#and then turn around and blindly consume media without questioning where it’s coming from

[jokingmaiden]

y’know if some of y’all would direct the energy you use to debunk matpat’s theories towards critical thinking abt world events we’d be a much more educated society overall

[silverstonesainz-archive]

learning curve

it takes time to learn to love yourself...

summary: finding yourself beyond the confines of your relationship was never meant to be easy. pairing: charles leclerc x alpine fem!reader (nicknamed fleur) word count: 4.4k warnings: google translate french, profanity, just very sad. note: here it is, long awaited. this was inspired by an ask i received. and its an ask that kind of motivated me to add another part. so i hope you enjoy, and please send more of what you like to see from charles & fleur.

taglist: @sluts-inc @sidcrosbyspuck @coffeehurricanes @miniminescapist @amsofftrack @melancholyy-scorpio @strawberrypaul

❃゜・。. ・°゜✼ ゜°・ . 。・゜❃

You were privy to the plummet in your results, the lack of drive you had in your baby Blue. The team watched you fall in Baku, crashing into the wall after three laps, and the fight you put up against Mick in Canada where the Haas eventually beat you. You were shrinking under the expectations your team and the fans had of The Beloved. You had become a shell of the fiery woman you once were behind the wheel, she was left on the top step of the podium in Monaco.

What hurt the most was that Charles was no longer by your side. He turned into a stranger, just a person you exchanged sad smiles with in passing. You still stood in the sea of red in every podium ceremony, watching him in awe as he stands with grace. The predestined, the future of Ferrari. Your heart still soars for him, like nothing ever changed. 

Except that it has. 

Your break up was no secret to your friends and family. There was speculation around the paddock, sly questions from the press, but Ella (your media personnel) did a fair job at teaching you how to maneuver your way through the questions. But just because it was a secret to the majority, didn’t take away from the fact that it was your reality. You no longer moved on the paddock with Charles in mind. You struggled to find who you were outside of Charles. You never noticed how all consuming he was, how he took up every ounce of you until you sat in your apartment alone after ending things and feeling lost. There is an emptiness that looms about you as you blindly walk through life as your own person, and it scared you to no end. It’s been a shaky transition, still fighting the urge to walk into the red motorhome to say hi to him and getting rid of the expectations that he’d come knocking on the door of your driver’s room. And yes, the breakup was your idea, but it didn’t mean that your heart didn’t hurt any less. 

You sit in your car for a while longer, body rigid and unwilling to walk through the front door. You were afraid of the stares, the questions, the how are you’s that you would be unable to answer honestly. This is the first summer break in years you’d be walking in without Charles in your tow. You take a couple of deep breaths in before switching the engine off, grabbing your bags, and lugging it into your home. 

You sit in your car for a while longer, body rigid and unwilling to walk through the front door. You were afraid of the stares, the questions, the how are you’s that you would be unable to answer honestly. This is the first summer break in years you’d be walking in without Charles in your tow. You take a couple of deep breaths in before switching the engine off, grabbing your bags, and lugging it into your home. 

Home smells like fresh laundry and food in the oven. It’s comforting, fulfilling, and always a safe space. But for the first time in your life, you felt like a stranger. You felt like you didn’t belong, or didn’t deserve to be here. Your mother pokes her head around the corner, smile wide and eyes crinkling as she walks over to you. 

“Hi there.” She says gently, “Welcome home Fleur.”

That’s when you fall apart. You run into your mom’s arms, knees buckling as she holds you close to her chest. She lowers you gently onto the ground in the foyer, her fingers stroking your hair as you cry into her chest. Your sobs echo through every room, fingers gripping onto your mother’s shirt like your life depends on it. You cry and cry until you are overwhelmed with exhaustion. Your mother leads you to your bedroom, sitting with you until you finally succumb to a dreamless sleep.

The first several days of the break you spend in under the covers. You ignore the multitudes of texts and phone calls, asking if you were making it to Ibiza to meet with half the track. You drink water, take bites of food, but not much else. 

There is a knock on the door, and your mother slides in. “Hi baby.” 

“Hi mom.” 

She sits on the edge of your bed, pushing your hair off your face. “Do you want to talk about it?” Tears brim at your eyes, a couple of drops escaping as you shake your head. Your mother smiles sadly, but nods. “Okay Fleur. But it’s time to get out of bed. It’s time to get some sun and to breathe in the fresh air. We miss you baby.” 

She holds out her hand, waiting for you to take it. “Come join me in the garden. I want to show you something.”

You allow your mother to pull you out of bed, leading you all the way to the backyard. The sun kisses your skin beautifully, the soft wind soothing the gentle burn. There are flowers scattered across the yard. Yellows and oranges, whites and pinks, all blooming in the sun. You sit in the grass as your mother waters her flowers, listening to her gush over her new found hobby and all the plants she has yet to add to her collection. It could’ve been minutes or hours that you sat there, but for a moment you were in utter bliss. You felt like you belonged.

But the feeling didn’t last long. 

You take your mom’s advice, trying to enjoy the sun and the fresh air. There’s a little space between the carnations and the lilies, where your mother plans on putting in a new plant. A small picnic blanket fits between the pots, and it’s become your little safe space. You spent the better parts of your day in the little nook, nose deep in a book as you try to distract yourself with written fantasy. The days roll by quicker, and you were slowly finding yourself again. 

You tried to immerse yourself into your family’s routine, but it was still hard. You were still drowning in the memories of the times you spent here with Charles. It felt wrong, feeling like you didn’t know how to move in your own home without him. And it isn’t hard to see the way your parents tiptoed around you, afraid to say his name and watch you break. Charles’ presence and the lack thereof, was not something easily forgotten. He was no longer around to help your mother in the kitchen, or to have long conversations with your father about your his latest work project. Your childhood home felt empty, despite your family being complete.

You started a journal, one you would scribble in until your hand aches. Charles keeps one, and you used to tease him about the little booklet but you get it now. You understand the satisfaction, the safety of the decorated cover. Your every thought and feeling is scribbled on the ruled paper, most of which revolves around your relationship. You pour your heart out through the pen, writing and writing when you felt like crying. Even with a sore hand, you still felt relief. Your entries reflect the feelings of fear, incompleteness, and uncertainty.

You questioned yourself constantly, wondering if breaking up with Charles was the right thing to do. Were you too quick to decide? Should you have allowed him to try and make it up to you like he claimed he would do? You never answered them, scared of the reality that you might’ve made the biggest mistake of your life. You wonder if the gaping hole in your chest is worth it, that your independence and time away from him after almost twenty years would really pay off in the end. 

Your mother sits at the edge of the blanket one Sunday morning, taking your attention away from your book. You set down a copy of your new romance novel, looking up at your mom quizzically. 

“You know,” Your mom begins, looking at the flowers around the two of you, “Pascale tried to give me peonies, like Hervé and Charles used to bring over for you all the time,” You sit up watching as your mother smiles at a pot of the orange flowers, “They didn’t grow well, and ultimately I kind of gave up on them. I enjoy growing lilies now.”

“Mom—“

“I want to be here for you and help you… Your father too,” She reaches out to hold your hand, giving it a gentle squeeze, “We just want you to be happy.”

You nod, looking down at your hands as you fumble with your fingers. “Thanks mom…” You mumble. 

“What can we do baby? How can we help?”

There it is, the feeling of helplessness. Tears well up in your eyes, and your hand is quick to swipe them away. The desperation in your mother’s voice hurts your heart. 

“I don’t know mom,” Your voice shakes, “I don’t know. I feel lost and empty and…” Tears stream down your face, and your mother is quick to embrace you. You cry softly as your mother rubs your hair. “I just feel like I don’t know who I am anymore mom.”

“You my dear,” She whispers, “are my precious Fleur. You are sweet, and thoughtful, and driven. You are a power force, on and off the track. You are everything your father and I raised you to be. Vous êtes ‘La Bien-Aimée,’ the Beloved. Vous êtes délicat, mais dynamique et passionné.” 

You are delicate, but vibrant and passionate. Your mother repeats the words said to you  before, written in the card that came with your white peony necklace. You smile, fingers squeezing the tiny pendant. 

“What if I made a mistake? What if should’ve been more patient with him?”

“I don’t think you did baby.” You look up at your mom and she pushes the hair away from your face. “We love Charles, loved who he was for you and what he’s done for you… but now this is your chance to grow even more. Time to find yourself outside of his shadow.” 

Tears well up in your eyes. “I miss him mom. And I still love him a lot.”

“And that’s okay. Truth be told, I don’t think you’ll ever stop. But you have to love yourself more. Okay?”

The conversation didn’t make the pain magically go away, but it made it easier to maneuver your way through your heartache. It made breathing just a little easier. Your mother’s words reassured you that you were on the right track, and that in time everything alright. The rest of the break is spent in lighter spirits, simply enjoying the company of your family and home. You meet up with old friends, and for the last weekend before you have to leave home, you felt like your old self again. It was bliss, being away from the cameras and the track. 

Your dad decides to drive you all of three hours outside of the city to your old stomping grounds. The old karting circuit, one that your godfather brought you to all those years ago. It’s worn down, the decades wearing it down year by year, but still held its charm. There were a few children walking out, hand in hand with their parents with their little kart in tow. You grin at the memories you have of this place, the races you’ve won and the battles you had. 

There were very few adults already getting settled in the provided karts, helmets on and suits zipped up. You greet the owner as you walk in, giving a big hug before indulging in light hearted conversation. He expresses how proud he is of you, and how he believes that you are a future champion. It makes your heart warm, and you have to give him another hug before slinging on your suit and helmet.

You climb into the little cart, flipping the visor down over your eyes. You wave at your dad before the lights go off and you zoom through the track. There are easy takeovers all across the midfield, and you were sure that a win would be an easy feat. But the cart in front of you is quick, cutting you off every time you try to overtake them. You were growing frustrated, it was if the person in front of you knew your every move. There are only two more laps left in the race and you run wide on a turn, drifting slightly. Your karts nearly touch, and other driver is forced to yield which gives you the lead. You hold  onto the lead til the very end, and you see your father and the owner cheering you on. 

You’re grinning underneath your helmet, doing one more lap before slowing your kart to a stop. You hadn’t felt this alive coming out of a race, a karting race no less. Your skin is on fire, heart beating quickly beneath your chest. There are several drivers that come over to congratulate you and you don’t even register the one who finished behind you stomping over. 

“What the fuck was that move?!”

You turn on your heel, flicking your visor open to look at your accuser. “I’m sorry?”

The driver’s suit is white with red detailing, helmet to match. He angrily pulls his helmet off. You feel the air knocked out of your lungs as your eyes meet his. There is a fire in his eyes, one you recognize from that night in the hotel. It’s the same look of anger that appears on his face after a frustrating loss. It’s a look of passion and the need to be right.

“That last move before you passed me. We could’ve crashed, destroyed the karts, got hurt! It was fucking reckless!” You are frozen in place and he stands there, helmet hanging on his hand and suit slightly undone. His chest heaves up and down ever so slightly as he waits for your answer. “Are you gonna say anything?”

You shake your head, turning on your heel and making a beeline for your dad. You pull your helmet off your head, feet quickly taking you away from the fiery Charles. Tears burn your eyes as you wave your dad over to the car. He jogs over quickly, not questioning your haste and simply driving you all the way home as you cry quietly. 

“Est-ce que ça va?” Are you okay?

“Il était là papa. C'est lui que j'ai doublé et il est venu vers moi. Il ne savait même pas que c'était moi.” He was there dad. It was him I overtook, and he came up to me. He didn't even know it was me.

He nods, reaching over and squeezing your shoulder. He doesn’t say anything else, allowing you to let out all of your emotions. “C'est bon mon cher. Tout ira bien... tout ira bien.” It's okay dear. You're going to be okay... it's all going to be okay.

You don’t know how long you cry for, all you know is that your eyes ache and burn by the time you make it back to the city, and your head is pounding when the car parks in the garage. You don’t greet your mother, barely register your aunts and little cousins in the kitchen, the house suddenly so loud. You run up the stairs, straight into your room and locking your door. You peel your race suit off your body and kick off your shoes before rolling into your bed. 

Hours fly by, the sound of children and chatter die down as time ticks by, and soon there is a soft knock on your door. Your mother’s soft voice is on the other side, asking if she can come in before jiggling the knob. 

“Fleur, s'il te plaît, laisse-moi entrer. Ne recule pas bébé.” Fleur, please let me in. Don't go backwards baby.

“Maman, j'ai juste besoin de temps. S'il vous plaît.” Mom, I just need some time. Please.

Her sigh is soft, and the soft pit pat of her steps move further and further away from your room. You finally sit up, pushing the blankets off your body, and walking over to your desk and opening your journal. Blue pen in hand, the point scribbling on the lines. Charles’ name is scattered everywhere, page after page. And at the end of your entry, you felt better. You missed him, the confession on the pages in front of you, but seeing him today made you feel better. There was no weight on your shoulders, no feeling dread. Though a shock, seeing him might’ve been the best thing that could’ve happened.

He looked good, if you ignored the anger in his eyes. The sun kissed his skin beautifully, hair kempt, and cheeks just slightly rosy. He was still just as beautiful, and you were still just as smitten.

You admit that being apart from him is hard. Finding the strength to stay away is growing hard with each passing day. But then you think of your job, think about the way the competitiveness will never stop getting in the way of your relationship. Maybe one day it won’t matter, maybe one day your love will be able to withstand the losses like it used to. You were both at the height of your careers, both the most ambitious you both have ever been. Your relationship had to take second priority, and it was a reality you both ignored since your Formula 1 debut. The break up was bound to happen, you both just denied it for far too long. 

You join your parents for breakfast the next day, and neither of them say anything about your mood yesterday. They talk about their plans for the day, leaving you at home by yourself. You didn’t mind, you figure you’d take the day to get back into your work routines. You follow your workout regimen in your backyard as soon as your parents leave. You are doing cardio and stretches, leaving the weight lifting for when your trainer arrives. You spend the better part of an hour getting your heart pumping, working every part of your body until they burn. The only thing that pulls you out of your workout is the sound of your back gate swinging open. You pant softly, taking a swing from your bottle.

“Hey Lo,” You greet, taking a towel to wipe down your face. “I have some weights in the garage if you want to just move in there.” You turn on your heel, towel dropping to the ground. You’re taken aback by Charles standing before you instead of your personal trainer. “H-hi.”

“Hi. Sorry I— My mom wanted me to drop off something for yours. I knocked but no one answered.” 

Charles is wearing a white t-shirt and black shorts, his Dior high tops on his feet. He’s holding a large tupperware in one hand and a pot of white lillies in the other. You both stand there, looking at each other quietly. Though you can’t see his eyes, you know he’s examining you in the same way you are to him. The air is light, but awkward. Neither of you know what to say, how to move.

On the paddock, it was easy to smile and nod in acknowledgement. Your motor homes were a ways away, and you have been lucky enough to not be scheduled for press conferences at the same time as him. After Monaco, it was fairly easy to avoid each other. There was never a need to pretend to play nice, to have to greet each other in a more personal and intimate way. Truth be told, you hadn’t stood this close to him in months. 

“Um, you can put those down in the kitchen. My mom can figure out what to do with the flowers when she gets back.” 

He nods, turning towards your house while you follow behind him. It’s a little sad to watch how naturally he moves in your home, knowing where everything is exactly. Charles sets the Tupperware on your kitchen table, and the pot by the window on the counter. You watch as he takes a look around the space, and you swear you see a ghost of smile on his lips as he does.

“How have you been?” You ask, leaning against your counter.

“Good.” He replies, smiling at you. “Spent a lot of time on the water.”

“Yeah, I can tell.” You tap the top of your forehead, showing him that you notice his skin peeling slightly in the same spot. 

He chuckles softly, “Yeah, put on sunscreen a little too late. How are you?”

“Good. Been reading a lot, and helping my dad with his new work thing.” You say. The silence settles, and suddenly you find yourself sharing awkward air with your ex boyfriend. 

“Did you want-“ “Was that-“ 

You both clamp your mouth shut, fighting the laugh that is going to bubble up your throats. Charles’ cheeks turn pink, and you imagine that yours is doing the same.  You both apologize, encouraging the other to go first. 

“No please,” You say, “Go ahead.”

“I was gonna ask if that was you at the karting track yesterday.” 

You bite your lip, nodding. “Yeah. Yeah it was.”

He rubs his face, “I’m sorry for yelling at you. Wasn’t expecting you to pull a move like that.”

You nod, “Yeah, well you were kind of frustrating me too. You wouldn’t let me through!”

“Well that’s the point isn’t it?” He smirks. 

You both erupt into a fit of giggles, shaking your head at the petty argument. “It’s fine really… I would’ve yelled too if I wasn’t able to overtake you.” 

“Oh I know. You used to get so mad at me when we were like… nine. You’d be so mad on the ride home. Papa would always take us out for ice cream after just so you wouldn’t be in such a bad mood when we brought you home.” 

“Okay but you would also try to run me off the track every chance you got!”

“I did not!”

“Did too!”

“It’s called racing, darling.” 

You roll your eyes, and turn away to hide the blush creeping on your cheeks. For a moment, you both forget the looming heartbreak that hangs above your heads. Just for a couple of minutes, with a brief exchange of words, you forget that he was no longer yours. He was just Charles. Your Charles.

“I’ve missed this.” You mumble, looking back at him. “I missed talking to you.”

“Me too… I missed you Fleur.” 

You rub your hands anxiously as you look at the boy who stands across the room from you. You both stare at each other, both refusing to move muscle or utter a single word. The moment was perfect, and neither of you wanted to ruin it. 

“I want you back.” He finally says. “I still think we can make this work.” 

You watch as he takes long steps towards you, towering over you. “Charles.”

“I still love you, Fleur.” His eyes search yours for a reaction to his words. There is something about the way he looks at you that takes your breath away. It melts your soul, and could nearly make your knees buckle as his eyes bore into yours. “Do you still love me?”

“I do.” 

Carefully, his fingers push stray hairs back before cupping your cheek. You lean into his touch instinctively. You inhale deeply, the smell of his cologne blurring your senses. 

“So what do we do?”

He looks to you, secretly wishing for an answer that will allow him to hold you for longer than what your current situation would allow. Your heart is skipping beats, rattling beneath your ribs. What do you do, what do you say? How do you move forward after gentle confessions? 

“Charles…” You take his hand from your face, holding it and squeezing lightly.

“Fleur please.”

“I need time.” You say lowly. 

“How much time?”

“I don’t know.” He pulls his hand from your grasp, hurt flashing on his features, “Charles-“

“I should go.” 

“Charles please!” You follow after him as he walks through your home, heading straight for your front door. “Would you listen?! Please?” 

He stops in the foyer, shoulders tense and body rigid. Tears well up in your eyes, and you can’t help but cry at the situation you’re find yourself in. Just minutes ago, it was perfect. But now, reality came crashing in full speed ahead. 

“This summer break, I had to come to terms with a lot of things. Come to terms with my life without you in it and who I am without you. You’ve been by my side through every up and down that I don’t know how to function without you.” Charles finally turns to look at you, tears staining his cheeks, “Us being broken up is more than what happened in Monaco. It’s become who I am without you, and you without me. You’ve been part of my life for years, and I know that in some form or another you always will be.” 

“I don’t like who I am without you,” He admits. 

“It’s a learning curve.” You chuckle dryly, “I don’t think I like who I am quite yet either. It’s going to take time.” 

Charles nods, looking to the right as tears continue to fall. You follow his line of sight, eyes landing on a photo of the two of you and your fathers during your time in Formula Renault. You were both so happy, holding onto each other, both soaked in sparkling cider and trophies in hand. It was your first shared podium ever. 

“I missed those times.” He mumbles before looking down at you. 

“Me too.” You agree. You sigh softly, “I love you Charles, I always will. I just need time.”  

He nods, cupping your cheek to bring you close so he can plant a kiss on your forehead. 

“Like I said Fleur… pour le reste de ma vie.” For the rest of my life. He lifts your face to look up at him, and you both smile with bloodshot eyes and tear stained cheeks. “I know in my heart that you’re the one for me, it’s the only thing I’ll ever be sure of. Take your time, I’ll be here.”

You nod. “Take care of yourself, Charles.” 

“I’ll see you on the track, Bien-aimée.”

“Ditto, predestinato.” 

❃゜・。. ・°゜✼ ゜°・ . 。・゜❃

read the winner takes it all here

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[immaturityofthomasastruc]

Lila Rossi: I’d Say She’s a Good Villain, but Then I’d Be Lying (300 Follower Special)

Deception and cunning are easily two of the most important traits an antagonist could have. It shows that even if they don't have the strength to overcome obstacles, their wit is more than enough. This kind of trait is why characters like Lex Luthor, David Xanatos, and Princess Azula are so beloved, simply because of how intelligent they can be as villains and pose a real threat to the heroes.

It's clear that the Miraculous Ladybug writers want Lila to be seen as this, but the writing seriously fails to back that claim up.

Easily one of the most controversial characters in Miraculous Ladybug is Lila, mainly for the writing surrounding her. But there was a time where she was actually more of an ambiguous character, mainly for the lack of screentime she had until Season 3. But unfortunately, the more appearances she's had have painted a very poor portrait of an antagonist.

