#barnes and noble staff

[jesncin]

Aah I got so much love today over Lunar Boy's book birthday!! Lots of friends getting their copies in the mail or finding my book in stores! A book birthday is like a birthday, I get people congratulating me and celebrating. But instead of me getting presents, it's everyone else who gets a gift (that I made!). So really, it's better than a birthday haha.

[sleepydross]

remember how flammable paper is

and remember how vulnerable servers are to overheating?

[psychesalcove]

POPSTAR BUT IM YOUR BOYFRIENDS GIRLFRIENDS FAVORITE DJ !

Annabeth Chase x reader

GENERAL ROMANTIC HEADCANONS

a/n: HERES YOUR REQUEST ANON!! hope you enjoy some stuff about annabeth, i love her sm 😓 hope you enjoy!!

ᝰ the two of you are basically a match made on olympus (im so sorry idk why I did that)

ᝰ she loves to talk to you about her architecture plans for olympus and other places she's doing

ᝰ if you guys have similar music tastes be prepared to be sharing headphones with her constantly

ᝰ she shows you her sketches of her ideas for olympus to see if you like them

ᝰ gelato dates 100%, the two of you sit outside on a patio eating your gelato and talking about whatever comes to mind at least 1 time a week

ᝰ shes a human calculator, so if you're struggling with math or science at New Rome, ask her and she will gladly assist

ᝰ be prepared to be going to historical sites and museums A LOT

ᝰ if there's a science museum nearby, you are going to be planning her birthday party there

ᝰ I think annabeth takes her sleep to another level, so when you start sleeping with her, know that your going to have memory foam pillows and mattress topper, cooling blankets, throw blankets and pillows, and stuffed animals

ᝰ you and annabeth for sure have the best sleep schedule out of the 7 (I headcanon that they are all still friends 😭)

ᝰ Barnes & Noble dates every other day. no questions asked.

ᝰ she has a tote bag collection and picks the one that best matches your guys outfit that day

ᝰ you two are regulars at this one Cafe by your shared apartment—it's the one with a library upstairs, so self-explanatory why you guys go there

ᝰ yk those restocking videos on tiktok of kitches? I feel like annabeth would be one of the girlies that do that, so be prepared to help her restock her snacks and fridge

ᝰ if your feeling to tired to highlight your notes for whatever college class your in, annabeth will happily color code your notes with her highlighters she paid 45$ at an overpriced art store

ᝰ along the topic of college, if you mention to annabeth you have a test, she will sit you down at the table and you'll be there for hours working on flash cards and other studying methods

ᝰ she will ramble to you for hours about the latest book she's read, especially if it's a historical or mystery genre

ᝰ you and annabeth have volunteered so many times at the local library that the staff considers you one of their own at this point

ᝰ and if you play UNO or any other game of the sorts, she will get competitive

ᝰ no exemptions—even if your dating her

ᝰ you'll sometimes come with her to her appointments to get her hair braided, so you get to listen to the gossip she shares with the person doing her hair

ᝰ she'll also ask you beforehand if you like certain beads or crystals and what would look best in her braids, or if she should just go natural for that period

ᝰ be prepared to have your mind boggled by the random facts she says at any given point, it becomes a routine in your day

ᝰ shes an amazing partner to have and is always going to be by your side

[wanda-widow]

Wait For Your Love

Civilian!f!Reader x Male!OC, Avenger!Bucky x Civilian!f!Reader

listened to "We Can't Be Friends" and decided to write on a whim.

Word Count: 1k

Summary: After loving one person that felt like your everything, you can't find it in yourself to love someone else the way you should and they know it. A run in with the person you loved most doesn't help your case much either.

Warnings: divorce, angst, bad writing (sorry it's my first time)

Don't forget to like and reblog 🫶🏻 please don't copy my work

To say that you had no luck in the relationship department was an understatement. Not one of those cliche “oh, I can’t find love, I’m hopeless” situations, but the kind where you couldn’t find yourself loving someone after you were in love for the first time.

Your first and quite possibly only love was the man you ran into the street one Sunday afternoon in Bucharest. The man that had eyes the color of the ocean in the sunlight and a smile that could warm your insides like hot chocolate. The man who was Bucky Barnes himself, the infamous Winter Soldier, the noble Sergeant. But all that put aside, he was your Bucky, your James. Yours.

