#to the person who asked i might do specifically yuri? maybe at some point?? but like. they are are always Something to me

[ninjasmudge]

make sure your cult leader is scooped up at least once a week so they dont get too cocky

#hey i cant draw right now so im using the opportunity to post some stuff i had saved in my drafts and never posted #this is kind of old art my desins have changed a bit since this but eh #i think the lamb is really cute ok #cotl #cult of the lamb #cotl lamb #cotl narinder #and btw i twizzle naris gender around like a thaumatrope #such that you could always consider my narilamb yuri if you wanted #to the person who asked i might do specifically yuri? maybe at some point?? but like. they are are always Something to me #narilamb

[heartbeatbookclub]

About the partners headcanons ask, i meant the latter! sorry if it wasn’t obvious haha

shit this has been sitting in my askbox a while--

I have been thinking about this a good while, but I did also...kinda forget about it for a little lmao...part of the time spent thinking was of how exactly I wanted to format it. I considered doing more of a bullet points sort of thing, but I think in general it's just easier to do this the way I typically explain things on this blog.

Rather than doing specific explanations of the potential relationships between each computation of the girls together, I'm going to speak broadly over each of them and talk about it in a more Poly Dokis sense, since that's typically how I do it anyway. With that intro out of the way, here's my vision in no particular order:

Sayori in general is a very lovey sort of person, regardless of if you're just close friends, or in an actual relationship. As a result, not a great deal actually changes in that respect. She is an absolute cuddlebug and physical touch is definitely her top love language to give, to most people's enjoyment, and some people's slight annoyance (Natsuki). I imagine she works down everyone's personal bubble until it feels weirder to not have a Sayori nuzzling somewhere on their body. She likes playing with everyone's hair. They also like playing with hers; it's a win-win. She's also a big fan of spending time with the others, whatever it is. Anything is fun as long as they're together.

On terms of receiving, Sayori very much likes words of affection, though she doesn't always believe them. She needs a lot of reassurance and reciprocation to be sure that she's doing enough in the relationship, and has a constant worry that she's being overbearing, or that her own failures and stupidity makes her a burden to others around her. Regardless of who she's with, all 3 of them try their best to make it clear that she's doing perfectly fine, and they still love her, obviously.

Sayori relies very heavily on Monika emotionally. I think that's a universal truth of their relationship no matter how it's spun. She does her best to be honest with the other 2, hard as that might be sometimes, but Monika is the only one she feels she can truly be herself around, and Monika is more than happy to oblige. In return, Sayori tries her hardest to help her as well.

She genuinely likes listening to Yuri talk about whatever she's passionate about. It makes her happy to hear Yuri so passionate about something, and she's always glad to encourage her to come out of her shell more. She lets Yuri go at her own pace on terms of how they take their relationship and in general gives her a lot of patience, but as long as Yuri doesn't mind, she will take every opportunity she can get to cuddle up to her. Once she gets past her initial embarrassment, Yuri really appreciates her wordless style of affection and makes an effort to reciprocate. Occasionally, she uses Sayori like a weighted blanket.

Sayori understands that Natsuki needs more space, but is quite persistent in her efforts to break her out of her shell, too. Natsuki is initially pretty put off by Sayori's style of affection (go figure) but doesn't exactly dislike it, it's more like...not what she's used to. She initially rebuffs her, but doesn't exactly fight it very hard. She's also glad to have someone to genuinely talk about manga with, though she gets the sense that Sayori isn't exactly reading into it as much as she is...

Monika has never been in a real relationship in her life, and it shows! She treads very lightly, feeling completely out of her depth, uncertain of what's correct or expected, as though that's a normal question to have in a relationship. She's fairly naive and stumbling her way through it to start. Once she finds her footing though, she's happy to be able to provide love to the people closest to her. Maybe too happy. She tries exceptionally hard to be a good girlfriend, with little attention given to herself. This is something the other 3 try very hard to make up for.

Her primary love language has gotta be words of affection. She loves using pet names and giving lots of compliments. Once she gets over the initial embarrassment of saying "I love you", it becomes her most used phrase, and no matter how many times they hear it, it absolutely melts the others every time. She's also a huge acts of service girlie. She loves being able to buy them lunch, or give them a ride, or help them with homework, or something. She's absolutely the type of person to buy you a lunch when she hears you don't have money for one, and won't hear anything about you paying her back.

She is incredibly bad at receiving affection. She'll minimize your compliment, she'll make sure she gives you something in return for any act of service, and she doesn't want to waste your time if you have somewhere else to be. The other 3 work incredibly hard to just get her to accept that they love her, too, which forces her to introspect on the matter. The one thing she doesn't suck at receiving is physical affection, and consequently it becomes her favorite, particularly from Sayori.

Oh yeah, this is somewhat offhand, but she's a terrible kisser, at least to start. Just thought I'd throw that in too

I think the biggest thing I'd like to establish in what the other 3 see in her is that she makes you feel absolutely safe and welcome in her presence. Whenever you talk to her, suddenly all of your problems and everything stressing you out are miles away, and everything is going to be okay. And she is very happy to provide that for other people; hearing that always makes her heart happy.

She tries her absolute hardest to make sure Sayori gets everything she needs in the validation department. Monika and Sayori reflect each other a lot, to the point that they both generally know what the other is thinking even when they don't voice this. Whenever Sayori is refusing to say something because she doesn't want to create friction, but it needs to be said, Monika will say it for her. Monika voices her needs when she doesn't want to, and she trusts Sayori to do it in return.

She vents to Yuri often whenever she just needs someone to listen, and Yuri likes to rub her back to ease her stress. She does her best to listen to what Yuri has to say in return, as well as humor her talking about her interests, but has a hard time saying she shares the same passion she does for them.

Monika is the one who most enjoys flustering Natsuki, and is also typically the most successful. Natsuki, of course, really enjoys turning the tables and flustering her in return. Natsuki in particular finds it funny that Monika has turned to manga as something of a guilty pleasure.

This is something else tangentially related, but I just realized that because I only advanced my DDLC shipping thoughts in a discord server, I never posted this here, so I think an essential part here is that I think all of the other girls have a huuuuge crush on Monika. Like head over heels, for various reasons. Sayori is obvious but the others find it hard to deny, she's like, the perfect woman. Monika has no concept of anyone having a crush on her prior to them admitting this, and is completely shocked.

Yuri has a somewhat warped view of what romance looks like, given to her by media she consumes. Very pure and romantic and dripping with prose. The thought in the back of her head is constantly "I could never do that...I guess I'll be single forever..." and when she actually ends up in a relationship it ends up throwing her entire worldview out of whack in that respect. In general, the others all spend a lot of time reassuring her that they all love her for her, particularly when she's herself, unabashedly weird. Eventually, with enough persistence and some soul searching, she starts to believe it, and comes further out of her shell.

She really likes feeling important to people. She's a great listener, and her favorite thing to do is to just let other people vent about their problems to her. Her primary means of affection is quality time, with some physical affection once Sayori REALLY breaks down her sense of personal space. She'll sidle up to the others like a cat. Sayori finds this absolutely adorable. She mostly just enjoys spending time silently around other people. The others invite her places and just let her vibe. She loves it. I've mentioned it before, but she also really enjoys sending people songs and things that made her think of them. She also likes buying things that made her think of them as a gift. She's very muted in her expression of love, but she spends a lot of her time away from the others thinking of them.

I also think that Yuri kinda sucks at receiving affection, though in a different way than Monika. Monika will instinctively reject it; Yuri has no clue how to respond. It flusters her, every time, without fail, until eventually she gets used to it and her response seems somewhat flat. Although for particularly sweet gestures, she is unable to contain her excitement.

Oh, also she's probably the best kisser out of the bunch, though she is frequently too embarrassed to do much more than a peck on the cheek to start.

Sayori is her go-to whenever she wants to infodump about something she's been really into lately, because she actively listens and tries to engage her, mostly because she really enjoys it whenever Yuri is excited about something. Despite her initial hesitancy, she actually really appreciates the kind of casual physical affection which Sayori employs, because she really likes and wants physical affection, but doesn't know how to ask without feeling awkward.

She likes it when Monika vents to her. She always feels incredibly at ease around Monika, which is difficult for her to find anywhere else, much less with another person, and she really wants to give back in return what Monika gives to her. She feels comfortable enough to freely talk with Monika based on this fact, partially because she knows Monika feels the same to her. It makes her feel wanted, and she likes that.

She really tries her hardest to help when Natsuki has problems, listening to her vent about her dad, or other people, or the world, or anything else that's giving her trouble at the moment. Yuri does her best to help steer her more towards the kind of person she wants to be, and to reassure her that she isn't a terrible person.

Natsuki is averse to being in a relationship on the risk that she turns out like her parents. The only reason she's here is because the others assured her they would help her not to be. Despite her hesitancy, and her pushing back on a lot of what's given to her, she does enjoy it. (She just doesn't think she deserves it.) In general, she's just very awkward at navigating anything and everything related to it, and is very easily embarrassed by the whole thing. It takes time to get her comfortable with it.

She's very acts of service heavy. She likes making things for other people, and spends a lot of time and effort doing so. She derives a lot of joy out of directly providing for people, and particularly in the beginning, she's still convinced that's all she can provide, but she does grow better at avoiding that sort of thinking with time. She also likes spending quality time with people, probably baking, maybe chatting about/reading manga.

She is absolutely head over heels for Monika, despite finding that realization...kind of annoying. She thinks she is literally the most beautiful, perfect girl she has ever met, and despite her best efforts to ignore that powerful urge to heap praise onto her, she can't help but make an effort to impress her, which is frequently successful!...which only goads her on to do it more. She tries to get Monika to read some of the series she's more seriously invested in, because she knows Monika will get a deeper understanding of the themes and subtext.

She's envious of how easily Sayori can make friends with anyone, and finds her to be so sweet it's hard to handle. She is absolutely terrified of ever doing anything to hurt her because she knows that whatever it was, Sayori would never let go. Sayori takes great lengths to remind her that she would never do that, because she is her, not her father. She is initially annoyed by Sayori's very heavy physical affection, but also seriously appreciates it because she would never in a million years ask for a hug.

Yuri and Natsuki's relationship is special. They eventually get to a point where they just understand each other. Yuri will push back on her just enough that Natsuki is confident trusting that what she says is honest, including that she really does love her and will never leave her. She seriously appreciates that. She finds it really fun to try and get Yuri to move outside her comfort zone.

...I might have more posts in this vein to make soon, among other things, but I thought I'd get this out of my askbox now so you don't have to wait in suspense. I'm gonna go sleep. I was sorta running on fumes towards the end here, so if it seems a little more clipped there, I apologizeee

#ddlc #doki doki literature club #ddlc monika #ddlc sayori #ddlc yuri #ddlc natsuki #my headcanons #asks #ddlc poly #i am not including every ship tag. god bless

[natelotl]

Open letter to the interactive fiction community

Personal opinion that doesn't represent anyone's but my own.

First of all, I will clarify that I'm just a reader, not a writer of this genre (I do write conventional fiction though), but here's what I noticed:

I'm someone who went away from the scene for about a year due to other interests and found myself reading my favourite titles again, as well as some I've never read before. I love this genre, so as a reader I enjoy reading various titles, but I always feel a sense of dread whenever I open most development blogs, with the exception of some authors that I know don't take fans asking stuff that personally. I will not name specifics, but if the shoe fits, you can wear it.

The sense of dread comes from whenever I try to open dev blogs. I'm always happy to know more about the plot and the characters, but I personally feel like I have to tiptoe when reading asks, and a bit scared to find out how authors react to other people who are asking seemingly innocuous questions and in return get answers that are... very defensive? of the work being written, and a lot of the time the ask is not even criticism of the work by whoever is asking.

I also get the impression that some authors in the community seem to enjoy looking down/dunking on their audience or think of their audience as more morally inferior for coming to different conclusions to their works? I get that fans 'not getting the point' of your plot and/or characters can be frustrating, but that's the risk of putting your work out there, isn't it? Even people who like your work in its entirety might not align with you personally.

To build up on the above point, as someone who enjoys other genres with romance elements or straight up romance games like dating sims/otome/BL/yuri/galge is that there's a sense of looking down at their audience who choose to play because they mainly enjoy the romance and/or are solely there for the romance/intimacy aspects, as if they're lesser than people who can enjoy multiple aspects. There's a sense of 'romance/sex is lesser' and I know there's a reason romance isn't compulsory to include as many players as possible, but it feels a bit puritan/sex negative to me, as is scoffing at players who find NPCs or antagonists/villains attractive enough to want to date, but you can always ignore/ delete those asks instead of openly antagonising your audience for wishing something that you have the power to include/exclude from your canon, no? All it does is make your a part of your audience resent you and/or refuse to engage with the work (it's happened to me before).

Last commentary: There's a sense of "I have the moral responsibility to write only morally correct fiction" sometimes, and so not enough creative freedom in general in especially how character flaws and especially villains are written? Are you guys limiting yourselves? But maybe that's my personal taste, I like leches, lol.

Small note for fellow readers: I know I just criticised how authors handle things, but in our part I think we can all start from reading FAQs and do away from asking things that might be out of their boundaries. we can always do fanart and/or fics, headcanons etc of things authors disagree with somewhere they cannot see.

I think that's all I have for now. I won't answer back, but I'm curious what the rest of the community thinks.

*EDIT: this was directed ONLY at western-style text-based IF community. If what you make is closer to dating sims, VNs or otome/galge/BL/yuri: feel free to ignore this post, you are not its target audience.

#interactive fiction #interactive novel #interactive game #discourse

[kuroopaisen]

happy accident || iwaizumi hajime

➵ writing a love letter is stupid. childish, even. but it’s no big deal, so long as iwaizumi hajime doesn’t get his hands on it... right? 

 wc: 4k

warnings: f!reader is the captain of the girls volleyball team, cursing 

request: “kind of specific, hope you don't mind but possibly iwa-chan attempting teenage love by accepting the feelings of an accidentally-sent love letter from the girl's volleyball team captain?”

a/n: this was so fun, thank you for requesting it! a big thank you to @nostalgic-yet-forgotten for beta’ing this! 

“Thank you,” Iwaizumi said, offering you a strained smile as he held your pencil out to you.

“Not a problem,” you nodded, trying to take it out of his hand with as little contact as possible.

“Hey, uh,” he stopped in his tracks, looking over his shoulder at you. “How are you doing contemporary lit?”

“Contemporary lit?” You frowned. “I, uh… fine? Not great, but…”

“Right,” Iwaizumi nodded, clearing his throat. “Well, see you around.”

“Sure.”

With that, he was gone.

You watch him go with a budding discontent.

What was that? That barely counted as a conversation. And for God’s sake, why had it taken him a week to return your damn pencil? You’d just assumed he’d forgotten.

You could feel Yuri’s eyes burning into the back of your skull.

“I know,” you grumbled as she zipped to your side, taking her usual spot on your bench. You’d both made a habit of sitting here during lunch – a stone’s throw from the gym, and a short walk to the vending machine.  

“Was that…”

“It was.”

“Fraternising with the enemy, I see.”

“It’s not like that and you know it.” You glared at her, reaching into your bag in some attempt to leave the conversation.

‘Fraternising with the enemy’ was one way of putting it. The ‘enemy’ being a member of Seijoh’s famous volleyball team.

Well, the boys’ volleyball team. That was the only one people wanted to talk about. The girls' team never seemed to get as much attention. And that, quite frankly, was unfair. Yes, the boys' team worked hard; but so did you. So did your girls.

Also, if it weren't for your boundless grace -- and the acknowledgement that a criminal record might mar your college applications -- you would've shoved your fist down Oikawa Tooru's throat by now. He was talented, yes, but you’d always found him kind of an ass. Made worse by all the attention he got – his personality plus an adoring fan club always seemed a recipe for disaster to you.

Iwaizumi Haijme, however, was another matter entirely.

A matter you couldn’t get out of your head.

“Why do you look so angry?” Yuri frowned, tilting her head at you.

“Because, uh… because Iwaizumi took all week to return my damn pencil,” you huffed, shoving the offending object into your pencil case. “And he decided to ruin a perfectly good lunchtime just to return it.”

“Don’t you have a crush on him?” Yuri asked in a hushed tone, raising an eyebrow at you.

"Yeah, but…” You sucked your breath in through your teeth. “I'm mad about it."

"You're mad about having a crush on him?" She raised an eyebrow at you.

"Yeah."

"Why exactly?"

"Because he's…"

There wasn't any real reason. You just felt that there had to be some natural rivalry between the two of you, given the state of your respective teams. Sure, Iwaizumi himself hadn't done anything wrong, but it was the principle of it. Worst of all, he was best friends with Oikawa Tooru. Sure, he seemed to be… long-suffering, but the connection was there.

“I’m just mad, okay?” You whispered, hoping to God none of your classmates had decided to eavesdrop on the conversation. But that’s the price you paid, talking about such things so brazenly. “I’ve got all these… these feelings but they’ve got nowhere to go.”

“What do you mean?” Yuri asked, taking a sip of her milk.

“Well, you know,” you mumbled, playing with the hem of your skirt. “I’m never going to tell him about it, so they just… sort of sit there. Stewing. Unanswered.” You groaned, running a hand through your hair. “I just want them to go away.”

That, really, would be the most ideal situation. But no matter how hard you tried, you just couldn’t stop thinking about him. Embarrassing, really.

"Look," Yuri sighed, looking up at the sky. "Why don't you just write him a love letter?"

"You're kidding, right?" You scoffed. "Do you want me to do a whole confession? Ask him to meet me on the rooftop after school as the sun sets behind us?"

"You're not going to give it to him, you idiot," she mumbled. "Just to like... get your feelings out, you know? Teen angst and whatnot."

"You're making very little sense."

"Okay, three things," she said, holding up her hand. "One, you're not going to tell him how you feel, right? That means you're just gonna stew in your feelings. Like you always do."

"Uncalled for, but okay.”  

"Two, sometimes writing down how your feeling is cathartic. And maybe that'll help you move on."

"Or it could complicate things because I'll overthink it."

"Three, I, personally, am sick and tired of hearing about Mr. Iwaizumi 'personally crafted by the hands of Michelangelo himself' Hajime, and therefore implore you to try getting him out of your system through any means possible."

"I don't talk about him that much." Did you?

Yuri gave you a dithering look. "No, you don't. Just like Oikawa's fan club never talks about his ridiculously swoopy hair."

You glared at her, crossing your arms over your chest. “You make it sound like he’s the only thing I ever talk about.”

“Oh, not at all,” Yuri shrugged. “But I can’t help but think you’d be a lot less angry if you got over him.”

“And you think writing a stupid love letter is going to help me do that?” You rolled your eyes. You knew Yuri wasn’t stupid – she was almost aggravatingly clever, sometimes – but this was the worst plan you’d heard from her in a while.

“Yeah,” she shrugged. “It’s worth a shot, right?”

“I’m not writing a damn love letter okay?”

✧✧✧

“You’re kidding, right?”

“Not at all,” Yuri grinned. “Just do it for me, okay? As an early birthday gift.”

“Yuri, your birthday’s not for another three months.”

“Just do it. Or else I will march up to that boy and tell him myself.”

You knew she was more than capable of making good on a threat like that. Best not to risk it.

"You want me to write it now?" You frowned, looking between your best friend and the writing pad set on your lap. You’d hoped she’d forgotten your conversation from yesterday, but you never got that lucky. Not with Yuri.

"Uh huh," Yuri yawned, sitting cross-legged on the bench.

She'd dragged you into the gym just as school had ended, telling you that it was for something very important and very urgent.

"Why?"

"I wanna see you actually go through with it," she shrugged, taking a sip from the juice box in her hand.

"Can't I just… do it at home and send you a photo?" You tilted your head at her. You still had to survive practice, after all. And there was a chance you’d bump into him before the day was done.  

