#also its harder to write an description in english

[farseeryirith]

There are no weak Custodes

Felt the need to add a little continuation to my anxious Custodes reader and angel boy. I had a bunch of little ideas that I couldn't expand, so this is the result.

Once again, English - not my first language so pls forgive any grammatical or spelling or wording mistakes I might've missed. I am also yet to figure out how to properly format text posts in a more aesthetically pleasing manner. BUT my New Year's resolution was to ignore everything that tells me to keep hiding my little writings and get better at writing in English, so here I am trying to fulfill that.

Happy New Year!

Sanguinius x fem!Custodes reader

Warning: Canon-typical violence, death, blood, vague descriptions of anxiety, Canon character death

It's the Siege of Terra and no one is having fun!

“You are quite strong, My Lady.” The Angel lands beside you as the last of the orks are being picked off and you are pulling your guardian spear out of the heap of metal the greenskins had decided to call a vehicle. 

“Of course,” you look up at the primarch to reply. “There are no weak Custodes.” 

He smiles at you, and the way your face flushes makes you doubt your statement. 

“There are no weak Custodes, there are no weak Custodes..” you repeat in your head like prayer as you push past pain and exhaustion. “There are no weak Custodes” as your lungs are burning and your nerves are screaming. “There are no weak Custodes” as your once gleaming golden armour turns a bloody red and the bodies pile on and on. “There are no weak Custodes” as one of your still-beating hearts few out of your chest and now defends Eternity Gate alone. 

You want to run, to go to him, help him hold the gate, but you cannot. Your place is beside The Emperor, you are a loyal companion, you have no other allegiances. Guilt eats away at you for even thinking of being elsewhere, and the guardian spear sings its horrible song as you cleave through meat and bone and armour. “There are no weak Custodes” but a sickening image of charred and bloodied feathers takes root in your mind and blistering rage comes to defend you from the fear that seeks to devour. 

Sanguinius had found you on the bridge of The Red Tear, looking through the window at the stars, and came to sit with you for company. You had been so enamored with them, billions of worlds each different from the other, full of life and wonders you had only read about before.

You told him once you had never seen a tree and he took you to see a planet full of forests of them. You wish you could forget the way he had looked at you as you broke off a branch to keep in your quarters. He had flown away and returned with four more, each with leaves of different shapes and colours. 

He looks at you the same way now, with a gentle smile and his eyes flick between yours and your lips. You can hear the quickened pace of his hearts and you know what it means. You know yours are singing the same melody, but you do not want to admit it. 

“Please, My Lord.” you say, turning away from him. “Please do not look at me like this.”

“I can tell you feel the same way, My Lady.” he says softly, and it makes it that much harder to ignore the aberrant song. 

“I know.” an admission of defeat. “But neither of us should.”

You take off, back to your quarters before he can stop you, and you hear him call your name but you proceed ahead. 

Valdor is barking orders somewhere behind you, but you cannot tell what he is saying. There is only the sound of rushing blood in your ears and the muffled screams of the traitor in your hand as you repeatedly smash his head into the ground until it finally cracks and covers your helmet with red and grey. You wipe at your eyes and grab your spear, but before you can charge at your next target a hand grasps your shoulder tightly.

“Sister!” you are shaken from your battle haze. “Are you injured?”

“Lightly.” you barely recognize your voice as you answer. You sound like your throat is full of gravel, and you try to lunge forward to keep going, but you are pulled harshly back by your fellow Custodes. 

“Come then, with the Captain-General,” he says. “The Emperor has taken the fight to Horus. We follow.”

You turn and as your vision clears you can see the boarding party assembling - Valdor with your cadre, The Praetorian, and his sons have formed a phalanx as the Blood Angels file in. Sanguinius is last to arrive as you take your place beside your comrades. He looks at you for a moment, as if he can tell you apart from the other Custodes, and there is something in his eyes that makes your throat feel like closing up. His lips move silently and you recognize your name - he is apologizing to you and your breath stills. 

Over the months of your stay on The Red Tear, your quarters had begun to resemble a real home, as your collection of souvenirs from the planets you had visited grew. The tree branches rested in a vase, that had been procured for you, filled with a gell that kept the leaves green. A bottle full of salt water, and shells from an ocean where Sanguinius had urged you to come planetside without your armour and go for a swim - an experience you would never forget, there had been so much water. A jar full of red sand from a desert world - “It is a shame we are so far, else I would have taken you to see Baal.” He smiled as you watched the sun dip under the dunes. 

You knew you would most likely have to leave these treasures behind on the flagship - Valdor would question you and you would have to admit your delayed return was due to galavanting around the sector with The Angel, watching sunsets and swimming in oceans. And if you admit that, you would cave and admit everything else. 

You would have to admit how The Angel cradled your face in his hand and looked at you with so much tenderness that it made your skin feel too tight.

“I am not made for this,” you tell him, but you know your eyes betray how much his touch is welcome. “I am made for war.”

“So am I,” he says and his voice is just above a whisper as he comes closer and you can feel his sweet breath on your skin. “But we can pretend we were made for more.”

“My Lord..”

“Just Sanguinius. Please.” he cuts you off, insistent. “I am not your lord right now. Right now there is no Crusade, there is no Imperium. There is just us in this room and there is no one guarding the door.”

“Sanguinius, I..” you begin but you are silenced by a gentle thumb caressing your lips. You had bloodied them again and for a moment you think he’ll be put off by your compulsions, but the look he gives you makes your head feel light.

“Tell me to stop and I will.” he says and all the will to continue denying your feelings crumbles. 

“I do not want you to.” he does not wait for you to say anything else as he closes the distance. His wings come around you as if to shield you from the world that does not exist at this moment. He licks the blood off your lips and his arms grasp you tight and pull you flush against him, a deep growl escaping from within his chest.

He loves you achingly tenderly as if you were something precious, as if your body was not made only for slaughter. Like a silken noose, he wraps around you, and you die repeatedly in his arms. Months later, when you return to Terra, you still feel a blazing trail across your skin, everywhere where The Angel had touched you. 

This is what ancient humans feared when they thought of Hell, you think. The ship is a black abyss and there is nothing but daemons around you. You quickly realize that the host of Custodes has been separated from the rest of the boarding party and your hearts stop for a beat, but you swallow the blood in your mouth and ignore the sinking dread. You must push on, you must find them. The Emperor needs you. Sanguinius needs you. 

You follow the Captain-General as you cleave a path through the abominations, and you try to ignore every dying scream you hear behind you. There are fewer and fewer of you as you keep going and the darkness keeps growing closer, threatening to suffocate you. You close ranks so as to not lose any more bodies to the void, but it’s no use - you are outnumbered and beyond exhaustion. “There are no weak Custodes.” and you keep going even after something slices deep at your leg and you fall to your knees for a moment. They.. he needs you. 

You can hear a sister periodically call out numbers near you and, with horror, you realize she is keeping track of time. Seventy-one, by last count. You have been fighting abroad for seventy-one hours now and your armour feels like it is eating you alive. Seventy-one hours and you cannot hear anything save for your laboured breath and your furious hearts. Seventy-one hours and your hands shake as you fear the worst. You are late. 

The darkness lets up soon enough, only to give way to a line of Astartes. There is only a second of stillness before recognition comes through - traitors. Valdor screams to charge and you do with no hesitation. Bolter rounds fly around you, catch you in the shoulder but you keep going. The stink of the traitors tells you all you need to know to ignore the pain - they still see a threat in you, they have not won yet. 

The host of Custodes descends upon the traitors and your eyes meet the ones of an unhelmeted Word Bearer. They are wide and wild as even your few exhausted numbers carve through his battle brothers and cousins with terrifying efficiency. 

