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hobeymakar · 4 years

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Whatever Will I Be | J. Skinner

Words: 2,627

A/N: In this, COVID-19 is going on and the playoffs are currently happening in its new schedule and format

Warnings: swearing, alcohol use, mentions of sex

You wake up to the sound of footsteps bursting through the door and running to your bed, pulling on your legs.

“Mommy! Daddy! Wake up!” you hear your twin sons exclaim, as they continue to pull on your legs.

“Boys! Stop it!” Jeff groans, sitting up.

He lifts Jesse up onto the bed and Jesse takes that as an excuse to crawl over to you.

“Mommy wake up!” he whines, yanking on your arm.

“Jesse! Be gentle with Mommy!” Jeff warns, shooting him a look.

Jeremy waddles his way over to Jeff’s side and gets lifted onto the bed, as well.

“Morning, boys,” you finally say, not wanting to be attacked some more by your sons.

“Auntie Jillian is here!” they announce.

“That’s great. How about Daddy makes breakfast!” you suggest, knowing how much the boys love when Jeff makes breakfast.

“Daddycakes! Daddycakes!” the boys chant, referring to Jeff’s pancakes.

“Alright boys, Daddycakes it is,” he smiles, getting up from bed.

He puts on an old Kitchener Rangers shirt before leaving the room. He obviously checks the boys pull-ups first, making sure they didn’t pee in them overnight. That’s one of the many times you’re both thankful that the boys are potty trained and only use the pull-ups at night. They then head downstairs where they’re met with Jillian who is standing in the kitchen, typing away on her phone.

“Good morning, Jeff,” she smiles, hugging her older brother.

“Jill, what brings you here so early?” he asks, as he places the twins in their high chairs.

“I figured I could help you guys out early. I know today is a big day and I figured I could help you deal with my favorite little nephews,” she explains.

“Yeah well with these little guys, we’re gonna need all the help we can get,” he replies, getting the ingredients out of the pancakes.

“Where’s Y/N?” she asks.

You start waddling your way downstairs right after she asks.

“Speaking of the devil,” he chuckles, as you slowly make your way to the kitchen.

“Y/N!” Jillian smiles, hugging you.

“Hi, my love! It’s so good to see you!” you smile back.

“How’s my little niece or nephew doing?” she asks, placing her hands on your bump.

“He or she is alright. This pregnancy has been easier than the twins. God, that pregnancy was so exhausting, but with this little one it’s been pretty smooth,” you explain, thinking about the hell the wins put you through.

“Mommy, juice!” Jesse chants, smacking his hands against the table.

“Jesse, what do we say?” you ask, giving him a stern look.

“Pwease!” he replies, shoving a finger in his mouth.

You, Jillian, and Jeff laugh before you get both Jesse and Jeremy a juice box, since you know that Jeremy would ask for one after seeing his brother drinking one.

“So I talked to Mom and Dad and the girls and they said they should be here within the next few hours to set everything up for the party. What time is your family coming, Y/N?” she asks.

“I don’t know. They said they would get here by 2:30,” you inform her.

“Awesome because we were planning to start this thing around that time. Everyone can eat and have a good time and then at like 6 we can do the actual reveal,” she suggests.

“That sounds like a great idea, Jill!” you smile, loving the plan.

“Thank you, my love. I always have the best ideas,” she teases.

Normally, you would’ve had a bigger celebration with Jeff’s teammates and all the WAGs, as well as all your friends and extended family. The celebration would’ve also taken place in Buffalo, as Jeff would be in training camp at the moment. However, COVID-19 brought a change to all their plans, so their celebration will be in their backyard and is limited to only you and Jeff’s immediate family.

Jeff finishes making the pancakes and serves everyone. He also pours coffee for himself, you, and Jillian. You all sit and watch as the twins eat and babble, while making a mess all over themselves and their high chairs.

“Are you guys sure you’re ready for another kid?” Jillian asks, looking at how chaotic the twins are.

“If I can handle these two little terrors, I think I can handle a third child on top. Although I will take advantage of this extra time Jeff has had to help,” you explain.

“I never knew how hard it was to get these two into bed every night, until I started doing it mostly by myself while I let Y/N rest,” he confesses.

“Now you know why I would always be so tired every time you would come home after a game,” you reply.

“Best wife ever,” he smiles, kissing your forehead.

“I love our children, even though they’re so damn hyper,” you admit.

The boys start babbling about something and you both pretend like you understand exactly what they’re saying. After a while, they finish eating and you clean them up, as Jeff picks up all the dishes and puts them all in the dishwasher.

“Babe, can you give the boys a bath, please? They have syrup all over their hair and themselves,” you note, taking in how filthy the boys managed to get themselves.

“Sure babe. Come on boys, you’re both stinky! Ew!” he teases, putting his shirt over his nose.

That gets a rise out of the twins as they start to laugh uncontrollably at their father’s antics. He picks them both up and carries them upstairs.

“Is my brother ready for another kid?” Jillian, as soon as he’s upstairs.

“I know it’ll be tough once the new season starts, but he loves being a dad and I know he’ll be able to handle it,” you reply, knowing how great he is with the twins.

“Yeah, he’s pretty great with them and he’ll be even better with a daughter. Right now, you’re outnumbered by the boys in your house,” she teases.

“I mean, I would love having another boy, but having a girl would be really great, too! It would be great to not be so outnumbered too,” you tease, referring to the amount of testosterone in your house.

Jillian goes outside to start setting up for the party, while you start preparing what to make for the party. After a bit, Jeff’s other sisters show up, as well as his parents and they help set up. Jeff’s mom and two of his sisters take over in the kitchen, so that you can go get ready. You head back upstairs and take a nice warm, relaxing bath, as everyone else is busy preparing for the party.

After a while, you get out of the bath and head to your room to get dressed. You’re in your closet getting ready for the party, while your in-laws are setting up everything in the backyard. The weather has been nice in Markham recently and you’re hoping that will continue for the few days left of summer. You, Jeff, and the twins have been at your offseason home in Markham ever since the league allowed for players to travel back to their home countries.

You and Jeff had decided right away that it was best for your little family to head back to Markham instead of riding out the pandemic in Buffalo. You’re both glad you did because it’s been a long offseason, with the Sabres not making the qualifying round.

You're currently 20 weeks pregnant with your second child, after getting pregnant right after quarantine started. You thought people were lying about a quarantine baby boom, but you definitely contributed to that. You finish getting dressed with your hair and makeup done as well. You have a blue and gold dress on, which are obviously Sabres colors, while Jeff is dressed in his jersey and the twins are also dressed in their mini Skinner jerseys. You leave the room and make your way downstairs and as soon as you head outside, you hear the shouts of “Mommy!”

The twins come barreling towards you and hug your legs.

“You look so pretty, Mommy!” they exclaim.

“Thank you so much, my babies!” you smile, ruffling their curls.

Jeff then makes his way towards you and you swear you hear the air being punched out of lungs.

“Wow, babe! You look amazing,” he smiles, kissing you.

“It’s amazing how nice I clean up when I’m given some alone time away from our little terrors,” you tease, referring to your active 2 year old sons who think it’s fun to drive you both crazy.

“Well good thing my family’s all here to help, except for Ben,” he adds, referring to his only brother Ben.

Ben is currently gearing up for another season playing hockey in Germany and unfortunately couldn’t be here but he’s apparently gonna be sent the video from one of Jeff’s sisters. You greet all of Jeff’s sisters and his parents, before greeting your family as well. Everyone is talking about the bets they placed on the gender and the decorations are set up perfectly. All the treats are baby-themed and everything looks amazing for something being planned during a global pandemic. Andrea pours you a mommy-gria aka a non-alcoholic sangria and you watch the kids interact with Jeff’s family, as well as your family. Music is playing and everyone is dancing and having a good time, completely forgetting about the chao going on in the world for the moment.

The food is being served outside and everyone is eating while also trying to keep a bit of a distance from everyone, as you’re still in a global pandemic. Your family is interacting with the Skinner family nicely and times like these makes you really miss family. In the beginning of the pandemic, the lockdown made it so that you couldn’t see you and Jeff’s family, but now with the restrictions easing, you’ve been cherishing the time being spent with them.

After a while, everyone finishes eating and you head over to the driveway where the net is set up and Jeff grabs his stick in his hand. Everyone follows suit and crowds around in the driveway to get a good view of the surprise. Jennifer hands him the special puck and they all get ready to film the gender reveal.

“Are you all ready?” Jeff asks, stickhandling the puck a little.

“Yes!” they all shout in unison.

“Alright, 1-2-3!” he shouts, before shooting the puck into the empty net.

Pink smoke comes out of the puck and everyone starts shouting. Jeff hugs and kisses you as tears of joy start to roll down your cheeks.

“I love you so much, baby!” he smiles, kissing you.

“You’re gonna be the best girl dad ever!” you assure him, knowing how great he is with the twins.

Those who bet boy pay up their debts and hand all the money in a box to Jillian, who returns it to your room for safe keeping. The music turns back on and people start dancing again, while Jennifer and Andrea go back inside to grab stuff to cut the cake. After that, everyone takes turns taking pictures with you, Jeff, and the kids in front of the cake that reads “whatever will i be?” After all the pictures are taken, Jennifer and Andrea start cutting the cake, while Erica and Jillian pass the pieces of cake out to everyone. After a while, everyone has a slice and you sit down on your favorite chair while you eat your cake. Jeff is sat right beside you as the twins are on their high-chairs making a mess from eating the cake.

“Are you boys excited to have a little sister?” Jeff asks.

“Sister! Sister! Sister!” they chant over and over again, smashing the cake with their hands.

“I guess that’s a yes,” he chuckles, kissing your cheek.

You start thinking of names for your baby girl as you eat, not noticing yourself starting to zone out.

“Hello earth to Y/N!” Jeff calls out, waving his hand in front of your face.

You snap out of it and blink a few times before turning to face him. “Sorry, babe.”

“What are you thinking so hard about?” he asks.

“Just names for our baby girl,” you reply.

“Already? What names are you thinking of?” he asks.

“I like Scarlett for her first name and Jessica for her middle name,” you inform him.

“Scarlett Jessica Skinner? I like that,” he smiles, nodding his head.

“So Scarlett Jessica it is then?” you ask to make sure.

“Yes babe, Scarlett Jessica it is,” he confirms, nodding his head.

Your daughter starts moving around in your womb, clearly agreeing with the choice for her name.

“She’s moving so I guess she likes her name,” you giggle, loving the feeling of her movements.

After a while, everyone is done eating, and Jeff’s sisters help clean everything up. After a while, some of your family start leaving, bidding you, Jeff, and the kids farewell. More and more people follow suit until it’s just Jeff’s family left. They help clean up everything and bring everything inside to the house. They packaway the leftovers to take over to their houses, since you tell them that you don’t want any of it.

After everything is cleaned up, Jillian informs you and Jeff that she’ll be taking the twins home with her to watch them so that you and Jeff can have a night alone together. You both happily agree to it and Jeff goes upstairs to pack everything for the kids, while you make yourself comfortable on the couch. After what feels like forever, but it’s really 20 minutes, Jeff returns with two bags packed for the twins.

“Babe, it’s one night! They don’t need all that stuff!” you sigh, knowing that he for sure overpacked.

“I just want them to have everything they need,” he defends himself, handing Jillian the bags.

“Are you boys ready to have a sleepover with Auntie Jillian?” Jillian asks.

“Yes! Sleepover!” they chant in excitement, since they know they’ll be able to get away with everything with their Aunt.

“Alright, let’s go kiddos!” she shouts, grabbing their hands.

She bids everyone farewell and leaves the house with the kids in tow. The rest of Jeff;s family follow suit and before you know it, the house is left to just you two.

“Do you hear that babe?” you ask.

“The sweet sound of silence. God, I can’t wait to sleep in tomorrow!” he cries out in joy.

“I love the boys, but I’m sure gonna enjoy this night without them,” you add.

“I’m gonna go shower,” he informs you.

“Alright, I’ll be getting ready for bed,” you inform him.

You both go upstairs and into the bathroom. You take off your makeup and tie up your hair, while Jeff takes a shower. You then go to your room and get dressed for bed, wearing only underwear, since you won’t have to deal with children trying to get into your bed in the morning.

You then climb onto the bed and wait for him, turning on the TV and getting comfortable. After a while, he comes out of the room wearing a t-shirt and shorts. He takes in the sight of you in your underwear and he goes straight onto the bed, grabbing the remote and turning on the TV.

“Hey, I was watching that!” you protest, pretending to be mad.

“No, I know exactly what you were doing!” he responds back.

He’s right, you were trying to take advantage of the lonely night and he luckily, took the bait. Jillian is officially your favorite sister-in-law now.

#jeff skinner #buffalo sabres #hockey #nhl imagines #nhl players #jeff skinner imagine #hockey imagine #nhl writing

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hecohansen31 · 4 years

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The Perks Of Quarantine:

Modern! Ivar+Tinder Date! Reader

(A/N): Hello there, lovelies!

This is a ‘thank you’ fic for @youbloodymadgenius, who donated to my Ko-Fi.

I obviously understand that this is an hard time for everyone, so I just wanted to thank you everyon who has been donating something to help me continue my passion of writing.

Please don’t feel pressured in any way in buying me a ko-fi; it isn’t the only way to support a writer (you can always reblog, comment and let people know how much you liked their stuff).

Thank you for everyone who has been supporting me!

I truly apprecciate it!

And as always: feedback is food for our writers’ minds, so please don’t forget to leave your own feedback!

WARNINGS: Mention of Sex, Quarantine, Covid-19, Disability.

Hey guys!

Have you been wondering what our two favorite idiots have been doing in quarantine?

Well, now get ready to figure it out!

And let’s start from a few questions that might arise:

THE FIGHTS:

As you might know Ivar and Tinder Date (which we’ll call TD from now on, because it is easier) they have recently moved in together and two months after that… COVID-19 hit and they were forced to discover further their compatibility and problematics.

Which might have been a pretty difficult situation.

Living with people other than yourself is already hard… think with somebody who is your lover but yet you don’t know as well as your family, all incased in an almost apocalyptic world, where anxiety is at its maximum levels,

The situation certainly wasn’t the best.

But I think that Ivar and TD would try their best to handle it, mostly through setting up two different routines, in order not to be constantly in each other’s presence, alongside setting up ‘time outs’ moments for fights.

Any fight with Ivar has the promise of being explosive, but whereas previously TD had the possibility to avoid him through going to work or taking a breather outside, this is now denied.

So, they try to avoid any fight from getting too aggressive with ‘time outs’.

Basically if either of them is dealing badly with something and TD can see that they are coming to the breaking point, they push themselves away, removing them from the situation, either moving to another room or doing something to calm themselves, in order to break the outburst from growing too big and explosive, confronting the other when they both feel calmer.

It doesn’t always work, mostly during the first times, but they are both determined to make this work out and no matter what you won’t run out or give up easily.

BOREDOM:

They deal with boredom quite well, honestly.

It’d certainly help that they both work, probably remotely, even more for Ivar, who is actually used to it, because before the entire COVID-19 many times when the pain to his legs was pretty debilitating, he tended to work from home and not go in the office with the other brothers.

I do think that he’d also be pretty nice in helping TD settling in, although she would soon know better than to invade his own ‘private office’ (like not to annoy you, but I feel like he’d be the type to have a psychotic breakdown if she accidentally brushed his elbow against his).

But he’d try his best to be helpful.

I also think that he’d drown in his work to avoid boredom, and probably the most fun he’d have (other than you know… the kinky stuff) would be rewatching his favorite movie sagas, probably wrestling with TD which movie to watch each night, although she’d probably give up, because he is the cutest geek as he does the Dark Vather’s voice.

I personally think that TD would try her best to learn new skills (me before quarantine: ‘OH LOT OF TIME TO LEARN THINGS’, me right now ‘the only thing I learned is that I can’t respect good thoughts’) and involve a rather annoyed Ivar in them, which would undoubtedly result in him learning some obscure and cool skills (such as his magical tricks or fucking origami, he’d just be so happy and calm doing origami).

And he’d hate it when TD accidentally sat on his perfect swan.

As two rather active young people, they’d also do your best to properly exercise, even more Ivar since he kind of need physical therapy so he does some small exercises on videochat with his physical therapist, unless his legs hurt pretty badly and she has to come home to him.

He’d have the time of his life, instead, watching TD train.

All those flexes and squats… he very much gets distracted every time she set up her own training moment, hence he does his best to avoid having truly busy evenings when he knows you’ll train (also because, although TD might call him a pervert, they always do a different kind of ‘exercise’, before the shower, if this one isn’t shared).

INTIMACY:

Their sex drive hasn’t in the slightest accelerated.

(I mean not that it wasn’t pretty high already).

As much as they might have more time at hands together, they aren’t that free from things to do that they can spend the entire day in bed just learning the newest aerobic moves (you spend the entire morning in bed still) (… what can you do when Ivar rolls over with those pretty pleading eyes).

It certainly does help that they can both tease each other meanwhile, working next to each other.

Although it lowers their work efficiency and Hvitserk does have a few ideas on why Ivar sometimes fakes that his connection doesn’t work.

It certainly does help instead with the intimacy part, because Ivar tends to be quite more affectionate at home, because he feels more at ease, so it is something that certainly has grown, mostly in his own willingness to start it.

Like it isn’t unusual for TD to hug him from behind if he is checking some documents and doesn’t have the webcam on, but it is certainly unusual for him to just simply grab her hand over the table, and maybe play a bit with her fingers or hair or to try to convince her to cuddle, together during one pause from work..

It certainly does help with making the dork lovey-dovey.

GOING OUT:

Exiting the house for the basic necessity is actually the most common source of fights between them, mostly at the start of the entire quarantine.

TD prefers to avoid Ivar going out of home, not because she doubt his integrity and attentiveness about all the matter (he is a clean freak so you have nothing to worry) but you are more worried by the thought that he might end up breaking a bone and might need some help, something that not many people in this time of need and rush might not be able to give him.

And to Ivar this is slightly humiliating, because he is the man of the house and he shouldn’t be afraid of anything or show any kind of weakness.

He should protect you.

Alongside this, he is truly concerned about TD’s wellbeing.

Like the only people he’d truly worry for in this pandemic would be her and his mother, because they are the sole ones that loves him freely, so he would be devastated to know one of the two sick because of him.

It’d just destroy him.

But at the same time, he just can’t fight her for ever, even more when he knows that she doesn’t mean to insult him, but she is simply stating the truth that sadly going out for him wouldn’t be as easy as for you.

He’d try to avoid this through online shopping and avoiding any problematics, but it’d scare him like hell to see you go out and he’d just hold you a bit tighter when you came back.

FAMILY:

As previously stated, Ivar misses his mother extremely.

He honestly is worried sick for her and as the complete momma’s boy he is, he’d absolutely call her daily, maybe more, although I do admit that Aslaug would do the exact same, so Td has set up a routine with the daily calls.

The fact that Aslaug always makes sure to suggest her how to care for Ivar, is a bit too noisy, but she is also very sweet in thanking TD for taking care of her ‘babyboy’ (and TD has now enough backmail material for a lifetime, with all the stories Aslaug has told her about child! Ivar).

He also low key misses his brothers, mostly Hvitserk, since they were both used to live with each other, but he deals with it better, mostly because they still work together, hence it doesn’t trouble him too much so they see daily although through a computer screens, instead I do think that some of his interactions might be healthier.

It is nice when you can’t stab your brother through the computer.

About TD, she misses her family dearly and Ivar can see it sadly, knowing when he has to cuddle her a bit closer that night, because she misses her mom’s sweet words or her father’s boisterous laugh.

Although he might not seem it, he is every inch the attentive lover she needs in these harsh times of need.

THE END OF IT:

Ivar wouldn’t believe it, truly.

He’d have the hardest time going back to reality, mostly because he is worried that the quick lift of some regulations might push people to act recklessly, so he’d be on his best behavior and would absolutely make sure TD did the same.

He’d be quite severe (constantly carrying extra-masks and hand sanitizer in every bag) but he’d also lift all his own ‘regulations’ to meet his mother and family, although he’d try his best to do it safely, being sure to avoid physical contact, although he’d wish nothing more.

