#also the workers party number is 13

[lady-a-stuff]

Taylor Swift only came once to Brazil, but the connection between Tayor Swift and Brazil are simply awesome. The newest thing is: EVERYTIME miss Swift released an album the Workers’ Party won the presidential elections:

2006: Debut - Workers’ Party won

2008: Fearless - There were no presidential elections

2010: Speak Now - Workers’ Party won

2012:  Red -  There were no presidential elections

2014: 1989 - Workers’ Party won

2017: Reputation - There were no presidential elections

2018: No album release - Bolsonaro won the elections (Workers’ Party lose)

2019: Lover - There were no presidential elections

2020: folklore and evermore - There were no presidential elections

THE THING IS Taylor is gonna to release Midnights this year AND we have a runoff of the presidential elections between Workers’ Party and Bolsonaro (let’s say a Brazillian Trump) this takes me to: TAYLOR SWIFT IS GONNA SAVE BRAZIL 

[taevbears]

Magic Shop - 13

Every coin has two sides

⤑ pairing: OT7 x witch!reader, Namjoon focused ⤑ genre: magic au, romance, angst, hurt/comfort, found family, domestic/slice of life, action/adventure ⤑ rating: 18+ ⤑ word count: 10.3k ⤑ warnings: descriptive violence, body horror, near-death of a main character, prejudice and oppression of mages, heavy angst. ⤑ note: lol bc last week, i had already written out the entire chapter and just meant to edit and post it last weekend. but then another idea struck me while i was at work, and even tho i meant to just change ONE scene, it started leading to a completely different ending. so lol here i am, one week later, after rewriting half this chapter 💀 this chapter is also heavily inspired by "A Village Under Siege" and "The Attack at Nightfall" quests in Dragon Age: Origins + the world of necromancer bells from the "Old Kingdom Series" by Garth Nix

Chapters: Series Masterlist | 09 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15

From the distance, an old windmill is spotted over a hill. Its turbines spin slowly with the breeze, and the weathered bricks keep it standing tall after all these years. The distinct landmark signifies one thing.

Hawthorn Village. You’re finally here.

And it’s just as Namjoon remembers it.

Nostalgia hits him as you all cross the bridge that leads into the village. Thatched roofs and walls made of stone and wood. A large well near the center of the square where he used to make wishes upon as a kid. The elementary school he went to, the old church that his parents religiously attended, and the farmlands with livestock and crop mazes.

Much to his dismay, the aftereffects of the nightly terrors have taken its toll on his beloved hometown.

People are trying their best to get through another day, distributing produce to feed the hungry and burning the dead. A blacksmith with tired eyes insistently pounds iron with a hammer to make new weapons that will give them a better chance against the enemies. A militiaman tries to keep up morale, although most of the remaining men are just farmers and workers – none of them trained to fight. Survivors step out of the infirmary tents, wrapped in bandages but still in pain. A small child cries, looking for their parents.

Doom hangs in the air. Haunted and defeated are the faces of Hawthorn’s residents, as the looming threat of another unsettling fight is set before them.

“What’s happened here?” Seokjin asks one of the villagers.

A middle-aged man’s light up when he sees your group. “I haven’t seen you folks before. Have you come to help us? Did our notices finally reach someone?”

It isn’t long until the group is ushered to the local church. Gathered by the altar is the mayor of the village. Dark circles are under his eyes from sleepless nights, but he looks at you all with hope as the villager announces you’re all from a guild. Then, he explains to your party their dire situation.

Decomposing corpses return to life at night with the hunger for flesh, and they have been attacking this small village for the past few nights. From dusk until dawn, these attacks on Hawthorn are relentless. Each night, they come in greater numbers. Due to the necromancer and dark magic being involved, no one has been responding to their urgent calls for help. The local hunters have been summoned to the capital, and guilds often overlook their tiny settlement when they pass by.

All of Hawthorn fears that tonight will be the worst attack yet.

“You’re our only hope,” the mayor pleads. “Hawthorn won’t stand a chance otherwise.”

The Oathkeepers look at Seokjin, but his eyes are on Namjoon. He feels the rest of you looking at him too. As if it’s up to him to decide whether his hometown is worth saving, or if the quest at hand is deemed too dangerous to assist. Allowing him to back out now before they’re obligated to see things through, no matter what the risk.

“Of course we’ll help,” Namjoon decides without hesitation. “Tell us what you need.”

Tonight, things look pretty grim.

Morale within the village is at its lowest. After multiple perilous nights of terror and gruesome deaths, the ones still alive are worried they’ll be next. That nothing will remain of their beloved Hawthorn once the sun goes down.

“Someone has to know something about the necromancer. We have to find out who is terrorizing the village and what their motive is,” Namjoon concludes as you all gather outside the church to debrief. “We also need to help the residents prepare for tonight’s battle: teach them how to properly hold weapons, encourage every able-body to help with the fight, and inspire them to defend the land and their community.”

“Leave the villagers to us,” Seokjin offers, gesturing at himself and the members of his guild. “We’ll do our best to get everyone ready before sundown. You just focus on finding that necromancer.”

“Taehyung and I are going to look at their resources,” Hoseok informs, surveying the infirmary tents. “I might be able to make something for the injured.”

“We’ll check on the blacksmith,” Yoongi says, putting a hand on your shoulder. “He was in rough shape when we passed by. Half of the villagers aren’t wearing proper armor and are carrying broken weapons. Repairs need to be done if they want to stand a fighting chance.”

“Taverns are a great source of information,” Jackson mentions as he eyes the local pub. A smile touches his lips as he wonders out loud, “Maybe I can even convince the owner to give out free shots of courage to the fighters.”

“Then Jungkook and I will talk to the farmers,” Namjoon decides as he looks at his familiar, who nods his head in agreement. “The notice mentions that they’re the ones who suspect dark magic is at hand. Maybe one of them saw something that can give us a clue to where our necromancer is.”

With a solid plan set, the party breaks off to their assigned tasks.

Tonight still looks grim, but there’s hope.

With success, they might be able to turn everything around before nightfall.

“Any luck?” you ask when you see Namjoon and Jungkook circling back to the village square after a while.

“Not really,” Namjoon mulls with a sigh.

“They said the horde comes from all around the village. One night, they’re skeletons from the village’s graveyard. Another night, they’ve come from the nearby lake or from the thickets of the woods,” Jungkook explains with a frown. Whoever they talk to seems to have different descriptions of the undead creatures. “Most of the villagers are too busy trying to stay alive to keep track of what’s been causing the dead to rise.”

“They did confirm one thing, though,” Namjoon adds before he throws a glance at his familiar. “They heard the sound of bells.”

“Bells?” you echo, looking between them.

“It’s how the necromancers summon the dead,” Jungkook simply explains. “Without them, they’re just like any other mage.”

“Good to know,” you mutter, shivering at the thought of hearing strange bells in the middle of the night. At least, if nothing else, you’ll be able to take away their advantage.

Still, a mage that has the skills to control the dead must be incredibly powerful.

“How is everything here?” Namjoon asks as he looks around.

“Good. Jin is a natural at raising morale,” you reply, looking over to where a small crowd chants Seokjin’s name. The others in his guild have been teaching them how to use their weapons, and although they’re still clearly unskilled, their progress is still quite an improvement from before.

“Hoseok-hyung looks like he has things under control in the infirmary,” Jungkook points out. The nurses and patients around him are in awe at the simple potions he had given them, claiming that he must be a miracle doctor. They also look smitten over Taehyung, who’s soothing voice calms and comforts the bedridden a bit.

“Yoongi-hyung, too,” Namjoon notes when he looks at your familiar, sitting over an anvil and helping the blacksmith craft weapons of steel. With assistance, it seems like the blacksmith will be able to get repairs done in time after all.

Shouts and cheers from the tavern show that Jackson, somehow, persuaded the bartender to give out free ale to the villagers. Although tipsy, their spirits are high, and they seem eager to fight after a round of complimentary drinks.

“I’ll help Yoongi-hyung,” Jungkook states, interested in what they’re doing. He approaches the blacksmith, who seems elated to have additional assistance.

“We should probably check on Jackson. Maybe he’s heard something,” you suggest, turning toward the tavern. But Namjoon grabs your hand and pulls you back.

“Actually,” he starts, suddenly a little nervous. He takes a deep breath before he tells you, “There’s something I need to do first. Before it’s too late.”

At age thirteen, Namjoon awakened the power of magic. The feeling of bestowment is like fire. The initial spark of energy courses through his veins and spreads within him. Mesmerizing, alluring, and dangerous. No matter how much he reads and tries to understand his abilities, there’s always something new to learn, to incantate, and to master through his connection to the Veil.

Magic is both a blessing and a curse. Two sides of the same coin.

At first, Namjoon hated what he was. He hated that he became a mage.

Every night, when he was locked away in Alterwood Keep or WIndshire Tower, he questioned what he had done to be damned with such misfortune.

Magic is what burned his family’s home to the ground. Magic is what got him taken away from his parents, his friends, and his village – everything he knew. Magic is what lured the hunters into killing Ignis, turned Adriel into a beast, and shunned him from his home for so long.

The same home he stands before now.

“This is it,” Namjoon tells you, looking at an ordinary-looking house.

It’s been rebuilt over the years. Shabby, but somewhat similar to what it used to be. The curtains are identical to the ones his mother had put on the windows, down to the same shade of color. The front has pots of flowers that she liked to grow, and as the weather warmed, she’d smile as they began to bloom. Inside, Namjoon is certain he’d find a small collection of books his father would’ve read, and upon his favorite chair, he used to emphasize the importance of education and the pursuit of knowledge.

Your fingers thread through his. “Are you ready?”

He looks at you and nods his head.

At age nineteen, shortly after he was transferred to Blackstone Castle, he finally started to see magic as a positive force in his life.

Magic is what brought you all together, intertwining your fates with each other like red strings of soulmates. Magic is what makes the ordinary, unassuming shop at New Haven come to life and keep you all safe and happy. Magic is what brings him back to where it all started, with you by his side.

Years have passed since that fateful day he was taken from his parents. He’s started to accept that magic is a part of him. For all its wickedness and destruction, and all its serenity and wonder. Two sides of the same coin.

He just hopes, as he raises his hand to knock on the door, his parents will accept him as well. Magic and all.

The door swings open. An older woman stands on the other side. “Yes, can I help you?”

There’s a polite but cautious smile on her face, and deep dimples on her cheeks that match Namjoon’s. The resemblance between them is unmistakable.

“Hi Mother,” Namjoon greets her with his own nervous, dimpled smile. His hand squeezes yours for assurance. “It’s me. Your son.”

Confusion turns to recognition, which turns from surprise to disbelief. You watch as the woman looks at Namjoon like he’s a ghost.

“Y-You. You shouldn’t be here,” she stutters, lip trembling as her eyes water. Her hand is pressed to her heart as she steps away from the door. 

An older man notices his wife’s distress and comes to the door as well. He puts an arm around her and frowns at you two, not seeming to recognize the young man who has his height and strong build. “Who are you? What do you want?”

“Father, it’s me,” Namjoon tries to say, but his voice is small. He’s starting to think that this is a bad idea. “Kim Namjoon. I’m your son.”

Like the woman, the man is initially shocked by the news. But then, his eyes narrow at Namjoon angrily. “What are the likes of you doing here, boy? Don’t we have enough to deal with?”

Namjoon visibly stiffens at the harshness in his father’s voice. “I’m here on a quest. I’ve come to learn that our village is under attack.”

“My village doesn’t need your help!” his father yells, spit flying as he holds his wife protectively. “Magic is what got us into this mess! Magic will make things worse!”

“Let’s get out of here,” you quietly urge, frowning at their hostility.

This is like his nightmares. Their looks of hatred and disdain burn under his skin, searing themselves into his memories. It’s hard for him to breathe, it’s hard for him to think. Suddenly, he feels so small. Like he’s a child again, standing before the fires that destroyed his home and took everything from him.

“Get away from him if you know what’s good for you, little girl,” the man warns, finally noticing that you’re there. “He’s something Wicked. His magic put us all in danger and ruined our lives!”

“I’m sorry,” Namjoon chokes out. The words that he wanted to tell his parents after all these years. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to—”

“Get out! Do not come here again!” his father interrupts as his mother bursts into tears, burying her face into her husband’s shoulder. He grabs whatever is closest to him and waves it in a threatening manner. “Get away from our house before you destroy it!”

Namjoon obliges, stepping away from the door. He looks deeply hurt as he tries again. “But Father—”

“Do not call me that!” he barks as he gives him one more hateful glare. “We don’t have a son. Not anymore.”

Then, he slams the door shut.

“That went well,” Namjoon comments, sarcasm thick in his voice. He sits on a broken crate in the alleyway the two of you end up in and sighs. “I feel like an idiot.”

Part of him had known that, maybe, his parents weren't going to give him the warmest welcome. Part of him even thought that, perhaps, his parents wouldn’t recognize him.

Still, it hurts.

It hurts that he had expected otherwise. That he had hoped his parents would listen to him and forgive him. That they’d come to accept him.

But they’ve made it more than clear that Hawthorn Village and the house he grew up in is no longer his home. And that the parents who raised him are no longer his family.

Namjoon always knew this scenario could’ve been a possibility. And yet, he foolishly wanted to be wrong.

“Joon…” Your voice calls out from behind him, but you seem at a loss of words.

