#i actually originally wrote a specific part of this much differently but i kept getting paranoid abt jt so i changed it

[b0mblover]

im so sorry lopt but also not

By: J

no tws. little bit of loptson fluff for the soul

it-

it all felt so weird.

he was still allowed to be himself,

but,

the sense of “himself” felt like it was changing.

sure, his comrades deaths made him feel something.

but.

that had been over half a year ago now.

since norikos death, lopt moved out.

well, as much as someone can without living there.

he had been living with mason for,, a while now.

he was allowed to be himself,

sure mason would get agitated sometimes,

but it never,

it never was unbearable.

for the both of them.

it was spring now,

lopt wondered if the odd feeling he had been… feeling, was seasonal depression going away.

“can a god even get seasonal depression”

most days he could ignore it but,

today was one of them that he couldnt.

he sat on the edge of the pull out couch, mason had to run some errands, leaving lopt alone with his mind, and ghosts.

some days hed hear the ghosts of the past that he had wronged.

sometimes begging, sometimes belittling him, sometimes just hearing wind blowing.

memories of the explosion flashed in his mind.

it had been half a year ago.

why did he care now?

could-

could gods even have trauma?

“well, as a shapeshifter, i am able to morph every part of my body that i see fit, i believe, meaning if that /were/ the case couldnt i just. take it away?”

he questioned aloud

(no no you cant lopt. because the writier is having “writers” block and wants you to suffer)

continuously, his mind replaying the boom of the explosion, 

the after shock he felt on the ground.

in reality, it was just mason shutting the door.

“hey, you didnt respond to any if my texts so i just got you bot-“

mason cut himself off, seeing the state lopt was in.

lopt continued staring at the ground,

his vision was crowded with static, and, the ghosts and voices were so loud they were drowning out his own thoughts.

he could barely feel when mason tapped at his knee to get his attention.

lopt looked up in the general direction he felt the movement coming from.

“uh, something.. wrong…?”

mason was unsure as to what was happening, he had never seen lopt so… broken.

lopt opened his mouth to respond, but nothing came out.

a voice seemingly coming from behind him said how he had nothing worth saying.

nothing that would be worth anything to such a person as mason.

nothing worth saying that would ever amount to his partner.

he started to spiral.

questioning just /why/ mason was with him in the first place.

humans had used gods for their blood before, though, mason never did that,

humans had used gods for their power before, though mason never did that either.

was mason just with him, just to betray him in the end..?

did mason stay, just to make fun of him?

remind him of the fact he can never have a real relationship with a mortal due to their mortality and his immortality?

to-

he felt something cold on his face.

he looked up trying to see what the source was, only being greeted by the static in his vision that had never left.

“shh shh there there, youre gonna’ be okay”

mason.

mason was trying to help.

why?

wouldnt it be better to go ahead and stab lopt in the back?

to essentially kill him right then and there

to-

“hey. hey breathe, breathe, youre okay, here can you see? you know what im saying right now?”

lopts mind kept rushing, but

he tried to pull through,

realising that it was essentially pointless for him to attempt to talk, he slightly nodded his head in a ‘yes’ manner

“good, good, i take it that you cant see much huh? i mean, youre looking right past me-“

lopt internally laughed, before shaking his head yes again

“alllrighty then, ill sit with you til’ it clears up mkay?” 

lopt flashed a slight, but genuine smile what he thought was masons way.

mason burst out laughing, lopt was not looking masons way in the slightest, from masons view he just smiled at a wall

“i- you-“

mason choked out between tears

“youuuu, n-need to-“

lopt felt a bit better, even if mason was laughing at his expense, somewhere in himself he knew that it wasnt masons intention, he was better than that.

mason mostly had regained his composure (or what little he still had after that) and started again

“y’know itd be k-kinda helpful if you /actually/ looked my way-“ mason got through between laughs

lopt giggled to himself before shaking his head in a overly dramatic way ‘no’

“ahhh darn”

mason snapped his fingers

“welp, i tried” he said before shrugging. as if lopt could see it.

“hows the whole vision thing going”

lopt contemplated his response for a second, it had cleared up but, not to a great degree

lopt waved his hand in an iffy way

“ahh- barely then”

lopt rolled his eyes, in a playful way, basing it off of feelings, he knew he probably wasnt even facing mason,

“jeeze how long does this fucking taaaaaake”

mason groanded out before fallinn backwards into the pull out couch, making a little “oomf” sound as he

hit it. 

lopt held up his pointer finger,

“huh? you say somthin’?”

lopt sighed. attempting to speak again

(j gave up)

“h-hour” lopt managed to get out

his voice sounded much deeper and raspier than the pitch he prefered to keep it at, being all that he could manage.

“i-o-oh” mason stuttered out, being caught off guard by lopts voice. slightly blushing aswell-

mason took a deep breath before composing himself again and sitting up.

“well, if its gonna take that long, how bout’ i get started on dinner?”

“s-sure, s-sou-sounds, good” lopt was pushing himself to speak, he had heard (and felt) mason get up, being unsure as where to face.

“alright then, and, please dont push yourself alright? you uh, you need to take your time”

lopt smiled back.

again smiling at a wall.

#j writes badly #no beta we die like jirou #i actually originally wrote a specific part of this much differently but i kept getting paranoid abt jt so i changed it #i uh. i think this is my first time properly writing masons charater isnt it? #idk i dont really remember. #btw they 100% had salmon for dinner and after lopt could see again he ate mango pudding with a fork #(hiya shlopt. i question sometimes if theres something deeply wrong with you /lh j) #im gonna just say jt rn. i do not have the best grasp on masons characters kn the slighest and im sorry for it. #im a lopt defender btw fight me #im puttinf off SO much work *sweats* #okok ill hush read the gay fanfic damnit! (or dont. idc)

[darknadaworld]

a long Antasma analysis and why I think he's misunderstood as a villain

about time i made this one ngl. took me long enough but looking into DT more really gives me a different prespective on Antasma .

i'll be first of all going with what we know based on what the Pi'illos and pi'illoper say (cuz basic informations)

based on what the Pi'illos said:

simply the basics. he was a normal bat, ate a Pi'illo's nightmare once, turned into a monster motivated (possibly) by hunger for that . eventually laid his eyes on the dark stone. started a WAR after stealing it. lost the war and got sealing away by the Zeekeeper into the dream world. but before he did, he shattered the Dark stone. its bits petrified everyone on the island . making this a fight where nobody won.

now what Pi'illoper wrote in his books:

basically Pi'illoper sliiiightly gave more details but , still more into the pi'illos pov .

so not much is added aside from calling Antasma a mage king of bats and adding this slight assumption that it's possible that Antasma ,possibly, isn't actually ORIGINALLY from pi'illo insland

(but again the pi'illoper isn't a reliable source much in that matter but yk had to add it .)

So regardless , in both takes , Antasma is hungry for both power and dreams .

now aside from these facts, i'll go right into the interactions with the rest of the characters (and why i think people maaaaaaybe looking into his motives and all a bit from a wrong direction)

first of all his interactions with the Mario Bros:

now not ONCE did Antasma bat an eye on the bros specifically. he was always interacting only with bowser and DREAMBERT. he's ALWAYS adressing dreambert.

the only time he adressed the bros was as "these creatures" . he doesn't care about them at all, he doesn't see them much as a threat seemingly, or even as equals. he's merely focused on Dreambert and Dreambert ALONE .

so, he's so arrogant and full of himself . he thinks they are NOT on his level .

now, with Dreambert:

it's obvious how much rivalry and bitterness he holds against Dreambert yk? he only adresses HIM he only has a grudge against HIM (for now . before Bowser's betrayal). but even so he still has that bit of arogance and pride regardless

especially when he gets apparently stronger by the end of the game . he's deadpan like "if you even DARE i will hand you pillow butt back at you " . (and he did lol)

nooooooow then next part is

Antasma's dynamic with bowser and why i think he did not give two dangs about him from the starts aside from his power and dream energy.

from the START of their interactions , Antasma made it so clear that he only wants Bowser on his side because:

1- he's stronger than Peach (both brawn wise and dream energy wise) also gotta stop here for a sec cuz i do wonder how it would've been like if he kept on with kidnaping Peach instead but oh well.

2- he is evil. he will cooperate better if treated right into the situation.

as the game goes on we get MORE hints that Antasma isn't much of a loyal dude himself but he DOES demands loyalty from others .

how he's OBVIOUSLY not very loyal and totally plotting something :

ok THIS part specifically, to almost everyone in the fandom, interepts it differently which is ok and very understandable!

but the way i see it is that Antasma is clearly LYING about sharing his powers. because he really went "i wish to conquer THE WORLD" but IMMIDEATLY changed that wording to "i wish i can do whatever i want actualluy! just fly around you know!"

but like, sure , do anything he wants , which still can imply yeeting Bowser aside ANYWAYS when he doesn't need him anymore , because by that time antasma is free to do whatever, correct?

ANOTHER hint to why i believe doesnt bat an eye about Bowser aside from the benefits (get it? bat an eye? cuz he's a bat king-)

is this scene specifically:

it might not sound much but it sorta is . basically right before that Bowser suggests taking that dream energy from his minions instead but Antasma is like "mmmmm no you're more evil and stronger idc"

so another trait Antasma has is that he's glutton . as HELL. both for power and Dreams .

you know what that reminds me of? Parasites. in which, parasites pick a specific host and just takes whatever benefits and gives nothing in return . because based on everything before that he's clearly using that "ah yea sure WE- of course we. you're there of course." excuse just as a big lie. he aint sharing any of that power he gets.

When the betrayal happens later on, Antasma is obviously as surprised as everyone else . Not because he's like loyal to Bowser or anything but either becausehe betrayed him FIRST or because he expects his pawn to be loyal to him anyways .(Cuz as I said before, Antasma is Arrogant and very prideful .)

The one take I see from most of the fandom is that in that moment he reconsidered NOT betraying Bowser and actually keeping the alliance which . .. would be possible but we get no hints to that really other than, what I said before, subtle hints that Antasma is simply manipulative towards the koopa king.

Sooooo lemme conclude all this long essay :

1-antasma IS evil . Very evil.

2-he's very prideful and arrogant .

3-he has this hunger for power and dream energy.

4-he sounds veeeery manipulative through all of his screentime.

5-geniunely has this parasitic behavior

6-he would take everyone down with him if he's not winning. Not because he's desperate but because he believes nobody is on the same level as himself .

7-he doesn't give a darn about the bros but still used Luigi's dreams to escape to the real world (idk might be cuz Weegee is a perfect dream host if that made sense)

8-he doesn't get much screentime but when he does there's a lot going on but I wish it was explored better .

But again this is just my pov of it!anyone can have a different take I suppose

That's all I suppose lmao until next time when I hyperfixate!

#darn i cant add more images but you got my point i hope ucycycycycy #antasma #darknoverse #darkno talks #mario and luigi #mario and luigi dream team #super mario

[yuliasolsystem]

A continuation of my awesome Plants theory.

Part 1 is here

In the manga, it's constantly stated that the Plants are created by humans. But humans know very little about the Plants. That sounds suspicious. We know from the manga that a lot of aspects about the Plants are kept secret (such as the blackening of their hair or the fact that they have consciousness), so why are we so sure that what is being said about the origin of the Plants is true? I have a feeling the general public was told that the Plants were created by humans simply to bypass ethical restrictions.

My theory that it actually went something like this: there was a certain patient zero, a woman who came into contact with something from another planet or another dimension, and after that her body and consciousness began to transform and eventually she became a proto-Plant. (Why do I think there was a woman? Because dependent Plants look like human women for no good reason. The manga isn't particularly fanservicey, so the standard "because boobs" explanation doesn't fit.) She started producing "offsprings", the usual dependent Plants. Considering how many of them there are, it is likely that she has become a huge "hive queen", continuously laying eggs, spheres, which are then placed inside the "bulbs".

In fact, they are not separate beings at all, but parts of the "queen" and share the same consciousness with her.

According to the Chronica, the Dependent Plants "are fundamentally one large collective consciousness. It is incredibly vast, but this "species" shares consciousness at a deep level, initially having no concept of individuality, so apparently "fusion" occurs without fatal collisions."

This explains why Conrad, who had the equipment with which he was able to restore Knives' body, simply didn't make clones of dependent Plants. Cloned Plants that are not part of the queen will simply not work.

Now I'll get to the question of why the Plants, or more specifically the proto-Plant, the queen, needed humans.

We know that humans are dependent on the Plants, and the Plants can simply refuse to work (like when the soldiers tried to shoot at the ark), so the fact that they continue to "serve" humans indicates that there is a benefit to them in doing so.

As I wrote in the first post, I think the Plants cause humans to mutate, gradually turning them into members of their own species. I think this is their way of reproducing, or rather spreading their species to new territories. Different individuals of their species have different specializations. The dependents specialize in spreading their genetic information through food, water and radiation. The specialization of the independents is to control the main population. This is why the independents are so dangerous to "humans" but still resemble them and are able to communicate with them.

Legato and Elendira are perfect hybrids and likely the model for what all of humanity should eventually become: a strong harmonious human body plus Plant's abilities. That's why these two are so close to Knives. Even though he, like the other independents, is not connected to a shared consciousness and knows only what Rem and Conrad have told him, he still feels that Legato and Elendira are closer to his people.

Now a bit about the Plants' conflict with the people of No Man's Land.

We know that the Plants were not happy with the way they were being treated, although they did not wish for the complete genocide of the planet's population. On this page we can see exactly what they didn't like.

We see how friendly Plant is to the human worker in the first frame, but then it shows what the Plants don't like: people taking too much biomass, people throwing expensive parties for the upper class (and this on a planet where the majority of the population lives in starvation!), people making products to sell for money, even though it's important to the Plants that resources are distributed as evenly as possible. And on top of that, the Plants are dying as a result of these actions, and given that they share a single consciousness, it's not only their shared pain, it's also the death of a piece of their shared identity.

