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czenzo · 1 year

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On the Hunt - Chapter III

[ao3] chapter links: [ 1 ] [ 2 ] [ 3 ] [ 4 ]

summary: After Simon gets bitten in an unfortunate run-in with a werewolf, he and Penny desperately search for a cure before the upcoming full moon can force him to undergo an excruciating transformation. Lycanthropy comes with many other side effects, however – and not only is Simon soon to experience them, but Baz will surely be dragged into the mess, too.

words: 2191 rating: M

note: this chapter officially marks 100,000 words posted onto my ao3, which is wild to think about, especially since almost all of it has been posted in 2022!! woohoo

DAYS UNTIL FULL MOON: 4

BAZ

Snow’s getting tetchy.

There are two upsides to this: one, all of his irritation is no longer being directed solely at me, but instead towards his hot flushes and mood swings, which are pissing him off so much the only thing he can do is mope around in his bed and spend the day tossing and turning. (He hasn’t attended a single class since getting bitten.)

Two, he’s hot, sweaty, and mere minutes away from taking his shirt off.

Now, before you get all righteous with me – I know. I know Simon’s going through hell, I know he’s having a horrible week, and I know he’s terrified of the upcoming full moon. But you can’t blame me for noticing how fucking good he makes suffering look.

It would be fantastic if he could be sexy and angry at a much quieter volume, though.

“Snow,” I say. I’m sitting at my desk, alternating between working on my Latin homework (I’m vaguely impressed that whole scholarly articles have been written about such trivial things regarding the language, but also a bit narked that I’m expected to wade through all the waffle) and making my way through one of the many werewolf-related books Bunce and I checked out earlier this morning. “I’m trying to work. Don’t you have anything better to do than roll around in bed all day?”

Admittedly, part of me hopes he doesn’t.

“Shut up,” he says, hissing his words so much it almost counts as one of my trademark snarls. “You’re not the one who got bitten by a bloody werewolf.”

“No, I’m not. I have more intelligence and sense of self-preservation than that.”

Snow huffs, and out of the corner of my eye, I see him wrestle with his duvet and throw it clean off his bed. The gush of air it sends across the room carries a strong, distinctly canine odour.

Crowley, he smells like a dog.

Having a nose that works supernaturally well is becoming tiring. I’m still reeling from smelling Snow’s blood the other night. (If I close my eyes, I can recall every detail. It smelt of cinnamon and honey, of autumn mornings and coffee, of wood and sweet burning and so purely of Simon Snow that if Bunce hadn’t been so quick to clean it up, I fear for the lengths my body would have taken to get closer to it, to breathe it all in, to lap it up with my tongue.)

(I scare myself, sometimes. Is it possible to be addicted to a person?)

“You can’t spend all day like this,” I say, rereading the same paragraph I’ve been trying to move past for the last fifteen minutes. I keep getting distracted by the grunting and groaning coming from Snow’s bed. (It’s not even the pleasant kind.) “Don’t forget you need to keep yourself in check. If I turn around and find you’ve gone and completely wolfed out on me, I’ll murder you in cold blood.”

“What, as if you've got any better ideas?"

“You underestimate me.”

“I over-estimate you. I give you way too much credit than you deserve.”

At this, I turn in my chair to face him. “When have you ever given me credit, Snow? I’ve still not had a thank you for finding that stupid necklace of yours.”

His face contorts for a moment before softening just a fraction. His reply comes out stiff and stilted, but I sense an ounce of sincerity. It’s incredibly odd. “Thank you, Baz.”

I turn back to my desk and say nothing in return for a short while. Both the lycanthropy text and the Latin chapter I’m reading refer to the same chapter of a book I’ve heard of in passing, so I take a moment to jot the title down, knowing it could be helpful for both my homework and Simon’s current predicament.

“Have you tried throwing yourself into the lake?” I eventually say. As soon as the words leave my mouth, I regret not speaking them with more animosity. I almost sounded sincere and helpful, which is far from how I want Snow to interpret it.

“What?” he replies after a lengthy pause.

“Go for a swim, Snow. It’ll bring your temperature down.”

“Baz, the lake’s fucking freezing at this time of year. Are you mad?”

“I’m not, but you may become so very soon if you don’t get off your arse and do something.”

“Shut up,” he says, but I soon hear him shuffling around and getting ready to go outside.

***

I’m not entirely certain how he managed it, but Snow convinced me to come with him to the lake.

One second I was in the warmth of our shared room, being productive and most definitely not thinking about the possibility of Snow taking his shirt off, and then it felt like I blinked and suddenly I was standing beside the lake, shivering, actually watching Snow strip down.

Merlin, Morgana, and Methuselah, Simon Snow is in nothing but his underwear. Across his chest is a generous spread of hair, and I think back to the glimpses I’ve had of his bare torso in the past. (They’re far and few, but I remember them in excruciating detail.) He’s never been covered in this much before. Snow needs to stop making lycanthropy look so appealing. It’s fucking annoying.

“You are aware that being half-naked isn’t a requirement for swimming, yes?”

“I’m not gonna swim in my trackies, Baz.”

“You’re going to make yourself ill.”

“I’m not a psychopath. The trackies stay off.”

Before I can conjure up a witty comeback, he’s already gone and chucked himself into the water with alarmingly little hesitation. He didn’t have the brains to consider emerging his body bit by bit and allowing it to adjust to the temperature, no – he cannonballed.

Whilst he’s submerged, I allow myself a second to dig my nails into my scalp. It’s both a grounding gesture and a reminder that I shouldn’t be dwelling on the mental image of Snow in nothing but a pair of boxers. (I’ve seen him change in our room countless times. I’m not sure why this time feels different.)

He breaks through the surface of the water with a shout, and suddenly he’s the happiest I’ve seen him in days. He splashes around, swims in circles, performs underwater somersaults, and floats around on his back, watching the evening sky darken above him. Meanwhile, I make myself comfortable on the lakeside, perching on one of the few rocks that aren’t coated in algae.

“You should come for a swim, Baz.”

It takes me a moment to process his words. “What?”

“Let off some steam,” he says, side-eyeing me as he lounges on his back, limbs spread out like a starfish. “You look dead tense. All the time.”

“A consequence of sharing a room with you for eight years.”

“I’m not really a fan of it either, but I don’t spend all my time bitching about it.”

“I don’t bitch.”

We exchange a look. I don’t like the knowing gleam in his eyes.

“Take the stick out of your arse and get in.”

“Absolutely not,” I say, turning my nose up at the body of water. It looks deathly cold, and I’m not sure how Snow’s still alive and moving. I'm not sure I would've suggested the swimming if I knew it was going to be like this, and I’m not certain magic would do much help, either – there’s so much water it would take multiple copies of me spelling it at once to increase the temperature by a mere couple of degrees.

“I said,” Snow paddles over to the edge. “Stop being a prig and live a little.”

“What in Crowley’s name did you just call–”

I don’t get to finish. In the blink of an eye, he reaches an arm out, firmly grasps my ankle, and pulls.

I can almost hear Bunce’s voice in the back of my head, informing me of the many perks of lycanthropy. As Snow bodily drags me into the cold, dark depths of the lake, I remember one of the ones that had cropped up the most during the beginnings of our research – enhanced physical strength. Lucky me.

If I weren’t already dead, I’m convinced that suddenly being plunged into the lake would have immediately stopped my heart in its tracks. By the time I emerge back at the surface, I’m ready to absolutely throttle Simon Snow, but the grin on his face and the laughter that erupts from him makes me forget I’m meant to be pissed off at all.

I’m here, now. May as well make the most of it. I scrape my hair away from where it’s been wetly plastered onto my forehead and push my hands in front of me, creating a small wave that engulfs Simon. He comes out of the other side gasping and spluttering, and I can’t help the small smile that makes its way onto my lips. (He made a particularly stupid face as he was trying to reach for air.)

“Feeling refreshed?” I say, to which he splashes water in my face.

“Yeah, actually. Wish I’d chucked myself in here sooner. ‘M not burning up anymore.”

“And now we’re both shivering, thanks to your idiocy.”

He grins. It’s a wonderful grin, all teeth and dimples and pure joy. “You enjoyed being dragged in. Admit it.”

“You can go and fuck yourself, Snow.”

“You’re too kind, Baz.” He pauses, and then his features pinch together to make him look uncharacteristically serious. I dread what he’s going to say before he’s even worked out how to word it. “Hey, why d’you seem so bothered about my, er– problem?”

I pull a face. It’s probably not a pretty one, but I’m too cold and focusing on keeping myself afloat to care. “What on earth do you mean?”

“You’ve been reading and researching just as much as Penny has.”

“Pardon me for not wanting to share a room with a werewolf for longer than necessary.”

“You don’t need to be a dick about it, Baz. I was actually going to thank you for a second, there.”

I take a breath and start making my way back over to the lake’s edge. “Spare me the sappiness.”

“Aw, you can’t be getting out already. You’ve only just gotten in!”

“More than enough for me.” I haul myself up and out of the water, scrambling to find my feet on the now-muddy lakeside. Luckily, my wand slid out of my pocket as Simon dragged me in, so it takes little effort to retrieve it and spell myself dry. I also throw in a You’re Getting Warmer to help regain the feeling in my toes.

Simon stays put, treading water and staring holes into my skull. I smirk and cast a quick Test The Waters, sending a stream of water directly into his face. The long string of expletives that pour from his mouth straight afterwards make a burst of laughter escape me, and before he can comment on it I send another stream of water his way.

“Alright, get out. Bunce will kill me if I let you die of hypothermia.”

“It’s not even that cold.”

“Your fingers are turning blue. And” – I briefly pause for effect – “I’m almost one hundred per cent certain you have a mountain of homework waiting for you at your desk.”

Snow groans and mutters a half-hearted insult. Eventually he clambers out, and I have to quickly drag my gaze far away from him. (Soaked-through boxers leave very little to the imagination, and a mere glance has, I must shamefully admit, given me wank material for at least a month.) (I’m glad it’s getting dark. I fed after my classes today, and the blood is now going straight to my face.) (And somewhere else, too.)

As soon as his feet hit solid ground, he physically shakes the excess water off his body and immediately starts pulling on his clothes.

“Aren’t you going to dry yourself properly?”

“With magic?" He scoffs. "Yeah, as if I can pull that off myself.”

Watching him try to drag his joggers back on over damp legs is an absolute pain, so I give in and spell him dry, too. I put considerably more oomph into it than I did on myself, and it makes his hair fluffier than I’ve ever seen it. It’s like one of those blow-dried cows Dev once showed me a picture of.

I must have started smirking at the thought of it without realising, because he shoots me a dirty look. “I’ll push you back in.”

“You wouldn’t dare.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Snow, if we don’t get back to Mummers soon, we’ll have our heads chopped off.”

“I’d prefer that over wolfing out.”

“Would you?”

He looks me dead in the eye. There’s a glint of genuine fear, and it makes me want to get back to our room and my research all the more sooner. I’m not sure I want to find out how he’ll handle it if we don’t find a solution in time. “Yes.”

#carry on #carry on fic #simon snow #baz pitch #snowbaz #czenzo.fic #on the hunt

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spoilertv · 5 months

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#SpoilerTV

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pooma-bible · 1 year

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Greetings in the matchless Name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Topic: VISION 02: The Picture of Things Hereafter (Part 03): The Lamb Alone is Worthy to Open the Book!

Rhema Word: Revelation 5:9-10 (NKJV) “And they sang a new song, saying: “You are worthy to take the scroll, and to open its seals; for You were slain, and have redeemed us to God by Your blood out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation, And have made us kings and priests to our God; and we shall reign on the earth.”

Let’s pray. Our Gracious Loving Father, thank You for giving us an opportunity to meditate Your Word today along with Your children who have been called to live a holy life, Father. I commit everyone who are all meditating this message into Your mighty hand Father. Bless them and give them the oneness of Spirit and make their heart as a good land to receive each and every Word which is living and active Father. Thank You Holy Spirit for helping us to understand the in-depth treasure of Your Word and helping us to live a life as per Your Word Lord. We give all the Glory and Honour to You only Father. We pray in the mighty Name of Your beloved Son Jesus Christ. Amen.

The passage in Revelation Chapters 4 to 16 covers the SECOND VISION that Christ gives apostle John in the following subjects:

VISION 02: The Picture of Things Hereafter [Chapters 4 & 5]:

VISION 02: The Seven Seal Judgements: Events Preceding the Great Tribulation [Chapters 6 & 7]:

VISION 02: The Seven Trumpet Judgements: Events During the Great Tribulation [Chapters 8 to 11]:

VISION 02: The Seventh Trumpet in Detail (Part I): Two Spiritual Wonders Struggling Behind the Great Tribulation [Chapter 12]:

VISION 02: The Seventh Trumpet in Detail (Part II): The War of The Dragon Upon the Earth [Chapter 13]:

VISION 02: The Seventh Trumpet in Detail (Part III): The Victory of the Lamb is Assured [Chapter 14]:

VISION 02: The Seventh Trumpet in Detail (Part IV): The Third Great Wonder, The Seven Bowl Judgements [Chapter 15 & 16]:

The passage in Revelation Chapters 4 & 5 explains the VISION 02: The Picture of Things Hereafter! In this vision two great things are seen. First, the throne of God is seen, then second, God Himself is seen holding a Book, a Book which contains the destiny of the world in the end times. However, the Book is sealed, for no one is found worthy to open and execute the events of the Book. Just when John despairs, One steps forward who is worthy, the Lamb of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, who was slain before the foundation of the earth.

We have been meditating the following in Three Parts since last two weeks.

VISION 02: The Picture of Things Hereafter (Part 01): The Throne of God: The Focal Point of History!

VISION 02: The Picture of Things Hereafter (Part 02): The Book of Destiny is Sealed: The Future of the World!

VISION 02: The Picture of Things Hereafter (Part 03): The Lamb Alone is Worthy to Open the Book!

We have meditated the First and Second Part in last two weeks. Let us try to meditate the Second Part VISION 02: The Picture of Things Hereafter (Part 03): The Lamb Alone is Worthy to Open the Book! and understand the following today, with the help of Holy Spirit:

(1) The Glorious Announcement: God has Intervened & Sent One Worthy to Open the Book:

(2) The Supreme Moment: The First Sight of Christ in Heaven:

(3) The Majestic Worship by the Four Living Creatures & The Elders:

(4) The Majestic Worship by the Angels:

(5) The Majestic Worship by the Whole Universe:

This is a most dramatic moment. Remember, John is having a vision, and his mind or spirit has been transported above earth into heaven. Therefore, everything he is experiencing is bound to be dramatic. But this moment must be the most dramatic of all: he is about to get his very first glimpse of Jesus Christ Himself. He is about to see the exalted Lord.

The background is this: God is holding the Book of Destiny in His right hand. A search has been conducted throughout the whole universe for someone worthy enough to open the book. But no one is worthy; there is no one good enough to open it. John is heartbroken and is weeping bitterly, for Go is ready to reveal the secrets of the end time to man. But no person can be found to open the book and to oversee the climactic events of the end time. The situation looks hopeless. But then all of a sudden one of the heavenly elders steps forth and announces that someone has been found to open the Book of Destiny. There is one Person who is worthy. This is the great subject of this passage: the Book of Destiny is opened – the Lamb alone is worthy.

(1) The Glorious Announcement: God has Intervened & Sent One Worthy to Open the Book:

The Bible says in Revelation 5:5 “But one of the elders said to me, “Do not weep. Behold, the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, has prevailed to open the scroll and to loose its seven seals.”

There is the glorious announcement – God has intervened. He Himself has sent One worthy to open the Book of Destiny. Who is He?

(i) He is the “Lion of Judah”. This is a title of the Messiah. The symbol of the lion shows that He is the strongest and most powerful member of the tribe of Israel. Judah was the strongest tribe of Israel, the strongest by far. Therefore, way back in history, God had prophesied through Jacob that his own son Judah would be a “lion’s whelp” (young cub). If Judah himself was only a young cub, then the Messiah Himself must be like the King of beasts, the lion. Very simply, the prophecy predicted that the coming Messiah would possess the strength and power of a lion, the king of beasts. Who then is worthy to open the book? Jesus Christ, the lion of Judah, the all-powerful Messiah and King. He and He alone is worthy enough to take the book and carry out the events of the end time.

The Bible says in Genesis 49:9-10 “Judah is a lion’s whelp; From the prey, my son, you have gone up. He bows down, he lies down as a lion; And as a lion, who shall rouse him? The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, Nor a lawgiver from between his feet, Until Shiloh comes; And to Him shall be the obedience of the people.”

(ii) He is the “Root of David”. The Messiah was to be of the household of David, of the root and seed of Jesse, of his family tree, of his blood, of his stem. Who then is worthy to open the book? The prophesied Son of David, the Messiah and King of the world. He and He alone is worthy to take the book and carry out the events of the end time.

The Bible says in Isaiah 11:1 “There shall come forth a Rod from the stem of Jesse, And a Branch shall grow out of his roots.”

