#will i complete this goal? probably not

[simspaghetti]

SS. Piccolo Tour - Part 4 / 5

The Cellar - featuring a fully stocked nectary, Indie's specialist dojo and a room full of all the treasures Lara has collected on her adventures (so far!)

[spectral-squid]

Alright, I saw this and really wanted to do one myself. I probably won't get far, given how small I am, but I decided why not and put goals pretty high up.

The only rule is that you can't have more than 10 notes per blog.

5 notes - I'll try to drink at least 64 oz. (8 cups) of water each day

10 notes - I'll try to eat 3 meals every day

15 notes - I'll try to document my eating on Chronometer again

20 notes - I'll try harder to wear deodorant even on days I do think I'll leave the house

25 notes - I'll make an attempt to shower every day

30 notes - I'll try to brush my hair in the morning and before bed

35 notes - I'll try and brush my teeth in the morning every day

40 notes - I'll try and brush my teeth at night every day

45 notes - I'll try to take note of my weight every morning

50 notes - I'll try and do my laundry regularly and finish it on the same day I start it

55 notes - I'll try and wash my face before bed every day

60 notes - I'll try and wash my face in the morning every day

65 notes - I'll try to shave my face more often

75 notes - I'll organize my room

80 notes - I'll attempt to keep a regular exercise routine

85 notes - I'll start trying to style my hair each day

90 notes - I'll try to keep my room organized

95 notes - I'll buy nail oil and take proper care of my nails

100 notes - I'll keep my nails shaped and at a certain length (not longer, not shorter)

110 notes - I'll paint my nails

115 notes - I'll try to keep my nails painted

120 notes - I'll look more into IPL

130 notes - I'll start IPL

135 notes - I'll spend no less than 30 minutes every day learning Blender and/or Robotics

140 notes - I'll start trying to learn and practice makeup

145 notes - I'll dye my hair

150 notes - I'll start looking at feminine clothing options

155 notes - I'll buy some feminine outfits

160 notes - I'll wear feminine clothing when I'm alone

170 notes - I'll wear subtle feminine clothing in public

Oh, right, and @marylandaccountx4 wanted me to tag them.

[withthewindinherfootsteps]

So we know that Wei Wuxian's treatment after his death was horrible. Even if nothing could impact him directly, there was still neverending slander, hatred, misinformation, theft...

But, for a while after he died, the sects did try to impact him directly – namely, frequently trying to resummon his soul. And today I'll explore the possible reasons for this, their likelihoods, and why I'm so, so thankful that Wei Wuxian's soul managed to resist the summons. Because, spoiler alert (or, you know. maybe not)... none of them are good.

(Long meta ahead)

In my opinion, there are four likely motivations for this: confinement, coercion, torment, and potentially destruction.

Out of all of these, confinement is probably the most likely motivation, at least for most sects (Jins and Jiangs excluded, though it was likely what the Jin sect said their motivations were – but I'll get to them later). This one is the most simple – we know spirit-trapping pouches exist, and we know the sects also placed 120 stone beasts on the Burial Mounds to prevent Wei Wuxian's soul from escaping. Therefore, this seems to be the most likely motivation – and fortunately for Wei Wuxian, probably also the best case scenario, though it still certainly isn't a good one.

For the second, coercion – this is where the Jin sect come in (more specifically Jin Guangshan with the help of Jin Guangyao). Due to their wealth and resources, they're likely the sect who played the largest role in the soul-summoning rituals. We know what they're willing to do to try to gain power – keeping Wen Ning under the pretence he was burned to death and trying to control him with the nails, and working with and helping Xue Yang torture people to help him refine his demonic cultivation, in order to have the Yin hufu fixed. Along with working with many other cultivators, alongside Xue Yang – Jin Guangshan really, really wanted that seal.

And so, Jin GuangShan sought after all those who imitated Wei WuXian in cultivating the ghostly path and gathered them under his rule. He spent a great amount of money and resources and these people, ordering them to study and analyze the structure of the Tiger Seal in secrecy so that they could replicate and restore it. - Villainous Friends extra, EXR

(Note that working with these cultivators very likely happened after Wei Wuxian's soul had failed to be summoned, since this happens some time after Wei Wuxian's death, whereas the soul-summoning ceromonies presumably started happening very close to it.)

