#am i . COMPLETELY on one? or is that claude holding the meat?

[yikes-00]

JJ!! 💙💙💙💙

42. “So excited already…” + Hangster, for inexperienced smut prompts, please?

(I'm totally normal about that prompt list...)

💖 Wishing you a great day! 🌷🌻🌹

CLAUDE!! I really hope you enjoy this one!!!! Based on some, recent convos we had👀

tags: impact play, d/s tones, dom Bradley, sub Jake, clothed sex, bondage, rivals that lovers

Rating: E/explicit

AN: peace and love!!!✨💕

Jake moans softly. His hips rock forward at the light touch that ghosts over his clothed cock. Jake tries to swallow down the noise. His body is wound tight and they haven’t even started yet. 

“You’re so excited already,” Bradley chuckles, “and we haven’t even started yet.” 

Jake clenches his teeth, sucking in a sharp breath, trying to calm himself down. Bradley shifts. His dress whites are in pristine condition still. The thick material is stiff with starch. Jake grunts softly when the soft touch leaves him. 

“B,” Jake says. His voice wavers and Bradley hums quietly. 

“Yeah?” 

“Please, just- just do something.” 

Bradley chuckles softly. Jake opens his eyes and Bradley is staring down at him. His lips are turned up into a small smirk and he runs his fingers through his honey colored curls. 

“Love it when you beg for me,” Bradley says softly. It’s quiet and intimate. Like this moment is just for them. “Love it when you need me.” 

Jake’s eyes flutter closed. It’s a burning feeling. His skin pulled too tight over his body. His wrists are tied to the bed. He’s at the mercy of the one person Jake never thought he’d give himself over to. 

Bradley smiles. He shifts his weight on the bed kneeling between Jake’s spread thighs. Bradleys fingers drag higher. His nails scratch against the sensitive skin of Jake’s inner thighs going higher. 

Jake’s cock twitches. Precome slowly drips out of his slit as Bradley looks closer. Jake’s eyes flick up and Bradley is just staring at him. 

The first slap has barely any impact. Bradley’s fingers lightly tap Jake’s thigh. Jake’s legs quiver as he lets out a soft moan. Bradley’s lips turn up. His palms heavily slide down Jake’s thighs tracing a path to his knee. 

“Ready?” 

The question is rhetorical.

The next slap lands on the meat of the inside of Jake’s thigh. The pain mixes together inside of him, sending an intense feeling of pleasure through Jake. Jake whimpers. His legs bend away from the sting and Bradley quietly hushes him.

Fingers wrap around Jake’s legs slowly pulling them straight and wide again exposing him to Bradley. 

“Don’t make me get the straps,” Bradley says in a dangerous voice. His fingers gently trail over where he just slapped Jake’s skin. “Shame to have to completely tie you up in my bed.” 

Jake’s eyes slide close. It’s black behind his eyes. Jake wills his body still and he waits. 

A moan slides between his lips at the next slap and the one after that. Bradley’s hand lands decidedly on Jake’s skin. The sounds of skin on skin fill the bedroom as Bradley moves up Jake’s thighs landing blows. Jake whimpers. His back bows under the effort to hold himself still. His cock is hard and neglected, curled up against Jake’s stomach. The tip is leaking, leaving a messy trail against Jake’s skin. 

Jake’s mouth falls open. A small whimper leaves his lips as Bradley tuts softly. 

“So needy, aren’t you?” Bradley asks. Jake’s eyes flutter open as Bradley drags his hand higher over Jake’s cock. Bradley’s eyes meet Jake’s. “Just a needy little brat that just needs a reminder to how to be good.”

Jake shakes his head. “You get off on this as much as I do.” 

Bradley raises a brow. His hand tightens and Jake whimpers. Bradley squeezes Jake’s balls in a tight grip. The pain is intense. Jake arches into the touch trying to relieve the pain. Bradley’s hand loosens and Jake lets out a quiet gasp. 

“Gonna be nice?” Bradley asks softly. Jake smiles. 

“When am I ever?”

Bradley shakes his head. He lets go of Jake’s balls and leans down. Jake picks his head up and meets bradley for a kiss. Bradley’s uniform presses roughly against Jake’s skin. The dress whites rub against Jake’s nipples sending another wave of need through Jake. 

Bradley’s mouth swallows the noises as he slides his tongue deep into Jake’s mouth. His hand cups Jake’s cheek. Bradley’s thumb brushes over the sharp bone before he pulls back. 

“Word.”

“Bronco.” 

Bradley looks down at Jake. His eyes are dark and Jake feels the anticipation pool in his gut. 

“You sure?” Bradley asks. The last lingering doubt settles in his dark eyes. 

Jake smiles. 

“Do your worst, Bradshaw. Besides, what else are rivals for?” 

#Hangster #hangster smut #sereshaw #bradley rooster bradshaw #jake hangman seresin #tgm

[sadbirder]

A Comparison Of Contemporary Landscape Photography With Traditional 19th Century Landscape Painting

The aesthetics of both contemporary landscape photography and traditional 19th century landscape painting hold much the same purpose, the objectification of nature as a servant to human kind. Both practices give misguided representations that nature is something which is ours to have. This way of seeing is an anthropocentric hangover that has no place in contemporary aesthetics because the belief that nature is ours to have because it belongs to humans is outdated and no longer practical or realistic in today’s world. 

19th century landscape painting is from a time when all people believed all of everything on Earth was here exclusively for humans to exploit, consume and dominate as they please. There were scientists and thinkers during this century who began to consider that perhaps nature was not here for us. Alfred Russell Wallace wrote in his book, The Malay Archipelago, that he noticed that very large fruits grow on very tall trees throughout the region. He suspected if one of these large fruits should fall on a human from such a height, it would likely kill them. He questioned why and if these plants were truly put there by god with exclusive reference to human kind. I am guessing that at the time, not many Europeans had seen large fruits growing on incredibly lofty trees.

Another figure, who had thoughts like this in the same era, was Henry David Thoreau. His book Walden explores what it is to live off the land without exploiting the land or the creatures on it. He did not hunt or keep animals and he grew a permaculture-esque farm/garden. He did this as capitalism was still growing into the dominant way of living in the western world. It is incredibly compelling to read the experiences of someone rejecting the latest fashion trends, a glamorous life based around financial assets and the need to eat meat on a daily basis in the context of that particular moment on the timeline of human history. The themes central to this book examine the state of the world and the ways in which people live on it and engage with it, the observations Thoreau makes are pertinent to scrutinising how we exist today.

Sunrise - Claude Monet

Landscape painting from this time does not share the same progressive thinking. At least, if it did at all, that is not why the paintings are cherished today. The 3 examples I have chosen, each show a romanticised view of a landscape that has been largely altered by the domineering presence of humans. The views also show people working or give the idea of work. Work is an unnatural process exclusive to humanity, it is the method and process of human domination of nature. In his book, Future Primitive Revisited, John Zerzan refers to this as the division of labour. Zerzan explains that there is a symbiotic relationship between the division of labour and domestication of humanity and nature that perpetuates negative cycles in human social structures.

Monet’s Sunrise shows what is still celebrated today as a beautiful sunrise scene. In reality it is a factory. Based on the era in which it was painted, it is presumably full of workers in poor working conditions. The factory is causing a great smog which is completely altering how the view of the river before it appears. The painting beautifies the cancerous smog as scenic and romanticises the factory as if it is something other than an eyesore, filled with miserable people. By extension, it celebrates the idea that humans and nature are here purely to serve capitalism by being functional workers. Humanity, in this painting, is not shown as a part of nature but as a tool for its subjugation.

The Hay Wain - John Constable

The Hay Wain by John Constable gives us a peaceful view of a man working the landscape of his farm with his horse and his dog. This painting is renowned for its beauty. Constable’s paintings have been so celebrated, that the entire area where they were mostly created is still preserved to this day as the Dedham Area Of Outstanding Natural Beauty (ANOB). This so-called beauty is the farmed landscape of south-east England. This area was once, in its entirety; ancient, deciduous woodland but is no longer so due to the consequences of work and human activity.