(iii) He is the One who has prevailed and conquered and won the victory; therefore, He is able to open the Book of Destiny. Over what has He prevailed? What is it that He has conquered? “The Root of David, has prevailed to open the scroll and to loose its seven seals.”

(a) He has conquered sin:

Apostle Paul says in Ephesians 1:7 “In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace.”

The Bible says in Hebrews 1:3 “Who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.”

Apostle Peter says in 1 Peter 2:24; 3:18 “Who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness—by whose stripes you were healed.” … “For Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit.”

(b) He has conquered death:

Apostle Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:25-26; 2 Timothy 1:10; Galatians 1:4 “For He must reign till He has put all enemies under His feet. 26 The last enemy that will be destroyed is death.” … “But has now been revealed by the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who has abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.” … “Who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father.”

Our Lord Jesus Christ said in John 16:33 “ These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.”

The Bible says in Hebrews 2:14-15 “Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.”

Our Lord Jesus Christ said in Matthew 12:29; Luke 10:18; John 12:31; John 14:30; 16:11 “Or how can one enter a strong man’s house and plunder his goods, unless he first binds the strong man? And then he will plunder his house.” … “And He said to them, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.” … “Now is the judgment of this world; now the ruler of this world will be cast out.” … “I will no longer talk much with you, for the ruler of this world is coming, and he has nothing in Me.” … “Of judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.”

(d) He has conquered all dominion, authority and power:

Apostle Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:24 “Then comes the end, when He delivers the kingdom to God the Father, when He puts an end to all rule and all authority and power.”

(e) He has conquered hell:

Our Lord Jesus Christ said in John 5:24 “Most assuredly, I say to you, he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life.”

Apostle Paul says in Romans 8:34-39 “Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written: “For Your sake we are killed all day long; We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.” Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Our Lord Jesus Christ said in Revelation 1:8 “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End,” says the Lord, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”

(2) The Supreme Moment: The First Sight of Christ in Heaven:

The Bible says in Revelation 5:6-7 “And I looked, and behold, in the midst of the throne and of the four living creatures, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as though it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God sent out into all the earth. Then He came and took the scroll out of the right hand of Him who sat on the throne.”

There is the supreme moment, the first sight of Jesus Christ in heaven. John had seen Christ in his first vision, but Christ was standing in the midst of the churches. But now the supreme moment arrives – the moment when John catches his first sight of the glorified Son of God in heaven. The sight was bound to be the most spectacular sight ever seen in human history, for God was letting a man see His Son at the throne of God. He was showing who His Son is worthy to rule and reign over the universe. When John caught his first glimpse of Christ, he immediately noticed five things:

(i) Jesus Christ is the center of the heavenly scene: (a) He was right before the throne of God, joining God at the very throne of God itself; (b) Then the four living beings surround Him; and (c) Then come the circle of elders.

Jesus Christ is the very center and focus of attention: every eye and thought is upon Him. He is the centrepiece of God’s throne room, the central figure on the stage of universal history, the history of both heaven and earth.

(ii) Jesus Christ is the sacrificial Lamb of God who has been slain. The picture of Jesus Christ as the Lamb of God is seen throughout Scripture.

Scripture declares that Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God who died for our sins:

(a) The Lamb of God was symbolised in the Passover. The lamb was sacrificed so that the judgement of God could pass over the people.

The Bible says in Exodus 12:3 “Speak to all the congregation of Israel, saying: ‘On the tenth of this month every man shall take for himself a lamb, according to the house of his father, a lamb for a household.”

(b) Isaiah had said that the Messiah was to bear out sins by being led like a lamb to the slaughter.

The Bible says in Isaiah 53:6-7 “All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way; And the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed and He was afflicted, Yet He opened not His mouth; He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, And as a sheep before its shearers is silent, So He opened not His mouth.”

The Bible says in John 1:29;36 “The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” … “And looking at Jesus as He walked, he said, “Behold the Lamb of God!”

(d) Peter had said that persons are redeemed by the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish or defect.

Apostle Peter says in 1 Peter 1:18-19 “Knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, like silver or gold, from your aimless conduct received by tradition from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot.”

Note this: Throughout Revelation John uses word “arnion” twenty-nine times for the crucified Christ. The word chosen by John stresses the slaughter, suffering, pain, agony, and humiliation of Christ. And all the suffering is still seen in heaven. Yes, the Lamb is now alive, but with the marks of the sacrifice.

The point is this: Jesus Christ is the perfect sacrifice for our sins. He lived a sinless life when He was upon earth; He was the Ideal and Perfect Man. Therefore, whatever Jesus Christ did as the Perfect and Ideal Mn, it could stand for and cover us. When He died for our sins, He died as the ideal and perfect sacrifice. His sacrifice for our sins was perfectly acceptable to God. Therefore, His sacrifice for sin stands for and covers us.

What happens is this: when we believe in Jesus Christ, God takes our faith and counts it as the sacrifice of Christ. God counts the sacrifice of Christ for us. This means that we are free from sin. We stand sinless before God, acceptable to Him – all because Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, removed our sins from us. We are cleansed from sin by the sacrifice of Christ. We are made perfectly righteous by the sacrifice of Christ. Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God who has taken away our sin and clothed us in the white robes of righteousness before God.

This is the reason Jesus Christ stands in the center stage of heaven. But even in heaven He stands as the One who has loved and given Himself for us; He stands as the Lamb who was slain as the perfect sacrifice for our sins.

The Bible says in Hebrews 9:12-14 “Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?”

The Bible further says in Hebrews 10:11-14 “And every priest stands ministering daily and offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. But this Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God, from that time waiting till His enemies are made His footstool. For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.”

(iii) Jesus Christ is the omnipotent power of the universe. Remember that the number seven in the Bible means completeness, fullness, and perfection. Jesus Christ is seen with seven horns which symbolizes complete and perfect strength and power. He stands in heaven as the supreme power and force of the universe.

Our Lord Jesus Christ says in Matthew 28:18; John 10:18; 17:12 “And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.”… “No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This command I have received from My Father.” … “While I was with them in the world, I kept them in Your name. Those whom You gave Me I have kept; and none of them is lost except the son of perdition, that the Scripture might be fulfilled.”

Apostle Paul says in Romans 1:4; Colossians 1:16-17 “And declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead.” … “For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.”

(iv) Jesus Christ is the supreme intelligence of the universe. The seven eyes symbolize complete and perfect knowledge, intelligence, and wisdom. He is omniscient: He knows all and sees all. Absolutely nothing escapes His sight and knowledge. Note: this is a symbol of the seven spirits of God which is the Holy Spirit. In the person of the Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ is everywhere, seeing and knowing all.

Our Lord Jesus Christ said in John 2:25 “And had no need that anyone should testify of man, for He knew what was in man.”

Apostle Paul says in Colossians 2:3 “In whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.”

The Bible says in Isaiah 11:2; Jeremiah 16:7 “The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon Him, The Spirit of wisdom and understanding, The Spirit of counsel and might, The Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord.” … “Nor shall men break bread in mourning for them, to comfort them for the dead; nor shall men give them the cup of consolation to drink for their father or their mother.”

(v) Jesus Christ is sovereign. He alone walks over and takes the Book of Destiny out of the hand of God. He and He alone is worthy to execute and carry out the events of the end time. This is simply a graphic way of saying what is said in the very first verse of Revelation.

The Bible says in Revelation 1:1 “The Revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave Him to show His servants—things which must shortly take place. And He sent and signified it by His angel to His servant John.”

(3) The Majestic Worship by the Four Living Creatures & The Elders:

The Bible says in Revelation 5:8-10 “Now when He had taken the scroll, the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders fell down before the Lamb, each having a harp, and golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints. And they sang a new song, saying: “You are worthy to take the scroll, And to open its seals; For You were slain, And have redeemed us to God by Your blood Out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation, And have made us kings and priests to our God; And we shall reign on the earth.”

There is the majestic worship by the four living creatures and the elders. As soon as Jesus Christ takes the book out of the hand of God, all of heaven and earth break loose in a song of praise. And note there are three waves of praise sung to Christ:

(a) There is the praise of the four living creatures and of the elders who surround the throne of God.

(b) Then there is the wave of praise from the numberless host of angels, ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands and thousands of them. The idea is that the number is so large that man and his computers could not count the number.

(c) Then there is the majestic worship of all creatures in both heaven and earth, and under the earth in the graves, and in the seas. All of creation – every being ever created – breaks loose in a chorus of praise to the Lord and to the Lamb of God who sits upon the throne (Jesus Christ).

This passage covers the praise of the four living creatures and the elders who immediately surround the Lord Jesus Christ and the throne of God. Note three things about their worship:

(i) They fall down before Christ, the Lamb of God, and play harps. Remember: the harp was the usual instrument used to sing the Psalms of praise to our Lord (Psalm 33:2; 98:5; 147:7).

(ii) They offer up golden bowls of incense to the Lord which is the symbol of the prayers of believers (saints).

Lesson: Just think of this: the very beings closest to God offer up our prayers to Christ for us. The heavenly host is concerned over our welfare even as the Lord is. They long for us to be helped through the trials and temptations of life even more than we long to be delivered through them. What a precious truth.

(iii) They sing a new song focused upon the worthiness of Christ. Remember: God had just held out the Book of Destiny and the shattering call had just pierced the air for someone worthy to step forth and to take the book. Someone was needed to open the book and carry out the events upon earth. But no one was found worthy. Not even those who surround the very throne of God; the four living creatures and elders, were worthy. Only one Person could step forward: the Lamb of God Himself, the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the scene here: when the living creatures and elders see the Lamb of God step forward and take the book from God, they fall down in worship and adoration and sing a song to Him, a song that has never been sung before.

The Bible says in Revelation 5:9-10 “ And they sang a new song, saying: “You are worthy to take the scroll, And to open its seals; For You were slain, And have redeemed us to God by Your blood Out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation, And have made us kings and priests to our God; And we shall reign on the earth.”

Note that they praise Christ for three things:

(a) They praise Him because He was slain for man and has redeemed or “purchased men for God” (v.9). They praise Christ because He died for the sins of man and has set man free from sin and death and the punishment to come.

Apostle Paul says in Romans 5:9; Galatians 3:13; Ephesians 1:7; Colossians 1:14; Titus 2:14 “Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him.” … “Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”).” … “In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace.” … “In whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.” … “Who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works.”

The Bible says in Hebrews 9:12 “Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption.”

(b) They praise Him because of His universal salvation (v.9). NO person is beyond his reach. He saves people from every tribe and language and race and nation. There is no prejudice or discrimination with Christ, no favourites and no partiality. He loves every person: male and female, poor and rich, black and white, yellow and red, ignorant and wise. Christ saves all wo will come from every corner of the earth. Those who surround Christ and the throne of God shout their praise to Christ for His universal salvation.

The Bible says in Luke 3:6 “And all flesh shall see the salvation of God.’ ”

Apostle says in Romans 10:13; 1 Timothy 2:4; Titus 2:11-12 “For “whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.” … “Who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” … “For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age.”

The Bible says in Revelation 3:20 “Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and dine with him, and he with Me.”

(c) They praise Christ because He has given believers the great gift of royalty (v.10). He makes them a kingdom and priests and note: they shall rule on the earth serving the Lord Jesus Christ forever and ever as kings and priests.

Our Lord Jesus Christ said a parable in Matthew 25:23 “His lord said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant; you have been faithful over a few things, I will make you ruler over many things. Enter into the joy of your lord.’

Our Lord Jesus Christ again said in Luke 22:28-29 “But you are those who have continued with Me in My trials. And I bestow upon you a kingdom, just as My Father bestowed one upon Me.”

Apostle Paul says in Romans 8:16-17 “The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.”

The Bible says in Revelation 1:5-6; 20:4 “And from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler over the kings of the earth. To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and has made us kings and priests to His God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.” … “And I saw thrones, and they sat on them, and judgment was committed to them. Then I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for their witness to Jesus and for the word of God, who had not worshiped the beast or his image, and had not received his mark on their foreheads or on their hands. And they lived and reigned with Christ for a thousand years.”

(4) The Majestic Worship by the Angels:

The Bible says in Revelation 5:11-12 “Then I looked, and I heard the voice of many angels around the throne, the living creatures, and the elders; and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice: “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom, And strength and honour and glory and blessing!”

There is the majestic worship by the angels. Note three facts about the angels:

(i) They are the center circle of the praise chorus.

(ii) Their number is astounding: an innumerable number is what Scripture is declaring.

(iii) Their song includes seven points:

(a) They praise Christ for His power. He is omnipotent: He possesses all power. He is able to open God’s Book of Destiny and to carry out and execute God’s will throughout the universe. He is able to carry out the events of history and the events of the end time. He is the sovereign Ruler of the universe.

Our Lord Jesus Christ said in Matthew 28:18; John 17:2 “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth.” … “As You have given Him authority over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as You have given Him.”

Apostle Paul says in Romans 1:4; 1 Corinthians 1:24; Ephesians 3:20 “And declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead.” … “But to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.” … “Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us.”

(b) They praise Christ for His riches. He possesses the wealth to meet any need throughout the universe, and need that we or any other creature may have.

Apostle Paul says in Romans 2:4; 2 Corinthians 8:9; Ephesians 1:7; 2:7; 3:8; Philippians 4:19 “Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?” … “For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sakes He became poor, that you through His poverty might become rich.” … “In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of His grace.” … “That in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.” … “To me, who am less than the least of all the saints, this grace was given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ.” … “And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.”

(c) They praise Christ for His wisdom. He is omniscient, seeing and knowing all. He knows all about God and heaven, and all about us and our world with all its temptations and trials. He can, therefore, carry out the will of God laid out in the Book of Destiny, and He can help us through all the trials and temptations of life.

The Bible says in Hebrews 4:15-16 “For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

(d) They praise Him for His strength. No one nor anything can stand against Him, not even for a moment unless He allows it. He has infinite strength, the very strength of God Himself. All He has to do is speak the Word and His will is done. Therefore, He can carry out the events in the Book of Destiny, and He can meet our every need.

Our Lord Jesus Christ said in Matthew 19:26 “With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”

Apostle Paul says in 1 Corinthians 10:13; 2 Timothy 4:18 “No temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man; but God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will also make the way of escape, that you may be able to bear it.” … “And the Lord will deliver me from every evil work and preserve me for His heavenly kingdom. To Him be glory forever and ever. Amen!”

The Bible says in Jude 1:24-25 “Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling, And to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy, to God our Saviour, Who alone is wise, Be glory and majesty, Dominion and power, Both now and forever. Amen.”

(e) They praise Him for His honour. He is the Son of God possessing the very nature of God, the eternal and sovereign Majesty, the Creator and Sustainer of the universe. He is the One appointed to open the Book of Destiny and to execute its events throughout the universe. Therefore, He is the One who is to be honoured by all.

Apostle Paul says in Philippians 2:9-11 “Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”

The Bible says in Revelation 19:7 “Let us be glad and rejoice and give Him glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and His wife has made herself ready.”

(f) They praise Him for His glory. As stated, He is the supreme Glory and Majesty of the universe, so glorious that His glory shines brighter than the sun to give light in the spiritual world or dimension. His own glory is the light of heaven. In Him is no flaw or defect whatsoever. Therefore, He and He alone is worthy to open the Book of Destiny and to carry out the will of God throughout the universe. He and He alone is due all the glory of the universe.

Our Lord Jesus Christ said in Matthew 5:16; John 15:8 “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.” … “By this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples.”

Apostle Paul says in Romans 15:6; 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 “That you may with one mind and one mouth glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” … “Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.”

(g) They praise Him for His blessing. He deserves all the blessing or praise that heaven and earth can give, for He has blessed all. He has given life and all the good things of life to all creatures. All blessings have come from Him. Therefore, all the blessings that heaven and earth can give are due Him.

Apostle Paul says in Colossians 1:12; 3:15; 1 Thes.5:18 “Giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light.” … “And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be thankful.” … “In everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.”

(5) The Majestic Worship by the Whole Universe:

The Bible says in Revelation 5:13-14 “And every creature which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, I heard saying: “Blessing and honour and glory and power be to Him who sits on the throne, And to the Lamb, forever and ever!” Then the four living creatures said, “Amen!” And the twenty-four elders fell down and worshiped Him who lives forever and ever.”

There is the majestic worship by the whole universe. After such group of created beings has sung their chorus of praise, then all of creation – every being and creature who has ever lived in both heaven and earth – shall break forth in one chorus of praise to both God and Christ. What shall they praise God and Christ for?

=> for their praise;

=> for their honour;

=> for their glory;

=> for their power.

Then the four living creatures shall shout “Amen”. And the elders shall fall down and worship the Lord Jesus Christ who lives forever and ever.

