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silverselfshippingchaos · 3 months

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hi, ash! i'd love to hear about your ffxv s/i and your ship with gladio! also, what does iris think about your s/i? :O

YAY!! I love talking about this kind of stuff!!!

(Some talk of death, injury, drowning, a bit of blood + spoilers for the game)

F.FXV Ash was born in the Crown City to two members of the Crownsguard (eventually the Kingsglaive). Ever since she was young, Ash was always fed this idea that her kingdom was amazing. She loved her home so much and she wanted to grow up there forever with her parents and her sister. It all changed when she was 16. She parents were killed in combat.

(In Episode A.rdyn, there's a boss fight against two soldiers... Those were her parents.)

Ash stayed in the city long enough to graduate high-school, but after that, she just couldn't keep going. She felt hollow and empty inside. The murder of her parents shattered her in every single way possible, wrecked her faith and her love to kingdom, ruined her life. She's messed up.

And so, Ash leaves. She makes a name for herself as a monster hunter, drifting from town to town and protecting the people. She comes to be known as Eos' Rose. Beautiful, but with thorns too. She didn't choose to be called The Rose, it's just that part of her outfit is a long, red coat. I still need to work out the details of her outfit and all that, but she has a red coat and quite a few earrings. She has a chain threader going through two lobe piercings on one ear, and a dangling rose earring on the other. Both silver.

(Whenever she was about 20, she met a lonely chocobo chick. This chocobo stays with Ash for a long time. She is a green chocobo named Sage. Sage is Ash's companion and best friend. Sage is very friendly to everybody, but she has a distaste for Gladio and has tried to bite him on multiple occasions. She succeeded once, but more on that later.

Again, Sage is naturally green. Prompto asks about this once.

"Hey, Ash! Why is your chocobo green?"

"Well, I dunno, Prompto. Why are you blond?"

It gets a good chuckle out of everyone.)

Anyways, early into the game, the Chocobros run into Ash! She actually draws her sword on Noct at first and then she realizes "holy shit, you're the prince. Oh my god, I tried to kill the prince. Oh no, oh no, oh no-"

It's a bit of a funny moment, but she ends up allying with the bros and she gets especially close with Gladio. They get along really well, both protectors of people and absolutely dorks too.

Ash is a gamer, so she gets along well with Prompto and Noct. They actually all played Kings Knight together online! So it's a bit of a "WAIT WE'RE KINGS KNIGHT MOOTS?!" whenever they finally meet. She gets along really well with Ignis too! Ash is very close with all of the gang. It's not long before her and Gladio are falling in love, kissing and sharing Cup Noodles under the stars.

And as for Iris, Iris ADORES Ash! Looks up to her as the big sister she never had. Iris thinks Ash is so cool and strong! And she tells Gladdy that if he breaks her heart, she'll kick his ass! Ash really loves Iris too. She was always the youngest in her family too, so it means a lot to her to be able to be an older sister figure to someone. Ash teaches Iris a bit about how to use a sword too.

Anywho, back to the plot.

Ash accompanies the bros whenever they go onto the boat to Altissia. Her and Gladio have a sweet, romantic date there. But that happiness doesn't last. It's been a bit of a running joke that Ash doesn't know how to swim.

The last thing Gladio expected was to lose her.

As Altissia falls, Ash sacrifices herself to save Gladio and Prompto. They both have to watch as Ash falls from a bridge and into the water. They watch as Ash dies. But there's not enough time to save her. Prompto sobs, Gladio screams in horror. Ash is content. She's going to die protecting the people she loves, right? It's not that cute and her almost drowning to death was the scariest moment of her life. She's choking and gasping for air, trying to grab any rubble she can just to stay alive.

Ash isn't seen again for a while. It's part of the reason why Gladio lashes out on the train—he's mourning his girlfriend's death. Whenever he's sitting there across the table from Ignis, you can hear him crying.

However, a few chapters later... Guess who comes back. She's injured, has scars on her face, and her coat is in tatters. Gladio hugs her and cries, Ash tells him to loosen up a bit since she has a few cracked ribs.

"What's the matter? Not a fan of ghosts?"

Gladio tells her that this isn't the time to crack jokes, but he hugs her so tight. She was alive. She was okay.

(However, during this time, Gladio actually found Sage and told her that Ash was dead. Sage bit him hard that day.)

But... How exactly did Ash survive..?

That gets explained in Episode Ignis. I won't talk about Ash's involvement in every DLC just to not make this to lengthy, but in Iggy's... Ravus sees her drowning. He grabs her out of the water and onto land. He's not gentle about it, and the impact of being thrown against rubble isn't great for Ash's bones, but she's alive. Ash is nursed back to health by the survivors of the town. There's a lot more detail there, but that's the gist of what happens.

Ash's relationship with Ravus is fascinating. They bond quite a bit and have a chat under the stars much later, right before Ash reunites with Gladio. I had to dig through like two years worth of discord messages for this but it went something like this

Oh and you know that level that's just Gladio and Ignis? Yeah, Ash is there too. She cusses out Ardyn actually. Although I really like Ardyn, my S/I doesn't. He makes a comment that she's quite grown up now. You know how he gets those flashbacks of peoples' memories after he kills people in his DLC? He saw an image of a little girl with red glasses. And here she was, a grown woman.

She breaks off from the group before the Ravus fight. I don't want her to see him like that.

Anyways, then timeskip rolls around. Whenever Noct arrives at Hammerhead is met with a familiar "kweh-kweh!". Sage greets Noct after ten long years, and then Ash runs over. They have a cute hug scene.