“Did He train you for this? To kill Astartes?” the traitor screams at you, horror in his voice, a dreadful realization. “Did He Know? Did He set us up for the slaughter?”

You do not answer his questions. Instead, you grab his face, lightning-fast, and bring him closer. 

“You reek of fear, Word Bearer.” your sandpaper throat bleeds as you speak. “And you are in my way.” you crush his jaw with your hand and move on. You are close to the bridge, you can feel it. A door opens in the distance of the corridor and you are proven correct. And your hearts still again. 

You can see white wings in the air - Sanguinius is there, he is engaged in a desperate duel with the monstrosity that still calls itself Horus. For a fraction of a microsecond The Angel’s gaze darts towards you, and you know he sees you. Those furious darkened eyes go soft and you know he is apologizing to you again. You do not have the time to question why. 

Burned and bloodied feathers fly across the bridge and the Brightest One falls. A cry of despair, a horrid and awful sound, echoes through the halls of the Vengeful Spirit, and deep within you something breaks. You want to scream as well, to curse the traitor, to run and tear him apart. You want to rage, you want to rage and sink your spear into his corrupted flesh and rend him into nothing. 

But you cannot scream, your throat feels like closing up and you find yourself unable to make a sound. Your eyes go dark, but your blade finds new meat to carve, hands moving by themselves. There are no weak Custodes, and your body knows that so it continues to do what it was made for on its own. 

You do not know what happened next. You come through to the voice of The Praetorian barking orders to take what is left of The Emperor to the Golden Throne. You hear you have won - that Horus is no more and the traitors are retreating. But all you can do is fall to your knees and sob, as you look upon the body of the man you loved, and his once brilliant white wings now stained red with his blood.

Later you don the black cape, along with your brothers and sisters. The Adeptus Custodes were tested and found wanting, and have been forever shamed. You tell no one that you do not wear the black out of guilt only. You wear it as mourning garb. 

[hollowed-theory-hall]

You know what fucks with me? Is it ever like actually fully explained how in the Deathly Hallows, Ron and Hermione get into the Chamber of Secrets by themselves. Is Parseltongue just a language people can learn now? Did they make Ron retroactively a Parselmouth too? Or is the chamber dumb enough that you can do the snake equivalent of meowing back at a cat at it and it'll go 'seems legit'

Another one for the 'what the heck happened to the writing in this book' pile maybe

Honestly, yes, that was so contrived, and for, like, no reason.

I mean, the explanation in the book is this:

“But how did you get in there?” he asked, staring from the fangs to Ron. “You need to speak Parseltongue!” Ron made a horrible strangled hissing noise. “It’s what you did to open the locket,” he told Harry apologetically. “I had to have a few goes to get it right, but,” he shrugged modestly, “we got there in the end.”

(DH, 623)

So, it's exactly a person meowing back at a cat, you're spot on with that description. It's so bad Harry doesn't actually recognize it as words in Parsletongue the way he always does, because Ron isn't speaking it! He isn't actually saying anything, just hissing randomly!

Which makes it bizarre the chamber actually opened to him like this. Seems like either loose security, some contrived magic helping Ron out or he was very lucky. Honestly, I prefer to believe he got the hissing lucky that one time, it seems more probable than the other options.

JKR did state in an interview Dumbledore learned Parsletongue, or at least, knew to understand it when spoken to him, but I don't treat it as canon. It doesn't make sense with everything we know about Parseltongue as a magical language, the way speakers of it just hear it as English, Harry has to strain for a moment to realize it's a different language (he can tell in the memories in book 6 if he listens carefully). Also, Dumbledore seems to me in these memories he's showing Harry like he doesn't understand the Parsletongue. And as I take the books' texts over the interviews when it comes to evidence, I don't believe he can and I chose to believe you can't learn Parsletongue and Ron got really lucky with one of his attempts to mimic Harry.

All in all, it seems she just decided you could learn Parsletongue in book 7 and ran with it. I don't even know why, since, like, it wasn't necessary? There were plenty of pages she could've replaced with Harry going down to the chamber considering how much time is spent on very little, well, anything. And if she really didn't want to add that scene it could've been an invisible scene like: "Harry opened the Chamber for Ron and Hermione to retrieve basilisk fangs,"

Like, I get wanting to give Ron a win, but he gets wins, he destroyed the locket and there are other ways to give him wins that don't include changing the very rules of magic.

Book 7 annoys me from an analysis standpoint, it makes theorizing harder instead of easier sometimes and it frustrates me so much more than the frankly bizarre writing choices. Although they bother me too, especially the pacing and structure of the book, but that's a whole rant on its own.

[deadchannelradio]

top worst thing (which is ridiculously common in fanfic but also in actual novels) with bilingualism is probably the insistence on structuring sentences like you would in english/as the author wants them to be. the former can lead to just plain wrong grammar (an actual published novel once tried to write 'the red sea' or smth in arabic like each word was being translated separately. and the end result was like if this sentence was constructed from several duolingo lessons. it was so against the rules of arabic sentence structure that i literally just stopped reading the book). At the same time, the latter is icky because it's not a thing in that language but it's also not a thing in english. Hence, it feels more like Ooh Exotic Cool Thing i can pass off as part of this language that i don't speak (like nearly every single bilingual character I've read fanfic of has said some version of 'brother/sister/sibling' in another language so repetitively that you'd think this was actually a common cultural phenomenon. but no.)

a couple smaller things would probably be misused petnames/petnames taken out of their cultural context. cause sometimes its just like... that's not what you think it is. and other times its a the word is dramatically the wrong gender (this can be referring to people but it can also just be a random noun). theres also the awkward phenomenon of unnecesarily specific descriptions, because no one is thinking 'oh, the melodious notes of her foreign syllables are like music to my ears' about people's english, and there's no reason for it to be like that in any other language.

and when writing a different language into the actual body of the story... its kind of hard to form an opinion on this tbh. cause if the script is entirely separate from english (I'll just use arabic as an example cause that's my other language) it's absurd to think your non-arabic-speaking readers will be able to think of it as anything other than like. a shape or a squiggle. but when it's transliterated, its harder for the arabic-speaking readers to know what it's supposed to mean. and then some sounds don't even exist in the basic english alphabet, so they have to be romanized, and it all just starts to become very confusing, so i think that's more up to your personal preference.

and of course there's the difference between formal language vs more relaxed language and different types of dialects and some words mean wildly different things in different dialects(again, my example in arabic would be that certain sounds at the ends of words aren't always there in informal settings, other letters are pronounced differently by dialect, there's words that don't mean the same thing at all between the morroccan and gulf dialects, etc.)

i feel like in general, some people are just very Weird about bilingualism. because for the bilingual character it really is just A Thing In Their Life. and its not a big thing unless this is actually central to their characteristics and traits. but i guess that doesn't really occur to the writers because its such a Big Thing in their eyes? idk

anyways sorry for leaving an essay in your inbox lol, hopefully this helps!!

you can leave essays in my inbox anytime anon this was a great and very informative read!!!

