#why did i draw this character two different ways? the world may never know | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

amalthiaph · 23 days

Text

I took an interest in The Bad Batch around the tailend of S2. It's not news to Tumblr that I almost slept on this show. And I cannot thank Caleb Dume enough for being the reason why I pressed the play button for this one. While I haven't been around for most of its active run, and I wish I had been, the last year has been among the best months of my life.

This show challenged my morals, and taught me lessons that I will forever take with me.

Tech taught me to embrace and take pride in who I am. I now think that I am not something that needs to be cured. I needed to be understood and accepted. He taught me that we deserved to be loved and be allowed to live the way we want to (as long as we are not causing harm to ourselves or to others).

Hunter taught me that at the end of the day, we're all still humans. We make mistakes. We fail. But we can learn from them, and we can strive to be better. And I should also take care of my hair bec I cannot accept that a man in a galactic war have better hair than me (Okay, did you honestly think I'm gonna be serious this entire essay?)

Crosshair taught me that at the end of the day, we really are still humans. Sometimes, we make choices that not everyone will understand or agree to. Sometimes, we don't even understand our own choices. But we can learn from them, and we can strive to be better. And that I should also go to therapy bec istg my hand shakes like hell I always need to rely on a pen stabilizer when doing my artworks.

Wrecker taught me that in this world where we can be anything, always choose to be kind. He is a great man who would always be there for everyone, and I hope that one day, I can be that person too. He is afraid of heights, but he climbs and go on high places anyway. Like him, I should also start conquering my fears. Dear Wrecker, I did try conquering my fear of heights last March 9 but I can't. I will try again.

Echo taught me to always fight for the greater good. Almost two years ago, me and a group of people campaigned for a great tomorrow. With pink flags and pink balloons, we worked on our little thing I like to call our rebellion. Sadly, we lost. At times, I am thinking of just giving up bec that's democracy and I cannot go against the people's decision, but characters like Echo and the rest of Rogue One taught me that nothing should ever stop me for fighting for the people's rights and that my love for my fellow citizens should always come first before hatred.

And lastly, Omega taught me to be curious, or more likely to not be ashamed for being curious. Learn about the world. Learn about lots of things. We never know when we need it. While I could say be good at strategy and win 30 grand on card games, nahhh, I'm not that smart.

I also learned to reevalutate myself as an artist. This show taught me integrity. I had ranted about this lately but these characters challenged me in terms of art. I knew that the creators aren't best at proper representation. While I could draw them as they are in the show, I choose to stand for what is right, and represent them as properly as my skills could. In the more technical side, I became good at drawing armors. And this little Actors AU Draw Series taught me to be responsible; I tried my very best to create and post them on time. This increased my productivity.

But enough about me.

There's something I realized two nights ago; we, the fandom, are Bad Batchers ourselves. We can consider ourselves a family, but not one of us is the same and we're all interesting, and capable in our own unique ways. We can have our own opinion and stand about something and still coexist. Like our favorite charactera, we embrace and celebrate our differences.

This show may end. No more Bad Batch Eves, no more cryptic tweets that cause us to hyperventilate, no more Bad Batch Wednesdays but it will live on, through us.

I know there will be a day where we decrease in number, one by one, little by little, but still, the show will live on through our actions, our opinions, our choices we make after May 1, 2024 because I know that all of us were changed in some ways by these characters and this show.

To the crew, your cryptic tweets caused me sleepless nights, but thank you so, so much. It is through your hardwork that we had this wonderful show. Thank you for making every second of the past year so worthwhile and enjoyable for me and for everyone.

However this show will end, whether happy or sad, I am glad it happened. However short my time was with them, I am happy I had been here. However short my time with everyone in the fandom was or if some of you leave one day, still, thank you so much for being part of my life; I am so happy I met all of you.

To Clone Force 99, thank you. I've never loved anything like this before. May the Force be with you.

#the bad batch #tbb s3 #tbb #star wars #amalthia cried while writing this

250 notes · View notes

ccasey0 · 2 months

Text

Okay, i have the first five stars. this took way longer than expected lol.

@allyheart707 is the one on Casey's tail. she is the star of sleep, and her bow carries dream arrows that grant those she shoots with it the dreams they will love the most.

@onlyhereforturtles is the fox looking at the black that Casey always leaves behind when he walks. They are a kitsune with markings that were surprisingly hard to get right. i was unable to add in all the stuff they mentioned, but i hope this is still acceptable.

@kitmay05 is the one waving at Casey. She is a small farmer who harvests shinedust and gifts it in little pouches to people in need. different kinds of shinedust has different qualities. she has a hoe that can be used for farming or whacking.

@cosmocafe is the goat floating at the top left. the only thing they mentioned was for the goat to have a scarf, so i made up a few little things while i was drawing. they can float and wherever they step they leave swirls of various different temperatures depending on the season. they help make the winter cold and the summer hot.

@icequeenabby is the little owl on Casey's head. she flies around the night sky while the other farmer stars are working to harvest the shinedust. she likes to fly underneath them and catch some of the stray dust on her wings. she will then happily fly around the newer shines that are just blooming and shower then with the dust to make them glow even brighter. she also has a stick. there isn't anything special about this stick. but she will kill you if you try to take it from her.

Whew, okay. that took forever. i still have two more stars to add to this, and then i wanna make individual drawings for each star. also, im calling the characters "stars" and the actual glowing dots in the sky "shines" so as not to get them confused with each other. I also want to add that i'm sorry if the stars don't look exactly how you guys described them. i did my best, and for some of the harder ones i just gave up and simplified them. at this point i'm too tired to change anything about it. oh. the explanation for why the stars are following Casey. sometimes, Casey will be walking through the Night sky to do something. sme of the stars see him and decide "oh! it's the Night Spirit! i bet i could help him with some stuff!" and they just start following him. they usually follow him around for as long as possible until he tells them to leave or to go do something. they will even follow him outside of the nighttime. Casey acts like he despises these little guys and their persistence. but he actually adores each one of them and will take a bullet to protect his tiny star bebes. the edgelord will never admit it though.

also, fun fact: the night sky is a little world of its own! it may just look like the sky from the earth, but it is more of a vast expanse of white where all the night spirits live. and yes, i know what you are thinking. "white? shouldn't it be black?" well, It is a mix of both. Wherever the upper spirits walk, the leave black footprints that spread like markers bleeding into paper. the blackness will eventually all drip away and land on the border between the celestial realm and the mortal one. then it just stays there, making the sky look black to everyone below. the Shines are bright enough to be able to shine through the backness though, giving the look of a night sky. also, only spirits can go through the borders alone. any mortal has to have celestial help to get to the celestial realm.

it might be a bit until i work on this again since i have a ton of work to do, family staying at our house for the eclipse, a bunch of other drawings i wanna get done, and way too little sleep to function properly. so yeah, imma sleep for a bit. catch up on some stuff. and then i will likely start up on this again. ALSO!! feel free to make this digital and add your own stars to this! i'd love to see what other people can come up with for this!

info on the au can be found Here! oke, bye now. hope you like it!

35 notes · View notes

physalian · 5 months

Text

Character Descriptions 101 (Or, the ugly truth about what really matters)

A lot of the appeal of being able to write your own book is being able to take all the characters you dream about and put them onto paper for everyone else to drool over as much as you do. You might create a character so iconic, they can be recognized by their hazy silhouette alone.

Not everyone designs Sherlock Holmes, though.

Not everyone needs to be Sherlock Holmes.

How well you describe your characters, especially your protagonist/opening narrator, says a lot more than you’d probably like about your experience as an author. I’ve got eight years of practice with my own works, twelve if you include my early days of fanfic – and resisting the urge to describe characters in the tried and true clichés is still hard.

So here’s the ugly truth about describing your characters, and some other pointers curated from the Internet you may have seen before.

At the end of the day, what is really important?

Unless you are writing in the genres of fantasy or sci-fi, or you aren’t writing humans, your character will likely be a very average looking human. Doesn’t matter if you think your special bean’s black hair/blue eye/snow white skin combo is unique – is the shape of his face, curve of his lips, how wide his shoulders are really that important outside of, I don’t know, a steamy romance novel?

I ask this because character descriptions fall into three camps: Thematically important beats, thematically unimportant beats, and “oh damn I have too many blondes, uh, here’s a redhead” beats.

I ask this, because “this character doesn’t look like they did in the book” arguments will never stop happening and we all have our sides on what matters and what doesn’t.

These details can be height, hair color, eye color, skin color, hair style, clothing, tone of voice, accent, birthmarks, scars, and tattoos, and anything in between. Sometimes, this trait is this person’s defining trait. Sometimes, the author just felt like it – sometimes the curtains are just blue.

But sometimes, a lot of times, they’re not.

My two cents: If that piece of their design is thematically important, the adaptation should respect it and include it. If it’s not, who cares?

Thematic Character Design

Thematic character design is the intent behind the choices the author makes when deciding how they will present their character to the world. This is *why* the character looks the way they do.

Visually, you see this in anime all the time. Crazy hair colors and styles help distinguish the cast when their faces might otherwise be too similar, or when drawing them from a distance. Sometimes the protagonist will have the most unique, or the loudest hair style (think Yu-gi-oh). Or the Important Lady Character will have pink hair. Or the sad angsty anime boy will have white hair (see my post about color in fiction).

In the written medium, you can “show don’t tell” a few different ways cliché ways:

Give the villain a facial scar

Make your femme fatale a redhead

Make your hero blonde/blue-eyed

But hey, they’re tropes for a reason, everyone knows what you mean when you write them. You might give your character green eyes like their mother, a trait Very Important when a redeemed-ish villain dies. You might give your character a brunette French braid that goes on to become the style of the rebellion. You might make your Illegal Divine Children the only three black-haired major characters in a sea of brown and blonde because they are the Three Illegal Divine Children. You make all your grisled fantasy men have beards and your elves clean shaven.

The existence of these traits serve the plot and the themes of the story. It matters because these traits make them look like the villain, or the dead legacy they must live up to. These traits ostracize them from their community, or help define their culture. These traits are the hallmark of a chosen one, or a pariah. These traits are emblematic of a special power or handicap, religion, faction, rebel cause.

These are the details fans complain about when adaptations get it wrong, and it’s not without merit. But what happens when those details aren’t all that important, no matter how much you think otherwise?

Unthematic character design

Everyone lost their minds when Hunger Games was being adapted and to everyone’s unnecessary horror, Jennifer Lawrence is blonde. Everyone got mad because it’s the little details you have to get right, otherwise you’re disrespecting the source material, yada yada. Is it really so hard to wear a wig, if you can’t get this tiny thing right, what else will you mess up, etc.

