#case type: content theft

[ai-art-thieves]

are you aware of kaijuno trying to pass off ai art as their own doodles?

....who the hell is kaijuno?

ok yeah a lot of these are ai generated... wait hang on.

there's a few that aren't ai generated

And it's stolen from what I can only assume is some sort of paint by numbers app

if its not ai generated content, it's either paint by numbers or flat out stolen.

And one of these is a straight up STOCK IMAGE.

She restricted the replies for all of her posts.

More investigation needed

[lloydfrontera]

Are you like- The official author of 'Greatest Civil engineer' series? Or did I miss something-? Cause I've been thinking you were this whole time yet one of my friends stated you were nothing more than a fan account. And I kinda wanna say their wrong- but I have no proof of confirmation.

Don't answer if you're not comfortable though- I won't mind being unanswered ngl, just giving me and my friend something to debate about.

there is nothing i can say to make this funnier you won this one nonnie

no as far as i know i am not korean author bk moon official writer of The Greatest Estate Developer

i am so confused as to how you ever arrived to the conclusion that i could possibly be. i literally have over two hundred posts about how lloyd and javier should kiss each other with tongue. i posted llojavi yuri two weeks ago. i'm obsessed with a minor character of the sequel that appears for less than 1% of the novel. i don't even speak korean.

i'm not shaming you i swear i am just so confused as what could i have possibly done to give you the idea that i was the author please i need to know

[ai-art-thieves]

Oh I am pretty aware of these bots.

They are bots that copy other people's posts, pictures, and tags.

Report it as unlawful content, specifically phishing.

If alerted, Tumblr will nuke it without question.

hey everyone be careful

I don't know if anyone has talked about this, but lately this has been happening in other fandoms too. There'll be these bot accounts that straight up steals people's posts and adds "expand" "read more" "continue" as a link in the end of the post - DON'T CLICK ON THAT, it's most likely a malware or something of the like.

so if you see a post like this: no profile picture, something that looks reposted (I've seen this happening to artists too) and a link at the end, even if the post has tags, that's a bot. Block and report it.

stay safe, and I hope @staff finds a way to stop these bots soon!

[anotherdayforchaosfay]

Cybercriminals are abusing Google’s infrastructure, creating emails that appear to come from Google in order to persuade people into handing over their Google account credentials. This attack, first flagged by Nick Johnson, the lead developer of the Ethereum Name Service (ENS), a blockchain equivalent of the popular internet naming convention known as the Domain Name System (DNS). Nick received a very official looking security alert about a subpoena allegedly issued to Google by law enforcement to information contained in Nick’s Google account. A URL in the email pointed Nick to a sites.google.com page that looked like an exact copy of the official Google support portal.

As a computer savvy person, Nick spotted that the official site should have been hosted on accounts.google.com and not sites.google.com. The difference is that anyone with a Google account can create a website on sites.google.com. And that is exactly what the cybercriminals did. Attackers increasingly use Google Sites to host phishing pages because the domain appears trustworthy to most users and can bypass many security filters. One of those filters is DKIM (DomainKeys Identified Mail), an email authentication protocol that allows the sending server to attach a digital signature to an email. If the target clicked either “Upload additional documents” or “View case”, they were redirected to an exact copy of the Google sign-in page designed to steal their login credentials. Your Google credentials are coveted prey, because they give access to core Google services like Gmail, Google Drive, Google Photos, Google Calendar, Google Contacts, Google Maps, Google Play, and YouTube, but also any third-party apps and services you have chosen to log in with your Google account. The signs to recognize this scam are the pages hosted at sites.google.com which should have been support.google.com and accounts.google.com and the sender address in the email header. Although it was signed by accounts.google.com, it was emailed by another address. If a person had all these accounts compromised in one go, this could easily lead to identity theft.

How to avoid scams like this

Don’t follow links in unsolicited emails or on unexpected websites.

Carefully look at the email headers when you receive an unexpected mail.

Verify the legitimacy of such emails through another, independent method.

Don’t use your Google account (or Facebook for that matter) to log in at other sites and services. Instead create an account on the service itself.

Technical details Analyzing the URL used in the attack on Nick, (https://sites.google.com[/]u/17918456/d/1W4M_jFajsC8YKeRJn6tt_b1Ja9Puh6_v/edit) where /u/17918456/ is a user or account identifier and /d/1W4M_jFajsC8YKeRJn6tt_b1Ja9Puh6_v/ identifies the exact page, the /edit part stands out like a sore thumb. DKIM-signed messages keep the signature during replays as long as the body remains unchanged. So if a malicious actor gets access to a previously legitimate DKIM-signed email, they can resend that exact message at any time, and it will still pass authentication. So, what the cybercriminals did was: Set up a Gmail account starting with me@ so the visible email would look as if it was addressed to “me.” Register an OAuth app and set the app name to match the phishing link Grant the OAuth app access to their Google account which triggers a legitimate security warning from no-reply@accounts.google.com This alert has a valid DKIM signature, with the content of the phishing email embedded in the body as the app name. Forward the message untouched which keeps the DKIM signature valid. Creating the application containing the entire text of the phishing message for its name, and preparing the landing page and fake login site may seem a lot of work. But once the criminals have completed the initial work, the procedure is easy enough to repeat once a page gets reported, which is not easy on sites.google.com. Nick submitted a bug report to Google about this. Google originally closed the report as ‘Working as Intended,’ but later Google got back to him and said it had reconsidered the matter and it will fix the OAuth bug.

[mehmetyildizmelbourne-blog]

This Bizarre Situation Might Shock You — But It’s True

An overt plagiarism case that raises serious concerns. This story is a bit sensitive, so I’ll write it anonymously to protect the identities of those involved. My goal is to share this as a lesson for writers and readers — not to sensationalize the situation, but to emphasize its seriousness and discuss what we can do collectively to address it. Plagiarism has been an issue for ages. While…

[echoekhi]

I’m Declaring War Against “What If” Videos: Project Copy-Knight

What Are “What If” Videos?

These videos follow a common recipe: A narrator, given a fandom (usually anime ones like My Hero Academia and Naruto), explores an alternative timeline where something is different. Maybe the main character has extra powers, maybe a key plot point goes differently. They then go on and make up a whole new story, detailing the conflicts and romance between characters, much like an ordinary fanfic.

Except, they are fanfics. Actual fanfics, pulled off AO3, FFN and Wattpad, given a different title, with random thumbnail and background images added to them, narrated by computer text-to-speech synthesizers.

They are very easy to make: pick a fanfic, copy all the text into a text-to-speech generator, mix the resulting audio file with some generic art from the fandom as the background, give it a snappy title like “What if Deku had the Power of Ten Rings”, photoshop an attention-grabbing thumbnail, dump it onto YouTube and get thousands of views.

In fact, the process is so straightforward and requires so little effort, it’s pretty clear some of these channels have automated pipelines to pump these out en-masse. They don’t bother with asking the fic authors for permission. Sometimes they don’t even bother with putting the fic’s link in the description or crediting the author. These content-farms then monetise these videos, so they get a cut from YouTube’s ads.

In short, an industry has emerged from the systematic copyright theft of fanfiction, for profit.

Project Copy-Knight

Since the adversaries almost certainly have automated systems set up for this, the only realistic countermeasure is with another automated system. Identifying fanfics manually by listening to the videos and searching them up with tags is just too slow and impractical.

