#i've never had a set process which is fun and all until i just have no idea how to do things that I was doing fine years ago

[chalkrub]

art trade w/ wizardorbs on toyhouse <:^) love beasties

#my art #anthro #cat #furry #monster #illustration #another year another failure to properly study wings. but we carry on regardless #in a weird phase with my art right now where I make lots of rubbish and have to try really hard to make things work #i've never had a set process which is fun and all until i just have no idea how to do things that I was doing fine years ago #anyone get me. consistency and I are fleeting friends

[kafus]

how i caught entei in leafgreen in the most ridiculous way possible

SO last week i started a pokemon leafgreen file on my childhood cart i've had since my 5th birthday, and one my goals ended up being getting every owned dex entry possible in JUST the one copy of leafgreen without connecting to any other game… and i did. except i forgot one. ENTEI!!

like probably a lot of you reading this i COMPLETELY forgot that one of the johto roaming beasts is in every copy of FRLG. i never even caught any of them as a kid. which roamer you get is based on your starter (squirtle = raikou, bulbasaur = entei, charmander = suicune) and i happened to pick bulbasaur so my roamer was entei. it does actually ROAM in kanto, aka whenever you change locations, the pokemon moves to a new route. obviously this is a pain in the ass, but it gets even more painful because roamers can flee from the battle and they will the instant you encounter them. you get the chance to throw one ball or use one move and that's it… so like in most pokemon games, you would use a trapping move like mean look to keep the roamer in the battle and turn it into a normal legendary encounter, right? HAHA WRONG

raikou and entei are affected by the ROAMER ROAR BUG in FRLG, which means if they use roar to escape the battle (yes, even in mean look, it doesn't stop roar from working) they just disappear from the game. permanently. forever. you can never capture it. suicune is not affected by this because it doesn't have roar, but my roamer was entei, so uh. the odds were stacked against me. did i want to repetitively encounter the roamer over and over, never trapping it, just throwing one ball each time? or did i want to set up a mean look pokemon only to have to soft reset every time entei used roar? neither option sounded fun and i was going to just give up and master ball it despite REALLY wanting it in a luxury ball like all the other kanto legendaries i had already caught… UNTIL!

i am a moderator of the ribbon master discord (a different pokemon challenge) and i was just sorta liveposting my thought process about this annoying roamer when gen 3 rng manipulation extraordinaire ddeeffgg crashes into the chat and suggests this fucking bonkers idea. and his bonkers idea is galaxy brain LET ME EXPLAIN

ariados is available in leafgreen's post game by catching spinarak in pattern bush, and of course electrode is a fairly common kanto pokemon. ariados gets access to spider web, which is basically just mean look with a different name (and i completely forgot it existed), it traps the opponent in the battle. but IMPORTANTLY, it ALSO gets access to BATON PASS… which, in gen 3, passes the trapping effect! usually if you were to use spider web and swap out ariados, the opponent would no longer be trapped, but baton pass solves that! and then electrode has the ability soundproof which prevents roar from working, and it even gets thunder wave (paralysis) and sonicboom (consistent 20 damage with no chance of accidental crits) to assist in easier capture of entei! nice!! awesome!! but getting this setup in order is the most ridiculous shit i've ever done in leafgreen

PROBLEM #1: ariados gets baton pass through egg move. in gen 3, egg moves are only passed down by the father and not the mother, so i had to grab a male ledyba, grind it to a high enough level to learn baton pass, then grab a female spinarak and breed them together. unfortunately this means my ariados would be level 1 and i'd have to train it up quite a bit, which leads into my next problem…

PROBLEM #2: ariados is SLOWWW. its base speed is a measly 40 compared to entei's whopping 100! ariados needs to outspeed entei to use spider web first turn so entei can't just run away! i would have to get ariados to a very high level to outspeed entei, grinding all the way from level 1. the one plus side is that the roamers in FRLG are bugged to always have a 0 IV in defense, special attack, special defense, and speed, which means unless entei has a +speed nature, its speed would always be a predictable and relatively low 105 at level 50, which is what it's encountered at. so i had to get an ariados with a speed of 106 or higher.

to get around both these problems as efficiently as possible, while breeding spinarak, i bred quite a few to get one with a +speed nature, and ended up with a jolly spinarak. everstone doesn't work in FRLG unfortunately, so the nature was completely random each time. soon my DAUGHTER WAS BORN after like 2-3 hours of breeding because FRLG eggs are SLOOOW and i was being stubborn about the nature, which i was getting unlucky on LOL

then i maxed out her speed EVs real quick by fighting picnicker susie on route 13 over and over, who gives 12 speed EVs per battle, 24 with the macho brace, which i was using. this was just to make sure i would reach 106+ speed as fast as possible. then i grinded her levels by repetitively fighting the two trainers right outside the weird chansey dance guy's house in sevault canyon on seven island, right above tanoby ruins. using the vs seeker on them is the best grinding spot in the game since they give 20k experience per fighting both of them and there's a healing spot Right There. i was using exp share and leading with my level 100 jolteon named Egg who i adore with all my heart. ariados, now named koolaid, ended up crossing the speed threshold at level 62! yes this took a while lmao

as for electrode, i wanted one at as high of a level as possible so i hopefully wouldn't have to grind levels. i lucked out as electrode is found at a whopping level 64 in cerulean cave's bottom floor. a 5% encounter rate but as i had already caught numerous 5%s for the pokedex, i didn't really care. however it DOES have explosion and i'd rather not have the electrode explode on me before i could catch it which would then send me on a wild goose chase for ANOTHER 5% electrode… so i grabbed the random level 24 poliwhirl with the damp ability, which prevents explosion from working, out of my PC, and gave it a smoke ball from the celadon game corner so i could lead with her and easily run from each encounter that Wasn't Electrode.

now you may be wondering how i was going to handle capturing electrode once i was actually in the battle because SURELY it would just use thunderbolt or something and instantly murder my poliwhirl. however funnily enough electrode only has two attacking moves at level 64, swift and explosion. explosion obviously doesn't work, and swift is a physical attack in gen 3 due to all normal type moves being physical, this was before the physical/special split in gen 4. electrode's physical attack stat is a garbage 50 and swift only has a base power of 60 so i honestly wasn't concerned. and best of all, poliwhirl gets the move hypnosis, so i could easily put electrode to sleep and start chucking ultra balls… and the smoke ball ended up being useless because i somehow ran into electrode first try what the fuck LOL

anyways i named them gatorade to match with koolaid. truly the dream entei capturing team. i didn't even feel the need to grind any levels on gatorade, level 64 was more than enough, so i just slapped the two moves i wanted on them - thunder wave through the one-use tutor in silph co, and sonicboom through the move reminder on two island, costing me two tinymushrooms which i thankfully already had and did not have to go out of my way to grind.

however the hours worth of prep ISN'T DONE YET! because uhh…

PROBLEM #3: ariados has to be above entei's level to outspeed it (yes, even if it had a 31 IV in speed AND a speed boosting nature AND maximum speed EVs, it still wouldn't be enough at level 50), which means the repel trick can't be used to encounter it. tracking down the roamer is practically impossible without using repels to cancel out all other wild pokemon, and in gen 3, unlike later gens, you can't put a fainted pokemon in the front of the party for the repel trick instead. and if i DON'T lead with ariados, entei will run away when i try to swap into it. SO i decided i would have to run into entei once first through the repel trick method, which marks it as "seen" in the pokedex, and then i would track its location through the pokedex to encounter it while leading with ariados.

to accomplish this, i simply ran in and out of the building on route 16, going in and out of the grass in the process, which would constantly be randomizing entei's location until it happened to randomize onto route 16. i caught a staryu with illuminate as an ability to raise the chance of entei appearing, which does work while staryu is fainted (wouldn't want to go in and out of the grass while entei was on route 16 without encountering it!) and otherwise led with my level 50 magmar that was on my elite four team named Torch for the repel trick.

i bought a whopping 100 max repels for this task but i ended up getting entei within just a few lol. torch was holding the smoke ball just to be able to run away safely without any shenanigans!

and now entei was in the pokedex and able to be tracked that way!

however, there was still ONE more problem...

PROBLEM #4: luxury balls are a pain in the ASS to get in this game! they can't be bought from any shop. the only way to repeatedly get luxury balls in FRLG is to show a pokemon to selphy, a rich girl who lives in resort gorgeous on five island.

i will mostly skim over this because it's boring, but TLDR i had to continuously talk to her, fly back to the pokemon center, get the pokemon she wanted to see out of the PC because the step limit is 250 before she gets sick of waiting which is like nothing (i already had a living dex of every mon obtainable in leafgreen otherwise so this wasn't hard), surf to her, then spam A through dialogue with her butler in which i had a 70% chance of receiving a luxury ball. i did this over 40 times until i had 30 luxury balls, and sold off all the nuggets and other items she gave me. good lord this took a while

and now with ALL of that setup i was FINALLY ready to capture entei in a luxury ball. this took me literally all day and i was really excited. to consistently encounter entei, i saved in cerulean city and tracked it in the pokedex from there, opening it over and over after changing to any of the four routes connected to the city, and moving to an adjacent route from entei's location when it was close in the hopes of walking onto the same route it moved to when i did. i was following a map made by hangarofroam, he has a video tutorial on how to shiny hunt the FRLG roamers and encounter them as quickly as possible, and i highly recommend looking it up if you want to capture these roamers yourself, but tldr this is the map i was using:

and once i encountered entei i was finally able to use the strategy i had prepped so long to do... and it worked without a hitch!! entei can't try to use roar first turn because it wastes a turn trying to flee, which is prevented by ariados outspeeding and using spider web... then if it tries to use roar the next turn, i've already switched into electrode to block it with soundproof. so from there it's just a matter of whittling down entei's HP to the red with swift/sonicboom and paralyzing it with thunder wave, then tossing luxury balls until success!

and i GOT IT after 3 encounter attempts and 73 luxury balls thrown. and FINALLY i have all 171 national dex entries possible in a single copy of leafgreen with no connection to other games, and all the legendaries are in fancy ass luxury balls. i am winning.

this was ridiculous. please be proud of my accomplishments. i've had this file for less than 2 weeks and i already have over 70 hours of gameplay in it after doing all this AAAAA

also barely related but look at Egg my jolteon he had like no purpose in this story but i took a pic of him in front of entei before going on to capture entei because i love him so much pleas

thanks for coming to my fucking ted talk i am SOOO normal about pokemonsdfjkfds (joke)

#pokemon #pokemon frlg #frlg #pokemon leafgreen #pokemon leaf green #long post #kiki plays games #kiki.txt #kiki was here #lg playthrough #entei

[spicyllewyn]

Kinktober 3. - Breeding / degrading.