“I’m sorry, baby,” he apologizes, feeling incredibly dejected as he keeps his back to you. “I shouldn’t have bothered. I should’ve known it’d be a waste of time.”

And it hurts. It hurts so badly.

Knowing that all his efforts to return home — and all the punishments he took for running away — were fruitless. That no matter how hard he tries to be good and understand his magic, nothing will change.

In the end, Ignis really died for nothing. And that’s probably what hurts the most.

Namjoon half-expects you to scold him for dragging you along. For you to comment how you knew this was a bad idea, and that you both have other important things to worry about right now.

Instead, you approach him and gently wrap your arms around his neck. Your body is pressed against his back, hugging him from behind. Neither of you speak as he stiffens under your touch. But he places his hand over your arm in a wordless request to stay.

And you do. You stay with him, kissing his tear-stained cheeks and wishing you could do more to comfort him.

But to Namjoon, this is enough. Being with you is more than enough.

When the sun goes down, the dead awakens.

Villagers of Hawthorn scramble indoors, locking themselves inside and barricading the doors and windows. The church bells are quiet, not to be rung until morning light. Everywhere is an eerie silence, and those left to fend off the inevitable enemies swallow their fears as they train their eyes on the horizon.

There, a green fog mixes with the misty air, and the putrid stench of rotting flesh slowly advances toward them. Death is coming, and with it, alarming numbers of the undead.

“All right, everyone!” the mayor begins, taking command of the last line of defense. The odds are heavily against them, but he has to keep up what little morale they still have left. “We’ve driven off this evil before. We can do it again for one more night. We fight, or we die trying!”

With that said, the villagers charge in. Battle cries ring out as they use their pitchforks, shovels, and scythes to attack the incoming herd.

But they only get so close before the fear sets in.

Death looks them in the eye. Corpses with lifeless, glowing eyes, flesh rotten and decayed, and bones visible as they unhinge their jaws and let out an unsettling groan.

Some of them flee the opposite direction, running away from their foes. Some stand frozen, panic seizing them in place. Some, unable to stand the horrid smell, drop their weapons and retch out their stomach’s contents.

The villagers don’t stand a chance.

Then, they begin to hear it.

In the dark, rural farmlands, the sonorous sound of bells toll. Yet, when their eyes gaze to the local church, the large brass on the tower is completely still. If it’s not from the church, where are the bells coming from?

A scream pierces the air. The mayor turns to see a woman swinging an axe around violently. Her eyes are wide with terror, fixed on something before her, but there isn’t anyone around her. She continues to scream at something to get away from her as she slashes the air.

Two friends suddenly turn on each other. The two men have been buddies for years, and it’s like they don’t recognize their friend. They have that same, wild look in their eyes as they grab each other and raise their weapons.

The mayor’s heart hammers in his chest as they turn against each other, mistaking alley for enemy. “Men, what are you doing? Stop it!”

But it’s too late.

Blood splatters. Followed by cries of agony.

Horrified, the mayor gets away before they try to hurt him as well. As he runs, he grabs a woman’s shoulders and tries to warn her not to listen to the bells. But when she turns to face him, her face is completely disfigured. The flesh looks like it’s melting off her skin, bone and muscle peeking as she smiles wickedly.

“What’s wrong, mayor?” the woman asks, but her voice sounds off. Another voice is layered over hers – deep and raspy, almost demonic – that clearly isn’t her own.

The mayor lets her go and shrinks back in fear. As he looks around, he sees that the undead have somehow surrounded him. They stand there and watch him with their lifeless eyes. Their rotting flesh. Pitchforks, shovels, and scythes in hand.

Mysterious bells continue to echo, drowning out his screams.

“Do you hear that?” Hoseok asks from beside you. The two of you are stationed a little away from the village, near a part of the woods that locals claim was one of the spots the dead have risen from. It’s foggy and creepy, and you’ve been eyeing the thicket and expect a horde of undead to stumble from beyond the trees.

But it’s been dead quiet.

Even as you hold your breath and stand perfectly still, you can’t hear anything.

“What is it?” you ask, your voice a whisper.

Hoseok glances over at you with a frown. “I hear the ringing of bells.”

The sound of footsteps crunching on leaves and twigs catch your attention. Seokjin calls out to you and Hoseok as he and Namjoon appear from the fog. “We need to regroup. Something is happening at the village.”

“What do you mean? Are they under attack?”

Neither of them answer you. The concern on both their faces only makes you worry more as you and Hoseok follow them toward the old windmill where the rest of your party is waiting. It’s a little closer to the heart of the village, and you can hear some commotion going on, like the villagers are in the throes of battle.

You spot Taehyung in his raven form, flying from the direction of the village and landing before you and Hoseok. When he transforms into his human form, he reports, “The recently deceased have risen, but they’re not the biggest problem.”

“Then who are they fighting?” Namjoon asks, eyebrows furrowing together.

Taehyung leans against Hoseok for support, bringing his palm against his forehead like he has a migraine. “They’re fighting each other.”

Silence follows the unsettling news.

Seokjin is the first to break it. “What the hell is going on?”

As if to answer him, you all hear it too.

The haunting, sonorous sound of bells in a nearby distance.

Hearing them sends a chill up your spine. And knowing that they’re beckoning death makes them even more terrifying.

“We need to get the bells,” Jungkook reminds you, turning away from the village to look you in the eye. “It’s the only way we can stop their madness.”

“We’ll have to be quick,” Namjoon agrees. “Or Hawthorn won’t make it to sunrise.”

There are seven necromantic bells. Each is more difficult to wield properly as their size and power increases. And, without proper care, the bells have a negative effect on the ringer that could backfire to certain death.

As you and the others approach the village, you hear the chime of the first bell.

It’s been a long day. Traveling the long roads to the village by carriage and on foot. Helping the residents prepare for the gruesome attacks tonight. Getting ready to face a powerful mage hiding somewhere nearby.

Sleep. The first bell sings. And you’re hit with a wave of drowsiness.

Yoongi catches you before you collapse on the ground. His eyes are tired, as if he hadn’t slept for days. In a slurred mumble, he commands, “Stay with me.”

The others aren’t faring any better. Long yawns and slow steps plague your group. Some of them look like they’re about to slump over and fall unconscious. You and the other mages ignore the lull of the bell and stay awake and alert. With tired eyes, you try to scan for the source of the sound and see a shadow slip into a building.

“There,” you point out, readying your wand. You follow after it with half your party close behind you. Seokjin stays behind with his guild, promising to catch up. Jungkook looks lethargic as he kicks open the entrance a few times before nearly tumbling inside.

A home abandoned is what you’re met with. The people living here seem to be gone, hurriedly leaving in the middle of making dinner. Flies swarm the rotting food, but it doesn’t look like anything else has been touched.

“Be careful,” Jackson warns, going further into the house. He uses his wand as a light, cautiously going from room to room to make sure the coast is clear.

It looks empty. But you know it isn’t.

You feel someone watching you all from the shadows.

When you turn to face the main room, your eyes widen when the figure emerges. Shrouded in tattered robes and carrying a bandolier of old bells is the necromancer. Deathly pale as a ghost, thin and bony like a skeleton, and decayed like the very creatures they summon. 

The necromancer — a truly Wicked creature — isn’t human at all. It’s a phantom.

It towers over you, face covered in darkness. In its hand is the second bell, which rings and beckons the dead with every step it takes toward you.

A burst of flames comes from your wand, aiming right at the necromancer’s face. Fire catches on its robes, but the necromancer seems unphased. Even as it’s burning alive.

Behind you, wooden boards split and break, and arms of the dead reach through the window to grab you. A startled scream escapes your lips when something does.

You’re pulled tightly to Namjoon’s chest as he leads you away from the doors and windows. He keeps a wand pointed at the necromancer as he holds you protectively. From your peripheral vision, you see Jackson, Hoseok, and the familiars trying to keep the horde out.

Distracted, you don’t notice the necromancer tucking the second bell away and taking out the third one from the pouch. With two hands, it rings the bell – up, down, left right – each toll causing different sounds from one bell, but they make a dancing tune that compels your legs to move on its own.

“Namjoon!” you gasp, trying to hold onto him. Mechanically, one foot marches over the other. Against your will, you leave his side. Neither Namjoon nor the other boys could stop you as their own feet seem planted in place, unable to move.

By its command, you spin around and start to slowly head straight toward the window, into the reaching arms of the undead. The boys call out to you, and you try to resist the magic. Every fiber of your being tries to hold you back from being torn apart by their greedy hands and mouths.

But your body won’t listen. You continue to march forward.

With all his willpower, Namjoon leans as far as he can and reaches toward you. His fingers grasp the back of your clothes and he yanks you backwards. You stumble a bit, but you reach back and cling onto him, anchoring yourself as he pulls you closer.

“I got you, baby,” he assures you, wrapping both of his arms around you.

Relief washes over your face, even as your legs continue to move on its own, you and Namjoon hold onto each other. With the wand still in your hand, you manage to point it at the necromancer and cast a spell of frost, just as it takes out two more bells.

The necromancer freezes. Icicles form around it for a few seconds before it shakes it away. Namjoon’s eyes widen when he realizes something.

Magic is very effective against the necromancer.

Just as he realizes this, the phantom necromancer starts to rapidly swing the bell in its left hand.

Whispers from beyond the grave seem to float around the room with the fourth bell, disembodied and ambiguous. The voices are in every direction, layered with the quick and steady rings. And Namjoon swears one of the voices is calling out to him.

His eyes look for who is calling him, and his gaze turns toward the crowd of undead by the window. Then, his eyes widen when he hears the chime of the fifth bell.

One of the skeletal remains starts to look familiar to him. The clothes are tattered and weathered, but the scraps of what’s left are the same from that day, slightly charged from when the hunters burned him. Flesh and muscle start to form around the skeleton, bringing back the teenage boy Namjoon once left behind.

Impossible.

Ignis, alive and well, is among the horde. His first friend since he’s become a mage.

“Namjoon,” Ignis calls out to him again. His voice is echoing and weak, but it’s still very much the same as he remembers.

Hoseok, and Jackson are looking in the same direction, stunned. Namjoon would’ve thought they’re also seeing Ignis until he hears the names they call out.

“Mina?”

“Adriel!”

A sense of confusion draws Namjoon out of the spell. He doesn’t see Adriel or Mina in the crowd, but he sees Ignis. Are you two seeing someone different?

Taehyung grabs both Hoseok and Jackson before they could step closer to the window. “Don’t. You’ll get hurt.”

Yoongi and Jungkook block the window as well, trying to keep you and Namjoon safe. He doesn’t realize it, but Namjoon’s grip loosens around you from the shock. The spell from the third bell still lingers, causing you to move away from him again, but Yoongi easily catches you this time.

“Is that—?” you begin to ask, but Yoongi shakes his head.

“It’s a trick,” he says as he tightens his hold around you. “Whoever you see isn’t there.”

Namjoon’s heart drops a little when he realizes the fourth and fifth bell must’ve brought back memories of a deceased loved one. An old friend to each of you that had passed on. Their voices. Their likeness.

“Hyung, you have to get the bells, Quickly,” Jungkook reminds him as he glares at the phantom necromancer. “Before it uses the seventh one. That’ll cause death to everyone who hears it.”

That means there’s only two more bells left, and the last one is deadly. If there’s a chance to stop the necromancer, it has to be now.

The necromancer tries another combination. It exchanges the fourth and fifth bell for the second and sixth ones. With the second, it’s able to summon the dead, beckoning them to come to it from beyond the grave. And with the sixth, it has complete control over them, binding them to its will. Within its shrouded face, its eyes begin to glow an eerie yellow the moment it wields the sixth bell.

Namjoon casts a bolt of lightning from his wand, but the necromancer vanishes before it hits. The bells ring somewhere that he can’t pinpoint, and he sees you and the others regain control of your bodies and try to look for the necromancer all over again.

“It couldn’t have gone far,” Namjoon reasons, scanning around. All of you are on high alert, wands ready to strike the moment the phantom necromancer appears.

Then, he hears the sound of wood breaking. More reinforcements join the previous herd and start to come inside. Namjoon completely loses sight of you and the others, using gusts of wind to blow the undead back and knocking them against walls and furniture. He calls out to you, but the disembodied groans, the stench of rotting flesh, and the sight of disfigured creatures keeps him from looking for you.

One of the creatures he comes to face is Ignis. Or at least, what looks like him.

“Stop. I don’t want to hurt you,” Namjoon says, pointing his wand at him. It feels like his Harrowing all over again. Being forced to face his biggest regret.

Ignis has his wand pointed at him as well. It’s a broken stick. The old, dirty clothes that he wears barely covers his chest and waist, but there’s a deep wound where the hunters have stabbed him through the heart. There are burn marks from when they had set him on fire.

Namjoon feels a burst of hot air as a fireball flies past him. He counters it with a water spell, dousing the flames before it hits him. The two elements collide as steam fills the room, causing Namjoon to lose sight of his old friend.

Sparks of lightning flash to his right, and he barely dodges an electrifying bolt. The attack hits a picture frame behind him, and the glass shatters as it falls on the floor. Wind sweeps up the broken glass and hurls it toward him, and Namjoon levitates the broken boards in front of him and uses them as a shield to protect himself.

Spells after spells become a dance between offensive and defensive attacks between Namjoon and Ignis. He can feel himself getting tired. The overuse of magic is causing his hands to blacken. He’s breathing heavier, and pain shoots from his arm when it got hit with a critical ice attack.