Lila's Tragic and Sympathetic Motivation for Hating Ladybug

Lila's first appearance was at the tail end of Season 1, “Volpina”. She was a new transfer student from Italy, and quickly made friends with a lot of her classmates for the lies she told, including being friends with Ladybug (which Alya blindly believed without doing any research like any excellent journalist). But because of how close she was getting to Adrien, Marinette, in a rare act of selfishness, transforms into Ladybug just to chew out Lila for lying about knowing her, humiliating her in front of Adrien. And this is the only motivation we get for what Lila does afterwards.

I'm not saying that it's wrong for Lila to get upset at Ladybug for doing this, and I like the moment of weakness Marinette has, but this is literally the only explanation we get for Lila deciding to side with Hawkmoth, a literal terrorist. As much as I hated the way the arc turned out, I could still understand Chloe siding with Hawkmoth, as it was clear that Hawkmoth was manipulating her and taking advantage of her ego. Lila? Ladybug's mean to her one time, and that inspires her to conspire with a complete stranger who brainwashes people to attack the city, which endangers innocent people and causes God knows how much in collateral damage if not for Miraculous Ladybug fixing everything.

I just don't get how a single negative interaction with someone is enough to conspire with a literal supervillain. Even in Season 3, when Marinette and Lila truly became enemies, it was because she risked exposing all the lies she told, which could damage her reputation. Sure, it's petty, but it makes sense for Lila to want to keep up the illusion. If she was simply an antagonist to Marinette in her civilian life like Chloe was before “Miracle Queen” , I'd be fine with that, but the writers clearly want her to be seen as on the same level of evil as Hawkmoth. I'll get into why that doesn't work later on.

Why Lila is an Excellent Liar

In my Master Fu analysis, I had pointed out that despite all the flaws he had, the narrative insisted on portraying him as an incredibly wise mentor. The same problem applies for Lila as well. We're supposed to see Lila as an expert manipulator and liar, but her lies are insultingly obvious. She always claims to be friends with celebrities and does all these awesome things, and in an age where we can have almost any question answered thanks to the internet, nobody ever stops to question her.

It's even more frustrating when you hear Lila talk about saving Jagged Stone's cat, when Jagged Stone is established to be very fond of Marinette (evidentially more than his own daughter), and nobody ever points that out. I think if Lila's lies were more stories about her travels around the world than outright lies about real people, it could have worked. It'd still be hard to believe, but it's something.

But this is a problem with writing shows aimed at children. As much as we hate writers who need to spell out things to kids, sometimes, they just don't understand some of the media they consume. Seriously, I never got this joke in SpongeBob as a kid, and I can't believe Nickelodeon actually approved this.

So the dilemma when writing a show with children in mind is finding that sweet spot between assuming your audience can figure it out, but not being too vague in your details. It's even harder when you need to find a way to convey the fact that someone is lying without being too obvious. Unfortunately, the show clearly fails to do that

Okay, this is going to sound like an incredibly weird thing to cite, and I only know about it because I used to know someone who was a huge fan of the franchise, but the movie Monster High: Friday Night Frights does a better job of subtly explaining to the audience that a character is lying. Please, just hear me out.

The movie follows the main characters competing in their high school's roller derby for the season after everyone on the usual team gets injured, and the championship match is against another school whose team tends to cheat to win matches. How they manage to do this without getting caught is anyone's guess. While the main characters are practicing, their coach, Clawd, notices a spy for the enemy team taking video of them to study their moves. In response, he calls over one of the athletes, Operetta, to chew her out for her showboating attitude. In reality, he's alerting her to the spy. Only using facial expressions, he clues her, and by extension, the audience, in on the fact that they know what the opposing team is trying to do.

This soon leads to Operetta pretending to tell the enemy team about their secret plan for the championship match, which was really an attempt to outsmart them to gain the advantage in the final stretch. The brilliance of this is how the audience is informed of this with no dialogue, and there's no scene afterwards spelling it out for those who don't get it. It manages to convey deception without being too obvious that Clawd and Operetta are being deceitful.

I think if there were more subtle hints to show the audience Lila was lying, she would be seen in a better light. As it is, Lila's lies are just pathetic, and it's ridiculous that everyone believes her. Which leads me to...

Lila, the Master Manipulator

I once read a Star Trek: Voyager fanfic that poked fun at the series by claiming that the reason a lot of the dumber episodes like “Threshold” and “Twisted” happened was because one of the crew members was an alien who unintentionally produced mood altering pheromones, with Captain Janeway actually realizing they were all high because of said pheromones, while two of the unaffected crew members were wondering what the hell they were doing before they found out the cause. Why do I bring this up? Sometimes, it feels like Lila is an unintentional parallel to the alien in that story.

Like so many characters, it's clear the show desperately wants the audience to view Lila in a certain way, but her actions do very little to actually back up that claim. When she's not using lies to tell stories about so many famous people she knows like her uncle who works for Nintendo, Lila is using strategies to manipulate everyone that are so obviously deceptive, the Thermians could pick up on them. Everyone and their mother knows how ridiculous a lot of what Lila does in episodes like “Chameleon” and “Ladybug” are, and I've talked about them before, so I'll try to be quick.

First off, as someone who had access to accommodations through high school and has had assistance in college so far, there is no way in hell that Ms. Bustier should take Lila's tinnitus at face value in “Chameleon”. If a student has a disability that could interfere with the education process, physical or developmental, not only does the school have to evaluate their performance, and determine if they're eligible for an Individualized Education Program, or IEP, but her teachers would have to be notified in the first place. As her primary educator, Ms. Bustier would be part of the team to oversee Lila's IEP and determine what accommodations she needs to help her learn better with her tinnitus and arthritis. But because the writers don't know what Google is, they just ignore it,  assume that Lila can just say she has a disability, and have everyone believe it. Even when Eric Cartman pretended to be disabled to compete in the Special Olympics, he put in more effort to look the part, even if he looked like a caricature.

Then there's the fact that that in “Chameleon”, everyone just believes Lila when she says Marinette stole her grandmother's necklace when not only is said necklace from the Agreste line of jewelry, but Alya, who is Rena Rouge, can't pick up on the fact that it's a fake. All she does to justify these lies is come up with a sob story about how nobody believes her, yet nobody ever tries to defend Marinette except Alya one time, and it was after she got expelled.

Or what about in “Oni-Chan”, where Lila thinks having Kagami kill Ladybug while claiming she'll back away from Adrien is a good idea? Let's say Oni-Chan does kill Ladybug or at least take away her Miraculous, what then? We know Lila wouldn't go through with this promise, and as soon as Kagami sees her harassing Adrien, she'll be ripe for akumatization again. Overall, not a great plan.

And yet somehow, this last example is what made her worthy enough to become one of Hawkmoth's most trusted agents. I'm just going to say it: Lila is not a good fit for the power of illusion. Whenever she's Volpina or Chameleon, she always goes out of her way to make a big show instead of being subtle with her deceptions. “Chameleon” is the worst offender, as even though Lila gets the power to shapeshift into someone else, instead of being discreet and cornering people into kissing them and gaining their appearance, she just runs around to get Ladybug's attention instead of being subtle. Even Felix had the bright idea to pretend to be Adrien to catch Ladybug off guard. How do you lose to something that happened in “Felix”?

Despite all of these screw-ups, we're still supposed to see her as this master of deception worthy of allying with Hawkmoth in both his supervillain and civilian form, when really, she's a terrible liar on the schoolyard and on the battlefield.

Why Lila is an Important Character

In the grand scheme of things, Lila just isn't as important of a character that the show loves to parade her around as. She's nothing more than a plot device used to raise the stakes in an episode, given how much reality seems to bend over just to accommodate for her lies. Even when the show alludes to her being part of bigger things, like her deal with Adrien, or her rivalry with Marinette, they don't even go anywhere.

She just feels pointless when you remember Astruc's brilliant idea to force Chloe into being the final Akuma for the season while Lila isn't even mentioned once. She only really makes appearances whenever the writers feel like it, which is why it’s hard to take her seriously. Why should I take this character seriously as a threat if the writers refuse to take her seriously as a threat? Why build Lila up as a big threat and not give her a major role in the finale? Why even include her in the show in the first place when you could show Chloe being more manipulative to fill in the plots Lila plays a big part in?

As of the time I am writing this analysis, four episodes of Season 4 have aired, three of them have been about lies or deception, and Lila hasn't been mentioned at all. It honestly seems like she won't appear unless the writers need a easy way to drive up the conflict, so they can justify it by saying that Lila's “superpower” of lying is more powerful than the common sense of everyone else.

I'm sorry this post was shorter than the last one, but compared to Master Fu, there's not that much to say about Lila that I haven't already said. Even the show barely gives her any attention, so it's hard for me to really find a lot to talk about.

[lucidpantone]

Hey, lucid! Regarding your commentary on the kynicole’s YouTube video comments.

I have to say that after the massive car crush season 4 was (I am literally getting angry at Wtfock as I am typing this) there is at least one thing that i am glad for and it is the conversations that have happened and still happening regarding representation in the media, accountability of creators to the audience and also accountability of the audience to the pieces of media they choose to consume.

There was a lot of animosity in the way the fandom treated each other during that time and that was painful to see but saying that I am glad that finally voices that were shut down before, were heard. People came forward and spoke about the pain that comes with creation of such insulting content. And those voices reached the ears of white male board members who are used to make decisions behind closed doors with money as their only motivator. And they didn’t achieve their goal. And I glad for that. Because they didn’t get the level of financial gain they were expecting and they were forced to listen.

I only wish that the fandom didn’t start expressing that aggression towards each other but rather gather that energy and target the advertisers which are the soft spot of Wtfock. I wondered why no one ever reached out to them. Why no one just said hey what you are endorsing is creating a massive uproar and it hurts people. If there is a lesson for us as a fandom to learn is next time just reach the sponsors. I have been in a fandom before where that really worked. If you wanna make a production company pay for their insulting content hit them where it hurts and stop making the fandom a lions’ den where people are afraid to express opinions.

The fandom has to be a safe space where even wrong opinions are met with educational response and not a stone attack. Because no nothing changes with shooting. It is not about people who already know the truth to just discuss between each other, it is about those people educating, opening the eyes to the ones that choose or are too previleged to see.

Take the movie Fight Club for example. The solution to fighting an oppressive situations is not coming by becoming a rebellious aggressor who fights just for the sake of fighting.

Thoughts after the cut

Thanks for this anon it really hit home because it took me back to the beginning of s4. I think its been a long enough time where I feel I can talk about this and be frank. I think s4 really exposed some of the ugly truths that were happening in the wtFOCK fandom. I think before s4 they were definitely cliques. I remember a period of time where those quizzes would go around and it was the same top group of blogs that were in on the joke. That never really happens now and a lot of those people left the fandom. Those cliques felt very evident going into filming s4 and I blame wtfock for this.  Because most people that extra-d weren't going into filming thinking they would have to harbor this secret for wtfock that Moyo had been passed up for Kato. It also created this extremely weird vibe where all these extras that were mostly young white women stepped in to defend wtfock and their decision to cast Romi without actually knowing what the season would be about.I kinda of get it to ya know? Imagine you have a good friend and they make a questionable decision you tell your friend what you think but you also wish them well and hope for the best. So I get why so many mostly young white women felt the need to defend wtFOCK but there is defending a casting decision and asking your mutuals to give it a shot and then there is silencing the effected class of people that were offended. I also saw a lot of condescending attitudes concerning people that brought up why utilizing Kato as a vehicle to tell a story about racism was deeply tone deaf and in the current climate and that it felt like a slap in the face. Instead of listening people fought back saying “you can be white and still experience aspects of racism”. Yea we get that but that's not what people were saying. Perfect example Ava/Mailin storyline happening in Druck now.People were saying using whiteness as a vehicle to explore a topic that is deeply penetrating society and a campaign for change did not need “whiteness” to validate it. It was a story that should have been told via the eyes of a party member of the effected class. PERIOD. I just think people, particularly those who extra-d and hard core stans couldn't imagine that their fav remake would create something like this..... I really do believe they believe they thought that wtfock had a better moral compass then they actually did and so they followed them blindly down the path of self destruction and in turn paid a price. It was sad to see how prominent the divide between the defenders and the critics became and it got really ugly but I think it got really ugly because the defenders wouldn't listen they kept hope going for too long they got sucked into this vicious cycle. In the end a lot of people left the fandom, a lot of people took a hiatus off tumblr and honestly I dont blame them. I am not here to defend people that literally belittled the voices of poc who had valid critiques of the season but I saw some stuff that made me really sad. Like I was on twitter and one of the big players on there shamed someone via their government name and I was like really? and it got so bad I just felt like people wanted blood at no cost and I just thought like guys stop already. Stop kicking this person while they are down. Like their fucking name was everywhere on twitter, insta and here and its like I think they got the point. You wanted to bury them and you did. So just stop now. Like you said anon I dont want to be part of a space (virtual or not) that makes others feel unsafe and s4 made the fandom very unstable because of the divide it caused. I like you am also happy that wtFOCK paid the price mainly because if this season would have even been slightly good those white dudes would have never got the wake up call they deserved but it makes me sad for the cast (which were obviously upset) and certain crew members (that I heard spoke up and were ignored). I hate that those people had to be collateral damage so a bunch of white dudes could realized that maybe they do indeed still harbor racist tendencies and suffer from inflated egos and am sad that s4 basically tore the fandom apart but I will say this. I really like the vibe of the tag now. I think its funny other skam remake stans come into the tag talking trash about wtFOCK s4 and am like people we talk more shit about s4 then other remakes do like aint no one defending s4 in the tag. Most people get triggered even seeing Kato’s face in the tag and I also think everyone took their rose colored glasses off and sees wtfock for who they are versus who they hoped they would be. 

[daylicate]

From New Age Deceit to Jesus - Boy, I Did NOT Expect This To Happen...Trust Me.

Hi, guys! So when I left this blog rather abruptly, it was mainly because I had a major realization in my life that I truly did not know how to explain without sounding absolutely insane. For many, what I’m about to share is going to be controversial, but I hope you understand that the reason I’m writing this is because I truly care about Taylor and her fans. If this can resonate with at least one person, maybe a halfway believer, then I’m happy with that. I’m also not trying to convert anyone or cast judgement or persuade anyone to stop what they’re doing! All love here! If God has taught me one thing, it’s that life is your own personal journey, and you can decide if and when to see a sign and make a turn. 

I’m probably going to start this around the time I became a huge Taylor fan again. It started around April of last year right before ME! came out. At that time, and for most of my life really, I always felt rather lost - as if there was a void in my heart that needed filling. When I started getting back into her music and her Easter Egg adventures, it was as if that void was filled...except not really, because I was never satisfied and was ultimately waiting for the NEXT thing Taylor was going to share with us to uncover. I guess you could say, the void got DEEPER. I was idolizing her so much so that, I unknowingly was treating her like she was God. At the end of the day, that’s what “stan” culture is - blindly worshipping false idols. If you were to look back in history, our culture parallels so much with the times of Ancient Egypt, Ancient Rome and Ancient Greece, except we have way more advanced technology and cultural distractions.

In becoming a Taylor fan, the world around me began to shift, because she made me realize how deceptive the media can be. Her whole career had me questioning everything I ever consumed from Hollywood that was PR-related. I got deeper into celebrity culture and blind gossip, which then led me to discover how corrupt things in Hollywood, and in this world, really are. Then, I found out about the Epstein stuff around July of last year, and boy did that affect me. I became SO disillusioned and disheartened that it slowly began to eat away at me. I really don’t know how else to describe it other than it feeling like the dementors from Harry Potter were legitimately sucking the life and soul out of me. I was not taking care of myself while consuming this information, and my faith was nowhere to be found. Around Fall of last year, I dropped out of my semester at college and entered intensive therapy. The biggest thing I learned in my time there was gratitude. I’ve had to deal with some trauma in the past, but through that pain I am able to connect and empathize with so many others. During that time, I learned to let go of the pain and see them as lessons that made me a stronger person.

Alright, so the New Age. Here’s a list of things that are New Age: metaphysics, past lives, numerology, twin flames, astrology, parallel realities, dimensions, crystals, sage, incense, tarot cards, meditating to reach enlightenment, chakra cleansing, rituals, channeling, reiki, energy frequencies, law of attraction, manifestation, psychedelics, aliens (starseeds, light workers, etc.), and SO much more. The best way to describe it would be like a huge buffet - you get to pick and choose your own personalized religion. Now, what I’ve come to realize is that the end goal of this stuff is to become...almost...Godlike. You’re basically training your mind to worship yourself. I worry about this gaining momentum because I see a LOT of celebrities pushing these ideas.

This is where it gets spooky. From April - June I was practicing this stuff intensely, and I would wake up every morning with intense joint pain and nausea, going HOURS without eating. My depression, anxiety, fear, paranoia increased TENFOLD whenever the news was on or when I would watch films/shows with my family. Again, it felt like dementors were sucking the life and soul out of me. Growing up, my mom would call me her “little bird”, and one day I stepped outside and found a dead baby bird right outside my parent’s home. When all this started occurring, I was NOT connecting it to the fact that it was happening because I was researching more about the darkness of Hollywood and practicing some New Age, or occult, stuff (tarot, crystals, astrology, meditating, law of attraction, numerology, energy manipulation, twin flames). From what I was reading online, I legitimately thought the pain and nausea were signs of my “consciousness increasing”.........again, it sounds insane, but once you fall down the rabbit hole, you try to find reasoning from “spiritual people” for why your body is reacting the way that it is. 

When I got back to my apartment, I still had so many questions about all this stuff I was researching. Again, you THINK the void would be filled, but it just gets deeper and deeper, because you want to find out MORE. While on Twitter, I saw someone reply to a tweet that said that the idea of focusing on love frequencies was Luciferian, and at first I was like, uh excuse me, what now?! It does not feel that way, sir! This stuff is all about love and peace! You’re lying! Well, the dude was right, because the devil is one big master of deceit. When it hit me that what I was practicing did not have my best interest at heart, phew, I got down on my knees, PRAYED, and repented. Then, the BEST and most humble feeling came over me. I don’t know how to describe it in text without it sounding wild but, it reminded me of the lyrics to Amazing Grace? “Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. I was once was lost, but now am found, was blind but now I see.”

Our entire culture is focused on self-indulgence, and during COVID I’ve realized just how self-centered and dark our society is. Since so much evil is finally coming to light, that means there has to be good. Because we have all this time to rest and think, basically little to no distractions, God’s voice (our conscious) is speaking directly to us, and we’re finally listening and acting on it! It’s just that, we’re not acknowledging that it’s God fueling this passion in us. We’re fighting injustice, trying to free the oppressed, exposing cruelty, redistributing our wealth to those in need, etc. Through our actions, we’re bringing light into our darkness, healing and righteousness. The sad part is, spiritual warfare is at play, so because we’re trying to do so much good, evil is finding ways to be more insidious.

Jesus is so real, and I’m so glad he saved me. If at any point you experienced anxiety while reading this, earnestly call out to Jesus to help you. I promise you that void you’ve been feeling your entire life will finally be filled. I’m so much more at peace now, and when I feel evil trying to creep back in, I’m just like, Jesus SOS! He’s the best and He loves you. When my mom used to talk about God, my body would physically cringe and reject her, and my thoughts would turn hateful. Now when I talk about God, I am so happy and free!

If this resonates, awesome! If you read this and thought, meh no thank you, I totally get it. Again, I don’t want to come off as THAT person trying to force God on you, because God doesn’t want that. He wants it come naturally and from a place of love (and fear - you gotta love and fear God) - it’s why we have free will! You have to be ready for it, because your life is going to do a complete 180. 

The best way I can describe it is that, I stepped into the daylight and let all of my demons finally...go. Don’t let the devils roll the dice no longer, my dudes! Sending love to you all, and please feel free to message me if you have any questions. I certainly can’t be the one to give you the answers, but I’d be happy to guide you! Discernment and not becoming easily deceived is key when you make this shift.

[ryukoishida]

Night.Frost 《夜。霜傳》: Outtake

Night.Frost | 《夜。霜傳》

Outtake 3: The Young and the Hopeless

Featuring: ShangGuan YueYou, ShangGuan YeLing, Nie Kai, LingHu Zhe, Qiu ZiYan  (上官月優，上官夜凌，聶凱，令狐哲，秋紫煙)

A/N: I wanted to end 2019 by posting an outtake that I’ve written to commemorate the 8.31 incident in Hong Kong by incorporating the event into the timeline of the original novel I’m currently working on. It had been a stormy year, especially during the last 6 months for HK-ers, so I want to use my creative outlet to sort of, I dunno, illustrate my take on it.   

-

August 31, 2019, around 11:00PM Prince Edward MTR Station

A night when many would remember the Hong Kong Police as terrorists.

Chaos. Horror. Blood. Screaming for help. Screeching in pain. Cowering in fear.

Tear gas filled the claustrophobic corridors of train cars.

Police shouting commands, throwing insults left and right like they cost nothing.

Indiscriminate violence against defenseless citizens who were on their way home.

Walking amongst them was an army of young people dressed in black shirts, yellow helmets, and gas masks — proud citizens and defenders of this city they called home.

A home that was currently sick, broken, tainted, but a home nevertheless.

And they would sacrifice all they had to offer to make this world right again.

Including their lives.  

-

Mid-September, 2019 Moon Shoal Club Headquarters, Central

“Captain, I trust you know how to handle this best,” ShangGuan YunXing stepped out of the Moon Shoal Club captain’s office, her figure dressed sharply in business attire was half casted in shadow by the office’s fluorescent lighting.