And so, I came up with a simple automated pipeline to identify the original authors of “What If” videos.

It would go download these videos, run speech recognition on it, search the text through a database full of AO3 fics, and identify which work it came from. After manual confirmation, the original authors will be notified that their works have been subject to copyright theft, and instructions provided on how to DMCA-strike the channel out of existence.

I built a prototype over the weekend, and it works surprisingly well:

On a randomly-selected YouTube channel (in this case Infinite Paradox Fanfic), the toolchain was able to identify the origin of half of the content. The raw output, after manual verification, turned out to be extremely accurate. The time taken to identify the source of a video was about 5 minutes, most of those were spent running Whisper, and the actual full-text-search query and Levenshtein analysis was less than 5 seconds.

The other videos probably came from fanfiction websites other than AO3, like fanfiction.net or Wattpad. As I do not have access to archives of those websites, I cannot identify the other ones, but they are almost certainly not original.

Armed with this fantastic proof-of-concept, I’m officially declaring war against “What If” videos. The mission statement of Project Copy-Knight will be the elimination of “What If” videos based on the theft of AO3 content on YouTube.

I Need Your Help

I am acutely aware that I cannot accomplish this on my own. There are many moving parts in this system that simply cannot be completely automated – like the selection of YouTube channels to feed into the toolchain, the manual verification step to prevent false-positives being sent to authors, the reaching-out to authors who have comments disabled, etc, etc.

So, if you are interested in helping to defend fanworks, or just want to have a chat or ask about the technical details of the toolchain, please consider joining my Discord server. I could really use your help.

------

See full blog article and acknowledgements here: https://echoekhi.com/2023/11/25/project-copy-knight/

[ai-art-thieves]

got this under my latest art post (a messy gouache painting)

blocked and reported as a bot, and recommend everyone does the same. nfts suck, btw

i feel sad for the guy who's identity and images got stolen from this bot.

[reasonsforhope]

AI models can seemingly do it all: generate songs, photos, stories, and pictures of what your dog would look like as a medieval monarch. 

But all of that data and imagery is pulled from real humans — writers, artists, illustrators, photographers, and more — who have had their work compressed and funneled into the training minds of AI without compensation. 

Kelly McKernan is one of those artists. In 2023, they discovered that Midjourney, an AI image generation tool, had used their unique artistic style to create over twelve thousand images. 

“It was starting to look pretty accurate, a little infringe-y,” they told The New Yorker last year. “I can see my hand in this stuff, see how my work was analyzed and mixed up with some others’ to produce these images.” 

For years, leading AI companies like Midjourney and OpenAI, have enjoyed seemingly unfettered regulation, but a landmark court case could change that. 

On May 9, a California federal judge allowed ten artists to move forward with their allegations against Stability AI, Runway, DeviantArt, and Midjourney. This includes proceeding with discovery, which means the AI companies will be asked to turn over internal documents for review and allow witness examination. 

Lawyer-turned-content-creator Nate Hake took to X, formerly known as Twitter, to celebrate the milestone, saying that “discovery could help open the floodgates.” 

“This is absolutely huge because so far the legal playbook by the GenAI companies has been to hide what their models were trained on,” Hake explained...

“I’m so grateful for these women and our lawyers,” McKernan posted on X, above a picture of them embracing Ortiz and Andersen. “We’re making history together as the largest copyright lawsuit in history moves forward.” ...

The case is one of many AI copyright theft cases brought forward in the last year, but no other case has gotten this far into litigation. 

“I think having us artist plaintiffs visible in court was important,” McKernan wrote. “We’re the human creators fighting a Goliath of exploitative tech.”

“There are REAL people suffering the consequences of unethically built generative AI. We demand accountability, artist protections, and regulation.” 

-via GoodGoodGood, May 10, 2024

[wheeboo]

off the record | kim mingyu {TEASER}

SYNOPSIS. Kim Mingyu lives a double life. On one end, he’s the perfectly charming yet clumsy coworker at the Daily Planet. On the other, he’s saving the world. But when you–a sharp-witted journalist–are paired up with him on solving a mysterious case of kryptonite trafficking, Mingyu finds it harder and harder to keep his secret at bay. And falling for you only makes it worse, when he’s only given two choices: protect his identity, or risk everything by letting you in.  PAIRING. superman!kim mingyu x journalist!fem!reader GENRE. superman au, fluff, angst, hurt/comfort, humour, slow burn, suggestive WARNINGS (FOR TEASER). swearing WARNINGS (FOR FULL FIC). swearing, suggestive content (kissing + implied sexual content), crimes being committed (hijacking, robbery, theft, illegal trafficking), violence (guns, fighting, etc), they're both in love with each other god help us all, mingyu in glasses yes, full warnings in the final fic <3 WORD COUNT (FOR TEASER). 1.5k WORD COUNT (FOR FULL FIC). estimated 20k+

notes: hello!! i'm alive and writing!! this is all inspired from this soft thought sent by my beloved @bananabubble which has been stuck in my head for the past many many months 😭 shout out to @tomodachiii for supplying the delusions and rooting for me too! i've only started writing this not that long ago and i'm already 14k in 💀 if you would like to be tagged for this fic when it's done, please send in an ask or comment down below <3

His cape flaps elegantly behind him as he carries the truck back to where all the police cars were coming in on the highway. Slowly, he lowers the truck back down onto the ground, a loud slam screaming through the air. At the corner of his eye, he notices one of the hijackers attempting to crawl through the broken window, but Mingyu is faster.

He yanks the man out of the truck by the collar and heaves him to the ground, but there’s something about the man’s close presence that physically makes Mingyu recoil back, and his eyes keenly focus on the faintest glow of green underneath the man’s shirt. 

Is that a… kryptonite pendant?

“Who the hell gave that to you?” Mingyu questions angrily, gripping the man by the collar of his shirt.

“I-I don’t know!” the guy sputters weakly. “I just drive the truck, man! I was supposed to leave it at Pier 13𑁋”

“I didn’t ask where you park the damn thing,” Mingyu interjects furiously. “Tell me who gave it to you.”

“I don’t fucking know anything! I swear, dude!”

Before Mingyu could do anymore questioning, the police are beginning to swarm them now. He gives the man one last glare, and reaches over to grip the pendant in his hand, ripping it from around the man’s neck. A stinging ache settles in his muscles, but it wasn’t any normal kind of soreness𑁋it’s the kryptonite kind. 

Yet with every ounce of strength he could muster, he tosses the pendant into the hands of an incoming officer. He already feels the pain lift off his skin as he bastardly drops the man back onto the ground, a fleet of other police officers coming to apprehend him.

“Put that thing into a lead case and to a lab immediately,” Mingyu groans out towards the dazed officer. 

Before anyone could say another word, he’s already shot himself up towards the skies, leaving nothing but a gust of wind behind.

He’s back in his civilian clothes and landing on the roof of the Daily Planet within a few short minutes. His glasses are on, his tie straightened, hair still a bit windswept which he brushes back with his hands. He wipes away some dust off his clothes before sneaking back into the building, resuming his normal routine.

Mingyu already knows he’s late, and at this point, he’s accepted defeat. He could only hope an extra cup of coffee that he might have put a bit too much sugar in would be enough to make up for his unexpected detour.

When he arrives at the conference room𑁋six minutes late𑁋you’re already sitting there in one of the seats, flipping through the case files with your brows slightly furrowed. A pen is tucked behind your ear, and he swears he can smell your perfume from where he’s standing at the door. It’s like a scent of lavender, and something else. Perhaps warm and sharp, just like you.

