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xamag-draws · 5 months

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BBR thoughts 2024

Since I mentioned that I finally dusted off an old project of mine and was ruminating on how I'd remake it, I thought I'd elaborate a little, now that I've solidified some concepts. For funsies

This is gonna be a bit of a long and unfocused one, but I don't share my personal thoughts here often, especially the stuff about my projects I always marinate in. And for once it's something that people have existing context for, so hey why not

So for anyone who hasn't been following me for a gajillion years, The Black Brick Road of OZ was a webcomic that I posted around 2013-2015, back when I was in highschool going on college (which is kinda crazy to think about). It was sort of a darker twist on The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, although I definitely leaned a lot more into dark humor more than anything in those first few chapters

I don't think it's available to read anywhere anymore, and I know people have been asking me about it. So here's the full proper archive of BBR, as full as it can be with deceased Flash

I totally used it as an excuse to shamelessly and self-indulgently experiment. It had interactive pages and GIFs and was wayyy too overproduced for what I could handle or what was necessary, but I did have great fun making it while it lasted

Unfortunately, that excess and the fact that I've changed too much as a person by the time I was in college is what ultimately killed it. The direction I wanted to go in was practically unrecognizable from the original idea started back in 2011, so there were many old hold-ups that I felt ruined it

At the time I kinda wished I could start/rewrite it all over, but considering that I pretty much had the entire script done at that point, it felt like a pointless sisyphean task. So I just put it on a shelf and didn't look back for about 8 years, because I didn't know what else to do

Now to be fair, the nature of my art has always been iterative and cyclical; when I feel like my creative juices have run dry I prefer to leave a project to marinate and move on to something else; cycle through other old things and bring in new skills and perspectives into the mix when I'm ready again. Not very productive, but it is what makes me happy to work on my OCs; I'm doomed to hit a wall with them eventually and I need some time to be able to find a new direction

So that said, I'm glad that BBR was left to marinate for that long. I don't think I was prepared, emotionally or intellectually, to tackle it again until now. The Wizard of Oz book (and the entire series of them, really) has always been near and dear to my heart, but there's a lot of context around it that I'm only unpacking now that I'm older

I think I always inherently feel negatively about the stuff I've made in the past, like its faults always jump out to me more than the positives, especially the more time passes. I've never liked that, and I do really appreciate the kind things people have to say about BBR to this day. The fact that it still can be recognized and remembered is very sweet

When I left it, I already found it "kinda cringe", and that feeling only deepened with years. When I took my first look back at it, asking the question "how would I rewrite it now?", at first I took a very cynical approach, as in "everything would have to be torn down"

But the more I sat on it, the more I found that I still see some merit and charm in the ideas I was putting out; I just didn't know how to execute them at the time (not to pretend that I know what I'm doing now, but I certainly know more at least). Turns out a lot of my old concepts could be changed substantially with just a few small tweaks. So I'd say that's a nicer way to think about my previous work

If you haven't seen yet, I posted a first draft of my new designs for some of the characters (the main group, the Goods and the Wickeds). Definitely subject to change, but more or less how I see them now

I'm just playing with these concepts; by no means would I attempt to remake BBR right this moment. Call it a pipe dream among my other ones. But just for fun, this is the direction I'd like to take:

Nowadays I'd probably make it a visual novel, with more emphasis on the visual part than the novel because I'm no English prose writer by any means. It'd still let me play a little with the interactivity while helping cut some corners on the drawing part (only some, I imagine I'd go hog wild anyway)

I've always intended for some events inspired by the sequel books to take place in BBR's past. Stuff like Jinjur's revolt or Ozma's rule preceeds the main events here. So I think it would be fun to follow the past of a few key characters alongside the main story. One chapter focusing on the present quest to see the Wizard, then one focusing on the past events (that are maybe reflective thematically); rinse and repeat

I'm also sticking a little closer to the original text in some regards. Not everything that I enjoy from the books would be translated here, it's still just a very loose fantasy on the material; but I'd like to be closer in spirit at least

I like mature, wise and powerful Glinda, I like kind and vulnerable Tin Man, I like the Wizard being a pathetic yet loveable liar, so I'm sprinkling in more of that for example

I'd like to keep some whimsy, but make it more grounded and a bit more serious to be coherent in tone. I think the original TWWOOZ book was a more realistic fantasy in some ways, even for the standards of the time; I like its simple but vivid tactile descriptions and details like bringing attention that Dorothy needed to eat and sleep

I find it funny that Baum specifically was averse to making his books scary or unpleasant, finding that unnecessary for telling a compelling kids story, but they still can get pretty dark and disturbing, at least for our modern sensibilities. Let's just say that I intend to use the Evoldo and Chopfyt storylines for my purposes. In that way, I feel like a "darker" Wizard of Oz retelling can still mostly be tonally in line with the original and balance it with enough heart and occasional humor

I slowly grew to appreciate the quaint old-timey quality of the original series, as well. The first book is both timeless and very much a product of the 1900s. Originally I tried to give it a little modern or at least anachronistic spin, but it was moreso because it's what I knew best, so these days I'd rather intentionally lean into the time period. Still not fully historically accurate by any means, but at least directly acknowledging the influence

The events of the story span across 40 years of these characters' lives, so I'm drawing inspiration from the entire so-called La Belle Epoque: the time period around 1880s-1920s. Basically I'm cooking, and my soup is old Victorian fashion morphing into Edwardian fashion and slowly inching towards flappers

Some new Dolly outfits

Lots of crazy things, political changes and innovations were happening at the turn of the century, which I think is noted and reflected by Baum in the books as well; the character of Tik-Tok might not blow any minds now, but he was one of the first robot characters in literature at that point; and don't even get me started on Jinjur, etc. Plenty of really interesting stuff one could lightly ponder in an Oz adaptation these days

Aesthetically, art nouveau has always been a big artistic influence for me, and it'd definitely be its time to shine here. John R. Neill's illustrations of the Oz books often keep me company as well. Nouveau architecture in particular fits that fairytale whimsy extremely well imo

I'd allow myself a little bit of art deco here and there, but ultimately its intimidating geometrical splendor is an antithetical to the flowery nature of nouveau and I associate it with a completely different era. Definitely fitting some characters like my Wicked Witch of the West, but shouldn't be overused

One of my main problems with the original BBR was that eventually I lost track of what it was even about; and the original ending felt too mean and unfulfilling to be worth it. Now I'd like to stick to the theme of home and family as my main theme, but in a different, more bittersweet way than in the book

An interesting connection I made is that a lot of my aforementioned older key characters (the Witches, Jinjur, the Nome King, etc) all came from the same reformatory as kids, that's how they know each other. In my recent research I learned that in those reformatories it was usually frowned upon to release the children back to the families, which were seen as the original corrupting influence regardless of the circumstance. The reformatory did everything in its power to cut that connection and make itself the only family those wayward kids were supposed to know and love. That's an unexpected tie into the theme of home that I'd like to explore as well

So yeah that's the current state of it. I have a bunch of outfit concepts I'm slowly cooking, although I'm now sure whether I'd post them... But I do miss these funny guys, and I'm glad some people still do as well :)

#my art #xam rambles #the black brick road of oz #long post #ohsees tag

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yanderes-galore · 4 months

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Heyy, can I could request a romantic yandere Hazbin Hotel Alastor x darling who is a demon who wants to redeem herself but has a deal with alastor so, she has her soul but being in the hotel cannot do her any harm or yeah? 👀

Sure! Made some tweaks to fit this into canon, Alastor's intention are still unknown towards you. Defaulted to concept as I wasn't sure how you wanted this. Originally didn't read that darling HAD her soul, so this got a bit difficult but I think I've got it.

Yandere! Alastor with Sinner! Darling

Pairing: Romantic/Platonic (Dubious)

Possible Trigger Warnings: Female Darling, Obsession, Manipulation, Ownership, Possessive behavior, Violence, Mentions of being a pet, Forced/Toxic partnership.

The only demons who can redeem themselves are known as Sinners.

Power is an important thing in Hell, that's primarily what deals are about here.

Power is what makes the hierarchy and makes other demons, like Overlords, powerful.

Alastor is one of these many Overlords.

He's actually... one of the most feared Overlords.

Based on what we can see in the show, demons would do anything to not go near him.

Alastor has made many deals with demons before.

Which is probably why he's so powerful.

You just so happen to be yet another Sinner he has under his belt.

Be it through gambling or some other desperate reason... you managed to come face to face with Alastor.

"Poor girl... all alone with no one to help you, hm~?"

The Overlord is pleased when he sees you, a desperate soul who needs his help.

Before he helps to pick you up, he offers you a deal.

A deal he's made countless times before.

He'll help you as long as you are indebted in some way to him.

Perhaps he doesn't have your soul, like you said.

Making any sort of deal with an Overlord is bad news.

In this case, instead of your soul, Alastor can settle for something else.

Perhaps he'll find a way to swindle it from you later....

At the time, well, you took it.

When he offered you that deal, you had no other option.

Such a deal made you a pet for the radio demon, one he can call whenever he wishes.

That's the deal... you'll be tied to him one way or another even if he doesn't have your soul.

Unless you want him to cast you out to the Hellhounds and Sharks again, hm~?

Y'know what's worse?

You happen to be his favorite.

"Hey there, darling dear~ We'll be great partners, you'll see!"

That was a long time ago, now.

You aren't sure why Alastor helped you... or why he allowed you to keep your soul for now.

At the time it took some begging.

You had to grovel to get Alastor to let you keep your soul.

Instead he ordered a... partnership instead of your soul.

You were often asked to help him out for tasks, you have for years.

You consider yourself one of the lucky ones.

Lucky because Alastor liked you enough to not leash your soul.

Something about you intrigued him.

One of the tasks you were summoned to help with was Charlie's hotel.

The girl needs STAFF and Alastor is willing to provide.

It unnerved you when Alastor came back to you after being gone for years.

"Darling~! Did you miss me~? We still have a deal, y'know... hope you didn't forget all about me~?"

Alastor's presence always left you uneasy.

Like most other demons, whenever he was in sight you felt your heart nearly stop.

However, Alastor was the closest demon you had to a friend.

So the feeling was usually easy to smother.

"Why are you here?"

"Once again I have a little job for you, sweetheart. Surely you know to listen, right?"

You knew you had to.

This partnership was the only thing keeping Alastor from taking your soul.

You had to help him... if you didn't, he could take your soul as collateral.

"State your order."

"A dear old friend of mine needs help running a certain hotel. She has no STAFF...! So I need you to come and help, my dear girl..."

His voice is a condescending purr, red eyes holding mischief.

He knows you can't refuse.

