#and one where someone basically summarized harry potter

[mountainyodeler]

we need to start settling fandom debates about characters' morally questionable decisions by posting them as simplified situations on AITA and letting unassuming redditors make the judgement

[mayakern]

If you don't mind sharing, what happened to vanetta's ex Edmund and his new saintess gf?

oh boy, so, a LOT has happened here so BUCKLE UP.

(and here’s a picture of vanetta for context for the maybe 2 other ppl who will read this huge post, which i have tried to summarize)

TLDR: after vanetta “died” and was yeeted into time travel, edmund died and charlotte saved the world. but edmund got brought back… and he came back wrong.

but the full story is so much weirder than that:

the core conceit of this game is that we are time (and place) hopping every time the party levels up, and mostly this is pretty normal—someone who’s from an ancient time visits a future date and finds out their country no longer exists, someone from the future goes to an earlier time and is shocked by the severely lacking technology, etc etc

except for vanetta, who is not from the past or future. she is from a book series. and she has JUST discovered this.

our most recent time hop has taken us to a dystopian capitalist future that takes place in a big mall in outer space (think a combination of tron, zenon: girl of the 21st century, wall-e and other similar media), where our wizard comes from.

and as soon as we materialize there, vanetta is recognized as a “really high quality and authentic cosplayer” of, well. herself. the book series she is from (the briar path) is popular on a level that basically combines twilight, harry potter and the bible all in one. it is fantastically popular, but also pretty old, and also is continually getting remakes and re-releases and right now they are currently making a manga adaptation of it. and it has a very active fanbase that writes a lot of fan fiction. this is, somehow, incredibly plot relevant.

an npc shows vanetta the comic, which currently i think covers 2 of the books in the series, and it shows her being depicted as basically your typical shallow, unsympathetic villainess character. and it depicts her death: the moment when, on the ramparts of the palace she was meant to preside over, she is faced with an angry mob seeking her death on one side and the crown prince (edmund, her former fiance) and charlotte (the saintess, his new woman, who in the fiction of the book was isekai’d into the world of the briar path) on the other side. vanetta climbs onto the rampart and makes a big impassioned speech (aka a villain monologue) about how pathetic and horrible they all are and when charlotte makes a swipe at her, vanetta chooses to let it unbalance her, forcing charlotte to live on with the guilt of her death.

only, the real vanetta doesn’t die. she gets yeeted out of time and space with three other time travelers. and our story continues

anyway, back to present day, the manga adaptation has just reached the part of the series where edmund dies—something vanetta did not know about. but just because he died in the book doesn’t mean he died in real life.

see, edmund had some pretty devoted fans. and one of them, who thought edmund was robbed by the narrative, got into some ancient, evil magics and combining this with the immense power of FAN FICTION, he tried to bring edmund out of the novel and into real life, and in the process ended up fusing with him and also with a force called The Hunger, a roiling miasma of despair that was the ultimate evil in the novels.

and so they all fused together and became a new thing. a god. in fact, our yuan-ti paladin’s snake god. who uhh subjugates and eats all non-snake people. the creation of this god also uhh was a huge cataclysm that basically started the earth apocalypse that lead to everyone ending up in the sky.

vanetta has JUST managed to secure annotated copies of the entire series that include academic commentaries and notes on historical context and the first chance she gets she is reading them so hopefully i’ll get more info soon lol

[nobodyknowstrouble]

ok so i watched Timecut and I'm so confused what exactly the timeline with the murders is supposed to be.

(Spoilers)

So possibility 1:

Did Quinn after the River incident decide to murder everyone and then either quickly build the timemachine or already have it handy and then everything just happened chronologically? Like River inicent -> Murder 1 -> Murder 2 -> (he tries to give Summer the letter) -> Murder 3 -> time-travels away to whereever to not get caught

But that doesn't really make sense because 1) why would he give Summer that letter after already revenge-murdering all her friends? and 2) murder-Quinn said Summer told him she would never be able to love him like that. Which didn't happen in the original-timeline we saw. Quinn tried to give Summer the letter but that other guy pulled her away before he even had the opportunity to and we see everything Summer does from then on and she gets murdered like ten minutes later so it's not like it could have happened off-screen. and most glaringly 3) how would murder-Quinn even know any time travel rules since he just got started and when exactly did he time travel and where to and when does Lucy get involved and nothing about this makes sense. So this is probably not what happened.

So (more likely) possibility 2:

Did Quinn after the River inicent make the whole plan to years later travel back in time and murder everyone?

So what would have happened is River incident -> spends years building the Timemachine -> travels back (probably from 2023 for consistency purposes, from a timeline where Summer and everyone was alive and Lucy never existed) -> Murders 1&2 happen -> (2003-Quinn tries to give Summer the letter but doesn't get the opportunity to so what even is up with him in the alternate future (=Lucy's timeline) that would have created because it seemingly isn't the one murder-Quinn remembers, because he said he got rejected verbally) -> new timeline is created where Lucy exists -> this causes Lucy to travel back in time and prevent (some of) the murders.

So that would mean that Lucy's timeline was already a timetravel altered timeline and before Quinn timetraveled there was a Lucy-less, murderless timeline with a bitter Quinn.

But what was the time machine doing in that barn then? Like it can't just have been standing there since 2003 because someone would have noticed it. And it can't have just been left over from murder-Quinn traveling back because that wouldn't have happened in Lucy's timeline, because if the murders had already happened in her timeline Lucy-timeline-Quinn therefore wouldn't have any need to travel back in time and make them happen.

So to summarize, there's a third timeline we never get to see where murder-Quinn came from, but then how tf did Lucy herself timetravel?

possibility 3:

Quinn created a timeloop

so he planned the murders -> build the time machine -> travels back in time from 2023 to 2003 -> murders everyone (while this timelines 2003-Quinn pretty much knows what's happening because he's already planning to do the same thing) -> 2003-Quinn lives in a timeline where the murders happen -> still builds the time machine -> travels back to make the murders happen again = so time loop, basically harry potter time-turner rules.

But again, that's not consistent because murder-Quinn should still remember the timeline where he never had the opportunity to give Summer the letter instead of getting rejected like he said. because the timeline where no murders ever happened never existed because it's a timeloop. So everything that happens while time travelling actually already happened and all he does is ensure it happens again.

Except if it's a mixture between 2 & 3 i guess, where it's not really a loop and still kind of linear.

so possibilty 4 i guess:

plans murder -> builds machine -> lives in time where no one died -> travels back -> murders -> but then either murder-Quinn would have to wait around to create the loop himself or Lucy-original-timeline-Quinn would have to travel back to create the loop but that doesn't make sense because again, wrong memories and also wouldn't there have to be two murder-Quinn's in that case? one from the murder-free-timeline and one from the Lucy-timeline ensuring the timeloop? Or murder-Quinn travels back to 2003 and murders and then travels back to the future (so Lucy's timeline) to immediatley go back to ensure that the murders still happen?

So fully chronological (from murder-Quinn's perspective) it would be:

River incident -> gets rejected by Summer -> decides to murder her & starts to build the time machine for it -> travels back from 2023 to 2003 -> murder 1&2 -> (due to altered timeline the Quinn actually living in 2003 doesn't get to give Summer the letter but also he's entirely irrelevant to everything) -> murder 3 -> murder-Quinn travels right after the murder in the barn from 2003 back to 2023 which is now the Lucy-timeline (we ignore that he somehow had to already have the time machine set up there) -> immediatley gets back in the time machine once he arrives in 2023 and travels from the new future (=Lucy-timeline) to 2003 to ensure everything still happens because now there still needs to be some kind of time loop -> that's the flashing light Lucy sees in the barn that causes her to go to 2003 (why didn't the time machine go with him, why is there still that thing they needed to steal in order for it to work in it??? but whatever)

(or maybe the flashing light was murder-Quinn arriving in the Lucy-timeline after travelling back. which would explain why the time machine is there and why it's still got "fuel" (since he was planning on traveling back immediatley) which would mean he'd have to??? build a second time machine to go back to 2003? since Lucy travelled to 2003 with his? or maybe he already had a back-up time machine? and where did he even go like why did Lucy even have the opportunity to get in the time machine before he travelled back? but i guess maybe he wanted to take a look at what Lucy-timeline-2023 looked like before traveling back? but if that happened i feel like he should be significantly more pissed off at Lucy. and honestly why isn't he like he has to have known she didn't belong in 2003 since he already lived it (twice?) so...why isn't he going after her considering she's messing with his entire plan) ->

technically because Lucy-timeline Quinn never had reason to build the time machine and plan the murders they're now again in the murder-less timeline 2003, so the murders murder-Quinn just committed (from his perspective) never happened and he has to redo all of them. So the murder-Quinn we see in the movie from his perspective has actually already done everything Lucy remembers and was literally just about to do everything the same again but obviously Lucy fucks that up.

Honestly even though I'm not entirely sure that's consistent with the (very few) rules the movie established, that's probably the theory with the least plot holes (at least as far as my extremly tired brain is concerned). But I'm kind of doubting that's what the movie was actually going for.

Then there are also the less thought out but still existent possibilities:

Or possibility 5:

murder-Quinn time traveled after every single murder.

But where would he get that fancy thingy they needed to steal in order to timetravel all the time. Or I guess he could just always travel somewhere where they just have a lot of supply but still the time machine is pretty heavy and it's not like he can just carry it around in his pocket so????

Or possibility 6:

he murdered Summer first and then travelled back to murder everyone else.

explains how the whole got-rejected-then-decided-to-murder thing fits but still doesn't explain the fact that he did not actually get rejected in the flashback we see. Also doesn't explain anything else about anything murder-Quinn says. So. No.

I feel like they probably meant for it to just be possibility 2, but it doesn't even matter because for most of the possibilites where 2003-Quinn isn't actually doing the murdering and time traveling, he's got to come from a murder-free timeline so why not help explain that with at least flashbacks to murder-Quinn's original timeline while he's having his evil villain monologue?

And maybe crank up the tragedy a bit more, like really hammer it down how much his life sucked during those 20 years because right now it seems pretty ridiculous to hold a grudge for all that time, enough to be a grown man travelling back in time to murder your high school crush that rejected you because she's a lesbian, especially considering she probably would have come out at some point within those 20 years considering she was actually already planning it.

I mean yeah murder-Quinn obviously thought it was personal, but shouldn't he have checked up on what his timelines Summer was up to in her life before actually travelling back to murder her? I mean obviously incels gonna incel but considering they want us to believe that ending-timeline-Quinn really is a good person who would never do something like that and wasn't just, you know, one rejection away from spending the next twenty years planning a murder, they really should have done something more.

And also like at least give us a bit more of an existential crisis from Lucy's side realising that not only was she only born because her sister was murdered but she is specifically the product of someone time travelling back to murder her sister, so a future where she never existed has basically already happened and she really just existed in the short space between murder-Quinn travelling back to 2003 and her following him? Like honestly the true horror in this movie was just purely existential.

So yeah to summarise: they really should have spend two more minutes explaining what actually happened so I didn't have to spend so much time overthinking it.

[hillnerd-art]

MARCH hang outs! :D

dates might be subject to change, but i’ll let you know asap

discord creative collab chat Saturday March 6th 1:30 pm pacific standard time Theme: Ron Weasley!

ZOOM BOOK CLUB SATURDAY March 13th 10 AM pacific standard time The Harry Potter series

ZOOM BOOK CLUB SATURDAY February 27th   11am pacific standard time PERSUASION by Jane Austen

IF YOU GET TIMEZONES CONFUSED, HERE’S A LINK TO A TIME ZONE CONVERTER: https://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/converter.html

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS:

Can I go to this? Yes! These are open to ALL

Where is the link to [event]? I put up a link to each event the day they take place! (I reblog this post about 15 minutes prior to start of event and it will include a link)

How do I get an invite to the event? Same as above. Just follow the link. You have to have a discord account or zoom account to log in, but it’s open to all

I’m shy. Can I come and just watch? Yes! You can be a silent observer or an active participant. Zooms you can type in chat with vid/sound off, if you are more comfortable- I’ll read aloud pertinent messages to the group.

For the book club, what if I never read the book? That is ok! We’ve had plenty of people not familiar with the books. If there are any present I make sure to do more summarization and character descriptions. For each book there’s a movie version you can watch, but no pressure! :D 

Are there any rules? Kind of? Basically don’t be a jerk, and if asked by mod (me) to stop saying/doing something do. If you get into any nsfw stuff, or talk about topics that need a trigger warning, you must make sure it’s ok with the group. If you’re uncomfortable always feel free to say something either to the group, or privately to me, and I’ll make sure we adjust.

How things work:

Day of the event I post a link to the event about 15 minutes before start-time.

We chat about random stuff until I have a few people there

If on Zoom: -please rename yourself to your tumblr name so we know who you are :) -I typically call on people and will put the order in the chat (so we don’t all talk over each other) -If you don’t want to show your face and/or talk that’s fine- you can either only use voice, or use the chat only- Just use the ‘hand raise feature’ or chat, and I’ll read out what you typed

On Discord -LINKS GO IN THE SIDE ROOM if you have links there are two side rooms to put them- one is for NSFW and one is for everything else :) Just say ‘I put a link to [name of whatever] in the [name of room] and we can check it out! It’s also a good way for us not to lose track of links to stories and such -DO NOT bombard the chat with gross-out stuff/Have graphic nsfw stuff in your username/pic It’s a chill bunch- I’ve never had to kick someone out ever or even do hard reprimands- just remember I’m mod, so I’m leading it and have final say :)

[seriouslysam8]

For the ask game, would you please answer questions numbered 2, 8, 14 (all of your titles have such cool names), 18 (I hope Abditory isn't one of them as that story rocks), 21, 24, 29, 30, 33, 34, 44, 51, 62, 76, 82, 85, 88, 90, and 98.

Sorry for asking so many, but I love your work! Entombed gave me so many feels! I found your stories because author Breanie said to read them in her author's notes. Best rec ever! Thank you for answering.

Wow, that is a lot of asks! Thank you so much for wanting to know so much about little ole me. I think I hit them all in this and my apologies if I missed one. Let me know if I missed one. @breaniebree is awesome and my writing BFF. She is amazing, and I love her.

2) What fandoms do you write for and do you have a particular favourite if you write for more than one?

So, I’ve written for The X-Files, Supernatural, and Harry Potter. I currently only write for Harry Potter. I would say Harry Potter has always been the most fun.

