#I WANT THE FULL STORY BUT I DON'T WANT THE FULL SPOILERS SO I GOTTA PLAY THE STORY

[aparticularbandit]

In which I spent forty minutes stuck in the snow in the driveway and am now safely not halfway in the road anymore and, uh. Hey, look, I have suddenly some free time, LET'S DO THE 2-4 CASE TRIAL.

[donelywell]

Have you seen the Sonic 3 Trailer? Opinions?

DUDE I CAN'T WAIT FOR THE MOVIEEEEEEE!!!!

I'm gonna dress up to the eights (because I can never reach nines) and drag my friends to the movie theater with them kicking and screaming-

Cut because Movie Spoilers from the Trailer

SHADOW LOOKS SO COOOOLLL!!! AND TAILS WITH THE OVERSIZED HELMET AND KNUCKLES WITH THE FLAMES OF DISASTER- YEAHHHHHH!!!!

I heard some people get mad that it's not gonna be exactly like SA2- and I'm okay with that! They're doing their own thing and I find it interesting! Tbh I view the movies as an au rather than canon twisted a little to fit on the big screen- and as a person who owns an au, I like to mess around and throw the canon stories around to create a different story, something fresher for people who are already familiar with the canon stuff.

I'm a little upset that Amy or Rouge doesn't appear to be making an appearance in the movie- but I actually have some hopes that Amy gets her own show like Knuckles did! Like Amy going from zone to zone using her Tarot cards to try finding her destiny and stuff like that- it'd give the fans what they want, more Sonic zones being shown and Amy/ other characters showing up! (as for Rouge, I think she might be a human spy member of GUN, I dunno, her being a mobian working for GUN doesn't really make that much sense in this universe. Though still, I probably won't be too mad about her not being there)

There are already a lot of characters main and side in this story, and I think Sonic 2 showed us that introducing 2 new characters makes it a little hard to dive deeper into both of their character. So while it would be awesome for Amy, Rouge, and Shadow to show up in this movie, it would not give them enough time to flesh out as full characters in the movie.

I'm not gonna say that the people who are mad about it are invalid about their anger- please don't take it as that. I just generally try looking at the good in some things.

Overall- I'm excited! Dude Shadow was so cool in the trailer- and I got a lot of hope that it's gonna be good because Jim Carrey said he wasn't gonna be in it unless 'the script was written by an angel in golden ink'- and he's in it TWICE!

Like Shadow did the ritual of beating the shit out of Tails- we gotta keep the tradition alive! Keanu actually fits Shadow so well as a voice actor it's crazy- 'Well aren't you a colorful bunch' hahaha!!

Dude if Keanu Reeves and Jim Carrey are canon in the universe- is Ben Schwartz?

[kedreeva]

Went to see "Twisters" tonight and it was thoroughly enjoyable!

Some spoilers below the cut

Okay first of all, I'm extremely excited to say that they don't push a love triangle despite there being a girl MC and two main guys. One of them is an old friend who remains firmly an old friend, with no indication that he has romantic feelings. Like they get to be actual friends!!!!! And the other, while potentially a love interest, had just as much potential to be a friend instead, and in an extremely important (to me) way they do not kiss! I was shocked, actually. I expected them to pull out a "gotta have a kiss to appease the amatonormative folks" but nope! Not even in the little mid credit blurb. He stays the night at her childhood home with her and nothing happens. Like not even an awkward moment of tension, they don't even show them going to bed I don't think.

And I feel this to my bones, she was allowed to be the star. She changed her old friend's mind and gave him a chance to choose doing the right thing and he did it because he cared about her opinion of him and wanted to be who she thought he was. And the other guy found out she had dreams/goals of doing something and instead of taking them or doing it for her, he said what can I do to help you, and she chose to let him help her. It was so softly done!! And this guy, he was a full on attention hound with a YouTube channel and loves showing off and he's taking a press guy into the storms to do a story about how awesome he is at tornado wrangling. But when it comes down to it, he tells the reporter she's the real story AND SHE IS!! The article gets written about her instead!

The beginning was. A lot. You get introduced to the storm hunting group, and then immediately 3 of the 5 get killed and the MC almost does, all because she miscalculated. But you know what? She a) keeps her trauma and b) continues doing meteorology stuff, just from a safer distance. Like it's very clear that tornadoes are still this girl's passion, something she loves with every fiber of her being, but she's also been traumatized by losing her boyfriend and two of her closest friends (not to mention her dream project) and nearly her life, in one go. And even still it is something she literally can't stay away from, she still takes a job involved with them through data analysis, and you can practically feel it killing her at the start. The way she lights up at the mention of studying them more closely like she had wanted to, and that excitement immediately chased out by fear. It was nicely done.

They did a really nice thing with the music as well- PERFECTLY captured that kind of moment where the rest of the world drops away and all you can perceive for a moment or two is this thing you love so much it feels like time stops to let you love it more. Except she's looking at weather. At winds moving or clouds or tornadoes. Which is so cool of them to have done for her. This girl loves one thing and it's fuckin WEATHER.

The "villain" of the story is understated and they really don't waste time going into detail about it, which is great because the MC isn't really interested in finding out more about the real estate mogul capitalizing on the devastation. She just doesn't want her friend working for them anymore. She finds out he is, she draws a line in the sand and tells him he should be doing the right thing not the easy thing, and her friend takes her objection seriously and alters his behavior. And that's all the more they really get into that side of the story. Why waste time on it when there's more tornadoes to show? This movie did what Godzilla: King of Monsters failed to do- showed us the monster as much as possible and actually I do care about the people still because none of their problems were irrelevant, none of them were problems for the sake of having problems.

Anyway this movie was enjoyable to me. If you like weather phenomena, storm chasing, chaos, and actually interesting interpersonal relationships, go have a watch!

[makethosenarratorsfight]

UNRELIABLE NARRATORS; SEMI FINALS

*NOTE; propaganda is out of order due to the post length!

Eugenides Propaganda:

the entire plot hinges on a detail he lets the reader (and every other character) assume is true. I don't want to spoil it because it's a really fun reveal but he is lying from the first second he appears on the page and you can't trust him to tell the full truth about ANYTHING related to himself and his goals. he mostly does it to keep his advantage and not have other characters be suspicious of him but it's just so fun when you realise he's been lying the whole time

Kim Dokja Propaganda:

I haven't read orv but he's fucking gotta be from what I've osmosised

He tries to remove his emotions out of the narrative soooo much, literally the most repressed guy ever. Okay so for context orv is about how this guy, Kim Dokja, has been the only reader of an obscure post-apocalyptic webnovel for years and the novel suddenly becomes reality. And at first you'll probably get the weird impression that his behavior is pretty strange for, you know, a literal apocalypse happening in his world - like yes, he is concerned with survival but he doesn't seem all that scared and he kinda treats it like a video game where he has to grind to make himself stronger and he also treats his companions like a party in an rpg. Then there's also the way he approaches the protagonist of the webnovel, from the start he just kind of describes him as a ruthless psychopath and jerk that is unfortunately a pretty useful ally. And also there's the fact that he carefully omits any mention of his past and when somebody asks if he's worried about his family when the apocalypse starts he just kinda... brushes it off? Anyway so yeah, this bastard is definitely traumatized, although I don't know how much of spoiler territory that would be, considering the fact that literally when he first reveals his trauma he's also unreliable about it. And turns out he does indeed, care A LOT about this world and the people around him. Because well, he kinda didn't care to mention that this webnovel that has become reality was like... literally his whole world before it literally became his whole world. Like, it was the only thing keeping him going for 10+ years and the protagonist that he likes to call a stupid jerk was his comfort character who he pretended to be when he felt like he couldn't handle something in his life by being himself. The protagonist is also canonically the person he loves the most according to a prophecy and he literally can't fathom the thought of him dying, even the timeline versions of him that directly oppose him. And I haven't even mentioned the Fourth Wall yet but I feel like this propaganda is a little long already

misreading the intentions of his companion (yoo joonghyuk) so many time.

YOU DON'T UNDERSTANDDD DOKJA IS SUCH A UNRELIABLE NARRATORRRRRR GOD I COULD WRITE AN ESSAY BUT I KNOW YOU LOVE DOKJA TOO BUT OMG HE'S JUST SO AAAAAAAAAAAH

Rest of Propaganda under cut!

he is the worst like actually. he starts the story talking about how normal and average he is. he is not. he is constantly mischaracterizing his friends and he's so good at lying to the readers that you don't even realize it at first. almost every single time he cries we have to be told by other characters because he never says it himself. there is literally a scene where his narration says "i wasn't crying" and then the in-universe entity that narrates the actions of people (orv is really weird and meta) says that he was, in fact, crying. honestly genuinely anything he says about himself (or doesn't say) cannot be trusted. he is just so frustrating. he drives me mad. i love him dearly. but he drives me so mad.

Dictionary definition of unreliable narrator. Does not tell the reader anything and then things happen and he's like oh yeah btw there was also this and this earlier but i just didn't feel like mentioning it. There's even a thing called the "Fourth Wall" that is able to see through kdj's bs so occasionally you get gems like,

Kim Dokja: I didn't cry

The Fourth Wall: [Kim Dokja was crying]

Imagine being so unreliable as a narrator you need a more powerful narrator to call out the actual narrator.

^ same submission, just spacing it out

This goes into spoiler territory, but; Kim Dokja is in possession of a skill called the Fourth Wall, which on the surface seems like it appears because he read the book that reverse-isekai’d into his own. However, as the story goes on it becomes clear that it’s pretty much a souped up version of his pre-existing dissociation. You cannot trust him to be honest about his feelings, his past traumas or his feelings about his past traumas, not to mention his tendency to just outright omit information that only gets revealed later on either when it becomes relevant or when an outsider POV reveals what’s actually happening.

Exhibit A: he says (in 1st person POV) that he’s not crying. The Fourth Wall immediately contradicts this (as it is literally words of the novel) by saying (in 3rd person POV) ‘Kim Dokja was crying’.