So with a heavy sigh, you listen to your dear partner....

This is what brings you to the hotel.

Honestly... you don't regret coming here.

Through Alastor you meet Charlie and the others, pitying Husk's position and trying your best to get along.

In your eyes, you originally were unsure on how to feel on demon rehabilitation.

Could... Sinners really be redeemed?

... Could you be redeemed?

You were unsure until Charlie seemed so adamant.

She looks so happy about it... enough to give you hope.

Although hope is a hard thing to keep when Alastor watches your every move.

The Overlord has to keep an extra eye on you for two reasons.

First of all, you're his favorite to toy with.

Second of all... he doesn't have your soul to pull when you 'misbehave'.

Alastor is clever, he knows what you think.

If he's known you for years, he picks up on your little thoughts.

Alastor can probably tell you get along with Charlie.

A little too well, actually.

At first he allows it, it's just some talk between girls....

However, when he realizes you want to be redeemed...

Alastor feels himself twitch a bit.

He curses himself for not taking your soul earlier.

A partnership won't allow him to pull you.

He has to own you completely.

You can notice the deer demon looking on edge.

His eyes keep glaring into you as you work, the grip on his staff unrelenting.

You sense you're walking on thin ice.

You want to be redeemed, theoretically you can.

But a voice nags you from the back of your mind.

Wouldn't that break your deal?

The thought makes you shudder.

You don't doubt Alastor knows about this.

You can tell once he stops looking as stressed as he was... no... in fact he's smug.

You have a feeling you aren't leaving so easily.

Despite this, you're determined, carefully listening to Charlie and participating in every activity.

Unfortunately... Alastor will step in before you can get anywhere.

"Darling~"

Alastor's voice is in its usual purr, entering your hotel room with a grin.

You fear what's coming.

"What is it you want?"

"Oh you know damn well...."

His voice distorts into static, making you freeze.

You've struck a nerve it seems.

Alastor steps closer, leaning on his staff with a glare.

"You think you're a clever girl, don't you?"

"I'm keeping to our deal, Alastor."

You try to lie, but you can't lie to him.

"You know you aren't, darling. I understand if you want to play along with Charlie's little game..."

He grabs your chin, his hold a painful vice.

"But you'll never be redeemed, girl. Not while I'm here. In fact..."

Alastor's other hand taps your chest, grin turning to a scowl for a moment.

"Call me petty... but I own your soul now."

Your jaw drops.

"What!? No, you can't-"

"I can..."

Alastor hums, manifesting a green chain around your neck.

"And I will..."

The moment your partnership breaks off, Alastor is able to claim your soul.

He feels you broke the deal...

Which means you're his now.

"You had a good run, dear... unfortunately you need to learn your place."

You feel yourself collapse on the floor, Alastor yanking the chain with a newfound grin.

"I've been waiting for this, girl..."

He kneels down, his voice an eager whisper.

"I should've taken your soul long ago, then I wouldn't have to deal with all this stress...!"

He pulls you onto your knees, watching you grovel like you did all those years ago.

"Perfect~" He hums, "This is exactly where you belong..."

You go to retort, but Alastor uses your newfound chain to choke you.

"It's best you be a good girl and listen to me now..."

Alastor hisses, pulling you so you look him in the eyes.

"I happen to hate misbehaving pets."

It was inevitable that he'd claim you... now you're rightfully his and will be for years to come... won't you?

#yandere hazbin hotel #yandere alastor #yandere hazbin hotel x reader

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dduane · 4 months

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...So once again it's the time of year when I return to this piece of digital art (or its earlier versions), tweak it a little in the attempt to get closer to what I see in my head, and repost it for Pride. (ETA, 3 June 2024: image tweaked a little bit more via late-night re-render because the upholstery wasn't rendering correctly, and as a result the kitty sort of vanished. Which would not be at all her style...)

At the moment I'm looking at These Two Idiots (for so they are) and considering with the usual bemusement how long I've been working with them. Of all the characters I've worked with in print, the only ones I've known longer would be the crew of NCC-1701—and very shortly now, for the first time as paid writing, a couple of gentlemen named Holmes and Watson.

I first "met" these guys in late 1970 in the form of the fellow college students on whom they'd be based: a couple of gents (not gay, as it happens) who were friends to me when I needed some. They were a tall dark guy and a short blond one with a mustache that came and went... so that, not even knowing the word "trope" at the time, I fell headfirst into one.

Less than a year after I met them, I changed educational tracks and schools, and we all drifted apart. But something about them stuck. The nature and depth of their friendship was unusual. So was one way it manifested itself: in ruthless snark that had no meanness or cruelty about it whatsoever—just affection.

In the late sixties I'd begun writing some very derivative fic strongly influenced by Tolkien. Rather to my surprise, though, as I started nursing school in 1971, the nature of that fiction started to change, and began rearranging itself around two characters who had a friendship like those of my college friends. With them as its core, a rather different kind of medieval-ish fantasy world started knitting itself together from various scraps of themes and imagery lying around in the back of my brain.

Even so early in the construction phases of this world, something the characters quickly made plain to me in the writing was that their relationships with one another were not what mainstream 1970s culture would consider conventional. They were gay... but that was a background issue,* and not at all the most important thing in their lives. They had far more important business to deal with—as became clear as their personalities and priorities started filling themselves out in the foreground.

One of them turned out to be the deliberate, analytical, methodical son of a provincial nobleman, all too aware of the expectations of those around him: that he might well eventually wind up running that province himself. Yet at the same time he also became aware that he had other problems, chief among them the discovery of a nascent power that would kill him young if he couldn't master it. And in the last thousand years, no one of his gender ever had.

The other presented himself more and more clearly as a difficult case: someone who wanted very much to be good at the family business, but wasn't... and knew it. Kind of a screw-up, repeatedly doing the wrong things for what he was sure were the right reasons. Yet, no matter how often he screwed up, he was also the kind of person who keeps picking himself up and trying again, because he's been told over and over that that's what people like him have to do: otherwise they're no use to anybody.

Imagine my shock when I realized that these two men—initially canonically enemies in their adolescence, then best friends as they grew, and eventually much more—were the (incomplete) answer to the question I'd once asked my Mom at the end of the bedtime reading of some fairy tale or other: "Why can't a prince rescue another prince?" Because one of them got himself more than once into situations where he really needed one kind or another of rescuing. The other one obliged him, while once or twice getting rescued himself. Those interlocking patterns started to solidify out of concept and into character detail and plot, while their world grew and proliferated into its own detail around them.

Then, without warning, in 1978 both world and characters decided they were ready to get real. I was abruptly dragged gasping and flailing under the surface of a novel that would begin the tale of what those two characters had yet to become. The period it took to produce that first draft was possibly the most interesting six weeks of my life... and that includes the six weeks during which I first scrubbed in on brain surgery. Day and night, for days at a time, I barely even existed except as something for a novel to come out of. When it was done with me, it just as abruptly dumped me back into my life and wandered away, leaving me staring around, blinking and wondering if anybody’d got the number of that truck. Nothing like it has ever happened to me since, which may be just as well. I’m none too sure that these days I could handle the strain.

The book—which sold a couple of weeks after it landed on its first publisher's desk—kicked off my career as novelist and screenwriter, and in its way proved that the world was at least somewhat ready for epic fantasy in which the basic culture was pansexual, polyamorous, and inclusive in ways that hadn't been attempted before.

So I owe them a debt, those two gentlemen up there: the tall dark curly-haired guy with the amateur strategist's mind, the blacksmith's shoulders, and the peculiar sword, his background thought always nibbling away at the question of how to heal the world's wounds: and the short fair gent who if he could would stay at home, live quietly in town, and work in the local library... except for when saving the world (or his found family) requires him to subsume his being into that of his ancestral demigod. Due to the success of the book in which they made their debut, these two became, in their way, the fairy† godfathers of the Young Wizards—and additionally enabled all that Star Trek fanfic I'd started writing a decade before to proceed to its logical conclusion.

More to the point, though, a lot of people in the 1980s and '90s who'd never seen queer representation in a fantasy novel, found it first, or at last, while following Herewiss and Freelorn down their road. It's been my pleasure to hold that space for new readers, and keep adding to it... because (if you ask me) it's needed more now than ever.

So, to the readership of the Middle Kingdoms works—now pushing half a century old—and everybody else who's celebrating the season: happy Pride!

*Not least because everybody else in their world is (at least potentially) some shade of queer, including God.

†(snicker)

#Pride #Pride 2024 #Middle Kingdoms meta #Herewiss #Freelorn #LGBTQ #LGBTQ fantasy

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ribbonprincess · 5 months

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confiscating rafe's drugs, but it's a little bit more comedic

i think he'd start tweaking idk man

(may you write it though, i dont know how to make good prompts so im really trying here)

warnings: drugs (ofc),slight choking,just Rafe being a lil scary.

🍭࿐ ࿔*:･ﾟ

Rafe is pacing in his room when you enter,you can see his shirt clinging to his back due to his sweat as he looks frantic "rafey? what's wrong?" your boyfriend turns around immediately, looking at you with a hard glare that makes you freeze in your spot "I can't find my coke- have you taken it? I know you did,where is it?" he asks,pointing a finger at you as he comes closer with long strides.

"what- I don't know what you are talking about... why would I have your drugs anyway?" "cause you've been complaining about how I've been doing them too often,so I know you have them. Give them to me, right now." You furrow your eyebrows before shaking your head at him "no,I won't. I don't like when you take it, you've been doing it too much and you become all angry and...weird-"

Your words are cut off due to a pair of rough hands clasping your throat "you will go and take what's mine and give it back,Is that clear?" you let a small whimper escape,gripping on his wrists as tears start to gather on your lashline "don't want to... I've,I've thrown them down the toilet" you lie,knowing them well they're hiding in your room in one of your drawers under a bunch of clothes.

A small scoff escapes Rafe's mouth making you even more scared as his grip tightens on you before releasing you completely to walk over the window,showcasing a view of the whole tannyhill. "Are they at your house,in your room? hm,tell me- baby please...I need them,you know I do,they make me calm" his hands all over the place,before he harshly dug the heel of his palm in his eyes "hey- no,no...okay I'll give them back,I'm sorry." You're quick to be at his side,pulling his hands away from his face as you wipe at his eyes. "I'll give them to you,I didn't flush them down the toilet- I lied. But you gotta promise me to take a little less at least,for me?"

