#you know you can’t just go to the underworld whenever you feel like it

[dreamsandconstellations]

*Odysseus’ crew appear in The Underworld post-Thunder Bringer*

Hades: Weren’t you just here?

[lovelyyandereaddictionpoint]

All of your Time | Yandere Hybrid SatoSugu

The thing about introverts is that they need to recharge

They need time by themselves to be able to handle more interaction

They greatly value their lonesome 

Whether to enjoy their imagination without distraction or to put themselves nose-deep in their field of interest

They have a safe space – a time or place meant to belong to them and only them

It’s why you didn’t go out on the unplanned drinking escapade when your boss and his partner offered

“No, thank you I have something to do tonight.”

Unbeknownst to you, you smashed their hearts into a tiny million pieces with that polite sentence

Though it wouldn’t be the first time

The only time they could get you to agree was when they made plans with many of your friends at a significantly later date

They decided to be nice about getting your affection so why was this so hard

Why was it taking so long to get any of your free time

“Sugu! I’m tired of waiting! Why can’t we just take them now!?”

“We both decided to be patient with them…you’ve already said you didn’t want them to hate you. Right?”

“...Yeah…”

“So we’ll be taking the long way…for now.”

He says that but their patience is running thin

And like a starving pack of wolves, they need something

“Oh yeah (Y/n) kind of really needs their alone time.”

They decide to do some digging as to why this keeps happening

by they I mean Suguru eventually gets an answer from your friend

“They make plans with themselves all the time. Honestly, we’re just lucky the days we do hang out don’t fall on the dates they’ve already picked out.”

Why must their darling be oh so fickle?

They decide to go to their other plan 

One they’ve crafted after many trips with you home where they stayed 3 meters behind and you didn’t know they were there

Passing by an ally you always do stopping at a familiar sound

“Oh my! Two cute friendly kitties in one day? I must be dreaming!”

You aren’t and when you return home you’ve got two fluffy cats that refuse to leave your side

Finally the perfect turnaround of seeing you composed and restrained at work

Then seeing you fawn and coddle them when they transform into cats in your home

Suguru and Satoru had gained their wealth through several means

Privilege, hard work, physical prowess, and agility that made them a force to be reckoned with in the underworld

Suddenly their ability to transform into their ‘lesser forms’ comes in handy when they feel the need to have more of your time

This time when you cancel going out with them they’re not too hurt

Knowing you're already running back home to be with them

It’s the perfect little plan that lets them have see so much more of you:

“Awww my little Nightsky~your like my little guardian! Even when I’m in the bath you watch after me, thank you!”

The black, purple-eyed cat purred in contentment as you let your fingers massage the cat’s head. Readjusting your robe you slipped into your slippers and made your way to your bed. On your way, you lightly rubbed the cheek of your white cat who was sat on his cat tree aggressively flicking his tail. 

You cooed,” Don’t be jealous Cream, it’s just that you get a little crazy whenever I let you in while I’m taking a bath.”

The cat meowed indignantly. Chuckling to yourself you grabbed your phone from your nightstand. Plopping on your bed you started scrolling through unanswered messages sent to you. In your peripheral you watched the cats mew at one another before beginning to playfully wrestle.

“Be careful on the cat tree, you two.”

They seemed to ignore you subsequently rolling off the perch and onto the floor. Having seen them do this exact action before you didn’t bother looking away as you read the messages from your friend in your department. Your lips pursed as the string of messages ended with a voice note.

“Hey, those two are still asking about you. Why don’t you give them a chance? Maybe they just want to be your friends?”

Sighing you prepped yourself to make your own voice note, unaware of both your cats’ attention solely directed towards you.

“If they do want that–and I highly doubt that–don’t they feel off? Like did you see how that grumpy old man gets so mousy when they’re around? I just don’t think I’d want to associate with that.”

After ending and sending your voice note, you hold your phone as it pings with messages from your friend. Holding in a giggle you tap back your response. Conveniently Cream and Nightsky are at your side rubbing their bodies and tails in front of your face as they both sprawl out on your forearms.

“Guys!”

You scold them but you have no plans to move them instead continuing to text your friend. Occasionally kissing your cat’s heads you continue to inform them–your friend—of even more dirt you’d found on your overly-friendly employers. It lightly amuses you how it looks like your cats are reading the texts as well though you're sure it’s your fingers quickly moving that they’re so entranced by.

A ping goes off and you quickly shoot up to throw on some clothes. The cats look curiously as you crazily hop around before snatching your keys. You smiled at your approaching cats,” Okay boys! Our delivery gal got caught at the gate. So I’m going to go get food be my good boys!”

Blowing kisses, you disappear with a slam and locking of the door.

Your footsteps disappear down the hallway. 

And your apartment is silent. 

For a little while.

“Geez are we really that off-putting?”

Standing and looking longingly at the door is the pouting and naked, Gojo Satoru. An owner of the company (Y/n) is currently employed at and the only white-haired man who was rubbing his face into the intimate threads of their robe.

Suguru Geto, also stark naked and the CEO of that company was sighing and holding the bridge of his nose, “ Perhaps we really won’t be able to convince them otherwise.”

“Why don’t we just take them now? Burn the condo and sweep ‘em off their feet?”

“Because I know you know they’d hate that.”

Satoru lifted his head with a sadistic smirk and shrugged his shoulders,” So? They’ll get over it!”

Suguru put a disappointed hand over his face if only to hide the smile that tickled his lips. “They’re not like me…or you…we have to be gentle. Too much shock and we’ll ruin them forever.”

Satoru whined, abandoning the robe he snagged to join Suguru on the couch. Posturing himself right above his husband, “C’mmmooonnn! They’re strong enough, they can take it!”

The ravenette wasn’t swayed, teasingly turning his head as he rested he his chin on his hand. “No ‘Toru too high a risk.”

“Then why don’t we take another approach, Satoru lightly turned Suguru’s head towards him flashing his award-winning smile,” How about we work a different angle.”

Suguru’s brow quirked in intrigue.

“One where we happened to be their perfectly timed saviors.”

“Do you really think that’d work?”

“I say we try it! Otherwise, I’m back to Plan: A!”

Suguru couldn’t help but laugh bringing the man down to nuzzle his own nose. Planting a kiss on his lips, he opened wider as Satoru dove in. Pulling away after a minute Suguru cutely mimicked his cat form as he batted his eyes,” Am I forgiven for me and (Y/n)’s time in the bath?”

Satoru sucked his teeth. “You almost made me forget you slimy snake! How dare you?!”

Suguru shrugged with a smirk on his face, sending a scolding look when Gojo growled and angrily clutched at his hair. The tension was released when they both let out boisterous laughter. 

The apartment wasn’t silent anymore.

And you’d returned from getting takeout a while ago.

“What the actual f–!”

[qiutls]

TNGDH 001

I became a hamster. No wonder I thought I was hearing squeaks last night, it turned out to be like this. Shiny golden fur that doesn’t lose its light even in the dark. Four lovely pink-tinted feet. Long whiskers that twitch whenever I move my cheeks. The black curtains flutter and the light leaks in from the steel cage hitting my eyes. Wait a minute… a steel… cage? A cage?! ― Eek. (Why?) I didn’t just become a hamster. I became a hamster that’s been trapped somewhere. * Thud. Thud. Thud. The cage I was in suddenly shook heavily and my small body rolled around in different directions as the cage kept moving. Who is it?! Who the hell drives like this?! Can’t you drive safely! Thump. My body sways to the corner again and I feel my butt stinging from falling too many times. Then I heard a horse sniffing, it felt thrilling to think that I was going to ride a horse. However, it only felt thrilling for a bit before I thought, It seems like I’m gonna be meeting King Yeomra. King Yeomra is the King of the underworld, hamster thinks he'll die because of the cage being shaken. Where the hell are we going? Why did I become a hamster? And why the hell are we not riding a bus or a train, but riding a horse? This is unfair, I feel so wronged. It’s so absurd that I have to explain, it’s so obvious that I’m a human not a hamster! That’s right I’m human! Bae Soohyun. I’m turning 27 this year. Even though my life was like a thorny path, I am a small mugwort that didn’t give up and kept living. It was a life where it seemed like I kept working day, night, dawn, early in the morning, from Monday to Tuesday to Wednesday to Thursday to Friday to Friday to Friday… But I had no doubt that my hard work would pay off. After years of hard work, it seems the day has finally come. The day when the game I developed became a big hit. I think it’s dead. Dead… That’s right… I died. After the earlier confusion of becoming a hamster has passed, my memories slowly started to come back. The game became popular and it felt like the son I was raising finally became successful. I was finally able to receive the first batch of settlement money thanks to the game. I rushed back home feeling so happy that I could fly. Rattle. The cage suddenly shook as the horse started moving. And I started shaking back and forth, my head felt like it was going to pop and my eyes slowly lost shine as I felt dizzier and dizzier. Are you kidding me?! I kicked the cage a few times hoping for the shaking to stop and then heard a voice not so distant. “I’m sorry.” An unfamiliar, deep yet friendly voice. “Just endure it for a little bit more.” But why did it feel like I’ve heard this line somewhere before. I’m sorry, just endure it for a little bit more. I’ll take you to your new home soon. It suddenly came to mind. While walking at the crossing on my way home, I bumped into a child who seemed anxious while carrying a hamster cage, then a car hit my body. I instinctively felt my death then, all my senses were occupied by the fact that I was hit by a car, and my consciousness started fading away. Twinkle. In front of my eyes something glistened brightly. Wait a minute, what’s that blue thing… [ Hello World! ] I was stunned by the blue system filling up my field of vision. A familiar phrase, the most basic sentence someone with programming knowledge would know. This is the very first phrase you learn to code when you start programming. Then, several windows came up one after another.

