#with chapter 4 having a story with 5 intermission bits

[count-von-kit]

Also adding to this a meme I once made and sent to my DM in regards to Abel.

OC Origins Tag

Tagged by @ddgraywrites Thanks for tapping me in on this fun game. 👀

Disclaimer: All artwork shown below are from a commissioned piece done by my partner @pookieesukiro. They're not very active on Tumblr, but you can find them on Twitter, IG, and TikTok if you want to check out their work. Same handlename. My partner will be doing all the artwork for this story.

Alright, so. I'm not very good at these, but the more you do the better you get at them, yea? It's easier for me to dissect my OCs' origins into personality and visually, as sometimes they're develop as one or the other first. That said, let's dive in. For the sake of keeping this shorter, I'll only talk about the boys, and not about Abel's family.

WIP: Abel's Youth Tale Project [Sometimes mentioned as Abel's YTP for short.]

Abel Rose

Abel is a very complicated and resilient child of mine who, as a adult of 26, was a very dear character from a TTRPG game I played with some friends back in 2021. [You can find more on it over at @haphazardrolls with links to the campaign VODs as well as some pieces I wrote centered around Abel.] The longer the campaign went on, the more complicated and evolved he became, helping me reestablish my love for writing while realizing he was a bit more than just "some college guy who got killed in a dark alley on his way to get some booze". With a TTRPG, you come to realize that sometimes there's only so much you can fit in with character development, and for little Abel I wanted to further expand on the past for him - why he is who he is when Camp Boolieve came about. I wanted to expand on his quirks, and insecurities. And for that, his story just came naturally over the course of a weekend. Growing up in the 90s and early 00s, I pulled some personal bits from my early childhood and teenage years despite Abel pretty much making himself. He is a child of abuse, depression, and suicidal ideology who deals with a little more than just being an openly bisexual teenage boy in a small town band. So it wasn't inherently trauma dumping, per say. Anyway, Abel in present day is still healing, but Abel in the past [this WIP of his origin and for the sake of this writeblr game] shares a lot of struggles teens in LGBTQIA+ spaces today may be going through. And with him I wanted to share how he pushes himself to constantly evolve into a better person while also showing he's still healing and unlearning things. He's still human. A piece of Abel's origin, which I've pulled from myself, is showing the struggles one can face with mental illness - how tough it is to find the strength to continue existing - how exhausting it can be. Even in our darkest days when we want to give up we can still find that strength to get back up on our feet and push forward into tomorrow. Abel's creation for me is a bit personal, but he is my resilience personified in writing, and because of that I want to make sure his story will see the light of day.

Erik

Oh Erik... He's a bit of a silly bastard, but he serves such an important purpose other than just further proving a long running joke that Abel has it down bad for dumb blonde guys. I don't really think there's much of an origin for Erik other than Abel needed someone to ground him, someone who was always going to be there for him, and someone who was his best friend - maybe just a little bit more. :) Erik comes off as a bit of a hardass who only follows his dick at first, but he shows loyalty and patience when its needed most. He's Abel's most trusted person, and a very critical character. Personality wise, his origin was to be that safe person who helps Abel discover who he is and guide him onto the path of who he will become. For the sake of mental health you can attribute him as being Abel's "go to person", and I think that's probably a better way of putting Erik's origin into light. I might not be doing much service in describing his origin for this game, but I'll just leave a note that his development [at least visually] was loosely inspired by popular blondies like Akihiko from Given, Ryuuji from Persona 5, and Asaichi from The Song of Yoru & Asa.

Dominik

Dominik is by far one of my favorite OCs. Not to push my baby boy Abel aside, but every time I write something for Dom [specifically his banter with Abel] I tell myself, "Folks are going to end up loving this morally grey bastard so much. I can feel it in my bones." Hell, even my partner think he's silly. Inspirationally, there's not much of an origin to Dominik's personality other than I needed someone who was a bit of bastard, morally grey, and someone who, as Abel puts it, "is shady as fuck". Dominik is one of those delightful lads who just sometimes break a fourth wall here and there and you just... don't question it. He's the leader to their little group, and is the little shit who always gets them into trouble. Usually. Visually he was inspired by Davey Havok from AFI. Specifically the era between Black Sails in the Sunset and Sing the Sorrow.

Sergio

There is not a whole lot to my beautiful tall boy other than I needed someone who was the residential band dad, and someone with the patience capable of keeping three idiots in line. Writing a group that's chaotic you need someone who is mature [ok that's subjective, but in the case of my WIP it's true], but also Sergio is someone Abel looks up to a lot. In fact, Abel often goes to him for advice. Sergio is the only one who can drive, and he is the voice of reason. His origin was that I needed someone to balance out Dominik's extreme while also having someone to serve as a role model. He's not Abel's "go to person" when mental health issues arise, but in time he will become that person for him. Inspiration for Sergio visually came mostly from Masaru Ōfuna from HaNaYaMaTa and probably to a lesser extent Neil Peart from RUSH.

To wrap this up, my OCs mostly wrote themselves out in banter that developed in my head. I was lucky with this, because normally I struggle to create characters, but everything in regards to Abel's YTP came very organically. And I think part of that was because this developed during a period where I was constantly thinking about nothing but Abel and fleshing him out.

Anyway, if any folks want to take a stab at the Origin Game themselves, have at it. <3 Thanks for reading.

[hulloitsdani]

Um. So. I may have gotten stressed and started transcribing FEH’s story mode. Might currently have all of book 1 written down. Perhaps a third of the way into book 2.

This started as a way to have the preface chapters handy since they’re not replayable. But then I looked on the FE wiki and saw that they only have a small fraction of the chapters written down. And that scared me, because means that my hyperfixation has a nonzero chance of becoming lost media if the app were to go down one day. So now I have all of book 1 in my back pocket, including the preface, two intermissions, and the two relevant xenologues. Once I’m further along and have a few more books accounted for, I have no problem making the document public. But until then I encourage others to also write some of its content down. Just in case, you know? Especially those prologues and Tempest Trials.

With that PSA out of the way, omg book 1 hi!!!! It’s been forever!!!!

Apparently, I haven’t reread book 1 in its entirety since I first played Heroes! I’ve gone back to look for specific scenes and replayed the levels on harder difficulties (self inflicted or otherwise), but I haven’t done a thorough second pass before. Which was news to me, because that meant I was consistently blindsided by scenes and characterization that I completely forgot about! Did any of you remember that Zacharias was apparently Alfonse and Sharena’s childhood friend? I didn’t! But there it is, chapter 7 part 5 after battle cutscene, Anna specifies that aspect of their relationship. That’s crazy! How does the timeline even line up on that??? If he spent his childhood in Askr, how did he manage to have a strong relationship with his significantly younger sister? How did he find himself rubbing shoulders with enemy royalty? Could he have inadvertently met Peony? I’m not changing my takes on his character, but I would love to know.

Speaking of character, apparently seven years spent writing a character naturally changes how they sound! Who would have thought. It made seeing the book 1 versions of our Askr trio a little jarring, but in an oddly nostalgic way! This was a phase of the game where the story, its characters, and its world existed with the singular purpose of introducing new players to what Heroes was trying to do. Which was, at the time, being a cute yet unobtrusive gacha app tie in with simplified FE mechanics to give you that gameplay fix on the go. And to its credit, it does do a good job of this! It ain’t a masterpiece, but I was charmed by its emphasis on showing off all these cool characters you could go summon. Ryoma gets to talk for a few lines and you are going to look at his very pretty art! But that meant that the world and characters of Zenith take a bit of a backseat. They’re not here to be too complicated. The Order of Heroes are the friendly faces that go on adventures and meet these heroes that you can summon for only $19.99. But we all know where the game and its story is going to go from here. That emphasis is going to wane as FEH grows into its own identity (and also earn IntSys over $1 billion worldwide).

But that’s a later development. Before that fundamental shift is where book 1 sits. It’s in this fascinating position where these characters have yet to solidify into their recognizable forms. And if you don’t believe me, chapter 9 part 4 has a scene where Sharena and Alfonse’s roles have reversed. For once, Sharena is posing the cautionary “what if the information we are getting from this total stranger is a trap?”, to which Alfonse responds “nah I’m getting a vibe that it’s fine and that we should believe him whole heartedly.” Like??? Huh???? It’s Bruno, but still, that’s hilarious! Alfonse’s pragmatism bordering on paranoia hasn’t established itself as a massive driver of his character yet. Nor has Sharena’s role as trusting emotional core and moral compass of the group. It was very easy to borderline Mandela Effect it into being there, but it isn’t. Not quite. There are hints, sure, but once again these characters were initially made to be simple at the time. The depth doesn’t quite exist yet.

