#a lot of the invented books were purely around

[not-poignant]

Hello Pia! You’ve probably been asked this before, but since I’m late to this specific party and don’t know how to find the answer I’m just going to go ahead and ask again: Are the books Arden recommends to Efnisien made up or do they exist? I want the book on queer nature but could only find a poetry book with that title. 😅

It's really just a mix, anon!

The book on jellyfish with the hot pink and royal blue cover? That exists. I can't remember the title, but there's not that many books on jellyfish and you should be able to find it. Okay no I'll stand up and go look at my bookshelf because I own that one, hang on... it's Spineless by Juli Berwald. The book on Game Theory and Animal Behaviour was real, which made me laugh.

The book on queer nature doesn't exist from memory, I wanted to invent a book that had a spine of the colour I wanted so I did. The book Pastel Shibari Dreams doesn't exist (which I say in the author's note), but the book on Leading and Supporting Love is real (which I say in the author's note).

Unfortunately I can't tell you which of the others are real or not because I write the word book nearly 800 times in that story and a ctrl+F is going to hurt my clicker finger going through all of those, lol, and I didn't keep a list of the titles that were real and the ones that weren't. Needless to say it's just a mix. (The tl;dr is I'm too lazy to click 800 times to check how many other books I mention - I think the planet one about the moons of wherever I also invented so I could make my Ganymede joke).

There are books on queerness in nature though, but I can't remember any off the top of my head. There were just none that were doing exactly what I wanted. The story really is a mix of 'I'm making this one up' and 'I own this one' and 'I need a very specific book spine cover and most photos of books don't show the colour of the spine so I have to invent a book' slakjfsa :D

[bump1nthen1ght]

A Very Monstrous Kinktober: Day 24 (Sex Toys)

Kink: Sex Toys

Pairing: Male!Minotaur x Male!Reader

Other Kinks: Mutual Masturbation

Warnings: N/A

Word Count: 1136 words

Kinktober Masterlist

“It’s silicone, actually.” You squirt some lube into your palm, rubbing it into the hole of your fleshlight. “Medical grade, I’m pretty sure. That way it doesn’t react with your skin.”

“Humans are so inventive.” Marinos coos, inserting two fingers into the hole. A cute blush runs across his cheeks, but it seems his scientific curiosity has peaked more than anything. “Trying to simulate love-making, it’s very daring.”

The toy is small in Marinos hands, even though you bought the extra large. You had needed the specific measurements of his cock to order it, doubting the average fleshlight could take him whole. Still, it seems like a child's toy in his hands, especially with the way he examines it, poking and prodding.

It’s adorable, the fascination he has for human science, for human inventions. You’d have never guessed when you entered his labyrinth that the “beast” who guarded it would be so understanding, so curious. But you guess spending years trapped in a labyrinth with only books as company would do that to you.

“Well,” You dance your fingers down Marinos’ chest, delighting in the way he shivers at the contact, “You know what they say.” Marinos drifts his focus from the toy to your wandering hand, exhaling loudly when you slip under his loincloth, “Necessity is the mother of invention.”

Your fingers barely wrap around Marinos shaft, only half-hard yet massive in both girth and length. The toy is all but forgotten, your slick palm softly stroking up and down, rubbing a thumb across the bottom of his head.

You may be ready one day to take him inside you, with a little magical help and lots of practice, but for now, you're happy just to feel pleasure alongside him.

Marinos’ cock slips out between his loincloth, fully erect and weeping precum. His hands dig into the sheets, eyes blown wide watching your small hand jerk him off. There's a low whine in his chest when you detach, the whites of his eyes growing wide when you grab the toy and press it into his palms. With a wink, you fish your own cock out of your boxers, grabbing your personal fleshlight and giving yourself some quick jerks.

“C’mon, big boy. I wanna watch.”

Marinos nods, buzzing with excitement, panting as he watches you sheath yourself in your toy. You throw your head back into the pillows, biting your lip as the warmth of the silicone wraps around your cock.

With shaky, excited hands Marinos grabs his toy, freshly lubed up and lines his cock head. His throat bobs as he presses the fake lips to his head, a shuddering moan coming out between his teeth.

“By the gods.” Marinos pants, pushing the toy down and finally entering its embrace. His hips unconsciously jerk, desperate for more. “This is-”

“Good, huh?” You like your lips, pushing the toy down to your base, then dragging it up to your head. Lube and precum leave sticky tracks across your shaft. From a glance you can tell Marinos isn’t even halfway down yet, savoring in the unfamiliar, his legs shaking.

“Y-yes, its-” Marinos sighs again, watching his own cock be swallowed up by the fleshlight, “-it’s fantastic.”

You lean into Marinos sides, beginning to move the toy faster up and down your cock. It's nice, but watching Marinos stokes the fire in your belly harder; His whimpers and moans as he finally sinks into the base are pure erotica.

“You can move it, y’know.” You chuckle, playfully nudging your shoulder against Marinos. Your toy makes sticky sounds, thwapping against your balls. “Unless you're more of a cockwarming kind of guy. Guess this is how you’d find that out.”

That does get a laugh from Marinos, all baritone, even when broken up by his heavy breaths.

“I k-know-” Marinos pants, slowly lifting the toy up his cock, “But if this were you, I’d have to stay still. I don’t want to hurt you.”

Your heart swells; Gods, how cruel was it that such a sweet creature was kept locked up all these years? Marinos was much too good for those royals anyway.

“You lean up, surprising Marinos with a kiss. He meets it with his usual softness, not domineering or belligerent. Just..himself.

He’s pulled the fleshlight up to the tip, copying you and shoving it back down in one quick thrust. He shudders into your kiss, hips jerking upwards.

“If you want-” You mutter into his lips, “I could play with yours and you could play with mine.”

“Yes.” Marinos pants. “L-lets do that.”

You nod, detaching from the kiss, throwing your hand over Marinos’ waist and grabbing the toy. His palm gently wraps around yours, once again reminding you just how much bigger Marinos is than you. Your cock throbs.

You both start off gentle, trying to test each other's boundaries. But Marinos is quick to meet your gentle strokes, throwing his hips into the fleshlight, making the toy shudder. Encourage, you move it a bit faster, hearing Marinos heavy balls hit the toy.

He picks up speed as well, and your hips begin to move on their own. Your cock is aching from your prior teasing, only spurred on by Marinos harmonic moans and the way he fucks the toy. It conjures up images of how he could fuck you one day. The first time would be gentle, lots of lube and patience, most likely doggy. He’d ease into you, keeping his cock warm for a couple minutes, then gently snap into your backside. With his long arms, he could probably lean over and jerk you off at the same time.

But once you were ready, would he bounce you on his cock like this, grabbing you by the hips and using you like a cocksleeve? Leave you breathless as he fucks you open, balls hitting your ass, filling you with cum?

Your toy leaks lube and precum, your balls beginning to tighten as those fantasies nearly send you over the edge.

“I’m gonna cum.” Marinos grunts, his cock twitching enough to nearly shake the toy out of your grunts. “I'm so close.”

“Me too.” You pant, drool pooling in your mouth. You both speed up your pace, fisting the toys like desperate teenagers, more instinct than conscious thought. Marinos breathes through his nose, shaking his nose ring, and digs his hooves into the bed.

“Shit! Cumming!”

“Aaa-ah!~” You quickly release into the toy as you watch Marinos cum fills his to the brim. Streams of it spurt off the side, covering his thighs and your hand.

You both fall back into the bed, soft cocks still nestled in your toys. MArinos leans over and kisses your cheek.

“Thank you, love.”

[androxys]

Comic Ages: Quick Breakdowns for the Golden, Silver, and Bronze Ages

If you're new to comic fandom, or even if you're not, you may hear people talk about specific "Ages" of comic books. If you don't know what that means, or what people mean when they talk about a Golden Age, this is a quick writeup meant to help you out!

This focuses on the Golden Age, the Silver Age, and the Bronze Age of comics. This is a DC focused writeup, though it's loosely applicable to Marvel comics too.

The Golden Age (1938-1950s)

DC Comics as we know it started taking form in 1937 with the debut of the Detective Comics title. Published by Detective Comics Inc. in partnership with National Allied Publications, the title was an anthology of various detective and mystery stories featuring characters such as Slam Bradley. Have you ever read the first dozen or so ‘Tec stories? Because I haven’t. I care much more about what came next. In 1938, All-American Publications began publishing Action Comics, debuting a character called Superman. Maybe you’ve heard of him. Soon after, in 1939, Detective Comics #27debuted the Batman. Arguably with Action Comics #1, though definitely by 1940, the Golden Age of comics had begun.

The original iterations of the Flash and Green Lantern—Jay Garrick and Alan Scott, respectively—were created in 1940. The savvy reader among you might recognize these two as belonging to the Justice Society of America, which had arrived on the scene by 1941. The JSA would be rounded out with Hawkman, Doctor Fate, the Spectre, Sandman, the Atom, and Hourman. Other characters created around this time include Green Arrow (1940), Wonder Woman, (1941), and Aquaman (1941).