Never has there been a chorus of worship as will be seen in the glorious day of redemption when all creation shall praise Him who is our Lord and Saviour, even the Son of God Himself. And remember why: (a) because He is worthy to step forward and take the Book of Destiny out of the hand of God; and (b) because He is worthy to rule and reign over all history, both ow and in the last days and throughout all of eternity, world without end.

Apostle Paul says in Romans 15:6; 1 Corinthians 6:19-20; 2 Thes.1:12 “That you may with one mind and one mouth glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” … “Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? For you were bought at a price; therefore, glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s.” … “That the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you, and you in Him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.”

The Bible says in Revelation 14:7 “Saying with a loud voice, “Fear God and give glory to Him, for the hour of His judgment has come; and worship Him who made heaven and earth, the sea and springs of water.”

Let us introspect ourselves.

Shall we thank our God for sending His beloved Son Jesus Christ to open the Book of Destiny as He is the only One worthy to open it?

Shall we thank our God for giving full authority to open the Book of Destiny to His beloved Son Jesus Christ as He is the “Lion of Judah”; “Root of David” besides conquering sin, death, satan and evil forces and hell?

Shall we thank our God for letting apostle John to see His beloved Son at the throne of God who is worthy to rule and reign over the universe?

Shall we thank our God for giving us His beloved Son Jesus Christ as His Lamb who was sacrificed so that the judgement of God could pass over us?

Shall we thank our God for giving us His beloved Son Jesus Christ who is omnipotent power of the universe, supreme intelligence of the universe, sovereign?

Shall we praise our Lord Jesus Christ for redeeming us from our sins by paying a huge price besides giving us the great gift of royalty so that we shall rule on the earth serving Him forever and ever as kings and priests?

Shall we praise our Lord Jesus Christ for His power, riches, wisdom, strength, honour, glory and blessings?

Let us Pray: Our Heavenly Gracious Father, we thank You for helping us to understand about “VISION 02: The Picture of Things Hereafter (Part 03): The Lamb Alone is Worthy to Open the Book, today, Father. We thank You Father for sending Your beloved Son Jesus Christ to open the Book of Destiny as He is the only One worthy to open it, for giving full authority to open the Book of Destiny to Your beloved Son Jesus Christ as He is the “Lion of Judah”; “Root of David” besides conquering sin, death, satan and evil forces and hell, for letting apostle John to see Your beloved Son at Your throne who is worthy to rule and reign over the universe, for giving us Your beloved Son Jesus Christ as Your Lamb who was sacrificed so that Your judgement could pass over us, Father. We thank You Father, for giving us Your beloved Son Jesus Christ who is omnipotent power of the universe, supreme intelligence of the universe and sovereign, for redeeming us from our sins by paying a huge price besides giving us the great gift of royalty so that we shall rule on the earth serving You forever and ever as kings and priests, Father. Father, we praise Your beloved Son Jesus Christ for His power, riches, wisdom, strength, honour, glory and blessings, Father. We thank You Father for filling us with Your joy, peace and hope, for accepting us when we approach You through Your beloved Son Jesus Christ besides being merciful on us and loving us so much and predestined us to receive Your promise of glory through Your beloved Son Jesus Christ, Father. We give all praise, glory and honour to Your Holy Name. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.

God bless you all.

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slightlyrebelliouswriter23 · 3 years

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hey so i'm hoping to get some writing advice about creative burnout? like i seem to write in fits and spurts. some months i can churn out a oneshot or chapter everyday and some months i can do one (1) creative thing only. so i'm wondering how to prevent creative burnout and how to just create more smoothly <3 thank you!

Creative Burnout & How To Ward Against It

First, I’d like to preface this all by saying you’re definitely not alone. You probably already know this, but sometimes it’s nice to be reminded.

I know from personal experience that creative burnout can leave you feeling hopeless, detached from yourself—the kind of identity crisis no one needs in 2020.

So buckle in, folks. It’s a dosy.

I. The Symptoms

Not to be the local WebMD page here, but signs of burnout can include:

Procrastination (more than usual)

Dreading writing and feeling stuck or overly perfectionistic when you try

Physical tiredness and/or irritability

Feeling like everything is monotonous

It’s more than just writer’s block. It’s a physical and emotional exhaustion response to something that goes deeper than a simple lack of inspiration. In my experience, and from a bit of research, I’ve found that what your brain is really looking for is dopamine.

Dopamine is essentially your brain’s chemical reward system for doing something interesting or exciting to you. As someone who is diagnosed with ADHD, I have chronically low levels of dopamine, so this is a constant struggle for me—but it is absolutely made worse by creative burnout.

II. The Problem

Studies have shown that the more we do A Thing the less that thing will give us dopamine (unless a component of the activity changes regularly). This is because eventually our brains desensitise to the stimuli provided by the activity, and subsequently, we become disengaged.

But it’s not necessarily The Thing (i.e. writing) that becomes boring. Actually, more than a few factors could be at play here, and the first step to finding a solution is to identify the problem.

1. ENVIRONMENT LACKS EXCITEMENT/CHANGE—

Sometimes, the monotony of everyday life can feed creative burnout. This becomes especially applicable in quarantine when you’re not leaving your house.

What we don’t realise is that even something as small as the variables of driving to and from work, or interacting with passing coworkers, gives us dopamine. So if you have the same routine every day that does not involve any added variables, your brain will begin staunching that dopamine supply.

2. EITHER TOO EASY OR TOO CHALLENGING—

In 1975, Hungarian-American psychologist, Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, coined the term “flow”, which refers to a heightened state of creativity and concentration on an activity. Csikszentmihalyi posited that if your skill level is equal to the level of challenge in any given activity, you will experience this state of flow.

The chart below is taken from Csikszentmihalyi’s own study on the subject of flow and motivation. It examines “your skill level” on the x axis in relation to the “challenge level” on the y axis.

Essentially:

Too much challenge + not enough skill = anxiety, worry (which might lead to procrastination and perfectionism)

Too much skill + not enough challenge = boredom, apathy (which might lead to monotony, irritability, and other depression-like symptoms)

Skill level = Challenge level = Flow

3. NOT ENOUGH “ACTIVE” STIMULATION—

When it comes to dopamine seeking, there is a distinct difference between active and passive stimulation in the brain.

Active stimulation is any form of activity that you have to actively engage in. For instance; exercising, doing a crossword puzzle, or reading a book. These kinds of activities not only give you dopamine, they also facilitate critical thinking and problem solving thought processes, which act as catalysts for creativity.

Passive stimulation, on the other hand, comes in the form of television, social media, and YouTube. It’s anything you can consume without having to actively engage. Passive stimulation will indeed give your brain dopamine, however, it won’t activate your creativity.

The problem also lies in the speed at which you receive the dopamine from passive activities. Passive stimulation is so easy to access that the more you consume, the harder it becomes to pick up active stimulation. Your brain expects a hit of dopamine just by picking up a phone or turning on the TV—it becomes addicted to the quick fix of a Netflix binge.

III. The Solutions

Based on the problems mentioned above, I am going to list a few solutions. Keeping in mind that not every solution will work for everyone, these can act as both preventative measures and remedies for someone who is currently burned out.

1. CHANGE UP YOUR ENVIRONMENT/ROUTINE—

Aim to do at least one thing per day that will add “variables” to the monotony. This can be as simple as going on a long walk, dressing up in that bold outfit you always wanted to wear to the office but never did, or sitting at a different workspace in your home.

Anything you can do that’s simple, but might provide an extra variable to your day to spice things up. Note: this shouldn’t be the same thing every day.

2. CHALLENGE YOURSELF MORE—

If you find yourself bored by your work, try challenging yourself more. This could mean setting goals for yourself that go a bit beyond what you’ve been doing.

For example, if you’ve been writing 500 words per day, see if you can beat your own word count every day for the next week. If you’ve been writing mainly fluff pieces, switch it up and do an angst piece. See if you can write a book in a month, or start a blog where you don’t write fiction at all!

Anything you can do to add a little kick to your workload. Note: Beware of challenging yourself too much! This can lead straight back into burnout.

3. CHALLENGE YOURSELF LESS—

If you’re on the flip side of that coin, and find that you are anxious, procrastinating, and perfectionistic when it comes to writing, fret not. Just because you’re experiencing any of these things, doesn’t mean you’re incapable of doing the job with your skillset.

It just means your perception of the job needs to be shifted.

Procrastination, at its heart, is a fear of failure, which results in actively avoiding the negative emotions associated with the task that causes this fear. Perfectionism is a type of procrastination that is a combination of a fear of failure and a fear of success (or, more accurately, other’s critiques of your success) all at once.

Neither have anything to do with your actual skillset, but they have everything to do with your perception of your skillset. Obviously, this is a harder thing to fix, as it has to do with deeply ingrained levels of self-esteem.

What I can offer you is a tactic to trick your mind into thinking you’re capable.

If you have a task, big or small, and you are feeling overwhelmed by it (like you might go curl up in bed and scroll Tumblr), immediately break that task up into smaller tasks. Keep breaking up the smaller tasks until you have the smallest possible part of the bigger task without doing nothing.

Then do that smallest possible thing.

If your goal is to write a 2000 word one shot, a small part of that task is writing half of it. An even smaller part of that task is breaking the one shot up into “scenes” and writing one scene. For instance:

Jude wakes up to a sore throat, a runny nose, and a fever.

She tries to go to work, but Cardan, being the mother hen that he is, threatens to never make her another grilled cheese sandwich (her favourite food) ever again if she doesn’t stay home.

Jude agrees begrudgingly, and Cardan sits her down in front of the TV with a bottle of Gatorade. He leaves to go get medicine from the store.

When Cardan comes back, Jude is worse than before. He makes her soup and saltine crackers and spoon feeds her.

She complains the whole time and, in her feverish state, threatens to never buy him another bottle of wine (his favourite food) ever again if he doesn’t let her feed herself.

Each bullet point represents one “scene” of about 200-400 words each. Obviously, there will be more details that you work out as you write. But with these five smaller scenes, your goal is no longer writing the 2000 word one shot. Your goal is writing the first of the five scenes.

If you complete the smallest possible task, you can stop, and you’ll still feel like you’ve accomplished something because you can cross off that task from your list. But chances are, by the time you cross off one task, you may have inspiration enough to keep going.

4. ENGAGE IN ACTIVE STIMULATION—

Since active stimulation has been proven to turn on the creative “tap”, try incorporating more of these activities into your daily routine:

Exercise: As the resident couch potato, I hate to say that exercising is good for creativity, but it is. Even if it’s just going on a short walk, so long as you’re moving.

Reading: Sometimes you have plenty of ideas, but no words to fit those ideas. Fill your well of words by carving out an hour or two each day for reading a good book.

The Creative Process: In the writing world, the creative process is a process of about 20-30 minutes that the writer partakes in every day before they start writing. This process should be creative, but also have nothing to do with writing. You can try colouring in a colouring book, painting, organising a page in your bullet journal. Anything that is creative but does not make you think about everything you have to do that day. Think of it as creative meditation.

Listen to music: Having APD, I personally can’t listen to music while I write. However, studies have shown that if you listen to at least ten songs per day, it will significantly benefit your dopamine levels and overall mood. If you’re like me and prefer to work in silence, maybe stick on a couple songs during your creative process. If you can manage music and writing together, get out those headphones!

5. KEEP A REGULAR SCHEDULE—

I know this is the most cliche point in the book, but it’s valid. This doesn’t mean do the same thing at the same time every day over and over, because ultimately we’re looking to avoid monotony.

But having pillars of structure to bolster the excitement can definitely work to keep you from slipping into burnout. Going to sleep, waking up, and having your meals at relatively the same time every day are good examples of this.

Feel free to change up the things you do between breakfast and lunch, but make sure you have those pillars of consistency so your brain knows that a break is on the horizon and doesn’t get tired.

6. PACE YOURSELF—

This is particularly difficult for those of us who are coming out of a creative burnout, but I urge you to pay special attention to this one. If we are suddenly hit by inspiration and the writing is flowing and flowing and flowing, eventually we will hit the point of highest dopamine capacity for writing.

Not putting a check on the flood of inspiration coming out of a creative burnout, I’d argue, is actually a guarantee that many of us will experience burnout all over again. It becomes this vicious cycle in which we are trapped.

While it feels great to write non-stop and receive immediate validation for that work, try to limit yourself to how much you’re writing and how immediately you post your writing (if you plan on posting it).

Whenever I finish a one shot or a chapter of something, I like to allow at least one day for editing before I post. This timeframe is important, because it acts as a buffer of rest between writing marathons.

