#so (over)thinking about it... there are a lot of merchants and rivers and only one swd. how exactly does he have that much control xD | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

prettypei · 10 months

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plot: you discover their childhood photos; fluff! crack!

reader: gn! Reader

pairings: childe, diluc, kazuha, ayato

warnings: some spoilers for story quests? kinda, pre-Snezhnaya

(a/n): was flippin thru the family album when I got the idea and I 4got childe's sister's name LMAO

✰CHILDE is surprised when he hears giggling in the attic. He's visiting his old home in Snezhnaya and he invited you along with him and now he realizes there might be... a little ghost girl up there? Not quite sure. So he's relieved when he finds out it's just you and his sister, although he scared you both awfully with a baseball bat in his hand when he came up. It turned out that you were...looking at his family album? He sits down next to the both of you, looking though them too. "Hey, remember when dad used to take us fishing?" Childe asked, smiling at his sister. "Oh yeah!" She giggles, "We failed a lot, didn't we? We only came home with two fish!" Childe chuckles. "Yeah, and the look on mom's face when we tried gutting the fish ourselves." All of a sudden, he hears a howl of laughter coming from...you? "What's so funny?" He scoots over and...oh. He slams the book shut and screeches:" OKAY THAT'S ENOUGH FOR TODAY! EVERYONE HEAD DOWN!!" You're still snickering to yourself as you head down the stairs and manage to gasp weakly:" Y-you never told me you fell in the river when you were young!"

✰DILUC thinks the tavern is especially loud today, but he dismisses it. It's probably due to Kaeya's outgoing personality and your chaotic brain. However, he pauses when he sees Kaeya passing...pictures around the bar? He's a little confused at why everyone thinks it's so hilarious. He sees a knight giggling at the picture in her hand, and he snatches it out of hers and looks at it himself. His eyes widen in embarrassment as he realizes what it is: it's an old picture of him and Kaeya playing in the mud, his clothes stained as he smiled a toothy and boyish grin at the camera. You walk over to him and wave the picture in front of his face. "Oh? What's this? Bartender and serious Diluc-" "Give that back." He snaps, taking the photo from you, his face flushing a deep shade of red. "You looked so cute in them though..." You tilt your head. "What happened?" "Ha ha, very funny." Diluc rolls his eyes. "But you were cute when you were a kid babe, that I gotta say." You grin as you pinch his cheek in a playful manner. He rolls his eyes once again, but he can't hide the tiny smile that's forming on his lips.

✰KAZUHA's trying out a new melody on his leaf when he saw something flutter past him. He snatches it just in time, examining the photo. He smiles when he realizes it's a picture of him when he was a kid, barely over 10, holding his first sword. "Kaz! Did you see- oh, it's in your hand." "Indeed it is." He chuckles as he hands it to you. "Why do you have this, (name)?" "Oh, I was checking out the library in your home and I found this! I'm really sorry it almost blew away..." "At least I caught it. Did you know this was the first sword I held?" Your eyes widen in awe. "Really? But you look so young in this!" "I was, I was probably about 13 years old." "Thirteen!" Your eyes nearly bulge out of your skull. "Yeah" he chuckles. "I was pretty young, wasn't I?"

✰AYATO hears a knocking on the door to this room and opens it, and he’s overjoyed when it’s you and not another merchant trying to scam him once again. “(name), darling what brings you here?” “Uh-uh-nothing.” You fail to hide the photos behind your back and ayato asks: “what are those, dear?” You sigh and confess: “Ayaka gave me these. These were childhood photos of you…I was just curious, I swear! I was going to return them to her today but…” you gesture helplessly at him. He chuckles and says “give me those.” You hand them to him and he examines them. Most of them were pictures of his achievements over the years: “winner of sword beginner competition”, “most likely to succeed”….but there was a picture of his family. He smiles at it and smiles at you. You hang your head in shame. “That’s your mom and dad isn’t it? I’m sorry that they’re gone.” He pulls your hand inside as he says “I have you as my family now, (name).”

#pei writes 🖋️#genshin #genshin impact x reader #genshin x reader #genshin imagines #genshin impact #genshin headcanons #childe x reader #childe x you #childe x y/n #ayato x reader #kamisato ayato #diluc x reader #diluc #diluc x you #kazuha #kazuha kaedehara #kazuha x reader #kazuha x you

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kyogre-blue · 8 months

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Quickly dumping out the Enbarr notes, since I'm sure the Shambhala section will have a ton of infodumping to note.

I think the only difference from VW is that we run some weird plan where a lot of our troops sneak into Enbarr ahead of the rest of the army moving in. Because uuuuh I guess we're weaker than the united army with Leicester? Everything else is pretty much exactly the same, including Dedue's part and the Edelgard death cinematic.

tbh I think it actually ends up feeling even weaker here? I thought it would fit better, since this is the "you like Edelgard but can't agree with her" route, but since she appears so little and her writing is so bizarre and confused... It actually feels kinda worse, since her dialogue feels incredibly inconsistent.

I thought I'd have some more appreciation for Edelgard after this route, but uh. I don't. Hm.

Anyway, onto more interesting points, I am starting to get the impression that Rhea and Seteth don't actually know much about the Agarthans. I think they might not actually know that the mysterious "those who slither in the dark" are from Agartha (and that's why they have beef), and it's basically explicit that they don't know who helped Nemesis make the Sword.

Which isn't an issue, but it's hard to remember that they know so little in practice.

Liveblogging:

A priestess mentions that they lost contact with all church personnel in Enbarr when the war started.

A soldier mentions that some of our troops have already departed for Enbarr dressed as merchants and traveling performers. We have an entire plan to have small squads sneak toward the capital and link up with the main army. The Empire apparently thinks we have abandoned our plans to invade (after Merceus).

Sylvain didn't think he's live this long (in the war)... bby. He wants to strike down the empire for Dimtri...

Apparently, we think Rhea is in Enbarr because of a soldier from Merceus. I guess Judith only told us that the Empire captured her. I already forgor.

The pre-battle blurb also mentions the troops moving in secret and our surprise attack on Enbarr. I don't recall this from VW. We were already outnumbered there, so I guess here with just the Church and Judith's troops, we're even worse off.

Based on the map close up during the pre-battle exposition, it looks like Enbarr was built on the delta where a river forks into two, with both ranches leading into the sea on the west.

Oh, Dedue is here! AC lied to me :( (/jk)

The music for his entrance is uh... imo it's a bit too heroic, given that he's here because Dimitri ended up like that.

He came after Gronder field, so... two months ago, since there was Merceus in between but not anything else. He gives us info on the inside of the castle (layout, presumably) and tells us that Rhea is at the palace.

Edelgard's axe, Aymr, is described as "a Crest Stone weapon designed to Edelgard's specifications, allowing her to use Raging Storm."

Edelgard's class, Emperor, is "With unparalleled defense, Edelgard appears as an unstoppable force in the legendary armor of the Adrestian Emperor." Note that her armor is a boobplate. So like... did they modify it for her, or....

Edelgard is so confusing. Even to the last, she goes on about how determined she is to "free this world" from the "vile grasp" of the "false goddess and her minion." But like... Edelgard has NO basis for beef with Sothis or Rhea. It's so puzzling and empty.

Dialogue with Seteth: He tells Edelgard to return Rhea and release her grip on Fodlan. Edelgard says that if we strike her down, "they" will return. So she can't permit what we desire (????? what? like, you'd assume she means the Agarthans, but everything else points to her talking about the Nabateans). She also knows that Seteth is a child of the goddess and thinks he can't be permitted power over the people. This is SO wild.

Anyway, to get this dialogue, I let Seteth get the last hit. The Edelgard death cutscene makes equally little sense on this route, btw. Edelgard was going "fuck you guys, I didn't think you'd make it this far, but I don't care and I'm never giving up" in the battle, but now she's all "you must strike me down to move forward, I wanted to walk with you..." GIRL WHAT

Hubert going behind Edelgard's back to write us a letter where he's basically entrusting the future and Fodlan to us is like....... l m a o This was whatever on VW, but on a route where we are the Church and those lizards Edelgard hates so much... god.

Anyway, Seteth apparently didn't really believe the Agarthans were behind all this, or else even around at all. He's very shocked and unhappy about Hubert's letter.

OK, unlike VW, where Claude is there for the info dumps and Rhea holds at least some stuff back, here she has no reason to hide anything. And she says she does not know where or how Nemesis got the Sword of the Creator. They only guessed that someone must have given him this power and tried to investigate it, but they never found the answer. They only NOW surmise that it was the Agarthans. ...hang on, do they even know that "those who slither in the dark" are from Agartha....

Felix and Sylvain are together at the monastery, cute. Felix even calls Dimitri by name when talking about defeating the Empire and the Agarthans to let him rest in peace.

Catherine backstory: She was born in House Charon in Faerghus > was called Thunderstrike Cassandra > attempted Officers Academy, was saved by Rhea as a student > was implicated in "a plot to kill the king" (seems to be Duscur) > fled to the monastery since she felt it was safe > Rhea hired her > and had her execute Christophe when he tried to assassinate Rhea, though the charges given publicly were regarding Duscur.

Is that right?

Anyway, next time: Shambhala

#playing fire emblem

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apocalypticavolition · 11 months

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Let's (re)Read The Wheel of Time! Chapter 5: Winternight

Welcome back to the reread that has caused both my tablet and my fire cube to glitch out in horrible, frustrating ways for no apparent reason! There are many spoilers going forward (like the fact that this will cause me to snap), so if you don't want that sort of thing, run.

In the Two Rivers that often included three or four generations under one roof, including aunts, uncles, cousins, and nephews. Tam and Rand were considered out of the ordinary as much for being two men living alone as for farming in the Westwood.

Makes you wonder what did happen to Tam's family. Presumably there were some deaths (maybe that's why he left the region in the first place; trying to get away from grief), but you'd think he'd have some cousins or something that would merit a mention. Or maybe the al'Thors were incredibly inbred and used to be a Congar/Coplin tier clan until they all died.

“I’ll start some stew for supper. And as long as we’re here, we might as well get caught up on a few chores.”

Already it's the worst Bel Tine ever, but don't worry Rand, it will get worse.

A broad oaken table was the main feature of the room other than the fireplace, a table long enough to seat a dozen or more, though there had seldom been so many around it since Rand’s mother died.

Because of course it's up to women to coordinate social events, even if they're outlanders who don't have the decades of social networking that their husbands do.

I skipped over a whole bunch of chores, btw. It's good scene setting but there's not much else to say about it.

...The Travels of Jain Farstrider sat on the table...

Hi Jain! For the first few books, your own title sounded like something rather old and well-established, The Travels of Marco Polo not as seen by his contemporaries but by the people of the 1500s. Now we know it's actually a very recent tome, not much older than Rand, which means that he's lucky to have a copy at all. Maybe Tam bought it in Illian.

There's actually a lot of domesticity stuff I'm skimming over. It helps set the calm mood that is about to be so violently shattered.

When Tam came back, Rand stared in surprise. A thick belt slanted around Tam’s waist, and from the belt hung a sword, with a bronze heron on the black scabbard and another on the long hilt. The only men Rand had ever seen wearing swords were the merchants’ guards. And Lan, of course. That his father might own one had never even occurred to him.

Of course even before that we get the mounting dread as Tam locks and bars the doors and starts rearranging the furniture.

Rand doesn't recognize the significance of the heron, which is a little odd. You'd think the sign of the blademaster would be exactly the sort of thing that stories would harp on about endlessly, like how Rand never shuts up about his man crush Lan.

“I got it a long time ago,” Tam said, “a long way from here. And I paid entirely too much; two coppers is too much for one of these. Your mother didn’t approve, but she was always wiser than I. I was young then, and it seemed worth the price at the time. She always wanted me to get rid of it, and more than once I’ve thought she was right, that I should just give it away.”

And this right here is virtually all the info we get about what might have happened in the Tam prequel that Jordan wanted to do. Two coppers doesn't seem like anything other than a complete steal for such a valuable blade, but something about Tam's statement makes me wonder if there's a lot more going on than just spending two coppers.

He had always vaguely supposed his father must have gone outside—his mother had been an outlander...

Shame that in all your years you never asked your dad about how he met your mother. Usually we get some kind of nod about how "Father never spoke of Mother" in these kinds of stories but Jordan's never actually said that and Tam seems quite open and supportive so it's just odd, like his lack of any relatives in the area. I will now endeavor to never think of these incongruities again because they don't really matter, they're just the kind of thing that you look back on make you go, "Oh yeah, these guys are fictional and not real people".