#trigun #trigun maximum #trigun plants #my headcanons #manga theory #trigun spoilers #trigun manga #spoilers #manga spoilers

[merionettes]

rubicon ask!!

first off I'm so so delighted that I picked up FE3H last summer and that it led me to finding your writing & especially this fic. what an amazing experience, what a treat with every update, I have all these fun memories now of places I was when I got the update email (and screamed internally every time). a little collection of sense memories colored in.

as for the actual question: very curious about your process. did you have an outline going in? I have to imagine yes (or else you're braver than black friday shoppers). how did you go about structuring this, ie did you have a series of Moments in your head that you wrote around and connected, or did you try to build scenes to fit the arcs you had in mind, or a mix of the two? anything and everything you want to share, I'm 🤲

you're killing me!!! man, thanks so much, seriously. 

as for the actual question, indeed. hahaha. ha. i delayed answering this for so long because it kept devolving into an essay about the emotional experience of writing a novel for the first time. well i give up. this is now two posts. one is the actual answer to your question, only ten times longer than it needs to be. the other is an essay about the emotional experience of writing a novel for the first time. so… caveat lector. 

first part under the cut. ← not kidding about the caveat!!!!!!

i've talked a little about the process before, so i'll piggyback on that post and dig a little more into the differences between the original idea and the finished product, including spoilers i couldn't get into when i'd only posted 55k. ("only." god.)

technically this did start with an outline. technically because at the time i was brand-new to fe3h and hadn't written anything but a few friend-ficlets in about 8 years. thought "skating au!!", spent a fevered weekend outlining all the major scenes, started in on the writing, and…. very quickly realized that i was nowhere near competent enough to actually. write it. "intensely frustrating" does not even scratch the surface, lmao, of what it felt like to have this thing in my head and only be able to produce what felt like the worst clumsiest tritest version of it. very apropos for skating, actually. 

looking back on that outline, it had almost nothing to do with the finished product, especially on felix's side. it didn't have the nationals flounce, the timeskip, training in vancouver, the lake, the nhk trophy sports anime climax, the backstory reveal meltdown. (it did have the redemptive healing free skate.) what, critically, it did have was sylvain's personal arc—burned out, desperate to quit, wants to go to college. it ended at exactly the same place as the actual story, with sylvain and dorothea's final skate together. the last line was one of the earliest things i wrote. 

in other words, even though almost everything between the first and last scene changed WILDLY in the process of writing, i always knew exactly what i was working towards and that was invaluable. 

insert two year timeskip here! during which i would occasionally reopen the skating doc, take a stab at another scene, feel this ominous sense of foreboding, and give up lol. you can thank the 2022 winter olympics for making me get serious, specifically 1) yuzuru hanyu going out in a blaze of bittersweet doomed quad axel glory 2) shoma uno losing to some eighteen year old. i believe my exact words were (consults notes) "anyway time to go back to my fic where i control the narrative and i decide who wins." idk what made this attempt different than any of the others—right time, right inspiration, right circumstances—but this time it caught fire. in uh. in a big way. 

so that's when i wrote what i refer to in that post as a skeleton draft and what i've since come to think of as a storyboard on steroids. this is when felix's arc really took shape, beyond "he is sad… he is mad… he is perfectly positioned to see right through sylvain." the fallout from nationals crystallizing, in particular, was one of the things that snapped felix into place and helped determine the tone and focus of the story overall. (that initial outline had much more of a romcom/classic fwb-to-lovers feel.)

the other thing that did this, of course, was sylvain's narrative voice. when i committed to "burnout who is controlling every single word of every thought to avoid admitting that he is burned out" was when this story became what it is. the voice dictated every single scene, the tone, the shape, what was revealed, what was implied, what was never making it on the page. it led me places i didn't anticipate. it made the cuts for me! cute scene you've got in that outline lol sylvain would never. 

i see past me in that post dancing around the length, lmao. well the ""storyboard"", the skeleton, whatever you want to call it, was over 100k. and yet even then, EVEN WITH 100K ON PAPER, there was still so much i had no fucking clue was coming! felix pushing sylvain on what he wants was there, but sylvain never explained what happened. my oc jm gautier (thanks for nothing, three hopes!!!) was an ominous presence, but he wasn't the final boss. there was no memory of the first time sylvain and dorothea met. (<- insane.) there was no glenn skate. i had to write to discover all of that.

so like—i cannot emphasize how much i grew as a writer through the experience of writing this story. prose, structure, character arcs, thematic arcs. i was harder on myself than i've ever been. and if i hadn't had that end goal in sight i don't know if i would have made it through all those iterations—storyboarding, drafting, rewriting, editing. wanting to deliver that moment powered me through any amount of frustration/exhaustion/bewilderment.

wow this post sounds almost normal. nothing about this experience was normal. which is why you're getting a part 2.

#sorry op for hijacking your ask for my own personal catharsis #extremely long post #rubicon #writing #ask

[blu3-f1nch]

Would you mind sharing what your version of Cherubim/Venomania’s story is?

[EXPAND ME, ART!!]

There's uh.. A lot to share here lmao- I'm so sorry this is gonna be kinda long, but a summary nonetheless. My body horror drawings of him are not a part of this canon.

Short answer; Many of the original themes of the story made me deeply uncomfortable so I didn't just re-write Cherubim, I re-wrote 90% of the universe and Cherubim just ended up being my hyperfixation. Yes he is still a lust demon, but lust doesn't always = s-x, it can also mean strong desires, his strong desire was freedom. Boom.

[Anatomy of the "False Angel" design can range heavily as he's essentially a shapeshifter. He can't just turn into random animals though-- I just mean that its anatomy can range from almost weasel like to humanoid.]

Long answer: For starters.. I re-wrote a lot of the universe, I wasn't super deep into the entire world and didn't want to spend more time reading the wiki than I already had (I'd been reading it for a few days trying to find specific information).

I re-wrote and/or added a lot of the gods, made an entire ranking system for the demons of the world, changed a lot of the lore- and really only did this because I was uncomfortable with one silly little purple haired mans' themes that led me into a week long spiral.

So for starters, his youth is much the same but is changed slightly. He wasn't born with any sort of facial deformation as I'm a tad uncomfortable with portraying characters who do abhorrent things because of a deformation/disability. Not to say people can't write these themes, I just was not comfortable with it under this context. Instead, he was born out of an affair, this he was known about to the public to some minor extent, but very little was known about him and he was kept out of the public eye out of shame. So he still didn't leave the castle much. [I do not have any concepts of him as a kid]

At one point he did have a taste of freedom, leaving the castle with his brother, as the two actually had grown up around one another and were rather close. They did this many times and Cherubim got to feel what it was like to have real friends outside of the guards and maids he spoke to, since his parents paid him little attention. He was caught however and after this was just kept in his room, rarely able to leave. He grew bitter and resentful, angry at his parents, angry at the world. He was just a confused kid. He had this deep desire to be free, so no one else could control him. These wishes attract a kind of demon known as an affiant. Hers [I call them Heirs] don't exist here in the same way that they do in the original work, they are something different. An Affiant is someone who has made a contract with an item of sin, so a human turned demon. Heirs are still born as purely beings of evil, but they have a bit of a different purpose. Anywho, aside from that, the Clockwork doll works differently here too. The original demon sealed within the doll has awoken and controls its body, though it still has much of its magic locked away. The Doll wasn't always this way but that doesn't matter. The doll was drawn to Cherubim for his deep desire for freedom and begun to speak to him, and over the course of a few years- until about his mid-teens, where they introduce the idea of forging a contract with a demon to get what he desires; Freedom. [I also do not have any concepts of the clockwork doll yet]

Cherubim is very off-put by this, he is not comfortable with this idea, and starts backing away from the clockwork doll, who is not pleased by this. She stabs Cherubim with the venom sword, forcing him to make a contract with the demon. In his initial moments, he had zero control over himself. He transformed into a being that would be dubbed "The False Angel," with the demon mostly in control at this point, it slaughtered the royal family. Cherubim was all that was left behind, going back to his normal form he would pass out. He doesn't remember much of these events, but he too was pinned as a victim; A fortunate survivor of some bloodthirsty demon who came in and slaughtered the royal family.

It has been many years since then, he's now 27. My take on lust is not lust in the sexual manor, but a deep desire for freedom, freedom through the acquisition of power and being above all others. However, because of the re-write I made of the lust demons powers, he more feeds off of emotions of the people around him, so keeping his people happy is incredibly advantageous to him. For this, he's generally admired by the public while at night he slaughters other demons not to protect his own people- but to acquire their power as well. He's actively seeking out the other vessels to gain their power as well. He's very self-serving in this AU, but not a straight up s-x offender (makes me deeply uncomfortable lmao) So here's my description of the Venom sword and the powers it gives its affiant: "The Venom sword -- is a katana with purple runes inscribed on the weapons blade, and the weapon itself is able to shift and change its appearance to any weapon of the users choice. In order to make a pact with this demon, one must be impaled by the sword, which leaves a scar that persists through any disguise the user takes on. It allows the user to change their face, body build, sex, etc- though again the scar remains. And much like a few of the other vessels, it allows the user to take on a more demonic appearance that is unique to each user, though often reflects one aspect of the original demon's appearance when it wasn't stuck within the vessel. This demonic form is extremely strong, and is when the user is most powerful. The lust demon also grants the ability to manipulate the memories of others, as well as the emotions they feel. They feed off of the emotions of the people around them, and sometimes other people's emotions make it difficult for the user to retain composure and their typical mannerisms. They must feed off of others emotions to replenish their magic. Feelings of happiness, excitement, bliss, etc give the user the strongest boost."

Sorry if any of this didn't make sense, it's 8 AM and I'm sick lmao-- I didn't proof read.

original drafting/Older design

This design felt too "human" to me, and so I started going with a more harpy/feline-like feel. This creature is supposed to resemble an angel, but something is supposed to be completely wrong about it. I don't feel like I hit the mark on this one, and I don't particularly like these drawings anymore- kinda got made fun of over them but I like them enough to share.

Clothing stuff I never finished or colored, one of my friends had me make a furry design for him lmao The gold and indego/purple theme is what I have for his clothes, and I'm thinking about changing his hair color. It'll be purple still, but it'll lean more towards magenta like in that one body horror drawing I did.

Here's the last of it, I don't have a whole lot of art of these designs honestly, I haven't fixated on him again and have been in bad art burnout-- just trying to focus on commissions and my OCs.

But yes, he doesn't go by Sateriasis Venomania because he never stole his brothers identity/had the memory fuge.

#you opened one hell of a rabbit hole #I will happily answer any other questions about this au! #please ask away #reblogs > likes #art #my art #blues art #digital art #my oc art #oc #mothy #evillious #the evillious chronicles #sateriasis venomania #cherubim venomania #cherubim #venomania au #duke venomania #duke venomania fanart #oc dump #info dump #lore dump #vocaloid #gakupo #kamui gakupo #gakupo kamui #evillious chronicles #evillious fanart #thank you for coming to my ted talk

[thedragonagelesbian]

3, 17, & 27 for cyrus pleeeeease!

<333333

3: Race and subclass?

Race: Wood elf

Subclass: It's Complicated

I actually have a full level 20 D&D character sheet for Cyrus that I made back when he was still just a Dragon Age OC. So, when porting him over to Baldur's Gate 3, I decided to keep as much of that build as possible, making Cyrus a base paladin (because being a knight is his Whole Thing) with a barbarian multiclass (because he has a lot of repressed anger and ruthlessness that become more and more evident the more and more the world wears away at his sunshine kindness, and paladin-barbarian is just a very sexy build).

His original subclasses were Oath of Devotion (again, textbook fairytale knight, this is The quintessential stereotypical paladin oath) and Path of Ancestral Guardians (one of the more support-oriented barbarian subclasses and plays with the idea of Kirkwall itself as his guardian spirits).

On the paladin side of things, I just kept him as an Oath of Devotion pally in BG3, although he did end up breaking his oath during Act 2, switching him over to the oathbreaker subclass.

However, BG3 doesn't have the Ancestral Guardians subclass, and the flavor is very specific to the DA2 version, so I decided early on that when he took his third level of barbarian, he'd be Wild Heart instead-- angling for 'bear heart' specifically because it grants immunity to almost all damage while raging, and being unkillable is an important part of Cyrus' whole deal.

And also.

I wanted him to have fire resistance (however conditional) for smooching Karlach.

And as I also had Karlach specced as a Wild Heart barbarian, it occurred to me that Cyrus' multiclassing into her class could be like. a Thing for their relationship. I wrote a little bit about it in my fic for them-- Karlach being the one to train Cyrus in how to be a barbarian, helping him find his rage & be okay with experiencing negative emotions instead of repressing them, giving him his wild heart piercings after the Ketheric boss fight...

(also in this first playthrough, Cyrus ended up romancing Halsin too, which makes the bear's heart thing that much more significant)

But the thing is. I love Cyrus and I love shipping Cyrus, and I knew very early on that I would want to play through the game again to romance at least Astarion and Wyll with him. But. I love narrative-mechanics overlap too much to repeat his paladin-barbarian build for the other runs, because that's His And Karlach's Thing, and he needs a different thing for Astarion and Wyll.

SO.

I have two other BG3 timelines for Cyrus with two other builds.

The first starts off with the same base class of paladin with Oath of Devotion as the subclass. However, after Astarion kills him while feeding from him the first time, Cyrus Comes Back Wrong and spontaneously develops an innate connection to the Shadowfell for uh... reasons that are truly beyond the scope of this already ridiculously long answer. So, in that timeline, Cyrus is an Oath of Devotion Paladin (he will still break his oath at least once when freeing the other vampire spawn, but I imagine this version of Cyrus will want to retake his oath?) with a (modded) Shadow Sorcerer multiclass.

The second involves moving Cyrus' entire timeline around so he's older, more experienced, and more jaded by the time that he gets tadpoled. He swore an oath of devotion to a tyrant who abused him and then he swore an oath of vengeance against them and their reign, and neither made him happy or let him live his life on his own terms as more than just a Title and a set of obligations.

So, this version of Cyrus lost all of his levels of paladin during the couple of decades of self-imposed exile that precede the game. In addition to some stat shuffling around, his base class switched to Ranger for the 'was living all on his own as a hermit in the woods' vibes, and also to keep him as a martial/melee character because that feels the most correct for him.

I only just got this version of Cyrus to level 3-- I specced him into the Hunter subclass originally, but I think I'm going to switch to Gloomstalker instead. There's just something thematically interesting to me about Oathbreaker-Shadow Sorc-Gloomstalker, a lot of Cyrus' character is propelled by the literal, physical internalizations and manifestations of all the bad shit that happens to him, and struggling to make peace with that and even turn those changes to his advantage.

(Also gloomstalker in BG3 gets misty step as an autoprep and I can never turn down a short-range teleport)

17: Do they enjoy life as an adventurer?

Paladin/Barbarian Cyrus: unequivocal yes! Cyrus loves nothing more than to feel useful and of service, and adventuring is the best way he knows how to be helpful.

Paladin/Sorcerer Cyrus: he says yes, but he's been in a state of perpetual existential crisis for the entirety of the game made worse by the fact that he tells himself he needs to swallow all of it down so as not to get in the way of the adventure & helping others

Ranger Cyrus: no lol he really thought he had left this life behind, and he is Too Old For This (spiritually). I think he's really thrown for a loop the first time he sits down to trance, comes to having spontaneously manifested some goodberries in his lap, and realizes he can do magic again for the first time in a couple of decades. He'll do the adventure, and he won't even complain that much, and I think as the game progresses, he'll find more to like about it, but at the moment he's quietly being a real sourpuss about the whole thing.

27: What was their life like before the events of BG3?

Kind of alluded to this in the subclass answers, but in the main timeline (which covers both pally/barb and pally/sorc), Cyrus was having a splendid time as a dashing young adventurer.

Ranger Cyrus was living by himself in a small cottage in some corner of Sword Coast wilderness, cut off from the rest of the world by choice. He was able to fend for and provide for himself just fine but was also much lonelier than he would have admitted to himself. Being around people again is a huge change-- and try as he may to keep some distance between himself and his companions, he just can't resist Wyll's smile.

#SORRY IT'S SO FUCKING LONG THE ONLY THING I LOVE MORE THAN MY BOY IS NARRATIVE-MECHANICAL OVERLAP #cyrus bg3

[ana-chronista]

1, 3, 6, 22 and 24 please

Thanks for the questions and sorry for the delay! These ones took some thinking...

1. what are 3 things you’d say shaped you into who you are? In no particular order:

Learning to like reading. I used to hate reading as a kid. I was getting on OK with it but it was boring and difficult and too much effort. One of my parents (actually not the one who is also into reading!) decided that wasn’t going to work, so kept trying me out with different books until suddenly they found one I clicked with. Suddenly I wanted to read ahead and find out what happened next, because when you only get to hear a chapter a night, it gets frustrating. So yes, I was basically tricked into liking reading by a parent who isn’t a big reader but was determined I would be!

Having quite a strong regional accent*. I can’t shake it, even when speaking my second language, and by now I wouldn’t really want to – it’s a part of who I am. It does make people look at me in a certain way in my job, and has made me very aware of how people make assumptions according to how others sound. My accent is often stereotyped in-country as being stupid or superficial, so it’s quite entertaining to see peoples’ reactions when they find out I’m neither. * (For those of you not from the same country as me, it’s probably the accent you’re thinking of; for those of you who are from the same country, you’re probably all thinking of about ten different possibilities!)

Living abroad for a bit. This came with plenty of ups and downs at the time, but I can’t begin to tell you how much more confident it made me, even in everyday life. I’d definitely recommend it to anyone who gets the opportunity.

3. 3 films you could watch for the rest of your life and not get bored of?

The Lord of the Rings trilogy. Seeing Fellowship on the big screen was a huge moment for me.

Airplane and The Naked Gun. Two separate movies but along very similar lines and I love them both. If anyone ever wants to come quote either of these at me, feel free!

And because I feel like the former two are so similar they count as one, I’ll also mention Captain America: The Winter Soldier, which has been doing the rounds on tumblr lately. As someone who didn’t really get into the first Cap movie, this one surprised me, but I really enjoy how it explores Steve’s ties to the world, both past and present. I was always disappointed that the Avengers never ended up feeling more like a group of friends, but those sort of bonds and trust aren’t as lacking in The Winter Soldier – in fact it’s a huge focus.