[danmei-hot-takes]

I hate the popularity of meatbun and mxtx in West. In my opinion, as writers, they are the weakest. Priest, MXS, Feitian are so much better (I'm sad some of their books are criticized for being less cough cheap cough romance) - people always choose more easy, juvenile writing than better quality books - more educated, harder to understand, probably not cool enough idk, which is ok but sad, but the fandom of these two writers is so crazy - calling trashy books masterpieces is an insult to real authors. Meatbun has absolutely no idea what a stable, consistent character is - flip flop personality how she needed for the plot and "development", deux ex machina🌸, using past of the characters for sobbing purpose - no matter how tragic, does not change a normal thinking person's opinion of the character or make up for what he did and as for the plot, what plot? People are making it into some deep story about redemption but honestly it's a typical trashy toxic yaio with rape and soap opera type scene and behaving. That scene with those stairs was so overly melodramatic it was ridiculous. like how am I supposed to take this seriously, this is not how normal racional person would act, but kinda yes, Meatbun is technically great at what she writes, but the fans are making it into something it's not, some poetic deep intelectual shit, NO it's just an ordinary Mexican-quality soap opera with a terrible messy plot, overacting actors, a dysfunctional funny relationship that can't solve anything normally btw my favorite was Cuando seas mía from 2001, super popular, but no one made a super intelligent deep story out of it, we just enjoyed it for what it was - shallow, stupid but fun. just for to turn off brain I think even the author herself didn't think much about any deeper meaning when writing and it shows, not to mention that webnovels overall are fast foods for entertainment, nothing deep, and that China has its own serious LITERARY books. Are people afraid to admit they're reading the equivalent of Fifty Shades of Grey in a Chinese xianxia package? and thats the same reason why it's so popular

I LOVE FEI TIAN YE XIANG!!! I’m so hoping his popularity picks up in the English speaking danmei fandom after his Seven Seas takeover. I’ve only read Guardian and the first vol of Stars of Chaos but would also agree Priest is amazing. Honestly I think Guardian does the same tropes as Tgcf a million times better. I adored it and the Mountain Spirit is the only time so far I’ve been completely enamoured with an extra, rather than being bored or tapping out.

I’ve had Thousand Autumns on my kindle since I started reading danmei, the description really vibed with me, but I got put off because everyone talks down the romance of it so much.

With Mxtx I am here with you. Any time I run a poll on main, if an mxtx character features they will absorb all the votes - even when it makes no sense! (Lan Wangji had no right to come third in a smut poll. Mxtx’s smut is not good.)

Anyone who’s followed me for a while will probably have noticed that I’m ride or die for Meatbun, however I do agree with you to an extent. I adore her because I’m an old school bl fan and she’s peddling top tier toxic yaoi (ignoring yuwu) and I think some people don’t clock that and try and treat it like some literary thing. Like the amount of times I’ve read things where they say Meatbun doesn’t romanticise sexual abuse when that’s her absolute jam is mind boggling. People say Bing a Ben isn’t as literary as her other works but honestly, I think it’s her at her best, doing what she loves.

That being said, saying trashy novels can’t be masterpieces is a bit snobbish. Like they can be bloody good at what they do. Also people can get way judgy about consuming BL and danmei is the easiest to dress up as something else. People just be out on the bus reading Chinese fantasy 😉

(I say this as someone who’s read r rated lezhin webcomics in the dentist waiting room)

[arson-09]

Feyre not knowing how to read… doesn’t make sense?

she said she wasnt taught to read, and other social related things because she was too young when they lost their fortune. However she says she was 8 when their mother died, and they lost their fortune soon after.

Now theres no certainty over what historical era fits the mortal lands best, which makes it harder to base at what age you learned to read but clearly women were taught (her sisters learned) but at what age? I learned to read at around 4, half the age of feyre. And historically boys were taught around the same age too (I used english Tudor era because i felt it fit the description best but if theres another lemme know) so feyre not knowing how to read because of her age doesn’t make sense

Now this could have been easily solved by her having a learning disability like dyslexia, didn’t have to be by name but make it clear she struggles because of reasons outside her control. Otherwise her not being able to read or write doesn’t make sense. Which is a common issue found in sjms books sadly, giving characters a trait or issue that makes no sense. sigh

edit: yes she was neglected, that kind of explains it but it makes me question why? i genuinely cant remember if its explained or not WHY her parents didnt gaf (which also makes her strange loyalty to her father confusing?) Maybe its just because but thats such a unfulfilling answer. Yes its common in real life for that, I can’t suspend my belief for this one. Just because doesn’t cut it for fantasy fiction books, non-fic and contemporary sure but in fantasy it feels cheap

and i wanna make it clear cause i already got a weird ass anon message, im not criticizing feyre as a character? im talking about the writing choices and how i feel about them as a reader and writer.

[tomer2]

Oops, All Self-Inserts

Description: Oops, All Self-Inserts (or OASIS) is a collection of My Hero Academia self-insert fanfics that all take place in the same world. It currently has around 20+ ongoing fanfics, but in the past, more fanfics have been a part of it, and soon, more writers are set to join. We even have a discord server you can join to talk with the writers or just to see the writing process. Currently at chapter 12 (the post-internship chapter), and chapter 13 (the prelude to the final exams) is being written.

Here's a link to the collection: https://archiveofourown.org/collections/OopsAllSelfInserts

And here's a list of recommended fanfics to start with if you want to get into this more easily:

(Obligatory self-rec) I'm Not My Past (Todoroki Shoto SI by Shoto Todoroki (T0MER_24)).

Word Count: 57k words. Only goes up to chapter 5 (the USJ incident).

Summary: He hadn’t expected to isekai into the body of Todoroki Shoto, son to the number two pro hero, Endeavor. Of course, there was only one thing he could do now that he was stuck here: get the hell out of dodge.

Wilfully Reckless and as Immovable as a Sozzled Bird (Kirishima Eijiro SI by SauronClaus).

Word Count: 180k words. Up to the current chapter.

Summary: "Bizarrely, our English word 'sturdy' may go back to the Latin turdus, thrush. Anyone described as 'sturdy' in the 1200s was wilfully reckless and possibly as immovable as a sozzled bird." -Susie Dent

Eijiro Kirishima was on track to be a hero until the mind of college student and dimensional expatriate James Eisner was dropped in his head. That changed some plans but not all of them. He wanted to be a hero, right? Now he knows how to go even farther.

Plus Ultra and all that.

It's got a TV Tropes page!

Part 1: Strangers in a Strange Land (1-6) Part 2: Something Wicked (7-?)

Himiko’s Guide To Stabbing Canon In Its Stupid Face! (Toga Himiko SI by Drop_of_Jello).

Word Count: 113k words. Up to the current chapter.

Summary: Waking up as a blood sucking yandere is one of the last things she expected to happen today.

Well, there's also the fact that she's woke up as a blood sucking yandere, every day, so this one isn't that different.

. . .

Wait a minute-

- - - -

TLDR; A self-insert wakes up in the body of Himiko Toga from My Hero Acadamia. But, she's always been Toga from MHA? This whole mind-meld thing is getting a little confusing, but it really seems to help chill the Toga side of her personality out.

However, it seems to also have some rather odd tradeoffs...

Oh what fun this'll be

Convergence of Mind (Shinso Hitoshi SI by Versatility).

Word Count: 147k words. Only goes up to chapter 12.

Summary: All his life, Shinsou was faced with the fact that he would have to work harder than most to achieve his dreams. Getting into U.A.'s hero course was no different. So, he mentally prepared himself for a grueling year of proving to everyone that he had what it took to be in the hero course. Nothing hinted towards things being different.

...except for the fact he barely spent two seconds in General Education before being pulled from the classroom. With everything going against his expectations, Shinsou figured he had nothing to lose.

"You kidding? Hell started when my soul got thrown into your body."

Besides the SI in his head, of course.

Eating My Friends (Amajiki Tamaki SI by ubormaci).

Word Count: 148k words. Up to the current chapter.

Summary: The best part of reincarnation was avoiding death. Getting a quirk was a nice bonus, though with the side-effect of everything else coming along with it: Amajiki Tamaki's leftover memories and thoughts blending together with mine like oil and water.

His anxiety was now mine, and his role to play? Mine as well. (Out, out, I'm getting out after it.)