8) Where do you take your inspiration from?

Random shit. Brontide came to me because I was browsing the HPFanfiction subreddit looking for a story suggestion and someone asked for a story where Harry was addicted to Felix. Only one unfinished dimensional time travel story was listed. It idea sparked me to write my own version. Entombed came to me because I was rewatching Buffy the Vampire Slayer where Buffy was buried alive. I knew I wanted to bury Ginny alive. As I stated in the author’s notes of last Kalopsia chapter, I drew inspiration from the Djinn storyline in Supernatural. I write about things I know, too. I have young kids at home so I like writing the Potter children as young because I can mimic their mannerisms in my writing. I’ve even asked my kids to say certain words to emulate their speech pattern in my writing if I’m writing that age group.

14) How did you come up with the title for the XXX? You can ask about multiple stories.

I HATE coming up with titles. My newest trend has been to literally Google “unique words”. There are a ton of Pinterest accounts who make fancy word and definition pictures. I scroll through all these little unique words and pick out ones I think fit a story. Sometimes I Google a unique word for BLANK and see if I can get a cool version of that name. @breaniebree actually helped me with Entombed.

18) Do you have any abandoned WIP’s? What made you abandon them?

Sadly, I would put Abditory in this category. Never say never though. I think about it from time to time. Honestly, I abandoned it due to such a negative response I was receiving and the lack of positive response. I became discouraged. It wasn’t even negative response due to my writing, it was literally a bunch of “why would you waste your time writing a story about the biggest plot hole in the books? JKR butchered the whole SK storyline and it’s unbearable to read.” So, basically, my reviews and PMs were filled with JKR hate over that plot point in the books. They heavily outweighed the positive reviews I received. Honestly, I think that’s why a bulk of stories get abandoned - lack of positive reviews or enthusiasm for a story. If I didn’t get so many great reviews for my stories, I don’t know if I’d be able to finish them or continuing writing new ones. Fanfiction is free, (as it should be) but it’s a lot of time and hard work. A little appreciation goes a LONG way. So, my advice, review everything you love reading and encourage writers to keep writing. I always say in my authors notes that reviews make me want to write and inspire me. That’s the truth. The moment I stop getting reviews will probably be the time I take a writing break again.

21) Tell me about another writer(s) who you admire? What is it about them that you admire?

@breaniebree. I mean she’s dedicated years to a single story with so many plot lines and characters that I’m amazed she did it. She’s a fantastic writer, and I definitely consider her my writing BFF. I feel like I’ve learned a lot from her and enjoy talking about writing with her so much. I’m so glad we’ve become friends.

24) How do you feel about writing smutty scenes?

Horrified. Anytime I get a little steamy in my stories, it goes immediately to @breaniebree who usually adds way too much smut and then I cut it down to still be somewhat PG-13 in order to appeal to a wider audience.

29) Do you have a story that you feel doesn’t get as much love as you’d like?

I feel like Kalopsia isn’t getting as much love as my other stories. I’m way behind in my normal review count per chapter. I wonder if it’s just the confusing storyline or if it’s just not as fun to read? But I was definitely worried it wouldn’t get the love I thought it deserved when I started writing it and it’s lived up to that expectation.

30) In contrast to 29, is there a story which gets lots of love which you kinda eye roll at?

Cronus Rising. People still recommend it occasionally and I still get random reviews. I’m like, “why????” Its horribly written and a stupid plot line. I literally was getting back into writing after not writing for a good five years, so it’s abysmal. I’ve often wanted to rage delete it.

33) What’s the biggest compliment you’ve gotten?

When someone tells me I should write an original novel and they’d buy the hell out of it. I do have some original novel ideas floating around (one I’ve been writing since I was like 15), but crippling fear of rejection from publishers have stopped me from ever actually finish an original novel.

34) What’s the harshest criticism you’ve gotten?

I got some criticism in Brontide for having drama for drama’s sake with no real purpose or goal for said drama. I felt my drama served a purpose, drove the story along, and I add a lot of fluffy and cute family moments. I feel like in real life, when you to your loved one is going through sometime, it feels like nonstop drama and bad news and like a dark cloud just follows you. I wanted to emulate that in real life. So Harry’s POV was often drab because HE was the one going through something horrific and it was all doom and gloom for him.

44) What is the last line you wrote?

“You never think I listen to your ramblings, but it’s kind of hard to block out, mate.”

51) From one to five stars, how would you rate your writing? (No downplaying yourself!)

Um... I’d say a 3. I think I have some good and unique plots for stories but sometimes I struggle on how to execute those on paper effectively. I struggle with descriptions, action, and showing rather than telling. But I do think I’m good at dialogue and capturing a character’s personality. So, 3.

62) Tell us about a WIP you’re excited about.

A lot! I have a Teddy/Victoire stalker story in the works that I’m excited about. I have (this is going to sound weird) but an outsider rom-com planned where Ron/Hermione breakup right before Hinny’s wedding and Hinny struggles to get them back together before the big day. I have a Potter family vacation fluff/comedy story planned. I have a game night one-shot planned. I have a short story about Luna’s wedding. So many that I want to write and don’t know which one to write first!!

76) Is there anything you’ve wanted to write, but you’ve been too scared to try?

I’d say no. I’ve always tried to write my ideas down. Some I’ve never finished because inspiration peters off and some I plan on finishing once my newest big project is done.

82) Summarize a random fic of yours in 10 words or less.

Harry goes through some shit, and Ginny is his soulmate.

85) Ramble about any fic-related thing you want!

I don’t understand why people don’t ship Harry/Ginny more. I don’t understand the Harry/Daphne obsessions (like just why???) or the Harry/Hermione ship at all. I always see people asking for story recommendation and they specific say “no Harry/Ginny”. They are literally perfect for one another and they are soulmates.

88) If you could ask one other fanfic author three questions about their writing, writing process, or works, what would they be and who would you ask?

@breaniebree .

1.) How do you organize all your charts? Send me the ALL the charts. Because I don’t understand how you keep everything straight!

2.) How do you write so much? You’re like a little writing machine in a cute little package.

3.) Where do all the ideas come from? In a dream? Just thinking? Driving? Do you write everything out in your head like meeee? Can I have some of your writing mojo?

90) How do you process and deal with negative reviews?

I obsess over them. I analyze them. I may get bummed out and not write for a few days. If you don’t like what I write, then don’t read or review. It’s a hobby. I do this for free. I’m not asking you to critique me. Give me a nice review or ask me a question, but don’t be cruel or mean because you can hide behind a keyboard and be a bully to make yourself feel superior.

98) If you had to give up either snacks and drinks during writing sessions, or music, which would you find more difficult to say goodbye to and why?

Music. I grew up with three older brothers. My house was always rowdy and loud and obnoxious. I need it to be loud. I can’t stand the silence or focus when it’s silent. I need music to help me think and write. When I’m home alone, I always turn on the TV or music, because I can’t stand when it’s silent. I think I’d go insane.

[rigelmejo]

7/16/2021 - other stuff:

I started translating the simplified print version of Guardian that has additional scenes! I am not sharing it yet, but may in the future at some point. (Notes for future reference: taking a picture in good light with the page flat, depending on if needed upping contrast so its darker/lighter in photos, then opening in OCR in Pleco works pretty well at converting the text to digital so I can make notes and edit and look up words more easily. Also so far 1 page takes 1 hour to translate roughly so keep that in mind ToT).

I am yet again tempted to to a full on Listening Reading Method ‘test run.’ By that I mean: picking a novel, (step 1) reading in english, (step 2) reading in chinese with chinese audio (repeating as needed), (step 3) reading in english with chinese audio (repeating as needed), (step 4) listening to audio only. Yes I’m still debating if I’d do step 3, then step 2 - since I tend to flip which I do first depending on the day. Also debating if I ‘prep’ first by listening only (I could call it step 0). Also still debating if I’d do instead: step 0 listen only, step 1, step 2, step 3, ~step 2 again~, step 4 listen only. Basically I did tiny tests with The Little Prince, and I’ve done 20 chapters of Guardian so far (which did help) but Guardian is so long I end up varying how I do it each day into whatever way gets me TO do it and Guardian is so long it will be months until I know what ‘completing a book’ is like for the process. The original forum creator of L-R Method would do like 3-6 hour books or like 10 hour books. Guardian is... much longer. Also, if I pick a book both harder than The Little Prince (so there’s more vocab to learn) and easier than Guardian (so I can get to a natural listening stage faster) I wonder how much progress I’d make. Right now books I am considering for a ‘test method’ run are: Harry Potter 1 (simply because someone made parallel text with audiobook videos already so it is super convenient to do L-R Method, also the book has  2600 unique characters and 7700 unique words so I would likely reinforce my hanzi knowledge and learn maybe a couple hundred more, and likely increase my vocabulary by several hundred to a couple thousand depending on how much I focus, I’m fairly sure I can blow through it quickly the only limiting factor is like The Little Prince I am not sure if the reading level is low enough that I may not pick up significant amounts of new words compared to how many I pick up from Guardian - https://youtu.be/NLu0JW6VtGM). Sherlock Holmes - The Hound of Baskervilles (the book is 7.5 hours so not nearly as long as Guardian, I could probably L-R Method it in 2 weeks, the novel is written for adults and a mystery genre so genre-words I may find more useful to me while also probably having a bigger vocabulary than The Little Prince,  P74 巴斯克维尔的猎犬 01 audiobook - https://youtu.be/hDKfUjienKA, full playlist of the sherlock audiobooks - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1QFMgv0n_Y&list=PLVyDH2ns1F757P-m8MHckuIFqWapl6y-1, and bilinguis.com has a parallel text which I am checking if it matches the audiobook - http://bilinguis.com/book/baskerville/zh/en/c1/). Bonus, just one day I’d love to test it with Alice in Wonderland in French since bilinguis.com has an audiobook and parallel text - http://bilinguis.com/book/alice/fr/en/c3/. Or Le Francais Par Le Methode Nature, since that also now has audio and text and one day I’d like to finish reading it - https://youtu.be/0uS5WSeH8iM.

Fun fact: I am listening to P74 巴斯克维尔的猎犬 01 (by  知识改变命运 ) in the background right now and the first thing I hear is “qinai watson” my dear watson ok. ok sherlock i see you. ToT. Aside from that I just keep hearing random words I know. If you plan to listen to a chinese sherlock audiobook though - I do recommend this playlist. I’ve found a few sherlock audiobooks and for some the audio is very rough like it was recorded from the radio, whereas this one is fairly clear and the reader speaks very clearly, and has a rhythm to sentences (which for me personally helps me listen easier and parse out words). So if you know some words they are much easier to hear, and if you are looking at the parallel text I linked on bilinguis it is quite easy to follow along. 

I really want to get into the habit of some extensive reading with audiobooks (as in reading while listening) just because it speeds up my reading, and I pick up some words in reading while practicing listening. Its also somewhat doable, whereas just listening I may often get lost unless I know the material well. Last night I read chapter 1 of MoDu while playing the audiobook and following along - obviously I did not read as in depth as if I’d have done L-R Method and looked up all unknown words with pop-up english. But combined listening comprehension and reading comprehension I understood ENOUGH to follow the plot and keep reading, at a faster pace than if I only was extensively reading and at a much better comprehension than if I only listen. (My listening comprehension is a bit better if I’ve read the text beforehand, but that’s sort of artificial since i prepped by reading the text beforehand). Yes, I learn new hanzi better with slower extended reading where I have time to really slow down and look at the new hanzi a lot. But I’d like to aim for quantity of materials read for a while? I’d if simply reading more will help, but a lot of the general advice seems to be the more extensive reading you do where you can follow the main points the more you will improve. And hey, maybe that applies to simply ‘listening a lot more’ too?

A lot of articles I’ve found recently emphasize repeated listening, and I want to try to include that more in how I study. While I might not do it as intensively as some articles suggest, I can definitely continue to do it in Clozemaster and continue playing audiobooks of chapters I’ve read already (so I can follow the audio ok) in my downtime. A LOT of my chinese study lately has not been active, its been mostly just ‘playing audio in the background.’ So since I’m not studying actively much, I might as well try to get in more listening.

I checked out the cdrama Forward Forever recently and opinions: if you understand basic chinese JUST watch it in chinese because wow are the english subs a hot mess ToT. I tried watching with subs and there were so many clear ‘wrong’ portions I just had to turn them off, they were made from google translate though so I’m not super surprised (but Xin Xiao Shi Yi Lang has much more decent auto-generated subs so ToT). I’m not sure if I’ll watch more or not, but I can definitely tell it was adapted from a BL source material with the way the main two guys are immediately set up as characters and then meet. I also want to check out Secret of the Three Kingdoms but I’ve seen like 3 minutes and I already am pretty aware I’ll probably like the show so much that I’ll want to put the english subs on for clarity. Secret of the Three Kingdoms feels Very well made.

If I was gonna try to summarize what my study plan has been this month:  - Listen-Reading Method Guardian (its going fine), with some experiments on the structure of the activity - translate some of Guardian (not really study as I’m pretty familiar w the chapters so just rereading things, mainly its translating practice) - Doing a few random things in japanese: read Guardian in japanese, play japanese video games a little bit, watch japanese-teaching video game example vids a bit (basically more tiny bits of japanese I’d add up to idk under 6 hours? just me glancing at things) - Reading this japanese grammar guide (I’m 1/3 through) - https://sakubi.neocities.org/ - Listen to various chinese audiobooks, with and without text. - Read various chinese chapters, with and without audio. - Listen/Read a bit of French, in Gigafrench (i truly mean a bit like a couple hours), Dracula (just listening) - some Clozemaster japanese, and a tiny bit of Clozemaster chinese (mainly to pick up stuff in japanese, and practice shadowing in both) So - some random chinese stuff reading/listening/L-R Method, some japanese exposure/grammar guide/clozemaster, a tiny bit of French (mainly listening practice). 

[reverieblue98]

Make Building a Plot Easier!

I think one of the biggest mountains writers have to face is coming up with a plot. This post will equip you with some better climbing gear to get over that mountain faster and better!

Conflicts

Let’s get into the nitty gritty right away! One of the main reasons writers find it so hard to come up with a good plot is that they have no conflicts! Remember that the basic parts of a plot are: what is the problem? and what is the solution? If you have no problem, you’ve already failed the first step! Here are some examples of conflicts you might have seen before. They’re very useful, so check it out!

