#/having a stable future what with politics and normal working people becoming more and more oppressed | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

desertdragon · 2 years

Note

👤 for Yugiri? Oh and also for a NPC whom Vaste is friends with.

Meme

I get to talk about the wife first 😮‍💨; also like I DM'd you I'm gonna do 3 just for fun

NOTICE: I recommend anyone who's gonna read this do it either on the iPhone tumblr app OR on my blog site in desktop (it's my actual url when you click on my icon or that page crease a post does when you hover over the top right on the desktop dashboard) or viewing my blog page on a phone browser, I DONT advise reading this On the tumblr dashboard because it's too long with Read More removed, your feed will break

I have marked Trigger Warnings for sections in Bold along with -'s they are intended to be skippable if needed

So I change a lot about Yugiri's future and her present, but not her past. Her past is exactly the same as normal; she was born and raised in Sui no Sato, she has both parents and two brothers, she was daring and reckless taking trips to the surface lands out of curiosity, and her meeting Shun who would become Hien is what changed the course of her life. She sacrificed it all to do what she thought was right. In this part all I do is try filling in for whatever isn't accounted for from a character perspective. The emotional, important details and minutia and all that shit.

Anything in this tag already has my essays or observations on Yugiri as she is. I'd like to compile some of that while focusing too on how she changes in my AU and what her future then is like. As a notice that tag will also be updated whenever ideas strike and I post them too.

Building on the stuff I've written before, I think Yugiri's ability to have compassion while still setting her boundaries, as well as being raised in a stable isolated society, all makes her a great person to see the value in something socialist. The whole reason she attached herself to Doma was because its colonization and the stories she heard from Shun's royalist perspective angered her so much as a child at the injustice; as well as the nobility and resolve she saw among the warrior class. It was an emotionally driven decision as the foundation of how she perceived justice.

A few people in the fandom agree that Yugiri needs to learn to live for herself, rather than as a tool or the eyes of someone else. I've even seen a few fanfics where this was attempted, with Hien either being accepting or not talked about. The need for independence is correct, but I feel people see it in a shortsighted way. None of those depictions took into account the grander moral, social, political, and further emotional nuances it would be attached to beyond pitching the concept's basics. Living for herself would completely tear up her world!

Though to be honest I'm a little glad? I don't trust this fandom and most fandoms to wipe their ass without burning their houses down somehow; so I'd rather get shallow basics than more fake deep rhetoric that's full of misogyny, racism, and bootlicking. As if the game story itself wasn't full of enough bootlicking as is.

So then coming from that, how should we discuss Yugiri in terms of her personhood and relation to Vaste? Her relation to Doma needing to evolve? This is sort of the fun part about writing for characters canon forgets exist because it's mostly free game.

I've failed to write this subject with any narrative consistency (which I'm gonna fix when I write the novel length version of Vaste's entire life because just short fiction like I've been doing is getting me nowhere) BUT her relationship with Vaste was under crisis at least twice. Both were huge character building moments that had her reevaluate herself and her life.

Neither time had anything to do with usual couple arguments or disagreements or just growing apart since 1. They're the types who work out how they feel between each other with consistency and enthusiasm for communication ie. They don't do that petty hold it in until I explode on the person I love because they should be able to mind read type shit & 2. I don't think they would grow apart because of how strongly they feel for one another and the sense of trust they formed by again, consistent empathy and communication!

What strained and almost fractured them came from morality, beliefs, and ideals. The first time was when Vaste confessed how much evil she had done while working under the Scions & Alliance. Obviously all sides involved in that share the blame, and yes Vaste was abused and manipulated in multiple ways, but she still did the things she did. She still killed countless unarmed civilians, she killed kids and at times child soldier conscripts of the Garlean army while in the field. She still upheld and represented governmental dominance. Even if there were times she stopped mid act and instead tried to covertly save these people or be defiant, it doesn't remove the times she didn't save them and didn't resist the oppression she worked for.

This is the first major split I take from canon regarding Yugiri. The game at no point meaningfully considers or explores the purpose or reality of being a soldier or government servant, despite its emphasis on politicking, war campaigns, war crimes, and even bio weapons like Black Rose. The game is extremely pro establishment, and when it does mention things like rape, murder, colonization etc. when done by soldiers serving a government, it's in quiet throwaway lines OR it's explained and resolved in the most stripped down form, then these simplified nuanced issues can be solved off screen or with one act. Or its ignored. Even slavery which is a topic present with Copperbell Mines, Beast Tribes, the Arcanist class, & Yotsuyuu's stories is simplified as either what Bad Eggs do, as a natural cost of economic success, or something that largely impacts One Person, rather than the systems of oppression they are.

If I go by base game Yugiri, no way would she stay with Vaste I don't think. If I wrote Vaste as close to how the game portrays the WoL and these topics, then she becomes a caricature- the typical hero who commits war crimes and serves the government with her activities never questioned and never even explored. She would be all of this, without meaningful impact or consequence (TW: Rape Mention in passing):

^ Redditors realizing this is the same issue superhero comics and comic movies have, where instead of someone with immense power and unlimited resources helping humanity’s betterment as a whole transcending petty borders, they become tools of State interests and propaganda agents

Also it's almost as if even in our fiction governmental organizations and their ally organizations still are only designed to benefit their own agendas, and any good they achieve for the public and human rights is pure coincidence or part of a public relations image, wow, surely this has no real life basis :^)

A Vaste and Yugiri written under normal game constraints would be very difficult to have last OR it could last but be hollow; it would require Yugiri to be even more of a blinded hypocrite than she already can be, and it would require her compassion at the core of the character to break. This wouldn't be a bad thing (it is still a character and has potential to be complex- think exploring Yugiri's Worst Self) if it weren't for the fact that it wouldn't be written in a mature way. It would be written as her and Vaste being unflinchingly in the right for this behavior because they fight for the "Good Guys".

Instead Yugiri would undergo a crisis weighing the evil of mercilessly killing, exterminating really, down to kids. The sheer level of blood on someone’s hands for that is too much, especially again with how Yugiri’s nature includes looking out for the helpless. Then you pit that against how it was ordered by a government body; by a united government body who sheltered the Doman refugees, and the fact that looking at how she herself is a government agent, she was taught you have to serve with undying loyalty.

But how do you serve when something so disgusting is asked of you? Isn’t there a point where as a person you have an obligation to resist when inhumanity is expected of you?

Then you combine this with how it forces her to examine her own sins in a similar vein. What about the things she’s done for someone higher than herself? Could she have stopped during some of her own killings? What exactly were some of the reasons for that behavior? It couldn’t all have been just, especially once we see that Hien is fine with pardoning sex traffickers because they share nationalities, how he doesn’t question the system that enabled it. It couldn’t all be just when working for government interests inherently means advancing one group’s desires over others, by any means necessary. There’s also no feasible way everyone she killed could have been bad people worthy of death.

The issue within her becomes complex, as much as what made Vaste do what she did is complex. How angry can she really be at her when Yugiri has killed just as thoughtlessly, just as much to appease other’s need for power they disguised as righteousness? Why was she measuring herself by these easily manipulated metrics, which then proved she’s so capable of ordered violence like a dog on a leash? Why does she dehumanize herself as a tool? Fuck, what about the subject of political prisoners?

I imagine she had to take time for being alone physically and mentally. She tries arguing against the feelings it all stirs in her mind, the things she held back by the skin of her teeth. Then the longer she's left with herself, she realizes she can't look at the people she's followed, she can't look at Hien, without being reminded of dead people. She can't look at them and not have her morality question itself, she can't look at any action Doma takes without questioning everything it's trying to stand for.

When the lines that used to seem simple become blurred because Yugiri is forced to see her mirror in someone, it opens her character down one avenue of gaining independence. Ultimately the goal is to face this mirror and either reject it in denial of her own evil, or accept it and change into someone better.

Which goes into the second crisis- abandoning government bodies altogether. Leaving Doma behind, seeking no masters but herself, walking away from her lords and their laws. Once she reconciles change on the individual level, it has to impact her relationships and groups too. Its the test that cements her commitment to being someone new.

Also when I say that I don’t mean Vaste is phrasing it as a test for her lol, I mean from a writing perspective. Vaste would continue fighting for what she believes in regardless of anyone else, she stops being people’s tool; though the loss would hurt her for sure. I think its the exact quality Yugiri gains by finding conviction in herself and Vaste’s example. Having conviction in yourself allows you to die on your own terms, succeed fueled by your own initiative. I’d love seeing Yugiri become that person, especially because it feels both natural and necessary.

It would still be a shock on some level for her to take this second step, but she would do it with less hesitation. She’s flexing her freedom for the first time in years; that childhood spark for daring never died beneath the surface. It was just sleeping. Once she regains it and throws off whats holding her back (ie. the royalist brainwashing and its components) she’s unstoppable. She’s calmer but less distant, she questions everything but also accepts facts as they are. Her anger is tempered and focused and it has always been an extension of her capacity to love the world. She begins awakening to a sort of enlightenment after liberating her mind.

Fighting Hien and besting him in a duel is the symbolic breaking of the final shackle. Everything that could and did hold her back, every doubt, it all comes to the point of no return. She will have her own future or die trying. She faces it with unbreakable determination as much as she does sadness.

They were friends once, and in the bottom of her heart I think she will always care at least for Shun the boy regardless of Hien the man. But that relationship is finally not enough to stop her from seeking her own justice. They were also master and retainer, such a relationship can never be equal by its definition. The old growth has to die for the new. She wants people who will stand beside her not in front.

She’s remade her identity before this because it felt right, I think she’ll be alright.

I want it clear too how much it is a relationship of equals between Vaste, herself, and their friends. If she opposed them she simply wouldn't have followed them, and I don't think she would let herself be strung along what Vaste wants to achieve just because they're together- in fact they would probably fight to the death if Yugiri remained loyal to what she already fights for. No amount of good relationships, fear of being alone, or crazy good dick is worth being a slave who lacks any independence for lmao. She comes to them because she believes in them as much as they do her, because they all see her and put her back in touch with humanity.

I say that because I've seen so many people including other women make their WoLs literally a dependent accessory with zero personality that doesn't revolve around their male NPC love interests and pretend it's sexy like congratulations you're upholding misogyny, here is your Woman Hater medal 🤡🏅 thank you for continuing to devalue us all as cum socks and emotional labor props, they write with this tone unironically in full seriousness (TW: NSFW, Misogyny):

TW: Suicide mention

Emotional vulnerability is so so important too. Yugiri comes off as holding hers back because of the dehumanizing nature of her position and training. Its really clear whenever she’s upset, emotionally strung, or expressing kindness and gratitude, in the Japanese even her speech mode changes. I want more scenes like the riverside talk in Stormblood, which was really the only time (besides another single one later in EW which I will not spoil for You specifically, though my followers should know since Aislinn @/lettersnorth mains ranged melee) where she knowingly allows the player past her facade.

With the gift of hindsight that conversation isn’t just contemplative and sad watching her self esteem fall, I think its one of the signs for when she goes to assassinate Zenos later. It has this air of tense finality to it even though she’s not openly saying anything suicidal; regardless of how the player chose to respond to her musing, its clear whats happened before this moment still weighs on her with what comes after. The fact she fully resolved to kill or die trying when dying was 99% certain proves how little her life is worth to her. Its eerie coming back to that cutscene for me. She’s lost everything since she left Sui no Sato and what she has left she sees no future for herself in it; she focuses on what it means for everyone but herself. And if she dies then that’s just how it is.

This is uncomfortably reminding me of myself and Vaste ahahaha.

When she grows past this I think she’d be sensitive to reading when someone is going through the same lows. Especially after being with Vaste and seeing how suicide also impacted her. She pulls from their shared experience on it and is the first to discourage people or open herself to listening. Its double serious for her, coming from the mentality of “I am disposable.”.

One of the big themes I have with my characters is bonding though shared suffering; I would apply the same logic to Yugiri. Once she embraces the suffering she has endured, has caused, and has seen others carry she can become more understanding as well. I feel like she would see it as a rebirth in her mind as much as it is from a writing angle. She has died twice now; everything after is witnessed by fresh eyes.

Symbolically she may hold a funeral for herself or another gesture in a similar connotation such as reciting the Mantra of Light- if they have Buddhism or its equivalent in this universe. I kinda want to believe they would since we already have a Shintoism proxy. They have a Shinto wedding by the way 😳 Moss knows what it looks like because I wrote a quick prose mock-up for them hffdgdg I have pages of notes just for Yugiri's attire details

Of course this coincides with Vaste's presence itself granting her aether new powers. That was intentional because I love when character growth progresses alongside their abilities and potential. Forcing her to get greater powers also forces her to continue honing her self control as much as her physical prowess. The responsibility expands her good qualities while encouraging continued reflection on her bad ones.

The new sense of greater power also helps her feel less powerless and better able to help others. I don't just mean her fighting skills. Back in SB when she was devastated at seeing Domans shun her for wanting to help them, her powerlessness was mostly from naïveté. She saw these people not from an empathizing human perspective, but as an outsider who wanted to play hero. They were a concept, a picture painted by what her soldier and royal friends had told her- a project in need of saving. Facing the reality humbles her, and I think gaining independence (as well as being open to the perspectives of those around her) after separating from her bubble keeps helping her progress in this.

In terms of her fighting skills through, they aren't just honed, but she's in greater tune with her body and aether than ever. She recognizes the increased responsibility it comes with too to prevent hurting the wrong people in a fight, as well as scaling herself in battle depending on her objective. Her superhuman speed and reflexes are phenomenal; combined with her control over lightening aspected aether, she becomes known as the God of Lightning to those who've witnessed her.

She kills Zenos by the way- I'm sick of her getting bodied every time they've met like she can't fight at all not even landing a single hit. She masters her glow up and blitzes his ass to death. Vaste doesn't kill him because it's what he would want and she also feels Yugiri deserves the satisfaction.

I have things I want to write purely showing off embracing her powers, and what mastery would look like. She's as precise as Vaste, and with upgrades she gets downright surgical. Lighting also has uses besides frying people, like letting her touch resemble a stun gun, or used for cooking and lighting fires if she wants etc.

Also yes I don't think she can cook. Simple things like rice balls or skewering fish over fire? Maybe, but nothing that requires cooking actual meals. From the way it seems she left Sui no Sato too young to have realistically learned much about cooking from her parents. If that changes or I get corrected information I'll reconsider it. For now from what I remember she would've had to leave home permanently as a teenager since when first meeting Shun she was a younger child. Especially since she took years to move up the ranks of her ninja training before she was considered a master.

Point is the game is rather vague about it, so that's what I'm going with. She knows survival skills for the field, but not so much life skills. Life skills take a backseat when your life is framed as disposable. What she can remember from her parents lessons at this point is probably hazy. It would be interesting to think her dad tried showing her a bit on stone masonry though. Since they live under the Ruby Princess there's a good chance women in that community are treated fairer. Maybe her dad would've tried preparing her to inherit the trade alongside her brothers.Those skills would be useful and an important tie to her heritage.

I think she keeps up with it from time to time, talking about stone quality, chiseling, building, different types etc. Most likely she can tell you something about if a stone incorporated building is livable. In the epilogue she runs a dojo for a non lethal version of the marital arts she learned as a ninja, but she also reconnects to stone masonry. Their new village will never be Sui no Sato, but it starts taking influences for every carpenter she helps or fellow stone mason she advises. Her younger son learns from her and continues the trade. She encourages him just as her father did for her; though the tradition it keeps her father alive in her heart.

Stonemasonry also allows her access to working on gravestones for the locals. When she does it feeds into her relationship with death. She gains a greater intimacy with it, with how the dead should be treated, a greater understanding, how she wants to be memorialized when she dies etc. It puts her in contact with the grieving in ways that let her help rather than destroy as she once did. It helps her find peace while contributing to her penance.

Plus it's funny imagining her trying to cook still learning like "Making dinner for my amazing boy girlfriend~" meanwhile Vaste and the others are like "Who the fuck is burning down the kitchen???!" Before they run in to save it (Lewena crying over the cheese being safe, and Mercuo & Syv hugging the wine bottles)

So if I had to sum the transition it's:

- Soldier blinded by power, naivety, misplaced loyalty, lies, and dehumanization ->

- Questioning purpose, re-evaluating loyalty as a concept, reconnecting with humanizing herself, discovering her boundaries, desires, and needs, questioning those around her ->

- Accepting her flaws and free will, doubling down her resolve, realizing she has the power to choose and change her world, acting on this change ->

- Being self assured yet humble, daring yet measured, calm and knowing when to act or when to wait, embraces her identity and personhood, tempered but fluid who knows where her principles lie

And finally everything carries her forward after magic and gods are gone. What she's learning are life skills, reclamation of humanity. Building her strength of character can only leave her a better person. She becomes patient, expressive, strengthens her honesty, solidifies her self worth, knows her wants and needs, sets boundaries, and is empathetic to others without robbing them of agency/objectifying them. Her views on violence calm too, and she matches Vaste's "No killing, violence only when necessary" philosophy. There's been more than enough war for the both of them; more than enough needless blood on their hands.

As a parent later on this tuning toward humanity and the world helps so much too. She's a mom who listens first, is honest without ever being demeaning or cruel, leads by example, and tries to reinforce balance constantly. She would never leave anyone feeling left out or confused on purpose; they will always know they're loved and won't be spoken over. She refuses to let her temper get the better of her whenever it's difficult.

Her kids will not repeat her ignorance nor her own parents mistakes. That's something she and Vaste have on their minds without hesitation. Also we have proof family is important to her because of how much she talks about missing them as is. It's about recognizing the humanity in others. It's about learning to listen to people over treating them like something to save. A reversal of her primary negative character trait.

She's the one who chose the kanji for their Doman/Hingan (Japanese) names too, after talking it over with Vaste. Yoshino's name reflects her being goodness and a blessing, while the boys names I HC are her brother's names, just different kanji. I thought it would be important to her character to honor them like that if she had sons. Ujihide's name is spelled to mean Family Flower (helping to reflect being born during Spring- EDIT: in double checking my research it can also mean the calyx of a flower, which is the green protective layer for an unopened bud, reinforcing a comment in the next section- consider also the meaning Family Protector), while Yoshitsugu's means Inheritor of Justice / Continuing Justice .

* As a side their Zulu names in order mean Peace/Silence, Threshing/Divination (as well as bird wings flapping- which links again to Zulu interpretation of birds as change, another meaning is to extinguish flames, the most common meaning is To Beat), and Victory. The first continues the theme of Yoshino representing hope and blessings as the eldest; meanwhile as the older twin, Ujihide's name reflects protection for his younger brother.

In the old days of both Zulu and Japanese culture twins were a bad omen and undesirable. It actually surprised me over the years to learn how many cultures have hated and feared twin births; there's a lot of negative superstition. If I had to guess the bulk of it comes from twins being a harder birth with a higher mortality rate. And how rare multiple babies in one go is. So when Vaste realized there was a second baby in there she named the older one something to repel bad luck. It's also a slight tongue in cheek joke because it's like his birth divined the coming of his brother after him.

