#more a summary than a story

[laurellerual]

Arya and Sansa storyswap: an exercise in imagination

Premise: I tried to speculate what might happen if Sansa manages to escape King's Landing and Arya gets stuck in the capital. I collected my thoughts on this scenario trying to make logical, credible choices that respected the characterization of the characters and the timeline of the books (the wiki was very usefull for this). I discarded all the scenarios that end in "…and then she dies horribly" because they're boring. I write with assumption that they would still remain POV characters and therefore mantain a minimum of plot armor. Like everyone, I have my biases so it's not perfect, but I tried to put myself in the most neutral mindset possible. Enjoy and let me know your thoughts. Part 2, Part 3

Part 1/3: Sansa

A Game of Thrones 

I believe Sansa's story would remain mostly the same until the end of Sansa III (AGOT). The only thing I feel like adding is an exchange with Arya. During breakfast Sansa notices Arya's bruises and her sister tells her about the secret passage with dragon skulls that she found, and how she got out of the Red Keep. Sansa clearly doesn't believe her and she thinks it's just Arya being weird.

At the end of Sansa III they receive the news that they will be leaving King's Landing soon, and she runs away crying and barricades herself in her room. In Sansa IV she is locked in Maegor's Holdfast and we find out that she went to Cersei to tell her about Ned's plan to leave. There's a narrative hole between these two chapters that can be exploited to make little changes. What happened that night after Sansa locked herself in her room? It has to be something that makes her change her mind about going to the queen or at least something that stops her from doing so. Personally I choose septa Mordane, you could expand her character and make her a little more similar to how she is in the show where she is shown genuinely loyal to House Stark.

The septa is present when Sansa escapes to her room so it's not unrealistic that she would decide to follow her. Sansa has been behaving "almost as wicked as Arya" lately so Mordane decides to follow her to lecture her or console her. Maybe she reaches her before she can barricade the door and make her see reason. Or perhaps seeing the girl so out of it she goes to Lord Eddard to talk, and she persuades him to talk again to his daughter and help her to calm down. Here you could write a scene parallel to the one in which Ned talks to Arya about Needle.

Sansa is not happy with her father's plans, and she begs him to go to the queen, to discuss this further and find another solution, to make her stay. To reassure her, Ned tells her that he already intends to go to Cersei (as he will do in Eddard XII), but he does not reveal the real reason why he wants to talk to her.

However he fears that the girl might take the initiative and do it herself. To be safe he assigns her a guard and ask him and the septa to prevent his daughter from interacting with Cersei before the departure. (I would like the guard to be Alyn but at this point he has already left for the Riverlands).

Cersei has less informations and when the moment of Ned's arrest arrives, Sansa is with her protectors that have already been warned to keep the Lannisters away from her. When the Lannister men arrive for her, the Stark guard slows them down and septa Mordane drags her away. First the two try to look for Ned, but they soon realize that the Tower of the Hand is under attack. The septa drags Sansa into the servants' quarters (into the kitchens? in the pantry?) idk.

The Septa shoves her in a dark niche, under a cupboard, throws a tablecloth over her and tells her to stay hidden. Mordane tries to think of a plan, but the Lannister men burst in. They recognize her as one of the Stark servants but when she does not provide useful information on the Stark girls they kill her. Sansa remains there all night, lying in the dust. She tries not to make any noise, she is terrified, and from her hiding place she can see the septa's corpse lying on the ground.

The first light of dawn comes in through a little window. Sansa tries to gather courage, she has to leave before the servants start working. The idea disgusts her, but she sees only one way to go unnoticed: she undresses Mordane, covers the silk dress with the septa's habit and hides the face with her veil. Then she wraps the woman in the tablecloth, as if it were a shroud and hides her in that same niche. She tries not to attract attention and find a way out. Sansa doesn't fully understand what happened, she would like to go to the queen or her father, but she is too afraid of the Lannister men after seeing them kill Mordane.

She hasn't eaten in a whole day so before leaving the kitchens she steals some food, like she did with Jeyne. The thought saddens her, who knows where her friend is? She hasn't seen her since she had breakfast with her and Arya. 'Arya...' Sansa remembers the secret passage her sister told her about and decides to try to reach it. With a little luck she makes it, no one pays attention to an anonymous septa. Thanks to the tunnel she manages to reach Flea Bottom.

Here she lives for a few days, trying to listen conversations to find out something about her father. Obv Sansa doesn't try to kill pigeons, she has to stoop to pilfering some food, and even eat trash. She mostly frequents the surroundings of the The Great Sept of Baelor and prays. She sings religious hymns and people take her for a begging septa and throw her some crumbs. One day the sept square fills with people, they are here for the execution of the traitor Eddard Stark. Sansa tries to climb up to not be crushed by the crowd. She sees her beloved Joffrey give the order! She screams, but her voice is drowned out by the noise.

The show is over, the people disperse again. She looks around desperately searching for something, she hopes for a friendly face. it is then that she recognizes a man dressed in black: it's Yoren. Sansa had seen him a few days earlier in the throne room, while he was asking father for men to recruit in the Night's Watch (in Sansa III). He's going away, but Sansa follows him. Now it's clear to her that King's Landing is no longer a safe place and this may be her only chance to return in the North, to home, to safety.

Yoren realizes he's being followed and try to scare her away. Sansa lifts her veil to show herself, she reveals her identity, She begs him to take her out of the city with him, she try to appeal to the ancient friendship between the Starks and the Night's Watch. Yoren looks at her face and recognizes a certain resemblance to Catelyn Stark. He chooses to believe her, so he cuts her hair, dresses her up as a boy and throws her in with the other recruits.

A Clash of Kings

I find it very funny that Sansa's boy name could be Sandor. Anyway, she tries to act nice and compliant to not put herself at risk, but mostly gets people to walk all over her. The younger recruits bully her because she “looks like a female (derogatory)” and she's an easy target. On the other hand, she doesn't have a sword to steal so Hot Pie and Lommy don't try to rob her, they just think she's a loser. Sansa keeps to herself, she doesn't go near Jaqen's cage, she doesn't catch a rabbit to share with Gendry, she doesn't manage to establish a particular relationship with anyone in the group. The commonfolk sucks, Yoren is kind I guess but he stinks. It will take a long time before she can start thinking about social injustice, for now she's just shocked by their miserable living conditions.

The Golden cloaks come looking for Gendry, but Sansa stays hidden because she thinks they are looking for her. Why would the queen want that rude guy? For a moment she thinks that he vaguely resemble Lord Renly… but no, that's nonsense. And even if it was, he's still a bastard. Yoren tells them that if the golden cloaks return they must escape.

One night the group go to sleep, but soon they are attacked by Amory Lorch. Sansa doesn't want to fight, she tries to hide, but in the chaos she ends up showing a soldier down from the tower, killing a man for the first time. She does everything she can to reach the trapdoor and escape. There's no way she'll go back to free Jaqen, but she decides to grab Weasel in the escape.

The small group of survivors, led by Gendry, arrive near an abandoned village. The Bull decides to explore it and takes Hot Pie with him. Sansa doesn't know it, but Gendry wants to abandon her and the others because he thinks they are just slowing them down. He has decided to propose the escape to Hot Pie because he is the second "less useless" choice after Arya. As per canon, Gendry and Hot Pie are captured by the Mountain's men (and probably die in Harrenhal).

Now here is an important change. Arya was captured and taken to Harrenhal because she returned to the village and try to save Gendry, but I don't think Sansa would do the same so she would not be captured at this point in the story. When Sansa and Weasel hear the sound of men in armor approaching, they run away to hide and leaves Lommy there to his fate.

The two girls now find themselves in the forest alone and without supplies in a land of burned villages, they're severely malnourished. Sansa would definitely think about trying to reach Riverrun, but she has no way of orienting herself. If we want to give her any hope of survival I'd say the only solution is for the two of them to be lucky enough to walk in the right direction. In this way the two get closer to the territory frequented by the Brotherhood without Banners and with a bit of luck the outlaws finds them before they die of starvation.

A Storm of Swords

The Brotherhood takes the orphans with them and feeds them. Weasel is probably left at the first inn/orphanage (where she will live a long and happy life), while Sansa meets Harwin, she is recognized and taken hostage. She learns that Winterfell has been conquered by Theon and that Bran and Rickon are dead.