Person vs self (internal) 

Person vs person (external)

Person vs society (maybe both)

Person vs nature (external)

Person vs supernatural/technological (external)

Most conflicts, big or small, will fit inside these categories. It will help if you identify which category your main plot fits into, or help you come up with one all together. Now, don’t assume that by picking an external conflict, you don’t use any internal ones. External conflicts in real life affect internal ones, and vise versa! 

For example, in a world where society forces you to work an awful job, (external conflict) you feel bored and depressed. (internal)

They directly correlate each other, so if you have one the other should come very easily! These complicated conflicts that create more conflicts are what gives stories purpose and interest. So, the hardest part is the part that you need to do first: What is your main conflict/problem? From there, decide how that problem affects the world, then how the world affects the people in it, then how the people affect each other. It’s a domino effect that requires some practice, but I promise that getting your conflicts sorted out will help you plan out your plot! 

World Building

Another huge issue I see a lot is that the author doesn’t actually know how their world works, or what makes it interesting. Let’s use some examples!

The Hunger Games is a bestselling series, and most people will tell you that they love it so much because it’s exciting. Why is it exciting? I don’t know, maybe it’s because THEY ARE IN A LITERAL FIGHT TO THE DEATH! If that isn’t intense world building, I don’t know what is! Suzanne Collins created a world where people are forced to competed in deadly competitions by a cruel overlord. Her world is so different from what ours is, and that’s what draws people in. It’s also what makes her plot easier to map out. Her main problem is directly connected to her world. In a world like ours, Collins’ main conflict wouldn’t make sense, but it works in her story because she knew how her world worked. 

Same for the Harry Potter series! If it was set in a world without magic, fighting a dark wizard probably wouldn’t make any sense. So, J.K. Rowling created a magic system, and explored how it would work in her story. She created a world where her conflict makes sense, and that paves the way for more conflicts/subplots. 

To summarize, you need to know how your world works, and what it looks like. It needs to compliment your main conflict so that the reader agrees that it makes sense. Rewrite the existing rules of reality so that your conflict is legitimate. You and the reader need to understand what’s going on, as well as how it happened and why. 

Development

You’ve probably heard of character development, but let’s go into more detail. 

The whole point of a fiction novel is to tell a story, right? A story should be comprised of a character who changes over time. If we get to the end of the book, and the character hasn’t changed, it’s not a very good book. 

Let’s say that you’re having a really bad day. Your alarm didn’t go off, and now you’re late to work. Oncer you get to the subway, someone spills some coffee on your shirt. It’s so hot that you drop your phone, and it gets cracked. You tell him it’s okay, but you’re not happy about it. At work, you get lectured on the importance of showing up on time by your boss. This makes you frustrated. After, the employees are talking about the stain on your shirt. You get embarrassed. After a long day of doing nothing but paperwork, you get home to find your wifi isn’t working. What would you do?

I”ll tell you what I’d do: I’d get upset. All those events through the day impacted me, and changed the way I behaved in different situations. This is what should happen to your characters. They should feel impacted by the events that happen around them, and that should change them into a different person by the end. Obviously, one terrible day at work wouldn’t deeply affect the person you are, (at least I hope not!) but your main conflicts should be big enough that they definitely change the character. No one likes a story where they character does nothing the whole time! We want to see their flaws and strengths, and how they change the outcome of different situation. It might seem small, but it’s very important. 

Brain Map

Alright, whether you have good conflicts, world building, and character development or not, you should begin to map out your plot. Personally, I like to use sticky notes to create a timeline for my stories. I use different colours for different characters, and each one has their own path. It allows me to visually see my plot, and identify any spots that might need some more attention. You could also write it out like an essay, talk it out with someone, or create a comic about it. It very important to be able to visually or auditorily see what your story is going to look like. If it’s all in your head, you might run into some problems like forgetting key ideas, unable to see plot holes, etc. I am a visual learner, so I love writing it out with different coloured pens on cool paper. 

So basically, don’t leave your plot in your head! Write it out so you can see what you need to work on, and so you don’t forget it. 

That was a long one, but I hope it helped you out! Creating a plot is definitely the hardest part about being a writer, and unfortunately, it’s different for everyone. Not all of these tips will work for everyone, but I think they are at least worth thinking about! There’s no formula to plots, so it’s all on you. No pressure or anything. 😉 Happy writing! 

-RB

[nyadversary]

asking since your harry potter post was really interesting and made me wonder - are there any magic systems you really like or think are well-constructed and consistent? what are the traits of a good magic system?

oh i definitely don’t feel qualified to make any broad statements about what makes a magic system Good, it depends so heavily on what kind of story you’re trying to tell. i do want to say more about why i think the magic system in HP is ultimately bad though, and i have at least one example of a system i like to compare it with. under cut

very very early on in the HP series — i’m talking about the first few chapters of book 1 — we get the impression that magical ability does symbolize something? like think about how the series opens. the first chapter of the first book follows vernon dursley, a man who lives an extremely mundane life, likes it that way, and is highly perturbed by anything unusual happening or by anyone who seems out of the ordinary. he’s, what, CEO of a drill company or something? some comically boring but well-paying job. petunia is a housewife who passes the time spying on the neighbors. their infant son is already being spoiled and treated more like a prized possession than a human being. and these people hate anything they think is weird, which of course includes anything to do with magic. the dursleys know for a fact magic is real and it pisses them off and they hate it. 

when harry is left at their doorstep, mcgonagall protests and says the dursleys could not possibly have less in common with magical people like them. either she or hagrid says something to the effect that the dursleys are the biggest muggles around, which stuck with me because it implies that magical ability lies on a spectrum and the dursleys, who are outright opposed to anything the slightest bit unusual, are the furthest from magical anybody can be. this implies all sorts of things about what magic could represent for the series going forward — creativity, rejection of social norms, etc. — and, since these people are harry’s only living blood relatives but he winds up finding community for the first time once meeting other witches and wizards, it appears to be setting up a found family theme. which all sounds perfectly good, and people will still cite this as being a theme of the books. the main problem with that is it isn’t the intended theme going forward at all. 

JKR’s weird obsession with blood lineage honestly needs to be unpacked in a whole other post and i don’t think i’m the guy to do it but... obviously as the series goes on, the importance of blood family gets underlined again and again. it turns out harry is being protected by some sort of sacred maternal blood magic (which is never explained) and this is why he has to live with the dursleys, people he hates and has nothing in common with. the fact that they’re his blood relatives trumps anything else. magical ability generally is passed down within families, and in the later books much time is spent going over various magical lineages (voldemort’s family, dumbledore’s family, sirius’ family, the malfoy family, the hogwarts founders and their descendants, etc...). any notions of magic symbolizing creativity is undermined by the lack of actual creativity in how the magic is presented going forward (like i said in the other post, it winds up serving mainly utilitarian functions in the story) and as for rejecting the status quo, the series embraces the status quo. the happy ending the characters work 7 books to achieve just has everything “returning to normal” — voldemort is killed and the remaining death eaters dealt with, the ministry gets a new PM, hogwarts gets a new headmaster, and things continue on as they were before. issues of systemic injustice are left unaddressed, the subplots about magical beings fighting for full personhood status (centaurs, merpeople, house elves, etc) are left unresolved, slytherin house is allowed to continue on as an institution and presumably many wizards are still just as bigoted towards muggle-borns as they always were, and — oh yeah — the idea that muggles are innately inferior somehow? never explained or addressed. the takeway is just that if you can’t do magic, you suck. it’s so disappointing. all the pieces are there for a way better story (hey guys i think there might be some systemic problems with your magic school and your magic government do you wanna try fixing that maybe?) but JKR was never gonna write that story because it’s one she doesn’t believe in.

to summarize how magic works in harry potter just so i can really make it clear how boring it is:

magic ability is innate and the vast majority of people lack it. with relatively few exceptions, the ability runs in families — it’s rare for someone without magical ancestry to have the ability and it’s also rare for someone with magical ancestry to not have the ability

with only a few exceptions, all wizards are able to learn all spells. some wizards are stated to be unusually powerful but how much of this is due to raw magical potential and how much comes down to other factors like education, general intelligence and ability/willingness to learn, desire to cause harm in the case of the unforgivables, etc is unclear. some magical abilities, like being able to speak parseltongue or being a metamorphmagus (or whatever the fuck shapeshifters are called in this series) or being a seer, are innate and can’t be learned by most wizards. like magic itself, whether or not you have any extra ability seems to be genetic (these are all traits we know run in families)

in order to perform magic, devices like wands, cauldrons, etc are used as instruments or vessels to direct the user’s innate powers. there is no summoning, channeling, or ritual use involved and spells typically only go wrong if the wizard in question is inexperienced or something is wrong with their wand. with very few exceptions (the main one i can think of is divination, which is handled very ambiguously and most of what trelawney teaches is implied to be complete crap), magic works in very predictable and straightforward ways

so it all boils down to “you’re either a wizard or you aren’t, and you almost certainly aren’t unless you come from a magic family, but if you are — good news! you have basically the same abilities as any other wizard. don’t worry there’s nothing even vaguely pagan involved.”

which, like. how utterly dull. there are so many other ways one can approach these issues and nearly all of them that i can think of / have seen done are more interesting than this:

you could have a magic system where magical ability is much more specialized. instead of all magic users being all capable of more or less the same stuff, let’s say person A, B, and C are all magic users but each has a unique magical ability (say A can fly, B can talk to animals, C can become invisible) and, while they might be able to develop their individual talents and become stronger, they can’t learn each other’s skills. charlie bone, which is a crap series overall but which i do think has a more interesting magic system, falls into this category, as does a lot of superhero stuff although it’s generally not called “magic” in those stories.

another, similar, approach would be to have more specialized branches of magic that characters train under — say pyromancy, necromancy, etc. — and so, while it might be possible for a water mage to learn a fire spell or two, characters have much more individualized skillsets. RPG magic tends to be this, obviously. harry potter kind of vaguely gestures in the direction of this trope in that the professors obviously specialize in their particular subjects, but it’s not as if snape doesn’t know charms or whatever — it doesn’t amount to much of anything in practice as all the adult characters are capable of performing a diverse range of spells.

how does one wind up with the ability to do magic in the first place? is it innate, and, if so, is it random or does it run in families? is it associated with any other traits? are there drawbacks to being a magic user? can non-magical people acquire the ability to do magic through some other means, and, if so, does this represent an irreversible change? are magic users really “human” or are they something more? are non-magic users lesser? is there any loss of humanity associated with magical ability? do magic users channel their own innate power or are they channeling something else — if so, is it a godlike entity, demonic, or does it defy moral classification? is there “good” magic and “bad” magic, and, if so, is the delineation clear? if these are different branches of magic, are they wholly distinct in how they work or is there overlap? etc, etc, etc.

ultimately i don’t think anyone should be worried about finding the most unique combination of these tropes, because they’ve literally all been done 10 billion times — if i started off listing popular examples of how these tropes are handled in other media pandemic will have ended before i’m done. what’s important is how writers choose to handle these questions when telling their story. like, what does magic mean to the characters? what does their use of magic say about them? what does magic symbolize? etc... these are opportunities for the story to have Themes and Meaning and impart something to its audience! tbh i think it really says something that the magic in harry potter is so ultimately unimportant to the story that people didn’t bother asking the usual questions about what magic itself / the magic system might symbolize... if you look at what rowling might actually be trying to say with any of that, well, it’s not good.

i guess to end off with an example i like. in the bartimaeus trilogy, which is an extremely good YA series and i highly recommend, magic ability isn’t innate at all. magic in this universe is all done via summoning “demons” (energy beings from another plane of existence basically) and binding them to one’s will, which as you might expect is very dangerous if you fuck it up and summoning is on such extreme levels of academic bullshit that you basically have to study your entire life to do it safely (learning dead languages, being able to draw elaborate pentacles with perfect accuracy, etc etc). in practice, this means magic is something only the ruling class does / can afford to do. anyone in any significant position of power is a wizard, while everyone else — the “commoners” — is a second-class citizen under the thumb of what are essentially superpowered politicians. while the fact that magic exists isn’t a secret, the majority of commoners have no idea how it actually works, that it’s really just summoning and anyone can learn it. they’re being encouraged to think of wizards as innately superior/gifted and to defer to them as their betters. yknow, Or Else. there’s much more i could say about this but it’d wind up being its own post and i’d probably have to just break down the entire plot of the trilogy, but i think from what i’ve said you get a sense of the themes / commentary here. 

this has run long but point being, magic systems Can be used to say something about the story and the characters and to make some sort of thematic point or provide social commentary perhaps, and i think it’s cool when they do. harry potter tries its best to avoid having the magic mean anything and when you do try and analyze what it means, you just get a story about how some people are just way better and cooler than others because of. uh. their blood. so rather than further unpacking that suitcase i say you could just throw it away and, as they say, read another book

[hidelaney]

Hi Delaney!

Ah, yes the quarantine. It’s getting to me. Definitely. Suddenly I have no office to go to. But it’s good, I think. Make the CEO realize the upper management has no literal reasons to keep us in the office. Like at all. Seriously, everyone from my team is working from home and the level of productivity is actually better. Because guess what? Not having people breathing down our necks is SUPER helpful. So HA!

Okay, about Larry Stylinson. You’re right, I did fall into YouTube Blackhole. And Twitter. And I just watched 1D San Siro concert. By watching, I mean I actually paused the work I’m doing and looked at the screen while it played. Admittedly I was also doing chores but! It wasn’t just background music! It counted!

When I said I could put Larry Stylinson in a microwave and be done with it, I mean the theories and compilation videos are so readily available and easy to digest like, comparable to instant meals.

It’s so neatly packaged, too. Like, I was introduced to Larry Stylinson basically yesterday. Now I could recite the storyline in my head whenever I please. Or when I want to please you, in this case.

Let’s see if I can get it all summarized down here. FYI, I’m borrowing your assumption that Taylor was in on it the whole time. And Eleanor, too. Because I actually know of her existence now! Character discovery! Except they’re real people so I feel the need to point out that I’m making all the assumptions all over the place. I’m doing this for you, my dear Delaney.

Keep in mind that we all need character growths and personal developments when I make non-flattering assumptions toward your favorite people here, ok?

First up! HS & TL met in a toilet.