Exhibit B: Fails to mention entire actions when it shows him emotionally honest even in the slightest; we had to read from another character entirely when Kim Dokja was being physically affectionate with his companion. It’s so bad that there’s this entire paragraph about Kim Dokja describing himself hiding his eyes in his hands in jerky, weirdly specific detail and just AVOIDING EVERY WORD THAT MIGHT SHOW HE’S CRYING. The brilliance of ORV is that when you re-read the entire thing you get hints that ‘yes, this WAS hinted at the entire time’ but you have to dig it out of Kim Dokja’s repressed, depressed self-hating internal dialogue with your own two hands.

^ same submission, spacing it out (i really should've done this earlier.)

i am a simple man (not a man). i see a tumblr text post with the words “unreliable narrator in it”. i read nothing else. i reblog & tag #kim dokja okay but in all seriousness i’m just going with the musty basic example: so there’s this moment where he sacrifices himself to save this guy. as he lays on the ground bleeding out, he says “hey, you don’t like me, right? you should kill me to get some money” the guy says “no kim dokja i cant do that (going through the five stages of grief except there’s only one and it’s anger)” the constellations (twitch viewers irl) are like omg he (the guy) doesn’t want to kill his companion (kim dokja) and shower him (the guy) with money kim dokja: oh, he’s not killing me for the money. smart!

as i quote a brilliant youtube video (all of omniscient reader’s viewpoint in 6 minutes) “yoo joonghyuk sees kim dokja as a c_____”

yoo joonghyuk: companion

kim dokja: cunt

^ same submission, once again. spacing it out.

Hides his true feelings, tells the readers what he thinks is convenient for the plot and that his own personal feelings don’t matter or are not so significant. Has unreliable thoughts abt his companion and is a liar. And is also an omniscient reader.

Kim Dokja always perceived his companions in this like nonchalant way like “oh yeah we get along but really we’re just fighting to survive (apocalypse setting) it doesn’t run that deep” when they all do genuinely care for him and he does in turn. He just, doesn’t think of it as an equal relationship? Dokja’ll sacrifice a lot for them but will get seriously flabbergasted if they do the same thing, so fricking problematic. Not to mention Yoo Joonghyuk, his “Life and Death Companion” (read: husband). Kim Dokja always seems to think that Joonghyuk has it out for him, which is kinda true, but he is literally blind to the fact that he’s attached to him. Like, it’s so obvious??? Also they have hella sexual tension but that’s another thing entirely

se get some many pov changes where kdj in his pov just assumed things based on what he knew the characters would do. however because of his interference the characters have changed and he wouldn’t know that if it hit him in the face

He's an unreliable narrator because he lies to himself and thus the audience. He literally rewrote his own childhood core memory. If someone says, "this guy is my friend!" He will go through so many hoola hoops in his mind just to rationalize it. Because he fundamentally believe that no one could love him and even if they did they couldn't know him and he's just gonna hurt them. He cries sometimes in canon but a lot of those times it's not even mentioned as crying he's that unreliable of a narrator. No joke, one time this guys he has a gay thing with called him his "companion" to someone who had just killed him (long story) and this bitch thought "oh wow he's doing it for the coins (another long story) he's so smart i wish I'd thought to that. He's terrible. He literally has an exchange with something called the Fourth Wall (an even longer story) where it said "you're crying" and he said "no I'm not" but he was crying. He makes me insane because the reader is supposed to project onto him. He made me see how much of an unreliable narrator I WAS. ORV is just like that tho.

[harusaki-hugo]

Hello! I uhm wanted to ask you if we can get another part of being like takemitches twin? Like specifically how the other gangs would react to you fighting and being a girl? Thank you 🫶💗

Fandom; Tokyo Revengers

Hcs; What's it's like to be Tokyo Revengers younger/older siblings .

Note; i didn't expect it to be this popular lmao. Also. warning might contain some spoiler for those who just start the anime. i thought about putting brahman too but it's still not out in anime yet. Also, you can my favorite and my least favorite here XD.

Being Takemichi twin sister part two:-

Black Dragon:

You just want to have one day without you being drag into Takemichi problem but no, you got a call from Takuya saying Takemichi got his ass beaten in church.

Just one day, but no, seem like holy spirit want to see you suffering because your mom told you to drag Takemichi back home so you guys can have dinner together.

So here you are, ignoring the fight happening around you as you go straight to the church. Yamagishi about to cheer your name when he sees the pissed expression on your face, and he start praying for taiju.

Imagine Taiju who about to punch Yuzuha stop when someone push the door open and yell out, "Hanagaki Takemichi!!" and Takemichi like, "Oh shit, full name. I f*ck up."

Inui already know who you are, he sees you dragging Takemichi back home one day by ear. See, he once tries to stop you since he wants to talk to Takemichi but you kick him between his legs, so he politely steps aside to avoid not able to produce heir anymore.

But Taiju is another story, he sneers at you and stop you from taking another step, "who the hell are you, can you see that-"

Just before he can say anything, you rush toward him, Taiju let out a small gasp not expecting you to rush head on. He throws a right punch, but you slip underneath him, clenching your left fist you aim for his family jewel and punch it hard that all male in the church share the same pain.

Taiju falls on the ground holding his crotch, he lifts his head up to yell at you, but you already pull your arm back, without any mercy you start repeatedly punching Taiju in the face, not giving him a chance to recover.

Inui now start thinking whether he should just join toman as he stares at you beating the shit out of Taiju, Kokonoi have a second thought about this event. And Taiju, he, well might need a ride to hospital.

"Takemichi sister is stronger than him." Inui say as he looks at you drag your brother away, " Wait, what?" Koko look at Inui with a wide eye, "Oh right, that's [name], takemichi twin sister." Yuzuha looks at the unconscious Taiju, "Well, damn. I think i like her more now."

Overal: Yuzuha now has a girl crush, Inui start planning on calling takemichi brother-in-law, Kokonoi will literally buy you anything because Inui like you, Taiju has a second thought; wondering if his siblings as strong as you will he end up in hospital sooner?

Bonus: Mikey who about to help the other stare in confusion when he sees you dragging Takemichi out by an ear, yelling and scolding him. He peeks inside the church and see Taiju laying on the floor, beaten up to pulp. "Gotta marry her someday." He thought.

Tenjiku:

Izana knows about you because Mikey like you, so he thought about, why don't we have a chat with you for a bit.

On your way back home from school, you see a group of males hogging around in front of your house. Curious you step closer to them and ask why they here.

Haitani brothers point out at how similar you are to Takemichi, which you answer with duh, obviously. But then you see Kakucho and you recognize him, you greet him saying it's been long time since last you see him. kakucho can't help but blush when you step closer to him because he *cough*haveacrushonyouonce*cough*.

Izana notice this obviously want the best for his servant and take the lead, he asks you a few questions. Mostly about your relationship with Mikey. Which the answers are no.

You sigh and tell them to leave you alone since you are not really an official member of Toman. You about to walk away when Ran stop you, without much thought you flip Ran over your shoulder making him crash on the ground.

Silence. Pure silence.

Izana being curious piece of art he is wanted to test your strength because why not? When you busy apologize to stunned Ran, Izana throws a fake punch at you, but you dodge it by reflex. Oh, now he really interested.

You two start fighting, well, more like you dodging and he is attacking. Much to the other surprise you manage to dodge every single one of it.

"What are you guys doing?" Takemichi who just come back from meeting Mikey look at you guys confusedly and worryingly.

You two stop the fight because Takemichi ruin the fun, izana word not you. Izana whisper something toward you before he walks away with the other following him.

'If Mikey want you then i want you too.' is what he whispers and you like, wtf? aren't you like eighteen? red flags much?

"[Name] never change. She still looks like her brother." Kakucho said out loud making them all look at him. "...That's a girl?" Izana asks, "Yeah? Don't you see she wear girl uniform?"-"...Well, damn!"

Overall: stay away from izana if you want to survive, kakucho want to see you again and maybe you two can get a drink together, Ran is intrigue and wonder if you are stronger than you look and Rindou wonder if you willing to go out with him.

[ourlittleuluru]

Okay I gotta yap about the new Lost Signal memory as it just became claimable because the storyyyyyyy 😭 It's so good???? I love it so much.

In general,

I CAN'T STOP LAUGHING 😭 The script they have to readddd

And the voice acting! Good stuff! 🤣 XAVIER SOUNDS SO STIFF. The voice actors really did a good job, humu humu (/≧▽≦)

Overall story line is just... the two of them sharing some flirty moments but also action! and then the little goofy moments near the end too! (The BGM just adds so much to it) and i love it!

Gonna put the more specific stuff under the read-more (ヘ･_･)ヘ┳━┳ because there's like one specific detail that's interesting. Nothing that's too mind-blowing. 😅 (also spoilers, yep)

Him still asking for consent 🥺 even when it's not an actual kiss.... Just reminds me of the 21 days trailer, where he does the same

and then... of course, there's a whole action sequence! Because that's what this card is all about. AND I mean, I can't help it. Gotta love a battle couple. Though, after all that is said and done...

XAVIER SIR

I KNOW YOU RICH BUT DON'T??? 😭😭😭 he really just... He sounds soooo regretful and really wanted to make it up 🥺 But let the companies go through this with the right processes and procedures first??

But Mr Manager is quite the opportunist X'D

Um... Manager-san???? Xavi??? Really?? You call Xavier "Xavi" and "Xav"??? 🤣 in CN it sounded less awkward. But usually Xavier's nickname by "older" people is 小沈, but the Mane-san called him 小回 after Xavier tried to say his full name 😭 so cute????

Like... what, Xavier??? What are you gonna do??? Destroy more railcar windows???? 😭😭😭😭 Sleep constantly on the job????

First thing... "too BROKE to cook".... Haeh??? Broke? Cook? Xavier? What are you up to??? - was my first thought. Second was just him trying to find an excuse to be with MC... but the real reason... is in the later part

Okay but this whole part also has me cackling 🤣 MC please... your denseness! But Xavier still feeling so darn guilty!! (but one thing here. IDK why, in CN the broadcaster does say "ST" as the donator. Though in EN, the broadcaster says "X" so... not sure why the sub in EN isn't following the EN script :v;;; just localization things, I guess)

MC.... ALL THAT MONEY WAS XAVIER'S 🤣😭 Man is trying to fix his OWN mistakes

but the fact he donated for 15 years... so he pretty much started donating since the Chronorift Catastrophe (or about a year before that) 🤔 aside from running around as Lumiere... Interesting detail to note!