But Ignis is slowing down too. He’s proven to be an incredibly difficult opponent. But like Namjoon, Ignis is panting for breath and from the tips of his fingers down to his wrist is inky black of magic overuse. The wound on his chest expanded, bleeding heavily, yet he still stands. Stubbornly, he continues to point his wand at Namjoon, still wanting to fight.

However, Namjoon knows he needs to end it now.

While in battle, it seems like the others have taken care of the undead herd, but the necromancer’s whereabouts are still unknown. He can hear them shouting at him, but he doesn’t know what they’re saying. All he can focus on is the opponent before him.

Needing to end the fight, Namjoon tries a new spell.

Keeping his eye on Ignis, he slowly crouches and puts his hand on the ground. The earth moves beneath his fingertips, and covering the house are thick vines. They come from one side of the house, through the window, reaching across the floor and ceiling, and finally snagging Ignis. He seems surprised when they wrap around his wrist and disarms his wand, and around his ankles to immobilize him. 

The surprise turns to worry when one of the vines wraps around his neck.

Then, they begin to tighten.

Namjoon tries not to react as he watches his old friend die by his hand once again. He feels the sting of tears threaten his eyes as the wand falls on the ground and Ignis begins to choke.

As much as Namjoon wishes he could go back in time and undo his old friend’s death, as much as he’d like to think this is the real Ignis and not some undead creature wearing his skin, he knows his friend is long gone.

He points his wand at Ignis, the tip of it heating with a fire spell.

But before it’s cast, Namjoon is knocked to the ground. As he comes to his senses, he realizes three horrifying things.

First, the phantom necromancer had been there the whole time. It’s been ringing the bells, conducting them like a puppeteer. And Namjoon is its puppet with strings.

Second, it isn’t just Namjoon that was being controlled by the bells. His party has been immobilized, forced to watch as Namjoon fights Ignis. But Jackson – who was standing closest to the phantom – manages to break from the spellbound restraints, covering his ears to block the sound. Out of willpower and determination, he puts one foot over the other to sneak up on the necromancer. Until, finally, he yanks the hoister of bells before the necromancer has a chance to grab the seventh and deadliest one.

Third, the moment that the necromancer is no longer in control, Yoongi lunges at Namjoon with his hand curled into a fist. Jungkook manages to grab Yoongi’s waist, but they both topple over and knock into Namjoon. The three of them are on the ground, and Namjoon realizes that Hoseok and Taehyung are yelling at him too, but their voices are where Ignis is.

Or what he thought was Ignis.

It isn’t an undead creature caught in the vines of his spell.

It’s you. This whole time, it’s been you.

“Let her go, Namjoon!” Hoseok screams, trying to yank the vines away from you. Every time he pulls one away, another takes its place. They start to tangle around him and Taehyung as well. He can feel it grabbing his ankles and see it wrap around Taehyung’s hand as he tugs on the one around your neck.

Fuck, he doesn’t even know if you’re even breathing. Your body looks lifeless as they continue to constrict your chest and your neck.

Taehyung curses and tries to shake off the vine that’s spreading up his arm and toward his neck. Hoseok’s mind is spinning, wanting to use a fire attack to burn the vines, but afraid that it’ll hurt you and Taehyung. And Namjoon is still dazed from the effects of the bells.

Seokjin finally catches up after helping the surviving villagers. His eyes widen when he sees what’s happening and immediately rushes to you with his sword at hand.

“Hyung!” Taehyung exclaims as Seokjin carefully cuts the vines to free the three of you. Hoseok immediately catches you, and to his relief, you’re still alive. You’re still breathing, but barely.

“Is she okay?” Seokjin asks, his hand still around his sword. The Oathkeepers have jumped into battle with Jackson, trying to take the necromancer down with standard magic spells now that the bells are not with it.

“She’ll be fine,” Hoseok says as he sees Yoongi rush toward you. He hands you off to him. “Watch over her, hyung. We have to help Jackson.”

Yoongi merely nods. His hands are trembling a little as he holds you in his arms, taking you somewhere safe from the fight.

Namjoon finally snaps out of it when he sees Yoongi passing by. He catches a glimpse of you too, but Jungkook shakes his shoulder and urges, “Hyung, come on, let’s go. They need us.”

Slowly, Namjoon stands and his eyes narrow at the necromancer. The spells are aggressive as it targets Jackson, trying to get its bells back. The Oathkeepers surround him, protecting him as they use their weapons against the powerful mage.

“Push it toward the vines,” Namjoon instructs, and they do. Each swing of an attack that the Oathkeepers land, and each spell cast from Hoseok and Jackson causes the necromancer to step closer and closer to the vines where you were.

One of the vines manages to snag the necromancer’s ankle. Another starts to wrap around its arm. Everyone watches as a being associated with death struggles to free itself from the plants that are full of life. But that only tangles it up even more, constricting it until it can’t move at all.

Then, Namjoon stands before the necromancer. He still has a bit of magic in him, and with it, he unleashes a small fire. Just like he had accidentally casted all those years ago, when he first awakened his power.

This time, it’s with purpose as the flames engulf and destroy everything before him.

There’s an unnerving feeling that settles throughout the remains of Hawthorn Village.

All night, the Oathkeepers gathered everyone they could find and brought them to the church. They figured it would be easier to protect everyone if they’re all in one place.

Priestess and the faithful Devoted clasps their hands so tightly in prayer, their knuckles turn white. Mothers hold their young children close, comforting them as best as they can. Men guarding the inside of the chapel anxiously pace with their hands hovering over their weapons, anticipating that they’d be the last line of defense if your party fails to stop the necromancer.

It’s been a long night.

The fighting and shouting beyond the church door lasts for hours.

But beyond the horizon, there’s a silver lining of hope. Dawn breaks, and a new day begins. As the sun rises, so does their salvation.

Word spreads of what you and the others have done. How you all saved the village. How Namjoon defeated the awful creature that’s been terrorizing them.

“Didn’t you have a son named Namjoon?” one of the villagers asks, but Namjoon’s father shakes his head and denies it. There’s a frown on the old man’s face as others have gathered to talk about the news.

It’s finally over. Their village is saved. They’ve survived those perilous nights. And it’s all thanks to the guild that came to help them.

Stepping outside, the morning light greets them. Fighters return to embrace their loved ones after the long battle. Children cheer with joy for their heroes, and tears are shed from relief between reunited families and partners.

Among the fighters, there’s Namjoon and his group.

One of the boys – the one with a slender build and a sharp face – has you on his back. The others are worn and exhausted, but seem okay from the distance as they help support each other back to the village. And Namjoon, with two of his comrades holding him up, keeps trying to disregard his own injuries as he worries about yours.

The concern on his face, the remorse and sorrow in his expression – it’s just like when he was a kid on that fateful day.

“How do you reckon they did it?” another villager asks him, looking at the direction that Namjoon’s father is staring at. It would be easy to reveal the truth. That Wicked mages are among them, and the entire village would be full of distrust and anger toward them.

“Who knows?” the old man says instead, and turns away from the group with a frown.

Magic may have gotten them in this mess, but in an ironic twist of fate, magic is what saved them.

For the first time in days, Hawthorn Village is promised a good night.

The mayor and the surviving villagers hold a small ceremony to honor the deceased and to hail your party as heroes. It will take time for their tiny village to recover. Even with the threat of the necromancer gone, there’s still fear of the night and what it could behold. But the mayor is confident that they can rebuild.

You’re then taken to Hawthorn’s inn to recover. Luckily, no one else is severely injured, but you and Namjoon have the worst of it.

Hours pass, and you’ve yet to open your eyes.

“It’s not your fault,” Hoseok reminds him, wrapping a cloth bandage around Namjoon’s arm. “That necromancer made you guys attack each other.”

It doesn’t make Namjoon feel any better.

“I nearly killed her,” he laments. At Blackstone Castle, Hoseok once swore that if Namjoon ever hurts you, he’d kill him. Truly, this warrants his friends to turn against him like others have done before.

But somehow, they don’t.

Hoseok finishes up and examines his work. “To be fair, she did a number on you too.”

Namjoon is told to rest, but he can’t bring himself to let his guard down. He keeps thinking there must be a catch. That, perhaps, the others are still angry with him and are starting to resent him.

“Namjoon-ah, come eat,” Seokjin calls out for him, gesturing for the mage to sit at the table. He serves him a bowl of stew the innkeeper made. “Be careful. It’s still hot.”

“Hyung, are you healing okay?” Jungkook asks again – probably for the fourth time that hour alone. He frowns at the bandages Hoseok put on him, and there’s genuine concern in his big, doe-shaped eyes. “If you need anything, let me know. Got it?”

“Be careful, hyung. You don’t want to hurt yourself again,” Taehyung scolds when Namjoon nearly bumps into something. It’s the closest any of them have been stern with him all day, yet Taehyung frets over him like he does with you and the others.

Even Yoongi strikes up a casual conversation with him, flipping through a book of Devoted scriptures he’s found. “What is this garbage they’ve been teaching you?”

Namjoon frowns. “Hyung, what are you doing?”

“There’s nothing else to read,” he states with a scowl.

“I mean, why aren’t you angry at me?” Namjoon asks, his heart still full of guilt. You mean so much to all of them, and what he did is unforgivable.

“You didn’t mean to hurt her,” Yoongi simply replies.

“But I did it,” Namjoon protests, feeling a bit frustrated. He doesn’t get it. “Why are you all so nice to me after what I’ve done? Why don’t you hate me?”

Isn’t this how it always goes? Why is it so different this time?

“You’re family to us, Namjoon,” Yoongi tells him. “We could never hate you.”

Namjoon wants to believe that, but he doesn’t feel like he deserves to. Not after what he did to you.

Whenever he feels overwhelmed and stressed, Namjoon likes to run to clear his mind. Usually, it’s along the river near New Haven, where he can relax beneath the shade of a tree he liked afterwards. But as he lets his feet take him somewhere, he finds himself by the Hawthorn Lake.

Most of the villagers have gathered here as the late afternoon sun colors the skies with reds and oranges of twilight. To honor and mourn the lives that were lost the past few nights, they’ve decided to hold a small ceremony for them. And standing a short distance from them is a familiar face.

“Where’ve you been?” Namjoon asks, walking up to him.

Jackson is quiet as he watches them. The villagers pray and hug each other, and some sing hymns and play instruments by the shore. Paper lanterns are lit and sent off into the water, representing both hope and remembrance, as well as grief and loss. With the setting sun hitting the water’s surface, it matches the small flames being carried across the lake.

It’s a beautiful ceremony.

“I wish we could’ve done something like this,” Jackson quietly confides without looking at Namjoon. “For Adriel, Mina, and everyone else we lost at Blackstone.”

“We still can,” Namjoon tells him, facing the lake as well. It might be difficult now, but maybe when things settle down with the hunters, they could go back to the lake by the castle and hold a memorial for them one day.

Silence passes as the sun continues to sink. For once, it’s a peaceful evening. And the somber songs start to turn to ones of celebration as a relief washes over them. Tonight, they no longer need to fear the dark.

“You know, I wanted to take up this mission so I could bring them back,” Jackson confesses. “Adriel sacrificed himself to give us our freedom. I’ve been trying to enjoy the gift he gave us, but it isn’t fair that he’s dead while I get to live outside the prison he desperately wanted to escape from.”

Namjoon frowns. “Necromancy is dark magic, Jackson. What if it backfired?”

“I didn’t care. I would’ve used whatever they had to bring them back: bells, tomes, ritual circles,” Jackson lists as he looks at the stash of bells he’s been carrying with him. “Whatever it took. Wouldn’t you want to do the same for that old friend you told us about? The one you saw during the fight?”

Ignis.

Immediately, Namjoon thinks of how the bells convinced him that his old friend had come back. How it took his shape and form, and how it used his voice.

“If I did, he wouldn’t have been the same.” He’d probably be no different from any of the other undead they saw last night. A shell of a human with its spirit gone. A mere illusion of what he once was.

“I probably wouldn’t have been the same either. Had I tried, I would’ve lost a sense of who I am and become a monster like that necromancer phantom,” Jackson concludes with a frown. “That thing we fought… it wasn’t human. It was truly Wicked.”

“Yeah,” Namjoon agrees. The necromancer felt like it had lost its humanity a very long time ago, and now just wanders into towns and villages to torment and cause chaos.

“Here.” Jackson holds out the bells to Namjoon. “Make sure to destroy them.”

Namjoon takes it, and he can feel the weight of its power in his hand. “What’s your plan now?”

“Don’t know yet. But I’ll figure it out,” Jackson replies with a small shrug. “I might stay here for a bit and help them rebuild. The guys at the pub really liked me.” 

You’re not sure how long you’ve been asleep.

For a while, you drift in and out of consciousness. You feel the warmth of Hoseok’s healing magic before he applies an ointment to your wound. You hear the sweet tune of Jungkook’s song as he sings to you. You feel Taehyung brush the hair away from your face and press his lips against your knuckles. You hear Seokjin bargain with you – a kiss from your handsomest boyfriend if you open your eyes. When you do, you see Yoongi sleeping on a chair nearby, and you’re certain he hasn’t left your side since you were brought here.

But you don’t see or hear from Namjoon. You force yourself to sit up as the memories of last night come back to you.

