#I may add more to the timeline in the future

[yukipri]

Some thoughts on Cara

So some of you may have heard about Cara, the new platform that a lot of artists are trying out. It's been around for a while, but there's been a recent huge surge of new users, myself among them. Thought I'd type up a lil thing on my initial thoughts.

First, what is Cara?

From their About Cara page:

Cara is a social media and portfolio platform for artists. With the widespread use of generative AI, we decided to build a place that filters out generative AI images so that people who want to find authentic creatives and artwork can do so easily. Many platforms currently accept AI art when it’s not ethical, while others have promised “no AI forever” policies without consideration for the scenario where adoption of such technologies may happen at the workplace in the coming years. The future of creative industries requires nuanced understanding and support to help artists and companies connect and work together. We want to bridge the gap and build a platform that we would enjoy using as creatives ourselves. Our stance on AI: ・We do not agree with generative AI tools in their current unethical form, and we won’t host AI-generated portfolios unless the rampant ethical and data privacy issues around datasets are resolved via regulation. ・In the event that legislation is passed to clearly protect artists, we believe that AI-generated content should always be clearly labeled, because the public should always be able to search for human-made art and media easily.

Should note that Cara is independently funded, and is made by a core group of artists and engineers and is even collaborating with the Glaze project. It's very much a platform by artists, for artists!

Should also mention that in being a platform for artists, it's more a gallery first, with social media functionalities on the side. The info below will hopefully explain how that works.

Next, my actual initial thoughts using it, and things that set it apart from other platforms I've used:

1) When you post, you can choose to check the portfolio option, or to NOT check it. This is fantastic because it means I can have just my art organized in my gallery, but I can still post random stuff like photos of my cats and it won't clutter things. You can also just ramble/text post and it won't affect the gallery view!

2) You can adjust your crop preview for your images. Such a simple thing, yet so darn nice.

3) When you check that "Add to portfolio," you get a bunch of additional optional fields: Title, Field/Medium, Project Type, Category Tags, and Software Used. It's nice that you can put all this info into organized fields that don't take up text space.

4) Speaking of text, 5000 character limit is niiiiice. If you want to talk, you can.

5) Two separate feeds, a "For You" algorithmic one, and "Following." The "Following" actually appears to be full chronological timeline of just folks you follow (like Tumblr). Amazing.

6) Now usually, "For You" being set to home/default kinda pisses me off because generally I like curating my own experience, but not here, for this handy reason: if you tap the gear symbol, you can ADJUST your algorithm feed!

So you can choose what you see still!!! AMAZING. And, again, you still have your Following timeline too.

7) To repeat the stuff at the top of this post, its creation and intent as a place by artists, for artists. Hopefully you can also see from the points above that it's been designed with artists in mind.

8) No GenAI images!!!! There's a pop up that says it's not allowed, and apparently there's some sort of detector thing too. Not sure how reliable the latter is, but so far, it's just been a breath of fresh air, being able to scroll and see human art art and art!

To be clear, Cara's not perfect and is currently pretty laggy, and you can get errors while posting (so far, I've had more success on desktop than the mobile app), but that's understandable, given the small team. They'll need time to scale. For me though, it's a fair tradeoff for a platform that actually cares about artists.

Currently it also doesn't allow NSFW, not sure if that'll change given app store rules.

As mentioned above, they're independently funded, which means the team is currently paying for Cara itself. They have a kofi set up for folks who want to chip in, but it's optional. Here's the link to the tweet from one of the founders:

And a reminder that no matter that the platform itself isn't selling our data to GenAI, it can still be scraped by third parties. Protect your work with Glaze and Nightshade!

Anyway, I'm still figuring stuff out and have only been on Cara a few days, but I feel hopeful, and I think they're off to a good start.

I hope this post has been informative!

Lastly, here's my own Cara if you want to come say hi! Not sure at all if I'll be active on there, but if you're an artist like me who is keeping an eye out for hopefully nice communities, check it out!

[ratsoh-writes]

Ages updated!!!!

I’m gonna do my best to include all important characters, including some “side characters” that appear often enough! So let’s begin!

Undertale: Sans: 65, papyrus: 49, Undyne: 47, alphys: 54,Toriel: 934, Asgore: 933, Grillby: 522, Mettaton: 22

Underswap: Star: 60, honey: 44, Twister: 44, Winter: 1013, Napstablook: 23

Underfell: Red: 66, edge: 43, storm: 44, King: 998, felltron: 21

Swapfell Mal: 60, cash: 51

Horrortale Oak: 75, willow: 59, Miss: 944

Horrorswap Lilac: 70, Basil: 54

Horrorfell Rust: 76, Noir: 53

Underlust Charm: 66, sugar: 52, Amor: 367, winnie: 10

Lustswap Sparks: 59, Salt: 50

Lustfell Lush: 63, Pepper: 51, Jezebel: 212, Marcelo goldenfoot: 455

Lustswapfell Sir: 68, weasel: 52, snow: 61

Lustred Flambe: 55, Pesto: 54

Lustgold Butler: 68, gold: 49

Outertale Pluto: 67, Jupiter: 49, titan: 598

Outerfell Orion: 60, atlas: 52

Outerswap Helios: 44, Artemis 36

Fellswap Lord: 60, mutt: 53

Fellswap gold Wine: 64, coffee: 50, Empress: 1033

Farmtale Peaches: 51, rancher: 46, Rosemary: 550, Yosemite: 501

Farmswap Cider: 50, Barley: 42, Carmen: 85, whisky: 520

Farmfell Ram: 49, pitch: 40, russet: 478, pooch: 489

Horrorfarm Moose: 64, maple: 53

Mafias Butch: 60, snipe: 58, ace: 53, boss: 50, slim: 48, bruiser: 45, tempest: 64, Don: 645, Madame: 647, Mr corgi (aka Charles): 67

Birdtale Quill: 59, crow: 51

Birdswap Mango: 62, papaya: 36, canary: 278

Birdfell Roost: 53, harpy: 42, Lewis: 90

Draketale Alden: 68, Ollivander: 60

Drakefell Barin: 71, Arwin: 59

Drakeswap Hilda: 66, saga: 63

Seatale Fisher: 60, Jasper 25

Seaswap Finn: 59, sails: 27

Seafell Hook: 58, captain: 30

Gastertale G: 80, green: 79

Dancetale Pop: 52, rhythm: 45, salsa: 678

Theatretale Tempo: 50, vibrato: 29

Fallouttale Lens: 69, cricket, 49, piranha: 65

Templetale Zen: 67, shield: 35

Nomadtale Gears: 49, compass: 42, copper: 645, lilo: 21, weave: 126, wisteria: 157, linden: 158

Here’s a quick rundown of a monsters lifespan:

A common monster has a life expectancy of 700 years give or take. The oldest monster in record (that wasn’t a royal) was a Drake monster who lived 732 years.

They are considered infants/babies up until the age of two. Toddlerhood is from 2-6

Children are from the ages of 7-13. Most monsters start public school at ages 7-8

Teenagers are from 14-19. Monsters mature at a slower rate than humans, and so while the body may look grown in the later teen years, they have yet to develop sexual maturity until around 20.

Once 20 they are considered adults, but some subspecies can continue growing up till 30

After puberty in the early 19-22 range, a monster is considered a young adult from 25-190. You can compare those ages to a human in their early to mid 20s physically

Middle Ages range from 200s- 400s roughly

500s are considered older and retirement age, 600s are elderly. Anything past 680 is fragile

The lifespan goes down with halfbreed monsters ( “full” monster parent and “full” human parent) where they live around 600-650 years

The lifespan takes a bigger drop for mages who have an expectancy of 250 years. Witches (humans who have trained to use magic) are known to live up to their 130s if they aren’t soulbonded to a monster partner.

Monsters and half breeds born with the disease called dimming rarely live past their 400s

An exception to the monster lifespan are the “royals”. They take a ritual after being voted into office that binds them to their country, making it so that any decisions they make for the country has to be for its and the peoples benefit (as far as they believe), making them a servant to ebott for the rest of their lives, but extending their life and health in return. The ritual can be broken for the royals who wish to retire and die in peace. The oldest recorded ruler was rumored to be around three thousand

And now the crash!!

For those who don’t know what that is, it’s when all the AUs merged (and my excuse for why all these guys are in the same place lol).

The crash started 17 years ago, and ended within 9 months. Since then no other mystery groups of monsters have been discovered.

Here’s a brief timeline of ebott from crash until now

First day: the land mass that holds ebott appears

Day 2: undertale, underswap, gastertale,, dancetale, theatretale, templetale, all the “farm” AUs, “lust” AUs and the “outer” AUs

Month one: the bird AUs fall from the sky, the nomads stumble out of the forest and the sea AUs mysteriously arrive on ship to shore

Month two, after two months, most of the fell aus (underfell, swapfell, fellswap gold) appear

Month three, the factory (mafias) monsters appear along with the “ghost city” now inhabited and known as ebott city, the capitol. A few weeks later, the fallout monsters appear and ebotts first official hospitals are created

Month four, the royals are finally brought together after threats of inner fighting, and Asgore is voted in as the king

Things settle for four more months, and the new land is explored, vary basic laws are out into place, and things start getting divided into districts.

Month five: Ebott makes contact with several other countries and is introduced to the worlds currency system. Ebotts gold, silver, copper coins is recognized as a currency by the rest of the world

Month seven, the first and only orphanage is founded for any unclaimed children.

On month nine of the crash, the monsters finally access the underground, and to their horror, they find three separate chambers housing the starving horror AUs who had no idea everything that was going on above.

Month ten, land is sold and divided, and ebott begins creating large scale farms

May 20, 2007, ebott celebrates their first official year as a country. The capitol city is named new ebott (cause Asgore sucks at naming things and frankly the rest of the royals aren’t much better)

May 30th, the royal guard is finally re-organized

December 2007, ebotts first countrywide gyftmas celebration, also an official design for the flag and coins are voted on and implemented

February 2008, the first official jail is built and used in ebott lol

July 2008, ebott is finally let into the rest of the worlds internet, and electricity reaches more areas besides just ebott city

August 2008, ebotts children and teens discover tik tok, and it is unanimously decided by every one that a standard public school has to be created

Late august 2008, the first public school is finished in city center

September 2008, the number of school sites number around 300, and counting

January 2009, ebott state college is built and open

April 2009, the ebott scouts is formed, and children hoping to join the guard in the future are able to sign up.

March 2010, ebott is opened by presiding countries for international students and charity programs

November 2010, the following of lady magic opens the temple to the public, and takes over the maintenance of what used to be known as the horrors underground. A grotto is transformed into a place of remembrance for those left behind before the crash

May 2011, the core from the stable underground is moved to the surface and duplicated into several other power factories. All of inhabited ebott is at least within an hour of power

May 2012, the stable underground is open to the public as a tourist attraction. Ebotts is opened by presiding countries to tourism

February 2013, because of public pressure from mainly farm, bird, lusts and the temple monsters, human-monster marriages are now recognized under the state as valid

July 2013 A farm monster discovers how to successfully cultivate magic crops from the underground, aboveground. He shares the secret for free, and other farm monsters take initiative to start sharing their own crop secrets. He is awarded the title of prince.

January 2014 Due to complaints about side effects from human foods, money is poured into research about safer ways to process and preserve foods in ebott.

April 2014, mellowmart becomes the largest company in ebott, finally beating out Walmart in scale.

