#The Magical Millennium

[literarywizard]

Near-Death Experiences In The Magical Millennium

The latest session of The Magical Millennium was intense! Two instant-takedown crits against the player characters after I rolled the worst possible options on my encounter-building table for what was already supposed to be a rough adventure. Oof.

Things took a turn for the intense during my groups latest session of The Magical Millennium. What was supposed to be an easy job standing guard for a few hours outside a warehouse while it was cleaned up so some pests couldn’t get back inside turned into an intense and almost deadly combat encounter. The general framing for this was that the party, all first-level characters and in their first…

[revolutionary-thoy]

Sketch I never finished

[blueliliesblueroses]

“Prince! Why do you betray your own world?!” // Sailor Moon Act 9: Serenity

.

.

Does anybody else think about how devastating it must have been for him?

[leirin]

The Fire Witch, Duskell

[sailorsenshigifs]

[funeral]

The sole knowledge human beings have of the world is the interpretation created by their own minds. This is why Eastern mystics say the world is a dream. What is usually thought of as external and substantial is actually made of the same stuff as a dream image. It exists in the same place—the mind—and is mentally projected outside what are perceived to be the limits of the body. There is no essential difference between inside the body and outside. Both exist within the mind. There is no root distinction between the mental and the physical; all is mind. To say the world is an illusion is not to say that it does not exist...The salient point is that human beings can never know anything about the absolute world with their everyday awareness. Everything experienced is an interpretation, a metaphor, of something else.

Donald Tyson, New Millennium Magic

[cardboard-crack]

[snepril]

Another piece by @nighterrandt, this one a little more action-oriented! The magical community in Millennium of Magic is usually pretty calm - the closest thing they have to your typical urban fantasy conspiracies is the constant squabbling between the Old Families, and even those are mostly limited to passive-aggressive comments at charity dinners. But there are still dangers - monsters from the Faerie, Practitioners twisted by Dark Magic, and older things forgotten by history. And when something bad comes knocking at your door, there are few better allies than a sphinx.

[literarywizard]

Player Versus Player Roleplaying In The Magical Millennium

While I didn't really have much planned for this most recent session of The Magical Millennium beyond homework interviews and maybe doing one adventure, the players provided all the tension we needed with some brilliant Player Versus Player roleplaying!

Another week and another Dungeons and Dragons session in the bag! This week, I got to run The Magical Millennium again. Our last session involved a Parent/Guardian-Teacher Conference and the party’s first adventure (which only included four of the group’s five players, unfortunately) and this one started off with a little bit of back-tracking for the player who couldn’t be there for the last…

[magic-is-something-we-create]

Happy WBW! How does magic work in the Ehlverse? If that’s too broad, pick one aspect you’d like to talk about!

Hi!! Happy WBW!!!

How magic works in the Ehlverse......................... where to START.

Okay first of all: despite trying a bunch of different things, I. Could Not figure out anything to draw for this question. Nothing was clicking.

BUT.

The Ehlverse has, at the point in time when the Millennium Saga and Whispers take place, 10 separate magic systems going on. And uh. That number, due to one of said systems, fluctuates throughout history. I'll focus on that one, since it's the framework for the whole entire world!

The Millennium Cycle, namesake for the Saga because it's hugely relevant to the plot, is a historical pattern of going back and forth between adding something new to (a Growth) or destroying something already a part of (a Decay) the world every thousand years. So, year 0 of the current calendar is when The Common Tongue (the magical translation magic that permeates the world) Grew, and year 1000 was when the Rill Decay happened, which has been trying to erase the Shara'i with a Vampirism epidemic ever since. Growths can add whole new species, peoples, magic systems, continents, plants, etc etc, and Decays can take any of those things away. This is overseen by the Goddesses, specifically Venn (Goddess of Magic, among other things) and Delta (Goddess of Change, among other things), with the other four essentially giving creative input in the form of suggested edits.

(Why, yes, TMS can be interpreted as a commentary on the experience of making art and when to let go of a thing and accept that it has flaws and that doesn't mean it isn't done.)

