#i also wanted to draw something slice of life ish

[chipsncookies]

Submas comic about coffee and new habits

#subway masters #chips's work #pokemon #sorry for the lasck of sbms art i was having a depression #but i managed to draw this... im happy #i miss drawing them. i love them so much #ingo has changed but he's still. ingo #i like to think even after beinf separated for a while they can pick up right where they left #i also wanted to draw something slice of life ish #my comics are messy just like myself bfhddhsg #the past - the person u once knew might be more familiar and comforting but z #it's no use to hang onto them compared to bonding and getting to know the person standing right here and now #adding this bc i finally manage to out this feeling into words

[sincerely-sofie]

Have you ever wanted to draw something but you fought due to your skill level at the time you decide not to do it

Ohhh man. I’ve got so many projects that I want to make but haven’t because I view my current skill set as lacking— and they’re almost always drawing related, because I’m very insecure about my drawing skills— even moreso than my writing skills. To go on a tangent and paint a picture of how severe this visual art insecurity is, I will list off how many people I have directly permitted to read my major written pieces once I passed my mid-teens:

My older sister, because she was my co-writer for the project and not letting her read my work wasn’t an option

My mother on one occasion

My aunt, who has experience with writing and publishing, and I have only ever sent two pieces to

Look at that number of people. The number of pieces I shared with them, in total, was four out of the hundreds of projects I’ve made over the years. I was so precious about my writing because I’m insecure about it. I’m even more insecure about my art. I couldn’t list off all the drawing projects I hesitate to make because I think it’s impossible with my current skill level, not even in a thousand years, but I’ll give a few examples that are always in the back of my mind lately.

A semi-animated pilot to a fantasy-comedy cartoon parodying The Office, starring a goblin secretary who’s trying to assassinate her employer and take over as the final boss of an RPG-esque dungeon that operates like an office building, while her employer is a lich who misinterprets all her efforts to kill him as her being flirty, leading him to develop a very severe crush on the goblin. The project is titled “Boss Fight”, and I have all the resources I need to make it, but I drag my feet because of my art insecurity… also I would be doing all the voice acting myself, and I don’t find my voice very appealing even when I change it to fit different characters.

A webcomic about a fantasy world populated by bipedal bug people that features a very brief “save the world” plot, then focuses the rest of the storyline on how the characters recover from the events of their backstories and the trauma the experienced while saving the world. It’s titled “The Creeping Chronicles”, and I love the project but am so insecure about being able to do the story justice with my art skills that I’ve tentatively pivoted to making it a book series instead. It’s got 21k+ words across 10-ish chapters because I’m too insecure about my art to draw it fully.

A slice of life comic titled “Welcome to Wayside” that’s basically Gravity Falls meets Stardew Valley where a young girl saves a cryptid’s life and now he’s stuck helping her until he repays the life debt he owes. The story features a vaguely men in black-style evil secret agency called G.L.O.O.M. (Gents for Ludicrous Oddity Organization and Management) who have various ranks are named after facets of fashion (khakis are their grunt labor and pocket squares are researchers) and they use a threat-ranking system based on dress codes (i.e. “WE HAVE A BLACK TIE DOWN ON SOUTH STREET, REPEAT: BLACK TIE DOWN ON SOUTH STREET”), and I adored G.L.O.O.M. along with the cast of characters featured in the story, but I don’t feel confident in my ability to design interesting-looking original cryptids.

I could leave this post at that, but I’ve got an important thing to say on this subject—

If you want to make something but are hesitating to because your skill levels are lackluster, make it anyways.

Doubt kills more dreams than failure ever can. Let yourself make the thing, and let yourself make the thing badly. Love it and how ugly it is. The perspective is all askew in this part, and that character is horribly off model there, and isn’t it all amazing? You made that! You made a thing! And you wouldn’t have this thing that you made if you waited until the conditions were perfect to make it and refused to create the thing before your skills were sufficient.

There’s this terrible thing about creative projects— one that is very noticeable in drawing projects especially, in my experience. As your artistic skills develop, your artistic vision also develops to become more and more detailed and masterful… and it’s always going to be outside of your grasp. If you wait until you’re ready to make the thing, you will never make the thing, because you’ll never feel ready no matter how much you build your skills. But if you make the thing before you feel totally prepared, you’ll learn and grow artistically as well as personally, and will be able to feel more confident in future thing-making efforts.

#creativity tips with sofie #(kinda) #(not an official installment to the series but it fits into things well enough to include it in the tag) #sofie answers asks #creativity tips #creativity tip #creativity advice #art tips #art tip #art advice #drawing tips #drawing tip #drawing advice

[scholarhect]

one fun story i have that i didn’t tell at the time for privacy reasons is how i lived like half a block from whitechapel gallery & on one sunday (i had one week left at my job & then i was flying out of london wednesday) i was having a weirdish day but i knew i wanted to see whatever was there before i left so i walked in an hour & a half before they closed. i didn’t know what the exhibition was, i just knew the one i’d seen when i went over the summer ended in october & there would be a new one. last time i’d gone the main doors to the start of the exhibition had been wide open but this time they were closed & there was a table in front of it with a woman sitting at it with a laptop. i wasn’t at all in the mood to talk to anybody and i wasn’t sure what the vibe was there so i hovered around the books they sell in the front for a bit & then went straight for the doors, like you do when you walk past somebody who might want to talk to you. i figured i’d stop if anybody told me to stop, but nobody did. so i got inside and there was a big tall wall with lots of medium-sized works that were mostly pencil on paper or had very limited color palettes, like just black & white & red, what i mean is low contrast, so basically it was hard to make out details at a distance, so i take a look & try to parse what i’m looking at & i realize i’m seeing a lot of naked women. lots of sex and orgies and women cutting men’s dicks off. turns out the exhibition theme is straight up just the works of one person, it’s all nicole eisenman who is a badass & funny butch(?) lesbian. it’s organized sort of chronologically but also by theme, the first book is all drawings & paintings with a certain sense of humor and it’s mostly about identity and lesbians and stuff. then past that it’s a lot of big paintings with people in places, then some really touching sort of slice of life/romantic ish paintings, then some cool sculptures (like, big heads, with water running through them & shit), then most recently these huge wall-sized political paintings. about trump & stuff. obviously i can’t sum up the whole thing, whatever. i spent like over an hour in there. then i get to the end of that series of rooms & to the area with some chairs & a little exhibition from students in the area it’s cool whatever then i go to leave the area & when i close the door behind me there’s a sign on it that’s like “DO NOT ENTER this is a paid exhibition & you have to enter through the front.” oops. past that there was a little room with this cool huge moving sculpture and another big painting, as like a free section of the exhibition. then i walked out. nobody stopped me. i didn’t actually realize it was supposed to be paid, like sure i guess based on context clues i should’ve realized, but like seriously it didn’t cost money over the summer so i didn’t know ! but either way the gallery was about to close so i just walked out. then i didn’t want to go home because it was like 6 so i walked down brick lane (i miss brick lane…) & got some food but i wasn’t huge on it… i also listened to chappell roan. that was my evening. i love this story i feel like walking into that room and getting slapped in the face with funny sexy sarcastic LESBIANISM is exactly what i deserved that day. also i think i deserved to see it for free. the universe said i deserved it. i still don’t know how much they were charging for it. in conclusion i didn’t take any pictures but that night i went & found one of the paintings i’d seen online. here’s the picture of it i found exactly where it was hung at the gallery

crazy. but i have to say the picture doesn’t do it justice, this thing was huge, you could walk up close to it and read the names on the file folders. you really just have to see it. it’s kind of weird to know i could go back but this wouldn’t be there, and i just probably will never see it again. which isn’t something i think about when i go to art places & see art. but i liked this one

#i was so crazy privileged to live in such a cool fucking neighborhood #post tag #i love art i love going to an art gallery and looking at everything there BUT i think this stuff was more fun to look at than most #<- unfortunately i can’t say that in a smarter way because i’m not an art person #i just like looking at it :)

[godscountryrp]

STAFF INTRODUCTION!

Alias: Ellie Age: 34 Pronouns: She/Her Timezone: CST

Hello everyone! I've been in the RP scene off and on for the last ~20-ish years (invisionfree and proboards babey), and have done just about every genre you could imagine. So why did I make God's Country? Because while there are a plethora of incredible Southern/Appalachian Gothic boards out there, and many wonderful slice-of-life, small-town, real-life boards, what I found that I wanted was something that was the horror of the everyday: the realization that humans can sometimes be the monsters lurking under beds and in shadows. I'm typically drawn to stories with characters that feel deeply human -- weak in all the ways people can be weak, strong in ways that might surprise them and the viewer (or reader), flawed or broken and terribly, beautifully imperfect... but all the more human, vivid, real for it. I do my best to write these kinds of characters -- ones who make selfish decisions, who try to do the right thing but end up making things worse. For God's Country in particular, I am drawing a fair amount of inspiration from True Detective (season 1, specifically), Prisoners, and the non-science fiction aspects of Stranger Things... as well as crafting something of a love letter to Eastern Kentucky and Appalachia, taking a deeper look into the way things are there and how they came to be, the cycles of trauma and pain... and, I hope, the hope that can still live in spite of all of this.

Also I just wanna make people cry.

#god's country #god's country rp #staff intro

[true-blue-sonic]

@icycream24 Here's the answers to the emoji ask you sent btw ^-^

🎨 How do you feel about fan art of your stories?

I love it! I'm always happy to see that people like my stories and characters so much, they want to make drawings with the scenes <3

🤯 What's a genre you struggle with as a writer (ex. romance, action, etc.)?

I think really hardcore action scenes such as fights are things I'm not good at. I find them difficult to write engagingly; my MO is using very long sentences most of the time, and for a short and snappy action scene that simply does not fit. I think my niche is much more fluffy things and slice-of-life kind of stories, haha. I'd say maybe things like mysteries and spooky stuff also, but I wrote a spooky-ish Splatoon fic that unnerved a friend so much they couldn't finish it, so maybe I'm better at it than I think?

It's not very much a genre, but I also struggle with scenes that have multiple characters present. With four or so character present I already find it difficult to give everyone enough to do and show they're all there. So large group scenes are something I need to practice also!

💲 Would you ever open commissions?

On the one hand I'd find it interesting to try it out, but on the other, I know I struggle with writing things that are already heavily pre-set or pre-determined. That is to say, if someone wants a very specific scene with specific characters and I have no ideas that fit that, I find it very hard to drag anything out of myself. So I'm very much still up in the air about that!

#thanks for the ask sorry it took so long <3 #they also say that you shouldn't make your hobby your source of income or something like that? #so yeah I'm definitely on the fence about commissions

[juyeonszn]

WIPS !