It wasn’t until I was writing this very paragraph that it finally dawned on me why the Askr trio voice lines, especially Alfonse’s lines, are such a big deal. That's where Alfonse’s character arc with trusting Kiran resides. There's the pragmatism we know and love! It’s not super present in the text of book 1, but the depth of these characters can be found in the voice lines you unlock from building them and earning the crown jewel level 40 conversation. That’s where Alfonse’s arc with his self isolating behaviors crumbles at that sight of one silly tactician. That’s where Sharena finally wins a fight against her own loneliness by forming genuine friendship with this stranger form a strange land, who is appreciative of her loud eccentricities. That’s where Anna apologizes about her initial underestimation of Kiran, thanks them for being more reliable than she could have ever hoped for, and swears that whatever hell may come their way, they’re in this together. The books themselves don’t seem to reflect this characterization until book 2, where they overall act more in accordance with the rest of the narrative. It’s as if they're taking from the voiced lines’ example and extrapolating more on the story they imply.

The one standing in slight contrast to all this is Bruno, as he's the most interesting character in book 1. It's blaringly obvious he's Zacharias, but it's genuinely amusing how deep he is in his own gaslighting. He can't manipulate, mansplain, manwhore his way out of this one folks, but he's certainly going to try! His lies aren't even that good, but it honestly contributes to how at wits end he is. Like, sure honey, I totally believe you that you just killed Zacharias. I bet he has an eight-pack too. Just take a nap for two minutes. But then everyone believes him because our protagonists have yet meld their group braincell. Overall, an amusing time.

I don't have a particular point I'm trying to make with this one. Just having a fun and pointing out the things I've noticed. Might give a little update for every book I complete. However many that will be.

[ecargmura]

Witch Hat Atelier Volume 5 Review

This volume is so good—which is what I always say for every volume. I can’t help it. This manga is so good. The storytelling has always been amazing and even more so in this volume. This volume is the continuation and conclusion of the Second Exam arc. The first two chapters of this volumes are POV changes from Coco and Qifrey’s side to Richeh and Agott’s side but the way they all converge by the end of Chapter 27 is really good. Shirahama really knows how to pace her story well. She doesn’t drag or prolong the conflict and tries to make her characters resolve it as well as they can with their current abilities.

Chapter 24 begins with where Volume 4 left off when Coco, Qifrey and Tetia meet the Romonons. They’re statues that are still alive, and harbor a grudge against witches as they were the cause of their demise. They decide to quiz Coco and Tetia to see if a witch could be trusted. Coco realizes what they’re lacking is comfort or warmth and she gives them the snug stone that Olruggio gave to her and the statues use it and the fact that they melt was shocking. I honestly found that a really shocking twist. It could foreshadow the possible fate of Coco’s mother—or like a bad ending for her of sorts. It’s really perplexing. They managed to reunite with Alaira who was thrown into the area by the Brimhat. I really liked how Tetia and Coco worked together to solve the riddle. Tetia doesn’t have enough screen time before, so this is perfect for her. She works really well with Coco.

Chapter 25 goes back to Agott who’s trying to find a way to undo the forbidden spell. However, the invisible Brimhat takes Euini to find Coco as his goal is to find her. Richeh leaves the cave and recalls the time she was studying under a strict master who wouldn’t allow her to make her own spells. Richeh realizes that she knows that making her own spells won’t be effective in the long run but she still wants to find a way to be herself. Gosh, the fact that her previous master was abusive and the way he touched Rili’s hair was so creepy. I love that Richeh realizes that the spells one’s good at, the thoughts behind those spells and those that make up another’s weaknesses are still a part of them as witches and that she’ll still be herself even if she uses another person’s spell. I really love that Richeh came to terms with this herself and that she actually uses another person’s spell for the first time.

Chapter 26 is a bit of an intermission as the Knights of Moralis are showcased here. There are a lot of them and I honestly can’t wait to see what sort of role they’ll play in the future other than trying to get Coco’s memories erased.

Chapter 27 has it to where Qifrey finds the invisible Brimhat and tries to engage in a battle with him despite being severely injured. He leaves a wind spell scroll behind as Coco and Tetia are left behind to hide from upcoming danger; Alaira comes along with him. However, Coco and Tetia’s hiding spot doesn’t last long as Euini is thrown towards them and Agott is reunited with them. Apparently, this whole ordeal is because the Brimhats wants Coco to use Forbidden Magic in hopes of having her join them. The invisible Brimhat’s true form is revealed to be a mutant cat. I love how Shirahama writes the kids. They’re not liabilities and they know how to stay put when needed but if they need to take action, they do it.

Chapter 28 shows it even more as Shirahama gets Coco, Tetia and Agott to come up with ideas together and even come with concise plans like using the Brushbuddy to find the seal mark and trying to reverse the spell by drawing the glyph reversely. I seriously love seeing them progress. However, the main Brimhat, the one with the eyeball decoration, shows up towards the end; his name is Iguin and he wants Coco to draw a spell that can reverse the effects. Also, it seems that the mutant cat Brimhat, Sasaran, was once a regular human witch who had a pet cat. I wonder if he fused with his cat…

The final chapter for this volume, Chapter 29, shows that the kids’ efforts to reverse the spell actually worked somewhat. Euini’s consciousness is back, but he’s still stuck with the forbidden spell. Richeh gets Olruggio by using teleportation magic to bring him to the cave. When the Brimhats leave, the arc concludes on happy notes. Even though Euini still has the forbidden spell implanted on him and can only be controlled by the medallion, Alaira decides to take him in as her apprentice as they decide to hide from Witch Society until there’s a way to remove the spell. I honestly loved the moment Euini and Richeh hug. The fact that Euini was someone who wanted to become someone he’s not and Richeh was working so hard to be herself and then they learned that it’s okay to be themself (Euini) and that it’s okay to use others’ magic without losing yourself (Richeh). This scene made me shed some tears!! I hope that they’ll reunite one day! I also loved the part where Coco goes “I’ll draw what I want, thank you very much” to Iguin. I was legit cheering! Coco is such a great MC. She does not falter when being handed a possible bad choice. She just goes with what she wants.

I can’t wait to see what the next volume has in store! My copy of Volume 6 is going to arrive tomorrow, so hopefully, I can read it as soon as I can! What are your thoughts on this volume?

[canarymemories]

hi finally compiling the thread i made the other day on twt abt the first chapter of recital so. welcome to me having far too much to say about my big bang fic skgh

chapter titling is similar to symphony (leo day fic) but instead of music terms, it's ballet terms. i'm nowhere near as used to ballet terms as i am w music terms so they won't have a deeper meaning (at least not on purpose lmao) like some of the symphony chapter titles do, but that's part of why there's nine chapters

a small aside: there is a specific structure i have in mind for the fic. there will be three arcs (if u want to call them that), the first three chapters is the first arc and then there will be an intermission chapter (up to this point is as far as i've confidently planned out so past this point, i can't guarantee anything but. nine chapters is the goal adkgsh). so then chapter 4 and 5 are arc two followed up by another intermission, then the final arc will be chapters 8 and 9. the plan is to stay mostly canon compliant until i don't agree w akira (or kinosei aslkhg), so i'll pretty much be sticking to the canon timeline

please listen to the playlist akdhg most of the songs do correspond to specific things/chapters so it's tied to the story itself plus i've listened to it too many times so. please tell me i'm so right about it 😔 the song i used in the summary of the first chapter is more of a chapter 2 song but i felt like it fit for the first chapter so adkgh (i have. So Many songs for checkmate so. can't wait for that one lmao) (chapter 1 songs are the first four in the playlist, the 5th one could go either way between ch 1 and 2) once more is posted, then i might actually sit here and go on abt why each of these songs is specifically here

writing choices 🎉 the one i want to talk about so so so so bad is the using nicknames in the narration bc if you've read literally anything else i've posted, you'd see that i don't do that, but bc recital is so close to izumi as the narrator, and this chapter is focused on his childhood, i thought it was fitting. there are a few instances of this changing throughout the chapter, such as makoto going from yuukun to makoto in the one flashback section and then staying as makoto when izumi is older, naru eventually changes to arashi.

and the one i really want to bring up,,, izumi's parents are always referred to as mama and papa but there is one singular instance where that's changed and that's during the argument at the end of the chapter.

and then she's referred to as mama again a few paragraphs later and this just goes into the point that i think izumi has a very complicated relationship with his parents. on one hand, they don't support him as an idol and have quite literally told him to his face that he's not successful enough to make it on his own as a model (next door), have treated him more like a doll than their child and they couldn't be bothered to actually ask him what he was interested in, but he still cares about them. he gets offended on their behalf more than once (in ! era at least), but it's just,, complicated. i feel like i can't really properly explain my thoughts here but i have Thoughts. but this is where the vaguely toxic parenting warning comes in from this chapter because the thing is, i don't think his parents were planning for him to feel the way he does about their parenting, they do love him and they do want to have him succeed just. maybe not for the right reasons, yk? ofc that doesn't justify their treatment of him or anything like that, there's just more to it than outright toxic parenting hence why it's subtle here.