Now it’s debatable whether it was during an X-Factor audition or Battle of the Bands. For the sake’s of my next argument, I’m going with they knew each other before X-Factor. Likely during their time in White Eskimo and The Rogue, respectively. Their (unconfirmed?) first words to each other were ‘Oops!’ & ‘Hi’

Up next, the X-Factor audition and getting put together in a band.

So here is where I kind of needed my first assumption for this to work. Their chemistry was so obviously through the roof. It made so much sense if they were already sort-of friends and then got put together in a band. Plus, I don’t think the way Louis jumped into Harry’s arms is something a relative stranger would do. And if they only knew each other out of everyone there, it’s no wonder they were both so apparently clingy and codependent. It’s like a situation where both of them went ‘I have no idea what’s gonna happen next, but at least I know you and you know me. So we’re bestie now. No take back!”

And then there’re video diaries, twitter cams, radio interviews, and other broadcasting media they appeared in. These need no explanation because you’ve probably seen all of them and I have functioning ears and eyes. So, yes, I saw videos of them being all disgustingly cute all over the place. During the so-called ‘Fetus’ phase (a wording which I personally find rather disturbing, no offense to your anatomy textbooks or anything.) They’re so sweet. Especially whenever there’s a mention of how they moved in and lived together. Their interactions must’ve been responsible for so many tooth cavities. So many aww-worthy moments. On stage, on screen, behind the scenes, potato cams. Basically everywhere in front of everyone.

Then 1D blew up and were well on their way to become their label’s biggest and brightest BCG-metrix star. It’s not hard to see why investors’d be invested (lol) in employing every marketing strategy possible to keep 1D in the spotlight.

There’s a twofold marketing exploitation to Larry Stylinson that I see from miles away.

Hard sell the heteronormative version of the boys. (To capture major market shares)

Never had Harry or Louis explicitly confirm nor deny their relationship status. (To capture additional market shares with queerbaiting)

But let’s say Harry and Louis were actually together and making 1) too difficult to achieve. Otherwise this whole thing falls apart like a wet house of cards.

Thus, here came what I’d like to call ‘dousing a fire with gasoline’. This is where there’s a sudden drop of their interactions in public and Larry Stylinson isn’t a cutesy smashup name of two boys who got along like a house on fire anymore. This is the part where a ship turned into a full fledged conspiracy theory. And it’s MEGA COOL WICKED awesome.

I say this in the nicest way possible. A tragedy is the grandest form of entertainments. Misery loves having friends.

Also, I’d like to say this. I’m having fun thinking of this as a fictional arc. Because I still feel like it will shatter my heart in to a million pieces if anything resembling what I write next was true.

Since breaking into US market was the Kickstarter into a global one, to the US 1D went.

This was where the heavy closeting got way more difficult to handle. Elounor had the excuse of Eleanor being a private citizen and therefore should be left alone for the most part. Haylor was the complete opposite. Taylor Swift was and still is an American Sweetheart. Harry Styles might have been the most famous British Harry if it weren’t for a (former?) prince and a wizard. (Seriously, we should not call any of our hypothetical future children ‘Harry’ unless you thought ‘Albus Severus Potter’ was a good idea. Poor kiddo.)

The saddest part about Harry Styles public image was how reminiscent of Emma Watson it felt. The minute they turned eighteen, their media portrayals immediately became hyper-sexualized. Suddenly, they left the human zoo into an open hunting game. Famous lives are terrifying.

Anyhow, say, Taylor Swift knew what the US music industry was like. She’s been playing the long game for quite some time. She got to know Harry and then became rather protective of him. Her conclusion was that ‘hyping up Haylor’ would: 1) increase media exposure for both Taylor and 1D which would translate to bigger channels of revenue for all involved, 2) hold the speculation about Harry’s sexual orientation at bay because, as horrible as it sounds, gays don’t sell in America.

This one fit nicely with your ‘Out of the Woods’ interpretation. Taylor wasn’t just spending time with Harry. She was actively enforcing the lock on the closet. Which explains why Louis seemed to resent Taylor quite obviously and quite a lot. His own heteronormative scripts with Eleanor had been relatively tame. Harry’s whirlwind series of romances in public had only just begun.

As Harry started gaining a womanizer reputation in earnest, so did the Almost-Subtle Couple Tattoo Sprees.

If ‘Always in my heart @Harry_Styles . Yours sincerely, Louis’ tweet was a sign that circumstances were about to go south for them. The tattoos were signs that the circumstances had already gone to shit. The tragic package had been shipped, signed, and delivered.

This is where non-flattering assumptions rise to the surface. I think 1D had been overworked past the point of exhaustion. Self-destruction as a coping mechanism became rather prevalent and pervasive within the band. The boys gleefully collected regrets as a new favorite pastime, some more than others. Consequences were nipping at their heels.

Then Zayn left right in the middle of a world tour and all hell broke loose.

Here comes the biggest Assumption Affair!

Louis and Liam, the last to release their solo debut albums, were the most prominent songwriters for the band. I’m not going to go on about Liam because I’m here to give you Larry Stylinson. And this is already way too long as it is. But, needless to say, the first discussion of a prospective solo career probably hit them the hardest.

If each song they wrote was a battle scar, Louis was still bleeding for the band when Harry, of all people, brought up the idea of a hiatus and solo careers. Realizing how many songs Harry already had waiting in the back catalogue must’ve felt like a slap in the face. Or a punch in the gut. Whichever you think is worse/more dramatic. I’m not picky.

Remember self-destruction as coping mechanism? What about relationship-destruction as coping mechanism? Louis cheated and had a baby with someone else. Infidelity at its finest.

ALERT! THIS IS A NEON SIGN OF ASSUMPTION AFFAIR! Please don’t kill me. I told you I was gonna make unflattering assumptions toward your favorite people. I just did as I promised!!! *run for cover*

Anyway...

I’m gonna take you back a little. I mentioned earlier how Eleanor was a private citizen and therefore should be left alone. At times when Louis desperately needed to be left alone, Elounor makes so much sense. If she’s a PR-only girlfriend, she’s a stellar employee. If it’s not just a PR thing, she’s as forgiving as a saint. Just, if it’s Harry and Louis, they likely both messed up and hurt each other badly. If it’s Louis and Eleanor,... I mean... Have you seen a meme where you misspell a word so badly that the autocorrect goes, ‘I don’t know what to tell you, man’?... Louis would be that misspelled word and Eleanor would be the very best autocorrect that practically brute force through every word in the Oxford AND Urban dictionary to find out what that word was. If that’s who she is, then bless her soul. However, for the sake of this argument, we will proceed with the assumption that she’s the star employee of the decade.

Losing loved ones and grieving for them are inevitable parts of human lives. Nothing put more things into perspectives than losing someone so fundamentally dear to you. When I heard Louis Tomlinson’s ‘Two of Us’ for the first time, I remembered walking through an actual forest my grandpa planted for us because he wanted to make sure his great grandkids would have a nice home to grow up in. Do you remember when you called and told me that he died the night I got on my first solo international flight ten months after the fact? I wanted to hate you for keeping something this big a secret from me. I wanted to hate everybody at home for that. But then you told me that it was what my grandpa had wanted. That he didn’t want me to be a sad sack of an exchange student. That you decided to not listen to my parents and call to tell me just before I was due home. So that I’d have time to feel hurt about being lied to. So that I could get all the angry words out. So that I wouldn’t scream at my parents when I got home and learnt the truth. So that you could take the brunt of my grief instead.

I just took a break to have a little cry. Where was I? Oh, yeah. You did the best you could for me when I lost my grandpa. I still managed to effectively shut you out for months. Just because you were the messenger of the bad news. What I’m trying to say is that grief changes people. It changed me. For the worst for a bit. And then for the better once I came to term with what it means to me. There’s a quote from Rosamund Lupton that sums it up neatly.

“Grief is love turned into an eternal missing.”

I guess this is the part where I connected the dots back to Harry and Louis. Well, their music definitely give grief different names. Both albums talk about coming to term with it and moving forward. Every songs they wrote could be woven to fit the narrative of Larry Stylinson and events surrounding them. If you buy the theory, then the good news is both Fine Line & Walls seemed to have a positive ending. One thing I know for sure, though, is that no matter how convincing a conspiracy theory maybe, it could all be built upon a faulty assumption. I’d probably have a way easier time disregarding Elouner if I didn’t have you as a solid proof in my life that, yes, people like the best autocorrect exists. It’s funny how I feel no hesitation at all in categorizing Haylor as a calculated move. Because in my head that’s just par for the course in business. And it genuinely terrifies me in a way. Who the hell I could’ve become if it weren’t for you knocking me off the ground and pouring kindness on me.

I know I skipped a lot of stuff. Missing names like Caroline, Danielle, Kendall, Freddie, Camille, Xander, etc. But HS and LT have a decade of history on public record and, frankly, my interest ran out four paragraphs ago. So just let me conclude this.

I think it’s tiring, spending this much time speculating on someone else’s relationship history. I must admit that I had to get it out of my chest because it was way too interesting to let go off. But now, I feel like I’m just going to stream Heartbreak Weather and listen to ‘No Judgement’ on repeat. Nile is my favorite non-problematic celebrity. I could spell his name so wrong and it probably won’t be an issue as long as I politely say, “Sorry, Mr Niall Horan”

This quarantine clearly leaves me with too much time on my hands.

Virtual hugs and kisses

Your Incredible Sasha 😘

[combat-wombatus]

uHm if you do these and if you want to do it I’d love a bnha matchup <3?

• my name is Aubri, I’m bi but prefer MHA boys tbh. I go by she/her, too.

• I’m a very Gryffindor person. (Sorry if you don’t know Harry Potter - 😖)

• I’m a June cancer, and I have ADHD and anxiety. My anxiety can be literally crippling somedays, but it’s gotten better overtime.

• I’m a bit of a class clown and usually just a clown 🤡 but that’s irrelevant. My teachers all hate me but like school-wise I do well so we have a love and mostly hate relationship 🤧

• I’m usually the ‘entertaining’ friend, in elementary the popular kids would invite me to play games with them because, “you’re funny” and it was like the biggest achievement ever 😭👍🏻 then they’d ignore me but that’s another therapy session

• I’m usually made fun of by people for being ‘weird’ and ‘insane’. Like all through elementary everyone thought I’d be a criminal when I grew up JUST BECAUSE I HAD UNDIAGNOSED ADHD - I hate it here 😐🦶🏻

• I’ve always been super into crime stories/true crime (where my anxiety comes from, I’m always worried about a pesky serial killer just killing me. It’s usually being kidnapped tho lmao) so I knew and still know like all these murder facts and sometimes I’d just randomly be like;

“Hey did you know it takes 12 hours and 2 days to dissolve a body in acid?”

or

“If you bury a dead deer over a dead body you buried deep in the ground, when police dogs sniff it and people dig they’ll just think it was the deer and won’t dig any farther.”

• So maybe people had a reason to be scared of me and think I’ll be a criminal someday, i dunno.

• I love love love reading and writing, and also debating. The things I’ve wanted to be when I grow up are basically: Dog shelter worker, actress, FBI agent, politician, and a writer. But usually I just want to do something that makes a positive impact on people. Like i wanted to be an FBI agent to solve crimes for people. I wanted to be a politican so I could actually help a lot of people. The entertainment industry also seemed like a way to make people happy. Idk, but then I decided I couldn’t be a politican at 10 because they were all corrupt and to be one I would have to be too. 😫🤌🏻 we love some good childhood angst

• the only subjects I’ve ever excelled at are ELA and Social Studies aka History, and Math I can’t do to save my life. ELA comes easy for me and I usually don’t have to work that hard and/or get too stressed over it. But I always get the meanest teachers for some reason. For example, one time I did my final essay for like 30% of my grade in 30 minutes the day it was due and I got an A+ 🦟🦗🦟🦗

• Uhhh id describe myself as a pretty loyal friend, I’m a ride or die type of girl. A story from my childhood that summarizes it pretty well is when I was in 2nd grade my friend wet her pants and she didn’t want to go to the nurse for it alone so I peed my pants so I could go with her and she wouldn’t have to be alone. Like, you know, a professional problem solver

• and I have genuinely attacked people for fucking with my friends but don’t snitch pls 🕳🏃‍♀️💨

• But also just anyone, people at my school tend to come to me with their problems for me to either help solve them by reasoning, or just to confront the other person like the bad bleep I am 😈😈

• I also have a huge daydreaming problem, it’s literally maladaptive daydreaming. So paired with my ADHD I don’t get shit done like ever.

• I have really high empathy levels I guess, like I always say hi to everyone I see on the street, especially if they look sad 😔 I’ve done it ever since I was a little kiddo.

• My fashion sense is very much a preppy/alt style. I wear those ripped tights and fishnets, I also have the MOST BIZARRE JEWELRY- like who allowed me to buy the gummy worm glittery earrings, hmmm???????? and those Mary Janes???????

• But I love crew necks and pleated skirts so I always obide by the National “hoes dont get cold” policy 🇺🇸😫🦅

• I wanna move somewhere someday, I don’t want to stay in America for very long

• I can speak Latin, French, and my native language which is English.

• My music taste varies, but my all-time favorite artists who all of their music they’ve ever put out has been my favorites are, Billie Eilish, Melanie Martinez, and Conan Gray.

• I no-joke have a sign in my front yard that says;

In ✍️ this ✍️ house we ✍️ don’t ✍️ worship Jesus ✍️ but instead ✍️ Melanie ✍️ Martinez

• My favorite shows are MHA (duh), The Promised Neverland, and Malcolm in The Middle.

• and I’m not going to tell you what I prefer in a partner, because that ruins the fun 😤

• but I will say I cannot be friends with someone who doesn’t really make me laugh. Like I’m used to doing most of the talking in convos but if you’re just boring I’m sorry it’s nothing personal but no thanks 😐✌🏻

• About my physical appearance, I have fluffy n curly brown hair, but when it’s in the sunlight it looks sort of brown but golden yk?? It’s shoulder length :) I have bleach blonde streaks in the front. I like wearing eyeliner most days, too. I’m pretty average size/ on the skinnier side. Kinda high key inscure abt my body bc I got flat shamed in elementary EVEN THOUGH I HAVE TIDDIES NOW- whatever 😤🙄. I also have crystal type blue eyes, and I do have fairly big eyes. But, like, not weirdly big. A good big. My cheekbones are ALWAYS PRESENT so sometimes I get called a Tim Burton character but it’s cool ig ☠️☠️ oh and I’m kinda short. I’m 5’3, even though my doctor said I’d be 5’7. I feel like I was either tricked by the doctor or someone just stole my destined height while I was asleep. It’s probably cause I didn’t keep an eye out for Selener 👁 😔😔

• I’m a definite night owl, like all of my energy comes at night which really sucks cuz I can’t do much since everyone else is asleep.