Then the Trollocs show up!

Rand felt the beginnings of an odd sort of relief. Whoever this was, it was not the black-cloaked rider.

Welp, Rand's gone into shock. Thankfully he snaps out of it and...

The creature roared, part scream of pain, part animal snarl, as boiling water splashed over its face.

Even in the first book the Trollocs are getting punked. This is only a distraction before Tam actually takes it down, but still.

Shadows, he told himself. Only shadows.

Yes Rand, the Shadow has finally come for you. Save this feeling that it's a completely inconsequential copy of what's real and true; it'll help you later. (Sadly, he will not.)

“They’re coming in the back!” The words came out in a croak, but at least they came out. He had not been sure they would. “I’m outside! Run, father!”

He starts and ends on good notes, but when you're being hunted by the forces of darkness you never give away your position even a little.

In mid-stride Tam whirled, not running toward Rand, but at an angle away from him. “Run, lad!” he shouted, gesturing with the sword as if to someone ahead of him. “Hide!”

After Rand gives away his position AGAIN, Tam bravely covers for him. You shoulda spent less time on meditation and more on emergency situations. What kind of novel by a semi-libertarian type is this that our heroes who live out in the woods besides a minimalist democratic government aren't crazy preppers whose irresponsibly placed bear traps have already killed fifteen government agentsShadowspawn?

Suddenly a hand closed over his mouth from behind, and an iron grip seized his wrist. Frantically he clawed over his shoulder with his free hand for some hold on the attacker. “Don’t break my neck, lad,” came Tam’s hoarse whisper.

Coulda whispered quicker. Geez, Rand probably pissed himself.

They kill for the pleasure of killing, so I’ve been told.

Don't sound too different from real people, do they Tam?

But that’s the end of my knowledge, except that they cannot be trusted unless they’re afraid of you, and then not far.

Is it just me, or is this rather an odd piece of trivia to know? Most good people aren't going to need to know this. Maybe Kari *had been* a Darkfriend back before she settled down and knew these things from experience?

No, of course not. But it's funny to imagine and since we don't get a prequel anymore we're all welcome to come up with the stupidest headcanons imaginable.

If he had to do it against a Trolloc he was surely just as likely to run instead, or freeze stiff so he could not move at all until the Trolloc swung one of those odd swords and. . . . Stop it! It’s not helping anything!

Realism doesn't hurt, Rand. It's good to acknowledge that battles are scary and that since you're not trained you're not likely to make a positive difference.

Creeping from tree to tree, he tried to make a plan, but by the time he reached the edge of the woods he had made and discarded ten. Everything depended on whether or not the Trollocs were still there.

Jordan, being a military man, is smart enough to know that plans don't really last in conflict, and this spreads to Rand. He also is again aware of his limitations and knows that if the house has Trollocs in it his only smart choice is to run back.

It was the light that decided him. The barn was dark. Anything could be waiting inside, and he would have no way of knowing until it was too late. At least he would be able to see what was inside the house.

Of course, you'll be quite visible as well, especially if there's anything in the barn watching. Can't blame you for not thinking everything through though - and luckily, nothing is in the barn, so that's all going to work out.

Four twisted bodies made a tangle in the remnants of the furnishings. Trollocs.

Tam did pretty fucking well to only be semi-mortally wounded while taking out four and distracting all the rest, especially for someone who claims to have had no experience with Shadowspawn, which are quite distinct from human opponents in several ways.

“Others go away. Narg stay. Narg smart.”

In a book filled with early installment weirdness, Narg really takes the cake, huh? He's also incredibly popular, though much like another incredibly popular non-human in this series I don't really get it. He's a fun but to me very forgettable meme. (NOTE TO SELF: Put in more of these hot takes in the hopes of getting angry replies to boost viewership.)

Did Jordan intend for there to be more distinct Trolloc characters over the course of the series and just never got around to it, or had to abandon them as the plans changed? Was this just laying the groundwork for Shaidar Haran? The world will never know.

Desperately he brought his sword up. The monstrous body crashed into him, slamming him against the wall. Breath left his lungs in one gasp. He fought for air as they fell to the floor together, the Trolloc on top. Frantically he struggled beneath the crushing weight, trying to avoid thick hands groping for him, and snapping jaws.

Rand's first fight. Like so many of his physical confrontations, this one ends ignominiously. His most "epic" fight is in a Sanderson book and besides that one I feel like most of his battles have high prices, ambiguous outcomes, or other weirdnesses that stop him from being Gilgamesh and keep him more at a Samwell Tarly kind of level when it comes to combat. You'd think the dude would have clued in sooner that his focus wasn't meant to be on the material world, but he is just a sheepherder I guess.

He was sure he was forgetting any number of things they would need, but Tam was waiting, and the Trollocs were coming back. He gathered what he could think of on the run.

He actually does pretty well. In a crisis, Rand tends to have a pretty clear head when he's not succumbing to madness. Anyway, he heads into the barn (it's empty and the wagon is wrecked) and promptly breaks down the wagon to at least have something to carry Tam in.

When the shaft fell free, he looked at the sword blade in wonder. Even the best-sharpened axe would have dulled chopping through that hard, aged wood, but the sword looked as brightly sharp as ever.

Every fantasy series needs to have magical blades that don't need sharpening no matter how often they're used. Jordan was probably one of the first to state that it all happened because the wizards and witches forging the blades were manipulating them at the atomic level. Even this is a cliche in the modern era though.

That thought was like a beacon as he pulled on his coat and bent to tend Tam’s wound. They would be safe once they reached the village, and Nynaeve would cure Tam. He just had to get him there.

I'm starting to wonder if any of these chapters will end without irony at this rate. Rand does *not* have the gift of Foretelling, that much is for sure.

Anyway, tune in next time for Rand's desperate trek across the Westwood. I'm sure it's just a travelogue chapter and that absolutely no life-changing revelations will be had.

#let's read #wheel of time #wot reread #robert jordan #wheel of time spoilers #wot spoilers #rand al'thor #tam al'thor #narg

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yeonghan-bh · 6 months

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skibbidy beep bop boo what is up its ya girl soggy unmicrowaved nuggets aka sun back here with a second muse that i swore up and down was not going to become a thing but say hello to no impulse control (hi that's me!)

i am here to introduce my bad decision, cho yeonghan rivers !

fulfilling the canon role mock orange after lots of questions with our dear admin! i bring to you darker themes with rivers! explicit details weren't described in his app or background but you guys probably get the gist of dark, gorey and grimey. see below the cut and give this a liddol like, i will swim swam into dms and! this is a secondary blog so any asks/likes from rivers' account will come through yeonsu's!

trigger warnings: child abandonment

TLDR

born to a couple that came from a community of the past monarch's supporters and people in the small unknown town of hwabok. they basically became a cult with the mentality they had hoping that the late monarch's line would one day return to rule.

the couple found comfort in each other because neither of them wanted to continue living in that environment. after they got married, it wasn't long before they became pregnant with their first child. however, the thought of raising their child in such a place started pushing them over the edge until it became obvious to everyone that their views did not align with the community!

basically, they were named as traitors and given the ultimatum of paying for their betrayal with their lives, or paying for their freedom with their firstborn. (think rumplestiltskin!)

the fear of dying was heavy and even more because the threat was very real to them and their unborn child. so they made the unspeakable decision of leaving their child behind to spare all their lives.

abandoned, the child was given the name 'yeong' as curse in meaning he had nothing and no one wanted him. however, the village elder who came to be responsible for him changed his name to yeonghan so that he would have a more respectable name he would be able to carry with pride one day.

yeonghan was the mark of shame for the community and it was made clear to him from a young age. he had no control of his life and lived to complete the dirty work and biddings for the community.

the name rivers came to after someone overheard his conversation with the elder taking care of him- telling him to take the path of least resistance like a river. the idea of yeonghan living only to bend to everyone's wills was quickly spread amongst the people and everyone soon called him rivers as another reminder of his cursed life.

however, the comparison given to him was that the path of least resistance would always lead him to finding a way and so yeonghan wore the name rivers with silent pride.

growing up, yeonghan was able to secretly develop his artistic skill thanks to the elder who took care of him. it was with their hidden support that he was able to create art and sell them in secret whenever any traveling merchants passed through town. this was how he earned enough money to finally escape the town following the death of the elder.

he's been in beonhwa for about four years now and has tried to live a quiet life. however, not long after his arrival to beonhwa, he was found by one of the townspeople who exposed his true identity as hwabok's dirty dog for those in support of the past monarch.

this made things difficult for rivers to truly start new, however, he was able to make do by continuing to sell art and using his skills to gain favor with certain nobility.

however, when rivers is in a pinch and needs quick cash, he has no issue turning to his past and taking on any dirty work from those looking to have things done in secrecy within beonhwa.

PERSONALITY

the biggest cynic and pessimist

but also the biggest romanticist?? it's the artist in him tbfr

lowkey mean af but it's just bec he doesn't give a fuck about people really

but he minds his own business so... if he does something to offend you, it's because you weren't minding your business! aka dont talk to him at all!

okay okay he isn't always taking shots at people but he isn't the brightest ray of sunshine out there but he does have the type of judgemental stare that will keep you up at night second-guessing yourself about if what you did was stupid or not

heavy chain-smoker and has recently switched over to herbal smokes now that he's out of the hellhole that town was

PLOTS

rivers' identity and origins aren't hidden. not after the way it was publically exposed following his arrival to beonhwa, and he's never done anything to shed or erase the past from his image. the community has mixed reactions about his presence in beonhwa and sometimes he's still referred to as hwabok's dirty dog. someone spits this to his face one day— maybe your muse defends him or maybe your muse agrees with them.

your muse is a collector of art and one day sees one of rivers most known pieces floating around. they want to commission something from him.

a fire has started in one of the fields in the outskirts and rivers happens to be nearby. after some investigation, a cigarette butt is found and seeing a chance- people immediately accuse rivers as the culprit. the cigarette butt they find in question however has traces of tobacco versus the rolled flower petals present in rivers pockets.

someone wants to hurt your muse and rivers was hired to carry out the deed?

#bhrp:intro #ooc ✘#— i tried ;;#— if ur cool with a random starter before deport plotting or in gen throw down an emoji in the replies and ill chuck that out!

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loremaster-lavellan · 11 months

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With Love, from Skyrim - Letter 2

Project information here.

Letter to Maela

Maela, Promise you'll keep our letters between us. I don't want Alma and Ata to worry, and I can't tell Llaren every dismal detail. He'd worry too. Try not to worry yourself either. They're fighting a civil war here. There's a skirmish outside the city every other day, I swear. I've seen more corpses than I ever care to again, and I've stopped wondering why there's so much junk in the river. I injured my leg the other day. Tripped while running from wolves. Nothing serious, but poultices and the supplies to make them cost more than I've yet to make in a week, so I'm stuck inside the walls while it heals on its own. I've already learned to stay indoors after dark, and now I can't leave during the day. If you told me the farm was better, I'd come running back home. But I made too many promises to turn back. Things will get better. They HAVE to. Check on Llaren for me, will you? Love, Your favorite (and only) injured brother.

Letter to Alma and Ata

Alma and Ata, I won't lie, it's not easy here in Windhelm, but I've earned enough coin to send some home to you! Fishing is a reliable, if meager, source of income. These Nords throw a lot of junk in the river, and there's always a market for fresh fish. When I've saved enough, I'll buy a bow and try my luck hunting. I've also met a treasure hunter or two who speaks of wealth found exploring crypts and ruins. How are your lungs, Ata? Are you sleeping, Alma? I hope neither of you worry too much. I'm not having much fun - it's always cold and work is hard - but I've got a warm place to sleep, and I'm not going hungry. There's a civil war here, a disagreement on religion, but I'm safe inside the city. If anything, it strengthens my faith in the True Tribunal. I hear there's a shrine to Azura a ways east of Windhelm. Perhaps I'll pay her a visit when I get out on the road. Three watch over you, Llaren.

Letter to Llaren

Llaren, I hate fishing. People on the docks watch me when I fish there like they think I'm up to something. So I got outside the city to a spot down the river and fish off an abandoned sawmill. It IS peaceful, but when it's peaceful, all I can think about is how alone and far from home I am, and every rusty scrap the merchants refuse to buy reminds me how far I am from everything I promised you. I can see Windhelm from here. I don't want to go back, but I'm not capable of traveling alone. So I'll fish for now. Hope I pull up something worth some coin. One day, I'll be able to handle the roads and the wilderness, and I'll leave Windhelm and never return. Tell me something good from home if you can. Tell me what you want in our future, in our house. I WILL build us a house. With love, Fels.

