#shipwreck steel

[chiropteracupola]

no flowers for the forgotten

#em draws stuff #oc time again hehe #shipwreck steel #the shadow: joe disanti #<- putting that new organizational system into use yayyyyyy #this is a cropped-down version of something I'd been struggling to resolve issues with for months #and then in the end I've given up trying to find away around it that looks nice #but I was too pleased with how parts of it turned out to leave it in the wip pile forever and ever #so here's. uh. some feet.

[theparrybutton]

Sequels to RPGs and how they handle progression

One of the most story-rich, narrative-heavy genres in gaming. The kind of games that don't leave many stones unturned, trying to tell full, complete stories with the lore of the setting explored to the last letter. As well as a definitive ending waiting for player, after they defeat a dark deity, or a guy trying to become one, or just a guy who's a huge asshole. Endings that give the world and it's characters a happy conclusion. But what about games that just... don't do that? Games that, while giving you a complete story, still leave out many secrets, red herrings and unresolved plotlines? Games that are made with the intent of following themselves up with a part 2? How do they handle game-to-game character progression? All this growth the player has built up over the course of their long journey?

Game sequels are usually completely different worlds with different mechanics, and even if they're set in the same world and star the same characters, the different mechanics can require character progression to be reset, leading to funny explanations (if any) like Dante selling his weapons to pay rent, or Adol Christin losing his stuff because of constant shipwrecks. RPGs are in the same boat (no shipwrecks here). These game sequels don't interact with their predecessors whatsoever because of that, aside from maybe giving you extra goodies if they detect save data. And even sequels that ARE direct continuations to previous games don't interact with prequels for various reasons. Such as, like mentioned above, having completely different game mechanics, a brand new cast of characters (who would naturally have to start from 0), and/or setting the sequel years after part 1, aging the old cast and effectively "rusting" them. For example, Final Fantasy X-2, despite starring characters from the original FFX, has no data transfers whatsoever, due to different game mechanics. But there are outliers, and there have been different ways sequels have interacted with their prequels, so let's look at a few examples.

Now, Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn is your typical case of a RPG sequel. Brand new cast of characters, set years apart from Path of Radiance (part 1 of the story), and also released on a different platform! Despite that, through the usage of GameCube memory card slots present on most Wii models, the game allows you to transfer your clear data of Path of Radiance which can affect various functions in your Radiant Dawn playthrough. For the most part, save transferring will affect characters from the first game in a minor way, due to those characters appearing much later in the story. Transferring will only give +2 to the stats a character has capped by the time they hit Level 20 on their promoted class, with a few exceptions to certain characters. One such character being Sothe, a sort of guardian figure to Radiant Dawn's new main cast, and as such he is present from the very start. In his case, his Level 20 stats by the end of Path of Radiance will carry over directly to Radiant Dawn, overwriting his base stats that he would have without save transfer, even if some stats are lower than his base stats. (Pictured below: RNG-blessed Level 20 Sothe in Path of Radiance and no-transfer base Sothe in Radiant Dawn)

Interestingly enough, the other Fire Emblem sequel game(s), Mystery of the Emblem and it's DS remake don't have any interactivity with their Book 1s. The only difference being that in Mystery of the Emblem SNES, Marth gets a special icon next to his name for just one chapter. This type of data transfer, fully carrying over character levels, is very rare in RPGs, and there's only one RPG series I can think of that does this.

The Trails series, or simply Kiseki, is a very unique series, due to it's 12 and counting games all being set in one, continuous timeline, happening one after another, with some games even happening at the same time as each other. This is because the series is cleanly split into different story arcs, each arc set in a separate in-universe country, so even here we run into the case of new games starring new casts. But the games within those arcs have interesting approaches to save transfers.

For example; Trails in the Sky SC and Trails to Azure, sequels to Trails in the Sky and Trails from Zero respectively, allow you to fully transfer the stats and levels of protagonists Estelle and Lloyd, allowing both to start at a higher level than they would otherwise, as well as having alternate versions of certain scenes, affected by how much side content you did in the prequels. Beyond those two games, a constant between all Trails sequels is that characters retain all of their abilities and the level cap is raised, due to the sequels having a much higher starting level for progression consistency. Characters will get upgrades to their old abilities on top of new ones, and if part 1's level cap was 50, in part 2 it would be raised to 100, with the characters' starting level being above 50. (Pictured below: Rean's average endgame level in Cold Steel 1 and Rean's level cap in Cold Steel 2)

And that's very cool. Not a lot of games care about character progression from previous games and yet here's a series of RPGs that put care and attention to their stories so much that they even maintain character progression consistency.

Now for something completely different, with the way the data is transferred being the unique part.

Two GBA games! But how is that possible? Save data is saved on the carts, not on the system itself! Here the developers used the ol' reliable method of passwords, with password length determining what you get to transfer over.

Short "bronze" passwords only transfer custom character names and certain event flags. Moderate "silver" passwords transfer full character stats from the original Golden Sun, as well as bronze transfers. And now the fun, stupidly long, 260-character "golden" passwords, which on top of previous bonuses, also transfer every item the party members had in their inventory by the end of the game, including exclusive items not present in Golden Sun Lost Age. A huge reward for the patient gamer who managed to put in all 260 characters correctly.

