#Part 1 of 4

[bontwisty]

As strong as a bear but soft like one too the Red Angel of Preventing Harm!! ❤️🐢

[piratefishmama]

Just ONE chance

Stephanie Harrington never intended to be a whole presence online.

She hadn’t even really understood the whole thing at first, it didn’t exist when she was a kid! An if it did it sure as hell wasn’t in every nook and cranny of the globe like it now seemed to be. Kids with iPads, hands glued to phones, six year olds who simply had to have the latest Apple thing.

It was all Dustin’s idea. King of the Gadget. Overseer of all things technology. Gargantuan nerd. Stevie’s little brother.

Not biologically, Claudia, Dustin’s mother had basically adopted Stevie when her own parents had tragically lost control of the wheel during a storm and wrapped their car around a tree back when Stevie was still a teenager. Back when Stevie was still Dustin’s regular babysitter and very suddenly found herself alone having been babysitting when the news reached her.

They’d been coming back from a business trip that she hadn’t been able to go with them on because of school. They’d been so close to home. She’d heard the sirens. They’d been that close.

It was fine though, in one fell swoop, yes she lost her parents, but she gained Claudia, and Dustin, and that was enough, because she sure as hell didn’t get anything else from them. It was all swallowed up, snatched away by her parents business partners because people are sharks and she just… wasn’t prepared to fight them on any of it, especially not when her parents had stupidly left her without a will.

Apparently they believed they’d live forever! The money vanished, the house was sold, she was left with nothing.

With growing up in the Henderson house, came choices, some great, some really stupid, and some that’d led to the very happy accident of Rosie.

To be fair to herself, she’d been in quite a long term relationship at that point! It was a happy one too! She’d thought he’d be it. Sure he’d been a lot rough around the edges, at the start, it’d been a shame cycle at the beginning since he was in fact, a colossal prick, but he was also the hottest guy she’d ever seen. Like, unfairly attractive considering his personality, and he knew exactly how to touch her to melt her icy resolve into a watery mess.

But once he’d gotten away from his dipshit of a father, his step mother dragging him with her when she escaped the man too, once Stevie had laid down the law of how little of the bullshit he’d learned from said father she’d personally tolerate before he’d get a boot out the door, he’d come around.

The racism had stopped immediately. The attitude had ebbed bit by bit as feelings set in, and he’d become a regular ol handsome teddy bear, he’d allowed himself to soften after he’d escaped the only reason he’d had to protect himself.

He’d even started getting along with his step sister, one of Dustin’s friends.

Then stupidity happened when they ran out of condoms, her cycles stopped, and three months in, two drunk idiots in a pickup ran a stoplight while he was getting her some ice cream. Doctors said he probably hadn’t felt a thing.

Rosie came along, a beautiful little thing, had her dad’s soft cheeks, his stormy eyes, thick dark lashes and soft curls, but she took after Stevie in everything else.

Stevie didn’t date after that. A personal choice really. She’d lost her parents, lost her love, and now she had a little girl to focus on, she was done. She felt herself complete! So what if she was still in her mid-twenties. Life had dealt her a hand, she was going to run with it.

Rosie would always come first, and she didn’t like explaining where Rosies father was, she didn’t like the look of pity on people’s faces, the apologies, the rinse and repeat cycle, and so she just. Didn’t bother!

It was easier! She had Rosie, she had her adoptive mother, she had Dustin, she had Billy’s sister Max and her other half Lucas, she had Susan, she had Robin, her co-worker and platonic soulmate from that dumb job at the mall she’d picked up to help Claudia with the bills, she had a whole support network, and she was fine.

Soon Rosie was in preschool, and then middle school, and the internet became a household thing, houses had computers, kids had phones, then smartphones, laptops, tablets, and suddenly the internet was everywhere and everyone had to be on it.

So there she was now. Mid-thirties, with a little girl, and a house paid for by her little brother.

Dustin had struck gold with a job at NASA, he’d put the downpayment on a little two bed house with a cute picket fence lined garden for her when Rosie was born without consulting her, just did it and “SURPRISE STEVIE, now get the hell out of mom’s basement, Jesus Christ.” Kept paying until it was all hers, and that was that… until he came round with computers and gadgets and then she had the internet because Rosie would need it for school because while libraries were awesome he’d had to suffer the five books at a time, Dustin rule one too many times and the internet had UNLIMITED books.

And now Stevie had a smart phone, and apps, and Instagram was fun! Doomscrolling the FYP took up chunks of her days off work while Rosie was at school! She never intended to be a name on there. She’d heard that people could become known for stuff, go viral or whatever.

She never intended to do that. She was a mother. Not even a hot young mom either. She was in her thirties! She remembered when the world didn’t have internet, she was there.

She posted work out videos, never having lost the competitive streak she’d always had as a teenager, sports were her thing back in high school, Gymnastics specifically, which led into cheering. She’d done some competition once with the team but nothing huge, she was fit, healthy, and the subject of many a thirst comment that she pointedly ignored.

She’d posted the occasional rant about Sally the PTA bitch with the self-proclaimed “best potato salad in the State” while doing her morning makeup, still never paying much mind to the comments section, the little rapidly climbing number that signalled followers, or the occasional DM from brands wanting to ‘collab’.

She didn’t care for that, she just wanted to post her little videos in peace. In retrospect, if peace was what she wanted, the lunch trend… probably wasn’t the best one to pick up. It was just a trend though! She’d seen a few moms doing it! Just posting little harmless videos online of what they’d pack their kids for lunch every day!

Harmless, fun! She loved making Rosies lunches, she saw no harm in sharing the fun!

They were always affordable, packed with healthy options, and creative too! She tried her hand at sushi, Rosie hated it, Robin loved it, so Robin got the sushi rolls in her lunches instead, picked up every morning when she grabbed Rosie on the way into work, they were both going to the same place after all, Robin taking on the music teacher role at the Middle school Rosie attended.

She tried noodle jars, cool wraps, made shapes and fun little animals out of fruit, she got creative, but they were all very cookie cutter videos, they all had the same vibe, similar content, it was something to fill her free time that she enjoyed so never in a million years would she have ever predicted that ONE of them, would cause so much chaos.

It started with the beeping.

The incessant pings sometime in the early hours of the morning. Notifications on her phone going off one after the other until she was forced to sit up, bleary eyed, and stare with squinted eyes at the far too bright screen of her phone, then she silenced it and went back to sleep.

With the chaos of the morning routines, getting Rosie up, washed, dressed, packed up for school, and out the door, she didn’t think about the incessant little beeping she’d silenced. It was a distant memory buried under the fog of a heavy sleep and continued to be a distant memory right up until Dustin appeared at her doorstep at around one in the afternoon midway through her afternoon workout, ruffled, stressed, flustered, and frankly just a little too sweaty.

He bypassed all niceties, as usual, bulldozing straight to the point, he pinpointed her phone, which sat comfortably on the countertop, seemingly oh so innocent, grabbed it, brandished it up as if to highlight its very existence and just “Woman, do you LOOK, AT YOUR PHONE?!”

Now, Stevie was not in the business of accepting a tone like that, especially not from her little brother. No matter how much he’d shelled out for the house, the attitude had to go. “Tone problem you little shit, fix it now or get the fuck out of this house and try again later.”

To his credit, he took a breath, and fixed it “Sorry, I’m sorry, but—look! Look at it, please, for the love of Christ, the internet is freaking out.”

“What?”

“Your video yesterday! The one with the like… teddy bear thing you did? With the rice an the—”

“Rosies lunch?”

“Yeah! Have you seen the comments on it?” Stevie rolled her eyes and went about picking up her things, workout sufficiently disrupted, she wouldn’t be able to pick that pace back up now. “Stevie?”

“You know I don’t look at those, people get weird on the internet, it’s like it gives weirdos the perfect place to be their weirdest selves and not in a good way.” She’d looked at them once, curiosity had gotten the better of her once upon a time and wound up having to ask Max what ‘OF?’ meant. She’d taken the win, let it momentarily boost her self-confidence, and decided to never look again. She was done with all that.