Mingyu takes a singular step forward, and your head snaps back up.

“Hey,” You greet him. “You’re late.”

“Sorry,” Mingyu breathes out, trying to keep casual. “Elevator broke down.”

You chuckle at that, pulling a chair out for him. “Does it break down often?”

He smiles faintly at your gesture, sitting down next to you. “You have no idea.” He slides one of the cups over to you. “For you, by the way.”

You glance inquisitively at the cup. “Oh. Thank you. Trying to bribe your way out of being late?”

“Depends if it works or not,” Mingyu remarks back, and he tries not to notice the way the corners of your lips twitch up into a small smile. 

A soft laugh leaves you, and it makes something flutter beneath his ribs. 

You take a sip from the coffee, and nearly choke it out. “Wow, that is dangerously sweet.”

“Ah, crap,” Mingyu mutters in embarrassment. “Sorry, I wasn’t, uh, paying attention to how much sugar I poured in.”

You wipe your mouth with the back of your hand, still coughing through a laugh. “It’s all good. I needed the sugar rush anyway.”

“Still,” Mingyu chimes back in. “I’ll get the ratio right next time, don’t worry.”

Next time.

The morning light shining in through the conference room windows shine on your cheekbones, casting flecks of gold across your skin and over the smile you were still wearing. His breath nearly catches in his throat at the sight𑁋the kind of smile that makes Mingyu almost forget he was mid-air just ten minutes ago and lifting a stolen truck with his own bare hands, freaking out about how you’d react to him showing up late. 

“It’s funny, right?” You start, turning your body to face him. “How we went from a stupid coffee incident to being paired up for a case like this. Who would’ve thought?” 

Mingyu hums thoughtfully, taking a sip of his own overly sweet coffee. “If I knew you were an A-list journalist, I probably would’ve risked being late to that meeting when we first met.”

You roll your eyes at him, tiling your head a little. “Why?”

Mingyu swallows a lump down in his throat, pushing his glasses up his nose shyly. “Uh… first impression, you know? It was your first day that week, so… I could’ve shown you the ropes of this place.”

Amusement glitters in your eyes, and you lean in, settling your chin on your hand. “We spilled coffee on each other, then you complimented my shirt. I don’t think anything is salvageable after that.”

“Okay, well, technically…” Mingyu starts, but his resolve falters quickly when he catches your gaze on him. “I didn’t plan to spill it on you. I was just nervous.”

“You? Nervous?” You repeat. “Why would you be nervous?”

Mingyu stiffens a little in his seat. “I mean, not nervous because of you, exactly. I mean, yes. You’re just kind of… I don’t know, intimidating?”

You stare at him.

“I’m saying you’re…” he pauses, knowing all too well he’s digging himself deeper into this hole he’s making. “...very cool. Like, cool-cool. Like, you have that unbothered, domineering energy𑁋okay, let me shut up.”

Your shoulders shake with a lighthearted laugh, and it seems to fill the large room more than it should. Mingyu only sinks down further into the chair, hoping that it could swallow him whole, as the heat spreads up to the tip of his ears. But even despite the embarrassment radiating off him, he can’t bring himself to look away from you for that long. 

“That was probably the best trainwreck of a compliment I’ve heard ever,” You tease playfully while tapping your pen on the table as if to stabilise yourself.

Mingyu groans into his hand. “Please forget I said any of that.”

“Oh no.” You grin. “Sorry, I’m filing that away in our case notes.”

His mouth flies open. “You’re joking.”

You merely shrug. “You’ll never know.”

That silence that follows after is strangely comfortable. Maybe a bit awkward, but not in a bad way. It’s quiet enough for Mingyu to realise this is probably the most peace he’s felt in a while. The adrenaline from the hijacking and discovery of the kryptonite pendant is momentarily forgotten, dulled by the sunlight falling on your face and a smile that crawls right under his skin. 

“Listen,” You begin, your tone turning a bit more serious, though sincere. “I know how people around here work. Trust is a weird currency nowadays. People hold their cards close to their chest, and sometimes, it doesn’t end well. We don’t have to share our life stories with each other. I just need to know…”

You pause for a moment. Mingyu is still waiting for you to continue.

“...that if things ever get messy, you’ll have my back.”

The weight of your words settle heavily on his chest. And there’s something about the way you’re looking at him𑁋steadily, hopeful𑁋that makes his stomach flutter. The same kind of feelings he gets when he’s flying too fast or perched at the edge of space and staring down at the place he’s dedicated to protect. 

He’s not used to this kind of vulnerability. Not from others, and definitely not from himself. 

“I will,” he finally says, voice low yet certain. “You don’t even have to ask.”

Mingyu notices the way you study him for a moment, as if you’re trying to read between the lines of his words and expressions. But then, the curve at your lips fades into something more softer, less amused, reassured. 

“Good,” You murmur, sitting up straighter in the chair. “Because I’ll have yours, too.”

And in the back of his mind, Mingyu knows one thing for sure: that he’ll protect you. From thieves, criminals, and the quiet threats that no one else sees.

Even from himself, if it ever comes to that.

God, especially from himself.

taglist (open) ʚɞ @haowrld @icyminghao @slytherinshua @jeonride @eternalgyu

@lockburn-castle @vrnism @weird-bookworm @ryuwonieebae @wonwooz1

@planetkiimchi @caramyisabitchforsvtandbts @aaniag @wootify @carlesscat-thinklogic23

@phenomenalgirl9 @mirxzii @bookyeom @parkjennykim @melodicrabbit

@bewoyewo @honglynights @bananabubble @treehouse-mouse @starshuas

@totomoshi @armycarat2612 @etherealyoungk @gigification @ahuiahoe

@svtficsarchive @lllucere @reiofsuns2001 @ppyopulii @smiileflower

@fujiswn

[ai-art-thieves]

foggymagazinegiver HAS NOW BEEN NUKED

THIS IS OLD NEWS. DO KEEP AN EYE OUT FOR BLOGS LIKE THIS, THOUGH.

BEWARE OF THE USER foggymagazinegiver!

They have been stealing art from people in the Pokemon community including some by @xxtc-96xx and adding MALICIOUS LINKS!!!! So be careful clicking on them because they WILL potentially harm you a lot.

So what should you do?

REPORT THEM for this

@ai-art-thieves should also help spread the word around!

Stay safe everyone!

[scarletcomalies]

Natasha, your mom's friend, who accepted the task of teaching you self-defense classes. However, in just a few sessions, she was also able to tame your arrogant attitude.

Word count: 1,488

Warnings: Theft, mention of knives and guns, brat reader. 18+ content, degrading, restraint, slight bit of dub-con, Nat has a penis, daddy kink, unprotected sex, breeding.

A/N: Not sure how drabbles work, but I was bored at a birthday party, and I felt like writing a little something hehe.

It all started when a thief had taken your handpurse from you and ran away quickly.

You barely felt it being snatched from you, and as you turned around, you realized that the thief was already at a considerable distance, so you opted to simply mutter a curse under your breath and continue on your way.

The thief was going to be disappointed when he sees its contents anyway, and you weren't going to run in heels for lipstick, a crumpled five dollar bill and your student ID.

Although it wasn't a particularly shocking event, your mother, with her tendency toward overprotectiveness, was convinced that this event had irreversibly scarred you. As a result, she decided to ask her best friend, Natasha Romanoff, to teach you self-defense classes.