Xavier's habit of scratching his nose when he feels awkward or needs to dodge a conversation topic 🥺💕 (But MC... you're both praising Xavier and dissing him at the same time.... 😂)

Okay... I think this is all for my ramblings??? I'll add on if I happen to catch anything else then. Until then... I'll just listen to this over and over...

Aight, Chu, Signing out! (￣^￣)ゞ

[suellenalmeida]

Thoughts on The Bear s3

Not positive ones, i have to say. If this season was, instead, the first one, I don't think I would keep on watching.

(spoilers ahead)

The cinematography and OST are gorgeous. The season is full of dramatic scenes to push the actors towards amazing performances. In that, it delivered to me. There are moments of brilliancy here (the heart dish, I mean, DEAD). But I think Storer got caught up in the awards obsession because everything else - plot, characters development- it's a mess.

it's not hard to pinpoint things that felt wrong to me, because they are many. To list some:

- Carmy and Syd: The lack of coherence of it all. She stops his panic attacks and calms him down in the kitchen, acts as buffer so he doesn't send everyone away with his temper, but it's Claire who supposedly is peace (lol). Carmy is doing all this for the star, that only Syd said she wants, and they have few interactions.

-Freaking Faks: felt forced, barely comedic and borderline annoying

-Saint Claire of lost causes: i believe we gotta stop at some point with the mental gymnastics to explain why her character is so stereotypically and shallowly written. Imo, there's no bigger plan. It's badly written. We are suppose to believe she's perfection encarnated and everybody loves her. Even though there's not one dialogue from her that feels coming from a real person. That monday quote, the story about the injured girl, the whispering again... unforgivable.

- Flashbacks galore: in the first episode, it was so well used. But it became a problem when you gotta sustain the narrative on flashs of the past the whole time.

- It drags: the season drags. The developments we saw previously are somewhat lost (Richie, my god) or not continued. We learned nothing more about the restaurant family, except for Tina (amazing episode, btw).

I could go on and on, but i'll let my thoughts rest.

[anistarrose]

taz balance one-shot recs!

I've been meaning to make this post for a while now, so here we are! The majority of these are from the past three years or so, because I love a fandom classic as much as anyone, but I particularly want to shine a light on some gems from after the peak of traffic in the fandom tags! There are of course also exceptions that are older, though.

Also, April 19th-21st are Just Leave a Comment Fest, so please show these authors some love!! They're all so deserving!

a recipe for home by @journalofimprobablethings: Taako tries to cook for the first time since Glamour Springs. When things go awry, Lucretia is there to lend a hand.

Gen (Taako & Lucretia), 3.5k. Early B.O.B. era hurt/comfort centered around cooking, with a delicious dollop of sentimentality and dramatic irony on top.

Seven Times Magnus Burnsides Gave Someone A Hug + One Time He Received One by @barry-j-blupjeans: Magnus wasn't really any good at— at words. He was more of an action man. Or, y'know, a "I'll take this hit so you don't have to" man. Talking to someone about their feelings was all kinds of weird, so usually he just left the space for someone else to talk. And, well... Magnus wasn't good at words. But there's a few different ways to get his support across.

Mostly gen with some Magnulia, 8.6k. You've all heard of the classic 5 Plus 1, but obviously Magnus deserves a 7 Plus 1! I don't know how to describe it without spoilers other than being full of incredibly sweet, gentle takes on so many fraught or bittersweet moments. Super underrated, do give it a read.

Embrace the Dark by @ceilingfan5: Bookstore coworkers Kravitz and Taako get more than they bargained for when Taako tries to use his powers to fix Kravitz's migraine. But it's okay--it's an excuse for them to spend time together until one of them can nut up and ask the other out.

Taakitz, 8.9k. Modern with Superpowers AU! Super sweet interactions between Kravitz and Taako, paired with lots of fun background worldbuilding. And, of course, a very special grilled cheese sandwich.

Break This Heavy Chain by Punka_Writes: In the immediate aftermath of Story and Song, Barry Bluejeans could really use a hug.

Blupjeans and misc. platonic interactions, 2.3k. The absolute epitome of comfort food in written form, with excellent Barry characterization (and of course, he does get that hug)!

birds of a feather steal sweaters together by @holdmecloser-gandydancer: When you're a big, burly guy it seems that your clothes just become free reign for all your friends. Normally Magnus is a reasonable guy, but everyone has their limits.

Gen (IPRE crew), 1.9k. Starblaster era fluff! Everyone is written absolutely delightfully, and every time I read it I snort out loud at least twice.

Security by @ceilingfan5: Barry has finally made it--his incredible scientific discovery has landed him a huge fortune...and a lot of problems. The only good thing that's come of it, honestly, has been his bodyguard, Lup. (And the science. That's good also.) He's just gotta stay normal about how nice it is to have someone like Lup around, and also not perish by way of press circuit, and everything will be fine.

Blupjeans, 6k. Modern with magic AU from Barry's POV, featuring equal parts anxiety and pining. Also, it's straight-up extremely funny.

Lonesome Dreams by @jerreeeeeee: Taako wakes up one morning from a nightmare, fast fading. There was a guy in glasses, and they were… somewhere high up? Something terrible happened, but he doesn’t remember. He wakes up in a wagon he’s never seen before, but it has his name on it. There’s tons of food inside, more than he’d be able to afford. And he’s alone. Thinking back to the last thing he remembers is difficult. College? No, he’d graduated. Top of his class, obviously, he remembers that. But what- what happened after? Where is Lup?

Gen (Taako & Lup), 10.2k. Everything starts out the same, except Taako remembers Lup, even if not how she went missing, and it's incredibly underrated and full of phenomenal characterization. I won't spoil how things shake out, but it's a great emotional ride and I genuinely reread it all the time.

it's my party and I'll mope if I want to by @holdmecloser-gandydancer: Taako's birthday is just another Thursday. A detective and an old friend have a different idea.

Gen (Taako & Lucretia & Angus), 2.1k. Short and so sweet! Fics about voidfished!Taako's birthday never get old, and this is one of my absolute favorites. Nailing the angst-to-wholesome ratio.

Tedious Familiarity by @barry-j-blupjeans: Déjà vu. Noun. A feeling of having already experienced the present situation. A tedious familiarity. Barry Bluejeans woke up in a cave, fresh out of a pod filled with green goop, and saddled with an unsettling feeling that he had been here before. If you had asked forty-year-old Barry if he would follow instructions left by a talking coin, he probably would have asked you what type of drugs you were on. But, y’know, fifty… two? Fifty-one? How old was he? Fifty-two sounded right. But, y’know, fifty-two years old Barry didn’t really have that many other places to turn, so this couldn't be all that bad.

Gen, 4.1k. Missing scenes based off Barry's decade alone, written in such an effective style, where all the little details truly make it. Mandatory reading for fellow Barry angst enjoyers.

Angus McDonald and the Wonderland Escape Rooms by coppersunshine: When Angus gets grounded from detecting, to keep his skills sharp he becomes a patron of the Wonderland Escape rooms, run by Edward and Lydia, who quickly decide he's their new nemesis. To their surprise, Angus and the collection of weird adults he's accompanied by decide otherwise.

Gen (Angus & Edward & Lydia), 7k. Modern with magic AU, putting Edward and Lydia in the absolute funniest possible job, at which a little boy detective torments... and maybe, even gives them a chance to turn over a new leaf. I am of the opinion that Angus and the Wonderland twins have a criminally underexplored dynamic, and this fic gave me everything I wanted.

If the Sun and Moon Should Doubt by Punka_Writes: Merle Highchurch, on the brink of a bad decision.

Gen, 1.6k. Merle character study immediately before running out on his marriage. Truly the incredible characterization that Merle deserves; this was a fic that really ignited my love for him.

Greensleeves by @sgrumby: Kravitz has never seen a lich like this before, and he's seen a lot of liches. Merle is just trying to save the universe, thanks very much.

Gen (Kravitz & Merle), 2.2k. A unique and also absolutely genius Lich!Merle AU where Kravitz inevitably comes after him, and Merle is... well, the Peacemaker, of course!

[maeve-is-annoying-about-books]

I didn't really wanna talk ahead of the Dungeon Meshi anime but I had this thought bugging me as I was skimming the manga. So, spoilers for what's to come.

I don't think it's any coincidence that Laios' party, out of a cast of infinitely more capable people, makes it to the final floor of the Dungeon. Why? Cause they aren't heroes.

Look at Kabru, he's the poster boy for anime protagonists. He has a tragic backstory, a personal beef with the dungeon, skills trained by a master of the crafts, and a large party who seems genuinely friendly together. He has everything going for him to one day dive to the bottom and gain closure for his story but he just can't. He never will, because the dungeon does not work on his logic. It turns out that there is no plot armor against hearing a siren sing for the first time.

What about Mithrun then? Personally wronged by the Demon, he's the paradigm of vengeance. A tragic hero who will do anything it takes to get to his goal and probably die achieving it. He has a party full of dark history and interesting dynamics, really laden with moral greyness. Not Berserk but a step closer to it than Kabru's story. But he is, unfortunately, also a classic hero archetype, and although his skills are impressive they aren't fit for the ecosystem around him, singleminded vengeance will see you killed by changelings, the cold, or starvation.

Shuro, it's gotta be Shuro right? A man from a distant land but a familiar one to the primary readerbase. He goes back to train, hone his mind, collect a party, and save the love interest from a cruel fate. Perhaps he will learn there is no saving her, and tragically be forced to slay the monster she's become. His journey ends the second Faligon dies, so he has no chance, ever, of becoming the Dungeon Lord. There doesn't need to be any extra traps to deter him, he'll get what he wants at the fourth level and be gone, his desire simply isn't pointed that way.