Yuri shook her head. "Nah. If you're alone -- and if you have all evening to do it -- you'll just overthink it and that'll defeat the point."

You glared at her. She hardly seemed to notice.

"Besides," she shrugged. "If you do it at home, you'll just text me about him."

“Yuri, I do not—”

“Letter,” she hummed, tapping the paper. “We don’t have much time.”

She wasn’t about to concede any time soon. You could see it in her eyes.

"I literally cannot believe you're making me do this," you grumbled, picking up the pencil with tense fingers.

"It's for your own good," she sighed, waving her hand at you. "Then you can shift your focus to the real prize of the boys' volleyball team."

You raised an eyebrow at her.

"I'm talking about Makki, duh."

You snorted. "That wouldn't really fix my problem, would it?"

Yuri shrugged. "Hey, at least he'd be more fun to talk about than Iwaizumi."

"And that's because…"

"I dunno. He seems off-beat. Kinda weird."

"Don't be mean."

"I'm not! It's a compliment!"

"So, will you be writing him a love letter, or?"

"I didn't say I'm interested, I just—" Yuri took a deep breath, pressing her eyelids with two fingers. "Look, just write the damn letter!"

It was easier than you thought it would be. That in itself was more embarrassing than the fact you were writing an honest to God love letter to Iwaizumi Hajime. As much as you were resisting it, the words just flowed.

You hadn’t even realised there were so many things to like about him. And apparently, you’d noticed all of them. Maybe you were in deeper than you’d thought.

And this letter was getting a lot longer than you’d expected.

Alright. That was enough.

“Done,” you sighed, tossing the pencil onto the writing pad with a little more force than necessary.

“So,” Yuri drawled, tilting her head at you. “How do you feel?”

“Worse!” You cried. “Now I’ve actually had to think about why I like him and that makes it worse.”

“Ah. My bad.”

“This is going in the bin right now,” you huffed, standing to your feet. “And we are never speaking about this ever again.”

“Duly noted,” Yuri sighed, slipping off the table.

You stormed out of the locker room, tossing the cursed letter at the bin. You never wanted to see that damned thing ever again.

✧✧✧ 

"Guess what I found!"

Yahaba's voice rang through the locker room, a tad too much delight in his voice.

“Your dignity?” Matsukawa called out.  

"Even better," Yahaba's face appeared from the doorway, grinning. "It's a love letter."

He held his hand up, a small, crumpled piece of paper pinched between his fingers.

"Just put it with the rest of them," Oikawa sighed, waving a hand at him. Iwaizumi's eye twitched.

"Uh…" Yahaba cleared his throat, eyes flicking to where the rest of the third years were standing. "It's not actually for you."

Everyone's head perked up at that.

"Huh?" Matsukawa tilted his head to the side.

"Who's it for, then?" Kindaichi asked quietly, the top of his ears blushed red.

"Iwaizumi."

A moment of shocked silence.

"What?"

All eyes were on him. Iwaizumi could already feel his cheeks growing red.

Someone had left a letter for… him? Not for Oikawa?

Seriously?

Yahaba slunk towards him, holding the letter out. The fact he seemed a little nervous about it made Iwaizumi feel something akin to annoyance.

"Did you read it?" Iwaizumi swallowed roughly, yanking it from Yahaba's hand like an unlucky fortune strip.

"Just who it's for," Yahaba said, eyes on the ground. Iwaizumi raised an eyebrow, but he didn't press the issue further.

There was no way this letter was supposed to end up in his hands. None at all.

"Well, are you gonna read it?" Hanamaki was smirking. Iwaizumi didn't even need to look at him to be sure of that.

"No," Iwaizumi grumbled. "Isn't that a little rude?"

"But Iwa, the drama--"

"Don't be an ass," he grunted, cutting Oikawa off. Sure, he was curious himself, but he wasn't going to embarrass the writer. Not if it wasn't even meant to get to him. 

“Fine,” Oikawa sighed, waving a hand at him. “Let’s start, okay?”

Iwaizumi tried to ignore the strange feeling in his chest for the entirety of practice. He really, truly did.  

But by the time he got home, his curiosity had reached its absolute limit.

He lay on his bed, turning the letter over in his hands. Something about it felt so… sacred. So forbidden. It had his name on it, but it hadn’t been given to him by anyone. It hadn’t even been left anywhere for him. Yahaba had ‘found’ it.

Should he read it? Should he put it in the bin?

Thoughts about what it might say had hounded him all practice. He could barely focus on the matter at hand – no, he just kept wondering who could possibly have written him a love letter.

He had to read the damn thing. If he didn’t, he was sure the suspense would drive him mad.

He sighed, unfolding it.

 “Dear Hajime Iwaizumi,

Admittedly I'm not great at this sort of thing. It wasn't even my idea. You can thank Yuri for that. Apparently I talk about you too much so she told me to put my feelings down on paper. So, that's what I'm trying to do.”

He frowned. Yuri? Wasn’t that the vice-captain of the girls’ team? And the author talked about him too much? A girl talked about him? Not in comparison to Oikawa?

I first noticed you in our first year (I promise I'm not about to launch into a whole retrospective -- that's not only a waste of time, but it's also deeply unromantic), when you made a killer spike during practice. I came to watch because I wanted to scope out what the boy's team was like. I didn't expect to be genuinely impressed. So, congrats, I guess? Good job?

Practice? The author had been there during practice? Why would they want to ‘scope out’ what the boy’s team was like? He’d assume it was one of Oikawa’s fans, but…

Anyway, I thought you were kind of cute, so I kept an eye on you. Oh man, that sounds creepy. I promise I didn't get up to anything weird, I just yearned from afar. I thought it would pass. But then, like, halfway through second year you got hot. So, fuck you for that one.”

He snorted at that.

“Okay, this is sounding less like a confession and more like a list of your crimes. Sorry, just some of that unnecessary rivalry I've built up in my head towards the boys' team.”

The reference to the ‘boys’ team’ again. Was this who he thought it was?

No. He wouldn’t let himself hope.

“That aside, I couldn't help but notice how dedicated you are to the sport. How hard you work. How much you apply yourself. It mustn't be easy, keeping Oikawa in check; he strikes me as the sort who's prone to self-destructing if no-one's looking. But it's like you keep him grounded. I'm not sure if you get praise enough for that.  

And I can tell that your team really, really respects you. Especially your underclassmen. That's no small feat, you know. I mean, I'm sure you do know, but—”

He pressed a hand to his face. Yep. He was burning up, alright.

“I don't quite know how to explain it, but I see this kindness in you as well. We've only spoken a handful of times, but when we have, I've always felt like you've respected me and what I have to say. A lot of the girls are scared shitless of you, but they all feel safe when you're around.”

‘The girls’? As in… the girls’ volleyball team? God, what he wouldn’t give…   

“Okay, I'm definitely rambling, and I'm not making a lot of sense, but thank you for being a good guy. That's a big part of why I'm so attracted to you.

So, this has gotten embarrassingly long. I'm sure my face is bright red as I write this.”

If only he could let the author know that his face was just as red while reading it.

“TL;DR -- you're hot and you seem cool. Also, you look great when you're all sweaty after practice. I don't know how you manage it.

Okay bye.”

And there, at the very bottom, was your name.

His heart felt like it was going to both collapse and burst through his chest.

You’d written all that. You. The captain of the girls’ volleyball team. The girl that made his heart beat a little faster whenever you walked in the room. The girl he kept borrowing stationery from because it gave him an excuse to talk to you. The girl he was sure overlooked him for other members of his team.

You’d written him a love letter.

What should he do? What should he say? Should he say anything? You hadn’t actually given it to him yourself. Did that mean you didn’t want him to see it?

God, he felt like he needed to get up and pace. He sat up, slinging his legs over the side of his bed.

He couldn’t just ignore this. Not when you’d said all that. Not when he’d been paying just as much attention to you these past three years. But again, you hadn’t handed it to him yourself, and –

He clapped his cheeks in a poor attempt to ground himself.

No. He had to act on this.

And soon.

✧✧✧ 

"He's here."

"Huh?"

Yuri nodded at the door of the gym. You looked over your shoulder. Huh? Iwaizumi?

"Do you know why?" You asked, turning back to your best friend.

"No idea," Yuri shrugged. "Looks like he wants to talk to you, though."

You frowned, turning to look at him again. He gave you a tiny wave. It looked so bizarre coming from him. But, admittedly, it was kind of cute. "He better not be trying to kick us out of the gym," you mumbled, turning around and jogging towards him.

Iwaizumi took a step back as you closed in, putting a bit more distance between the two of you.

Rude, you thought. Even after I’ve written him a love letter and everything. Not that he knew that.

“How can I help you?” You sighed, trying to smile at him a little.

“Uh…” He was staring at his feet. That was unusual. He always made eye contact with you – and you knew, because you always had to make sure you weren’t intimidated by those striking eyes of his.

Was he… blushing a little?

What’s going on?

“Can I speak to you in private?” He sounded nervous. Why on earth –

Oh. Oh no.

You could feel your teammates staring at you. Not that they knew what had happened. But there were certainly whispers about you and Iwaizumi.

"Outside," you barked, pointing one stiff arm out the door. "Now."

Iwaizumi nodded, turning on his heels and marching away.

You scurried after him, your mind bubbling with a whole slew of anxieties. Were you about to get rejected? How did he even get his hands on that cursed letter in the first place? Couldn’t he have just ignored it?

You walked a short distance from the gym, tucked around the side. At the very least, he’d chosen a location that’d minimise the number of passers-by.

But it was also the side of the gym that faced the setting sun. Meaning that a warm glow was illuminating his aggravatingly handsome features in the most delightful way.

You felt like you were about to die.

You were about to be rejected by The Iwaizumi Haijime while he looked this beautiful—

“Here,” he mumbled, holding the letter out to you.

You frowned. You hadn’t seen him get it out. “Where did you get this?”

“One of the guys found it,” he shrugged.

Oh. Of course. You may as well start digging your own grave.

“Are you okay?” He asked, letting his arm drop to the side when you made no move to grab that cursed little McGuffin.

“You weren’t supposed to see that,” you swallowed, hands gripping your shorts.

“Oh…”

“My friend, she—she thought that I should write about my feelings for you to get them out of my system, so—” Why were you telling him all this? This just made you feel worse?

“Oh,” he swallowed. “I see.”

A pause. A deeply painful pause.

“So you don’t feel like this anymore?”

Was that… disappointment on his face? Heartbreak? Something of a similar ilk?

Oh. Oh, letting yourself hope was a very bad idea. But you couldn’t help it.

You shook your head, your cheeks beginning to head up. “I… I definitely still feel all those things I put in the letter.” Truth be told, you couldn’t remember the details very well. God, you hoped they weren’t too embarrassing. “But if it makes you uncomfortable, let’s just… pretend it never happened.”

You tried to smile, but you didn’t know how convincing it was. It definitely wasn’t.

He smiled. God, he was so damn beautiful. You really were going to die.

You’d never seen him smile like this before, had you? That was a damned shame. At least it would be the last thing you saw before you—

“What if I don’t want to pretend this never happened, though?”

Wait, what? Had he really just said that?

“Why… why wouldn’t you?” Your heart was about to hammer its way through your ribcage, and there was nothing you could do to stop it.

He finally looked you in the eyes. His own were so intense, so beautifully green. “Well, I-I was hoping I’d be able to take you out on a date.”

Oh shit. Did the great Iwaizumi Hajime just stutter?

Your face bloomed red. “I’d love that,” was the only thing you could choke out.

And God, his smile. The one you’d seen just a few minutes earlier was nothing compared to this. No, this smile was the last hit you could take.

Iwaizumi wondered if he should do something; hug you, hold your hand, kiss your cheek. But he didn’t know if he’d be able to keep it together if he did.

So, he just gave you some kind of nod-bow – something a little awkward yet earnest.

You couldn’t help but smile at the gesture.

“So,” he rose back to full height, clearing his throat. “Friday, after practice?”

You tilted your head at him. “Won’t you be all sweaty, though?”

A new kind of smile touched his lips. Three flavours of Iwaizumi Hajime’s smile in one day. You truly were blessed.

“I thought you liked me like that.”

Oh shit. Oh fuck. You’d written that in the letter, hadn’t you?

You clamped your hands over your face. You couldn’t look at him anymore. Not today, at least.

Iwaizumi laughed gently. God, you were so cute. “Really, though. Is that time okay with you?”

You just nodded, hands still covering your face.

“I look forward to it,” he said. And he smiled, even though he knew you couldn’t see it.

He wanted to say something else. To compliment you, maybe. But he couldn’t think of what to say – there was too much, and he didn’t know how to phrase any of it.

And, he didn’t want to embarrass you. You looked one compliment away from an implosion.

“See you around,” he murmured. And with that, he walk-jogged back the way he came. He just hoped that his face wasn’t too red. The guys would never let him live that down.

You peeked through your fingers. Yep, he was definitely gone.

You keeled over, taking a deep breath. Did you really manage to make it through that in one piece? Without saying anything too embarrassing? Well, past the fact that your shitty love letter had ended up in his hands…

But that didn’t matter much. No, there was something much more important.

The Iwaizumi Hajime wanted to take you on a date. Did that mean he liked you, too? Well, he obviously liked you a little, since he’d asked, but…

Oh, this was so embarrassing. You really needed to get yourself together.

You had a date on Friday, after all. 

✧✧✧

“Good job letting one of the second years find it,” Yuri murmured, peeking around the corner.

“Ah, well,” Hanamaki chuckled, “that’s how you make it look even more like an accident.”

Yuri looked over her shoulder at him. “Am I a bad person?”

Hanamaki shook his head. “Nah. They needed this push, y’know?”

“Yeah, but…” Yuri bit her lip. “You do realise they’re both perfectly capable of killing us, right? And that’s on their own. Imagine what their combined power looks like.”

“It’ll be fine,” Hanamaki grinned, waving a hand at her. “They’ll be too loved up to notice.”

Yuri frowned, staring off into the distance for a moment.

All’s well that ends well, I suppose, she thought. After all, both her and Hanamaki had worked far too hard to make this happen. At middling cost.

“You know, I had to stick my hand in the garbage for that letter.”

“You did what?”  

#haikyuu x reader #iwaizumi x reader #iwaizumi hajime x reader #iwaizumi hajime #iwaizumi hajime imagine #iwaizumi hajime scenario #hngngnn i hate tagging things #anyway this is so dumb sfkljfdlkj but that's why it's Fun #also will i ever learn how to come up with decent titles? survey says no

[shadow-sovereign]

Part 1

I’ve got another Ryuji/Jin-Woo fic idea in an au world.

Let’s start with the setting: It’s a low tech world where everyone has magic. There’s no cars or computers, but they have magic-powered appliances like fridges and blenders. And the continent is broken up into different kingdoms.

Magic beasts roam the world, though I’m still debating whether it’ll be a natural occurrence or a result of gates. Could be a mix of both. Either way, it means they need Adventurers or Knights to deal with said creatures and protect the public.

In this world, people can grow their magical potential through training, though once they get to a certain point, it becomes harder to advance. Like, everyone naturally has a plateau point where it becomes harder to get stronger, and it’s different for everyone.

This story centers around Jin-Woo and Ryuji, who are Knights in King Go Gun-Hee’s army. Ryuji is the General (the top position) and Jin-Woo would be a...Captain? I imagine the top ranks going Captain, Commander, General.

At this point, Jin-Woo is in his twenties and stronger than Ryuji, which is why he’s gotten Captain rank already. But the King (who’s in charge of top ranking promotions) wants his Commander class to have more experience leading missions.

So, I imagine the backstory of this being that Jin-Woo joined the military when he was 16 (the youngest that they’re allowed). He was in training for two years, where he occasionally ran into Ryuji and developed a bit of a crush.

At 18, he started going on missions, protecting civilians from magical beasts. He discovered that he has a beast taming skill (somewhat rare!), which got the King’s attention. The stronger someone’s magic is, the more beasts they can tame, so the King assigned some tutors to him, to focus attention on training his magic to grow.

It even got him Ryuji’s attention, who likes to recruit strong Knights into his division. (Commanders have their own divisions and Captains have teams. The general has his own division too, but he’s also in charge of the entire army.)

So, Ryuji and Jin-Woo started training sometimes and going on missions together. By the time Jin-Woo is twenty, his small crush has turned into full blown infatuation and love. But he never makes a move, because Ryuji is known for sleeping around. (Not necessarily deep commitment issues like in ‘My love is a fire’ but he just doesn’t pursue people for long-term relationships. Open to the possibility, but he doesn’t go looking for love.)

Ryuji is also known for how proud he is of being the strongest fighter in the country. He doesn’t like competition. (Rumors even fly that he’ll try to take the crown when Go Gun-Hee passes, whether he’s named heir or not).

At first, Ryuji isn’t threatened by Jin-Woo’s growing strength, just excited for another strong fighter under his command. But then Jin-Woo passes his second in command and he starts getting worried. Then agitated.

Jin-Woo notices what's going on, but even with him trying to hide how fast his power is growing, it quickly becomes obvious when he surpasses Ryuji. It completely sours their growing mentor/mentee relationship.

Ryuji grows resentful of Jin-Woo’s power, jealous and threatened that someone is stronger than him. He can’t entirely avoid Jin-Woo, not when they’re sometimes the best two for a mission, but he puts distance between them.

Jin-Woo is not happy about that at all. He tries being nice at first, but when that doesn’t work, he tries out various ways to get Ryuji’s attention. (Like with kids, negative attention is better than no attention at all.)

He’s never deliberately rude, as he doesn’t want Ryuji’s dislike of him to grow, but he starts trying to banter with him. Finding what will make Ryuji respond, maybe bringing out his competitive side.

Though what they’ll compete about, I’m not sure. It can’t be purely physical activities that Jin-Woo could brute force his way through with strength. But maybe skill-based activities that Ryuji has just as much chance of winning, especially since he’s older and has tried out more things?

But their competitions won’t be the main focus of the fic, so I won’t spend too much time mulling over that.

So, the main timeline of the fic will be when Ryuji is in his forties and Jin-Woo is in his late twenties. I’ll probably have a chapter or two for the backstory, then get into the main plot.

I’m still working on some of the exact details, but let’s say there’s some tension with a neighboring country. They’ve had some skirmishes with them and Go Gun Hee’s efforts at diplomacy aren’t yielding much results, so it looks like a war might be brewing.

Ryuji decides that this is a golden opportunity. He’s been wanting to rule for a while now, but he has doubts that Go Gun-Hee will name him as heir and trying to forcibly take over after his death will have its own complications. Maybe he doesn’t want to spark a civil war in his birth country?

So, he decides that he wants to take over this ‘enemy’ nation. But how to do so?

He’s got some strong, loyal allies who might be willing to help out. (The S-ranks that were in his guild in the canon world.) They’ll be fighting the enemy soldiers, anyway, but they would need enough power to get a foothold into the country. To make their way to the capitol city and defeat that nation’s ruler.

His mind flashes to Sung’s beast taming ability, envious. If he had that skill, he could create an army of loyal soldiers. And then inspiration strikes. Just because he doesn’t have the ability, doesn’t mean he can’t make use of it. But how to get Sung on board?

He’s known Jin-Woo long enough to know that he has his own moral code. One that might balk at disposing of a foreign royal to put someone he doesn’t get along with in charge. (He doesn’t yet realize that the rivalry with Jin-Woo is one-sided.)

So, the odds of him convincing Sung to help him take over a country seem low. He goes looking through his library, searching for possibilities.

In this world, people can have a wide range of gifts, some that need specific circumstances to unlock. So, he’s been collecting books about obscure magic, both to see if he might have some of these gifts, and to know what to test his loyal people for. To see if they have any useful gifts that can be unlocked.

And he comes across a very rare form of magic, a type of control magic. Not mind control, but using mana to control another person’s actions. But it’s not something that can be learned.