• My love language is touch starved so I’ve never figured it out ✌🏻😗🔫

• but I am an attention whore so idk 😏

• I’m a huge introvert with social anxiety. It isn’t as bad as it used to be cuz I used to not be able to like go to restaurants but now I’m much better.

• I’m a huge history person, mostly like sad history LMFAO. Uh but a lot of my hyperfixations have been on history. Some examples are The Roman Empire, Julius Caesar himself, Anne Frank, The Titanic, the Black Plauge, Helen Keller, Marie Curie, Slavery in the US, Joan of Arc, and just a lot more. I always love talking about these things if someone would let me ramble to them but no one ever does 😖 it also got to a point where for all these subjects I’d go to the library and try to find a book on them but usually I’d either have already read it or I’d read it and know all the information.

• I’m super into Greek Mythology, I have 7 books filled with the stories, I’m going to Greece maybe this summer to see it’s history, and named my hamster Aphrodite but we call her Aphie. I also will talk about this forever and ever if you let me.

• My favorite color is yellow, my favorite food is literally nothing I never have an appetite, my favorite planet is Saturn, favorite song is Tag Your It by Melanie Martinez atm but it changes like everyday.

• Music is a huge safe-space for me if I’m feeling down or having a panic attack. It calms me down n is overall my coping mechanism 💃🏻💃🏻

• Biggest fear is spiders, even looking at one gives me a panic attack and I cannot sleep at all for that night, adding to my insomniac ass 🧎🏻‍♂️🏌️‍♀️

• I’m mature for my age, I don’t exactly like hanging around kids my age and I get along better with older crowds.

• i don’t like conventional dates, (I PROMISE IM NOT TRYING TO SOUND ‘QUIRKY’ AHAHA) I kind of like having a best-friend type partner more so dates that aren’t as romantic as like the movies or a fancy restaurant suite me better. My dream date is playing Monopoly on my bedroom floor 🦧

• Also I hate getting gifts. End of story. If someone gets me a gift like awe that’s nice but never again, I’d prefer to get you one. Especially in a romantic partner 😐 i keep a journal of my friends’ interests and hobbies so I can get them the perfect gifts for their bdays and Christmas’s. Been doing this ever since 4th grade.

• Though I don’t have much actual experience with relationships🧍🏻‍♀️

• I’m a huge believer in ‘family isn’t blood, it’s who you make it’ because I have a pretty shitty family life and my childhood has been trash. My friends are my family to me.

• Also if my friends don’t like my romantic partner ✨ GOODBYE ✨. Sorry girlie, bros before hoes 🦨💨

I was going to put more but I’m so so sorry for how LONG AND COMPLICATED THIS IS- idk if this is a autobiography or a matchup at this point 🤦‍♀️ don’t feel pressured to do this and if matchups aren’t open IM SO SO SORRY LMAO uh yeah ilysm 🦎🎂🧃

OMG ASLDFKJHASLKDJH

🥺 i’m so sorry bby but matchups are closed ;-; my 100 follower event was over while ago (i guess i should’ve specified that in the asks i answered LKSAJHFLKJAHDS SORRY IT’S MY BAD) but you sound so cool?? i had a lot of the same hyperfixations interests (heLLO helen keller was badass AF and the roman empire was messed up but still v cool, anne frank was awesome too) i also may or may not have wanted to be a politician when i was younger alskdjfhalkdhj but now i’m just 🧍🏻‍♀️ lost and anyways you’re amazing >.< love u lots and don’t forget to drink water and eat a lil something hehe :p 

[freddiesaysalright]

Dancing With Ben Week 3

A Ben Hardy x Reader Fic Disney Night - Jazz

Summary: Reader is one of the pro dancers on Dancing With the Stars. It’s her second season on the show, and this time, her partner is none other than Ben Hardy. Will they win the Mirror Ball? Maybe they’ll win something even more meaningful!

Word Count: 3K

Tag List:  @psychosupernatural, @someone-get-a-medic, @twigleektribute23, @ionlyhavepicturesofflowers, @asquiresofftime, @caborhapch, @iwasnothingbutacityboy, @a-kind-of-magik, @anxious-diabetic, @royalblueviper, @toms-irish-girl If you’d like to be added, let me know!

Week 1  Week 2

Week 3 here we go!!!

Disney night was a favorite of yours. It reminded you of childhood and the night was always joyful. Also, you got to take a break from rehearsal one day and go to DisneyLand. You were really looking forward to spending the day at the park with Ben, even if the cameras were following you around for most of the day. 

“Are you ready to have a fun Disney day?” you asked eagerly as you entered the park.

“I am,” he chuckled, looking at you.

You felt like a little kid again. You donned Minnie Mouse ears and everything for the day. You hardly noticed the way Ben gazed at you, like you were positively the sweetest thing he had ever seen. You took his hand and led him over to Cinderella’s castle, where you would shoot some things for the video package.

You stood with him in front of the castle, and faced him. “So, what was your favorite Disney movie as a kid?”

“I always loved The Jungle Book and 101 Dalmations,” he said. “I was into the animals.”

“No princesses, huh?”

He shook his head. “Nah.”

“You do know you look like a Disney prince, right?”

He laughed, throwing his head back. “I guess so.”

“It’s not a guess, Hardy, I’m right,” you insisted with a smirk. 

“Which prince am I going to be this week, then?” he asked.

“Actually, we’re doing something different,” you told him. “You and I are doing a jazz routine to Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious from Mary Poppins.” 

“I can’t believe you said that without messing up,” he said, impressed. “Do it again.”

“Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious,” you said.

“One more time.”

“Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.”

“Oh, you’re good.”

You giggled. “Thank you.”

“So, what do I need to know about jazz?” he asked.

“It is very fun and very Disney,” you said. “One step you’ll have to know is the Charleston.”

“Show me, coach,” he said.

You slowly walked him through the basic Charleston step. The camera guys got a shot of you doing it together for the package. Ben already had it down, blowing you away with how easy most of this came to him. Then, you headed out to enjoy the park.

“Do you like roller coasters?” you asked.

“I love them,” he said. “You?”

“I love them!” you agreed. “Oh, we’re gonna have so much fun today.”

You took his hand again and led him to the first ride. The line wasn’t terribly long since it was the middle of the week, but it was still Disney, so tourists were crowding the park. Ben held your hand throughout the ride. Even through the first drop, when your hands were in the air, they were intertwined. You looked quickly at each other before it went down, your stomach turned, and you screamed together. When you clamored off the ride at the end, your legs wobbled, but Ben held you up.

You continued through the park this way - hand in hand. You were heading to get some food, when a tiny hand tapped your knee. You looked down and saw a weepy little girl, looking desperately up at you. She was wearing a Cinderella dress, but her tiara was askew in her hair.

“Excuse me,” she sobbed. “Can you help me?”

“Yeah, honey, what’s wrong?” you asked, kneeling down to her level. 

“I’m lost,” she said with a sniffle. “I can’t find my mommy.”

“Where did you last see her?” Ben asked. 

“By the castle,” she answered.

You were in Toontown, so it wasn’t terribly far. It was still a long way for a girl her age to go alone. 

“Alright, we can walk you back over there and see if we can find her,” you said.

“O-okay,” she stammered with a nod.

“What’s your name, lovie?” Ben questioned gently.

“Laci,” she said.

“I’m Ben, and this is Y/N,” he told her. “It’s nice to meet you, Laci.”

The corners of her mouth  twitched upward as he smiled at her. 

“Can you hold our hands?” you suggested. 

“Hold on, I’ve got a better idea,” Ben said. “How’d you like to sit way up high on my shoulders, Laci? That way you can see your mum from wherever she is.”

Laci nodded enthusiastically. Together, you hoisted her up until she was settled on his shoulders, legs dangling on either side of his head. He held her ankles. At last, she laughed.

“Lean forward, lovie,” he said. “Don’t want you to slip off.”

“Okay!” she agreed brightly.

“That was a quick turnaround,” you said to Ben under your breath. 

“Kids love to be tall,” he replied simply. 

“Mr. Ben, why do you talk funny?” Laci asked from her seat atop him.

You grabbed his arm and snickered. “Mr. Ben!”

He chuckled. “Well, I’m from another country. England.”

“Oh!” she said. “Like Harry Potter!”

“Yes, like Harry Potter,” he said, smiling. 

“Do you know him?” she wondered.

“Not well,” he answered. “We’ve met, but, as you know, he’s a rather busy person.”

They carried on back and forth and you looked on with admiration. A pang of irritation went through you as you overheard the camera guy and producer exchange a few words.

“Are you getting this?” the producer asked.

“Yeah, they’re gonna love it,” said the camera man.

You made your way back to the castle and Ben instructed Laci to be on the lookout for her mother. You kept your eyes peeled as well for a woman who might be distressed. Laci wiggled on Ben and gave an excited cry. He gripped her legs tighter to keep her upright.

“There she is!” she said. “By the statue!”

You squinted and saw a pretty blonde woman up ahead. She looked frantic and was calling out. You jogged ahead, so you could lead her back to her daughter. 

“Hi!” you called. “Are you Laci’s mom?”

“Yes!” she sighed. “Is she with you?”

“Yeah,” you assured her. “And she’s fine, don’t worry.”

At that moment, Ben caught up. He lifted Laci off his shoulders and lowered her to the ground. She hurtled toward her mother and wrapped herself on her legs.

“Thank you!” her mother cried. “I stopped in a shop to grab one thing, and the next thing I knew she was gone.”

“She came right up and asked us for help,” you said.

“Seriously, thank you so much,” she said. 

A beat passed as she looked at you. “Aren’t you two on Dancing With the Stars?”

You smiled. “Yeah! I’m Y/N, and this is Ben Hardy.”

“I thought I recognized you,” she said. “The whole family are big fans.”

“We hope that means you’re voting for us,” Ben joked.

She laughed. “Of course! Especially now, after what you’ve done. Is there...anything else I can do for you guys to thank you?”

You and Ben exchanged a surprised look.

“No, nothing,” he assured her. “Really, she was no trouble.”

“Then can I just ask for a picture?” she said a little sheepishly.

“Of course!” you agreed.

She picked up Laci and put her on her hip. Ben took her phone and you all leaned in for a selfie. He snapped the photo and returned her phone to her and she thanked you again and again. When you parted ways at last, Laci in her mother’s arms, she waved to you over her shoulder, until she was out of sight.

“What a sweetheart,” you cooed. You turned to Ben. “And you! You really were like a Disney prince!”

He looked at the ground. “No, I wasn’t. I was just being a good person.”

“You literally swept her off her feet,” you said.

“I do the same thing to you every week,” he teased, winking at you.

It made you stop in your tracks. You caught your breath and then kept on walking. Shortly after, the cameras were gone and you and Ben were free to enjoy the rest of the afternoon however you liked. You packed as much as you could into the day, since Ben had actually never been before. You had an absolute blast on all the rides, sometimes holding tightly to him as you went. A few other people recognized you and asked for pictures as well, which you happily agreed to.

Finally, you stopped to eat something. You picked a restaurant in the New Orleans Square and sat down to eat. As you waited for your food, you chatted some more.

“So, are you excited for this week’s dance?” you asked.

“I’m always excited to dance with you,” he replied, and you hoped he missed the color that flooded your cheeks. “But I am excited for this dance. I’m actually a bit relieved to not be a prince character.”

“Why?” you wondered.

“Well, I feel like it’s how everyone sees me,” he explained. “The hot guy or whatever. I want to be known for my performance, not the way I look. It’s why - when I have a choice - I always choose to remain clothed.”

You cocked your head to the side with a questioning look. He laughed at how cute you were.

“For example, when I did Woman in White, there was a scene where I could have had my shirt off,” he said. “I chose to keep it on because I wanted people focused on the scene. Not my body.”

“Are you insecure about it or something?” you asked, incredulous at the idea.

“No, not at all,” he answered. “I’m proud of my body and all that but I don’t like being objectified. Ogled.”

“It makes you feel like the reason you get parts is because you’re eye candy,” you summarized.

“Yes, exactly,” he said. “I want to be recognized for my talent.”

“Ben, you are a very handsome man,” you said, holding out your hand, which he took. “But you are so much more than that. You’re really talented. Not just at acting, but dance now too. Even more than both those things, you’re genuinely one of the sweetest people I’ve ever met. It’s probably what I like most about you.”

“I appreciate that,” he said. “Really.”

You enjoyed dinner together and you realized your newfound respect for Ben. He took his art really seriously. He had fun, but he was intent on doing things the right way. You admired him greatly for it.

The next day, you began rehearsals. Ben was enthusiastic as usual as you broke down the basics for him. One fun thing about this routine was that you were doing a lift where he had to flip you over a cane. It was whimsical and interesting. Ben was incredibly careful with you. Luckily, he was strong and only dropped you once. You laughed on the floor when he fussed and wondered if you were okay. 

“I’m fine!” you insisted. “Believe me, this happens all the time. Do you need a break?”

“Yeah, maybe a short one,” he said.

You sat down and grabbed some water, allowing him to shake it off. At that moment, Sasha entered, carrying a gossip magazine. You raised an eyebrow at him.

“Look what I found!” Sasha teased. “You two were really cozying up at Disney, eh?”

He handed you the magazine and you opened it to the page he had dog-eared. You groaned when you saw it. It was you and Ben at the restaurant holding hands. The text speculated you were in a relationship, and also implied how it would break James’s heart that you had “moved on.”

“Looks like you two are the couple of the season,” Sasha said.

“I’m happy to take some of the pressure off Sharna, but this is ridiculous,” you said. It usually was Sharna who was rumored to be dating her male partners on the show. 

“Yeah, Y/N was just being nice to me right then,” said Ben. “We were really just having a moment of genuine friendship.”

“You know how it goes,” Sasha said. “The press has to come up with some scandal if they can. Unless of course it’s true.”

You smacked him on the arm. “Don’t you have some rehearsal you need to be at, Mr. Bottom Two?” 

Sasha feigned offense. “Oh, she’s feisty. Good luck, Ben!” 