He’d also keep the visits short and make sure to set up most of his work still at home, coming to the office solely if extremely needed, coming to the nearest one.

It’d take him quite some time to calm himself, but eventually he’d be happy (I hope).

@youbloodymadgenius @alexhandersenx @peaceisadirtyword @madamholmes @flowers-in-your-hayr @ justananotherlazzyperson @ thespottedcreature @ amy8220 @peakygroupie @ where-are-you-everywhere @emmyrosee @crys-1029 @avengers-fixation @ bagpipes606 @mac5323 @ serafina21 @lost-soul-was-taken @maggiescarborough @a-mess-of-fandoms @lonewolf471 @ fuckindiva

#Ivar #Ivar The Boneless #Ivar Reader #Ivar x Reader #Ivar Imagine #Ivar Fic #Ivar The Boneless Fic #Ivar Moodboard #Ivar The Boneless Moodboard #modern! ivar #modern au #Ivar Lothbrock #Vikings #History Vikings #Ivar Lothbrock Imagine #Vikings Imagine

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ginger-bread-official · 4 years

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Moony and Thumper Hijinx

Ficlet of a budding friendship between Tonks and Lupin in Harry’s 3rd year. Tonks trains near hogsmead and has found a companion in Remus Lupin.

Tonks had no official reason to keep her security credentials to the castle. She had finished her dueling training and passed her exam with Moody, but she still wanted to have the freedom to go up to the castle when she pleased to visit her favorite werewolf. It had become apparent that Remus and her had become friends through all of the dueling lessons and afternoon tea that had transpired in the past few months. They would walk the grounds together, plot pranks on the twins, share old stories; she recently started confiding in him about her dating life. He of course was one voice in a choir telling her to get back on the horse and start dating after Tulip’s betrayal, but he was the only voice that listened when she spoke back. He laughed at her date’s blunders and only gently teased her about hers. It had come to her attention during her visits that the students weren’t the only ones noticing the charming werewolf. Aurora Sinestra was commonly found nearby with her deep chocolate eyes focusing more often on the DADA Professor.

“Oh Thumper give it a rest.” Lupin rolled his eyes hearing Tonks’ theory for the hundredth time, “Aurora is not interested in me.” They were in the library searching for reference material that the professor needed for a lesson.

“She most definitely is.” Tonks whispered back. “Every time I’m up here she’s prowling around the corner,” She scratched the air playfully “waiting to pounce on you.” Remus shook his head amused at the young auror. “I’m only sorry I’ve gotten in the way. I don’t mean to be a cock block.”

“I suspect you’re projecting your own frustrations on to me.”

“Don’t try and turn this around to me Moony.” She shut down his deflection. “She’s clearly into you, and you’re blind old wolf to not see it.”

“SHHHH.” The harsh hush of Madam Pince came from around the corner. Tonks winced at the sound. She definitely didn’t miss that old bat looming around every bookcase. The old crone retreated after shooting the pair a dirty look.

“Your going to get yourself a detention Miss Tonks.” Lupin said with a playful smirk. Tonks stuck her tongue out at him, “Mature.” He chortled as he handed her another book to hold.

“When did I become your pack mule?” She added the book to the growing stack.

“When you decided to hang around during my free period.”

“I thought free period meant free time.” She whined. “Like free time to pull one over on Sprout, or free to go flying for a bit.”

“This is when I plan my lessons. Would you rather I don’t teach my students.” He asked still looking through ‘The Defensive Field Guide.’

“I’m sure they’d appreciate a day off. You’re working them pretty hard.”

“They need to catch up if they want to pass their O.W.Ls and N.E.W.Ts.” he closed the book and replaced it gesturing to her to follow him with the books. “I’ve only got 3 students that made it to N.E.W.Ts level from my predecessors. I can’t let them down like that.” He pulled out another Defensive book. Tonks smiled as his focus zeroed in on the book in his hand.

“Whats your goal?”

“My what?” He didn’t look up from the book.

“Your goal? How many students are you trying to get to N.E.W.Ts?” He didn’t look at her, but she noticed his eyes stopped scanning the page. “5? 10? Half?”

“All of them.” He stated

“Come on Professor, it's just you and me, who’s making the cut?” She leant in, “Dish.” She demanded. He finally broke his focus from the book meeting her eyes with a smirk.

“All of them.” He persisted

“Remus—”

“No,” he cut her off, “if I pick and choose the talented ones then I’m failing those who really need my help. So—” he leant in, “All of them, Nymphadora.” She reacted immediately taking the top book off the pile next to her and swinging it at the werewolf head. “Ouch!” He yelped when the book made contact.

“Don’t call me Nymphadora.” She scolded. He was still smiling though undercutting her stern tone. Madam Pince skulked around the corner probably hearing the commotion.

“I think we better head out.” Remus whispered, “Wouldn’t want you to get sent to the Headmasters office.” He was really enjoying toying with her. They checked out the books he picked and headed back to his office. The students they passed waved and greeted Lupin pleasantly. She remarked how he should run for governor of Hogwarts, earning a sly smile from him. She let him read through his books and prepare for his lessons in peace with the promise of shenanigans later. She read her study materials on the couch with the sounds of smooth jazz playing from his record player. A couple students stopped by for some academic help and she perked her head up to watch him interact with the students. She admired how passionate he was about helping these kids, she only wished she had a DADA professor who helped her. She had to work her ass off to make it to N.E.W.Ts and to get an acceptable grade for the Auror program.

She stood after a while.

“Tea?” She asked. Remus raised his hand in acknowledgement, which she took as a yes. She brought his cup to him, looking over his shoulder at his lesson plans. “Is this for your 4th years?” She asked,

“3rd.” He corrected her.

“Ahh. Harry’s year.” He nodded. “What does he call you during class?” Her signature inquisitive nature taking over.

“What?” He asked, remaining focused on his work.

“What does he call you? Remus? Moony? Dad? Pappa Professor?” She huffed in amusement. She saw a small smile play at his lips.

“He calls me Professor.” He answered simply

“But, but he’s your son.” She argued; Remus shrugged,

“He doesn’t call Sirius or I Dad.” Tonks thought on this a moment.

“He definitely has.” She remarked, “He did when we were kids sometimes.”

“Well growing up it would slip out, but Sirius and I never told him to call us dad.” He thought through when Harry would call them Dad, and how they would gently remind him that they were uncle Padfoot and Uncle Moony. Tonks’ brow was stitched. She was compiling all the memories of Harry as a boy, and she found that Lupin was right he called them Padfoot and Moony almost exclusively.

“Why is that?” She didn’t consider that this might be a sensitive issue. “You guys raised him.” His body tensed and his voice was strained when he answered,

“You’re forgetting, his real dad was our best friend.” She knew she went too far, hit a nerve. A beat of silence fell allowing Tonks to feel properly ashamed.

“Well, whether he calls you dad or not, you’ve done a great job raising him.” His body relaxed and she could have sworn she saw him looking at her from the side of his eye. The tension dispersed; she squeezed his shoulder leaving him to his planning again.

The pair worked the afternoon in amicable silence. Remus worked out his lesson plans while Tonks studied. She didn’t want to think too hard on it, but she had been spending a lot of time with Remus recently. He distracted her, and she was finding she really liked his company. They were unlikely friends, but friends none the less. She had worked her way through most of her potions workbook by mid afternoon. She was working through a particularly annoying antidote when her book was snatched form her view.

“Okay who are we targeting today?” Remus’ boyish smile lifted her out of her study stupor.

“Well we got Snape two weeks in a row. I think we should lay off for a bit.” She reasoned.

“I guess,” he agreed, “Sprout?”

“Oh I could never,” Tonks sounded almost offended at his suggestion, “She’s too trusting and sweet, it's like pranking a kitten.” He chuckled at her reasoning,

“Ok then. How about Minerva?” Her eyes lit up at the suggestion,

“My Everest.” Tonks agreed. “How do we get her?” She asked the spark returning to her eyes. “Sirius told me about the laser charm to lure Mrs. Norris away. Could we use that?” He chuckled

“It only works on her when she’s a cat.” He explained. Tonks pouted.

“Well then what were you thinking?”

“What if we stash her pillow with cat nip?” Lupin proposed.

“No go. Charlie and I tried something similar our 6th year. She can smell it as a human and then you just get in trouble.” She explained

“Well what if we Charm her quills?”

“To do what?”

“Sign her name as Purrrfessor McGonagall.” Remus smiled at he sudden explosion of laughter.

“Thats brilliant.” She beamed at the professor, “We could also make it so when she writes her first name it changes to ‘meow-va’.”

“Purrrfect.” Remus responded, “I can lure her out of her office with a phony excuse about a student and you sneak in and charm the quills. The only trouble is she adds security charms to her door when she’s not in her office.”

“Way ahead of you. Charlie and I found a way to sneak in her office from the roof.” She stood and put on her gloves adding a sticking charm as she did. “Give me 10 minutes to make it to her office then floo her.” She instructed as she opened his office window and began to lift herself out by the ramparts.

“Tonks wait.” He reached out for her, “We can borrow a broom so you don’t fall off the side of the castle.”

“Your next class starts soon, there’s no time.” She reasoned, “Plus its more fun this way.” She winked as she pulled herself up onto the turret of his tower office. He leant out watching her scale the out side of the castle with her sticky gloves.

“You’re absolutely insane!” He yelled up to her.

“Ten minutes Professor.” Was all she yelled back, and then she was out of sight. Remus chuckled to himself waving is wand at his wrist watch to set a timer.

#nymphadora tonks #tonks #tonks and lupin #Remus Lupin #Remus John Lupin #moony wormtail padfoot and prongs #andromeda tonks #prisoner of azkaban #Harry Potter #Nymphadora Lupin #professor lupin #hogwarts #REMUS AND NYMPHADORA #Nymphadora #Remus Lupin and Nymphadora Tonks

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glovesaved · 4 years

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( jack gilinsky , cis male , he / him, 22 ) no way ! i swear i saw 𝐍𝐎𝐋𝐀𝐍 𝐋𝐈𝐁𝐄𝐑𝐌𝐀𝐍 walking down danforth avenue ! i just saw a post about them on 6secrets ! i think it said something like “ 𝐋𝐄𝐀𝐅𝐒 𝐑𝐈𝐒𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐒𝐓𝐀𝐑 𝐆𝐎𝐀𝐋𝐈𝐄 𝐖𝐀𝐓𝐂𝐇𝐄𝐒 𝐒𝐔𝐍𝐒𝐄𝐓 𝐖𝐈𝐓𝐇 𝐌𝐘𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐘 𝐆𝐈𝐑𝐋 ”. isn’t that wild ? i guess that makes sense since they’re apparently 𝐈𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐍𝐒𝐄 and 𝐔𝐍𝐅𝐎𝐑𝐓𝐇𝐂𝐎𝐌𝐈𝐍𝐆. fans will claim that they’re 𝐈𝐌𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐓𝐔𝐑𝐁𝐀𝐁𝐋𝐄 and 𝐎𝐁𝐒𝐄𝐑𝐕𝐀𝐍𝐓. i mean , it’s not like i know them personally — they’re a famous 𝐋𝐄𝐀𝐅𝐒 𝐆𝐎𝐀𝐋𝐈𝐄 . whenever i think of them, i think of 𝐒𝐋𝐎𝐖𝐋𝐘 𝐅𝐀𝐋𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐃𝐑𝐎𝐏𝐋𝐄𝐓𝐒 𝐎𝐅 𝐖𝐀𝐓𝐄𝐑, 𝐒𝐎𝐅𝐓 𝐒𝐌𝐈𝐋𝐄𝐒 𝐖𝐇𝐄𝐍 𝐘𝐎𝐔 𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐊 𝐍𝐎 𝐎𝐍𝐄 𝐈𝐒 𝐋𝐎𝐎𝐊𝐈𝐍𝐆, & 𝐀 𝐋𝐎𝐎𝐊 𝐈𝐍 𝐃𝐀𝐑𝐊 𝐄𝐘𝐄𝐒 𝐓𝐇𝐑𝐎𝐔𝐆𝐇 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐁𝐀𝐑𝐒 𝐎𝐅 𝐘𝐎𝐔𝐑 𝐌𝐀𝐒𝐊 𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐓 𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐋𝐃 𝐌𝐔𝐑𝐃𝐄𝐑 . i wish i would have asked for an autograph ! ( ollie, they / them, 22, est ).

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐑𝐘:

— nolan’s childhood is fairly normal. born to middle class parents in calgary, skating and playing hockey from a young age. he never had to struggle much in his life, save for his parents’ separation when he was twelve, but even that ended well enough. he was always good at reading people, and though it stung at first, he understood.

— he started his hockey career as a forward, until one of his youth teams lacked a goalie when one of his teammates moved away and nolan volunteered himself to fill the spot. ever since that moment he was in love with the position.

— and the truth was though he was a good forward, he was an even better goalie. with reflexes like a cat, observational skills off the charts, he soon settled into net like he belonged there ( and soon, people were saying nothing else ).

— he was drafted to the everette silvertips in the whl when he was 16 where he continued to blossom and grow, setting franchise and league records including a shutout in his first career start and being named chl goalie of the year. and when his draft year in 2016 came, he was taken in the second round by the toronto maple leafs.

— he returned to everette for two more seasons. in 2017-18 collecting the accolades of whl player of the year, whl goalie of the year, and chl goalie of the year ( for the second time, being the first in chl to do so ). he finished with a 116-46-19 record, 2.01 GAA, 0.927 sv%, and 26 shutouts ( tied for most in chl history ).

— he started the next season with the toronto marlies, his next step in development. however, he was unexpectedly called up in december after one of the leafs goalies was placed on injured reserved. to his surprised, they decided to play him in the very next game which he won, becoming the youngest goaltender in over a decade to win his debut and the youngest in leafs history. he proceeded to record four straight wins before the age of 21, the first goalie to do so in over a decade. he was never sent back down to the marlies.

— the next season ( this past one ), saw him become the youngest in leafs history to record a shutout and slowly begin to claim his place as starter by march. he was pivotal in the leafs playoff run, though they were ultimately eliminated in the first round by boston to the surprise of no one.

— he spent much of the off-season in calgary with his family and doing off-season training there, though he recently returned in mid-august to prepare of the upcoming season.

𝐌𝐈𝐒𝐂:

— his role on the ice is incredibly high pressure no doubt, but he finds facing the toronto media far more intimidating. toronto is a city that cares very deeply for its team and though that is a good thing, it’s easy to feel stifled and under a microscope under all the scrutiny.

— has two gold ( 2015 18u, 2018 world juniors ) and two silver medals ( 2017 world juniors, 2019 worlds ), all for team canada

— “they see him, get lost in his beautiful eyes and forget how to play hockey.” since nolan has carter’s career claim, i’m claiming this conspiracy for him too ( basically, carter faced two fluke shoot out attempts : one where the player completely missed picking up that puck at center ice and another that lost it halfway to the net — both very very rare things to happen at the nhl level )

— jewish

— 6′2″. dark brown hair, light brown eyes. doesn’t smile an awful lot, but when he does and does genuinely you get the sense akin to the sun coming out from behind a cloud.

— i should put more here but honestly i’m figuring him out as i go

— oh that “mystery girl” in his headline is probs like a cousin or something aha

— should also mention he is bi on dl

— considered a bit of an enigma considering how little people know about him

𝐏𝐄𝐑𝐒𝐎𝐍𝐀𝐋𝐈𝐓𝐘:

— on the ice, nolan is the picture perfect image of focus, dark eyes and a look that could murder if anyone gets too close to him. and for a long time, who he was on the ice and who he was off it weren’t the same thing, but over time those lines began to blur and more and more he was dragging who he was on the ice off it too. the result was an increasingly withdrawn boy which only became worse when his prospect rankings began to rise and his looks only got more handsome. he retreated into the most familiar emotional armor he knew : the one he wore on the ice.

— he’s deeply private, hating to share much of his personal life though he does maintain an instagram on which he occasionally takes pleasure in posting cryptic photos just to confuse people.

— nolan is someone who requires a lot to get to him. he can keep a calm demeanor for an incredibly long time before he cracks, not surprising for someone who holds a position as stressful as his.

— despite his more withdrawn and quiet tendencies, he’s not exactly an asshole. he interacts with his fans courteously enough and doesn’t go out of his way to make anyone else’s life tougher. that being said, a lifetime in goal and as of late plenty of time off it has perfected a damn good death glare that he will use to keep people from talking to him if he has to.

— a man of few words, it’s rare to really get nolan chatty. only his closest friends and teammates succeed at this, otherwise small talk and frivolity often will result in silence. but nolan speaks plenty in actions, certainly someone who places a lot more value in a smile or kind gesture than any verbal expression.

— he’s not nearly as tough as his cagey eyes and stoic exterior would suggest, at heart perhaps a lonely boy who’s thrown up so many walls that he finds it difficult to truly connect with anyone.

𝐎𝐎𝐂:

hello friends... anyone remember noah from six 1.0 ?? well, i basically just made another goalie with carter ha/rt’s career claim 😔😔😔. anyway, i still hate the leafs and i hope six-verse leafs have a better defense than irl leafs, if not then my boy truly has the patience of a saint.

#sixhqintro #this is so bad i'm sorry #the best thing abt this intro #is definitely the header #and that's only bc jack is looking real softe in that photo #and if i called him jason at any point in thsi intro....#pls looke the other way thanks

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bedlamgames · 4 years

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Q&A #103

Today we have the Twine conversion, lesbian training mantras, social lube, a bunch of random stuff from the discord, and a whole lot more.

[Anonymous said]: I'm really curious what the tally means for your twine conversion posts. Can't seem to figure out what its suppose to represent progress wise...

- Answered this last Q&A. Because of you asking I’ve now also added the explanation to what it’s about to every stream post so I hope that helped with understanding what’s going on with that.

[Anonymous said]: Suggestion: For races that start with a random corruption (ie: Succubi), have an option in full custom to spend points to either narrow what that corruption is (to be one of the four types, for example) or to outright pick one (for a much higher cost).

- That’s a good idea. Being able to pick specifically I think would be too much. There are ALOT of corruptions so that would mean many many menus to be able to select everything. Being able to pick one of the four types seems fair to me as something to spend points on in Full Custom. Added it to my notes.

[Anonymous said]: Have a succubus slaver who used to be a lamia. On level up, she had the option to get the Fleet trait, which I thought was off-limits for Lamia due to their body shape. I think it's a bug?

- Good spot and should be fixed as of the last update.

[Anonymous said]: Noticed a bug with No Haven 0.903: If you select a human (or once-human) for your character, and then quick restart, your next character will keep the human's Racial aspect Social Lube. On the topic of that Racial, it says " includes one human, and three other different races/subtypes gain an additional Success" Does that mean one human and three non-humans, or one human and three slavers each of a different race from each other?

-Took me awhile to work this out as going from human to human seemed fine. However you’re right that those with a heritage like demi-angels or succubi will incorrectly keep the previous racial.

The second so as long as you have at least one human you can get the buff by say having a northerner, noble, wastelander, and convent.

[Anonymous said]: hi bud, xfto/x421 here, its been a long time i guess. wanted to ask about the status of the no haven/twine conversation. i joined your picardo lately but couldnt post some reports since you dont allow guest-posts. well anyway, the report is about something ridiculous i have found after some restarts, the chosen main charakter (lamia) starts as male with the hard carry aspect(immense shaft) and different description than the ones the perks would give. 1/2

another question, feels like i asked something similiar in the past, how about the integration of different artpacks/access to older pics, or deletion of those that never get used? i guess that would requiere some more access to the game than you allow atm. maybe with twine? do you have a roadmap on tfgames or somewhere for the future of no haven? i know there are some more races you want to implement and improve some systems, but thats it, hope you are doing well in these times. 2/2

I do an update on the patreon every two weeks which is linked on the twitter. You do not need to be a patron to read these and is the best way to stay informed about what I’ve been up to. That includes the status of the conversion. To quickly sum it up;

It's at a stage where all the RAGS to Twine code conversion is basically done. What I need to do now is translate all that work into something playable and there's currently big logic issues with a bunch of the conditions and passages. So what I'm currently doing is trying to tidy up the visual look of the code with a bunch of idents with the theory that will make finding the errors easier.

