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axzeelspeckles · 2 years ago

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Random thoughts and ramblings about the amazing film Nimona! Warning this is a huge tangent and does talk about spoilers for the movie and a bit of spoilers about the graphic novel (that I haven't read since my copy hasn't arrived yet) also I've tried to write this post like 3 times but it keeps breaking so oof.

Kudos to the creator ND Stevenson who I swear is a massive source of creativinies that I would absorb like a sponge if I had the energy to because everything they're apart of is something I feel like I'd adore if if I took the plunge. Also he identifies as enby transmasc (which, I am too, and I didn't realize how huge of a blow it was to realize that people like me exist). I really ought to look into She-ra and their other works at some point. Anyway, anyway, anyway - this is about Nimona!

I love that this obviously queer movie decided to be release during the later stage of June aka "Pride Month" because I feel like it gives people the chance to watch it with fresh eyes during July, which is Disabled Pride Month (I'm Australian so it isn't really a thing here as far as im aware sadly) which Ballister is such a fantastic and amazing character who is gay and disabled.

He is never portrayed as weak or lesser for his disability, I imagine for people that it'll actually be easy to forget that he is disabled as an amputee with how capable he's written. I feel like it might just go over peoples heads at some point because you never get to see stuff written so well unless if its poking you with it every few episodes or its extremely obvious at a glance. But with Ballister it 'just is who he is' and it moves on to focus on its plot like it has from the beginning.

And its never used as a plot set back or change the storybeat or anything of that sort of matter. Which is amazing. However it isn't just ignored either! He has a moment of weakness when he sees Ambroius again. He hesitates, he withdraws from reach out to him while looking at his arm (Oh, Nemesis!). It is still fresh and new and he's trying to handle it (you're doing great sweetie).

I'm not physically disabled (I do have a weak knee however) but a mentally disabled and experience fatigue constantly and I'm sure I'd have chronic pains if I didn't have a high pain tolerance. So while this sort of character isn't someone I can directly relate to it is someone I can connect with (Although I don't believe you need to be the same as something in order to connect/relate to it).

However I am at home a lot and I don't get exposed much to other people and that includes a lot of people with other cultures, beliefs, body types and disabilities. So being able to see people different than me on the screen is always awesome, and being able to connect with them is too. Which the Queen, Nimona and Ballister is fantastic for everyone and hopefully the Director will give the other sort of audience of this movie a time to think back and work through things.

But I haven't seen many disabled people in media, because I don't really have the energy to engage with much content for long. So I have a limited selection of characters who seem like fantastic representation - because while yes Toph from Avatar the Last Airbender is fantastic she has literal superpowers compared to the every day person so I love and praise how she's handled because everything she does is fantastic-

Seeing Ballister's strong and dedicated personality which still has that life to it made me instantly feel for him along side Hiccup from How to Train your Dragon (And before you ask - no, AstridSpeckles is not due to HTTYD, its inspired from Zelda actually!) And I just love how it was all written and displayed. In HTTYD it was to connect Toothless and Hiccup together in a beautiful narrative. Here they used his arm to make a beautiful narrative too - he uses it, constantly.

He fixes his arm with just one hand which is insane because its also his non dominant hand which wow thats amazing. And he doesn't shy away from using his arm for anything, he still touches people with it, still wields things with as much confidence as ever to do so. He reaches out to Nimona with it too in that scene. Also Ambroius reaches out to hold his hand in that scene too! So tenderly and without hesitation! Which if it was another case with other characters I reckon I'd be a little upset but you see how much they love eachother and how gentle and tactile and soft they are so it is just so beautiful to see here...

Also I don't really know where else to put this but since im on a tangent about Ballister ima just say it here. He is such a fantastic knight! He knew the moment his sword was handed to him that it was off. He knew it didnt feel right, the weight was wrong? Or it just felt off? He knows his sword. He knows his morals. He knows what he has to do to make things right. He never betrayed himself ever!

Also the eye sparkles change. At the start their diamonds, but Ballister's turns into squares as he gets more exposed to different views where Ambroius turns into a triangle as his views are being pulled (the director whispering in his hear, his own heart, and his love for Ballister).

Also he too is a fantastic knight! His life falling apart? Never lashes out. Never hurts those around him (Okay, cutting off an arm isn't a love language.) So yes that is a case where he did hurt someone but that is addressed in its own ways.

But he never hurts or lashes out at the people he's protecting. He could easily just take it out on them, stop caring, fall into a pit of despair at his own problems. But you actively see him dealing with this own issues and then instantly being a knight the next scene and he doesn't falter or fall.

He is also so strong and I love that he had these moments, would of liked some more though but he isn't a main character like Nimona and Ballister so I understand why he didn't.

Also back to Ballister for a moment because the moment he heard Nimona's not really handling the things she's carrying, that she was able to tell him about her most vulnerable, scary and intrusive thoughts after knowing him for so little, that his thoughts in an instant was to get her the hell out of there and go with her.

He would try to work things out with Ambroius I believe, but he saw the hurt of Nimona who he hasn't known that long over the love of his life and said this is my priority. That would be so hard for anyone to do, for example a parent knowing their child is queer and the other parent not accepting them - there are cases where the parents stay together because its too hard for them not too, and lose the kid or kick the kid out.

The fact Ballister in a heartbeat acted accordingly to keep this new precious person in his life to abandon (like they did to him) without hesitation is absolutely insane and I love it so much. Also that it wasn't a move out of malice or defiance. It could of easily of been written differently that they need to protect her and they have to leave right now. But no. He took action (he always takes actions!) and while he lingered on Ambroius, it wasnt hesitation. It wasn't to hurt Ambroius either. He put Nimona being at risk first.

So I've actually been aware of Nimona for a few years now. I've heard about its ups and downs and its eventually cancel to its amazing revival! But I was watching it as a passive observer, never interacting with it because I know I hyper-fixate, I didn't want too get invested and attached and because off the rollercoaster of it not coming to the big screen while being in the fandom at that time (im sorry you are all so much stronger than I am haha!)

However, it is alive and amazing! And I'm finally here in the fandom - I've finally watched it - I've finally decided to order the graphic novel like I planned to back during its first movie announcement so I can quote "Enjoy the movie and then read the book since the books are always better", so I can love both as much as I can, yknow?

From what I've discovered reading online here and there so far (and its likely that this is wrong so take this with a grain of salt since I haven't gotten my graphic novel yet) that apparently that the movie is leaps and bounds improved compared to the graphic novel (Note: Not better, improved.)

Improved origin stories, improved personalities, improved characterizations. So much of the voice actors provide life and inspiration to these characters bringing them to a level that the graphic novels didn't have the resource to do.

I also love how people also aren't going crazy (negatively) about the change of races to the characters - im so used to seeing discourse about this sort of thing but its so accepted here that it is so refreshing to see.

The graphic novel has a larger and looser timeline and I believe a darker story and not as much as a happy ending compared to the movie. I can't wait to read the graphic novel though it looks very interesting!

But the ending of the movie implies such a happier ending for everyone, since apparently I've seen that in the graphic novel Nimona visits Ballister while being shapeshifted as a nurse while he is in hospital and he caught on too late after she says goodbye and he never sees her again and is constantly reminded of her when she sees people with her hair colour and that is so bittersweet!

The fact we get her coming to him at the end with him going HOLY SHIT is because it is saying here that it doesn't end with that note. They are together still. And I really hope something more comes out after this because I need to see a bit more to know what is happening there.

I had written a lot more here but my post keeps breaking and doing ctrl+z is making me lose entire paragraphs and gifs I put in as text breakers so I'm gonna leave this here or maybe do another post when I end up reading the graphic novel, who knows. But yes. I love Nimona :D

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mcrmadness · 4 years ago

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Madness draws: Behind the Scenes of the Bela/Farin: “Widumihei” comic.

A few months ago I posted here this comic:

CLICK HERE for the original post about that comic where you can see it in better and bigger size, and also reblog it ;)

And this post is just a deep dive into how I plan, do and draw my comics.

Let’s start with sketchbook things...

So every comic needs a story, right? My comics usually are born from either some dialogue I imagine in my head or by an impulsive inspiration that happens when I see something or talk with people and a random idea is triggered. I’m very good at coming up with new ideas solely based on just one word or so which is why I often ask people if they have anything they would want to see/read because I suck at coming up ideas on my own. Or I do get ideas, but not as often as I’d want to.

This particular idea was very old and I have tried but I cannot find the piece that was my inspiration but it was in some of my old German books because I remember laughing at it with either my brother or even with the German teacher in 2011 or 2012. I was only able to find my first “sketch” of the story:

This is in the notebook I used for writing down some comic ideas and even had one comic in it, plus it’s also my fanfiction writing notebook. It has no date but I know for sure it was either 2011 or 2012 because that’s when I did my last Bela/Farin comic and pretty much started my (unintentional) 6 year pause from drawing altogether.

I have always been trilingual when I do these plans for my comics, often writing the “narration” in Finnish and the dialog either in English or German because I just cannot imagine them to speaking Finnish. The translation of that text goes as:

COMIC (sarjis = sarjakuva = comic book in Finnish)

1. The phone is ringing. 2. F: “Widumihei?!” B: ? 3. B: “Farin wtf?” 4. Farin walks from another room. 5. B: “Widumihei?” 6. F: “It means, “will you marry me?”“ 7. B: *wtf* REPLAY:

1. Bela is sitting/laying somewhere. 2. The phone is ringing. Reached with his hand? 3. Looks at the phone, “wtf?”, a thought: “von Jan: Widumihei?!” 4. Bela: “Farin?” / “Jan?” 5. F comes from another room, looks in from behind the door frame or something. B: “Widumihei?” 6. F: “Widumihei: “WIllst DU MIch HEiraten”“ 7. B: “WTF”

So when I then started to draw these comics again in 2018, I kept thinking about this one too and still wanted to draw it one day. If you have read the finished comic, you may notice something different in the old plot versus new: I switched Bela’s and Farin’s roles. Back then I didn’t know too much yet but over the years I have learnt much much more about them and I just figured that asking to marry him even as a joke would be too much for Farin and that it would fit Bela’s persona much much better.

***

I had a bit of problems with getting started with this one, mainly because the last times I drew a dä comic was in June 2020, in April 2020 and before those in October 2019. Because of so long time between the comics, I just always forgot about my methods and in which order I do things and what works for me the best. So every time I started to work on a comic, I had to start completely over because all I had was blank paper and I somehow needed to get my thoughts in order and out of my head, into a physical form aka as text and images on the paper, and it’s easier said than done.

So pardon me but from this on the text is going to get a little bit confusing for a little while from now on - but it’s also a very good look over how the life with my suspected ADHD be like sometimes...

I started working on the plot once again to my sketchbook... I think it was somewhere in the beginning of 2020. Because the next idea there is from the summer. This is what the plot looked like at that point - here I had already switched their roles:

Shortly, the texts go: 1. Farin is reading a book. 2. A phone makes a noise. 3. (Farin) looks at it/read the message. / 6. B appears into the doorway. / 11. F spits out the tea.

And underneath it you can see one of the stick figure storyboards I often do in order to kinda see the text in pictures better, and I will write down or draw important aspects like expressions (Farin’s eyebrows) or things like *facepalm’* or *eyeroll* so that I remember to add them.

Next I was struggling with the era. It needed to be an era with the old mobile phones with SMS options but still not too early because I feel that Farin would have not been the first in line to buy a brand new technology object, especially not when it’s a phone. I was even googling when did Germany get their first mobile phone - I remember I got my first phone aka Nokia 5510 in 2000 or 2001 after my mom got a new one and gave her old one to me, so the story shouldn’t happen too many years before the Millenium.

Originally I planned 1997 for that - I needed to think about that based on their styles because shorter hair is harder to draw. Here’s me trying out some hairs and how they’re to draw and which era would suit my needs the best. I actually find the text hilarious altho it’s mine but this is what it’s in English:

Time period -> 1996-1997? 1998 I’ve never drawn 1999 is not that much fun to draw 2000 is already a bit too late? Bela not that much fun to draw. -2001 moustaches are not fun to draw?

I think I was struggling with my thoughts because the next thing in that sketchbook is yet another storyboard:

Or actually I think this was just to see how many sheets I’d need and how many panels I could fit on one sheet.

Anyhow, I then did other things for some time before I got back to this project this year. Including finishing with the sketchbook I had been using since 2010 (and the half of it since 2018!) and I had to get myself a new one. So when I started to think about this comic again, one night I was just thinking about some Bela/Farin scenarios as usual and suddenly I just felt that I NEED to do the comic in the 1998 style!!! So suddenly we jump from the original 1997 idea to the new era, only because of the colors.

So asap I grabbed my sketchbook and started to look for the proper colors for the hairs:

This one I posted here before too as I was struggling a lot and just felt that I didn’t know how to draw, again. Sometimes when I feel like that, I start drawing with my non-dominant aka left hand because it doesn’t have all that in muscle memory so drawing and writing with it feels more free and it feels almost like pressing a refresh button in my brain. Suddenly the right one know again how to draw because left isn’t too well in control. The below part of the image is done completely with the left hand, including the coloring.

And because I had now a new sketchbook, I somehow couldn’t... deal with the plot and plans being in a different sketchbook than everything else so I had write the plot/dialog AGAIN, into this new sketchbook, along with the storyboards and everything:

Translations: kirja = book, puhelin = phone, oviaukossa = in the doorway, teet suusta = tea(s) out of a/the mouth. “Puhelin zoom” just means “close up to the phone screen” in Madness.

You can also see that I found out that I don’t need to do the stick figure storyboards to imitate a sheet when I can just draw this rectangle and smaller rectangles inside of it and write there numbers to match the things in the dialog to make it much easier for me to plan the pages. And here’s also a small easter egg: there’s 13 panels overall in this comic :D I almost did 12 but then felt that no, I really need to do 13 because, you know, the hairs, the era, the album title. And also because I like the number so much lmao.

So from there we get to the second storyboard which is not just stick figures anymore but just me planning how I want the panels to look like. To get the imagery of the rooms and facial expressions etc. out onto the paper so that I can see them in real life instead of my shady imagination that sometimes isn’t as vivid as what I could be.

Also have you ever tried to draw a beach chair? It’s more difficult than you’d think:

I tried to draw the same thing from the same reference photos so many times and still I always felt like I was trying to draw that impossible triangle or some other illusion image. And it just went on and on here:

Originally I also had planned the second panel to be a close up of the phone so that Farin’s face would be left at the background from the frog perspective. That’s what I was trying to with that weird-ass face on the left but turned out that I have never drawn these characters from such angle and I just... couldn’t see it in my head clearly enough to be able to draw it. So I dismissed that idea and that’s why the angle changed from a phone close-up to a side view to the room and at Farin.

As I was in the middle of planning the second page, I suddenly wasn’t happy with my original plot anymore. I wasn’t sure if it would work and needed to think about it one more time. So I wrote two other dialogs here, along with a storyboards for them both. I ended up choosing B from those two options eventually.

I don’t remember anymore if I had already done the first sketch of the comics or not but at some point I just felt that I no longer knew how to draw in my style. Sometimes you just draw and learn wrong things and wrong methods that you get used to and then you have to take a break and actually do a little bit of studying over your own style to find again the way how you want to draw, and get rid of the bad habits and find the good ones again. In my case it was to draw the eyes way way too big when they originally never were THAT big, so I had to learn how to draw them small and normal again. That’s why I did these, as I really needed to pay attention to the faces and remember how to draw them again:

The front-side views were another big readong for this “study” because I have drawn that perspective only once or twice before and I needed to figure out how I want to draw that. Also, I don’t know if it’s just me but for some reason the front-side Farin reminds me of one of the parent characters from this cartoon called The Rugrats which I watched as a kid. It was totally unintentional, but you can google The Rugrats if you don’t know how the charatcers looked like in the cartoon.

The things below are just me testing something. The red Farins were just to test how the colored pencils work on each other and how the fineliners work with the colored pencils, and which way is the better way to do the shading. And the red colored pencil was the only one available at the time so that had to do.

A little bit about the heads btw: You might notice some difference between the left and right faces. It’s because I have always, always struggled with drawing anything that is looking at right. Most of the animal portraits and all I have drawn so that they look at left because I just find it so much easier to draw. I think with comics it’s because I always start with the eye (and the eyebrows if I don’t forget it) and then do the forehead, nose, mouth and chin, and after that I either continue from the hair (from the front) or do the ear first. But when I am drawing them to look at right, I have to basically draw the mirror image and starting from the hair is not the key because it can easily mess up with the perspectives. I still usually draw everything in the same order but it really is difficult because I’m doing a mirror image and my own hand is on the way, too. Basically I’m drawing from right to left instead of left to right! (I think I should try drawing those with my left hand, then...)