“We won’t let you down, Chief,” ShangGuan YueYou, the leader of the clan’s most revered exorcist team, followed closely behind the older woman and replied briskly. Coming out lastly from the room was a glasses-clad man in his early 20’s, who stayed quiet during this exchange.

The other occupants in the headquarters, who’d been trying to eavesdrop or peek through the blinds into their Captain’s office as casually and quietly as they could for the past twenty minutes, immediately returned to their previous positions at their desks pretending to be engaged with their paperwork.

At the sight of the ShangGuan Clan’s Chief departing, the members of the Moon Shoal Club all rose up from their seats and bowed their heads low in respect as they greeted her in unison, “goodbye, Chief ShangGuan.”

All with the exception of one man slouching in the corner, the distaste in his blood-red eyes hardly disguised from the mess of his dark curls. He had his two hands shoved deep into the pockets of his jacket, body language exuding nothing but hostility and eye glimmering silently as his gaze met briefly with YunXing’s before he turned his head away as if he couldn’t stand the sight of this woman after all.

“YeLing…” YueYou uttered with a hint of warning under her breath.

YunXing ignored this, silently nodded once to acknowledge the team, and walked out without another word.

It wasn’t until they heard the elevator’s creaky humming that signified YunXing’s leaving that the members of MSC released a comically unified exhale of relief.

“So… what’s that all about then?” Qiu ZiYan was the first person to speak up, leaning back into her chair as she threw the pen she’d been twirling nonstop to the side. The writing utensil fell perfectly into its cylindrical stand.

“Meeting in ten minutes,” YueYou announced simply instead of answering her subordinate’s question. It was unusual for the captain to look so solemn, for even though ShangGuan YueYou was known in the community as one of the fiercest and most accomplished exorcists of her generation, she was the type of captain who led and guided her team with a merciless attitude when necessary but otherwise treated them as if they were all part of a family.

After YueYou went back into her office, all attention snapped to the remaining attendant of that secretive meeting from earlier: MSC’s vice-captain, LingHu Zhe.

“Must be something huge if the Chief herself had come down to talk to the captain about it,” Nie Kai, one of the youngest members in the team, piped up. “Brother Zhe…”

Zhe cleared his throat, too loudly and obvious to be natural, propped his glasses higher up the bridge of his nose with his index finger, and sighed when the other members of MSC kept staring at him expectantly.

“All I can tell you is that it has to do with the 8.31 incident from a few weeks ago,” Zhe said uneasily, “you’ll hear the details of the mission at the briefing later.”

“Ehhh, but Ah-Zhe…” ZiYan was rolling her chair towards the direction of the vice-captain with shining, hopeful eyes trained onto the man who held the answers to all her curiosity.

“Don’t you ‘Ah-Zhe’ me, Qiu ZiYan,” Zhe, who’d known ZiYan since their academy days, was long used to her ministrations, and so was unaffected by any pleading and puppy-eyed looks the woman was unabashedly sending his way, “I’m still waiting for your report from the Po Hing Fong case.”

“You’re no fun, vice-captain,” ZiYan pouted after being reminded that she did, in fact, still have a huge pile of irritating paperwork to go through before the case she’d been working on can be officially closed. Defeated, she rolled herself back to her desk and began to half-heartedly sift through the stack of files and tap out phrases on the keyboard.  

“And you have too much fun sometimes,” Zhe shook his head fondly at her before he, too, returned to his desk closest to YueYou’s office to gather files for their upcoming meeting.

By the wall where the two youngest members of MSC were sitting, the young woman named Nie Kai turned to her childhood friend and work partner with a worried frown lining her brows.

“Ah-Ling, you probably shouldn’t have acted that way with your grandma,” she fiddled with the frayed ends of her hair, “the captain looked like she was about to strangle you when you did that thing that you do.”

ShangGuan YeLing grimaced. He knew he was going to get an earful from his elder sister when they got home after tonight’s shift, and he was not looking forward to it.

But the reaction was almost instinctive at this point. Even when he was young, and before their turbulent relationship went from mere familial obligations to professional ties, ShangGuan YunXing had always ignited a sort of fight-or-flight response in YeLing. The elegant woman’s stony glares, unsmiling lips, distant words, and unrealistically high expectations for her grandchildren only made up a small portion of why YeLing disliked the old woman; something invisible that YunXing radiated from her mere presence made others, including her own blood-related family, fear of crossing the leading figure of the largest and most influential exorcist clan in Hong Kong.

“Let her,” YeLing shrugged nonchalantly, though to Kai, it seemed incredibly forced, “I bet that old woman would rather see me dead in a ditch than to continue disgracing the all mighty ShangGuan clan.”

“No way, there’s no way your grandma would wish you dead, even if… even if…” Kai didn’t want to say it – she didn’t need to – ‘even if she’d never really treated you like family, like a grandson.’

More like a pawn, like one of the many pawns on her majestic scheme of political chessboard.

YeLing glanced over at Kai, saw that she was chewing her lower lip for fear that she’d say the wrong thing, said too much.

He sighed, pushed himself out of the chair, and stretched until his joints cracked noisily, making Kai wrinkled her nose in revulsion.

“C’mon, let’s head to the conference room before my sister actually comes out and strangles me for being late to an important meeting.”

-

“I assume all of you already have some idea about what happened during the night of August 31 down at Prince Edward station,” YueYou turned on the projector in the darkened room, and various images and footages of that night’s events began to pop up on the large monitors in the middle of the conference table.

Sitting before each member of MSC was their own personal tablet, which contained all the documents and files required for this briefing.

“More or less,” YeLing said, hiding a yawn behind the back of his hand.

Sitting next to YueYou, Zhe added, “though depending on what news outlets people have been watching, there are two very different perspectives of the events of that night circulating on the Internet these days.”

“Idiots who blindly consume what the media feeds them can’t tell the difference between facts and fiction these days,” YeLing scoffed.

“So, what does Chief ShangGuan want the MSC to do?” ZiYan wanted to know, dragging her gaze away from the grisly and gory photographs and turning to the head of the table to direct the question at their captain.

“Cleaning up after the police, I’m willing to bet,” YeLing interrupted with an unimpressed snigger, and only stopped when YueYou threw him a meaningful glare. Still, that had never stopped YeLing from running his mouth when he was on a roll. “What? Am I wrong?”

“There is a reason why MSC and other organizations under the ShangGuan clan are separate entities from the other disciplined forces of the city,” YueYou ignored her younger brother’s jab and continued, “we don’t have the right to evaluate the actions and decisions made by the police department, and in turn, they have no right to budge into our businesses and cases either. This has been the arrangement set up by the clan elders and the government officials before our generation.”

YueYou’s solemn regard swept around to each and every member of MSC before pausing at YeLing, “We carry out our duties as told, and we don’t ask questions. I don’t want to hear anything controversial coming out from the mouths of my own team that can potentially endanger the clan’s reputation. Am I making myself clear?”

She was speaking to them as a group, but everyone knew that YueYou was directing this little speech especially at YeLing, who murmured a reluctant, “yes, Captain.”

“There were a few casualties during that night’s operation, though it was never disclosed to the public as the government fears that the news would bring up a new wave of disorder and uproar,” YueYou continued calmly.

“At least they’re right about that,” YeLing muttered, obvious disgust dripping in his tone.

“…how many?” Kai, who had been uncharacteristically quiet during the briefing thus far, finally asked in a soft voice. The underlying trembling did not go unnoticed by the team.

“Three,” YueYou replied.

On the central screen, photographs of two women and one man – all no older than early 20’s – were displayed. Their smiles forever captured, though their bodies were battered and abandoned.

“So young…” Kai murmured.

“Too young,” ZiYan agreed, eyes darkening and lips pressed into a firm line. “So, what’s our assignment?”

“According to the records, the police department hired a few Tao priests to perform a consecration ceremony a few days after August 31st to help with the three souls’ transcendence passage…”

“They did a half-assed job, didn’t they, these so-called priests?” YeLing guessed.

“That’s one way of putting it,” YueYou couldn’t even find the energy to scold him about his choice of wording this time.

After reading the reports that the police department had sent over a few hours earlier, the scowl on her face only grew deeper and deeper. She hated the political aspects of her job – playing nice with the other governmental departments – but as the captain of Moon Shoal Club, and as the future heir of the ShangGuan clan, YueYou had to force herself to refine her public relations skills, compromising where it was necessary, taking advantage when it benefited their clan.

“For the next two weeks after the consecration, we had received reports of civilians travelling on the trains between Prince Edward Station and Sham Shui Po Station having witnessed particles in the shape of or heard voices of the three deceased protestors.

“But these sightings shouldn’t even be possible if the priests had done their job right,” ZiYan offered.

“Precisely,” YueYou nodded in agreement. “What we suspect is that the priests had merely created some sort of boundary to trap these spirits within certain specific areas of the stations, as well as along the route between the two stations,” YueYou switched the images on the central screen and continued, “if you look at the diagram here, the red marks the spots where these spirits were said to be seen or heard, and there are consistent patterns to these sightings: always in the same locations, always around the same time – approximately eleven o’clock at night.”

“Disturbed spirits are always the strongest and most active near their time of death,” Zhe said, “but given enough time has passed, they will gradually weaken and eventually disintegrate.”

“Somehow, I find it really hard to believe they’ve mistaken consecration with boundary craft,” YeLing rolled his eyes and leaned further back against his chair. “You sure they aren’t trapping the spirits on purpose?”

YueYou’s gaze shifted sharply towards her younger brother but said nothing.

“How do you mean?” Kai asked her partner. “Why would anyone wish to purposefully and knowingly trapped a deceased person’s spirit in the mortal realm? That’s just… cruel.”

“Guilt, maybe?” YeLing shrugged, “or they’re just terrible pieces of shit that want to punish anyone who didn’t see things their way even after they’re dead.”

“Enough,” YueYou didn’t need to raise her voice, but the subtle impatience was enough to make everyone shut up. “Here’s the assignment we’ve been given directly by the elders: tomorrow after the trains stop running at around one o’clock in the morning, we are to access and investigate the scenes where the sightings had been recorded, locate the spirits, and take care of them. We can’t have civilians running into them constantly and spreading rumors about the 8.31 incident anymore.”

“And by ‘taking care’, you mean…?” ZiYan raised an eyebrow skeptically.

“What we usually do with them,” Zhe answered for the captain. “We will try our best to convince them to move on to the other realm in their own terms, but if they refuse to leave, we will have no choice but to carry out our duty as usual.”

“But we only do what we do because the spirits we deal with are violent and malicious in nature!” Kai protested. “Their existence was solely for destruction because no humanity is left in them anymore, but these people…” she halted abruptly to look at the photos of the three victims on her tablet again, “…they were just kids trying to fight for their lives.”

“Regardless, they don’t belong in this realm anymore,” YueYou said, “and if they are causing problems for the mortals, it’s our duty as exorcists to send them off. You have all been in this field of work for more than three years now – you aren’t fresh out of the Academy anymore – act like a professional and do not sully the name of the ShangGuan clan. I believe we are all more than capable of doing that.”

A few seconds of stagnant silence as the members of MSC mulled over their captain’s words and the underlying warning of consequences if they failed to follow the code of conduct.

It was true; even the youngest of the group – YeLing and Kai at the age of 19 – had been working out on the field since they were 16 years old and newly graduated from the clan-run Academy that aimed to train young, inexperienced Crafters into top exorcists that serve the community as a liaison between the living and the dead.

Zhe and ZiYan, on the other hand, were a few years older and had transferred from another region’s team into Moon Shoal Club in Central three years prior. The two had been classmates since their Academy days, and both were known as top performers in their various areas of expertise: Zhe in long-range gun craft, and ZiYan in Transcendental Aesthesia, the ability to sense and communicate with the weakest of spiritual particles.  

But even so, most of the cases they deal with on a daily basis involved angry, violent spirits that had completely transformed from what they used to be: the humanity in these ghosts that refused to leave the mortal realm for all kinds of reasons gradually dripped out, sucked dry by darker matter around them, and before they knew it, these beings became creatures that knew neither reason nor logic. Only singular, destructing emotions drove their actions, maintained their essence.

Spirits of people who had recently just passed away were much less dangerous; most of the time, they were more confused than threatening, and once they realized the fact that they had died, a majority of them would move on.

“We’ll meet at Prince Edward Station Exit B1 tomorrow morning at one o’clock,” YueYou seemed satisfied by the silence her speech had brought, and she continued with a more upbeat and encouraging tone, “remember to bring all your gear. The station should be cleared out of any MTR staff and police officers by then. We will be able to freely do what’s necessary without the fear of being seen by non-Crafters.”

“Make sure to rest well today,” Zhe added, smoothly taking over as YueYou concluded the briefing by turning the lights back on. The fluorescent made everyone’s faces seemed even more pale than usual, “it’s going to be a long night.”

-

Mid-September, 2019 1:04 a.m. Prince Edward Station (Exit B1), Mong Kok

In the early morning hours, neon lights of store signs still shone brightly over the slumbering city, but the windows of the surrounding residential buildings were mostly darkened, the deserted streets with the occasional late-night taxi rolling by and the incessant tik-tik-tik of the traffic lights on red casting the area in a smog of desolation.

By one of the station’s exits located in the corner of Nathan Road and Prince Edward Road West, three figures and a bird perched on its owner’s shoulder stood waiting, motionless like a paused movie.

“Brother Zhe and Sister ZiYan are late…” Kai murmured worriedly, her fingers rubbing restlessly against the plastic handle of her cello case. “That’s rare. A-Ling, you think they’re okay?” She looked towards her partner, who merely took a swift glance at his wrist watch before looking over at his elder sister.

YueYou didn’t look too perturbed by the fact that two of her subordinates were running late for an important assignment, though her animal familiar Xiao Yan gave a shrill, little chirp in response, the noise it made sounded strangely eerie in the near-silence.

Bouquets of white flowers were tied along the bannisters that bordered around one of the exits of Prince Edward Station. Scraps of paper money leapt and fell from the current of breeze. Puddles of wax from melted candles stuck to the concrete of the steps, the fragrance still lingering in the air long after the distinguishing of the flames. Pasted on the walls were posters filled with angry and desperate messages, written by friends and families and strangers seeking for answers and justice for those who’d been injured and supposedly died during the August 31 conflict:

生要見人，死要見屍

‘We want to see the person if they’re alive; we want to see the body if they’re dead.’

Every few days, these flowers and posters would be thrown away by city street cleaners, but by the end of the day, the bannisters would be decorated flush with mourning flowers and message cards again.

When the minute hand on YeLing’s watch stroke seven, the other two members of MSC finally arrived, breaths short and cheeks flushed from rushing their way over.

“Where were you two?” Kai sighed with relief at the sight of the senior members arriving safely, though both seemed suspiciously nonchalant for two people who were late to work.

“Uh… traffic?” ZiYan shared a slightly guilty grin with Zhe, whose flush deepened in colour as he quickly rushed over to YueYou’s side to apologize for their tardiness.

“Sister ZiYan, it’s one in the morning,” YeLing snickered, red eyes twinkling knowingly, “you’ll have to try harder to convince Captain over there.”

“No matter,” YueYou said, her tone and expression as neutral and inscrutable as ever. “We’ve already delayed enough. Let’s head down to the platform.”

As they made their way down the stairs, their steps echoing emptily through the narrow corridors of the underground station, Kai commented, “the flowers and candles outside… most of the public must be very convinced that people have died that night.”

“And who can blame them?” ZiYan replied with a grim expression, the lenient atmosphere from before having dissipated immediately as they descended deeper into the station. “People who participated in protests have gone missing for the past few weeks; dead bodies showed up in the waters with no substantial evidence of being suicide cases; and the police’s defensive attitude did nothing to assuage people’s beliefs or stop the rumors.”

The air was sickly stale the further they went. Non-Crafters would attribute this to the city’s terrible air quality caused by pollution, but Crafters like themselves could immediately recognize the decaying scent as the lingering presence of spirits, a trail left behind by those who wander the mortal realm even long after they died.

Prince Edward Station itself harbored a few spirits that mostly kept to themselves, and upon sensing the presence of the exorcists, who emitted the kind of vitality that creatures from the other side tended to avoid, they were smart enough to escape to the other parts of the station to make way for them.

There were four platforms, two on each level, and there was nothing that caught their attention when they reached the top level.

Afterall, the conflict did occur on the platform at the lower level.

It was getting increasingly harder to breathe the closer they got to where the sightings were recorded. Like dragging their bodies through viscous mud, the members of MSC felt the immense strength of boundary craft attempting to force them out.

“Yeah, this is definitely not what a consecration feels like,” YeLing muttered, his grip on the handle of his violin case tightened until his knuckles turned white.

“Kai, is there anything you can do about the boundary?” YueYou turned to her young subordinate and asked. “If we force ourselves, our bodies might not be able to withstand the pressure.”

“I’ll try my best, Captain,” Kai nodded. She pulled out her weapon – RuSu, a standard-size cello constructed of craft-enhanced wood, and matching bow – and began to play a melody. It was light-hearted in nature, and tiny silvery cicadas began to materialize in the air around the exorcists; the creatures fluttered towards the boundary tinged with red and radiating stifling pressure that hovered over the staircase that led further down into the platform on the lower level, and attached themselves as if the boundary was covered by flowers filled with fragrant sap.

When nothing happened, Kai pulled the bow across the strings with more vigor, the notes reverberating so loudly that the humans could feel their skin prickling from the oscillating waves of sound. The change of intensity in the tune ignited something in the silver cicadas, for their wings trembled at a higher frequency than before, the humming more noticeable, more urgent.

Soon, the red particles that made up the boundary began to vibrate as well, and as the melody of the cello grew deeper and the cicadas beat their wings harder and faster, cracks started to form, and they spread and split until the moment Kai played the last note and the silence hung heavily in the air, the wall shattered at last, the particles dissipating like dust and the silver cicadas, too, flew back into the oblivion.

The exorcists instantly felt the pressure reduced, and YueYou squeezed Kai’s shoulder encouragingly with a smile before leading the group down the staircase, with Xiao Yan flying just a little bit further ahead of the humans, its beady black eyes flitting cautiously this way and that to detect any oncoming danger.

“Nice one, Kai,” ZiYan slapped the younger exorcist lightly on her back, making Kai smiled sheepishly at the compliment.

Even though Kai managed to destroy the main boundary, once they made it down to the lowest level of the station, it looked as if the priests hired to do their job went even further than any of them had imagined, for the grey-purple walls of the entire island platform had been splashed a glowing red invisible to the eye of non-Crafters, but to those who had the powers, the unnatural glow of the blood red particles signify only one thing: the spirits who were located within the vicinity at the time when this boundary had been summoned would have no chance of escape.

And those that could not escape had only one fate awaiting them.

That of annihilation from their vitality being viciously sucked dry, until nothing of their souls remained but scattered ashes and dispersed smoke.

Though no one said anything, each and every one of their hearts grew heavy with realization.

It was just as YeLing presumed: this was no mistake. These priests were purposefully trapping spirits down here with no intention of letting them pass over to the other side peacefully.

Why they would do such an inhumane thing to begin with, none of them had the time to consider that right now, but they knew that there were people in their field of work who were desperate enough to do anything for monetary rewards.

Without another word, the five exorcists split into three groups; they spread out and ventured into different directions to inspect the area. The red glimmered eerily over their pale complexions, casting parts of their faces in shadows that flickered and dimmed like a weak flame.

“Guys, over here!” ZiYan called from the end of platform three, where the Chuan Wan Line train ran and continued on to the next station in Sham Shui Po. When the rest of MSC got to where ZiYan and Zhe were, they found the spirits that closely matched the descriptions provided by the witnesses of the recorded sightings.

From the first glance, it looked like there were three people trapped in the corner behind the red wall. Two of them seemed lifeless, piled on top of another on the floor like puppets with broken strings, blood still visible from the last moments of their life. The last one was kneeling on the floor, fists pounding against the wall though he knew it was useless, a young man in his early 20’s wearing all black and a yellow helmet.

His head was lowered, blood and tears were dripping down in rivulets, and so he appeared not to have noticed that he had attracted an audience. It seemed like it had been an eternity being trapped here, seeing the living world went on around him though the other side was blind to him and his companions’ existence.

“These three were most likely protestors who were involved on the night of August 31st,” YeLing was flipping through case files on his phone as he stooped down to get a better look at the other two spirits’ faces. After studying the photos of recent missing persons reports, YeLing concluded with a resigned sigh, “Leung LaiLing, 18 years old, and Lee KaYi, 17 years old – both were reported missing after August 31st, last seen by a couple of eyewitnesses on the train who were injured that night as well.”

“But who’s this?” Zhe wondered, his sympathetic gaze focusing on the man still kneeling and pounding against the boundary as if that was the only thing he knew to do to make a sound, the only thing he could do to seek help. It was hard for Zhe to swallow, seeing the recently passed away young people directly in front of him, utterly desperate in their fight for freedom yet powerless even to help their friends and keep them safe; the calm in him shriveled at the sight of the three spirits, and replacing that composed nature that had earned him the position of vice-captain in MSC was a slow-brewing storm of bitter acid and roaring rage.

Zhe knew, as part of the ShangGuan Clan, he must follow the oath he’d made after he graduated from the Academy as well as the strict rules of the clan itself. In the past, he had no trouble doing that; he had no reason to question these rules, but the reality was here and now, and he couldn’t pretend that he wasn’t at all affected by the sight before him.