what's a little less subtle is izumi's mom living vicariously through him, it's a bit more obvious with the modeling bit than the dance classes but idk it makes sense to me for her to have done them as a child too

baby modelgumi,,, they get their own point here bc i think those might've been my favorite bits to write and genuinely, the baby arashi bit is my favorite part of the whole chapter. they're just so alsdkgh oeugh cute i want to squeeze them in my hands 🥺🥺🥺. my note for this on my list of things to talk about is literally "baby modelgumi :pleading:" they hold a special place in my head and i hope in urs too

i was going to list stories reference but i might wait until i have more done and posted for that (plus i can't remember what story it is that arashi mentions izumi pushed her mouth into a smile as kids) but. portrait and canary hall mentions 🎉🎉

the argument. it's implied a few times in ! that izumi's parents don't really agree with him being an idol (leo says izumi was having isses at home around checkmate/war era). given that they put so much time and effort into having izumi model, i suppose that wouldn't be too surprising, but i think it's important to have some kind of breaking point like the argument scene bc in next door, izumi talks about how his parents treated him growing up and that just makes me think that he probably didn't have much say in his own life and there's just something about being an idol being his first big decision that idk hits a little different and there is more to an extent on this concept in the next chapter in comparing himself to leo and just kind of being like ,, huh...

last thing, so aside from the ending of the beginning section of the chapter, i feel so smart about the ending line of this chapter bc mama's pancakes come up in portrait and there's even a baby izumi homescreen line about it and it's meant to serve as an apology rather than her actually apologizing but i feel like u could take it a few ways but akhg felt so smart when i came up w the ending of the chapter. and i felt the same way when i thought of the first chapter ending and u guys will not like me for that one btu aksdgh <33

baby's first friendship next time 🎉🎉🎉🎉

[a-student-out-of-time]

MOD

I SWEAR

YOU HAVE TO BE CORRECT THAT AREI IS ALIVE

IF YOU ARENT

I WILL COMMIT ATROCITIES

//I've seen continuous doubts about my theory, and for both Timeline Anon and others, this scene felt to them like the final nail in the coffin for that theory

//The fact that you're all immediately writing her off as dead when we're not even at the halfway point and there are so many unanswered questions is astounding.

//Ahem.

//If she's gone, explain to me why there's still so many unanswered plot threads and interesting character details

Why is it that J was the one who brought up that secret? A secret that Arei herself admitted she overheard, which directly lead into that flashback scene with those two?

Why has J been going so ham on Arturo this entire time? Yes, one could easily say it's because she's sick of him and put two and two together, but honestly, it seems like a bit of a leap from "you told me you wished you had a brother like mine instead of a sister" to "your sister killed herself"

//Again, I can totally understand her being vindictive over this, given all the shit Arturo's caused her and Eden. But from how Arturo was acting, honestly, I'm inclined to believe he didn't actually say anything like that

//But you know what makes perfect sense? The details that lead into my next point

3. We have an established time frame thanks to the alibis. We know that the scene with Arei and Eden took place not long after the playground breakdown.

//That means that was a large window of time for the two of them to switch places. But why?

//That's incredibly sweet, and we know she wants more friends. And we know that, at the same time, J has been dealing with Arturo. Arei just saw J pull a scalpel on Eden over his secret, so why wouldn't she want to immediately jump to the other person she likes in her own way?

//The person that's had to deal with him far longer than Eden. Why wouldn't she want to give J a hand after that?

4. Again, we know that Arei knows that there's a murderer in the group, and even if the switch wasn't about that specifically, that probably means that she was likely trying to help with that. This means that, if the blackened of this case isn't the murderer, she had no idea who actually did it. Why reveal herself then? That would make her the most suspicious.

5. Maybe it's just me, but I can't shake the feeling that J has been acting weird these last few episodes. She's an aggressive person, and admitted in her intro that she's judgemental, but there's never been indication that she's been this vindictive. Even regarding her own secret, this feels especially harsh.

6. This moment right here feels interesting to focus on

//Of all things to say?

7. The biggest one for me right now is actually Charles and Whit. Clearly, those two know something's up. There may not be a conspiracy going on in this group like I initially thought, but Whit is another person who Arei clearly was close with last chapter. He was the one who cut off Teruko learning about the note at first, and then there's this bit after Eden's story

//What are you two up to? What are you hiding?

//I'd almost be tempted to say they're suggesting Arei was actually lying, but that feels at odds with the ways they've acted and what they're saying. Not to mention Charles looks more embarrassed than concerned or angry

//Furthermore, there's the fact that there was so much attention drawn to Charles having a secret, including a CG and telling Teruko to reveal it during the trial...and then we got no follow-up on that. He was just like "Oh yeah, guess I didn't need to. It was Eden's."

//I don't buy it. There's clearly more going on here

8. Finally, the fact that they had an emotional scene like this? Not even halfway into the trial? If it was after the intermission or near the climax, if that was the last scene we got with Arei, I might've bought it. But putting it here? Not a chance. This has to be leading somewhere.

//Plus, you know who else was convinced their best friend was dead? Shuichi and Maki. And guess what? Them believing Kaito was dead was all part of the plan

//There's also the many, many unanswered questions throughout this chapter, from what it was Arei's crying reminded her of (again, still not followed up on), to Teruko's prosopagonsia (no, that isn't just here to set up something for a future case, I'm sure of it), to whatever the hell is going on with Nico, Hu, David and Ace, who are part of their own drama right now

//Yeah, sorry, I'm only increasingly convinced that I'm right about this. Admittedly, we keep getting thrown so many curveballs that it's getting harder to make sense of it all regarding the exact motive.

//But the fact that J has said things that it seems like only Arei would say and do, particularly being vindictive toward Arturo? And acted in weird ways, like being super concerned about Arei's well-being early on, saying things like "even if the person you tried to kill is still alive," all of it just odd to me

//I'm not in denial and I'm not saying this as copium, I mean that earnestly. There are so many weird writing moments and character bits, combined with hanging plot threads, that it leads me to believe that this is what they're building up to. It's really the only thing that makes sense to me right now

//Clearly they had a plan with Arei from the beginning, given that we got this huge emotional scene with her and Eden, but that can't be all there is to it. It's a sad and emotionally satisfying moment for her character to end on, but placing it here so early honestly leaves me convinced there's more to come

[darlingpoppet]

Which of the previous WIPs are you most excited about and please briefly describe what you have/had in mind for each

Haha I see how it is anon, you wanna make sure I have all the bases covered and answer everything! 😂

Out of the WIPs mentioned on this list, I’m tbh looking forward to all of them because just talking about these ideas gets me hype about them all over again LOL. But for purposes of this ask, I think the one WIP I’m most excited about right now is (once again) the one I’m currently working on, which is “Patrochilles side story” because surprise! It’s actually a small spinoff fic to Liminal Spaces that I decided I wanted needed to write and so I’m planning on posting it during the intermission, between chapters 4 and 5. This fic is gonna be just a little Patrochilles-centric scene that takes place sometime during the timeskip at the beginning of LS chapter 3, and will offer a bit more context and world building (as well as Patrochilles-only sex) that we otherwise can’t get with Zagreus’ limited pov. I didn’t want it to interrupt the flow of the main story though, so a side fic it is!

As for all of my other WIPs not discussed yet, a quick roundup:

Achilles worship pza: a direct sequel to Flourishing Into Greatness whose wip doc was called “Pat worship pza” haha. Even though I was satisfied with Achilles not getting off in that fic I still kind of left open the possibility of a sequel and then my brain went, “ok but what if, tho 👀” It’s gonna be Pat pov!

Kitsune Levi + Priest Erwin: an eruri fic idea I’ve had in my head for a million years, based on collab art from an online game. Erwin is a shinto priest in modern Tokyo who lives a pretty quiet, normal life until a shape-shifting kitsune spirit starts showing up at the shrine. Will also be partially inspired by the Japanese children’s story called Gon, the Little Fox.

MP eruri AU: Yet another Eruri idea I’ve had for a million years LOL (see I had these ideas in my head the whole time during my snk years and then FINALLY I started writing as a hobby and then almost immediately switched fandoms LMFAO) basically this is a canon divergence AU in which Erwin decides to join the Military Police instead of the Survey Corps after the death of his father, and exploring all the what-ifs of that scenario. I’m envisioning a sort of ACWNR-like enemies-to-lovers erotic crime thriller type thing as Levi, recruited by Erwin into this corrupt police organization, learns the truth behind Erwin’s past, his motivations, and eventually helps him gut the place from the inside out.