You can take however long you need for the editing process, but definitely make sure you have a set amount of time in place. Otherwise, your brain might not have enough time to come down from what is essentially a writing high, and you will always need to reach greater heights in order to achieve that same level of dopamine.

~~~~

Overall, the most important things to take away from all of this are:

Change up your environment

Keep your brain actively stimulated

Have pillars of structure between which you can run about chaotically to your heart’s content

PACE YOURSELF!

Hope this helped. Happy writing!

-Em 🖤🗡

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#this one was a spiritual one y'all #thanks for the ask babes!#writing #writing tips #writing advice #writeblr #writing tip masterlist #writer #writer's desk #writer's life #writer's problems #writer's block #ao3 #fanfiction #creative burnout #asked and answered #em answers #danaanruhn #thank you for 2k!! 🥳💜

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wellntruly · 2 years

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Les Misérables, Vol. II, Book 1—

Yes I’m just making this joke again. You see it just somehow manages to capture exactly the sensation of turning the page and suddenly being dropped into 50 pages of Napoleonic warfare.

The secret is that I was actually fully ready to skip 'Waterloo'. I was all set to making a jokingly tearful apology that I skipped it Hugo, I’m so sorry I skipped it! I read it before I promise!

Only, I read it. I read the whole thing aahahahaha, hell. I mean by the time it started to slog down a bit after all the haunting lines about wells full of skeletons and a dead orchard of bare apple trees and crows before a wood full of violets, well I was already in so far. Might as well get to the end.

And if I hadn’t, I would have missed this exquisite bit of French-on-English commentary:

“A detail to be noted. There was in the English infantry, particularly in Kempt’s brigade, a great many raw recruits. These young soldiers were valiant in the presence of our redoubtable infantry; […]they performed particularly excellent service as skirmishers: the soldier skirmisher, left somewhat to himself, becomes, so to speak, his own general. These recruits displayed some of the French ingenuity and fury. This novice of an infantry had dash. This displeased Wellington.”

I also would have missed the reveal that the near-dying officer whom Thenardier robs on the battlefield is one of the Marius line, something my butt had completely forgotten from nine years ago!!

This man: “My name is Pontmercy.” Literally me, abruptly swallowing a blood orange toddy: “WHAT!”

And then the next book again is just a fraction of the length of the previous book, Hugo ha ha what’s this about!

The few pages of 'The Ship Orion' do contain however both of the following very good chapter titles:

CHAPTER II—IN WHICH THE READER WILL PERUSE TWO VERSES, WHICH ARE OF THE DEVIL’S COMPOSITION, POSSIBLY

and

CHAPTER III—THE ANKLE-CHAIN MUST HAVE UNDERGONE A CERTAIN PREPARATORY MANIPULATION TO BE THUS BROKEN WITH A BLOW FROM A HAMMER

As well as this brief description:

“an evil Norman monk, a bit of a sorcerer, named Tryphon[…]. This Tryphon is buried at the Abbéy of Saint-Georges de Bocherville, near Rouen, and toads spawn on his grave.” (This part came from Chapter II)

Now comes the point where I have to confront my numbering system. For Hugo does not just keep counting up books until 48, he starts over in a new volume—we are back at Books 1 and 2, honestly speaking. But, I’m just going to keep going like this, it gives a sense of the whole. Maybe my notation will be like this:

Vol. II, Books 9-10 /48 ✓✓

[Brickolage]

#Les Mis 2 More Mis #Brickolage #Victor Hugo #Isabel Florence Hapgood #Les Miserables

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pebblysand · 3 years

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[the thoughts on canon-compliance you did not ask for.]

last night between 2 and 3 in the morning (look, i couldn’t sleep, got up to write, then got caught up, okay? don’t judge me for my terrible sleeping patterns please) i had a super interesting discussion with a few people on the hinny discord channel about the definition of canon-compliant-ness. i think this is fascinating because to be honest, before getting into the hp fandom, i didn’t even think this was something one could disagree about. to me there was what was canon, and what wasn’t. a very black-and-white sort of system. i’m finding that it’s not.

through the discussions that i’ve had both on my fics and other people’s fics, it seems that i can narrow down - in the hp fandom - three elements of canon.

i. the events of the books/films

now, as a general disclaimer, you can obviously argue about whether the films are ‘canon.’ you can also argue whether cursed child is canon. there’s a lot of elements which differ between those and lots of opinions about how to look at them. personally, i tend to ignore cursed child. as to the books v. films, i pick and choose what suits my story more. generally, that’ll be the books. but for instance, i’m writing a harry&hermione friendship one shot right now, and there are a lot of movie-isms in that story because that is an aspect that was more explored in the films. however, for the purposes of this post, i’m mainly considering the source material to be the seven books. nothing more or less.

having said that, to me personally, that’s what ‘canon’ is: the events of the story and the characters that gravitate around those events, as described in the source material. things like: tom riddle killing lily and james, or harry, ron and hermione rescuing the philosopher’s stone. anything departing from that is, de facto, an ‘au.’ the whole world of what-if scenarios: what if Harry was sorted into slytherin, what if dudley was a wizard, all of those, to me, are aus.

generally, both as a reader and a writer, those are not scenarios i’m particularly drawn to. my default answer to those what-if scenarios is: ‘well, if harry is sorted into slytherin, there’s no story.’ or at the very least, there’s no story as i know it, and if there’s no story as i know it, then i’d rather read/write original fiction. it’s obviously a very personal preference and there are exceptions to this preference. i loved the changeling [1] for instance, and love the self-aware style of dirgewithoutmusic’s aus [2]. but as a general rule, that is not my preferred genre.

now, aside from the what-if scenarios, there’s also the question of filling in the gaps of the story itself. like, i find it interesting that we only make tsunamis [3] is labelled as ‘canon-compliant’ because i get the feeling that a lot of people would disagree that a fic in which hermione is harry’s first kiss is canon compliant. but, by exploiting the silence sometimes left by the author and turning it to your advantage, are you writing an au? is a negative space canon? is silence canon?

again, as a matter of personal opinion, i would not push my definition of canon-compliance as including blank spaces. to me, as long as it does not contradict the letter of the text, adding in events to the books to suit your story (i’ll address character in point ii) does not make your fic an au. to give another example that was brought up to me regarding my own work, i don’t believe that the events described in chapter nine of castles [4] are au because they exist in a blank space of the books. the fact that harry didn’t notice the 1:1s between ginny and amycus doesn’t mean they didn’t happen, it just means that they’re not in the positive space described by the books.

ii. the characters/characterisation

(as a quick vocab note, please note that below, i’m using the terms ‘ooc’ to mean that the characterisation of a character in a fic is not canon-compliant. they’re synonyms to me.)

now, while the above was pretty straight forward, i believe that this is where i perhaps differ from the masses in my interpretation of what “canon-compliance” means. more i discuss with people, the more i realise that i don’t really think there’s a real ‘canon’ characterisation. or at least not in the big things. like, yeah, it’s canon that harry likes treacle tart, because that’s a fact. but anything that is down to psychology or perspective of the character is, to me, generally up for grabs.

as a human, i believe that there’s things that people do, events that they go through, that condition them to act a certain way. while there is a core to every human being, i personally believe that in life, anyone would basically be capable of doing anything, given the right circumstances. i’ve recently - rightfully - been told my writing is all about the power of choice in our life, the reasons why we make those choices and the people those choices lead us to be. for example, do i think i might murder someone tomorrow? probably not. do i think i might be capable of murdering someone in wartime? perhaps? i don’t know, that’s not the world i live in and my life choices have not lead me to find out the answer to that. however, my point is: to me, good ‘characterisation’ is down to the circumstances and choices outlined in any work of fiction. hence, good characterisation is essentially, to me, equal to good writing.

i often say that good writing could make me believe anything and i mean it. i don’t tend to gravitate towards these fics because these ships are not my personal taste but i genuinely believe that good writing could make me believe in drarry or rarry if it tried. it’s funny because over the course of the discussion yesterday on discord, this was brought up ‘well, no one tags drarry as canon compliant,’ and i’m kind of like, i don’t know whether or not they do because i don’t read it but if they did and none of it contradicted the events as detailed in the books, perhaps it could be? like, that would take really good writing (imo), but good writing has - on occasion - made me believe in dramione a couple of times, so why not? in ‘til the sirens come calling [5], good writing made me 100% believe that harry and hermione would have an affair together. in we only make tsunamis [3], it makes me believe that they had this quiet little relationship building throughout hogwarts that we never knew about.

now, though, i suppose the question isn’t: do i believe it? the question is: is it canon? and, i think that’s where i differ from most people because to me, it is. to take ‘til the sirens come calling [5] as an example, i believe the fic is an au because hermione marries victor krum in the end. that’s going against the hard fact presented by the epilogue, and thus makes it an au. but i don’t believe the concept of a harmony affair is inherently au, because nothing is inherently au, character-wise. it’s about how you write it. how those people get to that place. that’s what makes canon-compliantness, in my opinion.

for example, for that fic, truth be told, we don’t know what those nineteen years include per canon, so they could very much include an h/hr affair. and whilst i don’t believe that the characters as they are in the books would have an affair together, i believe that the characters as they are presented in the fic, with the events and hardships that they go through, definitely would. good writing, to me, is - in part - recognising that characters are moving on a spectrum and that whilst their decisions/actions might not make sense in book-verse, they make sense in fic-verse. good writing is convincingly moving your characters from book-verse to fic-verse, and it not feeling ‘off.’

if it does feel off, that is bad writing to me, and that is also ooc-ness/non-canon compliant. it means that for whatever reason, the writer has not successfully transitioned and explained said transition through the events outlined in the story. with the right prose, you could make me believe draco decided to take on a career as a ballerina dancer after the war, and it would still be ‘canon-compliant’ to me. on the other hand, i have read fics (i won’t name them because that would be shit and also i don’t keep track of my ‘bad’ reads) where harry, ginny, hermione, or ron all act according to book canon and yet, their motivations felt off to me and completely ooc because the writing didn’t successfully lure me in. specifically, there was a lack of character evolution that i found uninteresting. i read mostly post-war stuff because i want to see my characters grow up [6].

as a last, additional note on characters, i also think that the characters in a story only exist within the prism of how we view them. this means that to me, locking my own understanding of a character's personality as 'canon' is particularly difficult because my understanding of a character is unique. i believe there are as many harry-s or ginny-s or hermione-s as there are readers. so i think saying someone's interpretation of a character isn't canon-compliant is odd because i don't actually believe there's any wrong or right answer. as i said, do i believe it likely that draco would become a professional ballerina? no. but if that works within your understanding of his character as described in the books, who am i to say that is or isn't canon compliant? i'll admit, the idea makes me sort of lol though.

iii. tone

lastly, i’ve come to find (in potter particularly) that canon-compliance might include tone. as in: hp is a story that is a) written in a certain style and b) written for children/young adults.

regarding style at a), this is honestly the main reason why it took me 15 years to write potter fic, despite the fact that i’ve been a fan for even longer than that. i genuinely thought you had to write like jkr. and i, well, don’t write like jkr. i love the books, but i don’t even particularly like her style. i like: camus, and sorj chalandon, and sally rooney, and dirgewithoutmusic and copper_dust [7]. i have zero ambition to write like jkr and don’t particularly want to read stuff that is written like her stuff either. it’s a style that imo works for her, but it doesn’t work for me as written by other people. i don’t particularly think you need to stick to her style to be canon-compliant.

which brings me onto my actual point: b) hp is a story written for children. young adults perhaps, for the later books. it sometimes explores dark themes but the writing style, the tone, etc. is lighthearted enough that it appeals to a younger audience. there’s snogging but there’s no sex, there’s violence but the torture is mostly off-screen, etc. issues like sexual assault, substance abuse, etc. aren’t explicitely brought up in the books, although they would one hundred percent fit in a book about a war that wasn’t necessarily aimed at children. the question is whether this setting and tone is part of what we call ‘canon-compliance.’

honestly, i don’t know. i didn’t think so until it was brought up to me that castles might be a dark!au and i was like: maybe? like, if you want it to be? i know what i like to read in fanfic: i love the exploration of serious themes that were not explored in the books, or explored differently due to the fact that they were written for children. one thing i will say and insist on is that i don’t think castles is all dark. i actually make a point of having lighthearted moments in each and every chapter, even just a notch, because i am attached to the fact that life as a concept is a mixture of good and bad, and you could laugh at the funeral of someone you loved, again in the right circumstances. but yeah, to me the post-war world is dark. so if tone is part of canon-compliance, then yeah in that way castles (as well as most of the stuff i read, to be honest), is a dark!au.

as a last side note, i’m not sure what that means for my other, lighter stuff though. like are the wolf’s just a puppy [8] or slipped [9] more canon-compliant than castles? i never thought about it in those terms but perhaps? it really opens up a world of questions in my mind and i don’t really have the answers to them.

conclusion:

so in sum, as a reader, what i mean as ‘canon compliant’ is basically a) the events as described in the source material and b) the characterisation of characters as they are at the start of the fic. if character evolution is sufficiently justified and well-written in the following thousands of words that the fic has, then said characterisation can still be canon-compliant, even if the characters act different than they would have in the source material itself. i’m a fan of good writing and good writing can make me buy into literally anything. it takes me places that i've never been before and convinces me that those places are the ones i should be in.

as a writer, i hope that regardless of 'compliance,' whatever i write at least makes ‘sense’ to people within the universe, even if they don’t consider it canon-compliant, per se. i feel like i can’t really be the judge of that. from the discussions we had last night, i feel like there are as many versions of what is and isn't canon-compliant as there are people.

---

[1] the changeling by annerb

[2] the boy with a scar series by dirgewithoutmusic

[3] we only make tsunamis by disOrdely

[4] castles by yours truly

[5] ‘til the sirens come calling by vexmybones

[6] as a side note and to take my own stuff as an another example, i totally agree that harry in castles isn’t harry in the books. i don’t think there’s much debate to be had in that assertion. i wrote him like this frankly because every other fic i’d read didn’t. they often had him sort of continue to be perfectly himself after the war, which i felt wasn’t speaking to me on a deeper level. imo, i think the war’s done a lot of scarring and the fic is about him growing into a new version of himself. so, to me, if i get a comment that says ‘i don’t think harry would act this way but i really love your writing’ it’s somewhat flattering but also confusing because i don’t really understand how one can enjoy the writing but not the characterisation. to me, they’re so intrinsically linked. what the comment tells me is: i think you did a very poor job at explaining character evolution and justifying character x’s [harry’s] choices but i still like your writing, somehow? i suppose that’s nice, but it doesn’t particularly compute in my brain. like, if the character feels off, it means the writing feels off and thus, why are you still reading? i appreciate all and every comment that i get but it doesn’t mean they always make sense in my own brain. if i’m honest, these comments often send me into an ocean of self-doubt about how shit my writing must be.

[7] copper_dust’s work and profile.

[8] the wolf’s just a puppy (and the door’s double locked), again by yours truly

[9] slipped (and said something sort of like your name), same.

#writing #fic writing #canon compliant #the meaning of words #pebblysand goes off a tangent #also general disclaimer that these are my thoughts #there's no wrong or right answer #it's just my own thoughts about the meanings of words

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cappymightwrite · 3 years

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ASOIAF & Norse Mythology

PART 2: The ‘Long Night’ and the Fimbulvetr

In PART 1 of this meta, from looking at just a few fan question answers, it seems rather clear to me that GRRM has more than just a passing interest in Norse mythology. One of the most fascinating and haunting myths in the Norse canon is the lead up to and resulting fallout of Ragnarök. In the show, the ‘Long Night’ appears to be just that, one night, and not even an awfully long one. In the books, however, it seems likely this will play out very differently. As a Norse nerd, the similarities to Ragnarök are just too obvious not to sit up and take notice, in particular, the similarities between the ‘Long Night’ and what is called the Fimbelvetr — which in my Old Icelandic dictionary translates to ‘the great and awful winter.’

Before I really get things rolling, lets take a moment to go over which Old Norse-Icelandic sources are traditionally used by medievalists to reconstruct the pagan conception of Ragnarök:

The Eddic poems Völuspá ‘The prophecy of the seeress’ (st. 40–51) and Vafþrúðnismál ‘The lay of Vafþrúðnir’ (st. 44–53) — these two poems provide us with quite a lot of information, with some sections being more comprehensive than others. Additionally, other Eddic poems, such as Lokasenna, Hyndluljóð, Grímnismál, and a few others hint at motifs, stemming from the ideas of Ragnarök.

In the Gylfaginning section of the Prose Edda (ch. 51–53), Snorri quotes many of the relevant stanzas from Völuspá in support of his own writing, though he also adds information that is unknown to us from other sources.

There are also a few skaldic* poems which give us minor hints regarding the incidents that will take places during Ragnarök.

NB: Eddic poetry is the term given to the poems primarily contained within the Icelandic Codex Regius manuscript, known as the Poetic Edda (written c. 1270, but arguably containing remnants of an older oral tradition). These poems are of unknown authorship. As for Skaldic poetry, these poems were written by known Icelandic skalds (ONI: skáld, ‘poet’), often in the courts of foreign kings, typically Norwegian, praising their patrons in exchange for royal favour; they span approx. c. 800–1300, so in some cases predate the recording (though not necessarily the composition or oral origins) of the Eddic poems.

According to Jens Peter Schødt, the Gylfaginning and Völuspá ‘are certainly the most extensive’ written sources we have on the Norse myths, as they ‘have played the most crucial role in the history of research.’ It is quite possible that GRRM has read much of the available textual sources on Ragnarök to help inspire his own work. That being said, if I had to bet on one being the touchstone source for him, it would be the Gylfaginning, since not only does it include detailed prose accounts of the events leading up to, during, and following Ragnarök, it also includes relevant Eddic poetry (notably Völuspá) in order to authenticate those descriptions. It really is a one of kind, unique source.

So, how about we begin with chapter 51 of Gylfaginning, where it is asked outright by Gangleri (aka King Gylfi) ‘what is to be said about Ragnarök?’ to which High answers:

There are many important things to be said about it. First will come the winter called Fimbulvetr [Extreme Winter]. Snow will drive in from all directions; the cold will be severe and the winds will be fierce. The sun will be of no use. Three of these winters will come, one after the other, with no summer in between. But before that there will have been another three winters with great battles taking place throughout the world. Brothers will kill brothers for the sake of greed, and neither father nor son will be spared in the killings and the collapse of kinship.* So it is said in The Sibyl’s Prophecy:

Brothers will fight,

bringing death to each other.

Sons of sisters

will split their kin bonds.

Hard times for men,

rampant depravity

age of axes, age of swords

shields split,

wind age, wolf age,

until the world falls into ruin.

The above translation is by Jesse Byock from the Penguin Classics Prose Edda — the translations in square brackets are his and included in the text, and he also uses a translated title for the Eddic poems, in this case, ‘The Sibyl’s Prophecy’ in place of Old Norse-Icelandic: Völuspá.

Several things are striking about this passage, chief among them, the fact that the precursor to Ragnarök is the Fimbulvetr, ‘the great and awful winter’ or ‘Extreme Winter.’ But before that, ‘another three winters’ in which much social upheaval will take place, circumstances that feel quite at home in ASOIAF. I would be hesitant to argue that GRRM is using the above description as an exact blueprint, but that being said, some of the circumstances described do feel very familiar to readers of his series:

‘Brothers will kill brothers for the sake of greed’ / ‘Brothers will fight’

This is perhaps suggestive of the Baratheon brothers, Stannis and Renly. Although, I’d say that the motivations/cause of the latter’s death is a little more nuanced than just ‘greed.’ But this is worth noting: the Norse source might offer us the seed of an idea, but it is GRRM who then “waters” it, effectively imbuing these dynamics with a deeper meaning and complexity.

Also, if we think of ‘brothers’ in a less literal sense, this could also apply to the ‘killing’ of Jon Snow by the black brothers of the Night’s Watch.

‘Neither father nor son will be spared in the killings’

Ned and Robb Stark fit into this category quite well, as both their deaths are gut-wrenching moments in the series. But also, more generally, this highlights that anyone, even beloved family, even heroes, can fall.

‘The collapse of kinship’ / ‘Rampant depravity’

In his footnotes, Byock observes the word sifjaslit to mean ‘the breaking of kinship bonds, but there is also the connotation of incest.’ In my ONI dictionary, sifja-slit translates to ‘adultery,’ since it is a compound of the nouns sifjar ‘affinity, connection by marriage’ and slit ‘rupture, breach’ — the latter most likely derives from the verb slitna, meaning ‘to break’ or ‘snap.’

The breaking of marriage bonds is present in ASOIAF, as in the case of Robert and Cersei’s respective adulteries. But we could also view Robb Stark’s marriage to Jeyne Westerling as a breaking of a betrothal bond as well.

Overall, I would say that there is room for both interpretations, and as we know, GRRM is pretty found of incest, prime cases currently present in canon being Jaime and Cersei Lannister, as well as the Targaryens.

‘Wolf-age’

Wolves feature a lot in Norse mythology, so it is interesting that the Starks, who are really the heart of ASOIAF, are so heavily associated with them.

Furthermore, the provisional title for the last book in the series, A Dream of Spring, was A Time for Wolves. The phrasing of this is just another way of saying ‘Wolf-age’, as found in Völuspá. But to potentially understand GRRM’s change in titles, it should be remembered that wolves in Norse mythology are often associated with war and violence — see, for instance, the kennings ‘wolf-wine’, ‘the river of Fenrir’, ‘the warm ale of the wolf’, which all mean blood. As someone familiar with Old Norse poetry, A Time for Wolves suggests to me a period of violence, whereas A Dream of Spring offers more hope and the potential for rejuvenation, perhaps paralleling the events that follow Ragnarök, as described in the Prose Edda and Völuspá (which I might get into further down the line).

‘Until the world falls into ruin’

It is strongly predicted, and alluded in the text itself, that the Wall will at some point fall, an event that will act as a precursor to the second ‘Long Night.’ The Wall is also considered by some people to be the end of the known world, so its destruction is strongly linked with the collapse of the social structure of Westeros as a whole.

As we can see, certain parallels can be made, though it is also worth noting that there are instances where they can’t be. For example, ‘sons of sisters will split their kin bonds’— I can’t really think of a relationship to compare this to in ASOIAF, unless it hasn’t happened in the text yet, and then who would it be? Robert ‘Sweetrobin’ Arryn and…Bran Stark? There are obvious similarities and ways in which we can link these descriptions to GRRM’s text, but we should be cautious to avoid shoehorning.

Indeed, it is fun to make these comparisons, but I think the main take away from this chapter of the Gylfaginning is that during the time closely preceding the Fimbulvetr, there will be ‘hard times for men’ with much social upheaval, including bloodshed, betrayals, and incest. In my opinion, the ‘Long Night’ has been heavily inspired by the Norse Fimbulvetr, and this is reflected in the way ASOIAF characters describe the ‘Long Night’, closely paralleling its Norse source.

To summarise from the above quotation, during the Fimbulvetr:

‘Snow will drive in from all directions; the cold will be severe and the winds will be fierce.’ (Gylf)

‘The sun will be of no use.’ (Gylf)

‘Three of these winters will come, one after the other, with no summer in between.’ (Gylf)

In ASOIAF, the earliest mention of the ‘Long Night’ is in AGOT, Bran I, in which Bran recalls the ‘the hearth tales of Old Nan’ detailing the apparent savagery and cultural difference between the northerners and the wildings, noting that ‘their women lay with the Others in the Long Night to sire terrible half-human children’. This evokes the above quotation from Völuspá, the reference to ‘rampant depravity’ in particular. But it is later, in Tyrion III, that we get the first real parallel between the Long Night and the Fimbulvetr:

Lord Mormont moved to the window and stared out into the night. “These are old bones, Lannister, but they have never felt a chill like this. Tell the king what I say, I pray you. Winter is coming, and when the Long Night falls, only the Night’s Watch will stand between the realm and the darkness that sweeps from the north. The gods help us all if we are not ready.

From the description in Gylfaginning, we know that the Fimbulvetr is preceded by three winters, ‘one after the other, with no summer in between’. Without taking it too literally, this description at the very least suggests that a move towards cold weather will herald the coming of the ‘Extreme Winter’, as this is foreshadowed as early as AGOT in this Tyrion chapter when Jeor Mormont states that he has ‘never felt a chill like this […] Winter is coming’. Directly following this statement is the foreknowledge that the Long Night is indeed on its way.

The reference to a ‘darkness that sweeps from the north’ is noteworthy too, as although most often associated with freezing weather, the Fimbulvetr is also crucially connected with the disappearing of the sun (‘the sun will be of no use’, Gylf). Indeed, the very name the Long Night suggests much the same phenomenon, as explained to Bran by Old Nan later in AGOT, in Bran IV:

Fear is for the winter, my little lord, when the snows fall a hundred feet deep and the ice wind comes howling out of the north. Fear is for the long night, when the sun hides its face for years at a time, and little children are born and live and die all in darkness while the direwolves grow gaunt and hungry, and the white walkers move through the woods.

[…]

Thousands and thousands of years ago, a winter fell that was cold and hard and endless beyond all memory of man. There came a night that lasted a generation, and kings shivered and died in their castles even as the swineherds in their hovels. Women smothered their children rather than see them starve, and cried, and felt their tears freeze on their cheeks.

I mean…this might as well be a description for the Fimbulvetr, it is THAT similar! Indeed, as we know, in the world of ASOIAF the seasons work a bit differently, as alluded to by Old Nan when she refers to ‘a night [i.e. a winter] that lasted a generation’. Similarly, the Fimbulvetr is unusual in that it is preceded by ‘three winters’, which suggests an extended winter lasting up four years, culminating in the ‘Extreme Winter’, aka the Fimbulvetr. It seems likely that the timespan of ‘a generation’ has been exaggerated for the sake of myth making. That being said, we would expect the Long Night to still be noteworthy in its duration. So, perhaps it is possible that, were GRRM to emulate the Norse source, his Long Night could potentially last for a similar amount of time (four years). Either way, I think we all expect it to last longer than it did in the show!