6. what’s the best and worst part of being online/a creator? I absolutely love being able to share my work, collaborate with others, and be part of a community around a common interest. When something clicks about a fandom it feels like you’re just chilling with friends and getting excited about the same things, and that’s definitely what I’ve found on the JO/Kӓӓrijӓ community. As for the worst part, I originally wrote a much longer explanation, but on reflection I think it comes down to the opposite of the above, which is when people can become cliquey and entitled within a fandom. I’ve been involved in many different fandoms over several years and had a huge range of experiences. One of the last before I quit fandom for about seven years was within a much larger fandom than JO/Kӓӓrijӓ. I’d been involved in a community project that left me pretty burnt out and disheartened, but led to me posting a fic on AO3 as my contribution. It got some decent reviews. One person in particular loved it. In fact, they loved it so much that in their final review they threatened me with very specific physical mutilation if I didn’t update soon. It was their final review because I logged out and never went back to post the rest. Obviously they could never find me, they weren’t even serious, and I’ve had questionable or downright bad reviews before, but it was a huge WTF moment and I was just done with it all. 22. say 3 things about someone you love They try not to let little things phase them, they’re compassionate without being a pushover, and they share my weird sense of humour, which is lovely. 24. what’s one thing you’re proud of yourself for? Trying to become happier. For a long time I accepted it when people would tell me that “life is just like this” and “most people are unhappy in some way”, until eventually I realised that, actually, I didn’t have to. It’s taken a lot of time and effort, but it’s been worthwhile, and while there’s still work to do (and probably always will be), I feel like I’m in such a more positive place than I was ten years ago.

#ana answers #it's all fun and games

[bellqmione]

You asked for lots of attention in your inbox and I'm unsure if that was an open invite or for mutuals only but uhhh, here's a rant on why fate: the winx saga was an insult to me, personally:

Winx Club is an Italian magical girl show that is currently drip marketing for the release of its 9th season. Season 1-3 were made by Rainbow, and then seasons 4+ had some form of co-producing by Nickelodeon.

It was remarkable for its colourful sci-fi fantasy setting and itstackling of difficult topics for children. The main characters (who were all fairies) rode hover bikes and space ships and dated energy sword wielding fighting Specialists whilst all having a signature colour and a sparkly transformation. Stella had a full story arc on her parent's divorce, Bloom had an adoptive and bio family and had to navigate both of them, Musa had lost her mum, Aisha had controlling parents (and later lost her fiance), Tecna had emotionally distant parents who valued logic over all else, Flora was shy and reserved and had to learn to speak up for herself. It was great (at least for the first 3-4 seasons)!

As the seasons went on (most from 5+) it got targeted at a younger and younger demographic and soft reset the main characters from 20 somethings getting jobs and getting engaged back into being students and so lost a lot of its fanbase who had enjoyed watching the girls grow up and wanted to know where life post s4 would take them.

Then Netflix decided it was going to make a live action adaptation aimed at an older audience. I was Very Very nervous but I had hope. A Winx where Bloom could say fuck and blood could be shown would be cool, and maybe this time we could actually see the characters get married and then move in together instead of living on separate planets with their parents still.

The first sign that it was not going to be good was when the casting call went out and there wasn't a call for Tecna: my favourite of the 6 main characters. I was so confused as to why but was hoping it was because they planned to introduce her later (as in the original show Aisha wasn't introduced until season 2). And then the cast got released and they'd cast a white woman to play Flora (the latina coded character) and a maybe white passing maybe white woman to play Musa (the chinese coded character). They later changed Flora's name to Terra and hoped we wouldn't notice but kept the casting the same. (Only coded bc this is a sci-fi show and the characters are all from different planets, for all intents and purposes the character just are Chinese/latina/ect.) This then left Aisha (afro american coded) as the token black girl in the cast.

Speculation on my part: I think they didn't do anything to mitigate the backlash for Musa as they didn't perceive it as as bad white washing as they were doing to Flora, somehow. And I think they white washed Flora because they wrote her fat and figured a fat latina woman would be too much forced diversity or something, as if people don't just exist.

As a kid, seeing the Winx all being badasses saving the Magix dimension together whilst two of them even looked like me was really special. And they just white wash ⅓ of the main cast. Like,,, what?

Next up they released to the press that the reason they got rid of Tecna was because they were going for a more fantasy, less sci-fi vibe and so the Fairy of Technology wouldn't fit in anymore. And by "less sci-fi" they mean they're scrapping the whole setting of the Magix dimension and are instead setting it in a hidden magic society on earth (with the show taking place in Ireland specifically). No more space travel, no more alien princesses, no more hover bikes or energy weapons or the whole plot line of reintroducing Earth to magic that was s4. They couldn't even set it in the fictional town of Gardenia, Italy (where all the earth shenanigans in the original show took place). Scrapping Tecna for this reason is also bs but I'll come back to that in a moment.

Then they said they were going to make sure that they had boy fairies and girl specialists because the original show didn't and they were more progressive (ignore the white washing)... ... ... THEY HAD BOU FAIRIES AND GIRL SPECIALISTS IN THE OG SHOW STFU!! The main characters were six girls bc, wow, magical girl show aimed at little girls, and the only specialists we spent time with were their boyfriends because who tf cares about anyone else?? But background characters showed boy fairies and girl specialists from the beginning?? The fairy school literally had multiple named guy teachers. Like,,, tell me you don't care about this ip without telling me you don't care about this ip.

*sigh*

Anyways, I'll go along with their logic for this next segment i guess. So, you want to show more gender diversity in your three two different magical schools (that you smushed into one school for some reason?), you don't want to have Tecna be a technology fairy because not only have you scrapped all sci-fi but you've introduced a completely different magic system (I'll get to it). So how to kill two birds with one stone? Make her a specialist! They fight using technology and having a main character be a girl specialist/boy fairy would definitely get your point across!! But nooooo, just get rid of her entirely i guess.

Now we have some minor nit picks that one could gather from promo material before we get to the plot of the show. 1) the colours and fashions: everyone looks so drab and so dull. The bright colours and y2k fashions from the first show were part of its main selling power, now everyone is dressed like they're 35 and don't have the energy to put into outfit crafting despite all being 16-18. Especially Terra, probably because they gave up trying to dress someone fat, thanks guys. 2) they've gotten rid of the third big magic school, the one for witches and then smashed the remaining two into one. Why? To give more harry potter vibes i guess (which isn't something you should want to be emulating but w/e they don't care). 3) the magic system is radically different. Before every fairy and witch had their own domain (eg: fairy of music, witch of storms, ect) but now everyone is one of 6 different types of elemental fairy. Musa is no longer the fairy of music but instead a mind fairy, but the other main characters get to keep their domain roughly the same (though they have to share) with fire, water, earth, light, and electricity. (You might think "electricity?" why didn't they make Tecna an electric fairy but idfk guys, idfk) Oh! and they've scrapped fairy transformations, saying they're a lost art (Bloom does get one at the end of the season but all it does is give her bad gci fire wings and the sequence is boring and there's no outfit change??? In a magical girl show???). 4) they've scrapped the iconic main antagonists from the show, The Trix: a trio of witches who want to rule the magic dimension and have an eye on Bloom specifically, for one character called Beatrix (oh wow, very creative) who's an electric fairy and idk has some bad blood magic thing going on.

Then the show actually came out.

I'll be brief here bc I've already gone on long enough but to summarise it:

- the girls all hate each other for the whole season despite their easy friendship and talking about their problems being a highlight of the og show

- the dialogue feels like Riverdale but worse somehow, "snorting the midnight crack?" is somehow a real line someone says with a straight face

- they make these 16 year olds have sex on screen, please stop I don't wanna see that

- despite Terra's storyline being about not taking shit from people for being fat they somehow give everything fatphobic undertones regardless??? At least Terra and Musa are actually friends for a bit ig

- there's a love triangle where there wasn't one in the original series. Please for the love of god stop

- there's a weird polyam/bi thing happening with Beatrix, Riven, and original for this show bi character that is done in the most biphobic way possible and I'm still confused as to how they did it so bad

- Bloom's adoptive mum is abusive now?? despite her adoptive family being absolutely lovely in the original???

- Stella didn't get held back a year for slacking like she did previously, she got held back a year for blinding a student on accident but her mum is making her say it was on purpose??

- Aisha is a wet towel teacher's pet for some reason??

- yeah it's just bad.

(also despite half the main cast being princesses in the original show, now only Stella is and for some reason her mum is the monarch instead of her dad and her dad just isn't in the picture and instead of being slightly distant due to divorce her mum is just straight up emotionally abusive, in this new magic system where magic is done with emotion, so Stella has shit magic control?? Also Bloom is American now and not Italian. Idk just odd here i feel)

Uhhh, yeah, thanks for reading. Feel free to ignore this i guess ahaha I don't know if this is over stepping I haven't been a proper tumblrina for long

- 📟🧚

#everything 2 me

[rockinlibrarian]

ao3 wrapped [writers edition]

This was an Ask Game Thingie from a couple weeks ago, but it's a yearly round-up thing, and Back In My Day on LiveJournal we used to pass around surveys like this and answer EVERY QUESTION, whether or not anybody Asked you any, and Year-End ones were great for, you know, wrapping up the year, and ultimately led me to writing full Year-End Wrap-up Posts that span a ton of different categories-- this year's coming later this week! So I've gone and filled out this whole thing because it's MY year-end wrap up and I can do it my way and have it on my blog like so!

How many words have you written this year? The word count on AO3 for 2022 says 51,282, but I assume this includes ALL the words of “Exploration of the Astral Plane” still even though only 3 of the seven chapters were actually published this year, and most of those were also WRITTEN last year. Likewise, I’ve WRITTEN a whole lot of words this year that have not been published yet (and will they ever be, one wonders?) So, grain of salt it.

2. How many works did you publish this year? Seven total listed works. That includes three new chapters of one work I originally published last year (see previous question) and three chapters of a work I haven’t completed yet (see next question). Five self-contained works (a couple of which have two chapters, but at least I published both this year. Wait, that’s a lie: “Chapter 2” of “Everything I Know About Writing the Loudermilk Twins” is actually the essay I put in the “Memory Work” Zine a few years back). Anyway, there are seven individual titles listed under 2022 on AO3.

3. What work are you most proud of (regardless of kudos/hits)? “A Captain With Seven Children”— because first off the concept is brilliant and kept getting more brilliant as I wrote, but can one really take credit for concepts, specifically considering I just happened to dream this one? But I took this seemingly-crack concept seriously, and that’s what led to bringing the inherent brilliance of it out. Secondly, it’s both so much fun and a nifty challenge to take the script of one of my favorite movies and see how it can be adapted to fit characters of a completely different time and culture and— only slightly different situation? One would think it’s a REALLY completely different situation, but the fact that it’s not SO far off after all is part of what makes it so much fun.

4. What work of yours has the most hits? “Not Just Stupid Kids,” which is ironic because I originally posted it anonymously. It would also have the most kudos if you discount what I believe is a weird glitch on somebody’s bookmark of “Chapter 19.5: Hidden. Safe. Somewhere,” which, don’t get me wrong, is a perfectly nice little fic, but it’s a throwaway interstitial thing for Legion which has a teeny fandom anyway, and there’s NO WAY it could get that many kudos naturally when there are so many better Legion fics to choose from. Apparently if you’re not signed in, you can kudo as a guest as many times as you want? And there’s one guest I believe has been through all my Legion fics multiple times this year, and kudoed them every time. But perhaps every time they open the link to “Chapter 19.5” it automatically kudos it again. This is the only sensible explanation.

5. What work of yours got more feedback than you expected? CLEARLY “Not Just Stupid Kids,” considering, like I said, I first posted it ANONYMOUSLY. Normally I post a ton of links on social media when I post something on AO3, “Hey everybody, come READ WHAT I WROTE!” but since I was embarrassed by that one (it’s a non-canon ship! I don’t DO those!) I didn’t. And somehow THAT one took off completely. I pondered, is it because it’s a ship? People follow specific ships? But the non-anonymous sequel has gotten a fraction of the reaction. Which can only lead me to conclude one thing: MAYBE IT’S ME PEOPLE DON’T LIKE.

6. Favorite title you used: Hmmm. I’m kind of torn: I liked coming up with a Community-formatted title, but I couldn’t decide between “Introduction to Eternal Crossover” and “Introduction to Infernal Crossover” so I combined the two, but I actually like either of the two separately better than the combination I went with in the end. So it’s more like my favorite potential title. I’m also strangely fond of “High on a Roof Stood a Lonely Seven,” which is the next chapter of “A Captain With Seven Children,” but is, barring miracles, not going to be actually posted until 2023.

7. If you use song lyrics, which artist’s songs did you pull from the most? Speaking of which, that would be Rodgers and Hammerstein. And that only because I’m specifically parodying “Sound of Music” lyrics. I hadn’t noticed that so many people name their stories and chapters after song lyrics until after I made this decision, and now I’m like, Come ON, at least MINE is a DIRECT reference to the story I’m writing.

8. Pairing you wrote the most for this year? Fiktor, ie Five and Viktor Hargreeves, ie the ONLY pairing I wrote this year, with a grand total of TWO. Non-canonical and should be completely ridiculous, so basically both fics are me trying to work out WHY the heck I love the concept of them together so much.

9. Favorite pairing you wrote for this year? Well that goes without saying, then, doesn’t it?

10. What work was the quickest to write? If Scrivener history is to believed, I created the file for “Not Just Stupid Kids” —called “Unrelated Fiktor”— on July 31, and according to AO3, I published the first part (which I thought would be the whole thing) on August 1, so apparently I really WAS just trying to get it out of my system. I ended up adding “chapter” 2 on August 8, which ties it at 8 days with “Intro to Eternal/Infernal Crossover.”

11. What work took you the longest to write? “Exploration of the Astral Plane,” which according to my Scrivener history I started writing on 3/29/2020, and finally finished in September this year. Granted, it’s also seven chapters long, but I also apparently started writing the last chapter on 3/15/2021. That last chapter was close to finished for a very long time. It was just the penultimate chapter that was taking so long.

12. How many WIP’s do you have in your docs for next year? Well, I count six unfinished stand-alones in Scrivener, and a couple more in Word (those are the OLD ones), and two multi-chapters that have already started being posted but just need to be finished. But whether they’ll specifically happen NEXT YEAR? We’ll see.

13. What’s your longest work of the year? Technically “Exploration of the Astral Plane” at 13,008 words, but not all those words were published this year. Only 5,417 words were, and about a third of those were written last year. So “A Captain With Seven Children” steals with 11,371 words published so far, and that’s only halfway done.

14. What’s your shortest work of the year? “Introduction to Infernal and Eternal Crossover” at 1,263, which edges out “Chapter 19.5” by 7 words.

15. What WIP are you taking into next year with you? Is this a different question from #12?

16. What’s your most common “Additional Tags” tag? “Backstory”— this is true both for this year and total. Some people write fanfiction to imagine characters’ futures— I tend to write it to figure out their pasts. Go figure.

17. Your favorite character to write this year? I was going to say Oliver Bird out of force of habit and then I realized I haven’t actually written much for Oliver this year, considering he was unconscious for most of it.* My real answer when I think of it is probably Hypnos God of Sleep, but I haven’t actually finished that fic yet, even though it was supposed to be a quickie (it’s almost done! But LIFE happened). As for characters that aren’t basically OCs (yes I didn’t invent Hypnos, but I did invent his personality for my story), writing the Hargreeveses as children is always fun. Peeling back the later influences on their personalities to the roots of who they are, including things that hint at future developments— and also they’re funny. *I just re-read Chapter 6 of “Exploration,” which is the one chapter I wrote ENTIRELY this year, and Oliver actually spends a good portion of that awake and active and delightful, for probably about as many lines as Hypnos, so maybe he counts after all.