December 2016, ebott petitions to be recognized as a free independent country to the United Nations. Ebott is turned down

December 2017, ebott petitions again to be recognized as an independent nation

February 2017 Immigration into ebott is closed, and monsters begin boycotting imported human goods. The ebott navy is built.

July 2017, ebott is declared an independent nation

March 2018, the royals declare ebott self sufficient in feeding the country when the amount of food related exports finally exceeds the imports for the first time

July 2018, ebott celebrates its first freedom festival

October 2018, the first college dedicated to the arts is opened in the captitol

July 2019, magical spars are declared the national sport after a grueling battle between spar fans and pickleball fans

November 2019, the first echo festival is celebrated in Goldenvalley

February 2020, humans not born in ebott are finally allowed to apply for citizenship, and the process for that is created.

April 2020 the goldenflower festival is organized for the first time

September 2020, several big brands like coco cola, Hersheys and nestle are banned in ebott when complaints of health issues becomes too much

March 2021, Wendy’s becomes the first company to create a monster-safe fast food outside of ebott, and after months of testing, is given permission to sell. Many other food companies follow and begin making separate recipes for their monster customers

May 2022, snails are declared the national animal of ebott, and popular snail breeds are recognized and the society of the domesticated snail is created for shows and licenses

November 2022, a different country tries to declare war on ebott on the grounds of them “stealing” their young working force (immigrant workers). Ebott threatens to close borders to tourists, those coming for medical care, and all outside companies selling in their lands. The untied nations slaps down the country declaring war.

February 2023, a new branch of the royal guard, called the NPTRF (national people’s trafficking relief foundation) or more commonly called the reverse kidnappers by ebotts supportive teens, is founded to combat the rapidly rising issue of monsters and humans being trafficked and dragged outside the country

[nanowrimo]

When Is a Small Press a Good Fit?

When it comes to publishing, many writers will think about big publishers first. However, there are a lot of different publishing options out there to explore. NaNo participant and author, Clara Ward, talks about their experience publishing with a small press and gives you questions to consider while you think through your publishing options!

NaNoWriMo inspired me to write. Signing with a small press gave me the support I needed to publish a book I love. 

I’d published books before—starting with NaNoWriMo sponsor deals in the early days of online publishing—but I never had the right skill set to promote those books. As a result, they never truly found their audience. 

In November of 2020, I poured my heart into a genre-blurring near-future tale of sailing across the Pacific and building a neurodiverse, queer, and possibly magical chosen family. In 2021, I titled it Be the Sea and asked myself: What am I going to do with that?

1. Are you looking for fame or family?

Small presses are as varied as the people who form them. If you read widely, you may already have a treasured book on your shelf from your publisher-to-be. Try asking NaNoWriMo friends who share your interests if they’ve discovered any surprising or emerging sources for great reads. (At the very least, you may find books you’ll love in unexpected places!)

Admittedly, a small press doesn’t have a fortune to spend on paving your path to fame. But I have never felt as seen as when my soon-to-be publisher, E.D.E. Bell at Atthis Arts, wrote back, “I’m really in love with what you are doing and would like to talk about it.” 

2. Do you have the bandwidth for working with others?

Even with the most supportive small press, you may have to push outside your comfort zone. I know authors who love the absolute control and freedom of self-publishing. For a time, I felt very comfortable just posting my NaNoWriMo fanfiction novels on Archive of Our Own. At most, I had one or two beta readers to offer feedback on those works. Whereas E.D.E. told me in one of our earliest conversations that in addition to our three rounds of editing we’d need “a good number of betas” to cover the range of topics we were working on together.

I was delighted! I knew what I’d written was ambitious, and I welcomed all the feedback I could get. But it turns out, each extra person in a process adds new challenges and delays. I had to stretch my empathy as well as my publishing timeline because, to quote E.D.E. again: “It’s a lot of emotion (as well as brain cycles) to go through...” Outside perspectives will only improve your writing if you are willing to work with them, to truly listen and learn.

3. Can you handle the two-way commitment?

No form of publishing is easy. The myth that authors write while others handle business and promotion is not true at the top, and certainly not with small presses. In my experience, working with Atthis Arts was like joining a team or chosen family. Beyond certain paid tasks, such as editing and sensitivity reading, I discovered a community of authors who freely offered coaching before my first public reading, social media boosting, tips for author webpages, and an extra pair of eyes on letters requesting bookshop readings or other events. While not all small presses work the same way, this supportive culture proved to be an excellent fit for me. Naturally, I wanted to give back whenever possible.

Small presses can only succeed with community. This month, as I promote the launch of Be the Sea at bookshops in Mountain View, Davis, and Sacramento, I will be introducing many Californians to my Michigan-based small publisher, Atthis Arts. When I stand up as a panelist at Norwescon in Washington state or at various science, library, or Pride events later in the year, I’ll be promoting more than Be the Sea by Clara Ward. I’ll give back by sharing my appreciation for small presses, the supportive and inclusive practices they can normalize, and the opportunities they open up for future writers and readers. 

Clara Ward lives in Silicon Valley on the border between reality and speculative fiction. Their latest novel, Be the Sea, features a near-future ocean voyage, chosen family, and sea creature perspectives, while delving into our oceans, our selves, and how all futures intertwine. Their short fiction has appeared in Strange Horizons, Decoded Pride, Small Wonders, and as a postcard from Thinking Ink Press. When not using words to teach or tell stories, Clara uses wood, fiber, and glass to make practical or completely impractical objects. More of their words along with crafted creations can be found at: https://clarawardauthor.wordpress.com

Photo by Hümâ H. Yardım on Unsplash

[kathaynesart]

I remember when you first started Replica and I haven't been here in a hot minute!

May you please do a debrief of what it is, the characters and their relationships.

I want to be able to give my friend (who I finally dragged down into this TMNT rabbit hole) a good explanation of your wonderful comic!

(⁠.⁠ ⁠❛⁠ ⁠ᴗ⁠ ⁠❛⁠.⁠)

Aw thank you so much! Hm… I suppose a summary would be good to have on hand. For the uninitiated with no context, here is the basic elevator pitch:

The year is 2044 and the last remaining Resistance of Earth has just fallen to the alien invaders known as the Krang. In a last ditch effort to save the planet, Casey, a freedom fighter is sent back in time to undo the events that first led to the invasion. While he is ultimately successful in his mission, the state of his original fallen timeline remains unknown. The last of the freedom fighters, his family, perished to ensure his safe escape, leaving their world to the mercy of the Krang.

Which brings us to the ultimate question: when you already know the heroes are doomed to fail, what can be gained from being told their story?

For the rest below, I’m going to write with the assumption that the reader has some basic knowledge of the series and the film because I feel that this story is best enjoyed with proper context.

SUMMARY

Replica is a story meant to answer many of the questions the first 4 minutes of the movie left us wondering. It’s to explain the basic history of the bad future timeline and how it came to be. The plot focuses particularly on the later half of the apocalypse, all with the intention of leading up to the opening scene where the Krang wins and Casey Junior is sent back in time to fix the mistakes that Leo and his family could not.

It’s to answer questions like:

How did Leo get injured?

Why is Mikey so old looking?

What were these characters like in the future?

What happened to Raph, Donnie, and April?

Where is big bad Krang Prime in all this?

How did the Resistance finally lose to the Krang?

Did they plan to send Casey back in time in advance?

What happened to this world/time-branch after Casey Jr was sent into the past?

MAIN CHARACTERS

For the most part, the cast is comprised entirely of characters from the series. My goal is to keep this as canon as possible, so no new OC's... save for one (kind of).

Omega Bootyyyshaker 9000 is where this story starts and ultimately where it ends. He is a brain scan AI of Donatello, created to act as both a support system for the Resistance after the turtle’s untimely death and also a key component in a plan that will hopefully put a stop to the Krang should the Resistance fail. Omega is great because he adds some much needed levity to the story, acting a bit more like the aloof but silly teenage Donnie (a side affect of not having to experience the usual physical weariness that comes with being an organic, aging organism in an apocalypse). However, he also adds more weight by being the thing that is supposed to outlast all of them and act as the last line of defense for the remainder of the universe. He claims to merely be a "replica" of Donnie's mind, but whether he's just a digitized scan, his own AI person, or somehow connected to Donnie in a deeper way has yet to be seen.

Leonardo Hamato: the man, the myth, the legend. Casey Junior spins tales of how great his sensei was in the movie, but in this story we really get to see Leo go from his lowest point as a pawn for the government, crushed by the shame of his past actions, to his greatest height as the leader of the Resistance. He is going to fail a lot in this story... but ultimately his greatest success is overcoming his own inner demons and coming to terms with being the father figure he had never asked to be. He cares deeply for his family and Casey... but he thinks he'd be a horrible dad.

Michelangelo Hamato: the only other surviving turtle to see the end of the world. He is the emotional bedrock of the family and a stand in therapist when he's not being a silly little guy. His mystical powers are unparalleled, but in his attempts to regain his lost Ninpo he taps into something far deeper, leading them down a path that intertwines the destiny of their doomed future and a past that has yet to occur.

Casey Jones Jr: a sweet boy taken in by the Hamato family. He strives to become a great warrior like his mother (Cassandra) and his Sensei (Leo). We are going to watch him grow from child to teenager as he slowly takes on the roll of being a fighter in the resistance. Through it all he must walk an unsteady line that allows him to find the strength to weather the storm but retain a certain spark of hope that helps keep his family going.

April O'neil: Commander of the Resistance and another honorary Hamato family member. She is the voice of reason and most emotionally stable of the family. Even after dealing with so much loss, she keeps a stiff upper lip as well as cold and calculating mind that always puts the colony's wellbeing first and foremost.

Donatello Hamato (deceased): The story begins shortly after Donnie’s passing during an infiltration mission against the Krang. He was dead set on planting a probe behind enemy lines that would allow them to spy on the Krang’s movements. However it seems that he had a secret agenda in planting something that would work as a final doomsday weapon against the Krang. What that is exactly, we do not yet know. The man self-destructed in a last ditch effort to avoid being interrogated by the Krang as well as a final attack to injure Krang Prime.

Raphael Hamato (deceased): The eldest brother who sadly passed away many years ago in the fight against the Krang. A boisterous but considerate man whose death sapped a great deal of the fighting spirit out of his brothers. His absence is greatly felt, but he might not be as far gone as he seems.

Krang Prime (One): Our big bad of the story. He is the leader of the Krang that has latched onto this planet like a cancer, using up its resources and assimilating its population. However, unlike the hundreds of planets that have come before this one is particularly personal. He doesn't want to merely assimilate but utterly destroy the descendants that caused his imprisonment thousands of years ago. His current state is unknown after being last seen with Donatello at the time of the man's self-destruction.

NEED TO KNOW DETAILS

All Resistance fighters have tiny self destruct bombs in their brains so that the Krang can not probe their minds to find out the Liberty Colony's location. They go off automatically after Krang infestation reaches a certain percentage, but can also be set off via voice command.

Donnie's brain bomb was far more potent because of the amount of information he knew. He did not want to risk the Krang getting any part of his mind.

The Krang have been searching for the resistance in a frustrating game of cat and mouse which has only become more difficult now that the Resistance easily knows their every move by using Donnie's probe.