In conclusion, the way in which the Fimbulvetr is described in the Norse sources bears a striking resemblance to the descriptions of the Long Night in ASOIAF. Futhermore, and most interestingly to me, it seems entirely possible that, like the Fimbulvetr, and like the first Long Night that went before it, the next Long Night will include the disappearing of the sun...an important feature that I will discuss further next time! So stay tuned!

References/Bibliography (excluding ASOIAF):

Snorri Sturluson, The Prose Edda, trans. and intr. by Jesse Byock, (London: Penguin Classics, 2005)

Jens Peter Schødt, ‘The Ragnarök Myth in Scandinavia’, in Finding, Inheriting and Borrowing?: The Construction and Transfer of Knowledge in Antiquity and the Middle Ages, 2019, Vol.39, p.365-384

END OF PART 2…

I haven’t quite decided if I will include my stuff about the sun disappearing in Ragnarök and the ‘Red Comet’, or if I’ll give it its own separate part...we’ll see! I would also like to talk a bit about the significance of storytelling as a way of recording history in ASOIAF... Basically, I have a lot of thoughts on things!

#asoiaf #asoiaf meta #asoiaf and norse mythology #asoiaf norse meta #game of thrones #game of thrones meta

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zerochanges · 3 years

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2020 Favorite Video Games

I don’t know if I am an outlier or if this is the same for everyone else but I really did not play a lot of games this year. 2020 was a very harsh year for all of us, especially for me for some personal reasons. So to get to the chase, I am just gonna say it left me not doing much in what little free time I did have, and I didn’t play much either. Usually I try to keep my lists for ‘favorite of the year’ to only titles released that year but since I played so little this year, screw it. I am gonna include any game I played this year regardless of release date.

Collection of SaGa

By far a flawed rerelease. It’s bare bones: there are no advance features you would usually expect out of these kinds of emulated rereleases like save states, fast forward, or rewind, and there was no real effort made to touch up almost 30 year old localizations that had to meet Nintendo of America’s then harsh standards. This really is just 3 roms slapped into a nice looking interface with an option to increase the game speed (which by the way you better use, the characters walk very slow in these old games).

I am bit harsh here, but only because I thought the Romancing SaGa remasters and the upcoming SaGa Frontier remaster all looked like they got a great budget and a lot of love while this is just another Collection of Mana situation (moreso specifically talking about Seiken Densetsu 1/Final Fantasy Adventure/Adventures of Mana part of that collection). I would have loved to see Square Enix do a bit more for these older games. Or at least include the remakes. Seiken Densetsu 1 had two great remakes, both unused in Collection of Mana, and all three of these original SaGa titles have remakes that have never seen the light of day outside of Japan. How great would it have been to get the Wonderswan remake of SaGa 1, as well as the Nintendo DS remakes of Saga 2 and SaGa 3?

But my gripes aside, these games are still fun as they ever were. Replaying SaGa 1 specifically during the holiday season really helped calm me down and made me feel at ease. It’s easy to forget but even in their Gameboy roots there are a lot of funky and weird experimental choices being made in these games. They aren’t your run-of-the-mil dragon quest (or considering the gameboy, maybe pokemon would be more apt) clones.

Raging Loop

Perhaps my favorite game of the year, Raging Loop is one of the best visual novels I have ever played hands down. The level of creativity and splitting story paths that went into it is simply mind blowing. The basic premise is both a wonderful throwback to the old days of Chunsoft sound novels while still modern and somewhat reminiscent of both Higurashi and Danganronpa. Essentially you play as Haruaki, a poor slub that got lost in the mountains with no clue where to go until you stumble upon an old rural village with a strange history and even stranger superstitions. Before you know it there has been a murder and the Feast is now afoot.

The less said about Raging Loop the better, although I do want to say a lot about it one day if I ever can write a proper review of it. This is a gripping game that will take hold of you once you get into it though and never let go. I actually 100%-ed this and I very rarely do that. I got every ending, every bonus hidden ending, played the entire game twice to hear all the hidden details it purposely hides on your first play through, played all the bonus epilogue chapters, unlocked all the hidden voice actor interviews, collected all the art work, etc, etc. I was just obsessed with this game, it’s that damn good! And the main character is maybe the best troll in all of video games, god bless Haruaki.

Root Double

From Takumi Nakazawa, long time contributor to Kotaro Uchikoshi’s work comes a game any fan of Zero Escape or Uchikoshi in general will probably enjoy. Root Double, like its name suggests is a visual novel with two different routes, hence Root Double. The first route stars Watase Kasasagi, the leader of an elite rescue team in the midst of their greatest crisis yet that could lead to nuclear devastation as they try to evacuate a nuclear research facility that has gone awry.

The other route stars Natsuhiko Tenkawa, an everyday high schooler whose peaceful life is thrown into turmoil when he stumbles upon a terrorist plot to destroy the nuclear facility in the city and his attempts to stop them. Together the two separate plots weave into one and creates a really crazy ride. Part Chernobyl, part science fiction, any fan of the genre will easily enjoy it. And hey it’s kind of relevant to include on this list too since it just got a Switch port this year (I played it on steam though).

Snack World

I was shocked upon starting Snack World as it is instantly incredibly charming, witty, and downright hilarious at times yet I heard almost zero people talk about it. EVER. This game is Dragon Quest levels of quirky though, and the localization is incredible. The game has such an oddball sense of humor that works really well with its presentation right down to the anime opening video that sings about the most bizarre things. Instead of the usual pump up song about the cool adventure ahead we get stuff like wanting to go out to a restaurant and eat pork chops.

The self aware/fourth wall breaking humor is just enough to be really funny, but doesn't overstay its welcome and always makes it work right in the context of the dialogue. And finally, just everything; with the menus, the name of side quests and missions, and the character dialogue -- are all just so witty and full of quirky humor. This is one hell of a charming and funny game and addictive to boot.

Trials of Mana

Trials of Mana has gone from one of those legendary unlocalized games, to one of the first major breakthroughs in fan translation, to finally getting an official English release complete with a fully 3D remake. In a lot of ways from a western perspective this game has had an incredible journey. As for this remake itself, I really found myself having tons of fun with it. I loved the graphics, and the voice acting while a bit on the cheaper side almost kind of adds to the charm since both the graphics and acting really give it an old PS2 vibe. I know that is probably just more me being weird but yeah, I had to say it.

I really hope Square Enix sticks to this style of remake more often, instead of just doing Final Fantasy VII Remakes that break the bank and involve extensive tweaking to both plot and game play. I’ll take smaller budget projects that play more like the original game any day personally. I wouldn’t mind if they also deliver a brand new Mana game all together in this engine either.

Utawarerumono Trilogy

This year saw the release of the first entry in the series, Utawarerumono: Prelude to the Fallen--and thus finally after three years since the sequels Utawarerumono: Mask of Deception and Utawarerumono: Mask of Truth came out in 2017 the trilogy is now complete in English. I ended up binging through Prelude to the Fallen very fast shortly after it came out and immediately jumped on to the sequels. Perhaps the best part of 2020 was that I finally played all three of these fantastic games, and did so back-to-back-to-back. Playing the first Utawarerumono was an experience I will never forget, it was like visiting old friends again that I haven’t seen in ages, by and large thanks to the fact that I saw the anime adaption of the game when I was much younger, nearly a decade ago. Back then I would have never of dreamed that I would get to play the actual game and get the real experience.

And it only got better from here, as all three games are such wonderful experiences from start to finish. The stories are all so deep, and by the time you get to the third entry, Mask of Truth, it’s crazy to see how they all connected over so many years and weaved together into a plot much bigger than they ever were. What carries it beyond all that though has to be the fun and addicting strategy role playing game aspect, which while a bit on the easy side, is still so much fun and helps make the game feel better paced since you get to play the conquests your characters go on and not just read about all the battles they fight. Beyond that the games are packed full of awesome characters, and I know I’ll never forget the amazing leads in all of them. Hakuowlo, Haku, and Oshtor will all go down as some of the greats to me.

Ys: Memories of Celceta

Ys: Memories of Celceta is a full 3D remake of Ys IV, a rather infamous game in Falcom’s Ys series. Not to get bogged down too much into the history of Falcom but by this point they were facing a lot of hardship and had to outsource this entry to other developers, and thus passed it on to two particular developers they had a business relationship with, creating two unique versions of Ys IV. Tonkin House who had worked on Super Famicom port of Ys III with Falcom ended up creating their own YS IV entry, Mask of the Sun for the very same system, where Hudson soft who had produced the much beloved Ys Books I & II remakes for the Turbografix (PC Engine) CD add-on created their own Ys IV entry Dawn of Ys for that console. Both games followed guidelines and ideas outlined from Falcom themselves but both radically diverged from each other and turned into completely different games.

Falcom finally putting an end to this debate on which version of Ys IV you should play have gone and created their own definitive Ys IV in 2012 for the Playstation Vita. I played the 2020 remastered version of this remake on my PS4. I even bought this on the Vita when it first came out but I am horrible and only horde games, never play them. So it was a lot of fun to finally play this.

Memories of Celceta is probably one of the best starting points for anyone looking to get into Ys, especially if you only want to stay with the 3D titles as out of all the 3D entries this explains the most about the world and series protagonist Adol Christian. Beyond that it’s just another fantastic entry in a wonderful series that has a few good twists hidden behind it, especially for long time fans of the series.

Random Video Game Console Stuff

Xbox Has Blue Dragon: I actually got an Xbox One this year for free from my brother. Because of that I started to play Blue Dragon again and there’s a lot I would love to say about this game. I don’t know if I am fully committed to replaying it all the way through however but I find myself putting in a couple hours every few days and enjoying myself again. Does anyone else remember Blue Dragon? I feel like it really missed its audience and had it come out nowadays and probably for the Switch it would have really resonated with the Dragon Quest fandom a lot more instead of being thrown out to die on Xbox and constantly compared to Final Fantasy VII and the like which it had nothing at all similar with.

The Turbografx 16 Mini: This was probably one of the best mini consoles that have come out and I feel like thanks to the whole 2020 pandemic thing it was largely forgotten about. That’s a shame, it has a wonderful variety of great games, especially if you count the Japanese ones (god I wish I could play the Japanese version of Snatcher included), and a wonderful interface with fantastic music. One of these days I would really like to be able to play around with the console more seriously than I have already.

Fire Emblem Shadow Dragon Never Existed: So Nintendo localized the first ever Fire Emblem game on Nintendo Switch which is awesome to see them touching Famicom games again--I haven’t seen Nintendo of America rerelease old Famicom titles since Mysterious Murasame Castle on the 3DS, but their trailer hilariously made it seem like this is the first time ever they released Fire Emblem when in fact they had already localized the remake Shadow Dragon on the Nintendo DS nearly 10 or 11 years ago. I and many other fans I talked to all found this really hilarious, probably solely because of how much they kept repeating the fact that this is the first time you will ever be able to experience Marth’s story.

All that aside though I have to say the collector edition for this newly localized Famicom game is probably the most gorgeous retro reproduction I have seen in a long time, and I really spent many many hours just staring at the all clear glass mock cartridge. I have found myself really obsessing over retro reproductions during 2020, and obtained quite a few this year. I really hope this trend continues to go on in 2021 as recreating classic console packaging and cartridges is a lot of fun.

#video games #collection of saga final fantasy legend #SaGa #SaGa I #SaGa II #SaGa III #Raging Loop #Root Double #Snack World #Trials of Mana #Seiken Densetsu 3 #Utawarerumono #Ys #Ys IV #ys memories of celceta

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writingmyselfout · 3 years

Text

Because I Could Not Stop for Death - Chapter Ten

Language: English

Rating: Teen+

Pairing: Hermione Granger/Harry Potter

Tags: AU - Canon Divergence, Reptilia28′s Don’t Fear the Reaper Challenge, Manipulative Dumbledore, Black Hermione Granger, Slight Ron Weasley Bashing

Prologue 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Chapter 10: Gimme Some Truth

Summary: The will.

MINERVA McGonagall was not generally known for impatience. In fact, quite the opposite: she was quite possibly one of the most patient women in the world, Muggle or otherwise. So it is with an uncharacteristic sense of impatience that she wakes early Saturday morning to get ready for her day back in London. When she realizes just how early, she forces herself to take her time with eating breakfast before taking the time to leave a reminder to her prefects and the Head Girl, a Gryffindor 7th year girl, that she would be away from the castle most of the day and they were to reach out to either Professor Flitwick or Professor Snape should the need arise.

In truth, she doesn’t anticipate anything of great importance occurring on the first weekend of the school year, but she’d also been teaching for long enough to know that when it came to hundreds of adolescent witches and wizards, it was best to prepare for the worst just in case.

She considers, briefly, letting the headmaster know of her plans but opts not to. His own weekends were usually busy, often resulting in him rarely leaving his office or leaving the school altogether for business elsewhere. Even if this were one weekend in which he was free enough to note her absence, she’s not inclined to give him advance notice of her plans. Perhaps it was paranoia, but considering his attempt to maintain guardianship over Harry, she thinks it possible that he might try to dissuade her from looking into the will, which she was determined to do.

Finally, she heads out. The school’s security measures means she’s unable to leave directly from Hogwarts to Diagon Alley. Instead, she goes into Hogsmeade, greets a yawning Rosmerta in the Three Broomsticks, and borrows her fireplace to Floo to the Leaky Cauldron in London. Most of the shops that made up Diagon Alley kept regular opening and closing hours, including those on Horizont Alley, Knockturn Alley, and Carkitt Market--side shopping areas--with only a few exceptions. Among those exceptions were the Owl Post Office and the Gringotts Money Exchange in the Carkitt Market, and the Healer Shop, Leaky Cauldron and Gringotts Bank directly on Diagon Alley, which were open all day, every day, for the convenience of their patrons. Some of the locations on Knockturn Alley likewise kept such hours, but McGonagall was not one to frequent that district, so which is knowledge she does not, nor cares to, possess.

What matters is that at eight o’clock in the morning, there are few out and about on Diagon Alley, but Gringotts Bank stands at attention at the end of the street, ready for its customers at all hours. And at this particular hour, there are few enough people even within the bank to ensure that she can be attended with little to no delay.

If there is one thing about Gringotts to be appreciated above all else, it is their efficiency. The goblins are not interested in wasting time, and are remarkably good at ensuring that all spells corresponding with Hogwarts and Ministry of Magic records are always working so their own documents are always up to date. They therefore are already well aware that guardianship has moved from the Headmaster to Harry Potter’s Head of House, one Minerva McGonagall.

Upon stating her business, a goblin by the name of Nagnok is called to lead McGonagall to a room off of the main lobby. It’s a small office, with two chairs facing a desk behind which there is a chair, then a set of drawers set against the wall next to a back door. She’s instructed to take a seat as they would return shortly with the documents in question, then they leave through the back door. They are gone for less than five minutes when they return with a large envelope which, in place of a wax seal, has a string and button seal. Nagnok takes a seat at the desk, modified so that he is eye-level with the witch, and passes the envelope across the desk.

McGonagall looks at the envelope for a moment, then undoes the tie to open it. Inside, tied neatly together, is a small stack of papers with two envelopes slightly smaller than the one they’d been in sitting on top. She undoes that tie as well, places the original envelope and tie to one side, then separates the items before her. She sets down first one envelope, then the next, and finally the pages in a stack together.

The first letter has Harry’s name written across it. When she flips it over, there is a gold wax seal with the image of a crest pressed into it. McGonagall realizes she has never seen the Potter family crest; had in fact never thought, as with most wizarding families, that there was none. The practice dated back to the twelfth century, and with the exception of families that had dealings with Muggle royals and received recognition from them, wizards and witches typically earned them for great contributions to the wizarding world after which the crest was magically included in Muggle records so as to avoid its use among Muggle nobles. McGonagall doesn’t quite remember when its usage fell out of favor and stopped being bestowed, simply that it was mostly only seen for institutions. Each wizarding school, for instance, and Gringotts as well as the Daily Prophet possessed their own heraldry. Not that she could recall what it looked like, but she was certain some of the older, wealthier families such as the Blacks and Malfoys similarly possessed their own unique family crest and coat of arms.

She runs her fingers over the wax, feeling the small indentations of the different charges on the small shield imprinted there, and Nagnok advises, “That is spelled to only allow Mr. Potter to open the letter.”

“I’ve no interest in reading a private letter addressed to my student,” McGonagall informs him, setting the letter aside. The second has no name written on the outside, and the wax seal on the back on this one is red and broken, indicating it had been opened before. She assumes by Albus, and she opens it and pulls out a folded parchment, surprised to find it completely blank. “Is there nothing written in this one?”

“As you can see, it is blank, but we were instructed to include it unaltered with the other letter and will. Albus Dumbledore also did not know what to do with it.” Nagnok grinned, amused, and McGonagall had a feeling that he took enjoyment at their befuddlement. There was likely a spell of some sort that only the guardian, or guardians, James and Lily had wanted for their son would know how to surpass.

She put the blank parchment away, setting it aside with Harry’s letter, and turning at last to the will itself. The topmost page was clearly the bank’s, providing information on when the will was last altered, when it went into effect, the date it was first accessed, and a blank spot at the bottom denoting when will was fully carried out. As she set the page aside, magically adding today’s date as the last time the will was accessed.

The details too small to see on the wax seal without much closer inspection were now enlarged and clearly visible. The next page had the full coat of arms and crest in all its magicked glory at the top of the page, before the official writing announcing the document to be the last will and testament of James Potter and Lily Jade Potter nee Evans. The shield of the coat of arms is black, with one large green chevron and three gold chevronelles. At the bottom is an open, azure book with black script that appears briefly, only to disappear again. The coat is charged with three red stags in the right corner, and two grapevines with a wheatsheaf, all three tawny in color, in the left corner. Above the shield, a stag with a caduceus makes up the crest, standing on a wreath of black, green, and gold, with a banner over it with the family motto in Latin. Briefly, she thinks she sees a hint of silver on the edges but the outline of the shield is black, and the lions on either side are gold with a red sash. She’s confident that the lions, considering their colors, are meant to represent Gryffindor, and she smiles. James had once mentioned, while Lily was pregnant, that he was sure to give McGonagall another Gryffindor to look after as all his family had been Gryffindors. She wishes she could tell him he’d been right.

She moves on, not wanting to dwell on things she could not change, and begins to skim through the documents. The will isn’t particularly long, so much as it is filled with legal jargon that makes it tedious to read. Ultimately, it outlines what items constitute the Potter estate, with related legal documents where necessary included with the will. Among such items was a London property that dated back to the 1600s, the cottage in Godric’s Hollow which was an ancestral home older than the London property, and the Gringotts vault, and the two deeds and Gringotts contract for each. There was also a small list of family heirlooms, with equal parts valuable and sentimental items, with a note as to whether it should be found at one of the properties or within the vault.

All of this McGonagall skims over, until she finally reaches the section she’s been looking for, which states that should James and Lily pass before Harry was of age, guardianship is to be passed on to his godfather, Sirius Black III. In the event that he is unable to carry out his duties, Harry is to be given into the care of Frank C.J. Longbottom and Alice Longbottom, or Remus John Lupin. There is not a single mention of Lily’s sister anywhere to be found.

Then there is a section regarding the funds in the vault. Once Harry’s old enough to go to Hogwarts, he’s allowed access to the vault directly, but until such time his key and the funds were to be overseen by his guardian. In that, Dumbledore had been adhering to the will, since he’d had the key, and it probably had been best to not give it to the Dursleys. McGonagall cannot imagine the Muggle pair coming to Diagon Alley to stand face-to-face with goblins, but stranger things had been known to happen in the pursuit of wealth. Granted, as she continues reading and notes that in order to protect Harry’s interests, funds removed from the Potter vault by anyone other than Harry would require an annual accounting to verify its use was in regards to needs directly associated with raising Harry, with a generous allowance to accommodate additional expenditures not directly related to Harry, but likely intended in the case of Harry going to one of his parents’ bachelor friends who might not be able to work as much if they were single-handedly raising a child.

“I have some questions,” McGonagall finally says to the goblin, who has been looking over papers and now looks up at her. “At the time of their deaths, all of the people noted here as possible guardians for Harry Potter would have been perfectly capable of carrying out those duties and being notified. Why, then, was Mr. Potter’s physical guardianship passed on to relatives not provided in the will, and magical guardianship given to Albus?”

“That would be the doing of your Ministry of Magic,” Nagnok informs her, the tone and sneer on his face making it clear how he feels about their interference. “Emergency provisions were put into place to allow for government intervention in the carrying out of wills and guardianship where they felt it best served the safety of the wizarding community, the Statute of Security, and-or the individual or individuals involved.” He’s clearly reciting the mandate from memory. “This was to be effective for two years starting October of the year one thousand nine hundred and eighty-one. It was extended an additional six years, and finally expired just prior to the current Minister of Magic taking office. Instead, it was decided that the provision would only continue to apply to Mr. Potter due to the extraneous circumstances, and there was no interest in challenging it.”

Of course there hadn’t been; the boy’s Muggle relatives were oblivious to the fact that he’d inherited a fortune, or that there had been a will at all left behind. McGonagall had a feeling that, had they known guardianship had been meant for others, they might have jumped at the chance to pass Harry off. It annoyed her to think that Albus had used his influence as such, and prevented Harry from going where he might have been wanted.

He could argue, for instance, that by doing so he had saved Harry from falling into the hands of his godfather, Sirius. However, Frank and Alice Longbottom had been perfectly capable at the time of taking in Harry. And with a child of their own the same age, Harry would have had at least a few happy years before the Longbottoms were captured and tortured by rogue Death Eaters fleeing the law, still trying to locate their defeated leader.Harry then would have likely stayed under the care of the formidable Augusta Longbottom, who was no doubt a strict woman, but one who would have done a much better job at raising Harry than his Muggle relations had done.

Remus Lupin is the only one listed who might still take guardianship, but that as far as she knows lest Dumbledore failed to mention, the man has never reached out regarding Harry either. She could guess why, and thought it likely that even if he had known about being a possible guardian for Harry, he would have relinquished said guardianship to Dumbledore easily. But he is the boy’s only connection to his parents left, and she wonders if she can convince him to take up the mantle his friends had intended for him.

Moving back to the list of heirlooms, she taps a finger at the symbols indicating their locations. “The items listed as being in the Potter vault, of course, I’m sure are present and accounted for; this is Gringotts, after all.” It isn’t mere flattery; McGonagall is certain that if anything had been removed from the vault at any point after the will’s creation, they’d have noted as much. Their records were always meticulously kept. “Would it be possible to get verification that the items that should be here or at Godric’s Hollow are where they should be?”

“For a fee, we could provide services to do just that,” Nagnok advises. “However, bear in mind that Godric’s Hollow was for a time cordoned off by the Ministry as they dealt with the...aftermath of the Dark Lord’s attack.”

She recalls. “Then they let reporters and tourists visit, like it was an attraction instead of the site of a tragedy.” She sighs, still annoyed by it. “Are you saying it’s possible the Ministry, or some other party, removed items from the cottage?”

“Thieves and looters are not uncommon, even today, but especially in times of war.”

Quickly and efficiently, she begins to gather everything altogether. “I presume I will be able to take this with me, in order to review its contents with Mr. Potter?”

“Fine.” Grumbling, Nagnok reaches out to take the Gringotts page, grabs a quill to sign it, and then passes both the page and the quill to the witch to do the same, as there is now a new record indicating that the will is being removed from the Gringotts property by Harry Potter’s acting guardian. “Please note we have a copy of the main will, and should there be any attempt to destroy or alter these pages, our records will be adjusted accordingly. We highly recommend, once Mr. Potter has seen the contents, that the will be returned here for safekeeping until he is of age.”

McGonagall nods in understanding, says she will be in contact in regards to contracting their services to verify the heirlooms not currently at Gringotts, and soon after is walking back outside. It’s perhaps been an hour since she arrived, maybe a little more, but foot traffic on Diagon Alley has already begun to pick up significantly. Nevertheless, she simply stands there for a moment, gathering her thoughts, trying to decide what to do next.

She can go back to Hogwarts, will in hand, and give everything to Harry. She would have to explain what the will says, certain that the will itself will be difficult for an eleven-year old boy to read and comprehend himself, but he would have it. He would know. There have already been so many secrets kept from him, she’s loath to continue the tradition, but she also does not want to do anything that might hurt the boy. What if Remus does, in fact, prefer to relinquish his rights as guardian? What if the London property is no longer habitable? What if he asks to go see the cottage in Godric’s Hollow? What if there’s something in that letter, written just for him, that prompts questions she can’t answer? Or an heirloom that they can’t locate?

“Enough of that,” she scolds herself. She is worried about scenarios that may not happen, and as a former Gryffindor and the current Head, even if the worse were to happen, she would face those challenges as she always did: directly and without hesitation.

The most important task to tackle was attempting to locate Remus Lupin, wherever he might be. She could ask the headmaster, who she suspects has kept a running tally on the whereabouts of all the living former members of the Order not currently working at Hogwarts, but she thinks she’ll leave that as a last resort. She has her own connections in London; friends, former students, or the parents of ones, with whom she might be able to find something out. Particularly those who had been familiar with James Potter and his group of friends during their time at Hogwarts. McGonagall thinks it would be ideal to speak with him face-to-face, but if she’s unable to do so, then the next option would be to try to write to him and hope that he can be found by owl. If that fails, and only if that fails, she will turn to Albus for assistance.

