#also probably knows how to mold clay

[unnerving-presence]

wishing wesker was real so he could massage my legs bc they hurt so bad 😔 weskie pls i need u

i think wesker would be oddly good at massaging like that shit has you moaning from relief like where did he learn that from 🤨

forgets he has the strength of a fucking bus sometimes and presses down super hard. may or may not crack a bone but you also probably needed that relief too

oddly enough has your legs hurting even more after but it’s okay cause within like a day you’re as good as new

[alizalayne]

Hello! this will be a quick process post so that you can see how I needlefelted a fursuit head!

I began by following the "bucket head" tutorial by Matrices, then added a layer of polyfill so that I wouldn't use as much of my merino wool. This is how I typically make a doll head, my "core wool" is often polyfill because it really likes to clump together and fuse.

Overall, this project took about two months of my spare time. This is the first fursuit head I have made, but not my first needlefelt project.

I would really like to encourage other people to try making masks this way! You can do any kind of subtle color with wool and the wool fiber is very cheap. If you wanted to make a fursuit head with the entirety of starry night flowing over it, or a head with tons and tons of complex colors, I think wool might be the best material. I also did not need to know how to pattern or sew in order to make this-- it was sculpture rather than sewing, which I am bad at.

The rest under the cut!

Another angle where you can see that I am building up the structure of the head.

I then made the ears, which are translucent because they're felted, just like real ears!

I wasn't happy yet with the proportions at this point, so I spent a lot of time figuring that out and deciding where and how I'd be placing the eyes.

I made a pair of sculpey follow-me eyes by using a little soy sauce dish as a concave circular mold and tried a foam clay nose and teeth. The sculpey eyes could be more successful, they took a lot of shaving and adjusting to get right and they eventually cracked from the strain I'd put them through while making them more shallow. For a while, I intended to make wefts of white wool to use on the sides of the head, but I ended up preferring a domestic shorthair head shape because it reads the most clearly as a cat vs any other animal.

I originally intended to have the eyes behind clear plastic domes and used "shaker domes" that people use to make greeting cards to cover the eye, but in the end they made the eyes too dull. I made foam clay housing for the eyes and painted it pink with acrylic paint. I used stick-on car window tint to create the pupils. My visibility inside the head is really good!

Finally, after fiddling, one of the eyes was deeper than the other and I had to re-set both to account for it. I added spot glitter on top of the acrylic paint on the eye using some gold watercolor paint I had, which was silly because I'll need to wash the head at some point. I will probably seal the eyes before washing and hope for the best. I intend to spot clean the head until it absolutely needs to be washed, at which point I'll remove some pieces or find a way to protect them while soaking the head in a cool dr. bronner's bath.

I glued down a layer of felt fiber on top of the foam clay "tear ducts" and then felted new fiber over the tear duct skin and cheeks to blend them into the face. I also removed the teeth and closed her mouth because I didn't have time to adjust the teeth as much as I wanted before the con that my friends and I attended. I would like to modify this head so that she can open and close her mouth.

Lastly, I added wire whiskers with little glass beads looped onto the ends and paper eyelashes that I also watercolored and sealed, like the insides of the eyes. Like I said before, it's gonna be a problematic wash, but I'm confident I'll figure it out, and I can always repair her or replace her lashes if something goes wrong.

Last thing, to keep the inside of the head nice and cool and prevent fogging since in the end I closed the mouth and had sealed eyes, I made a snorkel out of a snorkel mouthpiece fitted into two collapsible auto funnels.

I would say that realistically this entire project cost me less than $150. I had some materials lying around, like the wire and the beads and the sculpey.

I added two ear vents on either side of the head so that I had options on where to feed the snorkel out. If you look at the other pictures on the blog of me wearing the head, you mostly can't even see the snorkel mouth. However, it was a little problematic to let go of the snorkel to talk. it would be perfect for a silent suiter, but I'm lucky that so many people wanted to talk to me. I'd like to try and replace the snorkel mouth with something I can talk in, but I'm not sure what to use. It should be something that can create a seal to keep my breath out of the head. it's possible that I will be able to make something with a painter's mask.

I hid the "seam" between the head and my body with two yards of tulle tied into a big bow and sewn down onto the neck so that it wouldn't move around.

I hope that if you try making something similar you'll show it to me!

[onenicebugperday]

hi! i'm thinking of getting a few blue death feigning beetles as pets some time soon — i know with insects and invertebrate pets in general i shouldn't pick them up too often, but how often would you say is ok to handle them? i've read that with repeated handling they won't perceive me as a threat and are less likely to play dead, but obviously i wouldn't want to stress them out too much.

My general advice is that if you want to handle a pet a good amount, then bugs are probably not a great choice. I almost never handle any of mine, blue death feigning beetles included, unless I have to. I have read that they will feign death less if handled more often, but I don't know how stressful that process is for them. Bugs just don't get anything positive from being handled by us, so it's entirely for your own enjoyment. I'm not saying you can't do it, I just personally advise against it. Some people would say otherwise.

This is not to say that a lot of bugs won't need enrichment. They just don't get enrichment from handling, so that's where a proper enclosure is important. Unfortunately a lot of people give blue death feigning beetles just flat sand with a few hides in their enclosure and that's not ideal. Mine have caves and tunnels and rocks and wood and fake plants, and they love to climb, dig, and explore! I used excavator clay and exo-terra stone desert substrate (because you can get them wet and mold tunnels, etc.), cork bark, and aquarium/reptile hides and decorations to make a nice landscape for them, and then topped with loose dry stone desert substrate after the wet stuff dried. Fine sand and dirt can stick to their legs and cause issues.

Keep in mind also that they are primarily nocturnal, so you may not see them much except at night! They don't seem to mind if lamps are on or anything, though, so you can still enjoy watching them at night when they're out.

Hope this is helpful :)

[bigmammallama5]

what if i teach myself how to do potters plaster so i can make molds for ceramic dnd dice (i know they would be very difficult and probably unbalanced but also that skill would help me make personal molds and sprigs of my own stuff) i just think that would be neat (i looked at traditional silicone molds for resin die but i would be afraid that i wouldnt be able to get the raw clay out without damaging them)

[chameleon221b]

*WARNING: LONG RANT ABOUT SHERLOCK

Let’s talk TGG, like… imagine you’re John. You’re an exhausted army doctor who’s been treating probably the flu all day, and you bike home or take a cab. You’re ready to eat and maybe watch some telly and crash into bed.

But no. You get home, and there are fricken gunshots ringing out. Oh my God! Is your flatmate in danger? Is he shooting someone? Yes. He is… but not someone. A wall. He’s shooting a wall which for someone reason had it coming. You’re glad Sherlock doesn’t fight to give you the gun. Maybe it’ll look up from here. Ya lock the British Army Browning L9A1 in the safe, and you realize for the millionth time that your flatmate is mad but you’ve kinda ceased to care.

Then woah! The table is a mess. You’re not cleaning that up. You’ll eat in the armchair. But eat what? That is the question. Sherlock probably didn’t cook or get takeout or shop, or even eat, but you ask him anyway. It’s a kinda rhetorical question.

Without a suspicion you open the fridge and WHAT IN THE GILES?!

You shut it quickly. You might faint. Is it PTSD? A hallucination? Real? You summon courage and yank the door open, and yes, it’s a real head. You shut the door like you’re dreaming. Like what did I just see? You forgot you’re even hungry. Sherlock acts like it’s a perfectly normal thing to do! Then you remember he’s mad and you’re kinda over it. It is what it is. You’re tired.

Then you get a rant from Sherlock who’s acting like a five-year-old because you stated literal facts, how he’s ignorant about stuff he doesn’t care about which he proves in said rant. You wrote about your first case, and the only thing he can’t argue with is the clever title.

That’s it. You’re done for tonight. Fudge it. And Sherlock even has the audacity to ask where you’re going like… You’re not even gonna explain now. The emotional intelligence translator needs a vacation.

And… woah. John didn’t even eat anymore. Imagine being him. I cannot further to can 🤦🏼‍♀️ 😂 Dude just wanted to get home and eat and then sleep. But there were gunshots, chemicals, severed heads, and a mad 5-year-old who’s insulted for an inane reason. Being Sherlock’s flatmate is hard 🤌🏻

Extra details:

That yellow spray paint can on the table from the Blind Banker is there too (and an paper file container tied with a string probably full of old case notes). Imagine in his boredom Sherlock was like, “Let’s paint a smiley face so it can annoy me because I don’t have a case”, which is probably why the wall had it coming 😂 Don’t smile at Sherlock Holmes when he’s bored, even if you’re just a bloody wall!! 🤦🏼‍♀️

Ooh, and before Sherlock mentions the Vermeer painting in the middle of the episode, you can see him reading the pamphlet about The Lost Vermeer while he’s arguing with John. Just thought it was a cool detail.

