soubyou-blog

[soubyou-blog]

Sometimes he feels he’s drowning. It doesn’t make sense, when the time that’s always on his mind is a time where he was always burning in the sun, but it’s the only way he can describe it. Heat makes you sweat, fire makes you scream — water is a world where no one can hear you, where people are far away, even if they’re seconds away from you at the surface. It’s a world where even if nothing appears wrong he can’t breathe, even though he’s only surrounded by air. It’s where the right words never come out of his mouth, only meaningless bubbles. It’s where all he knows at night is the salt water coming from his eyes.

He hadn’t really thought about this being the world he’d escape to — it didn’t happen that way in superhero movies. When the bad guy went away, it was happily ever after. He always thought getting out of that place, anything would seriously be better, but...

                                                           He thought wrong, huh?

                                                          “Hibiya-kun!”

“A-ah...” His mind stalls. Stutters. As it seems to now too much. Though he thinks it really ought to be growing, it feels like parts of it are dying, working too slowly, summoning images he doesn’t want to see and feelings he can’t trust. Though at one time his feelings were the only thing he could, the one thing he could count on... he didn’t think he’d ever reach this point, but they’d become something even uglier than before, right?

                                                       Even though you got out just fine...

He swallows. His name is called again. “C-coming!” And he swallows again. The daylight is not something he thinks of happily anymore. Rather, this whole world seems like it could turn on him any time. Was that why his mind was never on it? Was that why he was constantly slipping off into sleep? Eleven years and he feels impossibly old, mismatched and unable to control this body of his.

“Hibiya-kun?” The voice this time is softer, having entered the room without him noticing. He flinches. Momo, for of course it is Momo, puts a hand on his shoulder, one which tenses under her touch. “Are you okay...? D’you feel sick?”

He can hear it in her voice, how ready she is to understand everything, to stay home with him, to excuse his weakness as if it’s the most natural thing in the world — perhaps because he is a child, perhaps because she is too generous, as she always has been. He shakes his head, taking a deep, slow breath, only just realising how quickly he’s been breathing until now. “I’m fine,” he says, staring at the wall as his thoughts echo, just go without me. I’ll hold you all back. Something in here is really, seriously wrong now, so...

He swallows that, along with everything, back. “N-no, no... I’m coming.”

[soubyou-blog]

super strong?!:

  At a level such as hers, defeating the enemies in the beginners region takes the whack of her staff and they crumble into dust. However, sometimes it’s those that are stuck in the early stages of the game that need assistance; seeing how players she’s helped in the past build guilds and become powerful is always a satisfying sight. 

  Travelling around the plains (there are ruins of buildings here, little reminders of the lore), it doesn’t take long to hear someone cry out. Turning her attention in the direction, she picks up her feet and hurries towards the source. Spotting the disturbance, Nanami feels a slight smile upon her lips at the sight. Yep, as expected… an inexperienced player with a weapon hard to master.

  Reaching striking range, she places her foot into the earth and pulls back with her staff. Body spins as she slams it into the side of the beast, sending its dust to scatter and disappear with the wind. With nothing else to defend the boy from around, she relaxes.

  “ Are you all right…? ”

He was already crying out, but the sudden motion — so quick it seems a blur, the dust whirling through the air enough to cough, what kind of thing is technology, seriously — makes him yelp louder, clutching at his bow as if holding it tighter would save him. Eyes that closed instinctively in expectation of an impact open warily as a thud is followed by silence, blinking dazed at a girl who is now, confusingly, talking to him.

She took out the monster, he realises — and his mouth drops open. “A-alright? I-I’m fine, but...” He stares into the empty space where the enemy had been. In all his time here, he hadn’t seen a player character move that fast, so he’d assumed it was a computer, but...

His head whips up to look at her, bow now lowered, but grasped ever tighter between his fingers. “Y-you took that thing out, right?! Like... how did you do that.” His eyes, which had previously been on the verge of sparkling, become deadpan with his voice, now mumbling. A drop of sweat, liquid awe, beads on his forehead. “Are you a moderator, or an NPC, or something...?”

[soubyou-blog]

dangerous person:

“Yeah, uh…. man, how do I do this… uh….”

  “Legal issues will make this even weirder, sorry… well, I’m here to grant wishes through the power of yellow. There. That’s out of the way.”

  Last time he talked to a kid, it ended in them running away screaming ‘Stranger danger! Stranger danger!’.

  “Might as well just… are you going to run away? I promise I’m not crazy.”

“Did you just say... legal issues?” Either this guy was totally oblivious to the outside world — more so than Hibiya himself, which was some feat — or he was trying to make him run away from him.

He takes a single step back, face slightly contorted, sure that this was some kind of demented kidnapper, from whom he’d never escape once he was in his clutches, yet — he stops, that word makes him stop. Wishes. His forehead furrows, watching him suspiciously. “What do you mean? What kind of wishes?”