This molestation of an entire habitat is something the British government seeks to preserve for tourism and capital gain. This is done under the guise of maintaining the lie that the quiet countryside of little England is; A: a reality available for all to attain B: a beautiful thing because it is still in it’s natural state. Again, within a painting celebrated for its beauty in depicting nature, we have ugliness and artificiality. A destroyed habitat, forced animal labour of the horse, a dog breed (Border Collie) selectively bred to exploit obsessive behavioural tendencies and forced to work. Here again, humans, animals and the land represent the means of the domestication of nature in order to create an artificial, human-dominated landscape. This painting tells us that nature only has merit if it has a purpose in serving the functionality of the human world. Nothing about it is natural, or beautiful.

Ivy Bridge, Devonshire - JMW Turner

Ivy Bridge, Devonshire by JMW Turner is similar to the previously mentioned landscape paintings. The natural landscape is sliced by a bridge being crossed by a horse-drawn cart in an area of England densely littered with ANOBs. I am not certain if each of the artists’ intentions were necessarily to celebrate these altered and artificial landscapes as natural beauty in their works. It is said that Turner wrote a poem of his experiences working on the Devonshire commissions revealing that the landscape raised questions about morality for him. It could be that Turner and the landscape painters of the 19th century were attempting to expose the fakeness of the setup. Nonetheless, the paintings are today incorrectly treasured as depicting the beauty of the world in it’s natural state.

The foundation of the idea that these paintings display to us natural beauty come from the views of people who lived in an era when it was conventional to believe that the Earth and nature were there for humans to sculpt in whatever way they liked. This essentially means that to celebrate these paintings today as natural and beautiful is to celebrate human domination of Earth and the domestication of its people and creatures. This celebration preserves two great lies. The first lie is that the Earth, as manipulated by humans, is in it’s natural state. The second lie; This manipulation, caused by human domination, is beautiful.

Thomas Heaton

All of the contemporary-traditional landscape photographers I have looked at are well known on instagram and each of their posts boast thousands of likes, often in the name of conservation. When I look at their photographs, I feel uninspired. How could this be so? Nature is inspiring. They are technically spectacular photographs of incredible scenery but post-production techniques such as the over-saturation of the colours create an unrealness. This is uncomfortable because it presents nature as having to be more than what it actually is to be considered a sight worthy of seeing. While thousands of people do engage with these photographs online, what does it do now for changing how we intereact with nature? How does it change the fundamental way we see the world and does it seek to change the anthropocentric viewpoint that the world is here for us?

Daniel Kordan

This style of photography has not progressed much since Ansel Adams pioneered it last century. Someone told me that this kind of photography is important because it shows people what we stand to lose if humans continue on this path of domination and extraction of nature. I ask the question then, is this tactic flawed? This method of revealing the beauty of nature in photography is not new. It has been a somewhat ubiquitos model for conservation and widespread awareness of nature in photography since Ansel Adams began his career in the 1920s. While this has achieved some huge successes in protecting wild landscapes, these very landscapes are still under threat.

Ansel Adams, Cathedral Peak and Lake, Yosemite National Park, 1938

Climate change, habitat & biodiversity loss are not known as entities who recognise borders and boundaries. Our activies outside proctected areas affect what is within them. I view this kind of photography as a green-washing activity. Consciously our not, these photographers play into the narrative that the landscape is something to be conquered. This is reflected in the corporate funding these photographers receive to travel the world and take these spectacular shots and then share them online with generic captions such as “Get out there and live it.” 

The consequnece of this tactic inspires swarms of amateur photographers into contributing to destructive tourism practices, not to mention the volume of iphones and camera gear purchased. These tourists flood the landscape and attempt to recreate, often successfully, the style of their favourite landscape photographers’ work. They too can share the images on social media and receive kudos for how in touch with nature they are, compliments are given to their highly technical photography. 

This style of photography ignores at large the impacts of current ways in which the human world engages with nature. These photographers leave the inevitable cigarette-butts, food packaging and other litter spread throughout almost any natural landscape out of frame. They might not even see the trash, it is hard to see human waste in a landscape when you do not want to see it. If photographs dealing with conservation of nature showed us the real way in which we interact with nature, would humans therefore be able to finally see nature?

This raises the question of what makes the professional a more worthy artist than the amateur recreationists? The method is also boring, old fashioned and it does not work. Why is climate change etc. getting worse if the tactic of showing people what we might lose is successful? This is because it is not, truly successful. It creates a narrative that the world is our pretty little thing to look at and this objectifies it. Photographers are asking people to look, but not see. In essence, professional landscape photographers whore out to us 5-second-views of a world that really requires vast amounts of time invested in multi-sensory observation to actually see. This tactic does nothing to push for a fundamental shift in how all humans interact with the more-than-human natural world because it does nothing to ensure that nature is seen. If nature is not even seen, how can we challenge the ways which humans see it and engage with it? The practice of how nature is represented in art must change in order to facilitate a change in the ideological practice of seeing nature.

Psychescape - Terri Loewenthal

Photographers like Terri Loewenthal speculate that perhaps the views of nature offered from art is a gendered issue and that we are too used to male-dominated views of the world. She seeks to reject technically-accurate recreations of landscape through photography by choosing to explore imperfection with her photographic practice. She does this in her Psychescape series of works by using a hand-built optic that manipulates the colours and shapes in a photograph at the moment of shooting. She is changing how her camera sees the world, in order to ask us to change how we see the world. Loewenthal intends to achieve this, unlike Ansel Adams and so many after him, by not keeping the human world out of shot. To show views of nature that include humanity which are beautiful in their coexistence.

Contemporary landscape photography and traditional 19th century landscape painting share a similar view of the world in both aesthetics and ideology. They continue to feed a narrative that the human-world is outside of the natural world, that the two are separate.  The practice of doing so has led to a great un-seeing of nature from humans in art and lived experience. We know that we need to change the ways in which humans live and interact with the world in order to ensure that humans can continue to exist in the world. We know that it is necessary for humans to coexist with nature in order to take steps in dealing with climate change and other such natural world catastrophes of the contemporary era. For a long time, landscape painting and landscape photography has refused to play a role in changing how we see nature by showing human dominated views and misleading interpretations of the way that nature is before us. Artists are now seeking to show that humans and nature are part of the same whole. Rejecting views which celebrate the human domination and domestication of nature by bringing the interconnectedness of humans and nature into aesthetics is key to fundamentally shifting the role of art in shaping how humans see nature.

#landscape painting #landscape photography #traditional #nature #climate change #art #art writing #claude monet #john constable #jmw turner #ansel adams #national park #yosemte national park #dedham area of outstanding natural beauty #aestheitcs

[nowis-scales]

Pre-Verdant Wind Endgame Update

An Update on the ol’ Three Houses Verdant Wind playthrough, since I’ve been neglecting documenting my journey properly for a bit:

• My current placement is Ch.20, so I’m only a few chapters away from the last one. It’s kind of a weird thought because I feel like I just hit the timeskip, but I’m keeping my fingers crossed that this will feel well-paced out. In terms of writing, I’m known for being a bit of a stickler for good flow. It’s why all of my fanfics take so long to update! I have to make sure my flow is perfect.

• The fact that they have been giving background information on characters has been so amazing. Learning that Raphael’s sister’s name was Maya and getting to hear about her has made me irrationally happy.

• Also, just generally, holy shit people sleep on Raphael and Leonie. Raphael often gets shoved to the side, and Leonie is treated like her only trait is liking Jeralt, and for me it all just culminates in the question of “so did you like... not do their support conversations, or...?” Seriously. I think Leonie might be one of my favourites in the game so far, and I adore Raph. He’s so sweet!

• The Flame Emperor reveal for some reason gave me “and I would have gotten away with it too, if it weren’t for you meddling kids” vibes. I liked the venom Cherami Leigh had there as Rhea, too. I think I read from someone that in Japanese, Rhea’s actually super calm in that scene. I don’t think I have a preference towards the anger or the calmness, honestly. I think I just liked how smoothly the emotion came across. Plus, I’m a little biased, I’m fond of Cherami as an actress. I haven’t found a performance from her I haven’t enjoyed yet.