[ Connection confirmed. Checking data. ] [ Determining quest. ] [ Calculating miracle value. ] [ Synchronization not complete. Please wait. ] [ Synchronization 0% complete. ] What does this mean? Data? Quest? Synchronization? Since the moment I woke up, this ridiculous situation started and kept going, I didn’t even get the chance to be surprised. While in a daze, the horse which had been rattling the cage non-stop suddenly fell silent and the owner of the voice earlier seemed to get off the horse. The tumultuous movement stopped, but I still felt nauseous. The cold wind blew into the cage, and I shivered. Suddenly, I heard another distant voice. “Your Highness, are you sure you don’t want to throw it out?” Your… Highness? First I rode a horse, now someone’s talking to a royal. These are words that you wouldn’t even hear in 21st century Korea. The term “Your Highness” is only something I heard as a child watching sageuk dramas. Then the deep voice I heard earlier replied. Sageuk is a k-drama genre in which characters wear historical costumes. “It’s a pup that was left alone by the horde, don’t you feel it’s a bit pitiful?” pup - baby hamster / horde - group of baby hamsters “What pity, Your Highness? It’s a child of a demonic beast, when it grows up,it will learn to seduce its prey.” I looked down at my small and round body, what do you mean seduce? Is this body even capable of seducing? In the first place, I’m not even a demonic beast, just a normal hamster, no I mean human! Heh, you’re quite convincing using that serious voice of yours, but you’re obviously joking! The man with the deep voice suddenly cut through my thoughts. “It’s still a child.” “A child of a demonic beast, Your Highness.” “That’s right, a child.” “Your Highness, the most important thing is that it’s a demonic beast!” That… Can you please stop referring to me as a child. It’s weird… While I was grumbling away my frustrations, I heard the man speak, this time anger laced his voice. “Are you questioning my decision?” He spoke words that could normally be taken lightly yet the way he enunciated it word by word felt like a threat, and that there was only one correct answer. “No, Your Highness, I was just momentarily confused since such a thing has never happened before. How dare I question the Grand Prince’s decision.” “Right. So, I’ll take care of it, surely you don’t think I am weaker than a demonic beast that’s barely the size of my fist?” You’re telling me he’s not just a royal, he’s the Grand Prince? “I already sent a man to the estate to prepare it's house, it would be fun to add little ornaments with it.” “Your Highness, you can also raise a real hamster, should I tell the man to prepare another one?” “No. Don’t test my patience.” “…Yes” This person is quite stubborn huh.

Soon the cage started shaking again, this time as the man walked, I could hear his armor rattling and his heavy footsteps rang. Then I felt the air around me get warmer little by little as he marched up the stairs.

It must be winter. Yet I died during summer, now I realize the abnormality of the situation. The man took me to a room and then removed the cloth covering the cage.

“Here we are.” I crouched in a corner and pretended to be asleep desperately. Somehow it felt like the smart thing to do, I couldn’t speak even if I wanted to tell him about my situation. Even if I told him, who’s to say he will not decapitate me for spewing nonsense.

How did my life become like this! Give me back my money! My skills! My future that was unfolding brilliantly! “Tsk. Tsk.” The man clicked his tongue, then he sighed deeply. Hey! I’m the one who’s supposed to be sad at this situation, why are you the one clicking your tongue! Ah, I really hate when people do that… Oh right, I was pretending to be asleep… Sleep… “Does it really not have a human heart?” He murmured.

What human heart? What is he talking about? “Looking at these naive eyes, before it turned into a demonic beast, did it really not have the heart of a human?” N-naive? Which eyes looked naive? Surely it’s not mine? “That’s right, for them there’s no such thing as compassion... Did I stay away from the North for too long? It’s no different from a glacier, it’s freezing. Tsk.” Suddenly, the man opened the cage, stretched out his hand and caught me in his palm.

― Eek! I was so surprised I forgot I was pretending to sleep, as I opened my eyes, I made eye contact with him.

[ 50% synchronized. ]

[ Kyle Jane Minehardt. Great Duke of Blake. ]

The blue system window showed up below his face. Hold on, this name, I’ve heard of it somewhere. Without knowing what was in my head the whole time, he raised me closer to his face. I felt his warm hand full of scars and calluses against my soft fur. Then he rubbed my cheek.

E-excuse me?! “You did well enduring the ride home, cashew nut, you must’ve been bored the whole way.” Bored? The ride was full of shock and horror for me, okay?! Wait, aside from that, can’t you put me down first? What the hell is this situation, why did you suddenly remove me from the cage… Wait! No! Don’t peck me! ― Squeak! Eek!  [ Let me go! ]

“Yes, yes, I know how you feel.” What do you know… You don’t understand a thing! Ack! Why’s he kissing me like he’s dying of love! A kiss… ― Squeak! Squeak! Squeak!  [ You bastard! What kind of dog kisses nonstop like you?! ]

“I’m glad you’re feeling better.” ― Squeak! [ Get lost! ] “Did you like being kissed?” I can’t take this anymore!

Wait a minute… This face… I took a moment to observe all his features, his pale yet tough complexion, distinct eyebrows, his hair that’s dark as a raven, his eyes which glowed crimson. A cold and resolute beauty.

― Eek! [ Grand Duke Blake ] I remember. The Duke of the North, Kyle. A supporting actor from the novel, The Heart of Winter, I always read while traveling to and from my company. Not only was he a supporting actor, he’s a supporting actor that dies in the middle of the novel. A man who’s life was miserable from start to finish, yet died with no regrets. The reason why I remember him, and not the protagonists of the story, was that he’s the unluckiest character in the novel. He was unlucky to the extent that I lamented his cold fate many times.

So, I died, and transmigrated into a novel? “Cashew nut?” Cashew nut, my name, I mean the name of the hamster’s body I’m occupying. Kyle stared at me, he seemed to be worried as if something went wrong. His gaze was warm and full of kindness.

Stop looking at me! This bastard, you’re gonna pierce through me with that stare! I’m just worn out… I flicked my head away from his stare, and turned back to glare at him. I tried my hardest to look as mean as possible.

“That look…” It’s scary right?! You’re so afraid you could die, right? I look like a dangerous demon, don’t I?! So put me down!!! You kiss crazed bastard! [ Cold and strict personality. Clean and thorough. Frigid and Merciless. ] “You look so cute, staring at me like that.” Aren’t you the cold blooded Duke of the North?! Let go of me! What do you mean cold and strict?! What merciless? ― Squeak! [ Let go! ]

Yet the Duke didn’t let me down for a long time and I had to put up with the crazy kisses the he bestowed.

Help me, please! Save this hamster!

novel ⠀✿⠀ next

[revserrayyu]

2.5 Xianzhou continuance thoughts [part 2]

**SPOILER warning** for March first boarding the Skysplitter, Feixiao coming to Yukong’s aide, a healer in need of a medic and the fight against Hoolay. As always, refrain from reading further if you haven’t reached the first boss battle or finished the entirety of the 2.5 story because I’ll probably mention some things that happen later on.

Amidst the serious wolf hunt going on, I appreciate the silly conversations the game threw our way to ease the tension once we switched back to March’s perspective. Now that we know Hoolay is capable of turning foxians into borisin with just his fangs, it’s good for our Trailblazing companion to be a bit suspicious of everyone at the event, but thankfully this one soldier is just an awkward man doing his job.

We continue to be such a bad influence on our friends, even when we’re not around. I can’t even be mad that the game insults our mental health because this whole scene is just too funny. And most likely true because the Trailblazer is far from normal.

The whole situation with Hoolay’s plague-mark spreading fear and the danger it presents alongside these lines of Feixiao’s just reminds me of that one line from Serval during the Belobog story when we first escape the Underworld and request her help: “I know Cocolia’s style - get everyone into a frenzy first.” (yes of course I remember random Serval quotes.)

Wise words from our resolute General. She would make a good mentor, but I believe it was said (no clue on when or by who exactly), that she can’t really take on an apprentice because of her busy schedule and/or shortened lifespan due to her moon rage. Something like that. Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong but I know there was a reason she doesn’t take apprentices somewhere.

Finally getting to the borisin attack scene that they teased us with during the 2.5 trailer and I’m truly impressed by how Feixiao manages to arrive at Starskiff Haven from Exalting Sanctum so quickly.

Granted, the speed at which she arrives is mostly due to her riding on top of a starskiff that she.. somehow acquired from who knows where, but the cutscenes switch up so fast from Feixiao reassuring Yukong she’s on her way one moment to then seeing her flying into the fray the next. I found it incredible.

It was also amusing to see Feixiao just ram the starskiff into an unfortunate borisin and crash land the whole thing while she remains perfectly unharmed.

Eeehehe, I just love that kind of pose where people hold their weapon over their shoulder like that. Not to mention that confident smirk of hers too.. aaahh she’s so cool~ And Yukong too. I still adore her. Shame we didn’t get to see her fight more than what the 2.5 trailer already showed us but hey, I’ll take what we can get. Better than nothing.

With the way you move, sweetie, everything is swift.

My assumption about Feixiao using Yukong’s bow from the patch trailer turned out to be correct. From wielding swords, gun blades, battle axe and bows, she can do it all folks! We love a multi-talented queen.

So that giant flash of light in the sky turned out to be Feixiao’s arrow.. good lord. At least she gave everyone a heads up about it so we could try to move out of range, but with how quick she acts, it couldn’t have be that much time. Thankfully Moze is kind enough to offer us some assistance.

Ma’am.. please calm down with the amazing cutscenes. You’re too much for my heart to handle. The powerful attack did seem to hurt her a bit though in the end, or it was her moon rage acting up.

Now there’s a question I’d like the answer to. How did people react to her bloodline? Or do they really not know about it and just see her as a foxian? Whenever I read about the Yaoqing, I see that moon rage is kinda common among foxians of that ship because of their close ties with the borisin, so perhaps other ships really don’t mind Feixiao’s backstory. After all her military accomplishments, I wouldn’t either, honestly.

Looks like we won’t be getting a definite answer either as she chooses to just taunt him instead. She’s perfect. I love her. I’d gladly beg for her.

Jumping back to the Skysplitter where March & Yunli meet up with Yanqing, the girls are rightfully suspicious of his sudden arrival and wonder if he’s a disguised borisin. It’s a fair assumption since they last heard he was supposed to be helping Feixiao, but he reasons with swift logic that ultimately makes fun of his own height and the truth surrounding that fact is hilarious.

For a whole side mission taking place back on the Luofu, there’s not as much Jing Yuan as I originally thought there would be. At least he’s working behind the scenes though, setting up a well thought of trap to lead Hoolay into by setting up a fake Wardance ceremony to draw him out into the ring.

The fight with the warhead himself was fine. I wish I remembered more of it but I didn’t really have any trouble with him.

The fight probably would’ve been more memorable if they didn’t cut to a flashback of a seriously injured Jiaoqiu right in the middle of it! AAHH! I’m actually kinda surprised that Hoolay kept him alive for this long (and didn’t completely eat him after everything either), but since there was no more use for him.. yeah, makes sense he would eventually toss our healer aside like trash and leave him to die on his own.

Oh goodie, yet another flashback to pull at my heartstrings. I wasn’t expecting Feixiao to be so much younger than Jiaoqiu..? Or more like I never really thought of who’s older/who’s younger between them before. I just assumed they were about the same age. Hearing him lose his patience with her was a bit unexpected, but when you remember how tired of Jiaoqiu is of learning that his patients lost their lives upon returning to battle and how the previous General asked him to personally save Feixiao, his annoyance is understandable.