HELLOOOO like my other blog, i decided to include a wip list bc i have a lot of things i’ve been working on!! <3

FORMULA OF LOVE

pairing ୧ eric sohn x f!reader (smau)

genres ୧ fluff, slice of life, some angst, crack

summary ୧ your friends always poked fun of your rivalry with eric sohn despite never really holding a substantial conversation with him. unfortunately for you, the two of you happened to take the same biology class for the summer semester. your other problem? he really needs to pass the class and you’re the only one who can tutor him.

featuring ୧ the rest of tbz, yeonjun from txt, yunjin from le sserafim, ningning from aespa + other idol appearances

LOVE ME LIKE THIS!

pairing ୧ lee sangyeon x f!reader (smau)

genres ୧ fluff, angst?, crack, slice of life

summary ୧ you’ve had the biggest crush on lee sangyeon for as long as you can remember. finally, you’ve gathered the courage to tell him how you feel— only for it to go horribly wrong. but somehow, someway the stars align and your failed confession becomes the best mistake you’ve ever made.

featuring ୧ the rest of tbz, taeil + doyoung + ten from nct, wendy from red velvet, jun and hoshi from seventeen + jeongyeon and momo from twice

WHEN IN ROME

pairing ୧ lee sangyeon x f!reader (fic)

୧ estimated wc: 5-7k ~ currently: 1k

genres ୧ fluff, angst????, crack

summary ୧ being selected as the maid of honor for your best friend’s wedding in italy is exciting, if you ignore the fact that you’re single and lonely. mix in some self pitying and a few too many drinks on the 12 hour flight over there plus knocking out on your handsome seatmate and you’re all good to go! however, the universe does not take kindly to you winning, so you soon learn that said handsome seatmate is actually the best man and now you need to do everything in your power to get away from him.

warnings ୧ um none yet bc i’m only like 1/5 done

CRAZY STUPID LOVE

pairing ୧ kim sunwoo x f!reader (smau)

genres ୧ fluff, crack, slice of life

summary ୧ being the manager of the baby/kids department of a retail store has its ups and downs, one of those ups being the cute young dad who comes in almost every day with his daughter. which is funny considering the fact that you’re the reason why he does it.

featuring ୧ sangyeon, younghoon, hyunjae, juyeon, kevin, haknyeon, and eric from tbz, hyunjin and felix from skz, yeji and lia from itzy, nayeon from twice + mentions of other idols

COLLISION

pairing ୧ lee hyunjae x f!reader (fic)

୧ estimated wc: 10-15k maybe more ~ currently: 700

genres ୧ fluff, angst, smut? maybe?

summary ୧ after nearly dying from a terminal illness, you awake in the hospital following a life saving heart transplant surgery. the first thing you notice is a young man outside of your room crying and very visibly upset about something. wondering who he is and why you feel so connected to him, you ask your nurse. she explains that he’s grieving the death of his girlfriend who passed away in a car accident— and her heart is the one you received.

HOME RUN

pairing ୧ eric sohn x f!reader (fic)

୧ estimated wc: around 10k-ish? ~ currently: 1k

genres ୧ fluff, crack, maybe some angst (i just wanted an excuse to write a silly little fic with my silly guy)

summary ୧ the one time your friend manages to convince you to go to a baseball game happens to also be the first time you meet eric sohn, though under… unfortunate… circumstances.

SLOW DOWN

pairing ୧ kim sunwoo x f!reader (fic)

୧ estimated wc: 10k-15k-ish ~ currently: 700

genres ୧ angst-ish, smut, other things idk how to describe

summary ୧ the semester is drawing to a close and you still have no idea what your final project for your photography course is gonna be. the topic is stepping out of your comfort zone, but that’s the only thing you’ve never done. when your brother invites you to one of his races, you discover that there’s a whole world of exhilaration just beyond your limits. both literally and figuratively.

TASTE OF LOVE

pairing ୧ ju haknyeon x f!reader (smau)

genres ୧ fluff, crack, slice of life

summary ୧ when changmin got him a job at the coffee shop his friends worked at, haknyeon wasn’t sure what to expect, he just knew falling in love with his manager certainly wasn’t on that list. you falling in love with him also wasn’t a possibility either, but here we are.

featuring ୧ the rest of tbz, joy + yeri from red velvet, mark from nct, yunho from ateez + other idol appearances

PLANNING !

ok these are things i have the ideas for, but just haven’t actually started working on. eventually they will be moved up to the wip list, but for now they are just in the planning stage

KIND OF LOVE

pairing ୧ choi chanhee x f!reader (smau)

summary ୧ you and chanhee have been camp counselors at camp cedar creek for years now. you’ve always been competitive, putting your groups up against each other in challenges much like you used to when you were younger. you both confused this competitiveness for hatred, so what are you supposed to do when it’s your last summer as counselors and all these unresolved feelings surface?

PIECES OF LOVE

pairing ୧ lee hyunjae x f!reader

summary ୧ you’ve been best friends with hyunjae all throughout university, sticking through thick and thin together. but now you’re ready to settle down and you want him to set you up with some of his single friends. but for some reason, each date ended worse than the last. the cause of that? hyunjae’s massive crush on you. (part of the taste of love cinematic universe)

READY TO LOVE

pairing ୧ kim younghoon x f!reader

summary ୧ younghoon has been in love with you since what feels like the dawn of time. he’s watched you fall for the wrong guys over and over again, too much of a coward to do anything about it. but uni graduation is approaching and he’s finally ready to let you know. he just hopes you feel the same.

ALL MY LOVE

pairing ୧ jacob bae x f!reader

summary ୧ to put it simply, you like to keep your circle close. as a dog walker, it was kind of hard for anything to capture your attention if it didn’t bark and have fur. however, your new client and his cute dog just might change that.

BABY BLUE LOVE

pairing ୧ kevin moon x f!reader

summary ୧ isn’t it kind of meta for a series about tumblr mutuals falling in love to be posted on tumblr?

© juyeonszn. do not steal, claim, or repost.

#wips #work in progress #tbz #the boyz #juyeonszn

[absolutebl]

This Week in BL

March 2021 Part 4

Being a highly subjective assessment of one tiny corner of the interwebs. 

This is a LONG ONE, it’s been A WEEK everyone. 

Ongoing Series - Thai

Lovely Writer Ep 5 - a little slow this week, but at least Gene finally flirted back, and very cute flirting it was, too. Also we got Aey’s motivation, background, and love interest. Thank goodness for that. 

Brothers Ep 8 - still pants, what can I say? Clearly I am a BL masochist. Very embarrassing for everyone concerned. 

1000 Stars Ep 9 - the conflict over Tian’s father was REALLY well done. The plot of this drama is excellent, the leads are great together, and yes I totally cried. What, you didn’t? 

Ongoing Series - Not Thai

Word of Honor (China) Ep 16-18 - big battle fighty fighty stabby stabby. Ep 17 switches to “this drama isn’t big enough for two chaotic-neutral godlings!” So what do they do? Drink together and bicker... A LOT. Then in Ep 18 we all get the dubious joy of really freaky puppets. (I HATE puppets.) Also how is China letting this be so SO VERY VERY GAY?  Also, I wanna walk through the forest wearing a smanshy purple robe and waving a big fuck-off white fan around simply because I’m a pretentious fuss monger. And frankly, I feel like this is an achievable life goal for me. 

We Best Love 2 (Taiwan) Ep 4 - not gonna lie, this is looking to be one of my top 3 BLs of 2021. It’s SO GOOD. Big bonus to this ep for treating stalker behavior like the mental illness it is and not as some dumb representation of enduring love. 

The Most Peaceful Place is My Place (Vietnam) Ep 1 - finally dropped (find it under NƠI BÌNH YÊN NHẤT LÀ VỀ BÊN EM on O2′s channel). It’s got actors already comfortable with BL and looks pretty good so far. An angry tsundere uke reunited with his ex, a stoic chef, giving us lots of snap, crackle, and pop out the gate. 

Dear Uranus (Taiwan GL) Ep 2 - I want to love it, but it is just moving too fast. There’s not enough character dev and then they’re throwing flashbacks in? It feels like a treatment rather than a show, and a rushed treatment at that. Bummer. 

HIStory 4: Close To You (Taiwan) Ep 2 (AKA Ep 3-4) - let the cheesy popcorn continue! Idiot remains an idiot; ingenue remains an ice queen; nice gay guy remains nice and gay; obsessive stalker brother is getting ever more whackadoddle. Of course these last two have the best chemistry. (It’s caregiver codependency and the salvation trope. We got us a Leo/Fiat situation going on.​) Plus lots of classic BL tropes because OF COURSE there are lots of tropes. 

Occasionally, I am tempted to argue that shows like H4 or Cherry Magic or Ossan’s Love aren’t technically BL because of the office setting and age of the protags - but then they all behave like high school students anyway, so *shrug* 

Stand Alones

Cute little Taiwanese micro BL Friend or Lover dropped, about bisexual realization within a friendship group. Normally these are too short for me, but this one did pretty good with its 15 minutes of charm, plus it’s abad boy + shy softy pairing. 

Breaking News - Thai BL

Fish Upon the Sky released its actual trailer. The upside-down kiss is gone, which makes everyone sad, and it seems far less rivals to lovers than the first iteration, which makes ME sad. But it still looks good and a more classic BL than GMMTV has given us in a while. New trailer focused more on the makeover trope and they’ve upped Mix’s role (the object of everyone’s affection) now that he’s proved himself. (Or they are using him more to carry the trailer since he has a fan base form 1k*). Starts April 9 on GMMTV in 1K*’s time slot, probably with a 10 ep run. 

2gether the movie is apparently coming April 22 to Thai theaters. F4 Thailand must be having issues or GMMTV just wants to milk the BrightWin cash cow. It’s rumored to be a combination of 2gehter + Still 2gether with some extra scenes and ending. Also, one assumes a lot will be cut out, if it’s movie length.

Call It What You Want released its updated trailer. If anything, it looks more scary than before. What are we in for? April 9th. 

Nitiman got a release date, May 7 on One31. 

I Told Sunset About You 2 got an updated release date of May 27 on LineTV. 

Second Chance the series is coming to LineTV on March 29. I don’t know much about this one. Tons of familiar faces (mostly TharnType side dishes) and some nice looking new talent but a dearth of eng subs. I think it may take on Brothers’ time slot. Line did eng subs for Brothers so maybe they will do 2nd Chance too? 

Close Friend the series is coming April 22. This is a combination of 6 couples with 6 story arcs as music videos (maybe)? It’s an epic fan service with familiar faces like OhmFluke (UWMA), MaxNat (LBC also in Y-Destiny), YoonLay (YYY also in Y-Destiny), KimCop (GenY), and JaFirst (TT2).

Y-Destiny starts March 30, and has starting dropping couple’s trailers. I’m still suspicious given the director but it seems like there is plot (or plots) and a theme. Looks to be a series of 7 single ep vignettes (amended, see comments, might be 2 eps each for 14 eps total), different couple each time, some with supernatural elements, all with decent chemistry and acting chops. 

Sun MaxNat’s tutor/student arc

Mon jaded rich kid meets poor innocent  

Tues sports romance enemies to lovers 

Weds the messy realistic actual dating one 

Thurs hot ghost boyfriend (sad) 

Fri YoonLayPerth coping with loss and finding new love (sad). This one will all rest on Lay's acting so we know it’s in safe hands. Our boy is going to KILL it. 

Sat time-slip memory loss reunion romance 

I’m thinking we can’t expect any of these to end happy or be classic BL. They’re gonna be more slice of life-ish. 

Gossip - BL Outside of Thailand 

Scholar Ryu’s Wedding Ceremony AKA Nobleman Ryu’s Wedding (Korean historical BL) got a legit teaser (eng sub here). @curriculumvtae​ reports that it’s releasing April 15th on WeTV (Philippines & Thailand) and Idol Romance (South Korea), while Will of Thai Bl says it’ll be on Viki too. It’s a short run of 8 ep built on a fake relationship trope (arranged marriage variant):

Ryu Ho Seon’s (Kang In Soo from You Wish) arranged marriage turns out to be with his expected bride’s brother, Choi Ki Wan (Lee Se Jin from Mr Heart). Ryu tries to undo the marriage, but his ill mother opposes this saying the scandal would be too much. Meanwhile, Kim Tae Hyeong (Jang Eui Soo from Where Your Eyes Linger), a senior at Ryu’s school, comes to congratulate him and falls in love with Choi. Then one day, the original bride disappears.

Okay it seems a bit twisty turny for ONLY 8 EPS, but oh my goodness how excited are we? Our first intentional historical BL out of Korea!

We already knew Hong Kong was doing a remake of Japan’s Ossan’s Love under the same name (not my favorite Japanese BL but so very popular) but it’s now reported to be coming to Viu in June. Who knows how the CFA will take it. Depends on whether Hong Kong bows before the NO GAY KISSES regs or if they are going to use this as a political nose thumb... things could get cray with this puppy (the original has several kisses and s shower scene). Are we back in Addicted territory only with added comedy and civil unrest?