• I was really confused as to why Seteth showed up in my house after Chapter 12ish I think? I wasn’t expecting him to just be there after the paralogue, but I definitely wasn’t unhappy. I do like him! I just never use him, because I recruited Bernadetta and Sylvain, so I kinda have a full roster going... 

• I was also confused in the Gronder Field fight because I couldn’t see what people meant about Bernie getting set on fire. Then I remembered Bernie wasn’t on the hill because she was with me. I recruited her. Whatever this proves about me, I don’t know.

• I did end up beating Marianne’s paralogue! It actually wasn’t as hard once I levelled her up a bit and classed her to a Holy Knight. The big thing with her in that paralogue seems to be that she needs a decent amount of power and movement to really get by, so that’s what I’d recommend for anyone else playing it. Using rescue will also probably help you out, but I tried to avoid using Flayn there because it’s kinda easy to kill her. 

• Admittedly, I’m not 100% sure how I feel about the support system. In some ways, I think it’s better that not everybody has that forced S-Support. Oftentimes we were either squeezing a love confession out of two characters who were unlikely to have one, or characters with decent potential might get snubbed because their connection was less apparent to the writers (and unfortunately that still does happen in the case of same sex S-supports in 3H). Having the conversations only go to a certain point is helpful, but at the same time, the inherent romantic undertones of several of the A-supports do make things feel strange. If it weren’t for the fact that I know characters can have only one partner as their paired ending, I would think lots of them were in a polycule. Nothing wrong with that as long as everyone’s comfortable, but because I know they can only have one person in their ending, I find it pretty jarring.

• I think it was interesting that they went to do the fights for breaking into Enbarr and then taking down Edelgard back-to-back. I’m glad they did, honestly, because while I don’t usually like to do two fights next to each other unless I’m grinding, it doesn’t mess with the suspension of disbelief. It would be stupid to break into Enbarr and then just run right back to the Monastery.

• I have still not completed the randomized quest from just after the timeskip. You know, the one I was yelling about with the weeds? Still haven’t gotten any weeds. I think I might just have to give up on it. It’s hilarious that my luck is so good that it’s actually bad.

• The fact that Byleth is praised for having more of a personality than Corrin is the biggest slice of bullshit I have heard from this fanbase in a long time. Byleth is literally designed to be a silent protagonist with nothing going on with them – they even came up with a story reason for why Byleth is such a blank sack of meat! In the kindest way possible, I don’t think most people realize that they are implementing whatever personality they want onto Byleth. Personally, I don’t find anything relatable about being stoic, calm, and not inclined to anyone (until plot happens, of course). I’ve always been the overly enthusiastic and caring type, with a tendency towards nervousness. Trying to relate to Byleth was like trying to relate to the experiences of a cactus. While I definitely don’t think Corrin is the strongest of the modern FE avatars – that award goes to Robin – they still had some things I could understand and relate to. If you’re not the type of person who loves the cool, “I fight for my friends” types like Ike, though, you’re likely to have a hard time relating to Byleth. If you can manage that type of character, then you’re more likely to have present them with a personality of their own.

• Actually, while we’re on the topic of Byleth getting praised for things Corrin got dragged for, the fact that Corrin is still cited as the character who receives the most “player pandering” is ridiculous too. Do a lot of characters like Corrin? Yeah! But most of them who do are deeply traumatized in a way that inclines them specifically towards Corrin. The Nohr siblings cling to each other due to their abusive childhood, the Hoshido siblings all in some capacity seem to suffer from abandonment issues (oldest) and/or attachment issues (youngest), and the official foursome of retainers have also had some sort of abandonment struggle in their past (forced separation from parents, murdered loved ones). While the cast of Three Houses needs therapy and is traumatized too, there is no reason why the inclination moves towards Byleth. Bernadetta feels safe around them just because. Edelgard is obsessed with them just because. Marianne learns to feel better about herself just because. Why are there so many exceptions for Byleth, and so many just without explanation? I don’t hate Byleth by any means, but these two things make my opinion of them lower than it would be otherwise. It kinda sucks that my image of Byleth is tainted by the fanbase’s hypocrisy, but I know I can’t have everything.

• The gameplay overall for 3H has been pretty fun! I love the addition of the Demonic Beasts, as annoying as they are to fight. There’s a charm to having some of your stronger units working to take on the soldiers blocking the path, meanwhile your army’s more intermediate strikeforce works to keep them safe by bringing down the beast. Once you get the hang of it, gameplay with the new additions is fun. The only thing I don’t use is Divine Pulse, but that’s because I’m on Casual and usually when I want to rewind, I want to just plain start over. So I use the old “turn off and start again” trick.

• Edelgard’s death scene was actually pretty good. I must confess that I went out of my way to avoid Edelgard in the academy phase, as I knew how hard the game was going to hit me with the “she’s obessed with you” thing and I wanted to see how wonky it would feel if I didn’t speak to her much. I was right that it’s incredibly awkward in terms of writing when you haven’t spent the time with her, but surprisingly, her death scene still holds up. Good voice acting, animation, and music. My only beef with it is something they have done in FE before, and it’s something I wish they’d stop. If a character is dying, you either let them have a few last breaths after their last lines or you kill them mid-sentence. It’s probably just a personal nitpick, but hearing them get their last word out without struggle and then immediately die just makes me aware of how badly the directors wanted the whole line to be in there. I can totally understand it but I find it so troublesome in the grand scheme of things that I just can’t.

• I also like that in the fight against Edelgard, they tried to make it ambiguous who had the key. Immediately as it told me that, I decided it was Petra and ended up being right. I was kind of sad to kill her though, to be honest. I don’t know her well, but she’s probably one of the Eagles I like more.

• The fight against the Death Knight at Fort Merceus ended up being surprisingly pretty easy. In fact, while I paved the way for most of my army, Nader ended up making it to the Death Knight just as Claude did. He did most of the damage – I’m not kidding, the Death Knight was down to 1 HP – and then Claude took care of the rest. It was a weird fight. They said impregnable a lot leading up to it.

• I understand why they kill Dimitri off-screen at the Gronder Field fight, but I was admittedly a bit disappointed. Again, Salli Saffoti does a good job doing Hilda’s voice for it, but I would have liked to see it animated. It was also nice to have that little rapport with Dedue! If only we could have allied with the Lions a bit more. Everyone always says Claude and Edelgard have similar goals; however, it’s their methods that differ. Claude seems to align himself a bit closer to Dimitri, so I’m usually a bit confused by the idea that Edelgard and Claude would work together. I was spoiled on enough to know her background and story, and even so, I think that her methodology is just a bit too violent for his tastes. But that’s just my two cents.

 Alright. I think that’s about all I can drain out of my brain from the top of my head. With that, I am off to kill the slithers! We’ll see how this goes. Wish me luck!

#koto plays 3h #spoilers fire emblem three houses #spoilers FE3H

[pandawritespoorly]

With Time: Chapter 36 - Apologies

Author’s Note: Here we are! Not all of the classmate's apologies are seen here, but they all do apologize (to Marinette. Adrien gets separate apologies). We've got a strong language warning for 'fuck', but I'm also giving a heads up that Claude's chaotic energy is strong in this chapter. My friend was ready to riot. I love my child.

Chapter Summary: Marinette's former classmates finally apologize.

First | Previous | Next

“He’s probably sleeping on the chaise,” Allegra guesses. The four of them are back at the bakery, and Tom and Sabine told them that Adrien stayed the night.

“I’m glad that he got t’ stay somewhere other than his house,” Allan remarks as they climb up to Marinette’s room.

Claude is the first to note the empty chaise, and they grin. Putting his hand to his mouth in excitement, he hurries to the loft, fist pumping and cheering quietly. Taking out his phone, he squeals, “Guyssss, they’re cuddling.”

After taking ample pictures, they hop back down so the others can see. All three of them take more pictures.

Adrien is lying on his back, head against the pillows. Marinette is tucked under his chin, arm thrown over his chest, mouth slightly agape. Adrien’s right arm is hugging her back, and their legs are somewhat tangled together.

