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#and he randomly said he hated all my NPCs
famwhy · 9 months
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Right Way Up (02)
Stranger Things
Yandere! Steve Harrington X F!Reader, Yandere! Eddie Munson X F!Reader, Yandere! Billy Hargrove X F!Reader
Synopsis: You always hated when your favourite characters died in shows or movies; always longed to have the opportunity to save them. So when you're transported into one of your favourite shows of all time, what else are you supposed to do besides save your beloved characters?
Warnings: Threat/violence, Gore, Mentions of sexual content (implicit), Death, Manipulation, Depictions of toxic relationships, Drugs and alcohol abuse
Note: Sorry for the wait, my loves, but here's Eddie, Steve, and Billy to make it up to you 💕
prev part. masterlist. next part.
02. bring unto me vanity
enter: billy hargrove
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YOU stood there, expression blank as you stared mindlessly into the Eddie Munson. It almost felt as though all your thoughts had left you the moment you bumped into him—flooding out in an endless, blank stream of nothingness you couldn't even begin to comprehend.
Then—not even seconds later—it all came rushing back.
Scenes of him lying in a pool of his own crimson, straining as he told Dustin about how he didn't run away—how he wasn't a coward for once. Scenes of the town believing he was some sort of satanic worshipper—vandalising his missing posters with pentagrams after he had just died protecting them. Scenes of Dustin informing Eddie's uncle of his noble death with tears streaming down his face; unrelenting in their cruel pace.
Scenes that always shot straight through your heart no matter how many times you rewatched them.
"Woah, hey, are you o—?"
You couldn't help it—the way you flew into his chest, arms wrapping around his back in a hug so tight—so inextricably emotional—that even the most affectionate of lovers, the most intimate of partners, would envy your outpour of emotions in that one embrace.
You couldn't help it because—because he was here. And he was okay. And he was alive—oh god, he was alive.
"Wha—?"
And apparently, he was also confused.
Get it together, Y/N. What kind of weirdo randomly throws themselves onto a stranger like that?
But he wasn't a stranger though, he was a character you had watched and grown attached to on screen; a beloved character you had witnessed die over and over again without being able to do a single thing about it.
But, a small voice prodded in the back of your mind, maybe you could do something now?
"Are you... okay?"
You blinked, further scattering a wet substance across your eyelashes. "Oh, yeah, um... it's just that—"
You didn't deserve to die, Eddie.
"—well, everyone is always so mean to you and— they're always like, calling you a freak just because you like playing a fantasy, role-playing game and it's just— it's so unfair because you seem like such a nice guy who doesn't deserve any of the shit that you get and I'm just— I'm so sorry!"
Ah, maybe you let out a little too much there, judging by the way he reacted.
His mouth had hung open, brown eyes wide in what you could only describe as disbelief, bewilderment and utter, utter shock.
For a moment, you were worried that you had accidentally made him malfunction or something; maybe said some type of dialogue that he couldn't compute and, therefore, couldn't respond to—like some sort of unaware NPC being told that they weren't real—which, in a way, is quite similar to his actual circumstance anyhow.
But then, to your utter surprise, he spoke again; in a tone that seemed light, almost—playful, even—"woah, uh, you always psychoanalyse people when you first meet?"—but... there was a waver in his voice, a vulnerability breaking through.
And you knew; you knew he was trying so hard not to let it break through.
Oh Eddie...
"No, sorry, uh—" you cut yourself off, pulling away to rest your arms against your sides, to really look him in the eyes as you offered, "—do you want to be friends?"
"Woah, hold up, Y/N L/N, the Y/N L/N—the Queen of Hawkins High herself—"
Queen of Hawkins High? You knew you were popular but—Queen? Damn.
"—is asking me, Eddie 'The Freak' Munson, if I want to be her friend?"
His words ushered the corners of your lips down and you felt that familiar constricting feeling in your heart again. "Don't call yourself a freak, Eddie. You're not. Please don't ever refer to yourself that way."
Cue the look of absolute astonishment making its way back onto his face.
"I uh—"
"Please, Eddie." Your fingers intertwined, eyes widening in what you hoped—prayed—was a look that resembled irresistible puppy dog eyes—
"Well, how the hell am I meant to deny you when you give me that look, sweetheart?"
—and resemble them it did. 
"So, does that mean—?"
He smirked. "Yes, Queenie, I'll be your friend."
The voice at the back of your mind was louder now, hope swirling together with mere hypothetical scenarios to grant you a vision—a world in which Eddie survived the bat attack he was subjected to in season 4; a world in which you saved him.
And hey, if you were lucky, maybe you'd be able to protect him from all the awful bullying he was a victim of as well. Lord knew he didn't deserve it.
"So, would you mind me sitting in on one of your DnD campaigns?"
He blinked, looking confused for what was probably the nth time. "You know what DnD is?"
"Oh, uh, yeah. I, uh, know someone who plays it. I mentioned it just now, remember? Definitely not a game that encourages satanism."
A bubble of laughter left his lips—and you swore you felt a swirl of warmth gather in your chest—his pretty eyes crinkling up as he said, "yeah, it definitely isn't." Then, his hand rose up to the back of his neck before he continued, albeit awkwardly, "I uh, actually have one today after school, if you wanna..?"
He trailed off but you knew what he was about to ask—and so—smiled at him as you confirmed, "I would love to."
"Great!" He beamed—rather cutely, if you did say so yourself—before immediately faltering, and soon, his hand was back on his neck. "We should probably head to English, huh?"
So you shared your next lesson together? Sweet. Saved you the hassle of running around like a headless chicken trying to find your class.
You let Eddie lead the way, following behind him with a pep in your step as you passed by doors upon doors, each looking just as beat-up as the last—but you were too over-the-moon to criticise their condition.
Perhaps the reason you were so happy was because you genuinely befriended a super nice, super fun guy that you always wanted to talk to when watching the show. Perhaps it was because you knew you had a shot at saving him; at giving him another chance to live in this fictional world. Either way, your mood had definitely lifted and for that, you were grateful—
"Munson, L/N, you two are late." 
—until, of course, you weren't.
Having arrived at class, you were met with a chorus of gasps sent your way, almost every single jaw dropping to the floor as soon as their eyes landed on you and your companion. 
The lady in front of you had her arms crossed over her busty chest, eyes narrowed specifically at one of the two of you and said person seemed to be very aware of it.
Eddie parted his lips, a grin manifesting on his face as he seemed to gear himself up for some sort of speech; one that would never get to leave his lips—at least, not on your watch.
"Sorry, miss, I held him up a little." Your lips stretched into a sheepish smile as you shrugged.
Not bothering to hear what she had to say—because why would you?—you made your way over to one of the empty seats at the back. There was another one in the middle of the room—one surrounded by broad-shouldered kids all adorning the same, bright varsity jackets—but, you would much rather be taking the seat away from them.
Besides, the back seat had an empty one right next to it.
As soon as your thighs landed on the smooth—yet highly uncomfortable—surface of the wooden chair, you tilted your head up, eyes meeting with the sweet character you were just walking with, before one of your hands rose up and gestured towards the other empty seat right next to you.
Another gawk. Another chorus of dramatic gasps.
Oh my God, it's not that big a deal.
"Well, Mister Munson? Will you be taking your seat or will you keep holding the whole class up?"
Snickers; mocking and malevolent in their nature—all bouncing off the walls of the room and into your ears, edging your lips down.
It didn't seem to bother Eddie though, who only let out his own sheepish chuckle before making his way down the row of beaten desks to the empty one beside you.
Your lips twitched back up, then he opened his mouth—"you weren't kidding about wanting to be my friend, huh?"—and you found them twitching down once again.
"Of course not, Eddie. I'm not that—"
A new voice abruptly cut you off. "Ahem. Now where was I?"
You couldn't speak for the remainder of the class, but that didn't stop you from communicating with Eddie regardless. All you had to do was rip out a page from your notepad, write a quick 'I meant what I said', scrunch it up and throw it his way.
You had then propped your head up on your hand, elbow resting on the bumpy table as you leaned forward to really gauge his reaction. The goofy way his lips had tugged up was very much infectious and you smiled as he furiously scribbled back a response before sneaking a quick glance at you—one that resulted in him freezing up, eyes widening and pink rushing to his cheeks in a way that was so cute, you couldn't help but widen your smile.
His blush grew deeper.
He was quick to pull himself back together though, and soon, the rest of the lesson was filled with the two of you tossing that same, crinkled sheet of paper back and forth—each time filling it with more and more ink as small giggles bubbled out of your mouths; childish and carefree with a hint of awe. You felt like a middle schooler all over again—it was nice, it was fun—
—so fun, in fact, that time passed by like a flash of lightning and, before you even knew it, a 'brrring!' rang through the air; one that had you rushing over to Eddie's side, ready to accompany him out the door. Were you being a little clingy? Maybe. But it was the Eddie Munson, who wouldn't be clingy?
"Oh wow, being waited on by a queen, boy do I feel special," his words were accompanied by a light tone you'd heard many a time over the TV, one you absolutely adored.
"You should feel special. You're awesome, Eddie. I'll stop at nothing until you realise that." 
He paused again, that pink colour from earlier returning to reign terror on his cheeks once more.
What a cutie.
You watched as he continued packing the remainder of his stuff in his bag, eyes trained on the glint of his solid-metal rings that would disappear and reappear from behind the rough cotton. Damn, how did they make him look so much more attractive?
Eddie was really attractive, you had no idea how no one in the school seemed to notice. The way his bouncy, brown curls framed his face—perfectly complimenting that pretty pair of eyes he was so lucky to have; the way he would exaggerate his hand gestures like a true drama queen—playfully joking about with a charm that seemed signature to him; the way he always seemed to—
"Uh, ready to go?" 
You blinked. "Huh? Oh yeah."
How long had he been standing there with his bag slung over his shoulder?
"So, sweetheart, I was thinking... for DnD later, do you wanna join in or, uh, just sit and watch?"
"Oh, well, I'm not too—"
A pang; shot straight through your arm like a bullet—and all of a sudden, your whole body jerked to the side, eyes landing on a pair of brown ones; different to the ones you were just staring into.
The very pair of brown eyes that had been the first ones to greet you in this world.
"Ack! Steve!"
He was frowning, brows furrowed and eyes filled with so much dejection, you found yourself wanting to do nothing more than wrap him up in a loving hug and tell him he was worth the whole world. 
"N/N," his voice came out soft, afraid, "what was that earlier? Did I... do something? Whatever it was, I'm sorry, please don't avoid me."
Dear lord, was he whimpering?
"No! Steve! No, no, no, no," you frantically shook your head from side-to-side, mentally beating yourself up for making him upset, "I just— I overreacted because of my arm."
One more cute, inquisitive stare from him and you finally broke. Damn his puppy dog eyes, was this how Eddie felt when you used them on him?
With a light sigh, your fingers found their way down the sleeve of your jacket, slowly bunching the material up to reveal the graying gauze underneath—yikes, looked like it was due for a change.
"Gah!"
Another tug—on your wrist this time—had you tumbling forward, almost smacking straight into Steve's chest had you not planted your feet and caught yourself in time.
He was so close—you could feel his breath on the bare skin of your arm, feel the warmth that radiated off his form. The proximity was almost causing you to lose focus in your vision, colours blending in to create blobs of indecipherable objects.
It didn't seem to bother him though, judging by the way his eyes stayed trained onto your bandages—not straying from them for even a second. Ever the caring one.
"What happened?"
"Oh, uh, just a wolf attack. It's nothing really."
"It's not nothing—" he finally looked up, gazing straight into your eyes with that familiar sense of concern given to you at the start of the day, and the day you arrived—you know? the one that never failed to give you a plethora of butterflies in your stomach? "—you're hurt. That could never be nothing."
Your breath was stolen from you for a few moments—unfairly and unlawfully—but soon, with a shake of your head, it (along with your vision) was seized once more. "Steve. I'm okay, really."
"At least let me take you to each class, please."
Well, when he put it like that—
But, in all seriousness, this was the perfect temporary solution to your problem and you were being handed it on a silver platter thanks to Steve. If you two really were as close as everyone claimed you to be, then Steve would definitely have your timetable memorised, meaning you wouldn't have to arise further suspicion by asking for a physical copy.
And have it memorised, he did. The rest of the day, he accompanied you to every class, looming behind you like a bodyguard and flat-out refusing to let you carry your stuff. Even when lunch came around and another pair of pompoms came to grab you, Steve was there to shut her down, not even giving you a chance to consider going to practice. Not that you would—you weren't stupid.
Soon, the end of the day rolled around and Steve was stood at the doorframe of your class, muscled arms crossed over his chest as he leaned against the wood with one foot crossed over the other.
"Let me drive you home."
You paused, hand frozen mid-air with a book slotted between your fingers. "It's okay, Cain's picking me—"
Just then, a thought occurred to you, and your mind dragged you back to your conversation in the early morning.
("I uh, actually have one today after school, if you wanna..?")
"—up..."
Oh shit, Eddie.
The book in your hand was inside your bag within milliseconds and you were right out the door in even less time than that, Steve's body having been slightly pushed aside in your haste.
"Woah, what's going—?"
You turned back around abruptly, almost causing him to bump into you had he not halted in time. "Do you know where Hellfire is?"
"Hellfire? That cult club?"
Your eye twitched. "It's not a cult—and I need to speak to Eddie."
His brows furrowed and his lips tugged down, expression shifting with an emotion you didn't have the time to decipher. "Eddie as in Eddie Munson? Super Senior Eddie Munson? Eddie 'The Freak' Munson?"
"He's not a freak, don't call him that." You narrowed your eyes before continuing, "and yeah, I mean Eddie Munson. So do you know where he is?"
"Why do you wanna know where Munson is?"
"I need to talk to him, Steve, now can you tell me where Hellfire is or not?"
"Are you sure? I mean, that kid sells some real serious shit and I don't want you—"
"Steve." Your arms folded over one another and you gave him the best stern look you could muster. 
Luckily, it seemed to do the trick, and soon, he let out a large breath before briskly walking forward.
You blinked, watching as his back shrank with each step.
"You coming or what?"
Then, your lips stretched into a grin. "Coming! Thanks, Stevie!"
He didn't respond—and you could have been imagining it—but, your ears seemed to have picked up on a hitch in his throat.
Cute.
