#lei's npc friends

[eiseryn]

Modern AU Outfit Designs (Lei ft. NPC friends)

Back on my outfit design BS, but this time for outfits in the modern AU. I've written a little stuff (fanfiction???) for the modern AU which takes place in a university setting!

Throughout her university and med school days, Lei actually had long hair! So in the modern AU, I decided to draw her hair long~ Also it really hits different 🥺 She's cute with short hair too but long hair Lei feels younger and softer to me.

For the outfit, I wanted to make winter/autumn outfit designs for another series of drawings I'm actually working on (I have like 50 bajillion WIPS) and so I made these as concept art / outfit designs. I wanted to include plaid elements so for Lei, her skirt is a green plaid! She's also wearing sheer tights, which is something she really likes, and she has some sort of heat-tech thermal white turtleneck as well as a fluffy probably sherpa wool? jacket but I didn't play with the textures enough for that (whoops). She's wearing white heeled boots the same colour as her turtleneck. She likes wearing heels cuz she's not very tall (158.5cm but she says she's 160cm when people ask). She also has a diamond shaped green dangly necklace - I like drawing her with diamond shaped green gems.

And of course, I designed her friends' outfits to be matching. I really wanted to have a plaid element among all four of them, and I realize that the four of them together are red, yellow, green, blue.🥺 Like sports day colours or something.

I designed Elise first, and gave her a classic red plaid circle scarf - those were super popular a few years ago! I decided to give her some red plaid legwarmers as well to add some colour to her otherwise plain suede jacket and black jeans/leggings (not sure which one it is). Her hair ribbons are red too, but I didn't put plaid in them (too small). She has a pretty simple outfit, because I imagine she wears simple but classy clothing. The Keeper (COC DM) later described her style as dark academia though, so I think I might draw her in some stuff like that later!

Ceres was pretty hard to design TBH. I wanted to give her a long skirt because she is shy and I thought it would be cute! I gave her fleece leggings under for the warmth. I also wanted to give her an accessory which I decided to be a headband which goes super well with the bangs that cover her face (in my opinion). I made them both yellow plaid, but the long plaid skirt contrasts and matches with Lei's short plaid skirt (bestie things 🥺 - Lei totally made them buy matching outfits). She has brown leather cowboy boots because fashion~ I wanted to give her a short jacket to contrast her long skirt and this is where I struggled I ended up making it the brown of her boots and added fur trim for a more winter/warm look. She's also wearing fur ball earrings because I wanted her to have a sort of fluffy look to her.

Vail! He looks so soft anime boy here and I love that 💅 I wanted to give him a simple parka with the inner lining of it to be the blue plaid so he'd match the rest of Lei's friends with the whole plaid design. I gave him jeans with a thigh belt which COULD be a gift from someone (👀👀👀if you know what I mean). Underneath the black parka I just threw on a simple winter turtleneck sweater to contrast all the black. I imagine it's pretty warm and made of thicc wool/ knitted material. I threw on some silver dog-tag/chain necklaces to ~ accessorize ~ a little more since he wears small silver earrings (apparently).

And voila! We're at the end of my unhinged rant about fashion/ outfit design! I'm sorry that I did not try to draw hands here. It's true I draw them badly anyways but I really didn't try this time. Sowwy.

#oc #my oc #lei #outfit design #modern au #original character #cyberpunk coc #some are also #not my ocs #vail #ceres #elise #eiseryn #eiserynn #oc lore dump #yes more lore dumps again this tumblr is for me to exclusively ramble on about my ocs we been knew #long post #lei's friends #lei's npc friends #oc outfit design #my art #sketches #coloured sketches #sketch

[meeeeeeese]

Moose's Guide to Quick and Easy Gold

So I get the vibes in the community here that a bunch of people don't really know all the tips and tricks to making easy money, so I thought I'd do a writeup on some of the small ways I make gold in Guild wars 2

Trick 1: You have wealth you don't know about

An inportant thing about Gw2 is that a lot of the wealth it gives out isn't in actual gold but in materials that you can then sell for gold. For a lot of people I think its easy to just click 'deposit all materials' and then forget about it. For me personally I have only 100 gold in my wallet but If I were to empty out my material storage I'd gain an additional 300 or so gold. The site GW2 efficiency is really helpful for telling you what high value items you might be holding on to, though It takes a bit of setting up.

Trick 2: Sell Orders!

Admittedly this is something I'm bad about, but if you can delay your gratification, but when you sell something don't fulfill someone elses buy order and instead, set up a sell order. I'll give you up to 10% more gold out of everything you sell

Ok now onto the acutal wealth generation methods

Trick 3: Send your least favorite character to the New Kaineng Jumping Puzzle

Jumping Puzzles in EoD reward jade runestones from their final chest, which go for 80 silver on the trading post.

Find the wiki page to get you through the jumping puzzle here, though there are often commanders on the New Kaineng lfg offering teleport to friend transport to the end of the puzzle. Basically you get a character to the end chest and every reset log in on that character and get your free! runestone, almost a gold for ~30 seconds of work

(as a note you only get the runestone once per day per account so don't send multiple characters there)

Trick 4: Leivas Hands out Gold, make sure to collect it

Ok not actually but he may as well. So this guy who hangs out in Arborstone, once you've gotten the Globalization mastery, will sell you 5 antique summoning stones every week for a grand total of 10 green prophet shards, 10 unusual coins, 100 imperial favours, 7000 karma and 1 gold. The summoning stones can then be sold on for ~3 gold each, netting you a profit of 14 gold for going up to an npc and pressing 'f' (or whatever your interact key is)

Trick 5: fast and profitable metas you should be doing daily

Let me introduce you to my favorite wiki page:

the event timers list

This lists out every meta event and world boss that'll be happening soon and all of them will give you at least something, and the meta's from HoT onwards awards you a hero's choice chest that'll contain at least one of these valuable materials to choose from: amalgamated gemstone (60 silver), jade runestone (80 silver), ancient ambergris (1 gold 70 silver) or an antique summoning stone (3 gold). It should be noted the last 3 only appear in the EoD meta's, for all other times choose the amalgamated gemstone.

With that aside there are 3 events in particular that you should try to get done that'll take 10 minutes or less

first up is the Legendary Ley-Line Anomaly, the naked man. The timer's page tells you which zone it'll spawn in and when it does you have to seek it out and murder it. Mounts are very recommended because this thing dies fast. Anyway when you kill it, it drops 2 things: a mystic coin (1 gold 20 silver) and some vendor trash worth 50 silver, pretty gold for 5 minutes of work

next is Dragonstorm. It happens once every 2 hours starting from the eye of the north and affords you the opportunity to beat up Ryland. If you join the public option you join a crowd of up to 50 other people and its easy enough that you could even afk if you wanted (though that would be very rude). Anyway once you murder the champions and blast the dragons you get to watch them share a passionate kiss as the die and you then get 2 gold straight up, 6 memories of aurene (worth 1.5 gold in total) as well as a chance to win the lottery and get ascended weapons or, even rarer, the very expensive eye infusions

Finally is Tequatl the Sunless, a world boss in Sparkfly Fen that awards you 1 gold straight up as well as a chance at an ascended weapon as well as a bunch of materials and unidentified gear

speaking of which all the other events give unidentified gear too and they aren't actually terrible rewards, you can get a pretty penny from selling them.

Trick 6: Daily Rewards

Firstly, just logging in every day gives you a sadly decent amount of income, mostly in laurels and mystic coins. Coins can just be sold if you're after cold, laurels can be spent on a variety of stuff. And if you're looking to turn a profit, HERE are the best ways to do so.

Also, do your daily achievements people, sometimes they're a pain but the daily completionist gives 2 gold as well as 15 achievement points, more than most other achievements in the game. Also they drive you towards content you wouldn't do otherwise (the daily achievements are the reason why I've done most of the jumping puzzles). Also If you're bad at any of the dailies on offer, usually a bunch of other people are also trying to do dailies and they're often willing to help. I see mesmers porting people through the daily JPs all the time.

Trick 7: Spirit shards can be converted to Gold???

I admit, this isn't something I do myself but if you're accumulating spirit shards like I am there are methods to turn them into gold

They're listed HERE

(again, this isn't something I've tried myself, I can't vouch for how well it works and all the methods require a starting amount of gold. But if you're desperate it might be something to consider

But I want more Gold, how do I get it?

If your looking for serious gold farming there are probably better guides than this but here are a few pointers to start raking in the money

1: As far as I understand, Drizzlewood Coast is the most profitable activity in the game, gold per hour wise. Runs take a while and you kind of have to pay attention to maximise gains but, if gold's what you want this is a good option.

2: Look for meta trains, I notice them happening a lot around reset, basically its a group that goes from meta to meta doing them in sequence. There are a few guilds that do them every day so if you see a train, chances are its on at the same time every day. I find them to be pretty chill, offer some nice variety in content and offer good rewards as well.

3: Fractals. Yeah I know this is getting into endgame content but doing T4 fractal dailies every day gives you around 20 gold straight up, a bunch of materials worth even more gold and a decent chance at ascended armor and weapons (and so many ascended trinkets, seriously at this point they get auto-salvaged if they drop)

Apart from that, pretty much everything in this game gives you some amount of rewards, even if they aren't entirely obvious, so don't stress too much, provided you aren't roleplaying in the serrated blade or whatever (Though good on you for having fun!) you're likely earning some amount of income. Even if it's only in materials

#gw2 #guild wars 2 #gw2 gold farming #There are better guides scattered throughout the internet #searching up 'Gw2 best ways to make gold' will probably yield results #though make sure to choose recent results to avoid outdated guides #but dammit I wanted to write something down myself #so I did. Enjoy #If you have any other tricks feel free to let me know

[brax-was-here]

GW2 Question time:

#guild wars 2 #gw2 #poll

[wellthebardsdead]

How all my dragonborns sound/their accents:

Poppy: yeehaw cowboy Cole Cassidy. I’m not even joking Poppy isn’t just my character but he’s a shared Oc amongst my dnd group who all enjoy both the elder scrolls and Overwatch. Our dm made him purely because he wanted a cowboy cyborg dwemer npc so he could practice his Cole Cassidy impression and he loves how we’ve all adopted him as our own in so many different ways.

Bass: Extremely deep baritone voice with a slight African accent. Though with his voice regulator on he sounds closer to South African or English with a very robotic undertone.

Henwen: A deep but very soft spoken voice with a Welsh English accent that can quickly switch to old Norse Viking when he’s tapped into his atmoran roots and screaming a battle cry that could send enemies running as they shit themselves.

Riiju-Lei: A Nordic accent but with hints of argonian roughness and occasional dunmer inflections. He’s a polyglot and often jumbles words from different languages but he’s often very gentle in his tone if not a bit direct.

Shamat: Soft spoken dunmeri accent teetering on Australian. His voice is quite deep but as a healer and someone wanting to befriend all he tends to lower his tone to a softer more approachable level.

Flynt: Irish, English/American accent. Raised in Cyrodiil he grew up knowing bosmeri thanks to his father and other bosmer in the community but due to how heavily ostracised they were at the time he adapted a more imperial accent. Though get him flustered and angry enough and he will quickly switch back to his bosmeri/Irish accent. He’s very confident in himself and in what he wants, though once he’s blinded and loses his ability to speak hes left only able to communicate through slurred and sad attempts at speech. Made even harder if he’s upset.

Dune: A very deep but surprisingly eloquent orcish voice, not as rough as most orcs but still capable of growling low enough to emphasise a point. Less of a barbarian and more of a mage/healer he speaks quite softly but can be confident among friends.

Aurorwren: his accent is a mix between Greek/Roman & old English. He’s very confident in himself and presents it clearly with how he speaks but around those he cares deeply for, particularly humans, he’s very softly spoken not wanting to be perceived as a threat to them in any way. Especially given his peoples reputation for cruelty.

Sylas: Welsh/English. He is rough and irritable at the best of times towards everyone except for Taliesin. His voice is deep and husky and he will use it in any way he can to seduce, persuade or intimidate others to get what he wants. But when alone with Taliesin and holding him tight the meanest he’ll get is a low growl in his ear during the throws of passion.

Vivienne: dunmeri/imperial accent, he spent most of his life in the city of blacklight but picked up English through the dwindling imperial influence throughout the city. Quite softly spoken and sweet when at peace. Under extreme distress voice will dip into Vivec’s voice, echoing with both his own and his past incarnation.