Bud Cooper x F!Reader.

Tags & warnings. Breeding + degrading + age gap. (Early 20's + late 30's) (+18)

Important writers note. Since Suburbicon is set in 1959 you can guess it right, this is kinda misogynistic lol, there's a bit of dub-con with the breeding part.

Word count. 2k.

Summary. Bud is dying to make you a mommy.

Kinktober masterlist.

Bud was sweet, well, most of the time. You just weren't used to accepting the idea that sometimes he seemed to be obsessed with you.

Flowers, cards, expensive gifts. Having a boyfriend with a job was more fun than you thought, but at the same time, you had to deal with the burden of an older man with completely different aspirations from yours.

You loved him, and he undoubtedly loved you, but did you love him enough to set aside your life plans?

Attending college was a huge privilege, the idea of getting a job, your own apartment. You never saw yourself as a housewife, although you didn't judge those who made that choice; many of your girl friends were living a dream life that way.

And you weren't a fan of kids.

Oh, and weddings were too expensive to even consider.

Needless to say, it was the opposite of what Bud wanted for you. Well, for him. Or should you say, for the both of you, maybe?

"How was work?" Your arms wrapped around his neck as you kissed his lips. As usual, the only thing between you two was a bouquet of flowers. Beautiful sunflowers that matched the aesthetics of your room perfectly.

"They're considering me for a promotion." The tip of his nose rubbed against yours, making you laugh. "You should think about... you know, what we've talked about."

You pursed your lips, shaking your head afterward.

"No." You had lost count of how many times you had to repeat this. "I've already told you, love. No marriage, no engagement, no living together, and no kids until I finish college." You knew the dialogue by heart, and he probably did too.

He groaned, a little pout appearing on his lips.

"People talk," he whispered before kissing your lips again. Ah, you knew that by heart as well; it wasn't very difficult for him to distract you from the main topic.

Ever heard the popular saying "Small town, big hell"? Turns out, for the whole neighborhood, your relationship was more than scandalous. Bud already had a reputation due to his recent divorce, and you had managed to make it even worse with what everyone considered "progressive" ideas for the 50s.

You weren't married, everyone knew that, and you weren't in the process of getting married because every time you attended a boring neighborhood party, they always checked your hands and your partner's hands as a way to confirm that there was no ring yet. But still, you never hid the liberties of your relationship.

You spent whole nights at his apartment, the old lady from the house around the corner always spied on you when you left in the early hours or even in the mornings, with disheveled clothes, messy hair, and smeared lipstick all over your mouth.

The public displays of affection were on your part, although it was difficult for him to give in a little, he later understood that you did not have to be a prude in front of people, in fact, he started to enjoy the way in which people stopped to look. how you devoured his mouth against his car and how it brought moans from your throat because of the way his big hands squeezed your waist as if you were going to get away from him.

He loved your cherry flavored lip gloss and letting everyone know you were his.

"They've always talked." You lowered the bouquet of flowers, placing them on the dining table as his hands traveled the same path over and over, from your hips to your waist. "You know it's not what I want."

He sighed but gave you the same defeated smile as always.

"I know." He took just two steps closer until your body was against the table. "I've got the migraine of the century."

You chuckled. You already knew what that meant.

"And how could I solve that?"

With little effort, he sat you on the edge of the table, and your hands traveled down his chest, brushing his abdomen until they reached the edge of his pants. You tugged at the fabric until his hips were comfortably positioned between your legs.

“You know well what I want.” It was the last thing he whispered before his mouth was on yours, kissing you wetly and desperately.

It was no different than other times, you would never have guessed that Bud had a mission for that night.

While he was nibbling on your lower lip your hands quickly unbuttoned his shirt, you were never going to get tired of admiring his body, muscles and tanned skin were the perfect combination, although this time he was so focused on your mouth that you couldn't move away to do it this time.

His fingers slowly lifted the hem of your mini skirt, the one that made older women look at you with disdain in the streets, the one that he loved so much. Bud only pulled away from your lips when he wanted to, looking down as his thumb brushed the center of your panties.

"Look at that." He whispered, applying more pressure with his thumb. “You're wet from just a couple of kisses."

You nibbled on your already swollen and red bottom lip, your eyes not leaving him for a single second.

“You are such a whore, you know that, sweetheart?” You whimpered as his thumb began to trace small circles over your still covered clit.

You felt how your little pussy throbbed around nothing. 'Whore' was a word that you knew was constantly floating around town to refer to you, it was fucking hot when your boyfriend used it before fucking your brains out.

You nodded slowly and bit back the urge to smile.

“So desperate.” You felt him teasing your hole with his middle finger, wetting your underwear even more as he pressed the fabric against the exact spot your slick ran from.

You sighed and your hands rested on the table for some support while you held your legs open for him. His gaze was still fixed on his hands against your puffy little pussy lips, marking the line between them with his fingers.

“People talk.” He repeated what he had said minutes before. “They talk about what a whore you are for letting yourself be fucked without being married to me.” You thrust your hips forward in desperation when his hand finally slipped under your underwear. You needed him.

“I know y-you love it.” You whispered with a breathy voice. “Letting everyone know I'm nothing but your slut.”

That was enough for him, you knew how to drive him crazy with a flutter of your eyelashes, even more so with a couple of words. He stopped touching you, and you were about to complain until you saw him unbuttoning his pants to give you what you really wanted.

It was your hand that delicately helped him position his cock between your legs. The head pressing against your hole after only pushing your underwear aside.

"This is what you want?" No matter how much he pressed he just didn't thrust into you, a few nights ago you had realized how much he liked to push you to your limit.

“Bud, p-please.”

"Sorry?" You saw the corner of his mouth twitch with the threat of a smile.

"Please please." You whispered, your pleading eyes boring into him.

"Please what?"

“Please fuck me, please, please.” You pushed your hip further to the edge of the table, not even with the pressure of your body you could make him continue. "I need it."

“Yeah? You do?” He cooed, a mocking pout on his face.

“I beg you.” You whimpered, your high pitched voice getting more demanding.

He clicked his tongue and in one thrust he buried himself in you, fulfilling your pleas in one expert movement.

“It doesn't matter h-how many…” He stammered as his fingers dug into your thighs. “How many damn times do I try to stretch you out.” He started with a slow rhythm, strong and deep, enough to use his own hands as a method to keep your body from sliding back on the table. “You are still so fucking thight, baby.”

Your hands traveled to your breasts, squeezing them over the fabric of your sweater, giving him a bit of a show before taking it off.

Ah yes, the fact that you didn't wear a bra was also something that attracted glances on the streets.

“Look at you, pretty girl.” He leaned enough so that he could bury his face between your breasts, licking his lips before beginning to place wet kisses on your soft skin. “Fuck, I want to marry you.”

His voice almost sounded pleading as your fingers ruffled his hair and pushed him even closer to you. He took one of your nipples in his mouth, sucking on it as his hips slammed into you again and again in a desperate rhythm.

“Please, please.” He whispered against your skin. “Please, marry me.” You were too cock drunk to think or speak clearly, you just nodded even though he couldn't see you.

It didn't take long for Bud to find that spot inside you, you moaned as loudly as you wanted, your back arching as if your body was begging to be as attached as it could be to his.

“Be my wife, baby.” You recognized well the way his voice broke, he was close.

He rested his chin on your chest and looked up. His eyes looked bigger from that position, it was stupidly adorable.

“P-Pull out.” You whispered between whimpers, your forehead resting against his.

Who were you trying to fool? You both loved each other so much it hurt.

He didn't obey you, his movements became more abrupt and you heard the table creak under your body along with the slap of your skin against his.

He was fucking you merciless.

“B-Bud.” You patted his cheek, trying to get his attention. “A-Ah, shit. P-Pull out.”

He dragged his hand up your thigh slowly until he reached between your legs, he pressed his thumb against your swollen clit making you see stars.

“Bud!” You exclaimed loudly, your entire body trembling with pleasure. “Yes, y-yes, God, yes.”

���You are going to be such a pretty mommy.” His nose brushed against yours as he straightened his back, seeking to be at your height.

You wanted to refuse, you really wanted to tell him to stop but your body was at his mercy, begging for more.

Praying he wouldn't get out of you.

“You want me to pull out, sweetheart?” He took your bottom lip between his teeth, nibbling on it and giving it a little tug before releasing it. “Tell me, do you want me to?”

Only moans came out of your mouth, shouting Bud's name and the word 'more' over and over again.

"I thought so." A delicate kiss on your lips. And another, and another, and another, and another. “You want my baby, don't you?”

You weren't thinking, you really weren't when you nodded.

A smile appeared on his face, accompanying his flushed cheeks and bright eyes.

It only took two more thrusts for you both to reach the limit, for the first time you felt the pleasure of being filled to the brim by him as your walls squeezed every last drop out of him. The warm liquid running down your thighs as your insides couldn't take any more.

“You are such an…” One more thrust silenced you, the way he pushed his spend deeper inside you. “Idiot.” You whispered, closing your eyes at the sensitivity of your body.

“You should start thinking about names.” His teasing smile made you want to punch him, but the soft, slow movement of his hips made you want to ask for more. “What do you say, love?” He pretended to pay attention to your babbling. “Yes, I think so too.”

He kissed your lips once, twice, three times.

“I'm not sure one is enough either.”

Tag list. @ninebluehearts @shousha133 @unear7hly @onefinnedwonder-fm @automnepoet @lokisremainingsanity @uncle-eggy @just-a-nightdreamer @spktrgantenk

Remember to comment if you want to be on the kinktober tag list!! <3

ngl, i kinda liked this one lol

#bud cooper #bud cooper x reader #oscar isaac smut #oscar isaac x reader #oscar isaac x you

[e-claire]

Misophonia sucks so fucking hard and no one anywhere ever wants to talk about it. Literally the only people I've ever had listen to me about my Misophonia are other people with Misophonia. So fuck it, Misophonia Awareness Post or something, I want to vent.