Before Hoolay leaves Jiaoqiu, our healer reveals he knows about the bloodwine custom where borisin kill off their prisoners and drink their blood before battle to increase their madness. Hoolay confirms this and I can only assume that he drinks said blood from the gash across our foxian’s chest. Unfortunately for the warhead, Jiaoqiu seemed to have an ace up his sleeve.. which just so happens to be poison.

During my 2.4 posts (part 2 I think), I jokingly said that “this man could very well poison someone if he wanted to,” but sir, I didn’t want it to be yourself!? And with the most lethal of poisons too?? Goddamn.. that’s so extreme, honey. I’m not even gonna question how or when Jiaoqiu actually drink the poison, but he definitely needed to make sure Hoolay had a taste of his blood or else his impressive last ditch effort would’ve been all for nothing. Thankfully, his plan is a success and the sly fox skillfully uses the same advice he previously told Mok Tok & Hoolay about with feeding a child with picky eating habits: you hide the thing you want them to eat among something else. Green peppers chopped up into meatballs. Deadly poison mixed in foxian blood.

Nooo no no, stop this self loathing at once! Your life is nothing close to insignificant! Aahh.. he’s making me so upset. Half the reason being he’s seemingly dying, the other half is because of Mark’s brilliant voice acting. He was so dang good throughout this entire scene, from sounding broken and losing hope, to the weak chuckles when he finds the tiniest bit of amusement about his poison plan taking effect. Actually, his performance was wonderful throughout the entire story so far.

What isn’t wonderful however.. is how Hoyo baited all of us into thinking that Jingliu was going to return! All those mentions of her name and the cameo of her during the 2.5 trailer.. worthless! The Jingliu from the cutscene is nothing but Hoolay being reminded of her style when Yanqing launches a serious counterattack by taking inspiration from his own experiences of battling against Jingliu during her companion mission.

Like.. yeah, good for you young man for freezing the beast so effectively, but I’m still so twisted that our ice queen doesn’t actually show up. I know it makes the most sense that she doesn’t, considering she and Luocha are locked up on another Xianzhou ship, but maaann.. it would’ve been so cool to see her again.

Despite turning into a popsicle, Hoolay still manages to strike back against Yanqing, only for a true queen to descend onto the battlefield and stop his large blade effortlessly, just as she did to both Yunli & Yanqing’s last patch with just a couple fingers.

Sigh.. what an amazing woman. And there’s gonna be a whole lot of fangirling over her during the next post too. (probably).

[leverage-ot3]

OKAY so I have two ideas about a leverage x pjo crossover and they hinge on whether or not the leverage crew are demigods are not. I also have a general one which is what this post is

leverage demigod/pjo au masterpost

I’m betting some (or all) of the leverage crew have complicated feelings about the demigod-godly parent relations. they hear through the grapevine that this 12yo has been accused of stealing zeus’ master bolt and that his mom has been kidnapped by hades and they’re like ABSOLUTELY NOT FUCK YOU

cue hijinks where the leverage crew is behind the scenes while annabeth, grover and percy are on the quest having the road trip from hell. except it’s not actually that bad??? whenever things look like they’re going to get REALLY bad something happens and the kids aren’t in a lot of danger anymore. annabeth is almost annoyed because she wants to prove her worth etc etc (love her dearly but she needs some rest (and therapy)), grover is overwhelmingly relieved, and percy is just hella confused but vibing and set on seeing his mom again

meanwhile eliot is fist fighting a minotaur and like five other monsters, sophie is seducing medusa (and it’s kind of working??? can’t blame her though sophie is a MILF), parker is planning a heist in the underworld, hardison is dusting off a pet project that’s a gadget that cloaks demigods from monster detection (good for everyone but perfect for percy), and nate is masterminding while also furiously planning a beat down speech for the big three

it’s possibility titled: the master bolt job

nate says let’s go steal a stolen master bolt or something like that

(parker: isn’t that defying the gods?

nate: we’re giving it back)

the journey ends with percy’s mom back safe and sound, nate yelling at the gods (but not before letting percy tear them a new one first. of course he lets the kid go first!!!), a new godly child support system, and camp half blood employing their first on-site therapist.

hardison teaches the hephaestus kids how to make tech that doesn’t attract monsters. eliot cooks the best dinner the camp has ever had (hestia who adores him maybe helped), the hermes kids are awed by parker (thee parker?!?). sophie instills the fear of god (woman) into mr d to treat the kids better and gives the oracle a spa day as a treat. nate helps chiron with training-life management for campers (he is NOT a role model for that but he knows what works. chiron is chuffed that this random dude is giving him advice but rolls with it because he’s a good sport)

aphrodite is enamored with the love parker, hardison and eliot have for each other. they don’t know it but she gave them her blessing 💖

[josendlessmonolouge]

hey so I just binged your head cannons and how does it feel to be right all the time? I was wondering what you would think about body/weight insecurities with the underworld kids? Like Hazel grew up in the 30s when black girls were the opposite of the beauty standard and I imagine her having complicated feelings about her appearance caused by never feeling attractive growing up. And going into the legion they do intense exercises so she probably put on a bunch of muscle weight after the first few months, and on a short girl like her that can look pretty stocky (totally not projecting rn). So she’s prob never thought about herself as very feminine or beautiful. Do think dating Frank and being desired would help her recover from that and gain confidence?

And with Nico he’s always been very skinny especially after the jar incident. I feel like people around camp would say insensitive things about him looking skeletal or ghastly as a joke but he would actually be very hurt by it. Like internalized homophobia would already make him feel unmasculine and comments like those would be like salt in the wound. Also his eating habits described in the book are definitely disordered in some way.

sorry this ended up way longer than I planned but would love to hear your opinion

Omg thank you for the ask and the spam likes I’m happy you enjoy my head-canons :>> So first Hazel;

I struggle a lot with body dysmorphia myself. The Hazel idea is something I hadn’t really thought about much but now that you put it in my head. I think definitely makes sense and I love it. I think her and Frank probably both have a lot of issues with their physical appearances and how they’ve changed within the events of the books and starting off with bad self image. Within or having to do with the events of the book being Him losing a bunch of weight and gaining muscle then putting weight back on after the blessing of mars, and her like you said putting on more muscle.

my BD/ED was actually the down fall of my first relationship so I don’t think just feeling desired could really fix it , however I think that being with frank would probably improve her self image. I think Frank is probably pretty body neutral or working hard at being body neutral for himself and encourages her to do the same. I do think that his adoration of her would probably also help some. He’s a wonderful hype man and a blushing mess whenever she gets dressed up cute so she can’t help but feel a little better about herself. I think they’re both probably working on themselves and building each other up when it comes to body image.

Nico ooh I’ve got a lot of feelings on him bc I’ve chatted with my friends about it and you said exactly what I’ve been saying about how it probably makes him feel emasculated since he’s a young gay man who’s constantly surrounded by these ultra masculine friends and probably feels like less than in some ways. I feel for some reason that he has some arfid symptoms because most modern foods are just different than he used to and just he can’t will himself to eat most things. He also just gives the energy off even when he was in the 40s he was pretty picky since his family was wealthy. (Idk that he canonically bought McDonald’s to raise the dead that kid cries if he tries to eat a French fry) so it’s extremely hard for him to gain the weight back after the jar incident. I also think He knows he should reasonable work at gaining weight but he also just wants to take up as little space as possible literally and figuratively so it’s a constant mental bottle of “I’m sick and getting sicker, will is worried about me I need to eat, but also food is icky and I really don’t want to see the number on the scale go up even though I know I’ll look and feel better”

I could go on for a long while about this actually lol

[eyeofhurakana]

Title: “Unlike Fiction” Chapter: 1/1? Pairing: Sampo x Reader, Gepard x Reader Reader: Gender Neutral / Illegal Underworlder living in Overworld Relationship Level: Sampo - Ex-Beau / Gepard - Current Beau   Trust: Sampo - Low / Gepard - Moderate Summary: You decide to show up for Gepard’s celebration for becoming Captain of the Silvermane guard at Serval’s request. However, things don’t go as expected… Warning!: Cursing, Thoughts of Self-Harm (No harm though!)

Glimmering glass chandeliers, bubbling champagne, and a cast of incredibly wealthy persons that all seem to know one another only skin deep… 

This scenery is straight out of any romance novel conveying star-crossed lovers of opposing social classes. Though you had to admit, the authors really nailed it. You always thought that at least some of it had to be a little embellished. Yet just as they say, even the ceiling of this immense manor is painted with glorious recounts of Belobog’s long history with awe-inspiring detail. 

Your fingers squeeze around the stem of your champagne glass.  

The nobles that have gathered are all dressed to the nines. Some even go so far as to wear flowers that are worth at least six years of your own pay. You gulp when you catch sight of a few of the noble ladies standing off to the side in a huddled corner with handheld fans up, covering the lower part of their faces. Quickly, you avert your gaze.  

You already know they’re talking about you. Not that it matters. Gossip is a game for the small-minded and weak-willed. 

Though you can’t help a certain thought that keeps besieging your mind. 

Should you really be here?

“There you are!” Serval calls excitedly with no bother to maintain the rules of decorum as she hurries over to you.

Thank Qlipoth… 

Her outfit fits the atmosphere but you feel a sense of pride to see that she never took out her punk rock highlights. It gives you a sense of solidarity as there were a few things in your own look that you refused to change just for a single event. 

She definitely gets a few irksome looks, for the mere sin of existing. But like the magnificent storm queen that she is, she doesn’t even care. Immediately, you feel like you’ve found refuge the second she hooks her arm around yours. 

“Ugh, thank goodness that you’re here. I was about to lose my head just a moment ago,” she huffs lightly before leaning into you with a relieved smile, “Seriously. I’m really glad you came. I know this isn’t what you’re used to… but if I know Geppie, he’s going to love it that you're here.”

“You really think so?” you ask, still feeling a bit apprehensive. 

“Of course! Oh god. You should see how he lights up whenever he mentions you. I swear, you’re like his favorite subject to talk about these days. He barely mentions work anymore. Thank you, by the way. That subject was getting a bit tiresome, but I never really knew how to break it to him, you know? I’m just still sore after the whole… Well… You know.” 

Her cerulean eyes drift downwards. 

Serval’s sudden termination from the Architects was definitely a huge blow. It was still fresh in her mind despite it happening over a few months ago. Even so, you could still see the cracks it left in her. 