And from here we get to the first sketch of the comic. From here on the images are from my phone’s camera so they are sometimes illegally bad but no can do, I again didn’t think I’d post these to anywhere:

Here you can see I was mainly just focusing on the shapes and the space inside those panels. Just trying to see the perspective and how everything is. The only thing that I drew more precisely was the third panel, with the hand and phone. I had quite a nice memory of old phones in my head but I still googled for some reference photos of Nokia 5110 phones as that was my first phone (as I mentioned earlier), and I also happened to have some of my other old phones on the table nearby so I took my own hand reference photos too:

They always say there’s a little bit of the artist in their art and this one literally has that - “Farin’s” hand is actually my hand! :D And I think the size is kinda on point too because this phone was like 2-3 times smaller than Nokia 5110 and I have small hands, and I believe Farin must have much bigger hands, so the 5110 probably would have looked about the same size in his hand.

After the first sketch, the next step was then - the second sketch:

I also wanted to add more action to the panels so that it’s interesting to look at and not just basically the same panel over and over again with just different speech bubbles, so I came up with the idea of Farin spitting out his tea not being as cartoony as it could be and that he would have to actually clean it up instead of just leaving it there just because in cartoons/comics everything is possible. That way I got more depth into the panels and it was also interesting for me to draw because I drew lots of new postures I have never drawn before, and I’m surprised how well it went despite me not even looking for any kind of reference photos! The only things I used reference photos for were the beach chair, and the phone in a hand. (I have actually always been quite good at drawing 3D objects and spaces, especially if they are rectangular.)

So yeah, this is the phase where everything is then finished with pencil and what follows next is drawing the lines with fineliners - I use Sakura Pigma Micron fineliners for everything else, and black Promarker for doing the lines for the panels (and also if I need bigger pitch black areas done).

Here are the panel lines done but I only had a photo of this first sheet.

And here are both sheets with the finelining done and all pencil marks etc. erased. I really like this part because it looks so clean when all those sketch marks are gone. It’s also crazy to think I literally spend hours drawing something in pencil only to erase it all away later :D

And here’s one photo of the coloring process, the first one has only the base colors done but none of the shadows yet (apart from the shirts), and the second one has some of the shadows done but not everything yet.

Usually after coloring, I will then go through everything with the fineliners one more time to make sure all the lines are dark enough as it just gives everything the finished yet a bit “sketchy” look that what I really like with my comics. The actual last detail is always adding my signature along with the date or year.

And here’s the finished comic one more time for comparison:

Don’t forget to check and reblog the actual post about this comic if you read this post all the way here. I’d appreaciate that a lot since art and artist on Tumblr are not really that much appreciated.

#mcrmadness draws #mcrmadness draws: behind the scenes #my comics #dä fanart #die ärzte

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thesunnyshow · 5 years ago

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Name: Juliet

Writing Blog URL(s): @wonderlustlucas

Nationality: American

Languages: English, beginner level French, teeny tiny bit of Korean

Star Sign: Virgo

MBTI: ISFJ-T

Favorite color: Pastel yellow

Favorite food: My mom’s Sunday gravy

Favorite movie: Howl’s Moving Castle (The Lion King is a close second though)

Favorite ice cream flavor: Specifically Turkey Hill’s Double Dunker (get it— it’s so good)

Favorite animal: Humpback whale

Go-to karaoke song: She’s Kinda Hot by 5 Seconds of Summer

Dream job (whether you have a job or not): Neurosurgeon! Or a Twitch streamer HAHA

Coffee or tea? What are you ordering? Ahhh probably coffee, I love tea but I need my coffee </3

If you could have one superpower, what would you choose? Shapeshifting! Clearly the superior superpower I don’t take constructive criticism.

If you could visit a historical era, which would you choose? This is weirdly specific, but I would love to be in Scotland during the 1700’s. Alternatively, the 1980’s.

If you could restart your life, knowing what you do now, would you? 100%. I know everything happens for a reason but getting a redo and being able to fix all the big mistakes I made would be pretty nice.

Would you rather fight 100 chicken-sized horses or one horse-sized chicken? One horse-sized chicken! 100 tiny horses would be crazy tiring.

If you were a trope in a teen high school movie, what would you have been? I would probably be the gay side character that gives good emotional advice but is hella lonely LMAO

Do you believe in aliens/supernatural creatures? Yes, both!

What are some small things that make your day better? Driving with the windows down and music blasting, picking up coffee, playing video games, & talking to my internet friends on Discord.

Fun fact about yourself that not everyone would know? I discovered my love for writing through Warrior Cats roleplay😭

What fandom(s) do you write for? Right now, only Kpop, but I wouldn’t mind writing for 5SOS or some of my other fandoms!

When did you post your first piece? On WattPad, December 2015. On Tumblr, April 2018 :)

Do you write fluff/angst/crack/general/smut, combo, etc? Why? I write everything! Fluff/smut/crack is my favorite and slight angst (usually just slow burn though cus I’m soft).

Do you write OCs, X Readers, Ships...etc? Again, I write anything and everything! Currently, second or third person reader inserts are my main style, but I also do ships and would love to write more OCs.

Why did you decide to write for Tumblr? Before Tumblr, I was on WattPad for different fandoms but eventually fell off. Then, when I got into Kpop in 2017, I found that urge to write again and decided to move to Tumblr since WattPad was becoming… weird. Plus Tumblr was a better fit for me!

What inspires you to write? To be completely honest, it’s the little things throughout the day that inspire me. For example, “Honey” was inspired by me not being able to open my locker in high school. “I Hemoglobin You” was based off my friend giving me a head rub while I was donating blood. Kpop idols just so happen to be my muses that I like to put into random moments of inspiration!

What genres/AUs do you enjoy writing the most? High school or college AUs are my favorite, along with some good ol’ friends to lovers slow burn. Angst isn’t my forte so I usually just stick to fluff, smut, and some crack. I haven’t written any but fantasy AUs are some of my favorites too! (RIP to my League of Legends AU that I started and haven’t touched in months.)

What do you hope your readers take away from your work? Just like other fanfiction authors inspire me, I hope some of my work inspires others. Considering fanfiction is free, there is so much out there to read and when I find a good story that inspires ME to write better, I’d love for my writing to do the same.

What do you do when you hit a rough spot creatively? 3 options: 1) Skip that scene and jump ahead to one I’m excited to write; 2) Erase what part I’m on and completely redo it; or 3) Drop it. The majority of my works usually take a few months to write as I will completely stop working on it until I find the right inspiration again.

What is your favorite work and why? Your most successful? “Four” is definitely my favorite work. It’s one of my longer pieces and there was a lot of raw emotion in there on my end. I love the relationship between Hyunjin and the reader and especially love the ending. “Greatest Gift” for Chanyeol is my most successful, and one of my other favorites!

Who is your favorite person to write about? Easily Hwang Hyunjin. It’s so easy to place him in any of my works, and sometimes it’s a struggle to NOT write him. It sounds stupid but sometimes I really feel like I “know” him so being able to describe him physically and mentally is easy for me.

Do you think there’s a difference between writing fanfiction vs. completely original prose? Yes and no. Yes, because most of the time, fanfiction is totally original as well and requires just as much thought as a 400,000 word novel. No, because fanfiction uses a specific person as a muse.

What do you think makes a good story? Detail and realistic dialogue! Of course, everyone has their own style of writing, but detail is especially important to me. Sure, you can have a great plot, but having concise, detailed writing to get immersed into makes a story so much better. I also find realistic dialogue to be a big deal— I hate when teenage characters are speaking in deep analogies because, if we’re being honest, my daily language is 95% just “Bruh.” If you’re like me, I’d actually prefer realistic dialogue over anything else.

What is your writing process like? Process… yikes. Sometimes… I have a random thought and then I’m like… hell yeah let’s write that. I actually have no process. I don’t outline, I just start writing and keep writing until I’m finished. Then I’ll read it all over to make edits, then I’ll use the Read Aloud feature to catch any mistakes I missed, then I’ll run it through Grammarly before posting!

Would you ever repurpose a fic into a completely original story? Hm, maybe? In the future, possibly, but as of right now I wouldn’t use any of my fics to do so.

What tropes do you love, and what tropes can’t you stand? Oh, gosh, tropes. Gotta love them. Friends to lovers, enemies to lovers, stuck together (AKA forced to share a bed), and fake relationships are my favorites. They may be corny, but I also love truth or dare or 7 minutes in heaven games in fics cus… they’re just classics. Also love fics with a popular x shy pairing. I can’t say I dislike many tropes, but I definitely have a love/hate relationship with vampire and werewolf tropes because of how romanticized they are.

How much would you say audience feedback/engagement means to you? Hm, to be completely honest, only a little bit? I mainly write for myself, it’s like a guilty pleasure to just get all my thoughts and desires out, and then I just so happen to make it public on Tumblr. Nevertheless, receiving comments and asks actually make my day, and sometimes I still struggle to wrap my mind around people enjoying my writing! So, thank you to everyone who has ever left me a kind message, I truly appreciate it ♥

What has been one of the biggest factors of your success (of any size)? Getting involved! I think one of the best ways to grow is to join networks, which not only gives you the opportunity to share your work on a greater scale, but also allows you to make connections. Like real life, making connections and making friendships with other writers can play a huge role in growing as a writer and growing your account.

Do you think fanfic writers get unfairly judged? Yes :( As someone who’s involved with other fandoms, I’ve heard the way some people think of fanfiction and it’s really sad. People do not know how much goes into writing and just see it as cringey and disgusting when it’s just… not.

Do you think art can be a medium for change? Yes! In all its forms, art is something a creator can use to influence their audience (in a good way, hopefully).

Do you ever feel there are times when you’re writing for others, rather than yourself? Like I said in #40, I mainly write for myself. Even when I’m writing a request, chances are if I like the request enough I’m going to create a story out of it that fits my personal desires the most.

Do you ever feel like people have misunderstood you or your writing at times? No! However, I’d still consider myself a small account and do not have TOO many works posted. But so far, I don’t think I’ve faced this problem :)

Do your offline friends/loved ones know you write for Tumblr? Only a few! My best friend Maggie is on Tumblr with me and only 2 of my other pals know I write fanfiction.

What is one thing you wish you could tell your followers? How much I love each and every one of them for supporting me and sticking around even when I won’t post for months🥺❤️

Do you have any advice for aspiring writers who might be too scared to put themselves out there? Don’t psych yourself out! In the time I’ve spent on Tumblr, I’ve never received any substantial hate. My main advice is don’t write fanfiction to get popular on the app, write fanfiction because you love to write and love your muses!

Are there any times when you regret joining Tumblr? No, as much as Tumblr can be annoying at times, I love the people I’ve met and the content I’ve found and wouldn’t have wanted to use any other platform.

Do you have any mutuals who have been particularly formative/supportive in your Tumblr journey? @pinktea99 — Mo, you’ve been around since the beginning honestly, and without you I wouldn’t have been able to come out of my shell! Thank you for all your love & support & for being my SF9 buddy❤️

Pick a quote to end your interview with:

“Like mate, stop procrastinating.” — 3RACHA

BONUS ROUND: K-POP CONFIDENTIAL

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aelaer · 5 years ago

Note

☕ Opinion on all the Wakandans we know, all of them, including those that died in Lagos.

Opinion on Wakandans: general badasses. Wish it was a real country. Hope that the film's existence gives real inspiration to the people of Africa that have access to the film.

Now in order from least important to most important (well in terms of plot), from the people I can find in the Wiki because I've only memorized how to spell the names of 6 Wakandans, and the name Erik doesn't really count. (Erik's a very very good name though).

The Wakandans that died in Lagos: 🎶 Those poor unfortunate souls / So sad, so true 🎶 It must be rough being a plot device.

Zuri, aka T'Challa's uncle figure killed by Erik: Good guy. Died for what he believed in and his country. I admire his loyalty to T'Chaka and T'Challa. Was right to turn N'Jobu in to the king.

N'Jobu, aka T'Challa's actual uncle: I get that he wanted to help people. Helping people by instigating war is usually not the way to go. I mean, if this happened in 1850s America then sure, slavery is bad. I mean war's not great, but that's a topic worth fighting for. But trying to instigate a violent race war in the world in the early 90s for class imbalance? Doesn't seem like a good idea. The LA riots were bad enough in the US. And criminals of all races that ended up with Wakandan weapons would have just used them on either each other (gang wars) or the police (of all races). In other words, he was not thinking ahead at all. Innocent people would have caught in the crossfire as what usually happens. Or they'd be victimized by those (of all races) without scruples. He'd not be helping the trodden in the (American) black community by gifting criminals with weapons, because those gangs are often the people terrorizing their very communities. I hate gang violence- it's so senseless.

King T'Chaka, aka T'Challa's dad: I've major beef with him. He killed his brother, which may be his kingly right or whatever since he tried to kill Zuri, but to leave his nephew there? Alone and without help? That's fucking awful, man. I mean there was no good outcome after N'Jobu died, but leaving a kid like that was heartless. According to wiki, his mom died in prison when he was a kid. This kid would have been put into the foster care system which would be no walk in the park. That's awful. I can't believe he abandoned his nephew. It wouldn't have been easy but it could have been better. Also, I really dislike him for his part in the Accords. A lot. Him rushing it through was not good. So yeah, not my favorite character.

Ramonda, aka T'Challa's mom: She's a cool lady. No qualms here. She raised two awesome kids.

W'Kabu, aka Okoye's former(?) husband: I wonder if Okoye was allowed to divorce him after the civil war. I hope so. Anyway, he was cool until he, you know, sided with Killmonger and betrayed T'Challa. But that's civil war for you. I know anecdotes of childhood friends and families fighting against each other in the American Civil War and I imagine it's happened in many a civil war elsewhere. Still, not cool.

M'Baku, aka The Best One: I love him. I love how he was set up as being this awful brute and then he ends up helping save Wakanda and also have a sense of humor. He is the best and I just want to hug him. What else is there to say?

Nakia, aka the love interest: Definitely one of the best love interests in the MCU. She has a solid personality with her own sets of beliefs, wit, can fight (which is always great in a superhero film), and she plays a core part in both helping T'Challa in his quest for the throne back (by saving the heart shaped herb) as well as helps shape T'Challa's change of heart by revealing themselves to the world. She's up there with Peggy Carter for me. I'd love to see her as much as we saw Pepper.

Erik Killmonger: One of the best villains in the MCU, hands down. Jordan's ability to portray him as both off kilter and sympathetic was incredibly well done, and this character is one large reason Black Panther was such a fantastic film. For all the fun of, say, Guardians of the Galaxy and Doctor Strange, which are in my top seven MCU films (it's hard to rank films), they don't have a really well-rounded villain. The fact that Erik is sympathetic enough that there were a few (insane) people on Twitter who thought his plan was perfectly alright really speaks to how well he was written and played.

Okoye: I adore this woman so much. Everything about her is just fantastic. I love her dry sense of humor and her friendship with the royal family. I really loved that we got to see the conflict of her trying to figure out what Wakanda was, and what Wakanda she was fighting for. That she went against her husband is incredibly poignant. Overall for a character with not a ton of screentime, she's very memorable and a fantastic hero in her own right.

Shuri: Shuri is the type of character diversity I expect out of my 21st century entertainment. A young black woman that happens to be as smart, if not smarter, than Bruce Banner and Tony Stark? Brilliant. I was wondering just how old this character was in terms of original creation date, so I looked it up and lo and behold: she made her debut in 2005, only three years before the first Iron Man was released. It doesn't surprise me that she's such a young character (only 15 years compared to T'Challa's 54 years of comic book existence) because such diversity in comics has really, really only exploded in the 21st century. Even Miles Morales of Spider-Man fame is only 9 years old! Anyway, I love everything about her. The fact that she is so crazy smart but also manages to still remain cheeky and a bit of a brat to her older brother is honestly icing on the cake. I'm so glad she exists as a character. I look forward to seeing what they do with her in the future.

T'Challa: According to the comics wiki he's a graduate of Oxford! I have no idea if they carried that over to MCU lore, but I love that (and it's not rare for foreign dignitaries to send their children to places like Oxford, so). Anyway, he is an absolutely fantastic character and one I can see becoming a favorite during the Phase 4 and 5 films as he gets more time to shine. His character arc through CACW is one of my favorite parts of the film; it's fantastic to see him grow as a person and realize what the quest for revenge can do to a person, which in turn leads to a fantastic parallel when you compare him with Killmonger during Black Panther. That there is fantastic storytelling. I don't know if he'd have any reason to team up with Stephen but goodness knows I'd love that. I've only written him a little (in something unpublished as of now) but I'd love to explore his character further in the future. He's fantastic.

Hope you enjoyed that :P

#t'challa #t'chaka #shuri #okoye #nakia #m'baku #erik killmonger #wakanda #mcu #ask #answered #mdcbd #long post

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shirokodomo · 5 years ago

Text

THE POSITIVE & NEGATIVE; Mun & Muse - Meme.