And set analysis:

And this ⬇️

Like… that table looks sus. There’s a weird yellow liquid. A bread from a bakery, the purple thing. Experiment? Or quick bite to eat while you handling literal chemicals? And then there’s a book… probably with obscure knowledge on the 100,027 different types of mold. And what is leaning against the window?

1. Big ass beaker.

2. Another beaker that contains with an umbrella and/or an old spraying device.

3. A fricken dead plant in a small clay vase in a bigger clay vase. 

4. A big weird red cup.

And

5. I think I found where the rum’s gone because what else could that bottle be other than a vintage bottle of rum with a dusty wax covering?

The set is cozy but also fricken eccentric 🤣 I can’t. It’s like Sherlock hoards random objects and/or souvenirs that only he knows why he keeps.

That’s it. That’s the rant. I’m done. I’ll eat pasta now and think about how John said, “Anything in? I’m starving.” followed by “severed head!” and Sherlock just replied, “Just tea for me thanks.” Like, “No bloody severed head for dinner, just tea.” 😁🥸😐

[twentyfivemiceinatrenchcoat]

THE ASK ABT JOBS SUGURU WOULD HAVE ,,,,,, i love thinking abt it thats my favorite subject EVA !!!! [thats a lie suguru as a whole is my favorite subject teehee :3]

ur SOOO right abt him being in law 2 help ppl ,,,,,, SO right w the idea of him walking around w a briefcase + slicked back ponytail + coffee GOHDDDD ok . okay . jobs I THINK suguru would have LETS GO !!

CERAMICIST - hed make these insane pots + sculptures n have showcases that r BOOKED like ,,, hes just so ,,,, pottery person 2 me,,,, n i feel like hed have a focus on using old pottery methods n keeping them alive in the modern day ,, like hes got some crazy intricate jomon pots, porcelain bowls + other kitchenware, n probs some bizen pots that he made dotted around his garden ,,,,, WAUGHHH I LOEV ART HISTORY

TATTOO ARTIST - ok . popular hc BUT STILL . hes worked his way up from being an apprentice in a huge shop -> owning his own lil studio pretty fast n hes GOOD . like hes got a rlly nice set of flashes that r colorful n playful but on himself hes probably got these super serious grayscale marbles and mythology plastered all over him [except for a family portrait mimiko + nanako made when they were like . 6 that he thought was so cute he got it tattooed on him] also i dont think hed b SUUPER in2 tattooing ppls names on other ppl or on himself, but maybe once u two have been dating for a LONGG while or r even almost a solid decade into marriage hed consider getting your name tatted somewhere hidden-but-not-really-hidden [womb tattoo, around the back of his ear, inner thigh]

MARINE BIOLOGIST - oHH MY GOHD OH MY GOHD OHHHHH MY GOHD i get super excited abt this cuz i wanna b a marine biologist SO BADDDDDD . its coming . TRUST !!!! anyway, he probably does some type of conservation bcuz . cmon . look at him . so he dives pretty often, like a weekly typa thing, BUT IMAGINE HIM IN THE SCUBA OUTFIT . he comes out sopping wet n hes probably rlly hot 4 a solid minute b4 the Stench hits u since ur both in an enclosed space and he smells like the underside of a dock.

CLASSICAL MUSICIAN - u know how i was talking abt how suguru would b a cellist ? yeah hed b a DAMN GOOD cellist like that man is principal cellist and hes so nice abt it 2 ,,, like he doesn't flaunt it and whenever someone in his section needs help w bowings or smthn else he gladly helps them !! he probably solos a ton on the tuba 2 ,,, like hes just SO GOOD at everything he picks up its insane

CONDUCTOR - same vein as the classical musician thing, he would b such a fine ass conductor ,,,,, like his facial expressions when the music gets intense and then it softens and hes swaying with the orchestra, hands gliding through the air ,,, also hed just b rlly good at keeping ppl in time and figuring out what each section was doing wrong.

oki thats my 2 cents on the whole thing ill get off my soapbox now dhhdhd :3

ASHLEY i’m finally getting to this…… these are all so bigbrained it’s crazy . AND I’M SO GLAD YOU SEE THE LAWYER!SUGU VISION <3333 he means the world 2 me….. silly little guy……

BUT WAHHH. CERAMIST SUGU THE LOML????? there’s this one stsg fic i rlly like where he’s a ceramics instructor and it …. changed me. as a person. AND I AGREE COMPLETELY the part abt him wanting to keep old art alive….. showcases constantly booked bc he’s just so skilled….. 😵‍💫 yeah. sugu as any kind of artist makes me insane. and him being good at pottery is just so…. weirdly attractive to me???? LIKE . him just having the most steady gentle hands…… teaching you how to mold the clay properly……… your back against his chest as he guides your hands . i need him so bad

AND . TATTOO ARTIST. yes it’s popular but it’s popular for a REASON (reason being: he is hot). HIM OWNING HIS OWN STUDIO and being so skilled….. the mythological tattoos + family portrait 🥺🥺 wahhh . he’s so sweet ashley…. i need him so bad…….. AND THE NAME THING …… i agree btw i feel like he would see tattoos as very . very very special. so getting your name inked into his skin so permanently might feel just as serious as a proposal to him 😭😭 i could see him doing it eventually tho ….. i agree w all the placements bUT. a part of me feels like . he’d get it tattooed somewhere on his chest … close to his heart….. :’3 sniffle. i could also see him getting a tiny heart you doodled onto his palm tattooed w/o you knowing and you’re just like ???? SUGURU??????? and he’s just. “i thought it was cute :)”…… sick sick man (affectionate) 😔😔

AND MARINE BIOLOGIST!SUGU ??? YOUR BRAINNNNN i remember you mentioning that in the sashisu college au too :33 him scuba diving!!!!! being constantly drenched and smelling of seasalt….. i’m of the firm belief that he was obsessed w marine biology as a kid so it just makes sense. I TRUST YOU BTWWW you���ll become a marine biologist for sure 🫡🫡🫡 pls let me pet the sharks once it happens . i would like to see them.

and finally ….. classical musician and conductor. CONDUCTOR!SUGU HAS ME IN A CHOKEHOLD BTW?? he would look so graceful and commanding and and and 😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫 just . him. swaying w the orchestra!!!!! he’s like a beautiful swan….. and ofc i love the idea of him being a musician too :3 it just makes sense. AND . HIM BEING A CELLIST. WHAT IF I CRYYYY he’d look so good playing it……

ashley your brain is actually so insanely big did you know that …… tysm for the food as always 🙏🙏 i am nomming him 2 death

[charminggirl512]

bad girl // chibs telford x oc

Chibs Telford x F!OC (Ellie Drysdale/Telford)

Warnings: 18+, smut, language

Word Count: 1,757

 The sounds of keys clanking into the lock wakes me up and I sit up slowly to avoid puking. The couple of bottles of liquor that I drank last night do not agree with me, and I would probably feel at least a little bit bad if Unser had to clean up my puke. I slap Gemma's leg a couple of times and she startles awake. Once we're both standing up, we finally realize who has bailed us out this time.

"Ha! I told you mine would come first this time," I tease her and she rolls her eyes.

"I'll pay you once Wayne gives me my purse back. You cheated somehow and I'm gonna figure out how you did it so that I win next time," She retorts as we walk out of our shared cell towards my very ticked-off boyfriend. 

"Hi, baby," I say and grip the leather of his kutte to attempt to peck his lips but he turns his face at the last second so that my lips land on his cheek. 

"Don't 'hi, baby' me, darling. You're in trouble this time," Chibs replies, still attempting to look annoyed with me.

"Oh, is the big bad biker gonna spank me? Maybe you should be the one in the cell, sir," I mock him which just seems to piss him off more.

"No, you'll enjoy it too much. But I do plan on not fucking you for a couple of days until you learn your lesson." 

   My face drops and that seems to bring a smile to his lips. He kisses the top of my head before leading me out to his bike where Clay is arguing with Gemma once again. Chibs pulls my helmet over my tangled curls and ensures that it's on properly before finally pulling me against him and molding our lips together, his tongue pillaging my mouth until we're both breathless. 

