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Advertising my Aboriginal furry visual novel, Lands of Fire

#lands of fure #visual novel #lgbt #lgbtqiia+ #lgbtqi #lgbtq #furry #gay #aboriginal #aboriginal artist

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Amazing how so many occultists and alledged satanists end up agreeing with Christianity on the matters of bigotry and racism. Horseshoe, immirite?

#pagan #paganism #homophobia #christianity #christian #bigotry #racism

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Dead Boy Detectives review

Netflix blesses us with another Vertigo adaptation and just like last time they do not disappoint. Loosely adapting the first arc, this series otherwise creates a brand new plot while feeling like the comics continuity. The characters are on point and the ones introduced are whimseical much like any Vertigo character.

The opening is highly amusing and I never skip it. The show does uses traditional animation for one scene and it’s positively lovely. Otherwise, the live action and CGI special effects are as good as the show’s budget could provide, which is impressive by itself. The set design is chef’s kiss.

Highly recommend this series

#dead boy detectives #netlfix #dc

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Binging Dead Boy Detectives. A good palate cleanser after Velma

#dead boy detectives #dc #warner brothers #netflix

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Velma died. Since there probably won't be a third season I guess it's a happy ending

#velma #max #animation #cartoon #scooby doo #anime

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Two otters of echo gang.

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Happy Earth Day

Cameron and Devon decide to celebrate Earth Day

Work Text:

"Good morning love" Devon yawned.

"Do you know what day it is?" Cameron asked.

"Uh, does it matter?"

"It's Earth Day."

"Uh?"

"You know, the day to celebrate mother nature and environmentalism and stuff."

"Why the interest all of the sudden?"

"To make me feel less like a piece of shit."

"Cam, we talked about this."

"I know, but just give me this, please."

Devon sighed, and nuzzled against Cameron.

***

Later that day, the two of them walked their way to the city park, where new trees were being planted. Cameron could feel the ripples of energy in the air, the coming of new life and the healing of the world. If Echo had one silver lining, is that it made him more spiritually aware, and days like this one more enjoyable.

"Hello, we'd like to plant some sapplings as well" Devon said.

"Sure thing!" an egret said, "There's two spots right over there."

"Thanks!" Cameron mustered.

The two of them picked sapplings in vases along with a toolkit, and made their way to the designated spots.

"Okay, so here it says to dig carefullt to loose the roots" Devon said.

"That should be easy."

30 minutes of delicate work proved him otherwise.

"F, all done!" Cameron said, proudly patting the soil around the sappling, now a mixture of what was in the vase and the wider earth.

"You have a knack for this!" Devon said, panting.

"And seeing as I still have tics, you should be very impressed."

"Oh, I am."

The two shared a kiss, much to the disapproval of a few bystanders. They promptly gave them the finger.

"So, anything else to celebrate this day?" Devon asked.

***

They decided to spend the remainder of the day just strolling around the park. Cameron bought a few pins, but that was the extent of extra activities.

It was just them, and nature.

#arches #vn #visual novel #gay #lgbtqiia+ #lgbtqi #lgbt #lgbtq #queer #echo project #echoblr #echo

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Volaticotheres of Lemuria

Reconstruction of the Cretaceous Indotriconodon magnus based on modern extant relatives, by omegafreelancer.

The shadow to the feathered flying lemurs, the volaticotheres of Lemuria are an ancient lineage whose origins stretch all the way back to the Jurassic, with forms like Argentoconodon and Volaticotherium pioneering mammalian flight 70 million years before other mammals took to the air. The latest Cretaceous Indotriconodon magnus is likely a close relative to the extant taxa; genetic studies show that living volaticothere lineages are no older than the Palaeocene. They occur, simultaneously, in the fossil sites of both Maldivia and Marama in the Eocene, flight likely being the reason for their success across both landmasses before they collided. Indeed, prior to the Pliocene they were the apex predators of these landmasses, some extinct forms attaining wingspans of four meters, being the largest mammals that ever flew. Only with the late Miocene climatic changes did these giants decline, giving way to the new apex predators of Lemuria proper: the giant raptors.

Still, the even today volaticotheres occupy the dominant mesocarnivore niches in Lemuria, being analogous to the weasels, mongooses, small canids and small felines of other landmasses. Except, you know, with the ability to fly. Over 45 species occur today in Lemuria, with 6 also found in Madagascar and nearby Indian Ocean islands. Three species occur outside of Lemuria: the African Kongamato (Afrodactylus kogamato), the Southeast Asian Ahool (Pitheconycteris ahool) and the Australasian Ropen (Luminopteryx ropen). The last two in particular are the earliest diverging crown volaticotheres, having diverged from their Lemuro/Malagasy cousins in the Palaeocene and from each other in the Oligocene, likely brought to their current range by the collision of India with Asia; as Indian Ocean winds blow majorly from east to west, most of the volaticothere diversity was kept from flying to Asia. It’s also speculated that the Van Meter cryptid was a volaticothere, but so far no remains have been found in the Americas.

