friendlybowlofsoup

[friendlybowlofsoup]

Character Study 1/?

cw: mentions of death, child abuse

On a quiet night, a young girl finds herself alone.

She sucks a breath, trying to silence her own wheezing, eyes squeezed shut and her fists clenched tight. She is terrified and exhausted, and enraged above all else, and the combination of it all has her pulse far too fast and far too loud.

So, crouching beneath a sodden tree, she takes another gasping breath.

She’d known this was coming. Her mother was the only one left to support her. Of course, they would come after she had passed. Of course, there would be no warning and no choice. In a farce of a hearing, she found herself praying that they would give her mercy, and she was still surprised when they didn’t.

“I will see you soon,” her mother had said, and the girl knows now that she had meant it.

The young girl rises. She is covered in sweat and shivering from the cold, but if she is found then she is dead, so she keeps moving.

There is another settlement not far from here, and a man who promised to help her escape to the city when the time came. She still has a chance, so she keeps walking, a hand over her face to muffle her panting.

The night is windless, but the underbrush rustles. She freezes, and a small pangolin noses its way from beneath a cover of leaves. Its scales drag against the dirt, loud and grating in the silent night, but it does not seem to care. It sniffs the ground, following a line of ants, and is just about to shuffle out of view again when it stills.

The young girl, blinded by the reflection of its scales, makes the mistake of meeting its eye.

The pangolin smiles. She can no longer run.

[friendlybowlofsoup]

Update June 22, 2025

Hello Everyone, sorry for the delay in an update. As usual, life had its way and I have been busy with moving and working to put together a proper announcement.

This year will be kind of strange for me, since I will be doing clinical rotations for my last year and will be moving to different sites every three months until my graduation next May. Currently, I’m at my first site in Japan until August, which is why it took some extra time to settle (in addition to some WiFi issues at my temporary housing, newly resolved).

However! Despite this crazy year, being in rotations does mean less classes and more time writing, which I’m hoping to fully utilize. Though I cannot promise an update date for the demo, I will say that I’m hoping to release some fruits of my labor on this blog soon for those interested. I needed a lot of practice to get back into my writing voice, after all.

Thus, while it is a short, boring update, I did want to say thank you again for your continued support as I have continued to float in and out these past four years. Not only am I awful at social media maintenance, but committing to this project while in school was way more than I could handle, and I appreciate everyone who continued to keep GotRM in their thoughts. I'm so excited to be able to return to it in full-force!

I will see you all soon,

FriendlyBowlofSoup

[friendlybowlofsoup]

omg i just saw god of the red mountain on itchio and ran here to your tumblr. This IF was one of my first ChoiceScript IF's so I'm super excited to have in Twine now! :D

⊂(´• ω •`⊂)!! Thank you for dropping by again! I'm also excited to be on itch! (though twine still intimidates me plenty as a writer lol)

[friendlybowlofsoup]

Hiii soup! Sorry to bother but did you take asks? If so, I have 2 questions! 1. I don't know how to explain this one lmaoooo but... Well. If the plant spirit RO's became animal spirit and the animal spirit RO's became plant spirit, what would they be? 2. What would be RO's reaction to an extremely shy MC. Like, someone so gentle, so nervous, a person you want to coat them in cotton wool so they never break? Thanks for ur hard work and have a nice day 💜

(￣ω￣)/ I will take asks! I probably won't be able to do anything long-form for a while, but I'm happy to answer whatever I can~

For your second question, I have talked about emotionally soft/shy!MCs before, and I feel that still holds up!

That first question is interesting though. I'm not sure if I've answered this before, but it was fun to think about so here it is anyway :D

--

Animal -> plant

Qiu might have been a pine or redwood? I tend to think of him as reliable and stubborn to change, so a tree that is emblematic of the Red Mountain while still retaining his longing for the sky feels right.

Kaski is a lot harder, but ultimately I can't shake the idea that he'd be a dandelion. A hardy, resilient plant that can find its home anywhere--one that is always at the whims of constant change.

Spider would have been a rosary pea/crab's eye plant! It is toxic and has to be handled carefully, but has been used as medicine traditionally and strung as jewelry because of its bead-like fruit.

--

Plant -> animal

An would have been a kingfisher, undoubtedly. They are symbols of beauty and wealth, and of a status as prized as peonies. I can easily see her wearing bold blues and oranges in another life, acting just as proud as she always has.