“This is precious.” Allegra bounces where she stands, looking over the pictures.

“I almost want to let ‘em sleep,” Allan comments.

“Almost,” Claude repeats, going back to the loft, “Mari, Adrien, it’s morning!”

The two don’t react, but a few more calls of their names and some gentle jostling of the mattress prompts Adrien to open his eyes. Blinking a few times to clear the sleep from his eyes, he brings a hand to face, rubbing at his eyes with the heel of his hand.

“Hey, Claude.”

“Hello, sleeping beauty. You rest well?” they tease.

Adrien smiles softly, mumbling, “Better than I would’ve back at the house. B’sides, Mari’d been overworkin’ herself again. Had t’ make ‘er sleep prop’rly…”

“That’s nothing new,” Allan sighs, “I think you’re the only one who can actually convince her to sleep, Adrien.”

“It’s a gift.”

“You guys are adorable.” Allegra shakes her head.

“Mostly Marinette though.” Adrien stretches, sitting up properly. The girl in question doesn’t wake, just mumbling sleepily and slipping off his chest, “Mari, it’s time to get up.”

He pokes her a few times, but she just bats his hand away, grumbling.

Claude snickers.

“Marinette, come on.” Adrien lifts her to a sitting position, she opens her eyes to glare at him. Noticing Claude, she waves lightly.

“Hello to you too, Princess Charming.”

She sighs, sitting up on her own, “I guess it’s morning?”

“No, it is midnight,” Felix deadpans.

The friends snicker and the three make their way down from the loft. Allegra holds up her phone, “We all have pictures of you two being absolutely precious, so we can send them to you. Maybe for your wedding?”

Marinette sticks her tongue out defiantly, “Maybe, we’ll just elope.”

“Claude would still find out, then they’d just drag us all there to be there. Y’ can’t escape from Claude,” Allan retorts.

“Nope! No escape from me!” Claude hugs Marinette tightly, making her laugh.

“Did you guys eat dinner before you went to sleep?” Allan looks at them suspiciously.

Adrien rubs his neck. “Uh… do cookies count?”

“No.” Allegra crosses her arms.

Claude lifts Marinette off the floor slightly. “The babies need to eat!” He cries.

Marinette kicks her feet fruitlessly, unable to reach the floor.

“Shortie,” Claude teases.

She scoffs, “Excuse you!”

“All in agreement with Claude’s statement, say ‘aye’,” Adrien announces, raising his hand.

There’s a chorus of ‘aye’s from everyone, making Marinette scowl.

“Betrayal. Complete and utter betrayal.”

---

The friends are wandering around the city, no real plans for the day. The citizens of Paris have been kind enough to leave Adrien alone when they notice him. When they make their way to the Trocadéro, they spot Max, Alix, and Kim.

Marinette studies them. Max is sitting on a low wall with a laptop and several notebooks surrounding him. He looks frazzled, and is repeatedly looking to his calculator to calculate something. Markov floats above him, seemingly in a better state than his maker.

Alix is skating in tight circles, gesturing wildly and speaking in a rushed, anxious voice to Kim. The boy is pacing, talking with her as well.

Markov spots the group of six first, smiling and waving in a friendly manner, but doesn’t mention their presence to the three teens he is with.

Marinette stands straighter, squaring her shoulders and walking closer. Her friends follow behind her, but walk a little ways away to give her space. They’re careful to keep an eye on the three classmates.

They haven’t earned any trust.

“Kim. Alix. Max,” she nods at each of them, and they turn to stare at her, “Hey, Markov! Good to see you again!”

“Ms. Marinette!” He greets her, flying over, “Thank you! The plan worked, Max and his friends have been cured!”

The three in question continue to stare at her, seemingly frozen.

Marinette smiles, turning to gesture at her group. “That’s good to hear. Do you remember my friends?”

The robot nods, flying over to them. “Of course! I am programmed to recall any human or animal I am introduced to! Greetings, Allan, Claude, Felix, and Adrien!” He turns to the braided girl, “By my calculations, you must be Allegra! It is nice to have properly viewed your face!”

She smiles, “Nice to meet you too!”

“Marinette!” Alix is the first to break from her stupor, running to the girl. When Marinette noticeably stiffens, seemingly preparing for something, Alix stops. “I’m so sorry.”

Marinette just stares at her, waiting.

“I- We- I never should have believed her. Lila. None of us should have! All of her stories were complete nonsense! I should have known that you’d never do the things she said you did! You were the best part of our class, and we fell apart without you, I- I’m just so sorry, and she did horrible things, and I just- I don’t know how to say how sorry I am.”

Marinette sighs, then speaks flatly, “You’re right. You shouldn’t have believed her. You shouldn’t have treated me the way you did. I didn’t deserve it, and even if I did do those things you wouldn’t have achieved anything besides just causing more hurt.” She turns to speak to all three of them, “I could honestly press charges, on many counts for so many of you. I’m not going to though, because I can guarantee that the hurt you’re all feeling now is merely a fraction of the pain all of you caused me, and I wouldn’t want to draw that out any longer for anyone - even Lila. Maybe someday, years from now, I can forgive you, maybe we can be friends, but there’s no undoing what happened, and we’ll never be as close as we used to be.”

Alix nods in understanding, then shakes her head, “You shouldn’t. None of us deserve that, after what we did.”

Marinette shrugs. “Maybe not.”

“Marinette?” Kim steps forward, “I’m sorry too - we all are. There wasn’t any reason for us to believe her over you, especially since you were, well, you. You were our class president, our everyday Ladybug-”

“Oh, fuck, she turned us against Ladybug!” Alix whispers in horror.

“-and you didn’t deserve any of it, I’m sorry.”

“Thank you, Kim.”

He nods sorrowfully, stepping back and fidgeting with the strings of his hoodie.

Max steps forward, looking down focusing on cleaning his glasses on his shirt. “M-Marinette. I apologize. Ever since the concert, I’ve been trying to run through my calculations to figure out where I went wrong. None of this makes sense, and logistically, I should have figured it out. Especially since Markov was so confused- I- He- He’d say that things weren’t adding up, and I would brush it off as a glitch in his system or a computer error. I should have known to factor in human error.” His normally steady voice is shaky, and he can barely keep it steady, staring at her with teary eyes.

Marinette’s heart can’t resist the urge to comfort him. She knows they don’t deserve to be comforted, but she hates seeing people upset.

She opens her arms slightly in an offer of a hug, and he nods shakily, hugging her tightly. Alix races over and just about knocks them over when she joins them. Kim, not to be outdone, does the same, and the four teens hold each other for a long moment.

It feels like goodbye.

They separate, Max and Kim blinking furiously and Alix with tears running down her face shamelessly. Marinette gives her one last tight hug before turning to head to her friends.

“Adrien?”

The model turns at Alix’s soft call. He waits.

“I’ve met so many creeps at the museum, I should have been able to recognize Lila for what she was. I’m sorry that you had to go through that, you didn’t deserve that. I’m sorry we helped her, I’m sorry we ignored you, and I’m sorry for being blind. I- I hope you have a better life, with better friends. They seem pretty great.” She wipes at her eyes with the back of her hand, smiling sadly. The boys nod sincerely.

Adrien turns slightly, looking back at his new group. Marinette has tears in her eyes, but she’s smiling wide, which is a look he’s grown accustomed to being on her face. Allan is hugging her tightly, and Allegra is talking with her. Claude is cracking puns - if Felix’s disappointed face and Allegra’s scowl is anything to go by. Claude glances up and raises an eyebrow at him, making sure he’s okay. He nods, and the other boy grins, turning back to the others.

“Yeah. Yeah, they are.”

---

“Cereal is a soup though!” Claude insists.

Felix and Allegra sigh in unison.

Allan shrugs, “I’m with Claude, it’s definitely a soup.”

“Thank you!”

“But it’s not!” Marinette cuts in, “By definition, soup is-”

“-a liquid dish-” Claude interrupts.