Allow me to describe what it is first for all the lucky people who aren't fucked over. Misophonia is likely an Audio-Processing Disorder (Potentially some form of Synesthesia) in which certain sounds trigger a fight or flight reaction. Trigger sounds can vary and sometimes after long term exposure it can create a reaction to the visuals associated with those sounds. It is possibly genetic, there is no known cause, there is no known treatment, there is only suffering and ways of generally kind of reducing that suffering. When I hear people chewing I am filled with a rage that can only be described as "Bordering on a primal desire to Kill." and there's nothing I can do about that. A family member or friend takes a bite of something crunchy and I have to sit there and exist with thoughts of pounding their fucking skull into paste with my bare god damn hands and then afterwards I have to go back to "being normal". I have to just pretend that didn't happen, I can't do anything with those emotions, I can't put them anywhere, I can't talk about them with anyone or gain any understanding or sympathy from others for having them.

When I see someone chewing food anymore it's borderline impossible for me to remain in the room with them for any more than a few seconds because the mere sight of them chewing makes me physically ill and inspires in me a sense of deep disgust and panic that I could never ever hope to describe.

I tell people about what it's like and I get one of four reactions :

"Oh I think I have that too" With a weird amount of curious excitement at the concept of having a fun new quirky thing to mention in conversations. This means that they don't have it, and they'll then proceed to list off a couple different things that literally no human being likes to hear and how much that thing "annoys them". This makes me want to kill myself.

"Wow, Yikes." Through a grimace. This means I was too open about how it makes me feel and they now think i'm a either a freak, liability, time bomb, or over-dramatic, and will do everything they can to avoid the subject in the future so that I can't make them uncomfortable. This makes me want to kill them AND myself.

Immediately eats something really loudly to set me off as a "joke". This means that they're an obnoxious piece of shit that I have to try my absolute hardest not to beat to death with my bare hands. This makes me want to kill them, if that wasn't already obvious.

"Oh. So that's what this is called." This means they have it, and we can both engage in a brief period of mutual trauma sharing that helps us know we're not alone, and that our curse is unfortunately shared with others. This makes us both somewhat melancholy, and kinda ruins the vibes until something fun happens.

And then we get into the "How do you make the pain stop", and good news! You can't. There is no way to make it stop. But you can make it hurt less with ✨Spending Unbearable Amounts of Cash✨

You can buy a billion different types of earplugs that will all do great at muting the world but always leave you incredibly unaware of the world around you and leave you fucked in-terms of listening to media.

You can buy normal headphones that will kind of work but never mute the world around you anywhere near enough and vaguely frustrate you constantly, but hey at least you're a bit more accessible! Try combining these with a combination of rain and static noise playing at all times in the background for an extra layer of silence :)

You can buy ANC headphones that cost infinitely too much money and are almost always built to break so that they can farm cash from you in repairs, but the ANC is so useful despite not working perfectly that you can't really exist without it so you're gonna spend 200+ dollars every couple years because you don't have a choice, and spend every single day 24/7 wearing hot heavy over-ear headphones! Use the Rain and Static Noise combo with this as well for the best ANC effect.

And inevitably, all of these options will give you hearing problems, potentially make you aware of new trigger sounds, and always leave you a step behind everyone else when a conversation happens. Pro-Tip : For when the sounds are really intrusive and you're on the verge of a breakdown, Combine ANC with Ear Plugs and the R&SN background audio to basically kill noise in it's entirety for a little while :)

AND NOW WE GET TO THE PART WHERE I SAY WHAT THE FUCK CAN YOU NORMIES DO TO MAKE OUR SUFFERING LESS FUCKING CONSTANT.

Listen to us. Don't ostracize us for experiencing emotions we can't control and don't mean or want to act on. If you can, try your best to do the trigger noises quietly, and try your best not to do the trigger visuals in-front of us. We know it's not something you can control entirely, but if you can make the effort to make our lives suck less, we'll really fucking appreciate it.

And if you try to get back at us during a fight by eating something really crunchy to abuse our disorder for your benefit, I swear to god I will hunt you down personally and subject you to the most violent and painful torture I can manage before killing you and hiding your body somewhere no one will ever find it so that your loved ones never have the closure of knowing if you died or if you're still somewhere out there. Thanks for reading even though I know you didn't because the length of this post is frankly unhinged and i'll probably only get like 2 likes at best.

#Misophonia #Misophonia Awareness #Actually Misophonic #Disorder Awareness #Mental Health

[valentine-writes]

Hello hello! Been downright dying over how much I love your AtSV work!! So I thought I would feed into it >:) If you're feeling up to it, whats been brewing in your mind about The Spot x reader? Take it platonic or romantic, either has so much potential for fun in my opinion and I guess I'm just interested in what ideas you might have?? Not a lot to work off of from what I'm asking but I hope you're able to have fun with it anyways ^^; Whether youre able to get to this request or not, thanks for reading! Love what you do :)

collision.

「 tws + notes: possibly ooc, unedited, he's kind of pathetic little meow meowified im sorry, first bit inspired by @//submurged-into-clouds !! <3 」

↳ ft. the spot

「 gn!reader, can be platonic or romantic <3 」

author's note: first, AUWJHEJSBS thank u so much!!!! im glad u like what i've written so far– and i am SUPER excited to write for the spot becuz im gon b real,,, there was a momentary lapse of insanity where i was scouring for any content of him at all. SO TY 4 UR REQ!!!! ( /)u(\ ) i hope this is ok!!! i got carried away and stuff so,, i hope this is at the Very Least coherent! leaned for platonic stuff with romantic undertones that intensify throughout so,, read it how u like ^_^

▸ we're going to start this by establishing that bro has literally No Friends anymore. you met him after the collider incident and by some miracle, some sort of mercy from a higher power in the multiverse– you ended up becoming friends with him

really, meeting him was an accident. wasn't supposed to be anything more– just him messing around with his new abilities and slipping into a random universe with no idea where he was.

and there was you.

just you. out, alone at night. just taking a walk– disrupted by someone falling out of a weird portal from the sky.

this is the day your paths crossed, the day your fates intertwined, the moment that your world collided into his.

to put more literally: the day he crashed into you very unceremoniously.

im now re-reading the title and remembering his backstory and giggling at my unintentional joke. he is not catching a break. even from me.

▸ after recovering from a random stranger from another universe tumbling into your own, you began to talk.

now– you don't remember how the conversation started, but you were glad to listen. the way which he rambled to you, words tumbling out of his mouth like they'd been on his mind for a while– you felt like he needed someone to hear him.

he's surprised. you're not bothered. not frightened. not even weirded out. but you're not indifferent. you nod along, you comment on things here and there– but you listen. you actually listen to him.

eventually, when he leaves, you're sat there for a moment. just frozen– processing whether that had really happened or not. you see the indent his body left in the grass where the two of you sat. it's evidence enough for you.

a few weeks pass and you're certain that you were just fated to meet once and never again. you were fine with this.

▸ until he randomly popped up in your living room one day.

yes, he had been actively trying to find your universe again– and as casually as he can be, is now peeking from out the portal he created, head leaning in to get a better look at you.

you're not sure how you can tell considering he has no face,,, but he's definitely smiling.

he waves to you, awkwardly, (noticing that you're just staring at him while not saying a word), "thought i would say hi, so– ...hi."

you blink at him tiredly. "dude, it's 6:30 in the morning–"

he's treating this like it's normal for people to just show up in your house. he missed you– and it's very evident.

▸ no matter what type of relationship you're in with him: you GOTTA set boundaries. being one of the only people who cares to hang around him anymore means that you're gonna be seeing a lot of him.

while he certainly hasn't completely lost grasp on the concept of privacy, it's definitely been altered by the fact he's got powers that allow him to pop up wherever he wants. he's just a teeny bit invasive.

"hello!" he'll greet, randomly poking his head through a portal he made to your bedroom.

on instinct, you throw the closest thing to you. he's just glad you reached for the pillow and not the alarm clock also at your arms reach on the bedside table.

definitely a good idea to remind him that if he wants to hang out, he should probably message you, and if he wants to show up at your house for whatever reason, he should give you a heads up.

he has nearly walked in on you changing. and has apologized a million times every time it's brought up. it fr keeps him up at night.

▸ everyone in his life leaving him def messed him up a bit. he can deny it all he wants, but he's terribly anxious that you're gonna grow tired of him and leave.

constantly like "oh my god what if they leave for someone who has a face" and itz like,,, boy,,,, stfu itz 3am

he needs reassurance, even if he never explicitly says. but you're kind to him. patient. you're pretty much an angel in his eyes.

which is why he feels comfortable texting u in the dead of night like:

(im gonna b real i dont even know why i have this image)

▸ he's dismissed by most people around him– but you've given him your time. you've shown him that you care. he's doing everything he can to be certain you'll still care for him.

the random waves of "oh no but what if they hate me" hit him HARD. especially if he hasn't seen you in a while, if you take longer to respond to his messages, if you haven't been answering his calls– bro will jump to a conclusion

"hypothesis: they dont love me anymore :("

☝️🤓 SORRY HAKJWOENDOEND he would NOT say that. im just clowning on him itz a part of my luv 4 him </3

needs to be needed. wants to be wanted.

eventually you have a long talk about this. he's got a bit of an ego after realizing how much power he truly possessed– but you gently encourage him to let it down. a simple heart to heart. and while you're certain these things aren't going to dissipate with a single conversation, you've let him know he doesn't have to deal with it alone.

▸ physical contact is a need for him. bro's touch starved. he likes linking his pinky with yours or just intertwining your fingers together. if you ever let him rest his head on your shoulder or hugged him he'd actually have to fight tears. he hasn't been given affection in a while :(

▸ he doesn't really feel like he has to hide anything around you. he really doesn't have much of a filter when you're talking to him which makes for some amusing conversation. he finds your laughter the sweetest sound in the world– he likes making you laugh :] it makes him feel like he's accomplished something

▸ the alterations to his body have caused some weird little changes that most people don't notice. one of them most noticeably to you– he'd cold. not frigid or like icy, but a lot colder than normal people tend to be.

you first notice this when you're hanging out in your bedroom. you're sitting on your bed, while he paces back and forth, rambling about another failed villainous act

(you haven't questioned his whole obsession with villainy considering that he seems pretty harmless with what he's been attempting– no matter how much he tries)

"and then– ohh, and tHEN THEY JUST—" you notice how he's gesturing frantically, exasperated, annoyed– and out of instinct to provide some sort of comfort (or at least calm him down) your hand grasps his wrist

there's a moment of silence.

his voice dwindles into a more soft, subdued tone, watching as your fingers wrap around his wrist. "wh– if you wanted me to stop talking, you could've just... just said or...."

his mind is going blank, trailing off at your touch. he doesn't remember the last time someone has held his hand or even brushed up against him without freaking out.