Patrochilles sex: this one is gonna be a fluffy first time fic… the raison d’etre for it being I wanted to see if I could tap into that best friends-to-lovers joy of making love with someone you already have no emotional barriers with, and it’s just something beautiful and natural you’re sharing together. Hopefully I can successfully get that across! 😤🙏

[shiningdesignersreflections]

Zoey: Traveler’s Robe

Designer’s Reflection: Traveler’s Robe

Obtained: Diamond Arena season 3

Rarity: UR

Attribute: Gold/Elegant

Awakened Suit: Traveler’s Brocade

Story - transcripts from Designer’s Reflection

Chapter 1 - Bait the Snake

Chapter 2 - Showtime

Chapter 3 - Cloudcrest Tour

Chapter 4 - Empty City

Chapter 5 - Target, Lodden

Story - summarized

There is a spy in Rosset. Zoey built this city to be secure, so having a traitor in her midst is infuriating. She creates a fake secret file to see who tries to run off with it. It doesn’t take her long to find the traitor - but she is shocked to learn the traitor is working for Qin Yi.

Zoey decides to visit Cloudcrest. The Neverfall Troupe is expecting her, and they lead her to their theater. The play starts - she is furious that Qin Yi wrote an entire play based after her loss to Mercury. How did he find out?

During intermission, she goes to find Qin Yi. He tells her that he admires her and just wants a friendship with her. She hates his manipulative attitude and leaves.

While inspecting the city, Zoey learns a bit more about Qin Yi’s past. Now that she is armed with one of his secrets, she feels ready to face him again. That night, she returns to the theater. Half her soldiers she leaves outside in case anyone tries to escape the theater, and half her soldiers follow her inside in case of an ambush.

The only one inside is Qin Yi, sitting on a stage, playing chess. He insists that all he wants is an alliance with her. He wants to give her information on Mercury’s hideout, and in return he wants resources from the Justiciars. Zoey agrees.

The Justiciars return to Rosset, and Zoey starts scheming to infiltrate Mercury’s auction gala at Lodden. Despite this shaky alliance with Neverfall Troupe, she hates two things: being manipulated and others finding out her secrets. She will not hesitate to get rid of Qin Yi if needed.

Connections

-In her Reflection for Gold Gilt Dream, Zoey reveals that there were two reasons for her infiltrating Mercury’s gala. Whether or not they got Leonid’s manuscript, she still wanted to get the plans for Mercury’s secret base on New Wing Island.

-This takes place before Zoey meets Nikki in game.

-Zoey tells Qin Yi that she knows about his mother. So far, Qin Yi’s Reflections have shown him trying to get away from her and her neglectful ways... but Zoey confirms in this moment that he still cares about her.

Fun Facts

-Zoey usually charges ahead in her missions, but here she has to learn a different tactic to dealing with Qin Yi’s mind games.

[yardsards]

i want to get into taz because it sounds really Coolio, but i wanted to know if there are specific seasons or anything that can be skipped (or perhaps a good summary of certain ones)?? I don't have a lot of time where i can actually listen and it'd take years for me to listen to every single episode

sort of but sort of not?

so (and there is a good chance you know this already but just in case): the podcast is made up of multiple different stories (also called arcs), which have no relationship to each other. the story that most people are referring to when they talk about the adventure zone is the first one, called the balance arc.

the balance arc is about 90ish episodes total BUT like a quarter of that is live shows or other bonus content, which are entirely skippable. basically, skip any episode whose title doesn't follow the standard format of "Ep. [number]: [chapter name] - [episode name]". also, episode 1.5 just is an edited down version of episode 1, so just listen to 1.5 and skip 1 entirely

this leaves you with 69 total episodes to get through. which is a lot more manageable than the ~300 episodes your podcast app was probably showing you. but considering each episode is about an hour long (and the last few are a bit longer than that bc they were REALLY determined to end with episode 69 bc funny sex number), that still might be a bit much for you.

now, none of these 69 official episodes can be Fully skipped without you being confused BUT there are some alternatives to listening to all of the episodes in podcast form if you don't think you'd be able to do that

the best option here is to read the graphic novels. right now, 5 out of the 8 total books have been published. idk when the last 3 are supposed to be published, but it'll probably be Quite A While, considering the 5th one was just published a couple weeks ago. but what you can do is read what books are available now, and then switch to listening to the podcast where the books leave off (which is at the end of the "the eleventh hour" chapter. which should leave just 20 podcast episodes to listen to)

(i myself have not actually read the graphic novel adaptations yet but i hear that they're pretty good. some minor plot points were changed or abridged in the graphic novel adaptations, but to my knowledge, none of this will seriously impede your ability to understand future chapters when you have to switch from novel to podcast. there were also some minor npc and town names that were changed for legal reasons in the novel adaptations, but i could probably find you a list of all those changes if you need, so you could know like "okay, when they mention phandalin in the podcast, they're talking about haverdale from the graphic novels")

but if the idea of reading the graphic novels doesn't appeal to you, the other option is to just read summaries of episodes on the wiki instead of listening to them. i suggest you just do this for the first chapter, "here there be gerblins". htbg is below the other chapters quality-wise and some character things end up getting retconned soon after anyway (because at this point the dm and players were still trying to figure out where they wanted to go with this series), so you won't miss too much quality content if you skip it. there is a summary of the whole arc on the wiki HERE, or you can read more in-depth summaries of each individual episode HERE (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) under the synopsis tab. this still leaves you with 63 episodes left to listen to, but it'll save you a few hours at least, and you'll get to skip over some of the "worse" episodes in the series

(some people have even recommended just reading episode summaries all the way up til the "petals to the metal" chapter but i STRONGLY disagree there. i actually really loved the "murder on the rockport limited" chapter, and thought the "moonlighting" mini-chapter/intermission wasn't too bad either

and like, if you go into the podcast with a sort of "i'm just gonna skip ahead til The Real Action happens" mindset instead of just enjoying the journey, you're not gonna have much fun listening to Any of the podcast, even AFTER it gets to the climax. because a lot of it is just going at its own pace and joking around. and while it does get increasingly story-oriented as time goes on, if you're looking for a point where it gets to be 100% balls-to-the-wall storytelling, you're never gonna find what you're looking for and are just gonna be frustrated)

[morimakesfanart]

hey I honestly love this story a lot and the drawings! how are the other chapters coming along !

I don't normally answer this type of question because then I get asked more and more which puts a lot of pressure on me HOWEVER I've been wanting to give everyone an update so I'll answer this time ;3c

The next chapter is pretty much done. It will act as final prep for the Announcement Day. I want to have more of said Announcement Day written before I post the next chapter (I also have original comics and commissions to do). The Announcement Day arc is probably going to be 4-5 chapters; I'm still drafting the 2nd. (It took me all of last year to figure out Mori's outfit for it & I really hope everyone ends up liking it.)

TBH I thought I would have gotten to this arc sooner -like ch20 lvl of sooner. It's making me better understand my writing style actually translates to written from comic form (I over estimated how many less chapters it would take to write instead of draw), and how I format stories. I had one point joked to a friend that I wouldn't get to the Sindria Arc until ch50, and I'm panicking that, that might actually be what's going to happen. My current plan is to try to get there around ch40. I had a bunch of things planned for between the Announcement Day and when Sinbad heads to the Kou Empire, but I'm gonna have to either turn a bunch into summaries, cut them out, or move them to a later point in time like I've had to do with a bunch of scenes already. I need to get better at handling timeskips. Every time I attempt one I end up realizing that there's no reason these characters should have taken this long to have this conversation if they see each other every day, so I end up erasing the timeskip 🙃

---

On top of Sindria's Prophet, I've started making some one shot omake things that will end up in a different collection (The Adventures of Simpbad) because idk how else to fit them. That will be where I fullfil the requests I've gotten for more intermission and AU chapters, and I'm posting this as a promise that I'm actually doing it. They won't be as edited or cleaned up as Sindria's Prophet, and not all of them will get art ... probably. Any chapters that do build off of each other or SP will have that marked for convenience. There will be a few NSFW too because I want to practice that, but I won't be posting those on Tumblr because of the current user agreement.

Some will also be my dabbles into figuring out what I'm going to do for the Adventures AU that a lot of people have asked for. Since Sindria's Prophet is a teleportation Isekai, the Adventures AU won't be. It was when le trying to write an Adventures AU that I ended up settling/deciding on Sindria's Prophet. I have plans for both Isekai and born in universe versions of Adventures AU as well as different starting points. So far it looks more drama heavy than SP, but I require comedy to live so it will still be in it. Since I'm not entirely sure how I want to handle it, I will be using reader feed back to decide on the final base.

---

All of this has actually gotten me a lot more comfortable with writing stories instead of only making comics. It's a lot faster. Scenes that take me a week to draw I get written in a day or 2. So I'm starting to play around with a few of my original stories in this format. There is one that absolutely can't transfer to written properly because it's a silent comic (no text anywhere) but that one's always been a bit different than my usual stuff anyway.

---

I hope that answered your question;;; I kinda just started rambling. I hope you're having a good day :3

[poptart-cat-78]

OKAY I FINALLY finished the novelization of GK2 and I have THINGS to say:

1.) I am SO relieved that the game did not include actual screams of agony coming from the furnace because I would NOT have been able to handle it. I mean I still can’t handle seeing von Glowers death but, God that would’ve made it so much worse for me.