THE MUSE - Hakudoshi (Inuyasha)

THE MUN - Eleanor / Ellie / El

Fill out & repost! This meme definitely favors canons more, but I hope OC’s still can make it somehow work with their own lore, and lil’ fandom of friends & mutuals. Multi-Muses pick the muse you are the most invested in atm.

My muse is: Canon / OC / AU / Canon-divergent / Fandomless.

It's a mix of these three, the character itself is canon but I have a bunch of AUs and Canon Divergents verses although I also write him within his Canon Verse

Is your character popular in the fandom? YES / NO.

Is your character considered hot™ in the fandom? YES / NO.

Is your character considered strong in the fandom? YES / NO.

I am not sure how the fandom views him in this regard, while he is one of the strongest incarnations, he isn't even on the level of either Inuyasha or Sesshomaru. So, kinda I guess?

Are they underrated? YES / NO.

Were they relevant for the main story? YES / NO.

To the story as a whole no, but he was relevant during a few arcs because of his connection to Naraku and the works he was sent to do.

Are they widely known in their world? YES / NO.

How’s their reputation? GOOD / BAD / NEUTRAL.

How strictly do you follow canon?

Depends on the characters he is interacting with. With the main group (Inu & Co.) and with the other incarnations with whom he has interacted in canon material (Kanna, Kagura, The Infant) I pretty much stick it to canon as much as I can, though I have my own interpretation of his character in certain stuff.

But there are characters he never met or barely interacted with in canon (Koga, Kikyo, Sesshomaru, etc) so in these I go overboard and mostly "ignore" canon, and let my own imagination interpret how their interactions would go, while trying to keep him as the villain he is but without making the interactions short or boring.

Then I have a bunch of AUs and Canon Divergent verses which I love to dive in and allows me to stray away from canon for the most part (i.e: he doesn't die, he doesn't betray Naraku, etc). Two of my favorite Canon Divergent threads are those where he ends up traveling with Sesshomaru after escaping from Naraku or the one where a mother-son bond slowly forms between him and Kikyo.

SELL YOUR MUSE! Aka try to list everything, which makes your muse interesting in your opinion to make them spicy for your mutuals.

He is a child and a child can still change his personality a lot even if they started out as a villain.

He is very intelligent, knows how to take precautions if/when things go wrong. In my opinion that makes him a good ally as much as it makes him a dangerous antagonist.

Canon didn't explore many sides of him and I'm more than willing to do that so plotting with me can become fun, even if some ideas might sound weird.

Although he was initially one of Naraku's most loyal incarnations and followed his orders, he can be self-serving (and in my eyes that's a good and bad thing) and can choose to take a different path from the initial plan even if that goes against his creator's goal and ends up benefiting the "good guys"

Now the OPPOSITE, list everything why your muse could not be so interesting (even if you may not agree, what does the fandom perhaps think?)

He is a villain and villains can be a little hard to handle and to create long threads with, without making it sound repetitive.

He can be quite creepy and perhaps a little annoying.

He has no qualms in his actions, doesn't possess empathy, doesn't care how many people were hurt or killed by his actions.

He is manipulative, although not as much as his creator, and more than capable of betrayal. Trusting him can be quite difficult especially after everything he did.

What inspired you to RP your muse?

Hakudoshi was always my favorite in the entire series, don't ask why, he just was, for some reason I was always drawn to him everytime he was on screen. His personality though sometimes difficult to portray can be interesting to explore, especially when aside from the fact that he is evil, there weren't any other sides of him shown which leaves a bunch of open doors for interpretation.

What keeps your inspiration going?

Dreams, random ideas and of course the other roleplayers I have interacted with so far.

Some more personal questions for the mun.

Give your mutuals some insight about the way you are in some matters, which could lead them to get more comfortable with you or perhaps not.

While I am aware that I have choose to portray a villain, I enjoy to try and step a bit out of the typical "I hate you and you hate me" troop when it comes to interactions with the "good guys", not saying that we shouldn't portray that, we definitely SHOULD because he has hurt many people and I don't expect other Muses to suddenly get along with mine but all I want is to try and step a bit more out of it so that we can create an interesting and enjoyable thread together.

An example I like to use for this, within the canon verse, is two threads I currently have with two different Inuyasha muses, in which we created an interesting set up for Inuyasha and Hakudoshi to interact, one that keeps the threads on-going smoothly, while keeping the obvious fact neither can stand the other because that's how their relationship is.

Do you think you give your character justice? YES / NO.

Depends on my mood and depends on the thread. There are many times I wonder if I'm making him "evil enough" or if I'm making him OOC.

Do you frequently write headcanons? YES / NO.

Do you sometimes write drabbles? YES / NO. But I am thinking of doing a prompt thing once a month for that! To help me with my writing skills.

Do you think a lot about your muse during the day? YES / NO.

Are you confident in your portrayal? YES / NO.

There are times I doubt it, other times I'm good with it.

Are you confident in your writing? YES / NO.

Are you a sensitive person? YES / NO.

Do you accept criticism well about your portrayal?

I'm open to constructive criticism all the time.

Being plain rude however it's a no for me.

Do you like questions, which help you explore your character?

I LOVE getting asks, they help me not just build my portrayal of the Muse but also provides me with many headcanon ideas.

If someone disagrees with your portrayal, how would you take it?

As I wrote above there are times I doubt my portrayal and also I am open to constructive criticism, so if someone disagrees with my portrayal I am more than open to receive tips on how I could get better.

Disagreeing with my portrayal just to be plain rude though, I'll pass. I don't want drama and I've created this RP blog to have fun and to escape a little from the problems in real life.

If someone really hates your character, how do you take it?

Eh I'm fine with it? Hakudoshi is a villain and a secondary character, I won't expect everyone to like him and I respect that. I just ask others to equally respect my liking for this character.

Are you okay with people pointing out your grammatical errors?

Yes I am, again I'm full open to constructive criticism. While I feel quite comfortable with my English, it's not my first language so errors are bound to happen.

Do you think you are easy going as a mun?

I am very shy and not exactly a big social butterfly, however I do like to talk to others that love the series/characters/etc as much as I do so DMs and Discord are open for that stuff too, not just plotting!

Tagged by: No one, found this on a random blog in the search

Tagging: @silverhanyou @windcarnation @konosesshomaru and anyone else who feels like doing this.

#dash meme #about the muse #about hakudoshi #about mun #long post

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notnow-letsdance · 4 years ago

Note

I recently looked at your page more I guess because I wasn't here back when you were actively writing this per say, and I honestly just feel the need to say I'm sorry. I'm sorry that you put up with so much hate and abuse. Writing is a choice, it's your choice and you writing is amazing. I recently asked if you might continue not now (I don't know if you'll see this message or that) and I'm so sorry if it causes pressure or bad feelings. I'd love to see more but respect either way. Best wishes!

Hello! I just saw these, I can’t believe I saw them so soon LOL. I log into here like once a year maximum but I was feeling extra tomark-y tonight and Grace ( @gotrigboy ) won’t fucking talk to me LMFAO. What a fucking awesome surprise!

Incoming ramble because I will also use this ask to just send a general update lmao!!

I am so so fucking glad that you love my story, and thank you so much for these messages. I was so young when I wrote it and it was during the worst year of my life (yes, even 8 years later, it was still the worst). Honestly, the hate and whatnot isn’t a big deal to me anymore—I was (and some would say I still am ;)) pretty fucking cocky, miserable, and I did end a wonderful story with no explanation. I understand why people were upset. I could write the world’s longest love letter to Not Now, and what it meant to me. What it STILL means to me. I’ve made lifelong friends from a joke I made at 13. I’m only filled with gratitude and love.

Don’t worry about the pressure, when people express interest it honestly inspires me. I would love nothing more than to get back to writing fic. I do have some chapters of Not Now uploaded to ao3—which are here—and as you may be able to tell by “Original”, I have been planning to rewrite Not Now for a long time (also, forgot to keep uploading to ao3, maybe I’ll get to that...). One of the many reasons I stopped writing was because I am overwhelmed by my own plot holes LMFAO. Were I to continue where I am right now there would be SO MUCH that I would have to clean up/add in the following chapters in order to get to a semi-rational ending. Sci-fi is hard, guys, especially when it takes place in the “real world”. I dug many holes that I can’t remember how to fill anymore. If/When I rewrite it, most things will remain the same. The only sacrifices made will be to improve on the general writing (the first few chapters aren’t great) and to eradicate plot holes. I want this thing to be fucking water tight because it’s my baby. Don’t get your hopes up, though. I have no timeline.

HOWEVER, THE ONLY WAY TO ENSURE THAT I FINISH NOT NOW IS TO FULLY FUND GRACE’S TOP SURGERY FUND—WHEN GRACE REACHES THEIR GOAL, I WILL FINISH NOT NOW, NO QUESTIONS ASKED. IT’S A DEAL I MADE WITH THE DEVIL... AKA GRACE.

Also, somewhat good news is I’m writing tomark again. Not Not Now, something kinda different and basic, but it’s a little side project I’m working. When I upload the fic to ao3, it will be under the same account (notnow). I hope I can finish the first chapter soon. I’m spending a lot of time laying the groundwork—mentally—so it’s taking me a while. No sci-fi this time. I started writing it on my twitter, but I have changed it since. I will also try to remember to upload a link here, but I don’t think anyone really knows about this blog (or tomark) anymore :(.

But honestly, I love writing so much. It’s the only thing that feels natural to me. Yet I am also a self-hating bastard—Mark always was the easiest to write—so your messages do mean a lot to me. I probably wouldn’t ever come back to this account—and likely try to forget Not Now altogether—if I didn’t have people like you dropping in every once-in-a-while to remind me that my story was more than just the embarrassing byproduct of a 15-year-olds’ descent into depression. Was that a mouthful? I can’t tell. This is a long ass response and I’m sorry. But thank you. Thank you. Not Now feels like the only good I’ve put into the world sometimes, it’s nice to know that it’s not lost to time.

Okay, I am trying to avoid rambling further! Don’t be afraid to follow me on twitter—it’s a pretty shitty twitter and I’m turning out to be a pretty shitty person but it’s the only place you’ll find me online nowadays. Now, that should be everything, I think I’ve said what I was meaning to! I love you all so much!

#tomark #ask #long post

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queenrhenpendragon · 5 years ago

Text

You know whose arc gets me every time?

Dameon’s. Dameon Maurva's arc is so beautiful and significant and affects not only himself but multiple other characters and also the entire heckin plot of the game and it moves me Every. Single. Time.

So I’m going to rant about it, welcome to the post I’ve been waiting to make for fourteen years.

First of all, this precious sun, this dear one, this absolute angel, was most likely raised mainly by an Ahriman sympathizer-- like, c'mon, am I supposed to believe Talia kept a child in the dream realm? Even without the nightmares it's dangerous, and very isolated. If something were to happen there would be nowhere she could send Dameon while she dealt with it. It’s one thing in fanfiction, but when I actually consider the logistics, either she was a truly terrible, irresponsible parent, or Dameon lived in Aveyond with his father. I've played Ahriman’s Prophecy; responsibility is Talia's middle name. Dameon was raised in Aveyond.

He has to have been a lonely child. He most likely had no human friends, and definitely none his age. Maybe the binis or fairies or sometimes Vata babysat him when Mr. Maurva was unavailable. Maybe not. Either way, such contact couldn’t replace his need for love and validation from his incredibly busy and important parents.

He probably constantly sought his parents' approval and was constantly falling short because how do you impress an immortal sun priest, millenia old and the last of his kind? Especially one who is apparently becoming disenchanted with the ideals he once fought for, the ideals his fellow priests died for. How do you impress a half-fairy who saved the world at the tender age of 17, who then became the Guardian of Dreams and is responsible for the safety and well being of every mortal creature? Especially! When! You only see them when they’re not busy keeping the universe running smoothly!

Furthermore.

Please understand that I love Talia and do not wish to vilify her in any way. I point out her flaws because I love her, because her shortcomings are so human and tragic and are part of what make the story as impactful as it is. And Talia... does not easily express affection. She is not likely to have cuddled Dameon during the times his father took him to the Dreamworld-- which just can't have been often, I just can't imagine a parent who even kind of cared about their child taking them to such a place frequently. She is not likely to have praised him or spent any notable amount of time showing interest in his interests. I do not say this to condemn her. She had a lot of responsibilities. She had never been a mother before-- and yes, she had a great example of motherhood in her Grandmama, but her own mother also left her in the care of others, abandoned her to pursue a louder call. Is it any wonder that she ultimately did the same to her own child?

She has no real relationship with Dameon. Even without all the evidence I have already laid out, this much is obvious in the way they speak to and about each other. Talia doesn't even mention Dameon is her son when she first tells Rhen about him. She gives him no more than an epithet, "Dameon, the sun priest." She does not express particular concern over his safety, even though she knows the druids are in danger and she herself was almost killed.

And Dameon calls her “mother,” and it is not because of the dialogue style of the game. Talia calls her parental figure “Grandmama.” Rhen calls Tailor “Pa” and “Daddy,” and Ma is known only as “Ma.” But Dameon calls Talia “Mother,” and his father “Father,” because that is the level of familiarity between them. The Maurvas live a strict, solitary life. Is it any wonder that Dameon is stiff and formal at the beginning? Is it any wonder he struggles to connect with others beyond a thoughtful compliment or an antiquated form of greeting? He doesn’t like himself, let alone trust himself. No one has ever taught him how to. He is so isolated, and lonely, and touch-starved, and unloved, and if that was the end of his character it would still move me. But there is more.

Talia literally killed his father, her own husband. It had to have happened when Dameon was still very young. If you take into account Devin’s apparent age, and the fact that a barely-aged Jack in av2 remembers Alicia as queen of Thais when we know that you can only ascend to the throne of Thais if you are married, and a few other details which I would be happy to pull up if anyone is interested, you will realize that Dameon can’t possibly be more than a year older than Rhen. More likely, he is younger, and this would be in line with the other canon ships we see throughout the Aveyond series.

And we found out in Rhen’s Quest that his father was murdered “many years ago.” MANY! YEARS! He was still a child, maybe 11 years old, at my best guess. He most likely hadn’t even attended a magic school yet. It’s possible he wasn’t even thinking about it. And then he had to take the position as Druid of Light. When he was a child, still mourning the death of the person most precious to him, at the hands of the only other person he could have had any semblance of a relationship with in all of Aia.

The people who were supposed to be teaching Dameon how to be gentle, loyal, and upright instead taught him how to hurt, and betray, and murder those closest to him. Even without Ahriman's influence, how is a child raised in that environment supposed to turn out healthy and good?

And yet he is still good! He is gentle and thoughtful towards not just Rhen but everyone he meets on the quest. That includes heckin MAD MARGE if you forgot. That includes an actual ogre. That includes people who are spiteful and dismissive towards him. He treats Rhen like she outranks him, the Guardian of the Sun, when she is still a peasant with a practice sword. He is kind to literally everyone except Talia, and he is at least respectful even to her. He never raises his voice at her. He never calls her anything except Mother. Never traitor, never murderer, never any of the curses we know Amanda had no qualms about using because she used them plenty in AP. Just Mother.

In fact he appears to be the reason Ahriman decided against killing Talia. Yes, Dameon wants justice for his murdered father. I think anyone who is being honest with themselves can admit they would, too. But he doesn’t want to kill her. He doesn’t want her to die. He just wants her to understand what she did, to understand the hurt she caused. He is apparently so against killing her that Ahriman has to change his carefully laid plans before he can convince Dameon to change sides.

And consider. During all of this, Dameon is literally possessed by Ahriman, or under his demonic influence, or however you want to phrase it. This influence likely began even before the game, but even if you ignore that, it is no small thing. Remember how quickly Mel became corrupted under this influence? Remember how quickly Galahad, who resisted the urge to drink blood for actual centuries, became corrupted? The fact that Dameon has any shred of goodness at all, after years of exposure to such darkness, even if you ONLY take into account the actual duration of the game, is evidence that Rhen is right; Dameon has a genuinely good, incredibly strong heart.

And speaking of that conversation. Please allow me to share some of my favorite screenshots in the entirety of the series.

My precious sun really went from this:

To having this very level-headed and respectful conversation, of which I have shared only two tiny snippets:

To THIS:

This. Is tangible, real difference, at a rate which makes sense, and I am so proud of him. I have seen people try to dismiss it, and his other development, by saying he is just pretending in order to make Rhen trust him. That literally. Does not make any sense. First of all, if this was part of his efforts to persuade Rhen to join Ahriman he would have done absolutely anything except agree that perhaps Talia was right. He would have tried to convince Rhen that Ahriman was right, not admitted he may have been wrong. And second, even if you ignore that incredibly obvious discrepancy, he either would have forgotten about the conversation with Rhen by the time they returned to the sun shrine and his mother asked him the question again, or he would have pretended to have forgiven her completely. Instead, he acts as though he is uncertain, because he is uncertain.