Volaticotheres are among Lemuria’s various non-therian mammal groups, and the only non-therian mammals to fly (flight otherwise occurs in the placental bats and flying lemurs). Their wings are composed of a patagium stretched by a styliform bone, similar to that seen in flying squirrels but elongated and strengthened into resembling the pterosaurian wingfinger; the old mammalian tarsal spur in turn became a structure akin to the bat calcar, supporting the uropatagium. The membrane itself has various muscle and collagen fibers that prevent fluttering, much as with the wing membranes of bats. Of all mammalian flyers, volaticotheres are arguably the most efficient due to their epipubic bones, which support muscle groups that aid in lung ventilation; this has allowed them to produce larger flyers with more endurant flight. They are however less agile than bats and some flying lemurs, seeing as their styliform is not as flexible as their wingfingers. Like other flying mammals the ability to fly demmands an immune system with less extreme inflammatory reactions, and so their cells have similar “self-fixing” programs. This allows them to survive with high quantities of viruses without being infected, but makes them especially vulnerable to other pathogens. The Ropen has however found a symbiotic relationship with bioluminescent fungi in its wing membranes, making it the only bioluminescent terrestrial vertebrate (the same might also apply to the Van Meter cryptid, assuming it exists and is a volaticothere). Their unique metabolic and immune systems also allow for longer lifespans, with some species living almost as long as humans reaching over eighty years old.

Most volaticotheres are nocturnal, using sight and hearing as their main senses, though some species has also an accute sense of smell, particularly dedicated scavengers. Some species echolocate, but not to the extent of bats and mostly just to locate perching sites. Some species are highly social, gathering in large flocks when not foraging, but larger species are mostly solitary.

Like bats and flying lemurs they give birth to highly altricial young, some relatively developed but still dependent on their mothers for several months. Like all flying mammals they can only attain flight when close to adult size, which in some species may take over an year. Several species form creches like bats and flying lemurs, finding safety in numbers while their mothers forage. Others make nests, and in some both parents take care of the young.

The varying diversity of volaticotheres means that different species have different symbolic values to the cultures of Lemuria. Typically though they’re considered the shadow to the flying lemur’s light, and many species are considered signs of bad omens, not helped by their zoonotic diseases. Many however consider them excellent pest control, and some have attained an unique totemic status in indigenous religions, particularly the large and impressive Walamul. Indeed the Vavaitosy (Felipterus aloeri) has been semi-domesticated, allowing to patrol and nest in Sammangal gardens and trained for falconry. Many are endangered due to habitat loss and the spread of fungal diseases, but some have quite adapted to city life, and their ability to fly gives them an advantage over competing introduced species like cats, dogs and mongooses.

These beasts were the first to take to the air, and hopefully will remain fluttering about for millions of years to come.

The largest living flying mammal, the Walamul (Werer; also known as Avaitosy in Atratra, and various other regional names like Yauava in Lemurian Tamil) reaches a wingspan of three meters and up to 5 kg, though smaller estimates are more common.

It is distributed across Lemuria, though it favours the rainforest regions, where there are fewer large raptors to compete with. Accordingly, its white and black color suits it well when it hunts in low light conditions (it is primarily nocturnal) and its rounded wings suit it well as it flies in the dense forest. It is a fearsome predator, echoing the ancient giant volaticotheres as it pounces on mid-sized gondwanatherians or even elephant calves, but thanks to its ability to fly it can rely on a mostly scavenging diet. It has a better sense of smell than most of its relatives, and its larger size allows it to displace smaller predators and scavengers, aside from the birds of prey.

It is a largely solitary animal, but it can tolerate the presence of two or three members of its species in its territory. Most such small groupings tend to be siblings, or parents and children. Breeding happens every four years, males following females by urine scent and spending a long period of time trying to court them, producing low pitched sounds. After mating the female raises the sole pup alone, usually left in a crevice or tree hollow while she hunts. The juvenile spends over an year being raised this way, and even after acquiring its independence it may stay within their mother’s territory for years.