He looks at you through a blurry gaze before nodding "okay...yeah,okay I'll cut down some dosage. Didn't mean to lose control,I'm sorry" he says,rubbing his thumb over the red spots on your neck sure they'll bruise overnight. It's rare for Rafe to apologize especially multiple times so you just nod and bring him into a hug "it's okay,let's lay down and then we'll go to my house later,okay?" He nods at your words,pressing his forehead against your collarbone "okay...I love you doll"

#🎀princess #outer banks #outer banks x reader #outer banks fanfiction #outer banks imagine #outer banks blurb #rafe cameron #rafe cameron x reader #rafe cameron thoughts #rafe cameron fanfiction #rafe cameron imagine #rafe concepts #rafe cameron blurb #rafe cameron brainrot

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fallout-lou-begas · 5 months

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Not sure if you’ve been asked this before, but what are your favorite/essential mods for new vegas? I’ve only ever played it unmodded so I’m curious

Good question! I definitely have answered this before, but that was so many years ago. It's only now that I've taken the opportunity to overhaul and modernize my own mod set-up that I've been figuring out the answer to this question myself. But I can definitely talk you through the most important parts of my new load order.

First, however, every single person modding this game in this day and age absolutely needs to start with the Viva New Vegas modding guide, and follow every step to the letter. The recommendations are air-tight and the instructions are written and presented as if you, the reader, have never even seen so much as a computer before. It's amazing. The "Base" of VNV contains nothing but bugfixes, lightweight unofficial patches, performance optimizations, and other under-the-hood stuff designed to remedy FNV's infamous stability issues while maintaining a completely "vanilla" feel. This makes it absolutely necessary, in my opinion, even for people who don't actually want to play with any (other) mods. Especially crucial to this guide is its mandate to use Mod Organizer 2; if you're using Nexus Mod Manager, Vortex, or Fallout Mod Manager any time since Biden got elected, you are shooting yourself in the foot plain and simple. The best endorsement that I can give of Mod Organizer 2 is that it mods you game completely virtually, meaning that if you fuck your mods up beyond repair, you can just go to your actual FNV launcher in your root folder and boot up the vanilla game like nothing ever happened.

And the "Extended" section of Viva New Vegas consists of more modding tools, quality of life tweaks, content restorations, and a curated list of strongly recommended gameplay modifications that nevertheless all come down to your personal preference (though deviating from their provided list may make you use your brain a little bit when choosing the right compatibility patches, and so on).

This isn't going to cover every single thing that I play with, but here's everything that I would think to suggest to anybody who asked. With that said, here's Fallout "Lou" Begas's Mod Recommendations, 2024 Edition:

Viva New Vegas Extended: Lou's Preferences

VNV Extended recommends several gameplay modifications that come down to personal preference. I installed just about all of them, with a few exceptions (I don't care at all for B42 Optics, for example). Here's some specific details:

Just Assorted Mods has a hell of a lot of features but I actually enable are breath-holding, the vanilla sprint, and the loot menu (though I flip-flop often on using JAM's Bullet Time in place of V.A.T.S.). If you install VNV and boot up the game and wonder "what is all this fucking shit on my HUD," it's probably some of Just Assorted Mods's components. Just disable the ones you don't want in the in-game Mod Configuration Menu, which you will also have available if you followed the instructions for VNV Base.

Vigor is a modernized fork of JSawyer, the mod that was originally created by FNV's own director after the game's release that tweaked a lot of under-the-hood game settings and statistical balance to his personal preferences. JSawyer Ultimate Edition a more faithful modernization of the original JSawyer whereas Vigor is "a more lightweight alternative" that dials back some of the more drastic features of JSUE. Your choice of these, or none of them, is purely personal preference, and my preference is for Vigor. Any form of JSawyer is strongly recommended if you play in Hardcore Mode.

Simple Vigor Config is used in conjuncton with Vigor and is an intuitive and easy way to overwrite Vigor's gamesetting changes with your own preference. I use the config to adjust carry weight to a much more punishing (25 + 5*STR) formula that incentivizes the use of backpacks, mindful inventory management, and companion inventory space; and to increase the starvation, thirst, and sleep Hardcore Mode rates to 10, 5, and 14 respectively.

Desert Natural Weathers is the weather mod to end all weather mods, in my view, and it includes configuration for customizing the darkness and visibility of nighttime. This effectively obsoletes former dinosaurs like Darker Nights Ultimate Edition. Refer to the post that I made on DNUE's Nexus page here for a copy of my settings to darken those dang nights with DNW.

In AIStewie's Tweaks's nvse_stewie_tweaks.ini file, I set bCustomSpecialPoints = 1 and iNumPointsToAllocate = 35. This slightly reduced starting stat spread forces you to make tradeoffs in your character creation, because it starts with a perfect middle 5 in every stat. Every addition above average will require a subtraction below average. The "Essentials" INI included with VNV Base is all that most players will ever need, so this is my one specific personal tweak that'll keep you from scrolling through every single option in the whole damn thing (though I also recommend enabling the tweaks that hide all of your skill check tags in dialogue for more immersive and less gamified roleplaying in conversation: set bNoSkillTags, bRemoveFailedSuccessText, bRemoveRedOutline, and iRemoveTags to all = 1. )

Lou's Personally Valuable or Sentimental Tweaks and Fixes

Better Pause Menu Screen (Simple Blur). I play with an ultrawide resolution and the vanilla pause menu filter doesn't actually extend past 1920x1080. So this is really vital, lol.

Vanilla Animations Weapon Scale Fix. This mod will fix a common issue with custom weapons and animation mods where your weapon will become invisible because its scale has gotten stuck at 0.

Companion Carry Weight Fix. All companions in the game have an invisible attribute called "companion suite" that, among other things, halves their carrying capacity based on their actual stats. If you play with a super low carry weight formula like I do, you can see how this is a problem. Here's the solution.

Miscellaneous Tweaks Collection includes a few files that I get great use out of: No DLC Recipes Early (great unless you integrate DLC crafting ingredients into your base game somehow) and Vendors Have Throwables (why the fuck are throwing weapons so hard to find in vanilla!). There are others that I use as well but I recommend these two the most generally.

Lucky 38 Suite Upgrade Terminal Tweak is a very cute little mod that removes the ugly wall-mounted terminal and makes you purchase your suite upgrades from the actual computer on the desk in the master bedroom instead.

I Fought the Law - Simple NCR Start finally gives you a good reason to check out NCRCF if you're not siding with the Powder Gangers.

Hire Cass Early was my "dream mod" for the longest time, and thanks to some help, it's finally a reality. Simply pick up the letter that this mod adds to the Mojave Express office in Primm and you can recruit Cass right away (through the usual persuasive requirements) without ever stepping off the road from Goodsprings to the Mojave Outpost. Part of my ongoing "make @ikroah real" project.

Harder Strip Access. Getting into Vegas to finally confront Benny should feel like a tremendous accomplishment. This mod makes it so. Better pony up the caps or call in one hell of a favor, kid! With any kind of tougher economy mods, especially, this mod makes it wonderfully Herculean to just buy your way onto the Strip.

Balance Tweaks

Pseudo-Realistic Carry Weight - No Weightless Item Overhaul and Realistic Bottle Cap Weight. The former is actually an optional file; the main file just implements the the carry weight formula that I was coincidentally already using. The latter just forces you to think strategically about how much money you're walking around with. Can you tell that I love inventory management? Note that if you give bottlecaps weight, you should definitely let yourself drop them when necessary by editing Stewie's Tweaks (bShowCurrencyInContainers = 1).

Carry Weight Affects Speed, Med-Tek Trauma Kit (Lou's Version), and More Conditions to Fast Travel. The first appearance of my own mods on this list! These three mods in conjunction tie your encumbrance and your overall health to your mobility far more strictly. I love the balancing act of packing enough supplies for an excursion while leaving enough room for loot that I can still fast travel with, and the choice to get greedy with more loot than I can comfortably carry and just hope to not run into danger on my slow walk back toward a merchant. My tweaks to the classic Med-Tek Trauma Kit mod apply this level of emergent gameplay and resource management to your limb health, though it makes the game much more difficult unless your character specializes in Medicine. I haven't tried it myself, but Simple Healing System is fully configurable, modern mod that I've had my eyes on and that might be better for most general playstyles, and it might even be compatible in conjunction with my Med-Tek mod for extra intensity!

Better Charisma (Charisma Affects Dialogue Skill Checks) and/or Charisma Affects Reputation. I've always been very frustrated with how much of a meaningless dump stat Charisma is, and the phenomenon of the 1 CHA 100 Speech player character in general. These two mods, which you can use just one of or both together, give Charisma much more meaningful and palpable functionality.

Terrifying Presence (Lou's Version), speaking of Charisma, changes the requirement for this perk from Level 6 and 70 Speech to Level 2 and 6 CHA, making it much more accessible to more types of intimidating characters. This same mod includes alternate options to take it as a trait instead, with the drawback(s) of either tanking your Speech and Barter and/or increasing your addiction chance. See also: Less Snarky Terrifying Presence.

New Vegas Karma Rebalance is a great under-the-hood mod that makes FNV's nearly vestigial karma system less nonsensical without removing it or its effects on the player entirely. Thanks to this and Mass Ownership Tweaks, which is already included in VNV Extended's recommendation of Essential Vanilla Enhancements Merged, Cass won't hate your guts just for stealing a few things from Caesar's Legion at Cottonwood Cove, especially not after you've already killed them all.

Damage Multiplier solves the sluggish damage sponge problem that plagues Bethesda engine combat by simply multiplying all damage dealt globally, both by and to the player, by a factor of your choosing. I use 2.5x, which is usually enough to kill any level-appropriate human being with a single shot to the head. 2x should be the minimum. Combine with Combat Enhancer NVSE and NPCs Use Ammo for overall faster but much more ferocious and intense combat engagements.

Visuals and Animations

Third Person Camera Overhaul. Though I'm still getting used to its extremely specific configuration settings, this is vital for a third-person enjoyer like myself. It obsoletes any and all "dynamic camera" or "shoulder swap" mods of the past. Once you figure out how it works and what you like, you're set for life.

Realistic Movement and Dramatic Inertia. Although a little goofy, it has never felt better for me to physically move around in the game than it has before. I like the weight and get-up-and-go that this mod has for me as a player, but it's especially significant in firefights and other combat situations where, now, your targets can't dodge bullets by shifting direction instantly or stopping and turning on perfect dimes. For a single, less heavyweight alternative, try 360 Movement and Diagonal Movement together instead. Each pair of these mods is incompatible with the other pair, however.

B42 Loot, B42 Interact, and B42 Inject. I recommend a lot of the B42 family of animation overhauls in general (except B42 Optics, lol) because I just love seeing my character actually do the things they're doing. For B42 Loot, I use the included config file to disable the "force pull" effect, and for B42 Interact, there exists compatibility patches between it and its more third-person oriented counterpart Animated Ingestibles, but I'd only look into that if you know what you're doing (though, I do).