18. The character that gave you the most trouble writing this year? Huh. I guess I avoid writing characters that I can’t hear clearly in the first place. I can’t think of anyone whose voice I couldn’t get right or anything, if I can be as bold to claim that. Approaching the question from a different angle, Viktor Hargreeves. Dang his self-esteem issues. They were simultaneously “yes I relate very much to this feeling of Complete Nobody-ness, therefore it’s all too easy to write” and “UGH would you STOP already and just believe what Five and/or Maria depending on the fic is trying to TELL you?!” And as it turned out, the moment of this that bothered me the most was the same moment my beta reader Frimfram* called out, too, which just goes to show, if your characters are annoying you, they’re probably also annoying the reader. Oh, and he also has the added challenge of not realizing he was trans until he was 29 and a half, which makes the fact that I write a lot of childhood stuff an odd balancing act of pronouns. *(OH WAIT, she's on Tumblr, as @amperdash! Hi, @amperdash!)

19. What’s one pairing you want to explore next year? Look. I didn’t INTEND to explore any pairings THIS year. I’m not a shipper! And yet, hopefully I DO finally post more of or even finish “Tesseract,” which has a lot of lovely deep married-folk discussions happening between Alex and Kate, if not overtly romantic— no, some of it IS pretty romantic, especially for Demis like me who are all about deep partnership being romantic. Hey, maybe I’ll even finish the Wash/Zoe fic I started ten years ago or something. Who knows. Oh, it’s also possible for these “pairing” questions to refer to non-ship relationships, or “&”s on AO3, but I always forget to note those, anyway. Ironic, isn’t it? I’d probably have better answers if I looked at it that way. Relatedly, do you think I should go back through my fics and add the “&” tags that apply to each? They might get more attention that way.

20. Which work of yours have you reread the most? That’s a good question, and I think it’s more confusing because I reread so much WHILE I’m writing, so I’m not sure how much I reread snippets of in process and how much I read as a completed whole. Maybe “A Captain with Seven Children,” because it is fun and also I'm still writing it, too.

21. How many kudos in total did you get this year? Now, if you click 2022 on the Stats page it says 303, but I was curious, so I added up all the kudos on the seven fics I supposedly published this year, and whaddya know, 303. But the majority of the 30 kudos on “Exploration of the Astral Plane” were actually received LAST year, when the fic was first posted; and it also isn’t counting the many kudos I keep getting on “The Invitation: an Epilogue” (still holding out as my most popular fic ever) and the less-often but still coming steady “The Puppy-fly Effect” and a few other random ones on other older fics, like the guest who frequently binges the complete Loudermilk Chronicles and rekudos every one (the “Placeholder” has even gotten two kudos!); and for that matter, how can you really count the absurd extra kudos on “Chapter 19.5,” anyway? There are 80 guest kudos there and I’m certain that’s only about 5 actual individual guests. I could go back through my email notifications and add up the kudos I ACTUALLY got this year (including the random 80 guest kudos on Chapter 19.5) but that’s a bit excessive.

22. Which work has the most comments? “Not Just Stupid Kids,” clearly the most popular work published this year. Most of the comments are like “Aw, don’t let the haters who say you shouldn’t ship adoptive brothers with complicated age-issues and much mental illness force you into anonymity and shame!” and I’m like, “No, seriously, it’s not THAT part that embarrasses me, it’s the fact that they’re NON-CANONICAL and exactly the sort of pairing I would be all ‘WHY CAN’T THEY JUST BE GOOD FRIENDS?!’ about any other time! Because I am freakish this way!”

23. Did you do any collaborative works this year? No, though it was lovely beta-exchanging with @amperdash. We’d get to cheer for each other! (You can read hers here: "Seong-min Ha has Superpowers"!)

24. Did you write any gifts this year? Not unless you count our Christmas card letter.

25. Did you receive any gifts this year? Not unless you count other people’s Christmas card letters.

26. What’s your most common category? Um, Gen? Like you had to ask?

27. What do you listen to while writing? I have an “Instrumental” playlist. I posted about that before.

28. Favorite work you wrote this year? I guess “A Captain with Seven Children,” but there’s a special place in my heart for “Everything I Know About Writing the Loudermilk Twins,” because they’re forever my babies.

29. Favorite line/passage you wrote this year? I think I keep coming back to this one the most, and it’s a perfect example of why writing “A Captain with Seven Children” delights me so much. To set the mood, here is the exchange as it appears in “The Sound of Music”: Maria has just arrived at the Von Trapps’ and is pretending to dance in the ballroom when Captain Von Trapp takes her by surprise saying, “In the future, you’ll kindly remember there are certain rooms in this house which are not to be disturbed.” She nervously stutters out, “Yes, captain, sir.” Then he says, “Why do you stare at me that way?” “You don't look at all like a sea captain, sir,” she says. He bites back, “I'm afraid you don't look very much like a governess.”

Now, this functions as a meet-cute— they’re taken aback by each other, she was being whimsical (which he surely needs in his life), and she’s embarrassed, and she’s staring at him because my gosh is he handsome and she was not prepared for that. But in my story this moment is absolutely not a meet-cute, but it is a first meeting that proceeds in almost the same way. Maria, being Maria, is still going to get impatient waiting and go poking around in the house; and Reggie is very much against his office being disturbed. But she’s not going to be struck dumb by how handsome he is— she’s going to be really distracted by how anachronistic he looks— old-fashioned even for her original timeline, and that was already 60 years earlier! So anyway here’s the scene:

“In the future, you’ll kindly remember there are certain rooms in this Academy which are not to be disturbed.” Maria jumped and succeeded in just barely not knocking the contraption over. “Yes, sir, Mr. Hargreeves, sir.” She gaped at the tall, thin man in the doorway. He looked like a Victorian shipping baron, with a monocle in one eye and a graying auburn goatee, a natty three-piece suit and cane. He squinted back at her. “Sir Reginald, if you please. Why do you stare at me that way?” “Well, you don’t look at all like I imagined the adoptive father of seven children, er, in the late 1990s, would look, sir.” “And how many of us have you been previously acquainted with?” “Well…none, actually.” “So I trust you will refrain from making further assumptions.” So the scene starts out almost exactly the same, in the office instead of a ballroom, but when Maria explains why she’s staring, Reggie is just GOING to react with a bit of snooty logic. And the weird thing is, I can totally hear Christopher Plummer saying it, too. I actually had to look BACK at the Sound of Music script because I wasn’t sure, anymore, which parts I wrote and which parts were from the movie. It just FITS so freaking well.

30. Biggest surprise while writing this year? BESIDES the popularity of “Not Just Stupid Kids”? WHILE writing, hmm. How many lines you can swap between Sir Reginald Hargreeves and Captain Von Trapp without being able to tell the difference!

#year-end roundup #ask game #fanfic

[katwriteswitcherthings]

for the fic writer questions... 4, 5, 27... and 10 !!

=^.^= <3 I'm just gonna pic a few of my fics at random!

4. What detail in grasp the nettle are you really proud of?

How Keldar is able to knock out a mage with a sign in one hit. This is part of a bigger story where it would get elaborated on more, but Griffins are known as the more magical of the Witcher schools, right?

So, they're probably all really strong at signs. Especially an elder Griffin.

I head-cannon that when mages go wrong (whether that be genuine or politically motivated), they contract Griffins as bounty hunters to track down and bring them in for sentencing/ jail. Keldar has had centuries of experience tracking and capturing mages.

5. What do you wish someone would ask you about nothing more to say? Answer it now!

Why/how were they looping?

A long time ago, I read a fic called Turtle Loops that was pure crack in the best ways. Apparently there is a whole universe of fics built on this premise? IDK but I thought it would be neat if there was something like this but for Witcher. I chose my favorite version of each character (Book!Geralt, Netflix!Jaskier, and Game!Yennefer) and ran with it.

I originally wanted this to run a little longer and actually have all three jumping into Book!Geralt's timeline at the proper time, but I ran out of time. Flash fic can be very unforgiving like that! :D I might come back to it someday if the bunny bites again.

27. How long did it take to write Vi Moxt Miirik? Describe the process.

I got the idea for this story sometime late October/Early November of last year. I started the document on Nov. 9th, 2021. I was searching through the Witcher wiki for some other story and fell down a rabbit hole, leading to some interesting articles on other wikis about the origins of specific monsters on the Continent.

I love non-human!Jaskier so much and thought, wow, Jaskier would make an excellent [redacted]. I also had just finished both The Last Wish and Sword of Destiny, and really wanted to incorporate a few of the other short stories into the Netflix!Canon.

I started the story, but I kept skipping around terribly. I wrote a lot for it, though, and I even had a general outline of when I wanted the stories to take place; but the connective tissue just never felt right to me. So I tossed it to the back burner for a while, adding a little bit here and there, but mostly left it alone. It's sitting at 28,224 words right now, and still nowhere near done.

Then, I see this year's What About The Bard?'s prompt list and... it clicked. It was originally in Geralt POV, so I switched it to Jaskier's and the ideas just worked so much better like that. Fun fact, the italic parts of the story are bits and pieces from the original Geralt POV version cut down or finished up. Most of the dialogue is the same across the different fics.

Who knows? I might get the inspiration to finally finish up the original version one day and post it up along side the WATB Jaskier version.

10. How do you decide what to write?

I get ideas from the most random of places. Flash fic has been great for letting loose random plots; the time limit means you have no time to dawdle. You just write and hope it makes sense when you're done.

I have a couple of documents I keep running lists on of ideas / pairings / concepts that I want to write. I have a fic in the works that's Young Vesemir/Guxart/Keldar OT3 set in the same universe as grasp the nettle.

Discord shenanigans are also very inspiring. I wrote a Sentinel/Guide AU because someone in a server was talking about how much they loved them and how much of a staple trope it was 'back in the day'. I have several rare-pairs that I want to write for, just so a friend isn't the only one making content for it.

#answered ask #ask meme #writing meme #@kuwdora

[randomcitizen98]

when u get this u have to put 5 songs 🎵 u actually listen to, publicly. then, send this to 10 others (non-negotiable, positivity is cool) ✨

Tagged by the super awesome @lovethistoomuch (I literally NEVER get tagged in anything so thank you so much 😭😭❤️❤️)

1. The Way I Feel by Keane

This is a song I just recently started listening to because I heard it at my job & I couldn’t quite hear it properly but I liked the beat & tempo & a lot of other stuff so I looked it up & properly listening to it the first time was like getting a sucker punch in the heart because it’s just SO GODDAMN RELATABLE. It literally felt like someone wrote a song about my life & current mental state 🥲

2. Crossfire by Brandon Flowers

Another song I heard at my job but this one comes with a funny story…. So the part that really hooked me (aside from the music itself) is part of the chorus when he’s singing “lay your body down” over & over again BUT since I was at work I could never tell what the hell he was saying & as a result, could not look up the song using the lyrics so my only hope was to use the Shazam feature on Snapchat. But of course just when I’ve decided that I want to find out the name of the song, I don’t hear it again for another two weeks ( just like that one item you see all over your room all the time and then when you actually need it & go looking for it, it’s nowhere to be found). My job plays the same playlist over & over again so I knew I would hear it again eventually but in the meantime I was being HAUNTED by the mere fragment of a song & it was driving me crazy. Finally, after what seemed like AGES of not hearing the song, I heard the familiar chorus during a slow moment at work & immediately scrambled for my phone so I could open up Snapchat & utilize the Shazam feature but it kept telling me “no music detected” so I tried holding my phone up (since the speakers are practically on the ceiling) but right at that moment some guests walk in & I had to (literally) throw my phone away… & while dealing with these guests I managed to hear part of a verse (“Tell the devil that he can go back from where he came”) so I tried desperately to cling to this lyric so I can look it up after the guests leave but my stupid ADHD brain forgot everything except for “the devil” 🙃😭😭 obviously I did eventually find out what song it was but HOLY SHIT was it a freaking process 😫

3. Hundreds of Stories by Lin Manuel Miranda & Olga Merediz

In the Heights is my favorite musical of all time & I love it so so so so much…. I don’t think I’m capable of accurately articulating just how much I love it so I won’t even try. I’ll just say that I love Lin Manuel Miranda so much for giving the world a musical where my people take center stage & the Latin American community as a whole is so gloriously celebrated. I just recently had the honor of watching a local production of the Original Broadway version & it was one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen 🥹🥰 I chose this song specifically because it’s one of the six that were excluded from the movie adaptation (which made me really sad but I still love that movie despite all the differences).

4. Ojitos Lindos by Bad Bunny & Bomba Estéreo

Listing this one in honor of the Bad Bunny concert I attended last week which was F**KING AMAZING 😭😭🥹 That man really knows how to put on a show 🤩🤩 This song is from his latest album which has a little bit of everything sprinkled in it…. It’s got songs to make you dance, songs to make you cry, he’s got us feeling the full spectrum of emotion with his album. This one in particular is a beautiful love song that makes me feel all warm & fuzzy inside whenever I hear it 🥰

5. Drippin by Rafael Casal, Daveed Diggs & SOB X RBE

I really like listening to this song on my way to my stupid customer service job because of the lyrics. Most notably, “I ain’t a killer, but don’t push me” & my personal favorite, “I ain't a killer, but fuck it, pop, pop, (pop, pop)” & listening to it on the way home from work makes it feel cathartic….. If you haven’t already, I HIGHLY recommend you watch the movie Blindspotting. It is a very powerful film that makes me cry every time I watch it. & if you like the film, chances are you’ll like the spin off tv series as well. & For those who are fans of rap, I’d definitely recommend the Miles AND Collin EPs 👌🏽👌🏽

A couple of notes:

Let me first apologize for the mini novel this post has deteriorated into…do feel free to completely ignore it.

To the lovely people I am about to tag, please do not feel any obligation to follow through with this… I promise I won’t be offended or insulted if you get this notification, take a cursory glance, shrug & continue on with your day 😊❤️

I do hereby tag: @drewgarfield @isthatacalzone @cobrabi @ms-anthology

#word vomit #sorry for this #i have a problem #tag game #about me #music #keane #brandon flowers #in the heights #lin manuel miranda #olga merediz #bad bunny #bomba estéreo #blindspotting #rafael casal #daveed diggs #Spotify

[taeyamayang]

YOU ARE BUILDING A LIFE SIZED SLEIGH????? girl WHAT??? AND NINE (9) N-I-N-E???? REINDEER??? That is absolutely batshit crazy I love it. Are you doing it by yourself? What is the competition for? Were you told to do the sleigh and reindeer specifically or were you like “imma show everyone up by doing the ABSOLUTE MOST.” (In the best possible way ofc lol) Ok for some background info I’m an extremely artsy person and is known for doing the most when it comes to my projects. There’s a TikTok that basically goes “Unlike others, my homosexual audacity makes me believe that I have all the nesceceary skills to accomplish whatever even though I have no prior knowledge in that area.” Which basically describes me to a T. Like if I have an idea I try to do whatever I can to produce that idea. I literally just finished a Medusa head. A fully gold, clay snake-d, clay covered styrofoam head. It’s magnificent…. But it almost made me lose my shit. It was supposed to be and interactive piece but the weight of it was too heavy (despite my homosexual audicty I also have ADHD and anxiety which means I need to get everything I can fit this project done NOW. Screw waiting! Screw planning! Therefore I didn’t take into account the amount of weight it would end up being and how hard it would be to keep it hanging smh) I also had a due date for it that absolutely did not help but whatever. It’s done, and it looks pretty badass if I do say so myself. That being said, I’m really excited to hear more about the sleigh and reindeer. ALSO MOMO LOOKS SO CUTE SITTING ON THE SLEIGH???? SHES SANTAS LITTLE HELPER 🥺🥺🥺

Aria isn’t that photogenic, she usually ends up rubbing her face against the camera or worse- her butt. That was just a lucky shot. I snatched Loki to cuddle with me and he actually did for once???? He usually gets bored and walks away smh. But then he was a really cuddly baby and I was NOT gonna let the opportunity slip away.

THANK YOU FOR YOUR COMMENTS IN MY WRITTING!!!!! they really made my day! I really kept pushing myself to keep going even when I doubted myself. I read online a quote from a famous author (Idr which one lol) that said when writting, consistency is key, even when writting in small amounts. 200 words a day. It adds up. So I always tried to write 200 words a day and would praise myself if I wrote anything considerably more. It’s a pretty good system to be honest, bc then I don’t berate myself for not writing as much as I want myself too.