For Yoshitsugu, Manqoba just means Victory or Winner. Yugiri agreed with her that since he was born a bit of a runt compared to his siblings and seemed reserved even as a baby, he should have encouraging names. They don't play favorites, but they do pay close attention to learn what makes him confident and sociable, and when he'd like alone time or to be in his thoughts.

In closing on her I want to write a character who's Vaste's foil, I wanted to fix how the story left her behind and flesh out what she has, and I want yet another example to prove the point that you can only change corrupt systems by stepping outside them. I want to expand a character I like by applying my narrative style.

Right now for Yugiri music, I’ve been listening to Khamsin’s theme off the MGR OST: The Hot Wind Blowing

On a personal note, when it comes to portraying Yugiri I'm very sensitive to avoiding racist stereotypes. I always try being mindful that I don't show/write her as the Submissive Asian Woman or the Cold Scheming Dragon Lady Asian Woman, or the Naturally Smarter Than Everyone Asian Woman. I'm not Asian so I will never be perfect at avoiding these, but I do everything I can when I check my drafts over and over to think about what I include, why I include it, and how the portrayal comes together.

As with my dark skin characters and Vaste I also encourage any East Asians who might find my Yugiri portrayal to correct it if they want. Racism is rampant in fandom and I've even seen people not just hurl slurs but substitute Chinese for Japanese in FFXIV's influences and vice versa; the old "All Asians Look The Same/Are Interchangeable" racist belief. It is beyond offensive and exactly what I wish to avoid, so I advise any non Asians writing Yugiri to be mindful too. If you write a racist portrayal you deserve to get called the fuck out.

The source material gave us scraps; they really are doing another underutilized another interesting dynamic a character can bring while making more for the fucking hollow boring Scions. It sucks, she’s not even the only character they do it to (certainly not the only woman either); in general a lot of the side stuff is better than the MSQ honestly. I also think its so funny that Lyse got more development once she left them, only to get thrown in the Female Character Development Waiting Cell, where she’s still sitting holding her Gucci handbag to this day.

EW was the first time since HW they tried injecting meaningful personality and character development into Scions but I feel like it was both too little too late plus feels shallow after two interim expacs of nothing consistent. Purely from a character writing perspective; obviously they push the story along but that's all they do which is the problem fksdofk (the Twins are in this weird middle ground on that in my eyes though, Urianger is on thin ice)

Anyway time for Estinien

Bestie <3

The biggest thing I love about him is how independent he is. In a game full of people riding your ass over anything to the point of a hollow personality, love seeing someone find a middle ground. His arc revolves around healing and inner peace, above all being true to himself. Yes he can be funny but people get way too caught up making him a meme or rude rather than pay attention to anything else.

He has heart, which is something he guards beneath the rage. Maybe guard is only part of it; he spent all his life focused on anger and revenge I think he forgot it in the back of his mind. It wasn’t as important as killing Nidhogg, and making sure everyone and everything helped do so. The longer it goes on though the more he realizes whats happened to him by drowning in hate; he was never totally blinded in order to do that, whatever he might’ve thought otherwise. He was on the path of losing his humanity. And that fact conflicted with a desire to let go and a desire to hold on.

He shares enough in common with Vaste like this that despite his initial rudeness I think she could tell in his eyes there was more going on. She saw what she was becoming whenever they first spoke. That bonded them right away beyond sharing being Azure Dragoons. He wasn’t in a position to truly help her then because of his own problems, but he would’ve been dispensing advice without realizing it. His honesty continued to be refreshing and grounding too as time passed with people continuing to dehumanize or idolize her.

I love his self reflection, in fact I think he’s one of it not the best at it of the entire cast. The fact that it started not when Nidhogg died but during them being bound together speaks to both the wounded child and unfulfilled man he was beneath rage. The moment he learned the truth of the Dragonsong War, when he felt Nidhogg’s being within himself, he’s been on a journey of understanding. He recognizes Ishgard’s corruption both in the present and the past, which led him to remove himself from an oppressive system while doing penance for his sins and the sins of his heritage in good deeds.

He knows he has a responsibility, and he’s acting on it in tangible ways when he helps Dragons and honors them.

He’s a guide for how I want Vaste to be; a warrior who recognizes who he is, what he’s done, and how he may be part of the community of humanity.

I wanna talk about why I think he’s out of touch at times and not great with socializing beyond Dragons.

It makes complete sense while also explaining how out of touch he is with things others see as normal (including money spending). He picked up the spear at age 12-13 and never put it down; literally and metaphorically training was what he did whenever he wasn't asleep. Alberic probably tried teaching him life skills, but it went unheard if he did. He still has a childlike grasp of things like buying for himself, taking care of himself, others reactions or thoughts about what he might say/do, self care etc.

Of course he’s like that! He never saw the value in being anything other than a tool for his own vengeance! Only years later once he’s come out of revenge can he see he’s stunted himself. I feel as if he’s playing catch up on this too since Heavensward, not just his wandering warrior philosophy. Speaking of that he reminds me of Raiden in Metal Gear Rising, accepting violence and combat as the fabric of his identity, but using it to help the weak and personal atonement. Often times this level of self acceptance when it comes to a negative trait is written so negative action has to be the result. Its nice to see a subversion thats meaningful without being another “Give in to your darkness while accepting no consequences”

Also when he was a villain, I was living for it. I loved when he and Nidhogg shared the role because from a character stand point it made sense. The game had this track record with its villains where they reflected the flaws in the world or society that produced them. Nidhogg reflected the suffering a greedy militant nation will inflict on another race when it stands to benefit; Estinien reflected the despair single minded hatred brings as it eats away who you are and your human essence. Ysayle saw the paranoid murders, rapes, classism and abuses of power rampant in Ishgard which made her side with the oppressed, its foundations built on slaughter of a minority. Yotsuyuu as we know was sexually sold and abused every way by the standards her country upheld, how it viewed women. Fordola is brainwashed, manipulated, and groomed into a reflection of her conquerors.

Really it was a fantastic tradition the Warriors of Darkness then later Meteion continued (I fucking loved Meteion & Hermes actually)- and then people amounted it to memes. Estinien and the others deserve better than that. Heavensward tied his struggles in a way that showed how mental weakness from our faults and deprived needs makes us easy prey for manipulation. Through him it deepened a personal aspect to what Nidhogg and Ysayle were doing; in the sense where the game gave us three characters exploring the failings of Ishgard and war itself. Had the expansion solely relied on Thordan to make its point then it’d be paper thin.

You could see every Heavensward villain/antagonist except for Thordan, and some villains in Stormblood (Yotsuyuu & Fordola) as having It Has To Be This Way fit over their fights

Estinien is great not only for his arc progression and down to earth personality, but because he’s one of the last symbols of when the game was at its best. A time when the game narrative started moving up with stumbles and promise. It took until Endwalker for me to feel even a fraction of that old thrill again. The writers saw they needed a foil character further commentating on when violence becomes senseless; fuck if they didn’t deliver.

His dedication to his agenda first continues to be a breath of fresh air; I want more characters who recognize when they contribute to oppression as he did then take steps doing something about it. I want characters who evolve their philosophy. Every time I see him being a dragon’s biggest fan asking nothing in return its a highlight. Because I remember when he would’ve butchered them all.

He’s my beloved for doing so. The game features mature topics, and characters like Estinien execute on the theme. They better not fuck him up or I’m adding him to my collection. Also him and Aymeric have a thing going on, bisexual husbands. Estinien sees he's fucking up when he does and he learns to correct his behavior. More male characters need to learn that shit, even in general. He loves fiercely. His word is his honor. He understands himself. He is healing. Love this fucking man.

Also I forgive him for anything bad because he worked on it or is working on it so he has always been my babygirl. I see a lot of myself in him too.

So the last bestie is...

Mercuo

I thought about using Gan but I’ve been feeling him ^ lately. Next time I’ll talk about Gan and also his design. Not everyone in the Guardians of Time agreed with or liked Vaste at first. In fact only Weyd, and Syv took a definite positive interest in him on first impressions.

You can argue Lewena somewhat liked her when they first met based on what I wrote a long time ago; however I don’t count it since Lewena’s thoughts were doubts and anxiety. Also she only exposed a glimpse of her powers because she thought it fit the situation while trying to show Vaste a ‘Look I’m special too its not just you’ side. Trying to show her value next to a famous person.

The others had a range of conflicting emotions or self doubts about if she could understand them, because of their low self esteem and differing views. Mercuo’s reasoning made him emotionally withdrawn and externally curt. He didn't dislike Vaste herself so much as the fact that as WoL she's an authority figure, she's allowed the privilege of sanctioned violence. He didn't trust her responsibility nor the role itself because authority betrayed him. He's seen intimately how ripe for warping it is, to the point he questions it's usefulness since it creates an exploitable imbalanced dynamic.

TW: Child Sex Abuse mention

As in his backstory the trauma of seeing the man who became his father figure molest and attempt assaulting children was the final shattering of his faith in authority figures. His parents had already given him up long ago, the priests before he entered the knighthood by and large didn't expect much, and everyone lorded over him because he was from The Brume and a Duskwight. Not to mention his father figure almost got the chance to molest him as well which was further devastating in hindsight.

He has reason not to trust the authoritative individual; he had an idea not to trust the system because Ishgard and poor people don't mix, but seeing it defend his pedophile mentor because he was highborn is the final straw. He puts trust in others when they earn it, and he has every right to. He and Weyd get along because she is genuinely forward thinking as a person and how she sees class systems.

She's seen firsthand the greed of Ul'Dah and the piranha tank it becomes at the drop of a hat. She's seen the neglect of the common man, the bribes, the brutality as policy, the corrupt divided powers. They have similar feelings in common. She had to earn his respect from tireless communication as well as her bearing. The heaps of money for his services was the plus. Vaste has to match that energy and conviction to him; he has to see by her actions she's intent on defying a system.

So first impressions wise he has no idea on any of this so he's on edge. He warms up the longer he spends time around her but the real shift comes when she opens up. Like Yugiri he has a crisis moment in their friendship. How can he feel anything toward a kid killer other than rage? She didn't get upset with him for not wanting to be near her for a time. He spent a long while thinking on it and on how she wants to change.

He thought about how the system broke her down to be capable of it, of how the Templar Knights did similar with him. He was a cop at the end of the day, he'd seen his share of police brutality in Ishgard. Back then though he was too young as a teenager to fully grasp the weight of what he saw and did beyond gut emotions.

In the end what bridged the gap was how hard he saw her trying. She put her money where her mouth was rather than mope but take no action. She started defying the Scions openly, and spoke out whenever she could. He watched her closely to find a grasp on her humanity. Not only that but she came up with the most insane plan he ever heard, killing gods so no one else can suffer as much as they did. This spoke to him, as a Duskwight, as a poor class Ishgardian, as a man.

They became hard friends once they reconciled these differences. If she had been only about her words he would've never changed his mind nor given her trust. If she wasn't serious she'd never have shared with him such a batshit crazy plan either. He understands she's in pain and is paying for it, like he is when he remembers his father figure, how he had to kill him for what he'd done. It's built on compassion and some empathy.

Otherwise though he's a romantic, a risk taker, an adventurer through and through. I don't just mean romantic in that he treats G'azef like a king either; he views the world as full of beauty in unexpected moments. Walking though nature is beauty, walking through towns is beauty, the moment when something gives you a full feeling in the chest is beauty. Hearing others laugh and share stories, joys over drinks is beauty. Sharing pain, is beauty. It's intimacy with the world around you that's romantic.

He's not shy toward new experiences either, though he won't do things he finds obviously stupid. If someone isn't getting him into a new thing then he's breaking their shell in a heart to heart way to do the thing too. Whereas Gan is obvious and enthusiastic when doing this, Mercuo can be that but also subtle. It's about reading situations, which he's done to survive since childhood. As a side effect it made him good at reading people and their emotions.

He keeps up loyalty to places and people he cares for. Chasing Comet's bar the 'Star Dancer' is one such place. He loves everything there, drinks, food, the company etc. Chasing Comet and Kind Dawn love his listening ear or hearing him jumpstart a good party or wild story. They also know him as one of the few who consistently pays his tab. Whenever they need help he'll jump in if able, which always helps. Comet can see on his face that he does things out of earnest, because it's right; it's a trait she finds is lacking in others. So he always has a home there, even on the occasions he does mischief.

He and K'ali do jockey each other over getting work as mercenaries, but there is respect. They may tease and bicker and be petty but neither does anything genuinely insulting. They respect each other's work ethic, skills, charisma and so on. There's been times where he's seen her off beneath the swashbuckling demeanor and stepped in; either with a word or by paying for her tab.

The times when she's been too distraught inside to remember to shave were his first clue that she's intersex, but he didn't bug her about it. He saw her anxiety over forgetting to upkeep how she presents and had the tact not to treat her any different.

When she finally did confide some in him, he was accepting. He also knows how much she cares for her brother N'ali. He wishes he had a family relationship like that; as time passes he gives that role to Syv somewhat. In any case he sees she has heart even when she's being a shit. Without her around things would be less bright.

The sword to him is so important because despite the painful memories he has using one, it's still symbolic of finding his first calling. Of finding freedom out of the slums and loneliness. Nothing can ever take that half away. He trains to the point it moves as an extension of his body; a skill he's proud of beyond belief. It is both an art piece and a tool of death to be respected. He and G'azef met through the sword too. They fight side by side as each other's embers in the clashes of life. They are in love so thoroughly to embody the sword in one another.

I really like Mercuo. I really like all my characters even when I struggle to fill them out. So moving forward I want to do more little by little.

Also I like fitting him in clothes with huge collars because it makes his head hilariously tiny but it works

#hc #so fitting that i was listening to the Metal Gear Rising OST writing this lol #'I CARVED MY OWN PATH; YOU FOLLOWED YOUR WRATH- BUT MAYBE WE'RE BOTH THE SAAAMMEEE'- narrative foils have done so much for us as a society #nhaama #to live this way

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adlbeay · 3 years

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I wanted to talk about the themes in the Walk in the Dust event. The story of Arknights has always had a high level of thematic consistency, but it’s especially prominent in this event. I feel like a lot of the discussion of the story in certain places comes down to “lore” and surface-level plot details, so I wanted to get this out there somewhere.

The two big ideas that are covered in Walk in the Dust are that of revenge and the homeland. Let's talk about revenge first. Long post and story spoilers under the cut.

In the beginning, we are introduced to Elliot, aka Passenger, who by the time we meet him, is an aimless husk of a man. He is utterly empty inside despite being the most powerful figure in the Reefsteep black market, with vast wealth and political influence under his thumb. Having completed his decades-long quest to slay everyone who was involved in betraying his teacher, he has no more goals for his life. After killing the Lord Ameer of Ibut, the last of his targets, he realizes that the revenge he had been pursuing was ultimately empty, that the weapons he built and the schemes he engineered to that end no longer moved him. Even the death of the Lord Ameer didn't matter one bit in the political landscape of Sargon.

As for the Sargon army... We live in different times now. The ruling Padishahs simply care not about what is happening here in this barren wasteland. My guess is that it matters not to them whether it's the father or the son that's in charge. Actually, to tell the truth, it hardly matters to me either.

Ultimately, no one cared if the Lord Ameer was murdered or simply died in an accident, not even Elliot himself. Sargon continues to be exploited by the Columbian military and the ruling Lords. Professor Thorne remains dead. His research, once entrusted to Elliot to prevent it from becoming a weapon of war, has nonetheless been used by Elliot himself to bring even more death. Now, 22 years later, Passenger sees finding Kal'tsit as his only path to salvation, so that she can once again give him a purpose like she did when she rescued him the first time.

Folinic's mom, Lillia, also shares the same kind of story. Her husband was killed in Chernobog when the count decided to purge the researchers working on the sarcophagus device. Among the children of the families broken up by this incident are Lyudmila (later Crownslayer), Alex and Misha (later Skullshatterer), and Luisa (later Folinic). Lillia finds Kal'tsit after months of searching, intending to take revenge on Grand Duke Vanya not just for her husband, but also for Luisa, who never got to know her father because of it. Kal'tsit tries to talk her out of it, even during the final phases of the plan, but Lillia's mind is set. She entrusts Kal'tsit with taking care of both Luisa and Lyudmila, as she knows she won't be able to come back to live a normal life after this. And... she succeeds. Although it is Kal'tsit who ultimately administered the poison, their plan works flawlessly and Duke Vanya is finally dead.

Except it still ended up being completely meaningless. The Grand Duke was in a glorified nursing home already near the end of his life, and if Kal'tsit didn't kill him then some other conspirator from the Ursus political backstage would have done it anyway. He was already crippled and blind, and as we find out during the confrontation with the Emperor's Blade, even Kal'tsit only agreed to Lillia's plan because it defused the conspiracies of other powerful figures who would have used the Duke's death to spark another rebellion. The only thing that Lillia ended up accomplishing was making sure that Louisa would grow up without both a mother and a father, and Lyudmila would never get the answers she really wanted about her family's death. And, although she ended up not doing it, she was even also planning to go back to Chernobog to kill Sergei, Alex and Misha's father, for his betrayal.

And this carries on through the future outside the event. Crownslayer ends up joining Reunion because she thinks it will give her the answers she wants and avenge her father. Folinic almost lets her anger at Atro's death get her into a confrontation with Wolumonde. In the end, Crownslayer is stopped by Kal'tsit and Folinic is calmed down by Suzuran, but we might be able to imagine what would have happened if they managed to carry out their vengeance.

The theme of homeland is one that's intrinsically tied to Kal'tsit and has at least a bit of relation to the broader story outside of the event. It's harder to talk about since it's not clearly split into individual stories like previously, but there's at least one character that exemplifies this theme the most: Old Isin.

Old Isin is appropriately to his name, old as rocks. He remembers being a servant to some lord of a long-lost city that very few even know once existed, and spends his time telling fortunes while trying to seek out people who, like him, also share that past. According to Kal'tsit, the city's people were scattered when it was destroyed, and now only Isin even remembers the origin of the name "Reefsteep". Even then, Isin only has vague memories, and believes it to be his unforgivable sin that he has forgotten so much about the city.

Old Isin originally helps Kal'tsit and Elliot because he hopes that she can help him remember about the lost city, and thus absolve his "unforgivable sin". And Kal'tsit indeed does help him. Isin begins to recall the conquests of armies a thousand years ago, something even with his age he should not have been a part of, much less remembered. Kal'tsit dispels the illusions clouding his memory, and reveals that what Isin remembers is only the stories that the padishah recounted to him, that the glory of his old city was only a memory of another memory. In truth, the city in Old Isin's memory was merely a stepping stone for the padishah's ambition to conquer the uncharted deserts, and was abandoned just as easily when that campaign failed. His homeland's glory was just an illusion created in his mind by the padishah's charisma.