"you're cold." you comment, now taking his hand between both of yours, as if you were trying to heat him back up. you don't meet his eyes, simply staring at his hand.

"oh– yeah, yeah, it's just– a thing with now. came with the holes–"

the sensation of your hands gently squeezing his shuts him up. you raise his hand to your lips and gently blow hot air onto it.

your brow furrows, nose scrunching up. "you're still cold..." you mutter, more to yourself than to him. quietly, your gaze returns to his face.

"does that bother you?" you ask him, after a beat of silence.

he shakes his head. your hands let go of his– but he quietly reaches back to hold it again.

"hold on a second. why don't you try again?" he suggests. you laugh softly, knowing it's obviously just an excuse. still, you humor him.

#the spot atsv #the spot #atsv x reader #the spot x reader #the spot x y/n #jonathan ohnn #jonathon ohnn #jonathan ohnn x reader #jonathon ohnn x reader #BRO ITZ SO HARD TO TAG FOR HIM IM GONNA ANWKJWEIJE?!!]^{>]*]% #ok im normal again

[pallisia]

various asks

my inbox is full of nice messages and i don't want to flood the tl so i'm going to answer a big batch of 'em! warning for spoilers:

thank you! this is great to hear. i've always loved the modern touches in ffs like 8, 13, etc., and it was a flavor i'd wanted to incorporate into a fantasy setting of my own. i still think about the part in ff8 where the president gets assassinated by a witch on live television.

even if their circumstances aren't realistic at all, i wanted the characters to feel down-to-earth, so i'm glad they came off that way. i only realized this after hearing from others, but "desperation" is a major theme throughout the story. she's gotta have "it"

thank you so much! to be fair, i was never planning to do fully rendered 3d backgrounds, only to use them as a foundation to draw over. it's something a lot of comic artists do these days, which i respect, but...i think it's not for me. i just don't like thinking about perspective unless it has an "atmospheric" in front of it. but i'm glad the approach i went with was a success! i also love "i felt like i was really getting mugged"

i'm not a musician in any capacity, and i'd never considered releasing any of my piddly little compositions until this. i'm lucky to have worked with such an encouraging friend.

i gotta look out for my clowngirls. thank you.

these two messages came one after another for a critical hit combo... thank you so much for letting my little freaks into your heart.

this is another thing i was hoping would happen! thank you.

ysme uses artisanry to augment her body. we'll get more into how that magic system works later!

thanks so much! i've never played any of the pmd games, but that's very high praise. and i'm honored to hear that i inspired you to make a vn of your own! it really is such a flexible and fun medium, so i hope you enjoy the process.

thanks! that was absolutely an inspiration. when i was outlining the script, i had the vague idea that i wanted ysme to coerce loic in a way that would make sense considering the magic at his disposal. personally if i were mugging a wizard i would simply not give him the chance to think about it .

thank you. i don't have the mental bandwidth to make an rpg, but i still wanted to make something that evoked the same feelings, so that's fantastic to hear.

thank you so much! i can only be myself, and thus there will be more titty.

#txt

[royalberryriku]

Some Thoughts on the 'Writing Process'™

So I see a lot of writers struggle with these very specific things, AKA:

The Staring at the Blank Page Thing where you struggle to come up with ideas, words, etc

The Word Counting Counting where you cannot stop counting your word count

The 'Can Someone ELSE Proofread This Because I Don't Want to Read It' dilemma

The 'How Do I STOP Hating Everything I Write' issue which also leads into the 'How Do I Stop Scrapping Everything' issue

And finally the 'I DONT WANT TO WRITE I WANT TO IMAGINE IT INSTEAD' problem

There are various things that can make writing hard, but I have had some thoughts! And maybe they might just be useful.

So for Issue Number 1, I've found that, if you want to write, NEVER do it before you already have the ideas. Looking at a blank page just makes it harder. You get bored and that makes writing feel boring. Of course, this is all just my opinion, maybe this actually works for you. BUT! In my own personal experience, I find that actually LIMITING how often I open my document helps a bunch. No matter how much you wanna write, there's no point torturing yourself over how little you're doing and shaming or pressuring yourself to get it done. Punishing yourself is just gonna kill your inspiration and, obviously, you're not going to want to write if you now associate it with punishment for not writing. It's a cycle of just being mean to yourself. Well, don't wanna be unproductive? As silly and counterproductive as it sounds; self care is the answer which I've found that actually works.

This actually leads into Issue Number 2. I think these probably stem from the same issue; punishing yourself for not producing. Again, punishing yourself and shaming yourself into just staring at a blank screen or staring at how little the word count is or how much you have to go until your goal is just going to kill your inspiration and make you bored. Shaming doesn't get you to write more, or faster or suddenly become more productive. Believe it or not? Self care and making it fun is what makes a fun story come to life. You're not just writing a block of text that's a recount to sell in this capitalist hellhole (I mean you are but that doesn't mean the process has to be bound by capitalism because FUCK CAPITALISM), you're writing a story you wanna tell; focus on the story before the method and don't punish yourself for it not just magically appearing. These things take time, they take trial, error, mistakes and various drafts, but FIRST? They take those little moments where you just daydream scenes and the imagination you have to exist at all. Focus first on the story and your own health and the rest will come, slowly but surely. Anyway that was a lot of words to essentially just say; don't look at the word count, focus on the story and the length will follow regardless. It's fine to check and obviously, you'll just have to at some point. But please please try and do what you can to avoid checking, even use a different method. I use page count because it's so varied and inaccurate that it actually doesn't matter and just tricks my brain into using that to see my very general progress and makes it seem bigger than it actually is. It also can just be easier to check at a glance if I want to make sure the structure of each chapter is more or less consistent enough.

Issue Number 3 is tricky, mostly because once you've made something, it can be legitimately very boring to reread everything you JUST wrote. For me, I'm sort of chaotic in that I reread as I go or do it very randomly and rewrite as I come up with things. The good thing is though that what you write isn't set in stone. It's malleable and fluid. I always have a cut and paste section on my computer where I just... cut and page and rearrange things as I think of it. I don't worry about "oh but what if I mess up" because you're ALWAYS gonna mess up! That's actually one of the cool things about writing, you CAN mess up and go back and reread it eventually to make it work a bit better after all the other chaotic going-back-and-fixing-things. Which brings me to my main point (especially if you don't want to replicate my chaoticness) I try to leave proofreading itself as much as I can for the end of it all. As in, I just let myself write, yes rearranging and going back whenever I want, but never throwing anything OUT, never scrapping the whole document because it's gonna have bits you might reuse. And more to the point, it gives you a lose skeleton to base your next draft on. It's more work but I find it really reassuring in that you don't judge every little thing as you go, but just say "meh, fuck it!" and write whatever works, then rewrite it in a separate document all over again, never deleting the last one so you can copy and page whatever you liked from the first draft, or second, or third, and use each mistake and flaw. Recycling is good folks, even just in writing. Or... at least it is for me. If this doesn't work for you, it doesn't work for you, but this is just what helps me so maybe it might help you too.

This also goes into Issue Number 4. Honestly, you're never gonna not be your biggest critic. But! You can at least make your work feel a bit more positive and go in with a "eh who cares?" mindset into writing. It may not erase the "wow this is hot garbage" feeling, but it'll feel a bit more like "well this is MY hot garbage and I don't care if it's bad or good, because at least it was fun". Plus, like I said; recycling is very good. The best way to force yourself not to hate something is to get really damn used to it, AKA, never getting rid of it. Which is hard, I know. Especially if you just really freaking hate it. And, well, it's not like I'm saying you should keep absolutely every little thing, I don't want you all to get clutter and folders upon folders of stuff you won't use...buuut I am saying it helps to keep things and get comfortable in your own messiness and imperfection. It starts to feel normal at least, or for me it does, and slowly you kind of just...accept it. Also, making fun little things to enjoy your ideas away from your writing itself. If you draw? Make fanart. Maybe even make AUs in your head. Maybe make some mood boards. HYPE YOURSELF UP! Or as best you can at least, and never force things. If you aren't feeling this particular story right now? Move on to another project and yes having WIPs can be annoying but sometimes it's necessary. Again, these are all just my opinions and stuff I do when I struggle with these; I'm not commanding anyone to do anything and as always, maybe this won't work for you personally. But hey, doesn't hurt to give it a try first and see if it works, or maybe something else will. Whatever the case, this is just my own two cents.

And finally, Number 5. Honestly? This isn't so much as issue in and of itself as much as just an issue of prioritisation. Imagination is the most important part of even coming up with a story to begin with and, honestly, imagining scenes can really help build a mental image of what you want to describe and how things look and feel. One thing, a little cheat code you could say, that I've found is melding daydreaming with research. Which makes absolutely no sense since this is the most funnest part with the most boring part of writing, but hey, it works surprisingly well I assure you. So here's the setup I have; no doc (except for if I really need to jot down some notes), then images that remind me of my work (Pinterest boards maybe, a few mood boards, etc), then the research. I go between each of these; daydreaming. The result? I imagine scenes with the research I want; motifs that work with themes, imagery to use in scenes, what architecture works, what the weapons look like. Then, before I even write, I go back and still daydream WITH what I've researched and it sticks in my mind way better than even the notes I've made. Speaking of, with notes, I like to doodle in the margins of them, make them fun, highlight with fun colours. Sometimes? Research, note taking and writing doesn't have to be work in and of itself, sometimes it can be fun and a little quest of your own. Sometimes making writing and research feel like you're daydreaming can make all the difference between begrudgingly slugging through a chapter, or just having fun writing a new scene you just imagined and that starts to form into something new and exciting.

