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#i think its all pretty personal and unique and not at the same time because some
physalian · 2 days
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“Endings are the hardest!” / “No, beginnings are the worst!”
I’ve never had a problem figuring out the way I want my stories to end but starting them? Yeash, that’s so much pressure. Both carry the same weight for different reasons while you have writers in both camps with legitimate arguments. One may be harder than the other on a writer-by-writer basis, but they are equally daunting.
So. Beginnings:
You have sometimes as little as three sentences to hook readers, at most the first chapter. I don’t even give fanfic more than the opening line sometimes (mostly because fanfic takes opening en media res to wild new heights). I’ve been working on a system of “I have one sentence to give you the setting, the protagonist, and the hook that makes this book different, go” and while it might not be perfect, it’s a starting point.
For example! The opening sentence to ENNS is:
Beneath the snowdrift of the longest blizzard Elias has ever endured, the last vampire in the dungeons has finally succeeded in taking their own life.
As someone who struggles with beginnings, I have given you five pieces of information in 25 words:
The setting, that concerns long and repeat blizzards and snow
Protagonist’s name
Establishing the existence of vampires
Establishing that those vampires are kept in dungeons
Establishing that those presumed prisoners are in such bad conditions, that they’re restoring to suicide, something vampires don’t tend to do
I think I did a pretty good job.
So much of the burden of your book is given to so few words. You can’t make it cliché, but try too hard to be unique and you risk looking pretentious. You have to establish the setting, the narrator, the initial setup and inciting incident and convince readers to pick your book out of hundreds of thousands of other options. I hate beginnings.
Best advice among an avalanche of others? Write a placeholder and come back later if it’s too daunting and frustrating because there is no writing advice that is one size fits all.
It’s entirely dependent on your genre, your demographic, the age of your protagonist and how self-aware they are, the tone of your story, your own personal writing style.
“First sentences should include THIS!”
Yeah, okay, but what if I have a better idea? Beyond that your sentence should have a hook that sets your book up as something apart from its genre neighbors, just go look at the most famous opening lines. They’re all different.
There is nothing in common between
Call me Ishmael.
and
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.
And that’s the point.
Endings though?
Endings bear the burden of providing catharsis, or robbing you of it. Endings have to answer ‘but what does it all mean?’ and stick the landing, or they don’t. Endings can turn a TV show that took the world by storm for four magnificent seasons and drag it limping across the finish line in a finale that sucks the life out of the fandom forever.
Endings either leave you in an existential lurch staring at the ceiling, or in tears of joy or anguish, or frothing at the mouth at yet another cliffhanger. If you can’t answer ‘what does it all mean’ you have bigger problems than just your final lines.
People don’t have fan theories about your first page, they have fan theories about what comes after your last page. There are no rules to writing an ending and sometimes by its nature of being unfulfilling you become infamous.
Example: The ending of Mark of Athena, that prompted this dedication in its sequel House of Hades.
“We’re staying together,” he promised. “You’re not getting away from me. Never again.” Only then did she understand what would happen. A one-way trip. A very hard fall. “As long as we’re together,” she said. She heard Nico and Hazel still screaming for help. She saw the sunlight far, far above—maybe the last sunlight she would ever see. Then Percy let go of his tiny ledge, and together, holding hands, he and Annabeth fell into the endless darkness.
(one short Leo POV later)
Nemesis wanted him to wreak vengeance on Gaea? Leo would be happy to oblige. He was going to make Gaea sorry she had ever messed with Leo Valdez. “Yeah.” He took one last look at the cityscape of Rome, turning bloodred in the sunset. “Festus, raise the sails. We’ve got some friends to save.”
If you weren’t in this fandom when this book came out and ended with the protagonist falling into Greek Super Hell, to wait a whole year to find out what happens next—We lost our collective minds.
And then the next book opened like this:
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Gettin’ a bit big for your britches there, ey, Riordan?
How you write your ending should reflect the kind of feeling you want to leave your reader with. In this case, it was anguish and despair and the pinnacle of “always leave them wanting more”. Maybe you’ve written a character who’s suffered constant setbacks to reaching their goal, and the final line is them at peace with, or without achieving it. Or it’s the final plot twist/reveal no one saw coming. Or it’s ambiguous, leaving it up to reader interpretation.
My favorite classical book ending comes from The Great Gatsby and while I had to crack open my copies of the PJO books, I know this line by heart:
So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
There’s just something so melancholy and tragic about it, as it should be: Gatsby is not a happy story. That line is the answer to the thesis, that trying to live in the past and not embrace the future, not allowing yourself to move on, can only end in tragedy, and yet, so many of us do exactly that.
The image of a dinky little rowboat is always what I’ve pictured, as opposed to a ship or something more formidable. A rowboat bobbing around the thrashing waves, pitted against a force of nature it can’t ever hope to overcome, yet it endures.
The book opens on an equally melancholy note, “In my younger years…” as the protagonist reflects back on their life gone by. It’s an American classic for a reason.
Even if your final line is unspectacular, the line isn’t as important as how the narrator feels about the book being over. Quotable hashtags are great, but if the ending doesn’t feel like a proper fit, you’re going to leave readers disappointed.
Endings are so fricken fun though, no matter what’s at stake. It’s as cathartic for me to finish as I hope it is for the reader to read. There’s plenty of advice out there on the perfect opener or the perfect closer, the endless arguments over which is harder, and it’s all up to you in the end. They just come easy to me, I have no advice. I can picture them well before I get to the final pages and they just click into place. Beginnings, though? Ugh.
Thank you for 300 Followers!!!
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tuliptiger · 1 year
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Just saw a post about a person being upset or frazzled that depression and anxiety are the "everyman" mental illness. I want to proceed this by saying I am NOT going to be shitting on this person at all and they have a point but I didn't quite agree with uhm the tone or everything about it.
I don't think it's wrong or bad that these two specific mental illnesses have a wider understanding and reach. They have been watered down for lack of a better term because they have come to mean many things including less debilitating symptoms and signs. This is not to say it's bad, I don't think. I think it's objectively good that more people are able to look at themselves and talk with medical professionals and be able to be helped for any severity be it minor or major.
And that was their main point of contention though because the more debilitating cases of anxiety and depression are taken less seriously when using the terms "depression" and "anxiety". I think that is completely a valid point and reasonable thing to be upset about.
However...
I do not think the answer is to "take back" the terms and that also isn't what they said or implied either. What I really heard from them and that post was "when I talk about my life altering devastating mental illness I want to be taken seriously and understood without having to go into detail or explain it" (because the last part can and is incredibly exhausting and frustrating especially if it is not outright understood or has a base assumption of the less debilitating ideas and versions). What I heard was "I want to be taken seriously". That ISN'T what they said but it is what I understood from it.
In which case the solution to this is for people to respect each other, listen to each other with good intentions and faith, and take each other seriously when we talk about ourselves. Unfortunately that's an individual and societal problem that runs a little too deep for this post.
As for the terms, there probably does need to be a language separation between severities of depression and anxiety even though there are rough versions of those already. Like social anxiety, moderate depression, major depressive disorder, chronic depression, oct, ptsd, etc. The very word depression has kind of lost it's oomf but I think for a relatively good reason. Maybe there should be an entire other word for major depression that doesn't include that phrase though to help with that communication gap. IDK. My two cents if that's worth anything.
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polarisjisung · 1 month
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PETNAMES NCT DREAM WOULD USE
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pairings: nct dream x fem!reader
genre: fluff
wc: 0.7k
warnings: hopefully none
notes: this is a little shorter than usual but if you couldn't tell already I'm a sucker for petnames (if you think they're cringy you're just painfully single 😤) so I HAD to make this
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MARK — my girl/babe
now mark's a chill laid back guy, and he loves you like crazy but he also doesn't see any need in extravagant nicknames or petnames and he sticks to the classics, he probably won't address you by your name for the most part so he'll just stick to babe. sweet and simple
"that's my girl" is such a classic mark thing, he gets proud over the smallest things you do, he's like your personal cheerleader. It could be something so small as flipping an egg without breaking the yolk and mark would be ecstatic.
RENJUN — darling
nicknames are serious business for renjun, every now and then he'll call you babe but to him it feels too casual— most likely it'll be something very specific to your relationship and how you met but if not he loves darling, it feels the most endearing to him.
JENO — baby/angel/gorgeous
for the most part jeno will stick to baby, sometimes babe but in his softest moments he'll go for angel— it's unconscious really.
but to jeno you're the best thing that's ever happened to him, like his own personal angel— somehow you always know what to do/say when he's feeling down and he's never met someone like that before. you're unique and somehow everything you do feels perfect to jeno, he thinks your soul is so pure, you're his angel.
on occasion jeno will throw a quick but calculated "good morning gorgeous" your way— mainly because it has you absolutely falling apart to the point where you can't even form coherent sentences, but jeno thinks it's cute
HAECHAN — sunshine/sunflower/honey
you bring out the best in him, you're his motivation and you give him so much energy for performances and his idol life, especially when things get tough so calling you his sunshine just feels right to haechan.
haechan probably throws around a lot of nicknames with you, sometimes some a little too weird, but he knows it'll get you smiling
"hey snookums" he'd say casually as he enters the room
"are you talking to me hyuck?"
he'd nod eagerly and you can't help but giggle at his dorky smile
"I love you but please, never call me that again" best believe he'll stick to that nickname for the rest of the week
and of course every time he steps through the door, haechan has to announce "honey, I'm home" like hes in some american sitcom, as if you didn't see him pull up in the drive and hear his keys jingle as he unlocked the door— you love him either way
JAEMIN — princess/pretty
sure jaemin thinks he's a princess but you? you're like the princess of all princesses. plus jaemin feels the need to remind you of your worth day in and day out— you're a princess and so you deserve to be treated like one, given jaemin's practically a king at princess treatment, you'd consider it appropriate
jaemin thinks you're pretty no doubt. in some moments, especially when you don't quite share the same opinion, jaemin will be the first one to remind you, and if you're feeling down "hey pretty look at me" he'd say in that soft low tone of his that's so awfully comforting, with two hands on your shoulder before giving you the pep talk of a lifetime
CHENLE — babe/baby
chenle's not much of a petnames guy aside from a casual babe/baby here and there but you suppose that's what makes it all the more special when he does use them
he much prefers to have a nickname for you that's exclusive to him than using petnames, but if its something you're into he'll definitely try and step up his game, also if he gets teased by his members for calling you by your name
a jealous chenle uses all the petnames under the sun— anything to make it clear you're his girl
JISUNG — (my) love/beautiful
jisung is usually soft spoken but too shy to throw around "I love/like you's" without becoming a blushing mess so his favourite way to subtly remind you just how much you mean to him are through petnames. he truly thinks you're beautiful inside and out, so it's one of the first names he addresses you with.
he likes to switch it up, testing and seeing which ones your smile grows the widest at. he decides love feels right. after all, you were the person who taught him all about it.