Question: Was the color of her hair more important, or the style that it was in?

She dyed it anyway to stay faithful, but which detail mattered to the plot, versus just being what the author picked for her?

Dare I wade into the “this character was white in the book” cesspool? Reluctantly, yes. And all I will say is this: Does their skin color serve any legitimate purpose to the plot or how they define themselves? No? Then shush and let the actors do their thing.

… But what if race *does* matter?

Is this a slice of life novel about some plucky high schoolers in your average American town? If the story isn’t any deeper than prom dates and football games, the skin color of your character is not important. Is this a treatise on segregation and the struggles of womanhood in repressed societies? Then yeah, the skin color of your character might affect their outlook on life a little bit.

In other words: Does your character care what they look like, and does their appearance affect the trajectory of the story?

Yes, it’s disappointing when you see your favorite character on screen and have to be told that’s them because it just doesn’t look like them. But what’s important is if they fit the spirit of the character, even if they don’t quite match their looks (a lesson I, too, need constant reminding of).

Character Descriptions in Fantasy and Sci-Fi

If making sure the adaptation stays faithful to the character design matters anywhere, it’s in these two genres. Why? Because you have free reign as an author to describe your mythic creatures, your aliens, your supernatural entities however you choose, and you worked hard trying to make them distinct from every other fantasy series out there.

But hold your horses on how specific you get.

Generally speaking, the traits that most authors describe first are hair, eye, and skin color, because it’s the easiest to get out of the way and everyone knows what humans look like to fill in the blanks. When you enter the realm of non-human characters, you have a lot more legwork to do to make sure your audience imagines what you want them to.

Maybe they have slit pupils like a housecat or a snake, or they have really floppy elephant ears, or they have antennae that twitch when they’re angry, or they have wings like a bat, a bird, a dragonfly. Or they have distinctive tattoos from their tribe. They have scales or feathers or fur and you want everyone to know how fluffy it is. You want your audience to know how tall they are, how heavy, how lanky, how robust. The shape of their face, their hands, if they have fingers like a pianist or a catcher’s glove.

Or, it matters because you’ve written an allegory on race, class, colonialism/imperialism, a World War, Apartheid, what have you, and your made-up nationalities need their own traits to be bigots about.

Answer: Hire a sensitivity reader before you design an insulting stereotype.

Otherwise, feel free to add as much fluff as you’d like. You go out there and you give exact measurements, constant similes about the textures of their skin, write an essay on cultural wardrobe, take two paragraphs to describe that ballgown and masquerade mask… and accept the fact that your readers will happily go SKIP!

Because description and exposition are also entwined with tone and the purpose of the story. I am writing an 18th century royal ball scene in a steamy romance novel and my hero is about to get her man – my audience might care about things like a sweetheart neckline, perfume, what kind of flowers are in the lacework, how it hugs her body, how the pink looks so damn sexy in the candlelight, how the skirts sweep so elegantly, every piece of jewelry she's wearing and how expensive it is and exactly how she did her hair.

Or, I am writing a fantasy adventure that happens to feature a pitstop at a royal ball – Your audience does not give one flying f*ck about what flowers are on that dress. Describe the color and something cool and eye-catching and move on.

The Ugly Truth: Does. It. Matter?

You can wax poetic about the minutiae of your absolutely unique and like no other fairies no one else has ever written before. Maybe you designed them less like Tinker Bell and more like anthropomorphised flowers – that matters!

You want your hot love interest to have a cupid’s bow and to remind the audience of that detail at least four times throughout the narrative? Not important unless the narrator is weirdly obsessive over it (or, again, romance/erotica).

The same thing goes for fantastical settings.

At what point are you describing the color of the grass, the kind of marble in the walls and floors, the exact shade of blue paint they used, the gables and the roofing tiles and the scalloping on the columns to unnecessary ends?

This also affects pacing.

If your entire story is set in a beautiful castle and the heroes never leave? Describe as much as your little heart desires. Is it just a pit stop on the way? Call it a castle, maybe it’s in ruins, give one uniquely defining trait that’s thematically relevant, and move on.

Side characters too: If you don’t even bother naming the poor schmuck, give their gender and maybe one fun fact and move on.

You’d be surprised how little character descriptions, or lack thereof, are even noticed. The amount of fanart head-cannoning a character being Not-White because the author technically never clarified is everywhere. I just reread the first two PJO books and Chiron’s human half is never described beyond his age and his beard. Everyone who read it filled in the missing details with what they wanted or expected to see and that doesn’t impact his character one bit.

Pacing your descriptions

See this post about how to pace your narrative.

Everyone knows the trope of the narrator waking up, gazing into a mirror and describing themselves to the audience. It’s cheap, it’s fast, it’s dirty, it’s effective.

So why do people hate it?

I think it’s less because it’s overdone, and more because it’s robbed of potential. When I wrote about pacing, I said every scene should be pulling double duty – character descriptions fall under exposition, and should do the same.

If you really want to have your hero describe herself to you via mirror, don’t just write a textbook, give it flavor. Is she self-conscious about her looks, saying she has choppy blonde hair but wishes it was some long, luxurious brown like some girl she’s jealous of? Does she have a big nose and wish it was smaller because she’s bullied? Or, does she love her green eyes, because her late father had them and she loves the connection they share?

Good pacing isn’t about how many or how few words you take to describe something, it’s how efficiently you use those words. Short doesn’t always mean it’s bland, long doesn’t always mean it’s profound. Don’t take 300 words to say something that could be said in 30 – but some things do deserve 300 words.

Examples:

A: She woke and rolled out of bed and stared at herself in the mirror. She had hazel eyes and blonde, curly hair that she pulled up into a ponytail.

B: She woke on the third alarm and rolled out of bed. Staring back at her in her vanity were tired hazel eyes beneath a mop of dishwater blonde curls and crease marks from her pillow.

C: She woke on the third alarm and dragged herself out of bed. Her vanity mirror glared back at her – a rats nest of dishwater blonde and crease marks from her pillow. She scowled and rubbed the sleep from her hazel eyes and raked her curls up into a messy ponytail to be dealt with after coffee.

Or, go even longer, really weave those details into the action of the scene, I didn’t here because this is a blog, not a book.

No matter what, best practice is to not infodump the description, spread it out – another criticism of the mirror trope. There is no one size fits all for any writing advice but if you’re spending more than four consecutive sentences describing a single character, object, or building, break that hot pile of exposition up and look how much better it reads.

Similes for describing your character, like any comparison, should serve a purpose. Think about describing an intimidating queen with snow white skin versus bone white skin – what vibes do you get from one simple word change?

You have a long time to describe your narrator, it’s okay if we don’t know what they look like on the first page. Give the details as they become relevant. If you open en media res and the hero is in a nasty fight scene – describe their hair as it flops in their eyes, describe their skin as it’s covered in sweat or scratches or bullet holes, describe their eyes as they patch themselves up and one is now black and blue – or describe their color full of fear, hate, malice, grief.

Describe them against another character so you get two birds with one stone. Whether the narrator is jealous of, attracted to, or appreciative of their fellow character’s appearance. Describe them self-conscious about trying to impress a crush, their spouse, a superior, interviewer, parent, the public, the press. Or describe them unhappy about how they’re being forced to look compared to how they usually are, e.g. a school uniform, prisoner’s uniform, fancy dress/suit, skimpy undercover costume, bargain bin, ugly hand-me-downs, holiday costume, sleepwear, full face of makeup, or no makeup.

All of these are motivated details that will read better than halting the narration to drop textbook lines of exposition.

Lastly, do not let your characters get side-tracked describing themselves when they have more important and prescient concerns. In the above hypothetical fight scene, a “she swept her blonde hair from her eyes and got back to her feet,” is going to read smoother than “she swept her blonde hair aside. It was short and choppy, cheap highlights fading and flyaways tickling her face. She got back to her feet.”

And even then, personally, I think this reads better still: “She swept her hair from her face and got back to her feet, sweaty blonde tangles stuck to her skin.”

Have intent, make it motivated, and the less it feels like awkward exposition.

Pitfalls to avoid

Full disclosure, I am white, from a long line of the whitest white Europeans. I do not write a pasty white cast of characters. Boy, was it an eye-opening experience realizing how harmful my earlier descriptions used to be, just from the books I grew up reading and through no ill-intent of my own.

So another detail in the realm of “does it really matter”: Not all brown skin is the same shade of brown, but resist the urge to compare it to any flavor of food or chocolate. I just reread a favorite kids’ book of mine and saw “chocolate milk” and as a kid, I never noticed or cared, but you bet I zeroed in on that little beat as an adult.

Is this hard? Kind of, yeah. I suppose you could go scorched earth with the food comparisons and describe all your characters in their flavor of milk. Pale skin has a lot of options: Snow, frost, paper, bone, fair, pale, lily, sandy, fawn, etc. and of course, milk, cream and sugar to boot.

The “brown skin like milk chocolate” is tempting, but dehumanizing particularly when only brown characters are described with food. Decide if the exact shade of brown is important, then get respectfully creative with the comparisons. The same goes with hair styles and textures.

Related to skin color: Be careful with what idioms and metaphors you use when describing characters who aren’t supposed to be white, doing things only possible or noticeable with light skin.

A certain famous author really tried to tell the world Hermione wasn’t *technically* white and the HP fans went and pulled page numbers proving that she has to be based on the behavior of her skin.

I’ve caught myself (and had to be told) a few times describing a not-white character “white-knuckling” something as shorthand for being stressed and tense. Faces blanching, paling, reddening, blushing, turning green, looking sun-burnt and bruised and scarred all look different depending on how dark their pigment is.

I am not at all an expert on what you *should* do for non-white characters so I will say this once again: Do your research and get a small army of sensitivity readers. Even if you don’t think you’re being racist, you might be. Accept the constructive criticism, and change it without complaint. Do not lie down and die on a milk-chocolate hill.

The Beautiful Truth

In the written medium, unless you canonize character art and take no constructive criticism, all your audience has to go on is suggestion. That means that your audience has the freedom to imagine their favorite characters however they want.

That means you get a million variations of the hero in their fan art – that’s amazing! If you never described the protagonist’s skin color? You get an audience that makes him or her or them the hero that they want to see and how you’ve inspired them – that’s amazing!

That’s what I mean when I ask if it really matters. You will always know how your literary darlings look. Is it more important that everyone else draws a million different paintings in their mind of the exact same face like a photocopier, or that you now have an audience giving you a million unique paintings of your life’s work immortalized in the grand literary canon?