You may notice that the Golden Age overlaps with World War II, and it definitely affected DC’s publication. The newly created figure of the superhero became a more starkly patriotic figure, often spangled in red, white and blue. Plots began to incorporate nationalistic themes, and heroes often fought spies, foreign agents, and saboteurs. Arguably, though, scholars argue that the war era was most important for how superheroes began to move out of a purely print medium to radio and film. (For additional reading on DC Comics and WWII, see the Freeman and Hutchens citations below)

As the 40s went on, however, interest in superheroes began to wane, and DC (though technically they weren’t yet a consolidated DC Comics) began to pivot to other themes, such as Western stories or science fiction. The end of the Golden Age, however, can arguably be traced to 1954 with Frederic Wertham publishing Seduction of the Innocent. Wertham’s book that claimed that comics were an active harm to children due to their depictions of violence and supposed (homo)sexual themes. Seduction of the Innocent led to Wertham testifying before a U.S. Senate Subcommittee, which in turn ended up leading to comics publishers adopting the Comics Code Authority, a sort of self-imposed regulatory authority.

I would personally characterize the Golden Age as having a sort of earnestness to it. Characters are being invented left and right, but the writers haven’t yet had enough time with them to shape them into the figures we now know them to be. In hindsight, a lot of these early stories seem... silly… Superman eating a pocket-knife in Superman #8 comes to mind. But even within the same issue as the goofy knife-eating, you see Superman working against foreign agents representing the real-world anxieties of the time.

The Silver Age (1958-1970)

After the establishment of the Comics Code Authority, the content of comics had to change. At the same time, DC Comics (though they still weren’t technically doing official business under that name) had a stable of characters begging for reinvention. In 1956, Barry Allen debuted as the new Flash in Showcase #4, and the Silver Age was off. Science fiction themes seemed to be all the rage for the Silver Age: Hal Jordan, the new Green Lantern, got his ring from a dying alien. Ray Palmer, the new Atom, was described as a genius inventor who created his size changing powers. Hawkman was brought back, no longer as the reincarnating pharaoh Khufu, but as a police officer from the planet Thanagar. The Martian Manhunter was more thoroughly fleshed out and elevated from a detective to superhero. As individual heroes were getting re-tooled, the concept of the Justice Society was updated in 1960 to become the Justice League of America, which debuted in The Brave and the Bold #28.

After establishing refreshed versions of some of their older heroes, DC decided that they wanted to begin to reincorporate some of their older characters into their modern publication. This effort began in 1961 with the spectacular “Flash of Two Worlds” in Flash #123, which featured Barry Allen, the Flash, teaming up with Jay Garrick, the Flash of the Golden Age. This issue established that the Golden Age characters all still existed, but on a parallel Earth that vibrated at a different frequency than the Earth of DC’s main heroes, which was designated Earth One. By using their powers, characters like the Flash were able to vibrate at the other Earth’s speed, crossing over. This concept would soon be expanded upon, leading to frequent crossovers between Earth One and Earth Two characters and teams.

Having two separate Earths, each with their own history, allowed DC to have multiple variations of the same characters, offering greater storytelling breadth. The Bruce Wayne of Earth Two, for example, had retired as Batman to become Gotham Police Commissioner, passing on the torch to his daughter Helena Wayne, the Huntress. Huntress would cross over to meet the Bruce Wayne of Earth One, the younger, childless Batman. DC would develop other Earths, such as Earth Three, with villainous versions of Earth’s heroes, of Earth Prime, with a single Superboy as Earth’s only superhero.

The Silver Age, as a whole, can be looked at as campier than other eras of comics thanks in no small part due to the regulations imposed by the Comics Code Authority. Stories tended towards science fiction and the fantastic, and creators were very interested in making pre-established concepts new again. Comics continued to expand through new mediums, often keeping with the tone of the time: the Adam West Batman TV show, for example, ran 1966-1968 and is a great example of Silver Age camp. While the Silver Age has an event that can be pointed to as a relatively agreeable indication of the era’s beginning, its end is slightly less clear.

The Bronze Age (1970-1986)

The Bronze Age of Comics came about during the 1970s, but it’s not easy to discern exactly when or with what event. Comic readers had been indicating a desire for darker or more mature stories. (In some ways, this desire can be considered as a reaction to the trend of the Silver Age as a whole. For further reading, I suggest The Caped Crusade: Batman and the Rise of Nerd Culture by Glen Weldon, which dives into how Batman media specifically follows a tone-pendulum.)

Some point to the death of Gwen Stacy over in The Amazing Spider-Man as the event that heralded in the Bronze Age, others point to Jack Kirby leaving Marvel to join DC and begin the Fourth World. The Bronze Age was emboldened by the revision and weakening of the Comics Code in 1971, after Stan Lee published a comic about drug use without the Authority’s stamp of approval. The comic was a success, leading the code to reevaluate or be left behind.

In the realm of DC, Green Arrow’s joining the Green Lantern title in 1970 in what would then be Green Lantern/Green Arrow #76 is generally considered a Bronze Age hallmark. The series focused on contemporary social ills, with its arguably most famous story tackling drug addiction in America. 1971’s Green Lantern/Green Arrow #78, “Snowbirds Don’t Fly,” depicted the teen hero Roy Harper's addiction to heroin and the other heroes’ reaction and response. In the Batman comics, Dennis O’Neil and Neal Adams began a long campaign to bring Batman back to a more gothic, brooding figure with appropriately dark villains. O’Neil and Adams’ 1971 Batman #232 debuted Ra’s and Talia al Ghul, while 1973’s Batman #251 would see “The Joker’s Five Way Revenge” take the Joker from his Silver Age clownish portrayal to a more menacing, murderous villain.

As DC Comics approached 50 years of publication in 1985, they began to recognize that five decades had left them with quite a mess of continuity. There were the Golden Age heroes on Earth Two, the Silver Age heroes that had become the Bronze Age heroes on Earth One, and a plethora of alternate Earths and company acquisitions to make it muddier. To mark the anniversary and clean house at the same time, DC embarked upon the Crisis on Infinite Earths.

Crisis on Infinite Earths, often referred to just as “Crisis” was a year-long maxi series running from 1985-1986. The plot involved the destruction of the DC multiverse, and resulted in the establishment of a New Earth with a new continuity. Nearly everything that came before was taken off the metaphorical table, and writers got to choose which pre-Crisis elements to re-canonize and which elements to create fresh.

[hollowed-theory-hall]

do you have any theories or headcanons about luna's mom and what she was researching and how she died?

Well, Luna tells us what she did, so I don't need to headcanon it:

my mother. She was a quite extraordinary witch, you know, but she did like to experiment and one of her spells went rather badly wrong one day. I was nine

(OotP, 863)

So, Luna's mom, whose name is Pandora, experimented with spells. Specifically spells of her own making, one of which has gone badly and killed her.

So, what she did was create spells on her own the way we see Snape doing. We know spell creation is complicated and incredibly dangerous. Therefore, Luna is likely right in calling her mother extraordinary for creating spells. Most wizards would never bother, and the only ones we see inventing new magic are extraordinary wizards like Snape, Dumbledore, and Voldemort.

Now, this specific spell that killed Luna's mom was witnessed by Luna since she can see Thestrals. So my guess/headcanon is that it's a spell that wasn't supposed to go wrong.

Like, it was a spell she already worked on, a fun charm she wanted to show her 9-year-old daughter, one she succeeded in casting before. I believe this because it doesn't make sense for a mother to endanger their child by experimenting with spells with them in the room. So I believe she thought the spell was ready when she showed it to Luna — but something went wrong, and she ended up dead. I have no idea what the spell could've been, though.

All I know is that Luna says:

“Yes, it was rather horrible,” said Luna conversationally.

(OotP, 863)

That'll likely be true regardless of what spell it was, but this line always gave me the impression that her death wasn't clean, like with the Killing curse, but rather more gruesome. Also, now that I'm reading this, combined with the fact Luna can see Thestrals, it seems she died instantly. There probably wasn't a period in a ward in St. Mongos, she just died the moment the spell failed.

Alternatively, It's possible a spell failed and then she had a period in St. Mongos until her death and that's when Luna saw her die, sitting by her bedside. That would mean the spell was still very experimental when it killed Pandora since she wasn't practicing it with Luna around. I like the first option better though.

For more general headcanons:

1. I usually place Pandora from a not famous or well-known magical family, like she's pure-blood but not sacred 28. Which one doesn't matter all that much.

2. She was in Ravenclaw like Xenophilius and Luna.

3. A few spells that we are familiar with from the books were invented by her (I don't have specific ones, but I like to think that at least one of them was invented by her).