Alas it’s not me disallowing guest posts... Picarto had some massive stonking issues and so they locked things down hard due to that preventing guests from chatting. I suggest a throwaway email site to get around that.

I don’t think there’s any art in the game file that’s not used as I try to keep on top of deleting the old ones. Not really down for doing art packs of the old ones as due to that not being my art so I see them as placeholder only until they can be replaced by commissions.

I probably do need to do some kind of roadmap sometime. I’m less keen as it’s kind of a dirty word these days as due to the miss-use of them by others it’s got some bad connontations, but I’m also aware the alternative which is me randomly mentioning stuff on discord/picarto streams leaves the vast majority of my audience in the dark which is also really not ideal.

[Anonymous said]: [no haven 0.903] [Crit no longer grants Bimboborn] okay, but how do I get bimboborn now?

- It’s a corruption. Specifically Blessings of Perversion.

[Anonymous said]: With the change to training where hypnotic slavers can fully embed the relevant mantras for blowjob, bimbo, and sissy training, could we also get that for lesbian training?

- Yes that’s the plan when I do the third part of lesbian training. Got a set of commissions planned just got to sort the funding and work out who I’m getting to do it.

[Anonymous said]: hey bud, x421 here, again, might be already fixed because thats from no haven .903, but i recently had the witch queen super rare quest, you might want to proof read the quest and results, there are a few typos. i really did enjoy the writing nonetheless, just a quick question about that quest, as far as i understood this one, you only change your odds of the final result depending on how good you do on your way to the final, but the reward in the end only depends on the final result? 1/2

2/2 it just dawned on me that its been a while since you made an Q&A post so i guess i ll go and lurk on the tfgames forum in the next days, just one last question: i asked early in development about camp upgrades and you were not that convinced about that stuff, i understand you want the slaver camp as some bandit camp and not some castle/bastion or whatever, but since you added camp upgrades, maybe add proximity to a certain region? or something to spend supplies and gold in a 13month+ run?

- Hah! Okay will give it another read through.That’s correct yes. There’s also rewards on the way if you Critical those parts.

There is a new gold sink coming soon in an upcoming update. I’ve also got plans for more camp upgrades coming later.

[From the Patreon]: I'm that guy you replied to about the patch notes in Q&A 101. Solid updates. Bugs in the outfit system has driven me nuts since like, 2015, has it been that long already? I think it has. I like collecting them and something always blows up. This time, I ended up with a slaver wearing both the ooze outfit and ponygirl outfit. So there's that. Also I was disappointed the new Quicker then You'd Like wasn't interactive. Solid in any case though, thanks!

- I'll get them all one day I swear! Don't suppose you remember the chain of events that led to that? New QAYL was a patron requested one with the idea of having a big pay off for playing submissive which often involves playing sub-optimally.

[From the Patreon]: 1-ive been noticing when you choose to repick choices for an slave training assignment the slave gets added to the list of choices 2-also just how rare is the post-slave princess city assignment, cause i can never seem to get it even after selling multiple slave princesses 3-another thing is that the nightly puppet-leader stat is almost impossible to get again(either that or i have bedwarmers incapable of usurping me even thought i my current stats mean i couldnt win against even the subbiest slave)

- Will check 3 as you've not been the only person to mention that. 2 I know exists for sure as other people have definitely got it. Should be no rarer than any other rare City assignment, and thanks for the spot on 1.

[From the Discord]: Top 3 Animes of the 2010 to 2020

Mahou Shoujo Madoka★Magica the series was staggeringly good. Just redefined what anime could be to me. Film is a... well it was a thing. A beautiful thing with an ending which I still quite know how to feel about.

Shirobako. It’s about creativity, craft, and about how people can come together to make something. It might not be something good, but dangit it’s been made and that’s worthwhile. It’s also from personal experience by miles the most accurate depiction of working in an office I’ve ever seen.

Oh man this is very very hard deciding on the third so pick one of the following and I could probably make a strong case for it.

Kobayashi-san Chi no Maid Dragon, Darling in the FranXX (yes really, yes even the ending), Lupin III: Part 5, Kill la Kill, Monster Musume, Flip Flappers, Demi-chan wa Kataritai, Zombieland Saga, or Kaguya-sama wa Kokurasetai.

Also while I was taking the question to mean series both Your Name and Promare are absolutely phenonemal films.

[From the Discord]: Best recent Eurovision Act

Lena. Always Lena.

[From the Discord]: What's the agricultural technological level of No Haven like

It’s not hit industrialization yet. What makes the difference is and allows cities like Aversol and even bigger to exist is that the organization of the human empire is far better than it has any right to be for the other levels of development being able to keep an incredibly complex supply chain constantly flowing even if on the ground level it barely seems to be moving at all. There are also some much, much larger farms both on the Great Plains and further to the north compared to the much more isolated single/couple of households ones that your slavers raid.

[From the Discord]: What have been some of your all-time favourite assignments, both in terms of working on them and how they turned out?

Love When Week’s End Comes for a recent one. Writing all the results in colour commentary (and all the variations for weather, events and outcomes) was a real challenge and I do like how it came out.

Witch-Queen and Arisin’ for being the first times I tried to go for a different, more potentially disturbing/freaky mood, and I’m pleased with the results.

Sable Masquerade as I really like the ‘bad end’ I came up with. Actually I like the whole thing as while the pitch from the patron obviously helped, a lot of it was inspired by a random superhero bondage party picture I saw on HF, which I decided to run with, and had a bunch of fun exploring.

[From the Discord]: Weirdest bug and most difficult bug

The one that resulted in a male wisp riding a griffon was a fun one.

Most difficult has to be the clothing management which as a previous question suggests I’ve still not entirely solved.

[From the Discord]: If No Haven was an MMO, what race/class would you play?

Kreen rogue mainly as I really like the edit I did for the portrait which MidnightonMars later translated into a commission.

If not definitely a lamia.

[From the Discord]: Knowing what you do now about the design of the game, are there any game mechanics you wish you'd have implemented differently?

Clothing management. So very much clothing management. I’ve redone it entirely twice now, and it’s still not where I want it to be.

[From the Discord]: What was your inspiration for creating the setting of No Haven? Has the direction the game has gone varied from your initial idea? If so what has been the biggest change?

- It started off with adapting the chan game Deeper Dungeons which was basically a certain popular mmo with nothing different about it outside of it being porn along with some possibly unwise options of personal abuse. I first changed it by ditching gnomes for neko which to my mind was a clear upgrade. There even used to be an examine refference in the RAGS version to suggest they’d been in the region of the dungeons before being driven out.

Then it was a gradual process of adding with the occasional subtractions to get it closer to a more Warhammer feeling setting which has always been a major love of mine when I was still doing Whorelock’s in RAGS.

With No Haven it was a case of building on what I’ve done there and expanding upon that with the race lore and assignment descriptions. Biggest was probably when I did the favoured/unfavoured stuff and added a ton of extra backstory to various races to justify the choices made there.

#Q&A

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daresplaining · 6 years

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Some Thoughts on Daredevil #600

Here’s to 600 issues of Daredevil (not counting mini-series, annuals, etc.)! As usually happens at these landmark moments, Marvel and the DD creative team celebrated with a longer-than-normal issue, which sparked far-reaching changes to Matt Murdock’s world.

The situation set up by this story arc is a grim one. Wilson Fisk has been elected mayor of NYC. Matt has been keeping an eye on him (and vice versa) as Fisk’s deputy, but has struggled in his every attempt to sabotage him. However, he has recently discovered a crack in Fisk’s law-abiding facade: a meeting that he has planned with the city’s prominent street-level villains. Matt, as Daredevil, gathers together a gang of heroes to crash the party.

Matt: “We protect this city, we fight in its streets, we are New York. And now we’ll take it back from Wilson Fisk. Mayor or not, he has to go down. We agree on that.”

Colorist Matt Milla still hasn’t quite gotten the hair color memo, because poor Jessica has lost her brown hair. It also would have been nice to see Colleen in this team-up, since Misty is there. But these are minor complaints. In a series that restored Matt’s secret identity and thus symbolically isolated him from many of his friends, it’s a powerful gesture, in this climactic issue, to see him engaged in this kind of a team-up... even if most of the people involved still don’t know who he is. It’s especially nice to see Maya (Echo) here, back in action alongside her former friends. Since her resurrection early in the run she has had a few really touching moments of reconnecting with Matt, and we hope to see more of her as the series continues.

Matt has pulled off similar plans in the past, and he has taken down Wilson Fisk in some thoroughly delicious ways, but in this instance, it ends up not being that easy. And we like that-- Fisk has been one step ahead of Matt for this whole arc, and it would have felt anticlimactic for such a simple, faulty plan to bring that to an end. Rather than catching Fisk red-handed, the Kingpin doesn’t show. The collected villains turn on each other, the heroes swoop in to prevent any unnecessary deaths... and then the cops arrive.

Matt: “Damn. Damn. So much for the plan. Need to get down there, before someone gets-- Wait. NYPD. But that’s... Oh, no.”

This scene, as exciting as it is, features a reappearance of the less-than-stellar Garney/Milla radar sense, which we’ve complained about before.

There has always been inconsistency, but generally, modern depictions of the radar sense don’t allow it to pierce solid objects. Here, we see Matt tracking the activity in the restaurant from outside, a blatant break with tradition that we’re not huge fans of. What makes even less sense is the arbitrary use of multiple colors. Since the radar depiction is a visual stand-in for non-visual perception, the different colors must represent something... but what? Texture? And in the panel where Matt notices the cops, his radar seems to be picking up on flat images and uniform details that he should have no way of perceiving. It’s a nonsensical, misleading approach to the radar sense, and a tragic departure from Paolo Rivera’s crosshatching design, which was used to great effect in volumes 3 and 4. We understand each creative team wanting to put their unique stamp on the comic, but come on... if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

The police swoop in and grab the heroes and villains alike. We learn-- in a neat twist that, again, fits with Fisk’s behavior in the issues leading up to this climax-- that the proposed meeting was a trap, designed to round up the city’s crime bosses and get them arrested. As Matt has done again and again in this arc, he assumed nefariousness on Fisk’s part, and ended up shooting himself in the foot. While we know that Fisk is still a bad guy, and probably has all sorts of things up his sleeve, it’s always fun to see him play the good guy, just to see how cleverly he constructs the facade. And even more compellingly, Matt’s failure to accurately read his nemesis backfires on his friends.

Wesley: “There were heroes there, too. Jessica Jones, Danny Rand, Maya Lopez, Luke Cage, Misty Knight and Marc Spector. Even Spider-Man.”

Fisk: “Spider-Man... and what is his name? Who is he?”

Wesley: “We don’t know. Just before the cops grabbed him, he sprayed that webbing of his around his neck. Sealed it up tight, like glue. They can’t get his mask off.”

(Oh, Peter. He’s so... experienced at this secret identity thing.)

It will be interesting to see how long they actually end up in jail, given the events of the rest of the issue. Hopefully, someone is babysitting Dani...

One of our favorite moments in this issue is a little reversal. While Matt has failed again and again to properly read his opponent, Fisk knows exactly how Daredevil works, and where to find him. It’s a level of familiarity between hero and arch-nemesis that is highly compelling to us. It’s these kinds of details that make for the best hero/villain relationships. It also gives Matt a chance to do a badass pose on Fisk’s roof, which is always a plus.

Fisk: “It’d be just like him. Come along, Wesley. Let’s go up and say hello.”

Matt: “Fisk.”

There have been so many iconic fights between these two over the years that it’s increasingly difficult to do anything new with them. This fight is certainly a good one... but then, they all are, and this tussle probably won’t go down in DD history as one of their memorable battles. But it’s still highly enjoyable, and is enhanced by Soule’s excellent dialogue, which highlights the core of their conflict, and emphasizes just how long they’ve been having these fights.

Fisk: “If my name weren’t Wilson Fisk, you wouldn’t have batted an eye. You’d be cheering that the mayor had found a way to get Owlsley and the others off the streets.”

Matt: “But you are Wilson Fisk. You are the Kingpin. And you’re the enemy of everything that matters about this city.”

Fisk: “No. I’m not. But I’m sick of trying to explain that to you.”

But as was foreshadowed throughout this arc, Matt isn’t allowed a clean win. Fisk hits him with a sledgehammer so hard that it’s amazing he’s able to stand afterward, and then goes off to tell a crowd of adoring supporters how great he is. Again, we are given a look at Fisk’s faked (probably?) duality, as Soule is exploring it-- the idea of him playing the hero while still being a villain. This isn’t a new Kingpin concept, of course, but it remains a good one, and an engaging way of playing with the character’s complexity.

Partway through the speech, the Hand arrive and shoot Fisk full of arrows, thus kickstarting the next story arc. The Hand are really neat when used well, so we’re excited to see where Soule takes them, particularly given their new connection to Blindspot. However, they are not this issue’s big surprise. We learn, as Matt is carted away by the cops, that with Fisk now out of the picture, the mayorship falls to his deputy...

Steve: “Matt Murdock is the mayor of New York City.”

(Heck yeah!)

This is really exciting, not only because of its implications for Matt’s life, but also because it has been a long time coming. Kesel wanted to do it back in the 90s, but the idea was shot down by editorial. Bendis teased the possibility, but it never actually happened, thanks to the events of the rest of his run.

Guy: “They’re going to ask you to be the Democratic nominee for Mayor of New York City.”

Matt: “Huh.”

Daredevil vol. 2 #56 by Brian Michael Bendis and Alex Maleev

And Waid’s speculative story in the 50th anniversary issue suggested that Matt had been/will become the mayor of San Francisco at some point, but we don’t get to actually see him in action.

Foggy: “They remembered him from his original tour of duty here, when he and the Black Widow made the scene. [...] So when he came back, they had your pop running for office in no time. Busy boy, he was. Made lots of enemies.”

Daredevil vol. 4 #1.5, “The King in Red” by Mark Waid and Javier Rodriguez

But we are finally getting Mayor Matt Murdock, and we cannot wait to see how that works out for him.

The issue’s secondary plot thread is possibly even more interesting than the Matt/Fisk shenanigans, because it’s all new. This thread follows Sam’s final battle with Muse... who is essentially a Blindspot rogue now, rather than a DD one. Their relationship is fascinating, with Sam’s quest to understand the nature of his own heroism/lack thereof paired with Muse’s frenetic lack of morality. They are both raw, emotional characters, and their interactions in this issue are stunning. We’re gonna miss Muse.

Sam: “I need to understand, Muse. I need this to make sense. Why do you do what you do? Why do you hurt people? Why do you kill? Why?”

Muse: “You know why, Blindspot. It’s the same reason you want to kill me right now. It makes you better it makes you strong it shows them your power it says something it means something it solves your problems it gives you control you’re big they’re small it’s art it’s art IT’S ART!”

This fight also hints that Sam’s connection with the Hand is far from over... and provides a glimpse at how his time training with them may have changed him.

Beast: “You know my power. The power of the Beast. I will give it to you once again. Just reach out... and take it.”

While Sam refuses to kill for the Beast, this relationship will likely continue into the next arc-- which appears to be Hand-centric. Sam’s continuing evolution has been full of surprises, and we’re eager to see where this story takes him. All-in-all, this issue didn’t stand out as one of the most earth-shattering Daredevil stories ever told, but it was still thoroughly enjoyable, and did a great job of setting up some very exciting things in the future.

As an extra treat, the issue also includes a short, Foggy-centric story called “They Also Serve” by Christos Gage, Mike Perkins, and Andy Troy. This is merely the latest in a long line of Foggy-centric stories that celebrate his relationship with Matt. And there’s not a dang thing wrong with that, because they never get old. Matt and Foggy’s friendship exists at the very core of the comic, and its power and poignancy only increases as the years go by. Give us all of the Foggy-centric retrospectives. We will get misty-eyed every time.

We have only one complaint about this story, which is that Foggy... doesn’t really sound like Foggy for parts of it.

Foggy: “This is gonna be so great! You have no idea how lucky you are, Murdock, ‘cause Foggy Nelson just happens to be the finest wingman in the history of wingmen. You just stand there looking handsome, strong, stoic... with a hint of tragedy, while I draw ‘em in with my oratorical virtuosity. Between my silver tongue, your looks, and the whole blind thing, you’re gonna need that cane to ward off the babes.”

(Who... who are you, and what did you do with the real Foggy?!)

In fact, he sounds just like MCU Foggy. Which maybe shouldn’t have surprised us, because Christos Gage was also a writer for the first season of the Netflix show.

Despite this bit of weirdness, the issue is a nice look back at moments in Matt and Foggy’s friendship. It’s a trip down continuity lane, emphasizing just how long they’ve known each other and how much they’ve been through together.

All told, it’s a pleasant way to close out the issue, particularly given the rocky state of Matt and Foggy’s friendship throughout this run.

#Daredevil vol. 5 #Daredevil #Matt Murdock #Kingpin #Wilson Fisk #Blindspot #Sam Chung #Muse #Commentary

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phantom-le6 · 3 years

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Film Review - Soul

My apologies to anyone following me that I’ve not been posting much in the past couple of weeks. In addition to finalising preparation for writing the third novel in the trilogy I’ve been working on, I’ve recently returned to having occasional days in the office for my day job, and having to transport my IT equipment to and from the bus on those days isn’t something I’ve acclimatised to yet. However, I’m now up to film three in the quartet of films I was aiming to watch and review before starting on the Batman animated series. So, without further ado, here is my look at Disney and Pixar’s Soul…

Plot (as adapted from Wikipedia):

Joe Gardner, a pianist and middle school music teacher living in New York City, dreams of playing jazz professionally. When he receives an offer for a full-time teaching position, his mother Libba urges him to accept it, fearing for his financial security. One day, Joe learns of an opening in the quartet of jazz legend Dorothea Williams and auditions at a music club. Impressed with Joe's piano playing, Dorothea hires him for that night's show. As Joe heads off, his excitement distracts him, and he falls down a manhole.

Joe finds himself as a soul heading into the "Great Beyond". Unwilling to die, he tries to escape but ends up in the "Great Before", where counsellors (all named Jerry) prepare unborn souls for life with the help of mentor souls. Each soul has a badge which grants passage to Earth once it is completely filled out with personality traits. Mistaken for a mentor, Joe is assigned to train 22, a cynical soul who has always lived in the Great Before and wants to avoid having to go to Earth. Discovering that Joe is in a coma at a hospital, 22 agrees to let him help find her "spark" to complete her badge and then give it to him so that he can return home. After Joe fails to find 22 a passion, they visit "the zone", a place that souls can enter when their passions create a euphoric trance, but which can also become a trap for obsessed lost souls. They come across Moonwind, the captain of a galleon bearing a troupe of hippie mystics, who help Joe locate his body on Earth.

Joe returns to Earth but accidentally carries 22, resulting in the two souls respectively entering the bodies of a therapy cat and Joe himself. They find Moonwind (at his day-job as a sign twirler), who agrees to meet them later at the jazz club to restore Joe to his body. In the meantime, 22 settles into Joe's body and enjoys small moments while interacting with Joe's peers. She holds poignant conversations with Connie, a student who wants to quit the school band but changes her mind after performing a trombone solo; Dez, who wanted to become a veterinarian but now enjoys being a barber; and Libba, who finally accepts Joe's passion for music. Meanwhile, Terry, an obsessive accountant who tallies souls headed to the Great Beyond, discovers that Joe is missing and heads to Earth in order to send him to the Great Beyond and restore the count.

As the day ends, Joe and 22 rendezvous with Moonwind to return Joe to his body. However, after Joe tells 22 that her experiences were not purposes, 22 refuses and flees to find her spark, with Joe tailing behind. As they run through a subway station, Terry traps them both and brings them back to the Great Before. 22 realizes her badge is filled out, yet Joe insists it was because of his traits, and that she has not truly found her spark. Angry, 22 tosses the badge at him and disappears into the zone. A Jerry informs Joe that a spark is not a soul's purpose in life, but Joe refuses to believe this and uses 22's badge to return to Earth.