In the previous paragraph, he's also quoted as having 'lusted after' the Yin hufu, which we already knew but it's nice to have a direct quote as evidence.

Now, would Wei WuXian willingly work with the Jin sect in doing this? No. We know that, and, given Wei Wuxian's actions in his first life (refusing to hand over the Tally, not being afraid to stand up to the sects, etc), I’m pretty sure Jin Guangshan knows that, too:

He beat around the bush a couple of times, using all his skills, yet Wei WuXian didn’t give in no matter what, and it made him run into a bunch of obstacles. - Villainous Friends extra, EXR

So this could actually make things go two ways. One, I'm wrong and that wasn't actually part of the Jin sect's motivations, since they know they wouldn't be able to control him (and in that case, had they managed to summon him, I could imagine them putting him in a spirit-trapping pouch and doing something similar to what Jin Guangyao did to Nie Mingjue's head. Which, also, not good). Two, it was a part of their motivations, and they hoped to find a way around that. After all, there are other guidao users out there now, and Wei Wuxian would now be a gui*. Also, cultivators can obviously harm ghosts – see the very existence of Night Hunts, and I'd include Xue Yang's talisman-caused destruction of A-Qing as well (while he isn't a traditional cultivator, talismans can be used by everyone).

Now, would either of these methods actually work? I'm inclined to think not really (and I expand on the former method in a note below). Would that stop Jin Guangshan/Jin Guangyao/the cultivators they employ from trying? Especially considering Jin Guangshan's lust for power?

I'm inclined to think no, too.

For the third, look no further than Jiang Cheng's reputation of capturing and torturing demonic cultivators after Wei Wuxian's death, due to thinking they could be him. And this does happen – Jin Ling knows and talks about it, and there's not real motivation for him to negatively lie about someone he loves. Also, when they come across each other at Dafan Mountain, we're told this in Jiang Cheng's inner voice:

A moment ago, Jiang Cheng was certain that this person was Wei WuXian, and all of the blood in his body started to boil. Yet, now, Zidian was clearly telling him that he wasn’t. Zidian definitely wouldn’t deceive him or make a mistake, so he quickly calmed himself and thought, this doesn’t mean anything. I should first find an excuse to take him back and use every possible method to get information out of him. It’s impossible for him to not confess anything or give himself away. I’ve done things like this in the past anyways. - MDZS Chapter 10, EXR translation

This mainly shows that he's tortured people before, rather than that he's tortured people because he thinks they're Wei Wuxian, but this reason is confirmed by Jin Ling in Chapter 24. Of course, the reason is also mentioned in this chapter, and there are other moments in the chapter that illustrate my point better**, but they come from second-hand sources which I know are easier to deny. Do take note of Jiang Cheng's expression both times he comes across 'Mo Xuanyu' (after he suspects he's Wei Wuxian) in Book One***, though:

After a moment, the corners of Jiang Cheng’s lips pulled into a twisted smile. His left hand started to unconsciously stroke the ring [Zidian] again. He spoke softly, “… Well, well. So you’re back?” - Chapter 10, EXR Although his face had always been clouded, marked with arrogance and satire, it seemed as if every corner of it had come alive. It was difficult to determine whether it was vengeful wrath, fathomless hatred, or raving ecstasy. - Chapter 23, EXR

This does seem to line up with what people say his attitude to Wei Wuxian is – there doesn't seem to be any happiness at seeing him again at all. The only time a word that could suggest that ('ecstasy') is used, it's accompanied by 'raving', and considering the context and the other possibilities of his expression, it's... probably not due to happiness at being reunited.

So, considering 1) this, 2) his contribution to the Siege specifically intended to kill Wei Wuxian, and 3) that at the time of frequent soul-summoning Jiang Yanli's death would be even closer for him, I feel pretty confident in saying that yes, this is likely a motivation for the Jiang sect in trying to re-summon Wei Wuxian's soul after his death. And, as mentioned earlier, cultivators can harm ghosts (and we know Zidian is able to remove souls posessing a body from that body, and that Jiang Cheng used Zidian on 'Mo Xuanyu' in Chapter 10. If it wasn't able to restrain/harm ghosts, or other methods weren't able to, why would he risk Wei Wuxian's soul escaping?).