In all the years you’ve known Namjoon, he’s always been a strong person. He has thick skin and a level head, and is eloquent and witty with his words. He shoulders a lot of the hard work so you and the others don’t have to. Whenever you need advice, comfort, or someone to rely on, he’s always the first person that comes to mind.

But Namjoon is also human. He can’t always be strong.

And while the details of the fight are still a bit foggy to you, there’s one thing that haunts your mind. The absolute horror on his face when Namjoon finally realizes it’s you he was attacking.

Yoongi stirs when he senses you’re awake. “Where are you going?”

Caught halfway to the door, you stop mid-step and ask, “Yoongi, have you seen—”

Just then, the door opens. Jungkook blinks in surprise when he sees you out of bed. “Oh? You’re awake?”

The others start to crowd in when they hear you’re up. You’re met with relieved sighs, lingering touches, and questions about how you’re feeling from all of them. But as you look around, you notice someone is missing.

“Where’s Namjoon?”

The boys look at each other, exchanging glances as if they don’t know what to tell you. Then, Jungkook speaks up. “He went to get some fresh air. He feels really bad about what happened.”

“I should talk to him,” you decide, determined to find him. You want to look for him anyway. “Do you know where he went?”

Soon, all of you are outside the inn. It’s incredibly empty by the square, and you learn that it’s because most of the villagers have gathered by the nearby lake. From what you’ve heard, it seems Jackson and Namjoon heeded over there as well.

“You’re the girl that was with that boy, aren’t you?”

For a second, you almost didn’t realize someone was talking to you. Then, you turn to see a familiar face. A woman that looked at you with terror and coldly slammed her door at your face yesterday. Namjoon’s mother.

“I am,” you answer, honest but a bit guarded. Now that you have a good look at her, you can see how much Namjoon takes after her appearance. He has the same high cheekbones, the same shape of her eyes, and the same deep dimples in his smile. She stares at you as well, but she doesn’t say a word. Self-conscious, you ask, “Is… Is something wrong?”

She blinks and shakes her head. “My apologies. I didn’t mean to stare.”

You don’t sense any hostility from her this time. Rather, you feel like she’s genuinely curious about you. Perhaps, after the battle and hearing people talk, she had a change of heart about her son.

“That’s all right. I must look terrible.” 

You laugh awkwardly, trying to dust off any dirt from your clothes and fix your hair. Magic helps make you look presentable enough to go out, but you’re still exhausted from fighting all night. Your spells are still weak from overuse, your current clothes are battle-worn, and you’re in a dire need of a bath.

“Actually, you’re quite beautiful,” she quietly admits, and you’re taken aback by the compliment. She looks away from you. There’s a sadness in her eyes as she asks, “How do you know him?”

She doesn’t need to name him for you to know who she’s talking about.

“We’re…” Friends? Lovers? Housemates? Family? “Together. He’s my partner.”

She still doesn’t look at you, but you can see the frown form upon her lips. “And you know what he is?”

“That he’s a mage? Of course I do.”

“And that doesn’t bother you?”

You blink at her, confused. “Why would it bother me?”

Her gaze lifts to meet yours, and she stares at you for a long time. It begins to occur to you that, although she knows that Namjoon is a mage, she doesn’t know that you’re one as well. To her, it seems outlandish that a human would willingly love a mage.

“He’s a monster. At least, I believed so,” she finally tells you. “I blamed him for ruining our lives. Don’t you know how shameful it is to have a child cursed with magic? The whole village shunned us for years.”

“Perhaps that’s a problem with your village’s beliefs and not your son,” you retort with a scowl. “His affinity to magic isn’t the only thing that defines him. He’s a good man with a kind heart, and while he’s many things, a monster is far from it.”

Remorse flickers on her face. “Forgive me. It seems you care an awful lot about him.”

“Of course I do,” you tell her so earnestly. “Whether he’s a mage or not, he’s still Namjoon. And I love him.”

Again, his mother stares in silence. She seems baffled, and, perhaps, a bit guilty. For a moment, she hesitates, and just when you’re about to walk away, she asks, “And… is he happy?”

You glance back at his mother. “You can always ask him yourself.”

“No, no. It’s too late for that now. It’s better that he doesn’t know I talked to you,” she backtracks, but there’s a small hint of relief to know what’s become of her son after all these years. “Thank you for indulging an old, shameful woman. I’m glad that he has someone like you who loves him for all he is.”

Night has fallen over the village of Hawthorn. But for once, it’s met with laughter and festivities of celebration. Jackson spots his new friends from the pub and introduces them to him. A guy named Mark invites them both for a drink and to hang out as the lantern ceremony continues.

The moon shines brightly as its light reflects against the lake’s surface, and the glow from paper lanterns being carried across the water is a breathtaking sight.

“Namjoon.”

But despite all the people and festivities around, all you see is him.

Namjoon leaves Jackson and the others and sprints toward you, but stops himself before he gets too close. His hand reaches out to touch you out of habit, but he holds it back. He swallows the fear and hesitation building within him before he plasters a nervous smile. “Hey, baby.”

You look him over, not saying anything at first. Your eyes seem fixed on the bandages he has around his arm. “Are you okay? Did I hurt you?”

His smile fades. A short chuckle of disbelief escapes his lips. “How is that the first thing you ask me when I’m the one that hurt you?”

“You didn’t know.”

“I could’ve killed you!” His voice raises, causing a couple passing by to look at you two. He steps a little closer and frowns. “I’m sorry, baby. I swore to myself that I’d always protect you, and I put you in danger. I don’t ever want to put you in that situation again.”

“Namjoon…”

“So, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking.”

You seem to know where this is going. He could see the shakiness in your breath and the way your eyes water. “Namjoon, stop…”

“I think it’s better that I stay here at Hawthorn.”

This decision didn’t come easy. But after hearing that Jackson planned to stick around, he figured he’d stay with him. Help the villagers rebuild. Reconnect with old friends and maybe even his parents. Make this place feel like home again.

It seems like a reasonable idea, but the hardest part is leaving you, the family you brought together, and the shop that became your home. As Namjoon stands before you, he knows he doesn’t deserve any of them. Not you, not the others, not the shop.

“You don’t mean that.” You’re crying now, and even as you wipe your tears, you can’t bring yourself to stop.

In all the years Namjoon has known you, you’ve always been a strong person. You carry an admirable confidence when it comes to your magic. You’re as kind as you are protective of the people you care about. You’re capable of handling yourself when faced with difficult situations.

Before he realizes it, he reaches out to you again. His hand cups your face and his thumb gently strokes your cheek, wiping your tears away. “I’m so scared of hurting you again.”

“And I’m scared to lose you.”

But you’re also human. There are times when you’re not always strong.

It dawns on him that you, like him, are terrified that your magic has hurt him. That you think the reason he wants to stay at Hawthorn is because you attacked him.

“You’ll never lose me,” Namjoon promises. Because he knows, even if you’re far apart, he’ll always think about you. In his dreams, in his thoughts. You’ve already claimed every part of him like a fire. “I love you.”

“Then don’t stay here,” you tell him. “Come home. With me.”

And it strikes Namjoon that this is what he’s been searching for his whole life. All the times he’s tried to return to his family, and all his efforts to understand his magic were to get what you’ve given him all along. Acceptance, trust, love. 

Namjoon nods his head, swallowing back his own tears. “Okay.”

“Okay,” you repeat, smiling with relief. And on that beautiful night, with the moon shining brightly and the paper lanterns glowing in the water, he kisses you.

Hawthorn is just as Namjoon remembers it.

The small, farming village with a tight-knit community. Every morning, the villagers rise at the crack of dawn, tending to their animals and crops, fishing by the nearby lake, and selling their produce at the marketplace. His parents still live here, and so do many of his childhood friends and their families. And when he looks around, he sees the familiar buildings of the old windmill, the local church, and homes made of thatch roofs and mud and stone walls.

Even when he was forced away, he couldn’t imagine anywhere else could be his home.

Years later, after finally returning to the village, Namjoon realizes he couldn’t be any more wrong. He had once thought – while trapped in a tiny room in Alterwood Keep – if he ever made it back here, he’d never want to leave. That this place was his village. This place was and will always be his home.

“Ready?” Hoseok asks, looking at you, Namjoon, and Jackson. The three of you nod as all wands are drawn over the necromancer bells.

With the power of four mages, the powers are sealed away and their tempting call to beckon the dead is nearly silenced. They look like ordinary bells, but should anyone try to ring them now, it’d be muffled and mute. Its effect is significantly weak with the magical seal intact, and the bandolier of bells tucked away in Jungkook’s pack.

“Let’s get out of here,” Seokjin decides once the spell is done. His hand slips around your waist protectively, weary eyes double-checking that none of the villagers have seen you guys use magic.

“It was nice seeing you guys again, man,” Jackson says, hand clasping Hoseok before he pulls him into a quick hug. He does the same to Namjoon and adds, “I’m glad you changed your mind. It doesn’t feel right to separate you all for some reason.”

Namjoon smiles a little at that. “Feel free to stop by at the shop anytime, Jackson.”

“I’ll know where to find you.” There’s promise in his voice that he’ll keep in touch.

Your party heads out of the village, receiving final thanks from the mayor and some of the other villagers for your help. Namjoon pauses when he sees his parents among them. His father merely nods at him and says, “Take care of yourself, Namjoon.”

“Thanks. You too,” he replies, a bit stunned. His parents leave it at that, shuffling away as Hoseok calls for him not to fall behind, but for Namjoon, that is more than enough.

When he catches up to you, you’re at the bridge that enters the village. He pauses and takes one more look around at the old windmill, village, and the farmlands. It really hasn’t changed that much since he was a child.

But Hawthorn no longer feels like home to him.

“Ready?” you ask, offering your hand to hold.

Around you, the others state how they’re looking forward to going back to New Haven. Yoongi complains that he needs a bath and a long nap. Jungkook wrinkles his nose at his muddy pants and mutters how he’s eager to start his meticulous laundry routine. Hoseok and Taehyung invite the Oathkeepers for food and drinks at the shop once you’re all back, and Seokjin complains how he’ll end up doing the majority of cooking.

Namjoon smiles fondly as he watches you all. Then, he nods and takes your hand.

These days, home to him is a small, ordinary, and unassuming shop in a bustling trading town. It’s a building that’s much bigger and more extraordinary on the inside than it is on the outside, with a tavern, a parlor, a mysterious door by the entrance that fulfills a person’s greatest desires, and bedrooms on the upper-floor curated to their residents’ tastes and styles.

Lately, home is waking up to bread baking and coffee brewing when Seokjin and Hoseok wake up early to start the day. It’s afternoons when he’s reading a book and listening to Yoongi playing the piano in the parlor, or Taehyung and Jungkook giggling as they play games with each other. Home is evenings when Jimin stops by with a bouquet of flowers for you, and all eight of you are gathered together for dinner as the weariness of the day melts away in each other’s presence.

To him, home is picnics by the river with you, basking beneath the sunlight of a gorgeous day. Home is debating what fruit is the best at the marketplace, and ending up taking home both of your favorites anyway. It’s childishly teasing each other with pranks and mischievous spells, and then finding ways to be in each other’s arms by the end of the day.

Home is with you.

Thank you for reading ♡ Comments & reblogs are greatly appreciated!

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[jujumin-translates]

★ Main Story | Act 13 - Budding Spring | Chapter 13 - Take It Easier

Citron: Is this not a private theater?

Izumi: There aren’t a whole lot of theater companies that have their own theaters.

Izumi: And there’s even fewer companies that have their own theaters at the time of their debut.

Sakuya: When I do guest performances at other theater companies, they’re always jealous when I tell them we’ve got our own theater.

Izumi: I mean, it isn’t easy to prepare a rehearsal space for every single rehearsal.

Izumi: I’m guessing the competition for rehearsal spaces and theaters is going to be even fiercer now with the number of new theater companies created because of the Fleur Award…

· • —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·

Sakuya: Ah, it’s almost time for it to start, right?

???: …Ahem, thank you so much for coming to the debut performance of “Indulgence In Working Overtime Gang”.

Mameda: I’m the supervisor, Mameda. And I’d like to say a few words before the show begins.

Mameda: First of all, I’m sure many of you thought the name of our troupe was a bit strange…

Mameda: Our troupe was created by myself and the other members. We used to do theater when we were in school, but we eventually started working as office workers.

Mameda: We watched the New Fleur Award Board of Directors press conference during a drinking party after working overtime. It was in the heat of the moment after watching it that we were able to create this troupe.

Mameda: Our motto is “Let’s take it easy and enjoy theater,” so some of us are more experienced and some of us are just beginners.

Mameda: We’re a mish-mash of people who came together simply because we want to do theater.

Mameda: For those of you who are frequent theater-goers, there might be some pretty cringe-worthy parts of our performance.

Mameda: We hope you’ll enjoy this performance as something you could watch while having a few drinks.

Mameda: Now then, please sit tight until the show starts.

Sakuya: …A mish-mash of people, huh? Kinda reminds me of MANKAI.

Izumi: Right? We had a mix of veterans and beginners at first, too.

Citron: I feel a sense of anonymity with them!

Izumi: I think you mean affinity.

· • —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·

Sakuya: Maybe it was just because of the greeting from the supervisor, but there was a really warm atmosphere throughout the theater.

Izumi: There really was. I could tell some of them were beginners, but they all seemed like they were having a great time.