Speaking of Japan, Absolute BL (AKA Zettai BL ni Naru Sekai vs Zettai BL ni Naritakunai Otoko) dropped sooner than anyone thought, March 27. But being Japanese who knows how/when/if we get subs. Protag finds himself trapped in a world of BL, but being straight he fights against any hot guy that draws near, but the whole world (literally) is conspiring against him. It’s a parody adapted from a yoai.

What with Absolute BL from Japan plus Lovely Writer and Call it What You Want from Thailand, is 2021 the year of BL being ultra self referential? Sure feels like it.

In Case You Missed It

Faded a gay micro film from Taiwan from 2017 deals with parental acceptance and serves up a ton of BL tropes (piggyback, forehead kiss, etc). I’m pretty sure this was a propaganda piece for legalization of gay marriage, and it’s an interesting nugget of BL history as a result. Yes, it ends happy. It’s cute. 

Next Week Looks Like This:

Some shows may be listed a day later than actual air date for accessibility reasons.

Upcoming 2021 BL master post here.

Links to watch are provided when possible, ask in a comment if I missed something.

Man there’s a lot going on right now! Spring has sprung... I suppose. 

P.S. I cannot believe I missed Absolute BL as a blog name. Numbnuts = me. 

#asian bl #asianbl #thai bl #thaibl #brothers the series #lovely writer #1000 stars #a tale of thousand stars #We Best Love: Fighting Mr.2nd #taiwanese bl #taiwan drama #history 4: close to you #dear uranus #taiwanese GL #asian gl #second chance the series #2gether the movie #y-destiny #friend or lover #Fish Upon The Sky #Call It What You Want #close friend the series #i told the sunset about you 2 #faded short #oassan's love #japanese bl #absolute bl #Nobleman Ryu’s Wedding #korean bl #nitiman

[the-huntress]

Little Moth - Chapter 2 - A Friend

[Thank you to everyone that has read my story so far. I really hope that you enjoy it. My apologies for the slow burn, but all good things come to those that wait… <3]

Masterlist

Y/N Protagonist, female. Reader X Karl Heisenberg. [18+]

Summary: Awoken by the clang of metal another strange dream haunts you as you make your journey towards the ominous ‘village’, searching for your life-long friend, Leon.

Trigger Warnings: Supernatural violence.

Song Suggestion: ‘Keep Me Alive’ by All We Are.

[Photos are my own] The next 24 hours were a blur; bagel, taxi, airport, flight, layover in airport, Frankfurter infused pretzel, flight to worryingly small airport, ride in the back of a 1980s Toyota pick-up truck (with cages full of chickens and feathers flying about), which took you to the smallest train station you’d ever seen (one platform), two steam trains later, a weakened moment of purchasing unidentified brand of cigarettes with picture of a goat on the front from a man that smells profusely like garlic, and then a moment of mildly suppressed panic at being in a completely unknown to you part of the world with not a word of Romanian to your repertoire.

Standing at what kind of looked like maybe the side of a road-ish, you pulled out the badly printed map, co-ordinates and a compass. You looked up at the sky, despite it being overcast the clouds were still thin enough to be able to see roughly where the sun was sat. It was 2pm, your phone no longer had a hope in hell of working out here signal wise, but at least for now, it could tell you the time, after that it would just be you and the sun.

You couldn’t deny as the treck took you further away from the already very small towns and villages, and further into the countryside and wilderness, that the landscape was incredibly beautiful. Snow-capped mountains, like you’d never seen anywhere but the movies graced the horizon, leafless tree branches began to out-number their more lustrous looking sisters, and yet, dotted amongst the white, a spattering of green, forests and woodlands a-like, untouched by the torrents of snow, as if by some magic. The fresh air in your lungs made you feel powerful somehow, like you were on a path leading to destiny, something inside you was being fulfilled. Even during the time sat alone on the steam train, staring at the hillsides and woodlands as they flew past, catching your own reflection in the glass here and there, you’d felt as if you were heading towards something exciting yet familiar.

The day seemed to go much faster than you’d imagined, but then it was late into the year, the days much shorter. Grateful for the fact that you’d chosen to wear a zip up hoodie under your usual work jacket, you still had to give the tops of your arms a rub with your gloved hands. You’d also prepared with thin leggings under your black combat trousers and worn hiking socks under your military boots. There was still more than enough light to see, but the Village was still not yet in sight. The hike had been challenging, your knee was now starting to protest, both with an ache and with a sharpness too it. Just a little further, you thought, wincing against it.

You stopped dead in your tracks. There was a noise nearby but not anything that you were used to. What was that? A train? There were no train tracks running through this part of the wilderness as far as you knew, you’d hoped not at least, else you’d be kicking yourself in the ass if you could have saved yourself from the pain that you were in after all this time. A rumbling, chundering, rickety sound, drawing closer and closer. A light in the distance, a lantern, two of them, swinging wildly now on the front of a carriage and a man’s face, crazed with panic, and what a man, at least two times the size in both height and girth of anyone that you’d ever met before.

“Run my darling adventurer, run, for it is not safe for you here!” He yelled towards you. But you couldn’t, you were frozen solid, seeing now what he was trying to escape; and you’d thought this man was larger than life. What approached behind him… was unearthly. The wind was thrown out of you as you were yanked by the collar and swung onto the back of the carriage. The man had tossed you up to at least temporary safety, although how stable this thing was you did not know. You stared back towards the rear of the carriage, eyes narrowing on what you now identified as your target. In short, you could see some kind of humanoid being, roughly 8 foot tall, muscles rippling, pale, sallow skin, with patches of thick hair covering various parts of its body, a loin cloth, beady, mean cold gold eyes, pointed ears and a mouth full of needle sharp teeth. Hurtling along in front of it, in its grasp were two humungous beasts, covered in shaggy hair, almost like two huge dogs or bears, but with some of the most nightmarish faces that you’d ever seen. All you could see was that fact that they wanted nothing more than to tear you limb from limb.

You didn’t mess around for shit and your pistol was in your hand before you could say ‘boulder punching bastard’. You fired one, two, three times, each shot tearing through the shoulders of the front two beasts.

“You really think that thing is going to take them down?” Yelled the driver, craning his head around to take a quick glance at you. You grimaced, thrown down to the roof by a sudden jolt, and quickly tore your glance back at your enemies. They were closing the gap.

“Make a quick turn, here, around that rock!” You yelled, pointing ahead. The man began his manoeuvre as you’d instructed, and without question, for which you were grateful, you only had a couple of seconds to act and one shot at this. You pulled the aerosol from your pocket. This wasn’t just any can, this was something that you’d created yourself. Looked like a normal deodorant or spray can for sure except for two minor differences; it was re-fillable, and it had a range of up to 15 feet. You swiped the lighter back from your cap and took aim, lighter in your left hand in front, aerosol in your right hand, the U-turn took your right back past the trio as they came tearing down the slope. The noise wasn’t quite deafening, but it was loud enough, and you’d succeeded. The two hairy beasts were covered in flames and yelping, running frantically and tore off into the forest. HAHA! You laughed, another bump and you were back on the roof, stealing a glance at the man steering who had a grin on his face too. “Trick shot!” You called back.

The wolven giant roared in fury, for he was scorched, but his rage burned savagely more so than any flame that you could create.

“Very good little moth, but we need something bigger for that one. In the carriage, the room below you there is something that will help, you will know it when you see it, retrieve it now.” You nodded, not noticing for a moment what he’d called you, but you didn’t have time to think and ask. You slid down through the small hatch in the roof, just wide enough for your body, some kind of sky light you guessed and fell to the floor. The dwindling sun light now blazing red over the horizon and through the silhouettes of the trees lit the inner carriage just enough for you to take in what was around you; a lot of meat for one thing. You were never any good at hiding your thoughts on your face, but no one was here to see that right now. There were a couple of larger crates, a globe, typewriter, trinket boxes. Parts rolled and rattled, but you knew what you were here for, right in front of you on the bed. You pulled yourself back up through the hatch.

“This it?” You called to him, holding up a hefty and yet ornate bow. It seemed to be built in the way that somewhat resembled a modern-day compound bow but had a more traditional look to its materials and smaller details. “That’s the one’” he called back. “Here, take these.” He went to pass a bundle of arrows without quiver, but as he did so the beast threw itself at the back of the carriage. You yelled, the impact threw you into the arrows, your blood now over a few of the heads, and all at once you were thrown into darkness, your back slamming against the floor of the inside of the carriage. Shaking your head, you realised what had happened, scrambling on the floor and grabbing as many of the spilled arrows up as you could. Blood began to soak the garments covering your right hip. It was just a flesh wound, but deep enough to sting, reminding you of a time in your childhood when you’d crawled through brambles and the thorns had left 12 longs scars down your torso.

Back on your feet, you booted the doors open, throwing them into the beast’s face, both his clawed hands firmly sunk into the wood either side of the carriage, half running, half being dragged along. He reared his head and roared at you, and you roared back, raising the first arrow and taking aim. “FUCK YOU!” You cried out, the arrow sliced through his cheek but this only made him angrier, throwing one arm into the carriage now, half in, the other arm pulled him further, you realised quickly with terror that you were very quickly being pinned against the bed at the back. It grabbed you around your waist, yanking you down onto the floor, roaring madly once again, into your face, the foulest smelling breath hot and slick with spittle. Something crashed off the shelf above you and onto its head, almost like it shot out of place of its own accord, against the natural trajectory of the way of which the carriage was now turning. It threw the beast back out of the carriage and you only had a moment to grab onto a fixture on the wall which held tools in place before you felt the carriage begin to topple and hurtle.

You lost count of how many rolls it took, but when it stopped it was deathly silent, like a veil had been pulled over this part of the woods. Rain began to fall on the deathly branches above in the would-be canopy. You pulled yourself out, scathed and bleeding, but you weren’t done. Good job you’d thought to throw on your light armour mid hike. You looked around at the driver, he didn’t say anything, but he was breathing. “Are you ok, friend?” You asked, putting a hand on his shoulder. He brought his head up and looked up at you. “Yes.” He replied, placing one of his hands over yours. You nodded and started walking to the hulking heap of hair, blood and muscle only meters away. With each step you took you felt the presence of something growing behind you, like a shadow. The sound of metal scraping. “He’s here.” You heard your companion breathe. You had no idea who or what he meant, but right now you had one thing on your mind and that was your kill.

Still closing the gap without a falter, you took three arrows that you had clipped to your bag only moments ago, set their heads ablaze with the fluid and lighter. You set them against the nock, the flames burning bright now in your eyes, and a shower of metal, knives, bullets, scraps came flying down from around you and into the flesh of the beast. They didn’t just stop upon impact, they kept going, embedding themselves further and further into its flesh. It bellowed and swung its arms in pain, standing tall above you, arching it’s back, but still you stood your ground, unblinking, until it fell back down to the ground, writhing now. You leapt up onto its twisting shoulder, taking aim with the bow and let the trio of burning arrows do their work, shattering through the skull, two ending it all at once, and one at an angle coming back halfway out of its blood shot eye.

You stayed there for what seemed like an eternity. Staring and waiting. No thoughts going through your mind, the darkness in you waning back to the parts of your mind where it usually hid, flowing away like black smoke or the tide going out.

Something was calling. Not out loud, but in your head, your heart, something was calling just for you, but without any sound. You looked up towards the carriage, which strangely was now upright again, though in a bit of a mess, your friend there besides it, a little worse for wear, and a glint of light, the reflection of the flames that had begun to grow around you in the darkness just beyond, the crunch of the undergrowth, and whatever it was, was gone.