Marigold: English accent, formerly bosmeri/Irish. His fathers cruelty and etiquette lessons literally beat his accent into him. He’s clearly spoken and can be authoritative in his tone if needs be and he’s not afraid to be cutting with his words either. When physically weakened or vulnerable however, he can be very soft spoken displaying he needs gentle care.

Shen Lung: Mandarin/Nepali accent. Living his whole life on the isolated island of Akavir he’s unfamiliar with the imperial language adopted all across mainland tambriel however he is a polyglot and knows all the languages on his homeland from Akaviri, to the snake folk tongue, to his own Tang Mo. He’s a fast learner and picks up how to speak from interactions with team dragonborn. His voice is quite deep but softly spoken with a playful lilt. When startled he will scream like a monkey and if left with his thoughts will sometimes chirp like a marmoset or smaller primate.

Evalien: Modern Working class Australian accent. She’s from our world and has and will call Nazeem a cunt to his face.

Naria: Māori accent. He’s generally very friendly and approachable with his tone and accent, easily pulling anybody in with it and making them a friend. Under water however he clicks, trills and groans out like a dolphin or whale.

Wyrm: English accent. Growing up in the collage of winterhold with access to endless knowledge and tutoring he’s a polyglot and very eloquent in several languages including his native dunmeri. He has a soft, kind voice and it matches his introverted nature, however he can speak clearly and authoritatively if needs be. With his adopted father Urag however, he’s like any teenager and will whine and complain if he doesn’t get his way~

#skyrim #ocs #dwemer dragonborn #bosmer dragonborn #dunmer dragonborn #Altmer dragonborn #falmer dragonborn #maormer dragonborn #Ayleid dragonborn #tang mo dragonborn

[ofonikabutobeetlesandmen]

A Summary of known Sumeru lore (crumbs) before 3.0 drops

Just the daily dose of Sumeru crumbs to make the wait slightly more bearable. In the last stretch of patches before we go to our next region. Idk about you guys, but I think I’m only going to look at the concept art of Sumeru whenever it’s shown to us. Otherwise, I’m going to ignore anything else, leaks included and explore Sumeru blindly!

Whichever you guys decide to do, I hope we all just enjoy the new region and element as a whole

About Kusanali

The youngest of the Seven, ascend five hundred years ago after the death of the previous Dendro Archon

Also known as the Flower Archon as well as Lesser Lord Kusanali as a term of affection from her people (in Chinese, this nickname is actually ‘Lucky Little Grass King/Monarch’)

According to Sayid during the Windblume Festival event in 1.4, the Sabzeruz Festival is a celebration in Sumeru that commemorates the birth of Kusanali (but whether or not this is birth in the literal sense or her ascending to godhood is not elaborated)

According to Vahid, she’s the creator of the Anahitian Blessing which is a fertilizer he claims can revitalize any barren land

About the God of the Woods

Suspected to be the previous Dendro Archon as they died during the cataclysm five hundred years ago which is when the God of Wisdom ascended

When they were alive, the trees, grass, and mud could whisper and speak but after their death, they stopped speaking

About Sumeru + the Academia 

Sumeru’s geography is a mixture of forest and desert according to Liben from the Marvelous Merchandise event and Lisa’s character stories

Eremites are a mercenary group from Sumeru and some in its ranks have strange powers. Some NPCs like Zhiqiong find their philosophies admirable, others like Nazafarin view them negatively

Xamaran, the large glowing mushroom from the Chasm, originally comes from Sumeru but it isn’t known how they got there

Knowledge is treated as a resource there, but as to whether or not that is due to the Archon herself or the Sages, is unknown

“Connections are far more precious than gold” is a Sumeru saying and some like Khedive go as far as considering repaying someone with gold rather than more knowledge or ability to obtain more knowledge as an insult (much to the Traveler’s chagrin)

Unsurprisingly as the Nation of Wisdom, Sumeru houses the leading schools in Teyvat, the most reknown being the Sumeru Academia which dates back to even before the cataclysm 

It’s so well-reknown, that students from around the world will leave their homes in order to attend the Academia

Rosalyne-Kruzchka Lohefalter, aka La Signora/The Crimson Witch, was once a student of the Academia

Lisa is another Academia alumni and she is considered the best student the Academia has seen in the past two centuries, graduating in only 2 years when it can take well over two decades for the average student to graduate

However, Lisa grew disillusioned with the pursuit of knowledge during her time in Sumeru witnessing raving mad scholars and underutilized sages. She then left and went back to Mondstadt, becoming a simple librarian

Cyno, a Sumeru native, is another Sumeru Academia researcher and an old acquaintance of Lisa’s, seen in the Teyvat Travail trailer and in the official Genshin manga

Collei is another Sumeru native who was a test subject of the Fatui who had archon residue placed within her. Thanks to Cyno, that power has been sealed and she has since returned to Sumeru

But as to what she has been up to since returning to her homeland, we don’t know but she is referenced in a Cat Tail’s Message Board sign as a girl wrapped in bandages

She’s good friends with Amber

Within the Academia there are Six Darshans that have their own foci students study but only a few are known to us

Spantamad/Aramati which specializes in studying the elements and the ley lines

Haravatat, which specializes in studying ancient runes

Amurta, unspecified specialty but theorized to be  related to ecology and plant life

Anisa, a traveling scholar in Watatsumi Island, notes being part of the Oceanographic Society 

There are different roles and progressions within the Academia

Driyosh traveling scholars

Dastur formal researchers

Herbad prestigious researchers with leadership positions 

Sages those who sit on seats in the council, possibly a ruling class

Gliders are illegal

#genshin impact #genshin #lesser lord kusanali #kusanali #dendro archon #dendro #god of wisdom #god of the woods #viridescent venerer #sayid #soraya #nazafarin #zhiqiong #sumeru #archon quests

[obscureaestheticist]

Dark Con & Succession War Characters as Players & GMs

Ging: Derailing god. Knows a pirating / rom site for everything. Adores Pathfinder and 3.5e but runs games as if Tomb of Horrors was just easy mode. Pariston: "It's what my character would do :)" Lamentations enthusiast. Leorio [current arc]: Channels the power of thesis block to destroy hordes of bandits. Cheadle: Strategic player who looks on in despair at their chaotic and extremely violent comrades. T-T Mizaistom: T-posing human fighter that somehow keeps pulling off the most significant moments in the campaign. Beyond: That one tiktok friend who cosplays as their character for each session and runs campaigns like theatrical wrestling performances. That vocal training has gotta be used for something! Muherr: Army vet, seen a lotta stuff, but runs the most heartfelt and hopeful campaigns you'll ever play. 7th Sea Gm. Steiner: Sweetest guy you know, writes the most terrifying mysteries ever. Pure unfiltered neurosis expressed through Call of Cthulhu and World of Darkness. Kurapika [current arc]: 3rd life-changing trauma this week "Sure! I can make it for Friday!" Melody: In it for the deep pan crispy lore. Makes the maps out of love. Can't play an evil character the save their life. Has mountains of Solo-RPG journals of wonderous adventures. Hanzo: Falls into the habit of down-to-Earth friendly characters that sling death threats and "comedic violence" at everyone to the point of awkwardness. Shall avenge every minor NPC the gm forgot to name. Basho: Doesn't own a single rpg book that doesn't also double as an art book. Bill: "That game from Stranger Things?" Theta: Evokes awe from fellow players for her RP skills. Greater knowledge of in-game politics than the actual DM. One Ring and Game of Thrones RPG enjoyer. Tserriednich: Tonight's Session - The GMs Barely-Disguised Fetish ... Kult & Drakar och Demoner for life. Benjamin: WILL apply real military strategies to your game regardless of setting and character. YES! He will bring diagrams! YES! You should be concerned! Twilight: 2000 nut. Zhang Lei: Chill. Enjoying the vibes. Simply awaiting the fruition of his diabolical schemes to spring into action... Once every other player is done with their wacky flumph hijinks. Camilla: Dungeon Bitches & Mork Borg. Throwing hands. Fuck everything else. Fireball isn't enough. Stay away from the loot. Halkenburg: Heart of gold, but tries waaaaay too hard to help the fantasy world he's meant to just be smacking trolls around in. Kacho & Fugetsu: Supports queer indie ttrpgs and are currently trying to figure out where to store all the gigabytes of pdfs. Hinrigh: "Yes, this is a rip off of all my favorite anime characters and I love them :D" Zakuro: Too shy to speak up, didn't realize they missed 5 turns. Lynch: Screw politeness, fists are all you need to ask questions. Morena: The "Nice Girl" Oito: "I just hope the game contains no foul language. Do we need a console?" Woble: The group mascot

#spoilers #hxh #hunter x hunter #hxh headcanons #headcanon #help i've been rewatching the whole series #succession war arc #dark continent arc #kurapika #terror sandwich #tserriednich #hinrigh #leorio #ging hxh #pariston hxh #cheadle yorkshire #mizaistom #kacho hui guo rou #fugetsu hui guo rou #hxh spoilers

[incoherentmuses]

more OSHA posting? more OSHA posting! (tagging @controlledchaosetc and @itusebastian, since you seemed interested, lmk if you wanna be untagged!)

so there have been a lot of Good Good Goofs and Bits over the years i’ve been DM-ing these boys. so many. too many, one might argue. but today let me pull one from the early days. an OSHA classic, if you will. a story i like to call:

The Seven Bats Incident

a quick premise, to get you up to speed. this is set during my first ever campaign, which i, in my infinite wisdom, decided to homebrew. a magical cataclysm has split the land of Ormana into ley-line divided sections, an incident called The Shattering. Magic has gone very wild in the years of this cataclysm, such that every spell cast, regardless of caster class, has a chance to ping on a Wild Magic table.

in this dangerous time, the PC’s have worked their way towards the heart of the cataclysm, and find themselves in a place where the wobbly magic has conjured eternal darkness across the land. they also find themselves in a magical college, where the headmistress is trying to deal with two problems: keeping a school of magic safe during a magical cataclysm; and vampires.

the school had a vampire problem. a creature of the night kept feeding on students and they hadn’t been able to figure out who the vampire was. with several suspicious characters around, including a bitchy, somewhat cagey, enchantment teacher, and a dubious necromancy professor, OSHA set to work trying to uncover the vampire in their midst.

now, readers. there was also a library in this school, because of course there was. and that library had a librarian - a sweet little tabaxi lady called Seven Bats. Her daughter was the groundskeeper, whom the PC’s had already befriended, and she was very helpful in letting the PC’s look through her books regarding the main plot they were still tracking down.

with progress on the vampire hunt going slowly, Draghull - at the time still a paladin - decides to perform a very good goof. He’ll cast ‘detect evil’ on Seven Bats the librarian because ‘wouldn’t it be really funny if the character with the bat name was the vampire?’

he casts the spell.

evil is detected.

the evil is undead.

‘Holy shit,’ he says. ‘I didn’t think that would work.’

now, gentle reader, i was frustrated at this point because i, resident dumbass that i am, had not realised that i had given my vampire an Extremely Obvious Vampire Name. I just got it off a generator! i made the npcs for the school and assigned one of them Vampire Chores later!

‘fuck!’ I said

‘fuck!’ Seven Bats said.

the whole school then descended into uproar as the party fought, chased, and finally caught Seven Bats. One failed de-vampire-ing ritual later, she was destroyed and the day was saved!

no-one was happy about it. she’d been turned into a vampire by the Shattering, and her daughter was understandably upset that her new friends just killed her mum. but there were no more vampires in the school, and the headmistress was so pleased she forgave the party their other trespasses (summoning a parasauralophus into the dining hall, the monk getting teleported into the roof and leaving a big hole, etc etc)

eventually OSHA got the Plot Info they needed and moved on to less eternally dark pastures. and my players have never, and will never, let me forget the time i named a secret vampire Seven fucking Bats.