He left with a laugh and without the magazine. You kicked it into the corner. 

“Let’s get back to work, shall we?” you said. 

Ben smiled and agreed. 

He picked up the routine well. You worked extra hard to get the parts where you tossed his cane and your umbrella down to perfect timing. By the time dress rehearsal rolled around, you were feeling great. You were getting fitted for your dress. It was the white one, similar to what Julie Andrews wore in the movie, but with a little more sex appeal. Your neckline was a deep vee, and the red bit really cinched in your waist. The skirt only went just past your knees and you couldn’t resist doing a twirl and getting the layers floating around your legs.

You heard Ben gasp in the doorway. You beamed at him. 

“Wow,” he sighed. “You look…”

“Practically perfect in every way?” you finished.

He nodded. You naturally made you way to his arms and settled there. 

“You look pretty good yourself, handsome,” you said, straightening his bow tie. 

“Thank you,” he said. 

“Are you ready to kill it?” you asked. 

“It’s only dress rehearsal,” he laughed.

“No excuses, Hardy,” you said, poking his chest. “Give me everything you got, remember?”

“Yes, coach.”

You made it through dress rehearsal without a hitch. You were sure you and Ben would be getting even higher scores this time around. It was going so smoothly. 

The time came for the performance. You and Ben were going right in the middle of everyone else, which was fine with you. You were certain he’d stand out. Tom started to introduce you.

“Next up, take a look at Ben and Y/N’s experience at Disney, where they faced an unexpected visitor,” he said.

The video package showed you and Ben talking and then they included finding Laci. You rolled your eyes. Ben actually watched the video this time, and he smiled at Laci’s face.

“She really was cute, wasn’t she?” he said.

You nodded. “Well, she and her mom are voting so let’s do them proud.”

You got set up as the video faded to black, the music started, and you began your routine. 

You and Ben leapt around that dance floor like Mary Poppins and Bert were right off the screen. He got every step. He nailed the small lift, and you felt like you really brought some fire to that jazz. When you finished, you embraced, before heading over to the judges, very much out of breath. 

“Once again, I’m shocked,” Carrie Ann began. “Seriously, jazz can be so hard, and Y/N pulled no punches with that choreography.” She added a few notes about footwork.

“I won’t lie to you, Ben,” Len began, but then he broke into a smile. “I really, really liked that dance. You went in there, gave it some welly, and you performed a real jazz number. Well done.”

You and Ben laughed and squeezed each other. 

“I loved that dance,” Bruno agreed. “You were bouncing around, and you really captured the essence of Mary Poppins and Dick Van Dyke in that movie. And honestly, you behaved like a real Disney hero for that little girl in the park. Well done, Ben!”

They all clapped for you as you headed to the skybox to talk to Erin and receive your scores. The other pros and contestants high fived you guys as you came through, finally stopping in front of the camera.

“Great job, you guys!” Erin said. “Honestly, Ben, you and that little girl had my heart just melting. What exactly happened there?”

“Y/N and I were walking and the girl - Laci - literally just walked up and asked us to help her find her mum,” he explained. “She was so sweet, so we helped her out, and luckily, her mum wasn’t too far away.”

“Still so, so cute,” she said. “Let’s see what the judges thought.”

You waited while the scores came in. All three of them scored you a nine. You screamed with joy and leapt into Ben’s arms, wrapping your legs around his waist. The three nines placed you at the top of the leaderboard. You felt like you were in the clouds. Between the dance, the scores, and the thrill of being in the lead, nothing could bring you down. Ben was exactly the same. You couldn’t stop hugging each other. 

“You did it!” you cried. “I’m so proud of you!”

“We did it!” he returned. “Together!”

You got warm all over from the sentiment. 

Finally, it was elimination time. You and Ben joined the other couples on the stage as you waited once again for Erin and Tom to go through couple by couple to tell them who was in danger. You gripped Ben’s hand so tight, you were sure his fingers were bruised. 

“Ben and Y/N,” Erin said. “I’m sorry, you guys are in danger tonight.”

Your mouth fell open and you looked at Ben. He swallowed and pulled you under his arm. He kissed your forehead and you closed your eyes. You held tightly to him, fearing you may not get to hold him again. 

“I’m sorry,” you whispered.

“It’s not over yet,” he said, sounding more confident than he looked. 

You waited. There were three couples total in danger. You and Ben, Sasha and his partner, and Lindsay and her partner. 

“The couple that is leaving us tonight is…” Tom began.

You gripped handfuls of Ben’s jacket, sending a silent prayer that you wouldn’t have to let him go yet. You weren’t ready. 

“Sasha and…”

You sighed with relief, but did not let go of Ben. He didn’t release you either. You held each other for a long moment. The others were already moving to say goodbye to Sasha and his partner. You and Ben looked at each other and then joined them, noticeably behind. 

“That concludes Disney night,” Tom said to the camera. “Thanks for joining us and come back next week to see what our stars come up with for country night!”

[leviathan-supersystem]

what is lesswrong and can you summarize why it's bad? I'm new to the term and Google results are kinda vague

it’s the blog joined at the hip with MIRI, the machine intelligence research research institute, which is a weird-ass AI doomsday cult which is seems grimes has gotten mixed up with. you know roko’s basilisk? that’s them. 

anyways to save time i’m going to copy-paste an earlier response to this kind of question from this post:

so have you ever seen someone saying in their blog description that they’re a “rationalist”? well that’s the self-descriptor used by people who come from a site called “lesswrong.com,” which is run by a guy named Eliezer Yudkowsky, and which purports to teach people the methods of “bayesian rationalism,” which is basically just a method to pretend you’re using math to help make your decisions, but since it involves guesstimating the probabilities you’re calculating, it’s not noticeably any better than just guessing without math. the whole thing traces it’s roots back to the site Overcoming Bias, which was wirtten by Eliezer and a man named Robin Hanson, who was involved in several Bush-era scandals [link]. going back further, the community can be traced to the Extropians, a techno-libertarian group from the 90′s.

oh, also Eliezer wrote a terrible Harry Potter fanfiction to promote bayesian “rationality” as well, called “Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality.”

anyways, aside from teaching people bayesian “rationality,” lesswrong is also an extension of MIRI, or the Machine Intelligence Research Institute, which is based around the idea that we are inevitably headed toward the creation of an all-powerful computer dictator, and that the only course of action is to make sure that we create a good computer dictator, and not a bad one. the whole thing has a decidedly quasi-religious undercurrent, and at one point that undercurrent burst through to the surface in the creation of Roko’s Basilisk, which was when someone on the site posited that when the all-powerful computer dictator comes into being, it will eternally punish anyone who didn’t do enough to help it come into being by donating to MIRI, so to avoid being punished forever people should donate as much as possible to MIRI, like some kind of modern incarnation of Pascals wager. while most of them don’t still subscribe to this belief, a small percentage of them do.

at any rate, besides the bad logic and AI worship, they also have really shitty politics- Eliezer Yudkowsky is a right-wing libertarian, as is Scott Alexander, who runs the closely related site SlateStarCodex. among the other nonsense, they both constantly try to use their sites to try to sell right-wing libertarianism to moderate progressives, perhaps most explictly in the slatestarcodex post “Right is the New Left”[link] which is basically dedicated to trying to convince progressive liberals that they should shift politically rightward and become libertarians. there are a whole bunch of really shitty conceptual frameworks they’ve come up with as part of this, including the “blue tribe/red tribe/grey tribe” framework, which is this really weak shoddy framework based around broad stereotypes about left-leaning people being snooty wealthy cosmopolitan democrats, right-wing people being simple working class rural people, and techno-libertarians being smart free-thinking genuises, and trying to use this framework as a sales pitch for libertarianism. probably the best illustration of how the concept is used by people in that community as a sales pitch for libertarianism is this post by pax-dickinson [link]. the fact that lower-income people actually lean leftward, thus contradicting their whole framework, doesn’t seem to phase them. you can straight up show them the statistics and they’ll still insist that it’s the gospel truth that left-wingers are all snooty rich whole-foods shoppers.

at any rate, besides being partially an effort by libertarians to recruit progressives and shift them rightward, the whole thing is funded personally by wealthy right-wing CEO Peter Thiel, who is known for his various statements about how democracy should be abolished and women should have never been given the vote, as well as his association with the neofascist alt-right sub-movement “NeoReaction,” specifically Mencius Moldbug, who Peter Thiel is also funding.

the sad thing is that Eliezer Yudkowsky doesn’t even seem to realize the extent of what Peter Thiel is using him to achieve by shifting people’s politics further rightward. Eliezer was shocked, for instance, when Peter Thiel endorsed Trump, instead of Gary Johnson.

so basically the lesswronger community is liberals being played like suckers by right-wing libertarians who are being played like suckers by neofascists. chain of fools.

as a result of this, the lesswronger community exemplify everything rancid about liberalism. very “the free market is sacred!” type politics. very “but fascists have feelings too!” type politics. people who think of themselves as progressive, but actually act in every capacity toward supporting right-wing causes.

which brings us to how I first encountered them

so i was just minding my own business, being a communist, saying unkind things about fascists on the world wide web, when these dipshits started dogpiling me and my friends for being communists, and saying unkind things about fascists, and screaming at us that we’re evil and stupid, etc.

but of course, then when we responded to these critiques, and offered our own critiques of the politics of lesswrong, they absolutely lost their shit, and acted like the victims.

also when i pointed out that one of their dear friends was in fact Wesley Eugene Rian, better known by his nom-de-blog Nydwracu, a well-known neoreactionary and utter piece of shit, and that this was perhaps relevant information to the debate, they similarly lost their shit, accusing me of victimizing him, since apparently being a prominent neofascist theorist is just “words on the internet” but me pointing out that someone is a neofascist theorist is terrible and dangerous. Nydwracu, incidentally, still engages in all the kind of douchebaggery you would expect, including recently trying to create a media hoax framing someone for murder [link]. the lesswrongers will constantly make excuses for this, and say the real bad guys are the leftists, and if they were just nicer to Nydwracu, he wouldn’t even be “fascist-ing on the internet” [link]. this of course is bullshit.

EDIT: oh, also, i almost forgot- around this time the lesswrongers began shipping me with nydwracu. like in the fandom sense. they came up with a name for the ship and everything. it was really really really really really creepy.

anyways, in spite of their constant whining about how left-wingers need to be more “charitable” toward right-wingers in debates, the lesswrongers themselves have absolutely atrocious conduct in debates, are extremely prone to flying off the handle and acting like assholes. anyways here’s some posts where i got trapped in debates with these assholes which pretty much sum up what they’re all about:

(links for desktop): [link] [link] [link] [link] [link]

(links for mobile): [link] [link] [link] [link] [link]

Addendum: you can also get a feel for the overall vibe of the community by checking out the reddit board r/slatestarcodex, which is a board for fans of the blog slate star codex, which spun off from lesswrong. you can also check out it’s rival community r/sneerclub, (name’s a joking reference to a post Yudkowsky made whining about people who didn’t like his harry potter fanfic) which is for critics and ex-members of the community, and has case after case documented of former members burning out under the weight of the overwhelming right-wing bias of the community beneath their thin pretense of “neutrality”.

[yurireview]

Ambition and Affection the drama of Croix and Chariot

it's been 2 years since the LWA premiere and I still like the dynamics of Croix and Chariox even though the dynamics of Diana and Akko is very good, I think the engine of the series were the two teachers who took separate paths ... that said I will begin the review in honor of my favorite dynamic and for the anniversary of the series

Litte Witch Academia is probably one of my favorite anime has all the elements for a good story, the focus is fun, true friendship and a path of the “hero” well simplistic but with great development, it can be said that it is one of the few Current projects that do have a soul unlike the current anime, but in the middle of this show there are 2 characters that really give a maturity to the show

Croix and Chariot were the reason why half of the season was the best part, it had an incredible development and it really made me wish that the anime had focused on that issue from the beginning to show us a lot more, but let’s continue with the review

Croix and Chariot

I hate that in the Fandom they tend to simplify their connection with saying “They’re like Diana and Akko if there was no jealousy” which is ridiculous if they can really figure out how deep Chariot and Croix’s relationship is not that they do not have parallels but that It is very different because of the context of their situations.

The anime leaves a lot of them in the mystery but what little it shows is quite revealing, to start with Croix was an excellent student and did not get together with other people because she did not care and did not need it. This image summarizes what Croix was then and his contrast with Chariot even before she met her.

Croix’s life was just becoming good enough to excel and achieve his goal that was all, only had his knowledge … but look at the change of Croix to meet Chariot, this shows us how special this girl meant to her.

Many in the fandom have wondered that it took an introverted girl to join Chariot who was the opposite of her and that probably Chariot’s dream would have seemed naive and stupid.

The answer to this is given in chapter 23 in the conversation of Diana and Akko, which point to one of the main points of the series as a whole and this is that many were fascinated by the magic of Chariot, but few realized that the first to fall in love with that cheerful and silly half-wit was Croix, even in the midst of all her seriousness and cynicism she was attracted to Chariot’s cheerful and problematic magic and encouraged not to give up and what makes this better is that it was Croix who in the end was the one who tells him the famous words “Believing is your magic”

Many have referred to this anime as the “Harry Potter in anime” which is inaccurate … but I must focus that Chariot and Croix’s part is like a less dark version of Dumbledore and Grindelwald, if they realize in spite of the “Friendship” of the two young magicians that really united them was the attraction of the Deathly Hallows were ambitious young but clear with different goals…with Croix and Chariot is basically the same, even in spite of that instant connection Croix ambitioned the “Magic to change the world” and influenced Chariot to help her look for it but each with different goals

it must be a tremendous irony that Chariot took Croix words as a personal motto while Geller took the words of Albus as his personal motto

“Believing is your magic” “For the greater good”

After becoming close they went to look for the wand … each one with their respective dream to neither of them the dream of the other seemed stupid, until Chariot was chosen, that was the beginning of the problems since for the first time Croix looked at Chariot with frustration and anger as he had ruined all his goals and I must say that this reaction is normal in someone like Croix

But if we continue the scene when Chariot cries exclaiming that he did not want that and thinking that Croix hated her, after seeing her cry Croix hugs her and swallowing her pride, her anger, her ambitions just for not seeing her cry … she trusted in her and encouraged Chariot to move forward at that time his affection for her was greater than his ambition which unleashed one of the Words and as we saw in the case of Akko this word has to be with a special person and clear a feeling of immense gratitude both parties.