#karl heisenberg #karl heisenberg fanfic #karl heisenberg fluff #leon kennedy #mother miranda #resident evil 2 #resident evil 8 #resident evil fanfic #resident evil heisenberg #resident evil village #heisendaddy #daddy heisenberg

[pacific-rimbaud]

Rules: It’s time to love yourselves! Choose your 5 (ish) favourite works you created in the past year (fics, art, edits, etc.) and link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought into the world in 2020. Tag as many writers/artists/etc. as you want (fan or original) so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome works!

Tagging @dreamsofdramione @scullymurphy @feelingofthesea @heyjude19-writing @niffizzle @ms-merlinblack @anneamm @frumpologist @raven-m-3 @ravenslightwrites and anyone else who would like to do this!

(I made a separate post, the other one has grown vry lorge)

Les Pèlerins

Draco x Hermione, Rated M, 10k words complete one-shot

I still cannot believe I was asked to write for D/Hr Advent. Thank you again to anyone who put my name in that hat. 🤯 I had a few ideas for Advent (Mall AU where Draco and Hermione are elves at the North Pole, Bletchley Park codebreakers AU) but really wanted to do an urban walking-and-talking piece just to see if I could write something that was actually readable. I particularly love what you don’t see: a broken Draco sitting in churches contemplating redemption, trying to glue himself back together and discovering his shape has changed, Hermione trying to make life and love work through sheer force of will and then learning to ease her grip, what it looks like for D&H that morning, the rest of the winter, in the spring.

Bright Objects

Pansy x Neville, Rated E, 17.5k words complete multi-chapter

This is less about the piece itself and more about the process of creating it with @grangerdangerfics @scullymurphy and @provocative-envy​ I am SO proud of what the four of us built as a whole, and our time working on it was one of the very best parts of a really terrible year. 25/10, would die for this crew and also for this soft soft Neville and this vulnerable, relatable bébé Pansy having a watershed WTF moment at the threshold of adulthood.

The Secretary

Pansy x Percy, Rated E, 45.9k complete multi-chapter

This was my second completed short multi-chapter after A Dress with Pockets, and it was a total pleasure to write. I have a lot of feels for these two. I loved this office AU so much I wrote in it again. Also I sometimes think about how smutty this is and want to hide my face, WHAT HAVE I DONE?

Notes on the Temptation of Peter and Heloise

Pansy x Percy, Rated T, 3k complete one-shot

This was exceptionally satisfying to write. I don’t know about anyone else but I loved watching this Pansy Parkinson lose her goddamned mind over this Percy Weasley. The absolute ache of these two. This is tied with Field Guide to North American Dragons for my favorite of the pieces I wrote in Death by Quill 2020. I grew tremendously over that competition and am deeply grateful for that experience.

One and Done

Draco x Hermione, Rated E, 35k complete multi-chapter

I know this is just a small slice of zesty Hermaco cheesecake, but it’s also probably the most Me thing I’ve written. My soul looks like this fic. Gawain Robards: a self-insert. This is my very, very favorite Draco (although he is very much adjacent to Draco from Love and Other Historical Accidents). I LOVE HIM. I love how much he loves her. I LOVE PANSY in this, I love that Pansy “Dislocated Cunt” Parkinson is the woman who loses her shit for Percy “Keep Calm and Carry On” Weasley in this AU, and for all its frivolity and spice, the scene where Pansy narrates Draco’s fantasy is structurally one of the more elegant things I’ve ever written.

Also, I’m not burning down the fandom art world, but I am SO proud of the art that sparked One and Done. I drew this from absolute scratch (this is a very art-nerdy thing to be excited about!) including that lace, and FUNNY STORY: to make it look right I had to draw and shade her bare breasts and then add the lace over her skin as a separate layer, which was a much, much spicier place than I was ever planning to go with fan art.

#Year in Review #2020 #my fic #my art #best of 2020

[musubiki]

hey so drawing isn’t my forte right.. but i do like writing and i also want to get better at it. you just so happen to be really good at writing and developing a storyline. i was wondering if you had any tips when you begin to write or where you go for inspiration it would be really cool if you gave some out

hmmm,,..,,this is a little tough because i never really thought of writing critically!! i just think about things and characters and things i want to happen and it kinda just falls together over time,,

- i guess the first point would be: have a goal for the story. whether its saving the world, destroying someone or something, or even if its something simple like slice of life, establishes the kind of story you want!! for me, tcwg has an end goal, but a lot of it is slice of life stuff in the middle, with some “major” events laced in that contribute to the endgame

- give your characters a lot of personality. sometimes its not something that can be done in one day, where you can sit down and say “character A wants to be this, and character B wants to do that!” sometimes its YEARS of waiting and watching the world around you, and watching movies and games and one day youre like “oh....thats what character A wants”

- give them hopes and dreams and fears and flaws!! give them things that will guide their actions!! because those actions is what pushes the story forward (or backward, which is fine too). give them a backstory that makes them hesistate in certain situations!! give them motivation that makes them do something!!

- i gather inspiration from literally everywhere. tumblr posts, nature documentaries, irl people i know, conversations i hear in starbucks, movies, games, everything!! imo the most “original” thing you can use as inspo is people/events/things irl. because its not you looking at an established story and taking from it, its like fate put that inspiration in your life

- if it helps, put events on sticky notes and shove them on your wall for a timeline. have some major events you know you want to happen and rearrange accordingly!! i think i did this for tcwg like......,,once. and i got tired of it. and then i was like “eh i kinda know what happens ish” and went with it

- dont worry too much about it. think about your favorite tv shows and try to picture your own story as an anime or something!! figure out what scenes are meant to hit hardest

- idk for me really the whole process was fairly unconscious...im sure theres some science to it and some official tips for storylines/story making but i wasnt that elaborate in my head about how i did things, it just came out that way

- thinking about it as an rpg game really helps!! you cant make things too easy, create some “laws” that will create difficulty for the characters!! give your weapons cooldown time. force them to go foraging for ingredients if they wanna “level up,” make certain actions have repercussions!! dont be afraid to make thinghs that will make people go “fuck if only the thunderbat could unleash lightning constantly instead of every 3rd hit, that would make life so much easier” YOURE RIGHT, IT WOULD!!! but we need them to make do

- but my main advice would be don’t rush it. the only thing i noticed about creating tcwg is that it took YEARS for the story to eventually come to this point. at first it was just mochi and lime eating oreos in mochis room doing homework, and after playing games, watching movies, reading, learning, listening for 3 years it developed into something bigger!! give it a LOT of time. 

- BUT!!! its also okay for you to establish something if it means you can move forward!! dont waste too much time going “ah, i cant do [this] because [this] hasnt been decided yet-” NO! decide it and move on. you can change it later. if it doesnt fit in with the story later on, change it when it comes to you!! dont get chained down because ONE part of the story isnt “ready.” and hell, if the whole story ends up played out and that ONE part isnt what you hoped, who cares. the other 90% of the story is still fine

- put lots of filler content to make yourself happy. let them get ice cream and do stupid pointless quests. dont be afraid to piss off your characters. not everything works out nicely. make them waste their time. frustrate them. make them make mistakes, have them act like assholes. give the story flavor

#idk man tcwg is just a bunch of cheesy tropes put together with some original stuff mixed in i feel like

[echo-bleu]

carve our names with fire

Clary gave Alec a wedding gift before losing her memories and her runes. Alec does with it what he does best: change the world to right an injustice (and become a BAMF immortal warlock along the way).

Alec & Clary Brotp with a side of Immortal Husbands, Angst and Fluff and Emotional Hurt/Comfort. Betaed by Bsgoddess (SorryTheUsernamesTaken). Takes off after Alec and Magnus announced their wedding, but the show happened over 3-ish years and the wedding is about a week after they come back from Edom, not the next day (because Timeline). The last part was loosely inspired by prompts on the Malec Discord Server, though it grew more world-building than I expected.

Read on AO3.

“You two will make amazing husbands.”

Alec looks up from his paperwork, realizing that he’s been unconsciously twirling his ring while reading. He didn’t hear Clary come into his office, but she’s leaning against the door frame, a small smile on her face.

They haven’t had time to talk properly since the announcement of Alec and Magnus’ wedding, with Jonathan wreaking havoc all over the world. But Jonathan is dead now, thanks to Clary.

“Thank you,” he grins at her sincerely. “I know it’s a little rushed, but with everything that’s happened, we decided we didn’t want to wait for the next catastrophe. At this pace, we’ll never find time to plan a proper wedding.”

“That’s fair,” Clary snorts. “We never seem to get a break.”

They’re still reeling from the deaths of several hundred Shadowhunters, just days ago. Alec has done his best to go to as many Rites of Mourning as he could, especially for people he knew, but even he couldn’t make it to every one of them. After being surrounded by so much grief, he’s more than ready for a slice of happiness. Magnus is in a frenzy preparing everything for the wedding tomorrow, and Alec can’t wait.

“I’m sure it’s going to be beautiful,” Clary continues, walking into the office fully. She closes the door behind her, and Alec frowns. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”

“Of course,” Alec gestures for her to sit on the couch, while he stands up and comes around his desk. He sits down beside her. “What is it?”

Clary looks down at her lap, biting her lip, and Alec feels dread pooling his stomach. She’s so uncharacteristically quiet that it can only mean bad news.

“I haven’t told anyone else yet,” she starts. “I don’t want to ask you to keep it a secret, but I can’t carry it on my own anymore.”

Alec places a hesitant hand on her arm. They rarely touch, but it seems appropriate. “Clary, what’s wrong?”

“I saw my mom the other day,” Clary breathes out.

Alec stares in shock. He lets go of Clary’s arm and glances down at his hand, the same hand that once ripped Jocelyn Fairchild’s heart out of her chest. Even now, almost two years later, he doesn’t feel clean of that. He can still feel the blood, see her face in his nightmares, Clary’s face accusing him. He has plenty of newer traumas to dream about, and it’s started to fade, but it’s not gone.

“What?” he croaks out. Is Clary having the same nightmares? Is she seeing things? It doesn’t match the way she said it, with that intense conviction in her eyes.

Clary’s eyes widen like she just realized how that sounded. “Not like… She was a...ghost, maybe? I don’t know. She felt real. She said she was sent by the Angels to give me a message.”

“A message,” Alec repeats slowly.

“I know how it sounds, but I think that’s the truth,” Clary says. “Because what she told me would happen...it’s started.”

“Clary, I don’t understand.”

She closes her eyes, her face screwed up in anguish. “She said that my rune ability was against the wish of the Angels and that if I kept using it, they’d take it away. They’d take everything away. Everything that makes me a Shadowhunter.”

Alec blinks for a moment, trying to make sense of it. “When was that?” he asks.

“The day after we got back from Edom.”

“You used a rune to kill Jonathan,” Alec breathes.

Clary looks up at his face then and nods minutely. She rolls up her sleeve, showing off unmarred skin where Alec saw a Silent Brother draw the angelic rune just a year ago. “It’s already started,” she murmurs. “They’re fading. One by one.”

“So you’re being...deruned? No,” Alec realizes. It’s different. Deruning is a Nephilim punishment, a human one. It strips them of their runes, but not of their identity, of their blood. “It’s more than that, isn’t it?”

“I think…” Clary hesitates, tears falling down her cheeks. “I think when it’s over, I’m going to be mundane. Fully. Without the Sight, and any memories of the Shadow World.”

“Fuck, Clary,” Alec mutters. “There must be something we can do—”

“I don’t think we can go against the Angels’ wish, Alec.”

Alec closes his eyes, his mind desperately running through possibilities and scenarios. He doesn’t see a solution. She’s right, the Angels’ wish is untouchable, they all know that. There’s no army to fight, no law to circumvent, no obstacle to overcome.

He pinches the bridge of his nose and feels the knot in his throat grow until it’s nearly choking him. He’s not ready to lose another friend, not now. And Jace… Fuck. Jace will be devastated. Izzy, too. None of them can take another disaster.