However, Ash's outfit is different. Not only is her hair curly (pre-ts Ash had it straightened), but she's wearing... Kingsglaive armor?! Her outfit is vaguely inspired by Crowe from Kingsglaive, but Ash had become a soldier. Not just to follow in her parents' footsteps, but because she had spent her whole life feeling lost and she had finally found a purpose. Traveling with Noct and Co had made her realize that her life had a purpose. She wanted to spend her life protecting her kingdom.

After her parents died, she didn't know what to do with herself. Noct was both her best friend and her king. Noct says that the Kingsglaive outfit looks good on her. It makes her smile. Ash had finally come home to Insomnia, and she had finally found what she was meant to do.

Before the gang leaves, she gives Noct a long hug and tells him to come back alive. She gives Gladio a kiss too.

And that's basically it!

#answered #OH BOY THAT WAS A LOT #i think i missed some details here and there but it's been a while haha! but yeah! that's basically who f.f15 ash is!#theres more ofc and she has lots of banter whenever shes running around with the bros but thats basically who she is #shes very fun! she makes a lot of puns and jokes but she's a great fighter! i'm really happy she finds a home with the bros :)#g.ladio loves her a lot! and she loves him too!!!!#they get married after the end of the game. BECAUSE NOCT IS FINE AND OKAY. HE'S FINE... SNIFFLES...#though there is an AU i have about how Ash fares if none of the bros come back. she just disappears. runs away just like she did after her #parents died. she sees the empty camp chairs outside the city and breaks down #but ahem!! They're all okay!! noct is okay!!! her and g.ladio have a very nice wedding! her dress is very pretty #and in true f.f15 fashion it's black! but yeah! i love ash a lot #(but i like sage even more! kweh kweh!)#sage is a very fun-loving bird and she likes it whenever prompto takes pictures of her. ash calls it chocobo to chocobo bonding #thanks again for the ask my friend!

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eclipsedcrystalstar · 1 year

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I wonder how many bird puns Mind and Soul make towards Heart since he has wings

#at least he has wings on the instrumental cover #we know they have a ton of bird puns from the Mucka Blucka cover #chonny jash #chonny jash soul #chonny jash heart #chonnys charming chaos compendium #chonny rambles #chonny jash mind

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moodr1ng · 7 days

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one weird and annoying effect of me spending so much time on mainly american social media and watching all these american shows and movies and reading books by american authors and having all these online friends from america etc etc is that like.. when i write i no longer feel like i can set my stories in france? like, bc i write in english it feels like i need to set my stories in an english-speaking country, and the us is the easiest one to set up (i think in a way it kinda feels like the "default setting" of western media?). i feel like if i wrote a book set in france itd be weird or confusing to people, and also im always bugged bc like.. the stuff i write in english cannot be directly translated into french, like it doesnt correspond 1:1 to french sentences, and so if i set a story in france im always bugged bc i think "but that cant be what the characters are actually saying, because theres no equivalent to this in french". so i end up setting a lot of my stuff in the us, except ive only been to the us once and not long enough to get a good impression of what living there is like (not to mention ive only been to nyc), so i also feel like when americans read my stuff theyre gonna immediately go "huh? thats not how things are here. this author is a hack who cant do research." .. so then sometimes i set my stuff in fictional countries or in an ambiguous impossible setting which mixes stuff from various english-speaking countries + france, but then that makes my story immediately less grounded. this is such a big issue that it blocks me from writing entire stories i wanna write bc i just cant even begin to put them somewhere 😔

#97 #ig the two options are like..#either suck it up and write shit set in france even if ik the language thing bugs me #or set it in the us and have someone from the area im writing about read through it and correct everything i got wrong #both of which are a bit daunting.#'sunny' is my one story thats explicitly set in france #and the language thing bugs me SO SO SO much.#even the tiniest bit like..#omars nickname for sunny is 'bunny'#which works double as a cute nickname + as a play on her name right #but in french itd be like.. 'lapin' which could be a nickname ig but #it has a totally diff vibe. its not as cute. it comes off more weird or forced as a nickname.#and it has nothing to do w sunnys name.#stuff like that is always annoying me.#oh yeah 'brotherhood' is also set in france i forgot lol and i had the same issue there!#the librarian in brotherhood makes a pun on the phrase 'early bird gets the worm'#but thats not a phrase in french and neither is 'bookworm' with which she makes the pun #so its like. no she didnt say that. she cant have bc theyre supposed to be speaking french.#actually sometimes i even feel like im not knowledgeable to write france either!!#like i wanna set something in paris but while im in paris often im always a passerby #and i feel like i cant write paris in an authentic and genuine way #so what am i just supposed to set all my stories in my city and nowhere else??#i probably overthink this stuff.

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pa-pa-plasma · 1 year

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I think I asked before, but I know fotpod is your crow/corvid Danny fic, but what’s the full name? Thanks. ❤️

honestly I'm so used to calling it FOtPoD I sometimes forget that's not an actual word & that. a lot of people probably have no idea what I'm talking about xD

it stands for Flying Over the Pit of Death & Danny's actually a black-billed magpie in it, though he does have crow friends (pics for birb reference)

one sec I wrote a whole thing on my DP side blog, daddyplasmius. okay it's here> [LINK] if you wanted to read my rambling about this project (& my FOtPoD memes)

#currently still writing this thing. started on Control Freaks. also brainstorming for Memory Blank & My Brother's Keeper #you'd think it'd be easy to make an AU as simple as ''no one knows bird au'' but it really isnt. Danny is bird. how he use thermos??#don't ask me cuz i've been winging it the whole time lol #pun intended #idk when FOtPoD is getting finished but I'll probs start posting before that happens anyways just cause #my writing has been postponed though due to. uh. finding a kitten in the woods in September. & family issues as well #getting back on track but like. this fic is gonna be Large. multi multi multi chapter. 60 of em. this is gonna be Shadow of a Doubt big #I have lots of big scenes done i just need to connect them & also write the scenes i have planned but havent written #also writing a meme murder mystery fic i was paid the equivalent of 1 (one) cornchip for (as I requested) so am also working on that too #also (& this one is the most important) i need to play (& for once in my life finish) spore. right now.