"I'm taking you to my house and then we're going to talk about this, Ellie. I can't keep getting calls from Unser telling me that you've been arrested again," He says firmly when we finally separate, his hands holding my face and his thumb stroking my cheek. 

"I'm sorry," I whisper and I know that it won't be enough, but it'll be a start. 

   He climbs on the bike first and I follow, pressing my cheek against his patch and winding my arms around his waist. I let the breeze distract me as he drives us to his house, most likely because he knows that if we go back to Gemma's where I'm still living, we'll have to overhear her and Clay either fighting or fucking. Once we're inside, I push off my ridiculous heels and head towards Chibs' room to change into some of his clothes. As I'm buttoning one of his button-downs, he enters the room and sits on the edge of the bed, running his hands through his hair. I step between his legs and play with his hair while he rests his head against my stomach, his hands rubbing up and down the back of my thighs.

"You ready to tell me what happened?" I sigh deeply and launch into the story.

"Gem and I went out for a couple of drinks and got a little rowdy. The bartender didn't like that we were being loud, so he tried to kick us out. Gemma threw her drink in his face and when he grabbed her arm roughly, I punched him in the face. He called Unser and he picked us up and took us back to the jail. I guess he didn't call you and Clay until this morning."

"Oh, no. He called us last night before he even went and picked you two up," He replies and I push his head back to look at me. "Ellie, that's the third time this month that I've had to see you asleep in a jail cell. If it happens again, I'm not bailing you out. You'll sit in there until Unser releases you or someone else comes to pay your bail, but I'm not going to do it again." 

"It won't happen again, but it's also not that big of a deal, Chibs," I mutter and that gets his attention.

"Not that big of a deal? Ellie, if you two fuck with the wrong guy just one time, I'll be picking you up from the morgue. You're not careful. You put yourself at risk and it scares the fuck out of me. Either you get it together, or we're done." I shove him away at that and he stands up and fixes me with a glare.

"I'm not careful? I put myself at risk? Jesus fuck, Chibs, your entire job is you not being careful and putting yourself at risk." He shakes his head at that and I step closer to him, pushing my finger into his chest. "Every morning, I wake up and pray that I'm not gonna get a call from one of your brothers telling me you're dead. So until you stop constantly being in danger, I'll continue to do the same." 

"What I do is to protect you! It's to protect anyone connected to the club. Fuck, if I didn't love you, Eleanor, I wouldn't do what I have to do. I would be going about my life, fucking random chicks, and drinking myself away. But, I do love you so I put myself in danger because it means that I get to see you breathing just one more day."

   He's so angry that he's almost panting when he finishes his rant, but I'm just in shock. We've never said that we love each other before, and of course, it would come out in the middle of an argument, like a bad cliche. 

"You love me?" 

"Shut up," He says before grabbing my face and kissing me. 

   I wrap myself around him and he's quick to pick me up and lead us to his bed. He throws me down and leans back to rip open my shirt, buttons flying everywhere, and I pull him back down to me. I nip at his lip before sliding my tongue into his mouth. Of course, he has to be the dominant one, so he takes over, pulling gasps and moans from my lips as he massages my bare tits and grinds himself against me. He moves down my neck, leaving his mark on me like a caveman. 

"I love you," I gasp out as he wraps his lips around my nipple, and his hand slides into the front of my panties. He teases my entrance before dragging the moisture there up to my clit while his lips continue their assault all over my tits and neck. 

"You're my pretty little slut, aren't you? Mine to fuck and to love and to yell at until I'm blue in the face to keep you safe. My little lamb, always so ready for me," He says into my ear as he pushes his fingers inside of me and continues to apply pressure to my clit with his thumb. 

"Always, baby. You fuck me so good that I don't know how I ever lived without your cock inside of me. Please, fuck me. Fuck me like you hate me and kiss me like you love me." 

   My words send him into a frenzy and he literally rips my panties off of me before throwing the torn fabric over his shoulder. He unbuckles his belt and pulls his dick out, just barely applying pressure at my entrance before thrusting all the way in. He's so deep in me that I see the bulge in my belly before he pushes down on it, sending pleasure through my body. I let out a loud moan as he pushes one of my knees up by my chest and snaps his hips into me so roughly that I know that there'll be bruises on my hips and thighs tomorrow. 

"You love when I'm rough with you, don't you, darlin'? It reminds you that you're just a hole for me to stick my dick in until I spray you with my come. You love to be degraded so much that you're dripping all over my cock, lamb."  He reaches between us to make tight circles on my clit with his thumb, pulling me closer to the edge with every rotation. 

"I'm just a dirty little slut who loves to be fucked," I moan out as his thrusts get even rougher. "Fuck, baby, I'm gonna come."

"Come all over my cock, baby, and then I'm fucking you from behind so that I can see that ass bounce while I remind you who you belong to." 

   I scream out his name as my pussy squeezes him before I come, my walls spasming around him. He barely gives me a second to recover before he's pulling out of me and flipping me over. I've just put my ass in the air when he slams into me and chases his own release. At this moment, I really am just a hole for him to fuck and I love it. His dick hits my g-spot with every thrust and he slaps my ass so hard that there'll be red handprints on there for at least a couple of hours. I chant his name over and over again as I come again and he presses his front to my back as he finally comes inside of me. 

   The only sounds in the room are our pants as come down. Chibs pushes my hair out of the way before pressing kisses down my spine and on the handprints that cover my bottom. I collapse onto the mattress and he gets a warm washcloth from the bathroom before kneeling by the side of the bed and wiping my pussy. He flips me over and peppers kisses all over my face, my favorite form of aftercare. 

"I wasn't too rough with you, was I, lamb?" I shake my head and he gently kisses my lips one time before pulling both of us underneath the covers.

"I love you, Chibby," I whisper to him as he presses his front to my back with his hand rubbing circles on my stomach. 

"I love you, my little Ellie." 

"By the way, if that's the way that you fuck me when I get into trouble, expect to be getting a lot of phone calls." I feel him shake his head before dragging me closer to him. We fall asleep like that and soak up our love for one another. 

[spacexseven]

dream (of me)

as mentioned in an ask before, this fic was inspired by a video of a life sized sculpture. also this is very very self-indulgent :> (actually i really don't like the title, but i couldn't think of anything else. one of these days i'll finally learn how to write a proper title)

—the line between fantasy and reality is thin

cw: breaking in, stalking, imprisonment

you didn't think you'd be spending your long-awaited break on making this—disregarding the money you spent on the boxes and boxes of clay; the same money you were saving for a fun little trip—you never considered yourself much of an artist. but who would have thought that things would turn out in such a way, ending in your trip getting canceled, and you picking up sculpting? you never really tried it before, simply because of how daunting the challenge was—not only did you have to give depth and color to your sculpture, you'd have to gently mold it to the perfect shape, painstakingly carve out the details and smoothen the surface. you couldn't slack on any part of the process despite how irritating it would become. you'd have to give it life, the kind that art gives, with your own hands, changing the inanimate lump of clay into a part of an almost realistic image.

maybe that was a bit of an exaggeration—you had only made a few small things with modeling clay before this, and it was unlikely you'd do as good as a job as you'd like. today marked the start of your first big project, a life-sized sculpture. after spending hours glued to your screen as countless videos played, and finally deciding to go for it a week ago, you were obstructed by what should have been a simple decision—stumped about what to sculpt. making one of yourself felt a little awkward, and you didn't really want to try recreating a celebrity. just when you were about to settle for making an animal, strangely enough, the answer came to you in a dream.

when you went to sleep a few nights ago, you had a strangely vivid dream of an ethereal person—someone so mystical that it felt otherworldly. that unexpected vision seized your mind and you decided—that was who you'd sculpt. despite it having been days since that dream, even the most minute details were still fresh in your memory. the gleaming fangs, sharp and delicate, the glossy, dark hair, the smooth voice that wrapped around a single word—too muddled to decipher—the shaky echoes of which reverberated within every corner of your mind, the unreadable expression in his eyes, glowing lowly in the dark, and the unmistakable pair of horns. he was not human; you were sure of it. even before catching a glimpse of those beautiful horns, you felt it, deep inside, that he was something very different from you. the moment his hand, manicured black nails contrasting with fair skin, gripped your forearm firmly, right before he uttered that word, a peculiar sensation overcame you. a sense of dread and fear washed over you, but at the moment you were unable to move or to wake up.