And his actions in the dream realm, confronting and fighting Agas for attacking his mother and desecrating her shrine, prove that he is sincere. Of course it takes him some time. Of course he hesitates. Forgiving someone for taking your parent from you is an enormous act. Forgiving someone you trusted for causing you that much pain is unfathomable. His progress is profound and inspiring and does not deserve to be treated like any less.

And he makes this progress while still under Ahriman’s influence! Can you even imagine! Aasgakadgjlkjklj. He tries to do what he believes is right even at the cost of those things most precious to him, his beliefs and ideals and the sacred memory of the person who raised him. ONE conversation prompts him to question everything. While Ahriman still has possession of him. I cannot even begin to comprehend being that brave. And this is just one small example.

I have seen many negative, unfair evaluations of the fairy dust scene. It is deeply tragic to me that such an important, eloquent, beautiful symbol could be so widely misunderstood. I have tried to explain it before. Allow me to indulge myself once again.

Fairy dust always reveals the truth. This effect is well established, not just in Rhen’s Quest but even in Ahriman’s Prophecy. It heals physical wounds (aka HP) and reveals the truth, and that’s all. There is never any indication that it can change hearts or magically “goodify” anyone or anything. It is not a deus ex machina. It was included specifically to exclude the possibility of that interpretation. It only reveals the truth, and if Dameon had already been aware of the truth, or if he truly honestly wanted the same things Ahriman wanted, it would have changed exactly nothing. That’s why Rhen’s choice to use it is so significant. It shows that she trusts him, as he is. She knows that he has a good heart and will do what is right when he knows what that is; she has been saying so for the whole game. In the final battle she gets the chance to prove she believes that.

And she does.

And she’s right.

When the truth is revealed to Dameon, he follows it, at the cost of his chance for justice, at the cost of living forever, safely, with the one person who has ever shown him any significant amount of affection, at the cost of everything he ever dared to want in his short, lonely, miserable life. While still under Ahriman’s demonic influence! Ahriman is still in his head! And he chooses to resist even though it means he will lose everything.

Now, this whole plot could have worked without the fairy dust. Previous cutscenes in the game have already proven that Dameon listens to Rhen. The screenshots I included are just a few examples of this; trust me, I could go on for a while. Dameon believes her and believes in her and trusts her, where he doesn’t trust himself. Amanda could have had Rhen just tell him what to do. Rhen could have had another conversation, told Dameon to switch back, and that would be that. It would be consistent and believable with what had happened in the game thus far.

Except then Dameon still wouldn’t trust himself, or like himself. He would still be lonely and self-loathing and miserable, or even if he wasn’t, there would be plenty of room for that interpretation.

But instead Rhen gives him a choice. Instead Amanda makes it clear that his redemption is not Rhen’s responsibility, or her decision, or her doing at all. All Rhen does is throw the fairy dust, and then lets Dameon realize what is right, and choose for himself what action he will take. She gives him the opportunity to trust himself, to believe in himself, for perhaps the first time in his life. She makes it clear that she believes in him. She gives him the support he’s been starving for his entire existence, and then she steps back, and let’s him choose.

This part is so significant for her arc, too. I have ranted about it elsewhere but allow me to sum up: Rhen has spent the game feeling like she doesn’t have a choice, and questioning her own judgement and her own significance. Dameon is the first to give her a choice, one which she seriously considers. She realizes she’s always had a choice. And she finally acts on her own judgement, without prompting from anyone else (in fact, without prompting even from the player, because as you might recall the choice the player is offered has always been “fight Dameon,” and yet Rhen never lifts a finger against him). She trusts her own heart and invites Dameon to trust his. She has always been a hero but this is the moment she really steps fully into the role. She saves herself. And then she gives Dameon the choice to do the same.

And they fight Ahriman, at staggering personal costs. Dameon fights while, again, still under Ahriman’s influence. He has to fight Ahriman physically and mentally, or spiritually, or all of them, most likely. He is not free until Rhen plunges the Sword of Shadows through Ahriman’s heart.

This part. I cry every time and I am crying thinking about it. Dameon has been a prisoner for likely as long as he can remember. His father supported Ahriman. He likely let that influence into the sun shrine. He let it affect Dameon. Dameon has likely never known a life without that darkness. Or if he did, he was too young to remember it. And now, finally, he is free. There is light for the first time. And because Rhen gave him a choice, he has the confidence and experience to stay free, to make himself and be proud of himself and not be just what he thought his parents wanted.

His gratitude to Rhen is profound. He has always been respectful and supportive of her, he has always listened to her and trusted her, as demonstrated during their first conversation when she meets him in Aveyond, and their conversations in the manor in Sedona, and every other tiny interaction they have. He looks up to her immensely.

And I think that is part of why he is so resolute about continuing in his role as the Druid of Light. Rhen has spent the game shouldering responsibilities that no one else could or would. Being the Guardian of the Sun is his responsibility, and he is determined to follow her example.

It is also the only thing he has ever known.

In the midst of his own uncertainty, still reeling from his own losses, resigned to a lonely eternity in his childhood prison, he still offers Rhen his support and devotion. This is before she ever makes her choice. He listens to her, sympathizes with her, and encourages her. He loves her, explicitly, out loud in canon dialogue, in literally. Every ending. No matter what she chooses. Nobody ever taught him how to love and yet he does it so scrupulously.

And in the canon ending, the True Ending as many of us like to call it, he finally, finally gets a chance to grow beyond his family’s legacy. To love someone and be there for her. To be adored by her. To be happy. To make a difference. To live a good life and die of old age and be buried beside his best friend and true love, and to face the shadowy unknowns of the afterlife together. And he accepts it, in an instant.

This is redemption not only for himself but for Talia, and Nino. All the Maurvas with their good intentions, who never got to see their happy ending because another call was too strong. Talia gets a second chance to watch her son grow, this time in a kinder world. And she gets a second chance with one of her dearest friends. Nino's legacy of absence and broken trust is finally set right. They all get a second chance to become who they intended to be, before they heard the calls they could not ignore. All because Dameon chose truth and love over every other voice, at every cost.

It was a very fairy-like thing to do. In overcoming his families' legacy, he steps into their true heritage. Aian Fairies value truth and love most of all.

There is an inscription on the statue that guards the fairies in AP. It has always resonated with me and I think it will help describe what I mean here:

Heart of gold thy secret guards

Love, felicity, light

Gaia's precious children

I am moved. I do not know a better way to say it. Dameon Maurva inspires me, and comforts me. His example has made me a better person. He has made me a happier person. I am so grateful to Amanda for being brave enough to tell the story she did, and being brave enough to stick by it. Her story changed my life and I honestly, truly do not believe I would be here without it. Her story saved my life, and I can never praise it enough.

#aveyond #dameon maurva #aveyond rhen's quest #aveyond 1 #talia maurva #rant

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betweenthepage · 5 years ago

Text

Mini Reviews

As always, you can find my reviews on Goodreads and you can also follow my Instagram

Review’s for:

1) Beyond the Black Door by A.M. Strickland

2) Scammed by Kristen Simmons

3) The Kingdom of Back by Marie Lu

4) Chain of Gold by Cassandra Clare

5) Ember Queen by Laura Sebastian

6) The Beautiful by Renee Ahdieh

7) Steel Crow Saga by Paul Krueger

8) Tithe by Holly Black

Beyond the Black Door

The book read a bit like early 2010’s YA (which isn’t a bad thing, I was fine with it. But some people don’t enjoy it). While I enjoyed the general plot, I wish some parts of the book were left out so that Kamai—the main character—could get the ball rolling sooner. I feel like it would have made for more interesting situations. I really enjoyed reading all the characters—especially Vehyn and all his villainous ways! The diversity in sexuality was beautiful and I am so glad that people are finding themselves in these characters. I think it was done beautifully, and will hopefully open the door for more books like this. Overall, I felt like the conflict was resolved very well and realistically for the book—aka no, “everything happened because I say.” 3 out of 5 stars!

Scammed

I enjoyed the first book, but this book? LOVED. The writing is great and the twists and turns? Did not see a lot of it coming! I’ve been conned! I LOVED that we got to see more of the secondary characters (Henry and especially Charlotte who I love x3 now) and I hope even more of the other students get some screen time in the third book. Beyond Charlotte, I was surprised to see how attached I got to Moore! More Moore! Lol Some of my only problems with Scammed were that a lot of the events that happened could have easily been solved with honesty (but then...no drama!) and that Brynn—our main character—was an easy pawn. For someone who’s good at what she does, she sure got played. I’m still spinning at all the twists that happened, trying to piece things from the first book. Seeing if maybe I missed clues, suspecting everyone, questioning who the real villains are and their true motives. That makes for a good book. @ Kristen Simmons/ Tor Teen, please send me the third book today, I am ready for third book, today. I will eagerly be waiting the third book, which I am ready for today. 4 out of 5 stars!

The Kingdom of Back

Marie has once again written a beautiful book with emotion and grace. As a pianist, I’ve been obsessed with many composers, Mozart being one of them. I knew he had a sister but didn’t know how she too was just as talented as Wolfgang. This books scratched the surface of her talent and used their imagination to write a different world. While I enjoyed the writing itself, I did feel like the otherworldness was a bit confusing and for me, didn’t make a lot of sense some of the time. I had to ignore things or add my own things in order to make more sense of it. Some times I was a bit bored due to the plot slowing down. Beyond that, I was filled with rage at the real life injustice portrayed in the story that Nannerl had to face. Not only from society/the world, but from her own father. I wanted SOMEONE to shout at him. It truly is a sadness and loss to the world that her compositions were lost to the world and she didn’t get her chance to be just as great as her brother. Marie Lu talked about how she believes her music lives on through Wolfgang, I believe so too.

Chain of Gold

Normally with so many characters, I mostly enjoy them but really only care for a few. With Chain of Gold, I LOVED every single character. They all stole my heart in different ways. Though, Matthew is my favorite by far. I have a soft spot for sassy men who like clothes.

I absolutely loved all the minor plot lines; I can clearly see how they’re going to develop into bigger plot lines. Though since there were so many small ones, it made for the overall plot to be...lacking? Not that it wasn’t good, but I just felt like I wasn’t at the edge of my seat. But given everything that happened, I know it’s only going to give me more anxiety as the books continue. I also had to pull up a family tree to see who’s kid was who’s because there are so many Lightwoods. They’ve kept busy haha

I loved seeing all of our characters from TID and I LOVE how much EVERYONE knows Tessa and Will love each other. Makes me feel even more lonely lmao.

And the ending with some of the main characters...it’s a troupe I haven’t read in a while but I’m so excited.

4 out of 5 stars!

Ember Queen

I’ve finally read this! I didn’t get to it because I travelled for a signed copy and then school but finally!!

Lots of moving parts to this book, which make sense considering they’re in the middle of a war. A lot seemed a little too easy, and while many were lost on the pages, it wasn’t anyone we really knew. Thus, the feeling of it being too easy.

The big heart ache towards the end of the book, I knew was going to happen. It no longer had a plot or arc to move the story forward unlike everyone and everything else so it was made clear to me. Regardless, I was still incredibly sad as it was one of my favorite things. (Trying to be vague and avoid spoilers lol)

I LOVED that after everything Theo has gone through, even all the growth she has had, she still remained a soft hearted person, unafraid of her emotions. Embracing her tears and everything she felt. I love a strong willed woman, but we need more soft hearted women. Both are equally strong and Laura did an amazing job at capturing that.

The ending was great, I think. It took something Theo often thought about and was a big thorn to her plan and made her embrace it. It was fitting.

I was fortunate enough to start this trilogy early via an arc, and I’m so glad I got to see it to the end.

4 out of 5 stars.

The Beautiful

Right from the start, I fell in love with Celine. I love everything about her but especially that she wasn’t afraid to want power AND love. The setting and time that this beautiful (haha get it?) book was written was a time where POCs were still treated badly. I liked the fact that Celine—and others—acknowledge this as well as enjoy that all people from everywhere could have a place where they could work side by side. There wasn’t a character I did not like or love. I enjoyed them all, even when they annoyed me or broke my heart. Even the potential lives interests (plural). I love both though I have my heart set on one boy. I didn’t like that even though a lot of things were revealed, those things were still vague. I have to think it’s because grander things will be revealed in the next book, but for now, it’s left me a little confused. This would have made this a 4 star read for me. But I just loved Celine SO MUCH that I have no choice but to make this a 5 star read. She literally made this whole book for me. 5 out of 5 stars.

Steel Crow Saga

Listen...it’s an Asian inspired book filled with LGBTQ+ INCREDIBLE characters, found family, POKEMON-ESQUE things? Just buy the book already. Don’t even finish my review.

This book was great. Every character in this book was amazing in one way or another. Lee warmed my heart (we love a sarcastic thief) but Tala owns it. She was by far my favorite character. Everything she went through, has done...she’s amazing and her growth through the book speaks loudly. She fought a lot of inner turmoil (NO ONE WOULD BLAME HER IF SHE PICKED DIFFERENTLY THAN WHAT SHE DID IN THE BOOK...but I’m glad she didn’t) and all the emotions she felt? I felt them too. I just want to wrap her in a hug and make sure nothing bad ever happens to her again. I did find one of the characters, Jimuro, annoying up until the end, where his growth was finally tangible. He was big talk but finally led with actions. Good job, dude. Still want to mildly slap you, but it’s all good. The pacing of the book was perfect and I want to live in this world where I basically can get my own Pokemon. Or metal bend. I do wish some smaller details were talked about more, as it left me with a couple questions, but overall I enjoyed it. And I hope one day there’s a sequel. :(

4.5 out of 5 stars!

Tithe

Story wise, I felt it was rushed and definitely could have been longer for the pace. But I liked it for the most part. Beyond the pace, everything felt a little too easy. If that’s the case, I can make it in the Unseelie court too lol The main character, Kaye, was something. While I generally liked her, she’s very selfish and unaware of the emotions or well being of her friends and family. Possibly it could be because of what she truly is...but still. And while she apologized for some of her actions, it seemed very surface based and it just rubbed me the wrong way. Her one real friend, Corny? LOVE him. Felt for him too. I hope if he pops up again that he gets nothing but happiness because poor king. Roiben? He was cool. I generally liked him! He was kind of the calm to Kaye’s chaos. He didn’t have much character to him but I know the later story revolves around him more so I’m excited to see his development. 3 out of 5 stars.

#book reviews #ya books #cassandra clare #holly black #mini reviews #rose speaks #review #my review #my reviews

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lemonjoonah · 6 years ago

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Grim Love: Echo

Word Count: 3K+ Rating: M Genre: Reaper AU, Drama Warnings: Major Character Death(s), Violence Pairings: Reaper!Jungkook x Reader x Seokjin Inspirations: LOVE YOURSELF Highlight Reel, SAVE ME, Guardian: The Lonely and Great God (AKA Goblin)

Summary - Every time I reach for you, every time I touch your hand, I am forced back to the beginning. Why can’t I save you from this endless cycle? Why can’t I save you from this pain?

The Grim Love series is a Reaper AU, featuring each of the members as Grim Reapers. Echo is Jungkook’s story…

A/N - This is the third instalment in the series. Even though they are individual short stories that can be read alone, I highly recommend reading all of them and in order as there is a natural progression to the information and overall plot (that’s right it’s all going to connect…). You might notice a few similarities between Taehyung’s and Jungkook’s stories but it is fully intended as part of the collective story line. Please pay attention to the warnings. These stories take a lot out of me emotionally to write, if you are easily triggered do not read it!

...

POV Jungkook

“This is our kindness, sending you.”

“I think you could do better.” I mutter back to my elders as I step across the void to the world of the living. If they have such power why can’t they do more? With every death they assign all I see is pain. The pain of the souls that leave and those that stay and mourn. If they really want to help, they should take away the agony, take away the guilt. That would be true kindness.

...

30th, Aug

I find you waiting patiently as a train crosses in front of us. A bag rests on your shoulder that’s bursting at the seams with what appears to be clothes and books. The weight of the sack must be heavy as you fail to notice when one of your belongings slips out. A red notebook falls from its place and hits the pavement. I stop beside it for a moment wondering if you will see it, but you proceed despite leaving that part of you behind. I hate the fact that I am unable to inform of the loss, I can only staying by your side until I can guide you on.

Your commute is not much further, entering a hospital I have been sent to many times. All though this will be a first, following someone who works there rather than a patient. We are surrounded by my kind, I cannot communicate with them while in this realm, but I can still feel their slight presence in the shadows of their assigned souls.

As I wait for you to change into scrubs, I ponder as to what might be your end. You, a young doctor, you don’t appear sick in anyway and any other natural causes would be unlikely at your age. Possibly an accident? It will likely be sudden. I wish that the elders would just tell us what to expect, if they know the timeline surely they know the cause too.

Your morning rounds consist of you checking on your long term patients. You consult one of the nurses before entering the third room of the day.

“How is he responding to the new dosage?”