Drawings done traditionally (colored pencil on toned tan paper), and added to the paper digitally. Just using Procreate now - my Adobe subscription finally ended, and I refuse to pay for it, so we're getting creative with editing.

#with love from skyrim #fels othara #the elder scrolls #skyrim #dark elf #traditional art #colored pencil #morrowind #letter writing

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alienducky · 1 year

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I am once again over thinking things and getting ramble-y about them, and this time it's the Fire Emblem Three Houses Academy Gronder fight, and also a little on traveling

We see in the cut scene that we have more or less a small army of generic NPC's for each house. Which is fine, makes sense, we are recreating an actual war. The students are learning how to be army officers and effectively direct others, we need them to have people to boss about. Besides their personal battalions

There's also Rhea and Seteth and a bunch of random Seiros guards standing at the top of a cliff watching the battle...

Actually I'm going to get sidetracked a moment, because wtf is up with that cliff they stand on? Pretty sure Bergliez territory, aka the bread basket of Fodlan, is "a fertile area near the Airmid River that is well-suited for agriculture". Giant fucking cliffs are not generally conducive to plant farming. Sheep or goat farming, sure. But not crops like wheat. And watching the scene again, there's pretty steep cliffs to the north as well, and I just... Sigh. I know Bergliez is a big territory and probably has multiple terrain types in it, but given what we see in the Houses scene, it's difficult to imagine the majority is nice and flat and plough-able and this is the only cliffy bit. I think I almost prefer the Hopes version of the map...? Actually that's pretty hilly too, though I don't immediately remember background cliffs. Do remember someone saying the Alliance are nice for not torching fields as they left, so maybe this fight area is the one odd spot surrounded by fields? Eh. The game has dragons. Guess I can live with fucked up geography.

Anyway. Back to my original points.

First part is the three colour armies. Who are they? Does each country send some of their own soldiers to help with the mock battle, temporarily lowering their own defenses? Or are they all Serios knights getting to play dress up for the day, meaning a huge chunk of the church army is here? Or are they even the other house students, since we see hundreds of those wandering around, and in Hopes we meet people who say they were in our class/year at the academy (which leads me down a tangent of how I think the academy works, but I can talk about that if anyone's interested). And how long have the houses had to get to know these people, to learn quirks and go over orders and strategies and sneaky plans? Or is it a "You won't always know who you're commanding in a war, tell these people you've never met before what to do in the next five minutes"?

Secondly, there really is a fair few people here for the fight. I'd say at least 100 per colour. At least. And they all had to somehow get there. And we know the students and Seiros lot at least had to come from the Monastery, and the route they take goes through the Alliance and across the bridge at Myrddin. And I could work out the specifics of how long that would take thanks to the amazing sevarix-blogs doing some pretty neat maths, but I'm going to generalise and say several days to get there, and then several days to get back. Because that's definitely not a "there and back in a day" trip. And you lose time setting up and breaking down camps when you travel, especially for that many people.

Which means they're going to clog up the roads. Like. A lot. There's several hundred people all plodding along with their mounts, plus probably supply wagons and healers and other assorted people not involved in actual fighting. This whole thing has got to be so annoying for anyone who lives along the route and needs to use the road while they're on it. Because the procession of people and mounts and vehicles is gonna be long and bulky and noisy, and generally speaking Fodlan roads dont look that great. I can easily imagine any merchant caravans going the opposite way being "encouraged" to move off the road so they can all get past so Rhea isn't inconvenienced

(Though I admit, that's just my take on the Church people. I think Rhea would probably be pretty cool about it, and not want others inconvenienced on her behalf. Her cultfollowers though? Icky)

Or is long distance large group warping a thing that Rhea allows for this yearly event, and possibly the weekend missions where we go to bloody Sreng (which is a whole other thing, because when we go kill bandits do we go through Faerghus, or up to Derdriu and hop on a boat? I have so many questions), but conveniently isn't available post time skip when we need to move our army around? Or maybe it is, since there's no other logical reason to come back to Garreg Mach each month when we'd just need to immediately turn around and leave again

#duckpond stuff #fe3h

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artisticbunny · 1 year

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Hello Bun! I have magically manifested within your inbox to ask you about…

Your OCs!

One of my anon subordinates (totally not me telling my friends about you no way) previously asked about your number of them, but I want to know who they are!! >:3c Any like, story or interaction or certain universe or specific aesthetics? Feel free to infodump Bun I’m all ears!!

(Sorry if this seems a little too pushy I just saw your reblog and was like ‘why don’t I be a good lad and prance on over eh?’ So here we are! :3 I hope you don’t mind!)

AAAAA HI MOOG!!! THANK YOU FOR GIVING ME THIS EXCUSE ILY DJDBDHE

IM SO EXCITED TO INFODUMP ABOUT MY CHARACTERS I LOVE THEM SO MUCH!!!!

I ACTUALLY HAVE THE FIRST CHAPTER OF THEIR STORY UPLOADED TO AO3 AND IM WORKING ON THE SECOND!!!

Buckle in cuz this is gonna be a long post lol

I’m not gonna reveal everything cuz there have to be some tricks up my sleeves, but I’m gonna be talking about major plot stuff that isn’t in the first chapter so, uh, spoiler warning also X3

OK!!!! SO MY MAIN CHARACTER BROOK IS BABEY AND I LOVE HER!!!! ABUSE TW THO CUZ BOY HOWDY THIS BABY TRAUMATIZED.

Basically the start of the story happens as she’s running away and escaping from her abusive household, this story takes place in a fantasy world so it’s more of a tower than a house but yk.

Her “mother” is this kind of just,,, awful person that basically just was using Brook as free labor. Like, she found Brook as a toddler literally abandoned by this little brook river thing and called her “Brook Child” because she couldn’t be assed to give her a proper name. There isn’t any actual physical hitting or anything to the abuse but god, if there isn’t just a buttload of neglect and verbal/psychological abuse going on. It’s not uncommon for Brook to have been locked in the basement for days on end without food because she did something wrong.

Brook physically is super scrawny because of this, like you can easily see her bones. She has CONSTANT, DEEP dark circles under her eyes that will probably never go away, and is often fatigued. She has a long scar going down one side of her face (her left, our right), caused by an incident with setting up chicken wire. Between her not knowing how to really deal with that kind of wound at the time and the fact that she’s constantly malnourished, it left a pretty noticeable scar

ALSO FUN FACT BROOK IS AROACE CUZ YIPPEE REPRESENTATION!!!!

After she runs away her plan is to get a few supplies so she can go live on her own because the only real experience she has with other people is her “mother” and just really wants to not be around people who she thinks are going to hurt her… uuunfortunately for her she ends up being peer pressured by a merchant into buying an enchanted dagger that uses up basically ALL OF HER MONEY SHE SAVED UP.

Said dagger comes with a prophecy and is, surprise! Sentient! Yeah so now basically she’s forced to go on this quest now! No living alone in the woods in peace for her! She ends up naming the dagger Willow because of a beautiful willow tree engraving at its base and for the fact that it’s handle is modeled after a winding tree trunk (with THOUSANDS of engraved TINY little symbols and glyphs and spells and the like that looks a lot like tree bark!)

Willow uses she/it pronouns because yes! The engravings that are so tiny you can barely see and make them out is what makes Willow sentient! It’s VERY complex spellwork and may have taken even over a lifetime to create! She is very well crafted :)

She is also VERY blunt. Willow doesn’t understand the complexities of like… softening the blow of its words, so it doesn’t even really try lol. Basically it’s like “ah yeah, you are my wielder so you ARE the one from the prophecy, there’s not any getting out of it, let’s go!”

Willow’s one purpose is to complete the prophecy and is ultimately loyal to Brook till the end because of this. Unfortunately, Willow will sometimes bend the rules Brook set for the greater good of completing the quest. (During their first meeting Brook set the ground rules of no killing, and no hurting people unless absolutely necessary.)

During like, the first few hours after she leaves the trade town she fled to to go get this quest over with she gets jumped by this like 7 foot dude in black armor. This is Quincy.

I love him because there are… a lot of complexities with him lol

Without getting into huge spoiler territories, basically, where he comes from, the prophecy is told differently to the point of where Brook is made out to be the villain of the story. He is trying to protect his family and his home. When scouting her out, he is surprised to see that she’s basically just a kid, but decides to go through with the attack anyways as an attempt to stop the prophecy from being fulfilled.

Brook doesn’t know about this rendition of the prophecy.

So basically he attacks Brook, and Brook tries to reason with him to the absolute best of her ability. Quincy, however, is not open to conversation at that point. With willow’s guidance, she ends up killing him.

She is stunned by this. She watches as he bleeds out on the ground and turns to Willow.

She’s like “we agreed on no killing, this guy looks pretty dead to me!!!” (She’s obviously more panicked than this in the actual story lol)

Willow is like “ok ok fine hold me near him give me a second.”

A fun fact about Willow is that she can act as a channel for magic, and use her wielder’s supply. So when Willow uses a spell, the spell treats Brook as the caster even though Willow is effectively the one to have cast the spell.

This is important because, well, Willow uses NECROMANCY. A FORBIDDEN SPELL. ONE THAT IS FORBIDDEN FOR A GOOD REASON.

In this world, when someone is brought back through the use of necromancy they get revived, yes. BUT THEY ALSO BECOME TRAPPED INSIDE THEIR OWN BODIES AS THEYRE PUPPETED AROUND BY THE CASTER. This tactic was used a LOT in wars before it was outlawed btw, just some world building dont mind me :)

Yeah so basically when under the effects of Necromancy you just have to watch as your body has to follow whatever orders the caster gives you, whether you like it or not. Because it’s the spellcaster’s life force that’s inside of you.

(I have a WHOLE magic system thought out btw, magic is part of living being’s life force. Without it you basically starve. It’s like air and food and water, you NEED it to live, which is why Brook going on a quest to save it is such a big deal)

Obviously Willow is like “here, he should fight with us now :)” and brooks just there like “…” =n= because she knows something is off but she can’t put her finger on it yet but this guy is acting REALLY weird now.

Even being cooped up her hole life as she was, KNOWS THIS SPELL IS FORBIDDEN. So when she finds out it was used, she is rightly upset. She doesn’t know the FULL extent of the spell, she doesn’t know if he’s still THERE or if it’s just his corpse or WHAT, but she feels horrible about the situation and tries to give him as much kindness and freedom as she possibly can. Quincy cannot speak, but is later able to communicate better as he’s given more and more agency. (Given the right circumstances, he MAY be able to regain speech in the future ;) )

Over the course of this situation he kinda goes from absolutely despising Brook, to like “ok… this really is just a kid, I kinda feel really bad now” to “oh my god wait this kid is actually really sweet” to “this is my kid now”

He basically adopts Brook towards the end lol

Brook doesn’t really realize this is happening until about mid-way through the story when she goes to get firewood and says if anyone else in the group wants to they can come with her and he goes with her and she realizes she was addressing the whole group and that they can come if they WANT to. And then she just looks up at him and is like… “did you WANT to come with me?” And he just nods at her and she almost cries lol

I just love them, your honor. Quincy = dad of the year (iiif you get past the bit where he tried to kill Brook but yk lol)

OK NEXT WE HAVE SAM AND JOE!!! MY BOYS!!! THEY ARE BOYFRIENDS!!!!! THEY LOVE EACHOTHER!!!! RELATIONSHIP GOALS!!!

Sam is a wizard and Joe is a werewolf, they’re trying to find Joe’s tether (what will let him stay sane when transformed) they met with Joe in a dumpster and Sam trying to throw out that week’s trash from his apprenticeship <3

Joe comes from a loving family of werewolves and was born as one, his biggest fear is hurting his loved ones, which is why he was so desperate to find his tether. It’s also why he was rooting through wizard’s trashcans when Sam found him lol

They made a deal that Joe would stay out of trashcans (because of the dangerous chemicals and broken glass and stuff) if Sam would help him find his tether.

Sam didn’t actually like his apprenticeship. He was forced into it by his parents because he was “talented” and showed signs of developing into a talented wizard. He once loved performing magic, but being an apprentice stripped it of all of its fun. He neglected his work, causing him to fall behind, he is now self conscious and does not like it when people watch him cast spells.