Steve led the way and you passed by a multitude of bland, white lockers—or well, meant to be white, they were obviously going grey with age though—before you found yourself standing in front of yet another tall, wooden door.
You rose a fist... and lightly knocked on it three times.
A muffled shout greeted you; a sign to open the door, probably.
Palm rested against the cold surface of the knob, you twisted your wrist and gently pushed against the weight of the wood.
A multitude of chairs, each one seating a wide-eyed member of the rejected club, with one specific throne placed at the head of a rather long table—Eddie's seat.
Speaking of the club leader, his arms stretched out the moment you peeked through the gap. "Miss Queen Bee! How nice of you to join us!" 
You didn't even pay mind to the many gawks sent your way, practically used to it all by now.
 "Hey Eddie!" You beamed and he smiled with just as much enthusiasm—though you swore you heard a growl coming from behind you. "I'm so sorry! I know I said I'd join you guys for this campaign but I completely forgot about my brother coming to pick me up! I'm so so so so sorry! I promise I'll join you next time!"
His shoulders sagged and he practically deflated, smile faltering as his eyes dimmed in lighting. It was only for a few seconds though, not even that long honestly, and soon, he was sending a gentle smile full of so much understanding your way—you almost flew over to give him another huge hug of utmost gratitude.
"It's okay, I get it. See you tomorrow?" His brows rose up and his eyes swirled with a sense of hopefulness you could never bring yourself to shut down.
"Of course," you spoke softer, eyes losing any hint of a sharp edge as you addressed him, "see you tomorrow!"
His smile was back, bright and blinding as ever—but before you could enjoy it any longer, your arm was tugged on and another pang shot through.
"Ack! Steve, seriously?!" You looked his way just in time to catch his furrowed brows and heavy frown, but his expression quickly shifted from one of fury to one of panic.
Wait... fury?
"Shit. Sorry, I completely forgot." He quickly took his hand off your arm in lieu of placing it on your shoulder, any hints of that previous expression now completely gone.
Did you just... imagine it?
"We should go, your brother's probably waiting for you."
"Yeah, uh—" you placed your hand over his own, brows furrowed and expression not all there, "—let's go."
Well that was confusing.
It wasn't long after your puzzling interaction that you found the grey, beat-down truck belonging to your eldest brother—parked up near the front of the school building with few vehicles nearby. 
He was sat behind the wheel, elbow rested against the open window and used cig between his two fingers—still leaking the toxic gas youth in the 80s seemed to be so obsessed with.
"I'm guessing you wanna take her to school again, huh Harrington?"
Not wasting a second, your best friend nodded.
"Well, you never failed me before so I guess it's fine. If she's okay with it, of course."
Steve, once again, gave you those big, pleading eyes and—c'mon—how the hell do you refuse that?
"'Course it's fine with me, Stevie." 
His lips quirked up and his eyes brightened much like Eddie's had earlier—though, unlike Eddie, Steve opted to go farther when expressing his delight.
How far? Well, his arms had wrapped themselves around your waist and you found yourself being pulled into a warm, sturdy chest—so, that far, you guessed.
You weren't quite... used to receiving affection so frequently—especially by a male friend. Though, judging by how naturally it seemed to come to Steve, he was normally quite touchy with you.
Now, you didn't particularly mind it, it was just... foreign to you—but, with time, you would definitely grow used to it. Besides, it was Steve 'The Hair' Harrington, who wouldn't want a daily hug from him?
"Alright, you two, break it up." Cain narrowed his eyes. "Don't think I don't see those wandering hands, Harrington. Don't you have a girlfriend?"
A particularly loud noise—that sounded like someone clearing their throat—came from beside you. It was followed by a sudden breeze against your waist and the following words—"they, uh, they weren't wandering."
"Sure." Then, with a flick of a finger, Cain's cigarette was sent flying through the air. "C'mon sis, time to go home."
"They weren't wandering, N/N—"
"I know they weren't, Stevie." You chuckled. "He was just teasing you."
You didn't let him respond—opting, instead, to ghost your fingers over his arm and wiggle them in one last goodbye before making your way around the truck, kicking a pebble or two while you were at it.
Your hand slotted between the handle and the knob, and with a pull—accompanied by a step up—you were off, leaving the dazed form of Harrington in the dust.
Houses, one after the other—zooming by in a blur of colours; of people and cars that still seemed so surreal to you. Being in the 80s was so... weird. There was one thing you hated for sure though—the lack of mobile phones.
Like, seriously?! What did a girl have to do in order to get some entertainment around here?! The TV shows weren't good and the VFX in films was enough to make you empty your stomach contents in a gross assortment of sickly green vomit. Maybe you were being spoiled but damn, living without the Internet to entertain you sucked.
"We've got new neighbours," Cain's voice pierced through your thoughts, "just moved in a bit ago."
New neighbours? Could it be...?
"When'd they move in?"
"A day or two ago." He shrugged.
"How did I not notice?" That question was more for yourself than him.
"We didn't particularly let you." But he answered anyway.
"Right. Did you see who they were?"
"They have a son, 'bout your age. Why? Do you wanna hook up with him or something?"
You slowly turned his way, expression scrunching up. "No, ew, you're gross."
"What? You're a teenager, it's only natural."
"True—but also, dude!"
His shoulders bounced up and down as he chuckled at your misery. Big brothers sure sucked sometimes.
"Alright, we're home. Get out, shithead." 
You playfully rolled your eyes but obliged, jumping out of the elevated truck with a big swing of your arms before landing on the ground—a light 'thud' following after. Thank god you were on the sidewalk and not sinking into mud right now.
Well, now was as good a time as ever to test your little theory of who, exactly, had moved in to the previously-empty house next to yours.
Your eyes flickered to the side, scanning the house and frowning at the empty driveway that greeted you.
No blue camaro.
Maybe he was out on a drive? Cooling off some steam by recklessly going over the speed limit?
"What are you doing standing around? Get." 
Guess it'd have to wait until tomorrow.
You twisted open the door to your house and were immediately greeted with the sound of grunts and plastic harshly smacking against plastic coming straight from the opening closest to you. 
"What d'you wanna eat?" Cain's voice calls from behind you.
"You can cook?" 
He sent you a weird look and you found yourself wanting to rip off a piece of duck tape, coat it in the most sticky glue you could find, and slap it bang in the middle of your lips.
"I've always cooked for the three of us."
"Right. Yes. You have always done that. Silly me." With a tiny giggle, you looked off to the side to eye the suddenly-very-interesting wall.
"Oookay, what do you want then?"
What did you want? You weren't particularly in the mood for anything—your mind was way too occupied for choices right now. How could you worry about food when your brain constantly replayed the events of the demodog attack and scenes that happened in Stranger Things as a whole?
"Alright—" you blinked, tossing your gaze forward again to see Cain heading to the kitchen, raising one rough arm to wave dismissively in your direction, "—I'll just make lasagne."
Then, you jumped as you heard a yell from the other room. "Fine by me!"
Maybe you could ask Curt if he had anymore info on the family next door. You were fairly certain it was who you thought it was but better safe than sorry, huh?
"Currtt." 
You appeared from behind a pillar, slowly walking over to your second eldest brother with the most artificial smile you'd ever worn on your face.
"What?" His fist continued colliding with the bag.
"Do you know anything about our new neighbours?" 
"Why the hell would I give a damn?"
Immediately, your smile fell. "Useless."
"What was that, you little shit?"
So much for getting info from him. 
Well, you had time to spare so you might as well spend it gathering your thoughts some more.
First things first, you had no idea how to get back to your world—and to be entirely honest—you weren't sure if that was your top priority as much as surviving was. This was Stranger Things, a world that contained a hidden dimension filled to the brim with bloodthirsty, plant monsters that could, quite literally, rip you limb from limb.
There was also one glaring question that really stood out to you; one that prodded the back of your mind earlier today; that had you leaping into Eddie's arms in the first place. Could—
"Alright, shitbirds, dinner's ready!" 
"Fucking finally." 
Well, guess you had to wait for some other time to contemplate that question.
All three of you gathered at the table to eat and, as your fork prodded against the pasta sheets on your plate, you found yourself eyeing the two extra seats—empty and unoccupied. Were they for guests? Or perhaps... your parents? 
Did you even have parents in this world? Curt and Cain never spoke about it—you never really saw anyone in the house other than them so... were you parent-less? It made sense seeing as Cain was the one who cooked for you three—a fact you weren't privy to before because of... wait, why didn't he cook before? You had been in this world for a few days now and you hadn't been cooked a single meal since arriving.
"Hey, Cain?" You turned to the eldest, keen on finding an answer to your question.
"Hm?" 
"How come you never cooked before?"
"I have cooked before, what are you talking about?" He rose a brow.
Shit. Careful with phrasing.
"I meant like, when I was on house-arrest."
"Well, I don't know if you noticed but I was busy fixing a car commissioned to me by the Wheelers."
Ah, that made much more sense.
"Are you okay, Y/N? You haven't been acting yourself lately."
Well shit.
Before you could stutter out a response, he had already beat you to talking.
"Is it... 'cause of the attack?"
"Oh!" You saw the opportunity given to you and seized it. "Uh, yeah! I'm just... still shaken up by that wolf attack."
His lips tugged down and concern creased his brow, sending your heart into that constricting feeling for the nth time. You were starting to grow sick of it.
"You know what? I think I'm done."
"You barely touched your—"
"It was great, thanks, goodnight!"
"It's not even—"
You tuned out the rest of what he was trying to say, rushing up the stairs with loud 'thud's echoing after each step; hand barely resting on the rail as you zoomed by.
Did you have a valid reason for running away this time? Not really—at least, nothing as justified as when you ran from Steve before. Your only reason right now was... well, you didn't even know what it was.
All you knew was that your bed looked mighty comfy right now.
And comfy it was, you passed out as soon as you hit the mattress in fact, entering the land of slumber with nothing but the vast expanse of darkness to greet you when you arrived.
It seemed like only seconds passed before you felt your shoulders start to shake gently, long fingers wrapped around the exposed curves; long fingers you were now quite familiar with.
You eyes fluttered open and you were met with the soft, brown eyes of your best friend hovering over you.
"Steve? What are you doing here?"
"I'm here to pick you up, Nance is waiting in the car."
His words brought your attention to behind him, seeing the shine of the sun's rays making its way through the clear glass of your window to light up your room and coat it in a warm, yellow glow. Unfortunately, you couldn't bask in the beauty of the scene for long.
"Oh shit! It's morning?!"
"Yeah—did you... sleep in your cheerleading outfit?"
"Yes, yes I did, Steve. Now get out so I can get ready!" You sprang up, placing both of your hands on his shoulders this time before you spun him around and pressed your palms against his back, lightly ushering him out of the room.
"You already look ready to me." He snickered.
"Oh shut up." 
With that, you slammed the door shut in his face and quickly got to fixing your bedhead.
Luckily, you didn't have to change, but you definitely had to reapply your makeup which took quite a few minutes. That plus the time it took for you to refresh yourself in the toilet and you were looking at just narrowly avoiding being late to school.
Your feet carried you down the steps swiftly as your eyes locked in on the door, passing by a very flabbergasted Cain on your way there.
"Wait, you forgot to—!"
His words were cut off once you slammed the door shut, rushing down the front yard to stumble into the back seat of Steve's BMW, where both he and Nancy sat awaiting your arrival.
Your chest heaved up and down. "What are you waiting for?! Go!"
"We aren't late." Nancy replied, raising a brow at you.
"We... aren't?" You paused to catch your breath.
"No, we aren't."
You slowly turned your gaze to the left, meeting the ridiculous facial expression of your best friend; cheeks sucked in and eyes looking off to the side.
"Steve."
Then, a huge bout of laughter tumbled out of his mouth and you found your eyes scanning the interior of his car before landing on a half-full water bottle. Perfect.
Within seconds, you snatched it up and sent it hurdling towards the back of his head.
"Ow!"
"Not funny, asshole!"
"Liiittle funny."
"Just drive, Steve," sighed Nancy, fingers kneading through her temples.
"Thank you, Nancy," you huffed, "at least someone here isn't a dick."
Cue another snicker coming from the driver's seat.
You rolled your eyes as the car started up, bouncing you up and down against the smooth, leather seats. It was kinda bizarre how this was a car from back in the 80s but was still the most expensive car you had ever found yourself sitting in.
Okay, maybe the 80s didn't suck that much.
You still missed your phone though.
Now, you would've happily continued reminiscing all of your memories with your beloved device, but—just then—your ears picked up on a sound; one you were awfully familiar with, the roar of an engine you couldn't bring yourself to ignore even if you wanted to.
Your hand moved on its own, wrapping itself around the handle of the door before pushing it open as you placed one foot out, your other following straight after. Now leaning on top of the door of Steve's car, you gazed straight forward.
Metallic blue; shiny and glinting in the sun's rays. At the bottom, a yellow number plate stared you right in the eyes: PCE 235. 
The left door clicked open and out came black boots paired with light blue jeans. Adorning them was a guy rocking a denim-on-denim look—blonde mullet rested comfortably on his head and striking, electric blue eyes scanning the parking lot with little emotion swirling inside.
Then, he made eye-contact with you, holding it for one, two, three seconds before breaking away, flicking his cigarette, and sauntering off in a way that exuded pure confidence.
There was no doubt about it, that guy was Billy Hargrove. And if he was Billy Hargrove, then that meant—
—the events of Season 2 had officially started.
@bdudette, @tanyaherondale, @killerqueenfan, @l3xiluve, @thedoubleexposurephotography, @xxqueenofdemonsxx, @briarsheart
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hustlecandy · 8 months
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Part 2 of this post bcuz yee :)
Also under cut cuz long:
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Day 11: Giant
"What the heck is that? Is that even a bug!? Dead Landers creep me out…"
(Ngl I like the hc that Vi is freaked tf out by the Dead Landers. She is 16 she should not peek the horrors)
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Day 12: Reconciliation
"I don't wanna be a jerk, but I didn't miss the Hive at all. ...I did miss you just a little bit."
(Yesterday I learned that Vi's Request was gonna be longer and featured a second sister that Vi had to make up with. Why were we robbed of this.)
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Day 13: Scout
"Rebecca, do you remember us? It's Leif! We scouted Snakemouth Den…"
(Hc that Leif originally became a scout to research Seedlings & the like bc they thought they were adorable in life too 🥲)
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Day 14: Bounty
"To think a plant and its minions could harbor such malice... This fight doesn't favor us."