Laios, on the other hand. None of his party are heroes, they're all here for selfish reasons and have absolutely zero illusions about heroics and greater goods. Laios is here to save Falin, he only wants his sister to be safe. And to eat and document monsters. Marcille is here for forbidden magic and Falin, and her two desires coincide with her resurrection. Chilchuck is here because he got paid up front and can't leave without rumors spreading. Senshi was always here and he just wants to live in peace with nature. None of them have heroic intent, broadly. But it also means they don't have heroic conceit either.

Laios' party will eat anything. They'll run from battle, take shortcuts. They treat monsters not as grand challenges to overcome but something to fight for their lives with. With their teeth if need be. There is no honor here there is only living. Honor gets you strangled by treasure bugs. Revenge will see you abandon your party to giant spiders for the mere shot at your target. Duty sees you skipping meals because your goal is so important. It is striking how different the dungeon is between Laios and the others. They all treat the dungeon as their personal hell to be striven against and conquered, only Laios sees it as an extension of the living world and understands his place in it. And I think that is so fucking cool, it's so multifaceted. Like, their exact skill set is perfect for getting through the dungeon because of how they all treat it. But also because the dungeon wants them there, because they have very personal, strong desires. Desires that shape their skills, and desires shaped by their skills in a kind of Ouroboros.

And it's an interesting question of how much of both factors into their progress in the story.

[mohgreal]

I looked into a few spoilers and watched a fight with Radahn/Miquella and I gotta say that Mohg didn't deserved to be used as a husk for any of this

Like all of this doesn't make sense to me lore wise, story wise and the final fight itself looks like a reused asset...

I may be wrong of course, because there is not enough information about Miquella's plan fully, but for now I'm just extremely confused

Gonna go cope now by drawing Mohg's and Malenia's fanarts where everything is well and fine😔

Anyway sorry about the rambling, just wanted to talk about the dlc thing with someone and since we are mutuals I thought you wouldn't mind

U can ignore and delete this ask if you want, sorry for bothering, hope you have a good day!!

First of all, never apologise for yapping to me thats the entire point of my account sdiwbfjx

And yeah, the so called so called "plot twist" being a popular theory sucks. Like what did Mohg do ?? Have a cool outfit?? Honestly I would rather suffer through the "mohglester" and slander then this. It does make him more sympathetic, but also kinda boring.

The fight really does feel like it was made a day before, someone on reddit thats a game dev made a whole long ass reply of how theyre certain thats what happened.

Anyway I dont really have the *full* scoop of lore info since I havent played the DLC yet because my laptop broke, I do still think it's a shitty way to end both Miquella's arc, Mohg's arc, Radahn's arc that was supposed to be finished, and as well as a shitty way to end the dlc. I know fromsoftware simps will just tell me to cope but like, its so bad. Im not sorry because it makes zero sense, looks bad, and the fight feels reused and boring.

I do think we should all collectively cope, (mostly me and the pre dlc miquella enjoyers) which i plan to do by writing whatever. I want to play something else to get my mind off all the sote issues but im too hyperfixated and once again I don't have the laptop to play anything on whoops

conclusion always ramble to mohgreal

[astral--horrorshow]

Around-The-Clock Shadows

Platonic Yandere ROTTMNT x Reader

Info: This will be a full-length fic including multiple ROTTMNT characters, the main storyline revolves around the Mad Dogs.

Fic Summary: You sure are likeable, aren't you?

Chapter 1: Preparations and Purple Dragons

Characters: Kendra, Jase, Jeremy, Donatello, Raphael, Michaelangelo, Leonardo

A/N: Kicking off the first day of my summer break with a fic! I've been working on this for a while now, so I hope you like it! Apologies for the short length and any bad writing! I was very inspired by @yanteetle , @pianocat939 , @yanyanderes , and @yandere-toons ! (edit: @oleander-nin too!!)

If you want to be added to a taglist, just say the word! If you want to draw fanart or make anything based off of this, I would be literally honored. Please don't be shy, I will love whatever you make! If you have any questions about the fic, feel free to ask!

TW: Kidnapping plans, toxic relationships, stalking, Jase gets kicked in the shin (spoiler: it's Kendra), attempted(?) peer pressure, Leo and Donnie are creepers.

I do not condone any of the behaviors found or done in this fic. This story is purely for entertainment purposes. If you or someone you know is being treated like this, please contact the authorities.

Please Reblog writer's work!

Chapter Summary: You hang out with the Purple Dragons, and the Hamato brothers prepare for your arrival.

Word Count: 1166

☆~☆~☆

Kendra had her hand on the back of your neck, leading you further into the Purple Dragon's closed-off corner of the computer lab.

"And this is the Dragon's Tooth," she said as she pointed to a large, circular table with a small, green device suspended in a glass tube.

"Oooo!" You leaned towards it in curiosity, careful to not get too close to the lasers, "What does it do?" Before Kendra could answer you, Jase rushed over and started to explain with a speedy voice, "The Dragon's Tooth is a military-grade piece of technology that- ow!"

Kendra had kicked him in the shin. Hard. From what you had known about her, she didn't like to be interuppted.

"Shut up, Jase," Kendra snapped.

Jase kneeled on the ground on one leg, rubbing the kicked one with a grimace on his angular face. You reached out to him, but Kendra casually pulled you by the collar of your shirt next to her, placing her hand on the back of the neck you craned to see if Jase was okay and pushed you along yet again.

Your watch suddenly let out a long, piercing beep, which caused your gaze to turn to the plastic screen.

"Oh, I need to get home!" You exclaimed, rushing from Kendra to grab your bag.

"Awh, c'mon, can't you stay a little longer?" Jeremy strolled towards you along with the rest of the Purple Dragons. You were, quite literally, cornered by them, but you still persisted in your quest to return home.

"But I really gotta leave! I'll see you tommorow!" You rushed out, waving to the students strung up by their knickers outside their tech cubbyhole. The Purple Dragons didn't pursue, looking at the silent, red device on the collar of shirt in a cocktails of smugness and satisfaction (mostly from Kendra) and slight guilt of invading your privacy (mostly Jase).

You rushed to the bike racks as soon as you came out of the double doors of the High School. Going to unlock your bike, you spotted a figure in purple slink down an alleyway.

You pulled up to your residence, locking your bike and unlocking the door to your home. Taking off your shoes, and setting your bag down on your bed, you flopped down onto the carpet, feeling the rough material rubbing against your cheek. Despite it grating against your face, you found a sense of comfort in the act. You turned towards your bed, focusing on the underside. Stuck to one of the nails of the supports, was a bright orange piece of cloth. You reached out your arm, grabbing the fabric between your fingers. It was a bit worn, but perfectly clean otherwise. How odd, you didn't remember having any clothes like that.

☆~☆~☆

You opened the freezer door, shivering at the blast of cold air hitting your face. You grabbed the ice cream container as fast you could, and gingerly closed the freezer as to not wake up your family. As you sucked the spoon free of the frozen treat, you gazed at the moonlight filtering through your kitchen. There were a few clouds, but otherwise it was clear. You couldn't see the stars, though. Not in New York City, where lights and air pollution thrive. Putting the ice cream back, (you couldn't eat so much to the point where it would be noticeable) you pulled your blanket tighter around your shoulders and tiptoed back to your bedroom. You buried yourself under the warm covers, a welcome respite from the cold, and closed your eyes, unaware of the being outside your window.

Leonardo chuckled to himself, and propped his elbows up on the windowstill. He watched you cutely snuggle your pillow, your cheek squishing against it. The only thing he wanted was to pinch and squish them 'till they got numb, but bringing you home sooner than planned would make the rest of your new brothers irritated at him. You fell asleep almost immediately, you must've been so tired, poor baby. He pulled out his phone, and dialed a number.

"Hey, Don- what? Yeah, I know it's late. Don't shout at me right now. Yeah, add ice cream to the list."

☆~☆~☆

Mikey skipped into the room, holding a pair of slippers in his hand. He set them down near the bed just as Donatello finished spreading a thick, fluffy blanket on it.

"Ah, thank you, Michael," Donnie spoke upon seeing Mikey with the slippers.

"Anything for them!" Mikey squealed, obviously shaking with excitement.

"Hey, party people," Leo casually called out as he strolled into the room, holding his ōdachi over his shoulders like they were regular sticks instead of mystical, deadly weapons. Upon the red-earned sliders entrance, Donnie turned and glared.

"Leo, I don't see why you had to call me at exactly 2:38 AM last night. It could've waited until morning."

"What?" Leo pulled his hand to his chest in mock indignation, "And not complete the list? I swear, it's like you don't even want them to be happy here!"

"Of course I do!"

Before their squabble could turn into a full-on argument, Raph burst in the room with a number of plushies of different shapes, sizes, and colors in his arms, which he started to arrange on the bed. Donnie sauntered away from Leo to help Raph in an attempt to keep his temper under control, and Mikey arranged things around the room. Leo slumped his shoulders, made a portal with a single slash of his ōdachi, and fell backwards into it.

☆~☆~☆

Donatello typed on his keyboard, occasionally turning his gaze to the other screens, which had a plethora of security cameras, locations of trackers, and information displayed on them. "Occasionally" being every few seconds. Eventually, he gave up on his coding and leaned back to soak up all the information on you and blue light the multiple moniters could give him. He was the number one expert on you, which he had to be if you were going to be happy in the Lair. He was also going to be your older brother soon, which meant he had to make up for all the missing years. You didn't know how much you needed them all, but you would soon. Very, very soon. A ping from his phone pulled him from his obsessive thoughts. He had sent S.H.E.L.L.D.O.N to guard you throughout the day when he or his brothers couldn't do it themselves. His eyes widened to saucers when he saw the feed from his creation.

You, standing there. With the Purple Dragons. Talking to you. Touching you. The Purple Dragons. You, oblivious to their danger.

Donnie leapt up from his chair and sprinted toward the door, racing through the halls. He wouldn't let that horrible, deceiving, Kendra and her flunkies take advantage of you. Over his dead body.

"I'll be there very soon," he thought, "Wait for me just a little longer.

I'll save you."

☆~☆~☆

A/N: *chuckles* you're in danger.

[fluffygiraffe]

So, I saw your Puzzlevision Jr. AU and I can say that he's so adorable! What is his story in the Puzzlevision Jr. AU?