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redr0sewrites · 1 month
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HIYYAAA if it's not too much to ask I wanted to request if you could write Adam, Lucifer, Alastor, Vox and Val having an S/o with weather based powers, like their emotions can influence the weather. Thanks <3
YESSSSSS OFC! I LOVE THIS IDEA SM I LITERALLY SQUEALED WHEN I SAW IT IN MY INBOX HEHE
🥀Cw: none really, mostly fluff, a bit of omplied smut in vals part but what do u expect
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Adam
adam is not the most self aware, so it takes him a while to realize that your emotions coinciding with the weather are not just some cosmic coincidence
it strikes him as odd that whenever the two of you argue, the weather in heaven is always particularly nasty, but he doesn't bring it up because he thinks its an idiotic theory
when you eventually explain your powers to him he has the biggest AHA moment ever
honestly adam loves your powers and finds them to be so interesting. he was the first man after all, he was one of the first few to navigate earth's tumultuous weather patterns. seeing you control the weather and watching how it reflects your emotions is genuinely intriguing to him, and adam brags about your powers to others ALL the time
seriously though, adam is always yapping about how he has the most powerful partner and how you're powers are so unique. he genuinely admires you so much and wants everyone else to see you the same way
your powers are useful when it comes to arguments because adam is not the most self aware person, and he tends to not realize when you're upset until you actually flip out
even when you're not upset with him, adam makes sure to do his best to calm you down when he notices the weather being particularly wild
if anyone ever gives you shit about your powers, know that adam will be the first in line to punch them in the face. he knows you can't control your emotions sometimes and never blames wild weather on you
i think adams the type to enjoy warmer weather, and he always cracks the biggest smile when the weather miraculously turns to his favorite type when you're on a date together
definitely loves beach days with you, and the fact that you can make it permanently sunny is so enticing for him
Lucifer
still pissed they took the yellow font away from me
honestly luci is such a sweetie when it comes to your powers. he probably picked up on them pretty quickly considering how powerful you are, but he didn't want to be nosy so he waited until you mentioned your powers to ask questions.
he definitely did have a lot of adorable questions, and was very intrigued about the fact that your emotions were the catalyst that controlled your powers.
after learning that piece of information, he starts paying attention to the weather more often. even before he's dating you, luci will call you to ask how your doing when ever he sees the weather going haywire. he's learned to prepare himself for any weather misfortunes that occur, and always comforts you when you're feeling down
lucifer is quite attentive even without your powers revealing your emotions, and he will often be able to calm you down before the weather even takes a turn for the worse
he would never want to weaponize your powers or use them in any way because he knows how closely linked they are to your emotions. howeeeeeeveeeerrrr, he does admire you when you stand up for yourself with your powers and will definitely cheer you on from the sidelines as you kick ass with the weather without even standing up
lucifers favorite weather is snow!!!! on your guys' first year anniversary, you made it snow inside your shared bedroom as a gift and luci nearly CRIES. he hasn't seen snow in years bc, yk, its hell, not very snowy weather, so the fact that you put in so much effort to make his favorite weather for him honestly makes him feel so appreciated
after that he might ask you to make it snow more often, and he loves cuddling up with you with hot cocoa to watch a cheesy movie while pretty smowflakes fall all around you both
Alastor
alastor would be intrigued by your powers to say the least. he's quick to figure out what they are, and would probably be drawn to you solely because you're so powerful. in fact he'd probably either try to use you for your power or challenge you and be petty, but over time he found himself growing a soft spot not only for your weather powers, but for you
i love al but he definitely saw u as an asset at first, in fact he was probably a bit intimidated and irritated by the spontaneity of your powers, but also very intrigued by your raw ability. he probably found himself attracted to your power more than anything at first, but once he got to know you, alastor began to see you as more than an asset and as a genuine friend, and that feeling continued to grow into something alastor was very unfamiliar with.
alastor probably picked up on your feelings towards him from your powers, and the fact that flowers would literally bloom whenever he was around. it definitely improved his confidence about his feelings and he'd probably pester you a bit into admitting your feelings for him. to your shock he reciprocates, and soon you become hells greatest power couple
alastor sees it as a weakness when someone wears their heart on their sleeve and is very emotional, so he will be very protective of you when your emotions are running rampant and the weather is reflecting that
he does NOT want people to know about your powers because he wouldn't want other sinners to try to hurt you, influence you, or use you to get to him
he'd definitely help you to master them and control them better, and would probably keep track of what each form of weather means and how it correlates to each of your emotions
honestly al loves your powers, and is so intuitive about when you're getting upset. i think he's the type to enjoy rainy weather, so he loves when you make it rain. while he rarely sleeps, once he trusts you enough some nights he'll ask you to make it rain at nightime because the soothing noise helps him sleep
Vox
vox understands that sometimes sinners aren't always happy about the powers and forms they receive in death- for goodness sake, he literally lost his head and has to deal with having a literal television as a head, so he understands it if you struggle with your powers
vox would encourage you to use your power, in fact he would probably love to see you electrocute your enemies or blow them away, vox is entranced by power and would be even more attracted to you if you were powerful
loves when you make it storm during alastors broadcasts so the radio is always staticy and cutting out, it always makes him giggle
it took vox a while to notice your powers, but once you fully explain them, he has LOTS of questions
hes a bit worried about your rain and his TV head at first, after all electronics and weather don't often mix, so he makes sure to waterproof himself and any technology you migh be around
(theres something so poetic about him falling in love with someone who holds the power to dismantle his entire technological empire and destroy his existence- ok i'll stop yapping)
vox doesn't go out very often, but when he does, his favorite weather is warm weather but with a nice cool breeze.
vox would use you for weather forecasts and people often wonder how he's always so accurate! little do they know about his sweet darling controlling the weather for him!
sometimes vox will text you in the morning with a goofy guess on what the weather will be today, something crazy like "the sky will be green" and lo and behold, when he opens his curtains, the sky is green and he is very, very surprised
Valentino
very enticed by your powers to say the least
your beautiful, smart, and powerful? sign him up!
would probably ask you to film in some of his pornos and would use your powers for kink-related uses, such as like a mild electrocution kink (lightning) or waterboarding (rain, etc) or something like that
this oblivious man would probably not notice your powers AT ALL until you explain them to him, he's honestly so clueless but he finds them interesting regardless!!!
valentino is not the most aware of other people's emotions and he can be oblivious sometimes, so the weather is a great gauge of your emotions
he immediately knows when your horny bc he's memorized the weather patterns when you giys have sex.... u hear sum?
he likes teasing you and then hearing thunder boom outside
val loves that his partner is powerful, and loves showing you off and showing off your powers. he's absolutely supporting your right and wrongs
valentino loves hot weather, it gives him an excuse to wear lowkey scandalous clothing so he loves when you make the weather very hot
he assumes you have more control over your powers than you actually do sometimes, and will be surprised when the weather starts acting up as your trying to stay calm
for example, val will tease you by sending you a dirty picture of himself or flashing you a glimpse of his lingerie under his coat and will snicker endlessly when the entire room starts to heat up as the weather suddenly grows uncomfortably hot
sometimes when he's pissed at one or both of the other vees, he'll hve you cause a storm in their offices/rooms just for shits and giggles
SORRY THIS REQ TOOK 500 YEARS ITS BEEN IN MY DRAFTS FOR AGES <\\3 i have never written for valentino before so im sorry his is so short😭 im trying my best yall BUTTTT ANYWAYS EXPECT SOME MORE WRITING STUFFS BC IM OFF SCHOOL FOR THIS WEEK
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meanbossart · 3 months
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i just need to take a second to gush about how much i love durge drow and astarion, they feel so fleshed out and perfectly written together in their fucked up wretched ways. They really inspire me to write more for my own tavs, hopefully one day ill be able to say im as happy with my own work as i get when seeing yours. I have to ask though, do you have any tips on drawing head shapes and faces? or maybe about wrinkles? i find i really struggle with that stuff when drawing and i adore how expressive and grungey all your art looks!
First of all thank you so much, I love hearing what people think of the two of them together 😭
Honestly you've hit on something that's quite near and dear to my heart, I love developing and figuring how to draw and stylize different faces to get the most unique, interesting looking results - everything about the details is highly rewarding to me. What does x type of nose look like from this angle? In this style? How can this eyeshape best translate to my art? How different does a face look when its making this expression? What does that MOUTH DO? etc etc.
In fact you kind of inspired me to put a little tutorial/guide together the last hour lmao and what a blessing it is that the two current subjects of this blog serve as great models here, being that their faces are basically polar opposites!
When it comes to heads, you've probably heard it a dozen times before that you want to think of them in terms of geometry and facets; my process to drawing them is pretty conventional so I won't spend too much time on it, but it goes something like this:
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Obviously I don't do every single one of these steps most of the time, which is just something that comes from practice/developing muscle memory, but it is helpful to start off this way for two main reasons:
By making these guide lines and splitting a head into pieces like this, you'll have an easier time seeing and understanding it as a multidimensional object, and in turn, facilitate It for you when you venture out into doing wacky angles and lighting.
Making different headshapes starts HERE. notice how Astarion's "face" slate is narrower and longer, how my durge's jaw pieces sit lower on the head, how all of the same pieces came together in the same way but we ended up with one real pointy elf and a real brick of a drow - making characters look different successfully begins very early in the sketching process.
The next thing you want to do branches out into every day life: start noticing yours and other people's facial features. How does an upturned nose look from a high angle? How does the size of someone's cheekbones affect what they look like when they smile? How about when the light hits them a certain way? Does someone's lip shape changes when they pout? When they laugh? How does a person's hairline change the shape of their face? You do NOT need to creepily sketch every stranger you see on the bus, but get into the habit of actually noticing what people look like when you talk to them - when you look at pictures, when you watch movies - make a mental list of interesting ways mouths, noses, and eyes can come together in a variety of different proportions to make completely distinct looking mugs, and how they change depending on how you are looking at them.