#writing advice #character design #character development #exposition #writing resources #writing tools #writing

42 notes · View notes

goldyluna · 6 months

Text

I just had an impuls of drawing Sara and Shin with wings and it became an AU. Everything began with one "what if"! And then it became this. Your Turn To Die: Purgatory Trials.

In the world between life and death is a Purgatory. A place where people have a chance to go back to live, to their homes and loved ones. But if they can't do that, their existence will stay only in the hearts of living. As everyone suddenly appear in an unfamiliar place, they find themselves with two easy choices. Play Games to Live or Die.

And there are these things. They call themselves Guardians of Purgatory. They looked like fallen angels, with no way to say for sure if they were there to really guard them. Will they be of any help or everyone's destined to perish?

Second part here and third part here

Below, you can read my "little" ranting about characters! (There may be spoilers if you didn't finish the game)

Guardians may or may not be bad. Even if they don't have evil intentions, their own existence makes others nervous and uncomfortable. Their appearance is too grand and too vague to feel secure in most cases. They feel godly-like and omnipotent. Their faces blank, without expression. And even if they can't do anything serious, they can't hurt anyone with their hands... How could you trust someone in a place like this?

I will write their normal names as I have no idea how to name them differently and what they could represent (like "Laughing Doll" or "Crying Doll"). I really wanted everyone to have clothes and elements resembling their oryginal selves. To give them things that symbolize them.

Sara Chidouin - She is our main protagonist in YTTD, but here she is one of the Guardians. Her voice is strong but gentle. Her movements are with purpose. She will most likely try to help children or people who aren't doing well. Sara isn't innocent. We know that in simulations, she could be ruthless. I don't say that she is evil and a demon with angels face. Everyone except Shin sees her as a good person that they could trust. I wanted her to look so open, so graceful and kind, but at the same time, I gave her horns covering her face and dark wings. Not because I think she is more on a bad side, but to highlight how she is. Kind and wanting everyone to live and escape, but being able to wreak havoc if she felt like she needed it. In the end, she could have any personality a player chose for her. I think I did her a justice with her design.

Gin Ibushi - He, honestly, gave me trouble with the design. Especially with clothes. I knew I wanted him to have a mask and wanted him to be warm. Warm in colors, expression, pose. Warm with attitude to others. He, as a Guardian, is the most liked one. Almost nobody can hate him. He likes to play and usually helps others in a trade for playing with him. He never would do anything bad to anyone, but because he seems as the most naive and weak one of fallen angels, there are people that want to hurt him to try leave any other way than win the Games. Gin would never hurt someone back, but fortunately (or unfortunatelyto those that did the unforgivable), other Guardians aren't that good to not get rid of the offender.

Shin Tsukimi - He and Sara were my first "Angels" to sketch. He is also a little villainous in the game, but he still is one of my favorites. I can understand him, even if I think he could do things differently. His whole persona in this AU may be a little biased by me and my vision about him. Especially that this is an AU. He, as the Guardian, isn't trusted by others that much at first. He doesn't really go all his way to help others and sometimes ignores those who need his assistance. He usually can be seen near Kanna and then is more likely to say something useful. He can help, too, if he thinks someone can give or tell him something he needs. Why would he need anything? Doesn't he know and have everything? And why does he have this key?

He also has the wound on his chest as a connection to someone... that you will see in next character chart xD and kinda to his death in ch2.

I still am figuring this AU and have another 3 "Angels" in making. But for now, have this thee!

52 notes · View notes

linkspooky · 2 years

Photo

Toji’s Two Legacies

I don’t know if you’ve noticed this, but Gege likes to draw parallels between Maki and Toji. You might not have caught on, he’s extremely subtle about it. However, despite having the same backstory as the outcast of the Zenin Clan, and the same Heavenly Restriction, Maki only reflects one aspect of Toji.

Maki herself only became aware of Toji after seeing one aspect of him. During the fight against Dagon, Toji suddenly breaks into the Domain and in front of the scattered members of the Zenin Clan and absolutely slaughters the curse spirit that was givnig them all trouble. Maki has no idea who Toji is even, he is just someone who appeared in front of her and showed her a strength with her heavenly restriction that she had never seen before.

Her only impression of him was him as a fighter, stronger than anyone she had ever seen before, apparently, free of everything that was holding Maki back.

In her desire to be like him and emulate him, Maki only really understands that he is an extremely powerful individual who can defeat others even without cursed energy. In a mini-arc where Maki is apparently, not seeing something important, and learning to see more, there is something that we the readers know that Maki is not privvy to.

Toji is a complete and utter failure of a human being.

Toji, the strongest monkey even without cursed energy, only cared about the strength to the point of neglecting everything else.

Toji only cared about proving his stnregth, getting stronger, and crushing the same socery world that rejected him. To the point where Toji’s life is entirely empty. He has nothing, but his strength. Toji while alive, didn’t act that much different from his flesh puppet zombie that only attacked everything that was stronger than it. All he did was fight for money, blow the money at the race track, with no thought to how he brutalized others, or the people he left behind.

Which is why I point out, there’s another side of Toji’s personality that Maki is completely unaware of. It’s not good to be like Toji.

Toji’s decision, to neglect everything and only focus on getting stronger, made him abandon Megumi his one “blessing” the one person he loved truly. At the end of Toji’s life, he may have climbed the heights of one of the strongest human being, but he died empty and full of regret, only thinking of how he left behind Meugmi. Toji was strong, but that’s all he was. He had no connections to anybody, except Megumi, and he cut Megumi off.

Maki might not have any way of knowing better, but, Toji is still a terrible example for her to follow.

Choosing the path of strength, to the point where there is nothing else. While Maki saw Toji completely tear apart Dagon, there was also a side of Toji that only Megumi witnessed. Maki only sees Toji’s strength, but Megumi is treated to a different side of his father.

It makes sense, Megumi is the victim of TOji’s abandonment and abusive neglect as a parent. I doubt Megumi would even care that his father was one of the strongest Jujutsu Sorcerers, because he compeltely failed him in his duty of a father.

However, for Toji, ther ewas something even more important than strength. Something he should have focused on instead. And Megumi is only able to see that one small sacrifice in a moment of refret for how he lived his life. They’ve both seen different parts of Toji and were impacted in different ways (I expect at some point Megumi will learn who Toji is as he didn’t recognize him face to face in person), and I wonder if this stark difference in the way they both interpret Toji is going to lead to different paths for their character development.

Part of me worries the overemphasis on strength, is because Maki has nothing else left. Toji still had Meumi in his dying moments, but Maki lives, without amother, and without Mai. She hasn’t materialized any other goal, other than bearing her fangs, and challening the strongest around.

#maki zenin #megumi fushiguro #jjk meta #jujutsu kaisen meta #jujutsu kaisen theory #jjk 199 #toji zenin #toji fushiguro #znein clan

221 notes · View notes

abeinginsand · 1 year

Note

you're THE sparrow blog so him, but I'm also rly curious what you think of lark and normal?

Smiling at that compliment, thank you for thinking so!! Makes me very happy hehe!! :D Sparrow, my beloved <3 [was surprised by this] [<--same person drawing/talking about sparrow every other day asdksadssea ] Also thank you for the Sparrow ask as well @lex-the-lesbiann :) I'm back from work so here's the bingos! I rambled mostly about Lark and Sparrow but do mention Normal a bit more in the last two paragraphs. Sorry this took so long! Sparrow:

Lark:

Normal:

I liked how energetic and bold Sparrow and Lark were in season one (and silly haha). Took me a bit to understand what the parenting issue was (or atleast part of the issue) at first? But eventually I got the vibe of not knowing how to deal with anger part as well as that the twins may benefit from a different style of parenting in general. One that Henry struggles to do (as shown with how Darryl and Glenn do manage to connect with the twins a bit by being somewhat playful/competitive).

We are missing a lot of Mercedes point of view on stuff and I wonder if maybe she has an easier time being playful/competitive? I like to think they get some of their mischievousness from her. Both parents did work together to set up a chore based dnd campaign for their kids to play for example. Its brought up in detail in the season 1 patreon newsletter...think its very cute and proves that they are definitely trying to better engage with the twins interests.

I felt for them all as they got tossed into the adventure and the family bond was put to test. I think the reason I'm more attached to Sparrow is due to his interest in drawing, fascination with wolves (and power), and especially his struggles with having to be a mediator between his loved ones. While I do not know much about wolves, I did love cats SO much as a kid that I wanted to be one as a job. I did not understand jobs as a concept yet haha. I'm sure if I was offered some way to be a "love" cat for greater good when I was a pre-teen...I would have said yes before Henry even finished talking lol. Wild shape is such a fun spell (and shapeshifting magic in general).

About the "so mean" square, I have seen a few harsh takes about adult Sparrow. I think a part of why Sparrow gets scrutinized so much is because we get most of the scenes from Normal's view (since he's one of the main characters). And for some reason, (maybe they were both super close in between seasons growing up?)--Normal seems to focus on his father's reactions much more heavily than his mom or uncle. Even though both Rebecca and Lark have also shown to either not like the mascot interest that much ("let me teach you something more useful" -Lark ep 1) or Rebecca being concerned (like his dad) about how Normal's going about it. Both his parents are concerned about the poor hygenie especially because it could make him sick after all.

And even in the calzone conversation, Sparrow explains that a lot of his reasoning comes from worry (and his own past). He doesn't want Normal to get hurt, physically or mentally...and especially doesn't want him to be hurt in the same ways he was before. Were his words harsh? Yeah, he was also drunk and being influenced by a eldritch god too. He wouldn't have said that out loud otherwise and clearly he has never said that before otherwise Normal would not have been that shocked. Sparrow does love both his kids and he's trying really hard (in my mind at least). I think it'd be great if they could all talk again at some point. It would be a nice start to understanding each other better. :[

This isn't explicitly stated but I imagine both the twins were bullied in the various schools they went to. As a unit, they were comforted with each other and quickly felt like others weren't worth there time. They'd rule the world someday, get strong enough so others would not dare to bother them! Which leads to the fires and fights and I think the rumors probably stuck from back then too. Sure, Sparrow comes back vowing to be a lovewolf and actively tried to be nicer (while still mischievous)...but I doubt their classmates would be accepting of the change. Not instantly anyway, but Sparrow is stubborn and keeps on trying for better or for worse which...takes a big hit to his self-confidence, self-love too.

And in contrast, I think Lark stops caring all together about outsider opinions. He cares about his family and friends and anyone else can either get out of the way or put their fists up if they have an issue. He's got an apocalypse reversal to work on! I think...both are angry at the world but Lark embraces the anger--hides behind it while Sparrow feels like he must pretend his anger doesn't exist at all. Unless he is masquerading as Lark...then well suddenly its easier to express it, to not be so scared of it--because he isn't scared of Lark ya know? No matter what, they have each other's backs.