Puzzlevison Junior! Full Lore! CW; Spoilers!

Mr. Puzzles never grew out of Children's TV shows, but accidentally seeing a violent one scared him. That show was why he felt he should cut off his head and put a TV there. He's less violent, nicer, and probably acts more childish. Probably has better intentions, making the world a better place and safer for children of all ages! The shows he'd make the cast would be more story-book, cookie-cutter, happy, and less violent. In the movie, when he realizes Mario has run away, he tries to get him to come back in the nicest way possible, but Mario is really upset with the fact he took his TV time. He'd get his face smashed in, as he realized later he had to let chaos run amok in his channels to actually get good ratings, probably cried (as he didn't want it to be scary). But in the end, he did. Mr. Puzzles would politely try and put them in different shows but get startled when they started being violent in them. When he got the Five Stars, he immediately removed all the scary TV shows, leaving only his channel. The set would be more happy and colorful, think Sesame Street Elmo's World When Mario ruined it, though, he almost began to cry, but he kept his cool and told Mario to "Go into the corner and count to 1000" with a fake parent-like tone. When the cast break out and make their own show, he'd get really upset and whiney, starting to cry as he threw another fit, slamming his foot down over and over as he simply began to complain. In the fight, he'd be dodging the others, trying to be more defensive and he'd try not to hurt anybody. When they get five and a half stars, he'd lose his powers. He'd begin to apologize and cry, mostly about the castle. He "didn't mean for all the bad to happen" and he "promises he'll be good this time." (Note, I'm on the edge of him being redeemed or he just gets kicked away like in the movie.)

All the Movies!

IT'S GOTTA BE PERFECT - Something went wrong. SMG4 was making the best video ever, and the TV had to help him! It's only the nice thing to do! The keyboard would be more pastel, but still, meaty themes that he mostly tried to hide. The meat went awry, and the rest of the movie went normally.

Western Spaghetti - A more cartoony and happy version of a Western place. One-Shot Wren tries to be as evil as the place allows him to be. His downfall was the fact that the world limited his powers, and Meggy was only "knocked out" every time that she should have been killed.

WOTFI 2023 - Mr. Puzzles expected a nice happy lesson about how stealing is wrong, but it went wrong. The episode is the same.

In the end, he looked nervous as he sat down, clutching his knees. He then says "I promise children, next time, it'll be different... Next time will be better."

All the Episodes!

Mario's Mysteries - It's basically the same, except there are no violent themes. Why would there be? Kids shows don't have those! The only time that there are any "adult themes" is when the programming breaks in the TV Time song, in which Mr. Puzzles looks very distressed and worried, though he changes the topic to The Bee Movie. The pipebomb reward was replaced with a kazoo! The Bloo-Skido part was a playground instead, and the rocket launcher was a party popper. When they find out Mario ate the spaghetti, there is a flash of anger in SMG4's eyes, which quickly is replaced with playful cheeriness as the episode ends with SMG4 promising more spaghetti for him.

Once Upon an SMG4 - Practically the same, except for the fact that there is less being mean to the animals. The motives for money are changed to healing the sick animals because we want a good message after all! The SMG4 Witch is less scary, of course, because he doesn't want to scare small children. More cartoony too. The scene where Smg3 meets the fairy godmother goes more like this- The animals still mess up the dress, but while Smg3's eye twitches, he tells the animals they tried their best. Mr. Puzzles comes in with pastel fairy wings and a crown, of course with a tutu. "Hello, dear princess! I'm the fairy godmother and- What in the world are you wearing?" (He sounds more concerned and worried.)

Scooby Mario, Where'd You Go? - Practically the same, doesn't really change much. The robots are less spooky and the atmosphere is colorful. Instead of going to prison for breaking an animatronic, Bob comes out of the bathroom and asks what he missed. Turns out he was in there the whole time! They then get the pizza as the camera moves out, the show having a happier ending!

Mr. Puzzles' Incredible Game Show Spectacular! - Pastel colors! Yay! He doesn't get mad, he gets sad and overwhelmed. Instead of screaming "IN A MINUTE" with a scary face, he simply looks upset with wide eyes. Exasperated, I suppose it's called. He tries to negate fighting, trying to help them settle their differences and try and make up with reasons like "You should always be nice to your friends" and such. Mario ruins everything and Mr. Puzzles has a temper tantrum. It's less "trying to kill everybody" and more "go away! :(" He doesn't actively try to hurt anybody, and the cage he uses for Mario is just a cardboard box. The audience is plushies.

[weekend-whip]

Ninjago Fic Rec Week (2024): Day 4

Prompts: AU/Movieverse/OCs! (Catching Up! I uh skipped Day 3 oop but I've got plenty to offer for this day! Which is...also late...don't look at meeee)

Aus WITH OCs (or as I like to call this list, my own personal indulgence corner. All the AUs/Movieverse stories I've read are ones that get recc'ed a lot already + I myself have already recc'ed them at one point or another, soooo let's throw some pure spotlight onto some OC stories! Even if a lot of it is connected to me to some degree that's irrelevant):

As The Years Pass By: A fic currently in the process of being rewritten/reworked but still chock full of next-gen Dragons Rising goodness! And it stars the one, the only, Jenna and Ethan from @rainofthetwilight!!!! This fic made me fall in love with her characters and I've loved reading/seeing/drawing these two adorable kids ever since!!!!

Dad!Jay AU by @taddymason: An AU so good I'm still catching up on reading it bit by bit to savor it for longer *-*)9 All the stories in this series are worth the read alone for the accumulation of taddy's character Kaida (a girl who needs no introduction–she's that awesome guys, trust me) but also the eventual father-daughter bond with amnesiac!Jay that is gripping and engaging aaaaall the wall through!!

I Carve This Poem From the Harshest of Storms: Another I'm not caught up with YET (a running theme for this Fic Week, it seems hgfhgfdfgds i'm sorry I'm slow and have a short-attention span). It follow two fascinating peeps in The Administration following The Merge, and without giving too much away, @theartsyswissapple ‘s voices for the characters just POP and make them feel SO real and it's been intriguing to read so far so yeah others should give it a try too!!!

What it Takes for You to See Me: A Spinjitzu bros story with added FSM and Mystake goodness too!!! This is one I've just started reading myself, but you know I love some throwbacks to Wu and Garmadon's past! And the OC here, @marhan-writes-n-draws's Amka, fits into the setting like a glove!!

Honeycomb: Gotta give a shoutout to @miqotepotatoe's Lucy while I'm here too!! Some short, sweet snippets of the Ninja Team's best (and most yellow) cheerleader!! I love her dynamic with everyone, and especially Cole <3

The Space Between Us: A very deep and heart-wrenching introspective into @k1ngtok's characters Lynda and Jamie, Master(s) of Space. It's story about siblings and bonds at its core, but also be mindful of tag of you're looking to dig deeper! (it also takes place in legacyverse technically but that's neither here or there I promise)

Flowery Language Another super funny and endearing story by King following Jesse (hey it's my boy!!) and Antonia on the case to discover who's been leaving flowers in Jesse's locker (spoiler: it's not Cole lmao). It's actually a semi-sequel to this old thing *I* wrote however long ago, but thaaaat's not required reading (though it does help). If you want more of a fix for the Jesse-Antonia duo + more of Jamie, this is the story to read!

Learning to Love (Again): Yet another King fic based in legacyverse (a coincidence), this one kiiiind of takes place during Season 2/Book 3 and follows Jamie on his quest to truly show his friends (Nya, Antonia, Harumi, Jesse, and...Olivia?!) just how much he cares about them through the power of love languages over the course of a week and it is AWESOOOOOOOOME!! Soooo many touching and feel-good moments, mostly soft slice-of-life with teenagers being teenagers, and is a great pick-me up when your soul is feeling sad ;w;)/ I advocate for this one just for the warm soft friendshippy-feelings it gives me alone!!! AAAAAA—

Something About Morning Glories: Jesse (oop there he is again) takes it upon to himself to comfort Jay after the latter finds himself concerned about something following obtaining his True Potential. A duo I desperately want to write more about but can't yet, so this little bit of foundation for their relationship will have to suffice for now ;w;)/

(and if you're still clamoring for more of a certain magic pink fool, there's plenty more where that came from; perhaps there may be a Jesse-Antonia friendship origin story on deck soon, along with maybe some DR stuff~! ...listen there will never be a good chance to self-advertise like this again!! BE YOUR BIGGEST FAN!!! SELF-LOVE BABY!!!! *-*)9 )

In the Company of the Stars: A tale as old as time—a Royal!AU where the fair groundskeeper of a palace's garden (that's the OC) falls head over heels for the prince far out of his league (that's Cole)—except, the prince absolutely likes him back...albeit only as his secret, suave alter-ego. But is that really true—and, more importantly, is there bigger problems to deal with right now???? There's romance, mystery, good food, royal drama, angst, fluff, sabotage, magic, a whole bunch of flowers, Harumi causing chaos on purpose, Skylor throws Chad across a room, Jay goes on a rampage a some point, Kai can't flirt to save his life—the author just needs some fresh motivation to post the darn next chapter already because the ending's gonna be really really good ;V

[tokyo-tower-symbolism]

I've been meaning to get into the re:live game story for a while now, but I don't know how necessary the event stories are in comparison to the main and school stories...

do you have a recommended reading order for main story and events if the timeline makes them interspersed?

Uhh, there was this one good google doc that had a bunch of stuff like what stories were important for each character, but I cannot find that right now so I'll do my best from memory but honestly I might miss a couple things so my bad.

Edit: thank you @pallastronomy for finding the doc in question, i really wanted to read that again too

To read it you can go to the wikia, read it on karth.top, or look up the parts on Youtube. That last one might be the best since you'll get the full visual novel experience.

So first off I would suggest reading the first part of the story, so Main Story chapters 1-6. Well, suggest is a strong word. I think those chapters kinda suck, but I guess they're necessary for the premise and to introduce the characters? But then again they abandon the original premise half way in favor of the performance festival so whatever. And if you want a better introduction to the characters you should read the School Stories (ignoring SJH) and also maybe watch Shoujo Cante All Starlight. So really I don't suggest you read those chapters but

I think at this point you are can read the event stories from "Hello to Halloween" to "Surprise! Rehearsal Friends!"