(Fuck you Devourer all my homies hate Devourer. That's why I Ice Rain-ed it to death during my second playthrough)
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Day 15: Family
"Is it really okay?"
"Of course! You're family!"
"We're not completely sure…"
"I don't know how...but I know it's true! Don't worry!"
"Besides, you're the coolest explorer! My uncle's so cool!"
"T-Thank you. We'll stay, then..."*sniff*
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Day 16: Sand
"We truly have come far. Good job, everyon-"
"Leif!"
"NO!"
(Dune Scorpion Jumpscare)
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Day 17: Caterpillar
(Yin you are so adorable,,,it's such a shame that your whole existence is never elaborated on </3)
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Day 18: The Truth
"I'm not Leif exactly, but we're still Leif. Even though he got lost to time, and fused with a cordyceps… We will live on as Leif!"
(Top 10 Video Game Quests That Change Your Brain Chemistry Permanently [<- said through tears])
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Day 19: Beetle
(Charmy has to be one of my favorite NPCs hands-down. She's cute as hell and has a chance to randomly raise your attack/defense/health during battle? And Kabbu thinks she's neat? Blorbo material)
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Day 20: Hive
(Ngl Queen Bianca II's design goes hard. A little confusing, but it goes hard)
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the-laridian · 1 year
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76 asks: 🏰🧠⌚😎 for whoever you like!
I'm gonna go with Willow as the longest-played of my alts.
Current camp: Willow's newest camp is now on a hill above the old Summerville Lake lakebed, based on a site I wrote about in an unpublished fic. The important part about the site is that it backs onto an old bunker, which Willow and Beckett are able to use as an addition to the living quarters. (Which is one of the shelters.)
So they've got a cabin/house and then the shelter in the back, which gives them a lot of space and privacy. I hate to have Beckett be out in the rain with his kiosk, so I always build that into the camp.:)
SPECIAL stats, perks, and mutations: Willow was originally going to be a charisma/intelligence build, but at launch, there was essentially no reason to use the charisma stat, unless you interacted with other players, which I didn't. So I rebuilt him as a luck build, which honestly explains a lot more stuff in his story :) He's now primarily Luck/Agility/Intelligence, plus some legendary perks.
Speaking of perks, just about all my characters end up with these:
Aquaboy, everything that reduces weight of stuff, Adamantium Skeleton, Starched Genes, Super Duper, First Aid, Action Boy, Born Survivor, Marathoner, that perk that removes radiation during sunlight hours, and more. Oh, and Lone Wanderer since I usually play solo. I know I could swap builds, but I never ended up doing it.
Mutations: every character of mine ends up with: Speed Demon, Healing Factor, Marsupial, Bird Bones. Willow has others that I don't dare try to remove because which ones get removed is random, which seemed neat at the time but now I could stand to lose, like Plague Walker.
How old are they and were they born in the Vault?: Willow is 24ish and was born in Vault 76a. Which is a good time to point out that because of the multiple "waves" of Vault Dwellers coming out, with Appalachia in different states of plague / depopulation / repopulation, @the-lastcall said that there should be multiple Vault 76s. Willow's obviously from 76a, which had the least supplies and was just kicked out the door. Will and Rowan Dane come from 76b which had the easiest time (they got supplies and the wasteland isn't quite as deadly as when Willow started). This is my headcanon now about the Vaults in this game :)
So Willow is one of the first wave of Dwellers released, from his Vault; he didn't even know that other Vault 76s existed until those from 76b started appearing, looking shell-shocked at this world and everything trying to kill them and so on.
(Technically, he was 22 when he left the Vault, but he's been out for a few years now.)
His experience with Beckett's quest: I will be first to admit that Beckett's quests are a little awkward at times, and I wish the relationship aspect was better than it is, but at least it's something. I have fics on AO3 about these two. I also miss the NPCs that were introduced during Beckett's storylines. We should be able to have Beckett's friends and brother show up randomly at our camp after his questline is done.
Thank you for the asks, anon! :D
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i3ee · 2 months
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I’m really fucking tired.
Everyone’s got their own hurdles, it isn’t easy for anyone and for me I just feel I was put on this earth, cursed. There’s always something happening, whole life’s been a complete sick fucking joke.
I just feel like if we’re in a simulation, I’m that NPC that always gets picked on. If God created me, he must hate me, the most feasible scenario I find, is that we live only in chaos. Everything’s a complete fucking mess, there’s no order to anything, we as humans have formed civilisations, capitalism, laws and all that just to make sense and give structure to how chaotic everything really is. Some people live lives of extreme bad luck, others have it way, way worse than I do, people live in the middle of warzones, famine, poverty. Life is nothing but chaos and not worth living in my opinion.
Had a terrible upbringing, never loved as a child. Abused physically, mentally and sexually. As that was childhood, I grew up as a needy people pleaser and I find I’m always putting others’ wants before my own needs and allowing people to walk all over me. People could push me out the way and I’d be the one to say sorry to them, and I absolutely hate that about myself but that’s how I was “raised” I don’t know how else to be. I was never shown any respect growing up, not even as a human. I felt like a burden, pushed and shoved constantly, there was never an “excuse me.” It was always “MOVE! YOU’RE IN MY WAY!!” Is that how you speak to your children? Do you really think raising them that way will make them successful adults?? I was never allowed out, never had toys, wasn’t allowed to watch TV, couldn’t have hobbies outside of STEM subjects, never had a loving, nurturing mother or father figure, my brother did. The golden first born that gets everything. All the toys, all the love and even to this day at 32 years old, I still envy that. Why me? Why do I have to live this cunt of a life.
I still don’t know how to fully grasp life. Even now, every day it’s just one shit thing after another. Essentially I was trained, not raised, trained as a servant to do my parents chores and threatened with beats, stabs, fire whatever they could grab if I didn’t do their laundry or dishes or whatever their pleasure.
Where there should have been love there was only fear, sadness and pain. That’s how I was controlled. As a child I remember asking my mother for a balloon in McDonald’s, one of the ones on that plastic stick. My mother’s response was “yeah get it so I can beat you with it.” I put it back but when we left she double backed, got a balloon and subsequently whipped me with that stick when we got home. The mental abuse, the name calling the putting down was the worst. She called me stupid and worthless more than she said my name at any given point in my childhood through to 21 when I ran away. The words forever etched in my brain and I still hear them randomly from time to time as they haunt my adulthood. It takes me back, I remember her anger, the pink pyjamas she was wearing, where I was sat on the floor cross-legged as she stood towering over me. Words like “No, actually you’re not stupid, I’m stupid because I gave birth to you.” This was my Childhood, It was just constant and exhausting. On top of everything I had a brother, who took it upon himself to ensure I was to bullied, beaten, spat on at every chance he got. When we were kids, he’d pin me down when I was in bed and rub his dick on me until he was satisfied.
But oh no wait, there’s more! Life then decided to fucking fuck me even more and give me cancer, 4 fucking times and with each time I managed to pick myself up and jump the hurdle, but I’m not seeing the finish line anywhere, after the fourth relapse I’m just exhausted.
I’m in a profession where I’m not valued where there was no sick pay, no holiday pay, no benefits which meant during my sickness it was extremely financially difficult, and it’s just… FUCKING FRUSTRATING. I have 0.62p to my name as I type this as my employer is being shady as fuck and has been irregular with pay, I don’t think I can handle anymore. I really don’t. I researched that helium is the best way to go.
You keep hearing other people’s stories how they came from a dark place and now they thrive. I’m thinking no matter how hard I try, maybe for some people it just doesn’t get better. I think I’m doomed until I’m on my deathbed.
Fuck this shit.
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darkestwings · 11 months
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ok lets start with the things that could actually be considered making progress:
i've been exploring mostly north of where i spawned, and have met the loggers (conveniently located in walking distance of the mansion i've made my homebase) and the isherwoods who recently gave me a cow which randomly turns white for a day every so often. i also got some dogs just cuz i could, and rescued a couple companions from an overrun motel; an asthmatic idiot who steps on my traps all the time and an amnesiac who is really handy with the spear i gave her. made the idiot sit in a jumpseat in the bed of my truck cuz i was lowkey hoping she'd fall out and leave me alone, but felt like it would be too mean to abandon her in the middle of nowhere on PURPOSE...
later found a weirdly patriotic lady in a hotel i had previously cleared and took her with me, which required that i do a little impromptu vehicle construction in the parking lot in order to have enough seats to get everyone in the truck and back to base (i was NOT making another trip, and she kept complaining when she didn't have a seat).
took everyone back to my mansion base and decided to turn it into Babies First Faction Camp, which obviously is my first attempt at a faction camp. not loving that actually, seems basically pointless because when i send my NPCs on missions they don't actually do anything or bring any loot back but whatever.
at this point i decided to attempt to sort of edit my truck. i wanted to be able to take 2 NPCs with me when exploring, but have a spare seat in case i met anyone i wanted to keep and also have everyone inside the vehicle with me, not in the bed of the truck. i had also found a mini-fridge and installed that which was excellent for long explorations, but also took up some cargo space i wanted to get back. so i basically turned my truck into a crew cab, with 5 cargo space spots as well as the minifridge. i've since changed one of those cargo spaces into a livestock stall or whatever it's called (just in case someone else gives me a cow i guess) and i plan to add some other features later, but just haven't felt like doing it...
and since that went so well, i decided to try getting some solar power happening for my base so i could use a fridge and maybe a light. my first attempt appeared successful, but then the fridge drained the car battery i had used and i couldn't get it to recharge again or get power to the fridge at all so i took it all apart and tried again, this time with several more panels and a large storage battery, and now i have a working fridge and a little lighted crafting area next to my mansion's courtyard.
i also decided i hated the circuitous route the roads took to get back to where id been exploring, so i basically just....chopped a narrow driving path through the forest, which worked so well i did it 2 more times later on in other places lol
then found a guy just standing in a cornfield (said he was "guarding the location" which i know is the standard response, but it's funnier in this context) and i took him back to base too.
got bored and built a boat just to see if i could, turned out to be way easier than expected and anti-climactic...
anyway i've decided to go back down south again to the area i just wrote off at the beginning (ran into 2 mass burials on my characters 2nd or 3rd day and just noped outta there till i had better weapons) so ill update on how that goes later on
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caro-bug · 3 years
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Ok the time has come
If you are a diehard Raiden fan or won't take me criticising Genshin for some other reasons, plz skip this post, because It's gonna be one hell of a Rant.
Don't get me wrong, I love Genshin and I'm not planning to quit it or something, but criticism must be given.
And that being said...
GENSHIN 2.1 STORYLINE WAS VERY, VERY BAD
And here's why:
Barely any playable characters were given any depth in this version. They were all treated just like plot devices.
Especially Yae Miko, who was there just to explain everything to our dumbassess and and give us an axcess to the power of ambition and friendsip I guess
Kokomi and Gorou? Nahhh, why give them any actual spotlight, if they were there only to deliever the schocking news that Fatui gave dellusions to the resistance? We might've as well learned that from some random soldier NPC and it would make little to no difference.
Speaking of delusions, don't Kokomi and Gorou fight on the front line? HOW THE HECK did they not notice that all of their visionless soldiers suddenly can use the power of elements? Did everyone hide it from them and everyone actually succeeded? Wasn't Kokomi weired out buy th sudden improvement of the whole resistace? How the heck did none slip up? WHY DIDN'T KOKOMI OR GOROU CHECK OUT THESE "WEAPONS" BEFORE GIVING THEM TO THEIR SOLDIERS? THEY COULD HAVE BEEN BOMBS OR SOMETHING
Also the fact that Kokomi just made us a general without giving us time to get to know how resistance works, or that she would give Teppei promotions just because he asked was extremely stupid. Not a master strategist move for sure. We could be a spy. Kokomi didn't even aknowledge Teppei until he asked her for a promotion.
Overall the whole resistance arc was extremely rushed and basically almost useless. If it was wisely prolonged, this update could be spread between two versions no problem. We could have had more quests where we and Teppei would slowly climb up the ranks, get to know more about Kokomi, ACTUALLY FIND OUT STUFF ABOUT EI AND SCARAMOUCHE INSTEAD OF LETTING YAE INFO-DUMP IT ON US.
Kazuha was ok I guess, but he was given very little screentime, and as my friend (a big Kazuha fangirl, mind you) noticed, that his whole arc revolves around Tomo and he barely has any personality besides grieving his loss, which is dissapointing.
I'd rather see him actualy join the resistance and face Ei not because he randomly appeared to save us, but because he was banished from Inazuma and had the courage to return.
Speaking of random appearances, why were Kazuha and the resistance at Tenshukaku anyway? Like, hear me out: Last time they've seen us alive was when we declared we would find the dellusion factory. So unless Yae told them we were here, they had no right to know (and if she did, how would that help?) And if they ACTUALLY thought that they could raid Tenshukaku, why do that right after their army recieved such a big blow, and with so little men? Besides the fact that Kazuha Conviniently managed to save us, it was all just an unnecessary bloodshed.
And Ei... Oh my god, I'm sorry, but the way they did her was such a mistake.
She basially went through the same thing as Venti and Zhongli, but was the only one to chose violence.
When we tell her that her people are suffering she's like "yeah, I know, so what?" But then we defeat her with what's basically a power of friendship and she's like. "Ok, I'll stop the decree I guess" and in her story quest she suddenly wants the best for her people? Oh no I know you don't.
She could have been the actual victim of The Fatui's plot. Imagine if Sara was actually collaborating with the Fatui and when we told her about them "manipulating" Ei she'd say she's gonna tell her but would actually go to backstab her before she realises the truth. Or if the "you've changed, you're getting weak" line would be what Scaramouche said to Ei after he defeats her.
Or, she could be an ACTUAL villain. The one that isn't forgiven just because she buys some dango milk and pulled a sword out of her boobs. She's a tyrant and there's no denying it. So why didn't she die to get what she desserved? Why didn't she get any actual redemption, or make some sort of sacrifice to show that she wants well for Inazuma after all? She could face the consequences of her wrongdoings and see the death she caused or experience the wrath of the people she hurt but noooo, her people already forgave her and are concerned for her health! But she's just being angsty, so let's go on a peacefull stroll and show her some horny light novel people wrote about her <3 Like come on, really?
Like seriously, if Mihoyo had the guts to actually call her evil, that would barely infulence her popularity. People simp over well-written villains like crazy. Well-written villains rule.