“Stevie, this time… one of those weirdos, is famous.” Since it was the age of the internet, Stevie regarded him with a look of disinterest, ‘famous’ could be anything, it could be some dweeb behind a computer screaming obscenities at a mic hooked up to some ridiculously overpriced gaming PC for likes. It could be a podcast bro with half a brain cell kicking its long since dead other half, it could be—“rockstar famous.” Dustin clarified. “One of the guys from that band I like? Corroded Coffin, they just—” he swiped the phone, letting out a soft scoff as the screen just flicked to life, no security pin to be seen of course, no matter, he’d probably berate later, he had a video to find and—“Ah-hah! Look!” and a phone to once again shove into his big sister’s face.

“That’s not even my video!”

“I know! They took the comment down already, but it’s EVERYWHERE, look!” Someone had screenshots. It wasn’t just one video covering it, Dustin scrolled, another popped up soon after, someone getting a little too excited about what was probably the most unfortunate of accidents.

“Don’t they have like… I dunno, people running their accounts? A person? Maybe their internet person just forgot to log out of that account?”

“No! Eddie runs it! The guitarist? Eddie Munson, he usually runs it all himself so everyone thinks it’s him, AND—AND LOOK!” Dustin clicked on the Corroded Coffin’s account, then tapped on the most recent post. Just a big black square, with the word ‘Whoops’ in big bold white lettering, captioned ‘I regret nothing. Just ONE chance, sweetheart, just one.’ With a little prayer hands emoji. “He’s ASKING you out!”

“He’s being a freak on the internet” hands found her hips, the classic mom pose. Immovable, stubborn.

“He’s always a freak! But he’s really cool! He does like, Make A Wish stuff, and—and visits children’s hospitals dressed up like fantasy characters, and he runs DnD things on the account every few months an he’s just REALLY cool, I mean they’re all really cool but Eddie is really cool maybe—maybe you could—”

“Upend my life, Rosie’s life, for a guy I don’t know, who has a job that takes him all over the world, who probably has his pick of whoever the hell he wants so what exactly could I bring to the table to keep him around? I’m done with all that shit, Dusty… I had my time, I have Rosie, I have everything I need. What makes you think I’d even like him?”

“You liked Billy.”

“Get out.”

“No, wait, not like that, I mean, they’re the same! Well, okay, not the same, Eddie didn’t start out a giant prick an he’s never been racist, but they’re sorta similar, similar music tastes, shit fathers, he’s rough round the edges, lil scary looking sometimes but he’s just a big softie when you get past the whole, scary dog thing. Eddie’s like… if Billy never had a shit dad. I just think that maybe… if you looked him up, maybe you’d… I dunno, you’d like him… maybe he’d be your kind of guy… maybe you could finally find someone who appreciates you… you’re not supposed to be on your own, Stevie.”

“Yeah well, I’m not. I have Rosie, and Robin, an you guys… an y’know. Bob.”

“Bob?” One of her patented looks told him all he needed to know, he jerked back in revulsion “ew! God! Fine, could you just! I dunno, look him up or something? Just think about it, I swear he’s really cool an I’d—”

“You’d love free tickets to their next concert.”

“Well, yes, but—”

“Alright then, nice to see you Dustin. Always a pleasure to have you round, please get the hell out of my house.” 

“UggGGGGGHHHHH, STEVIIIIEEE!!!”

“Uggghh, DUSTIIIIN! You interrupted my work out for internet pervert nonsense.” She began shooing him toward the door “Shoo, shoo. I have a family sized bar of chocolate to work off my hips before it gets stuck there.”

“He’d love your hips! With the addition of chocolate bars or not!”

“Weird! Out!” Out the door he went, it closed behind him.

That of course didn’t stop him from yelling through the door, “Just look him up!! I promise you won’t regret it!” But she mostly ignored him, until he went away.

Mostly because… Dustin never spoke up in favour of men before. He’d even gone through a period of hinting at maybe just switching sides and dating Robin when he found out Robin was a lesbian, but both women had promptly shut that down every single time he tried bringing it up.

He wasn’t a huge fan of men.

He’d been raised by a strong independent woman, he’d had a strong female role model in Stevie who’d pushed through every trauma life had thrown at her, he had Robin, he had Max, Jane, Erica, he had Nancy his friend Mike’s older sister, one of his friends had also been raised by a strong independent woman, he’d been surrounded by strong women his entire life with only one real solid male figure.

And that was his middle school science teacher, Scott Clarke. Which was kind of sad when you thought about it.

For him to really vouch for a man, it meant something! It wasn’t something to ignore, even if every instinct Stevie had told her to just. Leave it. What kind of man could a rockstar lifestyle have created. What kind of red flags could Eddie Munson be hiding that Dustin couldn’t (or didn’t want to) see.

Did he really even mean it?

Was it actually Eddie, and not someone else from the band? Would she be seen as foolish for even entertaining the thought? It wasn’t like she’d ever paid attention to the bands Dustin liked, so surely nobody would see her as a weird fan for thinking about it, right? She didn’t even approach him!

He approached her!

Shit like that didn’t just happen though. Or did it? Could it? Was she stupid to even entertain the thought?

Before she knew it, it was time to pick Rosie up, and she hadn’t even finished her work out. it was fine, her hips could handle a chocolate bar. For now. Its days were numbered.

[tallbluelady]

I forbid ye maidens all Who let fly your lovely hair To go down to Carterhaugh For Young Tam Lin is there

[neonpaperlanterns]

Part One: Max and Star

I decided that instead that I wanted Max to give his pendant to Star. So they switched.

[undercityrezident]

My Reflections on Octopath Traveler 2: Part 1

(This reflection has been split into four parts because of Tumblr's image limit per post. Please find Part 2 here, Part 3 here, and Part 4 here.)

Before I begin, I should outline my bias for this game. It’s no exaggeration to say that I might have a sense of inflated gratitude for Octopath Traveler 2. When I was forced to deal with a difficult situation throughout the month of March, I had little in the way to entertain me. One avenue to help retain my sanity was my Nintendo Switch, though I'd already played through most of the games I own for that console.

But that’s when I turned my attention to a game I’d gotten as a gift a couple of Christmases ago, a game that I’d been sleeping on for far too long: Octopath Traveler 2. After inserting that cartridge into my Switch and booting up the game, it quickly became the main reason I wasn’t going stir-crazy.

I’ve played the first Octopath Traveler, and I thoroughly enjoyed it, even with some of the flaws I noted on my playthrough, so I knew that I was likely in for something good unless Square Enix royally botched it. However, an RPG of this sort is a time investment, making it daunting to approach when you have so much else going on, hence why it took me so long to finally sit down with this sequel. Now, with abundant time on my hands, there was no better moment to finally dive in.

And boy, was it a deep plunge, and a refreshing one at that.

So here it is, now that I’m back on here with a continuing obsession with the game that single-handedly helped me for those three weeks and is continuing to drive me into obsession in the aftermath: my reflection on Octopath Traveler 2, for all its goods and ills.

And believe me, the goods outweigh the ills heavily.

Before you read on, while this reflection is about a game that came out over two years ago, those who still want to go into it as blissfully blind as I did, please take note that there will be complete spoilers for the game below the cut.

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The Boosting and Breaking of Iconic Battles

One of the biggest appeals and strongest points of the original Octopath Traveler, in my opinion, was its battle system, and it’s no surprise that it returned with more than a few tweaks and additions. At its core, the battle gameplay is largely the same as before, but its complexity has been notched up, buffing the break and boost system by adding a new latent power meter that fills up under various conditions throughout the battle.

If you thought you could pull off some insane combinations in the original game, wait until you tie in the various characters’ latent powers when they pop off. I’ve managed to snag some victories from the jaws of defeat in some truly insane ways. And while I’ve heard it’s quite easy to optimize your party to completely obliterate some bosses far too fast to enjoy them, I wasn’t that kind of player—both for being not quite that smart and also for being the kind of player who doesn’t min/max by instinct unless there’s absolutely nothing else to do.