Ryuji almost gives up on the idea, until he reads a detail that some with this gift can enchant an object to act as a control object, and the control of said object’s abilities can be transferred to another.

[That was a clunky way of saying it, but it’s basically this. Person with ability enchants collar. Gives control of collar to Ryuji. Now whoever’s wearing the collar will be forced to obey Ryuji.]

It seems like the perfect solution, but how does he find one of these people?

With a great deal of searching. Luckily, he does have a network of people that he can ask to keep an ear out for rumors of someone with this gift.

When he hears of something that seems promising, he goes on a trip and finds someone with that gift. [It probably won’t be from his pov, though. Jin-Woo will just notice that he’s gone for a while.]

And when he comes back….he somehow gets the collar on Jin-Woo.

Somehow.

I haven’t figured that part out yet.

Tricks him into it, maybe? Makes a bet with him?

Perhaps the collar will latch onto Jin-Woo’s neck if Ryuji gets it close enough.

The collar is powered through the wearer’s own mana, so Jin-Woo can’t just overpower it. Supposedly. In reality, Jin-Woo gets the sense that he could overpower it. (The same way the giants in canon were able to overpower that barrier Yuri Orlov put up.)

But Jin-Woo holds off on trying to break free because he wants to know what the heck Ryuji wants badly enough to put a slave collar on him. (Sadly for Jin-Woo, Ryuji is only focused on getting an army and not anything...else.)

And I think I’ll have part 1 end here, with part 2 being on pillowfort. Because Jin-Woo’s reaction to the collar isn’t exactly PG. I don’t want to post anything not SFW on tumblr, in case it gets deleted.

I don’t post a lot on pillowfort, but it’s for anytime I have a not SFW story idea I want to share. And if tumblr ever gets deleted off the internet for some reason (like getting sued into the ground), then you’ll be able to find me on pillowfort. It’s my backup website.

https://www.pillowfort.social/posts/2283048

#Solo Leveling #fic ideas #Sung Jin Woo x Goto Ryuji

[agent-cupcake]

Garreg Mach Café Episode Two: Lucky Seven (Yuri x Reader)

The first thing you learned about him —one of the very few things you knew about him— was that he liked sugar. A lot. You didn’t work the counter most of the time, you just made the drinks. So, you didn’t know who had ordered the heart attack inducing Ruined Sky Strawberry Frappe, only that someone was looking for a cavity. Vanilla bean coffee, three pumps of vanilla syrup, and strawberry puree with ice blended and topped with whipped cream, hazelnut drizzle, strawberry drizzle, and red sprinkles.

The second thing you learned about him was his name. Or, more accurately, his lack thereof. People regularly used dumb names. It didn’t really bug you, there was no shame in entertaining someone who thought making a barista call out a drink for Phun E. Monki was the peak of modern entertainment. Not so surprisingly, you saw a lot of hipster and nerd traffic through the café so references and jokes weren’t at all unheard of. Really, this one wasn’t even that bad. Comparatively.

“Ruined Sky Strawberry Frappe for Arsène Lupin,” you called, turning around.

“That’s mine,” the waiting customer responded. Shockingly, it was not the top-hat wearing gentleman thief who stood at the counter waiting for his drink. Neither was it the dweeb you expected. Your Arsène Lupin —that is, the man standing on the other side of the glistening lacquered wood countertop— certainly wasn’t normal, but not in the way you had initially assumed.

The third thing you learned about him was that he was disarmingly beautiful. He stood casually; his arms crossed with one of his hands resting lightly on his chin as he watched with a half-smile that you would have sworn had a mischievous glint. Waiting to see if the little joke got a reaction, you figured.

Well, who were you to deny him that? Pushing down the instinctual nerves of talking to someone who belonged more in the technicolor light of your two-past-midnight Instagram escapades rather than the academia chic café, you smiled back. “Here you go, Monsieur Lupin.”

That made his lips twitch in amusement, which shouldn’t have been as gratifying as it was. “Thanks,” Arsène said warmly, wrapping his fingers around the cup. It wasn’t like you were intentionally trying to notice, but his fingers were long and thin, the nails neat and manicured. Pretty hands. Attractive hands. You wondered if they were soft, or as strong as they looked, or what they might feel like-

Nope. No. You needed God.

Or Tinder

“I hope you enjoy,” you said, trying to act like you hadn’t just committed some obscene thought crime. He was supposed to leave after that. People got their drinks and either sat down or left. But he didn’t, meeting your eyes with an even gaze. Their violet coloring was striking, drawn out by the purple eyeshadow smoked out over his pale eyelids. The makeup should have been off-putting, you were less than uninterested in the pierced hoard of e-boys that had saturated the modern alternative dating market, but it wasn’t. Not on him, at least.

“This is a cute place,” Arsène said. But he wasn’t looking around the cafe, he was staring directly at you. Which… you weren’t sure if you were to buy into your ego telling you he was flirting or your paranoia that he was laughing at you. “Is it usually this busy?”

Flirting was better, for your sanity’s sake if nothing else, so you smiled, doing a quick check to make sure you weren’t missing any customers. The guy working the register was looking at his phone under the counter.

“You know, you shouldn’t pick such an obvious pseudonym when you’re canvassing a business,” you said playfully. “Charm will only get you so far.”

That made him laugh, his appraising eyes sparkling with amusement as he stabbed a straw past the whipped cream of his drink. “In my experience, charm will get you anywhere.”

“For you, maybe,” you allowed, feeling a little more emboldened by that response. Lowering your voice slightly, you leaned in as if to conspire. “I guess the real question is what you’re stealing, Monsieur Lupin, hearts or jewels?”

“Jewels, usually,” Arsène told you without missing a beat. “I have no need to steal the hearts.” He shrugged one shoulder carelessly, casually. “I collect enough of them as it is.”

A corny, over-confident line like that should have made you laugh. Unfortunately, you kind of believed it. So you raised a skeptical eyebrow. “That goes against the spirit of being a Phantom Thief, doesn’t it?”

“Why, do you want me to steal your heart?” Arsène asked. He didn’t sound serious, exactly, but neither was the question joking enough to keep a flush from crawling up your cheeks.

“Baristas don’t have hearts,” you told him theatrically, rejecting your silly reaction. “It’s a void of caffeine, student debt, and the disappointment of our parents.”

Arsène was about to respond when you heard the door jingle open. You turned, looking over your shoulder at the customers who had stepped up to the register. “It looks like you’re needed,” he said, following your eye line.

“Yeah,” you said, feeling a strange stab of disappointment. Which was dumb. A little bit of banter with a handsome stranger was nice, but it shouldn’t have been anything else.

“Don’t worry, I’ll be back,” Arsène said, smirking in a way that made you think he’d seen your dismayed reaction. “Thanks for the drink.”

He raised the cup like a toast goodbye, and you wished him a good day. It was completely ridiculous, but that quick and strange interaction played on loop in your head for the rest of the day. You went from embarrassed, to amused, to insecure, and back again dozens of times. By the next day, you weren’t sure what to think about it and you hated to think that you were watching for him, but-

Well, you were.

The fourth thing you learned about him was that he had a schedule, a specific time slot that seemed to be allocated to getting an overly sugary drink at your little cafe.

“Noa Fruit and Caramel Macchiato for Mr Pink,” you called, already expecting to see his smile based on the name alone. Not that the preparation did a whole lot in lessening the effects. Today Arsène, or Mr Pink, wore a dark striped button up tucked into black pants. The top buttons were undone, showing off the elegant column of his neck and the framing lines of his collarbones. His skin was so pale, like it had never seen the sun, the color perfectly even and milky.

“That’s mine,” he said. Redundantly. Of course it was his.

To think that you’d done your makeup with more care than usual today was embarrassing, but you were glad for it as you passed the drink to him. “Reservoir Dogs, right?” you asked, forcing yourself to not be flustered.

“Very good,” he said in a voice that was borderline condescending.

“You thought I wouldn’t know? I serve coffee in downtown, knowing Tarantino is practically a job requirement,” you said. Arsène laughed warmly, a sound that was somewhere between amusement and mocking, a sound that invited a mess of fluttery nerves to dance around in your stomach which you covered with a smile. “Mr Pink, though… he’s a long way off from being a gentleman thief.”

“Let’s just say that I’ve fallen from grace,” Arsène said, his smile an odd combination of mirth and mystery. “Lupin is... more of an ideal. Reality is hardly ever so romantic.”

“Cheers to that,” you said wryly.

“Although if I had to emulate one of them, I’d far prefer it to be the gentleman,” he said, dropping a few dollars in your tip jar. Cheeky. “Thanks for the treat.”

“Oh… Yeah,” you said, not even thinking to point out that it was your job. Unless he wasn’t talking about the coffee, which was even more baffling. “Have a nice day.”

After that came a lineup of sugary drink orders under the names of famous thieves. Some references you knew immediately, others you had to google later. And always, always, he just about made your heart stop with that smile.

It was… Maybe a week later? Your Arsène had become something like an expectation. Which was ridiculous. And stupid. But it was true, and he hadn’t been in the day before which affected you far more than you dared admit. Seeing the familiar purple head in the lineup of waiting customers was more relieving than it should have been.  

A Vanilla Wyvern Wing Latte for Danny Ocean, this time. Unfortunately, there was a swath of customer’s orders that needed filling so you couldn’t give it to him personally, sliding it across the counter before rushing back to the blender. That kind of disappointed you, especially since you hadn’t seen him the day before, until you realized that he had taken a seat along the bar, writing something in a notebook and sipping on the creamy white latte.

Waiting for you? Pushing down the spark of excitement you felt about that, you finished up the orders. After that, you took a breath, grabbing a rag to at least seem productive as you inched towards him.

“You’re awfully far from Vegas, Mr Ocean,” you said. Although you called him that, you still thought of him as Arsène Lupin. Your Arsène.

He looked up from his notebook, the end of his pen pushed against his lip in a distracting way. They were so pink. And shapely, his top lip curved by a perfectly symmetrical cupids bow that no amount of lip kits could falsify. And… And you were staring. Again. He obviously noticed, what with the way he grinned when you forced your eyes up to his, but he gracefully didn’t point it out.

“Casinos are nothing more than a party trick,” he told you lightly, flipping his pen through his fingers before letting it drop to the paper. “I’ve got my eye on something far more valuable.” His eyes were burning into yours as he spoke.

That was the fifth thing you learned about him. Arsène could make anything sound like a double entendre. You thought of yourself as being somewhat difficult to ruffle, but even the most innocuous of comments from him could make your cheeks warm. It was the tone of his smooth, lovely voice. Always speaking under his breath, or low enough that you found yourself leaning in.

“Jewels, right?” you asked, playing it cool because you refused to fall prey to what you knew was a purposeful attempt to throw you off balance.  “I heard there was an exhibit coming to town.”

“I’m not really interested in that sort of thing,” Arsène said with a little wave of his elegant hand. “You know the reprehensible means they use to get them, don’t you? So beautiful... but stained with blood. Not too dissimilar from myself, I suppose.”

That momentarily tripped you up. He sounded so genuine, even with the little quip of a joke. Most people couldn’t pull off saying something so nakedly edgy. Maybe it only worked because he was pretty, and you were a fool. So you just smiled. “You really ought to work on this whole subterfuge thing.”

Arsène’s eyes met yours. So intense.  “And how would you recommend I do that?”

“Misdirection,” you told him, refocusing on wiping up the counter to avoid his gaze. “The names are bad enough. You’ve gotta at least pretend to be an upstanding member of society, right?”

“Do you think I’m not?” he asked lightly, his head falling to the side, hand braced against his cheek casually. “And here I thought I was perfectly amicable.”

“Oh,” you said. Did he sound offended? You quickly backtracked. “I didn’t mean to imply that I don’t think you are, it’s just that what you said-”

“I’m kidding,” Arsène said, the slightly concerned expression slipping from his face like an easily discarded mask.

You winced, internally kicking yourself. “Ah, sorry.”

“Don’t worry. That was cute,” Arsène said with that oddly infuriating unreadable grin and shutting his notebook to stand up.

“You’re leaving?” you asked, almost confused that he’d wait only to cut the conversation short.

“Haven’t you realized? I’m a wanted man. As much as I’d love to stay and chat, I’ve got things to do,” he said. “Speaking of that, I hope you didn’t miss me too much yesterday. This project is more difficult than I anticipated.”

“That’s fine, it’s not like I expect you to come by,” you said. You lied.

“No?” Arsène asked. He didn’t believe you, that much was obvious. “Fine, then. I’m not afraid to admit that I missed you. I’ll definitely see you tomorrow, though.”

“Can’t wait,” you said. And, despite the half-sarcastic affect you tried to put on, you meant it.

It only settled after he’d already left what he really had said. Missed you. Not for the first time, you toyed with the idea of giving him your number. Then again, maybe you were misreading the situation. After all, you didn’t even know his name.

Still, true to his word, he came around the same time the next day.

This time, it was a Cinnamon Dust Frappe for Garrett. Arsène, or Garrett, was wearing a sweater today in a nod to the rainy weather. Just like everything else he wore, it was entirely in service of his allure, a dark knit with leather elbow patches. White clips kept a section of his hair out of his face, which was curling at the ends. From the humidity? Or perhaps he usually straightened it?

“It took me a minute,” you admitted as you handed him his drink, “Garrett. That’s Thief, right? I have to be honest; you don’t really strike me as the gamer type.”

“I’m full of surprises,” he responded. After a moment, he added, “I haven’t got much time for games these days, but I have some fond memories from when I was a kid.”

“Probably why you’re a criminal,” you said.

If you weren’t mistaken, his eyes widened for a fraction of a second in something like surprise before that was composed into something else, his laughter driving it away. “You might be on to something with that. Video games do make kids violent, after all.”

“So, tomorrow, will it be Ezio? Or Corvo… He’s got a bit of thievery under his belt.”

Arsène scoffed. “I’d never do the same trick twice.”

That made you smile. “I look forward to it.”

After he left, you realized that you’d learned the sixth thing about him. It was such a small and mundane detail, but there was something charming and oddly intimate to imagine Arsène as a kid playing video games.  

The next day, you were working register while helping to train the newbie in making drinks. It was cold. Slushy snow half-heartedly sprinkled down outside, and the heater was desperately trying, and failing, to keep the cafe warm. The repairman wouldn’t come until the following morning. All in all, your mood was rather poor.

Until the door opened and a familiar face stepped up to the counter.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you up here,” Arsène said.

“Desperate times,” you said with a shrug. He smiled at that, looking up at the menu contemplatively.

“I’ll have…” he said, “a Mockingbird Mocha Hot Chocolate. Medium.”

“And who might you be today?” you asked professionally, the Sharpie point poised over the side of the cardboard hot drinks cup.

“Prometheus,” he said without hesitation.

You blinked, caught off guard for a second as you tried to figure out the reference. That was… clever. The original thief. You couldn’t help but shake your head in amusement as you scribbled that on the side of the cup. The newbie already knew how to make the drink, leaving you with nothing to do. The cafe was quiet today, a rarity. It was the poor weather. People dropped in to get hot drinks, but you didn’t blame them for not sticking around. Arsène was dressed for the cold, wearing a white cape coat that was either incredibly trendy or strangely fringe. Of course, it worked perfectly on him. He looked ready to hop into a new age fashion catalog for outerwear.

“From gentleman thief to a gangster to god… Moving up in the world, are we?” you asked to fill the silence.

“On the contrary,” Arsène told you “There’s no power in being a god nobody believes in.”

“I’d definitely believe in you if you could warm it up in here,” you told him. “I’ve been freezing all day.”

“I’m sure I could think of a few ways to warm you up,” Arsène said, smirking, his eyes dancing with mischievous amusement. “After all, I’m the one who stole the first flame.”

A shaky exhale left your mouth, becoming something like an awkward laugh because he definitely had you going for a second and you knew it was on purpose but still. “That’s what you meant. Right.”

He raised an eyebrow. “What did you think I was talking about?”

“Here you go,” the newbie said with absolutely perfect timing, handing Arsène his drink. At least your blush was keeping you warm.

“Thank you,” Arsène said, meeting her eyes. You were pretty sure you saw her swoon, which made sense. That was the most practical response to him, after all. He looked back to you. “Try to keep warm, I’d hate for you to be calling in sick.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” you said. He grinned, wishing the both of you a good day. And you did warm up. By thinking of all the ways he could keep you warm. At this point, even God Himself probably couldn’t do much about your sinful thoughts.

The next day was another cold one, meaning that it was slow. Because of that, your boss had decided that only one person was needed, and you didn’t mind if that was you. Paid hours were always welcome. More than that, and you hated yourself for it, you hoped to see your Arsène. You’d been scrolling on your phone under the register when the door opened. Winter rushed in like it had been chomping at the bit for the chance, called forth with the jingling of bells. Arsène had arrived right on time, wearing that white cloak coat and tall white heeled boots. Snowflakes shined in his hair, quick to melt in the warmth of the repaired heater. By now, you should have been immune. But you weren’t.

“Alone today?” he asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Eerie, isn’t it?” you replied, gesturing to the empty cafe. “Not that I mind, now that the heater is fixed… What will you be having today?”

“A medium Caramel Leclair Latte,” he said.

“And your name…?”

“Yuri,” he said, which you scribbled onto the cardboard.

“All right… Just gimme a second,” you said. The drink was oddly tame for him, and a lot easier to make. You were pretty sure you could whip up a latte in your sleep. He waited without saying anything, but you could feel him watching. The music was too quiet to be a distraction and you were incredibly aware that it was just the two of you which was stupid because the counter practically put you in a different realm of reality, but-

You forced your thoughts to focus on something else, considering the name he’d given you. It was oddly unassuming, at least by the standards of other names he’d given you. You couldn’t recognize it as anything in particular, either. It was Russian. Or Japanese. It being the name of a Russian thief probably made the most sense contextually, but you were drawing a blank as to the specific reference.

“I can’t figure it out,” you admitted when you finished the drink and set it on the counter between you, “who are you impersonating today?”

Arsène blinked, a second of confusion passing before his lips quirked up just a bit. “Myself, actually. I figured it was time to give you my name. You can call me Yuri. Yuri Leclerc, to be precise.”

That was the seventh thing you learned about him. Your stomach clenched. Out of nerves or excitement or happiness, you couldn’t tell. You smiled, feeling something giddy fuzz in your head. “Well... It... It’s good to meet you, Yuri Leclerc.” Yes, you liked that name. It was better than all the others, even better than Arsène.

“The pleasure is all mine,” Yuri replied smoothly.

“So… Is there a reason for this momentous revelation?” you asked.

Some of the mirth drained from his eyes as he slid two of the little coffee straws into the lid. “I’m leaving town.”

The disappointment that struck you was beyond silly, it wasn’t like you had any claim to him. You’d only just learned his name for God’s sake. “Did the police finally catch up with you?” you asked with a smile, trying to be playful.  

“Not yet,” Yuri said. “I prefer to leave before they catch wise.”

“I can never tell if you’re joking or not,” you told him, shaking your head. Sure, he was smiling, but, well, he smiled a lot. It was always unreadable. Amusement at something. Life itself, maybe.

“For your own sake,” Yuri said, his eyes fixing on yours, “you should always assume I am.”

Because that really cleared it up. You decided not to worry about it too much. “But you are leaving, that’s not pretend?”

“Yeah.”

Your heart sank all over again. Stupid, stupid. At least you finally knew his name.

That made for seven things you knew about him. That was enough, wasn’t it? Lucky sevens and all that? Without thinking too hard about it, you grabbed one of the embossed café cards and a pen, scribbling your name and phone number on the back. “If you’re ever back in town or whatever, this is me,” you told him, handing it over. “Or I dunno, I get vacation time. Maybe it’d be fun to take a trip to Almyra or Albinea or wherever gentleman thieves go until the heat dies down.”

Yuri looked at the card for a long moment before tucking it into his wallet, smiling. You felt like you could read this smile, it was warm and friendly. More real than his others, the emotion catching in his eyes, too. “I wonder, do you mean that?”