She stark using women's clothes again because she prefers them. And also because every day she manages to hide the fact that she is a girl less and less. She has no intention of cutting her hair a second time, and now that she started eating regularly again she got her first period too. Coarse as they are, it is a relief to be surrounded by people who recognize her as a noble lady. Lady Ravella is a breath of fresh air and Tom is an acceptable singer. She enjoys Edric Dayne's company and thinks he's cute, but she doesn't understand why he wants to talk about Jon Snow.

Sansa is taken to Lord Beric who promises to reunite her with her mother. The sight of the undead man repulses her, but his behavior is chivalrous enough. She certainly doesn't try to escape, she just hopes that he respects his oath.

One day a prisoner with a familiar and unmistakable face is brought to the Hollow Hill: it's the Hound.

#sansa stark #arya stark #asoiaf #asoiaf fanfiction #<sort of #more a summary than a story

[dantoru]

hello i posted a new fic 😊

🎈🌟 1/4 chapters (to be updated daily)

#I DIDNT INCLUDE THE FUCKING LINK AT FIRST. BYE #i like the first 2 chapters more than i like the 3rd and 4th so SHRUG what evar #also idk how to write a good summary. So nonsense bungaku it is. #I do like this one #it’s my first attempt at a multi chapter in a very Very long time #so enjoy :) #project sekai #wonderlands x showtime #tsukasa tenma #rui kamishiro #ruikasa #my fic #it was supposed to be rui flower language but i don’t rly mention flowers. like at all in the story #so. The chapters are named after flowers but that’s about it

[not-poignant]

Are Sebastian and Alex going to learn about bdsm and safe practices/negotiation? Or do they keep fumbling around and doing what they're doing?

Hi anon,

People who learn about BDSM don't necessarily practice safe practices or negotiation.

And there are elements of negotiation in this story! It's not a black and white 'they're not doing this in a paint-by-numbers sort of way and therefore it doesn't count' situation, y'know?

They are two characters in their mid-20s who live in a tiny town, one of those characters is dyslexic to the point that he can barely read, and the other's method of doing things has worked for him all his life (or so he thinks), they don't have any reason/s to learn about BDSM, and it's not likely that either of them ever will.

That also doesn't mean that they can't enjoy their kinky sex life.

There has been a lot of discussion already, and there will be more and more going forwards. It might not be at the level most people want, but Sebastian has certainly obtained consent (more than once), offered and then insisted on debriefs and post-sex discussion, explained to Alex how to communicate if he hates something, and made it clear that what he likes is unusual and sadistic in nature. It's also clear that Alex likes being pushed, i.e. - not being forced to give consent in every circumstance when someone can take control and give him what he wants anyway. That's actually pretty common in some people with a child abuse background who become people pleasers.

If you want negotiation + safe practices at a certain level, you'd have to completely remake Alex's character into someone who can magically be a functional, communicative, healthy human being, and he's not that. Alex is getting better at communicating (that's how we go this far in the story in the first place), but if you expect this story to end on Alex being a perfect human who can do Instagram-level kink negotiation, then no, this isn't the story you want, anon.

If you look deeper and don't expect cookie cutter kinds of dialogue, there has been ongoing negotiation in the story since the early chapters. When Alex makes it clear through physical response and then verbal that he doesn't like yelling, Sebastian stops yelling. When Sebastian makes it clear that he has complicated feelings about hiring his ex-school bully as a cleaner, Alex makes it clear that he doesn't share those complicated feelings, especially in light of the pay rate. Sebastian consenting to Alex being his cleaner makes it clear that those terms are acceptable to him.

When Alex tries to undervalue himself, Sebastian makes it clear that he's not comfortable paying someone less simply because they value themselves less. When Alex then takes that pay, it's a form of consent to Sebastian's attitudes. Their relationship has been an ongoing negotiation since the beginning, and that's how they've grown closer. If you're used to only looking for very obvious signs of negotiation, it might be easy to miss the non-verbal and subtle forms of negotiation that are happening.

For example, it might not seem like it, but Sebastian - many chapters ago now - talking about how he likes control in the bedroom and that turning Alex on long before they'd ever shared anything sexual together, is a form of communication. Alex learns he likes the idea of it without it ever been forced on him, and Sebastian wouldn't have that conversation with someone he didn't trust (for example, Alex in the beginning of the story). They had to have trust to have that conversation, Alex had to have trust to ask Sebastian questions about it in the oblique way he did, and they had to share a common comfortability have a conversation in that direction in the first place.

In A Stain that Won't Dissolve, these things don't look like a psychologist's version of: 'Okay, what do you want, and this is what I want, and here's where we meet in the middle' - a lot of life doesn't look like this (but if you want that, I've written that in Falling Falling Stars - it still has dubious consent though, lol). Both Alex and Sebastian have poor communication on their side, and it's a growth story for the two of them.

But no, I have no intention of Sebastian ever learning terms like 'subspace' or 'RACK' or anything like that. A lot of people in the world, especially prior to easy access to the internet, figured this stuff out on their own and many of them made it work even without the rigid or codified structures of the world of BDSM (and some of those people went on to invent the world of BDSM that we take for granted today).

It's the kinks that make you kinky, not the knowledge of an acronym or the world it engenders.

There's also no reason to think that Sebastian has access to a healthy education about BDSM there, it's not like Elliott was practicing much healthy BDSM in my other Stardew fic, The Wind that Cuts the Night, :D Elliott knew all about safe practices, negotiation, and BDSM, and chose to ignore a lot of the safe stuff over messing around more dangerously.

The fumbling around is the point, basically. Growing up is messy, and dubious consent is hot (for some of us), and there are many ways we communicate with the people around us, especially when it's two guys in a town the valourises machismo and stoicism over emotional openness, and one of those guys was beaten by his father over not being macho and strong enough which makes him exceptionally resistant to communicating clearly even about basic subjects and needs.

That's the part I actually really love about this story.

#asks and answers #a stain that won't dissolve #thespectaclesofthor #it's hard to read intent in your comment anon because it's really just #two questions chained together with nothing else at all #but it feels very purity-wank coded #the tags of the story don't give *any* indication #that they're going to do anything more than keep growing the relationship towards a happy ending #but with tags like dubious consent and miscommunication #it's going to be my version of a happy ending #and not necessarily yours anon #but also if you don't see the negotiation and communication already happening #this might not be your kind of story #as i said above #the fumbling around is the point #the messiness is the point #it's in the summary and everything #it's a story about two boys messily growing up #not two boys fulfilling some psychologist's brief about communicating perfectly

[pjsk-story-summaries]

Please let me know if there's anything I can do to improve my summaries!

#main stories are. long. so those might have to be blocks of text unless someone is more creative than me #but accessibility is something i'm really passionate about for this so anything counts!! #not a summary

[paperconsumption]

its a bit hilarious how little of a fuck my novel class professor gives about sci-fi/fantasy

#like we did summaries today and she was wayy more enthused discussing other people's stuff #my summary was shorter than like everyone elses just bc the assignment was a paragraph and i wrote a paragraph. and its pretty broad stroke #bc i have a lot of complicated worldbuilding planned that i cant really describe in a single paragraph/page so i just left it out #and she asked the bare minimum of questions so i barely said anything else and my turn was the quickest out of everyones #someone else had a sci-fi story and that was discussed much longer. but only by virtue of having a long summary actually detailing the plot #she was. visibly happier to talk about any other genre

[slowips]

faithfully yours or haunting sounds interesting 👀 - Mimikyu

@andromeda-nova-writing

faithfully yours is an office!AU where reader notices that kaeya brought lunch and the cuisine is... unique. turns out they grew up in the same town, and as they start to grow closer, they learn more and more on how their lives intertwined... (sort of).

the term faithfully yours was adapted from the prompt that stared the story.

haunting is a canon compliant piece that takes place after the inazuma's war. kazuha goes to sumeru to meet with an old friend who he somehow got connected to, and as reader walks him around town, it becomes increasing clear that to reader, kazuha never left.

this story was inspired by how i misread one prompt, and then it took a life of its own, haha.