“Unfortunately no improvement, he’s still unresponsive and on the respirator.”

You double check the chart at the foot of his bed with a sigh, “I can’t increase the prescription, he’s already at the highest dose.”

I can tell this patient of yours has little time left. The presence of his reaper is so strong that I doubt he will even last the hour.

Thirty minutes later you are called back to that room for a code blue. Your patient is in need of resuscitation, but I already know that the attempt is futile. The soul has already left with it’s guide. It’s not coming back no matter how hard you try.

After calling time of death you retreat to your locker room in defeat, hanging your head as you stalk away. This is the guilt that I hate, when those who are left behind feel responsible despite the fact that it is not their fault. There was nothing that could have been done, it was just his time. You rummage through your bag looking for something, pulling out all of its contents to find what you need. You stare at the now empty sack with a confused look, while muttering to yourself, “I know I put it in here.”

You must be looking for the journal that you had dropped on your walk over.

“If you want to give her kindness let me tell her where it is.” I whisper to myself, I know the elders aren’t listening, but it still makes me feel better to point out the faults in the limitations they have placed on us.

I can not talk to you. I can’t touch you until you’ve reached your end. Only the things that draw you to your demise are within my grasp. How fucked up is that? They will only let us touch what hurts you the most.

You give up on your search checking the display on your phone to see a text from an unknown source.

...I found a red notebook with your name and number inside. Is it by chance yours?...

I watch as your face lights up with relief.

...Yes! Thank you so much for finding it. I’m at work right now can I meet you somewhere tonight to pick it up?...

...

At the end of your shift you head to a cafe you both agreed upon. He sends you a selfie along with his name, Kim Seokjin. Telling you to look for his handsome face. I scoff at his attempt to flirt, but you giggle and smile.

Before we even reach the cafe I can see him waiting for you across the street. Holding not only your notebook but a bouquet of flowers. I find myself confused by his forwardness as he has yet to even meet you.

You wave at him before crossing in a hurry.

It turns out I was right. Your end is sudden. I didn’t even see the truck coming before you stepped in front. The horn and the screech of brakes do nothing to prevent your death.

It’s my purpose now to take your hand and guide you on. I have done it so many times before, trying to explain to a fearful soul who I am and what has taken place, but you, you are different. Sadness and longing consumes your expression as your eyes fall on mine. “Jungkook?”

It’s at that moment that I feel myself being torn away, as if I have been summoned back to my elders only the pull is far stronger. But I have yet to take your hand... the hand of someone who is wide eyed and calling out to me in pain.

...

30th, Aug (2nd Attempt)

I find myself back at the train tracks with you... but how? It’s as if the day hasn’t even happened, even though I can still hear the echo of your voice calling my name. I stare at your face trying to remember, trying to recall the past that you must share with me, but all I can see is your last day. The day in which we are now reliving.

The elders say they take away our memories when we start our roles. They say that it will make our job easier but I don’t believe them, not when there are others who still remember us, not when I can’t understand how you know my name.

The red notebook of yours falls once again, and again you fail to notice. Your day proceeds just the same as before. Visiting your patients, while losing one in the process. It’s when you check your phone after your futile search that I notice the first difference, the location he has sent you to meet at, it’s not the same as the time before. This one is on the other side of town, despite the long trek you agree, clearly desperate to retrieve your belonging.

But as you step on the bus to go to the meeting spot, it becomes apparent that you will never make it off. Just like at the hospital, the surrounding souls are shadowed by my kind. When the bus collides with a barrier I reach out to you. I am able to take your hand this time but as you speak my name once again I am ripped away.

...

30th, Aug (3rd Attempt)

“What the fuck is happening?” I question staring at the train that crosses in front of us. Something is clearly wrong. “Care to enlighten me, oh kind elders?” I shout to the sky. “This is our kindness, sending you.” I repeat in a mocking tone. “An explanation would be great.” I make an attempt to return to the void to question them but find my path blocked, your hold on me is too tight, tying me to this world so that I can not leave. You are so close to death that to travel back without your soul is impossible.

This time Kim Seokjin doesn’t message you. You remain in the dark regarding the location of your missing notebook.

One of your coworkers enters the locker room staring at your belongings you have strewn about the floor in your search.

You look up at them sheepishly, “You haven’t by chance see that red journal of mine have you?”

“Are you still using that? Honey that’s not how you should coupe. Writing them down won’t bring them back.”

“I know that! It just helps... it helps me to let them go.”

Is that what you use it for? To record the names of those who you lost under your care? I call out with the intent to shame once again. “Do you see? DO YOU SEE NOW?! She shouldn’t feel bad for this. She shouldn’t carry the weight of your fucking choices.”

On your walk back from work you comb the streets looking for your lost possession. You’re so absorbed in your search that you fail to notice a presence following you. A man that has been eyeing the bag on your shoulder with envy.

He grabs for the strap and makes an attempt to cut it with a knife to free it from your shoulder. You twist around in confusion, causing the blade to instead finds its place in you. The assailant runs off dropping the knife as he goes. You fall to the ground hand pressing on the wound in your abdomen.

Your face slowly turns white as you struggle to breath. I can’t stand to see you in this much pain, when all I can do is wait. Wait until you can take my hand, wait until I can finally take you away with me.

No one comes for you, no one finds you before you speak the name that pulls me back.

“Jungkook?” .

30th, Aug (10th Attempt)

“NO! I refuse to keep doing this. This is not kindness this is torment! She doesn’t deserve this. How many more times does she have to die before you’re content?” The train finally crosses and you proceed. “So help me god, if that journal drops one more...” I listen to the dull thunk of the pages on the pavement, seething as I glance down to it.

“How do you not notice that?” I start yelling at you, scolding upon deaf ears in anger, uncertain of what else to do. “Turn around and go pick it up!”

But of course you don’t, it would be a miracle if you could hear me, if you would just listen to me I could save you from so much pain.

...

When your patient dies in front of you once again I only become exasperated as you try to save him, “Stop worrying about him and try looking after yourself.”

The text from Seokjin this time is him offering to bring the journal to you. Informing you that he will wait downstairs in the lobby. If you can posses that journal maybe this cycle can end, is that what this is all about? The only constant each time is your determination to get that damn thing back.

You never reach him, you never get the chance to retrieve your belonging. You slip on the fourth floor staircase and fall, hitting your head as you go down. I make it far enough to hold you in my arms this time. I need to know, I must know how you remember me. Your touch seem so familiar. Hearing your voice speak my name echoes throughout the gaps inside me, as if it should hit a memory and unlock a part of me that remains hidden. But it only sends me back, back to those fucking train tracks.

30th, Aug (30th Attempt)

I am tired of watching you die, of seeing you in pain. The only thing that brings me refuge now is hearing you whisper my name.

This time you ended up staying at a hotel after a night of drinking with your friends, too intoxicated to make it back home. When smoke begins to pour in through the vents of your room you are too far gone to notice. You lay deep within your slumber as the room fills with toxic fumes and the flames creep under your door.

“Please wake up, please don’t let this happen again.” I begin to sob wishing I had the power to pull you from this bed.

You begin to mutter and toss in your sleep, “Jungkook... I’m sorry I lost it. Please don’t leave... don’t leave me...”

You are simply dreaming, but that doesn’t stop me from trying to reach you. “Wake up, you have to get up. I won’t leave you but... I can’t save you. I don’t know how.”

The next time you say my name you’ve already passed, and I am pushed away once again.

30th, Aug (50th Attempt)

So much pain...

30th, Aug (75th Attempt)

Why can’t I take you with me...

30th, Aug (100th Attempt)

Why can’t I save you from this...

30th, Aug (411th Attempt)

No matter how many times you die I am always the first thing you see. My name always comes from you lips before anything else.

As the journal falls I stay by it’s side. I will come back to you in time, I promise, but I have to find out how to end this. How I can free you from this echo of an end, my only lead is to follow what you’ve been searching for. With the hopes that it will bring you to your final peace.

...

Just as in days past Kim Seokjin finds the journal, but he doesn’t immediately open it as I thought he would. Instead I must follow him back to his apartment as he carries your possession in his hand.

He opens the curtains of his window to shed light on a wall filled with fresh sharpie marks. To anyone else they would just seem like the writings of a mad man, random words crammed onto the dull paint of the room, but to me the tell a dark story in two words or less. Truck, bus, thief, hospital staircase, hotel fire and so many more...

I stare at the display in shock and horror, every circle in the web he has drawn is a death you’ve endured. As read each one I can feel myself reliving the experience in my head. How? How does he know all of this? How does he know what I have witnessed, what you have suffered?

Each of your deaths seems to branch off from a choice that he has made, when he has texted you, when he hasn’t, where he has agreed to meet you, where he has encouraged your friends to take you.

Seokjin sits on his bed staring at the wall as he opens the journal of yours to the beginning. And there on the very first line I see my name written by your hand. Echoing back to my end.

...

The walls which surround me are bleak and sterile, the steady beeping of the monitor mocks me as if it’s counting down the limited time I have left. The only good moments within this hospital room are the frequent visits from you. You check in with me often despite not being my doctor, our prior friendship preventing you from taking the role as my primary physician.

“How are you feeling today Jungkook?”

“I’m fine.”

“Any pain?”

“You already have enough patients to stress over, please don’t worry about me too.”

“You know I will always worry about you, even if I’m not your doctor, even if you say not to. But something's wrong, what is it? Tell me.”

“Could you do me a favour first?”

...

I wait patiently for your return, knowing that I’ll have to explain myself once you do. It almost saddens me to see you back so quickly with a bag in hand. It would have been nice if you could have remained in blissful ignorance for a little longer.

“Like this?”

You hand me a red notebook that I asked you to purchase.

“Yes, perfect.”

I take it before giving it right back to you with a sly grin. “For you.”

“What for?” You chuckle.

“For your relief. I want you to write everything that causes you pain everything that weighs down on you in here, you need to let it all go. Starting with my name...”

“Jungkook?”

Tears begin to flood your eyes as I take your hand and try to explain. “My test results came back today. The new medication, it’s not working like they hoped.”

I told my doctor not to say anything to you, that I wanted to be the one to tell you. I knew you would blame yourself if they did and I couldn’t bear the thought of it. We have been friends for so long... You always tell me of the things that worry you, of the guilt that wracks you. I won’t be there to help you through those times, to give you the release that you need from the pressures weighing on you. If I can’t be here for you, I want to at least give you something, something that might help save you from the pain...

...

This journal was my last gift, and here he holds it like it’s his key to you.

In anger I try to take it from his grasp, I am unable to touch the book but I manage to make contact with his hand, forcing the notebook to fall to the floor.

He looks down in confusion trying to explain the phenomenon that is me.

I can only touch the things that are hurting you, the things that lead you to your end... This man, Kim Seokjin is he the reason you are going through such agony? I look to the wall once again. Is he the reason you are forced to die over and over? With every death a result of his actions...

He bends over to pick up the red journal and faintly whispers, “I have to go back to the beginning, that’s the closest I’ve come so far.”

With that choice he sends you the same text that I remember from the first day following you. Asking you to meet him outside a cafe.

...

As you are about to run across the street he tells you to wait, crossing himself instead. I have to choose, will I let you die again or prevent him from reaching you?

Seokjin is fully aware of the truck that is heading down the street, waiting to the side until it will pass him by. But even if it does, I know that this loop will not stop, not until I can destroy the cause of your death. I can’t do this anymore I can’t watch you die again.

He has forced you relive so much pain, so much guilt. He is within my grasp, he is within my realm, he is within my right to end.

My contact with him is short but serves its purpose. The tires squeal and the horn blares, but not for you. He can’t hurt you now, not when I will lead him away.

This is my kindness, taking him... to save you.

...

A/N: I’m so sorry for that end, but I promise it’s not the end of Seokjin’s story. Lots of easter eggs in here, but if you are curious as to why I set the date at Aug. 30th, I suggest rewatching the Highlight Reel.

#jungkook x reader #seokjin x reader #jin x reader #bts x reader #bts fanfiction #bts fanfic #bts reader insert #jungkook x reader x seokjin #bts au #bts grim reaper au #bts grim love series

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lordsicheng · 6 years ago

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Anonymous: Pt. 1

c: Jung Jaehyun, oc, others

g: mystery, romance, slight thrill (?)

s: a freelance writer slash igconito internet sensation, Jaehyun dives into making anonymous love letters midway his career– only to make one that could turn him into someone he doesn’t think he is

w: 2k~

a/n: in the middle of writing this I think I could say this is slightly inspired by the Netflix show “You”, which I totally am obsessed with omg but I made sure the writings I made of this are not plagiarism to the original plot! I also am a little bit late because I was gonna post this on his birthday but meh :/ this serves as a bit of a comeback from me on writing (I wrote this in two hours oops) so yeah enjoy!!

It was just another day for him as like the others. He wasn’t expecting anything special in particular, but he ends up getting a different order than usual at one of his favorite breakfast places only a block from his home. He looked at the other people inside the restaurant, no reaction in particular by the fact that majority of them inside came as couples, some as quads, and a few as close-knit families. He didn’t seem be fazed by the fact that he was the only one that was alone on a table.

In fact, he felt more comfortable that he didn’t have any company with him.

“Here you go sir; three layer pancakes with cranberry syrup and blueberry bits, less butter, and tall broad Arabica coffee.” the waitress smiles warmly as she served him his order, looking at him as his eyes feasted on the meal set in front of him

“Thank you. Compliments to your cook.” he smiled politely to the waitress as he looked up

“You come here quite often and order the same thing. I was surprised you ordered something different—a mix of sweet and slight bitterness thanks to the beverage.” she commented

“Today’s a special day.” he grinned, slowly putting on a napkin and grabbing the utensils from the side

“Oh, right. Valentine’s. Perhaps you were able to score a date today, no?” she teased, almost as if she was flirting but also slightly discouraged if it were true

“Well, everyday should be Valentine’s day. Love should be given in any form anyone could.” he paused, sighing slightly before looking up at the already confused waitress, smiling yet again before continuing

“It’s my birthday.”

To Jaehyun, his birthday was just like any other day—living alone in one of the most populated cities in the world whilst being a freelance writer was what he always wanted. He wasn’t particular about his future and to his luck, his parents let him choose his own path. Although he was given a chance to travel many times during his youth, he felt at home whenever he was in his hometown. In fact, he chose to stay instead of grabbing the opportunity of studying in one of the most prestigious universities in America.

Eyes fixed to his laptop screen, he scrolled through the rush of emails he had received from his boss and fans of his freelance writing. He was hesitant on opening some, who just wanted to either greet him or ask for a commission.

“Thank you, but inspiration is hard to catch nowadays.” he said to himself as he read through a letter of a man asking for a commission for a write-up

And of the many writings he had made, he chose to have a different pen name or even went on anonymous. His talent involved being igconito in many other forums whilst giving advice about romance, often using his common pen name, “Jeff Valentine.”

His phone suddenly rang and he looked at the screen before grumbling, rolling his eyes as he just decided to answer it without any hesitation.

“Yes?”

“Jaehyun, hey, I need your help.”

The frantic voice from the call didn’t particularly daunt him but rather amused him as he knew this particular person would only call him on his birthday for one reason

“Mark, I told you I didn’t want a party for my birthday.” he chuckled

“W-who says we were throwing you a party?” Mark, a close friend of his, stuttered slightly

“I don’t know, maybe your Instagram story about a Valentine-themed party with a huge photo of me at the back that you forgot to filter for other people to see except, well, me?” Jaehyun spoke sarcastically, already feeling Mark’s nervousness about the surprised being messed up thanks to him

“Shit.” Mark cursed, internally slapping himself as he let out a sigh

“Look, I appreciate that a lot. But I really am not interested in parties.”

“Dude, just once, I swear! We really tried to make the best surprise but I really blew it… If you can’t go I swear they’re gonna find out I messed up again like last year!” Mark pleaded

“Mark, you sent the texts to all of your friends about the surprise party. And that obviously included me.” Jaehyun stood up from his seat, walking around his room

“Please? Just act surprised at least since you know I slip up a lot.”

Jaehyun thought for a while and decided, that even though he really wanted to be alone on his special day, he chose to just celebrate it with friends since he knew the others were just as ‘lonely’ as him during Valentine’s day

“Fine.”

“Great! Really means a lot man. There’s gonna be great food, great ambiance, I invited some girls—“

“Whoa, wait. Girls?” Jaehyun furrowed his brows, cutting Mark off

“I mean… don’t you think it’s time, man? Last time you dated someone you completely cut them off and they ended up dating someone who looked just like you.” Mark reasoned

“I’m not interested in dating, Mark. I don’t even know where you’re getting all these girls?”

“Thanks to me and some connections, we’ve got a couple coming over. Let’s see if one of them hits the jackpot—aka, you, Mr. Valentine.” Mark laughed as he sat on his sofa, Jaehyun feeling a little bit iffy about his plan

“I’m only going for the food. Text me the address and time, I have to do some work and run errands.” Jaehyun grumbled yet again, sitting back on his computer chair

“Errands? It’s your birthday, though?”