Yours until one morning, you went to his small apartment to find it wrecked with no sight of him. Bullet shells littered the floor and the wood was broken near a corner of the room. You didn’t see him since, but he was always a lingering “what if” in your mind.

6 years later, your fourth attempt at love had landed you in a marriage that barely seemed to hold itself together. Owen, your husband, was constantly busy and on days that he wasn’t, all the two of you seemed to do was sit around. “I love you’s” had become a barely heard statement, the efforts to try and rekindle what was once a blooming romance falling flat. Maybe it was partially your fault, looking for what you loved in Bucky in other people. You fell in love with Owen because he had made you feel seen, made you feel that warmness you felt when you were with Bucky, a rare gentleman in a messed up society. A rare gentleman who reminded you a little too much of a certain someone. A rare gentleman who wasn’t Bucky and who didn’t quite love you anymore.

Your eyes fell on the overdue divorce papers on the kitchen counter, various bills and letters covering the majority of it. A full year had gone by since Owen had filed for divorce and yet, neither of you had signed it yet. Gently pulling it out from the stack, you sighed as you ran your fingers over it before reaching for a pen.

“Dammit” you sighed softly, signing your name carefully at the bottom before placing it on the kitchen table where he would see it when he got home for work. Walking to your bedroom, you took in the house one more time, gaze lingering in places where you and Owen would cuddle for hours, make meals, and just be in love. Finding your suitcase in the closet, you packed your essentials before leaving your house keys on the table, leaving the house for good.

Deciding to get some food before you crashed at your friend’s house, you found a small sushi bar and parked your car, entering the shop.

“Welcome to Izzy’s, just take a table anywhere or come sit at the bar” A bartender called out as another staff member ushered you to the bar and put the menu in front of you.

“The California roll’s here are good. Basic, I know, but you gotta try them” A warm voice came from your right as you looked up, nodding and looking back down at the menu before doing a double take. Short brown hair, slight stubble, the same ocean blue eyes and charming grin. The same man you fell in love with all those years ago.

“Bucky?!” came the loud response before you could stop yourself, face flaming red from your loud exclamation as he drank you in, putting the pieces together as well.

“(Y/N)... I uh… it’s been a while” he said quietly, turning so that his stool now faced you, sliding the menu over to the server and ordering for you before looking back. “How have you been?”

“How have I been? How have I…” you scoffed, hand coming up to rest on your head, mind reeling from the sudden change of events and the sheer audacity that he had to ask how you had been after running 6 years ago. To be honest or to lie through your teeth, you went with the latter. “I’ve been stuck wondering every night where you had run off to, James. Better yet, my marriage just ended because he didn’t love me anymore and he…” He wasn’t you. I only loved liked him because he was kind of like you. “We just didn’t work” you ended flatly as you stared at the counter.

“That night…” he started to say, throat bobbing as the memories started to flood back. “I ran because I had to. Fuck, if I could be with you without the risk of your safety, I would, (Y/N).”

“Bullshit on the risk of your safety” you retorted, jaw clenched as you remembered the news announcing that he had gotten a full pardon, that he was partnered alongside the new Captain America. Pushing down the hurt and the longing, you shrugged. “It’s fine, guess some things are better left in the past.”

“Doll, c’mon” he said quietly, watching as you shoved a piece of your California roll in your mouth to avoid talking. “Give me a little time to make amends, gather myself after the whole Flash Smashers situation. A-And then we could try again? Start as friends, see where that goes… I…” Sadness flashed on his face for a moment when he saw how dejected you looked. “Please?”

“Maybe”

“Just a couple months wait. Even less if I push through it” He said earnestly, raising an eyebrow as you shoved another piece of sushi in your mouth, waiting for you to swallow.

“I’ll think about it”

“Remember when we used to cuddle on the small mattress in my apartment. You’d make little hand shadow puppet shows for me until I fell asleep” Bucky pushed on, feeling hope bloom in his chest when a small smile tugged at your lips. “And sometimes we’d sit on the balcony and wait for the stars to come out while we made up constellations because Lord knows we don’t know a single one.”

“Okay” you whispered, eyes finally meeting his. “I’ll wait for your love”

Authors Note: Thank you so much for reading! Appreciate all of you so so much 💗

[fayeandknight]

Went to go meet a friend for lunch today and brought Forte. The restaurant is about two hours away so I knew it was going to be a long day.

I was a little anxious because it's a Hot Pot place which means limited room under the table and frequent visits from staff to change out the plate. Forte took about ten minutes to figure out a comfortable position for himself. But once he did he just dozed.