“Do you want me to?”

“I might.”

“Then I do,” you said with a shrug, like it was easy as that and unsure exactly how much of what you said was strictly playful. It didn’t really matter because it made Yuri smile all over again and the look was fond enough to make your heart seize.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” he said. “Until then, do you by any chance watch the news?”

“The news?” you asked, confused by the shift in topic. “Not if I can help it.”

“Well, you should, at least for a few days.”

“Am I gonna turn it on and see your mugshot slapped all over some headline about a bank robbery or something?” you asked, mostly joking. Mostly.

“What would have ever given you the impression that I’d do something like that?” he asked, feigning a tone of offense.

“Steal something?” you asked.

“Get caught,” he corrected.

You laughed, thinking of something clever to respond with. Unfortunately, the door opened to admit a trio of bundled up students, killing the moment before you spoke.

“That’s my cue,” Yuri said, picking up his coffee. “Don’t miss me too much until we meet again, yeah?”

“Only as long as you promise not to forget me,” you told him.

“It’s a deal, then.”

“Goodbye, Yuri.”

“Goodbye,” he echoed, his eyes meeting yours and voice gentle. Intimate, almost. Then he was gone, a flash of violet and white disappearing into the winter cold.

It was silly, but you kept an eye on the news like he told you, curious to know if anything would come of it or if you’d just fallen for a cute guy’s ruse. But, no, something did happen. A huge theft. The jewel exhibit that had been about to roll out downtown had been robbed. Such a feat was meant to be impossible, there was seemingly no way it could have been done. But it had and there were no suspects, no public leads. And, not surprisingly, no mugshots.

#fire emblem three houses #fe3h #yuri leclerc #yuris leclair #fe yuri #yuri leclerc x reader #yuris leclair x reader #fe yuri x reader #YOU'VE BEEN HIT BY #YOU'VE BEEN STRUCK BY #ive had this idea in my head for so long #admittedly i'm not sure it turned out the way i wanted but i can't tell why #iS thIs a pERsoNa rEFeRenCe? yes

[sabraeal]

House of Stone (Preview)

The fourth and final fic of the Holiday Rare Pair series...or is it? The vote originally selected a full chapter of this fic, but unfortunately...there’s a prequel fic I have to write to really nail down what I want to do. There’s no Zihal in this preview, just some HINTS...and so post-bingo (maybe even post-obiyukiweek?) I’ll be writing an ACTUAL Zihal fic. But until then...enjoy this little sneak peek of a fic series that should be upcoming next year...

In the annals of the kingdom’s histories, before they become the North’s warden, it is said the House of Bergatt once served as its kings; a long uninterrupted line from Dai the Iron-Handed to Kenzo Bent-Knee. Zen would never doubt the words of the court historians-- not where his tutors could hear, at least-- but Tomo classified dolphins as fish, and Kohi was notoriously beneath the thumb of the Wisteria king of his age, and by extension, his Bergatt wife. A little embellishment went a long way over a few centuries.

But he believes every word of it now.

Tariga glares at the boat with such icy derision, Zen half expects the rail to rime over, no matter how humid the sea air. “I don’t understand. Yuris has to have a port. It’s a major part of our trading routes outside the continent.”

“It does.” It sits in the distance, a gentle mound bristling with trees, hunched on the horizon. Kihal told him that from the air it looked like a bird nested in sleep, but on the map it’s just another craggy oval, larger than the others in its chain. “But that’s on the other side of the island.”

“Then why aren’t we going there?” The row boat rattles on the winch, and Tariga’s face blanches a shade whiter, like the snows of Wilant themselves. “It’s better to dock than leave the ship anchored out at sea, isn’t it? The crew would probably appreciate--”

“The crew will be heading back to the port city as soon as we’re off.” By the new shade of pale Tariga discovers, this is not the sort of assurance he’d been hoping for. “The port is on Brecker’s side of the island. Who I’d like to avoid, otherwise he’ll have to invite us to dinner.”

Tariga casts him a dubious glance. “Would that be so terrible?”

“No,” Zen allows, “but then we’d have to go.”

It’s the sort of joke that, in his humble opinion. merits at least a chuckle. Obi might have delivered the line with more aplomb, a little more colorful sarcasm, but his timing was at least solid. At least worth more than the crickets it gets. And it certainly didn’t earn the wide-eyed wariness Tariga aims at him now, as if--

“Correct me if I’m wrong,” Mitsuhide says, so mild, from just above his shoulder. “But I was under the impression that Izana asked you specifically to dine with the viscount while we were here. As a courtesy.”

“Ah...” Mitsuhide might never get really, truly angry, but the weight of his disappointment has smothered better men than him. “Yes, he did. But he didn’t say we had to do it right away...”

Even with nearly a decade of service, it will never cease to surprise him how easily his aide can move. A head taller than nearly any man besides his brother and twice as wide in the shoulders, Mitsuhide still springs to his side with a cat’s grace, catching his shoulder before he can slink away.

“But you won’t forget, I hope?” His hand might as well be a yoke for how heavy it sits on him. “Zen?”

“Ah...” If he doesn’t look at him, then there’s no possible way Mitsuhide can see him sweat. “Of course. I would never disappoint my esteemed brother. I just think...it’s better to meet with the Yuris first. You know, for...diplomacy.”

Tariga’s mouth bent into a stubborn frown. “Protocol dictates that you are to introduce yourself formally to the lord of a land before taking up residence.”

If Obi were here, he’d have some choice remarks to make about that. I wouldn’t expect you to know about that one, your grace, he’d probably say, all limbs and sly smiles, considering how easily your brother forgot that little bit of politesse.

He would have had to scold him of course-- one didn’t spout truths with such blithe impunity in the company of lords-- but that would at least save him the trouble of these impromptu etiquette lessons.

“And since you’re the prince royal,” Tariga continues, warming to the subject, “wouldn’t it would be rude if the viscount didn’t also offer to house you and your--?”

“Right, but this is different.” He’s not quite sure how, but surely he’ll be able to invent a reason between the start of his next sentence and the end of it. “The Yuris are a, ah, sovereign tribe, who provide a vital service to the crown, and they would take it as a personal insult if we were to meet with Brecker before coming to greet them.”

Tariga’s pale brows draw tight over his nose. “Sovereign tribe? I thought Yuris as a whole was beneath the viscount, not foreign allies...?”

Mitsuhide’s dark eyes pin him with the sort of look that says, now how do you plan to get out of this one? Zen bites his cheeks to keep from scowling back. Of all the things he’d like Kiki to answer for, leaving him with a suddenly pedantic and intently rules-abiding aide would be at the top.

“Semi-sovereign,” he corrects. “They handle themselves on the whole, as long as it doesn’t interfere with the interests of Clarines.”

His aide shifts, the sternness in his expression turning to the fainest ghost of humor. “I don’t think many of the Yuris would appreciate the insinuation they owed anything to the viscount besides what he earns.”

Tariga, guileless, asks, “And that would be...?”

“Why don’t you ask them when you get there?” Zen suggests. He could use the entertainment after the last few months cooped up in Wilant. “I’m sure the chieftain’s granddaughter would be happy to give her opinion.”

It is a herculean effort not to grin, especially under Mitsuhide’s warning gaze. He keeps it down to a twitch of his lips, easily buried beneath his hand. Kihal would certainly have a long list of ideas, starting with a swift kick in the posterior and possibly ending with being tossed out his own tower, this time not sea-side.

“And all this,” Tariga says after a long moment, “is why we have to go ashore in...these?”

The wind knocks the row boat against the ship’s side, earning a dubious glare from Tariga, the sort that only a lord born land-locked and frozen could.

“Yes.” Zen gives it a pat for good measure, biting back a grin as his aide’s knees quiver. “Don’t worry, you’ll love it.”

No matter how many times he makes he trip to Yuris, Zen can never remember how long the actually crossing takes. In his memory, they are hanging from the ship’s deck one moment, Yuris a hunched, jade shell in the distance, and the next they are at the dock, the tribesmen clapping them on the back. But in truth, well--

“Two hours,” Tariga reports to him as they arrive, salt-soaked and pink, at the dock. “We’ve been rowing for two hours.”

“The crew has,” Mitsuhide corrects, so gentle. “It’s not a short trip.”

“No,” Tariga agrees, “just long enough to boil us for dinner.”

Ah, and that had been another thing he’d forgotten-- as nice as the sun felt on the ship’s deck, wind ruffling through his hair, on the open waters it was no better than a mirror, reflecting the heat a thousand ways. When the wind wound to a lull, cooking seemed an apt description for what occurred in the confines of their vessel.

Zen leaned back in his seat, letting his fingers trail in the bay. The water is clear this close the the islands, like looking through glass.

“Do you see them?” he asks, smiling down at the colorful shapes swimming below. “All those fish, off on their own business, not even aware we’re here. A whole world beneath our feet, and not an inch of it explored by man.”

His newest aide tilts, just slightly, head turning to gaze out mildly across the water. It is the only concession he makes before saying, “Were you bringing that to some point?”

Zen’s mouth twitches; he hides it in the crook of his arm. “It feels like freedom, doesn’t it?”

Tariga sits quietly as the boat bumps the pier, mouth pressed to a thin, white line.

“I’m not sure how to break this to you, Highness,” Tariga says finally, trembling wretchedly in his seat. “I know you believed I would enjoy this excursion, but--” his mouth wrinkles with displeasure-- “I do not love it.”

“But it’s an adventure.” Zen gives him a wide grin. “More fun than sitting up in that old, drafty castle in the middle of the winter snows, at least.”

Tariga lets out a sniff. “I think that perhaps you and I do not see eye to eye on what makes a good time.”

“Oh.” He casts a long glance back at Mitsuhide, who is making a valiant effort to stay sober and stalwart even as his mouth twitches. “I think you’ll come around.”

#akagami no shirayukihime #snow white with the red hair #my fic #fic: house of stone #ans #I was going to try to at least get to some part of getting on yuris #maybe even some kihal #but 1.5K is a good preview #and now you can see how much fun we're going to have with the Tariga-Zen-Mitsuhide Team Zen #ONE DAY #there's actually two prequels #a mitsukiki one #and an obiyuki one #and i'm hoping to get to the mitsukiki one by the end of the year #WE'LL SEE

[artemis-entreri]

I have a silly question, is it homophobic if I am straight and am not into seeing men with men or woman with woman, etc ? I think you make great art! Don't let this discourage you at all. Take care of yourself!

[[ Hey there, I’m glad you asked. My answer would be: it depends on what you mean by “am not into seeing”. There are a lot of fine lines and nuances on this topic, but it’s impossible to cover them all in a reasonably short post, so I’ll try to cover some of the bigger points. In a general sense, the answer would lean towards “yes”, however while I stand very firmly for LGBT+ rights, I don’t believe in condemning someone and shutting them down very swiftly for asking a question like the one you asked, as I think that discussion is important to help each other understand and grow. 

So, I ask these questions, not necessarily for you to answer me, but rather for you to think on. By, “am not into seeing men with men or women with women”, do you mean that you don’t actively seek out gay content? If so, I don’t believe that’s inherently homophobic. However, the age of “gay content” being its own section is in my opinion becoming antiquated, since traditionally, things in this category are anything that includes non-straight elements. For too long, “normal” is that which doesn’t acknowledge the existence of non-straight. However, this is really artificial and not at all reflective of what reality is, the true normal would include people of all sexualities and gender identities. But, if we were to artificially try to restrict this question to gauge your outlook, I guess we can use this example: Let’s pretend that you’re into manga. You collect certain genres of manga, but like anyone else, you have specific tastes. Maybe you’re not into romance. Maybe you’re not into mecha. You don’t collect yaoi/yuri manga, which is manga whose purpose is focused on gay/lesbian relationships. That wouldn’t inherently make you homophobic, because content like yaoi/yuri is specifically gay. It is only about the gay and goes all out for the gay. Its main purpose is the gay, its main audience is people who seek actively out that gay content. Not seeking out this type of genre isn’t homophobic, it’s just a preference, and isn’t too different from not being into the other genres. DISCLAIMER: This example is restricted to manga and probably porn. It is NOT the same thing to be like, “I’m not into cars, why is it a problem if I’m not into seeing gay people?” For the record, something like that would indubitably be homophobic.

When you see something that includes gay content, does the gay content devalue the piece for you? You complimented my art, which makes me think that it’s unlikely that you’re a raging homophobe because those types tend to foam at the mouth at anything that’s remotely LGBT and would sooner have a seizure than say anything good about gay content even in an insincere way. Here’s a thought experiment: imagine if your favorite artist (musical or visual) created something containing gay content, would you give it a fair shot or would it automatically not be as good as their other pieces for you? Again, this is a bit challenging in that for most people, they don’t love all of their favorite artist’s creations, and of course there’s the matter of our own personal experiences allowing us to relate more or less to any particular work and rate it accordingly. Here’s another way to think about it, if you look at classic works of art by the great masters, would it ever cross your mind that the ones depicting characters of a gender that you are attracted to are automatically superior to the ones depicting characters of a gender that you aren’t attracted to? I don’t mean in terms of personal appeal, but rather, would you feel that two works by the same master, containing different genders, would be different in terms of mastery? Anything with gay content is really no different, if you can see the value of a piece regardless of what’s depicted (gay versus not gay, we’re not talking about other subjects here), then you probably aren’t homophobic. Further, do you think it would matter to your appreciation of the art if you knew or did not know that the great master creating it was themselves gay?

Again, this is a complicated and important topic, but my blog isn’t dedicated to this topic so I’ll wrap things up here.

Finally, your sexuality doesn’t factor into this equation, in my opinion at least. It is sadly possible for LGBT+ people to discriminate against other LGBT+, a common instance of this is the erasure/invalidation/discrimination against bisexual people, pansexual people, and asexual people by others in the LGBT+ community. That being said, you might feel like because you’re straight it can make you be considered more homophobic. For instance, perhaps you’ve seen things along the lines of, “fuck straight people”. However, this sort condemnation I believe comes from the issue of societal imbalance and privilege. Being straight is a privilege because it’s considered the “norm” by society, and unfortunately, a lot of people who are privileged are blind about it and abuse that privilege. Like all generalizations, condemning a privileged group is flawed, but messages like “fuck <insert privileged party>” really mean, “fuck members of  <insert privileged party> who abuse their privilege”. Anyway, I wanted to mention this, because your own identity does matter, and it’s important to take a step back and think about where you’re standing relative to an issue. I think you’re ok, Anon. It’s difficult to ask questions like these, even anonymously, especially to an LGBT+ content creator such as myself who one would expect to not give you an answer that you’d want to hear. It is such an understandably sensitive topic that you could’ve even been blasted for asking your question, but you did so anyway, so I think that’s pretty admirable. The ability to challenge our own perceptions is what allows us to grow, and makes us better people than those who are not capable of doing so. ]]

#LGBTQIA #LGBT+ #lgbt representation #homophobia #ama #ooc #anonymous

[nellie-elizabeth]

The Falcon and the Winter Soldier: One World, One People (1x06)

Oof, okay, so I obviously enjoyed watching this, but I do have some things I would like to discuss.

Cons:

The biggest one is honestly about Isaiah. I understand that this is a superhero show, and there's some cheesiness baked into the very concept of it. I like the idea of a triumphant ending for our heroes, where amends are made and everyone is brought some measure of peace. BUT, I feel like a more nuanced, more true to reality ending here with Isaiah might have been different. Maybe he gives a tip of the hat to Sam, says he's happy he's found his peace, but he still doesn't agree with his choices. See, the thing is, some people who have been hurt by systems want that system to acknowledge its mistake, to apologize, to make amends. That's what Sam is pushing for. He believes we can do better, and all that. And that's a wonderful perspective. But other people who have been hurt by systems might not want anything to do with that system ever again. At the end, when Sam sets up the part of the museum for Isaiah, he says "now everyone will know what you did for this country," and Isaiah seemed pleased and touched by this. But I couldn't help but think... he was forced into doing those things, and then punished for doing them. If he'd decided he didn't want acknowledgment, didn't want to be linked to the idea of American heroism... I couldn't blame him for that. It might have added more nuance to the ending. Sam could have even said that it's okay if he and Isaiah don't agree on the best way forward, they still have mutual respect, or whatever.

As a white lady, maybe I'm off base. I'm just really curious at what the reaction is going to be. All through watching this show I kept saying to myself that an ending where Sam takes up the shield and becomes Captain America can't stand on its own. There's got to be nuance. There's got to be some good justification for it. And as I'll talk about in a moment, I think they've done an okay job... but I also wouldn't be surprised to find some people enormously dissatisfied with this conclusion. Steve Rogers handed the shield to Sam, yes. But should we forget what he did before handing it over? Well, he walked away from the government and was on the run because he didn't respect their choices. Just some food for thought.

I also just want to say: ????? to that ending for John Walker? It was so bizarre to see the light banter moment between him and Bucky after Walker had quoted Lincoln. Like... that felt so out of place. And now he's being made into an American agent? I don't understand that random lady's role in events. I don't know if I'm supposed to think it's sinister and creepy as fuck that John still has a uniform, and even the suggestion of authority (I do think it's creepy as fuck, for the record), or if I'm supposed to be... pleased that he got a new job? Just, tonally, the stuff with Walker in this finale was all over the place. He didn't seem to really matter, and yet he was still there, and the episode didn't seem able to reckon with his presence.

Oh, also, I can totally respect a bit of ham-fisted politic in a show like this. It's really the only way to do it. But Karli saying that Lamar didn't matter, and John saying "you think Lemar's life didn't matter?" was, perhaps, a little on the nose. I'm not sure I like the BLM mouthpiece being blond haired blue eyed John Walker, especially when Lemar's death, at least as a narrative function, only happened to allow John to get sad and angry about it. Where's his wing in the museum, huh?

Also Sharon Carter, she's my girl or whatever, but I gotta admit she was kind of boring to me in this whole series. I wanted more from her. The reveal that she was the Power Broker had me shrugging. I wanted to be more shocked, but she was so clearly telegraphed as being fishy from minute one. The fact is, we haven't had enough time with this character to figure out who she actually is as a person, yet. I don't understand her, and that's a shame.

Pros:

That was a long "cons" section, especially for an episode that kept me riveted the whole way through!

First off, the action was exciting and different and had so many classic "superhero moments" while not totally abandoning a more grounded feel. Sam holding the car up was such a Moment. Also the "that's Black Falcon!" "No, that's Captain America" moment was so cheesy but exactly the right kind of cheesy, you know? We got to see everyone being a bad-ass, crowds applauding, Sam's fantastic entrance with the new suit, the wings, the shield... damn. It was all cool in the way the best Marvel products need to be.

So, Sam taking the shield. I think it works because of his speech to the politicians. Specifically calling out the power they have, and the people they have in the room with them when they make the decisions that will affect so many people. There's this wonderful moment when one of the politicians asks a legitimate question: what about people who came back after the snap to find someone else living in their house? It's so complicated. And as the show ends, we're not given a simple answer. Sam merely points out the miracle of having everyone fighting the same fight for once. These rich and powerful people have had no idea how impossible it can be, and now they're getting a taste of that. There might just be the power of equalizing in all of this.

And most important to me? The government didn't hand Sam the shield. Sam took it and took ownership of it on his own terms. Think back to the legacy of Steve and the shield, honestly. Yes, he was given it by the government, but then he stole it when he ran away, then he gave it up, then Tony gave it back to him... it's a lot more complicated than it might first appear. Nobody's going to argue that the shield was Steve's to give, and he gave it to Sam, and Sam took it for his own. That made it work for me, as a direct contrast to the way in which John Walker got his hands on it.

