#you live a fascinating life

[roakkaliha]

Yeah i met this one dude thru a wc server and he asked me to join his server n i was like sure and it was all pastel goth tbhk carrd twt furriers so you know shit was gonna be insane. Anyway i bought a 10$ custom from this dude he never finished n i was like ok 🙄 and he kept like approaching me to buy other shit but this was last year before i got my current job so i was making 10/hr AND my sister was asking me for cash (now estranged) upwards of like 50$ every few weeks so i was like dude im not buying a 200$ used fursuit from you fuck off. Anyway i just started screenshottimg every convo i had in that server bc they pissed me off and would also lie about things they said like 10 min prior so id cite my sources n ppl got SOOOOO mad. Anyway there was also obvs favoritism and like this one dude went so hard for White Guy Furry Using JPN Name despite having been kicked from his bpdpolycule it was whack. Anyway they were also fatphobic like crazy and had bad takes abt a certain trial last year which was fucking HILARIOUS bc id talk about a legal part of it and theyd be like "well idk anything about that but-" SHUT UP THENNNN . Anyway the guy was gonna commission a huge piece from me but i refused to continue past a concept till i was paid the first half. (More on that later). Hed also ghost whenever i called him on anything including his poor conflict resolution skills which then got me made a mod (????) . Anyway mod chat blew up after a minor misunderstanding turned into a bloodbath bc one mod thought one of the main guys Eff Pees broke a rule and i was like OKAY OKAY OKAY IM DOING MY FINALS CAN YOU CUNTS ACT GROWN so then me and other mod got demodded and the mod chat got nuked. (But i had screenshots :)). Anyway i get a dm later from sb who knew that other mod n was like heyyyyy btw those ppl scammed others out of both money and art (comming n then ghosting) do you have all the evidence of that and also where they accused me of being a pedophile. And i was like oh boy do i.

I didnt even think it was a scam thing or whatever these people were just such insufferable cunts i ended up cataloguing vital context to the buyer beware. #paralegalslay

[starry-bi-sky]

mmmmmm read a disciple shen yuan/shizun luo binghe fanfic about two days ago where the first chapter was the Immortal Conference arc, and SQQ was the one who had to be pushed into the abyss (he was still the villain) except Luo Binghe was refusing and was like, lowkey losing his mind about SQQ being so close to the edge. SQQ ended up having to be the one to fall in himself because of the system's punishment system. The rest of the fic is leading up to that moment. But like, MMM i've been obsessively thinking about that first chapter for DAYS ever since.

now i've been in svsss for a grand total of *checks watch* a week. but god obsessed with that. I want to write/read a fic where disciple SQQ goes a little nuts down there. Like keep all of the things that make SQQ, SQQ, but just. Throw in a little bit more trauma in there. A little bit of a mental break. Let him go a little nuts as a treat. Just a tad unhinged. I wanna see him go, just a little, "god fuck it, i've tried so hard to change this shitty story's outcome and it feels like everything i've done has been for nothing. I'm going to die in this world no matter what I do, I've been doomed from the start, so might as well die the way I want to." and he just, breaks a little! Under all the stress.

He still retains the traits that makes shen yuan, shen yuan, like his overwhelming kindness. But he's just! yk. A little less patient. Paranoid. Jumpy. Colder. A little more aloof and closed off. A little more Shen Jiu. He's no asshole child abuser, but he was a Number One Hater in his past life and he's leaning into that old habit a little more now.

(On a totally coincidental not-at-all related note, there's not enough SJ-and-SY-are-the-same-people fics out there that i've found. This is totally unrelated...)

The Endless Abyss turns the mind into an over-sharpened blade, and SQQ is both fascinated and perhaps a little excited to explore a place that doesn't have a lot of info on it in the mortal realm, but still terrified out of his mind. And he's no Luo Binghe, he doesn't have the sheer brute strength and power to just bulldoze his way through, so he has to be a lot more sneaky and cunning if he wants to survive.

The fic itself role-swapped LBH and SQQ so that SQQ was the half-demon (which lowkey fucks) and LBH the human, but I'm equally-if-not-more obsessed with the idea that LBH remains the half-heavenly demon and SQQ the human. If only because I keep thinking about SQQ befriending some demons (particularly and specifically a group of succubi) and they grow very attached to this Human Cultivator so through magic plot stuff they create some kind of seal/illusion/talisman that makes SQQ appear as a demon because a human cultivator in the endless abyss may as well be the equivalent of putting a giant neon target on your back.

And iirc Shen Jiu was taught demonic cultivation by that one guy(?? i've only been here a week so im not caught up in ALL of the lore yet) so that could totally happen here.