It was a miracle that she didn’t give up hope on everything entirely… 

You squeeze her arm a little to bring her back to the present before she can drown herself in the past. 

“Hey, let’s just enjoy ourselves then. We’ve been through hell. It’s the least we can do, right? We can even see this as, I dunno, reparations for stupid bullshit?” 

“Reparations for Stupid Bullshit. RSB. I like it,” Serval laughs with a delighted nod, gladly going with the flow, “Yeah. Let’s do that.” 

She squeezes you back. An appreciative thank you. 

The two of you end up tearing up the tables filled with fancy cocktails and hors d'oeuvres while chatting about everything and nothing. By the time the great big announcement comes around, both you and Serval are incredibly - and happily - drunk. Restraint isn’t exactly a strong suit for either of you. It’s probably why you get along so well.

When Gepard is announced as the next Captain of the Guard, you both end up hooting and hollering like fools. You get a few glances from those surrounding you and even Gepard breaches the usual protocol to peek. 

But he doesn’t smile when he sees you. 

Instead, his eyes widen, brows flying up. Then he turns to face front and center like the soldier he’s trained to be. 

“...” 

A sudden sick, sinking feel forms in your chest. 

What was that? 

It doesn’t help that you’re intoxicated. The wall that usually keeps the worst thoughts out suddenly isn’t there anymore. Worries flood you without hindrance. 

The dam of reason isn’t there to protect you. 

“The hell was that?” Serval says, only escalating your worries, “He saw us, right?” 

You purse your lips tightly, unable to reply. 

Gepard receives praise from both of his parents as well as a few renowned dignitaries. It takes everything you have to keep Serval from breaking into tears at the sight of Cocolia. Serval ends up holding your hand with such a tight grip that her fingernails dig into your skin. But you let it happen. You know how deep those emotional wounds have cut… 

She’s barely holding herself together. 

“Serval…” 

“Don’t tell me we should go. I-I deserve to be here too,” she insists shakily which is remarkably perceptive for own so heavily inebriated, “If anything… she’s the one that doesn’t belong here… This is my home. My home.”  

The pain in her voice pulls at every heartstring inside of you. But you have to be the least drunk between you. …Since sobriety is long, long gone. 

“I… need to use the bathroom,” you say. 

It’s not a lie entirely. Besides, she won’t question it. You don’t know your way around this place like she does. 

“Oh shit. Sorry. Yeah, of course. Come on. I’ll take you… woah. Um… Let me hang onto you.” 

It takes a little while to find a washroom. It seems Serval’s mind keeps getting muddled from having seen Cocolia. But you keep your patience. It’s what you’d want from your friend if this ever happened to you… 

By the time you get to a nearby empty washroom, you barely shut the door when you hear Serval breaking into tears. Your heart becomes heavier than you’re used to. Maybe because you’re pretty sure that you’re bound for one more heartbreak today. 

Gepard’s face the moment he saw you in the crowd has yet to leave your mind. 

As much as you’d like to hope… you feel that you already know.

He didn’t tell them… 

You sit there on the closed toilet for barely a moment before breaking out into silent tears. 

This… always… happens. 

You try to keep quiet as best you can. You don’t like expressing your pain to others. Your upbringing discouraged showing weakness of any kind. To those around you at that time… you were an incessant inconvenience. 

Even still, you hear a soft knock on the door. 

Serval sniffles just behind it. 

“Are you crying?” she asks with a genuine sweetness behind it, despite her own anguish, that just makes something inside of you crumble to dust.

A sob escapes despite your damnedest attempts to keep it in. 

You don’t want to be a burden. 

Yet before you know it, she’s already come in and hugs you tightly without reservation. You don’t remember how long the two of you bawl your eyes out, but it’s enough that Serval has to reapply both her and your makeup. 

 Every noble wears makeup and she’ll be damned if she lets one of her few closest friends walk around shabby.  

“Hey, hey. I know you’re worried…” she says while gently applying another coat of foundation on your cheeks, “But I’m telling you, my brother would never ever do that to you. Ugh… He’s nothing like that con man. Ugh… I’m so sorry that I even introduced you to that jerk. He just… He didn’t seem like that, you know?” 

She popped her foundation away back into her hidden dress pocket before pulling out some eyeliner to fix the mess under your eyes. 

“Geppie is different. I swear. I’ve never heard him tell a lie in his whole life.” Her motions slow as she remembers the look he gave both of you during the celebration of his promotion. “I… I’m sure he had his reasons for reacting so weird. Maybe he was just really surprised?” 

You smile weakly despite not believing that. 

“You’re probably right,” you fib. 

Damn. You were already exhibiting bad habits from said someone… 

“Don’t worry. We’ll talk to him soon.” 

And just like that, the two of you return to the party though it’s mostly over and done with. Only a few of the major boozehounds stay for the free alcohol while others try some last minute attempts to schmooze with those of higher standing. 

Eventually, Serval learns where Gepard retreated off to in search of some solace. 

“This’ll be great. I’m sure of it,” she says as she pulls you along. 

But with every step, you feel like you’re nearing an execution. The type that can tear the very soul in half while keeping the physical body intact. 

“Stay here,” she whispers to you, leaving you just outside the doors before dramatically shoving them open, “Little bro!” 

You can hear the shifting of his armor along with his footsteps as he turns to face his older sister. 

“Serval…” 

Gepard's voice sounds heavy. No matter how much you rewind it in your head, there’s no mirth in it. 

“Surprised?” she asks as she hugs him suddenly, “Didn’t think I’d miss your big day, did you?”

“...” 

“Gepard?” she asks before leaning back to eye him better.

“You shouldn’t have brought them…” he murmurs but it’s not low enough that you can’t catch it. 

The ground beneath you becomes like thin ice over a frigid lake. Each word he says produces a fresh crack, branching out to assure your inevitable destruction. 

“What? What do you mean? Aren’t you glad to see them? Gepard, you two are dating. Of course, I’d-” Serval then suddenly stops.

You drop your head as you feel an uncomfortable heat rising along your neck and ears. 

Mortification. 

She takes a step back. 

“You didn’t tell them?” she asks but she’s not really asking.

Her tone sounds utterly appalled.  

“I-I was working on it!” 

“Gepard! You said-!”

“I know what I said!” 

You can’t take anymore. 

Removing your shoes, your footfalls become nearly silent as you make a desperate retreat for the nearest open balcony. The freezing air greets you the moment you step out. With a shudder, you make it to the nearest portable heater, switching it on. With time, it glows a gentle orange that reminds you of the Geomarrow where you’re really from… 

The place that you should feel ashamed of… 

A tear escapes you but you quickly wipe it away, refusing to cry any longer. 

Then… in just that moment…

A crazy thought invades your mind.

This is very high up. 

…Anything could happen.

A despairing croak escapes you as you grip onto yourself tightly. 

No, no, no. Not these thoughts. 

Anything but these thoughts!!

It’s like fighting against the blinding cold winds of the Great Freeze. There’s no escape and before you know it, you’re completely lost within its windchill. 

If only you hadn’t left… Being alone and disturbed with far too much alcohol always makes for a tragedy waiting to happen… 

Please… Someone…  I don’t… I don’t want…

And then the improbable happens.

A light flickering in the distance. 

At first, it seems random until you realize it remarkably seems like the code that-

No bloody way. 

‘Hey there, friend.’ 

That’s what it says. 

Your eyes widen. 

No way, no way, no way. 

Quickly, you pull out the pocket mirror Serval had lent you. Well, given you, but it was way too expensive to keep on your person. You would sneak it back into the untouched mounds within her workshop later. 

For now, you pop it open and use the mirror to reflect the light to message back. 

‘Friend or foe?’

You wait with great anticipation for the next reply. At first, you think it might not come, but it does.

‘Friend?’

A desperate laugh escapes you as you can tell right away who this is. 

‘Idiot.’

He doesn’t miss a beat. 

‘Your idiot.’ 

You frown. 

‘Not mine.’ You correct firmly. 

Then nothing. A part of you gets tense. 

Did you ruin it? If so, then was it for the best? 

But those thoughts vanish when you finally see the light flash again. 

‘Are you okay?’  

Now it was your turn to give pause. Were you okay? 

Your hands trembled around the mirrors as fresh tears fell. This was a pivotal moment. You could feel it. 

The air felt like it had been sealed in an invisible vacuum. Static silently building within…  

You look toward where you came from.

Neither Landau has come for you… 

Too busy bickering, no doubt. 

You lightly bite down on your tongue to try and stop the tears but it’s futile. 

‘Not okay.’

The next response is so quick that you nearly miss it.

‘SOS?’

You tense. 

Your next response will be huge for what happens next… 

‘SOS?’ He asks again. “...” 

No. The pain is too much. You want out. 

‘SOS.’ 

You wait a few minutes there for a response or anything… but there’s nothing. Your shoulders drop with regret at showing even a hint of your vulnerability to an ex of all people. He probably just found your pain entertaining. Maybe he was taking pictures on his phone right now.

Well, might as well give him the best shot. 

You weep quietly from where you lean against the railing… only to feel a sudden rumble from the west side of the manor. It… felt like the kind of shockwaves a bomb gives. 

Did he just-?! 

The clanking of metallic armor stomping down the halls fills your ears as commands are shouted at length. You debate leaving the balcony but now you’re scared. What if you’ve been lured into a trap? What if you’ll be made the scapegoat? What if-

“Hey there.” 

You turn to see the dual dagger-wielding rogue lifting himself with ease over the railing. You were at least three stories high… Had he really just scaled all of that on his own? 

Those enchanting green eyes capture you in an instant as they seem equally mesmerized to see you again. A relieved smile spreads across his face as he tilts his head. 

“Heard you wanted a swift exit?” 

AN: *sipping on Bicardi* Wow. I did not expect to write this… Thank you magic bat. 

For those of you that made it this far, thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed it! 

This could continue but we'll see. Love Triangles are pretty fun though, eh?

[cryingpariah]

My One Piece Oc Jackie's opinions on people and organizations in OP

The Strawhats: she really likes them! Be able to visit them even if just for a moment make her work day infinitely better. She knows as a member of the press she has a duty to be unbiased buttt nobody actually follows that so it’s fine. Though she knows that the race to the top is anyone’s game, if she had a personal favourite that was no one’s business but hers.

The Heart Pirates: she can tell how much their captain distrusts her and she respects it in all honestly. He never turns her away anyhow so it’s never an issue and the crew has an infectious sense of humour and camaraderie. They crowd around her and ask for all the juicy gossip the Grandline and New World has to offer and she must say, they make a perfect audience.