Anyways, I will get to the point haha. The oak-garcia-swallows family is precious to me and I'm often thinking about their relationships with each other or to themselves. I focus most on Sparrow yeah but I do love Lark and Normal too! Specifically for Normal, don't have much else to add but I love his little facts a lot-- marching band cover enthusiast, the mens wear, the fanfic writing etc.

I liked Taylor and Normal right away when I started s2 while both Link and Scary took me more eps to warm up too. Its fun to see them all bouncing off each other when things are silly but pretty compelling in the tough times too (in recent eps). Speaking of Taylor and Normal--they don't get along that well, but I like to write scenarios where they are close friends! They are a very silly and creative duo to me.

#dndads #sparrow oak garcia #lark oak garcia #normal oak swallows garcia #abeinginsand talk tag #dndads s2 #ask meme #dndads spoilers #dndads s2 spoilers

17 notes · View notes

quietbluejay · 30 days

Text

Ahriman Exile Reread 2

First, let's hear from Past Bluejay

thank you for your words of wisdom, past bluejay. Now, onwards with the reread Wait, I forgot to warn, spoilers up to Ahriman: Eternal, not a lot but I do reference a big twist as well as some characters' fates

part 2 time astraeos and his bros are arguing space marine style

yes truly the best way e_e ok so carmenta gave them all bionic eyes to replace the ones that got eaten carmenta continues to be the best "salvation demands loyalty"

because, as terrible as they can be you don't want to see what they will become without the oaths "oaths did not require trust, that was a truth the imperium had taught him" they all know this will end badly but the only other option is to let go of the thing they're clinging to and meanwhile ahriman is crashing after the combat/magic high and is feeling guilty okay straight up suicide ideation see what i mean, he needs to be transplanted into an entirely different universe and put in horse plinko there failing that, i still think a sun lamp and cat would help time for ahriman to spend time with tolbek's rubricae i'm sure this will help cheer him up

yeahhhh

ow that hurts

"they will never be my slaves" thats not gonna last long thidias and kadin (the other two space marines, astraeos' brothers) are still arguing choked voice im fine

;-; ok an aside but i do love the environment French sets up everything is set in an everlasting gloom, all there is is metal and wires (and human flesh) (and frost) it is an existence divorced from the light of the sun and the stars and anything natural Oh yeah so Maroth summoned a daemon into Cadars body (another one of astraeos brothers) Astraeos: I can save him…

Ahriman, having rubric flashbacks: hey that’s hell you’re walking into Time for Ahriman and Carmenta to have a chat about her mind linking with her ship and how dangerous it is Ahriman: I’m not gonna judge you tho I’m not that much of a hypocrite The whole conversation is great, I just don't have anything more to say about it than that!

and we're at trust again Carmenta wanting to trust ahriman time for ahriman to go into his mind palace the only place in this story world with light and natural things

time for ahriman to teach astraeos the deeper magical mysteries man warp juice really is a drug, it's not just ahriman astraeos has the same reaction ahriman: it's all my faullltttt

this, too, is overwhelming pride assuming you are the worst ever and responsible for everything, is just as much pride as assuming you are the best to believe that you are alone the architect of everything it's a terrible defence against the thought that maybe you couldn't have done anything at all ahriman is trapped in the "im the worst/im the best" cycle

it's a hard thing to accept because it means you didn't have the control you thought you did over the situation

gee i wonder what might be a theme like half the cast gets bad feelings abot this the entire psychic part of the cast do they stop? no lol Ahriman answer questions or draw 20 lol this book in a nutshell:

mysterious voice in ahriman's head: you don't need your sword

oh hey the oracle is an old friend used to be a comrade now is like 100 floating eyes ahriman: i have questions menkaura: everyone does ahriman, internally: phew, you know what, my life may suck but at least im not this guy

literally EVERYONE calls ahriman out

to be honest, it's why i was basically done with the series (before the third book even) because it was just the same thing over and over again the supporting cast was what kept me but like, essentially ahriman's character arc is done in book 1 this is what i mean when i say i don't think ahriman can be fixed, i think even if there was irrefutable proof that he'd been puppeted by tzeentch, he would just refuse to see it though he's not quite there yet at this point i think he could probably have been fixed in this book unfortunately this is wh40k and this is his negative character arc "ask yourself what you truly wish to know: the truth, or the lie that forgives you your choices?" man

okay, hear me out how to fix ahriman and save astraeos, carmenta, and astraeos' bros: warp storm causes them to time travel a lot further than intended i kind of want to throw them at a potential blorbo (next book i might be reading) but idk enough about him yet to see if he's actually valid, i have a few ideas for him (it's tax evasion pirate man, the meme the legend, the guy named after one of the best great lakes) okay I'm memeing here but astraeos thinks about ahriman's eyes in order to calm down because he's getting magic headaches man everyone thinks about ahriman's eyes so much

ahriman: so who is hunting me menkaura: lol the list of who isn't is shorter menkaura: so why didn't you let yourself die ahriman: i still allow myself to hope rare mental health W for ahriman unfortunately it's…. note from future bluejay: past bluejay did not finish this thought. I am consumed with curiosity

anyways time for ahriman to actually explain what's going on

so no one told you life was gonna be this wayyy lmaoo his method is to project his memories into their minds man will do literally anything to avoid explaining with his words

oh, ouch, the last thing Magnus said to him before banishing him was "You are the best of my sons, you always were" moment of silence after the memory ends where everyone is trying to mentally process this, ahriman smiles weakly man, he'd be so great in another setting, unfortunately he's here

hope disguised as arrogance ahriman you are KILLING ME with your lack of critical thinking skills and inability to apply lessons you previously learned wails and grabs hair repeated eye motifs specifically removing eyes ….i've connected the dots

groans oh no not again i am deeply tired of human fat burning owo kadin pov

in the end ahriman just jumps from one type of pride to another with no stops in between to learn humility but also i mean it's hard when there are forces (tzeentch) that are actively (tzeentch) poking him into this shape honestly, i am starting to get a bit fed up with him, though it's idw optimus but less rage inducing (because it's better writing lol) and i get that it's part of the point of the setting but there's only so much i can take of this cycle tbh i knew i'd hit this point eventually, it's just making it frustrating at times to read his POV mainly because I know what's coming lol ahriman and kadin think the same thing about astraeos

at least astraeos does get out of the cycle eventually oh boy horror movie time in the dark meanwhile, ahriman summons a daemon with astraeos' help daemon is fun takes the form of his dead brother and then goes through how he died

sassy

rip ahriman, got outplayed ah, tzeentchians so, Amon knew he was going to summon this daemon, so he summoned it first and put a binding on it so it would kill Ahriman when he summoned it thidias dies a hero so he won't become a villain ;-; Carmenta once again saves the day and everyone* *except Thidias and also arguably Kadin who got double possessed

interesting ahriman's experience with the dark mechanicum is that they tend to lose their emotions and humanity vs carmenta who is becoming more emotional the longer she mind melds with her ship more light motifs so, astraeos wants answer about why his brothers died, or worse than died ahriman: i made a mistake astraeos: just one? owo a hint astraeos' chapter gets special darkvision powers now which primarch could be their founder….. next up ahriman: let's steal ourselves a navigator

I return to Ahriman and hey it’s Iobel my beloved This is wild

And also setup for the astraeos thing

And now cut to Astraeos going “this is a bad idea” Note he and Ahriman are now wearing blue armour, this may be relevant if I ever do time travel fic

Really getting Star Wars vibes from this The -hahahaha - the rebel ship going dark and waiting for the imperials to board and investigate so they can retrieve/kidnap someone on board Ahriman has been way out of it enough for the inquisition to pop up and him to have no clue who they are Okay we know Astraeos eyes are green Didn’t expect that

Iobel!

Ahriman once again passes out And gets badly injured Not in that order If I had a nickel for every time Ahriman has passed out in a novel, I’d have…probably at least 50c? Time for time shenanigans

Man everyone gets poetic about ahriman's eyes. I like Silvanus (kidnapped navigator) well enough but I don't have super strong feelings about him.

Who are you and what did you do with Ahriman

...

Yeah. I want to strangle you a bit lol In the end it is his untempered virtues that note from future bluejay: I left this sentence unfinished WHERE WAS I GOING WITH IT??? Meanwhile Carmenta panics

Annnd that’s when she decides to betray Ahriman

Ahriman is Tired Also he’s a bird furry Classic tzeentchian Annnd Amon decides to reward Carmenta by killing her Rip

The repeated theme of either becoming monstrous or dying

Ayyy she’s alive RIP Silvanus for finding her this has not been his day his week, his month or even his year Also I misremembered! Ahriman was not in fact chained to the ceiling naked he gets to wear a tunic So, amon's plan is to kill all the remaining thousand sons with the rubric

To be continued...

#warhammer 40k #bluejay reads warhammer

2 notes · View notes

midwestclover · 11 months

Text

I’ve got an older tumblr, but made this a seperate one and I seen @callivich post so I decided to answer the questions and find more open-minded people! Expand my horizons more, guess you could say!

Name: Howdy! Names Nova :)

Age: Twenty-seven.

What made you fall in love with Gallavich?: They are both able to relate to one another when it comes to having a big family, with dysfunctional tendencies yet that is also something where the pair are extremely different because one family shows far more agression, while the other still shows compassion and love. I loved the idea of the big bad macho dude softening for Ian as time goes on, even despite the fact he wanted to ‘teach a lesson.’ The two of them bring out the worst parts of eachother, mean while are capable of as well bringing out the good even if the other cannot see themselves as such. Their continuous meetups, and fall outs make me think about the whole ‘their souls are bound to another laced by a golden thread.’ Because in the end? They always come crawling back to one another. Also! I love the idea of Mickey showing hate towards the world in the beginning, softens for Ian but through character development Mickey grows. Something wholesome about them together, growing, evolving and changing for better.

How long have you been a fan?: I would say around 2015 I got into Shameless? So, I’d say since then!

Favourite Gallavich moments/scene?: Oh goodness, there are numerous that are rent free in my delulu thoughts. One of them would have to be when Fiona makes the connections of Ian possibly being Bipolar and needing to go into a Psych, but Mickey wants to take care of him. I can only imagine how straining that may have been on the two of them, yet Mickey went ahead and did it anyways. Another scene would have to be Mickey’s coming out. God, there’s just so many to count! I don’t know why, but them parting ways when Mickey crosses the border. There’s just something so special about their kiss and it makes me weak in the best way possible. But their wedding? Never seizes to make me ugly cry!

