#Running Exercise Disadvantages

[healthyfitlifestyle09]

What are the advantages and disadvantages of running ?

Running is a popular form of exercise and physical activity that comes with various advantages and disadvantages:

Advantages of Running:

Cardiovascular Health: Running improves cardiovascular fitness by strengthening the heart and increasing lung capacity. It can help reduce the risk of heart disease, stroke, and high blood pressure.

Weight Management: Running is an effective way to burn calories and lose or maintain weight. It can help with weight management when combined with a balanced diet.

Mood Enhancement: Running releases endorphins, which are natural mood lifters. It can reduce stress, anxiety, and symptoms of depression while promoting a sense of well-being.

Improved Fitness: Regular running can enhance overall physical fitness by increasing endurance, strength, and stamina.

Bone Health: Running is a weight-bearing exercise that can strengthen bones and reduce the risk of osteoporosis.

Enhanced Mental Clarity: Running provides an opportunity for mental relaxation and clarity. Many people find it a great way to clear their minds and solve problems.

Community and Social Interaction: Joining running groups or participating in races can foster a sense of community and social interaction.

Disadvantages of Running:

Injury Risk: Running can lead to overuse injuries such as shin splints, stress fractures, and tendonitis, especially if proper techniques, footwear, and rest periods are not observed.

Impact on Joints: The repetitive impact of running can put stress on the joints, particularly the knees. Some individuals may be at a higher risk of joint problems or exacerbation of existing conditions.

Time-Consuming: Running often requires a significant time commitment, particularly for longer distances or training for races.

Weather Dependency: Running outdoors can be influenced by weather conditions, making it less appealing in extreme heat, cold, rain, or snow.

Expense: Investing in quality running shoes and gear can be costly. Additionally, race entry fees and travel expenses for races can add up.

Monotony: Some people may find running monotonous or boring, leading to a lack of motivation or interest in maintaining a running routine.

Inclusivity: Not everyone can participate in running due to physical limitations or health conditions.

Safety Concerns: Running outdoors, especially in secluded areas, can pose safety risks. It's important to be aware of your surroundings and take precautions.

In conclusion, running offers numerous physical and mental health benefits, but it's important to be mindful of the potential drawbacks and take steps to minimize the risks, such as using proper techniques, gradually increasing intensity, and listening to your body to avoid overuse injuries. If you're considering running as part of your fitness routine, consult with a healthcare provider or fitness professional to ensure it's suitable for your individual circumstances.

Read more helpful information about health & fitness :

[dreamwavesexploringreality]

MISTAKES

Chishiya x reader

TW: Angst, mentions of death.

Based on a request: Chishiya pushes the reader away and regrets it

--

Another night, another game, another massacre. Chishiya emerged from the building where the game had taken place with an impassive face and a strange feeling of heaviness inside. He had been the only survivor, doing whatever was necessary to leave that place alive, as always. But for some reason, something felt different this time.

Chishiya took a brief breath, feeling the cold night air filling his lungs painfully, temporarily soothing the ache that had settled in his heart.

Everything had seemed straightforward at first: Seven of diamonds with clear rules and a single objective: to reach the final level alone. The game was based on a vertical, structured system—a tower of choice. Seven players, seven floors, and seven levels, all starting from the first. Each level required solving an intellectual challenge to progress, but the difficulty increased as fewer people could continue with each level: only six could pass the first, only five the second, and so on until only one reached the top of the tower and survived the game. Although it was possible to intervene to help others, this only put oneself at a disadvantage. Sharing answers reduced resources, making it more challenging to solve the subsequent exercises. In reality, it was all about leaving people behind; being selfish was the most sensible strategy to reach the top of the tower alone, ensuring no one else did. But then, why couldn’t he look into the eyes of those he left behind? Why did he question, for a millisecond, helping that young man struggling with a simple task? Chishiya knew the answers to those questions, though it pained him to admit it. But… What if she had been there that night? Would she have died like all the others? Would he have survived? These unanswered questions haunted his mind, awakening ruthless fears he had locked away during his time in Borderlands.

The walk back to The Beach seemed shorter than expected when he lifted his head and saw the huge, neglected entrance of the hotel. It exuded a sepulchral silence, contrasting with the clamor and scandal that usually emanated from the building during daylight or party nights. In the stillness of the night, Chishiya could hear, like silent echoes, the voices of those who had lost their lives in the game, and the ghostly scent of blood that painted each floor of the tower reached his nose, carried by a gentle breeze.

“Chishiya!” A voice jolted him from his introspection. “Chishiya! You’re back early; I knew you would be!” The man felt a pair of arms encircle him, nearly cutting off his breath. The familiarity of the embrace, instead of comforting or offering refuge, immediately produced a feeling of rejection, and he freed himself with a swift motion, pushing the surprised girl a few steps back.

“Not now, Y/N,” he said abruptly, with a coldness he didn’t usually use with her, and moved towards the hotel’s interior. Y/N followed him, running in a way that Chishiya interpreted as that of a lost puppy. The idea almost made him vomit. What if one day he didn’t come back? What if she died? What if she died… because of him?

“What happened? Are you okay? Are you hurt?” Y/N bombarded him with questions, trying to keep up with his pace to his room.

Chishiya remained cold, walking firmly as if he didn’t hear her, and when he opened the door to his room and stepped inside, he turned to look at her. “Definitely a lost puppy,” he thought to himself as he observed the girl’s face twisted in a grimace of doubt and insecurity.

“Go to bed, Y/N,” he said briefly, and she felt as if he had just shot her heart.

“But… but what about the goodnight hug? We can… we can lie in bed and just hold each other! You don’t have to talk!” The woman’s tone sounded desperate, pathetic from her perspective, but she couldn’t help it. She needed it, needed to know he was there, that he had returned alive from the game and that… he cared.

But Chishiya closed the door without answering her pleas or looking at her a second time. Maybe he didn’t care for her as much as she thought… or maybe he didn’t care for her as much as she cared for him.

Y/N stood for a few seconds in front of the closed wooden door, hearing the man moving around inside the room. She heard the shower start running and Chishiya moving around the room, probably looking for a new swimsuit, completely ignoring the woman he had left with tear-streaked face and a broken heart on the other side of the door.

That night, Chishiya couldn’t sleep. Each time he managed to overcome insomnia, a dreadful nightmare seized his mind, waking him with gasps and sweat. He saw himself in the game he had played that night, but instead of the other players, it was Y/N who was there. They were both on the penultimate level, knowing only one would reach the top and survive. The puzzle was easy, but for some reason, the girl couldn’t solve it, and then his mind grew dark. He saw himself giving a correct answer that he couldn’t even hear with his racing heartbeat pounding in his throat. He looked into her eyes as they turned gray, white, lifeless. He watched her body fall to the ground with a great thud and saw her head bounce against the floor until it finally lay still. Then her mouth would open, and heavy words would pour out of the building’s speakers at full volume, as thick tears streamed from her lifeless eyes, soaking her face and creating a large puddle around her. “You killed me,” “It’s your fault,” “I hate you,” “I wish I’d never met you”… And he cried. He cried in his dreams because he was losing her and woke up with a damp trace on his cheek. Only the moon witnessed his own heartbreak in that cold and lonely hotel room, and when dawn came, with the first rays of light filtering through the room’s curtains, he realized how wrong he had been all along.

© 2024 [@dreamwavesexploringreality]

----------

Hey everyone!✨

I just finished writing a new piece based on a request I received. I might have taken a few creative liberties... but I got really into the story and let it flow in its own direction😅.

If you enjoy it and want to see where the story goes next, let me know! Your feedback could lead to a second part, so if you're interested let me know 🌟👀!

Thanks for reading and for all your support!

[quack-quack-snacks]

Time Will Tell - Chapter 1.24

My Time Will Tell Masterlist

My Cha Hyun-su Masterlist

My Navigation and Masterlist

The Time Will Tell Glossary

Warnings: The spider monster attack, reader gets injured (we love an injured queen), Hyun-su finally gets to choose his destiny (he pulls a Britney Spears). Word Count: 2,260

prev | current | next

You couldn’t stand watching the scene of Hyun-su just dangling in the air, wrapped up with nowhere to go and unable to do anything about it. 

Instead, you went back to the nursery to find your siblings. When you got there, you only saw Yeong-su playing with his dinosaur next to Jin-ok and you walked over to lean down next to him. “Annyeong Yeong-su, have you seen your sister anywhere?” You asked him.

He looked up at you with a small pout. “No. She said she’d come play dinosaurs with me but she hasn’t come yet.”

“I’ll go find her and then the three of us can play. How about that?” You asked him with a smile and he immediately brightened up, nodding ecstatically.

So, you ventured off to find your sister, using it as a distraction from the rescue mission you weren’t participating in on the floor below you. It took you a while but you finally saw her just wandering the halls with a lost look on her face. It brightened when she saw you and you smiled at her. “Yeodongsaeng, you know you’re not supposed to be going off on your own. You’ll get lost or something could happen!” You lightly scolded and held out your hand for her to grab. She did happily and you started leading her in the direction of the nursery. 

“I didn’t mean to, I was just trying to find Mr. Ha-” She was cut off by an ear-piercing screech that sounded from right behind you. You were already preparing to run even before you saw the eight-legged creature crawl out of a vent on the ceiling. 

You acted purely on instinct when you picked Su-yeong up and started running. She screamed as she saw the monster quickly approaching you from behind and hid her face in your neck. You rounded the corner just in time to avoid the beast crashing into you, sending it flying into the wall with a sickening crack! instead. You let out a breath of relief when you saw Mr. Han aiming his crutch gun at the beast and you pushed your legs even faster. “Han Du-sik, move!” You screamed at him when the monster fell to the floor, incapacitated. You knew it would only stay down for so long and you wanted him to get out of there as soon as possible, especially with him being at a disadvantage. 

You didn’t look back, but you could hear the squeaking of his wheels as he pushed them vigorously and sped away. You were set on getting Su-yeong to Jin-ok with your brother and protecting her before retreating to help the man; your axe was in the nursery anyways. 

When you got there, you could see the room was boarded up, each of the residents completely abandoning the drill exercises you all had practiced so many times. It made you furious but you couldn’t do anything about it at that moment. 

You banged harshly on the door to let them know you were out there before setting Su-yeong down and crouching to be at her level. “Get them to open the door for you and stay with Ms. Cha and Yeong-su, okay? I’m going to go help Mr. Han deal with the monster.”

You gave her a kiss on the forehead and ran away, leaving no room for a discussion as you barrelled to where you last saw Du-sik, completely abandoning your axe that was stored inside. 

Sure enough, you found him, but he was lying on the floor, his wheelchair lying sideways with the wheels spinning aimlessly. “Han Du-sik!” You called out, running towards him and putting your arms under his armpits. You tried pulling him away despite his pleas to run away but you weren’t strong enough. The monster arrived just as you’d barely gotten him six feet away from where you found him and you cursed under your breath.