Sam and Joe bonded over researching to find Joe’s tether and eventually fell in love. They both ran away not long after on a search for any more information they didn’t already have.

Also Joe is afraid of sheep :)

(“I don’t like it when they stare at you with those beady little eyes-“)

Kat is a ghost. She doesn’t remember her past, but she does remember waking up in the middle of the woods one day and never being able to find a way out. She had been alone for god knows how long before someone passed through (that being Brook, Willow, Quincy, Sam, And Joe) so obviously, she had to play a prank on them. GOLDEN opportunity for some entertainment.

Kat has claustrophobia (and because it’s never being revealed in the book I’ll reveal it here: she was buried alive. Framed for a crime she didn’t commit by someone in her adventuring group. The group’s agreed on punishment was for her to be buried alive and abandoned.) often getting flashbacks of suffocating, of cool dirt sticking to her face, muffling her screams and pleas for help.

Kat is very laid back and likes to make light of heavier situations with humor. She is a LOT smarter than she lets on, and has a very strong sense of moral justice. She also has a talent of apperating knives from her ghostly fog. She is very skilled at knife throwing.

Terra (Full name Terra Delah Etang) is a siren originating from Ckorplek, an underwater city found in the mesa reefs. She was a mighty warrior (arguably the strongest and most skilled with her voice) tasked with protecting her people’s most prized possession during an invasion. She dragged herself across the red sand, lake hopping for days before settling in a far off small pond-sized salt water body of water with a small island in the center. She would stay there for years protecting the item with her life. Unfortunately, Brook needs that item for her quest and Terra isn’t exactly willing to give it up.

Yeah they basically kidnap and gag her so she can’t make them kill themselves with her voice lol

They’re not just gonna leave her to die but they’re ALSO not gonna risk their lives letting her go free.

She is a reluctant party member, but as long as she’s with her people’s treasure and she’s able to make sure it’s safe, she isn’t super like… against it? Also they’re her only ticket back to her pond since they are basically wheeling her around in a red wagon full of water lol she still kinda hates them tho

Terra is super hotheaded and isn’t that forgiving of a person so it takes a while before she opens up lol

(She’s kind of like the boblin the goblin of the group in a way if you think about it lol)

Corey is half dead.

During his life, he took care of his mother and younger sister by going on quests and bringing back money. He would often ally with other adventurers to do this, and had a habit of only taking what his family needed of the rewards.

One day, on a quest to Dread Caverns- a cave system known for making your worst fears come to life- as they neared the center, where their prize was, he was betrayed.

Busted up in the fight, and with his head cracked open, he fell to the ground, left for dead, as the team he allied with ran off without him.

Fortunately for him, he landed on a healing potion he kept strapped to himself. Just in case. In the moments just after his heart stopped beating but just before his brain activity died, the glass pierced his skin, and the potion flowed into his body.

Because of this one in a billion timing, Corey was able to survive, subsisting mostly off of the world’s magic. He no longer has a heartbeat, and his left arm and leg no longer work, but he was alive, and stuck in dread caverns for about three years before Brook found him.

Corey has killed before in self defense. During his time In Dread Caverns many would come with the goal of killing him in mind, as rumors would spread of him being the reason the caverns were so dangerous.

Next is a reoccurring antagonist: Zeki.

They use She/They pronouns ;)

Zeki first appears after Dread Caverns in the story and is a well known infamous robber. She is known for kidnapping a member of her target group, and hypnotizing them to give her information and or infiltrate the group in order to easily incapacitate them. She smells of metal and is always followed by the sound of ticking clocks. She has multiple pocket watches hidden on her person at all times.

Zeki was originally the daughter of a prestigious family. They were expected to be perfect every second of every day, and were forced to learn parlor tricks to entertain guests. She would often sneak off into the middle of the night in order to destress and indulge in their true passion, whittling wood into beautiful sculptures. This went on for a long time before they were found out. All of her work was burned and destroyed, and she was cast out of the family with just the clothes on her back, and her grandfather’s pocket watch.

She almost starved before out of pure desperation they attempted one of the parlor tricks they learned. Light hypnosis. She managed to convince a passer by to give her some of their bread, and that was the beginning of their new life. Zeki would get more and more powerful every time they practiced.

Hypnosis only ever lasts from 3-5 days, but varies between that from person to person. Even after recovery, a person may relapse.

FINALLY!!! MY BOI!!!! CORVUS!!!

My lil plague doctor guy!!! I love him!!!

He never takes off his mask, he just doesn’t feel comfortable with it. The only reason he would take it off ever would be to clean it (even then, he makes sure nobody is around) or during a medical emergency.

Corvus is an actual, trained doctor! Which is part of the reason that Zeki decided to keep him as a part of their hypnotized entourage.

He is a sweet and caring guy, and just wants what’s best for everyone! No dark backstory for him other than being a part of Zeki’s crew for a bit, he’s just a lil guy! :3

I’m so sorry this is so long and I’m also sorry about the decrease in writing quality as it goes on lol this took me hours to type out XD

THANK YOU FOR THIS OPPORTUNITY TO INFODUMP IF YOU HAVE ANY SPECIFIC QUESTIONS ABOUT ANYTHING LET ME KNOW ID BE HAPPY TO ANSWER!!!!

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amewinterswriting · 2 years

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Happy Worldbuilding Wednesday! Let's talk about food. What are some common foodstuffs one might find in your world? What might you eat every day? And are there special foods for holidays?

Oof, took a long time thinking about this.

Agorned: Big variety depending on regions.

For example, Anika grew up further north than most, and her family were very good at supplementing root vegetables and squashes with (not quite entirely legal) game, wildlife, foraged berries, nuts and mushrooms - knowledge which has helped her live rather self-sufficiently when travelling.

Riccardo grew up in a more southern, fertile climate, where bread, leafy greens, cultivated fruits, oils and soft cheeses were more common and meat was a very rare treat for holidays only.

Notte grew up in a small village on a busy merchant route, so while exotic spices, chocolate and coffee would be seen and possibly even smelt, they were too expensive to buy. Everyday food was often whatever leftovers the coaching inn (where he worked and lived) had going spare - usually large one pot meals like soups and stews that can be prepared in vast quantities and portioned out when ordered. Lots of grains and legumes, often fish on account of the river, occasionally chicken when there's a few too many roosters or the hens aren't laying anymore.

Sierra grew up in a religious orphanage/nunnery. They grew all their own food and herbs, preserving a lot for the winter. So pickles, jams and chutneys were a common part of meals, along with honey from the hives. Salted or smoked meat wasn't unheard of, but not especially common. Soups, porridges and casseroles were very common as they're easy to prepare for larger groups and easily adapted to whatever is currently in season.

Across a continent, over in the desert, there's far more access to spices and rich foods like chocolate and coffee and nuts - so much so that even abandoned children might know what they taste like. Of course, that might be because they have been lucky enough to pilfer some off a merchant's stall without getting caught. Or it might have been a bribe, to encourage a child to divulge any interesting information they may have heard. Or it might have been a gift in an attempt to lure a child into danger...but regardless of how, most street kids are definitely aware of what chocolate is and how far they would be willing to go to procure more.

#worldbuilding #writing #ame talks #agorned #writblr #it's still world building Wednesday for ten minutes here!#I'm not procrastinating procrastination #you are #long post #my writing #ask game

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boggleoflight · 1 year

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11, 12, and 24 for the comfort ask meme!

Thank you so much! :3

11. What is an item of clothing/an accessory that completes them/makes them feel safe?

The first and most obvious answer is her coat/Ala Mhigan gown, but I've spoken at length about that one. For a while, she also found a lot of comfort in a carnation earring given to her by a merchant who would pass through her village. He was the only non-Miqo'te (a Dunesfolk Lalafell named Sosoliro) she'd see with any sort of regularity and was kind of an uncle to her and F'ystran when they were growing up. He was in the village when the Calamity struck and was unfortunately killed, and she wore the earring in memory of him.

It was unfortunately torn out of her ear during the battle with Zenos at the end of Endwalker, and she's since decided to forgo earrings going forward because of it. She still thinks of it, and of Sosoliro, very fondly.

12. What is their safe place? And what does “safe place” mean to them?

Paradoxically, on an emotional level, it's the vague concept of 'the road'. When she is given the chance to wander with no particular aim and no risk of the world ending (or of her being attacked by gods know what), she finds the most peace and security when she's on the move. On a bit of a sadder level, a part of it is being uncomfortable staying in one place too long at a time because she feels it makes her too easy to find for people who would wish her ill. Staying in Sharlayan post-EW was a bit of an exercise in understanding that things, for a while, were peaceful, and neither she nor her friends were too much at risk.

It's made all the more a safe place for her when travelling with friends (and G'raha).

24. How do they relax? Is that a solitary activity, a group activity, or both?

The two major ones are reading and bathing. The former, she loves to do with G'raha. Quiet, her snuggled up with her back to his chest and him reading over her shoulder, occasionally murmuring things to each other. Their favourite topics to read about in those moments are history and folklore. (There's also less-relaxing reading dates, though, where they're studying and very excitedly bouncing off walls over what they're reading.)

Bathing is mostly solitary when she very much needs to sit in her own head for awhile. However, as a Miqo'te (and a Seeker who grew up by a river to boot), she's no stranger to communal bathing and is not too shy about things like hot springs or bathhouses. It makes for a fun bonding activity, and is a good way to relax with friends.

#yllis #my wol #thank you again!!#i like to think that during stormblood she would go to the hot springs in kugane to unwind with lyse and tataru #ask games

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monsieuremjaydee · 2 years

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Sustainable Consumption

I needed to get rid of my couch. I was moving. The thing was in good condition and with the furniture shortage going on at the time I figured someone will certainly take it off my hands. The only thing that was wrong with it were these filthy fuzz balls all over the seats and the back. Otherwise, primo.

I may have lied a little. MY idea was to chop the couch up with an axe and throw it out the balcony since it would be a lot of work to bring it out to the curb for the garbage men. MY WIFE’S idea was to sell it. So I ordered one of those battery powered fabric shavers to see if it could make my fuzz ball problem go away.

Two days later I’m in my living room patiently shaving the couch while watching Game of Thrones. It took some time, I’ll admit, because the shaver is small and the couch was big and I was also trying to pay attention to the show because you don’t want to miss anything being that GOT is so unpredictable. You look away from the screen for two seconds and suddenly the main character is dead.

Anyway, I shaved the thing top to bottom and left to right and once I finished I couldn’t believe what I saw. A brand-new couch. I called my cat to the living room and asked him to try and stay off the couch because I plan on selling it and now that it’s nice and shaved I don’t want to deal with cleaning cat hair off it.

Another two days go by and I got some guy coming to scoop up the couch. I grabbed one of those sticky roller things and, just as the doorbell rang, managed to finish rolling off all the cat hair. “Top of the morning to ya,” the guy says to me in a British accent.

“Good morning,” I respond. “You have someone with you to help carry the couch?” I asked, signaling that it won’t be me.

“My mate is in the car,” he says. “I’ll cast an eye at the couch and fetch him over if we strike a deal. If you don’t mind?”

Fishy, but ok. I stepped aside, “come right in.”

He starts inspecting the couch like it was some exotic animal, just short of sniffing the seats. Then starts negotiating, trying to sound all smart with his British accent, using words like “depreciation” and “time decay” but I’m not fooled. “Look chief,” I say, “the price is what the price is. I got fourteen other inquiries about this here couch,” I gave it a tap, “all willing to pay premium. Take it or leave it, guy.”

Here’s the thing, I spent six months in London during college and that cured me from thinking that people who talk with a British accent are smarter than me. There was this pretty girl in my Shakespeare course with the most profound Brit accent you could imagine — long story short — her and I decided to see the Merchant of Venice together at the Shakespeare Globe as part of a class assignment. We met up at the Mile End subway station on what might have been a Thursday afternoon and took the Central Line to St. Paul’s, then walked across Millennium Bridge.

“Is that a river or a lake?” the girl asks me, pointing to the body of water beneath us.

I stopped. Could she possibly be THAT stupid? I wished she had asked me what the name of the river was. I could easily justify that. She was from northern England, it was only her second week in London, never been before, wasn’t much into geography. But this… this was hard to get around. “Well, do you know the fundamental difference between a river and a lake?” I asked.

She squinted her eyes and stared at me with a finger pressed to her lips.

I offered a hint. “One is still, the other moves.”

“Yes!” she exclaimed. “I always forget which is which…”

“This one moves. It flows. See?” I pointed down.