He takes in Clary’s red and puffy eyes, the way she’s looking at him like a lifeline. She’s become a friend, over the years. They didn’t start that way, but they’ve grown close. She’s the person closest to Alec outside of his family and Magnus. He blinks back tears.

“You’ll still be alive,” he murmurs. “But—”

“I’ll forget you. All of this,” she gestures around them. “Everything. I’m scared, Alec.”

Alec holds out his hand, and she grips it tightly in hers. He covers them with his other hand. “How long?” he asks.

“I don’t know. I only have two runes left, so not long. Tomorrow, maybe the day after.”

Alec closes his eyes. She might not even make it to the wedding. “Fuck,” he repeats.

“I don’t want to forget,” Clary murmurs, sobbing.

“It’s going to be okay,” Alec says softly. Neither of them believes it.

At least she’ll be okay, most likely. If she forgets everything, loses her angel blood, she’ll be just another mundane. She’ll be safe. Alec tries hard to hang onto that and not on the pain to come.

Because if he even lets himself imagine it, he’ll crumble.

“Why tell me first?” he asks.

Clary hesitates, biting her lip. Her sobs have receded, though tears are still running down her cheeks. She sniffles. “You’re in charge of the Institute, so you need to know. For, you know, patrols and stuff. I didn’t want you to be caught by surprise.”

Alec swallows, touched by her foresight. It’s hard to remember sometimes that she’s the same girl who once trampled on every rule without care. She still doesn’t follow orders blindly, but she’s come to care about the Institute and its Shadowhunters like they’re her family.

And in a few days, none of that growth will matter anymore. She’ll be gone. Alec wants to retch at the injustice of it all. She’s come so far, and this punishment is truly unfair.

But then, why should the Angels be fairer than the Nephilim? Alec once sat in this same office waiting for his sister to be convicted of treason and deruned. He watched his mother be stripped of her runes and her identity. Clary herself was sentenced to death for bringing Jace back to life.

They both know all too well that life isn’t fair.

“There’s another reason,” Clary says after a moment of silence. “I wanted to give you something. It’s a wedding gift, but I’m not sure I’ll be able to hold on until then, so I wanted to give it to you now.”

She pulls back her hands and takes a folded piece of paper out of her pocket. Alec carefully unfolds it, expecting some kind of drawing, but what jumps out at him is a rune, carefully inked onto the thick paper. One he doesn’t recognize.

“I can still create runes, even if I don’t dare activate them,” Clary explains. “It will work, I know it.”

“What is it?” Alec asks. It has similar elements to the Alliance rune, Clary’s most beautiful invention to date, but it’s also different, rounder, and more complex.

“I didn’t give it a name,” Clary says. “You can name it if you want. Or keep it to yourself and never use it. It’s your choice.”

“You’re rambling,” Alec says, almost amused despite the gravity of the moment.

“Sorry. It works kind of like the Alliance rune, but it requires a strong emotional bond. There are elements of the Wedding rune and the Parabatai rune in it.”

Alec tilts his head, and he can recognize it now, the familiar runes almost intertwined with each other.

“Shared between two people,” Clary says slowly, “it should bind souls and bodies together. You’d share blood, powers, emotions. And it’s permanent.”

Alec’s eyes widen as he takes in the implications of that. “Sharing powers…”

“Yes. If you do it with Magnus, you should be able to share his eternal youth.”

“Clary, this is—” Alec breathes, unable to formulate his overwhelming gratitude. “It’s an incredible gift.”

Clary swallows. “I wanted you to have it before—” she gestures vaguely. “I didn’t talk about it earlier because I wasn’t sure I could make a rune that powerful, but I know this one will work.”

Alec closes his eyes briefly to clear them of tears and pulls her into a hug. She melts into his chest, sobbing. “I want you to know that I’m incredibly grateful for everything you did for us,” he says over her shoulder. “We owe you so much.”

“Even if I didn’t obey the rules?” she hiccups. “I caused you a lot of trouble.”

“But you saved us over and over too,” Alec says. “You brought Jace back to life. You’re the reason we got Magnus back. You’ve been through so much in the past few years, but you’re still here coming up with the most incredible gift for my wedding, even when you’re running out of time…”

“I can’t tell Jace and Izzy,” Clary sobs into his shoulder. “Izzy just asked me to be her parabatai. And Jace… I can’t say goodbye. It’s too hard.”

Alec hugs her tighter. “It’s okay. I’ll tell them for you if you want. Anything you need.”

“I love them. I love you. I love you all so much. To think that I won’t remember anything…”

Alec runs a hand through her hair, gently. “We’ll make sure that you’re alright. And… I’ll keep looking. Maybe there’s something we can do to make the Angels let you come back. If not, maybe we can figure out how to bring you back ourselves. I won’t give up.”

“Thank you,” Clary murmurs. “Take care of Jace for me. He’ll need you.”

“I will. I promise.”

They hold each other until Clary’s sobs subside, and she’s able to compose herself. Alec keeps a tight grip on his own emotions, even though they threaten to spill over. He’s long learned to compartmentalize, and he can’t afford to break down in the middle of a workday. But before he goes back home to Magnus that night, he takes out the folded sheet of paper again and studies it until his sight goes blurry and he has tears running down his cheeks. He goes to the roof with his bow, working his anger into the arrows he sends out in the sky, and he runs to Magnus’ loft without a speed run, his lungs burning.

When Magnus asks him what’s wrong, he can only shake his head and hug him tight.

 *

 He’s dancing with Magnus when Clary leaves. He’s tried to keep an eye on her most of the night, once the ceremony was done, but he misses her running out and only realizes she’s gone when Jace starts to look for her.

The party is coming to an end. Alec excuses himself to Magnus for a while and he tracks Clary down, two blocks away, where he finds her looking around her in confusion.

“Who are you?” she asks when he calls her name. “Don’t come any closer!”

Alec sighs, the knot in his throat threatening to explode, and he raises his hands in a gesture of peace. “I don’t mean any harm,” he says. “You just seemed lost.”

“I’m—” She looks around again, frantically. “I don’t know where I am.”

“I’ll call you a cab, okay?” Alec offers. He falters, realizing that Clary doesn’t have a home to go to anymore. Jocelyn’s dead, and Clary will have to suffer the loss of her mother all over again. “Is there anyone you can call? A friend?”

“Yeah,” Clary says. She pats her dress. “I’ve...I think I lost my phone.”

“I’ll lend you mine,” Alec says. “I’m Alec, by the way.”

“Clary.”

Alec forces the pain away and attempts a smile. “Nice to meet you.”

 *

 “I told you you’d make amazing husbands.”

Alec looks up from his paperwork in surprise, and he’s overtaken by a strong sense of deja-vu. It isn’t the same office or even the same city, but the way Clary is leaning against the door frame reminds him exactly of the day before she left. She seems aware of the parallel, grinning at him conspiratorially.

“You did,” he smiles. “Welcome back, Clary.”

She looks different, and yet the same. Her skin is free of runes, and she has a new haircut that makes her look older, but there’s the same light in her eyes. It’s been a year. A year of Jace moping around the Institute, his pain a constant tug on the parabatai bond. A year of missing her, more than Alec never thought he would.

“Thank you.”

Jace called Alec just hours after Clary recognized him at her show, three weeks ago, but Alec hasn’t been able to join them in New York yet. She regained her memories quickly, in only a few days, once it started. Jace and Izzy have been keeping him updated.

“So that’s where it went,” Clary says, staring at the large abstract painting on the wall. “I thought it was you and Magnus, but I wasn’t sure. It’s hard to reconcile those memories together.”

Alec looks up at it, at the signature that looks suspiciously like a rune in the shape of a C and F in the bottom right corner. “It was us,” he confirms. They’ve been to every single one of her school’s shows, buying multiple paintings while having to pretend they didn’t know her. “We have more of them at home. Magnus felt it was a way to keep you with us. He’s missed you a lot.”

“I know,” Clary says. “We had lunch a couple of days ago. He didn’t tell you?”

Alec laughs. “He did. He recounted every minute of it. He was excited.”

Clary tilts her head playfully. “Is he the only one who missed me?”

“I’m pretty sure Jace thought of you once or twice. Izzy, too,” Alec smirks. “Of course we all missed you. Come here,” he stands up and opens his arms.

She bounces up to him and hugs him tight around the middle, the top of her head barely reaching his shoulders. Alec laughs and leans into the embrace. “I’ve missed you,” he murmurs.

“I’d say I’ve missed you too, but—” Clary shrugs, pulling away to look up at him. “I felt like something was missing, the whole time. And ugh, I didn’t remember you were so tall.”

Alec raises an eyebrow. “You didn’t remember me at all,” he deadpans. “More seriously, I meant to come to see you, but things have been hectic over here.”

“I heard you made Inquisitor. That’s amazing, Alec!”

“Yeah, it’s, uh, very recent,” Alec blushes. He still hasn’t learned to take a compliment, but his promotion is something he can take pride in. It’s an incredible testimony of how far the Clave has come in just a couple of years. Not so long ago, a Shadowhunter who chose to marry a Downworlder would have been cast out or at least kept carefully out of any politically significant position. And now he’s here, barely turned twenty-five, in the second highest Clave office. “Magnus is the High Warlock of Alicante now,” he adds. Because of that, the Clave asking his husband to help Downworlders move back into Idris after centuries of fleeing the Shadowhunters’ increasing restrictions, is something Alec will never not be proud of.

“You haven’t changed,” Clary observes, smiling. “I was worried you’d turned into a high and mighty prick, now that you’re such a big name.”

Alec rolls his eyes and snorts. “I’m not Jace,” he reminds her. “Come on, let’s sit down. Do you have some time? I can take my lunch break, there’s a restaurant around the corner.”

“Sure,” Clary nods. “I have an appointment with the Silent Brothers to determine if my body’s ready to take runes again, but I came early to see you.”

“Great. We have a lot of catching up to do.”

 *

 “Did you use it? The rune?” Clary leans in over her dessert in curiosity. They’ve been catching up for the past hour in a booth at the back of the restaurant, and it almost feels like they saw each other yesterday, for how comfortable and easy it is to get back into their banter. Alec has missed this.

He leans back in his seat, his stomach full. “Yeah,” he says, placing a hand over his heart where the rune is located. “We exchanged them two months ago.”

“Does it work?” Clary asks with a spark in her eyes.

Alec turns his hand palm up over the table and focuses. It doesn’t come easily to him, not yet. He’s been training with Magnus, but magic is much harder than it looks, so they’ve been focusing on controlling his random outbursts whenever he’s stressed more than developing his active magic.

Blue strands of light encircle his hand briefly, leaving in their wake a yellow rose. He hands it to Clary, who gives him a wide smile and turns it in her hands to observe it. “Wow!” she exclaims. “Yer a wizard, Alec.”

Alec bites on his finger to contain his laughter. He’s learned far too many mundane cultural references through osmosis with Simon and weekly movie nights at the loft, while Clary was gone.

“We had my blood and magic analyzed by the researchers at the Spiral Labyrinth, and they say I’m immortal too,” he says. “Or more exactly, tied to Magnus’ immortality. But since he’s tied to my life force too, it makes us functionally invincible. Someone would have to kill us both at the same time for it to stick.”

“That’s amazing,” Clary breathes. “More than I even thought of when I made the rune.”

“We have a lot to thank you for,” Alec reaches out to pat her hand. “More than you know.”

“What do you mean?”

“This rune allowed us to make huge strides in magical theory, and specifically angelic magic. It’s part of the reason why I’ve been so busy because I’m also working with our researchers on several projects.” Alec pauses, realizing he’s getting ahead of himself and Clary can’t follow. “Okay, so when you gave me the rune, I told Magnus about it right after our wedding. He was blown away that you would give us such a gift, by the way. I’m sure he’ll want to thank you himself.”

Clary smiles. “He’ll have plenty of time for that, now that I’m back for good,” she says.

