that relationships fray and dissolve with no further resolution other than we as adults both need to move on for safety and good health. It is not acceptable in real life and fiction is allowed to place that also in it's thematic relationships. He has a small, small spark of recognition at the end of the main story, however he himself seems to choose to ignore it, as change is hard and he has never taken to that well as was foreshadowed with his dogs and the idea of sharing a space with Wei Wuxian. To write this is an awful lot of work into his psyche which is not a nice place, he is a terrible being and downplaying that to make a sugar sweet person does not work instantaneously. He is the one responsible for the entire fallout with Wei Wuxian and he hysterically realizes that even as he tries to continue to blame Wei Wuxian.

The issue that I have with his current stan culture, is that they already view him as something he is not. They play at bicycle with all of the other protagonists that have positive traits that they strip as they see fit; Good affirming loving to children adult Lan Wangji, Self-sacrificing ultimately did it all for love and care Wei Wuxian, Hard exterior but softened to who they consider an annoyance Wen Qing, Loyal as partners in their exploits on the field and always have each others back Wen Ning. They even take Jin Guangyao's persona of playing damsel and using that as a positive to soften up Jiang Cheng into something he has never been for anyone for ships.

[5/5] Also, making WWX/WN/LWJ apologize just makes them look better than JC. Like, stans supposedly love JC, so they ahouldn't be lazy and work hard to give him actual character development. Again, I'm sorry for spamming your ask. It just really baffles me about where they get these 'hot' takes (All I'm going to say is that JC was ungrateful, and WN had a reason verbally dismantle him).

They see this, but, they will spin it in any way to excuse Jiang Cheng due to the story itself showing that he was in the wrong to everyone he flung accusations at and his hate. No one but him is at fault for his spite as he had gotten his revenge on the ones that had ruined Lotus Pier and killed his parents. His own resentment pitted him against good and well meaning people that he refused to help as he mimicked his mother's words about raising their heads higher out of goodness instead of keeping low and staying self-centered. There is the underlying criticism of taking individual arrogance as self-care at the cost of others. Each point that Wen Ning makes is exactly what Jiang Cheng himself knows as he hated Wei Wuxian for being something he could not be or even wanted to be. Jiang Cheng wants kindness but does not understand that kindness to others needs to be selfless and accept the hurt that can come with that in life. He encompasses the fall from the path of buddhist lifestyle, "The Three Poisons" to Wangxian's "Without Envy" at the stories end.

[6/5] P.S. I'm not saying I want reconciliation fics, but I just feel that if stans want JC to have a happy ending, then I think that he should actively work for it. I think it would be interesting to see what force of nature would push him through a character development because throwing a therapist at him would result in a murder.

"I'm not saying I want reconciliation fics, but I just feel that if stans want JC to have a happy ending, then I think that he should actively work for it."

They do not think he has to work for it, they say his tragedy is enough, while heaping accusations against Wei Wuxian and saying his own are not enough to absolve him. Something Wei Wuxian has never denied and told all present they are allowed to forever hate him for what he had done in the past, but that they need to find a way to live in a life that is always moving on. He learned that grudges do nothing once they are absolved and it leaves you with hate with nothing else to do with it once that object is gone. In terms of reconciliation, I do not ever think that either want anything other than a distant peaceful out of each other's life set up. Jiang Cheng does not need Wei Wuxian in his life to be satisfied and never has since he used him as the handicap to hide behind to stay angry and miserable. Being without that fallback opens the world far more for him to change than him ever interacting like an old friend with Wei Wuxian ever again, if he ever had the guts to do that.

[sou-ver-2-0]

Why calling it "logic versus emotion" makes sense

At the end of chapter 2 in Your Turn To Die, the player is forced to choose between killing Sou or Kanna. Kanna frames this as a choice between "logic" and "emotion," where saving Sou is the "logical" choice and saving Kanna is the "emotional" choice. 

Personally, I love the writing in this part. I think it's the strongest writing in the whole game. However, since joining the YTTD fandom, I've read various posts from fans who don't like calling this a simple choice between "logic" and "emotion." For them, it felt like an emotional choice to save Sou, while it was a logical choice to save Kanna. After seeing this argument so many times, I decided to unpack my feelings on it. I also wanted to write my own defense of why calling this a choice between "logic" and "emotion" makes sense, at least to me. For me, it all comes down to how it’s written as a choice between two opposing worldviews, and I don’t focus on the little technicalities. I’ll also argue that the game is using descriptive language, rather than prescriptive language.

But first, we have to deal with a strange irony about this choice:

For the genre-savvy player, yes, it IS "logical" to save Kanna and "emotional" to save Sou.

Before writing anything about this choice, I need to acknowledge that Sara and the Player are two different people. They're obviously connected, and they inform each other's feelings and choices, but they still exist in different worlds. Sara is actually trapped in a Death Game. The Player is vicariously experiencing what it would be like to be trapped in a Death Game through a fictional story.