#with love. #mimikyu #/ #my biggest fear is that these summaries make the stories seem more cooler than they actually are #these 2 stories are very old btw... like... i started haunting in dec 2022 #i just couldn't seem to find the right flow or the right ending so i never finished it #same for faithfully yours tbh. i wrote the first half and re-reading it (or at least when i did a few months ago) it was orite #but i faced the same situation in which i wasn't sure how to continue or develop it further #thank you for asking btw!!! maybe after this ask i'll look into these wips again #i do want to finish haunting i love that idea so much it makes me sick sometimes hahaha #attempted to rewrite it or at least worked on it a few times but my brain literally couldnt focus #and it doesnt help that life has gotten pretty busy (i'm just procrastinating...) #q: with thoma.

[thedrotter]

sweet sweet re:kinder community... I would like to ask y'all how you came upon the game and your experiences with it because i wanna know. im genuinely so curious to hear about other people's experiences and little opinions about this game because of how wild the game is (/pos) I'd love to hear it. do ramble to me about it

#re:kinder #not art #so in my case i once saw someone talk about it in a video and some scenes with the very vague context really struck with me #i was like wow...that is so sad... i wonder what goes on #but the thing is i watch videos talking about games like that ALLL THE TIME while im multi-tasking so i FORGOT FOR A YEAR?!?!? #until one day i was sick in pain on my bed could not move. and then it came to me. yes. “RE:KINDER. I SHOULD PLAY IT.” LIKE OUT OF NOWHERE #i will never understand how i dying of pain remembered a game i saw once BY NAME AT LEAST A YEAR LATER when jve heard of so many games #and you wanna know why it stuck with me. i saw in the video an image of the “as if id be reborn as a princess” line #i did not know the context but it was devastating #AND WHEN I PLAYED THE GAME when that scene game i was shocked to silence😭😭 BECAUSE I BASICALLY WENT COMPLETELY BLIND?? #I DID NOT KNOW THE LITTLE KID WOULD BE THE ANTAGONIST???? AND THAT HE WOULD HAVE SUCH A SAD STORY?? #like. i saw the sad coming i knew it was bound to happen yet i could have never been prepared for how hard it would hit me #I HAD TONS OF FUN but at first when i finished it i was so confused and so lost i was like welll.....what a game... TOO STUNNED FOR WORDS #then i thoughr of it for 20 minutes and bawled my eyes out and realized it was art #so when i got to my second playthrough i CRIED LIKE CRAZYYY😭😭 I WAS BLOWN AWAY IT REALLY HITS YOU #personally it admittedly hit close to home and while it made me bawl my eyes out it was also very comforting i felt very understood #AND IT WAS CRAZY FUN TOO i was not bored once the first time i played through it i was sleepy but i was so excited to keep playing😭😭 #its funnt becayse i was initially apprehensive about playing cuz im sensitive to stories where sad things happen to kids #but i played it regardless because i was like “but what if its one of those scary media that hit close to home and i enjoy” #AND I WAS RIGHT. BUT NOT ENTIRELY BECAUSE I DID NOT THINK IT WOULD HIT AS INTENSELY AS IT DID😭😭 IT WAS MYCH MORE THAN EXPEVTED #many ways in which it impacted me but if i started listing them i would not shut up . so for now it is enough #IN SUMMARY WOW.. WHAY A GOOD GAME!! PLAY RE:KINDER!!! #i rambled more than i intended to i do apologize

[whisperprime]

Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8

Hob isn’t certain what Dream has cooked up in that pretty little head of his when it comes to theories about what happened, but he can tell this response wasn’t even on his list.

“2189?”

He sounds carefully reserved. The fact that he doesn't outright disbelieve such a thing might be possible leaves the once mortal human with some serious questions.

But those are for a later time.

Right now, Hob nods. He had long since decided that if questioned about this, he would tell as much of the truth as he felt he could. He would explain the meeting with The Other Man, the seal, maybe even where and how he’d spent those 106 years.

He would not share that Dream had been the being who'd been originally summoned. Nor would he mention Dream’s death. There was no point in either. One hadn’t happened in this timeline. One hadn’t happened yet and dwelling on it would do no good. So.

Hob presses his hands into his thighs to still them. “I was sitting in The New Inn when a stranger approached me.” He smiles, some true amusement leaking in. “Seems to be the story of my life.”

Dream has narrowed his eyes at him, searching his face for any tells that this is all a fabrication. He won’t find one because Hob is all too serious. “In the year 2189?” When he finds no lie, that at the least the story teller believes this all to be true, Dream leans forward. “Are you proposing you've time traveled?”

The immortal human wishes he were more into science fiction, because this was already a bit over his head and trying to explain this to someone else feels like a task. He can still barely believe it all. And he lived it. “Sort of? He called it ‘destroying a timeline’?”

“He?”

Hob spreads his hands out, a bit helpless here. "Did I mention that story is filled with mysterious strangers who often fail to mention their names?"

His friend ignores the slight, raising his hand, but it seems more to stop himself from continuing this particular thread of inquiry. "I interrupted. Please begin again from this 'New Inn'."

Hearing the name of what had become such a dear place to them both said without shread warmth or recognition hurt like swallowing shards of glass. One felt like it had lodged in place in his chest and Hob has to resist the urge to rub at it.

"I initially told him I wanted to be alone, but then he knew my name - my real name," Hob still remembers the chill of hearing his name on the lips of someone other than his friend, especially at a time no one was supposed to know it. "He said it was important, so I gave him a chance. Better to know if I was going to have trouble and needed to leave, you know?"

Dream give a curt nod, showing he understands.

Hob swallows and wishes he'd remembered to bring a drink with him. "Then he started talking about how he shouldn't have existed, but did? And it was because of the premature end of the universe or something?" He pauses, then scoffs. His eyes drops to the table as he tries to remember as much of the encounter as he could. Wishes he'd understood what was said more. "I thought he was nuts, honestly, especially when he started talking about time travel, but. Well." He shrugs, again. "He had a compelling arguement."

Dream considers this. Hob is a little surprised he is even entertaining all of this. "What did he want you to change?"

Hob considers his options. "Have you heard of a Gabriel Richards?"

His friend gets a bit of a far away look to him and Hob wonders how well the whole knowing everyone thing actually works. It takes a moment or two, but Dream comes back with, "He is known for discovering gialium. His daughter discovered how to use it as a cleaner, more safe energy source to any previous resource."

"Huh." Hob has never heard of 'gialium' before, but a safer energy resource is always good. He isn't certain how this element not being discovered could possibly lead to the end of the universe, but then The Other Man had said it was a chain reaction sort of thing. He gestured to Dream to indicate that this was the answer and added, "He said Richards was supposed to do something but didn't. Now he has."

Dream raises an eyebrow, but doesn't look satisfied with this at all.

"Look, I don't know how to prove it any of this-" He breaks off, because he does know how to prove it. He's just unsure how this version of his friend will respond to such a Knowing if simply calling him lonely had been enough to send him running. When he hadn't had every bit of solitude he could ask for until it choked him before he came back.

"I've seen Death," Hob says, quotes. Can see Dream recognizing the reference and waiting to see where he's taking this.

Sees when he decides to bite. "Oh?"

Hob stares off just to the right of him, the memory still bright in his mind in the way a beloved photo that has been looked at time and again is remembered. He can still hear the laughter of his friends, even if he can't remember their faces. Still remembers this beautiful stranger, dressed all in black save his insanely large ruby, approaching their table. Remembers him glancing at someone, although by the time Hob had thought to look, they'd been gone.

"She was there with you the day we met." Hob catches the slight flicker of surprise out of the corner of his eye. Knows he's caught him this time. "It was her doing that granted me this long life. Her and your bet over if I would give up on this life if I had enough to drown in it." His eyes flicker back to meet Dream's eyes. Says, albeit not unkindly, "She was the one who bet I wouldn't."

Dream takes the hit. Accepts it and nods in acquiescence. He had indeed lost that bet. Several times over. Had only asked at the time of their parting those last few times because it had become part of their ritual.

Hob takes the victory and let's go of it along any pride he may have gained in it. "I met her a couple more times in that other timeline." He's unsure, but he thinks he might see some like alarm flash in those blue eyes, but it's gone before he can be sure. "Once at one of those horrid Ren Fests and again while she was mortal?" Hob pauses, wonders, "Is that something you all do? She made it sound like it was just a thing she does."

Dream leans back on the couch. He clearly finds that subject to be one he has difficulty with, going by how he sounds like he is choosing his words carefully. "Every one hundred years, for one day, she allows a part of her to become mortal and then meets it like any other mortal being. To better understand them when she comes to meet them."