The result of my playstyle was the chance to see some truly fun and creative boss battles, which remain one of the highlights of this game as it was in the first. Another step up the game took in this sense was how the game played with mechanics and the dynamism of its battles to drive up the stakes. Some bosses shrouded the turn order from you, temporarily pushed certain party members out of the fight, outright turned party members against you, stacked debuffs throughout the fight to add a sense of timing and urgency, and even nullified once-reliable abilities. As the best example I can think of, I can rightly say that the final boss was ten times more intense than it would’ve been for the fact that you couldn’t revive your allies except when the boss was broken, making every decision feel tense and risky.

Of course, these challenges were offset by how you could strategize to make sure you had varying degrees of party synergy. The sub-job system returned, and with many classes revamped with returning abilities and new ones to complement their associated characters’ unique personalities compared to the travelers in the first game, combinations and ideas to combat even the toughest of challenges in the game were abundant. Also returning is the fun idea of giving alternate outfits to each traveler’s sprite in battle when they take said sub-job. Just take one look at any character you give the hunter sub-job and tell me they don’t at least look marginally cuter with animal ears.

While we don’t see the return of the same secret jobs from the first game, we get new ones that have some interesting dynamics of their own. They’re typically acquired towards the very end of the game, so you might not get as much time to mess around with them as the others, but they do open up some very intriguing potential as the challenge mounts toward the game’s climax. The exception to this is the inventor class, which is available from very early on, but the resources to unlock its abilities are typically found slowly throughout the game. Still, the inventor allowed for some flexibility early on, making some growing pains a little easier at lower levels.

And Osvald looks good in a steampunk top hat with goggles, let me tell you.

Overall, the battle system was already built on a very sturdy foundation, and the developers managed to make this game’s system—and the battles by extension—better as well.

Plus, I will not forget the absolutely intense excitement of fighting the final boss with ALL. EIGHT. TRAVELERS. AT. ONCE. What a rush! What a thrilling climax, getting to pilot the whole team, even if it was done on a pseudo-switching system. That, in itself, added another layer of strategy I had to consider on top of the already staunch difficulty of the final boss.

Even the small additions made the battles feel that much richer, like the travelers adding flavour to encounters by complimenting one another on their accomplishments in breaking an opponent or expressing concern for a fallen character. The travelers even had special lines when summoning particular characters to the fight or when fully boosting against their story bosses.

Few things in the game hit me as hard as when Osvald fully boosted himself during his Chapter 4 boss fight and cried out, “Forgive me, Rita!” or when Throné was letting out growls of pure anger when fighting Claude. I had no idea how much more these little touches would endear me to these characters, make battles feel that much more gratifying when breaking an opponent, or how much more tension I’d feel when the characters would voice their dismay on seeing someone gravely wounded.

Of course, the tension in battle would be nothing without our implacable foes, and once again, the artwork details for bosses drive home both the nostalgia for such design styles and choices from the games of yore. It also greatly serves the purpose of highlighting the threat, characteristics or, in some cases, downright depravity of some of the villains you face in this game, especially when paired with their voice acting. These battles are nothing without stakes and motivation to fight these opponents, and the artwork and interspersed dialogue in the battles help to amp up the drama of it and make it feel just as personal for you as it is for the travelers.

Of course, I can’t say the battle system was absolutely perfect. There were a few flaws here and there that frustrated me, even if only momentarily. Some spells or abilities were lacking a measure of description that crippled me in crucial moments because I had either misunderstood them or their level of non-specificity led to poorly informed decisions.

One such example that comes to mind is Alephan’s Wisdom, which works for numerous abilities between different party members, but it’s hardly possible to tell which except by experimentation. In the clutches of an intense battle, experimentation of that ilk is ill-advised, but there were times I had to gamble on it in a dire moment. When that gamble failed to pay off, it felt rather depressing. The idea that I might have to look it up to know exactly which spells it could enhance was a grating prospect.

As well, there were instances in certain boss battles, whether by simple bad luck or some flawed design, where a boss would empower themselves to unleash a devastating move at the end of a turn, only to immediately go first the next round and unleash said horrid ability to cripple my party, giving me absolutely no hope to prevent it by breaking their defences. While I can see horrific probability being the main culprit for this, I would hope that the game’s programming would allow for some intelligence in determining whether the boss should be allowed to pull off such a power-up move when it knows that they get the next move the round after.

I found this happened more than a few times throughout the game, and while I could say that I might have just that much bad luck, I want to think it happened often enough that I feel there should’ve just been a touch more thought put into developing countermeasures against this sort of occurrence.

That said, I can’t say that these small and infrequent complaints overshadow the otherwise stellar and well-thought-out battle gameplay that permeated the game overall. Even small things, like the ability to fast-forward battles to help with the little grinding that I needed to do, made big differences in my appreciation for the game's battles. The battle system did not need to change too drastically from the first game to maintain its appeal, but I saw how many aspects were tightened up to make it even better than before.

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Taking Path Actions to Improve Gameplay and Design

The battle system wasn’t the only thing that saw additions in the sequel.

The Introduction of a day/night system added extra depth by making the world feel a bit more lived in. NPCs would change location and dialogue depending on the time of day. Some puzzles and side quests can only be completed at one time or another. A scant few can only be completed by switching between the times of day to accomplish separate tasks pursuing the same goal.

This core mechanic of switching between day and night also complements one of the game’s overall narrative themes, driving the point the game makes all the more deeply by integrating it into gameplay. This, to me, is a hallmark of great game design, as many video games tend to ignore such integration in favour of relying on the player’s ability to suspend their disbelief or rely on the disparity between gameplay and storytelling that’s sometimes come to be expected with video games (less so lately with improvements in technology, though it’s still a prevailing trend). While there are a few exceptions to this exceptional design philosophy throughout the game, Octopath Traveler 2 does its best to keep to it, and playing the game feels all the more satisfying and cohesive as a result of this attention to detail and care.

The time-of-day system also deepens the characters’ mechanics, as each character now has two path actions: one for day and one for night. The day actions correspond to those you know for each job in the first game, but their night path actions not only add variety and flexibility in how you tackle challenges in the overworld but also deepen the characterization of the travelers. Osvald, a scholar and ex-prisoner, mugs people at night for their items, demonstrating his straightforward nature and his willingness to do what he must to proceed on his quest for revenge. Ochette gains followers by literally sharing meals to make friends with them. As above with merging gameplay with story, merging characterization with gameplay is a fantastic demonstration of excellent game design and attention to detail.

Path actions also play a pivotal role in the game. While, for most of it, they are simply a means to acquire items, information, and additional boons in battle, there are a few moments here and there where they help facilitate plot progression. At times, it does feel like a bit of a slowdown in the storytelling to try and make the game feel more interactive. These can feel like awkward sticking points, especially as dialogue scenes and gameplay are segregated by fade-to-black-fade-in transitions. But there are some crucial moments where these path-action plot moments feel notably impactful.

Nowhere is this more evident than in a few of the ending sequences of the game, where a path action is used in a crucial moment to either incredibly comedic or emotional effect. These specific moments will be touched on in my story reflections later, but the fact that attempts were made, sometimes quite successfully, to incorporate these gameplay elements into the storytelling is very much appreciated. It helps make me, the player, feel involved in the story, which should be a primary goal for an interactive medium like a video game.

On the note of storytelling, side stories return as well, and while many are of similar stock to the first game in terms of depth and quality, there are a few exceptions that expand the scope of storytelling potential. Some great examples are the trials series in Timberain, the Stage Actors quest in Tropu’hopu whose result depends on who completes it, the Washed-Up Letter alluding to a character in Osvald’s chapter 1, the Mysterious Box leading to a haunted house, and many of the “next chapter” quests which wrap up and add further some NPC characters’ stories.