TLDR: Make writing fun! Like Mary Poppins once said; "a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down". Sometimes it's actually better to make the work into a treat instead of using a treat as a bribe or punishing yourself. In fact, making any part of the process into a punishment for not working just makes everything harder.

ALSO! Just in general, take breaks! It's easy to forget what you're doing (especially once it becomes fun) and forget to take care of yourself both physically and mentally. Too much time looking at a screen (or even just a page) can be straining! Remember to eat! Remember to drink water and sleep! Get up and walk around if you can, go to the bathroom and maybe even go for a little walk outside and get some Vitamin D if you're able to. Remember to maybe take a few days away from writing so you can come at it again with a refreshed mind and new perspective, sometimes you can get boggled down and start getting too focused on one little thing. It's good to let yourself have half an hour, an hour or even a few days to just refresh and go out and get new inspiration just from living. Sometimes the key to writing and ideas is to just stop writing for a bit and to just take a breath.

#writing #writers on tumblr #creative writing #writing community #writeblr #novel writing #writers and readers #tumblr writers #tumblr writing community #writerscommunity #writerblr #writers and poets #writing advice #long post #also some swearing oops #writing resources

[autumnmobile12]

Human turned Vampire variations

From the classic bite of Bram Stoker's novel explained to some really convoluted metamorphoses, here are 6 ways humans are turned into vampires throughout modern media.

Shiki

This series had a slow process, similar to the classic Dracula. The shiki chooses one victim to feed off of over the course of three nights and holds said victim entirely under their sway through a means of hypnosis. Growing increasingly more anemic and unable to tell their family and friends what's happening, the victim eventually passes away from heart failure.

However, the vampire bite itself doesn't guarantee a new vampire. It's caused by an unspecified genetic factor that responds to a vampire bite. The shiki in the series gather around the grave of their latest victim and wait for signs of life, digging up their new member if they do and giving up if they start to smell the body decaying.

It led to a pretty devastating moment for one of the vampires who desperately tried to turn the rest of her family, but none of them had the genetic factor and she ended up killing all of them for nothing.

Hellsing

Vampire bites virgin human of the opposite sex.

Okay, seems simple enough, but what exactly are we considering virginity here? This is an arbitrary concept with a definition that has changed multiple times over history, not to mention the 'loss of virginity' definition today varies according to who you ask. What are we considering gender? Are we strictly adhering to an individual's biological characteristics or is transgenderism/gender-fluidity at play? What about intersex individuals?

This one seems straightforward until you consider all the non-heteronormative angles, but really...I'm pretty sure no one watches this series for the plot. I think we all just showed up to see a vampire annihilate the Third Reich.

Twilight

I've never read/watched the books/movies, but I've heard it's venom in this series. Is it venom? If so, that's an interesting take.

Vampire in the Garden

Saliva.

The vampires of this series are the result of a genetic mutation and can change another human into a vampire by introducing an unspecified pathogen/chemical found in their saliva into the human's bloodstream.

Soulless (or the Alexia Tarrabotti novels)

All right, this book series is fun and I highly recommend. British sass, steampunk Victorians, LGBTQ+ representation, fabulous vampires, and dorky werewolves, I love it.

Anyway, vampires in this series have what's called 'feeder fangs,' but the female vampires have a second smaller set called 'maker fangs.' So only a female vampire can create a new vampire.

Also, the supernatural system of this world revolves around souls. People can have an average 'amount' of soul, for lack of a better word, an unknown percentage of people can have 'excess soul,' and a rare number can have no soul. Excess soul lingers after death, so people with excess soul become ghosts when they die. Or, if they are bitten by a vampire or werewolf, they can become that supernatural being and gain immortality.

But since there's no feasible way to measure how much soul one has, becoming supernatural is a roulette with death. Similar to Shiki, immortality by vampire bite is not guaranteed.

Vampire Knight

Vampires can reproduce with each other and give birth to children, essentially making them just a long-lived, virtually immortal sub-species of humanity that needs blood to survive.

There's also a vampire hierarchy of which only the rare 'purebloods' can create new vampires, but the former human vampires are unstable and often become mindless, blood-driven monsters, adding to the classicism of the upper hierarchy.

(If I remember right, it's been awhile since I read these.)

...

These are all the methods I can think of, but reblog if you can think of another method or one that's similar to the ones above.

#dracula #vampires #vampire media #vampire human metamorphoses #vampire knight #shiki #hellsing #hellsing ultimate #soulless #alexia tarrabotti #vampire in the garden #twilight

[bomberqueen17]

The Witch King

This is not like, a coherent review or anything.

Yesterday I was just like possessed with anxiety nonstop the whole day and everything I did seemed to make it worse and i just like spun my wheels and I got some things done but mostly felt worse and worse and more and more stressed, due partly to external circumstances but largely, i think, to nothing in particular. And finally after dinner I was sitting on the couch comfortably and realized you know what, fuck it, I am not going to "try to write" and wind up refreshing tumblr and chatting on discord all night, not while I'm already fretting and stewing like this, i'm going to be miserable and probably get in a fight or something and i don't want that. Fuck it. So I went to the tab I already had open in my browser, which I'd had open for weeks but the time was never right, and I bought the kindle version of Witch King and read it right there in my browser, the whole way through, did not click away or put it down or move or do anything else, and you know what it was fantastic.

I'd read a preview and been like hm i don't know what this is about and read a couple of amazon reviews that were like this was really confusing, some of which concluded so i didn't like it and some of which concluded so i super liked it, and like, I've been a fan of Martha Wells since she put the Element of Fire up for free chapter by chapter on her Livejournal when the rights reverted to her in like 2006 or so, so I knew what I was going to get and also knew that I would not particularly know exactly what I was going to get until I got it, and I also knew I was going to enjoy the ride, but I hadn't wanted to read it in stolen or exhausted moments lest the "this is confusing" bits prove too much.

In the end I found it not in the slightest bit confusing, it was a very straightforward interspersed flashbacks storytelling technique that i thought suited the story beautifully (not to be spoilery but we join a character in medias res with an action scene and it's him trying to figure out who has betrayed him in a complicated political scenario, and in the process of unspooling this he has to revisit the site of where the complicated political scenario was first set up, some sixty (?) years earlier, so he's retracing his own steps and it's really well done I think, introducing new bits of history right as they're relevant to the current storyline-- and just fantastically done, not at all forced, completely natural and compelling, and no the reader isn't told anything they don't need to know but you do get everthing you need to know, there's no unneccessary coyness at all).

So anyway i loved that, and I hope there's a sequel planned but it stands alone just fine if not, I'm already figuring i'll alternate my rereads and do every other chapter each time, so I can do All The Backstory first, then All The Current Timeline story, and that's such a fun way to eke out many many many rereads of a story that like all of Wells' works I will reread until I have chunks of them memorized (anyone who has read my works surely has found whole undigested bits of hers bobbing around in there because I do this so much; I found the phrase weary past bearing in something of mine the other day and was like oh that's moon when ember first shows up i stole that whole emotion wholesale out of the third raksura book yes i did).

Little side notes: Love the aroace qpr vibes with Kai and Zeide, also sort of enjoy the lowkey genderfuckery that comes with a demon who has his own gender then inhabiting bodies that had different genders. Great magic system too, and I love that we first get introduced to how Kai's pain magic works as a like totally fait accompli chunk of didactic worldbuilding and then in a later chapter we get to see the flashback of him inventing it and understand why it works the way it does, that was also so well-wrapped-up.

Anyway-- Definitely recommend this one but probably it is best if you can do it like I did, in one big binge-read. It took me probably three hours and I was trying hard not to read it too fast.

Yeah. Anyway. People assume I'm a big reader. I was, as a kid. I am not now. This is the first new book I've read since probably the spring sometime. I don't casually read things i only read them if I'm going to add them to my Pantheon of Rereads, and that goes for fic too mostly.

#martha wells #witch king #book recs #kind of a book review #sort of

[deputyash]

WIP Day

Tagged by @adelaidedrubman Thank you! (Also probably some other people from long ago too but I can't remember, sorry X3)

Tagging: @harmonyowl @derelictheretic @teamhawkeye @strafethesesinners @purplehairsecretlair @peachyaliien @ri-a-rose @redreart @statichvm @shellibisshe @glowwormsmith @fuckin-nancy @isobel-thorm @blissfulalchemist @direwombat @v0idbuggy @wrathfulrook @mel-eficent @cassietrn @beemot @englass @laindtt @shallow-gravy @the-delicate-disaster @katamari-possum

A/N: Have two WIPs cause I had a mini drabble that I had fun with, but also a piece of a longer work I've had for like weeks now lol. Also heads up for wound-tending and stitches for the second WIP.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

WIP 1:

Despite never seeing them himself, Astarion never cared for his eyes. The thought of them only ever brought back wretched memories of the beginning of his torment, his turning. 

This slowly began to change the more time he spent with Izel, gazing into her eyes. They were an enchanting shade of garnet. One moment they would catch the light and sparkle so sweetly and the next they were a deep chasm he could get endlessly lost in. If red eyes could be as beautiful as hers, then perhaps his own could be too.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

WIP 2:

She looks over the wound again and repeats the process until she’s satisfied with the cleanliness of it. She sets the cloth aside before grabbing and opening the metal tin. Inside are several needles and various spools of thread. 

Izel grabs one of each and sets aside the rest as she begins prepping the needle. She strings a considerable amount of thread through the needle before bringing her left arm to rest on her lap. She leans forward as she brings the needle to the wound. 

Her fingers tremble slightly as she moves to bring the needle point to her skin. She pauses and tries to shake off the tremors but the combination of the chilly air, the mild pain thrumming through her, and her general fatigue, makes it a fruitless task. 

With a soft hiss she pushes the needle into her skin. She angles it back up and brings it out on the other side of the wound, making her first stitch. She repeats the motion again, flinching when she hits a particularly tender spot. She glances up at the lake. The orange rays of sunlight were beginning to dip down below the shimmering surface of the water.

She was losing daylight fast. She needed to speed this along or she’d be here all night. 

She repeats the motions again and again until she reaches a rhythm—a shaky one—but one nonetheless. Izel nearly reaches the end of the wound when a voice cuts through the silence, shocking her from her concentration. 

In a split second, Izel is on her feet and spinning around to face her intruder, teeth bared in defense, uncaring that the needle and thread were still attached to her arm. 