That clocks with what she'd said. Figures she couldn't have just explained it like that. Or maybe she had and Hob and been a little too wigged out by spending time with a mortal Death of the Endless (or a part of her) to catch it. Either way.

Hob shifts, braces himself as if he were about to walk into a storm. "I know you're her little brother."

His friend-who-isn't-his-friend stares back at him out of eyes that were no longer blue, but rather as dark as the night sky, light only by galaxies no human has ever seen. "You would claim to known me, Hob Gadling?" Hob hears the words, you dare, from that night in 1889 as they lay between them, unspoken, but a heavy weight regardless. Did Hob dare to claim he knew any creature such as this one?

Yes. Hob dared. He'd dared that night and every day he'd held to his hope with near blind faith where perhaps he should not have.

"Aye, I know you." Hob meets that gaze, holds it, and names him, "Dream of the Endless."

Dream shudders, lightly, at the sound of his true name. All doubt has vanished from his expression, but what has it cost Hob to play this card?

Part 9

#the sandman #hob gadling #dream of the endless #my fic #title: carry you back into the light #decided to break it off here #the next part might be short as a result #so much for this being nothing more than a summary #thought of death taking up the once a century meetings with hob #then she decided it would be in totally random #and left field ways #that and her spending one of her mortal days #with a very confused hob amused me #so in it went #maybe i'll write that story one day #dreamling #can't believe i forgot that tag

[wereshrew-admirer]

......Regency Era AU 

Duvall came to Eastern Folly as a student, but though he comes from a good family the high society of Sangfielle paralleled the common folk in their disdain for the old dominion. struggling to keep his place among the nobles, he regularly took long walks in the countryside to avoid doing anything rash in response to the taunting of his peers. 

On one such walk in the spring he met a young farmer wandering far from home and restless despite the season’s usually bone-wearying work of plowing and planting. they’d been forbidden from working the fields until the crops emerged, having been caught the year prior attempting to plant unearthly seeds in the soil. 

The farmer had never met a nobleman and their suspicion of Duvall was no different from their hesitancy to trust any of his class. Duvall, well accustomed to hostility by now, found this a refreshing change from the sneering of his supposed peers. 

The farmer, for their part, was pleasantly surprised first when instead of taking offense Duvall shared in their complaints of the local ruling class, and second when he reacted with genuine (and even enthusiastic) interest when they mentioned their theories on unorthodox methods for increasing crop yield. 

The two formed a habit, unintentional at first, of meeting along the shore of the large lake to the west of town, laughing together until the suns hung low on the horizon. they became close that summer, but when the weather cooled and harvesting began the farmer was called back to work, their size and strength appreciated by their family even when their mind was not. 

Duvall continued his afternoon walks until the frosts fell over the land and chilled his feet, but his friend did not return. All winter he sat at his bedroom window looking out at the low hills surrounding Eastern Folly, dreaming of the day he might hear the farmer’s laughter and forget, if only briefly, the strict world in which he lived his daily life. 

He got his wish the following spring, before even the first of the year’s new leaves unfurled -he found his farmer working among a construction crew near the marketplace Duvall frequented. At first he was overjoyed, but when the farmer caught his eye and called to him from the scaffolding of a new building, Duvall realized at once that they were not alone, and that any number of his enemies might witness his association with this commoner and use it to their advantage. 

Still, his desire to speak to his friend was strong, and he managed to pass word to the farmer of a time and place for them to meet in private. 

The farmer, blind to Duvall’s concerns and new to both urban life in general and the vulgar stories passed among their new coworkers, misinterpreted this request and arrived at the proposed meeting place with expectations well beyond those Duvall had intended. 

Surprised but far from offended, Duvall found himself drawn into the farmer’s arms and an affair of the sort he’d thought only possible in the most frivolous of fictions. But unlike his clothes, the farmer was unable to strip from him the true reasons for his discretion. 

Duvall was a scholar. To access his studies he must remain in the good graces of his family, and to do so meant that though he was allowed to fly far from the nest, he was to remain a respected member of high society wherever he landed. And the farmer was far below his station in both class and temperament. To be seen together would ruin him. 

And so when they met, they did so in secret, and only with great caution on Duvall’s part.

This would prove disastrous for any love that may have grown between them when Duvall received a scholarship that took him far from Eastern Folly on such short notice that he was unable to find the time away from watchful eyes to inform the farmer of his departure. 

Though he tried to write, his letters were returned to him undelivered. In desperation he wrote to the farmer’s parents under the guise of a business owner seeking work owed, and to his horror, this was the only letter that received a response: his lover had been conscripted and was soon thereafter killed in battle. 

Years later, Duvall returned to Eastern Folly in time to see its change into Blackwick county, and established himself there as a humble professor. Finally tolerated by the local gentry, if only, he suspected, as a source of entertainment. Still, this afforded him the freedoms he had originally sought in his flight from Aldomina - to study as he saw fit, and to research first hand those subjects that caught his interest. 

And he was not altogether as lonely as he seemed - he made what he thought were genuine friends in a rival scholar whose humor was all that saved him from constant scandal, and in a lady who shared Duvall’s foreign tongue and whom would have faced similar trials if not for her cool demeanor that allowed insults to roll off of her like beads of water off a duck’s back (unlike Duvall, who continued to struggle to control himself when sufficiently frustrated well beyond the years of when such things are expected of young men). Others, too, were kind enough to him that he felt at ease in Blackwick, if not at home. 

Parties, unfortunately, were still an uncomfortable necessity to remain in good favor with the patrons he had managed to acquire on his own, and to satisfy his now-distant family who continued to send him financial support from time to time with the hope that he might someday marry and expand the reach of their line into the heartland. 

And so every few weeks he’d spend an evening suffering the ignorant questions of those attempting to stave off their own boredom. He was painfully aware that most attending these social events had no genuine interest in his research, and so when the gaggle of dull-witted gentry abandoned him for some new amusement, Duvall felt nothing but gratitude to the unfortunate newcomer whose mysterious origin drew their attention.

It was a general, he found out later, having “returned” to Blackwick after a successful campaign in the bloodfields absolutely dripping in awards and medals and tales of gloriously violent exploits. Duvall’s gratitude for the distraction they posed did not extend to his curiosity, as not much turned his stomach quicker than did the glorification of military men who stood on the backs of soldiers who had no choice but to die fighting under their heel - a sensitivity that he did his best to hide, lest someone inquire as to how he picked it up.  

It was this that kept Duvall far from the circles that grew around the general, though the rumors were impossible to escape: Chine should died when a bullet tore through his face and took one of his eyes, but he had fought on to lead his men to victory as if unaffected by pain or blood loss. The list of battles they’d won was long, and they had become well known for their ferocity and willingness to face death alongside his soldiers. It was said that the very sight of their snarling face sometimes inspired their foes to surrender - The tales of their exploits nearly bore Duvall to tears. 

The only interesting line of gossip was the officer’s mysterious background. They were said to have come from Eastern Folly, but no local house claimed them. They spoke with the local accent, though, and bore features similar to those whose lines ran deep as the mines in these mountains. 

More curious yet, he would not identify the benefactor that sponsored their commission. Claiming again that they had ties to the land of Blackwick itself. What might have been a controversy that ruined a lesser man, Chine thrived on it. Equally fearsome on the ballroom floor, it was said, as they were in battle. 

This set Duvall off laughing whenever he heard it and so his friend and rival Lye Lychen took to announcing dance partners as though they had stepped into a boxing ring with the general, assigning points to potential suitors as they struggled to catch Chine’s attention through the normal means of flattery and sex appeal and over-practiced wit. 

While this often successfully got his shoulders shaking, Duvall managed to not so much as glance in the general’s direction. Lye’s obvious exaggeration of the situation became something of a game between the two of them and the Lady Es. She acted as a referee, confirming the truth or lie of Mr. Lychen’s claims whenever Duvall called it, saving him from actually looking himself - which added to the challenge for Lye, who was determined to craft a story just extravagant enough to draw Duvall’s curiosity without being flagged as false. Lady Es, in all fairness, never contradicted Lye until Duvall asked for her word. 