If only I weren't such shitty actor.

Magical Anime Crime Girl (Eri SI by Maseago).

Word Count: 22k. Up to the current chapter.

Summary: Listen. The important thing is, none of it was my fault. Even if I did do all of it.

The Levitating Girl (Uraraka Ochako SI by ameoverdose).

Word Count: 63k. Up to the current chapter.

Summary: A girl gets stuck in the My Hero Academia universe as Ochaco Uraraka. There’s only one problem: she hasn’t watched the anime in years. Now, she has to fill in the holes in her memory and save Japan from disaster with the voice of the real Ochaco in her head.

And So the Dominos Fall (this one is about the perspective of the various characters that aren't SIs, it's written by different members of the project).

Word Count: 100k. Up to the current chapter.

Summary: The world turns without any input.

…

Did you really think that you were the only people that mattered?

[normalaboutdntm]

Pinned (updated March 31, 2025)

Hi, welcome to my blog! I intend this to be a place where I can document bits of Death Note the Musical history that I'm privy to and also reblog a shitton of fanworks (y'all are so talented).

To that end, here are links to posts about DNTM history I was privy to (Please let me know if the links break, I've also tagged the posts as #find later):

London programme with image descriptions

Signings and merch at NYCC 2023

Write-up of the DNtM panel at NYCC 2023

Write-up of the album listening party at NYCC 2023

Link to a Google Drive folder of audio/video from the panel and listening party at NYCC 2023, including tracks from the upcoming cast album

My hard-hitting reporting /lh over the dubiously licensed Texas production!

Feel free to send asks/DM me if you have questions about anything I've attended.

***I'd like to make it clear that I do not intentionally leak and I do not support leaking bootlegs as this makes it much harder for masters to film them. Please do not participate in leaking so we can keep theater accessible for everyone! As far as I know how to confirm, everything I have publicly available in the archive is allowed to be (I'm happy to discuss my process for checking this via DMs and would love some pointers if y'all have any). I'm new to the trading community and don't know all the rules & best practices yet, but I want to engage in a way that doesn't jeopardize its future, so if you see me doing something that conflicts with that, please let me know.***

Without further ado, my archive of DNtM materials!

Japan 2015x2, 2017x2 proshots

Korea 2015/2017 and 2022/2023 revival (removed for now, please see explainer doc in the folder)

Russia 2017 concert with Alexander Kazmin, etc

Brazil 2022 "editing practice" production

USA 2015 demo album and 2023 NYCC videos, including tracks from the asofyet unreleased London concept album

UK 2023 boots x2 (Palladium and Lyric, with both L actors) [not included in the archive but I have instructions for where you can get them], audios from all 3 Palladium performances and one from the Lyric, youtube/tiktok clips from the Palladium

the English script

plus some other stuff!

Feel free to send me stuff I don't have (in other words, please please please send me stuff I don't have), especially anything from the Lyric part of the UK2023 run, the 2017 Taiwan show, 2020 Japanese production, the 2021 Moscow concert, the 2024 Brazil concert, or bonus content related to any production (social media posts, etc)! I'm pretty sure the Brazil video I have is from the 2022 production at the same theater (the Clara Nunes) but if you know better - or have a complete audio/video - I would love to hear from you!

Other super-awesome links:

DNTM x Ready as I'll Ever Be AMV by me! :) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gownszo6TKA

Cleaned-up subtitles for TAoPP (if you don't know what that is, just keep scrolling): https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1bsc-XWf0EIMmmmqTRfz8R_ba43aUBKGI

Projects I'm working on:

Write-up of the London performances at the Lyric I attended (essentially done, I just need to clean up my notes) updating wrt the Lasagna boots

Subtitling the Lasagna boots

Re-timing the 2015 Korean subtitles to match the 2022/2023 Korean revival (PLEASE tell me if you know of anyone who has done or is working on a proper English translation of this)

Follow-up post regarding the Plano production compiling backstage information from the cast and audience impressions

This is also a Melliot fanblog, so here's links to their stuff as well:

Adamandi, an indie musical (full production) - "Three queer students of color at an elite midcentury college go to horrific lengths to earn a coveted graduation prize." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAYXkOJ42zs

The Art of Pleasing Princes (staged reading) - "Murder! Magic! Mischief! Marriage? An LGBTQ+ fantasy musical about revenge, falling in love, and everything that comes in between." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pgc4wdkH0cU&t=0s

Oh hey it's a link to my TAoPP subtitles again, how'd that get in here twice: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1bsc-XWf0EIMmmmqTRfz8R_ba43aUBKGI

Ghost Story, a concert version of Melliot's newest work - "Two love stories between Chinese American and Polish American men haunt the same Montana ranch house — one century apart. As past and present intertwine, the lovers confront long-held fears in their quest to determine if they love one another for the right reasons." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4o-vKr36aE

Whirlwind for Hire, a musical podcast by the "Elliot" in "Melliot" about a nonbinary immortal assassin named Alastor - https://open.spotify.com/show/3grLbfZQQ7I7BTCTnbb5Nr

[yabashiri]

I'm back with a bang. Project Fiction - an Irumatsu and Irujnko fic will be finally published in its entirety! First arc is up, at about 50k words and 7 chapters. Read more to see if it's your cup of tea.

Do you hate some things about DR canon? Do you wish the talent system in Hope's Peak was more explored? Then read no further! I'll copy some bullet points from PF's description on AO3 and explain them in more details.

This work has: - Heavy OOC for Iruma and Kaede

PF!Iruma is not lewd, but she's a hothead, a reserve course student, and she also likes basketball. Weird, right? She also has nothing to do with inventions, her true talent is more of an abstract concept in line with your usual 'hope' and 'despair' gimmicks. It allows me to create a story with no killing games, but filled with tension similar to how Death Note is considered a 'shounen' even though it's a detective mystery.

As for Kaede, be warned that she only appears in chapter 8 for the first time. Remember her pre!game line in v3? "I don't have faith in humanity". What if I based her entire character on that and pitted against this Iruma? You can't imagine how heated it gets. - In-depth exploration of how Hope's Peak works, what's a 'talent' and how it impacts the chosen students

Do you know how talents are assigned? How scouts do their work? How exactly Kamukura Izuru was made and what studying on the reserve course is like? I know, and I'll show you in great detail.

- Nods to the canon, while turning the plot of DR1 upside-down.

Junko's game plan stays the same: kill the council, rebel the reserve course, fill the world with despair. With Iruma, however... not all goes as planned. It's not a story about people stuck together until almost all of them die. We go from Hope's Peak to an open world, and you'll see famously neon Tokyo in all its glory.

- Heated gay arguments, a weird online game, absurd talents beyond your average human standards.

While the story goes beyond ships and their dynamics, it has that in spades. I also present to you a certain game by Team DANGAN, and it's not about a pun-making bear torturing students. Imagine Genshin Impact's combat but more tactical, focused on PvP. That -- and much more.

- An abundance of author notes. This one has a lot to say.

I'll be straight with you, I put a shit ton of details into my works. Chekhov's Armoury is a trope I came up with before I realized it existed. I'll give you fanarts, songs, memes. Basically I've never had a lot of readers so I had to get used to creating fan content by myself.

- Typos I am translating this work into English, and while I'm pretty confident in my abilities, I am not perfect. It's kinda hard to know how real people talk when you're not exposed to the language on a daily basis. If anyone wants to be my beta, I'll be honored.

Translating this thing is ungodly hard. Writing it took me 4 years and was even harder. This story means a lot to me, I put my heart and soul into it, and I truly hope someone will enjoy it as much as I do. I also hope someone makes a TV Tropes page for it one day :D This is my only dream as a creator.