Character Kit Remake is a mod that I was turned onto recently. For a long time I have scoffed at character appearance overhauls out of nostalgia for those classic gamebryo engine potato-faces and what I thought was, to be blunt, the tasteless ineptitude of the actual overhauling. But I do really like this one, even if the showcase of screenshots do a really bad job of selling it. It looks a lot better in motion and in game, I promise. i think that these people are just not good digital photographers.

Height Randomizer. It's funny how much you can get attached to a minor character when they are, for whatever reason, especially tall or short. This lightweight mod just adds some height variance to all NPCs in the game that don't already have a non-normal 1.00 height setting in vanilla.

The Strip Groove. Dance on command. Endorsed.

Items, Economy, Crafting, Survival, Repair, Etc.

Gloves Galore (Lou's Version), Power Armor Gloves, Combat Armor Gloves, and White Glove Society Wear Gloves. Anyone who has followed me long enough on here should know that I have strong, totally normal feelings about gloves.

Armed to the Teeth Redux and literally any backpack mod. I've used this duffel bag forever, for example. I love these ones because I personally love when you can physically, literally see the things that a character is supposed to be carrying.

Flashlight NVSE. Another piece of Agnes Sands's arsenal, this is the one "old" mod that I can't quit. Even if it is a little janky, I've yet to find a better directional flashlight mod. Only install this is you think you can handle wrestling with it a little, and make sure your "Exterior" flashlight settings are all on the lowest quality regardless of computer specs (or else it causes flickering). It's a must-have for darker nights, too.

Famine is the last "loot scarcity" mod you'll ever need. Combine it with Harder, Barter, Faster, Stronger from the VNV Extended recommendations list for a really tough time affording even basic necessities without tailoring your build for mercantile success... which is just how I like it.

Cheaper Repair Costs. The vanilla formula for determining the cost of weapon and armor repairs at merchants is, in a word, fucked, where it literally costs twice the weapon's base value to repair it from broken. This mod lets you adjust that proportion so that you won't be better off literally selling and buying another gun in every single case. I play with a rate of 67% (which means that paying a merchant to repair a completely broken weapon from 0% health to 100% health will cost 67% of the weapon's base value).

Alternative Repairing does too much cool, practical shit to the base repairing system to even get into here. To keep it short, it intuitively incentivizes actually scrounging for all kinds of formerly useless junk that you can now scrap for spare parts. Check it out.

Water Overhaul. Ever play with a Universal Water Bottling mod and find things suddenly far too easy? Water Overhaul combines all the convenience and sense-making of bottling water anywhere with the much-needed tradeoff of truly purified water being much rarer. All that convenient H2O is now just radioactive enough to keep Goodsprings Source from singlehandedly breaking the survival economy of the game (not to mention the literal economy).

Cowboy Coffee and Coffee Grounds, my own mod that adds brewable coffee to the wasteland. While mostly just created because it's cute, it's really nice to have a reliable and palpable source of sleep deprivation relief when playing in Hardcore Mode.

Gun Oil From Animal Fat, another mod of mine that provides a cheaper, craftable, and less demanding but less effective repair option to complement Weapon Repair Kits. I patched this one recently to fix some old issues, and it's great for incentivizing emergent gameplay (since you need to hunt for meat, and cook the meat for fat, and combine the fat with loot to make the gun oil).

Sound

Less Constant Music and Passive Combat Music Tweaked do exactly what they say on the tin and are perfect for people who like to get immersed in the natural sound of their environment, especially if you're a chronically stealthy player like me and you've trained yourself to constantly listen for enemy footsteps. I do recommend keeping Less Constant Music disabled when you first start a game, though, because until I can figure out how to add an exception to it myself, it will remove the background music from character creation at Doc Mitchell's house more often than not, and I really like that music.

SPEAKING of Doc Mitchell's music, Try Not To Get Killed Anymore is one of the first mods I ever made and it has never left my load order. It simply replaces the musical sting that plays when you die with an emphatic, tolling bell and the refrain from Doc Mitchell's theme, plus an optional version that includes his ghostly voice telling you to try not to get killed anymore. Two of my other personal sound replacers are the Mysterious Stranger Level-up Theme, Simple Snap Sound Effects for Quest Updates, and Mechanical Camera VATS.

#fallout #fallout new vegas #fnv #mods

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applestruda · 2 years

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Ok so i've gotten a couple of people asking me how i color,, so i thought i might like, drop a mini tutorial for how i draw in general. I will explain to the best of my ability, but im not super good at this kind of thing (also this is gonna be a long post)

I will say that usually I go into a drawing with a general idea of what I want to draw, the vibe I want to give, and the colors I want to work with. Of course these can change throughout the process though.

(and side tip is to flip the canvas often, that way it's easy to catch mistakes and tweak them)

So I always start with a sketch, it's not clean or pretty, just meant to give me a good base. And from there I color in the flats

Next I take some darker colors and just throw it on top of the flats, erasing where I want there to be highlights

I then specifically take the brush called stickman (on procreate), and do a wash over the art. I find that it creates a variety of interesting colors and adds some texture.

From there, I take my usual brush (chalk) and I grab the colors created by the previous step, rendering out the form with them

Next is just the highlights, where i pretty much make a good base to start adding details and messing with layer types.

Details! I use a variety of brushes, layer types, and colors, just messing around and seeing what I like. I often stumble across something I like through this method, completely unplanned.

(also to create the wispy effect like what's around the stars, I just grab a color, use whatever layer type I think looks cool, and then go in with my eraser to add more shape to it)

The final couple of steps is still me just messing around with layer types and colors, but usual to the whole drawing instead of specific spots, possibly unifying colors and or trying to push contrasts a little further (it depends on what I'm going for). And then i finish it off with another stickman layer to add more texture back!

And erm,, Yeah! That's kinda it.. In total this took 1 h 11 min.. and honestly most of it is just me messing with things until I like it..

Hope this helps,

#struda rambles #<- not really but idk #its kinda rambly #art tutorial #my art #scott smajor #i really live by fuck it we ball #fweofbwjoebf

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alexanderwales · 1 month

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My juniper bonsai died. I had gotten it at a bonsai class, where I pruned and repotted and trained it, and had it for about a year. I was so happy that it lived through the winter, and I kept it watered, looking at the new growth and seeing where I would eventually make it take shape into something a little more interesting. But it's dead now. I had noticed the tips getting brown, and that meant it wasn't getting enough water, so I watered it more often, making sure the soil was moist. The tips got more brown, and then over the course of two days, some critical process inside the miniature tree failed, and the whole thing went brown and dead. I'm not entirely sure what went wrong, which is frustrating, because it means that if I make a second bonsai from a cheap little Home Depot juniper, there's a good chance that it, too, will die.

As time goes on, the thing I enjoy more and more about video games is how legible everything is. You press a button and something predictable happens. You screw up and you understand why, and how to fix it. Even a hard game, like Dark Souls, lets you understand why you died to the boss and what you can do better next time. You can say to yourself "okay, shield for the first two attacks, dodge for the heavy attack at the end, then punish with a heavy attack and back off".

I've been editing the first book of my webnovel, Thresholder, and I am just mired in an inability to understand whether the changes I'm making are actually improving it. Everything is done by feel and rules of thumb. I'm trying to be bold, but I'm charging off into the fog, unable to see where I'm going. I've always hated editing, not necessarily the line edit stuff to remove clunky phrasing (which is fine) but the larger scale stuff, trying to hammer a good story into a great one, removing unnecessary characters and winnowing down a scene until it's just the exposed heart.

If I could have a minor superpower, it would be to see, in real time, the audience average score for a piece of writing before it was released. I could tweak a line and get some feedback on whether it was better or worse. I could change a character's name and see whether people liked it better. I could do A/B testing.

But writing in real life has very long feedback cycles, even if you're posting things online, and it's difficult to know whether you've made something good until after it's out in the world.

#bonsai #video games #thresholder #writing

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whinesandwhimpers · 10 months

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it's always the quiet ones

Rodolfo Parra x f!reader

cw; noncon, creampie, forced orgasm, bit of somnophilia

You wake up to what you quickly figure out is someone's cock inching its way inside you. You're laying on your back with someone between your thighs. It's too dark to see who it is. Your top is still on. You tense, quickly becoming wide awake, and a hand covers your mouth before you can scream.

"Relax, Amor, Let me in," They whisper, leaning over beside your ear, and you easily recognise the voice, making your heart crack. Rudy. He groans, still pushing his cock in. It's thick. The stretch stinging. "I got you ready and you're still so tight."

You let out a muffled pained gasp as he forces the rest of his length inside, wincing from the burn and stretch of his thickness. Grasping his wrist, you try to remove his hand from your mouth, failing when he doesn't budge. You start sobbing after he places a kiss on your forehead. The gesture would've been sweet if he hadn't taken advantage of you.

He swiftly pushes your thighs up to either side of your chest and rests his weight on top of you, returning his hand to cover your mouth while he places his other palm beside your head to hold himself up. He slowly moves his hips back, pulling out until just his tip is inside before driving his cock back in again and again.

You dig your nails into the front of his shoulders, trying to push him off. You give up when all it does is make him groan in enjoyment from the pain.

"I'm sorry, Mi Amor, I had to. Don't— Don't cry." He shakily says, shuddering at the feeling of your walls around him, and moves his hand from your mouth to cradle your cheek and wipe some of your tears away.

"Please stop, Rudy." You try pleading, doing your best to ignore the way the discomfort is turning into something else entirely.

"No, I can't. I—" He thrusts particularly hard making you yelp. "I had to have you after today. Having you pinned under me in training— Mierda," He drops his head under your chin, harsh breaths hitting your clavicle, and roughly grips your hair between his fingers as he rams his cock into you harder. "You broke my last thread of control."

A few more rapid thrusts and he buries himself to the hilt as he finishes, filling your poor pussy up with his cum and panting hard against you. He kisses your jaw and slips out of you, then guides your legs down and massages your thighs with the heels of his palms.

When he moves away from between your legs, you slam your thighs closed. You've stopped crying now and you wipe the tears from under your cheeks. Now that your eyes have adjusted to the darkness, you watch him. You expect him to leave. He doesn't.

He walks over to your dresser and opens the top drawer, riffles around in it. He makes a noise of success and pulls out... your fucking vibrator.

"I've noticed you use this often, Amor." He walks over to the bed.

"You.. noticed?"

"I was too selfish before but I'll make you feel good now. I wanna hear more of those pretty noises you make when you think no one is around."