But Blackwick was not populous enough for such a game to continue forever. It was inevitable that eventually Duvall would look upon the general by accident, on or off of the dance floor. It happened late one evening after Duvall had drunk just enough to doubt himself - across the room a large group of people shifted, opening just enough to reveal at their center the figure that Duvall had thus far avoided. 

And fate would have it that the general, in that moment, also glanced in his direction. Duvall was frozen in place, staring with eyes so wide that he was sure to draw attention by his expression alone -  there across the hall stood his farmer, rendered nearly unrecognizable by the scars that cut bright lines through their freckles and dug deep pits into their face, but alive. He half-stumbled forward only to realize that a sea of party goers still blocked the path between them, and then recognition seemed to spark in the general’s eye and instead of reflecting the intensity of joy that Duvall felt for the briefest, sweetest moment, their expression shifted into a cold glare that seemed to take the floor out from below Duvall’s feet. 

Lyke was near enough to catch him, exclaiming, “woa now, you alright buddy? You look like you’ve seen a ghost”

Duvall grasped his friend’s arm for dear life, staring at the space where his farmer had been a moment before, replaced now by the ever-shifting crowd, and grateful for it, too - for a moment more of that hateful glare would surely have sent him to his own grave. He shook his head as if to clear it, blinking up at Lye and forcing a grin that he knew wouldn’t fool the man for a second, “you know - i - i might have”

#chine/duvall #regency era au ???? #my writing #??? #did not mean to write more than a summary but here we are #long post under the cut #sorry for my ignorance i am but a STEM person who encountered the smallest bit of a genre and was swept away #i'd like to write this in less of a fake flowery tone someday but i've got so so many fic wips #why is it so easy to hoard story fragments?? #images i feel compelled to finish but stories i'll just write and write and write and put back on my shelf for later #(this isn't good writing but it is an idea i'm having a fun time ruminating on for some reason)

[always-a-joyful-note]

Well, it looks like I've caved and started with the Korean TLs of the i7 story from 6.10. It's (pretty) slow progress, but I'm managing more or less okay. The question I have to the fandom is....while I'm not confident enough in Korean (like at all) to give direct TLs from that, nor do I want to since the translator has password protected their TLs (and I don't feel comfortable doing translations from a translation, anyway), I wouldn't mind giving summaries of each section after I finish it if people want it

#fandom spamdom #idolish7 #i7 #<-putting it in that tag too because its a genuine no pressure offer #i also understand if people would rather wait for the full story too because i know i sure would #of course another option is that you all can just feel free to dm me for the link to the TLs (its available publically)... #...and also their (also publically available) instructions on how to unlock the chapters #at least for those who know kr better than me #id say im lucky that i didnt have to do this for orv but orv was also kind of the reason why im going for korean anyway #that also reminds me that i should read up on the portuguese translation for butai ni sake and maybe offer a summary for that too.... #....so many languages so little time #also while i do have more stable free time now ill still be slow so.... #note's notes

[morninkim]

Rise of the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers - Evil Empire Aliens

After 10,000 years... It’s free.

(Story-relevant info and context under the cut)

Dr. Finster has been hearing whispers in his head for the past 50 years, roughly since he acquired this strange artifact found on the Moon. It started sparingly at first, once or twice a year at most, however in the past few months - since the appearance of Goldar and the Power Rangers - they’ve become more frequent. Louder. It says it can help Promethea defeat these invaders, help the Power Rangers, help the Earth.

It just needs energy.

An alert comes in on the base’ security systems, Goldar has appeared just outside the perimeter. The voice beckons Finster to go.

“The Power Rangers will come. I just need the energy from their transformation. Take me to them.”

Finster resists at first, but is compelled, sneaking himself and the artifact out in the panic as Goldar makes his approach to Promethea base. Of course, he’s intercepted by the Power Rangers, their teleportation scrambling Promethea’s video relays. No one in the base sees what happens next. But they feel it.

The Rangers - too occupied with their battle to notice Dr. Finster hiding nearby in the desert brush with the artifact - call their Dinosaur powers and transform, releasing a pulse of multicolored energy.

And the artifact opens.

Everything is swallowed in darkness in an instant as a shape begins to form between the two factions. Piercing red eyes. Gold markings. And sharp claws.

The shadow wastes no time in attacking the Rangers, taunting them. It calls them “incomplete”, “weak” and “lacking”. Questions where their sixth is.

Beaten down and near defeat, the Rangers make a stand. They refuse to give up, combining their attacks to deal a solid strike to the shadow.

It shudders from the damage, weakened.

And retreats.

Goldar withdraws as well. There is no honor in taking another’s kill. He must go find where the shadow went, and leaves the Rangers to lick their wounds.

Following their defeat, Alpha V alerts the Rangers to something new he’s detected. Something that may lend them the help they desperately need.

Or rather, someone...

Meanwhile, the shadow streaks across the desert to the city, finding a lone girl in a green hoodie in an alleyway. It senses... Insecurities. Loneliness. Strife. Exactly what it can take advantage of. It draws itself over the girl, taking root in her mind and controlling her body.

Later, in the body of the girl (or Tommy Oliver, as it had found in her head) and having created its own garments with its magic, the shadow finds Finster at his small apartment downtown. It thanks him for freeing it. But she requires more from him.

“What was it you called my urn? Rita Repulsa? Yes... yes, I like that name.”

#rotmmpr #mmpr #mighty morphin power rangers #power rangers #rita repulsa #tommy oliver #putting the story stuff under the read more so its not intrusive on anyone's dash lmao- #but there's neat stuff in there #only one more design until i'm fully done with rise s1 stuff and we can get into s2 #which uhh you probably guess is based on Green with Evil #season 1 is essentially an extended Day of the Dumpster #so it'd have a few more comedy-centered episodes than the other planned seasons #with story ones thrown in intermittenly #anyway rita's shadow form (Atir. which we'll get to when i post the next design. which also obvs is gonna be Zordon) #was one of the first things i thought of when i first started on the design series so lmao- #i just like big vague shadow shapes. and her taking over tommy's body ties into some Good Story Shit later on so i'm excited to share that #when i do a season 2 wrap up #anyway. next design's Zordon and then i'll do a Season 1 summary post #my art

[mejomonster]

Coming up with ideas for writing 💜💜💜

Actually writing ;-;

#rant #ToT #upside is i have solved some lore loopholes which. if u know me u know how rare i actually didnt alreayd have way too much worldbuilding #decided on. but finally nailed down a bit of worldbuilding i was foggy on. #also i am SO hype for magic to come into the story #downside: i have 40k words to write before i get to be writing that part ;-; #also? idk if yall are like this. but like whatever i Actually write always comes out significantly different than The Plan #like. fact: i have every single major scene in my summary to write. #reality: at least 70% of those scenes will likely be different than the summary once i actually write them out. #leading to possible new avenues ill utilize vause they work better/more theme cohesive/more in character #so like. i love my summary abd im clinging to it for dear life #but also terrified in the knowledge reality will be way more complex #like. i wrote this week what SHOULDVE been a simple scene #but upon actually making it. the characters chemistry was so AMPED up i feel i pretty much need Some relationship development in the scene #even tho i didnt plan that in my summary. but even if irs just AWARENESS OF LUST these bitches are dripping chemistry #also the scene turned out way fucking funnier than i planned. so like. to not fully utilize the comedic execution would be #throwing a gift away. #so im now stuck tryjng to Add Onto the intended summarized scene. since i didnt plan #to write 1 an almost kiss/desire to kiss 2 embarassment the likes of which only this dork couldve created for himself

[solarisgod]

hello! i'm curious to know what canon divergences / differences does antineon hieraeon's roleplay version have in comparison to the original version, if there are any?

Hiya! There are few differences between the roleplay and original versions. We try not to stray too far from the series canons regardless of the lore and settings of specific canon verses that aren't similar to Antineon Hieraeon's, while we have a few self creativity based rules to avoid huge canon overlapping or changes. There's always alternative verses / versions but we intend to put all of our time and energy on our own. Here are few differences that we can think of thus far:

Astereus ( collective name for the older Starwakers ) is labelled as Order-4 in the original version, which essentially means they're one of the most powerful Antigods who not only have access to sensing and interacting with the Audience, but they also know every details and events of the ANHA storyline. In the roleplay version, they're Order-3, meaning while they can still interact with the Audience, they have limited knowledge of the storyline. This is to avoid metagaming and godmodding while roleplay is an ongoing continuous storyline based on two-way communication between the writers, so it's not possible for Astereus to always know what'll happen in a roleplay setting.