Citron: And the story depicting a realistic toxic work environment so comically was very interesting!

Sakuya: They really made the most of the company’s motif and strengths, given that there’s so many office workers in the troupe!

Izumi: It was really easy to watch and there was a lot to study from it. If they ever do any streams, let’s invite the other guys to watch.

Sakuya: Yeah!

Announcer: “And next, we bring you on-site news from the International Arts Festival.”

Citron: --.

News Anchor: “The whole city it excited to be hosting the International Arts Festival again this year.”

News Anchor: “Every year, notable figures representing the theater and film worlds of various countries, as well as celebrities from other countries, are invited to this event, which garners lots of attention.”

Izumi: The International Arts Festival, huh? Is the Kingdom of Zahra also participating?

Citron: This is the first time we have received an invitation, but we are still considering whether we will participate or not. This is an important time for the troupe, so I want to focus on that.

Citron: I am perhaps not a very good Minister of Arts and Culture.

Sakuya: When we performed in the Kingdom of Zahra, the people there were really happy thanks to you, Citron-san.

Sakuya: Because you’ve come to love our country…

Sakuya: And because you introduced it in such a friendly manner, everyone accepted us in the end.

Izumi: In a way, it’s like you’re building bridges to other countries through theater, Citron-kun.

Citron: I thank the both of you.

[ ⇠ Previous Part ] • [ Next Part ⇢ ]

• • •

3939-Sakuya

I always get hungry after seeing a play. Getting to talk about what you thought of it over a delicious meal is just another one of the fun parts of seeing a performance!

#MANKAICompany #SpringTroupe #AdultGroupRecommendedIzakaya

[dailyanarchistposts]

May 13th: From Renault to the streets of Paris

Monday 13 May

6:15am, Avenue Yves Kermen. A clear, cloudless day. Crowds begin to gather outside the pates of the giant Renault works at Boulogne Billancourt. The main trade union ‘centrales’ (CGT, CFDT and FO) have called a one day general strike, They are protesting against police violence in the Latin Quarter and in support of long-neglected claims concerning wages, hours, the age of retirement and trade union rights in the plants.

The factory gales are wide open. Not a cop or supervisor in sight, The workers stream in. A loud hailer tells them to proceed to their respective shops, to refuse to start work and to proceed, at 8am, to their traditional meeting place, an enormous shed-like structure in the middle of the Ile Seguin (an island in the Seine entirely covered by parts of the Renault plant).

As each worker goes through the gated, the pickets give him a leaflet, jointly produced be the three unions.Leaflets in Spanish are also distributed (over 2000 Spanish workers are employed at Renault). French and Spanish orators succeed one another, in shod spells, at the microphone. Although all the unions are supporting the one-day strike, all the orators seem to belong to the CGT. it’s their loudspeaker...

6:45am, Hundreds of workers are now streaming in. Many look as if they had corpse to work rather than to participate in mass meetings at the plant. The decision to call the strike was only taken on the Saturday afternoon, after many of the men had already dispersed for the weekend. Many seem unaware of what it’s all about. l am struck by the number of Algerian and black workers. There are only’ a few posters at the gate, again mainly those of the CGT. Some pickets carry CF DT posters. There isn’t an FO poster in sight. The road and walls outside the factory have been well covered with slogans: ‘One day strike on Monday’; ‘Unity in defence of our claims” ‘NO to the monopolies’.

The little café near the gales is packed. People seem unusually wide awake and communicative for so early an hour, A newspaper kiosk is selling about three copies of l’Humanité for every copy of anything else. The local branch of the Communist Party is distributing a leaflet calling for ‘resolution, calm, vigilance and unity’ and warning against ‘provocateurs’.

The pickets make no attempt to argue with those pouring in. No-one seems to know whether they will obey the strike call or not. Less than 25% of Renault workers belong to any union at all. This is the biggest car factory in Europe. The loud hailer hammers home its message: The CRS have recently assaulted peasants at Quimper, and workers at Caen, Lyon and Dassault. Now they are turning on the students. The regime will not tolerate opposition. It will not modernize the country. It will not grant us our basic wage demands. Our one day strike will show both Government and employers our determination. We must compel them to retreat.” The message is repeated again and again, like a gramophone record. I wonder whether the speaker believes what he says, whether he even senses what lies ahead.

At 7am a dozen Trotskyists of the FER (Fédération des Etudiants Révolutionaires) turn up to sell their paper Revoltes. They wear large red and white buttons proclaiming their identity. A little later another group arrives to sell Voix Ouvriere. The loudspeaker immediately switches from an attack on the Gaullist government and its CRS to an attack on”‘provocateurs” and “disruptive elements, alien to the working class”. The Stalinist speaker hints that the sellers are in the pay of the government, As they are here, “the police must be lurking in the neighbourhood”. Heated arguments break out between sellers and CGT officials. The CFDT pickets are refused the use of the loudhailer. They shout “dèmocratie ouvriêre” and defend the right of the ‘disruptive elements’ to sell their stuff. A rather abstract right, as not a sheet is sold. The front page of Revoltes carries an esoteric article on Eastern Europe.

Much invective (but no blows) are exchanged. In the course of an argument I hear Bro. Trigon (delegate to the second electoral ‘college’ at Renault) describe Danny Cohn-Bandit as “un agent du pouvoir” (an agent of the authorities). A student takes him up on this point. The Trots don’t. Shortly before 8am they walk off, their ‘act of presence’ accomplished and duly recorded for history.

At about the same time, hundreds of workers who had entered the factory leave their shops and assemble in the sunshine in an open space a few hundred yards inside the main gate. From there they amble towards Ile Seguin, crossing one arm of the river Seine on the way. Other processions heave other points of the factory and converge on the same area. The metallic ceiling is nearly 200 feet above our heads, Enormous stocks of components are piled up high right and left. Far away to the right an assembly line is still working, lifting what looks like rear car seats, complete with attached springs, from the ground to first floor level.

Some 10,000 workers are soon assembled in the shed. The orators address them through a loudspeaker from a narrow platform some 40 feet up. The platform runs in front of what looks like an elevated inspection post but which I am told is a union office inside the factor. The CGT speaker deals with various sectional wage claims. He denounces the resistance of the government “in the hands of the monopolies”, He produces facts and figures dealing with the wage structure, Many highly skilled men are not getting enough. A CFDT speaker follows him. He deals with the steady speed-up, with the worsening of working conditions, with accidents and with the fate of man in production. “What kind of life is this? Are we always to remain puppets, carrying out every whim of the management?” He advocates uniform wage increases for all (‘augmentations non-hiérarchisées’), An FO speaker follows. He is technically the most competent, but says the least. In flowery rhetoric he talks of 1936, but omits all reference to Léon Blum. The record of FO is bad in the factory and the speaker is heckled from time to time, The CGT speakers then ask the workers to participate en masse in the big rally planned for that afternoon. As the last speaker finishes, the crowd spontaneously breaks out into a rousing ‘Internationale’, The older men seem to know most of the words. The younger workers only know the chorus. A friend nearby assures me that in 20 years this is the first time he has heard the song sung inside Renault (he has attended dozens of mass meetings in the lle Seguin). There is an atmosphere of excitement, particularly among the younger workers.

The crowd then breaks up into several sections. Some walk back over the bridge and out of the factory. Others proceed systematically through the shops where a few hundred blokes are still at work. Some of tees: men argue but most seem only too glad for an excuse to stop and join in the procession. Gangs weave their way, joking and singing, amid the giant presses and tanks. Those remaining at work are ironically cheered, clapped or exhaled to “step on it” or “work harder”. Occasional foremen look on helplessly, as One assembly line after another is brought to a halt.

Many of the lathes have coloured pictures plastered over them: pin-ups and green fields, sex and sunshine. Anyone still working is exhorted to get out into the daylight, not just to dream about it, in the main plant, over half a mile long, hardly 12 men remain in their overalls. Not an angry voice can be heard. There is much good humoured banter. By 1l am thousands of workers have poured out into the warmth of a morning in May. An open-air beer and sandwich stall, outside the gate, is doing a roaring trade.

[ciaossu-imagines]

For day 10 of the event, I used number 4 from prompt 13 for some of the guards from Nanbaka! It’s such fun to write for these guys and I hope you lovelies enjoy the headcanons!

Do they give out candy or do they eat it all themselves? Favourite candy?

Hajime and Hitoshi wouldn’t pass out candy if it was left up to Hajime. He gets so involved in his work and his little free time is spent on the few hobbies he has and he’s actually probably going to completely forget about Halloween up until he’s reminded by his brother or one of his co-workers. If it wasn’t for Hitoshi, there would be no candy for the trick or treaters. However, Hitoshi really enjoys Halloween, both for the chance to dress up in a cute costume and for the opportunity to see all the little kids in their costumes. Hitoshi makes sure that, if Hajime isn’t working, he helps pass out treats to the kids. Hajime is more likely to give the kids whose costumes he really likes more candy, though Hitoshi scolds him for doing so because all the kids are doing their best and deserve equal treatment.

Kiji doesn’t stay home on Halloween. If he’s not working and has Halloween off, then he’s out and about attending various Halloween parties and having fun on his own. He doesn’t even buy candy for himself because of the havoc it would cause for his skin.

Neither Kenshirou nor Samon celebrate Halloween, so they don’t pass out candy. Both men prefer to work on that day anyway, but if they don’t, then their neighbours have already learned well enough to not even bother with their houses. However, Samon will definitely take advantage of the Halloween sales on candy to pick up some that he’ll bring to the prison to munch on while he does paperwork. He also probably hands out some to the prisoners if they do really well in their training.

The Daisen brothers always argue about this every year. It’s very rare for them all to be working Halloween, and at least one brother will for sure pass out treats. The argument they have every year is always about what kind of treats they’ll be passing out. Youriki insists on handing out anything other than candy, as the most health conscious of the bunch. Kids love apples too, right? Why don’t they pass out apples? Meanwhile, Rokuriki and Kokoriki will argue with him until they’re blue in the face that kids deserve a treat every now and again. Kokoriki suggests canned juices while Rokuriki just wants to give the poor kids candy. They might end up in physical fight-fights over it. They end up giving out apples every year.

Yamato used to be fastidious about either him or his wife handing out candy. He really loves seeing all the kids in their costumes and is super friendly with them. However, as soon as he had a child of his own, making sure she gets to go out trick or treating is the top priority for both Yamato and his wife. It’s a little sad, because his house used to be the one absolutely all decked out for Halloween, with animatronics and blow up decorations and fake tombstones and anything else he could think of that the kids might love.

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

Pennsylvania’s Democratic-controlled House of Representatives approved a measure by a close vote Tuesday that would raise the minimum wage to $15 by 2026, fulfilling a long-held party campaign plank that has run up against Republican legislative majorities for years.

The bill passed 103-100 with all but one Democrat voting for it and two Republicans joining them. But it has an uncertain future in the Republican-controlled Senate as lawmakers and Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro increasingly focus on budget legislation ahead of the July 1 start of the new fiscal year.

Pennsylvania’s minimum wage is set at the federal minimum of $7.25, and last increased in 2009.

The measure would gradually increase the minimum wage to $15 by changing from $7.25 to $11 in its first year, then to $13 in 2025 and finally to $15 in 2026. The bill ties future increases to inflation, which sponsors say mirrors action taken by 15 other states.

The legislation would also increase the tipped wage to 60% of the minimum wage from the current $2.83 an hour. The movement comes after Democrats won a House majority for the first time in a dozen years, albeit by one seat.

It’s been a yearslong effort for Democrats, who have campaigned on increasing the minimum wage nationally.

Rep. Justin Fleming, a Dauphin County Democrat, said it was one of his priorities as a candidate. He recalled working for a former Democratic governor when the Legislature last increased the minimum wage.

“If you had told me that it would be 14 years before this body would take another stab to raise the minimum wage, I simply wouldn’t have believed it,” he said. “Passing this bill will keep workers who live close to our borders here in the state and patronizing Pennsylvania businesses.”

Republicans emphasized concerns for small businesses and rising costs associated with raising the wage.

“I cannot support a bill that would put a local family restaurant out of business and, along with it, the many employees who make a living at their three locations,” said Rep. Katie Klunk, a York County Republican.

For some Democrats, the effort didn’t extend far enough.

“An African proverb says, ‘When elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers,’” said Dauphin County Democratic Rep. Patty Kim. “Even if we raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour, the grass still suffers. I support this bill because this is a piece to a larger puzzle that will help working families.”

Shapiro campaigned last year for a $15 minimum wage and, in his first budget address, he asked for the increase. Republican opposition stymied efforts by former Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf through his eight years in office to raise the minimum wage.

Wolf imposed higher wage requirements on companies getting loans, grants or tax breaks from the state government through an executive order in 2021. He did the same to state contractors in 2016.

All told, 30 other states and Washington, D.C., have raised the minimum wage above the federal minimum, including some Republican-controlled states, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Every neighbor of Pennsylvania also has raised the minimum wage, although Ohio’s law exempts lower-earning businesses and employees under 16.

June is budget month in Pennsylvania’s Legislature and often a time for deal-making on pet policy priorities between governors and top lawmakers.

Senate Majority Leader Joe Pittman, R-Indiana, said last week that his caucus would wait for the House to pass a minimum wage bill to consider it. However, he said, “$15 an hour is not a practical number” for Republicans in that chamber to consider.