I'm not going to argue that Sara necessarily likes Kanna more than she likes Sou, and thus it is more "emotional" for her to save Kanna. It's possible to play Sara as someone who isn't that affectionate of Kanna, and she can act generously towards Sou. That's not the main issue here.

The issue is that the Player expects the fictional story to go in certain directions based on the morality of their choices, while Sara has no such meta expectations. The Player can reasonably expect to be rewarded with a happy ending at the end of YTTD if they make the "correct" moral choices. Saving Kanna feels like the "morally correct" choice on a gut level because she's a child, while Sou is an adult. So the Player may choose to save Kanna purely for logical reasons. They're not trying to be selfless or wise; they just want a reward from a videogame. And...they're not wrong! Immediately after saving Kanna, the player is rewarded with a cathartic scene with Joe, cluing us in to the idea that choosing Kanna is the "good path." 

Meanwhile, if the Player saves Sou, they're saving him in spite of knowing that this could logically lead to a "dark path." You might save Sou because he's a fascinating character, or because you're curious what will happen, or simply because you think he's cute. These are all emotional reasons. Maybe you don't expect any "happy" rewards if you save Sou, but you still expect the story to be exciting with him around.  

Speaking for myself, I want to see both the Kanna and Sou routes for reasons that are both emotional and logical. I sympathize with both characters, and I want to analyze them as they continue their arcs. I just think they're great characters connected to fascinating themes about humanity.

In other words, the Player is going to have all sorts of feelings about this choice based on the safety of their separation from the Death Game. It's only a videogame to us. We're not actually killing a child or a young man. We still feel sad about the story, but it's a safe sadness, one we can control. You can make your choice based on which type of tragedy is more interesting to you in the moment.

So that's how the Player experiences the choice, but what about Sara? Does it still make sense to call it a decision between "logic" and "emotion" for her? I would argue, "yes." First of all...

"Logic" and "emotion" are descriptive terms for the argument styles of Kanna and Sou, respectively. 

Using "descriptive" terminology means that we attempt to classify language as it is actually being used. Using "prescriptive" terminology means that we dictate how we should be using language.

When Kanna calls this a choice between logic and emotion, you might have thought she was being prescriptive. You might have thought something like, "You can't tell me how I should feel about this." But I think Kanna was simply being descriptive of the language she and Sou were using. It's a fair assessment of their opposing argument styles.

Kanna argues that you should vote for her by appealing to your sense of logic. She eloquently makes the case that Sou has proven himself invaluable to the team with his computer hacking skills. He came extremely close to finding an escape route just before the second Main Game began. With more time, he could find another one. If he dies, there is no one else in their party with his valuable skill set. She also effectively weaponizes her own helplessness by arguing that she is a "useless" child. She states that dying for the greater good "is the only thing she can do." What I love about Kanna's argument is how she twists Sou's own words against him, since Sou has been using coldhearted logical arguments since the beginning. She shows how much she's learned from him, and she's even able to outsmart him.

Sou argues that you should vote for him by appealing to your emotions. He furiously makes the case that he is the most hated member of the team and that you should give into your hatred of him. He says that the choice ought to be obvious based on your feelings. He calls Kanna stupid. He keeps shouting "Stop!" and "No!" He waves his arms in despair. He resorts to threats and exclaims that he will never forgive anyone who votes for Kanna. Sou's argument is compelling because we have never seen him so vulnerable before. Even with his strong will to live, he has an even more desperate will to save the little girl he's grown to care for. It's devastating to watch such a man break down. After losing his previous eloquence, he is forced to bare his soul and pray that that is enough.

However, even with all that in mind, you could still argue on a technicality that some of Kanna's statements are emotional while some of Sou's statements are logical. For example, when Kanna says that she is useless, this reflects her emotional state since she has low self-esteem. And when Sou starts threatening people, it's logical to take his threats seriously. 

But there's something deeper at work here than technicalities. There's still something at the core of their arguments that makes the choice to save Sou "logical" and Kanna "emotional."

At its core, this debate is about how to measure a human life's worth. Do you measure a human life based on how "useful" they are? Or do you recognize a person's worth based on their humanity alone? 

This is a choice between two worldviews, which the story calls "logical" and "emotional." 

In the logical worldview, you prioritize a person's usefulness over their humanity for the greater good. Also, you must be willing to use people like tools for the greater good.

In the emotional worldview, you refuse to reject anyone's humanity, even if it threatens the greater good. Also, you must accept that some moral causes are more important than survival. 

If you vote to save Sou, then Sara prioritizes the greater good; theoretically, the group can use Sou to escape. But being willing to use Sou this way rejects Sou's humanity, because we would be using his talents against his will. For Sou, escape is not worth the cost of Kanna's life. Sara also rejects her own humanity by treating both Sou and Kanna as objects instead of people. Kanna is discarded as a useless object, while Sou is kept as a potentially useful one. This is why Sara guiltily calls this "the worst possible choice" when she makes it. And it's why Sou seems to care more about revenge than survival in this route; there is no meaning in a world where we must sacrifice children.