Favourite Shameless character apart from Ian and Mickey?: Lip, Kevin and Veronica for sure!

Do you write or draw or make edits?: I have been a writer for twelve years, but haven’t been able to make any fanfics for ao3, yet. But my works will likely be posted here, once I get more inspiration. I do also make moodboards, and random edits sometimes! Depends on the mood. But I am a sucker for aesthetics so. I also do roleplay, so there’s that as well.

Favourite type of Gallavich fics?: Still figuring this one out, once I know I’ll be sure to give my input!

Favourite Gallavich quotes?: ‘Ian, what you and I have makes me free.’ - ‘you’re under my skin man, fuck can I do?’ Both by Mickey. ‘Hit my husband again and I’ll fucking kill you’ this one PHEW, because Ian is saying that to Lip—HIS BEST FRIEND AND BROTHER! ‘You are so much better than that.’ Because goddamn. Dare I say more?

#gallavichintro #gallavich

9 notes · View notes

b4nd1t-gh0ul · 9 months

Text

OC lore

I’ve been wanting to post something about an oc I made about one year ago now. His name is egg-dog. This post it literally going to be me posting the lore of Egg-dog and his species I made a year ago with @orel-missing helping me make the world he lives in and characters in that said world.

So, ignore any bad spelling cause this was from a year ago and I haven’t looked at it for quite a while now. I also may update it soon. This is also the time when I used to go by Bandit and stuff and I did just do a quick update so I'm not showing people's names in this.

EGG-DOG LORE:

Egg-dog is a character first made by a comment on a meme from a friend. The meme that was said, was the egg-dog meme which a dog’s fur was cut like an egg. At first, I didn’t know what the meme was, so I drew up the character that was named egg-dog. (I only found out it was a meme after a few months) Egg-dog goes by he/him and is about 3 years old.

Egg-dog’s design was shaped as an egg. The body was round. The eyes are just two circles with scribbles in the middle of them. The ears are lines going up and down three times (or more for different egg-dog’s). The tail is somewhat the same thing just with a line. There is no mouth draw onto the character. The nose is just a line, and the legs are two lines with three stumps at the end. There is also hair fluff at the top cause why not!

Egg-dog in the world that was created by Orel, and I is a species that is named egg-dog. (I know that his name is the species name, but you know it kind of just stuck. I was lazy too lazy to change it) The species is a dog that is combined with an egg. I was originally going to add cats as well, but I decided that idea and made cats into a spider, cat, dog thing. There is also an egg-dog but with rabies which is called potato hound (also named by my English teacher). Egg-dogs tend to live for about 7- 10 years. And tend to grow up to about the size of a 5’8 persons knees.

The lore of how egg-dog (well at least the species) was made is that and egg and a dog was accidentally combined together with a test tube full of unknown chemicals that was spilled over the dog. That was when the first egg-dog was made (Which I named Oliver), after that Oliver was used for tests and to create more of her species. Which she couldn’t breed and cause of that they took parts of Oliver to create more of its species.

They later found out that Egg-dogs cannot breed. The only way they can reproduce is by breaking their outer shell and using the yolk that spills out of the cracked egg-dog to create a baby egg-dog. After the baby-egg dog is created they then tend to slowly create a shell around them. After a day it is compete. Sadly, the original egg-dog that cracked their shell would not survive, at least it's a 50% chance of the egg-dog surviving that process. The females are the only ones able to do this. The chances for the egg-dog to be male are a higher chance by 70% while it being a female is 30% chance.

Now moving onto Oliver. Oliver never ended up surviving as the science team decided it would be too painful for the poor pup to have to be alive while being tared apart. So, they put Oliver down. The closest egg-dog to Oliver is egg-dog as egg-dog has the same fur coat and many things alike. There are many failed attempts at trying to recreate Oliver ended up with horrible looking creatures. The creatures were put down.

Egg-dog’s personality is like a dog. A very happy dog! He has a happy personality, with a cheerful, sassy bark. Egg-dog may look like he doesn’t know anything for a weird looking creature but is intelligence for the species. Egg-dog tends to be extremely social with many different types of creatures but does not trust them easily. Egg-dog also tends to help calm down any character somewhat like a service dog. When egg-dog gets attached to a character he tends to get jealous. He also has an attitude when meeting new people. Egg-dog is kind of lazy as well. And the man himself is adorable! You can argue with me!

There are many weaknesses to egg-dog and the species. They are able to crack easily and have very little females, so it is hard to reproduce more egg-dogs. They do drink water, but most prefer to not drink water as some have a fear of water. They end up just drinking milk. Most are also colourblind (they only see black and white). The chance for this is 80% are colourblind and 20% are not. Egg-dog is colourblind. They also have one or two strengths (or more). They are able to smell and hear extremely well just like a dog. Egg-dogs can understand any language even morse code. They can also adapt to any area they go to.

Egg-dogs are also a sign for angels to appear more. So, most scientist have them as they will be able to hopefully have a higher chance of studying angels. Egg-dogs and angels’ connection is an odd one as angels use Egg-dogs to see how they have been as they felt bad for Oliver. Some Angels also do a sneaky gender swap with male egg-dogs to have the population start to grow again. They cover up what they are doing by creating a genetic mutation that changes the gender of the egg-dog which will be explained later.

Egg-dogs can get a type of rabies that I like to call… rabies. How rabies affect egg-dogs is that they start to rot and lose their shell, they end up growing a huge mouth which had sharp teeth. They become insane. When they get rabies, they have to be put down. What they are called when they get rabies is a ‘Potato hound’.

Little notes:

7-3-23: Egg-dog is going through a small redesign as I have changed my style.

7-3-23: Egg-dogs first design was last year around term 3 or 2

9-5-23: Egg-Dog’s first 3D model was made on the 9-5-23

Story samples:

The bolt of energy flooded through his veins. He ran with every muscle he has in his body. He ran. He didn’t stop running in till his legs stopped moving. He laid in a bush hidden from those humans. He had escaped. He was never going back. He wasn’t human. He was a creature. A creature of science they like to say. A creature with no intelligences, that feels no pain. They were wrong. He does feel pain, every needle injected inside him hurt like a blazing fire. He wasn't an animal. He was once an egg. A simple egg. An egg combined with the DNA of a dog. They humans called him test subject 275 but he called himself Egg-dog. Egg-dog was alive. He could feel and see and think. He wasn't some type of experiment for them to make and then throw away like trash. He was Egg-dog. He must escape. He saw things that haunted him. He could never tell anyone; he didn't have a mouth to speak from. He was like any other animal that was alive. He felt the pain. He saw the world around him, and he knew that this place… that place wasn't home.

The sounds of the wind blow past Egg-dogs ears. The birds fly past in the sky. The creatures of land and sea blur past in a distant memory. The world wasn’t normal. It had creatures of glitches and shapes. It had living things that were never supposed to be alive. There were more creatures like Egg-dog. There were many things. Many things that Egg-dog couldn't understand.

Egg-Dog designs:

(I have a special design that I still love for egg-dog which was when I first had drawn him but I can't find the photo so I'll update this when I get/find the picture)

Potato hound design:

#oc #my ocs #my oc art #oc artwork #oc story #oc lore

4 notes · View notes

vixy-exists · 7 months

Note

I think you should talk about them!! Be unhealthy about them!! I wanna read it :D

I don’t think you know what you got yourself into, anon. But aaaaaaaaaaaaa thank you in advance for enabling me to talk about one of my favourite things in the world!!

(Stuff under the cut!! Warning though, it’s like +2000 words and I get into headcanons and some pretty dark stuff too! I hope it's worth reading though :'D)

(I started an essay like… back on October 11th so Imma expand on that a bit. Also, I go into some character analysis and some headcanons connecting to that and how those things would interact and intertwine with each other!)

Okay, so

They first started out as a random crack pairing between me and my friend as a joke +2 years ago. Like literally just going “Wouldn’t it be funny if they kissed”? Then I started writing a fic about them and drawing and thinking about them more and aaaaaaaaaa. They have so much potential together – both as just friends and as lovers too!! Also, yeah, the ship name KazNaka came from said friend, though I also have been calling them Kazkemi somewhat, because I think it’s cute :)

They both have the same interests but different backgrounds and different ways of thinking. This makes them fit well together but be different enough to be interesting. For example, their love for computers or their interest in demon summoning. It’s stated in some interviews that one of the reasons why SMT 1 could happen and why Kazuya downloaded the Demon Summoning Program (or DSP as I’ll call it from now on) is because he never had a father or a father figure. He wants that power associated with a father – here, the power of demons. But what would he do with that? In the game, it feels more like Kazuya uses the program for self-defence – like he doesn’t know what else to do with it. He has the power just not the reason to use it – not until later when he has to fight for his life.

On the other hand, Nakajima is just interested in the occult, probably thinking of the DSP as just a way to flex his genius at first. Yes, he programs it, but he has no reason to use it, to test it, or a reason to finish it (it’s something briefly mentioned in the first book). That’s when his sudden burst of anger after getting beaten up comes in. He now has the motivation to finish it and, (unfortunately), use it. He uses the DSP as a weapon, a thing he can exercise his power with to control people, somewhat satiating his power-hungriness after what Kondo and Kyoko did to him.

It’s similar but different and makes me wonder how they would interact with each other if they were close. Would Nakajima let Kazuya use his program? Would he know better and feel like something bad would happen if he let him? Would he even tell him about it? What would Kazuya think of what Nakajima did at Jusho High? Would he see it as a good way to use something like the DSP or would he condemn it?

We also have their familial backgrounds. As I said before, Kazuya has no father figure, but it’s apparent that he has a good relationship with his mother. It’s almost the exact opposite with Nakajima. Nakajima hates his mother – he hates how she doesn’t have time for him, how she only cares about her work and nothing else. On the other hand, from the first two books, it’s not really apparent what he thinks of his father. All we know is that he’s away in Los Angeles on a work trip. I could imagine him secretly admiring him (like a child longing for his absent father, somewhat idealising him – similar to Kazuya) or I could imagine him having a neutral relationship with him. Either way, he still had his father in his life more than Kazuya – and, on the surface, it looks like they’re a completely healthy family who are also probably well off financially.

If I may also bring some headcanons in here: I like to believe Nakajima has a bad upbringing in general, being neglected and abused mentally – a reason why he would escape into the world of computers and the occult and maybe why his mind tries to protect itself with his fragile arrogance. It’s mostly his mother who is abusive (after all, she’s the one who he sees the most), but his father is not a great person either (it’s just that he's away a lot so Nakajima doesn’t see that side of him often). He doesn’t realise it, of course. He thinks what’s happening is completely normal in most families. He probably doesn’t even understand why he doesn’t like his parents (or, mostly his mother) and thinks it’s just because they are constantly away (which is a reason, but not all of it) and gets confused whenever they act kind towards him. The “how can I hate them so much when they act so kind to me now”, not remembering how bad the past has been.