This is still up to planning, but originally, Micah and Warlock / @deveils weren't meant to be as intimately close as their roleplay counterparts are since season three in the earlier series, while their original counterparts got officially together post-canon / after the eighth + final saga or around saga four. Their slow burn was actually supposed to be insanely long and painful, but Bard and especially I basically got impatient, though, even them being very intimately close three seasons in still work because Micah just... have that effect, honestly. But in roleplay, their relationship became close a lot more sooner than the original.

In terms of Micah and Adoniram / @fatefire, all I can say is as someone who's been in a relationship ten times with most being toxic or distant, something will happen between them later on in the series that makes me feel uncomfortable to take the time and energy to do roleplay interactions between them like I have with Micah and Warlock together, so, in roleplay version, Micah and Adoniram has been a lot more distant since Adoniram resurrected and they reunited, mainly because of Angelparadox separating Micah from him and others by usually placing Micah in solo missions, but even while unaffiliated with Break Beyond Force in the current / fourth season, there is still a painful distance between them while Adoniram's detachment with reality and himself worsens over time.

Similarly applies to Micah supposing to have more interactions with xyr close friends and business partners, Sweetsilence /@oncehaunted and Steelstorm / @oncehunted, but we just don't have much time and energy to juggle so many muses at once, but Micah in the original isn't as distant with them compare to xyr roleplay counterpart, but the distance still works in the end.

Astereus is a lot more interactive and acknowledging to the Audience in the original. It's just we can't do it as often in roleplay to avoid throwing our writing partner off guard while taking them out of the creativity space, but it happens very rarely or at least when writing for my co-creators.

#ANONYMOUS #/// #// #/ #𓁹 ༑ ࿐ྂ ⩇⩇ : ⩇⩇ ⚠︎ [ 𝙴𝚇𝙸(𝚂)𝚃 : 𝙶𝙾𝙳 ] * ‹ OOC . › #𓁹 ༑ ࿐ྂ ⩇⩇ : ⩇⩇ ⚠︎ [ 𝙴𝚇𝙸(𝚂)𝚃 : 𝙶𝙾𝙳 ] * ‹ ANSWERS . › #[ thank you for this question also! this was a fun one as I've been wanting to do canon divergence notes ] #[ and this is a perfect opportunity to do so ] #[ to be honest the original version is a LOT more batshit insane and intense than what roleplay have going on ) ] #[ the roleplay version is basically of an in-depth summary than a full on story itself - if that makes sense ] #[ but also 90% of our plot canons are improvised as Bard and I have been mostly storytelling on the spot since the beginning ] #[ which is amazing to see how we can roleplay the series out with little plans of the storyline ksdbkghsdbgks ]

[pyrriax]

hi tumblr im a normal individual that writes extremely normal fics. [through tears.]

#haunted ecosystem #haunted bookshelf #fic: it looks just like a dream #im... gonna go make the webweave for this one. #i might accidentally write genderqueer roshambo (again) but thats just the way i roll. #yes this is an au fic. no i will probably never pursue this au beyond this one offshoot fic. #im not gonna au tag for that reason but i think its really interesting to think about the timeline for it. agony. #this is my first draft for the summary and i. honestly? ive learnt how i like to format things. unconventional as it is i think it.... #i guess it captures my style better. i like the weirdly open-ended nature of it. my summaries are more additions to the story than *summary #which. maybe isnt the best idea. but im working within the constraints of ao3. #might see about cooking up a workskin for this stuff. it could be fun? possibly. maybe when i have more time. #also YES i cut off a bit of it. im not sure about that section so i am running it past some people first

[lee-hakhyun]

hello, wanted to ask if you know anywhere with summaries of the side story pre 565?

for 553-555, red-gtech has summaries

i'll write a (somewhat) condensed summary of 556-564 for you ^^

episode 2. rewrite (556-653)

lee hakhyun wakes up and looking at the screen door, he notices that his face isn't his. there was a cardboard cutout of the character with that face in front of the theater where the event was held, but he can't recall what character it is. he realizes he's transmigrated into orv, and that he's transmigrated into an extra character. scanning his surroundings, he figures out he's in geumho, and bihyung appears! the main scenario arrives, and proof of value begins. lhh tries to open his attribute window, but there's an error and it can't be activated. he then tries to call the fourth wall, but there's no response. he then tries to activate any of the author-specific skills like [avatar], but that also doesn't work.

there are two main groups in the station, a group of people that are part of a church lead by a deacon and the other being people gathered together by a big man with a tattoo on his forearm. they try to push at the barrier, while lhh makes a plan to meet up with kdj and goes to a vending machine to collect a bug to clear the scenario. he gets a bug and pockets it without killing it.

while he was catching bugs, he gets a message on his phone, from rep kdj. he congratulates him and says he'll send him a gift. he realizes it's a message sent through a web novel platform, and orv is there along with all 551 chapters. he tries reading a chapter, but only the comments left by readers show up. he can't actually read what's in the chapters, just the comments.

he meets another reader, and lets him get his own bug. the ahjussi kills the bug, and clears the scenario. he then asks lhh if he's going to let the rest of the people die, and lhh says kdj wouldn't have saved them either.

the big guy who had leading the group pushing the barrier, and confronts lhh and the ahjussi for not helping them out. it quickly escalates to violence, and lhh is able to use the exclusive skill of the character he transmigrated into, which calms his head and he hits the vending machine until a bug comes out. he takes the bug, and thinks of the readers in the theater and of ji eunyu. his skill activates,

and he says he'll save everyone if they follow him.

the big man challenges his words, and he emulates kim dokja's way of speaking to convince everyone, and tells the people that the scenarios are real and that he knows something about this situation, comparing it to a test from god due to human sins. this gets the attention of the deacon, who starts muttering about crimes and trials.

he then brings up that the scenario can be cleared by killing any creature and gets everyone to work together to gather bugs. he organizes the collection of bugs and talks with the deacon, and finds out he has [character list] and uses it on the deacon the deacon is named kim chulyang, which is a name that he can remember writing about in a discarded setting for orv, but he couldn't recall what it was. he has the crouching figure attribute like jung heewon, which means he has the potential to be very powerful if he awakens under the right conditions.

bihyung appears and warns that the constellations don't like it when the incarnations are too smart, and as everyone manages to get a bug, they all crush them at the same time. but the scenario clear message doesn't appear.

bihyung appears again, and mentions that people were playing tricks here too. lhh belatedly realizes that the other readers must have been doing the same thing, and the bureau has interfered with the scenario.

with this, he realizes something. kim dokja used bugs to clear the scenario. with this change, kim dokja may die. the people turn on lhh, and the big man tells him to take responsibility, but he starts talking about future events, reciting the prime minister's speech moments before the news is broadcasted. due to the bureau's interference, the scenario can't be changed anymore, and the time limit can't be reduced by 10 minutes like it was in orv.

the prime minister's death causes a lot of panic, and the people rush back to the barrier to try to break it down. lhh calls out to them again, and uses the fear to take the lead. he looks at the comments, and sees a story he didn't write.

there's also a comment from 'rlaehrwk37'.

the people have done what lhh told them and there's a pile of old clothes. his idea is to kill germs instead. kim chulyang questions whether this will work, and he says that 'germs' are still living things. lhh also wonders if it would work, and he's also not sure if it would work. he says it might be the intention to kill that counts.