Just when you collapsed, falling beside the man and preparing yourself for the monster’s attack as it neared, Du-sik slammed his crutch against a lever on the pillar beside you. A string attached itself to one of the monster’s legs and left it dangling in the air. You almost let out a sigh of relief until you felt a searing pain slash against your side and you were sent flying in the air. 

One of the spider monster’s legs had flailed around and gone clean through your shirt and side. It held onto your shirt while Han Du-sik grabbed onto your ankle, trying to pull you back. You were amazed at how your flimsy T-shirt was holding strong while the body it surrounded was being tugged in two different directions. 

Turning as much as you could while in the hold of both the monster and Mr. Han, you banged your fists against any part of the monster you could reach with every ounce of strength you had. Your - still injured from you punching the glass case holding the axe just barely three days ago - hand’s wounds must have reopened because you could see the white bandage that wrapped around it was starting to stain itself with a growing blood patch. 

Then, as quickly as you were raised into the air, you were dropped. You fell onto your back, the wind getting knocked out of you and you gasped uselessly. You could distantly hear Mr. Han screaming for you to run away but you could only bring yourself to move a few meters before you collapsed again, still unable to breathe and gasping for air. You gripped at your shirt and clawed at your neck for air until finally, finally, you felt a breath of air find its way into your lungs. You panted heavily, taking in breath after breath greedily and mentally thanking every single tree that existed. You looked up and saw one of the claws had pierced right through Du-sik’s leg, leaving it a bleeding mess on the floor. His face showed no pain so you assumed he couldn’t feel it but it was still a worrying sight. 

You could truly only watch as he hit the monsterized leg going through his own leg. The lack of air, along with the blood loss you were going through with your side bleeding profusely, made your body weak. 

You thanked your saviors when he was able to dislodge the claw and the beast was sent into the air by the group of girls holding the rope. When you looked over, you were able to see your little sister among the mix of people holding the rope; the only one you didn’t see was Eun-yu-

“You ugly eight-legged bastard freak! Fuck you!” 

Speak of the devil.

Eun-yu came sprinting up behind you with a lit Molotov cocktail and chucked it at the monster. You knew she was most likely aiming at its torso but with the way it was thrashing around she only managed to set one of its legs on fire. Regardless, you thanked her mentally as she helped you up and started to basically drag you away to a safer location. You made a note to thank her verbally whenever you regained the ability to speak. 

You stumbled alongside her until you both swung around when you heard screams as the group fell, losing their grip on the creature and unintentionally setting it free. 

You watched as its sights set on you and Eun-yu.

You watched it regain its footing and start crawling towards you.

You watched the horror dawn itself on Eun-yu’s face.

And so you did it without thinking. 

You used every ounce of strength left in your body to shove Eun-yu out of the way. She looked up as you did and screamed your name. A sad smile spread on your face as you accepted your fate. Your only regret was never saying goodbye to your siblings, forcing them to live as they had with your father’s death. You closed your eyes and waited as the creature approached. The screams of all the residents echoed through the room and the howls of the beast got closer and closer until-

What you expected to be sharp claws were instead replaced by a calloused hand spinning you around so that you were back to back with your savior. 

You knew who it was immediately just from the feel of his hand on your skin. Despite the interaction being so fleeting, you didn’t think you’d ever be able to forget the feeling. It was just so uniquely him.

Ji-su suddenly ran up to you just as Eun-yu reached you and together, they helped drag you over to the wall. They leaned you against it and Eun-yu immediately started putting pressure on the laceration on your side. You cried out at the pain but didn't resist it - partly because you were too weak to but also because you knew it would stop you from bleeding out. 

Hyun-su got stabbed multiple times by the monster and you watched it take him down, falling on top of him with screeching howls. The sight was horrifying and if you were strong enough you would have pushed Eun-yu and Ji-su away to rush over and help him. 

It went on for an excruciatingly long minute before both parties of the fight stopped moving. You held your breath - which hurt your side like crazy but you ignored it - and waited, praying he was okay. 

‘Let him be okay. You can take me away but please, please let him be okay...’ You pleaded in your head. 

He finally moved, pushing the monster off and away from him. The sigh of relief you let out was painful but worth it. Wasting no time, he stood up, putting nearly all of his weight on the spear he held and panting heavily. 

Everyone stared at him; some gazes thankful, some in shock, some in fear.

And then there was yours. Your gaze of such relief and affection and…

No… it couldn’t be… right?

You’d barely even known each other for more than two months, and the first month of that was just brief interactions that lasted probably much longer than they should have. 

But there was no other way you could describe this feeling. No other way to describe how your heart lit up just at the sound of his name. How fiercely protective you got whenever someone talked down on him. How you longed for his presence when he was gone. How you were always drawn back to him no matter how hard they (Eun-hyuk) tried to separate you. How you felt no fear for him no matter what state he was in. 

So that’s what it must be. 

Love. 

His eyes found yours and the small voids that absorbed all light like a black hole slowly retreated back into his pupils. His gaze traveled down from your eyes to where Eun-yu’s hands were still pressed into the wound on your side before he looked away. You could see the flash of guilt that covered his face when he saw the blood leaking from behind your shirt and immediately knew his mind was sent into the realm of self-blame. 

He turned, starting to limp in the direction of the arcade room no doubt. He used his spear as a crutch and you yearned to reach for him and help him, but all you could do was watch helplessly as he walked off.

You tugged on Eun-yu’s sleeve with a pleading look. “Help me.”

She nodded, allowing you to wrap an arm around her neck while keeping her hand on your wound and assisting you as you followed after the boy. 

Everyone else seemed to have the same idea as they got there before you, allowing you to watch as Hyun-su opened the door and stepped one foot through the frame before stopping at the sound of his name falling from Ji-eun’s mouth as she stepped to the front.

“Hyun-su,” she called. He stopped and slowly turned around to face her. “I’m sorry. I know we made… things more difficult for you.”

He just stood there watching her, his feelings of confusion and gratefulness at her apology plainly showing on his face. 

Eun-hyuk stepped up next, saying what you’d been begging him to since the beginning. “This time, we’ll let you choose.”

The two choices he had were evident despite Eun-hyuk’s lack of saying them aloud. 

Continue to spend his time in the arcade room, quarantining himself from everyone else.

Or:

Leave the arcade room and join the rest of the residents in their - as free as can be - free lives. 

He stared at the boy who’d just granted him the choice regarding his freedom before skimming his eyes along everyone else. They stopped on you for a moment longer than needed before he turned back to the door. You nearly let out a sob at what you thought would be him going back into the arcade room regardless of the choice given to him, but you were quickly relieved when he retrieved the foot placed inside the room and closed the door. Once he turned back around, you were barely able to give him a smile and sigh out in relief before you could feel yourself fading. 

“Fuck,” you said to yourself softly. Your arm started to slide from its place around Eun-yu despite her efforts to catch you and you fell to your knees before everything went black.

The last thing you remembered was the embrace of someone with soft, yet calloused, hands. 

~

taglist: @hyeon-yi @haowonbins @mythical-mushrooms13

[stnaf-vn]

I think the real life style tragic scenarios are a bit heavy at the moment… but I can soften them in metaphor or get meta.

I remember there being some ask somewhere about what Friend would do if Sweetheart and Cara Mia/Mio (the love interest of Harper from Camp Willowpeak) were the same person? Compete or give them up?

What if SH was Harper himself. Someone just as dangerous as Friend who could also potentially be stronger and run faster. (And be resistant to drugging.)

Or if Sweetheart was someone or something else that Friend couldn’t overpower and kidnap, leaving him to beg and fear abandonment for any little thing?

If Sweetheart was slowly turning into something while Friend watched their distress, tried to care for their changing needs, and wondered if his Sweetheart would lose the human part of themselves that was his childhood friend.

A Sweetheart that was deeply uncomfortable with his wealth, finding the inequality between them glaring or perhaps being reminded of the snobbish treatment from his mom until Friend sold the company.

However the fine print had left Friend at a disadvantage and financially ruined. Both he and Sweetheart had to work so there was no time to exercise to remain hot fast and strong, no ability to supervise SH or keep them away from the world, and they had the means and opportunity at any time to leave him.

I still like the idea of the worshipper AU. Worshipper!Friend receiving constant conflicting requests from the hive mind or being gaslit into thinking that he was misinterpreting every instruction and doing it wrong. Becoming increasingly desperate and deranged as he vies to stay the favourite.

Perhaps just a few slightly real life scenarios. 

Sweetheart is terrified of Friend’s destructive outbursts. Hiding. Becoming distant. Shutting down. The more panicked and unstable he gets about their reactions to him the more traumatised and withdrawn they become. They don’t know him anymore.

Friend dreams of living UT!Friends life and basks in the laughter of his sisters with SH - waking to the reality of a locked empty house with SH screaming for help in the basement.

👀🍿

(the part about Harper being SH is funny because @campwillowpeakvn and I had a crack ship with UT! Friend and Harper)

[edward-cabrini]

How To Put Real Swordsmanship Into Writing

Given my love of HEMA (Historical European Martial Arts) and with both of my books featuring swordsmanship prominently I thought I'd type a quick how to guide. The answer is to read various instructional texts and practice the movements physically. By building up your understanding you can get that much more creative with your fight scenes while keeping them believable. However, not everyone has a local HEMA club or the patience to read some very very dry texts about swordsmanship. It doesn't help the terminology is of course antiquated as all hell. Such is the nature of HEMA.

Below is a list of some guiding principals:

Stepping back out of range is the best way to dodge most strikes.

Putting your blade over your opponents blade will get you better control of it.

Just above the cross guard is where the most pressure can be applied/maintained.

A strike from above will more easily parry other strikes.

When swords clash they are in a bind as the metal bites (think star wars when the lightsabres are pressed against each other), a good swordsman can feel how much pressure their opponent is applying to their strike/parry.

Nothing wrong with a good, punch, kick, shank with an offhand dagger, etc

That probably covers the board strokes. I also want to add that those principles can absolutely be broken. For example in my first book Lorcan wins his first fights largely by sheer determination rather than good swordsmanship. On the flip side his best buddy Fiachra wins his duel against Lorcan by being a much better swordsman. His strikes are by the book and executed precisely. You can absolutely have better fighter being taken down by worse ones. Everyone's a fancy knight until a rock crumples their helmet. Using the guiding principles is how you can create opportunities for those moments. For example, a strike from above will hit someone before a strike from below... Unless you run at them and knee them in the bollocks as you hug them with a tackle. Not very sophisticated but very real. The other thing is that people do talk while fighting, especially if it's just some light sparring between friends. They'll need breaks to catch a breath and might circle around each other with a lowered guard to recover or seek to bait an attack. I don't know where the trope came from that talking fighters doesn't happen but it's by no means the norm. God knows I've had a fair share of sparring partners that love a chat about their day, a technique, or even just to say "That was a good hit." Of course that's a friendly fight. Less friendly fights might be more stoic or screamy. The last thing I'll say on the matter is that people don't have long eloquent speeches while fighting. Actually that's true for most exercise. There's a lot more that could be said on writing a good fight scene, but I'm going to end this post here. It already feels long and if I start breaking down what could go on in the bind or describing the guard positions and their advantages/disadvantages we'll be here for days. So that's all for now. I will no doubt revisit this topic soon.