That’s where Kazuya comes in. I imagine they would both look at each other’s lives and only see the good parts in them. Nakajima still has both of his parents, a father and a role model, he’s well off and goes to a prestigious school. What’s not to envy about that for someone like Kazuya, someone who comes from a poor and broken home? He probably feels weird whenever he visits and sees how better off Nakajima lives or hears him praising his father and how much he works, but he could never say it out loud. It’s jealousy, he knows it, but there isn’t really anything that could fix it, so why say it out loud?

On the other hand, all Nakajima sees is how good of a mother Kazuya has, and how he receives all the love that he has longed for for so long. It’s a feeling he can’t really understand, especially since he doesn’t know the reason why he feels it. It’s a sort of emptiness inside him, eating away at him slowly, agonizingly, but he doesn’t dare to say it out loud. Kazuya doesn’t need to know. He would just think he’s weak, pathetic, completely breaking the image he tried so hard to build up.

I can just imagine them feeling all insecure whenever the other is talking about their family. Kazuya looks at pictures of Akemi’s family, the emptiness his father left eating away at him. Or Nakajima getting welcomed into Kazuya’s family and trying so hard not to cry when receiving normal, healthy parental love for the first time.

Again, different, but similar.

Their personalities, I think, would also work well together. They are opposites. Kazuya is somewhat shy, doesn’t talk much but is a good listener and is capable of understanding people and body language. He would probably be very charismatic if he actually decided to talk to people, but he doesn’t have the bravery for that just yet. (Or, at least I think he’s like that, based on the stuff in the game.) On the other hand, Nakajima is arrogant, is probably confident and also talks a lot but has no one to listen to him. He’s probably shit with actually interacting with other human beings too – something that causes him to not have a lot of friends (in other words, he has no friends at all). No one is patient enough to deal with his bullshit, no one understands his interests nor cares at all – just like with Kazuya. Imagining them trying to interact, to step out of their comfort zone maybe is so fun for me. Like Nakajima finally letting Kazuya speak and nerd out about tech and shit and he discovers how much they truly have in common.

Oh, and coming back to their interests too! It’s mentioned somewhere that Kazuya has a commercially available COMP, but it has several modifications (probably by Kazuya himself). I imagine he’s very into tech but in a different way than Akemi, making them have several topics they can converse about. I like to imagine stuff like Akemi trying to teach programming to Kazuya or Kazuya fixing up one of Akemi’s computers, maybe modifying it a bit. Or the two of them brainstorming video game ideas or maybe even helping each other out with homework and school stuff (either in high school or even later in university). And, back to the occult too, I imagine Akemi knows more about how to practise it (he read one book over and over again and made a program out of it, I imagine that’s all he knows) while Kazuya has more knowledge about demons in general (like types and behaviour and shit). I can imagine Kazuya being the one to help out a bit in the program, making suggestions to improve it and Nakajima promising he will be able to test it out if he’s ever done with it. Of course, that never really happens, but I’ll get into that later.

I also have written a lot of stuff for them so far (it’s not on the internet, but I’m thinking about putting it on AO3 if I manage to organise and rewrite it) and most of what I wanna focus on in my writing (something I don’t think I’m successful in yet) is them growing closer together and healing somewhat – before all the DDSMT shit happens that breaks them apart. So uhh spoilers I guess?

I imagine they start interacting online – Kazuya being interested in the DSP while Nakajima is interested in Kazuya’s occult knowledge – and meet up somewhat after. They are distant from each other, only seeing the surface things, making an ideal picture in their heads before they grow closer together and start to see the cracks in each other’s life. Nakajima sees the bullying Kazuya goes through in school, how lonely he is, how having no father affected him, what being in a poorer family is like and how he escapes into the world of the internet, a place where he could finally forget about his troubles just for a bit. It’s similar to Akemi’s situation too. Kazuya slowly sees how years of abuse affected him, how he had no friends growing up, making him run off into his work and how he barely eats and barely survives because of it. That idealised picture they have of each other and each other’s life breaks and they grow even closer because of it. They can’t solve these issues, but they can help each other deal with them. This could work even if they were just friends, but I like to imagine that Kazuya had deeper feelings from the beginning while Nakajima only develops them as he learns more and more about Kazuya (falling for him harder, of course). And, as they both step out of their comfort zones, they finally start dating, accepting their feelings for each other, finally finding happiness, in each other.

And, of course, comes DDSMT. The thing that brought them together, the Demon Summoning Program, is what breaks them apart. Akemi becomes obsessed with his work again, going back to his unhealthy habits while Kazuya is left there, worried sick for his boyfriend. Nakajima doesn’t want Kazuya hurt, not talking about what he did because of it. He doesn’t realise that’s the reason he’s hurting him. And that’s why he doesn’t mention how he completed the DSP, fearing, that if he did, Kazuya would use it and summon something he can’t handle or leave him (either because he got what he wanted out of the relationship or because he realised how awful Akemi is). Ironic, considering that, because of his arrogance, he did just that – summon a demon he couldn’t handle. (And maybe if he asked for Kazuya’s help prior, things would have turned out much better and he wouldn’t have summoned such a powerful demon like Loki in the first place.)

Meanwhile, Kazuya basically receives constant rejection, locked out of Akemi’s life. He doesn’t understand why this is all happening. They were so well off and now Akemi just doesn’t answer his texts or his calls, he’s barely home and… And when he is, he only talks about this Yumiko girl, someone Nakajima has grown seemingly obsessed with and it’s the straw that breaks the camel’s back. He assumes what anyone would assume – Akemi just doesn’t love him anymore and is just too much of a coward to say it to his face. So he breaks things off just a day before it turns out Loki was using Nakajima all along. So, in this version, I imagine Nakajima doesn’t even have time to process what Kazuya said to him, only realising what had happened after the whole Megami Tensei stuff. But at least now he has someone to talk it over with, someone who will help him with his feelings and what to do next.

But, while I haven’t gotten that far into writing or planning, I feel like they could make up (that is if the world doesn’t blow up SMT 1 style). Maybe when they both graduate, after all the chaos that their lives brought upon them, they meet up again and maybe, just maybe, they can start again.

That, and I just think two nerds nerding out together about demons and computers is cute. They just make a cute pairing in my opinion :)

I also haven’t gone into all the shit about my headcanons for their relationship or how I’m still debating about if their breakup would be canon (I like my boys wholesome :() and stuff like that. Like how I imagine Kazuya brings some of his mother’s cooking to Akemi, just to get him to eat something for once, or how Akemi makes little games and gifts them to Kazuya or about their insecurities while dating and aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa- I should probably stop before I accidentally write a 10000-word essay about them lol.

And, again, thank you so much, anon for letting me ramble on about these two!! Even if this was too much to read :’)

#GNJSNIENE LIKE REALLY #THANK YOU SO MUCH ANON!!#this has been boiling in me for like 2 years straight just WAITING to come out #PLEASE tell me it wasnt boring im so nervous about them and all this-#kaznaka #text post #long post #im open to talk about them anytime if someone dares to ask after this lmao #smt #megaten #kazuya smt #akemi nakajima #im sorry but you all must suffer through my ramblings

2 notes · View notes

not-poignant · 1 year

Note

random genuine question. how do you write a book? I've written multiple fanfics successfully and want to be a full time author nothing too crazy but just enough to make a good living. But I'm finding myself stuck when it comes to executing my original ideas. I plan them out well but when it comes to the acts/chapters and actually writing I can't seem to pull the trigger. I understand it takes time and I may just be overthinking but still I'm worried I won't be able to execute.

Hi anon,

You are probably better off asking someone who writes books for a living, because I definitely don't, and when I did publish two novels, they have never done as well as my serials (and writing a serial is very different - for me at least - to writing a book). Like, they did moderately well, but I consider myself a professional serial writer and not a novelist, and those two things are 100% not the same thing. (Which is also maybe where you're struggling.

Writing fanfics successfully can often have zero bearing on whether you can (or want to) write a novel. Writing one is not writing the other! The processes are totally different, unless you were just writing novels and splitting them up into serial chapters and then, well, you wouldn't be here asking this question sdalkfjad)

There are some great novel-writing books out there, and many can be requested through libraries, and many of their authors have blogs or similar where they teach many of their techniques online. There are so many different ways of structuring a novel (and it can change depending on your genre, and I don't know what your genre is either!) I can't recommend any personally, because I don't read them, because I don't really write novels.

When it comes to actually sitting down and actually writing anything of length though, it's sometimes down to asking yourself a few things:

What feelings are happening in you that hold you back? Are you afraid it won't be good? (In which case there's no way but through, anon, you have to write some bad writing in order to get to the good writing, it's a mandatory part of the practice - a garden needs shit/manure in order to grow, lol).

Are you bored because you planned it all out? (In which case you may need to look into writing novels without plotting them first).

Are you more excited for future chapters instead of present chapters? (Write out of order! And make the present chapters shorter).

Are you more interested in fanfiction's regular feedback from readers? (In which case consider creating a reader group for your original writing, or finding a really good beta who can give you that feedback). (I can't get dopamine from writing novels, so I don't write them, I just find the process boring in a way that's pretty intolerable to me).

Is the novel too huge of a road into meeting your characters and setting/s in prose? (Consider writing small oneshots for your characters and world first. Consider writing side characters in the world in a 2-3k fic. Treat it like responding to a fanfiction challenge. It can often make access to the world a little easier).

Is something about the story actually broken? Do you need to go back to the drawing board re: the strengths of the characters?

Learn how to fall in love with your characters the way you've fallen in love with fanfic characters. If they're not strong enough to earn that 'love'/'obsession' - make them stronger. (Although, frankly, sometimes you can only learn that love by writing them. Think of it this way: When you start writing fanfiction, you've already invested hours of time into learning the characters and their depth. You need to invest at least the same amount into your own characters and their stories before you might stumble across that same love).

Outside of that you can apply any number of techniques to novel writing, but ultimately, a lot of it is sitting down and just writing (sometimes pretty terribly) and learning how to overcome writer's block and understanding why it's happening for you.

For me, I learned that the cons of writing novels just didn't outweigh the pros. The lack of dopamine feedback re: readers doesn't play well with my unmedicated ADHD brain, which means writing to no feedback at all tends to leave me extremely unmotivated. And fitting the novel formula re: story lengths ultimately just didn't work with me either, most of my long stories naturally hit or exceed the 250k mark, which is fine for serials, but not fine for most novels outside of epic fantasy or hard science fiction.