Marinette ignores them, continuing, “-a liquid dish typically made by boiling meat, fish, vegetables, in stock or water! Do you boil your Cheerios, Claude?”

“‘Typically made’!” Allan quotes.

“Not to mention,” Claude starts, “The definition had an ‘etc’ after the list of what you add, which leaves it open to interpretation!” “Mari, you can’t avoid the truth. Cereal-”

“-is not a soup!” Allegra, Felix, and Marinette speak over him.

“-is a soup.” Adrien finishes.

“By your logic, the Seine is a soup of river water and boats!” She gestures wildly to the river beside them.

“It does have fish!” Allan raises a finger, gesturing to show he thinks she has a point.

“Well, duh,” Claude adds.

Adrien puts an arm around Marinette’s shoulder, “Good to have you on our side, Marinette.”

“I want a divorce!” She goes over to Allegra, staring at the ground, “Kill me. Kill me now. The Seine is not a soup.”

Allegra hugs her, patting her on the back comfortingly.

“What was that, Ma-Ma-Marinette? I live on a soup?”

Marinette wheels around, turning to the blue-haired boy leaning over the railing of the Liberty. “Luka! You’re smart and reasonable! Please tell them that cereal isn’t a soup! Neither is the Seine.”

He hums, closing his eyes and strumming on his guitar. “I think… that anything can be a soup if you truly believe.”

Marinette stares at him in shock for a moment, then throws her hands up in the air and walks away, “Nope! Nope! Can’t do this! I’m out! Sayonara! Goodbye! Farewell! Au revoir!”

Her friends snicker. She turns back and returns, sighing.

“Ignoring your blatant lies, how are you? It’s been a while.”

“Pretty good. Better now that Jules isn’t under that siren song anymore,” He smiles at her, “Thanks for that, by the way.”

She raises an eyebrow, “How’d you know I was responsible?”

“That whole thing had your song written all over it. I was there.”

Allegra snaps her fingers, pointing at Luka. “That’s where I know you from! You were a part of the competition!”

He nods, “Yeah.” He strums on his guitar, thinking over something for a moment, “You were… with the flutes? Adrien was on piano, obviously.”

She nods.

“How are you?” Luka asks Marinette, “Your song is… different. A good different.”

Allegra, Claude, Allan, and Felix seem confused by his meaning.

“Much better than I was, now that I’m out of Dupont.”

“They wouldn’t let your song soar. You were forced into a decrescendo that threw everything else off. Now?” He nods approvingly, “It’s much better.”

“You didn’t know me before Dupont,” she points out.

“Anyone can tell when the music is wrong.”

She tilts her head and squints at him, “Hmm.”

“Uh, what song?” Claude interjects.

Marinette shrugs, unsure how to explain.

“Jules and Rose are ready to see you,”  Luka says out of the blue, “You can head on back to them, Jules is probably expecting you.”

Marinette smiles, turning to her friends. “I’ll be back. Luka can explain his whole song thing while I’m gone.” She waves as she boards the boat, heading down to Juleka’s room.

It opens slightly when she knocks, and the girls inside wave her in.

Rose looks close to tears, and Juleka isn’t much better.

“We’re so sorry,” the taller girl manages. “Luka had always told me to be careful near Lila, and I just… never believed him, never cared. You were always so you, I should have known better than to think you’d do what she said you did.”

The designer smiles weakly.

Rose finally breaks, sobbing and rushing to hug Marinette tightly. She can make out some of the muffled apology, and gets the gist of it. She returns the hug, which only seems to make Rose cry harder.

“W-we d-don’t des-deserve y-y-y-you!”

Marinette just continues to comfort her as best she can until the girl quiets down. Rose goes to sit next to Juleka, who now has a few tears rolling down her cheeks silently.

“I won’t deny that you guys hurt me. Deeply. It took me months to recover from that properly, and I’m not sure if I’m even done healing yet. I… I can’t even begin to describe how… awful it got. I don’t hate you-”

“You should,” Juleka argues, “You should.”

Marinette sighs, “What would that achieve? No, I’m not going to continue this cycle. I don’t forgive you, and I’m certainly not going to forget, but I’m not going to hate you. I put enough energy into hating myself these last few months, I’m not about to waste energy that way again.”

Juleka shakes her head.

They talked for a while longer, before Marinette eventually had to go. Returning to the top, she sees all of her friends chatting happily with Luka. Felix is the first to spot her and she gives him a tired smile.

Luka turns, playing something on his guitar that matches how she feels perfectly as usual.

“It was nice seeing you, Luka.”

“It was nice seeing you, Marinette.”

Waving goodbye, the group moves on from the houseboat. By now, it’s beginning to grow dark out, and eventually the group grows smaller as more of them go home when they pass by. In the end, it’s only Adrien and Marinette. He’s going back to his house, but some of his stuff is at her place, so he gets to stop there first.

At the park outside of her house, her remaining former classmates are waiting. Alya isn’t there, which is a relief.

They need to talk separately.

One by one, Marinette speaks with each of them, Adrien watching vigilantly by her home.

Nino is last.

“Nette? It was really uncool of me to treat you the way I did. Y-You were the best part of our class and I just let everyone throw you away. I threw you away. It- I have no excuse. Lila lied, but we didn’t even question her, even when you pointed out the flaws. We ignored e-everything, and I just- I’m sorry. We grew up together, and it took a day for me to decide that meant nothing.”

“Nino, I won’t lie,” she notices how the boy winces at the phrase, “You and Alya hurt me the most out of the entire class. You went from my best friends to my worst enemies so quickly. I’m not sure you’ll ever fully understand how much that had me questioning my self worth. I spent months thinking I was nothing but some awful burden, and it was only recently that I finally realized that I didn’t do anything wrong. I made so many excuses for you and none for myself. I’m not going to hate you. I’ve spent long enough dwelling on nothing but hate that I’m done giving energy to that. I’m not forgiving, and I’m not forgetting, I’m just tired. Tired of dealing with this situation that never should have existed in the first place if my ‘friends’ had trusted me, tired of… a lot. Consider us a little worse off than strangers - because at least strangers haven’t caused me months of emotional pain.”

Nino nods tearfully. Marinette sighs. “I don’t hate you. I really don’t. Goodnight Nino.” Giving him a quick hug, she turns to head to the bakery. Adrien meets her halfway and she just about asks him to carry upstairs because she is completely spent. Her poor sleep schedule tied with everything that happened today, it’s no surprise she feels dead on her feet.

“How are you holding up, my lady?” He puts an arm around her, squeezing her a little.

“Eh,” she manages.

She knows he can see through her, but she’s not particularly focused on hiding her lack of energy at the moment.

“Then it’s time for you to get to bed.”

She nods, she really doesn’t have a problem with that plan.

---

Author’s Note: Marinette is probably being too lenient on them, but she's Marinette, so what else would you expect?

Disclaimer: Claude & Co.'s opinion on cereal does not reflect the author's opinion. That said, the author would love to see where you guys stand on that matter.

Alya is next chapter, so don't worry that she's not here. Also, I'm going to try and write all/most of the remaining chapters of With Time by the end of  this weekend. I want to finally get rid of that question mark. Once I have it all written I'll probably start updating more too! (Tuesday would be my extra update day, so if I do finish the story by this weekend's end, then expect Chapter 37 on Tuesday!)

Thanks for reading! Feel free to leave any thoughts, theories, constructive criticism, or anything really in my ask box, in replies or through reblogs. I love seeing what you think!

P.S. Okay, I'm getting curious. What's your stance on soup? I, of course, went overboard and created a survey, so I guess answer it if you want?

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#miraculous ladybug #with time #adrien agreste #marinette dupain cheng #allan #allegra #claude #ml felix #luka couffaine #juleka couffaine #rose lavillant #alix kubdel #le chien kim #max kante #markov #strong language #is cereal a soup #a discussion courtesy of claude #because who else #now with a survey

[kendrixtermina]

for the ship thing thoughts on claumitri and ingrid/dorothea?

ingrid/dorothea?