You scramble to move away but he lunges at you and wraps his arm around your waist, laying on his side and pulling you against his chest. He turns the vibrator on a middle setting and, through your struggling, presses it against your clit, making you shriek as a ripple of pleasure shoots through you, the previous fucking have built up something within you.

You flinch away from the vibrator and your ass presses against his dick making you jerk forward.. right back against the vibrator.

Rudy chuckles and runs the vibrator up and down your slit before returning to your clit, pressing harder, making you whine and squirm against it. His arm around your waist slips under your shirt to massage your breast and play with your nipple, tweaking and pulling it.

He turns the vibrator up to the highest setting and you fall apart with a cry, arching your back, hands mindlessly gripping the bed in front of you, your face scrunching up as Rudy continues working the vibrator on you through your orgasm.

"Good girl." He murmurs.

"Stop." You whine, legs twitching and trying to catch your breath.

He pulls the vibrator away and switches it off and tosses it on the floor.

You go rigid when you realise he's not leaving.

He gets comfortable behind you, spooning you. He pulls you impossibly close, arms wrapping around you. Your back is against his chest, his dick is right up against your ass, and he hooks his leg over your legs.

You're trapped.

"You won't tell anyone about this, will you, Cariño?" He rhetorically asks, nuzzling his face into your hair. "Because I'm the Sergeant Major and no one will believe you."

#rodolfo parra x reader #rudy x reader #rudy parra x reader #dark!rudy #perv!rudy #rodolfo parra x female reader #my writing

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moonlight-prose · 11 months

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✧ INHALE, EXHALE ✧

a/n: it's hard to believe that in ten days kinktober and october will be over. that's actually insane. the month has gone by so fucking fast. also i'm really shocked i've made it this far. i fully expected to give up on day ten, but here we are. entering the home stretch. writing this has made me realize i need to write more for anakin. so i hope y'all enjoy my first official anakin fic.

day twenty-one - breathplay + fingering | kinktober 2023

summary: "the act of inhaling a breath was intimate. a way for your body to grasp onto the strands of life that connected you to the planet you resided on. to keep you going until you took your final one"

word count: 1.1k+

pairing: anakin skywalker x f!reader

warnings: EXPLICIT SO MINORS DNI, breathplay, fingering, inappropriate use of the force, choking, anakin having a dark side, dirty talk.

The act of inhaling a breath was intimate. A way for your body to grasp onto the strands of life that connected you to the planet you resided on. To keep you going until you took your final one. The one that ended it all. The sensation of your chest rising and falling, your lungs filling with something so beautiful—so peaceful—often made you realize how incredible everything was.

No matter how much you wanted to search for beauty, it stood right before you. Offering itself to you on a silver platter; giving you no choice but to take and take until there was nothing left to give.

The act of taking away breath…was sinful.

Each breath you inhaled, now ripped from your grasp, stolen from your lungs with the promise of nothing. There would be no reprieve. No offer of more. Because your breath was gone and yet…you were more than willing to keep it that way. The act triggered something in your brain, right down to the darkness that resided in the very depths you avoided. It dragged the thoughts to the forefront—or perhaps he did—and presented themselves as if they were prey ready for the kill.

“So you do like this.” He said the words with a smirk, his body lax on the chair that stood next to your bed—legs spread wide and eyes dark with hunger. “I knew you’d be filthy.”

Dropping his hand, you gasped for air, the high of the oxygen hitting your lungs and nearly turning your brain fuzzy. Causing you to drop down onto the bed devoid of energy yet burning right down to your core. You couldn’t tell how long he’d been at it. How many times he’d cut off your air supply only to give it back with the wave of his hand. A true master of knowing how to make you squirm.

Your fingers gripped the sheets, legs stretching out as you sucked in air quickly. Knowing that the small break would only be permitted for so long. His hand on your thigh changed that thought. It had your eyes flying open, mouth parting in an already formed plea as he slid his fingers up higher. Tracing the skin with symbols. The language of the Jedi of Old. Long before you or him were ever born. You could recognize their shapes anywhere, having trained by his side, and you tried to make out what he was spelling.

What words he was lightly ingraining into your body like a mark that wouldn’t vanish.

“Anakin,” you breathed, body responding to his touch instantaneously.

“You can take it again.” He trailed his hand up higher, fingers brushing the curls above your mound—feeling the way your body jolted, hips trying to reach his touch. “You can take anything I give you.”

Your breath hitched, eyes fluttering shut when he finally slid a bit further and sunk two fingers into your slick. Parting you lewdly for his eyes to see. You were wet and warm. Practically weeping into his hand. But then something pushed forward, sliding along your body and tweaking your nipples roughly, dragging a punched out cry from your lips.

He smiled, flicking his wrist to touch you in a way only he enjoyed. The Force was not meant to be used so obscenely. But Anakin had always been one to bend the rules. Especially when it came to you.

“Look at you,” he marveled, circling your clit gently. “My beautiful mess.”

You gasped when his finger curled into you. “Anakin—”

“Take it,” he growled, the touch now returning to your neck. The skin was tender, but you leaned into it. Arched your back to give him better access. “Be good and let me hear you honey.”

“M-Maker.”

“Fucking beautiful.” He pressed another finger into you, eyes drinking in the way your mouth fell open, a whine of name echoing in the room. “You’re all mine aren’t you?”

“Oh fuck.”

Thrusting up into you, he focused on the rise and fall of your bare chest, throat extended and waiting for him to continue. A vision of perfection right before his eyes. Without another thought he dragged the Force back to where you wanted it; where he could watch your body give into the pleasure. It wrapped around your throat, pressing down gently at first until your eyes opened, meeting his.

You saw the depravity in them, the need that bled into the air around you. Demanding everything of you—all that you were willing to give.

“I asked you a question,” he said, curling his fingers and striking that spot that had a breathless sob hitting his ears.

“Yes!” you cried, thighs trembling.

He pressed down harder, your breath effectively being cut off—head hitting the pillow with a whine.

“Right answer.” He smiled, thumb sliding messily over your clit and dragging you even higher. “You’re my good fucking girl aren’t you baby?”

Nodding, you clutched at his arm, nails dragging against the clunky armor he wore. Not two hours ago was he out on the battlefield right by your side. Helping you lead an artillery against the Separatists. Yet now he had you holed up in his cabin, dragging release after release out of your body. Rendering you useless in tomorrow’s training.

“Do you want to cum?” He rubbed directly over the spongy spot on your walls, catching the way your eyes rolled back. “Yeah you do.”

The pleasure was too much. Your lungs screamed for air, but the bliss that spread from between your thighs only caused you to spiral higher. For a brief moment, he let up, allowing you to suck in a breath or two. Yet he never relented with his fingers. Three of them now buried deep in you, plunging in and out at a speed that had cries falling from your lips.

“I can feel it.” Your hips grinded down on the palm of his hand, the pleasure building with each movement. Yet you needed something to push you over the edge. The Force pressed around your throat, cutting off your air as he leaned in closer, lips brushed yours. “Cum for me. Give it to me.”

The tight coil in your body snapped. Flooding you with a white hot flame that rocketed up your spine. Digging your nails into his wrist, you could see him smiling proudly through your blurry gaze. Tears streaming down into your hair. Your lips curled up as he took his hand away, letting you breathe once more. Giving you a chance to come back down from the high you’d been suspended in.

“Beautiful.” He cupped your cheek, kissing you softly—a stark contrast to the way he just had you. Yet that’s what you adored about him, what made you pull him closer as your lips properly sealed over his.

Until he found his way into the bed with you, hands wrapping around your body. Breathing his very own life into your lungs.

#anakin skywalker x f!reader #anakin skywalker x reader #anakin skywalker x you #anakin skywalker x y/n #anakin skywalker smut #anakin skywalker #star wars smut #my writing #kinktober 2023

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mimiyewaffles · 5 months

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A FEW INTERESTING THINGS

I guess I need help

So if y'all dont know, I'm trying to revise my boyfriend's d3ath.

It's been two months since I have been affirming and a few days since I got into the concept of void. Now, I'm trying to get into the void.

I've noticed a few crazy things, that I would love to share.

I've always affirmed that “everyone will forget about my boyfriend's demise because it was just my nightmare and no such thing ever happened. He's all alive and healthy” So I guess my affirmations are kinda playing out.

When I got to know about his demise, I sent him like 100 texts that day, I was so emotional and poured down everything to him. He not only is my boyfriend, but also is my best friend. The bestest friend ever and it was the worst day of my life. I was never ready to lose him.

I sent those 100 texts to him on Snapchat and obviously, my texts were just delivered. Nobody read them because that "nobody" Was long gone. I'm talking about feb, 2024. So I checked his snapchat after a few days of emotional ranting, and those texts didn't show up. I thought it might be a glitch and now after like 3 months, I went back to check on him because I missed him and guess what? ALL OF THOSE TEXTS ARE GONE!

Now idk if I'm tweaking but wtf? Snapchat has this feature where messages get deleted after 24 hours of being seen. But nobody saw my messages to begin with, where are those texts????

Like... All the snaps, that were sent before those texts and even after those texts are still in delivered, not seen.

Can anyone tell me if this is a glitch? This couldn't be, right? It's been 3 months to that incident, if it were glitch, it would have been fixed by now but idk-

My bf would post about his travelling and stuffs in Instagram reels and I often visit his account to look at him all alive once again and one day, I noticed one of his reels cover has changed 💀 and I even showed it to my sister and friend and they were shocked too. I thought it might be a glitch too. But it stayed like that for 3 days and then switched back to what it was before.

This might be a glitch idk honestly but my friend said it might be a "timeline/dimensions overlapping"

Two of my close friends are really logical minded and I never told them about my manifestation/shifting to a reality where my bf never got into an accident, because they wouldn't believe me. They don't even believe in multiple realities... So, not worth it.

A week ago, I texted one of these friends, saying that I feel like my bf is alive (emotional ranting) and all she told me was to hold up and move on, I'm thinking way too much 😮‍💨

And that's that. We didn't talk much about it.

After a few days of that, she texted me herself telling me that she feels the same. She feels as if my bf is alive too and maybe faking a death. We didn't get into the conclusion but yeah, we are still in doubt.

Also I would daydream about meeting my bf once again and i would make infinite possibilities to proof my reasoning mind that he's alive. So one of my imagination was my friend texting my bf's brother (they have nothing in common, they don't even know each other yet I imagined them talking) and his brother would say that my boyfriend is actually alive. And that scene exactly happened, except for the alive part. my friend talked to his brother to get his "last" Pics and guess what? They don't have that. Which is super weird because that accident just happened this year and those photos are gone. I texted one of his other brother who always replies to my texts and always give me updates about how their family is grieving but when I asked about pics, he left me on seen— again very weird.