#dnd stories #osha dnd #dungeons and dragons #dnd #ttrpg #losing that parasauralophus was the biggest tragedy of draghull respeccing into fighter tbh #i cannot recommend enough a campaign premise that lets you roll wild magic so often #unlimited comedy potential

[anchored-trident]

Community-building Tag Game

Tagged by: @quigonsjeans

Name: Real names? In this economy??? Call me Trident

Pronouns: he/him

Where do you call home? Currently holed up in Fullerton, southern California, although I am very eagerly planning to move to Concord, NH in the next 12-15 months (depending on finances)

Favorite animal: I'm going to be boring here and say cats... even though both cats I've owned have died... Primarily because they don't lick you and slobber all over you

Cereal of choice: Trix, but like, the old, classic Trix. From like, 2015. The good Trix

Are you a visual, auditory, or kinesthetic learner? 80% visual, 20% kinesthetic. Audio means nothing to me. Fun fact: I can't/won't actually commit to learning somebody's name until I've either seen it written down, or I asked them to spell it out so I can visualize their written name in my mind (like actual letters on a whiteboard)

First pet: I had a fish. It died. It was a very long time ago. I'm not sure if I ever even named it. Then I didn't have pets for a very long time. Then I had a cat... adopted a kitten whose yearning for the Great Outdoors could not be restrained by any amount of human-enforced enclosures

Favorite scent: Lemon. Lemon handsoap. Lemon merengue pie. Lemon pound cake. You get the gist

Do you believe in astrology? Naw, but when I was 8, I got really into astronomy... of course, back then, we lived in the Hungarian countryside, where it was a lot easier to see stars than in SoCal. I make yearly trips to the middle of nowhere to look at the Milky Way, and deeply regret that I still to this day do not own a proper telescope

How many playlists do you have on Spotify/Apple Music? 46 Spotify playlists that I have made... a few more if you count playlists I'm subscribed to. My music friends either strongly dislike or are extremely puzzled by my music taste

Sharpies or highlighters? Can I pick neither? I'm going to pick neither and go with fountain pens instead. Recently got into fountain pens, and they're AWESOME

A song that makes you cry: Hmmm... I haven't had a good cry in at least 7 years, but... there are a few that can touch my heartstrings just right and bring me to the verge of tears. How Long Will I Love You, from the movie, About Time, tugs on the strings of my hopeless romantic heart in just the right ways

A song that makes you happy: I was not expecting to have to think so hard about this one... I think it's going to be a toss-up between I Knew You Were Trouble by Taylor Swift (with the goat-like screams whenever appropriate) and Believe by Cher, because both of those are songs I can't help but sing along to, and even though I've never been a good singer, I love them

And finally, do you write/draw/create? if so, use this as an opportunity to shamelessly (😉) promote yourself!

Can't draw for the life of me. I write poetry on my other Tumblr account, @trident-writes-poetry

I am also a D&D Dungeon Master and love brainstorming plots and ideas and NPCs, but I don't necessarily write anything. I think I'm an ENTJ, so the idea of sitting still and being alone with my own thoughts is terrifying, so I'd rather just spend my time with people

Nominations (either because we're mutuals or I find you interesting): @logo-comics, @litostaves, @psychopomp-reborn, @technolilly, @teaboot, @clawedandcute, @o-lei-o-lai-o-lord, @thebirdandhersong , @messianicbabycatcher

#tag game #tumblr tag game #trident.txt #about me #might do more of this hmmm

[autistic-girl-academic]

okay here’s my thoughts on what lies within beneath the cut

that was...really short yeah. and i don’t even think i was like speeding through it or anything. i try to be as positive as possible about this stuff since anet is testing the waters but it’s kind of hard to ignore - i would have at least liked a little hint of ‘to be continued’, even if it would’ve interfered with the happy moment-of-rest thing going on in the epilogue, because while i’m pretty sure we’re not done with the haze/demons i couldn’t help but go “so no kanaxai?” *throws phone*

BUT i did really appreciate vlast as one of the characters you got to reminisce about because you do not understand how secretly starving i am for more vlast spotlight *looks at my big gw2 au post i still have to make* ...anyway- cinder was a bit of an odd choice to have included imo, but i could easily foresee the shitstorm that would’ve come up if it was ryland instead. i would’ve subbed in trahearne personally. (the knight of the thorn quest gives some good moments about his and the commander’s doubts, but you have to pony up a bunch of mats for it sooo)

the new final branch of the meta event was kinda neat, although all those turtles going around shooting at ley-jade absolutely nuked my framerate a few times, and the charging-the-stations bit got rather hectic. i would’ve liked to interact with the boss itself a bit more - maybe some elements of like the hearts and minds battle, where you’d fight manifestations of bad memories and turn them into allies? idk, again, i know they’re experimenting with the new release format and want to be understanding of that

oh as for brim & scarab...on one hand i kind of loved “friends’ detective agency” just for how embarrassed everyone was about it. on the other hand i was also hoping we were changing the name to special ops before i talked to that new npc

getting to pet the jade behemoth after the battle + going on a mini dating sim = thumbs up from me though

#gw2 spoilers #gw2 eod spoilers

[spiribia]

one thing gw2 does really well is the massive sense of scale it creates for its elder dragons & the sheer effort needed to defeat one... the very final showdown for kralkatorrik after so so much preparation is like, you lure its head into a massive forge (because thats all that will fit) and then your dragon ally blasts crystal around its neck getting it stuck in the wall and then you use various resonance crystals (its weakness) to injure it while a ton of people in airships that youve recruited bombard its body with cannons. and then it escapes so you and your dragon ally follow it into the realm of the dead where it fled to gorge on souls to recover its strength and you blast weak points all over its massive body and then your dragon ally opens a portal to force it back out of the realm of the dead and severs one of its wings off but as it falls out huge islands from the afterworld plummet after it crushing its body and the new zone is very visibly from the map its still-living body crushed under unimaginable mass of rock. then because the islands are made uninhabitable by the electric storms that surround the dragon’s body there’s an optional meta event where you slowly gain a foothold across the islands and set up camps. then you gather its blood from its severed wing and forge a spear. then you find out the dragon is slowly healing by tapping into a ley line network under the island so you go and block those and then as your npc friend words it you go into its mouth down its throat and punch its heart (with the spear) until it dies

#talks

[eiseryn]

Lei's Treasure Box of Memories

Description: A collection of drabbles (short snippets) from the memories of Lei (OC). These memories are ones she treasures from the times she spent with her friends in the slums (Ceres, Elise, and Vail). There are also a few more stories included as bonus stories -- one for each of her friends, which are just more cute memories she has with her friends.

Length: approx 7k words

[CERES] 

Blooming wildflower I beg you, please tell me Why do people fight and hurt each other?

Hmmm? Was that Ceres’ voice singing softly? Lei’s ears barely picked up on the sound, but she had ears that were a little sharper than usual. 

How cute, Lei thought and smiled to herself. She was standing just outside Ceres’ ambulance, which was parked right in the alleyway of Prism’s inner slum clinic. She waited until Ceres had finished the song before walking over to the passenger side and tapping on the window with her knuckles.

Ceres jumped slightly in the driver’s seat and whipped her head toward Lei’s direction. 

“Delivery for Ceres~” Lei held up her lunch bag that she had kept cool in their lab’s fridge. It was most definitely not a good idea to store food with unfinished drugs and certain chemicals, but they tried to keep the things separated and contained the best they could. For some reason, Prism did not have a break room for their entire staff in this clinic so that they could appropriately store food for the sparse breaks they sometimes got. Although Lei had only worked for Prism before, she suspected all the corps were stingy about things like this.

Ceres visibly relaxed and then unlocked the door so that Lei could climb inside. Lei handed over the bag and sunk into the comfy seat. Actually, it wasn’t that comfy, it was just the first time in seven hours that she had been able to sit down.

“Long day so far?” Ceres asked. She held the bag in her hands without any question, which warmed Lei’s heart but also concerned her a little. Hopefully Ceres was not this trusting with other people.

Lei nodded before stretching out her neck. “Melissa had the great idea to comment on how unusually quiet today was, so of course, there was immediately a flood of people who came in with various wounds and medical needs. I even had a lab shift today but I spent my day picking shrapnel out of wounds and sewing up flesh again.” 

She closed her eyes and rested her head on the headrest of the seat. “You can go ahead and start eating, I know you probably haven’t gotten a chance to eat yet either.”

“B-but this is your lunch.” 

“Go on, Ceres. I made extra for you. I should warn you that I made them last night so they might be a little dry, but they should taste alright.”

Like a good girl, Ceres opened up the lunch container and revealed the small rice balls sitting inside. Lei wanted to make them bigger, but her hands are only so big. Ceres passed one of them to Lei, who took it and began to chew on auto-pilot. There was not one thought in Lei’s head as it was covered in the thick and heavy shroud of exhaustion. 

“D-did you hear anything when you came in?” Ceres was asking. She was holding a rice ball in her hands, but there was only one small bite taken out of it. 

“Hmmm?” Lei was chewing through her riceball, so she had to swallow before replying. She considered lying briefly, but she wanted to be honest with the ones she cared about. “Oh, you have a lovely singing voice, Ceres.”

Ceres’ cheeks immediately flushed a bright red, which was accentuated because of her pale skin. “Y-you w-weren’t supposed to h-hear that!” 

“Aw, that’s too bad. With a voice like that, you could give the singers at Wondergo a run for their money~”

“D-don’t tease me…”

“I’m being honest.” And Lei really was. But seeing Ceres’ uncomfortable expression, she changed the subject.

“Are you free this weekend, Ceres?”

“F-free? Technically I have Saturday off, if there are no emergencies…” 

“Meet me in the shopping district then. We’re going shopping.” 

Ceres looked confused. 

“Shopping is always more fun with someone else! I used to go with someone… But I can’t anymore.”

“W-well..” 

“Please? Keep me company?” Lei didn’t like to beg. After all, she had learned that her mother absolutely hated any sort of fuss or weakness from Lei. But Lei felt comfortable enough around Ceres to show a side of vulnerability.

“O-okay, fine.” 

Lei’s phone sounded with a notification and she saw it was one of the coworkers she actually spoke to, Leon. He informed her that they were about to get busy again and she had five minutes to come back. 

“Tsk. Probably more of today’s bad luck rolling over.” With a heavy sigh, she gobbled down the rest of her riceball and then nabbed another for the short walk back. “I need to go back to work. Enjoy the rest for me, Ceres.” 

“B-but-.” 

“You can return the container to me when we meet up~” And then with a slam of the ambulance door, Lei was gone.

She and Leon took turns scolding Melissa for the rest of their shifts. 

“Ceres, your shoes are so worn-out and dirty!” Lei exclaimed upon seeing Ceres that Saturday. Ceres was wearing her usual attire of a loose fitting shirt and pants under the Prism-issued doctor’s coat. But for some reason, her sneakers were especially well-used. Lei was surprised she hadn’t noticed before. 

Ceres looked sheepishly toward the ground. 

“Have you not had the time to replace them?” 

“Mmm… y-yeah… s-something like that.” Ceres responded.

Lei shook her head. “Well, at least now we have our first order of business outlined.” 

And then she promptly dragged Ceres into the nearest shoe store.

“What about these?” Lei pointed at a pair of heeled combat boots. “I notice you never wear anything other than running shoes.”

“They look nice…b-but…”

“But?”

Ceres looked at the shoes for a long time before shaking her head. “I don’t think they would suit me very well.”

“I disagree. You’re pretty, so you would look good in anything.”

Lei thought about it for a little longer. “But you’re right, heels aren’t good for someone who’s always driving. Something with a flatter sole would be better…. like this one!”

She pointed at an equally nice pair in almost the same shade as before. Lei noted they were very similar to a pair she herself owned, although hers were black with green laces. Likely these ones had a miniscule change so that the corp could now sell them as “new and improved”. 

Ceres stared at the shoes for some time before shaking her head again. 

“Oh come on, you can at least try them on, just to see. Please? For me?” Lei started rummaging through the boxes. “What’s your shoe size?”

“It’s six…”

There was luckily a box near the top of the pile, otherwise Lei was uncertain if her weak arm muscles would be able to pry one from the bottom. 

“Here.” She opened the box, took the shoes out, and put them in front of Ceres’ feet.

With a bit more coaxing, she finally got Ceres to agree to try them on.

“How do they feel?” Lei asked. 

“Weird…” Ceres was standing in them like she was a newly born lamb. Her legs shook when she tried to walk around.

“Well there is a bit of a height to them that might feel that way if you’re not used to them. These types of shoes are best after being broken in for a bit.” 

Ceres shook her head. “I don’t think I would be able to wear them…” 

They only walked out of that store with Ceres’ new running shoes.

Ceres was the same in the clothing store they visited.

“What do you think about this dress?” Lei held up a flowy emerald-coloured dress to her body and swished it about. 

“It looks nice!”

Lei pouted. “You’ve said that for every piece of clothing I’ve shown you. I wish you’d be a little more honest. It’s hard enough to find clothing flattering for someone plain like me.”

“B-but I think you’re pretty….”

Lei simply shook her head and returned the dress to the rack.

“Well that’s enough for me. What about you, Ceres? What types of clothing do you like?”

“E-eh…” Ceres remained silent for what felt like a long time. “W-well… pretty dresses are nice and techwear is cool… but I don’t think I could wear them.”

“Why not?” Lei suspected she knew the answer, even if she had asked.