BUT the way the Cycle manifests changes almost every time. In-world, there's infinite debate to be had about whether or not the planet's creation itself was a Growth, and whether the Goddesses had to essentially just do a rapid series of Growths to get life going before settling into a Growth > Decay > Growth > Decay pattern. And, like, the fact that the Rill Decay hasn't fully manifested (the Shara'i still exist as we're creeping up on year 4000 PCT) when the Eqian Decay (1000 BCT) was over in an instant with an entire continent being inverted into deep sea chasms has made a lot of people question whether it was a Decay at all, over the centuries. (Those people don't realize that Sieril was the technological leader of the world at that time, with the Shara'i having essentially faced an apocalypse that dropped them to less than 1% of their population. Because, you know, that was almost 3000 years ago.)

ANYWAY. The plot of TMS revolves around the Great Decay that was supposed to happen on the dawn of the year 3000 having been stopped by the Chosen One, and uh maybe just actually delayed instead. But he's been pretending he fully stopped it. And its currently 3995 and 5 years is not a lot of time to figure out how to stop the Permanent Magic Eraser from destroying the manifold societies that are entirely dependent on magic to function.

Thank you again for the question!!

[ellasent]

Share to scare a Magical Starsign fan.

[leirin]

Kiss From a Qulo

[zellk]

I have begun to ponder about Lana and Rena in Hades II... All the witches stuff suddenly makes it so fucking easy to add them in.... Hopefully some art to come about all this will come......

[empressofthesunwriter]

The Queen's Gambit: The Story

The most powerful piece in chess is the queen.

When this piece joins the game of Duel Monsters anything will change.

With two dragon sisters, a magician and her descendant, the queen will take her rightful place.

As it should have been.

Chapter 8: Mokuba

Our young heroes were currently walking along a forest path of the Duelist Kingdom, sharing with each other the duels their other friends hadn't seen.

Currently, Yugi retold his Duel against Ryota Kajiki, who had been third in the Japanese Championship, and his underwater monsters.

Sehrazat's group listened in excitedly and asked questions.

After Yugi ended his tale Jonouchi said: "Ryota Kajiki is a hard guy to hate."

"Well, he did give you fish!", reminds Sadiye, holding hands with her big sister Kihana.

"I still can't believe you didn't think of bringing food to the island.", tutted Kihanan gently, which made Yugi's group all look sheepish.

"And I can't believe this is not butter."

All stared at Maja, all beside Sehrazat who nodded in understanding.

"Is it time to spout cryptic nonsense Maja-Chan?"

The brunette with the long wild spikes nodded happily, which made all sweatdrop.

"All duelists came here with their own hopes and dreams.", tried Anzu to steer their conversation back to something normal.

She liked Maja but experienced for the first time this side of her was a bit strange, Anzu won't lie.

"Yeah.", agreed Yugi. "They have their own problems, just like us."

"Problems...", repeated Jonouchi and thought about his dear sister Shizuka. "You're right."

That's when they all heard a cry for help. Surprised they looked around.

In the distance they saw the lackey of Pegasus with the really pointy hair, having a boy in a chokehold who screamed for help.

They all run up to them.

"Hold it right there!", shouted Honda.

Hair-Guy Lackey stopped and turned around, still with the boy in a chokehold.

Again the boy asked for help and courageous Honda Judo threw the Hair-Guy over his shoulder, freeing the boy in the pink shirt.

Long Honda couldn't celebrate his victory, because Hair-Guy got up again and kicked him in the face.

Poor Honda fell down defeated and Hair-Guy grapped again the boy in the pink shirt.

While Kihana, Maja and Anzu helped Honda up and checked for injuries, Jonouchi commanded Hair-Guy: "Stop it! You won't get away with this!"

"What's your problem?!", added Sehrazat ready to let Afya take over to beat Hair-Guys ass.

"There's no need for violence.", called Yugi.