Which brings us to the Emperor's Blade. Wherever he stands is the dominion of the Empire of Ursus. Whatever he does carries out the Ursus Emperor's will. Or at least, that's how the Royal Guards imagine themselves, single-handedly carrying out their homeland's legacy. Kal'tsit lays it out clearly:

Kal'tsit: Tell me, what does the current Ursus Emperor think of the Pine Valley affair? Or do you mean to tell me the seeds of that uprising, the origins of the crisis were all the will of the Emperor? Feel free to keep deceiving yourself, but the truth is the young emperor is unaware of the events that transpired there. You believe he has no need to know. You... all of you seek a bygone era. You are just caught up in the former emperor's grand vision!

As does Patriot in Chapter 8:

Patriot: I fought with your fathers. Your strength and tactical acumen are no less impressive than theirs. But you look at the Ursus of those times with rose-colored glasses. What you see is nothing more than your wild fantasies.

The Royal Guards are described in not too unclear words as soldiers who probably believed too much of their own grandiose affect. They are unparalleled fighters, to be sure, but it isn't hard to infer that those words about executing Ursus's will and each Royal Guard being his own nation are words intended to strike fear into their enemies rather than statements of any real truth. Indeed, if you know anything about the internal politics of Ursus, the idea of "Ursus's own will" can be seen as more of a nostalgia at a bygone era when Ursus was, or at least seemed, united in conquest under the previous Emperor. The perceived glory of their homeland is what motivates the Emperor's Blade, but like with Old Isin, the truth behind it is shaky at best.

We also have the contrast between the retired veteran at Pine Valley and Grand Duke Vanya. While talking to Witte, the veteran cuts off one of his own fingers, claiming that the scars he has suffered in Ursus's wars, once considered symbols of his glory and honor, were ultimately meaningless, and he wants this self-inflicted wound to be his only legacy to Ursus. At the same time, the Grand Duke is postulating about how the seeds he had sown in the winter would give birth to beautiful flowers. Even though his actions and the crimes he committed never bore fruition, he is convinced even in death that Ursus's soil will bloom.

The issue of a real or imagined homeland, and its loss, is also shared by the Sarkaz as a whole not only in this story but in the main story and many other events. It's even arguable that Rhodes Island's mission to help the Infected was originally inherited from Babel's goal of establishing a stable homeland for the Sarkaz. After all, as pointed out in many places, the Infected and Sarkaz share much of the same discrimination.

Sarkaz Mercenary: Home...? How could us devils... us Infected possibly have one... Kal'tsit: The Sarkaz have tried to rebuild 'Kazdel', their home for centuries, though they have never succeeded. Everyone has a different idea as to what the term 'homeland' means, but as it stands right now, Kazdel is perhaps as close as you can get to the term's original meaning.

And in Twilight of Wolumonde:

Armed Infected: We’re going home? To what home?

Mudrock: Kazdel. There may be no place for Sarkaz outside of Kazdel. But in Kazdel, there is a place for you. Not because of tolerance. But because there is... nothing there. Kazdel... is where the homeless go. A land of rootless people.

So what does all this have to do with Kal'tsit?

In the ending cutscene, Passenger asks Kal'tsit whether this "Rhodes Island" is yet another passing persona to be used to accomplish a goal and discarded when it's complete. Like the persona of the Trusted Advisor, or the Servant, or the Laterano Cleric, will she abandon Rhodes Island as well? Kal'tsit initially puts up a front saying he has no right to ask, then bluffs about having thousands of answers, but is pushed by Passenger saying he'll even accept a lie. In one of the only times we get to see Kal'tsit faltering, she actually has no answer to this.

Unlike the other characters we see throughout the story, Kal'tsit has no homeland. No matter how fake or illusory it is, Old Isin and the Royal Guard have something to believe about a place where they can belong. The nobles in Victoria, as incompetent as they appear from the outside, are dedicated to defending the peace of their home despite having no ruler. Even the ostracized Sarkaz can ultimately go back to Kazdel, as unpleasant as that might be. But while Kal'tsit wanders the earth to keep the homelands of others from falling into chaos, she has no homeland of her own to go back to.

In one of the trailers for Chapter 9, we hear a recording from Theresa, addressed to Kal'tsit: "I hope this Rhodes Island can be a place to call home, a place you can always return to."

#arknights #arknights spoilers #kal'tsit

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justforbooks · 3 years

Photo

Why do we read? The wealth of genres available suggests that some of us read for comfort, escapism, knowledge, or to improve ourselves. Whilst these are all perfectly valid reasons, it’s also worth thinking about reading about themes, perspectives, and societies that go beyond our own comfort zones.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, it has been estimated by the proofreading service, Global English Editing, that 35% of the people in the world have read more books than usual this year.

With normality disrupted, is it no wonder we have turned to books more? Books can give us all sorts of benefits, but when thinking about our reading habits during a pandemic, it is worth looking at this from a mental health perspective.

The Benefits of Reading — But Why It Should Also Challenge Us

Reading can force us to be mindful, take us away from the blaring digital world that we have become more reliant on, and force us into the present by talking one page at a time. “Bibliotherapy” is a relatively new form of reading therapy being used in clinics, libraries, and schools to promote recovery in people with mental health difficulties in some places in the world.

With these mental health benefits in mind, it is one explanation for why so many of us have taken to reading during the pandemic. But reading to improve our mental health can also be coupled with challenging and educating ourselves. Reading fiction is one of the best ways to do this. Not only are you benefiting from its natural escapism, but in many cases, fiction forces you to put yourself within the shoes of others.

A central theme with my reading habits in 2020 was choosing books that challenged me. In this respect — the books that follow have forced me to go beyond what’s comfortable — as I have learnt about different issues experienced by characters I wouldn’t necessarily encounter in my daily life.

Each has changed my perspective on a range of issues — highlighting why it’s important to read books that challenge us.

An American Marriage, Tayari Jones

Literary fiction

Celestial and Roy are a newlywed couple — for a brief moment — they indulge in the feeling of being married and the excitement of spending the rest of their lives together. Until one incident changes everything. Roy is wrongly accused of a crime he didn’t commit and is sent to jail for the rape of a woman.

“Much of life is timing and circumstance, I see that now.”

Whilst in jail, Roy desperately tries to keep his new marriage alive, whilst sending Celestial letters and hoping for a better future. But Celestial cannot continue to live her life waiting for theirs to start. In many ways, it is a story about relationships and love but heavily tainted by the blatant racism that lays at the heart of the American criminal justice system and how it has the power to alter lives.

Why Did it Challenge Me?

Reading this as a white woman, made me realise this situation would never happen to me. Reading from the point of view of Roy, a black man, wrongly convicted for a crime he didn’t commit purely on the grounds of his race and circumstance — was a learning experience for me.

I grew up in a considerably white town. Until fairly recently, I knew very little about racism and how it perpetuates the very systems that we typically view as ‘just.’ Therefore, reading about these types of experiences that I wouldn’t usually be exposed to in my life, was essential for me.

“Twelve years is what they gave him. We would be forty-three years old when he was released. I couldn’t even imagine myself at such an age. Roy understood that twelve years was an eternity because he sobbed right there on the defendants’ table. His knees gave way, and he fell into his chair, The judge paused and demanded that Roy bear this news on his feet. He stood again and cried, not like a baby, but in the way that only a grown man can cry, from the bottom of his feet through his torso and finally through his mouth…”

The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell

Political fiction

The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists was written during the early twentieth century and tells the story of a group of Edwardian workers. Owen, the outspoken socialist, makes it his mission to persuade and educate the rest of the group on the importance of a fairer society. He tries to make them realise the extent of their exploitation and how little it achieves — but he is always fighting an uphill battle.

In many ways, this book could be regarded as a socialist manifesto. But in others, it is far more than that. Through Owen, as readers, we learn that poverty is not about misconceptions such as laziness, but is more often than not, a political choice.

It’s rhetoric surrounding the workplace, and the unskilled versus the skilled worker highlights how we still undervalue certain people in society. Nurses and cleaners make up the groundwork of our society; however, they are still persistently underpaid. Throughout the novel, Owen makes a case for a redistribution of wealth, workplace rights and an overhaul of the capitalist system which in his eyes, is responsible for the vicious cycle of poverty they find themselves in.

“Every man who is not helping to bring about a better state of affairs for the future is helping to perpetuate the present misery and is, therefore, the enemy of his own children.”

Despite being written long ago, it contains an essential insight into the reality of working-class, Edwardian poverty, poor workplace conditions, and poverty workers' experience to keep themselves alive. Of course, it is inherently political, but it also teaches readers about human and societal values. Such as fairness, equality, and decency.

Why Did it Challenge Me?

Despite it being set during a very different time, it made me re-evaluate all the problems within our own society whether that’s the persistent gender pay gap, poor sick pay, or people not being eligible for financial help during the Covid crisis when they’ve had to stay at home during lockdowns.

Above all, the descriptive scenes of the workplace — most notably — one in which a young boy, Bert, who is told off for trying to light a fire to keep himself warm — made me realise how brutal and hard work manual labour jobs in the Edwardian period were — and how little rights they had.

Such A Fun Age

Fiction

Emira is a young black woman, living in Philidelphia and trying to find her feet. She works as a babysitter for a middle-class, white blogger who thinks she’s all clued up on race. Through the perspective of Emira, the novel deals with the casual forms of racism and microaggressions that many of us (particularly white people) may not usually notice in our day to day lives.

“Emira had met several “Mrs. Chamberlains” before. They were all rich and overly nice and particularly lovely to the people that served them. Emira knew that Mrs. Chamberlain wanted a friendship, but she also knew that Mrs. Chamberlain would never display the same efforts of kindness with her friends as she did with Emira: “accidentally” ordering two salads and offering one to Emira, or sending her home with a bag filled with frozen dinners and soups.”

Switching between Emira’s perspective, and Alix’s, the blogger, Such a Fun Age is a poignant, comical and revealing portrayal of the present world and the half-hearted ways in which white people commonly approach the subject of race. Alix thinks she is all clued up on what it’s like to be a black woman, as she has plenty of black friends, and after all, employs a young black woman.

Stephanie Hayes, writing in The Atlantic, sums her character up brilliantly in stating that the novel, “satirizes the white pursuit of wokeness.” Furthermore, this switching between two completely different characters means,

“Alix’s myopia isn’t lost on Emira. Writing from the younger woman’s point of view, Reid renders white people whose eagerness to shed their blinkers results in fumbling attempts to identify with black people — as much to burnish their own images as to genuinely connect with others.”

Why Did It Challenge Me?

It made me realise that some of the ways I used to approach talking about race — were wrong. By reading about Emria’s experience with her boss, Alix, I was exposed to the realities of casual racism. Something, as a white woman, I am have never experienced myself. This is obviously something I will never understand, but after reading this, I feel more aware and educated about it.

Reading this forced me into the perspective of Emira, a character living completely outside my own bubble. It opened my mind up to how the daily lives of others can be so different. Most of all, it forced me to stop and think.

Keep the Aspidistra Flying, George Orwell

Political fiction

This book encapsulates the dilemma that many young, recent graduates like myself, have to deal with. Do you strive to embark on a career that’s safe and stable, or pursue something you love, even if it takes longer and involves many more hurdles along the way? Gordon, the protagonist, has a safe job at an advertising firm; however, he gives this all up to work in a bookshop, for a slither of his previous salary.

After leaping into the unknown, he tries to stand against the capitalist society he feels he is forced into. Deliberately quitting a good job, and living below the poverty line, Gordon thinks he is making a robust, political stand. He tells the reader how he hates money and how this rampant need fuels every part of our society.

However, Gordon eventually realises the errors of his ways — as he learns his actions aren’t realistic because they aren’t encouraging a change to the system.

“The mistake you make, don’t you see, is in thinking one can live in a corrupt society without being corrupt oneself. After all, what do you achieve by refusing to make money? You’re trying to behave as though one could stand right outside our economic system. But one can’t. One’s got to change the system, or one changes nothing.”

Why Did It Challenge Me?

In this current job climate, it was a reminder that at the moment, no industry is ‘safe’ and that there is no such thing as a ‘proper’ job. Those jobs such as advertising, marketing, retail and hospitality — that we were always taught—were secure and ripped apart during the pandemic. It made me think about my own plans and perceptions of the job market.

Additionally, Gordon’s inherent dislike of money and the capitalist world reignited my desire for a more minimalist outlook and society. After all, money is never the route of all happiness.

Reading fiction is an enjoyable form of escapism, but it can also teach us a lot about other peoples’ lives, and challenge our own ideas and values. We can often become comfortable living in our own bubbles and reading the same books we have always turned to.

But reading fiction can help challenge our own comfort and promote a more diverse world view — when dealing with subjects such as race, society and culture. By reading fiction, we get to be inside the minds and live inside others' shoes we may never encounter in real life. Thus, it’s a form of stepping outside that comfort bubble, a form of social education, and a way of understanding people.

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at http://justforbooks.tumblr.com

#JUST FOR BOOKS #Why do we read?

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epochl · 3 years

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𝙼𝙴𝙴𝚃 𝚃𝙷𝙴 𝙾𝙲𝚂 :

𝙱𝙴𝚃𝙷 & 𝙱𝚁𝙸𝙳𝙶𝙴𝚃𝚃𝙴 . ( fandomless )

adopted siblings who were adopted really young. beth is two years older than bridgette. beth was adopted after her biological parents died in a car crash and her adoptive parents were friends of theirs. bridgette was adopted as a baby after being left by a teen mother. their childhoods were relatively stable and happy despite this. their mother is a social worker and their father a doctor so they were really set up to succeed and have a good life. they currently live together.

bridgette (played 25-29) started looking for her mother when she was a teenager and this led to a few years of going a little off the rails because of the instability and uncertainty. she got pregnant at age 19 with her boyfriend at the time. she has a son called teddy (edward) named after their adoptive father. despite this, she went back to college to study fashion design and began a career in fashion. she’s very focussed on the future and can often miss out on the day to day existence with her son. she can be a bit ... distant ... because she’s so focussed. she is a good mother, just not always the most present one.

beth (played 27-32) is the older of the two and takes that responsibility really seriously. she studied at art school and is a phenomenal artist and at the stage in her career when things are really starting to take off. however, she moved in with her sister a few years ago, seeing the way that bridgette was sometimes not being the most present in teddy’s life. she’s very much the stabilising force and the true better parent, more present in all aspects, but she does have a growing frustration with her sister, especially as teddy gets older and starts to recognise whats going on in the house.

𝙼𝙰𝚁𝚉𝙸𝙰 . ( spy based )

mariza (played 26-30) is an actual real life living genius. a chess champion who went to oxford and studied physics and fell in with a crowd in university that would lead her in to MI6/SIS (changes based on fandom) , first as a codebreaker and then becoming an undercover spy, specialising in political situations. she often ends up working undercover high up in other governments. she’s fluent in seven languages. outside of being a spy, you generally wouldn’t ever thing of it. she has a small home with a pet dog called archie and is a frequent visitor to her local parks and libraries. she’s close to her family and tells people that she’s working in administration for the government so they don’t ask too many questions.

𝙳𝙰𝙽𝙸𝙴𝙻 . ( apocalypse based )

daniel (played 32 - 35) had the pefect life, a wife he adored and two children, aidan ( 6-8) and lola (2-5) , until the apocalypse struck. his wife died quickly (depending on the setting depends on how but normally we go zombie) and he had to deliver the final blow to ensure no further harm could come. now a single dad with two kids and ptsd, he’s travelling across the country teaching them survival and seeking out a rumoured safe space in the hopes that they will get to grow up with some sense of normality.

𝙷𝙴𝙰𝚃𝙷𝙴𝚁 ( modern witch )

heather (played 23 - 27) is an average person, doing an average podtgrad in english literature, except she’s not quite, because she just happens to be a witch. brought up by her grandmother, she went to normal school in the day and studied witchcraft by night, learning about the legacy passed down in her family. now, she’s trying to merge her two lives together, working in a friend of the family’s witchy bookshop while she funds herself through school. think sabrina the teenage witch style witchness and dark academia style vibes.

#this is brief but hi love them.#( ... ) GEN. BRIDGETTE TURNER — “ BETTER DAYS WILL COME WHEN YOU BUILD THEM. ”#( ... ) GEN. BETH TURNER — “ BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE MAKE BEAUTIFUL THINGS. ”#( ... ) GEN. MARZIA PRINCE — “ A SMILE LIKE A LOADED GUN. ”#( ... ) GEN. DANIEL SCOTT — “ THE EMPTY ROAD TO NOWHERE. ”#( ... ) GEN. HEATHER WALSH — “ WE ARE THE DAUGHTERS OF THE WITCHES YOU WEREN’T ABLE TO BURN. ”

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k-writer1998 · 4 years

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Runaway

Prompt fic: runaway! felix x princess! y/n

fluff

w.c: 2.2k

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“What’s a princess doing climbing the palace wall? I’m pretty sure you have doors.”

The voice immediately registered in my mind and I rolled my eyes as I gave the voice’s owner a smile that matched his own toothy grin. His golden locks caught the sunlight making them stand out against his tanned skin.

“Doors are for people with permission to leave Felix. I, on the other hand, am running away unless you want to kidnap me instead.”

“Why are you like this? You ask me to kidnap you every time I see you, being kidnapped isn't something a princess should be asking for.”

In the distance, the sound of steps on cobblestone grew closer. After sharing a glance, I quickly grab Felix’s outreached hand as he pulls me into the tree he was perched on.

“We can discuss the finer details in town or you can watch me leave. Either way I don’t want to stay in the palace right now and the guards are coming,” I whispered.

Letting out a sigh he pulled me along and we completed our escape.We were talking as the town came into sight when Felix suddenly pulled up the hood of my cloak.. My lips tugged into a grateful smile as a soft thank you fell from my mouth. Felix was so much like a gentleman I almost forget he’s wanted, even the townspeople seemed to forget. The blacksmith Changbin and the stable boy Jisung, two of the fiercest villagers, along with the mayor’s son Hyunjin and the florist’s son Jeongin greet Felix as if they were best friends.

“How is it that you are a wanted criminal yet the town treats you like royalty?”

“Huh, what? Royalty? What? Why would you say that?”

“Because everyone loves you even when your wanted poster is hanging right here?”

Coincidentally we walked past the town notice board where the poster in question hung. I’ve never heard father talk about it but suddenly one day it was there so I never caught wind of what exactly Felix did to become wanted. There were rumors, but they are far too vast and many don't match the boy I've grown to know.

"It's probably because the poster looks nothing like me."

"Felix… they have you down to the freckles."

"Oh! Do you smell that? It seems the bakery just finished a fresh batch."

It was always like this, Felix avoids topics about the poster and about his life. He’s never around long enough for me to figure out anyways. I've hinted at his past a few times but he always seemed to find a way around it. My eyes followed the movement of the boy as he happily spoke with the baker's son, Seungmin. He has a friendly disposition and a smile that’s like a burst of serotonin but the way he carries himself is almost… regal. I’ve observed him over the span of a few months and the more I learn the more mystery surrounds him. One thing is certain though he’s good at hiding what he wants to keep hidden. Soon Felix exited the shop with a single loaf of bread looking pleased with himself as he broke me half. Starting our stroll once again, I silently followed Felix’s lead, still stuck in my earlier thought, as I picked at my bread until his velvet voice broke me from my thoughts.