A pitched laugh is the only thing that she’s met with. “It’ll take a little more than a sewing needle to kill me, don’t you think, darling?”

Izel lets out an indignant huff but lets the tension fall from her shoulders. “What are you doing here, Astarion?” 

He flashes her a smile. “I could ask you the same thing, dear. I saw you sneaking off earlier.” He makes a scurrying motion with his hands before continuing, “Not exactly subtly either, might I add.”

“Who said I was trying to be subtle? Perhaps I just wanted some peace and quiet.” She lets out a curt hum before continuing, “Now I’d really like to finish what I was doing. I’d rather not spend all night out here with a needle hanging from my arm.”

Astarion simply crosses his arms and looks at her, gazing at her from head to toe. Izel hardens her stare and turns her body away from him, but doing so causes her to mistakenly tug at the thread still connected to her arm. She flinches and lets out a soft hiss as she looks down at the stitches, which in turn reveals them to Astarion.

“That is some of the worst needlework I’ve seen in my life.”

Izel cocks her head to the side and shoots a glare in his direction. “They don’t need to be pretty. They just need to work.”

He lets out a breathy laugh, “And leave plenty of scars in the process.”

He saunters over and stops beside the makeshift table. He reaches down and picks up the tin full of sewing supplies. He plucks out a new needle and spool of thread. He brings the needle up to his crimson eyes.

“I’m quite the embroiderer you know.” He briefly waves down at his clothing. “Did everything you see here.” 

Izel watches as he easily threads the needle before setting it aside and picking up a small pair of sewing scissors. He holds his hand out before waving it impatiently. 

“Arm, darling. I don’t have all day.”

“Why are you helping me?” She asks, still leaning away from him.

“We’re a team, aren’t we? And while I am no Shadowheart, I can at least offer…what few skills I do have…” He clears his throat, “So, are you going to give me that precious arm of yours or are you indeed going to let that needle dangle there all night?”

Izel eyes him with a mix of wariness and curiosity. She could sense something beneath his words but she doesn’t push him for an explanation. Who was she to push for answers? She certainly wouldn’t appreciate it if their roles were reversed. In fact she'd loathe it. Almost as much as she loathes the idea of trusting a near stranger with a needle near her flesh, especially one who had pulled a dagger on her when they met.

She lets out a sigh and looks down at her arm. The stitches were sloppy and they were already coming loose in some areas and too tight in others from her abrupt stop. She grits her teeth before relenting. She turns towards him and lets her arm rest in his outreached hand. 

“There. That wasn’t so hard now was it?”

Astarion brings the scissors to the stitches and begins cutting them all off. He carefully pulls out the remaining bits and tosses them off into the grass before reaching for the carafe of water. He pours water over the wound. Izel bites down on her teeth as the stinging resurfaces but otherwise stays firmly planted in place. She refuses to look weak in front of him. 

He wipes away the water with a clean cloth before bringing the new needle to the top of the wound. Izel looks away from the operating area and instead looks up at Astarion’s face. His eyes were keenly honed into his work, his brows pinched together and his mouth pursed into a set look of concentration. Perhaps he isn’t lying. Maybe he really does know his way around a needle and thread.

Her eyes then glance down at his clothing. She hadn’t really noticed the needlework on it before. All along the garment is brilliant gold embroidery, making distinct shapes and patterns all over the neckline and shoulders. She didn’t know much about the ins and outs of embroidery, but from what she could see, his work was delicate, skillful, beautiful.

#I added an extra paragraph to the second WIP last minute so hopefully it isn't too jarring lol #deputyash's writing #my writing #deputyash's ocs #my ocs #izel #izel x astarion #astarion #astarion x tav #astarion x oc #bg3 #baldur's gate 3

[sarah-yyy]

What is clj and why are we watching it? (I ask even though I still haven't finished lltg😅)

ALRIGHT it's been awhile since the last proper rec post (and yes yes yes buddies i know i am late to the show i'm SORRY) so bear with me while i try to contain my yelling about cang lan jue (or, love between fairy and devil, which......as my sister put it, is about as low an english title as it can get 😂)

what: period cdrama // 36 eps, roughly 45 mins each where: netflix // iqiyi why: do you enjoy the soft sunshine gremlin/broody fight fight fight demon dynamic? this is the show for you 🥰

a brief overview!!!

this is my son dong fang qing cang, or, daqiang (affectionate), Moon Supreme™, mightiest in the three realms, who was unfortunately defeated in battle 30000 years ago and imprisoned for ~reasons

this sweet child xiao lanhua (lit. little orchid) is a low level immortal orchid spirit (fairy is ehhh, she's not exactly a 仙 but ehhh translations hmm) who accidentally (!!!) Frees The Monster™ from his prison while attempting to save this other boy she has been having a crush on

(the whole thing involves kissing - this is literally the first episode)

(this is not the only kissing we will get, dw)

the process triggers a spell and they??? switch bodies when they kiss??? which is hilarious because we get fun scenes with xiao lanhua in dfqc's body like

and

ANYWAY this is not the only side effect of their first encounter!! dfqc soon realises that he has been Cursed™ to a) feel any pain inflicted upon xiao lanhua physically, and b) share xiao lanhua's emotions!

him!!! an almighty being who has not felt one (1) single feeling since he had them literally ripped from his being (not by choice 😭) since he was a child!!! suddenly he's crying?? and feeling fear??? and getting hurt??? this is Not Okay!! he is the mightiest in all the realms!!! this is a weakness that he must rid himself off!!!

before he can figure out how to do this, the most prudent thing to do appears to be to have to protect xiao lanhua from all harm, and uh, doing whatever he can to ensure her emotional wellbeing and happiness??? dfcq goes from broody unfeeling demon lord to number one xiao lanhua stan (begrudgingly) the longer he stays around her

he literally went batshit to protect her and it was Amazing to watch!! god of war whomst??? can't hear you over me beating your ass to protect my girl

but it's not just that!! he's also going around reading through ancient scrolls to figure out how to best make an orchid plant grow/blossom well, and just. collecting dew water for her! making her (terrible) food!! taking to see the sunrise because it's good for her! daqiang contains multitudes!!!!

the entire time, because dfqc never really bothered with any explanation beyond "you belong to me", xiao lanhua is thinking: fuck, i accidentally freed a guy from prison and now he's in love with me?????

it's hilarious

ANYWAY that's the setup of the show!! obviously, there are some plotty things going on, and ofc it wouldn't be a good xianxia if they did not have go to the mortal realm to 渡劫 (i'm on this arc now and it's so funny too, i love it)! i'm only two thirds of the way through the show because tragically work is a thing that i have to do, but i have heard that there is Sads™ towards the end (although i'm told it ends well) and i'm looking forward to it!!

i personally am really enjoying this! things move along quickly in this show, and because they're pretty basic plotlines it doesn't take a lot of focus to watch! the sets/costumes are gorgeous, and dylan and esther are surprisingly good in this!! i've always been pretty meh about dylan outside of cvariety until now, but there have been scenes in this where he just blew me over. the pacing of the relationship is good as well, like i'm 2/3 of the way through and they haven't gotten together yet, but they're obviously fond of each other and slowly tipping across the line and it's just SO CUTE TO WATCH

please watch this so we can all suffer together, 11/10 would rec

#cang lan jue #clj #tv rec #cdrama #long post for ts #usual disclaimer: i don't watch cdramas with eng subs so idk the quality of the subs VENTURE IN AT YOUR OWN RISK

[something-pithy]

Heyo, glittercats and kittens! So chapters 6 and 7 of an echo, a stain are up! And starting this week, I'm going to start including story notes along with the link.

I'm a note writer lol. Part of how I even begin to keep track of all the wildness of writing something longer than a grocery list is to write about it before I start writing it, if that makes sense lol. Character sketches, ideas about why certain things are happening, backstory, setting details, etc.

I'm pretty verbal about my writing process because -- well,  I like writing about writing a lot, and also, I think it improves both the work and how I get there. Anything might end up here -- character sketches, ideas about why certain things are happening, backstory, setting details, etc. I don't really wanna be leaving like eighteen thousand words of notes on every chapter, so here we are!

Sometimes I think they might add some interesting context for readers, sometimes it's information that I think is important but it's too much for the notes section on the story itself, and sometimes it's just so I have a document of my progress for this story. So here are my notes for chapter 7! ---

Chapter 7's title is from "Come to Me" by Bjork, which is definitely one of my Astarion / Tav falling in love themes for when I'm up in these flashbacks, back before Astarion Ascended (and he still had a soul loool).

The notes from previous chapters had promised a Shadowheart & Tav conversation in this chapter. This is not the Shadowheart & Tav chapter I promised, but it is the one that continued to demand to be written until I capitulated. 

And also, honestly, the one that's going to benefit that other chapter that was supposed to be 7 and the story as a whole in the long run, so I hope you like it! 

I was getting really stuck with my original plan, and so I just started writing -- well, this. And the chapter after this. And possibly the one after that. Loooool there is a LOT going on at this point in these kids' lives.

The original plan is still 100% happening, but I think I needed to 

1. explore the foundations of who these people have become (by these people of course I mean Tav and Astarion, but also friendship is magic, so our beautiful OG friendgroup babies) 

2. what the relationships between them look like and 

3. some clues, at least, as to how they got there. 

(tl;dr we're purposefully time-jumping, and I'm having fun with it, so I hope you will, too!)

But never fear, Shadowheart and Tav will of course be chatting when we return to the story's present. And it won't be in just one chapter.

OR

hey y'all, we're gonna be doing some purposeful (and hopefully at least coherently executed) flashing back and jumping forward (or up! or laterally! OR WHATEVER) in/on/around this story's timeline!

Final note, but an important one, on Tav's identity: 

I tried to keep Tav ambiguous for the first few chapters because I know that sometimes a really detailed and specific-looking or backstoried Tav can make people disengage from the story because they don't relate to the identifying details provided. (also, it's me, I'm people, or at least one of the people lol)

But at the end of the day, as soon as I started even thinking about writing a BG3 fic, I started really digging into and developing this Tav, who does reflect the dialogue, action, and relationship choices I've made in my current playthrough of the game with her, yes. But in having spent / continuing to spend some time thinking and writing about who this Tav is.  I'm not going to lay them all out here, but I think when you want to play in a sandbox as fucking ginormous and intricately, infinitesimally detailed as Faerun / The Forgotten Realms / DnD,  a little story/character-relevant contextual frontloading can help readers have as much fun with it as the writer does. 