And finally, option four: destruction. We're heading into much more speculative territory here, so don't consider this on par with the first three. But consider this:

We know there are some spells, like Xue Yang's talisman used on A-Qing and the body-offering ritual, that can ruin the returning soul’s reincarnation cycle by destroying it. Therefore, soul destruction is possible.

The 'main'/supposed reason for summoning Wei Wuxian's soul back is to stop the "cultivation world, or even all of mortal land" from being "faced with the most insane damnation and revenge, sinking into nothing but chaos and despair" when Wei Wuxian inevitably returns. While, as mentioned above, I severely doubt this is the motivation for certain sects – and to me is likely a rumour which the Jins (again, especially Jin Guangsha) fanned the flames of to justify summoning Wei Wuxian back for their own purposes**** – there are other sects which would take it more seriously.

Although likely disrespectful, people already thought it served Wei Wuxian right to die without his body intact by the time of the second siege – something believed to negatively affect your reincarnation in your next life*****. This is only the logical next step, and I'm pretty sure the vast majority of people would believe that, again, it would serve Wei Wuxian right, or would at least lead to less harm of the world in the long run.

For these reasons, I could definitely see this as an option for some sects, especially the sects who consider themselves more 'righteous' (cough cough the Nies under Nie Mingjue cough cough). After all, evil is evil and good is good, and the evil deserve what's coming to them. And what better way to prevent that than from preventing his soul from returning at all? So for the Nie sect – and likely some of the smaller sects involved in the Siege, since among them, additudes probably vary – yes, I do think it could be a motivation.

I’m not as sure about the Lans being willing to go this far, and that’s largely for two reasons. One, Lan Wangji’s presence and his relationship to Lan Xichen, who does (not always, but he does) let this affect how he treats Wei Wuxian. An example of this is that, when Wei Wuxian's return is made public, Lan Xichen does let him hide and shelter at the Cloud Recesses instead of trying to pursue him, likely majorly due to Lan Wangji. I'd argue that the aftermath of the Nightless City also acts as an example of this, although it definitely isn't perfect. But though he, Lan Qiren and the 33 elders do come to find Lan Wangji and do not let him continue to shelter Wei Wuxian (after they see Lan Wangji's feelings), Lan Xichen doesn't use this opportunity to kill/capture Wei Wuxian, despite Lan Wangji being in a worse condition due to having fought 33 elders, Wei Wuxian being catatonic, and Lan Qiren likely supporting this outcome (especially considering he was the one who led the Lan sect in the Siege – chapter 68, Wei Wuxian's POV). And he did let Lan Wangji take Wei Wuxian back to the Burial Mounds after:

After he went out of his way to send you back to Burial Mound and returned in such low spirits to receive his punishment, how long he kneeled before the Wall of Rules! - Chapter 99, EXR

Again, this was right after the Nightless City massacre – there isn't any goodwill towards Wei Wuxian at this point in time.

Of course, the Lan sect did participate in the siege after Lan Xichen knew of Lan Wangji's feelings towards Wei Wuxian, which Lan Xichen was no doubt a part of (although Lan Qiren lead the Lan sect in the siege, Lan XIchen had to have at least known/given his support, if not participated.) And it should be considered that Lan Xichen letting Wei Wuxian shelter at the Cloud Recesses was after Wei Wuxian had been back for a while, and had not caused the downfall of the Cultivation World, like many suspected he would after his death. And of course, as stated previously, his handling of the aftermath of Nightless City wasn't perfect either (though please note that his main motive here was to protect Lan Wangji from being potentially executed, rather than anything about Wei Wuxian himself). So caring about Lan Wangji doesn't mean he won't harm Wei Wuxian. But I do think he could find bringing Wei Wuxian's soul back to completely destroy it a bit excessive. There is, though, the chance that the elders of the Lan Sect would react to this differently, and of course they would have a sway on both Lan Xichen and the Lan sect as well.

The second reason is smaller, but there seems to be more focus in the Lan sect than in others when it comes to letting ghosts rest peacefully/helping them move on. And that could definitely lead to more resistance to the idea of summoning a soul back to destroy it as well, which could especially impact the elders. So I'd assume that the Lan sect would be the most likely sect to summon Wei Wuxian's soul back just for confinement, or just for some way of making sure any resentment is disippated, his spirit moves on, and he can't cause more harm to the world (eg via Inquiry)******. Not that he would or does as a ghost or as a reborn person, but that's unfortunately not relevant to this.