Moreover, all of them (his family members) have moved on completely. They are enjoying and travelling. Idk how but like in a month of my bf's demise, they started partying a stuff which is super weird to me.

.....

I guess my affirmations are kinda becoming true. My 3D is maybe conforming slowly (?) Idk 😭

Lemme know what y'all think. Any tips on revising such thing would be appreciated. Thanks for reading 🎐

I'm sorry if I don't make any sense, I'm probably being delusional. Sorry for the rant 🥲🤌

#law of assumption #revision #loa #loassumption #loa success #loassblog #revising death #death revision #loa blog #manifesation #manifesting #void state #the void #eiypo #loablr #reality shifting #shiftblr #shifting community #shifters

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sozila · 2 months

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chiaroscuro. (nanami x reader)

synopsis: as a princess, you had a duty to the country. to knight kento nanami, you simply were his everything.

pairing: personal knight!kento nanami x princess!fem reader.

warnings: 18+, mdni. eventual sexual descriptions.

masterlist | previous | next

you are on: contemplation. part two of three

a/n:

apologies for the late upload! life is very tumultuous and i am no exception :,) i've been writing this for a while but it was mostly done a hot minute ago, but got beta read recently by my lovely ivy (@beeh-ive) and i've made tweaks enough to proudly say this is a good part two :) ! word count is 6.8k, very large jump but promise it's going to lead up to a good ending part three!

ao3 link here.

contemplation. (part two)

kento looked at you incredulously. he stuttered for the first time in your presence, unable to find words.

“wha— well, i..! you cannot possibly —“

you look at him firmly, an unwavering resolve in your eyes. “i want to run away, and i need you to help me.”

kento was barely processing words, let alone the logistics of this act. the ramifications, oh god, what if someone heard you utter these words? this was absolutely insane. he paced the room for a moment. it was true that your situation is bleak.after all, you’ve recently found out about a secret marriage alliance concealed so well even kento was aware of the arrangement. he was already ruminating that you were to marry any man, much less a cold prince. he knew certain rumors about satoru gojo. his womanizing escapades, lack of responsibility, unruly behavior. he was truly furious when he saw the same man standing in front of him and was declared to be betrothed to you. you, who got shy at even the mention of being intimate with a man, who had the aura of grace itself and was definitely the most respected princess kento knew. to say prince gojo did not deserve you was a scathing understatement. his princess deserved a man of finest nature, who would give you the world in your hands if need be. deep down, a tiny voice whispers that he only wishes it be him.

kento snaps back to reality when he hears you call him for the fourth time. “kento nanami! heavens, is it surely so impossible? i know it shall require finesse and sacrifice, but i simply..” you trail in self-doubt, biting your thumb absentmindedly. with a small sigh, nanami kneels in front of your lap and grabs your hand, gently pulling it away.

“forgive me, princess. i reacted unbecoming of myself. i simply.. i simply think about the meaning of it all. if you leave this castle, you will always be in hiding. you will never see your sisters and brothers again. you will lose more than just your lifestyle, my crown. this… will be irreversible.”

his tone was soft and comforting, but his words stung, making your chest ache. he was right. a life lost to gain another. it is an ultimate sacrifice that you need to be absolutely sure of.

“i understand, kento. i will grieve, this is fact. but i cannot live the rest of my life knowing i could have escaped this all when i had the chance, albeit small.”

kento looks down at your hands that were still being held in his caresses them softly with his thumb. your heart jumps at the gesture.

a beat passes.

“give me the night, princess. i will form a plan that will do you the least harm. this is my promise to you.”

his eyes flashed with intensity, the devotion in his tone not missed. his head leans down to kiss your hands, eyes not breaking contact. his lips stay on the skin longer than expected, causing you to feel hot from the contact.

you couldn’t lie and say you didn’t miss the obvious; kento was a very gorgeous man. you’ve watched him (far more often than a lady should) train on his off days from your window, his skin glistened with sweat and his body moved swiftly in sparring. his body was built compared to most of the royal guard, surprisingly lean due to his tall figure.

you’ve caught yourself accidentally drawing his features in your sketches, and now held a secret stash of them in your closet. once when cleaning, one of the maids found them and you begged her not to tell on you. she simply giggled and complied. “you misunderstand me! they are very beautiful, my lady. you should show him one day,” she told you. you thought about the scenario in which you could do so. the both of you in your colorful garden, him walking in step of yours as he usually does.. and you courageous enough to tell him your true feelings.

would he be happy? horrified? uncomfortable?

…interested?

you knew the possibility was nothing short of impossible. but when he looks into your eyes like that, pledging his loyalty so sincerely to you, you can’t help but let your mind wander to the idea.

the soft squeeze on your hand pulls you away from your thoughts and back to the man in front of you. your head dips in a bow of thanks, silent but sincere.

kento wordlessly understands. his hand slips out of yours—the emptiness making your heart sink for just a moment—but your composure evens back to calm, as you have perfected over the years. he pushes off of his knees and reflects your bow, a bid goodnight. you barely raise your fingers in a motion to say, yes, you may go, despite the looping thought that he rather stay with you for the night instead. it was a childish impulsive thought, but one present in your head nonetheless.

he exits the room with your heart in his hands, as it has done so for the last five years.

the next morning you do not find kento at your door when you wake up. nor do you after your chamber maids come in to bathe and dress you. and even so when you are drinking your morning tea in the gardens. still, you sat in your frilly prison, passing the time in the ivy gazebo until you had some sign of your knight.

while kento had in fact left his post as your personal protection, he did not leave you without replacements. in his place were two young guards you had been acquainted with in passing. you had forgotten their names unfortunately, but they were extremely recognizable. one had blue-black hair in the shape of a sea urchin, a creature you had read about in novels only. despite your lack of familiarity with the sea animal, you definitely saw the resemblance with the boy. he was stoic and a well-mannered one, unlike his counterpart. radiant pink hair and with an energy you hadn’t seen anyone over the age of three exercise, the second guard was a bright and kind boy that struck conversation with you often. you had learned by the afternoon his name was yuuji, and the silent one was megumi.

“your highness, i must say your taste in flowers is just impeccable. a lady’s maid told me you curated this entire garden at fourteen, is that true? the colors just light up this dreary castle, thank the gods. i hope you don’t mind if i practice some dueling with megumi here? got to keep our senses sharp, right megs?” “yuuji, we are not sparring in front of the crown princess. my deepest apologies for my imbecile partner, your grace.”

you snap your fan open and cover your mouth to let out a giggle at their shenanigans. what joy to see youth being youthful, you conclude.

the chamomile in your cup eventually goes cold and the sun turns into a bright orange hanging in the sky. you gather your skirts and your fan and walk back to your room, pulling at your bodice. the lace had been digging into your skin since morning, and upon further inspection it was evident by the red marks that it was not just a figment of your imagination. you think for a split second if you should call your chamber maids but decide against it- you’re not a child, you can change a damn dress by yourself. your suffocated waist is instantly relieved as you practically rip off the pink cloths and strings. you’re finally allowed the luxury of breathing once you toss the pesky things away from you. corsets were surely made with the man perceiving it in mind, not the woman who had to wear it. you’re in simply a chemise under-slip when you hear the unmistakable voice of your dear knight trip on himself in shock.

you miss the way his eyes widen before he chokes out a cough. “—ahem! p-princess, my deepest apologies, i would not have barged in if i knew.. i knew you were indecent,”

as you flip in reaction to him your cheeks flame instantly, hands flying to your breasts to cover any unwanted bits. you knew the linen on your chemise was rather thin, a tad see-through. “k-kento!” you squeak with equal embarrassment.

he lowers his gaze out of respect, and if his hand wasn’t covering his face you would know it was pure scarlet. this was insanely out of his clearance; fuck scandalous. he wasn’t in his usual uniform, but instead a formal pair of slacks and a white blouse with the sleeves rolled up. gods.

you let your hair fall around your face to hide your wandering eyes. nothing more sinful than strong forearms on display for you while you’re barely covering yourself, gods help the both of you. your eyes dart to the throw linens on your bed and all but lunge for them, wrapping yourself to cover your dignity.

“i assume you have updates, yes?” you barely manage, trying to maintain the true situation at hand.

you notice kento physically straightens as he enters his professional demeanor, remembering why he came into your room in such a hurry in the first place. you also notice he is holding parchment in his other hand.

“of course, my crown. i must preface with another apology, however.. i do realize it took much longer than i expected to settle discreetly,” you give him a quick nod and hand wave of dismissal. he takes this as a sign to continue.

“right, thank you. in six days’ time, your father has deemed you to travel with prince satoru back to his country via his ship. the crown prince maintains his own crew, so he will be on deck before dawn to see through business. this allows us to have you ride in your own personal carriage to the docks, only accompanied by a driver and myself. i will take over the carriage and detour us to this—“ he points to a dot on his parchment, a map. “—village. we will stop for food and supplies, rest. i will be arranging some documents for our identities as well. after that, we will travel another day’s time to the village where i will buy a cottage for you to reside. it is a lovely but quiet town, princess, it sits by the shores untouched by our ships and trade. it is… serene, i've been told. for the life you deserve to live.”

your eyes meet his, and the intensity, the familiar intensity of his devotion and loyalty, is unmissed. it’s paired with something soft you cannot recognize, but makes your heart skip rapidly regardless. it’s him, any look he gives you sends you in a flutter of joy. you clear your throat to break the trance.

“what about his father, king masako? where will he be?”