Central Park Colony: now destroyed, but was once the last massive human colony in North America, housing both the EPF (Earth Protection Force) and US Government. Racism was a huge problem as most yokai and mutants were either quarantined, tested on, or used as living weapons in the fight against the Krang. It has since been destroyed.

Liberty Colony (aka the Resistance): grew from the ashes of the Central Park Colony. It is comprised of the survivors and lead by Leonardo, April, and several others. It is much smaller and more militaristic, but treats yokai, humans, and mutants equally.

Artificial Intelligence (like Omega and Shelldon) are able to fend off the Krang assimilation that people and tech would normally succumb to. It is for this reason Omega is used as both a protector of the Liberty Colony and operator for a majority of the vehicles so that the tech can no longer be easily taken over by the Krang during attacks.

Leonardo and Michelangelo (as well as Donatello's) Ninpo have all been stripped from them by this point in the story. While Leo can not tap into his family connection at all, Mikey at least has regained the ability to use some of his mystic powers.

Mikey's mystic abilities however come at a price. Since he can not tap into his Ninpo and the fountain of energy from his ancestors, he is instead using his own life force to cast his spells. It is slowly draining him.

TIMELINE Can be viewed HERE

SOURCE MATERIAL The video that inspired this all can be viewed HERE

Hope this helps! Sorry it's a bit long, tried to break it up with images. At least there might be a few interesting bits of information other readers may not have noticed. I snuck in a few things that haven't been mentioned yet, hehe.

[raayllum]

Anyway time to talk about the 6x03 poem:

As many others have speculated judging by the map, Captain Skall made her way to Hook named after her, and then "as east she sailed into waters so deadly and cold" in the Frozen Shards, her ship eventually being stuck and meeting her doom there.

With that out of the way, I want to talk about other pieces of info, why this might be the poem for 6x03 specifically, and where I think Skall may fit timeline wise:

"From the isles without name" makes me think of the Independent Isles in between Evenere and Katolis.

"sailing north, she called herself free" makes me feel feral with Callum (and Rayla) doing the same in hopes of freeing Callum from Aaravos' grasp by destroying the prison

"Through forests and flowers, past the uneven towers" clearly symbolizes Katolis, indicating that Skall lived once most of the human kingdoms had been established, and thereby post-Exile/Exodus.

"Skall hungered for glory, she wanted a story / they’d tell it long after she died". Routinely we see a desire for glory / worthiness / power described as hunger ("Hungry for knowledge and power" / "But that small taste left some humans hungry—starved, even—for a better path. An easier path. And thus Elarion became the birthplace of a new form of magic, a shortcut to primal power: dark magic"). This also comes into seeking a legacy.

"So with winter wind’s blowing / she sailed north, forgoing / a man who’d have made her his bride". This is where we see the poem take a more negative slant in a few ways. The first is winter, wind, and north, setting up a future unfortunate turn of events. This is also the first mention of Skall having something else in her life other than adventure and something she had to subsequently abandon. While the end of the poem is much more on her side of feelings, "forgoing" does mean "renouncing; sacrificing or giving up" something that is more positive.

"Alone in the cold, yet ever so bold" again adds to the more negative feeling the poem is building, as boldness is in the contrast with "alone in the cold" that's overall negative and maintaining a bit more of an upkeep. Likewise, we see the return of the wind with an even more negative connotation in wailing in the following stanza: "And oh, winter wailed / as east she sailed / into waters so deadly and cold". We see the return of cold but also the change into things being 'deadly' (although there were still hints of danger earlier, as 'bold' indicates).

"Then came the ice, and trapped in its vise" The cold finally catches up to her, and we see ice return as a form of entrapment (2x06, 3x08, 3x09, 5x04, 5x06, 5x08). Most interestingly, "vise" is a tool with closable jaws for clamping things. Maybe the ice is magical, or the jaw of a great (the dragon we've seen in the trailer) creature?

"And while she found peace / she wished that, at least / she’d told him she loved him, always". While the poem ends on a somewhat bittersweet end (at death but at peace), we do see that Skall died with a final regret to the man she could've wed but left instead.

Or you could say, a last wish.

Either way, the poem paints a rather grim journey: going North didn't hold the same freedom and achievements that Skall hoped for, and instead led to entrapment, separation, and death.

That said: there's a few Rayllum-y things I think we can glean from this poem, for starters:

1) The episode will likely have a strong focus on Callum and Rayla sailing to and/or through the Frozen Sea on whatever ship they're planning to use to get there. This leaves 6x02 "Love, War, and Mushrooms" more open to either explore other plot lines or another pit stop in their journey (like say, the Silvergrove)

2) The poem itself has pretty clear Rayllum parallels, specifically in TDP's continual gender subversion of the women who puts other things above her romantic relationship, even if it's likewise seen as a sacrifice. Rayla left Callum in order to protect him/the world from Viren, even if that meant damaging their relationship, and Skall puts her desire for glory and adventure over presumably a more settled married life at home. (Excuse me while I scream over "forgoing a man who'd have made her his bride.")

3) The poem likewise has some parallels to Rayla's "Dear Callum" letter specifically. There are wishes expressed of the leaving party, a desire to have made feelings more plain that Callum reiterates in 5x04 when they think they're about to die ("I hope you know—" "I know"), and most notably, a parallel to the always mention:

she wished that, at least she’d told him she loved him, always.

But, if it does—if you feel that soft aching—know that that piece of your heart isn’t missing. It’s not missing at all, Callum: I’m carrying it with me! Always. I love you. I love you so much.

4) All this bodes quite well for 6x03 being an episode with a big Rayllum moment in it — perhaps even their Big "You Finally Came Back" Talk — especially since there's not much else to (presumably) happen on a ship if they're just travelling somewhere (and not being pursued this time).

Episode Speculation (a summary / misc thoughts)

Callum and Rayla travelling to the Frozen Sea

Big Talk happens

+ potential love confession / reaffirmation?

They reach the other end of the Frozen Sea

Maybe fight the big dragon from the video game teaser we see with Rayla (like Skall, she has literal hooks = blades) whose guarding or in their way to the Starscraper? Could account for the jaws and maybe the ice

One of them is worried and/or has a moment of thinking the other person is hurt/injured bc of said dragon fight?

Maybe some Aaravos backstory in his lost love (although like I said, I don't think it's Skall exactly — I still think the likeliest names are Elara-adjacent or Kalik)

Episode Title Speculation (in about this order):

The Frozen Sea

By River and Sea

Always (this would be my personal favourite and i would never stop screaming)

[its-chelisey-stuff]

what level of downbad-ism, what level of loser-ism... how much of a GONER, do you have to be to give zero fucks about your possible (almost certain) death???

YES!!! also omg poor Sol was way more scared of Sunjae being there than of the shady truck

HIS FACE WHEN HE REALISED!! I loved it. His future self never figured it out, because Sol left before his theories could actually make sense, but this Sunjae had it all (actual confession by her and a little push from Taesung) to know what was ahead.

OMG!!! HE'S CRAZY!! like yeah this confession is out of this world, just shows how devoted he is, how IN LOVE he is, how much he prefers to have her by his side, for whatever time they can have, rather than be apart from each other BUT he's also quite literally crazy, because dude, there's a really BIG chance (like you have already died twice chance) you'll end up dead and you don't care! Not at all. Amazing.

That was just so cute. And finally a kiss they both will remember lol

P.s. Not to rain on anyone's parade, but I'm gonna lol Because I just have a really bad feeling about the future. The last timeline was basically the best outcome there could have been(not to mention Sunjae didn't actually die). Why would that be the second to last timeline? Why would that be the second best? I think it's gonna end up being true that Sol made a careless decision in going back in time before she could make sure about how things were gonna turn out. I think this isn't, somehow, the last trip to the past or there's a twist coming up.

Also there's this:

Why would they show us a glimpse into the future if we are still in the past? In the happy past, may I add. Idk, something's fishy...

I'm gonna go crazy waiting for next ep lol

[phoebepheebsphibs]

What does the bad timeline au look like for your boys 👀

OOOOH, here we go!

(So, I did hint to this in the NFIF/UIFY Crossover when DvD met Omega, and Omega ran a simulation to see what DvD's future would be like. It was a general explanation, but I'm gonna go deeper into detail now --)

2020: So, first off, the Krang attack in 2020, same as in canon. Leon, 'Phael, Mikey, and DvD manage to survive the invasion by some miracle. For the first year, they just focus on staying alive and hidden from the aliens, but by the end of that first year the reunite with April and their friends and discover the beginnings of the Resistance. (Karai was separated from them all as well, but no one has seen her yet and so they all assume she's dead.)

2023-2025: Several years pass, and there is still no sign of Karai. While the boys are out doing a supply raid, they get ambushed by a Krang attack and are caught in a collapsing building. 'Phael freezes in panic and Leon takes a hit to rescue him, though the two are trapped in rubble together as they wait for Mikey and DvD to dig them out. However... Leon doesn't have that long, and encourages Raph as the leader of their family to stay strong and take care of Mikey and Donnie and April and everyone else...

Leo dies, having saved Raphael.

2025-2030: The three mourn their brother, but do their best to help lead the Resistance. In 2026, Cass gives birth to a son, and 'Phael helps her to raise the child. However, during these five years, tragedy strikes again. Michelangelo's hypoglycemia has been acting up due to the low rations, and in spite of their promptings to take care of himself, Mikey has been intentionally skipping meals so the others can take his rations, effectively starving himself. That, coupled with the injuries he gets from his ninpo overdrive, finally takes its toll on his frail body.

Mikey starves to death.

2030-2035: After Mikey's death, Donnie and Raph have a hard time staying cheerful. And to add to the grief, Cassandra dies in battle as well. But some good comes to light, as the group receives word of a lone stranger roaming New York and saving survivors while battling the Krang. After investigating, they discover that Karai has survived and become something of a folk hero! She joins their Resistance, bringing her own group of survivors with her. During this time, Raphael has grown to be a force to be reckoned with, and even the leader of the Resistance! Donatello is working around the clock to create weapons and grow nutritional, non-contaminated plants that they can eat safely. It's hard work, but no one said the end of the world was easy. DvD discovers a formula and equation that may work for time-travel, but he is unsure... he starts to build the machine.

2035-2044: The Resistance is not looking good. They can barely go above ground anymore without being picked off and slaughtered. The food and supplies are running low. 'Phael realizes that the end is coming, and there may be no escape. He has Donnie work full-time on the time machine, as it is their last hope. The Resistance grows smaller and smaller with each passing month, until it seems like it's just Raph, DvD, April, Karai, and Casey Jones Jr., along with a few special people like Big Mama Frida Kahlo. Finally, in 2044, the Krang find their hideout and begin to slaughter the last of the Resistance. Raph has CJ and Donnie evacuate into the labs with the time machine, and while Raph holds them off, Donnie begins to power the machine with his ninpo and what little electricity they have left. Raph instructs Casey on what to do, that he's sending him back in time -- not necessarily to stop the Krang, but more importantly to save Casey from the attack. If nothing else, Casey must survive. If Raph can do nothing else but make sure that his boy sees a world without war, where he is healthy... that will be enough for him. That will redeem his mistakes, how he let his brothers die because of his failures and fear. Casey has to live. He tells him to find his family, warn them, and to find his sister as well, because she -- Suddenly the Krang break into the room, and Casey is thrown into the time machine. Dee's ninpo goes into overdrive and powers the machine, though it costs him his life. Raph manages to hold the Krang off until the machine does it's duty, and then...