These things are not the only quality features the game retains from its predecessor. The art style the game evokes remains as charming as ever, with lovingly rendered environments and contrasting spritework for the characters. The sprites seem quite a bit livelier as well, with more detail and animations being added to give them a sort of vibrancy that helps add character and works in tandem with the voice work to provide an engaging story while maintaining the goal of paying homage to older RPGs. Agnea’s story benefits especially from these more vibrant and active sprites, as many of her cutscenes depend on these small but still communicative displays.

I also want to give a note of appreciation for the various pieces of artwork in the game. Each character gets a pair of portraits that, more often than not, highlight the characters’ path actions by day or night. They further help draw out the travelers’ unique characterizations, once again tying portrayal to gameplay.

I should also mention that, once again following in the footsteps of its predecessor, Octopath Traveler 2’s character designs are top-notch, communicating well the themes, motivations, and feelings of the characters they portray. Even better are the characters’ story-ending artwork, each evoking some aspect of the character or their story lovingly.

However, one point that sticks out to me as something that may not have been as well integrated into the game but added as a sort of bonus feature for “cool factor” was the fact that you could get your own sailing vessel in the game. Don’t get me wrong, as someone who absolutely loves all themes nautical, I was thrilled when I first discovered I could purchase and pilot a sailing ship on the seas between Solistia’s two continents.

The idea of discovering islands and treasures I otherwise wouldn’t have had access to was exciting at first. However, I found I quickly exhausted all these discoveries rather quickly, and the act of sailing around quickly grew dull. It was nice to note that I could, if I wanted, cross between the continents at will without having to pay for ferries anymore, but that was something I could already do once I’d already paid the fare at least once to each anchorage and unlocked fast-travel locations.

I feel like more could’ve been done with the sailing segment of this game, but it felt somewhat tacked on, largely acting as a money gate for characters to access late-game areas to complete their stories. If there had been something more added, like more story elements at sea—a ship-to-ship pursuit ending in a ship battle to confront a villain would been amazing—or… the ability to visit Orsterra (however limited that would have to be for the development time/resources for the game), I would’ve much more greatly appreciated the ability to sail around.

Another irking issue for me was something carried over from the first game: the fact that you must keep your starting character in the party. I never really understood this decision in the original game or this one, and I speculate that it has something to do with the idea of picking your protagonist and only being able to part with them once you’ve settled their story.

Even as much as I found myself captivated by my starting character’s (Throné’s) story, I feel all these characters’ stories are important, especially to them. Each character is a protagonist in their own right, whether their stories are more relevant to the overarching plot or have greater stakes or not. For these reasons, I don’t understand why I’m forced to have a character locked into my party, relegating me to having them levelled way higher than the others while I try to level the rest evenly so I don’t feel shortchanged for their combat abilities when I bring them to their respective story chapters.

Still, even in the wake of these flaws, it's clear that the developers put a lot of effort into not only maintaining the quality gameplay established in the first Octopath Traveler but also working to eclipse it in the sequel as well. From start to finish, the overworld gameplay was well-thought-out and executed, sparing no detail to ensure that every hour of this game was memorable. And I have to say, in the two weeks I spent playing, I can remember quite a few emotional moments due to this game’s artistic and design polish.

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Travelling Eight Ways Through Stories to Bring the World to Life

Worldbuilding and General Ideas

Before I dive into each of the individual characters’ stories, I should note that the world of Solistia itself is, to me, a fascinating setting. I’m not a connoisseur of RPGs of this sort, so I might be able to write this off to how few I’ve played, but I have to say that a world that’s on the cusp of an industrial revolution, with the advent of the steam engine being one of the main plot points, is a novel idea to me.

Where medieval-fantasy and steampunk RPGs seem dime-a-dozen, one where the advent of such technology is an active influence in the game, paralleling human history, is something I found quite refreshing. Even better, it helped to reinforce many of the themes common to multiple characters’ storylines. The concepts of class disparity and the influence technology could have on those levels of social and cultural strata, for good or ill, is a theme and idea that resonates strongly, even today—especially today. Accenting these themes in a fantastical world also containing magic, monsters, and gods makes for something not only poignant but entertaining in equal measure.

The contrast between the old world and the new, the wealthy and the poor, and the powerful and the downtrodden, are all themes that tie together this game’s world and its central characters. In twain, concepts that bridge these ideas and people, whether it be technology, culture, faith, or emotion, all make their marks on this game and its myriad tales.

The game’s setting is every bit a character as its eight travelers, and their stories would be all the lesser if such an intriguing and deep world weren’t built around them. You need only complete some side stories or use the inquire action to see the depth written into this game and its people. I spent well over a hundred hours playing this game, and I’m sure I still don’t have a full grasp on everything this game contains with its living, breathing complexity in all its denizens. But I’ve managed to peer pretty closely at it through those hundred hours, and I am thoroughly impressed.

If you want a comedic example, go to Clockbank and inquire through its citizenry. You’ll marvel at the sheer ridiculousness of the thieves’ guild mind games being played by a startlingly large section of its population. For a more serious one, inquire to the citizens of Roque Island and see how they’re all treated as numbers on a spreadsheet by their employer.

Beyond the world, there are also efforts made to enhance the story past the simple act of writing. Compared to the first game, this game features TONS more voice acting. While the prequel had voice acting in specific scenes, just about every line spoken in a character’s main story (barring chatting with random NPCs irrelevant to the plot) has voice acting. This was clearly a massive effort, and I must say I appreciate it. I think it does these stories a great service to have the writing fully expressed in this way, making so many more moments so much more impactful.

My only complaint regarding this is that the travel banters, returning from the previous game, aren’t voice-acted. Wonderful as they are (having grown in how they portray facets of the characters, connections between the travelers, and their reactions to ongoing events), it’s an oddity to see dialogue for these characters not voiced in contrast to how everything else is. I hope future games in this series see the travel banter voice acted in the same way we saw it done in their main stories. I can only imagine how much fun it would be to hear them bouncing off each other in ways similar to how they did in their crossed paths (which I will certainly be discussing later).

However, I do very much appreciate that all the character-chapter-based travel banters, even the ones you missed for not having the right party members together at the right time, are viewable after the fact. I loved being able to look back and see what each character thought about various events or their fellow travelers without fear of having to replay the game (or search for it online).

And finally, before turning to the individual stories, I wanted to praise the decision to let each traveler undertake their own Chapter 1 themselves (besides whatever NPCs they might have with them for plot reasons). While it was cool to go around helping each traveler conquer their first boss in the first game, I felt that it better served to build characterization, introduce supporting characters, and keep the focus on each traveler if they each got to conquer their first chapters by themselves before interacting with the party.

With that all said, I finally get to dig into the main reason I’ve wanted to write this reflection in the first place: the travelers’ stories. I wanted to do this in the proper “O-C-T-O-P-A-T-H” character order, but I feel it would be more natural for me to write about them in the order I encountered them.

Throné

I began my long journey with Throné. I’ve read that many people started with her because they anticipated the return of the purple “lockpick” chests from the first game, but I had completely forgotten about those. It’s been a long while since I played this game’s prequel, so it hadn’t even occurred to me. I picked her because a) I’m always here for a complex femme fatale character, and b) I’m always here for a dark, tragic story, and her introductory blurb assured me of that.

I had almost picked Osvald for his own intense tale of revenge, but I opted to choose Throné because I suspected that I’d have to keep my starting character in the party much as the first game did, which I was correct about, and I wanted to have something other than a scholar this time, as I had picked Cyrus in my first game (I generally have a predisposition towards intelligent, caster type characters and classes/jobs and wanted to try to play against that for variety this time around).

So it was that I began with Throné, and perhaps there’s a bias due to her being my starter character, but hers was perhaps the strongest Chapter 1 I’d seen among all of them. While you could easily draw parallels to Therion’s story in the first game, with both characters being bound by something—the bangle versus the collar—the approach taken here is intensely different.