Light and shadow play a HUGE role in how faces look, too, basically as crucial as actual bone structure does. As you see up there I tried to rough out how natural, head on, and underhead light would look on these two very different looking guys, and while we can see definite patterns, there are small differences that come to be because of the sizes and shapes of their features.
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Here is a very, very basic look at how some of these features come to look the way they do, how they interact with one another, and how they compare between a blocky, rather conventionally "masculine" head and one that's much softer and slimmer.
Note please that it is not one or two characteristics that give a chaarcter their "look"; you can reduce a face to eyes, mouth, and nose through stylization and still have them be recognizable, but if you want to do more than that, you have to consider the whole package! Chin, cheeks, brows, direction of the jaw, slope and size of the forehead, depth of eyes, ridge of the nose, etc - I know this is probably far more than you bargained for, but if you start making note of a FEW of these things now and slowly add on, this will eventually become second nature to you.
Similarly, understanding how these characteristics come together will help you with rendering light and shadow in a realistic way, and predicting what their facial expressions may look like - if no two people are alike, neither are their smiles. :)
Lastly, remember that I'm no expert - I have developed my own methods and semiotics and yours may look slightly (or vastly) different, and that's fine! I hope only that by sharing this it has given you a base to work off of.
Anyways, I HOPE this has been helpful and not just the unsolicited ramblings of a face pervert.
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omgthatdress · 1 year
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the major takeaway from last night is that Karl Lagerfeld was more of a personality than a designer and that Yves Saint Laurent was the clear winner of that rivalry.
For those who aren’t familiar, Karl Lagerfeld and Yves Saint Laurent were both fashion wunderkinds who emerged in the late 1950s, both appointed heads of major brands at the same time, and had very intense rivalry. Yves Saint Laurent took over Dior after the passing of Christian Dior, helped cement the brand as a major player in fashion, and then after a disastrous stint being drafted into the French army, built his own fashion brand that went down in history with its unique and diverse and always evolving looks.
Karl was always kind of behind Yves. He designed for a lot of major fashion brands, and managed to establish himself at the top of the game at Chloé, but he didn’t get his full on legendary status until he took over Chanel in 1983. This history of the Chanel brand was already pretty frought, with Coco Chanel modernizing and defining the fashion of the 1920s and 30s, but being forced to shut down during World War 2, during which she collaborated with the Nazis. Behind the Bastards did a pretty great two episodes on her. When the brand returned in the 60s, fashion had changed tremendously. Dior, Givenchy, Balenciaga, and Balmain had all taken over mid-century fashion, and now that aesthetic was being taken over by mod, the miniskirt, and the likes of Mary Quant, Pierre Cardin, and Paco Rabanne. So when Chanel came back it was largely seen as a stuffy old lady brand, which it remained until Karl took it over.
Now, this is where Karl actually did something really impressive that you honestly can’t take away from him: he took a fashion house in severe decline, one that had been in its flop era for literal decades, and he made it hip again, while still managing to stay true to the ethos that Coco Chanel had laid out.
Chanel is clean, minimalistic, and classy. It is easy to wear, effortless, and always extremely glamorous, which is what made it so iconic in the 20s and 30s. Given that the 50s and 60s were all about making a fucking effort, the thing that the brand managed to keep doing well was its suits. You know what kind of suits I’m talking about. Tweed jackets and midi skirts, neat tailoring, delicate pastel colors, pearls and camellias and chains. It’s not so much that it was edgy and exciting but it was expensive and it was *Chanel* and people wore it for the status symbol alone. That is what Karl took advantage of and managed to re-invent.
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That sort of aesthetic fit perfectly into the you-can-never-be-too-rich-or-too-skinny 80s, when wearing status symbol clothing was everything.
Then, in the 90s, he managed to keep things exciting by following exactly what was on-trend at the time and incorporating elements of street wear and hip-hop.
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However, after that, he kind of lost his edge and just rested on “it’s Chanel” rather than actually pushing the fashion envelope. By the time he died in 2019, he was a fucking dinosaur and fashion had long since moved past him. The thing that he was ultimately most well known for was his own very distinctive look and flamboyant personality.
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Before I ever started studying fashion, I knew who Karl was because I’d seen him so many times, and I’d seen parodies of him so many times. I knew *him* but I didn’t really know his work. And I think having an incredibly boring Met Gala dedicated to him reveals that: his actual artistic legacy is skinnier than the models he used to berate. Karl Lagerfeld built his brand on his diva personality, and that sort of personality and outlook just isn’t hip anymore. Fashion is always about moving forward, and Lagerfeld’s beliefs should remain fossilized in the past.
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f1byjessie · 3 months
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A PICTURE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS ━━ LN4.
sometimes the right words are hard to come across, and sometimes everything you need to say can be captured in an image.
( lando norris x photographer!reader )
━━ part four.
“Saw McLaren posted pics of the new car,” Jack says in lieu of a greeting when he sees you after the weekend. He picks up his pace and crosses the distance to meet you where you’re fumbling with the keys to your “office”, and then he takes a few of the many equipment bags you’re attempting to juggle, saying as he does so, “You take any of those or no?”
You laugh, “Ah, no. They actually hire on a whole studio crew that does that. They’ve got lights, green screens, special camera lenses, the whole lot. The post-production on those photos is mad though.” You get the door unlocked and usher him inside, “I got to sit in on it once, and it’s crazy how much work goes into getting just a couple week’s worth of promotional content.”
He sets your bags down where you direct him to and then offers you a snarky grin, “Still probably would’ve looked cooler if you took ‘em, to be fair.”
It makes you laugh again. Jack seems to be good at that, and it feels nice to get along so well with someone you work with. You’ve found a surprising friend in him. At the end of your conversation on Friday, you’d exchanged numbers and he’d made you promise to reach out if you needed him for anything. You hadn’t, but he’d still sent you an unflatteringly angled picture of Kyle Walker from after their match against Newcastle, followed quickly with━ “use this in the next media drop thx,” and the chatter had gone from there.
You set down your own bags. “Well, thank you. Pretty sure it’s not as fun as this job, though.”
And you mean it. You’ve had opportunities to switch over to studio photography, and though you respect the people who do it and the unique challenges it poses in its own right, there’s nothing like being upfront and personal with all the action, getting to see the athletes in their element and know them on a level that goes beyond an hour or two shoot. You wouldn’t trade it for the world.
“Wait,” you pause, hands stopping just above where you’re ready to start sorting through your equipment, “since when did you keep up with Formula One?”
Jack shrugs. “I don’t. But you work for that team, yeah? So I figured I might as well see what they’re all about.”
“Well, if you need something to do during the summer, let me know and I’ll see what I can do,” you tell him, resuming your sorting. “They give me extra tickets for each race but they usually end up going to waste.”
You don’t bring up the falling out you had with your parents at eighteen when you told them you were going to pursue photography or the fact that you haven’t really talked to them in years because of it. You also don’t mention that due to the strenuous, near-constant traveling and the strict schedule of your job, your friendships are limited to the athletes you work with and the other McLaren staff that travel with you━ all of whom have passes of their own, for obvious reasons.
Jack, thankfully, doesn’t ask about it either. Whether he’s made his own assumptions or respects that it’s probably a sore subject, he leaves it alone and the two of you carry on in companionable silence.
You get your equipment unzipped from the bags and organized across the room per your system, guiding your temporary helper with pointed fingers to where it all should go.
The silence is only broken again when he asks you a question. “You got a favorite driver?”
It’s so out of the blue that you nearly jump, startled by the suddenness of it against the quietness of the room. But then you laugh and shake your head. “Officially no, but just between the two of us, me and Lando started at the same time so he’s got a special place in my heart. He’s also my best friend.”
Jack raises an eyebrow, “Oh yeah?” Despite the persona he puts on, you think he secretly loves gossip. “How’d he take the news about you being with Ward, then? ‘Cause I’d have some choice things to say to any friend of mine if they got with a prick like that.”
You purse your lips, divert your gaze to avoid Jack’s eyes, and shrug, fiddling with the neck strap of your camera as you do so. “I don’t know.”
“You ‘don’t know?’”
You shrug again and feign checking over the settings as if your camera’s aperture is suddenly the most interesting thing in the world. “He hasn’t been picking up my calls,” you start, “or answering my texts since the paps released the pics, so.”
When you glance back up, Jack’s making a face. “So, your best friend finds out you’re dating a total bellend, and instead of asking you about it or at the very least taking the piss, he ignores you?”
When he puts it like that, you feel a bit stupid for being more sad than you are angry.
All you can do is shrug.
INSTAGRAM.
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yourusername ladies and gentlemen, jack grealish (i was threatened into posting these, send help pls)
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You decide that if Lando gets to be petty, then so do you.
The thing is, you’d told Lando you wouldn’t replace him with any of the guys from Manchester City, and you’d meant it━ you still mean it, despite your frustrations and annoyances with him telling you otherwise.
But if he’s going to play games, then so are you.
Technically you hadn’t started the relationship with Garrett willingly, but Lando doesn’t know that, and even if you had that doesn’t give him the right to go about ignoring you. You’ve been supportive when he’s gotten girlfriends━ you even ate greasy pizza, drank cheap wine, and cried watching The Notebook together when he ended his long-term relationship back in 2022. He could at least pretend to be supportive, or better yet he could pick up the fucking phone. 
As pathetic as it sounds, you’d let him yell at and berate you if it just meant he’d answer your calls. Because having Jack around to gossip with and shoot the shit is nice, and he really does help you not feel so alone at Etihad Campus, but Lando’s your best friend and he has been for years now. There’s nobody that understands you as well as he does, even if he is a twat half the time, and what you need now most of all is that particular Lando brand of annoying to cheer you up.
The door opens, drawing your attention from where you’re scrolling through McLaren’s newest posts. Garrett stands in the opening.
The memory of that night still lingers like a bad taste in your mouth, bitter and unpleasant. You’ve managed to avoid him for the most part in the time since then, ignoring the looks he shoots your way out on the field or in the weight room, and lucky enough that his meetings with the physio team keep him preoccupied so that he can’t seek you out in between training sessions. You’d known it was inevitable that you’d have to face him, but that doesn’t stop the dread from pooling in your stomach when you see him standing in the doorway with his arms crossed and an eyebrow raised as he surveys the makeshift office you’ve done up for yourself.