(propecia treats male pattern hair loss.)

a bonfire is started with the pile, and people start throwing in bug carcasses and old junk to burn germs, including the big guy who had been protesting lee hakhyun wonders what will happen to his readers, while they wait for the scenario clear message.

there's an error in the system messages, and the results won't be clear until the end of the scenario. bihyung appears and from his reactions, the bureau had not planned for this to happen. when people asked bihyung whether germs were living things, all the constellations stopped bihyung from speaking. the timer hit 10 minutes, and lhh says that it's time for 'that' to appear.

a hologram screen appears in the station, and lee jihye is shown on the screen along with the aftermath of the scenario in daepong girls' high school. it's exactly the same as in orv, and causes a panic in the station. the reader ahjussi tries to calm people, but the group turns on them.

he starts to think that maybe's it's better to stop trying to save these people, but his exclusive skill activates.

lee hakhyun's skill, ☐☐, allows him to write the next actions of a character. he starts to write a sentence, and,

there's probability constraints, so he can't just write anything and have it come true. there's also 'reader feedback' from rlaehrwrk37. lhh tries a few different sentences, getting lackluster success rates and an increasingly annoyed rlaehrwk37.

with 30 seconds left, he can't seem to figure out what to write, but he remembers ji eunyu's advice, and thought about the character's desires. he writes sentences for kim chulyang, and gets an interested reaction from rlaehrwk37.

exiting the snow garden, the colour returns to the world and time returns to normal as the sentences lhh wrote become reality.

kim chulyang says that this is a test of faith, and that the gods above are watching our choices. he calls lhh a 'lion of god' and that they have already passed the ordeals with his guidance. the people are brought together by the shared hope, and lhh gets a messages that kim chulyang has awakened with the attribute 'the one leader', and has started the religion of the church of life.

not only has he aided in the start of a cult, he personally awakened of the 10 evils. as he despairs over this, the cultists are chanting about the great sacrifice of germs. he briefly considers sticking with the cult, but discards the idea once he realizes yoo joonghyuk would very quickly dispose of him.

the atmosphere of the station is cheerful, and people talk about their lives while waiting for the scenario to end. almost everyone is calm, but the big man calls everyone crazy and says that the only sure way to survive is to kill someone. lhh uses [character list] on the man, and gets his name, lee cheoldoo. he's the cheoldoo group's boss, who never showed up in orv.

he has a weapon, but he can't fight the rest of the 21 people in the station alone, and proposes that 10 people join him to kill the other half. kim chulyang challenges him, and with the cultists' solidarity nobody joins him. lee cheoldoo instead goes for an older man who was close to him, and the old man calls for help, though the crowd moves back and nobody steps up to help him. a character panics and joins lee cheoldoo, and he's instructed to point out someone to kill. with this, people start to panic and eventually everything is blamed on lhh, and lee cheoldoo decides to kill lhh instead. kim chulyang stops anyone from interfering, saying that this is god's messenger protecting them all, and as lee cheoldoo approaches, only one person stands with lhh.

the reader stays with lhh, but they both seem to have low stats and lee cheoldoo's physical stats average 7 by lhh's guess. with 2 minutes left, he tries to stall for time by talking, but lee cheoldoo starts to choke lhh.

as he's losing his strength, he sees someone behind lee cheoldoo holding a pipe.

he thinks he sees kim dokja, but it's the reader who helps him out. with the time limit counting down, they struggle against lee cheoldoo and finally hit the time limit.

paid settlement begins, and everything was normal. the reader asks if he succeeded, and as he nods he hears something fall. lee cheoldoo's headless body hits the ground, and lee hakhyun watches as the characters' heads explode one by one.

the reader asks if he really was trying to save them, and lhh hesitates before saying yes. he had a hunch that this plan would fail, but due to him not mentioning that these characters will no longer appear in the story.

lee hakhyun accepts and waits for his death.

but he doesn't die. the scenario clear message appears, and his kill history appears: 19 humans.

lee hakhyun realizes who he's possesing. the previous leader of geumho station, cheon inho.

episode 3. protagonist(?) (1) (564)

lhh thinks about cheon inho. he was the only survivor of geumho station originally, so these characters would have died even if he didn't transmigrate. so, was it lee hakhyun or cheon inho who killed these character? is he a murderer or a writer who describes the death of characters?

he calms down, and the constellations begin to show their interest. he gains the interest of the 'absolute evil' system who interpreted his incitement killing as deliberate, which he takes as a bad sign since it will be harder to get sponsored from the 'absolute good' system.

he then gets sponsored by the absolute good system. the good constellations interpreted his actions as heroic for trying to save the other characters.

he talks with and comforts the reader ahjussi, and when trying to use [character list] on him it fails because his 'soul' isn't a character. he learns he has another skill now, [reader's comments list]. it works on readers, showing a reader profile and allowing him to pay coins to read comments they left on orv, with 3 comments being free.

checking the reader's comments, it seems he started reading because of his daughter, jiyoon, and then decided to read the rest of the story.

they exchange names, with the reader getting flustered when he says he's cheon inho. the name of the character the reader possessed is 'lee dansu', and it seems that other readers can see their attribute window. they agree to call each other by the names of the characters, and the bihyung appears, complaining about how weird the scenarios have been before congratulating them and bringing up the sponsor selection. lee hakhyun doesn't expect to get as many sponors as kim dokja, but he hopes that he'll at least get 1 narrative grade constellation for his troubles.

and when sponsor selection arrives, he gets 10 constellations offering to sponsor him.

#ask #orv #orv side story #orv spoilers #here we go rereading again~~ #at this point i've probably actually spent more time reading the side story than orv's main story #feel free to ask me anything about the side story i am happy to talk about lhh #unrelated but i really couldn't say i had a favourite character before lhh #before it was like. i love all these characters equally #i still love them but lhh is just a whole other thing. something about him just enthralls me #side story rambles #<- the rest of my chapter summaries are in this tag! might just make a directory post at this point lmfao #edit: i have backdated this post so it shows up earlier when you search the tag chronologically

[recurring-polynya]

go places addenda

Earlier this week, I finished posting go places, a 28k fanfic about Rukia and Renji getting ready to go take their Academy entrance exams. I started this story in 2019. It sat in a hot mess amongst my WIPs, and nevertheless informed a lot of flashbacks and memories that show up in various parts of my The Heart is a Muscle series. I made reference to a number of these throughout the writing, which my beautiful beta reader @diademchiofthetripod said worked fine as “textual ruins”, but I thought someone out there might be interested in actually finding the cross-references.

Additionally, this story contained a lot of world-building, just *bags* of worldbuilding, much of which started life as, or was inspired by various Tumblr posts, and I wanted to link those, too. Some of them are mine, but many came from other wonderful, thoughtful people, or came from us riffing off each other’s ideas. I am always grateful to the community on this website, and I just wanted to give credit to all the goofin’ around over here that inspires and informs my writing.

[cut for spoilers and also length]

Chapter 1

Settings are deeply important to me, and I felt like if I was going to set this entire thing in District 70, it deserved a name. Shiotsuka, 塩塚, means “salt mound,” because I wanted to invoke the imagery of barriers, like a town that sees itself as the last bastion of civilization, despite the fact that there are ten more districts to the south, including the home our protagonists have just left. In some ways, they are correct, though: Shiotsuka has the last post office on the South Road, the last shinigami recruitment station. I think all the ends-in-zero districts try to associate themselves with the ten above rather than the ten below. I realize this sort of thing is important mostly to me, but it sets the tone of the story as Rukia struggles to hold on to what she knows and who she is against the overwhelming message to focus her eyes onward and upward.

Mr. Mochida has been part of this story from the beginning. In fact, the opening scene of the original version was from his POV. I think that if I had started the story fresh in 2023, he would have been a very different character, but he was already *there*, and it didn’t feel right to replace him, which turned out to be a very good decision, actually. The actual point of this note is that I named him back before I got really into custom, bespoke character names, so it is likely that his name came from the Wikipedia list of Japanese Olympic weightlifters or something like that. I honestly don’t remember. It is a fairly common Japanese surname and, written 持田, means “hold or have” and “rice field.” An ordinary name for an ordinary sort of guy.

The bit about watered-down soy sauce came out of this post where I was wondering why they even had 55-gallon oil drums in Inuzuri and @bleachbleachbleach came up with a nicer answer than mine (which was Squad 12 toxic waste, although I am still fond of @snurtle 's idea from the tags that Rukia and Renji have glow-in-the-dark bones)

Chapter 2

The main reason there are couriers in this story is very simple: I have been re-reading Naomi Novik’s Temeraire series, and I got obsessed with the couriers and wanted some couriers. I realize that there is already the Secret Remote Squad, which is the subdivision of the Onmitsukidou that wears those rectangular hats and delivers messages around town. You know, these guys:

I wanted something tonally different though--a set of shinigami that spend most of their time outside of the Seireitei. Their job is important, but they’re more independent and a bit casual, and I liked the idea of this being one of Renji and Rukia’s first exposures to a shinigami-on-the-job (versus most of the introductions Kubo likes to do, where a character gets a Hollow dramatically slain right in front of them).