Or, y'know, you could just transfer over through the Link Cable, like a chump.

These were some of the examples of how sequels to RPGs handled character progression, if they bothered to at all. While it is a bit of a bummer that more games don't do this, it's understandable why sequels ultimately decide to separate themselves from their predecessors, even if they are direct continuations. But that's a topic for another day.

#trails #kiseki #fire emblem #path of radiance #final fantasy #radiant dawn #golden sun #trails of cold steel #trails in the sky #jrpg #rpg #trivia #cool game mechanics #adol christin shipwreck joke

[gijoe-forever]

#gijoe #torpedo #rock n roll #big ben #shipwreck #snowjob #steel brigade

[ltwilliammowett]

The wreck of the Peter Iredale in the Fort Stevens State Park, Oregon, USA, at sunset, by Robert Bradshaw

The Peter Iredale (1890) was once a four-masted steel barque sailing vessel owned by British shipping firm Iredale & Porter. In September 1906, the ship left Santa Cruz, Mexico, on its way to Portland, Oregon, where it was supposed to pick up wheat bound for the United Kingdom. But a heavy wind and strong current sent her on to the breakers and she ran aground at Clatsop Beach, with three of her masts snapping from the impact. The wreckage became an immediate tourist attraction, and despite being buffeted by the wind and waves ever since, it remains so today. It’s now part of Fort Stevens State Park.

#tall ship #peter iredale #steel barque #1890 #shipwreck #age of steam

[seamusicpoetry]

Launched in 1891, the steel-hulled Grecian was built during an era of unprecedented industrial growth and dramatic change in shipbuilding technology. Good steel flexes but doesn’t break upon impact. However, in June 1906, when Grecian struck a reef in northern Lake Huron, its steel plating proved brittle. With a hole in its bottom, the nearly 300-foot steamer was being towed to Detroit for repair when it flooded and sank near Thunder Bay.

Learn more about the Grecian here:https://thunderbay.noaa.gov/shipwrecks/grecian.html?fbclid=IwAR2MFxvstljVFDDK_e7gvsZovsRbYMwxHFB-AkuoDUHEgmIsmAJLnpH9h7I

#shipwreck #steel bulk freighter #Grecian #1906 #Thunder Bay #Lake Superior #Lake Huron #blue #waters

[dinodude52]

Okay, let's talk about the Titanic

Because I'm autistic and the Titanic was one of my special interests as a kid and that submersible has reignited my interest a little bit.

There were enough lifeboats. The controversy about the lifeboats came from the fact that the original designers wanted more lifeboats, but they downsized the number of boats to clear up the deck. There were regulations in place to ensure there were enough boats on all White Star Line ships. With the few collapsible boats they included on the ship, they had enough boats. The problem was they didn't fill them properly during the evacuation. Edit: I say there were enough lifeboats but I doublechecked and realized I miss remembered. The Titanic was equipped with the legally required number of lifeboats at 20 (16 on deck and 4 collapsible). The assumption had been that, in the even of an emergency, they would have the ability to be rescued fairly quickly and the lifeboats could be used to carry people to safety on repeated trips. Unfortunately, the closest ships were still too far away. The Carpathia was the rescue ship despite being further away than the closest ship to the Titanic, the Californian.

"Women and children first" wasn't the norm for shipwrecks. Typically, women and children made up the majority of the dead during such tragedies. To my knowledge, only two shipwrecks have done "women and children first," and they are most definitely the exceptions, not the rule.

On that note, one of the reasons the lifeboats weren't filled properly was because the crew on one side of the ship interpreted Captain Smith's command as "women and children first" while the crew on the other side of the ship interpreted the command as "women and children only."

The majority of the dead were third class passengers. Some did survive, but the majority didn't.

There were also a number of dogs that perished on the ship, though some did survive.

The ship wasn't going any faster than it was supposed to.

As for the ice field, they were skirting the bottom edge of said ice field. Where they were passing through, the icebergs were supposed to be pretty small.

The iceberg the Titanic collided with was unusually large for that time of year and for the location it was floating in. The weather conditions of the time made the ocean much colder than usual so the iceberg didn't have the chance to melt as much as it could have.

Though the lookouts didn't have binoculars, the sky was clear and the ocean was calm that night. If there was an iceberg, by all accounts they would have been able to see it, though it's suspected that the calm seas might have actually been a hinderance to spotting the iceberg rather than the help the lookouts assumed it would be.

On the topic of spotting the iceberg, recent research suggests that due to some atmospheric weirdness, the horizon line looked higher than it actually was. I don't remember the specifics, but it had something to do with the calm ocean and warm air from the south mingling with cool air from the north. It was also an exceptionally cold night that night, according to survivors, which might have aided the optical illusion. With the horizon looking higher than it was, the iceberg would have either looked smaller and further away than it was, or it could have been hidden completely.

The way the Titanic was built, it was explicitly designed to take damage head-on rather than from the sides. If the ship had stayed course instead of turning, it would have survived. It would have taken significant damage, but it would have stayed afloat.