Sure, he was probably crazy. But Hibiya had seen a lot of things that shouldn’t be real, and there was one thing he truly wished was.

[soubyou-blog]

how do i start on one of these things again? um the bad graphic aside ( i used comic sans?? ew gross) but thank you guys so much??? like i am so happy??? probably gonna cry later??? so here, I shall list all the lovely people and senpais i have

Keep reading

[soubyou-blog]

[ we’re still on hiatus, buuut! a small new year url change & clean up! ]

[soubyou-blog]

@tatatarata

Perhaps it was stupid to wander. No, he was stupid — he’d known that for more than a thousand years now, and his only saving grace was that he knew how idiotic he was. It wasn’t like this place went anywhere; it wasn’t exactly the same as the mirror of the city he’d seen over and over, but he wasn’t stupid enough to think it had a way out, even though the maze of streets eventually began to shrink and smooth themselves over. Past that city, what would he find? Not an exit, maybe, but... it wasn’t like he had any reason to think it wouldn’t be dangerous, was it?

It didn’t matter, anyway. No, it didn’t matter. He kind of knew he’d lived his last death.

It takes him several minutes — maybe hours, maybe years, what did it matter? — for him to realise the city wasn’t smoothing itself over at all. On the contrary, it seemed to be disappearing only because it was crumbling — the skyscrapers that were so imposing, so powerful, so terrifying... becoming dust, chunks of steel and concrete that slice into his foot. He winces. Maybe that means that he’s still human.

The sun beats down, never setting. How long he walks for, he doesn’t know, but his body doesn’t need to stop — his real body, after all... well, even if he doesn’t want to think about it, he knows where that is too. Do you think... how long has it been, down there? Rather, had he finally been burnt into a crisp, and had anyone cried to see it, or maybe Hiyori —

“U-ugh.” It’s a fatal mistake. There was a reason he hadn’t stopped moving, he knows now, as the lapse in his thought makes him lose his footing on the uneven ground, the energy seeping out of him. What was he doing, seriously? He wasn’t going anywhere. He wasn’t ever going to go anywhere. He was dead. He closes his eyes, feeling the tears welling up — who he stops them for, he doesn’t know, even as he somehow lifts his head and then his torso. His body is dusty, blood trickling from his knee. You really are an idiot. When was he going to give up?

His eyes shift up to the sky and then across the landscape, when he realises something is different. Someone is different. Someone is here. He squints, narrowing his eyes at what looked like another part of the debris, at first glance. Wobbling, he gets to his feet, beginning to pick his way over without taking his eyes off what is slowly beginning to look like a silhouette, tiny within a mass of wires. His heart begins to pound. He thinks, stupidly, that he’s forgotten how to talk to people. He blinks, eyes stinging from the dust. Once, twice. His gaze catches a head. Black hair, and pigtails —

                                                                                           “Hiyori?”

It isn’t Hiyori. Of course, it isn’t Hiyori — what would he do if it was? What good would he have done then? Suddenly cold, uneasy, he brings his arms up to hug himself, coming to a stop and staring up at the contraption. It was definitely a girl, quite a bit older than the one at the forefront of his mind. He closes his mouth. Swallows. And wets his tongue. Of course, it was much harder to say any word that wasn’t that name. This time, his voice is quiet, cracked. “You... who are you?”

[soubyou-blog]

lipt-97:

I feel rly sorry for you, kid

[soubyou-blog]

…Love breaks my bones and I laugh.

Charles Bukowski, Fingernails; Nostrils; Shoelaces  (via wordsnquotes)

[soubyou-blog]

At his doorstep is a framed drawing of Hibiya and Hiyori. It's well done, pen lines clean and the coloring filling in the lines perfectly. The artist name isn't on the paper, but there is one thing that may signify the identity behind the gift giver: '9'.

“Huh? This is...” He crouches down to pick up the frame, though he already has a bad feeling — it isn’t from Hiyori, he knows, and he doesn’t need to think very hard to figure out who’s responsible. This kind of drawing, after all... this number, that was stolen from someone else —

He grits his teeth. If it weren’t framed, he would have torn it up on the doorstep, no matter how much doing that to Hiyori’s face would have stung — yet his fingers fumble with unfamiliar latches, and he can’t open the back while his hands shake. “D... damn it!” That that guy would dare show up here, without even having the courage to show his face — well, perhaps he simply didn’t want to see the frame shatter as it was flung to the ground, door closing on it without a backwards glance, even as the tears well up. Hibiya’s bedroom door slams behind him, his mother’s calls ignored. Was that guy trying to ruin his birthday? Seriously, that was just like him.