[etheries1015]

Hello can I request a fluffy fic about how Jack would interact tereact their s/o while he’s using his unique magic? I hope it’s not too weird of a request

Its not weird at all! I actually think this concept is super cute 😭 thank you for the request <3 I hope you like it <3

Jack seldom used his unique magic, save for the times he desperately needed to. It took a lot of energy to maintain his wolf form, and it wasn't a very common type of magic, either. That didnt stop you from asking him to, and I quote, "Turn into the fluffy wolf again!!!" Wanting to preserve his magic (and avoid becoming your play thing...) He would find an excuse each time to gently refuse your insistent prodding.

There was one particular day though, one in which you found yourself deep in a hole of...well, stress. It was a rather difficult day, to say the least. Being the only non magic wielding student at an all-magic school, there were bound to be times you felt to be at an extreme disadvantage. You must had forgotten you chose this day to study with Jack, for when he attempted to find you in the library where you had chosen to meet, you were nowhere to be found.

Finding you crying in the garden of ramshackle was the last thing he thought you would be doing. You were huddled up in an abandoned corner of wilted flowers, hugging your knees to press against your chest as your body trembled with sadness. You heard someone approaching you, yet avoided their gaze in fear of embarrassing yourself further with tears to simply add to your "pathetic feats" of the day. You heard a gentle and familiar sigh, Jack dropping his bag and bending over to meet your eyeline.

"Rough day, I heard," Jack rubbed the back of his neck, "Do you... want to talk about it?" Shaking your head, Jack pursed his lips. He never particularly felt as if he were good at comforting people, for his actions always seemed to speak louder than his words. He wasn't used to seeing your smile fade like the wilted flowers, or hearing muffled cries escape your typically optimistic mouth. Thats when it clicked in him, the one thing he felt would be able to cheer you up...he hoped.

You heard rustling sounds before the familiar sound of magic casting, head flicking up in time to hear his chant and watch Jacks form morph into that of a great wolf with long untouched white fur. You let out a gasp of surprise as a smile quickly took over your face, Jack utilizing his now wolf form to nuzzle your cheek against his own. You opened your arms to hug him, petting the silky fur that you only dreamed of being able to pet.

"Get on," Jack encouraged, "I wanna show you something." You double checked if he was certain he would be alright with you upon his back, his response was eagerly inviting you on and insisting he was more than capable to do as much. He lowered his body for you to comfortably climb onto his back, hugging him firmly while shoving your face into his deep soft locks of fur. Determining you were secure enough, Jack ran.

He ran through the woods a rather short trip because of his sheer speed, it seemed as if only a few minutes had past before you made it to the destination, Jack allowing you to get off his back. Before you stood what looked to be an abandoned projecy, entering the decently sized house that lay on the floor between two older looking trees. The floors were crooked and the ceiling was rotting from moist wood, the inside bare of furniture and appliances. It truly seemed to be a work in progress that someone had decided was no longer worth the time.

"I found this place not too long ago," Jack admitted, "During a run. I meant to bring you here sooner after I fixed up a couple things, I think it'll make a fun hideout one day! Or a study spot for us!" You side eyed wolf Jack, raising a suspicious eyebrow.

"Are you sure you weren't trying to trick me into jogging here sometime with you to get my daily dose of exercise in?" He let out an (almost offended) chuckle.

"You're failing gym, it takes a lot to do that." He joked. You embraced him once more, shuffling your head between his shoulder blade and falling to the ground bringing him with you.

"I can't maintain this form forever," He said almost reluctantly, his heart warmed from the affection you gave him. You nodded into his shoulder and breathed in shakily, Jack laying down on his side and allowing you to cuddle against him.

"Just...a little longer," you muttered, "is it weird? I'm sorry." Jack shook his head, giving your cheek a small and affectionate lick and rubbing his soft head into the crook of your neck as if to hug you back.

"Not at all," He replied. You two remained like that for a short period of time, before Jack had to revert back to his original all too soon in your opinion, to his tall and strong human form. His arms were now wrapped around you in a normal hug, to which you responded with a kiss against the soft skin of his cheek.

"Thank you again," you smiled gently at him. Jacks cheeks took on a rosey hue, looking away shyly with a smile tugging at the corners of his lips and a hum of thought escaping them.

"Maybe I should do it more often..." You sat up in excitement, stars in your eyes as he almost immediately regret the words slipping out his mouth. There began the whole theatrics, You insisted that next time he take you on another journey on his back, or saying something silly about him being your "knight in shining fur" protecting you in a "cool" way against danger. You gushed about the stories you could write about some sort of wolf forbidden romance, and all the other things he heard you laugh about before. This time, he listened to you with love and attentiveness more than he ever had before, not realizing how much he missed your rants.