“So are you gonna tell me about these “finer details” you mentioned earlier?”

“Ugh…” I sigh as I give him a side eye he returns with a patient smile, “My coronation is coming up soon and one of the traditions is announcing my engagement, the only problem is I don’t have a fiancé.”

“I’m assuming the king has tried to find you one and you’ve refused them all?”

“Well father calls it “scaring them off” but besides the point. The problem lies with time. It’s decided the next suitor will be my fiancé, there just isn’t any more time in this matter.”

Minus a few furrowed brows, Felix was actually taking this better than I thought. Not many outsiders understand the workings of royal society. He took a moment as he weighed over his next question before he asked.

“So are you really running away?”

“Although I do joke with you to kidnap me, I do know better you know. It’s for the future of my country and as crown princess I have to make choices others don’t,” I smiled.

What more could I do? There would be no gain from revealing my true feelings anyways. Felix seemed lost in thought, most likely trying to process all of this so after a moment I gave him a little nudge. He turned to me with a smile and his eyes seemed to soften. Usually I would hate a look like that from anyone, but just for today and because it was Felix, I took it.

“C’mon don’t be a downer, there is still half a day’s adventure waiting for us.”

We went back on the main street looking about the shops and even played a bit with the children in town. Before we headed back our final stop was Minho’s restaurant. The food was amazing but I expected nothing less from the palace cook’s son. Felix excused himself for a moment, leaving me to my thoughts. I can’t explain it but the air around him has changed.

“You like him don’t you?”

“OH- shouldn’t you be in the kitchen?” I gasp as I look at Minho sitting in Felix’s seat.

“Yes but I am the owner so I can do what I want and you never answered my question.”

“Wipe that cheeky smile off. Being my childhood friend doesn’t mean you know me,” I huff.

“That’s not why I asked but also another valid point. I’ve seen lots of people come through my restaurant y/n, I can tell when someone has a crush.”

“Well whatever the case it doesn’t matter anyways. Didn’t your mom tell you what’s been going on in the palace lately?”

“You may not think it matters but who knows, maybe it matters enough to change something.”

Before I could argue with him, he ran back to the kitchen with a mysterious smile and moments later Felix came back. After dinner we had to start the unavoidable walk back to the palace. Once the front gates were coming into sight, Felix pulled me to a halt. I knew he wouldn’t be able to walk me all the way back but he was never one for goodbyes. He would usually disappear and I wouldn't notice until moments later. Why the sudden change in habit? There was a careful look on his face and it made me nervous, it was rare to see him so serious and a first during goodbye.

"Hey, don't be like this. It almost makes me want to really run away with you," I tried joking.

“Can I ask you something?”

“By all means.”

“If I was a prince would I pass your test?”

“Felix you are one of the few people willing to put up with my temperament and can easily keep up with me. If you were a prince you would be my first pick.”

I wasn’t going to speak my true feelings but with that expectant look on his face, I couldn’t help but be honest. Although this parting weighed on me the more we extended this goodbye, he looked content with my answer. Not wanting to be the only one thrown off, I emptied my mind and let instinct take over. Pulling him down, I kissed his cheek before running off to the main gate. It wasn’t until the guards were escorting me back into the palace did I dare to look back and of course there was no trace of him… Being scolded in the study made me realize, I may have accepted my fate but it didn’t mean I wouldn’t be petty about it.

“You know, have you ever thought as to why I’ve rejected every suitor you brought forth? They’ve either belittled my intelligence or overestimated their power in this union.”

“My daughter, you're my everything! I’ve handpicked the most suitable of the royals for you. You are being too critical on these princes.”

“Wow, didn’t know that’s how ‘I’m sorry’ sounds these days.”

“Y/n, I’m sorry… I truly am but you know you are running out of time, we cannot delay anymore.”

“You only care that I’m crowned, not taking into account that I will have to entrust our kingdom to whatever prick comes next let alone live with him.”

“Y/n please-”

“Don’t worry father, I’ve come to terms with this decision. I will have a fiancé by the end of the month. I’m tired from my outing, I will return to my chambers now.”

Aside from my head hurting from that conversation with my father, my mind couldn’t help but worry about Felix. Ever since telling him I was to be engaged soon, he seemed… off for the rest of the day. Through the next few weeks of preparations, meetings, and dress fittings Felix has yet to leave my mind. It’s normal for him to disappear for periods of time but there was something final about our last goodbye and it doesn’t settle well with me.

“Princess?”

“Sorry, I got distracted by the beautiful flowers. I’ve had little time to enjoy the garden like this recently.”

I smiled at the prince beside me as I internally sighed. Curse my stupid heart for making this harder than it already is. The fourth prince of the Western Valley, although born so far down the succession line he is still ambitious yet seems to overestimate his own intelligence compared to his competitors.

“You must be uncomfortable. Although eloquent with your words, very few have expressed your desire to be here.”

“We never spoke much so I’m a bit awkward, even more so with this strange setting.”

“Strange? I thought it to be normal for royals to get married for political reasons.”

“Ah, yes. That it is true… that is what this is,” I reply flatly.

“Princess y/n that doesn’t mean we cannot grow to love each other. I will be a competent hus-”

Typical how boring.

“Let’s be frank. You are no more interested in me than you are in the flowers here. What you’re interested in are the benefits gained from this union. I am aware of most situations going on in other kingdoms along with my own. You seem to have underestimated my intelligence if you think I don’t know your true motives.”

“Princess you are overstepping,” he growled as he grabbed my wrist and pulled me close enough to hiss in my ear, “regardless of how you may feel towards me you have no say but agree, isn’t that right?”

“I advise you to unhand me at once. You may be my only option but with this kind of behavior I would rather marry a pig,” I spat.

His grip began to burn as I struggled against it but no sooner was it there that it was ripped from my arm. Between prince Jacob and I stood none other than the boy that has plagued my mind. While still holding onto Jacob’s arm, he grabbed my hand and moved me behind him defensively. He seemed different, there was an air of authority around him and a fierceness I’ve never seen before.

“Hope I’m not late, princess.”

“What a no good second prince like you doing here?”

“I could ask the same to a little fourth prince like you.”

Prince? What is he on about? The two boys glared at each other, neither relenting in this power struggle although it was blatantly obvious who had the upper hand here. It wasn’t until I heard Father’s voice booming from the archway did Felix let go and take a step back.

“What is the meaning of this?!”

“I’m Prince Felix, second prince of the Southern Isles, and I’ve come to ask for your daughter’s hand in marriage.”

“What insolence-”

“I accept!” I cut my father off. He sputters at me and I roll my eyes, “You should have no reason to reject father. I have a fiancé, as promised, and it’s one I’ve chosen for myself.”

Father nearly faints into his advisor’s arms at my response as prince Jacob storms off in embarrassment. Although this will cause quite a political uproar my only focus is the boy standing next to me with his sunny smile and adorable freckles I know and love.

“If you’re a prince why have I never bumped into you before?”

“I always left those political events to my older brother crown prince Chan.”

“Well now that you’re my fiancé you better get used to those events,” I laugh before adding, “Are there any other big secrets you wanna tell me since apparently everything is coming out now?”

“Hmmm, being a prince is the only big one,” he teased.

“Then how about we start small, like your wanted poster?”

“My father doesn’t appreciate that I like to travel so he notified all the neighboring kingdoms to keep an eye out for me.”

“So I’m guessing you run away often?”

“I did but recently whenever I ran I always somehow ended up here,” he answered cheekily as he stepped closer to me.

“Well now that you’ve admitted you enjoy your time here, I’m not letting you go anymore,” I respond as I wrap my arms around his neck.

“Lucky me.”

#stray kids #skz #stray kids imagines #stray kids scenarios #stray kids oneshots #skz imagines #skz scenarios #skz oneshots #lee felix #felix imagines #felix oneshot #my writing #skz gc prompts

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border-spam · 4 years

Text

Everything, and far sooner than Tyreen was ok with, mostly because Troy is so weird.

Ty had given her a basic breakdown on the twin’s first night on her ship once Sei got a drip into Troy and it was clear he wasn’t on death’s door anymore. The buggy ride back to her ship had been terrible, not knowing these kids yet hadn’t made hearing Tyreen’s wracking sobs or the rattle of Troy’s lungs any easier. She’d done her best to focus on driving, tuning her hearing to the crunch of the scorched dust under their wheels, and away from what the girl was saying to her brother as she leaned over him in the back seat. Ty was whispering as she braced his head on her lap, reassurances and mild threats that he better wake up, and Sei would have smiled at the love being showed if it wasn’t so personal. Listening in felt... intrusive. There was a very real chance he’d not be alive by the time they made it to her dock, she’d let Tyreen have this time with in private. It was between them, not her. She was just the fool who hadn’t sense enough to turn down a stray girl's pleads for help, and Sei was sure she was going to regret it.

Once he was finally stable hours later, she’d insisted the girl level with her. The amount of charity she was willing to offer strangers was nearing its limit, it was time for Tyreen to justify why Sei should continue being hospitable when she’d done what she’d been begged to, now that Troy was going to make it. Ty slumped on the floor next to the wall cot where he slept, and sniffled between tears that they weren’t from Pandora. That they hadn’t been prepared for any of this and how quickly things had gone wrong. She’d said all she had now was her brother, whimpered through hiccups that she’d nearly lost him too because she hadn’t been able to help when he got sick, and promised she’d pay her back somehow if they could stay just a few more days. Sei had sighed, rubbing at her forehead tiredly as she felt a headache mull behind her eyes. Painfully aware that two dirty, sick kids with nowhere to go and no one to fall back on were people she’d never be able to forgive herself for turning away, she’d told Ty just to go to fucking sleep. They’d discuss it tomorrow, and that she hoped Tyreen was aware just how lucky she really was to have run into someone stupid enough to give them a chance... that they would need to earn their keep.

That dynamic became the norm even after Troy woke up. Ty did all the talking, while Troy said nothing for weeks. His fearful silence around her in the crew quarters or the way he’d pretend to be asleep and refuse to make eye contact had left Seifa worrying he may be mute; a real possibility considering how often you’d come across folk with selective communication on Pandora. When she brought it up with Ty eventually, she laughed, then waved her hand dismissively. Nah, he wasn’t mute, she’d scoffed. He was just an awkward tool.

Sei would hear them discussing things in muffled voices behind closed doors, but he remained silent around her, eyes wide as he’d pick at the threadbare hem of his sweater and nod yes or no responses politely.

She would never have thought it would be him that would tell her everything.

Ty had opened up plenty in those first few weeks, especially once she’d decided Seifa could be trusted after not changing how she treated either when Troy’s Siren status had been noted by the medic he’d needed. Tyreen had been adamant at first that they couldn’t trust doctors, that letting anyone know what she and Troy were would be a deadly mistake, but Sei had sworn her “friend” would keep them both under wraps and helped the younger woman understand her brother needed help. She’d been right, Troy’s condition had improved, they hadn’t been sold to a corporation, and Ty blossomed into being genuinely chatty instead of suspiciously reserved.

A happy Tyreen was all confidence and NO subtlety, she’d make huge broad statements like how they were from a “A little backwater planet, oh you wouldn’t have heard of it...” whoever she learned it from was a rampant bullshitter who relied on being boisterous, not believable, and Sei would smirk as she sipped from her coffee, nodding along with Tyreen's clumsy attempts to lie about how they moved here to be stars, taking notes on what she'd need to teach this woman if she was going to have a chance. “Stars...” she’d replied, the twinkle in her eye betraying her amusement at the entire scene Ty had just worked so hard on, “Stars don't wear pants with the asses near tore out of em, Tyreen. You got a lot of work to do, and you gotta start from the ground, love." By the end of the month Ty was raring for opportunity to get off the ship, while Troy was just about mobile, still weak enough to not be able to stand for long. It had been painfully clear his physical condition was poor, the virus that had nearly killed him in their first week on the planet would have been shrugged off as a head-cold by most natives, but weeks later and you could still hear the rattle in his lungs and see the tremor in his hand. Ty had been accompanying Sei on small trade-offs, chores, sales approaches, and was confident enough to beg for the chance to run tasks alone. Said it was a ”Great opportunity to learn the ropes!”, insisted with practiced charisma that it would help teach her to handle herself around Pandorans, and Seifa had wholeheartedly agreed. She’d been on an errand planet side, picking up some carbon buffers from a friend of a friend when Troy had finally spoke.

He’d arrived silently to the table for the meal Sei had called into the cabin quarters to let him know would be up soon, and sat slumped, staring down at the food while Seifa tried to fill the heavy quiet with idle chatter as she prepped her own. ”Any word from Tyreen yet?” -silence, just the brush of cloth behind her as he shifted in his chair- ”She’ll be fine you know, been doing great with me, natural liar! Plays them like cards, heh-heh” She’d turned to sit with her meal and paused mid step as she saw the state he was in, at the exhaustion in his expression as he awkwardly hunched over the little table. He looked shattered, scruffy hair framing the dark rings under his tired eyes, staring quietly at the untouched food in front of him. Sei decided it would be worth gambling a different approach as she lowered herself into her seat.

“Ahhh.. sorry Troy” she’d sighed, resting her cheek on her hand as she leaned on the table and tilted her cup towards him in apology. “I’m boring you, huh. My company must be pretty terrible then, I’m getting rusty...” He’d turned quickly at the theatrically melancholy in her tone and fidgeted as his eyes flickered between hers and the plate in front of him, clearly alarmed and unsure how to respond. She waited, lifting the cup to hide her smile as the massive man in front of her squirmed like a child, before he finally stuttered out a choked:

“N-no. No. It’s not you. You’re .. fine.” There it was. Now they were getting somewhere, he’d taken the bait exactly as she hoped. Looks like letting others down was a weak-point, and she stored that away mentally for the future.

His voice was softer than she would have expected, crackly from misuse and a still raw throat, but it was something. Now she had to get him to keep going. She’d flashed a friendly grin at him, eyes narrowing as she beckoned with a finger for him to continue. He’d turned to the food again, and his shoulders sunk as the worry on his face was replaced with the same sadness from before, hand shaking slightly as he rested it by the plate. “It’s n-not you. It’s the food. We... we had something like this at home..” He’d paused for a moment then, looking to her shyly for reassurance that it was ok to be talking to her at all, and when he was met with a nod and gentle smile, he started again... and did not stop for half an hour.

Everything. Things she would never have imagined asking about, things someone else would consider intensely private, he spilled in one long, shocking monologue. It felt like he’d been bottling this for god knows how long, and she hadn’t had a clue how to respond as she sat next to him, trying to keep her expression blank and hide how disturbing the things he was calmly explaining were to her.

Leda, Typhon, Nekrotafeyo, the accident with Tyreen, how dad had just thought him a freak but become overwhelmingly controlling and smothering of Ty after mom, how sick he’d been, how she’d tricked him into coming here and he should have known better but he never seems to learn, how hungry he was deep in his bones all the time, how he desperately didn’t want to be here but can’t leave, how much he loves his sister but doesn’t know what to do, everything.

He’d spoke till his voice was cracking and hoarse from misuse, and that was the only thing that had stopped him from continuing, coughing quietly as he stared at the cold food. If Seifa’s reaction was something he noticed, he wasn’t phased by it, and she’d sat in the terrible silence next to him, struggling to think of what the hell she was meant to say.

“That’s rough, buddy.” wasn’t going to cut it. There was no way she could have been prepared for everything he’d just shared so freely, like it was some mundane chat between close friends and not the kind of secrets a normal person would have the self preservation to know not to blurt out to a near stranger. Words were failing her, so she awkwardly extended a hand and rested it above the hollow of his shoulder, stroking her thumb over the ridge of his collarbone in a comforting gesture, and hoped that any kind of reassurance she could offer right now would lessen how vulnerable the moment was. He’d not reacted, still gazing down at the untouched meal, then timidly cleared his throat and shifted his eyes slowly to meet hers from under his brow. “I.. I don’t think I can eat this” he’d whispered as his voice hitched nervously. “I’m going to go back to sleep. Thanks though.... S-sorry again.” He’d stood and nodded gratitude to her, before quietly lumbering out of the room she remained sitting in shock in, the cold coffee still in the cup held by her mouth. Tyreen had a lot of explaining to do when she got back, and Sei didn’t make it easy.

Asks are Open!

#borderlands #borderlands 3 #bl3 #troy calypso #tyreen calypso #calypso twins #leech lord #seifa #sbsart #my hcs #my writing

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itsuki-minamy · 4 years

Text

BEFORE ZERO: CHAPTER 2 “BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION”

Translation: Naru-kun Raws: Ridia

A cat that has disappeared recently appeared at the front of the garden with a prey that it had killed.

When Akio, who went to a distant university, visited a young man about six months later, Shiotsu was immediately associated with such a scene.

"Marry this boy."

Contrary to Akio's expression at the entrance, which is something she's good at, she brought a strange one.

Shiotsu thought.

The young man in front of him is slightly shorter than him. The age is the same as her, who is 20 or two younger, but when it comes to Akio, who is mistaken for a high school student at eighteen, she appears to be an adult and a child.

What kind of person does it mean to show up at someone else's house after being after a girl?

No, the reason he sees them with such colorful glasses is that he has probably been involved in Akio's love affairs several times in the past. If he looks at it without prejudice, the young man in front of him seems to be a very ordinary person without any special points. On the contrary, polite behavior makes he feel even better.

However, there was a sense of incongruity, like "why is Akio such a genuine person", which made him feel like it was strange.

Unfortunately, there was no advance notice for the day's visit, and her parents were paying, so Shiotsu decided to deal alone.

"I'm sorry to have arrived suddenly."

The young man, who called himself Hayatoshi Minato, sat down by the table and bowed deeply.

"Today, I was visiting Akio's parents' house to receive a greeting, and suddenly there was a story that said," I will show my face to Brother Gen."

From the first glance impression, it was a reasonable greeting, he was calm and uncomfortable.

On the other hand, Akio,

"Well, this is also like a family home. It's another home."

She immediately stretches her legs to make it easier.

"Akio... I don't mind if you relax, but at least after the greeting."

Minato nodded his head as Shiotsu frowned.

"I was planning to show you what I'm doing today."

"Oh, by the way... it's a pain."

Akio sat in a sitting position next to Minato, even though she was scared. Since she is experienced in kendo, when she sits down seriously the form is determined.

"Oh..."

It wasn't his attitude that attracted Shiotsu's interest.

Akio obeyed what the others said.

It is the fact.

"Akio told me that she has a family relationship with Shiotsu-san."

"Oh..."

Shiotsu returned to Minato's words.

"Well, it's a long-distance relationship, but this street and my house are in the neighborhood."

"Especially, Shiotsu-san was like a brother and sister, and they went to the dojo together."

"They told me to be careful not to hurt their son..."

"I see... Akio-san is committed to everything. The parents would have been relieved to see Shiotsu-san."

"Yes, I'm fine with that."

He was caught up in an indirect conversation, and Akio got in the way.