The night's show is a success, but Joe is not as satisfied as he imagined he would be and realizes that his life has not significantly changed even after fulfilling his dream. Looking at objects that 22 collected while in his body, and recalling the moments they had enjoyed together, he sees that these experiences have given 22 her spark. By playing piano, he enters the zone with the intent to return her badge but discovers that she has become a lost soul. He chases her down and shows her a maple seed she had collected to remind her of the time she spent on Earth, having realized that a spark is not a soul's purpose, but merely an indication that it is ready to live. Joe's actions restore 22 to normal, and he returns her badge and escorts her out of the Great Before for her journey to Earth.

As Joe prepares to enter the Great Beyond, a Jerry stops him and offers another chance at life in gratitude for finally inspiring 22 to live. Joe returns to his body on Earth and starts the next day committed to enjoying the rest of his life.

Review:

When it comes to Disney and Pixar films, I’m not someone who goes in for everything that comes out of the collaboration of these studios, just like I don’t go for every Disney animated classic, etc. More often than not when dealing with these films, especially now that I’m a grown man, the film has to offer up something in its very premise that makes me think “ok, that’s actually going to be interesting enough to be worth my time.” A key example of this was several years ago when Disney and Pixar advertised Inside Out, and I was drawn in by the intriguing premise of a family-friendly exploration of a young mind. Soul seemed to be a logical next step in the same vein, but shifting the focus from something psychological to something spiritual, while at the same time avoiding religion.

Because of its very premise, Soul can be a tricky film to get into; there’s a lot of metaphysical, and quite frankly hypothetical, concepts that frame the scenes set in the soul realm, which is primarily split into a “great before” that is apparently the origin point for all unborn souls, and an access point to the “great beyond”. The latter is evidently kept ambiguous both to avoid coming down for or against any religions, and also to keep the focus more on the former. It’s one of many smart moves made by those behind the film; another is decision to establish a culture trust comprised of black employees and consultants so that the main character of Joe Gardner is an honest representation of black Americans and not some horrible stereotype. I can think of so many places outside the film industry and so many groups in addition to black people who could benefit from such trusts being established.

The story itself is certainly interesting as well, so the film isn’t just depending on this strange concept of a soul dimension to keep the audience hanging on, and the almost odd couple dynamic between the key characters of Joe and 22 (voiced by Jamie Foxx and Tina Fey, respectively) is a fun one to watch. The middle part of the film where our main characters wind up in the wrong bodies brings a few scenes I initially felt compelled to fast-forward, as at first viewing they felt like weirdness for its own sake. This is how I tend to regard any body-swaps played for comedic value, and it’s why you’ll never find me watching something like Vice Versa or Freaky Friday. However, having re-watched with the film commentary on, I now understand this is a necessary component in helping Joe, and to a lesser degree 22, to reassess their attitudes by altering their perspectives.

The film has a decent jazz score as its title and the main character of Joe requires, and among the other actors lending their voices to the film are Angela Bassett (T’Challa’s mother from the MCU film Black Panther) and British TV host Graham Norton. So, all in all, this film mostly sounds like it deserves its critical accolades, perhaps even more so considering that the film’s production had to be finished from home, as the Covid lockdowns hit Pixar when Soul had about seven weeks of production left. Surely, one would think I couldn’t find anything to fault after realising what the body-swapping was about, right?

Well, sadly, that isn’t quite the case. The film works towards a reveal in its third act regarding the nature of what a soul’s “spark” is, but the way the scenes in the great before set out how these sparks are found contradicts what they supposedly turn out to be. While that’s probably meant to be misdirection, it comes across as contradiction to me. The reveal is that sparks are just indicators of a soul’s readiness to live, but if that is so, why are new souls taken to the “hall of everything”, which is set up with examples of specific pursuits, or allowed to look what a mentor soul has done in their life? Everything in the build-up suggests a spark is a soul’s passion in life, not a readiness for life. If it’s all about readiness for life, why wasn’t anything that inspired 22 to live available in the soul realm? For me, this is the one part of the film where I think the reach of those who made the film exceeded their grasp.

Other than this single issue, Soul is still a very good film, and while not quite at the same level as Inside Out, it is still a worthy follow-up film of sorts. I give it 8 out of 10, and I think Disney and Pixar need to work on something like an Incredibles 3 or Inside Out 2 before they try to create more Soul films. Hopefully the time in between will allow them to better prevent future inconsistencies if Soul is indeed given any sequels.

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perpetually-jungshook · 6 years

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Without You: Bloodstone (Part 25)

Genre: AU, bts!werewolf, fantasy, angst

Warnings: language, violence, suggestive content

Word Count: 4.3k

Summary: Werewolves, contrary to popular belief, are usually gentle creatures. Except for a very specific set of circumstances, they would never hurt a human (on purpose). The few unfortunate times when mistakes were made put a permanent dark mark on the beasts and people began labeling them as monsters. What the human population failed to recognize was the fact that they were protecting us from something much more sinister. Luckily, a few survived and the gene was passed down hereditarily until one day finding its way to me… in the form of my best friend.

Loyalty is often as blind as justice should be, as unstable as a lightning storm ought to be, and as misplaced as an opinion in the truth.

Chapter 25:

Despite Jimin being gone, Jungkook still seems committed to avoiding me, along with the other wolves. Namjoon and Seokjin are more polite about it, often stoping to have brief conversations, but Taehyung, Hoseok, and Jungkook hardly speak to me. Yoongi seems apathetic, but I rarely saw him to begin with anyway.

The pack spends most days outside. Doing what? I’m not sure. Exercising? I went for a walk once and came across Taehyung and Jungkook. They were chasing each other, the bronze wolf running from the raven black one. When Jungkook finally caught up, they playfully wrestled. I had paused to watch, curious, but for over twenty minutes they didn’t do anything else. I think they eventually noticed me, so with their supernatural speed they loped off elsewhere, leaving me physically unable to keep up and follow.

I’d heard in one of my classes that when they’re young, animals (mammals in particular) play to develop hunting and/or social skills. Maybe Jungkook could be considered “young” as he just recently transformed. That’s the reason I stick with to validate the behavior.

I tried to go out for walks often, following different paths of hidden lanterns to give myself a sense of variety, but the wolves evaded me. Purposeful or not, it made me feel lonely.

All I wanted was to see my friend, to see how he’s progressing and growing. Even at mealtimes, I got ignored by almost everyone except Munhee, my questions and comments going unheard amidst the general din of conversation.

For whatever reason, the isolation, especially when the others were within arm’s reach around me, began to feel heavy. Naturally, the thought of simply eating alone crossed my mind. It would make me feel less frustrated that they ignore me, avoid me. But I’d only done it once or twice before I realized that eating alone is what Jimin always did. The psychological threat of being like him drove me back to the dinner table.

So I buried myself in my studies.

Munhee and I went to the workshop every day. With my new silver knife in hand, she taught me the basics of how to use it, making me practice holding, hiding, and brandishing it. I also started learning intermediate magic.

I can now perform reactive magic with most herbs and stones. It’s simpler than I thought it would be, interacting with the energy of the object instead of only my own. I can produce all sorts of colors of “flame” now and find myself often carrying wildflowers in my pockets to “burn.” Most plants don’t do anything as dramatic as the Calendulas but I find it entertaining.

Munhee has scolded me several times, saying it’s not right to play with magic, but it’s not hurting anyone and practice makes perfect. Whenever I’m not on a walk, practicing reactive magic, being bitter about being alone, or pretending I have any skills with a knife whatsoever, I find myself reading.

There are so many herbs and stones that do incredible things with magic, but like I said, there are so many more that do absolutely nothing. Memorizing them all is not difficult. It just takes a lot of time.

Among the things that I have not done are: ask where Jimin might have gone (because that’s his business and I doubt anyone here would know anyway) and tell Munhee about my second exchange with Halsahm.

Obviously, Munhee knows something happened as there was a dead body in my room, but I figure I won’t have to deal with any of it for a while. Besides, good spirits, corresponding evil spirits… it might all just be something Halsahm made up in an attempt to possess me. Maybe even my rudimentary magic might be advantageous for it- especially since I would be relatively easier to access than someone as skilled as Munhee. I couldn’t even find anything about it in the workshop’s literature collection, so I decided to drop the topic for now.

I turn the page of the book in front of me carefully. It is thin and yellowed, delicate. I idly wonder if I should ask Munhee about rewriting it. Or better, photocopying.

This chapter is about quartz, something I’ve already read extensively about. I sigh quietly. Might as well just skim then. There may be some obscure yet useful information. As my eyes trace over the words, I can’t help but let my mind wander a bit.

Another thing that I haven’t seen in any of the books is divination.

Not a single word.

It’s led me to question whether divination is actually magic and if… I hallucinated the whole thing. Doubt is easy, especially self doubt. But the vision hadn’t been wrong. Halsahm had been alive.

Maybe I can try it again after my walk today. The Hepaticas aren’t in bloom and I’m not exactly sure what I should be searching for, but who knows? I might just see something interesting.

I set my book aside, fix Jimin’s bed, pick up my backpack, grab a few fruits from the kitchen, and head outside. Today, I choose to follow the red lanterns. Howling and playful barks echo through the empty streets surrounded by crumbling buildings, all shadowy sounds carried on the breeze. Each of my steps leaves a small crunch in my wake, courtesy of the gravel and plant life that litters the roads.

I find the edge of the forest and take a seat against a tree to eat. At least I’m getting fresh air.

Now late summer, early autumn, it’s a bit hot out, but not unbearably so, particularly in the shade. Clouds have begun to gather in the distance. A cold front? That might be pleasant. I scan the decaying town with interest and a bitter weight settles on my chest. Somewhere in there, my best friend is living his life without me. All because of Jimin.

I kick angrily at a small pebble and it skitters a meter or two away. Why couldn’t things just be easy and simple? Slowly, I reach for my backpack and dig around until I find the bloodstone. The surface is cool to the touch, polished. I smooth the pad of my thumb over it.

Okay, I did this once, I can do it again. The only question is: what had I done?

Stared at the stone and asked questions, felt frustrated… I start to zone out, trying to remember. Then the flickering starts. I find myself in the village, in front of one of the partially collapsed structures with a blue lantern inside. Not as shellshocked due to vague familiarity with the location, I find it easy to relax into the double vision.

The village is still in front of me, the forest behind and in my peripheral vision, but I can also see the wolves, four of them. I can’t see anything beyond or around them. Just their spectral forms, Jungkook, Hoseok, Seokjin, and Yoongi.

The soft grapefruit colored wolf, lies off to the side, watching with bored eyes. The other three prance and sprint around, batting each other roughly, but not harmfully until one is pinned or has fallen, only to start over again. Irritation seeps through me, making the vision waver. It still looks like they’re only playing. Why aren’t they training? To fight demons?

What had I expected? Specialized training? Yes. Organized exercises? Yes. But this is the second time I’ve seen them… messing around. And it’s annoying. I bury myself in studies to make myself stronger, more useful and they’re playing.

I try not to be angry. I could be assuming things incorrectly or- or…

This is exhausting, making excuses on other peoples’ behalf to see the best in them. I blink and the vision of the wolves disappears, like clearing blurriness out of my eyes. I stare idly at the bloodstone, torn between fairness and supporting my friend. Well, my “friend” that hasn’t spoken directly to me in days. I run my finger over the surface of the stone again and can’t help but empathize with Jimin. Just a little.

The crimson specks in the bloodstone flicker.

I see a field, full of short, flowerless plants. They’re familiar, yet oddly different. The Hepaticas? Why am I here? My view pans around as my mind’s eye silently requests. Now that I have a basic comprehension of magic, it makes this a great deal easier, more understandable.

I can’t see the trees at the edge of the clearing. It takes a few seconds, but I eventually notice the person kneeling in the middle of the field.

Jimin.

I almost call out to him in shock, but then I remember that I’m not actually physically present. Why is Jimin in the Hepatica field? Where has he been this whole time? For some reason, my heart starts to pound- no. Flutter. Excitement.

He gets up and starts walking toward where I know the edge of the forest is supposed to be, but in the opposite direction of the bunker. Panic floods through me. He’s leaving. Why? He can’t just leave- but I can’t go get him. I might be able to stumble across the Hepatica field, but there’s no way I’d make it there before he disappears back into the mists of… I have no time for metaphors.

“Jimin!” his name futilely leaves my lips and the sensation causes the vision to waver. Maybe I’m seeing things. Maybe the double vision is messing with my head. Maybe it’s just a coincidence.

But I could swear he turns and… sees me.

“Eun?”

The jolt back to the real world- or back to the reality that surrounds my body is disorienting. I blink a few times before Namjoon settles in my field of vision. He is blurry for a second or two, but the effect fades as he continues speaking.

“You alright? You seem a little dazed.”

“Sorry, sunbae. I was practicing divination,” the words leave my mouth before I can think about them. But what’s the harm? Namjoon knows I practice magic.

“Divination?”

“Yes.”

“That’s quite a skill you have,” he smiles warmly. “Even noona finds it hard to perform divination.”

“Really?”

Namjoon nods, “That’s advanced magic, at least, according to what she’s told me. It’s great that she’s teaching it to you.”

Teaching it to me… right. I agree politely.

The man with the blue-grey hair laughs lightly, “What were you looking at? If I may ask.”

“Nothing particularly interesting,” I shrug, but refrain from being aloof to avoid suspicion. He doesn’t need to know I saw Jimin and he probably already knows what Jungkook was doing. “Just exploring around.”

“Well that’s wonderful. It’s good to test your personal limits, especially with things like this,” he offers me a hand up, a surprising gesture considering I’ve been unofficially ostracized. I take his hand and hoist myself to my feet. “Noona asked me to tell you that we’re all heading into town later to pick up groceries and extra supplies. Would you like to go? Or do you need anything?”

“I think I’d rather stay here if that’s okay with you.”

“Of course. I’ll let you get back to practicing then-”

“Sunbae? Can Jungkook stay behind with me? Just in case.”

Namjoon pauses mid-act of turning around, then nods, “If he agrees, absolutely. I’ll ask him for you.”

“Thank you.” I give him a polite bow.

The pack leader looks as if he’s going to say something more, but then a howl splits the air, a deep sound, velvety. Taehyung. Namjoon’s attention snaps toward it.

“Sorry to cut this short,” he whispers. “Gotta go take care of something.”

Before I can acknowledge his statement, his shirt is off, he’s transformed into the massive blue-grey lupine creature, and full sprinting in the direction of the howl. Bending down, I pick up the bloodstone from a small tuft of weeds and slip it into my backpack. Apparently, I’d dropped it at some point after Namjoon startled me. I have to stop doing that before I lose it.

Figuring that the howl had something to do with demons, which even with my silver knife I should stay far away from, I decide to stay out a little bit longer and try to find the Hepatica field. Why? Plot development. I have nothing better to do other than attempt to find Jimin.

He’s irritating, pretentious, and possibly dangerous, but now I’m armed and for some reason… I miss him. The thought makes me cringe and I blame it on supernatural hormones. I will blame it on an “instinct thing.”

Hiking my backpack higher on my shoulders, I start my rather pointless walk through the forest. It’s highly likely I’ll get lost and even if I, by stumbling over a deposit of miracles, do somehow manage to find the Hepatica field, Jimin will probably be gone. But here I go anyway.

While familiar with the dilapidated town now, I haven’t been into the forest more than a few times, at least, beyond a few yards past the tree line. Every time I’d gone further, it had been with someone else leading the way.

At first I try looking around for familiar landmarks, but the change of season has all sorts of new mosses and lichens growing and the stream has swollen a bit too, swallowing any notable stones or the like.

As I walk, my hand reaches into my pocket to find the wildflowers I’ve been idly collecting. Taking a moment to gauge their different energies, I pick one and crush it in my hand, letting the heatless fire consume it, creating a royal purple flame. I repeat the process every time the flame starts to turn a pale pastel color. It’s not productive, but it keeps me busy and keeps my anxiety low.

I also make sure to brush against as many plants as possible, leaving my scent so someone (one of the wolves) can presumably find me if they come looking. Especially Hobi.

It only takes a half an hour for me to get absolutely lost, and yet I keep walking.

As the sun starts to fall below the tops of the trees, I decide to take a break and sit down with my back against a fallen log. This was such a stupid idea, but who cares? The only person who will probably immediately miss me is Munhee-

The thought gives me chills. Is this how Jimin feels? Except, he doesn’t have an “only person” to miss him.

I reach into my pocket for another flower, a therapeutic compulsive habit, but find it empty. With a sigh, I hold my palm out in front of me, letting the familiar green flame blossom on my palm. If only revelation magic could take me to the Hepatica field.

Sudden movement in the corner of my eye catches my attention, just at the edge of my field of vision, a flash moving between two trees.

A coffee colored werewolf. The coffee colored werewolf.

I immediately get to my feet, almost stumbling and falling under the weight of my backpack, and rush forward in a dead sprint; but by the time I reach the place I thought he might be, there’s nothing there. Not a footprint, not a broken branch.

I even conjure the green flame again to provide a little more (color tinted) light. Nothing.

On the slight breeze that slithers through the forest, I can hear a very distant howl and identify it easily. Jungkook.

I brush the recognition aside and look around. Maybe I’d been wrong. Maybe I hadn’t seen him, or maybe I had gotten the place wrong-

A flash of rich brown in the corner of my eye causes me to turn my head. Like the naive little girl I am, I follow. And follow again. Each glimpse of hope, illuminated by the green flame flickering in my palm and eventually the light of the full moon as it rises, leads me further, making me- almost redundantly- more lost.

Until I find myself in the Hepatica field.

Naturally, as I’d predicted, Jimin isn’t here, but the very fact that I’d found it is astonishing. Did it actually have something to do with the revelation magic I had been using? Or maybe this is some strange offshoot of my seeming talent for divination.

I glance around the clearing, breathing in deeply the smell of damp earth and natural, earthy, sweet forest decay. The sky above me should be peppered with stars, but everything has started to take on a grainy quality. Fog will be settling in soon. I should get back before something happens to the moonlight and I’m left in the complete dark. Well, except for the whole magic fire thing. I look around as if the universe will present to me the thing that I want. The person that I need.

Wait… amber eyes? In the trees on the other side of the clearing…

“Jimin?” for some reason, excitement permeates through me, then dissipates almost immediately.

“Eun, what the hell?”

I glance away just for a moment, but by the time I look back, the eyes are gone and my full attention swivels to a very angry Jungkook.

“Where have you been?”

I sigh, wanting to ask him why he suddenly cares, but that would be bitter and I am not a bitter person. At least, I refuse to be. I play idly with one of the tattered straps on my backpack, “Just taking a walk.”

“Do you even know how long it took me to find you? Were you just wandering around in circles?”

My gaze drops to the plants that litter the ground around my feet, crushed underneath them. I feel like a scolded child as my voice gets soft, “Kind of. Yes. You were busy and I had nothing better to do.”

“So you went tramping through the forest?”

“I didn’t go tramping.”

Jungkook lets out a huff, raking his fingers through his hair, “We’re going back to the bunker.”

“But…” I look back at the forest, where I had seen- where I had thought I’d seen the amber eyes.

Jungkook steps forward, catching my wrist, “Let’s go.”

“Okay,” I relent, knowing that Jungkook is the easiest, if not my only way home. I wait until he’s shifted to climb onto his back, wrapping my arms around his neck and burying my face into his raven black fur.

This is the first time in weeks that I’ve touched him for more than mere moments, more than accidental brushes of hands passing plates at the dinner table or attempted but failed embraces at the mistletoe double doors before he leaves. I’m surprised he’s letting me touch him at all. Maybe it’s because Jimin has been gone for so long. Maybe it has something to do with convenience. As he starts walking, then speeds up into a jog, I can’t help but let my heart hurt.

I miss him- Jungkook.

With this close proximity, I notice he feels more muscular than before, fur more shiny, movements more purposeful and coordinated. My best friend has changed so much, physically and mentally it seems. He’s never spoken to me so sternly, so angrily. He’s been worried, sure. Demanding too, but never furious. That hurts more than the inadvertent abandonment. What happened to my sweet, soft Jungkook?

The more I think about it, the more it hurts me.