I'm honestly worried about how The Tsaritsa will be handled...
But okay, okay. To lighten up the mood, here are some things that I liked about this update:
Teppei, duh.
Watatsumi Lesbians.
Sara. Oh dear, oh dear, gorgeous. Once again, she proved herself to be an honorable person. We've seen her admit that she was doubtful about the decree. We've seen her world being shattered as she realised what her family did. We've seen her put away her selfless devotion to do what's right. My hot tengu gf, I absolutely love you and your writing so far.
Scaramouche has more interesting backstory and motivations than hid creator. He's the villain we deserve. He has the gnosis and he's yet to cause some drama, so hopefully he fixes this hell of an arc.
Thoma didn't have much screentime, but I like how they touched the topic of how it's hard for him to stay in hiding
Sayu was cute and fit into the story nicely.
ANGRY TRAVELER YES. They spoke. They were pissed. They were traumatized by witnessing Signora's death, even though they hated her. They see that the gods are nothing to mess with, they're changing, they're becpming just like their sibling. YES, YES, YES.
The fact that Raiden somehow "marked" us to attack us when we join the resistance army was cool and relflected her elemental skill really nicely.
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lolibles · 3 years
Text
playing video games with them| anemo boys <3
characters: kazuha, xiao and venti
very fluffy, a little suggestive in kazuha’s part, slight slight angst for xiao, crack
synopsis: what games you play with them, how they act with you!
not proofread please don’t sue me this is also very random :)
kazuha
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playing stardew valley and animal crossing with kazuha is my life goal that will never be fulfilled please cry with me. anyway, just imagine cuddling on the sofa under a thick blanket on a cold rainy day with cups of hot chocolate or tea whilst playing stardew valley. the both of you work through the first year slowly as little farmers doing cute little farm things. also if you ever chose to get into a relationship with any of the npcs in the game kazuha will not be happy, he’d definitely not talk to that particular npc because he is now kazuha’s “sworn enemy”. he will also be a pouty baby, so please apologise and give him kisses. and if you REALLY want to make it up to him, ask him to marry you in animal crossing and this man will be on his knees in a split second. he’d prepare EVERYTHING, from the venue, the guests, he’d even attempt to design his own tux for his little character to wear. and you guys would have such an adorable animal crossing wedding. also because kissing in game is not enough, he’d probably kiss you irl when the wedding officiant says you may now kiss the xx. honestly i see kazuha even going out spontaneously to buy you a promise ring with a little maple leaf engraved in it for you. yes it was an animal crossing wedding, but it was a wedding non the less. playing minecraft with kazuha please, its so fucking wholesome- he’s so good at the game and he doesn’t even try. he knows all the tricks and he’s so sexy with redstone you cant convince me otherwise. he’s also an amazing builder pls wtf. AND OH MY GOD, imagine playing the sims4 with kazuha, he’d literally cry inside. you both would sit next to each other in front of the computer screen for hours just designing your characters. and you would have a little cat too. everytime kazuha’s character flirted with yours, he will definitely shoot you one of his romantic haikus. also the first time your characters woohoo’ed, he most likely would have teased you and said “its unfair that only they get to woohoo you know.” anyway i think playing wholesome games with kazuha is 10 bells out of 10 bells.
xiao
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now this one is kinda scary. i think its pretty obvious that xiao plays shooter games honestly. or anything that has to do with fighting. it wasn’t unusual to hear him literally SCREAM randomly throughout the day because of a game. if you ever play shooter games with this aggressive boy, please proceed with caution. i honestly feel like he would be so caught up in the heat of the moment he’d actually forget he was playing with you. so if he ends up getting angry, please bare with him- he honestly doesn’t mean to call you bad, or useless, or trash… I SWEAR. xiao will immediately regret his words and he’d feel so bad. especially after he notices how your mood just instantly dies. he’d feel so bad, even after he apologised and you forgave him, he can’t accept the fact that he just called you- the love of his life something so vulgar. and since he’s so awkward and bad with people he’d literally feel like crying on the spot. he wouldn’t know what to do to make it up to you. the next few days, xiao was so cautious around you- even if you didn’t think much about the incident anymore. in the end even xiao was unable to stay away from you for too long, and he’d ask you to watch him play games instead- which you happily agreed to. he loves it when you straddle him while he sits in his chair while gaming though he’d never admit it. but whenever you felt him get tense, all you had to do was give him a kiss and you just knew he’d calm down. you literally work magic on him. also occasionally you’d hear some idiots in his party talking shit about him, you wouldn’t think twice before speaking into the microphone and start standing up for him, and your grip around his waist would definitely tighten a lot more. “if i ever hear you talking shit about MY boyfriend one more time, i will literally come in game and beat the absolute fuck out of you.” yassss girlboss! xiao’s heart would explode and his face would be beat red, he thinks he doesn’t deserve you. also he thinks your so sexy standing up for him like that, please don’t tease him about it. i rate him a “please dont scold me im trying my best” out of “FUCK YOU SUCKKKKKK”
venti
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oh my god, horror games. he hates them but he can’t stop. playing phasmophobia with him would be incredibly fun, but he would make you do all the work literally. he’d be too scared to do anything- and if you ever got caught with the ghost you’d be stupid to think he’d try to save you. he would be the first one out the door and running away. he’s also so loud, your honestly more likely to get jump scared by his screaming than the actual game. other than that i think venti likes to play the sims4 too, except he’s so chaotic about it. he wants to do challenges and he also wants to make like 10 babies with you even if your sims can’t afford them- cries when they are taken away. has all the packs and just enjoys fucking around with everything- also makes bets with you, like whether your baby is going to be a boy or girl, and if you lose you owe him a kiss or he asks you to do something for him. when he plays with you, he needs to be touching your body at all times. he says it makes him feel safe, and warm. so you just let him. venti also wants to play karaoke games with you, he loves your voice so much- whether you can sing or not he loves it. but he will tease you if you cant. he loves duetting with you, to him it’s something very intimate and close to home. he wants to hold your hand and give them a squeeze as an encouragement when you sing with him. and yes you guys probably have played just dance a few times, but venti gets incredibly tired after one round- so please bare with his annoying ass. i think venti is a solid 8 red bulls out of “ive already drank 15”
guys i was supposed to include aether but his part disappeared and i- </3 i’ll have to rewrite and upload it in a second part!! heh sorry for being gone for so long, anyway i have my presentations tomorrow, a test on thursday and another presentation on friday ;-; wish me luck! ill be back writing in a few days while i suffer rn sghshshsh
also @truegaypotat my love here is some xiao content <3
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Text
Just finished my first ever DnD session!!! (And my first time DMing.)
My accents kept randomly switching between yorkshire and Irish. Lol. But everyone seemed to enjoy them.
Some highlights:
The wood elf bard (who loves all animals except chickens, which he hates) wandering into town and immediately booting a chicken two feet across a path. (Then promptly ignoring the old man who yelled at him for it.)
The half orc cleric half-heartedly waving candles around when giving a blessing to a very over-enthusiastic cart driver.
The entire party’s utter delight when I introduced a kenku NPC and told them about the mimicry trait.
The (INT 4) dragonborn wild magic sorcerer standing in a doorway, suspicious that the upset human barkeep and her wheelchair-bound half human, half dwarf wife might secretly be pursuers in disguise.
The Cleric (in high-quality robes) crawling under said dragonborn’s legs, while the wood elf storm sorcerer squeezed around her.
A PC rolling for random “encounters” at two points during the day, and getting heavy rain both times (the second literally seconds after I had rolled and declared that the first bout had finally stopped).
Two of the party rolling nat ones on their first survival checks.
The party briefly wondering whether the missing teen had just wandered off to be a trouble-maker, before I pointed out (after a 24 nature check) that the footprints suggested she was carried off unwillingly by ‘a flying creature.’ (Actually an Aaracokra bandit, but they don’t know that yet.)
The dragonborn (who is so dumb that she in-game makes all her decisions based on dice rolls) just zoning out and staring into the fire instead of answering any questions sent her way. As well as refusing to eat lunch because her dice roll said no.
Didn’t actually get to the first fight, but it all works out ‘cos one of the PCs couldn’t be there today, so will get to bump into them in the woods next time! And everyone said they had fun, so yay!!!
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bean-n-shroob · 4 years
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The Origami King Review/Opinion
(I sorta hate that it has the word The in it cause when I did impressions or this review, it sounds strangely official)
I’m gonna review but if people don’t want spoilers here’s some Pros and Cons that I felt
Pros:
+ Music is fantastic! I love how the battle theme changes with every area/sub-area you go to.
+ Writing is good, it gets you invested in enough to sorta care. Humor is top notch as expected!
+ Olivia is a sweetheart! I love her so much and how she’s so marveled by everything.
+ Boss Battles are fun to figure and deal with.
+ Finding Toads is actually kinda fun, I enjoy figuring out where they’re hidden
+ Badge system is intriguing if not a bit clunkly put together (sorry, this is suppose to be Pros)
Cons:
- Regular Battles get old quick if puzzles aren’t really your thing and its a bit too easy to just not depend on the coins, thus making them pointless.
- Story sorta flops, it starts strong but then just sorta fizzles and all we got left is... fun experiences (I know this sounds like a Con, but while the experiences are fun, it is disappointing the story sorta flops hard)
- Character Design is very meh. The most well written character can’t save it from its extremely generic design
- But also Olly is not... that well written... so...
- Partners and Vellumentals are kinda under utilized to a disappointing degree (baby steps, baby steps ugh)
Anywho, that’s all my feelings (that I can remember and feel I can say without spoilers)
6.5/10 (I’ll explain the scoring under the cut)
Spoilers Under Cut
Hello and welcome to the Spoiler Bits of this Review/Opinion
Buckle in, this is a long one
Now y’all may be a bit curious as to why, with so much big things (music/writing/bosses/Olivia) being good and so little being bad, why a 6.5/10?
Well, I felt a 7 was too generous and would make people think “Oh, its good!” but a 6 is like “Eh... its mediocre” and a 6.5 is more like a “Its Good, But” and I feel that But is important! I know how this may sound, but TOK could’ve been WAY better and Chapter 2 was an example of how good this game could’ve been!
You know how people always bring up Huey, or the “Morton Leston” joke, or the “I would do things that would raise this game’s rating” line as examples as why Color Splash is actually really good and we’re all in denial?
I feel Chapter 2 will be that for TOK and its all because of Bobby! I like Bobby, I like Bobby a lot! I wish he stuck around! I loved how he and Olivia interacted together and how they formed a bond!
But
I sorta hated how overall useless he was to the action and adventuring. He’s the most useless partner that somehow leaves a deep impression on the player!
He leaves such a deep impression that I don’t think anyone noticed how badly written Professor Toad was! He was such a let down as a follow up to Bobby! And worst of all, he was like way more useful than Bobby! He can dig holes, he can wipe out a whole role of enemies, he has a function outside of battle and story.
Seeing how useful Professor Toad was, sorta put into perspective Bobby and his eventual sacrifice to save Olivia (I told ya this was spoilers). He just dies, in a shockingly emotional moment, giving a speech about how Bomb-Ombs live relatively short lives and are always trying to make the most of it.
Wow... I really wish Chapter 6 didn’t have a segment where you were half hazardly shooting bomb-ombs out of a cannon, cause otherwise, this could’ve been way more impactful!
But it also made it seem like "we can't make Bobby too useful, he's gonna die. So just keep him extremely simple and useless in every other aspect of the adventure, besides story."
I don’t get how TOK started out so strong! The intro and Chapter 1 introduced us to the basic loop how what we’d have to do and how stuff will play out and Chapter 2 took that and showed us how far we could go with this loop and how involved the world will be with this loop!
Only for Chapter 3 to just give up on everything and give us 1 expansive dessert to explore, a very one note partner who doesn’t leave a lasting impression, a boring quest of solving an ancient riddle and a very annoying boss dungeon segment that went on longer than it should’ve! And above all else, a very half-assed excuse for why he won’t be joining your journey! Especially since Chapter 4 doesn’t have a partner!
Chapter 4 feels like an overly-long intermission of Mario n Olivia’s adventure to Chapter 5. Legit the purple streamer of 4 could’ve been the green streamer of 5 and it would only flow just a little bit less smoothly. Chapter 4 has this weird send off to the Vellumentals, with the boss dungeon being a mixture of the last 4 Vellumental chambers you’ve explored. Which feels out of place especially since there’s like 2 more chapters of stuff happening afterwards! And like a thunder elemental like boss fight in 5 but I guess they just couldn’t be bothered to create a Thunder Vellumental fight to tack onto the story and just gave it to this Origami Sumo Bro! Okay!
And then the Bowser Castle segment is right when they decide to get creative with enemy encounters, but only 2 enemy encounters (you can fight these two multiple time if you’re neither a chicken nor annoyed with the battle ring system) but then just stop right after cause Scissor makes cut out soldiers was the only excuse why that happened.
Again... I like TOK, I do. If I didn't, I'd rate it a 4 or 5 outta 10. I'll talk about the good, I will, but lemme just rant about 1 thing first! Its actually 2 rants but its gonna be about 1 topic I'm rather passionate about.
Character Design
I hate how generic the Legion of Stationery are! Once again, Chapter 2 wins by giving Rubber Band a very unique design, but everyone else is so generic looking! Remember how I said the personalities couldn't save them from their generic design? The Legion have such fun personalities, its so tacky and fun! But I cannot get over how it contrasts with the fact I'm staring at an object hoping in place or wiggling or jiggling as they talk! It kinda sucks, honestly!
I wish these guys had more creativity behind them, and truth be told it wouldn't have bothered me had Rubber Band not been an outlier! Why them and not everyone else! Its baffling!
But above all else, the worst offender, is the Origami Craftsman! The dude who folded Olly! Is a TOAD! That's it! A toad in an apron! WHY
And I get it, there's story reason behind it! Olly wants all Toads gone cause they all look alike and thus everyone reminds him of the Craftsman who wrote (a very touching message) on him!
And that SUCKS!
(uh oh, i forgot about Olly and his terrible terrible motive to be evil)
Speaking of Olly! Remember when I said he wasn't well written? Well besides being an evil prick who enjoys messing with the heroes (i dont mind that, evil just to be evil is fine), it sorta randomly just comes up that he hates Toads near the end! It just comes up!