~~~

WHEN she has returned to Hogwarts, it is shortly before dinner. She is tired, frustrated that she’d managed to find three students who’d gone to school with James and Lily, two of whom had been Gryffindors, and yet none knew anything about Remus Lupin. The man, for all his friendliness and general good nature, had kept few friends during his time at school, and of those, none had made it out of the war alive except the one responsible for the others’ deaths. She would have to write to him, which meant deciding how much to put in a letter versus waiting until she could speak to him. McGonagall doesn’t want to admonish him for his lack of interest in Harry to this point, no doubt believing as she had that he’d been well in hand under Dumbledore’s care. However, she does want to impart on him the gravity of the boy’s upbringing, and that he was likely the boy’s best hope of getting away from the Dursleys. He was the last person named in the will, so without him, next of kin took precedence.

If only James hadn’t been an only child.

Then there had been the added frustration of realizing, upon a second look, that there was no address in the will or the deed itself for the London property. She would have to submit an inquiry to the Ministry of Magic, but considering the state of things before their deaths, she wonders if perhaps the London home was also put under the Fidelis Charm. Without that secret keeper, forget finding the place herself, how would they be able to send someone to confirm the heirlooms that should be there?

“Hello, Professor.”

“Good evening.” She looks over at the student moving past her in the hall, notes it’s one of her Gryffindors, and says, “Ms. Spinnet, if you can locate Mr. Potter, please have him come to my office.”

The girl answers in the affirmative before she runs off to do as requested, and McGonagall heads to her office. She’s decided; she will tell him that she has the will, but wishes to look into a few things before sharing it with him. Hopefully his trust in her will extend into believing her when she says she thinks it’s for the best.

She’s a few lines into her letter when there is a knock on her door. McGonagall is only mildly surprised when the one who comes in is not the student she’s waiting on, but the Potions Master. “Severus--” She’s only just started to greet him as he’s closing the door, when there’s more knocking a small, messy-haired head peers in around the still open door.

“You wanted to see me, Professor?”

“Yes. Do come in, Harry. Have a seat.” She motions at the chair across from her, and Snape opens the door further to let him in. The Potion Master then looks back, raising an eyebrow at his colleague who nods for him to stay. She watches him close the door but remaining close to it, as if to ensure no intruder will come in.

“Is this about my parents’ will?” Harry asks.

“Yes. I was able to obtain their will from Gringotts, however there are some things I’d like to look into, now that I’m privy to its contents. I’d like you to wait until then for me to share it with you, all right?” She has set the quill down to one side, letter momentarily forgotten as she clasps her hands together on top of her desk.

Harry is quiet, considering. “How long will that take?” he asks after a few moments.

“Hopefully not long,” she tells him, but admits, “But I don’t know exactly. It may be a few days, or a few months.” She meets his gaze steadily. “I do promise that, one way or another, you will know before the school year ends.”

Silence again for a beat, then another, before he nods his head in agreement. “Okay.”

“Thank you. Now go on, dinner should be starting soon.”

She sends him off with a smile, after which Severus comes over to take the seat he has vacated. “These things you would like to look into; anything I might assist you with?”

“You wouldn’t happen to know where Remus Lupin is nowadays, would you?” She knows the answer, even before Snape’s lip curls in disdain and he scoffs, answering in the negative. It had been highly unlikely, she’d known that, but it was worth a shot anyway. “Well, he is the only one left in the will named as a possible guardian who could possibly take the role.” Severus’s raised eyebrow and incredulous look perfectly convey how he feels about that, but she continues anyway, “If he declines, then it would go to next of kin and Harry remains with the Dursleys.

Snape sighs. “I assume you are going to try to write him?” She nods, and he continues, “I suppose I could reach out to some acquaintances of mine that may be able to locate him, just in case.”