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itsbenedict · 7 months

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mutual 1: conventional morality is nowhere near cringe enough to be based. you agree.

mutual 2: i'm going to liveblog my attempt at solving this obscure statistics conundrum you've definitely never heard of

mutual 3, reblogging mutual 2: oh, yeah, the Obscure Statistics Conundrum, we've all seen it. i have strong opinions on the obvious easy and simple way it should be solved, somehow

mutual 4: i need. to fuck that old man.

mutual 5: picture of a bird

mutual 6: [twenty-post long reblog chain arguing about politics with a stranger in stubborn defiance of the obvious fact that the stranger is not reading a single word they're saying]

mutual 7: here's my take on the latest chapter of the current Wildbow serial that you're going to have to blur your eyes and skip past because you haven't found time to read all five million words of this cool thing you don't want to be spoiled on

mutual 8: what if [the most deranged shit you've ever heard in your life]- and we were both girls?

mutual 4: don't forget i need to fuck that. old man. please.

mutual 9: [automatically generated link to a post on some ideologically extreme underground social media site with ten users that they use instead]

mutual 5: picture of a bird

mutual 5: god every single thing about my life situation sucks so fucking much i want to cry and now you do too

mutual 5: picture of a bird

mutual 10: reblogging that last picture of a bird

mutual 5: picture of a bird

mutual 4: that old man. you know. what i need.

mutual 11: here's today's doodle :) [outlandishly beautiful piece of original art which gets seven notes]

mutual 12: only posted eighteen spicy takes about gender today, so here's a new one i just came up with. is this anything

mutual 13: hey, wanna look at this pornography that somehow hasn't gotten taken down by Tumblr yet?

mutual 14: [a pun so bad she gets put in the fucking Hague]

mutual 5: picture of a bird

mutual 15: [21st reblog on the politics reblog chain where everyone is talking past each other and has zero intention of persuading anyone]

mutual 4: i need to FUCK that old man. what do you mean he's dead

mutual 8: what if i fucked that old man. and we were both girls.

#benedict dashboard simulator 2023 #oh no popular post

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stitcherofchaos · 1 year

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My sister and I watched the angry birds movie yesterday and I noticed a ‘coexist' sticker on the back of the truck that Terrance was driving. It takes like 0.2 seconds to notice it before he drives away.

And then I thought to myself-

“Why didn’t they make the sticker say ‘coeggist’ instead of coexist?”

Missed opportunity Columbia Pictures 😔

#angry birds #angry birds movie #angry birds red #angry birds chuck #angry birds bomb #angry birds mighty eagle #angry birds Terrance #why the frick am I tagging angry birds so much?#what has my life come to?#bad puns #i love puns #jokes #bad jokes #bad humor #tumblr humor

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confused-wanderer · 27 days

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The villains are utterly confused.

They remember the first robin. They remember how bloodthirsty the little gremlin was, how he appeared out of the darkness with a “HIYA FOLKS” that gave people near heart attacks with PTSD so bad they flinched everytime they walked into a dark corner. They remember his grin, baring few too many teeth with a glint in his eyes whenever the bat wasn’t around to curb him. They remember the death stare, the brooding that made no one doubt this was the Bat’s son. They remember how a punch would land a lot harder than it was supposed to, or the screaming that followed. Oh they remembered him alright.

The second one thank the stars was better. The second robin was giggly. He would hop around town, offering his help to everyone who needed it. Sure he was rough with abusers but hell no one cared about them. Matter of fact, the villains were glad because those assholes deserved no sympathy. They remember his puns, his wonder, his innocence and his spark. They remembered his laughter, his concern - the kind that only comes from one who’s been on the streets. This one was better, and the villains thanked their lucky stars. They remembered him alright.

But now, as the years passed and new characters emerged, the crime city saw the rise of two characters - a sunshine happy nightwing and a ready to kill red hood. And naturally, from their experiences in the past, the villains ended up making an honest mistake that ruined the two vigilantes’ reputation:

The villains assumed the first robin was Red Hood and the other was Nightwing. And BY GOD Gotham has not seen unhinged chaos like this.

SCENE 1

Red Hood *drawing his pistol* : Please, reach for your weapon. I’m itching for an excuse for my intrusive thoughts to become extrusive.

Two-Face: You dare mock me little bird?! Well.. I may not have my weapon.. but I have something I know you’d like..

Red Hood: Oh yeah?What’s that?

Two-Face: TAKE THIS! *slams button and coconuts start falling from the sky, all cracking and spilling as they hit the ground*

Red Hood:

Two-Face:

Red Hood: .. the fuck was that supposed to do?

Two-Face: .. HOW ARE YOU STILL STANDING?! YOU HATE COCONUTS ROBIN!!

Red Hood: The fuck- .. wait did you call me robin?

Two-Face *grins* : Yea.. robin. The first one. Thought I didn’t notice?

Red Hood: The first one? Does this *gestures vaguely to himself and his weapons* seem like something the first robin would do?

Two-Face:

Goon 1: I mean.. yeah

Red Hood: What! The first robin was nice!

Goon 2 *guffawing*: I beg your fucking pardon??

Two-Face: .. you took my coin and attached a magnet beneath it so everytime I flipped it it wouldn’t stop spinning. Do you know how long that took me to figure out?? Do you know how insane it drove me?? Joker had to help me out of pity. OUT. OF. PITY.