The rivets used to connect the steel plates on the side of the Titanic were made of iron, I think, and an impure iron at that. The iron became brittle from the cold water so when the iceberg scraped against the side of the Titanic, the seams ripped apart like a zipper. The rivets failed completely.

The survivors of the wreck reported seeing the Titanic break in half, but no one believed them (probably because many of the survivors were women). It wasn't until the wreckage was found that the truth was known: the Titanic broke in half.

Though the lifeboats did their best to stay in a group, a few boats ended up floating away. The bodies were recovered some time later. Many retrieval efforts were dispatched over a handful of weeks after the tragedy. They were never able to recover all the bodies, and I think they only managed to recover about 100 out of 1500 bodies, give or take. They took the bodies back to Halifax in Canada where the Titanic was supposed to dock first. There's a memorial there and the unclaimed bodies have been buried there as well.

If there were bodies trapped inside the Titanic as it was sinking, there weren't any bodies once it hit the bottom of the ocean. And there definitely weren't any bodies when the wreckage was found in the 80's. The pressure would have destroyed them, bacteria and deep sea creatures would have eaten whatever was left. They would have decomposed.

As they were attempting to recover the bodies, a search and rescue team did find the iceberg the Titanic hit. They knew it was the true iceberg because it still had paint from the hull on it.

I went to the Titanic museum in Orlando once a long time ago and it was wonderful in a tragic way. My favorite part of the tour was a small section where the deck was recreated, including a bench you could sit at and a wall covered in black cloth and lights to look like stars. It was cool, but not cold, and was set to replicate the night of the disaster. Sitting on the bench, you could really feel what it was like to be on the Titanic the night it sank. The next room you entered was a room with a piece of the hull, and then after that another room filled with the names of everyone on the ship. If the name was lit, the person lived, but if it wasn't, the person died. You got a card with information about a real passenger at the beginning of the tour and in that final room you learned if your passenger survived or not. I still have my card somewhere, but I'm not sure where. I can't remember the name of the passenger on my card (this was 7 or 8 yrs ago by now) but he was a third class passenger, one of the few who survived, and unfortunately his wife and all his children perished. The panels with the names were set up by class, and the most heartbreaking part was seeing the panels with the third class passengers and how many names weren't lit.

And those are my Titanic facts. IDK what it is about this ship, about this wreck, that captures our imaginations in such an intense way. I used to check this book out of the school library about the Titanic and read it over and over again. I was obsessed. Still am, apparently.

Note: This was all from my memory so if my facts aren’t quite right, I apologize. It’s been *years* since I’ve gone down a proper Titanic rabbit hole.

#titanic #titanic wreck #shipwreck

[caffeinewitchcraft]

The ship rocks.

Leona stares out over the choppy sea without emotion. A wisp of memory: the way she screamed and laughed her first day at sea. She wore yellow that day and she remembers the shock of her shirt against the endless blue of the sky.

She leans against the center mast, head tilting up. The sails are tattered ghosts against the steel-grey sky and there are scorch marks marching along the wood. When she tied the crew to the mast, she made sure to take their daggers and pocketknives. She didn’t think they’d be so desperate as to burn themselves free.

The sun hasn’t shown its face in five days. What little light peeked through the clouds disappears as it slips further and further away. Leona closes her eyes against the encroaching darkness. She knows what comes next.

“Darling.”

It’s not a voice Leona knows. That’s why she’s the last one standing. An orphan with only one love in her heart her entire life is stronger than someone who left a family behind on distant shores. A cruel and callous statement, but true.

“Darling, please. For me. For us. For what can be.”

Leona grits her teeth and opens her eyes. The craggy mountains that have locked her ship in pace rise like blades into the sky. Dark and imposing, jutting out of the sea like teeth. Blue lights glimmer in their crevices and along their shores, little flames of ethereal light that promise more warmth than can be found on a shipwrecked ship.

“You’re different. Please, let me show you how different.”

Different. Leona scoffs even as she feels something give deep inside. She’s an orphan from an town filled with them. They’re not different. Even her love for the sea isn’t unique. The men and women she sailed with held the same love in their hearts.

And now they belong to the watery grave below.

So Leona holds no illusions when she steps away from the mast. Even as a part of her heart sings, Different, I’m different, Ill be different, she doesn’t smile like her crew mates did. She’s falling for the lie, sure.

But she won’t go down smiling.

“Darling, I promise it’s not what you think. Come here, come here.”

Leona falls from her ship and into waiting arms.

#my writing #Drabble #long post #sirens #Leona and the sirens

[47burlm]

The SS Edmund Fitzgerald was an American Great Lakes freighter that sank in Lake Superior during a storm on November 10, 1975, with the loss of the entire crew of 29 men 1. When launched on June 7, 1958, she was the largest ship on North America’s Great Lakes, and she remains the largest to have sunk there 1. The ship was carrying a full cargo of ore pellets with Captain Ernest M. McSorley in command, en route to a steel mill near Detroit, when it joined a second taconite freighter, SS Arthur M. Anderson. By the next day, the two ships were caught in a severe storm on Lake Superior, with near-hurricane-force winds and waves up to 35 feet high 1. The ship was located in deep water on November 14, 1975, by a U.S. Navy aircraft detecting magnetic anomalies, and found soon afterwards to be in two large pieces 1. The cause of the sinking remains unknown 2.