“Errands as in shopping, my friend. Now, text me the details and I’ll catch you guys tonight.” Jaehyun dropped the call without even hearing Mark’s last words, putting his phone next to his laptop as he leaned back and let out a sigh of exasperation

He looked to the side and noticed the sun was slightly showing, though it was the middle of winter in transition to spring. He thought that maybe if he took a couple of hours for a walk he’d be more inspired to do anything on his birthday. He immediately grabbed a coat and hurried out his apartment towards the nearby park that was near the river

“Winter, winter. Looking at all these couples make me slightly bitter.” he thought to himself the moment he realized a lot of the people around the area were couples

However, to his luck, he saw someone by the benches sitting alone whilst holding a romance book. To him, this was probably typical for most singles—reading an idealistic novel as they fantasize about their fairytale romance waiting to happen even up until they reach 50. He just shrugged and continued on his way, until he saw that particular person stand up and walk rather in a fast pace towards the other side of the park. As much as he wasn’t interested in their own business, he slowly decided to follow suit as he thought it was probably just some nasty breakup about to happen

To his dismay, he realized he was brought back to his apartment building—even worse, on the same level of his own place.

“No way.” he mumbled, standing by the stairs that was far enough from where the person had stood

With a few hard and loud knocks on the door, it swung open and he saw a man, probably around his age, dragging around three luggage bags as if he were to fly off to another country of some sorts

“Great, now you’re just gonna leave?”

“I have no choice, y/n! You’re having too many idealized expectations of me and I’m getting sick of it.”

“Sure, leave! Valentine’s is all about being left alone.”

“Who gives a fuck about Valentine’s, y/n? It’s always Valentine’s in your head!”

Sheesh, talk about a nasty break up, as Jaehyun would’ve imagined in his head as the man leaving with his bags got into the elevator quickly. Jaehyun, on the other hand, decided to look down and walk towards his own place, only a couple of doors from the stairs.

He took one glance at that certain person again and noticed them sobbing, slowly walking into the apartment before heading inside his own. Feeling a little bit guilty for eavesdropping, he thought, why not give a small note for them on this particular day?

As much as he wasn’t a fan of the idealistic thoughts of romance itself, he just decided to go on with it because of impulse and head on to his laptop to think of a write up. But what was he supposed to write? A love story? A poem? Some sort of weird quote about love?

That’s right, he was likely gonna go for an anonymous love letter.

Besides, they’ll probably not notice or just think of it as a prank, eh? Valentine’s day is actually full of pranks as he remembered, as many as those done on April Fool’s day.

Cracking his knuckles before writing, he paused and realized again that he wasn’t sure on what to write.

“Roses are red… Violets are blue…. If you were a booger, I’d choose you?”

Meh.

That was already cheesy to some, but that was just plain disgusting to him.

He thought again and felt like it should be sincere and well thought out. He decided to open up his emails in case he was able to think of something, but then he realized he had opened an email from earlier and decided to read it again

“Mr. Valentine, I need your help.

I saw one of your advices from the Romance Realm forums and I wanted to email you personally, if you don’t mind.

I need to come up with a letter for my crush. She is in love with the thought of romance but doesn’t seem to think of it realistically. I want to make a letter that makes her realize that I will be able to give her that realistic romance she deserves rather than the idealistic one she can’t grasp on.

A reply would be nice. Thanks!”

It must’ve been fate that he decided to do this one good deed just to cheer up someone. So alas, he thought of something quick the moment he remembered the term, ‘idealistic romance, and grabbed a pen and some special paper he had saved

Besides, this was his hobby and talent. It wouldn’t kill anyone if he tried to do this, right?

A little over thirty minutes and with penmanship worthy enough for its own font, Jaehyun grabbed a light scented, special envelope made for letters sent during Valentine’s. It was like giving a letter to a young love yet again to him as he sealed it with a sticker rather than anything.

He got out of his apartment and walked on over to the person’s front door. As he looked down, he noticed a mat on his feet and decided to put it below, making sure there was a slight peep of the envelope on the side. He suddenly heard the knob of the door about to click open, making him immediately retreat before getting caught—and to his relief, he wasn’t.

The person behind the door then walked out and immediately saw the different contrast of colors from their mat and the envelope that was peeping on the side. They crouched down to see it and immediately got a whiff of a mix of vanilla and rose that seemed to entice their sense of scent

Without hesitation, they walked back inside and closed the door behind them.

Jaehyun, on the other hand, was spying from his own place as he made sure the door was unnoticeably opened at its slightest inch, grinning and closing the door as he sat on the floor in respite.

To him, it was just some fake letter to make up someone’s day.

To the other, it was one that could liven up their dreams of a fantasized romance.

“It’s just like any other day, but today’s just a lil bit special, no?”

#jung jaehyun #jaehyun #nct scenarios #nct 127 scenarios #jung jaehyun scenarios #jung jaehyun imagines #nct #nct 127

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wumingfoundation · 7 years ago

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On #QAnon: The full text of our Buzzfeed Interview

Ryan Broderick of Buzzfeed just published an article on this #QAnon conspiracy bullshit titled It's Looking Extremely Likely That QAnon Is A Leftist Prank On Trump Supporters. The piece features quotes from an interview we gave via email. Here’s the full email exchange.

Can you tell me a bit about when and how your book Q was written?

We started writing Q in the last months of 1995, when we were part of the Luther Blissett Project, a network of activists, artists and cultural agitators who all shared the name «Luther Blissett». Luther Blissett was and still is a British public figure, a former footballer, a philanthropist. The LBP spread many mythical tales about why we chose to borrow his name, but the truth is that nobody knows.

Initially, Blissett the footballer was bemused, but then he decided to play along with us and even publicly endorsed the project. Last year, during an interview on the Italian TV, he stated that having his name adopted for the LBP was «a honour». The purpose of signing all our statements, political actions and works of art with the same moniker was to build the reputation of one open character, a sort of collective "bandit", like Ned Ludd, or Captain Swing. It was live action role playing. The LBP was huge: hundreds of people in Italy alone, dozens more in other countries. In the UK, one of the theorists and propagandists of the LBP was the novelist Stewart Home.

The LBP lasted from 1994 to 1999. The best English-language account of those five years is in Marco Deseriis' book Improper Names: Collective Pseudonyms from the Luddites to Anonymous. One of our main activities consisted of playing extremely elaborate pranks on the mainstream media. Some of them were big stunts which made us quite famous in Italy. The most complex one was played by dozens of people in the backwoods around Viterbo, a town near Rome. It lasted a year, involving Satanism, black masses, Christian anti-satanist vigilantes and so on. It was all made up: there were neither Satanists nor vigilantes, only fake pictures, strategically spread rumours and crazy communiqués, but the local and national media bought everything with no fact-checking at all, politicians jumped on the bandwagon of mass paranoia, we even managed to get footage of a (rather clumsy) satanic ritual broadcast in the national TV news, then we claimed responsibility for the whole thing and produced a huge mass of evidence. The Luther Blissett Project was also responsible for a huge grassroots counter-inquiry on cases of false child abuse allegations. We deconstructed the paedophilia scare that swiped Europe in the second half of the 1990s, and wrote a book about it. A magistrate whom we targeted in the book filed a lawsuit, as a consequence the book was impounded and disappeared from bookshops, but not from the web.

This is the context in which we wrote Q. We finished it in June 1998. It came out in March 1999 and was our final contribution to the LBP.

I've been reading up about it, and it's largely believed that it's underneath the book's narrative it works as handbook for European leftists? Is that a fair assessment? I've read that many believe the book's plot is an allegory for 70s and 80s European activists?

Although it keeps triggering many possible allegorical interpretations, we meant it as a disguised, oblique autobiography of the LBP. We often described it as Blissett's «playbook», an «operations manual» for cultural disruption.

The four authors I'm speaking to now are Roberto Bui, Giovanni Cattabriga, Federico Guglielmi and Luca Di Meo correct? The four authors of Q?

You are speaking with three of the four authors of Q, and you're speaking with a band of writers called Wu Ming, which means «Anonymous» in Chinese. In December 1999 the Luther Blissett Project committed a symbolic suicide - we called it The Seppuku - and in January 2000 we launched another project, the Wu Ming Foundation, centred around our writing and our blog, Giap. The WMF is now an even bigger network than the LBP was, and includes many collectives, projects and laboratories. Luca aka Wu Ming 3 is not a member of the band anymore, although he still collaborates with us on specific side projects. Each member of the band has a nom de plume composed of the band's name and a numeral, following the alphabetical order of our surnames, thus you're speaking to Roberto Bui aka Wu Ming 1, Giovanni Cattabriga aka Wu Ming 2 and Federico Guglielmi aka Wu Ming 4.

Can you tell me a bit about your background before the Luther Blissett project?

Before the LBP we were part of a national scene that was – and still is – called simply «il movimento», a galaxy of occupied social centres, squats, independent radio stations, small record labels, alternative bookshops, student collectives, radical trade unions, etc. In the Italian radical tradition, at least after the Sixties, there was never any clearcut separation between the counterculture and more political milieux. Most of us came from left-wing family backgrounds, had roots in the working class. Punk rock opened our minds during our teenage years, then in the late 1980s and early 1990s Cyberpunk opened them even more, and inspired new practices.

When did you start noticing similarities between Q and QAnon? I know you've tweeted a bit about this, but I'd love to get as many details as I can. I feel like the details around QAnon are so sketchy that it's important to lock in as much as I can here.

We read a lot about the US alt-right, books such as Elizabeth Sandifer's Neoreaction a Basilisk or Angela Nagle's – flawed but still useful – Kill All Normies, and yet we didn't see the QAnon thing coming. We didn't know it was growing on 4chan and some specific subReddits. About six weeks ago, on June 12th, our old pal Florian Cramer – a fellow veteran of the LBP who now teaches at the Willem de Kooning Academy in Rotterdam – sent us a short email. Here's the text:

«It seems as if somebody took Luther Blissett's playbook and turned it into an Alt-Right conspiracy lore. Maybe Wu Ming should write a new article: "How Luther Blissett brought down Roseanne Barr"!»,

After those sentences there was a link to a piece by Justin Caffier on Vice. We read it, and briefly commented on Twitter, then in the following weeks more and more people got in touch with us, many of them Europeans living in the US. They all wanted to draw our attention on the QAnon phenomenon. To anyone who had read our novel, the similarities were obvious, to the extent that all these people were puzzled seeing that no US pundit or scholar was citing the book.

Have there been key moments for you that made you feel like QAnon is an homage to Q? What has lined up the best?

Coincidences are hard to ignore: dispatches signed Q allegedly coming from some dark meanders of top state power, exactly like in our book. This Q is frequently described as a Blissett-like collective character, «an entity of about ten people that have high security clearance», and at the same time – like we did for the LBP – weird "origin myths" are put into circulation, like the one about John Kennedy Jr. faking his own death in 1999 – the year Q was first published, by the way! – and becoming Q. QAnon's psy-op reminds very much of our old «playbook», and the metaconspiracy seems to draw from the LBP's set of references, as it involves the Church, satanic rituals, paedophilia...

We can't say for sure that it's an homage, but one thing is almost certain: our book has something to do with it. It may have started as some sort of, er, "fan fiction" inspired by our novel, and then quickly became something else.

There will be a lot of skepticism I think that an American political movement like QAnon could have been influenced by an Italian novel, how do you think it may have happened?

It's an Italian novel in the sense that it was originally written in Italian by Italian authors, but in the past (nearly) 20 years it has become a global novel. It was translated into fifteen languages – including Korean, Japanese, Russian, Turkish – and published in about thirty countries. It was successful all across Europe and in the English speaking world with the exception of the US, where it got bad reviews, sold poorly and circulated almost exclusively in activist circles.

Q was published in Italian a few months before the so-called "Battle of Seattle", and published in several other languages in the 2000-2001 period. It became a sort of night-table book for that generation of activists, the one that would be savagely beaten up by an army of cops during the G8 summit in Genoa, July 2001. In 2008 we wrote a short essay, almost a memoir, on our participation to those struggles and Q's influence in those years, titled Spectres of Müntzer at Sunrise. A copy of Q's Spanish edition even ended up in the hands of subcomandante Marcos. It isn't at all unrealistic to imagine that it may have inspired the people who started QAnon.

Have you seen anything in the QAnon posts that leads you to suspect any activist group in particular is behind it?

No, we haven't.

You think QAnon is a prank? Without some kind of reveal it's obviously hard to see it as that. If you think it was revealed that QAnon was actually some kind of anarchist prank, would it even matter? Would its believers abandon it or would they just see it as a smear campaign?

Let us take for granted, for a while, that QAnon started as a prank in order to trigger right-wing weirdos and have a laugh at them. There's no doubt it has long become something very different. At a certain level it still sounds like a prank, but who's pulling it on whom? Was the QAnon narrative hijacked and reappropriated by right-wing "counter-pranksters"? Counter-pranksters who operated with the usual alt-right "post-ironic" cynicism, and made the narrative more and more absurd in order to astonish media pundits while spreading reactionary content in a captivating way?

Again: are the original pranksters still involved? Is there some detectable conflict of narratives within the QAnon universe? Why are some alt-right types taking the distance from the whole thing and showing contempt for what they describe as «a larp for boomers»?

A larp it is, for sure. To be more precise, it's a fascist Alternate Reality Game. Plausibly the most active players – ie the main influencers – don't believe in all the conspiracies and metaconspiracies, but many people are so gullible that they'll gulp down any piece of crap – or lump of menstrual blood, for that matter. Moreover, there's danger of gun violence related to the larp, the precedent of Pizzagate is eloquent enough. What if QAnon inspires a wave of hate crimes?

Therefore, to us the important question is: triggering nazis like that, what is it good for? That camp is divided between those who would believe anything and those who would be "ironic" on anything and exploit anything in order to advance their reactionary, racist agenda. Can you really troll or ridicule people like those?

It's hard to foresee what would happen if QAnon were exposed as an anarchist/leftist prank on the right. If its perpetrators claimed responsibility for it and showed some evidence (for example, unmistakeable references to our book and the LBP), would the explanation itself become yet another part of the narrative, or would it generate a new narrative encompassing and defusing the previous one? In plain words: which narrative would prevail? «QAnon sucking anything into its vortex» or «Luther Blissett's ultimate prank»?

In any case, we'd never have started anything like that ourselves. Way too dangerous.

#QAnon #Luther Blissett #Q #novel #Wu Ming

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yourkeeperoftherunners · 7 years ago

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Birthday Shenanigans

Plot: AU He’s the top of your class, comes from a well-off family, and he happens to be your best friend. But everyone else writes him off as a nerd who is cute, but has no game. Birthdays happen once a year and this one takes the cake with a few changes. What better way to spend his birthday...shopping with you and proving those haters wrong?

Rating: PG-13 (Language, talking behind someone’s back, lingerie store, mention of past bullying)

Characters: RM x Female Reader, feat. mention of other members.

Notes: This is based on a dream I had recently, tweaked slightly with a different opening. The item mentioned in the one shot is inspired by this set. Thank you @btsreactsarchive for letting me bounce the idea off of you.

How’d your test go? Sent 14:12 PM

Joon

Do you need to ask? Sent 14:15 PM

You rolled your eyes when you saw your friend’s response. He was all riled up last week about how he did on the test for History, staying up all hours of the night trying to cram as much information into his head before class the next day. You knew he had this in the bag – hell, he tended to lose his cool too much before big exams and projects, which you blamed on his parents for instilling in their eldest.

You leaned against the lockers, tapping your foot impatiently as you waited for your best friend to get out of his final class for the day. Granted you were early, seeing as your Shop Class teacher thought it would be nice to let everyone go early before the weekend.

Once the bell rang, you looked up and kept an eye out for your friend in the sea of students leaving their classrooms. You spotted him stumbling out of the classroom, nearly falling on his face. A hand caught the lockers closest to him and he straightened up, fixing his glasses as a few jocks snickered at his misfortune. He ignored them as he gently nudged his way through the crowd, catching your eye.

“Sorry, Mrs. Jang decided to ramble on about some British war...in run on sentences might I add,” Namjoon sighed with a shake of his head.

You pretended to look horrified and clapped a hand to your cheek. “No! Say it isn’t so! She had the audacity to speak in run-on sentences in front of Mr. Valedictorian Kim Namjoon? Oh the shame, the tragedy!”

Namjoon rolled his eyes at you and you grinned cheekily as you walked toward the entrance to the school. You almost made it to the front when Crystal grabbed your arm, pulling you to the side.

“Y/N! Thank God I found you!” she declared. “So, Taehyung invited me to his party tomorrow night and I’m freaking out! I mean, me! Kim Taehyung asked me to come!”