Also, and I'm just going to say it, Tav is a queer, first-generation Baldurian child of two immigrants. She's the Faerun / Baldur's Gate equivalent of a BIPOC, with parents who were born in places very different both from Baldur's Gate and each other's home cities / kingdoms. Also, she's mixed-heritage elf (sun, moon, sea -- yeah, I'm that guy, come at me bro loooool). All this context is key to who Tav is as a person, as a creator, as an adventurer, and just in general.

I want anyone to be able to read Tav and be able to understand who she is, if not be able to relate to some small part of her -- but in my mind, people like Tav are essential to the story of a place like Baldur's Gate, and I really enjoy exploring what that looks like.

I'm having fun with it, so I hope you will, too!

#ascended astarion #astarion fic #astarion x tav #bg3 fic #bard!tav #slow burn #redemption arc: now nontoxic! ... i think? #manipulative astarion #yandere astarion #tav's insight proficiency tho #banter #the companion gang is there too #how do i even tag this

[somethingusefulfromflorida]

My entire Spanish novel collection

I'm not a huge fan of George Orwell, but I read both Animal Farm and 1984 in high school so I know they're short and easy to read. They'll be good practice.

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is by far my favorite series of all time. None of the four (yes, four. Not five, not six, but four) are favorites by themselves, but taken as a whole I have yet to find anything more entertaining.

Jurassic Park is fun but VERY dry (as is Crichton's style). He has a lot of "look at all the research I did" exposition dumps, which I liked as a teenager but don't much care for now. If nothing else, I'll learn plenty of scientific vocabulary from Parque Jurasico.

The Martian is one of my favorite books of all time, tied for first with two titles below. I've read it a dozen times, I know it forwards and backwards. El Marciano was the first Spanish book I ever bought back in 2021, and I couldn't parse more than one word in ten. My reading comprehension has improved tremendously since then, and now I can read almost the entire thing (if I don't understand a certain passage, I know from memory of the English version which part I'm at in the story and can limp along without getting frustrated or confused)

The Road is one of the few books that has made me cry. Let me leave it at that.

The Time Traveler's Wife is another favorite tied with The Martian. I read all the other books on this list in high school or college, but I didn't pick this one up until relatively recently. I am currently in the process of reading La Mujer del Viajero en el Tiempo for the first time, and like The Martian I am able to use my knowledge of the English version to cross the gaps I don't yet understand.

World War Z is the third of the three way tie for favorite. I wanna say I read it for the first time in 2011 or 2012. It was before the movie came out, and I remember taking it with me to read at church camp one summer (it was a long bus ride to North Carolina, and I had to hide it from the chaperones all week). Every time I reread it, I pick up on some new aspect I missed the first dozen times around, so I'm excited to see if I come to any revelations in Spanish.

Books I want to get

Artemis and Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir

Devolution by Max Brooks

Redshirts by John Scalzi

A family friend of mine moved to the United States from Honduras in her late 20s and learned English in part by watching Sesame Street with her kids, so I want to get Spanish versions of the Hunger Games trilogy and the five Percy Jackson and the Olympians books because I figure YA novels might help me learn Spanish easier than adult fiction. Right now I'm looking for simple titles that I'm already familiar with, but eventually I want to start buying Spanish books I've never read in English so I can fly without a net. My background is in Latin American Spanish, specifically Cuban Spanish, but my copy of El Marciano is European, so it shouldn't make too much of a difference which translations I buy (just so long as I keep series grouped together in sets so they're all the same)

#spanish books #español #libros #animal farm #1984 #george orwell #the hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy #douglas adams #jurassic park #michael crichton #the martian #andy weir #the time traveler's wife #audrey niffenegger #world war z #max brooks #the road #cormac mccarthy #spanish practice #reading list #to read list #spanish edition

[buqbite]

how do u set up machine translation?

OK SO

First of all, I downloaded a website translator. I use mate translate, a firefox extension. It's an absolute lifesaver for navigating ANY site not in English.

Using that I made an account on Munpia and bought the sctir chapters as I translated. Munpia doesn't let you select text, so I used an OCR website! (Aka sites to get the text from images)

Now the two that I used were imagetotext, which is quite fast, but likes to fuck up and malfunction, forcing me to restart the process a lot. Bc of that I switched to prepostseo, which works well enough, but does require you to do a captcha test every. single. time. And I am SO FUCKING BAD at those that I went half insane.

So what I would do is to take a screenshot of whatever page I'm on, get the text through the OCR and paste it into Obsidian (I make two separate files for each chapter - RAWs and TLed) until I have the whole chapter.

Now, the formatting does get kinda fucked up. While I use the text on Munpia as a reference, I fix up the formatting of the text.

This is where it gets a little complicated: I like to use Azure to translate. It's a service offered by Microsoft, which includes a translator that, in my experience, is a little better than other machines. And since I don't edit the text this has proven to be VERY useful to me.

But setting up Azure is an absolute bitch and a half so I could also recommend Papago. They include definitions of certain words too, which is really useful. You're just gonna have to do it bit by bit.

Lastly? I recommend learning hangul. It's super fuckin fun (to me, but im a huge nerd) and it will help you with understanding when something's mistranslated a LOT.

The translations are pretty.. Well, they're unedited machine translation. But at least you won't have to wait 12 years for all 870 chapters to get translated. I say that you enjoy the process (It's very very repetitive and I highly recommend putting on a show in the meantime!) and just.. well, just have fun.

I've found that I really enjoy some of the descriptions even when they're not the best. And good grammar gets overestimated anyways. Talk to any older immigrant and they'll tell you the most fantastic stories while inventing sentence structures never before seen (Speaking as a child of immigrants here lol)

And gosh even with the translations being fucked up I've still had so many moments where I got so emotional I cried. The author is a wonderful writer and I can't wait to learn korean enough to be able to read the original text

That's all for now! If it sounds complicated, thats because I do NOT know how to keep myself short ^^

#asks #If you have any more questions or would like to see me show some screenshots don't hesitate to ask! #Also for the names its gonna be a bit of a guessing game. Bc the machine doesn't rlly know what to do with them so it tries to translate it #Which is how Yoojin-ah will sometimes turn into Eugene #Or. Peace gets called Piss. #I cant keep a straight face even while typing this #Also SHJ keeps getting called the holy emperor or sth. at one point I even got “The Holy Virgin” and laughed so hard I cried #Im too lazy to check the post for spelling errors guys can you keep an eye out for that for me pleaseee

[quaranmine]

How do you go about writing mysteries? Like how your firewatch one has its slow drip of discoveries and backstories and stuff. I keep getting totally lost, cuz I already know my endings, and keep forgetting the audience doesnt and shouldnt know the same. Mysteries are fun. They are also the hardest thing ive ever tried to write.

Honestly, mysteries are SO hard. I don't really know how to write them well either. And your ask honestly surprised me some, because up until this point I have never really considered my AU to succeed as a mystery. There is some legitimate mystery in the story (as to where Mumbo is) but, as it becomes clear in chapter 10 I think, most of the things about the Forest Service, Grian's conspiratorial thinking, and finding someone to blame are just set dressing. Or, to give myself more credit, more character study than reality. Something I've had written in the outline since day one is "Is this a mystery, or is Grian just convinced it's a mystery?" Half of the mystery in the story is finding out what actually happened, and half of the mystery is actually just a character study on Grian's grief and thought processes.

I going to put the rest under a cut, it gets kind of long. I can probably talk about my AU forever honestly. And if anyone reading this isn't caught up to at least chapter 10 this will spoil things:

But anyway. I think the best advice I have is to work backwards. You say you already know your ending so it seems like you're doing that already. I knew from the moment I started working on the story how it was going to end, so working backwards from that is a matter of arranging things to be in the places you want them. Having a complete outline also helps because that's what helped me create that "slow drip of discoveries and backstories" because I wanted to reveal things at a relatively steady pace. As for forgetting that your audience doesn't know things...idk I just try to focus super hard on what has/hasn't been revealed and where everybody's povs are. I think that just becomes a learned thing. I don't just know more than the audience, I know more than all the characters too, and I have to make sure they all operate on exactly what they currently know. I think rereading your already-done work as you go helps to refresh you on this.

Another hard thing about mysteries is like....trusting the audience to make connections. I think that I often overplay my hand and spell things out because I am inexperienced in knowing where to draw the line. For this AU, I didn't really intend it to have any big twist ending. I wanted the truth to be telegraphed as the audience uses their own logic to realize that Grian's POV is biased. And even though I haven't released chapter 11 and 12 yet, I....think I succeeded? Based on the difference in comments from chapter 1 to chapter 10, I think most of my readers are where I want them to be. But I didn't know that until I actually released the chapters. Anyway, I think the surprise is less about what the answer is and more about how it all goes down.

In terms of backstories, Firewatch AU has an almost parallel "before" section. There is never a "flashback" to before Mumbo disappeared. The first scene of the story is the ground zero and we never go before that. So the timeline of the story is always "contained" despite skipping around sometimes? Over the course of the fic I slowly introduce scenes that eventually lead us into exactly how Grian got here in the present-day plot. Pretty much all the "before" sections emphasize one way or another that Grian has been struggling.

I guess I can summarize my intentions with the chapters? There's a specific structure to them and their purpose (if I could help it.) Sometimes I feel like I have this story structured within an inch of its life, which is one reason that I have been able to post as I go without needing to make any retroactive changes to already done chapters.

Chapter one: establishes the central problem in the story, introduces the main characters to each other, and introduces Grian's goals. Honestly, I think this is a great first chapter since it introduces everything it needs to. It swaps time periods more than any other one but that is because I specifically modeled it to reflect the intro of the game Firewatch.

Chapter two: introduces fire as a major plot element, and serves as character development and relationship development between Scar and Grian. Also introduces more of Grian's grief, his thoughts about search and rescue, and specifically (vitally, to the plot) allows Scar see just a glimpse of what's happening with Grian that Grian isn't telling him.