4. I like to think Luna's mom was the artistic one (pretty canon since her father isn't implied to paint from what I remember). Like, we know Luna draws and makes jewelry and furniture herself, so basically I think her mom did too and that's who Luna got it from. I headcanon that before Luna was born she painted magical creatures (both real and imagined) on Luna's bedroom walls.

5. I think Xenophilius was less of a flat-earther before Pandora died. I mentioned here how I think he and Luna lost a lot of their faith in the ministry that hid something regarding Pandora's death or the ministry didn't sanction some of her spells for use post-mortemly. This distrust in the ministry pushed their opinions farther from the mainstream of the Wizarding World.

6. Harry describes Luna as more groomed in the photograph with her mother. As I mentioned, I think Xenophilius wasn't as absent-minded and unkept as we see him before Pandora's death, but Pandora was always the more preset and focused of the two of them. She probably often reminded him of things they scheduled that slipped his mind.

[just-another-star-47]

Thoughts on the Sallow family:

I hope they aren't too confusing..😅

Through the conversation after the Imperio incident with Sebastian, we learn that he and Anne had to pack things up and leave them behind when they moved to Solomon.

It didn't sound to me like they were moving from one house in Feldcroft to another, so I'm leaning towards them not having lived in Feldcroft (at least for a while).

Also, they probably owned a much larger house that had a basement and enough storage space for things that were unnecessary enough to leave behind. I therefore toy with the idea that they lived in a larger village, where their parents had better access to new books and research materials.

In the conversation, we also learn that Anne gives Sebastian a handmade crest as a good luck charm. It is not clearly stated that it is a family crest, but there definitely seems to be a close connection between the parents and it, as Anne kept it as a keepsake.

However, if it is indeed a family crest, it could indicate social status.

Crests were worn as a sign of belonging to a clan and were later made for individual families, for example to differentiate families with the same surname. They belonged not only to royalty and nobility (which in the wizarding world would probably be the pure-blooded families), but also middle-class families (craftsmen, merchants etc. who were able to accumulate material possessions). As far as I know, peasants (such as farmers etc) did not have crests.

This would also fit with a comment made by a student who suggested that he thought Sebastian came from a more 'upmarket' area than Feldcroft. Personally, I found it interesting, as I had kind of assumed that Sebastian came from a farming family and only rose through the social ranks because of his parents and his desire to learn. But the family crest would suggest that his family had been wealthier than simple peasants for longer.

(But perhaps they had their origins in Feldcroft and then 'worked their way up'?)

In my further confusion of thoughts, I also thought about Anne and Sebastian's parents. Personally, I don't think they taught as professors at Hogwarts, as Ominis statement that they spent every minute in the basement studying sounds more like research than teaching to me.

If they did teach, I can well imagine that Anne and Sebastian were already at Hogwarts as small children because their parents were busy at the castle for several days, for example. I could therefore imagine that they lived directly in the castle with their parents, or in one of the villages nearby (Hogsmeade or Lower Hogsfield).

Either way, I think the family travelled a lot, as Sebastian is incredibly knowledgeable about the whole area. Personally, I can understand these journeys as research trips by the parents, but either way it shows that the family could afford it.

I also found it interesting that Sebastian mentioned that the souvenirs of their parents included photos. Photographs only became more or less suitable for everyday use between 1840 and 1860 and were therefore a relatively new invention, which was also made by Muggles. Apparently, the parents' thirst for knowledge also extended beyond the wizarding world, which to me means that Anne and Sebastian have no (or few) reservations about Muggles, Muggle-born wizards, etc.

There are more thoughts buzzing around in my head, but I think that's enough for now. 😅

[mask131]

So…I followed your advice in researching Greek Myths and learning them via the Authors. And uhm…I was curious because something bugged me.

Now I’m bad at history, but as far as I knew, Laurel Wreaths were mostly common in Rome, rather than Greece? (I could be wrong) so I had like a nagging feeling. And found out that the Daphne and Apollo myth (And probably also Hyacinthus I’m looking into that) was told in Ovid’s Metamorphosis? I could be wrong, so far I’ve only seen Ovid as the original author.

Sorry- I saw your post about Arachne and thought about what other myths were originally purely Roman then were mistaken for Greek Myths and wanted to add this into a possibility-

A LOT of stuff were invented by Ovid! Myself I learned only a month ago that Morpheus was "invented" by Ovid and I was like... wow. (There were dream-gods in Greek mythology, but they were not singularized, and the persona of Morpheus as the individual god of dreams was invented by Ovid)

Now, I don't know much about the specific use of laurel in Ancient Greece vs the Roman empire, but if you ask about the origin of the story of Daphne and Apollo, they are definitively Greek and Ovid did not invent her (though he told the story in a very, very different way).

The story of Daphne's numerous misadventures was recorded by Greek authors - and while it was quite late records, which would make us wonder if it isn't a late development or invention, they all rely on older sources attesting a presence of Daphne's legend for quite a long time. The two major records of Daphne's legend by Greeks are Pausanias' Description of Greece (2nd century CE), and Parthenius of Nicea's "Erotica Pathemata" (1st century BCE). BUT Pausanias explains that the legend he collects has been known for a very long time in the area around the Ladon river, to the point of implementing itself within the worship of Apollo, while Parthenius begins his story by pointing out he is merely retranscribing the text of older sources - a book from a 3rd century BCE historian named Phylarkhos, and an elegiac poem by Diodoros of Elaia. But given these two older texts were lost, we only have the latest record, hence this feeling of "novelty" when the story is actually at least around since the 3rd century BCE...

In fact, the existence of Daphne in Greek mythology long before Ovid's Metamorphoses is also proven by how massively different the Greek records of Daphne's life are from Ovid's tale. Everybody knows the story of Daphne through Ovid, since it was the most popular and widespread one... But both Pausanias and Parthenius report the same legend, which is very different from Ovid's rewrite.

In Ovid's tale, Daphne is said to have been Apollo's first love, and that the god's feelings were caused by Cupid as a way to take revenge after being mocked (Apollo, as a talented archer-god, mocked Cupid's own archery talents). Cupid shot a love-killing arrow in Daphne's heart so that the nymph would reject all forms of love, and she became "like Diana" - by refusing any form of marriage or romance, and fleeing the company of men and rejecting all her suitors, preferring the loneliness of the woods and the pleasure of the hunt - her father, the river-god, insisted on her giving him a son-in-law and grandchildren but she insisted she wanted to remain endlessly virgin like Diana. Meanwhile Apollo had received a love-inflamming arrow, one that not only caused a deep desire and mad love within the god for Daphne, but also made this attraction stronger and more obsessive each time the god saw the nymph. As such, Apollo tried all he could to please her and woo her and seduce her, but each time he tried the love-repelling spell on Daphne caused her to flee in fear and disgust and terror ; and the more she fled, the more Apollo found her beautiful and desirable, thanks to Cupid's curse ; and thus he followed her, but the more he pursued and insisted the more she fled. Their respective love and hate kept growing and growing until Daphne, exhausted and not wanting to flee anymore, stopped by the shore of her father the river-god and begged him to transform her so that her beauty would be gone, and she would not be loved anymore. Her father turned her into a laurel-tree, but it was no use, as Cupid's power as too strong: Apollo was still in love with the beauty and radiance of the tree, and he could feel Daphne's heart beating in the plant; and similarly Daphne's hate still lived on, as when Apollo embraced the tree and kissed its branches, the tree shivered and was repelled away from the god's body. But Apollo ultimately decided that if she could not be his bride, he would make Daphne his official tree and symbol - and to this, Daphne actually agreed as she offered her "leafy branches" to the god.

That's the Roman story of Daphne invented by Ovid. What is the difference with the Greek story he took inspiration from? (Because it is very clear that Ovid's source was the story twice told by Pausanias and Parthenius ; and told by others before whose name were lost...

1: In Ovid's story, Daphne simply admires and imitates Diana's behavior. In the Greek legend Daphne was ACTUALLY one of the huntresses of Artemis. Or to be more precise Parthenius explains that Artemis found Daphne "dear" to her because she shared the goddess' life-choices, refusing to live in cities, not hanging out with other girls, hunting in the mountains with a large pack of hounds... And Artemis loved Daphne so much she offered her a gift: she would always shoot straight at her target and never miss.

2: There's no Cupid/Eros in the Greek legend. Daphne is not Apollo's first love, she is not cursed with rejecting all love, he was not cursed to love her to insanity - this whole episode was invented by Ovid. Apollo is still in love with Daphne in the Greek legend, but it is just a regular love.