In a deal with Wolf in 2019, the Senate agreed to raise Pennsylvania’s minimum wage in four steps to $9.50 in 2022, but the House’s Republican majority blocked it.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Mike Luckovich

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

April 5, 2024

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

APR 06, 2024

Today offered yet more evidence that Biden’s rejection of the Republicans’ supply-side economics in favor of investing in ordinary Americans is paying off with high growth, low unemployment, and strong wages. 

Today’s jobs report from the U.S. Department of Labor for the month of March showed higher job growth than analysts anticipated. Instead of the 214,000 jobs expected, the U.S. added 303,000. The government also revised its estimate of job growth in January and February upward by a combined number of 22,000. President Joe Biden noted that this report meant that the administration had created more than 15 million jobs since he took office.

The unemployment rate was also good, dropping slightly to 3.8% in March. According to economist Steven Rattner of Morning Joe, the United States has now had 26 consecutive months—more than two years—of unemployment under 4%, the longest stretch of unemployment that low since the late 1960s. 

Rattner pointed out that immigrants have helped to push U.S. growth since the pandemic by adding millions of new workers to the labor market. As native-born workers have aged into retirement, immigrants have taken their places and “been essential to America’s post-COVID labor market recovery.” 

Heather Long of the Washington Post added that wage growth has been 4.1% in the past year, which is well above the 3.2% inflation rate.

“My plan is growing the economy from the middle out and the bottom up, investing in all Americans, and giving the middle class a fair shot,” Biden said in response to the new jobs report. That system, which resurrects the economy the United States enjoyed between 1933 and 1981, has been a roaring success. 

Biden was in Baltimore, Maryland, today, where he flew over the remains of the collapsed Francis Scott Key Bridge, spoke with the response teams there, and met with the families of those who died when the bridge fell. Apparently trying to demonstrate that government can be both efficient and effective, the administration has emphasized speed and competence in its response to the bridge collapse of March 26, 2024.

Kayla Tausche of CNN reported today that the U.S. Coast Guard was onsite within minutes of the collapse, and that Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg was working the phone as soon as he heard. He had spoken with Maryland governor Wes Moore, Baltimore mayor Brandon Scott, and White House chief of staff Jeff Zients by 5:00 a.m. Biden was briefed early that morning, before he began to reach out to state and local leaders. 

Baltimore County executive Johnny Olszewski told Tausche: “[Biden] demonstrated a clear understanding of the importance of the port, had a real empathy for myself and all the individuals impacted…. And he was unequivocal that he was going to do whatever he can, legally and within his power to expedite a response.”

The collapse of the bridge not only affected traffic around Baltimore, but also shut the Port of Baltimore. For 13 years, that port has led the nation in carrying cars and light trucks, as well as tractors and cranes, handling more than 847,000 vehicles in 2023. In that same year, the port handled more than 444,000 passengers and $80 billion worth of foreign cargo. The damage to the port is of national significance. 

Less than four hours after it received an official request for funding for repairs on March 29, the Department of Transportation authorized funds to begin to address immediate needs, which officials say is a record. The Army Corps of Engineers says it expects to restore a narrow navigation channel for use by the end of April and to have the port reopened fully by the end of May. Until then, the federal government is improving the infrastructure at nearby Sparrows Point to enable it to handle more ships. 

But the Republican Party remains committed to the idea that the government must be kept small and that private enterprise must be privileged over public investments. Today, the far-right House Freedom Caucus announced that it would not consider funding the bridge repairs until foreign shipping companies had paid in all they owe (Biden has called for funding the bridge immediately rather than waiting for insurance funds, which will come much later).  

They also say that they want the repairs to come out of money Congress has appropriated for other initiatives they dislike, that any new funds must be fully offset by other cuts, and that “burdensome regulations” such as labor agreements must be waived “to avoid all unnecessary delays and costs.” 

They are also demanding that Biden reverse the administration’s “pause on approvals of liquified natural gas export terminals” before Congress will consider any funding for the bridge reconstruction. In January, under pressure from climate activists, Biden paused the construction of such terminals. Liquid natural gas is a valuable export, but it is also made up primarily of methane, a greenhouse gas significantly worse for the planet than carbon dioxide. Oil and gas interests are strongly in favor of developing the liquid natural gas industry while ignoring its effects on climate change.

One of the proposed plants affected by the pause would have been the largest in the U.S. It is planned for Louisiana, the home state of House speaker Mike Johnson. Johnson has already tried to tie funding for Ukraine to lifting the pause on liquid natural gas export terminals, and the White House refused. Now, apparently, extremist Republicans are trying the same gambit with repairs to the Francis Scott Key Bridge and access to one of the nation’s most important ports, although slowing repairs at that key juncture will directly affect many of their constituents.  

Indeed, despite the solid demonstration that government support for ordinary Americans is the best way to build the economy, Republicans continue to maintain that the way to promote economic growth is to concentrate money among a few men at the top of the economic ladder. The idea is that those few people will invest their money more efficiently than the government can, and that the businesses they create will employ more and more workers. To that end, Republicans since 1981 have focused on tax cuts and deregulation in order to give those they see as job creators a free hand. 

That system, so-called “supply-side economics,” has never actually worked, but it has become an article of faith for Republicans. It is a system that is popular with the very wealthy, and Biden called that out today in a video he recorded with Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT).

In the video, the two men comment on a video clip in which former president Trump, speaking at a private event, promises wealthy donors another tax cut. Biden says: “That’s everything you need to know about Donald Trump. When he thinks the cameras aren’t on, he tells his rich friends, ‘We’re gonna give you tax cuts.’” 

Sanders chimes in: “Can anybody in America imagine that at a time of massive income and wealth inequality—billionaires are doing phenomenally well—that he’s going to give them huge tax breaks? And then at the same time, he’s going to cut Social Security, Medicare, and programs that our kids need….”

“That makes me mad as hell, quite frankly,” Biden says. “There are 1,000 billionaires in…this country. They pay an average of 8.2% [in] federal taxes. So…we have a plan: Asking his good buddies to begin to pay their fair share.”

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[allthebrazilianpolitics]

At the ILO, Lula advocates taxing the super-rich to pay for energy transition and create 'Global South's AI'

'Income concentration is so absurd that some people have their own space programs,' says the Brazilian president

The world has a record number of billionaires and, therefore, taxing the super-rich is the best alternative to financing the energy transition, particularly in developing countries. That’s the idea proposed by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (Workers’ Party) on Thursday (13) during his speech at the opening ceremony of the International Labor Organization (ILO) in Geneva, Switzerland, which focuses on social justice.

“We have never had so many billionaires before. Three thousand people have about USS$ 15 trillion. It surpasses the GDP of countries like Japan, the UK, Germany and India together, and is more than the estimated cost for developing countries to lead in a climate change scenario,” he stated.

“Income concentration is so absurd that some people have their own space programs. They are, certainly, trying to find a planet better than Earth, to avoid staying among the workers who build their wealth.”

Lula said that “We don’t need Mars; the Earth is our home,” highlighting, however, that “the planet can’t take it anymore.” The Brazilian president also said that COP30, to be held in November 2025 in the city of Belém, will be an opportunity for the world – which is used to voice opinions on Amazon – to “listen to what the Amazon has to say about itself.”

In addition to defending a global coalition against hunger and poverty and for the end of permanent seats at the ILO, Lula said that the world needs a “new social contract that places the human being at the center of public policies.” He also talked about the use – and dominance – of artificial intelligence tools.

“We need a Global South’s AI project,” the Brazilian politician said, stressing that these tools are the use of personal data by private companies. "Changing this situation is a revolutionary task,” he concluded.

Continue reading.

[ukrfeminism]

3 minute read

Daisy has only met her biological father twice. The first time, she was on a sleuthing mission to find his house where, with her heart pounding, she introduced herself on his doorstep: “I think I’m your daughter.”

The second was in court last summer, where she helped to ensure that Carvel Bennett, 75, was convicted for raping her mother more than 40 years earlier. Daisy’s mother was just 13 at the time.

Daisy, 47, a social worker whose surname cannot be used to protect her mother’s identity, fought for a decade to have the case investigated but was repeatedly told — including by police officers — that she was not a victim.

Now she has won the backing of the House of Commons justice committee for “Daisy’s Law”, which would see children born of rape treated as “secondary victims”, giving them official standing in the eyes of the law and enabling them to become complainants in criminal investigations. It would also potentially give them access to specialist support.

Harriet Wistrich, the director of the Centre for Women’s Justice, a legal charity which supported Daisy’s case, said: “This would enable them to be afforded rights afforded to victims in the Victim’s Code. It would also entitle them to access services provided for victims of crime.”

Daisy believes it could also mean that a prosecution could go ahead even if the mother has died.

As part of its scrutiny of the government’s Victims’ Bill, the committee argued that the bill and its victims’ code should “make specific reference to the inclusion of rights . . . of children born of rape”. She believes this would be a world first.

A recent report by the Centre for Women’s Justice estimated that between 2,080 and 3,356 babies were conceived through rape last year in England and Wales. Although exact statistics on the number of children born of rape are not available, Alison Thewliss, the Scottish National Party MP for Glasgow Central, told the House of Commons that 1,830 mothers had declared their children born of rape in official child benefit forms submitted to the Department for Work and Pensions in the past year.

Daisy was born in Birmingham and was separated from her birth mother after a week. She always knew that she was adopted. Aged 13, she was shown an official document with information about her birth parents: it listed her mother as 14 at the time of the birth and her father as more than a decade older.

Sex with a child under the age of 16 is statutory rape, although an adult has a defence if they reasonably believed — in cases where the child is aged 13 or over — that they were 16 or older at the time.

The document detailed Daisy’s mother’s interests at school. But when it came to her biological father, it described only his appearance.

“I used to sneak down and read this piece of paper because it was the one connection to this other world,” she recalled. “But I was worried about what had happened to my birth mother. It was a heavy burden.”

She was told more about her conception when she turned 18. “It wasn’t written ‘rape’, it was ‘sexual intercourse without consent’,” she said. “It was shocking, but then it also made sense.” Two years later she traced her birth mother, exchanging letters and photos before the pair met.

In her mid-twenties, Daisy asked her mother about her biological father in a letter. “That upset her. I asked if she had thought about prosecution, because I’m DNA evidence.” Initially her mother was not keen to proceed but in 2012, when cases of historic sexual abuse filled the newspapers, Daisy began thinking about it again. “I thought it was easy — I had records, and I am forensic evidence,” she said. “So surely they’ll bite my hand off in terms of a prosecution?”

She requested more information about her birth family and found an address for her father. Although the road was misspelled, Daisy managed to locate one with a similar name close to her mother’s childhood home.

In 2015 Daisy tracked down her father, recording the meeting with a buttonhole camera. “My heart was pounding. I’ve never sweated so much in my life,” she recalled. “When I said, ‘I think I’m your daughter’, he gave a sort of smile and invited me in.”

Daisy asked if he had sex with her birth mother, to which he replied: “Just because you have sex with somebody doesn’t mean you make a baby.” Daisy recalled feeling “physically sick” to notice a photo of his great-granddaughter in school uniform. Her motivation, she says, was the fear that there could be other victims: “He’s been a risk to children for over 40 years.”

She continued to lobby the police to investigate the case. Although the police still refused, her biological mother decided to make a statement in September 2019 and officers took Daisy’s DNA. Bennett was then arrested but pleaded not guilty. In court, Bennett claimed that he had not known Daisy’s mother was under 16 and said that she had instigated sex. The judge, Martin Hurst, called this assertion “ridiculous”.

“It was the first time I’ve ever been in a room with both my genetic parents,” said Daisy. “Watching my birth mother’s evidence was horrific.”

As she was not considered a victim, Daisy was not given any special consideration during the case and was initially told that there might not be space for her in the courtroom. She had to ask the judge for her victim impact statement to be read out, in which she said: “You’ll never truly understand the devastating impact your act of rape . . . has had on two children and the lifelong implications this has had on us both as adults.”

Bennett was found guilty at Birmingham crown court in August last year, and handed an 11-year jail sentence. “A pregnancy as a result of rape means extra time; I was an ‘aggravated factor’,” Daisy said. “I’m the living embodiment of male violence — I wouldn’t be here unless a man had raped a child.”

She says she had hoped not to have to involve her mother. “We know what the court system is like for rape victims; why would she want to re-traumatise herself? She did enough as a child: she disclosed that information, including to police. I wanted to see if I could do an evidence-based victim’s prosecution or even be seen as the victim myself. The law requires me to be treated as a victim to get justice.”

Daisy said that even among those campaigning to end violence against women, children born of rape remain a taboo — in part, she believes, because it gets linked to the abortion debate. “I’m pro-choice,” she said. “I’m not talking about foetuses, I’m talking about born children.” She hopes that Daisy’s Law can break down some of the stigma around the issue.

Daisy hopes to win the support of MPs for Daisy’s Law at a planned event next month. Years of campaigning took a toll on her mental health but she hopes that if the government takes up the justice committee’s recommendations, it could ensure that other children born of rape do not face the same barriers to justice.

“People say ‘child sexual abuse, it’s a pandemic’ — that feels like a platitude,” she said. “What are you doing about it?” Only 1.3 per cent of reported rapes result in a charge. “We need to use every part of the law. My birth father was one of them — and I nearly lost my mind fighting for justice.”