You nodded and shot her a thumbs up. She grasped both of your hands and added that she needed a wingwoman for tomorrow night. At her question, you tried not to wince as you pulled your hands from hers. You weren’t as close to her as you used to be and she had gotten quite annoying after she couldn’t stop babbling on about Taehyung and her silly crush on him. Hell, the girl did so much talk about trying to get him, yet she never tried until this party invite she got. Plus, you already had plans in place.

“Sorry Crys, I’m already hanging out with Joon – it’s his birthday tomorrow,” you explained as you glanced back at him.

He was hanging by the door, waiting patiently for you to wrap things up. You frowned when he got jostled by one of the soccer players, a punk named Jungkook, who managed to make him drop his binder, notes scattering all over the place. Before you could walk over to help him, the captain of the swim team came to his side to help him collect the notes.

“Ay Jungkookie! Apologize to your hyung!” Hoseok called over his shoulder.

Jungkook ignored him and Hoseok sighed before handing Namjoon back his notes.

“Sorry – he’s getting a little too smug after that last victory,” Hoseok sighed. “Congratulations on the top grade on the exam by the way. Wish I did better, I mean, the B’s not awful, but my dad’s probably gonna talk my ear off about it.”

“Oh thanks,” Namjoon replied as he pushed his glasses up. “A B is good – not an easy test after all those threats she made.”

Crystal noticed where you were looking and sighed with a huff. “You’re joking right? The nerd? What the hell are you planning on even doing with him? Like, practicing facts and reading textbooks for fun?”

You backed up and shot her a confused look. “Hey, he’s my best friend. Who cares if he doesn’t go out and party hard like everyone else here? He’s got dreams and aspirations he’s working toward!”

“Are you guys like dating or something? I mean, that’s the only reason I could see you spending so much time with him!” she asked, hand on her hip.

You shook your head, fingers wrapping around your bag strap. “It’s. His. Birthday.” you stated. “Friends celebrate birthdays together. Look, I’m sorry I can’t help you with your crush, but I made plans with Joon a long time ago.” Before she could say anything, you turned and headed toward Namjoon, who was bidding Hoseok good bye.

“You could have gone to the party,” Namjoon spoke up after walking home with you in silence.

You jerked your head up and raised a brow. “You heard that?”

He shrugged and explained that your friend wasn’t exactly being quiet or discreet when she spoke with you. You pursed your lips together and sighed.

“Joon ignore her,” you ordered as you hoisted your bag higher on your shoulder. “She’s not close to me anymore. All she ever does is whine about Taehyung this and Taehyung that! Ugh she rambles on about him but she can’t even puck up the courage to say anything other than ‘Hi’ to him! Besides, I hate going to parties like his because you know they’re gonna involve the cops a couple of hours in.”

“True, true,” Namjoon sighed as he paused at the entrance of his neighborhood. “Hey so, I was thinking...can we, I dunno? Go shopping or something tomorrow?”

“Um Joon it’s your birthday so we can do whatever you want,” you replied with a shrug of your shoulders. Shopping wasn’t a favorite in your book but for your best friend, you’d do anything.

You had known each other since you were kids, his parents moving to your town from Ilsan, South Korea. His parents had come into a lot of money from a grandparent. Combined with a high profile job transfer for his father, they had been able to buy a home in a gated community. Not many people at school knew about his wealth, partly because he was shy to share that information with anyone. You had been one of the few kids to welcome him warmly and not treat him like a freak when he revealed how smart he was compared to your classmates. Hell, you even punched out one idiot, screaming at the bully that Namjoon was probably going to become the next Bill Gates.

“Where and when?” you asked him.

“I’ll text you tomorrow morning okay?”

“Mall’s already open Joon, where the hell are you?” you sighed as you checked your phone again. You crossed your legs and tried to ignore the growling sounds your stomach was making.

Namjoon had texted you when you got up, saying he’d meet you at the best mall in your town, AKA that high end one with all of the snooty boutiques and high end brands that people coveted. He asked you to hold on eating before he met up with you, saying he was going to bring coffee and breakfast. You nearly protested that you could cover breakfast and coffees, but he won his way, saying he’d see you around the time the mall opened.

He hadn’t asked you to dress up, but you took the effort to put on a clean, neat look that made you presentable so clerks wouldn’t snub you as easily. Comfortable flats, a long skirt, and a t-shirt, the whole look finished with a blazer.

You checked your phone again before you saw the last person you wanted to see today: Crystal. She was coming your way, distracted by something that someone else was saying, which you took as a sign to move by a pillar, hidden from her view. You didn’t recognize the girl she was with, but it was probably some other lackey who was suffering through her dramatic ‘OMG I’m going to Taehyung’s party – what do I wear?’ spiel.

“OMG I have nothing to wear to the party tonight!” she wailed to her companion.

“Chill, just buy something, tuck the tags in, then return it!” the other girl replied.

You bit your lip at the idea. Sure you didn’t like some of the snobby people who worked at this mall, but it seemed unfair to simply buy something, wear it once, then return it with the lie that you only tried it on at home. They had to make a living too, after all.

“You’re a lifesaver for coming with me!” Crystal sighed. “Can you believe Y/N? We’ve been friends for a long time and she chooses the nerd over me!”

“Who, the valedictorian?” her friend asked.

You swallowed the lump in your throat and narrowed your eyes. Now you were tempted to reveal yourself so you could wipe that smug bitch’s look off her face. You didn’t care if she trashed you but Joon...

“Should I try Gucci? I think Tae loves Gucci, right?” Crystal asked.

“I’m worried about their return policy,” her friend warned.

“I swear I need to find a rich boyfriend or some – whoa hello there...” Crystal murmured as her eyes drifted to someone passing by her.

You glanced around the pillar to see a young man clad in a white blouse, tucked into a pair of grey dress pants walking your way. His hair was parted to the side and was dyed a taupe, almost grey color. Once your eyes met, a familiar dimpled smile cross his lips and you blinked in shock upon realizing who it was.

“Joon?!” you gasped when he came closer. “What? How? Um wait, where are your glasses?”

He chuckled as he held out the go-to container in one hand with two coffees and breakfast sandwiches from a cafe, one cup bearing your name. You lifted the cup from the carrier, mouth still gaping.

“I’m wearing contacts today,” he explained. He draped the matching jacket over his shoulders before raising his cup to his lips. He took a sip from it and nodded at a bench a few steps away. “Wanna sit and eat before we come up with a plan of attack?”

You nodded as he led the way, ignoring the stares from Crystal and her friend. He placed the carrier between you once seated and removed his cup again, raising it toward yours. “Cheers!”

“Happy Birthday,” you added, tapping your cup against his. “Oh and here’s my present for you. Sorry it’s not designer.”

“I don’t care if it is,” Namjoon reassured you as he accepted the bag from you, unwrapping the tissue covered parcel. He smiled when he saw it was a beanie themed to Ryan, his favorite LINE character, which you made. You also bought him a small plush to go with it and he grinned brightly once he saw both things. “I love these! You made the hat?”

“Yup, seeing as you needed a hat and what better than to make it like your favorite LINE character?” you replied before unwrapping your sandwich. The initial shock of seeing your best friend looking like something out of a magazine spread had worn off, but it was still hard for you to wrap your head around. You thought Joon looked good regardless of being “nerdy” – he had a charming smile and could make glasses look good. Not that you were complaining about his current look, but one had to wonder...

“Hey so, when did all of this happen? I mean, you look sharp, but you don’t need to change your style for me or anything. You know I don’t care about appearances,” you said.

Namjoon swallowed the mouthful of his sandwich he was eating and wiped his mouth with a napkin. “Yeah I know. I was thinking about some of the people we see at school every week.”

“Their opinions don’t matter Joon.”

“I know that! But today’s my birthday and I kind of felt like...well, changing things up. Maybe mess with their heads a little. You always said those people were due for revenge at some point,” Namjoon mused, a glint in his eyes. “Plus...Umma said I was due for a haircut.”

You snickered at his last sentence and he took another sip from his cup. You finished your sandwich and made a face.

“Well I wish I owned something nicer, cause I look like a slob compared to you,” you sighed.

“What are you talking about? You look great! Wait, I don’t think I’ve seen you in a skirt before!”

“I was trying to look presentable so the clerks don’t think I’m a hobo,” you shot back. You tried not to roll your eyes as you spotted Crystal coming over to you, waving dramatically.

“OMG! Y/N I didn’t know you were here!” she called out with a faux excitement. Her eyes focused on Namjoon and she took a step towards him. “Who’s your hot friend here?”

Namjoon rose from his seat on the bench and offered his hand to you. You stood up and collected the trash from your breakfast.

“Good morning Crystal, nice to see you too,” he greeted with a smile that bordered on a smirk.

Crystal shot him a confused look and looked at you for help. A matching smile appeared on your face as you nodded at Namjoon.

“We need to go, right Joon? Think you said something about getting your watch repaired?” you drawled.

Namjoon flashed his wrist, which had a pricey Rolex clasped around it. “Yeah you’re right. Sorry ladies, we need to go – the store gets pretty busy throughout the day and I’d like to have it back for tonight.” He gestured for you to go first and you thanked him, passing a trash can to toss the wrappers and napkins in. He followed, catching up to walk beside you and the both of you waited until you rounded the corner before bursting out in a fit of laughter.

“Oh. My. God.” you huffed as you tried to breathe between laughs. “Did you see her face?”

“Oh she looked...” Namjoon covered his mouth his hand as he howled at the memory of Crystal’s baffled look.

“You know, I normally hate shopping but this has been fun,” you admitted as you took a break outside Burberry.

Crystal had stalked you for a few stores, probably trying to get a glimpse of what you and Namjoon were doing. You weren’t spending any money, but you would busy yourself searching the racks and showing Namjoon things to try on. He’d go into the dressing room and emerge to strike dramatic model poses, making you laugh. He did purchase a few staples for his closet, most of them being on sale. The clerks treated both of you well, one offering you drinks and light cookies while he tried things on. When you excused yourself to the restroom at one point, Crystal had tried charming Namjoon, probably hoping he’d buy her something expensive too. Instead, Namjoon politely rebuffed her, quoting exactly what she said about him yesterday and excusing himself to find you. She gave up after his rejection and you hadn’t seen her since.

Throughout the day, you crossed paths with a few jocks from your school, many dragged by their girlfriends for a sale at Victoria’s Secret. They didn’t recognize Namjoon, many just nodding and saying he looked cool as they waited outside the store for the girls to be done.

“I had fun too,” Namjoon admitted. “Feels good looking a little different and messing with everyone’s heads.” He tilted his head and smirked. “You didn’t feel a burning desire to join the madness in Victoria’s Secret?”

“Ugh hell no! That looked like a battlefield and I swear I’d be eaten alive first!” you groaned with a shake of your head. “Plus their stuff is total crap – it doesn’t last for more than a few washes and it’s overpriced.”

Namjoon tilted his head at the last comment and you sighed, explaining that your mom took you there many years ago once puberty hit. But the hype for the store died when you realized your first bra fell apart after the seventh wash. Instead, you spent your money on bras elsewhere. He nodded before looking off in the distance, spotting a store on the far left.

“Hey, can we do one more store then lunch?” he asked. “Hope you don’t mind – I made reservations at this one place and they’re not until 13:45.”

“Sure,” you replied, standing up and fixing your skirt. “Which store?”

Namjoon didn’t respond, choosing to take long strides in the direction of the shop and you struggled to catch up. He paused once he was a few feet away and grinned cheekily. You caught your breath and looked up to read the name on the boutique overhead. La Perla.

“Joon what the hell?”

He turned to you and jutted his full lower lip out, trying to look cute. You stared at him flabbergasted and he pouted.

“Come on, humor me!” he whined. “I have a good reason to go in here!”

“I’m not putting on some skimpy number for you,” you warned, crossing your arms.

“For my birthday? Please? I’ll pick something appropriate – no actual bras or underwear.”

You stared at him giving you a puppy look and huffed, saying that you’d do it this time only. “No pictures or video,” you warned him as you grasped the handle on the door.

He gave you a mock salute as he held the door open while you entered. You stepped in and locked eyes with the clerk who greeted you, wishing you could just leave and never look back.

The clerk who was standing before you was someone you knew from middle school – she had been two grades above you and bullied you because you accidentally stepped on her stupid duster sweater she was wearing one day. You plastered a fake smile on your face when she didn’t recognize you and you quickly turned toward a rack of their ready-to-wear clothing, inspired by lingerie designs.

“We have a Sale on our Spring/Summer items,” she announced.

You nodded, muttering a thank you as you moved to the area where the sale items were housed. Namjoon picked up a negligee trimmed with lace and grinned as he held it up. You shot him a glare and he quickly put it back.

You skimmed past some evening or special event dresses before pausing at a pair of pants, tailored with a slim fit and a high waist. They were a deep red color and the fabric felt nice between your fingers as you stroked the material. Okay, maybe this wouldn’t be so painful after all.

“I’ll try these,” you said to the clerk as you held out the pants. She nodded and took them from you while you skimmed the rack to make sure there wasn’t anything else to try.

“Are you ready?” she asked as you approached her.

You nodded and she beckoned for you to follow her to the dressing rooms. She threw back the curtain and hung the pants on a hook. As she was turning to leave, she paused to look back at you.

“Excuse me for saying this, but you seem familiar – do I know you?” she asked.

You swallowed the lump in your throat and opened your mouth to answer, but was cut off by Namjoon yelling your name, saying he’d be sitting outside waiting for you to show him the pants. Thanks a lot Joon.

“You look good,” the clerk said with a polite smile. “Let me know if you need anything else.”

You stared dumbfounded at the curtain, wondering if you were imagining things. Was she actually being civil? You almost pinched yourself but decided against it, remembering why you were standing in a dressing room of all places.

Turning your attention to the pants, you unclipped them from the hanger and unzipped the back. Your flats were kicked off and you draped your skirt on the chair. One leg was in the pants when you heard a knocking sound on the wall by the curtain.

“Y/N, your boyfriend wants you to try on the matching top with the pants – what size are you?” the clerk called out.

You blinked when she said ‘boyfriend’, struggling to get the pants on. You called out your top size and she left to find it. She probably thought Namjoon was your boyfriend, which would explain why you were in a fancy lingerie store trying things on.

You heard her heels clicking toward your dressing room and she dangled a matching red crop top through the curtain opening. “Let me know if that size works for you. If not, I think we have the next size up, but I’ll have to check in the back.”

“Oh um, thanks,” you said as you took it from her. You zipped up the pants and stared at yourself in the mirror, one hand holding the matching top and the other bunching up your t-shirt so you could see the waistband on the pants. Your eyes wandered to the top in your hands and you sighed.

It was sleeveless with a sweetheart neckline that dipped low enough to show a sliver of cleavage. The bottom was finished in a similar manner to the top of the pants. Normally you detested wearing crop tops like this, but since the pants were high waisted, maybe it would look okay?

You tossed your t-shirt onto the chair and unhooked your bra, draping it over the back of the chair. You unzipped the side on the crop top and put it on, adjusting it so it lay flat and supported your breasts properly. A quick glance in the mirror made you take a double take.

The set was...hell, flattering with a small amount of skin showing between the bottom of the top and the waist of the pants. It almost reminded you of something a 40s or 50s era girl would wear, only more modern and very expensive. You didn’t even want to think about how pricey these still were.

“Y/N, may I see?” Namjoon called out.

You swallowed the lump in your throat and straightened up, pushing the curtain to the side and walking out to the couch where Namjoon was seated. He was sipping a sparkling water, one leg crossed over the other. Once he laid eyes on you in your new ensemble, he raised his brows with a nod of approval.

“You look strong,” he murmured with a smile. “Like a boss. Seriously, you look so good.”

“Thanks,” you murmured as you tucked a strand of hair behind your ear. “It’s...beautiful. I mean, normally I don’t go for tops like this, but it looks...cool with these. I feel kind of classy retro in a way.”

“So yes or no jagi?” he asked with a wink.

“Ummm...I’ll have to think about it,” you replied with a small smile, going along with his little charade. He probably overheard the clerk call him your boyfriend.

You walked back to the dressing room and closed the curtain, checking the tags on the clothes. You winced when you saw how expensive they were, despite being on sale. Before you could start changing out of them, you heard your phone ding and you retrieved it from your purse.

Joon

So what is the damage if you got them? Sent 13:27 PM

You

Definitely not in the cards. They’re too expensive! The pants alone are over $200! Sent 13:28 PM

I don’t have that kind of money to spend right now! Sent 13:28 PM

He didn’t reply after that and you took that as a sign to get dressed and make your way out of here. You hung up the items before slipping your own clothes on. As you were smoothing out your skirt, you heard another knocking sound, accompanied by the clerk’s voice asking how everything fit.

“They fit beautifully, but I’ll have to give them some thought,” you replied as you threw back the curtain. You held out the items to her with a polite smile and she glanced back at the register before looking at you.