2.) I prefer the epilogue of the game to the one of the book. At least in the game, Grace, sort of acknowledges that Gabriel might have considered von Glower a friend. In the book, Gabriel and Grace don’t even DISCUSS it and it just feels.. cold. idk how else to describe it.

3.) Gabriel is more.. self aware in the book than in game which makes for some interesting realizations from the character (i.e him facing the fact that not only was he very similar to von Glower, but he was attracted to him, too)

4.) The last bits of foreshadowing von Glowers death. Not only is he described as looking “tragic”, but during the intermission of the opera, when he’s chatting with the other audience members, they’re described as being “caught by his (von Glowers) fire”. Just add salt to the wound jeez Jane

5.) An interesting change in perspective happens towards the end of Chapter 9. The narration goes from calling the characters by their names (Engelhardt is actually Gabriel) to describing them, like the narrator is distancing themselves from the situation(in a way). Grace becomes “the woman in green”, Leber becomes “the bald man”, von Glower becomes “the dark man”, Gabriel who is now a wolf, becomes “the creature” (which wow, what a way to dehumanize him) and only go back to referring to Grace and Leber by name. Whereas the narration refers to Gabriel and von Glower by the color of their wolves fur (brown and black respectively which like wow, I didn’t think the dehumanizing could get worse)

6.) The novelization seems to suggest that the wolf and human parts of the werewolf brain are “separated” and what the human brain knows the wolf brain is vaguely aware of. For example all Gabriel knew once he transformed was to trap von Glower so he couldn’t escape. I wish this was explored more

7.) The novelization also seems to confirm that wolf! von Glower did not want to fight wolf! Gabriel. (The more likely reason for this is because he knows he can’t hurt Gabriel without hurting himself).

The differences between the book and the game give the story two completely different experiences even if a good amount is more or less in line with the events of the game. I still have more thoughts about the book but that’s gonna be another post

[snowdice]

Creased Hoodies (Chapter 11: The Return) [Folds in Time Universe]

Fandom: Sander Sides

Relationships: Logan/Virgil, Janus/Patton (background), Remus & Roman  (background)

Characters:

Main: Logan, Virgil

Appear: Patton, Roman

Mentioned: Janus, Remus

Summary: Virgil just wanted to go on his planned summer research trip to do an anthropological study in 2005 America. However, when he is taken off course by an unknown enemy, he ends up stranded in the summer of 2018 with no way to get back the the 44rd century. Luckily, 2018 happens to be where a certain illegal time agency is based, and he might have an in with one of its agents.

This is the intermission for the story Folds in Paper. It takes place between Folds in Paper Book 1 and Book 2. It also takes place after the first 5 chapter of “Messages for a Hacker” which are side stories in the universe. Check all of this and more out on my Folds in Time Master Post.

Chapter Summary: Patton returns home to a very awkward 

Notes: Time travel AU

This is a fic I’ve been writing on study breaks that you have probably all already seen at this point. I’ve slightly edited it for wording and grammar, but not for content from my previous posts. Feel free to send in asks to direct it because I’m not 100% sure where this is going and you can help decide if you feel so inclined! You can see the process I went through to build this at this link.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10

The breakfast table was silent the next morning. Though, if one could call it a breakfast table when Logan was only drinking a cup of tea, Roman was chewing on a slice of unbuttered, untoasted bread, and Virgil was squirreled away in Logan’s bedroom either still asleep or avoiding them both was debatable.

“…Look,” Roman said.

“We aren’t talking about it.”

“How was I supposed to know the two of you were getting it on?!” Roman said, talking about it. “Put a sock on the door next time or something. It’s common courtesy!”

“We weren’t having sex,” Logan hissed. Roman opened his mouth. “Shut up and learn the ‘common courtesy’ of knocking.” He pointed a spoon at his roommate threateningly.

Yet, still, because it was Roman, the other man opened his mouth once more. Luckily, before he could say anything else on the matter, there was a loud crack from the living room.

“I’m going to need a towel please!” Patton called.

“I’ve got it,” Roman said, jumping into motion and sprinting towards the bathroom. Logan meanwhile, stood and headed towards the living room.

“Why are you wet?” Logan asked immediately upon taking in the sight of his roommate. His very, very soaked roommate. He was dripping water like he’d just crawled out of a pond.

“There was an ocean in the church,” Patton replied, seeming unconcerned by the fact that he was getting their carpet wet.

“What?” Logan asked.

Patton pushed his sopping wet hair out of his eyes. “The time distortions were a lot more intense than the ones we’ve seen before,” he said. He held out a small innocuous appearing device whose only mechanism seemed to be a small switch. “Be careful with that. It’s unstable, and we might have damaged it getting out.” Patton winced and removed his timepiece from his wrist. “Actually, speaking of that… this might need a checkup too.”

“Were there issues with the tech?” Logan asked, reaching for both devices.

“…No,” Patton said, looking a bit sheepish. “We may have… had to turn off all of the safety protocols.”

“You what?!” Logan asked, snatching away the timepiece and clutching it to his chest. “Patton, I just made this for you!”

“And you did a really good job!” was Patton’s reply, “but we didn’t want to drown in a church.”

“It was a completely new design!”

“And it’s really good,” Patton said with a smile, “and clearly reliable. We didn’t blow up!”

Logan took a slow breath. “I’ll make sure it wasn’t damaged.”

“Thanks Lo!”

Roman entered the living room then, bright blue towel in hand. “I have returned bearing gifts!” he proclaimed.

“My hero,” Patton said with a laugh. He took the towel and used it to wipe off his face and then start to dry his hair.

“So, an ocean in a church?” Logan asked.

Patton nodded. “I’ll have to thank Virgil for suggesting the inflatable raft,” he said. “Though I think he might have cheated on that suggestion.” He paused then as he finished running the towel through his hair, face growing slightly more serious. “I saw Remus,” he told them.

Roman froze instantly. “You did?”

“Uh huh,” Patton replied. “He was with Janus, but I figured I shouldn’t say anything about you to him since that trip was way out of sync. I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, no, of course,” Roman said. “That makes sense. That’s fine. How was he?”

“He seemed good,” Patton said. He flashed Roman a smile. “Happy. Not exactly what I expected though. He’s quite the character. I can tell he and Janus are good friends.”

“Oh,” Roman said. “That’s… that’s good.”

Patton’s face screwed up slightly. “He did flirt with me though, so that was weird.”

“He what?!” Roman screeched.

“It wasn’t particularly innocent flirting either,” Patton said with a grimace.

Roman took a moment to process this information before pulling a face that one would expect to see on a small child trying a lemon for the first time. “That’s disgusting! That’s like… that’s like my brother flirting with my brother. Gross and wrong!”

“It was… it was weird,” Patton confirmed.

“What did he even say?” Roman asked.

“Mostly it was comments about my…” he made a motion with his head that Roman apparently was able to decipher.

“He talked about your butt?!”

“Well,” Patton said, “he didn’t exactly use that word.”

“That sounds about right for Remus,” Virgil said, poking his head into the living room.

“Oh, so you’ve finally decided to join the land of the living, Emo?” Roman asked, turning to him.

“Shut up,” both Logan and Virgil said at the same time.

Of course, he did not. “You know, Pat-Pat, speaking of posteriors…”

“One more word out of you and I will murder you,” Virgil threatened. Roman did not look afraid, quite the opposite.

“Uh,” Patton said, looking between them. “What’s going on?”

“I’ll tell you latter,” Roman promised with a wink.

“You will not,” Logan said. “Keep your gossiping tendencies under control.”

“Well, wait,” Patton said with a pout. “Now I want to know.”

“You go take a shower,” Logan ordered.

Patton and Roman shared a look that was already giving Logan a migraine. He had no doubts Patton would have the whole story along with a good number of embellishments by dinner.

“Yes boss,” Patton said with a cheeky grin.

Logan rolled his eyes as his roommate turned towards the bathroom, the towel still on his shoulders. He was dry enough that he wasn’t dripping everywhere anymore, and he made sure to slip off his waterlogged shoes and socks so as to not track water to the bathroom.

“Put everything in the biohazard hamper,” Logan called after him.

“I know!” he called back.

“And you,” Logan said, tuning to Roman, “clean up all of the water he got on the carpet in the off chance there are any pathogens in it.”

“Why me?” Roman whined.

“Because you’ve annoyed me,” Logan said, “and I need to insure these two devices do not explode.”

“Ugh, fiiiine,” Roman said, dipping back into the hall.

Virgil glanced over at Logan once Roman had gone, his expression the picture of awkwardness. “Uh,” he said. “Hey.”

“Hi,” Logan said.

“…Are those things really at risk of exploding right now?” he asked.