But yes, as a motivation for the Nie Mingjue-led Nie sect? Absolutely.

So, these are the main motives I suspect to be behind the attempted summoning of Wei Wuxian's soul after his death (and if I've missed any, please let me know – I'd love to have a discussion). And, of course, none of them lead to anywhere good. Because of course it wasn’t enough to besiege Wei Wuxian, murder the 50 non-combatants he was responsible for (and throwing them into the blood pit as a mark of disrespect because why not?), and lead to his death via him getting torn apart. It wasn’t enough to steal all his inventions, and use them commonly while still slandering him with no reprieve – or to steal his notes and give them to people like Xue Yang to study (Villainous Friends, again) and to use for their own, extremely extremely harmful, purposes. Of course, the cultivation world has to try to harm Wei Wuxian after death as well ((:

We don't know whether Wei Wuxian rejecting the summoning ceremonies was conscious or unconscious, but if it was the former, these are very likely reasons he refused to return in this way. If it was unconscious – for example, maybe during the frequent soul-summons his soul was in a weakened state due to him dying from a backlash of resentful energy and getting torn apart, and it healed over time but not before the soul-summoning rituals stopped – well, I can only be thankful.

Finally, let me leave you on the thought that – although it may well have happened since we don't spend much time in the immediate aftermath of the Sunshot campaign – there isn't even any textual mention of this happening to Wen Ruohan. Who, while not being a guidao user, was still very dangerous, still an extremely powerful cultivator, and still had a lot of reason to feel resentment. So.

:')

Thank you for reading!

--

*Considering what we see of how Wei Wuxian's guidao functions – redirecting the ghosts'/corpses' resentment into doing something they'd want to do, eg attacking people, and directing it towards a target – I'm not sure using it to force a spirit to do something 1) extremely specific, and 2) explicitly against their will would actually work. Iirc the closest thing we get to this in text is Wei Wuxian using the corpses of Wens to attack other Wens in the Sunshot Campaign, but he's still just directing their resentment to a target of his choice, and fierce corpses do tend to be on the less concious side of things (hence why Wei Wuxian had to awaken Wen Ning's consciousness). Considering how Wen Ning attacks Wei Wuxian and the Burial Mound Wens before his consciousness had fully awoken, I... really don't think those fierce corpses were able to differentiate (or didn't care).

Meanwhile, ghosts seem to be a bit more in control of themselves – see A-Qing, and Wei Wuxian's own descriptions of his ghost self.

That, alongside ghost!Wei Wuxian being able to resist his soul-summoning and the fact that pretty much all of the new guidao users are a lot weaker than he was, does make me think that this this wouldn't work. I do wonder about Xue Yang, since his methods are pretty different as well, but he's more of a modao user than a guidao user (he controls living corpses rather than dead people) and I don't think you can insert physical nails into ghosts?? Though if he was specifically instructed to figure out some way to control ghost!Wei Wuxian (who's probably kept in a spirit-trapping pouch in this scenario), he might be able to do something at least. Though also he was also struggling to piece Xiao Xingchen's ghost soul back together, so he may struggle with those areas?

Well, whatever the potential outcome, I'm so so happy once again that Wei Wuxian's soul managed to resist the soul-summonings...

**Mainly this:

Everyone in the cultivation world knew that the young leader of the Jiang Clan watched out for Wei WuXian in an almost crazed manner. He would rather catch the wrong person than let go of any possibility, and took anyone who seemed like they held the soul of Wei WuXian away to the YunmengJiang Sect, inflicting severe torture on his victim. If he wanted to take someone back, the opposition would surely lose half of their life. - Chapter 10, EXR

But I have heard people say 'you can't prove that it's just more rumours' before, and I wanted my evidence to be as watertight as possible.