whoever he was, whatever he was—regardless of whether he was even real in the first place, you knew you were going to sculpt him. if your mind was clear, you wouldn't have attempted to make this, knowing you'd probably just mess up the picture of someone so beautiful, but you felt like that vision had bewitched you. you couldn't stop yourself from following through with it once the idea settled in your mind. muttering a quick word of encouragement to yourself, you finally start, eyeing the boxes of clay and heap of wires nervously.

it had been a couple weeks since you started your little project, and you had made considerable progress. the proportions surprisingly worked out right, and despite the uncontrollable slight trembling of your hands, the features you began carving were mostly realistic. you quickly realized you probably wouldn't be able to work on anything below the shoulders, not having enough clay or energy, but that helped you focus on the face. you could have sworn, though, that last night the nose looked a little high and the eyes a little too wide apart from your recollection of the man, yet when you had woken up, it was perfect. an eerily splitting image of the man from your dreams except for the fact that it was gray and pliable.it had been a couple weeks since you started your little project, and you had made considerable progress. the proportions surprisingly worked out right, and despite the uncontrollable slight trembling of your hands, the features you began carving were mostly realistic. you quickly realized you probably wouldn't be able to work on anything below the shoulders, not having enough clay or energy, but that helped you focus on the face. you could have sworn, though, that last night the nose looked a little high and the eyes a little too wide apart from your recollection of the man, yet when you had woken up, it was perfect. an eerily splitting image of the man from your dreams except for the fact that it was gray and pliable.

as you firmly reshaped the jaw with your fingers, you thought back to your dream. honestly, it was impressive how accurate you had gotten the image so far. the sharp lines that made the eyes, if colored, would look just like those from your memory. could you make these glow, too? the slope of the nose, looking perfectly natural, and the pointed ears—somehow, you just knew the exact shape of them despite how much of it was blocked by his hair. speaking of, his locks, although they were made of clay, fell just as gracefully on his forehead and splayed over his shoulders in that effortless way he had it.

honestly, you were impressed by your own work. you couldn't believe you did all this by yourself.

you try to think back to the shape of his mouth, the fangs inside of it—how did something so deadly look so elegant? it suited him. on him, the feature that should have your instincts kicking in and forcing you to run, made him look all the more charming and drew you in. you can remember he was wearing something quite outlandish, a finely crafted outfit, though one very different from your usual clothes, with something resembling a wide collar around his neck—you'd have to remember to make that.

although you had never made anything remotely similar to its shape, it was surprisingly easy to make the curved horns that rested on his head. while you could've sworn you initially made them a little smaller and smoother, the slightly bigger size and ridged texture did resemble the real thing better. of course, since your sleeping hours were so inconsistent, it was normal to have blanks in your memory. you probably worked on it when you were half asleep in the dead of the night.

after finally finishing up the details, you put aside the paint you mixed earlier for the last part of the project. the shades were a little unlike what you were expecting, but you had to make do. you were actually quite disappointed with it, thinking it might ruin the overall sculpture if the colors looked wrong, but even if you wanted to do it again, it would be a waste of money to get more. these were close enough, you supposed. under the right lighting, it would be somewhat accurate, and nobody but you had seen that mystery man anyway. with that thought, and one last, lingering look at the gray creation that sat on your working table, you switched off the lights and left the room.

there was no way this was your work.

you squint at the little bottles of paint, confused by what you were seeing. no, you remember, when you left these last night, the colors were different. the green for the eyes was dull, the dark array of green, blue, and black for the hair was drab and unnatural, and the colors you picked to paint the skin were all tinted with gray. the mixed paints you were seeing now, however, were anything but. the colors were rich and vibrant, an exact match, and if you looked closely enough, it was almost as if they were glowing.

you're sure the paint didn't look like this last night. at first, there wasn't even an inkling of doubt in you, because you could remember your dilemma last night, worrying about the color and not being able to fix it. but then, what happened? there was no logical explanation for this phenomenon—unless the paint was supposed to turn lighter over time, even then, that wouldn't explain the completely different shades. The vibrant, rich colors were nothing close to the abomination you had last night.

a small part of you was worried, fretting about what this could mean, but a larger, louder part of you insisted there wasn't any need to look too deeply into this. even if someone broke in, why would they have stopped by to mix paint for you? and how would they have known the exact colors you needed? it was very possible that under the dim lighting and through your tired eyes, the color seemed a lot more different than it actually was, but now, well-rested and energized, you saw it for what it always was.

deciding to put your doubts behind you for now, you prepare to paint. you've come this far, and you desperately prayed you wouldn't mess up this next part, fearing that all your efforts would be in vain otherwise.

slowly, you begin to see it come together. it took tediously long for each layer to be completed, mainly due to your increasingly frequent breaks. even then, by the end of the day, you were mostly completed. with painting the face. you took a break and had your dinner, glancing back at the sculpture with exhaustion obvious on your face. you weren't sure what you were subconsciously expecting from making this, slaving away for weeks by now, but you were relieved it was almost over and mostly accurate.

although you knew you should leave the details for last, you had a strong urge to paint the eyes. you felt like painting the eyes would bring the work to life. those vivid, glowing eyes were forever burned into your memory, and you thought it to be one of the most beautiful things about that man. well...even if you messed up, it was alright. after all, it wasn't like you were making this to be evaluated by others. seized by the idea, you quickly grabbed the airbrush and set to work, the paint glowing unusually bright, ominously in its container.

until you entered the room, your morning had been perfectly normal. nothing was out of place, and nothing felt different. but once you glanced over at where the sculpture was resting overnight, you were taken aback by the sudden extra presence in the room with you. looming over your desk, cradling the almost finished sculpture to their chest, was a mysterious cloaked figure. you watched, mesmerized by the scene as the stranger held your weeks' worth of hard work to their eye, closely studying it. they turned the sculpture around to further observe the details, and when they raised it up to the light, you recognized the hand that caressed the stained clay, the sight of glossy black nails still fresh in your memory. as you stand, frozen in place, the intruder slowly turns around. after a few moments pass in silence, he finally spoke.

"i see," his eyes and tone betray no emotion to you, "that you received it."

you're not sure what it he's referring to here. the initial dream you had of him, perhaps? or the convenient, unacknowledged help throughout the process—the meticulously mixed colors, and the little modifications? was that his work, after all? the lingering question of what you had gotten yourself into echoed in your mind. regardless, you can't manage a response yet, still unable to completely process what was unfolding.

"i appreciate your efforts very much. this is a truly wonderful creation, and almost identical to me. it is only right that i give you something in return, yes?" your lack of response doesn't seem to bother him, "well, what should you like? or would you prefer it if i were to pick out something for you?"

"you can leave."

you're not sure where the courage to say that came from, but you force yourself to hold back anything that would break your fragile facade and fix the scowl on your face. even if he was beautiful and something otherworldly, this wasn't right, or safe. how did he even get inside? why was he here?

he seems to think over your reply and takes a few, slow steps towards the door but stops to glance back at you, heavy cloak brushing the floor with every slight movement, "that wasn't what you really wish for, right? i can only give you something you wholeheartedly desire. in order to respect the thought and effort put behind this," he gestures at the statue, and it only occurs to you now that he was still holding it. strangely enough, the thing seemed to be glowing a faint green, "i should give you something just as meaningful. if you're too shy to say anything, i can just as easily find out myself."

"the only thing i want is for you to leave," you feel a tinge of regret as you look at the sculpture, thinking back to the painstaking process of making it, "take that if you want, but leave me alone now."

"you don't want to let go of it," he smiles wryly, "you want something more than just that..."

he's making his way over to you, yet you can't hear a thing. even as you can see his heeled boots landing sharply on the tiles, his cloak sweeping over them right after, you can't make out a single click of the heels, or anything else, for the matter. it's as though your head was underwater, ears waterlogged and unable to capture any sound coming your way. it didn't help that your head felt heavier, too, as he came closer and closer, glowing pupils locked onto your cowering frame. you knew he was tall already, but with the way you were sinking onto the floor, he felt, and looked, like he was towering over you, above you—as though emphasizing the difference between you and him, in both power and position, if his demeanor so far told you anything so far.