“Um-hm, yea. So, it’s a… La…”

“R…”

“River!”

“Exactly,” I said. “River.” I guess not everybody has to be a limnologist. But let me tell you something. Had she insisted for long enough in that British accent that Thames was in fact a lake, there was a time in my life that I would have believed her.

In any case, you get my point — not falling for it. Not today.

“Take it or leave it, guy,” I say to the Englishman. “Let me fetch my mate,” he says, and in just a few quick minutes I was short a couch and long five hundred bucks. Yea, you heard that right. $500.

All that to say this. You don’t have to throw your old things out. You can sell them.

#sustainability #fiction writing #fiction #reading #books #short story #esg

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dammitadolfnomorecake · 2 years

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**Cultivating Love**12**

Lance was sad to part ways with the merchants, but he was relieved that they’d reach their destination safely. Leaving them, they’d had gifts forced upon them. Pidge immediately saddened by the lack of shiny treasures as payment, while Hunk was happy for the food. For his part, Lance had been gifted a new robe, simple and made of blue he accepted it as gracefully as he could, ignoring Pidge’s complaints about not getting one herself. He’d wanted to stay in the village longer, but he also wanted to hurry to the mermaid clan as soon as possible. That Shiro hadn’t replied made his heart ache. He hadn’t wanted a reply, or so he told himself, yet deep down he’d hoped for something to come telling him that he was missed and to come home.

From the village to sea was a three day ride. The road much more worn, and much less treacherous. The town they were now at was a bustling port, Lance supposing that calling it a city would be more accurate. The scent of the ocean calming, as were the sounds of the gulls overhead. The fox clan backed onto a river that lead to an estuary, strongly reminding him of the days when he and his siblings had been carefree. He’d not been home in two decades, but that was hardly unusual for a fox who’d chosen the same path as him. From the port they’d take a ship, then take a smaller boat to the cove where mermaids would come to meet with travellers. Provided they were deemed worthy enough, they’d be allowed into the palace there.

“This place is as big as I remember it”

Nearly falling out her saddled as she craned her head to see everything, Lance could only shake his head. There were gambling dens a plenty, and he had the feeling Pidge would make the most of it

“We need to secure lodgings first, then we’ll some fun”

“You’re always so serious. Have you thought what you’re going to do if we have to wait for a ship?”

“I’m trying not to. I dread to think that Keith’s still following us, or about his conversations with Matt”

“You can’t be mad at Matt if he’s told Keith anything”

“I can too. Your brother is a flirt. I barely escaped his clutches”

Swaying a little in his saddle, Lance played it off cool by pretending he was trying to find whatever it’d been that Pidge was looking at. Since writing to Shiro he hadn’t felt the best, an ache settling deep inside his head that hadn’t left. Normally a person’s heart hurt when love was involved, yet Lance put it down to actively trying not to wait for a reply that’d never come. A good bath, a good meal, and good lot of wine would soon have the problem solved. Hunk had tried speaking to him, but Lance still couldn’t give him the answer he wanted, considering he still didn’t know what it was. Pidge sighed heavily over Matt

“One day I’m not going to be grossed out, but that day is not today. Let’s find somewhere nice to stay”

“Sounds good to me. I want to bath before we head out. Let me know if you see anywhere interesting”

Securing lodgings at the inn, Lance was downhearted to hear the next boat they needed wouldn’t come for another week, though thankfully they wouldn’t have to wait another month after that one for the next one. Paying extra for a private bath, he left Pidge and Hunk to organise their things, before heading to the bath alone.

There was nothing quite like hot water and soap after a hard ride. He’d become soft compared to the weeks they’d have to on the battlefield between bathing. Unwrapping his feet, he’d soaked them first, before letting himself sink into the welcomed warmth. There were a fair few beasts in the area, so even if Keith did come looking, hopefully he’d find someone else… especially now he feared corruption was setting in.

Eyeing his toes at the end of the bath, they’d lost feeling. At first he thought it was from his new boots, but the blackness that had set in wasn’t. The internal turmoil of his life was now affecting his health. Pidge and Hunk couldn’t know. They’d worry too much and should he fall further, he wanted his last days to be spent in happiness with his best friends before his death. But that didn’t mean he wanted to die. He wanted to live more than anything. He wanted to watch Hunk and Shay make a family, to see Pidge fall in love for the first time. He wanted to see Keith and Shiro, even for one last moment, before the cold blankness of eternity claimed him. He’d dealt with things just fine all this time that seemed funny that finally putting himself first would be the worst thing he could do. Tomorrow he’d find some time to finally sit and meditate. He’d listen to his body and try calm his mind… or even tonight while the others slept.

Closing his eyes, Lance started to doze. His mind reminding him of the way Keith would smile, and he could almost hear Shiro’s voice calling his name. Unaware of how low he was sinking in the water, he came up all at once, spluttering in shock over nearly drowning himself.

“Lance!”

A shock ran through him. There was no way… yet he suddenly felt sure he’d just heard his name called by Shiro

“Lance, look in the mirror”

He had to be going crazy… Shiro was no where near him. He was back in the palace…

“Lance, I can see you. I know you can hear me”

That was definitely Shiro’s voice… Lance felt foolish as he asked?

“Shiro?”

“I’m using the mirror. Can you see me?”

Confused and seeing no mirror, Lance rose from the bath, taking his robe and pulling it on

“I can hear you…”

If this was Pidge’s work, he was going to be genuinely mad at her

“The mirror seems to be on the table”

Looking around, Lance squeaked as he found the mirror in question across from him. Shiro had just seen him naked… his poor modesty destroyed

“Hello, Lance”

Rushing to the mirror, Lance couldn’t help himself. His pathetic heart doing flips in his chest

“What do you think you’re doing?!”

Shiro smiled. He smiled the smile that made Lance feel lucky when he saw it. The mirror itself wasn’t large, but large enough to make him ache to see Shiro properly

“I’ve been trying to reach you for days. I used the energy in your hair to find you… you’ve cut it, it’s a good look for you”

No. This wasn’t the time to let himself be swayed. Shiro could have used his magic to find him sooner if he’d wanted. And Lance was kicking himself for checking his bed for loose hairs before leaving. Still, his stupid hand went to his hair. Stupid feelings. He was only just getting that maybe he didn’t love Shiro like he loved Keith, but realising that properly was some time off yet

“That aside, what do you want?”

“You do see all, don’t you. Is Keith with you? I fear I upset him and left in a hurry”

Lance bit down a bitter laugh. Shiro only cared for Keith…

“Right. Keith. How could I think for a moment you’d be concerned with me? I told him to stay with you and if he left that’s not my responsibility. Don’t call me again”

“Lance… it’s not…”

“No. No. No. you don’t get to give me your excuses. I’m frankly amazed the pair of you noticed I left at all. I’m not coming back. You and Keith can run off and be happy without me. Thanks from breaking me out this illusion of thinking you may have cared. But I can see it now. I deluded myself for too long. Goodbye, Shiro”

Reaching out, Lance smashed the mirror. He didn’t care about whatever rebound Shiro suffered as the spell broke. Why had he been happy to see Shiro? Why did he even care? Shiro wasn’t as affectionate with him as Keith was. He thought their bond was built on mutual respect after all they’d been through on the battle field… So why was it that he was so upset about hearing what he already knew in his heart? Shiro as Keith. They had each other. They were both wolves and he was a fox… a fox that could never be a wolf no matter how hard he fought and no matter how much merit he earned.

Lance was drunk. Hunk had noticed a change in him when he’d come down from bathing, but there were few times he’d seen Lance drink to excess. It’d been fun at first. Lance and Pidge drinking and laughing. Lance smiling. Then it turned to Lance drinking when even Pidge wanted to stop.

Carrying his best friend back to the inn, he bid Pidge farewell for the night, continuing on and into Lance’s room where he laid his best friend out on his bed. It wasn’t until he was looking at Lance’s face that he realised Lance was conscious. The pain in his eyes stopping Hunk from leaving him

“Lance… What’s going on with you?”

Slowly tears formed and rolled down Lance’s cheeks. A soft sob escaping his lips as Hunk pulled him close

“I’m sure it’s not worth these tears. Tell me, what happened?”

“I was a fool, Hunk. An utter fool. I thought they loved me back”

Ah… Lance had drunk to numb his pain, only drinking had laid it raw before him again

“Oh, Lance”

“Shiro used my hair to track me. He… he spoke to me… but all he wanted to do was enquire about Keith! Why was I not good enough, Hunk? Was it because I touched Keith too much? Did I spend too little time taking care of Shiro!? I never wanted to be a burden but that’s all I was, was I not? I must have made such a fool of myself!”

Hunk wished Lance wouldn’t yell in his ear, but let it slide. He knew Lance deeply feared being a burden. He’d come from a large and warm family, but he’d also seemed to have a lot pain in his heart when they’d met. Hunk had been envious of the fox clans ways, but there’d been more to the story

“You’ve had a lot to drink. I’m sure things aren’t this bad”

“They are. I lost my temper. I told him I wasn’t coming back and to be happy with Keith. But… but I miss Keith. I thought they both held space in my heart equally. I thought… I know our relationship was different and we were never physical past light kisses and touches… but am I no different than a student who loves their master? Is my role any different? To be there in support? To ensure Shiro had more time. I was proud to do that, so why do these years of effort amount to nothing now? I’ve killed more demonic men and beasts than days I lived all for the glory of our emperor and for peace in the cultivator realm. I earned my rank. And I seem now to know nothing. I’m sorry, my friend. I shouldn’t be burdening you. I want our days to be happy while they last. You are right, I am drunk. I should sleep it off”

Lance clumsily pushed him away. Hunk wanted to ask Lance what he truly felt, but the alcohol would only wind him up further. It hurt to see Lance like this

“Even if you don’t love me like that, you are my best friend, Lance. Tomorrow will be a new day. Let me cover you up, and let’s get those boots off”

Either too drunk or too upset to care, Lance kept his back to him. Hunk pulling the thin blankets up to Lance’s shoulders before moving to take his boots off.

It was then he noticed. As the first boot slipped off his saw Lance’s toes. Letting his magic cautiously brush against the inky blackness, his heart dropped. He could feel the start of corruption. Taking Lance’s other boot off, he held his hands over Lance’s feet, feeling for the corrupt root inside his best friend. Lance surely had to have noticed. Perhaps that was why he’d acted the way he had when he’d come downstairs. Leaving Lance’s side, he fetched Lance’s needles. His chi regulation was blocked from his abdomen down. If his body couldn’t maintain the natural flow, then he had to assist. The purity of Lance’s heart had always been commented on… so now he’d trust in the purity of the Lance he knew to begin healing the damage before it spread.

Unlike Pidge and Lance who snored the night away, Hunk stayed up. He carefully watched the exceptionally slow change in Lance’s toes. Lance would twitch and move in his sleep, Hunk giving up on the needles a little before dawn, trusting his own strength as he focused. He’d never tried to clear corruption from one he loved, but he couldn’t not try.

Using too much of his energy, Hunk climbed into bed next to Lance. Lance immediately moving into his warmth as he wrapped his arm around his best friend. His chin felt better, and his snoring didn’t seem as nasally as before. But still… Why did Shiro have to reach out now? What exactly had been said? And why not first ask Lance how he was or why he’d left? He had the feeling Lance’s upset feelings had brought the conversation to a close with Shiro before Shiro had been able to explain his side of things. Not that he was defending Shiro. Asking first after Keith was a piss poor thing to do. Unless Shiro planned to assess if Lance and Keith had spoken then intended to explain his own side of things. Now he had what Lance said playing on a loop. That maybe Shiro and his relationship was never what Lance thought. It all felt too cruel.

Sleeping in a little for them, Lance woke before Hunk did. Hunk waking to find his best friend had been watching him sleep. He’d have been startled if it wasn’t that it was so very Lance

“Don’t tell me you’ve got an eye for bears now”

“Only platonically. Should I ask why you are in my bed?”

Right. This was his chance. Pidge wasn’t there and Lance couldn’t escape

“Yes, you should”

“Then was it because I got a bit drunk?”

“No. It’s because you’re falling into corruption and didn’t tell me!”

Lance flinched, Hunk’s tone was more angry growl than he’d meant it to be. Quickly he continued

“I saw your toes when I took your boots off for you”

“I suppose you won’t believe me if I said I thought it was from the new boots?”