And you don't need to read them all, but they're fun! I couldn't really tell you which ones are super important to the plot, sorry about that. Honestly my personal opinion at this point is to just pick a couple characters you like to follow and read their stories. You can see who participates in each one on the Revue Starlight wikia

Plus, character card bond stories! Each event has a couple gacha cards they're trying to sell, and sometimes they're not super related to the story, but sometimes they are. If someone references something that happened off screen, it either happened in an earlier event or in the bond card, but I'd still only read the bond cards once you're done reading the event is over since otherwise they can be spoilers. Just think of those as prequels instead of preludes.

Then at this point you can read Main Story Chapters 7-11. And I really do think you should read these since they are juicy. There's a new plot and we really get to dive deep into the ReLive characters and see their individual pasts and why they now stand on stage. It's great.

Now for the Event Stories, feel free to read any story from "Starry Diamond Tragic Orion" up until "Royal Retainer"

Although now I gotta bring up some caveats. Anything with Seiran is not going to matter to the main plot of ReLive, and if you're curious about them, then that gets into Stage Play Territory which is much easier to follow but not in ReLive.

And honestly same with the Seisho only stories. They're fun, don't get me wrong, but they kinda don't affect the developments of the cast at all.

Starry Diamond is a live show that had some Revues, so some of the relive events are just rehashings of those. Except Venus & Cupid Story, which is a sequel to Zeus no Chuusai from the Starry Diamond Live, and that revue is actually super important to the Yumeoji Sisters's story but it is not in ReLive.

And once you've had your fill of those stories, you can start reading Main Story Chapters 12-18, Arcana Arcadia. And this one is really good. Iirc, the main revue starlight writer came in for these parts. There's some info that directly leads into the movie. And it's honestly great.

But the issue is that there are intermission bond stories that need to be read in the middle of the chapters. If you are reading it online that can be kind of pain, but in the game I think it's in the right order? I could not say for sure since I don't actually play it. Anyways, here's the vague order according to the wikia, but I'm not 100% on this

Chapter 12: 1-2

Chapter 13: Tower, Hermit, Empress, 1-3, High Priestess, 4-5, Magician, 6-9, Hanged Man, Strength, 10-15

Chapter 14: Wheel of Fortune, Chariot, 1-2, Lovers, 3-14, Faith, Hierophant, 15

Chapter 15: 1-2, Devil, Sun, Justice, 3-15

Chapter 16: Death, Charity, 1-15

Chapter 17: Temperance, 1, Fool, 2-4, World, Judgement, 5-15

Chapter 18: Hope, 1-9, Emperor, 10-14, 15/Moon

So yeah, after this you have basically free reign to read the remaining event stories. The next big ongoing plot seems to be about Siegfeld Junior High, but that one also isn't really connected to the previous stories at all.

Also some cards have connecting bond stories even without events, such as the Frontier Rangers, Orpheus, Camelot, Snow White, and Yin-Yang.

But for real, I think the best way to get into the story is to read the main story and then see what characters you like. Then you can read along all their bond stories and events that they star in, and maybe you'll find other characters that stand out. If you are missing any information, usually characters will reference whatever they are talking about, so you won't be completely lost.

So yeah, I hope you have fun with the relive story! It touches on a lot of the themes from the show and honestly I just really liked seeing the characters again. And also Arcana Arcadia is great, just so great.

[trashlie]

Love and Deepspace Thoughts

I promised some thoughts about Love and Deepspace and we're a week into the game and I think I can finally ramble about it for a while. I've been immensely enjoying myself and screaming daily with my friends lol and I think I've been able to formulate my thoughts pretty well! Idk how many people actually wanna read this, but I always love to have a record of my thoughts - especially something this early in game, because knowing papergames, there's going to be so much angst, so many twists and turns, and I'm already seeing a lot of threads of how things could play out and I like to be able to look back and see how wrong I was lol.

I play on the North American server and have completed chapter 7, so this will be full of spoilers for story content, as well as a lot of spoilers for anecdotes, tender moments, and some of the myth stuff - I'll try to denote where I'll mention certain spoilers in case you're trying avoid certain things, but it'd be impossible to write all of my sincere thoughts and capture all of what I really love and am looking forward to without spoilers, unfortunately.

Below will have a lot of thoughts on the current LIs as well as speculation about the 2 coming LIs, as well as their dynamics, and further speculation on where I think - or maybe just would like to see - the story could be going. To be clear, I have not cleared all anecdotes or myths, as I'm trying to savor things and good lord I cannot pull all those cards; a lot of this is compilation between my experiences as well as @poisonheart and further things I've read and discussed in the server. I will also be approaching this as a longtime player of MLQC, papergames' other otome game, because I cannot help but see the comparisons between the game and sing the praises of where I feel like they've grown and refined, but I don't think you'll need to have played MLQC to read this - you can honestly just ignore those bits lol >A<

What I can outright, sans spoilers, say is that I'm really enjoying Love and Deepspace so much and I think that it's come at a really good time for me, personally, as a MLQC player, because there's so much in game that's been completed and we're basically going through the motions doing our dailies, waiting for our new chapter events or participating in the occasional events (if you aren't hoarding resources for SP wish tree events) so it feels SO refreshing to dive into a new game that takes place in the same universe/world but have so much new stuff to uncover, so much new lore, new characters to meet and get to know. In MLQC I have a very clear favorite, but so far in LADS, I find that while I think I might have a favorite, I really enjoy all three LIs so much and I don't feel bad when I pull someone else's card, because it means I get to gobble all the lore! I don't feel like "UUUGGHH THIS GUY" when we get to X's chapter route. Perhaps it's just that LADS really caters to specific tropes and cliches in a way that I enjoy, but I feel so much like they've done these characters great justice! This goes for the MC, too, who doesn't feel at all like a cookie cutter MC meant to be a stand in for our own self-insert, but rather has a lot of personality of her own, is feisty and discerning.

Also, I gotta give a lot of props to the character customization features. I understand why people are upset that you can only change your hair and hair color in the photobooth function, but we rarely see MC out of that feature - so much of the game is in first person POV - and the times that we do see her, she's seen from the back, so maintaining the same hair for all characters allows them to keep something they can use for her stand in in such scenarios. But the customization is legit nuts! You can do so much with it, I spent so long tweaking mine the day before the game launched! I want to make side accounts I will never play just to play with that function lol

But let's get into the good stuff!

I really cannot sing the praises for the LIs enough, and that's going to be the bulk of what I'll talk about, because even this early in game, there's so much nuance to the LIs in both their characters as well as their dynamics with MC. Everyone brings a little something different to the table, and with what little we know of the upcoming LIs, I think even if for some reason the current LIs don't work for people, maybe the new ones might? But personally, I am so invested in all three of them! While I think I have a definite ranking in favor forming, it's not like it means I dislike any of them at all, and I'm always so eager to learn more!

One thing I'd like to mention before getting into it is that I love the inclusion of the myth cards, and though they are treated as alternate universes, I think it's more like they are previous or parallel timelines, but I'll try to get into that a little more as I talk about the characters!

From what I can see so far, I think Rafayel is one of the more popular fans with the North American/English-speaking fanbase - and it's not hard to see why! He's sassy, provides good comedy, he's fun to bully, and he's really pouty. I had a feeling he would be my favorite from the get go, just because I tend to have a thing for really pathetic men lmao and I have SUCH a fondness for him. I said I think I have a ranking forming, but it feels WRONG to rank them because that's how much I really like them, but if I had to, Rafayel's #2 position is really, REALLY close to #1! But the thing is, it's not just because of all of those traits above. I'd argue that he's one of the characters who has a lot of iceberg depth, as in there's a lot of depth to him that may get ignored or glossed over because of the sass and brattiness that accompanies, or even masks, it. As poisonheart puts it, the comedy hides the pain - and Rafayel comes with a LOT of pain! There's a delicious complexity to him where he is one part needy and clingy, but also one part resentful and hurt. MC made a promise that she doesn't recall - whether it was in this life or another - and you really get the sense that Rafayel wants to settle the score, but at the same time his feelings get in the way of those bitter, hurt feelings, and I really enjoy this complexity a lot! I think it elevates all of the sassiness, gives it a purpose and meaning.

Take his Nightly Stroll Bond: on the one hand it comes across as comedic and even manipulative -and it is! But when you get into it, you understand why. That's not to say if I think there's justification for manipulation because that's not what I'm here for; I'm just here for a good time and a good time I'm having. But when Rafayel says "It's been 800 years!" I don't think that's an exaggeration - he just isn't talking about just the day that he waited. Is faking an injury/illness and checking himself into a hospital overkill? Sure lol but that's what makes him so delightful to me. There's all of this hurt and unaddressed resentment, but as much as that, there's all of these feelings! Because even though he's hurt, he CARES about MC, SO MUCH. That's the problem! It would be easier if he didn't care, but he does. He's so needy, so clingy, he wants her attention because he's waited for so long while she was off, having forgotten him, living a life that abandoned and left him behind while he waited and waited and listen ;~; my stinky fish man I'm so sorry I cannot wait for her to learn the truth. I want to know SO BADLY what happened! When did they meet, anyway? He makes a comment on the homescreen when he's sulking lol about "See you in three months... three minutes, landlubber"

HOW LONG DID HE WAIT FOR HER IF ONE MINUTE IS ONE MONTH TO HIM?!