When It comes to the yams fic it originally came from one of my first Haikyuu fic ideas, which was kind of a reverse harem thing? IDK IF THATS THE RIGHG WORD SKSHJS. like kinda a chose your our adventure/route kind of thing and it would be with several different characters. The idea changed a lot, like for example the love interests you could chose from at the end would be (at some point of my brainstorming process) ALL of the first year boys from Karasuno, Noya and Suga, then Oikawa, Kuroo AND kenma. I limited it down to Tsukki, yams, hinata, (or) noya, (Idr which one) suga and Oikawa after. Basically all the Karasuno first year boys but Kageyama. I don’t think you’ll ever catch me writing for kageyama tbh. He’s very one track minded and I don’t think I’d get his personality right.

Tbh it wasn’t TOO far out there, even with the crazy cast of characters and I really liked some parts of the story idea! but I feel like a lot of the parts between those parts would feel forced or rushed. Like for example, i feel like it was very Oikawa and Tsukishima heavy (which is weird bc they are total opposites) so you could see MC’s and their relationship grow, where all the other boys relationship would feel awkward and out of place. I also feel like when stories have so many routes and options in love it takes away the feelings and what makes a good relationship for the characters, whether it be platonic or romantic in the end. Writting all that down is making me kinda miss the idea LMAO. IT WAS SO CUTE! but I know it isn’t meant to be. Even after deciding against the idea of this massive size I kept a lot of the ideas for it. Again this fic idea came right after watching haikyuu for the first time and I feel like it was my brain trying to fit in as many scenerios and stuff at once into one timeline. After watching more of it and learning more about the individual characters I was able to seperate some of these story ideas and flesh them out. Now would they ever reach any the point where they hit paper (or in my case, a fresh google doc? )That’s another question entirely

The Yams fic originally came from a scene (lmao a deleted scene ig) bASED ON MY INSECURITY. ABOUT MY FRECKLES. *gasp, I know* ok tbh my freckles are a lot different I have them spread out everywhere on my body, including my face. They always kind of annoyed me since they are just kinda randomly dotted on my face, and aren’t big enough (or enough in general) to look like constilations. They aren’t even noticeable enough for anyone to notice but me. Except the marylin Monroe mark right above my lip. I had that one all my life. But still, they annoy me. And like right after I started working on the fic, MORE STARTED APPEARING? LIKE HOW???? ITS WINTER! ITS NOT LIKE THE SUN IS GIVING KE MARKS OR ANYTHING? sigh. But anyway, the scene was supposed to have MC complaining about their freckles, which makes yams want to talk about how he hates his freckles until they say how their freckles aren’t even cute, like his are. idk it was a cute little thing based off my Insecurities. After I scraped the whole thing, along with the little scene I just mentioned, years later I read a Haikyuu or BNHA (I can’t remember which one) scenario where the boys compliment the MCs freckles, which turn out to just be acne. Then VOILÀ! The idea returned! This time new and updated! It was originally NOT supposed to so long or emotional. I just REALLY got into his character and fleshed it out a LOT. It was supposed to be a quick kind of thing, where yams gets embarrassed and flushed, then teased. All that cutesy stuff, but ik that yams has been struggling with his insecurities about his freckles for a long time, and insecurities like those don’t just go away. It’s not always something you can laugh about later. Sometimes the scabs from others words and your own thoughts don’t heal over, and with enough force, they can be picked off to show a fresh wound, like the pain never left. I know what it’s like to have severe anxiety and let small things tumble and grow into something incomprehensible. I know what it’s like to be stuck in your own head and I really wanted to show that. I’m really happy that you could feel his worries through my writing cuz that is 100% what I was aiming for. I hope others who can identity to yams in any way can see themselves in it too.

I might take you up on beta reading one day, when I get a discord. I think I had an account, maybe at some point? But I honestly have no idea how to use it. But I love how you took your psych major daydreams and put them to paper (figuratively, again) by writing haikyuu scenerios and headcannons. Putting your major to good use I see kksjkdkdk 😂. Before I started putting work on tumblr I was super scared about how people would react andd more importantly, how I would react to others reading my work and interacting with it. But tbh, I don’t really care that much? Like it’s weird, I thought I’d be obsessing over it but it’s kinda a background thought. Like it makes me happy when I see people interacting with it and I wish sometimes I cold have more validation in that aspect sometimes but it’s not a NEED. Now it makes me wonder if I should’ve started a fanfic acc before, or if I should be glad I did it now instead of before when I possibly could have let it take over me. Now I just worry about consistency- in posting that it’s.

Which leads me to another question. How do you differentiate between your different blogs? I know you have like two or three, but how do you decide what to put on you personal vs fanfic account? What to reblog on which ones? Bc I know even though I’m writing everyday, I’m not putting out work everyday so my fanfic account kinda sits vacant from time to time, where my main gets daily action (man when I put it that way it seems like my fanfic account is my side chick or something LMAO)

I LOVE HOW YOU JUST LEFT THE CLASS AFTER THEY TRIED PRESSURING YOU LMAO!! Like “oh one sec, I’ll be right back” *narrator voice* “And pea did. not, in fact be right back. She walked straight out the door, and kept walking. And walking. Till she got home. The end.” KAHSAJSJS. iconic. AND I THOUGHT YOU SAID YOU WERE BREAKING UP WITH YOUR BF! NOT GF!! There could have been a possibility you said “partner” and I assumed boyfriend, BIT EITHER WAY, I FEEL HOMOPHOBIC IM SO SORRY! but I’m glad you broke up! Like in the nicest way possible!! Dragging out relationships when there’s no spark is just trouble for EVERYONE. like idk why straight people insist on doing it for sooooo long. Like I understand it’s hard, and they are probably quite comfy and change can be difficult for everyone, but there has to be a point where you know that things aren’t gonna fix themselves? Like why wait till everything blows up instead of breaking things off like grown ass adults, not teens in some over dramatic coming of age movie? I can’t stand how in tv shows the standard husband and wife absolutely hate each other. Because it’s supposed to reflect real life (at least in America) where spouses are supposed to fall in love, get married, have kids, then fall apart. LIKE IF YOU CANT EVEN STAND TO BE IN THE SAME ROOM WITH THEM WITHOUT WANTING TO SPEW VERBAL ABUSE WHY CANT YALL GET A DIVORCE??? like I know it’s long process and shit, bit damn, anything is better than that sheesh. And people wonder why whenever someone dies they look at their spouse first smh.

Bruh those beauty standards sound like they are describing an anime character LMAO. That shit ain’t realistic! It’s so wild to hear that your aunt told you not to play too much bc you get “MAN LIKE MUSCLES???” WTF WHO SAYS THAT TO A CHILD? Good for your mom telling you otherwise.

So about the murder house at the college… I don’t go there so I wouldn’t know for sure, but it seems like no one really knows? Or cares? I mean the hs I went to being right next to it never really mentioned it and you’d think that a murder house would cause gossip yknow? I’m pretty sure it happened 20+ years ago so anyone alive during that time wouldn’t be attending the school really, or they would’ve been like infants. GIRL WHAT THE FUCK??? YOUR CREEPY DEATH TUNNEL STORY OUTWEIGHS THE CREEPY OLD MURDER HOUSE THATS NOW USED FOR ADMIN REASONS? I think it’s fucjing insane how horrible things happened and you wouldn’t even know. Whether it’s the murders in my picket fence town or the death tunnels at your Uni. Really shows you how important history books are, huh.

Tbh, when it comes to my cupcake disaster I wasn’t even that late? I thought I’d be though lol. And omg, Asian schools sound fucjing terrifying. They sound so strict and prestigious and very stressful. I don’t think my anxious ass could have handled it. Also, don’t worry you are probably way better at math than I am. All throughout my life I’ve been horrible at math, the only time I wasn’t when I was in like preschool and was excited to learn LMAO. I can’t even count how many time math has made me cry thought just the ages of like 6-18. It’s pathetic, actually.

About genshin, my bestie and tell each other everything, especially the fictional characters we simp for. She’s a big childe simp. I remember one time she told me she was talking to her friend and was like “I wanna see childe naked.” (Joking, but not yknow LMAO) and her friend was like “pedophilia????” SKaksbdjka bUT THATS BESIDES THE POINT. I send her all the pics and memes of childe and some of her other fav fictional men and she send me memes of Kuroo and bokuto LMAO. Some of our convos are WILD. Like they can go from “that’s where my trauma comes from” to “hahah GAE” in the same convo.

Like 2 weeks ago we had this convo

Me: girl I have some bad news

Her: oh no

Me: I have another fanfic idea

Her: oh no

What’s it about?

THEN I JUST DUMP EVERYTHING I HAVE IN THAT IDEA AND SHES LIKE “mood” “gay” “damn” “just like me fr” SKSHAJWH I can’t stand her sometimes. She also calls me out when some parts of the stories are familar to my other ideas (they often build off of each other since 90% of them don’t leave the drafting board of my head. She’s like “new challenge, an MC WITHOUT trauma, where the MCs parents are completely alive and well.” And I’m like 😤 “but that’s no fun!” KEBDKSJSKSB

BUT SPEAKING OF NEW STORY

Ok well technically this is an older one that’s been sitting in my head for a while. I have a really good idea for a hawks series (from BNHA). I probably will never write all of it but the begining is super solid so I might just start from there. BUT! I’m afraid this will completely divert me from my bokuto fic. I think I’m a little over half way done with it but idk my writing can get out of hand. Currently, it is 6,301 words long. The final number should probably be over 8,000 words long, but we will seee

I LOVE YOUR NEW STICKERS! I love how you made the present day(? Technically it’s not present day, but yknow what I mean) and the time skip versions!! AND I LOVE THE EMO MODE BOKUTO!!!! SO CUTE!!! THEY LOOK SO GOOD!!!

ALSO I SHOWED BESTIE THE PHOTOS OF YOUR GENSHIN STICKERS! after I showed her what I said about genshin she said: “GIRL i’m surprised you know so much but at the same time i can imagine considering how much i talked about them lmaooo”

SHE WANTS TO KNOW WHEN YOU START YOUR BUISNESS SO SHE CAN BUT ONE! AND MEE TOO!! but I’m not sure if that possible since international shipping can be a bitch. BUT WE WILL SUPPORT IN SPIRIT!

I look forward to seeing your sticker buisness grow and I’m excited to see how the sleigh looks when it’s finished! Keep me updated!!! Bonus cat pics for you!

i did!! i'll attach the photos below so it wouldn't get in the way with the texts. actually it was like a community competition idk to build camaraderie among neighborhoods so when the adults were brainstorming for an idea i suggested a santa's factory theme and they were like yeahhh that's nice but it would be much cooler if have santa and his reindeer pulling his sleigh and when everyone's asking if anyone could do it NO ONE WAS ANSWERING. so a thing about me in groupworks is when the group grows silent and no one feels confident to try, i dive in head first (as long as i can pull off the task. besides, i want to give it a try too lol. i love creating things) so i volunteered and my mom was supportive of it, actually the entire neighborhood is. i sent them progress pictures and they liked it so much so they encourage me throughout the tedious task and that kept me going. btw that sleigh can fit 2 toddlers i know because i have 2 toddler nephew and niece and they can sit on it side by side lol. anyway, it's purely made from recycled materials :D DAMN your medusa craft sounds amazing!!! omg do you have a photo of it i wanna seee omg!! so we do have smth in common! we love creating things and when we get into the zone we do it with 100% focus

ohhh i like the idea of the reversed harem but just as you said it might be difficult to pull off since there may be characters that are less emphasized than the others so it will be oikawa or tsukishima heavy. that's why it is not recommended to write for many characters because it will be hard to give them the their own spotlight and it will turn out messy and may even risk the plot. if i'm not wrong the maximum characters (major characters) you can write for is 5 but ideally 3 is okay. i tried that tho with my halloween interactive fic (which i have not written for in SO LONG lol i'll get to that) so i tried to incorporate all the characters i could write for in haikyuu but i didn't give them a spotlight. i picked a few to give an elaborate background of, then they others were minor characters. i feel like i'm giving an unsolicited advice 💀 i'm not the best person to give you it but i'm glad i could discuss things related to writing to someone. maybe you can push through with the story idea but pick maybe 3-4 characters you want to focus on and others are minor characters.

about the yams story!! tbh i couldn't relate to the freckles thing but they remind me of my tiny moles 💀 i have them all over my body and even on my face. in our culture it could be seen as a beauty mark but i just couldnt love the one above my mouth (tho it gets complimented by my friends, i just couldnt) but i have fondness for freckles (ironic i know) i find them cute as it somehow adds softness to the person's features hence when i was reading your message i was like "NO WAYYY FRECKLES ARE ADORABLE! WHAT DO YOU MEAN!! I LOVE THEM." but then it reminds me of my tiny moles and i just 🧍🏻‍♀️ lol maybe it's human's nature to love what they don't have and dislike what they have. so even though i do not have freckles, with the emotions and realness of the characters' conflict in your yam's fic i was able to connect/relate to it. keep writing!! :)

yess!! i'm omg i would love to try beta reading heh if i reply late (i always do anyway 😭) send me an ask of your discord name so i can add you immediately and get on w the writing!! aaahh i'm excited hihi yeah!! my major actually contributes a lot to my writing lol. talk about consistency ahhh it's harder to be consistency esp when you're busy (me 💀) about the 2-3 blogs, this (main) blog is purely for fluff fanfics or fics rated general since i started this blog i never intended to write nsfw since i'm more of a fluff writer but since i'm trying to explore more writing styles i opened a nsfw blog. that's my most recent blog and i only have one fic posted there lol i find it difficult to whip a nsfw blog since i don't think that's my strength lol and the personal blog that's where i rb art, fics, post shits (personal shits), and other things lol it's like a dump account honestly. i created a personal account mainly because i didn't want my main blog to appear messy for the readers if ever they want to check my blog. i do post personal things on my main blog but only that is not too personal? or i think is interesting for many to know smth like. it actually depends on my mood whether i'm comfortable to have many people read about what's going on with my personal life aka my childhood enemy who turned hot but my college struggles that gave me anxiety that's kept on my personal blog bc it has less followers and all of them are my mutuals here sooooo heh are you thinking of running more blogs?

it's fine!! it's okay if you thought of a bf instead of a gf lol no worries. omg thank you for congratulating me on breaking up bc i'm proud i did it. breaking up ia tough because it means hurting the person close to you but yeah we have the same idea, i think it's pointless to pretend in a relationship that you are not into. it's like you're wasting you and your partner's time and i don't think anyone deserves to be treated half of how they treat someone they like. i'm kind proud i was able to do it. it is hard lol 💀 but i'm happier now. YEAH i want a more diverse family on shows. single parents, homosexual parents, found family, etc.

i could tell you more stories about the crazy place my uni sits in if i remember them lmao but overall i like experiecing creepy stuff thus the death tunnel thing. my college friends and i are amused by creepy things 💀

if i think of it now... ASIAN SCHOOL DID GIVE ME ANXIETY AND NOT ONLY ANXIETY, LOW SELF ESTEEM TOO WTH dude i think they have a kink for making you feel dumb. i mean, a competitive environment is good but when opportunity to grow is limited, it only gives the students anxiety. i remember having a private tutor until before 7th grade but beginning 7th grade was also the start of my summer classes in math (I AM BAD AT IT I SWEAR I CRY TOO LOL i never aimed to be the best i was okay being average and when i get an above average score at a test I AM OVER THE MOON) and on my senior yr in hs i attended a cram school (i think that's what it is commonly called) it's to review you for college entrace exams because the results is revealed nationwide (more anxiety, everyone knows your taking it ha ha) and it's almost a must for us to pursue a college degree otherwise the elders will think of it as a waste if you don't(?) smth like that so yeah after school and classes i attend cram school where we review lessons from 7th grade to senior hs and we answer tests EVERY MEETING so yeah that burnt me out.

the beauty standard iS THE ANIME. the standard is skinny women with humongous boobs like bruh that aint even possible without an implant like how could all fats be isolated on someones chest and not on other parts of their body that's like basic science THEY MAKE US STUDY SCIENCE SAYING IT'S IMPORTANT BUT MEN HAVE UNREALISTIC HUMAN ANATOMY STANDARDS LIKE WTF now that we're on this topic, i realized i have not adhered to the crazy body standards we have (ofc i used to but that was younger me feeling pressured and all it wasn't a good year in my life but yeah) like tatts and piercings are a taboo and more so if you're a woman and here i am with 7 piercings and planning a tatt. they want petite body and big boobs? you know what? *points at my stomach* this is a flab *points at my boobs* and my tits are small HAVE FUN LMAO i don't think i'm the type to go by the rules or at least the strict standards set by society bc i feel chained. even when my aunt told me to stop engaging in activities that would make me grow man muscles, i'm lifting weights now 😭 idk man i feel like the more i feel boxed in a set of ridiculous rules the more i'm prone to breakaway lol. anyway thats just a quick rant 💀

OMG YOUR FRIEND SOUNDS AWESOME i feel like i can vibe with herrr and that she is a childe simp bRUHHH SHE IS FUN btw the childe naked thing had me chuckling lmaooo that was so out of context and it does sound weird for outaiders bUT DAMNNNN CHILDEEEEE UGH IM SIMPIMG i ship him with zhongli does your friend ship them? i. need. to. know. and!! cynari please kaveh and alhaitham too GOD MYVE Y SHOULD PLAY SO WE CAN SCREAM no pressure BUT !!!! LMAOOO

thank you for the photos i appreciate them A LOT your cats make me happy esp UNDER A CHRISTMAS TREE AHHHH

here's the sleigh as promised (i only have them taken at night since i thought you'd like to see the lights. it's placed on a roof btw lmaooo it's crazy) and here's my friends dog. his name is gokong wei SUCH A CLINGY BABY

thank you for writing to me!! i always enjoy talking to you! may you have/had a great new year and i hope we can end 2023 together too! merry christmas and happy new year, myve ♡

#myve.😺 #if there are typos #NO THERE ARENT #peas.tmi.sessions

[heyyyharry]

Happier

(inspired by happier by Olivia Rodrigo)

Word count: 2.4k

I'm selfish, I know, I can't let you go So find someone great, but don't find no one better I hope you're happy, but don't be happier

Part 1: Drivers License

Part 2: Deja Vu

A/N: I edited the original lyrics to match the POV :)

.