He often wondered how YueYou did it. He stole a glance at their Captain, and saw what he’d expected: an impeccably composed expression and red eyes that betrayed no shift of rising emotions.

“Will someone tell him to stop banging on the boundary?” YeLing pulled himself up to his feet again. “Hasn’t he realized that it’s not helping?”

“Ah-Ling,” Kai quietly warned him and shook her head as her partner glanced over at her questioningly.

“Let me try and talk to him,” ZiYan murmured. She carefully got down onto her knees so that she would be able to look at him at eye-level should he lifted his head up. Focusing on enhancing her vitality by closing her eyes and taking a few deep, measured breaths, ZiYan felt all her senses becoming more sensitive and receptive, her Transcendental Aesthesia ability flickering on.

She lifted her arm and pressed her palm gently against the part of the boundary where, trapped on the other side, the nameless man was still pounding silently.

“Hey,” ZiYan thought, transmitting the word through, the area around her palm gleamed purple for a moment, and that was when the man froze.

His body was still shaking as if any moment, a slight breeze would disperse his soul into the unknown oblivion, but it seemed like he could hear someone’s voice addressing him. Frazzled and confused, he slowly lifted his head up.

It was excruciating.

Such a simple, natural gesture as lifting one’s head up to communicate with another person face-to-face should have been easy, but as the man stayed still enough for all the exorcists to truly observe him properly for the first time, they immediately noticed the angular bump on the side of the man’s neck.

A shard of white covered with hints of blood and plasma pierced through the skin.

His neck was broken.

Kai took a small step back in shock, slapping her hands over her mouth so the gasp that escaped from her lungs wasn’t as audible, but no one could blame her for such a violent reaction.

When ZiYan finally saw the man’s face, all she saw was blood and tears smeared across what would have been a finely sculped, handsome face, but bruises taint his skin blotchy purple and swollen in odd places; the whites of his eyes were bloodshot as well, so seeped with old blood that it was difficult to distinguish irises from sclera. His symbolic yellow helmet was slightly askew but still sit proudly on his head like a crown.

ZiYan had to maintain very tight control over her facial expressions to not convey the shock and horror her heart was weighted down with.

The man held his palm up to meet ZiYan’s, bloodied lips curving up into a weak smile, and it might have been ZiYan’s imagination, but it looked as if a trickle of hopeful light flicker in the spirit’s dark, lifeless eyes.

“You… you can see me? And the people beside you?” his lips moved but none of the other exorcists of MSC could hear him because of the disruptive particles that made up the boundary.

ZiYan nodded.

“How much time has passed since… since that night?”

“It’s September 16 today.”

“I tried…” he swallowed – or tried to, because it was impossible but it was a habit that he had when he got emotionally overwhelmed – and continued, “I tried to let them go ahead of me first, through the tunnel towards Sham Shui Po – tons of people were escaping down that way – but then they got caught by the bastard police and I-I can’t go – not without those two!”

“What’s your name?” she asked gently.

“Wong TsunWei.”

“Okay TsunWei, we will try our best to break the boundary and release you and your friends,” ZiYan motioned to her teammates, “we believe the only reason why you guys are stuck in this part of the station is because of the boundary craft. Once the boundary has been lifted, you three should be free to pass on over.”

The man stared first at ZiYan, then he gradually let his gaze drift towards the other members of MSC, one after another, each time spending a few seconds to maintain eye contact, before he lowered his head again without another word; he had also retracted his arm back to his side and shifted more towards the back and closer to his friends as if to protect them from harm.

“What did he say, ZiYan?” YueYou asked.

“They’ve been stranded here since August 31,” ZiYan replied as she stood up and turned to face the group, her expression grim, “he seems confused at best – doesn’t even know how much time has passed since he died. He told me that he and the other two were going to escape by following the train tracks heading towards Sham Shui Po, only that they never made it out of here…”

“And this young man’s identity?”

“He says his name is Wong TsunWei,” ZiYan said, and directed the next question towards the younger exorcist, “YeLing, are there any records of such person in the system?”

“Give me a sec,” YeLing pulled out his phone again to scroll through the missing persons reports from the police department’s archive. After several minutes of searching with no satisfying results, YeLing decided to widen his search. “Here’s something. His name didn’t come up in the police’s missing persons database, but it seems like his acquaintances have been searching for him through a Facebook group called ‘Hong Kong Missing Populations’; the group is apparently established after August 31st, and Wong TsunWei’s name popped up quite early on. From the photos posted on the group’s page, that seems to be our guy.”

He nodded over to the spirit who was still huddled close by his two companions, his eyes quiet but wary when he glanced over at them once in a while.

“Wait, so does that mean his family never officially filed a missing person report with the police?” Kai wondered.

“A lot of people have mysteriously disappeared since the start of the anti-extradition bill protests back in May,” Zhe recalled with a frown, “of course, rumors began to get crazy once bodies of these missing people were found, mostly under suspicious circumstances that the police brushed off as mere groundless rumors.”

“Brother Zhe, you really think this is the police trying to hide the deaths of these protestors in order to keep their reputation clean?” Kai found this instance just outright immoral, not to mention unbelievable, as the Hong Kong police had reputation of being one of the world’s most respected and trustworthy disciplined services.

Or at least, they used to.

These days though, no matter who you asked on the streets, the young or the elderly, those still in school or in the working class, the people’s trust towards the police had only been decreasing significantly over the past few months.

In reality, people had more faith in their own capabilities than in the police.

None of the members in MSC had ever discussed this whole situation, but they all read from different news outlets in their own time, and formed their own opinions, though they knew to keep politics out of their work since their organization was so closely tied to the government.

“You can’t convince me that these three here – and who knows how many others – have nothing to do with the police,” ZiYan shook her head, the revulsion was obvious in her tone.  

“It’s not in our place to investigate whether or not this has anything to do with the police,” Zhe reminded her gravely.  

“Ah-Zhe is right,” YueYou, who had been rather quiet during this discussion, finally spoke, and all the members grew quiet, “the river water doesn’t interfere with the well water: we do our jobs, and they do theirs. Nothing more, nothing less.

“Now, before we start, I want to make myself clear one more time: our mission is to make sure no non-Crafters will be subjected to another sighting, and that means this can go one of two ways,” YueYou continued in her usual composed tone that often had others mistaken her as cruel and impassive, “once we’ve gotten rid of the boundary, and should they decide to move on in their own terms, then all the better for everyone. If they have any last messages they’d like to send to their family and friends, we can at least promise them that much. However…”

Because things rarely worked out that smoothly, and YueYou had learned to always have multiple back-up plans, she needed to ensure that her team understood the consequences.

This was unlike any other missions the team had undertaken; in a way, YueYou knew that ShangGuan YunXing was testing them – YueYou as a leader, and the others as exorcists – by assigning this mission to MSC in the first place.

“If the three spirits refuse to leave, we will have no choice but to do what we usually do,” YueYou needed her team to understand the severity of this mission; they couldn’t afford to make any mistakes, or leave any strings untied that would give her grandmother the excuse to disband and rearrange the personnel of Moon Shoal Club. She had hand-picked and recruited these people for a reason. “Is that understood?”

“Yes, Captain!”

“Good. Ah-Zhe, Kai, let’s spread out,” YueYou took out her white jade vertical flute ChuanHun and Xiao Yan flew back to her usual perch on YueYou’s shoulder, “the three of us will focus on lifting the boundary. YeLing, ZiYan, you two stay close by with your weapons ready in case the spirits have other ideas.”

YeLing and ZiYan nodded and positioned themselves accordingly after the other three exorcists spread out, about two meters apart to form a triangle that enclosed the trapped spirits along one of its edges.

While YeLing pulled out his violin RuQi and placed it in the crook of his neck, bow fixed on the strings, ZiYan reluctantly put on BaiHui, a pair of fingerless, leather-sewn sap gloves that perfectly fitted over her slender fingers. She, too, positioned herself defensively adjacent to YeLing, her hazel irises darkening with worry.

Pursing her lips over the blowing hole of ChuanHun, YueYou played the first notes, gentle and sweet like the song of a phoenix, and then Kai joined in with the lulling deepness of the cello, both instruments’ sounds complementing each other in a serene yet melancholic song.

From Kai’s playing, silver cicadas materialized once more, but this time instead of attaching themselves to the wall of the boundary, they followed the golden string of ChuanHun’s melody, bounding themselves to the delicate thread as it weaved over and across the glowing red boundary to create a sheet of gold and silver hovering just above the wall.

While the two musical crafters created a web, Zhe loaded the cartridge into his Beretta handgun, took aim, and accurately shot four times, each time aiming at one corner of the gold and silver net until it was securely pinned. The craft circuits carved on the specially-manufactured bullets activated and emitted a violet glow that proliferated along the paths of the golden thread and silver cicadas.

As soon as the entire net was burning with violet flames, YueYou and Kai quickened their tempo; like before, the cicadas’ wings thrummed and the threads trembled; the vibrations of both caused the extra thick wall of the boundary to crack under pressure, bit by bit, inch by inch.

The process took longer than before, even with three Crafters’ combined powers, but within a few minutes’ time, the fissures became more apparent, growing longer, wider, until with a definitive strident splintering, the boundary was broken, the particles dissipating like dust.

Sweat tainted the three exorcists’ temples, signifying how much vitality they had expended in order to break apart the boundary. Even they would have to agree that, despite the priests’ underhanded ways, their boundary craft was of first-class quality.

YueYou nodded at ZiYan, wordlessly telling her subordinate to go ahead and talk to them.

“TsunWei, can you hear me?” Once more, ZiYan kneeled down so she could see the three spirits better; people tended to be less intimidated when spoken to the same eye-level after all. She then tried to get the other two’s attention by calling out their name as soothingly as possible as to not startle them.

The young woman called Leung LaiLing seemed to have heard ZiYan’s voice. Slumped over face-down against the ground, she attempted to push herself up, arm shaking with effort, but it was difficult and the exorcists soon realized why: she could only use one arm, because her right arm had been twisted at a sickening 90-degree angle, rendering it completely useless.

“H-help us…” she sobbed, her long hair matted with blood covering half of her beaten face. She reached out, eyes desperate, and ZiYan reached back out to the stranger and held her hand without thinking.

“ZiYan!” Zhe shouted, wanting to warn her.

“It’s okay,” ZiYan assured him, her gaze never leaving the woman’s.

Addressing LaiLing again, ZiYan told her gently, “you and your friends should be able to go now. The force that’s been trapping you here is gone.”

LaiLing shook her head, eyes squeezing tightly closed.

“Is there anything you want to say to your family or friends before you go?” ZiYan asked, since that was the most common reason why spirits decided to stick around after they died. She figured a young person like these three probably still had many things they wanted to accomplish or say before they were willing to go on to the other side. “We will try our best to relay your messages to them.”

LaiLing’s hand was icy cold in ZiYan’s, and she felt a light squeeze against her fingers.

“It’s… it’s not that,” LaiLing said weakly, tears dribbling down her cheeks like pearls. They fell onto the ground and disappeared, as if they’d never existed in the first place.

“She’s right…” the other woman who had been lying limply beside her spoke up. Lee KaYi, most likely still a high school student, with her neatly clipped hair and innocent wide eyes, pulled herself into a sitting position. There were no outward signs of her injuries, so it was likely that she suffered from internal bleeding before she died. “We can’t go like this… there’s still so much we have to do.”

“You’ve already done so much,” ZiYan sighed, the sympathy for these young people growing overwhelming; she knew this was dangerous, letting emotions overriding her logic, especially during missions like this, but she was only human.

Still alive, fortunately. Still capable of having compassion for others. Still wishing to help those who needed it, even if they were on the other side.

“Let the others carry on and do the rest,” ZiYan felt her eyes growing hot, but she wouldn’t allow one drop of tear to escape, “and we will ensure that you three will be remembered, that your deaths will not be discarded as another ‘accidents’.”

“We can’t go… not yet…” TsunWei stood up with movements spasmodic like a robot running out of battery. His bloodshot eyes were depthless and dark, and streams of thick blood were flowing down his cheeks; he glared out into the world and saw nothing – no hope, no light. The dark swirl of confusion, frustration, and sorrow churned wildly within him, having grown exponentially in the duration of being entrapped behind the boundary. Now that the boundary had been destroyed, that darkness was allowed to grow without any restraint, and the last strip of humanity that had been binding that monster was loosened.

“Our fight is not done yet. We can’t leave here yet, not like this.”

“ZiYan, you should move away now,” Zhe warned her quietly. With quick, practiced movements, he changed his cartridge with another set of bullets, and took aim at the staggering spirit whose appearance seemed to have shifted right before their eyes.

Something within Wong TsunWei’s spirit snapped. His eyes and his heart only sensed those who were with him or against him, and he would do anything to kill those who sided with the wrong, the tainted, the dirty ones.

Leung LaiLing’s grasp on ZiYan’s hand became too much, the exorcist’s bones creaking from the immense strength of the undead, and when she tried to pull away, the spirit’s hold tightened even more.

ZiYan hissed in pain, wide eyes searching for the woman who had been so desperate and helpless only a few seconds ago now consumed by Resentment, and realized at last that she was already lost and gone.

A report echoed sharply, the flash of violet light tore before ZiYan’s eyes, and the bullet from Zhe’s Barretta sank into the middle of Leung LaiLing’s forehead.

Where the bullet hit, thin black lines began to trek in all directions from the wound, down the spirit’s face, her neck, and along her limbs like roots of a plant. Uttering a spell under his breath, Zhe activated the craft circuit on the bullet, and trickles of electricity travelled along the pathways of the black threads, rendering LaiLing paralyzed and immobile.

As soon as her fingers slackened, ZiYan ripped herself away, and Zhe grabbed her arm roughly when she got close enough, pulling her to stand behind him. Even though he didn’t say anything, ZiYan could tell the man was angry; he just wasn’t the type to shout, but ZiYan found that LingHu Zhe was much scarier when he was silent.

“Stay behind me,” Zhe murmured lowly.

ZiYan nodded numbly.

Taking a silver cylindrical container in the size of an adult’s index finger, Zhe brushed his thumb against the craft circuit engraved on the metal of the tube, triggering the spell and causing Leung LaiLing’s limp figure to get sucked into the container.

Even in her last moment of consciousness, her spirit’s form disintegrating into a fog-like substance, Leung LaiLing was trying to grasp for something that was now impossibly far out of her reach.

Zhe clasped the Soul Vial back onto his utility belt.

“YeLing, incapacitate Wong TsunWei. I’ll take care of Lee KaYi. Ah-Zhe, back us up when necessary,” YueYou’s commands were simple, concise, and didn’t allow any of the exorcists in her team to argue.

“Yes, Captain!”

A trilling of violin notes began to reverberate within the walls of the underground station, the melody crafted a silver cord that chased after Wong TsunWei, who regained much of his energy and newly driven by a surge of Resentment. He grabbed the end of the cord bare-handed and yanked it as hard as he could, causing YeLing to trip forward, nearly losing his footing if not for Kai pulling the back of her partner’s shirt to steady him.

“Thanks,” YeLing huffed. His song didn’t get interrupted, and with a fast change of melody, the cord glowed with heat, orange light radiating from the length that continued to dance lithely in the air.

Wong TsunWei immediately let go of the cord when he realized that it was burning him, but YeLing took that one moment of hesitation as an opportunity: he flicked his wrist sharply to play notes in a higher register, and the cord abruptly changed its direction, winding around the spirit’s wrist twice before pulling him backward to knock him off balance.

The black dusty particles of Resentment flared angrily around Wong TsunWei as he tumbled onto the floor gracelessly.

“Brother Zhe!”

“On it.”

Another shot rang out, this time the bullet hitting the spirit’s chest. The same black lines crawled over Wong TsunWei’s skin, but instead of electricity, small flames licked the down the paths, and the spirit screamed in agony, arms swinging wildly in a feeble attempt to take someone, anyone, down with him. But as a newly passed away spirit, Wong TsunWei’s powers blazed and dimmed without a predictable pattern.

“We can’t go… we can’t… we’re still… we can still fight damn it!”

Dark blood frothed around his mouth, and he choked on the thick liquid, the odd angle of his broken neck made his movements even more similar to that of a haunted, broken puppet.

After struggling for another few seconds, he, too, went limp, his eye sockets still widely stretched to display black, unseeing eyes that would never see the light of day again.

When the four exorcists looked over to their captain, they noticed that YueYou had already acquired Lee KaYi’s spirit and was just putting her Soul Vial away.

The station was very, very quiet once the noises of the activated craft circuits died down.

One level above them, they could make out the belated unrest of other spirits, a pulsating, continuous hum and murmuring that was impossible to ignore.

YueYou strapped her ChuanHun xiao back to her side, and the rest of the MSC members took that as a sign to conclude their mission.

-

After they had a short debriefing, YueYou dismissed them for the night. As the members of MSC went on to their separate ways, YueYou locked herself inside her office.

The room was dimmed except for the sole source of light from her desk lamp.

She threw herself into the office chair, all traces of her usual elegance and poise that made her seem polished and difficult to approach seeping out of her being for the moment as she closed her eyes tiredly.

She thought back to her team members’ expressions and the opinions they bore for the police and the ShangGuan Clan, and she considered omitting some of the things they’d said in the report she was supposed to send to YunXing.

Before she could go further with this consideration, her office phone rang.

YueYou waited for the third ring to sound before she picked it up.

“This is MSC’s ShangGuan YueYou,” she uttered into the receiver, sinking deeper into her chair as she waited for the other end to say something.

When the other side spoke, however, YueYou suddenly became more awake, her back straightening instinctively, and said, “Grandmother? Good evening.”

A pause, and then a small, bitter smile appeared on YueYou’s lips.

“My apologies, Chief ShangGuan. What can I do for you?”

-

“Oi, LingHu Zhe,” ZiYan bumped her shoulder against the man standing next to her, but all she received was more heavy silence.

It was around five o’clock in the morning, and they had gone back to Zhe’s tiny apartment on King’s Road in North Point after they left MSC’s headquarters. Dawn was about to come and wake up the city, but until the first tinge of sunlight tainted the horizon, Hong Kong still slumbered heavily under the pretense of peace and serenity.

She couldn’t stand it. This silence. Zhe not talking to her.

“Are you going to be like this?” ZiYan snapped.

“Depends,” Zhe said quietly. They were both looking out from the apartment unit’s balcony. Calling it a balcony was being generous though; the little stoop that jutted out from the 18th floor of this aging building had only enough space to fit a few potted plants, so with two full-grown adults standing there, it was more than a little cramped.

But that was fine, too, ZiYan thought to herself, enjoying the solid warmth from the body next to hers.

“Ah, the man finally speaks,” ZiYan’s voice was brimming with sarcasm.

Zhe sighed, and finally turned around to face her. Beneath the lenses of his glasses, the man looked exhausted, his bottom lids bruised with shadow, “ZiYan, what were you trying to do? Get yourself killed?”

“What do you mean?” ZiYan asked, frowning as she turned and glanced up to meet the other exorcist’s eyes.

“You’re just trying to help them, I get that,” Zhe’s expression softened, “but there’s a point when you should know to behave professionally and remember that first and foremost, we are part of the ShangGuan Clan.”

“I thought we’re human beings first and foremost.”

“Don’t get philosophical on me,” Zhe smiled wryly, raising his arm and flicked his partner’s forehead softly, before his tone turned serious again, “you know as well as I do that it doesn’t work that way – not when we’ve taken an oath to serve the Clan.”

“Ah-Zhe, you can’t possibly tell me that you believe what we’ve done tonight – exorcising those three kids’ spirits and hiding what the scumbag police did – don’t tell me you’re all right with that.”

“Don’t you get it? It doesn’t matter whether or not I agree with the purpose behind the mission,” Zhe tried to explain as patiently as he could. It wasn’t as if he couldn’t understand the frustration behind ZiYan’s words; after all, for a brief moment when he saw the three young people’s defeated spirits trapped behind that ruthless boundary, his heart mourned for them too. “We are only carrying out our duties. Shouldn’t that be enough?”

“So, you agree with ShangGuan YueYou’s way of doing things, huh?”

“YueYou is my childhood friend, I’d trust her with my life,” Zhe only said, though he neither agree nor disagree with ZiYan’s statement.

“Yeah, she’s your friend, but she’s also our Captain, and most of all, she’s ShangGuan Clan’s future successor,” ZiYan reminded him. She didn’t want to say it out loud, but from her observation of working under YueYou for the last few years, she could tell that the woman took pride in her work, and would do anything to get to the top. But ZiYan also understood that Zhe and the ShangGuan siblings shared a relationship that was akin to family, so she held her tongue, and with an exhausted sigh, she asked, “you’ve never considered that things could have progressed differently if we’d just taken some time and talked to those kids?”

“That’s not how we do things, and you’ve seen how the Resentment had affected them, changed them. It would have been too risky to spend any more time negotiating with them at that point. Leung LaiLing – you were holding her hand – you knew, better than any of us, that the Resentment had completely consumed her, causing her to lose control, and there was no going back when that happened.”

At that, ZiYan’s lips pursed into a tight line, jaw taut with roiling frustration.

Zhe tried to soften his tone when he felt the bitterness and rage radiating off of ZiYan’s tightly drawn frame, “ZiYan, you’re so kind to others and I remembered, when we first met at the Academy, that your wish was to become an exorcist who help the dead pass on peacefully. That’s a noble goal, and I admired you for it back then; now, too. Always have. But…”

He paused, which made ZiYan looked up at him with query in her eyes, and Zhe smiled softly at her, his hand wrapping around her slightly smaller one, and warmth instantly engulfed her in ways she always found comforting whenever she was with him.