If you vote to save Kanna, Sara does so knowing it may be harder for the group to escape without Sou's skills. But she embraces Sou's humanity by allowing him to follow his heart. She also strengthens her own humanity by refusing to cross a moral line. This is why Sou actually keeps his will to live in this route and mounts a desperate escape before his death. Because there's still meaning in a world where Kanna is allowed to live. He still dies, but with peace and purpose, and having repaid Sara for freeing his true heart.

In any case, you may still disagree with the semantics of "logic" and "emotion" to describe these worldviews, though they work for me personally. I have one more point to address.

Is it really logical to save someone who threatens you?

At this point, I'd like to talk about the most logical member of the group, the character who immediately votes to kill Kanna: Keiji Shinogi.

You, the Player, may believe that Sou will get his revenge if he lives, because it would make a compelling story. And Sara, a high-school student, may be reasonably afraid of Sou's threats, because Sou has tried to hurt her before. Even though the text doesn't portray Sara as being afraid of Sou in this moment, I understand why the Player would fear for Sara's life. In other words, a logical reason to kill Sou is because you don't believe you can control him. How do you force an adult man to behave?

Enter Keiji Shinogi, who doesn't hesitate. Keiji is stronger than Sou, and he's wicked smart. He's confident in his own abilities. And he understands vengeance better than anyone. He doesn't underestimate Sou, who has outwitted him before, but he decides to accept the risk. Like Sou, Keiji has a ruthless will. I believe that one reason Keiji voted first was because he wanted to assure everyone that "your friendly policeman" would keep Sou in line. So even though Sara doesn't act afraid of Sou in this moment, Keiji is there to calm any hypothetical fears the Player has. 

And Keiji commits to this role! In the beginning of Chapter 3, in the route where Kanna dies, the first thing Sou does is disturb the group peace. He puts on his "tough" mask and pretends that he never really cared about Kanna. In response, as everyone else is fidgeting nervously, Keiji laughs and calls out Sou on his bullshit. He eviscerates Sou emotionally, effectively putting Sou in his place and forcing him to be submissive, for now. It's Keiji's way of reminding Sou that they already know how weak he is, and Sou isn't going to get away with any tricks under Keiji's watch. Even if Sou's only "trick" in this case is to pretend he has any pride left.

From a storytelling perspective, I'm sure that these two will keep playing their power games, and Sou is likely to regain the upper-hand eventually. But from an in-universe perspective, Keiji looks like he knows exactly what he's doing in this scene, and Sou looks like a fool who better do what he's told. That is, if he doesn't want Keiji to skewer his heart in front of everyone again.

So where am I going with this?

My most generous interpretation of Keiji's vote is that he decided that Sou's life had value inasmuch as he could use Sou. After all, it's not like Keiji spared Sou out of compassion. Keiji just said that he hated Sou more than anyone he's ever known--and Keiji already killed someone else he hated. The harsher interpretation of Keiji's vote is that he fully expects Sou to die later due to his zero percent survival rate, which would make Kanna's presence technically more of a "threat" to Keiji's own survival. However, I prefer to think that Keiji was swayed by Kanna's brilliant defense of Sou's usefulness. That's because Keiji isn't a simple monster; he's a complex man who still wants to "serve and protect" the group...in his own way.

To follow in Keiji's footsteps and vote with "logic" means that Sara decides to trust Keiji's judgment. We know that Keiji is one of the smartest and strongest characters, in addition to being Sara's reliable ally. This is why I think it's still "logical" for Sara to save Sou in spite of his threats. Because Keiji is still there. 

Conclusion

That's why framing the choice as one between "logic" and "emotion" works for me. I see it as a choice between two worldviews, one in which people are valued for their usefulness, and the other in which people are valued for their humanity. 

I understand that the Player is going to have their own thoughts and feelings about this choice. Believe me, I was heartbroken too! I really wanted Sou to redeem himself and live. And I think Sara even feels the same way, since she pleads "Don't kill our ally!" when Safalin threatens Sou. It's still possible that Sou could redeem himself in the route where he lives, but I imagine it will be more important that the Player faces consequences for killing Kanna. But no matter what happens in Chapter 3, it doesn't change the fact that it looked possible in Chapter 2 for Sou's skillset to save everyone, and everyone was operating under that mindset.

I think that the writing in this game is stellar so I wanted to defend the story's framing. It surprised me to see folks who had reacted to it differently, but that's all part of the fun. It got me thinking about how interesting it is that the Player and Sara view things differently. It also got me thinking that what seems like a logical choice in the moment could feel like the wrong decision in hindsight.

Thanks for reading!

[robininthelabyrinth]

What if instead of being his dad Wen Ruohan was his grandfather. And one of his sons had sizhui.

also on ao3 because long

Nie Mingjue staggered a little after he stormed off, the adrenaline rush of fury – at Meng Yao’s betrayal, his many betrayals, at Lan Xichen for accepting Meng Yao’s explanations at face value, at himself for not being able to do what he probably should – all fading away into exhaustion and pain.