Red Hood:

Goon 1: ..Also you did steal some of our bones

Red Hood: hedidfuckingwhatnow-

SCENE 2

Nightwing: Hey there buddy! You look frostyl!

Dr. Freeze: Aha! You are too late to stop me robin!

Nightwing: .. robin?

Dr. Freeze: why yes! Don’t act coy, I know it’s you there. Now that we’ve got that clear.. I was wondering if you remembered all those years ago when you gave me a source for electricity to power a hospital keeping my Nora?

Nightwing:

Dr. Freeze: well you weren’t careful enough and never told me how much I could take from it.. so I used it to power so many of my inventions that came after

Nightwing *remembering when Jason was robin and every damn time he came to visit Wayne Manor his room would always run out power and the countless cold showers in freezing winters he had to take because of it*: .. oh? Well, sorry to break your bubble, but that wasn’t me Elsa.

Dr. Freeze: no? You joke around, make puns and I’m supposed to believe it’s NOT you?. The first one brooded like there was no tomorrow. He pissed me off so bad once I overheard him saying his favourite ice cream flavour and I made sure it wouldn’t be available in Gotham for YEARS. You’re not as bad as the first one. I’d remember if you were him.

Nightwing:

Nightwing *firing up his escrima sticks to maximum voltage*: Oh let me jog your memory then :)

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rad-batson · 1 year

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Quick headcanon that at some point, the Justice League makes a time-off calendar for every time a leaguer is busy and needs someone to keep their city safe while they’re gone. Maybe they have a work trip or a family thing or even some vacation they planned.

All a hero has to do is request time off, and another member will sub in while they’re gone. The only problem is that it creates a pattern. It would be suspicious if Green Arrow is only replaced when Oliver Queen is on a business trip, right? So to keep the public on their toes, JL members are encouraged to take a random day off each month or so and switch out with no rhyme or reason. Just any random day, any random hour.

The outcome is complete chaos.

Clark Kent has the pleasure of interviewing Wonder Woman at the scene of a car chase she just stopped in Metropolis.

Some muggers in Star City are scooped up into a giant glowing cage while Green Lantern riddles off bird puns to an exasperated Black Canary.

A team of robbers hit a bank in Central City but get roasted by Plastic Man for their poor their safe-cracking skills as they’re taken into custody.

Black Manta uses his high tech weaponry to wreak havoc in the Atlantic only to be hit with a torpedo as the Bat-Sub dives towards him at full speed.

Cyborg is lecturing a group of teen vandals in Fawcett City when Captain Marvel just waltzes up, says, “I’m tapping back in,” and continues the lecture where he left off.

Complete. And. Utter. Chaos. No one knows who will show up at the scene now, not even the cops, but criminals are scared shitless.

The JL decides to keep the calendar. If only for entertainment.

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hedgehog-moss · 7 months

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I randomly found a 500 page French book on OpenLibrary about the etymology of animal names so here are 10 (ish) fun facts:

the French word for poodle, “caniche” looks like it definitely comes from Latin “canis” (dog) but no! It comes from cane / canard (duck) because it was a waterfowl-hunting dog—and its name in English, Swedish, German, Dutch (poodle, pudel, puedel) also reflects this dog’s affinity with water (from pudeln = to splash about). It’s like otters, whose name come from the same root as water...

the canary on the other hand is named after canis / dog, since it comes from the Canary Islands which, according to Pliny the Elder, were named after the huge dogs that lived there at some point. Some historians think these mysterious big dogs were actually seals or big lizards. Then a bird ended up with the name ‘from the dog place’ though it’s unclear if dogs were ever truly involved. (Meanwhile Spain / Hispania comes from the Phoenician i-shepan-im, the place with rabbits.) I like the idea of ancient humans seeing seals or lizards and going “weird dogs”. Like how ancient Greeks saw hyenas and named them “pigs, I guess?”

the fox has a great diversity of names in Europe: fox / Fuchs, zorro, räv, volpe, raposa, lisu, róka, renard... In French it used to be called ‘goupil’, from the same Latin root as the Italian ‘volpe’, but then the mediaeval cycle of poems known as Le Roman de Renart, about an unprincipled fox named Renart, became so popular that renard became the word for fox and goupil disappeared. It’s like if 500 years from now bears in English were called baloos. (The English and German words for fox come from the indo-european root puk- which means tail, like Hungarian ‘farkas’ (wolf) which means tail-having, or squirrel, from the Greek words for shade + tail, there are actually lots of animals that are just “that one with a tail”...)

French has a word for baby rabbit (lapereau) derived from Latin leporellus (little hare) and we used to have a word for adult rabbit (conin) from Latin cuniculus (rabbit)—related to the German Kaninchen, Italian coniglio, Spanish conejo, etc. But ‘conin’ in Old French also meant pussy (there were mediaeval puns about this in the Roman de Renart) and at some point I guess people were like okay, it was funny at first but we’ve run this joke into the ground, and a new and politically correct word appeared for adult rabbit (lapin) based on the pre-existing word for baby rabbit (lapereau).

The english bear is thought to come from the proto-IE root bher-, for brown—I love how Finnish has so many nicknames and euphemisms for “bear” ranging from “honey palm” to “apple of the forest” and English is like... dude’s brown. Same amount of effort with the Swedish and Danish words for fox, räv / ræv, from a root that means reddish-brown. (And the Hungarian word for lion, oroszlán, along with the Turkish ‘aslan’, comes from proto-Turkic arislan / arsilan which comes from arsil which means brown...) And since brown was already taken, ‘beaver’ (+ German, Dutch, Swedish...: Biber, bever, bäver) has been speculated to come from bhe-bhrus-, a doubling of the original root so... brownbrown.