Where Therion had to deal with the existence of his ex-partner and all the troubles that come with that, Throné is actively trying to escape her association with the Blacksnakes, and the setup that comes with that in Chapter 1, both in terms of narrative and the actual setup by Mother and Father, hit hard. Being forced to kill Pirro in a death match arranged in the shadiest of circumstances is both tragic and intense. The way events set up Throné’s quest for freedom and the main antagonists of her story in Mother and Father is expertly executed.

This chapter firmly established Throné as a strong, driven character for me, pushed along a gripping story by an undercurrent of dark tones that lean on the foibles of parentage, imposed or otherwise. I was drawn further in by the portrayal of Mother as an incredibly vile villain, irredeemable in all the best ways that make it satisfying for us to take her down in her path’s Chapter 3. The small but poignant parallel in having Mira witness it, given the revelation of Mother having killed Throné’s true mother, only drove a dagger deeper into my captivated heart as I watched that story branch conclude.

Father, on the other hand, is a more complicated matter, and his route contrasts Mother’s route fantastically. While there is no doubt that Father is not a good person, there is that seed of what kind of good—or at least, slightly better—person he might’ve had the potential to be if things hadn’t turned so sour for him. The loss of Marietta and his true child to Throné’s true father utterly broke him, if his tale is to be believed at least—and the doubt invoked by potentially unreliable narration does make the story more interesting to consider. The ensuing battle with Father, having trained Throné to finally end his miserable existence, however tragic and utterly twisted it is, was thoroughly emotional.

In the end, it was evident that, in his own intensely perverse and morally bankrupt way, Father did try to be a good parent to Throné, even threatening to kill Mother should she kill Throné. We can probably all agree everything Father did fucked up Throné to such a degree that she’ll probably never recover fully from the trauma of the life she lived, but it still felt somewhat touching to see Throné give Father some semblance of peace at the end when she called him Dad.

I think the part that messed me up the most in the wake of it all was how the dagger you looted from him was named after Marietta. Sadly, though, I found its impact somewhat blunted by how I quickly found a weapon that I thought was better and equipped it to Throné not long after. I never sold Marietta, though.

With those chapters closed and with the revelation that Father and Mother’s keys could not unlock Throné’s collar, and thus her freedom, her Chapter 4 brought us back to New Delsta, and I’m always a fan of bookending stories like this.

However, this chapter is where I felt Throné’s story faltered in an otherwise excellent tale. Had this part of the story been foreshadowed or hinted at better, this might’ve been, without a doubt, my favourite story among all the travelers’. We had a singular hint of the upcoming twist, one that came so early on in Mother’s Chapter 2 route that was so vague that there was no way I could start putting anything together before this chapter. Only Father’s final speeches indicated anything about Throné’s true father, and even that didn’t give much detail of the man nor his staggering crimes and depraved conduct.

Yes, Claude, Throné’s true father, is an absolute monster and one of the most, if not the vilest, villains in the series. Hell, he probably holds a top-ten position amongst my mental pantheon of reprehensible villains (at least by metrics of their misdeeds). He is found in a truly haunted place. Nothing is said of Lostseed or why it is the way it is—at least none that I found beyond the speculation that it was this kingdom spoken vaguely in fables that various characters in Throné’s story recite. This unsolved mystery might be such by design, as some mysteries might have a better impact if left unsolved. However, I cannot give the same benefit of the doubt with the approach the developers took with introducing Claude.

Claude, apparently the literal progenitor of all the Blacksnakes—all in an attempt to sire an offspring to kill him—accomplished his deeds through the most vile ways, both in the acts of creating and sullying the ensuing lives of his children. Yet, these deeds, or any clear hint of them, are absent from the rest of Throné’s story. This resulted in a twist that completely blindsided me, and as someone who believes that sudden, unprovoked twists like this are cheap writing barely worthy of the name “writing,” I found this to be… underwhelming, at least narratively.

Don’t get me wrong, I was very motivated to see Throné’s story through for her freedom and to end Claude, but I found the sudden reveal intensely lazy. The one child we saw in Oresrush looking like Pirro was never brought up again, nor were there any other examples of anyone with similar features. If there had been more hints that many of the Blacksnakes had uncannily similar features, this would’ve been a great approach as well. The guardsman at the Garden and the keeper of the trolley at Lostseed are an example of this, but it comes far too late in the story.

In my opinion, Mira would’ve been a great way to exposit this. I wonder how Throné would react looking at a girl who shares some of Throné’s features she has in common with Claude, especially in the wake of killing Mother against Mira’s wishes. The idea of sharing the same nuances in their expressions of fear, despair, or rage in that moment could’ve hit quite hard, I feel.

Still, even with that major complaint, I can’t say I’m totally dissatisfied with the ending to Throné’s story. It’s bittersweet and completely on theme with the rest of her story. She wants to be free. She wants to live a life away from the stench of blood. But she had to shed yet more blood to do it. To free herself from all these mockeries of parental figures.

I’m sad that we didn’t get to see Throné resolve her feud with Mira directly, only getting to see it happen in a “next chapter” side story that did not explicitly involve our thief, and I do wonder about what Throné did with that baby Claude was holding through the whole battle. These are plot holes I wish had gotten their proper dues, along with a proper buildup to Claude. As well, I wish the idea of Claude being a potential vessel for Vide was something that also extended to Throné, further complicating her role in the final chapter of the game.

But I cannot complain about the masterful use of and conclusion to the themes of her story. The final battle is intense from a narrative perspective, with Claude bringing up images, the ghosts of her past, to fight her: Pirro, Mother, Father, Marietta, and even Throné herself. And then it all ends, at last, with us, the player, getting to use Throné’s path action to let us take the key from Claude as he perishes. Our final act to ensure Throné’s freedom.

And, at long last, Throné is free, even if it came at a high price. She might not know what comes next for her, but the idea she gets to choose is a bright spot in the otherwise dark sky that’s hung heavy over her life. No collar to threaten her. No parents to cage her. She is her own woman, and she earned her freedom, even if it stinks of blood.

---

Osvald

I read The Count of Monte Cristo when I was fairly young, and I think it’s caused me to have an affinity for revenge stories, especially ones that make you question the whole venture along the way. It might be one of the reasons I liked both this story and Primrose’s from this game’s predecessor. And, thinking of Primrose as Osvald’s story began, I wondered if his story was going to be a retread of Primrose’s.

Thankfully, though there were certain parallels to the beginnings of each these two revenge stories, I found they diverged fairly quickly, and each protagonist handled their quest differently, putting to ease most concerns I had about any overlap between the two.

If there was a character I could relate to the most among all of the travelers, I feel like Osvald would be among the top picks… or at least he would’ve been a decade ago. While he certainly has powerful emotions driving him in his story, the man is nothing if not analytical and logical in his pursuits. Similarly, I felt there was a time when I looked at everything through the same lens, having closed myself off to emotions as a defence mechanism. I spoke little and hardly confided in anyone else.

I can’t say that we’re completely alike though, since while my time of suppressed emotion and overreliance on logic might’ve been a defense mechanism, I’m fairly certain it wasn’t for him, but rather a central aspect of his personality and characterization. Regardless, this did make me connect with him in some respects, and it makes me wonder how my game experience would’ve changed if I started with this scholar as I had with Cyrus in the last game.

Regardless, his traits made him a fascinating character to me, and one whose story I greatly looked forward to consuming piece by piece as we travelled across Solistia. I was a bit confused about why his escape from the prison constituted two chapters, especially when the second seemed so much shorter than the first and could’ve easily been part of the first since they shared the same setting. But in truth, it made little difference besides the brief pause between them.

Pushing forward into the story, we quickly learn that Harvey is a completely unforgivable villain undeserving of mercy or sympathy, much like Claude. Comparatively, though, I like him as a villain better than Claude because he maintains an intense presence through most of Osvald’s story. Better yet, we get a much better idea of what motivates him. His inferiority complex turned megalomania was unravelled to the audience in a great way, peaking with his final encounter in Chapter 5.

He is, admittedly, something of a very hammy villain, with his Chapter 4 appearance and the final confrontation devolving into supervillainy that even some Batman villains might raise an eyebrow at. And, after reading some other fandom commentary, I did see how the final battle resembled an anime power-beam conflict. Even so, in the moment, I thought it was an intensely engrossing and fun fight, and I thoroughly enjoyed the climax of their story.