“No, and I’d be insulted that you’d lie to me”

Lance sighed at him

“I honestly swear that last night I planned to meditate and assess my health internally. Now that we had a safe space for me to do so and our journey has paused… then Shiro called me… and I was just so mad”

“Lance…”

“I swear upon my fox mask I did intend to. You know I don’t make that promise lightly”

If Lance was swearing on his fox mask than Hunk knew it to be true

“How long?”

“A few days… maybe a little before we parted ways with the merchants. If we hadn’t had to wait for the boat I’m not sure what I would have done”

“You idiot. You know corruption can spread! Be thankful that I looked at them last night”

“You did?”

“Yes. I’ve done what I can, but I suggest you meditate as soon as possible. We have no plans set while we are here”

Lance nodded before snuggling into him

“Thank you, Hunk. Today I’ll meditate… but in return, I have a favour to ask of you”

“I don’t think you’re in any position to ask favours”

“Still, I will. I want you and Pidge to make a list. 5 things each you’d like to do while here and I will do the same. We’re here for 6 more days, we may as well make the most of it. I know I want to see the market place and there’s a few rare herbs I’d like to purchase. So I wouldn’t feel right dedicating our time solely to what I want. Can I ask that favour?”

It’d be easier for them to stay together and Hunk did have a few places that he wanted to go. Plus Pidge would gamble if she was left to herself

“Fine. You’re foolish, you know that right?”

“Oh, I’ve become somewhat aware. After breakfast I’ll set up my barriers and attempt to meditate. You should rest today, too”

“Maybe I would if I wasn’t worrying over you”

“I think it’s Pidge we’ll both need to worry over. I’m sure by now Shiro has sent word to Keith and we’ll be left to journey alone. I may have been a tad rash, but I’m now not sure if I don’t regret it”

“We both know you do. Don’t let him bother you”

“It’s a bit hard but I want to focus my time here with my two best friends. I’ll go get us breakfast, you rest a little longer. Thank you for your help. I don’t know what I did to deserve you”

“You’re fine, but don’t do it again. It hurts to think you can’t trust me”

“I do. Now sleep before I start singing”

Hunk faked a groan

“Anything but that. Don’t be long or I will send Pidge after you”

“Rude. I’ll remember this. Get some sleep, big guy”

Hunk rolled over to watch Lance leave. He’d have to think of an excuse to keep out of Lance’s way for the day… perhaps indulging her gambling would be the simplest and easiest way. Plus, there were a fair few things he wished to send back to Shay… He missed her so deeply. She’d probably be doing a better job of soothing things with Lance than he was. She and Lance seemed to get on well, so well that if they were blessed with a child they’d have liked to ask Lance to be their child’s master should they possess cultivation powers. For Shay’s sake he’d protect their small dream and, if he had to, he’d drag Lance back to the palace even if it meant his best friend fought him.

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notapaladin · 2 years

Text

if you’ve got love to get done

Plotless beach fluff? Plotless beach fluff.

Also on AO3

Acatl had thought he knew what a vast expanse of water looked like. Wasn’t their city on the biggest lake in the world? Hadn’t he grown up swimming and rowing across it? Hadn’t he dived into its depths? There was nothing left about the concept to surprise him anymore.

But when the litter paused and Teomitl pulled the curtains aside with a delighted, “Look, you can see the ocean from here!” he knew he’d been wrong.

Of course Cuetlachtlan had banquets and feasts and richly appointed rooms for the Revered Speaker of Tenochtitlan and his closest family, even the exalted High Priest of Mictlantecuhtli (Ichtaca had all but shoved him out the temple gates in an effort to get him to take a vacation). But the best part of the city was that it stood at the mouth of a river, emptying out into the sea.

Acatl would have preferred to wander the harbor with Teomitl, the press of the crowds giving him an excuse to hold hands. But the Revered Speaker’s free time had been claimed for diplomacy for two days now, and so he was here with only his brother and several local nobles, taking in a place as lively as the Tlatelolco markets.

No; moreso, because the Tlatelolco markets were orderly. This was chaos.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” their guide asked.

He nodded, trying to resist the urge to wince as the merchants haggling nearby broke into an argument. They might be dressed as noblemen—he’d refused to wear his full regalia, but Teomitl was inordinately fond of pressing little trinkets upon him—but that didn’t seem to affect the denizens of the harbor marketplace. Fishermen made their way through the crowds with baskets of fish, vendors shouted to show their wares, and children and small dogs wove their way through peoples’ legs.

And yet, it was still better than being at the palace. If he sat through one more poetry reading or dancers’ display acutely aware of how little he belonged there, he was going to scream.

Neutemoc was no help. The knowledge that Tenochtitlan’s Commander of the Jaguar Knights was unmarried had spread like wildfire, and he was in the middle of a circle of merchants all trying to sell him fine fabrics and jewels for courting gifts. The fact that many of those merchants were also pushing forward their pretty daughters was surely unrelated. Acatl couldn’t help but smile.

Unfortunately, Neutemoc saw it. “Acatl! Come over here, help me pick a gift for Mazatl.”

Acatl sighed and made his way through the crowd. Even when he wasn’t wearing priestly gray, people still made way for him. Apparently his necklace of skull-shaped beads was very effective. “That bolt of fabric, there. With the pink.”

Since the pink cotton in question was being proffered by a very lovely woman with her hair in a single long braid, Neutemoc gave him a dirty look. “You’re not helping,” he muttered.

“What?” It was long past time for Neutemoc to at least take some interest in remarrying, surely.

His brother drew closer, voice barely audible as he grumbled, “I know you’re happy, but married life is a lot different when you have to actually live with your wife, Acatl.”

He felt his face burn. Neutemoc had found out about him and Teomitl entirely by accident several years ago; he’d been terrified at first, certain his brother would truly despise him, but after the initial shouting had died down (and Teomitl had pointed out that threatening your Revered Speaker’s life was still technically treason even if he broke your siblings’ hearts, in which case he would hand Neutemoc the knife himself) they’d settled into a relatively peaceful truce. But that still didn’t make it less embarrassing, nor did it lessen the ache in his chest at the reminder that for all Teomitl loved him...well, it was hardly as though they could marry.

“Hrmph,” he muttered. “I think I’ll go for a walk.”

The harbor stretched for miles, but as he continued on some of the crowd started to disperse. He still attracted stares in his owl-embroidered loincloth and gold jewelry, but fewer people seemed to know or care what they meant, and he didn’t stop long enough for any of them to decide to bow. At any other time, he would have lingered; there were still merchants here, after all, and the smell of grilled fish fresh from the water was always tempting. But...

But he was alone, and there was no one here to eat it with him. (Teomitl. There was no Teomitl. Gods, he missed him.)

He kept walking along the shoreline. Soon he could barely hear the sounds of the market anymore; there was only the screaming of gulls and the low sigh of the wind. Only the steady lapping of waves tempting him to dip his feet in. The scattered glimpses of the ocean grew wider, until finally nothing stood in his way..

He turned and looked out, taking in the full sight of the sea before him.

On a clear day at home, he could see mountains in the distance. Here...here, there was nothing. Only endless blue stretching to the horizon to meet the blue of the sky above. Birds wheeled above his head, screaming defiance at him; out in the distance, he thought he saw the back of some great fish. He realized he was holding his breath.

There was absolutely nothing between him and the water. He took one step towards the shore and then another, letting out an unconscious sigh of relief as the sand went from scorching through the soles of his sandals to dark and wet and cold. He looked down at his feet, which seemed safer than looking out to sea, and wondered.

Well, there was no one here to see him. He knelt and untied his sandals, wiggling his toes in the damp sand. He was no stranger to wet sand, but this was grittier and more uniform, with not nearly as many rocks and—he was almost sure—nothing lurking in the waves to bite him. And it was blessedly cool, a balm compared to the heat everywhere else. He took a deep breath, let it out, and felt his whole body relax at once.

And then he heard footsteps behind him. Footsteps he’d know anywhere, quick and brash and beloved.

“Acatl!”

He turned, already smiling like a fool, to greet his Revered Speaker. His Revered Speaker, who’d managed at some point to escape the endless flood of diplomacy and slip out of the palace in plainer garb, only gold at his ears and lip and nose marking him as anyone important. (His Revered Speaker, who’d still managed to find him even though they were by now quite far from fresh water. It appeared there were some uses for ahuitzotls after all.)

“Teomitl,” he breathed, and pulled him into his arms.

Teomitl glued himself to him immediately, grinning up at him with utter lack of regard for the salt water soaking into his sandals. “Not Ahuitzotl-tzin?” he teased. “You’ve been so careful.”

Acatl couldn’t help but snort, but even that came out fond. He had been very careful, for the sake of their reputations if nothing else. “We’re finally alone now.”

“So we are.” Teomitl gave him a squeeze, pulling away just enough to meet his eyes. “Trust you to find the one spot we might get a little privacy with an entire city out to host us.”

Gods, Acatl wanted to kiss him. “You know I don’t like being treated with such deference.”

Teomitl’s eyes gleamed. “You don’t seem to mind on the mat,” he purred.

Even with all the years they’d been together, Acatl still felt his face burn and had to look out to sea again in a completely futile effort to hide it. “That’s—you are terrible.”

“But you love me,” Teomitl teased.

“...I wouldn’t have come this far if I didn’t.” It was the truth. Given the choice, he normally never left Tenochtitlan. But Teomitl had wanted to show him the ocean, and so here he was, looking out past the very end of the sea-ringed world into blue infinity. The light glittering off the waves stung his eyes.

He was aware of Teomitl turning in his arms to gaze out on the water with him. His voice was something close to reverent. “...What do you think of it? Truly?”

The wind whipped a loose lock of hair back from his face, carrying with it the sting of salt. Tucking it behind his ear would have meant removing an arm from around Teomitl’s waist, so he let it be. “...It’s beautiful,” he murmured. Not as beautiful as you.

Teomitl grinned, leaning against his shoulder. “They say it’s the edge of the world.”

“You don’t believe it?”

His lover hummed thoughtfully, giving the idle question more weight than it probably deserved. “I’ve learned that a lot of things are possible,” he said finally.

Fighting an overreaching god. Walking through the Heartlands. Putting down a corrupt ruler. Love, unasked for and undeserved and entirely unexpected. Acatl turned back to Teomitl, cupping his jaw so that he turned to face him. “So have I,” he murmured.

He wasn’t sure which of them leaned in for a kiss first, but it hardly mattered, did it? What mattered was their mouths meeting, slow and sweet and astonishingly tender for all that Teomitl’s hands on his hips were tight enough to very possibly leave marks. Teomitl hummed against his lips and was still smiling when he pulled away.

“Mmm...” There was a look in his eyes Acatl knew very well. The sort of look that said he was hungry, and not for food.

Well, so was Acatl, but that sounded like a recipe for getting sand in unmentionable places. “...Why don’t we go for a walk?” he suggested, before Teomitl could lure him into changing his mind. “My legs could use the exercise.”

It wasn’t a lie. He’d already been walking for a good while, but that still wasn’t really enough to make up for how much time he’d spent sitting lately. Teomitl still rather looked as though he was considering other forms of exercise, but he just smiled and slipped his hand into Acatl’s instead. “Let’s.”

Walking along the shoreline was peaceful enough with only himself and his thoughts, but it was much better with Teomitl by his side. It took very little time for Teomitl to take his own sandals off as well, wading cheerfully along in water up to his calves and splashing Acatl’s cloak with every step. They spoke of inconsequential things—the differences in local cuisine (not spicy enough for Acatl but delicious to Teomitl), the marketplace and ball courts compared to the ones at home (smaller, and their ball game had different rules), whether any of the merchants had been successful with Neutemoc (no, to Teomitl’s vocal disgust).

And the water, of course.

“Are you sure you don’t want to go in any deeper?”

Acatl had gradually let himself be steered into ankle-deep waves, but even those were pushing and pulling at his feet in a manner he was distinctly unaccustomed to. He cast a pointed look at the absolutely soaked hem of Teomitl’s cloak. “No.”

“The water’s nice, though.”

It was nice. But still. “And when I get knocked off my feet, pulled out to sea, and drowned...”

Teomitl snorted at that. “As if you’d drown when I’m here. This may not be Jade Skirt’s domain, but I’ll keep you safe.”

He sighed. He really couldn’t deny his lover anything. Going a little deeper would feel pleasant, particularly with the sun still beating down on his shoulders, and with Teomitl’s hand in his going up to his knees probably wouldn’t be too bad. Teomitl was very sturdy.