English foal / German Fohlen / French poulain / Italian puledro all come from the proto-IE root pu- which means small (e.g. Latin puer and Greek pais = child)—then the French ‘poulain’ became ‘poulenet’ with the diminutive -et (so, a smallsmall animal) and poulenet became powny in Scots then pony in English, which was then re-imported by French as ‘poney’. Also the Spanish word for donkey, burro, comes from Latin burricus = small horse, and in French Eeyore is named Bourriquet with the -et diminutive ending, so we just keep taking small horses and turning them into smallsmall horses...

The boa (bo(v)a) shares the same etymology as bovine / bœuf / beef, due to a widespread belief that some snakes suckled milk from cows. Pliny the Elder stated this as fact and (not to bully him but) modern research tells us “there is no empirical basis for saying snakes like mammal milk; experiments, indeed, have shown that captive snakes systematically refuse to drink milk”

I was disappointed to learn that antelope comes from Greek anthólops which referred to a mythical creature, because I grew up convinced the origin of the word (antilope in French) was anti-lupus, as in, the gazelle is the generic prey so as a concept it’s the opposite of the wolf, the generic predator. Wolf and anti-wolf. Though it raised the question of why we don’t have antilions (zebra), anticats (mice) and antibears (salmons)

Many European languages have named kites after some sort of flying animal: in English it comes from the word for owl, in Portuguese from the word for parrot, in Italian from eagle, and in French it’s cerf-volant aka flying-deer. There’s an interesting hypothesis for this! Kites came to Europe from China, where they were often shaped like dragons or snakes, and snake is serpent in French and serpe in Old French, so it’s possible that kites were serpe-volants aka flying-snakes. But the ‘p’ and ‘v’ next to one another were a hassle to pronounce so the p got dropped and it became ser-volant, then ‘ser’ which isn’t a word started being mistaken for ‘cerf’ which is pronounced ‘ser’ but means deer... (We did it again with chauve-souris (bald-mouse = bat), which comes from the Gaulish cawa-sorix aka owl-mouse—which makes more sense as a name for bats! similar to the German Fledermaus, flying-mouse, and Spanish murciélago, blind-mouse. But Gaulish ‘cawa’ was mixed up with Latin ‘calva’ = chauve = bald, so now a French bat is a bald-mouse)

I love etymology, it’s all flying deer and dogs named splash and snakes named cow and ponies named smallsmall and five animals named brown and three named tail—words acquire a veneer of linguistic respectability over the centuries and we forget that fundamentally everyone just says whatever

#language tag

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bunjywunjy · 1 year

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Are bears just.... undomesticatable

My friend and I were talking about it today, how humans will pet anything and domesticate anything even remotely friend shaped...so what happened with bears?

I mean we tamed wolves and big cats (domesticated themselves but ya know) oxen, deer and birds, wild boar....why never did we make tiny lovable bears?

well, the shortest answer to that is that domestication isn't really something we did TO animals, it's a process that happens over time that requires work from both ends! it's a two-way-street, so to speak.

see, for domestication to really work, the domesticated species has to actually need something from humans that they then get when they enter a partnership with us.

for dogs? companionship, food, shelter, safety of the group, and assistance with child rearing and territory defense.

for cats? access to a steady food supply, shelter and safe places to rear their young, companionship.

for horses? protection, safety and shelter, healing of injuries and illnesses, and a constant sense of reassurance.

for livestock animals like cows, pigs, and goats? guaranteed safety, healing of injuries and illnesses, assurance of producing young in a safe place, and an eventual swift mostly-painless death free of the agonies of the wilder food chain.

but bears?

bears don't want anything from us. bears don't NEED anything from us. they'll eat our trash, but they're just as happy pulling salmon out of a river somewhere.

they don't have any use for human protection or shelter. they'll eat you if they think it's a valid option on the table. (pun intended)

so no, no matter how much you might like a domesticated grizzly to cuddle up to on cold nights, they're just not interested and so it will never happen.

and that's okay! there are some animals that we just don't have anything to offer to, and it's good to acknowledge that.

bears belong in the wild.

#cursed biology

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croakings · 2 years

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extremely tempted to name my newest thing just like. something so deeply uninformative at first glance but that is also actually a ginormous spoiler/so very on the nose re: plot, except i'm not sure anyone but me 1) would ever know how much of a Dude. moment it is (because that realization relies on some A Language/Culture I Made Up knowledge and idk how much of that i can actually include) or 2) would truly appreciate how funny i am when/if my little joke IS revealed/comes up, which is imperative. it's not funny if it's not funny. and on their own it's like. yeah that sure is a title i guess technically. WHICH. even at best it will be late in the game where i can drop the hee hee hoo hoo. people will see my joke and there is No Way they can get it. what if they pass by the story of my dudes because the title sucks

#wip blogging #two main contenders for Um Hey Like. Why titles are:#1. A Hero #and 2. Being a Story #BECAUSE. theyre both like.#ok so the two main characters are lan and ehir but you dont know ehir's name until Way Later for like half the book he's going by sacha for.#reasons. stuff. Plot. but the story is actually abt figuring out whatever the hell is going on w him #hence option number 1! you would think it's referrong to lan (the ostensible hero) but actually it's just a Very shitty pun #option number two is the same level/grade of Very Shitty pun but it has LAYERS.#also the subject is the same it's still based around ehir's name #in my made up language ''eh'' is a prefix meaning ''being'' or ''to be'' and ''hir'' means ''story''#so. badum tss second verse same as the first #so it'd b a story called a story abt the story of Some Guy named a story who also has a lot of rumors(stories) floating around that need to #be corrected AND [spoiler] how the god of stories (not me but also. yes me. hee hee hoo hoo) fucks up his day (everything)(but you dont know #that until Way Later when he [spoiler2] dies(that story ends) and then subsequently Does Not Die (retelling; it isnt the same but the story #(and him A Story) is still there) and also some other stuff.#that one is again an extremely involved on the nose very shitty pun. theres actually more layers even but i'll shut up about it.#way too much meta there.#my third option is ''from the mouths of birds'' which is. MOSTLY not a shitty pun.#or well it isnt a pun at all actually it's more a reference. it's the first part of ehir's culture's version of ''once upon a time''#or like. the equivalent. bc yknow how birds can imitate things and pass them along but they can get warped or altered in the process but #something still started the chain somehow and each new iteration still both leads back to the first one and also is in and of itself moved #forward so it's a bunch of new things it's one long thing it's different every time it's the same thing even if it isn't #all of these are one(1) joke/spoiler just approaching it in different ways and in various degrees of Dude #and. again there is. Even More to the hee hee of it all but i want to sit on those.#ftmob is what i'm leaning towards. ish. for more Joke Reasons and also it's vaguely more like a reasonable title #but. 🤔 Its Not A Shitty Pun.......... it does have to DO w a shitty pun but that's not the same...#anyway