It was at that point that he acknowledged that, in his anger, he had probably made a mistake by storming off in the first place – even with Baxia in hand, even with Wen Ruohan finally dead, Nie Mingjue really shouldn’t walking around alone in the Sun Palace.

He was injured, and heavily so; any Wen that wanted could probably take him down. A strong wind could probably take him down.

Still, it wasn’t as if his pride would permit him to go back and ask Lan Xichen to leave Meng Yao’s side for long enough to notice that a man he’d called friend for over a decade had been rather brutally tortured for several days and could very much use some medical assistance - apparently, tending to the injuries to Meng Yao’s ego after Nie Mingjue had shouted at him about the fact that he’d murdered people was more important.

So Nie Mingjue kept on going, lifting his sleeve to try to wipe the blood out of his eyes.

It didn’t work very well, mostly because there wasn’t much space left on his sleeve that wasn’t already covered in blood, and it only ended up making it worse.

On a whim, he turned towards the corridor where he knew from experience years before that the Wen clan’s rooms were located, thinking only that he might be able to find a sheet or some spare clothing to use to wipe his face clean.

He found something different.

The Wen cultivator was only a boy, around the same age as Nie Huaisang; his knees shook and his eyes were white all around the edges in his terror. The colors of his robes suggested he was surnamed Wen but of low status, and while there was a sword at his belt, it looked as fresh and unused as Nie Huaisang’s saber.

Instead of wielding it, he was clutching a small child, a year or two old at most, to his chest.

Nie Mingjue stared, and the boy stared back.

“These are the rooms for the main family,” Nie Mingjue said after a moment of silence, and the boy blanched, inadvertently confirming his suspicions. “Whose child is that?”

“Please don’t kill us,” the boy said, lip quivering. “Or don’t – just don’t kill him. A-Yuan didn’t do anything.”

“Whose child is that?” Nie Mingjue repeated. “Wen Xu’s?”

He couldn’t imagine it being Wen Chao’s, though he supposed it was theoretically possible.

The boy nodded reluctantly. “I wasn’t planning on telling him anything about that,” he offered. “He wouldn’t need to know…”

“That I killed his father?” Nie Mingjue asked, arching his eyebrows, then shook his head, dismissing the entire thing. If a child grew up and wanted revenge for his father, he of all people wouldn’t stop him from trying no matter how little Wen Xu deserved the honor; he could deal with the problem whenever it arose. “I’m not going to kill you. Either of you – what’s your name?”

“Wen Ning – ah, Qionglin. You’re not going to..?”

Nie Mingjue nodded at the sword at his waist. “Tell me, Wen Qionglin. Have you ever used that?”

“Uh, I fly sometimes? Not well, though,” Wen Ning said, looking confused. “What does – oh.”

Nie Mingjue rolled his eyes, feeling like the point had been made.

Wen Ning clearly did not agree, still looking lost and not a little terrified.

“Yes,” Nie Mingjue clarified dryly. “I am not going to kill you. There’s no battle happening right now, so killing you would be the same as killing a civilian, and unlike your sect, we don’t do that. Or anything else, for that matter.”

“Anything else?”

“Wen Xu had neither a wife nor a concubine,” Nie Mingjue said. “I’m making an assumption, but given the child’s age, the timing…and the fact that that child has the look of a Lan.”

Wen Ning winced again and bowed his head. “His mother was taken against her will from the Cloud Recesses after Wen Xu burned it,” he confirmed in a quiet voice. “She – she committed suicide, not long after the birth.”

Nie Mingjue sighed. He’d been right, then; this child was one of the many remnants of war. 

He thought, for a moment, of calling Lan Xichen over to tell him that he had a cousin lingering here. Surnamed Wen, of course, and that would be a hard burden for the child to bear growing up, but the child was still Lan blood; Lan Xichen would take him back to Gusu in a heartbeat.

Of course, Lan Xichen was still with Meng Yao – calling one would bring the other. Meng Yao, who had just killed Nie cultivators that Nie Mingjue had known his whole life and blamed him for not understanding why he just had to do it, even though he knew Wen Ruohan would be dead soon, and Lan Xichen, who defended him without a second thought, without giving a chance for Nie Mingjue to explain his grievances, without trusting him to have a reason for his anger…

Meng Yao, who had sent them letters with information – sent Lan Xichen letters with information.

The same information that had led Nie Mingjue into the trap at Yangquan, which had led him to the Sun Palace, where Wen Ruohan couldn’t wait to see him kneeling before his throne, where Meng Yao had used that moment of inattention, focused on Nie Mingjue’s pain, to stab the man in the back –

Where Lan Xichen had come so conveniently quickly after the death was accomplished.

Had Lan Xichen known what Meng Yao was planning? Had he known what he was sending Nie Mingjue into?

Had he known and decided not to tell him?

(Nie Mingjue would have gone willingly, if they’d told him. Being captured as nothing, the torture was nothing, he would bear it all a thousand times over if it meant that he would see Wen Ruohan’s death. But he would have only taken volunteers with him, men prepared to accept death, and not – not as it was.)