“They couldn’t find you an actual office?” He comments, looking disdainfully towards your desk and the large Manchester City logo emblazoned across the front.
You shrug, wishing he’d just get to the point. “I’m only here for a few months. Doesn’t matter much to me. What do you want?”
He takes a step farther into the room and closes the door behind him, taking his sweet time to cross the distance toward the seats. When he’s finally lowered down into one, he looks up to you with a nonchalance that fills you immediately with anger.
“I’m making some amendments to our agreement,” he announces.
“Like hell you are.”
He raises an eyebrow. “Did you seriously expect people to believe we’re a couple if we never actually do anything to give off the impression of being a couple?”
You scowl. Obviously, you hadn’t expected to just skate by on the coattails of pictures from a single night. You’d known from the very beginning that you would eventually need to make another public appearance together at the very least if you wanted to keep the paparazzi fed and encourage the idea to the media that you’re in a committed relationship with one another. You’d just been hoping you would’ve had more time until then.
“I’m not an idiot, Garrett,” you grumble, crossing your arms in your seat. You had been looking through pictures from the day’s morning practice, but now you think having to look at any more of Kevin De Bruyne’s grinning face will make you lose your mind when you feel the furthest thing from happy.
“Obviously,” Garrett scoffs. “But you’re the one who said I get one kiss and nothing more. Newsflash, love━” your scowl deepens, “━couples do more than just kiss one time.”
“So what are you suggesting?”
He pulls his phone from the pocket of his joggers and swipes across the screen for a few moments of anticipatory silence. “Well,” he finally says, “it’s the sixteenth now. We haven’t got a match until the twenty-sixth. Go on a date with me this weekend.”
You can’t say no. There’s no plausible excuse for you to get out of it, and deep down you know the only way you can get rid of Garrett is to just do what he says and hope the media make their conclusions about his change quick enough that you can ditch him before the summer break.
At least during the Formula One season, you can use traveling as a reason to get out of dates. When the Champion’s League starts back up he’ll be traveling around Europe a bit more than he is now, and there’s always a chance you could be in the same country at the same time, but the likelihood of your schedules aligning is slim and that means you’ll be safe from any ventures out into public.
But for the time being, you’re stuck.
“Okay,” you reluctantly agree.
He claps his hands, a deceptively cheerful grin on his face. If you didn’t already think of him as the worst prick you’ve ever met, you might’ve found it charming. It’s the same smile he used to flash at you in your first week when he was trying to cozy up and ease his way into your good graces. The sight of it makes you sick to your stomach, now.
“Great,” he rises from his seat. “We’ll do some shopping, get some lunch━ make a full day out of it.”
At this point, you don’t care what he has planned. You just want him to leave you alone so you can try to at least pretend like you’re gonna finish the rest of the work you need to get around to.
Garrett’s made his way to the door and has his hand reaching for the handle when he turns back around and gives you a smirk. “Might wanna work on your happy face, though, love,” he comments, gesturing towards you with a nod of his head. “‘Cause if you look like that in front of the paps they definitely aren’t gonna be very convinced that you love me.”
Just to spite him, you let your scowl deepen. “I don’t need your advice. I know how to handle myself, Garrett.” You say his name like a curse━ like the very feeling of it on your tongue causes you pain.
If he notices, he doesn’t comment. His face turns thoughtful, but there’s still the smugness painted across his features that makes you so unfathomably annoyed. “You must be pretty familiar with the paps if you’re always around those drivers, yeah?” He knows the answer to his question already, so you’re not sure why he’s even asking.
He stays silent, though, like he’s genuinely expecting an answer, so you shrug your shoulders. “Obviously.”
“Obviously,” he repeats back to you.
His laughter is all you hear echoing in your ears even once he’s long gone.
Until your phone starts to ring and Lando's name flashes across the screen.
━━ tags: @maih23 @urfavnoirette @leclercsluv @f1luvur @formulaal @a-disturbing-self-reflection @starlightpierre @chezmardybum @marshmummy @405rry @sideboobrry11 @d3kstar @mcmuppet @happylittlereader @casperlikej @5starl1ght
━━ a/n: cliffhanger hehe~ also, i promise we're getting to ACTUAL formula one stuff soon
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communistkenobi · 13 days
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Hi, genuine good faith question if you'd like! How is TOS racist? It was my understanding that the OG Series was like, huge for equality in media?
I’m speaking primarily about the content of TOS itself, not its historical impact - I understand it had various historic firsts in terms of having characters of colour in respectable roles, which I’m not dismissing. My experience with the discourse on here surrounding the show is that people front-load these character representations as emblematic of the show’s progressive politics. Which, if we want to go that route, TOS was contemporary to the US civil rights movement, which provides us with a handy measuring stick to see how TOS actually grapples with race, not just the presence of characters of colour themselves. I'm going to be kind of defensive in this explanation, not towards you specifically, but because I have had this conversation with people online many, many, many times, and so any defensiveness on my part is in anticipation of arguments I know will come up as a result of making the basic claim that a show made in America in the 1960s is racist. I'm also going to be copy + pasting from an older post I've made on the subject since it's been a while now since I've watched TOS so some of the details are fuzzy.
Like okay, the premise of TOS is that the Enterprise, as an ambassador of Starfleet/the Federation, is seeking out new alien life to study. The Prime Directive prohibits the Enterprise crew from interfering with the development of any alien culture or people while they do this, so the research they collect needs to be done in an unobtrusive way. I think this is the first point at which people balk at the argument that TOS is racist or has a colonial conception of the world - the Enterprise’s mission is premised on non-interference, and I think when people hear ‘colonial’ as a descriptor they (understandably, obviously) assume it is describing active conquest, genocide, and dispossession. Even setting aside all the times where Kirk does directly interfere with the “development” of a people or culture (usually because they’ve “stagnated” culturally, because a culture "without conflict" cannot evolve or “develop” beyond its current presumed capacity - he is pretty explicitly imposing his own values onto another culture in order to force them to change in a particular way), or the times when the Enterprise is actually looking to extract resources from a given planet or people, I’m not exactly making this claim, or rather, that’s not the only thing I’m describing when calling TOS racist/colonial.
The show's presentation of scientific discovery and inquiry is anthropological - the “object” of analysis is alien/foreign culture, meaning that when the Enterprise crew comes into contact with a new being or person, this person is always read first and foremost through the level of (the Enterprise’s understanding of) culture. Their behaviour, beliefs, dress, way of speaking, appearance, and so on are always reflective of their culture as a whole, and more importantly, that their racial or phenotypic characteristics define the boundaries of their culture. Put another way, culture is interpreted, navigated, and bound racially - the show presents aliens as a Species, but these species are racially homogeneous, flattening race to a natural, biological difference that is always physically apparent and presented through the lens of scientific objectivity, as "species" is a unit of biological taxonomy. Basically species is a shorthand for race. This is the standard of most sci-fi/fantasy genre work, so this is not a sin unique to Star Trek.
Because of this however, Kirk and Co are never really interacting with individuals, they are interacting with components of a (foreign, exotic, fundamentally different) culture, the same way we understand that a biologist can generalize about a species using the example of an individual 'specimen'. And when the Enterprise interacts with these cultures, they very frequently measure them using a universalized scale of development - they have a teleological (which is to say, evolutionary) view of culture, ie, that all cultures go from savage to rational, primitive to advanced, economically simple to economically complex (ie, to capitalist modes of production). And the metrics they are judging these cultures by are fundamentally Western ones, always emphasising to the audience that the final destination of all cultures (that are worthy of advancing beyond their current limited/“primitive” stages) is a culture identical to the Federation, a culture that can itself engage in this anthropological mission to catalogue all life as fitting within a universal set of practices and racial similarities they call “culture.”
This is a western, colonial understanding of culture - racially and spatially homogeneous people comprise the organs of a social totality, ie, a society, which can then be analysed as an “object,” as a “phenomenon,” by the scientists in order to extract information from them to produce and advance state (ie Federation) knowledge. The Enterprise crew are allowed to be individuals, are allowed to be subjects with a capacity for reason, contradiction, emotion, compassion, and even moments of savagery or violence, without those things being assigned to their “race” or “culture” as a whole, but the people they interact with are only components of a whole which are “discovered” by the Enterprise as opportunities to expand and refine the Federation’s body of knowledge.
Spock is actually a good example of what I'm talking about, because he is an exception to this rule - unlike the others in the crew, his behaviour is always read as a symptom of his innate Vulcan-ness, where his human and Vulcan halves war for dominance in his mind and character. Bones (the doctor, one of the main cast) constantly comments on Spock's inability to feel things, that he is callous and unsympathetic, ruled by Vulcan logic to such an extreme that his rationality is a form of irrationality, as his Vulcan blood prohibits him from tempering logic with human emotion and intuition. Now you can argue that Bones is a stand-in for the racists of the world, that Spock proves Bones wrong in that he is able to feel but merely keeps it under wraps, that Vulcans are not biologically incapable of emotion but merely live in a socially repressive culture, but this still engages in the racial logic of the show - Vulcans are a racially-bound species with a single monolithic culture, and Spock's ability to express and feel 'human emotions' is the metric by which he is granted human subjectivity and sympathy.
And on the flip side you have the Klingons - a “race” that is uniformly savage, backward, violent, and dangerous. In the episode Day of the Dove, where Klingons board the Enterprise along with an alien cloud that makes everyone suddenly aggressive and racist (this show is insane lol), the Enterprise crew begins acting violent and racist, but the Klingons don’t change. They aren’t more violent than before (because they already were fundamentally violent and racist), and they don’t become less violent when the cloud eventually leaves (because they are never able to emerge from their violence and savagery as a social condition or external imposition - they simply are that way). Klingons are racially, behaviourally, psychologically, and culturally homogeneous, universally violent and immune to reason, and their racial characteristics are both physical manifestations of this universal violence as well as the origin of it. The writers and creators of TOS are explicitly invoking the orientalist idea of the “Mongolian horde,” representing both the American fear of Soviet global takeover as well as blatantly racist fears about “Asiatics” (a word used in the show, particularly in The Omega Glory where a fear of racialised communist takeover is made explicit) dominating the world.