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lsdoiphin · 6 months

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Foods of Vestur

@broncoburro and @chocodile provoked me into doing some illustrated worldbuilding for Forever Gold ( @forevergoldgame ), an endeavor I was happy to undertake. Unbeknownst to me, it would take the better part of a week to draw.

In the process, I conjured about an essay's worth of fantasy food worldbuilding, but I'm going to try and keep things digestible (pardon my pun). Lore under the cut:

The Middle Kingdom

The Middle Kingdom has ample land, and its soil, landscapes, and temperate climate are amenable to growing a variety of crops and raising large quantities of livestock. The Midland palate prefers fresh ingredients with minimal seasoning; if a dish requires a strong taste, a cook is more likely to reach for a sharp cheese than they are to open their spice drawer. Detractors of Middle Kingdom cuisine describe it as bland, but its flavor relies on the quality of its components more than anything.

KEY CROPS: wheat, potatoes, carrots, green beans, apples, pears, and grapes KEY LIVESTOCK: Midland goats, fowl, and hogs

ROAST FOWL: Cheap and easy to raise, fowl is eaten all over Vestur and by all classes. Roasted whole birds are common throughout, but the Middle Kingdom's approach to preparation is notable for their squeamish insistence on removing the head and neck before roasting, even among poorer families. Fowl is usually roasted on a bed of root vegetables and shallots and served alongside gravy and green beans.

GOAT RIBEYE: Vestur does not have cattle – instead it has a widely diversified array of goats, the most prominent being the Middle Kingdom's own Midland goat. The Midland goat is a huge caprid that fills the same niche as cattle, supplying Vestur with meat and dairy products. Chevon from the Midland goat is tender with a texture much like beef, though it retains a gamier, “goat-ier” taste. It is largely eaten by the wealthy, though the tougher and cheaper cuts can be found in the kitchens of the working class. Either way, it is almost always served with gravy. (You may be sensing a pattern already here. Midlanders love their gravy.)

FETTUCCINE WITH CHEESE: Noodles were brought to the Middle Kingdom through trade with the South and gained popularity as a novel alternative to bread. The pasta of Midland Vestur is largely eaten with butter or cream sauce; tomato or pesto sauces are seldom seen.

CHARCUTERIE WITH WINE: Charcuterie is eaten for the joy of flavors rather than to satiate hunger, and therefore it is mainly eaten by the upper class. It is commonly eaten alongside grape wine, a prestigious alcohol uniquely produced by the Middle Kingdom. The flavor of grape wine is said to be more agreeable than the other wines in Vestur, though Southern pineapple wine has its share of defenders.

BREAD WITH JAM AND PRESERVES, TEA SANDWICHES, & ROSETTE CAKE: Breads and pastries are big in the Middle Kingdom. The Middle Kingdom considers itself the world leader in the art of baking. Compared to its neighbors, the baked goods they make are soft, light, and airy and they are proud of it. Cakes in particular are a point of ego and a minor source of mania among nobility; it is a well-established cultural joke that a Middle Kingdom noble cannot suffer his neighbor serving a bigger, taller cake. The cakes at Middle Kingdom parties can reach nauseatingly wasteful and absurdist heights, and there is no sign of this trend relenting any time soon.

CHOWDER, FARMER'S POT PIE, GRIDDLECAKES, EGGS, CURED MEATS: If you have the means to eat at all in the Middle Kingdom, you are probably eating well. Due to the Midland's agricultural strength, even peasant dishes are dense and filling. Eggs and cured meats are abundant, cheaper, and more shelf stable than fresh cuts and provide reprieve from the unending wheat and dairy in the Midland diet.

STEWED APPLES AND PEARS, JAM AND PRESERVES: The Midland grows a number of different fruits, with apples and pears being the most plentiful. In a good year, there will be more fruit than anyone knows what to do with, and so jams and preserves are widely available. Stewed fruit has also gained popularity, especially since trade with the Southern Kingdom ensures a stable supply of sugar and cinnamon.

NORTHERN KINGDOM - SETTLED

The Northern Kingdom is a harsh and unforgiving land. Historically, its peoples lived a nomadic life, but since the unification of the Tri-Kingdom more and more of the Northern population have opted to live a settled life. The “settled North” leads a hard life trying to make agriculture work on the tundra, but it is possible with the help of green meur. The Northern palate leans heavily on preserved and fermented foods as well as the heat from the native tundra peppers. Outsiders often have a hard time stomaching the salt, tang, and spice of Northern cuisine and it is widely considered “scary.”

KEY CROPS: potatoes, beets, carrots, tundra pepper KEY LIVESTOCK: wooly goats, hares*

GOAT POT ROAST: Life up north is hard work and there is much to be done in a day. Thus, slow cooked one-pot meals that simmer throughout the day are quite common.