And I THINK it was suppose to be hinted at by the fact all the Toads gets attacked and folded by Paper Macho and Folded Soldiers. But my problem with this is:
1. Would they have been daring as making Folded Toads as enemies? Thus the lack of Folded Toad enemies should've hinted at this
2. The enemies were origami version of Mario enemies! So enemies still being enemies but folded would've just strengthen the fact we'd be fighting bowser minions again, making the previous Toad hint moot.
3. Toads have always been in peril in previous PM games so the fact they're in peril again wouldn't have been a point of interest!
I GUESS the fact Folded Peach specifically asks whether Toads should be silenced could've hinted at this, but people just took it as "hah lol Toads annoying" and not "oh, this villain has a thing against toads~". Its just, who else would the villain have pointed out? There's only Toads here! Maybe if there was a bigger variety of npcs and we saw other npcs either becomes folded soldiers or be spared from the folded attack, we could've wondered "hey, why are only the toads getting stuck in places?"
But we don't!
Anyways, huff! Lemme count all the good, spoilery things in the game (that's not in Chapter 2) to end on a good note
I love how Olivia is so sweet, no one could bring themselves to be mean to her (except Olly), even Kamek has a hard time being mean cause she's so bubbly and caring (except for that weird bit in the forest where Kamek had to be all rivalry about it but I digress)
Bowser backtalking Olly was very funny, I loved it a lot!
The fact Olivia asks Olly to come to his senses before Mario smashed his face with the Olivia hammer (i need to specify this cause otherwise it'll look like Mario interrupted this scene with a hammer smash but no, Olivia fully knew her hammer weight was gonna fall on Olly's face and just gave some last words of pleas before not even letting him respond) I loved that.
I liked how sweet Olivia was to Luigi despite how much he kept screwing up (i forgot to rant about that but tl;dr, he's a bit of a buffoon and its a bit annoying) i thought it was very touching how Olivia kept rooting for him regardless.
The Tape talking like a Gangster was actually really funny, I liked that a lot.
Bowser's pep talk to Olivia was very funny, it was basically "dont be sad, look at me, my muscles are massive and I can punch through walls!"
As jarring as they were, I actually liked a lot of the singing and dancing that occurred through the game.
Olly having his own color scheme for his Vellumental forms was super cool!
The ending was really touching. Olivia wished for all of Olly's creations to be undone, and because you find out in Chapter 4 that she's also a creation of Olly, she is undone too. And they don't spell that out! You just find out she's not around and connect the dots. I think that was very well done.
And these are some of several reasons I liked TOK and why I couldn't rate it lower than 6. It has a lot of things that just doesn't live up to Chapter 2 and its disappointing to realize halfway through that the game peaked in Chapter 2. Its so weird, they showed us how good it can be and then never lives up to the expectationd set by Chapter 2. I wish it did
Thats why I rate it a 6.5/10
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This afternoon, I’m going to GM a tabletop RPG session that I’ve been preparing for a little while before. The campaign is pre-made, but I can always customize things.
There’s a moment in this particular place where my players are where they meet something that’s pretty much an angel- and in the base thing, it’s supposed to cut off one of the player’s hand to get an artifact that said player has. Just because.
I immediately thought my party would hate it. Like... Tearing someone’s limb like that just isn’t something that happens at my table unless it’s because of combat and it makes sense. But having it be cut up by the Will of the GM doesn’t fly with me (i had bad experiences as a player with that), so even when that specific part was sessions away, I took the specific player who had the artifact aside, and I asked if taking away his character’s arm would be something I could do for the scenario.
I got my answer- it was no. He also had bad experiences with just, having his character randomly killed or hurt Just Because, so y’know.
It’s something I never had to do before, having to ask someone- are you ok if I do this to your character ? will it be all right ?
I don’t... have like. a “moral of the story” or anything. I think however that I’ll do it again if I feel the need to. I want to know that my players are okay with how i GM. And sure, I guess I had to spoil a little. But saying “An overleveled NPC that your characters Cannot Kill would cut your arm if I do it the way the book tells me to, are you OK with this?” is better for me than just doing it without warning.
Sure, I could’ve just not said anything and planned to not do the arm cutting part anyway. That’s a thing I thought about doing. But idk, it could go either way for a character arc, so that’s why I asked. How does the character cope with having her arm be cut off, then gaining a new magical one that probably has its downsides- magic doesn’t fix everything- would be an interesting character arc. But when the story’s almost over it kind of feels like a dick move, and that’s not the way either me or the player wanted to handle that. So no arm cutting.
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bae-leth · 5 years
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I got kinda invested in this “Kitty Version of Monastery Students” AU, so I wanted to try and come up with kitty versions of everyone. I apologize ahead of time for the kitty names, I did my best but some of them were so hard to come up with kitty puns for. WARNING: Some slight spoilers for things that happen in the game plot (the most major thing would be a reference to chapter 9)!
*******************
BLACK EAGLES
Edelnyard: A classy cat, very picky about who she gets close to. Disappears at odd times, especially when trouble is afoot. Oftentimes, it’s either things go her way, or they’re not going any way. Five years later, she is somehow even more picky about those she allows near her.
Mewbert: Kinda scary looking, pure black cat that is always with Edelnyard. Hisses and swipes at anyone who tries to pet Edelnyard. Ignores basically anyone who tries to interact with him. More or less the same five years later.
Ferdinyand: A kitty who’s constantly competing with Edelnyard for affection from people. Meows loudly whenever Edelnyard is around and often intercepts anyone trying to pet Edelnyard. Otherwise a very friendly kitty that chills out a lot after five years.
Catspar: Very loud and energetic kitty, seen running around the monastery when he’s not hanging around Linyardt. Seems to have a sixth sense for people’s natures, as he’s very affectionate around “good” people and hisses at “bad” people. He’s not quite as loud after five years have passed.
Linyardt: Super sleepy kitty cat, always napping away in students’ beds or wherever the sunlight is hitting the ground. Catspar always jumps around him and plays with him. While Linyardt never seems to respond, he doesn’t seem to hate the attention. Pretty much the same after five years.
Pawtra: A cat who’s not of a breed found in Fodlan. Usually found hunting the mice and birds around the academy. Otherwise she likes to follow around Edelnyard or curling up in students’ laps as they work. The one mainly responsible for controlling the monastery’s vermin population during the five year timeskip.
Furnadetta: Incredibly shy kitty that’s rarely seen around the academy, to the point that it’s a widely known challenge to try and spot her. Constantly runs from people, only going near people who have been at the monastery for many years. Very slightly more sociable after five years.
Dorokittya: Very sociable kitty cat who enjoys getting pets and treats from everyone. And yet she completely ignores anyone who tries to bribe her with expensive treats. More or less the same after five years have passed.
BLUE LIONS
Dimeowtri: A cat who’s very popular around the students and staff for his friendly and affectionate nature. Seems to be very close to Demew, Felkit, Sylnyain, and Ingkit, although Felkit doesn’t seem to return the affection. Prone to random bouts of aggression for unknown reasons. Went completely feral during the five year timeskip, his fur being dirty and matted and losing an eye at some point too, and takes a long time to trust people again.
Demew: The biggest cat at the monastery and kind of intimidating, however he’s an absolute sweetheart once you get to know him. Most of the other cats around the monastery avoid him or are otherwise scared of him. Often seen trailing after Dimeowtri, like a protector. Went missing at some point during the five year timeskip, only to show up a few months later in perfect health, other than a few new scars.
Felkit: A super grumpy and antisocial kitty. Hisses and swipes at most people and cats that come near him, but much calmer around a very select few others. Directs most of his aggression towards Dimeowtri, despite said aggression not being returned. Still very grumpy after five years but very slowly mellows out around others, taking an especially long time to chill around Dimeowtri.
Sylnyain: The cat known to be contributing the most to the academy’s growing cat population. Seems to be the most affectionate around the female students and staff members. Very peaceful and affectionate, mellowing out in many ways after five years have gone by.
Ingkit: A calm cat who’s often at odds with Sylnyain but otherwise seems close to him, Dimeowtri, and Felkit. Tends to ignore Demew a lot, although they’re slowly getting better. Tends to get bothered a lot by other male cats around the monastery. Very much the same after five year have passed.
Nyannette: An adorable little orange kitty who’s super friendly and has the cutest meows and trills. Tend to be accident-prone, especially whenever she wanders into the kitchen. She’s very close with Purrcedes and often spends time with her. Slightly calmer five years later.
Purrcedes: One of the oldest cats in the monastery and often spends time around Nyannette. She is a gentle and friendly kitty cat who takes things at her own pace. She’s pretty much the same five years later.
Nyashe: A young cat who was taken in after being caught stealing from the kitchens. It took a while to rehabilitate him but now he’s a friendly little sweetie who relieves stress for students around exam time. Very much the same after five years.
GOLDEN DEER
Clawde: A rather friendly and playful kitty cat, well known for sneaking around and surprising students and cats alike by showing up out of nowhere. Known for disappearing at random times, much like Edelnyard, but usually nothing goes wrong when he does it. Seems to be much the same after the five year timeskip.
Pawrenz: A kitty cat that constantly seeks attention and meows loudly and often if he doesn’t receive it promptly. No one can seem to decide on whether they find him annoying or endearing. He and Clawde appear to have a onesided rivalry, Pawrenz often trying to steal attention from Clawde. Seems to have calmed down after five years.
Hilnya: Probably the laziest and most spoiled cat hanging around the academy. She’s very good at kissing up to students and making them give her treats and attention. Can scratch hard and fast if annoyed too much. Hasn’t changed too much in five years.
Mewrianne: A cat that’s so quiet that everyone thought she couldn’t meow at all. Rarely goes near other people. She can often be found hanging around the cathedral and tends to look a little sickly. Seems to have gotten healthier after five years, although she is still rather quiet and keeps to herself.
Lysithenya: The smallest and youngest kitty you can find at the academy. She melts when you scratch her in the right places or give her some of her favorite treats. Seems to act much older than she truly is. After the five years, she’s just as small and just as adorable and feisty!
Ignyatz: A super adorable little cutie of a kitty! Very gentle and sweet, a super calming presence for students and staff. You can usually find him hanging around Rapawel. He didn’t change much over the five year timeskip.
Lemeownie: A really tough cat who’s often seen picking fights with some of the rowdier cats on the academy grounds. She seems rather fond of Purralt and often hisses at Bycat and competes with them for Purralt’s attention. Mellowed out quite a bit after five years.
Rapawel: The second biggest cat you can find around the academy. Known for being a big eater, often hanging around the dining hall and food pantries. Otherwise he hangs out with Ignyatz. Rather similar after five years.
BONUS
Bycat: A rather quiet cat who’s a recent arrival at the academy. Very hard to gauge the emotions of so both students and other cats tend to be wary of them. But they became very popular after a few months passed and became more social around others, especially around Edelnyard, Dimeowtri, and Clawde. Mysteriously disappeared prior to the timeskip, only to randomly show up once five years have passed, becoming somewhat more open and friendly around others.
Purralt: An old cat who arrived with Bycat and is their father. Rather protective of Bycat and rather distrustful of monastery staff for unknown reasons. Sadly passed away a few months after his arrival. It was noted that during the month after his passing, Bycat was very difficult to find, the only times they came out being to walk the halls, often searching around the spots the academy students had often seen them hanging out at with Purralt, meowing in a way no one had ever heard before.
Some Bonus Headcanons
The cats were names by other students (the nameless NPCs) after they realized how similar they are to several of the students. When word got out to those students whose names were used, there were mixed reactions.
Dimitri despises Dimeowtri for reasons he can’t understand. The feeling is very much mutual. In the Blue Lions path, their relationship somehow manages to get worse, even though the pair are the only ones left at the monastery. By the end of the war, they’re on somewhat better terms.
Dimitri spoils Demew a lot and is widely agreed to be Demew’s favorite human. Likewise, you can often find Dedue gardening in the greenhouse, Dimeowtri sleeping peacefully in his arms as he walks around.
Mewbert adores Edelgard and will often curl up in her lap or rub up against her legs. He hates Hubert though and constantly tries to scratch at him. Hubert had to be talked down from trying to curse the cat many times.
Much to everyone’s surprise (and amusement), Dimeowtri, Felkit, Sylnyain, and Ingkit love hanging out with Felix. Felix tries so, so hard not to seem affected but he really adores those cats. He nearly decked Sylvain in the face when Sylvain came across Felix baby talking (baby talking) the cats when he thought he was alone.
Claude hates whenever people call out for Clawde when he’s around since their names sound the same. He tried so hard to get the cat to respond to a different name, but Clawde is very insistent upon responding to “Clawde” and only “Clawde”.
Bernadetta is one of the only people who can interact with Furnadetta.
Mercedes’ favorite cat is Nyannette while Annette’s favorite is Purrcedes.
Byleth was rather apathetic to Bycat, spending the most time spoiling Purralt, Edelnayrd, Dimeowtri, and Clawde. Jeralt, on the other hand, was the only human Bycat would spend any time with for a long time. Both Byleth and Bycat ended up spending a lot of time together following their respective father’s deaths.
Hilda loves spoiling Hilnya and decorating her in cute collars.
Marianne and Ingrid are super popular with all of the cats, at least one of them often trailing after them.
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mingi-bubu · 4 years
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Watch “Youth With You” with Me!