Dame Rachel de Souza, the children’s commissioner, said: “I hope that legal recognition will help to dispel the stigma and shame which is often felt acutely, but silently, by mothers and children born through sexual violence.”

[anniekoh]

Silicon Valley, despite being a supposed hub of innovation, one separated from the garish demands of regular industries, has culturally grown to resemble an open-air private equity firm where companies are incubated like animals bred for slaughter.

While I’m not saying the Valley is entirely bereft of innovation, the modern tech ecosystem has become an alternative asset market built to enrich the very same people it once claimed to reject. Fred Wilson, the co-founder of Union Square Ventures, said in 2016 that startups that took corporate money were “doing business with the devil,” yet the only remaining difference between the current state of venture capital and private equity appears to be how willing they are to say the quiet part (“we need to make money off of this investment”) out loud. 

Silicon Valley’s key differentiator was that it was theoretically the place where venture capital took risks on interesting and innovative technology, yet the best-funded startups remain siloed in whatever industry venture capital believes will be “big,” even if they haven’t got any true path to profitability.

It may also be a result of the different incentives that bring people to the Bay Area and the tech industry in general. A decade ago, engineers made an average base salary of $92,648 versus $139,729 in 2023. The software industry has created 82 new billionaires since 2010, and the 2019 tech IPO rush created an estimated 5000 new millionaires across eight tech companies. In 2013, there were 39 unicorns (tech companies worth a billion dollars or more). According to CBInsights, there are now over a thousand of them. And because Andreessen and his fellow venture stooges forced so many lossy, unprofitable companies to go public, many of them are underwater (and they have been for some time), with the top 50 Tech IPOs since 2020 losing 59% of their market capitalization as of May 13 2023.

As a result, the Valley is left with the avaricious culture of the finance industry without any of the stability. Venture capital’s elite turned startups into alternative investments, fattened them up to sell, and, when the market dropped out in 2022 and 2023, shrugged their shoulders and blamed the workers. They, along with tech’s leaders, derided a culture of “entitlement” that they themselves created. Oh, workers want food at the office? They want a gym? They want a place to nap? Then why didn’t you fucking complain when companies started offering this shit back in 2015?

Because tech’s elite hates labor, and hoarding talent was a necessity to pump valuations. The tech industry — by which I mean the Valley’s powerful venture arm — spent a decade convincing software engineers that they were an elevated class, promising them the world and oftentimes delivering it without requiring them to build something that improved the world in any way. And the second the party ended — the moment that the economy stopped endlessly providing growth to every single company in the market, and when money stopped being free — tech was ready to eject tens of thousands of workers, and tech’s venture capitalists were ready to stop signing checks and start requiring “hard numbers” for the first time in years.

And the problem with an industry that is led and powered by venture capital is that it doesn’t build any real culture. “Startup culture” is a vague shibboleth that exists to justify labor abuse in exchange for a theoretical massive payday in the future, with the hollow premise that there is something more noble about writing code or “working at an early-stage company” than there is any other job. While there are people doing cool, weird or societally-beneficial shit, they are endlessly drowned out by a combination of founders trying to build “the next big thing,” with “big” referring to how much they can sell it for, and “thing” being “whatever is going to sell to someone.”

[beardedmrbean]

MADRID (AP) — The Spanish parliament on Thursday approved legislation expanding abortion and transgender rights for teenagers, while making Spain the first country in Europe that will entitle workers to paid menstrual leave.

The driving force behind the two laws was Equality Minister Irene Montero, who belongs to the junior member in Spain’s left-wing coalition government, the “United We Can” Party.

The changes to sexual and reproductive rights mean that 16- and 17-year-olds in Spain can now undergo an abortion without parental consent. Period products will now be offered free in schools and prisons, while state-run health centers will do the same with hormonal contraceptives and the morning after pill. The menstrual leave measure allows workers suffering debilitating period pain to take paid time off.

In addition, the changes enshrine in law the right to have an abortion in a state hospital. Currently more than 80% of termination procedures in Spain are carried out in private clinics due to a high number of doctors in the public system who refuse to perform them — with many citing religious reasons.

Under the new system, state hospital doctors won’t be forced to carry out abortions, provided they’ve already registered their objections in writing.

The abortion law builds on legislation passed in 2010 that represented a major shift for a traditionally Catholic country, transforming Spain into one of the most progressive countries in Europe on reproductive rights. Spain’s constitutional court last week rejected a challenge by the right-wing Popular Party against allowing abortions in the first 14 weeks of pregnancy.

A separate package of reforms also approved by lawmakers on Thursday strengthened transgender rights, including allowing any citizen over 16 years old to change their legally registered gender without medical supervision.

Minors between 12-13 years old will need a judge’s authorization to change, while those between 14 and 16 must be accompanied by their parents or legal guardians.

Previously, transgender people needed a diagnosis by several doctors of gender dysphoria. The second law also bans so-called “conversion therapy" for LGBTQ people and provides state support for lesbians and single women seeking IVF treatment.

The center-left coalition government is currently under fire for another of Montero’s star projects, a new sexual consent law that was intended to increase protection against rape but has inadvertently allowed hundreds of sex offenders to have prison sentences reduced.

The “Only Yes Means Yes” Law makes verbal consent the key component in cases of alleged sexual assault. The government is now struggling to come up with an amended version and end the controversy ahead of elections later this year.

The three initiatives have met strong opposition from the right-wing parties that form Spain’s main opposition bloc.

[thisselflovecamebacktome]

Things I Learned About Hotels By Working In A Hotel That I Wish Others Knew; AKA, Why You Need To Be Nicer To Hotel Workers:

I’ve been wanting to make this post for at least a year now, but this post has really pushed me to do it, so I definitely recommend reblogging that too because while I will avoid covering the same ground, I definitely 100% agree with it all.

Last year, I worked as a hotel receptionist for around eight months and it may sound dramatic, but it has completely changed how I look at travelling and staying in hotels. I will also note that the hotel I worked in was relatively small and open less hours of the day (especially during covid lockdowns) than most hotels, but most of these experiences are ones other hotel receptionists I’ve spoken to, both within Australia and internationally, have confirmed they have also experienced. So with that in mind, these are the main things I wish customers knew.

1. Hotels partake in a specific kind of exploitative capitalism that I have not experienced in any other job over my 13 years or so of working. This relates to not only how they treat their workers, but customers too. This will be an overriding theme and arguably the thread pulling everything else I say here together.

2. It does not matter if you’re planning to pay cash on the day, reception still need your card details. People claiming that they’ll pay cash on the day just to not show up, or worse yet, be let in by central without them checking that the guest has paid happens more than you’d think and it’s the receptionist’s head on the chopping block if the hotel doesn’t have a card to attempt to get payment from. With this in mind, do not give them your personal card if you wish to pay on your business card, or at absolute least, tell them that you are going to call back and give them your business card details at a later time if you do not have access to it yet so that they can make a note, because ultimately the card you give is the card getting charged. Also, make sure you explicitly say that you want to pay cash on the day if that is the case, otherwise your card will be charged.

3. If you book through a 3rd party, any cancellations/refunds, changes or complaints about price need to go through them, not the hotel. It is incredibly rare that a 3rd party will give a hotel your card information (typically only happens if the hotel calls them because payment hasn’t gone through), so no, a hotel cannot do anything about the fact that Agoda charged you more than the hotel’s sale price or if you accidentally ordered a twin room instead of a family room through Trivago. What they can do in some cases is extras. So if you order a twin room and need to pay for a cot to be put in the room, you can call them and they can take the card details to charge for the cot and nothing else.

4. Hotel workers know if you are lying to them. Every conversation you have with another worker at the front desk (whether it be housekeeping, reception or the boss) is recorded with video footage and has notes left for the other staff. Do not tell them that Becky who worked yesterday promised you a refund or to change rooms or to hold a room for you if they did not because it only takes one look in our notes to see that Becky has noted that the boss said no. Likewise, all VIP status guests have indicators in their booking to say they are as such and don’t ‘always have the same room!’ and to say as such is not only entitled but a tell-tale sign that you are lying. Likewise, ALL bookings receive confirmation emails with a booking name, customer contact (usually phone number AND email, but if it’s 3rd party, it may just be the number) and at least one booking number on it. There is 0 point telling them you have a booking if you don’t.

5. Deliberate same day bookings are a pain. Look, obviously things happen where cars break down or your house floods or whatever and you suddenly need a room you didn’t think you would. That’s annoying but ultimately fine, I’m not talking about you guys. But if you have known for the better part of a year that you’re coming to a concert or visit family but only book your room on the day, know that you are making the receptionist’s job harder for no reason. This goes doubly as hard if you come in after housekeeping has left, triply as hard if you come in within the hour that the hotel closes, because chances are they’ve already done finances for the day and now have to redo them, and quadly so if you’re coming in as the receptionist is walking out at the end of their shift for the night.

6. Preferences are just that: preferences. If you ask for a specific room or a specific floor, that does not automatically mean that you will get it. It means that the hotel will do the best it can to put you in that room/on that floor it it is available when they designate rooms (usually the afternoon before you come). And no, being older or in a wheelchair or having a pram with a baby in it does not change that. Most if not all hotels have ramps and/or elevators for you to get to each floor. That does not mean that you should not ask for it or that the staff will not try to put you in the next closest thing to what you want should your preference not be available, but a hotel is not going to kick out somebody else who is midway through their stay just for you to get a room one door closer, especially given both of you may have requested it. Also, accessible rooms and “regular” rooms are not interchangeable. If you have been put in a “regular” room or vice versa, it is because you booked that.

7. Just because you received a free upgrade last time you came, does not mean that you are always entitled to one. Sometimes if you are lucky, a hotel will overbook the type of room you are in but will have some more expensive rooms available, leading to you to receive a free upgrade. This is done at random and I have only ever had it happen to me once; earlier this year where my friend and I got a seaside view we did not pay for. A hotel will likely not tell you that you’ve been upgraded, especially for that reason, but if the room is different/has more amenities than you paid for, chances are that’s what happened. But like I said, it is somewhat a rarity, and even rarer to happen to happen to the same person multiple times unless you have some kind of deal with the hotel. So coming downstairs stomping your feet around and yelling when you get exactly what you paid for the second time is not going to get you an upgrade. If you want to be guaranteed to be in the the more expensive room, you are going to have to pay for it.

8. If you book a room at a pet friendly hotel, do not be surprised that other pets are also at the hotel. Listen this should be a given, but you’d be surprised how many people brought their dogs to the hotel and then somehow got surprised and started bitching at the idea that someone else had their pet there and demand new rooms because of it only to lose their shit when finding out that all the rooms are pet friendly.

9. Hotels do not control the businesses around them. Yes I understand that the 24/7 McDonalds speaker next door and the road on the other side is loud. Yes I understand that the smoke from the pub on the last side and the fact that their patrons use up most the parking the hotel shares with them is a pain. No, there is literally nothing the hotel staff can do about it. These things are noted on the website and something you should have looked into before ordering the room.

10. It does not matter if you only use the room for an hour or half a day, you will be charged a full night’s accommodation. Housekeeping is not in all day and the minute you check in, that room is no longer usable if the head of housekeeping isn’t there to mark it as clean, even if you do not touch a single thing in the room. So no, it does not matter if you’re using the room for a conference or a quickie and not staying there the night, you are getting charged the full rate. Same goes if you show up at 4am and barely sleep in it or decide not to show up at all.

11. Early check ins/late check outs (especially ones that are free and/or without notice) are a big deal. Room selections are usually done the day before you show up and are often done with early check ins/late check outs in mind for the customers in the room before you, you and the ones after you. So if you don’t give hotels that notice and reception allow it anyway, especially for free and especially when it’s busy, they have done you a massive favour, even if it’s not as early/late as you would have liked. Like at the hotel I worked at, I was meant to charge an extra $10 for every hour extra a customer spent in the room and an extra night’s worth if they were not out by 1pm. Instead, because my boss wasn’t around to know the difference, I usually left it up to housekeeping and if they thought they could do it, just allowed people to stay the extra for free. So yeah, keep this in mind next time you ask for extra time, do not return this kindness with rudeness about how you want more time and do not be deliberately late out of the room the next day. Because chances are at least one staff member has put their neck on the line for you.

In saying that, it also means that if the hotel says no, that genuinely means that they are too busy to do so and nothing personal. What they will likely do instead if you ask is hold onto your luggage which you can either come and pick up or, specifically for early check ins, give permission to be put in your room once it is ready to go. Legitimately though, just tell them when you make the booking or as soon as you know and avoid the potential disappointment and making their staff’s job harder.

12. The boss matters. I am not saying this in a ‘their opinion trumps all’ way, I am saying it in both your experience as a customer and the staff’s as workers is nearly 100% up to the boss. At the hotel I worked at, the boss I had for 99% of my time there not only refused to let me do things I knew how to do and could easily do with little disruption to my day without permission (yes, refunds included in case you’re wondering), but he was also never around and barely answered calls when workers were calling with emergencies or to ask permission to do the thing. Again, it is the receptionist’s head on the chopping block if they do it without permission, so keep that in mind next time you yell at them for not doing something straight away. Like trust me, most receptionists would rather just do it and get it done with. That boss would also literally just chuck out any complaints.

Alternatively, the boss I got in my final few weeks there not only read and acted on the complaints, but listened to the workers and allowed me to act and just let him know what I’ve done. Not only did my day go smoother, but there was an obvious change in attitude from guests.