3: The Greek legend has a character that Ovid completely erased. Leucippus. Leucippus was another man who was in love with Daphne but knew that she was a lonely huntress closely linked to Artemis... Understanding he could not seduce her in a conventional way, Leucippus put up a convoluted plan to win the girl's heart. He dressed himself as a woman and created for himself a female persona. He approached Daphne and pretended to be a fellow huntress ; Daphne agreed to let her join her hunting party, and she soon grew to admire this bold, strong woman so unlike the other girls of Greece and whose strength and hunting talents far surpassed those of a common maiden... In fact she grew such affection and admiration for the fake-huntress that Daphne developed a dear and solid friendship with her: it was said she was always by Leucippus' side, refused to let Leucippus away from her, and kept embracing him/her and clinging to his/her body. However, since Apollo was also in love with Daphne he grew both jealous and angry (since, as the god of truth, he knew of Leucippus' deceit), and decided to reveal the truth. He implanted in Daphne's mind the idea that she had to bathe in a given stream: she went there with her "attendant maidens" and female servants/fellow huntresses (Daphne is never said explicitely to be part of the huntresses of Artemis, but she herself lives in a group of "wild women" very similar to Artemis' huntresses so... it is strongly implied she is one of them, especially since she literaly lives like the goddess and has been gifted by her). Leucippus of course refused to bathe, despite the other girls' insistence, and since he refused still, they tore his clothes away from him... discovering he was a man all along. And since this group of women act on a Artemis' huntress logic, they did what seemed the most reasonable thing to do... kill Leucippus by plunging in his body all of their spears.

4: The Greek legend does agree that Daphne begged a third-party god to turn her into the laurel tree to escape Apollo's love-hunt, but the details are different from Ovid's tale and the story is more lacking in explanations... All we know, from Parthenius' record is that Apollo appeared to Daphne right after Leucippus was killed. Why? We don't know, but he clearly came to profit off the fact his romantic rival had been killed in shame/crime, and that he had a part to play in the "reveal" of Leucippus' deceit... But all we know is that Daphne fled Apollo, and he pursued her, and to avoid being caught by him she begged to be hidden from his sight, and thus she was turned into a laurel tree. But in the Greek legend she doesn't beg her father the river-god... she begs Zeus, and he is the one who grants her request and protects her from his own son.

Things are even worse in Pausanias' record, since he stops after Leucippus death and there is no story of Apollo hunting down Daphne in any way... He doesn't even speak of any metamorphosis ; and yet he does mention that Daphne was associated with the laurel, and that the heavy use of laurel in Apollonian rituals and games was because of the god's love for Daphne. (But from yet other sources contemporary to Pausanias' writings, such as the "Life of Apollonius of Tyana", we know that the story of Daphne being somehow "replaced" by a laurel-tree was well-known, though it wasn't always said why such a thing happened)

In conclusion, as usual with how Ovid tweaks the Greek legends, it is interesting to see how he shift the character and what the character is supposed to be about. Thanks to Ovid the image we keep of Daphne is the one of a victim fleeing in fright and fear, and her relationship with Apollo is depicted as a frightening and cruel tragedy orchestrated by Cupid... And yet, we do know that Daphne started out as a badass huntress of Artemis, and that her original story was about a man changing his gender in hope of winning her heart - to the point the involvment of Apollo was seen as a side-detail that could be omitted (Pausanias even claims that Apollo's involvment in the legend was an addition by the priests of the god, and not present in the main folktale)

Mind you I am not at all an expert on Daphne's character or story - and I am sure others are more informed than me... But that's the few things I know

[zahri-melitor]

Dark Nights: Death Metal:

Well, this was an event that accomplished what it was intended to do (set up Infinite Frontier) but also was incredibly full of itself and self-referential. You know when you go into a story and the story itself has tie-ins making fun of how overblown this all is, it probably should have been reined in harder.

I do think there were some cool designs in this story, but the problem was that a lot of it was purely hung up on aesthetic, rather than any level of in-universe reasoning. The redesigns exist for the Rule of Cool, not for any storytelling reason. There wasn't any real consistency to who had a redesign and who did not. Which, when you're dealing with a full-DC universe event that is busy talking about COIE, Infinite Crisis, Dark Crisis and Dark Nights: Metal, means several characters were already appearing in multiple costumes when talking about the earlier events, making things even harder to track (for one example, Mary Marvel appeared as a tiny background image in both her red and her white costumes in a double page spread, because she wore different ones in different Crises. This is both attention to detail but also something that is going to confuse people). On top of this, Greg Capullo being the artist on the main book meant that there was no hope of telling characters apart by facial features, which when you've changed someone's costume and hair style, makes life even more difficult.

I also think part of the problem and clear reliance on the Rule of Cool was that, after inventing a whole Justice League of evil Batmen for Dark Nights: Metal, none of them other than The Batman Who Laughs did anything in this event other than sort of decorate the scenery. You spent an event and series of one-shots designing these characters 2-3 years ago and they're not even being used, in favour of newer Evil Batmen versions? And event TBWL gets a whole makeover and redesign by getting his brain implanted in a Dr Manhattan clone body. Like, what is the point in getting invested in these characters.

Why does Diana have blue-ombre hair and an invisible magic chainsaw. Why would Diana want to have an invisible magic chainsaw. What about Diana's character, the diplomat, peace advocate and negotiator, suggests her approach in this situation would be to feel she needed to have a chainsaw as her main weapon. This is the sort of problem the event's dealing with.

I think it was an epic-scale event, but the main emotion I had coming out of it was 'I don't care' in regards to all the fighting. I don't care about there being a Batman-version of every single possible hero and villain across the Multiverse and Dark Multiverse. I don't think it provides an angle for particularly interesting commentary, and the event didn't even properly dig in and interrogate what this means about how DC as a company leans into the Bat franchise above all others.

The Batman Who Laughs' first appearance in the entire event was explicitly saying "I know you're tired of me but look you're back reading me again!" and it's like...thanks, genre-savvy Joker!Batman, but I'm not actually here or interested in reading this for you. I'm working through this story to see what particular strings are being pulled to change future storytelling.

I think when you look at some of the structural moving parts of the event, such as the various links of previous big events to damaging the Source Wall, how that led to Perpetua getting free, and the process of saving and rebuilding the Multiverse, the discussions of where they’re taking the now Omniverse, there was an interesting epic plot under everything being used to justify the moves wanted from the event. The intent to shake-up the status quo and restore more of post-Crisis in characters' memories was something that had been drifting around DC for several years at that point, with some characters explicitly getting post-Crisis memories back via various means.

But it's such layers of 'doesn't this look rad? I think it does!' on top of the bits of plot I actually cared about.

I think there was some more interesting work done in various tie-ins and backups as writers used the space to interrogate some ideas (or in the case of Joshua Williamson, get on with the Wally West Rehabilitation Project). I have a soft spot for using the setting to allow some people to have necessary conversations they would otherwise avoid. And I’m a sucker for a good splash page full of a dozen different variants of the Titans over the decades.

But oh it was the sort of giant event where it felt designed to fuel comic book debates. Why is Sgt Rock here as narrator? Because we’re including everyone! Even though I think most active fans of the character are probably in their dotage now, we have to include all our different facets and genres. Including the old military comics.

I know I’m usually more positive than this, and look I did get emotional in the final quarter of the story, as everyone but especially Diana prepared to sacrifice their lives.

I just feel there was a lot of red herrings and page time wasted on concept art that was ultimately meaningless.

[glubby-guppiez]

*I MADE A TMNT AU [WIP]

*cw: typing quirk

*Oroku family info

*Basic synopsis

*Turtles are from a zoo in Guatemala

*The turtles are Central American Snapping Turtles

*They were stolen and mutated by Baxter Stockman

*Baxter Stockman is the main villain and the turtles work to stop him because he is too far gone and has hurt so many people and creatures in his quest for vast knowledge and is completely apathetic

*)(amato + Foot clan does not affect the story

*The turtles + Splinter lived in Guatemala until they met April and then they moved to New York to go after Stockman

*The turtles start off as regular mutant turtles, but early on during the events of the AU, get mutated further into dragons (friends idea)

*Character Info

*Shared info about the turtles

*Central American Snapping Turtles *All were originally named by the zoo *When they are mutated into dragons, their heights increased *The mutation process was very painful *Wings grew out of their backs and broke their shells at the top where the wings grew *Knows/speaks/writes in Spanish and English *Keeps their original weapons *Learned ninjitsu and self defense similarly to Mutant Mayhem and Bayverse via books and videos but also by watching humans at the dojo that is right above where they live

*Michelangelo

*)(e/)(im Cis male *5'11" (Pre-Dragon) *7'2" (Post-Dragon) *Very muscular build *Lost one of his right toes *Wears cheap gym shorts and an orange sweater around his shoulders that soon turns into his mask after he mutates into a dragon (tears off a sleeve) *Nunchaku on belt *Stickers on shell, including an anime sticker Raphael put on as a joke that won't come off *Old mask had the iconic Mikey short tails *Gay *The Leader *Optimist *Actually good at strategizing *Tries to stay energetic and joyful even when it's inappropriate *A little bit insensitive tbh *Not entirely on purpose he just doesn't understand why everyone isn't happy-go-lucky and constantly optimistic like he is *#1 Cheerleader *Tries to keep good relationships with his family *Very loving and supportive of them *Learning empathy is part of his character development *Mondo Gecko becomes a love interest for him later on