"dearest, there is nothing wrong with desiring," although he was speaking softly, his words seemed to echo around the room, bouncing off one wall to the other and slamming back into you, "even if the...subject of your desire seems impossibly far away—i would know better than anyone else. what i'm trying to say is, if you were to accept your true desires, you would only be reciprocating mine."

you blink owlishly up at the stranger, feeling something stirring in your stomach. he was so beautiful but dangerous. how ironic was it that there was something so alluring about that danger, that darkness that surrounds him? it only added to his mesmerizing beauty.

"we've never met before, have we?"

"not that you might be aware of, but i have caught a glimpse of you before. can you imagine, for me to be so taken with you by just the fleeting moment that you walked past, how deeply you have struck me? how devoted i am to you, who knows not of my existence?" there's a wistful expression on his face as he answers your question, a faraway look in his eyes before he grounds himself again, watching you once more.

"i would like to bring you somewhere," he finally breaks the building silence, gesturing to the empty air beside him, "perhaps, we will find something that suits your tastes there, if you can't find it in me."

"i don't even know your name," you protest weakly. deep down, you were already convinced. you had a feeling he knew that you were, too.

"my dearest," there's a slight frown threatening to mar the perfectly balanced expression he adorned, and despite yourself, you feel upset at disappointing him, "my name would not be familiar to you. but if it pleases you, you may call me malleus. now, would you follow me for a while? i want to show you everything i am, and everything i can be for you."

he has, you note, a manner of speaking that never failed in captivating you, almost hypnotizingly. you had to force yourself to not get deceived by the syrupy tone and the tempting offer. you were already so bored, and a trip to some mystical, unknown place was oddly enticing, more than it should have been. the dangers and the risks associated with it flew over your head, so bewitched by the person in front of you. and when he peered into your eyes, something so raw and desperate, yearning shining in his orbs—or was that just the natural glowing color it had? still, when he was looking at you so deeply, a forlorn expression on display—

"if only you open your heart to me, my love, you'll see that mine was always in your hands."

—how could you say no after that?

he conjures a mirror from behind his back, large and gleaming. you don't even stop to consider how such a feat was possible. suddenly, the bright surface turns dark, a murky shade of green, and he reaches out to grab your hand. blindly—foolishly, you stumble behind him, into the darkness. around the two of you little green lights, bright and hypnotizing, fly around, as though creating an invisible barrier. even with the numerous little lights surrounding you, you find that you can't see a thing apart from him. you can feel his hand still wrapped around yours, and for some reason, you haven't tried to pull away. or maybe, you did try, but he wouldn't let go. you can't quite tell what was happening.

his honeyed words, his gentle voice, his firm grip, all of it hid from you from the cruel reality, and the impending aftermath. as you step out again, him close by your side and your hands still held in his, you're far too mystified by what feels like a whole new world you've walked into, to notice the mirror quickly shattering into pieces at his feet, turning into dust moments later. within an instant, it disappeared into nothingness, as though it was never there in the first place. who could blame you for not noticing, when the world stretched out in front of you was so different from anything you had ever seen before? the colors and the lights illuminated something beyond your understanding, and you were so taken by the sight that you hadn't stopped to consider what this all meant, being brought to a foreign world. you hadn't even thought about how you might return or when—naively believing your companion would bring you back.

how could you, as a regular person unaware of his world and its rules, have known that the mirror was your only way home?

[breezybubbles]

Hi breezy! Could may order an an tea with cinnamon, Cappuccino? Mabye a little fanfics or Headcanons with Eijirou, shinsou, shoto and mabye aizawa with an reader (fem) who is insecure about their chubby thighs.

Take your time and have a lovely day/night!

Stay healthy!

-Tiniwini

Hi my love, this was such a cute request, and I had fun writing it! I'm such a simp for these boys

cw: body insecurity, fem reader, a tinge of angst, really just pure fluff, some suggestiveness

Eijirou Kirishima

Kiri is the sweetest boy, and his love language is definitely words of affirmation.

Not to mention that he most definitely praises the ground you walk on

You could just breathe, and this man would fawn over your being, spewing on and on about how perfect you are and how lucky he is to have you

So, of course, he is utterly shocked when you mention that you’ve been feeling insecure regarding your plushy thighs

You express to him that it is hard to feel confident about your body when all of the models that you see on instagram have a thigh gap and no stretch marks to be seen

This man just stares at you blankly before melting into a puddle and instantly comes to comfort you

At first, he’s like, “how dare you call my baby anything other than the magnificent goddess she is?” but he moves on to the actual comforting part

He is just so shocked and confused as to how you could see your thighs or anything about yourself as not perfect, and god-forbid unattractive 

He’s definitely the type to lay you down and massage your thighs, whispering soft praises and reveling in how squishy they are

He explains that the models you see are specifically picked to be the extreme of what society considered beauty, and they in no way represent what he sees as beauty and the general public’s appearance.

He encourages you to unfollow the people on instagram who make you feel self-conscious as you don’t need that on your feed.

If he hears you start to talk shit about yourself again, he will one hundred percent bend you over his knee and give you another thing to complain about (in a soft way ofc)

Shoto Todoroki

Okay lets be honest, this man can be an airhead sometimes (a himbo indeed)

So, he probably isn’t going to be the one to notice when you are feeling self conscious or unhappy with your appearance

In his mind, you are the most beautiful and radiant girl on Earth, so why would she feel any different than what she is

However, if you ever let him know how you are feeling, he will 100% give you an honest answer

When you explain that the way your jeans never fit you the way you want them to because of how thick your thighs are, he will simply shoot back by saying that your thighs make the jeans fit you better

I also see him as the kind of person to remind you that you shouldn’t be fitting the clothes, the clothes should be fitting you and that if you are not happy in your clothes, then don’t wear them

He will look you dead in the eye with a serious, set-in-stone face, and tell you all the things he loves about you, and if you try to counter those with your insecurities, he will come back just as hard and begin to list at least 10 ways each of them make him love you more

You guys also bond over each other insecurities, confiding in one another and comforting on another, with no judgment only love.

Shoto is the kind of guy to have his head between your thighs, kissing every inch of skin he can reach and leaving little love bites every once in a while.

Hitoshi Shinsou

Unlike Shoto, Hitoshi is very intuitive and he’s an observer.

He listens to you, he watches you, and he knows you. He notices when you mention a negative thing about your body in a passing conversation, he if you are merely saying it to yourself, and he sees if you stay in front of the mirror clawing at your body like you are a piece of clay you can mold.

So he will definitely confront you on it if he can tell that is hurting you overall

Don’t get me wrong, he respects your boundaries, but it upsets him to see his Kitten so upset over something so stupid and superficial, so if he needs to set some things straight, he will.

He definitely doesn’t want to just spring his questions on your like he is some kind of interrogator, so he will just try and find when you are in your head about your appearance and ask you what's on your mind.

When you confide in him, he’ll try to act surprised, but he saw this coming a mile away.

He will talk you through your insecurities over a cup of coffee, rubbing your thighs firmly while you two sit on the couch.

I totally see him having you strip down to your underwear (or nothing at all ;)), and making you stand in front of the mirror, admiring yourself and pointing out three things that you find attractive.

Like maybe he does that every night, and you are not allowed to repeat a feature from the night before, and if you don’t say it with your chest, then you have to try again

After that, he will do the same thing, pointing out everything (literally everything on your body) that he finds attractive, smothering you with praise, and kissing you wherever he can reach

Shouta Aizawa

Okay, once again, we have another observer on our hands

He knows every inch of your body. Every. Fucking. Inch. So when he observes that you are clearly self-conscious, he is genuinely stumped

He has no idea what it could be

I feel like he is a lot more blunt than Shinsou, needing to confront you on it as soon as possible so he can eradicate whatever insecurity that has you so distraught

When he finds out that it’s your thighs that make you so upset with your body, he is honestly a little sad

He loves your thighs; they’re plush, warm, and make the perfect cushion to nap on

So he makes it his life's goal to make you love your thighs again

He’ll praise them, give massages and kisses, always have at least on hand on them, even while driving, and will always whistle when you wear anything that is close to tight clothing 

He’ll also talk you through your self-doubts, reminding you that its okay to not look like all the K-pop stars, and that all that matters is that your healthy

If you need a little more convincing he will be more than happy to oblige.

Will always be down to leave bruises on your thighs while doing certain, ehm, activities, so that when you look in the mirror you remember that the most important person in your life loves your thighs

a/n: this was super cute, and I'll probably do more characters for this headcanon if it gets popular enough!

[africanmorning]

This didn't happen very recently, but at some point within the past couple years I finally managed to see the first episode of Avatar: The Last Airbender, and man was that a huge perspective shift for me.