Logan glanced at him. “Technically they are always at least slightly at risk of exploding, but admittedly the chance is further from 0 than I would like it to be at this moment.”

“Great,” Virgil said. “One more thing to be anxious about.”

“You don’t need to be anxious about it, Virgil,” Logan said.

“Uh, I think I do need to be anxious about the maybe bomb in your hands,” Virgil said, throwing a suspicious look towards the devices.

“That’s not what I meant,” Logan said.

“I know,” Virgil sighed.

“We are two mutually consenting adults,” Logan pointed out. “There isn’t any shame to it.”

“Can we please talk about our very embarrassingly interrupted kiss after you’ve dealt with the explosives?”

“Very well,” Logan agreed. He walked to the other side of the room to grab a statis chamber from a cabinet drawer.

“What’s that?” Virgil asked as the cube shaped device popped up.

“It’s a stasis cube,” Logan said as he placed the two devices into it and activated it. It lit up yellow. “It will allow them to cool down completely from their earlier use in a safe environment. Once they’re more stable, it will be less dangerous to work with them.”

“If it just takes 5 seconds to deal with them, why are you making Roman clean up?” Virgil asked amused.

“Like I said,” Logan said. “He annoyed me. Speaking of,” he glanced into the hallway where Roman currently was. “How do you feel about leaving before he gets back? Patton will clean himself up and probably take a nap immediately after, so we have time. We could get coffee in peace.”

Virgil smiled at him. “Sure,” he said. “Escape the apartment for coffee part two.”

Want to read more? Click below!

Folds in Time Universe Master Post

My Main Masterpost

[mod--soul]

~ Spoilers for The Book of Boba Fett Episode 5 ~

I’m ... torn ...

From a writer’s perspective I totally understand the need to include this narrative here, but at the same time is it also another subtextual choice that really does not sit right with me ...

But let’s look at the facts:

The Book of Boba Fett was so far only told from Boba’s Point of View. Everything we saw, we saw through his eyes, experienced with him. So it makes sense that if we get an episode dealing with Din it’s solely from his perspective. That’s consistency that is uncommon in visual media that likes to jump from person to person to cover different angles. But it is common in books, where either the whole thing or at least a certain amount of chapters are entirely from one characters POV. (The jumping within a chapter, paragraph even, might be still used in FanFiction, but is otherwise an outdated concept.)

And if we want to get technical, the show is called the BOOK of Boba Fett, so it fits that its narrative would be structured as such.

Episodes 1-4 considered of a flash back and a “what’s currently happening”, which makes this particular one an intermission that completely breaks the concept. From a completely different characters POV. In a written narrative this make sense, (makes it even a little more interesting if the POV character is unclear and you’ll have to figure out who it is). In a visual medium this is ... strange, especially considering that the character has its own show - and the titular character of this particular show doesn’t even show up.

Nevertheless does that not change the fact that this intermission was necessary, because the way this story/season is structured my prediction for the last two episodes would be: Din will not be a part of them and Boba will need to find other help for his cause/war. And if that is the case and the whole thing would have been handled in a “Mando won’t be able to help” one-liner there would have been a riot. So special episode with even more (slightly contradictory?) Mandalorian lore (and Mando’a !!!) it is. (The interaction also kind of supported my theory that Din had gained the right to be called by his full name through becoming the head of a clan - even though the way the show is addressing characters totally irritates me, but that is probably a culture thing. Still, a lot of the dialogue in those scenes felt strange, but that might become a post of its own ...)

Still, the exclusion of Boba bugs me - and so many others - the most. There are multitudes of ways that they could have included Boba in is own kriffing show, even from Din’s perspective! This is also where the subtext comes into play as that decision is basically telling the audience that Boba is not interesting/necessary enough to appear in every episode of his own show. And that is really not good...

Unfortunately do I not see how a Boba-Special would fit into the story telling structure of The Mandalorian as some have suggested, but maybe we’ll be surprised ... though maybe, we still get three more episodes and this really is Mando 3x01 a bit early ... but that’s probably even more wishful thinking ...

P.S. Have I just not seen it or has really no one commented on the word play the title does on one of the movie titles yet?

[cloud-side-gaming]

Cloud’s Chronic Chapter 18

I’m new to tumbrl, so I’ll start with my latest gaming blog. Which I wrote a few days ago and post on a gaming site. I’ll add old chapters here too. Then the new ones going forward. I do most my gaming on PS5 & PS4

Pretty late with this chapter. I spent pretty much a solid month playing and loving Returnal. I got to 97% of the way to platinuming the game and my game crashed. I had to turn console off to get it to do something. Then when it came back on the save file had corrupted. For some reason the cloud save was corrupted too. Maybe it overwrote. This was the most gutting and annoying save corruption I’ve had.

I managed to do a perfect run on my first run after the tutorial run. Biomes 1-3 and then 4-6 in one smooth run and completed the game again. Then it took weeks and weeks of replaying through the 2/3 biomes I needed all collectibles for to get the respective last trophies. I think the last one I needed was in the desert biome and was an ultra rare room that has one chance to spawn per run. I think it took 70 runs to unlock.

Then finally after that massive grind and pretty much earning the platinum twice over I got one of my favourite platinums in my collection. It’s a good job I liked the game so much.

After that I chilled out a bit and then got the beautiful Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart. It’s truly gorgeous and one of my fave platform games I’ve played on PS along with Astros. I’ve played about half way through so far. I need to go back and finish it as I put it on hold to complete a milestone I was close to.

I decided to make FFVII Remake my 100th platinum as it’s a special milestone and FFVII is a special game to me. One I grew up playing as a school kid and the one that got me hooked on RPGs and JRPGs. Also one of the only games to make me emotional.

Firstly though as FFVII intermission has just come out. I decided to enjoy Yuffie’s DLC first. I loved the story and the fact that it was based in the same time frame as the main game. Parallel to the main story. Yuffie was really fun to play as in combat with a great ranged and close range mix. Can’t wait to play as her in Remake part 2. Another great addition was the mini game Fort Condor. A simple yet addictive strategy battle game. With different troops and board set ups. I really hope they bring that mini game to part 2 also.

The other real hard part was the pride and joy fight in the battle sim. Where you take on 4 summons back to back and then the ultimate weapon. The hardest fight is Bahamut who also calls a summon for a hand and hits you with a one hit kill move every few mins. Only reprieve or a mana barrier could save you. Somehow I passed that on my first attempt. Thanks to some luck and a recommended set up. At 40 mins long, I’m glad it didn’t take a lot of try’s. As a reward you get a necklace that lets you start with a limit break. That was super useful in the last few chapters. I popped a few easy plats to get to 99 after that. Then got the platinum and 100 milestone earlier today.

The last few days I started Hades. Omg what an amazing, beautiful hand drawn and addictive game. I can see why it got so many GOTY’s on the switch. I fell in love with it the first day I played it. After 14 attempts I finally made my first successful escape / run on my third day playing it. This will be my chill out game and one I play along with a few others if I can get off it. I really want to get this platinum and spend a lot of time with it. I bought the PS4 version with free PS5 upgrade. So once I have the 5 plat. I’ll go back to it sometime and earn the PS4 plat.

The game is a brilliant Rouge-like. You have 6 weapons you eventually earn. I favoured the bow at first and really enjoyed the range and safety it provided. As you go through the rooms you get given boons by the Greek Gods Zeus, Poseidon etc etc. That Biff your attack, special, cast (spell) and more. Each one is noticeably different and fun. Also you can get Duo boons that combine the power of two gods for very powerful effect. Like lightening on top of a water pushback.

The game is difficult but as you make your runs you get permanent upgrades to work on that make each run a little easier. Like extra health, extra lives etc etc. There is also a god mode. A 20% damage reduction that increases 2% every death to a cap of 80%. Now Ive completed my first run. I might start using god mode to make the grind a bit easier.

As you meet more characters and give them gifts they give you keepsakes. Another powerful bonus to help you along. Which you can level also. The character interacts and the way the game adds story slowly each run is a master stroke in rouge like story telling. This game really is a joy. I look forward to playing more and learning more.

As I’m writing this Ghosts of Tsushima Director’s Cut is minutes from release. I stopped playing it only a few hours in for last years GTTSC. So this is the perfect time to restart and get into one of last years best games in its ultimate form on PS5

Another great few weeks or months of gaming are ahead. Have a good one all.

[fantranslatorbychoice]

Oh glob, what have I gotten myself into? Just some long updates lol XD

Well, the year’s almost over, and it’s already the second half. The first half was too much and to be honest, I had to swim with the circumstances I am in right now so I had to put this passion non-profit project on hold, like seriously. But I did started translating the first few pages as early as December last year, as my very nice benefactor actually sent me the rest of the entire set of the Kakuriyo no Yadomeshi series after sending off the first 4 volumes. Probably read the entire thing first. But hey, free stuff is free so why complain. Plus my benefactor actually got the entire set for a steal, won’t say how much but in Amazon Japan, the last time I checked the whole set is roughly around $150 or a bit around that. and that’s just the first 7 volumes. Probably there’s an entire set now that’s about $200, as the final volume was released around August 2019.