Although I must say something curious Croix is ​​the only witch who is not even allowed to touch the Shiny Rote and this is because Croix is ​​the kind of witch that is supposed to be protected by the Grand Triskelion … What would happen if she used the magic of world reconstruction with its ambition to become the most powerful witch? Taking your dream to the extreme and transforming into something else

People like Croix are very explosive and their dreams are quickly transformed into very unpleasant things, in the whole series we see that their only emotional link is to Chariot and otherwise had no remorse, just imagine:

What would happen if she unleashed the words or found a way to dominate all the power?

Here again I can make an accurate comparison with Harry Poter … just imagine how many deaths would have been saved if Gellert Grindelwald could not have obtained the power of the Deathly Hallows for magical protection, as Dumbledore himself said. “He lost the control when receiving power ”

In the incident of the Shiny Rote and the “chosen” was something that created a big wound that would affect both long-term, but as we see in chapter 12 of Akko vision, there Chariot is with the Shiny Rote next to Croix who looked at her and applauded him, sharing a nice moment what basically eliminates those who say that right there they stopped spending time together.

I must say that this memory is very romantic

Although Croix was half resentful, he had not turned away but his relationship with his special person, to see the way Chariot executed his mission and truly the distancing worsened when Chariot became an “Idol” and the famous “Shiny Chariot” was born “

If you remember chapter 23 Croix tells you that thanks to the Full Dream Spirit his plan is now possible, but if analyze Chariot little Flashback this is a lie, after several months of using the Full Dream Spirit it was confirmed that it was a Total success and Croix told him the effects, but really Croix if he wanted to help his way with that spell because Croix thought that was the way to get the Seventh Word that’s why he let go of his frustration when Chariot said “I do not want that power” , is angry that the “Chosen” is a stupid who does not see the “reality” of the magical world, it is more Chariot stopped looking for the last word in concentrating on his show.

One of the reasons why Chariot believes she is responsible as Croix for the theft of magic is because he knew in his heart that Croix had become selfish and ambitious for power through her, but decided to ignore him and trust in his methods…because of her affection for her, she pretended that everything was fine, but in the end that caused much more damage to both of them and to the people who lost their magic

After their fight even when they separated Croix was watching her as her career was broken and even with everything that happened between the two Croix worried and was very surprised to see how Chariot destroyed herself because of all her problems and pressure that it was carrying … although the reality is that Chariot became selfish and that made Rote reject it.

Returning to the current events in the series, you will notice that the day that Chariot retired was when Croix truly went on his way and a plan to carry out his mission and if we see the bigger picture, Croix had already surpassed Chariot in terms of “Achievements” when they spent 10 years each separated by their way, Croix was admired and they said that the future of magic was on their shoulders, since she was a revolutionary in “modern magic”

In the incident with Akko in Chapter 15 where Chariot confronts her, she says this very revealing phrase:

“You have not changed in anything, you are always trying to get things for yourself”

Chariot sentence proves what I mentioned before and makes a lot of sense with the guilt he has for the Theft of Magic because she let herself be deceived and ignored the truth until Croix herself confessed it, although ironically Croix revealed this information because she thought that Chariot was not going to be an “Immature” because from Croix’s perspective “Good justifies the means” for her. What good is it for a few to preserve their magical talent if the magic in the world were to disappear?

In all their interactions there is a kind of tension that only people who liked in the past possess, are practically enemies and have different goals and ideologies … but in their confrontations, none of them actually seeks to hurt the other because they can not .

If Croix had wanted to kill Chariot, he would have done so long ago and the same with Chariot, she could stop Croix before he started his plan, only that he did not really want to confront her and not give her away even without knowing his plan.

Why do you think I did not give it away? Why do you think he did not tell Akko about Croix? again I can use something from Harry Poter … when Dumbledore was asked to face Grindelwald he did not make his decision in 5 years where there was a lot of confusion and chaos in Europe, where he said “I had an emotional bond for man”. … basically Chariot had the same dilemma with Croix, she really wanted to stop her without having to face her directly and her internal conflict is very well done.

Although Croix is ​​not better, he had the same weakness for Chariot and this is clear in chapter 21 where he was holding Chariot to arrive with Akko

When one of her attacks left her unconscious and Chariot was going to die in the fall, Croix did not hesitate 1 second to go and save her in a state of panic, forgetting all her goals.

A simple and powerful scene that gives us a good background of both

The moment Chariot reacts and stares at Croix for the body language you can determine that he was feeling our “villain” and asks him to stop trying to save Akko to which Chariot refuses knowing that Croix was not going to stop her anymore.

Chariot just decides to stop Croix when he hurts Akko revealing the truth in the worst way crushing the dreams of his special student and fuck if it was such a well done scene

In the only real showdown in the whole anime was between Croix and Chariot in chapter 24 when both abandoned all their emotions to fulfill each his dream, even though it lasted little I would say that Croix won by managing to stop Chariot and defeat her

When Croix breaks the seal and thinks that he already won by getting the magic that changed the world, upon receiving it he realizes that not only can not use it but it is not what she expected … something curious about Croix is ​​that it is the Witch who has an ambition of real power not “smiles” and see that the “Great magic” was about that left her shocked

In this part he shows us how his own egoistic dream is in constant conflict with and I dare to say, the love that Croix has for her. That is why in the series this is what leads to their contradictory actions. She can never really settle on either, no matter how much she tries on herself. She may think that she knows what she really wants, but in fact, she has no damn idea and the moment Woodward appears she reproaches him that nobody is guiding her and that she felt set apart.

Being stripped of her dream and consequently of her ambition, the other great thing she had left was the feelings towards Chariot and that is why after her magic gets out of control she asks Chariot to leave her and to save her several times, showing true repentance for what he did and recognizing that it was all his fault.

When Akko uses great magic the result is something that Croix never came to expect since honestly it is such a joyful magic that I really do not think Croix would have imagined something like that.

Understanding this should not be surprised that Croix helped Chariot and the little witches or the speed with which Chariot forgives her and re-establishes what they previously had … it can be said that Akko not only revived the magic in the world and he gave the redemption to Chariot but he made Croix understand what really mattered about magic and about his own feelings.

In the final scene of both that I must say is my favorite because it symbolizes a new beginning for Croix and Chariot that has a lot of romantic charge in his farewell especially by Chariot his facial language to the departure of Croix is ​​amazing and his final words are even better “! Croix will be waiting! … I’ll be waiting for you”

No doubt a great conclusion and definitely the only couple (lesbian) of the series

[sandersstudies]

WHAT ARE ESSAYS AND HOW DO I WRITE THEM???? OUR GR9 TEACH EXPECTS US TO KNOW NO ONE HAS E V E R TAUGHT US

EXCELLENT QUESTION

OKAY SO HERE IS HOW TO DO AN ESSAY - GET STRAPPED IN KIDDOS

Introduction: HERE’S WHERE YOU SAY WHAT YOU’RE GONNA SAY. 

“Broad introductory phrase introducing the reader to the topic and why it is important. A brief sentence or two narrowing down what you’re talking about more. If you’re analyzing or arguing, a basic introduction to the argument you’re making. A thesis statement, which includes your first major point, your second major point, and your third major point.” 

POR EJEMPLO

“The Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling has had massive international impact on people of all ages. However, many people do not look into the complex symbolism which Rowling chose to include in her novels. One especially important example of this is use of animal symbolism throughout the books. Rowling’s use of this literary device is essential to the series, including iconic creatures like Scabbers the rat, Crookshanks the cat, and Hedwig the owl.” 

BOOM. THE READER LOOKS AT THIS AND SAYS “WOW I KNOW WHAT THIS ESSAY IS GONNA BE ABOUT AND IT SOUNDS SUPER INTERESTING” 

“Woah, but hey Study, how do I know if my thesis is good?” - WELL FRIENDO, FIRST IT HAS TO BE SOMETHING YOU HAVE ACTUAL EVIDENCE FOR! YOU CAN’T JUST SAY “Dumbledore is gay” IF THERE’S NO TEXTUAL EVIDENCE FOR THAT. ALSO, IF IT’S AN ARGUMENTATIVE PAPER, IT HAS TO BE AN ARGUMENT! AN ARGUMENT DOESN’T HAVE TO BE MEAN, IT JUST HAS TO BE SOMETHING ANOTHER ESSAYIST COULD LOOK AT AND SAY, “Nope, I think you’re wrong. Animal symbolism isn’t actually that important in Harry Potter.”

Body paragraphs: HERE’S WHERE YOU SAY WHAT YOU’RE SAYING. YOU MIGHT HAVE TWO BODY PARAGRAPHS, YOU MIGHT HAVE TWENTY. BECAUSE THIS IMAGINARY PAPER HAD THREE MAIN POINTS IN THE THESIS, LET’S SAY IT HAS THREE, AND WE WILL DO ONE AS AN EXAMPLE.

“Here I am introducing the topic of the paragraph, and sometimes this sentence is called a topic sentence and is like a little mini-thesis. I’m offering some basic background information on the topic so the reader knows what I am talking about, but I’m avoiding summarizing because an essay is not a book report. I’m making a point about this topic and telling the reader why this point is important. Here’s some evidence to back up my point. Additionally, here’s another piece of evidence backing up my point, maybe even a quote or source if it’s relevant. Finally, here’s a little more evidence backing up my point. I’m wrapping up the paragraph with another more generalized statement that will make it easy to transition into the next paragraph.” 

WHAT THE HELL DOES THIS ACTUALLY LOOK LIKE, STUDY?

“Scabbers the rat is an important character in the Harry Potter series, and Rowling uses symbolism as foreshadowing for his character’s actions. Scabbers appears first as Ron Weasley’s pet rat, but is eventually revealed to be a human being named Peter Pettigrew. Making Peter Pettigrew a rat is an indicator of his behavior, because rats are recognizable symbols in many kinds of media. Rats are generally viewed as vermin and pests by many people, and Peter Pettigrew is frequently mentioned to trail behind and annoy his more talented classmates. In Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Minerva McGonnelgal comments on Pettigrew, saying, “[He] hero-worshiped Black and Potter. Never quite in their league, talent-wise. I was often rather sharp with him … Stupid boy … Foolish boy .. .He was always hopeless at dueling…“ (Rowling 211). This is evidence for Pettigrew’s weakness and lack of usefulness, like a vermin. Eventually, Pettigrew betrays his friend by revealing his secret, essentially “ratting him out.” This common phrase is used to indicate that someone is untrustworthy, further adding to the symbolism of Peter as a rat. This is only one example of Rowling’s use of animal symbolism.”

BOOM. YOUR READER SAW YOUR POINT AND SAW SOME REASONS YOU MADE IT.

“Hey Study, what is that little bit in the parentheses there?”  WELL KIDDO, THAT’S A CITATION. YOU NEED TO CITE ANY IDEAS YOU DIDN’T COME UP WITH YOURSELF. SINCE YOU DIDN’T WRITE HARRY POTTER, YOU NEED TO GIVE ROWLING CREDIT BY INCLUDING A CITATION. THIS CITATION IS IN MLA STYLE, BUT SOMETIMES YOU MAY NEED TO USE APA OR CHICAGO STYLE. 

NOTICE I DON’T USE “I,” “YOU,” OR “WE” IN MY PARAGRAPHS. UNLESS YOU ARE TOLD TO INCLUDE YOUR OPINION, REMEMBER JUST TO STICK TO THE FACTS. I ALWAYS CARE ABOUT WHAT YOU THINK EXCEPT WHEN IT COMES TO ESSAYS.

Conclusion: HERE’S WHERE WE SAY WHAT WE’VE SAID AND WHY IT’S IMPORTANT.

“Here’s a refresher on what I said, from the introduction to the last body paragraph, bringing the reader through the paper so they remember all the most important stuff. I might be “re-stating my thesis” here, to make sure my reader got my main point. I don’t add any new facts or information, but I might offer some generalized statements about the topic. I conclude with letting the reader know why my topic and the ideas I got out of it are important.”

WHAT THIS MEAN?

“Rowling’s seamless use of foreshadowing and symbolism have been one element of what made the Harry Potter books so attractive to audiences, and Scabbers, Crookshanks, and Hedwig are excellent examples of this. Harry Potter’s massive impact on pop culture and the childhood of an entire generation has made it a topic of literary discussion and analysis, and animal symbolism is only one important part of what makes these books so compelling and exciting.” 

BOOM. YOU WROTE A PAPER. ALL DONE!

PSYCHE JUST KIDDING, NOW IT’S TIME TO EDIT - HERE’S SOME FREE AND IMPORTANT EDITING RESOURCES:

owl.purdue.edu

hemingwayapp.com

grammarly.com

slickwrite.com

CONGRAMJURATION GO HAVE A COOKIE YOU DID IT

[runadamsrun]

It’s been a while since I’ve put anything up on my Tumblr.

One reason is because I’ve been busy. Teaching is an awful lot of work. Of course, it’s been so much easier this year with the pandemic going on and schools being closed (I’m personally loving this though, so sorry everyone). Virtual/distance/online (whatever you want to call it) teaching has made this job so much easier, and so much more refreshing, compared to what I went through my first year last year.

So yeah. While it has been much easier, I’ve still been busy because I’ve had to change up my lesson plans. Like, adapting them to make them online-learning-friendly. I’ve also been trying to change my curriculum map to better connect and tie in the subjects students will be learning throughout the year (to like, connect what they’re learning in the first unit, for example, and make it relevant and come up later even in the latter part of the school year). So there’s that too.

...

But another reason why it’s been so long since I’ve put anything on my Tumblr is because I’ve been... waiting, I guess. And hoping that I’m wrong, and just... my wishing that there’s some logical, or romantic, explanation for what I’m about to talk about. I’d say this is probably my main reason; because I’ve been too afraid to put it into text and out into the universe.

But just the other day, on the 10th of November (I remember because I spent Veterans Day the next day brainstorming how to finish up this post), I finished one of my favorite (maybe after HakoMari) light novel series of all time: Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei. And to summarize it with a few words, there are these two “siblings” who are really, really in love with each other; like, a completely and genuinely true love. And with complete trust and dedication in each other. And I guess... finishing the series and seeing the true love between the two characters made me reflect on my own life.

After all, it’s in the middle of November, and right now, I feel like I need to put this down somewhere. Because the way things are looking is so different from... that. That I can’t help but feel bitter and depressed and just... hurt.