General:

Rate the Ship -  Awful | Ew | No pics pls | I’m not comfortable | Alright | I like it! | Got Pics? | Let’s do it! | Why is this not getting more attention?! | The OTP to rule all other OTPs - IDK why everyone wants Ingrid to be sapphic when she’s the one (1) character who explicitly says that she’s not sapphic. Or at least, shoots down Dorothea’s flirting in the B support. I think there’s value in having a non traditionally girly character who’s still hetero, many girls who want bfs get told that they will never get one if they don’t act stereotypical and that sucks. Or you could even read her as aspec given that she’s not too interested in pairing up or being attractive, and that the Glenn thing was arranged. She can still admire him and be sad he died without necessarily having the hots for him after all they probably grew up together. Also I don’t really see the particular appeal of those 2 characters together, they don’t have that much in common and Dorothea has a bajillion better options including sapphic ones. 

How long will they last? - As long as it takes Ingrid to say she’s not interested

How quickly did/will they fall in love? - I kind of see why Dorothea might think she’s hot or mistakenly assume she’s into girls as the whole tomboyish look is something ppl sometimes do to communicate that, and she probably finds something relatable about their experiences re: slimy jerks. She does indisputably kick butt and have pretty hair

How was their first kiss? - I’ve had the experience before where the other person gives it a nice, proper try but you can tell they’re not really into it

For the rest of this meme I will not be a spoilsport and entertain the thought/ try to think about what it would be like if they DID get together. It’s certainly inconceivable to read it that way, perhaps Ingrid simply wasn’t ready yet at that time/ or it was an internalized thing.

Wedding:

Who proposed? - I’m certain Dorothea explicitly tried that on screen in the paralogue XD

Who is the best man/men? - Ingrid might try bringing Sylvain, Felix or Dimitri if we’re in a timeline where he lived. 

Who is the braid’s maid(s)? - Petra or Bernie

Who did the most planning? - Dorothea

Who stressed the most? - Ingrid

How fancy was the ceremony? -Back of a pickup truck | 2 | 3 | 4 | Normal Church Wedding | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | Kate and William wish they were this big.  Neither would be much for ostentatiousness but I think Dorothea would want a bit of romantic florish

Who was specifically not invited to the wedding? - Their jerkish ex suitors, even if they are important nobles of [winning faction]

Sex:

Who is on top? -  Definitely Ingrid

Who is the one to instigate things? - Dorothea

How healthy is their sex life? -Barely touch themselves let alone each other | 2 | 3 | 4 | Once a couple weeks, nothing overboard | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | They are humping each other on the couch right now  

How kinky are they? -Straight missionary with the lights off | 2 | 3 | 4 | Might try some butt stuff and toys | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | Don’t go into the sex dungeon without a horse’s head  - I can’t see Ingrid being very kinky, but Dorothea might ease her into it. 

How long do they normally last? - a while

Do they make sure each person gets an equal amount of orgasms? - Very much so

How rough are they in bed? -Softer than a butterfly on the back of a bunny | 2 | 3 | 4 | The bed’s shaking and squeaking every time | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | Their dirty talk is so vulgar it’d make Dwayne Johnson blush. Also, the wall’s so weak it could collapse the next time they do it.

How much cuddling/snuggling do they do? -No touching after sex | 2 | 3 | 4 | A little spooning at night, or on the couch, but not in public | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | They snuggle and kiss more often than a teen couple on their fifth date to a pillow factory. Dorothea really wants to have a relationship so once she gets one she’s gonna want PDA, Ingrid will probably be more stiff and proper - but I can see how a situation where she explores this/eases into it might be interesting to read. It’s not like Ingrid is completely unromantic given all her lofty ideas about honor and how she likes these high fantasy-eque books. It’s somewhere in there

Children:

How many children will they have naturally? - Would probably not have babies. 

How many children will they adopt? - Dorothea canonically looks after oprphans at least in Silver Snow so now entirely unlikely like two or three

Who gets stuck with the most diapers? - Ingrid being the responsible one

Who is the stricter parent? - Ingrid

Who stops the kid(s) from doing dangerous stunts after school? - Ingrid

Who remembers to pack the lunch(es)? - Dorothea

Who is the more loved parent? - Dorothea

Who is more likely to attend the PTA meetings? Ingrid

Who cried the most at graduation? - Dorothea

Who is more likely to bail the child(ren) out of trouble with the law? - Dorothea

Cooking:

Who does the most cooking? - Ingrid

Who is the most picky in their food choice? - Neither

Who does the grocery shopping? - Ingrid. 

How often do they bake desserts? - Often enough. Gotta appreciate how so many people in this game heartily enjoy their nom stuff, even the girls. I think Lorenz is the only one noted as not having much of an appetite. 

Are they more of a meat lover or a salad eater? - This is Ingrid we’re talking about. We’re not partying until there’s a roasted stuffed pugket involved

Who is more likely to surprise the other(s) with an anniversary dinner? - Hm. On the one hand Dorothea’s the romantic on the other hand Ingrid takes her obligations & loyalty seriously. But I think Dorothea would be the sort to really enjoy being the surprise-ee so let’s say Ingrid

Who is more likely to suggest going out? - Dorothea

Who is more likely to burn the house down accidently while cooking? - Neither. 

Chores:

Who cleans the room? - Both

Who is really against chores? -  Neither. 

Who cleans up after the pets? - Ingrid, mostly cause it’s her pets (Horses & pegasi chiefly)

Who is more likely to sweep everything under the rug? - Dorothea

Who stresses the most when guests are coming over? - Dorothea

Who found a dollar between the couch cushions while cleaning? - Ingrid. She has a jar where she collects all the spare change

Misc:

Who takes the longer showers/baths? - Dorothea

Who takes the dog out for a walk? - Both, though probably Ingrid more often cause she likes the outdoors

How often do they decorate the room/house for the holidays? - Dorothea strikes me as the decorating kind so regular

What are their goals for the relationship? - Probably to find their freedom together  and also help the poor. I suppose that is something they might have in common

Who is most likely to sleep till noon? - Ingrid

Who plays the most pranks? - Dorothea

claumitri

General:

Rate the Ship -  Awful | Ew | No pics pls | I’m not comfortable | Alright | I like it! | Got Pics? | Let’s do it! | Why is this not getting more attention?! | The OTP to rule all other OTPs - Sure why not?  There’s nothing in particular that makes me think “Wow those would go super well together” but also nothing to the contrary. I’ve seen good fic for it.  I guess they’re just the two dudes who get the most characterization and also sorta get along/interact, so there’s a lot to work with.

How long will they last? - Hm. Dimitri would strike me as someone would like to be serious and longterm about things. They would need to work out the politics first but there’s no reason why they couldn’t last

How quickly did/will they fall in love? - I’d say it wouldn’t take them that long to get started, but somewhat longer to really get to a deep level. Largely because Claude is quick to build surface friendships but slower to really show his real feelings, but also Dimitri wouldn’t necessarily realize that he’s holding something back or press the issue. It helps that they are both just likeable people tho. Dimitri is not going to pass up a chance for a heart-to heart talk. If he got through to that hidden more idealistic side of Claude I think they’d click and get something lasting going. They would definitely always have disagreements about their methods and are fairly different in how they deal with their feelings, but they both have the will to work with ppl with different opinions and build bridges. 

How was their first kiss? - Claude probably quipped something about how it was surprisingly passionate. Dimitri turned into a tomato that same instant. 

Wedding:

Who proposed? - Dimitri

Who is the best man/men? - Dedue and either Nader or Byleth.

Who is the braid’s maid(s)? - Not applicable. But if it were, probably Hilda and Mercedes or Flayn. 

Who did the most planning? - Claude. He likes them feasts. 

Who stressed the most? - Dimitri. Thankfully Claude is chill enough for both of them and knows to distract him

How fancy was the ceremony? -Back of a pickup truck | 2 | 3 | 4 | Normal Church Wedding | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | Kate and William wish they were this big.  