*Madonna (Donatello)

*She/)(er Transfem changed name *6'4" (Pre-Dragon) *7'6" (Post-Dragon) *Largest and most muscular turtle because of her Bo training and mechanical handling *Wears skirts and an apron with lots of storage, including a large tool belt *Steal's Raph's clothes even though they are small on her *Paint splats on shell *Braided mask tails *When everyone's masks broke because of the second mutation, she made everyone but Mikey new ones (Mikey immediately tore up his sweater and made a new mask) *Straight *Group inventor *Not very good at organizing her thoughts and explaining her inventions, and tech is always very messy and hard to follow *Personality is like Rise!Donnie but toned down *Doesn't really get mad but sulky *Very bad grammar *Often butts heads with 'Nardo *)(as a large bo collection and only uses her least favorites and never the ones she really likes unless she has to *Small crush on CJ in the beginning (purely one-sided and goes away after a while)

Leonardo

*)(e/)(im Cis male *5'8" (Pre-Dragon) *6'7" (Post-Dragon) *More scrawny and lanky than the rest of the group *Was effected the most by the second mutation out of the group appearance wise *Wears comfortable loose clothes like hoodies and sweatpants *Plain, long tail mask *Wore glasses before second mutation *)(as a dragon carved onto his lower shell (he begged asked Madonna to do it) *AroAce *Main intel of the group *Very observant *Non verbal and writes everything that comes to mind in these journals called: "Big Book of 'Nardo Thoughts" and hopes to publish them one day. *Thinks he should've been the leader *Geography nerd *Otaku

Raphael

*She/)(er Cis female *5'4" (Pre-Dragon) *7'4" (Post-Dragon) *Muscular but chubby build *Wears feminine clothing mainly jeans and crop tops but also skirts and dresses *Mask tied into a nice bow *Madonna put nail polish drawings on her shell *Paints hers and Mikey's nails *Lesbian *Sassy like 1987 Raphael *Very girly and feminine *Very protective of her family *Does have rage strength *A voice of wisdom/reason *Still kind of childish *)(angs out with Splinter a lot *Gets a girlfriend named Marilyn

Splinter

*)(e/)(im Cis male *5'6" *47 *Bushy-tailed Woodrat *Wears a dirty ass expensive silk bathrobe that he stole from a human that he WILL NOT take off *Raph likes to style his fur *Straight ally *Only knows Spanish *Reads a lot and taught the turtles how to read *Great cook *Mediocre dad *Was taken from his own parents at an early age so he has no clue how to parent outside of instinct and books *He's trying he goes to the PTA meetings he goes to them/ref *Brought home a whole bunch of girl books for Madonna when she came out to him *Praises Mikey for his optimism *Adores 'Nardo's writing *Wants a wife so bad

Baxter Stockman

*TW FOR MENTIONS OF ABUSE *)(e/)(im Cis Male *5'5" (Pre mutation) *6'4" (Post mutation) *56 *Black and Brazilian *Buzz cut (Pre mutation) *Skinny build (Pre mutation) *Becomes a fly mutant *Much more muscular post mutation *)(air grows out *Kind of looks like Super Fly *Wears stereotypical lab gear *Questioning AroAce *Very devoted to his work *Abused and neglected his wife (April's mom) and daughter (April O'Neil) *Made the turtles, Shredder, Splinter, and other mutants *Everyone )(ATES him *Rightfully so *)(e uses mech suits to fight like 2012 him in season 1 *CJ is his pupil early on *Kind of a bitch to CJ *Sadistic *This man gets very uncomfortable to be around after he's mutated *Like bro wanting disect and study every living thing he comes across after the mutation *Throws a fit when he's wrong about something *Has a deep desire to be all knowing

April O'Neil

*She/They/It Demigirl *5'8" *19 *Afro Latina *She has dark brown hair styled in afro puffs *Skinny but athletic build *Sports a black and yellow track suit with a white undershirt *Bisexual *Daughter of Baxter Stockman *Tech whiz *Madonna's best friend *Big sister figure to the turtles *Grew up in Guatemala and moved to New York with the turtles and Splinter shortly after meeting them *)(er dad's #1 hater *Fluent in Spanish *Knows English, but it's rough *Uses a gun *Dating Karai

Casey Jones (CJ)

*They/)(e/It Nonbinary (fine with gender neutral or masculine terms) *5'2" *17 *White *)(as that 2000's mid length emo boy haircut *Wears Jeans + Band tee and a lab coat *Main inspo from 2012 Casey design wise *Omniromantic (pref for men) Asexual *Kind of wimpy and doesn't fight *Mainly uses mousers and other robots *Stockman's pupil until he joins up with the turtles *Works alongside 'Nardo and Madonna *Genuinely scared of Mikey *Grew up in New York *Failed Art Class and will have to repeat highschool they are so salty about this it is not even *Geek loser *Main personality inspo from '87 and 2012 Stockman

*I will write about more characters later and more lore but rn this is all you get. If you wanna see specific characters or if you have any questions, feel free to ask me my ask box is open!

[klausysworld]

can you make fluff alphabet for yandere klaus mikaelson

Yandere Klaus fluff alphabet:

🥀Activities

Klaus would have a range of activities for you to indulge in, he loved to get involved with it so you could be closer to him, feel a little more comfortable with him. Having things to do made you happier and he cherished you smile

🥀Beauty

Klaus is constantly telling you just how beautiful you are, he’ll pepper your face with kisses and hold your hands to his chest while whispering words of admiration

🥀Comfort

Most of the time he’s the reason you’re upset but he still tries to comfort you, it often ends up being him holding you as tight as he can without hurting you until you calm down and relax in his arms

🥀Dreams

He want’s to have kids with you. He would find a witch to see if it was possible and once he found out he could? He practically pounced on you, he wanted you to mother his children, wanted you to be swollen with his babies.

🥀Equal

nothing about your relationship is equal. He has every ounce of power hanging over you head at all times. You don’t do anything without his say so, go nowhere without him, you only really speak when he persuades you to answer him

🥀Fights

He yells a lot. He can see you as ungrateful sometimes, he doesn’t understand why you are unhappy with his love. Sometimes he gets carried away and will do something harmful to either somebody you love or accidentally hurt you in a fit of rage, he will apologise for this. Tell you he’s sorry and he loves you, he doesn’t ever want to see you cry again

🥀Gratefulness

Klaus was so very grateful to whatever higher power there may be for allowing someone as pure and enchanting as you to roam the earth. He would tell you how lucky he is to have found you and that’s why he keeps you so safe

🥀Honesty

Well you’re never going anywhere so he has no reason to lie to you but some things he’ll hold back so that you aren’t entirely petrified

🥀Inspiration

yea no you kinda bring out the best and worst in him? Like he’ll be soft and loving towards you but it makes him a million times more deadly to anyone who even looks you way

🥀Jealousy

He invented the word. He’s possessive and jealous over anything. Someone breaths the same air as you and he’s dragging you out the room. He gets jealous of everything, doesn’t matter if its a book or a word search because he wants you to pay that much attention to him not a stupid story, he tells much better ones

🥀Kisses

He enjoys to leave love bites all over your jaw, neck, chest and thighs although nobody will ever see those ones. He kisses you every opportunity you give him. Sometimes you wont kiss him for days so when you do he’ll have him tongue down you throat and exploring as much as he could before you would cry out from lack of oxygen

🥀Love confession

well… he sorta just always loved you. He saw you, he loved you. He kidnapped you and immediately told you he loved you and that meant you were his and you had to stay with him in his house in his room in order to be safe and happy.