For what might be the first time in his life, Nie Mingjue felt a momentary pang of distrust in Lan Xichen’s judgment.

“If you find yourself in need of help with the child, come to my Nie sect,” he finally said, a compromise with himself. He’d normally offer a token of some sort, but he didn’t have any on him; they had all been taken away long ago. “You’re both surnamed Wen, so you’ll probably end up in a prisoner of war camp at first, and then get resettled, but if it ends up being too hard, you can tell them to ask for me…and if I’m not around for whatever reason, ask for Lan Wangji. He’s reasonable and righteous, as well as discreet. He won’t turn you down.”

Wen Ning nodded. “I’ll keep that in mind, Sect Leader. Thank you.”

Nie Mingjue waved a hand at him, nose wrinkling as he felt the blood start dripping down his forehead again. “You should leave first. Get far away from here, before anyone else makes the connection I did.”

Wen Ning began to go, then hesitated. “Do you need medical assistance, Sect Leader Nie? I know a little…”

“I’ve been in Wen Ruohan’s custody since Yangquan,” Nie Mingjue said, and Wen Ning blanched; at least he realized what that meant, even if, somehow, Lan Xichen didn’t. “‘A little’ isn’t going to help.”

“You probably shouldn’t be walking around if you’ve got broken bones,” Wen Ning said anxiously. “Or burns. Or deep cuts. Or, uh –”

“Wen Qionglin.”

“…yes?”

“Take the child and go.”

-

Eventually Lan Xichen had found him, furious at the apparently belated realization that Nie Mingjue had not gone straight back to his camp for medical help – as if Nie Mingjue would know where their camp was, given that he hadn’t been told anything – but the evidence of his concern helped ease Nie Mingjue’s fears.

He was aware it probably shouldn’t – he still believed there was no reason for those Nie cultivators to die, believed that Meng Yao could have offered to send them away to the Fire Palace the way he had done later when he wanted to preserve Nie Mingjue’s life – but he couldn’t help himself. Between his temper, his position, and his reticent personality, he had many admirers but almost no close friends, and so he treasured the ones he had like gold. The thought of breaking with Lan Xichen left ashes in his mouth.

In fact, if one looked at it a certain way, Lan Xichen might be the only friend he had left – he’d had others, growing up, but they’d become distant after he became Sect Leader, the impossible barrier between them, and even more distant once he’d become war leader, responsible for their lives and deaths. He’d once thought he’d had another true friend in Meng Yao, but that was before he realized how many of their interactions had been staged with a deliberate goal in mind.

Before he realized that Meng Yao had never thought of him as anything other than a stepping stone.

And now Lan Xichen wanted them to become sworn brothers.

Nie Mingjue had been repulsed by the idea when he’d first broached it, only a day or two after the events in the Sun Palace. Becoming Lan Xichen’s sworn brother was nothing, but Meng Yao…? Before, maybe, but now…?

“A-Yao really did think he was doing the right thing,” Lan Xichen said, his eyes full of sincerity, and Nie Mingjue wondered when it’d become ‘A-Yao’. Lan Xichen didn’t even refer to Lan Wangji with such a term, though that might be more due to Lan Wangji being such a stickler for etiquette. “I know you think that he didn’t have to kill them, but he was the one who’d been there so long, who knew Wen Ruohan’s thinking – he couldn’t give up the opportunity we’d created at so much cost.”

The opportunity you created with my flesh and bones, Nie Mingjue wanted to say, but didn’t. He would have agreed if they’d ask, and surely that was the same as having agreed, wasn’t it? It would be petty to hold it against them.

It would be petty to continue feeling hurt. 

“And his attack on me at Langya?” he asked, his arms crossed. “After having engaged in the premeditated murder of one of his own superiors?”

“It’s more complicated than just that,” Lan Xichen said. “There were reasons – you can’t look at things as just black and white, Mingjue-xiong.”

Nie Mingjue wasn’t sure how planning to stab your own fellow soldiers in the back in a way designed to disguise their deaths as enemy casualties didn’t fall pretty firmly into the “unmitigated black” category. 

Oh, sure, Meng Yao had reasons, he always had reasons! But even if there was abuse, Meng Yao had had other options – if no one at Langya would list, he could have written a letter to Nie Mingjue himself to lay out his grievances; Nie MIngjue had already been acting as the overall commander of the war by then, and even Jin Guangshan’s thick face, pretending he didn’t know who Meng Yao was or that he’d never seen any letter, wouldn’t stand up to a direct conversation.

There were other things Meng Yao could have done, and he pointed them out to Lan Xichen.

“That’s all the more reason you should swear brotherhood with the two of us,” Lan Xichen said, and he was in earnest; he had always been so very earnest. “As the eldest, you would have the opportunity to help teach A-Yao how to walk on the right path, even when he feels he’s trapped. You were such good friends with him in the past – you could be friends again!”

It sounded more like responsibility than opportunity, but in the end Nie Mingjue really had liked Meng Yao once, really had had faith in him, and maybe Lan Xichen was right; maybe there was a good man under there, twisted only by desperate circumstances.