The Kid Pirates: like Trafalgar Law, Eustass Captain Kid does not trust Jackie a bit but he also knows the weight of the power of information has so he plays nice. His new strategy lately trying to recruit her, he has found no current success on that front. His promises are many and varied: money (she had plenty of savings), protection (she was an excellent fighter thank you very much), incessant asks from their little winged pirate-to-be (tempting but Big News waits for no man, woman, or mink).

The Seven Warlords of the Sea: she thinks the the entire idea of the Warlord system is stupid and can be too easily taken advantage of by cruel and powerful pirates (and it was..twice). She also think the pirates who join are somewhat sellouts. Isn’t the whole appeal of being a pirate is playing by no one’s rules but your own? Choosing to join the Marines, even adjacently, feels like a cop out to her. The only exceptions in her eyes are Pirate Empress Boa Hancock and First Son of the Sea Jimbei since they so obviously joined to save their people.

(Her personal rankings go something like Jimbei, Boa, Mihawk, Crocodile, Gecko Moria, Donquixote Doflamingo.)

(Kuma remains unranked so far, something in her gut tells her there’s more than meets the eyes with the Tyrant.)

The Admirals: she understands for genuinely world ending threats they are a needed force but for anything below that feels like complete overkill. Whenever she’s at Marineford she usually gets dragged into doing some secretarial work for them which depending on who it is can range from an honestly pleasent interaction to her fantasizing about shoving his head through a electric meat grinder.

(Her ranking goes Fujitora, Kuzan, Kizaru, Akainu, and then Ryokugu.)

The Underworld: hates it and the overwhelming majority of people involved in it. To be fair there’s nothing to like about it anyway, it’s a swirling cesspool of the worst humanity has to offer (yes that includes her too). Other than her boss Stussy is the only one she can tolerate.

Big News Morgan: likes him because they’re so similar and hates him because they’re too similar. She’s grateful for him taking her in and she loves her job but she also knows he just kinda sucks?? As a person?? If she thinks about it too hard it makes her dizzy with indecision so she tries not to.

Red Haired Pirates: The weird drunk uncles of the sea, they loved snatching her hat away to ruffle her hair and asking her to join in on whatever merry pirate ditty they happened to be belting out, she declined and instead procured an instrument to jam along with. Shanks was easily one of the most convoluted individuals she’s ever met, she’s dying to know what makes him tick even though she knows he’ll never tell her. A girl can dream, can’t she?

Dark King Rayleigh + Former Empress Shakky: she’s in awe of them! She practically begs to hear his tales of his time as the right hand man to the King of the Pirates and her anecdotes as ruler of the Amazon Lily! Rayleigh usually acquiesces but occasionally he (and Shakky) like to tease her for her eagerness but she can’t help it!! They’re just so cool!!

Whitebeard Pirates: if she’s there, it’s always for a big order and a big order usually means either weapons restock or a party. The members of the Whitebeard pirates always seem worried about her, offering hot meals and checkups while she’s there and threatening to head up to the WE NEWS blimp whenever she complains about work. She doubles down, acts extremely cheery the next time she sets foot on the Moby Dick and it works…mostly. Edward Newgate, father to dozens of wayward souls can’t be tricked with a child’s lie.

Big Mom Pirates: she had the pleasure of meeting Charlotte Linlin shortly after being taken in so she got Mom mode for 2.5 years. The Charlottes have taken to her in all their years of business together and are delightful hosts when she visits. It probably helps that she shares a birthday with a Sweet Commander so they love to invite her to Whole Cake Island to celebrate together!

Beast Pirates: she actively has to be forced to go to Wano, the SMILE Fruits users give her the heebie jeebies! Not to mention once when discussing some newly produced and shipped North Blue scotch The King of Beasts had called for her and, while incredibly drunk, started rambling to her about his lack of willingness to live. It went on for a while before a Tobi Roppo member found them and escorted her out. Easily the longest 20 mins of her life…

Blackbeard Pirates: truly and wholly detests them, especially their captain. She keeps a calm and indifferent mask on when she has to interact with them but she refuses niceties. Teach is offended by this and loudly recalls memories of how sweet and accommodating she was back on the Moby Dick whenever she’s in earshot.

Cross Guild: the business model of placing bounties on Marines for even civilians to collect and then when said civilians are marked as criminals welcoming them into the group is ingenious! She’s surprised no one has thought of it before. The idea of Buggy being its head with Sir Crocodile and Dracule Mihawk acting as his wings is laughable. There’s not a snowball’s chance in hell that just happened! Now if she could only get 5 mins alone with the Genius Jester, she’s sure she can get the real story…

The Revolutionary Army: if she wasn’t very dedicated to her current job, she could definitely see herself as a member. Conflicts of interest to her lifestyle aside, she really wants them to succeed and is usually the one pushing for their stories to be the front page. If she ever spots some Revs on a mission she’ll, despite her curiosity, leave them to their work. And if a stray arrows happens to knock aside some marines and move some slaves away from a nearby explosion…well who’s to say it was her? Forgery is on the rise lately yknow? You can never be too sure…

[kinnporsche]

okay, because there are so many talented writers in this fandom, i decided to make a little rec list of the incredible fics (all by different authors) that i’ve read recently—likely to be the first list of many! all of the fics in this list are completed (though if it’s a series it may not be yet) but the next list i put out will most likely be wips to help spread the love around! the list order is according to length, from longest to shortest! make sure you read the tags, and check out all these authors further because they’re all so amazing! [part 1/?]

— blue blood by ahdriking – explicit / 121.6k words

In the dark, low places of the underworld is a club called Sang Bleu, a place where the depraved and the debauched can enjoy themselves with reckless abandon, and enjoy the brutal fights that take place in the infamous pit. Kinn finds himself amongst them, invited by the owner to celebrate a newly formed alliance. He doesn’t expect to be entertained by the mindless violence and spectacle, until the next match is announced; a fight to the death, in his honor.

And then he appears; the Phoenix, a man with golden skin and dark eyes and a saunter in his step that makes Kinn’s blood hot. He doesn’t stand a chance, not against an opponent twice his size, but the arrogant jut of his chin says he believes otherwise. For the first time in a long time, Kinn feels intrigued. Against his better judgement, he places a bet.

— but you’re everywhere (yes you are) by fortunehasgivenup – explicit / 92.4k words

What if Porsche, upon remembering the kiss on the pier, went to Kinn and said that he remembered? What if there was no diamond auction? What if they’d had a different start? Would it make them any softer?

(No.)

— paperwork promises by surrealsunday – explicit / 80.5k words

Filing paperwork and tending to the needs of rich, stuffy executives was never Porsche’s dream career, but a job is a job. That job is made a lot less easy—but maybe a bit more interesting—when the boss he’s been avoiding since that very first day in the elevator, gets a lapful of coffee and an eyeful of Porsche. Just when Porsche was getting used to the monotony of the every day…

— the king’s tree by luckydragon – explicit / 78.5k words

Kinn was seven when he woke up one morning to discover a small silver circle on the back of his left wrist.

— between the sheets by daswarschonkaputt – explicit / 70.5k words

“And who’s that?”

“Oh. That’s Porsche. He’s Khun Kinn’s live-in boytoy. He’s harmless, mostly. Just a pretty face.”

(A boyfriend can go so many places a bodyguard can’t. As the threat of a potential leak in their security forces looms large, Khun Korn hatches a plot to place an added layer of protection around his heir presumptive. Enter Porsche, former bartender, current bodyguard, and reluctant fake boyfriend of Kinn Theerapanyakul.)

— crimson clover by daltoneering – explicit / 52.4k words

Kinn falls silent, holding his gaze for a long, uninterrupted moment. Sizing him up. Porsche meets his stare defiantly, squaring his shoulders and lifting his chin. He won’t let Kinn know how much he is internally quaking about what he’s agreeing to do, or how much it aches to think that he doesn’t even know when he’ll see Chay again. He’s doing this for Chay. He’s doing this to save him. (Or: Porsche reluctantly agrees to help the mafia out on a quick job at a diamond auction, because he’s desperate and probably also insane. As it turns out, he’s signed up for a lot more than he bargained for.)

— i’m the one for your fire ‘series by kurtstiel – explicit / 48.4k words

This series is canon compliant with the exception of Kinn and Porsche being in an established Dom/sub relationship. All parts can be read as a stand-alone.

— for you (i’d burn the world to the ground) by cuteandtwisted – mature / 41.8k words

Porsche is Kinn’s most vicious bodyguard. Feared by most and respected by all, he flinches at nothing and fears no one. (And if he feels his knees give out whenever Kinn enters the room, then nobody has to know.)

(Or: AU where Porsche grew up at the compound after his parents died serving the main family and spent his childhood/teenage years annoying his way into Kinn’s thoughts (and heart), before an ‘incident’ turned him into Kinn’s most lethal weapon.)

— you picked a dance with the devil, you lucked out by aby01 – explicit / 34k words

Feral alphas are devastatingly violent, brutally vicious and absolutely loyal. To have one under your control means great power. Kinn has been looking for his own for years now. He just didn’t think he’d find it in a mouthy beta that tricks him out of his favorite watch.

— la fortissimo ‘series by mirrorofprinces – explicit / 23.1k words

Moments during episodes 2-5 when Kinn and Porsche could have (should have?) hooked up, if Kinn was just a little meaner about it.

— nfwmb by vesna (mrsronweasley) – mature / 18.8k words

There’s a rushing in Kinn’s ears, a noise he can’t shake. It almost makes him miss the next thing Arm tells him. “He was supposed to check in, as per protocol, but—”

“But what,” Kinn snaps. A headache is building behind one of his eyes.

Arm’s eyes are wide right before he lowers them and says, “He hasn’t been heard from in two and a half hours.”

(Or: Porsche is kidnapped. Kinn goes through it.)

— show me yours, i’ll show you mine ‘series by sirvaria – explicit / 15.8k words

Kinn and Porsche having fun in and outside of bed.

— heartlines ‘series by oliviacirce – explicit / 5.8k words

Kinn and Porsche communicate through sex. (Or: connected PWPs set during the one month time skip in episode 14.)

— stuck when you get sweet by butterflylungs – explicit / 3.2k words

There’s a hunger nipping at his heels that begs him to cling to Kinn, to climb under the other man’s skin and make a home for himself there; no matter what he does, the feeling has never gone away since he met Kinn.

(Or: Kinn takes Porsche home to continue what they started.)

— your teeth round my organs by androktasia – explicit / 3.1k words

“Aren’t you meant to finger me?” Porsche asks, breathless, as Kinn smears lube around the rim of his hole. Kinn looks up, pausing his movements, and Porsche shifts slightly, almost unconsciously, as though trying to get him inside.