🥀Marriage

Klaus would definitely marry you. You in an elegant white dress promising to be his forever is his goal. A ring that bounds you for eternity and is proof of your love

🥀Nicknames

Love, Sweetheart, Angel, Sweet one, My lovely, Doll, Baby, Princess, Darling, My girl

anything to reming you you’re his really

🥀On cloud nine

He would keep you and his feelings hidden from others. Elijah only got suspicious when Niklaus locked his door even when he wasn’t in there, the room was soundproofed and not even his hybrids went close to it. Rebekah endlessly tried to set Klaus up with people but he only ever wanted you

🥀PDA

well you never really go out in public so its not much of an issue but on the rare occasion you do then he will never let you go, he’ll kiss you in-front of as many people as possible so they know you’re his, your hand in his, arm around you and head in your hair

🥀Questions

He doesn’t have a lot of questions for you as he found out as much about you as possible before capturing you but sometimes he’ll ask you about your dreams or how you were as a child so that he can head your voice

🥀Romance

If you behave he’s the sweetest, champagne is a treat and so are heart shaped chocolates, endless amounts of red roses and perfumes that he knows you like. Dinner dates and candle light baths. He wants you to feel appreciated

🥀Support

He supports your life, you could be dead without him you know? Any worries you have will be eliminated and sorted ASAP

🥀Thrill

Klaus likes to know where you are, what you’re doing and what’s happening tomorrow he doesn’t want to feel nervous or anything. Days when you’re responsive and kind are thrilling enough

����Understanding

Why are you so sad? why can’t you love him? why won’t you accept his love? why are you crying? stop getting mad! why must you block all of his advances? Klaus will never understand your reasoning

🥀Value

if something happened to you Klaus would absolutely loose it. Your life means more than anything to exist ever. Your love is sacred and your body is to be worshipped. You hold more value than all the treasures in the world

🥀Wild card

Klaus will do skin care routines with you, he knows you enjoy having the face masks on and doing you nails so he’ll paint them for you and let you use a roller on his face as you cleans his skin

🥀XOXO

Hugs are a must, normally from behind so you can’t protest much but often you’ll return his hugs and let his snuggle you closer. Kisses are heavily wanted, he craved your lips and loves when you grant him the opportunity to claim them

🥀Yearning

He always wants to be with you. You’re on his mind 24/7 and he would happily move underground and have you and your little family together forever

🥀Zzzz

Klaus has to be touching you when you sleep, Spooning, on top of you so you cant leave, you held against his chest, head on your stomach, any way he can be holding you really

[whiteeyes-is-a-mad-scientist]

Big sci fi lore dump

@mango-water I never pass up an opportunity to explain my sci fi lore. I tried to sort the images into groups to better explain.

(first 5 images) So big chunk of this world started with an oc named plum who i made very quickly before a comic class. She works with the 7 vulpes who kinda keep the whole universe running. Shes from a planet that has been destroyed and she doesnt remember much of. The 7 vulpes work within our solar system as it is the least populated so staying hidden is easy, the hall of fox (5th photo) hides nicely here. Plum is the newest member as Neptune, her teacher, disappeared. The others arent fond of this as plum doesnt quite know what shes doing yet. Plums main weapon is a button that holds a bunch of evil creature souls, these souls bend and morph into any weapon she needs. While helpful this almost makes her greatest enemy the god of monsters (not shown in any images) Her other enemy is currently her husband Walter (3rd photo) as after the destruction of his planet and what he thought was the loss of his wife he fell to evil influences. Hes currently on a path of pure destruction and is loosing himself, he doesnt even know the hero who keeps stopping him is plum.

(images 6-9, slighty shown in image 12) Sun dogs! The strongest protectors of the galaxy... or at least they were before they grew so distant that many think of them as only legend now. Sun dogs are women from all planets and world chosen by the stars (a goddess like figure but she prefers not to be referred to as such, thinking of her as a mom is much prefered) Most of these sun dogs live on a hidden planet named Olvora but some like Elanor (girl in the 12th image and comic at the bottom) grow up on different planets and make their way to Olvora later. The queens (image 7) Lo'uk yel and Puk na' ashaya (names are from a vulcan name generator i have not made a language for the sun dogs yet lol) teenage friends turned lovers. Lo showed great leadership and skill quickly becoming the previous queens apprentice. Lo gained popularity quickly and Puk felt she needed to impress lo too, so she hopped in the ring and sadly bit off more than she could chew. It did lead to her confessing feelings tho. The two have a very professional royalty look but behind closed doors they still have a lot of alien cats and giggle over movies n romance books. Some other notable sun dogs include the blue robot lady (image 9, whos name i still need to pick out) she was badly injured and thought she had lost the ability to shift into her sun dog form forever but with some help from a cyborg she was able to regain the spirit she needed. The trapped sun dog (image 6, also needs a name) a long forgotten warrior who was captured a long time ago. She now powers a ship with a mysterious captain whos not up to anything good. Lastly theres the torn one whom we will get into later

(images 10 and 11) Sonia and Ovvus. Sonia was the first human to make contact with others. Her first contact being with Ovvus a head scientist and communications officer on one of system x's many exploring fleets. The two are how the other planets got info on humans and how humans got info on the other planets. Earths government isnt very fond of system x nor the other planets and has stayed to itself, while many humans have left the planet and moved due to distrust in the earthly government. (on earth everything has kinda melded into one government and if you have money you have the loudest voice in choices. Many have found that exploration, invention, and creativity have haulted in favor of profit.) The two recently had a son, Orion, which has become everything their life revlolves around. The two rarely go on months long exploration jobs any more and stay on Torbin in their little farm home.

(images 12-14) System X! A big piece of the entire lore. All started on lined paper in my sophmore year math class. The mother planet (the biggest one) has the other 4 planets revolving around it. in order: Geutune (the dusty eye), Torbin (the green planet), Dostruga (the hungry giant), and Zinus (the icy planet). each unique in there own way. The system of planets moves throughout the universe absorbing stars, destroying enemy fleets with ease, and overall being a pretty intimidating force. Thankfully leadership on system x has always kept fair and does its best to provide for its citizens. Each planet has a ruler but those rulers report to the sovereign on the mother planet. Most if not all of the rulers have a council elected by the citizens of each planet.

(images 15-18) Qex are originally from the mother planet and are still the most populous on the planet. When designing them they had a opossum and nebula influence. Zets originate from Geutune. Their legs are built for sand and speed which comes in handy on the dusty planet constantly whipped by wind. As you can tell they are very rabbit based lol. Drok originate from Dostruga and they had a dragon and octopus inflence. Dostruga has a lot of giant creatures and plants making muscles and extra appendages a must. Drok use their tendril hair to express and pick up things often. Thron originate from Zinus. was thinking about unicorns and horses when making them. They often have a lot of hair to keep warm on the icy planet, the extra claws help to grab onto snow, and their horns can glow when they need light. (not pictured below) but the Tez'le originate from torbin. They have anntenna and 4 arms. Very bug based to match their plant covered planet

(images 19-21) Some concept pieces of various things. Otherworldly battle horses with sci fi armor. Sun eaters, a species of mindless beasts that devour suns. A big threat to the universe as they are giant and unstoppable. The only known weakness they have is sun dogs. Usually these beasts are solitary so they dont pose too much of a threat other than the occassional attack on a sun that is warming a planet, but in groups they are very destructive. Walter, plums husband, is currently pushing these beasts toward each other, creating a giant hoard of them. Theres no telling how many stars this group will be able to devour. A dragon warship. The concept art was made for a different planets warship but it might become a design for a system x style one

(all the last images) A comic I made in my last comic class i could attend. its a 12 page thing so I couldnt fit it all here but this is where the sun dog plot line is currently left off. The torn one is a sun dog general who was sucked into a blackhole but managed to escape its grasp. not without injury though. Her features were enlongated and her old heroic leader self was gone. The general turned on her troops and destroyed them all. She was unable to be stopped due to her unstable core which could go supernova any second. Elanor wasnt fully aware of this and fought the sun dog anyways. The battle worked up the torn one enough that her core couldnt sustain her and blew up.

OK THATS ALL MY RAMBLING FOR TODAY lmao im so sorry there is so much and its a big ol mess rn

plus theres so many other little tid bits that I didnt include 😭🙏

[atyd1960]

Marauders era characters and the conspiracy theory they wholeheartedly believed in:

Sirius- told anybody who cared to listen that airplanes were magical, he refused to believe that Muggles were capable of inventing a giant heavy metal can with wings that carried hundreds of people through the air without the assistance of the wizarding world.

Remus- not sure if it’s a conspiracy theory but he did claim time and time again that Jesus was a homosexual, James and Sirius believed it to be cannonicly accurate and didn’t understand why Lily and Mary always acted so weird whenever it was brought up.

Marlene- she refused to believe that America was real.

Dorcas- was obsessed with Atlantis, believed it to be a real place, claimed to have evidence (it was mainly just a lot of history books quotes taken out of context).

James- he thought aliens built the Pyramids.

Lily- strongly believed the government was secretly experimenting on repressed magical creatures (such as Giants and house elfs), she was livid and people were scared to bring up this subject around her.

Mary- she didn’t believe dragons were real, Alice took her to see them during the summer break between 5th-6th year, Mary stood her ground and claimed them to be a social experiment created by the government. (She believed Unicorns and Thestrals were real, it’s just dragons she was being weird about. No one got it.)

Alice- she believed dragons were an intelligent species that would one day rise up and take over the world. She wasn’t mad about it.

Bertha Jorkins- she had an inexplicable fear of ants, and she was sure they will one day gather together and take control of the planet. She claimed there’s nothing humans can do stop them because ants are invaluable to life on earth.

Emmeline Vance- she was 100% sure everyone’s turning into crabs. She was terrified.

Peter- he believed vaccines contained microchip tracking chips and that muggles are a little dumb for taking them and inevitably giving all their info to the government (he was a pure blood who never got vaccinated in his life and no one understood where he got that idea from.)