Raph and Donnie die sending Casey Jones Jr. into the past.

And yes, I did cry writing this.

[jayden-killer]

SHALL I COMPARE THEE TO A SUMMER'S DAY?

previous part here.

summary: That's it. That's the moment when you decide to open the famous letter Loki wrote to you before sacrificing himself into becoming the God of Stories.

warnings: lots of angst, heheheh.

author's note: my biggest apologies!! I didn't mean to procrastinate this one, but I also had 0 ideas on how to write it (((￣へ￣井). I tried my best. Also, bonus point, as an english literature student, i had to add Shakespeare's Sonnet 18. >:)

taglist (people who wanted the letter, its hereee!!): @eviebuggg @tea-kovsky-pot @sititran

☆

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate:

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,

And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,

And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;

And every fair from fair sometime declines,

By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm'd;

But thy eternal summer shall not fade,

Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;

Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,

When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,

So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

***

My dear,

Putting what I’m feeling on paper now is complicated for me.

Certain emotions have no explanation.

The TVA will collapse. I have seen into the future, and have gone back in time indecipherable times to put a point to this story, however my attempts have always been in vain. Only when hope was about to leave my body, I understood.

I understood my glorious purpose, I understood that there would be no other solution but one: sacrifice.

It will lead to the birth of a new, better timeline, however, not everything is pink and flowers. I already know there will be consequences for what we’ve built hard, you and I. Breaking a love pact that we promised to honor in spite of everything.

Which I will break.

The bitterness in my mouth assails me. The pen trembles in the palm of my hand; my eyes are swollen with tears...

To me, you are like an early morning sun ray on what is to be a sunny summer morning.

To me, you are like sea waves, crashing on rocks with determination, yet delicate in their touch.

To me, you are like the melody of a harp, melodious, cordial.

You are what still feeds the beating of my heart at such a difficult time as this.

You are what I call "Love of my life".

What a wonder, love itself. Before you, I never knew love. You, my other half, enchanted me with your magic. You gave me all of you.

It wouldn’t be fair of me not to return the favor.

I shall never forget your angelic voice, your shining eyes, the sweetness of your lips, your kind touches, the brightest smile in the Nine Realms, making the major gods invidious.

Do not shed more tears than you have already shed.

I will not be physically with you, sleeping in your arms on your comfortable sofa, enjoying the warmth of your body.

I shall watch over you every single day of my existence. Time won't separate us, not even in the slightest.

I'll always look up to you,

I'll always protect you.

Our souls are connected even beyond time itself.

My beautiful wife.

With much love,

𝐿𝑜𝓀𝒾.

[fanfic-obsessed]

Not quite a fall

Here is an idea that takes the horrifying absurdity of the Clone Wars and magnifies it.  Please keep your hands and feet inside the ride at all times…unless you wish to become part of the ride itself. Then grab onto these characters and you too can try to wrangle them. 

I do want to make it clear from the start that the Jedi Council and Dooku are making the best of some fairly shitty options, at this point and in the future. The Jedi do not know/cannot prove Palpatine is Sidious and the reality is that without absolute proof they risk being wrong and if they are then the real Sith master will go to ground and they will be left with nothing.  In addition Palpatine has contingencies for every aspect of his plan (and likely did in canon as well, if he had a contingency clones for himself), including if clones were found early, the chips did not work as intended, and the Jedi found out too early. It may not be obvious, or seem counterintuitive for the Jedi to keep walking forward, even knowing of the trap, knowing that so many would likely die in this fabricated war. But this is not meant to be criticizing the Jedi for the shitty options they had. 

Now we start with Yan Dooku, prior to his Fall. This is also before the Naboo crisis , in fact this is in the beginning when Palpatine is still manipulating him. 

*-As a side note, have you ever tried to look into the timeline for the clones and try to fit it into the greater timeline. That shit is wild. Jango Fett is recruited for Operation Knightfall-Order 66 and the clone project- in 32 BBY. This is the same year of the Naboo crisis and, according to Wookiepeidia, it is also the year that Cody was born. Based on what we know of the Kaminoan numbering system for the clones, there were at least 2 batches before Cody’s-The Nulls and the Alphas. Jango Fett was recruited by Dooku after his Fall, and he is said to have fallen after Qui Gonn’s death. I get that Palpatine had already been building towards this but man for this timeline to work Dooku had a quicker Fall time than Anakin-who went from ‘stop him’ to ‘time to murder children’ in a distressingly short period of time-  All this adds up to 32 BBY being, like, 2020 COVID  levels of crazy. Because we had Qui Gon’s death, Dooku’s fall, the recruitment of Jango Fett-I understand there was a bounty hunt as an audition-, and all of this happened in enough time for at least 3 batches of clones- possibly more- to be born in 32BBY. How long is the gestation period for the clones? How is gestation and decanting set up so this timeline works. The Galactic Standard year is a 12 month/368 day model. Even if we presume that the double aging is also present in gestation, thus instead of 9 months it takes 4.5 months, that is still 13.5 months for 3 batches. Even with a staggered start cycles-batch 1 is the start point, batch 2 starts a week later, batch 3 starts a week after that and we can get everything down to a minimum 5 months, there still so much shit that has to happen in 7 months-*

In this Dooku, as a Jedi Master, does recognize that he is being manipulated and goes to the Jedi Council. He has just enough proof to prove that the Sith were back but does now know who (He knows that Palptine is involved but does not know if he is a Sith, a willing collaborator, or a patsy). The council decides that Dooku would go undercover as it were, to pretend that he is falling for Palpatine’s manipulation and to let it go to its natural conclusion, which they all presume will end with Dooku pretending to fall.  Outside of the Council, there are only three other Jedi that are told of this assignment. Shadows Tholme and Quinlan Vos (though a senior Padawan at the time) were his contacts. The only other person told was Senior Padawan Obi Wan Kenobi, at the insistence of Mace Windu (Now this was not through some belief in Obi Wan as a person, or his value to such a mission. It was purely so that he could keep Qui Gon Jinn from flipping his lid when and if Dooku needed to pretend to be a Sith. Jinn was not told because no one thought that he could keep from endangering everyone through some ‘Will of the Force’ reasoning or trying to be ‘helpful’).  Neither Obi Wan or the Shadows are told who else knows (though Vos and Thome do know the other is aware), and Obi Wan still has no contact with Dooku, so this knowledge does not change much at first. To be exceedingly clear, Obi Wan is only told that Master Yan Dooku is taking a long term mission where he might have to appear to Fall, in which case Obi Wan is going to need to keep Qui Gon from interfering; he is given no other information about to mission or what is being found.  As it turns out Qui Gon dies just before Dooku ‘falls’. 

The clones are still commissioned, but they are not chipped; save for a single clone whose name later becomes Chip, this is the clone that Dooku shows to Palpatine as proof the plan was going as it should. This Dooku is more involved with the Clones. Though the trainers do not know it (having entirely bought into project Knightfall), Dooku carefully teaches the clones th truth of their existence (that the war they are being commissioned for is BS, purely a trap for the Jedi and that they would have been designed to both love and be forced kill the Jedi). In essence he trains them to be spies in the guise of soldiers.  He has reported the existence of the clones to the council, but like Dooku they are stuck by what they can visibly do with the information. There is some limited secret contact between the leaders of the clones (The Alpha’s as the Nulls had been adopted by Kal Skirata) and the Jedi Council, in which the Jedi Council apologizes for what is being asked of the clones and plans are made to help those that need an escape wherever they are able (Dooku ‘claims’ as many clones that were due to be decommissioned for his own ‘experiments’ as he is able, most of the time that meant that clones who were to be decommissioned were sent to live on a small, unpopulated moon in Serrano’s system-the exceptions to this were clones born with fatal, untreatable congenital defects, for example being without enough of their major organs that there would be no way to grow more before the child died in agony-those few who were truly not viable were given a painless death. It becomes a practice amongst the clones that anyone who truly did not want to fight would drop their scores into Decommission range). 

To this end the Coruscant Guard were specifically chosen because they were the best at that kind of subterfuge, the clone equivalent of the Jedi Shadows and the ones who could keep themselves hidden/shielded against mind control 24/7. Fox is the only non Force sensitive, near human in the galaxy who is entirely impervious to Jedi mind tricks and Sith Mind control, the reason he was given the command that would have given him the most contact with Palpatine. They find out, much later, that some strange mutation makes him entirely impervious to any Force based power that will cause him harm.

When the time comes to enact the plans to start the war, Dooku still sends Jango Fett to lure Obi Wan to Geonosis.  But Obi Wan goes to Kamino knowing that he was going to find the Clones (having been briefed by the Council, who had been informed by Dooku). Anakin is not aware of the second layer to their mission to protect Padme, having never been brought into the loop regarding Dooku.  Obi Wan and Dooku have a pleasant conversation about both Qui Gon (and how he was likely watching from the Force), and there is a plan in place for Obi Wan to escape before the gladiatorial arena in a way that still would spark the war, but not cost lives.  That plan had to be abruptly scrapped when Anakin and Padem showed up on Geonosis to ‘rescue’ Obi Wan, after they sent a message to the council.  One of the major changes to Geonosis is how Anakin lost his hand; it was not chopped off by Dooku but lost in an explosion caused by the droids. 

Here is where we start to get into the horror and the humor. Because this war is fabricated, a thing of smoke and mirrors whose sole purpose is to collect power for a few individuals. More importantly this is a Bullshit created war for the purpose of trapping the Jedi. The upper command on both sides (Jedi High council, Dooku and later Ventress, Palpatine, Grievous) know that the entire war is bullshit, though Palpatine does not know that the JHC are aware. The troopers, from the youngest to the oldest clones, are all utterly aware that the war is bullshit. They grew knowing they would be fighting in a war that was utter bullshit.  The reason that the Droids could not be programmed for critical thinking was that it took them a maximum one battle to realize the war was bullshit, and they were not pleased about being cannon fodder. 

In fact there were only two groups who were actually affected by the war that were not aware that the entire thing was contrived bullshit. 

Every office not part of the high command (non clone officers, Jedi Generals, the entire command structure between fielded droids and CIS Generals on Grievous's level-I have no idea how the command structure of the CIS army works and barely any more about the GAR structure but work with me here), which I tend to think of as the middle management is the first group. 

The other is the innocents being attacked by CIS forces.  To them the war is very real.

Until they know for sure who the Sith Master is Dooku, the Jedi High Command(now including a fully read-in Obi Wan), or the Clones cannot let on that they know the war is ultimately bullshit. And there are too many innocents at stake to completely blow off or fake fighting. Yes when Dooku, and Ventress after she is brought into the fold, are in command they tend to try and take worlds with resources but little to no populations and they disengage as soon as they possibly can,  but there are too many who buy into ‘The War’ or the power that they are getting to fake battles and in battles someone is bound to die. 

Imagine being one of the Jedi Councilors and high generals, knowing (instead of just suspecting) that every battle they go into is unnecessary bullshit to trap the Jedi. Knowing that their troopers know that they are being sent into battle for unnecessary bullshit, but everyone having to pretend that they buy into the bullshit, that they have to pretend ignorance of things so gallingly obvious.