He was truly glad you were back to being yourself...silly, smiling, utterly perfect you.

~~~~~~~~~

I'm so used to writing for the third years KDHFKWJD I hope he wasn't TOO out of character! If you have any suggestions on how I could improve on this, let me know and I shall update it accordingly~ I hope you liked it and properly answers your ask! If not, feel free to send another one <3

[athingimdoingnow]

Day 2: Oops! All tropes!

Today we have a real one page ttrpg. I have read it already, but I’m going to reread it closely.  Also just for your information this one is FREE read it before my review if you want, I think it’s like 5 minutes max. Check it out. Why not?

This is technically a TTRPG.

So it’s about fandom, of course, specifically fanfic, and the idea is to be a dimension hopper and get endings per world. What are the worlds? Determined by fandom and tropes, which there is a handy linked perchance site for (only for tropes, fandoms determined per group). What’s the goal? To… get an ending, and move to the next world. So it’s a theoretically light, simple one, very rules-light, and I will be evaluating it at least partially as a one-person TTRPG. For those unfamiliar one person TTRPGs are more like journals or writing experiences with dice mechanics attached (though there are no dice attached in this one). I think it could easily be played with multiple people but also as a one-woman, so that’s important here.

Anyway.

Originality: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

I mean it’s a fanfic TTRPG. I will be flabbergasted if I run into even a single one of those again across all my systems.

Mechanics: ⁉️

Day two and I am already inventing new rankings. So. This game does not have mechanics. Not even a little. There are no dice, there are no stats, there are no encounters, there is not even a character sheet really. It feels more like a writing exercise or fun text-based RP you’d have with a friend than… a TTRPG. 

Replayability: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Okay so look. It might be literally not a TTRPG in many ways. However, you cannot look me in the eye and tell me that the idea of spinning a wheel for a fandom and a wheel for a trope and playing as some sort of meddling dimension hopper does not lead to incredible replayability. I mean have you seen the amount of fanfic on AO3? I haven’t, and I’ve been on there for years. I haven’t seen a fraction! So sure, it’s replayable.

Variance: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Theoretically even if you roll the same trope it would be for a different fandom. You gotta put in some elbow grease for this, but there’s immense variance just in a single run from “session to session” (doesn’t really have formalized sessions), so making a whole new character or playing with a different group of people would yield entirely different results.

Character Creation: ⭐

One ability and one disadvantage with three (pre-built) options to choose from for each. You have to put in a lot of legwork on your own, there’s no mechanical nuance (naturally), there’s not really gonna be anything, unless you, the player, are very invested and flesh out the character on your own. In all fairness that’s definitely the way to enjoy this game, and how I would play it. However, one must meet the game where its at, in a vacuum, and this one isn’t it.

Overall: ⭐⭐

I wanna give this one a higher score because I think it’s awesome but it’s a one-pager with no mechanics, I think I’m obliged to keep it low. The creator has not made anything since this, which is a real shame! They at least haven’t put it out on itch.io. This is notably their first ttrpg, and it’s super interesting and seems fun, even if I think it’s lacking as an actual system, so I hope in the future they invest more heavily into a mechanical side. (Also it was put out like two months ago so this might be a hasty thing to say “aw man I hope they make more” about, admittedly)

Quick aside, mechanics can be narrative based. I’ve seen narrative-based tarot card systems, but that’s still mechanically satisfying and explains how you play the game very clearly. Just figure I should clarify while we’re early on. Anyway.

Check out the page!

This one is FREE, did I mention it’s FREE?

Oops! All Tropes! by AnalogCG

[burinazar]

have strongly discovered an impulse in myself to be critical of people who have lived here a long time and not apparently tried to learn japanese, especially if the seeming reason is something like they don't think it's important, and especially if they're fellow americans

this disturbs me about myself a little, and is provoking some self reflection, because like. well do you need me to explain why "if you move to a country you better speak the prevalent language or be prepared to prioritize learning it, otherwise i'll judge you" is a bad impulse of thought? back home i truly have not a trace of urge at all to look critically upon people who have lived in the US for a while but don't know english or only know a little because they were prioritizing things other than learning it. that just isn't a thing that occurs to me. and what's more is the things i think it says about someone when they *do* judge people for this are generally unflattering things. obviously.

so i've been interrogating this abt myself a lot and wondering why the hell i feel like that. like i think part of it is that the image i have of a person (especially men, especially americans, especially white) who comes to japan and lives for ten or twenty years and only vaguely considers maybe they should learn japanese is generally an image of someone who considers themselves already fit for and perhaps superior to the norms of the place they've come to, whereas the image i have of a person who comes to america without speaking english, especially someone who isn't white and someone who is in any capacity marginalized, is someone who's going to be treated as lesser and knows it and is in no way doing so out of some feeling of cultural superiority, and the feelings around not actively having interest in or efforts towards learning english (if they indeed are not bothering with doing so, which i kinda don't think is common at least as much as it seems common for there to be long term foreigners in japan who aren't particularly trying to learn japanese) are way way less likely to be something like "i don't need to bother" and more likely to be something like they would totally find it useful to know but have limited time and energy and resources, and they're ultimately in a position of dealing with a disadvantage rather than this very different thing of...i don't know, what seems almost sometimes like a smugness that someone is able to get by fine with just english and doesn't need to bother with the non-english language of the country they're in.

as a related exercise asked myself how i'd feel about americans who moved to india and never tried learning any local language for 20 years. Hmm. I Would Also Feel Negatively I Think, and would make uncharitable assumptions about their attitudes towards their own culture versus the one they were living in. comparable thought exercise result: i don't seem to have this feeling about non english speaking foreigners here? though i also haven't like. run into anyone of that background who has this 'my language is already enough' outlook. there are various ppl i've met who are South Asian or SEAsian immigrants, and i didn't get any such read on them. one can from the post probably gather some of my guesses as to why that may be the case lol.

and there's selection bias because all the people i know like that are folks i met through the cultural exchange association, which does language lessons and other events, so they're likely to be interested in that sort of thing and coming to it more than their peers who don't care about language learning and cultural exchange-- but in and of itself, the fact i'm like, almost the only american that goes to those kind of also contributes to this impression?

anyway. i think it's stuff like that, a sense of me assuming like, a sense of presumed western and american and english speaking cultural superiority on those people's parts (which i know is not really fair) rather than me suddenly becoming culturally conservative and developing some kind of "immigrants must assimilate" attitude (which would be like. actively alarming to discover in myself. this other thing is less so.) but like. i will still keep thinking about and questioning myself. that's a healthy thing to do lol.

[novankenn]

the Nephokinetic

(Users can utilize vapor in combat, whether it be releasing waves of mist to disorientate their opponents or conceal themselves in order to land sneak attacks, or using vapor to create weapons or having it accompany the user's own attacks.)

RPV was a man down. Jaune Arc their former leader having vanished one night, for no discernable reason, at least to them. So after missing the 40th Vytal Festival due to being a member short, the trio moved into their second year... proving their ability to cope and move forward, despite their disadvantage.

/==/

Pyrrha, Ren and Nora disembarked the bullhead. The small village they were sent to inspect, had no landing pad so the vehicle had to land in a nearby prepared area. Behind them Professor Peach stepped off. It was a second year supervised inspection mission.

The goal of the exercise was to teach the students how to see the strengths and weaknesses in a settlement or hamlet's defensive structures. To help them in those times they were dispatched to protect a settlement how to best utilize the resources at hand.

Their approved site was Fort Vale. A heavily fortified community was situated near the coast to the east of Vale proper, however for some reason while on route the destination was changed to their current location. A small unnamed village of maybe a dozen families or so, protected by a stout wooden palisade, and a few automated sentry turrets.

Peach knew at one glance the place was a death trap. Any serious Bandit or Grimm assault and the place would fold like a house of cards. Yet Peach was also aware of the side objective. There was someone of interest to Ozpin in the area... and she and her charges were the closet available team. Even if team RPV was a member short.

The trio of students lead by Professor Peach closed upon the sturdy-looking main gate. Showing her ID she and her charges were quickly allowed entry. Once past the gate Peach turned to face RPV.

"Now. I want you all to wander about. Take you time. We'll meet back at the gate in a hour." Peach let her eyes glid over the three young adults. "Pay close attention, and when we get back together I want to know from each of you what is good about these defenses... and what is bad. Any questions?"

Ren raised his hand.

"Mr Ren?"

"I thought we were supposed to be inspecting Fort Vale? Is there a reason for..." Ren didn't finish but looked around. The statement was however made.

"It was changed mid-route." Professor Peach informed the trio. "But the assignment is still the same and what you see and deduce here is applicable in other places. Any further questions?"

Pyrrha and Nora remained silent.

"Very well get to it. I'm going to have a chat with whomever is in charge of this place."

It took a little prodding and about twenty minutes but soon Peach found herself leaning against the counter of the General Store, speaking to the proprietor, who just happened to also be the woman in charge of the small settlement.

"So what brings Beacon out here?" the woman named Brittany Birch. "Should I be telling people to start packing?"

"No. It's an inspection exercise, and in fact I was going to ask you if there was a reason for us to actually be here instead of Fort Vale?"

"Well I can tell you we've not put in a call in for Huntsmen." Brittany replied, "No real need once the young fella showed up."

"Young fellow?"

"Yeah, young guy, was just wandering the road. Arrive about three weeks ago. Good thing too..."

"Why?"

"Had a small grimm incursion happen a couple days later." Brittany relayed, "Bad for us too. Pushed our defenses all most to the bring..."

"How big of a group?"

"One or two dozen." Brittany replied, "Nothing a larger settlement couldn't handle, but as you can see... we're still just scraping by."

"Well I assume you made it through... you're still here, obviously."

"Well it was because of the kid." Brittany informed Peach, "Without him we would have been over run."

"Was he that strong a fighter? Up to two dozen grimm is still a task to handle by one person." Peach commented, "Or did he have a strong semblance?"

"Well I'll say this... It was something else."

"What do you mean?"

"I don't really know how to explain it... but the kid used the grimm's own bodies against each other..."

"That makes no sense. Did he control a grimm and make it attack the others?"

"No... you know how a grimm evaporate after dying?"

"Yes."

"Somehow he manipulated that... used it against the pack. I mean it was seriously disturbing... the more grimm that went down, the more powerful and plentiful his attacks and defenses were..."

Peach stood there in silence, her lips pressed together. What the head-woman was speaking off... was impossible. Someone capable of using the essence of grimm as a weapon? There had to be more to it.

"Is this... individual still in the community?" Peach inquired. "I would like to speak with them... if I could."

"He should be. For all his help I put him up at my house. He's got a room in the attic. Private, warm and safe."

The incessant and rapid ringing of an bell sounded in the distance.

[mariacallous]

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the Ram temple in Ayodhya in the key northern state of Uttar Pradesh in January in hopes it would earn him a massive victory in the national election that concluded in June. That didn’t happen—at least not to the extent that Modi, his Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and their ideological fountainhead Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) expected.

In what has widely been described as a shock result, the BJP won merely 240 seats in the 543-seat parliament, after setting a target of 400 seats. Modi has formed a government but only with support from other parties.