Give it a shot -- you won't regret it.

I hope.

[weirdcat1213]

MXTX and Marie Lu: an unnecessary long post about writers I like very very much

spoilers for Heaven Officials Blessing and the Legend series but not that bad

tldr; They describe things and I like that but I had to make it this long and add some stuff about writing and cultural expectations cuz i guess ill always be an english major at heart

Ok so I need to get this off my chest so I hope youre interested in writing, describing things and cultural expectations

So I've started reading Heaven Officials Blessing cuz I like gay and sad people and I love the donghua so much but BOI THAT WOMAN CAN HURT ME SO GOOD >:D

The simplicity of her words may be due to translation, her own style or part of the normal style in China but it contributes a lot to the books in my opinion. It is because of her simplicity that the reader is able to follow her long and detail descriptions.

Now, a lot of writers like to describe things, and MXTX does this a lot. She describes clothes, places, faces, etc when it's necessary for the story. But what I love about her is how she describes certain actions and moments.

There are moments that just cannot be described in 3 sentences, they're too important. The example that I want to show has not left my mind since I read it because it was one of the best slaps in the face ever.

TGCF Vol. 2: (from the free version I could find but it'll do)

"Before he even finished, there was a loud scream, and Hong Hong-er leapt to his feet, running towards Guoshi to headbutt him.

His voice was young and tender, but his screams were filled with rage, as if his heart was filled to the brim with unspeakable pain and anguish, making many of those present shiver. That young child was covered in injuries, yet he tore and hit out at them like a red-eyed rabid dog, violent and aggressive.

The Deputy Guoshi blocked Hong Hong-er and Guoshi backed away, yelling, “MAKE HIM LEAVE THE MOUNTAIN, HURRY! Don’t touch him, I mean it! That fortune is too toxic, don’t touch him!”

The Deputy Guoshi hurriedly moved aside, and Mu Qing and Feng Xin didn’t know whether to act. Seeing that everyone was avoiding him like he was a poisonous snake, that child was

shaken and started thrashing even harder, biting and screaming.

“I’m not! I’M NOT!! I’M NOT!!!!”

Suddenly, a pair of arms wrapped him around the waist, encircling his small form. A voice came from above his head.

Like look at this! This moment cant be longer than 2 minutes and its described in such way that breaks me. The voice and actions of the little kid (who is kinda doing a bad job saying "hey im not actually dangerous/toxic") get under your skin. The descriptions of his voice, his figure, how he looks yelling, how everyone reacts to this moment, how the MC reacts to this...its all just so amazing. The description grabs you by the ear and it makes you listen, it makes you watch. And thanks to that harrowing description the last bit really gets to the reader. Finally someone bothered to actually listen to the kid and console him. It's so fucking beautiful and it makes me want to eat glass. It really gives you the feelings that an angel really came from above to save a child from the pain in his own heart.

“You’re not. I know you’re not. Don’t cry, now. I know you’re not.”

That young child pressed his lips closed tightly, grabbing on to that pair of snow-white sleeves around his waist with a death grip. He forced himself to hold back for a long time, but in the end, he couldn’t. A stream of tears suddenly rolled down from that round, black eye, and he burst out crying."

And all this emotion, this care for the craft reminded me of something, of someone. The queen the legend Marie Lu.

Although I would say she follows the regular American conventions when it comes to writing (she is american after all), she also takes care in her descriptions. However, in this case I want to talk about how she describes feelings. Marie Lu's characters are not just happy or sad but they have Feelings that just need to be expressed on the page otherwise they will explode. An example:

LEGEND SERIES BOOK 4 REBEL:

I nod again. "I'm sorry. I-"

"I find myself nodding through my tears, wishing I could have turned to him sooner, wishing I could be more like him in every way. "I see them every night," I say to him, my words breaking. "They're there every time I close my eyes, I jump at every sound. I see a soldier in every person standing at a corner. I thought- I thought if I could just drown it all out in the Undercity, if I could replace it with something else so loud and overwhelming, that it might go away- I thought if I could just see the Republic again, return home and understand my past..."

The pain in Daniel's eyes is raw and real. The fear of this was what had kept me silent for so long. He nods once, his hands firmly on my shoulders. "I see them too," he says quietly. "I should have talked to you about my nightmares. I can't expect you to open up to me if I don't do the same."

"Don't be." His eyes soften, and he pulls me into a hug. "You didn't do anything wrong."

It is his embrace that finally breaks my last barrier. I cry and cry and cry. I cry because I'd never let myself truly understand my own brother, because I'd never understood myself. I cry for all the lives that our pasts have set on different paths- for June's loss of her family, for Tess's loss of her childhood, for Daniel becoming a parent when he was himself just a boy. I cry because I'm grateful that we still, in spite of everything, have all found each other.

Because sometimes, broken pieces find a way to make a new whole."

NOW WHY AM I BOTHERING WITH ALL OF THIS. A couple of days ago one of my favorite video essayist youtubers said that his best writing advice was to keep things simple, that that was the best way to write.

This is just one of my favorite moments ever. The MC has been bottling things up for the whole book and on that scene he finally let's everything go. His brother also finally let's go his own fear and allows himself to be soft with his brother. The scene, however, would not work as well as it does without the description of the moment right before he breaks down crying. The feelings he can sense from his brother, his own feelings about his own perceived weakness, etc. These descriptions just gives the reader a window to see how much the characters have in their hearts. Again, it's so many emotions they could explode. Like this scene could have cut short in multiple ways and if it was recorded for a TV show it would not feel as long as it does in the book. Lu bothers with these descriptions to remind the reader that the characters have real feelings inside. They twist and change as it would happen to someone real and that's amazing. I love how she does it every time.

So how come these scenes, really description heavy, are this fucking cool and a short and fast description would not have been able to make them justice?

It's because usually when we talk about "keeping things simple" or "show dont tell" we want to apply them for everything. We want to apply them no matter the author, genre, target audience, etc.

This book explains it way better that I ever could but basically, writing tips and advice are based on what we consider normal. Most people consider the american conventions the rule, so when someone doesn't apply them to their writing, the writing is flawed. In the same book it is mentioned how typical Chinese writing prefers telling over showing things. They just love the details and that can be seen in MXTX's writing. She is following conventions that usually would be deemed as "wrong." Going back to Marie Lu, I want to think that she knows a bit about Chinese writing but she also knows that, even if its not the rule, descriptions help her writing alot; which is why she does it.

This is a nice and long way to tell you that when you read something pls do it with an open mind. Please dont have a mental list of what makes good of bad writing ready to point out an author's flaws. You could be discovering a new convention from a different culture, a convention that can be game changing for the book.

[dailybbq]

HI WOW I LOVE UR ART

if possible can u drop some of ur qtaro hc's? its rare to meet another qtaro enjoyer !! :D

THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!! i'm always so happy to find others who enjoy him - it's been a little easier since 3-1 now that other people actually consider him :'P!! & yes of course! i have many, but i think (since it is a 'general' prompt), i will leave it to the basic headcanons on his backstory/character for now :]

DAY 2: WHO IS HE?!

- Ethnically Puerto-Rican & Scottish-Japanese! He's fluent in Japanese, Spanish, and English (less so, he's uncertain about some pronunciations and prefers writing it out instead of speaking it) - where he grew up has certainly affected the sort of intense emphasis/descriptive language he uses in Japanese, but Spanish has also affected the style in which he speaks :D + he also really enjoys learning about other cultures (and reconnecting with his own!) through language & conversing with the people there. It's much more interesting and personal than simply... reading research other people have gathered on them.

- Transmasc non-binary; primarily uses he/him in English, él/lo in Spanish! He also finds neopronouns fun. Though he doesn't elect to use them for himself, he doesn't mind if others do!!