Go Ro would have been a salamander or another reptile of some kind, as they are often associated with longevity and medicine. I think it also would have been fun to write him in the perspective of a cold-blood animal.

Hiemi would have been a koi fish, for how beloved it is in every culture. There are many things it symbolizes--everything from prosperity to love--and its gracefulness certainly suits her as well.

[friendlybowlofsoup]

it's so good to see you active again and i hope you've been well! i have a question about the ROs, how tactile is each of them with a romantic partner and do any of them have a favourite kind of touch?

Hello! Sorry for the delay ^^; While I am trying to be a little more active again, I'll probably only be able to drop in once or twice during a week for now...

But, I do have your ask about their favorite touches answered here :D as well as how tactile they are in general over here

Note though that once romanced, I'd say that Qiu, An and Kaski are the most likely to initiate touches, while Go Ro and Hiemi are on the opposite end. Everyone else sort of floats in between ~ヾ(・ω・)

[friendlybowlofsoup]

Have you considered posting the demo on cogdemos.ink (dashingdon replacement)? It supports choicescript. Personally, after a couple of playthrough I prefer just reading various routes directly from the files, and Itch.io is kind of ass in this regard.

I'm sorry, but since I've decided to fully move away from choicescript, I will not be uploading the demo onto that new site (^^;)

[friendlybowlofsoup]

Oh man, no worries! I did see a few things from other authors also mentioning that they were worried about the same thing, so I guess it is true that it's happening :(

Mhm. And, to be fair, I do see the merit in trying to preserve inactive projects. It is sad that a lot of those stories may be lost forever, so I can see why people are hoping to move them over to the official demo site, itch or wherever else.

However, yeah, I can imagine many authors are as concerned as myself about how our works might be mishandled during this huge shift, so I decided to just prevent what I can. (＿ ＿*)

[friendlybowlofsoup]

I noticed the dashingdon demo is down, did you take it down? :(

Ah, yes I did, sorry, Nonnie ;;

I was planning on making an announcement about taking it down, but I was made aware that there were a few people who were planning to preserve my dashingdon demo without my knowledge. And while I was okay with people browsing the code while the site was up, I'm a little wary about potential reuploads or misuse of my work that I can't control, so I decided to take it down quietly.

I promise I'm working hard to transfer things to twine so that it catches up to where the dashingdon demo left off on! 人(_ _*)

[friendlybowlofsoup]

I think the person who sent this ask meant what would the ROs do if they heard the MC talking to someone else about the RO. For example: MC talking with Ann about how cool and how much they like Min He and Min He happens to be passing by and heard the MC saying that.

I wonder if you are taking reaction asks? If not, feel free to ignore (>w<) But if you are, how would the RO’s feel if they overheard MC absolutely gushing about them to someone else? Bonus points if MC is specifically complimentary/admiring of something theyre a bit insecure about !

I have terrible reading comprehension skills, I'm sorry Anon.

TO THE REAL ASK:

--

Qiu is entirely pleased, and while he never admits to having overheard, he's certainly glowing for a few days after. When you needle him about his grin, unaware, he simply hums and pinches your chin fondly, leaving you without an answer.

--

An very deliberately sidles up to you, enjoying every second of your embarrassment as you realize she's heard everything. Ignoring the poor third party, she flips her hair back and coyly stalks up to your retreating form, asking you to repeat it all again.

--

Min He feels guilty, at first, for eavesdropping but the longer the conversation goes, the more it turns into warm, fuzzy affection. She confesses to hearing about it later, and asks you, hand against your chest, if you truly meant everything.

--

Xinyi might cry. He's comfortable enough your relationship, thinking you chose him despite his inadequacies, until he hears you praising what he thought were flaws, and--well. Later you find him pressing a cold cloth against his red eyes, but he only laughs as you worriedly ask what's wrong.

--

Kaski leans against the wall, listening carefully to your words, soaking in the love pouring from your voice. He glances at your figure, the way your eyes shine as you insist on his goodness, of all things, and basks in the ache of his heart-- one that is sweet and unheavy.

--

Hiemi is, genuinely, surprised. She considers your words, your enthusiasm and earnestness--she didn't doubt your feelings, but part of her has always wondered why. Later, when you've forgotten all about that conversation, she rests her head against your shoulder, reaching for your wrists as she thanks you.