So I would also recommend sitting down and asking yourself what did fanfiction give you that made you able to write it? And what do you need novel writing to give you, to make you able to write it? Likewise, ask yourself - do you want to write original novels? Or original serials? There's a good market for both now, and novels =/= serials. Like, they are naturally written in different ways!

Do you think you would struggle to write an original serial the same way that you're struggling with novels? All of these things are important to ask yourself.

But ultimately, just... I hate to say it, but sometimes you have to force yourself through the struggle, and write stuff while groaning because you know it's bad, to get to the other side. It's like learning any new skill - and fanfiction writing does not naturally lend itself to writing novels with everyone! You are learning a brand new skill!! Just because I know how to draw with pencils doesn't mean I know how to paint with watercolours, and I may be even more intimidated to learn watercolours because I know now how long it took to get the hang of fanfiction. Sometimes you just have to actually sit yourself down and be like 'okay I have to get real good at being real bad at something for a little while, even if I hate it.'

Chances are it won't be as bad as you think anyway, and then even if it is, well that's a normal part of writing a novel. That's why the first draft is the first draft, and not the final product. :)

#asks and answers #pia on writing #dodgy advice #how to write a novel #i will flat out say as well that novels are just *harder to write* than fanfiction #because you didn't have someone else doing the hard work for you #of establishing the characters and the world #you have to do that now #and it feels harder and more daunting because it IS HARDER and more daunting #like fanfic can be hard work #especially if you're writing AUs in original worlds #but for the most part #someone else did thousands of hours of labour #to give you a world as a sandbox to play in #now you have to do a version of that labour for yourself #and i'm gonna be honest anon #sometimes it is a lot less fun in the beginning #i found writing in a more 'fanfiction style' helped me #but ultimately i decided against being a full-time novelist #and chose to be a full-time serial author #so i'm probably not the person whose advice you need the most sdalfkjs

16 notes · View notes

twistedtummies2 · 2 years

Text

The Devils I Know - Number 4

Welcome to “The Devils I Know!” For this spooky time of year, from now till Halloween, I’ll be counting down My Top 31 Depictions of the Devil, from movies, television, video games, and more! The end of the countdown draws ever nearer. Today’s Devil proves you can’t judge a fallen angel by his cover. Number 4 is…Tom Ellis, from Lucifer.

Earlier in the list, I discussed two different DC screen versions of Lucifer: Peter Stormare in “Constantine,” and Gwendolyn Christie from “Sandman.” As I said with both of them earlier, I don’t really know much about DC’s Lucifer in the comics, so I have no idea how well either of them portray the character as depicted in said comics. However, sandwiched between both of those versions is a show that, at first, I honestly didn’t even realize WAS based on the DC version. Once I did, naturally, that only made things all the more intriguing. That version is the one played by Tom Ellis in the TV series simply and aptly called “Lucifer.”

“Lucifer,” the show, is a supernatural crime/mystery series, somewhat similar to shows like “Sleepy Hollow” or “Supernatural.” The plot focuses on Lucifer Morningstar, the Devil himself – played by Tom Ellis – who has basically decided to leave Hell and is sticking around on Earth. A chance encounter with a police detective, Chloe Decker, leads to Lucifer becoming the resident Sherlock Holmes of the local police department: a special consulting detective, whom they call on for particularly odd or difficult cases. From that point on, Lucifer embarks on many adventures, helping Chloe and her team solve mortal crimes, while at the same time dealing with “family matters” of the divine and cosmic. Within the same episode, he may face a human serial killer and an angry angel or rogue demon. The show, itself, is just a masterwork. These kinds of series tend to be hit or miss for me, and I’m not sure why. But Lucifer hits a good balance in its tone, style, and storytelling that I really love. A big part of what makes the show work, as you might expect, is Tom Ellis as Lucifer himself. Ellis’ Devil is NOT a villain protagonist, as you might expect, but rather a misunderstood anti-hero. While Lucifer is certainly not the greatest guy in the world – he has an ego the size of the Sun (fitting for a man named “Morningstar,” I suppose), and lives for the present with all of its deadly sins and vices – a constant running theme in the show is that he is NOT an evil man. He simply gets a bad rap because of the mixture of who he is and the job he’s been forced to do. His duty is to PUNISH evil, and make no mistake, he takes intense delight out of doing so; he can be quite sadistic and he feels genuine rage at the follies of man and how often they blame him for their own mistakes. But he is not evil himself; he doesn’t tempt humans to destruction, he doesn’t lead them on with false promises. Even when it comes to good ol’ fashioned Faustian pacts, he makes it clear that it’s all the person’s choice and he never gives them less or more than they demanded. As the show goes on, Lucifer becomes an increasingly rich character. From his relationships with the other characters in the series to the way his personal life develops as he deals with increasingly more challenging issues, both in the mortal and celestial realms, he continues to grow and shift, all while keeping basic ideals close to the heart. Among them is his sense of humor: Lucifer is HILARIOUS, both the show and the character. A big part of the humor for the Devil himself comes from the fact that…well…as he, himself, many times points out, he NEVER tries to hide the fact he’s the Devil. At all. He doesn’t change his name, he doesn’t do anything to pretend he’s anything but what he was, he’s ALWAYS making it clear that’s who he is. Which makes it kind of hilarious whenever anybody realizes he’s not joking and he’s not crazy, he’s totally serious. It leads to drama, too, but for me it mostly makes me laugh how they always react with, “OMG, you’re ACTUALLY Satan?!” and what else can he say but, “I’VE BEEN TELLING YOU THAT ALL THIS TIME!” Of course, much of what makes all this great goes to Ellis as a performer. He captures every moment perfectly, from Lucifer’s more zany, eccentric, whimsical moments – I feel like this is what you’d get if The Master from Doctor Who had their own show – to the points where his inner vulnerability shows, to even the scenes where he has to remind people, “I’m the literal Devil, DON’T F*CK WITH ME.” Whether he’s being charming, frightening, or downright hilarious, he definitely creates one of the greatest Devils in TV history, if not THE greatest of the same. I actually feel kind of bad for leaving him out of the Top 3…but hopefully those three above him will not greatly disappoint.

Tomorrow, we enter the Top 3! HINT: Don’t clown around with this Devil!

#the devils i know #top 31 devils #fiction #tv #television #dc #lucifer #lucifer morningstar #list #countdown #best #favorites #halloween advent calendar #october special #number 4

9 notes · View notes

nvghtingale · 2 years

Photo

𝐔𝐒𝐄 𝐌𝐄 .

── from @cathartidie .

part i. jealousy

the two of them arrived together at the gala, standing side by side. arms linked, they smile at each other like two parts of the happiest couple ── happy couple, famous couple, picture perfect fucking couple in their coordinated outfits. the two of them are giving interviews before the awards begin. they’ve had their picture taken again, and again, and again ── it would almost inspire jealousy within isabele, if she cared about overshadowing them. in truth, she’s been keeping her distance. she is not one of the stars to be gazed upon tonight, hers is a different portion of the night sky. he’s been invited, of course ── one of his movies was nominated, after all, and who was he going to bring to the event but his partner ? famed director meets them and falls for them, the famed composer, what a beautiful love story ── the papers have been eating it up for a while now, haven’t they ? after all, it’s how she found out about the two of them.

she can almost hear it, the haunting whisper in the back of her mind in a the nondescript voice of a fellow guest: ah, how did that one song go, the one released in 1991 ? the duet ? maybe they’ll play it tonight ! it must have been written about the two of them, sweet of isabele de azevedo to have performed it ──

part ii. utility

her grip on roje’s arm tightens at the thought of a certain song by a certain composer being played for the world to hear ( again ) , and they look at her with a frown.

❛ what’s wrong, isa ? ❜

it isn’t anything that they deserve to be burdened with. ❛ nothing, dear. ❜ she gives roje a halfhearted smile, gently rubs the spot on his bicep that she’d unintentionally held onto a little too tightly. ❛ just a little tense. i’m sorry, i should be more careful. ❜

they return her smile, except the kindness within it is amplified by a hundred, a thousand ── they’re one of the kindest people she’s known, someone so genuinely sweet and tender. she’s lucky to have them beside her ── acquiring her own invitation was not easy and had taken some careful maneuvering, especially when isabele was bold enough to request a plus one.

who do you intend to bring with you ?

a date. his name is roje lai.

she was met with a look of surprise ── for all of isabele’s bold flirtation, she’d never been seen with another in public. perhaps this is why her request had been met with approval, inevitable source of gossip. from the moment she dropped their name, isabele could sense it ── the turning of gears in journalists’ heads as they sought to put two and two together. to find said roje lai and track his movements to draw conclusions of his character. what could they glean from the way he moves, the clothes he wears or the way he smiles ?

❛ it’s okay, ❜ they answer, ❛ i’m glad you’re alright. ❜

from the corner of her eye, isabele spots a pair of paparazzi looking in their direction ── not one to waste an opportunity, she brings her hand to gingerly cradle roje’s face and tilts her head to the side so that hair spills down her back rather than over her shoulder, giving the cameras perfect view of the smile she’s painted on ── just giddy enough to depict a blooming romance, just sweet enough to carry reality.

❛ certain. ❜ and a camera clicks, flash going off and momentarily blinding her. isabele much prefers the critics. but that may be because she’s well aware of how much they love her ── the cameras are more instantaneous, and it feels inelegant. abrupt. a click, and a story is half - written already. thus, let her spell out the other half for them.

this they know: isabele de azevedo unexpectedly shows up to the golden eye awards, and even more unexpectedly, she does so on the arm of a stranger.

this they don’t: isabele de azevedo and roje lai have an odd relationship, carved out of conflict but made soft to the touch by shared peace offerings. she still recalls the feeling of flying when he’d pushed her on the swing, the sliver of joy they’d granted her in the respite they’d both sought.

this they won’t: roje lai was not really selected as a plus one because of his kindness, gentleness or attractiveness. roje lai is also called vulture. vulture is strong and cannot be killed. vulture doesn’t immediately catch onto some things, and somehow, neither did their team ── she’s isolated them and kept them as a bodyguard while the rest of her team carries on with their plans. it hadn’t been easy, yet somehow, it had all worked out. it’s using them, yes … but it’s survival. and until they part, at least she and roje can have a nice time together. she does enjoy their company ── finds them beautiful in so many ways.

huh. she hasn’t told them.

part iii. sincerity

they’re walking arm in arm down a hallway, as are others ahead of them, all making their way to an elevator at the end of the hall. the next part of the event is starting soon, after all ── but there’s no need to be punctual, is there ? there is such a thing as being fashionably late, in the end. but they’re too sweet to let that happen, so he’s started walking a little faster to catch the elevator in time, until ──

❛ i like you, roje. ❜ it’s spoken out of the blue, just loud enough that they’ll hear before they rush off too far. sure enough, the admission makes them freeze in their tracks, and the elevator leaves without them ── it’s only them in the hallway now.