"Yes. Then..."

Minato corrected his posture towards Shiotsu.

"I think I was surprised by the sudden story, but I'm not overly cheerful. I don't know if it will be five or ten years before I get married, but I look to the future. I would like to apologize for the relationship I established."

"Ah..."

It is a long time to say that two people, who have just met, will ask for forgiveness ten years in advance...

"Sorry, nothing... what if I say 'I won't forgive you'?"

After blurting out such a word, Shiotsu rushed in and added Minato.

"No, I'm sorry. Right now, I want to say, "I don't mean to speak in the first place."

As a social resignation, it should be possible to say "Congratulations" or "Cheers to Akio" here. However,

"But it's okay."

Once again, he was afraid to say it again.

"Besides, brother Gen says that."

Akio sharpened her mouth.

“It's the cancer that makes you think 'it's not going to last any longer', so I came all the way to see you. You'll be fine next time."

"Eh?"

Minato bows his head and...

"Oh. Are you hanging me "decently"? I see, I see."

He didn't seem to feel uncomfortable with "next time", Minato cried, laughed and turned to Shiotsu again.

"Again... that's why, Shiotsu-san..."

Minato said, leaving a smile on his cheek.

“I want “brother Gen” to support me. Both Akio-san and me."

++++++++++

After that, the situation changed more quickly than originally expected.

Far from "five years, ten years ahead," he entered the group six months after the greeting, and a year later, Akio had twins.

Akio wanted to get married and give birth, of course, but Akio's parents and others around her with their "we want to summarize the story this time" and "we want to calm Akio" helped.

The other party, Minato,

"So, it's faster than I thought, but let's start over."

He made arrangements for important things like finding a job and moving.

Minato's parents died prematurely and it was said that a small inheritance had allowed his to earn a living until his income was stable. He said, "It's a long time before we can give back to all of you...", but he had no tactic to rely on public support or the home of Akio's parents.

Although Minato is calmer than the average person, Minato, who has not passed the age of 20,

"It's okay. You have plans for the future; I think there is something like a life plan."

I confirm Shiotsu every time,

"If I say it strongly, my plan is to complete it with Akio."

Saying that, Minato laughed at ease.

"I will not be bored for the rest of my life."

"Not boring." Shiotsu, who tends to accept unplanned situations as stress, is an idea that never comes to light.

"If it is okay..."

Rather, it is less flexible.

Have thought about it,

"I think it's good for Shiotsu-san to have the ideal of 'being there' in things," he said.

About five years later, the relationship between Shiotsu and the Minato family continued unabated.

Shiotsu, who dropped out of college to become a policeman, and Minato, who became a general clerk. Akio, who has had several short-term jobs while raising her twins. In general, they are a very ordinary citizen.

Akio's parents died one after another when the twins were three or four years old, and Shiotsu decided to take care of them on behalf of their relatives, but Shiotsu also had his own job and his own life. When he visited the Minato family on occasion, he was surprised by the growth of the twins.

The reason it changed is the appearance of a person named "Blue King".

The "Blue King" Habari Jin recently established an organization called "Scepter 4". As a result of the aptitude test within the police, Shiotsu was chosen as one of them, and was soon placed in the position of the King's official lieutenant.

Furthermore, the Minato family, who were related to Shiotsu, underwent a similar test, and it was found that everyone, including children, was fit to have powers.

Unlike Shiotsu, who originally had an ideal of social order, they had the option of living as ordinary people while being watched by the authorities. However, mainly due to Akio's high hopes, the Minato couple received an installation from the "Blue King", and they both became members of the "Scepter 4" maneuvering section.

Of course, Shiotsu objected. The functions assigned to the new organization are those in which the exchange of lives is normal.

Not recommended for couples with young children. That is something common sense cannot admit.

But there were some extraordinary factors in the situation.

One is that Minato Akio has displayed unusual aptitude that surpasses Shiotsu's. If she accidentally wakes up to a Strain and become a stray person, along with her own direct personality, it cannot be left out in the general public.

And one more thing is the rise of the "Red King" Kagutsu Genji. The number of people who can control the members of the red clan led by Kagutsu is scarce, and the breakwater that stops the collapse of society must be reinforced no matter what.

++++++++++

These are ancient stories.

Akio's twins are 12 years old. They will become middle school students this spring. It seemed to him a great achievement that this family was able to enter milestone season without missing any.

By the way, the twins' birthday is in early March. He tried to adjust the shift for the Minatos to celebrate this with their family, but he couldn't make it easy for Minato and Akio to go home at the same time, so the month was halfway there.

And now that day.

"It's a bit late so start first."

Said Minato who got the phone call from Akio,

Shiozu was a bit gloomy.

"Uh."

There are already five plates on the table. Minato's home cooking. He knows it's always good to work, but it will take a certain amount of time to prepare this beautiful dining table.

It was planned that Minato after the night shift would get ready for today's party, and Akio, who will be leaving the office for the night, will join him later. Shiotsu, who happened to be working at the same time as Akio, also decided to participate, but he remember that he was just an "uncle of a relative" and is in an extra position.

Although, that's...

Akio, the mother of this family, wonders what she would do later than that. Where the hell would she stray on a day like this?

While Shiotsu was irritated, Minato and their sons were...

“I can't help it. Hayato and Akito. Let's cut the cake."

"Yes, I'll get a knife."

"I'll serve you a plate."

Then she changed her schedule and started working. He's used to Akio not moving as planned.

Also,

"I'm glad Shiotsu-san is here. Only three of us really lack emotion."

"Oh."

It made him worry about it.

Akio returned home about an hour later.

"Oh, have you already given a gift? Did you give it to Hayato and Akito, brother Gen?"

The twins waited in time, looked at each other and responded with their voices.

"Catalog gift."

"Buhahaha! What is that?"

Taking the catalog brought by Hayato, Akio laughed even more.

"Brother Gen, this is what you will give them! It's like tableware or futon!"

"It's not interesting and I'm sorry."

Truth be told, a paper cutter similar to the one custom made the other day for "Blue King" Habari Jin.

The twins of the Minato family are said to have a strong longing for the "Blue King" Habari Jin.

If he gives a gift that matches Habari, Shiotsu's thoughts that would make him happy would collapse on his birthday.

The paper cutter that was supposed to be given to Habari was used to kill the member of the “Purgatory” clan at the hand of Zenjo, a member of the Mobile Task Force. A similar one is too sinister to give away.

"Brother Gen is really boring. He's too boring to laugh."

"Akio, I'm not saying that."

Minato gives up on Akio who keeps laughing,

"I am happy, Shiotsu-san."

"I have fun choosing."

The twins said to Shiotsu.

"It's good to be funny."

Akio said with a smile and satisfaction.

“Because we are like that. It's just ordinary boredom."

Namely, this year's gift that the twins were given with the couple's joint name, chosen by Minato, is a fountain pen with the names Hayato and Akito.

“It is a souvenir. It won't force you to be interesting."

Minato smirked.

"Thanks Dad."

"I appreciate."

The twins said.

"This house would be useless without me."

Speaking like this, Akio went to the front door and returned with a large box in both hands.

"What are you doing with that big box?"

When Shiotsu asked, Akio raised the box to her face level,

"I bought a set at an electronics store."

"Wow!" Said the twins.

"Akio..."

When Minato yelled, Akio looked back in trouble.

"I know. I spoke with the children and "decided to graduate the toy". This is not a gift, it is mine."

"Is there such a graduation?"

Akio ordered the twins, ignoring Shiotsu's words, if there was such a graduation.

“Hayato and Akito. I'll let them do it, so I can connect various things."

While Akio was late and ate, the twins clashed, hooked up a game console to the TV in the living room, completed the initial setup, and started playing together. For the game software, they choose what they bought together with the main unit and tested it.

Finally,

"Okay, let me do it too."

Akio, who had finished eating, also intervened there.

"The controller is not enough."

"There are only two."

"I am the owner. You take turns."

"She is not willing to give it to her son."

Minato said to Shiotsu who leaned forward.

"Apparently that was the correct answer."

"Correct answer...?"

"The children said:" We are adults now.", So I thought about putting them together... but I'm afraid I still don't have enough time to play."

The appearance of Akio and her children addressing the television in the living room is more like a close brother and sister than parents and children.

"But in high school, playing with parents would be boring."

"Perhaps it is a great distance from children of the same age. After all, the occupations of their parents and the qualities of children's blood are special."

"I see... it's a job."

"Even if I'm working or raising a child, I'm trying to find everything... I trust Akio's nose."

"What is that "nose"?"

"I call it instinct... She always looks messy and always makes the right decisions where necessary."

Shiotsu looked towards the living room. Both Akio and the children play seriously, shake their bodies and raise their voices. When he was really serious and Akio's legs stopped, Minato rushed over and stopped.

"That's it…"

Marriage, childbirth and enlistment in "Scepter 4". Akio's actions and choices thus far seemed to always be hasty and reckless from Shiotsu's perspective.

If everyone is connected to this scene,

"I see, it's true."

It certainly feels that way now.

(To be continue…)

#K #k project #k fan clan #K stories #K BEFORE ZERO

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syncogon · 4 years

Text

[QZGS TL] Butterfly Blue 2019 Ye Xiu Birthday Interview

For Ye Xiu’s birthday on 05/29/2019, Butterfly Blue did an interview with thepaper.cn (澎湃新闻). You can read the Chinese here: https://card.weibo.com/article/m/show/id/2309351002454377326526805418?_wb_client_=1

I’ve translated most of it below. I omitted some questions that I felt weren’t super relevant, such as the progress of the live action (since it’s already out now), and some of his other works.

As always, let me know of any major errors! Past translations that I’ve done of BB’s words may be found /tagged/bb-interview.

***

Q: Ye Xiu’s birthday is coming up, is there anything you’d like to say to him?

A: Happy birthday, you not-old youth.

Q: Asking on behalf of many fans, why don’t you establish a pairing for Ye Xiu?

A: Glory is his official pairing.

Q: Where did the inspiration for Ye Xiu’s character come from?

A: Michael Jordan was an inspiration, the idea of “even after retiring I can still do this.” I’ve actually always been following basketball and soccer, first through newspaper, and then through blogs and media. I’ve accumulated a lot, and when I was writing The King’s Avatar I used all of it. Many people have asked me if I know a lot about esports, but in reality I know less about esports. More inspiration came from sports that were more developed. I drew on real sports and esports, and at the time I even watched many Chinese Go competitions.

Q: Ye Xiu has many female fans, because his personality is quite different from many classic male webnovel protagonists.

A: It’s because his character setup is different, he’s not some lowly noob. Even though he’s 25 at the start of the novel, which sounds young, in reality his mental age is much higher than his actual age when it comes to his professional resume. He’s calm and stable, because he knows that he’s already at the top of this profession. It’s like if you took a professional soccer or basketball player and put them into a high school league, they’d feel no pressure at all. In general, that’s what being in-game is like to him. Later on when he’s playing matches, he still has that confidence, because he has strength, and he has already proven this strength.

Q: Why didn’t you add a romantic storyline to The King’s Avatar?

A: It might have to do with personal views. In particular, female writers when writing esports might include a romantic storyline, romance above all else, anything can change for the sake of love, etc., but I don’t really agree with those kinds of views. When I write love, even though it’s important, it’s not the most important, and many things can surpass it. So when the career storyline becomes the main storyline, it doesn’t really matter whether love is present or not. It can be a helping thing, but it won’t be the main focus when I’m writing. I hope to write a relatively pure story. You can fall in love, but it can’t interfere with your profession.

Q: I’m actually somewhat curious, have you watched Love O2O?

A: I have. When I first wrote about gaming, there were three main types. One type was where it became more romance-focused as it developed, and the focus was not on gaming but on falling in love. Another type was alternate world [i.e. isekai], the type where you enter the world of the game. Then, the third type was esports. My earlier books were only focused on playing games, and it was very cut off from reality. Whatever results you had in-game, they couldn’t really help you in real life. Gaming was just a pastime. But esports is different, esports is a profession. The King’s Avatar is like this.

Q: How do you feel now that The King’s Avatar has gotten so popular?

A: It’s nice not having to work. Actually, we writers all were writing right as this profession was developing. The webnovel profession was developing really quickly, and we reaped the rewards of being a part of this emerging industry just as it was experiencing explosive growth. Because this was the early days of this new industry, many people had tremendous gains. We joined at just the right time - this is luck. You have to enter this industry, and then if you persist, you will most likely profit.

Q: In The King’s Avatar, are there any shadows of your real self in there?

A: Not really, to be honest. I play games myself, the first time I really got into them was in college. But at that time, I wasn’t in so deep that I’d be helping guilds or anything, I wasn’t that sociable. The game I played was called Westward Journey (大话西游), and I was basically still in the stage of treating it as a chat room. Very different from mobile games now, where you have to join a WeChat group or QQ group as soon as you enter, otherwise you’ll get wiped out.

Q: What are you aiming for now?

A: Accuracy, the accuracy of my words and sentences is what I’m aiming for. When there’s something I want to express, I want to be able to find an idiom, a phrase, to accurately express it. Funny or not funny, I’ll let it come naturally, I don’t need to purposely try to build a moment to make people laugh, I don’t need to purposely edit in an online segment just for that purpose anymore. In the past I might have done this, but this is the difference between my past and current self. It’s not that my style has changed, it’s that I realized that that’s useless work, it’s putting the cart before the horse.

Q: Now that you already have God Ye Xiu as such an iconic character, how will you surpass that?

A: Ye Xiu will always be 25-26 years old, and now it’s really been a while since I’ve written him, so I’m a little distant. Now, I’m already 35-36. I feel that I’ve already written enough about Ye Xiu. If I were to write more, there’s really nothing more I could write. For pro esports players, continuously playing matches is enough, but for me there isn’t much meaning anymore. It’s all repetitive, and there isn’t going to be any big turning points. I still want to find some new material.

Q: How do you feel about your position right now? If you could use a few keywords to describe your current life, which words would you choose?

A: Stable, everything’s revolving around stability.

Q: Do you think it’s more important for life to be interesting or for life to have meaning?

A: What meaning. I’m one of those people who, since I was young, was very worried about dying. I actually discussed this with Mao Ni [t/n: another webnovel author], and we talked about ghosts in hotels and whatnot. I actually really want to meet a ghost, I think that if I met a ghost I would be very at ease, because if I knew that we become another kind of existence after dying, then there’d be no need to be so afraid.

Q: Many people online say that, looking at Bug Dad’s words you can tell he’s quite a good person. Is there anything you’d like to say to that?

A: They have sharp eyes, it’s irrefutable.

Q: It seems like there’s some story about you circulating online, that you always like to pay the bill.

A: No, that’s just politeness, we’re adults, we have to refuse each other, you know? But in the end none of them took out their wallets.

Q: Is Bug Dad normally a cold and distant person?

A: I’m alright, but it’s true I don’t speak much.

Q: Why do you have the nickname of “goddess”?

A: Because of my pen name, people think that I’m a female author, and people admire me!

Q: If you write too much and become bald, then what?

A: I’m already balding. [t/n: BB commented in his Weibo retweet of this interview that the picture of him that they used is old; he has much less hair now]

Q: If your daughter wanted to play esports in the future, would you support her?

A: Yes.

Q: Why did you choose to grow your hair long? Is it because you don’t have time to have it cut?

A: Because there’s no need, after all there’s not many strands left.

Q: Is there anything you want to say to the fans?

A: Whether or not you’re a female or male reader, I am incredibly grateful for everyone who likes my works.

#quan zhi gao shou #qzgs #the king's avatar #tka #全职高手 #mine #translation #bb interview

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kbandtrash · 4 years

Text

The Heir and the Library of Secrets (SKZ Royal AU)(Part 3)

~Megan~

Masterlist

Y/N hardly lived, having to work and care for her two brothers. The heir lived in constant fear that he would be killed before becoming king. But secrets are told, old and new faces find their way close, and the lives they had known start unraveling.

??? x Reader

Word count: 1.7k

Part 1

After the first assassination attempt, Felix had been attacked three more times in the span of a month. Everywhere he looked, now, seemed dark and hopeless. No one at the palace had tried to do anything about it. Even his own mother had grown weary of giving him more guards, because it just wasn’t working. Somehow, assassins were still coming in and out like flies.

Felix no longer trusted anyone. Weeks ago, he might’ve gone outside in the garden with his brothers, or read a book peacefully in the library, but his life had taken a turn for the worse. He didn’t speak to his brothers and was wary of any food given to him.

Inside, he felt useless. While people tried to protect him, he was stuck in his chamber daily. One day he heard that his mother had fallen ill, but he wasn’t allowed to visit her. He was trapped behind fear that he would be killed.

On occasion he would be escorted to practice sword-fighting with his teachers. Sometimes he was allowed to fight against his brothers or servants, but he hardly trusted them, either.

On this particular day, he had gotten word that his mother’s situation had grown worse. He had been sitting on his window seat, comfortably looking down at what he could see of the gardens, when his personal servant made his way into the room.

“Your Highness,” he said, bowing. “May I join you?”

“Of course, Chan,” Felix replied, moving over to let the man sit. He watched as Chan closed the door behind him, giving a polite nod to the watchmen outside.

“You shouldn’t be calling me by my name, sir.” He sat next to the prince.

Felix shrugged. “You’re the only one left, after all this time. And I respect you, hyung.”

Chan seemed to visibly tense at his words. “With all due respect, Prince, you do not need to be formal with me. You have the higher position.”

“Don’t mind it, Bang Chan. I do as I wish. Besides, you should be grateful I even think of you as a friend. Not many people are as trustworthy as you.” He was looking at his nails boredly, tired of arguing about such a thing. Chan was older than the prince anyway, so he was simply being polite.

The servant, in his neat white uniform, straightened his back. “Well, I did not come to talk so casually. Would you like the good news or bad news first?”

He thought for a moment, before dropping his hands in his lap. “The good news.”

“All suspects have been investigated, and all offenders have been locked away.”

“That’s a relief. What could go wrong?”

“The bad news is, unfortunately, unrelated. Would you like me to continue?”

“Please do.”

“Your mother is currently in a much worse state than before, and may soon pass away.” The man said it so simply, so emotionlessly, that Felix immediately believed him. He stood with wide eyes.

“Am I still not allowed to visit her?” he shouted in alarm. He rushed to his door, thrusting it open angrily. The patrolmen held him back with strangely calm faces.

Chan stood and waved the guards off, to which they quickly obliged. Felix made it past them in fury, sprinting through the hall. Chan was close behind him.

Felix reached his mother’s room quickly, but Chan held him back suddenly. “You must promise not to overreact. Stay calm.”

“Of course,” Felix said, nodded briskly, before pulling out of his grasp and entering the room.

His head spun. Everything seemed to slow down. His eyes had landed on his mother, bedridden and coughing up blood. It was undoubtedly caused by poison, but then how had doctors not been able to save her before it got worse?

When at last the world stopped swirling in his vision, he made out his three brothers sitting to the side, sharing the large window seat. Their heads had flicked instantly toward him when he had flung into the solemn room.