The ship’s mysterious demise inspired Gordon Lightfoot’s hit song “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” (1976), which helped make it the most famous shipwreck in the Great Lakes 2. The ship’s wreck is located at 46°59′54″N 85°6′36″W in Lake Superior 1.

#Youtube

[just-late-roman-republic-things]

Thurinus

A companion to Agrippa, in more ways than one.

I When you're four years old, your father dies. You don't recall his face. You are nearly crushed By the crowds, stricken with the stench Of burning flesh and flowers On the bonfire that is Rome.

Your mother remarries. Her new husband Has a son of his own. He needs no scion of moneychangers Polluting his dinner parties Or drawing whispers When you cannot stop wheezing.

II You go with Grandma Julia; Mother murmurs that she will write. Grandma soothes you with stories Of her little brother, who defied a dictator While the Senate's "best men" shivered, Owning nothing but his name.

Little brother isn't so little now And flatterers pay you false praise. You flout your stepfather by flouting them For common Marcus Agrippa. His name means nothing; yours, too much. But he sees you, and not a Caesar.

III You are eight, your sister eleven, Her husband thrice her age. Grandma's brother objects In a dispatch that demands what you can't. His legions cannot bring her back, but There is thunder rumbling in Gaul.

As you turn twelve, Grandma dies. You return to mother and her husband And speak first at the funeral. From Ravenna arrives a letter Complimenting your Latin. You reread it every week.

IV You are permitted at Philippus' dinners (For your stepfather is Philippus) If you stay silent as Scipio schemes, Cato conspires, Marcellus maneuvers To conquer the conqueror Who asks after your health.

You learn to smile at Cicero And pretend to Pompey And they smile back, for sickness Has fashioned you small, And you look younger than you are. You let them think that.

When you are thirteen, the man who denounced a dictator Becomes one.

V Caesar's hairline is receding And war has wrinkled his brow But he bursts in at a banquet With a laugh like lightning, Invades Philippus' villa Like he invaded Italy.

Caesar dissects you with his eyes, Drenches you in self-doubt, But you will not back away. Throat thick, you ask a favor For Agrippa's brother abroad, Who betrayed Caesar for Cato.

VI You're too fragile to follow Caesar. You are a man yet not a man Garbed in a grown-up toga, Confined to your mother's care. A steward stole your inheritance, Leaving nothing but your name.

Caesar brings back the brother Whole and healthy. The hug From your best friend makes you Want. You wonder, but dare not ask, What Caesar felt for Nicomedes.

VII You can tell you're being tested Supervising Caesar's triumph. You faint, sun-stricken, feverish Your thin form failing again. Caesar sails for Spain without you. You follow anyway.

At seventeen, you're seasick, Shipwrecked on the Spanish shore, Roused by Agrippa half-drowned. You cross enemy country, Are received in Roman camp. Caesar is speechless.

VIII You get no grace from your great-uncle. Caesar showers you with work And compels you to give commands. Half-panicked, you keep pace, A drizzle to his downpour, Refusing to be riven.

You bring Agrippa on the boat home, And steel yourself for a storm From Caesar--who smiles, Doesn't care if you share a bunk, Sends you both to the Balkans To assault Parthia at his side.

When you are eighteen, your idol and idealism Are stabbed to death.

IX The legions want you not to leave. Caesar's blessing is a blade In your back, a poisoned plum. They promise to protect you, But your mother begs you come And Agrippa is all the armor you need.

Evasion's impossible: Italy Embraces you, and grown men grieve As you've never seen. "Caesar"-- His name is a nation's hymn. They wonder about his will; You didn't think he could die.

X You weren't his closest kinsman: Pinarius has better blood; Pedius, years of service. Lucius has the lineage And Antony has it all. You're hardly one-half Roman.

Philippus sends strange letters Warning you, but for what, He won't put in writing. You meet him and your mother With visitors in their villa. Caesar's people procured his will.

XI

A pittance to Pedius and Pinarius; A provision to the Roman poor; To Antony, nothing; to Lucius, less; All else, he left to you: his land, His books, his bank accounts, His network and his name.

A posthumous adoption: possible, But odd, and Caesar's perfect prose Is unusually unclear. He's left you one last exit To comfortable obscurity. But if you're brave--

XII "It's madness," says your mother, Who sees only your small bones. "A folly," says Philippus, Who cares only for his comforts. You push past them, grab Agrippa, And sit down with Caesar's men.

You are eighteen. Agrippa's lips Are the first to utter your true name, Which you hadn't known till now. You will murder the murderers Who felled your father, but tonight, As thunder rumbles in Rome,

You kill Gaius Octavius Thurinus, And rise as Caesar.