“We do not have any choice but to follow the rules.”

ZiYan allowed Zhe to pull her closer into his embrace, and she buried her face snugly against the crook of his neck. She felt Zhe gently kissing the top of her head before wrapping his other arm around her shoulders.

‘But do we never have a choice? Or are we just choosing to blindly follow the rules set out for us?’

-

“Kai, I ain’t driving your drunk ass home, just going to put it out there now,” YeLing downed a gulp from his bottle of beer, set it down on the bar table, and looked over at his partner and best friend who was nursing a cheap cocktail in her hands.

The rosé spritzer Kai had been drinking was only half finished, the melting ice cubes gleamed like frosted jewels floating in a sea of pale pink bubbles under the dimmed light of the pub, but her usually pale cheeks were already growing rosy and warm.

She hadn’t said a word since they sat down about half an hour ago after they had been released from the night’s duty.

It was a little past three in the morning, and even in the SoHo district of Central, many bar patrons had started leaving for home, drunken and sated for the night, ready to return back to reality after a few hours of restful sleep.

“Yeah, not like you’re going to be driving yourself anywhere, either,” Kai murmured with a defiant smirk, knocking her glass against YeLing’s beer bottle.

“Hmm,” a nonchalant response.

“You know… I’ve been thinking about what Sister ZiYan said…” Kai said after taking another small sip of her drink.

“About?” YeLing asked, though he already knew what direction this conversation was going.

He knew her well enough by now to read her easily, and he’d seen how Kai had reacted to the three spirits during the mission earlier, the initial shock when she first saw the disfigured bodies, the horror when she realized who’d done this to the kids, and the sympathy, even guilt, for not being able to help them even during their last moments of existence.

“What we were doing tonight – apprehending the spirits instead of helping them pass on to the next realm,” Kai’s grip on the glass tightened, the liquid inside sloshed around from how hard she was shaking from fury, “we’re basically helping the police lie to the public by cleaning up after their mess and hiding the fact that they’ve… well, they’ve committed murder.”

“You heard what my sister said,” YeLing reminded her, red eyes gleaming with a quiet warning. Though at the mention of his elder sibling, his brows instantly gathered into a slight frown. As much as he looked up to his sister, who was the only family member YeLing was willing to trust and depend on, there were a handful of times during their time working together that YeLing thought she had made some dubious decisions, but as her subordinate and younger brother, he had never tried to question or challenge her.

As ShangGuan YunXing loved to remind her grandson, he was not in the place to ask questions.

“I did,” Kai said quietly, gaze lowering to stare at the bottom of her glass as if answers would float up to the surface if she glared at it hard enough, “and you know I respect Sister YueYou a lot. I’m not saying she’s wrong; I mean, she wasn’t the one who gave the order. I don’t think she has a choice in the matter, either.”

She took another swig, the sweet bubbly alcohol sliding down her throat hotly, almost suffocating her, but she bit down the urge to cough.

“But I just can’t live with myself,” Kai sighed, sagging into her seat and craning back to stare up at the dark ceiling, and white spots danced merrily across her field of vision, making her a bit light-headed for a brief moment, “knowing that we’re almost as bad as the police themselves…”

“We’re not the same,” YeLing muttered, voice raw from alcohol consumption barely audible.

-

‘You will not be forgotten,’ she promised silently to the three spirits forever trapped, eternally lost.

Like many of the black-clothed civilians all around her, she placed a white candle on the concrete steps of the exit of the Prince Edward Station, the single lit wick weak and dim, but gathered into tens, hundreds, thousands — and maybe then, the flames would blaze bright enough to eliminate the darkness and reveal the truth to the world.

[babyyeollie]

just one more; suho

summary : a party, a late night diner and heated kisses all lead to one thing - avoidance

pairing : junmyeon x reader (y/n)

genre : fluff. fluff. flUFF. 

word count : 2.7 k 

‘ You were fairly certain that his round cheeks, dusted with pink and heavily contrasting with the harsh white lighting of the diner might have been the most beautiful thing you had ever seen. ‘

“Come on, Y/N. Just have one more!”

You rolled your eyes at the insistent, slurry voice coming from your side and pushed away the cup being offered to you. Shaking your head, you attempted to let your voice carry over the top of the blaring music,

“No, thank you. I’m fine!”

Your extremely drunk friend seemed to take this into consideration but clearly thought better of pushing the argument when a loud song blasted through the cheap speaker system. A cheer tumbled from her lips and she swayed into the main party room, once again leaving you alone.

You stared at the cup that had been left on the small coffee table in front of you and tilted your head. You had already consumed around three rounds of the amber liquid and were in no hurry to drink a fourth, especially not when you had a very, very long trek back to the opposite end of college and were beginning to feel the effects of the alcohol in your system. The thought pricked a sudden movement in you. It was beginning to turn into the early hours of the morning, which made the perfect excuse to escape the party and curl up in your bed, a glorious sleep in the next day the only thing on your mind.

In all honesty, you just weren’t having a good time.

Haerin had once again dragged you to another campus party. It was the same routine almost every week. You'd finish your Friday lectures and she would instantly squeeze you into a tight dress, pulling you out of the door and into her element.

You had never really been the partying type. Even in high school, you would attend celebrations with friends, but only found yourself getting drunk enough to regret the consequences once, and you were in no hurry to relive that experience.

Hefting a sigh, you pried open your purse and checked the amount of money remaining, wondering if you had enough to buy a coffee on the way back to your dorm. Frowning at your lack of notes, you shut the purse and moved to stand up just as at the same time you felt the end of the lounge dip under someone’s weight.

Flicking your head up, you caught sight of who had sat beside you and although the lighting was dim, there was no way that you could have missed the ethereal face staring back at you.

The corner of his mouth was quirked in a half-smile, the sight enough to reduce you to a puddle.

“Hi." You said dumbly, mouth agape.

At your greeting, his mouth broke into a full grin. The boy leaned back on the love seat, “Hi.” he responded in a voice akin to liquefied gold. As if locked in a spell, you found yourself sliding back into the chair, moving ever so slightly towards him.

The boy’s eyes glinted in a way that made your heart skip a beat and he wordlessly held out the previously discarded cup in question.

You supposed that one more drink couldn’t hurt.

~~~~~~~

The clock read two-thirty in the morning and the slowly dwindling crowds of party goers were moving by in a blur, yet the only one you cared about focusing on was the boy in front of you. ‘Kim Junmyeon’ he had said his name was.

Even he was beginning to blur.

Junmyeon held your arm as you tipped forward with a giggle at his joke and his eyebrows furrowed in concern,

“Y/N, are you feeling alright?” he questioned softly. Nodding blindly, you grabbed onto the sleeve of his soft cotton shirt in an attempt to right your body. The room was spinning slowly and you smiled up at him, “Yeah… I just felt a little dizzy for a second.”

Junmyeon looked at the mess of cups strewn around the house and then towards the neat collection of them by where to two of you had been sitting all night. He shook his head in amusement and concern, pulling you off the dance floor and back towards your chair to grab the items you had resting there.

Pouting, you followed.

“What are you doing? I was having fun out there with you.” You sulked, tugging on his sleeves. Junmyeon’s cheeks heated ever so slightly and he shook his head, putting it down to your drunken ramblings.

“It’s time for us to go, come on, I’ll walk you back to your room.” Junmyeon slung your coat over his arm and tucked your clutch on top of it. You responded by showing him another pout.

“I don’t wanna go home.” you complained loudly, earning a few glares from those nearby.

Junmyeon simply tilted his lips up in a soft smile and tucked your arm into his to keep you upright, “If you come now, we can get something to eat on our way.” surprising even himself with these words - he normally wouldn’t have suggested anything like this, but then he wasn’t usually the type to talk to strangers at parties either.

You considered his proposal, waltzing into the fresh night air with him and nodded, trying not to make yourself feel dizzier than before. “Could we get a coffee?” You inquired, much to his delight. “Of course.” Junmyeon agreed and focused on supporting you all the way to the small 24-hour diner only a short distance from your dorm.

Your vision swayed in and out, spots dancing in front of your eyes, but you had to admit that your new friend was a spectacular weight, preventing you from flying high and far away. A giggle escaped your mouth at the ridiculous thought and you ignored Junmyeon’s imploring glance in response to it as you walked through the doors and into the humid room.

“Come on, this is my favourite table.” You simply stated, dragging him towards the far back of the small café. Junmyeon followed without a word, only letting a simple smile grace his features at your antics.

The two of you took your seat in a booth along the back wall and Jun used this time as an opportunity to assess just how drunk you happened to be. He dipped his head to meet your eyes and you winked sloppily at him.

“You could just take a picture you know. No need to stare at me all night.” You said, leaning closer to him across the table. Junmyeon’s cheeks heated slightly, however, he noticed that your words weren’t slurring whatsoever, so you clearly weren’t drunk enough to suffer serious consequences in the morning.

“You said that you wanted coffee?” He questioned, eager to change the subject from his staring. You nodded eagerly and gestured toward the menu, “This place has the best coffee for miles, my personal favourite is the mocha latte with chocolate dust.” Junmyeon smiled to himself as he plucked the menu from its holster by the wall. He was definitely going to make a mental note of that one.

A waitress made her way over and bowed to the two of you ever so slightly, “How can I help you?” She asked in a soft voice, eyes raking over the two of you in an almost questioning manner, no doubt wondering who would stumble into a small diner at three in the morning, despite its promise to be open all hours. Junmyeon scanned the menu and then looked up at her, “We’ll take one large mocha latte with chocolate sprinkles, a large cappuccino and the apple cinnamon pancakes, thank you.” The young woman raised her eyebrows but scribbled down the order hastily, “It won’t be too long.” She said walking back into the kitchen and trying to conceal her yawns.

Junmyeon folded the menu and sat it back in the small holder, flicking his eyes up to meet yours. You were sat with your head resting on your chin, staring at him with a small and wonderful smile,

“What?” he questioned, smoothing down his hair and tilting his lips up in a small grin to match your own.

You shook your head slowly and leaned across the table, feeling braver than you should’ve in front of a very handsome almost-stranger.

“I think that I may just like you, Kim Junmyeon, in fact, I think that I may like you quite a lot.”

You were fairly certain that his round cheeks, dusted with pink and heavily contrasting with the harsh white lighting of the diner might have been the most beautiful thing you had ever seen.

You almost couldn’t help it when you leaned over the table and pressed your lips to his incredibly smooth and plump ones, expecting him to jolt back in surprise you closed your eyes, but instead felt him move closer to you, sliding his hand across the table to rest on top of yours.

Your heart was beating erratically as you felt him nip at your lower lip, not caring who was present.

The sense of nonchalance that he had made you only lust for him more.

“Do you want to leave here?”

“What are you implying?” He asked with a small smile against your lips.

“How far away is your dorm?” You fought the urge to press your lips back to his as he let out a breathy laugh.

“Not too far at all.”

```````

“I am never drinking again.” You moaned to Haerin who was seated across from you in the main library of your campus. Your friend simply shook her head and continued to highlight her workbooks, “Y/N, you’ve given me this spiel four times now, and I don’t understand what is getting you so worked up. You were tipsy at most, and it’s not like you asked the boy to marry you!” She whisper-shouted across the table, barely sparing you a glance as finals were just around the corner for the both of you. You sighed and tapped your pen on the leg of your jeans quickly, “I know, I know, but I barely even knew the poor boy! I wouldn’t be surprised if he were staying out of my way at college on purpose.” You sighed loudly and slumped backwards in your chair, the rhythm of the pen not breaking. Haerin finally looked up from her book and narrowed her eyes at you, “You had never seen him before the party either,” she pointed out, “He’s probably older than us and attending a different set of classes - this is a huge college.” She took a swig of her coffee and stared back down at her notes, “Now I suggest you push tall, dark and handsome out of your mind and focus more on your media notes.”

You poked your tongue out at her response but found yourself smiling anyway, Haerin always knew how to make you feel better about almost any situation.

Ten minutes into your notes at most, you sat back and moaned loudly, “Oh my god, I had sex with him and I didn’t even get his phone number.”

With a slam of her textbook that screamed finality, Haerin packed everything into her bag while answering you, “Maybe it was a good thing - You seem to babble just as much sober as you do drunk.”

The small girl pushed out of her chair and marched away, not even leaving a hint that she had been there. As you followed her retreating figure, you couldn’t help but notice the boy peeking out at you through the stacks, with your heart fluttering you took a closer look at the shelving to realise it wasn’t Junmyeon, but a stranger who just so happened to be witnessing your silent screaming match.