(And, off-topic... isn't it really sad how Jiang Cheng, in the present day, is described as young? Because, for a clan leader, he is. And another thing he is, is close in age to Wei Wuxian – who was killed 13 whole years prior :') )

***And do note that the only other time they run into each other before Wei Wuxian's identity is revealed to the world apart from this is their brief interaction at Jinlintai, where he can't just act however he wants. The next time they run into each other after it, Jiang Cheng is literally taking part in another siege against him, and still extremely hostile ("surrounded by hostile energy, face insidious, staring straight at him" – from EXR chapter 60). Then he loses his spiritual powers and can't do anything. By the time he regains his powers, Wei Wuxian, Lan Wangji and the Wen remnants' corpses have saved everyone during the Second Siege, and though public opinion hasn't properly shifted quite yet, it will soon after Sisi and Bicao tell the story of Jin Guangyao, and voila, a new scapegoat (do note that he doesn't completely bar Wei Wuxian from entering Lotus Pier after the Second Siege, though). Plus, throughout it all, Lan Wangji is still constantly present, which makes it hard for Jiang Cheng to really do anything. And then he's finally faced with the Golden Core reveal, which does alter his motivations towards Wei Wuxian (obviously the resentment is still there – read chapter 102 – but it's also mixed with other complex emotions, and he seems to start being able to move away from that a little in Chapter 103). I still definitely wouldn't describe Jiang Cheng's attitude towards him as positive, but it isn't at the point it was at the start of the novel (eg Chapter 10).

But even if his attitude does change, or would for whatever other reason apart from the reveal, that still doesn't change an initial motivation so isn't relevant to this meta. We know his intentions at the start.

****It's also possible they may have originated it, but I think WWX's reputation was bad enough for it to form naturally. Though you can trace a major part of that back to them, too.

*****That belief isn't outright stated in MDZS, but the fact people are specifically talking about the status of WWX's body in the aftermath of his death suggests that this belief does have some grounding in the MDZS universe, at least? And we know MXTX has included it in TGCF (though that doesn't mean it's definitely in MDZS), so she has used it in her works. If this isn't the case in the MDZS universe I am sorry (although that could also mean there's less importance placed on not disturbing the reincarnation cycle in the world of MDZS...? Which would work towards my original argument) – I don't want to spread misinformation that something is definitely true, I just think there's evidence to suggest it is true, which isn't the same thing.

******Again, I think this would depend on who ends up having more influence over who in the Lan sect. After all, normal resentful spirits only do what they do because of their resentment in death, whereas Wei Wuxian is 'dangerous' because of who everyone thinks he was in life – so him being reborn naturally could also 'cause a lot of harm to the world' during the time period this version of him would live in, unlike the resentful ghosts they appease. This could definitely lead to many advocating for confinement, I think.

[wouteke]

Me like two days ago: less pwp for 2025 lets lock in Me now: arguably most depraved pwp i’ve ever written

If anyone is interested in a/b/o dubcon feel free to go to ao3.gov ^_^

[the-one-who-lambs]

I wrote 1400 words today in 3 hours, which is absolutely nuts for me (usually I write in like 1, max 2 hour sessions, and get like 200-500 done on days that I write). I'm tempted to write more, but I'm just about to finish the first big scene of the chapter and if I leave that for myself tomorrow that gives me a really easy starting point to get into a good flow again.

My chapters are usually about 6k-7k on average. I warned y'all in advance that I expected this to be the longest chapter in the entire fic, because this (and ch 16+17) are going to be the most character development-heavy, climactic parts of the narrative. And since I'm want to make this chapter in particular hit like a motherfucker, I am being very generous about not rushing the pacing here. So far Chapter 15 is 4500 words, and my god do I want to write more of it right now, but I know damn well that overall writing more consistently in shorter sessions gives me much better results so I'm going to let my creative batteries recharge.

Normally, I don't make my writing any longer than it needs to be, because I am able to take the events of what could be a 15k chapter and make it just as effective in, say, 5-7k, and it's taken a lot of skill development to be able to do that successfully and without much difficulty. However, (I hope) I have enough practice with the "rules/standards" of "good writing" that I'm experimenting with breaking that particular convention intentionally.

Which is... not usually what my readers expect from my updates lmao. So I'm giving y'all a warning in advance:

I'm gonna estimate that this chapter's gonna be 13k-15k. Probably 12k at the absolute minimum. Will it actually take too much longer than a regular chapter? Probably not a whole lot because I'm in the creative-energy-overflow stage of chapter writing that gets me so in the zone that I've powered through half the chapter in a week before I know it.