I appreciate the progression the story took, from breaking out of prison, to returning to Conning Creek (the scene of the crime), to Montwise in pursuit of Harvey directly, and finally to where Harvey was performing his final ritual in the tomb of D’arqest. It was well-paced and hit all the right notes along the way. I also appreciate the presence of Lady Clarissa in Chapter 3, as Osvald desperately needed someone trying to talk him out of revenge, or else the narrative would seem a bit one-track.

Thankfully, we hit the twist in Chapter 4, and the plot went from a fairly “by-the-notes” revenge story into something more special, if tragic. The absolute dread and horror I felt when it was revealed that Rita had not died that day and had been used to fuel the Grieving Golem was heartbreaking. I mentioned earlier in this reflection that Osvald’s shouting “Forgive me, Rita!” was one of the emotional highlights in any battle in the game, and I think I might be underselling that. Let me put this into perspective.

A giant golem is dripping putrescent purple ichor in front of you. You and your companions are heaving, all on their last legs, and it’s Osvald’s turn to act. You have moments before it destroys your group. As the player, you hear the music swelling, a wave of violin notes rising and falling… rising and falling… as the percussion beats in the background. Osvald steps forward, and you have your latent power ready, Alephan’s Wisdom buffed, and enough BP for a full charge. The music builds to its peak, and he shouts his plea for forgiveness to his wife as he fully boosts. It’s a mercy. It’s an end to whatever suffering Rita might still be enduring. An end to something that besmirches her memory.

Then he casts his spell, and the beast that was brought into being on the wings of his wife’s lifeblood finally falls to a heap, hopefully freeing Rita as well.

You finally exhale in relief, only to have your momentarily clear mind be reclaimed by the sadness of what you’ve just done. What Osvald just had to do.

And then Elena enters the scene, alive and well, but with her mind altered to recognize not Osvald as her father, but Harvey, the man who destroyed her real father’s life and used her mother for a glorified experiment.

I know I couldn’t have truly understood what Osvald was feeling in that moment, not being a parent, but damn if my heart went out to him. It’s a scene that will stand out as one of the most memorable of the game for me for how heartwrenching it was.

But in the wake of that, the change that came was just as important: the realization that Osvald had something to live for, to fight for, other than revenge.

That was when this became a great story for me and when I was truly invested enough in seeing Osvald to Harvey’s demise. Further revelations in the final chapter would further damn Harvey as being even more dramatically disgusting a monster than we’d seen him as in Osvald’s story alone. But none of that mattered in the moment, because it felt so damn good to see Osvald protect his precious daughter and divine the secret of the seventh source.

It was made all the better when said discovery led to a new move appearing in Osvald’s list of spells in the ensuing battle. This was the first of a few instances when learning a move during or before a boss encounter courtesy of the plot made me absolutely giddy. Again, another brilliant way to tie storytelling to game mechanics.

To this day, I’m not clear if both Harvey and Osvald discovered different variants of the seventh source, or if Harvey simply mistook the shadow as the source itself while Osvald had been the only one to discover the true article. And while it might’ve been a bit cliché to see that the power of love, the urge to protect his child, was the catalyst or the key to Osvald unlocking it, in the emotional thick of the drama, it didn’t matter to me. It felt right. It felt appropriate. It felt perfect for Osvald’s development: a man, analytical and seemingly devoid of all emotion save for rage, finding purpose and though a gentler—though no less passionate—emotion to fill the void that Harvey had left him with from the beginning those five years ago.

I won’t lie, I am not sure if this is my absolute favourite story of the eight, as other contenders hit equally strong highs or maintained consistency of quality throughout theirs. But of this I am sure: Osvald’s story is of top quality, both in this game and among the medium in general, and I will likely refer back to it if I should write a revenge story of my own someday, much in the same way as I’ll likely refer back to the Count of Monte Cristo as well.

---

Part 2 Continues here...

Part 3 here. Part 4 here.

[artemistorm]

Stew Pot Plot pt 1

Alternate prompt #9: Drugging -- Time, everyone

TW - nonconsensual drugging, unconsciousness

(1054 words)

******

Time sat on a folded blanket and leaned against Epona’s side, who was laying down. He played with the corner of the page of his journal, unable to focus on recording the day’s events with Sky recounting his own experiences with time travel as he folded and put away his freshly cleaned clothes. The other heroes were scattered around camp doing various chores or activities listening to Sky’s story and waiting for dinner to be done.

“What? You used a timeshift stone to sail a pirate ship through a desert?? That’s amazing!” Wind exclaimed. “I wanna go to your Hyrule next! I wanna see that ship in action!”

“Can I borrow a timeshift stone?” Wild asked, yawning. “I would love to see what it does in my Hyrule.”

“I’d like to give you one,” Sky said. “But I’m not sure if I can. There’s only a few stones left and the robots have been using them to rebuild their civilization. So far they haven’t been successful at mining any new timeshift stones, but we’ll see if they can spare one next time we go there.”

“I didn’t really have time travel, but I could freeze time,” Wind said holding up his phantom sword.

“One of my adventures used time travel,” said Legend, not looking up from the hookshot chain he was inspecting and regreasing.

“Same here,” Twilight said, cleaning under his fingernails with the tip of an absurdly large knife.

“As did I,” Time said. “But you know that story already.”

“How’s dinner coming? Is it ready yet?” Wind asked peering into the pot where meat, potatoes, and gravy were sewing.

“Not yet,” Wild yawned again. “The potatoes still need to cook for a while. They aren’t soft yet.”

“How long until it’s done? I’m hungry now,” Wind whined. He tried to stab an arrow into the pot to skewer a piece of meat, but Wild parried him with the spoon.

“Wind, relax,” Warriors said. “It’ll be done soon enough.”

“Does anyone have any extra food? Can I have a snack?”

“You can’t wait like… half an hour?” Wild said rubbing his eyes.

“Tired much?” Four asked with a half smile.

“Yeah, a little,” Wild admitted.

“I’m pretty sure that I’d shrivel up and die if I had to wait for half an hour more for food.” Wind complained and flopped dramatically over Sky’s lap.

“Would a carrot help?” Sky laughed and fished a carrot out of Wild’s bag.

“You’re offering me a raw whole carrot as a snack?” Wind asked incredulous.

“Sure. Why not?”

“Better than nothing I guess,” Wind sighed and swiped the carrot from Sky’s hand.

Time turned his attention back to his journal as the conversation around him turned away from stories and to the mundane. After having completed a quest in Twilight’s Hyrule they had suspected a portal switch was soon to come and had spent the morning doing last-minute preparations. Sure enough, just after lunch, a portal swept them away to the dusty red cliffs of Wild’s Hyrule just outside of Gerudo desert. With some difficulty, they managed to get everyone, including Epona, down the cliffs and into the valley along the road and halfway between Outskirt and Gerudo Canyon stables. Instead of trying to reach either, they opted to camp out where they were—after clearing out the monster camps nearby of course.

Finished with the entry, Time closed the book and wiped the quill nib clean before stowing them away.

“You’re really strugglin’ tonight aren’t ya?” Twilight asked. Time glanced up and saw Wild rested his head on his arm, nodding off as he waited for the stew to finish simmering. Wild inhaled deeply and slowly sat up.

“…yeah,” he said then stretched and yawned. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Why am I so tired?”

“You did have watch three nights in a row,” Four said. “It’s probably finally catching up with you.”

“It doesn’t usually hit me this hard,” Wild said.

“Why don’t you go lay down? I’ll take over cooking for you,” Twilight suggested.

“Umm…” Wild trailed off staring at the pot. “I guess you can.”

“Do you want us to wake you up when dinner’s ready?” Twilight asked gently taking the spoon from Wild’s hand.

“Sure,” Wild answered and rubbed his eyes. He got up and ambled to his pile of possessions. Within minutes he was fast asleep.