13. The staff are trying their best. A lot of this goes alongside the above about the boss making a difference, but a large majority of the time, if something wasn’t done properly, chances are it was an accidental oversight from it being busy OR, and more likely to be completely honest, the boss has not given their workers the tools to do the job properly. The main example of this I can think of at my hotel is my boss refusing to upgrade/replace anything AND giving housekeeping cheap cleaning products he knew did not work. So yes, they understand it’s horrific that the couches in the rooms are beyond use or that the carpet has a stain on it. There’s not much they can do about it. Also, them giving you the boss’ and/or the health inspector’s contact details is not them trying to put more work onto you personally, it is them hoping that someone will listen to you because management sure as hell hasn’t listened to them for the months on end they’ve brought it up.

Likewise, if you claim to have lost something in the room and reception/housekeeping does not find it, it is not that the hotel has stolen it and your racist and assuming remarks about which member of staff stole it make you an asshole. Like no one wants your half used lipstick Karen, especially during a pandemic.

But also just in general, while I do not have many positive experiences with the hotel I worked at, the people who worked at my level (so maintenance, housekeeping and the other receptionists) were genuinely the nicest and best people I have ever worked with and would do anything to help myself and the guests when asked respectfully. We all understood that it was a group effort and for one section to do their job well and/or for the customer to be happy, every section has to do well. And like genuinely, that goes both ways. Like the more organised and willing to help a customer is, the easier it is to make you happy. So like genuinely, next time you travel if you could do something as small as making sure your rubbish is in the bin rather than across the room/in the sink or making sure any pillows you don’t use and the remote are put back when you leave, that makes a world of difference for the staff and future customers.

14. Most hotels only have one, maybe two receptionists working at a time. As a result, not only was overtime a near daily experience, but a lot of hotels will conduct in illegal (at least by Australian law) activity and will ‘require’ receptionists to sign out for breaks so that they will not be pulled up, but still be present at the desk and work. I have legitimately done 15 hour shifts with barely the chance to have the occasional sip of water let alone eat/have a proper break, and that is common from what I have heard from others in the field. Also, due to understaffing, one of these shifts was before I even finished my training.

It also means that during busy times, yes, chances are that phone calls are going to be missed and that the best way to contact them is by sending an email. The only exception to this is if you are making a booking because they have to take your card details and obviously it is not appropriate to send those via email.

15. The receptionist is not just a receptionist. Cleaning and maintenance services are not available 24/7. At the hotel I worked at, reception closed at 8pm (with a number being left for the 24/7 hotels of the same franchise for cases of emergency) while the cleaners finished any time between 1pm and 6pm depending on how busy things were and maintenance always finishing at 4:30pm. If you have a problem with the cleanliness or functionality of something after those times, it is the one receptionist working there that has to fix it, and honestly? Most the time even if you have an issue within the times that maintenance is working, they’ll send the receptionist to check it out first because they have to come in from elsewhere (whether it be another hotel in the franchise or their office because they’re contractors, not specific hotel employees). Likewise, if housekeeping is having a busy day, the receptionist will often have to help them with cleaning duties to make sure that your job runs smoothly. This goes doubly hard in a lockdown/pandemic because oftentimes the hotel will not have the cleaners and maintenance come in and instead just leave it all to reception. It should also be noted that most hotels do not train receptionists for this. Like the only training I got was how to split/make the beds and where the bins were to take the rubbish out. But that didn’t change that I still had to do the lot.

16. Most hotels do not have on site security. When I said that receptionists pretty much have to do everything at a hotel because often they’re the only ones there, I meant it. The hotel I worked in had contractor security which meant that if there was a threat, I had to somehow talk my way into going to the back, pressing a button there, wait for security to call and then when I didn’t pick up, waiting half an hour for them to show up from their office across town. Given most issues happened at night, it was literally just me and the guests there, making me the barrier of protection to make sure no one got hurt while also being ordered to do what I could to not allow the hotel to endure any losses through theft/lawsuits etc.

During covid, it also meant that reception were the ones enforcing any mandates, which admittedly I felt was much harder emotionally than when I worked retail because while people from my city were nearly all very pro mask/vaccine, the other states of Australia had more mixed views, sometimes violently so, and it was those citizens I was mostly dealing with.

People also get much angrier at the idea of the cost and availability of rooms than you’d imagine.

17. Hotel reception is often thankless and soul sucking. That 15 hour shift I said I did during my training earlier on? I broke down into tears swearing up and down that I was going to quit the next day because the day had been that horrible. Though it was the first time I had ever reached that point in a job, it was far from last, nearly all of which were only at the hotel. It was by far the worst job I’ve ever worked and the one with the worst mannered customers and management. Like in my whole time there, I can only ever remember receiving thank yous from the coworkers at my level; unlike every other job I’ve worked where at very least, most customers and management gave the consistent verbal thank you. And it was made all the worse knowing that so many of the issues, both customer and management related could have been so easily fixed (and mostly were when they changed management, unfortunately by then it was just too late as I had another job lined up), but entitlement and capitalism got in the way. 

But even without the customers and specific management, hotel reception is very much a profession where you have to leave morality at the door. Like the amount of homeless or otherwise down on their luck people, even those just a few dollars short, I had to turn away on the off chance that the hotel could sell that room (when in reality, there were nights during the pandemic lockdown where had 50+ rooms spare so were never going to sell that much) still haunts me; as does knowing how much the hotel charged people with bad timing who legally could not leave the state due to snap lockdowns/restrictions despite the fact the hotel wasn’t giving them half of the services they originally paid for. Not to mention all of the means that hotel managers go to to avoid giving credit let alone refunds, even to people trying to do the right thing and stay home during the unexpected height of the virus or the fact the hotel charged by how busy the hotel was so at times I was charging people $700AUD+ for a room I wouldn’t even spend $100AUD on if I was going away. Or even how the hotel would knowingly take full payments from people they know didn’t show up rather than calling them to double check and offering even a partial refund.

And all of that for what? To get yelled at and spat on by customers who don’t want to follow the law? To get scapegoated by management when they didn’t want to fix things? And all for just above minimum wage? It is honestly a black hole of a job where you stare into the void and pretty much never get anything back in return, and ultimately, it’s not worth it.

So if you are travelling any time in the future, even if you cannot do anything else, please do the absolute minimum and remain kind and even say thank you to the hotel workers. You will absolutely make their day.

[howwelldoyouknowyourmoon]

The mother of Abe Shinzo’s assassin was financially exploited [now confirmed by the Unification Church to be them]

▲ Shinzo Abe at a UPF (Moonie front org) event in 2022

EDIT: As of July 9, 2022, Gendai Business has confirmed that the suspect's mother was a Unification Church member.

EDIT: As of July 11, 2022, Unification Church says Abe shooter's mother is follower  LINK

NHK has reported that Tetsuya Yamagami, the man who shot and murdered Shinzo Abe, had a grudge against a certain organization and believed that Abe had connections to it. He has told police that his mother joined this group and donated a large amount of money, which ruined their family's life.

The name of the religion is not being made public yet by the police, though some of the Japanese media have named the Unification Church. ... Some members have confirmed that Yamagami’s mother attended the Nara Church, which is currently closed and dealing with reporters. Hyung Jin Moon, son of Sun Myung Moon and leader of the schismatic Sanctuary Church (Rod of Iron Ministries), is currently agitating followers on a tour through Japanese cities. He was in Nara last week. 

The suspect has revealed the name of the group to police, and stated his original intention was to murder an official of the group. The targeted official also has not been publicly named. 

In a video of the event, you can see Yamagami looking to the left and right of Abe. He may have been looking for the official then.

There is speculation that this murder was motivated by the financial exploitation of the Unification Church, though there is good reason to also suspect Soka Gokkai, as they have their own political party Komeito, which is in coalition with Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party, and are also known to make millions of dollars from their membership.

The local UC is at the same station where the murder occurred. The next closest UC churches are at least an hour away by train.

It is well known in Japan that Abe’s grandfather had a strong relationship with the Unification Church. The Church’s headquarters in Tokyo was on property owned by Kishi, next door to his residence. Kishi often would see members cleaning up the neighborhood, and hearing them pray and sing. He would speak to young members and vocally support the UC’s anti-communist activities.

Shinzo Abe has maintained this relationship with the UC in order to secure votes, as UC members are known to actively vote and be willing to campaign and mobilize. (Soka Gokkai is known to mobilize their members as well.)

Shinzo Abe has addressed several church-affiliated events the past few years, including the September 12, 2021 Rally of Hope and the February 13, 2022 World Summit. Abe’s relationship with the UC has existed since at least his first cabinet.

▲ Nobusuke Kishi and Mr Kuboki at the UC headquarters in Tokyo

On the UC’s relationship with Kishi and the LDP:

By the early 1970s, a number of LDP politicians were using Unification Church members as campaign workers. While the politicians were required to pledge to visit the Church’s headquarters in Korea and receive Reverend Moon’s lectures on theology, it did not matter whether they were members of the Church. Actual Church members – so-called “Moonies” – were sent by the Federation to serve without compensation as industrious and highly valued campaign workers.

In return, for many years the Church enjoyed protection from prosecution by Japanese authorities for their often fraudulent and aggressive sales and conversion tactics.

. . . 

A list prepared by the Japan Communist Party of 126 LDP and DSP politicians who used “volunteers” from the Federation for Victory over Communism to staff their campaigns includes Ozawa Ichiro, Hashimoto Ryutaro, and other senior party leaders. In the 1990 general election, the Unification Church announced that it had provided financial and campaign support to more than one hundred Japanese Diet members.

As a measure of the influence Moon enjoyed in Japan, in 1992 the government gave him special permission to enter the country even though Japanese law forbids entry to a foreign national who has served more than year in jail. Moon had served eighteen months in U.S. jail for tax evasion and had been barred from entering Japan on these grounds for nearly a decade. In March 1992, Kanemaru Shin, vice president of the LDP and the head of the largest faction within the party, intervened on Moon’s behalf with the Minister of Justice.

Updated on Saturday, July 9, 2022

How Moon bought protection in Japan (on Moon's connections to Kishi and organized crime) Three Moon girls woo Prime Minister Kishi of Japan The Mystical, Occult Underbelly of South Korea’s Fascism

After Tetsuya Yamagami’s mother was recruited into the Unification Church her three children had nothing to eat. The Unification Church / Family Federation for World Peace and Unification had taken everything, with no regard for the well-being of the family. Tetsuya Yamagami was a teenager when his mother was recruited.

Atsuko Hong: Another Japanese Member Who Murdered a UC Leader Over  Fraud Violent Direct Action in the Unification Church

Shocking video of UC of Japan leader demanding money

Moon extracted $500 million from Japanese female members Behind the Bastards podcast: Part One: The Moonies Are So Much Worse Than You Could Possibly Imagine Part Two: The Moonies Are So Much Worse Than You Could Possibly Imagine

[hkandiu]

A challenge for me, a gift for you! 🎄

Hello everyone! While I do have a bunch of stories for December I'm finishing, I wanted to give myself a fun holiday challenge again - to give you a gift! I’m looking for this to be in the Naruto world like last year, but expanding this year to also include Stucky in Marvel, and Superbat in DC! (Those are my strongest pairings in those two fandoms, but other secondary characters/pairings are welcomed too!)

The challenge for me is that I'll basically stick to like 1-2 hours to write it/maybe stay under 4k because lordy knows I can write veerrry long ones!

Ratings won't be higher than T and no adults will be romantically matched with children. All will be posted to ao3 in one multi-chaptered story, and I'll let you know what chapter yours is etc.

So, if you're game, send me a message in my ask box or in reply to this post with a pairing (or more) or one or more characters (if you want gen/platonic) and one or more of the prompt numbers below (some kept from last year, others are new), and I'll whip up a short story in December/January! Anonymous requests welcomed too! Big thanks to those of you who did this last year, I really appreciate it!

Prompts: Also feel free to specify if you want a type of AU, version of the characters (specific portrayal of Superman/Batman or perhaps Captain America/modern Bucky?) and any other info or details you'd like to share for it

1  Disaster date

2  "You're scared of that??"

3  Secret Santa

4  "Who needs a party when we have each other?"

5  Fur-ever family/pets (adoption or current pets)

6  Fake dating (not fake forever, wink wink...)

7  Rainy day

8  “That's it, I quit!"

9  “Nothing shocks me anymore...”

10 "Should we follow them?"

11 Teamwork

12 "Your taste in [insert] is terrible"

13 Call the medic!

14 Roommates

15 Decorating for the holidays

16 Co-workers meddle

17 At least one is drunk

18 “I never said that!”

19 Shouting match

20 Secrets

21 Mistletoe

22 Matching outfits

23 Drunk confessions

24 Someone is scolding someone

25 Pajamas

26 "Good thing we didn't do that..."

27 No sleep

28 They keep running into each other

29 “We never agree on anything!

30 “A cup of coffee/tea/water etc would be nice.”

31 "Would falling in love with me be so terrible?"

32 Sick and over it all

33 Person C gets involved for Persons A and B because they sure won't/can't do it for themselves!

34 Someone gets locked out and asks to spend the night at someone else's place

35 "You know what? The feeling is mutual."

36 Clutter

37 Memories

38 A second chance (or third, or fourth, or...?)

39 Video games

Feel free to ask questions too! Thanks for reading! 🍥