Alec nods. “Since you said it was permanent, we took our time to make the decision. Immortality is not something to be taken lightly. For me, it wasn’t even really a question, but Magnus wanted me to be sure that it was what I wanted.”

“That makes sense,” Clary nods.

“We also wanted to make sure that the rune would work the way you said it did, that it wouldn’t have any…unforeseen side effects.”

Clary frowns. “I never had a problem with my runes.”

“Honestly, Clary, you used them mostly in emergencies, with no regard for safety. Maybe it was warranted then, but this time we weren’t willing to gamble both of your lives on it. Especially when it came to using a rune on a warlock.”

“Of course,” Clary says sheepishly. “Ugh, I was rather impulsive, wasn’t I?”

“You could say that,” Alec grumbles, remembering all the times her hasty decisions landed him in hot water with his parents or the Clave. “Anyway, we researched the hell out of it. Every text we could find on rune creations, on the wedding rune and its variations, we even looked into warlock archives that hadn’t been opened for centuries. And that’s how I figured it out.”

“Figured what out?”

“How you created runes. And why the Angels hated it.”

 *

 “This is what we’re working on,” Alec says, letting Clary into the lab. “It’s all confidential, but since you’re the one who started it all, I figured you deserve to know. And I’m the one who decides who is read in on it anyway.”

Clary looks around in wonder. The room has some of the equipment she’d expect in a lab and some she doesn’t recognize, but what attracts her gaze is the large corkboard in the middle, covered with sheets of paper.

On each of them is a rune. A rune she’s never seen before.

“They’re all new runes?” she asks.

“Yes,” Alec answers, leaning his back against the wall. “What clued me in was how you used elements of several existing runes to create a new one. I copied down every rune from the Gray Book and all of your runes and I started looking for patterns. We’ve always known that some basic elemental runes existed, but not that they could be combined. It took me a few months, but I came up with this.” He points at a rune at the top left of the board, which Clary can see is based on the Deflect rune, with two additional strikes going through it.

“Of course you would,” she mutters. “That’s some kind of armor rune, isn’t it?”

Alec smiles. “As it turns out, everyone can create runes, at least in theory. It’s very hard and requires a strong theoretical background unless you’re named Clary Fairchild and you have additional angel blood. Or maybe just an amazing instinct, I don’t know. Yes, this one imitates armored plates around your body. It’s more effective at stopping blows than the regular Deflect rune, but it doesn’t stop people from tracking you.”

“That’s amazing,” Clary says.

“As soon as I saw it work, I told Magnus and we worked on it together. It’s the biggest discovery about angelic magic that we’ve made in centuries.”

“Why did no one find it before?”

Alec pushes away from the wall to face her fully. “Soon after I used this rune for the first time, I started experiencing the same thing you did: push back from the Angels. Even drawing normal runes became harder. We got scared that I might be deruned like you were, so Magnus and I decided to go ahead with your rune, bind ourselves together. If I had magic, the Angels couldn’t take away my Sight or my memories.”

“That sounds like a plan me or Jace would have come up with, not you,” Clary quips.

“Yeah, well, things were evolving quickly. I could barely hold a stele at that point,” Alec says, frowning.

Clary blinks. “Wow, the Angels really were angry.”

“The bond fixed it. I’m out of reach now, they can’t do anything to me. And now that I knew what I was looking for, I found accounts of other people to whom it happened, who lost their Nephilim blood because of this. You have to read between the lines because it became taboo to even talk about it, but it looks like the Angels don’t want us to have this ability. Jonathan Shadowhunter probably had it, he had more pure Angel blood than you and he’s the one who created all the original runes, but since then, no Shadowhunter has been able to create new runes. Until you.”

“But I got punished for it,” Clary says, wringing her hands. Her memories of the last few days before she was stripped of her runes don’t feel fresh like the events happened yesterday, but they also don’t feel like they’re a year old. She can still see her mother’s ghost, or whatever it was, telling her what would happen if she kept using new runes.

It’s been a year, but without her memories, she hasn’t had a chance to process all the trauma, all the emotions.

“Yeah,” Alec sighs. “You certainly didn’t deserve it, but you were.”

Clary shakes her head, trying to get rid of the darker thoughts. “Obviously you didn’t stop there,” she says, gesturing at the board. “So what did you do?”

“Well, since my warlock blood protects me, I started thinking about who else might be protected. I reached out to Helen Blackthorn, you remember her?”

“Oh, she’s half-Seelie, isn’t she?”

“Yes. She and her brother. They were both willing to try working with us, especially since Magnus and I were fairly sure we could stop the process if we were wrong and the Angels were able to harm them. As it turns out, they did fine. So I found more Shadowhunters with Downworlder blood. At this point, we have eight people creating new runes, including me.”

“That’s incredible,” Clary says. She looks closer at the runes on the board. She can instinctively tell their purpose, which is proof that her ability hasn’t gone away. Alec lets her observe them for a while in silence, and she thinks she can discern a pattern in there like the runes have a signature. “That’s yours,” she points at a rune in the middle of the board, once she’s fairly sure she’s understanding her instincts right. “And this one.”

“You’re right,” Alec says, sounding impressed.

“You have a...tell,” Clary smirks, looking at him over her shoulder. “They feel distinctively you. I can probably find Magnus’ too, but I’d need a place to start since I’ve never seen him draw a rune.”

“Here,” Alec points to one on the right side of the board. “Can you tell because of your rune ability, or because you’re an artist?”

“Maybe a bit of both,” Clary shrugs. “I’m not sure. I should have known this was Magnus’,” she laughs when she looks at the rune. The flourish and artistic strokes look exactly like something Magnus would go for.

“We definitely need you in our group,” Alec mutters, jotting down a note on a pad on the desk beside him.

“I don’t know,” Clary says, taking a step back away from the board. “I don’t want to tempt fate. I don’t think I could stand to lose my memories again.”

“No, of course,” Alec says. “But I don’t think it would happen.”

“Why?”

“Magnus’ theory is that if enough Shadowhunters start creating runes, the Angels will just have to accept it since they can’t cast us out. Since our wedding, there are more and more mixed Nephilim and Downworlder couples, so there will probably be a whole generation of people with mixed blood. They’ll be able to create runes.”

“What does that have to do with me?” Clary asks.

“I don’t think it was a coincidence that the Angels chose to give you your memories back now. The breakthroughs that we’ve made aren’t going away. I think it’s their way of telling us that they won’t fight us anymore.”

Clary blinks at him, trying to process that idea. She remembers asking Maryse, at the wedding, if the Angels could forgive. The picture of the Angels that Alec paints is cold and calculating, matching with what Clary saw of Raziel — and to some extent, even Ithuriel. What if she wasn’t forgiven, but instead simply reinstated in her rightful place? What if Alec managed the unthinkable, and made the Angels themselves change their minds?

“Is that possible? I mean — wow.”

“Why not?” Alec shrugs.

Clary has a sudden flashback of the Alec she first met, over four years ago, who was terrified of coming out and upsetting the order of things, who was killing himself trying to meet his parents’ expectations. The man standing in front of her now has grown so much, just like Clary has, that they’re barely recognizable. To hear him talking so casually about changing the world-changing immutable laws such as those of the Angels?

But then, they’ve changed so much already, haven’t they? They participated in the destruction of Edom. They defeated the Mother of Demons. They explored and even created whole new sections of magic. Alec and Magnus’ marriage and their careers changed the laws of the Clave and opened the way for so much more.

They’ve already changed the world. So why not a little more, indeed?

Clary jumps at Alec’s neck, making him grunt in surprise. “This is amazing,” she says. “You’re amazing. And I’m so glad I’m back.”

“Me too,” Alec laughs, resting his chin on the top of her head. “Welcome home, Clary.”

#shadowhunters #alec lightwood #clary fray #malec #clary fairchild #mine #echo's fanfiction #malec discord server #hm discord

[tipsycad147]

Choosing a rune set: A beginner's guide

by Michelle Gruben

Thinking about taking up the runes? Mastery of the runes can take many years, but it is not difficult for a beginner to learn the basics. (Much as young children can quickly learn their ABCs.) The first learning tool you’ll need is a rune set of your own, to begin familiarizing yourself with this ancient system of knowledge.

First, some background: Runes are archaic European letters used in magick and divination. The best-known runic alphabet is the Elder Futhark, which contains 24 symbols.There are other rune systems, such as the Younger Futhark, Northumbrian runes, and Witches' runes. But most of the time, when people talk about reading runes, they are referring to the Elder Futhark, which fell out of use as an alphabet around the 8th century AD.

Each rune has a threefold meaning: A phonetic sound (as a letter of the alphabet), a mundane object or action that it stands for, and a mystical or abstract significance. Rune-casting—or reading the runes—is a way to activate intuition and gather information about the past, present and future. Runic symbols have powerfully condensed meaning. Sometimes, a single letter says something that paragraphs cannot.

Make or buy?

Making your own set of rune stones or tiles is an excellent way to begin to learn the runic symbols. Painting or carving the runes can be a kind of meditation, and help to infuse your new rune set with your energy. Depending on your level of craftiness and the tools/materials available to you, making your first rune set can be a great option that lets you express your creativity.

On the other hand, there are many beautiful rune sets for sale—many made with materials and techniques that would not be practical to replicate at home. Investing in a pre-made rune set that calls to you can be an equally good beginning to your runic studies.

Usually, rune sets for sale at metaphysical stores include the 24 Elder Futhark runes. Most also have one blank (or “wyrd”) rune that acts as a wild card. A drawstring bag or box and a set of basic instructions may also come with your runes. However, don’t feel that you have to use any of these items just because they were sold as a set. Rune-reading practices vary greatly, and eventually you will settle on a method that works for you.

Making your own runes

If you go the route of making your own Elder Futhark runes, you will need 24 roughly equal-sized objects that will become your rune tiles. (25 if you wish to include a blank rune.) Your backyard or local craft store probably has something that can be made into runes. (Be sure to practice good magickal etiquette if you take something from nature.) Wooden nickels, tree branch slices, earthen clay, and even glass aquarium gems all make serviceable homemade runes.

Obviously, some materials are more durable than others. I made my first set of runes with flat rocks gathered from a streambed. I didn’t realize that they were made out of fragile sedimentary rock. They flaked and crumbled to pieces after several weeks of being dry. Uncured wood will split, and painted symbols will chip off when the runes tumble together in a bag. It may take some trial and error to make a rune set that can endure being carried around and used in readings. Wood-burning, clear-coating, kiln-firing and engraving are all crafting techniques that will help your handmade runes stand up to wear and tear.

Materials

Rune sets can be made from a staggering variety of materials: Glass, bone, antler, wood, gemstone, ceramic, metals, and common stones. What you choose mainly depends on your preferences and budget. What feels most magickal to you?

Bone runes are made from cleaned animal bones, which are then painted or engraved with the runic symbols. (I’ll admit that bone items personally skeeve me out, but many Witches who work closely with the animal kingdom love them.)  If you collect bones, or know someone who does, you can create your own set from the bones of a special animal. Commercial bone runes are usually made from water buffalo bone—a byproduct of meat and dairy farming in Asia.

Antler runes are made from cross-sections of deer antlers. Antlers are fast-growing bones, and their magickal properties are similar to bone. Antler runes would be a marvelous choice for a rune-reader who connects with Stag energy. (Both bone and antler runes look like puppy treats to dogs—so keep your prized rune set away from Fido.)

Wood runes can be made from nearly any type of wood. You may wish to choose one of the folkloric magickal woods for your rune set (Oak, Ash, Elder), or some other wood with a personal significance. Wood runes may be painted, engraved, woodburned—or a combination of these methods. A sealant or varnish gives the wood a lovely sheen and helps protect the symbols, but many rune-readers prefer to keep it all natural with a light coating of oil or beeswax.