Joey and Sehrazat looked at him surprised and the girl tried to control her Yami who was ready to slaughter Hair-Guy.

"It's for your own good that you don't interfere.", told Hair-Guy turning around with the boy in his arms and showing them his empty Dueling Glove. "This guy lost all his Star Chips."

The boy cried out: "You're wrong! My Star Chips and cards were stolen from me!"

"It doesn't matter. If you lose all your Star Chips, you're deported from this island."

With this and the words those are the rules and he should give up, Hair-Guy walked with his "prisoner" away.

"Guy's we can't let this poor kid be kicked out!", said Sehrazat.

"Truth, if his cards and Star Chips were stolen it is unfair.", agreed Kihana.

The others also nodded in agreement and so they ran after Hair-Guy.

They reached him by a little port, where he threw his prisoner with the other duelists who lost in a tiny rowing boat.

"What did the person who stole your Star Chips look like?", wanted Yugi to know from the boy in the pink shirt.

"I didn't see his face because he covered it with a bandanna.", explained the boy. "He suddenly challenged me to a duel."

"Was it at the Duel Ring in the grasslands?"

"Yeah. When I placed my Star Chips and my deck on the table, he stole them and ran off!"

"We'll find that thief, so just wait!"

Hair-Guy informed them all how the boat departed in 30 minutes. That was their time limit.

"We'll find the thief.", promised Anzu.

"You will get your Star Chips back in no time.", assured Kihana.

"Just be patient!", added Maja.

"We'll find him and teach him a lesson!", growled Honda, hitting with one fist his open palm.

With Afya in their shared minds, who called for bloodshed, Sehrazat nodded rapidly.

"Yeah! For a duelist, Star Chips are the same as his own life!", said Joey. "I won't forgive anyone who steals those Star Chips!"

"Is this not a bit too dramatic?", mumbled Sadiye to herself.

The only real ones who were in a life-or-death situation were Aunty Amira and Yugi's grandpa...oh and Joey needed the money for his sister's eye operation.

Maybe that was a Duelist thing?

Sadiye also played Duel Monsters, but she wasn't as obsessed with it as Sehra, Nee-Chan and Yugi and Joey.

The boy in the pink shirt said thank you to them and Joey, of course, had to make a joke saying he would take as a reward for catching the thief half of his Star Chips.

All sweatdropped and stared unimpressed at him.

After this, they made their way to the Duel Ring where the theft had happened.

Honda asked Jonouchi what this reward nonsense was, however, Joey laughed, confirming he was only joking.

The blonde wondered then, why they returned to this Duel Ring and how they should catch a thief without a clue.

Now, Yugi explained that he only knows how criminals always return to the place of the crime.

"That's so smart, Yugi-Kun!", praised Sehrazat and sat down beside him on the ground.

Yugi laughed shyly and blushed red, one because of her compliment and two because they were so close.

He could smell her nice perfume.

Lotus blossom if he wasn't wrong.

The others also sit down on the ground.

They didn't even need to wait long as suddenly a short masked boy with a wool hat and a bandana on his face sprung out from the bushes.

"I found you, Yugi!", he shouted...in a voice Sadiye know.

Confused the youngest in the group blinked.

Huh?

Where did she hear this voice before?

"He must be the one we're looking for!", said Joey, as all jumped back up from the ground. "I'll beat him up!"

"No! Don't use violence!", shouted Anzu and Kihana together.

Bandana-Boy growled Yugi's name and Joey and Honda growled back he should give back the Star Chips he had stolen!

"Wait.", stopped them Yugi, before really fist were swinging. "I think he's here for me."

Suprised all looked at him.

Yugi turnend to the boy.

"Do you want to duel me?"

The Bandana-Boy nodded.

Okay, so a children's cards game shall clear the situation, alright.

Only poor Sehrazat rubbed her temple because Afya still demanded blood.

Sometimes she forgot how her loving Gran-Gran could be a bloodthirsty Warrior-Queen.

While Yugi and Bandana-Boy took each their place on the Duel Ring, Honda promised he would make the thief pay if he tried to steal Yugi Star Chips.