So he did it, gave his good name to a man he wasn’t sure he could trust, and that was just another thing on top of everything else he had to do: there was a war to finish, bodies to bury, the Unclean Realm to rebuild, politics to manage…it was all a mess, and one he had to tackle alone.

It wasn’t until the celebration at Phoenix Mountain that he finally had a chance to put down his burdens, even if only for a little while.

“Meng Yao,” he said, because the name Jin Guangyao felt more like an insult on his tongue. “Can you find someone for me?”

Lan Xichen had asked him to think of things he could ask Meng Yao to do, insisting that it would help mend their relationship for Meng Yao to feel wanted rather than merely scolded.

“Find someone?” Jin Guangyao echoed, turning to look at him. “Of course, da-ge. You need only ask. I’m only surprised – you don’t often ask about people in specific.”

Nie Mingjue supposed that was true.

“You’re helping with the resettlement of the Wen civilians, aren’t you?” he asked. 

The Jin sect had volunteered for the work, and it made sense: they were the wealthiest sect, capable of buying up land for the Wens to live on and paying for the wages of the men it would take to keep an eye on them until they could feel certain that they weren’t planning rebellion. It would be good for the Wen civilians to have some land where they could farm, an honest life they could lead, and it was probably better for them to live nearer to the Jin sect, which had suffered much less in the war, than risk anger elsewhere. 

“One of them is named Wen Qionglin,” he continued when Jin Guangyao nodded. “Skinny, like you, but taller – maybe half a head. Big eyes.”

“He must be a rare man indeed for da-ge to notice his eyes,” Jin Guangyao teased, though there was some expression Nie Mingjue didn’t recognize in his eyes. It was almost dark, something possessive and angry, but that didn’t make any sense. Perhaps he was only still irritated at how badly his first major event for the Jin sect had gone.

Nie Mingjue had only mentioned the eyes because at the time it’d seemed as if they were wide enough to take up half of his face, the boy as skittish as a rabbit; he shrugged, not wanting to talk about it too much. He’d made a decision based on pain and anger, and he still didn’t know if it had been the right one.  

“If you can find him for me, let me know where he is,” he said. “If you can’t, you can’t. It’s fine - I have other places I can look.”

-

In the end it hadn’t been Jin Guangyao who had found Wen Ning, but Wei Wuxian.

Nie Mingjue only heard about the whole disaster much later on – he’d assumed from Jin Guangyao’s silence that the boy had somehow managed to evade the Jin’s resettlement efforts and had turned to checking elsewhere.

He hadn’t been expecting to find him again as Wei Wuxian’s Ghost General.

That had been a shock, as had finding out about the boy’s identity – 

“He’s Wen Qing’s brother,” Jin Guangyao told him, later. “She ran a Supervisory Office in Yiling, caring for prisoners to make sure they stayed alive pending interrogation – torture, really. He assisted her…did you really think he was just a civilian, da-ge? You really shouldn’t let yourself be so easily deceived by an innocent smile.” 

– but in the end Nie Mingjue decided that it was still his responsibility to find out what had happened to the little Lan boy.

He went to Yiling.

There was a barrier at the bottom of the Burial Mounds that Nie Mingjue lightly touched with his saber – not enough to actually destroy it, which would cause a backlash, but enough to make the person who put it into place notice. It was little more than a means of knocking, really, but Wei Wuxian stormed down the mountain in an offended fury.

Perhaps Nie Mingjue had come on a bad day.

“You’re not welcome here,” Wei Wuxian said. “I’m not handing over the Stygian Tiger Seal, or the Wens – I want to be left alone.”

“I only –”

“I’ve already separated from the Jiang sect and been condemned by the entire cultivation world; what more do you want?! I’ve had enough. Wen Ning, make sure he leaves.” With that, he turned on his heel and went right back up the mountain, leaving Nie Mingjue blinking.

Wen Ning shuffled forward. His face was flat, seeming almost cruel in its indifference, but Nie Mingjue suspected that was just the stiffness of death. “He won’t come back down,” he said.

“That’s fine,” Nie Mingjue said, still somewhat taken aback by the sheer level of rudeness. “I came here to speak to you, anyway.”

Wen Ning blinked. “…me?”

“I wanted to check up on you,” Nie Mingjue said, feeling abruptly very awkward – Wen Ning had died, after all, and in bad enough circumstances that he’d risen up again as a fierce corpse. He couldn’t even be sure that the fierce corpse, however conscious, was still the Wen Ning he’d been before he died; some rumors suggested it was something else moving the body, some tool or dreadful summons of Wei Wuxian’s. “And the child.”

There was a moment of silence, when Nie Mingjue began to wonder as well, but finally Wen Ning stirred and spoke again.

“…he’s doing all right,” he said, and there was a small smile on his face. “Wei-gongzi took A-Yuan down the mountain to the village recently and he got a whole bunch of toys; he’s been very happy.”

“I’m glad,” Nie Mingjue said, and felt rather stiff himself. “I should have done more for him, the first time we met. I regretted it later, but couldn’t find you.”