Twilight stirred and tasted the soup.

“Just about, needs a few more minutes. The seasonings’ a little funky. I wonder what he put in it.”

“I hope it’s the seasoning and not the meat that’s funky,” Four said.

“No, the meat was fresh,” we just hunted it a day or two ago,” Twilight said.

“I know what’ll fix it, spices!” Hyrule said. “I have some beetle dust, Goron spice, nightshade seeds, dried larvae powder—”

“How about some rosemary and sage instead?” Time offered. “I have some other herbs as well.”

“That sounds much better than beetle dust,” Legend made a face.

“Maybe he put beetle dust in it already and that’s why it tastes weird,” Four quipped.

“I did not!” Hyrule objected. “I’ve been way over here patching up my socks this whole time.”

“Have you even washed those?” Legend wrinkled his nose at the holey brown stained socks.

“Course I have,” Hyrule scoffed.

“Are you sure about that? What did you wash them in? Wild’s stew?”

Hyrule responded by throwing a sock at Legend’s face.

“Here, let me,” Time took a seat next to Twilight with a bundle of herbs in his hand. Twilight handed off the spoon and Time busied himself tearing up leaves and pinching off rosemary spikes and dropping them in.

“I call the first bowl,” Wind piped up and dug through his stuff to find his bowl and spoon.

Time stirred the herbs into the stew and at the bottom of the pot under a pile of potatoes he found the small pouch of herbs and spices bound in cloth and string that Wild must have put in there earlier.

“That’s quite enough of that,” he murmured to himself and fished it out, tossing it aside. After a few more minutes, the potatoes were plenty soft enough—a little too soft—enough that they could have been mashed to make a potato soup. Oops. Oh well.

“Dinner’s ready,” he called.

(To be continued tomorrow...)

Next

[archivist-crow]

The Bell Witch - Part 1 of 4

The famous pre-American Civil War haunting of the Bell Witch involved poltergeist phenomena and spectral creatures, and, according to legend, tormented one man to death. The haunting excited the curiosity of many people, including General Andrew Jackson. The story exists in several versions, three of which are presented here. The first is probably closest to the true anecdote, as it allegedly is based on the diary of one of the Bell sons, Richard Williams Bell. The third version has a modern sequel. The different versions demonstrate how stories change in retelling.

Legend 1:

John Bell was a prosperous farmer who owned 1,000 acres near Adams, Tennessee. He had a beautiful wife, Lucy, and eight children. They were all devout Baptists and model citizens, In 1817, their lives inexplicably were turned upside down. The first signs were spectral creatures witnessed by Bell. One was a large, doglike thing that vanished when Bell fired upon it with his shotgun. The other was a large, turkeylike bird.

Following the appearances of the creatures, the home was plagued with knockings, rapping, and scrapings on the outside doors and windows. Sounds that resembled giant rats gnawing the bedposts and giant dogs clawing the floor were heard. These phenomena went on for about a year, and then covers began to be pulled off beds and invisible hands slapped faces and pulled hair. Particularly tormented was the Bells' 12-year-old daughter, Betsy, who was slapped, pinched, bruised and stuck with pins. Betsy was so afflicted that at first the family suspected her of perpetrating a trick on everyone else.

At first Bell was determined to keep the haunting a secret, but it became intolerable for the family. Bell at last confided in a neighbor, James Johnson, who discovered the offending spirit seemed to be intelligent, for it would temporarily desist when beseeched in the name of the Lord. Johnson advised forming an investigatory committee. With that, word went out, and the Bell home became the object of great curiosity.

The spirit began to whistle and then to speak. It gave various identities. It said it was "a Spirit from everywhere, Heaven, Hell, the Earth. I'm in the air, in houses, any place at any time. I've been created millions of years. That is all I will tell you." On another occasion, it said it was the spirit of a person who had been buried in the woods nearby, and whose grave had been disturbed. The bones had been scattered about, and a tooth was under the Bells' house. The spirit was looking for the tooth. The Bells searched, but no tooth was found.

On yet another occasion, the spirit said it was the ghost of an immigrant who had died and left a hidden fortune; it had returned to reveal to Betsy the location of the money. The spirit gave a location, and the Bell boys dug for hours without finding a thing. That night, the spirit laughed over the joke.

The townspeople came to think of the spirit as a witch. The spirit agreed, saying, "I am nothing more nor less than old Kate Batts' witch, and I'm determined to haunt and torment old Jack Bell as long as he lives." Kate Batts was a hefty local woman married to an invalid. She had once been dissatisfied with business dealings with Bell and had threatened to get even. She was still alive. From then on, the spirit was called "Kate."

"Kate" made almost daily appearances at the Bell home and visited everyone else in Robertson County as well, abusing them with her caustic tongue. She made predictions about the future, including the Civil War and the two World Wars of the 20th century. But her primary purposes were to torment "Old Jack," as she called Bell, and to torment Betsy in order to dissuade her from marrying a young man named Josh Gardner. "Kate" did not disturb Lucy Bell, nor Betsy's favorite little brother, John Jr.

"Kate" grew so famous that General Andrew Jackson decided to visit and bring along a "witch layer," a professional exorcist. Just outside the Bell farm, however, the Jackson carriage suddenly stopped and the wheels refused to budge. "Kates" voice then manifested, promising to appear that night in the home. The carriage became unstuck.

Later in the evening, "Kate" manifested with phantom footsteps and a voice. The witch layer attempted to shoot her with a silver bullet but was slapped about and frightened out of the house.

John Bell fell victim to repeated bouts of illness, for which "Kate" claimed responsibility. While he lay sick in bed, twitching and jerking, the spirit cursed him continuously. Finally, the ordeals wore him down and he told one son that the end was coming. He went to bed and never recovered.

His family found him in a stupor on the morning of December 19, 1820. A strange bottle was found in the medicine cabinet. When the liquid was administered to a cat, the animal went into convulsions and died. "Kate" exultantly declared that she had poisoned him with the liquid while he was asleep. Bell died the next morning. "Kate" shrieked in triumph.

The torments of Betsy began to diminish, encouraging her to announce her engagement to Gardner. That brought on a renewed attack from "Kate." In despair, Betsy broke the engagement and married another man, Dick Powell.

"Kate" announced to the Bell family that she would leave for seven years and marked her pledge with a cannonball-like object that rolled down the chimney and burst like smoke. As promised, "Kate" returned seven years later and plagued Mrs. Bell and two sons with scratchings and the pulling off of bed covers. They kept the return a secret, and the torments stopped after two weeks.

Before "Kate" left a second time, she visited the home of John Jr. and pledged to return in 107 years—in 1935— when she would bring bad tidings for Tennessee and the entire country. The year came and went without incident, but the area around the Bell farm is said to be haunted still.

The Bells never understood why they were singled out for such an unearthly attack. It is not known what the real Kate Batts had to say about it. Theories have been advanced that Betsy may have been a poltergeist agent. She was the right age, around puberty, and her strict Baptist upbringing may have caused repressed sexual guilt. She also may have had subconscious resentment toward her father. However, there is no evidence that she was unhappy or repressed. And, while the spirit did plague Betsy the most, it roved all over Robertson County and meddled in everyone's affairs. Perhaps the intense resentment and hatred bottled up in the real Kate Batts created a thought-form that took on a life of its own.

Abridged text from The Encyclopedia of Ghosts and Spirits, Third Edition by Rosemary Ellen Guiley (Checkmark Books - 2007)

[hottubraccoon]

Solistal; Land of Knowledge and Hunters

northern mountain border of the continent, primarily dwarf citizens

Character SHORT List:

Alexa Snowlight

Amber Gemwater

Blackfingers

David Woodkeep

Holly Nightfoot

Kyvon Snowfeather

Raiden Snowlight

Vril Snowfeather

Zabrac Blooddust

Achraf Nekker on unsplash.