Joey agreed and how they wouldn't let him escape.

As the voice of reason came Kihana: "Guys, there has to be a reason why he wants to battle Yugi so much. Let's watch the Duel, maybe we will find out."

In one second Yugi was there and then...not anymore.

Since Sehrazat and her friends saw Yami for the first time they all gaped and even blushed or got bashful.

The pharaoh was hot!

Only Sehrazat just looked neutral.

Meh, she liked Yugi better.

Also, the pharaoh was her 3000-times Grandfather so, ew, no!

However, she couldn't help but tease Afya a bit.

"Gran-Gran, Pops is hot. You have good taste."

Afya just flicked her forehead.

"Not now child of mine, also I'm pretty sure we had an arranged marriage, you know, like it was used in the old times."

"I see how you are practically undressing Pops with your eyes...don't lie!"

"I pledge the Fifth!"

"Gran-Gran!"

Meanwhile, the others noted how the boy didn't have a Duel Glove, so he was definitely the thief. Then they wonder why Yugi would duel him if they only had such a short time to return the Star Chips.

It was Anzu who pointed out that maybe Yugi knew who the boy was!

Yami and Bandana-Boy wagerd 5 Star Chips and began their duel.

The first turn was Bandana-Boy.

"I play Man-Eating Plant in attack position."

Man-Eating Plant: ATK 800/ DEF 600

Yami countered with Winged Dragon, Guardian of the Fortress.

Winged Dragon, Guardian of the Fortress: ATK 1400/DEF 1200

Bandana-Boys monster was destroyed and his Life Points dropped to 1400.

"You can't defeat my monster using stolen cards.", lectured Yami. "Because your heart doesn't dwell inside stolen cards."

"Yugi, I don't believe in your 'heart of the cards'! Cards aren't about the heart! Cards are about power!", shouted the thief back.

"Like I thought, you're Mokuba, Seto Kaiba's younger brother.", revealed Yami.

Angry the thief took off his disguise.

It was really Mokuba Kaiba.

"Mokuba-San?", shouted Sadiye. "What are you doing here?"

"You know him?", asked Anzu.

Sadiye nodded.

"We go to the same school and class. He sits on the bench before me."

"Sadiye-San, my brother vanished because Yugi hurt his pride.", answered Mokuba his classmate, before he turned back to Yami. "It's your fault that Pegasus is now trying to take over Kaiba Corporation!"

"What? Pegasus?", asked Yami, while the others also looked worried at Mokuba.

This didn't sound good at all.

Mokuba explained how Pegasus spread the news of how Yami defeated Seto Kaiba worldwide. Since then, Kaiba Corporation has lost the trust of its investors and business has plummeted. Pegasus had just waited for this moment. He talked in private with The Big Five, Kaiba Corps Board, telling them to transfer all their chares to him. Only like this, they could save the company. The Big Five agreed under the conditions that Pegasus would defeat Yugi in a duel. Of course, Pegasus agreed, saying how easy this would be.

But since Mokuba had the key to the Storage Facility, where all the important documents were, Pegasus kidnapped him to the Duelist Kingdom as his prisoner, before he could flee.

"Yugi, it's all your fault!", accused Mokuba.

"I understand the situation, but that's no excuse for stealing other people's cards.", told Yami.

"Be quiet! I play this next!"

Krokodilus appeard on the field.

Krokodilus: ATK 1100/ DEF 1200

"Go, Krokodilus!"

The monster attacked Winged Dragon, Guardian of the Fortress, but was of course defeated by the more powerful monster.

"It's pointless to keep duelling.", said Yami. "This game isn't so simple that you can win with stolen cards."

Jonouchi agreed: "That's right! Stealing Star Chips for revenge is the worst!"

"You're wrong! You have the wrong idea! I have to protect Kaiba Corporation in my brother's place!", shouted Mokuba back.

It's then that Anzu realized if Mokuba managed to get Yugi Star Chips, this would disqualify him, meaning Yugi technically never lost a duel.