Who was specifically not invited to the wedding? - Lorenz’ and Sylvain’s jerk fathers. They might be important nobles but they’re jerks. Edelgard, Arundel and Rufus would already be dead in the AM timeline but if they weren’t they wouldn’t be invited anyways. Claude seems like might actually counteract Dimitri’s tendency to take bad treatment out of politeness. Felix might say that he won’t come but then show up anyways.Or there would be some conspiracy to kidnap him and make sure he comes. Lysithea came up with the plan and recruited Ingrid, Hilda and Sylvain to help her.

Sex:

Who is on top? -  Hm. I could see either doing it. Perhaps Claude would suggest that they switch it up for novelty. But Dimitri is definitely the little spoon, despite his actual size XD

Who is the one to instigate things? - Claude

How healthy is their sex life? -Barely touch themselves let alone each other | 2 | 3 | 4 | Once a couple weeks, nothing overboard | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | They are humping each other on the couch right now  

How kinky are they? -Straight missionary with the lights off | 2 | 3 | 4 | Might try some butt stuff and toys | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | Don’t go into the sex dungeon without a horse’s head  -  The discussion would be absolutely hilarious cause Dimitri’s easily embarassed and Claude is a bit of a troll. But he wouldn’t go overboard or make Mitya uncomfortable Claude generally knows when to stop the gremlin act see that one scene with Flayn 

How long do they normally last? - average but it would be pretty intense

Do they make sure each person gets an equal amount of orgasms? - Not necessarily I can get either getting a kick out of just being the one administering the pleasure. 

How rough are they in bed? -Softer than a butterfly on the back of a bunny | 2 | 3 | 4 | The bed’s shaking and squeaking every time | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | Their dirty talk is so vulgar it’d make Dwayne Johnson blush. - You’ve got one person with super strength and one with super toughness/regeneration. There is potential here. 

How much cuddling/snuggling do they do? -No touching after sex | 2 | 3 | 4 | A little spooning at night, or on the couch, but not in public | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | They snuggle and kiss more often than a teen couple on their fifth date to a pillow factory. Methinks Dimitri would be pretty affectionate while Claude’s certainly flirty but the genuinely vulnerable/emotional stuff would have to be in private behind closed doors

Children:

How many children will they have naturally? - Perhaps Claude found some magic mpreg magic right next to where he got the magic cure for Lysithea…

How many children will they adopt? - No jokes aside Dimitri strikes me as the sort to want kids and also to make a point to choose to adopt. The people of Fodlan better get ready to get some adopted Almyran or Duscurian war orphan as their next king. Dimitri would just proudly stand by his adopted kid and Claude would handle the political fallout. 

Who gets stuck with the most diapers? - Dimitri

Who is the stricter parent? - Dimitri

Who stops the kid(s) from doing dangerous stunts after school? - Certainly not Claude

Who remembers to pack the lunch(es)? - Dimitri

Who is the more loved parent? -  Both but in different ways. Dimitri is the affectionate parent who comforts the kids when they’re upset, and Claude is the designated fun parent that you can openly talk about everything with. 

Who is more likely to attend the PTA meetings? - Dimitri

Who cried the most at graduation? - Dimitri cried so much

Who is more likely to bail the child(ren) out of trouble with the law? - Claude

Cooking:

Who does the most cooking? - Claude

Who is the most picky in their food choice? - Claude

Who does the grocery shopping? - Claude

How often do they bake desserts? - Probably not that often

Are they more of a meat lover or a salad eater? - Claude certainly likes a good serving of nom stuff. And Dimitri’s huge, probably needs some fuel to keep functioning

Who is more likely to surprise the other(s) with an anniversary dinner? - Claude strikes me as the surprise plans sort

Who is more likely to suggest going out? - Claude

Who is more likely to burn the house down accidently while cooking? - Dimitri

Chores:

Who cleans the room? - Not Claude. Dimitri tries but he’s clumsy

Who is really against chores? -  It’d not that Claude’s against it perse he just gets distracted thinking about stiff

Who cleans up after the pets? - Claude

Who is more likely to sweep everything under the rug? - Claude

Who stresses the most when guests are coming over? - Dimitri

Who found a dollar between the couch cushions while cleaning? - Dimitri

Misc:

Who takes the longer showers/baths? - Claude

Who takes the dog out for a walk? - They do it together. Both like walking out in nature. 

How often do they decorate the room/house for the holidays? - Dimitri isn’t much for decoration and Claude forgets about the holidays half the time

What are their goals for the relationship? - Just to be happy. Dimitri would want to have some separation between that and the politics - but it’s certainly helpful for the peace between the countries if the Kings are an item and they both care alot about promoting peace perhaps in slightly different but potentially complementary ways. 

Who is most likely to sleep till noon? - Claude

Who plays the most pranks? - Claude

#fe3h #three houses #fire emblem: three houses #claude von riegan #dimitri alexandre blaiddyd #ingrid brandl galatea #dorothea arnault

[notpreparedblog]

Introduction and Story

The Fire Emblem series, for me, has been one of those things that’s always been in my peripheral, but never really close enough to gain attention. I knew of a slew of characters from the Smash Brothers series, that it was a tactics style RPG, had knights, and horses, and magic…and that’s about it. Fire Emblem: Three Houses is the first traditional Fire Emblem game on the Nintendo Switch, and the first game of the series I sought out.

After just finishing my first play through of Fire Emblem: Three Houses, I really didn’t know how to review this game. I typically like to delve into each major mechanic and give insight into how it all ties together, but the idea of touching on everything is daunting for this game.

Fire Emblem: Three Houses is massive. I was initially amazed at how little I actually did after playing for three and a half hours.

Your three choices, Claude in the yellow, Edelgarde in red and Dmitri in blue.

By nature, there’s three different story line routes for you to take, each with their own twists and turns; The Alliance with Claude, the Empire with Edelgarde, or the Kingdom with Dmitri. There is a mid-point of the game where decisions must be made that drastically impact the rest of the game and splitting off into different forks. For that main reason, you will absolutely need to (and want to) play through multiple times.

With the branching story, each path you take gives you a different experience. My first go around was with Edelgarde and the Empire. I felt that some of the story beats were visible from a mile away, but they were never unsatisfying, and the characters actions in-story always made sense.

There’s a rich history in the world of Fódlan where Three Houses takes place, and I felt the game does a great job in reinforcing that, and making the world feel lived in.

  Gameplay

At the start of the game, you’ll be met with a few different difficulty options. First, you have the option of choosing hard or normal difficulty, which is self explanatory. Second, you must choose between classic and casual. Classic means that when one of your character perishes in battle, they are lost forever. Casual means that they more so retreat from battle when defeated, giving you access to them again the next mission.

I originally wanted to go for casual just so that playing the game felt less stressful, because I definitely wouldn’t be able to let one of my students die throughout the game, but I’m happy I didn’t. Going with classic made me rethink how I was going to utilize my team. If there is no risk of permanently losing a member of your team, all you have to do is throw characters at enemies without repercussion and overpower every battle. Part of the fun is treating the battlefield like a chessboard and trying to make smart decisions for that particular round of moves, and a few in the future.

Rhea, Archbishop of the Church of Seiros as well as her second in command, Seteth.

I also went for normal difficulty, but I felt that it was a bit too easy. I never did any grinding and completed all of the story, auxiliary and paralogue battles that popped up. With just that situation, I was consistently over leveling missions I was participating in.  It wasn’t until the final two battles that I felt the difficulty spiked.

Aside from difficulty, the gameplay of Fire Emblem: Three Houses is split into a few distinct sections; character development and the actual battles.

The overall template of Fire Emblem: Three Houses ends up feeling like the following; Begin month, instruct your students, build support and relationships between your students and other inhabitants of Garreg Mach, complete quest/auxiliary/paralogue battle, repeat the previous steps 2-3 times per month then complete the month with a story mission between weeks three and four.

You take on the mantle of professor after arriving at Garreg Mach Monastery, choose a class of students to oversee, build relationships with them through different actions that you take, then lead them on the battlefield.

With that in mind, don’t come into the game expecting endless battles and action. Battles become more fun because of the investment you put into your students, your team and goals in terms of selecting future character classes for them to excel at, and eventually become.