Hibiya had never seen Konoha’s drawings himself, him having been missing at the time — but he’d been shown the illustration he’d done of him and Hiyori in retrospect, and the similarity of that image and the one in the frame haunts him now. “Konoha...” After the sun sets, with his parents occupied in the fields, he sneaks back out the front to take the frame back inside. He winces, fingers sliced by shards of glass. Yes, this really was like that person.

How foolish he has been.

[soubyou-blog]

"Happy birthday, Kid," she grinned, following to give him a hardy smack-on-the-back for the second year in a row. Continuing her tradition of giving him electronics vastly incomprehensible to his country-folk (albeit, still developing) brain, she hands him a tiny, recent generation Tomagatchi. This shouldn't be /as/ hard to figure out, right? "I gave one a these to Hiyori-chan a few years ago, you can pair them up and play together." She gave him a subtle wink. "Have a good birthday, Hibi-chan."

“W-wah!” It’s impossible to suppress a yelp when confronted with such a forceful ‘pat’, one which is quickly followed by a raising of the head and an indignant, “Stop doing that! Jeez…!” Frowning, he rubs his back, disgruntled as he takes the gift. The expression intensifies, mixed now with confusion, and the growing feeling that this was far too girly a toy. It was one of those pet things, right? He’d seen Hiyori playing with hers, and the excited reactions of their classmates, he supposed, were enough to give it some semblance of cool.

That observation, coupled with Takane’s wink, is enough to make it way, way, way beyond cool — cheeks turning quickly beetroot, he shoves the gadget in his pocket, turning his face away as he stutters out a response. “S-so what?! It’s not like that means anything…!” He sighs. It’s not like Takane, of all people, would believe any lies he spat out in that vein. He scratches the back of his neck. “Thanks, Ene-san.”

It was embarrassing, in more ways than one. To still be thought of by those who saved him from loneliness, after all this time… well, they’d never know, how important that was.

[soubyou-blog]

awkward guy?:

@amahibi

  “Uh… Hello there?”

  Ugh, how pathetic. After all this time, he still had virtually NO IDEA how to deal with kids. Every generation they just keep changing and changing and changing. How was he supposed to keep up?

  “Eh, it’s nice to meet you?”

“E-eh?” He looks up, squinting. What was this guy doing, sounding so hesitant? Seriously, he should be the one not knowing what to say, being approached so suddenly by someone so... weird looking. Hibiya steps back slightly.

“Um... yeah.” If this was some creep, he was ready to run fast. “Did you want something...?”

[soubyou-blog]

@vigilavi

It always seemed a good idea at the time. ‘This time for sure, she’ll have to notice me!’ Thoughts like that would push him towards some ambitious enterprise or another, though this was perhaps the biggest one yet. Who would have thought he’d get his parents to support buying such a thing anyway? It’s not something used for studying, it’s not something productive in the slightest, and, besides, even Hibiya was afraid of meeting suspicious old guys online — but he wasn’t going to question it. No, no, he’d soak up what mercy he could.

The game itself certainly wasn’t having any mercy on him, anyhow. It was to be expected from her, but Hiyori really must be skilled to be so famous in this place — seriously, he’d put in hours, and hours, yet going beyond the beginner’s area was far too scary. Believe him, he’d tried. But there was some kind of mechanic he didn’t understand needed for that, and he couldn’t get more than a few steps without fleeing.

“Urk... Hiyori... can’t ever see me like this!” In this kind of situation, he finds himself backed into a corner by some low level enemies, that she would surely be able to pulverise with grace. He raises his bow, struggling to line it up while moving back — how he’d gotten so close to this monster, he didn’t know. “Please, please...! Just die already...!”

[soubyou-blog]

You try too hard, and you end up having to stitch yourself up every time.

palestiniansunset (via wnq-writers)

[soubyou-blog]

Focus.

Happy birthday, Hibiya Amamiya.

[soubyou-blog]

(=ↀωↀ=)✧

[soubyou-blog]

girl:

@amahibi

  “ah…uhm, excuse me but…are you alright..?” seeing    as the city was struck with yet another heatwave, homura    couldn’t help but grow concerned when she saw the boy    stooped along a wall.

Sweat beads on the side of his face, as he breathes lightly in the heat, eyes drifting dully up at the sound of a voice. Honestly, he is tired — honestly, he is exhausted. He hasn’t stopped moving since he left the haze, and he hardly paused inside there. But... there was reason for that, and it was a reason he wasn’t going to forget, not in a thousand years.

“Yeah, I’m... fine.” It’s so obvious, so obvious — yet for Hiyori, it was nothing to lie.

[soubyou-blog]

[ i haven’t been here in ten years and you have probably all forgotten me but FOLKS!!! IT IS THE BIRTHDAY OF A VERY SPECIAL BABY CHILD AND I’M HERE TO CELEBRATE

i’ll be doing some old drafts and getting to some starters i owe to give my son the attention he deserves on this holy day. if you want a starter, feel free to like this while i’m at it!! ]