"What do you mean?", wondered Honda.

"You don't understand?", asked Joey.

"Do you?"

"Well, no. What do you mean?"

"She means: If Yugi doesn't lose in a duel, Pegasus's agreement with The Big Five is void.", answered Kihana.

All beside Anzu made an oh sound.

They got it now.

"I see.", mumbled Yami, before he saw that Mokuba wasn't anymore on his Dueling Platform. "Mokuba!"

As it turns out Mokuba climbed Yami Duel Station and managed to grab Star Chips, leaving him with only three, before the younger Kaibe started to run off.

However, he was stopped, by Sadiye who stood in his way with her arms open.

"Sadiye-San! Let me pass!"

"No, Mokuba-San, what you doing is wrong!"

"It's the only way!"

Before he could just run around her Kihana, Maja and Sehrazat blocked his way too.

"Mokuba-Chan.", began Kihana. "Please there is another way, just listen."

Under the ice blue eyes of Sadiye's older sister, Mokuba felt he looked at Seto's beloved Blue-Eyes White Dragon, which made him stop in his tracks.

Sehrazat took over: "You have to trust Yugi. If he beats Pegasus, nothing will happen to Kaiba Corp."

Maja and Sadiye nodded in agreement.

"Kaibe is suffering right now.", called Yami. "But that's so he can learn about the heart of the cards. He's fighting to win his pride back. Kaiba will return when he learns about the heart of the cards. Are you willing to abandon your brother and the trust in Kaiba Corporation?"

"But...But what should I do?"

"Like Kihana and Sehrazat said...I promise to defeat Pegasus. If you want to know what Kaiba is struggling with...If you want to understand the heart of the cards, give that boy back his deck and his Star Chips."

The younger Kaiba thought for a second and looked at his classmate and her sister. Again his eyes found Kihana, who nodded at him.

He really had a feeling he was interacting with the Blue-Eyes White Dragon...it was strange but nice.

Mokuba turnend back to Yami.

"I undertsnad. I trust you, Yugi."

"The boat is leaving in three minutes!", reminds Anzu.

"Let's don't waste time!", shouted Sehrazat.

They all ran as fast as they could back to the little port.

Sadly the boat was already leaving!

They meet Hair-Guy at the port who smugly said: "The losers' boat already left."

"But they shouldn't have left for another minute!", disagreed Anzu.

"That's unfair!", shouted Sehrzat with balled fists.

"I don't care.", said Hair-Guy.

Joey accused Hair-Guy of tricking them, which all our friends agreed on.

Mokuba holds out his hand with the Star Chips to Hair-Guy.

"I'll return these Star Chips, so call the boat back."

Hair-Guy just slapped the Star-Chips from his hand and they fell into the ocean.

Oh no!

"Some of this were Yugi's!", exclaimed Sehrazat.

Feeling guilty Mokuba said sorry to Yugi.

"If you have your Star Chips stolen, then you're a disgrace as a duelist.", mocked Hair-Guy. "That alone is enough to disqualify you."

Then he gripped Mokuba.

All shouted shocked.

"Unhead, Mokuba-Chan!", growled Kihana, while Sehrazat felt, beside her own, Afya's anger.

In one second both switched places.

Before anyone could realise what happened, Afya and Kihana stormed the Hair-Guy, Afya punched him hard in the face and Kihana took Mokuba from him.

With the boy in her arms, Kihana ran back to the group and they all huddled protective around him.

Afya had her feet on Hair-Guys back to keep him down.

"Don't move or you will regret it.", the once queen of all Egypt hissed.

"You bitch...!"

"Insults won't get you far."

To demonstrate it Afya stomped Hair-Guy harder into the ground.

All were fascinated by that and Yami was immensely proud.

His queen was truly a strong woman.

A real Warrior-Queen.

...It was so hot!

Hair-Guy realized how he was in a pickle and decided to change his tactic.

"Alright, alright, the boy stays with you but...The only way to gain Star Chips is through duels."