- Bisexual & polyamorous also :] I have a small (often not too relevant, other than me providing further context to all of those Q-taro's had to leave behind for the Death Game) headcanon that he has a boyfriend named Yusuke (友輔) who he met in high school! Yusuke's also struggled academically, to the point that he fell a year behind Q-taro — having to make-up the credits for that extra year before he could finally graduate. Soon after, when he was able to make it through his undergraduate degree, they celebrated together... and through an drunk accident, Q-taro severely injured himself. This is the incident shown in-game, and it's what plays into his struggles of realizing how much he's seemingly 'left behind' and how stagnant his life feels while Yusuke continues school, the kids at the orphanage are growing up, the team's already figured out a strategy to make up for his absence... but, well. I digress.

- Q-taro really loves taking photos of his day-to-day. Even if he's not often the one in the pictures, he loves getting to see his friends smiling at some stupid joke he made behind the camera, or taking more subtle pictures when they're casually hanging out and laughing — not purposefully smiling for the camera or anything... it feels far more genuine.

...Hence, his 'treasure' in the prize exchange is a camera the kids got for him on his birthday one year. Photos of his life before the Death Game are still in the cartridge — even the one he took of Yusuke moments before he was hospitalized and isolated from everyone he cared for. Asunaro grants him this to serve both as a reminder of his loved ones waiting for him, and of how devastated he was when he was injured and felt as if his life was passing him by. In this 'Game', his life will be stolen — and Q-taro still has a life he wants to live... he has to live...

- In any case... I also think he has a chronic limp from (physical) bullying he endured when he was younger (he never really tried to fight back, and they went harder on him because he was dark-skinned + a large kid, they assumed he could take more of a beating). He healed up well enough, and it doesn't impair his skill on the field at all, but it is noticeable when you notice him casually walking. When Asunaro replaced his limbs upon request, they still had to implement some weakness in it such that he wouldn't question or overcompensate for the limp he's always had. (& adjacently related, but I do delve more into a pre-/no-Death Game AU reference here if you're interested!)

- Additionally, I do believe he's coded in-game to have autism — whether or not it was as intentional as Gin's pre-established symptoms, it remains true in my mind... The ways in which he connects with Gin and Kai, his literal and blunt manner of addressing things (there are many instances, but particularly the start of 2-1 where he belatedly realizes that although he'd like to applaud Sara for being strong, he needs to instead focus on the fact she's still in a vulnerable place and try to support her that way... 'cause she is still a kid, even if she's trying to act like a leader right now. It's also why his later conversation with her quickly veers into the topic of 'casual life' — by way of distraction and finding comfort for her sake, because he knows Asunaro's pushing the participants' limits intentionally), the intense 'passion' he holds for many things... you must see my vision, yes...

With that, and the context of many other participants in-game canonically having schizo-spec disorders, I also headcanon him to have schizo-affective bipolar disorder. He foremost experiences auditory hallucinations, and occasionally has to double-check with those he cares for to make sure they weren't calling him, or that they didn't say something that his brain has latched onto and repeated (which, when not idly irritating, can be upsetting phrases that he internalizes). When he's experiencing manic episodes, he often goes days unable to sleep because he feels both physically and mentally restless — he'll often struggle to manage his frustration/sensory overload in his attempts to physically wear himself out (in the hopes it gets him to finally rest) & he tends to intensely focus on various inane hobbies he'll drop soon after the episode ends. This includes (but is not limited to): testing out pottery, collecting and sorting different washi tapes, researching and testing the differences in fungi, and baking (he normally just cooks; baking isn't his thing (although he loves pastries)). Q-taro also struggles immensely with articulating himself aloud (this also ties into the autism) when it comes to more lengthy or serious discussions. While he understands what he wishes to say, he can't often figure out a good way of getting it out — hence defaulting to physical touch and affection to reassure others.

- Speaking of his favored physical touch! I think he enjoys all forms of it, but ultimately prefers:

- Hugging (people are usually shorter than him, and he likes hugging them, then picking them up in the air and spinning him... though he's also fond of casual moments where he gets to lean down over someone's shoulder while they're busy and hug them like that) - Hands on one's face (when he's comforting a kid, he often holds their face to help them feel 'steady' & to make it easier to wipe away their tears (or, lets them lean into his shoulder to hide the tears), and will gently nudge their chin up when he's trying to inspire some confidence. he likes letting his loved ones close to his face, because he considers that a really vulnerable part of someone. (also... he thinks it's cute when Yusuke pinches his cheeks when he pretends to be scolding him.)) - Hand-holding!!! (it's nice, and as i've shown above... he likes being gentle with his loved ones. but, whether it's something silly like swinging their hands around, or holding their hand in public for comfort's sake, or simply something to help them ground themselves... he just enjoys knowing they're there.)

And... I think that is all I'm going to add for now!! I hope this suffices; thank you for reading through! Maybe next time I'll delve more into my hcs of how he interacts with some of the cast (or, perhaps simply draw that out :D)

[groundzero-v]

20 Questions for Fic Writers!

Thank you @gracelesslady23 for tagging me! <3

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

Only 8 (one is still waiting to be revealed in the prongsfoot fest!)

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

121,775 words

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Harry Potter, and then mostly barely known fandoms haha (I have a soft spot for rareships), I'm thinking about writing for svss or mdzs too though

4. Top 5 fics by kudos

I don't wanna listen anymore - prongsfoot, multi-chapter, misunderstandings

Ad Infinitum - cyberpunk game, one-shot

Rising over dying flames - bnha gen fic, percy jackson au, two shot

Kintsugi - prongsfoot, multi-chapter

Marauder's Guide to Saving the Wizarding World - prongsfoot longfic, current wip, Marauders fight Voldemort AU, Triwizard Tournament arc, overload of pining, Marauder banter

5. Do you respond to comments?

Absolutely! I really treasure nice comments and re-read them often. They are very special to me. I try to always reply, even when the comment is only a word, but sometimes responding takes me some time

6. What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I don't really do angty endings haha. I'm a very happy ending oriented person, I like my angst only before the very end. So angstiest? Probably nothing

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

All of them! But so far probably the unrevealed prongsfoot festa fic

8. Do you get hate on fics?

I got some slightly weird comments but so far (thankfully) not any outright hate. I'm very lucky that people in the prongsfoot fandom are so incredibly nice

9. Do you write smut?

Ah, not really. I do like to read spicy fics sometimes but it depends

10. Do you write cross-overs?

It depends on the definition, I like to put characters into different universes, but the original characters of that work don't exist when I do. So it's more of an Alternate universe!

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Hopefully not? I'm afraid to know, but I don't think my fics are popular enough to be stolen haha. (Whoever steals fics should be deeply ashamed though!)

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Once so far, to russian

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

I haven't, I imagine it's really difficult, but it could be a lot of fun as well

14. What's your all-time favorite ship?

Prongsfoot!

I fell in love with them a long time ago and I really love writing or reading about them. The characters feel so comforting to me and I love the intensity and devotion they have for each other.

15. What's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you will?

I currently have only one real WIP published, the Marauder's Guide. For me its really easy for self-doubt to set in when writing long fics so it becomes harder and harder to push myself to write next chapter after not picking it up for a while. But I really want to finish it. I think it will take a long time but I will do it! Hopefully?

So I suppose the answer is my wip for the Sirius Black fest. I have this great idea in my head, but when I try to put it to page it sounds so bad it makes me lose motivation. We will see if I can push through haha (It's prongsfoot by the way because of course it is).