Geography:

Solistal is based on the UK islands physical geography*. It is very much the coldest nation, having snow almost all year round except for the 3 months often jokingly referred to as their 'summers'. Despite this, storms are infrequent and the weather is generally clear or slightly cloudy. Storms are constantly being prepared for, both snowstorms and magical storms, as the ones that do appear and particularly harsh in Solistal. Besides those, earthquakes have been recorded in the nation too.

*but only when I feel like it lol

Architecture:

Most of Solistal's territory is the northern mountain range that stretches from the east to west coasts. Adventurers struggle to survive in the winter on the other side of the mountains. Maybe, these harsh conditions are why there's an impossible amount of fossils found here compared to the other nations. These mountains are also the only place in Klenith that natural clusters of 'seals' can be mined for the magical properties. The seals are said to be the result of a magical blast that sent many forms of mega-fauna to go extinct, connecting to the fossils found here. Another piece of this theory is the 'everburning flame' kept watch near the capital city, Domongrad. Nobody has a reason for why it continues to burn despite the snow and ice surrounding it, but many suggest magic, specifically the magical blast that took out mega fauna. As there is no concrete way to find out, it is still being discussed by scholars and many myths have stemmed from these theories. From the outside, the planning of Solistal towns appear to be random, but is entirely dependent on what each towns considers necessary. If built on flatter ground and the need for stronger buildings is higher, that town puts it's most traveled buildings on the outside. Whereas, a different town will be secure in their mountain-side so will focus on their magic and research, therefore their magical stores and casters' homes would be placed further into the mountain walls. What's needed is most central, and what's not is pushed out. Many towns and cities are built into the side of the mountains, pushing their necessary buildings into the caves to be the most defensible. The styles, including materials used, follow Russian architecture. Although... squashed, because dwarves don't need as much room.

Trade/Commerce:

Solistal primarily exports the ore/minerals that are found in the mountains, the magical seals only found here, and have large stores of meat due to mega fauna hunting. They could be self-sufficient, however it would lower the citizens general happiness and lifestyles. As they have such large holdings over the ores and seals, trading is a constant request from the other nations. Whilst the continent wide trade is currency based, within the Solistal borders it is often information based. Even when currency is required, the price will often be lowered for a good book or two. Their largest import is dyes from Birkina, requiring ink for the libraries, and their lowest being finer/thinner cloths.

rxbn on unsplash

Other Parts:

For Great Kettering. 1 / 2 / 3 / 4

For Solistal. 1 / 2 / 3 / 4

For Kamikita. 1 / 2 / 3 / 4

For Birkina. 1 / 2 / 3 / 4

[brasiliangp]

CHRISTIAN PULISIC - Juventus vs AC Milan - Dignity Health Sports Park, Carson, California - July 27th, 2023

[bluespring864]

Part 1: On being nervous, ups and downs during a match and the illusion of control.

Novak Djokovic, Vice Sports interview (2019) in Serbian (with English subtitles)

[ask-de-writer]

About KALARA, (Part 1 of 4) :

MLP Fan Fiction

@nevermord​ READ, LIKED, REBLOGGED

and COMMENTED on

KALARA, (Part 1 of 4)

MLP Fan Fiction

About KALARA he noted :

Well, Jonathan is learning all kinds of things today. These "monsters" weren't eliminated completely, and might not be monsters at all. His sister has access to magic, and he even seems to have learned some manners! XD

Jonathan still has some things to unlearn but, knowing that what he believed is largely wrong, he is a quick study. He is not at all dumb. And he really is a good colt.

[thatwritererinoriordan]

Four Vignettes

I don't know what this is. Maybe it was inspired by my Spotify Wrapped? I'm still not sure I'm using the word "pastiche" correctly. I pulled at a few different threads and I wove this, whatever it is.

One.

Robert Sheehan is outside my window again. Lucky for me, I'm on the 2nd floor, in my writer's studio above the corner bodega and he's standing on the sidewalk.

The window is open.

"Eileen!" he shouts up. "Come on, Eileen."

I leave my chair, push aside the pink-and-gray buffalo check curtain and peer down at him.

Putting his Irish accent on thick, he sings, "Believe me, if all those enduring young charms..."

"I'm dreaming," I say, interrupting his croon. "This is because I said you should play Kevin Rowland in a movie about Dexys Midnight Runners."

"Not a dream," he half-says, half-sings. "Don't you want to come down and go for a walk with me, just around the neighborhood?"

"No." The smell of hot tortilla chips warming in the bodega below makes my nostrils flare. I imagine the salt crystals on their flat surfaces. Craving the warmth and salt, I feel a hunger pang.

"Why not?"

"I've got things to do."

"Like what?"

I gesture at my laptop. "I have to write things. Legitimate things, fresh things, not just this Joyce Carol Oates pastiche."

"Eileen, you ain't telling the truth."

"Not my name," I remind him.

"Eileen, Erin, whatever. This is your day set aside for going for a walk with me and you know it."

I feel threatened. I close the window and go back to my laptop.

[sweethoneyrose83]

He swallows hard, his heart aching as she speaks. How…how could she…? His words come out in a harsh, bitter tone.

"Fine then…just…just run away again…that…that seems to be what you do best…when…when things get hard…when…when you get upset…you just run away…that’s…that’s all you ever seem to do…" Trivia sighs as she’s in tears.His voice continues to come out harshly as he continues to speak.

"Well…? Go on…you want to go back into that cryogenic freezing…go ahead…let’s see how long it takes you to run away again…how long until everything else is too hard and you decide to…decide to go into hibernation…" Trivia nods "I agree with you there" His heart was pounding as he continued to speak, his words harsh…full of anger and bitterness.

"Oh…you agree…? How…how lovely…finally you agree with something I say…for once you agree with something I have to say…well…if you agree with me, then go ahead…why are you just standing there…? Go hide again…don’t come out until you decide you’re ready to run away again…" Trivia turns and walks away *His heart aches as he continues to speak, even more frustration and bitterness in his voice as he watches her start to walk away.

"Of course…you…you’d turn around and go hide as soon as I say something you don’t like…that…that sounds about right…I…I don’t know why the hell I ever even cared about you…" Trivia stops *He swallows hard, his voice coming out in a harsh, angry tone.*

"Oh…oh have you changed your mind…? Are you going to stay…and try to make things right…? To…to finally show you actually care…? Or are you just going to stand there like a coward? Or…or are you just going to run away…? Are you really going to go back to running…to running just like you always do…?" Trivia leans against a wall and sits down. His voice continues to shake as he continues to speak, his emotions starting to bubble up to the surface. He…he was sick of it…sick of being hurt like this…of having to deal with her running away…he…he wanted her to care…why…why did she never seem to care…?*

"No…no answer…? Nothing…? I…I don’t even know why I’m asking…I…I know what happens next…I just…I just wish for once you’d actually…you’d actually care about someone other than yourself…" Trivia looked down; she was gray, emotionless and cold. He takes a deep breath, anger starting to fade, sorrow starting to take its place. He felt hurt…so very hurt…and so…so worried… He didn’t want her to…to give up. He still needed her…

"T…Trivia…I…I’m sorry I…I know…I know I’ve said some harsh things…I’m sorry I…I can’t help it…I…I just…I’m just so worried, especially when you…you just run off like that without telling me anything” "No...it's true..." Trivia whispers "Everything you said about me is true I'm not arguing… her voice was so soft and defeated. *He sighs as he speaks, his heart aching as he slowly sits down next to her. 

[crowlixcx]

Two good friends. Two best friends.

[sentate]

SENTATE - The Sunset Collection

Blending beach days with date nights; The Sunset Collection is fresh set of romantic dresses that can be kept casual for the day or glammed up for the evening. Whether its a cheeky sheer mini dress or a showstopping silk gown, your sims are guaranteed to be sizzling by sunset!

This 8 item set comes in my 30 swatch colour palette plus 15 new print swatches.

8 Items Total / 30 Plain Swatches (+15 prints)

DOWNLOAD - Free on Patreon

MORE DOWNLOADS  |  TERMS OF USE  |  LINK TREE

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Learning to celebrate the little wins!