Karli's death was inevitable and tragic. While I never cared all that much for her character as an individual, she worked quite well as a symbol. Sam points this out in his speech as well. Hasn't anyone stopped to wonder why people believed in this cause so much they were willing to die for it? That matters. It means something. And more will follow. I appreciate that the show ends on an ambiguous note. The people in power are still the people in power. And yes, their decision has been postponed. They've decided not to relocate people and replace the borders immediately. But what is the long-term solution? How does the world begin to heal? Well, we don't know. We don't get to see that.

If anyone got short shrift in this finale it was Bucky, but I'm honestly okay with that for a couple of reasons. One, this is Sam's show and I'm happy that it stayed that way. And two, we saw Bucky's emotional arc come to a head in last week's episode. The work isn't done, but he knows what the work is that he has to do, and we see him start to do that. He gives the journal up to his therapist. A way of letting go of his guilt, but also of saying goodbye to Steve in a way that can give him some actual closure. He confesses to his friend Yuri what really happened to his son.

And more than all of that, he shows up to hang out with Sam and his family. He brings cake. He goofs off with the kids. He hugs his friend, his partner, Sam Wilson. I can see Bucky coming to peace with some things. Coming into his own. It breaks my heart that we don't get to see more of that play out on screen. The show had to make a choice about whose story to prioritize, and in my opinion it made the right choice. This was a show about Sam's journey and Sam's decision here at the end was the capstone of that.

That scene at the end, though... the kids hanging off of Bucky's metal arm was such a poignant image for me, because this man is a killing machine, was designed to be so, but has remade himself into something else, and this moment really showcased that. Also, that gay-ass ending of Sam and Bucky looking out over the water together and then strolling away, Sam's arm around Bucky? Thank you for my life, Disney, I guess. And we got Bucky calling Sam "Cap," and his obvious admiration and pride in him for his speech... I just love them, y'all. I really do.

I wouldn't say anything about this show broke the mold or made me really excited about Marvel again. I enjoyed it, because I already liked Sam and Bucky, and I got to spend more time with them. I was nervous about how they were going to navigate certain political stickiness, and honestly I think they did... an okayish job. I could have wished for them to go even further, but they didn't take the easy way out, in my opinion.

I hope they make more of this someday. Regardless, I'm not ready to say goodbye to Sam Wilson or Bucky Barnes, so I hope we get to see Captain America and the White Wolf grace our screens again in some project or other!

8.5/10

#review #fatws #fatws review #the falcon and the winter soldier #the falcon and the winter soldier review #falcon and the winter soldier #falcon and the winter soldier review

[alo-piss-trancy]

Ok hi, I didn't wanna say anything, but please don't write knifeplay/bloodplay for Yuri. I def don't wanna spoil anything, but it's learned on a certain route that Yuri has a s*lf h*rm problem (I'll leave it at that).

You honestly seem like you're not trying to be a jerk with this ask, so I'm going to do my best to answer this as politely as possible without compromising my personal beliefs on the matter. This is going to be long and a little serious, but please note I'm not attacking you or trying to start a debate. I'm just laying all my thoughts on this down at once so I make myself clear, because a short answer would leave a lot of nuance out.

I understand what you're trying to do here. For the record though, I also considered that a pretty massive spoiler and I did not appreciate that at all. Even if you all think you're 'helping', don't do that again. Y/uri was pretty much the only character I'd managed to avoid most spoilers on and you killed the surprise for me. This game is already so full of fluffy 'filler' in the beginning that I don't have a ton of big plot points to look forward to in each route.

Now, I realise this is a very delicate topic and incredibly triggering to some people, especially with those two things combined. I am 100% willing to tag it with just about any variation needed to ensure you or others affected can blacklist/block it and never have to see a word of it in the future. I'd also be happy to go back and tag that original text post I made if needed. I mean that. You all are welcome to ask me to tag things anytime, and so long as you're polite about it I'm perfectly willing to oblige to the best of my ability in future posts! If I occasionally forget, just toss me a light reminder and I'll jump into editing and add it in.

That said, I want to make it clear that I am very firmly against censorship. I'm willing to take all necessary precautions to ensure people can curate their experiences on this blog and AO3, but at the end of the day I can still post whatever fictional stuff I choose to. As can anyone else. Same goes for more formally published media.

Now, it's entirely possible I would have gotten to that part of the game and decided 'oh dang, I'm not so enthused about that fic idea anymore...'. My whims and ideas change frequently, and what you mentioned is a heavy topic with a lot to unpack and process. It's also entirely possible that future plot would only provide more fuel.

Fyi, when I originally mentioned the knifeplay I was actually thinking a lot more along the lines of her doing it to the protagonist, not the reverse. But for the record, if I did choose to write it with focus on Y/uri, I would still be well within my rights to.

This next part of my answer is going to address some heavy topics, this is your warning!!!

Sometimes people's kinks are a way to take a thing that is personally scary or upsetting to them and find a way to reverse it. To find pleasure or power or get used to the idea of the awful thing in a safe, controlled fashion. I'm not going to go into the full details on this because there's plenty of explanation and research elsewhere already written up, as well as an excellent book on the subject, and I'm not turning this blog into a discourse debate. But I needed to mention it for my point.

There are plenty of stories that could be explored with Y/uri in this context. Did she have this kink before the self harm events started and it was completely unrelated, or did she develop it afterwards? How did she discover it beforehand? If developed afterwards, did it start out as another way of harming mixed with pleasure in a self-destructive way, often done sloppily and without proper technique? Or was it strictly used as almost exposure therapy to deal with those urges and thoughts in a safer, more contained scenario, maybe even allowing the partner she trusted to wield the knife to prove their bond/reinforce that she can be loved without being hurt deeply, that she is worthy of affection and trust and loyalty. Maybe this finally helps give Y/uri a tool to embrace her 'weirdness' without harming herself and others. Or, what if she thinks it can be a useful tool and is sure she's ready, but partway through the scene she gets triggered or has flashbacks... how does she deal with it? How does her partner? Can it be overcome with effort, research, and taking things slowly, or does she realize this kink is actually completely off the table for her?

What if she has this kink and is excited to try it, but her partner isn't? How does she take that rejection? Or do her poor social skills mean she skipped negotiation to begin with and attempted it in the middle of a vanilla session? Would her partner freak out or even get mad, or try to swallow their fear and let her do it so they don't hurt/offend her, even at the cost of their own comfort?

This topic also opens a ton of potential plots for darkfic, but I'll refrain from discussing that out of respect for you and others.

So as you can see, there's much more to explore than 'Knife=Hot'. I believe those discussions and ideas are necessary and provide important fuel for thought when explored fictionally, especially since mainstream media doesn't cover a lot of them.

~~~

I feel I should take a second to clarify knifeplay for those who may be unaware. It doesn't always equate to actual cutting/drawing blood. That can be an aspect, but usually only by those far more experienced and, you know, actually into that. A lot of participants don't actually go that far. Mostly, it's either about the physical sensation of the knife touching you at all, or the adrenaline/controlled fear and intimate trust of a partner bringing an object like that so close/teasing you with it.

In fact, it's frequently advised in those circles (especially to newcomers) to use a dull butterknife instead, because it simulates the same feelings of metal on skin/can dig in a little without any real risk of cutting/drawing blood. Even if one chooses to use a different knife, it's still pretty common to dull the blade, or some people even substitute with a closed pair of scissors (combined with the partner blindfolded, you can't really tell it apart from the real thing).

These versions of knifeplay are well controlled and ultimately pretty harmless, so long as both parties know what they're doing and stay alert. And more experienced players with sharper knives are even more cautious/have studied extensively to know where/how deep to go without risking scarring/serious injury.

Remember the golden rules of kink: Safe. Sane. Consensual.

With those in place, it is not nearly the same as self harm. Just as controlled, consensual, well-negotiated BDSM with safewords, respected boundaries and a trusted partner is never in the same league as abuse.

~~~

Now that that's out of the way, back to my point:

There's no perfect representation or narrative for everyone, in any group (be that gender/sexuality/triggered by certain things, etc). Every human being is different, everyone interprets media differently, and everyone takes away different elements from stories.

What one person in a particular group may find cathartic, relateable, or painful but necessary food for thought, another may find completely repulsive, personally hurtful, offensive, something they can't stand to hear. And guess what? Both of those can be true at the same time. One side is not immediately right over the other.

There are queer characters or interpretations of them in fics that I vehemently despise, might even find hurtful or sickening and think 'how can anyone create this, it's insufferable! People in 'my group' aren't like that, it's a horrible representation. I can't relate to it at all!' But you know what? Other people can and do, may find comfort in those exact narratives and experiences, may heal their pain instead of inflicting more. And that's great. It's what they needed or wanted and if I don't like it, I click away and do my best to avoid it.

There are specific tropes and narrative themes I personally cannot get through without being triggered into anxiety attacks or dragged back to bad times and places in my life. Sometimes I see them tackled in ways that are hurtful or seem insensitive to me. But I recognise that for someone else, it's exactly what they needed to see to get through that or come to terms with it, or see a way they wish that thing could play out. I would never dream of telling those people they aren't allowed to enjoy it, OR telling the creator of that piece of media or a tv show 'Hey ummm please don't use this plot because it turns me into a human wreck for a week'. Because it's not remotely my place to do so. They can create whatever they want, they have no responsibility towards me or my well being. A few might be kind enough to include a warning at the beginning of that episode or in the description, but they are in no way required to. It's up to me to curate my experience and try to keep my guard up/research what might have those tropes, and in the rare occasions I get blindsided, yeah, it hurts like hell. I struggle, I might even backslide a bit. But I just have to try my best to deal with it and make a note to be more careful next time. Because you can't control the world around you, not even the online world, and you have absolutely no right to. The only right you have is to protect yourself without infringing on other people's boundaries/rights.

And there's also another important point. There doesn't have to be a big important point or explanation for why a creator creates something, or why consumers can enjoy that creation! If someone wants to create a plotline with all of my triggers used in the most 'insensitive', 'wrong', pointless ways possible, strictly for Entertainment or pure kink material instead of some deep dissection of the issues involved? They can go hog wild!!! They are 100% allowed to do so on this earth, and I can't (and wouldn't want to) do a thing to stop them.

One person can read a kink fic and it hits a very emotional theme for them/they think it explores a deep topic well. Another person can read that same fic and get nothing out of it except their rocks off. Both of those readers are completely equal and 'allowed' to enjoy that fic. Both reasons are completely valid reasons for why the creator was 'allowed' to post/create that fic in the first place. Nobody needs permission, nobody has to answer to anybody except themselves. Period. This extends to any topic, any type of fic.

Yes, even for things I find absolutely abhorrent and insensitive and don't understand/want to read ever. I may resent everything about its existence, but I will defend to death the creator's right to make it exist in the first place.

It only affects me if I let it affect me. If someone's making content I despise or am upset by and can't handle, I can choose to ignore or avoid them, blacklist those tags, I can block them and move on with my day. I can do anything within my own bubble, but the second I consider going into their bubble and saying they can't make that thing, I am in the wrong. Because I'm not respecting their space and rights.

If someone makes cookies with ingredients I'm highly allergic to, pastes the ingredient warnings all over the box where I read them, and I still eat one, would anyone cheer me on for blaming them when I have a reaction? Would anyone think it was remotely okay of me to start calling up every bakery in town and saying they weren't allowed to bake those cookies EVER, because some people somewhere might be allergic?

No. They'd tell me I was crossing the line, because I'm infringing on other people's boundaries and lives. I'm expecting everybody else to take responsibility for something that, while horrible and painful, was my fault for touching.

Now, if someone sets out unlabelled cookies not realizing I'm allergic to something in them, and I eat it and have a reaction, that sucks. It's an awful experience. But is it the baker's fault? As long as they didn't do it maliciously, not really. They can be advised politely to label it in the future, and I can do my best to remember to ask/be more cautious next time I come across something I'm unsure of, but they're still allowed to bake those cookies for themselves and others.