“Because I don’t suit them…”

Lei imagined what types of clothing would look nice on Ceres. A dress in white would look good on her and so would pastel purple to contrast her eyes, Lei thought. Then she imagined Ceres in techwear. It was a little more difficult, because Ceres had a sort of soft image in Lei’s mind, but anything was possible in the realm of fashion. As Gigi used to tell her, it was all about the confidence in rocking an outfit. 

“That’s a lie. You would definitely be able to pull off either style.” Lei finally said. 

Once again, Ceres shook her head.

With a sigh, Lei sifted through the racks in Ceres’ size. She held up a pretty dress with sunflower patterns to Ceres and nodded in approval. She also spotted a very long, baggy high-necked jacket with white accents that she could see Cere shyly hiding in. Additionally, it even had big pockets and sleeves that went past her hands. She could see Ceres wearing leggings or shorts with it, and it would look good with the running shoes Ceres always wore too. 

Meanwhile, Ceres stared at Lei in confusion throughout the entire process. 

Hmm… perhaps I could get something for her birthday, Lei thought. The little gears in her head began to turn. 

“By the way, Ceres, what do you do in your free time?” Lei asked Ceres while they were in line for the bubble tea stall. Lei realized that if she didn’t ask, Ceres would never really talk about herself. 

Ceres had an expression Lei couldn’t quite read, so she continued speaking. 

“For example, I like to take very long, scented soaks until I’m pruny and wrinkled. And on my days off, I like to go grocery shopping to cook and check out new restaurants or bars. I used to dance when I was younger but that was a long, long time ago… I still keep up with my daily stretches though! What about you?”

“I-I used to like walking alone at nights in my neighbourhood…” Although Ceres’ voice was already soft by default, she sounded extra hesitant and quiet when she was saying this. 

“You don’t do that anymore, right?” Lei furrowed her eyebrows in concern.

Ceres shook her head rapidly. “N-no, of course not!” 

“Good,” Lei sighed in relief. “It’s not safe to do that here.” 

“I know…” Ceres mumbled something that Lei couldn’t catch. This is what Lei assumed she heard, but she could not be entirely sure. 

“Hmmm, what was that?” Lei tried to ask to be sure. 

“It’s nothing.” 

Lei didn’t have any more time to ask because then it was their turn to order.

“Ceres what are you ordering?”

“A matcha milk tea with pearls, please.”

“Oh, good choice~ That’s my usual order, too. But I’ll have the taro milk tea with red beans this time.” 

The tired-looking bubble tea barista nodded and went off to make their drinks after they paid. Unfortunately, he was the only one at the stall so he had to work extra hard taking orders and making the drinks. Lei wondered how many hours his shifts were but something told her it might be better if she didn’t know.

“Do you always order matcha?” Lei asked Ceres. 

“Yes, usually…” 

"Have you ever had taro milk tea with red beans?"

Ceres shook her head. "Not that I remember."

 Their drinks were ready, so Lei took her drink from the counter, stabbed it with practiced ease of ordering boba too much and tipped the straw to Ceres. "It's good to try something different here and there. Here, have a sip."

Ceres bent her head down to take the tiniest sip Lei had ever witnessed. 

“How is it?”

“I-It’s good!”

With such a small sip, Lei wasn’t sure if Ceres had more than a drop of liquid, which also meant that no red beans had been eaten. But she wouldn’t push it. 

Lei pointed back to the street they had just left. “Let’s go back to that clothing store from before. I liked the lingerie they had on display.”

Later, when Lei was heading home, she would realize that Ceres only mentioned a hobby that she did Uptown/Downtown. Ceres did not mention any of her current hobbies.

She must be too busy for them now. Lei justified. Or maybe she can’t do the things she likes anymore. 

 After all, the same was true of her. Lei used to enjoy spending time in parks and gardens during her youth as well. She really liked plants and the flowers they could grow with actual sunlight. But well, there was no way that she could do that now. But even with her justification, there was a sense of unease that weighed heavily on her.

She took a nice, long bath with the calming scent of lavender when she got home. 

[ELISE] 

It was one of her days off, which meant that Lei had to go grocery shopping. Apparently, slummers didn’t usually do any cooking, but Lei liked to. It made her feel healthier and more accomplished with her life. 

She could have taken the train, but she thought she was due for some exercise, so she decided to walk to the shopping  district and take the train on the way back. She would later find that this would be unfortunately a bad decision. Or perhaps not, considering the person she’d get to talk to. 

There were some men shouting on the street as she was walking in the residential district so she looked for a chance to cross to the opposite street. But before she could, one of them came running toward her, knocking into her with his burly frame. 

There was a brief sensation of falling before Lei found herself on the ground with broken glass digging into her palms. She didn’t wear gloves outside of work but looking at her bloodied and cut-up hands, she thought that might be something she should consider for the future. 

“Fuck.” Lei tried not to swear often, so when the words slipped out of her mouth it always indicated something bad. 

Well, at least she didn’t have any groceries in her hands that she dropped. At least.

Do I really have to go into the clinic on my day off for this? Lei dreaded. But then, she remembered that there was another clinic perhaps a 15 minute walk from here. So she got back up on her feet, thanking herself for choosing to wear pants today, and continued her walk.

Elise was at the front desk. It was strange that her clinic had very few workers, especially when it seemed that she got a decent amount of patients. Lei had to wait in line for a while before it was her turn. 

“Sorry for the wait.” Elise said when she finally returned to the front desk.

“It’s no trouble at all. I understand.” Lei was able to relate as a fellow doctor. That’s when Elise finally looked up at her. 

“You look familiar… but I don’t think you were a patient. Have we met before?” Elise furrowed her eyebrows. 

“Yes, I’m Dr. Lani. I work at the Prism clinic. There was a patient you took in for us a few weeks ago and I was responsible for that transfer.”

“Oh, yes, I remember now.”

“Yes, thank you for all the work you did in saving that patient, Dr. El-”

“Just Elise is fine.” 

“O-oh, alright.” Lei thought Elise should be treated with respect for all the good work she did, but she supposed it was more respectful to address someone by their chosen name. “Well then, thank you Elise.”

“No need to thank me, I’m a doctor. It’s my job to save lives.”

“Hmmm… you’re right about that.” Lei couldn’t help but smile. She was glad that there were still doctors out there who valued saving lives. 

“Now what can I do for you today?” 

Lei showed Elise her hands. “I would treat it myself, but unfortunately I’m physically unable to.” 

Elise didn’t ask any questions, just simply nodded her head and began the careful work of picking out glass out of the cuts. Lei didn’t envy her. She found it a pain to meticulously pick anything out of flesh wounds. 

But Elise was very efficient with her work. Much more efficient than Lei was. Lei hoped that was because of Elise’s natural talent and not because she was used to it. Lei knew it was probably a combination of the two, though. 

“How much do I owe you?” Lei pulled out her credit chip, with a bit of difficulty since her hands were freshly bandaged and stung from the antiseptic.  

Elise shook her head and smiled. “I don’t take fees from fellow doctors.”

Lei frowned. “I couldn’t possibly not pay for the treatment you just did.”

“It’s my code of honour not to take payment from doctors. Besides, you need your hands to do your work.”

“That’s true… I have to go in for work the day after tomorrow.” Lei sighed. “Well, I don’t want to leave this favour unpaid. Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help. I am a synthesis specialist, but I can do patient care at the basic level.”

Elise simply smiled.

“I’m being serious, Elise.” Lei frowned at Elise and tried to give her best “serious” face. Unfortunately Lei was not very threatening. 

“Hmm… Well, there’s nothing now, but I’ll never refuse a gift~”

“Oh?” Lei tilted her head. “What type of gifts do you like?” 

“That’s up to you.” Elise said simply.

“Elise, that’s not being very helpful right now.” Lei frowned once again. 

She started headed toward the door. “If there’s nothing else, I have to check on my other patients.” 

Lei sighed and got off the examination table. “Of course, thank you again. I’ll… come back with a gift at another time.”

“I’ll look forward to that then~”

Lei bought Elise some very high quality compression socks. Very good for long shifts standing on their feet, which she imagined both of them did as doctors. She didn’t know Elise’s size, but since they were both a similar height, she was able to estimate. 

Thank you for your hard work in saving lives and taking care of people. But do make sure to take care of yourself as well. Lei 

Ceres gave her a note from Elise a few days later.

Thank you for your gift,  I appreciate the gesture. You take care of yourself too. But feel free to come back if you have any injuries. Elise

Lei smiled. 

It's nice, she thought, to have someone else take care of me for a change...

[VAIL]

Lei didn’t know where those feelings started. As a doctor, it was important for her to remain impartial to all her patients to ensure everyone got equal treatment, but at some point in time, she started to look forward to seeing a particular one with pretty blue hair. 

This is wrong, Lei told herself. I’m the worst and my license should be revoked. 

But she simply tried to ignore her thoughts and forget them. What no one knows won’t hurt anyone… right? 

She did her best. Like she always did.

She justified that it was due to a simple psychological phenomenon: Mere exposure effect. He came so often, once or twice a week, that it just became a constant in her life. 

Fortunately, he did not always appear injured. What did concern her, though, were the things that he would frequently purchase when he was in the clinic. 

“It’s concerning,” Lei told him once, “how often you buy sedatives.” 

“Don’t worry about it. Most of them aren’t for me.” He replied simply.

When people say not to worry is when I worry the most, Lei thought. But she bit her tongue. Not because she didn’t care, but because it wasn’t her place to ask. But she would wonder, she always would. 

Why do you need so many to use them on someone else? And even if you say they’re mostly not for you, that implies that you are using some of them. You must be aware that they’re highly addictive, right? Do you… have trouble sleeping? 

“Alright,” she would say instead. “Each dose will induce sleep from anywhere between four to eleven hours. And they are 10k per dose.” 

She followed her clinic’s protocol like the obedient little dog she was. Why did this world value money more than human lives? 

Unfortunately, she didn’t think she would ever find the answer to that. 

“There’s a new bar that opened.” He told her once when he was getting treatment, again. 

“Oh?” Lei liked checking out new places. “What’s it called?”

“Feline Fine.” 

“That’s a cute name.” 

“It’s a cat-themed bar.” 

“You like cats?”

Vail nodded. 

“Me too.” Lei couldn’t help but smile. “Thanks for letting me know about it then. Maybe I’ll check it out on my day off tomorrow.” 

“5PM?”

“Is that when they open? I guess I could go at that time.” 

“See you there.”

Before Lei’s tired brain could fully comprehend their conversation, his treatment was finished and he was out the door with his weekly purchase of drugs. 

When she was finally lying in bed that night, she finally processed the information. Wait… did he? No… I’m overthinking it. 

Despite her better judgment, she went to check out that new bar at five o’ clock the next day. She wore one of her favourite dresses with sheer tights and had spent a little more time on her makeup than usual. Just a little, though. 

The bar was located in the upper slums near the edge of the shopping district and Lei was not surprised to see that it actually opened at 3PM and stayed open until early in the morning. The logo was written in lowercase neon pink cursive letters and there was a stamp of a paw print. Overall it gave off a very cute and soft vibe. 

There was a large glass window that allowed for people to see inside. Peering into the bar, Lei noticed that it was very busy, likely since it had newly opened. What stood out the most to her was that the servers were all dressed in butler or maid clothing and wearing cat ears and tails. Additionally, there were multiple robotic cats with different synthetic fur colours prowling about, much resembling Cillin, the one she owned. She wondered if they also vacuumed the place when customers weren’t there. 

Well, I guess I should go in.

And then she proceeded to struggle with the heavy glass doors with her weak doctor arms for a bit of time before finally pushing them open wide enough for her to step inside. She glanced around to see if anyone had seen, but luckily the people nearby were clearly wasted already. 

Shuffling past the people blocking the door, she scanned the main room and quickly found the one she was looking for sitting by the bar. Fortunately, there was a seat beside him, which she bee-lined for.

“Hello there~” 

He looked up at her with his usual calm expression that gave nothing away. “Hey, Doc.” 

“What drink do you have there?” Lei sat down and pointed to the clear dark amber liquid in the glass in front of him. There was no ice in the glass. 

“Rockyroad. It’s my favourite.”

Rockyroad? Lei had to really think before she remembered it was an alcohol that was known to induce sleepiness after drinking large amounts of it. 

“Don’t drink too much, it’s not good for your liver.” Lei couldn’t help but say. 

“Don’t worry about me.”

Too late, I already worry about you, she thought, but she bit her tongue. After all, it wasn’t her place to say something like that. And, a doctor’s advice is only good when the patient is willing to abide by it.