  Battles

Speaking of battles, the real action in Fire Emblem: Three Houses, comes from the different battle types. If you’ve never played a tactics-RPG game, battle fields are broken down into a grid system similar to a chess or checker board. Each battle has rounds where your team, allied teams and enemy teams are able to move all of their units once. During these rounds is when you would attack, use items, heal team members and so on.

  General battle map view, showing you the grid, obstacles, enemies units and more.

Story Battles: These battles, which usually occur once a month in-game, progress the story and usually offer the player the most unique setups. They feature more named characters, which are typically deadlier and require more thought on how to approach them, and more unique side objectives other than ‘rout the enemy’ or ‘defeat the enemy commander.’

Paralogue Battles: These battles hold the best content other than your basic story battles and are always character driven, with a particular conflict or goal in mind. One may require you to block four escape routes for thieves while another has draw bridges in the middle of the map that need to be re-taken. Many of them also reward you with one of the heroes relics and are always worth doing.

The unique aspect of this paralogue battle puts you in the middle of a battlefield with fog of war surrounding you. You can seek out enemies in the fog, or act defensively and wait for them to come to you.

Auxiliary Battles: These battles also soak up a battle activity point and are a step up in difficulty from basic battles. Many of them include rare beasts and reward you with various meat or resources to continue upgrading or repairing your weapons.

Quest/Basic Battles: Throughout your time at Garreg Mach Monastery, you will get a number of quests that involve a battle, many times rewarding you with another gambit battalion. There’s nothing much else to say about them. They are usually uninteresting and just require you to defeat a number of non-threatening enemies.

Basic battle list along with activity points on the top of the screen.

The downside of this aspect of the game, is map variety. Too often is a story map revisited for a paralogue battle or vice versa. The auxiliary battles or basic battles also pull from the same pool of maps. There were multiple times that I played through the same map two or three times in a row just completing quests, paralogue’s or even story missions. It would have been nice to have a larger map selection pool so that battling becomes less dull outside of the over-arching narrative.

  The Monastery

Garreg Mach Monastery acts as the central hub for most of Fire Emblem: Three Houses and feels like a character on its own. During the story, you’ll slowly unlock areas of the monastery to explore, and subsequently, give you more to do.

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On top of leveling up your characters in battle, you’re really expected to invest equal time during the following activities to better improve overall.

Professor Level: The professor level allows you to do more actions during the explore phase of the monastery, and gives you more battle points for when you decide to battle instead. You increase this by participating in extracurricular activities that I’ll talk a bit about below, building relationships and completing quests.

Training Grounds: Houses a tournament every month featuring a different weapon type. You choose a character to enter into the tournament. Winning nets you gold, an item and experience towards increasing your professor level.

Dining Hall: Various options available to sit down with other characters and build your relationship with them. A sound strategy would be to eat meals multiple times on the same day to increase the motivation of your students, so when you go to instruct them, they gain greater experience towards the selected skills.

Fishing Pond: Exactly what it sounds like. You use your bait to catch fish to use for meals at the dining hall. Each successful catch nets you a small amount of professor level experience.

Greenhouse/Harvesting: You have the option to plant seeds and cultivate them. Doing this will yield more seeds, items and again, professor level experience.

Tea time is another activity you can use to build bonds between yourself and the others at the monastery.

While overall I like the idea of the monastery, it’s design really leaves something on the table. I really don’t care much about having the best graphics, but environments look very blocky and outdated next to the detailed and interesting character models. Everything has a jagged edge, sort of like it was out of the N64/PS1 era, except with better textures.It’s a strange contrast that’s very noticeable.

  Characters

One thing I was not expecting, I guess being a newcomer to the series, was how large the character roster is. At first, I was worried about this because how is it possible to get really in depth with everyone and have it not feel superficial? There are always some characters that are developed more than others, and some that are forgotten. This really isn’t the case with Fire Emblem: Three Houses.

I really am blown away with how much personality each character is packed with. The house I chose for my first go around was the Black Eagle House. By the end of the game, following these same characters for nearly 50 hours, I could correctly answer any question they had, have perfect ‘tea times’ every instance, answer their queries correctly in the church and more. I felt that the amplified feeling of knowing they can die in battle also helped me get more attached to them. I never left a character to die, it just didn’t feel like an option.

Couldn’t help but think of animated Link saying ‘Excusssse me Princess Zelda.’

Aside from each character having distinct personalities, the voice acting is also superb. I usually read quickly and scroll past text but here, I waited and watched every conversation because of how much I enjoyed the voice acting.

Support Conversations: The more two characters get to know each other, the better their relationship gets. When that happens, support conversations unlock between those two characters, and they are lengthy. I started getting in the habit of waiting until I was eating breakfast to start activating these support conversations because they took so long to go through. At times, I would sit for 30-45 minutes strictly just listening to characters build relationships with one another. It sounds boring on the outside, but it really was a nice change of pace sitting back and enjoying these conversations.

The main growth of a character besides straight leveling up and support levels, are leveling skills and becoming classes that excel at those skills. This is mostly all done during the classroom sessions that you will be setting up for your team. Classes are all visible from the outset, so you can, and should to a degree, plan ahead for certain characters and see what you’d like to be.

An example of instructing a student on a particular set of skills.

If you really want a Dark Knight on your team, you really need to select an appropriate character, then focus on Reason, Riding and Lance skills. The same goes for any of the other few dozen classes that are obtainable. It’s really an open book, and although certain characters clearly excel at certain skills, you’re never truly bound to those skills. Get creative, and work on what fits your style as a player.

  Other Points

Cutscenes: I really enjoyed all of the cutscenes I’ve seen in Fire Emblem: Three Houses. They stand apart from the rest of the game, enacting a more anime style than what is presented elsewhere. Many of them included some unsettling images that reminded me of the feeling I have watching titans contort in Attack on Titan, or even some of the imagery from Berserk.

There are some unintentional comedic elements as well. One cutscene in particular shows three armies rushing towards each other for this grand battle. When it’s over, you head to the battle screen and everyone is standing around waiting for their individual orders.

The animation is top notch whenever given to the player. Unfortunately, cutscenes are sparse.

Online Recon: Another addition to Garreg Mach is online recon. When unlocked, an NPC as well as four other characters from other players appear. They each sell you one item at a small discount from just purchasing it in store, and you have the option of doing a mini-game with them. The mini-game scatters them across around half the monastery, and you have to find all four of them within 90 seconds. Rewards for completion include basic food items and one time, a battalion. It’s just strange and super laggy whenever you get near that section of the monastery.

One of the online recon travelers from other players games.

Pacing: The pacing of the main story can feel awkward with the system they have built. They really want to do one main mission every month, with you as the professor, teaching, battling, exploring and everything else during the same month. This is fine for the first half of the game where you are teaching students, and as a class, are being assigned one major mission per month, but the same is not the case for the latter half of the game. I don’t want to go into spoilers, but I felt the system faltered a bit later on and pacing seemed either too rushed, or too slow at times.

  Final Thoughts

I’m happy that I took the plunge into the Fire Emblem series. Outside of enjoying the board game/tactics play style, I’m a veteran RPG player, so those long conversations or bonding moments between characters are very welcome and I got just as much enjoyment out of character development as I did actually battling.

The downside, is that map variation was rather boring outside of unique ones used for story or paralogue missions. Graphics are also blocky and seem out of place for this generation of consoles (characters models were a different art style and looked fantastic).

There are three distinct paths for you to choose in Fire Emblem: Three Houses. While the first half of the game may largely be the same for all three choices, the second half is drastically different and you’ll want to check out the other paths.

As long as you aren’t expecting a visual spectacle or non-stop action, you’ll find the same enjoyment that I did with Fire Emblem. Now, onto the second playthrough…

  Review: Fire Emblem: Three Houses #fireemblem #threehouses #nintendo #nintendoswitch Introduction and Story The Fire Emblem series, for me, has been one of those things that's always been in my peripheral, but never really close enough to gain attention.

#anime #attack on titan #berserk #fire emblem #fire emblem three houses #nintendo #nintendo switch #rpg #tactics #three houses #turn based