❛ you do ? like … like - like ? ❜

god, he’s cute. she can’t help but giggle, cross the distance between them. in truth ── maybe it wasn’t just the inkling of jealousy that led her to suggest roje as her guest to the rest of magpie’s team; maybe it wasn’t just the pro of having a bodyguard she could easily hypnotise at her side. maybe there’s that genuine endearment. maybe she was happy to propose him and argue in her own favour before the rest of her team, convincing them that this was the only option for a date. maybe the best way to answer roje’s question isn’t with words, but by pulling him down and pressing her lips to his.

maybe she isn’t fully using them, after all.

#𓅪 ❛ 𝐒𝐓𝐔𝐃𝐘. ‣‣ ( MEMES. ) ❜#𓅪 ❛ 𝐌𝐄𝐌𝐄. ‣‣ ( CATHARTIDIE. ) ❜#once again no double spacing bc too many word make brain go uh oh #buT ILYSM DEL SORRY I RAMBLED HKDFHK

6 notes · View notes

thatpunkmaximoff · 8 months

Text

[Book One of Three]

Story: 3 out of 5 Smut: 1 out of 5

If you’re one who can look past some very obvious (but not many!) mistakes, then this book was actually a pretty decent read.

There was a bit going on, but once you grasp how the world works then you’ll be hooked.

The highs and lows, twists and turns, left you anxiously wondering would happen next or what the hell one character was thinking to do what they did. Looking at you, Rio 😡

Now read my spoilery thoughts…

* Very much little mermaid vibes… just more darker.

* Lynne vowed she wouldn’t lose a bone and what did she do? She lost a bone. And Rio picked it up 😬

* Ahhh. A crime boss. I like Rio, but I’m not sure I like this writing style 🤔 Maybe I’ve read too much mafia romance and fantasy just isn’t my fav anymore…

* The Blood Queen is a bitch. And why doesn’t she want Lynne to know who her fuck buddy was..?

* Being sent to the Top World without a voice.. ? She’s definitely Ariel. And Rio is a gang leader instead of a charming prince.

* Lol. She chose a “dress” from her collection and was wondering why she was being gawked at while Too World. It was a fuckin’ negligee! That’s why everyone thought she was a sex worker 🤦🏻‍♀️

* So who the fuck is Baron? If it’s Rio, she’s fucked. He doesn’t let chicks get in his way and Fox apparently has dibs. If her dislike for Lynne already is anything to go by, she’s gonna be super pissed/jealous when Lynne and Rio start spending time together.

* ….and Rio’s fucked. Love at first sight? Already possessive? Yes, please.

* Dude, Rio’s kind of a dick. He unfortunately saw Lynne kill one of his men, accidentally, and wants to weaponize her now 🤦🏻‍♀️

* The tension! Oh man, he was showing her how to seduce a man… and yeahhhh… they’re both fucked 😂

* I love how protective he is already. He took her out to see if she could do parkour and she’s impressing him. I love it.

* “All right, I like that you can fight back. But I will always take the blows aimed at you, understand?” — and this is where I fall in love with Rio.

* Lol she whacked him with her shoe hard enough to draw blood 😂

* The betrayal! Rio’s best friend is a dick.

* Or not… 👀 Wtf is going on lol.

* How did C-Wax get in Lynne’s clutch? Is Fox really fucking with her or someone else…?

* The “sexting” is kind of awkward, but bearable.

* Then again, Lynne’s never done that before so, of course, her flirting is awkward.

* I think the author should have edited this again before sending it off. Twice I’ve seen two different sentences repeated a couple paragraphs later. It’s kind of cringe.

* “I may seem calm,” he said, “but I’ve already fucked you a hundred times in my mind.” — goddamn 🥵

* Wow. Lynne totally went Selene on Fish’s dead ass 😂 That leap + decapitation combo was totally inspired by Underworld. Calling it rn.

* Fuck. “Any” knows about the Underworld. He just outed Lynne to Rio. Fucking asshole.

* So “Any” has a deal with the Blood Queen too 🤦🏻‍♀️ He has a time limit to kill his sister’s murderer… and twice already Lynne’s caught him pointing a gun at Rio. Does he think Rio is responsible? Fuck that dude.

* Ugh. I hate Fox and her smug little attitude.

* Wait.. is Lynne “Aria” and she just not know it? Rio’s mentioned how she and “Any” look alike, and notices some familiar things about her that he shouldn’t because he’s never met Lynne before. What if she’s “Any’s” twin?!

* What the fuck, Rio. You betrayed Lynne?!

* Oh no. Lynne touched Rio with her bare hand.

* Who the fuck knocked her out?!

* Oh fuck. Rio can see Bory and hear Lynne now!

* I FUCKING CALLED IT! I knew Lynne was Aria, “Any’s” twin 😭

* Also, how dare the author end it like that.

#bone thief saga #the bone thief’s tale #lynne #rio renero #heleen davies #fantasy romance #dark romance #inspired by the little mermaid #booktok book review #book review

1 note · View note

bellmo15-blog · 2 years

Text

Everything I had gotten up to this point has been pretty self indulgent already, I think that's been obvious from the start. But now we are getting to the point where I REALLY started to become self indulgent because this pic was the debut of my blatant self insert Michael! A sona that originally I thought of using as a joke even writing a fan fic that was never really made to be taken seriously. But then after I got a few more pics with them I genuinely wanted to actually be serious about using them and fleshing them out and now they are one of my most used OC's for pics. By the way, that fic isn't cannon! Again, I wrote that as a joke at first and the only part's I'd really consider cannon are the whole "finding a portal to other worlds opening in his own back yard" and the last part about Animal Crossing New Horizans. And what better way to debut them with a pic of them dressed in a Plugsuit. Or at least, this is an updated version of that pic. This isn't something that I asked Emilio to redo for me, this is something he did of his own volition a year after the original pic as a gift for me and it's quite a glow up if you ask me!

The original pic if your curious.

Original description: Another year, another pic involving Rei’s black Plug suit. It’s like the Olympics every four years but in this case it’s one year, it’s a pic and not an event and it’s not being cancelled because of Corona Virus. Yeah I know, my attempts at humour are NOT the greatest. But hey, my humour’s not why you watch me… Is it? No, it’s the art. And this time we got emilio6 to thank for this drawing, the second time I’ve commissioned him this year. The first thing he did for me was that Milotic suit pic.

“Who is this handsome man in this sexy suit?” you may be asking yourself. Well I’m glad you asked if you did because ladies and gentlemen I present to you… Me. Not a new OC that looks like me. Not a new OC that’s meant to be a representation of me although I guess you could technically count it as such since it is a drawing of me, just plain old me wearing an outfit from a character I know nothing about from an anime I STILL have yet to see. Why have I decided to commission something involving my actual self? Well there is a couple of reasons that factor into that. Most of the fetishes I commission people to draw art of, be it hypnosis, coiling or suiting are ones I want to practice in real life but can’t. That alone has its own factors as to why I can’t ranging from my preferred methods of hypnotism being purely fantasy and even the IRL methods of hypnosis don’t work on me. And I’ve tried self-hypnosis two. Apparently, it’s impossible for autistic people to be hypnotised anyway but I don’t remember where I heard this from so it could be bull shit for all I know just like a lot of things on the internet. Like that theory that Super Mario 64 is a free masonic initiation. Where do people come up with this shit? But since this is a pic of me in Rei’s Plugsuit I’ll move onto that topic.

1.I don’t live by myself. While I’m sure the people I live with wouldn’t actually care if they found out what I was into, in fact they would probably be okay with it since they are quite open minded people, it’s not something I feel comfortable with coming out to them about.

2.Cosplay, especially latex cosplay, can be expensive! The prices for some suits alone can be well in the hundreds and considering I live in Australia there’s this little thing you may have heard of called Exchange Rates. Since the value of Australian money isn’t the same as American for example, I may end up paying more for something than what the recipient is actually getting. This is also why I am a little hesitant to commission the more expensive artists out there as much as I would like to. For the record I know you can get some cosplay of these suits pretty cheap for different materials, in fact I once saw one going for $30 but part of me would rather the more shiny and more accurate version of the suit. And also, ya know, issue 1 I brought up. If it wasn’t for that I actually would save up for a plugsuit.

3.Let’s say I wanted to go the extra mile and wanted to be Rei. Obviously I couldn’t because I’m a guy but I could get a Rei Kigu and body suit. You know, those anime masks that people are somehow creeped out by for some reason I will never understand. Those can be just as expensive hell even more expensive if you want a custom one. Would you believe me if I told you I kind wanted a Kigu of my OC Mikaela?

With all that put into perspective I think you can understand now why I commissioned my actual self in this pic. Honestly though, I do not regret it. I’m happy that I commissioned emilio6

to draw this and it did come out amazing. The suit itself looks nice, I mean it’s hard for either or Rei’s plugsuits to NOT look nice and also, I look nice as well. Even going the extra mile and adding in the helmet for me as well. Also, and maybe this is a result of me just playing the Batman Arkham games and Watch_Dogs 2 recently but this honestly feels like something I would want to wear if I had to sneak into somewhere. Take a guess which of the alternate Batsuits I used the most in Arkham City. I’d be lying if I said this was going to be the one and only time I ever commission myself in a pic. Hell, it’s not going to be the only pic I have of myself in fetish wear. Next time I com something like this chances are high it’s going to be a Zero Suit of hell maybe even a Totally Spies suit. Some may look as this and think “Wouldn’t it be more fitting for you to be wearing Mari’s Plugsuit because you both wear glasses?” And to be honest, you wouldn’t be wrong. I didn’t even think about that until I wrote this description. To be honest I just like Rei’s suit design more and you can’t really blame me for thinking that either. I actually like all the Plugsuits in general but my favourite will still be Rei’s for a long time. I’m aware that Rei’s plug suit and every other suit I just mentioned before are made for females but I mean come on, if artists can draw men in Zero Suit who’s to say plug suits made for female characters can’t be worn by males? Besides, apparently there’s a moment in the anime where Shinji puts on Asuka’s plugsuit, the honest to god best part about Asuka! Seriously though people, why do you all like Tsunderes so much?

Artist is emilio6: https://www.deviantart.com/emilio6

#Evangelion #Plugsuit #OC #SelfInsert

0 notes