"What do you mean by that exactly?", growled Afya, pressing her foot harder into his back.

"If I see right Yugi has still three Star Chips left.", began Hair-Guy. "I don't duel but in an hour I will find an opponent for him, so he can stay on the island."

"And what is the catch?"

"That you let me go."

Afya hummed and turnend to Yami.

"What do you say?"

"Any funny business and Afya will throw you in the ocean.", said Yami seriously.

"No funny business I swear!"

"Alright, Afya let him go."

"No you guys should go with Mokuba away, I will catch up to you and tell you the details from this guy. I don't trust him not to try to grap Mokuba again. Kihana protect him!"

"Of course, your Majesty, it's not even a question."

So the group without Afya walked away and when she was sure they were far enough, slowly she lifted her foot from Hair-Guys back.

He stood up, shaking and gasping for air, but told her where this duel for Yugi/Yami would be.

In an hour at the grasslands, where they had duel Mokuba.

Afya gave Hair-Guy a last look which screamed murder, which made the man shake and then caught up to her friends.

(*)

An hour later our group of nine now returned to the Duel Ring.

Kihana held hands with Mokuba and Sadiye, Maja and Anzu stood protective beside Mokuba, Maja ready to unleash magic in case something went wrong, while Joey and Honda stood before them and before them were Yami and Afya leading.

"We should be careful.", whispered Afya to Yami, she didn't want to worry the others. "I bet with you Pegasus henchman has a surprise in store."

"We will be careful and keep one eye on Mokuba."

"Kihana is strong and Maja has some surprises up her sleeve."

"Care to tell me?"

"The magic we use isn't the only one."

This made Yami blink for a second surprised before he gave Afya a smile.

"How you and Kihana saved Mokuba and you kept the henchman in place was incredible."

Bashful Afya put a bit of her long blue hair behind her ear.

"It was nothing. I couldn't watch a child being kidnapped!"

"Of course, but you reacted the fastest of us. You are a true warrior."

"Well...I might be your queen but I won't disagree how I'm a warrior too."

Both smiled flirtatiously at each other.

They couldn't before all flirt as they normally would.

First, it was their private affair and second, they didn't want to give the others second-hand embarrassment.

Hair-Guy already waited for them.

Yami came straight to the point: "Who's my opponent?"

"He's already here. Look!"

All let out surprised shouts.

"Kaiba?"

"Nii-Sama!"

Kaiba laughed.

"Yugi, I'll get my revenge!"

[maddiviner]

How would one perhaps cast a glamourbomb?

Note: This article describes some stuff people did in the past. It’s not safe or wise to do that kind of thing nowadays, if it ever truly was. I don’t recommend engaging in these activities, but wanted to answer this anyways. The word itself made me nostalgic, but conflicted? Yeah.

Glamourbombs, at least as I know the term, aren’t spells in the traditional sense. They are (were, more like) magical performance pieces. They touch the “mundane” world with some sort of occult interjection. This was (perhaps thankfully) most common in places where the veil between “mundane” and “weird” was already thin: libraries, universities after midnight, anime conventions, places like that. While I don’t doubt people still do this today, the trend was at its peak around the turn of the century.

At the time, I was in middle school. As the Millennium (holy f**king s**t! its Y2K!) approached, the apocalypticism wasn’t just limited to the Christian kids. Those of us who weren’t Christian or just came from more secular families still saw things like hysteria about Y2K glitches and especially climate change. A lot of that was pretty scary to us, especially considering some of our more fundamentalist-minded neighbors were saying the world was going to end and “Jesus was coming back.”

It wasn’t so much that we believed them. We just knew, even as kids, that the scientists weren’t lying about the climate data. We also knew that people were acting really irrationally, whatever their reasons. This fit in well with the notion that some big change was coming. Maybe it wasn’t the Christian apocalypse, but could it be something? Plenty of adults seemed to think so, too.