“Felix!” Jisung said in surprise, his jaw dropping. “You came?” Felix noticed his normally neat blonde hair had grown messy.

Chan came inside and bowed politely. “I brought him safely as you asked, Prince.”

Minho gave a nod from his seat, and then gestured to the spot next to him. “Sit, Felix.”

Felix’s heart was racing, but his brothers were, besides their unkempt look, composed. It didn’t surprise him they were there, even if she was only Felix’s mother. She was an amazing mother and lovely step-mother. Nonetheless, he sat with them with clenched fists.

“Mother may not make it,” Minho began, sadness present in his voice, “but the doctors can keep her alive enough for at least two more months.”

“What’s the point of forcing her to suffer longer than she has to?” Hyunjin suddenly asked, nervously playing with Jisung’s shirt. “She shouldn’t have to be like this for so long.” Jisung nodded along, a worried expression on his face.

Minho patted Jisung’s knee reassuringly and sighed. “She has to be alive, otherwise someone may take the throne of Haven if it is absent before Felix is ready to inherit it.”

Felix swallowed the anxious feeling suddenly in his gut. “I have to rule early?”

Minho nodded, his lips a straight line. “Sorry about that.”

“But I’m not ready!”

There was a cough from the bed, and a fresh splatter of blood spilled onto his mother. Hyunjin was at her side in a second, picking up a wet rag that soaked in a shallow bowl. He gently cleaned her as her eyes opened slightly.

“Mum?” Hyunjin urged. “Can you see me?”

Weakly, the woman lifted her hand to his face, stroking it softly. “Hyunjin…”

“Mother!” Jisung exclaimed, eyes wide. He was next to her now, holding one of her hands. “What is it?”

Her forehead was beaded with sweat, her long dark hair stuck to her face. Her breathing was mostly stable, except for sudden wheezes. She stayed like that for a moment, searching with only her eyes to see if anyone else was there.

“Jisung, honey,” she began, voice quiet. “If I get better, let’s draw together and eat all of the cake.” She gave a small chuckle that only caused her to erupt into coughs. Hyunjin quickly dabbed at her mouth with the rag.

By now, Minho and Felix had stood, with tears threatening to spill down their cheeks. They watched in silence as she recovered.

“Hyunjin, I want to get a bigger mirror with you one day and read stories all the time.”

“Stop acting like you’re going to die soon. The doctors will make you better soon!” he demanded, as if he were a child.

She smiled. “I just want to say it now, to scare you.”

“Mother,” Jisung whined. “Don’t do that.”

“Let me see Minho. He’s here, right?” she asked, almost sternly.

Minho stepped forward and brushed her hair out of her face gently. “I’m here.”

“Even though I might not get to watch plays with you, I want you to watch them frequently so you think of me.”

“Stop scaring us!” Jisung pleaded, frowning.

Instead of answering, she coughed lightly. “See? I’m already getting better. Don’t be afraid. Now, is Felix here?”

“Yeah,” Minho said, moving to the side and bringing Felix forward.

The heir had tears falling down his face, seeing just how much pain his mother was in, and yet she made jokes like she did always. “I’m here, Mother.”

She shifted her head to look him directly in the eye. “Felix, I love you. You will become an incredible king of Haven someday.”

“Mum…” he tried to say, but she cut him off.

“I have advice for you. I want you to visit the village as much as you can. Learn the way of your subjects. I’m sure your servant will take you.” She suddenly began to cough uncontrollably and Hyunjin handed her the rag.

“We will fetch a doctor,” he offered. “We will visit you again soon.”

Minho shuffled out first, shooing the others out as well. Chan was waiting outside the door, and walked right behind Felix when he came out last.

“Is Her Majesty all right?”

“I suppose,” Felix answered briefly before turning toward him. “You live in the town?”

“Yes.”

“When would be the earliest I can leave here with you?”

“Leave here… with me?” Chan repeated, jaw dropping. “I don’t know, sir, but it would be best to stay safe in the castle.”

Felix shook his head. Behind him, the three other princes had disappeared from sight.

“You also have duties here, do you not?” Chan continued with nervousness.

“Mr. Bang,” Felix said with a low voice, “I know I do. But your duty is first and foremost to do what the Queen tells you to do, am I wrong?”

Chan bit his lip and nodded slowly.

“The Queen told me that studying the ways of subjects would help me become a better king. She recommended you to me.”

“Then, I will gladly assist you.”

Felix folded his arms, leaning against the wall. “Firstly, we need to establish a date. Then we must alert the patrol that our outing was advised by my mother.”

Chan clasped his hands behind his back, furrowing his eyebrows. “My family may not be in a good enough situation to accommodate you this week, but we’ll be receiving more payment soon, so perhaps in a week or so I can spare the time. Sir,” he finished, almost forgetting to be formal.

“Don’t be formal with me, Chan. It’s not important.” He paused, squinting his eyes at the servant. “If you do, I will not hesitate to cut your pay.”

Chan immediately bowed. “Of course.”

Felix raised an eyebrow skeptically, and then began to walk back toward his room, because he had nothing else to do and assumed he still wouldn’t be allowed to do much else. His servant, or hyung, followed behind him, a smile on his face.

He was part of raising the future king, and therefore quite excited. That didn’t stop any anxious feelings from building up inside his chest, however.

Part 4

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cyberastros-blog · 3 years

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How will be Year 2021 for you as per horoscope prediction?

There is a famous saying, “Change is the only constant thing” and yes, it is true in all its sense. We are going to enter and progress in yet another year. We witnessed the year 2020 and are the lucky ones to enter in 2021. The past’s gone and we are ready to welcome new things. Whereas the Horoscope predictions 2021, promises some really good things coming ahead; there may be some situations that will not be in our power to control. You will cherish the favorable circumstances but need to be careful during the testing times. Vedic Astrology free predictions for 2021 will act as a guiding tool for you.

The year 2021 horoscope prediction seems to bring good things for all the zodiac signs. On a broader platform, it will scatter happiness and success for all of you, unlike the previous year. As you are going to know about it in an advance; it will act as a torchbearer for you to know and understand the circumstances. You will skillfully handle your life by this powerful acknowledgement. Our expert Vedic Astrologers, are here to provide you with the guidelines for 2021.

As we say a stitch in time saves the nine. So, let’s see what 2021 brings for you…….

Aries - the Ram

The year is going to give you the cutting edge that you wanted for so long. Your professional and personal life will be very well balanced. Your love life will too bloom. You may have temper issues, just like the Ram. It may hamper in giving you a clear picture. Those of you who are searching for the perfect partner will find this year promising. Aries 2021 is full of fun and fear for you. Choose which way you want to go ahead with, says your Aries 2021 horoscope predictions.

Taurus – the Bull

The year 2021 brings all good things for your professional and financial life. Whether you are getting a promotion or salary hike; the positive cosmic influence will not let you down. Your financial progress will also be up to the mark. The year 2021 is all smiles for you. Be a little polite and dedicated towards your family life too. Your busy schedule may hamper the love between you and your partner. Every cloud has a silver lining. Find ways to steal some time for your lover. Your health-related issues can be the reason for your sudden mood swings. Change the little habits and see the brighter picture, says your Taurus 2021 horoscope.

Gemini – the twins

Be relaxed as the year 2021 will give you freedom from the ongoing struggles. The last year was hard for Taurus natives but this year promises success and prosperity. The time is good for romance and tying the knot. Don’t be apprehensive about the changes, they are good for you. The year is good for investments but if you want to make a big investment; an expert’s opinion is highly recommended. Health status will improve and your life will take a positive step. Think before you act. See your free online future prediction 2021 to know more…..

Cancerians

The year 2021 will start on a difficult note. Certain things could be really tough for you. The aspect of Saturn in Capricorn can pose a challenge for you like misunderstandings with your partner, difficulty in your career and problems in financial status. Hard work is the only key to sail through this year 2021. Your income will also increase as the year progresses. You will be in a stable position in your work life. Your problems ought to be in between you and your partner, don’t let personal life come in public, advice your Cancer 2021 free love life prediction.

Leo – the flag bearers

You will be deeply rooted in your family and will seek their guidance and support. Your professional life will keep you busy. Your popularity and social circle will increase. The year wants you to be patient. Avoid making decisions based on temporary emotions. Refrain from turning into a stubborn being due to the knowledge. Detach yourself from pride. The year 2021 wants you to be careful with your attitude and everything will automatically fall into place, says your Leo 2021 horoscope.

Virgo Horoscope 2021

The year is going to be really good for you. Ample opportunities will knock on your doorstep. Success will be awarded. Think carefully before taking any step. It will be the year where only you have to decide the best option among the lot. There will be times when you will be sorted but some phases will be there where you will feel uncertain about life. Be true to yourself and things will be automatically become clear, advice your horoscope prediction.

Librans, shine bright!

The year will be best for you. In terms of professional life; you will flourish and your personal life will also come on the right track. Your career status will be enhanced. The year is going to be easy for you, unlike the previous year. Your financial position will also become better. Take care of your mother’s health. She can feel alone along with a few minor health issues if not attended in the beginning. The year is best for people who want to go for higher studies, says your Libra 2021 horoscope. Check your free career report astrology here…..

Scorpio Horoscope 2021

The year 2021 is likely to bring mixed results for you. However, you are likely to get the fruit of your hard work. Relationships will improve. You will see that you and your partner start understanding each other well. Grab the best option and you will be praised among your friends and family. There will be moments of overconfidence but avoiding this attitude will be the best option for you. Health will remain in its glory except for the normal ups and downs, says your 2021 horoscope.

Sagittarius Horoscope 2021

The year is going to be outstanding for you. You will be blessed with peace, happiness and prosperity. The Sagittarius natives despite belonging to any age bracket will feel the blessings coming their way. Stable personal and professional life, better financial position and health will be the highlights of the year. Enjoy this year as you have suffered a lot in the last year. Be careful with the one who pretends to be your friend but is a foe in real, advice your Sagittarius horoscope 2021.

Capricorn Horoscope 2021

The year 2021 solely depends on the decisions you take, dear Capricorn. Whatever decision you take, think twice or thrice and introspect the results as they will impact your future. You will spend some good quality time with your partner after so long. Saving money should be your priority this year. Watch your health too. The year brings some surprises for you. Be ready to take the roller coaster ride this year, says your Capricorn 2021 horoscope predictions.

Aquarius Horoscope 2021

The year 2021 for Aquarius natives is full of lessons and teachings. You may face challenges but will overcome them. Just stick to your honesty and hard work and the results will be in your favor. There can be some moments when your high expenses will be a cause of worry. But after the initial months, everything will fall into place. Your work will be appreciated. Your partner will be there for you and stable finances will keep you intact. Be mentally strong and handle things wisely, says your 2021 horoscope.

Pisces Horoscope 2021

The year is one good year for you. Initially, you may feel a little agitated due to the uncontrollable expenses but everything will be fine as the year progresses. Opportunities will also come and you need to be careful with the ones you grab. Love life may be a little tense. Your patience and your zeal to carry out things with grace will be helpful. You have to be watchful of your sudden expenses, says your Pisces 2021 horoscope.

#Horoscope predictions 2021

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things2mustdo · 3 years

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Nature has given humanity a roughly one-to-one ratio of adult men to women, but the most attractive women are being taken out of circulation to either join alpha male harems or participate in degenerate lifestyle choices. This leaves the average man practically no choice in settling down with a mentally stable and cute woman in her prime.

In Islam, a man is able to marry four wives, which is what my wealthy Iranian grandfather did on his way to siring 24 or so children that included my dad (the exact number is a mystery). He took away three women that an Iranian man of lesser means could have married, creating a societal imbalance, but that’s nothing compared to what we have in the modern Western world, where a single famous man can command the sexual attentions of dozens—if not thousands—of women in their sexual prime, spoiling these women for normal men who don’t have the ability to tingle their vaginas with the same intensity.

How many actors, musicians, and sports athletes are trying to plow through as much prime pussy as possible? How many Hollywood directors and music producers are leveraging their positions for sexual gain? How many club owners, restaurateurs, Arab sheikhs, and politicians are doing the same? Each one is taking way more beautiful women out of circulation than men like my grandfather, all while elevating their standards to such an extent that no average man can ever gain their love, let alone two hours—or even two minutes–of their uninterrupted attention.

We also have to account for female lifestyle choices that are designed to delay or prevent pair bonding and marriage. The biggest is career. Most girls, while embarking on a career, balance out the boredom of working a meaningless job by hopping on the cock carousel and banging at least a few men every year. By the time a girl hits 25 years old, any man who meets her will have to deal with a walk-in closet of emotional issues and hang-ups from being pumped and dumped as much as a 1930’s brothel whore.

Then there is the Instagram and Facebook lifestyle that creates crippling dopamine addiction, which causes a girl to only be satisfied if dozens of men are actively thirsting for her every day. I estimate that if a girl has over 500 followers on Instagram, she is so used to attention from throngs of men that the love of one man cannot possibly satisfy her.

We must also throw in the growing “travel blogger” lifestyle where, instead of using only her body to get attention, a girl uses pictures and video from exotic locations to enhance her beauty. Other girls, with nothing substantial to offer the world, decide to showcase pictures of pets or their tasty overpriced meals, but even that puts them on a dopamine loop that ruins their future interactions with men.

By far, the most damaging lifestyle choice women make is becoming a sugar baby, a politically correct term for “prostitute.” For some easy cash, she whores out her body to the highest bidder (some women combine Instagram and prostitution in a seamless package). How can such an Instagram prostitute ever settle down with a man who has a normal salary? There are also the hundreds of women who enter porn every year, some from seemingly stable families. Sadly, men are so desperate for love that many would wife up a former prostitute or porn star, but it’s highly unlikely those women will make for stable families.

The Western world is a sinkhole for women. The prettiest of the bunch fall into the hole and get spit out years later an entitled #MeToo hag who can never be happy, making the Islamic four-wife rule seem downright egalitarian. The sad truth is that if you meet an attractive girl today, she was pumped and dumped by numerous sexy men, prefers to nurture her career than children, is addicted to attention via the internet, and has participated in some kind of scheme to exchange social status or cash for her pussy. She’s more than suitable for a bit of fun, but would it be wise to seek a relationship with her?

Even with the obesity and short-hair epidemic, I still see a bountiful supply of cute girls I would happily reproduce with. I would love them, let them caress my beard, and lay my seed deep within their vaginal guts, but the problem is that those guts are not for me—they are for the Chads who would never marry her, the beta orbiters who await her newest selfie as if it were a source of food, or the rich and lonely men who would sponsor her for thousands of dollars a month. They’re taking her out of circulation at the time I want her most, and by the time they are done with her, I no longer want her. I guess I’ll try to weasel in a bang or two when she is not yet fully degraded, and enjoy the fleeting pleasure that comes from it as much as I can.

https://www.rooshv.com/how-to-stop-the-fall-of-women

An acronym that you’ll often come across is AWALT, which stands for “all women are like that.” It is used in response to someone trying to point out that a particular woman is different than all the rest and more deserving to be placed on a pedestal of some sort when it comes to relationships. While that acronym is useful for newbies who are just beginning to de-program themselves from egalitarian ideas spewed by the establishment, it breeds a hopelessness among men that they can never extract more than casual sex from women.

Most men have seen firsthand how women change due to the presence of corrupting factors in the environment. If you give a woman an open bar, she will over-consume and make decisions that harm herself. If you give a woman a smartphone with social networking apps, she will become a narcissist in a short amount of time, falling in love with her own image. If you give a woman a liberal education, she will come to firm belief than men were born to bring pain and slavery unto women.

Only a woman with an exceptional upbringing can resist alcohol, social networking, and university brainwashing, and for the women who can initially resist it, she will surely succumb after enough time and pressure. It is in this way that AWALT is true: all women who face corrupt influences in their lives will become corrupt and behave in a similar way that degrades their virtue, making them unsuitable for long-term partnerships. But if AWALT is true in describing the universal fall of women in the presence of toxic influences, it must also be true that they possess universal purity in environments which lack bad influences that attack her virtue.

A reliable corrupter of a woman’s virtue is having plentiful male choice. If over the course of five years a woman in New York City has her choice of 100 alpha male cocks, she will be unable to resist the thrill ride that these men offer. She will begin to structure her life around a neverending alpha male sex party where she receives and expects fun, excitement, drama, and entertainment in exchange for willingly accepting her place on various booty call rotations. During this time, she loses most ability to be a suitable wife and mother, or even to be a good person, because the alpha males who use her for late night sex do not place demands upon her that make her more feminine, loving, or nurturing. She becomes damaged goods, suitable for nothing more than casual humping.

But now let’s imagine that instead of being born in New York City, this girl was born in a poor Ukrainian village that only has a population of 1,000 people. For whatever reason, she was unable to get out of this village and a complete blackout of internet prevents her from meeting thirsty foreign men. It’s quite easy to see how she marries a village man while still young because it’s a better prospect than suffering alone to earn her bread in a place where employment opportunities are few. The environment a girl is placed in will mostly determine her worth as a life partner.

Most women who are put in New York City will, within a few years, default to becoming a promiscuous slut. Most women who are put in a tiny village with no way out, with little choice in men, and with positive religious influences, will default to being a good wife and mother, possessing normal and acceptable human flaws like all men have. Women put in specific environments will act in specific ways, which is why looking for a unicorn in a Western city is fruitless, since she’s within reach of the devil’s workshop. He will get to her and make sure she experiences all manner of vice.

Western nations facilitate the “fall” of women from a state of purity and innocence to one of abject corruption. I don’t believe women are inherently born to be degenerate, just like how I don’t believe men are, but once we put a woman in an environment that enables, facilitates, and even encourages her corruption, she will certainly become corrupt. But what if you can catch a woman before she inserts herself into this environment and then shield her from it? What if you grab her at the time she is about to jump into the abyss, and through your diligence, power, and knowledge, protect her from Western influences that will destroy her? Would it be safe to give your time, energy, love, and commitment to this woman? It’s important to note that I’m not stating you save a corrupt girl, since by then it’s too late, but to prevent a woman from becoming corrupt in the first place.

It is completely your responsibility to create the environment of a good home, a good city, and a good country to prevent the fall of your women. It’s your responsibility to create the right environment where all women remain good instead of succumbing to an evil where within a short amount of time she becomes a useless, tattooed, overweight, and masculine slut. It should be clear to you by now that women absolutely can not save themselves, and have no inherent resistance to the pollution that tempts them in this world. It’s solely up to us men to shield their natural virtue so that they become the wives and mothers that allow you to fulfill your biological destiny while furthering the health of your society.

It’s not a matter of telling a girl that sleeping around is bad or that Facebook is bad, because by then the ship has sailed and her soul is likely long gone. It’s a matter of creating the environment where women are restrained from sleeping around, blocked from becoming addicted to taking selfies, and prevented from becoming brainwashed by social justice ideas. We must stop them from entering the environments that destroy them. We must guard the door of evil that they are hurtling themselves towards while resisting evil ourselves.