The Walamul is symbolic of the night itself across Lemuria’s cultures, and simultaneously revered and feared; while this animal rarely poses a threat to people, it may target livestock, though traditionally this is deterred by leaving piles of scrap and unusable carcasses in order to dstract it non-lethally. It most famously appears in The Drama of the Moon, where it is the final challenge for the two competing gods. In western Lemuria, where it is less common, it is seen particularly ambivalently as an enemy of the Sun Goddess, yet also a bringer of rain. In many areas it is a totemic symbol of great importance, and some people claim descent from the Walamul as an ancestor spirit.

Currently, it is Vulnerable due to habitat loss and occasional persecution as non-traditional agriculture declines and prejudices increase. Conservation efforts have been successful in raising its population from a bottleneck in the 60’s, and the animal can even occasionally be seen in urban areas. Cats and small dogs are occasionally targetted, but such urbanite volaticotheres often preffer to attack trash cans.

#lemuria #speculative biology #speculative zoology #speculative evolution #spec evo #volaticotheres #volaticotheria #indotriconodon #eutriconodont #triconodont #eutriconodonta

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Restrospective on the Qixote derivatives

Some time ago I wrote reviews for The Inseparables and Giants of La Mancha and yeah, it’s weird how two films derived from Don Quixote on a modern setting were released so close together, like with 2022 and it’s slew of Pinocchio movies.

For the moment though, this seems to be a duology so I might as well compare both films.

Both of them have obviously a Don Quixote stand-in with wild imagination. I feel this was a bigger plot point in The Inseparables since it’s how the day is solved and ties to the themes of being different and possible neurodivergence allegory, whereas in Giants it was just kind of random. There, it’s simply a contrived way to make a rift between Alfonso and Pancho, and while it’s seen in the final battle it really does nothing besides reskinning what’s actually happening on-screen with Alfonso’s imagination.

Both films naturally miss the point of Don Quixote’s delusions, which I feel would have made for a powerful lesson or at least an interesting theme, but the closest we get is it provoking three act low points. They just want the Bluey pie and eat it too, neverminding the fact that on shows like Bluey imagination still is grounded while the characters in these films are literally hallucinating. Alfonso in particular is constantly surrounded by imaginary rabbits; this is not the mark of a quirk personality, it’s genuinely concerning.

Overall, I’d say neither are good movies, and I can’t decide which is worst.

#don quixote #animation #anime #cartoon #film #review

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2022 was the year of Pinocchio. 2024 is the year of Don Quixote given The Inseparables and Giants of La Mancha.

#the inseparables #giants of la mancha #anime #animation #cgi #don quixote #cartoon

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What if Mesozoic mammals were tiny because of the heat?

Recently a study for no evidence for Bergman’s rule (animals growing larger with colder climates) in Mesozoic dinosaurs and synapsids. Then another study came to mind, finding that mammals shrunk during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maxium.

This lead to a question: what if Mesozoic mammals were strongly impacted by higher global temperatures, and couldn’t grow much larger?

Animals like Patagomaia, Repenomamus and Oxlestes among others show that relatively large sizes could be attained by Mesozoic mammals. The presence of absence of dinosaurs doesn’t seem to impact how large mammals grow (for instance both Maastrichtian Patagonia and early Cretaceous Liaoning have highly diverse small to large dinosaur faunas), so maybe global temperatures being higher made it harder for mammals to grow larger due to their high metabolisms.

Then again some Mesozoic synapsids didn’t have as high metabolisms and modern mammals, so who knows?

#petm #paleontology #palaeontology #palaeoblr #paleoblr #mammals #mammal #synapsids #synapsid #metabolism

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My brother just got married. Pity there wasn't a party, but I'm still so proud of him

#gay marriage #lgbtqiia+ #lgbtqi #lgbt #lgbtq

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Indotriconodon flies,baby!

By omegafreelancer

So learning that Indotriconodon magnus – an already impressive animal in being a large sized Mesozoic mammal and an unambiguous eutriconodont from the Maastrichtian – is also a volaticothere I naturally had to commission it in its likely volant form.

Volaticotheria phylogenetic tree by Bajpai et al 2024

Its debuting study also recover Sangarotherium and Eotriconodon as volaticotheres. The former in particular is the only mammal in an Arctic environment dominated by other synapsids (Averianov et al 2020), so it clearly must have been able to fly and migrate when other crown mammals couldn’t.

Things just keep looking up for volaticothere flight, which I already extensively argued for with the marine deposition and lack of dental wear of Ichthyoconodon, the early cosmopolitan distribution of the group, the fact that Volaticotherium‘s hand is largely missing and the fact that gliding mammals are primarily herbivorous (Luo 2017).

Naturally, I also used this image to forward my speculative volaticotheres over at Lemuria.

What a wonderous day.