#i have a lot of thoughts about octavian and i'm making it everyone's problem #octavian #augustus caesar #julius caesar #poetry #jlrrt scribbles #ancient rome #octagrippa

[chiropteracupola]

what hobbies does spike from shipwreck steel have? favorite color? what did they do as an extracurricular in school?

finally I am answering this ask in order to say that spike was a Very Intense soccer kid who grew up into a much less intense soccer adult!

here is spike at around eight years old, just after a game with her neighborhood soccer team, the 'Pizza Bagels.' she doesn't remember the rules of the game half the time but she is very enthusiastic about getting to Run and Kick Things, and that particular enthusiasm has been carried forward to present-day spike, who still kicks a ball around from time to time, as well as being a bit of a gym bro with a tendency to let their little cousins use them as a human climbing frame. they also enjoy cooking and old arcade games!

and as you might expect, their favorite color is teal.

#em draws stuff #oc time again hehe #shipwreck steel #the radiologist: spike padilla #2024 year of Posting Scribblescrabble. on my own schedule ie a way while after the asks were actually sent :] #pizza-bagels as a kids' soccer team name is Thoroughly drawn from my own experiences in soccer as a babychild #before my knees got atrocious I played for 'the purple panthers' 'the flaming mustaches' and 'england'

[idkyetxoxo]

Twenty | Vagabond | The Last Kingdom

"Lighten up husband you know you're the only one I like touching me"

"Just you wait till we're out of here woman"

─── ✦⋅ ☆⋅✦ ───

As we braced ourselves to depart from Eoferwich through sheer force, a silent plea escaped my lips, directed towards any god willing to listen. The last thing we needed was a spatter of bloodshed so early in our mission, especially if we aimed to conquer Bebbanburg and save Aelfwynn.

As the imposing gates parted, revealing Edward and his assembled army on the other side, I finally released the breath I had been holding. Uhtred allowed Edward his moment of triumph as the satisfaction of marshalling such forces washed over him, but I couldn't help but roll my eyes at the spectacle.

"To Bebbanburg" Finan's cry pierced the air, rallying the soldiers as cheers erupted around us. He shot me a knowing wink, to which I responded with a grin.

As we journeyed northward, our path was suddenly intercepted by Cynlaef, Aethelstan's closest companion. "What of Osferth?" I exclaimed, swiftly dismounting to warmly embrace him.

"Osferth is alive and well," he reassured me, his words washing over me like a soothing balm. With a sigh of relief, I turned back to Finan, nodding in gratitude. His smile mirrored my own, acknowledging the weight that would have burdened me had Osferth's fate been uncertain.

"I've been wandering" Cynlaef began, only to be abruptly cut off by Finan's terse interruption. "Now is not the time," he interjected, effectively silencing him.

Nevertheless, Cynlaef managed to relay the news of King Constantin's movements, his arrival at Bebbanburg by sea alongside his retinue while his main army marched overland. Despite doubts about Constantin's maritime voyage, we dismissed the notion, focusing instead on our pressing objective of rescuing Aelfwynn.

"We cannot besiege Bebbanburg while Aelfwynn remains captive," I asserted, finding agreement in Uhtred's proposed plan. He outlined a daring scheme wherein he and a select few men would infiltrate the fortress via a cliffside path to liberate Aelfwynn.

"When you say men I am going to assume you included me," I remarked, arms crossed, prompting Uhtred to exchange a glance with Finan "Don't look at him" I warned, steeling myself for the peril ahead. "It's going to be dangerous," he cautioned, to which I responded with an exasperated eye-roll.

"I am the one that swore the oath so I will not rest until that girl is safely in my arms, anyone with objections can handle them on their own," I declared resolutely, mounting my horse and riding ahead. 

Uhtred's plan hinged on Haestan, whose supposed reformation still left me wary. Haestan would feign shipwrecked traders to lure Wihtgar onto the beach, then signalling Edward to initiate the attack.

── ✦⋅ ☆⋅✦ ──

Scaling the rocks to reach the fortress proved to be an arduous feat, pushing the limits of exhaustion to new heights. Yet, my smaller stature in comparison to the men granted me an unexpected advantage, allowing me to manoeuvre more easily among the jagged terrain.

"Ah," I muttered, my gaze fixed on the seemingly insurmountable rock face before me. "What's the matter?" Sihtric inquired, concern etched across his features as he peered up at me.

"There's no way forward," I replied, frustration bubbling beneath the surface. "The path is gone."

"Is there another way around?" Finan's voice trembled with apprehension. "Can we go back on ourselves?" His anxiety, palpable in the air, mirrored my own, perhaps tinged with an added layer of concern for my safety.

"There's no time the tide will be turning and men will be leaving their posts" Sihtric interjected, his tone laced with urgency. I glanced back at Finan, who rested his head against the rock in resignation. "You always said you wanted to die at Bebbanburg" he grumbled, a hint of gallows humour threading through his words.

"No one is dying" I retorted firmly, quelling any hint of fatalism. "Less talking let's go" I commanded, forging ahead as we ascended, each step a precarious dance with gravity.

Silence enveloped us until Finan's hand slipped causing him to let out a scream, his fingers barely clinging to the unforgiving rock face as his body hung below.