This is colonial thinking! Like, fundamentally, at its core, this is colonial white supremacist thinking. Now this is not because TOS invents these tropes or is the origin of them, it is not individually responsible for these racial and colonial logics - these conceptions are endemic to Western thought, and I am not expecting a television show to navigate its way outside of this current colonial paradigm of scientific knowledge. I’m also not expecting an average person watching this to pick out all the intricacies of this and link it to the colonial history of Europe or the colonial history of western philosophy/thought. But this base premise of Star Trek is why the show is fundamentally colonial - even if it was the case that the crew never intervened in any alien conflict, never extracted any material resources from other people, this would still be colonial logic and colonial thinking. The show has a fundamentally colonial imagination when it comes to exploration, discovery, and culture.
I think a good place to end is the opening sequence. The show's first line is always "Space! The final frontier." I do not think the word frontier is meant metaphorically or poetically - I think the show is being honest about its conception of space as an infinitely vast, infinitely exotic frontier from which a globally Western civilisation (which the Enterprise is an emblem of) can extract resources, be they material or epistemic
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kafus · 6 months
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i wont feel offended if you ignore this ask btw, i get that its asking something kind of personal! but can i ask what you mean by the internet treating DID as magical?
hi i actually enjoy DID questions don't worry LOL and i'm in the mood rn
when most people think about DID they are usually thinking about very overt cases with very distinct alters with vastly different personalities, different names, gender identities, etc. while this is a popular angle to imagine DID, overt cases like that are actually a pretty small percentage of what DID tends to look like. (of course, social media can push people's presentation to become more overt, which isn't fake/bad or anything, humans are social animals and the way we interact with each other can affect even our mental illnesses. additionally some people will become more overt after receiving therapy while they start communicating with alters for the first time. but my point is DID is not usually that strikingly obvious)
this popular perception also leaves out a lot of the rest of DID which falls in line with what people consider more "typical" disorders, PTSD symptoms galore, dissociation/dissociative amnesia, somatic pains and illness, comorbid conditions and physical disabilities. i think if people had more of an understanding of the non-alter parts of DID, it would ground the disorder a lot more and make it a lot less "magical" seeming.
but overall it all comes back to like... people not understanding that DID is just an extension of PTSD and other parts-based disorders. the same psychological process that makes PTSD/C-PTSD happen, BPD, etc, is what causes DID, it's just pushed to a far extreme due to when the trauma is experienced (very early childhood) and other factors surrounding that trauma, such as the length of time the trauma occurred over, or whether or not the child had stable caregivers and/or relief from traumatic events. DID is not some sort of completely separate category of mental illness - alters (the DID definition of them) may be unique to DID, but they come from the same place a ton of other mental illnesses do and there's a ton of overlapping symptoms between DID and pretty much every disorder caused by trauma.
i often see people act like DID is some far off life experience they couldn't even fathom or imagine living with, but if anyone just actually explained this shit properly i'm pretty sure most people, especially traumatized people, would go "oh that makes sense" and not feel so estranged from it lol. it's really frustrating because people continuing to see DID as this sort of magical, far-off experience, takes the disability/disorder out of it in conversation about it (people can only ever seem to talk about alters) and it also usually ends up spreading misinformation at the same time. there's sooo much bullshit about DID out there. good grief. it even hurts other people with trauma-based conditions that aren't DID
edit: wait also btw OSDD-1 is included in this conversation, i'm just using DID as shorthand instead of typing DID/OSDD every time and i am personally diagnosed with DID so lol
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iloveyouinred · 9 months
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Albedo x Veterant Mountain Climber!Reader
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𓇬♡ | Warning: NSFW, obsessive behavior, kidnaping, stalking, noncon, creampie, breeding, mention of pregnancy
𓇬♡ | Word Count: 1.5K
𓇬♡ | Notes:
*Track Point refers to the location along the mountain trail that being mark by reader on the map. This include camp and unique landscape that can be use as sign when climbing. (The only mountain i ever climb is the one in Genshin so..).
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You should have come down the Dragonspine running the first time you notice his presence. Yet you were weighing your luck and started a bet with yourself. You were so close to the peak, and it takes you days to climb up the Dragonspine safely. Going down the mountain just because of your paranoia will take you days, and even more days to go back up again. So you were thinking, What if you finish the climbing and go down once you take a look at the peak of Dragonspine's greatview that you missed so dearly? The last time you saw it was years ago. What the worst that could happen really?
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It was on one fine evening when you started to notice some other footstep on a trail you have passed. You never go back on your trail so if you didn't get lost and circled on the same spot that one time, you would never notice. You are nearing the peak of Dragonspine and you only notice now. It's impossible for someone to live in this secluded area of the mountain, and the trail was not familiar for other adventurers so whoever leaves a fresh footprint behind you must be either a lost adventurer or someone whose intent is to follow you. You are not sure why or how long this person has followed you, because you never once saw a fireplace being lit up in the area you ventured. Which is pretty strange remembering the fact that the Dragonspine chilly air only got more deadly in the night. And if you are not a pyro vision holder you would have died long time ago. So you are contemplating on how to confront this not so human figure that has been following you. Days you tried to set up some traps to lure the stalker out. Yet none of it seems to work. At some point you start to question yourself, was it really someone or was it your brain playing tricks on you? You get that once in a while, when venturing into areas with far too low temperature. So after a week of not sleeping properly, you finally give up for one night. After all, the pace of your movement has been slowed down just to set up some traps here and there, and lack of sleep is really taking a toll on you. So with one hit on your pillow you drifted off to the dreamland. Unaware of the man that is eyeing your sleeping figure. Admiring it as he always did for the past 5 years.
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In the morning you wake up fully recharge. Your body feels warm, which is unusual, but it makes you move easier. You have a good feeling about today, so you set off early and start to climb to finish up the leftover trail, using your energy to its fullest. Soon before the sun fully set, you had reached the very peak of dragonspine. Taking in the beautiful view that you will not see again for several months or maybe years. By the time it's fully dark out, you have already climbed down some map track point. After all, the mountain peak might be pretty, but it was not the best place to set out a camp. You were planning to camp on the 3rd track point but uneasy feelings started to arise in your heart. So you continued climbing down the mountain. It was when you reached the 5th track point that you ran out of energy. With your breath running heavy and your feet start to grow numb. By that time the fear had fully worn off, being replaced with your tiredness. You can feel all parts of your body ache. It was understandable really. It would be weird if your body did not crash down already. Dwelling on your-not so much left-choices, you decided to build a simple tent to rest your body for the night. You were lying in your sleeping bag ready to black out when out of nowhere a hand wrapped around your neck. It was when you knew all of that sign and the bad feeling truly warned you of real things. But it was too late. As you struggled and choked on his hand, you caught a glimpse of what might be the most pretty face you had ever seen. Pale skin covered in deep red blush, a pair of sharp shappire bite down on you, and what seems to be fluffy blonde hair. A few strands of blonde hair fell on his face. Your tears flowed down your cheek before you lost consciousness.
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Countless nights pass as you feel the sun rise once again by the cave entrance. Now he is bottoming you out. Shoving his length inside your gummy walls to meet your womb entrance, ignoring the bruises that start to appear by how many times your pussy being fucked. It's been what? Days? Weeks? You are unable to think clearly. And he won't let you. By how he always puts your head in the clouds. Sending your overly sensitive body to reach a chain of orgasm after orgasm. You were so full and he just seemed to never ran out of energy to fuck you just to fill you to the brim. Warmth that was never before given by the chilly mountain. And you are like a child eating sugar for the first time, the sin of feeling heaven on earth. That your mind cut short by yet another orgasm. You don't think you will get out of this cave alone or at least you must be pregnant with his kids, if only you ever get the chance to get out. He might not thinking the same thing, for he prefers to keep you by the warmth of his camp. Rather than seeing you running around the dangerous landscape, actively trying to kill yourself by overpushing your body pass its limit. Just like how you were that last night on the dragonspine peak. Climbing up in high fever and pushing yourself to go down another 7 track poin while your body has already trembled and stumbled along the snowy path. You did manage to build a simple camp, but with your condition that day. If he lets you sleep there you might as well join the Dragonspine frozen body collection.
You should be grateful. Now he won't let you experience that terrible cold anymore. If stuffing himself inside you as long as he can is the only way he will. Or he might just fuck you dumb so once he get you out of there, belly swollen with his kids, you will be the obedient mate of his. His little housewife that he keeps in a quiet village not far from Mondstadt. That will raise your kids and watch them grow while he stuffs you with another one. He will always make sure to fuck you days on end, and stuff you full so you will never forget and might as well start to crave the feeling of warmth he gives. Oh how he adores your face. Tears running down your cheeks as your mouth gasp open letting out some muffled moans through his finger that stuffed in there. Your eyes almost roll back to the back of your head by how good his length kissing your womb. Hand simultaneously rubbing your hard nipples. And how his soft kisses are raining on your face and neck. You would fool yourself into thinking he love you if not by the fact that you are being fuck into submission by him. Your body starts to gradually accept him, your legs hugging his waist and hand scratching his back. Taking another mind blowing orgasm as his cum filled your already stuffed womb. For the first time since he fuck you, he stop moving. Letting his length stay inside you as you swallow all his cum. You could feel your belly bloating by how overly filled your womb is. And you dont think your consciousness will hold on a bit longer, because once he slowly pulls all his length out leaving only its tip kissing your entrance, giving you a false hope on how he is stopping and letting your trembling body catch a rest for a bit. Only to slam it back in and start fucking you harder. You scream as the sudden high hits you before your body collapses. Trembling continuously as your consciousness drifts away.
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barelymaddy · 1 year
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Aries and where you are the most independent
×Please take into consideration that what i talk about in this post may be affected by your other placements and aspects×
Aries 1h-You are overall independent and have a strong sense of identity!You knew who you were from a very young age and your ideas and the way you present yourself are very unique.You got a pioneer spirit and might be a trend setter(without even knowing🤭).On a darker note,you might have been ostracized or even bullied growing up for your uniqueness and people tend to react in an agressive way to your ideas.
Aries 2h-You are financially independent(or will be)!But even as a child,you knew how to manage your money and things.You don't need somebody else to tell you your worth,as you have a lot of trust in yourself.You might also have a very unique voice that makes you stand out.The negative side here is that you don't know how to ask for help,be it money matters or a boost of confidence.You might also find that your values are very different from the ones of your peers.