With each of his confident, bounding strides forward, I can feel the movement resonate in my own body and roll through me in waves of nothing short of pure loneliness. I begin to feel the despair that Jimin must have felt at first, then the inevitable ebbing of feelings as we draw into ourselves, closing ourselves off emotionally because knowing we’re being shut out by everyone for something that isn’t really our fault… it hurts.

Jungkook starts to slow as we leave the army of fading trees, entering the empty village. I loosen my grip around his neck and allow myself to drop to the gravely street. He transforms back into a human, walking a few paces ahead of me.

He says nothing, which I suddenly find is worse than yelling.

The further we walk, the more his demeanor begins to get colder, and the more the fog rolls in. I begin to feel numb. By the time the little shack that hides the staircase to the bunker is in sight, I am numb.

Jungkook reaches for the door, then stops.

He slowly turns around, “What’s your problem?”

You. Me…

“This whole thing.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” his tone is as distant as it is aggravated, a strange combination.

“This, us, this place. I want to go home.”

Jungkook’s stare is hard.

The fog that surrounds us is heavy, so thick that I can barely see three meters in any direction. It stills the air, absorbing sounds, muting color, a visual manifestation of the emotions looming inside me.

“I just can’t do it anymore,” my voice cracks, but I somehow manage to keep his gaze.

Jungkook’s composed expression falters, features simultaneously betraying both hurt and anger, “What? Do you think I want this? Do you think constantly tearing my body apart and losing my mind is fun?”

“Do you think watching it happen is any better?”

His gaze flicks to the sky and I know his attention is pegged exactly on the full moon, despite not being able to see it myself. Jungkook’s voice lowers in warning, “Now’s not the time to have this conversation.”

His words only make anger bubble into my chest, “Oh? Then when would be better for you? After training? After everyone else gets back? After you’re off your man-period?”

“Male dogs don’t go into heat,” he states blandly.

“Well excuse me for not knowing everything.”

“Maybe, if you paid more attention to noona, you would.”

My skin prickles in irritation, “Stop making this about you.”

“I’m not the one being selfish,” he snaps, attention plunging down from the moon to me. “Do you understand how hard it’ll be if you leave? How many people I could hurt? How many people those things will kill?”

“Selfish? I’ve given up months of my life, Jungkook.”

“At least you can leave after this,” he storms forward until stopping only a handful of centimeters away, harsh amber flooding his irises, “I’m going to be stuck with this for my entire life.”

Instinctive fear trickles through me at the change in his eyes, the subtle rippling of his muscles, but I refuse to let it be the reason this argument stops, “You’re making it about you again.”

“We’re not having this conversation right now.”

“Sure, just keep pushing it off and maybe you won’t have to deal with it.”

“What’s your problem?” Jungkook’s body shudders, making him clench his jaw and speak through his teeth, “We’re not even asking you to do anything difficult.”

“Not difficult?” my voice begins to rise, “First of all, you get to go gallivanting around with your friends while-”

“We aren’t gallivanting.”

I talk right over him, “While I have to spend countless hours memorizing and reading and practicing, only to get left behind and ignored. On top of that, I have to lie to my family so that I can stay here and make sure you are okay. And let’s not forget I risk my life staying here, for you.”

The last part visibly makes him bristle, “That’s not my fault.”

“No, it’s not, but I’m doing it because you’re my friend, Jungkook.”

“Well I didn’t ask for that either.”

Both of us pull away slightly, eyes widening, shocked into speechlessness by the implication of his statement. Time slides to a stop, the only evidence of its passage being uneven breaths. I recover first, “I didn’t know you felt that way. I’m sorry for causing you so much trouble then.”

“Eun,” he calls my name, regret lacing his tone, shock rendering him immobile, and amber draining completely from his irises, replaced by the familiar chocolate brown, but I don’t hesitate to turn and enter the small, inconspicuous shack, quick pace fueled by my desperation to not let him see me cry. I’m halfway down the concrete staircase when he finally chases after me, pleading, “Eun-ssi, wait, I didn’t mean it like that-”

I manage to slam the double doors in his face, knowing he won’t pass the mistletoe barrier unless it was opened for him. With my back pressed against the hard wooden surface, I listen for the telltale signs, the screaming, the whimpering, the snarling, or (a recent development) just the cracking of bones, but am met with none of those.

Even through the haze of my anger and the violence of my tears, I can’t help but notice he’s kept his human form, despite the emotional pull of the argument and in sight of the hormonal impact from the full moon. The smallest bit of pride flits through me at this mutual accomplishment, but is forgotten as soon as I hear a door from within the bunker open, making me freeze.

Everyone had just left for a trip into town…meaning Jungkook and I were supposed to be here alone.

Hope surges through me. Maybe Jimin had come back. Maybe he’d led me to the Hepatica field and followed Jungkook and I back to the bunker, slipping inside when we were arguing. Maybe-

Then I feel it, the eerie stillness. My ears prick up and I realize that the silence from the fog outside has permeated into the bunker. The strange suspension in time hadn’t been warped perception due to stress.

Hello, Eun. Have you thought about what I said?

✩✩✩♔✩✩✩

A/N: sorry it’s a bit late. Life happened :’) hope you enjoyed!

Send me your theories/questions here. Or just come say hi ;)

Support me/Donate and get some super rad 😎 rewards

Much love ~🐰 xx

#bts fanfic #werewolf bts #jimin fanfic #jimin angst #werewolf jimin #jungkook fanfic #jungkook angst #werewolf jungkook #namjoon fanfic #fantasy #werewolf fanfic #without you: Bloodstone #bloodstone

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easyfoodnetwork · 4 years

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Shoppers Miss Grocery Store Samples. Brands Miss Them More

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With sample stands canceled due to COVID-19, emerging food brands have few options to reach shoppers

Last year, Daniel Maloney could often be found working a sample table at specialty food markets around New York City. From his side of the table, Maloney would tell shoppers about Sol Cacao, the chocolate company he co-founded with his brothers Dominic and Nicholas. He would explain the brothers were brought up in Trinidad and Tobago, where their own great-grandparents once farmed cacao, before going on to found the Bronx’s first chocolate factory, and one of the few Black-owned chocolate businesses in the city. He would talk about the company’s commitment to ethically compensating farmers for cacao beans, as well as its support for environmental preservation and organic farming.

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced grocery stores to set new limitations on handing out samples in stores, so shoppers today won’t learn those details that, when added up, make Sol Cacao’s $6 price tag seem fair. Without Maloney there to tell people about it, shoppers might not even know that Sol Cacao exists.

“When we give out samples and we get to talk to the customers, it validates the price,” Maloney says. “People got an opportunity to meet one of the owners, to get really intimate with the brand. When COVID-19 happened, that went out the door, and it was right around Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, Easter, which is our key season.”

Following industry leaders like Costco and Whole Foods, who nixed in-store samples in March, the vast majority of grocery retailers have canceled sampling during the pandemic. That’s had an impact on brands of all sizes, but especially small and emerging brands, which rely heavily on sample stands to gain exposure and build a customer base. A free taste of chocolate can rouse shoppers from their shopping tunnel vision and help small brands attract attention if they can’t afford pricey product displays.

Rodrigo Salas, president of Molli Sauces, says samples are critical to differentiating his products from thousands of competitors on the shelf. They’re also important for educating people about the brand’s regional Mexican sauces, not only unfamiliar customers but also store employees, who are Molli’s best advocates during everyday business. Without sampling, business has suffered.

“We’ve lost about 30 percent of our sales since we started seeing the effects [of the pandemic] here in America,” he says. Like many business owners, he has pivoted to increase digital sales, but it’s not enough. “Online we’ve been able to recover about 5 percent of those sales,” Salas says. “We haven’t found a way to really compensate for the lack of in-store presence.”

Sam Miller is founder and CEO of Phoodie Marketing, a third-party company that helps brands arrange in-store demos. He explains brands use sampling to establish a “data story,” which is important to establishing a brand’s viability to retailers. Illustrating consumer demand and interest allows brands to win and maintain space on store shelves. That data is also crucial to gaining priority at distribution centers, where distributors decide which products get precious space on delivery trucks.

Chitra Agrawal, owner of Brooklyn Delhi, points out trade shows, which run on sample stands, are also on hold. Pre-COVID, those events were a cost-effective way for small brands without sales teams to meet directly with store buyers. “Not being able to sample at these types of events will definitely take a toll as well,” she says.

With grocery stores under pressure to keep shelves stocked, there’s little chance they’ll go easy on underperforming brands. “A lot of brands think they’re going to be cut some slack because of COVID. It doesn’t seem to be that way. The merchants are still doing their reviews, they’re still consolidating,” says Jesse de Agustin, founder and CEO of demo and retail sales firm EDS Strategy.

That’s clear to Salas too, who says, “I am worried. At the end of the day, you have to prove to retailers that your product is going to sell with or without in-store promotion. You have to prove it’s relevant. They don’t care if you’re sampling or not. They just want to see the sales and volume going up.”

To combat dropping sales, brands and retailers have devised a variety of pivots to maintain contact with consumers, including “dry” versions of in-store demos in which customers receive closed packages of food to enjoy at home, along with the usual brand spiel.

That’s what members will see at some Costco locations, where in-house marketing company Club Demonstration Services has outfitted the usual sample carts with plastic barriers. Just as Costco drove many retailers to pause samples in March, the megaretailer inspired excitement across the industry when it announced the return of samples in late May. A handful of other retailers have begun offering dry samples as well, and a few are even offering standard tastings.

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SAMPLES ARE BACK AT Costco. All safe. Here is how they do it. . . #costco #wearamask @costco #costcosamples #samples #besafe

A post shared by Jared Plushnick (@plushnickwx) on Jul 14, 2020 at 10:57am PDT

A map of retailers, including grocery stores, shows stores across the country reintroducing demos in some form. According to de Agustin, EDS has had a lot of success with dry demos, comparing them to a QVC pitch in which sales rely more on quality presentations than samples. He argues the pandemic may raise the bar for demoers, ultimately improving standards across the industry.

But the dry format has its own challenges. “Brands either have to give away a full unit because it has to be a prepackaged sample, or they have to figure out a way to make a smaller sample size that they can do in bulk,” says Andrew Therrien, director of business development at demoing company Samplers Inc. “Often packaging is more expensive than the product itself,” he adds. That can be especially hard on smaller brands with limited budgets, but Miller wonders whether even Costco can make dry demos profitable in the COVID-19 era.

Samantha D’Amico, director of operations at Samplers Inc, also addresses how demos might play to an extremely anxious audience of harried grocery shoppers. “Our reps were never aggressive, but they were assertive. We’re training them to dial that back a little bit,” she says. “Obviously they’re there to promote the product and sell, but in this environment you have to handle that more delicately than we did pre-COVID.”

Therrien explains the company has seen success with low-interaction alternatives like drive-thru samples, where someone distributes goody bags from a branded tent as shoppers enter a retailer’s parking lot. Meanwhile, Miller says a lot of brands are pushing coupons, as well as promotions to entice customers with lower prices. He has also seen some brands adding free products to grocery delivery orders, enabling them to reach customers who avoid the store altogether, but he adds that this method is limited to large brands with big budgets.

Before the pandemic, demoing could cost thousands of dollars, making it a big but potent investment for small brands. Therrien says COVID-19 has raised some of those costs, requiring brands to spring for outdoor tents and pay a premium for high-risk labor. The payoff could be bigger too, since customers may find a successful event more impactful, but it’s a risky maneuver.

With many consumers preferring to shop online, some smaller brands are giving up demos entirely and spending resources on digital marketing instead. Molli Sauces and Sol Cacao have both shifted more attention to social media in recent months: Salas has been streaming cooking demonstrations on Facebook Live to show customers how to use Molli products, while Maloney has been leading chocolate tastings through Instagram.

De Agustin believes this is a knee-jerk reaction that may hurt in the long run. Unless brands are prepared to go entirely online, he says, they should be careful about ignoring their retailers, which could cause them to lose regional accounts or cede shelf space.

But Agrawal suggests digital could be a way for smaller brands to overcome the many ways they’re disadvantaged compared to big brands. “There are just a lot of costs associated with selling your product at grocery stores. Going direct-to-consumer, you own all of the information on your customer base. That is so valuable,” she says, adding that there are extra advantages for international brands that may not be deemed “mainstream” by retail buyers.

Maloney believes digital engagement will help Sol Cacao make meaningful contact with consumers. “There’s a lot going on in the news, and I feel like people are looking to social media to see what else is going on in the world. Brands who are able to tell their story effectively during these times, those are going to be brands who people will remember,” he says.

It’s unlikely samples are going to return to normal before a widespread COVID-19 vaccine, and marketing companies are planning to closely track comfort for demos among consumers and retailers for the next year at least. But the pandemic may affect the industry much longer.

“I think it’s going to reshape everything. I think it’s going to make it harder for people to start a food business like this in a traditional way,” Salas says. Even as he predicts dire things for sampling in the future, though, Salas believes there’s opportunity for brands willing to get creative. “I think there’s going to be a lot of innovation, just like any revolution in the past. We can’t rely anymore on this tool, so we need to rethink the whole strategy, to find ways to get people to discover us outside of the store.”

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With sample stands canceled due to COVID-19, emerging food brands have few options to reach shoppers

View this post on Instagram

SAMPLES ARE BACK AT Costco. All safe. Here is how they do it. . . #costco #wearamask @costco #costcosamples #samples #besafe

A post shared by Jared Plushnick (@plushnickwx) on Jul 14, 2020 at 10:57am PDT

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#Blogger #cooking #Eater #food #recipes

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probablyottrpgideas · 6 years

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Game Recap Series: EIS 0

Since I started this series I’ve only been playing my Dungeonbowl campaign, which has meant I had completely forgotten to do an Up-to-Speed post for the actual real proper campaign I’m running. Since we had our first session of that game in over 2 months last Sunday, I need to do a recap, so I’ll push through the update as quickly as possible before I get to that session. Here goes:

In the land of Caerwyn, there is one central government, the Tyrian Empire, and the largest institution within the Empire is the Imperial military. Given this juggernaut of resources, many people enlist as a means to pull themselves out of debt or receive training they otherwise would have to pay a lot of money for.

Through a variety of reasons, a pool of new recruits all join at the same time, and underwent basic training.

Group A (PCs)

Avoyelles Isani: Drow, Circle of Twilight Druid, Charlatan (Feygate) Arner Diomal’st’ano: Eladrin, Sorcerer/Cleric, Archeologist (Encarlin) Nerra: Half-Elf, Skirmisher Rogue, Criminal (Imperial) Eleric “Relic” Mort: Human, Champion Fighter, Gladiator (Imperial) Jimothy Tames: Githyanki, Battlemaster Kensai, Merchant (Imperial)

Group B (NPCs)

Nichollo Gioirdani: Eladrin, Evokation Wizard, Folk Hero (Feygate) Sorel Conera’st’ona: Deva, Storm Cleric, Outlander (Encarlin) Errol Goddard: Pixie, College of Maestro Bard, Artist (Imperial) Farren Selch: Feytouched Githzerai, Path of Brawn Barbarian, Urchin (Imperial) Robert Tames: Razorclaw Shifter, Inquisitive Rogue, Charlatan (Imperial)

During their training, rather than be transferred to one of the many formal units, they are instead put through a rigorous induction test (involving being dropped with minimal resources and separated from one another in the middle of a blizzard) to join the mysterious and prestigious Empire Intelligence Services.

After their induction the two teams were assigned separate senior agents; Group A would be led by Celia Sapienza (Eladrin, Shinobi Kensai, Guardsman, Feygate) and Group B would be led by Glymmer d’Embry (Elf, Wyrmling Shogun, Scion, Imperial). Group A were then given their first mission; investigate a series of disappearances in the northern town of Farren’s Landing that had the local guard puzzled.

Arriving in Farren’s Landing and setting up their temporary base in the top level of a local inn, the group began investigating the three disappearances that they knew of, as well as organising a meeting with a locally known smuggler who might be able to provide them with information. Within the course of their investigation they discovered a number of details; all three disappearances featured a paw print as of a large dog, and two of the three featured closed and locked doors. They also discovered that one of the disappeared was a member of the local crime family, and that all three had interacted in some way with the local manor. Arner and Relic visited a local dog training yard with a mould of the paw-prints and confirmed Arner’s suspicion that the culprit was using some kind of Blink Dog.

Using Celia’s cover story that they were the retinue of a minor Feygate noble to establish an audience with the Duke, the team investigated the manor and discovered that a number of scholars from the arcane library had been recently dismissed. One of those figures, a young sorcerer named Dareg Shille, had been messing about with Blood Magic, and after discussing with the senior arcanist what sort of mutations could be achieved using blood magic the team began to believe that Dareg Shille had twisted a once good-aligned fey into assisting him in abducting townsfolk.

Using both the Pollan crime family and the local guard for assistance, the team tracked Shille to the flood-water tunnels under the city and, despite being forcibly separated by the Blink Dog’s ability to grab hold of them and teleport them away, they slew the dog and Shille, although they were too late to rescue any of the abductees.

While in town, they received a message from command of a new mission; the late brother of the Duke of Farren’s Landing had apparently been having an affair with the young sister of the Empress, and the two had been trading letters that, should they be made public, would embarrass the royal family. The team had to track down the hiding place of the letters and bring them back to command. By discussing the details of the Lord’s personal life with the residents of the Duke’s manor, the group identified a hunting lodge deep in the nearby forest, and travelled out there to retrieve the letters. However, as they pulled the letters from their hiding spot, the group was ambushed by unknown assailants, who used blinding and stunning alchemical explosives to temporarily subdue the party. When they recovered the assailants were gone and the letters still remained, and no-one was quite able to work out what had been taken/done. Still, they returned the letters to command, and their CO Warren Caine told them not to worry about it, as without more to go on they couldn’t really do much more anyway.

Returning to the field base the team had a week of rest before being sent off on their new mission; a mercenary guard for a lord of the royal court had been accused of the murder of the lord’s son. Ma Wei, a talented and dangerous arcane archer, had resisted arrest and fled, heading north. The last word anyone had was of her boarding a boat at Farren’s Landing.

The team geared up and returned to Farren’s Landing, without Celia (who was on another mission at the time), finding the docks and asking around to see if anyone had seen an elf matching Ma Wei’s description. A few people mentioned they had seen her getting on an ice-cutter, implying that she was heading further north into the frozen polar continent of Kalteheim, although they could not remember the name of the ship she had boarded.

Needing passage to the north for themselves, the team went looking for someone with a similar ice-field ready ship, and were directed to Emilie Greys (Shade, Nightstalker Shadowblade, Pirate), captain of the Viaggiatore. Greys turned out to be a Shade, and what’s more her entire crew were comprised of the dregs of mortal races, be they shadow creatures or shapeshifters or even an ogre. After a minor scuffle with sahaugin saw the team step in to protect the crew, they were accepted as friends and the journey continued much more congenially.

Halfway to Kalteheim, the Viaggiatore stopped off at a small island town called Isla Helado to restock, and the team, with nothing else to do, decided to investigate a local haunted castle. Once there they destroyed the ghost of the old Imperial commander and the skeleton soldiers, broke the enchantment on the armoury, and cleared the place out. In the process, a ghost of a dog imprinted on Relic, and now follows him around (the team now call him Zero, after the ghost dog from The Nightmare Before Christmas).

While stuck on Isla Helado, the team were treated to a story/mass hallucination by the skaldic ships quartermaster, Lucas Rimeweather AKA Old Man Exposition. Through his storytelling the team got to live through the story of how Captain Greys became a shade, 1000 years previously when the Viaggiatore crew were only six;

Captain Ysalt Margaine: Deva, Shugenja Cleric, Pirate, Imperial E4-G13 AKA Birdbot: Warforged, Path of the Eagle Totem Barbarian, Gladiator, Imperial Amaya DeSaad AKA Goldfist: Lightborn, Sweet Science Pugilist, Vigilante, Imperial/Fallow Elena Willow: Hamadryad, College of Courtship Bard, Courtesan, Feygate Everett McCree: Changeling, Shadow Spy Rogue, Cultist, Imperial Emile Greys: At the time, a regular human

The story went that Emilie, seeking the power to wreak vengeance on those who had killed her family, had tried and failed to become a Shade. So the crew went to Marnati City and sought out the expertise of a non-binary Elven magician called Maester Delver. Delver told the crew that the only way to save Emilie was to complete the full ritual, turning her into not only a Shade but a Shadowblade. The ritual could only be found in the Isle of the Lost in the Shadowfell, and to get there they would need to be able to travel across the planes. They suggested that the best way would be to bind the soul of a planar travelling creature to their vessel, and they provided the crew with some soul-binding artifacts. Meanwhile, the crew tracked down rumours of a Shadow Dragon hiding in the islands south of Caerwyn, and so travelled there. They got the location of the Shadow Dragon, found it, slew it, and bound its soul to the Viaggiatore. Once complete, they travelled into the Shadowfell and found the Isle of the Lost.