Chapter three: mostly vital character development (especially for Scar) and relationship development; I've got to set them up as becoming friends before the big stuff kicks in. also, fire lookout knowledge!

Chapter four: first big clue (found by chance, not by Grian, which sort of emphasizes the idea of things being out of anyone's control that comes up in the narrative a lot.) Bigger spotlight on Grian's emotions (understatement of the year.) Scar gets officially looped into the Real Story. From this point on the plot progresses relatively regularly.

Chapter five: more character development, and another backstory hint about Scar. also, now that Scar is looped in, he gets to contribute information to the plot by bringing the newest clue (that builds off the information revealed in chapter four) (hey grian, it turns out when you communicate to people they can assist you)

Chapter six: this chapter is mostly a flashback section, which i wanted to avoid in chapters but IIRC it was simply too long to include with chapter five. This section with Pearl serves to emphasize a few different self-destructive tendencies Grian has (isolation, his living space, his financial situation, etc.) And finally, more information Scar gives him since he has contacts from working there so long. Also, from here on out Grian's conspiratorial thinking grows.

-> side note, one part of this story being a mystery that was difficult was that like. without internet research being available in the 80s, most "detective" actions would naturally involve talking to people, interviewing, looking at documents, etc. but since grian is Alone, in the middle of the Wilderness, he has none of that. it's, uh, difficult to introduce clues when the main character has little ability to find them. I had to sit down and be like, realistically HOW can he solve this without just wandering around in the woods endlessly? It's not a fun story if all he does is hike around the forest. In the game Firewatch, that sort of worked, but that's because you're controlling Henry. It doesn't translate well to reading. But with Grian entirely on his own, exploring the forest is the only "tool" he has. So Scar is a useful addition since he actually knows people to talk to that Grian doesn't and can move things forward by bringing more information to the table. But I have to proceed carefully to ensure he isn't just a deus ex machina for any hard parts of the plot. Scar talking to someone off-screen can't solve every problem in the story or else it's a bad story.

Chapter seven: some conflict/roadblocks introduced, because Scar cannot just endlessly poke around and find information without repercussions. also, the govt loooooves to make information available only to specific people. you can and will get slapped on the wrist if you consistently overstep the boundaries of your job. also, i need Grian to contribue his own piece to solving the mystery without Scar, so with his boots-on-the ground he finds the trail Mumbo took to get to from point A to point B. He gets a dangerous idea that will later escalate the plot closer to the climax, since we're officially in the second half of the story. There's a flashback that is purposefully the first part of the story so far to have someone outright state they think Mumbo is dead (and of course it's Jimmy.) Ends with more character development for Scar.

Chapter eight: WOOOO SCAR CHAPTER! but not before some egregiously obvious foreshadowing and a distinct reminder that this is a story about fire. i break from my deep character pov for the first time just to give the readers some scientific and historical background. we finally learn more about Scar, which should in theory retroactively piece together why he specifically wants to help Grian so much: because he sees his own experiences reflected in what Grian is living through now. also, since so much of this story is Grian isolating himself and pushing help away, it is vital for him to be shown someone else Does understand him

Chapter nine: beginning of the end pt 1 of 3. we re-center fire as a risk in the story again. grian commits a few crimes, because his main motivation this whole time has been information. and he simply can't get that information sitting in a tower by himself in the woods. he is desperate to find puzzle pieces to slot together so that everything makes sense. this is also the height of his conspiratorial thinking and there's a big disconnect between how he views other people, and their actual actions. I initially didn't want the story to "leave" its main setting, I wanted it to be a bottle. But that just didn't work in practice when plotting this out.

Chapter ten: beginning of the end pt 2 of 3, and we bring the flashback scenes full circle by including grian's decision to become a lookout in the same chapter we learns he gets fired. a somewhat anti-climactic reveal of there not being all that much conspirarcy to Mumbo's disappearance, in a way that hopefully is not disappointing since hopefully everyone reading realizes Why grian was convinced of this and Why he's wrong. woooo fire again! the return of the mystical bike location that was introduced early in the plot! grian finally being forced to reckon with things he's been avoiding thinking about all story! a fallout between our beloved main characters at the 11th hour!

Chapter eleven and twelve: ???? coming soon but you can guarantee they'll deal with the loose ends here since this story is standalone in its plot

So, idk if that type of analytical breakdown is useful to you. But you can kind of see how my plot was guided by the constraints on my narrative--a lot of my choices involved either needing different characters to help grian, or needing grian to go somewhere else. but i constantly wanted to make sure that it made sense for Scar to help Grian, that Scar never overstepped his place in the narrative by being "all-knowing", and that all of Grian's decisions are driven, even to the point of Problems, by his grief. Also, to kickstart the plot, I needed at least one major shake-up to happen (in this story, finding the bike) or else Grian probably would have been just as doomed as everyone else to look in the wrong places. Since it's more or less a cold case, a breakthrough needed to happen to move things forward. So I suppose what I needed was: first, to know the ending I needed to get to; second, to know where I was starting; and third, to provide at least one major clue to give the characters an opportunity to unravel the rest.

Also, this is less about mysteries and more about characterization, but when writing Grian I put Mumbo at the highest priority in all situations. This means he is willing to tank his financial situation, his jobs, his relationships with his friends, and even commit crimes for Mumbo. He consistently does not consider his own future when making decisions. He's reactive and more than willing to take things to the extreme, which I think makes him honestly more fun to write about. I think his Drive pushes the story even when there's just dialogue sitting in a fire tower. One thing I never wanted to do in this story was soften characters' emotions or actions into something "easier."

anyway, this is a story about trying to find logic in places where there is none, coping badly and learning to cope, accepting support from others, grief, and finding closure <333 thank you for your ask it was very sweet to be asked for advice and hopefully SOMETHING in this essay helps <333

#twirls hair hiiiiiiii #i can analyze like every bit of this au like an english assignment u have no clue #i think uhhhh half my enjoyment in writing is not just writing but engaging in analysis of things. it is Enrichment for me #there's so much to talk about with the theming in this story honestly. i do A LOT of things on purpose in this fic. #this story is not gonna join the ranks of the Literary Greats but it is my first shot at trying to do many things and i've enjoyed it a lot #from here on out any other story i write (that i take as seriously as this) will just continue to get better because i learned a lot here #hc_firewatch_au #quara asks

[romanceandshenanigans]

Writer Q&A Game

Thanks to @clairelsonao3 for tagging me!

1. What motivates you to write?

I'm not exactly sure tbh. It almost feels like a compulsion. There are days where I simply do not feel good in my body if I haven't written anything. Then there are others where I can't bring myself to write because I'm too tired or too distracted from life. Honestly the second I get a clear head and enough time to myself, I'll start writing.

2. A line/short snippet of your writing that you are most proud/happy of. If not maybe share a line of someone else's work you love (just please credit them)

This isn't from my WIP, but from a fanfic I wrote a while ago. I want to try to find a way to incorporate it into something. Not sure where though.

“I know this seems like it’s coming out of nowhere,” he said, “but promise it’s not. I’ve had a long time to think about it.  A few years, actually. I guess, I just didn’t realize how deep I was in it until about five minutes ago.”

She kept silent, but the simple fact she hadn’t told him to get out gave him the confidence to keep going. . 

“I meant it when I said I’m crazy about you. I like that you take your sugar with a drop of coffee.  I like how you sing to yourself when you’re happy.  I like that you never seem to get cold.  I like that you never lose your head under fire, but still need me to get rid of spiders. I like that you can laugh at yourself.  I like that you can laugh at me. Hell, I like that you’re perfectly willing to slap my face if the situation calls for it.

I like so many things about you Liz, and that’s just the stuff I found out on accident.  I can only imagine the stuff I’d learn if I started loving you on purpose."

3. Which OC makes you smile every time you think/talk about them and what are they like?

I really do enjoy writing Finn. The boy just makes my smile.

Close second is another OC which I wrote for fanfic who I want to save and put someplace else, Lucy. She's my softest girl who has a lot of love to give. Might figure out a way to put her in this regency setting somewhere, but who knows.

4. What process of writing do you enjoy the most?

The first draft spree. The moment when you get an idea and you have write it down as quickly as possible. It's rough and definitely will need some editing, but that rush cannot be topped. It just feels satisfying to exorcise even the smallest of scenes out of my body.

5. What part of writing do you think you are the best at? (Yes stroke your own ego it's okay)

Dialogue, hands down. It's at least the part I've gotten the most compliments on.

6. What is something in the writeblr community is most enjoyable?

I've only just started to dip my toe in, but I really do love answering asks. I like seeing other writer's process and knowing I'm not alone. It's just fun!

7. A writing tool/device you use that helps you with writing? (It could be speech to text, a writing program etc)

I've been using Scrivener and it's really helped me keep everything organized. I have a very conspiracy board way of drafting, so having all my random snippets in one place really helps.

8. A piece of worldbuilding that you like in your own story? (It could be the magic system, a particular place in the story, a law etc)

Not sure world building is my strong suit for this current WIP. I suppose I'm enjoying expanding the world of the theatre, but I admittedly need to do more research.

9. What piece of advice would you say to encourage others to write if they are having a rough patch?

Write anyway. It doesn't have to be the scene that's giving you trouble. It doesn't even have to be for the piece you're trying to focus on, just don't get out of the habit of writing. Once you lose that momentum, it takes a long time to get it back.

10. Tag some people whose works you love/have been your biggest supporters

Gotta give a shout out to @clairelsonao3 for being so welcoming in my introduction to the writeblr community. And @janec23, for being one of the few specifically romance writers to reach out.

But I really can't begin to thank all the people who have followed me from my fanfic blog over to this one. It really means so much to know people are interested in reading anything I put out there.

@flapjacques, @jo-harrington, @can-of-pringles, @handahbear, @auroramagpie, @justanothersadperson93, @sad-cat-hours, @ghostface001, @theowlwhocameback, @mattmurdocksscars, @roruna, @everything-intertwined, @sweetjedi, @arcanerazil, @vibratingbonesbis, @delirious0pandemonium, @llovelykenobi, @geek-girl7, @mixedupanddown

Know that I love and appreciate you all.

I'm also going to leave this an OPEN tag to anyone who wants to do this, and especially invite everyone who I have tagged above. (and

#tag game #writeblr #wip: untitled regency romance #writeblr asks #about the author #writeblr tag game