From the beginning, you made clear your disinterest in attending. You arrived intentionally late for every session, and at the redhead's scoldings, you would simply roll your eyes and dismiss her words with disdain. During training, you often interrupted her instructions with snide remarks, and refused to follow her directions, preferring to improvise moves that lacked technique. There was something magnetic in her determination and in the way her green eyes flashed with frustration that made you purposefully act even more insufferable than usual. You loved to see it.

During lessons, there were times when she would restrain you from behind so that you would repeat the technique she had taught you, and you could feel a bulge in her pants rubbing against your ass. It was such a yearning feeling, that you would pretend to do it all wrong, so that she would make you repeat it, and in that way, prolong the contact.

"Your mom just wants to protect you, you know?" Natasha remarked, once another not-so-successful session was over.

You were so exhausted, you preferred to sit on the floor with your legs crossed rather than even get up to help Natasha put the equipment away.

"Come on," you scoffed from your spot. "The thief barely touched me. He just took my handpurse and left."

"Fortunately," Natasha replied. "Imagine if he'd had a knife, or worse, a gun. Imagine if you had been alone, at night."

She took your silence as if you didn't really care to understand your mother's point of view, but in reality, you were reflecting. She just wanted you to know how to take care of yourself, in case something worse than that happened. And Natasha had been so nice and patient to you.

But before you could respond, she spoke up, "What am I bothering to convince you for? You probably are so selfish, that you'd let someone stab you just to worry your poor mother."

You weren't sure if her words had hurt or offended you, as perhaps you had taken your attitude to such an extreme that you had actually caused her to have a twisted perception of you. It was true that you possessed certain difficult qualities, but you were not evil. Sometimes you simply felt that your mother's overprotection was excessive, and that made you more irritable than usual.

What you said next was the result of not having slept at all the night before, for you had been studying intensely for an exam. Despite all the sleeplessness, you didn't manage to answer it as you expected, leaving many questions blank. All that you had accumulated, added to her hurtful words, led you to say the following...

"And you probably have a tiny dick," you snapped. "And maybe that's why you're bitter and miserable, because no one wants you."

Natasha was silent for a moment, too peacefully that it was scary, but her intense, darkened eyes were the only thing that allowed you to realize that she was indeed impacted by your words.

"Dare to say that again?" She challenged you, the tension in the atmosphere becoming more palpable every second.

"No one wants a woman with a small dick," you crossed your arms over your chest, arching your eyebrow in that defiant manner she was already more than sick of.

Natasha began to laugh, but it wasn't the sarcastic kind of laugh, no, it was one that was beginning to terrify you and hindering your ability to maintain your composure.

Natasha approached you with firm steps, her commanding presence filling the space between you both. She was so close that you could watch her green orbes, deep and piercing, burning with such intensity that you felt that at any moment, she was going to set the whole room on fire.

She simply pulled down her pants and boxers at the same time, at the level of her thighs, and seeing the massive size of her member, made you swallow your words.

"Is this a small dick for you?" She asked, seemingly satisfied at your shocked expression.

And as if the situation wasn't humiliating enough, Natasha used a quick and precise maneuver, where she grabbed your shoulders and, in an instant, had you face down on the floor, making you groan in discomfort. She proceeded to restrain your wrists against the small of your back, and by straddling the back of your legs, she prevented any movement from them as well.

"Come on, defend yourself like I taught you," she groaned, pressing you harder against the cold floor.

You tried to free yourself from her grip, but every move you made only brought you more pain, because Natasha, with her keen perception, detected every attempt to escape and prevented it with ease, adjusting her grip to make you feel even more trapped.

The whimpers you emanated were so delightful to her ears, making her cock grow more erect. She didn't know who was suffering the most, whether she for not filling your bratty hole right there, or you, who were being physically and verbally degraded.

"That's what I thought," she chuckled, grabbing the shaft of her cock and smacking it softly against your covered ass.

With one hand, albeit clumsily, she managed to pull down your pants and panties just like she did a few moments ago, and released your wrists so that, with her two hands, she held your waist and positioned you on all fours so firmly that you felt as if you had no control over your own body.

"Don't think I haven't noticed how you pretend to be dumber than you are, just to feel my cock against you," she remarked. Obviously, she was able to understand the workings of incredibly complex, criminal and dangerous minds, how could she not detect yours? A clueless, spoiled, college student. "You probably said that just so you could see it, hm? So desperate for Daddy's cock."

But it was very double standards on her part, calling you desperate when she always ended up in the training facility bathrooms after you left, grunting your name between longing gasps as she pleasured herself.

She ran the tip over your awaiting hole, but as she noticed how it contracted in anticipation, almost imploring to be filled, the last ounce of reason left her body, letting her full length inside you. And better than she had imagined, your warm, wet pussy welcomed her deliciously.

In unison, you let out a prolongued moan of pleasure, both of you mitigating that unspoken desire that had become so unbearable.

Her movements began slow and safe, intending to feel for as long as possible how tight you felt around her, and to hear those low moans you vocalized every time she entered and exited you, complemented by the sloshing sound your hole made in consequence.

But that same action was what provoked her breath to quicken, and along with it, her rythm. Her hips were working overtime to match her cock's desperate needs, but it was impossible when said needs increased every passing second with the way you were whimpering, now high pitched and more frequent.

"Can a small dick fill your hole this good, hm?" She groaned, tilting her head back as she felt her climax approaching.

"No! No!" You cried out, and just like her, you could feel it coming. Your head was growing fuzzy for the pleasure altering every fiber of your being, like the most powerful drug ever made. "I'm sorry, Daddy! I lied! I love your big, fat cock! Please!"

She swore to herself that she was going to be strong and proud enough to stop when you admitted it, having already achieved her goal, but your words made her cum involuntarily erupt inside of you.

That sensation of being completely filled with her seed made your orgasm follow hers a little later, yours and her release leaving her cock shiny and dripping with your mixed juices.

Natasha was aware that even the most intense masturbation would not match how wonderfully your pussy embraced her cock, and how mesmerizing was the sight of your ass bouncing whenever your bodies clashed together.

Imagination was not going to overcome reality, in this case.

So she preferred, just this once, not to be frustrated by her loss of control.

[therobotmonster]

On that recent Disney Vs Midjourney court thing wrt AI, how strong do you think their case is in a purely legal sense, what do you think MJ's best defenses are, how likely is Disney to win, and how bad would the outcome be if they do win?

Oh sure, ask an easy one.

In a purely legal sense, this case is very questionable.

Scraping as fair use has already been established when it comes to text in legal cases, and infringement is based on publication, not inspiration. There's also the question of if Midjourney would be responsible for their users' creations under safe harbor provisions, or even basic understanding of what an art tool is. Adobe isn't responsible for the many, many illegal images its software is used to make, after all.

The best defense, I would say, is the fair use nature of dataset training and the very nature of transformative work, which is protected, requires the work-to-be-transformed is involved. Disney's basic approach of 'your AI knows who our characters are, so that proves you stole from us' would render fair use impossible.

I don't think its likely for Disney to win, but the problem with civil action is proof isn't needed, just convincing. Bad civil cases happen all the time, and produce case law. Which is what Disney is trying to do here.

If Disney wins, they'll have pulled off a coup of regulatory capture, basically ensuring that large media corporations can replace their staff with robots but that small creators will be limited to underpowered models to compete with them.