Before you raise your hands in despair and claim that this is an impossible task, that Western society is finished, I say this: what is a society but a collection of the people within it? What is a society but an assembly of living humans that include ourselves? We are a part of this whole, and it’s up to us to ensure that the truism of “all women are like that” serves in our benefit and our society’s benefit instead of being at the forefront of our most terrifying nightmares.[culturewar]

Read Next: Women Must Have Their Behavior And Decisions Controlled By Men

After a long period in society of women having unlimited personal freedom to pursue life as they wish, they have shown to consistently fail in making the right decisions that prevent their own harm and the harm of others. Systems must now be put in place where a woman’s behavior is monitored and her decisions subject to approval of a male relative or guardian who understands what’s in her best interests better than she does herself.

Women have had personal freedoms for less than a century. For the bulk of human history, their behavior was significantly controlled or subject to approval through mechanisms of tribe, family, church, law, or stiff cultural precepts. It was correctly assumed that a woman was unable to make moral, ethical, and wise decisions concerning her life and those around her. She was not allowed to study any trivial topic she wanted, sleep with any man who caught her fancy, or uproot herself and travel the world because she wanted to “find herself.”

You can see this level of control today in many Muslim countries, where expectations are placed on women from a young age to submit to men, reproduce (if biologically able), follow God’s word, and serve the good of society by employing her feminine nature instead of competing directly against men on the labor market due to penis envy or feelings of personal inferiority.

The reason that women had their behavior limited was for the simple reason that they are significantly less rational than men, in a way that impaired their ability to make good decisions concerning the future. This was eloquently described by German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer in his important essay On Women. He described them as overgrown children, a comparison that any man who has dated more than a dozen of them can quickly agree to after having consistently witnessed their impulsive and illogical behavior firsthand.

Women are directly fitted for acting as the nurses and teachers of our early childhood by the fact that they are themselves childish, frivolous and short-sighted; in a word, they are big children all their life long—a kind of intermediate stage between the child and the full-grown man, who is man in the strict sense of the word. See how a girl will fondle a child for days together, dance with it and sing to it; and then think what a man, with the best will in the world, could do if he were put in her place.

[…]

…women remain children their whole life long; never seeing anything but what is quite close to them, cleaving to the present moment, taking appearance for reality, and preferring trifles to matters of the first importance.

[…]

That woman is by nature meant to obey may be seen by the fact that every woman who is placed in the unnatural position of complete independence, immediately attaches herself to some man, by whom she allows herself to be guided and ruled. It is because she needs a lord and master.

When you give a female unlimited choice on which man to have sex with, what type of man does she choose? An exciting man who treats her poorly and does not care for her well-being.

When you give a female choice on what to study in university, what does she choose? An easy liberal arts major that costs over $50,000 and dooms her to a life of debt and sporadic employment.

When a female lacks any urgent demands upon her survival, what behavior does she pursue? Obsessively displaying her half-naked body on the internet, flirting with men solely for attention, becoming addicted to corporate-produced entertainment, and over-indulging in food until her body shape is barely human.

When you give a female choice on when to have kids, what does she do? After her fertility is well past its peak, and in a rushed panic that resembles the ten seconds before the ringing of the first school bell, she aims for limited reproductive success at an age that increases the likelihood she’ll pass on genetic defects to her child.

When you give a female choice of which political leader to vote into office, who do they vote for? The one who is more handsome and promises unsustainable freebies that accelerate the decline of her country.

When you give a female unwavering societal trust with the full backing of the state, what does she do? Falsely accuse a man of rape and violence out of revenge or just to have an excuse for the boyfriend who caught her cheating.

When you give a female choice on who to marry, what is the result? A 50% divorce rate, with the far majority of them (80%) initiated by women themselves.

While a woman is in no doubt possession of crafty intelligence that allows her to survive just as well as a man, mostly through the use of her sexuality and wiles, she is a slave to the present moment and therefore unable to make decisions that benefit her future and those of the society she’s a part of. Once you give a woman personal freedom, like we have in the Western world, she enslaves herself to one of numerous vices and undertakes a rampage of destruction to her body and those who want to be a meaningful part of her life.

A man does not need to look further than the women he knows, including those in his family, to see that the more freedom a woman was given, the worse off she is, while the woman who was under the heavy hand of the church or male relative comes out far better on the other side, in spite of her rumblings that she wants to be as free as her liberated friends, who eagerly and regularly post soft porn photos of themselves on social networking and dating sites while selecting random anonymous men for fornication every other weekend.

Men, on average, make better decisions than women. If you take this to be true, which should be no harder to accept than the claim that lemons are sour, why is a woman allowed to make decisions at all without first getting approval from a man who is more rational and levelheaded than she is? It not only hurts the woman making decisions concerning her life, but it also hurts any man who will associate with her in the future. You only need to ask the many suffering husbands today on how they are dealing with a wife who entered the marriage with a student loan debt in the high five figures from studying sociology and how her wildly promiscuous sexual history impairs her ability to remain a dedicated mother, with one foot already out the door after he makes a reasonable demand that is essential for a stable home and strong family.

I propose two different options for protecting women from their obviously deficient decision making. The first is to have a designated male guardian give approval on all decisions that affect her well-being. Such a guardian should be her father by default, but in the case a father is absent, another male relative can be appointed or she can be assigned one by charity organizations who groom men for this purpose, in a sort of Boy’s Club for women.

She must seek approval by her guardian concerning diet, education, boyfriends, travel, friends, entertainment, exercise regime, marriage, and appearance, including choice of clothing. A woman must get a green light from her guardian before having sex with any man, before wearing a certain outfit, before coloring her hair green, and before going to a Spanish island for the summer with her female friends.

If she disobeys her guardian, an escalating series of punishments would be served to her, culminating in full-time supervision by him. Once the woman is married, her husband will gradually take over guardian duties, and strictly monitor his wife’s behavior and use all reasonable means to keep it in control so that family needs are met first and foremost, as you already see today in most Islamic societies. Any possible monetary proceeds she would get from divorce would be limited so that she has more incentive to keep her husband happy and pleased than to throw him under the bus for the most trivial of reasons that stem from her persistent and innate need to make bad decisions.

A second option for monitoring women is a combination of rigid cultural rules and sex-specific laws. Women would not be able to attend university unless the societal need is urgent where an able-minded man could not be found to fill the specific position. Women would not be able to visit establishments that serve alcohol without a man present to supervise her consumption. Parental control software on electronic devices would be modified for women to control and monitor the information they consume. Credit card and banking accounts must have a male co-signer who can monitor her spending. Curfews for female drivers must be enacted so that women are home by a reasonable hour. Abortion for women of all ages must be signed off by her guardian, in addition to prescriptions for birth control.

While my proposals are undoubtedly extreme on the surface and hard to imagine implementing, the alternative of a rapidly progressing cultural decline that we are currently experiencing will end up entailing an even more extreme outcome. Women are scratching their most hedonistic and animalistic urges to mindlessly pursue entertainment, money, socialist education, and promiscuous behavior that only satisfies their present need to debase themselves and feel fleeting pleasure, at a heavy cost for society.

Allowing women unlimited personal freedom has so affected birth rates in the West that the elite insists on now allowing importation of millions of third world immigrants from democratically-challenged nations that threaten the survival of the West. In other words, giving women unbridled choice to pursue their momentary whims instead of investing in traditional family ideals and reproduction is a contributing factor to what may end up being the complete collapse of those nations that have allowed women to do as they please.

I make these sincere recommendations not out of anger, but under the firm belief that the lives of my female relatives would certainly be better tomorrow if they were required to get my approval before making any decisions. They would not like it, surely, but due to the fact that I’m male and they’re not, my analytical decision-making faculty is superior to theirs to absolutely no fault of their own, meaning that their most sincere attempts to make good decisions will have a failure rate larger than if I was able to make those decisions for them, especially with intentions that are fully backed with compassion and love for them to have more satisfying lives than they do now.

As long as we continue to treat women as equals to men, a biological absurdity that will one day be the butt of many jokes for comedians of the future, women will continue to make horrible decisions that hurt themselves, their families, and their reproductive potential. Unless we take action soon to reconsider the freedoms that women now have, the very survival of Western civilization is at stake.[culturewar]

Read Next: People Should Not Be Allowed Unlimited Personal Freedom

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nalijahreads · 3 years

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The Fates Divide Book Review

by Veronica Roth

4/5 stars | Goodreads

~ hey everyone! i just wanted to add a note that i tried something new while reading which was taking notes of what i liked each time i read. why? so i could give a more in-depth book review. i normally forget what i want to say about a book because it has been a few days since the beginning of the book or because i forget to write a review until later. this way, i remember everything i want to say and i can take my time when writing them. hope you enjoy this ~

**spoilers, second book in a series, read at your own risk**

The Fates Divide picks up right where the first novel ends: Cyra, Akos, Teka, Isae, Cisi, Sifa, Eijeh, and Ryzek on a spaceship fleeing from Voa. Political tensions are heating up and our main characters are in the middle of it. Do they choose sides in the inevitable war that will happen between Thuvhe and Shotet? What side do they choose? They handle politics, family woes, life-changing oracle readings, love, and plan to murder those in power.

Immediately, I noticed how much Veronica Roth’s writing developed from the first book to the second, making me give it the book an even higher rating. Everything was so much more developed. Since characters carry stories for me, I immediately noticed how much more rounded they were. Overall, diversity was handled really well. Often characters of a marginalized community are made so odd because they are just insensitive stereotypes. It didn’t feel like that in this novel. Gay couples are just couples. It’s not a “big deal” in this world that couples like this exist––not even for characters in higher positions. There’s even hints of a mirror on the racism and xenophobia in our own world and how we ostracize people, even on their own land like having certain amount of drops of blood determine who you are, or the Shotet attack being viewed as immoral compared to the Thuvhe attack, and more. There’s even nonbinary rep! It all made me so happy to see done so casually without making it unimportant.

Staying on characterization, the POVs really help set each character and the storylines apart. We were able to see Akos’s mental health deteriorate through his actions and thoughts. The same goes for his change in grit and willpower as he became more quick-witted and began back talked a lot. Eijeh’s POV was probably the most interesting because he has this double-sided mind that I’ve never seen in fiction because we’re able to see so much more than just his mind. For Cyra, we got to see more of her pain which got lost in the first novel. The little reminders helped me understand what chronic means, especially when she was so distraught over them coming back in the end. It’s also brilliant to see Cyra’s interest in knowledge instead of just being told. Her tangents and random questions hit the nail in the head. The opposite happens though with Cisi. Cisi was kind of underdeveloped since her POV was to focus on Isae. The reader is treated as if we can’t remember that her currentgift holds her back from speaking truthfully. We’re told over and over again that she can’t say what she wants instead of just having her throat close up. All of this interiority allowed me to feel the weight of the actions that took place making me genuinely stressed out and tuned into the plot.

Lastly on characters, they were so humanly and their relationship arcs were strong. Veronica Roth included simple things like forgetting someone’s name and burping from a stomach ache. That never happens in novels! But it’s something people do everyday! I felt like I was actually along an everyday journey with them rather than missing the slightly mundane pieces. On relationships, they didn’t feel forced at all. The rift that happens between Cyra and Akos was very necessary. Without it, there would have been many questions hanging in the air that would have made this shallow. Cyra grew because of it since she didn’t rely on Akos, and I loved that. Controlling her temper and thinking before firing off was *chef’s kiss*. The rift also showed us just how much they love each other. I ached when they both realized why or what made them love the other person––it was much more angsty than other romance novels that aim to be. There’s even something to be said about familial relationships and what really makes someone your family since that is important to the plot. There’s even a cute female friendship between Teka and Cyra that is honest and not simple but also not too important.

Admittedly, the first fifty pages made a few things predictable, BUT, since they were apart of the beginning novel arc, I wrote it off as acceptable. They served a larger purpose and weren’t surface level. They actually added to the added weight of the stakes at hand.

At first, I was unsure how I felt about the ending. I loved that feelings from the previous 200 pages weren’t ignored just because everyone survived. It makes sense that Cyra and Akos couldn’t immediately forgive each other––but it also makes sense that their hard feelings weren’t stable because of how much they love each other. The same goes with the state of the galaxy. Just because Voa was saved, doesn’t mean that the war ends or that political beliefs magically change. Just because Akos killed Lazmet doesn’t mean that Thuvhe and the Shotet make up or that the Hessan people forgive him for betraying the temple. The ending was comfortable. It wasn’t as chaotic as I expected but I felt calm during the falling action. As a side note, it made me so giddy with happiness that Ogra accepted the Shotet onto their planet because the people who had fought to be seen finally were given the respect they deserve!

Lastly, as a personal wish: I would love to see a spin-off novel/series/novella of this set further in the future because I want to see how everything works out! We’re told the Assembly becomes more active in fighting against some planets and I’d like to see the aftermath through an eighteen year old’s eyes, fifty years later, who lives on Zold. The world in this series is so complex and interesting and the science intrigues me rather than pushing me away. I want to learn more about currentgifts and even see more of the other planets.

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everythingstarwars · 4 years

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Mine - A Kylo Ren x Reader Fic

Warnings:

- leading up to smut (none in this chapter)

- kissing

- choking

- anger issues

- possible TLJ spoilers?

Chapter Three - You’re Safe Here

Weeks passed, and you saw no more of Ren. This shouldn’t have bothered you quite as much as it did. He was a Commander, after all. Why would he visit? And yet, your desire for familiarity in this bleak, monotonous lifestyle had you scanning the doorway every now and then, heart fluttering with the hope of seeing his face. The notion that Kylo Ren’s masked face had become a source of comfort was almost enough to make you laugh.

That was until one day, roughly 2 months from the day you were brought onboard. A sharp knock on the door alerted you to the emergence of a visitor, and you glanced up from your book (Imperial Legacy, Volume 9), prepared to greet the stormtroopers for their weekly check in.

“You came back,” You said, eyes widening.

Kylo Ren stepped out of the shadows for the millionth time in your brief history with him. He seemed less stiff today. He walked into the room and allowed the door to slide shut, signaling that this would be more than just a short visit. The stormtroopers were nowhere to be seen.

He strode across the cell until he reached you, then stood still - hovering. It seemed like an eternity until he spoke. “I’ve decided to take the duties of checking up on you myself. As one of our more… capable prisoners, you require a higher level of security,” he informed you.

It was almost a compliment.

“Understood.” Was all you said in response. “Sir.” You added after a brief deliberation. This caught him off guard. Kylo brought a cloaked hand to his helmet and ran it over the back, as though stroking his hair in thought. He glanced backward, noticed the simple metal bench at the corner of your room, and approached it to take a seat.

You leaned back against the headboard and smirked. “So, what - are you gonna just watch me do nothing for eternity?”

You didn’t expect a response, and he did not provide one. Reclining once more, you opened up the book and continued to read. While the story - now on a voyage through the particularly murderous years of the Empire - was riveting as always, something had been awoken in the back of your mind. The thrumming of your heart cared not for your persistent ignorance. After a moment, you peered over the crest of the book with a soft gaze and waited until you were sure he was looking you in the eyes. It didn’t take long.

“I don’t mind,” you said, your voice inching toward a whisper.

As the months went by, Kylo returned week after week, just as he had promised. For the most part, he remained silent, stealing away to his secluded corner and dutifully watching you read, write, sing, or sleep - which admittedly, you found a bit disturbing. Informing him of this, he agreed to the surprising promise of waking you up upon his arrival, should you be asleep again in the future. Your respect for him grew little by little.

Conversation was limited. He was not a social creature. Kylo seemed to have no issue keeping silent for hours at a time. However, that was not to say that he was robotic in manner. Many times, you caught him staring at you while reading or writing, or almost-inconspicuously scanning your body from top to bottom as he entered your room. Almost. Occasionally, he would even instigate conversation.

The first time was one day as he sat watching you read the latest Imperial Rule Manual (Volume Twelve: Droid Edition). Walking to the bookshelf, he stooped down and examined the rows of books, most of which had been clearly removed and replaced, returned to their home heavily dog-eared and evidently consumed.

“You read all of these?” He asked. You glanced up from your pages.

You allowed yourself a smirk. “I had nothing else to do.” Keep the explanation short and simple, that was your best move. Somewhere in deep caverns of your mind you registered the fact that your starvation for human contact had led you to treating Kylo Ren like a tentative street cat.

“I’ve always found them incredibly boring.” Kylo admitted. This response wouldn’t have surprised you if the fact that Supreme Leader Kylo Ren speaking to you at all wasn’t the most shocking thing you had experienced to date.

“Oh, they are.”

“You read them anyway? Interesting …”

Was there… amusement in his voice?

“Well, they may be a bit boring but… I agree with most of their beliefs.” The words were true, as was your surprise at his reaction.

“Tell me,” He responded, settling on the floor next to your bed with his back against the bookshelf. For a moment, his villainous guise flickered, and he seemed very normal. Very young. Sitting there next to you, silent and calm, giving you his full attention in a moment of abrupt compassion.

You raised an eyebrow and obeyed, beginning to explain your thoughts on the imperial texts. He didn’t make a sound, allowing you to speak for as long as you wanted and add as much detail as you desired. When you finished, he responded with his own opinions on the matter, and the conversation continued.

It was almost two hours before he stood up to leave. Despite his brief politeness, he left without a word of goodbye and never brought up the conversation again. But from that day on, your dynamic had changed. Kylo Ren was no longer a voiceless captor. He had opened the channels of interaction, and you wanted more.

Over the following months, you began to speak more and more, soon growing almost comfortable with each other. Often he would arrive at your cell only to be greeted by a beaming smile on your face. The two of you discussed literature, history, the beliefs of the empire you already shared, the planets you had visited, and the worlds you yet longed to see. He refused to share any information about himself or his past, but invested fully in any stories you were willing to share or hopes of the future. Contact remained prohibited.

Even in the lightest of times, however, darkness tends to linger. You were occasionally reminded of this. No matter how open Kylo Ren grew to be around you, he was an Imperial Commander, a force of evil, and a Sith.

“There’s a celebration they do, every year at the end of the harvest season. They gather all the younglings and float Lilieans in the river. I used to watch them drift down the riverbanks with my father, until they reached the waterfall, and then whoosh-,” you made a swishing gesture with your hand. “There they would go. Gone forever. But we would do it again the next year.”

You had been conversing with him for about an hour already, and you both were deeply immersed in stories from your childhood. Kylo, curious and willing to listen, and you, passionate and eager to share. The stories brought a smile to your face, in addition to making you a bit homesick.

Kylo nodded. “It sounds beautiful,” he said. You smiled wistfully.

“It was.”

He noticed your expression. “You miss it?”

“Very much so. It has been my home since birth. Wouldn’t you miss yours?”

“No,” he admitted. “I find it surprising that you do.”

You cocked your head. “And why’s that?”

“I had taken you for someone smarter than that. Such sentimentality; attachment to something as meaningless as a planet…”

“A planet that you ravaged,” you reminded him.

Kylo sighed. “When will you understand,” he said eventually. “That sometimes the intent outweighs the outcome?”