Aries 3h-You are an independent thinker!You might also be an only child or the older sibling.On rare occasions,you might've grew up in a neightborhood where there weren't many children besides yourself.You are a very fast thinker and always come up with new ideas.The negative side is that you had a very different way of learning from your classmates and in class,you either felt bored or left behind.This placement also makes it hard for you to collaborate with other people and might indicate a dangerous or aggresive environment(school or neightborhood).
Aries 4h-You are independent from your family!In my opinion,its a pretty difficult placement to have,as you didn't grew up with a sense of unity in your family and no matter the circumstances its hard for you to truly feel like you belong.Might also indicate a violent childhood and family life,usually from the mother's part.On a brighter note,the independence you were taught in your childhood will help you later on in your adult life,as your already know your way around things.Also,you might find that you will create a "soul family" later on in life with people you care about,so don't lose hope,you are not alone!
Aries 5h-You are independent in your hobbies!You don't need other people to enjoy yourself and just like aries 3h,you might have been an only child.(For 18+)You don't mind the idea of quick flings and are a pretty adventurous person on this part.You might have had a few partners throughout your life.Allthough you are not really good at "being part of a team",you are very creative and are good at expressing yourself in a very unique way.The negative side here is that you often feel lonely when it comes to your interests,as not many people from your area share the same prefrences and skills as you,and others often feel the need to compete with you in any activity you do.
Aries 6h-You are independent in your daily routine!Even as a child,you were left to deal with things on your own,especially when it comes to health matters.You needed to learn how to schedule appointments and take care of yourself,all on your own.On the good side,your body is vey healthy and you are very intuitive when it comes to your needs.When it comes to your work environment,the people are competitive and often times,you are left on your own,not having many colleagues friends,but you are a very hard worker and its not hard for you to get a promotion if you really put your mind to it.Overall,its not hard for you to find motivation in your day-to-day life.
Aries 7h-You are independent in your relationships!Allthough your partnerships might suffer a lot because of that.You are not one to always think about love and relationships and are pretty happy on your own.Even tho this might make you a bit sellfish at times.Its pretty difficult for you to express your affection in relationships,and often tease your partners.Nonetheless,you are a very dedicated and protective lover and will always fight for love once you find it.Also,you might not really like the idea of "bussines partners" and you prefer to work by yourself.
Aries 8h-You are independent when it comes to your vulnerability!Not many people were there for you when you felt exausted or just needed a good cry,and that made you very closed off.This also made you hyper-independent in your romatic relationships and friendships.You were often left to deal with your "demons" on your own,and this made you pretty scared of your shadow side.When it comes to your shared resources,you might often find yourself as the provider in your relationships.(For 18+)Also,you might have a few kinks that you don't share with other people you know(BDSM,hair-pulling, scratching etc.)
Aries 9h-You are an independent learner!Your most important experiences and adventures are done by yourself.You didn't really had a lot of people to learn from when you were younger and had to teach yourself many things.Especially when it comes to your interests.Your belief-system was also formed based on this.You grew up thinking you NEED to be independent at all costs,and that made you a bit fickle as a person.You might also be/have been very independent in university or college,meaning you most probably had a job and payed for your things with your own money.If not,this was the time when your sense of independence was formed.
Aries 10h-You are independent in your career!And since this is the MC,you might also have a reputation of being independent.Your long-term goals don't usually include other people(so relationships are not one of your aspirations).Also,your career might require you to be independent.Another thing would be that your father taught you how to be independent(it depends on your relationship if in a healthy way or a neglectful way).
Aries 11h-You are independent in social groups!You will often find that your goals and dreams are different from those of your peers,and this means that the path you took to get to them was pretty lonely.You also find riots to be very important,as you often fight against the system.You have the power to reshape and change the world,but that will usually be done by yourself.Also,you are pretty independent from your friendgroups or any social community.You don't like to identify yourself as part of something and often this means that you have a lot of friends but never one main friend group.
Aries 12h-You are independent in your beliefs!Some themes here are pretty similar to those of aries 9h,as they are both Jupiter houses!You will find that your beliefs about spirituality,the afterlife and the way your subconcious works will be pretty different from the ones of other people and this will often put you in tense situations where you will have to fight for what you believe in,as you will be challenged a lot.On a darker note,you might live in a constant fight or flight mode and have mental health issues.Whenever a chapter of your life ends you will also feel pretty alone,and might have the tendency to retreat yourself.You are also scared to share your secrets with other people or rely on them for that matter,which further leads to your "i'm on my own,i need to be independent" attitude.You will also find that a lot of your dreams will have themes related to independence.
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bidisastersanji · 5 months
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"Zoro gets lost because he uses his red string of fate like a compass- and that's why Sanji always finds him" was one of the first things I posted and now it's real! I got three chapters and here's the first part below the cut. Click here to read it on AO3 if you prefer. each part is around 1.5k words. edit: part 2 here, part 3 here
Zoro has always been a simple man; one of actions over words and of tangible things over what he considers trivial. It’s therefore not surprising that, in a world where certain people are bound by fate, each in their own unique way- some rumoured to share markings on their skin, some with changing eye colours, or even some who feel phantom pains from across the sea- in such a spectacular world, Zoro doesn’t really linger on the red piece of thread tied to his pinky finger. 
The red thread hasn’t ever really been a question in his mind, it just was.  
As far back as he could remember, it’s just been there, infinitely stretching Northwards, unmoving and unseen by others. Subconsciously, he taught himself to use it as a compass to navigate his home island, Shimotsuki. He never had to remember to take it with him, and it reliably was always stretching in the same direction, which was perfectly convenient with the function he’d ascribed it. His odd way of getting around easily became second nature, a habit so deeply ingrained that he barely gave a second thought to the bright cord on his hand. 
--- 
He’s about eight years old when things change. 
The first day Zoro gets lost, he thinks he might’ve missed one of the steps he memorised, jaw tight with repressed irritation at being reprimanded for his lateness to practice. 
The second time he gets lost he’s in the forest, thick trees towering over him in all directions, and when the sun starts to lower in the sky, frustration bubbles up in his chest, tight and sour, stinging his eyes, threatening to spill out as he struggles to find his way back to the dojo. They must’ve cut down some trees or something, he scoffs to himself. 
The third time he gets lost, he’s pretty certain that someone must be playing a prank on him and moved the garden shed from its usual spot. There’s no other reasonable explanation -short of the shed growing legs- seeing as he’s such a natural at getting around. 
From then on, Zoro learns to accept that he lives in a world where people mysteriously move landmarks, buildings and roads around all the time. He tries not to take it too personally, being the target of all these pranks, but he does resent the time he wastes when getting around, as its precious time he could’ve been using to be training. Training to finally beat Kuina. 
It takes him weeks to realise that maybe the string on his hand isn’t pointing in the same direction anymore. 
Once he does notice, he notes that it periodically moves around- sometimes a bit, sometimes a lot, always right when he starts getting used to it damnit and no his sense of direction is just fine thank you. After the first couple of students at the dojo get their asses handed to them for teasing him about it, adults and children alike learn not to poke fun at the glaring, directionally challenged green-haired boy, no matter how often nor absurdly he gets turn around.  
The only person that Zoro reveals his little secret to is Kuina.  
He’s eleven, still a head or two shorter than her, and they’re taking a little break from sparring, sharing some homemade onigiri her mom made her. They’re sat in a tree’s shade, a pleasant breeze cooling their overheated skin, and she asks him about his infamously atrocious spatial navigation. He denies it at first, ears heating up in embarrassment, but after a couple more bites he decides if anyone were to know, it would have to be her. His friend. His only best friend. 
The young Zoro reveals that he’s not really sure why he gets lost in the first place- he's always relied on the thread- not landmarks or maps, as he’s now learned others do- to tell up from down, but one day it just moved. His north star moved, and has kept on moving these past three years, and he still doesn’t know why, just that it’s a real bother. 
“Your... thread?” 
“Yeah.” he eagerly stuffs his mouth with more onigiri. 
Her eyebrow raises quizzically. “I don’t know what you mean by that.” 
Zoro gestures to his pinky with a tilt of his chin and a wiggle of his finger. “You know. My red string. On my pinky.” 
“Zoro, I really don’t. I don’t see anything...” She furrows her brow, thoughtful. “But mom did give me ‘the talk’ last week- maybe this has to do with your soulmate!” Sensing a certain disinterest from her junior, she goes on. “Based on the examples I’ve heard about; I’d say it’s likely that the piece of string on your finger leads to your other half.” 
Zoro shrugs lazily. “Sounds like a drag, couldn’t this just be like, my inner compass or somethin’?” 
Her eyes crinkle at that, a grin splitting her face from ear-to-ear. “What inner compass, moron? You always get lost. And aren’t you the least bit interested in the person on the other end?” She pokes him in the chest. 
“Not really, no.” Zoro tries to brush off the taunt, lips pursed and palming his neck in a nervous tick. 
“Ok, think about it this way,” Kuina calls for his attention, “Somewhere out there, on this wide, wide sea- or a faraway island, I guess, there’s someone meant for you. Your person. Your equal. Isn’t that the least bit exciting?” 
The young boy’s scowl shifts into something softer, a pout. “I... guess?” He sighs. “I honestly don’t know- all I care about is becoming the best. Right now, Kuina, you’re my goal, you’re who I’m looking to. I don’t really care about this stranger, or fate, or anything like that. I’m gonna make my own destiny.” 
Her shoulders shake as she laughs. “Why am I not surprised- Zoro, all you think about are swords and fighting. You’re hopeless. I kind of worry for whoever’s stuck with you-” 
“Hey!” his nostrils flare with indignation. “They’re lucky to have me as a soulmate! I’m gonna be so strong- the strongest- and,” he slows down, realising she’d tricked him into caring, just a tiny bit, “a-and they’ll be the happiest soulmate ever ‘cause I’ll protect them.” 
She hums in agreement, amused. “And you’ll cherish them, right?” 
“Y-yeah...whatever.” he stands up abruptly, eager to change the topic and get back to training. “But my priority is to be the greatest swordsman- and don’t you forget it! I’ll beat you tomorrow for sure!” 