Worse, everything that is a 'smoking gun' when it comes to copyright infringement on Midjourney? That's fan art. All that "look how many copyrighted characters they're using-" applies to the frontpage of Deviantart or any given person's Tumblr feed more than to the featured page of Midjourney.

Every single website with user-generated content it chock full of copyright infringement because of fan art and fanfic, and fair use arguments are far harder to pull out for fan-works. The law won't distinguish between a human with a digital art package and a human with an AI art package, and any win Disney makes against MJ is a win against Artstation, Deviantart, Rule34.xxx, AO3, and basically everyone else.

"We get a slice of your cheese if enough of your users post our mouse" is not a rule you want in law.

And the rules won't be enforced by a court 9/10 times. Even if your individual work is plainly fair use, it's not going to matter to whatever image-based version of youtube's copyreich bots gets applied to Artstation and RedBubble to keep the site owners safe.

Even if you're right, you won't have the money to fight.

Heck, Adobe already spies on what you make to report you to the feds if you're doing a naughty, imagine it's internal watchdogs throwing up warnings when it detects you drawing Princess Jasmine and Ariel making out. That may sound nuts, but it's entirely viable.

And that's just one level of possible nightmare. If the judgement is broad enough, it could provide a legal pretext for pursuing copyright lawsuits over style and inspiration. Given how consolidated IP is, this means you're going to have several large cabals that can crush any new work that seems threatening, as there's bound to be something they can draw a connection to.

If you want to see how utterly stupid inspiration=theft is, check out when Harlan Ellison sued James Cameron over Terminator because Cameron was dumb enough to say he was inspired by Demon with a Glass Hand and Soldier from the Outer Limits.

Harlan was wrong on the merits, wrong ethically, and the case shouldn't have been entertained in the first place, but like I said, civil law isn't about facts. Cameron was honest about how two episodes of a show he saw as a kid gave him this completely different idea (the similarities are 'robot that looks like a guy with hand reveal' and 'time traveling soldier goes into a gun store and tries to buy future guns'), and he got unjustly sued for it.

If you ever wonder why writers only talk about their inspirations that are dead, that's why. Anything that strengthens the "what goes in" rather than the "what goes out" approach to IP is good for corps, bad for culture.

[ai-art-thieves]

Not the first time the lavenderconstellation.store bots stole content from people for easy clicks.

Out of caution, I would not trust the link in this post.

I remember some Tumblr users a while back warning of this exact format.

A screenshot of a social media post

An interesting item in the screenshot

Colored link that leads somewhere to "buy" the product

There's some things I'm not sure about. If I remember correctly, the post said that the spam accounts would post innocuous things to gain a following. The account above fits as a meme reposter. I think the risk was that the linked website would steal personal information like credit cards.

There were other items that spammers used: a light up cloud, a lamp shaped like a fire-breathing dragon, etc. If anyone has more information, please let me know. I'm only going off of memory.

[comicaurora]

Hi Red!

I know you mentioned how people have been reuploading your videos to tiktok and now I have actually seen a few of them I realised they started slowing them down to escape content id. This to me implies that you are talking so fast they know it would be incomprehensible if they sped it up.

Also did you guys manage to find a way to stop or report these things?

Like many content hosting websites, tiktok's approach to reporting theft is "step 1: give us your legal name and home address so we can send it straight to the person who stole from you in case they want to fight you in court or mail you a bomb!" so. no. no I have not.

fortunately I consider this to be largely a non-problem, because

(a) tiktok has been stealing my videos in cut-up bite-sized chunks for maximum viewcounts, which renders them borderline unwatchable and compels curious viewers to just seek out the unmangled original

(b) our audience is prolific enough that the comments are unilaterally full of people saying "hey this is stolen from osp on youtube go look them up". I've gotten a handful of comments on twitter saying that's how people found me in the first place, which is hilarious. real stochastic discoverability at work

(c) tiktok's views-to-money RPM conversion is tens to thousands of times worse than youtube's, so nobody's making enough of a profit to piss me off

[honestlywtfisgoingon]

GET A LITTLE LOUD. I DON’T MIND.

—WITH GOJO SATORU

REMEMBER: THE CLASSROOMS AT JUJUTSU HIGH AREN’T EXACTLY SOUNDPROOF…

content: teacher!gojo, teacher!reader, husband!gojo, smut, unprotected sex, p in v, semi-public sex, against the wall, over the desk, creampie, gagging, panty-theft, use of names slut and whore, not proofread

notes: i’m back this is crazyyyy!! i literally wrote every other day and thought about posting but i never finished anything and then all of a sudden it’s been years :O and im back w gojo brainrot. p.s. obi content is still coming but u just gotta be patient sorry i literally am so rusty

words: 3374

“toru! they’re gonna hear you, not me!” you worried your words wouldn’t get past the lewd sounds gojo was making as he rammed his dick in and out of your pussy. he did all this while holding you against the wall of the classroom— where anyone could come in.

“oh, i’m not worried about getting us caught” each of his words was let out between harsh moans, breath heavy as he kept his open mouth pressed against your neck. so he did hear your concern, it just made absolutely no difference to him. there wasn’t even a stutter in his pace, set hard and fast as soon as he slipped inside you only a bit ago.

“then why’re you covering my mouth?” one of his large hands smothered the entire bottom half of your face, but you managed to squeeze your words through the small sliver of space between gojos long fingers just like before.

“because i can actually stop myself from screaming. can you?” he was taunting you, sure, but the truth in it had you blushing. you were a little embarrassed of how easy it was to get a sound out of you. it was hard for you to keep everything in when you were naturally so vocal, and it only got harder the closer you were to coming. satoru always loved the moment he could see your conscious efforts to stay quiet become entirely abandoned in pleasure. once you couldn’t hold back, neither did he, fucking you as hard as he could, until he wrung out every little praise, and whimper, from your pretty throat. when you couldn’t help but shout his name for everyone to hear was his favorite, and he hated having to smother all the noises that always turned him into a horny teenager. he didn’t hold back his own grunts and groans though, letting them out freely in the classroom, which you didn’t think was very fair.

“that’s n-aah!” you couldn’t help but prove him right, a high-pitched moan jumping from your throat when he lifted you up, only to slam you back down where he was waiting to meet your hips a particularly eager thrust of his own.

“mhmm there it is.” he gave a smug little laugh that was always so familiar coming from him. satisfied that he had proven his point, he went back to making sure you kept quiet. instead of using his hands to muffle you this time, he smothered them with his own deep groan through a passionate kiss.

it didn’t help your case that your only response was an increasingly dazed look in your eyes. he clapped a large hand over your mouth again as you clung to him for dear life. your nails scraped at the back of his expensive dress shirt, feeling the muscles of his back react to the sensation. you raked them up to the softly shaved snow on his nape, pushing another groan out of him. only one of satoru’s hands were free, but he was doing the work for both of them. sometimes your husband was gentle and soft during sex— this was not one of those times. there was nothing sweet about how he groped your ass, gripping and kneading at the skin harshly. every so often one of his fingers brushed against your unoccupied hole while his palms spread your ass slightly.

gravity had you feeling like he was fucking his cock into you well past your pussy. you felt a pleasurable shock each time he hit that perfect spot, shooting up your body. how could it not feel that good with the way you met him with every bounce on his pretty cock. you both got closer and closer, but not quite there. you knew from the beginning that would be short, but you two couldn’t resist a quickie. honestly, you couldn’t resist any opportunity to fuck.