Raising your eyebrows at him in a short-tempered manner, his eyes widened in alarm and he disappeared back into the rows of books, leaving you completely alone in the large library.

```````

Everything had you on edge during your final weeks at the campus for the semester. It was growing increasingly colder outside as the seasons morphed into one another, and you had only just completed your exams that had resulted in spending every waking hour at either the library or the 24-hour diner studying as hard as humanly possible and gulping down cups of coffee like they were water.

Time was running thin in your life and yet everything you did was hardly enough to distract you from Kim junmyeon.

Suho, as you'd found out that he was called around campus by friends and admirers alike.

Your final class of the school term was currently streaming into the lecture hall and you felt, and looked, like the undead. Dark circles were pressed under your eyes in an almost brutal fashion and your hair was something akin to a bird’s nest - in all honestly you weren’t one hundred percent sure why you even came that day, almost everyone had opted to stay in bed or study for any last tests that they had coming up and you were sure that the latter would have done you the world of good.

A dull throbbing was hitting your head almost rhythmically as you trudged your way into the bare theatre. The heating was cranked up to its highest setting and there were at least three people resting their heads on stacks of books or laptops, looking dead to the world. You filed into your normal seat towards the back, spreading yourself out as you knew that Haerin would not even consider showing up today.

Curling in on yourself and closing your eyes, you finally felt yourself drifting into a peaceful sleep until a delicate tap on the shoulder roused you suddenly from that.

You almost couldn’t stop the anger that flashed through your body at the disturbance, opening your eyes and flicking them towards the person who had wound themselves up at your side.

Standing in front of you was a tall boy holding a large, steaming cup of coffee.

Furrowing your brows, you sat up straight and rubbed your hands over your eyes to clear your vision, coming into focus was a very, very attractive and familiar face smiling at you softly.

“One large mocha latte with extra sprinkles?”

Junmyeon held out the warm cup and when you simply continued to stare at him he faltered slightly, the corners of his lip dipping down.

You couldn’t help but get the urge to kiss him, however, your brain seemed to be working on autopilot.

“Why now?” You asked quietly, keeping your features collected and relaxed.

He understood what you were implying and gestured towards the empty seat beside you, a silent question. You nodded at him and moved your books over so that he could take the spot and watched as he sat down the cup and rubbed the back of his neck.

“I was nervous. Scared, I suppose.” He said, cheeks heating slightly.

Your lips parted slightly and you turned to him, tiredness fully forgotten.

“I didn’t think that I was that terrifying.” You said with a light laugh to which he shook his head in response, “You’re not, but I figured that maybe… I don’t know, maybe you didn’t want anything after the party.”

“I constantly sought you out but every time that I saw you around campus you were either with your friends or studying. It didn’t feel right to interrupt you.”

You stared at him for a moment before picking up the coffee cup and pressing it to your lips, taking a sip from it, you watched how the light caught his eyes just perfectly and felt your stomach do a small flip.

“I don’t kiss every guy that I meet at parties, and I certainly don’t sleep with them, so you definitely were one of a kind, for me at least.” You said quietly, maintaining eye contact the entire time.

Watching his lips break into a hesitant smile you felt your heartbeat growing louder and louder.

“In that case, do you think that you’d like to go on a date with me? No alcohol this time.”

Pretending to think about it, you rolled your eyes and leaned forward to kiss him on the cheek, “Of course, we’re basically already at fourth date status now.” You said with a laugh, to which his cheeks turned that stunning shade of frosted pink, and you were still certain that it was the most beautiful thing you had ever seen in your life.

// Admin Aimee with another fic 10900 years late lmaoooo, I am really sorry about the gap between posts. Lately, Mon has been swamped with work - barely ever getting a day off :( And I’ve just hit assignment week BUT It’s my birthday on the 22nd so I will be releasing TWO new scenarios to celebrate! One is the first chapter of a new fic I’m writing and the second is a highly requested scenario of our sehunnie ;)

I love you all, thank you for the constant support on our blog xx

[financialinvestingradio]

FIR 84: How to Make MONEY (what oil??) !!!

What does it mean to make money!!?? That's That's a big question on a lot of our minds, right? What what does that actually mean, especially for all this going on with COVID-19 and such? Wow, small to medium businesses are just getting hammered. I'm sure a lot of you have been seeing the small to medium business loans, the SBA loans that are coming out. And obviously, some of those are even grants, if you will. What I wanted to talk about was some of the secrets that we've learned in terms of making money or earning more money in our businesses. It actually kind of goes back to some of the things that we've done with our kids. So, so quick, quick little story here. So we have a large family. We have six kids. And we basically have started each of our children with running their own business in our home. I call it the yard manager. So as each of our children were growing up, they each took turns being the art manager, and over the years well, first of all, I should probably explain why What What it means is they're responsible for getting the work done in the yard. Now, that means they have the opportunity to hire their siblings that have budgets, they'll have cost of goods sold requirements. But in the end, they ultimately have to send me an invoice. And one of the lessons they've learned over time is no invoice no money. And so there were times when I went without paying them for weeks and they'd be like, Hey, Dad, where's you know, where's the money? It'd be like, you got to send the invoice. And so they would do that and they'd get into the pattern of that and help them to start tracking and finding some independence but I noticed a pattern over many years of doing this as each child took on the role as they came into the role they are crowned you know, with with this crown, your crown is the art manager anyway, the pattern that I noticed is that is it they almost always Start projecting into the future. So as they start to see the flow of the money coming, right, and they start to get into the pattern of that, and they start collecting the data. Now, of course, the data in this little operation is very simple. It's, it's, here's the work that was done. Here's the data was done. Here's the amount and of course we come up with with what those mounts are ahead of time. And here's who was involved with it, if any, mostly it's down, but like, like I said, sometimes some of them hate doing weeding, right. So they, they want to hire that out to their siblings. But in any event, they almost always start projecting into the future because they see the money flow, and they start looking at ways to optimize it. Alright, so maybe there's another way they can figure out to get the work done faster or cheaper. And of course, like I said, they're looking at the cost of goods sold. Some of them may have even looked at patterns like, Well, okay, when it's storms or rains or whatever it might be, they realize that there is Come reduces, right? Well, it's interesting when we look at our businesses and we look start looking at the data that we have available to us, it actually becomes a critical activity to monetize our, our data, right to commercialize it. There's a couple obvious ways, of course, for companies to commercialize data. One of those is the data, of course gets collected, and it's analyzed for product development purposes, right or to make better products. And of course, that can translate into improve sales and, you know, products with higher value and so forth. That's the first sort of obvious way. The second obvious way is, of course, the data gets used to identify problems and bottlenecks in internal processes, which of course then can eliminate or improve, you know, business bottlenecks and improve the efficiency and profitability. Right. So those are two obvious ways. I saw that with our kids in the US Manage payroll. Again, I've seen it many years over over time with small to medium businesses.

So I wanted to look at some examples of some companies on how they've used data like, there's a search and discovery service called Foursquare, and they sell its data to retailers. So they can optimize their outdoor advertising and online marketing to match you know, the routes that people use to navigate the city. Right. There's other groups, media companies that collect digital data on people's interest, and then they sell that to online advertisers. Certainly weather forecasting companies like freaka can, you know, they also help advertising match weather conditions? Those are certainly some examples. There's other companies and this is of course, in some cases, it's their own data, or its data there that they're intentionally collecting from others or for others. Certainly An example would be Facebook. Right. So the you know, the question is, you've got Facebook, right? Would Facebook really have paid $22 billion? And you know, for WhatsApp in 2014? If if, in fact WhatsApp didn't already have data on 600 million consumers worldwide? I mean, they probably wouldn't have done that. Right. So it wasn't the fact that what's apps revenues were massive. I think at the time, maybe they're around 10 million back in 2014, or 2013. You know, Microsoft, what did they pay over 2 billion, I think is two and a half billion. They did that for from Minecraft, and that the time Minecraft had very little actual revenues. It was the data that the Microsoft was after, which is a key valuation. So, fact of the matter is, even as a small to medium business owner, if we're not cognizant of the data and information we're tracking, we're actually leaving money on the table and now ends up hurting us rather than helping us. And in today's technology world, it actually becomes more important for us to do this to take a moment to get our data strategy together. Doesn't have to take a lot of work. We got to take some effort to do that. Well, I'm sure you've heard the phrase, hey, data is the new oil. Right? And there are some people that certainly say that, and I think that while at a surface level, you might say, Yeah, that makes sense. But there's some challenges with that with that metaphor. Turns out in reality, I think we're the oil in the metaphor, right? It's humans, right? It's the footprint, the digital footprint. The transactions that we do, the places we go, the people we see how we interact. That's actually the data. And that's actually where the money is. It's tracking that. So we have to be much more cognizant of how we of course give our data but also as business owners We need to be more cognizant of, if a consumer is sharing certain kinds of data, and they're open to that. It's important for us to also understand the opportunity that's available there as well. I think when Zuckerberg you know, Facebook when he was testifying before Congress, he explained a bit about how Facebook makes money, right? He said something about, Hey, you know, it's we're taking data in terms of what's happening, you know, where the people are clicking what they're doing, who they're interacting with. And then ultimately, they sell that, you know, off to advertisers, right? I think they do over 200 billion a year annually, right, basically, by selling our information. So to get started, it's really important that you know, as a small to medium business owners that we start with the data that we currently have, we have to look at it and say, what's our business, what's my role in the business, and then there's typically at least three things to get through. are no one is we got to look at the patterns of our data, right, we should analyze it. Look for patterns and trends that certainly present themselves. But number two, we got to look for what those patterns mean, they tell a message, right? There's some information about it. And the key to this is to figure out what's actionable and what's not. And number three is to focus on the big picture, where are we trying to go as a business? What are we trying to get done, and then use some tools to help us get there. Now one of the things that we do is we apply artificial intelligence to do that. So because after a while you realize you go mind not looking at all this information, number one, number one, right take so much time number two, the AI is proving to help see things that we can't see very easily with our eyes. And so given the fact that we believe that there's money on the table in our data, that we don't have to do a lot of extra work to go harvest it. We just got to go mind for it. Pull it out, leveraging technologies like AI helps us to do that. One of the things that we've seen that comes out of this is the ability to make better decisions, right? And so I'm not a fan of saying take AI and hand it off, and we just go blindly do whatever it says, I'm more in the line of thinking that this is augmented intelligence, use the intuition that you have as a business owner, but then augment it with what AI insights are providing. So, you know, these days, as I'd mentioned, you know, the more that we have data at our fingertips, the more important it is for us to leverage some kind of techniques that will help us to, you know, understand and get the insights from it. Now, recently, I was applying some AI for a company and was evaluating patterns and the predictions and as I reviewed it with the business owner, he made the statement simply, I had no idea I had no idea that the patterns were existing in my business, and that if I did more of this and less of that, I actually can, you know, increase my sales as well as you know, reduce some of my losses. And that's just as important to know ahead of time. You know what this is actually, uh, you know, historically and predictively a losing venture on these particular set of activities. Therefore, let's stop doing that. So whether we'll see improvements in you know, making more money or reducing losses, both are certainly benefits to our business. All right. So there you have it, the How To Make Money, it's in our data. Let's go after the data. And quite frankly, there's enough tools and services out there today, that even if we don't have the skill sets in our small to medium business, reach out to someone such as ourselves that click AI and talk to us about it or find someone else but nevertheless, go harvesting for that data. My name is Grant Larsen. Thanks for joining us. Next time, go find the money in your data.

Thank you for joining grant on ClickAI Radio. Don't forget to subscribe and leave feedback. And remember to download your FREE eBook. Visit ClickAIRadio.com now!!

Check out this episode!

[clickairadio]

CAIR3: How to Make MONEY (what oil??) !!!

What does it mean to make money!!?? That's That's a big question on a lot of our minds, right? What what does that actually mean, especially for all this going on with COVID-19 and such? Wow, small to medium businesses are just getting hammered. I'm sure a lot of you have been seeing the small to medium business loans, the SBA loans that are coming out. And obviously, some of those are even grants, if you will. What I wanted to talk about was some of the secrets that we've learned in terms of making money or earning more money in our businesses. It actually kind of goes back to some of the things that we've done with our kids. So, so quick, quick little story here. So we have a large family. We have six kids. And we basically have started each of our children with running their own business in our home. I call it the yard manager. So as each of our children were growing up, they each took turns being the art manager, and over the years well, first of all, I should probably explain why What What it means is they're responsible for getting the work done in the yard. Now, that means they have the opportunity to hire their siblings that have budgets, they'll have cost of goods sold requirements. But in the end, they ultimately have to send me an invoice. And one of the lessons they've learned over time is no invoice no money. And so there were times when I went without paying them for weeks and they'd be like, Hey, Dad, where's you know, where's the money? It'd be like, you got to send the invoice. And so they would do that and they'd get into the pattern of that and help them to start tracking and finding some independence but I noticed a pattern over many years of doing this as each child took on the role as they came into the role they are crowned you know, with with this crown, your crown is the art manager anyway, the pattern that I noticed is that is it they almost always Start projecting into the future. So as they start to see the flow of the money coming, right, and they start to get into the pattern of that, and they start collecting the data. Now, of course, the data in this little operation is very simple. It's, it's, here's the work that was done. Here's the data was done. Here's the amount and of course we come up with with what those mounts are ahead of time. And here's who was involved with it, if any, mostly it's down, but like, like I said, sometimes some of them hate doing weeding, right. So they, they want to hire that out to their siblings. But in any event, they almost always start projecting into the future because they see the money flow, and they start looking at ways to optimize it. Alright, so maybe there's another way they can figure out to get the work done faster or cheaper. And of course, like I said, they're looking at the cost of goods sold. Some of them may have even looked at patterns like, Well, okay, when it's storms or rains or whatever it might be, they realize that there is Come reduces, right? Well, it's interesting when we look at our businesses and we look start looking at the data that we have available to us, it actually becomes a critical activity to monetize our, our data, right to commercialize it. There's a couple obvious ways, of course, for companies to commercialize data. One of those is the data, of course gets collected, and it's analyzed for product development purposes, right or to make better products. And of course, that can translate into improve sales and, you know, products with higher value and so forth. That's the first sort of obvious way. The second obvious way is, of course, the data gets used to identify problems and bottlenecks in internal processes, which of course then can eliminate or improve, you know, business bottlenecks and improve the efficiency and profitability. Right. So those are two obvious ways. I saw that with our kids in the US Manage payroll. Again, I've seen it many years over over time with small to medium businesses.

So I wanted to look at some examples of some companies on how they've used data like, there's a search and discovery service called Foursquare, and they sell its data to retailers. So they can optimize their outdoor advertising and online marketing to match you know, the routes that people use to navigate the city. Right. There's other groups, media companies that collect digital data on people's interest, and then they sell that to online advertisers. Certainly weather forecasting companies like freaka can, you know, they also help advertising match weather conditions? Those are certainly some examples. There's other companies and this is of course, in some cases, it's their own data, or its data there that they're intentionally collecting from others or for others. Certainly An example would be Facebook. Right. So the you know, the question is, you've got Facebook, right? Would Facebook really have paid $22 billion? And you know, for WhatsApp in 2014? If if, in fact WhatsApp didn't already have data on 600 million consumers worldwide? I mean, they probably wouldn't have done that. Right. So it wasn't the fact that what's apps revenues were massive. I think at the time, maybe they're around 10 million back in 2014, or 2013. You know, Microsoft, what did they pay over 2 billion, I think is two and a half billion. They did that for from Minecraft, and that the time Minecraft had very little actual revenues. It was the data that the Microsoft was after, which is a key valuation. So, fact of the matter is, even as a small to medium business owner, if we're not cognizant of the data and information we're tracking, we're actually leaving money on the table and now ends up hurting us rather than helping us. And in today's technology world, it actually becomes more important for us to do this to take a moment to get our data strategy together. Doesn't have to take a lot of work. We got to take some effort to do that. Well, I'm sure you've heard the phrase, hey, data is the new oil. Right? And there are some people that certainly say that, and I think that while at a surface level, you might say, Yeah, that makes sense. But there's some challenges with that with that metaphor. Turns out in reality, I think we're the oil in the metaphor, right? It's humans, right? It's the footprint, the digital footprint. The transactions that we do, the places we go, the people we see how we interact. That's actually the data. And that's actually where the money is. It's tracking that. So we have to be much more cognizant of how we of course give our data but also as business owners We need to be more cognizant of, if a consumer is sharing certain kinds of data, and they're open to that. It's important for us to also understand the opportunity that's available there as well. I think when Zuckerberg you know, Facebook when he was testifying before Congress, he explained a bit about how Facebook makes money, right? He said something about, Hey, you know, it's we're taking data in terms of what's happening, you know, where the people are clicking what they're doing, who they're interacting with. And then ultimately, they sell that, you know, off to advertisers, right? I think they do over 200 billion a year annually, right, basically, by selling our information. So to get started, it's really important that you know, as a small to medium business owners that we start with the data that we currently have, we have to look at it and say, what's our business, what's my role in the business, and then there's typically at least three things to get through. are no one is we got to look at the patterns of our data, right, we should analyze it. Look for patterns and trends that certainly present themselves. But number two, we got to look for what those patterns mean, they tell a message, right? There's some information about it. And the key to this is to figure out what's actionable and what's not. And number three is to focus on the big picture, where are we trying to go as a business? What are we trying to get done, and then use some tools to help us get there. Now one of the things that we do is we apply artificial intelligence to do that. So because after a while you realize you go mind not looking at all this information, number one, number one, right take so much time number two, the AI is proving to help see things that we can't see very easily with our eyes. And so given the fact that we believe that there's money on the table in our data, that we don't have to do a lot of extra work to go harvest it. We just got to go mind for it. Pull it out, leveraging technologies like AI helps us to do that. One of the things that we've seen that comes out of this is the ability to make better decisions, right? And so I'm not a fan of saying take AI and hand it off, and we just go blindly do whatever it says, I'm more in the line of thinking that this is augmented intelligence, use the intuition that you have as a business owner, but then augment it with what AI insights are providing. So, you know, these days, as I'd mentioned, you know, the more that we have data at our fingertips, the more important it is for us to leverage some kind of techniques that will help us to, you know, understand and get the insights from it. Now, recently, I was applying some AI for a company and was evaluating patterns and the predictions and as I reviewed it with the business owner, he made the statement simply, I had no idea I had no idea that the patterns were existing in my business, and that if I did more of this and less of that, I actually can, you know, increase my sales as well as you know, reduce some of my losses. And that's just as important to know ahead of time. You know what this is actually, uh, you know, historically and predictively a losing venture on these particular set of activities. Therefore, let's stop doing that. So whether we'll see improvements in you know, making more money or reducing losses, both are certainly benefits to our business. All right. So there you have it, the How To Make Money, it's in our data. Let's go after the data. And quite frankly, there's enough tools and services out there today, that even if we don't have the skill sets in our small to medium business, reach out to someone such as ourselves that click AI and talk to us about it or find someone else but nevertheless, go harvesting for that data. My name is Grant Larsen. Thanks for joining us. Next time, go find the money in your data.

Thank you for joining grant on ClickAI Radio. Don't forget to subscribe and leave feedback. And remember to download your FREE eBook. Visit ClickAIRadio.com now!!

Check out this episode!

[sempiternalsandpitturtle]

Boosting your website marketing efforts in 2019

In this day and age, a business must have a strong digital presence in order to be an effective marketer; after all the world wide web is where so many people spend much of their time and money. So, it makes perfect sense to get in on the action and join those businesses marketing their products and services to target audiences that lay in waiting.

But, in 2019, standing out from the competitor crowd isn’t always an easy feat.

With so many updates and algorithm changes taking place on various social media networks, businesses can often lose sight of the bigger picture and leave one crucial online platform behind: their website.

Thankfully, we’ve got the inside scoop on what it takes to step up your website marketing efforts and implement a strong strategy for 2019.

Social media versus websites: Who comes out on top?

You’ve heard of Fury, Mayweather and Ali, but today in the red corner we’ve got social media and in the blue, websites.

Long ago, before dog filters and live streams, websites ruled the roost.

However, it wasn’t long before MySpace, LinkedIn and of course, Facebook were born and started making waves in the online community. Now, in 2019, social media’s worldwide penetration is showing no signs of slowing down. Latest figures from Statista show there are currently 2.77 billion social media users around the globe, showcasing a 1.95 billion increase from 2010!

With benefits ranging from increased brand awareness to ease of promoting products, it’s no surprise many businesses asked the question:

“Why do I need a website when I can just use social media to promote my business?”

Well, here’s why websites are such an integral part of your online marketing efforts.

Why websites are so important

On social media, a business is somewhat at the mercy of that particular platform, with limited leeway to customise how its customer experience plays out. With set rules and regulations to adhere to, if you make a mistake, the platform may choose to cancel your space on its site leaving your reputation and revenue at risk.

This is why it’s crucial to combine the benefits of social media with the control and stability of a website. Your website is created to reflect your brand, product/service and your business’ identity and gives you complete control in the management of your site. Think of social media as a tool to attract people to your site where conversions can then take place – almost like stepping stones!

However, it’s no use blindly posting content whenever you feel like it – you must have a plan in place, otherwise known as a website marketing strategy.

What is a website marketing strategy and why is it so important for 2019?

A website marketing strategy is a plan of action that relates to all marketing efforts associated with your site. This strategy often includes the steps you’ll take in order to achieve your specific website marketing goals, such as generating more leads or increasing conversions.

In 2019, having a strong website marketing strategy in place is more essential than ever. If you know what you want to accomplish but don’t know how to get there, you’re setting yourself up for failure

This is why it’s important to stay on top of changes and updates. Doing so will ensure your strategy remains relevant, smart and competitive.

So, what are the tactics that can help your boost your website marketing efforts in the present day?

Understand and implement voice search

“Siri, show me the best doughnuts in Melbourne.”

“Alexa, what are the most popular digital trends right now?”

The above examples are just two questions people may ask their smartphones, after all, the three big names in phone operating systems (iOS, Android and Windows) support voice activated search.

Back in 2011, when Siri was first introduced by iOS, mobile users enjoyed the theatrical element of asking the in-house robot some pointless questions. Fast forward eight years, and Google estimates that 20% of its searches are conducted through voice, But that’s not all. In 2020, ComScore predicts that 50% of all searches will be through voice activated operations!

While it’s clear that there’s a serious demand for voice search, what does this mean for businesses?

Basically, if you want to boost your website’s marketing efforts in 2019, you must leverage voice search optimisation.

Voice search optimisation refers to the way in which businesses online ‘enhance’ their content for voice search. The ultimate aim of this is to earn the featured snippet spot in the search engine results page (SERP) for keywords related to your business and target audience. For example, if someone asks, “Siri, show me homeware shops in my area”, you’ll have hopefully adapted your content to appear in the number one spot. By ranking in this position, your business increases its online visibility, which can lead to more website visits and hopefully more conversions!

In order to cater for voice search intentions, your website and content must:

Be mobile friendly.

Provide concise answers to questions.

Include and target long-tail keywords.

Focus on action queries.

Be up to date with opening hours, business name, address and other important listing details.

Tune into chatbots

Staying on the subject of Siri and her voice-activated counterpart crew, this group of technologies is also known as a type of chatbot.

Don’t worry, chatbots aren’t as scary or complex as you think, and it’s important you’re aware of what they are and how they work.

In its simplest form, a chatbot is a computer program that aims to replicate human conversation, through text or voice with a user’

They offer a variety of different purposes, such as recommending products, answering questions and having conversations with people on your website.  

For brands looking to boost website marketing efforts, implementing chatbot technology should be a top consideration for the following reasons:

Collect and analyse customer data: Since chatbots are interactive tools, they’re capable of gathering customer insights and feedback. Such information can help improve your products/services and even make your website better for users.

Save time: Chatbots can provide fast, automated answers to a range of common questions customers may ask. This ensures consumers gain the information they need in the quickest possible time, without having to wait on hold or email your business. In turn, this increases customer satisfaction.

Make communication with your brand more fun: Chatbots offer a new way of communication and ultimately make your brand appear more up-to-date and interesting – two qualities that help separate you from the competitor crowd.

With great benefits like the above, it’s hardly surprising chatbots are becoming a crucial part of website marketing in 2019. Are you ready for the rise of the ‘bots?

Get involved with video

YouTube is more than just the home of cats playing pianos and channels dedicated to hydraulic presses crushing an array of household objects (if you haven’t already, it’s worth a watch!) In fact, YouTube, as reported by endless sites and reports, remains the world’s third most visited platform, after Google and Facebook. However, we’re not done yet. In 2019, a whopping 87% of internet users in Australia watched videos online, according to data published in a joint We Are Social and Hootsuite report.

With more and more people choosing video content over other mediums, businesses can’t afford to miss out on including video in their website marketing efforts.

But why is video such a sought after content medium?

It’s easy to digest: You’ve probably heard the phrase, ‘a picture speaks a thousand words’, so just imagine what a video can offer! Your consumers can learn a great amount of detail in a matter of minutes, all while staying engaged on what you’re offering.

It’s sharable: Click and share. It’s as easy as that. If you spend time creating a captivating, attractive and informative video that’s useful for your target audience, why wouldn’t they want to share it with their friends and followers? Giving them the option to share your video content helps spread your brand awareness and reach a wider pool of people.

It’s great for SEO: Google rewards businesses who offer relevant and engaging content by ranking them higher on the SERP. Importantly the search engine favours video content as it ticks the boxes of ranking requirements (presuming it is both relevant and engaging, of course!)

You don’t have to possess the director and producer prowess of Spielberg to reap the rewards of video content. All it takes is a good idea (behind-the-scenes previews, employee interviews or new product reveals), a strong story and great visuals to create compelling and captivating video content!

Content marketing still matters

While we’re welcoming a plethora of new technology and bots, there’s one strategy that has been around for a number of years but shows no signs of slowing down: Content marketing.

No business can deny the benefits associated with publishing regular, relevant and engaging content. Doing so keeps you visible to both your target audience and search engines, as well as increasing your credibility and building trust – qualities that lead to higher page views and rates of conversion.

So, what’s changed with content marketing in 2019?

For starters, Facebook announced a change to its algorithm to favour posts from users’ loved ones over businesses on the platform. As such, companies have had to adapt content when posting on the popular social media site. They must place a bigger emphasis on ensuring content sparks emotion and therefore encourages users to interact.

Due to stronger competition and more businesses battling for the number one ranking position, it’s getting harder to get your content reaching the right people. As such, more and more brands are turning to a combination of organic and paid options. Together, this amalgamation can drive growth and generate substantial ROI for your marketing efforts.

Publishing regular and valuable content keeps Google on your scent for the right reasons, while employing paid ads now and again gives it a boost to help it reach further afield.

from http://bit.ly/2Y4fjKS

[rebeccahpedersen]

Are Bidding Wars Coming To An End?

TorontoRealtyBlog

Have you been reading Toronto Realty Blog for a week?  A month?  A year?

Choose any of the above, and surely you’ll have heard me talk about misleading headlines in the media, and how much that bothers me.

More often than not, it’s a headline like, “Real Estate Market Nosedives In May,” which leads the reader to assume that prices are down, when in fact it’s sales that have declined, and all the while prices are up.

But what conclusion would you draw from this headline?

“Frustrated By Bidding Wars?  Home Buyers May See Some Changes Ahead”

An optimistic reader might assume that “bidding wars” are coming to an end, some way, somehow.

But it’s not the bidding war itself that the article is referencing in terms of “change,” but rather the process of bidding, and that’s the issue I take with this headline.

I understand that to get people to buy a paper, or click on an article, the headline has to entice.  I’d be lying if I didn’t admit I’ve been lured in by those sponsored ads on the sidebar of websites that look like articles, with headlines like, “These NFL stars’ wives are turning heads.”

But when it comes to real estate, which is my occupation and passion, it bothers me more than anything else.  I’m sure the same would be true of whatever industry you happen to be in, and how headlines could be misconstrued.

Over the past couple of weeks, I have seen multiple headlines about “bidding wars” all of which don’t accurately reflect what’s actually happening in real estate circles.  The above headline is a great example.

But even the articles themselves, or the sub-headings often don’t explain the issues at hand.

This article, “Ontario May Let Realtors Tell Homebuyers The Price Of Other Bids,” offers the sub-title, “right now, buyers often blindly offer more than what they had wanted to spend in hopes of beating their competitor.”

Well no kidding.

I wanted the house for free, but alas, what I wanted was not in line with fair market value.

Sarcasm aside, the true issue I have with that sub-title is that it seems to alleviate the buyer of all responsibility.  It surmises that it’s somehow not the buyer’s fault, or that the buyer wasn’t in control of their actions, which isn’t the case.

It can’t be the case.

You can’t walk into Shopper’s Drug Mart to buy Tylenol, walk out with two magazines, Q-Tips, some Hallmark cards, and eight bottles of Pert Plus that were on sale, and then turn around and blame Shoppers from forcing you to spend so much.

So on the one hand, you have a headline suggesting that somehow bidding wars might be coming to an end, and on the other hand, you have a headline suggesting that it’s the fault of the system in place for buyers over-spending.

I don’t like either suggestion.

Here’s a headline that is more accurate:

“Ontario To Consider Allowing Disclosure Of Prices In Real Estate Bidding Wars”

Only now, I take issue with the term “bidding war,” because once again, it’s misleading.

What is a bidding war, after all?

Frustrated buyers have a completely different definition than most, and depending on whether you’re a buyer, seller, agent, or onlooker, you would define the term differently.

Let’s not confuse “a multiple offers situation” with a “bidding war.”

Because the moment we start referring to three offers on a $799,900, 3-bed, 2-bath semi-detached house on the east side as a “bidding war,” then we’re overreacting, and fear-mongering.

For as long as I have been writing this blog, and as long as I have been working in the real estate industry, there have been multiple offers on properties.  Houses, condos, low-end, high-end, it doesn’t matter; every segment of the market is prone to having more buyers than sellers.

This is a fundamental principle in almost everything we discuss here on TRB, and it often goes without saying.

The media headlines seem to suggest that if there are five offers on a house, which is under-priced to begin with, that this is a “bidding war.”

I could not possibly disagree more.

A bidding war, in my opinion, occurs when two or more parties submit multiple bids, for the same property, at the behest of the seller.

For example, that $799,900 listing gets five offers, and the people who bid $1,005,000, $995,000, and $975,000 are all invited to “improve their offers.”  And they do.

But then after that improvement, the seller’s agent says, “You’re all still soooo close, why don’t you improve again?”  And they do.

And then after that, one of the buyers decides to improve even more, by his own accord, and the listing agent has a legal obligation to inform the other two bidders, so he does.  And they may or may not improve again, but if they do, then the first bidder can improve yet again, and then the other bidders might want to as well, and then we’re into “bidding war” territory.

But if those three bidders simply improved their offers after the first submission, and then highest bid was chosen, that’s called “Tuesday” in my books.   It’s nothing special.  It’s ordinary, routine, expected, and the norm in the Toronto real estate market.

I can’t help but feel as though people like to use the term “bidding war” as a blanket statement to refer to essentially any offer process, and that’s such an incredible overreaction.  If you encounter traffic on the highway tonight, you can’t go around saying, “All highways are trafficked, all the time.”

I have seen buyers who live in fear of multiple offers, and in many markets, they don’t end up buying.  That’s tough in a market that’s appreciated every year for twenty-one straight years…

Now as for what’s really happening behind the scenes in this world of reports about “bidding war changes,” the last headline gave you an idea, but here’s the best article, and most accurate headline thus far:

“Ontario Looks To Level The Playing Field Between Home Buyers And Sellers”

This was published on Monday by Shane Dingman from the Globe & Mail, who is probably one of the most informed and accurate real estate reporters out there today.  I’m not surprised to see his name accompanying this headline.

Level the playing field.  That’s a good way of putting it.

Another term used with respect to potential changes is “modernization.”

Essentially, Realtors are governed by the Real Estate & Business Broker’s Act, which was written in 2002, and as OREA’s Tim Hudak has mentioned on many occasions, it’s wee bit out of date.  It’s like reading George Orwell’s 1984 today, and expecting to learn something.

I’ve spoken to Tim Hudak about this on many occasions, and I recently gave him examples of my conversations with folks at RECO with respect to advertising, and how they fail to distinguish between different forms, ie. they have many of the same rules for online and print, which is like having the same instruction manual for a car and an airplane.

REBBA simply must be modernized, and I think Mr. Hudak and others are doing a good job of consulting agents to see what types of reform are needed.

When it comes to the rules associated with multiple offers, this is the area of the Act where, in my opinion, changes would be greatest felt by consumers.

The question at hand is simple: why can’t a listing agent divulge the terms and conditions of competing offers to bidders in a multiple offer process?

People refer to the bidding process as “blind,” and it is, to some extent.

On that $799,900 listing, the buyers with the three bids clustered at the top – $1,005,000, $995,000, and $975,000 clearly know something about what they should be offering, otherwise they wouldn’t be so close together.  It’s called “Doing your homework,” and the person who offers $850,000 deserves to have their time wasted, as they clearly hired an agent who didn’t know what he was doing, or had no clue themselves.

The public, however, would love the process to allow for the listing agent to say, “The highest bid is $1,005,000, let me know if you want to improve your bid.”

That would be great for the bidder at $995,000, because if he was going to improve to $1,020,000, now he knows he would be over-bidding, and instead need only go to $1,006,000.

Everybody wins, right?

Well first of all, the seller doesn’t.  But that’s why all of this “disclosure” would need the seller’s consent, and why I personally think no seller would consent, and why these changes mean nothing.  But let’s keep the conversation going.

So what happens when the $995,000 bidder moves to $1,006,000?  Does the $1,005,000 bidder go home?

No.  He’s allowed to improve.

So he goes to $1,007,000.

And then the bidder at $1,006,000 goes to $1,008,000.

And so on.

And thus I ask, how is this any different in the end?  How is this LESS of a “bidding war” than what the media currently refers to when discussing multiple offers?

In theory, allowing the listing agent to disclose the prices of offers (assuming this is after ALL offers are submitted, otherwise how the hell could any of this work?), would avoid the person at $995,000 from jumping to $1,050,000.  But I can tell you that this rarely happens.  In fact, the “over-bid” is almost always at the start of the process.

For example, that house listed at $799,900 gets five bids as per our previous example, only the top three are $1,050,000, $995,000, and $975,000.  That is how the “over-bid” happens in 99% of cases, in my opinion.  Those big bids are made right from the start, and thus the proposed changes to the Act wouldn’t prevent this.

Now from here, the natural conversation goes to something like, “Well why don’t we have open auctions, like they do in Australia?”

Ah, right!

We’ve all seen the video on YouTube, we’ve all read about it in the Toronto Star, and we’ve all seen online comments about how great their “system” is, and how it would allow people to bid in a transparent process that’s fair to all.

Except those bids are done in person, on the front lawn, during the middle of the day.  I can’t wait until somebody suggests that this isn’t “fair.”

And many of those listings are sold before the auction begins.

And many of those listings are “withdrawn” before, during, or after the auction.

And many of those sales are not binding as they don’t meet the seller’s reserve; which leads to the property being “passed in” as the terminology goes, meaning “passed in to further negotiations.”  In some auctions, 30-50% of “sales” are actually passed in.

And so on, and so on, and so on.

And what about online bids?  What about phone-in bids?  Who is responsible for live-streaming?  And who sets the bid increments?  And are we assuming all of these offers have the same deposit, closing date, and are unconditional?

The grass is always greener on the other side, especially when it’s in Australia.  HERE is a 2018 blog post I wrote about Australian auctions.

So what’s my conclusion?

That we’re all screwed?

Not exactly.

I’m completely in favour of a change to allow the listing agent to divulge the terms of competing offers to buyer agents (and thus buyers), but only with the seller’s consent.

And I’ll let you in on a little secret folks: it’s already happening.

I don’t mean that John the listing agent is telling Bob the buyer agent what Cathy the buyer agent’s offer is, because John doesn’t like Cathy or because John likes Bob more than Cathy.  I mean that it’s very common for a listing agent to say to a buyer agent, “Your offer is the second-highest, but the highest is conditional.  Can you match the highest offer?  If so, we’ll take your offer, so see if you can come up $10,000.”

I see no issue with that, and the only folks that would are those viewing real estate sales in a vacuum, and who believe that high prices are the fault of agents and their actions.

But then again, rules are rules, and if the rules say we can’t do that (which they don’t, exactly), then we can’t.  And shouldn’t.

But we do.

Figure that one out…

So let’s update REBBA to reflect how agents are already doing business, but allow the seller to have the final say.

Does that “level the playing field,” or not?

The post Are Bidding Wars Coming To An End? appeared first on Toronto Realty Blog.

Originated from http://bit.ly/2SMf8Ez

[doctorwhonews]

Torchwood: Instant Karma (Big Finish)

Latest Review: Writers: James Goss, David Llewellyn, Jonathan Morris Director: Lisa Bowerman Featuring: Naoko Mori, Jonny Dixon, Sara McGaughey, Duncan Wiseby, Ross Ford Released by Big Finish Productions - July 2018 Order from Amazon UK “That feeling…it felt amazing.” “I know.” “We could do anything, couldn’t we?” It was only a matter of time. Between its mother show’s satirical coverage of the subject in “The Return of Doctor Mysterio” and the franchise’s recent deconstructions of classic sci-fi tropes such as artificial intelligence (Cascade), cult conspiracies (Believe), and nihilistic escape rooms (Aliens Among Us Part 3), Torchwood always seemed inextricably bound towards tackling society’s rabid superhero mania. Case in point: avert your eyes from the screen of whichever digital platform you’re consuming this review via right now and look up into the sky. See that mythical figure descending from the heavens, like the Greek god Icarus with his majestic wings of old? That’s not a bird, nor a plane, nor even the Man of Steel himself – introducing Instant Karma. Rest assured that the following verdict won’t comprise simply of genre puns, though – partly because iconic adages like “with great power comes great responsibility” sound rather dated in the age of social media influencers / trolls / politicians, but moreso because this reviewer would sooner renege his profession than get on the wrong side of Karma’s three-strong writing team. If Family Guy’s Peter Griffin took to Quahog 5 News’ TV airwaves to “grind his gears”, then Torchwood range regulars David Llewellyn, James Goss and Jonathan Morris evidently selected audio drama as the ideal medium to do so; from pesky stragglers holding up the queues for ATM machines to ignorant railway passengers incapable of wearing headphones, from far-right politicians to Cardiff-based secret agents sticking their noses where they oughtn’t be, the axes are well and truly out in a vengeful hour of unrelenting bestial fury… Just kidding! But odds are that we’ve all bemoaned at least one of the bugbears mentioned in the previous paragraph, thereby confirming how brilliantly the three wrights channel commonplace social tensions into a painfully believable tale of tragic hubris. The aforementioned persistent agent, Toshiko Sato, has her hands full as ever, with our scribes throwing nuanced moral dilemmas aplenty in her direction as she investigates the emergence of a seemingly superhuman community group capable of murdering their irksome victims with but a single malicious thought. Might we justify such grievous violence if directed at the ‘right’ target? Is it always fair to blame up-and-coming ‘vigilantes’ for the unforeseen consequences of their actions? In a world where those influencers mentioned earlier often come to the fore with but a single viral tweet or video, only to find their every word scrutinised for its potential to shape followers’ actions / ideals, originally far-fetched dilemmas such as these are fast gaining pertinence, making the script’s refusal to commit to one moral standpoint as the more righteous stance all the more powerful in hindsight. Serving full justice to weighty debates such as these takes more than politically charged dialogue and the odd explosive set-piece, of course; you’ll also need accomplished performers with the emotional range to keep a straight face given the tale’s disbelief-testing premise, yet simultaneously to avoid sinking listeners into despair when critiquing our childhood cravings for supernatural abilities. It’s for this reason that the decision to centre Karma around three core stars rather than an overstuffed ensemble works to such compelling effect – naturally Naoko Mori resurrects Toshiko’s personal vulnerability, intellectual sense of humour and oft-overlooked bravery with the ease of flicking a light-switch, but don’t underestimate Jonny Dixon or Sara McGaughey either. Both shine with remarkable intensity given their newfound introduction into the Torchwood universe, Dixon’s initially collected take on soldier-turned-bus driver Simon belying a deeply unsettling egotism underneath and McCaughey’s seemingly blindly faithful lover Janet fast revealing herself as no less psychologically complex – nor formidable – as events take a turn for the worst. Perhaps it’s telling, then, that this reviewer’s only reservation towards the finished product concerns the sense of unfinished business lingering for these richly-detailed characters as the credits roll all too abruptly. Every great storyteller knows the value of leaving their audience wanting more, but past instalments in Big Finish’s monthly Torchwood range left us practically on the edge of our seats, desperate to know what became of Jack’s investigation into the Committee after The Conspiracy and Uncanny Valley, who the time travelling conspirators engineering events in Visiting Hours were or – as discussed last month – the true intentions of Norton Folgate, only for subsequent instalments to pick up with the same protagonists and yet virtually no sign of those previous plot threads. While this could suggest a bigger game-plan at work, what with one-off releases such as The Torchwood Archive and Outbreak admittedly furthering some of those minor story arcs, some might equally interpret it as Big Finish wanting to avoid those picking up a random Jack or Owen release in the monthly range finding themselves lost amidst ongoing story arcs, in which case return trips to Karma might induce a frustrating sense of longing for the closure which never came. But that’s a question for another day – no doubt our understanding of Torchwood’s evolving narrative continuity under Big Finish will continue to grow as a second season of post-Miracle Day antics launches this autumn and the monthly range kicks into top gear with a full year’s worth of standalone missions starting next March. Regardless, Instant Karma confirms without any hesitation that now’s the perfect time for the studio to up their game with further monthly outings, delivering both exhilarating action for superhero aficionados and arguably the perfect therapy session for anyone in serious need of venting their stress mid-commute. Just be sure to remind Goss, Llewellyn and Morris that we told you as much, alright? The New Gods only know what’ll happen if we incur their wrath. Next Time on Torchwood – Never mind superheroes, though; to paraphrase one Jim Moriarty, every comic-book needs a good old-fashioned villain. Trouble is that those ne’er do wells reckless enough to stand in the Torchwood team’s way rarely live to tell the tale, with one notable exception – Bilis Manger. If only we could ascertain the whereabouts of Abbadon’s kindly yet secretly bloodthirsty benefactor, then perhaps, just perhaps, this fourth season of monthly releases could finally buck the trend of past runs ending on devastatingly underwhelming notes. No luck? Oh well – we’d best retreat to the Travellers’ Halt for the night in that case. Rumour has it that the buffet’s to die for… http://reviews.doctorwhonews.net/2018/08/torchwood_instant_karma_big_finish.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=tumblr

[conniecogeie]

5 Steps to a Super-Focused, Super-Successful Content Experience

Few marketers would admit to valuing quantity over quality—or volume over effectiveness—when it comes to content. And yet for many, their actual output tells a different story.

When I interviewed content marketing aficionado Robert Rose last year, he observed how marketers in general have “become so focused on becoming an on-demand vending machine of content for sales enablement, for filling social channels, email newsletters, and blogs—all those things that have grown up organically over the last seven years—that we’ve forgotten how to create high-impact content.”

That constant drive to expand content, to saturate the market, to produce more, more, more, it’s like marketing’s version of gravity—a constant but unseen force that we never consciously notice.

Unless we’re mindful about process, strategy, and results, our content volume will continue to grow. And what’s so bad about that? According to Shelly Lucas, an Austin-based B2B content marketing consultant, when you create too much content, “it doesn’t get used, the quality is lower, and optimization falls by the wayside.” And it becomes less focused, targeted, and effective as a result.

Lucas points out several factors that contribute to marketers’ tendency to produce too much content:

They don’t have a content strategy (or they don’t stick to it).

What they produce isn’t getting the results they want or expect, so instead of testing and optimizing, they create something different.

What they create is working, and everyone wants a part of it.

A certain critical mass of content is needed to feed digital campaigns.

These are all compelling forces to reckon with, but they can be overcome with five simple practices and changes in perspective.

We've forgotten how to create high-impact content. – Robert Rose Click To Tweet 1. Tear Down the Silos

Siloes are problematic when they stand between:

The marketing department and other departments, especially sales

Individual teams within the marketing department

Different software tools that don’t play well with each other

In all three cases, these barriers make it difficult to get the right information into the hands of the right people at the right time. Content teams are usually too overloaded to deal with a laborious process for tracking down the performance results of their most recent releases. With a dozen deadlines always looming, they have no choice but to move on to the next piece, more or less blindly.

But what if all teams with a content-related role shared the same work management and reporting tool, with all relevant information gathered into a single source of truth? When this is the case, content marketers always have the latest analytics at their fingertips before they start a new campaign, ebook, or video. They have the intelligence they need to pivot and react in real time, effectively building upon past successes and avoiding recent failures.

This, of course, requires the CMO or another department leader to recognize the benefits of unifying all teams into one solution and appoint someone to start the discovery process of finding the right tool. It will take some up-front effort, but it’s worth it in the end.

2. Start and End with the Customer

“We’ll never be perfect at every step of the customer’s journey,” Rose says, “but how do we become remarkable at a few strategic steps, so that the thing the consumer wants is to have another experience with us?”

We can start by shifting our mindsets to be more customer-focused, rather than relying too heavily on internal talking points. This can be done by following our personas on social media, hanging out where customers congregate online (whether that’s LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, etc.), interviewing actual customers, and other similar practices.

We can then use these discovery experiences to compile a list of questions that real customers and prospects need answers to—and design a content experience that satisfactorily answers those questions in the right order and the proper place in the funnel.

“I recommend that producers shift from trying to catch every keyword to trying to answer a single question,” says Tonya Parker, Content Producer and Manager at Parker Content. “Each piece should provide a solution to a known consumer need.”

Sometimes we think we know our customers’ most pressing questions and needs, and it’s easy to let our perspectives be colored by existing company assets and internal assumptions. But time spent in the field listening to actual customers has a way of bringing us back to reality.

3. Audit and Map Out All Content

It’s not good enough to simply consult that list of customer questions on a semi-regular basis, as we churn out an ever-expanding library of assets. Instead, we should use the questions to build a strategic content map that’s clearly documented and easily shareable with all who have a hand in content creation.

As you engage in this process, you’ll quickly identify those old assets that have no place in your new plan—making it glaringly clear how much dead weight you’ve been creating and carrying around.

“To make content development leaner, define a strategy and stick to it,” says Lucas. “I’ve used quarterly content pillars, with each defined by a persona a specific use case, to help identify priorities.”

That’s one way to do it. Here’s another.

Bob Warfield, CEO and President at software provider CNCCookbook, has grown a large business (4.5 million visitors a year) almost exclusively through content marketing. He produces content for only two reasons:

To maintain engagement with his current readers and audience.

To bring in new readers via the usual SEO-originated traffic.

“These two needs require different content,” Warfield says. “In many cases, #1 is achievable with short articles that are fun and interesting with my audience. That’s not to say they don’t like skyscraper content too, but I cater to about five personas, and it’s better to give at least a couple of them something new every week when I can’t afford to produce a new skyscraper every week for every persona.”

Lucas and Warfield have differing approaches to strategy, as they should, given that they serve different consumers in different markets. The point is that they both have a strategy that informs a documented content map, and they stick to the strategy.

4. Murder Your Darlings

You may or may not be surprised that this tip was inspired by a quote from horror author Stephen King: “Kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings.”

He’s not talking about characters here—heaven knows there’s lots of bloodshed in the typical King novel. Rather, he’s referring to the importance of brutally editing your own work. Just because you adore a particular sentence or turn of phrase that you’ve crafted doesn’t mean it serves an effective purpose. When it doesn’t advance the plot or reveal character, you have to kill it, no matter how brilliantly worded it is. And the truth is, it hurts much less if you eliminate the sentence yourself rather than having someone else swoop in and excise it.

The same principle applies to your content experience as a whole. Every team that produces or owns content is going to have their favorites—pieces that they spent a lot of time on, that they’re particularly proud of, or that they’ve otherwise invested attention and affection in. Even if the piece is a dud in terms of performance or it doesn’t fit customer needs, some of us still cling unreasonably to pet content pieces.

You can’t create a stellar content experience without weeding out the bad stuff or the stuff that no longer fits. Someone is going to have to make those tough calls. If you can’t handle it at the team level without starting a civil war, turn to the overall content strategy as defined by management. Whether it’s a director of marketing, a marketing VP, or a CMO, the person driving the ship has to be the one to lay down and enforce the rules regarding which darlings will be sacrificed to create a better content experience.

5. Fine Tune with Measurement

“88 percent of the top performers measure content marketing ROI, compared to 72 percent of the overall sample and 56 percent of the bottom performers,” according to the B2B Content Marketing report, which highlights benchmarks, budgets, and trends in North America in 2017.