Sturdy and, unsurprisingly, quite good at luring him in not only to his knees, but to his waist as well. Then again, the waves did most of the work, slapping high enough up on his thighs that he really might as well go further. And even though it soaked through his thin cotton loincloth in an instant, thus ensuring he couldn’t rejoin polite society until his clothes dried, it was blessedly cool and tempted him to dunk his upper half as well. He couldn’t help a sigh of relief.

Teomitl looked as though he was thinking the same. “Isn’t this great? It’s not like home, of course, but...”

It moved a lot more, for one thing. Lake Texcoco had currents, but nothing like this. Still, at least his every step wasn’t tangled in lake weeds and green algae, and Teomitl’s smile (not to mentioned the sight of his wet, glistening skin) was a considerable bonus. Acatl squeezed Teomitl’s fingers, unable to hide his smile. “I’m surprised you aren’t just swimming by now,” he muttered fondly.

Teomitl shrugged, rubbing the back of his neck with a wet hand. Seawater trickled down into his cloak. “Maybe later. Right now, I—ow!”

Acatl froze. “Are you alright?”

Sand was still settling around Teomitl’s feet, but he dove down and plunged his hand into the cloudy water anyway. “Something bit me—ack, it got my thumb—really? Really?!”

Before Acatl could come to his defense, he raised his hand. There was a large, clearly irate crab attached to it, its pincers turning the skin of his thumb white. “I am going to cook and eat you,” he snarled.

Acatl suffered a sudden, violent coughing fit. “Love,” he eventually wheezed, “you see why I didn’t want to go into the ocean?”

Grimacing, Teomitl detached the crab from his hand and shook himself like an ahuitzotl, muttering, “At least on the lake, I know where all the hazards are.”

Acatl sighed, tugging him closer. “Let’s get back on land before any more of the local wildlife tries to rebel against your reign.”

Teomitl grumbled something that sounded like, “Good idea,” but then he started wading back towards dry land and so what actually came out of his mouth as the sea breeze slithered under his wet clothes was, “Shit, that’s cold!”

Acatl could have pointed out that such was the natural result of being soaked to the skin, but he held his tongue. They’d been having a very nice day, after all. And the breeze, though indeed cold where it touched his wet skin, was a positive balm in the sunlight. He stepped onto the shore, sparing a moment to knock a bit of seaweed off his calf, and suggested, “Why don’t we lay down and dry off?”

That put a smile back on Teomitl’s face. “You want to bake yourself in the sun like a lizard? Have you been possessed when I wasn’t looking?”

“Ha, ha,” he said dryly. “I don’t know about you, but I don’t feel much like walking in wet clothes—oof!”

Really, he should have expected Teomitl to shuck his cloak and pull them both down to the sun-warmed sand just where it met the surf, with enough room so that they could stretch out their legs and let their feet dry as well. Before Teomitl could start asking him about his back (he was fine, he wasn’t that old yet, thank you very much), Acatl tugged him into a kiss. “You are absolutely incorrigible,” he breathed when they broke for air.

Teomitl grinned, unrepentant. “You said you didn’t want to walk in wet clothes, so...why don’t we lie down and take them off?”

It had been hard to resist earlier. It was nearly impossible now, especially when Teomitl trailed his fingers over his stomach. But Acatl thought of the bulk of the city behind them and the likelihood that someone would eventually come looking for the Revered Speaker of Tenochtitlan, and even though he had to grit his teeth he managed to force out, “The clothes stay on.”

“I can work with that,” Teomitl purred, and did.

By the time Acatl remembered how to form sentences again, their clothes were still wet. This time, at least, it was because Teomitl had splashed them both in an effort to clean up, which he couldn’t complain about because anything was better than feeling sweat dry behind his knees. Between the steady crash of the waves against the shoreline, the heat of the sun on their faces, and the softness of their cloaks spread underneath them, he was sorely tempted to take a nap.

Teomitl was using Acatl’s outstretched arm as a pillow, and his hair tickled. Especially when he stretched languorously, rubbing against him like a jaguar. “Isn’t this better than the lake?”

Acatl considered that. “...Fewer mosquitoes. And no ahuitzotls interrupting us.”

“That was one time,” Teomitl muttered, wriggling closer as though burying his face in Acatl’s shoulder would muffle the embarrassment in his voice.

After a moment, though, he relaxed with a long, gusty sigh. One foot rubbed lazily against Acatl’s ankle, but aside from that he was still, his breathing gradually slowing and evening out. Even his heart was a lazy thump against Acatl’s side. Acatl wondered if he’d fallen asleep, but when he looked down he saw one half-open dark eye watching him.

“Getting comfortable?” he murmured.

Teomitl let out another sigh, the arm around Acatl’s waist tightening just enough to remind him of the strength there. “II missed you,” he said quietly. “You make everything better. And the king of Cuetlachtlan annoys me.”

Teomitl tended to react rather violently when he was annoyed enough. He’d been getting better, but the specter of a diplomatic incident brought tension to Acatl’s voice as he asked, “What did he do?”

“Nothing,” Teomitl grumbled. “But he hopes I’ll take one of his sisters for a wife.”

“...Ah.” It seemed inadequate. “You don’t want to?”

“I don’t know her,” Teomitl muttered. “And I have enough wives for now.” He had Mihmatini, Tiyacapantzin, and two concubines, not nearly as many as even a young Revered Speaker usually had, but his words came as no surprise; while Teomitl loved them all and was a devoted father to his children, it had taken him a surprisingly long time to become truly comfortable around them. He’d never been so awkward with Acatl. “Besides...well...”

Acatl waited, stroking Teomitl’s back.

With a frustrated huff, Teomitl tucked his face even tighter against Acatl’s shoulder. His words came out so mumbled that it took a minute for Acatl to resolve them into, “It reminds me that I can’t just marry you.”

This wasn’t the first time one of them had raised the topic, but it felt like a knife in Acatl’s heart every time. He breathed out harshly, curling around Teomitl as though he could change the world if he just held on tight enough. “You would. I know you would. But it doesn’t matter, because I know how devoted you are even without such things.” After a moment, he smiled slightly and added, “You know, even Neutemoc called you my wife earlier.”

Teomitl’s head snapped up. His face was doing something that suggested he wasn’t sure whether to be deeply touched or mortally offended. “He said what?”

“...In the context of married life being easier when one does not live with their spouse, yes.”

His lover plainly was not mollified by this. “Hrmph,” he muttered, going deeply pink around the ears. “Your wife. Honestly. I don’t even know how to spin cotton!”

He couldn’t help but grin. Part of him, despite knowing better, had honestly worried Teomitl might take offense. “You could learn.”

The flush was spreading to Teomitl’s cheeks now, but he was starting to smile. “And I’m a terrible cook.”

“Your grilling is perfectly adequate,” Acatl said, and stole a kiss.

Teomitl truly beamed at that, teasing and radiant. “I can’t give you children. I mean, not for lack of trying, but—”

Acatl kissed him again. And again, laughing with it, until Teomitl rolled over on top of him with a breathless, “So, husband. Are you enjoying this trip a little more now?”

The sand under him radiated warmth, but the breeze drifting in from the sea cooled his skin deliciously, and Teomitl’s body shaded him from the sun. The waves were as steady as their mingled heartbeats. He still had to deal with truly interminable episodes of diplomacy, but there would be someone waiting for him when it was over. Maybe, he thought, he could sneak into Teomitl’s quarters tonight.

“I am.”

#obsidian and blood #acatl #teomitl #neutemoc #paladin writes stuff

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rayshippouuchiha · 3 years

Note

I read “[Naruto] made budgeting and math his bitch” and all I want to say, to ask, is to consider the possibility that he’s the one in charge of Team 7’s budget? Please and thank you for your time.

It takes Naruto a bit to notice it. Takes a while for all the pieces to line up just right for him to see it.

His team, as talented as they all are, are absolute shit with money.

They're up north, huddled together on the roadside just inside of Tomi, the capital city of the midsized island that makes up Gold Country, when the truth comes out.

Their mission had been long and draining and they're all looking forward to a ship back to the mainland and a stop at an Inn for a night before they start the trek back to Konoha.

The only problem with that plan is the fact that everyone is flat broke.

Everyone, that is, except for Naruto. Which the other three would know if they'd bothered to ask him instead of assuming he was just as broke as they are.

Because Naruto's wallet is basically still as fat as ever despite the length of time they've been gone and the fact that he's done his definition of splurging at the shops in Tomi. He'd put the few hours where they'd split up before meeting again to start looking for a ship back to very very good use.

Supplies were always cheaper for him outside of Konoha proper where the shopkeepers don't know him and he's actually allowed to haggle. Plus their contractor, an ancient silk merchant named Kaede, had taken enough of a liking to Naruto to put in a good word for him at the local shops.

A courtesy that she, apparently, hadn't offered to the rest of the team or maybe just one they hadn't bothered to take her up on. Naruto isn't sure which it is exactly.

But if it's the second option then Naruto's not sure what to think. He'd never turn a discount or chance to haggle down, no matter how small it is. He knows better.

"Well," Kakashi-sensei says brightly. "Looks like we'll be running to the mainland and camping until we're back home. Let that be a lesson to all of us to bring more money next time."

Sakura looks like she's on the verge of either tears or a tantrum and Sasuke looks as blank as always except for the slightly displeased curl of his mouth.

Naruto finds himself a mix of both of their reactions because what?

Bring more money? That was Kakashi-sensei's solution? Just bring more? Like what Naruto knows was in each of their wallets before they left Konoha wasn't a good six months of Naruto's regular budget?

And they've got relatively little to show for the fact that they spent it all?

How??

It's in that moment that the truth hits Naruto directly in the face.

He's the only poor person on this Team. He's the only one of them who has ever had to actually worry about money.

Sakura has parents who actually love and house her, all her mission earnings are pure profit. Kakashi-sensei is probably the shinobi version of rich with his rank and all the high-level missions he's taken. And Sasuke is absolutely the shinobi version of rich with the wealth of an entire Clan at his disposal.

When they run out of money they just ... go get more.

Naruto, with his crumbling apartment and trap-wire thin budget, lives an entirely different kind of life.

They can probably just walk right into the Konoha bank he's sure they all use, the same one Naruto's never been allowed into, and just withdraw more money.

Not Naruto. All of his money, whatever he's scrimped and saved for, has always either been on his person or hidden away in a hollowed space beneath his bed.

For a long moment, Naruto debates with himself. Considers not saying anything and just following along with Kakashi's plan.

But, well, he does have the money and they are his Team.

So ...

"I got this," Naruto huffs out as he holds up his still bulging wallet. "But we're doing it my way and you'd all better pay me back if I spend anything."

He doesn't bother to listen to their protests or whatever they might say or do. Instead he turns on his heel and stalks off towards the docks, intent on finding them a ride to the mainland that doesn't make him want to gouge his eyes out at the price.

Half an hour later finds them settled on the deck of a small fishing vessel, warm pork buns in hand, and Naruto not missing a single yen.

The hoard of shadow clones he has practically crawling over the ship ended up being payment enough for the weathered-looking woman who'd given them passage.

He ignores the way the others stare at him and focuses on eating his lunch, mind already ticking over what Inns he remembers them passing and what he could do to get them a night's stay for the lowest cost possible.

With him in the lead, they manage to make it all the way back to Fire Country without having to pay for much of anything at all. Naruto had bartered everything from his shadow clones to Kakashi-sensei kissing the back of some woman's hand to his own help modeling a kimono while waitressing in his female form at a restaurant in Blouder City for food and lodging.

He'd actually like that last job the most since Tsubame-san had not only let him keep the kimono but he'd made a small fortune in tips as well.

It's not until they stop at the Black River Inn, the last waypoint before they reach Konoha proper, that Naruto finally steps back. Much to the puzzlement of the rest of the team, he lets Kakashi-sensei step up and rent them a room instead.

Tatsuyomi, the man who runs the inn, is the brother-in-law of the woman who runs the Tree Bud in Konoha.

He knows Naruto on sight.

It's not until they're settled into their shared room that night, the others eating a hot meal from the kitchen and Naruto eating the last of meat buns the cook Akira had slipped him before Naruto left the restaurant in Boulder, that someone finally asks.

"How'd you get so good with money, Naruto?" Sakura is the one to break the ice. "Figured you'd blow it all on ramen or something by now."

"He didn't actually pay for much," Sasuke points out quietly. "And nothing full price. He traded and haggled for everything instead."