Stone runes are made with precious gems, semi-precious stones, or even ordinary pebbles. Some Norse Pagans I know insist that wood and bone are the only proper materials for rune tiles. Rune stones, they say, are a modern, New Age invention.

Even so, gemstone rune sets—which combine the metaphysical lore of crystals with the runic alphabet—are probably the most popular type of rune set among Wiccans and Pagans. Gemstone runes are pleasingly heavy when cast, and undeniably beautiful to work with. You can choose your gemstone rune set based on the magickal properties of the stone—Amethyst for intuition, Jasper for courage, Hematite for protection, etc.

Ceramic runes include rune tiles made from air-dried, oven-baked, or kiln-fired clay. (The latter is the most durable.) They are popular with DIY-ers, and those who connect especially with the element of Earth. One of my favorite artisans makes rune sets from fragments of pottery that have washed ashore in her coastal town—they are unique and colorful runes of Earth and sea!

Glass runes and pewter runes are specialty items that are hard to find. Though these materials are made by humans, they are perfectly appropriate for magickal work if they appeal to you.

Are there any materials that should not be made into runes? I’m a magickal pragmatist. I’m into what works, and I don’t have much regard for sacred cows. But. As a magickal pragmatist, it’s perfectly fair to point out that the runes work best when treated with the utmost respect and dignity. Odin, it is told, hung on the World Tree for nine days and nine nights in order to receive the secret of the runes. It just seems wrong to look up the symbols on Pinterest and start carving them onto Styrofoam.

You can argue, I suppose, that since the runes are a sacred alphabet, they sanctify everything they touch. And yet, I have an instinctive revulsion toward runes made from paper, wood composites, and plastics (polymer clay included).

The runic symbols are worthy of great reverence—but there are no absolutes when it comes to selecting rune tiles. I recently broke my own rules and added a set of inexpensive resin runes to my store. I wouldn’t want a lack of money to prevent anyone from studying the runes. Even a basic set of runes can become a powerful tool in the hands of a serious seeker.

Size and Shape

All settled about the material? It’s time to spare a bit of thought on the size of your runes. Runes, especially gemstone runes, may be as small as a half-inch—too small to be practical for most readers. Basically, you want the rune set to be easy to read, and to feel comfortable in your hands. If you’re going to be reading for others, or in low light, go a bit larger. Even big runes are really travel-sized!

Rune tiles vary in size and shape, even within the same set. If you use the “blind draw” method of rune-reading (putting your hand in the bag and feeling around), it becomes more important for the runes to be a fairly uniform size.

One final consideration is the shape of the runes: Flat, round, symmetrical? Round-ish runes are fine for drawing from the bag. But if you want to lay your runes out in lines or grids, tile-shaped is the way to go.

Some rune readers—but not all—read “reversed” runes. Reversals give a different meaning when a rune lands face-down, or upside-down. If your rune tiles are very round and/or symmetrical, it will be more difficult to tell when a rune comes up reversed. Some runes (like Isa and Gebo) look the same whether they're upright or inverted. If getting the reversed meaning is important to you, get an asymmetrical set and memorize the orientation.

Choosing your first rune set can be intimidating, but it doesn't have to be. Pick a set you're drawn to, learn the symbols, and begin using the power of the runes to transform your life and magick!

https://www.groveandgrotto.com/blogs/articles/choosing-a-rune-set

[quanxui]

andro!!! do you have any favorite mangakas?

hi kaia! i have lots!! i really enjoy reading manga and reflecting over my feelings with it hehe also, warning! i've rambled here so it's long hahah!

the first on my list would be ONE, the creator of one punch man and mob psycho 100! some don't like his art but i like it! i'm currently reading the ones he's drawn. it mixes well with his wholesome-ish writing! i'm obsessed with his stories, the way he can turn something so shounen/fantasy/adventure into a slice of life that makes me feel like i've healed or learned a really good lesson (shounen/seinen)

Tatsuki Fujimoto comes in second! he's known more as chainsaw man's mangaka but i've read almost all his oneshots and his other series, fire punch. i don't know how to explain this but his works can be quite vulgar/indecent (so um beware!) but it doesn't give off those ecchi vibes you know? they just feel normal and aside from his fascinating storytelling, i love that about his works! one of my favorite oneshots of his is about two sisters in an art school and the younger one had painted a nude of the older sister, and as a rule of the school, they would display the best painting for a month i think. and i thought id find it repulsive (you see i even try to read things i think i might hate haha) but it was somehow sweet? (shounen/seinen)

i find Jun Mayuzuki's after the rain and kowloon generic romance's very impressive too!! especially the way she wrote after the rain, a story about a 17 year old girl who's in love with the manager from her part time job, a 40 something divorced man. i dont want to spoil anything so all i can say is i really recommend reading it! i've watched the live-action, and am about to watch the anime. jun mayuzuki's art style is something to praise too!! i'm no good with art critiquing but i love her backgrounds so much! also, her kowloon generic romance gave me wong kar wai vibes!!! everytime i read a new chapter, an 80s citypop song would play in my head, too! (shoujo/josei)

next is Robico!!!! her popular work would be my little monster! but i haven't read that ^^ instead i've read an anthology by her and our precious conversations. i love love love her art style and her writing!! but what i love the most are the dialogues! they're not philosphical or anything supreme, but they're just normal conversations. i guess it must be because i miss going out and having actual face to face conversations with people that's why i've fallen for her dialogues. oh and i’m at awe with her oneshot collab with the mangaka for death note!! (shoujo) 

Tsubasa Yamaguchi is blue period's mangaka. i really enjoyed blue period because i was reading it while i was stressing over what i wanted to do after i graduated highschool. i never realized i've run out of time and i had to make a decision already, see? and reading blue period really comforted and calmed me! since tsubasa yamaguchi has also written the manga, i really really feel thankful for her writing! i love her art too! i've said this a lot of times too, probably, but i really love the shadows in her art! (seinen)

Kyoko Okazaki! myanimelist calls her one of the mothers of josei manga! her art style's attractive to me too! but what's more attractive are her characters!! her works contain fashion, homosexuality, drugs, sex (an awful lot, here’s an article i recently read about her). idk, i love the way she can write and draw these kinds of stories during the 80s. she rocks! (shoujo/josei)

there we have it, my top 5! recently though, i've been admiring the art in skip to loafer by Misaki Takamatsu! i like the expressions and the neat lines! i also like Kon Kumakura's female characters and art style, but you'll barely find translated versions of her works. and Akimi Yoshida, creator of banana fish! i've read a few 80s to 90s manga and sometimes their art style is a bit too messy and crowded for me but i love love hers! it's neat! i haven't read banana fish tho, i've read kisshou tennyo!

thanks for sending me an ask that let me ramble this long >.< enjoy!

#i just noticed this but i like female mangakas HAHA #even webtoon creators... #and female animators #liham

[flaggermousseart]

creator tag meme

@knifeears said anyone could snatch it up, so here I am, snatching

rules: it’s time to love yourselves! choose your 5 (ish) favorite works you created in the past year (fics, art, edits, etc.) and link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought into the world in 2020. tag as many writers/artists/etc. as you want (fan or original) so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome works!

#1 The Kiss in the Shrieking Shack

It’s almost a year since I made this, but I’m still very satisfied with it. I managed to make a lot of background with several layers of shadows. This was a very simple idea: just make one change to the canon scene. I added the canon dialogue from the scene in the tumblr post, and I didn’t need to change a single word, and that still makes me grin. My favourite panel is one of the last ones, where they just stare at each other, I’m very satisfied with that picture in particular, especially Sirius’ expression. This comic exploded in popularity more than I could have imagined. I am thrilled so many people enjoy it.

#2 November 1st 1993

Sticking to the Prisoner of Azkaban-timeline, making a scene with just the teachers. I just like what I managed to show with the dialogue and the art here. In canon, Snape seems to think Remus Lupin isn’t trustworthy because of his past history with Sirius Black, as we can see from his talk with Dumbledore at Halloween, and the things he says in the Shrieking Shack. I just took that, and made it a romantic/sexual history. Snape’s not outing him as a werewolf, instead it’s another painful secret he pokes at.

Also satisfied with Minerva and Remus’ short conversation; he didn’t help his ex into Hogwarts, and she believes him, but at the same time … Remus IS hiding one BIG secret (the fact that Sirius became an Animagus to help Remus through hard times) that quite IS possibly at least part of how he got onto the school grounds. Ah. Guilt.

The last picture took me ages. I made the poster, and then copied and tweaked and drew tears and holes in them, piecing it all together in a ton of layers. I kept the file of the posters, and ended up reusing it in a different comic later.

#3 Nightmare

Still in the Prisoner of Azkaban-timeline, when everyone thought Sirius was a murderous traitor. Parts of this comic are a bit uneven. I spot some issues with the size of people’s eyes in certain frames. But it’s mostly about the atmosphere and emotions, and I think that worked well here.

I always like drawing Sirius’ ‘straight outta Azkaban’-look; dressed in rags and long messy hair. Here I had a lot of fun working on making him creepy, both with dialogue and the way he acts. As if he really was a loyal servant of Voldemort, not giving a damn about the deaths he’s responsible for … and any romantic tones are messed up and possessive, as if he had intended to keep Remus like a pet once Voldemort took over.

This is basically all about creepy atmosphere and how Remus never got the therapy he needed after the war.

#4 Picking up the Pieces

This was the year I started writing fanfiction. I love reading it, but never dared to write and put it out there before. I worried I wasn’t good enough, that I didn’t understand characters well enough … but once I dipped back into my obsession with HP (this is one of the fandoms that is always in the back of my mind, even if others things take the front seat), I ended up trying. I feel comfortable with this world; I feel I know it well enough to try and make something within it, even without my art as a crutch.

Picking up the Pieces is an AU where Sirius gets a trial and ends up raising Harry together with Remus. I love this type of AU, because there’s the happiness of a better childhood for Harry, contrasted with the war they came out of, and the people they lost.

The Trial took a lot of work, but I wanted to try and do it justice. I love working in details of the world, and reread and reread the canon we know to try and piece it all together, and drag in just about all I could think of that could be used as proof for and against Sirius.

Both that part, and Wolfsbane are Outsider POV from minor canon characters, and I absolutely love Outsider POV. I liked fleshing out Damocles Belby, and make his research into the Wolfsbane potion more emotional.

We need to talk about the snakes is basically a slice of life episode focusing on Harry’s magical powers starting to appear, and with some special skills his godparents never suspected he had. I enjoyed peppering background about their life together into this, and it is one of those stories where the audience that knows canon understands what’s happening, but the characters don’t; and I enjoy that.

I still have ideas for Picking up the Pieces, so hopefully, there will be some more in this series.

#5 Rumours

Aaand right back to Prisoner of Azkaban-timeline! (yes it is my favourite HP-book, why are you asking?) This little fic has much in common with #1 and #2. It is basically a canon scene that I did a little bit of tweaking to. It deals with the rumours that have started to spread around the school about how professor Lupin used to date Sirius Black years back.

It’s short, but I liked writing Harry in this; his thoughts on those rumours, both at the beginning and end of the fic. It sticks to Harry’s POV like how the book canon is presented, and again there’s how we the readers know things the characters does not.

#bonus 

I just think this unicorn is rad.

I tag @kattlupin, @engie-ivy and anyone else that wants to do it. Show us what you’ve made this year!

#creator tag meme #not art #it's okay to be happy with things we've made #Wolfstar

[thedailyvio]

Every now and then I feel bad for giving 0 context for anything, so gonna quickly summarize my story stuff under the cut

The Traveler’s Found (TTF)

Skye, Gill, Marth, Kydin, Leo, Kira, Krieg, Heiwa, Narcissa, Sebastian, Vadim, Bahemek, Xenon, etc

TTF is hard to summarize because it has 10 story arcs and they all lead into the other, but the plot begins with ‘A wizard terrorist attacks the king of Hou’lu sending two girls on a quest to stop him’ which sounds so simple doesn’t it -sobs-

 Very adventure, political intrigue, slice of life elements

They basically travel all over the world, and I’ll quickly summarize what that’s like by listing each countries major influences

Hou’lu: Italian Renaissance, China

Sunobor: Medieval Germany, Japan, Inuit

Haldon: Folk Mexican, Folk Italian

Lavynna; Byzantine, some inspo from India to structure of things?