After Kuina’s death, thoughts of soulmates and red threads rarely ever cross his mind. 
At her funeral, he briefly wonders what’ll become of her soulmate, if she even had one, but it just brings bile to his throat. They’d never even met her- why did they even matter. They were the ones mourning her, the ones robbed of their beloved friend, daughter, rival- they were the ones left behind with a Kuina shaped hole in their chests. The bitter burn distracts from the heavy emptiness he can’t shake off, the cold wetness of grief seeping into his skin. He wholeheartedly leans into the fury, grateful for a target, a temporarily outlet for the howling tempest of emotions caused by the loss of his best friend. 
Zoro’s world zeroes in on becoming the best. Pushing himself to the limit. Sparring, training. Constant practice and meditation. After Kuina’s death, there’s no student at the dojo for him to look up to, no ever-progressing goalpost he can set as a target. If he stays, he’ll continue being a big fish in a little pond.  
Zoro leaves. 
He sails the East Blue, seeking stronger and stronger opponents, cashing in bounties to get by. The Demon of the East Blue, they start calling him. But he’s still the same boy who gets lost, the ghost of a red thread distracting his steps and getting him turned around as he travels from island to island. His odd navigating system is as familiar and mechanical as the way his muscles move when he uses his swords, so ingrained he rarely registers that he’s eyeing the thin, tightly corded rope in his peripheral vision. 
Arms tied back with a much thicker, tangible rope, body sore, throat parched and delirious from the burning sun, Zoro doesn’t have much to do in Shell Town’s military yard. For the first time in years, he lets himself contemplate the implications of what Kuina had explained to him- the implications of having a person out there meant for him. He wonders if they’ll ever meet- it seems unlikely if he died here. Which he won’t, of course. Because he’s going to be the world’s greatest swordsman, and not even death will keep him away from achieving his dream. Then- only then, will he maybe think of looking for whoever was stuck with him, he decides. It’ll be his decision. 
For now, he’ll just keep following whatever path he feels will lead him to greatness. 
And what an odd path he stumbles into. Zoro joins a pirate crew. He makes friends. They get into heaps of trouble, fighting the marines, a crazy clown, a creepy butler... Zoro is happy to test his mettle, to feel challenged once again, the rush of battle pulsing through his veins like the sweetest nectar, the comforting weight of his blades grasped in his hands and mouth. 
It’s been a couple of days since they left Syrup village now, and from her spot on Merry’s bridge, Nami has been giving him weird looks. 
“Did you hit your head?” 
He huffs, miffed at being bothered during his nap. “No. Why’re you asking?” 
“You haven’t been getting lost as much lately.” she smirks when she adds, “And I’ve seen you get lost on a smaller ship than this, once.” 
His eyes roll. Fucking witch. “Dunno what you mean, my sense of direction is great.” 
“And Luffy’s a great swimmer.” 
They glare at each other for a moment. Sensing she won’t get any more info from the swordsman, Nami turns away first and sighing, returns her full attention to manning the ship’s helm. 
Truth is, the thread had barely moved since they left Usopp’s home island, always pointing in the direction the Merry was sailing- not that Zoro had noticed. This rare situation enabled him to get the hang of the ship’s layout relatively well, and he’d been enjoying how easy it’d become to move around, even though he chalked it up to personal atunement to the Straw hats’ already beloved ship. 
A few hours before they get to the Baratie, he thinks it’s a funny coincidence that the thread is pointing in the direction the Merry is going. 
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attyattlaw · 4 months
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cross posting yesterday's rambling thread for posterity and because tumblr lets me edit things. anyway this is a sorta long thing and i might add things i forgot to mention in the twt thread
i tend to draw on-model canon because im a coward + just personal preferences. but the way i convert the canon designs into my artstyle is that i take the distinct features oda gives them and then combine it with personal headcanons to complete what should look like a unique human. Starting with Trafalgar Law, who is unfortunately a bland-ass conventionally pretty boy
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someone commented a while ago the law hat drawing tutorial i made a while ago didn't make much sense and i realize its bc of the specific way i draw law's face: heart shaped (ba-dum-tss). That meaning, a narrow chin widening into a mild defined jaw, wide cheekbones, and up to his know-it-all brain dome.
given that, the pudgy guitar pick shape of his head i mentioned here should make a lot more sense.
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i don't think this design point is unique to me, as most conventional pretty anime boy gets given jaws like this. a lot of law artists tend to veer into this head shape. just how life be sometimes. other points: flat, thick eyebrows is bc im a hairy gal and i need to feel better about myself.
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Killer gets to be more interesting, because he shouldn't be considered conventionally attractive. my idea behind killer's is that those individual features is smth he would be insecure with enough to hide himself in a helmet but i draw him with all the love in the world actually. i'd like to think its how kid sees him or yknow, law, bc he's my kin assigned blorbo and maybe you ship lawkill as a guilty pleasure too i mentioned before (and ruined people's days) when i said whenever i draw killer he looks like griffith before i put on his goatee. the upper half of his face is distinctly feminine, with the lower half kinda over compensating. other than that uhh...idk. stan killer
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Kidd is the bane of my existence, i feel like i can never draw his face consistently. yet at the same time he's so damn fun to draw everyone gotta try it.
my problem with kidd is that this mf does have eyelids. most kidd painters out there interpret this as him having deep set eyes (think Matt Smith or jeffrey star) . and yeh skill issue on me i should practice that. other notes, i try to make him younger than canon makes him look. he is my babygirl and he deserves to look cuddly. my band au kidd version has the honor of being allowed some chubs. he's just tries to look older and more menacing with edgy makeup. also i try to give him dimples when i can because, well i can.
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Rosinante last bc i lost steam after kidd. the thing abt cora is that aside from not having eyebrows, everything is structured with the generic one piece man template. which means i gotta do everything myself doffy is there bc the way to figure out how to draw these two is to give them minor differences from each other, that being doffy gets slightly sharper features. in canon, these two are also rly wide boys (more of an oda style feat tbh) but i make them long. though bigger brained donquixote artists know that of these two brothers, doffy should be the wiry-er built. anyway that's it. in conclusion, i need to draw more girls actually i feel like im becoming misogynistic by osmosis from oda's style and now i draw girls all looking the same too.
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thesensteawitch · 4 months
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A Long Awaited Message From Your Spirit Guides 🩵🧚
Pick A Pile Reading
🩵(Left to Right- Pile 1, Pile 2, Pile 3)🩵
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Hello, Senstea Souls!🦋🩷
This is a collective reading on a long awaited message from your spirit guides about a specific situation in your life. Take a deep breath and choose your pile/piles intuitively. Take what resonates and leave what doesn't. Feel free to DM me in case you want to book a reading with me.
Now go ahead and read your pile.
Also, thank you for all the reblogs that you guys do. I am forever grateful!🌻
Booking Form|My Rate Card|Support My Blog
Pile 1
Tarot Cards- Ace of Cups, 8 of wands, King of swords, page of pentacles, 4 of Pentacles, ace of pentacles
Hello, my dear pile 1. Well for you I see that this specific message is regarding your health or some insecurities regarding your body. For a very long time, you have not been feeling good in your body. Some of you may even be going through some health issues. It has been pretty overwhelming for you to deal with what was coming towards you on the health front. Your spirit guides want you to stop thinking of the worst-case scenarios or look down upon your body in any way possible. Because your thoughts create your reality. But the good thing is that none of the worst-case scenarios that are playing in your head are going to come true. Nothing will come out of this worry but if you don't stop thinking of negative thoughts then you'll develop a pattern that will lead you to manifest worst-case scenarios in other areas of your life. So please, my dear pile 1, stop worrying. Rewire your brain to think of the best-case scenarios. The card here says, “You do not have to think specific positive thoughts about your body, but you have to not think specific negative thoughts. If you could never again think about your body, and instead just think pleasant thoughts, your body would reclaim its natural place of wellness.” I also sense a rigid mindset. Your energy is inflexible. I see two polarities but it's difficult for you to find a common ground between them. The two polarities confuse you. You must learn to accept both worlds and find peace in that acceptance. As much as gray there is in this world, it's equally true that black and white exist too. You need to ground your energy. Your root chakra may be imbalanced. Spend time in nature. Open your heart to the healing energy of the earth. Don't hold onto the idea that your body should be a certain way. You can't afford to do that! Don't think you have so less and hold onto it. There's abundance and soon you'll be shown the way. Give yourself a chance. Don't try to look too much into the way your body is. It is lovely the way it is. Once a doctor said to me, “Your heart is still beating, isn't it? Your lungs are still working perfectly fine, aren't they? That means you have a purpose to fulfill and your story isn't over yet. There's nothing wrong with you. You're perfect the way you are. There's no one else like you. God didn't make the exact same human as you and sent them to this earth in the same family as yours or the same environment as yours. You are unique!” Know that the universe will test you and will see if you've learned your lesson or not. So do not look down upon your body in any way. It's your safe abode. As soon as you let go of the insecurities you'll soon notice your creativity birthing out of your sacral chakra. You'll start expressing more and won't let anybody make you believe otherwise about your body. I also sense new opportunities in terms of healing and career are coming your way so keep your eyes open. Free yourself, free your spirit.
For any further clarification or to book your personal reading on this situation feel free to DM me.
Below I am sharing the links to:
Booking Form
My Rate Card
Pile 2
Tarot Cards- The Lovers, King of Pentacles, Eight of Swords, Seven of Cups, Eight of Pentacles, Eight of Cups, Two of Wands
Hello, my dear pile 2. Well, the first thing that I sensed is that some of you may be projectors by human design. Because the card here says, “The entire universe is being affected by what you are offering.” You have this sweet child-like energy but at the same time, you are a wise old soul. You may be seeing a lot of angel numbers, especially 888. I hear, “What comes down must go up.” Your life is about to change pile 2. Your guides want you to know that whatever decisions you are making right now are drastically shaping your future. Many of you are stuck between two decisions and your only way out is to take a balanced approach. There is strong water and fire energy in the cards. Opposing forces but very powerful. Both can cleanse and heal. Some of you are even going through a period of cleansing. A lot of negativity is being released from your life so don't hold onto your past. Your hard work will pay off and soon you'll find the clarity regarding a certain situation you're very confused about. All your long-awaited dreams are soon coming true. Your spirit guides want you to know that all the pain and confusion you went through was part of the plan only to bless you beyond your imagination. Your patience will reap rewards. For some of you, I hear that your patience will bring true love in your life. A time of celebration awaits. No one and nothing can put you down. Nobody will be able to stop you. I hear ‘Unstoppable’ by Sia. Being a projector you took in a lot of negativity from people's aura and now it's time for you to release all of that. It's time for you to come to yourself. Call all your power back that you gave away to others. I sense that some of you are even highly sensitive. You can easily pick up on people's true intentions. Don't underestimate your own power pile 2. You're gifted. Do not undermine your own gifts. The world needs someone like you. And you guys are soon going to receive a big boon and you guys are so intelligent that you will know how to make the best use of it. I sense strong psychic abilities in this pile. You are beyond beautiful, pile 2. I am in awe!!!!!! The only guidance here is to listen to your intuition and to leave the toxicity behind. Be it people or places. Those who can't reciprocate what you have to offer don't DESERVE to be in your life. Period. Protect yourself, you beautiful souls!