[happyk44]

on one hand i like yukio and he's already gone through so much and is actively trying to begin his healing process

on the other hand i think his death would cause rin to lose his fucking mind and i would really enjoy seeing that as well

[deathnguts]

Dabi Todoroki is a Barty Crouch Jr variant and I’m tired of pretending he’s not

[leviathiane]

Killua's genuinely, at least lowkey, traumatized by nen. He's never known what it was or that it had a name, but that oppressing feeling of danger has been curdled into an innate fear with his brother's face in his head. When faced with it again, even against an opponent below his equal in terms of strength and experience, his trauma overwhelmed him.

[candidateofloyalty]

Franziska’s insistence on perfection is an attempt to live up to her father’s legacy despite that legacy being built on lies and ruining countless lives including that of the person Franziska loves most. Accepting that she is not and cannot be perfect is a major step in her development into not only a better person but a happier one. And despite all of this, every time she declares her own perfection my immediate impulse is to agree with her

[puppppppppy]

who up seeing their disorder in a fictional character but feel like its not their place to put a name on it

[swamp-world]

goal is to stop reblogging stuff as much and start actually using this as my blog. what this will mean ideally is less consuming of media and more reflecting on media. that is it that is the primary goal above all else. i will be endeavouring to only post things that i have read or engaged with, i will be endeavouring to post about many things i have read or engaged with. i aim to use my tumblr account as a tool to help me slow down in the world rather than viewing my tumblr account as being inherently oppositional to me slowing down and being in the world.

[jurassicpark1990]

realised i never posted any of my 2024 summaries for tv shows, movies and fanfic. i don't feel like making three separate posts so will condense it all in one post and then make a separate post about my 2025 goals <3

first up: tv shows

i watched 1156 episodes in total from 50 different series (less episodes and series than last year). of the 1156, i had already seen 922 of them which is a bit embarrassing tbh

the most watched in a month was 186 (in january) and the least was 48 (in december). i did try and track days but wasn't consistent

including rewatches, my most watched show was schitt's creek. excluding rewatches, my most watched show was the great british bake off lmao

my most watched episode was - for the second year in a row - currahee (episode one of band of brothers)

my top three genres were comedy, drama and scifi

in total i watched 41,424 minutes of tv this year! the four shortest episodes i watched were all 20 minutes long (an episode of the bear, one modern family episode and then two yu-gi-oh ones). the longest episodes were both two part pilots (DS9 and monk) but outside of that it was currahee

most episodes of tv i watched were released in 2016 (85). the average and median years of release were 2007 and 2008 respectively. the oldest episode was an episode of next gen from 1987 and i watched 24 episodes that were released in 2024

i did try rating each episode but i was a bit loosey goosey with it all and gave the vast majority five stars. i gave one episode of next gen (man of the people) a one star review because it was horrifically offensive lmao

next: movies

for the first time since i've tracked movie watching, i cracked 100 movies this year! specifically i watched 102. however.... only 12 of these were new to me :/ to put that in perspective there were 12 movies that i watched more than once this year

i watched three movies three times this year: the fellowship of the ring, the phantom menace and jurassic park

my biggest movie watching months were december (18 movies), june (17) and january (16). on the opposite end there were three months where i only watched three movies: may, august and july

the day i am least likely to watch a movie is wednesday! this is interesting because i had two classes on wednesday all year. so i wonder if it was a uni thing or a general middle of the week thing

my most watched genres were scifi, comedy and family/childrens

in total i watched 12,407 minutes of movies this year! the average length was 121 minutes but the shortest was 68 minutes (duck soup) and the longest was the extended version of the return of the king

the oldest movie i watched was duck soup (1933) and i watched three 2024 releases: despicable me 4 (with my nephew, i hated it), the merry gentlemen (with my friends, i hated it) and wallace & gromit: a vengeance most fowl (with my partner, loved it!). the average and median year of release were 2001 and 2002 respectively

my rating system is a bit more rigid with movies but i still gave approximately half five stars, which tracks with the amount of movies i rewatched tbh