Spoiler alert: the entire light novel series is made up of 10 volumes, so if you read it, the afterword by Yuuma-sensei specifically says that volume 10 is the final one, and Yuuma-sensei feels sad about it.

Yeah I highlighted that part in red, just in case many Kakuriyo fans still have some extreme hunger pangs or are unsure whether the novel series has ended. Here you go, straight from the horse’s mouth. Yuuma-sensei also has another Ayakashi light novel series, 浅草鬼嫁日記, roughly-translated to “Asakusa Wife from Hell Diaries”. Seems fun, they’re literally ogres - Oni living in the real world, like a reverse Kakuriyo thing. Who knows, maybe someday I can score that series too lol. The writer really likes Ayakashi, if it’s not that obvious yet 草 草 草 草  yeah I write kusa lol oml I should stop... But returning to the Kakuriyo series.. I won’t spoil what happened lol but I will probably make a commentary on that once I get the translations up and running.

Which leads me to my next announcement:

I PLAN TO UPLOAD THE DIRECT TRANSLATIONS OF JUST THE INTERMISSIONS/INTERLUDES ( 幕間 ) AND THE AFTERWORDS (あとがき) OF EACH VOLUME.

Chapter 5 is the only complete and full English Translation that I will be uploading here, and the rest will be summarized versions of the chapters plus my translation notes and commentaries.

Bummer, right?

Well, to be honest, after starting my initial translations I ran into several issues which made me feel sucker-punched and added to the stuff I’m worried about:

Issues regarding plagiarism (either my stuff getting plagiarized or potentially being accused of it)

Translating everything actually takes too long, even for me (I’ll explain that later)

More serious issues like possible DMCA-ish complaints (won’t want my hardwork just getting flagged and killed)

Personal stuff piling up and affecting my momentum

To be honest, when I received the books, I was so excited to work with them and upload as much as I can. But lots of things happened one after another, plus the worldwide issue that we have right now, so doing fun stuff wasn’t at the front of my priorities. So at the moment, I am mostly offline, by necessity, like connection is slower and with data cap, so I mostly do my translations with whatever hardcopies of dictionaries that I have on hand, offline. It’s good and all since I can put my skills to the test, but it can be expected that not all of the words are available in the books so I still have to hook on Jisho just to find the missing words I need. So my stuff pretty much looks like this:

I could just take pictures of these and upload them here but the maximum number of pics that tumblr allows is 15, and good glob I have more than 15 pages of translated material. Plus, as you can see above, some parts are untranslated and I had to find them in Jisho once I get online, so right now I have about 50% word-processed with the raw parts cooked, and I only have 12 raw pages remaining to be cooked and hashed lol

Which leads me to my next issues: my slowness (yeah I have to surrender on my slowness) and my fears regarding plagiarism.

I actually only started doing these translations in full blast around 2 months ago, and eventually I had to slow down so I won’t get bogged down since I also do other stuff. But I found out that ploughing through it can get quite draining. I started thinking that fan-subbing and scanlating were easier because aside from working digitally, these were also mostly done in teams so work time gets cut. Well, those were the days lol But for this one, aside from flying solo, I had to use all of my offline resources a lot, like doing everything by hand. It finally broke me about half-way and I had to step away from it, like reaaaaally step away from it. I thought I could finish 50+ pages in a span of a week. Well, I wasn’t exactly wrong there, but I also had other stuff to do, and if I just read it like I would any book without having to do anything, it’s a done deal. But having to translate stuff was draining, I felt frustrated so it broke me. I have to write each page by hand, leave out the words I can’t find or don’t know, and move on to the next page until my body stops working. Rinse and repeat until I could finish about 10 pages and get on with the typesetting and completing the missing parts. That takes a while so I just do my best to be patient.

Then the thoughts of plagiarism popped in and out, like I started thinking how to ensure that my stuff doesn’t get stolen and reposted elsewhere, or worse, getting my site shut down because fan translations are ambiguously illegal, like fansubs and scanlations, and I think those were what got me the most, so I just gave up midway. I’d say ambiguously illegal because if a series or title wasn’t licensed elsewhere then translating it is a fair game. But if it’s already released as a translated version by publishers, then releasing a translated version is like labelled as stealing, even if it’s non-profit. Of course profiteering is the worst, some steal what others work hard for, that they did for free, and sell them off. Scumbags to the bone smh I do my best to be within the fair use thing since I understand how much effort is made in creating content, so at present I have just decided to just put up the intermissions and the afterwords because aside from these being only a few pages long, it’s less likely to get whacked. Plus it’s easier for my psyche to just sum up each chapter and add some comments on it so it won’t be taken down, plus I wont’ be too-attached so even if some nutjobs repost it elsewhere because some people are just unempathetic like that, at least I won’t be as resentful. Plus the afterwords are just so cute, Yuuma-sensei gives off an adorable and relatable vibe, so I feel like aside from just showing off her stories, I think she needs to get signal-boosted too, so people would have an idea on who wrote this hunger-inducing light novel series lol.  I only started to pick up the whole thing again about a week ago, and I still wasn’t fast but at least I got to add at least 20 more pages translated, plus I started to type the first pages and add the missing words so at the very least, I felt some sort of achievement. It gave me some hope, and to be honest I have been doing this to maintain my sanity even for just a bit, so I guess I will do my best to bring Yuuma-sensei’s work out into the world. It’s a really good series, and it got animated into 2 seasons, plus the manga’s out, so that says a lot on how the series caught on. It can’t be denied that it’s a really engrossing series, so I don’t see any reason why this really good series should remain hidden. It probably has a lot of fans but aren’t being too attached into it because of language barriers, and even in my own way, I would like to bridge that gap. I mean, I may have slow internet that can only open mails in basic html but hey, this is the least I could do for the fandom. It’s not like I spew out doujin stuff or anything lol

OK, so summing up this long-ass update:

Chapter 5 - The Mysterious Capital Youto** - coming soon

Will just translate the intermissions and afterwords into English

English summaries of the chapters plus commentaries will be uploaded

Please don’t expect any fast uploads lol it’s not like I do ctrl+A into Google translate and slap it in here. Nothing against doing that but.. uhm, sometimes AI don’t get the nuances translated, and a lot gets lost in translation, so at best, anything done by some trash enthusiast, even noobs can still have some oomph in it that soulless beings can’t even top off. But hey, that’s just my opinion lol

So yeah, there you have it, a long update. Oh, and I changed the name of this blog because I have other raw stuff that I may be able to put here without any fear of being taken down because they’re in the public domain, so they’re all fair game since I don’t get any profit from them anyway and others may also appreciate them too. Hint: One is a series of Japanese classic  fantasy short stories, the other one is a set of instructional manuals on how to write kana and kanji in ballpen and brushpens. They’re a bit lighter so once I get Chapter 5 up I’ll do them as soon as I get rested.

See you all later and thank you for stumbling in this blog. xoxoxo

[bean-n-shroob]

The Origami King Review/Opinion

(I sorta hate that it has the word The in it cause when I did impressions or this review, it sounds strangely official)

I’m gonna review but if people don’t want spoilers here’s some Pros and Cons that I felt

Pros:

+ Music is fantastic! I love how the battle theme changes with every area/sub-area you go to.

+ Writing is good, it gets you invested in enough to sorta care. Humor is top notch as expected!

+ Olivia is a sweetheart! I love her so much and how she’s so marveled by everything.

+ Boss Battles are fun to figure and deal with.

+ Finding Toads is actually kinda fun, I enjoy figuring out where they’re hidden

+ Badge system is intriguing if not a bit clunkly put together (sorry, this is suppose to be Pros)

Cons:

- Regular Battles get old quick if puzzles aren’t really your thing and its a bit too easy to just not depend on the coins, thus making them pointless.

- Story sorta flops, it starts strong but then just sorta fizzles and all we got left is... fun experiences (I know this sounds like a Con, but while the experiences are fun, it is disappointing the story sorta flops hard)

- Character Design is very meh. The most well written character can’t save it from its extremely generic design

- But also Olly is not... that well written... so...

- Partners and Vellumentals are kinda under utilized to a disappointing degree (baby steps, baby steps ugh)

Anywho, that’s all my feelings (that I can remember and feel I can say without spoilers)

6.5/10 (I’ll explain the scoring under the cut)

Spoilers Under Cut

Hello and welcome to the Spoiler Bits of this Review/Opinion

Buckle in, this is a long one

Now y’all may be a bit curious as to why, with so much big things (music/writing/bosses/Olivia) being good and so little being bad, why a 6.5/10?

Well, I felt a 7 was too generous and would make people think “Oh, its good!” but a 6 is like “Eh... its mediocre” and a 6.5 is more like a “Its Good, But” and I feel that But is important! I know how this may sound, but TOK could’ve been WAY better and Chapter 2 was an example of how good this game could’ve been!