(On the other end of the realms, poor Shizun Luo Binghe is just. losing his fucking mind over losing his most precious and beloved disciple. About .5 seconds from burning down the peaks himself. somebody sedate him.)

The Endless Abyss sucks and SQQ is having a really terrible time and can feel himself going lowkey mad, but also holy shit look at all this WORLD-BUILDING. look at all this flora and fauna, and oh if he had the equipment for it he'd be writing all of this down. ALL OF IT. He was kinda-sorta-already planning on never leaving the Abyss as some sort of fucked up self-exile and self-preservation thing, but now he might? actually just?? never leave if he can help it, like he lowkey likes it down here.

anyways the next time anyone ever sees SQQ again he's got hair so long its almost touching the ground and he's either in rags and half-feral or he's been completely dolled up by his adoptive succubi sisters and still about three seconds from biting anyone who tries to touch him. (he's also lowkey trying to book it back down to the abyss even if he has desperately missed all of his friends and shizun)

[beetlethebug]

consider,,,a lucanis who is in love with emmrich, a spite who is in love with rook, a rook in love with emmrich, and emmrich who is in love with all three but wants lucanis, spite, and rook to get together because he feels he is not the type of man any of them deserve...

bonus points for spite being the one to realize just what sort of love quadrilateral is going on and is the one to get them all together.

[jaggedjot]

Foreshadowing is opening the season with the tale of a child vampire whose physical otherness causes it to be rejected by its kin, before being killed when they deem it unable to live independently, and how their parent, who is as culpable for their fate as they are grief stricken by it, decides to follow them into death.

[somerandomdudelmao]

Hi. First, I wanted to let you know that you're a huge inspiration to me :)

Second, as a fellow fanartist I wanted to ask: how do you get over the fear of people perceiving your artwork as too unfinished (if you have that fear at all?) How do you tell yourself "okay stop. This is as much as I'm gonna work on this page" and then hit the post button? I have this thing where I start a piece and then never post it cause "it's not completed yet".

Thank you in advance!

Ah thank you:3

Honestly, I just prefer speed over finality. My goal is not to create perfectly beautiful art. My goal is to tell a story. To convey information. To convert my train of thought into something that can be perceived with the eyes.

I can do smooth linework, detailed renderings, correct anatomy and all that. But I don't really need that, as the sketch is enough to convey the story. And it's very quick too~

For me, an artwork is considered complete when it says everything I want to say through it. And sometimes that means making the hands look like two blotches. Simply because for my story, the hands aren't important at that point. I'll draw them well in the moment when I want to tell something through them:)

So, usually I just make sure that the most important elements look clear. The facial expressions, the curves of the cape, the position of the hands, whatever. The things I really want people to see and process. Everything else serves solely as a backdrop.

If people think my work is unfinished, that's their problem. I don't have to adjust to their understanding of "completeness." If they want to see my work "finished" according to their value system, they can finish it themselves and then happily look at its perfection lmao

________

Just as a funny addition and proof of my words.

Important Hands:

Not important hands:

And still, for me, they are all - finished:)

[hanakihan]

an anecdote about a philosopher who asked a conqueror to move away and stop blocking sunlight

listen I spend too much effort on this shit which is basically a scene from a fanfic that I just wrote in my head I sure am doing things in wrong order ain’t I

ANYWAY for those unaware it’s based on Ancient Greece anecdote about Alexander the Great meeting with Diogenes and later completely disrespecting the great conqueror himself without actually offending him

Diogenes’ philosophy honestly gives me such strong Ratio vibes (or more like other way around) AND I encourage people to create more AUs involving Ratio and Ancient Greece stuff

[serpentface]

Do psychotropic drugs and/or ritual play a role in any of the blightseed cultures? A pretty broad question, lol

Yeah that’s a very broad question, the answer is about as much as it tends to play roles in real history. Alcohol is pretty ubiquitous (outside of cultures that abstain from intoxicants) and used for a variety of purposes, opioids are commonly used in some parts for pain relief or recreational purposes, stimulants (usually in mild, natural forms) are used to provide extra energy, and hallucinogens are most commonly used as part of a larger religious framework (rather than for recreational purposes). Any more elaborate answer kinda has to be case by case in a certain culture or part of the setting.

I'll just take this as an opportunity to talk about the one established sect that pretty much REVOLVES around psychoactive use. This is the Scholarly Order of the Root, which is a sort of mystery religion + elite community of scholars who currently occupy the Ur-Tree and its forest in the far southern Lowlands (southeast of Imperial Wardin, on the same land mass).