Gehinna: Ancient Hebrew

Parappa: Egypt-Germany

North Desert: Russia-Arabic

Harpies (more a tribe): Maasai

TTF of them all gets the most complicated but very incrementally, so it’s the hardest to express much on. But they get a cool hard magic system based on 10 elements so

Also TTF dragons are sentient, intelligent, and morally complex

—

The Miyoré Schism

A prequel to ttf by about 900 years

Faolan, Mien, Enlai, whatever I name the girl, Jiao

The plot here is a bit simpler

What happens when the one who pulls the blade only those Chosen by God can touch is among the race of people thought to be destined to serve?

This focuses largely on the Sha’li of East Hou’lu. As a race they have very distinct white hair, pale skin, and red eyes. At this time in history, monster taming was very common as well, so most the characters have a family or personal monster. Sha’li also have an ability to become “invisible” but in actuality they are lowering their ‘presence’ or ‘noticibility’ to all non-Sha’li

This story draws largely from Tibet for its aesthetics

—

Kingdoms

Ariella, James, Charles, Kiba

I have uprooted a lot about this story and not yet relayed it, but so far

A girl who wanted to become a soldier but was refused strikes out on adventure to do what she can for her country on her own- but to her chagrin gets a tag along

This story likely will have a soft magic system, and is definitely still based on Victorian and Japanese aesthetics. It’s actually a specific era of Japanese history but I can’t remember which. Possibly 16th c?

Despite this, it’s a low tech world.

Most fantasy type creatures/races do show up in Kingdoms, unlike my other stories

Dragons exist in Kingdoms but are universally evil and nobody has ever killed one

—

Magic and Cannons (MnC)

A wip name still

Cusick, Agathe, Romana, Kordell, Levi, Maureen, Ames, Sung-jin

I’m still figuring put the plot to this honestly, but the first bit is definitely

‘A narcissistic man is captured as a PoW and must find a way to escape’

There’s just three countries of any importance to this world, and it’s much less whimsical in nature than the others, being closer to reality in some ways, and having a lot more tech. Though it vibes as subtly cartoony in how characters have slightly exaggerated aspects to their personalities and behaviors.

Delemar is the country Cusick is from and is based on Wild West in many ways, they’re a very independent people which can be good and bad, they also give no hecks about safety and are pretty wild in general

Choson is where Romana is from and they are much more interested in normalcy and order, which can be both good and bad. They prefer reptiles and fish as pets to mammals actually, which feels important to mention. If you know much about history, I suppose it’s clear they draw a lot from Korea for aesthetics.

Choson is also a very mixed population in terms of race, which Delemar is very much not.

Kievan is where Agathe hails from and is based on Russia. In each case I tried sticking to 1850s-1900s ish for my influences of these countries, though socially they are very diff.

Kievan has an affinity for wine and is the only country that appreciates using electricity for power. They have harsh winters, especially compared to the other two countries which tend to be more tropical in climates. Kievan is less developed so far, but they tend towards legalism there, and while that can be bad, they are also the one not involved in a pointless war, so

MnC is what I call glasspunk, Delemar and Choson rely on ‘reactions’ for their energy sources, which I can only explain as ‘you know how if you mix two volatile liquids, they could explode? They harness the energy from such things’

This is possible because their magic system is a type of alchemy which has allowed them a lot of reactions not available to us, and with this they’ve been able to get treated glass which is nearly indestructible, great for containing anything they need.

Magic is still something within the individual, but in MnC the extent of what it does is change the properties of whatever you’re touching with your hands. If you specialize in using this and inventing things based off of things with changed properties, you’re called a mage.

MnC has a lot of strange tech this way, including trains, vehicles, customizeable guns, staves that through weird tech stuff can have sort of elemental effects, etc.

Electricity is not compatible with reactions btw, because it can cause them to explode outside of when they’re meant to, kinda like smoking by a bunch of canisters of gasoline, it might be a lil risky. So societies that use reactions do not use electricity and have things in place to get rid of it, and societies that use electricity don’t use reactions. Combining them can get cool tech, but is inherently risky.

oh whoops I went off there, huh. Oh well it’s not seen as often as the other types of societies/magics I listed so

Dragons in MnC are animals (technically wyverns?) and have been domesticated to be work animals. No fire breath but they do have a strong venom, I think a neurotoxin type?? And the insides of their mouths are orange 👀 oh and the domesticated ones are reflective like mirrors ish

—

Children of the Little Mine (CotLM)

Geno

This is the only one I plan to make a novel, because it’s set in 1950′s-1960′s New York City and I don’t care about those aesthetics at all

I don’t have it planned out very far for plot, but basically a gremlin thief boy of 17 has a strange ability to manipulate how gravity effects him, and seemingly nobody else in the world has this. But one day during a break and entering situation, Geno finds another boy with an ability, and from there they decide to try sticking together a bit to figure out why, and maybe put together a heist against a mafia boss in the mean time (two stealy boys)

This is very close to being historical fiction aside from abilities, which are /extremely/ rare in this world. I’m very inspired by Artemis Fowl and A Separate Peace for tone, and plan to have middleschool boys as my target audience. Though I love fantasy and such, this one’s still a bit close to my heart anyways

Anyways literally nobody asked for this I just do this to myself. I seriously wanna start practicing comic making skills, but I can’t do that too much for a daily thing when I can usually put in an hour at best. I’m trying to find a sweet spot for it all, but it may yet be awhile before I can post literally anything that sheds light on who the heck any of the chars I post are.

I want to though, and I’ve been running this blog for years now, so best to assume it’ll get there someday. I have still written a lot and planned out things, so progress still happens behind the scenes. Aside from the last few months but that’s not uncommon for this time of year. If you actually read this, thanks euchjsd I don’t think many will, but having it here makes me feel a bit better

#Text

[josiebelladonna]

what it’s like to write 1 million words

so as part of a celebration of fever in, fever out hitting the 600k mark yesterday and my 1 mil goal is officially within reach now, i’ve taken the liberty to write about what it’s like seeing as it’s such a daunting number and a grueling task. there are a couple of works on ao3 that are bandfic related that have reached that number, but i’ve only seen a couple, though: one of them is actually a genuine story, a queen story (drawing a blank on the name of it, though). the other one is a compilation of mostly zeppelin one shots. it’s a very humbling experience, too: you learn a lot about yourself as well as the way in which people react to you, especially with a story like fever.

first off, it royally messes with your storytelling ability. if you’ve followed me on ao3 or wattpad or even on here for any length of time, chances are you’ve read some of my writing. and you know that i’m a storyteller. i’ve always seen fanfic as a way of telling a story rather than a straight up genre: you play around with what and who you love and you tell the story that’s within you at the same time. when i hit souls of black/book four (even volume two is also called that), i decided to challenge myself and write longer chapters: at that point, i was averaging out about 4000 words a chapter which is a good amount, especially since most other writers in the metal tags are putting out 1000 to 2000 words a chapter on their works. but i had come to point in my writing, after sitting down most days since september 2017 to write something, where i had gotten so tight: writing that amount in a couple of hours rather than a couple of days, and now i have to do 5 or 6 or 7k otherwise i’m gonna lose it. i’m at a point now that i have to catch myself when i go long anymore on my other works in progress, and my past works almost feel like they’re missing something as a result.

second, it’s isolating, especially if you’re in the bandom/rockfic-related tags. you feel people watching you, even judging you and making fun of you. it’s kind of nerve-racking actually, especially since most people in those tags have a discord and they all seem to be speaking a language that you don’t understand. you can’t see them but you sure can feel it, especially if you’re rather infamous like me. i’ve noticed this feeling in works that are upwards of 100k: people look at you funny and they aren’t sure whether they love you, hate you, feel sorry for you, or copy the ever loving fuck out of you (which is happening... quite a bit in the metallica tag especially: every time i check, people are posting one shots that are kind of slice of life-ish). this feeling got extra pronounced after i hit half a million, too. it also feels like... people are pushing back against me. it’s hard to describe but there are times it almost feels as though everyone wants to see me fail. (you know that “up and down glance” people would give you when in school if you dressed different? it’s kind of like that). it doesn’t help matters that i already think i’m a shit writer, too, because i get hardly any reads and i feel like people are just here to read their precious porn than get lost in something lovely like a genuine story, so i don’t feel at all sexy or like i’m some sort of goddess (just writing a story like that in fandom notorious for that sort of thing just in concept alone is hard enough).

third, it really is like climbing a mountain. you have off days where all you want is to rest and do nothing. i know i do: by the time i got to the meat and potatoes of the fic with souls of black/book four, there have been a few times, especially right now near the end where i thought, “fucking hell, i don’t know if i can do this” (it also didn’t help matters that i have the inktober drawings to tend to and the artist and the writer in me are pretty much fist-fighting each other). but at the same time, it’s one of those things where it’s like... if you call it a draw and turn back now, you’ll regret it forever.

fourth, ratings almost become a moot point, especially if it’s a coming of age type story and you have themes like... exploring sexuality. the same can be said for the tags. you have a bit more leeway if it’s rated “t” or “m” because most people on ao3 are old enough to understand these things but i kind of wonder about those with an explicit rating or a “g” rating because... there has to be something to bring it up or down a bit.

fifth (this is arguably a corollary of the second point), you get the absolute weirdest comments. at least i have anyways. you get people asking you when it’s going to end or when you’re going to have something else on deck. you also actually get people laughing at you. “i can’t believe how long this thing is, holy shit”, said one person.

and lastly, you get into a league all of your own, especially if it’s like fever and it’s a slice of life type story (and the two guys at the center of it all cannot be summed up in a single sentence). you become known as the person who’s onto a million words. even if you hit half a million words, it puts you in a league all of your own. people are afraid of you or they think you’re crazy or better than them and you start to wonder if you’re at all respected - at least this is in my experience. i will say this, though: someone recently called me the “pantera of fanfic writing” because i’m kind of here by myself with this big beastie (much like how pantera were kind of by themselves in the midst of every rock and metal trend of the 90s, and anyone alive at the time will tell you that people didn’t know what to do with them).

here i am, at a bit over 600k (603490 to be exact) and with souls of black about to drift into veritas (or sam, joey, and alex all hanging out together in the 90s and watching the world they had watched rise from the ground up come unraveled). i think with veritas, this next one here, i’ll be updating every other day. make the chapters as long as i can possibly stand it because alex and joey both went through a lot in the 90s as we’ll see.

do i recommend going for the million? if you really genuinely feel it in your bones, like you have something inside of you that you feel requires that amount, yes, definitely. go for it. even with the caveats, it’s more than worth it. you see the scenes in your head come to life. you make inside jokes with yourself (like this is easily one of the most quotable things i’ve written: i quote stuff from it all the time!). even with the caveats, you’ll also get people thanking you. i’ve had a couple of people message me on instagram for it (i’ve actually had joey and alex show their love to me more because of it!).

it is hard work, and it takes a lot out of you, especially if you’re writing long chapters like that, and i know the whole meme going around about how writers should actually write if they want their story to come out in the open, but the door is open. if no one else will, then you should, and i believe in you. i’ll say this, too: once you clear 500k, it gets kind of liberating. like, okay: the gloves are off now. time to go forth.

#1 million words #600 thousand words #fever in fever out #fanfic #fanfic writing #fanfic wip #wip #anthrax #testament #alex skolnick #joey belladonna #essays #ao3fic #ao3 fanfic #read on ao3 #text