See, I've already seen pieces of ATLA before. When I was a kid, someone gushed to me about how good the show was and showed me a couple random episodes completely out of context. I hated it on sight, for pretty much all the same reasons I hated most other children's media at the time. If you had asked me then, I would have simply said that I thought the show was stupid. But after some time, I realized that no amount of "stupidity" explained the resentment and sheer anger that these shows, including ATLA, created in me at the time. The problem wasn't that the shows were "stupid," the problem was that the shows were fun.

Fun was not something I got to experience a lot of in my childhood. If I had to pick out a single, most defining aspect of it, I'd probably say either "anxiety" or "loneliness." For as long as I can remember, I knew that I had a lot of expectations that I needed to meet, and mistakes were not tolerated. You could say that I was a "high-performing, very well-behaved" child.

So, imagine, then, how I felt watching TV shows where the kids were silly, goofed off, and made bad choices that often resulted in nothing more than a slap on a wrist—all portrayed with a casual air of "These are children! This is what childhood is like!" Can you understand how infuriating that was to someone like me? To be shown, as far as I was concerned, a fake, fanciful lie? A lie that I was sure was even making my life worse, because it must be convincing children and adults that children are irresponsible fools, and if more adults knew that children could be responsible, and smart, and obedient . . . then maybe they would treat me better.

Over time, I grew less judgmental of ATLA and shows like it, but I was still pretty confident that it simply wasn't "for me."

The irony of this is not lost on me. Though I still haven't watched ATLA proper, from what I've heard about the show since, I was probably the exact kind of kid that many of the messages were intended for.

The problem?

Of the episodes I had seen, Zuko either was not in them, or played such a minor or out-of-context role that I learned nothing about him.

So, when I was in my mid-twenties, finally seeing Zuko in episode one as my roommate watched it in our shared living space, I was fascinated.

THAT was the character I had needed. THAT was the character I understood. Someone who had been molded into something unloveable. Someone who had no more power over it than wet clay has over the potter's hands. Someone who, deep down, knew this wasn't the right way to be, the way they wanted to be, but to be anything else would be to become destroyed. That was huge.

Because. Yeah. In retrospect, I was a fucking asshole as a kid, at least to other kids. But looking back, I also know that it was the only way I could be. In my isolation, it was the only thing I knew. And even then I knew that I was fucking up. I just didn't know how to change it. And once I finally got exposed to a wider world, saw that there were other possibilities, I did change. A lot. But it took a long time, and it was hard, because the same changes that would have won the approval of my peers, made me a better part of society, would have also destroyed me at home. The same things that made me unloveable also made me survive. I don't think I can explain the confusion I had for the longest time when interacting with other children. It went something like, "How can you be that way so openly, so happily, when I cannot? What is so different between you and I, that the same things that bring you joy could only ever cause me pain?" Even now, that unloveability still follows me. I once saw someone say that loneliness is self-fulfilling because others can sense the loneliness on you and are repelled by it, and I'm inclined to agree. It's no one else's fault. Of course they would be repelled by someone like me, who either clings so much that it's suffocating, or becomes so afraid of clinging that I become aloof and unreachable.

Anyway. Zuko is relatable, and seeing him has really recontextualized the entire series for me. It's kind of a relief, really. I know he gets a redemption arc, and I don't think a lot of characters I relate to in this way do. I've been holding on to those kinds of messages lately—the ones that tell me that I might have a future. Though, man, I wish I'd had an Uncle Iroh like he did, to hold my hand through everything and help me get to that better place in the end. Maybe things wouldn't be so hard now.

[pickerelstripe]

Hi hi hi! @troutfur from main here and I'm very !!! about Claymew. I've got a couple questions I wanted to ask:

Does your conlang differ much grammatically from base Clanmew or is it meant to be much the same just with lexical changes?

Are you expanding on other grammatical words like you did with pronouns? I for one would be really excited to see what alternative opening particles and forms of evidentiality others may come up with!

Are family and social structures in ClayClan going to differ much to how they are portrayed in canon/Better Bones? If so do you have vocab to reflect that?

What sorts of words related to the arts does ClayClan have? Theater in particular I find very intriguing.

Oh hello! :D Yessss questions... also thank you, it means a lot that you like this project!!! I'm excited to share more, I've already got some posts planned out haha. These answers got long so they're under the cut! Enjoy some rambling (and words for theater!)

Does Claymew differ much grammatically from base Clanmew?

At the moment, no, as I've been focused on filling out the lexicon - I just finished the tree expansion but I've still got 50+ plants to name before I consider it really complete (and even then I'm sure I'll keep finding stuff to add).

I also don't know a whole lot about grammar haha, that's the one part of language I struggle with... but! I do hope to learn more about unique grammar structures and possibly implement some, I think it'd be a lot of fun.

2. Are you expanding on other grammatical words like you did with pronouns?

Pretty much the same answer as above, in that I'd like to dig into this once I know more about it!

I think evidentiality in particular is very interesting, so that's probably the avenue I'd explore first. An aspect of base Clanmew I really like is the particles that differentiate methods of attaining information (sight, hearing, etc), so I'd like to pry into that and see if there's anything I can play with... ClayClan is so communal that I could see them having multiple particles for "I heard this from someone else", differentiating information from family members, Clanmates, outsiders, etc. I'll have to look into it!

3. Are family and social structures in ClayClan going to differ much in comparison to canon/Better Bones? Is there vocab to reflect this?

I really enjoy base Clanmew's perception of families, especially the mi/ba* system, so as of right now I'm running with that! The story of Heart Rot involves a lot of family drama, though, so I might mess with it to enhance that.

Actually now that I think about, I really ought to have a special word for a ClayClan cat who left honorably... For a second I also thought "oh and a word for QPRs" but then I remembered iwaw*, haha.

The family structures explored most directly in Heart Rot are the relationships between sisters, father-daughter bonds, and abusive partnerships, so if I do add new vocab it'll most likely be related to those.

OH AND MUD-KITTENS! Holy cow I forgot about those!!! A kitten found abandoned on the territory is a mud-kitten, a gift from Silverpelt to the Clan. They're always adopted in and raised unless their parent comes to claim them. The new word for a mud-kitten is glefmew, "raw clay kitten", a kit that's fresh from the world and ready for metaphorical molding.

4. What sort of words does Claymew have for the arts?

Plenty! I'm planning a full post about artsy words, so I'll just put the theater terms here for now. I make a lot of words with inspiration from base Clanmew, so those original words will be marked with an asterisk, as always.

Stage play - Paopapp (pao*, papp*) Musical - Paopayana (paopapp, yanana*) Rehearsed - Umnabana, umnaba, umnab (umnem*, ababab*) Stage - Sheshee Actor - Rrubab Cat who prepares the stage - Washrubab (washa*, rrubab; a "shadow-actor"!)

Yes ClayClan has musicals, yes they have musical kids, yes this is a hilarious concept to me as well. I was a major theater kid and still enjoy working backstage, so I looove exploring ClayClan theater! It's a concept I haven't seen explored much in WC fanwork, I'm glad you like it.

[digitalagepulao]

Monkey Technology at Huaguoshan

So, I've been musing on just how much the monkeys would be capable of achieving when it comes to technology. We know that Wukong taught them a whole lot, but what could they do before their naturally born sage brought all his learning? This is mostly me rambling about stuff that comes off my head and from my own experiences and learning.

Tool use and crafting

We are well-aware of tool usage among the great apes/homonids (aka humans, chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans and bonobos, as well as extinct hominins like neanderthals and homo habilis), and for convenience's sake I'll give the fantasy monkeys the same skills. Wukong is credited as teaching them how to sharpen wood and bamboo for knives and spears, so crafting tools might have been out of their wheelhouse. So we have to work with basic, naturally occuring tools, like sharp stones and sticks as they are found. To further this point, that should include mortal and pestle tools, as all you need is a concave rock and another stone or even wood to grind things with.

Fire

This one is a bit dicey. Wukong isn't given explicit credit for teaching firecraft, but the novel does make mention of them burning incense and offerings. We can always handwave these deets as stuff monkeys learned by watching humans as animals often seem to do in the novel, but they aren't quite told to make use of it until Wukong returns and makes a proper kingdom out of Water-Curtain cave. So on this one, I'll just say it's something that they've known how to do for a while, but had very little reason to put that particular skill to work until Wukong came along.