Episode 18 Part 2
aaaannnnnd we’re back!!!
my phone is plugged in, i have my water, i have a hankering for more m&ms and will probably get some
as the west side bc rapper mark lee says, lezgeddit
oh instead of m&ms i got a slice of mango supreme cake but like a homemade version
anyway
we left off at esther showing up to lisa’s room for the interview
i love that the sound cuts out randomly
this is a fun interesting way to see esther
she got the go ahead i love to see it!!!
xin liu appears at lisas as well!
ooohhh xin want to have long hair and typical girl group style i think it’s v intereseting
lisa says yes!!!
xin was quaked!!!
that was so cute omg
lisa’s like oh hell yeah i got my pick!!!
xin liu is lisa’s jolin’s jiayi’s yixing’s xukun
a;lskfjsld no one has gone to ella or silence yet
zhengting is so dramatic i love one man
jadsl;kfkjasldkfjasd;lkfjal;kdsjf he really said he’s peaking in on Xukun
ALSDKJFALDSKJF WALKED IN TO SEE HIMI WITH ALL HIS TRAINEES IM SO WEAK
A;SLDFKJA;SKD;LFJ XUKUN REACTING TO THE CUT OUTS
HIS LILL JUMP A BABIEEEEE
I WANT ZIKUN INTERACTIONS AND I WANT THEM NOW
“didn’t you see no one came :((((”
“i think that they’re too scared bc of performing a npc song” xukun sweetie
we know the truth
adfjaklsdfj as xukun leaves “it’s fine you’re not alone you’ve got the two of them” and motins to the fuckign cardboard stands i hate himmm
“no i need to be gentle i might break them”
zhengting is the only man ever
xhit xukun has a lot of people for the interview
i mean like
same
but damn
silence is also waiting alone
if this was a us show all by myself would be playing rn akldjfs
OMG XTZ MY WIFE
she has shown up at silence’s interview
asdf;liasjdfkjasdf he just says she can stay right off the bat
ljalfdkajsd meeee toooo
aish he was kidding
he and xukun are peas in a pod
alkdfjasldkfals
ok now she’s in fr fr
she’s so cute im too in lvoe
hes like “am i too easy in this??”
aww baobeiiii
alsdkfjals;dfjalsd;kfj
OH MY GOD HE CALLED OUT FOR NINEONE AND THEN IMMEDIATELY RAN BACK TO HIS SEAT
LAK;SDFJALKDFJ I LOVE HIMMM
djfalskdfj she went to jony j
alkdsjfal;skdjf;lasdkj
“what else should i ask you?”
adklfasd shes part of his team
i bet shaking
oh my gosh i was not expecting sharon to be his choice wwowowow
he is doing like 0 interviewing
marco is here too
and bunny oh my god
wowowow
im going to kick him
alsdjsfkj shaking i knew he wanted her on his team
ohalsfjasldf
she went to silence i lvoe to see it
what a queen
yes yes you are
she’s so cute!!!
kfaslkf roada alkdsfjasd i love herrr
alksdfjalskdjfasdl fshut the fuck your mout silence
i love shaking so much
im going to fight asl;dfalsdfjaklds sulong is the love of my life omg
al;dskfjasd roada is still hiding i love her
she’s so fuking cool omg
the trills oh my good god
fdjsasjdf no one can take you seriously when you keep laughing dummy <3333
she’s on!  
yan yu went to ella!!!
wasn’t yan yu on her list???
ajldfjas mom loves to play
yan yu is so cute
ajdslkasdf!!!
she’s on the teammmm
yu zhang!!!
she pulled a silence
joey is on the team too
three looks so pretty
i want to give her a hug right now she deserves a long hug
shes going to make me cry
asldkfjalsdkjfa apply for this job i love her
i swear to god mom posted some of the lyrics in her instagram posts
anyway she chose three!!!
i love mom
ok xukontent
i guess i dont need subtitles while xukun explains how the stuff is gonna work
xinwen goes first and again we have no subtitles
oh my god his eyebrow raise i am LOoOkinG
hmmmm i didn’t like frhanm’s performance as much
i love how much xukun wants everyone to do well T.T
meee tooo aria me too
hes so supportive and i love him
god he looks so good
i want to be that pen
ok we are calming down and moving on
choose xinwen!!!
yes he did ugh me and xukun have a briancell in common ugh
kasdjflskd is zhengting still alone
frhanm goes to zzt
so did florasdlkfas;
awwww zzt is such a sweetheart oh my god
alsdjsdk
oh no tako sweetie
and xinran oh no
sinran and tako are going to have to go to jony j’s performance :(((
they desrerve better than someone who is like, well i guess im stuck with them
he really said he’s not choosing them what the mcfuck
i feel especially bad for xinran bc it’s twice that this has happened to her
zhu zhengting is the only man ever if he picks them
he really is giving them a fair chance i am
he is the only man ever
ZHU ZHENGTING IS THE ONLY MAN EVER
why..why are we watching the theme songs dancings?
i dont care for lion as much as i do orange island
but we been knew
i still don’t understand why we’re watching these
i still think knock knock was really cute and deserved more votes
ngl i did skip thru the practice rooms until i reached light orange island
this is like a weird redux of the whole ywy1 split stage thing where we got 5/9 unine members in neighboring tarzan and iirc shenshen in the iconic retreat stage
but like how there were two teams and only one was able to do a live performance
and the other team was only able to record in the practice room
that’s whta this reminds me of
i wonder what’s gonna happen when the trainees find out what jony j said
hell i wonder what’s gonna happen when sulong, zhengting, ella, lisa, and xukun find out what he said
like xukun has a protective streak a mile wide and jony j all but said he didnt want any mistakes or imperfections on his team
tho whether or not that’s the translator making it more vitriolic is unbeknownst to me
can’t wait to find out
anyway apparently next episode is girls time with mom!!!
ella said she’s gonna ask them a tricky question and the 6th grader in me is dying to know if its ‘do you think xukun is cuuuteee O.O” bc i think that would be fucking hilarious
and also the top 20 will get to mcstay?
perhaps i will cry even more next episdoe
they really are gonna have their own little lightsticks arent they
oh my god xiaotang only woman ever
i really hope that ppap makes an appearance when we get ziyi and linkai to show up
i cannot express to anyone how much i want that to happen specifically so it pisses tiana and fabi off
anyway we have reached the end and i am emo
jony j can take a long walk off a short cliff
xukun and zhengting are the only men ever
and mom is too mischievous for my poor nerves
i will see you guys next week for episode 19!!
stay safe and stay healthy! <333
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30 days - 30 ideas
i have so many ideas of little things to include in animal crossing games (new horizons and the future), so i wrote one a day on twitter counting down to new horizons’ release, and i thought i’d compile them all here for easy reading now that the list is complete and new horizons is only hours away. (note that some of these were posted before the direct/other information was released, so they may be a little outdated, but what can you do.) let’s go!
day 30: observatory. (i said little but this is the biggest one.) i want the observatory back. but more: imagine if we could learn about real world stars, planets, and constellations like we do bugs, fish, etc. in the museum. & visiting opposite hemisphere towns would teach more!
day 29: combining villager personalities & essences/natures (pocket camp) to create more varied villagers and dialogue. also species' traits. a peppy, natural bunny (dotty) would be very different from a peppy, cute squirrel (peanut).
day 28: be able to combine certain fish or bugs into one container in your house, so you can have a personal mini aquarium or habitat. also, please let us change the type of container (and give fish more space in theirs so it's not so depressing).
day 27: let us refurbish (almost) all items. i'm willing to give a pass on event/gracie items because they're supposed to be special, but otherwise. i hate having a piece that fits the theme but doesn't match and you can't refurbish. (this includes rugs, flooring, wallpaper.)
day 26: different wrapping papers for presents. the wrapping paper in pocket camp is so cute, much cuter than the yellow sacks we get to buy in new leaf. i'd send so many wrapped presents to my neighbors!
day 25: let us build big pwps/amenities that we and the villagers can interact with. bonus if they're seasonal: an ice skating rink in winter, swimming pool in summer, ferris wheel in the spring... riding a ferris wheel with cherry blossoms blowing? sign me up.
day 24: (another big one) a way to change gender, and a nonbinary gender option. in new leaf, i had a lot of friends stop playing entirely because their avatar no longer matched them after coming out as trans, but they didn't want to delete their whole town, so they felt stuck.
day 23: let villagers catch fish and bugs instead of just perpetually trying with no reward. while it's cute to watch them stalk bugs in the bug off, never seeing them catch any makes me feel sad for them!
day 22: choose held items in dream towns (dream towns better still be a thing). a small detail, but most of my characters carry wands or balloons but can't in dream towns. and when your dream is set on a rainy day, you always default to a red umbrella no matter what.
day 21: sound configuration options. (apparently you can change the volume of kk slider songs playing but i wrote this before that, okay?) not just those, but being able to turn up/down/off hourly music, ambient noises, effects, etc. i'd love to turn up the sound of the ocean!
day 20: SUNFLOWERS. well, new flowers in general, but specifically sunflowers! they're my favorite, and we need tall flowers in the game. plus everyone went wild over the sunflower event in pocket camp.
day 19: more things to do with villagers together. not just going to each other's houses, but inviting to the roost, bug hunting, apple picking, etc. would be SO cute! and that *we* can invite *them*, not just wait for a random ping.
day 18: combine “traditional” events and holidays with wild world events for a fuller calendar. i LOVE the unique wild world events, but taking out toy day, halloween, etc. was also a mistake. the wild world events would fill in those months where major holidays don't happen.
day 17: multiplayer islands to live on with friends. now, nintendo is FAR behind the times with multiplayer, so i don't expect this if ever, but i want it. i want to make a town with my online friends, like a minecraft server. please.
day 16: side jobs. no obligation to do them at a given time or at all, but something extra and fun. working at the roost is a great example, and i'd love to see more: villager home designer, shopkeeper, restaurant chef... these would especially be great later in the game.
day 15: diagonal furniture. please. i like putting things kitty corner and some items, like the basket chair, just don't look right without that.
day 14: let villagers write random posts on the bulletin board again! it was one of my favorite things about wild world.
day 13: more interactive items, for both players and villagers. we've seen villagers reading books and eating ice cream, which is great, but it bothered me that they couldn't play on the jungle gym pwp and stuff!
day 12: let us layer small, tabletop items. PLEASE. clutter looks so much better and realistic when layering is an option, like in the sims.
day 11: remove restrictions on where we can plant palm trees and cedar trees. it never even made sense that cedar trees could only be planted on the top half of the town, but nothing we've seen so far hints at this changing.
day 10: customizable community buildings. one of my favorite parts of happy home designer was designing our own shops, hotel, concert hall, etc. they really made my main street feel unique, especially compared to new leaf's main street where everything's the same (minus unlocks).
day 9: let villagers swim! i want to have cute beach days with my villagers but not if they're stuck on the land.
day 8: ceiling items. please don't take away our ceiling items. we saw a pinata that could potentially be, but that's it (even the hanging plant was converted to a wall item). and, while they were a great addition in HHD, there were very few ceiling items. i'd love a LOT more!
day 7: minigames! at the very least, bring desert island escape back, but i'd love to see much more. a mix of amiibo festival minigames and the one in nintendoland would be great, as well as some new ones. especially if they're multiplayer to play with friends!
day 6: create-a-villager! i don't expect them to be villagers actually in the game, but it could be neat as a little side thing. when hacking new leaf was big, there were a ton of cute and creative fan-made villagers just made with retextures, and i'd love to see more.
day 5: nocturnal villagers and activities. i LOVE nighttime, it's so relaxing, but you also run out of things to do (or, pocket space, if you like nighttime fishing like me). at least residential services will let you sell your fish 24 hours a day, but i'd like a bit more to do.
day 4: something to replace streetpass/the HHA showcase. i loved seeing people's houses, and being able to order from them in new leaf was a nice bonus. i'd love something similar with our friends list, a mix between that and what we had in city folk.
day 3: deeper lore on special NPCs. we have a lot on the able sisters and the nooks, even some on brewster and blathers, but i want to know more about the others! what's pascal's story? we know nothing about him, he just... pops up randomly.
day 2: more weather events/phenomena. red moons, eclipses, blizzards, hail, MOONBOWS... there are so many neat weather things in the world!
day 1 (WE MADE IT!): biome DLC. i've been asking for different terrains/biomes since before happy home designer, where we got to choose those. even though new horizons is set on an island, it's still a standard biome with four equal seasons. i'd LOVE dlc that allows us to make a snowy mountainside home, or a home like the PNW where it mostly rains and snow is uncommon. or a tropical town with sunshine and palm trees abound. bonus if the DLC means we can have more than one town per console. please, i need it.
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gem-quest · 4 years
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[QUEST o2. - E N T H R O N E D]
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(written by @bebemoon)
mentions: @ayzrules @elissastillstands & @armadasneon​
. . . Quest 2 .
A few days passed without word from Inferna, and Neddy was beginning to think she'd been forgotten.
A pair of players were marrying in the gardens the week following the meadow fair. And Neddy made an appearance out of sheer curiosity-
The ceremony was within a tumble of pale pink blossoms beneath a flowering tree, and the fae—and even all who were stuck on the level—were in attendance, surrounding the couple of Moonstone players. Neddy recognised the groom as the gleaming Moonstone jouster from the fair. The bride was a tiny Healer with hair matching the blossoms overhead and a veil of glimmering chain mail set with white crystals. They seemed blissful- so much so that Neddy wondered about them.    
Besides, was this a binding union in the real world? Probably not since Finvarra was the one to marry them, and Neddy rather doubted the Prince was ordained for such an affair. He wasn't even real.
Maybe it didn't matter to them- at any moment, any of them could be skewered with a sword and die at once in two worlds. Might as well live happily and love when possible.  
Neddy shook her head. What an outlandish situation they all found themselves in . . .
-
There was a celebration afterwards, but in Yue City. Understandably, the happy couple wanted to be able to eat together as well as remain free of the fae.
Neddy stayed behind to put her feet up on the feast table alongside some of Finvarra's tittering wives to watch the dancing for a while. The feeling of isolation began to creep up on her once again.
Suddenly, there was a familiar trilling from her rucksack at her feet, barely audible over the fairy music. It was the sound the Plexus' messaging function made when a new message was received.
Excitedly, Neddy dug into the rucksack and drew the Plexus out. She swiped the screen, and the new message appeared. It was from Inferna- "Jack's Girlfriend" [fire emoji] in the Plexus.
The message read: WYD ???
Neddy replied with a long message detailing the wedding she'd just witnessed, overseen by the Prince himself.
To which the redhead pithily replied, "Bruh xD".
Neddy grinned at her screen.
Inferna went on to ask Neddy if she was ready to take on Aydina, and when Neddy indicated that she was "ready as she would ever be", the other girl sent back:
“Btw I invited 2 other ppl to join us for dodgeball- Morningstar and Balestra if u wanted to look them up! Hope that’s okay 💖💖💖 say hi to jack 4 me!!!!”
Attached to this was a selfie of the candy-redhead eating the apricot tartlets Neddy had paid her with.
Morningstar wasn't a name that Neddy recognised- but Balestra, she knew immediately. She was another Moonstone player- a celestial knight- with a griffin mount. If Neddy wasn't very much mistaken, the griffin ate some of the garden's fae NPCs. And Finvarra still recounted the incident like some sort of disastrous Biblical tale.
Maybe it would be good to have someone like that on her side? If Balestra's griffin ate Aydina, would that be an automatic win?