Online, and in our own (burgeoning) occult spaces, we had our own spin on things. Allegedly, by glamourbombing, we were helping, in some small way, to enchant this increasingly hostile mundane world. Because, as teens and tweens growing up on White Wolf, Captain Planet and Square Enix, we clearly knew what was best for reality!

We had every right to (at least try to) impose it on the rest of the world at every chance. Right? Right?

We’d all read at least two books on witchcraft from Barnes and Noble, too.

In some scenarios of glamourbombing, the point was just to make people going about their day pause for a few seconds, think “Hmm? Cool!” and go on about their lives, hopefully in a better mood. These were usually simple things like flyers seeking a “LOST UNICORN,” a notice that you’re entering a “PIXIE-FREE ZONE,” silly things like that. You still see stuff like this today and (if it’s well-designed) it makes people smile and nothing more.

Other glamourbombs had more complexity. They (sometimes) included a bit of magical technique - an active hypersigil, for example.

When pen drives grew in popularity, they became common tools for glamourbombing, with people filling the drives with “magical” material and leaving them (usually conspicuously) somewhere, like a library.

These hypersigils might take the form of experimental music MP3s, animated loops, even actual .EXE files (supposedly). I don’t know whether anyone was bold or foolish enough to click on something like that, of course.

I was barely in my teens, and definitely still sorting things out when it came both to my personal beliefs and perspective on wider community issues like this. Even then, though, I knew not to click any weird .EXE files.

The larger problem, in case you couldn’t tell?

A lot of this straight-up ignores issues like bystander consent from a magical perspective and, y’know, the problems that can arise from leaving weird/unexpected things in public places.

Also? In case you’re not keeping track, I’m talking about the 2000s here. Early 2000s. As in directly after 9/11. Not exactly a wonderful time to be running around acting weird in public and dumping strange packages. Not a safe or wise thing to be doing. Some people got a tag on that early on and quit such shenanigans.

In the summer of 2003, I attended a summer program for “gifted” 🙄 kids where I took the course focused on Greek mythology. The motley pack of metaphysically-inclined nerds I met there thought glamourbombing was tragically cool, of course. We had all kinds of ideas about “Lost Pegasus” flyers and other Greek mythology-themed things. Thankfully nothing that would’ve been too harmful. We ended up being too shy and busy with schoolwork to actually do any of it.

Sadly, later on, there were some attempts by groups (some of which I’d call cult-like) to recruit using this kind of thing. I won’t name anything that’d put me on anyone’s radar (hopefully), but I remember reading about some of it.

One particularly unpleasant and notorious use of this technique occurred on the west coast in the late 2000s when a cult set up an “art installation” in public featuring a live rat in a maze and some other random detritus. The rat didn’t freeze to death despite cold temperatures, thankfully.

Incidents like that (which was, of course, reported as a bomb scare) probably helped to put a stop to the glamourbombing trend. After all, if you’re (supposedly) after some kind of mind-liberating mass reenchantment of reality, well, nothing could be worse than the whole bomb squad showing up, right?

As the digital age crept on, I think people started to reevaluate attention’s role as a commodity. It’s really easy to get attention if you want it, as things like the “rat in a maze” exhibit (which made the papers) show.

You can’t control what kind of attention you’ll get, though, and you can’t say for certain that what you’re doing won’t have unintended consequences for other people. With that in mind, something like glamourbombing doesn’t seem very responsible, especially right now.

I guess the concept isn’t irredeemable. As recently as 2018, I was posting on Facebook looking for someone to help me slay the green dragon that sometimes lands in the field near the Taco Bell by the highway.

Little pranks and jokes like that can brighten everyone’s mood sometimes. There’s certain contexts, though (my Facebook feed, for example) where it might be appropriate, and others where it wouldn’t.

And the full-on concept of a glamourbomb, designed to “spread magic in the mundane'' with an active sigil of some sort, etc? Hard pass. Doesn’t seem ethical to me nowadays.

And, of course, it’s generally a bad idea to do anything that might be mistaken for a bomb threat.

[funeral]

Donald Tyson, New Millennium Magic