The Ur-Tree is the obligatory Huge Fucking Fantasy Tree (and its surrounding forest). It’s a mass of vegetation about a mile tall and almost as old as Plant Life Itself, its upper branches are primeval plants, which become more modern the nearer they get to the ground (and each 'level' holds tiny ecosystems, some containing descendants of LONG-extinct arthropods/other small animals). Its lowest branches and the surrounding forest are contemporary plant life, and all is connected and protected by an incomparably MASSIVE fungal mycelium network (which is itself a living god).

A lot of the Scholars' more secretive practices revolve around experimentation with substance use with the goal of expanding the Mind and transcending the body to fully connect to the Dreamlands, and they have a supply chain of traders and mercenaries called Rootrunners who traffic substances into the Lowlands. Most of their psychoactive use is in a very intentional capacity and not just like, for fun, but a LOT of them are just straight up addicted to cocaine (in the form of alchemically refined bruljenum, which is used for practical purposes of its stimulant effect during long hours of work).

All known psychoactives are desirable for experimentation (particularly hallucinogens), with each having properties that either allow expansion of the Mind, transcendence of the body, or outright divine communion. Their effects are logged in great detail and interpreted to form the basis of the Scholars' understanding of the natural world and reality itself.

The most important substance is Ur-Root, which is root matter from subterranean levels of the Ur-Tree that have both their own intrinsic psychoactive substances and a very, very high concentration of living god mycelium. The tree root contains DMT and the mycelium has its own wholly unique effects (being an actual living god). They alchemically refine it into a purer, more potent form, and use it to expand beyond the body and directly commune with the Giants, a group of entities they have identified as the only true gods.

An Ur-Root trip starts off with minor visual distortion, which turns into shifting fractals that slowly obscure the vision. Eventually the senses are entirely taken over by a 'tunnel' of rapidly shifting fractals and geometries. In a complete trip, the experiencer gets a sense that they have been pushed through a membrane and entered another realm, finding themselves in a distinct experiential Space.

At this point they may encounter entities which communicate to them in a language impossible to describe but wholly understood. These beings are understood to be the Giants, or at least aspects of the Giants that mortals are capable of comprehending (they often take familiar tutelary forms of the Mantis or the Snake, or appear resembling the same type of sophont that the experiencer is, all composed of ever-shifting geometries). The experiencer often feels a sense of unconditional and endless love from these beings, though the Giants may be more hostile and may appear in the form of the Trickster (usually a cultural figure regarded as malicious, be it an animal or otherwise) in a bad trip.

(^Up until this point, this has mostly just been a DMT 'breakthrough' experience ft. 'machine elves' and the like).

They are then removed from this space and returned to something that feels like the real world, but is nearly unrecognizable. They have a sense of rapidly moving through time, and will usually see 'the spires' towards the beginning, which just so happen to look like this:

(source + some context via Implication- the spires are exactly what this art is depicting)

The experiencer continues to move across an unfathomable amount of time, occasionally 'seeing' other such flashes of unfamiliar landscapes and creatures, and yet also being devoid of all their senses, the 'seeing' is pure, unfiltered experience. There is a sense of interconnectedness with all life, and that one has become the forest (or even Life) itself. The sense of time is wildly distorted, the trip lasts only about 5 minutes but feels like an eternity and is understood as literal hundreds of millions of years.

The experiencer has usually lost any remaining sense of Self and individual consciousness during this phase (in which case this time distortion is usually a neutral or even peaceful experience), but some retain a fraction of their identity, and find themselves trapped and conscious while experiencing what feels like eternity (which can be LIFE-CHANGINGLY distressing, even after the fact).

(^This latter part of the trip is the effects of the Ur-Tree fungus).

The trip ends with a sense of rushing through the ground and back up into one's body, at which point they will abruptly return to their senses and consciousness. The details are then immediately retrieved via interview and recorded in immense detail. The whole experience is understood as having been full comprehension of the Dreamlands, communion with the Giants, and then a tour through the act of creation.

This is done as part of the initiatory practice into the inner mystery-religion of the scholars, and as needed for study by high scholar-priests. It is not taken lightly, both as it is absolute communion with the gods and reality, and in that it can be a very, very difficult experience. People who have gone through this often walk away with a permanently shifted perspective, often in a positive and/or comforting way- a sense of interconnectedness with all life, a peace with the concept of death, seeing less of a point in individual ego and the concept of Self, and comfort in the sense of divine love they (may have) experienced. This heavily influences the philosophy of the Scholars and has had effects by proxy in the religious worldviews of the region.