-In this world the Jedi council has created a secret process for allowing the defection of troopers that do not want to fight. Pong Krell (who never got to the point of Falling, as he never got used to thinking the clones were non sentient) and a handful of other Jedi spread throughout the system's armies, maintained a deliberately high ‘casualty’ rate to go with their high success rate. Clones that wanted to defect were transferred to these specific battalions where they were ‘killed in action’ and transported to a way point that relays them to the planet the decommissioned clones went to. None of these Jedi know that Dooku is actually on their side, or that the whole war is bullshit, but they are able to hang onto their sanity a bit better for this process. -

Picture Dooku, and later Ventress, staring across the battlefield as horrified at the lives being taken as the Jedi. Still having to pretend to buy in, saying all the right things (Ventress does still take Wolffe’s eye, but it is Wolffe’s idea to help sell that Ventress is not ‘too soft’ on the clones she is fighting). Imagine having to calculate the exact point they can withdraw, when they have to press their victory for appearances. Knowing that they (as Ventress was completing her Jedi training under Dooku, who does not want her to be lost to the darkside) have to reconcile killing for the sake of appearances.  Having to bury their own horror when they work with other CIS high command, who very much know that the entire war is bullshit but don’t care, or are actively enjoying, the lives lost. 

It changes some details, both major and minor, on who dies when, but in the grand scheme of things this knowledge does not change the overall trajectory of the war (though Dooku is not killed). It is still three years in that Palpatine tells Anakin (who, at no point, is brought into the loop about Dooku, the defection of clones, or any of it-mostly because no one not in a very strict ‘need to know’ was told and partly because the Jedi Council allowed the clones themselves to decide who would know about the defection battalions; they could not quite convince themselves that he would not share that information where he should not) that he is the Sith Master. Anakin runs to tell Windu. 

But in this, instead of gathering the council to fight Sidious, Windu’s first action is to comm Fox. All he says to the head of the CG is, ‘Palpatine has just confirmed that he is the Sith Master’. 

Fox responds with, ‘I will comm you when it is done’.

Anakin is standing there, breathing heavily from running all the way from the Senate, very unsure what was going on but certain the announcement that Palpatine was a Sith should be taken with some more urgency than Windu was showing. 

Ponds enters and when he is told who the Sith is he sighs, deeply. “I was so sure it was that odious aide of Palpatine’s” (Whom Pond refers to only by the name of Bastard, if at all).

Just as Anakin is starting to become antsy (very much in the mindset of ‘shouldn’t we do something about the professed Sith in the same building as my secret wife?) Fox comms back. His hair is sticking straight away from his head (he found out that Palpatine’s Lighting did not hurt him the old fashioned way) and reports that Palpatine is very dead (each Guard wanted to make sure…and shooting is a good way to make sure), the Senate is in lockdown, to tell Skywalker that his wife is on a medical transport for the Temple’s Healing Halls (using those exact words),and that Fox will be filing a formal complaint against the Naboo education system for poor sex ed.  

After the call is done, the next call Windu puts in is to Dooku. Windu tells Dooku that it is time to come home.  Anakin watches horrified fascination as Dooku visibly sags with relief, saying that he and Ventress just need to tie up some loose ends here and to have a therapist ready. 

[d34dlysinner]

Prettybusy Updates/promises for the future. Year 2024

I literally took this from their website so. This was posted today: 10/01/2024.

Hello, this is Prettybusy.

Since the release of <What in Hell is Bad?>, many people have found Hell to support us and tell us what could be improved.

We are most apologetic that we cannot reply to all the voices.

But even when we weren't able to respond to everything, we still read every email, made sure we didn't miss anything,

and kept the production crew together for ongoing discussions.

We would like to apply many new things to Hell, but here's our first response to your voices,

summarizing what we can realistically expect to see in 2024.

More info about content, pricing and improvement of environment under the cut.

[Addition of contents]

Life goes on forever.

To those of you who come to find <What in Hell is Bad?>, we hope to be with you for new stories and new events.

So, here are some new content that we promise to add.

First

The addition of a new main story - Chapter 5 - (within January)

Hell's next story will be added.

What will be added in the new main story are main story episodes including battles, Minhyeok's story, and Hell's chatrooms.

We aim to add new chapters once every 3 months.

Second

The release of the minigame <Catch Minhyeok's Boxers> (within January)

Minhyeok's boxers have flown away in the wind! It is a game where you catch boxers floating in the sky with Ppyong who is armed with shibari.

To satisfy your desire to earn paid currency, we will add a minigame that allows you to randomly farm items alongside light gaming.

You can obtain not only Lesser Keys and Greater Keys, but also Solomon's Seals if you're lucky(!)

Third

The addition of new daily chats (within February)

The interest of all devils which you can see once a day. Daily chats will be added.

We are aiming to add daily chats steadily once every 2 months.

Fourth

The addition of the Friends system(within March)

You are not alone now...!

Adding friends gives you the ability to earn additional items, see what characters your friends have that you don't, and show your profile to other friends.

Fifth

The addition of Realm of the Seraphim(within March)

The closed <Realm of the Seraphim> of the Dark Sanctuary will be opened.

You can now enter Gabriel, Raphael, and Michael's realms to fight them.Similar to the Nightmare Dungeon, you can only face them if you fulfill the conditions, and while it will be a scarier battle, you will be rewarded with better items.

What's unusual about this is that you won't exchange items through an exchange, but rather you get the

items you loot from their realms immediately after the battle.

Sixth

The addition of a birthday system(within April)

The devils understood the human world's <celebration of birthdays>.

Now, the devils will congratulate the day you were born, the most unusual being in Hell.

Devils who are on good terms with you will contact you, and also prepare presents with their hearts.

Seventh

The addition of decorating the lobby icon(within May)

The production crew also enjoy decorating everything with the devils we love.

Like on Halloween, the function to decorate the lobby icon with a single devil's theme will be added.

The icon packages for all devils won't be there from the start, but the icons of all devils will definitely be added.

Eighth

The addition of line stickers(once registration is complete)

We are preparing line stickers of each devil version.

First off, Ppyong's stickers are ready and we are getting ready to register. It is not up to us to decide whether it will be able to register so we can't give you an exact timeline, but barring any major issues, you should be able to see them in the first half of the year. We will also be creating a number of opportunities for you to join the devils outside of the game this year.

[Pricing system reform]

Once again, we sincerely thank you for finding Hell despite its many shortcomings.

We will continue to improve the parts that inconvenience you in Hell's environments you experience.

So, here is our promise of 2024 to make your experience more comfortable.

First

The function to 'select' when summoning an L grade character (within February)

We confirmed that you have been working hard to get your hands on L grade devils, and we have seen how

frustrating it can be when you have reached your number of guaranteed acquisition but can't get the devil you want more.

Therefore, the production crew discussed this to be the improvement that should be made first.

Now when L grade characters are newly released, you can select the character you want once you

reach the number of guaranteed acquisition.

Moreover, we sincerely understand and apologize for the frustration of those who didn't get their limited characters.

In the interest of equity, we can't directly give you the angels you didn't get, but we have added a system to make it

easier to get Solomon's Seals with the promise of a definitive reprint of the angel characters.

Second

Monthly acquisition of Solomon's Seals (within February)

We have confirmed that people who play the game 100% for free don't have the opportunity to get an L grade character, and that makes them feel a great sense of loss.

We have made all of our stories available for free for those who want to play for free, but we empathize that the devils, especially the touchable ones, tempt you so strongly that it is difficult to resist.

Therefore, players who play for free can also obtain 500 Seals per month through various activities such as quests and attendance.

Third

Pancake Shop renewal (within March)

We have received a lot of feedback about the efficiency of the Pancake Shop and how getting S grade characters and artifacts with pancakes just isn't that much fun.

Also for 100% free-to-players, one of the largest opinions was to to give them the opportunity to

earn L grade characters when they obtain duplicate L grade and S grade characters, even if it costs much currency.

While it is impossible for us to listen to 100% of the feedback we receive, we have been working hard to make sure we are listening to you as much as possible, which is why we are announcing a complete renewal of the

Pancake system and prepare the opportunity to obtain L grade characters.

(1) The Pancake Shop will now be upgraded to the Nightmare Pancake Shop, and free-to-play players will now be able to obtain L grade characters through the Nightmare Pancake Shop.

With the addition of the Nightmare Dungeon and the Realm of the Seraphim, you will need to develop a variety of characters. Gold and Tomes will be much more important, and you will need to be more efficient with limited action power.

As a result, duplicate acquisition of B/A/A+ grade characters will now grant Gold and Tomes, and duplicate acquisition of S grade and L grade characters will grant <Nightmare Pancakes>.

(2) <Nightmare Pancakes> will be used in purchasing goods in the newly opening <Nightmare Pancake Shop>.

In the Nightmare Pancake Shop, you can purchase a monthly rotation of <L grade characters> and <L grade character artifacts>, <exclusive stickers to decorate your chat room profile>, <in-game icon design packages>, and

<Solomon's Tears>.

(Through fun planning, we will continue to add novel and adorable goods.)

(3) The <Pancakes> you already own can be used to purchase items from the existing Pancake Shop, or exchanged for <Nightmare Pancakes> - currency that can be used in the Nightmare Pancake Shop. (*Not at a 1 to 1 ratio.)

This is an upgraded version of the Pancake Shop that we have been working hard to continuously bring you as many opportunities as we can.

Not all functions are immortal, and we are planning to listen to many opinions again after implementing the shop.

Through the renewal of the Pancake Shop, we hope you obtain more efficiency and opportunities.

Fourth

Adjustment of the price of the Nightmare Pass (within March)

The Nightmare Pass was designed to give players a chance to get a guaranteed L grade character and a lot of paid items for a fraction of the cost.

However, there were various opinions ranging from the Pass being cheap to too expensive due to exchange rate

differences between countries (in some cases due to the dual conditions of exchange rate and app store).

One thing we know for sure is that most players had a blast.

We want you to enjoy your visit to Hell, so we have decided to price the Nightmare Pass a little lower than it is now, taking into account currency differences between countries.

We will announce the exact price again.

However, we respectfully ask for your kind understanding that it takes a lot of time and effort to bring

L grade characters to you, including the artwork, Live2D, stories, comics, and voice acting, so we can't just make them too cheap.

[Improvement of environment]

First

Adjustment of staging time of Ultimates (within February)

While we wanted to maximize the spectacle of combat through fancy staging, we found that the pacing of

combat can be a bit sluggish for those who are already used to staging.

The scenes in which the characters' faces appear will be reduced to 1/2.

Second

Enjoying event story illustrations (within March)

We accept wholeheartedly the feedback that after watching an event story, it is very sad not to be able to see the illustrations after the event story period.

You can now rewatch the illustrations you enjoy in the future event stories you meet in the existing album.

Third

Addition of a Boss skill window (within March)

We hear your feedback that when a boss angel appears, it is hard to respond because you don't know what skill they use.

Boss angels will now have skill icons next to the angels, and you can tap on it to see the skill they use.

However, there are bosses that intentionally do not expose their skill icons in some places for the sake of difficulty.

Fourth

Faster announcements

We recognize that announcements about new character additions and release schedules do not give you enough time to prepare, or even make you feel anxious.

To explain the situation so far, the <evaluation> takes a very long time unlike other games, and it is very difficult to confirm the release date.

This is because even if we announce our release date well in advance by the standards of other games, 2-3 weeks can easily pass if we get rejected only a few times.

But this is not a situation that our players should have to deal with, and it is something we must solve.

For a safe announcement, we are planning to update only the main story and minigame in January without releasing new sub stories, new S grade characters or L grade characters.