References

Bajpai, Sunil; Rautela, Abhay; Yadav, Ravi; Wilson Mantilla, Gregory P. (2024-02-29). “The first eutriconodontan mammal from the Cretaceous (Maastrichtian) of India”. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology. doi:10.1080/02724634.2024.2312234. ISSN 0272-4634.

Averianov, Alexander; Martin, Thomas; Lopatin, Alexey; Skutschas, Pavel; Schellhorn, Rico; Kolosov, Petr; Vitenko, Dmitry (2018-07-25). “A high-latitude fauna of mid-Mesozoic mammals from Yakutia, Russia”. PLOS ONE. 13 (7): e0199983. Bibcode:2018PLoSO..1399983A. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0199983. ISSN 1932-6203. PMC 6059412. PMID 30044817.

Luo ZX, Meng QJ, Grossnickle DM, Liu D, Neander AI, Zhang YG, Ji Q (August 2017). “New evidence for mammaliaform ear evolution and feeding adaptation in a Jurassic ecosystem”. Nature. 548 (7667): 326–329. doi:10.1038/nature23483. PMID 28792934. S2CID 4463476.

#indotriconodon #eutriconodont #eutriconodonta #paleontology #palaeontology #paleoart #palaeoart #paleoblr #palaeoblr #mammal #cretaceous #maastrichtian

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several drawings I did of different religious/traditional head coverings in west and Central Asia !!!

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To stardust I return

Damion's final moments as the seven stars collide with the earth

Work Text:

Damion couldn't help but stare.

He had lost contact with Cyrus, and he did not get any reassurance about his fate.

He missed him so much. But he knew he'd live, something within him told him so.

The light grew whiter and hotter by the second, and his vision was a blank canvas.

He could picture him and Cyrus playing basketball, him and his love running before the sun lit the earth, the both of them kissing and loving each other.

And, suddenly, the mind creating that picture was gone. It did not feel the shockwaves of the heat burning him asunder.

It just continued on, a brightness ever lasting.

#remember the flowers #furry #fvn #vn #visual novel #gay #lgbtqiia+ #lgbtqi #lgbt #lgbtq

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A Vorthos Defense of Lukka

Sorry this response turned into a small essay (~1400 words) that doesn't really answer your question, but my Hot Take™ is that I don't think Lukka needs to be fixed.

I believe the problem doesn't lie in Lukka himself, but in the way both the narrative and the fandom treated him extremely unfairly. I'm not asking anyone to like Lukka. Personally, I don't even think anything about him is particularly likable. But I think as a character he deserves a lot more respect than he gets, and I'm tired of seeing other people hate on him without actually engaging with his story or understanding what his character is about.

Here's the thing: Lukka is basically the homeless veteran of planeswalkers.

He started his story in Sundered Bond (Ikoria ebook by Django Wexler) already successful in his military career, engaged to be married to Jirina, and having General Kudro's favor. He was a model citizen and his life was great. One day, a flying-hyper-murder-tiger killed Lukka's entire squad and people discovered Lukka was a monster Bonder because the tiger spared him. The rumors got to General Kudro, whose decision upon hearing Lukka might be a bonder was to have Lukka immediately executed.

Lukka didn't betray Drannith. Drannith betrayed Lukka.

Lukka escaped his execution and was rescued in the wilderness by Vivien, who traveled with him to the Ozolith, where a mysterious evil voice caused Lukka to unlock the full power of his monster bonding abilities. Through it all, Lukka still tried to hang onto his old life. His allegiance hadn't changed. At first, Lukka wanted to use the monsters he controlled to fight for Drannith, not against it. Lukka was convinced that the offer of a loyal monster army would be enough for the city to take him back, but he was no longer welcome in Drannith.

Lukka became increasingly unstable and spiraled into insanity because he had his life unexpectedly, completely ruined and wanted nothing more than to return home to his old life, but that wasn't possible because he now belonged to a class of people who were extremely stigmatized in Drannith's society. He had become an undesirable. Once the city's shining star, he was now the lowest of the low. He lost his loyalty and turned against the city when he realized Drannith didn't care about people, Drannith cared about keeping people in their places.

In Sundered Bond, Lukka loses literally everything. He loses his job. He loses all his friends. He loses his fiance. He loses his home. Everything. He even loses the cat. This all happens to him within like, a week.

Lukka experiences the same hostility in his second appearance, Strixhaven. At this point, he's still a new planeswalker, and he's been planeswalking blindly trying to find civilization again. He arrives on Arcavios thirsty and starving and tired and injured. When he finally finds a town, he visits an inn and asks only for food. But they don't give him any food! They won't allow him to wash up or to rest! This is a man who has nothing and has done nothing, and the townspeople are suspicious of Lukka and want to call the Dragonsguard –Strixhaven's magical cops– on him because he committed the crime of... existing near them while visibly having basic needs that are unmet.