And listen, idk what anyone else thinks, but the end of chapter 7 had me in my FEELINGS, with the way he tried to leave her at the bottom of the ocean - but he couldn't, because of their promise, because he's unable to go back on it, because even though she forgot all about him and their promise and went about her life without a memory of him, he can't do that. It's the hurt! It's the resentment! It's the confliction between his feelings, because it seems like they take up equal space - his hunger for her attention, for what feels like she was so fickle to give and take away, the way she meant so much to him and he feels like it wasn't the same ;A;

(I've contemplated how possible it is that they met when she was younger, before she was attacked in the Wanderer incident 14 years ago, and if that could somehow have affected her memory, but I feel like it must be something greater, because seeing the fish glow in his heart means the vow they made was binding, so something strong must've caused her to forget. But that's also why I've contemplated if this was in another life? I'm less sure about this, because in Rafayel's second anecdote, he crosses paths with MC at university, though of course she doesn't recognize or recall him, and he specifically recognizes her voice. "Though her voice has matured, her pronunciation, enunciation, the rhythm of her speech, and even the emphasis in her sentences... Every word strikes like a drumbeat, awakening long-buried memories in his mind" It feels more likely that it happened while they were younger. Also I feel like this passage really encompasses her significance, that he can recall these details, to recognize them after so much time ;~; stinky fish you make my heart ache ;~;)

I appreciate so much that they've given Rafayel so much depth, that under the comedy of his pathetic, sulky exterior is so much reason for it, that there's an undercurrent of resentment and something dark - after all, we haven't actually uncovered what happened with the painting and Raymond. We saw the mermaid skeleton in his house - was Rafayel seeking revenge for his people?

But Rafayel also shows tremendous emotional sensitivity, in ways that sometimes catch me off guard. I distinctly remember lol sitting in shock after 4-3, and the text from Rafayel that pops up asking MC if she got the thing, telling her about how he asked a seagull to send a white seallshell why hasn't it arrived yet lol and I remember going "NOT NOW RAFAYEL READ THE ROOM ;~;" and then he goes on, telling her "if you draw on it and put it into the ocean the sea will carry the feelings you poured into the drawing to the soul you yearn for" and I just started SOBBING lol ;~; It was just so.... poignant but so simple. He didn't say I'm sorry for your loss or my condolences or anything like that - it was his own chaotic, weird method, but it was sincere. Likewise, he shows that similar sincerity in Ocean At Night, despite initially dismissing paper lanterns as silly human traditions - a lantern will be blown out why would you put all your hope in something so fleeting - coming around to using his own flame, that will never go out, to light a lantern for MC with the prayer that her hopes will never go out. ;~; Listen, I cried. I was TENDER my heart was soggy ;~;

And while I know people love a good pathetic man and enjoy chaotic sass and the fact that we really, truly NEVER know where his plots are going to go lmao - always an adventure with him - I hope they appreciate that depth and don't disavow the darker elements of him that give reason to those core elements of him. Rafayel is a character that carries his hurt and bitterness on his sleeve, rather than hiding it or shoving it away, and I really look forward to exploring it and all the messiness it has to offer, and how it will play out for MC.

On the very far end of the spectrum is Zayne. He's the character I expected to not be too fond of, so I was so pleasantly surprised as we got to know him to find myself proven wrong! I expected him to be... hm... I guess colder? More prickly? Than he turns out to be? And, admittedly, he is still rather aloof and cold on the surface, but I think it helps that he and MC have that history and that we are introduced very early to them through the A Frozen Promise Bond. It made it readily apparent that Zayne was not a cold and aloof person because he was too lofty or something but rather... it just seemed like maybe he'd been someone more awkward when he was younger, someone who didn't know how to connect very well with the daughter of this family friend, but he still tried. The snow seal took me out, you guys ;~; I never moved on from that!!!!!!

Despite seeming so cold, there's a certain kind of warmth to Zayne, just under the surface. He shows his care and concern in the ways he knows best, as MC's PCP, caring about her well being and health, but their Tender Moments are a collection of wonderful moments showing them growing closer, getting to know each other better as people, as friends and equals. For the record, Starry Nocturne hurt me so much, but it did two things I thought were so important. a. It showed that he was not infallible, which I think is very important, because often characters are written in their roles as geniuses who never fail, or else accomplish the impossible, and to see him lose a patient, while painful to read, made him so human but also b. It gave him that moment of vulnerability with MC where he could lean on her. It's so, SO important! for a MI to be able to lean on the MC, I feel, for them to be those equals, for him to be able to be vulnerable with her, but especially so for a character like Zayne who feels very reserved and closed off.

MC makes statements about feeling like there's distance between her and Zayne, especially when they first come back into each others' lives for the first time, so getting to indulge in these little Tender Moments of them taking little steps towards each other, closing that gap between them, is so satisfying! Having that history gives them a dynamic unlike Rafayel or Xavier's with her, because she has her memories of their childhood, of who he was when they were younger, and who they are now, and can compare the warmth of him opening up, of the chuckles and laughter she elicits from him. They also have this kind of flirtship I really enjoy - something very coy, not in an uwu so shy way just.... very coy, both dancing around the bush, before one of them calls it what it is - I thought the A Heartfelt Paradise Tender Moment a really good example of this!

It's so easy to read Zayne as being cold and aloof, but he really does have so much warmth, he just isn't good at showing it. He doesn't wear things on his sleeves like Rafayel or MC. But good LORD when he's in private....!!!!!!! The Business Trip Memoria TOOK. ME. OUT!!!!!! This is the game launch and they're already throwing this at us?! It was, to me, such a mature kind of date to give us? Two people who have had to grow used to each other's absence in their lives, and continue having to make space for those absences, as both are busy people - Zayne, a dedicated cardiac surgeon and MC a hunter - and what it means to grow used to the absence and to miss each other. But listen - when MC got in his lap?! She was touching his mouth? His face?! "What did you want me to do, in front of all those people?" he asked her? SIR?!

HELLO?! Girl. Listen.

I had to fan myself alfjkkfkjafjkafkjaf lmao

I looooooove them for that element of normalcy - for the people who have important careers and lives that they have to attend to, but still find the room for each other in their lives. The implication that Zayne rushed his way through school, took on grueling workloads and lacked a social life amongst classmates much older than him, not because he loved learning or even because he was so dedicated to his career - but because it was his way back to MC, so that he could return to stand in front of her? GOD. HOW DO YOU MOVE ON FROM THAT? HOW DO YOU HANDLE THAT? Knowing that he did it all so that he could stand in front of you again? HOWLING pls LISTEN.

Zayne may feel cold on the surface, but he is SO warm, he cares so much. And not just about MC, either. Thank God, too, because I'm not huge on the "Cold man only cares about the woman he loves" type, but Zayne cares so much about his patients, and making sure they feel seen, cared about? His first anecdote had me crying about seniors in hospitals with no relatives to accompany them to their examinations ;~; What a man.

I haven't had a chance to dig into his myth yet, which is a shame, but his third anecdote DID destroy me. I'm not even exaggerating, I was sobbing in my bedroom - and the worst part is I knew it would be painful going in and I still wasn't braced for impact enough! I mean, frankly, both his second and third hurt but nothing like the third! Parallel universe Zayne in a grim reaper role where he must kill humans turning into Wanderers - so very opposite the surgeon version of him who does everything he can to save people, both of them living parallel lives to each other, experiencing each others' lives through their dreams/nightmares. THIS HAS ME SCREAMING!!!!!

So much of MLQC has a lot to do with timelines - parallel worlds, some alternate universes, a whole timeline that's technically the same timeline reset but also still moving forward...... lol I can't help but think about where all of this fits in to LADS. Even though the Myth storylines are taken as alternate universes.... I think they're part of everyone's stories. We see echos of them. I haven't finished Rafayel's but even little moments, like making a break for it and having to run to escape attention echos a scene of Rafayel and the Princess MC making a mad dash in the market alley to escape the palace guards. It feels especially true for Xavier and MC, which I'll get to. But especially with Zayne - whose myth, again, I haven't been able to dig into, but seems to pose him as a sort of god, a forseer - we have two very different timelines/events now: his myth/Philos story and his parallel Grim Reaper self. How many timelines/parallel universes are we playing with, I wonder....?

I really want to revisit this in the future when I do get to dig into his myth, because I can see how Rafayel and Xavier's myths tie into their identities and their dynamics with MC, but I don't know yet how any of that works for Zayne and MC! I'm so intrigued, I can't wait!!!!

And finally, Xavier. God, I should have known lol in retrospect I should have realized Xavier would be my weak spot but listen..... sometimes I gotta lie to myself lol I love everything about him, the seemingly gentle eepy man who is also simultaneously a walking weapon of mass destruction but also so easily stumped by a UFO machine lol. Much like Rafayel, I'm especially fond of him because of the depth and dynamics, but also, honestly, much like Rafayel, he just checks all the boxes. Poisonheart puts it best when she says Xavier is the perfect middle-ground of the two - he's not as sassy as Rafayel is, but he'll still roast MC, he's very grounded and comes off a little aloof sometimes, but he doesn't seem nearly as aloof as Zayne, and he's also really unintentionally funny! He plays the middle-ground of them SO well. And where Zayne was working hard in order to show up in front of MC again and Rafayel has a score to settle but also so much neediness, it feels like Xavier has a LOT of karma to make up for.

Now, I personally don't have his myth cards, but poisonheart does, so everything I know I've experienced via her and all of our hours of screaming lol and the thing that really gets me the most about Xavier and MC is like..... okay it's the way he's clearly this really incredibly strong guy, but he plays the submissive prey role so well? lol He begs if she tells her to, he doesn't resist, he indulges her, he plays along - but when the mood strikes, he'll pull the dominant switch and flip the table and alkfjlFKJKAFJ ALKJFAF LAKJFAKFKJFAJ AFLKJD GODDDDDDDD IT GETS TO MEEEEEEEEEEEEE

Xavier has that sense of like.... everything for MC, right? Like he's making up for a lifetime. There's implications that maybe he's been searching through space and time for her, trying to find her, that they've lost and each other countless times before - or rather, she's lost him - and his Shooting Stars myth supports this. Sometimes it's really subtle, sometimes it stands out so much I'm in agony. She remarks so often how he feels so distant, like he's as out of reach and mysterious as a star. She has nightmares about him disappearing and he is incredibly reassuring about staying, about not leaving. And maybe I'm reading into it, but he even talks about her hanging on tight, like maybe if she's strong enough, she can keep him from ever being taken away, keep them from being separated this time.