Indeed, without regularly looking at the ROI of your content efforts, there’s no objective way to know which darlings to kill (who wants innocent casualties on their conscience?), you can’t effectively refine your strategy and content map, and it gets ever harder to break away from the company talking points and look at your work from the customer’s viewpoint.

No content experience is going to be flawless out of the gate, no matter how many brainstorms or rounds of review you go through. Only a strong routine of gathering and discussing performance data for each link in the content experience will allow you to locate and strengthen—or eliminate—the weak links.

And no, you don’t have to squeeze in extra meetings in order to share performance data, which will only be forgotten or lost soon after the meeting. A silo-smashing work-management solution, as mentioned in tip one, gives you an easy way to disseminate analytics to all stakeholders and participants. Plus, your ROI data will be permanently archived alongside all other relevant project information for easy retrieval later.

Less Is More

Are you comfortable following the path of least resistance, which usually results in sprawling, unfocused, ever-proliferating content—the “more is more” approach? Or would you rather adopt a “less is more” mindset, devoting your energy to creating lean, mean, unforgettable assets—and fewer of them? Unlike so many other aspects of content marketing, there’s just one right answer here, and you’re only five steps away from making the right choice for both your customers and your team.

Get a weekly dose of the trends and insights you need to keep you ON top, from the strategy team at Convince & Convert. Sign up for the Convince & Convert ON email newsletter.

http://ift.tt/2uek5tU

[kraussoutene]

5 Steps to a Super-Focused, Super-Successful Content Experience

Few marketers would admit to valuing quantity over quality—or volume over effectiveness—when it comes to content. And yet for many, their actual output tells a different story.

When I interviewed content marketing aficionado Robert Rose last year, he observed how marketers in general have “become so focused on becoming an on-demand vending machine of content for sales enablement, for filling social channels, email newsletters, and blogs—all those things that have grown up organically over the last seven years—that we’ve forgotten how to create high-impact content.”

That constant drive to expand content, to saturate the market, to produce more, more, more, it’s like marketing’s version of gravity—a constant but unseen force that we never consciously notice.

Unless we’re mindful about process, strategy, and results, our content volume will continue to grow. And what’s so bad about that? According to Shelly Lucas, an Austin-based B2B content marketing consultant, when you create too much content, “it doesn’t get used, the quality is lower, and optimization falls by the wayside.” And it becomes less focused, targeted, and effective as a result.

Lucas points out several factors that contribute to marketers’ tendency to produce too much content:

They don’t have a content strategy (or they don’t stick to it).

What they produce isn’t getting the results they want or expect, so instead of testing and optimizing, they create something different.

What they create is working, and everyone wants a part of it.

A certain critical mass of content is needed to feed digital campaigns.

These are all compelling forces to reckon with, but they can be overcome with five simple practices and changes in perspective.

We've forgotten how to create high-impact content. – Robert Rose Click To Tweet 1. Tear Down the Silos

Siloes are problematic when they stand between:

The marketing department and other departments, especially sales

Individual teams within the marketing department

Different software tools that don’t play well with each other

In all three cases, these barriers make it difficult to get the right information into the hands of the right people at the right time. Content teams are usually too overloaded to deal with a laborious process for tracking down the performance results of their most recent releases. With a dozen deadlines always looming, they have no choice but to move on to the next piece, more or less blindly.

But what if all teams with a content-related role shared the same work management and reporting tool, with all relevant information gathered into a single source of truth? When this is the case, content marketers always have the latest analytics at their fingertips before they start a new campaign, ebook, or video. They have the intelligence they need to pivot and react in real time, effectively building upon past successes and avoiding recent failures.

This, of course, requires the CMO or another department leader to recognize the benefits of unifying all teams into one solution and appoint someone to start the discovery process of finding the right tool. It will take some up-front effort, but it’s worth it in the end.

2. Start and End with the Customer

“We’ll never be perfect at every step of the customer’s journey,” Rose says, “but how do we become remarkable at a few strategic steps, so that the thing the consumer wants is to have another experience with us?”

We can start by shifting our mindsets to be more customer-focused, rather than relying too heavily on internal talking points. This can be done by following our personas on social media, hanging out where customers congregate online (whether that’s LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, etc.), interviewing actual customers, and other similar practices.

We can then use these discovery experiences to compile a list of questions that real customers and prospects need answers to—and design a content experience that satisfactorily answers those questions in the right order and the proper place in the funnel.

“I recommend that producers shift from trying to catch every keyword to trying to answer a single question,” says Tonya Parker, Content Producer and Manager at Parker Content. “Each piece should provide a solution to a known consumer need.”

Sometimes we think we know our customers’ most pressing questions and needs, and it’s easy to let our perspectives be colored by existing company assets and internal assumptions. But time spent in the field listening to actual customers has a way of bringing us back to reality.

3. Audit and Map Out All Content

It’s not good enough to simply consult that list of customer questions on a semi-regular basis, as we churn out an ever-expanding library of assets. Instead, we should use the questions to build a strategic content map that’s clearly documented and easily shareable with all who have a hand in content creation.

As you engage in this process, you’ll quickly identify those old assets that have no place in your new plan—making it glaringly clear how much dead weight you’ve been creating and carrying around.

“To make content development leaner, define a strategy and stick to it,” says Lucas. “I’ve used quarterly content pillars, with each defined by a persona a specific use case, to help identify priorities.”

That’s one way to do it. Here’s another.

Bob Warfield, CEO and President at software provider CNCCookbook, has grown a large business (4.5 million visitors a year) almost exclusively through content marketing. He produces content for only two reasons:

To maintain engagement with his current readers and audience.

To bring in new readers via the usual SEO-originated traffic.

“These two needs require different content,” Warfield says. “In many cases, #1 is achievable with short articles that are fun and interesting with my audience. That’s not to say they don’t like skyscraper content too, but I cater to about five personas, and it’s better to give at least a couple of them something new every week when I can’t afford to produce a new skyscraper every week for every persona.”

Lucas and Warfield have differing approaches to strategy, as they should, given that they serve different consumers in different markets. The point is that they both have a strategy that informs a documented content map, and they stick to the strategy.

4. Murder Your Darlings

You may or may not be surprised that this tip was inspired by a quote from horror author Stephen King: “Kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings.”

He’s not talking about characters here—heaven knows there’s lots of bloodshed in the typical King novel. Rather, he’s referring to the importance of brutally editing your own work. Just because you adore a particular sentence or turn of phrase that you’ve crafted doesn’t mean it serves an effective purpose. When it doesn’t advance the plot or reveal character, you have to kill it, no matter how brilliantly worded it is. And the truth is, it hurts much less if you eliminate the sentence yourself rather than having someone else swoop in and excise it.

The same principle applies to your content experience as a whole. Every team that produces or owns content is going to have their favorites—pieces that they spent a lot of time on, that they’re particularly proud of, or that they’ve otherwise invested attention and affection in. Even if the piece is a dud in terms of performance or it doesn’t fit customer needs, some of us still cling unreasonably to pet content pieces.

You can’t create a stellar content experience without weeding out the bad stuff or the stuff that no longer fits. Someone is going to have to make those tough calls. If you can’t handle it at the team level without starting a civil war, turn to the overall content strategy as defined by management. Whether it’s a director of marketing, a marketing VP, or a CMO, the person driving the ship has to be the one to lay down and enforce the rules regarding which darlings will be sacrificed to create a better content experience.

5. Fine Tune with Measurement

“88 percent of the top performers measure content marketing ROI, compared to 72 percent of the overall sample and 56 percent of the bottom performers,” according to the B2B Content Marketing report, which highlights benchmarks, budgets, and trends in North America in 2017.

Indeed, without regularly looking at the ROI of your content efforts, there’s no objective way to know which darlings to kill (who wants innocent casualties on their conscience?), you can’t effectively refine your strategy and content map, and it gets ever harder to break away from the company talking points and look at your work from the customer’s viewpoint.

No content experience is going to be flawless out of the gate, no matter how many brainstorms or rounds of review you go through. Only a strong routine of gathering and discussing performance data for each link in the content experience will allow you to locate and strengthen—or eliminate—the weak links.

And no, you don’t have to squeeze in extra meetings in order to share performance data, which will only be forgotten or lost soon after the meeting. A silo-smashing work-management solution, as mentioned in tip one, gives you an easy way to disseminate analytics to all stakeholders and participants. Plus, your ROI data will be permanently archived alongside all other relevant project information for easy retrieval later.

Less Is More

Are you comfortable following the path of least resistance, which usually results in sprawling, unfocused, ever-proliferating content—the “more is more” approach? Or would you rather adopt a “less is more” mindset, devoting your energy to creating lean, mean, unforgettable assets—and fewer of them? Unlike so many other aspects of content marketing, there’s just one right answer here, and you’re only five steps away from making the right choice for both your customers and your team.

Get a weekly dose of the trends and insights you need to keep you ON top, from the strategy team at Convince & Convert. Sign up for the Convince & Convert ON email newsletter.

http://ift.tt/2uek5tU

[fairchildlingpo1]

5 Steps to a Super-Focused, Super-Successful Content Experience

Few marketers would admit to valuing quantity over quality—or volume over effectiveness—when it comes to content. And yet for many, their actual output tells a different story.

When I interviewed content marketing aficionado Robert Rose last year, he observed how marketers in general have “become so focused on becoming an on-demand vending machine of content for sales enablement, for filling social channels, email newsletters, and blogs—all those things that have grown up organically over the last seven years—that we’ve forgotten how to create high-impact content.”

That constant drive to expand content, to saturate the market, to produce more, more, more, it’s like marketing’s version of gravity—a constant but unseen force that we never consciously notice.

Unless we’re mindful about process, strategy, and results, our content volume will continue to grow. And what’s so bad about that? According to Shelly Lucas, an Austin-based B2B content marketing consultant, when you create too much content, “it doesn’t get used, the quality is lower, and optimization falls by the wayside.” And it becomes less focused, targeted, and effective as a result.

Lucas points out several factors that contribute to marketers’ tendency to produce too much content:

They don’t have a content strategy (or they don’t stick to it).

What they produce isn’t getting the results they want or expect, so instead of testing and optimizing, they create something different.

What they create is working, and everyone wants a part of it.

A certain critical mass of content is needed to feed digital campaigns.

These are all compelling forces to reckon with, but they can be overcome with five simple practices and changes in perspective.

We've forgotten how to create high-impact content. – Robert Rose Click To Tweet 1. Tear Down the Silos

Siloes are problematic when they stand between:

The marketing department and other departments, especially sales

Individual teams within the marketing department

Different software tools that don’t play well with each other

In all three cases, these barriers make it difficult to get the right information into the hands of the right people at the right time. Content teams are usually too overloaded to deal with a laborious process for tracking down the performance results of their most recent releases. With a dozen deadlines always looming, they have no choice but to move on to the next piece, more or less blindly.

But what if all teams with a content-related role shared the same work management and reporting tool, with all relevant information gathered into a single source of truth? When this is the case, content marketers always have the latest analytics at their fingertips before they start a new campaign, ebook, or video. They have the intelligence they need to pivot and react in real time, effectively building upon past successes and avoiding recent failures.

This, of course, requires the CMO or another department leader to recognize the benefits of unifying all teams into one solution and appoint someone to start the discovery process of finding the right tool. It will take some up-front effort, but it’s worth it in the end.

2. Start and End with the Customer

“We’ll never be perfect at every step of the customer’s journey,” Rose says, “but how do we become remarkable at a few strategic steps, so that the thing the consumer wants is to have another experience with us?”

We can start by shifting our mindsets to be more customer-focused, rather than relying too heavily on internal talking points. This can be done by following our personas on social media, hanging out where customers congregate online (whether that’s LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, etc.), interviewing actual customers, and other similar practices.

We can then use these discovery experiences to compile a list of questions that real customers and prospects need answers to—and design a content experience that satisfactorily answers those questions in the right order and the proper place in the funnel.

“I recommend that producers shift from trying to catch every keyword to trying to answer a single question,” says Tonya Parker, Content Producer and Manager at Parker Content. “Each piece should provide a solution to a known consumer need.”

Sometimes we think we know our customers’ most pressing questions and needs, and it’s easy to let our perspectives be colored by existing company assets and internal assumptions. But time spent in the field listening to actual customers has a way of bringing us back to reality.

3. Audit and Map Out All Content

It’s not good enough to simply consult that list of customer questions on a semi-regular basis, as we churn out an ever-expanding library of assets. Instead, we should use the questions to build a strategic content map that’s clearly documented and easily shareable with all who have a hand in content creation.

As you engage in this process, you’ll quickly identify those old assets that have no place in your new plan—making it glaringly clear how much dead weight you’ve been creating and carrying around.

“To make content development leaner, define a strategy and stick to it,” says Lucas. “I’ve used quarterly content pillars, with each defined by a persona a specific use case, to help identify priorities.”

That’s one way to do it. Here’s another.

Bob Warfield, CEO and President at software provider CNCCookbook, has grown a large business (4.5 million visitors a year) almost exclusively through content marketing. He produces content for only two reasons:

To maintain engagement with his current readers and audience.

To bring in new readers via the usual SEO-originated traffic.

“These two needs require different content,” Warfield says. “In many cases, #1 is achievable with short articles that are fun and interesting with my audience. That’s not to say they don’t like skyscraper content too, but I cater to about five personas, and it’s better to give at least a couple of them something new every week when I can’t afford to produce a new skyscraper every week for every persona.”

Lucas and Warfield have differing approaches to strategy, as they should, given that they serve different consumers in different markets. The point is that they both have a strategy that informs a documented content map, and they stick to the strategy.

4. Murder Your Darlings

You may or may not be surprised that this tip was inspired by a quote from horror author Stephen King: “Kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings.”

He’s not talking about characters here—heaven knows there’s lots of bloodshed in the typical King novel. Rather, he’s referring to the importance of brutally editing your own work. Just because you adore a particular sentence or turn of phrase that you’ve crafted doesn’t mean it serves an effective purpose. When it doesn’t advance the plot or reveal character, you have to kill it, no matter how brilliantly worded it is. And the truth is, it hurts much less if you eliminate the sentence yourself rather than having someone else swoop in and excise it.

The same principle applies to your content experience as a whole. Every team that produces or owns content is going to have their favorites—pieces that they spent a lot of time on, that they’re particularly proud of, or that they’ve otherwise invested attention and affection in. Even if the piece is a dud in terms of performance or it doesn’t fit customer needs, some of us still cling unreasonably to pet content pieces.

You can’t create a stellar content experience without weeding out the bad stuff or the stuff that no longer fits. Someone is going to have to make those tough calls. If you can’t handle it at the team level without starting a civil war, turn to the overall content strategy as defined by management. Whether it’s a director of marketing, a marketing VP, or a CMO, the person driving the ship has to be the one to lay down and enforce the rules regarding which darlings will be sacrificed to create a better content experience.

5. Fine Tune with Measurement

“88 percent of the top performers measure content marketing ROI, compared to 72 percent of the overall sample and 56 percent of the bottom performers,” according to the B2B Content Marketing report, which highlights benchmarks, budgets, and trends in North America in 2017.

Indeed, without regularly looking at the ROI of your content efforts, there’s no objective way to know which darlings to kill (who wants innocent casualties on their conscience?), you can’t effectively refine your strategy and content map, and it gets ever harder to break away from the company talking points and look at your work from the customer’s viewpoint.

No content experience is going to be flawless out of the gate, no matter how many brainstorms or rounds of review you go through. Only a strong routine of gathering and discussing performance data for each link in the content experience will allow you to locate and strengthen—or eliminate—the weak links.

And no, you don’t have to squeeze in extra meetings in order to share performance data, which will only be forgotten or lost soon after the meeting. A silo-smashing work-management solution, as mentioned in tip one, gives you an easy way to disseminate analytics to all stakeholders and participants. Plus, your ROI data will be permanently archived alongside all other relevant project information for easy retrieval later.

Less Is More

Are you comfortable following the path of least resistance, which usually results in sprawling, unfocused, ever-proliferating content—the “more is more” approach? Or would you rather adopt a “less is more” mindset, devoting your energy to creating lean, mean, unforgettable assets—and fewer of them? Unlike so many other aspects of content marketing, there’s just one right answer here, and you’re only five steps away from making the right choice for both your customers and your team.

Get a weekly dose of the trends and insights you need to keep you ON top, from the strategy team at Convince & Convert. Sign up for the Convince & Convert ON email newsletter.

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5 Steps to a Super-Focused, Super-Successful Content Experience

Few marketers would admit to valuing quantity over quality—or volume over effectiveness—when it comes to content. And yet for many, their actual output tells a different story.

When I interviewed content marketing aficionado Robert Rose last year, he observed how marketers in general have “become so focused on becoming an on-demand vending machine of content for sales enablement, for filling social channels, email newsletters, and blogs—all those things that have grown up organically over the last seven years—that we’ve forgotten how to create high-impact content.”

That constant drive to expand content, to saturate the market, to produce more, more, more, it’s like marketing’s version of gravity—a constant but unseen force that we never consciously notice.

Unless we’re mindful about process, strategy, and results, our content volume will continue to grow. And what’s so bad about that? According to Shelly Lucas, an Austin-based B2B content marketing consultant, when you create too much content, “it doesn’t get used, the quality is lower, and optimization falls by the wayside.” And it becomes less focused, targeted, and effective as a result.

Lucas points out several factors that contribute to marketers’ tendency to produce too much content:

They don’t have a content strategy (or they don’t stick to it).

What they produce isn’t getting the results they want or expect, so instead of testing and optimizing, they create something different.

What they create is working, and everyone wants a part of it.

A certain critical mass of content is needed to feed digital campaigns.

These are all compelling forces to reckon with, but they can be overcome with five simple practices and changes in perspective.

We've forgotten how to create high-impact content. – Robert Rose Click To Tweet 1. Tear Down the Silos

Siloes are problematic when they stand between:

The marketing department and other departments, especially sales

Individual teams within the marketing department

Different software tools that don’t play well with each other

In all three cases, these barriers make it difficult to get the right information into the hands of the right people at the right time. Content teams are usually too overloaded to deal with a laborious process for tracking down the performance results of their most recent releases. With a dozen deadlines always looming, they have no choice but to move on to the next piece, more or less blindly.

But what if all teams with a content-related role shared the same work management and reporting tool, with all relevant information gathered into a single source of truth? When this is the case, content marketers always have the latest analytics at their fingertips before they start a new campaign, ebook, or video. They have the intelligence they need to pivot and react in real time, effectively building upon past successes and avoiding recent failures.

This, of course, requires the CMO or another department leader to recognize the benefits of unifying all teams into one solution and appoint someone to start the discovery process of finding the right tool. It will take some up-front effort, but it’s worth it in the end.

2. Start and End with the Customer

“We’ll never be perfect at every step of the customer’s journey,” Rose says, “but how do we become remarkable at a few strategic steps, so that the thing the consumer wants is to have another experience with us?”

We can start by shifting our mindsets to be more customer-focused, rather than relying too heavily on internal talking points. This can be done by following our personas on social media, hanging out where customers congregate online (whether that’s LinkedIn, Instagram, Twitter, etc.), interviewing actual customers, and other similar practices.

We can then use these discovery experiences to compile a list of questions that real customers and prospects need answers to—and design a content experience that satisfactorily answers those questions in the right order and the proper place in the funnel.

“I recommend that producers shift from trying to catch every keyword to trying to answer a single question,” says Tonya Parker, Content Producer and Manager at Parker Content. “Each piece should provide a solution to a known consumer need.”

Sometimes we think we know our customers’ most pressing questions and needs, and it’s easy to let our perspectives be colored by existing company assets and internal assumptions. But time spent in the field listening to actual customers has a way of bringing us back to reality.

3. Audit and Map Out All Content

It’s not good enough to simply consult that list of customer questions on a semi-regular basis, as we churn out an ever-expanding library of assets. Instead, we should use the questions to build a strategic content map that’s clearly documented and easily shareable with all who have a hand in content creation.

As you engage in this process, you’ll quickly identify those old assets that have no place in your new plan—making it glaringly clear how much dead weight you’ve been creating and carrying around.

“To make content development leaner, define a strategy and stick to it,” says Lucas. “I’ve used quarterly content pillars, with each defined by a persona a specific use case, to help identify priorities.”

That’s one way to do it. Here’s another.

Bob Warfield, CEO and President at software provider CNCCookbook, has grown a large business (4.5 million visitors a year) almost exclusively through content marketing. He produces content for only two reasons:

To maintain engagement with his current readers and audience.

To bring in new readers via the usual SEO-originated traffic.

“These two needs require different content,” Warfield says. “In many cases, #1 is achievable with short articles that are fun and interesting with my audience. That’s not to say they don’t like skyscraper content too, but I cater to about five personas, and it’s better to give at least a couple of them something new every week when I can’t afford to produce a new skyscraper every week for every persona.”

Lucas and Warfield have differing approaches to strategy, as they should, given that they serve different consumers in different markets. The point is that they both have a strategy that informs a documented content map, and they stick to the strategy.

4. Murder Your Darlings

You may or may not be surprised that this tip was inspired by a quote from horror author Stephen King: “Kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings.”

He’s not talking about characters here—heaven knows there’s lots of bloodshed in the typical King novel. Rather, he’s referring to the importance of brutally editing your own work. Just because you adore a particular sentence or turn of phrase that you’ve crafted doesn’t mean it serves an effective purpose. When it doesn’t advance the plot or reveal character, you have to kill it, no matter how brilliantly worded it is. And the truth is, it hurts much less if you eliminate the sentence yourself rather than having someone else swoop in and excise it.

The same principle applies to your content experience as a whole. Every team that produces or owns content is going to have their favorites—pieces that they spent a lot of time on, that they’re particularly proud of, or that they’ve otherwise invested attention and affection in. Even if the piece is a dud in terms of performance or it doesn’t fit customer needs, some of us still cling unreasonably to pet content pieces.

You can’t create a stellar content experience without weeding out the bad stuff or the stuff that no longer fits. Someone is going to have to make those tough calls. If you can’t handle it at the team level without starting a civil war, turn to the overall content strategy as defined by management. Whether it’s a director of marketing, a marketing VP, or a CMO, the person driving the ship has to be the one to lay down and enforce the rules regarding which darlings will be sacrificed to create a better content experience.

5. Fine Tune with Measurement

“88 percent of the top performers measure content marketing ROI, compared to 72 percent of the overall sample and 56 percent of the bottom performers,” according to the B2B Content Marketing report, which highlights benchmarks, budgets, and trends in North America in 2017.

Indeed, without regularly looking at the ROI of your content efforts, there’s no objective way to know which darlings to kill (who wants innocent casualties on their conscience?), you can’t effectively refine your strategy and content map, and it gets ever harder to break away from the company talking points and look at your work from the customer’s viewpoint.

No content experience is going to be flawless out of the gate, no matter how many brainstorms or rounds of review you go through. Only a strong routine of gathering and discussing performance data for each link in the content experience will allow you to locate and strengthen—or eliminate—the weak links.

And no, you don’t have to squeeze in extra meetings in order to share performance data, which will only be forgotten or lost soon after the meeting. A silo-smashing work-management solution, as mentioned in tip one, gives you an easy way to disseminate analytics to all stakeholders and participants. Plus, your ROI data will be permanently archived alongside all other relevant project information for easy retrieval later.

Less Is More

Are you comfortable following the path of least resistance, which usually results in sprawling, unfocused, ever-proliferating content—the “more is more” approach? Or would you rather adopt a “less is more” mindset, devoting your energy to creating lean, mean, unforgettable assets—and fewer of them? Unlike so many other aspects of content marketing, there’s just one right answer here, and you’re only five steps away from making the right choice for both your customers and your team.

Get a weekly dose of the trends and insights you need to keep you ON top, from the strategy team at Convince & Convert. Sign up for the Convince & Convert ON email newsletter.

http://ift.tt/2uek5tU