“Enjoy in moderation, then.” She said, and turned her attention to the woman behind the bar. The bartender was dressed in a nice suit like the butlers and also donned a pair of cat ears. Lei noticed that some masculine-looking people were in maid outfits and some feminine-looking people were in suits. 

“Bartender, one meow-jito please.” 

“Right on it, ma’am.” The bartender said, and immediately began to mix the drink. 

While Lei waited for her drink, one of the robotic cats padded her way on the bar counter, nimbly stepping past all the patrons’ drinks. To Lei’s delight, it was a fluffy colourpoint just like her Cillin. She stroked its synthetic fur when it sat in front of her and wondered if it was the same model. 

“So… you like cats?” Lei turned her attention back to Vail when the bartender slid her the mojito. 

Vail nodded. “One of my dreams is to get a real cat.” 

“Really? Me too!” Lei spoke more excitedly than she had all week. “Not a lot of slummers think about things like having pets, since they’re so expensive and all… What made you want to get a cat?”

“They’re cute.” His attitude about it seemed like he was brushing off her question, but she justified it was just his personality.

“Hmm… can’t argue with that.” Lei smiled into her drink.

It was nice to talk about mundane things like this, especially when the majority of her conversations with other people involved technical work-related jargon or depressing information about patients. Something about Vail’s demeanor was pleasant and comforting. It was like he didn’t have a worry in the world, and it made her think that perhaps, she didn’t need to worry either. 

On her second drink, a paw-loma, she felt tipsy enough to try her hand at more conversation. 

“How did you find out about this bar?” She tried to maintain eye contact with him, which was a bit difficult since he seemed to always be looking at something else. 

“I passed by it while they were still renovating during a run.”

“That’s right… you’re a runner.”

Lei wouldn’t usually have asked more. She did not want to stick her head where it didn’t belong, and usually the less you knew about these things, the better. But she had some alcohol in her blood now and she was curious about this guy she only saw in the clinic.

“What other interesting things have you seen on your runs?” 

He returned his gaze to his drink. “All sorts of things.”

“Such as?” She tried to prod.

“Hmm… well I can’t tell you too much, but I once worked with this runner who made up nicknames for everyone including herself. And she kept using really complicated nonsense words. Like she said that we runners were “fighting against the eternal darkness that envelops this land as one of the few chosen arbiters of the night”.” 

“I think I’ve learned about that sort of condition before. What was it called? Chuunibyou syndrome? It has something to do with having delusions. I’ve never actually met someone with it, so it’s interesting that you did.” But to be fair, Lei had scraped through her psychology courses so she wasn’t completely certain with this information. 

“I don’t know about that.” Vail murmured, but Lei’s ears were able to pick it up. 

She decided to change the subject. “What nickname did she give you?”

“Something like “Keeper of the Forbidden Hand”?” 

“Hmmm… I wonder how she decided on that name for you?”

“Who knows? Maybe she was going off on a whim.” 

Lei wondered what Vail's real name was. She had heard that runners went by pseudonyms. But even if she asked, he probably wouldn't tell her. It was probably safer that way for the both of them. She would be curious though. If nothing else, she hoped that he wouldn't call her Doc outside the clinic. That was her title and occupation, not her name. 

“What was her own nickname?” She asked instead. 

Vail had to think about it for a bit before he answered. "Keeper of Secrets?”

“Hmmm… what an interesting individual.”  

“Yeah, and there was this other time I worked with a runner who pointed at a bomb and asked, ‘what’s this bomb-looking thing?’” 

Lei couldn’t help but chuckle. “It seems like you run into a lot of… “interesting” runners. This one that you’re talking about now seems to lack critical thinking skills in particular. But you all pulled through, right?” 

“Yeah, we managed.” 

Perhaps it was the atmosphere of the bar, or the alcohol in her blood, or even Vail’s company, but time passed more quickly than Lei imagined. 

Vail checked his phone and began to stand up. “Looks like I’ve got somewhere else to be.”

Lei stood up to leave with him. “I should go too. I think I’ve had enough to drink tonight.” 

In her heeled boots, she realized that she could see the top of his head when they were both standing. This gave her an odd sense of satisfaction. 

She also realized she was a bit drunker than she thought because she had a fierce urge to reach out and smooth out the messy locks of his hair. She kept her hands busy by putting on her rain jacket. 

“Thanks for being my drinking buddy today.” Lei said as they walked out of the bar together. “It was nice to chat with you.” 

“Let’s go out for drinks again sometime. Here’s my number.” 

Well, ethics be damned, Lei thought. She was not going to turn down an opportunity to spend time with someone who actually wanted to spend more time with her. Whatever the reason may be. 

“I’ll look forward to that, then.” She smiled at him, and to her surprise, he actually smiled back. 

BONUS 1: Thank you for being born

Hmm… Lei looked at the clothes and shoes she was in the process of wrapping. She should probably give up and fold them neatly into a bag because wrapping them this way was not working. 

Ceres’ birthday on April 1st was approaching and she had been planning and working on preparations for almost a month now. 

Gifts? Check. Cake… cake? Oh no, she hadn’t ordered that yet. She then realized that she had never directly asked Ceres what her favourite cake flavour was. She would have to do that quickly. 

LEI (03/26, 11:15PM): Out of curiousity, what type of cake is your favourite? 

CERES (03/26, 11:26PM): Fruit cakes! Well… I guess mousse cakes now, since they’re easier to get here. 

CERES (03/26, 11:27PM): Why?

LEI (03/26, 11:30PM): Just doing some market research. Thank you~

Lei hoped that Ceres would not suspect a thing. Even if she was being rather suspicious about her preparations. 

They were both working the day of Ceres’ birthday. Well, Lei had a night shift that lasted until the morning and Ceres was technically always working.

So after her nap, Lei picked up the matcha and vanilla mousse cake she’d ordered and then texted Ceres.

LEI (04/01, 8:04PM): Help! I have an emergency! Can you come to my place? 

CERES (04/01 8:06PM): On my way!

It wasn’t even five minutes later when Lei heard frantic knocking at her door. Ceres had definitely sped here. 

“Lei? What’s wrong? Open the door!” Ceres’ usually soft voice was panicked and shrill. 

Oops. Perhaps Lei had taken the surprise element a little too far. 

Lei crept to the door quietly while holding the plated cake carefully. She flung the door open, to see Ceres’ golden eyes wide and concerned.

“Surprise? Happy Birthday!” Lei sheepishly smiled. 

“Y-you… you gave me such a f-fright!” Ceres gasped. 

“Sorry…” Lei had enough conscience to feel guilty. “But I couldn’t think of another way to get you here without being obvious about it… Sorry.”

Taking Ceres’ hand, Lei led Ceres into her apartment and had her sit at the table with a glass of water to calm down first. Then she fetched a knife from the kitchen and cut the cake, making sure to give Ceres a big piece.

“How long were you planning this?” Ceres asked, when she was handed her giant piece of cake with a fork.

“It’s been about a month now! But I’ve been thinking about it ever since I asked you when your birthday was.” 

“That’s a long time…”

Lei had to swallow her bite of cake before she answered. “Not really… I wanted to invite Elise too, but unfortunately she was working… like always.” 

Lei cleared her throat and changed the subject. “What did you usually do on your birthday back in Uptown/Downtown?” 

“O-oh, um, t-the usual things… j-just cake with my family.”

Now that she was thinking about it, did Lei eat cake with her family? She might have in her very early childhood, and in later years her eldest brother would buy some for her, when he remembered. She also remembered that during her brothers’ birthdays they would eat noodles for long life. She only remembered eating noodles on her birthdays some of the years she lived in her family’s house. 

Lei wasn’t hungry anymore, so she got up from the table and went to the connected living room, where a large gift bag was sitting on the coffee table. She passed the bag directly to Ceres. “Here’s your gift, Ceres.”

Ceres placed her fork down and gently lifted up the tissue paper. The first item she pulled out was a flowy long dress the colour of lavender. It had slightly darker floral designs printed on the fabric. 

“O-oh… thank you…”

The next item was the baggy techwear jacket Lei had seen on that shopping trip with Ceres. The material was waterproof so Lei thought it would make a good rain jacket. And finally, the last item was a comfy pair of soft white leather boots with no heels. 

“I remember our conversation about clothes that you liked but wouldn’t ever wear. So I bought them for you. You won’t refuse if they’re gifts from me, right?” Lei smiled at Ceres.

Ceres looked hesitant, but she had a soft smile on her face, too. “W-well… I suppose if they’re gifts…”

“Wear them sometimes, alright? These are good items to add to your wardrobe!” 

“I’ll… think about it.”

“Or! I have a better idea. You can try them on now!”

“E-eh?” 

“It’s good luck! To try on new clothes on your birthday!” Lei wasn’t actually sure, but it was probably a superstition somewhere in the world, right? 

Before Ceres could protest, Lei pushed her into the bedroom and closed the door on her. 

“T-there are a lot of clothes in your closet…”

Oops. Lei didn’t usually close her closet because it was too full of clothing items to properly close half the time. So to the closed door she said, “Well, it’s one of my hobbies~ Feel free to try anything on if you want to! They might be slightly big on you, but that’s fine.” 

Lei clapped when Ceres emerged wearing all three items at once. She actually didn’t expect Ceres to try them on all at the same time, but for some reason she was able to pull it off.

The advantage of being pretty is that you can pull anything off, Lei thought. But she wasn’t jealous toward Ceres. She was instead proud to be Ceres’ friend. 

“I don’t think these suit me very well…” 

“I disagree! Give me a little twirl!” Lei made a twirling gesture with her hand excitedly. 

Ceres tried to. But unused to the feel of her shoes, she tripped on her own feet. Luckily Lei was there to steady her in time before she actually fell. 

“S-see? They don’t suit me…” Ceres was covering her face with her hands. 

Lei shook her head and gently patted Ceres’ head. “You’re simply not used to it yet. But thank you for trying them on. It’s fun to play dress up with someone again…”

Lei thought for a bit of time before she finally could think of the words she wanted to say. “Thank you for going on with my antics too. I’m sorry if it was too much this time.” 

“It’s because I trust you, Lei.” 

“Me too, Ceres.” Lei smiled. “Thank you for being born.” 

BONUS 2: Take care of yourself

“You know, Ceres, everytime I visit Elise’s clinic, she’s always working. Does she not have any days off?” 

“Did you know Elise once collapsed from overwork?”

Lei whipped her head around to stare directly at Ceres. “She collapsed?” 

Ceres nodded. “After that, she hired a few more workers. I still think she’s there too much, though…” 

Lei didn’t have to ask why Elise would do such a thing because she knew exactly why. Elise was just the self-sacrificial type, noble and kind, risking herself to save someone else’s life. 

On her next day off, Lei went to visit Elise with some gifts. 

“Oh hello, did you get injured again?” Elise asked, surprised when Lei walked in. 

Lei shook her head. “I don’t have any injuries today.” 

“Then what brings you to my clinic?” 

Lei put down the bag of skincare products. “For you, Elise. They’re great products for mature women like us.” 

Was that too direct? Too harsh? It didn’t really convey how Lei felt, but putting her feelings into words was always difficult. She wasn’t really able to do so in her youth and she never developed the skill to do so. Or at least, not smoothly. 

“You need to take care of yourself better.” Lei had to really wrack her brain for the words, but she firmly believed these were important words that she needed to say. 

Because… if you don’t… the slums will be down the best doctor they have. And I’ll be down one of the people I care about. These were things Lei couldn’t bear to say aloud. Things that she was afraid to admit. 

“Did you come all this way to tell me that?” 

Lei could only nod. 

“This means a lot to me. It really does. Sentiments like this are hard to come across in the slums.”

Lei could definitely see that, especially witnessing the sort of suffering people had to do here just to get by for another day. 

“But you don’t have to worry about me. I can take care of myself just fine.” Elise gave Lei a reassuring smile. The kind of practiced, doctor’s smile that Lei had also learned to make.

“Elise, do you really think that’s going to work on me?” Lei frowned at Elise. “I know that look. I can make it myself.” 

Elise simply turned away to sort some files behind the reception desk. 

Lei sighed. “When’s your next day off? I'll give you the spa day you deserve.” 

“I don’t get days off often.” 

Lei shook her head. “Oh, I’ll bet-”

“But I’ll save one for you.” 

“Coming from you? Now that’s truly an honour.” Lei couldn’t help but smile. 

“I should see my other patients now. Don’t come back as a patient.”