He's also the one who feels like he's actually endured all the years. Rather than separate timelines or parallel worlds it feels like Xavier has actually traveled through space and time, like he's the same Xavier from the myth himself, which makes him talking about the loneliness of stars so much worse. How long has he been alone, searching for her? ;~;

But their dynamic just really gets to me - it's those echos, the way MC subconsciously acts on them, and how indulgent Xavier is towards her. It's the playful teasing and the gentleness and how he plays so submissive and docile but when the mood strikes he can switch it up and catch her (and me!!!) off guard. It's the way he texts LMAO never writing out you or one lmao (which is marginally better than Rafayel's COMPLETE LACK OF PUNCTUATION LMAO ALFKAJFKJAFKJAFKJAFJK) It's the way he has that innocent baby face and could absolutely get away with murder.

Initially I had contemplated if it was possible he is actually a star and while maybe that isn't true I am still not certain he's human - at least he's not from our world (especially if he really is the very Xavier from the myth) but I still like to think of him as one, because he wears the star motif so well and likens himself to one so often. Also, look, I am a SUCKER for a star motif. I was doomed from the start lol.

There's just something about the agony and TRAGEDY in their past, in the echos, the subconscious fears, and the sheer indulgence!!!!! It's MC telling Xavier he might be her enemy later and the distress it caused him, prompting him to share his access privileges with her to earn her trust ;A; It's the way he's apparently spent DECADES, at the VERY LEAST, on our earth AND HE'S A TERRIBLE, TERRIBLE, TERRIBLE COOK lmaoooooooo it's the stupid little lines he says because he's not as overtly clingy and pouty as Rafayel but an armful of plushies is a dreadful thing because then he doesn't have a free hand to hold MC's hand !!!!!!! HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO BE NORMAL ABOUT THIS?! WHINES

I could write a whole essay about Xavier and I'm restraining myself and attempting to be really, really normal about him okay?

But yeah for him it's that depth of like... the guilt and agony he carries - because not only does leaving her hurt him, but it hurts himself, too. That unbearable loneliness, the endless wait, hoping, wondering, unsure of when, or if, he'll find her again, but refusing to give up - and when he does, endeavoring to make up for it. Like, as it is, there's something about strong men being submissive that is so lakkjfkafkjfkjaf alfjakfaf but it's the way Xavier does it with MC that is soooooo INDULGENT, so VERY "for you, because it's you" that makes me want to chew my keyboard and howl at the moon and every time he reassures her he won't leave I feel dread but also I want it to be true.

I know how papergames operates. I know Xavier may mean it, but I also know.... ;A;

And to think, this is all JUST THE LAUNCH STUFF! We haven't even passed chapter 8 yet lmao We don't even have all our LIs! We've (maybe?) yet to meet our antagonist? WHICH I'M EXCITED ABOUT BTW

Listen.

I have some thoughts and I'll try to keep them short (yknow, for me) because this is already long and rambly and maybe I can just expand on this later but: Sylus and Caleb are confirmed as LIs right? But are they the same person or not??????

If Sylus = Caleb it gives us a LOT of potential for exploring some really complex, grey morality. I mean, no matter what, Sylus is going to bring grey morality lol but especially if it turns out Caleb is actually secretly the leader of Onychinus, because it brings that whole "Who is this person I thought I knew?" and more so because Onychinus is poised as an enemy to the Hunter's Association.

But something Papergames has done in MLQC and I fully expect them to do here is explore grey morality, not only in Onychinus, but the Hunter's Association. Xavier's Tender Moments Garden of Secrets brings up the implication that some Wanderers are, in fact, intelligent, and while it's rare, it can occur. And with parallel world Grim Reaper Zayne having to kill people before they turn into Wanderers it begs the question of this world: can that happen here, too? And it gets into the moral conundrums. That's not to say the Hunter's Association are bad for killing Wanderers and protecting people but it starts to bring up questions, because in Grim Reaper Zayne's world, this is being covered up. What about this world? There's also the question of what is Onychinus even doing? I fully expect to find that whatever their objective is, it will be a question of the greater good and if the ends justify the means and the such.

Ultimately, an antagonist LI has to be sympathetic in some fashion, because how else are they going to write the story for them lol. Like they can certainly have Bond/Memoria/Tender Moments that are more about the combative element of their relationship meeting the chemistry that draws them to each other, but at any rate, there has to be something that draws them to each other and makes them care, right? So therefore, he can't be entirely bad, or at least MC has to be able to empathize with him and his objective, or the cause of it or something like that.

If Caleb = Sylus, that might be more achievable because of their history, but obviously that isn't a requirement, and that can also make it more complex, because again, that whole "this person I thought I knew".

I think there's a possibility for that overlap partly because we already have a LI with a history with MC - but to be fair, Zayne's history with MC is very different than Caleb's and has a different dynamic, so even if they didn't give him the villain route, it would still play out very differently and give them a significantly different enough dynamic that I don't think it would be a big issue.

If he's not Sylus, then there's still a lot of avenues to explore with Caleb. They've already implied that Caleb wants to take care of MC, wants her to lean on him and let him play that role for him, to stop being so strong in front of him, and I think that could very well affect his story and what has lead to his "death". Being in the airforce makes me wonder if it's possible that the military is associated in any way with Onychinus - after all, didn't he say that he does top secret work involving the deepspace tunnel, and isn't Onychinus interested in that? It wouldn't be the first time a government agency was written as being corrupt lol (and again there could be a lot gray morality here where Onychinus isn't necessarily inherently bad). Caleb could have gotten involved simply by his job.

There's the revenge angle, if he, too, was an experiment subject (which would make sense because why did Granny take him in as well?) and wanting to get back at? the people who experimented on them. Or wanting to be more involved? A spy case? SO many possibilities and I'm really excited to see where it all goes!

I think regardless of how Caleb is reintroduced to the story, I imagine there's going to be some kind of conflict - his "death" and then reappearance.... did he know that was going to happen? was it planned? was he involved? I don't think they'll bring him back and yay! now she has a family member back but I think there will be some kind of strife to work through, some good ol angst that really plays with the dynamic of feeling hurt and betrayed but wanting to return to the old times that can never be returned to, wanting to seek refuge in someone who maybe doesn't exist anymore, being drawn to someone you cared so much about and feeling so conflicted about it alfkjkfjkjafjkaf kj

I JUST HAVE SO MANY FEELINGS!!!!!!!!!!

This is such a rambling mess so kudos to anyone who made it this far. Maybe I'll manage to write some more bitesized thoughts later @___@

[kanmom51]

JK's live 30 June 2023 12:38 am KST

30.6.2023 12:38 or 00:38 KST

cr./to the creators of the media used in this post.

Before I start talking about the live itself and Seven, of course, let's look for just a second, again, for the fun of it, at the numbers.

12:38 or 00:38 is the time JK started the live.

Do you see what those 2 numbers give us? Side by side?

1 2 3 and 8 and then 3 and 8. Does that help?

123

and

8/11

Do I think he did this on purpose? The 123 yeah, I see that. But the other part, nah? Just a usual lovely stars aligning Jikook coincidence I guess, lol.

Oh, and we also have 12:38 that gives us a 2+8=10 and the 1 and 3 that give us the 13, so:

13/10

So, not too too much happened during the live. JK came, talked a little tiny bit about his upcoming single, working on an album and a little more too, worked out, was his own cute self and dipped.

That was that in a nutshell.

Now let's dive in a little deeper.

JK talked about Seven. Well, telling us it's coming out on the 14 July and that he's excited about it.

There is an album in the works, but not finalized just yet.

Oh, and the MV, it's a wrap, and was fun. Now I'm truly curious.

I did talk about the song not being written by him in my previous post. He heard it with BPD and said he wants to do it a lot. His words.

He heard it, he liked it, he wanted to do it. Not personal, not a life story.

Doesn't mean the lyrics didn't 'speak' to him in a sense. Didn't mean something to him. You can feel connected to a song that isn't written by yourself. But it is something to keep in mind when we hear the song, watch the MV and see the lyrics, lol.

Just side tracking here for a sec to this:

CP says it's sooooo good. I'm gonna trust him on this.

Question I have right now is: Is JM becoming JK's spoiler king?

JK misses Jin and Hobi.

He got a new lip piercing.

What I love about that man is that he's so aware. He knows there are those that do not approve (you know, those idiots that think they have ownership over him or a right to tell him what to do). And yet, he doesn't give a shit. He wanted it, he did it. If they want to accept it they will, if they don't sucks for them. And the thing is that when he says it, he does it so nicely and respectfully. I LOVE IT!!!

He told us he's taking English lessons.

As a matter of fact, he had one just before starting the live.

Funny how both JK and JM seem to be studying English at night.

Remember this?

You know, must be one of those Jikook coincidences.

Nah. Fuck that. They are studying English together. Period.

JK talks about doing intermittent dieting, so he bought snacks but can't eat them just yet.

JK wanting to share but blanking out, lol.

Well, he didn't give us a spoiler, but we did get the next best thing, lol.

We get full JK workout.

Gotta love army edits (some at least, lol)

Poor baby hurt himself.

That was quite a workout.

Well, working out can be alone or together. There are many forms of working out... Does he really want us to wonder all of that?

The duality of this man.

And then.

I absolutely adore that JK has no problem what so ever that we see him like this. No makeup, every hair possible out of place, tired, sleepy, drunk, sad, happy, just bare.

He trusts us to see him bare.

Writing those lines, that sentence, idk why, it brings tears to my eyes.

He's not afraid to be himself. Take it or leave it. Yes, he plays the part of the idol, but he isn't afraid to show us him, a real human being just like us (just way prettier and sexier and more talented and more intelligent and in better shape), as much as he can under the circumstances of being an idol and a celebrity.

How can we not LOVE this young man?

JK ending the live.

So, not so much going on during this live.

I wrote this post based on the translations available. Of course I will watch the live translated and come back with corrections if be needed.

This to me felt more like a scheduled live for him, less one he just wanted to do, to keep connected with us or to convey a message that doesn't have to do with his own promotions (you get what I'm saying). And it makes sense it was pretty much scheduled, given the announcement of his single release. But who cares? We got us some cute ass JK. Just seeing him warms my heart. I assume it has the same effect on you.

I'll leave you with an amusing take on JK's live.