.

.

Harry had come up with a thousand scenarios of how this day would play out. Actually, he’d been thinking of this day since the moment he’d received the news. He didn’t dare to hope that she’d say yes to coming back for a sequel. He’d been sure that they would write her character off, give a lame excuse for how his love interest could not make a return and make his character forget about her completely to move on with a new girl in town. It would have been great if it was that easy in real life. Once someone was written off the script, they were gone for good. Real-life relationships were not that simple. Goodbye didn’t mean ‘never see you again’. You would still share the same friend circle and social bubbles, and it was worse when you two worked in the same industry. Harry didn’t know how he’d lasted a year without running into her, not since the Grammys.

“Didn’t you two date?”

“No.” Harry shook his head, but his eyes stayed glued on Y/N from across the room. She wasn’t looking his way, too busy saying hello to everyone else. “No,” he repeated, more to himself than to his co-star. “We didn’t.”

“But she wrote an entire album about you,” said the other twin. What was her name again? Lulu?

“Luna!” cried her sister, Lex. “You can’t ask him that!”

“No, it’s okay,” Harry said with a tight smile, slightly annoyed by the blonde twins, but he didn’t want to seem like an ass on the first day of filming. “And I don’t know if it was for me. You should ask Y/N.”

“Ask me what?”

Harry flinched when he looked up and saw Y/N padding towards them. She hugged the twins, who seemed way too excited. Harry guessed they were Y/N’s fans. They gave off crazy fangirl vibes, probably just pretending not to know the drama to interrogate him. He couldn’t blame them for assuming he was the villain and definitely could not blame Y/N for portraying him as one. It was more important that he knew who he was and how much he had changed since his last relationship. Maybe they could finally be friends.

“Were they bothering you?” Y/N asked him once the twins had left.

Harry nodded. “They’re your friends?”

“Oh, I met them last year on tour. I’m surprised you don’t know them. They were on Disney.”

“I don’t watch Disney,” Harry admitted with a smile. “Well, not today’s Disney.”

“Understandable.” Y/N nodded and bit her lip. She seemed guarded with her straight back and hands hidden behind her. She eyed him up and down, quite subtle yet noticeable. “How have you been?”

“Pretty good,” he said, nodding slowly. “You?”

“Yeah, but mostly tired because of tour.”

“You’re done?”

“Yup, last night was the last show.”

“Nice.”

Y/N raised an eyebrow. “Nice?”

Harry blinked. “Did I say something wrong?”

“No.” Y/N giggled. “You still sound very...you.”

“Well, shouldn’t I?”

“Yeah, you should. But it’s been a year so…I mean, you haven’t changed much.”

“Right,” he said lowly, his eyes falling to his feet. Harry supposed he should say something else, perhaps bringing up another random topic to discuss, but all he could think about was what had happened between them. Things had been messy, hadn’t they? How could they go back to before that? Before her first song about him. Before he’d chosen someone else over her.

Or he could talk about her new relationship. She’d been in a happy relationship for almost six months, right? No wait, hadn’t they broke up two weeks ago? He wasn’t sure because he hadn’t been catching up. If they’d broken up, he’d sound like an ass to even mention her ex’s name. He should just stay quiet.

“I’ll see you later?” she said, gesturing at her stylist who was waiting by the door.

Harry could ask her right now -- the reason she’d agreed to film the sequel to their first movie together. He’d heard from a very reliable source that she’d specifically asked her agent to decline any project that he was in. So did this mean they were good? That she didn’t hate him anymore? He could have gathered his courage and got the answer right then…

“Yeah, see you.”

...but he didn’t.

And so she gave him a smile and a little wave, then happily returned to her stylist.

.

.

.

“See you tomorrow, Y/N!”

“See you, Annie!” Y/N said as she put the rest of her things into her tote bag. Her new driver had got her schedule mixed up, and so she had to wait here for another half an hour. She was in no rush. It had been a light first day, and she’d had a fun time getting to know the new cast members and catching up with old friends.

She sat on the sofa in the lobby, legs crossed, texting her best friend about her day. She’d purposely left out the short off-screen conversation with Harry, and her best friend didn’t even bother to ask. In their world, he didn’t exist, and his name was censored in every conversation like a curse word that was even worse than ‘cunt’. Nevertheless, she didn’t hate him anymore. She was doing just fine on her own, being busy with her career, and she’d been in a happy relationship after her fall out with him.

She and the guy, a model, had broken up two weeks ago due to long distance and some differences that they could not change. They had ended on good terms and decided to stay friends. They said you could only stay friends with your ex when you still had feelings for each other, or you had never loved each other that much in the first place. For her, it was probably the latter. Her previous relationship had been more platonic than romantic, apparently. So she had nothing but the best to say about him.

As she was going through her camera roll, just reminiscing about the past, she heard footsteps approaching and looked up to find Harry. He offered a smile and gestured to the spot beside her on the sofa. “May I sit here? My ride is late.”

“Yeah, sure.” She hurriedly scooted over.

“Good job today,” he said. “You were great.”

“Thanks, so were you.” She smiled, and they both looked away at the same time. This was so awkward. She hated small talk. She’d never had to have small talk with Harry. Conversations with him used to be so easy and natural and silly. Whatever this was, it wasn’t them.

“Can we just be normal?”

At first, Y/N thought she’d been the one who’d said it, so when she realised it’d been Harry, she was speechless.

He swallowed and sat a bit straighter, still not looking at her. “I don’t want us to be weird and awkward.”

“Okay,” she said.

He cleared his throat. “Wanna try again?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“Okay, not to sound like an ass but when Joey kept forgetting his lines, I was so pissed off, I could throw a chair at the wall.”

“Right?!” exclaimed Y/N, feeling free to have finally broken out of her shell. “Like, he doesn’t even have many lines. I know he’s new but damn...you can’t get far if you don’t learn your goddamn lines.”

Harry shook with laughter. “Oh God, we sound like dicks, don’t we?”

“Maybe.” Y/N laughed, covering her mouth. “But you know what? We can’t be nice in this industry. It’s impossible.”

“Shhh, if someone heard this, we would be into big trouble.”

“Oh please, I’ve had worse articles written about me than ‘Y/N speaks facts about her lazy co-star’.”

Harry tossed his head back and cackled. “The worst one I’ve got this week was ‘Harry Styles hates therapists.’”

“What?!” Y/N gasped. “No way! That’s so stupid!”

“Right?” Harry rolled his eyes. “I could get all my therapists to speak up for me but I’m kinda immune to bullshit now.”

“Therapists? Like plural?”

“Yeah, one in every city.”

“Damn.”

“Yeah.”

Y/N rubbed her hands onto her legs. “Rough year?”

Harry’s eyes rolled to the back of his head as he leaned back. “You have no idea.” Then he swept his hair out of his eyes, sucked in a breath, and finally looked at her. “I wish I could have talked to you, though.”

She bit her tongue, knowing what she was about to say next would disappoint her best friend so much, but she had to. “So do I.”

Harry looked taken aback before his lips curled into a smile. “It’s silly, isn’t it? I haven’t talked to you in a year, and I feel like I know everything that’s happened to you except that I don’t.”

What he’d just said might make no sense for most people, but Y/N knew exactly what he meant. She nodded and wetted her lip. “You only know as much as everyone else does.”

“Yeah, I got updates on you from the news and our friends.”

“Same.” Y/N smiled back. “I hate how they write articles about your new haircut but not mine.”

“I like your new hair colour.”

“Thanks. I like your new car.”

Then they both burst out laughing. It was fun and also a little bit strange that Y/N didn’t feel the same anxiety talking to him as she used to. It must be because they had grown and were now meeting again as better people.

“Damn, my ride's here,” Y/N said as she read the text from her driver. “I gotta go now.”

“Oh, okay.” Harry stood up and followed Y/N to the entrance. “Hey, just wondering--”

“Yeah?”

“Am I...am I still blocked?” He looked a bit flustered as she tilted her head and squinted her eyes. “On your phone. Because I remember you having my number blocked--”

“I unblocked you on your birthday.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yeah.” Y/N shrugged. “I should’ve sent you a happy birthday text but...I didn’t want your girlfriend to get the wrong ideas.”

“My ex.”

“Yeah, I know.”

They smiled at each other one last time before saying goodbye. Y/N knew it was silly, but she was hoping he would go after her.

Ding.

A notification popped up when she was in the car. She was almost home, and it was from Harry’s number. He’d sent her a link with a message that said, “Hope you like it :)”.

Curious, she tapped on it and was directed to an audio file titled ‘Track 5’. The upload date was last year. About two weeks after their short conversation at the Grammys.

Hurriedly, she fumbled inside her bag for her iPods and put it on before she pressed play.

“Hey, Jeff, I couldn’t sleep so I wrote this song. Listen and let me know if it should go on the album.”

Then came the piano intro. It sounded good, so Y/N wondered how it hadn’t ended up on his last album.

But when he started to sing...

We ended a while ago Your friends are mine, you know, I know You've moved on, found someone new One more guy who brings out the better in you

And I thought my heart was detached From all the sunlight of our past But he’s so nice, he’s so funny Does he mean you forgot about me?

Oh, I hope you're happy But not like how you were with me I'm selfish, I know, I can't let you go So find someone great, but don't find no one better I hope you're happy, but don't be happier

And does he tell you you’re the most beautiful girl he’s ever seen? An eternal love bullshit he might not even mean Remember when you were with me I meant it when you heard it first from me

And now I'm pickin' him apart Like cuttin' him down will make you miss my wretched heart But he’s charming, he looks kind He probably gives you butterflies

I hope you're happy But not like how you were with me I'm selfish, I know, I can't let you go So find someone great, but don't find no one better

I hope you're happy I wish you all the best, really Say you love him, baby Just not like you loved me And think of me fondly when your hands are on him I hope you're happy, but don't be happier

The song was for her. He’d written it when her new relationship had gone public. Y/N sat there, staring blankly ahead until the honking of a car tore open her inner peace, and reality came crashing back in. The driver dropped her off at her house. Instead of going inside, she stood on her front steps and replayed the song one more time. When it ended, she decided to text him: Why didn’t this make it to the album?

She didn’t know where he was now, but it showed ‘typing’ in less than a second, as if he’d been waiting in their chat since he’d sent that link.

You would’ve hated me, Y/N.

True, she replied. Still, I would’ve loved the song lowkey. And added, I love it btw.

He took so long to type that it was driving her crazy. She flopped down on the concrete stair with her phone clutched in her hands, her heart thundering against her ribcage. Anxiety popped like a balloon when his message appeared: Were you happier?

She reread it again and again.

No.

I wasn’t either, he responded. I kept getting deja vu.

Ha, nice reference.

That song is my guilty pleasure. Love listening to you roasting me on loop.

That last message made Y/N bury her face into her palm and giggle like a fool. She thought for a second and wrote: I could come roast you in person now if that’s what you prefer. I think we’ve never had a proper roasting.

Can we meet, Y/N? Or are you busy now?

No, not busy.

Great, I’ll pick you up.

Just tell me where, she responded with a smile on her face. I got my drivers license now :)

#harry styles #harry styles fanfic #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles writing #harry styles fluff #harry styles imagine #harry styles imagines #harry styles angst #harry styles one shot #harry styles x you #harry styles x y/n #harry styles x reader #harry styles fic

[bcitisthelight]

So.Where to begin.

What you should know is, this isn’t my fault. It’s @misskirby who is to blame for this. She has this AMAZING fic, it’s called Benediction. I like to read it weekly, for sustenance. Go read that first if you want...literally any of this to make sense.  So there’s this passage which stole every marble I had, wherein Anakin is explaining the etymology of the Huttese he uses to refer to his children (with a really thorough explanation on Luke’s name. 

Anakin scrubbed the back of his neck. “Huttese doesn’t have—words of love. It doesn’t have… benedictions. It’s kind of a cruel language. There’s a whole case for groveling and then—there’s really only the word for love.”

“And that’s abiya?” Obi-Wan said.

Anakin’s grin was crooked. “No. That’s luke. In the Tatooine dialect, at least, it’s luke. We used—things, mostly, to—you know.”

“Luke,” Obi-Wan said, tasting the word, looking down at the sleeping child he’d just been holding, one who carried his parents’ love for him in his name. For the first time in all his life, he wondered what his own name meant, and who it was who had given it to him.

“Abiya is the milk from a flowering cactus,” Anakin said. “It’s very sweet. And rare. I only ever had it once, with my—my mother.”

Obi-Wan turned to look at Anakin again. The expression on Anakin’s face was raw, intense, but Obi-Wan forced himself to look at it, out of respect for the memories of a woman he owed all of Anakin to; the one who had protected him, loved him, when Obi-Wan hadn’t known he had existed at all.

“It also means the morning rain,” Anakin said, waving a hand. “A lot of words in Huttese have many definitions. Abiya, though—it’s a relief. A respite. Pure joy.”

Obi-Wan swallowed around the burning in his throat. “I see,” he said, strangled.

Anakin looked away, his throat bobbing. “Luke only has the one definition, though. There’s only one word derived from it, too, lukkali. Noun and a verb. A krayt dragon whelp, or—krayt dragons, the mothers, their carry their whelps in their mouths, because there’s no place on Tatooine that’s safer, so it’s also the act of doing that.”

I LOVE this passage. I love all of the work it does emotionally, narratively, etc. It’s the best. And yesterday morning, I zeroed in on a specific line. “In the Tatooine dialect” Except hold on, I thought to myself. Anakin was born a slave. What if, when he says the Tatooine dialect, what he means is...the dialect of the slave class? 