You narrowed your eyes. His words rarely angered you, the bar set as low as it was, but somehow these struck a nerve. “Look, I don’t know what your intent was,” you growled, “And I doubt you’ll tell me. But that was my home you destroyed. Those were my people you massacred. And when you took me aboard this ship, it was for doing something that I still believe in. I was protecting them, protecting my family and our legacy.” You were nearly spitting with anger now. You weren’t sure where it had all come from so quickly, but a fire had ignited in your chest and it was futile to resist the flames.

“You imperial beasts have no idea of the lives you are destroying, even less so of the lives you are taking- ” Something silenced you. A tightening in your throat. Your vocal chords were compressed enough to mute them entirely, and soon you felt oxygen begin to diminish in your lungs. You couldn’t breathe. You couldn’t move. Hands raised to your throat in desperation, you struggled for air that was not supplied.

Kylo approached you. Slowly. Taking his time. His hand was raised in a grasping motion. When he reached you, he kneeled down and leaned in a little too close for your liking. He squeezed his hand and your throat closed along with it.

“Careful what you say next, delicate one. Would be a shame if something happened to your pretty little neck.”

You tried to gasp and failed.

“I would be more careful with your words, moving forward. Not everyone here is as forgiving as I am. And seeing as you consistently defy my orders about staying quiet, you may want to learn to beg for forgiveness soon.”

With a single flick of his wrist, your throat reopened. You inhaled deeply and struggled for breath, gasping and heaving like a fish. He allowed you a moment to regain oxygen. When you felt more stable, you met his glare with one of your own.

“You almost killed me,” you growled.

“If I wanted to kill you, I would have.”

You considered this for a moment. The strangulation had not lasted very long, and his force-grip wasn’t as tight as you would have expected. Your throat felt surprisingly devoid of lingering pain. The whole affair seemed to be more of a fear tactic than anything else. It worked.

Furthermore, you found yourself considering his words from before carefully. You were surprised to find you believed him. He was more forgiving than many First Order officers had been so far, that was undeniable. It struck you that you could have gotten in far more trouble than you did for your traitorous words.

You held his gaze in a new light. Shadows of anger remained in your heart, he had still strangled you and he clearly hadn’t lost the fiery nature you had first experienced. But you found yourself able to nod politely and whisper, “I’m sorry, Commander. I understand when to hold my tongue.” It wasn’t a lie. But it wasn’t entirely the truth.

He nodded and stole away to the doorframe, where he lingered for a moment. Dramatically, as was the routine with everything he did.

“You don’t need to apologize,” he said.

For the first time, he didn’t seem to relish in the candor of his words. He glanced back at you one last time and left the room.

. . .

Weeks passed, and life in solitude continued. The storm troopers returned once again for the weekly-check in. Kylo did not. You couldn’t bring yourself to be sad. If anything, it was almost nice to be able to push him from your mind once and for all. Well, almost.

You hadn’t seen him for an eternity, when one night you were woken by a weight on your shoulder. Something jostled you once. Then twice. After a moment, you were awake and sitting up. Your head felt full of sand. Even with groggy vision, you could tell it was the middle of the night.

Kylo stood at the foot of the bed, his arm extended and his voice impatient.

“Get up,” he instructed. You stood, took his hand, and allowed him to lead you to the door. You registered the fact that your hair must be a mess and your voice was raspy with exhaustion. His wasn’t. Did the guy ever sleep?

“Follow me. Don’t make a sound.” He spoke quietly. When you reached the door he grasped your wrist. In the darkness, you saw the glint of metal and heard a sharp clicking noise. Your bracelet clattered to the floor. With the handcuff removed, he pulled you out of the cell for the first time in months and the two of you took off down a barren hallway. The entire ship was asleep, and the only sound was the monotone humming of an engine somewhere.

“Where are you taking me?” You inquired. His hand was to your throat in an instant. The walking ceased.

“What did I say?” He growled in your ear. His leather glove was cool against the skin of your neck. Your heart thrummed at the feeling. When you tried to breathe, you found you could, just barely. The thought was exciting.

“Apologies, sir,” You submitted as he released you. You hoped the darkness was enough to disguise your smirk.

He resumed his pace, leading you along with him, though he no longer clutched your hand. Willfully, you followed him, more out of curiosity than anything else.

After a couple of hallways that brought no change of scenery, a new thought dawned on you. Your throat closed up without any action from Kylo. Beads of sweat met the skin of your forehead and crystallized in the cold night air.

“Kylo,” You whispered. “Am I going to die?”

He almost stopped, but then seemed to think better of it and keep walking.

“What?”

“Am I being led to my execution? Did they send you to make it easier on me?”

You heard a soft laugh from somewhere inside his helmet. “My presence has grown to soothe you, has it?” He teased.

“I- uh… no.”

“No,” He consoled, “You’re not going to die.”

You sighed in relief, but a million questions remained.

“Then-,” You began.

“Quiet. We’re almost there.”

He took you down one final hallway and the path opened up into a cavernous control room. Blinking lights, abandoned consoles, and empty chairs filled the room. Even at night, it purred with electricity and activity, as if alive in some way. Massive computers lined the walls, and the front of the room was consumed by an enormous floor-to-ceiling window, revealing the vast expanse of space outside.

You walked through it in amazement. A long, glossy pathway through the center guided your way to the window. It was like walking down an aisle. As you passed each computer console, your fingers skimmed the tops enviously, imagining the power contained in just a single one, and what you could do with such ability. So much information, so much control, held in this one single room.

Kylo walked behind you for the first time. He allowed you to take your time admiring the room. You imagined he must be proud. This was his accomplishment, after all. His empire.

The window rose in front of you, tall and enchanting, like a gateway to the outside world. As you grew closer, you began to spot the small dots of stars in the distance, tiny flickering lights that appeared and vanished in your vision. One by one, then clusters, until the entire sky was filled with them. It was a sight you were familiar with, but seeing such wonder from space itself, as though you were another star among them, was different in every way. Your eyes glowed in their light.

Kylo joined you next to the window and watched as you reached out to touch the glass. You recoiled immediately. It was freezing. Colder than anything you had ever felt, as though it would solidify your blood with just one touch.

He ignored your activity and stared out the window. You tried to decipher what he found so interesting and could not, beautiful as the void was. You were about to ask him why he had brought you here, when something caught your eye.

A sliver of light lit up a corner of the window, growing larger and larger by the second. You remembered suddenly that you were on a ship, and it was moving.

The light was being omitted by something far in the distance, many light years away. There were only a couple of celestial bodies that did that.

Kylo gestured to the light - as if you hadn’t noticed - and spoke for the first time in minutes.

“Do you know what this is?” He asked, as the ball of light edged into view.

You nodded, recognizing it after a moment. “...Pleione, right? It’s a star,” you responded, smiling. It struck you what was about to happen.

“When it passes our ship in a few minutes, it will generate a mirage of light across the sky.” Kylo voiced what you were just piecing together.

“A sunrise,” you murmured. Sudden excitement consumed you as your scientific brain kicked in. You had seen a sunrise before, of course, but never from a ship. You hadn’t realized it would be possible until now. “From the angle of the destroyer against it’s rays… similar to that of a mini-planet. We’ll actually get to see a sunrise.”

“Indeed,” Kylo confirmed, sounding a bit awestruck. He looked at you, and allowed his gaze to linger for a moment. Had he been expecting you to understand? Wouldn’t most people? You couldn't be sure, but why would he bring you out here otherwise? You wondered what he was thinking.

“Kylo, why did you bring me out here?”

“I figured you missed seeing them,” he answered, still looking at you.

Something stirred in your heart. A genuine act of kindness, of sympathy… from Kylo Ren. It should have surprised you more than it did. Still, the act was unexpected and brought a bright flush to your face despite efforts to remain cool.

His next move surprised you more.

You had turned back to watch the approaching star, when a low click brought your attention back to Kylo. With a sound similar to that of a vacuum cleaner being turned off, his helmet was removed and cast aside. A heavy sound resonated through the room as it hit the floor by his feet.

“Kylo, what’re you…?” You inquired with widening eyes.

He turned to face you, and the man that met your eyes was worlds away from how you envisioned Kylo Ren. He had tumbling black hair, pushed back by the mold of his helmet, that reached the base of his neck in length and curled around his ears ever so slightly. His eyes were a shade of brown so dark they were almost black, and his skin was the color of ivory.

When he smirked at you, he looked so different from the man you thought you had grown to know. So young… so pretty. It struck you how handsome he was, a development you were certain you had not prepared for.

“Well, I can’t see the beauty of the sunrise if I’m wearing a mask, can I?” He said, almost flippantly. His voice, his real voice, mesmerized you. It was low and sonorous, less raspy than it had been with the helmet on yet still slightly cracked. The voice of someone tall, someone warm. Of a man with a young heart but an old soul.

You realized your lips were dry and tried to remember how to breathe.

“Look,” he said, interrupting your swirling thoughts, all too abstract to form words. The sunset had begun.

It began slowly, as though waking up from a long nap. Tiny slivers of warmth crept along the edges of the window. Not too many, not enough to overwhelm. Soon, an entire glowing curve of raw sunlight was visible. Then, the night sky burst to life, massive brushes of colorful light spreading in every direction, painting the sky with its splendor. Every panel of the window was illuminated by a magnificent golden glow, the stars in the distance fading as they were consumed by the light.

It was a spectacle unlike any you had ever seen. It light up Kylo in the warmth as well, his raven-black hair turning a shade of burgundy and his dark eyes glittering gold. You realized it must be doing the same to you.

You both turned to look at each other in awe at the same time and locked eyes. You were smiling, he had a serene look on his face. You looked away first, blushing. His eyes stayed on you.

When it was over and the sky returned to an eerie pitch black, he led you back to your cell.

You stepped inside rubbed your eyes, the effect of waking up so early finally hitting you. Kylo stood in the doorway with his mask in hand, staring at you with a thoughtful expression.

You took a step toward him. Upon receiving no reaction, you took another. And another. Until you were a mere few inches from him. Almost breathing the same air. With tentative slowness, you extended a hand and he met it, allowing you to take his. His hand was nearly twice the size of yours, but his fingers were long and laced gently with yours.

“Thank you for keeping me sane,” You whispered. The words weren’t really enough to express your true gratitude, but it would do for now.

Kylo narrowed his eyes. “I trust this will be enough to keep you behaved for a while?” He asked.

“Very well behaved, Commander,” you teased, moving closer and closer to him. He didn’t stop you.

You were an inch away. Less than. His arms were around you. You weren’t sure when that had happened. Your hands were around his neck. His skin was smooth, and cool to the touch. But his lips were warm when he kissed you.

It happened in an instant, almost too fast to register. You two connected, and all the barriers that had been put up melted away.

His lips were firm, but used gently. He took the lead, wrapping his arms further around your waist and kissing you deeply. His tongue slipped into your mouth and you fought a whimper. How was he so good at this? Your thoughts became giddy. Kylo...kylo...kylo… His lips were magic, his touch electrifying. His upper lip pressed into yours with the perfect amount of pressure, while his bottom lip grazed yours lightly, almost as if trying to open it.

He bit your bottom lip teasingly as he pulled away and a light moan left your mouth. He smirked at the sound. You were certain your face was now flushed completely red and possibly sweaty, but you didn’t care. He looked perfect, still, and he had just kissed you so… passionately. Your mind was too fuzzy with lust to think straight.

Kylo was still looking at you, but it was clear the time had come for him to leave. His eyes were asking a question, and you responded with a nod but reached for his hand one last time.

“I don’t want you to go,” You confessed.

He gazed into your eyes. His expression betrayed nothing, but he squeezed your hand lightly and leaned in to kiss your forehead.

“I’ll be back,” he said as he pulled away.

Whether that was a threat or a promise, you couldn’t tell. But a moment later, he was gone.

You stood there standing at the door for long after it closed.

#star wars #star wars fanfiction #kylo ren #kylo ren x reader #kylo ren fanfiction #makeout #daddy kylo coming soon #star wars the last jedi #first order

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artsandpoppy · 4 years

Photo

Get to know POPPY PINK who’s THIRTY years old and works as the OWNER OF OUT OF THE BOX CRAFT STORE in town. She is from FLORIDA and is often times mistaken for ANNA KENDRICK while others say she reminds them of POPPY from TROLLS.

about:

death cw, cannibalism cw, depression cw, pregnancy cw, miscarriage cw

when poppy was still only just a few months old her mother was killed by a serial killer cannibal on a night out with her friends. the killer was caught a few towns over three weeks later and has been in jail ever since. because of this she was raised by a single father - peter “peppy” pink, the longstanding mayor of their small town trollsville, florida.

even though she grew up with only one parent poppy never felt unloved or neglected. the entire town practically pitched in to help raise her - she was always bouncing around from “aunties” and “uncles” places while her father was busy with work.

peppy pink is the absolute greatest man as far as poppy is concerned. she loves her father to death and always dreamed of one day becoming just like him. which is why she planned for the longest time to follow in his footsteps and become a politician. when college rolled around she majored in political science and double minored in business and arts - figuring that was a good balance of things she loved to do as well as practical studies.

in high school as well as college she was a bit of a party animal, out almost every night with friends - even for just small get togethers - and disappearing from home completely on the weekends, unless mayor peppy had an event he needed poppy to attend. in high school she was fairly calm in comparison to a bunch of her friends and fellow party-goers, usually only drinking maybe one or two drinks per party. but once college rolled around she started drinking more and occasionally doing drugs on special nights, like big concerts or raves, etc.

her junior year of college was when she met creek and her entire life changed. she’d had past relationships before, but none of them compared to how quickly and hard she fell for him. within just a few months of dating she knew he was the one.

and for a long time things were great, after graduating they got engaged but decided to wait to be officially married until his yoga studio was stable and her own political career had started to take off. she was working with her father and learning the ropes of being a small town mayor while her father still technically held the title. but even though they had decided to wait a few years, poppy still dreamed about the wedding everyday. she had scrapbooks planned and after a year of being engaged stumbled upon her dream dress and bought it without any hesitation.

about 2 years after graduation is when poppy found herself pregnant for the first time. it was the best news she’d ever received in her life and she and creek were over the moon (or like with everything else with creek - that’s at least what she thought) only for her to miscarry a few weeks after finding out.

that was hard on her and the first time poppy experienced one of her bad depressive episodes. throughout high school and college she’d had times were she’d get down and struggle for a day or two - but nothing as serious as what happened this time around. she was in bed for two weeks and struggled to even leave her room, much less the house. thankfully since she worked primarily with her father and other people she considered to be family, they all understood and she faced no repressions or setbacks at work.

there were a few pregnancy “scares” over the next year but nothing more than just a late period. each time it upset poppy, but nothing that lasted more than a day or two.

until it finally stuck and she found herself pregnant again. this time she made it through the whole first trimester and a month into the second, even found out it was going to be a girl and it was just when she and creek started thinking about names that she miscarried again. it was even harder than the last time, a surprise considering she had been told she was likely in the clear since most miscarriages are more common to happen during the first trimester.

this was absolutely one of the lowest points of her life. she took a complete leave of absence from work and didn’t leave the house for a month. none of her friends could find ways to cheer her up and she pretty much shut them out anyway. only wanting to be by herself or with creek.

after about a month she started to slowly recover, gained her energy and her appetite back. it was during this time that she completely re-evaluated her life and realized she wasn’t as truly happy as she thought. sure, she had her crafts, her friends, and creek... but was being the future mayor really what she wanted? or was it just her following along in what was always expected of her? with these doubts she decided to wait a bit before going back to work - choosing to focus on music instead

she became a local musician, playing at coffee shops and such whenever she could. the yoga studio was doing good plus she always had the trust fund her mother left her to fall back on, so poppy wasn’t worried financially.

it was great for her mental health and after a few months she decided it was what she wanted to do full time. a choice that she really had thought would make her life better, but instead brought it crumbling to the ground. because apparently that wasn’t what creek had signed up for. he had planned on marrying the future mayor, wanting to be the elite of the town himself, and when poppy gave that up it changed things for him - changed it so much in fact that he dumped her. called off the engagement and ended the relationship entirely.

the breakup was messy. real messy. the fact that he had cheated on her multiple times over the year was revealed, they both said horrible things to each other, and poppy went so far as one night destroying his yoga studio in a drunken rage with a baseball bat. it was the one time she actually got in trouble with the law, spending a night in jail but having the charges eventually dropped

to this day poppy still isn’t sure if he ever even loved her at all. it’s fucked her mentally a lot when it comes to relationships. she’s constantly doubting the other person’s feeling despite how hard she tries not to. it’s the reason why most of her relationships post-creek have ended. with her getting stuck in her head and overwhelmed and ending things out of fear and insecurities. even if she still loves the person, which she always does.

when poppy falls in love, she’s in love for good. even with creek, as much as she hates and despises him for what he did and how badly he hurt her, there’s still a part of her that will always love him. when you picture your forever with someone that isn’t something that just goes away.

speaking of falling in love - poppy falls super fucking easily. she has a small crush on almost everyone she meets. she’s at any given time harboring active feelings for at least one or two people.

but anyway - after the break up with creek, poppy started going out even more than before. partying or clubbing every night. it was during this time that she got closer to her high school rival barb - a girl she’d always secretly had feelings for but never acted on because of the rivalry that was between them. this party phase lasted about a year before she got a little tired of it. around that same time was when corona opened and she decided to make the move.

her childhood best friend, branch, who has been there by her side through every up and down of her life was against the idea of her leaving at first. but once poppy sets her mind to something there’s no turning it back, so he gave in and decided to move along with her. the two got a townhouse together on the island and each opened their own business - for branch it was a sports and camping goods store and she started up an arts and crafts one.

the arts and craft store has a whole area in the back with a few comfy chairs and two tables for people to work on anything they want! she also has a little stand with a “mini business” run by bubbles (it’s a pet psychic stand)

moving to corona is the best thing she’s ever done. it’s helped her so much, she’s met so many amazing people - some of the best people she’s known her whole life.

she still struggles with her depression at times, but she’s getting a better hold on it. she still also hella overworks herself, but that’s just in her nature and is likely something that will never change. about once every other month she has a crash day or two, where she does nothing but sleep and lay in bed - it’s a mixture of the exhaustion and sometimes the depression playing in, but most people close enough to her to know about her mental health struggles are aware that this is sort of her normal routine now

she has a girl band with barb and also occasionally performs at open mic nights solo - a part of her stubbornly refusing to give up performing out of spite against creek

a big stress baker as well as just a big baker in general - at least once every few month goes around to all the local businesses and gives the owners little treats because she likes to stay in touch with all of them

scrapbooking and kitting are her favorite crafty past-times, but she also paints and draws and does all sorts of artsy stuff

favorite colors are pink and purple. tho she loves a good blue too

pop is her top genre of music, but over the time of meeting people like barb and hickory she’s come to enjoy all types. but pop will always be her favorite.

she has the power of glowing. a guide to which can be found HERE

she has a bunch of minimalist tattoos which can be found HERE

#my ball of sunshine and love and music #with lil a sadness as a treat #intro

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