the truth is, he meant it when he said he really didn’t care about being caught from all the noise, but he also didn’t like that getting caught meant having to stop before he could make you finish.

even deeper than that desire, the one he didn’t want to admit just yet, was his possessive need. satoru wanted to keep those pretty little screams all to himself. he figured that he was the one helping you make them, he should be the one who decides that only he gets to hear them. people could still know just who was claiming you by his own pornographic professions of pleasure. Maybe he would let you cry out in the end to reward you, if only because he wanted to hear you say his name like you always did.

to get you there, he was going to have to go just a little harder to push you over the edge. chasing both of your highs, he used all that famous speed of his to switch positions and bend you over the desk. it all happened so fast that even if he slipped out, you didn’t feel it.

the new angle already allowed him to go deeper, but it also allowed you to arch your back. satoru didn’t moan, he whined at the sight. he always loved seeing just how far you’d bend for him— literally. it made his cock throb inside of you, the blood pulsing through the veins along his shaft that were making each drag against your walls take you closer to heaven.

still muting you but no longer having to hold you up, he used a free hand to bully your clit as well as your hole. there was so much sap dripping down from your pussy, making the noise that rang out everytime your ass and his hips met even more vulgar. he easily gathered up some of the wet mix of both your juice and his precum on two of his fingers removing his hand from your mouth only to shove his fingers in instead.

“mmm fuck baby, taste yourself. taste us.” you gagged on them, the choking sound canceling out the much louder whines you were about to make.

he desperately tore off his blindfold, shoving it in your mouth as a gag and telling you to play with your pussy. even before his hand could grip your hips though, you were already meeting his thrusts.

he gripped your hips with his large hands, squeezing your body beneath him, “oh shit. yeah yeah please. keep slamming that ass back on me princess. please please please.” he begged as if he was at your mercy, even though his inescapable grip was the only thing keeping you from falling limp. he grit his teeth, feeling you tighten around him. you went from throbbing to squeezing him like a vice as your orgasm suddenly shocked through you. you shook, your knees knocking a bit as you used your last bit of strength to push back on him, feeling as much of his cock as you could while you creamed on it. your eyes rolled back almost like they were compensating for the screams you couldn’t let out.

as sensitive as you were, satoru wasn’t done yet.

“so so close, hold out princess.”

the gag slipped from your slacked jaw, but you bit your lip to stop any noise that came from the sensitivity. you nodded and satoru petted your head and smiled. with just your lip to stop you from making noise and you so close to coming, satoru didn’t give a shit about volume anymore. you were about to let out some of the sluttiest moans like you always do when you come, and he wasn’t gonna miss them for anyone. “You know what? get a little loud. i don’t mind,” just before ramming in so hard that he knocked over the desk. the last of your moans morphed into a panicked scream, mingled with the crash and bang of the desk falling, along with all the objects on it. you were nearly one of those things if satoru hadn’t tightly gripped your hips and your neck, keeping you fused together. so much was happening, but he made sure that you were right where you needed to be for him to pour all his cum inside you. it seemed that after everything, your voice couldn’t handle much more than a little whimper when you felt all his hot, thick cum filling you up. you always tightened your legs out of instinct to hold it all in, and it also helped you keep standing as he shuddered, letting a long stream of broken groans and eventually whimpers just by your ear. he wanted so badly to take his time watching his cum drip out of your hole just to gather every drop not inside you on his fingers and shove it back in. you always begged for his cum huh? he’d be a bad husband if he didn’t give you all of it.

shit. his mind cleared he assessed the damage less than a moment after. even with all this clutter on the floor, at least he didn’t add his cum to it he thought. still, the biggest mess was between your legs, and he couldn’t help but feel a little proud about the two of you.

he immediately picked you up like a ragdoll and sat you down on a desk. you still felt your tongue threaten to loll out but you threw a leg over his shoulder out of instinct, giving him access between your legs to clean up the slick that covered your sex and thighs with his blindfold. it was already covered in spit anyway.

“fuck. someone definitely heard that” he murmured during his rushed clean up.

“who’s fault now huh—“ you were cut off by satoru’s reaction to hearing approaching steps he yanked you forward to button your shirt as you realized the person was running, very, very fast. you were both so relieved that you still had your skirt and he still had his pants on, leaving you one less thing to trip over. while he fumbled with your clothes you zipped up his pants and buckled his belt. gojo had just finished the very important task of checking to make sure no cum was leaking past your panties before yuuji came bursting through the door. you immediately hopped off the desk and smoothed down your hair and your skirt, while gojo tried to pass off his ruffled hair by acting like he’d been running his hand through it.

“hey, are you guys ok? we thought we heard something crash.” yuuji eyes darted to the desk on the floor, completely missing the raging blush on gojos face and the slight wobble in your knees. he opened his mouth to ask only to be shoved through the door when nobara came in hot behind him.

“hey! i thought we were all gonna check it out!” she scolded him with her whines.

“not my fault you’re slow!” he defended.

finally megumi strolled in, looking as nonchalant about the whole thing as he could be, in great contrast to his best friends.

“students!” you turned to satoru as he addressed them enthusiastically, “your teachers were just training and made a bit of a mess.” wow. that excuse just…well it sucks. you almost wanted to roll your eyes but had to do a double take. where did he get his glasses from? when did he put them on? leave it to gojo to keep his accessories on hand. it did help distract from how puffy and pink his lips were as he spoke.

“you were fighting in here?” yuuji tilted his head in question. combined with his big brown eyes, his actions had him looking like a puppy.

“it was impromptu.” you bolstered gojos excuse while trying not to cringe at how bad it was to begin with.

“ooh were you like couple fighting?” nobara jumped in with her question. it seemed she was way too intrigued by the prospect of drama to question how much sense it actually made, and you had absolutely no objections to that right now.

“wait things can get that heated to where you battle??” oh yuuji. he asked as if nobara knew all there was to know about the subject.

“no, no!” you waved your hands frantically, only to be completely tuned out once the two kids entered the mode of conspiracy. they talked lowly but didn’t whisper, as if you couldn’t hear them literally talking about you five feet away.

“i mean they totally look like they got into it.” nobaras chin was between her thumb and pointer finger while her eyes narrowed in inspection, yuuji mimicking her actions. after a second of tapping her cheek, she pointed directly at her sensei, making you and satoru almost jump a little bit. wow you had to get a hold of yourself. “no offense, but you should probably fix your hair.” nobara stated bluntly. gojo pouted. you thought he was adorable but also made a note to compliment his hair later.

megumi had been silent, not even really looking at you or the mess. his eyes just wandered the walls until it seemed like something clicked in his braim. his eyes darted back and forth between you and gojo. suddenly rolling his eyes letting out an exasperated “oh my god,” megumi just dragged a hand over his eyes and his face. he wasted no time turning around and walking away, seeming absolutely done with you two.

he caught nobaras curiosity and had her chasing him out the door and down the hall where you could hear her calling out “hey! hey, fushiguro come back!”

“hey wait what’s he talking about.” yuuji looked increasingly confused as he followed suit.

you almost slumped in relief you were so tired and you had to put effort into standing straight and not just falling into gojo. he looked at your relieved and tired face with a goofy smile. that smile. it disappeared as soon as you started slapping his arm.