16. What are your writing strenghts?

I saw banter mentioned a lot in comments so probably that! I really like writing dialogues between the Marauders and especially James and Sirius. I also really like adding in tiny character or worldbuilding details

17. What are you writing weaknesses?

Description definitely. Pacing too, especially in the first drafts. Actions during dialogues maybe? I sometimes struggle to describe who is doing what to show exactly what I have in my head. The biggest problem is definitely endings though. I always rush them :(

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language?

Overall I don't add another language to my fics. I never know how much to translate, how much time spend with it and so on, so I use it very very little.

Technically though, English is my second language, so I'm always writing in a different language haha.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Harry Potter! I think it was Prongsfoot as well

20. Favorite fic you've ever written?

I think I tend to like my newer works because the older ones make me embarrassed by their writing haha. So probably Marauder's Guide! It's an idea very dear to my heart, even if it's not perfect in the slightest

Tagging @plecotusauritus @padfootastic @roalinda (no pressure!)

[not-poignant]

if ur still doing the writing meme (i've liked all ur answers even the 'unpopular' ones a haikyuu fic i loved once got rewritten and i'm still sad i never saved the first one because i didn't realize the author didn't like it and i wish i'd commented more or sth to make them know we loved the og so much) -> 13 and 34 plz

Ahh I'm sorry you went through that anon re: the Haikyuu! fic. Please don't guilt-trip yourself for it. Authors have lots of reasons for rewriting a fic, or deleting a fic, and sometimes even when it's had thousands of kudos they will still do it.

It sounds like you commented in general (since you say 'commented more' instead of just commented) which is like... really awesome. Who knows, maybe the author thought they were giving you the better version! You can always leave a comment and ask if they still have the original chapters on file somewhere if that author's still active, and if they'd be willing to share them with you somehow.

Now to the meme:

13. What is a subject matter that is incredibly difficult for you write about? What is easy?

I was going to answer this with 'easy, everything I don't write' lmao because I just avoid the stuff I find hardest. But that's kind of...not the point. So in all seriousness:

Big ensemble scenes with big ensemble casts. I don't know why I insist on writing these a fair bit, but anything that has more than two characters in a scene is a struggle. More than four is like 'OH GOD.' It's just a lot of work in a different kind of way.

Happy endings. It's not that they're difficult to write, exactly, it's that I'm often...kind of sad to be letting go of the story and I feel like I've already let it go at the point that I'm writing the happy ending. Like, I am not happiest when I'm writing the happy ending, though I want it to feel really really good for readers. I love happy endings, but I also get really noticeable lag and slow down a bit towards the end of stories, because I have less motivation. An ending means letting go of that version of the world, or that installment, and my brain is like 'dun wanna.'

Beginnings/openings. I don't really enjoy the first few pages of a first chapter and I know I'm not often good at beginnings which further preys on my 'everyone is going to hate this story' insecurity I have at the beginning of a new thing.

Action scenes used to be in this but they're not as much anymore. But I do really struggle with sex scenes too! And I think that's a reason I don't write them as much as I used to. It's not a bad thing, one of the reasons they're harder is because I want them to be good and I just don't want to do carbon copies of previous sex scenes and I've now written like 200 of them.

As for things I find easy, hmm. I'm going to go with broadscale characterisation and dialogue. I also think generating character and place names is really easy, and inventing species to populate a new world is easy. I also think describing nature is easy for me, though I sometimes feel silly or like...I'm boring people when I describe it, so I try not to do it toooo much.

I'm bad at writing description but hilariously I don't find it difficult. x.x Maybe that's why I'm bad at it.

34. Thoughts on the Oxford comma, Go:

*takes a breath*

Since you don't mind unpopular opinions I hope you don't mind this one: I fucking don't rate the Oxford Comma and try to avoid using it wherever possible. It's really easy to avoid some of the errors an Oxford Comma can prevent through context, and frankly, the Oxford Comma can create its own issues which can be prevented through not using it. You can avoid or introduce ambiguity whether you do or don't use it, basically, one solves some problems and introduces others, the other solves some problems and introduces others.

In that sense, it's understandable why it's not mandated in many style guides. It is preferable in US English, but damn, I'm not from the USA. And the Oxford Style Guide recommends it but the Oxford Style Manual recommends against it. Australian Style Guides, including the one issued by the government, generally oppose its use, but it's not mandated, so it's really at the author's discretion.

I've tried using it. Like, I've sat down and thought 'right I'm going to give this a good shot' and I just really don't like it. So you'll see a handful here and there in my writing where I thought 'okay let's try it' and then just been like nahhhh.

I have no problems with other people using it, and those people can have all the extra commas I'm not using because damn, they'll need them. :D

--

From the Weird Questions for Writers meme!

[onboardsorasora]

Twenty Questions for Fic Writers tagged by  @lilyrizzy thank you for the tag! this was insightful for meeeee

1. How many works do you have on ao3? 7 (all my other fandom fics are on different sites)

2. What's your total ao3 word count? 139,751

3. What fandoms do you write for? F1 and InuYasha

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos? Match Point, Adore You, Teeth, Wreck Me and Random Works

5. Do you respond to comments? Yes! I love squealing together with my readers.

6. What is a fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? Wreck Me! Lmao people were big mad. Second would probably be that Quest Fic “Tell Max I love him”

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? So far the only fic that’s ended is the Adore You verse. So Teeth has the happiest ending.

8. Do you get hate on fics? Nope. no one has told me to my face/in my ask/comments/DMs that they hate my fics. 

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind? I do! I have a fic (InuYasha) where there was an art exhibition that devolved into an orgy. No sex pollen needed. I have a smut fic series (also InuYasha) I’ve only been writing rpf for less than a year so I’m behind on the smut.

10. Do you write crossovers? I don’t think I have (def not for F1) but I’m not opposed. I just need to know a lot about both worlds to feel comfy

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen? Not that I know of. I’m also afraid to go looking

12. Have you ever had a fic translated? Not that I know of, and I’m afraid to go looking lol

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before? My DMs are just chat fics all day every day. I’ve outlined like 2 fics which I’ve published with @blacklaces

14. What's your all-time favorite ship? My OTPs are Maxiel and SessxKag. I do love me some Dewis as well

15. What's a wip you want to finish, but doubt you ever will? So far, I don’t have a new WIP for F1 just yet. I do have a lot of half baked ideas written in my notes app. But I have 1 IY one that…. I dream about finishing but I know it’ll never happen. Its already been 10 years and it was supposed to be a whole ass epic plot. Its sat at 69k words….it would have easy been 100k. Thats not happening I feel

16. What are your writing strengths? Honestly, I’m not sure. I think its my dialogue? I’ve been trying to get better as descriptions. Honestly Idk lmao. My writing strength might be comedy? Idk idk– if someone knows, please tell me?

17. What are your writing weaknesses? Angst, or keeping the mood angsty. I’ve been working on my pacing and descriptions

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic? I don’t do it anymore. I used to (for IY its a little harder because the original show is Japanese set in feudal Japan so a lot of the nouns are Japanese) But for F1 I just write with the assumption that everyone is speaking English and if they aren’t then I’ll say it. Like there was a note in Adore you to assume any dialogue between these two characters are in Italian. Because, of course, the scene was set in Italy. I’m in my “here is some dialogue” he said in Dutch era.

19. First fandom you wrote for? Either InuYasha or Yuu Yuu Hakusho. I can’t remember, but it probably was IY

20. Favorite fic you've written? I think its Tennis AU!! I truly love Tennis!Dan so so much! Enchanted AU is coming in a close second. 2Wrecked2Furious is my baby so I don’t think I can reasonably count it fairly.