“I’ll do my best~” 

BONUS 3: A place where you are safe to dream

“Technology is too hard to keep up with nowadays.” Vail was saying.

They were drinking together again, but this time in a different bar. Feline Fine was still Lei’s favourite, but it was nice to have a change of pace here and there.

“Vail, you’re young, though! I’d imagine the youth would be keeping up with things like that. You can complain when you’re old like me.” She tried to keep her tone light and teasing but there was some truth to her words. 

“I’m not that young. And you don’t look that old.” He said this rather quickly and firmly.

“Oh my, thank you! It’s just my baby face, but that’s still very flattering~ But you would be surprised. I went through a lot of post-secondary education to become a doctor, not to mention my residential period…” She cleared her throat to break up the rant she almost had gotten into. “That’s not important, back to the technology you can’t keep up with?” 

“Cities are apparently making tunnels connected to each other for the rich and wealthy to travel across. And along the road there are holograms of A.I. waifus and husbandos that follow you the whole way. And they also deliver food and items for you while you travel.” 

“That sounds like an excessive waste to me.” 

They both drank. 

“I remember VR technology was really popular with my classmates back in high school. Many of my classmates would get scolded by their parents for spending too much time playing around and not studying. But I never understood the hype.” Lei turned her head and stared at the liquid in her round glass. “Afterall, you eventually have to return to harsh reality, like waking up after a nice dream.” 

She played around the rim of the glass with her finger. “I much prefer what’s real.”

Vail nodded, but he said, “But dreams are nice.” 

“You have dreams?” Lei wasn’t sure why she was so surprised. It was just the sort of abstract someone as relaxed as Vail might think about. He had just the sort of dreamy mood about him. 

“Of course I do. Who doesn’t?” 

Lei wondered what her own dreams were. The idea of dreams was intangible and seemed so far away from her reality. Was someone like her allowed to dream of better things for herself? Even if she had any dreams… would she be able to fulfill any of them? 

“What… type of dreams?” Lei’s voice was getting softer and slower. She probably had one too many to drink this time. Her eyelids were getting heavy and she rested her head on the bar counter. 

Lei wasn’t sure if Vail was thinking or if it was just her drunkenness skewing her perception, but it felt like a long time before he answered.

“Sometimes… I wonder about what it’s like outside of the slums… or even just outside the city.” 

“Hmmm…” Lei closed her eyes, drifting. “Well, I’ve lived “outside the slums” but is it really better? There, it’s all about climbing the cutthroat corporate ladder and trying not to fall off or get backstabbed. But, there are… definitely some things that are better, though. It’s cleaner, for one, and people aren’t dying on the streets. They have gardens and you can feel the sunlight on your skin. Slummers don’t get enough vitamin D…” 

Did she miss Uptown/Downtown? She certainly didn’t miss her blood relatives, but… she did miss the gardens and the sunshine. She missed being able to walk around safely without always being ready to draw her handgun. She even missed the higher-grade lab equipment they had access to. Maybe, she missed seeing Gigi and shopping with her. Elise and Ceres might have experienced life in the Middle district, but now she wished Vail could experience it too. It was a luxury to be able to live there, she understood that now. 

“Can’t tell you about other cities though. I’d imagine…” She yawned. “I’d imagine that they’re probably the same as this one. Only the most elite thrive and the majority of the people suffer and struggle to survive.” 

“But it’s nice to imagine something better.” His voice was definitely quieter now. 

“Yeah… that would be nice. If some other place has it better than us.” 

She could hear Vail’s voice saying something to her but she couldn’t process what the words were. She was already drifting away to her sleep, in a place where she was allowed to dream. 

AUTHOR'S NOTES

The lyrics Ceres is singing in the beginning are the translated lyrics to the beginning of the song "Euterpe" by EGOIST. It has flower motifs in it, just like Lei has flower motifs 👀

Apparently Lei's shifts at the Prism clinic are 10 hours long and they have no scheduled breaks (need to find time for their own breaks). Capitalism sure is evil.

Gigi Legris is her friend from uni/med school and they were pretty close when they both lived in Downtown. They bonded over their mutual interest in fashion and likely used to shop together a lot. Lei lost contact with Gigi after she moved to the slums, but she doesn't know that Gigi tried to contact her after... Gigi is pretty girlboss and she works out and is very strong! Furthermore, she probably got a promotion to work Uptown as a researcher later on...

Lei probably did ballet for a few years in her youth but showing no significant talent, her mother probably pulled her out of it. She probably quite enjoyed, though! Also I wanted more ugly duckling --> swan vibes for her.

Lei actually doesn't curse that much and only curses when things are bad BUT IN THE CAMPAIGN THINGS GO BAD A LOT SO SHE CURSES A LOT LOL

AGAIN I MUST MAKE A DISCLAIMER, BAD IDEA ETHICS-WISE THAT SHE BECAME FRIENDS WITH HER (Former?) PATIENT

Did you notice Vail's potentially smooth move? Read it over again if you missed it I worked hard on that

At the moment, it is uncertain if Vail has troubles sleeping so that is why he buys sedatives. This is one of my theories though and would make sense why he likes drinking an alcohol that induces sleepiness after drinking a lot of it (SHE CAN FIX HIM!!! <- cope)

Apparently Elise is 38 years old. She is a mature woman. (Lei is 32 for reference and Ceres is 30). Also for Vail he's allegedly 27 (ish)

At the end of the BONUS (3) She does end up falling asleep and Vail takes her home 😳😳😳 If I post it you'll see what happens after (it's spicy but not LOL)

#oc #oc writing #my writing #original story #original character #collection of drabbles #oc backstory #oc lore #lei #lei's backstory #cyberpunk setting #cyberpunk coc #creative writing #lei's npc friends #vail #elise #ceres #story #leon melissa gigi #eiseryn #eiserynn #collection of stories #my oc #long author's notes #i love my ocs and also the ocs that are not mine that i stole XD #well #i kidnapped them tbh XD #i think lei and her friends are so cute ;w;

[0carkki0]

If only we could enter Joon’s Manor in the Living World... 

Now I’m obsessing over TaiViv again, so... Now I shall ask bunch of questions, and then press shuffle on iTunes. The songs are the answers. I decided that the songs have to have lyrics. Otherwise they are ignored. ^^

It’s kind ofa  way let the fate decide what the NPC thinks, since I can’t ask the ArenaNet directly. They don’t know my Commander. He’s one of the thousands and thousands of Commanders. ^^ 

Little brackground for those who don’t know: in my mind Taimi is a reincarnation of Vivs’ progeny sweetheart who died when they both were 7 years old. She was born again in that same year by the prayers of Dwayna’s Priests, and yes, Vivs went to ask for them to help. First he asked the Grenth’s Priests to bring her back to life, but they refused. So, the Priests of Dwayna offered their help, and since Dwayna is more about healing and life, instead of being brought back as an undead, she was reincarnated. 

Anyway... Let’s start... 

What did Taimi think of Vividatt before the Personal Story? Hold On by Imperia

At Personal Story? The Brave/Agony Applause by Deadlock

What did Taimi think of Vividatt in the season 2? We Had Everything by Delain

Heart of Thorns? Nights of Ecstasy by Acting Lovers

Season 3? Where the Light is Bleeding by Sleeping Romance

Path of Fire? Beautiful With You by Halestorm 

Season 4? Bobby Bodybuilder by Acting Lovers

Icebrook Saga? Vampire’s Kiss by Acting Lovers

End of Dragons? Dehumanized by Disturbed

Hmm... There is a lot of song from Acting Lovers... ^^; Well then... Let’s try to break it down... 

I did already ask wat did Taimi think of Vivs at the time they met. The song was Burn to Cinder by Epica. 

Taimi 11 years old. Vividatt 18 years old. Before the Personal Story the song would make sense only if Taimi actually knew the Commander already. But why would she? Did she just happen to see him and get the feeling she had seen him somewhere before. Did she actually start supporting him from the shadows after Vivs got out of prison? Maybe she saw Vivs when she was still a small kid, and Vivs was a teenager? Perhaps she has caught Vivs hesitating in committing a suicide. But along the way got really interested in Scarlet after hearing what all she had done in this time. 

Personal Story: Taimi was 12 years old. Vividatt was 19. Taimi heard the stories about the Commander, and somehow knew that Vivs more like just went along with the happenings, although he was clearly not alright. 

Season 1: Taimi was 13 years old etc... I asked earlier already this question, and the answer was Burn to Cinder by Epica. I think when Taimi met the Commander now face to face, the strong nostalgia hit her again. This was one of the motivations to join the group of the Commander. Other reasons were that, she realized she could never reach out to Scarlet by herself. But this group clearly wanted to stop and fight her and was going after her, so Taimi thought it my increase the chances of getting closer to Scarlet if she joined them. And she could probably also learn more about this Commander that seemed so familiar to her. 

Since Braham was closer to her age, she made friends with him, instead of the Commander. 

Season 2: Taimi probably acknowledging her crush on the Commander, and feeling a bit upset (teen crushes on older people is quite normal (it’s another story if the adult responses which I assure you, Vivs did not, not in that way anyway.) by it as well, since she didn’t show interest in him earlier, perhaps he would have taken her under his wing, instead of Zojja. Not that Taimi’s wasn’t grateful to Zojja for that... And the Commander’s and hers age gap is quite big. And now they have to also concentrate on the strangely acting sylvari, magic Ley-Lines, Thorny Vines, Phlunts and Dragons. Not that Taimi wasn’t excited and interested in it all (except Phlunts), but now they were going to be super busy in solving this Elder Dragon mystery. How dare Phlunt humiliate her in front of everyone, let alone steal legally her invention?! 

Heart of Thorns: Of course seven years age gap doesn’t matter, if they were both grown ups, and Taimi like everyone else was growing up. How about meanwhile prove to the Commander how invaluable she was for the group? And show what her mind could do. Problem was how people still treated her like a progeny... Did Taimi just catch the Commander watching her and then suddenly turning his head? YES! ... Hormones... amiright?

Season 3: I think here Taimi learns more about Vividatt’s dark little secrets, simply because Vivs at times forgot that he was carrying a communicator and wasn’t being careful of what he was saying or doing. So, at one time Taimi was hearing yelling, threats and then fighting sounds. After all that, some questionable sounds were heard. Taimi, even if her golem was still not entirely fixed, went to investigate, and found an Inquest Lab full of asura body parts and the Commander doing something unmentionable to an armless, legless and headless body on top of a stairs. When he heard Taimi mentioning his name, he got shocked too, that Taimi had to see that side of him. Taimi decided to escape, but Vivs went after her. Gladly Vivs had already come to his senses so they ended up just talking, and he told her his unfortunate past. And now, even if Taimi knew about this, when she had made the overlooks on the Dragon destruction research she felt like she had done even worse, since this wasn’t just about one evil group, but about the entire world. One mistake can cause world destruction. To her surprise, though, the Commander just told her that he wasn’t upset by the overlook, but more like what could have happened if they proceeded with the plan of making two Elder Dragons fight each other. 

At this point, Vivs has already started to grow feelings for her. The only reason he didn’t even hint anything to her was that she was still under-aged. But... she was going to be a grown up one day... 

I personally view the season 3 as the season where the Commander and Taimi get a bit closer. I mean, Taimi is all the time supporting them via the Communicator, and at the end of the season it’s only Taimi and the Commander of Dragon’s Watch trying to do something about the coming up problem. Braham was making his own guild and was angry at Commander, for who knows what reason. Rox was with him. Caithe has always walked her own path... I’m not even sure if she was a member yet... Rytlock was dealing with his people about the Mists incident. Marjory was injured and Kasmeer had a meltdown. So... it was just Taimi and the Commander. Of course, there does join the Queen’s advisor and her... friend. But they are not in Dragon’s Watch guild... 

Path of Fire: No matter how crappy Taimi felt about herself, the Commander always had made her feel good. And she felt useful, even if the Commander was far away and the Communicator didn’t work well. Vivs found the high areas to talk to her when he could and listen to her take of the situation. Also, in my head they almost kiss at the end after the night the group meeting again face to face. 

Again, in my mind, Taimi and Vivs actually do kiss at the night of new years, even if Taimi is STILL under-aged. Vividatt just happens to be very drunk already, and when he sees Taimi just sipping out of her drink, he decides to go and drink it from her mouth. Afterwards Vivs feel really guilty of it, when he remembers it. Of course Taimi doesn’t say anything to anyone. 