"Still," Sakura presses. "He's the only one of us who isn't broke and he managed to get us a stay in every Inn we came across on the way home. Kind of weird."

Naruto stops, stares down that the cold meat bun in his hand, eyes squinted almost closed and shoulders tight.

He forces himself to breathe, to let the tension flow off and away.

He takes a bite of his bun.

Chews.

"I've never had parents," Naruto finds himself saying.

Around him the room goes absolutely silent.

"Don't have a Clan or a guardian or anything either," Naruto's shoulders shift restlessly, nails biting into the soft flesh of the bun in his hand. "Been living off the orphan's stipend since I was four. The pay from that is ... there's never been a lot to go around. There's always bills and supplies so I had to learn to make what I had really count. Being hungry for a long time sucks you know? Never want to do that again, not after the first few times. Not unless I have to."

"Y-You get mission pay now though right?" Sakura says, voice low and eyes wide.

"Don't get the stipend anymore though, that stopped when I got my headband," Naruto shrugs again, uncomfortable in his skin for a reason he can't properly name. "And mission pay gets split so ..."

The quiet is thick around them. Sasuke is practically glaring at his bowl and Kakashi-sensei's knuckles are white around the edges of his book.

"But yeah," Naruto finally says as he pushes himself up onto his feet, half eaten bun in hand, and turns to hop up onto the windowsill, "I learned money stuff real young. Probably the only school thing I was ever really good at."

A flex of muscle has him out the window and sitting on the edge of the roof, feet dangling and conversation officially over.

The rest of the night and the journey back to Konoha proper is quiet.

The next time they go on an extended mission outside of the village it's Naruto who's in charge of any and everything even remotely money-related as soon as they pass the border.

And if their mission pay starts getting split three ways instead of four, well, Kakashi-sensei doesn't say anything so Naruto doesn't either.

#RayRambles #Naruto #Naruto Budgeting Drabble #CREAM AU

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holden-caulfield · 3 years

Text

What If I Don't Want You To?

main masterlist

REQUESTED: "Hii! I saw that you wanted people to leave kaz requests in your asks so here I am! Could you do a ff in wich the reader is a part of the crows and she's really sarcastic and flirty (similar to jesper) and she constantly flirts with kaz, (he acts like it doesn't affect him but he secretly loves it) and one day she does something especially bold that makes him blush madly and they finally admit their feelings for each other (also a lot of teasing of the crows to kaz pls) thank you so much!"

SUMMARY: reader loves to tease kaz but is scared once she realizes she might have gone too far.

WARNINGS: a mention of blood but nothing graphic

WORD COUNT: 1422

Kaz was the most closed-off person you knew. He never revealed anything, wether it was his feelings or the details of a new plan, and it enraged you. That's why you took it upon yourself to see just how far you could push him.

Flirting with Kaz Brekker wasn't an easy task, nor was it rewarding but it sure was fun. The crows loved to see which new technique you would have used and what effect it would have had on Kaz. It was usually a simple glare; a snarky comment when you were lucky. Bets were made on his reactions and you soon became a part of it.

"What are we thinking today, Y/n?" started Jesper while walking you down to the club, "I'm betting on a smirk."

"A smirk?!" you asked surprised, "I'm not even sure Kaz can smile..."

"He can, i've seen him once. I thought i was dreaming but when i pointed it out, he glared at me. I knew it was real when he whacked me with his cane." stated Jesper, shivering at the memory. You couldn't help but laugh at his theatrics. "Why do you do it, by the way?"

You took a moment to answer, suddenly serious again.

Truth was that all the innocent flirty comments you made −comments that started out as nothing more than a pastime− soon changed something in you. They were becoming truthful, and seeing Kaz answer with nothing but a dismissive comment was not easy. Trying to evoke feelings in him, inadvertently awoke feelings in you. Feelings for your boss that you shouldn't have had.

"Do i need a reason? It's fun, why do you talk to yourself in the mirror when you think no one's watching?" you retorted, raising eyebrows in genuine question.

"First of all, you shouldn't have seen that. Second of all, you should try it, you'd feel much better afterwards." he said simply and you tried restraining the smile that inevitably made its way on your face.

You entered the club which was, as always, in full swing. Several people were already ordering at the bar all kinds of alcohol while many others were betting all their possessions at the tables. Only the dregs knew that the real bets were being placed under the tables.

"Ten that he doesn't say anything." you heard someone whispering.

You were the newest of the dregs and of the crows, but you had already earned yourself a reputation.

"Twenty that he finally kicks her out." another voice from somewhere in the club.

That one made you shiver. Would he really reach a point where he would fire you? You were a useful member, you wouldn't have made it into the crows if you weren't, but were you too much? Would he eventually get tired of you?

You walked over to your usual table with Jesper to meet Inej. Kaz wasn't there yet and you were really thinking of ending it there, no more flirting, no more jokes. This was your job, nothing else.

"What do you have for us, boss?" asked Jesper as he saw Kaz approaching.

He looked as he always does: black refined clothes clinging to him in an assortment of sharp edges, making him look even more direful to new merchants. He looked dashing the way a raging sea at night is; frightening, yet enticing. And that was wrong, you reminded yourself.

"It was a dead end." he said, sitting down.

He was in a gloomy mood, certainly for the news, and even though you knew you would have let down the whole club, you couldn't help but think of the comment you had heard moments ago.

"Twenty that he finally kicks her out."

You loved working and simply being with the crows and the possibility of being kicked out was positively frightening.

But you couldn't simply stop. Everyone would have noticed something was off, he would have noticed. And then what? He would have known you liked him.

You had to do something big, something he couldn't simply ignore. You might have been out of the dregs for good, or maybe not.

Jesper kicked your shin under the table, making you focus back on the real word and motioning at all the dregs in the club, looking expectantly at you.

Kaz and Inej were now talking about something you weren't quite getting, their voices seemed distant as you tried to forget about everyone's eyes on you. You had made it a thousand times already, you could do it once more.

"So, what are we going to do now?" asked Jesper and Kaz leaned back in his chair.

"I have some other leads we can try, but we'll have to split up." he started, the prospect of new kruge in his pockets making him incredibly more cheerful, "Jesper, Inej heard something about a particularly pricey painting in east stave, she'll bring you there and you'll learn more about it. And Y/n," he began and you perked up.

It was your moment to say something and get it over with.

"We'll go to west stave, i need your help with a lead there."

"Oh, you need me?" you said, your tone excessively teasing.

"That's what i said, but i can ask Inej." he replied drily.

You hesitated but you were not one to back down, especially not in front of one of Kaz's passive aggressive comments.

"But then you wouldn't get to stare at me longingly while i work, would you?" you said, pouting slightly.

You could have expected a retort, a glare, a not-so-nice hand gesture, but not him storming out of the club.

The entirety of the dregs was dumbfounded, Jesper and Inej, who never participated in the bets but still knew about them, were agape. You were mortified.

"Maybe," began Inej, "You should go talk to him."

"And meet my demise?" you asked.

"There must be a reason why he stormed out-"

"Yes, that he would have liked to kill me but blood stains are tough to remove." Jesper laughed but you were quite serious.

You got up either way, you had to explain yourself to him, you owed him at least that, and got out.

You found him not so far from the club's entrance, leaning on the railing over the river. You approached him unsurely.

"Kaz." he didn't turn around, so you got closer to the railing and noticed that his face, even in the night with the palest light of the street lamps, was scarlet. "I'm- i'm sorry, i will stop."

He remained silent.

"That is if you still want me in the crows, if not i'll leave tonight obviously." he turned to you, usually-perfect hair now slightly tousled, face still red and unreadable.

"Why wouldn't i?" he asked.

"I'm always teasing you and i figured you hated that. I will stop."

"What if i don't want you to?" your head perked up and he turned back towards the horizon, but a smirk crept up on his face. He didn't bother hiding it.

"So you can smile?" he rolled his eyes.

"I don't like it when people point out things i obviously do, you should have noticed back there."

Heat rushed to your face and the smile he had plastered onto his face turned into a complacent one.

"It was real? You stare at me longingly?" you asked bewildered.

He looked at you once before turning to the horizon once more, "Obviously not."

But you could sense he was lying.

"Told you he could smile, Y/n!" shouted Jesper from behind you.

You both turned around to find Jesper and Inej surrounded by the dregs and a couple of other clients too, all jostling to get a better look of the scene.

"It'll be hard for him not to, i'm afraid." joined in Inej and you bit your lip to refrain the laughter. Kaz's annoyed expression didn't help you maintaining a straight face.

"I'm not paying you to stand here doing nothing, get back inside." he ordered.

Everyone turned back inside but Jesper and Inej.

"Boss, if Y/n now gets double, just know i'm great at flirting too." stated Jesper as Kaz made his way back to the club, you in tow.

He ignored him and whacked him with his cane. Again. Jesper had now yet another lovely cane story to add to his collection.

"You'll never let him forget it, won't you?" you whispered. Jesper looked at you like a child who had just entered candy land.

"Never."

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#kaz brekker x you #kaz brekker x y/n #kaz brekker x reader #kaz brekker #kaz x y/n #kaz x you #kaz x reader #grishaverse #fanfiction #fanfic #fluff #shadow and bone #six of crows #kazzle dazzle

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shepherds-of-haven · 3 years

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Do you have any advice for newbie fantasy writers? Your characters and world feel so real. I want to reach that level. Also how did you create the language phrases in your story?

Hi there, thank you so much, these are such high compliments! I wrote a little bit about the hardest parts of writing fantasy here recently, and of course there's always more advice in the #writing advice tag, but I think my biggest piece of advice is to start small. Start with your main plot: who are the central characters, what are their roles and relationships to each other, what do they want and how is that in conflict (and there has to be conflict, whether internal or external; otherwise there's no plot). Everything else--all the little details and tidbits about the culture and history and economics and politics--comes way later, and you risk overwhelming yourself if you try and sit down and outline everything from the get-go.

Like, if you know you want to write about a princess and her bodyguard falling in love, start with that and then work outward. What's keeping them apart? What's her job as royalty and her relationship with her family, and her family's relationship with the public? Why are they rulers? Are they regarded favorably or not? Really basic things you need to know before you start writing. Then branch outward: are women eligible for the throne or not? How does succession work in the event of unexpected death? Is this more like a western monarchy, an oligarchy with many ruling clans as part of the court, or something else? Are there threats to the royal family's position? What makes the bodyguard fit to be her bodyguard? Trained in secret arts, master of a special weapon, has special powers, or something else? Then you'll start getting into whether or not magic exists in this world and how it factors into the main plot, what kinds of politics or conflicts exist, which will branch into antagonists and villains, urgent concerns and high stakes, and etc.!

Do not try to start from the beginning (like "500 years ago, there was a war between three factions over the world's most precious resource, ferrunum, and the winning faction retained control over ferrunum, which gives one the power to grant wishes, but only people of pure blood from this one mountain clan can be the ones to ask for the wishes, leading to more conflict over time..."). It spirals out of control quickly and gets the main actual story lost in the muddle! I mean, maybe that's just how my brain works, and outlining everything from the beginning of the universe to the present works for other people; but I think keeping things manageable and just letting different ideas accumulate over time rather than deciding everything straight from the start allows the story to build momentum, rather than stalling it in its infancy!

Another thing I would recommend is looking at many different sources of inspiration, rather than just one or a handful! Read a book (or watch a show, or read a manga, or play a video game) about merchants or pirates or spice traders or inventors rather than just princesses and bodyguards to get a feel for how things work in other aspects of the world, and feel free to explore other fantasy worlds, too--especially ones inspired by other cultures rather than just the classics, like Tolkien and Lewis. I got inspiration for how the nobility acts in Shepherds from sources as varied as Crown Duel (a YA court intrigue fantasy novel), Bridgerton (TV show on Netflix), and Curse of the Golden Flower (Chinese epic wuxia drama film). Just absorb lots of stuff and let the little details inspire you and amalgamate into your own creation!

Finally, to answer your question about different language phrases in the game, I just straight up mashed letters together until they looked right on the screen. Like, I always thought Elvish would sound very flowing and lyrical, like a river rolling over a bed of cool smooth stones or the breeze winding through grass, so I stuck a lot of l's and r's and e's and a's together until they looked right, like aya lani ("the gods smile"). And I thought Haven city slang would be sharp and guttural and cutting, so insults like muti and ketch sounded right!

I hope that helps!

#Shepherds of Haven #writing #writing advice #writing tips #fantasy #FAQ #tips #advice

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