We will be pulling about two months' worth of evaluation for new characters that are tied to evaluation, so we'll be able to give you a stable schedule ahead of time once we have the results of the evaluation.

We realize that not releasing new characters can be boring for our users. But if you could understand that this was a very difficult decision for us to make, we'll be working harder in the month of January to ensure that we're able to give you stable announcements.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank you from the bottom of our hearts for finding Hell once again.

We would like to say that although we do have many shortcomings, but we never made decisions to give you bad experiences.

And that we'll never stop, and that we'll continue to think and listen every day to keep things moving in the right direction.

We wish we could use large staff to make faster improvements and respond to more voices in real time, but we are deeply sorry and saddened that we can't.

We will repay your love with a production crew that will answer your questions as quickly as we can.

You are the most valuable and appreciated part of the production crew's experience.

Though it may be slow, Hell will not stop. It will become more experienced and faster.

Thank you always.

Link of the website:

http://whb.prettybusy.kr/

[stupidspidey]

DRAKE VS KENDRICK LAMAR

(Hey! here’s all of the songs i referenced that i cns actually add here! Plewse note i literally forgot to cover *meet the grahams*, but, fuck it, whatever.)

With the recent ongoing war between Kendrick Lamar and Drake, i feel like as someone with way too much time on their hands and nothing else going on for the day, what better than to write a cohesive timeline of literally *everything* that’s happened? And i don’t mean from **First Person Shooter**, i mean from **good kid, m.A.A.d city** type everything. Yeah, the Drake stuff isn’t exactly as recent as it may appear. Saying as theres no more ‘intro’ for me to give, here i go.

***Buried Alive Interlude (ft. Kendrick Lamar) - Take Care (2011)***

This was the beginning of the relationship between Drake and Kendrick, both of them considering eachother peers in the industry, despite being in such different lanes. (Lamar conceptual, and Drake more mainstream.), In an interview Lamar describes Drake as “A good guy.” (paraphased), regardless, things seemed alright for the two, the only real “beef” being their opposing views on how they views on their wealth and fame, Lamar keeping personal details quiet, while Drake frequently posts his lavish life to his thousands of followers.

***Poetic Justice (ft. Drake) - good kid, m.A.A.d city (2012)***

To say the two artists were always in some sort of feud would be wrong. On Kendrick’s debut album later rap classic, ***’good kid, m.A.A.d city’***, we see a feature from Drake on the track Poetic Justice. A few things of note though, is that this time period shows us a good natured relationship between Drake and Kendrick, even Drake going as far to say that *“GKMC was the last great concept album.”,* though there was definitely tensions between the two, as Drake’s refusal to work with Kendrick again began after the lyric **”I’m usually homeboys with the same n——s i’m rhymin’ with, but this is hip-hop and them n——s should know what time it is. And that goes for J.Cole, Big KRIT, Wale, Pusha T, Meek Mills A$AP Rocky, Drake, Big Sean, Jay Electron, Tyler and Mac Miller, I got love for you all, but i’m tryna slaughter you n——s.”**

Drake took an offence to this, and spited a refusal to work with Kendrick over it, seeing it as a diss, though nowadays most view this as friendly competition from Lamar. After the fact of Drake’s refusal though, Lamar did go back on another song to say **”Yeah, and nothings been the same since they dropped Control. Tucked a sensitive rapper back into his pyjama clothes.”**, this line being aimed at Drake, and actually being considered the starting point between the two’s feud, having Drake in interviews act nonchalantly and saying he isn’t “taking the bait”, he was the only rapper to have taken offence to Lamar’s initial lyric. Some also found Drake’s initial compliments to *GKMC* offensive, as the term “concept album” usually gives the idea that everything on the album is a story, or ‘made up’, implying that Drake believes Kendrick’s story in Compton was fiction, though i find that to be a bit of a stretch personally. Some people also found it as a fairly backhanded compliment because of this.

***Control (ft. Kendrick Lamar) - Big Sean***

I mentioned earlier about how this song sparked the real aggression between the two artists, and that statement still stands. Coming off of tour alongside Drake and A$AP Rocky, we saw Lamar feature on this song alongside Big Sean, in which he aims not just for Drake, but the rap industry as a whole. To repeat the lyric from earlier, **”**I’m usually homeboys with the same n——s i’m rhymin’ with, but this is hip-hop and them n——s should know what time it is. And that goes for J.Cole, Big KRIT, Wale, Pusha T, Meek Mills A$AP Rocky, Drake, Big Sean, Jay Electron, Tyler and Mac Miller, I got love for you all, but i’m tryna slaughter you n——s.”** This lead the press to obviously inquire Drake on his thoughts on this, to which he responded: *”I didn’t really have anything to say about it. It just sounded like an ambitious thought to me. That’s all it was. I know good and well that [Lamar] ‘s not murdering me, at all, in any platform. So when that day presents itself, I guess we can revisit the topic.”* This quote came with the claims that Lamar’s ‘dream’ of murdering him (metaphorically) was simply a fantasy, and that he simply couldn’t live up to what Drake had established. In other words, Drake believes his star power keeps him away from the threats Lamar proceeds.

***King Kunta - To Pimp a Butterfly/100 - The Game***

In these tracks, Drake begins to show a response to Lamar’s claims. In *King Kunta*, from Kendrick’s sequel album **To Pimp a Butterfly**, now widely considered one of the most influential albums in rap, Lamar pens **“I can dig rapping! But a rapper with a ghostwriter? What the fuck happened?”** this lyric is aimed at allegations that some of Drake’s music is written by a team, rather than himself—— more commonly referred to as ‘ghostwriting’, I haven’t heard much about this, but i do believe the lyric **”I got a bone to pick! I don’t want these monkey-mouthed motherfuckers sitting in my throne again!”** could be a potential dig at not just Drake, but the industry as a whole— something Lamar has done a few times as we’ve covered. Either in coincidence or response, Drake released a jab at Lamar around the same time, penning **”I would have all your fans if i didn’t go pop and stayed down on some conscious shit.”** these two lyrics are really the last time in the 2010’s we hear of the beef between Drake and Kendrick up until the recent events, with both of them seemingly simmering, nothing is really said as far as i’m aware between this point and the next.

***First Person Shooter (ft. J.Cole) - FOR ALL THE DOGS (2023)***

Oh J.Cole. you poor, poor man.

*First Person Shooter*, one of the lead singles for Drake’s album ***FOR ALL THE DOGS***, is with no doubt a victory lap for Drake and his colleague Jermaine Cole (more frequently, J.Cole). On the track, Cole pens **”People argue who’s the hardest MC, is it K.Dot, is it Aubrey or me? We the big three like we started a league, but right now i feel like Mohammed Ali.”** Now to most, this would come off as a compliment, with Cole stating that the big three of rap is him, Kendrick Lamar and Drake, though a few people saw this as fairly backhanded, seeing the following Mohammed Ali comment along with the fact that Drake was also on the song to be placing Lamar in third, implying that Cole believes those two usurp Kendrick, putting him in the top 3 out of pity in a sense. This is what set the current ball in motion, and more importantly, set off Metro Boomin and Future. (Well, not really, but the next instalment happens to come from their album ***We Don’t Trust You*,** so…)

***Like That (ft. Kendrick Lamar) - We Don’t Trust You (Metro Boomin and Future) (2024)***

This is where the games begin. Lamar is featured as a surprise feature on Future and Metro Boomin’s collaboration album, **We Don’t Trust You**. In this surprise however, Lamar comes in full force. Penning **”They think i won’t drop the location, i still got PTSD, motherfuck the big three, n——a it’s just big ME! (n——a bum!)”**, being the most iconic of the shots thrown from Lamar, as for after Kendrick continues to call Drake and Cole ‘bums’. It’s obvious that this is aimed at the two, as Kendrick starts his verse with **”Fuck sneak dissing, First Person Shooter? i hope they came with three switches, i crash out like ‘FUCK RAP!’ diss Melly Mells if i have to, got 2 tees with me, i’m snatching chains and burning tattoos.”** This is, of course, the beginning of what i like to call “the war” between Drake and Kendrick (and J.Cole, who immediately backs out, respect to him though, shit gets crazy.), for the first few weeks, neither artists really respond to these lyrics, up until J.Cole.

***7 Minute Drill - MIGHT DELETE LATER (J.Cole) 2024***

This is where the responses come in. J.Cole fires back at Lamar after a few weeks of seemingly nothing from the two aimed at in FPS, on this track, Cole aims singularly for Lamar, using a multitude of lyrics and phrases to insult him. This isn’t actually the first time Lamar and Cole have been in a sort of “battle”, though with the brotherly bond between the two, it’s been seemingly in good hearted nature. On the track, Cole raps **”He’s averaging one hard verse like, every 30 months or somethin’.”** in reference to the large release windows between Kendrick’s albums, GKMC, TPAB, DAMN. and Mr Morale. Following this, he states that **”If he wasn’t dissing, then we wouldn’t be discussing him.”** Implying that if he hadn’t been aiming for the two, nobody would be discussing Kendrick Lamar at all. This most likely comes from the radio silence from Kendrick since Mr. Morale outside of surprise features like **America has a Problem.** Cole also claims that he’s **”Front of the line, with a comfortable lead, how ironic, soon as i got it, now he wants something with me.**” Telling us that Cole’s belief is Lamar’s aiming is out of jealousy or envy, rather than the usual friendly competition between the two. In a more extended line proceeding this, he pens **”Your first shit? A classic. Your last shit was tragic. Your second shit put n——s to sleep but the gassed it. Your third shit was massive, and THAT was your prime, i was trailing right behind, and i just now hit mine.”** Each line in this lyric is directed to a different Kendrick Lamar album. His first shit (***good kid, m.A.A.d city***) is considered a classic in the rap genre, and is considered by some to be Lamar’s best album. His last shit (**Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers**) is taken in a completely different direction than most of Lamar’s previous work, this leads it to be more negatively reviewed among the rest of his works. His second shit (**To Pimp a Butterfly***)* Is the follow-up album to GKMC, showing us the first instance of Lamar’s social commentary (though, present in GKMC), this making Cole claim it as putting people to sleep, as it was too introspective and political (This line is heavily disagreed with, as most people perceive TPAB as the best rap album of all time.) His third shit (***DAMN.***) is considered by most to be Kendrick’s prime, and also the peak of his fame. Featuring artists like Rhianna and with hit classics like DNA. and HUMBLE., the album is considered some of Lamar’s most iconic work to date. After the release of ***7 Minute Drill***, J.Cole immediately backed out and apologised, stating “Do y’all love Kendrick Lamar? Cause so do i.” And basically apologising to him. To this day it’s unknown wether or not this was out of either respect or fear for Lamar, though we do know that ScHoolboy Q, a colleague of Cole’s, told him to simply not get involved, as he knew it was more of a thing between Kendrick and Drake.