"Finan!" I cried out, panic seizing me as my heart raced with dread. "Give me your hand!" Sihtric's voice rang out, urgency fueling his movements, while I scrambled down toward them. "If you let go of him Sihtric I'm pushing you next" I barked, my own fear translating into a fierce resolve.

With a herculean effort, Sihtric managed to haul Finan back up, the tension easing as relief flooded through me. Sihtric erupted into laughter, momentarily eclipsing the gravity of our situation.

I slapped the back of Sihtric's head a mix of irritation and gratitude swirling within me, before pulling Finan close, my voice trembling with emotion. "You're an idiot," I whispered, my eyes glistening with unshed tears, as he cupped my face tenderly.

"You're not getting rid of me that easily," he quipped, his lips brushing against mine in a fleeting kiss.

"We're almost there," Uhtred's voice broke through the moment, "carefully" I cautioned Finan, casting a wary glance at the treacherous path ahead.

"This is a much better view than Sihtrics arse" Finan's irreverent remark echoed through the air, drawing an exasperated eye-roll from me.

At last, we reached the summit, relief washing over us like a gentle tide. I seized the opportunity to pull Finan into a kiss, savouring the fleeting moment "Maybe we should be doing that more often" he mused, his words tinged with playful warmth as I pulled away, shaking my head with a smile.

Sihtric skillfully hacked away at a weakened section of the wooden wall, creating an opening for us to slip through before discreetly covering our tracks. The moment we stepped into the fortress, distant voices pierced the air, sending us scrambling to hide.

With Uhtred donning a helmet as a disguise, we embarked on our mission to locate Aelfwynn. As we cautiously traversed the grounds, my thoughts raced with the dire consequences if any harm had befallen her. 

Spotting King Constantin in the courtyard, a surge of anger welled within me. "If he's so much as even touched her I'm gonna turn him into Sigefrid" I muttered under my breath, my words tinged with venom.

Before I could react, Uhtred ventured toward his cousin, "Uhtred" I said in a harsh whisper but he didn't stop walking, ignoring my warning with ease. "You, stay in the courtyard" a voice commanded, prompting me to swiftly retreat behind Finan.

"Why does Constantin place his men here?" Wihtgar's inquiry hung in the air, met with Finan's attempt at a Scottish accent, I almost laughed out loud after Sihtric's imitation and attempt at the word "aye."

It didn't take long for Wihtgar and Constantin to discern the ruse, their suspicions falling upon Finan, Sihtric, and eventually, me. "Are you also shipwrecked Danes?" Constantin's query sent a chill down my spine, though it offered a glimmer of hope that Hild and Haestan had successfully infiltrated the fortress.

"Torture them for answers, show them the fate of any sea raider," Wihtgar commanded, his words dripping with menace.

"Gently," I interjected a futile attempt to temper the impending brutality as a guard shoved my arms behind my back. "I can cooperate if you ask politely," I offered, earning a silent rebuke from Finan's glare conveying 'Shut up before you get us killed.'

As we were bound to posts, I exchanged a glance with Uhtred, the only one among us still free. Wihtgar's piercing gaze bore into us, and I feared he would recognise our true identities. Mercifully, he was called away, diverting his attention elsewhere.

Turning my focus to our captors, I summoned what charm I could muster. "Excuse me," I addressed one of the men, feigning vulnerability.  "What" he spoke gruffly and I forced a smile onto my face and then pouted "I think I injured my shoulder during the shipwreck," I said and he stood there looking at me like I was a foreign alien.

"Would you mind checking to see if there's a wound?" I inquired, attempting to infuse my voice with a hint of vulnerability. The guard's disinterest was palpable, but I pressed on, resorting to a flirtatious approach. "I could offer you a reward," I teased, my words laced with a promise that seemed to catch his attention.

"How's that?" he responded with a smirk, his demeanour suggestive of a man accustomed to such advances. Glancing at Finan and Sihtric, I noted their understanding of my ploy, though Finan did not look amused at all.

"Come closer, and I'll give you a clue," I murmured seductively, drawing him nearer with a subtle sway. As his fingers grazed the skin of my neck, a shiver ran down my spine, but I maintained my composure, knowing our freedom depended on this ruse.

His touch lingered, tracing a delicate path down the curve of my neck, his fingers deftly pulling at the fabric to reveal the vulnerable expanse of my skin. His hand slipped into my shirt feeling around and groping with a curious and unnecessary intent, I nodded at Finan and Sihtric silently conveying our plan, before bringing my head down forcefully onto his, catching him off guard.

Staggering back, he became the unwitting target of Sihtric's swift retaliation. A shard from Finan's boot found its mark, freeing us from our bindings in a flurry of action. Sihtric deftly cut the ropes, liberating Finan and then myself from our constraints.

The other guards were skillfully and quietly taken care of.

"How was that?" I grinned, revelling in our triumph, though Finan's eye roll hinted at his lingering exasperation. Sihtric's thumbs-up offered reassurance, as I leaned into the banter, seeking to ease the tension. 

"Lighten up husband you know you're the only one I like touching me" I whispered as he passed me a weapon.

His smirk mirrored my own determination "Just you wait till we're out of here woman" he grinned. With resolve in our hearts, we dashed towards the stairs, fueled by the prospect that fate lay within our grasp.