“Where did you hear that?” Kinn asks.  

“I watched some porn,” Porsche says, and Kinn raises an eyebrow at him, unimpressed. He remembers the kind of porn Porsche likes—shrieking women lying back and taking it from coarse, grunting men. “Gay porn,” Porsche clarifies after a moment.

[msweebyness]

MiracOlympus HC’s

Here’s some HC’s for the Godly kids of MiracOlympus! Enjoy! @artzychic27 @imsparky2002

Kim, Nathaniel and Adrien set aside an hour every week to go down to Tartarus and just troll the heck out of their dad.

As the goddess of marriage and family, Marinette often attends mortal weddings. If the ceremony brings her to tears, it’s said the marriage will be a lasting and loving one.

Lila has an enchanted golden apple that she uses to cause trouble amongst mortals and immortals alike. It’s so beautiful that most can’t help wanting it.

The festival that gets held every year to celebrate Rose is basically Ancient Greek Pride. People of all romantic, sexual and gender identities are welcome and celebrate together. Rose herself makes an appearance every year in her powered-down goddess form.

Let’s get one thing straight. Nathaniel did NOT kidnap Marc. He went to the Underworld entirely of his own free will, and the only reason Mylene freaked out was because Lila intercepted the letter Marc sent his sister about his whereabouts. Got it? Good.

The muses put on a weekly performance for the other gods and attendance is pretty much mandatory. They put so much work into it.

Nathaniel, Anthony and Staci are called the ‘Gloom Squad’ due to residing in the Underworld. They have entire conversations just comprising of them saying morbid and ominous shit.

Luka and Juleka have a special mental link that allows them to find one another at any time when they recite a certain incantation.

Whenever a new deity is born, they are presented before the Fates (Bustier, Mendeliev, and Winters), who announce them and determine what domain they will rule over.

Some of the godly kids were born in WEIRD ways. For example, Rose came out of the sea in a shell, and Max burst out of his mom’s head!

Nino was kidnapped by mortal pirates once, and escaped through the power of sheer prank genius.

Many of the god-kids have animal companions that are very dear to them. To name a few, Adrien has his eagle, Liiri, and Marinette has her peacock, Duusu. Juleka has the deer that pull her chariot, and Max has Markov, his faithful owl. Marc and Nath have Baark, the three-headed guard dog of the Underworld.

As benevolent as they generally are, it’s still a BAD idea for mortals to insult the gods. They are still the rulers of the world and you’ll treat them with respect if you know what’s good for you. Some mortals have learned that the hard way, like the woman Max turned into a spider for insulting his engineering skills, or the queen whose children were turned into woodland animals by Juleka and Luka because she had dared say she was a better mother than Anarka because she had more kids.

Ivan often feels a bit insecure about not being as conventionally attractive as the other deities, with his hulking size, bad eye (forge accident, he wears a patch), crippled knee (he uses a brace), and surly features, but Mylene and the others are quick to reassure him that he’s beautiful inside and out, just like everything he makes is.

For the life of him, Kim cannot stop misplacing his trident. Seriously, someone put a tracker on that thing.

Marinette, Ondine and Marc have regular meet-ups for tea where they just exchange gossip and be fabulous immortal queens.

Juleka’s arrows are enchanted so they cause no pain to the animals she shoots with them, and she never kills any more than she needs to. She cares immensely for creatures of the forest.

Eclipses happen when Chloe and Zoe have a particularly intense argument.

Brecken can understand the languages of all animals, and regularly mediates disagreements between the other gods and their pets.

Lucien and Emani are no longer welcome on Olympus. I’ll let you guess the reasons for that.

All of the gods regularly have meetups on Olympus for lunch. It’s like a big crazy family reunion.

Eri scares the crap out of everyone but they generally know she means no harm. The only ones who aren’t scared of her are the Gloom Squad and Juleka.

Alix gets like half an hour of sleep because she’s always trying to get things done and the other gods are always on her ass about this.

Ismael is an absolute menace on April 1st. No one is safe from his reign of terror. No one.

He also bleats when he's upset.

Leave your thoughts in the comments and belongs!

[doevademe]

I originally had planned for this prompt to be about Percy and Nico remembering they were lovers in a previous life and trying to work through that, but the characters (especially Nico) resisted that plot. Oh well, maybe some other time.

Some other time has come. You can’t just tell us about this magnificent idea and not elaborate!

(It’s the notes from Mixing up the Routine)

Oh, now that takes me back.

Okay, so quick background on my WIPs: I have a lot of them. Some of them transform over and over until they become unrecognizable when I finally publish them. Some barely change and get published with just a few minor changes from their early stages, and some never see the light of day due to plot or characterization problems (or because I know fans would hunt me for sport with some of my more controversial ideas).

My fic about Percico as reincarnated lovers belongs to the latter category. Whenever I try to develop it, I hit a roadblock in either the plot department or the characters remaining in character means the story grinds to a halt. I've tried to rework it multiple times, but I've never been able to get it right. However, if you want, I can give out the latest outline for the story under the Read More, especially since I'm sure I'll never actually write it out.

The conflict starts with Percy and Nico having dreams about their past lives, where they see a person they are in love with (who they are changes a lot each attempt, sometimes they're both men, sometimes a man and a woman, once they were even two women). At first, they think this dreams are random and unimportant, but they are persistent, and once they realize it's their past lives, they become obsessed with finding the other.

Nico theorizes that he's getting these memories now because he's nearing the age when his past life met their lover, and thinks that him having those dreams means they can find each other again. He goes on an underworld adventure, trying to find some way to track his past lover.

Percy, meanwhile, is having an identity crisis. He's falling in love with a memory, while being days away from his wedding with whom he thought until just recently was his one true love, but how he feels for his past live lover... it makes this whole thing feel shallow and petty. He's also sad because Nico has been acting weird, and he knows he won't make it to his wedding, and that just hurts.

Nico appears before Percy the very day he calls off the wedding, and they are both confused. Percy was sure Nico would be away for longer, and Nico believed he was shadow traveling to his past life lover. Nico finally explains his absence and Percy realizes who they are to each other but... he doesn't feel for Nico the same as he did for past life lover, so what gives? Why is that?

Cue an investigation about what's happening, ending up with Percy and Nico realizing this isn't their second life. It's their third. Both times, they have found each other, and their love has made them as miserable as they have been happy. They always end up in tragedy and Percy had decided enough was enough.

It's revealed that before their last life began, Percy lied and said they'll go together like last time, but when Nico jumped into the Lethe to be reborn, and Percy didn't follow. Nico was born decades before Percy because of that. Then, he asked Aphrodite (in some drafts his mother, in other drafts through his father Hermes) to make sure he didn't fall in love with Nico in this life. To block out the feelings.

Once they learn this, Percy is convinced he did the right thing, because what happened to Nico while he was in love with him? Just pain and tragedy. Maybe it's for the best that they remain separated this life, give Nico a full life for once.

And here's where I hit a roadblock, because continuing from this to a happy ending requires Nico to fight to convince Percy they can be together, that this time will be different, but the thing is... why? Why would Nico want to fight for them when he feels like he's the only one with feelings in this life? What argument could be strong enough to compel Percy to undo the block? Only he can unlock his heart. Nico could ask Aphrodite, but that would be no different from forcing Percy to love him. The characters resist this plot having a happy ending, and I want this plot to have one.

So yeah, this is where I'm stuck, and any iteration of the reincarnation has been met with similar issues. I still like this plot a lot, but I really can't make it work, no matter how much I try.

[winns-stuff]

Alright, new chapter and it's okay. I am tried of fertility goddess lore. I never liked the plot point in the first place, so it lost it's luster fast, but whatever. I will say I am on the fence about the jealously thing. It feels unessesary in the grand scheme of things. Honestly, I am all for communication even if it's about dumb emotions that we feel but don't approve of. However, I think Persephone has always been a jealous charaters especially before they were dating with Minthe. I am happy it's being addressed, snd she's been jealous before about Hera. I think. She's been insecure, and I think we could talk about her insecurities, but it felt very meh. Don't know how to feel. Just like...whatever. Also, also, I do like moth Hades. I think since he can't really intimidate people in this form, which is always a huge problem in the series, I almost prefer it.

I agree with you, it feels very weird that we’re focusing on Hades and Persephone when Kronos literally has a child hostage in Tartarus that they both know about and even told Hera about it. I’m not sure why they’re still walking around like everything is fine honestly and that’s one of the reasons why I hate the drama in LO, whenever Rachel adds it there’s like one or two chapters about it and then we go back to Persephone and Hades fluff. You can’t just add a huge plot point in your comic and then ignore it entirely for the sake of your romance it doesn’t make sense with the context of the story. Especially with Hades, what happened to his huge monumental trauma about Kronos escaping and coming back for him?? He has literal chapters dedicated on telling us how scared he is of Kronos and how much he terrorized him but the minute that he gains the information that he’s back and could possibly break out again he leaves the Underworld unsecured just to accompany Persephone to a date she should’ve just denied.

Speaking of that date it was so stupid, if this was Minthe accepting a date from Thanatos while officially in a relationship with Hades and he didn’t approve of it everyone would absolutely riot and say that Persephone is better. But now we see Hades not being comfortable with the fact that she even got a letter telling her to go on a date with him and she just completely ignores his worries and doesn’t talk to him about while also accepting it. It doesn’t make sense and I’m sure the only reason why Ares didn’t try anything is because Rachel didn’t want Persephone to look like a bad partner which genuinely I believe she is. Bottom line is that they need way more communication.

[fictionkinfessions]

Being Achilles is… weird.

I’ve already grieved. Back in the day, when I first lost him and my rage was what won us the war. I grieved extremely unhealthily, I caused bloodshed, I caused pain, I caused countless souls to take their one way trip to hades early. While it did feel like a massive relief to get all that raw heartbreak out, it also turned me into the worst version of myself. Then I go and get myself shot, killed and sent to the underworld. And for a long, long time, I couldn’t face him. I was ashamed of who I’d become, I was convinced he’d never want to see my face again. For years, years and years I stood in that hall and reflected on everything that lead me to this point. Dead and depressed, traumatised and full of guilt. It took me a long time to process it, but eventually I turned into this apathetic shade of a man known for his rage and whenever someone would come to me for advice on bravery and conquest I’d just tell them to never turn out like I did. Fight for your loved ones yes, but don’t become a bloodthirsty, revenge seeking monster like I did. It’ll wreck you. I came to see him as a past lover, someone I still held dear but would likely never see again. A fond, bittersweet memory.