Like any election result, the outcome had multiple causes that will take time to fully sort out. But one thing is already clear: Modi failed in his long-running bid to homogenize India’s Hindus across castes and cultures and consolidate their vote for his political benefit.

In 2014, Modi came to power on the back of religious nationalism and security issues, and he continued that trend in 2019. This year, in the absence of any urgent security threat from regional rival Pakistan and rising concerns over unemployment, inflation, and authoritarianism, Modi banked on the RSS’s homogenization strategy.

The Ram temple was built on a site long disputed with Muslims, where a 16th-century mosque stood until December 1992, when a group of Hindu nationalists razed it to the ground allegedly on the BJP’s provocation. Experts said the BJP had envisaged the temple would instill pride in Hindus, feed their Muslim animosity, and bring them under the Hindu umbrella to choose Modi.

Even though, by and large, the Hindu community seemed to have been pleased with the inauguration of the temple, that didn’t translate into votes for Modi across the Hindu hierarchy. Instead, the results exposed the weaknesses of the homogenization exercise.

Hartosh Singh Bal, an Indian journalist and the executive editor of the Caravan, said there is “diversity in Hinduism” and the election results prove that it can’t be “papered over by directing attention and hatred outwards” toward Muslims. This election proves that “Hindus are not a monolith” and that “various segments of Hinduism have a successful chance of taking on the BJP,” he added in reference to tactical voting by lower castes in Uttar Pradesh against the BJP.

Karthick Ram Manoharan, a political scientist at the National Law School of India University in Bengaluru, said that in Tamil Nadu, a state in southern India with the second-biggest economy in the country, the BJP did not win a single seat out of a total of 39.

“Hindus are the absolute majority in Tamil Nadu, but they still mostly vote for the secular Dravidian parties,” Manoharan said in reference to local parties that have emerged out of social movements opposed to an upper-caste Hindu order that the BJP and RSS have been long accused of nurturing and propagating.

In March, just a month before voting began, I witnessed saffron-colored flags expressing support for Modi’s party jutting out from rooftops and windows in tightly packed homes in western Uttar Pradesh. Some people I spoke to said that BJP workers had decided to adorn the neighborhoods as they pleased, but underneath the flag-waving, a large-scale discontent was brewing over a lack of employment opportunities.

The upper-caste youth seemed confused, if not yet disenchanted, with Modi and in the absence of industry and strong local economies once again mourned the loss of government jobs to affirmative action. (The Indian Constitution reserves almost half of all state jobs for people from lower castes and others who confront a generational disadvantage and historical discrimination.)

Meanwhile, Dalits, who sit at the bottom of India’s Hindu hierarchy, in hamlets nearby who depend on the quota for their dignity and livelihood were quietly recalibrating their options. The mood was starkly different from 2014 and 2019 when I visited some of the Dalit-dominated parliamentary seats in Uttar Pradesh. Back then, Dalits I met were upbeat and decisively pro-Modi. They said they supported him since they believed that he might raise their stature in the Hindu hierarchy.

But 10 years later, they suspected the BJP was plotting to weaken the constitution, the only assurance of rights for marginalized communities in a country where upper-caste Hindus continue to hold social capital and economic power.

Recent comments by BJP leaders that if Modi won 400 seats, he would change the constitution spread anxiety among lower castes that the party intended to scrap the reservation system. The BJP repeatedly denied this, but the suspicion that it is first a party for upper-caste Hindus is deep-rooted among lower castes, and experts believe the comments were part of the BJP’s political strategy.

“They were testing the waters to see what would be the reaction,” said Sushil Kumar Pandey, an assistant professor of history at Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar University in Lucknow and the author of Caste and Politics in Democracy.

“The opposition picked it up and campaigned on it, telling people a change in the constitution could mean losing your livelihood, your jobs,” Pandey added. “That worked at a time [when] people were also scared of privatization” and in government-run sectors.

For Dalits, it was about more than jobs. The Indian Constitution is nearly worshipped by the community and celebrated en masse on the birth anniversary of the Indian intellectual who wrote it. B.R. Ambedkar was no fan of Ram and advocated against the caste discrimination inherent in Hinduism all his life, even converting to Buddhism when he felt there was no escaping caste-based prejudice. While he couldn’t annihilate the caste system, he ensured that the constitution offered lower castes a quota in government jobs to gradually uplift them.

In his honor, and as an ode to the progressive document, Dalits sing songs in praise of the constitution and hail it as the upholder of their dignity in a society where they continue to be belittled. Any change to the text was unacceptable. “Their cultural identity is linked to this book,” said Ravish Kumar, a journalist and the host of a popular YouTube news show.

In the south, too, there was a fear of culturally being subsumed by a Hindi-speaking upper-caste elite. Indian federal units, or states, were defined in the 1950s on the basis of language, and to this day south Indians identify themselves on the basis of the language they speak. The Ram temple had no resonance in the southern states, particularly in electorally significant Tamil Nadu, with the highest number of seats regionally. Tamils were wary that the RSS’s homogenization agenda would drown out their cultural ethos and impose a secondary status on the Tamil language.

Manoharan, the political scientist, said that in Tamil Nadu, it was “not so much religious but fear of cultural homogeneity” and “a language policy which will give importance to Hindi speakers over Tamil speakers and upper-caste Tamils over other backward castes.”

In a state where “88 percent people come from so-called lower castes” and “69 percent have jobs under affirmative action through a special act,” people were also extremely worried that the BJP may “water down” the employment quota promised in the constitution, Manoharan added.

The southern Indian states have a longer history of resistance to upper-caste domination, a higher literacy rate, better economies, and a tradition of secular politics. While the BJP maintained its tally of 29 seats from the last election, it is being seen as a poor result considering the inroads the RSS has made in the south.

For instance, in the southwestern state of Kerala, the RSS has more than 5,000 shakhas, or branches, second in number only to Uttar Pradesh, India’s most populous state—yet “despite the fact that the RSS has thousands of training grounds in Kerala, they are unable to get influence,” said K.M. Sajad Ibrahim, a professor of political science at University of Kerala. “That’s because while religion is important, communal harmony is more important to people here. BJP tries to create tensions, and that doesn’t work here.”

The BJP managed to gain one seat for the first time in Kerala, but that isn’t being attributed to its ideological success or expansion of homogenization project but to the winning candidate’s personal appeal. Suresh Gopi, the winning candidate, is a popular movie star.

In many states in the Hindi belt and even in the south, the BJP did well. The upper castes and urban voters are standing firmly behind Modi. Kumar, the journalist, said it would be foolhardy to dismiss Modi—and the bigger Hindutva, or Hindu nationalist, forces backing him—just yet. He said Hindutva hasn’t lost and only faced a setback. “The BJP was trying to dominate caste politics with Hindutva,” he said, “but the election result shows that dominance has cracked.” However, he added, “it has only cracked—the ideology still has wide-scale acceptance.”

Everyone else Foreign Policy spoke to concurred but added that Hindus are far too diverse to be homogenized. Manoharan said the results exposed the weakness of the homogenization agenda and its faulty premise. “Hindutva’s aim for homogeneity is confounded precisely by a structural feature of the religion-culture it seeks to defend—caste,” he said.

[azspot]

This preference for private power over against public goods goes hand-in-hand with the racism, sexism, xenophobia, and other oppressive views characteristic of the radical right. The unfettered exercise of private power will inevitably mean the reassertion of traditional forms of dominance in private life — the superiority of the man over his wife, the ownership of children by their parents, the various hierarchies of race, etc., etc. In reality, the neoliberal order was fully compatible with such hierarchies, which festered and worsened even as exceptional individuals from disadvantaged groups enjoyed spectacular success. But even that token representation was experienced as a humiliation by many of our fellow citizens — above all Trump himself, who first stormed onto the political scene to spread lies meant to delegitimize our first Black president and who arguably chose to run for president specifically because Obama mocked him in his remarks at the Presidential Correspondents’ Dinner.

An und für sich

[traditional-with-a-twist]

lxvii. Beauty and Her Beast

<<Previous || first arc || second arc || third arc || fourth arc || AO3 || Next>>

For Obi, all the doubts had burned away.

He had said to Shirayuki once that he could not help her understand as Zen could —he would bring the prince to her instead. Zen could clear away doubts impenetrable to Obi; he saw through it all, straight and clear down the path ahead to the sunlit lands that lay beyond.

Now Obi saw it, too.

No longer did he feel himself adrift, without purpose or direction except what he set for himself, secure only in the knowledge that he could not be trusted. Just when they had all thought themselves abandoned, and none perhaps more so than Obi, Zen had bequeathed this parting vision.

For the first time since his master had ridden away, and the army of Clarines had returned home without him, the way forward was made clear to Obi.

The only question now was how to get there.

This guiding light – charged by the threat of imminent danger – revived all Obi’s prodigious energies to concentrate on a single point: stop the sea snake before she could hurt Shirayuki.

...

With this single-mindedness of purpose, he threw himself again and again against his bonds, muscle against the cords, bone on steel, until he felt the ring that bound him to the wall begin to give way.

All this time, Mitsuihed sat motionless. His body hunched in on itself, immobile, but his mind was churning. He heard his friend’s struggles as if from a long way distant, strangely muted.

Metal clanged on stone as Obi wrenched himself free. The victory stayed him not an instant – he sprang to the door and pounded iit with the same ferocity as his chains, his energies unspent.

Obi was hammering at the door, and their faces were hammering in Mitsuhide’s head: Kiki… Shirayuki… they were in danger.

Mitsuhide wanted to help them; in his soul of souls, he yearned for their happiness and well-being. He would have given anything for that – but he shrank from the connected thought: that day on the battlefield, Zen’s blood running into the grass, and his own empty hands – shaped to wield a sword in the defense of his prince’s life, yet helpless against that red flow, powerless to save him.

Perhaps it was better not to try than to fail, when that failure might cost the ones you loved best, nothing short of everything.

...

The door burst open, but beyond it — a staircase full of armed men.

They fell upon Obi with wild yells, bearing him backwards over the threshold as inexorably as a wave.

Even had he not suffered from every deprivation and abuse as a prisoner, to say nothing of his long stretch of relentless, self-inflicted maltreatment while journeying alone, Obi would have been at a disadvantage, fighting in doors at close quarters.

As Itoya had discovered firsthand, Obi exercised the full extent of his powers in the forests, among the trees.

The boundless spaces, with their multitude of possibilities for concealment, gave full play to his abilities: the hurtling speed, lightning strikes, crushing force.

Inside four walls, he was more easily hemmed in, crowded and outflanked by his opponents. Now, in the heaving press of assailants struggling to subdue him, he was slowly folding under their weight.

...

Mitsuhide rose. Ahead of him, a guard raised a club over Obi’s head. The blow descended —and broke. 

It had struck a broad shoulder, interposed between.

For a moment, the fighting stilled. Towering above the other men in that close, dark room, Mitsuhide spoke: “There are things in the past that I wish I had done…but there is more in the future that I still wish to do.”

His eyes met Obi's: steady, clear brown against the wild gold with dilated pupil. "I'm here,” Mitsuhide said simply.

With a strangled yell, the guards closed to battle again, but now the odds swung against them.

Fighting back to back, Mitsuhide and Obi bore down the hail of blows, forcing the guards away, to either side, like a prow cleaving the waves.

...

Mitsuhide struck with a grim determination, face set, one eye always on his friend, for Obi flung himself into the brawl with an abandon heedless of his own safety. More than once, Mitsuhide intervened to turn aside a hit that must surely have incapacitated him – if it were possible to halt the raw drive that consumed Obi with his mindless purpose.

Mitsuhide almost envied him that unfettered instinct – he felt himself slow and dull, his power blunted by a long season of no training more strenuous than the cross-country pace of a courier in saddle.