Retrieving the correct ritual required them to complete the challenge of the seven virtues. The first room was a puzzle, testing their wisdom, where they had to solve a riddle to find the key to the next room. The second was a large battle arena with a cage door that only allowed a single combatant through. Birdbot went through and faced off against an Earth Elemental on his own, testing his courage. After this was completed the cage lifted and Birdbot was attacked by a fearsome dracolich, forcing the others to rush to his aid, testing their loyalty. Once they realised there was no way they could defeat the dracolich the team had to lay down their weapons, testing their humility. They then passed into the next room, which was filled to the brim with treasures untold, which they had to walk past without touching, testing their temperance. At the end they had to place something of value in the empty chest in front of the door, testing their charity. The last room was a gigantic library of scrolls; this, a test of their faith, simply meant they had to select one scroll without looking at it and continue on. Here, at last, they messed it up, and while they retrieved the ritual they were forced to leave Birdbot behind. They rescued Emilie and the story ended there.

Finally arriving at Fort Rast in Kalteheim, the team signed on as crewmembers of the Viaggiatore so that their names could be withheld from the ships manifest and then quietly came ashore, seeking out a local inn named the Frozen Hearth. There they asked around with the locals to see if anyone had seen Ma Wei, and they were directed to a local Bard who had been away for a while and recently returned. Av and Jimothy interrogated the boy, and found that he had indeed come through on the ship Illusion of Choice, where he had been friends with Ma Wei. He directed them to the hunting paths north of the fort, and the group decided to see what they could find. While this was happening, Nerra thought she saw someone following the group, but said nothing.

On heading out for a look around, the team became acquainted with the peculiarity of the local fauna of Kalteheim; largely, that everything was giant. Proximity to high magical fields had caused all natural creatures to take on colossal sizes, with rabbits the size of lions and wolves as big as mountains. Also at around this time, Celia appeared with bad news; Robert, Jimothy’s husband and member of the B team, had been badly injured on a mission. Jimothy left to be with his husband while he recovered, and the team were joined by Kitt Delkatt (Human, Hunter Ranger, Consort, Imperial), a new recruit.

While out on the Hine Plain, a frozen wasteland north of the fort and the apparent direction Ma Wei had travelled, the group encountered an Ice Titan, a snow fox three or four times the size of an elephant. They tried everything, from hiding to running to fighting, but the creature seemed to barely notice their attacks. In the end, the group were saved by an unlikely ally; another Ice Titan, a wolf so large that its head was a mere shadow in the sky, which crashed out through the snow and snapped up the fox in its jaws like it was nothing.

The team continued on until they reached a gorge, where they found evidence of someone having climbed down inside. Following the trail, the team was attacked by a hail of magical arrows, and they might have been in danger had Celia not revealed that they were there on behalf of the Intelligence services, not the police. Ma Wei, nervous but now curious, allowed them inside the old Stealth Corps. fox-hole she was hiding in. The two groups discussed their positions and came to the conclusion that someone was setting Wei up; the best bet would be to take her into EIS protective custody while they looked into the frame job.

While they were discussing things, however, they were attacked by pursuer that Nerra had almost seen; a Chaotin (homebrew elvish subtype) assassin with powerful psychic abilities. The team were all, barring Avoyelles, paralysed by the assassin and would have died, were it not for Zero possessing an Ice Titan and eating him.

On the way back to the Fort, half the team fell into a fresh ravine and discovered an ancient, abandoned temple, where a gauntlet of necromantic power was killing any wandering traveller and turning them into skeletons. One such skeleton had retained his mind, Mac Bonney (Awakened Undead Skeleton, Marksman Rogue, Archeologist, Imperial) and he assisted the team in fighting off the hordes of skeletised bugbears, minotaurs, ogres and a powerful bone naga. In return, Mac was brought back with them to the EIS camp.

After this lengthy trip the party were paid their salary and given the chance to come stay in the Imperial Capital city of Tyria for a while, which would give them the ability to visit Robert and catch up with Jimothy. While in town they got to know their fellow spies, including getting better acquainted with Errol, Farren, Warren and Glymmer on a personal level, as well as go shopping and generally explore the metropolitan excesses on display. Jimothy, who had begun to develop a reverence for Kord, found a temple to the thunder god and explored the possibility of becoming a paladin. He also got into an underground boxing match with Relic and handed the fighter’s ass to him.

Their leave was cut short however when Warren received word that the two cultists who had been captured after the attack that had left Robert injured had revealed something in their interrogation; something terrible was going to happen in the small town of Brattenhome, east/south-east of Faelmarch. The team were dispatched there as quickly as possible.

When they arrived, Relic detached himself from the group; Avoyelles, who had been flirting heavily with the fighter, took this as an opportunity to sulk following the recent revelation that he had a wife, and so no-one questioned it. In truth, he was spending his time on a separate mission for Warren, looking for an old equipment cache hidden somewhere in Brattenhome which contained some documents Warren needed retrieved in secret.

Meanwhile, the rest of the team filled his spot by befriending another traveller passing through the town, a copper dragonborn named Alketh (Dragonborn, Evokation Wizard, Sage, Imperial). They began their investigation, and quickly discovered that a young elvish storehand, Yushiro Nakai, had disappeared. As it was late when they arrived they turned in shortly after, but the next morning Yushiro reappeared, shortly before mutating into a horrifying spider creature. The team dispatched her, and then spoke with the sheriff of the town to discuss what had happened. He asked them to keep the investigation quiet, but that he would help them out if they needed it.

The team then took a quick trip into the forest to follow up a lead (dead-end; the Walshes were not cultists at all but vryloka isolationists, and while they were antagonistic towards the team intruding onto their land they were not investigated further). On their return to town, however, they found that five more townsfolk had been kidnapped in the night, and the town was now in uproar. Getting a meeting with the mayor, the team identified what they were in town to do and the mayor gave them access to whatever resources they wanted. The group split up to conduct parallel investigations into a number of leads, including the homestead of one of the disappeared folks, the fishing boat of another, and a creepy warehouse at the edge of town. The group in the warehouse were attacked by another mutated villager, a trio of giant spiders and a swarm of regular spiders, and they barely escaped with their lives.

Which brings us, at last, to the most recent session...

#EIS with OTT #recaps

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spoilsoflore · 6 years

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For the Groove of the Game, pt. 2 (Final)

Stories Untold (2017)

Stories Untold, much like the '80s sci-fi/supernatural horror it's influenced by, hides subtle complexities behind novelty. The throwback main theme was frequently praised and compared to TV series Stranger Things (which has similar inspirations), yet it was just the tip of the iceberg. The game features no direct contact with any characters, thus most of the story is told through environmental context and interaction.

Most of the background music consists of low, droning notes, and the majority of audio is idiosyncratic with technology from the time. For “The House Abandon,” this combination emphasizes a domestic, ideally mundane, setting. However, as the story progresses, small shifts in scenery accompanied by audio cues draws players into the game's written narrative and ultimately provoke the question of who the player as the main character is.

SU then expands upon the concept in “Lab Conduct”: The player character is given a name, Mr. Aition, and audio is presented in stereo, multi-directional; so, players become a concrete individual in a defined space. Although the nature of horror and tension changes between these first two chapters, the sound design maintains a theme of small audio details belying larger impacts. For instance, did you notice the shuffling (or is it breathing) toward the end of “House Abandon”? Or the clicking at the end of “Lab Conduct”? As for “Station Process,” the introduction and final dialogue of the female character is painfully distant and chilling. SU's world is crafted of elaborate facades concealing the devastation of innocuous behaviors, and its sound design magnifies the intensity and gravity of these implications.

Observer (2017)

Rutger Hauer might have been chosen for Observer due to his ties to Blade Runner; but, his voice also immediately sets the tone for the game's sound design. His accent, stilted patter, and the occasional quality manipulation create a mechanical undertone. The effect is one of an organic voice still in the process of undergoing a digital transformation, a concept that echoes Observer's grander premise.

In fact, the majority of dialogue in the game is done either through radio or intercom with human interaction primarily limited to dreams. Even a dying victim who Daniel comes upon only speaks via a device akin to an electrolarynx. The exception is the landlord, Janus (voiced by famed Polish actor Arkadiusz Jakubik), who suffers speech disfluencies, likely a product of his own cyborgian transformation and the mental impact of the war that demanded it.

The main soundtrack is cyberpunk oriented; but, a seqeunce with a surprisingly peaceful interlude of classical music appears to be a nod to developer Blooper's previous game, Layers of Fear. The sequence breaks up the persistent parade of disconcerting and unpleasant sounds inhabiting the Stacks. Rather than using discordance, Observer's sound design seems to focus on abject noises with mechanical and organic sounds that hover distressingly at the edge of familiar—an aural cracked door with all its tantalizing and foreboding possibilities.

Dark Souls III (2016)

While the Souls franchise has often been praised for its soundtracks, fan revelations and speculations suggest the music of Dark Souls III to be more instrumental to the game than merely providing ambience. The theory proposes that DSIII's boss battles are essentially choreographed to their respective background tracks. Although the idea has gained traction across the internet, developer FromSoftware has yet to confirm whether this subtle rhythm-action gameplay was intentional. The evidence is tantalizing nonetheless:

Most of the boss soundtracks in DSIII are predominantly 4/4 time, the most common time signature. The time signature is the count of beats into a measure and typically a good indicator of how often downbeats (beats that emphasize the rhythm) fall. Vordt of the Boreal Valley is a good example of 4/4 time.

However, Dark Souls' downbeats are misleading: Many downbeats, including Vordt's, are used for movement and/or wind-up while attacks occur in the remaining counts. So, if a player anticipates an attack on the strongest or most defined beat of a measure and dodges or guards, they're likely to dodge directly into the actual attack or prematurely guard and fail to maintain it through the duration of the attack—aka “get bodied.” While the base formula of attacks avoiding the downbeat is decently reliable across the game, the time signatures change. A number of bosses are in alternate time signatures, and at least one seems to change in the middle of his battle.

The Dancer of the Boreal Valley has been one of the driving forces behind the rhythm-action theory. Furious internet consensus is she breaks all the rules. However, it might be more she breaks the aforementioned ones: Her fight appears to be in 6/8 time (which is different from 3/4—but that has its own place and time), and many of her attacks actually strike on the downbeat. The lack of an easily discernible bass line coupled with the Dancer's echoing steps also serves to disrupt the player's rhythm. These incongruencies can easily throw off an Ashen One conditioned by hours of gameplay. Oddly enough, although the quest narrative might suggest otherwise, the Dancer can be challenged at almost any point in the game after gaining access to the High Wall of Lothric. The early opportunity potentially says a lot about Dark Souls' lore and design. While the Dancer most blatantly breaks the mold, she's not the only boss in 6/8 time; and, the boss purportedly responsible for her title and swords is a phenomenal example of this musical theory overall.

The Abyss Watchers appear in 6/8 time; and, while they're tendency to spawn as a trio might follow gaming's “rule of threes,” it possibly also makes it easier to coordinate attacks to the unique time signature. Others have suggested that the Abyss Watchers move in 4/4 time, which might be true when each Watcher is viewed individually. In fact, each Watcher moving in 4/4 time within a 6/8 measure would likely ensure attacks would persistently overlap, i.e. as long as two Watchers are standing, better watch your back—It's basically the world's deadliest round.

Some have compared DSIII's music-based tactics to a lyrical “call and response,” which nails the coordinated aspect of the boss fights but suggests more mimicking or a predictable response on the player's part. An alternate analogy is that the DSIII bosses are the leaders in couples' dances, which share a few concepts with conventional fight choreography. Pontiff Sulyvahn not only demonstrates this idea well, but he is aesthetically and narratively tied to the Dancer, and it's strongly suspected his music changes time signatures and tempo mid-battle.

Most of the Pontiff's fight is in 4/4 time, but it doesn't start that way. His battle likely begins in 3/4 time—a signature often confused with 6/8. The change occurs when he generates his shadow half, and the tempo increases.

A key point is that the Pontiff has a home stance in which he withdraws his swords toward his body. This lapse of attack is often equated with formal training and appears to be an intentional pause in which the Pontiff is anticipating the player's response. Whether the reply is aggression or evasion, ideally the home stance would prepare him to guard, move in pursuit, or wind up for a strike. Like the leader in a dance, the Pontiff can hope to provoke a specific reaction (ideally aggression—the “run into my fist” tactic); but, it's not guaranteed, and he's forced to accommodate his partner's, the player's, response regardless. Identifying these openings in which the boss is awaiting the player's response as per their choreography is a vital key to Dark Souls strategy.

Rhythm-action elements in action games and RPGs aren't revolutionary, appearing in popular titles such as Super Mario RPG (reprised in Paper Mario) and Bayonetta; thus, its subtle execution in DSIII possibly contributes to its surprisingly accessible gameplay. While this design choice might grant the game wider appeal, it doesn't detract from its difficulty and cultivates another layer of complexity. The correlation of fighting styles to choreography, near-fluid application of choreography to music, and the subtle transition between world-building ambience and rhythm-oriented boss battles places Dark Souls III at a pinnacle of current video game sound design. Now, an important question is: Does this theory apply to other Souls titles as well?

These recent titles clearly demonstrate the importance of sound design in creating immersive games. Do you have a favorite on the list? And, since this just scratches the surface, what other games of the last five years do you feel contribute to the industry's innovation? How does a game's sound design, be it the atmospheric effects or soundtrack, influence how you play or interpret the story? Whether you play on mute to avoid the jump scares or pump the directional audio to track digital denizens, let us know!

#Sound Design #video games #video game music #stories untold #observer #dark souls #dsiii #ds3 #audio design #spoilers #spoiler warning

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thebestintoronto · 5 years

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53 Finest Points to do in Toronto-- A Total Overview to Top Destinations

There are many things to do in Toronto it can be hard to understand where to begin. Being among one of the most multiculturally varied cities on earth, there is something for everybody.

It's our hometown but we've also skilled Toronto as a vacationer and also right here and this detailed guide will certainly give you an excellent base to start preparing your trip to Canada's largest city.

Top Things to do in Toronto

Component 1: Ideal Toronto Traveler Attractions

# 1 CN Tower

The CN Tower is Toronto's a lot of renowned spots. Integrated in 1975, it reigned as the world's tallest structure until 2007 when it was taken control of by the Burj Khalifa in 2008.

Today it is still clinging on the Leading 10 in the 9th place, but it is no much less impressive standing at a large 553.3 m-high (1,815.3 feet).

You can consume supper at the rotating dining establishment, walk on the glass floor, take in the 360 degree sights of Toronto from inside and out, appreciate a virtual reality trip, find out about the making of the CN Tower and for a real excitement, head outside and lean over the edge of the tower on the interesting Edge Stroll.

Place: 301 Front Street, appropriate close to the Rogers Centre where heaven Jays play baseball. Instructions - TTC to Untion Terminal, then walk East on Front Road.

# 2 Ontario Science Centre.

Located north of the city, the Ontario Science Centre has been a favourite for years. There are wonderful hands-on science shows and stunning screens.

Walking through the Living Planet exhibits seriously feels like you are walking through a genuine rainforest.

It has Toronto's only Planetarium and also there is an OMNIMAX Theatre showing new films frequently.

Place: 770 Don Mills Roadway North York: Take the Subway Line 2 to Pape Station, transfer to Bus 25 North to Don Mills at St. Dennis. Or take an Uber, or ride a bike!

# 3 Ontario Area.

I am so delighted that they re-opened Ontario Area at Toronto's Waterfront. Situated at the CNE Grounds on the Lakeshore, it's an exceptional location to invest an afternoon.

It has one of the best exterior celebration stages in Toronto at Budweiser Stage drawing in heavyweights carrying out in an intimate setting (We've seen Aerosmith as well as the Killers below as well as it was awesome!) As well as there's an IMAX theater.

Enjoy the outstanding route for cycling or rollerblading that goes around 7.5 acres of green area. It is transforming annually and you never ever understand what will be new with each season.

Location: 955 Lakeshore West BLVD - Take the 514 Tram bent on Dufferin Gateway Loop. Or ride a bike along the waterside route.

# 4 Hockey Hall of Fame.

Canada enjoys its hockey and you can celebrate everything hockey at the Hockey Hall of Popularity located at the foot of Yonge and Front Road. It houses the Stanley Mug and also it gets on display screen when it's not exploring the nation.

It houses the globe's largest collection of hockey memorabilia, there are interactive screens as well as two theaters. Sports fans will like this area.

Location: 30 Yonge Street - Train Line 1 to King Terminal.

# 5 Casa Loma.

Toronto has a castle and also this is a beauty. It was integrated in 1911 by Sir Henry Pellatt; a regional financier to be made use of as his private home. It was an extravagant residence with 98 rooms at 64,700 square feet (6,011 m2).

There are stables as well as a trainer residence and today it is a preferred traveler attraction.

Dave and also I both operated in Casa Loma often times as Hollywood flicks typically movie on the premises. There is even an 800-foot passage resulting in the stables.

You can explore the several suites, the yard, as well as the premises, there's dining including great dining at the BlueBlood Steamhouse, a laid-back restaurant at the Balcony Grill as well as coffee as well as snacks free Café.

Place: 1 Austin Terrace - Take the Metro Line 1 to St. Claire Station and then walk West to Casa Loma.

Part 2: Ideal Toronto Museums.

# 1 Royal Ontario Gallery.

The Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) is Canada's largest museum and also one of the top 10 social establishments in The United States and Canada. Located at the edge of University and Bloor, this remarkable gallery melds old and new. The modern style is a beautiful enhancement. It was contributed to the original structure producing a magnificent masterpiece.

It is suitable for a building that houses 13 million artefacts and art work featured in 40 various exhibit spaces and galleries.

You can get breakthrough tickets at Obtain Your Overview for $20. Place: 100 Queens Park - at the corner of Yonge as well as Opportunity Road. Line 1 or 2 Train to Gallery Station.

# 2 Art Gallery of Ontario.

The AGO underwent a significant makeover in 2008 with a stunning style by Canadian musician Frank Gehry. With new life comes brand-new events and also the AGO attracts some of the top displays on earth. The art gallery houses irreversible collections like the Team of 7, The Thomspon Collection and Contemporary Art.

It additionally has a wonderful cafe where locals like to fulfill for a drink or coffee.

Area: 317 Dundas Street West - Line 1 Train to St. Patrick Station.

# 3 Bata Footwear Gallery.

This is among one of the most one-of-a-kind galleries we've experienced with display screens of footwear with background. However you'll likewise get to see star shoes like Elton John's platform boots and also Elvis' Blue Suede Shoes.

Canadian tale Terry Fox's running shoe is on display screen from when he attempted to encounter the country for cancer research study after shedding his leg to cancer. He eventually succumbed to the condition, however he is a real Canadian hero.

Area: 327 Bloor Street West. Train Line 1 or 2 to St. George Terminal.

# 4 Fort York.

It's a ft in the middle of the city. Before Toronto came to be the huge city that it is, it was when called York. And this fort based on the shores of Lake Ontario to secure the city throughout the Battle of 1812.

This National Historic Website is open year-round offering led scenic tours, demonstrations, and displays. You'll have fun communicating as well as learning more about history.

Location: 250 Ft York Blvd. Streetcar 511 or 505 or 509 Road Car.

# 5 Aga Khan Museum.

Opened up in Sept 2014, the Aga Khan Gallery is among Toronto's most recent attractions. This museum located in the north of the city at the Don Valley as well as Eglinton features a collection of Islamic, Persian and Muslim Art.