=========

"Looking for something, stranger?" said the innkeeper, a round man with a head of robust curls.

"A hot meal," said Lukka. The innkeeper hesitated as though about to say something, then nodded and moved toward the kitchen.

"Haven't seen clothes like that before," came a voice behind Lukka. "You're not from around here, I imagine."

He turned. A tall man in the same rough clothing as the rest of the townsfolk had stood up from his table and was walking over.

[…]

He heard the man suck his teeth. The innkeeper still hadn't returned from the kitchen. Lukka was starting to doubt he ever would.

"Okay, Oriq, I think I've heard enough. We don't take kindly to meddlers in this town, or those who seek to disturb the peace. If we were a proper city, we'd get the closest, least busy Dragonsguard to sort you out. But we're just a small farming village—so we've learned to deal with strangers ourselves."

[Episode 2: Lessons - Adana Washington]

=========

Fans like to point at Lukka and make "ACAB" ("All Cops Are Bastards") jokes about him, but they don't understand that he's explicitly an anti-cop character. Lukka was formerly a cop, but he quit and fully turned his back on the entire concept of policing when he realized that the reason cops exist is not to protect people, but to rid society of undesirables like him.

=========

"These dragons," Lukka said, his voice a growl. "Those Dragonsguard. They've held power over these people for too long. They've made them fearful of every shadow, every unfamiliar face. What happens when it's not just the Oriq they're hunting down—when it's anyone who practices magic in a way they don't like?"

[Episode 3: Extracurriculars - Adana Washington]

=========

I know what many of you will say: "How can Lukka have such a based take when he's such a terrible person?" It's true– he is not a good person. He's an asshole and he's harmed / killed innocent people and animals. But he's been both a cop and a homeless man, and he knows that cops are far more dangerous. You don't need to be a "good" person to deserve food and shelter. It's cops who promote the idea that you can deny the basic rights of the people you think are "bad".

So on Arcavios, he's again forced out of civilization and back into the wilderness. His suffering seriously never ends. The way he was treated, it's no wonder he accepted when the Oriq kidnapped him and asked him to help attack Strixhaven. Why should he give a damn about society if they don't care about him? If their society is so fearful of others that they are unwilling to practice compassion, unwilling to provide for people's most basic needs even when they haven't done anything wrong, then doing wrong doesn't matter. They will share his pain. He will watch it all burn to the ground.

Lukka is an example of what happens when someone's basic humanity is repeatedly denied to the point that they can no longer feel anything but anger.

This line from the story Survival of the Fittest, by Roy Graham, expresses it perfectly:

=========

He had been a cruel man by the end, a villain in so many ways. But perhaps in his position, there was no way to become anything else."

=========

Lukka reaches out for stability and support and never truly finds it. He's a character who keeps getting punished over and over for having bad things happen *to* him, not because he *does* bad things. Most of the bad stuff he actually does is in response to others treating him like shit for no reason.

Despite everything, Vivien still cared for Lukka and wanted to help him get back on his feet. She thought Lukka's military expertise would be useful to the strike team against New Phyrexia, and she encouraged him to join. They both saw it as an opportunity for Lukka to regain some of his dignity and protect his home once more. How does the narrative reward him for his effort? By corrupting him, humiliating him, and having him be put down like an animal by the only person who showed him any compassion through all this.

What could Lukka have become if he survived to be rehabilitated? I guess we'll never know.

Unfortunately, there is absolutely no hope for a character who mistreats animals. Most fans will never ever get past that, and there's a part of me that honestly believes Lukka just got phyrexianized and killed off because the Magic narrative team realized they couldn't salvage his reputation and didn't know what to do with him. The fandom's overwhelming negative response to Lukka had irreparably damaged him as a character.

As my bespoke friend @xantchaslegacy said, "The only meaningful difference about Lukka and Gideon's cop-to-planeswalker journey is that the narrative let Gideon live long enough for other people to make him a better person. And Lukka got shanked before it could happen."

Again, I don't need people to like Lukka. I just want people to understand. I wish people were more willing to actually engage with the story and see the value in characters they dislike. There's no reason Lukka should've been treated like a punching bag the way he was. He was trapped in a cycle of being dunked on by the story and then dunked on by the fans, again and again. And people continue to push an understanding of Lukka that is just false.

The fandom reacted to Lukka the same way the strangers on Arcavios did: He'll never get a second chance because they wouldn't even give him a first chance.