Now, if I deliberately baked cookies with an ingredient that people are very frequently allergic to (ex. peanuts) and set it out in a crowded buffet without a warning label, that's a jerk move. That's intentionally trying to cause harm to others. But simply baking that flavour of cookies still isn't a crime or harmful by itself.

~~~

I'll be honest, I'm running out of steam and I think I've said most of what I have to say, so I'll wrap it up. I want to reiterate that I'm not ripping into you with this long answer, anon! I understand why you sent me what you did and I'm trying not to come off as harsh. I'm happy to go back and tag things and will tag anything else similar in the future!!! But at the end of the day, regardless of whether I personally end up writing that fic or not, or even want to after I get to that plot, I don't agree with telling anyone they can't/shouldn't write it at all. I wanted to try and explain my viewpoint thoroughly, and I hope you can respect that, just as I'll respect and try to accommodate you and other followers. This is the only time I'll really get up on a soapbox like this, and I have no interest in debating these things on my blog further, but it is a topic I've been passionate about all my life so I'm afraid I'm not budging on it.

#bear gets a letter #not omo #tw knives #tw knifeplay #tw cutting #tw self harm #d/dlc spoilers

[recentanimenews]

INTERVIEW: So I'm a Spider, So What? Fei Voice Actor Eri Kitamura

  In coordination with the current season of So I’m a Spider, So What?, Crunchyroll News was given the opportunity to officially translate interviews with the staff and cast of the series. You can read the original Japanese interview with Eri Kitamura right here.

The interview was conducted by Daisuke Iwakura. 

    So I'm a Spider, So What? Relay Interview with Eri Kitamura as Fei: "I'm trying to portray reservedness as a human, and strength as a monster."

"Me" (a.k.a. Kumoko) has obtained Parallel Minds. Meanwhile, on the human side, the Hero Julius has entered the Great Elroe Labyrinth ...

Things are starting to take shape on So I'm a Spider, So What?  For Part 9 of the relay interview series, we speak to Eri Kitamura-san, whose character was reincarnated as an Earth Wyrm. We spoke to her about what it was like to play a character who isn't human.

  —What was your first impression of this project?

Kitamura: I thought it was pretty bold. (Laughs) I think I expected the heroine to be a cute girl because of how things normally go, so I was really surprised to see Kumoko's design. But when I saw the way she was throwing around internet slang, along with the typical video game elements like skills and leveling up, I realized that the story and writing would be just as interesting as the designs, and how Kumoko is really iconic of the show's appeal as a whole. 

—When you auditioned, was it for the role of Fei? 

Kitamura: At the tape submission phase of the audition it was for the role of Katia, but during the studio audition I also tried out for Filimøs. After that, they suddenly asked me if I could read for the dragon. There was no art or script at the time, so when I asked whether or not I should go for something more natural or exaggerated, they told me to show them what the difference would sound like. (Laughs) I thought they were maybe looking for someone who could do monster voices on the side, so I tried making battle sounds and talking cutely, and at the time, I had no idea whether it was what they were looking for.

  —That's interesting.

Kitamura: When I was on my way out the door, Director (Shin) Itagaki said I did a good job, and I had no idea if he meant my take on Katia, Filimøs, or the dragon. (Laughs) But something about what I did made them think I was a good choice for Fei, so I'm glad about how it turned out. 

—What's your impression of Fei?

Kitamura: Before being reincarnated, Mirei stood out a bit in her class, and tended to get on Wakaba's case, so she struck me as a pretty traditional high school character. The kind of person who is a bit more confident about themselves because they're one of the popular kids. But Director Itagaki explained that she wasn't just a simple heelish character, and that when everyone was fawning over Mirei, Wakaba was the one person who didn't, which is what caused that animosity. Essentially she's a young girl who was convinced she should be the center of attention, and that's why she picks on Wakaba and takes a high-handed tone with her specifically. It's not that Mirei is a villainous character, and that balance was something I tried to be careful about.

  —She does have a bit of a precocious high schooler feeling.

Kitamura: I think so, too. I don't think she was quite what you would call a party girl, but she does come across as playful in the way that high school students who try to seem mature do. That was something I made an effort to get across, from Episode 1.

—Is there anything you're careful about because she's a monster?

Kitamura: Mostly just how monstrous to make her sound when she's using magic. An example of that is the scene in Episode 3 where they are using water magic for class. She becomes more powerful over time, so I didn't want to make her seem too strong from the get-go and tried to establish a baseline for how that she would sound initially instead.

  —During the battle with the Earth Wyrm, Fei really demonstrated her strength.

Kitamura: There was something about that I was curious about. After the battle, she earns the title of Kin Eater, and I was wondering if there was a point in the battle that she realized her relationship to this other creature. It's pretty clear she's realized what happened in the scene right after the battle, but it's not specified in the script, so I wondered when she realized who she was fighting, and asked the director about it. Fei doesn't seem the type to be able to fight while keeping a lid on her emotions, so depending on how that works, I thought about maybe changing up the tone when she has to bite into the wyrm's neck.

—What did the director say? 

Kitamura: He wasn't sure about the specifics of the Kin Eater thing, but he pointed out that she would be more analytical and cool-headed than Shun, and that she'd have a better idea of what's going on. Essentially, even if she did realize she was fighting a blood relative, she'd be able to figure out what needed to be done quickly, and would be able to fight normally. That being the case, I tried to make sure that it didn't sound like Fei was wavering or not sure about what to do, and tried to match the way the animation looked. 

—You let the animation direct the way you performed that scene.

Kitamura: I think so. When your character's face is on screen, there's always a temptation to try and get across some kind of subtext for the non-verbal parts, but in Fei's case, I generally try to make sure it's a neutral performance unless something specifically suggests otherwise. 

  —What's your impression of Fei and Shun's relationship?

Kitamura: They're pretty casual in an uncomplicated way, so I try to make sure that the performance comes across as low-key. She's a bit like Shun's pet in some ways, but instead of her being his familiar, their relationship is more of an extension of the one they had as classmates, which means they're on pretty even footing with each other. It's a bit like she's his adventure buddy and older sister.

—Adventuring Buddy and Older Sister is a great way of putting it. (Laughs)

Kitamura: She comes across as a lot more mature and reserved than Filimøs, who used to be their homeroom teacher. (Laughs) So when Hugo is being prickly, her reaction is to sigh and go, "Oh, well." She's not the type of character to push back when someone pushes her. She's reserved as a human being, and strong as a monster, and I think those two factors form the core of why I try to depict Fei with a pretty level-headed attitude.

—The way her relationship with Shun is so steady makes them seem like really good partners.

Kitamura: (Shun) Horie-kun is playing a character who's more calm instead of a really fiery young hero, so together we both give off a vibe of being level-headed. With these two, there's not a lot of, "Okay, let's do it!" "Yeah!" action. (Laughs) The way that they try to operate in a more collected fashion ends up making Hugo seem really impetuous in comparison.

  —With Hugo in the picture, what's your take on how the human part of the story is developing?

Kitamura: The way they don't all get along despite being classmates is realistic to me. They're not exactly in open conflict with each other, but they're not forcing the idea of being friends, either. The fact that you still have different cliques among the class, even after reincarnating in a fantasy world, gives it a strange feeling of realism. Hugo and Yuri stand out a bit from the others, but I feel like the others don't let that bother them. 

—Now that you mention it, excluding Yuri and Hugo, everyone seems to respect each other's space.

Kitamura: That's the case with Fei and Shun, too. Nobody has any idea what Filimøs is up to, and nobody is sticking excessively close to anyone else. They've all got a fair bit of independence from each other. I think Katia might be the one who's most on guard about their surroundings, though. It's that awareness that leads her to warn Shun about Hugo's hostility. There's no telling how everyone's relationships might change over time, which is one thing I'm looking forward to.

—Are there any characters you find interesting other than Fei?

Kitamura: Sue's brother complex is genuinely cute. Half of that is just me finding Yui Ogura cute, though. (Laughs) Other than that, definitely Kumoko. We record separately, and when I see the footage of her and how many lines she has, it always comes as a shock. Her sessions must make her feel like a ping pong ball being knocked around. When I encounter Ao-chan (Aoi Yuuki) in the studio, I always tell her she should be getting paid for three roles' worth this time around.

  —(Laughs)

Kitamura: The simple fact is that the amount of lines means that it'd be a terrifying role for any actor who can't process that amount of material efficiently, which makes me believe that she's a character that can only be pulled off by someone like Ao-chan. I think a big part of that is that she herself is a bit of an otaku ... Granted, I am one, too, so it's not like I can talk. (Laughs) But the way Kumoko talks to herself and certain things about her speech have that distinct otaku style to it, right?

—I agree.

Kitamura: I think the otaku audience has certain things that they like to hear that they recognize, and Ao-chan is able to pull those parts off. Usually, if you're not an otaku yourself, it takes a while to really wrap your head around slang like that. And you can't just say it convincingly, but you also need to incorporate it into your performance in a way that feels natural and sounds good. With her, you're like, "Yes, exactly like that!" And between the chaotic action bits and the comedy parts, she does a great job of displaying her range.

—Thanks for speaking with us. Is there anything coming up after Episode 7 that you'd recommend people keep an eye out for?

Kitamura: A little bit further on, we're going to get a picture of what Fei ... or rather, what Mirei is like as a person, and I think that'll be one of the highlights for the first half of Fei's story. Not just her, but we'll also see what Shun and Wakaba were like during school, so I'd keep an eye out for that. I hope everyone enjoys it.   

By: Guest Author

#Anime #News #Latest in Anime News by Crunchyroll!

[theanimeview]

Theory: The True Voice of Yusuke Urameshi

By: Casea Mhtar, @madamekrow​

Yu Yu Hakusho is ultimately my favourite anime, to the point where I can’t bear the thought of liking an anime more than it. For example, Berserk (1997) will be my “number 1” while Yu Yu Hakusho has exceeded the list altogether because its pedestal is just that high. That is the length I must go to secure a strange sense of balance for myself and stave off yet another identity crisis for a different reason. So you can probably imagine how much chaos was thrown at me when I found out that Yusuke Urameshi’s voice actor is completely different than the one I vividly recall when I found myself rewatching the series a few weeks ago. I have a memory of my sister and I watching a single episode she had taped on VCR and we would specifically watch the credits nonstop. We were trying to memorize the song (with great success, I might add).

At the time, there was still no means of listening to the ending theme anywhere other than its source. YouTube wasn’t really a thing, and even if it was we didn’t have access to the same databases we have today. So we watched that part over and over and over again. I remember etching each image into our minds, every lyric into our internal roster of songs as it played on repeat. The names kept popping up just as they did before the last and the voice actor of Yusuke Urameshi, my favorite character, was none other than Yuri Lowenthal.

I distinctly recall thinking “Yuri, that’s a cool name” to myself as his name came up again and again. Not to be rude, but “Justin Cook” just isn’t exactly a name that would elicit such a thought from me and, indeed, never came to mind since I am certain it wasn’t in the credits of my beloved Yu Yu Hakusho VHS. 

So, in my rewatching of the show, present-day me had the initial assumption that what was going on here was a perverse version of the Mandela Effect. However, looking into it now, I feel that completely waters down my experience and doesn’t actually explain what happened. 

I mean, I can’t simply ignore my recollection as being a false memory, as every Mandela Effect is reasoned away with. No. I needed to find true reasoning for this madness. 

For the sake of convenience and for the lack of a better theory, I will settle on there being an unexplained dimensional shift. Certainly, any reasonable person could argue that I made a mistake. I simply misread the credits, maybe even pulled that name from somewhere else. Or perhaps Yuri was Yusuke’s voice actor from a different dub! But that isn’t the case as seen in this YouTube video comparing EVERYONE who has voiced Urameshi. 

So... Let’s say this was all a misunderstanding on my part. BUT THEN it didn’t just end with me incorrectly reading names in the credits over and over. I didn’t wrongly perceive the Funimation dubbing as being someone else and then call it a day. I was validated in my belief for a long period of time by outside sources.

.Hack//G.U. Vol. 1: Rebirth (2006)

The overall series of .Hack// is a subject I will certainly indulge in more in the future, but for the purpose of staying on-topic, I shall restrain myself. The reason I bring it up now is because in 2006, when .Hack//G.U. Vol. 1: Rebirth was released (I will always say it in full!), the protagonist--Haseo--sounded so familiar. I couldn’t quite figure it out until I saw who was credited with the voice acting. Out loud, in front of witnesses (if you count my birds), I said, “Yuri Lowenthal?. . . Wait, is that the voice of-”

I looked up his name to find he was-at that time-credited as the voice of Yusuke Urameshi. Quite a mistake that is since officially he is unlisted in the series yet multiple people around the world think otherwise, the same as me. Not only that, but updating all of Lowenthal’s pages to be credited with Haseo in addition to Urameshi. Many people had to review those pages, many people happened upon those pages and never bothered to correct them. That’s what really gets me. Sure, if my Ego was backed into a corner then yes, I can perhaps admit that my eyeballs had failed me and that’s all you’re gonna get out of me! Yet there is no copy I can find of him voicing the character online.

Could this be an example of lost media instead then? Well, no. Apparently not. Most anyone I’ve told about this believes I am confusing him with someone else. They may not remember “Justin Cook” at the top of their heads, however they are adamant about Yuri Lowenthal never, ever voicing Yusuke Urameshi. Because he didn’t... in this dimension.

Perhaps I truly am mixing him up his voice with a different character? Yuri Lowenthal is also famously the voice actor for Sasuke Uchiha in the english dub of Naruto. An extremely popular character from an anime that is surrounded by an enormous and ever growing fan base. The problem with that is, I’ve never watched Naruto. I didn’t even know Lowenthal was in any way a part of Naruto until I was somewhat adjusted into adulthood. When explaining my entire theory to a friend, I asked them if they can imagine the essence of an other-dimensional Yusuke within the voice of Haseo. 

“All I hear is Sasuke from Naruto,” They bluntly said.

I’ll be honest... That hurt more than it should have, but I swallowed my pride and looked into it since I’ve never actually heard what Sasuke sounds like.

What I begrudgingly find is that my friend was right. Again, this was the first time I had ever heard Yuri Lowenthal as Sasuke and I didn’t know that he was the voice actor until a few years prior. This entire ordeal leaves me feeling unnerved that there are so many loopholes being found in the False Memory Theory. It can’t be completely dismissed as large scale misinformation or misremembering. That is why I had to settle on the theory that there was some strange dimensional shift, even with how outlandish that sounds.

The Discovery

I don’t know when it occurred and I’m not sure how I missed it, but it happened. You would think being thrust out of your prior dimension, or being crammed into a different one, would have some sort of impact. Maybe that’s why I developed back problems during my teenage years, I can’t really say. All I can recall is the feeling of my stomach hitting the floor through the bottom of my feet when I finally found out. I was watching the DVD box set of Yu Yu Hakusho that my friend lent me and I could immediately tell something was not right. Yusuke didn’t sound anything like I remembered, the voice--the tone--was weird, his inflections were way off, it was all wrong! WRONG, I TELL YOU. So, to the internet I went only to find someone else being credited...

“Justin Cook this” and “Justin Cook that” appeared all over. There was even a video of him yelling “spirit gun” for a fan and I was still in disbelief! There was no way! This wasn’t possible! 

Apparently, in this dimension it is though, and that is a fact that I will have to live with for the rest of my life... or until reality throws me back to my own dimension. The knowledge that I will look crazy whenever I tell this story, as well as the reality that there could be more dubs out their with voices unknown. Not just voice actors, but entire animes—maybe video games, even people I thought I knew! Who knows what was left behind with Yuri Lowenthal as Urameshi! I don’t care to think about it too much. My heart is wounded enough I tell you. I already have a crippling fear of one day finding out my whole life is a lie—I don’t need to rack my brain about all of this as well.

In Conclusion,

Yuri Lowenthal was fantastic as Urameshi and I wish I could somehow put my memory into an audio clip for everyone to hear. Not so much to prove that he was better, but to solidify why my experience is very real to me. Though, if you did hear the Yusuke that I knew, I truly believe you would think it was pretty good at the very least. (Not that Justin is bad... just that it feels wrong to my beloved memory... sorry Mr. Cook.) On the bright side, Lowenthal is plenty successful and I am always rooting for him regardless. Sure, Justin Cook is my “number 1” Urameshi in this dimension, but the Yuri Lowenthal rendition that doesn’t exist in this world has exceeded the list all together in my heart. His pedestal is just too high.

What about those of you reading this? Do any of you have a similar experience? Maybe you also remember Yuri Lowenthal as Yusuke Urameshi! Let us know! (Let ME know! Please--I beg someone to find a copy if one exsists in this world. 😭) 

Happy Wednesday. I guess. Bye. 

#yu yu hakusho #naruto #justin cook #yuri lowenthal #voice acting #voice actor #anime dub #dub #anime rant #anime #yusuke urameshi #analysis

[kendrixtermina]

Cindered shadows Reaction

tl;dr - Fodlan is a crapsack world and I want to strangle Rhea (or break Amyr on her again). Yuri is a very good contrast to the others and a cool addition to the ‘verse  for all that he is basically Joker XD

I took live notes while playing

One thing to take note of here is the house leader’s “canonical” classes (Fortress Knight/Warrior, Hero/Paladin, Assasin/Wyvern ride, though some of those assume the budding talents to be unlocked already) as well as just more of a look into what their dynamic is when they’re together - as such well-contrasting characters I always thought it was a shame that they didn’t interact more so I’m glad for this

 Edelgard is always somewhat standoffish/ closed off and generally the ‘logical’, least personable one, Claude is surface-level friends with both. Dimitri would like to think they are full-on BFF, calls Claude “my friend”, defends him etc. Claude’s friendship with Edelgard is very banter-driven, but there (the bit where she says “wow this trap could have been your idea” and hes flattered). Of course both of these carry over into their post-timeskip interactions especially when they part on good terms (Dimitri always does, and Edelgard easily can part with him on good terms, but Claude, though he doesn’t like the thought of them dying,  wouldn’t take risks on either them) - and of course it’s Claude who proposes the feast after the mock battle where they all eat together. Edelgard and Dimitri were never friendly (at least not during the academy), but at this point they’re civil. 

Claudes Dialogues are BRILLIANT like he really shines in this one (Edelgard probably gets the least exposure but all of this is set before the reveal, so she has to keep her cards close to her chest - Or maybe there just cant ever be enough Edelgard for me lets be honest)

First impression of the Ashen Wolves is that they’re all very dramatic with a lot of bluster (Hapi being the contrasting exception but over-the-top in concept) - they have really been the Kings of their own little world, having a lot of free reign underground, accountable to few and throwing down for the heck of it

So it’s Yuri Leclerc and he was adopted by a Kingdom noble, the same Gwendal and Lonato served  and who dies if Arianrhod is blasted, but it seems like unlike wish Ashe who was taken into the family this was just a temporary gig for him

That makes him a commoner, which by itself is a big difference from the other three. Dimitri is and always was the crown prince whereas Edelgard suddenly ascended the sucession list due to tragedy and Claude has a much doubted claim on both sides of the border

I suspected he was going to be from the kingdom as we already had the Alliance, the Empire and the token Foreigner accounted for - also ‘Yuri’ is a slavic name like ‘Dimitri’ - though being adopted he isn’t necessarily from there

(Later we learn that he was in fact born in a village in the Kingdom)

Also liked the callback to count Gloucester’s sheming and how he had Balthus spy on Claude

They do go through some work to flesh out Abyss and make it feel lived in as a sort of society. 

Just look at that very very makeshift classroom. Few down there were getting any sort of education before Aelfric set this up

They do something clever here where Balthus tells you part of why he’s wanted, prompting the question of everyone else’s stories

This idea of a wretched hive beneath the Church reminds me of Amsterdam where the big church was in the prostitutes’ quarter and they actually had flourishing trade agreements going on

But as a hiding place for outcasts it shows us all the uglyness about fodlan and how much persecution/ need for change there really is (Really wants me to play Crimson Flower again. Or Verdant Wind.)

There’s people “chewed up by the Nobility”

Duscurians and Almyrans

Many in the church want the place “purged”, Rhea wouldnt go so far but is at the very least unsympathetic

Tons of Banned Books (is this where Seteth puuts them?) Claude and Linhardt have a field day over it

That poor woman (probably Dagdan since she talks of a war) who was persecuted for believing in other religions (which was a thing under Rhea - I’ve been saying it, Shamir and Cyril are “allowed” because they work for Rhea which to her is the same as believing, both are “working for her family/ for us instead of against us” because Sothis is not just her god but someone she knows personally)

Yuri and his trouble are a sort of quasi-police or keeping order, reporting to Aelfric. As his second in command Yuri is a sort of “prince” and already lead his own bandit troupe, or perhaps more a chieftain than a prince, he’s a leader, an authority but not an inherited one but 100% selfmade, he comes from nothing - People call him “boss”,

One wonders if he already dressed in this noncomforming manner before comming to the abyss

He is very very self-reliant, decides and opines for himself, gives Byleth backtalk, very much a natural leader who owns his influence entirely to that natural-leader ness 

Byleth asks very good, very direct questions 

Hilda, Linny and Ashe are here because of their connection to the Abyss characters and the information they can provide - Ashe knows Yuri, Linny knows his book lore, Hilda heard rumors from Holst...

Here we get to appreciate why Claude keeps Hilda around she knows all the gossip, all the ‘local’ information that Claude doesn’t have, she’s an excellent info source

Lets appreciate that it was those three specifically because they were slacking off

Ppl say there the church scorns them pretty much I like how they’re no longer even pretending that the church is nice

The four MCs, meanwhile, might all have ended up here in a different life; If El had escaped the experiments she could’ve been like Hapi, Claude was already an outcast, Jeralt fled with Byleth as a refuge(or could have been sent there as a mercenary to torment the locals and then decided to stay there instead), maybe not young!Dimitri, but timesskip Dimitri was outright a vagabond and says in his lecture questions that he travelled many places and temporarily lived in slums he didn’t go full murdery until a few years in, as Gilbert recounts

AU where they all grew up  or met in the Abyss is what im saying, and the four MCs and Yuri team up. The slitherers still stir up war, perhaps Duke Aegir or Arundel made themselves Emperor etc. 