VENISON WITH PICKLES: Game meat appears in Northern dishes about as much as farmed meat – or sometimes even more, depending on the location. Even “classier” Northern dishes will sometimes choose game meat over domesticated, as is the case with the beloved venison with pickles. Cuts of brined venison are spread over a bed of butter-fried potato slices and potent, spicy pickled peppers and onions. The potatoes are meant to cut some of the saltiness of the dish, but... most foreigners just say it tastes like salt, vinegar, and burning.

MINER STEW: While outsiders often have a hard time distinguishing miner stew from the multitude of beet-tinged stews and pot roasts, the taste difference is unmistakable. Miner's stew is a poverty meal consisting of pickles and salt pork and whatever else is might be edible and available. The end result is a sad bowl of scraps that tastes like salt and reeks of vinegar. The popular myth is that the dish got its name because the Northern poor began putting actual rocks in it to fill out the meal, which... probably never happened, but facts aren't going to stop people from repeating punchy myths.

RYE TOAST WITH ONION JAM: Rye is hardier than wheat, and so rye bread is the most common variety in the North. Compared to Midland bread, Northern bread is dense and gritty. It is less likely to be enjoyed on its own than Midland bread, both because of its composition and because there's less to put on it. Unless you've the money to import fruit spreads from further south, you're stuck with Northern jams such as onion or pepper jam. Both have their appreciators, but bear little resemblance to the fruit and berry preserves available elsewhere in Vestur.

HARE DAIRY: Eating hare meat is prohibited in polite society due to its association with the haretouched and heretical nomadic folk religions, but hare dairy is fair game. Hare cheese ranges from black to plum in color, is strangely odorless, and has a pungent flavor akin to a strong blue cheese. It is the least contentious of hare milk products. Hare milk, on the other hand, is mildly toxic. If one is not acclimated to hare milk, drinking it will likely make them “milk sick” and induce vomiting. It is rarely drunk raw, and is instead fermented into an alcoholic drink similar to kumis.

MAPLE HARES AND NOMAD CANDY: Maple syrup is essentially the only local sweetener available in the North, and so it is the primary flavor of every Northern dessert. Simple maple candies are the most common type of sweet, though candied tundra peppers – known as “nomad candy” – is quite popular as well. (Despite its name, nomad candy is an invention of the settled North and was never made by nomads.)

TUNSUKH: Tunsukh is one of the few traditions from the nomadic era still widely (and openly) practiced among Northern nobility. It is a ceremonial dinner meant as a test of strength and endurance between political leaders: a brutally spiced multi-course meal, with each course being more painful than the last. Whoever finishes the dinner with a stoic, tear-streaked face triumphs; anyone who cries out in pain or reaches for a glass of milk admits defeat. “Dessert” consists of a bowl of plain, boiled potatoes. After the onslaught of tunsukh, it is sweeter than any cake.

NORTHERN KINGDOM – NOMADIC NORTH

Although the Old Ways are in decline, the nomadic clans still live in the far North beyond any land worth settling. They travel on hareback across the frozen wasteland seeking “meur fonts” - paradoxical bursts of meur that erupt from the ice and provide momentary reprieve from the harsh environment. The taste of nomad food is not well documented.

KEY CROPS: N/A KEY LIVESTOCK: hares

PEMMICAN: Nomadic life offers few guarantees. With its caloric density and functionally indefinite “shelf life,” pemmican is about as close as one can get.

SEAL, MOOSE: Meat comprises the vast majority of the nomadic diet and is eaten a variety of ways. Depending on the clan, season, and availability of meur fonts, meat may be cooked, smoked, turned to jerky, or eaten raw. Moose and seal are the most common sources of meat, but each comes with its own challenges. Moose are massive, violent creatures and dangerous to take down even with the aid of hares; seals are slippery to hunt and only live along the coasts.

WANDER FOOD, WANDER STEW: When a green meur font appears, a lush jungle springs forth around it. The heat from red meur fonts may melt ice and create opportunities for fishing where there weren't before. Any food obtained from a font is known as “wander food.” Wander food is both familiar and alien; the nomads have lived by fonts long enough to know what is edible and what is not, but they may not know the common names or preparation methods for the food they find. Fish is simple enough to cook, but produce is less predictable. Meur fonts are temporary, and it's not guaranteed that you'll ever find the same produce twice - there is little room to experiment and learn. As a result, a lot of wander food is simply thrown into a pot and boiled into “wander stew,” an indescribable dish which is different each time.

CENVAVESH: When a haretouched person dies, their hare is gripped with the insatiable compulsion to eat its former companion... therefore, it is only proper to return the favor. Barring injury or illness, a bonded hare will almost always outlive its bonded human, and so the death of one's hare is considered a great tragedy among nomads. The haretouched – and anyone they may invite to join them – sits beside the head of their hare as they consume as much of its rib and organ meat as they can. Meanwhile, the rest of the clan processes the remainder of the hare's carcass so that none of it goes to waste. It is a somber affair that is treated with the same gravity as the passing of a human. Cenvavesh is outlawed as a pagan practice in the settled North.

HARE WINE: While fermented hare's milk is already alcoholic, further fermentation turns it into a vivid hallucinogen. This “hare wine” is used in a number of nomad rituals, most notably during coming of age ceremonies. Allegedly, it bestows its drinker with a hare's intuition and keen sense of direction... of course, truth is difficult to distinguish from fiction when it comes to the Old Ways.