Tagging...... @blacklaces @purplesallthewaydown @flawlessassholes if you haven't as yet/want to. Also anyone else <3

[squarebracket-trickster]

Voting "nuance" because I don't know whether a high school elective called "Creative Writing 12" that was taught by the same teacher who taught AP English (and who was an amazing teacher - if ridiculously hard marker - who I still have a lot of respect for). In this course, we basically spent the whole semester workshopping each other's short stories and poems (with a few weeks before that of basic instruction on story structure).

To be honest, I didn't learn anything I hadn't already learned on my own time about story structure from the lecture portion of the class, but I think it really was just meant to be a "get the basics out of the way so we can get to the real reason we are here" situation.

The workshopping, on the other hand, was extremely informative.

First of all, I was exposed through my peers to a lot of different stylistic traditions, genres, and story/poem structures that I never would have sought out on my own time (or didn't even know existed), and I think it really expanded my idea of what you could do with the written word - how to use words and structure for effect, what kind of emotions you can invoke, what you can even use stories to say etc...

It also taught me a lot about critique, both the etiquette and what makes good critique. Our teacher really emphasized the "two good things and a suggestion" method, which was fantastic for getting us to appreciate pieces we wouldn't normally like and see them for their own merits, how they measured up to what *they* were trying to achieve... rather than just critiquing a piece because it did something *we* didn't like or personally wouldn't read. It also resulted in our suggestions being more tailored to helping the piece become *its best self* rather than what each of us would like based on our personal prefences. I really thought at the time that all this was just standard practice and a no-brainer, but having been in writing groups since, it really is surprising how often critique focuses on the personal preferences of the critiquer rather than engaging with what the author was trying to do. Also, writing groups that don't make an effort to point out the positives often don't last long because it's just not enjoyable to pour your heart into something only to have it torn to shreds without remorse at 2:30pm on a Monday afternoon single every month.

Going into that class I thought it was going to be a lot harder to come up with two good things to say than it would be to come up with suggestions, but it turned out to be the other way around. It's so much easier to find things to compliment, even in a piece of very beginner writing, than it is to come up with actually insightful and helpful critique. Critiquing spelling, grammar, and even minor details isn't insightful; these are actually so far down on the list of priorities when it comes to making a compelling story (and yet, these seem to be what a lot of inexperienced critique groups zero in on). Better critique (imo) focuses on how a story makes use of things like time/chronology (in medeas res, linear story telling, backstory, time skips, telling a story "backwards" or out of order, prologues/epilogues/interlogues, parallel plots etc), set-up and pay-off, thematic questions and whether the resolution actually fully addresses the dilemma set up, as well as narrative voice, atmosphere/tone/mood, subtext/showing vs telling (and all the devices to achieve this like setting, character descriptions, dialogue, symbolism etc), and, of course, pacing and point of view.

There was one story that I will always remember as the one that got away because I sat at my desk for a solid 45 minutes until the bell rang, with two compliments written down on the paper in front of me, and I never was able to think of a single suggestion for it. It just made such perfect use of every tool at its disposal. (Funny enough, years later, I was talking with the guy that wrote it about that class, and apparently one of my stories had been living rent free in his head all these years too, so we're even haha). I often wonder, with how much I've grown as a writer, if I read that story now, would I have the skill to give him feedback that I didn't back then?

Learning how to *properly* offer critique and feedback was probably one of the best exercises I did in growing my own skill. It's not even just about learning how to spot and address problems in other's writing so you can tackle them better on your own; it's also in a way like learning how to work with visual art in a new medium. You are forced to learn how genres and styles you don't normally work in work so that you can apply those rules, and it gives you a wealth of new tools to play with when you sit down to write yourself.

I don't think I noticed at the time just how much the course was building and strengthening new writing "muscles" - I was actually bored in that class a lot - but, looking back, I saw a serious spike in my abilities around that time, and I think it was due to a combination of that class, AP English/Literature (the "learn to write a coherent argument FAST on the spot" class + learning about literary, rhetorical, and poetic devices), and graduating from reading exclusively YA/MG to finally enjoying some classics and adult fantasy.

The class has also made me really picky about the kind of critique groups I will join.

Feel free to leave further explanation below!

[sunriseverse]

For the ask meme: 9, 10, 12, 17, 28, 33, 40

thanks for the ask!

9. How do you find new fic to read?

honestly i just open whatever tag i want to read and backread from whatever's the newest. i do filter out certain things (length, completion, some archive warnings), but other than that, i don't do much else, just go from there. this is, as you can imagine, harder in smaller fandoms, and sometimes i feel a bit like a rat searching for crumbs.

10. How do you decide what to write?

usually what i write is either 1. prompted (rarer these days now that i'm not Known as a prompt writer), or 2. based on ideas i toss around with my friends. talking concepts through with people helps solidify my thoughts and portrayals—i'm not very good at forming cohesive narratives on my own, without anyone to bounce them off of.

12. Are there any tropes you used to dislike but have grown on you?

hmmm, i can think of a lot i used to be neutral towards, but now i hate or dislike strongly, but not much the other way around...................maybe non-linear narratives? i used to find them annoying, but since i started writing them for sunrise and realised how useful they are, they've grown on me.

17. What highly specific AU do you want to read or write even though you might be the only person to appreciate it?

pacific rim or his dark materials fusions always get me. i think these are a bit more common, though (pacrim has its own fusion tag, even), so i guess my most obscure and highly-specific au would be a dmbj-zmyx fusion/crossover—dmbj could definitely work as a door world, but both fandoms have a really small english fanbase, so i'm not sure the overlap between them, and likely, i would be the only one who wanted to read it.

28. Does anyone read your fics before you post them? If so, who?

i don't tend to let people read the entire completed fic before it's posted, but i do send my friends excerpts! poor @lungache has to listen to me both ramble about my concepts and toss my horrid little sneak peeks at them, and @lucientelrunya gets the same treatment, and i greatly appreciate both of them for it.

33. If you write chaptered fics, what’s your ideal chapter length to write? Is it different from your ideal chapter length to read?

the ideal chapter length is whatever gets the job done, but if i'm writing a multichapter fic, then whatever length the first chapter is is the bare minimum for all following ones. i've written fics that had 1k chapters, and i've written fics that have 5k chapters—it really just depends on how much i'm covering per chapter. (also, my chapters these days tend to be longer just because i love description and emotion, and refuse to be concise.) for preferred reading length, usually anything 1k+ is good for me, and i'm not too picky—i'm willing to read 2k chapters, or 30k chapters.

40. Do you tend to reread fics or are you a one-and-done kind of person?

depends entirely on what i'm feeling. i haven't reread most of my bookmarks, but if i'm in desperate straits (have been through a tag and read everything i'm willing to already), i'll go back and reread things.

[joifee]

"xB", M.C. Joifee, 2023, Digital Drawing with Medibang Paint Pro, 30.2 x 19.9cm, uploaded on the artists tumblr-blog

This artpiece was drawn during @shepscapades hermit character-design event all through june. The artist M.C. Joifee was inspired by the painting "Ophelia" by the british artist Sir John Everett Millais, drawn 1851-1852.

The imagine depicts xBcrafted lying inside a shallow river in a similar pose to Ophelia in the original painting. Other than Ophelia his eyes are closed, making him appear more peaceful than Ophelia. He is surrounded by floating cherry-blossom, choosen by the artist due to the current 1.20 update of minecraft, which introduced the cherry-grove biome.

The river is surrounded by minecraft-typical fauna. On the shore of xB's right side is an azalea tree is growing from the ground. On the left side sugarcane is growing next to a sandy beach. On the left side of the picture, parts of a stone bridge is visible. Possible a bridge build by xB himself or another unknown to us hermit.

Floating particals let us assume that theres a sporeblossom and a cherry tree nearby.