Characteristically, Dimitri really likes the idea of a secret haven for the outcasts (see all his dialogues about “acceptance” and general ‘help-the-orphans’ thing) - but also characteristically he’s a bit of a tool for the status quo- “Claude don’t be rude this guy is giving out charity~” but the issues Dimtri the issues they shouldn’t need to hide anyways and this is why I prefer the ‘revolutionary’ routes (CF and VW) - though to his credit Dimitri does do charity and stop ppl being poor when he’s king. 

Claude is absolutely having a field day, this is right in the way of his “Political program” - “What you’re helping the poor and downtrodden by barely tolerating them in a sunless hole where they have to hope the church doesn’t decide to purge them” They basically live in ever present danger

Bit sad that they had Edelgard “tied up” catching up with Constanze rather than stating a reaction to the abyss as a whole though it’s probably very deliberate that she keeps her cards close to her chest - As constance asks “What is the princess doing here?” - investigating that’s what. She mostly asks questions or voices conclusions - shes certainly also investigating for her own purposes

But of course Dimitri and Ashe, pure as always, immediately want to help the locals

Edelgard meanwhile is thinking strategy, talking of capturing and interrogating the enemy

Of Yuri ppl tell you both that he’s a real scoundrel/ “our scoundrel” - he loooks out for them so they obey him, “when I say jump they jump” - a Mafia leader of sorts. He’s like Claude in the ‘motivating ppl through taking care of their interest’ parts but claude’s alliances are looser and no one does “jump” like Yuri projects authority, its not quite the honor loyalty Dimitri inspired because he “pays”, Edelgard projects authority but it’s loyalty to the cause more than personal loyalty, and she’s an ideologue and inspires the same in her followers theres no “pay” from Edelgard. She warns you that you might die and that’s it. She is the same herself. 

I think Yuri would die for another the way that Claude and Edelgard would not, like when Aelfric got his mom putting her in danger was never an option. I don’t think you could pressure Edelgard with a hostage, she’d just be like “Hostage-kun, I won’t let your death be in vain” and then tell their captors to screw themselves. 

He has things in common with all the others - he has a certain honor and a people-driven leadership style like Dimitri (rather than ideals-driven like Edelgard, Claude and Seteth) - though unlike Dimitri his honor is only for the “in” group, he cares about protecting his turf, his people... and nothing else. Thus he doesn’t fit into the revolutionary (Edelgard, Claude) vs restorer (Dimitri, Seteth) dichotomy because he’s not concerned with the system as a whole - he doesn’t like it or have faith in it, but he will absolutely work with it when it suits his aims (such as when he makes his own alliance with the church behind Aelfric’s back, or just working with Aelfric in the first place)

This alliance is probably also supposed to give a reason why the Wolves would sttick with the church later (though Hapi’s non CF supports talk alot about reforming the crap institution that it is) even though they mostly have reason to dislike them

Like Edelgard he is calculating and ruthless more than Dimitri or Claude. (He laughts at peeps who fell in his trap) But you couldn’t see Yuri sacrificing an ally like Edelgard does (like with Dimitri the people come before the plan) and Yuri often markedly does NOT tell allies what they’re getting into while El makes a big point of telling everyone the risks and allowing them the chance to step out

In a way he’s Claude with a edge but without the big vision. Yuri is the most small-picture, Claude the most big-picture of the lords

They also have a different relationship with trust - some describe Yuri as “devoted to his own but too trusting” , he says it’s a choice... but he is never really fooled, just pretending to be, he solves a great part of his plot on his own. 

Like Claude and Seteth he prefers to play it safe/ know he can win (though Claude and Yuri arent against calculated risks) whereas Edelgard and Dimitri will do what they think is right with no guarantee of victory and don’t care much if it kills them or their followers

Otherwise tho they have a lot in common and are fast friends XD Yuri makes some great observations “Wow look at you three trying to suss out each other’s motivations must be exhausted”

“Doesnt take a title to have an agenda“ - Yuri and Claude are really... a “takes one to know one” situation

Claude tells us they generally get along tho (”Any misunderstanding might spark a war... ”... yeah)

Likewise, Yuri immediately gets that Claude’s friendliness is esentially “maintaining neutrality” more than actual allegiance

Yuri also seems relatively forward in romantic matters which is unlike the others lol

Remember how I was frantic for Claude/Linhardt or Claude/Hubert friendship content? Here’s another great team that ought to have interacted more, I could even see them working romantically assuming that Claude would be so inclined. 

Hapi/Sylvain, too! Because they’re both cynics

But despite her cynism Hapi is also characterized as considerate

Yuri likes board games! hes in the board game squad with Hubert, Claude, Sylvain and Edelgard. The Board Game squad is incidentally the Best Characters club

 He’s not big picture and only develops something like that toward the end of his support chain (to fight poverty)

So in a sense his style and the hole in it is more like Byleth’s own - he learnt practical leadership in the field and applies it for those he likes. He’s more self-directed

aaand more undercover fun

It seems that both the slitherers and Alferic were after the Chalice at the same time - the Death Knight’s presence hints at it, Metodey’s confirms it. So far I’d assumed he was one of Edelgard’s loyalists like Ladislava but it seems he works directly for Arundel, Edelgard is not too friendly with him and accuses him of “Disrespecting her house” 

Since Aegir was in power during the Bridgid and Dagda war, the slitherers could definitely have had something to do with how Constance’s family was treated, if they were onto her secret - I don’t see how Aelfric could have done it

Bold of El to order Jeritza away in broad daylight. At this point she’s probably come to accept that no orders are gonna keep him from Fiting PPl where he can, especially her she is a very tough opponent

I trusted Aelfric until he spoke. The voice is... its not a good guy voice. Same with how the eyes are drawn

then he called people “his flock”

“They are charitable only when it suits them”

“they have eyes and ears everywhere”

Yeah. I’ve always said that Rhea is like one of those millionaires who give their pocket change to charity but then support policies that keep people poor. Hopefully no one will keep arguing that she cares about the poor or the disenfranchised. 

“Her grace thinks its a nuisance”- This tells us alot. Alfric had to convince Rhea to give half a rats ass about the poor but still speaks of her with honorifics. That’s the crack in his soul right there

I also love how Yuri protests whenever anyone - the church etc make plans for him, hes very self-governed

Hapi, Lysithea, El and Byleth should have a “victims of human experimentation” support group

Alternatively, Cursed People support group with Hapi, Marianne, Bernadetta and Dimitri

I like the C supports with Byleth and Balthus as well as Hapi because they tell us not just about them but about Byleth - Both adress Byleth’s go-with-the-flow tendencies and lack of own direction, though Byleth makes clear that by this point they actually like the professor gig

“I could see this person just about anywhere”...in a bad way. Oh but Hapi you too can be recruited to all routes XD No she’s right. By-By is being used and she should tell them. 

MORE PARENTS LORE I rejoiced so much and this was such a cool thing to adress here

At first it seems that Rhea was also after the chalice but turns out she had written it off and the one pursuing it within the church was Aelfric

But you all do catch the implication that she did this all before and “great tragedy” resulted? Right? You get what that means?

For once she actually noticed a mole though Aelfric likely wasn’t subtle

It results in a zombie dragon because she meant to revive a dragon not a human

By now people should really be used to Rhea handing out legendary treasure to byleth

there are friendly reminders of the western church purge still going on

I like how constance smells a spy right away

Also the contrast between Hapi’s jaded “Lets just give them the thing so they leave us in peace” (Yes, Lapis Lazuli) and Constance’s “We can’t let them have the artifact! theyre bad” - Constance might be shrill but she’s a person of action

The sunlight thing is a tad over the top/unrealistic but it’s not per se the cliched split personality thing, more like going outside brings out the bad memories after hiding away underground for so long (she tells mercedes as much) while she otherwise covers it with bluster. Her parents and older brother were killed and her hometown destroyed, after all. She is still basically talking the same overdramatic/ formal way

Perhaps two sides of nobility like the pride but also the demure good breeding n shit, there is some forced quality to the bluster even indoors

But ultimately she’s pretty hard working and determined underneath

At one point Hilda says something like, “You sure that we should interfere? I don’t want to make anything worse it might be better to stay out” - This right here is why you can’t get CF Hilda

Further Hilda facts: She had countless suitors and knows her way around “magical doo daads” and fortune telling

Having her mildly superstitious is of course a fun contrast to claude

“Compared to you even Hubert looks like a spring chicken” lol

I was going “Linny I love you” the whole time

Speaking of love... The moment I decided I loved Yuri is when I learned why he was expulsed - because the church sent him to kill someone he knew and rather than be upset, or thing how he might change society to prevent it or draw other conclusions from it... He refused on the spot and fough church ppl. That’s when I saw how he fits with the other characters. What the contrast was.

Yuri is one of those rare types who would never give the full voltage in the milgram experiment

Because see? That ties back so well into the themes

One of the main scenes that contrasts the house leaders is their reaction over having to fight Lonato. They all sympathize to a degree, but none acts against it. Claude and Edelgard show their dislike of the church and want to stop crap like this, but right there right then, they play along for the sake of their plans. (Claude’s plan at this point still involves stealing relics)

Dimitri is the closest to Yuri in that he immediately regrets it massively and says they should have found another way (in part because he is against the notion of “sacrifices for the plan”) but this realization comes to him only after all is done because ultimately he follows authority/ sees some good in it and the status quo

Yuri,  meanwhile, flat out refused. Yeah he also killed whoever the knight escord was but he refused

Also let this sink in: Yuri was slated for execution because he refused to kill someone he knew. This is what might have happened to Ashe, Sylvain etc. if they had refused to fight Lonato or Miklan. 

Aelfric arranged for him to fight someone he knew but that’s all he did, the rest is the result of normal church policy and then begged for pardon (meaning the normal policy would be to kill him) The mission might have gone to a different house, but the church constantly makes ppl fight ppl they know. You realize just how easily all our beloved characters could have ended up just like Yuri?!

I loved how, when offered info about their parents, Byleth immediately seeks it out with no delay

“Never discard a wild hunch lol“ Claude I love you Linhard I love you

Generally we see Dimitri being the local people person and catching onto details about people’s emotions and dispositions , while Edelgard is like, “Investigate this, investigate that” (i love that about her), and Claude is the oddball/curveball and follows his intuition. Yuri goes on instinct, Seteth, if I had to say, on experience perhaps, certainly caution. 

So she doesn’t even recognize Dimitri. She did say that “she can’t say the name” so she probably never learned that her little friend was the prince. Can ppl stop acting like she snubbed Dimitri or like she has any reason to treat him like a brother?

I don’t think he pieced it together until the ball, and she only realized either during the parlay (AM) or some time before their final confrontation (She distinctly knows by the time she killed him)

Another poignant moment is when she basically didn’t trst Aelfric and only started considering that he might be good by the time Team Slither showed up. Yeah she’s not trusting and would have zero base assumptions that any church ppl are good

By the time she learns about the Nuvelle crest she’s so done like, “Are there any MORE conspiracies I should be aware of?” And indeed there are

Aelfric is sort of a consequence of Rhea’s coverup certainly not an 1D villain. He started doubting her after the coverup began semi thinking for himself and at first this led him to try and make the abyss less chaotic and speak in their favor before Rhea, but then when Sitri’s body fell into his hands he was just too tempted

And UGH remember when I said that for all that im not a Rhea fan, i don’t thnk the human experimentation was so bad because she didn’t harm anyone and it seems like the homunculi lived out normal lives? yeah i take that back

Even if Sitri wasn’t healthy enough to travel she didn’t need to be completely isolated exept for trusted church peeps

This would have happened to Byleth. You see how this would have happened to Byleth? Completely isolated and controlled?

Oh Jeralt jeralt baby you were so right to flee with Byleth so right

Worse because Rhea was a parental figure

Also she kept creating more homunculi though they turn out frail and basically live miserable lives

and the first attempt with the chalice probably did kill ppl

sitting with the corpse all the time is creepy too

doest that mean Byleth won’t rot either?

So she was a book worm - Jeralt did say she was brainy

It did start as a mentor crush, much like Byleth’s own relationship might

I love how Edelgard is all subtly concerned after Yuris fake attack

I wonder how that apology line was phrased in Japanese, “useless” seems a bit harsh given that Edelgard generally seems to love her father, but there is no denying that he lost control of his empire and that as a result villains wrecked havock all over it so there’s nothing better she can say there excuses wont help constances situation

Like this must be very hard for her

Constance’s support definitely confirms that it was the Seven Families/ ie the PM and Arundel who did this to her (also lol at the concept that she basically wants to make Byleth her very own Hubert or Gilbert)

Edelgard is saddled with all this stuff from the previous administration - I mean so is Dimitri with the instability, the recent anexation of Duscur and part of Sreng... but she gets confronted with it more, iDK if it’s common knowledge who’s really in charge

Because Yuri is concerned with his turf, not the world, it makes sense that “his” route would be the sidestory. I kind of wanted a part 2 in the sense that I like this cast and want more of him as a main character but I also get why there isn’t one... because he wins no matter what. Lucky seven! He’s the one who can’t lose (except if you dont do the sidestory I guess) ”He works with whoever’s in power to maintain his own, just like when he made the deal with Rhea. He gets all three house leaders and Byleth to promise that they will look out for the Abyss so his bases are covered no matter who wins.

- even so he basically solved his own problem and Byleth’s presence just kinda gave him the opportunity . Well, one defining factor is that they trust Byleth exactly because they don’t “seem like a typical church funky

Still since Rhea tells us the backstory here what use is the silver snow ending? I suppose she doesn’t mention the homunculus/ “I created you” bit but the lack of decay and the transplanting heart bits do sort of hint at it

Certainly a contrast tho, like in SS you learn the magicky parts us in CS you get way more about who mommy actually was as a person

Poor, Poor Byleth. This must be such a mindfrick for them. Like I had so many feels for By-By

It’s so weird to go back and have the Yuri & so present throughout the monastery,but  not know us yet

#fe3h #cindered shadows #ashen wolves #fire emblem: three houses #fire emblem three houses #three houses

[0w0tsuki]

My take for the Main Theme of SDRA2

I know I said I wanted to talk about Syobai or trans Yuri first but I feel like in order to write my future kinda long post analysis essays I will first need to talk about this. Because it ties into a lot of how I view the characters designs.

And the thing I need to talk about is the themes that are the driving message. Dr1 had hope vs despair, Dr2 had the future, and Drv3 had Doubt vs Belief and Logic vs Emotion. But as SDRA2 is want to do it does the same but with a bizzar twist. Instead of sending a message it instead sends a question. "What makes you...you?". The equivalent of this is asked in the Mastermind Mikado's only FTE and he proposes a couple answers, though they will not be all of the answers look into this post. The answers I will be looking into are your genetics, your memories, your surroundings, the people close to you, fate, and finally yourself. And these answers are shown throughout the individual stories of each of the characters.

Let's begin with the initial 3 Mikado mentions in the FTE. Genetics, memory, and surroundings. The odd one out is has the most obvious correlation. Now I say genetics but it's more or so your body. But Mikado uses genetics as a reference for the Okononji twins, who have genetically the exact same bodies but are two and complete different people. Now with this is where we get to the faults in the logic of the Mastermind. He uses this example as a reason to discard the idea. To him it's plain and simple that your body does not affect who you are a person but it does. Just not to the extent that satisfies him. No matter how many times your memories are reset or your surroundings are changed there are just some things that will remain with you as a person because your just BUILT that way. But what little idea could an AI have of how the body effects you when he has none.

With the odd one out of the bunch out of the way let's get into what I believe are two sides of the same coin. Memories and Surroundings combine together to make a greater core theme of "The Past" in a way to spiritually Mirror the main game it's based off of whose main theme was the future. Memories I believe are a more solid form of how the past effects you as a person. They are specific. Things that your mind is able to pull up for you. Positive life changing experiences or in the case of our characters trauma. Mikado also dismisses the because as in the case of the former answer, it does not personally effect him. Mikado is an AI created to be an exact replica of the real version. Even his memory was deleted he would remain the same person. It's why Mikado's "backstory" are played by a robot Yomouri. A robot aproxamation of someone you know who's dead gives backstory on the motivations on a man who's dead and this info is actually if I'm correct doesn't even come up in the trial. And then he destroys because the backstory of the man who created him has no effect in his master plan.

Instead he suggests his answer. Your surroundings. Surroundings are morso how your past affects you in way you don't remember. Things that just sort of happen over the day to day and imprint themselves onto you. The things you do without thinking because that's the way you were raised. And with this we can begin to understand his thought on his own identity but also for creating the killing game. You see Mikado the AI had a completely different surrounding than the real one. A digital one. One no human could not experience. This is why I think while linuj said that the real Mikado would have gone down the same path that AI Mikado goes out of his way to make himself look so different. I also believe they have different end goals. Mainly because AI Mikado specifically destroyed and made irrelevant any motivation would have for seeking out Usturo. Now maybe one the the Mikado stans who have watched chapter 0 ten times over can extrapolate what the original's end goal might have been but that's not who were here for. What was Mikado's plan? It's one of two parts. First is to create the surroundings that led to "creating Utsuro" in the first game. Create a killing game, have each trial vaugly keep some of the elements as the representatives in the original killing game, and have a Yuki stand-in to experience it and ba da bing ba da boom. You got yourself an Utsuro....ok let's get into the secret ingredient that makes all this work.

FATE! The divine will of the cosmos! DESTINY!!! Or in the context of this story a plot device known as "The luck of the Heavens". Now I would kind of get into the mechanics of the luck but it was done some wack and contradictory bullshit. I'm at this point it just does whatever it wants. Because sometimes its working against his will but still pull of some crazy bullshit to fulfill the dying wish of his. And Mikado is kinda banking on the Ultimate luck to make everything just work? Like him being brought back is a good thing as the luck has thought in the past then the mere act at an attempt of resurrection should work. It's why he always says "The Outcome has Already been Decided" because even though he's not aware Sora posseses the luck he will believe it's still working in his favor. Funnily enough it works not out of Utsuro's will to live but out of Akane's desire to be with Utsuro. That horny fuck is still working her magic even when removed of her memories. You see I believe the way Akane received the luck from Utsuro is because he wished "that she would find someone who loved her in her next life and not someone like him". And now here she is in this new life. But now the luck is in possession of Akane the idea of someone to love her was different. The luck of the heavens was now following two different wills for the same goal. This is why we have Yuki, the one who will eventually become Utsuro, the one who Akane desires most. And also why we have Yoruko, Utsuro's last will, someone for Akane in her new life as Sora, someone who Sora latches onto not because she was saved from any pit of despair but out of the genuine kindness and caring she gave to her. Yes I'm going to say it. Soruko is the entire reason for the killing game but I will get more into that in my Soruko essay.

But while we are talking about Utsuro let's talk a bit about how we let others define ourself. This one affects more on an individual level than it does a narrative level so I'm just going to list some examples. Akane let's her obsession with Utsuro define her. Nikei let's his hatred of Mikado define him to the point where his little void card focused rather than it did his actual trauma that led to him becoming a void like it did with the others. You learn that in her past Yoruko changed a lot of how she looked and lived in order to get closer to one person. Sora is affected in many ways affected by Akane. Someone who is like with the twins the same as her but not her. A wholey different person that lives on through her. All of the voids let their desire to see Utsuro define them.

And we get to our final answer. And remember none of these are to be the definite answer but all of these inform who you are. But the final most powerful thing is what Yoruko beats into Sora's head in chapter 5. You. It's a little bit cheesy but no one is better at knowing or defining yourself than you. Sure your past can affect you but you can understand it as a part of yourself and something you can live with rather than letting it overcome you. That yeah she does share the same body and past as Akane but she does not have to let that define who she is but she can decide that for herself.

And that's one of the things I like about the ending when you look past some of the more wack shit. It wasn't a good or a bad ending. It was just an ending, a mixed bag of tragedies and the good things we have left. Yeah the masterminds dead but so is everyone else who died. Sora is trapped in the program but hey! Try is working on getting out. Because life is just like that. The happen to you good or bad, they affect you but ultimately time passes and your story continues. I think it's why Sora told everyone to "live" as her parting words. Because yeah the situation sucks but they are now on the other end of the tunnel so the best thing they can do is to live on.

But yeah anyways those are my takeaway of a bunch of ideas I had bopping around in my head. If it's a little incoherent I'm sorry I kinda free wrote this while high. Hope this all makes somewhat sense and I'm not just talking out of my ass.

#long reads #long post #Sdra2 #sdra2 yoruko #sora sdra2 #sdra2 sora #sdra2 mikado #i was high off my ass when writing this #tw drugs

[agent-cupcake]

Third place winner @atomicchocolatecookie asked for a fluffy Yuri scenario where reader was a mage and artist and although this isn’t as fluffy as I kind of intended... I hope you enjoy it? 

POV Yuri x Reader

/

“You called for me, yeah?”

Yuri’s greeting caused you to jump up from your chair, sketchbook pages fluttering to the floor. He probably should have knocked rather than let himself in, considering the circumstances, but the breach in etiquette didn’t seem to stick to you after the surprise faded. Sometimes you scolded him for such antics, but not today. A pity, you were pretty cute when you were indignant. Then again, he did feel a sort of fondness for the way your eyes softened for him, the way you smiled despite being startled. If he had any doubt as to the reason for you calling for him, it was all cast out with that look. Yuri was good at noticing things. Little things, signs in people’s behavior that gave away their feelings. Not that you ever tried particularly to hide what you felt, or perhaps you just hadn’t recognized the feelings for what they were. In a way, receiving your invitation was a relief because, to him, your affection had been obvious for a while. You cared for him. Loved him, even. Yuri had seen it all before. But in that second, appraising you honestly, Yuri decided that he didn’t mind. It was you, after all. Maybe you weren’t all too different from countless of the other women he’d enjoyed, but that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. He’d come to like you quite a bit and after everything that had happened-