He had forsaken the way of the sword, and it had forsaken him. He would have reproached himself bitterly for this in turn, but the mad throng left little space for reflection.

It was all the work of elbows and fists: rusty as he was, Mitsuhide relied more than ever on his superior bulk.

Their attackers, repulsed to the point that they felt themselves defending against the onslaught, wrestled all the more frantically as the prisoners neared the top of the stairs, but now even the support of the walls failed them in the containment effort.

Only the open air beckoned, and Mitsuhide and Obi would not be denied.

They burst into the hall — and found the house in chaos.

...

For the first time, Obi paused. Adrenaline may have pushed him beyond thought, but a sense far deeper than consciousness warned him something was amiss – something too costly to ignore. 

A moment later, Mitsuhide smelled smoke.

He gripped Obi’s arm, trying to recall his friend to himself. Eyes darting this way and that, Obi met his gaze only reluctantly and obliquely at that.

“The windows,” Mitsuhide shouted above the din. “The windows!”

Regardless of whether Obi heard him or understood, he surged forward in much the way Mitsuhide had hoped. A haze now clogged the air; both men bent low as they ran, their height no longer serving them in good stead.

At least the estate’s staff had grasped the greater danger and paid them no attention —too frantic in their cries and desperate attempts to organize some defense against the flames that now licked at the walls.

The first window Mitsuhide and Obi found answered them with blackened glass, the gardens beyond completely obscured with smoke.

...

Mitsuhide reached out to turn Obi back, but he had already wheeled around and plunged once more into the corridor. Following, Mitsuhide struck his foot against a step. He stumbled and corrected; they were running on stairs — below, the heat grown intolerable; above, a gamble in the dark.

Obi cut left — the floor had leveled out again — and Mitsuhide followed. 

They emerged onto a balcony, its fluted bowl clinging to the walls like a flowing vine. 

Brilliantly orange serpents were devouring the ornamental trees below, blackening their pale stone paths.

Only the central fountain had escaped the conflagration. It shone a glassy, sapphire blue, a pool of tranquility in the sooty, sparking mess. 

Obi’s whole body had angled that way, his gaze fixed, his muscles coiling to spring.

...

For a breath, Mitsuhide remembered he was mortal. 

Then they jumped.

[cerealmonster15]

SILVER DND UPDATE AGAIN!!!!!!!!!

Silver and Adrian are walking to their first class in the morning after their training session, and outside the school, they see the teacher's body chopped up and half burned in this big gore pile. Freaking out now, they run and tell the principle who sees the body and basically goes "fuck the paperwork is going to be awful" lol 😭

Principle has Adrian and Silver wait in his office while he makes a bunch of calls. The other party members see what happened to the teacher overnight before the principle gets people to come in and clean up, and they try to avoid suspicion and go to class like normal, but the principle has already told the teachers to make all of them come to his office immediately

When they're all in his office, and when he is done with calls and reviewing security footage, he tells them they are all VERY lucky that there is an obvious suspect (not Dolor, someone else he framed) in the case seen on camera drugging the teacher and dragging away his unconscious body + a lot of that same suspect's DNA at the crime scene. If nothing came up, they would all be the number one suspects since the principle and basically everyone at the school knew about their scuffles with the teacher

They're let off scot-free with a reminder that they have exams TOMORROW!!! (Silver, who has been brooding about seeing a gruesome crime scene of a dead person he knew, immediately snapped out of it because he has not studied at all. And also has been sleeping through half his classes. And also is in a different universe and knows nothing 😭) The party agrees to hold an all-nighter study session

HOWEVER. They agree on this, but then as soon as they are out of the principles office and in private where nobody can hear them, Adrian asks the rest of them if they had anything to do with the murder and *both* Adrian and Silver (who still has disadvantage on insight) roll high enough insight to clock EVERYONE'S really low deception rolls 😭

Silver gets onto them in a very "I'm not mad, just disappointed" speech over how the teacher was definitely Not killed out of self defense, and the teacher could have still chosen to change and become a better person one day, but never has that chance now, ect. Adrian is dead silent the whole time, but DM clarified he was also PISSED at what they did. So they all crack and spill everything that happened and what Dolor said, saying they wouldn't have agreed if they realized how badly he would be killed, ect, and it's mostly water under the bridge after they all apologize for their murder allowing crimes

anyway. BACK TO THE EXAM SILVER IS SO FUCKED FOR LOL. They have the all-nighter where we make con saves every couple hours to try and stay awake/do some roleplay. The two plot derailing lesbians from before fall asleep cuddling and Adrian takes a photo to get payback for the pic of him and Silver asleep together getting sent out to everyone lol. One of the very study obsessed characters has time magic apparently and got so locked in they accidentally stopped time until Silver shoved them out of their chair to help him study. Silver falls asleep a dozen times and somehow wakes up as soon as someone tries to wake him up every time until time stops AGAIN and they tell him he can just sleep before the exam while time is stopped lol

the exam was REALLY FUNNY because the DM sent out a google form with 10 questions that we would answer in character for a potential +10 bonus +intelligence modifier +a d4 roll bonus to the final d100 roll to decide our scores. I answer in character by getting everything wrong but the two questions about exercise, -1 intelligence modifier, +2 on the d4 roll, so a total of +3. AND THEN THE DM ROLLS A 98 ON SILVER'S SCORE 😭 AND HE GETS A 101 GRADE 😭 it was really really funny. We joked about him guessing on almost all questions and just somehow getting everything right, going to the teacher afterward with head in hands like "I just guessed I don't deserve it 😔" but being forced to keep his 101 grade anyway njhbvgcfvhbjvh LOL

after exams, the principle calls them in and tells them that to deal with all the trouble they've been getting into since the school year started, they're all going on a cross country road trip to visit 7 deity temples during their off days!!!! Which we will begin in act 3, after our beach trip :)

THSDKFJSDL THE WHIPLASH... frolicking to class after falling asleep together and training together OH GOD HORRID GORE PILE OF TEACHER. AND OUR FRIENDS WERE BEHIND IT!! well as long as they said they didnt mean to. anyway better go study for EXAMS!!! i like that theyre like well YOU CHILDREN threw hands with this teacher so this VIOLENT MURDER was probably you. altho i guess adrian nearly died in said scuffle so maybe it's not that crazy to consider kflsdhf... silver my boy fighting for his fucking life out here just trying to stay awake and then SCORING TOO GOOD!!!! ON ACCIDENT KJFLSDHKLFJSKLFH

theres a lot going on for these kids. godspeed to them and their field trip 😌

[catch-me-hello]

Debut’s Plan – Episode 6:  New Characters Emerge

It’s a good thing I don’t work in K-pop.  My picks rarely make it into the final group.  My favorites on this show aren’t doing well.  A survival show run by me would have to be called Debut Duds, and the band name would be No Future.  I’d probably have to fit an ampersand in there somewhere, but you get the point.

So with that cheerful intro, welcome to Episode Six!  Our trainees will be doing Plan 4 today, which will be Expression.  We’re going to see a lot of acting in this episode.  Let’s do this.

We start with our trainees gathering at the main dome, where they find a classroom setup. 

Our Starnouncer appears on the dome to greet them.  It welcomes back Park Seong Hyeon, who missed Plans 2 and 3 due to illness.  He’s recovered and says he is determined to be in the Top 7 this time.

Our trainees learn that Plan 4 is about Expression, and they are now in acting school.  One of my picks, Park Won Bin, is actually an art major in college who studies acting, so he’s got an advantage.  He’s not the only one.  Baek Jun Hyuk was a child actor.  And an incredibly adorable one at that.

Our acting teacher for today is popular Korean actor Eum Moon Seok.  Right away, I’m enjoying this class.  Our teacher makes the point that K-pop idols are at a disadvantage, having to express emotion in a 3-minute song that K-drama actors have several onscreen hours to express.  Plus, actors don’t also have to concentrate on singing and dancing.

Our trainees watch clips from famous Korean movies and K-dramas.  These are the clips they will be performing.  I’m fascinated with Eum Moon Seok’s teaching techniques.  He shows them how to unleash the full power of their voices, find the context of each scene, and get into the characters’ heads.  I would pay to take acting classes from this guy.

The trainees start performing their scenes.  Jang Yong Hoon, Wu Hao, and Lee Woo Ju give impressive monologues.  I may not understand the language or know the original scenes, but I can feel the emotion through the computer screen.

They also do a great improvisation exercise when a prop phone doesn’t ring when it’s supposed to, so our trainees have to keep their monologue going until it finally rings.  As there survival shows for aspiring K-drama actors?  I’d love to watch one of those.

I’d be fine with the class going on for the rest of the episode, but Eum Moon Seok has a gift for the trainees before he leaves.  It’s a script for a K-drama written for this show.  It’s called Imperfect Game.  The trainees are going to audition for the roles and film it.

The synopsis is this: 

Once aiming to win the national high school baseball tournament, the Woojoo High Baseball Team dreamed of winning the Phoenix Flag.  But after a scandal scattered its members, the team is on the brink of disbanding.  A new transfer student appears, hoping to restore the glory of Woojoo High, and begins gathering the team members again.  What will be the fate of the Woojoo High Baseball Team?

If this show came up on my Netflix suggestion list, I would totally watch it.

Seven of the 21 trainees will be cast in lead roles.  The others will be supporting role characters and extras.  The trainees will have five days to rehearse for the lead role auditions.  This will be especially hard for the Japanese and Chinese members, who will have to read, memorize, and deliver lines in Korean. 

Let’s pause for a quick tangent.  Park Won Bin is wearing an eye patch in this episode. 

I’ve seen trainees wearing eye patches in almost all of these survival shows, and I thought it must be a popular fashion statement in Korea, because not all of them could be getting that many eye injuries.  But then I did some checking.  Yes, sometimes it is a fashion statement.  But most of the time, they really are getting eye infections.  Idols wear makeup and colored contacts so often, their eyes are prone to irritation and infections.  Idols may also wear eye patches when recovering from double eyelid surgery.  Ah, the perils of staying beautiful.

Back to our show.  The scene that everyone wants to do is one with a fight scene in it, and the trainees doing that one really seem to enjoy rehearsals.  A lot of aggression is being worked out here.  I hope no one gets hurt.  Park Jun Hwan, the trainee who originally wanted to be a baseball player, is really connecting with his character.  The whole rehearsal process is mesmerizing to watch. 

Meanwhile, the foreign trainees struggle to read their lines.  We get a great moment when 14 year-old Lee Woo Ju has to explain the Korean word for “agony” to his Japanese scene partner Haru.  He says, “Imagine you got eliminated from this show.”  That’s all he needs to say.  Haru immediately gets it.  Lee Woo Ju turns out to be a great acting coach for both his non-Korean scene partners and should probably try that as a career if K-pop doesn’t work out for him.

During rehearsal week, the Starnouncer calls them back to the main dome.  Another acting coach is coming in to help.  He strolls in, casually dressed in sandals and shorts, which throws everyone off a bit.  This is acting coach Kim Si Hoon.

The only person I can find online with that name is a Korean baseball player with the NC Dinos, so I don’t think this Mr. Kim is a celebrity, other than being on this show.  Still, he has an impressive resume.  He has a Master’s in Acting from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.  And this man is not fooling around.  “You need to think of yourselves as actors, and I will treat you like actors,” he tells our trainees.  “Not being good at acting isn’t the issue.  But doing it half-heartedly is a problem.”  The trainees all stand up a bit straighter and look more alert.

Our trainees are told to remove their socks and go barefoot.  I really hope that floor has been scrubbed.  We already have one trainee with an eye infection.

The trainees walk around barefoot and are told to pay attention to their feelings.  “What are you feeling?” Kim Si Hoon demands in a booming voice.  “My feet hurt,” mutters Lee Woo Ju. 

This acting coach is like a drill instructor, clapping a specific number of times for each instruction.  He has them do exercises like pairing up, standing close together, and not breaking eye contact for several minutes.  As an introvert, this looks like total hell to me.  But then something very interesting happens.  After having them stare into each other’s eyes, Kim Si Hoon claps three times and tells them to start saying their lines.  When they do, they are fully immersed in their characters in a way they weren’t before.  They’ve been transformed.