“he has planned to stay here for diplomatic discussion to further the marriage treaty between the nations. when you are declared missing, it is best the king and prince are separated to increase the chance that you will not be found.”

this was true, you knew that messages between prince satoru and the king would take long, and devising a search between both sides even longer. it buys you time that you will desperately need. kento had really thought this through, and found the information in one day to boot.. you were beyond impressed, but also knew that he wouldn’t fail you with such an important task. he tells you some more details about his plan, making sure you wouldn’t be blindsided by any events that could occur.

you give the maps a once-over and understand you’ll be traveling eastward, the warmer forest regions of your country. no wonder kento said the village he has chosen for you is going to be beautiful; you knew the potential environment from your books on your country. whatever the state of your future residence, you knew that freedom was what you dreamed about.

you give him a final nod with strong determination, a fire blooming in your chest. “so it shall be, we make our escape in six days’ time.”

waking up on the fateful day, you try to take in as much of your room and the castle as you prepare for the journey.

out of nerves or maybe excitement, you had woken up well before the sun had risen, the sky still lit by moonshine. you try to capture the details of the room you’ve been housed in from the day you were born, the murals painted on your ceiling and the pink furniture you held memories with.

picking up a necklace, you can’t help but feel a sense of melancholy for the bouts and bouts of jewelry you owned. twirling the metal in your hand, the light bounces off the rocks adorned in them. they never held much significance to you, just things you expected to receive every birthday, new year’s, or another excuse of an occasion.

you didn’t feel the parting of sorrow, and the absence of the emotion is what made you truly sad. what a bittersweet inception.

when you idle in the halls before the staff wake, you stand before the only painting you ever cared for.

tears well up, blurring your vision of your mother smiling back at you with your chubby figure held in her dainty frame.

this was the only painting of you and your mother in the same picture that still hung in the castle halls. your mother had died a few days before your second birthday. it was true that your birth has intensively affected your mother’s health— your father thanked the gods when she came out of the delivery alive.

but no one realized that she suffered heavily for the months to follow. kerchiefs with bloodstains, dizzy spells and finding the queen passed out in the bath were well-kept secrets from the king, by her request. she knew she had limited time in this world with her beautiful baby girl and did not intend to be bed-ridden with treatments.

what she did not know was that her death would loom over the kingdom for years and years, blackening the heart of her devoted husband. somewhere deep down, he blamed you for her death. then came your nannies, the governess that tortured you for years into the prim lady you were today. you longed for the chance to switch the stars and have a life where your loving mother stayed for you.

despite the brutality of your upbringing, you held true to your kind heart and had compassion for life itself, reading about the beauty of the world and the adventures people had beyond your wildest dreams. at least now you have things to look forward to instead of cursing the universe. the raw nature at your fingertips, you exploring the forests and beaches!

and maybe, just maybe… you get to give a mother’s love to a child of your own, something that you never had the opportunity of experiencing, long outside these cold stone walls. you hope someday you would find a man that would help build the future you dreamed of... and maybe he isn’t too far away.

voices start to echo among footsteps in the castle and that was your sign to retreat back to your room. you get prepared as usual and your chambermaids have already packed your items for the supposed trip to the gojos’ kingdom.

when you’re finally standing outside in the front courtyards, you fiddle with your lace gloves, fan hung on your wrist. your father and king masako were standing to see you off, with the entirety of the guard and staff. kento was still not here yet, and the carriage was being loaded with your suitcases.

you look at the trees to calm yourself, watching birds flutter around singing their soft melodies.

“ah, sir nanami. we were beginning to think you were absent,” king masako chuckles slimily, throwing a hand on the back of your knight.

your breath hitches at the sight of him. he was fully decorated in his royal guard uniform today, with all the medallions, ribbons, and your family’s house insignia, his sword now ensheathed in an etched-swirling gold cover. he was one of the highest ranked knights in the guard, save for the captain and the king’s personal guards.

“apologies, i had misplaced my medallion.” he walks up to the carriage and opens the door, finally looking at you.

“after you, princess.” you turn to your father and king masako and give a small goodbye curtsy out of respect, and lifting your skirt you walk towards the carriage. kento stretches a hand out to you, to offer you help on. you don’t know why this time feels different, but you feel a hot surge through your glove when your hands meet.

you step on with poise and sit delicately on the seat. kento gives you a strong look and curt nod before closing the door behind you, leaving only the carriage windows with sheer curtains as your view back outside, on all four sides of the vehicle.

you hear mild conversations and feel kento sit in front with the driver, the horses snorting and nickering. at last, the carriage pulls with a whip, and the feelings and turmoil that had been plaguing you have ultimately dissipated.

earlier, he had told you it would be around an hour deep into the forest when he would seize control over the carriage, knocking out the driver with force and then injecting a serum that would keep him asleep for a few hours to minimize risk. knock, knock, knock.

kento told you he would give you a signal so that you would not be caught off-guard when he takes over the horses, given that it would be a little rocky. you shut the book you were reading and stay on high alert, hands gripping the cushioned armrests. your heart was beating fast.

you had confirmed with kento that he would not try to hurt the man, simply hitting a nerve in his body that would put him to sleep.

“argh!” a soft grunt of struggle, but the silence that followed finalized to you that the driver was subdued.

the carriage shakes violently for a moment from the horses veering off track. you manage to get to the front window that separated you and the driver’s seat, pulling the curtains away.

“kento! are you alright?” your eyes dart and see him lay the limp man on the seat in a manner so that he would not fall off before taking the reins of the horses and yanking them back, enlisting whinnies from them. “agh.. it’s under control, just a moment!” the horses slide into a racing stop, a small dust cloud surrounding the carriage from the action.

a long breath you didn’t realize you were holding finally leaves you, your hand flying to clutch your chest.

you thank the gods that this went smoothly as you step out of the carriage, looking for kento and the unconscious driver. your eyes catch him dragging the driver to a shaded part of the trees, away from the road. you follow, the crunch of leaves underfoot echoing in the stillness.

"we'll need to move quickly," kento expresses, glancing over his shoulder. you nod, anxiety tightening your chest as you watch him tie the driver's hands and feet. the urgency in kento's eyes matches your own, knowing the journey is far from over. "let's hope this works," you murmur, exchanging a determined look with kento before heading back to the carriage.

as you climb back into the carriage, you quickly change into the plain clothes kento had advised for blending in. the simple blue dress felt unfamiliar, but necessary. definitely freeing, you think as you glare at your deathly tight corset laying on the carriage floor.

kento stands outside, on watch for any other vehicles passing by. his sharp gaze never wavers as he scans the road, his posture tense.

"ready?" he calls through the muffled door, his voice urgent.

you nod, adjusting the dress with a quick tug to make sure it's secure. “ready.” you call back, opening the door once more.

you step out to give a small spin, eyes watching his reaction. the sun is hitting your hair in such a way you look positively angelic.

“too plain?” you joke with a lopsided grin.

he shakes his head, a small languid smile on his lips. “nothing is ever plain on you, princess.”

gods, you would never get over how intensely he pronounces all of his words.

you blush and cover your reaction with a small distinguished cough, and turn to the horses.

“would you like me to sit beside you, or inside the carriage?” he clears his throat, going back to removing all of his decorations to display a more plain guard uniform. “personally, i would prefer you inside. to attract less attention,” he explains. you nod firmly, not arguing with any of his logic. “so be it, then. nothing i am not accustomed to,” you hum, settling into the carriage.

as kento mounts on, this time into the driver’s seat, you notice him adjusting the reins and glancing at the road ahead. “there will be more passers-by, so please lay low.”

you brace yourself, giving a noise of agreement. the vehicle lurches forward again and you close the curtains of your windows, your heart a soft pound with the rhythmic clatter of the wheels.

a nearby ship’s horn blares in a deep rumble, like clock-work with the crash of ocean waves. satoru is tapping his foot rapidly, glancing at his pocket watch before shutting it with an irritated huff. he walks down the propped plank to the docks, approaching his group of officers.

“it is currently five hours past sunrise. the princess should have been here two hours ago. is someone going to tell me any information on her whereabouts, or are you just useless scoundrels i pay to idle about?” he seethes, his glare withering the men into shivers.

the second mate pipes up with a small voice, wincing. “your grace, i..” a couple of hushed whispers between the men ensue before he gets shoved to continue on by one. “we.. no one knows where she is. they said she left the castle a little over the agreed time, but that was the last correspondence, pleaseforgiveusyourgrace !” he squeaks out the last few words in a rush and holds his hands up in anticipation of a physical blow.

satoru’s jaw ticks, his eyes narrowing at the men. how stupid. this entire kingdom included; they’re all so stupid . don’t think he missed the exchanges of heated glances between you and your knight, the dark and calculating man that kept staring daggers at satoru in that first meeting. he heard him inside your room passing by, even. soft words he was all too familiar with. what blasphemy that no one had a clue of the scandal happening right beneath everyone’s noses.

he pushes past the men, disgruntled, and finds the nearest saddled horse to jump onto. the men exclaim in shock, pleading him to find reason. “no, it is absolutely impossible for me to leave this with idiots. i am finding the princess myself and will be back in damn good time!” he yells behind him, starting his horse in a fast fashion towards the forested road.

you didn’t realize you had dozed off until kento was softly shaking you awake. you open your eyes, mildly disoriented with where you were but quickly remembered the reason you were here.

“i need to water the horses, princess. i’ll be at the river offside the road,” his deep voice rumbles in your ear as he leaned down to tell you this. you nodded sleepily, watching him through half-lidded eyes as he moved away.

you hear the horses clomp away with him. the warmth of the midday sun and the earthy sounds of the forest surrounded you, lulling you back into a peaceful state. you had never been able to simply enjoy the forest whenever you were on trips to events or other towns, it was so new to you to just exist and be able to do as you pleased without thinking about repercussions. you also felt a sense of security knowing kento was nearby. with a soft sigh, you slowly began to sit up and move, ready to join him by the river to stretch your legs a tad.

you weren’t ready to see the scene before your eyes— the horses were cast aside along with a new one and your knight engaged in a sword fight with the crown prince you were supposed to be with.

kento had checked on you when you were quiet in the carriage, sneaking a peek to find you dozing off on the seat with your book ajar in your hand. you were adorable, even with drool on your chin. he chuckles softly at the sight, you just had certain quirks about you that kento loved.

he notices the horses are panting more haggardly than before and pulls to the side of the road, since it was following along the river. they clearly needed water, and it seems you were due for a stretch given your oddly-bent sleeping posture enlisting knitted brows from you, something he caught as well.

kento drops down to come around into the carriage, close over your sleeping form. unmatched beauty, you had. he wakes you gently and leaves you to recollect your senses while he detaches the horses, leading to the calm flow of water. they dip their muzzles into the river, slurping eagerly.

suddenly, the next moments go by in a blur when kento’s focus immediately shifts to the rapid galloping he hears coming from deep in the forest.

he has his sword drawn in time and in a strong stance when prince satoru leaps off of the moving horse, his own sword firmly gripped in his hand, pointing at kento’s chest.

“care to enlighten me why the princess is not on my ship but rather traveling with you?” satoru demands, sizing him as they circle each other.

both were remarkable swordsmen of their own caliber, this would not be an easy fight for either man.

“the princess always travels with me in her stead,” kento replies cooly, poker face unreadable.

satoru’s glare shines with fury. he takes a lunge and maneuvers with kento’s deflection, swift and focused.

“do not change the subject at hand, you knave!” he seethes.

the clash of metal reverberates through the air as kento parries the blow, the force of the impact vibrating up his arm.

“stay back, your highness," he warns without looking at you, his attention fully on the prince.

satoru’s head whips for a second to find you wide-eyed, in commoner’s clothing, watching the two of them altercate. kento took this as an opportunity to disarm him, but satoru was too quick on his feet for something so mediocre.