─── ✦⋅ ☆⋅✦ ───

so close to the end making me sad iwl 🥹 also unread

Tag list - @jasontoddorjasongrace

#aethelflaed #alfredthegreat #danes #england #finan #finantheagile #finantheagilexreader #finanxreader #historicalfiction #love #osferth #ragnar #saxons #sihtric #sihtrickjartansson #thelastkingdom #tlk #tlkxreader #uhtred #uhtredofbebbanburg #uhtredragnarsson #vikings #xreader #thelastkingdomxreader #tlkff

[ncat]

Crazy how for a while, after humanity did open air nuclear testing, we had to start treasure hunting for old world steel like

Since like, the passive amount of radiation in the air yeah? Metal like steel is just, passively radioactive. Not dangerously, but noticibly detectably. And even with passive levels decreasing over time, it's still too much for the case of some stuff like, space equipment

So we just, scavange old shipwrecks to try and find this old world steel

It's some fantasy novel storytelling

"Och, child listen. We must dive deep into the oceans blue, and hope we may find the vessels of travelers from the ancient times before the invention of the great weapons, for our most valued of artifacts today would be tainted if we used modern steel, a curse brought upon the world for these horrible machines. But the ships of old, what steel they possess comes from before then, and they remain pure. As such, we must find what is left of it"

#Its called Low-background steel #Im up violently late and remembered seeing i think one of the top gear???? dudes talking about it?? #and like yeah its sought after nowadays to be used in like #Geiger counters and space equiment used to detect stuff #its pretty neat #put also fantasy as hell

[gowns]

tonight i read my 5 year old a story about a seal who lives in antarctica and she had questions about where that was exactly, so i showed her a map, and i explained to her how cold it was. there's the south pole, there's the north pole, there's alaska, it's technically a part of the united states, but it's separate and close to the north pole... antarctica is this big mass south of everything, and up north there's all this ice... and she was like "wow it must be sooo cold that no one could live there!" and i was like "well! actually! people do live there! but it can be very hard for other people to get there." and then i described the northwest passage and showed her pictures of ships stuck in the ice and she was like O__O and i was like "YEAH can you imagine sailing a wooden ship through THAT?! so people kept trying and trying to do it, and getting stuck, and it took a long time to figure it out, and even today, with a ship made out of steel with heaters, it's still very difficult to navigate through all that ice."

and then i was like... wait, dammit, she's about to go to sleep. and her eyes were still like O__O so i closed the pictures of shipwrecks and icebergs and googled pictures of inuit people and igloos and was like, these are the people who live in that area, this is how they survive the cold, and she was like :O ! and i was like "yeah! it's totally possible to live there and survive there, and actually the most successful people who want to visit and study in those areas are people who talk to the native people there. do you want to see a documentary about how kids live in cold places tomorrow?" and she said "yes!!"

i turned off the light and was worried she would dream about shipwrecks on icebergs so i said "imaaaagine that you're comfy in an igloo, cuddling with your seal friend" and she smiled and clutched her teddy bear. i think it worked! hope she doesn't dream about the northwest passage tonight lol

#oh it's bedtime? oh you're comfy in your bed? this is what an iceberg looks like under the water

[hasbr0mniverse]

Shipwreck’s Corner - Raptor was a yuppie tax consultant who took up falconry as a pastime and soon became obsessed with the avian blood-sport. He discovered that by breeding bigger and stronger birds and equipping them with steel-tipped talons, they were capable of attacking much more profitable game. Caught poaching on a Cobra mink ranch by Destro, Raptor joined the ranks of the Cobra legions and began work on developing a bird of prey strong enough to attack a G.I. Joe.

#hasbro #g.i. joe #gi joe a real american hero #raptor

[wickedcriminal]

Some of the most grown up, bravest things book Hiccup has ever done that I think about often;

(Spoilers)

Unarmed and staring down a sword, a deadly dragon, and an erupting volcano, and still managing to sing in the face of death

Freeing the Wanderers on the American Dream 2

Freeing a gigantic terrifying dragon just because he couldn't stand to see it so sad and trapped in chains

Defeating his own father in a duel for the crown, even though he didn't want it, just so that he could free the dragons and hopefully end the war peacefully

Being a branded Outcast and still having the compassion to free and disarm dragon traps, even when both humans and dragons were trying to kill him

Willingly entering Prison Darkheart to look for his best friend

Willingly staying in Prison Darkheart to look for his best friend even when staying was extremely dangerous for him specifically, and even when given ample opportunity to escape, instead giving up that opportunity to a little girl who couldn't even remember her mother. He even redid all the buttons on her bear suit so that she would look her best when she went back to her family that is the sweetest thing--

Waiting patiently for the perfect moment to kill a dragon even when he was literally being digested alive by it

Saving Snotlout even though doing so would literally put him and all of his friends at risk of being brutally killed by dragons and even though Snotlout himself wasn't above killing him

Realizing Snotlout had led him into a trap, coming to that realization, and, this is extremely important-- ultimately decided to let himself be led into the trap on the off-chance they might let slip where the lost things and Camicazi were. He actually made a choice in his head, and then steeled himself, and willingly walked into Alvin and the Witch's trap on the off chance he could find the lost things. That's ballsy for a fourteen year old kid

ESPECIALLY CONSIDERING HE WAS TORTURED

Speaking of that-- ENDURING WATER TORTURE. His dragons managed to keep him from drowning and getting torn to bits by pirhanna dragons, but that water was freezing and clearly did a number on him mentally. And he never broke. That was so brave of him and I'm never getting over it.