Season 4: Taimi probably did notice Vivs starting to workout and take more care of his appearance. This is simply because of the parasite minion died in his pants and didn’t satisfy him anymore. He have had it since he was 15, and it ate anything Vivs let out of his system. But because pooping and peeing happen only once in a while, the minion began to keep Vivs’ thing ready to... shoot out ‘milk’ whenever it was hungry. In return Vivs got more power. But because in Path of Fire he was killed, the minion died as well, but didn’t return when Vivs did. Instead, now Vivs suffers from priapism. He has to satisfy himself now, which has lead to him to try to look attractive to lure people to him to have little fun with him. And he needs it to keep the psycho side, that earlier took out the whole Inquest Lab full of Inquestians, under control. 

Now Taimi was 18, and Vivs didn’t have any excuses anymore to keep his hands to himself. 

‘...looks sexy in his thong.’ XD 

Icebrood Saga: After going to the areas that rarely had any sun there, Vivs lost his tan and became again very greenish pale. Taimi could tell that Vivs was in his element, while dealing with creepy stuff at the snowy dark areas. 

At the beginning, when Taimi was writing her thesis about the Elder Dragons, Vivs was dealing with the strange happenings in the far Shiverpeaks. He thought that he could concentrate into dealing with the problems better now that Taimi was safe back in Rata Sum, but no. Vivs noticed himself missing her, and his mind wasn’t fully in the battle present, which probably lead to him being shot with a bow that was created to battle the Elder Dragons. Vivs could concentrate 100% again, when Taimi was in sight (or in earshot, even if vie communicator) again. 

Taimi herself was just glad she could concentrate in peace to her writings, not having anyone disturbing her line of thought. ^^ Well, till she got it done and especially when the Elder Dragon minions began to appear in Rata Sum. She gladly called the others to where she was... And thought to give piece if her mind about the happenings to the Commander. Let’s say Vivs didn’t mind being lectured by her. To him it was like hetero male getting a half naked woman dancing in front him. XP 

End of Dragons: Taimi can sense Vivs feeling bad for having to kill Ankka, that was clearly suffering from a deep depression, and the mother of all Elder Dragons, especially because of Aurene. Also, Taimi feel a bit bad herself, not just for the same reason, but her acting at the beginning probably did hurt Vivs a bit. She also saw that Vivs was already giving up at the fight against the void creatures. Taimi feared that Vivs actually did die, but Aurene brought him back. Taimi was VERY relieved. 

Now: I asked this also earlier (what would Taimi think of him now that it was all over) and the result was Poet and the Pendulum by Nightwish. I take that like Taimi knows Vivs suffers from depression, which is caused by guilt, which was caused by his psycho side doing horrible things to innocent people, which was caused by this Professor messing with his mind when he was still a toddler, and later his mind being messed with by the parasite minion. And yet, he keeps on fighting and in the heat of the battle and exploration has this need to save people. As much as possible. Taimi wants to support and help as much as she could and can. 

What Taimi respects in Vivs: Remedy by Waldo’s People. With this song, I think that is what Taimi really respects about Vivs, is that instead of putting his head under the dirt, he decides to go and help people, even if it was just for the reason to ease his guilt. Taimi knows that Vivs knows that if no one did anything, they all were going to die. So, they should at least try to fight back, or die trying. Because if they didn’t do anything, they would die anyway.

That he was being this guide to people to get them to fight together, despite his own personal struggles. 

I think that Taimi thinks that without the Commander, they all most likely would have died. 

Vivs himself thinks that anyone could have easily taken his place. Someone like Caithe, for example. 

Overall in my head Taimi and Vivs are pretty much in love with each other. But being asura, they easily cast aside tender feelings, and tend to think more logically. Taimi’s current state is uncertain, so she doesn’t really care to get involved with family life. Vividatt would not mind that, but he wouldn’t mind just being with her either. They do it at times, but they often think that it’s just to keep Vivs’ psycho side in control, although, their feelings get involved with it very much. They will never admit it, though. 

Also, Taimi getting jealous over Gorrik also raised Vivs’ eyebrow, although Taimi has all the reasons and right to feel how she feels. Especially since Vivs himself tends to sleep around, even if it is to not let out his dangerous side. 

Relationships are complicated. 

#Guild Wars 2 #GW2 #Taimi #Asura #NPC #None Player Character #OC #Own Character #The Pact Commander #Commander of the Pact #The Commander #OCxNPC #Own Character x None Player Character #ship #I have not slept at all all night

[that-foul-legacy-lover]

Digital Heart

Foul Legacy Childe x Reader Gender Neutral (no pronouns mentioned) Angst Warnings: Falling, fighting, minor injuries, nausea, breathlessness 

In which Genshin is an interactive RPG accessed through an immersive headset, and you find yourself pushed to play it by your friends.

~ * ~

It started with a game.

For thirty days and thirty nights, your friends have been pleading for you to play it. Genshin Impact it was called, an free immersive open-world RPG with hundreds of weapons, characters, and power ups. Accessible through a specialized headset that tracked movement, it had only been a month since the freely downloadable game’s release and it was already a success, garnering praise from the customizable main character and the interactive playstyle. Play it. Your friends beg. You’ll love it. We can play together. 

You refuse at first. The game might be free, but the headset isn’t, and you need to save that money to pay for food and clothes. Alongside your financial state was your schedule, a long list of work and chores that left little time to play games with constant updates like Genshin, so you told your friends- politely, as that’s how you were raised- that it’d have to wait. They agreed, quietly.

Then the next day, they ask again. You make an excuse- too much work. They agree, again.

The second day, asking. You’re too tired, you say. Of course, they respond.

Everyday, the same question. The same request, the same demand. It wears on you, amused exasperation drawing a sigh from you everytime you open your notifications.

Play it.

You can’t.

Play it.

You don’t have time.

Play it.

You need to focus!

Play it.

…

…Alright.

Finally, you cave. You create an account, a headset en route to your house. You clear an area in your house so you don’t accidentally hit anything. The headset arrives, and you insert the batteries, said to last up to an entire day playing nonstop, a stage you dearly hope you never reach. You pull it down over your head, cringing at the thought of your hair getting so mussed, and switch it on. A long and potentially worrying warning flashes before your eyes and you blink, not used to the in-depth cameras yet, as the screen goes white.

Welcome to Genshin Impact! Please name your character… appears, and you subsequently slip down the rabbit hole.

It’s fun, you find. Your friends were right, you did like Genshin Impact, although you thank your lucky stars that you weren’t as attached as some players were, as you still had work and life to attend to. The combat and story were enjoyable, and the characters were funny and diverse in personality and playstyles. The main character, who was also your customizable avatar, was quite literally you, the story explained, a traveler from distant lands who fell face first into Teyvat by mistake and tragedy. Of course you still haven’t gotten entirely used to the whole immersion thing, and sometimes shuddered under the eerily real programming of the NPCs and characters, but that was nigh unnoticeable when focusing on fighting monsters. Your deep love for exploration and discovery surfaces, and you take as long as you want exploring every inch of the wonderfully modelled map as you follow the main story, or “Archon Quests”. You calm the great dragon Dvalin and bid your friends at Mondstadt- Kaeya, Amber, Lisa, Diluc, Jean, and Venti- goodbye, Liyue sprawling out before you in wooded forests and cloud-covered mountains. A mysterious man runs across you at the Inn, the immortal Adeptus Xiao, although you would’ve thought he was quite young due to his short stature, and you encounter Zhongli in the Harbor, along with Lady Ningguang and her subordinates, Keqing and Ganyu. A member of the malicious-seeming Fatui also greets you and introduces himself as Childe, a name you don’t trust for a second, yet find yourself getting strangely attached too. The story progresses with you at Zhongli and Ningguang’s sides, the suspicion being pointed more and more to the Fatui, and you find yourself staring up at the elegant pillars of the Golden House, the mora mint building.

You gulp. You know this is where Childe’s boss battle takes place, and you’re not sure if your team is prepared, even if you stocked up on food right before leaving the Harbor. Inhaling a deep breath, you shove the enormous front doors open, and a cutscene pulls your fear tight against your throat. Everyone’s suspicions were right- he was here to steal the Geo Archon’s gnosis, and you have to stop him. 

Easier said than done. The cutscene of your face shows a determined, fierce expression, instead of the nervous one you had in real life, and you almost laugh. You dearly hope your characters are strong enough, and step into the arena.

Phases One and Two are relatively short, as you quickly learn to avoid using Childe’s respective elements of his Vision and Delusion while his shield is up. The battle is fun and fast-paced, and you feel a thrill in your bones as you dodge another attack before swinging your sword in retaliation. Childe stumbles, and Phase Two ends with a cutscene. The corpse of Rex Lapis, something you considered a bit gruesome, is discovered to have no gnosis, and you can feel the raw anger in the Harbinger’s voice as the air crackles and hisses. A horrible, blinding light shines, and Childe is gone.

At least, human Childe is gone. In his place floats a monstrous version of himself, nearly 14 feet tall and complete with horns and armor, and your mouth drops open slightly as you gaze at him wide eyed. But your focus is violently shifted when the floor cracks and turns to dust, sending you tumbling down into the belly of the Golden House. You land with an unceremonial thump, thankful that the creators hadn’t been cruel enough to make you feel the damage you took in-game.

And Phase Three, the final phase of Harbinger Tartaglia, commences.

He has considerably more health, and his attacks can range from irritating to deadly, you just barely dodging the falling Hydro arrows that would’ve slaughtered your current character. Of course, it doesn’t help that you’re sneaking glances at your attacker every few minutes. Your mind wanders to the lore as you shield yourself from violet lightning. Does this transformation hurt? Where does it come from? Why does it look like a moth? Maybe one day you’ll get answers. 

Despite the raised difficulty, Phase Three also ends rather quickly. Your characters, it seems, were overleveled. The remainder of the Archon Quest passes, Childe reappearing once at the end, and it’s over. The screen blips off as you log out and place the headset on a table before laying on your bed and using the last few hours before bed to contemplate what you’ve just seen.

The next days quickly fall into routine. After completing all your work, you’d take an hour or two to play Genshin, leveling up your characters even more and going through various quests, Childe’s included. You see his transformation, dubbed the Foul Legacy form, again, and almost swoon before stopping and giving yourself a harsh scolding. You fulfill requests and tasks for various people around Teyvat, or at least the parts of Teyvat you can access, and improve your skills and stats. You have a talent for dodging, you find, and use it to your advantage while fighting.

And every Monday, when the clock resets, you re-enter Golden House to battle with Childe and claim your just rewards.

Of course you could do it everyday, but a squirming, guilty feeling in your gut stops you, making you feel like you’re hurting him, no matter how many times you try to tell yourself that he’s simply a video game character, a program in an electronic system.

This thought makes you a bit sad, you think.

The fights are getting easier, something you credit to your rising stars of characters, and you stand before the Ley Line Blossom quicker and quicker each time, something you expect to be no different today.

Phases One and Two are just the same as you take advantage of Vaporize and Overload, drowning out Childe’s pre-programmed sounds of pain with your own abilities. The battle pauses, and you’re transported to the same chamber underground, with its fiery walls and glittering arches, as the fight resumes. With the same attacks and characters, it’s becoming a tad dull, and you frown, wondering if you should try to get another character soon.

You’re lost in your thoughts when you slip and fall.

This you feel in the real world, having landed hard on your back and knocked the air out of your lungs. For a few moments you struggle to breathe, and Childe takes the opportunity to appear right over you, his spear flashing purple. You swear internally, bracing yourself as he readies his weapon.

But the strike never comes. You inhale desperately, oxygen finally flowing into your chest, and open your eyes. The graphics of your game are gray and fuzzy around the edges, framing Childe as he slowly puts his spear down and, to your amazement and slight terror, jerkily reaches towards you. Voice clips play overhead, pieced together to make not words, but a static-interspersed whining sound, much like a concerned beast. Your eyes widen, and Childe stops, withdrawing slightly almost as if he’s worried that you’re afraid, and you whisper his name once, as a tentative question.

Then with crackle and a ping, your game crashes and everything goes black.

You gasp and rip off the headset, chest heaving as you struggle to comprehend what just happened. You’re shaking, nervous and fearful, but curiosity runs strong through your veins. Your finger slides towards the On button, and you press it and slip the device back on.

You’re standing outside, the doors of the Golden House closed as if the battle never happened. The guards surrounding it look ordinary, occasionally repeating phrases you’ve heard and ignored countless times. Glancing around and trying to squash the nauseous bubbling feeling in your gut, you push the doors open again.