***Push Ups (Drop and Give Me 50) - Drake (2024)***

This transitions is smoothly into where we really are today, the consistent stream of tracks between Drake and Kendrick that seemingly antagonise eachother to no end. We begin with **Push Ups**, a track where Drake goes not just for Kendrick, but for everyone involved with ***We Don’t Trust You***. Drake starts the track with **”Drop, drop, drop, drop…”**, a seeming triple entendre to a multitude of things relating to Kendrick. First off, some interpret this as Drake telling Lamar to “drop” something, either being a response to him, or just solo music in general. Another interpretation follows the idea that he is telling Kendrick to “drop and give him 50%”, as it’s suspected that Lamar’s label takes a 50% cut of whatever he releases. A third (and less interesting) interpretation is that it’s in reference to Lamar’s frequenting of the parks to do his exercise routines, namely doing 50 pushups. following this we hear **”I could never be nobodies number one fan, your first number one, i had to put that in your hands.”**, Implying Drake believes Kendrick’s fame comes from his features on Drake’s album ***Take Care***, and Drake’s features on ***Poetic Justice*** (both covered earlier.), following this, we get **”How the fuck you big-stepping with a size seven men’s on?”**, this is both a reference to Lamar’s album ***Mr. Morale and the Big Steppers***, and also Lamar’s height, being 5’5. Later on, we get **”Maroon 5 need a verse, you better make it witty. Then we need a verse for the Swifties, Top says drop, you better drop and give em 50!”**, this is in reference to how Kendrick has previously featured on songs for both Maroon 5 (***Don’t Wanna Know**)* and Taylor Swift (***Bad Blood***), Drake uses this almost in mocking. The “drop and give me 50” line is repeated through the song. Following this is **”Its like your label, boy, you’re in the scope right now. And you’re gonna feel the aftermath of what i write down.”**, this references both of the labels Lamar has been signed to, Interscope Records and Aftermath Records. To cap off what i’m gonna cover for this song (lest i be here for hours), Drake pens **”Pipsqueak, pipe down. You ain’t in no big three, SZA got you wiped down, Savage got you wiped down, Travis got you wiped down—“**, this line tells us seemingly whay Drake *a*ctually believes to be the big three, unlike what Cole claimed on First Person Shooter, this also seemingly a jab at Cole aswell, as Drake seems to ‘remove’ him from the big three. He later also says **”I don’t care what Cole think, that Dot shit was weak as fuck.”** seemingly solidifying this line of thought. Drake is now out for both Kendrick and Cole.

***Taylor Made Freestyle - Drake (2023)***

This song seemingly stems from Drake’s impatience for Lamar to respond. (something he’d largely backtrack on later), To give some context to the title, the real beef between the two began during the release of Taylor Swift’s album ***The Tortured Poets Department***, because of this, Drake accuses Lamar of being “scared” to drop within this timeframe, in fear of being overshadowed. Unfortunately, in this song Drake begins by targeting one of Kendrick’s idols, Tupac, through the use of his AI Generated voice, a move that would wildly lose Drake the public vote. I’m not going to cover the stuff that’s used from the AI Snoop Dogg or Tupac primarily because (and trying to remain as completely unbiased as possible), Drake is a massive bitch for using them. Anyway, onto the first line of note: **”But now we gotta wait a fuckin’ week cause Taylor Swift is your new Top, And if you boutta drop then she has to approve.”**, this comes again from Drake’s belief that Kendrick is scared of dropping out of fear of being overshadowed, stating it as if Taylor ‘owns’ Kendrick. If i’m being completely honest, that’s literally all i can say about this track, pretty much every line aimed at Kendrick can be summed up to that exact definition, so i’ll move on the the next track.

***euphoria - Kendrick Lamar (2024)***

This is where Kendrick begins his involvement, by not just dropping his response, but by dropping two in one day, **euphoria** and **6:16 in LA** (the latter of which i’ll cover next). The track begins with a reversed sample from a remake of ***The Wizard of Oz***, in which a character proclaims **”Everything they say about me is true!”**, this could be interpreted to Kendrick owning up to the title of *”The Boogeyman”* some have given him in previous beefs. Following up this, Lamar begins the track with a slow, melodic beat, as he softly rhymes over the top of it. He pens **”You’re moving just like a degenerate, every antic is feeling distasteful.”** in reference to Drake’s use of AI voices on ***Taylor Made Freestyle***. After this, we receive a beat switch in which Lamar begins to ‘battle-rap’. We begin with **”Have you ever paid five hundered thou’ like, to an open case?”** This line is allegedly written in reference to Drake’s sexual assault allegations from Instagram model *Laquana Morris*, in which he paid $350k in settlement. Though this could also be in reference to Lamar’s 2017 lawsuit in which LOYALTY. was accused of plagiarism by *Terrance Hayes*, a case that was later dismissed and dropped with little to no explanation. Later, Lamar pens **”Id rather do that than let a Canadian n——a make Pac roll in his grave.”**, Another reference to Drake’s previous usage of Tupac’s AI voice, and more notably, Kendrick’s desire to defend Tupac’s legacy from that sort of usage. **”What is it, the braids? Oh you dont wanna work with me no more? Okay.”** Is in reference to how Drake’s haircut (twisted braids) has him thinking wrong to go against him. The following comment about not working with him is in reference to Kendrick’s comments on **Control**, aimed at Drake, and his reaction to no longer wanting to work with Lamar. **”Its three GOATs left, and i see two of em hugging and kissing on stage.”** Is in reference to ***It’s All A Blur Tour***, in which J. Cole and Drake headlined together, a photo commonly shared of the two of them hugging on stage. **”Yeah, fuck all that pushing P, let me see you Pusha T!”** Is in reference to Drake’s previous beef with Pusha T, in which he revealed that Drake had a son, Adonis. This later removed all responses from Drake, making people consider Pusha T the winner. There’s a LOT more lyrics in this song, but i’m gonna cut it primarily for actually making space for the rest of this stuff.

***6:16 in LA - Kendrick Lamar (2024)***

In a surprising move from Kendrick, he released two songs in a row, this one more personally aimed at not just Drake and everyone he’s associated with, but Drake himself. With this track there aren’t many lyrics i actually want to select and really explain like i have in previous sections so i’d be better off more or less explaining how tensions were in the release of this track. People were no short of surprised to see Lamar drop such a substantial amount of tracks in one day, making most people seemingly ‘switch sides’ from Drake, while most others applied the argument that “most had decided their winner before their battle even started.”, however this song is the prelude before we really get Kendrick to delve into Drake’s allegations, and more impressively, straight up call him a p*dophile.

***Family Matters - Drake (2024)***

After a day or two of waiting with bated breath, Drake finally responded to Lamar’s tracks with a return to burn Kendrick. The song begins with a reused sample of **Push-Ups**, almost making the song seem to be a sequel to that, Drake begins by proclaiming that **”Cole losing sleep over this, that ain’t me.”**, in reference to Cole’s exiting from the battle. However a lyric following this further landed Drake into a negative public opinion, as he raps **”Always rappin’ like you’re tryna get the slaves freed.”**, seemingly dissmissing to the work Kendrick’s done for knowledge on Black History, as well as mocking Lamar’s general influence and introspective style of rap. Later, Drake finally fires back with allegations that Kendrick is abusive toward his wife, with the line **”Ay, let that shawty breathe.”**, allowing the listener to interpret that Lamar may be involved in abusing his wife, Whitney. (Though, this was later seemingly disproved by a tweet from Whitney’s brother showing support toward Kendrick.) Drake then raps **”Shake that ass for Drake, and shake that ass for free.”**, implying both that Whitney is disloyal to Kendrick, and that Drake supposedly wants this to be a song people dance to in clubs via twerking or something, this later backfired as Lamar’s next track, ***Not Like Us***, actually ended up being played in a multitude of clubs and raves upon release. Drake later raps **”good kid, m.A.A.d city van, we’ll pop the latch and let the door slide.”**, seemingly in reference to a drive-by in Kendrick’s Compton days, as in the album the Van is used as a symbol of protection from the violence in the world outside. Drake is proclaiming he will destroy Kendrick’s only sense of protection. In Part III of the song, Drake begins by rapping **”Kendrick just opened his mouth, someone go hand him a Grammy right now.”**, seemingly believing that all of Lamar’s Grammys are given based off of popularity over talent, though Drake follows this with **”Where is your uncle at? Cause i wanna talk to the man of the house.”,** this is in reference to the **Mr Morale and the Big Steppers** track **Auntie Diaries**, in which Kendrick tells the story of his Auntie transitioning into his Uncle. The bar basically mocks Kendrick for being less masculine than a trans person, sort of transphobic to me but, yknow. From here it’s just more lyrics about the allegations of Kendrick’s abuse of his wife, bringing us onto **Not Like Us**.

***Not Like Us - Kendrick Lamar (2024)***

This track is the pinpoint for when we go from ***To Pimp a Butterfly*** to ***To Catch a Predator***. In this track, Kendrick fully goes in on Drake’s sexual abuse and pedophilia allegations, exposing a major amount of Drake’s argument. The first influential lyric on this track is **”Say, Drake, I hear you like em’ young.”**, again in reference to these allegations, now, to get this out of the way now, i’m gonna say the same for **”Certified Lover Boy? Certified Pedophile!”** and **”Tryna stroke a chord, and it’s probably A-Minor!”**, the first of which being a reference to Drake’s album **Certified Lover Boy**, and the second referencing the guitar chord A-Minor, entendres with “a minor” (Holy shit, man.) **”Certified Boogeyman, i’m the one who upped the score with em’.”** Is in reference to the **Halloween** character *Micheal Myers*, and more importantly his intimidating presence, that of which Kendrick implies he also brings in his opponents, the usage of ‘certified’ could also be another reference to **Certified Lover Boy**., and with all that covered, that’s pretty much all that comes from this track and, honestly, the beef in general.

***THE HEART PART 6 - Drake (2024)***

To remain as unbiased as possible, this is where things get downright embarrassing, and honestly, what solidifies Kendrick Lamar’s win. For starters, the track title itself is in reference to Lamar’s **The Heart** series, which is typically used to debut a new album, like **DAMN.** and **Mr Morale and the Big Steppers.** This is actually a joke that was frequently used on Twitter beforehand, as well see with the rest of this track, most of Drake’s research comes less from his peers and more from Twitter, the track itself actually is an attempt to mock Kendrick Lamar’s sexual assault, something of which we learn, actually never happened. Drake raps **”Mother i— Mother i— That’s the one record where you say you got molested.”**, despite him saying this, **Mother I** is Kendrick talking about how his cousin didn’t molest him, but none of his family believed him, in other words, Drake completely misses the point. Before this Drake raps **”This Epstein angle is the shit i expected.”** When, in prior songs, nobody has mentioned Jeffrey Epstien. He also raps **”I only fuck with Whitneys, not no Millie Bobbie Browns.”** in reference to his allegations in messaging *Stranger Things* star Millie Bobbie Brown, despite being 17 years older than her. Yet again, Kendrick had never mentioned this beforehand.

***MR. MORALE VS THE 6IX GOD.***

In the end, it comes down to personal opinion on who you really think ‘won’ this sort of thing, it’s a very arguable and personal thing, wether you believe that Kendrick beats his wife, or that Drake is a pedophile, just know either way, when i release this Kendrick Lamar would have released 4 more tracks.

Wish me luck.

[cash-111]

PSA + Guide to my works

Requests are closed for now. You can still check the rules for future reference :)

Wizarding World:

Any and all writings that include Hogwarts as a setting are AUs where the starting age of attendance is 14 years old.

This means you should keep in mind that the characters in the stories going from 4th year are 17-18, all the way to last year where they’d be around 20-21.