SOUTHERN KINGDOM

The Southern Kingdom is mainly comprised of coast, wetland, and ever-shrinking jungle. While the land is mostly unfit for large-scale agriculture, seafood is plentiful and the hot climate is perfect for exorbitant niche crops. What they can't grow, they obtain easily through trade. Southerners have a reputation for eating anything, as well as stealing dishes from other cultures and “ruining” them with their own interpretations. KEY CROPS: plantains, sweet potato, pineapple, mango, guava, sugarcane KEY LIVESTOCK: fowl, marsh hogs, seals

GLAZED EEL WITH FRIED PLANTAINS: A very common configuration for Southern food is a glazed meat paired with a fried vegetable. It almost doesn't matter which meat and which vegetable it is – they love their fried food and they love their sweet and salty sauces in the South. Eel is a culturally beloved meat, much to the shock and confusion of visiting Midlanders.

NARWHAL STEW: Narwhal stew is the South's “anything goes” stew. It does not actually contain narwhal meat, as they are extinct (though the upper class may include dolphin meat as a protein) – instead, the name comes from its traditional status as a “forever soup,” as narwhals are associated with the passage of time in Southern culture. Even in the present day, Southern monasteries tend massive, ever-boiling pots of perpetual stew in order to feed the monks and sybils who live there. Narwhal stew has a clear kelp-based broth and usually contains shellfish. Beyond that, its ingredients are extremely varied. Noodles are a popular but recent addition.

FORAGE: The dish known as “forage” is likewise not foraged, or at least, it hasn't been forage-based in a good hundred years at least. Forage is a lot like poke; it's a little bit of everything thrown into a bowl. Common ingredients include fish (raw or cooked), seaweed, fried noodles, marinated egg, and small quantities of fruit.

HOT POT: Hot pot is extremely popular, across class barriers, in both the South proper and its enclave territories. This is due to its extreme flexibility - if it can be cooked in a vat of boiling broth, it will be. Crustaceans and shellfish are common choices for hot pot in the proper South, along with squid, octopus, mushrooms, and greens.

FLATBREAD: The Southern Kingdom doesn't do much baking. The vast majority of breads are fried, unleavened flatbreads, which are usually eaten alongside soups or as wraps. Wraps come in both savory and sweet varieties; savory wraps are usually stuffed with shredded pork and greens while sweet wraps – which are much more expensive – are filled with fruit and seal cheese.

GRILLED SKEWERS, ROAST SWEET POTATO: While a novel concept for Midlanders and Northerners, street food has long been a part of Southern Kingdom culture. You would be hard pressed to find a Southern market that didn't have at least three vendors pushing grilled or fried something or other. Skewers are the most common and come in countless configurations, but roast sweet potatoes are a close second.

CUT FRUIT AND SEAL CHEESE: Fresh fruit is popular in the South, both local and imported. While delicious on its own, Southerners famously pair it with seal cheese. Which leads me to an important topic of discussion I don't have room for anywhere else...

THE SOUTH AND CHEESE: Since the South doesn't have much in the way of dairy farming, cheese is somewhat rare in their cuisine – but it is present. And important. Cheese is the domain of the Church. Common goat dairy imported from the Middle Kingdom is turned to cheese by monks in Southern monasteries and sold to the Southern public, yes, but as you have noticed there is another cheese prominent in the Southern Kingdom diet: seal cheese. Seal cheese is unlike anything else that has ever been called cheese; the closest it can be compared to is mascarpone. It is is a soft, creamy cheese with a mild flavor and an indulgent fat content. It is used almost exclusively as a dessert, though it is only ever mildly sweetened if at all. It is extremely costly and held in high regard; the most religious Southerners regard it as holy. Dairy seals are a very rare animal and raised exclusively in a small number of Cetolist-Cerostian monasteries, where they are tended and milked by the monks. Due to their status as a holy animal, eating seal meat is forbidden. Eating their cheese and rendering their tallow into soap is fine though.

(HEARTLAND SOUTH) SOUTH-STYLE GOAT: The Heartland South is a Southern enclave territory in the Middle Kingdom. Visiting Midland dignitaries oft wrongly assume that because the Heartland South is in Middle Kingdom territory, Heartland Southerners eat the same food they do exactly as they do. They are horrified to find that familiar sounding dishes like “goat with potatoes” are completely and utterly unrecognizable, drenched in unfamiliar sauces and spices and served alongside fruit they've never eaten. Meanwhile, Heartland Southerners firmly believe that they have fixed the Middle Kingdom's boring food.

(BOREAL SOUTH) “TUNSUKH”: If Midlanders are afraid of Heartland Southern food, Northerners are absolutely furious about cuisine from the Boreal South - the most legendarily offensive being the Boreal South's idea of “tunsukh.” Southerners are no stranger to spice, so when Southern traders began interacting with the North, they liked tunsukh! It's just... they thought it needed a little Southern help to become a real meal, you know? A side of seal cheese soothed the burn and made the meal enjoyable. And because the meal was enjoyable, the portion sizes increased. And plain boiled potatoes? Well, those are a little too plain – creamy mashed sweet potato feels like more of a dessert, doesn't it? ...For some reason, Northerners didn't agree, but that's okay. The Boreal South knows they're just embarrassed they didn't think of pairing seal cheese with tunsukh sooner.

ARMY RATIONS

The food eaten by the King's Army is about what you would expect for late 1700s military; salt pork or salt chevon, hard tack, and coffee. The biggest divergence they have is also one of Vestur's biggest points of pride: they have the means to supply their troops with frivolous luxuries like small tins of candied fruit from the Midland. A love of candied fruit is essentially a Vesturian military proto-meme; proof that they serve the greatest Tri-Kingdom on the planet. Don't get between a military man and his candied fruit unless you want a fight.

#verse: forever gold #worldbuilding #fantasy worldbuilding #food worldbuilding #fantasy food #food art #animal death//#might have to proofread this later forgive any typos I am tired

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