Regulus- he fully and unironically believed cats have nine lives. I’m not sure how it played out in his day to day life but I know it was somehow significant.

Sybil Trelawney and Pandora Lovegood- they just kinda believed in all of them?

Snape- was a flatearther

[lostdrarryfics]

I thought I would comment to try and find this fanfic since it's been in my head for a while.

Have you ever heard of a post war fic where Draco has to help Harry with a dark magic addiction before Harry goes crazy (not actually, he doesn't really go crazy but it's a thing that can happen, I believe at one point "just look at happened with Aunt Bella/Bellatrix, Draco says a spell in one scene to cleanse Harry of dark magic use (it's a Latin spell I believe to cleanse the soul or body of dark magic, that pure-bloods invented to try to prevent you from going crazy), Draco tries to make him stay in Malfoy Manor but Harry rebels and only stays a short time or on a weekend (as in Draco makes him and he leaves back to grimmauld place during the night or something.) Anyway Harry ended up going back to the place he lived (12, Grimmauld place) and getting obsessed with dark magic again even though Draco had burned the library to the ground but Harry had some books on a book shelf in his office that he stashed so he could continue doing dark magic and rituals while Draco wasn't around, also I think the golden trio was estranged from each but there was no bashing. (Let me say just to be very clear, I don't remember him bashing anyone, there could have been bashing but if there was it's not something memorable).

Infact, I believe that Hermione is the one who contacted Draco about Harry's condition and maybe they weren't estranged but Ron and Hermione were looking for her parents, I don't remember a lot since it's been so long since I last read it.

We believe you are looking for Ancient and Noble Houses by Lomonaaeren (80k, M)

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[bilbobagginsomebabez]

i love kendrick lamar so much for how clearly he sees rap and how intentional his actions are when it comes to upholding and honoring it. the drake diss saga is so fascinating to me because that's exactly what he did AGAIN.

rap is the most intellectual and literary genre of music because in no other genre does the musician also assume the role of speaker, of orator. it's a speech that's also a poem that's also a song that's also often a history--a tool to raise consciousness, to give voice to and teach its information-starved people what harm was done and sometimes chart a path to undoing it. and you can dance to it! it's multipurposed and embedded in the daily life of the culture that created it, using the full complexity of music as technology for a communication highway. if rap was a car and i slapped it on the hood, it would be to express "there's so much going on under here, i don't think anybody understands all of it, but goddamn does she go so so so fucking fast." I genuinely believe that we should respect and interact with it as an oral history tradition. perhaps early in its development, but it's not just another type of music.

and lamar loves rap like rap loves lamar; rap is his perfect ecological niche and his presence strengthens the ecosystem in turn. in interviews, he talks about the wordplay, assembling bars and songs like puzzles, literally playing with the meanings and how the words influence each other. embedding different messages that require you to listen to it over and over to catch all the meanings, that require it to age with along you and accrue its true depth in your mind as you accrue experience and comprehension. i couldn't imagine a more involved and complex demonstration of pure literary skill or a mind more suited to take the challenge and treat it like his elementary school playground.

whole fuckin books could be written about Euphoria, Meet the Grahams, and Not like Us individually. like Not Like Us is the least complex of all of them and it's STILL this perfect distillation of the soul of hiphop. a club track on a classic west coast beat denouncing an injustice/exploitation and affirming the values of its people while describing and educating on a historical context of extraction. the others hit a different height of the genre or create a new one. euphoria is a classically great song that gets better in the aftermath of the battle when lines that didn't make sense are revealed to be direct statements about future events. the complexity of the wordplay and the strategy it describes epitomize the competitiveness and sport of the genre.

in meet the grahams, kendrick invented the epistolary diss in order to double a diss track as an evocation of Black generational trauma. he ripped drake's character to shreds by addressing every member of his family and explaining the ways in which uniquely Black trauma that drake ignores and preys on and extracts is destroying his own soul and his family. how his lack of respect and connection to his people translate to a lack of respect and connection to himself, to disconnection from his children that they will have to puzzle over and recover from in their own adulthood. demonstrating its cyclical nature, and how vicious that cycle is. enunciating through drake the step by step process of generational trauma caused by rejection and alienation, building a bed of empathy and comprehension for the listener while denouncing drake for the cowardice and betrayal of his response to it, for his selfishness and decision to hand the trauma down again. by addressing it first to adonis, showing both how necessary and culturally embedded it is to step in and provide mentorship when parents are dropping the ball.

a lot of the reactions were almost scared by it and immediately distanced themselves from it. someone on dead end hip hop said "he's talking directly to drake, he's not talking to us anymore." (around the same time as he had his head in his hands and said "i think this might help this dude.... later" which made me laugh so hard i cried.) but kendrick is so much smarter than that. it's not just for drake. it's a mirror to the pain and dissonance that made drake, the culture that allowed drake, and the living futures he and men like him destroy.

and i haven't even talked about the music. how embedded his music is in Black art, how he pulls forward greats from previous musical eras like George Clinton and embeds the literal soundscape of Black musical history. it's incredible. this isn't to say other genres of music are worse in any way. music doesn't need to be a song that's also 17 other things in a trench coat. rap just did something else that we haven't begun to really take stock of. and tbh i think it's fun to have somebody run circles around you when you can admire the sheer awe-inspiring skill of the loops.

[halothenthehorns]

Spoilery goodness on TSatS below!

I want to preface this by saying I've never been active in the PJO fandom before when something first came out. His books have always been on and off my radar every five years or so since I was in middle school and I binge read to catch up then move on to something else, but since I've been actively writing fanfiction for these books lately, here are my first, fresh thoughts.

First the good!

I actually really liked Will was a big ol' doofus damsel in distress. Not everybody needs to be a big action hero and 'useful' on a quest. Will was there purely for moral support because Nico was going back to a most dreaded place, and he fulfilled that roll with moderate success while the two worked on their issues. I will now forever laugh at Care Bare Powers activate, and Will punning his own name and just being happy to be along was all I wanted from him.

I don't know why anybody would say him and Nico were ooc. You do know characters adapt and change over time, right? Of course Nico's going to be slightly different than before, this is the first book we've ever seen him actively trying to be happy.

I did laugh at some parts, I did have whole chunks of chapters were I was invested and curious what was going to happen, and I can not say enough how much I love Bob and Small Bob!

The Gorgyra's parts were some of my favorite, I can't help but laugh there was a scenic route through Tartarus on the happy friendship boat by sharing memories, and that's what I really wanted out of this book. A little background on these boys, a good promise of their future, and that is exactly what I got.

The Cocoa Puffs are a hilarious addition and I hope Nico and Will name every one of them and they make terrifying additions in continuing novels.

It wasn't a great shock or twist or anything he left his darkness behind. I half expected it to be their treasured objects that were invented for this book, so the fact that it was instead a piece of Nico he always clung to was a fairish way out of it without having to dramatically kill somebody, or break up Solangelo, or worse, make it Bob.

Chapter 24 was probably my favorite. I really loved Persephone's talk with Will;

but this chapter also kind of highlights some of my bad.

I really get why a lot of people are saying it reads like preachy bad fanfiction. Persephone could have shown up and had that talk with Will without the whole, oh if somebody's forcing you to be in a bad relationship you should runaway as fast as possible detail.

There's whole chunks of the book like that.

I was genuinely bored on some of it, Epiales  nightmares went on way to long when a first grader could figure out that's what was going on from the moment they reached the bottom the first time and mysteriously found their way at the top with a 'shadow' lurking behind them.

I like the sidequesty idea, the RR books had always been bad about doddling around to get to the real meat of the story with his sidequests and exploring more of the Underworld is always fun. The update on Geryon getting a boyfriend made me freeze up and mind blank for a good minute in shock, so I'll give it that.

I don't know, I think a good sideplot would have helped some of the structure problems. I've never written my own novel, I'm not going to pretend to think I can and should fix this, just my first thought.

The almost last bit where it was Hades who put all this together was another good example of why this was kind of cringe but mostly in line with the general RR series. The gods can never be OOC because they're gods. They can do whatever they want from book to book and it's just their mood for that moment. Hades breaking his rules to give Nico a moment with Bianca and Bianca (that's not a typo) was a sweet gesture and him using his son to get Bob out because his yelling got to loud was sweet and amusing.

But then they didn't do anything with the moment. It was just a quick shot, Bianca (actual Bianca) barley even got to say anything, and it was just over :( You spent whole pages of them just walking around like a Tolkien novel, you couldn't have given a little more emotion to Nico finally getting to talk to his mother and sister for the last time...

My only major complaint was the camp.

Dionysus was OOC. Him just sporadically being a good counselor and listening to Nico and caring is just, so, ugh. Not everybody needs to be nice and sweet and rainbows. I don't care I'm contradicting myself, Dionysus was written in previous books to care about the kids but in his own salty way about being stuck there, you didn't have to make him share his popcorn.