Not to mention that moment where he looked Snotlout in the eye, even after everything he did, and told him he never gave up on him-- and he still isn't giving up on him-- before jumping back into the freezing water to escape. Nerves of steel.

Then he woke up from a shipwreck with amnesia to a little dragon telling him "Hey good morning. You're the top most wanted enemy in the archipelago. Dragons and humans think you're dead but they'll definitely kill you on sight if they find out you're not. You're being hunted by dragons right now actually. Also you need to get to this island full of dragons (that kill you by launching you into the sun the second you step on it), because your arch-nemesis is there and he's about to become king of the archipelago. You need to not only stop him from becoming king, you yourself need to become king of the archipelago, and then you need to face this BIG GIANT HUMAN HATING ISLAND BURNING DRAGON in SINGLE COMBAT to determine the ultimate fate of human and dragon kind."

And Hiccup said, "okay."

AND DID IT

That kid managed to get to that island JUST IN TIME, with AMNESIA, and interrupted Alvin's coronation even though he was black and blue and torn to shreds and limping and crying and couldn't even remember his own name and STILL told them all that he was willing to become King of the Wilderwest.

What a kid

Not to mention he faced that human hating island burning dragon with the courage of an entire army's worth of heroes.

AND ENDED THE WAR PEACEFULLY!! BY BEING KIND AND COMPASSIONATE AND WILLING TO WORK WITH FURIOUS TO MAKE A BETTER WORLD FOR BOTH SPECIES AND IM SOBBING HE IS SUCH A GOOD BOY HE IS SUCH A GOOD KID

Even when Furious dies he promises to the end of his life to try to make the world better for dragons and he DID to his dying breath he tried

He tried and it mattered

Hiccup Horrendous Haddock the Third is quite possibly, in my opinion, one of the coolest protagonists ever

#i have a lot of feelings about this kid he is so brave and i love him #httyd books #book hiccup #book!hiccup #hiccup horrendous haddock lll #how to train your dragon books #how to fight a dragon's fury #how to betray a dragon's hero #how to seize a dragon's jewel #how to steal a dragon's sword #how to break a dragon's heart #how to twist a dragon's tale #these were all circumstances that he chose to react to that's why i didn't include things like going to america or fighting the romans #these were things he actively chose to do even when he could have easily done something different #either because he was scared or because he didn't want to draw attention to himself #but he didn't because that's not who he is

[beardedmrbean]

A large Chinese-registered barge was detained by Malaysian authorities after it was found carrying massive piles of steel ship parts and old artillery shells believed to have been looted from a pair of British battleships wrecked during World War II.

The Malaysian coast guard initially detained the vessel — a large bulk carrier ship — for illegally anchoring in Malaysian territory in the South China Sea, but opened an investigation with police and heritage departments after the artifacts and materials were found onboard.

It is suspected the metal was stripped from the nearby wrecks of the HMS Repulse and the HMS Prince of Wales, two ships sunk by Japanese torpedoes in 1941 just days after the attack on Pearl Harbor.

The attacks killed 842 sailors and the shipwrecks have since been designated as war graves.

The large Chinese-registered barge which was detained by the Malaysian Coast guard and suspected of looting wrecks. MALAYSIAN MARITIME ENFORCEMENT A/AFP via Getty Images

The deck of the barge was piled high with pieces of rusted steel believed to have been looted from the battleships.AP

Looters have been known to target WWII shipwrecks for their raw materials. Known as “prewar steel,” the metal the ships were built from was untainted by radioactive elements created and spread across the world by the detonation of the first atomic explosion in 1945, making it extremely valuable for use in sensitive medical and scientific measuring devices.

Photos from the barge showed towers of rusted metal, cables, and maritime refuse piled high on the deck, with an excavator and large crane stationed nearby. There were 32 crew members onboard the vessel, including 21 Chinese individuals, 10 Bangladeshi, and one Malaysian.

The same ship had previously been fined for operating without permission in Malaysian territory in 2017, and before that was chased into international waters by the Indonesian Navy after it was caught looting, according to Al Jazeera.

The HMS Repulse is one of the British battleships the barge is suspected of looting. It was torpedoed by Japan in 1941.Getty Images

A large number of rusted artillery shells were found among the scrap metal on the Chinese-registered barge.AP

Malaysia’s maritime agency said the most recent suspected looting is likely linked to a recent case in which police found numerous rusted artillery pieces and maritime artifacts at a scrapyard in the country. Those shells were detonated after being discovered.

The National Museum of the Royal Navy in the United Kingdom said it was “distressed and concerned at the apparent vandalism for personal profit.

#nunyas news