Neddy replied simply to Inferna with a thumbs-up emoji, but she couldn't help feeling a twinge of doubt.
-
I C T U I U M . to . M E R M A I D . C O V E .
Inferna and her two companions were already waiting in the level 30 foyer—a wide glass room looking into the beachy landscape beyond with huge, flat screens showing players already in action on the level—when Neddy blinked in.
Seeing the sparkling sea spread out to her left, Neddy's first inclination was to start singing “La mer”.
Inferna's disappointment that Neddy had shown up sans Jack was instantly perceptible. The redhead pushed her lip out and raised one hand to her hip.
“Where’s Jack?” she said, pouting dramatically. “I even brought him a huge thing of sugar cubes! And a fresh batch of sauce.”
Neddy pulled an apologetic face. "Sorry, he's been M.I.A. for a couple of days," she told her. "He does that, I'm finding."
A slip of a girl with a crown of curls and a longsword on her hip was leaned up against one of the glass walls. She nodded at Neddy by way of a greeting.
Inferna jerked her chin at her. "That's Balestra," she said, grinning. "Moonstone rider like yourself. Maybe you know her?"
Neddy didn't want to bring up the gardens fiasco in case it was a sore spot with Balestra, and so she lied. "Oh, er, no- I-I don't believe we've met, actually," she stammered. "I'm Neddy. I swear I'm a real rider- my mount is just . . . I don't think he'd be much good at dodgeball anyway."
Three pairs of eyes regarded Neddy. She didn't know why she was so nervous, but she knew everyone could tell that she was.
At least Inferna seemed to be enjoying herself, as usual. She snorted in the silence. "And that's Morningstar over there," she said, thumbing the other player in the foyer.  
The third pair of eyes were almost too haunting to properly look into. They belonged to a ribbon of white slashed with violent red- a crown of berries, Neddy realised. Intimidatingly, a crystal scythe lay across her shoulders and her arms were draped over either side of the polearm. She looked a bit crucified.
The phantom made no move to acknowledge Neddy. However, her strange golden eyes stayed pinned to her.
Neddy merely raised her hand in a meek wave. "Hello."
Morningstar said nothing.
Inferna clapped her hands to break the bizarre tension between the four of them. "Well, let's go kick some ass!" she declared and punched the air. “I just confirmed with the other seven people who agreed to join our party. Three Ammolite, two Obsidian, two Moonstone.”
Neddy was impressed. Inferna was certainly on top of things. Perhaps more apricot tartlets were in order.
Inferna flashed them a cheeky grin. “Let’s go down to the beach?”
-
Neddy considered herself fortunate to have gotten some intimidating figures on her side for this dodgeball match- especially considering the others Inferna had rounded up. Not an inspiring bunch. But Inferna had only been looking to fill out the team.
Mermaid Cove was beautiful. The beach was blush and the sky was bright. The harbour was bustling at one end of the shore and magnificent pirate ships bobbed in the offing. Up the beach, giant pink conch shells were set upright in the sand and hollowed out into stalls that sold necessities like medi-elixirs, pep potions, and replacement gear. An old one-eyed woman with a blue parrot on her shoulder was selling fried octopus tentacles in shell-shaped baskets. A length of fishing net was draped over the market area and all manner of scavenged sea treasures and seashells were strung up, dangling over the customers as they browsed.
Neddy wanted to roam the market area for a while, but Inferna was all business. 
Inferna led them through the intro ordeal, having one of the other players activate the in-game event with the NPC shopkeeper, since Inferna herself had already completed the level and therefore could not activate it again. 
Inferna tapped her foot impatiently as the NPC ran through her whole sob story about how the mermaids had created Angel’s Breath to revive drowned humans, how the pirate queen Aydina and her eleven crew members had killed off all the mermaids to keep Angel’s Breath for herself-
Finally, the NPC said, “If you get the pirates to leave the town, I’ll show you where the last Angel’s Breath is hidden.”
“Great, let’s go,” said Inferna, then she directed the rest of the group to the shoreline.
As they stood on the beach, she threw her finger in the direction of the sea where a massive dome was rising slowly out of the water.
"Look, look!" Inferna shouted. "There it is!"
The others crowded around to watch in awe as the dome continued to surface, throwing off water and a terrible mechanical noise that scraped the ears.
"We're going into that thing?" Neddy asked, her stomach flipping.
Meanwhile, a pirate ship-complete with a skull and crossbone flag-sailed into view. Inferna rolled her eyes. “Yeah, in a sec,” she replied. “Aydina has some dialogue that we have to sit through. God fucking damn, but the NPC shit in this game gets so tedious.”
It wasn’t much longer before Aydina, the pirate queen, sauntered up over to them, her crew right behind her. With an unruly mane of fiery red curls, fierce eyes, and dressed in sheer black chiffon that billowed dramatically in the breeze, with lacy black gloves that went up to her elbows and a pair of badass black boots to match. 
Inferna cut to the chase. Apparently, sometimes you could skip the intro dialogue if you talked faster than the NPCs. “Yo, Aydina! Get the fuck out of here.”
The NPC gave Inferna a disparaging look. “How are you going to make me?”
“I challenge you to a dodgeball game,” she replied tightly, and Aydina nodded her agreement.
“Time to go!” Inferna crowed, evidently pleased that she’d successfully gotten Aydina to skip through most of the annoying dialogue. 
A narrow walkway of roped-together driftwood began to rise out of the sea. It did not look the least bit steady, and Neddy was ready to forego the whole thing just at the sight of it.
The sea is beautiful, yes. But it is also crushing and fathomless. And Neddy had always had a fear of it. The prospect of going beneath the ocean's surface was almost debilitatingly frightening. 
She hated herself for wishing Callum was there to hold her hand.
But no sooner had the thought of him crossed her mind that Inferna was taking her hand and pulling her towards the rickety walkway. 
“Come on, move your ass,” Inferna said, shooting her a playful look as she tugged her along. “Be careful during the actual game, though. Aydina can randomly let water into the court and drain it out whenever she wants. It’s the biggest pain ever.”
Neddy wanted to sink inside herself at that, but- it felt almost as if Inferna was passing some of her chaotic strength through her fingers into Neddy’s. And her feet moved to follow after the redhead. 
-
They marched into the dome, and the door sealed off behind them, metal clanging as the dome sank back under the sea to rest on the sea floor. The dome itself was made out of some kind of transparent material, allowing them to see the various sea creatures and coral formations surrounding the place. 
Inferna paused, causing Neddy to pause too. The redhead seemed to have noticed a throng of excited players making their way back to the foyer, where they’d be able to watch the game on the screens. 
“What?” Neddy wondered, dividing a look between the Inferna’s face and the other players. 
“If we win-” Inferna cut herself off and then winked at Neddy. “When we win, those players will be swarming all over us the second we get back to land- for the Angel’s Breath. Best to have a few ictuium potions on hand.” 
Inferna said as much to Balestra and Morningstar as well. Then, Aydina was explaining the rules of the game to them.
“If the ball-” and here she summoned the “dodgeball” out of thin air, which was an enchanted turtle shell- “hits you, and then hits the ground, you’re out. If you catch the ball, you’re safe. If the ball bounces off of you and one of your teammates catches it, you’re both safe. But, if the ball bounces off of you and someone on the other team catches it, you’re out.”
Inferna cast Neddy a sideways glance. “Don’t get hit,” she advised. “That thing packs a punch on its own, but depending on her mood, Aydina can make it stab you with barnacles, shock you, or spray disgusting gross poisonous stuff that’ll kill you before the time is up.”
Aydina rolled the ball over to where Inferna was standing. “I’ll let you guys have the first go,” she said, smirking confidently at them, looking directly at Inferna. “Since I feel sorry for you. How many brain cells do you have, to be wearing such an atrocious hat?”
“Fuck you!” Inferna shot back as she picked up the ball. “You’re such a fucking cunt.”
The pissed-off redhead gave the other eleven people a questioning look. “Well, should I go for it? Or do one of you guys want to do the honors?”
-
[ You can pick up here or back up a bit or do as you like if you end up taking this quest up ! No instructions for Neddy (but keep in mind she’s not a strong player), just do as you like and make sure they win ! ^^ And, if you need any help at all, just ask either Ayz or me~ ] 
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jakey-beefed-it · 5 years
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D&D asks... 2 5 6 10 19 21 25 30 34 Sorry there are so many, I’m just just starved for D&D at the moment.
Well. Shit. If I can help even slightly, I will. o7
2. Your favorite character that someone else has played 
A good long while ago, back in 4th edition d&d, my friend Brian rolled up Sarin, a pretty kick-ass proper elf of the sort that you very rarely see people take on. He was an ‘eladrin’, basically 4e’s High Elf only if anything more so because they were literally from the feywild and had some innate magic beyond what you usually get as the standard sort of sylvan-themed ‘Elf’ race in d&d. 
Sarin was a fighter who used his innate magic (basically short-ranged teleportation) for excellent tactical advantage. He had a really cool backstory where he had fled the Winter Court of the fae for various reasons (mostly political) and had to make his way in the regular mundane world. Over the course of the seven or eight levels we played that game for, he slowly became less ‘cold’ (womp womp) and alien, forging friendships with his chosen band of motley mortals
Mostly calling him out specifically because of the really good job Brian did on characterizing him as a very different sort of being who through his friendships gradually learned to find a place in the mundane world. Anyone who knows Brian (his social awkwardness manifests as ‘aloofness’ to most people) knows this character was just... perfect for him.
5. Favorite NPC. 
I’ve been trying to avoid posting about anything from my current games in these posts because I don’t want to be seen like, taking sides/picking favorites and whatnot. But this category seems pretty safe, so I can go ahead and pick an NPC from the Goblin Squad game-
Sumi, the like nine year old Adventure Kid, daughter of a caravan owner (and his extremely cool barbarian wife) the group befriended. Sumi is bright, curious, mischievous, brave, and often hilarious. The whole group loves the shit out of that kid, even though she is often worryingly stabby. She’s gonna be a hell of an adventurer when she grows up. Smart money is on something vaguely rascally, rogue or bard, though she also shows lots of curiosity toward magic. 
6. Favorite death (monster, player character, NPC, etc). 
In a limited series Exalted game I ran over one summer between years of college, my friend Jon played a rogueish character named Davire who solved most problems through fast talking, and those he could not solve with talking he generally solved with knives thrown from a safe distance away. 
The time came to do a critical hand-off to an NPC villain; the party would hand over a terrifyingly powerful Artifact of Doom and in exchange the villain would return their loved one(s). Davire, the fast-talking oh-so-clever why-solve-a-problem-with-the-direct-approach-when-other-ways-are-more-fun guy, walked over with said artifact and killed the villain with it.
Not by activating it. It was a 30 pound or so hunk of metal (series of interlocking rings you could manipulate into various positions for effect) and he just... he just brained the dude with it. Effectively a crit, with complete surprise, and then burned lots of resources to ramp up the damage after the fact with a combination of magic he had devised (and spent xp to develop) like five sessions prior (of a ten session arc) because his plan all along was to take his ‘i never solve anything with violence that can be solved with conversation and certainly not at point blank range’ character and surprise the baddie by just fucking clocking him with the goddamn thing. That was his plan for the entire back half of the story.
There was, of course, a Bigger Bad, and he actually ended up giving his life most heroically to stop him Forever (actually using said ultra-powerful artifact at the cost of his own life) and that was seriously cool too but honestly when he just straight-up merc’d my underboss with Surprise Combo He’d Been Planning For Weeks I was fucking delighted. 
10. Your favorite enemy and the enemy you hate the most. 
@kingerblogs‘ goblins are literally always a goddamn hoot. Absolute favorites, even the ones who aren’t the Very Special goblin Boy who my barbarian effectively adopted (despite the fact that he is very likely a full-grown goblin), Skabb. 
I have a love/hate with mind flayers. Love because they’re great villains and full of potential horror both cosmic and just plain visceral, hate because augh they want to eat your brain!
19. Do you or your party have any dice superstitions? 
Can’t speak for others but oh dear god yes. It doesn’t really come up in d&d anymore given that I play online and we use bots to randomly generate a number in the correct range rather than physical dice. But I can definitely point to my Warhammer habits as an example- a die consistently rolls low? Put it in ‘time out’ and don’t roll it again that game. Putting your dice away or setting them out to be rolled before a game? Set them with the highest face up, to ‘train’ them that that is the desired roll. 
21. Have you ever regretted something your character has done? 
Oh sure, lots. The one that comes to mind right now though is the time when Altanin accidentally burned down half the city they were trying to save from a cult that wanted to burn it down.
So the cult had these barrels of fantasy napalm stored in strategic sites all over town, and we had found exactly one of said sites, and were fighting the resident cultists. One of them jumped down into a tunnel (they were using the sewers and such to move around unseen) to escape us, and Altanin (who was raging) had a fun thought- would it not be the height of irony if this guy got blown up by his own WMD? So Altanin hoisted the barrel above his head, and then hurled it down into the tunnel to fry the bastard. Full-on donkey kong style.
The guy burned to a crisp all right, but the fire did not stay contained to the little escape tunnel and instead spread to the rest of the warehouse we were in, and then a few other nearby buildings before we were able to slay the living flame elementals that were spreading the blaze. 
Thing is, the other cultists were stationed throughout the city, awaiting the signal to blow shit up. About half of them saw this fire, went ‘well, it’s early, it’s not time for the coordinated assault’ and held off. The other half went ‘oh shit we’re starting early?’ and blew up their fantasy napalm. 
So it could have been worse, in that if we hadn’t done anything they would’ve just set off coordinated detonations and burned the whole city down like an hour later. But yeah it was... not Altanin’s finest moment.
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25. What have your players done that you never could have planned for? 
No examples are springing to mind so let me just say that sometimes it feels like half the shit my players do takes me by complete surprise. Often for the worse (why... why would you do that?), often for the better. 
30. Are your players diplomatic or murder hobos? 
My players tend to solve all manner of problems through cleverness or persuasiveness that I have planned as combat encounters. This delights me. 
34. Do you tend pick weapons/spells for being useful or for flavor?  
Flavor is slightly more important to me, but usually I can convince a DM (and as a DM, I am amenable to) that they’re not mutually exclusive and let me ‘re-flavor’ a spell or power or weapon or whatever to be both effective AND thematic to the character.