Chiron's always been like that. Oh, another big bad prophecy where my campers are off to do the most dangerous and world perilous things?

Cool, yeah, I'll be over here teaching archery, have fun with that.

The fact that there were no campers was?! I call absolute bull the 80-100+ kids that are supposedly there all have happy homes lives they went off to. Why would you even want to write it like the place was empty and barren? I wasn't even hoping for more OC and intense background, just a little casual time of Nico being accepted in camp which we only got on the first pages and then- Just, so much, !?

Thing two was Piper getting the check-up call at the end instead of Reyna. Yes authors, highlight the recently found out gay chick instead of Reyna Avila Ramírez-Arellano, Jason's best friend you keep forgetting existed and is now possibly exploring her Aro/Ace life with the Hunters and Jason's sister Thalia! This choice just personally infuriated me because I want a Hunters book sooooo bad, and I was desperately hoping when the scene started we were going to get a 'jump off' point for them like this book was at the end of ToA

If we get a Piper book next, maybe I'll get lucky and it'll be a team up book wit them, but I am not holding my breath at this rate.

5/10, would only recommend to hardcore RR fans. Will probably reread again someday, but years from now when I convince myself it might not have been as bland as I remember it.

[billconrad]

The Subject of Death

    Death has been present on our planet since the first single-cell organism, and our reaction to this inevitable circumstance ranges from fear, acceptance, enjoyment, and worst of all, infliction. Of course, writers tap into this subject with gusto because death represents so many extreme attributes. “Do this, or you will die!” “Are you willing to risk your life?” “Sam died to protect us.” “Jane allowed her child to die to satisfy her strong beliefs.” An author could base an entire book on one of those sentences.

    At the other end of the spectrum, we have characters who do their best to avoid death. “I walk every day and eat healthy.” Then, some people seem oblivious to the subject. For example, I recently read the book Frozen Hell by William Trotter, which is about the Russian-Finland war. In a single battle, Joseph Stalin ordered 27,500 Russian soldiers to fight a hopeless battle, and they all perished. Why? To get some land. So pointless.

    Death spans the story spectrum from comic relief to horror story nightmare fuel. We even created an entire branch of science (medicine) to keep death at bay and another branch (the mortuary) to preserve our dead bodies. There is even the pseudoscience of freezing people hoping to be brought back to life.

    Authors often revolve their plots around death and even invented physics-defying concepts, such as immortals, ghosts, daemons, werewolves, vampires, and zombies. That’s correct. Authors have successfully cheated death. They even take it a step further with time travel. A character can see they are about to die, go back in time, and speak to themselves so they prevent their death.

    Fortunately, there is no such thing as time travel and zombies—pure fiction. So, can an author transport those 27,500 Russian soldiers into the future to save their lives? Yup. However, once the reader puts that book down, those brave soldiers return to their graves. Then, the fiction author will review the historical documents and write another groundbreaking book to entertain new readers. This time, the Russian soldiers turned into zombies.

    Even I am guilty of snatching death from the grim reaper’s icy cold grasp. In my first book, the main character is a 500-year-old woman who survives by killing others and harvesting their organs. Am I taunting death? Seems like it.

    We love fictional characters who take a hard slap at death. The recent famous vampire and zombie stories explored such characters. Video games take this further and allow players to kill other characters. The screen vividly displays the opponent’s deaths by splattering blood all over the screen as if death’s hand is grasping the joystick.

    Even non-fiction writers appreciate a good battle scene. In the book Frozen Hell, death is studied, glorified, and given a new perspective. Why would somebody want to glorify death by writing all about it? Good stories sell books, and book sales pay the author’s rent. Well, at least that is a worthy goal (that I have yet to experience).

    On a personal level, I fear death. I want to experience all I can out of life and do my best to be healthy. Yet, I am curious. What will happen when I die? Science tells us our cells will stop functioning and decay into dust. Religion, hope, and pseudoscience provide an alternative view. This included reincarnation, heaven, hell, and the afterlife. According to that logic, I can meet Amelia Earhart, which would be amazing.

    I spend a lot of time thinking about death. This includes avoiding danger, embracing the topic in writing, learning about our deadly history, and keeping my body healthy. I have come to understand that death is not necessarily bad. If humans were immortal, it would be impossible to feed everybody. Those who seek revenge could never accomplish their goals, and wars would continue into eternity. Death wipes the slate clean and provides food for ants.

    I suppose we should thank death. The Grim Reaper has taken so much from us yet left us a fantastic world free from dying people. Plus, he provided endless story material. Perhaps that makes death the best character there has ever been.

    You’re the best -Bill

    August 24, 2024

    Hey book lovers, I published four. Please check them out:

    Interviewing Immortality. A dramatic first-person psychological thriller that weaves a tale of intrigue, suspense, and self-confrontation.

    Pushed to the Edge of Survival. A drama, romance, and science fiction story about two unlikely people surviving a shipwreck and living with the consequences.

    Cable Ties. A slow-burn political thriller that reflects the realities of modern intelligence, law enforcement, department cooperation, and international politics.

    Saving Immortality. Continuing in the first-person psychological thriller genre, James Kimble searches for his former captor to answer his life’s questions.

    These books are available in soft-cover on Amazon and eBook format everywhere.

[autodialog]

Burnout

You remembered me.

Yeah, I completely forgot you existed. Sorry about that.

No worries.

No guilt trip?

I'm your inner sage, your satan, your voice of reason. What good would a guilt trip be at this point?

Pretty damned useless.

You swear too much.

I know.

So you're burned out.

I found out that my paid time off doesn't flow over to the next year, and I've never really worried about accounting for my time off. But I had to do the accounting and discovered 130 hours sitting there waiting to be used.

You need a break.

I needed a break six months ago. I'm a set-it-and-forget-it kind of guy. I don't take days off unless I have to.

That's not good enough. You need to schedule more time off in the future and stick to it.

Yeah, I know. I know. I've already added one day to my calendar next year. I'm waiting on my wife's job prospects before scheduling any other vacations, but I'm going to schedule them. I promise.

You also promised to call the clinic to get hearing aids today.

Damn. I forgot to do that.

Yup. See? I don't need to guilt trip you at all. So you're burned out.

Big time, but I'm afraid of it.

There is nothing to fear about it.

I'm afraid of the concept of it. It's hitting me. I really am burned out. I feel it. I know it. My brain in mush. At work I stare at my computer and can think of thirty things that have to get done and I have no idea how to do any of them.

Just start.

That's a recipe for burnout. I can't move forward. I'm scared.

Of what?

Burn out.

That doesn't make any sense, so explain it to me like I'm five.

Okay, you know how I don't even like to say the word "vulnerable"? It's a nasty word. It even feels wrong to say it, let alone be vulnerable. Brené Brown talks about it a lot and I just don't get it. I even heard the word used to describe John McClane in Die Hard and it seemed so wrong. Burn out is the same way. I'm supposed to be stronger than that. More resiliient.

Ah! So you don't know what resilient means.

It has two meanings. One is to be hard like stone and not moved by the world.

Be like the promontory against which the waves continually break, but it stands firm and tames the fury of the water around it.

And that's you, is it?

Sometimes.

But that's not how it works. The rocks eventually fall to erosion from the waves. Rocks are just slower about it than human beings. We break faster, but we also have something rocks don't have.

Oh?

We grow back stronger. Isn't that the whole point of progressive strength training? The body repairs itself from the careful damage done to it under the bar and so the next time you have to do just a tad bit more careful damage.

That's pretty basic.

You know what's missing in that? Rest. You can heal, unlike the rock. You can grow stronger, but only when you rest. A night's sleep isn't enough. How many times this week did you wake up in the middle of the night thinking about work?

A couple of times.

And did you wake up thinking about music or writing or art or books?

No.

So you are failing even to retreat into your own mind often enough. You're not taking the time to remember what is good and what is bad, what is virtuous and what is vicious. If you were to stop right now and determine what was good or bad in your world, how would you enumerate them?

I'd stare blankly, unthinking.

Really? You've never unthought in your life.

There are people, supposedly, who do not have an inner monologue. I have a hard time believing this is true.

You're not one of those people. I've been narrating your life since you were a kid and invented YouTube before the World Wide Web was a thing. You have thoughts all the time, as well as tinnitus. So what's really going on when you can't even think of a word?

Sometimes pure unadulterated fear. The big one is aphasia. I've seen it do things to people and I don't want to put my wife through that. But today trying to explain something to her I couldn't. I couldn't find the word to start with.

Which is all the more proof that whatever well you draw from is damn near empty and you need to pause to refill it. But you're afraid to do that.

I am.

You think it's a point of strength to plow forward and work twelve-hour days until this work crisis is over.

I do.

You're an idiot.

You're not being helpful right now.

Yes, I am, but you're being an idiot and not listening to me. Come back in the morning after you've slept.