She nods her head, grateful. “Thank you.”

“Is that the only matter?”

“Unfortunately, no. Before they went into hiding, the Potters were living in London. I’ll be sending an inquiry to the Ministry to see if there are records as to where, but as the address is missing from the deed itself, I suspect it may not be so easy.” She reaches into her desk, where she has stowed the will for the moment, and pulls out the blank envelope. “I suspect this might have additional answers, but as its magicked, I’ve no way of reading it.”

“May I?” McGonagall passes it over and Snape looks it over before pulling out the blank parchment.

“According to the goblin at Gringotts, Albus was equally befuddled by this blank letter, so it’s probably safe to assume that it’s not a simple matter of invisible ink or the like.”

Snape nods his head in agreement, passing it back once he has replaced the parchment in the envelope. “I’ll look into what spell may have been used, and whether there’s a potion that might negate it.”

“That would be helpful,” McGonagall agrees, putting the envelope back in her desk. “Otherwise, we can only hope that Remus may have the answer. Other than him, the only one who might help is--”

“Black,” Snape finishes.

“Precisely. And I don’t fancy a visit to Azkaban, though I doubt he’d be keen to be of assistance.”

“Assuming, of course, that his sanity is still intact.”

“Excellent point.” Ten years surrounded by dementors. McGonagall shudders at the thought, and despite his crimes, she pities the man who’d once been her student and James Potter’s best friend.

Story Notes:

Chapter title is a John Lennon song. Hopefully, this chapter doesn't disappoint.

And look, I have no idea what the “J” in Lily’s name actually stands for, so I went with Jade for the obvious connection to her eyes. I didn’t want to put too much thought into it, lol.

For my own edification, and because I couldn’t actually find an answer to this, does anyone know at what point it was no longer required for the heir who inherited the family crest/coat of arms to change it in England? If anyone knows, or has better research skills and can actually find the answer to that, please let me know ‘cause I’m curious. I frankly spent way, WAY too much time looking up information on heraldry, especially considering what a small part the Potter crest I created plays in this and the artistic liberties I took with it anyway, hahaha.

In canon, Harry’s family has no known family motto or crest, which is not impossible but Linfred (the oldest family member we know of) made enough of a reputation for himself that he was able to leave a “significant gold pile” to each of his SEVEN children, laying the foundation for the Potter fortune; and his work was influential enough that some of his remedies/potions were the precursors for stuff in modern use (Skele-Gro and Pepperup are specifically named). Plus, his eldest went on to marry THE granddaughter of Ignotus Peverell, one of the brothers who inspired the Tale of the Three Brothers. Their names were lost to history, sure, but considering there’s a story about them, it means they would have been influential/famous enough in their own time to have warranted that kind of attention. His granddaughter would not be so far removed from his time to not warrant respect due her station, and a marriage to match, considering the attitudes of the time (assuming witches/wizard society was classist, which I think they would’ve been considering current attitudes in canon).

Anyway, I’ll stop rambling now.

#Because I Could Not Stop for Death fic #BICNSFD #Harmony fic #HP fanfic #Harry Potter

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innerchorus · 2 years

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I wonder a lot about Shapur's parents and Hilmes's mother. What kind of person was the previous queen? I headcanon Hilmes might sport a special kind of grudge towards Tahamenay for “seducing” his father, because he loved his mother a lot and well... he loved his father too and is/was unable to see his father doing any wrong aka betraying his mother so kid!Hilmes subconsciously transferred the blame onto Tahamenay and it stuck. (A parallel with Zandeh, if I say so! Both having huge amounts of faith in their fathers and thus being unable to see fault in them) (I can't say I blame Hilmes, even knowing what I know of novel spoilers Osroes was still a far superior father to Hilmes than Andragoras was to Arslan, imho) And I wonder when Shapur took the lordship of his lands, presumably when his father died? I wonder if Shapur admired his father at first, only for it to be shattered when the whole debacle with Isfan went down? I wonder a lot about Isfan's mother too. Gah, so many questions!!

Yes, so many questions! I wonder about these kinds of things a lot, too. I wish we were give more details about these family dynamics. Tanaka must have decided that they didn't have enough relevance / direct influence on the plot for it to be worth expanding on. It sucks that (as far as I'm aware) we don't even have a name for Hilmes's mother? She seems to exist within the story only as "Osroes's wife." I want to know how she felt about [insert spoiler here].

At least Arakawa drew her for us:

I wish Tanaka had made more space for women in the story. Even the royal family tree included with Book 2 only includes the males.

Hilmes's mother died long before Tahamenay was brought back to Ecbatana, and given that context it's not quite so glaringly odd that Hilmes never seems to think of her (he's unlikely to remember her that well, and he's too busy being bitter about events that happened after her death). She was never actually queen, either; Gotarzes was still Shah at that point. A little snippet of info from Book 1, Chapter 2 (iii) : 'During his time as crown prince, Osroes had taken a wife at eighteen and by the following year had sired a son. After that, his wife passed away from illness, and he had never officially named a queen, preferring to maintain a bachelor’s lifestyle.'

Hilmes most definitely hates Tahamenay, though, referring to her as a 'witch who had seduced both his father and his uncle'.

Anyway, there was definitely love between Osroes and his wife. I hope we get to see a little bit more of their relationship illustrated by flashback later on.

There's definitely a bit of a theme with regards to characters either acknowledging their father's flaws or failing to accept them. I wrote some meta on this topic a while ago about Zandeh and Alfarid. As for Shapur, I’m sure he never looked at his parents the same way after he had to go and rescue Isfan. I assume the most common way to inherit land/titles is for them to pass to a designated heir when the holder dies, so it probably happened that way for Shapur. Or else his father could have stepped down due to illness or infirmity, I suppose. I like that when Shapur got called to Ecbatana to serve there as a military commander, Isfan was given the responsibility for his lands.

I would have loved to hear more about Isfan’s mother, too. I wonder whether Shapur had much contact with her, knowing that Isfan was his younger brother?

I wonder about Zandeh’s mother / Kharlan’s wife, too. Did she know what Kharlan knew before Atropatene? Does she ever get to see Zandeh again after he rides off to serve Hilmes? And what about Sam, did he have a wife and children?

Also I just have to mention how much I hate the fact that Tanaka, glossing over events in Pars during the timeskip between Parts 1 and 2, mentions all sorts of interesting stories that emerged, including one about ‘strange events entangled with the daughter of Hodir, Lord of Kashan Fortress’ and then never elaborates. I get the impression these stories may have varying levels of truth to them, but I want to know what happened and it’s not specified!

(There is also a mention of a travelling merchant who came all the way from Serica to pay a visit to Daryun... do you think he brought a message from Shinrian?)

#arslan senki #the heroic legend of arslan #hilmes #osroes #osroes's wife #i wish tanaka had named her #spoilers make me feel so bad for hilmes #i actually think it's worse for him than for arslan #shapur #isfan

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serendipitous-magic · 3 years

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what's your writing process like? do you plot things out beforehand? or do you sort of write it as it comes? a mix of both?

Depends on what I'm writing!

In general I'm a planner. I can't write from a blank page, unless I'm just like... really really captivated by whatever I'm writing, which was what happened with the first chapters of both The Art of Living Your (Second) Life and The Partnership Plan.

a) In general, if it's a fanfiction I'm writing, I tend to build the plan as I write - meaning, oftentimes I'll be inspired to write the first chapter, and I'll write that with little idea what the rest of it will be. Or, even if I have an idea what the rest will be, it's more of a vague skeleton than a full plan. And then, as I continue to write, I think more about where the story is going and I continuously add to and refine my plan kind of alongside the actual writing. In this way, the plan grows at the same time that the actual chapters do - but because the chapters take significantly longer to write than planning does, the plan outpaces the "real" writing and I usually know the basic story arc from fairly early on. Then it's just a matter of fleshing it out, adding detail, writing down scenes I thought of, etc. And then when I get to that point in the actual writing, I have a framework in place already.

-_-_-

b) Sometimes for fanfic, I have a more complete plan upfront - although I use "complete" here to mean "from beginning to end," not "completely detailed." So, more like a full skeleton than a full body, if that makes sense. I did that with Roll for Strength. What usually happens is that my plan will look something like...

...

Chapter One

-Will suspects Mike has a girlfriend and is kind of put out about it but thinks he's over Mike so he tells himself he doesn't care

-Will walks in on Mike and his BF (name??) and has a crisis (they don't see Will, so Will knows about Mike but Mike doesn't know that Will knows)

-Will might get off to that later, guiltily? (Or move to chapter two)

Chapter Two

-Do Mike's POV to tell about how he ended up dating a guy, how he got very disillusioned with the world after canon events and got into a "fuck it, the rules don't matter and I hate them anyway" mentality, which eventually snowballed into him kind of realizing and accepting his sexuality earlier than usual fanon

-Also introduce BF (name??) in a scene

-Set time and place - season should set the mood if not already mentioned in Ch 1

-Maybe also do BF's POV briefly to introduce him?? Or leave that for later

...

Etc.

And that's the original skeleton plan. And then it gets expanded upon more and more and more as I continue to think about the story, sometimes even with full pages' worth of unbroken text blocks as I get inspired and start basically thought-vomiting an entire scene. So by the time I get around to actually writing it, it might look like the above, or it might be a few steps shy of an actual draft already, depending on how much I've thought about / worked on that part.

See #5 in this writing advice post to see what I mean about a "thought vomit" draft.

-_-_-

c) Here's the thing - the above was for fanfic, or for short stories, or stories that I'm just kind of having fun with.

For original stuff, I adhere much more tightly to the "rules," because the guidelines for original work (that you might try to publish in the actual publishing market) are much stricter - and for good reason! Fanfiction is a sandbox, and we're all invested in the characters and worlds and settings already. We're all reading and writing fanfic because we already love these characters and this world, and we just want to play in it.

It's a different situation with original novels that you hope to publish. The plot, pacing, tension, and story beats have to be much, much tighter and more polished. Because people reading original work have no prior reason to be invested in it or care what happens - that's work that you have to do. For fanfic, that work was done for you by the original thing. Not to mention, the publishing world is so absolutely choked with competition, and the emphasis lies so heavily on sales, that if your book isn't fucking top-tier compelling, no publisher or agent will take a second look at it. Which is kind of unfortunate, because there's value in slower, more relaxed, more reflective storytelling, too - it's just not what capitalism has decided to value, which is sad.

But anyway.

When writing an original thing, I basically need a full plan - beginning to end, covering all plot points. Not necessarily all the details, just all the plot points - I need a skeleton and I need connective tissue. The rest comes later. But to start, I need to know what happens, why, and how the characters get from event to event. I need to know the physical story events, the emotional beats, and how those things logically flow throughout the story.

Some people can write without this and it still turns into a compelling story, tight narrative, etc. I envy these people. I have all respect for these people. I cannot do this. If I write original work with no plan, and especially without at least like 50-75% of a plan, I end up with something slow, meandering, and kind of limp. No bueno.

So, I usually use a beat sheet.

What's a beat sheet?

It's a 15-beat plotting structure used by screenwriters. And, yeah, technically it's for movies / screenplays. But storytelling is storytelling. And it's highly flexible. (And my favorite professor ever taught it to me in college so you can pry it out of my cold dead hands.)

Google it. It's what I use to make sure my (original work) plots are tight, have momentum, have a satisfying character arc, etc.

Okay, okay, I'll paste the basic structure below just so you can see wtf I'm talking about:

-_-_-

-Act I:

1) The First Frame

-What is the first thing we see? This should be a snapshot of the main character’s problem, before the story begins

-Ex: the Star Destroyer in A New Hope

2) The World Around Us

-What is the main character’s world like at the beginning of the story?

-What is missing in the main character’s life?

3) State the Theme (sneak this into The World Around Us)

-What is the story secretly about? This should happen during The World Around Us

4) Inciting Incident (smol tentpole)

-What happens to put the hero on the road? This is where the hero’s life changes forever.

5) The Hero Questions

-1st introspective moment

-Can the hero really do this? Should the hero chicken out?

-Oftentimes the hero fails at something

-Ex: Luke gets his ass beat by the raiders

-Act II:

6) Crossing the Threshold / The Emotional Hurdle (big tentpole)

-The main character makes a choice

-Beginning of Act II

7) The B Story / The Love Story

-Introduced here

-Often but not always a love story

8) Promise of the Premise

-Fun and games in the world you promised

-Horror movie? Creeps here!

-Sci fi? Space battles!

-Animation? Shenanigans!

9) Midpoint (big tentpole)

-The hero finds out that what they want is not what they need

-Luke rescues the princess - turns out that’s not really what the story was about

10) Bad Guys Close In / Throwing Rocks

-Events conspire to tear the hero’s goal to shreds

-Wesley is mostly dead, Inego is drunk, Fezzick is part of the brute squad

-This is the other side of the fun and games coin where things are no longer fun

11) All is Lost

-Something super bad happens, and that goal is impossible

-If someone important is gonna die, it’s probably now

12) The Pit of Despair (smol tentpole)

-The hero mourns the death (if someone died) and wallows in his/her lowest point

13) Inspiration

-A fresh idea

-Act III:

14) Come and Get Some / Final Confrontation (big tentpole)

-The final confrontation - the final showdown

-A and B stories wrapping up at the same time

-The theme makes sense and the battle is engaged

15) Final Frame

-Opposite of the first frame

-The hero is changed

-_-_-

It's what I use. But hey, you don't have to. What works for me might not work for you.

I'll finish this off by pasting in a section of actual real-ass planning I have open in a document for one of my novels at this moment (it's giving me the evil eye, I swear) so you can see what I kind of mean by "thought vomiting." Also note that in my actual document, the bullet points are indented incrementally to be kind of "nestled" underneath the relevant points, if that makes sense, and that it's a whole eye-watering mess of different colors. But for Tumblr, it's this:

-_-_-

-You have to be rescued by the rest of the team, because you fell down that hole - and you are, eventually, after screaming yourself hoarse some more (plus it’s been like an hour or more now, so they have since noticed that you were missing)

-I could gloss over this, like end the chapter when you run away, and open the next one with “It takes another half hour of screaming your throat nearly bloody before the team finds you,” or something

-They berate you for chasing after ghosts - you say you didn’t find anyone down there, because you know for damn sure nobody’s gonna believe what you think you saw, and you don’t even think you believe it

-This leads to a trip to the local doctor (a clinic, probs, akin to UrgentCare), which you’re not happy with because that’s more people taking notice of you

-However, you’re also going through the change in mindset here - see below

-Note: I as the writer don’t have to worry about the paperwork or whatever that you’d normally have to fill out, getting hurt on the job, because you weren’t officially hired - however, it would be a good “humanity is okay” moment if the guy who hired you came in and helped you with the medical expenses because he felt bad - he’d also probably be a little nervous about you suing or something, but you assure him that you have zero interest in that

-I could include a funny line where the guy says he’ll pay for your doctor bill and you try to say no (being indebted to someone is bad news for you) but he insists, because he says he feels responsible, and you just kind of stare at him and then blurt, “Do you need me to kill anyone for you?” (Something you probably regret as soon as you say it, not because you expect him to accept but because you abruptly remember what happened two days ago.) (Would it be too much to also add like “You want me to murder anyone for you? You want a blowjob? I will do anything,” and he gets flustered and bats it off like “Nah, nah, nah, chill out. You’re crazy, man.” And insists that you don’t need to pay him back)

-Here’s a decision I have to make - does the guy pay for your doctor bills as well as paying for your work today (leaving you enough money to potentially split town, but you decide not to), or do you have to pay the $2,500+ in doctor bills with no insurance for the injury, which raises the stakes by depleting all your money?

-I think I like Option A best, because it gives Sam more agency as a character if they decide to stay despite having the option to leave, versus them just being stuck completely - plus I don’t know how else I’d be able to explain away you having money for the hotel

-The guy who hired you pays you for the work day here - and maybe, just maybe, that gives you barely enough to buy that used car (although, why would it? It couldn’t have been more than like $200 for 8 hours of work, maybe $300 if he was really really desperate - if it was a really cheap used car, that might give you barely enough to buy the car but literally nothing left over)

-Point being, maybe you have enough money to bolt now, if you chose to - and you have to make the choice not to

-The car you found might be a $1,500 Honda Civic (or Jeep or whatever) with a dead battery, and the guy selling it says it should run fine with a new battery, which you Google (apparently it would be somewhere in the range of $100-$200) - maybe you think of how nice the mechanic was for you and wonder if you could cut a bit of a deal with him, if you get this car - and if the guy pays for your trip to the doctor and pays you for the temp work, this could just tip you into the margin of being able to afford the car, if you haggle with the seller

-_-_-

Or another example, with more actual sentences:

-_-_-

-As you approach the trailer you start to register a smell that turns your stomach - something like a porta potty and something like the sharp tang of rusting metal. It makes you pause - maybe there really is someone in there, using the place to live whether there’s a sewage hookup or not - it wouldn’t be the weirdest thing you’ve heard of. But after standing for a bit, silent and listening, and then hiding behind a large tree to chuck a rock at the vehicle to no response, you continue forward. You’ll just have to be cautious. Your spirits lift when you see the door. It’s completely grown over. (Leafy vines lace over it, tangling in the handle, yellowing and unbroken. If someone is living in there, they’ve been using the window to come and go, and that doesn’t seem all too likely. Bolstered by a new swell of confidence, and picturing the unlikely riches you might find stashed away in a cabinet or a glove compartment, you cross the last few feet towards the shape.