They go on to do exercises in movement, voice work, and imagination, and I am really enjoying this.  I’m getting acting classes from experts for just the cost of my Viki subscription.

Before we know it, D-Day is here.  It’s Audition Day for the lead roles in Imperfect Game.  Our board members and judges gather to watch them through a video feed.  The choreographers are not with them this time.  Instead, Kim Si Hoon is joining them.

One by one, the teams take the stage and perform their scenes.  First up is the fight scene, which takes place in a classroom.

I am so caught up in these performances and don’t want to pause to take notes.  The trainees are immersed in their characters, and I’m immersed in the performances.

I am curious about one thing.  This classroom scene begins with a student walking in to see another student asleep at his desk.  The light is shining on the sleeping student’s face, so the first student sits in front of him and uses his hand to block the light.  This is a scene I remember vividly from TAN’s “Walking on the Moon” video.  Taehoon is the student asleep at his desk, and Jooan walks in, sees the light on his face, and closes the curtains to block the light.

When I first saw the TAN video, I just thought this was just a romantic scene.  But now I’m wondering if it’s based on a famous scene in a Korean movie or K-drama.  This scene, used in this music video and again on this survival show, is way too specific to just be a coincidence.  If any of my readers know, please speak up in the comments.  If it is a trope, I’d love to see the original source.

Next up is another confrontation/argument scene, where we learn that one of the baseball players had suffered an injury that may be related to the scandal that pulled the team apart.

Jang Yong Hoon’s performance brings me to tears.  He has trouble with expression when he sings, but as an actor, he shines.  Same with Seok June, who gives a powerful, believable performance.

I’ve been waiting anxiously for Hanu’s turn.  He’s been working so hard with the Korean language and trying to sound like a native Korean speaker while at the same time giving the scene the emotion it demands. 

He’s amazing.  The coaches love it.  They ask him to do it again in his native language, and it’s fascinating to see how he physically relaxes into the role when he’s more comfortable with the language.  When he’s done, one of the coaches asks, “Should we change the script to Japanese?”  Something tells me Haru just won a lead role.

Fellow Japanese trainee Kaira is up next, and he faces the same challenges.  He’s always shown great expression in his performances, so I’m really looking forward to this.

It’s a small part, but the coaches say he speaks like a native Korean.  He overcomes the language barrier to impress the coaches with just a few lines.

Park Won Bin has the hindrance of the eye patch, but he shows so much passion in his monologue.  The coaches can’t take their eyes off him.

Now we come crashing down with a very uncomfortable sequence of events, which we get in a flashback.  Trainee Kim Min Jae has a real struggle with Plan 4.  He’s just not good at acting, and since he’s a perfectionist, he wants to give up since he can’t do it perfectly.   Remember when we first met our acting coach Kim Si Hoon, and he said, “Not being good at acting isn’t the issue.  But doing it half-heartedly is a problem”?  Well, Kim Min Jae’s rehearsal in front of the class is worse than half-hearted.  He’s barely trying.  And Kim Si Hoon is NOT happy about it.

In front of the entire class, the teacher makes Kim Min Jae bend over, stick his tongue out, and say his lines loudly enough for everyone to hear.  I’m dying a million deaths for him.

As horrifying as this is to watch, it does seem to work.  When Kim Min Jae stands back up, he looks completely broken, but he’s able to say the lines with expression.

Then he breaks down in tears in front of everyone.  For several agonizing minutes, everyone just watches him sob.  This is so hard to watch.  Finally, everyone gets up to hug him, and I think we’re supposed to see this as a healing and heartwarming ending.  I’m emotionally exhausted at this point.  This has been an intense episode.

The flashback ends, and we see him do his final audition on D-Day.  He looks drained  The coaches applaud his effort but say he was too low-energy.  All I can think is, leave him alone.  Lord knows how many hours he’s going to spend in therapy because of this.

The auditions are over.  Now the board and the coaches need to assign the Top 7 roles so we can film this thing and see who makes up our new Top 7.  They are:

Park Won Bin, Chu Yoo Chan, Jang Yong Hoon

Baek Jun Hyuk, Haru

(A special note about Haru:  He did so well that his character, who is supposed to be from America, is changed to Japanese instead.  The coaches loved his performance that much.)

And finally,

Jang Jyu Hyun and Seok June

We end with some clips from the resulting K-drama.  The clips are not translated, so I don’t know what’s going on.  But thankfully, Park Won Bin’s eye seems to have healed.

We get a reminder to vote for our two favorite NewKids (I really don’t like that name) at newkids.co.kr.  Can we write in a vote to change the name?  Starship, you came up with badass group names like Monsta X and Cravity, and now you show up limping to the party with the name NewKids?  I can come up with better names using the online K-pop Group Name Generator.  Even The Eye Patch Crew would be a better name.

Whatever.  I need sleep.  From the previews, it looks like next week, we’re going on a road trip.  See you then!

Road Trippers.  Even THAT would be a better name than NewKids.  Geez.

[rea-grimm]

Dragon of Masyaf 2

warnings: blood and injury

Your training and various exercises sometimes took place outside the fortress and outside the city itself. Together with Altair, you went to the desert, where a small enemy camp was supposed to be located.

The plan was to stay the night in the desert, reconnoitre the enemy's territory and get the flag from there, which was located in the very centre on high ground. After that, you were scheduled to go to Jerusalem, where the Grandmaster was supposed to have a meeting with the Rafiq there.

You had travelled some distance from Masyaf when the enemy camp that Altair spoke of appeared in front of you. You camped not far from it and it was up to you to get the necessary information. 

Altair often taught you about the mistakes of his past, so he made sure that you used your intuition, but that you found out the necessary and correct information.

When evening came it was up to you to prepare the fire. You got wood and everything, but no matter how hard you tried, you couldn't get the fire going. You've probably tried all possible methods. Using sticks, stones... Nothing. You were slowly running out of patience.

“I'll do it,” Altair said after a while of you competing with the flintlocks. You nodded in agreement and handed him the rocks. Altair slammed them together a few times and you thought you didn't see any spark.

But he crouched down to the hearth and began to blow into it. You watched curiously as you noticed what seemed to be a flame coming out of his mouth. Suddenly, smoke appeared from the hearth and the fire was on. You couldn't believe your eyes.

“Thank you, Master,” you finally said, swallowing your other questions. How? What it was? Etc. He taught you to question, but right now you were questioning your eyesight.

"You're welcome. And Y/N? Just call me Altair," he said and you felt like his eyes were shining gold. But you attributed that to the illusion created by the flames.

You wanted to execute the infiltration plan at dawn when the guards were changing. You got in without any problems without anyone seeing you. You got to the flag and you had the impression that it was suspiciously easy.

Your suspicions were justified because as soon as you touched the flag, an arrow pierced your shoulder. You immediately pulled back and focused on the direction the arrow had come from. You noticed the archers. Looking around you found yourself surrounded. So they waited for you. It was a trap and you fell into it.

You broke the arrow so it wouldn't get in your way and even with the flag in hand you ran away. Now that you've had it, you're not going to leave it there. You jumped off the lookout tower and ran away. 

You ran around the tents so they wouldn't see you, but when you got to the gate they were already waiting for you. They've completely blocked your path.

You drew your sword in your good hand and were thankful that you were learning to fight with both hands, just in case. Enemies rushed at you and you were clearly at a disadvantage.

Although you always tried to focus on the one closest to you, spotting who would attack and the like, despite that you knew that this was a problem. Fortunately for you, Altair was watching the whole situation and as soon as you were hit in the hand, help was on the way.

Just when you were starting to feel like you couldn't handle another attack, an assassin swooped in. He deflected one attack with his sword and blocked the other one aimed at you with his hand. You saw the sword go through his uniform, but you didn't see the blood. However, you had to focus on your opponents.

Together, you finally managed to kill the bandits and get to safety. At a sufficient distance, when you reached your camp and horses, you wanted to look at his hand. After all, you saw how the sword hit him. Altair showed her to you, but there was no injury on her. You looked at his hand in confusion.

"A lot was going on at once. Maybe someone else got hurt like that," he said, focusing his amber eyes on your shoulder, which was still bleeding and had a piece of arrows sticking out of it. "I'm more concerned about your injury," he said, inspecting it.

He carefully tried to help you out of your uniform, but it only got worse. A sharp pain shot through your shoulder and you looked unusually pale and exhausted. He didn't like this at all. This injury required proper treatment.

"We'll head straight for Jerusalem," Altair ordered. "Can you stay in the saddle?" he asked you worriedly. You nodded in agreement. After all, this little injury won't put you out of the game, right?

Unfortunately, you couldn't have been more wrong. After some time in the saddle, fatigue began to overtake you and the pain began to spread like a contagion throughout your body. 

At one point you had the impression that your eyelids were made of stone and that you couldn't keep them open any longer. You blinked and then blinked again. 

Then you could no longer open your eyelids and the peace of darkness enveloped you like a pleasant blanket. It wasn't until too late that you realized you fell asleep. It only dawned on you when a pair of hands grabbed you.

"You'd better ride with me," Altair said firmly. You nodded your head in agreement. He helped you onto his horse and settled behind you. He tied the reins of your horse to the saddle, held you around the waist with one hand so you wouldn't fall, and held the reins of his horse with the other. You leaned comfortably against his body, which warmed you pleasantly. Before you knew it, you fell asleep again.

You only woke up to the noise of people who were also heading to town. You stopped away from the main gate which was guarded by guards on each side.

"Can you get in?" Altair asked you as you regained your senses and surveyed your surroundings. Your shoulder still hurt, but you had already stopped bleeding.

"I'll make it. I'll blend in with those monks over there and sneak in with them undetected," you replied. Altair nodded his head in agreement. He helped you off the horse and onto the ground, putting his cloak over your shoulders. He didn't want your injury to attract unnecessary attention.

You did as you said and got through the guards to the city unnoticed. There you sat down on the bench and waited for the master, who joined you after a while. Together you walked through the alleys to the district where the base was located.

Normally you would have gotten there via the roof using parkour, but now you didn't want to risk making your injuries worse. Plus, you didn't want to risk running into the archers patrolling the rooftops.

When you finally reached the base here, you sat down on a bench in front of the building while the master made his way there via the roof. There was also a secret entrance, but only the local Rafiq knew about it. When you finally got inside, your injury was the priority.

Malik, the local Rafiq, with Altair's help, got rid of the rest of the arrow and tended to your wound, which began to bleed again. You were given the day off and rather your task was to rest. That wasn't a problem for you.

You lay down on the soft carpet that was littered with pillows and closed your eyes. You thought you were going to fall asleep again, but you probably weren't that tired again. 

You still had your eyes closed and were listening to your surroundings. Nothing very interesting. That is until you heard the voice of the master and Rafiq. They were talking about something.

"…It was supposed to be a simple mission. I went to check it out myself. I have no idea where they turned up. If I wasn't sure myself, I wouldn't have sent her there," you recognized your master's voice.

"I see. I'll try to find out more in the city," Malik replied. There was silence for a moment.

“Now tell me since when have you personally been training the novices?” Malik asked in a different tone. Altair didn't answer.

"Does she know about it?" was Rafiq's next question.

"No. I didn't tell her the real reason. Besides, she indeed has potential," finally replied the Grandmaster.

"Just be careful," Rafiq said finally.

"I know. But sometimes I have this urge..." you didn't hear the end of that sentence. Overall, the conversation was weird and didn't make any sense to you. 

Sure Altair acted strange at times, but what other reason could he have chosen to keep an eye on you? But now you had the impression that you wouldn't find out much. You'll have to go about it differently.