In my years of reading Bleach fanfic, I have decided that I do not care for it when people use flash step to travel long distances. This is a personal opinion, please do as you like in your own fanfics, but I just don’t think flash step should work that way. For one thing, my impression is that it basically involves doing a spatial shift from one place to another, which would seem to carry a heavy risk of running into things (or people). Also, it seems like it should take a lot of energy. Also, there are some characters (Hanataro) who can’t use it, which seems like it would cause a lot of problems. That being said, flash step is allegedly a set of techniques within hohou (we just never learn what any of the other ones are). I had some fun making up some that are practical for long-distance, which was both fun and satisfying for me. Ryuupo is written 流歩, where the first character , which means "flow", is also used in the word for jet stream, and then the second character is the same one for “step” that’s used in “flash step.” Hayaashi, 速歩, means “brisk walk” but it’s also the word used for a horse’s trotting gait. I do not actually speak Japanese. I did my best.

Relatedly, I also liked the idea of Mr. Mochida teaching Rukia and Renji a lot of practical, but not flashy stuff, and in particular, things that take lots and lots and lots of practice, but have a great deal of payoff. Unlike some people, who try to teach a kid bankai in three days, he’s more of a “strong foundations” sort of guy. I hope it’s obvious (particularly you’ve read my later stories featuring Renji in sensei-mode) that Renji is imprinting on this guy like a baby duck.

The Seireitei Bulletin makes an appearance, in part because I wanted to make a vague reference to my headcanon that Tousen personally transformed it from a propaganda rag into…um…something more closely resembling a news outlet. I also wanted to drop some hint of some big doings in the city that the reader would recognize, but would, of course, be basically meaningless to Rukia. It is actually right around the time Byakuya became captain, but that was a little too…too. However, Gin also became captain around the same time and you know I never miss an opportunity to do a shout-out to Iba’s mom.

Rukia contemplating a life in the Onmitsukidou is partially a Between Tides joke, but it’s mostly a reference to a Hisana-joins-Squad 2-and-then-adopts-Rukia-herself AU that @alopexplasma and I improv’ed our way to in the comments of section of Call Me Back When the War is Over.

Watanabe Yuuto is one of my Inuzuri irregulars; he also featured in the story Renji tells Chad about Rukia vs. the Bees, which is the next-to-last scene of Chapter 5 of See You on the Other Side.

Renji tells the story about Rukia wrestling the tanuki (or badger) to Byakuya in Chapter 11 of Call Me Back When the War is Over. It’s the second scene down and can be read independently of the rest of the story. Towards the end of the same chapter, Rukia clarifies that it was a badger (definitely not a tanuki).

Chapter 3

Rukia’s bunny print yukata makes two appearances in Call Me Back, once in Chapter 12, proving that Renji was paying attention after all, and once in Chapter 13.

Here’s a six-part video series on how to make your own waraji. I did not know that waraji were for short-term use! That was the second most interesting thing I learned writing this fanfic! The shihakushou headcanon is one I have been working on for a long time and I’m glad that I finally worked it into a fanfic. I wrote out most of my thoughts on the topic here, and here’s the senkaimon transfer protocol post that originally got me thinking about it way back when.

I did a whole post on the “Black Dog of Rondanini” kidou Rukia is trying to read. Thanks to the Bleach wiki for the kanji version of the chant, which was very helpful in writing this part.

Obligatory link to the Renji breaks his arm story.

The poem Renji is trying to write out is the Iroha, a pangram that was used as a kana ordering system prior to 1890. I felt like it was the sort of thing a boy’s mother would make him copy out to practice his writing, analogous to the old "quick brown fox".

Chapter 4

(for realsies, tho, a lot of the dream sequence references this post I made about the symbolism of Sode no Shirayuki taking the form of a yuki-onna)

Chapter 5

I was trying to come up with a list of common items that an Edo era traveler might buy/take with them on a journey when I inadvertently came across the number one most interesting thing I learned while writing this fanfic.

The incident Rukia remembers about thinking Renji didn’t like her until the day she laughed at some sick burn he made is the same incident Renji mentions in Chapter 4 of a little in love, in which he thought she didn’t like him until the day she laughed at his sick burn. What a couple of idiots.

“Rukia even worked in a shop for a bit.” If this seems familiar, it’s because it’s from my unfinished Inuzuri story I Can’t Believe I Found You in that Town and I’m sure I’ve posted excerpts from it on Tumblr. It was a pawn shop. Her job was scamming people. She was very good at it.

Re: the 1000 kan budget Mr. M gives them: For reference, per Color Bleach+, an issue of the Monthly Seireitei Bulletin costs 380 kan. A cosplay Squad 4 nurse’s outfit costs 5,980. City inflation is wild.

“I like the signs they have here,” Rukia says, pointing up at one that shows a pipe with rings of smoke coming out of it. “You can tell what the shops have without having to go in.” I went down a real rabbit hole on Edo era kanbans (and yes, that’s the etymological origin of kanban boards used in agile project management). A lot of them relied on puns, and I read in one article that high-end city shops would make their signs rely on insider knowledge so that only their more sophisticated customers would recognize them, which is the most Seireitei-ass thing I have ever heard.

“I did some arm-breaking for a crooked apothecary for a while,” Renji admits. There were some more details on this in the Renji-breaks-his-arm story, and probably also the upcoming chapter of Heart is a Muscle. If it feels like Renji mentions about six thousand different jobs he had in Inuzuri, I did that on purpose, because I wanted him to feel like a guy who was always on the grind. Most of the jobs were extremely short-lived.

Chapter 6

“I know about wheels!” Renji volunteers. “For a while, I worked at a place that took old carts and swapped their wheels around to make them look different and then sold them again.” Inuzuri is the chop shop capital of Soul Society

“We met a shinigami once, in Inuzuri. We both got real hungry, just from being around them.” I realize that everyone has not watched episode 32 of the Bleach anime 100,000 times, but this happened in episode 32 of the Bleach anime. There’s a screenshot of them in the post above.

Chapter 7 Mr. Mochida’s home district is Zanshien (残紫苑) Lingering Aster. Aster means “remembrance” in hanakotoba. Sometimes I am not subtle.

“There was a girl. That’s a complete story in itself.” Man, you know how I feel about lines like that.

Kaho, written 馨朋, means “sweet-smelling friend” because I was still on my flower bullshit.

Renji clenches one fist. “Our friendship can take this, Rukia. It’s like the book I’ve been reading on bodyweight exercises. The way you build muscle is by tearing the fibers apart, and then more muscle grows in to repair the tears, and that’s how you get stronger.” A lot of times, I have regrets about the name The Heart is a Muscle, but then I write crap like this.

The tapping also shows up in Between Tides.

“when sparrows begin building their nests” is one of Japan’s 72 poetic microseasons. The Japanese school year has begun in April since 1886, so I assume that's when the Shin'ou term starts, as well. I figured the Rukongai kids would try out shortly before then, so that they can just stay if they get in. The idea of official communications from the Seireitei being conducted in the most arcane ways possible was done with love for @bleachbleachbleach

One of the first things I did when I picked up this fanfic again earlier this year was try to calculate how long it would actually take to walk from the Inuzuri to the Seireitei. I have all kinds of notes based on the stuff Yoruichi tells the Karakura kids about how long it takes to walk around the Seireitei, the diameters of Tokyo and NYC, amounts of time I felt would be practical, etc, etc, and in the end, I just used some numbers that felt right in my heart. Time dilation in the deep Rukon is yet another headcanon I picked up from B3, but it’s also how I reconcile the various competing estimates of Rukia’s age. Do not try to follow Mr. Mochida and Hatori’s math, they’re probably using some silly “Thirty days hath September” calculation mnemonics. I think you can take my word for it that Rukia and Renji made it to their tests on time. For the record, they passed.

#my fanfic #i know this reads like the end notes to infinite jest and i'm sorry #actually the story summary was an homage to 60 minutes more or less with Madame Psychosis so maybe it's approp #i want everyone to know that Alopex noticed a good 80% of this and commented on it *before* i made this post #a true polynya superfan that i def don't deserve #my GOD i hope all the links in this post survived #i did them in html initially and Tumblr Did Not Like It #i guess 'addenda' is more accurate than 'errata'