Well, every person had a vice. Yuri was more than well aware that he’d never find absolute regardless; what was a petty indulgence on top of that?

“Yuri! You came,” you exclaimed, just a touch breathless. He doubted that you meant for it to be appealing, but the happy relief in your tone was alluring in a way, even if the hesitant concern in your smile was somewhat condescending.  “I didn’t know if you would.”

“With such a cryptic invitation, how could I not?” Yuri responded with a playful confidence to squash the irritation of your tone, dangling the sheet of paper you’d sent to him between two fingers. It was a simple thing, merely inviting him to visit the collection of rooms you’d claimed as a home and art studio whenever you stayed in Abyss, but the lines were clearly drawn up and he was more than capable of reading between them.

“I thought you might want some company. I know you’ve been having...” You paused, chewing on your lip as you carefully selected the right words. Your lip was already red from the treatment, a sign that you’d been stressed. Or nervous. “A hard time.”

Yuri could have laughed at such a massive understatement, but he held off. It wasn’t like there was anything funny about losing dozens of his people in a surprise ambush from hired thugs. It was an insult. A tragedy. An event he should have been able to avoid. Although Yuri knew the aim of the attack was to get him to let off on the nobility, although he absolutely knew that it meant he couldn’t give in, sometimes, between trying to organize aid for the widows of his men and trying to restructure things to fix any compromised pieces of his plan, it was hard to justify to himself. Sometimes the notebook in his pocket was a dead weight, a body count he had to support with every step onward. It wasn’t funny at all but Yuri forced a smile and a confident, if teasing, voice. He was meant to be strong. Besides, weakness would hardly benefit him now. That’s what he always did to get what he wanted, wasn’t it? Lied, pretended. It didn’t matter.

“Aw, you were worried about me,” he cooed, holding your gaze with a winning smile. It had the intended effect, even if you tried to play off your embarrassment. Your reaction was cute. Yuri liked the way your eyelashes fluttered as your eyes leapt around, unable to meet his. The way your fingers danced at your side. You had pretty hands, graceful and dexterous in the way so strongly associated mages, musicians, and artists. They were softer than most, but not without callouses. Yuri would have been a liar to say he hadn’t wondered what they might feel like, if they were as clever as he thought they might be.

“Yeah, I guess so,” you answered. “You’ve seemed different since… It happened. So I wanted to do something to help you feel better.”

“You’re cute,” Yuri said, wondering in an abstract way if you were always this bashful when it came to men or if he was special. “But as you can see, I’m fine. Not that I don’t appreciate the sentiment.” That was why he’d come, wasn’t it? You could distract him —you were willing to!— and with just a word, with a single touch, he could have you at his complete disposal. And maybe that would help. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time he used another to soothe his aching spirit. The self-loathing of his actions hardly even registered. Not yet, at least. “Although,” Yuri said in a lower voice, taking a few steps closer. You were soft, in a way. Guileless and charming in how earnestly you regarded him as you met his eyes. It was a beauty that was all at once shy and overt, and one that he found inexplicably compelling right then. He was close enough to smell the faint fragrance on your skin, close enough to make his intentions clear. “Let’s drop the act, yeah? I think it would be better if we both more honest about what we really want. What I-”

“Wait!” you said, cutting him off. Strangely, you took a step back, an action an odds with your bright eyes and blushing cheeks, clear signs of attraction. “Um, sorry. What I want, why I invited you here, is to give you... I have a gift that I wanted to give you.”

Yuri, caught somewhere between amusement and surprise, stopped and raised an eyebrow. “A gift?”

“Yes, I painted you something. I thought that it might lift your spirits a bit. Maybe,” you said, your excitement edged with a skittish mania now that the mood had turned so abruptly. You gestured to the easel behind you, one that was covered by a ghostly sheet thrown on top. Yuri had discounted it as a trivial piece of furniture, a seemingly omnipresent setup in your rooms.

A gift. You had never painted anything for him specifically, although he had seen some of your portrait work. Painting people was a special hobby of yours when you weren’t engaged in other endeavors. Sometimes he wondered why you bothered at all with the criminal work, but you insisted that art was a mere fancy.

“Consider me intrigued,” Yuri said honestly, dropping the flirtatious effect. “May I see this ‘gift’?”

“Yes, of course,” you said in an overly bright voice. Insecurity and awkwardness was written into every line of your body, scratched deeply into the furrow or your brow and purse of your lips as your smile fell. Somehow, even this was a little charming. “Right. Well, I guess there’s no point in waiting. So-” You pulled the sheet off the easel, letting it drop to the floor without ceremony. Yuri wanted to say something, make some sort of comment about your behavior, but when you pulled the sheet away from the easel, he was rendered speechless.

What could he say?

“Do you like it?” you asked softly, peeking at him sideways.

Yuri was well aware of his beauty. He primed and projected it in the scathingly vain way only an auctioneer of the self could be. His looks were well documented by every painter and wordsmith who had ever attempted and failed to capture him in some capacity. But you hadn’t painted beauty. Portrait-Yuri wasn’t looking at the viewer, but at something past the edges of the canvas. He was smiling, commanding, but there was something else. His allure wasn’t aesthetic, but transcendent of such a trivial attribute. That man both was and wasn’t Yuri. Like he was staring into a mirror reflecting a perversion of reality.

“Yuri?” you asked when he didn’t answer.

Yuri blinked, clearing his throat and forcing a smile. It was harder this time, with such an obvious reminder of what the genuine article was meant to look like right in front of him. “Sorry, I was admiring your technique.”

You swelled with the almost-praise, your eyes alight as they searched his face for any response. “So you like it?”

Did he? Yuri looked back at the canvas. With the second glance, he was able to understand what was wrong with the image, what troubled him so intimately. You had painted a hero. Portrait-Yuri’s smile held no deceit. In his posture, there was no pretend. The man you’d painted lacked Yuri’s sin. The hands he raised in passion as he seemingly addressed someone or someones unseen were clean of filth. After the sleepless hours he had spent trying to clean up a mess that was a direct result of his wrongdoings, the image was like a bludgeon of his flaws. After being so entrenched in the darkness of the world he’d submitted himself to, the light was jarring.

“You can be honest with me,” you told him when he didn’t answer.

Yuri shook his head, trying to push back the feeling swelling in his chest. “I didn’t pose for this, so I’m trying to remember when this might have been,” he lied. Misdirected, really.

“Oh, it was a while ago. You were rallying support, uh, explaining how you were gonna make the nobles take responsibility,” you told him. It took a second for the event to come to mind, but eventually, Yuri remembered vaguely what you were talking about. Moons and moons ago, then, he couldn’t even recall if the two of you had been close at that point. Yuri had nearly forgotten about that night. “Nobody believed that you could do it. I don’t even think I did,” you added after a moment of thought, staring at the painting rather than meeting his eyes. “You were called crazy and overly optimistic and naive. But when you got up to speak, I realized something.”

“What’s that?” he asked.

You turned to him, your eyes sincere. Intense. “It’s not blind optimism or naivety. It’s not like you lie to yourself that the world is better than it is. In fact, I’d hazard a guess that you see the worst parts of the world more than anyone else. But you don’t submit to such a cruel fate or accept that it’s the way things must be. You want the world to be a better place, and you have the will to change it. That night, that’s what I saw.”

If he were any lesser man, you would have rendered him speechless all over again. But he was Yuri, and a response formed alongside a smirk that didn’t even half reach his eyes. “You’re wrong about that,” he said. “About me.”

“I know what I saw, that’s why I painted you in the first place,” you told him stubbornly. “I didn’t know if I was going to give it to you until now, but since everything that happened… I thought maybe you’d need a reminder.”

He knew the words would come out too sharply before he spoke them, but Yuri couldn’t stop himself from asking, “A reminder of what, exactly?”

“Art can’t change the world,” you said, ignoring his tone. “At least, nothing I could do. But you know, people use statues and paintings of saints to inspire their good actions. They look at paintings of Nemesis as an example of evil. When I look at this Yuri, I see you. The you I think you want to be. This is the man that history will remember. So even when bad things happen... Even then, this is-”

“A little paint can’t cover the things I’ve done. That man,” Yuri nodded to the portrait, “isn’t real.” His voice lowered, softened. “Besides, history would be better off forgetting me.” He looked at you, so earnest and trusting, and ran a hand over his face as the guilt formed into a sick slush in his chest for what he’d intended to do. “You would be better off forgetting me, too.”

“Then why do you fight so hard to do good things?” you asked him. “If you believe that the bad things you’ve done have destroyed any hope of redemption, why do you leverage your power to help make things better for the people in Abyss? If you truly believed you were beyond any hope, then doing those things would make you an idiot. Sorry, Yuri, but I don’t buy it.”

“Should I try and convince you, then?” Yuri asked. “I wonder what it would take. If you wish to exalt the best of me, you should know the worst, yeah?”

“Fine,” you said, no hesitation or doubt in your voice. You put your hands on your hips, tilting your chin upward in defiant determination. Yuri was no artist, but if he could have saved the sight of your eyes at that moment he would have gladly become one. The look was not the simple infatuation of a girl, or the affectionate and misguided love he believed had kept you trailing around him. Could he even call it love at all? When you looked at him like that, he felt oddly exposed. Only minutes ago he had believed fully in his ability to manipulate the situation, but right then he wasn’t so sure. “Tell me about your guilt and shame and listen when I tell you that you can be forgiven. That I forgive you.”

Forgive him? You? You, a master forger and gremory who wanted to be recognized first and foremost as an artist. You, a whimsical fool who insisted that beauty was for everyone to enjoy, scoring the ungrateful aristocracy who hoarded it all for themselves. You, who had joined his cause out of a childishly expressed desire to do good. Yuri knew he was guilty of countless unthinkable sins, he knew that enough blood dripped from his hands to drown in, and he knew that even the goddess’s clemency could not save him from reaping what he had sown. Yuri could argue the point if he wanted to. He would have been right to say that he was deserving of your disgust and distrust. He should have done his best to avail you of whatever love you believed you felt for him.

But he looked at the portrait you had painted, and couldn’t. Was that really what you had seen that night? Could that really be him? Those whose names were listed in his notebook, would they believe in such a thing? In such a man?

Eventually, Yuri relented to the war of his thoughts, shaking his head and putting a hand to his temple. “Who put you up to this, I wonder,” he mused.

“We were all worried,” you said, “But nobody put me up to this. It was the only way I could think to remind you of why you’re needed and appreciated. And I was worried because I... I care about you. I don’t want you to be unhappy.”

Those words pulled him from his thoughts, set something within him at ease. The awkward way you stumbled over the words, the way your voice softened them so sweetly. Yuri had been confessed to in hundreds of ways but never had simple admissions been used to such great effect. It was also a reminder that despite your clear feelings, you had rejected his advances in an attempt to make him feel better. Seemingly inadvertently, you had turned everything around on him. Yuri wasn’t sure if he liked the feeling, but he felt a sort of appreciation for the way you’d managed it all.

“Do you, now?” he asked suggestively, peeking up at you. Sure enough, blushing, your iron-clad determination having eased up. But the look was different. Or perhaps his way of appreciation had just changed. 

“Don’t tease me, Yuri, I’m being serious,” you said.

“Who’s to say I’m not being serious? I seriously was asking how you felt. I’d like to know these things.”

You hesitated. “Really?” you finally asked, your tone adorably earnest.

He laughed. It wasn’t full, but it wasn’t fake either. It felt good, as if some weight had been taken from his chest. “Whatever am I going to do with you.”

“Trust me?” you asked.

When Yuri looked up at you in surprise at the request, something within him softened. He wasn’t a fool, nor was he particularly good at lying to himself. It was affection. Desire of the heart. Not just for you, but for the portrait of him you’d created. The desire to be that version of himself.

He smiled, although it was a confused expression, half bewildered and half reeling from surprise. “Maybe I will.”

#fire emblem three houses #FE3H #yuri leclerc #yuri leclerc x reader #fe yuri #fe yuri x reader #my writing #lmao guess how many words this is bc it's not what it should be #i'm the worst

[ayakashiramblings]

Twilight: Breaking Dawn and Relationships

Once again... I am sorry Gaku.

Prologue

For the love of the gods, you had just wanted to bond. Sure, you could have stuck to food but one of your comrades was finally at the legal drinking age. You just HAD to celebrate that.

So you had turned to a rather sketchy magazine and everyone said they were down to do whatever the activity was on the first page. 

Eventually, the page was burned. And you shall find out why. 

To give them credit, they were good sports about it and even drew up a chart. 

It was the Dawn Faction against the Twilight Faction, with each member of one of the factions having to compete with their counterparts in the other group.

The pairs arranged are listed before, couple with cute, loving annotations like ‘ogre-face’, ‘furry’ and ‘choker’.

Koga and Toichiro

Kuya and Shizuki 

Ginnojo and Kuro

Aoi and Oji

Yura and Gaku

MC as the regulator

Chaos and Pain

Koga Kitamikado

Ah, the budding entrepreneur, making great strides in the scary new world thanks to his smart decisions.

A truly educated and learned person.

So of course, he wisely chose… to do a dare. 

Mad man.  

Even madder, he knew it was Toichiro’s turn.

He couldn’t help it, he liked things to be unpredictable. All kitsunes were masters of that.

Also, it was he who started this whole game.

“Ok, I dare you… to watch.”

“... To watch?”

“Yes. For five minutes specifically.”

“Watch MC make out with Kuya.”

Toichiro lost half of his tail with a swift swing of a sword and his fur was all ruffled from that blast of wind before MC could stop them. 

So of course, MC had to do the smart thing. 

“Fine, I will. Aoi, prepare.”

“WHAT?!” 

Kuya was becoming unusually pale and at least now we know Koga is a red oni.

At least Koga’s exclamation was muffled as MC shoved a piece of paper to his face. 

It was only when Koga became cross-eyed did he realize that it was one of Aoi’s pieces... specifically a chibi sketch of Kuya sleeping on a tree branch.

And MC was... aggressively kissing the paper. 

The pressure of her lips still felt even through the paper on Koga’s face.

Damn, it could have been on fire.

The paper and his face. 

Toichiro lets it go because everyone is getting uncomfortable with all the action happening and, OMG MC are you trying to slip in your tongue? 

DID KOGA JUST TEAR THE PAPER WITH HIS TEETH?!

Aoi is sad that one of his hand-drawn chibis is now in bits and pieces. 

At least it was only Kuya.

Kuya

To be fair, he thought he was safe because the one asking was Shizuki. 

What he didn’t know was that not only was Shizuki ordered to, the snow spirit had imbibed in some alcohol.

“Kuya, I want you to write…”

“Why did you ask for the impossible?” 

As Shizuki waved away the Satori Seer, Kuya was unusually the first to offer comfort. What was usual was the ‘wisdom’ it possessed,

“It's OK Aoi, I have a story. It's about an American treasurer who got lost in history until his wife who he cheated on…”

“Here is the catch. I want you to write… a lemon on your LEAST favourite ayakashi that you’ve recently met with your most favourite person here.”

“Hmm… so Kagemaru and MC.”

“What the hell, Kuya?”

‘L’ is for Loser Kagemaru.

‘E’ is for Every time MC beats him, I smile.

‘M’ is for Masochist because Kagemaru is weak for strong girls.

‘O’ is for when Other Onmyoji Boy drags away his contract.

‘N’ is for Not gonna lie, it was beautiful.

Unlike Toichiro though, Shizuki doesn’t want to give up without a fight. 

So poor Kuya gets trapped in a snow blanket until the kitsune and the rest of the Twilight gang restrains the mad snow spirit. 

Oh well, at least he can sleep.

After Koga finishes digging him out of there.

Ginnojo

By now, the wise grandpa had witnessed the dangers of taking on dares, unlike SOME people.

“I’ll take the truth.”

“Gin-Gin, this isn’t you pursuing truth and justice.”

“I know and frankly, with the way things are going, maybe not now. Corruption runs too deep.”

I mean... he’s not wrong. Kuro slightly pouts at having been seen through.

“Ok, now tell me what part of MC do you think you can touch without blushing?”

...

Nevermind, he would rather live a lie. 

It’s just that Kuro, ever-the-summer-child is great at giving the purest thing in the world. 

Puppy-dog eyes. 

There is no way he can lie now so, ironically with his face practically beet-red, confesses, 

“Her kimono. Specifically the sleeve.”

“Hehe, so that’s what you...”

“Specifically the third thread.”

“Weird flex but ok...”

“Specifically the third thread’s middle and it has to be the blue one.”

Again, the Twilight sect has to show mercy to their elderly citizens.

MC offers him her sleeve, even slightly pulling out the thread and now Ginnojo can smile, albeit bashfully.

Aoi

He stares at Oji like an office camera. 

What was the lesser of two evils? Truth, and who knows what Oji might ask. Dare, and…well…he could only imagine what his employer’s mind could think, but at least he knew Oji wouldn't propose anything life-threatening. 

Just utterly mortifying like that one time Oji had dropped him off at school...

“Hehe, don’t worry, I won’t ask you to do anything extreme.”

“I’d rather you ask anything extreme. Truth.”

For some reason, Oji smirked, as if that was the right choice for his plan and the wrong one for Aoi’s last shred of dignity.

“Ok, gimme a second...”

Everybody freaked out when Oji decided to let the eye in the middle of his forehead appear and bulge out.

“It’s my lie-detecting eye.”

Yes, everyone. He has one. Not that he thinks his own son would lie. 

Aoi is tempted to punch it away but he couldn’t let the rest of his comrades down after all they’ve done.

“Is there something you've seen in a steamy movie that you'd like to try?”

Great, and now it would look bad if he couldn’t name any or chose the wrong one to highlight. 

So like the pure baby virgin that he is, announces, 

“The ribbons.”

MC tries giving him her hair ribbon but he smacks it away with the brightest blush she has ever seen on his face. 

Smacks the eye as well that just turns green to show that he is telling the truth.

Yura

“My wise brother will never do such foolish acts like choosing...”

“I pick truth!”

... Gaku is tired. He already knows how kinky his brother is.

Don’t ask me how he knows. 

Anyways, Gaku has to think for a moment. He doesn’t want to put his brother in a bad light but he still has to keep the risque nature of the game.

So, he finally settles for asking, “Ever put something weird in your body?”

There, the most ambiguous question that ANYONE could take an innocent perspective on...

“Why, I once indulge in cream whipped to fluffy peaks with Sir Kuya. We poured it over our chests...”

Kuya tries to protest in his frozen chamber but it’s too late. 

“And made-believed that we were Oji’s pecs he thinks he can expose but truthfully fails.”

Now, to Yura’s horror, Kuya is further pressed against the floor and Koga is still struggling to dig him out. 

Interlude

“We’re killing them.” announced the Dawn faction. 

MC has officially died and wonders about calling Akiyasu up just so that her Ayakashi would fight together against him instead of each other. 

Even Kagemaru somehow offers her his commiserations as Yuzuru the beautiful geisha who had only arrived to deliver some beer. 

Stumbles into this mess and stumbles out.

And now, it’s time for the Twilight gang.

Toichiro Yuri

Sweet revenge for Koga. 

“I want you to kiss Shizuki DIRECTLY, LIPS TO LIPS.”

At first, he was fine. It was just making out. Sure, he might vomit into his valet’s mouth but at least that could be cleaned up. 

Plus, at least Shizuki should be a good kisser with all the ladies he has charmed into his life.

... Until Toichiro had realized.

“Why... is the rest of the kitsune clan here?”

Many small foxes were loping in their direction, some already in their more humanoid form. All had one goal. 

“GREETINGS MASTER TOICHIRO!”

“Sir Koga said that there was a huge bash with inari sushi!”

As Koga tosses a few fried tofu pieces at the rabid crowd, Toichiro’s eyes turned briefly feral.

“... I hate you. When this is over, I’ll- mmph!”

Shizuki decides to land a big wet one on him. 

Today was the day Toichiro learnt that no, Shizuki was a bad kisser. drunk at least.

There was an unexpected twist when one of the clan members cried with joy.

“FINALLY! MY SHIP HAS SET SAIL!”

Shizuki

Can we just marvel at the fact he is actually playing though for just a second? 

We all know the other stoic man Ginnojo is actually curious about new games.

But to get Shizuki to play instead of just serving some drinks and cordials?

That is no ordinary accomplishment.

And all we have to thank for this marvellous sight is... alcohol. 

Oji-san, why?

“Tell us how you orgasm.”

Kuya, why?

Except... Shizuki doesn’t bat an eyelid. In fact, he even throws a wolfish grin in.

“Only before my girl because she is too good.”

“But I make sure hers comes harder.”

“And she will scream.”

...

Kuya lost and just burrows himself into the snow hole Koga had spent hours digging.

Oji

At this point, Aoi is becoming like the past self you had only seen once. 

An absolute discipline master. 

Oji thinks he can get away because Aoi is way too shy to ask him to do anything THAT scandalous. 

For some with 100 eyes, the old man sure is blind.

With a smirk and almost evil, ominous tendrils of his bad aura flooding the room, he asks Oji,

“Well, I think you must have been a verrry bad boy in school.”

For the next round, Aoi makes Oji have a time out on someone’s lap.

Specifically Shizuki. 

“You are so grounded after this.”

“Don’t you mean, time out, Mister?”

Aoi has no regrets.... especially since he managed to sketch it, caricature style.

Kuro

“I’m going to go with truth because I have a feeling the dare is the opposite of touching ironically.”

Wise choice, Kuro.

The problem is... he’s forgetting that Ginnojo was a soldier.

For a major force in the Edo period.

And he has seen Aoi grilling everyone while at the Milk Hall. 

If he doesn’t know what questions will break a person, I don’t know what to say.

“So... Kuro, does your Ayakashi species know how to lap dance? If not, what are their attractive features?”

“Oh, Gin-Gin. Why did you go to the dark side?”

“Because you hate the dark. Also, I took out something from the military.”

He darted out of the room, returning with a fairly large device. 

Ginnojo set it up directly in front of Kuro, tapping a microphone positioned in front of him. Several lights on the device blinked, and a paper readout steadily fed out a long sheet of steady wavy lines. 

“This is a lie detector, the less freaky version. I’ve got Gaku making one based on your heart rate.”

Ok, I don’t think the lie detector was invented by then but let’s go along with it, ok? 

“Erm... not really. I guess... we hug a lot?”

The lie detector machine broke. Now nobody knows. 

Until 1921.  

Gaku

Dare because there is obviously something he can FINALLY do for his brother.

Picking truth would have been anti-climatic because the twins know each other too well.

“I want a customized sex toy that vibrates.”

Specifically to the theme song of the game.

Gaku decides at that very moment to never let Yura near his notes ever again. 

Because now he has to refer to his original blueprints... except he doesn’t actually have a notebook on this. 

FOR OBVIOUS REASONS.

Actually has to sketch it out.

He refuses to look at the anatomical books he has even though there is literally a shelf dedicated for them.

So... yes, he’s drawing based on what he’s seen.

“So, are you basing it off yours because it’s awfully average...”

“OF COURSE A DICK LIKE YOU WOULD KNOW!”

Epilogue

Aoi has decided he is going to stay away from alcohol.

MC didn’t even moderate the game. She just watched the chaos unfold. And the article burn.

#ayakashi romance reborn #arr #ayakashi rr #AyakashiRR #Ayakashi: Romance Reborn #ayakashi aoi #ayakashi yura #ayakashi toichiro #ayakashi koi meguri #ayakashi kuro #ayakashi kuya #ayakashi koga #koga kitamikado #arr koga #arr aoi #arr yura #arr toichiro #arr shizuki #shizuki #ayakashi shizuki #voltage inc #arr oji #ayakashi oji #voltage headcanon