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flarebossmalva · 5 years
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the catghost post, pt. 1 [intro saga]
i said i was gonna talk about catghost, and then it turned into attempting to explain catghost by summarizing it, and then it turned into multiple posts because there’s a lot of material to cover and i want to do a thorough job. watch the intro saga first because this is a good series and you should check it out for yourself before listening to me ramble about it!
CWs for part 1: murder, images of dead bodies / skeletal remains, other disturbing imagery (including a couple jumpscares), one image depicting animal death (it’s near the very end of the post)
Alright, I’m posting with decent grammar so you know it’s serious. If you’re just here looking for a brief overview of the series, here’s my crack at it: CatGhost is a multimedia ARG comprised primarily of YouTube videos and accompanying minigames. It’s ongoing, and I plan to update this post as the series itself updates. On the surface, the videos resemble other YouTube cartoons, following the tried-and-true formula of two characters comically tormenting a third; however, something else is clearly going on below the surface, and it quickly becomes clear that these three are tied together by very dark circumstances. Much of what’s really going on is still unclear, but enough has been revealed that I can talk about it without constantly resorting to pure guesswork.
This is part one, covering the Intro Saga (first three videos and their associated games). Like I said, I wanted to be thorough and if I didn’t split it up into separate posts this would get way too long. It’s already too long.
CatGhost 1, “Birthday,” opens with flames filling the screen, then a ripple effect playing over the title card, which I mention because that’s gonna make a whole lot more sense in a minute. We then see our main cast, Elon (cat), Naarah (ghost), and Gideon (hedgehog). Gideon is asleep and the girls are making fun of him. From their dynamic, it seems Naarah’s pretty young and Elon is sort of a big sister figure to her, which means they’re probably close in age. Gideon is 48; today is allegedly his birthday, though he seems unaware until the girls tell him so. Gideon seems generally confused about whatever’s going on and just wants to go back to sleep, but the girls want to take him out to someplace called “Party Country,” and eventually they end up threatening to curse him if he doesn’t comply. The threat seems pretty real as the girls’ voices turn demonic and their eyes glow. Gideon gives in, though it’s unclear if he even realized he was in any danger. 
Next scene, Gideon is presented with his birthday cake, which is... pretty wonky-looking, to put it gently. Pecking order for the trio gets further established when Naarah intimidates Gideon into saying the cake she made looks fine and seconds later Elon comments that the cake isn’t very good. Naarah defends herself and says that it’s hard to bake a cake without hands, to which Elon sympathizes and says that her paws aren’t much good either. Naarah says “I miss having a body.” The girls were human once, and seem to remember it clearly. Gideon, on the other hand, interjects saying he has no idea what they’re talking about. Whatever circumstances have bound these three together, Gideon seems to be the only one with no awareness of what’s going on.
Party Country turns out to be an arcade cabinet. Gideon is encouraged to play, but he seems completely apathetic about the game (Gideon seems completely apathetic about most things) and dialogue implies he may not even know what a video game is. Naarah calls Gideon “Dad” at one point while she and Elon bully him into playing, a detail which could lead one to guess a major twist way in advance but which I actually never noticed until just now. Gideon gives in and starts playing, declaring that the game (which we can’t see yet) is actually pretty fun, but the girls continue to tell him to play as if they can’t see that he’s already complying. We then cut to the game, which I’ll talk about more below, but suffice it to say that unless your definition of “fun” is all about talking to fucked-up skeleton ladies in some haunted woods, this is not a fun game:
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Afterwards, Gideon wakes and assumes he dreamed the whole thing until he sees the ugly birthday cake Naarah baked. He waves goodbye to the viewer, breaking the fourth wall; an odd thing for a character who shows so little awareness of his surroundings to do.
The game associated with this episode is the same game shown in the episode itself. It’s pretty simple; you play as Gideon and can move left or right through a gloomy-looking pixelated forest. There are two NPCs and a small number of objects to be interacted with, all of which can appear randomly. For now, we’ll focus on the two NPCs. Both are skeletons, and both wear simple dresses of the type peasant girls might wear; one is tinted red, the other tinted blue, with the blue skeleton being notably smaller. When interacted with, the red skeleton will say “It burns! I can’t feel my skin,” or “Trapped like a fly in a jar,” or “I have taken on my new form.” The blue skeleton will say “It’s cold here, I can’t breathe,” or “I have to save him, he waited for me,” or “She lured me into this place.” Is the fire/water motif from the episode’s opening starting to seem relevant? Oh, and there’s more. One game object is a sort of upright stone with a hole cut into it near the top; I’ll be calling this object “Key” as that’s how it identifies itself. Key can be interacted with by typing questions, to which it will give an appropriate answer based on words/phrases it recognizes (like Tool in Petscop, incidentally). If we ask Key certain questions about our main cast, we can learn a lot about the story.
Ask “Who is Elon,” and Key tells you, “Temptress.” Asking the same question about Naarah returns “Proselyte,” while Gideon is “Judge.” If you ask what happened to any of the main cast, you’re told “Vanished.” However, asking for death dates yields results; Elon and Naarah both died in 1650, while Gideon died in 1672. Ask where each of the main three are, and you learn Elon is “In a jar,” Naarah is “Immersed,” and Gideon is “In a dark place.” Given all that, I think we can put the basic setting together:
Elon, Naarah, and Gideon were all human once. They lived during the seventeenth century in what is now the northeastern United States. Naarah must have been a preteen or young teen at the time of her death; Elon was likely a young adult in her late teens when she died, and the pair met their respective fates at or around the same time. Gideon lived into his late forties before dying, which speaks to a life of relative comfort for the time and place, befitting a judge. The animosity between the girls and Gideon seems pretty clear: Gideon sentenced both of them to death for witchcraft. Elon, represented in-game by the red skeleton, was burned at the stake, and her ashes were subsequently stored in a jar. Naarah was drowned by being tied to a chair and immersed in a large body of water (this was a common execution method for suspected witches, and the presence of a chair hanging from a rope in the game supports this); her remains are still underwater. Gideon was most likely given a traditional burial after he passed away of, most likely, natural causes. The wrinkle is that Gideon seems to have been right — Elon and Naarah are witches. Elon (the Temptress) taught Naarah (the Proselyte) the craft. Now all three appear to be stuck in the world of the show, which I guess is some sort of weird limbo, and only Elon and Naarah know what’s going on or who they used to be, probably because they are witches. 
We can also take some more guesses at what might be going on based off the interactions the main cast have with each other. For instance, Elon’s the leader of the group and generally takes charge, but it’s clear that at least some of that confidence is an act and she doesn’t really seem to be pulling the strings here. The two have plenty of reasons to hate Gideon and could easily use their magic to put him through hell, but instead they don’t go beyond pushing him around and making fun of him — Naarah even bakes him a cake, which she complains about the difficulty of doing. This could imply the three have been trapped in the afterlife with each other ever since dying and the girls have finally gotten tired of exacting less petty revenge. It could also mean that deep down they’re fond of Gideon and don’t really want him to come to harm, which is a strange relationship to have with the man who ordered your torture and execution. Later videos will shed further light on the dynamics between the three, but for now we’ll leave it at that.
One more thing before I move on — asking Key any question containing the word “murder” will trigger a jumpscare. Initially, this was of what appears to be Naarah’s corpse, but it’s since been changed (we’ll talk about that change later). Here’s the original jumpscare showing Naarah:
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CatGhost 2, “Knock,” is more straightforward and thus will take me less time to summarize, thank god. Elon and Naarah are telling knock knock jokes. Gideon completely fails to understand the joke, and possibly completely fails to understand the concept of jokes, and the girls get so pissed they put some sort of curse on him and he winds up locked in a dungeon-like room. The door bears a large ornamental mail slot that looks like some sort of gargoyle’s face, with the slot as its mouth. Gideon is instructed to write a knock knock joke that’s actually funny and slide it through the door if he wants to be released. His first attempt is rejected (it doesn’t even have a punchline) and so Gideon tries to think of another. Cut to the words “2 years later” and Gideon’s still trying to write a funny knock knock joke — this series isn’t above the typical cartoon tropes and I love it. He finally comes up with one (Knock knock / Who’s there / Anita / Anita who / Anita get through this door!) and triumphantly slides it into the mail slot, which then grows larger until it takes up nearly the entire door, the “mouth” gaping wide. Gideon stares at it and is seemingly hypnotized. Disturbing images tinted blue and red flash across the screen, before the camera pulls back and Gideon is shown still in a trancelike state as the girls look at him, confused. Naarah says he’s been staring at that door a while, and she and Elon seem mildly concerned, but decide poking him with a stick would be more fun than helping him. Credits roll.
For this episode, much of the worldbuilding is in the form of freeze-frame bonuses and background details, meaning you have to pay close attention to catch everything. When Gideon is teleported to the cell, images flash onscreen showing an inverted cross and the word “EXCRUCIATE,” all tinted red (the color generally associated with Elon), as well as what appear to be human bones and a girl’s face, tinted blue (the color associated with Naarah). In the cell with Gideon is a skeleton, though he seems not to take notice. One wall reads “Wild Partes of the World,” which is a complex reference I won’t attempt to explain in full (the phrase has been quoted and quoted again across multiple books) but in context within the rest of the story refers to early seventeenth-century Virginia, which must be where our main trio lived as humans. Text is shown written in the Theban alphabet, a substitution cipher based on the Latin alphabet and generally associated with witches and occultists. When Gideon is hypnotized by the door, he sees a judge’s podium, a jar (presumably the one containing Elon’s ashes), and a hanging chair (as was used to execute Naarah). Images of graves are shown, inverted and flipped upside down, along with a similarly distorted picture of a row of houses. During the end credits, the background appears to be lava with yellow flashes moving across it; putting all these yellow flashes together results in this image:
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Audio during the intro, when reversed, is of a voice saying “I don’t know. I don’t know where it’s at. I think they’ve been looking for it for a long time, but… sometimes it seems like we’re just never going to find it.”
The accompanying minigame features the door from Gideon’s cell, complete with its ornamental mail slot (browsing the wiki, because of course there’s a wiki and of course that’s how I’m getting images for this post as well as checking for stuff I missed, it seems fans call this the “Horrible Beast door”). The door can be interacted with by knocking on it using tap code; if the right words are input, the game will display a corresponding image.
“Megalith” produces an image of Key, the stone you can question in the previous minigame:
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“Libation” shows Gideon’s unfortunate-looking birthday cake:
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“Trinity” shows the shadows of three people, what appears to be a man and two girls, most likely our main trio:
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“Excruciate” shows what is presumably the stake used during Elon’s execution:
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“Proselyte” shows what must be Naarah’s skeleton, along with the chair she was bound to, laying at the bottom of a body of water:
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CatGhost 3, “Window,” opens by showing that same body of water, although there is no sign of the chair or of Naarah’s remains. We then cut to an outhouse in the show’s typical animated style. Elon is inside, preening, when a noise outside startles her. She checks and discovers a small hand mirror, with Theban writing on it reading “For Elon,” though the text is mirrored and upside down. Elon seems confused and flips the mirror open, whereupon she sees a black-and-white image of a mysterious woman, her face completely in shadow save for her glowing white eyes. When the woman raises her head and makes eye contact with Elon, the cat gets so spooked she drops the mirror and flees. Elon runs back inside, entering via the Horrible Beast door, and is greeted by Naarah, who’s acting suspiciously and asks if Elon saw anything interesting outside. When she’s asked point blank if she’s the one who left the mirror there, Naarah denies it and blames Gideon, and even though it seems obvious that she’s lying, Elon doesn’t question her further. She confronts Gideon, who is chopping wood and seems enthusiastic for once, and tells him — I’m only paraphrasing slightly here — not to use witchcraft to fuck with a witch, or else [colorful threat omitted for brevity’s sake]. At the end of this rant, she briefly shapeshifts into some sort of demonic chimera, with a snakelike body, horns, and quite a lot of teeth. Gideon, who as usual has no idea what she’s on about, is suitably terrified.
Elon, back to her regular form, goes back inside and picks up what appears to be a crayon drawing of a blue girl hugging a taller red girl, accompanied by Theban that reads “From: Naarah, To: bestest best friend.” We can presume Naarah is the blue girl and Elon is the red girl, of course, but of interest is the small form next to the house in the background. It looks like it could be a dog, and, given later events, it almost certainly is a dog.
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The drawing had been resting on a large object covered with a cloth, and Elon, curious, pulls the cloth free. Underneath are three mirrors, angled so they all face towards her, and the strange woman from earlier (some fans call her “the Watcher,” which I’ll go with for now) is reflected in each one. Elon is frozen in place as the three Watchers advance towards her, and she begins to cry. The Watcher points a finger (from here on there seems to be only one of her, not three) and Elon begins levitating as the background glitches out. She’s tugged towards the Watcher, and when the outstretched finger touches her forehead, the screen goes white.
Then we’re back to the pixel graphics from the first minigame, in the same dark woods as before, but Elon and Naarah aren’t skeletons — they’re living girls. Elon is pale, with long red hair and blue eyes; Naarah is quite a bit smaller, with brown skin and dark blue-tinged hair in pigtails. Interestingly, Elon wears a blue dress and Naarah’s dress is red, despite their typical color associations. Elon stands over a crying Naarah, her expression sullen. After a few seconds, the credits roll.
This time, the “minigame” just shows a static image of a mirror. Well, almost static — the clock resting on the dresser below the mirror moves in real time, matching the time set on the player’s computer. At exactly three AM system time, the Watcher appears in the mirror, which is then overtaken by static, and the scene changes to Elon and Naarah as we saw them during the end of the last video. Initially, it seems to be the same as before, with Elon standing over Naarah as she cries, but this time there’s dialogue. Here, have a transcript I stole from the wiki because it was easier than typing it up again myself:
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After this, the mirror becomes static once more; if you wait three minutes, this image displays for a single frame before the game closes:
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So, yeah, I think it’s safe to say that’s a dog in Naarah’s drawing. This also seems to explain why she’s crying in the scene we just saw. Why the dog was killed (sacrificed on an alter, looks like) is a mystery I’ll tackle when we cover the later sagas.
Also, in the interest of equality, this time it’s Elon who jumpscares you if you type “murder.” Typing doesn’t do anything else in this game, though.
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That concludes the Intro Saga! This post is already really long and I’m not going to bother giving closing thoughts at this point especially considering the series is still ongoing. Stay tuned for the next installment, coming whenever I get around to it!
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