“You looked?”

Nie Mingjue nodded. “When I was at the Phoenix Mountain hunt a few months back, I asked my sworn brother to check the Jin resettlement program, as he helps organize it,” he said. “He must have overlooked you somehow – I told him to look for Wen Qionglin; perhaps that was the issue.”

It didn’t seem especially likely, since Jin Guangyao had been able to find out about Wen Ning’s past, but he couldn’t think of any other reason why the normally efficient man would make such an oversight.  

Wen Ning was quiet for a long moment, a strange expression on his face. “What are your plans now, Sect Leader Nie?”

Nie Mingjue frowned. “What do you mean?”

“About A-Yuan. His parentage…”

“You said he was fine and happy,” Nie Mingjue pointed out, realizing that Wen Ning was probably worried that he’d insist on the boy returning to the Cloud Recesses. “I’m not…Lan Xichen is very busy with his own concerns, anyway, and if the child is happy, then nothing need change. And Wei-gongzi’s hysterics aside, Yiling is fairly well protected by him at the moment, so this is probably the safest place for him to be.”

The Jins were furious about what had happened; he wouldn’t trust the Wens with them right now. In fact…

“If the Jin sect start making trouble, my earlier offer to care for him is still valid,” he said, and this time he did have a token at his waist that he was able to offer up. “Given your actions during the war, it can no longer extend to you as well – assuming you can even leave Wei-gongzi’s side, anyway.”

“Who told you what I did during the war?” Wen Ning asked. “That sworn brother of yours again? Lianfeng-zun?”

Nie Mingjue nodded. “As I said, I asked him to look for you; he found out in passing about what was done under your sister’s command. I can’t offer succor to someone who helped torture my Nie cultivators, even in the guise of offering medical aid; there would need to be a trial, and passions are still inflamed. Better that you stay here.” There didn’t seem to be anything more to say: he’d found out what he’d wanted. “I’ll take my leave, then.”

Wen Ning slowly nodded. “Come back again sometime, Sect Leader Nie,” he requested, and even seemed sincere about it. “And – stay safe.”

It was a strange farewell, but Nie Mingjue supposed that the remnants of the Wen sect – and a fierce corpse, no less – would be more concerned than most about security and well-being.

-

“Wei-gongzi,” Wen Ning said, sitting on the floor next to Wei Wuxian’s working bench in the cave. “I have a question.”

“Is this about my sister’s wedding again? I’ve already accepted that I can’t go. You don’t have to keep worrying.”

“Not about that,” Wen Ning said. “Something else.” He hesitated. “I have a friend –”

Wei Wuxian dropped the half-finished compass of evil onto the workbench with a thunk and spun around to look at Wen Ning with a grin. “You have a friend? Go on.”

Wen Ning stared at him, bewildered.

“Everyone knows that asking for advice on behalf of a friend means asking for it for yourself!” Wei Wuxian sai, beaming. “Go on, tell me – do you like someone? Or is it something to do with your body –”

“It really is about a friend!” Wen Ning wailed, hiding his face behind his hands. “Or, well, not a friend. Someone I know. He’s the one with friends – bad friends.”

“Bad friends? What do you mean?”

Wen Ning peeked between his fingers, but Wei Wuxian appeared to have calmed down a bit from his earlier manic glee.

“I think,” he said, thinking very hard about his words before saying them, “that – this person I know, that he’s being manipulated by one, maybe more than one, of his friends. I don’t know why, but…I don’t know. It gives me a weird feeling. Like something bad is going to happen. And I don’t know if I should tell him or if that would only make things worse or…I don’t know.”

Wei Wuxian nodded, finally looking serious. “Is there a chance that we can drop the ambiguity?” he asked. “I can help better if I know who the people you’re talking about are.”

“It’s a bit sensitive. I don’t want to get anyone in trouble…”

Wei Wuxian looked around the cave pointedly. “I’m pretty sure we’ve offended everyone we could possibly offend already, Wen Ning.”

“…I think Chifeng-zun shouldn’t have sworn brotherhood with Lianfeng-zun and Zewu-jun,” Wen Ning said in a rush.

“I retract my previous statement,��� Wei Wuxian said weakly. “What? How do you even – you consider Chifeng-zun a friend?”

“He was very nice the first time we met,” Wen Ning said.

“Chifeng-zun? Nice?”

Wen Ning shrugged.

“Okay,” Wei Wuxian said. “Okay. This is fine. You did in fact find the only three people in the cultivation world that I haven’t crossed yet, but – it’s fine. Okay. Let’s deal with this. What do you mean he’s being manipulated? And what’s wrong with Lan Xichen? He’s the real nice one.”

“I’m not saying he isn’t! It’s Lianfeng-zun that’s the problem, I think.”

“I haven’t heard anything bad about him, other than the fact that he runs whenever Chifeng-zun appears,” Wei Wuxian said. “But then again, rumor doesn’t get you very far, or else we’d be living in a palace of blood and gore right now – emphasis on palace. It’d probably have better washroom facilities than we have.” He sighed and shook his head. “What makes you say what you’re saying?”