You left Jerusalem as soon as your shoulder healed. You surveyed the surrounding situation, Malik, who you found out was Altair's best friend, was overseeing your training for a while. Even so, they kept nudging each other. Malik kept calling him a novice, even in front of you, and it annoyed Altair.

Unlike the Grandmaster, Malik taught you in maps, documents, and generally in that direction. A proper assassin should develop both body and mind.

1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Assassin's Creed Masterlist

[legally-brief]

MOVIES WITH MEN IN UNDERWEAR (This is outdated- website shutdown early 2000’s)

“ E-F”

E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) Ten year old Henry Thomas in long underwear with no shirt. Calls 14 year old brother "penis breath".

Early Bird, The (1965) Slapstick comedy starring Norman Wisdom. Businessman determined to make a tricky golf shot up an oak tree ends up hanging upside down and falling out of the tree, and of his trousers, when his suspender buttons give way. Enraged, in his striped shorts, he chases Norman Wisdom across the golf course. Near the end of the movie, Wisdom steals the fire chief's uniform in his campaign of destruction. The fireman climbs out of the lift shaft in his white T-shirt and boxer shorts, only to be doused with water.

Early Frost, An (1985) (TV) Aidan Quinn and boyfriend in boxer shorts.

Earth Girls are Easy (1989) Sci-fi comedy. Geena Davis throws her cheating fiancé out of the house in his surgical mask, stethoscope and boxer shorts.

East Is East (1999) Comedy-drama. A young Anglo-Asian guy is seen for a second dancing in his bedroom in his green print Y-fronts.

Echoes in the Darkness (1987) (TV) Good scene with Robert Loggia stripping in his office wearing white T-shirt and white briefs.

Electra Glide in Blue (1973) Robert Blake. One scene exercising in white briefs. Another getting all dressed up in Dallas Duds and forgetting pants.

Elmer Gantry (1960) Burt Lancaster, in his Oscar winning performance, has a scene in turn of the century ‘drawers’.

Emerald Forest, The (1985) Blonde Charlie Boorman as a white boy raised by natives and wearing just loincloths throughout the movie.

Endless Love The main actor screws with his girlfriend in white jockeys (kinda dark though).

Enemy of the State (1998) Action thriller. Pursued by intelligence agents who have hidden tracking devices in his clothes, Will Smith has to strip to his white undershirt and pale-striped boxers and run through the streets to escape.

Escape Artist, The (1982) Griffin O’Neal as a 14 year old boy in chains and boxer shorts.

Evening Star, The (1996) There's a great scene of Scott Wolf in tighty whities.

Everybody Does It (1949) Paul Douglas in white boxers and garters can’t find a place to change into his trousers, as his wife: Celeste Holmes, has invited all her women friends over to hear her sing.

Exit to Eden (1994) The very beginning has a young boy being spanked by his mother in his underpants. A very short scene. The movie also has lots of people walking around in gold thongs, which aren’t quite underwear, but might be worth mentioning.

Eye for an Eye (1996) Revenge thriller. Ed Harris in his boxers in a couple of domestic scenes.

Eyes Wide Shut (1999) Tom Cruise and Ms. Kidman play out a long, marijuana-laced argument in their underwear.

F/X (1986) Bryan Brown under fire and crawling around his apt. in white briefs ... extended scene.

Fábula de la Bella Palomera (1988) (Fable of the Beautiful Pigeon Fancier) "It is Orestes' exquisite absurdity that engages us, his preposterous dignity while tumbling trouserless out of a mistress' window..."

Fabulous Baker Boys, The (1989) Beau Bridges is caught in the hallway of his hotel in dark printed boxers, while Michelle Pfeiffer looks on and comments.

Face in the Crowd, A (1957) Scenes of Andy Griffith in white boxers and A-shirt.

Fallen Angel 13 year old boy is star of kiddy porn movies, in boxer shorts on set, no shirt.

"Fallen Angels" (1993) [TV-Series], episode "Red Wind" One-hour TV adaptation of a short story by Raymond Chandler. Private eye Phillip Marlowe (Danny Glover) is on the beach at night with his blonde client. When she invites him for a swim, he strips to his underwear, hesitating to put down his gun. He should have followed his cautious instinct, because when he comes out of the sea in just his wet orange print boxer shorts, he's at a disadvantage. But it's a beautiful sight.

Family Man, The (2000) Romantic comedy starring Nicholas Cage. Near beginning of movie he makes two or three short appearances wearing black Calvin Klein briefs, and a few minutes later he is seen wearing a pair of plaid boxer shorts.

Fandango (1985) Kevin Costner

Fargo (1996) Crime drama/black comedy. One guy gets beaten up in a corridor in his white T-shirt and print boxers. At the end of the film, one of the protagonists is arrested, struggling as he's handcuffed face-down on the bed in his white T-shirt, dark socks and pale blue boxers.

Fast Talking (1984) Young looking 15 year old boy strokes a wooden penis in shop class. Later is forced by principal to strip to underwear.

Fat City (1972) Good scene. Stacy Keach sleeping in green shirt and ratty white Y-fronts. He walks around his apartment a bit.

Fatal Attraction (1987) The opening scene, with Michael Douglas sitting in the couch reading his appointment book or sth like that while waiting for Anne Archer (who played his wife) to get dressed early in the morning. He was wearing a pair of white classic brief but the white dress shirt he was also wearing cover part of the underpants. There was also one more scene, He was making love with Glenn Close stripping off each other’s clothes.

Fatal Instinct (1993) Armand Assante appears in printed boxers in two scenes in this spy-flick spoof.

Father of the Bride (1950) Spencer Tracy has a nightmare where he walks down the church aisle and loses his pants (white boxers) before the entire congregation.

Fatty's Magic Pants (Fatty's Suitless Day) (1914) "Have you ever gone to a fancy dress ball and had your trousers suddenly vanish? Fatty Arbuckle has. What will happen as the evening progresses? Will more articles of his clothing disappear?"

Fear of a Black Hat (1993) Comedy. Rusty Cundieff and others in boxer shorts; includes a scene where disarming for a fight goes as far as stripping to underwear!

Female Trouble (1975) Divine (as a man) wearing classic whites (with skid marks).

Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986) Swimming pool scene with Ferris (Matthew Broderick) and his friend in boxer shorts (wet).

Fierce Creatures (1997) Comedy. Kevin Kline running around in his black boxer briefs, and John Cleese in shirt, tie and striped boxers.

Fight Club (1999) Drama. "We twice see a man's bare butt in a black and white advertisement (as well as another man in small and tightfitting underwear)".

Fightin' Fools (1941) "While the Our Gang kids are enjoying the local swimming hole, a rival group ties all their clothes in knots. Our Gang challenges the meanies, and the two sides have a military-style battle using fruits and vegetables for ammunition."

Final Exam (1981) Horror flick. Frat guy gets stripped to briefs.

Finders Keepers (1984) Micheal O’Keefe gets caught in the bathtub with some other man’s wife - and escapes wearing only his boxer shorts. A long chase scene entails.

Fine Madness, A (1966) Sean Connery bums around his apartment in his boxers.

Fire with Fire (1985) Story of a young guy sent to a juvenile detention camp. Nice scene, about halfway through, of the guys in the bunkhouse roused from bed for a late-night inspection. Several cute young guys in jockeys or boxers, including Craig Sheffer.

Fire! Trapped on the 37th Floor (1991) (TV) Scene with three fire-fighters getting out of bed in jockeys (one white, one red, one black) and one tee-shirts.

First Power, The (1990) Twenty-five minutes into the film: Lou Diamond Phillips quickly puts jeans on over white briefs; he then walks around room wearing only jeans with waistband of briefs showing.

First Strike (1996) Humorous actioner with Jackie Chan, including a scene where he's stripped naked at gunpoint. "One of the funniest scenes is Jackie singing 'I Will Follow Him' accompanied by a strip tease"; "I was going to say 4.5 stars, but then I thought about Jackie walking around in that hysterical polar bear hat and the koala underwear...5 stars all the way!"

First-Time Felon (1997) (TV) Boot-camp drama. Omap Epps and other prisoners being inducted into a prison, lined up in white T-shirts and boxers.

Fish Called Wanda, A (1988) John Cleese does what he thinks is a private sexy strip tease down to his bikini briefs and then some, and finds he is being watched by an entire family who are somewhat shocked by the sight of him.

Fisher King, The (1991) Robin Williams and Jeff Bridges are in Central Park at night and Robin Williams is dragging his butt across the ground nude like a dog saying "Do you know why dogs do this? Because it feels SOOO good!!" Absolutely hilarious!!

Five Easy Pieces Don’t remember scene, though definitely has underwear scene

Flashfire (1993) Action. Tom Mason is killed early on, shot dead in his white undershirt and dark print boxers.

Fled (1996) Action. The heroes visit (surprise!) a plush massage parlor, where they're greeted by a most attractive black man in a black robe and white boxer briefs. Cue another shootout and the guy is quickly killed. Such a shame.

Flesh 1995 - A Male Sexorama of Tomorrow (XXX) A rather stupid story (as in most pornos): after some nuclear accident sex for pleasure is forbidden and only allowed for public TV. This gives rise to some beautiful hunks to appear on stage in different types of underwear (thongs, jock-straps, briefs, and boxers). After getting hard in them there are various scenes of sexual pleasure (really hot, especially because of the underwear playing an important role). This finally ends up in a hot j/o session among 5 guys (this time without underwear). Copyright 1990 by Videorama.

Fleshtone (1994) Martin Kemp on the phone in his white underwear.

Flirting with Disaster (1996) Ben Stiller has a lot of scenes in his boxer shorts - including a running joke where he’s constantly taking his pants on and off.

Flying Down to Rio (1933) Gene Raymond rhapsodizes about Delores Del Rio in his hotel room, dressed in white yoke-front boxer shorts.

For Love of the Game (1999) Drama/romance. "We briefly see the back of Billy's (Kevin Costner's) underwear as he gets undressed while preparing for the game".

For Love or Money (1993) Comedy. Michael J. Fox in his underwear at one point; dark boxers.

For Your Eyes Only (1981) Action. James Bond and team attack a mountain hideout at the end of the film. Some guards are caught asleep, and are glimpsed getting out of bed in their assorted underwear.

Forces of Nature (1999) Romantic comedy. Needing cash, Ben Affleck reluctantly has to strip in a gay bar, and is highly embarrassed when Sandra Bullock suddenly pulls his trousers down, revealing his boxer shorts to an enthusiastic audience.

Foreign Correspondent (1940) Joel MacCrae in hotel room in bathrobe. Two toughs come in to get him. He goes into bathroom and out hotel window. On ledge, robe blows open revealing him in A-shirt, white boxers, with shoes, socks and garters. Long scene as he escapes and climbs through a window only to be where a party is going on in his underwear.

Forrest Gump (1994) Tom Hanks and friend ‘Bubba’ (Mykelti Williamson) are in their military white boxers and T-shirts, as they clean the barracks floor - talking about shrimp.

Fortress (1993) Violent, futurist prison-escape drama. Christopher Lambert movie with lots of prisoners in black underwear (including a few on the toilet).

Fortress (USA Movie) In the middle, the actors and actresses strip down to their underwear and swim out of a cave. Don’t know the people, though.

Fortune and Men’s Eyes Hot scene of guys in classic white briefs.

Fortune, The (1975) Warren Beatty and Jack Nicholson drop their trousers for Stockard Channing in this 1920’s era comedy, revealing white full-cut boxers and garters.

Forty-Ninth Parallel (1941) Wartime drama. Fugitive German sailors stand and salute in their shirts and undershorts before getting into bed. In an escape bid at the end, they steal an old railroad guard’s uniform.

Foul Play (1978) Dudley Moore believes he is very sexy in full-cut printed boxer shorts covered in red hearts.

Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994) Romantic comedy. Hugh Grant momentarily seen in his white shirt and pale blue boxers in one scene; blue T-shirt, striped boxers in another.

Fourth Man, The (1983?) A gay Dutch man obsessed with another younger man, spies on him - and follows him throughout the Netherlands. White European briefs on one man, as he ‘massages’ himself. Red bikini briefs on the younger man, in a fantasy sequence where the obsessed man pictures the younger man on an erotic crucifix, where he slowly and sensuously pulls the red bikini briefs off the younger man inside a Dutch church.

Foxy Brown (1974) Action. A judge ends up humiliated in a public hallway without his pants. A gang leader is stripped for mutilation (who makes this stuff?!).

Fraternity Row (1977) Lots of guys (including Gregory Harrison) being hazed in briefs. LONG scene at end of movie.

Freejack (1992) Pretty short (yet nice) scene towards beginning of movie with Rene Russo waking Emilio Estevez outta bed. Emilio laying down and walking around in gray Jockeys. Nice shots, but look fast.

Freeway (1988) Ball-exploding scene has beefy James Russo getting out of bed in white jockey shorts and grey T-shirt.

French Kiss (1995) Kevin Kline in his underwear in the hotel room when he sleeps on the couch.

Friday (1995) Comedy. Two short but good scenes: Drug-confused Chris Tucker running down the street in his white undershirt and briefs, pursued by his friends in a car; and Bernie Mac, chased by jealous husband, running to his car in his white undershirt and red briefs.

Friday the 13th (in some parts) There are some scenes where young men in briefs were killed.

From This Day Forward (1946) Mark Stevens in white boxers and A-shirt, has a marital quarrel with Joan Fontaine.

Full Metal Jacket (1987) For those with boxer fetishes.

Full Monty, The (1997) The hit comedy about a bunch of unemployed guys who become strippers.