“sa-to-ru!” a slap accompanied each syllable. “that was the worst excuse ever! there’s no way they’re not going to figure it out!” your hands kept slapping his bicep, but were just as quick to wrap around it right after. you pressed your cheek against the expensive cotton sleeve as you hugged his arm tightly and pouted just like he did as you looked up.

“c’mon let’s be real here, megumi would rather die than discuss our sex life with his friends. plus, we’re married, princess. i’m pretty sure a husband fucking his wife is like, the least surprising thing ever.” he rolled his eyes as he turned to wrap his arms around your waist, your hands resting on his chest.

“what about itadori? i’d hate for that kid to lose his innocence,”

“innocent? that kid is a self-proclaimed ass man.” taking advantage of the subject, one of satorus own hands came to rest on your ass. you quirked a brow but he pretended not to see your face and just continued, “i also saw a pinup poster in his room,”

“wait, really?” you stopped and shook your head a bit, like it would help you refocus on what you remembered you were talking about, “oh but still, toru, i know they know we have sex but—“

“but what?” he sighed, waiting for your most definitely poor reasoning.

“i don’t know, just” you started blushing and he knew that little embarrassed look. he knew you always liked to play the good girl, to hold on to your pride. if it didn’t make for such a fun game he’d say it’s a total waste of time knowing, without fail, he’d have you on his leash in minutes (literally or metaphorically depending on what your setting allowed). a single long finger tilted your chin up, his face suddenly so close to yours.

“oh you’re not worried about them finding out about my wife being fucked, you're worried about them finding out that she likes to be fucked like a slut.” such crude words came out in delicate breaths that fanned across your face.

“no!” your voice died out instantly when he pulled you a little closer again, your noses now touching instead of just your breath.

“hard enough for the desk to fall and loud enough to scream.” you had had sex minutes ago, and even worse, had almost gotten caught, and yet he was saying and doing everything to make your pussy throb all over again. you were always so easy for him to play with, never offering any real objections despite your attitude. “yeah? you don’t want them to know how desperate you are, how you just couldn’t keep your legs closed until we got home? because that’s all you want, isn’t it.” he whispered in your ear, your eyes fluttering back with chills. the sensation of him placing kisses on your neck brought you back to your senses once again.

“please, as if you didn’t run around the whole school just to say you needed ‘help’”

“and you’re suchhhh a good little helper for me, baby,”, he went to kiss you on the mouth you returned it, but as soon as he deepened it, you pushed him away and he had the audacity to look hurt. you were getting whiplash from having to repeatedly pull yourself together just to fall right into his hands again.

“you’ve gotta be fucking kidding me. i swear we almost got caught there’s no way we can go another round. you’re insatiable gojo satoru.”

“mhmm, we both are, mrs. gojo satoru.” he tapped your nose before lowering his voice once again. “so, how bout i take these panties, and we go home when my cum is about to leak past your skirt, huh?”

“fine. deal.” you huffed, but spread your legs quickly. he went on one knee to pull your panties down, enjoying the picture of your pussy and leaving a kiss on your clit which made you hiss, before he had the fabric dropping to your ankles. you stepped out of them and he swiftly pocketed them.

“i love my wifey so much!” he stood up and kissed you with a cute smile as if he hadn’t just shove your panties down his pants.

“that’s good because love you too toru,” you said softly, hands clasped behind your back and rocking back and forth on your heels with a lovesick look like a schoolgirl. honestly, he never stopped making you feel like one.

“aww so sweet.” he tucked a hair behind your hair, sending butterflies past your stomach and to your whole body, but you just knew that wasn’t all. “who woulda thought you were such a whore?” ah, theres your satoru.

“only for you” you patted his cheek jokingly, but he just groaned with his whole body. he had to do things in the most dramatic way possible of course.

“ugh. baby, you can’t just say things like that and then—“

you pushed him off, leaving him, arms still stretched out reaching for you, even after you walked out the door. he looked at the clock before deciding it was max 30 minutes before you asked to go home. you came back in 10.

— bonus:

“well i mean the honeymoon stage is like that, although it’s annoying and gross.” nobara shrugged while still stirring her boba.

“they’ve been married for 7 years. dated for 10.” megumi responded quietly, nobara consequently spewing her drink.

“no way! they act all starry-eyed and all that stuff still.” yuujis own eyes opened wider in surprise

“yeah that’s what i thought too!” it helped nobara that even yuuji had the same idea too. “ugh now that i know they’re just like that it’s kinda gross.”

“wait megumi if they’ve dated for 10 years, you lived with both of them at the same time, right?” both of megumis friends leaned closer to him, eager to hear where yuujis question went, but he didn't even look at them.

“yeah what about it,” he said as nonchalantly as ever. this was a topic he had always made a point never to dwell on.

“so you had to have heard—“

“okay, that’s enough. we’re never talking about this again.” ideas like yuujis were the exact reason why megumi refused to feel his interest. ideas like yuujis made him want to die from remembering just how many times he accidentally heard the two of you…daily.

“yeah gross, good idea.”

“um yeah, you’re right, don’t answer that actually.”

[jumped-for-the-yaoi]

it’s like a ‘Getting To Know You’ game with the guy you committed identity theft on

wordcount: 1,755 words

i don’t even know if this is in character anymore this is probably wildly ooc but i just needed to get the wemmro brainrot out of my system. I wrote this all in one sitting btw

__________________________________________

Wemmbu shows up unannounced at spawn one cold, breezy night. And, by some dumb coincidence, Ro is there too.

She’s only managed to gather some of the materials needed for the Sticklers’ base before the sound of soft footfall on grass alerts her to someone approaching.

Ro freezes, wings still lifted with half a mind to flee. He’s at, what, four hearts? There’s no way he could take a fight right now and win.

There’s a beat of tense silence. No one moves.

Finally, the newcomer gives a polite cough, his tone a little amused and a little teasing. “Yo, Roshambo. Hello? You afk or something?”

Ro recognises that voice, and he’s… Less than thrilled about who it is. But he braces himself and turns to face Wemmbu anyway, with his arms full of shulkers and a tense smile on his face. “Yo, hey.”

“Hey.” Wemmbu doesn’t move to jump her or drive a sword into her gut. He just… Stands there, holding some black concrete Ro had dropped on the ground earlier. He’s standing in the shadow of a building, hugging a thick cape around himself. “What’chu up to?”

“Not much. Building stuff for Rek,” she answers vaguely. She sets down some of the shulkers, switching them out for strength pots just in case.

Wemmbu’s head tilts, waiting for her to continue. When she doesn’t, he just nods. “Mhm. Okay. Cool.”

He steps forward, and Ro takes a step back, reaching for her sword—

—but Wemmbu just opens one of her shulkers, rummaging through it and examining the contents. Something disappears into his inventory — one of the decorative flowers she had stored in there, probably — and he laughs at her, almost giddy. “You’re so jumpy, bro, chill.”

“Okay, man.” Ro huffs a sigh, heading toward Mapicc’s castle to collect some of the shulkers he’d left behind. Like a stray cat, Wemmbu follows a good distance behind her.

He doesn’t stop yapping, either. “You’re wearing my old armour trims,” Wemmbu remarks out of the blue. His tone is only curious and somewhat thoughtful, but Ro tenses anyway. “It can’t be my taste in trims that’s inspiring you to copy me.”

“Not exactly,” Ro replies, absentmindedly sorting items while still keeping a careful eye on Wemmbu. “It’s not… Important.”