You know how people always bring up Huey, or the “Morton Leston” joke, or the “I would do things that would raise this game’s rating” line as examples as why Color Splash is actually really good and we’re all in denial?

I feel Chapter 2 will be that for TOK and its all because of Bobby! I like Bobby, I like Bobby a lot! I wish he stuck around! I loved how he and Olivia interacted together and how they formed a bond!

But

I sorta hated how overall useless he was to the action and adventuring. He’s the most useless partner that somehow leaves a deep impression on the player!

He leaves such a deep impression that I don’t think anyone noticed how badly written Professor Toad was! He was such a let down as a follow up to Bobby! And worst of all, he was like way more useful than Bobby! He can dig holes, he can wipe out a whole role of enemies, he has a function outside of battle and story.

Seeing how useful Professor Toad was, sorta put into perspective Bobby and his eventual sacrifice to save Olivia (I told ya this was spoilers). He just dies, in a shockingly emotional moment, giving a speech about how Bomb-Ombs live relatively short lives and are always trying to make the most of it.

Wow... I really wish Chapter 6 didn’t have a segment where you were half hazardly shooting bomb-ombs out of a cannon, cause otherwise, this could’ve been way more impactful!

But it also made it seem like "we can't make Bobby too useful, he's gonna die. So just keep him extremely simple and useless in every other aspect of the adventure, besides story."

I don’t get how TOK started out so strong! The intro and Chapter 1 introduced us to the basic loop how what we’d have to do and how stuff will play out and Chapter 2 took that and showed us how far we could go with this loop and how involved the world will be with this loop!

Only for Chapter 3 to just give up on everything and give us 1 expansive dessert to explore, a very one note partner who doesn’t leave a lasting impression, a boring quest of solving an ancient riddle and a very annoying boss dungeon segment that went on longer than it should’ve! And above all else, a very half-assed excuse for why he won’t be joining your journey! Especially since Chapter 4 doesn’t have a partner!

Chapter 4 feels like an overly-long intermission of Mario n Olivia’s adventure to Chapter 5. Legit the purple streamer of 4 could’ve been the green streamer of 5 and it would only flow just a little bit less smoothly. Chapter 4 has this weird send off to the Vellumentals, with the boss dungeon being a mixture of the last 4 Vellumental chambers you’ve explored. Which feels out of place especially since there’s like 2 more chapters of stuff happening afterwards! And like a thunder elemental like boss fight in 5 but I guess they just couldn’t be bothered to create a Thunder Vellumental fight to tack onto the story and just gave it to this Origami Sumo Bro! Okay!

And then the Bowser Castle segment is right when they decide to get creative with enemy encounters, but only 2 enemy encounters (you can fight these two multiple time if you’re neither a chicken nor annoyed with the battle ring system) but then just stop right after cause Scissor makes cut out soldiers was the only excuse why that happened.

Again... I like TOK, I do. If I didn't, I'd rate it a 4 or 5 outta 10. I'll talk about the good, I will, but lemme just rant about 1 thing first! Its actually 2 rants but its gonna be about 1 topic I'm rather passionate about.

Character Design

I hate how generic the Legion of Stationery are! Once again, Chapter 2 wins by giving Rubber Band a very unique design, but everyone else is so generic looking! Remember how I said the personalities couldn't save them from their generic design? The Legion have such fun personalities, its so tacky and fun! But I cannot get over how it contrasts with the fact I'm staring at an object hoping in place or wiggling or jiggling as they talk! It kinda sucks, honestly!

I wish these guys had more creativity behind them, and truth be told it wouldn't have bothered me had Rubber Band not been an outlier! Why them and not everyone else! Its baffling!

But above all else, the worst offender, is the Origami Craftsman! The dude who folded Olly! Is a TOAD! That's it! A toad in an apron! WHY

And I get it, there's story reason behind it! Olly wants all Toads gone cause they all look alike and thus everyone reminds him of the Craftsman who wrote (a very touching message) on him!

And that SUCKS!

(uh oh, i forgot about Olly and his terrible terrible motive to be evil)

Speaking of Olly! Remember when I said he wasn't well written? Well besides being an evil prick who enjoys messing with the heroes (i dont mind that, evil just to be evil is fine), it sorta randomly just comes up that he hates Toads near the end! It just comes up!

And I THINK it was suppose to be hinted at by the fact all the Toads gets attacked and folded by Paper Macho and Folded Soldiers. But my problem with this is:

1. Would they have been daring as making Folded Toads as enemies? Thus the lack of Folded Toad enemies should've hinted at this

2. The enemies were origami version of Mario enemies! So enemies still being enemies but folded would've just strengthen the fact we'd be fighting bowser minions again, making the previous Toad hint moot.

3. Toads have always been in peril in previous PM games so the fact they're in peril again wouldn't have been a point of interest!

I GUESS the fact Folded Peach specifically asks whether Toads should be silenced could've hinted at this, but people just took it as "hah lol Toads annoying" and not "oh, this villain has a thing against toads~". Its just, who else would the villain have pointed out? There's only Toads here! Maybe if there was a bigger variety of npcs and we saw other npcs either becomes folded soldiers or be spared from the folded attack, we could've wondered "hey, why are only the toads getting stuck in places?"

But we don't!

Anyways, huff! Lemme count all the good, spoilery things in the game (that's not in Chapter 2) to end on a good note

I love how Olivia is so sweet, no one could bring themselves to be mean to her (except Olly), even Kamek has a hard time being mean cause she's so bubbly and caring (except for that weird bit in the forest where Kamek had to be all rivalry about it but I digress)

Bowser backtalking Olly was very funny, I loved it a lot!

The fact Olivia asks Olly to come to his senses before Mario smashed his face with the Olivia hammer (i need to specify this cause otherwise it'll look like Mario interrupted this scene with a hammer smash but no, Olivia fully knew her hammer weight was gonna fall on Olly's face and just gave some last words of pleas before not even letting him respond) I loved that.

I liked how sweet Olivia was to Luigi despite how much he kept screwing up (i forgot to rant about that but tl;dr, he's a bit of a buffoon and its a bit annoying) i thought it was very touching how Olivia kept rooting for him regardless.

The Tape talking like a Gangster was actually really funny, I liked that a lot.

Bowser's pep talk to Olivia was very funny, it was basically "dont be sad, look at me, my muscles are massive and I can punch through walls!"

As jarring as they were, I actually liked a lot of the singing and dancing that occurred through the game.

Olly having his own color scheme for his Vellumental forms was super cool!

The ending was really touching. Olivia wished for all of Olly's creations to be undone, and because you find out in Chapter 4 that she's also a creation of Olly, she is undone too. And they don't spell that out! You just find out she's not around and connect the dots. I think that was very well done.

And these are some of several reasons I liked TOK and why I couldn't rate it lower than 6. It has a lot of things that just doesn't live up to Chapter 2 and its disappointing to realize halfway through that the game peaked in Chapter 2. Its so weird, they showed us how good it can be and then never lives up to the expectationd set by Chapter 2. I wish it did

Thats why I rate it a 6.5/10

[vanillapie-80]

After finishing 4 pages, I think that’s enough to finally announce my comic.  At the start of May, I will begin to begin my comic. Jersey’s Devils is a crossover comic between Guillermo Del Toro’s Tales of Arcadia and MIke Mignola’s Hellboy. Why? Well it’s because I love these two pieces of media and think that they could work well together. I’ll explain more stuff in a bit, but for the people who don’ t want to a read another paragraph of me addressing stuff, here what you need to know. Updates will always be posted on Wednesdays, and the comic will be in a separate account which is @jerseys-devils-fancomic (Now I just realized that I misspelled Jersey in the banner, and unfortunately I cannot change it now because the the file to edit the image got corrupted today. So you’re going to have to deal with cause I worked too hard on this.)

Anyways another reason why I’m making this a crossover is because it’s my favorite thing to do. I love to explore the characters dynamics and relationship and how can those universes work if the coexisted together. If haven’t guess already this a pretty self-indulgent AU so some things will change. Would I count this a Wizards AU? Depends, on one hand I know that the story is very far off, but on the other hand it does take place after season 2 of 3 Below. So I’ll let the audience decide. Another thing is that when each chapter end, there will most likely be a intermission where the comic will explore more on this AU that doesn’t follow the main storyline. In terms of the timeline, the comic takes place at the end of 3 Below (few weeks after Jim fought the knight) and before issue #5 of Hellboy. I’m really excited you guys, I really started thinking about doing this in December. I was debating on whether or not I should make it a fic or a comics, but I decided to do the latter because it just felt right. One thing to note however is please, please do not repost my comic, it’s disrespectful, and because I'm posting it on twitter and Instagram as well. I think that’s all I have to say for now, feel free to ask me any question you have.