For any further clarification or to book your personal reading on this situation feel free to DM me.
Below I am sharing the links to:
Booking Form
My Rate Card
Pile 3
Tarot Cards- Page of Cups, 10 of Cups, The Lovers, 7 of Cups, 6 of Swords, Queen of Swords
Hello, my dear pile 3. For most of you, the message has something to do with ‘love’. I am even hearing, “To love, love, yeah. I needed to lose you to love me.” I also sense that fun times are coming for you but it seems that some of you are heartbroken about a situation or relationship that ended in your life. You are looking for closure. You need to make some adjustments in your life because what happened in your life happened to teach a very important karmic lesson. I also hear, “In this world, it's just us. You know it's not the same as it was.” Your card says, “Be easy about all of this. Life is supposed to be fun, you know. We want you to feel love for your life, for the people of your world, and most of all, for yourself. There is great love here for you.” Some of you may be moving places or recently moved to a different place and are feeling disheartened. The card wants you to know that love is everywhere you go. And I don't think that you guys are alone. There's someone still sticking around with you. It's time for you to explore what it truly means to love and feel loved. It doesn't mean that you're supposed to go on multiple dates but experience love in every way possible. Write someone a letter, paint, give someone flowers, or apologize to someone if any apologies are pending. As you embody love soon the romantic love will find you and it will stay with you for a lifetime. You may be tempted to go back to your ex or the person you broke up with. But please don't, especially with the same energy that you sent out previously. Do the right thing. There's no point in writing the same story over and over again. Don't start many things just focus on one thing. You may end up feeling tired or low in confidence at the end of the day as you may end up having high expectations from yourself. It's time for you to write a new story and not repeat the same old patterns. That's why your guides are asking you to make some adjustments in your life. Have fun with your work but don't end up burnt out. Forgive those who have left you and forgive yourself if something didn't work out. It's time to let go. Remember what's meant for you won't pass you by. So take things lightly and hold onto the spark of inspiration that you may get now and then. Keep your heart pure and don't let your love be overcome by any temptations.
For any further clarification or to book your personal reading on this situation feel free to DM me.
Below I am sharing the links to:
Booking Form
My Rate Card
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Trust
part 9 of DLM ao3
After the stew was done and Danny got out of the shower they all sat down to eat. They ate in silence for a while neither one of the bats wanting to push Danny into feeling uncomfortable, but Jason had a question he wanted to ask. He probably should have asked earlier, but he’ll blame it on the shock for not thinking of it sooner.
“Hey, Danny?”
“Yeah?” Danny said, setting his spoon down.
“How did you know it was me?”
Danny tilted his head and squinted, “What do you mean?”
Jason gestured with his spoon, off to the side Dick was watching them, his gaze analytical. “I mean, how did you know the guy in a red helmet was me?”
“Oh.” Danny settled and picked up his spoon again, through a mouthful of soup he answered, “It wuz th’ same ectoplasmic signature.”
Jason stared. He glanced at Dick, but he also looked confused.
Across from them Danny paused and glanced between them warily. He stared at Dick for a moment before turning to Jason. “Like I mentioned before, we’ve both been… death touched. And when someone’s been death touched a bit of ectoplasm gets incorporated into their system, the amount of ectoplasm varies depending on the situation. But when ectoplasm binds with a person it develops its own unique chemical signature. You can think of it like DNA. Ghosts and some machines can sense the differences, so when I came across Red Hood, I could sense that it was you.”
“Huh.” Jason said unable to come up with anything else in the face of discovering that he gave of what probably amounted to his own unique radioactive signal.
“And you said some machines can track this?” Dick asked. Jason was thankful that his brother was here because he wasn’t sure if he was up for asking all the necessary questions.
Danny looked hesitant again and looked at jason.
Jason nodded at him and Danny looked a little reassured.
“Yeah. There are a few. That’s how the GIW are tracking me. I don’t think they were around Jason enough to latch onto his ecto-signature so you shouldn’t need to be worried about them tracking you down. Gotham has plenty of low level ghosts so their scanners should be pretty muddled. But that’s also why I should go. My signature is stronger than the shades of Gotham and They know how to track it. I don’t want to give you any more trouble.”  Daanny wasn't looking at either of them, instead he was completely focused on stirring his stew.
Jason and Dick glanced at each other.
“Hey, Danny, look at me.” Jason said.
It took a bit, but eventually Danny looked up.”
Jason smiled slightly, “I told you I’d protect you, didn’t I?”
Danny looked away, biting his lip. “I don’t want to put you in danger.”
Jason reached across the table and placed his hand over one of Danny’s. “I’m Red Hood, kid, I can defend myself. And there are plenty of bats in Gotham who would love to help.”
“The GIW are different. They don’t care who they have to hurt to get what they want. They’ll just keep bringing in more agents until they get me.”
“Well then we’ll bring in the Justice League.” Jason said, Bruce would be okay with it if Jason told him it was to protect a kid. 
“I don’t want you to get caught in the crossfire. I won’t let you get hurt.” Danny said, shaking his head. 
Jason glanced over at his brother. Dick was always better with the emotional talk.
“We’re vigilantes Danny. We’ve been trained in defending ourselves and others.” Dick said.
“And they wouldn’t be able to take us down without causing people to go after them for attacking vigilantes.” Jason added.
Danny shook his head harder, he was staring at the table, his eyes slightly glossy. “They won’t care, they'll lie and say you were defending dangerous creatures, that you were being manipulated by evil ghosts.” Danny laughed bitterly. “Or they’ll claim you’re also contaminated and capture or exterminate you. They’ll do anything to get what they want.”
There was more to this, Jason knew. Something bad had happened to the kid, apart from the obvious scar, but now wasn’t the time to push for information. Right now, they needed to convince Danny to stay with them, to let them protect him.
Jason got up, walked around the table and crouched by Danny’s chair. “Kid, look at me.” Jason said gently. He waited till Danny did before continuing. “I know you’re scared,” Danny opened his mouth and Jason continued before he could argue, “and I know you’re worried about us getting hurt. But this is what we do. We fight to protect people. And there are a lot of powerful people on our side. And I’m sorry we haven’t been there for you before, I’m sorry we didn’t get to you in time in the past, but we’re here now. Together we can take down the GIW. Let us help you.”
Danny’s eyes started watering, and Jason reached up to give his shoulder a reassuring squeeze.
Then Jason was falling back as the kid launched himself at him. Jason held Danny as he started to sob. “I’ve got you, kid. I’ve got you.”
“Thank you.” Danny whispered as he cried. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
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comicaurora · 9 months
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(sorry for the long ask)
So there's this thing? That's been kind of bothering me, I've noticed it in the shera remake but also other places, where all these faceless minions are just there to show how hard/easy it is for the protagonists to get rid of them.
There's a couple of things, but I think that it just boils down to that they're not treated as characters? The hero will push them into a volcano and celebrate, then get all conflicted when facing the villain captain puppy kicker because "if I kill/hurt you I'll be just as bad" and in the same shot there's a pile of downed henchmen. And I get that, because from a meta perspective it would be hard to animate several hundred or however many individual people all fighting, but it's just weird right? In the show the only people without helmets on 24/7 are the main cast and of course the Rogelio/Kyle/lonnie group. Which is Confusing?? Because it seems like there's only a few options, either every single other person likes wearing the helmets all the time with no breaks, or they're breaking dress code and getting away with it, or "cadets" means they're in training. And somehow way more competent than all the other trained soldiers. It's weird, and I'm not even fully sure how to describe it. Do you have any thoughts?
Faceless minions are a time-honored storytelling tradition that persist despite being slightly reality-breaking story convention because-
They make it very easy to choreograph cool-looking fights against a big pile of interchangeable bad guys
You only need as many extras as you'll be showing together in one shot, meaning you can imply a vast army of evil with only like five costumes/character models
They make it easier to pick out the heroes in group shots and fights
They provide contrast against the important villains with unique designs
Easy protagonist disguises for sneaking around in
This is pretty useful stuff, but it does all feed into the effect that armies of faceless minions are generally not composed of full-fledged characters. They're a pile of broadly interchangeable mooks. This is one of those things that's technically dubious from a realism standpoint, but I honestly don't think it's automatically a bad thing for a story to make it really easy to tell who's an important character and who's an interchangeable obstacle in their way.
This does get shaky when the characters start acting like that. To them, in the reality of their story, those mooks ARE real, dangerous people, and their facelessness doesn't detract from that. The protagonist's morality shouldn't depend on how important a character is to the plot or how unique their design is, and that character inconsistency is the more disruptive bit of writing. Mowing down minions by the truckload only to spare the big bad makes it feel like the main character is standing apart from their own story and making the kind of value judgment the audience is, and that's weird. It's not weird that the faceless minions exist, it's weird that the protagonist evidently doesn't see them as real people.
But that doesn't mean every stormtrooper or background orc or ninja needs their own unique design, name and backstory. Narrative conventions exist for a reason, and while I do love a setting that feels like it's absolutely full of unique main characters all living their own lives, it's absolutely not mandatory. Sometimes things in stories are made unrealistic so they don't undercut the impact of the story itself, whether that's simple theater sets that don't draw the eye away from the actors, unrealistic lighting so a movie viewer can actually see what's going on, song and dance numbers, flashy showstopping villains, or convenient armies of ninjas to take down with one punch each. Storytelling has its own tools.
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