“you realize i can have your public execution done for this filthy affair? have you no respect for royalty, knight?” he sneers, scoffing at the indifference he saw on kento’s face.

kento’s brows knit together in confusion. “an.. affair? you’re mistaken, prince gojo. i have no illicit affairs.” he admits.

satoru chuckles bitterly before throwing another three consecutive blows with his sword, unwavering.

“by the gods , you must think me loggerheaded! i’m not blind, you bastard! i know you’re bedding the crown princess!”

you gasp, causing both men to put their attention onto you again since you hadn’t made a single word since the fight began. “that is untrue, prince satoru! i swear on my crown!”

you shout, touching your head out of habit but soon remember you were not in royal attire and your crown was actually sitting in the carriage. your face rouges in embarrassment. “well, my crown in the metaphorical sense.” you mutter with a shrug.

satoru's eyes flick back to kento, disbelief and rage warring in his gaze. "you expect me to believe that? i've seen the way you look at her!” he snarls, lunging once more.

kento side steps, his sword moving in a swift arc to deflect the prince's attack. he doesn’t refute the claim presented to him, however.

"enough!" you cry out, stepping forward despite kento's warning. "this fighting is pointless! you need to know the truth, satoru."

the two men pause, their heavy breathing the only sound breaking the silence. satoru's expression softens slightly as he looks at you, though his grip on his sword remains tight. "explain yourself, then, princess." he demands, with a hint of desperation in his tone. "why are you here, and not on my ship?"

“because i can’t marry someone i don’t love !” you scream while throwing your hands down, the anguish you’d been holding in burst at the dams of your composure. they both seemed a shred taken aback with your reaction, something they’ve never seen from you.

“do you know how painful my life was? how nothing was ever good enough for my father or governess? how i’m expected to sit quietly and smile kindly while others speak for me? how, as a woman, i have virtually no power in the kingdom unless it be through my future husband? no! you do not .”

you heave as the word-vomit had come to a close, your expression a little less than crazy. you take a deep breath, eyes closed, before you look back up at the man with a bitter smile. “so yes, prince satoru. i have devised a plan to leave my life on the throne because i cannot live this wretched life anymore. gods forbid i have a choice ,” you spit the last word, voice cracking on a sob.

satoru had softened after hearing your entire speech. your eyes discerned a sense of heartache behind his gaze on you, and you could definitely say it wasn’t about you. he knew what pains you spoke of, to be choiceless in a system designed to use royal birth right as chess pieces in a game of world politics. the breeze whistles past your ears and a light shiver comes over you.

“i understand.”

you give him a look of hesitance.

he doubles down firmly. “i understand completely, princess. i misstepped in assuming you had left in a selfish act.” he admits, lowering his sword back into his cover. “but in truth, this is quite courageous.”

you breath a sigh of relief, thankful no one lost an arm or leg in the heat of the fight. kento looks at you with a proud expression, which sets your stomach in a flurry.

“…but, if you wish to leave without me stopping you, you must comply with my one request.” you flick back to him with shock. he had a request ?

“i’ll hear it first,” you say with a slow frown.

he rolls his eyes in exasperation and pops a hip in stance. gods, what a sassy man. “oh, don’t get your knickers in a twist. i’m asking that you allow me to help you.”

now it really was your moment to be shocked, jaw slackening. “wha— why, whatever for?” you exclaim in confusion.

he takes a small huff of a sigh before stepping towards you to pat a hand on your shoulder. “because i know a thing or two about not wanting to marry someone you do not love.” there was something distant in his eyes, something you didn’t quite grasp, but you believed his words were earnest.

and so it was settled; kento and satoru decided their alibi stories, kento letting him know about your stops and where you would end up if he needed to reach you in the event of an emergency. they were still rather agitated with one another, but more so kento as satoru kept cracking jokes that didn’t make kento laugh in the slightest. it was a little uncanny how quickly satoru’s demeanor switched into a childlike one. i suppose the “womanizer” claims aren’t for nothing, you thought. again: you were just glad no one was injured, no chopped limbs or whatever else. you were not exactly keen on bloody sights. what? a lady has her limits.

kento steps away from satoru for a moment to speak with you while the prince waters his own horse. you had learned he had grabbed a random royal horse and had it race here, the poor creature. kento looks down at you, close enough for your nose to fill with the scent of him. you try to focus away from the intoxication you were feeling to pay attention to his words. his low timbre voice rumbles by your ear. “i’m very proud of you, princess.” your cheeks warm in gratitude. you don’t think anyone has ever told you they’re proud of you, for anything. “thank you,’ you whisper shyly. it’s not in your nature to be so bashful, not even with kento. you were usually the one bothering and teasing, like satoru had been doing. what’s been happening lately, was your infatuation so far gone?

finally when everything is settled. you’re seeing off the prince. he beckons you to come to him with a small cheeky grin. you roll your eyes playfully and do it anyway. he leans down from his horse to whisper in your ear. “i hope you know i was being serious when i said your knight looks at you in a way a knight should not.” he quips with a smirk. your eyes flick to kento and catch his disgruntled frown at the sight of you so near the prince, despite the debacle that just occurred before you all. you scoff and shove the childish man in his face. oaf.

“please get back to your country, satoru.”

“aww, you called me by my name!”

eventually, the night falls and kento once more ushers the horses into the forest. he pulls the curtains separating the two of you to speak behind him.

“it’s getting too dark, and these backroads are unsafe at night. we’ll stop here so you can sleep peacefully, princess.”

you look at kento with a frown.

“are you not sleeping?”

he gives you a look as if you were not understanding. “i need to keep watch. my duty as a knight hasn’t changed because of our plan, your grace.”

kento definitely didn’t show any signs or tiredness or weakness, but they trained that out of them at the military academy. and most of all, this was your kento. you knew his mannerisms. you get out to dig into the suitcases at the back of the carriage, much to his protests. producing two blankets and a makeshift pillow, you shove it into kento’s arms.

“we’re alternating. i sleep four hours, you sleep four hours. and you can’t say no! you won’t be alert in the daytime if something does happen,” you jabber.

as per usual, he looked mildly displeased with your fall behavior, enlisting a cheeky smile from you.

“gods know how much you’ve aged me in stress itself, princess,” he grumbles, stalking off to lay the blankets down on the cold grass.

“all the more reason you need beauty sleep, dear kento,” you hum in a sing-song tone. you retreat to the sleeping arrangement inside the carriage.

you’re plaiting your hair in two neat braids when you realize you’ve left your hair bands outside when you were pulling blankets out for kento. you exit the vehicle and turn to the back of the carriage when you catch a full glimpse of a shirtless kento in the middle of changing.

you squeak. the moonlight was rather bright, definitely enough to see his muscles and taut back. he was a very, very rugged man. scars from sparring lightly littering the sight, it was nothing short of rough. the emphasis lied on him being such a man .

he had immediately flipped around upon hearing your footsteps, and it was officially his turn to be beet red, caught in the middle of indecency.

“the odds are even now then,” you wobble with an embarrassed laugh, trying to make light of the situation like before. he looks at you incredulously as he haphazardly throws on the new clothes. “princess, you cannot joke about blasphemy like this!” you giggle harder at his reaction. “i should have been the one acting like this when you came into my room that evening,’ you quip with a light shove to his chest. he squawks and if it was even possible, blushing harder. “i-i did not intend to do that! you’re always reading a history book at your table by late sunset, or drawing in your sketchbook. you tend to use the sunset lighting more, i.. i just assumed!–” he rambles on and on, apologies shoved in between his overthinking. you’re not listening anymore, though.

he remembers things about you.

you did read often, all palace staff knew. it wasn’t special. kento knew you loved history and the world. kento knew you loved arts and culture, and drew frequently to pass time. he watched your fingers move so quickly as your sketches took shape. in awe. he was so enamored by your talent, oh if you knew. you didn’t gather that you spent more time in the later hours to draw, but it was true you loved sunset lighting. you never thought about it until now, but you did. a detail even you did not know about yourself, and he knew .

gods, get real. obviously he remembers. he's ordered to stay with you every moment. what delusions are you feeding your emotions? that he kept that information for romantic reasons?

you rest a hand on his shoulder, prompting him to shut his mouth. you’re looking at him with a small sincere smile, riddled with the feelings churning in your heart. “i’m simply teasing, kento. mistakes happen.”

he looks at your fingers on his shoulder, then you. he nods curtly, silent for a moment. his timbre voice rumbled gently, so soft to you. for you. “i only want.. no, need you to know.. i would never encroach on your vulnerability. i hold my respect for you to the highest standard.”

there was that unwavering loyalty again. that borderline sinful look of trust wading in his deep brown eyes that you wanted to absorb until the end of time. his frame curled towards yours, you see the dutiful submission from the powerhouse he was. how such a large and fearful man who was dueling the most gifted swordsman hours ago, was now back to being your loyal subject, a humble guard. fully attentive to you, as always. every sense was trained onto your body, your soul, your being. perhaps it was because of the dark night, the lust in your heart lurking in the shadows.. you knew at that moment, you wanted nothing more than to embrace him in the rawest capacity. to ravage and ruin your demure act just for him.

a breeze breaks the trance between you and him. you’re both already shuffling away from each other, you clearing your throat, him coughing to cover up the air of what was exchanged nonverbally.

“i shall wake you when four hours have passed, princess. please sleep,” kento mumbles, turning to his blankets.

you realized to some effect, he was thinking deeply in that moment, just as you had. you wished to know what he thought, and if they were filled with the same unforgivable fantasies you had of him. in truth, you knew this chance was slim if not nonexistent. but you had your dreams, and sleep awaited you anyways. if you couldn’t have kento in flesh you were allowed your mind-palaces where you can trace those scars on his back again and again, kissing every bump and valley of his body. those unwavering loyal eyes watching every move you make on him, skin to skin. his hands on you being rough but gentle, like his tone. they slot over your hips like they belonged there, you sat atop him. you felt beautiful under his gaze, his touch. he says things that make you melt into him sweetly. you’re unable to decipher where your body ends and his begins. your kisses get interrupted by his own capture of you, flipping you to the bottom. he’s towering over you so deliciously, wide chest, powerhouse . his fingers pulling away your hair from your eyes so you can witness him dipping his head down to–

you jolt awake. you didn’t follow when you drifted to sleep in your thoughts, but you knew you were drenched in sweat and unchecked filthy need. this was highly unbecoming of a princess, gods help your soul. dirty dreams of your knight, hah!

yes, you were far, far gone.

omg ur mind... is literally so tv-ma... LOL anyways please leave comments i luv them chomp chomp and i luv you, as usual :)

peace luv bathtub taglist! @kawliflo @deepcloudspyhairdo

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