Wemmbu hums, stepping closer to steal more stuff from Ro’s shulkers. “Really now? It must be, like — I feel like you wear my armour trims around more than I do at this point, bro.”

“I mean, you’re not around much,” Ro points out. She examines him, head tilting. “Weren’t you banned after the spawn war? By Flame?”

“Yeah. He killed me after I was revived, too,” Wemmbu replies nonchalantly, waving a hand. There’s a glint in his eyes and the smallest sliver of a smile in his voice, but it’s gone in an instant. “You know, average Lifesteal activities.”

Ro stares, and he finds it so utterly fascinating how he can't read Wemmbu at all. But he just nods, turning back toward the shulkers. “How many hearts are you on?”

There’s a brief pause. Then Wemmbu laughs, a soft chortle of amusement. He sounds different up close: there’s still a hint of danger in his voice, but he sounds softer than the ruthless reputation he’d established for himself. “Ten thousand. Or, actually, more like one.”

Ro stops dead in her tracts, staring at him in astonished disbelief. “You’re on one?”

“Yup.” He’s grinning still, leaning on his sword like he wasn’t just the smallest mistake away from being deathbanned again. “Is it not obvious?”

“Not really, no.” Ro frowns, wings puffing up a little in alarm. “You’ve been keeping to the shadows this whole time.”

Wemmbu giggles, smiling a little wider. “Yeah, that’s, like. Intentional and all. Here.”

He steps into the pale moonlight, and Ro stops. For a long, long moment, she just stares.

It was never a word she thought she’d describe Wemmbu as, but right here, right now, he looked… Ordinary. More like a person than a god.

Her eyes trace down the blooms of orange flowers, dotting down his arms and over him. They grow over a glowing scar in his abdomen, still faintly pulsing with his heartbeat.

His tiara is cracked, and there are scorch marks that mar its usually pristine surface. The hearts usually set into his sleeves are gone, leaving only the golden framing still attached.

He looks… Well, not weak. Just human.

The moment quickly dissipates as Wemmbu pulls the cloak around himself, straightening up until he’s exuding confidence again. “So, yeah.”

Ro blinks at him, taking a moment to process everything and regain his ability to speak properly. “Doesn’t that… Bother you, though? Like, what do you even do at one heart? Don’t you want more?”

“I mean, yeah? But I did do everything I wanted to do this season, so,” he shrugs. “I don’t really care. Mainly I just hibernate under spawn or fuck around with Derap and Zam, but I just go hang out elsewhere if I’m bored.” He fidgets with one of the yellow ribbons in his hair, a gilded sun charm set into it. “It’s not that bad.”

Ro hums a little. “I mean, I suppose, yeah. So you’re just… Okay with being deathbanned if that ever happens?”

“I guess, yeah,” Wemmbu laughs, picking out one of the flowers from his hair. “I’ve done everything I wanted to, y’know. I’ve had my fun and all.”

A pause. “It’s funny how I spent a week invis pretending to be you just so that I could borrow your reputation. Your power,” Ro comments, glancing around Mapicc’s tower. Aside from some player activity, it’s back to its mint condition. “And now…”

“And now I’m powerless and everything?” Wemmbu finishes for her, a grin still on his face. “Yeah. It’s fine, though. I still have my aura.”

Ro laughs a little too, relaxing. “Guess I’ll have to try harder to take your aura next time.”

“You can try, bro.” Wemmbu looks around the castle, eyebrows lifting a little as he catches Ro doing the same. “You literally impersonated me for a week, right?”

“…A little bit, yeah,” Ro replies, her tone a little sheepish. She did frame him for a lot of things he didn’t do… “No hard feelings?”

“Bro. I should’ve killed you a few times as compensation or something.” Wemmbu shakes his head, vibrant purple eyes catching hers. “I can’t believe you did that, bro, that’s crazy. You’re that obsessed with me?”

Ro flushes, mostly from embarrassment. Not at all from anything else. “Okay, bro, whatever—“ Wemmbu just laughs at him.

“I mean, you spent so much time obsessing over me,” Wemmbu continues, ignoring Ro’s spluttered indignation, “do you even know what my favourite colour is?”

“Hmm.” Ro takes a moment to take in the figure standing in front of him, with neon purple hair, nearly fully purple amethyst trims, and formal attire swathed in purple, fitted neatly underneath his cloak. “Let me guess. Purple?”

Wemmbu gasps a little, eyes widened for extra exaggerated effect. “How’d you know?”

Ro shrugs, stifling a laugh at the admittedly stupid joke. “Eh, I just had a hunch.”

He sits down on a nearby chest, head propped on his hands as Ro blinks at him. “What’s my favourite flower, then?”

She hesitates. “…The ones growing on you right now?” She guesses. “I don’t remember the name.” The shulkers at his feet sit long forgotten, and so do the strength pots still in his inventory. Whatever he’s trying to do is infinitely better than being jumped.

“You’d be… Correct! It’s an orange tulip, yeah.” Wemmbu cheers a little, amusement sparkling in his eyes. He leans in a little, like he’s treating Ro to some secret. “Do you know why it’s my favourite?”

She shakes her head a little, staring back at him. “Is it like a you and Derap thing, or…?”

Wemmbu shrugs, looking up at the stars. “Kind of. It’s the flower I had from the start of the server, when I got stranded in a cave and stuff. Actual trenches.”

“Dang.” Ro can’t help but smile a little. “I didn’t take you for the sentimental type.”

“Okay, that’s because I’m not.” He giggles, plucking the petals off one of the soft tulips. “They were just what I was buried with.”

And. Well. Ro doesn’t even know what to say to that. Luckily, Wemmbu fills in the gap in the conversation seamlessly, gesturing for Ro to sit next to him. “Sooooo. What have you been up to?”

“Oh, man. Where do I start…”

Their talk afterwards is still guarded, of course: Ro never tells him much about Jumper and Rek, but indulges him when he asks about her past builds and experiences. Wemmbu just listens, occasionally butting in with ridiculous jokes and quips that Ro returns right back.

Wemmbu never tells her who he was meeting off the server either, though there was always a giddy look in his eye whenever he spoke about them. Ro teases him for it. Wemmbu just rolls his eyes.

They talk. They laugh. They talk more. Ro builds some kind of parkour in Mapicc’s castle for the hell of it, and Wemmbu almost bans himself on it because, quote end-quote, “he’s bored”. She’s never heard Wemmbu laugh so much before, and the sound is even sweeter in such close proximity.

But everything comes to a close eventually, and by the end of it all, the sun is already beginning to rise.

Wemmbu looks up to the lightening sky and sighs. “Welp. Looks like I should head out soon before people come back to spawn. Nice to meet you, Roshambo.”

Ro glances at him incredulously, getting up to leave as well. “Nice to meet…? Bro, you know me. And I know you, too — we’re not, like. Strangers.”

“You knew my name and who other people perceive me as,” Wemmbu points out. “That’s not really knowing me, is it?”

She thinks for a moment. “Well. I guess not, yeah.”

Wemmbu’s nose wrinkles a little, and he rummages through an ender chest for an elytra. “Bro, are you not gonna say it back? C’mon…”

Ro huffs a small laugh. “Alright, alright. Nice to meet you too, Wemmbu.”

“Hell yeah. Okay, bye.” He shakes open a pair of scaly wings, jet black and shimmering with enchantments. “See you, bro.”

Ro waves him off with a small smile, turning back toward his own shulkers. “See you, Wemmbu.”