And then I saw him again. And truth be told, I didn’t know what to feel. There was all that guilt again, but I was also in tears with joy that I could finally say sorry in person and say I love you even if it was for one final time before he told me I was a monster and never wanted to see me again. By the grace of the gods, things just… went back to normal. The normal before the war and before the bloodshed. When we were just dumb kids getting into trouble while we took a break from training.

And now, I’m ripped away from it all again and placed into a system to protect a group of people from all walks of life. Sharing a body, sharing traumas and feelings. And yet this time… I didn’t need to grieve. I already did, I’d lost him one, loosing him again didn’t hit me as hard. Like I’d let all that anger and sadness out back in my warrior days and there was just none left. Of course I miss him dearly, but I’ve come to accept, I’ll probably never see him again this time.

Patroclus if you’re out there, I know you know this already but just remember that I love you, that I’m sorry for everything that happened during that stupid fucking war, that no matter where you may be, I’ll always support you in spirit. And please, find peace without me. I don’t think I’ll ever be fully at peace without you, so you do what I can’t ok? For your own sake. I love you, I always will. Don’t remember me as the bloodthirsty monster I became. Remember me as the stupid crybaby kid you’d have stick sword fights with after training. Back when it just just us, the big wide world, and no one to ever tear us apart.

x

[casliveblog]

Custom Toonami Block Week 175 Rundown

The Witch from Mercury: So IMMEDIATELY after Sul’s duel with Gaston everyone goes ‘wait aren’t the suits that suck the life out of you banned because our war chief is a bloodthirsty dictator?’ and she immediately gets arrested and kicked out of school. Meanwhile Mio’s been told that she’s no longer forced to marry the school’s top pilot and her father is cutting out the middleman and just arranging a marriage for her which she’s like what 16 even for a high business monarchy style thing it seems a little early to lock that down that hard. Also just kinda wondering what the point of even playing at the ‘oh it’s whoever the best is’ if you’re just gonna immediately cut the façade whenever it’s someone you don’t want like why not just force a marriage from the start. Anyway Mio’s like ‘bitch I wanted to marry the gay girl how dare you take back your orders and give me new ones’ like she doesn’t like being told what to do but explicitly seemed a lot more chill about it when it was Sul. Gaston gets beaten by his father for losing and we allude to him being slightly less shitty than we were initially led to believe since he did send some people to clean up Mio’s garden. The bigwigs are all having a NERV-style meeting of shadowy figures and our resident obligatory Masked Gundam Character Prospera is like ‘yeah it looks and functions exactly like a Gundam but it didn’t suck her soul out so it can’t be one, right?’ and no one’s fucking buying that and also it’s a bunch of old men high on their own power so they’re just like ‘well you’re under arrest for building something that functions exactly like the thing we banned then’. Meanwhile Mio shows up, redicrecting her escape attempt to Earth to save Sul and telling her father off and basically having a badass teenage tantrum in a shareholder’s meeting, like it’s kinda cool how blatantly petty and personal her grievances are that it takes some balls to bring it up the way she does surrounded by the most important people in the world that just sentenced a masked lady to jail for technically not breaking the law. She challenges her dad to fight the Aerial and reinstate her engagement to Sul which he has absolutely no obligation to accept given idk if Corporations should really work on Klingon rules anyway and if you’re gonna take shit from him say if you win you get the whole company, go big or go home. But the group discusses that the illegal suit is pretty dope and they wanna get some more data out of it so they agree to let Sul fight to save her Gundam and her lesbian fiancée so that’s good.  

Inuyasha The Final Act: Inuyasha and co. are still soaking in Kikyo’s death and Koga gets an admittedly nice sendoff where he gets to leave on good terms with Kagome as well as get enough out of a rise out of Inuyasha to snap him out of his post-Kikyo coma and get him to resolve to make Koga’s sacrifice worthwhile. I like how Koga intentionally says the most triggering shit just to piss him off at this point like he’s really become self-aware as a character and knows what his role is. Also as another character that embodies the ‘the power to achieve your dreams is inside you’ moral of the story he started out seeking the jewel to obtain the power to unite the wolf demon tribes and ends up so strong that losing his jewel shards is basically just a minor inconvenience and ends up in a relationship that does in fact unite the fractured parts of the tribes. Meanwhile Sesshomaru is talking to his mom about trying to master Meidou Zangetsuha and ends up getting Kohaku and Rin dragged into the underworld during the training. I feel like Sesshomaru’s mom is such wasted potential like she has so little screentime and is basically a plot device they could’ve done so much more with. Once she reveals that Rin can’t be revived again by the Tenseiga Sesshomaru’s grief and compassion evolves both the healing and the meidou side of Tenseiga so he can purify a hundred souls as it was originally stated and create a much larger Meidou Zangetsuha, though Rin still has to be brought back with Mommymaru’s necklace of convenience. It’s really funny that Jaken takes it upon himself to be Sesshomaru’s emotion translator at this point since he knows he’s stoic enough not to cry when Rin dies despite wanting to and also won’t  thank his mom for saving her despite being thankful. Last but not least she tells Kohaku he also can’t be saved by Tenseiga in case people were starting to think that now that he and Sesshomaru are together, apparently you only get one free get out of death free card regardless of the source so yeah. Inuyasha’s group make it their new mission to hunt down and protect Kohaku so they can figure out what to do now that Naraku has 99.9% of the jewel.  

Castlevania: So I’mma be honest, this is where the Internal Vampire politics get kinda frustrating, like I’ve had it in the back of my head that all this infighting may just be a way to ruin Dracula’s otherwise impregnable plan and have a heroic victory while both evil sides are fighting each other and I’m still worried about that considering we’ve spent more time with them than with Trevor this season but in this episode we even find out that all the shit Carmilla wants to do Dracula would’ve just let her do anyway like he doesn’t give a shit, she wants to usurp his armies and the one move that she’s been gunning for since she walked in the door they’re just like ‘sure go nuts’ and the planning of the past like three episodes has basically been for that. I’m getting ahead of myself, Trevor’s group stuff first since we actually make some progress on that this episode. Basically Alucard gives Sypha the reverse speech that Trevor gave her last time about how he’s a dick and they can’t really trust him and like 75% of this show at this point is untrustworthy vampires telling people they can’t trust people. Sypha wisely asserts they’re both morons and they’ve gotta suck it up and get to world-saving or else everyone’s fucked. But yeah back on Carmilla’s weird warpath they don’t know Godbrand’s dead and Isaac is called by Hector to get him to sign off on going to Braila and get in on the Carmilla cult. Isaac is not down for Carmilla but he is for the Braila plan since it means everyone can shut up about it and Carmilla can stop whining so the politics of it don’t functionally matter, like it’s been such a long fight for this and it doesn’t functionally matter because they just do it anyway. Granted Isaac does it because it means their traitors are all in one place with a name and a face and Hector does it because everyone that talks to Carmilla is like ‘Carmilla is always going on about how she doesn’t trust or respect anyone but I’M DIFFERENT, I’M THE SPECIAL ONE’ like Godbrand was a fucking moron so that was fine but geez she’s not even being seductive enough for them to be thinking with their dicks they’re just idiots, she’s not even good at the manipulation considering if she’d just asked Dracula to do it he’s so done at this point he prolly would’ve. She doesn’t even bother to pretend this was Hector’s independent idea and follows him into the room coaching him and shit. Like the only functional thing this does is make Carmilla the Commander in Chief for this fight for… some reason, and like it’s not even a good argument because the two sides are ‘do something’ and ‘do nothing’ and Carmilla has the balls to be all ‘haha now you’re in too deep Hector so I don’t have to pretend to like you anymore’ like BITCH AS LEAST WAIT TILL YOU ACTUALLY HAVE THE REINS like holy shit all you did was convince Dracula to do something he wasn’t all that adverse to doing in the first place you’re not exactly Sosuke Aizen and she has this weird girl power bent to some of her speeches and I’d really rather girls just do the badass girl power thing instead of talking about how girly and empowered they are all the time. Long story short I don’t really like Carmilla and this plot had a really weird end to this section of the season for basically taking up half the runtime. Meanwhile, actual girl power girl Sypha found a way to trap Castlevania in one place as long as she can jerry-rig an ending to the spell that’s like 80% done but she doesn’t have a lot of time because the castle just showed up like… five minutes ago.

Jujutsu Kaisen: It’s Mahito versus Nobara time and apparently Mahito’s clone can’t transfigure souls and can only do the Clayface body warping shit and Nobara actually figures this out and uses the clone’s body as a substitute Straw Doll like she did with the other guy’s arm cause semantically the clone is basically Mahito’s arm and she wrecks him up from long distance, saving Yuji from an ambush in the process and giving him the opportunity to beat the shit out of Mahito while he’s stunlocked. Rather than keep going through that shit, Mahito employs the Joestar Family’s Secret Technique and books it the fuck out of there. The two Mahitos actually meet up and switch, the real one attacking Nobara while Yuji beats the other one’s head in. Mahito gives Nobara’s face a quick tap and isn’t sure if he killed her, like this whole exchange is excruciatingly vague about whether she’s dead or not but we jump straight into her backstory which isn’t a good sign. It’s basically a fleshed-out version of the story she told in the beginning of the series. I feel like this happens a lot where characters in long-running series have simple backstories at the beginning and then have a secondary supplemental flashback to beef up the tragedy or reframe the original flashback, half the cast of One Piece has done this at this point but for Nobara it’s an interesting retelling of her story through the eyes of her friends and giving a ‘this is your life’ type deal about who she’s loved and why she’s done what she’s done that gives a lot better of an idea of who she is than her original introduction. But yeah her eye fucking explodes which is weirdly not how we’ve seen Mahito’s powers work anywhere else but it was just a light tap while he was in a hurry and maybe her energy resisted it or something. Given that and the vagueness where even Mahito’s not sure if it was enough to kill her I’m tempted to say she’s not dead because usually you don’t want to be ambiguous about that shit unless you’re gearing up for a big return but as far as I know the manga’s already fighting Sukuna at this point and she’s yet to make a comeback so who fucking knows.

Delicious in Dungeon: After Laios’s sword gets busted he tells the story of how he got it fighting a bunch of living armor in the dungeon and how he fucked up and died the first time, confirming that death does indeed have no consequences which explains Marcille’s dialogue in the first episode and why no one seems too worried about rushing to get Falin. Still I’d say if death has no consequences in your series that’s something you’d want to establish right away because that is kind of an investment breaker, something like how DBZ put limits on the dragon balls at first and made loopholes harder so death isn’t just meaningless like it is in the Buu Saga. Still I kinda like this episode since it’s mainly focused on one thing and the food stuff doesn’t get in the way of the storytelling too much. They manage to sneak past the living armor colony and Laios fights Ornstein and it turns out it’s a bunch of mollusks living in the layers of the armor and doing weird goopy Alphonse Elric shit. They cook them and Laios gets Ornstein’s sword but it has a mollusk living inside it still so he’s basically got a living weapon which is pretty neat.