--

Go Ro is never letting you forget this ever. He is there when you leave your conversation, towering over you as you blanch in horror. He repeats every praise you gave him, slowly, word-by-word, clamping down on your arm when you try to run. He's bringing this up every time you bicker with him, the words permanently etched into him.

--

Chun cannot look at you afterwards. She avoids you for the rest of the day, near tripping over herself, until you finally corner her and she admits, flushed, that she overheard. She asks you, disbelieving, if you were speaking the truth, and when you say yes, she sinks to the floor, completely melted by joy and embarrassment.

--

Spider is oblivious to who you're praising so highly, so when he comes over, curious about what you're gushing about, you snap your mouth shut. He immediately goes on the attack, pestering you to spill, repeating those praises (very loudly), until you have to nearly wrestle him to just back off. He, of course, learns the truth later, and just about dies laughing as you try to strangle him.

[friendlybowlofsoup]

Noticed the itch demo going up from the ol' email and stopped by to say hi! Writing the game while doing a doctorate is crazy, take all the time you need! Sending all the best of luck with your pursuits and all the love for a story that's always close to our hearts.

( ´ ▽ ` ).｡ｏ♡ Hello! Thank you for dropping by!

Thanks for your kind words, haha. Yeah, this program has absolutely destroyed my progress, but I'm really hoping to start picking it up again once boards is safely away.

[friendlybowlofsoup]

I wonder if you are taking reaction asks? If not, feel free to ignore (>w<) But if you are, how would the RO’s feel if they overheard MC absolutely gushing about them to someone else? Bonus points if MC is specifically complimentary/admiring of something theyre a bit insecure about !

Hehe, I wrote quite a few jealousy asks back in the day, and I feel like their reactions would still hold up!

Here is the jealousy tag with some goodies, as well as an extra post I didn't tag properly :DD

[friendlybowlofsoup]

I knowwww if MC teases Qiu about An and then goes and falls in love with her he is holding that over both of their heads for the rest of his fuckin LIFE. its not every day you get that kind of ammo handed to you on a silver platter

Oh Qiu Ko DREAMS for a chance like that.

Every time MC blushes and 👉👈 around An? Qiu is looming over them. An starts to fall for MC too? He starts cracking jokes about home-wrecking. Then once they actually get together, he's going to be SO insufferably smug for SO long.

I want to say he's pretty even-tempered as far as the cast goes, but he can hold some nasty grudges and he's always eager to one-up An (mutual feelings) (￣▽￣)

[friendlybowlofsoup]

Honestly only 1.5 years is not a lot left imo you're almost there, congrats!

That's true! Sometimes it feels infinitely long, but it's also probably going to zoom by before we know it (´ﾟωﾟ｀) thank you!

[friendlybowlofsoup]

That's so cool! I work reception for an optometrist and it's crazy how complicated the eyes are, I always think I could never do what the doctors do because they just know so much stuff and I could never remember it all lmao. But that's an awesome career! Good luck with the rest of your doctorate!

Oh wow, really!? What a coincidence! Yeah, I definitely underestimated how complex this field would be, but for all my whining about the schooling, it's definitely become a career I love. We moved into clinic care as students, and let me say, we truly appreciate the support from receptionists, opticians and techs because there's so much in the back and front end that we simply could not do without you guys 😭

Thank you so much for your encouragement, Nonnie, and I hope you take care too! ((o(^∇^)o))

[friendlybowlofsoup]

if its not too invasive, what school are you doing now? Undergrad? :00

(；゜∀゜) Unfortunately (or fortunately?), I've finished undergrad. I'm currently slogging through my doctorate for optometry... 1.5 more years....

[friendlybowlofsoup]

Will the mc be able to get cured of the curse in all routes or do we have to choose the specific one (or there is no cure at all)?

Thats a secret, Nonnie (ﾟ∀ﾟ )

But! I will assure you that every route has equal, or equivalent, outcomes, whatever they may be!

[friendlybowlofsoup]

congratulations on the twine demo release! i just replayed and even if it was just the prologue it kind of felt like coming back to an old friend ajdfjsd i'm so excited for the next chapters, and good luck with the rest of your port!

Thank you!! (T▽T) I will def continue to write (and transfer) as much as I can!