So here’s the thing. The Hutt society is based on the idea that the Hutts are the prime race, there was the whole Hutt empire thing, I mean the holiday the Boonta Eve Classic is supposed to commemorate is literal holiday that commemorates a Hutt ascending to godhood, during the process of which all of his slaves renew their vows of fealty. It’s not just a class system, where you can you know, in theory move between classes. This is a strict caste system, which you are born into or are captured into. Which got me thinking - what if the language of Huttese has a dialect system...based on caste? We see examples of this sort of socio-linguistic pattern in actual real life!! Tamil and Arabic are some pretty famous examples where certain historical societies who use that language break down that language based on caste, with their different varieties having all sorts of different meanings and cultural connotations, but there’s a ton of them. And in fact, there’s tons of societies which base their dialects on social or other cultural factors.

There’s even a name for it: diglossia, where a society as a whole uses one language but different parts use radically different dialects and forms of that language in different circumstances. Now, strictly historically, how diglossia typically works is that one dialect is seen as a low (L) dialect and one is seen as a high (H) dialect. And get this - in diglossic societies which also contain really severe social inequality - in some cases the dialects can seem almost unintelligible to those who speak the opposite dialect And then based on that passage I posted above, I thought...what if the unintelligibility in this certain case, specifically the unintelligibility between “high” huttese and the dialect spoken by slaves wasn’t surrounding the actual words or structure...what if it was /context/.

So basically in the last thirty six hours I’ve....I’ve made an entire headcanon on Huttese as a trifold diglossic dialect system. I’m putting it under the cut because God its, its a lot guys. Its a lot. Also? It’s written as though its an entry in sociolinguistic glossary of sort, because of course it is. Who wrote that glossary? Space nerds. Nerds in space. Nerds in space from Coruscant University who need research credits for their space masters degrees. 

For the purposes of this glossary, the modern caste system of the Hutt Clan has been recorded below. 1. Masters 2. Servants* 3. Slaves The reader should be aware that there is technically a high caste called “Grand Masters”, which historically was comprised of members of the Grand Hutt Council and their families. This caste used a dialect usually referred to as “Archaic Huttese”, and is the source dialect of Huttese, originally developed on the Hutt home planet of Nal Hutta. However, this language has long fallen out of common use.  The reader should also note that belonging to the Servant caste does not imply any quality of servitude per se. Rather, this is the caste of all ordinary free people who live under Hutt Rule. This designation is believed to have originated in the understanding within the ancient Hutt empire that any being who lived under Hutt dominion was by rights a servant to any Hutt who should need them.  The dialects of the castes are as follows.  1. The dialect of the master class is also known as “High Huttese”. The common dialect of all high-born Hutts, and widely adopted by non-Hutts who own slaves or hold positions of authority within Hutt society. This dialect is used in all interactions involving a master, whether between a group of masters or a master and a lower-caste member. With Hutt families whose bloodlines have been regarded as a part of the master class for several centuries, there is a curious strain of monolinguism in an otherwise highly polylinguistic society, with many high born Hutt families refusing to learn even the fundamentals of standard Basic. The reasoning for this seems to be a cultural belief held by the masters that any person of a lower caste bends to the needs of the masters, rather than the other way around. The historical risk of a master’s displeasure upon improper address has led to this dialect becoming the default in conversation unless you are absolutely sure of another person’s caste, since historically the risk of offense should you choose wrong was often very high. There are at least three different cases of blood feuds between members of Hutt Master families which involved the use of a lower caste dialect as a cause of offense. 

This default status of this dialect means that when a person in the Republic references “Huttese”, they are almost always referencing the master dialect. The master dialect is what is taught in the schools of the Republic. This has led to a sort of self-perpetuating cycle. As interactions with the rest of the galaxy have shifted to singular dialect, the use of the master dialect has become more solidified within common Hutt Society, even when the speaker is aware that Low Huttese would be acceptable. 

It should be noted that this exception applies only to free people. Slaves are required by Hutt law to use this dialect when speaking Huttese to any non-slave they interact with, even if that person does not belong to the Hutt caste system. The Hutt law imposing this requirement famously reads, “Because all beings are above a slave, a slave should speak to every being in the tongue of their masters.” The penalty for a slave addressing a master in anything but the high dialect is often some sort of physical punishment. A rather gruesome tradition which is kept in force to this day.  2. The servant dialect is also called “Low Huttese”. While originally it was relatively distinct from both the dialect spoken by the masters and the dialect spoken by the slaves of Hutt Society, it has since suffered a bit of stagnation. There are many factors which could cause this to occur. As the Republic opened up more and more channels of commerce to Hutt Space, and the Master dialect has become the norm outside of Hutt Society, true enforcement of the linguistic standard for non-enslaved beings has fallen much to the wayside in the last two standard centuries or so. Modern Low Huttese dialect is thus mostly similar to the Master dialect in grammar and generally accepted vocabulary. However, a remaining diversion exists which is based on pronunciation, and a significant reliance on rather course slang on the part of those who speak Low Huttese. It has been said by Huttese linguistic scholars that while High Huttese is a an excellent dialect for threats, Low Huttese is an excellent dialect for swearing.  3.  The slave dialect has no name in any official Hutt or Republic record. It is not recognized by any authority in either written or spoken form. In fact, generally the only beings who know or speak the slave dialect are those who are or who once were enslaved, and their loved ones. The dialect differs rather severely from high huttese - though primarily through meaning and cultural context, rather than actual structure. 

It seems that this “hidden” diversion was born of necessity, rather than choice. The masters didn’t like the idea of their slaves having a way of communication the masters were not privy to, and so would punish any slave caught speaking a dialect which was immediately recognizable as being outside of the master dialect. The slave class in the ancient Hutt empire adapted to this by taking the dialect forced upon them, and manipulating a large portion of it for their use. Rather ingeniously, they seem to have developed an entire dialect specifically ordered so that they could express themselves freely without being automatically targeted by a passing master or authority figure. This is the vital distinction: words in the master dialect often have vastly different or even opposite meanings when used in the slave dialect. Added to this complexity are the wide range of connotations and contexts for each word. An interesting note to the slave dialect is that generally, the more abstract a word is, the fewer meanings or connotations it has, whereas often the most culturally impactful words and concepts are taken from simple or every day words. There is only one word for love in the slave dialect - “Luke” - because it is seen as pure, and when given, unconditional. When this word is used, there is no linguistic distinction between platonic or romantic love - the slave class instead relies on idioms or proverbs to express the difference in feeling. In direct contrast, there are nine different ways a person can use the verb which means “to attach”, ranging from the mundane (“Attach these two machine parts together”) to the taboo (“to cause another person to be enslaved”) There are some words which are unique to this dialect, however. One example is the word for “freedom”, which in the slave dialect is “telena”. 

The master dialect’s word for freedom is the same as their word for authoritarian power. Freedom within the master caste, then, was specifically associated with the ability to exercise dominion over the world around them. Members of the slave class, as individuals who constantly suffered under that same authoritarian power, showed a collective repugnance for the association between freedom and the very dehumanization they themselves suffered. Drawing from the use of the anakin plant as one of the most culturally and spiritually significant symbols in the caste (See entry on Anakin, a flowering plant which originated in the deserts of Tatooine but which has since been domesticated throughout the Outer Rim) they instead chose to develop a word based off the Hutt verb “to bloom” One common expression amongst the slave class is “Telena telen ali anakin” - “Freedom blooms with the anakin” Those interested in the study of this dialect, then, are well warned that they should take great care in attempting to communicate in this dialect (if they can find a teacher, that is - many slaves or even those who were formally enslaved are understandably reluctant to give up what is likely one of the only means of expression of not only agency, but of caste solidarity. I have seen two former slaves go from total strangers to kindred spirits in the space of five minutes, upon discovering by means of dialect each others mutual experience.)

#I made an entire headcanon on Huttese as a trifold diglossic dialect system #she said #like a LOSER #do you ever write a sentence so insane it immediately deals you psychic damage #and what makes it worse is that #this is something i did in my free time today #this is what i do for FUN #anyways #I will be writing more to come lmao #Huttese #star wars #conlang #sociolinguistics #but you know #in space #please don't take the actual structure too seriously i am strictly here for the social connotations #i dont know linguistics #and frankly #i dont care

[bts-weverse-trans]

201127 Weverse Magazine ‘BE’ Comeback Interview - Jungkook

Jung Kook: “I hope this feeling never fades” BTS BE comeback interview 2020.11.27

I had a chance to interview BTS before, when they debuted. During that interview, Jung Kook had one small habit; when I met him again a while later, he had corrected it. He makes a conscious effort to change himself. And after seven years, I met Jung Kook again.

You directed the music video for “Life Goes On,” BE’s title song. Jung Kook: I was really eager to direct the music video from the outset. My plan was to organize the synopsis, discuss it with the  music video director I was working with, shoot and edit them, but we were short on time. So I worked on it while sharing ideas with the director. Originally there were a lot of scenes with lip synching in them, but we took some of them out and put in more scenes that conveyed the members’ emotions better. It wasn’t easy to combine scenes, but I think now I know more about how much of everything is needed when shooting a music video.

You had shot the Golden Closet Films and uploaded them to the BTS YouTube channel, and now you shot a music video. Jung Kook: Once we were on location, we had directions for everything we needed to shoot prepared in advance, so I took candid shots of the members here and there with a camera during the shoot. We were filming in a beautiful place so when they asked me to take pictures of them as they wanted to be presented, I did.

What kind of pictures did you take of yourself? Jung Kook: I was just, in them. (laughs) I’m not in the shot for the Golden Closet Films either. I kind of take a back seat. The director had to shoot my parts for the music video, since I couldn’t film myself, so I relaxed a bit. I tried to make the other members look really good when I recorded them. Since this was a BTS music video and not my own, I wanted to show what was happening with every member and the team, not just one individual’s thoughts. Each person who watches the video might feel different, but I wanted to show that we feel what other people feel, that we’re in the same situation.

You get your picture taken a lot, but you don’t pay much attention to the ones you’re in. Jung Kook: I never really liked having my picture taken. (laughs) And I’m usually with the others when we’re working, obviously, but it’s hard to take a camera and take selfies. So I take pictures and videos of the other members every chance I get.

Do you still find it difficult to have your picture taken? Jung Kook: I put my best face forward when it’s for something I have to do, like  for photo books, but it’s still not easy. Videos are okay, though. And even though I’m not nervous at all when I sing in front of tens of thousands of people, if I have to sing or talk in front of a small group, I get super nervous. I never feel that way on stage, but maybe I have a hard time doing things that are a little bit awkward for me.

It seems like you draw a distinction between work you enjoy and work you find difficult. Jung Kook: Work related to music, like recording, composing, writing lyrics, filming music videos and things like that, are all fine. But anything outside of that is probably a challenge for me.

On BE, you each explained your feelings about work in the song “Dis-ease.” You must have experienced a cycle of enjoyable and difficult work over seven years, so how did you get through the hard times? Jung Kook: I actually understand my own problems well, so most of the time it’s okay. I can figure things out one at a time through experience instead of just looking for answers. I’m always growing and my personality changes, depending on my environment. I think I’ve learned to do things I used to find difficult by experiencing it little by little.

Speaking of growth, “Skit” was very memorable. You recorded it the day after “Dynamite” reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and you, who talked about what you did before you became trainees in “Skit” in your debut album,talked about being first place on the Billboard Hot 100 this time around. Jung Kook: When I was a trainee, I saw the older members rapping and thought, “Wow, they’re so cool!” But now, after having spent everyday together, I’ve forgotten about all that. (laughs) Sometimes I see the lyrics they wrote, see them dancing and hearing the things they say on stage, and think, “Oh, right. That is the kind of person they are. They’re a lot different now.” You know how you don’t feel it when you live with your family, but if you can’t see them for a long time, you miss them. You might even cry. We’re a real family. Like, legit! (laughs)

Your “legit family” (laughs) each put their own songs on BE and came up with units spontaneously. What was it like making the album that way? Jung Kook: We talked with the company over the outline of the album and organized our ideas together. That was our process for making songs. Then we’d listen to them together, and if we thought they weren’t great, we’d go back and work on them some more. The members would get together and say, “Hey, how about so and so do a unit song this time?” or, “What should it be about?” and share a lot of ideas that way.

How did the others respond to your song, “Stay”? Jung Kook: That song was originally meant to be on my mixtape. We planned to put a different song on the album, but after V heard it, he said, “This song that Jung Kook wrote is really good,” and then the other members all listened, said it was better than the other one, and somehow (laughs) “Stay” made it into the album. The message for the other song was also, “Even though we’re far apart, stay just where you are.” I wrote my song with the same theme so I loved that it was included in BE. At first, I wanted to talk about how we’re always together, using the English word “wherever.” I wanted to express how we’re always together no matter where we are, but Namjoon heard that and said “Stay” might be better. I liked his suggestion, so I changed it. He really helped me to organize my thoughts, since I’m not always good at writing everything I want to express.

One might go as far as to say the lyrics sound heartbreaking, but it’s arranged in EDM. Jung Kook: We imagined we were performing for the fans while we made it, jumping up and down with them.

It sounds like you really miss your fans. Jung Kook: This album really hit us in a different way, with this situation being what it is. Because the world is struggling with COVID-19, we have to keep our heads up and convey our messages to our fans.

What can your fans expect from you when you finally meet again? Jung Kook: There’s nothing specific, but when I watched our old performances, my facial expressions were awkward and my dance moves weren’t always perfect. I keep working to improve myself, so I hope   when the fans see me, they think my performance is amazing and that my aura fills the stage.

Are you happy with how you look in your latest work? Jung Kook: I’m not 100% satisfied, no. When we did performances for “Dynamite” recently I kept seeing my imperfections.

Your acting in the intro to your “Dynamite” performance was really impressive. Even in COVID-19 times, you captured a feeling of liveliness and being cool, as though to explain what the song is all about. Jung Kook: Actually, on the first day of filming the music video, I was supposed to film my parts first, but I was so bad that it had to be pushed to the end of the shoot. So,I was a bit more relaxed when the camera rolled.

So that’s what you get when you’re relaxed! (laughs) Jung Kook: Yes, I relaxed, and something went “pop!” and “boom!” inside me, and then I did it however I wanted. (laughs)

It’s fascinating how someone who performs the way you do during stadium tours can feel nervous while filming and yet still do so well in it. Jung Kook: I can be a shy person. When people used to ask me to sing, I couldn’t always do it—like in front of adults or teachers. And I’m still a bit like that. If I start thinking, “Oh, I can’t do this,” then I really end up not being able to do it. Even when I could have done well.

Why do you think that is? Jung Kook: I feel the same way about my dancing and my singing, and I can’t compose a really amazing melody either. I feel like I’m always somewhere in the middle. But then I also think I have my own colors, so I like to quietly, slowly open up to people, and let them know what kind of person I am. Yeah, something like that. (laughs)

But, when you review your songs and performances objectively, you see all of your changes, don’t you? Jung Kook: There’s a lot of change. My voice has changed a lot; I grew taller and my frame and facial structure have changed, too. I could tell how awkward I looked at the beginning, but after a while, I think, “My gestures look better now, but I feel like my dance is too rigid.” And again after a while, “Now my dance is fine and my gestures are good, but I’m making awkward facial expressions.” And later, I say, “Now I got the facial expressions down, but, hmm, there’s no killer move.” (laughs) That’s how I slowly changed. And then my actions, thoughts, dreams, goals, what I value, what I want to do—all these things will change depending on the situation.

You had some changes in BE, too. Throughout “Life Goes On,” you lightly carry your voice and tone throughout the whole song, like they’re flowing. Jung Kook: Right. I think that’s very important. My general feeling was my voice should be woven into the song, rather than bringing out my individual voice. The lyrics say the world stopped, but I can’t keep on being sad, and life continues and flows on. I wanted to mix a little bit of my own colors into that complex, subtle sadness. I listened to how the other members recorded their parts for the song, and I sang while thinking about how I could do it in a way that it would all blend together well. I kept changing my voice exploring how to make it sound better, cleaner. I kept trying new things while I was recording, performing, and practicing.

When you look back after all that change, don’t you feel like you accomplished a lot? Jung Kook: I don’t really pay attention to things that have already happened. I think more about what it is I need right now, so I rarely think, “I got a lot better from how I used to be,” or, “I did a good job.”

You sound insatiable, in a good way. Jung Kook: Yes. This is how I want to keep living, and I hope this feeling never fades.