-You find the body and recognize it as one of the two obnoxious vlogging dudes from the motel

-I’m kind of imagining the moment of discovery like the wardrobe moment in Narnia where, during your nice forest trek, there’s been some pleasant acoustic music playing (like All the Pretty Girls by Kaleo maybe) and then it just stops abruptly in the middle of a phrase, maybe echoing slightly, when you see the body, and all at once everything is sickly silent.

-Oh dude, maybe you continue thinking it’s a duffel bag (possibly feeling pretty upbeat, though cautious until you’re literally about to step over it, and then you happen to glance down and get a sickening, chest-slamming shock when an empty human face is staring up at you

-Note: there should be mushrooms growing in, on and around the RV, because mushrooms are Creepy

-You go to investigate the RV

-Maybe you recognized the body as one of the vloggers and you’re trying to see if his friend is around - or maybe, in a kind of sick daze, you short circuit and find yourself doing the only thing you can think to do: continuing along your trajectory, stumbling towards the RV and tearing the rusted-out door free from the lattice of brittle vines that held it in place (this is what alerts The Dude that someone has been here), like if you just get to your original goal that’ll fix everything - somehow, if you just keep moving forward on the track you set out on, that thing won’t be real anymore - at the very least you have to get inside, to put a door between you and the body, like you’re pulling the blankets over your head to shield yourself from the boogeyman. Just as long as you’re not out there with, with...

-_-_-

Anywho, I'll stop.

I apologize again for... (scrolls up for a million miles) all of that, but you asked me about my passion and now you pay the price, lmao.

#asks #anon #writing #writing advice #i guess?#my writing #thought vomit draft #also you get a sneak peek at The Vanishing Day I guess lmao

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choices-and-voices · 3 years

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hi sorry if this has already been asked somewhere but im was wondering if you had any tips on how to get the best experience without having to pay ?

Hi there! Don’t worry, this question hasn’t been asked before, and I am honestly super flattered that you value my opinion enough to ask it ☺️ I’m not sure how helpful my tips will be because I don’t exactly consider myself an expert in this, but here are some things that came to mind! I’ve gone into quite a bit of detail, but if you want a quicker overview, just stick to the bold headings. Also, if any of the people reading this have good tips of their own, please lmk! I’m always learning new things about how to do this too 💕

1. This one’s a bit obvious, but still – take the opportunities that the game gives you to earn free diamonds. That means watching the bonus ads every day (5 diamonds/day), playing through chapters as often as you can (including replaying old books if there are no new releases – 2 diamonds/chapter), and watching ads at the end of book chapters for an extra diamond. Obviously, all this is a bit of a balancing act – you want to be playing Choices often enough to build up your diamonds, but not so often that it takes over your life and makes you feel frustrated, because what’s the point of it if it’s not fun anymore, y’know? So I’ve always been careful not to overdo it. Even if all you do is watch the bonus ads every day, that’s 35 diamonds/week – basically, one big diamond scene a week – which is honestly not too shabby.

2. At any one time, only play 1-2 books that you’re really invested in, and try to supplement that with another 2-3 books that you’re not really invested in or are replaying just for diamonds. As tempting as it can be to rush through every good-looking book in the app all at once, that just leads to a situation where a) you’re trying to divide your free keys between waaay too many releases, and b) there are so many demands on you for diamonds, you never get to consistently spend them on anything. So I personally think it’s best to only read a couple of good books at once, and instead of marathoning them, break them up with chapters from less-good books – this builds up your diamond stash for spending on the good books. Which leads into my next point:

3. Don’t zip through books too fast – even if most of the chapters are already released, spreading them out helps you earn more diamonds for them in the meantime. I’m really lucky to have been playing Choices for so long that almost all the books were presented to me in weekly release format – if I downloaded the app for the first time today, and saw all the fully-released books on there, I feel like I would be way too overwhelmed to play. So I reckon that, even if a book isn’t technically a weekly release for you, make it a weekly release! You might decide to play all the books you’re really invested in on a particular day when you have more free time – say, a Sunday. Then, you have Monday-Saturday every week to earn diamonds for those books, and something to look forward to at the end of it all. As for what you do with those diamonds:

4. Be smart about what you spend diamonds on. There are a couple of different components to this tip – it involves things like a) figuring out which types of purchases are worth diamonds in general, b) figuring out which types of purchases you want to prioritise in certain books, and c) planning ahead before you start playing a book chapter about where you might want to spend diamonds. To address each of those things one-by-one:

a) Figure out which types of purchases are worth diamonds in general. Off the top of my head, there are 6 main types of diamond purchases in Choices: ‘friendly’ scenes with LIs (12-25 diamonds), ‘steamy’ scenes with LIs (25-30 diamonds), scenes with your whole friendship group, collectible items (e.g. the tapestry pieces in Bloodbound, the clues in Veil of Secrets, etc.), outfits, and pets. Your mileage may vary a lot on which of these are most important to you, so take my opinions with a grain of salt. But my general advice would be to i) prioritise group scenes above LI scenes, ii) prioritise ‘friendly’ LI scenes above ‘steamy’ LI scenes, iii) avoid collectibles, and iv) go for outfits and pets only if you really like the look of them. This advice is based on the fact that, firstly, I think you get a better experience of immersion in a book if you know a bit about all the characters around MC, rather than just about one LI; secondly, ‘friendly’ LI scenes tend to tell you more about the LI than ‘steamy’ scenes, which are often 80-90% copied-and-pasted erotica despite being more expensive; thirdly, collectibles are a massive drain on diamond stores, and almost always unlock quite short, generic scenes that it’s easy to find on Tumblr or YouTube; and fourthly, both outfits and pets don’t do much except appear in the story at key moments, which can be a really nice touch but is still only needed in moderation. Of course, there are exceptions to these rules, and you might find that those exceptions are sometimes book-specific. Which leads me to Part B of this point:

b) Figure out which types of purchases you want to prioritise in certain books. It’s all well and good for me to say that group scenes are usually better than LI scenes, but when I’m playing a book with an amazing LI but a pretty meh supporting cast (*cough cough* Myra Dixon carries Baby Bump on her shoulders *cough cough*), I obviously may need to adjust my spending habits slightly. Moreover, by focusing all your diamond spending on just one main thing per book – like Myra’s romance in Baby Bump, or the party’s side-quests in Blades of Light and Shadow, or the posse in Queen B – I think you end up with a much better playing experience, because you feel like you’re seeing at least one facet of the story in-depth instead of getting a patchy surface view of lots of different facets. For the most part, the purchases you prioritise in a book can mostly depend on personal taste, but there are a few books where some background knowledge might be helpful in the decision. Four things that I think are worth flagging are that i) the ‘competition books’ (America’s Most Eligible, Queen B, Hot Couture) do require regular outfit purchases to win, although winning isn’t that much better an experience than being runner-up; ii) Veil of Secrets and Nightbound are two books where it’s worth saving 30-35 diamonds for the final chapter, because your MC is forced to leave the small-town setting if you don’t; iii) Across the Void is a book that frequently invites you to spend diamonds to save characters’ lives, but their death arcs are honestly much better-written and more sensible than their survival arcs; and iv) the It Lives series is the only one where characters can die due to an accumulation of choices you make throughout the story, so maybe it’s worth keeping some diamonds in reserve for that one. Which just leaves us with one more sub-point:

c) Plan ahead before you start playing a book chapter about where you might want to spend diamonds. I want to take this opportunity to thank whichever people in the fandom maintain the Choices wiki, because oh my gosh, they are lifesavers. For the last year or so, my response whenever a new Choices chapter is released has been to wait a few hours, Google ‘[book name] choices’, open the wiki result, and skim through to check how many diamond choices are available & how much they cost. Because all the wiki includes are the possible responses to every choice presented – it doesn’t even state the wording of the choice itself – this is a relatively spoiler-free technique that helps a lot with big picture planning. For example, you might decide not to buy an early group scene because there’s a nicer-sounding LI scene later on, and come to think of it, you should replay a few more chapters of another book first to save up the diamonds for that scene. If you don’t mind encountering just a few more spoilers before you play the chapter, you can also scout out its diamond scenes in more detail by searching the relevant book or character tags on Tumblr, or by looking for a chapter stream on YouTube. You may decide that you don’t need to buy a diamond scene if you’ve already seen it played through by someone else, or alternatively, you may decide whether or not to buy a diamond scene based on how good it looks in an existing playthrough – in either case, these techniques can help you thoughtfully ration out the diamonds you have, instead of being caught off-guard whenever a diamond choice comes up.

5. On the subject of the Choices wiki, it’s also a great way to maximise your success in books without using diamonds. Whenever there’s a ‘right’ option to a choice that gives you a better outcome later in the chapter, that’s indicated in the wiki. So with a bit of pre-reading of the wiki before you play the chapter, and/or with the wiki open on a separate screen as you play, you can get the best outcome without having to buy that outfit or bonus scene that promised you ‘an advantage.’ Obviously, your mileage may vary on whether this method is actually worth it, or whether it takes all the fun out of Choices by ‘cheating’ at the gaming aspect. I personally view Choices as more of an interactive story app than a game I’m trying to beat, so I have no issue with this method, but opinions may differ and that’s okay.

6. If you’re really feeling like a lack of diamonds is limiting your playing experience, it may be best to start out with ‘cheaper’ books until you have more diamonds stored up. In this case, I’m using ‘cheaper’ to mean books where there are fewer diamond scenes, where diamond scenes are less expensive, and/or where diamond scenes don’t play as big a role in the plot. It can be hard to identify which books fit this bill, but as a general rule, it’s more likely to be the earlier-released ones or less-popular ones. Some which I’d recommend are the first few books of the Freshman series, the #LoveHacks series, the High School Story series, the Perfect Match series, Most Wanted, The Heist: Monaco, Wishful Thinking, Bachelorette Party, and The Royal Masquerade.

7. Finally, a really quick tip for making the most out of free keys – keys are used up as soon as you start a book chapter, and refresh ~every 3 hours. This means that, even if you don’t have time to play chapters every 3 hours, you should try to open the app roughly that often and just click to unlock a chapter. When you finally have time to play, you’ll have a whole lot of chapters ready to go plus another two refreshed keys, and you can power through them at whatever speed you need to fit in them into your break time or to earn diamonds for an upcoming release. Once again, this is a tip that may need to be practised in moderation, because you don’t want to be constantly interrupting your life to load up an app on your phone. But even if you just log in and unlock chapters every 6 hours, or every 12 hours, that’s still 2-4 extra chapters ready for you at the end of the day plus your two free keys.

I think that’s about all for my tips! Thanks for reading, and I hope it helped at least a bit ❤️

#playchoices #choices: stories you play #asks #asked & answered #original post

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babyfloors · 3 years

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Wondering Wednesdays, Baby Acres, Chapter 2: Infrastructure, with words!

July 21, 12021

books

Coop

4Freedoms

health

mywritings

PublicDomainInfrastructure

writing

This post starts the rough draft of Chapter 2 of my non-fiction WiP, Baby Acres.

This chapter will have about 2500 words, (hopefully educational words!!) 500 of which have already been written as the Introduction, but will quite likely have to be thrown out and refitted with the new evolution of the book. We shall see.

And again, by way of disclaimer, the overall goal is now to explain why we need both equ. + justice, & why in 4 phases. This chapter will transition to a chapter (2-5) for each phase, showing what Phases I-IV could look like as part of a possible roadmap for a fully inclusive society for all of us. This vision is laid out in the hope that All HumanKind will eventually have each person’s basic needs met, without taking anything from anyone, and without violence, intimidation, nor coercion of any kind.

Chapter Two:

( Chapter 2’s outline was last week…)

Chapter 2 Introduction:

The first stage of this project involves building empathy, and bringing each one of us to see each one of our fellow human beings as … a human being. Each one meriting humane treatment, and human dignity.

That empathy building phase was Phase 0 (yes, I’m a computer scientist by first training, so I start with 0…). Phase I is meant to go for fifteen years, potentially from the years 2022 to 2037, building a movement to strengthen some of our most crucial and obviously key pieces of our social infrastructure, which are in the public domain. During this period, one of the ways that we can both build conceptual support and also literally build our physical infrastructure that needs support, is by borrowing an idea from President Franklin D. Roosevelt, which worked during the Great Depression to create jobs while educating young (white) men at the same time. What we want to do now, is to educate, facilitate service, and build a community-service frame of reference, while also upgrading our public infrastructure, just as FDR did in the 1930’s via his program.

Bringing back an updated version of FDR’s Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), or Roosevelt’s Tree Army, as it was popularly known, could provide a stepping stone between the empathy- building work that must always be on-going, and the support-building work of bringing our society to a consensus on the needed support for the most basic of our public social infrastructure institutions, like Public Libraries, Public Transportation, Public Education (especially in the financial and legal areas, where so many consumers fall prey to financial predators, and end up in debt due to lack of knowledge), and Public Health. These four systems under gird our entire societal structure, and need support perhaps the most urgently, in return for which we potentially get the most payback for all members of society. While we do the difficult work of building the necessary consensus to get there from here, a simpler step might be to bring back some form of the CCC, updated to be far more inclusive, and used as both a means of providing employment to young people, and also to educate them, much like the Gap Year in Europe.

But instead of having our new high school graduates backpack around the country, they could be sent to work in urban public library branches, light-rail and subway/Metro stations, local urban public schools, or inner city health clinics. As they rotate from one part of the country to another, say, monthly, they learn first-hand of the conditions in places they are not from and have not lived, while serving communities they have never met, working alongside peers from different walks of life, and seeing a side of their native land that they did not grow up with. In short, learning the realities, and different perspectives, of this large and diverse nation of ours.

— (Next Wednesday: Chapter 2, section I …)

I’m considering this Rough Draft as the block of clay from which my book will eventually emerge, obviously, and some ideas for phases III and IV are still becoming more fixed in my mind as I write, so the final version will likely look pretty different from this Rough Draft, and will need updating once I get to the very end.

And once again, yeayyy( !!)with regard to audience, I may have at least a couple of comps: Walden Two meets The War on Poverty: A Civilian Perspective (by Dr.s Jean and Edgar Cahn, 1964). I know that lots of people consider Skinner’s writing to be stilted, but I like the tilt of most reviewers, in that the idea is that a community should keep trying policies that members agree upon until they find what works for all of them.

As for genre, I’m still wondering: Non-fiction, System Change, Causes, maybe even Inspirational, but I doubt it.

Last week’s installment of this series…

Action Items:

1.) Consider some ideas you may have on how our society can solve the problem infrastructure upgrades in the next 15 years,

2.) Share them with us in the comments, here, please, and

3.) Write a story, post or tweet that uses those sources and your thoughts.

Dear Readers, ideas on learning, especially multiple #LanguageLearning, on-going education and empathy-building, to #EndPoverty, #EndHomelessness, #EndMoneyBail & achieve freedom for All HumanKind?

Support our key #PublicDomainInfrastructure & #StopSmoking at LEAST for CCOVID-19: 1. #PublicLibraries, 2. #ProBono legal aid and Education, 3. #UniversalHealthCare, and 4. good #publictransport Read, Write -one can add Stayed on Freedom’s Call via this GoodReads button: ,

Vote, Teach and Learn (PDF Lesson Plan Book)!

and my

Babylon 5 review posts

, if you like Science Fiction, and a proposed

Vision

on Wondering Wednesdays: for a kinder world…

Shira Destinie A. Jones, MPhil

our year 2020 CE = 12020 HE

(Day 1 … Day 5)

Stayed on Freedom’s Call (free copies at: https://archive.org/details/StayedOnF…) includes two ‘imagination-rich’ walking tours, with songs, of Washington, DC. New interviews and research are woven into stories of old struggles shared by both the Jewish and African-American communities in the capital city.

Shared histories are explored from a new perspective of cultural parallels and parallel institution-building which brought the two communities together culturally and historically.

Please leave a review, if you can, on the GoodReads page.

Shira Destinie Jones by ShiraDest is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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pooma-bible · 1 year

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Greetings in the matchless Name of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Topic: VISION 02: The Picture of Things Hereafter (Part 02): The Book of Destiny is Sealed: The Future of the World!

Rhema Word: Revelation 5:3-4 (NKJV) “And no one in heaven or on the earth or under the earth was able to open the scroll, or to look at it. So I wept much, because no one was found worthy to open and read the scroll, or to look at it.”