It is The United States and Canada's very first museum dedicated to Islamic Art and also was begun by the private collection of the late Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan that had been collecting considering that the 1950s.

The gallery residences 1000 objects going back 10 centuries housed in a remarkable distinctive building.

Place: 77 Wynford Drive - Subway Line 2 to Broadview Terminal after that take Bus # 100 to museum.

It's a great museum to visit in conjunction with the Ontario Scientific Research Centre as they remain in the very same area of town.

Suggested Toronto Tours.

Toronto Urban Adventures - Run by Toronto Indigenous and also our friend Jason. This excursion company has some wonderful alternate scenic tours of the city from Graffiti tours, Beer Make History Much Better Tours and also When Pigs Fry.

Obtain Your Guide is a trip company we have actually used around the world and also they provide led scenic tours of Toronto including:.

Toronto Bike Trip - This 3.5-hour bike trip takes you around the major views at a very easy rate. Leave the beaten course to see lots of sites that are not quickly reached by bus or car.

Toronto 5-Hour Ultimate Scenic Tour - This is the utmost Toronto highlights scenic tour beginning at the CN Tower monitoring deck, taking a Harbour Cruise and also a scenic tour of Casa Loma. See various other destinations like the Eaton Centre, Queens Park and St. Lawrence Market.

Distillery Excursion - The Distillery Area was as soon as the largest whisky manufacturer of the British realm. This excursion takes you with the historic area tasting beer and also chocolate.

Toronto Harbour Scenic Tour - A harbour cruise provides bird's-eye views of the Toronto Horizon. 1 Hour is just sufficient to take it all in and also proceed with your day.

Hop-on-Hop-off Bus - We enjoy a get on hop off bus when checking out a brand-new city. They're a good way to navigate, get your bearings and also quickly see all the significant visitor destinations. A 48-hour pass is just $49.

Component 3: Must-See Toronto Attractions.

# 1 City Hall/Nathan Phillips Square.

It's a gathering place for tours as well as meetups. It most likely brings in the most site visitors to Toronto because of the legendary Town hall Building. It is a prominent spot for events, art screens, as well as celebrations.

It's Toronto's Times Square as this is where we celebrate New Year's Eve and the fountain develops into a skating rink during the winter season.

Location: 100 Queen Road West - Metro Line 1 to Queen Road.

Stroll tour of Toronto to see all the significant sites with Get Your Overview.

# 2 Graffiti Street.

Graffiti Alley is picking up vapor with the appeal of Instagram.

Found at Queen as well as Bathurst offers 1 km of walls covered in Graffiti along Rush Lane. Canadian commentator Rick Mercer shot his Tirades along Graffiti Alley over the course of his 15-year program.

Area: South of Queenstreet Between Spadina as well as Bathurst.

# 3 Harbourfront.

Harbourfront has actually come a lengthy way given that we lived there in the 90s. It is now an incredible enjoyment location complete with theaters, galleries, songs places, as well as celebrations.

There are plenty of dining alternatives at Harbourfront and it is an outstanding place to walk along Toronto's beachfront, do some buying in the Harbourfront Centre as well as take some artisan workshops.

Area: Found on Queens Quay - Take the metro to Union Terminal and Walk South to the water. Or take the Spadina Tram all the way to Harbourfront.

# 4 Chinatown.

One of Toronto's the majority of vivid areas in the downtown Chinatown located on Spadina Avenue. Get your preferred Oriental vegetables for authentic cooking, consume extraordinary Chinese food as well as ask for a pot of tea after hrs (you'll get a pot of beer if you know where to go!).

You truly dropped as if you have actually stepped into little China with the sounds, scents and taste of Asia engulfing the senses at every turn. If you take a trip a great deal, this is a wonderful place to get that dosage of Asia you've been missing out on.

Found along Spadina Avenue in between Queen and University.

# 5 Yonge and Dundas Square.

It's our mini version of Times Square. This preferred public square in the heart of Midtown always has something interesting going on. Surrounded by billboards, purchasing, flick theaters as well as City TV, it's an occurring area.

There are constantly outdoor performances, events as well as also cost-free films in the summertime.

Location: At the crossway of Yonge as well as Dundas Road. Take Train Line 1 to Dundas Terminal.

# 6 The Path.

When we take a trip the world, everybody asks us concerning the below ground city in Toronto. Well, it holds true, we have a whole below ground world under the city known as The Course. Starting at Yonge and also Dundas Square it weaves with 30km of the midtown core completely to Union Station.

More than 200k daily site visitors and also travelers stroll the path filled with restaurants, shopping, cafés attaching 75 high-rises, train terminals, outlet store as well as hotels. When it's chilly outside in the winter it's an excellent location to roam and also when the summertime obtain too warm, it's a great getaway from the heat.

Situated: in the downtown core. Just stroll into any kind of structure as well as look for the Course indication. Go to Path.com for maps.

Toronto Day Tours. Niagara Falls Air, boat & Wineries - Niagara Falls is the celebrity attractions, however it has an outstanding wine area. This trip takes you to vineyards as well as you obtain a stunning picturesque plane trip plus a flight on the world-famous - Housemaid of the Haze (currently referred to as the Hornblower.

See The Most Effective Points to do in Niagara Falls. Algonquin Park 3 Day Trip - Algonquin Park is an unbelievable Provincial Park 3 hours north of the city. At 6356 square km (2955 square miles) It would take a lifetime to check out, but 3 days is ample sufficient to detect moose, remain in a cabin in the woods and get a feeling for the Excellent Canadian outdoors.

If you can drive yourself to Algonquin, we recommend a canoe and also outdoor camping scenic tour with Voyageur Quest Tours, the specialists in the location. We spotted 9 moose on our excursion with them.

The Bruce Peninsula - Tobermory is popular for its shipwrecks relaxing in shallow waters. You can either snorkel or if you dive, see the much deeper wrecks relaxing at the end of Lake Huron. Trek the Bruce Path, explore the grotto and take a jet watercraft bent on Blossom Pot Island.

Royal Prince Edward Region - Royal Prince Edward Area is Ontario's Second most prominent wine region and it coming to be extra prominent annually. See the areas found on the coasts of Lake Ontario as you drink a glass of wine and also delight in a regional lunch.

Stratford - Long prior to it came to be referred to as the residence of Justin Bieber's youth, Stratford was well-known for its festival. With 4 different theaters, Stratford showcases Shakespeare manufacturings as well as Broadway Musicals. It has actually attracted the similarity Alec Guinness, Christopher Plummer, Dame Maggie Smith, and also William Shatner.

See our experience at Stratford Celebration.

Part 4: Toronto - Things to do Outdoors.

# 1 Distillery Area.

The Distillery Area was as soon as residence to Gooderham as well as Worts alcohol distillery, making it the ideal location to exchange among the city's top home entertainment districts.

Walk via the pedestrian pathways along cobblestone roads as you browse the several shops and also art galleries. I enjoy the historical artefacts that are on display throughout the complicated.

In the summer season the streets come to life with outside road entertainers, songs as well as stage efficiencies.

In the winter, the Christmas Markets remain in full speed. There are lots of areas to eat as well as there are some bars as well as microbreweries to wet the palate.

Location: Situated on Mill Street between Parliament and Cherry Road.

A Segway tour of the Distillery is an enjoyable means to navigate as well as discover of its history.

# 2 High Park.

Situated in the West End, the city's largest park brings in site visitors from afar during cherry blossom season, yet there is a great deal more to high park.

Go To the High Park Zoo real estate residential animals like bison, highland livestock, as well as llamas. It's a wonderful park for hiking as well as cycling and in the summer season Shakespeare in the Park starts with online performances from the Bard.

There's Grenadier Fish Pond, the Historic Colborne Lodge and also it is a short stroll to the Lake Shore to delight in the Toronto Waterside.

Location: Take Subway Line 2 West to Keele or High Park Terminal.

# 3 Toronto Islands.

You need to go to the islands for an amazing view of Toronto but there is a whole lot to see out here too!

There is stand paddle boarding, kayaking, and also cycling. You can see the beaches of the island including Toronto's renowned Nude Beach.

We constantly take pleasure in an outing on the islands and there's even a tiny amusement park. The islands are a perfect escape from the city.

Area: Take the ferry from Queen's Quay.

# 4. Evergreen Brickworks.

The latest outdoor market location is the Evergreen Brickworks situated in the Don Valley.

With outside markets, art exhibits and cafés, it's a superb location to spend a couple of hours.

Rental fee a bike from among the city's bike share places as well as market out to the silent district to grab some fresh fruits and vegetables from the farmers market.

Area: 550 Bayview Avenue. It's complicated to get to a biking or a vehicle is the best means. By transit, take Subaway line 1 north to Davisville and then bus # 28 to the Brickworks.

# 5 The Beaches.

The Beaches have actually long been a favourite vacationer destination of Toronto.

It is a location where time stands still boutique stores, pastry shops, indie shops and also restaurants line the hectic road. The Coastlines are exactly what you would expect from its name.

Beginning at Ashbridges Bay, you'll find beach volley ball, boardwalks, and also parks extending along Lake Ontario through Kew Beach along the 3km path leading to the R.C. Harris Filtering Plant.

Traffic is an awesome in the summertime, so make use of a bike to get around. Purchase an ice cream cone and also stroll the roads stopping in to pay attention to music or see the farmers market. The Beaches Jazz event takes place during the month of July.

Place: Toronto East -Take the Queen Tram.

# 6 Riverdale Ranch.

You heard me correctly, there is a ranch in the middle of Toronto. Located in the East End of midtown Toronto, this is an actual functioning farm that permits site visitors.

Its 7.5 acres consist of vegetable yards, farm animals, and also a farmhouse and barns. It's a terrific representation of country Ontario farming neighborhood as well as a silent getaway from the pressure of the city.

Area: 201 Winchester Street - Line 1 to University Subway Station transfer to 504 Eastbound bus.

# 7 Toronto Bike Trails.

Toronto has some exceptional bike routes away from the city website traffic. You can use the bike share program to cycle around the city, or you can rent some bike.

Just how around taking a scenic tour with a guide to see some of Toronto's best attractions.

Some of the most effective biking routes are the Beachfront Path, Leslie Spit Path, The Don Valley Bike Path, Trick Yard Belt Line, Taylor Creek Park and also High Park.

Locations: For a full listing of Toronto, Bike Routes check out Toronto.com.

There are lots of biking trips in Toronto to get you began.

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Vitamin Therapy Toronto - The IV Lounge

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instantdeerlover · 4 years

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Shoppers Miss Grocery Store Samples. Brands Miss Them More added to Google Docs

Shoppers Miss Grocery Store Samples. Brands Miss Them More

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With sample stands canceled due to COVID-19, emerging food brands have few options to reach shoppers

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A post shared by Jared Plushnick (@plushnickwx) on Jul 14, 2020 at 10:57am PDT

via Eater - All https://www.eater.com/2020/8/25/21378708/grocery-store-free-samples-covid-19-costco-whole-foods

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ciathyzareposts · 4 years

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The Black Gate: Of Valor and Virginity

Surreptitiously awarding the Rune of Valor to Kliftin of Jhelom.

The more Gideon thinks about it, the more he doesn’t really like having a death-dealing demon bound up in his sword. The question is what to do about it. Ideally, there would be some magic ritual that would simultaneously release the demon and send it to another plane, but I don’t know how to do that, and Erethian–the person who bound the demon in the first place–is dead. I can’t drop it in the deepest part of the ocean (which, let’s face it, is only about 20 feet deep) because the interface doesn’t let you drop things over water. I’ll assume that for similar reasons, I can’t drop it in a volcano–if I can even find one. No spells destroy it.

I think about trying to ruin it in the forge, and it’s in trying to put it on the hearth that I discover something unpleasant: I can’t even remove it from my inventory. If I lay it town somewhere, it just leaps back into my hand the moment I close my inventory screen. This also means I can’t try Plan F, which is to destroy it with Rudyom’s wand. (Rudyom’s wand doesn’t work on it anyway, even if I try it with the sword still in my hands.) I can temporarily stow the sword in a container, like my backpack, but if I then set down the backpack, the sword jumps back into my hands again. If I’ve already replaced the sword in my hands, it jumps into whatever container I’m carrying in place of the backpack, If I’m not carrying any container, it tosses whatever I’m carrying to the ground and puts itself in my hands. It will not be parted from me.

You cannot unforge what has been forged.

The best I can do for now is commit to not using it, which means taking Magebane back from Jaana and giving her her old regular sword again. I don’t need a sentient sword influencing my thoughts and actions, and that little confrontation with Dracothraxus was a bit too uncomfortable for me to trust that the sword isn’t doing either. Maybe I’ll figure out some other options along the way. Before heading for Jhelom, the party returns briefly to Britain and cashes in nuggets and gems for gold. I spend nearly all my gold on new spells and reagents from Nystul. Now that the Avatar is maxed out in intelligence and magic, I want to get more out of my spells than usual, and I vow to find a reason to cast every spell and discuss them as I do. Before I get into this, it’s important to remember that spells in Ultima VII come in nine levels: eight regular levels plus a set of 8 Level 0 “cantrips” that you can cast indefinitely. Except for cantrips, each spell requires an expenditure of mana equal to their level plus the associated reagents. The syllables from Ultima V still exist, theoretically, but the player no longer has to know them. The spellcaster just speaks them automatically. We get to Jhelom by heading south to Trinsic and then west across the lower continent and then across the channel. I’m doing this from memory, so I’m happy when we see roads and houses on the first island we encounter. We land near the dock, which worryingly has cannons pointed outward, as if expecting hostile ships to arrive. It occurs to me that cannons in this game can be moved but not turned, which is odd for a game that allows so much interactivity otherwise. It amuses me that Britannians, when they go to buy cannons, have to specify whether they want an east-facing cannon or north-facing cannon or whatever.

If the invasion comes from an oblique angle, they’re screwed no matter what.

We arrive at midnight, which I assume is going to give me a chance to use my first spell, “Awaken,” on a sleeping NPC. Oddly, although the first building we come to–city hall–has a double bed, there’s no one in it. There is, however, someone in bed in the hut across the way.

Awaken – AN ZU (“Negate Sleep”), Level 0 cantrip. A relatively useful spell that wakes up a sleeper. It doesn’t have to be a magic slumber: it awakens normal sleepers, too, and is the most reliable way of doing so. Unlike in Ultima VI, regular sleepers in VII will sometimes awaken if you just make a ruckus around their bedrooms, but it’s faster to cast the cantrip. I’m sure I’ve used it more times to wake up NPCs in the middle of the night so I could talk to them than I have on characters put magically to sleep.

Maybe the joke is there is no such cantrip, and the person really awakens from some idiot yelling “AN ZU!” in his room.

The sleeper turns out to be Master de Snel, head of the Library of Scars fighting school. (The name is a clear play on producer Dallas Snell.) He’s also a trainer. Some experimentation shows that he only raises combat, not the associated attributes, so I think Inforlem is a better deal. (de Snel gives +2 combat for 2 points; Inforlem gives +2 combat, +1 strength, and +1 dexterity for 3 points). I try to have Gideon train with him anyway, but he remarks that Gideon is already his superior in skill. I guess the Avatar just isn’t going to be able to spend those skill points. His statement that Jhelom is “devoted to the art of combat–not mere slavish military discipline, but pure violent confrontation” strikes me as a bit ominous. Jhelom used to be devoted to valor. Back at city hall, the mayor, Joseph, has appeared, and he wakes up before I’m able to use the spell. He characterizes Jhelom as a rough place, and he’s called upon to maintain order with his sword as often as his pen. He says that fighters gather in the town square to duel every day, but then clarifies that they mostly use training dummies. It’s more like a mass workout than a battle. There are sometimes matches “to the blood,” though, and people bet on them. So far, Joseph is beating Jheolm in the contest for the Rune of Valor, but I’m not sure I like this place.

Is that because of its nature or because of people like you?

We take the opportunity to explore the empty Library of Scars. In addition to practice rooms, it has an actual library, which disappointingly has a “Britannian Purity League” flyer in a prominent place. The “Books of Britannia” entry is updated with The Accedens of Armoury. To make it easier to see, I cast the “Glimmer” spell, which I honestly forgot existed until I started reviewing the spells. I would have used it earlier in some of the dungeons.

Glimmer – IN BET LOR (“Create Small Light”), Level 0 cantrip. Creates a low-level light for a short duration–just long enough to check out a room. Still better than adventuring in the dark. Useful when you don’t want to waste reagents or spell points on “Light” or “Great Light.”

De Snel made me suspicious enough that I confess I swiped a key I found in his house. I justify it by saying I’ve been generally charged by Lord British with investigating what’s wrong with Britannia, and I need a wide mandate to do that. The key opens a locked office in the Library of Scars which has a couple of chests. One has The Book of the Fellowship and a serpentine dagger. The other has three gold bars and a Fellowship medallion. A parrot in the corner says “I know where the treasure is” in between “Polly wanna cracker” and “pretty bird.” But I can’t make it say anything else, even when I try to give it some fish and chips. At this point, it becomes weird to rouse people from their beds, so I set up my bedroll and get a few hours of sleep. I still don’t know what the rest of the party does while I use the only bedroll. When I wake up, it’s raining and thundering, which gives me a chance to use another cantrip.

Weather – REL HUR (“Change Wind”), Level 0 cantrip. Makes it stormy if it’s sunny and vice versa. Not very “useful,” but it’s actually kind of unpleasant to adventure when it’s raining, so I use it just for aesthetic purposes. There are lots of other games that I’ve wished had this option, particularly the two Assassin’s Creed games where a storm seems to magically appear every time you engage in a sea battle. Note that the original spell of this title in Ultima V was necessary for sailing the direction that you want to go.

Kliftin, an ex-soldier, runs the town’s armory, but for some reason the armory also has a spinning wheel and loom, and I catch Kliftin operating the loom as I enter. He claims to have “seen [his] share of death and destruction,” which reminds me that the book talks about strife between regional leaders, but you really never have any sense of where these supposed wars happened. Britannia’s not that big of a place, and Lord British seems to keep it pretty orderly. Unnamed wars and campaigns simply don’t fit with the landscape. He’s a little less charitable in his views of the town’s duels, which he says are often fought to the death. He’s worried about Sprellic, the mild-mannered innkeeper, who stole the Honor Flag from the wall of the Library of Scars and has refused to return it. (I would have stolen it, too; it’s supposed to be the Valor flag. Doesn’t this town know its own history?) He’s therefore going to face three fighters from the Library in a duel to the death. He suggests I ask more at the pub. He sells equipment, but I need to save my money for spells and training, and I’m already doing a fine job finding equipment upgrades. We cross a bridge to the west side of Jhelom, where we find nothing in a few houses. Then we find Sprellic hiding in his own house, where he begs Gideon not to hurt him “this time.” He calms down as we talk and explains that he arrived from Minoc a few years ago to buy the Bunk and Stool pub. He employs two barmaids who together keep the unruly fighters under control through charm (Ophelia) or physical violence (Daphne). Recently, a stranger came to the tavern claiming to be the Avatar. A member of the Fellowship, the man consumed conspicuously then went to bed. Not long afterwards, he complained that it was too cold, and he kept complaining even after he had every blanket in the inn. In desperation, Sprellic went running around town and found an “old tapestry” hanging on a wall, so he took it, not knowing he was taking the standard of the Library of Scars. In the morning, the “Avatar” was gone, with the tapestry, and without paying his bill. Later, three members of the Library of Scars–Syria, Vokes, and Timmons challenged him to duels to the death. Before I’ve left his house, I’ve agreed to serve as his champion.

This is a bad sign.