...

I first met my senpai in February over 4 years ago (in 2016). If you look far back enough in my Tumblr, you’ll see that post: when I first met her at KPQ. It’s been over 4 and a half years since that day, and it’s been a ridiculous roller coaster between us with so many ups and downs I’ve lost count.

When I first met her in the game, I admittedly thought her character looked cute. Of course, I know it’s just a character sprite. I could make a girl character myself and no one would be the wiser. But well, that was my first impression I guess.

Then she spent hours in KPQ leveling me, and we added each other to our buddy lists at the end of it, I think... with the promise that we’d meet up in the future to level together. I saw her again not too long later, and we talked, and I probably asked her a question or something. And she gave me advice for something or another. And it wasn’t just one time, but I’d ask her many questions, and she’d always have an answer for me. She was kind of like an upperclassman, who I could turn to and rely on if I ever needed anything. So that’s why she was my senpai.

At this time, I think I got really attached to her. As in, I suppose infatuated? Like, to the person behind the character sprite. She was helpful, kind, knowledgeable, and patient.

When she first left me for no apparent reason, I was emotionally crushed. And as I said at the time, there was no reason why I should’ve felt that way for someone who I’d only known for maybe tens of hours online, and without even knowing anything about them (like, all our conversations at that point had been only related to the game).

She came back the next day, and she... thought nothing of her actions at the time, despite my reaction the day before. Despite how she had to have known how I felt. But I brushed it off because I was just so glad she came back. Now by this point, I look back to the me of 4 years ago, and I wonder what was going on through my head, and why I was so attached to her. I think... maybe it’s because I didn’t really have romantic interests at that moment (I still don’t, as of my writing this), and I wanted someone? And I guess I had seen enough anime/manga/novels and stuff where the protagonist just happens to... by coincidence or fate, meet their person on the other end of the red string of fate. Kind of like... Kirito and Asuna, or Weed and Seoyoon. In a game, even.

We spent some time together, doing Maple stuff, and I still didn’t know anything about her. Then she left a second time about a month later, this time cutting me off entirely, and saying that I’d find someone better.

This time I was angry, of course. But... I don’t know. Well, it’s all there in some March 2016 posts. I don’t really want to go into it. But I think I was angry at the time because I felt like... I’d been leashed and my emotions toyed with. She knew just how attached I was to her, and... looking at our conversation at that time, it’s almost like I played right into it, into this drama or play of hers.

Then in September of 2016, she reached out to me on the game’s forum (it has a private messaging system where you can start a conversation with someone, and communicate back and forth) and apologized, telling me how she had to have a surgery. And as a result, she cut out everyone she knew so it wouldn’t hurt. Hence her behavior toward me. I also mentioned this in an earlier post not too far back.

And after she sent that message, I forgave her, and we both logged on and met up. And she told me her story “in person”. And we reconnected. I think... our relationship became a lot better, and it felt more genuine. It definitely felt somewhat different from before. And her opening up about why she had left made me feel... mmm... I guess special? Because I imagined she wouldn’t tell anyone else about that surgery, but me in particular. Maybe I was special to her.

Then the game released a big patch (New Source) and the game became basically unplayable for most of 2017, so we only kind of stayed in touch through the forum’s private messages. But it wasn’t even really “staying in touch”. As you’ll see me mention later throughout this post, that conversation on the forums between us? 80% of the messages are from my end. (I know how this sounds; I’m disgusted with myself too, fucking creep and weird me.)

In 2018, I commissioned the piece of art up there for her birthday in April (it’s the draft, because I don’t want to put up the completed version). She loved it. And... for the rest of the year, she was basically gone. Completely off the radar. That is, didn’t respond to any of the private messages on the forums either. But she came back near the end of the year, and... mmm. It was because she got into a car accident, according to her (hence the MIA). But I mean, I only heard about it once I coincidentally found her online in the game and she told me. I wouldn’t have heard about it otherwise, definitely not through the forums.

But anyway... she would need to have a surgery. So we got married in-game.

...

As I’m writing this and looking back, I’m tearing up. Damn it. Because... ugh. Because it was my dream, and my dream came true.

In my character’s inventory, I always held onto the materials needed for a wedding ring, and the wedding quests, and stuff.

And they were finally going to be of use.

I held onto those items because... I’m not really sure why. Maybe I wanted to be ready for an impossibility? I had always said that I wouldn’t ever marry anyone else in the game except for her, despite guildies wanting to marry me for Onyx Apples (a rare consumable from doing a married-people-only party quest). Up until that point, I was pretty confident that my character would stay single forever. But then she... asked me if I ever thought of getting married. And then I proposed to her. And she said yes.

So we got married.

I guess I felt insecure after the two times she left me. I’m a horrible, insecure person, but I always had a fear that one day, she wouldn’t want to meet me or associate with me in-game anymore. Idk. Or worse, that maybe she’d pick up someone else and be their... senpai, for lack of a better word. Someone to replace me.

So us getting married... made it official. Made me someone who’d be bound to her. And that was, and still is, the highlight of all the time I’ve spent in that game.

It was cute, honestly. We had to meet one of the NPCs, called “Mom and Dad”, to get their permission. Well, she had to, specifically. So she asked me if I was ready to meet her parents. And once we got there, she even jokingly said, “Oh no, they don’t trust us.” And... it was really cute. And sweet.

And then she disappeared after that.

In 2019, she was also... MIA throughout most of it. Meaning, I probably saw her, at most, several tens of hours the entire year. The only method I had of reaching her was through the forum’s private messaging, of course. In the latter half of the year, we met up... kind of on-and-off and fought bosses. That was basically the year for us summed up, and there wasn’t any real progress or communication. Of course, also basically no replies in the private messages.

In 2020, I’d like to think it was an improvement. When I saw her again in February, I tried to talk to her about things not related to the game, and learn more about her as a person. I asked her about her favorite songs, or if she liked Harry Potter (because I’d like to take her to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter one day); she did, of course. And... I tried. I mean, I really, really did. To get to know her better, I mean.

I essentially confessed, and told her she made my experience on MapleRoyals what it was. That she was my raison d'être, and the only reason why I logged on. I asked her if she used Discord, or Skype, or anything, and she said no to everything. And she said that... she preferred to be in contact through the forum’s private messaging system. Which... has been bad, to say the least. Most of it is just me... messaging and... not getting any response.

And at the end of it all, to my essentially-a-confession... she asked me if I wanted to re-attempt a boss fight. And she told me she had to go afterwards.

...

And anyway, the last time I heard from her, it was some time in March this year. She told me she’d be busy with a project, and that she’d be back some time in May or June.

And that’s been... it. Despite my using the forum private messages, I haven’t heard from her since.

I’m reading this post over again before I submit it, and... I admit. I sound crazy. I sound fucking creepy. I sound insane. I sound delusional. I’m admitting it. I sound creepy, and delusional, and crazy, and insane.

But it’s hard to really... describe how many hours we’ve spent together in-game. I can confidently say it’d number in the hundreds of hours together. Most of it was us just grinding mobs, or fighting bosses, and very little of it was us actually talking (again, only recently in the beginning of 2020 did I make headway and talk to her about non-game stuff). But... I’d like to think there was some meaning to all those hours we spent together. And I’d like to think that I meant something to her. Because... after all, why else would you spend so many hours with someone, over the course of 4 years, in this crazy, stupid roller coaster ride right? 

I don’t know who she is behind that character sprite, behind the screen. I don’t know much about her at all, aside from her name, her favorite song, and whether or not she likes Harry Potter. And some other things (kinda more personal I guess).

But goddamn it. I was, and still am, in love with whoever is behind that character. And... maybe when I confessed, I wasn’t clear enough, despite... how clear I think I was?

Because how do you become any more clear without sounding like a creep making unwanted advances? You can’t. I also... at the time, wanted to keep what we had between us (whatever you can call everything I described above) than risk losing her, and losing everything. That thought absolutely terrified me.

And now, I don’t know what she thinks of me. And as a result, here we are, and here I am.

Over half a year later and nothing from her. I don’t know what she’s doing. I don’t know if she’s okay. I don’t know... well, anything about her really. It just... fucking sucks, when I feel like... all that time we spent together has meant so much to me. And on the other hand, maybe it’s meant not much, or nothing, to her. Otherwise, wouldn’t she have checked her private messages and responded? At least once?

God fucking damn it. I know this is the case. But I still miss her. And... I’m still in love with her.

I’m fucking scum. Aren’t I fucking disgusting.

[okd-blr]

Who is the admin

Basics:

While Im sure most of you can figure out who runs this blog, especially if you visit the OKD home page, for use on this blog go ahead and call me V.

I’m 28 years old, if you are a minor who does not wish for adult interaction please be aware of this.

I am a bisexual pre/non transitioned Trans man and use he/they pronouns

While I do not have a current diagnosis I am not neurotypical, very likely I have ADHD

And if any of this matter to you I’m an Aries, a Slytherin and a Furry

Kintypes:

I have three different types-2 kintypes, a Theriotype and a fictotype.

My first kintype technically falls under a few different labels, but would most easily be described as a Cthonic type divine. My other kintype is that of a vampiric like animal/human shapeshifter. these two kintypes tend to be very fluid and blend together.

My theriotype is that of a melanistic jaguar like is depicted in the blog icon

My Fictotype is that of a specific character portrayed on a canadian TV drama that is an Unseelie Fae

Experience as otherkin and in the community: 

I first came to the conclusion that I might, in some way, not be entirely human 16 years ago.

At the time Vampire was the only thing I could really think of-as my grandmother was fully invested in the ideas of the Satanic Panic and had assured me as a child vampires and witches were absolutely real (she was right of course but not in the way she imagined) 

At first I dismissed this idea as the imaginings of a lonely, bullied child who wanted to be special and wished for control and power in their life. yes I was pretty quick on the critical thinking train.

However the experiences I had, the feelings I had that lead me to initially suspect being nonhuman did not go away despite my skepticism and so I would explore it in small ways until roughly 2004 when i would stumble across resources for the Real Vampire community and a small-likely now gone-page for the ‘were’ community ( the label used prior to Therianthropy) 

I read through these sites-especially the resources on vampirism, very thoroughly-though I did not join the forums as I was not allowed to do that kind of thing because of aforementioned paranoid grandmother. 

In high school I had a number of friends who claimed to be vampires, witches, reincarnated angels and such but it was clear pretty much from the beginning that this was just a game to them and they tended to engage in lots of drama and pretty teenage backstabbing and gossip. I largely managed to avoid this by claiming to be a “solitary’ vampire.

There were others I would meet in college who would, for a while, genuinely believe these kinds of things but feel out of it again after a few years-again I was the only one who remained serious about these experiences and identity.

In early 2009 during my third semester of college I would discover the forum TherianWilderness via someones Deviantart signature. Being a now independent adult I signed up, and from there also signed up for Werelist. Mostly at this time I was exploring my theriotype and the shapeshifter kintype. 

I would later bring up the subject of incarnated angels on Werelist and be directed to otherkin specific forums such as OtherkinPhenomena and OtherkinAlliance. (Though I ended up with an account on nearly every active Otherkin forum at the time, OKA was where I eventually settled down) from there 

I would begin much more serious introspection and personal growth not only related to my being Otherkin but also in relation to the rest of my spirituality. in this facet the older members of these forums were a huge asset to me and I continue to value their input and opinions on the subject-even though the group from those days has largely drifted away from each other. This same group of people would also be active in specific Otherkin circles and groups on Livejournal and then Dreamwidth.

In 2011 I would found Otherkin-Deviants on DeviantArt.com-At the time it was one of the few groups that was not Therian specific and in the ensuing 7 nyears it has become one of the largest Alterhuman related groups on Deviantart at over 350 members. 

Also in early 2011 I would create a Tumblr account. At this time there was no Otherkin community here and my main blog was almost entirely Harry Potter related. After some explosive life stuff I would be gone from the internet for a year-when I returned to Tumblr in April 2012 the Otherkin tag on Tumblr was in full swing and already full of drama, misinformation, trolls and a bunch of other ridiculous crap. So of course I rolled up my selves and went to work correcting what i could and attempting to police/moderate a community that inherently can not be moderated on this particular medium. It was all very dramatic, theres was lots of yelling and by 2014 I was sick of it all and decided to take a break from the kin community-aside from a select few people who I enjoyed talking to. 

Sometime in early 2016 I decided it was time to end my hiatus and take a peak back into the tags-annnnd it pretty much hadn't changed. but I was much better at handling The Discourse at that point and knew when to disengage. 

Sometime not too long after my return I would realize the fae kintype I had been unsure  of and questioning for nearly 10 years was, in fact, a fictotype. 

And while I had only been gone fro about two years-there didn't seem to be very many kin left in the tags who remembered me so establishing myself as a knowledgeable person within the community was starting over from scratch. I still wouldn't say I’m exactly a go to person when it comes to correcting misinformation-because while I do do that on my personal kin blogs those blogs are mostly for me to log my own personal experiences.

That brings us up to now-where I have created this extension of the OKD deviant art group. This blog has the same purpose as the original group-to showcase community art and creativity and foster a place for open and civil discussion and education. Though this is one of many ‘kin help blogs’ many of the blogs out there that claim to be information or for helping Otherkin/Therian/Fictionkin are FULL of misinformation and the mods of those blogs do not always take well to being corrected. 

So, to summarize- I realized I was Otherkin 16 years ago, prior to ever knowing there was a community- and have been an active participant and admin of my own groups for the last close to 9 years-on a verity of different mediums from forums to chats to Tumblr, Amino and Discord. 

Who I am otherwise: 

I am a freelance artist living in the US with my fiance and our son and cats.

 I love TV, films and books-especially the horror, scifi, and fantasy genres. I identify as being somewhere between Punk and Goth and truly love the music from both subcultures-though I also love music from many other different genres. I also greatly enjoy table top gaming and it would be really cool if I actually had time to join a D&D campaign. 

I joyfully engage in fandom and shipping and spend probably too much time looking at fanart and reading fanfiction. If you're interested ask me for my fandom blog :3

As mentioned earlier, I am a furry and enjoy the art and interactions of the furry community. As an artist I particularly enjoy how wonderful the furry community is about supporting artists. 

Most of my time however is probably spent stressing about pretty typical things like rent, utility bills, car repairs and home maintenance. I may not be human on the inside but rent is rent no matter who, or what, you are.