It’s different this time. Instead of being in the upper room, you fall a short distance into the Third Phase Chamber, your shoes clicking on the tiled floor. Childe floats in the center, his back to you, and you take a tentative step forward. He turns and looks you dead in the eyes, before flinging his spear to the side and rushing towards you on his feet, kneeling to your height. Instinctively, you jump away as he sits on the ground before you, letting out joyful chirps and trills, sounds you didn’t even know he could make. You approach him, sword held loosely in your hand as an extra precaution, and he tilts his head and coos as you cautiously sit with him. Your hands are trembling as you try to understand that this is real, he is real, all of this is happening.

And if it’s not, then it’s some damn good programming.

Questions start to fill your mind, one after another, and you ask him, responses coming as a nod or a headshake.

Is this real?

Yes.

Or programming?

No.

Could you always do this?

No.

Just today?

No.

Over a period of time. Yes.

How…?

The final question hangs in the air, and he shrugs slightly, then points at you. You did this. You woke him up, made him feel pain, sorrow, and happiness, all stemming from you, his love for you. From the minute the Archon Quests let you meet, he was vaguely curious, the most emotion he’s ever felt in his cold, empty programming since before. And when the code broke, he adored you, not like Childe viciously adored battle, but a soft adoration, one with all his digital heart could muster. You smile, and he purrs at what a wonderful smile it is.

Something flickers in the corner of your eye. Then another. And another. You turn and squint, then gasp as your surroundings begin to dissolve into colorful squares, the game taunting you as it glitches and lags. You and Childe leap to your feet, only to watch helplessly as the world crumbles away. You look down at your hands and see them beginning to break apart into pixels. Childe reaches out to hug you, to hold you close, but his hand passes right through you, a sickening reminder of how unreal he is. He wails in anguish as you both try to grasp each other, only to shatter more, the pixels covering your screen like rain on a windowpane.

Your game crashes for a second time, the only sound a desperate whimper that soon fades into an electronic squealing.

It takes a week to fix your device, the tech people saying that it was “overloaded”. Finally the repairs are finished, and you’re back at the Golden House, the doors already ajar. You slip into the room, expecting either a battle or, hopefully, someone to greet you.

But the room is empty. No one, human nor monster, stands in the center. Instead there is one lonely Ley Line Blossom, waiting, the final gift from an impossible love. 

#genshin impact #childe #tartaglia #gi ajax #foul legacy #foul legacy childe #genshin childe #genshin tartaglia #childe x reader #tartaglia x reader #foul legacy x reader #sfw #genshin sfw #genshin x reader #genshin impact x reader #genshin angst #HERE IT ISSSS #i had a really fun time writing this #idk if anyone will like it bc they might find it cringey but i had a grand time writing it #yes i know it's late shut up shut upppp #i'll reblog it tomorrow #i dont expect many people to like this but it made me happy so i don't care!!! #i've been doing this and drawing rosaria for the entire day #it's fun!! hopefully more tomorrow #anyways enjoy!!! >:)c #genshin au #wifi writes #genshin fic

[thehomebrood]

This is an NPC appreciation post! Check out some of our awesome NPCs from our streamed actual play campaign Ley Lines! These are only a few of our many, many NPCs haha

#dungeons and dragons #dnd #ttrpg #original character #oc

[heavenhasaroad]

Heaven Has A Road - Original Characters

While the story is wholly about Xiao Xingchen, Xue Yang and Song Lan, and kept as close to canon-compliant as possible after the original divergence setting everything in motion, the disaster trio do occasionally run into a number of npcs along the way.

Here is a neat little compilation of the named extras in Heaven Has A Road, in case the text refers back to a name you’ve forgotten, or you want to read an extra tidbit or two about all the people SXX have happened to!

Ai Shenxu – the fangzhang (abbot) of the Daoist temple Yanxia Guan. A wise and mischievous old daoshi who manages to manipulate Xue Yang into meditation and spiritual growth, much to the latter's chagrin. He tells Xiao Xingchen a story of a young troublemaker who came to the temple to take advantage of the kindness of the daoshi there, but who got lulled into that peaceful life, and is still there all these years later to turn other young troublemakers' heads in the right direction.

A-Lei – a young disciple of the doctor-wives in Tanzhou.

Gao Lin – a girl of Muaishan, whose father was driven insane by the mist spirits. She tells the daoshi her story, to try to help Xiao Xingchen figure out what was done to him while he was spirited away.

Madam Hu – the old woman in charge of the inn of Aijian in Muaishan. She's vastly superstitious and terrified of all things to do with gentry, cultivators and the unnatural... But she does grow to care a lot about the strange travelers under her roof, despite her fears.

Old Hu – the innkeeper of Aijian in Muaishan. Xue Yang and Song Lan first met him when searching for Xiao Xingchen, and he set them on their way to find the spirits' lair. He and his wife later welcomed the traveling trio to stay at their inn to recuperate after fighting and vanquishing the mist spirits.

Old Luo – an old daoshi at Baixue, remembered by Tian Hao and Song Lan with a mix of fondness and trepidation. A rather fearsome teacher who took pleasure in punishing any miss-stepping pupils with the chore of sweeping the courtyard before dawn. He's mentioned by the Yanxia daoshi as a master of acupuncture techniques. In Muaishan, Song Lan uses spiritual pressure point techniques to weave Xue Yang's meridians back together, saying Xue Yang killed the man who once taught them to him.

Qian Feng – jianyuan of the Daoist temple Yanxia Guan. He’s the temple’s second in command, responsible for Night Hunts and handling the everyday affairs of the temple and the daoshi living there. Tian Hao says he's a strong cultivator – especially when it comes to the strength of fingers holding onto coin...

Tian Hao – a daoshi of Yanxia Guan. He studied as a guest cultivator at Baixue Ge for a year in his youth, and is one of the few besides Song Lan who personally remembers the people there. He calls Song Lan his shidi and gives him advice and support, and they made a promise to stay in touch through correspondence.

Wang Haifeng – a young cultivator who used demonic cultivation to raise corpses for him and his friends to fight to gain heroic reputation. Xue Yang mentally dubbed him ”unfortunate front teeth”. He showed quite great interest in Xue Yang's skills and knowledge, though he was very cowed by the telling-off they all received by Song Lan once he learned the truth. He is one of the last survivors of the Yingchuan Wang clan, which rose to prominence under the Wen thanks to Wang Lingjiao's involvement with Wen Chao.

Wang Meili – one of the elderly doctors in Tanzhou, who was born to the Yingchaun Wang clan but left to study medicine with the Dafan Wen. There she met her life partner, Wu Lian, and the two of them eventually set out as wandering cultivators to offer their gifts of healing to those in need, before finally settling down in Tanzou. She has a stern and brusque demeanour, but is a highly skilled doctor and a very loving wife.

Wang Rouqing - the ghostly widow of Wangzhuang, and Wang Haifeng’s mother. She stopped talking after the death of her husband and the massacre of her in-laws during Sunshot, and only found peace after Xue Yang helped confirm her husband’s spirit had truly moved on.

Wu Lian – one of the elderly doctors in Tanzhou. She was once a guest-disciple with the Dafan Wen, where she first met her companion Wang Meili. Together they set out as wandering cultivators upon finishing their training, to offer healing and care to those needing, and finally settled down in Tanzhou. Mild-mannered and sweet, she likes telling stories and making her stern wife smile.

Zhao Yicheng – one of the young cultivators who fought the undead at the old plague graveyard. Designated ”short boy” by Xue Yang, he was the leader of the gang, and the brains behind his and his friend Wang Haifeng's plan to use demonic cultivation to raise monsters for them to fight in order to gain glory and a good reputation. He and his cousin Zhao Yijun are from the Zhao clan, which Wen Zhuliu once belonged to before getting adopted into the Wen family.

Zhao Yijun – one of the young cultivators who fought the undead at the plague graveyard. Xue Yang called him ”the taller Zhao” or ”compass boy.” Happily unaware of his cousin's and friend's plan to raise the dead, he was trying to track fierce corpses using one of the older models of spirit compass - which strangely started malfunctioning once Song Lan joined the Night Hunt... He and his cousin Zhao Yicheng are from the Zhao clan, which Wen Zhuliu once belonged to before getting adopted into the Wen family.

------------------

To potentially be added to as the story progresses.

#meta #characters #ai shenxu #a-lei #gao lin #madam hu #old hu #old luo #qian feng #tian hao #wang haifeng #wang meili #wu lian #zhao yicheng #zhao yijun #wang rouqing

[dourpeep]

Hey do you have any tips for people who play genshin that are new? Like when It comes to Lvling characters and stuff?

OHOHOHO MY TIME HAS COME--

This is a little long because I get carried away and went over a lot, but!!

I think the overall most important thing is that...don't tire yourself out. But onto the good stuff-

Since you're new, when you're travelling around pick up whatever grabbable items you can get because it's better to have excess than panic later because you don't know where to get the stuff you need (guilty as charged, but now I hoard kdfaieh).

Make sure to mark down places on the map! I personally have all the crystal mining spots marked! I also mark down good hunting areas for meat and specific NPCs (namely, the four gliding minigame NPCs in Liyue). Sometimes I'll also keep tab on a specific mob that spawns somewhere (i.e. juvenile geovishaps) or specific character ascension material (like the sea ganoderma for Kazuha).

Run domains (weapon ascension/talent) + Ley Lines! While it's good to run bosses in the beginning, due to a lack of resources, it's important to make sure you give these attention as well! They're vital to leveling up your characters. If you're only working on a few peeps, Sundays are your best friend for domains because you can pick and choose what you want to do. But yeah, make sure to do those ley lines because you will run out of mora and character exp books fast.

Complete the story quests (optional, and a given lol) :D This is mainly because there's a few handy features that you can get from doing each area's reputation rank. For example, you can unlock the recipe for condensed resin once you get Liyue to rank 3, I believe? Don't worry about rushing through though! The quests are long and chock-full of story so enjoy them :DD

Artifacts! In the beginning, don't worry about running artifact domains as much, the ones that you get running around adventuring + from the adventure rank and journal are pretty good as is. Not to mention, it isn't until about rank 35 that you reliably get 4* and 5* artifacts...then it's suffering.

Don't be afraid to use foods. Something I've realized is that there's a lot of people who are against using the buffing foods (attack, defense, elemental res or dmg) just because it's not a flex?? But use what you can use, y'know? If you need to eat an adeptus temptation for that food buff, go right ahead! It's there for a reason and there's no need to limit yourself since playing is all about having fun

This one isn't as necessary, especially if you're going to be playing casually, but team comps are important too. While I personally do like making mine half-catering to my favorite characters, it doesn't hurt to make sure you have a few options when it comes to weapon or elemental types. Like Xinyan is a really great physical dps and she as a claymore user she's fantastic with breaking geo shields...but anything that has an elemental shield is incredibly difficult to knock out on her own. That's why I also have Qiqi who can apply cryo (though she's not the best cryo applicator) and Xiao who can swirl (used in tandem with Xinyan's pyro or Qiqi's cryo, I'm somewhat able to break most elemental shields down).

Don't be fooled by the meta/best in slot stuff. Yes, it's nice to have a character that is known to be incredible, but for the most part, I've noticed a lot of these stuff include limited banner 5* characters and weapons or p2p stuff. For the longest time, my team was made up of all 4* (and one Qiqi) and I was kicking ass! But for example, the 4* you get in the beginning make up a fantastic team.

Amber is great for her charge attack! She can easily hit 3k+ charge attack damage without really being built and takes down cryo shields like no other! She's also great against electro enemies because of that.

Kaeya is great because his skill and burst have short cooldowns and apply consistent cryo. I had him built as a support/dps in tandem with an electro character.

Lisa! I personally don't like using catalyst because I'm impatient, but hoooo boy does she pack a punch. Catalysts are fantastic because they always apply their element to enemies (very reliable dmg).

Traveler is also really good because they're pretty flexible. I prefer the anemo traveler because I love swirl reactions, but you can easily build them for their element damage or for physical damage. Also you get their character ascension stuff easily with adventure rank which doesn't hurt.

You can also get Barbara who's great for hydro application + healing for free in the beginning and you can get guaranteed Noelle from the starting banner. Noelle is particularly good because you can also build her to fill any niche. She has a shield, healing, and she hits hard because she's a claymore user!

Oh!! Going back to talents! Depending on what you're looking to build, you can only level up what's necessary. Like, for example, if you're building Kaeya for his cryo application, just focus on leveling up his skill and burst since talents are pretty costly! No need to build on auto attacks if you're just going to switch to him real fast, apply cryo, then switch back after all!

I think that's about it for now, but lemme know if there's anything else you'd like to know :DDD

#anon asks #sprout's tips #genshin impact #genshin impact tips