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End: Frieren confronts Aura and surprisingl the Autistic Elf Power Hour has its second encounter with Living Armor this week, what’re the odds? Aura basically has the Millenium Scales except instead of summoning a demon to eat a Musuem Curator she weighs their power level and just instantly controls anyone weaker than her with the caveat that if someone stronger than her shows up she just automatically gets controlled instead. I’m kinda sad this means Aura doesn’t actually have a demon army like this was just a plot by four guys and not a whole organized force but I guess it’s fine. She uses an anti-spell spell to dispel the control instead of blasting nameless husks into the ground and desecrating their corpses because Himmel yelled at her last time for disrespecting the dead. Aura asks her why she cares what a corpse thinks and oh it is ON now. Meanwhile Fern and Stark are preparing for Stark to book it out of dodge and try and get Frieren back to fight the other two demons when they get caught in an ambush by Blood Sephiroth and the little girl. Turns out the little girl’s powers are Unlimited Blade Works/Sharingan shenanigans where she can create a weapon and mimic a fighting style by watching it enough and she’s just so happened to have copied Eisen’s style during the first war and decks Stark with his own moves but better. Meanwhile it seems Fern’s ability is Quick Draw and she can just fire off spells crazy rapid and puts the push on Blood Sephiroth in a really cool fight that creates literal fireworks. Stark takes Eisen’s words of “Just don’t die, stupid” to heart and does that thing from Samurai Champloo where if you leave yourself wide open enough it leaves the enemy wide open for their counterattack and destroys the little girl so yay, two down two to go.

Vinland Saga: War has reached Ketil’s farm and he’s got about 300 farners with pitchforks versus Canute’s 100 Jommvikings and Royal Theigns so yeah it’s basically the coughing baby versus the hydrogen bomb. Luckily Thorfinn’s met up with Leif and Leif’s a fucking chad and agrees to take on all of Thorfinn’s extra baggage he’s gathered over the past season and transport Arnheid out of there while the fighting’s going on. Snake tells his men that Ketil is a fraud and was never a war hero because he knew the guy his name was actually based on and came to him for help but at the same time he feels indebted to the family that’s taken care of him all this time and it’s really funny to watch his speech about how Ketil’s a fraud and not worth dying over right as he goes out to die for him fires his men up more than anything, like actions really do speak louder than words. Ketil’s kinda bought into his own hype at this point and isn’t listening to the dozens of people telling him he’s going into a meatgrinder and yeah it’s a fucking massacre, I imagined Thorfinn would be more upset watching this or trying to actively broker peace talks but I guess he’s got other shit on his plate right now since Arnheid’s on death’s door and got her ghost husband’s permission to go say her last goodbyes. Meanwhile Thorgil’s just gonna pop out of the ocean buck naked with a sword and try and cut Canute’s head off behind enemy lines so that’s… a plan I guess. I have no clue how he intends to get out of there even if he succeeds but okay, you do your naked regicide.

[rotworld]

i hope the new year has been kind to you !! please don’t feel pressure to write. take time to rest well. i go back and reread old pieces of yours all the time! i admire your writing a lot and wanted to ask if you had any more advice about writing .. am excited for whatever you post, whenever it is you post it ^__^ your sandman fic is so evocative and interesting.. the prose is so .. thick in a glutinous dough kind of way.. i don’t know where it’ll go.. thank you again!

thank you and happy new year! so far so good lol i’m with family and very happy. i appreciate your patience and understanding. while i am working on stuff again, i’m also sort of stranded away from home until the later part of this month lol so my schedule is a bit strange.

as for writing advice, here are some exercises to try!

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->rewrite a classic: china mieville wrote four final orpheuses, a short story which explores four different reasons why orpheus failed in his quest to bring eurydice back from the underworld. these range from a moment of weakness to simple human error and tell radically different stories about their relationship and his state of mind in just a few brief snippets. 

find a story like a classic myth or fairy tale and rewrite it in ways that resonate with you. change the ending, reinterpret the characters, or focus on a different perspective. if you’re not sure what to do, try coming up with questions you want answered or alternate possibilities: how did marya morevna first defeat and capture koschei the deathless? what does the sea witch get up to when mermaids aren’t pestering her to see the surface world? hope is the last thing in the box pandora opens; what does it look like, and what does she do with it?

->imitate another writer’s style: i made a post one time about voice and said you shouldn’t feel pressure to change it, but i also think going out of your way to emulate another writer for an exercise can be fun and useful. for the sandman fic, i tried to imitate the “feel” and structure of gaiman’s writing. when i first read the comic, i was really amazed by how many plot threads he would juggle each arc, and how those threads would weave together in the finale, so i wanted to use that along with the more dreamy, surreal prose and absurd humor. 

find a writer or specific work that you enjoy and wouldn't mind imitating stylistically. study their voice (the aforementioned post has specific examples of what to look for) as well as how the work is structured. you could write fanfiction or something original with this exercise, but i think it’s easiest to stay in the same genre and use similar themes or aesthetics as the work you’re using for reference. 

->if you get stuck, time travel: recently i read a book on revisions (unfortunately can’t remember the title/author, i skimmed it at the star but didn't buy it) that gave advice along the lines of “if you suddenly get stuck and can’t figure out why, the problem is several sentences ago.” the thinking here is that we sometimes write ourselves into a corner without realizing it, and you need to back out of the corner by retracing your steps. you might’ve gotten bored or lost focus and that made the last few sentences really rough or go in a direction that’s hard to work with. go back a paragraph or two and reexamine what you have, cutting it entirely if need be. 

alternatively, i’ve found that if i get stuck at the very start of a piece, then the problem is where i’m choosing to start. i’ve been working on something about certain characters involved in certain illicit businesses and wanted to open with a party at a fancy venue. i was hellbent on opening with some scene-setting narration/exposition on the venue itself as the reader travels there, and i wasn't getting past the first sentence. so eventually i shifted forward. instead, the reader would have just arrived at the venue and the opening would introduce one of the characters at the party. this also just didn't work, so i moved forward even further. everyone's at the venue, the party has been going on for a while, and it starts with the reader considering the reasons they should not be at this party. what ended up working was cutting my initial, slow-paced plan and starting closer to the action, and i think that's a good idea in most situations. 

[nightprompts]

&. 𝐜𝐫𝐢𝐦𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐦𝐞𝐝 𝐬𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬.

(  an  assortment  of  dialogue  prompts  for  various  crime  /  mafia  /  detective  /  criminal  underworld  scenarios.  trigger  warning  for  dark  themes.  feel  free  to  change  as  you  seem  fit.  )

❛ i always get paid in the end, one way or another. ❜

❛ maybe you just need someone to tell you what to do. ❜

❛ i don’t think you fully understand the situation you’re in. ❜

❛ rule one: don’t get caught. ❜

❛ i do what people pay me to do. ❜

❛ consider this a professional courtesy. ❜

❛ i want us to be friends. i want us to trust each other. ❜

❛ you thought you could just fuck with us, and we wouldn’t fuck with you? ❜

❛ can we just exchange three words without you pulling a gun on me? ❜

❛ the detective’s life isn’t an easy one. but it rarely lacks for excitement. ❜

❛ i don’t have time for distractions right now. ❜

❛ tell me, what was life like on the other side? ❜

❛ so, to what do i owe this pleasure? ❜

❛ how many fights have you been in this week? ❜

❛ you want a silencer pistol? sure, if one’s on sale. ❜

❛ go ahead. you might as well finish the job. ❜

❛ can i at least buy you a drink? ❜

❛ you’re gonna get yourself killed if you keep this up. you know that, right? ❜

❛ we’re not all savages here, sweetheart. ❜

❛ the only thing that’s gonna keep you safe in this world is that gun. ❜

❛ i’ll teach you something about punishment. ❜

❛ do we have your allegiance or not? ❜

❛ why is it whenever we see each other, you’re covered in blood? ❜

❛ you wanted the truth. i've given it to you. it's up to you what you do with it. ❜

❛ you’re playing nurse to a killer, you know. ❜

❛ this your idea of laying low? ❜

❛ looks like you could use a bodyguard. ❜

❛ you look great. like a million bucks of real money. ❜

❛ working together again, it’s just like old times. ❜

❛ drink all you want, but we need to stay focused. ❜

❛ you’re like a cockroach i can’t kill. i mean it in a good way. ❜

❛ you eat, or you get eaten. animals call it survival. humans call it business. ❜

❛ i could teach you how to fight, but i wasn’t equipped to take care of you. ❜

❛ i wanted to hurt them for the way they hurt you. ❜

❛ no one’s worth a bullet between the eyes. ❜

❛ may i have my gun back? ❜

❛ who taught you how to do that? ❜

❛ i’m gonna make you an offer. one time only. ❜

❛ i had it under control. you didn’t need to do that. ❜

❛ you still have to keep up appearances. ❜

❛ the bodies he buried laid the foundation of what we are now. ❜

❛ imagine how quickly you can succeed if you just take what you want. ❜

❛ that wasn’t a punch. if i’d punched you, you’d be on the floor. ❜

❛ the choice to live an ordinary life is no longer an option for me. ❜

❛ i need you to focus on this case. not on me. can you do that? ❜

❛ you’re still an honest person. it’s the rest of the world that’s gone crooked. ❜

❛ all you need to do is exactly what i tell you to do. ❜

❛ i’ve done things i’m not proud of. i’ve hurt people and i’m going to hurt more. ❜

❛ blood money buys the best art. ❜

❛ everyone who ever helped me is dead. i don’t want that to happen to you. ❜

❛ i don’t kill people. not even scumbags like you who deserve it. ❜

❛ you treat all your ladies like this? ❜

❛ you’re not very good at retiring. ❜

❛ remember who the real enemy is. ❜

❛ you’re one of us now. nobody ever tell you that? ❜

❛ i’m the lucky one who pulled you out of the garbage. ❜

❛ if it were up to me, you would’ve been dead a long time ago. ❜

❛ everyone in that room has lived far worse than anything you’ve ever done. ❜

❛ if you’re doing it to help someone, doesn’t that make it okay? ❜

❛ you don’t get to be at the top without making enemies looking to tear you down. ❜