Details of this experience are closely guarded, and initiates are given absolutely no prior knowledge and expectations for their trip. This is seen as a necessity- their naivety will allow for a true, unfiltered experience, and can be used to gauge whether they should or should not be accepted. Those that have a distinctly bad trip upon initiation may be assumed to have been 'rejected' by the giants and thus denied full priesthood, though this largely depends on How they interpret their distressing trip- those who identify this as a test and harsh lesson in a journey to enlightenment may be accepted (as this is how fully initiated scholar-priests interpret and handle their bad trips).

This inner priesthood is only a small fraction of the Scholarly Order, and its greater function is as a hub of education and repository of knowledge, and Scholar-trained doctors can provide some of the best medical care available in the setting ('best medical care in this setting' only means so much but it's pretty solid, relatively speaking). Only a chosen few Scholars ever get to commune with the Ur-Root, and most of the divine secrets revealed in the process are kept hidden (though they indirectly influence the politics and worldview of the entire order).

[the-apocalypse-is-cancelled]

I think one of the reasons I love the "came back wrong trope" from the resurrectee's pov is that the experience feels so similar to being born neurodivergent. To my parents I was born wrong. And that feeling that this was the case persisted until I left the nest. I'm so normal about this trope🤓👍

[sluckythewizard]

[PUT INTO PLACE, TIED DOWN AND ARRANGED, AND IS NEVER THE SAME, AGAIN.]<-listen to my favorite songs. VAMPIRES ARE WONDERFUL ARENT THEY. THE FLESH IS SO MUCH MORE DURABLE. SO MUCH STRETCHIER THAN HUMANS. THE STRESS DOESNT KILL A VAMPIRE THE SAME WAY IT DOES A HUMAN. YOU CAN TAKE THEM APART THREAD BY THREAD AND LEAVE THEM WIDE AWAKE WITHOUT WORRY OF THE BRAINMATTER SPOILING UNDER VINEGARY AGONY.

[willyhoos]

Q: WHAT TOPS THE FOOD CHAIN? A: HUMANS

[moggettt]

HERE IT IS!! after Many moons of chipping away at this OC song comic for my scifi-noir android character Whitney and his bodyguard Bast, it is finally as complete as it shall ever be;; I’m proud of the work I put into this one! Pretty niche, but maybe some folks out there will enjoy UuU

ps: there's also a video for easy viewing!

[notedchampagne]

nona the ninth has helped me to romanticize the impermanent which is equally healing and horrific

[alenachelk]

I can perfectly imagine how Adrien would be a family man as an adult, but I don’t see that in Felix at all. Sometimes I even doubt that he and Kagami will get married. I have several scenarios for adult Felix and they all have a bad ending and he will be unhappy. But there is one where he happily travels around the world, everything that is not related to people fascinates him and he is more close to nature and magic and he likes to explore and study everything. Constantly expand his horizons. He looks like William Traynor before the accident.

[formerheroeswhoquittoolate]

hi do you think sam is normal about the fact that matt died (on what was supposed to be his watch. by the way) and then came back as a fucking catholic priest. like. this guy watched his community get torn apart by a religious leader. aforementioned religious leader told him to kill a guy, got really pissed when he didn't, and threw him and his mom and their entire community under the bus when the beast came to take back its stolen power. he doesn't trust religion. he definitely doesn't trust religious authorities.

and now, you know. his quasi-father died (very nearly by the sword sam was given. by the way.) and came back as a religious authority. he actively works in the catholic church. he's a priest. that has to be uniquely shitty for sam. your dad figure is back from the dead (that you probably should have been there to save him from in the first place) and he's not a lawyer anymore but a guy in the exact same position of authority as the one you became blindspot to work against. the one that tried to make you into a murderer. the one that got your mom killed. oh and he doesn't remember you. crazy.

[bharv]

People compare Gortash to Elon Musk but kids I would be so surprised if Escobar wasn’t wholesale on the Gort mood board

[laugtherhyena]

Okay so maybe the wrinkly split head devil isn't the Aging devil itself, since it being called aging definitelly feels like a mistranslation and and public safety wanting to erase old age by sacrificing the younger generation fits the point the chapter is trying to get across much nicer than if the devil was aging itself (+ if you think about it for 2 seconds erasing aging as a whole is a terrible fucking idea since no one will be able to grow anything anymore and people will be stuck as babies and kids forever whereas erasing old age should just make people not age past adulthood and probably cause people who are already elderly to just dissapear on the spot)

But that doesn't mean i'm keeping Cherryboy the exact same because if old age specifically is enough to achieve primal fear level then aging as a whole has gotta be one too. So hooray! someone's getting a slight revamp in the future :)