Claywork

Since we established they know how to craft fire, next comes what to do with that fire! And first things that come to mind is cooking and claywork. Again, they only seem to cook food after Wukong's leadership, so on to clay. Clay is quite easy to mold and then burn, but it would take seeeeveral attempts to get the heat management right and learn what makes pottery crack in the kiln. As for glazes, they can be a happy coincidence! Depending on the process and time during firing, when the oven is opened, one can find the inside walls with a luster of ash that melted into glaze, and it's pretty neat! Natural glazes can be made by processing wood ash, which again takes some time to learn on their own but not impossible.

Textiles

The monkeys are described as being able to weave grass mattresses, and then later Wukong teaches them to make flax, which is a way more involved process in itself. Now we're on more dicey ground, as textiles take quite a bit of refined precision grips that most tree-dwelling primates aren't capable of anatomically. I'll probably go off about monkey anatomy at some other time, so we'll handwave that one to fantasy rules too.

Winemaking

We got plenty of mentions of coconut wine and other drinks at Huaguoshan's feasts and celebrations, but how did the monkeys get to wine? Animals in nature have been noted to indulge in recreational drugs, including fermented fruits, simply for the joy of it. A notable example is cedar waxwings indulging in fermented berries and needing to be picked out of walkways by kind humans so nobody trips on them. And most notable of all, humanity has had a long history with fermented foods and drinks. Coconut wine takes a bit of processing to be well, wine. This could have been learned over time but again, the monkeys never had much need to perfect this knowledge or put it to much use until Wukong's reign. Making wine is kind of hard when you don't have proper shelter to regulate temperatures, and his discovery of Water-Curtain cave is notable for sparing the monkeys the whims of weather and seasons. So we have shelter, but what about vessels? Water-Curtain cave is said to have all the necessities of life within, including stone dishware, so it's safe to say they had access to stone vases and pots, plus we've discussed claywork, so monkey-made glazed pottery is also a possibility. And we also covered fire, so the process of heating and cooling mashes for fermenting is also checked off the list.

Incense making

The monkeys are described to practice religion to some extent, offering prayers and burning sacrificial livestock to the gods, so one would imagine they'd stretch that worship to burning incense. Incense can be as easy as scraping off aromatics over simmering coals, which is absolutely within their scope to do, but things like incense sticks might take some learning. Getting the dust fine enough to be kneaded and then rolled or extruded is quite a labor without more complex tools than a mortar and pestle, but that's work they might be able to invest in during Wukong's reign at Water-Curtain cave.

Medicine

Now this one is a wee bit tricky. If we're keeping simply to usage of medicinal herbs, then we have multiple cases of great apes using foraged ingredients to heal themselves and even teaching the right way to consume them to their young. If we stretch this to say, poultices and infusions, that feels like a reasonable leap to make given all the other things they seem capable of thanks to basic tool use. For more say, complex things like major injuries and sickness might be touch and go. Usage of tools like splints, sutures and cauterizing are more on the lane of homonini (aka humans and our closest extinct relatives) and I think this is something they'd need to learn from humans how to go about it. If Wukong also brings with him knowledge of traditional healing ie. acupuncture, Tui na, and more complex medicine mixtures, then the monkeys' lifespan is gonna get much longer. And since he goes out of his way to protect his kin from King Yama's rule and shares immortal wine and peaches freely with them, that's definitely something he would do.

Art

Talk about a large category, eh? Art can be any number of things, but I wanna focus on their technical capabilities and their sense of aesthetic appeal. Art has been a homonin trait for a long long time, with recent studies suggesting all the way back to Homo naledi, who lived during the middle Pleistocene. Anything from dragged fingers across mud and clay, slashes on rock, and of course the well-known cave paintings, can be easily assigned to them as they had basic tools available. The monkeys are also described as capable of dancing and playing music during Wukong's reign, so it's unknown if these are skills they already have or were taught over time by him, or if it's something that they just had the time to devote to at that time. I'm going to take that as a little of column A and column B. As for aesthetic appeal, we know great apes as well as other animals do have a sense of what is "beautiful", as well as have their individual preferences. What exactly monkeys will find appealing is definitely up for debate, but while they might take cues from humans through observation, they're capable of their own experimentation at their own time and leisure. Accessories, face and body painting, carvings, and drawings would be fairly common sights among the monkeys, and likely very prized possessions and gifts.

[go-go-devil]

My friend @silenthillmutual tagged me to answer some fic writer's ask game questions, so without further ado...

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

17 as of right now.

2. What is your AO3 wordcount?

181,115

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Mostly Hylics, but I've dabbled in several different fandoms. I've also written for the band Ghost, Pathologic, Knock-Knock, created the Neverending Nightmares tag on AO3 which still only contains the 3 fics I wrote for it, and am currently writing an epic novel-length Dark Souls fanfic!

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

1) Outcasts in an Overcast - 109

2) Dedusmuln Uncharted: The Hunt for the Paper Cup - 78

3) Molding A Legacy - 61

4) The Moon is Down - 60

5) Chaos Inverted - 51

Basically most of my Hylics fics lol 🌙 🎸🌯

5. Do you respond to comments?

I always try to respond to every comment I get since it's not often that I get any. There were a few that ended up slipping through the cracks of my memory, and to those I'm sorry since it now feels kinda weird to respond to a comment written years ago, but mostly if you see a comment that I haven't answered it most likely means I've already responded to the person on another social media site.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Definitely a tie between The Moon is Down and Chaos Inverted, but frankly that's to be expected since Gibby's such a doomed character. Out of all the blorbos I had to write Shakespearean levels of angst for it somehow ended up being the clay alien who's head looks like an orange and/or zoopals plate XD

7. What is the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Ironically it's a Pathologic fic I wrote two years ago called Like A Fire Melting Us Down. Basically a hurt/comfort fluff fic featuring Murky and Daniil bonding over both being autistic. It's probably the only fic I've written fic I've written that has a definitively happy ending, as in there's no room for darker speculation for the future or anything like that.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Thankfully no. If anyone out there doesn't like my fics they've done good not to harass me about it.

9. Do you write smut? If so, which kind?

No.

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest crossover you’ve ever written?

The only crossovers I've written thus far both involve the game Knock-Knock; either the Lodger interacting with Thomas Smith from Neverending Nightmares or Daniil Dankovsky from Pathologic.

The latter comes from the fic Intruder, which I'm most proud of of all the crossovers I've done so far, yet I'm kinda surprised no one else has attempted this themselves or entertained the idea of my fic since Knock-Knock was what inspired Pathologic: The Marble Nest to begin with. I guess it's true that there are only 12 Western Knock-Knock fans left on the internet...

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Also thankful this hasn't happened yet.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

No, but if anyone wants to please let me know. I'd be more than happy for my stories to cross language barriers!

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

One time my fellow Hylics fic veteran bombcollar wrote a story called Dedusmuln's Dossier, which is all about Dedusmuln documenting all of the enemies in Hylics 2, and which I contributed two pieces of writing for The Hand of Moodbleen and Carassius! It's an awesome fic I recommend any Hylics fan check out, and I had some good fun thinking of what I wanted them to say about these two uniquely annoying enemies.

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

Goddammit I don't fucking know lmao. I don't take shipping as seriously as other people do. For now I'll say Burakhovsky for all the beautiful art I've seen for it, the Hylics crew being in a queerplatonic polycule and, just to throw an insane curve ball at everyone in the room, Siegmeyer/Domhnall ;-)

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

I'm gonna finish 'em all one day. I will not leave my children to rot in the pits of Writer's Block Hell...

16. What are your writing strengths?

I've been told by many people that they tend to really love the way I write dialogue for each of the characters I work with, original or already created. I'm also a lover of environmental descriptions and am always trying to build upon and improve in that aspect into my works.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Probably fight scenes since I've had so little practice, and due to a lot of the books I read not really having that many. I'm hoping To The Accursed can help me improve on that front, since Dark Souls is so heavily combat-oriented.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I haven't gone farther than using singular words in other languages as of right now. That's something I'm definitely gonna need to step up on later down the line, particularly since there will be Dark Souls characters I'll be writing soon who will be speaking some sentences in Latin and Welsh respectively.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

The Swedish metal band Ghost! It was a story called For A Divine Cause which was about Papa Emeritus Primo realizing he suffers stage fright right before he's supposed to start touring for the first album, and thus summons his younger brother Terzo to help shape him up into being a good front man.