finally: fanfic

i read 490 fics! based on the three years i've tracked this, it's a little bit less than average. i read 19 fics more than once (including one fic which i read five times.......) and about half of the fics were rereads (this is interesting to me and i defs wouldn't consider this standard for me)

i read from 33 fandoms this year, my top three were hockey (165), game of thrones (73) and inception (44). which is an absolutely hilarious combo in 2024

my top pairing was jaime/brienne (absolutely no surprise there). arthur/eames (inception) were third overall and the rest of my rop five were hockey (which i won't be sharing)

in total, i read about 4.5 million words - this is 1 million more than last year and 1 million less than the year before that, which is pretty neat imo. my longest fic was 73.133 words and then there were three under 100 words but they were all actually fan art. the average length was a little over 9k which is probably a little under my sweet spot tbh

the oldest fic was from 2004 and most fics were either published in 2023 or 2012. the second makes sense because of all the game of thrones and inception but not sure what was up with the 2023

my biggest reading month was october (91) and my smallest was september (21). this tracks with my uni schedule because all of my major assignments were due in september and then i was free lmao

now, a bit about the actual fics themselves: about half were about characters in developing relationships (makes sense) and a quarter were established relationship (something that i love to read tbh)

for rpf, only 5% of fics were future fics. this surprises me because i love and adore future fics but it might just be because there's not that many out there

for canon, there was a pretty even split between canon compliant and canon divergent fics (both around 35% in total) and then 23% were post canon

the most common trope that i read was apparently fluff. this does not sound right at all because i lowkey hate fluff

other popular tropes wereL polyamory, internalised bi/homophobia, amnesia and infidelity

i don't usually read AUs but the big ones were rule 63, trans characters, modern setting, soulmates and vampires. also lots of different time fuckery fics - time loops, time travel, multiverse fics and age regression - and i loved all of them

most of the pwp i read were either threesomes or first time which is a fun combo imo the other really big one i noticed was cunnilingus - shout out to all the game of thrones girlies who think jaime lannister eats mad pussy

there were 12 fics i didn't give kudos too - some were really old rpf and i got embarrassed about it and then the rest were my own fics that i reread

this was, by far, my worst year for commenting on fics. i'm beyond embarrassed about this. i think it was probably because i was rereading a lot of older fics but that's no excuse

this was my first year at attempting to rate fics. it was a bit of an odd exercise because i think it's odd to rate fanfic. however, it was fun for looking at my feelings towards tropes (remember how i read a bunch of fluff? well i didn't give a single fluff fic higher than 3 stars). i am going to keep doing this

now hey if you made it to the end, you're my fav <3

[mc-critical]

Bonus:

2.22 (46) / 2.24 (48) / 2.25 (49) / 2.35 (59) / 2.39 (63)

[jam-packed]

oughhh i have. something.....in the works. but i cant draw it till my new ipad comes in next week sigh :(

[truethes]

i am. thinking about zhong.li ...

[stellarstarcelios]

☀️ Something I noticed in Overwatch!

☀️ Everyone is saying that the Sombra and Illari interaction about Sombra trying to gather info for Illari and feeling sympathy for her means that Illari is part of Talon.

☀️ I know a lot of people assumed it meant Illari is in Talon, but I remembered it says on the Overwatch website:

☀️ Meaning, in my mind, while Sombra works for Talon, she's basically using their resources for her own purposes and to reach her own goal. It's not like she's completely loyal to Talon, because she joined them after she had to wipe her identity as Olivia and they wanted her to join their ranks.

☀️ So who's to say she doesn't help others outside of Talon with her abilities and knowledge? Like Katya Volskaya in the original Infiltration short.

☀️ So, I don't think Illari is part of Talon, but Sombra might be trying to help her get info on something. Maybe she's trying to get info to see if maybe her ceremony for her solar threading was sabotaged in some way?

☀️ Even though Illari believes it was entirely her fault, Sombra might have convinced her she can see if it really was her fault? Maybe talked to her in a way that made it seem like it wasn't and she would find out whose fault it was? I mean, Sombra seems much more charismatic and charming than the fandom makes her out to be, in my mind. Not to mention how much power she holds over those in authority with her hacking and intel skills.

☀️ Those are my thoughts based on my research, but Sombra seems to have connections with a lot of the other Heroes, so she's definitely got her own agenda.