This is because I want to reference years other than the last one and I don’t feel comfortable writing about 14 year olds. (Especially because some of my future content might be 18+)

Works:

Theodore Nott:

Am I so bad? [slight hurt comfort, friends to lovers]

Stress relief [comfort, friends to lovers]

Mattheo Riddle:

Honey Daze [fluff]

Pick your guy:

Fun it is [Theodore, Draco, Mattheo. Flirting]

Dance lessons [Unspecified. Fluff]

What do they think about marriage? [All. HCs]

Opposing sides [Unspecified. Angst]

Random filth [All. HCs. Smutty]

Reader-centric:

Whatever it takes [unforgivables, corruption]

Sirius Black:

Choices [Angst]

Obey Me! Shall We Date?:

Reader will be referred to as MC and be considered of age (20+).

Works:

Beelzebub:

All is Fair in Love and Food [fluff]

Haikyuu:

Age will generally be unspecified, but presumed 18+ even in high school settings. I will probably write for both regular timeline as well as time-skip.

Works:

May come in the future.

Last comments:

For now this all, I’ll add more as I go (and maybe expand in fandoms) as I see fit. Hope this is gucci with everyone.

Love, Cash

[rainbowsmagicandshit]

For those who don’t know, today, May 1st, is Beltane (in the northern hemisphere). Beltane is a Celtic holiday and said to be one of the three days of the year where the veil between the physical world and the spiritual word is at it’s thinnest (the other two are the Summer Solstice aka Litha and Samhain).

This is also the holiday that Arthur uses the Horn of Cathbhadh to talk to Uther in the Death Song of Uther Pendragon in season 5.

I don’t know much about this holiday—just a shallow understanding, I wasn’t raised in this culture, but am loving learning about the practices—but here is some things I know about it. Beltane literally means “the fire of Bel”. Bel is the god of the sun, and Beltane celebrates his union with the goddess of the earth, Danu. Bel and Danu are seen as the parents of the Irish gods. One of the traditions of Beltane was to put out all fires, light a sacred Bel fire, then everyone would take flames from that sacred Bel fire, and relight the fires and their hearths. So, fire is one way to celebrate Beltane. Another way is flowers. The Welsh goddess Blodeuwedd is the goddess of emotions and flowers. She is also associated with Beltane. Since Beltane is when all the flowers start to bloom and nature is vibrant, decorating everything with flowers is another Beltane tradition especially flower crowns.

Samhain falls on October 31st in the norther hemisphere. This is the holiday associated with the Cailleach. Samhain means “summer’s end” and the holiday is seen as the Celtic new year. Samhain is the holiday that Morgana and Morgause used to open the veil in the Darkest Hour in season 4 (if I remember right).

Why am I posting this? Because it seems like the holidays in BBC Merlin are the holidays of the Wheel Of The Year. This is useful for fanfic writers who want to expand on the Merlin world more. Or want there to be a holiday or banquet in their stories but don’t know what to make it for. Or want to try and work out a timeline for the show. Or just want to use it for tropes.

I meant this post as more a jumping off place to know where the BBC Merlin holidays originate from. I would suggest definitely researching each individual holiday more before writing about it.

I cannot stress this enough. I am not a 100% accurate source on these holidays. I think the information I have above is true, but I could be wrong. I’m very new to this.

If anyone wants to correct or add on to this that knows more, feel free to.

And to the once and future fandom, have fun researching and thinking up fun plots🫡

Ps. All the holidays are opposite in the northern and southern hemispheres because the wheel of the year follows the cycle of the seasons, so when it’s the summer solstice in the northern hemisphere, it’s the winter solstice in the southern hemisphere. When it’s Beltane in the northern hemisphere it’s Samhain in the southern hemisphere. Etc.

P.p.s. The pronunciation… 😵‍💫😖 it’s…it’s…it’s not what you think for like half of them. 😵‍💫

[mugs-n-cans]

The Basics

Yo! I’m Scout, kind of a big deal. I created this blog to show everyone how freakin’ sweet I am. Also, Snipes is here! He’s not sayin’ anythin’ ‘cause he thinks this is a bad idea. Ask away! I know I’ll get a lotta autograph requests but keep it to a minimum, guys.

Now for the real basics

I’m the mod. My name is Max. I go by he/they/it. I’m just creating this for a bit of fun, as I’m bored and have nothing better to do. This is going to be a speeding bullet focused blog (if you couldn’t guess so far). Also, this is my first ask blog, so please bear with me.

Anon list

mod is 18+, suggestive asks are allowed but nsfw will be ignored

most of this will be my own headcanons and perspectives, but you are allowed to project your own

you can send as many asks as you like, but please do not spam a single ask

roleplay as much as you like

i will also write for other mercs if the question pertains to it, but i would like it to be relative to sniper or scout (miss pauling is included of course)

RED x BLU asks are allowed as well, just please specify by coloring the name (i.e. scout, sniper) or just saying BLU Scout or RED Sniper. RED x BLU will be on a separate timeline than RED x RED or BLU x BLU

you are welcome to ask questions about the mod as well!

DMs are open if you want to chat or if you have questions about rules or whatever else!

you are allowed to sign off with an emoji to be recognized in the future!

freak fortress asks will be separate from team fortress. abbreviations for their names can be CBS or AP, just for clarity sake.

I may add more rules later as I think of them

Tags

#mugs n cans - general asks

#asks n cans - scout-centric asks

#mugs n asks - sniper-centric asks

#mod mugs - asks about mod

#ooc - mostly for things unrelated to asks like announcements

#bullet mail - for replying or posting outside of asks ic

#suggestive - for those spicy asks

#bullet fanart - for me being incapable of not sharing speeding bullet fanart every few posts

#song recs - self explanatory!

#freaks n asks - all asks pertaining to Christian Brutal Sniper or Ass Pancakes

[i-never-forgot]

…Do y’all think Dusknoir is naturally nocturnal?

Idk if it’s ever been mentioned in the Pokédex/series if ghost-types tend to be strictly nocturnal or are simply more active at night, but we’re going to hypothesize about the former real quick.

(Preemptively tagging @fujii-draws and @sincerely-sofie bc I’d love to hear y’all’s thoughts on this!😊)

Concepts to consider:

Dusknoir being eepy in the daytime, therefore he zones out or dozes off if he’s not actively doing anything. I bet he still floats like horses fall asleep standing up. His eye just shuts and maybe he sags a little in place but other than that he looks like he’s just chilling. If he’s not careful he’ll nod off mid-conversation or mid-task if it’s rhythmic and/or muscle memory (thinking knitting or whittling or smth like that, although I’m not sure if he’d do either of those things specifically) since he would likely find such chores soothing in their monotony and tedium after All That™️.

It’s easier for him to stay awake when he’s in direct sunlight, but if he goes underground or catches a nice patch of shade he’s out like a light if he slows down long enough and is alone or with someone he trusts if they’re not busy. I can easily see him taking naps under trees leaned up against their trunks like this. (May or may not have a sketch of this very idea too…🤫)

Overall just imagining this big old ghost just kind of acting lethargic and even a little lazy if he gets to the place where he allows himself to be; floating around like a balloon in a gentle wind, conducting chores or running errands around town or w/e. Obviously he’d be more alert while exploring, but when he’s in rest mode he’ll probably try to take it easy to conserve energy.

Now for the flip side: night comes around and suddenly he’s Awake™️. He visibly perks up and gets more energetic, his movements quicker and more precise and his eye bright and attentive. He gets Ghost Zoomies and I’m sure the others would think it’s strange at first. It might take them a while to get used to it.

Mayhaps his instinctive nature would come out to play and he might even be a bit mischievous. Maybe he likes to Shadow Sneak around and spook his friends—an innocent, (mostly) harmless little game he honestly cannot recall the last time he played. Maybe they eventually start playing tag with him to see who can catch him in his more agile state. (I think Grovyle might enjoy this most once they both get past the trauma of Dusknoir being incorporeal and thus immune to attack chasing Grovyle. He’s so quick on his feet that I think they’d be fairly even matched, and I can see them totally being competitive and keeping score. Celebi would even add more fun to the mix being able to fly.)

Overall he’s just in a better mood. He’s concealed in the darkness and explores without as much worry about running into someone unsavory.

(Perhaps this is why he was so powerful in the future—perpetual darkness acts as a poor imitation of the darkest, longest night, after all. Maybe he has to readjust in the healed timeline since he’s never had to deal with daylight for extended periods of time. Maybe he gets a little weaker but he considers it a fair trade for his new and gentler lease on life.)

[666writingcafe]

The Ballad of A Homeschooled Prince

Diavolo

As MC and Solomon explain the details of what happened on their way to the castle, my heart sinks. The Devildom and Celestial Realm have never gotten along at the best of times, so I'm not exactly surprised that Mammon--and to a lesser extent Asmodeus--went through that kind of experience. But it's certainly not the future I want to live in. I believe everyone has value, regardless of race.

Most demons don't see it that way, though. They think themselves to be superior to angels, and therefore the Devildom should never welcome those of the Celestial Realm.

That's in large part thanks to my father. To say that he hates angels is an understatement. If he had it his way, he'd either exterminate every single one of them or, if he was feeling generous, enslave them for all of eternity.

So, he didn't take too kindly to six of them falling more or less on his doorstep. He wanted to send them away. I insisted that they stay. Once he saw that Lucifer bore my mark, he acquiesced, but not before snarkily telling me,

"If you want to act all high and mighty, then perhaps you should take my place for a while. That will get rid of all your silly ideas, and you'll finally start seeing sense."

And then he pretty much disappeared after assigning the brothers titles, so that put an end to that argument. If it weren't for Barbatos, I'd be doing this entirely on my own. Thankfully he and I are on the same page, and not just because he's subservient to me. He's never particularly agreed with my father's policies, but due to his position as butler, he had to keep his mouth shut or risk severe punishment.

Before I can start implementing any change, though, I have to figure out how to get the brothers acclimated to life in the Devildom, and fast. The normal method of assigning them mentors clearly isn't going to work, and with my additional responsibilities, I don't have the time to teach them much of anything.

That is why I wanted to talk MC and Solomon. Based on what Thirteen told me, they should have some insight that will hopefully help me resolve this issue.

MC develops a nervous look on their face when I ask the question, but Solomon manages to comfort them with a soft smile and nod.

"In our timeline, you had established a school," MC quietly answers. "It was called the Royal Academy of Diavolo, or RAD for short. There was a wide array of courses ranging from the standard fundamentals to more advanced, specialized topics. The school was successful enough that you were able to implement an exchange program across the three realms, and Solomon and I were among the first group of students to participate."

"You're not the only one that wants peace and unity between realms," Solomon adds. "I know it may seem that way right now, but there are other people in the Devildom that feel the same way about the future as you do. You just have to know where to look."

Well, this is rather interesting, to say the least. The fact that there's a future timeline where I'm actually able to make positive changes to the Devildom and prove my father wrong...the idea is simply too enticing to ignore.

But I can't do it on my own.

"Would either one of you be interested in being founding members of this school?" I ask.

"Well, it wouldn't make sense for me to, given that I end up being an exchange student later down the line," Solomon replies. "But MC should be able to as long as they use their alias." That makes sense. Wouldn't want to mess with their timeline too much.

I look over at MC, who takes a deep breath before responding,

"I'm in."

Taglist: @lost-in-time-wanderer, @fuzztacular, @dianedancer18, @sweetbrier2908, @flare-love, @completelyshatteredbrokenmschf, @thunderlightning351, @l3v1chan, @anxious-chick, @5mary5, @expressionless-fr