It's without question the worst of my fics from a writing and technical perspective, but it was the first one I ever wrote so that's kinda to be expected. I am pleasantly surprised it has so many kudos and bookmarks after all these years!

20. Favorite fic you’ve written?

Honestly, I'm think I'm gonna have to make it a tie between Dedusmuln Uncharted and Chaos Inverted.

The first is the fic where I truly started getting more creative in my writing (and is my first full made podfic which I'm even more proud of!), while the latter was sooooo much fun to write and gave me the confidence to write novellas. The Hylics fandom has been so supportive of my work, and I thank you all for being the best fandom experience I've ever had <3

That was fun! I'll tag @bombcollar, @pinkiepiebones, and @brainshock-alpha for this one ✏️✨

[sylvanianfamiliez]

going to be autistic on here abt bjd eyes

i’ve been experimenting w trying to make bjd eyes for years at this point and im like confident in my skills but i’m struggling to find the right materials. i watch a lot of various eye makers’ tutorials to see what they use but the problem i always find is that most of them don’t seem to worry abt how the eyes will hold up longterm, which is smth i rly want for mine. like using uv resin for the base will yellow so bad….not to mention the health effects

so it’s like health + longevity that bothers me. i don’t want to use toxic materials for my eyes and risk my health for it. stop using resin without proper ventilation and shit inside your home. please.

my best bet rn is polymer clay for the bases and it works great but the major problem i have is dust in the pure white of the eyes…gonna try some ways of minimising this but i also can’t spend all my energy trying to reduce dust in my environment bcuz it’ll give me a heart attack from the stress. plus i can’t seem to get it to smoosh perfectly in the silicone molds…it’s always got some dents. that’s probably just practice though

so for the dust my thinking was maybe i’d just cover it in acrylic paint after, but acrylic paint stays a bit sticky and attracts dust anyway so. it kinda cancels out. i’ve thought about other materials to use as a base but it always comes back to yellowing. i wondered whether maybe thermoplastic could work but i couldn’t find anything about the yellowing rates so, maybe i’ll try it and leave it sometime but i don’t have high hopes

but then ofc there’s the problem of The Oven. i make the irises out of polymer clay bcuz that’s what works best for me. i’ve never been able to use pastels for my colours bcuz it just looks gross and grainy and muddy no matter what i do, so polymer clay is pretty non negotiable. which means whatever i use for the bases has to be oven safe

and the bubbles in the domes as well…it’d be good to get a pressure chamber someday but that’s a more serious piece of kit than i have room for rn. laeli suggested trying a vibrator to agitate the bubbles which i wanna try so bad lol. but i need to get the resin first….i wanna try art resin cuz it’s supposed to be non toxic so i could use it indoors. and i saw some tests where it was super resistant to yellowing as well. so it sounds perfect but since it’s 2 part resin i’d have to have a lot of eyes prepped beforehand so i don’t waste it all as it’s not cheap !!

im thinking about seeing if i could do the bases with art resin as well but since it’s only non toxic on its own cuz it doesn’t react with anything else in the air, i don’t know what pigments i could use if any. apparently their pigments they make are kinda ass and i’d need it to be a really solid white. they also don’t sell the pigments individually afaik. i’d like to try a white gel pigment but again !! i don’t know how it’ll react. it’d probably be fine but i wish i had the info…..plus i don’t know if it would just melt in the oven. you shouldn’t really put resin in the oven. and if it worked i’d definitely want to get my own little oven sooner as i’m just experimenting w the kitchen one first….bcuz it comes back to the toxic fumes. but even if i did that’s also. having the space for it

UAGH !! you see why i am going round in circles….i wish i could be one of those girlies that just fucks up their lungs and makes eyes that go yellow in 2 years and be happy but unfortunately i care for both myself and my product. i think i’m gonna have to just work on making my space dust free for the white polymer clay but I DONT WANNAAAAAA

[da3dm]

Night Light: Wings

I realized that it would probably be pretty hard to picture what their wings look like, so I drew them! Posting this only after the seconds chapter since it sorta spoils elements and what his friends will get!

I'm also gonna include their personalities with brief mentions of past lives.

—

Axel

They don't understand what his symbols mean and he had now been marked as a magicless fairy. As the first fairy with such dark coloring and strange marking, they have no way of truly knowing if he is or not unless it manifests on its own. He's a very adventurous and curious fairy, which has gotten him into plenty of trouble throughout his life.

—

Spark

He has received the flame element like most red fairies, but because of his eyes being a golden hue he can somewhat give his fire and extra boost, the flames burning hotter and faster than most others. He is more solid, giving everyone the cold shoulder on his usual days, only to be shouting constantly when stuck with his friends. In some ways, he feels like his 'friends', are just kids he's babysitting to keep them from self destructing.

—

Sett

He was lucky enough to receive the light element along with his wind because of just how pale his coloring actually is. This is an extremely rare power and a powerful one that is of great use to their colony. He's lazier than most and likes laying in the sun, just soaking in all that energy. No wonder he became a light fairy! But when he's not doing that, he's in some way or another being dragged into fights by Clay or tricking Axel into thinking his idea is more fun, when it's simply safer. He's always very calm and toned down.

—

Clay

This feisty guy got some slightly heavier wings in exchange for full earth molding. Not as rare as light, but almost just as useful. He is a brand new force to be reckoned with with the added magic, only adding to his already abrasive personality. He's been known to get into fights or try to ride wild animals, always coming back with new scars and a bold grin on his face, regardless of if he won or lost. When something happens to his friends, he is the very first to step forward and give the culprit a what for—he's saved Axel from his curiosity many times.

—

Added bonus:

Fairy wings before they graduate. I'm leaving it just black and white since the color scheme depends on individual and the fairy type! This is just to give an example!

[ihaveatheoryonthat]

I mentioned in chapter 17's notes that I had a list of which warden crafted their flute out of what material, and this seems like the right place to share that information!

For the purposes of MHIMH (not that we hear it 'on screen') the two functions crafting serves are these: a warden's bracelet proves that the warden knows the land well and is dedicated enough to forage for the specific materials to create this symbol of service. A Celestica Flute, meanwhile, is meant to show the cooperation between a noble and warden; oftentimes, this means that the noble will either secure the base material, or play a hand in creating the flute.

Lian used (or will use) off-color augurite to make his flute; it's not viable for helping a Scyther evolve into a Kleavor, but it's still the same mineral, and inherently tied to the noble's line. I think Kleavor was discerning when it came to the particular shade.

Mai's flute is made from one of Wyrdeer's shed antlers. It's unique in that it was once part of her noble.

Calaba's flute is molded from red clay that Ursaluna tracked down and collected for her. It seemed appropriate for the Crimson Mirelands, but also, clay plays a part in some forms of medicine.

Arezu's flute is made of reed, which Lilligant played a hand in growing until it was a suitable quality to craft from.

Palina's flute is actually made of blown glass! Unlike most of the others, Arcanine played a role in heating the material to a workable state rather than going out and collecting it.

Iscan's is a little out in the weeds, so to speak. It's theorized in-universe that ancient Gastrodon used to have protective shells a very, very long time ago. He doesn't know it, but his flute is actually crafted from a piece of one of these shells, dredged up from the seafloor by Basculegion.

Melli's flute is carved from a branch of Electrode's tree. At the time of carving, it was young, fresh wood and taken from high up.

As we've seen, Ingo had the wonderful experience of processing one of Sneasler's more impressive kills while crafting his flute. It took him several tries to get the technique right, since bone doesn't carve the same way apricorns would.

Gaeric's flute is carved from a clear crystral, likely some manner of quartz. Unlike the other nobles, Avalugg is too large to forage at this point, so the tradition was upheld by one of his Bergmite. I think it probably found the material while out with Gaeric. (Alternately, we could argue that it's a piece of Avalugg's body, frozen so solid that it will never melt, but I'm not sure about that.)

Sabi's flute is crafted from Piloswine ivory. Like Sneasler, Braviary found a suitable quarry and brought it to his warden; unlike Sneasler, there was less viscera involved.

The only flutes that are actual relics/heirlooms are the ones held by the clan leaders. The one associated with the Pearl Clan isn't made of pearl per se, but nacre. The Diamond Clan's is made from a large fragment of star piece.

This means that each of the flutes has a unique tone and musical range to it, which is part of how the nobles can tell who's being called and by what person! (It also means that, in this version of events, each of the flutes looks different from the others, and personally, I like that. It's the particular shape/crafting process that makes it a Celestica Flute, not the aesthetics.)