“I’m not sure…it’s probably nothing. They didn’t pay any attention to Chifeng-zun when he’d been tortured, letting him walk around where he could’ve been killed, and then they swore brotherhood before his wounds had even scabbed over, and I swear they must have pushed him into it, what with the way he treats Lianfeng-zun...Anyway, then there’s everything that’s been happening with Lianfeng-zun and me - ”

“…you know what, let’s focus to that,” Wei Wuxian said, holding his head as if it hurt. “What has Lianfeng-zun to do with you?”

“Chifeng-zun asked him to look for me, a few months ago, and he deliberately didn’t tell him where I was,” Wen Ning said. “And he also told him a bunch of stuff about what I did during the war that’s really not true – he thought I was involved in torturing people, and I wasn’t, I swear! – and anyway, I don’t know why he’d do that. Sworn brothers shouldn’t lie to each other, should they?”

“Generally speaking, no,” Wei Wuxian said. “Okay, yes, that’s all a bit suspicious; that bit with him exaggerating what you did during the war sure sounds like he’s abusing Chifeng-zun’s trust to isolate us even more. But what’s wrong with Lan Xichen? He’s Lan Zhan’s older brother – I like him.”

Wen Ning nibbled on his lower lip. “It’s not what he did,” he said slowly. “It’s only…okay, let me tell you a story. There was an uncle I liked once. He’d been a guest cultivator, but he married one of my cousins, and he was really nice to me; I used to go over to see him a few times a week. And then one day my sister told me I couldn’t talk to him anymore because he was gone: she’d had him ejected from the sect because she’d found out that he beat his wife.”

Wei Wuxian nodded.

“I didn’t believe it at first,” Wen Ning said. “He was always really nice to me, you know? He’d never raised a hand or behaved badly where I could see. A bunch of other people hadn’t believed it, either, for the same reasons. He behaved well, he had a good reputation, he smiled…my cousin tried to kill herself. That’s how my sister found out, and she believed her. And she was right, too.”

“Lan Xichen is as nice in private as he is in public, though.”

“No, you don’t understand – I don’t think he’s the guest cultivator in the story. I think he’s me. Me and all the other ones that refused to believe what was going on even if we saw the signs, just because we liked him so much. He wouldn’t have gotten away with it for as long as he did if we all hadn’t been willing to defend him.”

“So you think Lianfeng-zun is the one that’s up to something in secret,” Wei Wuxian said slowly, fingers drumming on his leg. “And Lan Xichen is acting, however inadvertently, as his shield…Chifeng-zun would definitely believe whatever Lan Xichen told him. That’s probably how he got captured in Yangquan to begin with, actually; that makes a lot of sense. But what benefit would there be to Lianfeng-zun to manipulating Chifeng-zun into hating you? Hating us?” 

He frowned. “Do you think the Jin sect is planning on trying something against us here at Yiling, and Lianfeng-zun is trying to get Chifeng-zun on board? I know the Jin sect wants my Stygian Tiger Seal, while the Nie sect has never much cared about it…this could be serious.”

Wen Ning nodded.

“One question, though. You said he deliberately knew where you were and didn’t tell him – are you sure about that? That’s the key point, at least to me: getting your past in the war wrong, that could be a mistake, and we don’t know if there was some sort of earlier agreement about what happened in the Sun Palace. How do you know Lianfeng-zun knew where you were?”

“He visited,” Wen Ning said, and looked down at his hands, which were clenched so hard that the knuckles were white. “He looked right at me while he was talking to some of the guards. And…”

He trailed off.

“And?”

“And then I died, Wei-gongzi,” Wen Ning said solemnly. “Less than a day later, the guards he was talking to killed me.”

-

“Not that I’m not always happy to see you, Wei-xiong,” Nie Huaisang said, ignoring the way that he could feel his sect elders a few rooms over bursting into flame in sheer rage without ever realizing why, and also the way his elder brother was going to break both his legs if he ever found out that this was what Nie Huaisang was doing with the role of acting Sect Leader in his absence, “but…why are you here again?”

“To save your brother!” Wei Wuxian said with a grin. “Also possibly to get your thoughts on what a good wedding gift for my sister would be. I can’t decide whether to go with something fancy, heartfelt, or crude.”

“Don’t go with fancy, the Jin sect has all the fancy they need for a lifetime,” Nie Huaisang said at once, because that much he could answer. “And – wait, what was that about saving my brother?”

“Also, I may need to marry Lan Zhan in order to finalize an adoption,” Wei Wuxian said thoughtfully, as if he wasn’t blowing up explosives in Nie Huaisang’s brain with every word. “He doesn’t know about it yet. Do you think you can find someone who can officiate?”

“My brother can do it, he’s technically an elder in the Lan sect by virtue of being sworn brothers with their sect leader,” Nie Huaisang said, mouth moving on automatic. “And – what? Marriage? Adoption? Not know about – also, can we go back to the bit about saving my brother?”