The last place to visit in town, believe it or not, is the Bunk and Stool. Right in the front door, we run into Syria, an olive-skinned “fighter from the south”–gods know what that means in the confusing geography of Britannia. It’s clear that Sprellic would have a crush on her if she didn’t terrify him. She got 10 lashes for allowing Sprellic to escape with the flag, so she’s determined to make him pay. I soon meet Vokes and Timmons, and they are similarly intractable when it comes to the subject. They refuse to believe it’s a misunderstanding, or to show any mercy to someone who clearly isn’t a fighter. Timmons isn’t even a member of the Library of Scars yet, but de Snel won’t let him join until he defeats someone who has challenged the school. I had started this quest by thinking that it’s solution would be finding the stolen banner, but now I’m thinking that these three deserve a good thrashing. Dupre is next. He’s his usual self, recently knighted, in the midst of “conducting a survey of all the drinking establishments in Britannia.” He confirms that Jhelom has gotten a lot more “bloodthirsty” and he summarizes what’s happening with Sprellic. I have him join the party, of course, determined to kick out Sentri if things get unwieldy. Dupre comes with chain armor, a sword, a shield, and a mug of beer.

To be fair, that’s what most RPGs are about.

It’s 11:50 at this point, and the duel is supposed to be at noon, so I have just enough time to talk to the barmaids before I have to head out. They’re taking bets on the duel, so I bet 100 gold pieces on myself–well, technically Sprellic, but I hope it will pay regardless. Daphne is heavy and unattractive and vocally resents Ophelia. Ophelia is both a bit mean, egging on Daphne, and bit daft, claiming that Sprellic is the Avatar in secret and will easily defeat the three fighters before opening his own fighting school.

Remember this quote.

The dueling grounds are back on the first island, so we head there. I soon find that there’s no good way to fight the three members of the Library of Scars solo. Going into combat mode engages everyone in the duel, which isn’t as unfair as it sounds because all three of the Library fighters jump in together instead of individually. There’s no way to tell my party to exercise restraint, so we actually kill all of them. De Snel is happy about the outcome and invites me to join the Library of Scars. Ophelia gives me 1,000 gold for the outcome (Sprellic was poorly favored by the odds). Later, it occurs me that there is a way to get the party not to fight–set them all to “retreat”–but slaughter seems like the wrong way to go about it. I try just knocking them out or putting them to sleep, but it just delays the inevitable end of the duel. They did insist it was “to the death,” after all.

Technically, your buildings are both on the north side of the street.

Reloading, I try some other options. De Snel has nothing useful to say about the upcoming duel. Joseph, for all his claims that he often intervenes, refuses to do anything about this case. He claims that he and de Snel have an understanding and that if he upsets that, de Snel is likely to assassinate him and take over the town completely. It’s Kliftin who has the answer. First, he figures that the false Avatar is Sullivan the Trickster, known to do this sort of thing. Second, he comes up with the solution: he can just weave a new Honor Flag. It will fool the fighters long enough to call off the duel, and if they ever do figure out it’s a counterfeit, they won’t be able to say so without looking foolish. Plus, they’d have to challenge Kliftin in that case, who’s a lot tougher to beat. It’s going to mean that I miss the appointed duel time, but I rationalize (correctly) that this game doesn’t have any way of telling today’s noon from tomorrow’s noon. While we wait, we explore the rest of the island. Outside of town to the west is a cave, where we’re attacked by a single nameless fighter the moment we enter. The cave has a crate with a triple crossbow–supposedly a devastating weapon that costs a ton if you try to buy it in Iolo’s shop. I hate micromanaging ammunition, though, so I don’t bother with it. A cave system south of town is much more extensive, so much that I’m surprised it’s not a named dungeon. We fight some bats and gremlins as we enter; I’m still not sure why gremlins turn into food in this game. We soon come across a trap that generates a field of fire across the floor. I think this might be a good opportunity for a spell, but it turns out I’m wrong.

Douse – AN FLAM (“Negate Flame”), Level 0 cantrip. Supposedly douses flames, but doesn’t work on any flame that you’d really want doused, like ones blocking your passage in corridors. Only works on things like torches and campfires that you could douse by double-clicking on them. At least it doesn’t cost anything, which is more than I can say for Great Douse, or VAS AN FLAM (“Great Negate Flame,” Level 1), which supposedly douses everything in the area. While we’re at it, I might also discuss Ignite (IN FLAM, “Create Flame,” cantrip), which does the opposite. If you can think of a single use for these spells, even hypothetical, anywhere in the game, I beg you to comment.

A wizard attacks us in a ruined structure in which two stone harpies flank a crystal ball. Trying to use the crystal ball prompts a voice that might be The Guardian to shout “go away!”

An interesting scene.

As we return to the entrance, the spontaneous flames are gone, so I use the occasion to try “Detect Traps” and “Destroy Traps.” Neither works, but it’s maybe the case that the flames’ appearance isn’t a “trap” as such. I’ll have to experiment some more before declaring the spells worthless. The dungeon has a few minor finds–a few reagents, a set of swamp boots, a little food. On an island east of town, the Shrine of Valor is in pretty good shape. There are some gremlins running around the area, but it’s well-kept and has a sword on the altar, which I suppose is okay. It occurs to me that I didn’t hear the word “valor” once in Jhelom, which is a bit depressing, but I suppose I can’t expect cities to maintain their mission statements for over 200 years. It occurs to me that when the cities were created around the virtues in the backstory of Ultima IV, certain professions were naturally drawn to certain cities because of those virtues: fighters to valor, mages to truth, and so on. (Druids=justice and rangers=spirituality were always a bit of a stretch and should have been reversed in my opinion, and I guess tinkers=sacrifice never made much sense.) Two centuries later, the remnants of the professions are there, but not the virtues. Jhelom still attracts fighters and Moonglow still attracts mages, but they’ve become more about the realities of those professions than their aspirations.

The Shrine of Valor from above.

There’s a small island northwest of Jhelom with another cave entrance. It’s clear that someone’s been living inside, but I can’t figure out what they’ve been up to. There’s a huge barrel of beer in a corner–and next to it a set of thumb screws. At the south end of the cavern, a curtain parts to reveal a sack with a single key. The key opens two chests in the main room, and inside we find a couple of bars of gold, reagents, and a magic helm. The best I can figure is that some bootleggers operate out of here. On a fun note, if you turn the spigot on a keg of liquor in this game, your party members absolutely freak out, alternately screaming “turn it off!’ and “thou art wasting it!” Nothing brings them more distress, apparently.

It’s not like you were going to get to drink it.

Our final adventure in the Valerian Isles occurs on the southeastern tip of the main island, where we find a pirate and the remains of a ship. The pirate is pacing back and forth but refuses to talk with us even though his garbage pile and arrangement of furnishing suggest he’s been stranded here for a while. There are three barrels of gunpowder among the wreckage, and these are the first ones in the game that I feel comfortable (for role-playing reasons) grabbing for my own use. They generate explosions that can be useful on locked doors and in combat.

I like that graphics are advanced enough in this game to set up little “vignettes.”

I return to Jhelom, where Kliftin has created the fake Honor Flag. I return it to Syria, who takes it grudgingly and calls off the duel. Sprellic is overjoyed at the result. Ophelia refuses my arguments of a “moral victory” and I’m left with ten worthless chits. As for the Rune of Valor, I always interpreted valor as a mandate to actively seek wrongs and right them. You can life an honorable, just, and compassionate life just dealing with things as they come to you, but only the truly valiant do something proactively about an injustice that isn’t otherwise their duty. Thus, I give the rune to Kliftin, who came up with a solution to a problem that he could have ignored, taking some risk upon himself in doing so.

I was tempted not to, but the game didn’t give me that option.

We cap this long entry with a visit to the Dungeon Destard, which has always struck me as the least literal of the original eight dungeons (“Wrong,” “Deceit,” “Despise,” etc.), although as the opposite of valor, it’s clearly meant to evoke “dastardliness” or thereabouts.

In an early room, I meet an unlikely trio consisting of a fighter, a ranger, and a winged gargoyle. The fighter introduces himself as Cosmo. He claims to be betrothed to Ophelia, the Jhelom barmaid (who didn’t mention him once), but she’s apparently decided to make him prove his virginity before they get married. That sounds like she gave him something to keep him busy, because she certainly didn’t sound like a virgin. Anyway, he thinks there’s a unicorn in the area that only virgins can touch. This tickles a memory, but I seem to recall that the unicorn is in a different dungeon. His companions, the ranger Cairbre and the gargoyle Kallibrus, Kallibrus seems genuine but confused because gargoyles don’t have genders and don’t mate. Cairbre concurs with me that Ophelia just sent Cosmo on the quest to get rid of him, and he even shares my opinion about Ophelia’s likely virginity. Despite all of that, he has a fondness for Cosmo and didn’t want him to venture to the dungeon alone. It’s nice to meet another group of friends, even if their quest is stupid.

“Not that there’s anything wrong with that,” Cairbre hastens to add.

Deeper in the dungeon, we start running into dragons. Dupre proves himself the weakest link of the party, having joined when he was only Level 3 (everyone else is Level 6), so I get a lot of use out of:

Heal – MANI (“Life”), Level 3. A simple spell that heals about 10 hit points. A useful workhorse; probably the spell I’ve cast most since beginning the game.

There are a lot of caltrops in the corridors. I really hate those things. You never seem to get them all, and no matter where you move them, someone always seems to stumble over them later. But it’s worth it, because we soon find a bunch of gold bars just sitting in the hallway.

Can you even see these?

In a large, central chamber, we kill three more dragons and find the corpse of a man with a Fellowship staff, a chest with two Fellowship medallions, and a sack full of potions and reagents. Further along, another dragon cave delivers some huge dividends: stacks of gold, gold bars, gold nuggets, and gems, along with the 5-10 gems per dragon that we’ve already been looting from their corpses. Our economic prospects have definitely turned around, and it’s time to reflect that in spells, reagents, and training. Poor Spark has 15 training credits to use. There’s also a spellbook in one of the chests, but none of my party besides the Avatar can use it, and he has his own. I’m not sure that any NPC in the game besides the Avatar can cast spells.

Coming here should have proven our valor, but it just stoked our avarice.

We do find the unicorn, although in a separate set of caves that share the same mountain range with Despise (if there’s an illusory wall connecting them, I didn’t find it). He’s right in the entrance, prancing around a pool of water, and he introduces himself as Lasher. He tells a horrible story about why unicorns can detect virgins: they were originally a species of nature spirits, both male and female, bound to service by a wizard. When the leader of the clan decided to spend one night chasing females instead of heeding the wizard’s call, the wizard cursed the entire herd with chastity, forbidding them to mate. This curse caused them to kill all the females of their species and left them with a sensitivity to “sexual energy” such that they could only tolerate the presence of virgins.

I thought Britannia was a more enlightened society.

He’s aware of the presence of Cosmo and his companions, and he’s avoiding them because he’s “sick of being used as the instrument of women’s humiliation.” But he laughs when he hears that they’re looking for him to prove a male virgin and agrees to help. (I return to them later, but there are no new dialogue options.) During the conversation, he asks whether I’m a virgin. It’s an interesting question. I’m not, obviously, but I never thought about whether my character is. He didn’t explicitly have sex with Princess Aiela in The Savage Empire, and he rejected the overtures of the gypsies in Ultima VI. He seems pretty old to be a virgin, but one wonders if things back on Earth even count. I mean, his power and skill all reset when he walks through the moongate; why not his virginity? I err on the side of saying yes, and the damned horse actually has the nerve to accuse me of lying to avoid embarrassment! After my party has a good laugh at my expense, he confirms that I do regain my virginity upon entering the moongate.

Maybe I put that demon sword away too soon.

He then asks if I’m a virgin by choice or circumstance. I say “circumstance” because Jaana’s in a relationship and I’ve otherwise been surrounded by men since I got here. Lasher offers to help and asks if I want love or lust. The real answer is that I want neither in a society that has yet to discover deodorant or razor blades, but I choose “love” and he directs me to Nastassia in Cove. I’ve already met Nastassia, of course, but the conversation reminds me that I promised to find out what happened to her parents. We’re going to make some spell and training stops along the way, but otherwise the next stop is Yew, city of Justice. Time so far: 46 hours

source http://reposts.ciathyza.com/the-black-gate-of-valor-and-virginity/

#retro games #dos games #retro #crpg #adventure #amiga #oldcomputers #8bit #16bit #blog #repost

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poop4u · 4 years

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The Best Exercise For a Dog is Using Its Nose

#Poop4U

Maggie, Skip, Jim and I are just back from a lovely hour-long walk this morning. All four of us were serenaded by the songs of a newly-arrived migrating birds, including Yellow and Palm Warblers.

Bird photos from Wikipedia, such a great resource.

Jim and I gloried in the sights of these gorgeous birds, the French-blue sky after a day of rain, and baby leaf buds springing forth, full of life and promise and hope.

While we walked and looked, the dogs walked and sniffed. And sniffed and sniffed and sniffed and sniffed. Yes, they got some physical exercise–especially good for Skip now that he can take longer walks along with his physical therapy exercises. But mostly what they got was brain food, and I can’t think of anything more important for a domestic dog than that. There’s a lot going on between those adorable ears, and we neglect it at our peril. Using their noses engages a dog’s brain in vital ways, and can prevent a raft of behavioral problems. Lots of interesting sniffing has been critical to keeping a just-turned, three-year old freight train of a Border Collie sane during his extreme physical restrictions. (Not to mention my sanity. Just saying.)

I was reminded of a post I wrote in 2016 titled Take Your Dog on a Sniff, and I thought today would be a good day to repeat it. There are so many people with new dogs out there, along with so many people with dogs/kids/jobs/life/pandemics taking up massive amounts of our time and energy. The best way I know to tire out a dog out in a healthy way is not to get it physical exercise, but to give it mental exercise. Tricks are one way to do that, but letting a dog use its nose-brain connection is another. You can do that by playing scent games, or going on walks (especially in new places), and the pay off is huge. Skip and Maggie came back to chew on stuffed Kongs, and are now sleeping at my feet while I write.

Here’s the post from 2016, Take Your Dog on a Sniff:

Recently I watched someone walking his dog close to my office in Black Earth. Every ten feet or so the dog tried to stop to sniff the ground, and every time she did, the man at the other end of the leash pulled her forward so that he could continue walking. Ah, the canine-primate disconnect, which never fails to appear if we just pay attention. I wrote an entire book about this, The Other End of the Leash, and yet I’m still discovering ways in which we struggle to merge our ethological needs.

Primates love to walk, at least, terrestrial ones like humans do. Not only that, but we like to walk side-by-side with our friends, to face the world together and exchange the news of the day. While we’re walking we spend a lot of energy looking around—enjoying the view and noting what has changed in the neighborhood. Dogs, on the other hand, primarily want to learn about the environment through olfaction, a sense that we humans are better at than we think, but often pay little attention to. But how many of us insist that our dogs don’t stop to smell the roses, but walk or trot happily by our side? It is why, in Family Friendly Dog Training, I suggest that dogs define heeling as “walk slowly and ignore all interesting things”. This photo, by the way, is Susannah Charleson’s Search and Rescue dog Puzzle, with Susannah in the background. (If you haven’t read her books yet, you’re lucky–because now you get to. Don’t miss them, they’re great.)

Dog owners aren’t alone in ignoring the olfactory needs of animals. Birte Nielsen and colleagues published an important paper in December of 2015 titled “Olfaction: An Overlooked Sensory Modality in Applied Ethology and Animal Welfare.” They argue, compelling, that we do animals a disservice by not acknowledging the impact of odor on their behavior and wellbeing. These odors can both cause suffering or improve lives. Jenna Bueley, DVM, found that air captured from a busy, stress-filled urban veterinary clinic increased stress-related behavior in dogs, reported at the 2012 IFAAB conference. Clark and King, noted in Nielsen’s article, found that olfactory stimulation increased behavioral diversity and activity levels in captive black-footed cats. But note… the same study found that odors had little effect on the behavior of captive gorillas. Ah, that primate thing again.

You don’t need me to tell you how important smell is to a dog. None of us are surprised that years ago, Bradshaw and Lea found that the vast majority of a dog’s interaction with a new dog related to olfaction (1992). But I think we all, me included, need to be reminded of how much “going on a walk” can be defined by us as “walking while looking and perhaps talking,” while to a dog, “going on a walk” means moving from one interesting smell to another.

It is important, but not natural, for us to acknowledge the essential nature of the sense of smell. Examples of its importance abound: Wells and Hepper (2006) found that day-old pups preferred the scent of aniseed if their mother’s food had contained it while they were pregnant. Think about that—it means that dogs can learn to associate emotions, and thus behavior, with a particular smell even before they are born. (Breeders take note.) It also appears that the perception of scent is lateralized in the brain in dogs. Sinischalchi and colleagues (“Sniffing with the right nostril” 2011) found that dogs preferred to use the right nostril when sniffing new scents, and switched to the left when the scent became routine, or non-threatening. Dogs who smelled arousing stimuli (adrenalin, sweat) never switched to the left nostril. Since the right nostril is linked to the right hemisphere of the brain (it’s an exception to the usual switch, left eye to right brain for example—if that stopped you for a moment, it did me too…), this suggests that olfaction in a dog’s brain is lateralized, and that the sympathetic HPA axis (hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal, or “on alert!” axis) is primarily mediated by the right hemisphere in dogs.

[Addendum added in 2020: And now we now that a dog’s nose can sense heat. Who knows what else they can do with their noses!]

This all circles around to the title of the blog: Take your dog on a sniff. I’ve written before that dogs need autonomy to be truly happy. I’m arguing here that what they most need is the freedom to use their noses. That is easy for us who can walk our dogs off leash. But leashed dogs need owners willing to compromise—an invigorating primate walk with our dogs trotting alongside part of the time, and the rest includes the dog getting, finally, the freedom to go from scent to scent and all the stimulation and information that entails.

Full disclosure: I’ve been good for years about letting my dogs stop to sniff when we are walking on leash, but lest I sound smug, guess how many photos I have of my dogs sniffing something? Three. Only three. That’s compared to literally hundreds of photos of my dogs playing together or with toys. Ah, that primate thing again. (Happy to say I updated that this morning, in May 2020, when I took a lot of sniffing photos.)

MEANWHILE, back on the farm: Skip is progressing by leaps and bounds, and we got a green light from UW physical therapist Courtney Arnoldy to give him a bit more freedom. Here she is working on weight loading Skip’s back right leg through a series of exercises that we replicate in the garage. (I watch on FaceTime, can’t go into the building. The photo was taken by assistant Haley, who was invaluable in keeping Skip focused while Courtney set up some of the exercises.)

Half of our walk this morning was with Skip on a long line rather than a short leash, so he got lots of time to trot rather than just walk fast. I’ve tried letting him off leash for a brief period of time and it’s pretty much what I thought it’d be: Two seconds of Skip standing still, and then exploding as if out of a rocket for twenty strides–the time it takes me to say Stand! and call him back to me. It’s just impossible to ease a young dog into getting a graduated amount of exercise, but I’m doing the best I can. Our next PT appt is next Monday, and I have hopes that his leg will be sound enough that I really can let him run for a few minutes without causing a set back.

Here are the dogs wearing out their brains while we listen to the birds.

If you follow the blog you know I love to cook, and I’ve done even more of it since Jim and I are staying Safe at Home as much as we can. Saturday I made the dough for these cinammon date rolls, and Sunday morning I got up early to make up the rolls and let them rise a second time before baking. (Or, “proof” if you’re British, says the woman binge watching The Great British Baking Show over and over and over again) . They look pretty good in the photo for sure, but I have to say, they taste even better. Healthy? Uh, nope. I’m making amends by making a lovely chicken/asparagus dish tonight, but I just picked fresh rhubarb and I have this recipe for rhubarb cake that is out of this world . . .

Friend and kick ass photographer Stephn Dahlgren came out to the farm last week to take some more photos. We haven’t seen most of them yet, but here’s one of Nellie, who, of course, managed to photo bomb what had been a great opportunity for a Trisha/Skip photo in lovely light. Nellie is highly displeased that twice a day I have to keep her out of the garage to do Skip’s physical therapy. She is making it clear by ripping the hell out of the wooded frame to the garage door, the message being clear: This is MY GARAGE. CAN YOU NOT READ THE SCENT MARKS AND VISUAL SIGNALS?

I hope you are hanging in there during this challenging time. As a dear niece said to me recently, “We’re all in the same storm but in different boats.” I hope your boat is keeping you afloat safely and without too much suffering.

Poop4U Blog via www.Poop4U.com Trisha, Khareem Sudlow

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