“Really? Cause your boyfriend said you’re taking them,” she remarked. “He’s about to pay for them right now.”

You stuck your head out of the dressing room and saw Namjoon was waiting by the counter, card in hand. He winked at you and you shot him a knowing smile before looking back at the clerk.

“Well I guess I am,” you remarked.

She took them from your hands and draped the pants over her arm. “Hey um...listen I know I was a bitch when we were kids. I had some messed up stuff happening to me and...well, I handled it terribly. Um, any chance we can put it behind us?”

You blinked and studied her face for any signs that she was tricking you. She stared back with a small smile and nodded wistfully at Namjoon. “He’s a keeper from what I can tell. Smart, handsome, a good guy...wish I was lucky.”

“Yeah he’s full of surprises,” you murmured with a smile.

“Joon you didn’t have to spend so much on me today – it’s YOUR birthday!” you complained once you were far away from the shop.

“But you’ve done a lot for me as a friend!” he protested. “Also, wasn’t it nice to show that girl that you’re doing better? I think I remember you telling me she made your life a living hell in school.”

“Well...yeah but she did apologize while we were in there,” you admitted. “She thought we were dating.”

“And look at all those haters before today that said we were undateable!” Namjoon joked. “Today, we’re vibing and riding high!”

You rolled your eyes as you nudged him in the arm. “Funny, but in all seriousness, I will pay you back for those – promise.”

“Actually if you wore them to school – with a jacket so you don’t get yelled at for bare shoulders – while I wear my fancy suit, we could have one last troll day,” he offered with a smirk. “Can you imagine how many people would lose their shit seeing us? We could get the last laugh.”

“That does sound tempting,” you pondered.

“Please for me, I say we do it,” Namjoon begged. “I overheard a few guys in the locker room saying you’re a dude with long hair. Prove ‘em wrong.”

“With that, sounds like we got a game plan for Friday,” you declared with a smirk. “We’ll dress normal, then Friday rolls around – BOOM!”

#BTS AU #BTS imagine #BTS RM #BTS RM imagine #RM imagine #Kim Namjoon #Kim Namjoon imagine #KNJ #tw: mention of bullying #yourkeeperoftherunners original #number 2373

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kpoptimeout · 7 years ago

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My Top 10 K-Dramas of 2017 - What’s Yours?

2017 is ending soon and K-Dramaland has once again brought us so many goodies this year. As per our blog’s tradition [For 2016 faves click here] , below are my Top 10 favs of the year (my faves in alphabetical order so it might not be yours so please don’t judge)

My only specific criteria this year is that the show must have had started in 2017 to be considered a 2017 series (Hence, Weightlifting Fairy Kim Bookjoo and Goblin were in last year’s list)

Chicago Typewriter (tvN)

Ever thought of a haunted typewriter that will slowly help you recover stories of your past life? Maybe not but this innovative drama does just that. Featuring talented movie focused actors Yoo Ah In and Im Soojung (HER FIRST DRAMA IN 13 YEARS SINCE THE LEGENDARY “I’m Sorry, I Love You”) as lovers separated from the past life but current bickering duo and rising talent Go Kyung-Po of Reply 1988 fame as their half puppy-half manipulative ghost friend from the past, the drama is one rollercoaster of emotions jumping between two equally interesting timelines of modern South Korea and Japanese occupied South Korea. I really enjoy the combination of working out the characters’ mysterious past life and also the commentary on the modern literary world. If you want an intriguing and fun story-line with revolutionary history shenanigans and early 20th century speakeasies, Chicago Typewriter is the drama to watch!

Duel (OCN)

Finally, CLONES ARE PART OF K-DRAMALAND. After many dramas on multiple personality disorder and twins switched at birth etc., we see the concept of genetic copies and the ethics of such science finally pursued in this well-written and exciting thriller. Yang Sejong plays the clones in question and as a newcomer who only debuted in 2016, he is one to watch out. He expertly played the two dramatically different clones and honestly got me super freaked out watching the show. OCN continues their amazing run with thrillers and I cannot wait for more new content from them.

Fight My Way (KBS2)

Every year there is one bomb slice of life drama and this year it’s “Fight My Way”! Inspired by the real-life romance of mixed martial artist Choo Sunghoon and his wife Shiho Yano, this rom-com about a UFC fighter and his childhood love is sweet, funny, and poignant, touching on realistic experiences of everyday couples. Park Seojoon excels as the fighter Ko Dongman and I think he honestly does the best when acting in these common man roles like in “She Was Pretty” and “Witch’s Romance” versus the over the top hero ones like in “Hwarang.” Kim Jiwon proves she is no one-hit wonder and here to stay after her “Descendants of the Sun” fame in this relatable role of a girl who has to abandon her dreams due to practicalities of the real world and Ahn Jaehong continues to be a pure delight after “Reply 1988”.

Hwayugi (tvN)

Only 2 episodes in, the Hong Sisters already prove that once again they are the producing queens of K-Dramaland and Hwayugi is going to be scoring home runs like their earlier supernatural dramas “My Girlfriend Is a Nine-Tailed Fox” and “Master’s Sun”, whilst riding the wave of another widely popular mythical tvN drama “Goblin.” Reinterpreting the Chinese fantasy story “Journey to the West”, this drama plays with characters already well-known in Asian folklore and throws in interesting ghost/demon/monster fighting side stories along the way. Having worked with the Hong Sisters many times, Lee Seung Gi shines in his first role back from the military, playing the mischevious Monkey King Son Oh Gong. The other castings are also great - with Cha Seungwon fittingly being the eccentric and mercurial Bull Demon King, FT Island’s Hongki as the super flirt Zhu Bajie, and Oh Yeon Seo as the pure but strong-willed reincarnation of Xuanzang. If you need a fix after “Goblin”, just watch this already.

My Secret Romance (OCN)

OCN’s first ever rom-com is a fan favorite locally and internationally and for good reason. It is one of those expected rom-com plots with chaebol male lead, awkward grassroots female lead, BFF with a crush on her, etc. but just done very well. It does do something innovative - going around all the awkward will they kiss or not KDrama stuff to a male and female lead who meet three years later after an awkward one-night stand. Additionally, the chemistry between Sung Hoon and Secret’s main vocalist Jieun is great and made the drama all the more fun, cute and entertaining. Also, THE OSTs ARE AMAZING BECAUSE BOTH LEADS ARE GOOD SINGERS.

Ruler: Master of the Mask (MBC)

One of the K-Dramas I looked forward to the most this year was “Ruler: Master of the Mask” because of the amazing cast of Yoo Seungho, INFINITE’s L, Kim Sohyun, and Yoon Sohee and boy I was not disappointed. Going with a Prince and the Pauper-esque plot in Joseon Korea, Yoo Seungho and L did a great job in the delivering the two roles respectively. While some people complained the show was kind of slow, I rather the PDs slowly build up the story than rush a lot in the first few episodes then drag on forever at the end.

Strong Woman Do Bong-soon (jTBC)

Following the popularity of another tough female lead drama “Weightlifting Fairy Kim Bok Joo”, “Strong Woman Do Bong-soon” also made a strong impression on viewers. The story surrounding a cute and petite girl with supernatural human strength, played by popular actress Park Boyoung, made for a lot of laughs and also led to some fun romantic moments with male leads ZE:A’s Hyungsik and Ji Soo. The pairing of Park Boyoung as Hyungsik’s bodyguard was a well-done flip of normal K-Drama gender roles and I am excited about more female empowerment in K-Dramaland!

Tunnel (OCN)

After tvN’s “Signal”, I was not sure if I can find another amazing time-travelling thriller of that quality to watch. But OMG OCN is back at it again with their thriller generating machine and they delivered me with “Tunnel.” The male lead, played by the honestly still underrated talent Choi Jinhyuk, is a detective from 1986 who finds himself in 2016 after traveling through a tunnel. Discovering the case he was working on is still unsolved, he joins forces with a modern police officer played by Yoon Hyunmin and a criminal psychologist played by Lee Yooyoung. This show inspired by the Hwaseong serial murders is very good and deserved to be the major hit it was in South Korea, being the most viewed OCN drama of all time.

While You Were Sleeping (SBS)

Suzy and Lee Jong Suk is one drama already sounds like aesthetic goals but this drama also had good writing and plot to carry itself well. With Suzy playing a journalist who can dream of future deaths and Lee Jong Suk being a prosecutor who acquires her ability after moving into her neighborhood, the two form a likable team and really took us on a roller-coaster ride of emotions. While I am not the biggest fan of Suzy’s acting in the past, she has definitely improved a lot and I think people who are avoiding the drama just because of her should really give it a try.

Whisper (SBS)

Legal dramas with strong female leads are always fun to watch, be it tvN’s “Good Wife” or SBS’s “Punch.” Another such drama is “Whisper”, which is supposedly set in the same universe as “Punch” according to some eagle-eyed fans, and it follows the alliance between Lee Bo-young’s charismatic but debt-ridden female section chief police officer and Lee Sang-yoon’s virtuous elite judge in their journey to uncover defense industry corruption at Taebaek, the nation's biggest law firm. These two top actors of course delivered great performances and Kwon Yul continues to rise on my list of second male leads to watch out for.

Honorable Mentions:

Circle (tvN): An ambitious exploration of dystopian futures by tvN featuring a talented cast including Yeo Jingoo, Kim Kangwoo, Gong Seungyeon and HIGHLIGHT’s Kikwang.

I’m Not a Robot (MBC): Yoo Seungho aka #BAE? Count me in and ready to watch all the episodes. Also, the robot thing is a newer drama trope that has lots of potential.

The Liar and His Lover (tvN): While the storyline is the expected K-Drama rom-com fare, this was a solid debut performance from Red Velvet’s Joy and damn the OSTs were great. Crude Play needs to debut as a real band real quick.

Mad Dog (KBS2): Another amazing action-packed K-Drama thriller starring the amazing actor Yoo Jitae of legendary movie “Oldboy” fame. Also, K-Drama fans need to watch out for Woo Dohwan as this young actor is very talented and has huge potential.

Suspicious Partner (SBS): The final drama of Ji Chang Wook before his enlistment, this is a feel-good rom-com with a great cast of Nam Jihyun, Choi Taejoon, and Nara.

What’s your Top 10 K-Dramas of the Year? Leave your thoughts in the comments section below and may the drama sharing begin (and the road to more excuse for holiday procrastination!)

Also, if you want to check out underrated K-Pop songs of 2017, here are the lists for idol songs, artist songs, and OSTs!

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sincerely-chaos · 7 years ago

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A Year as Told as Words of Fic Written

Inspired by @jbaillier‘s post on the year in terms of written fic (and the absurd experience of seeing one of my own scribbles mentioned amongst some frankly amazing stories…) I decided to give this summary thing a try, if nothing else then because I’m trying to get back to writing more again, and this might… something.

Most hits: A Study in Floodgates and the Art of Tipping Scales. My very first fic in fandom, my very first story written in English and also a frequent reminder of the fact that my English has - after all - improved after three years of writing solely in English. The story in which we follow the codependent and somewhat unhealthy start of what’s to become a relationship between Sherlock and John, with the added twist of each chapter illustrating a psychiatric symptom or a psychological phenomenon. Let’s say that ‘Show, don’t tell’ wasn’t really a concept I was aware of when I first started writing this…

Most hits on a work posted (I read this as ‘started’) 2017: Inconsequential. My little sandbox project that I started as a one-off on tumblr and almost deleted the day after, but that apparently resonated with a few, very persuasive people, which made me attempt to write an ending to it, and then it all got out of hand and became a story that is now rather dear to me, both because of its themes (kink, emotional constipation, neurodiversity, sensation seeking behaviour and the intricasies of relationships, kinks and emotions) and because it’s a story where I allow myself not to obey to any sort of ‘common sense’ in terms of writing - the chapters are very uneven, the story is fragmental at times, there are jumps, the chapters may or may not be written in the same narrative style and— you get the picture. This is where I go to amuse myself without caring too much about consistency, which is pretty fitting, given this version of Sherlock…

Most comment threads: Patterns of Silver Birds, which is delightful in a way, because of all that I’ve written, this is by far the most intriguing writing experience, but also the most personal and experimental. Plus, this story is what brought @pennypaperbrain into my chaotic life, and the discussions, beta and nudgings from her during the writing of this story have been some of the best and most intriguing things that has happened in my writing life. This is where love is actually - arguably - a chemical defect, OCD isn’t quite what you’d (well; John…) expect, Sherlock’s thought process is guiding the narrative and his perceptions and sensory experiences are more coloured by my gut reactions and instincts than in anything else I’ve written. Also, this is very much a cathartic story to tell in more ways than one… The fact that this story has put me into contact with people who mentions having had similar experiences as those in the flashbacks to Sherlock’s childhood is nothing but fascinating.

Highest wordcount: A Study in Floodgates and the Art of Tipping Scales (which initially had an even longer title, believe it or not…)

Most bookmarks: Patterns of Silver Birds. (Yes; I’ll try to finish the last chapter shortly. By which I mean ‘anytime I have the focus to put that many words and plot parts together without losing track of them. The outlines and parts of several scenes are in fact already done…)

Most popular AU story: Define ‘AU’, and what do you mean by ‘popular’? All my stories are more or less AU in some way, given the backstories I give the characters, but if we go by more common ways of defining AU, my most kudo’ed AU would be The Landlocked Adventures of The Tuna Detective, which is, yes; exactly what it says on the tin. Tunalock with a side-order of mental health (well, if we’re to be more exact, I’d say that Tunalock’s reactions in this isn’t very depressive, but a natural reaction to his situation as a landliving tuna in love with his human flatmate whilst being stuck in Moriarty’s net…). But if you look closely, it’s probably a story about otherness…

The stories I never expected to write: All of them, to be honest, but in particular The Landlocked Adventures of the Tuna Detective (I think you can guess why… but I had a fever and @yourdykeinshiningarmor was bringing me so many fish puns…!), Trick of the Light (because I honestly tried to write a PWP teenlock, and despite the fact that people tell me - kindly - that I failed the ‘without plot’ part, it was not something I thought I’d write. First time teenlock without any prominent mental health issues isn’t what I expected, so I rose to the challenge…), Imprints (because that ended up as close to ‘fluff’ as I’m likely to ever get), Things About Bodies Still Alive (my first poem ever…!), a redundancy of moons (this is probably as close to ‘break up’ or ‘relationship falling apart as I will ever go - I want them messed up and sometimes suffering, but not parting ways…!) and Anomie (in which I, for the first and to date only time, write something that takes place after The Reichenbach Fall).

The Story I’m most proud of in 2017; Patterns of Silver Birds.

Favorite moments in fic life: I refuse to answer this question as the answer would be obscenely long, but 70% of it would consist of the people I’ve met through fandom, IRL and/or online, and the things we’ve done, discussed or created. And a lot of knowledge that’s been earned through these years.

Frustrations: Seeing kind, talented, encouraging, fascinating people leave fandom because of wank (and not the nice kind that involves genitals) or other problems, or due to disappointments. Me being unable to un-compartmentalise everything happening after The Hounds of Baskerville (I don’t hate it, I just… got stuck in my happy place which is season 1 and 2). Being unable to write during periods of time due to the frailty of a chaotic mind. Fandom getting a bit less… populated after season 4. We have so much to work with - please stay and discuss things with me!

Stories I wish I had written aka my favourite reading experiences of fics published/updated/finished in 2017: Can I refuse to answer this question as well? Because frankly, I don’t remember which of all the amazing stories I’ve read over the year were actually posted or updated during 2017, and I could probably tell you some of my favorite stories overall, but… I can’t choose. If anyone wants to know what I’ve enjoyed recently, I do have bookmarks, bookmarked for very variating reasons; finding good descriptions of a phenomenon in them, an interesting take on something, the perfect comfort food in fic form, a story that won’t leave my mind, a story with fascinating narrative, a story that changed the way I look at love/sex/the mind, a story that pushes many of my kinks… there are many and varied reasons things end up in my bookmarks. But rest assured - there’s been so much amazing fic written in 2017 that I’ve adored!

My conductors of light: This is yet another question I find hard to answer, because I honestly am too wary of forgetting someone. I suspect some of you know who you are: the people that have discussed everything from sexuality to psychiatry or books with me on the tumblr chat and in comment sections, widening my understanding and opening up for a mutual discussion and sharing of some personal things I will rarely discuss with anyone in real life - I really, really respect and adore you all, and am thankful. It might be months between our conversations or I might be slow to respond, but it has meant the world to me. The people who have beta’d for me over the years. The people that has given fandom and me so many amazing, insightful stories, artworks and podfics (PODFICCERS!!). THÉ PEOPLE WHO ENCOURAGES OTHERS with their kind words, their inarticulate, enthusiastic keyboard smashing, emoticons, recs, reblogs, messenges, replies, love... and so much more!

I’m just really, really happy to be here with you all.

#summary of 2017 in too many words

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