You’ve found immense success with BTS. What makes you want to keep doing more and keep improving yourself? Jung Kook: I want to show people who I am: how I talk, how I act, how I sing, and so on. And after that, I want to be acknowledged for doing what I like to do, and for people to see what an amazing guy I am. I want to do these things step by step. I want to be appreciated as Jung Kook, as the real me.

What do you think is the source of that energy—the energy to keep proving yourself, even though you’ve already achieved so much with BTS? Jung Kook: I think my heart’s telling me to. BTS was able to climb this high thanks to the group members, the company and our fans. But there’s always the question of whether I could receive that kind of recognition by myself, so I have this feeling of wanting to throw myself at some challenge alone. There’s a lot I want to do, and a lot I want to achieve.

By gradually improving yourself, what kind of person would you ideally want to become? Jung Kook: A person who’s crazy awesome in their field. (laughs) Those kinds of people look cool even when they do something different. I still have a long way to go. I feel like I could be more captivating and draw more out of people by improving any number of things, by trying hard to be confident about my singing, or the way I dance and perform. BTS is way more important and meaningful to me than I am to myself, so I’m not saying I want to do anything alone. But I hope I get to the point where I can perform alone for three or four hours in a venue full of people.

It’s clear that your job, music, is very important to you. Jung Kook: I must never let it go. That’s what I always think. I have to keep it close to me, even if I get bored, or I don’t want to hear it, or it feels like a hassle. I want to keep on making music. It may be a long ways down the road, but I want to prove myself with my music.

You said before that your MBTI is ISFP, so I looked it up. Obviously, MBTI can’t sum up a person perfectly, but it says ISFPs tend to be “curious artists.” Your answer reminds me of that. Jung Kook: That sounds about right. I looked up the personality traits for ISFP too, and it was interesting. (laughs)

Maybe that’s the reason you set your goals so high. You seem like you have high standards and want to keep growing. Jung Kook: It’s like a foggy mountain top. (laughs) I can’t even see it yet.

You’ve been climbing for seven years, staying curious. Is there anything you want to say to the people who have been watching you all this time? Jung Kook: Umm … Well, there are seven of us, and the seven of us keep running ahead. So it’s possible we could get tired, one by one, and drop out, right? But if more people join us, one by one, and run with us, we can support each other and pull each other up if someone falls down. That’s kind of how I feel. There are people who supported us from the beginning who have been watching us the whole time since, and because of them our follower count keeps going up, and they all keep us on track. So the only thing I can say is—thank you. We were nothing special, really (laughs) but they keep on liking us and supporting us, and the best way we can repay them is to give them our all through our music and our performances. They push me to work hard, even on things I find difficult. (laughs) I’m eternally grateful.

Just like in the last line of “Stay.” Jung Kook: “We are together.”

Trans © Weverse

#bangtan #jungkook #weverse #weverse magazine #be album #comeback interview #201127 #2020

[thepriceofbeingaroseisloneliness]

GIGS No519 Interview Toshiya [Bass]

Despite the hidden gimmick elements in the new single “Oboro”, which brings to the fore “simplicity” and “clearness”, Toshiya’s bass sound has a strong presence. With his words, we are going to start the second half of the solo interviews.

“[Oboro] is a song that holds both DIR EN GREY’s essence and novelty. For me, rather than that uniqueness and novelty, I felt this is going to be the core song of the album.”

Notes before reading: This is Toshiya’s solo interview from GIGS No519 June issue released on April 27th. 

You can buy the magazine at Amazon Japan.  Feel free to correct me if you spot any mistakes or any confusing parts. Links or credits to this post when the content is reposted or captured in other SNS is appreciated :) ----------------- *Toshiya’s interview comes after Kaoru’s, Die’s and an analysis of the latest gear, that’s why in the introduction of his interview the “second half” of the solo interviews is mentioned.* Text by Yukinobu Hasegawa Photos by Reishi Eguma. -You were already composing and arranging songs for the new album and from that, “Oboro” was first announced as a single. What kind of mindset did you have when you tried to move on to the next album from the previous one “The Insulated World”,released in 2018? T: At the beginning, I didn’t have any specific image of the album as a whole. -I think you want that (image) to appear naturally while you are doing the creation work. T: That’s right but as I feel like I’m always making songs, whenever I start, I only have the mindset of “let’s make something good”. -The songs you composed (from early stage) have not been released to the world yet but, what kind of songs did you make? T: Surprisingly, simple songs. Not very detailed. But I think it depends on the song. I started writing songs thinking I wanted to make something different from the previous DIR EN GREY, but there were some parts that seemed too different for me. So, I feel like I'm still searching for the direction of them. -Looking back at the various songs that you’ve made in the past, I feel like you tend to prefer an avant-garde* approach. So, I was a little surprised when you told me you were working on a simple song.

* Avant-garde is a tend for music that  sounds nothing like the music we're accustomed to, experimental, considered to be at the forefront of innovation. T: Ah, I see. But basically, I think I'm a simple person. I've made songs that feel avant-garde but it’s just that such songs were easy to be accepted/used (by the band). I don't know the specific reason, but I think it's probably because the range of the band will be expanded. However, many of the songs I make myself are very simple. -Even if you say "simple", I think people feel differently about it. For example, Shinya also says his drum playing is “simple" but it's actually very difficult.  How does that simplicity that you mentioned feel for you? T: That's right…..I'm wondering how to describe it, but to put it simply, it may not be something very DIR EN GREY-ish. I think many of the simple songs I make are like that. -What do you think that is “DIR EN GREY-ish”? T: Our band is probably "heavy" or "intense"…. Another things that is often said (about the band) is “complexity”, I think that’s the image of the band. With that in mind, the songs I make aren't very DIR EN GREY-ish. Of course, when I write a song, I'm aware of that. -Do you dare to make something that it’s far apart from those ideas? T: It’s the other way round. I’m not trying to do something close to that, but I’m like “I have to take it in the direction of DIR EN GREY a little more". But from that point on, I started thinking, "How about getting too close?”, "It's more interesting to be in a slightly different place." Well, I might just think those things on my own (laughs). -Are the avant-garde songs born from those thoughts? I think musical input and stimulation are also important when you are composing.  In 2020, we were in a situation in which you couldn’t do many public activities but, how did you get that input during that time? T: Basically, even with this corona situation, there are some things that haven’t changed much. If I had to say something, I can spend more time on composition and production as there are no tours or live performances. Regarding the input part, it seems to have changed, but I feel like it hasn't changed. Besides, I don’t think it’s something I’m conscious about so, I haven’t changed anything in my music because of Corona. -Last year in August, “Ochita koto no aru Sora” was released in a digital format but, I think this song has a complex pattern in the development of the next step. What was in your mind when you were arranging and recording this song? T: Riffs are also the main melody of the song so I basically listened to the guitar riffs and arranged it so I could put my own play in some parts. In terms of sound making, there isn’t much change. Making in a basic way the feeling of my favourite distortion, it feels like mixing various things there. -For the past few years, you've been actively experimenting with various bass effectors every time you record, but have you tried several of these in the "Ochita koto no aru Sora" recording? T: Basically, I don’t remember which one I used anymore (laughs), but the basic system hasn’t changed, the head is an ampeg cabinet from the 70s, I think it was SWR. In the recording of the previous album "The Insulated World" the bass I used was also a dingwall one. That bass can be used for almighty (pedal). *1.A bass cabinet is the box with the speaker.   2.Ampeg is a manufacturer best known for its bass amplifiers.   3.SWR Sound Corporation is a specialist manufacturer of bass guitar       amplifiers, preamps, speaker cabinets, and acoustic guitar amplifiers.  4.  Dingwall Designer Guitars is a  canadian manufacturer of bass guitars.  5.  Almightty is driver pedal for bass.

- “Ochita koto no aru Sora” was a song with a positive message. Did you find a new direction as a band giving shape to this song?

T: There might some different aspects now but at that time, it may not have changed. I don't think we can completely overlook that, so I can't say anything about it. However, “Ochita koto no aru Sora” itself was made completely to be a single. That's why there may be new things, but surprisingly, I have a strong sense of putting out what was inside us in that way. In what way is it the opposite? Does it feel “new”?

-There are various elements, but I feel that each one is like DIR EN GREY-ish. However, it resonates very much that the lyrics leads from a negative perspective to a positive one.

T: I see. Regarding the lyrics, I think it’s a continuation of the taste of other songs we’ve done so far, but I don’t know because I haven’t asked. However, although the flow of the lyrics are not the same in content, I felt like it was written from a close place.

-The song that follow this one is the new single “Oboro”. Kaoru wrote the original melody but, what was your impression when you first listened to it?

T: I don't think it's much different from the finished form in terms of feelings. The intro had this kind of atmosphere from the beginning. I think it's a song that holds both DIR EN GREY’s essence and newness. However, I personally felt that "this is the core song in the album" rather than being unique or new. As a result, “Oboro” became a single, but at first it wasn’t written with that purpose. We suddenly talked abour releasing a single and after that, as we all agreed that it was a good song for that, we decided to choose it as a single.

-From what part of the song did you feel that it was going to be the core of the album?

T: I felt that this ballad-type atmosphere and feeling really stands out in the album. Because of that, we decided to release it as a single, but we haven't released many singles like this, so I think it made a good change.

-The fact that you feel that  a ballad with a melody  it's going to be the core of the album….does that mean that the other songs are the opposite of it? It seems to be quite an atmosphere where this amazing song was born! (laughs)

T: Well, I can't say anything about that because not all of them have come out yet (laughs). However, it's easier to make a slightly up-tempo songs, so I wonder if there are many songs like that for now. Even if I actually make a song, I don't know if it will be included in the album, so I can't really say anything about the direction of the album or the feeling of the songs. However, "Ochita koto no aru Sora" was made to become a single, so there are a lot of parts of it that hit the target. And as for "Oboro", I felt that it was meant to be release as a single, but also that it was meant to be kept for the album.

-For example, do you change the arrangements and the bass approach if it's an album song or a single song?

T: Yes, it changes. It's completely different for me if is going to be a single or if it is going to be a song for the album. Even if I make  the original melody, it’s different on how much time it takes. Singles are harder to do. You can work more relaxed if it is a  the song for the album. For singles, I feel that the part I am aiming for as a bassist is very strong at the time of elaborating the arrangement.

“If you think that everyone has slowed down in many ways, I think you can start running again. I think it's better to act than to think. So, I'm looking forward to the future.”

-Did you do a lot of trial and error in your part when you made the bass arrangement for "Oboro"?

T: It’s really a minor part. It feels like the details are boiled down when it seems to be a bass phrase like that in a rough flow. The bass in the demo of the original song had many root-playing (basic) phrases so, how to elaborate them from there? what do to with the cadence?  However, “Oboro” has a bass line that snuggles up to the song, I think this phrase has the strongest awareness of song melody.

-While focusing on that sustain-based roots playing components, some bass phrase will come up when you are doing the arrangements but won’t turn out very showy. And when it comes to the ending of the song, it will show fierceness while increasing the distortion of the sound. I felt it was a carefully selected phrasing.

T: I think it’s easier to hear it at the ending of the song, but that distortion is actually there during the whole song. Not only the ending part is distorted but also the beginning. However, when all the instruments came together, I don’t think that distorted feeling could be properly heard. Even if it's distorted that much, surprisingly, it goes well easily. I usually have two patterns at the time of recording. For example, even if you use the same distortion effect, the distortion is applied with a little shallow sound like a hunting sound. So, this time, it was a way of finding what I felt comfortable with when it got mixed with the sound of the band.

-So the reason why you can’t hear that distortion in the first half or the middle of the song is because it got completely blended once the sound of the band got together?

T: That's right. I think there is a perception that if it is distorted, the sound will inevitably be drawn into it. However, if it's distorted that much, it gives a plump low feeling and you can see the phrase. It's simply because we don't stack as many guitars as we used to. Sometimes the sound of each instrument can be heard firmly, so the approach can be focused on what you want to hear. To put it simply, I think it's a big thing that the direction of the band has become simpler. So, in recent years, I think the balance of the band is very good at the time of put together each member’s part. I think that vocals are especially attractive in "Oboro".

-Kyo is very fast adding the lyrics, I’ve heard that he finished recording his part before the instruments  (recording) were done.

T: That's right. "Oboro" already had the vocals done at the stage of recording the bass. However, although he recorded it first, in the end this part will be the last one. After all, it seems that there are parts  he wants to record again once the other parts (instruments) are added. However, even if it is not the final form of the lyrics, if they are already included, the nuance of the phrase will change. Maybe it’s the same with the other members. I think everyone ends up arranging their parts for the lyrics.

-So, the idea was to keep the bass of "Oboro" as simple as possible?

T: Whether you're playing or listening, it was a simple form that seemed comfortable. I think a phrase that requires a lot of work is also good. If there is a song that suits that idea, I wonder if I should take a laborious approach. In that aspect, I thought the dynamic of “Oboro” feels as pleasant as possible. However, I was allowed to play a bit with it. I think the proportion and the sense of balance are also good.

-Did you choose to record some takes while changing your approach?

T: "Oboro" was decided by the current phrase from the time I did pre-production work at home.So, when I recorded in the the band's pre-production room, I just made a few minor corrections when I made the actual recording. As for the mix,  regarding my part, it was a good feeling from the beginning

-Neal Avron has been appointed as a mix engineer this time. Did his mixing work significantly change the nuances of the bass sound?

 T: It has changed. But the biggest change depending on the engineer is the sound of the drums. More like, I feel that the personality of the engineer can be understood in this aspect. Personally, I think the vivid and deep sound of the "Oboro" drums is good.

-A remake of your song "T.D.F.F" is recorded as one of the couplings. What kind of mindset did you have approaching this song including the arrangement?

T: As always, I thought about the phrase from the perspective of what it would sound like if it were done by my current self. When we do a remake, I listen to the original version of the song to confirm what I was playing at that time. Sometimes it's interesting to discover that I was playing it live with the wrong idea(laughs).

-The person that you were at that time is brought back as well?

T: There are times that happens when we rethink our approach. It was like this at that time, but I think it's different to do this phrase now, or to do it with a different feeling. Some of the old songs are due to youth, I have a variety of knowledge and experience now. So, there are times when I change to an approach with a completely different interpretation, and there are parts where I want to play faithfully to the original. For example, keep faithful to the main phrase that  would change everything if you changed that. At the time of "THE UNRAVELING" (released in April 2013), I had a strong desire to change everything if I wanted to remake it, so I changed it completely, but in recent years I have been thinking about the original carefully and the idea is to put my current sense into that. Because when you're making a song, it's your song, but it's not only yours. In that case, it’s better to capture our thoughts and the memories and the thoughts of the fans together in order to shape that song in a good way. If you want to make a bold change, I think you should use that idea to create a new song with it.

-The other coupling song is a live track from the concert without audience at Meguro Rockmaykan. What do you remember about this?

T: It's one of the first stages I've stood on since I became a member of DIR EN GREY, but the Rockmaykan with no audience felt strange. When the live starts, there is only one thing to do, so it's not much different from usual. But I’m not sure if there is something extra in it. It’s not about the call and response (from the audience), I think that the tension inside me is different depending if there are fans or not. After all it is more interesting to have audience. It can also inspire you. I think that such a form of live is also a possibility in times of Corona, but it doesn’t have to be like this every time. However, I learned a lot from this new experience with this new way of expression. Besides, it was a confirmation that there are various things that can be done in a situation like this.

-After this, there is a concert with audience on May 6th. How are you feeling now?

T: I'm looking forward to it and I'm happy. Above all, I am very grateful to be able to perform in front of the audience. Something that used to be normal is not normal anymore, so I wish I could do it with a new feeling.I think the world has simply changed due to Corona. Until now, everyone was running, and I think there was a huge difference between each person’s position. However, because it's all gone, to put it the other way around, everyone restarted from the same position. How does each person perceive that? Of course, the negative effects of corona are huge, but just thinking negatively does not change anything. So, if you think that everyone has slowed down in many ways, I think you can start running again. I think it's better to act than to think. So, I'm looking forward to the future.

#dir en grey #toshiya #translation #gigs #oboro #toshiyatranslations