Aside from our waitress, who watched me direct him into the space, the staff serving us didn't even notice him. They complimented me on the way out though and said they hope to see us again soon.

After two hours in the restaurant we wondered around the Barnes and Noble next door for about 45 minutes. I paid him occasionally throughout but didn't have to manage him. He kept in a loose heel unless he moved to into a blocking position.

Really, really impressed with him. I rarely go out to eat and have never asked him to settle in such a cramped space for this long. But he took it all in stride and didn't miss a beat.

At the end he led me right to my car even though we came out from a different place than we'd entered.

[organizeworkers]

Union Domino Effect Reaches New Jersey Bookstore

There was this desire to demand respect from our employers and see our work recognized as the labor that it is.”

One day in the summer of 2022, without announcement, explanation, or fanfare, a new notice appeared on the wall of the breakroom of Labyrinth Books in Princeton, New Jersey. Employees recognized it as the brand new union contract of Politics and Prose, D.C.’s first unionized bookstore, and it lit a fire.

“That was the initial call to action for all of us. After that a small group of people got together and started talking seriously about organizing,” recalls Sarah Kempf, one of Labyrinth Books’ organizers. They started by identifying their co-workers’ common complaints. “In this particular area of New Jersey, it’s just not a livable wage, and it’s a job that’s designed to be a long-term bookselling career.”

Though adequate pay was front of mind for Sarah and many of her coworkers, the notice on the wall sparked a drive within Labyrinth’s workers for a more intangible gain: the dignity they were owed. “Everything had been simmering under the surface for a while… There was this desire to demand respect from our employers and see our work recognized as the labor that it is.”

From grievances to action

The employee Discord server, already used as a space for workers to air their grievances, soon had a thread reserved for union discussion. The bar down the street had cheap drinks and lots of room, a perfect spot for organizers to commiserate with workers fresh off a difficult shift. Sarah remembers the invaluable solidarity built in these discussion zones. “You could stay there for an hour or however long you wanted but we would just sit around and talk. It was a great way to build community, to get people comfortable with colleagues that they don’t see or work with as much during the day. This played a huge role in our organizing. We created spaces both digitally and in person where people could come together and find community among their fellow workers.”

One of the organizers reached out to a contact at EWOC, and Sarah and other future members of the Labyrinth Books organizing committee (OC) wasted no time in attending trainings. “EWOC helped us set the foundation for the organizing committee,” Sarah says. “All of us who were on the OC did the EWOC foundational training together… It was a great way to see how other organizing campaigns were going, to get inspiration, to get questions answered. It was great to have a network of support from all around the country from people who were doing the same thing that we were.”

They contacted the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU) not long afterwards. “We knew that we wanted the support of a larger union … when we reached out to them, they were very excited because they had just been organizing the Rutgers Barnes & Noble… They were great in giving us the training that we needed and preparing us for anything we might face in the battle,” Sarah recalls. “RWDSU really wanted to ensure that as many people were inoculated and prepared as they could possibly be and it really paid off for us.”

Community support — and a major win

“Turnover was the most difficult challenge that we dealt with,” Sarah says. Like many other retail enterprises in college towns, Labyrinth’s workforce was constantly shifting, posing a serious threat to organizing attempts. The union effort nearly dissolved at one point after a large number of staff quit, but Sarah and her colleagues persevered.

“It was very demoralizing at first. It felt almost impossible to pick up the pieces after so many people had left,” she says. “What we learned was just how important it is to build a sense of community, to be the colleagues who are there for the new people, to be the first face that they see so they feel comfortable coming to us with their problems… Forming the union gave people a reason to stick around.”

When it was finally time for the campaign to go public, organizers found themselves buoyed by the power of Princeton’s community. This support came most immediately in the form of advice from Princeton faculty and graduate students, but Sarah thinks it had the remarkable effect of pressuring the store’s owners to voluntarily recognize the union as well.

January 9 saw the publishing of a press release declaring the owners’ intention “to use this organizing moment as an occasion to listen to everyone, make positive changes, and form a united Labyrinth that can do all the work we do better together.” Sarah attributes this surprising development to their community organizing efforts: “I think a lot of that had to do with the community support and how much they saw that the workers so overwhelmingly supported the union and how many people from the outside supported it as well… The community has really rallied behind us.”

The single act of pasting another union’s contract to the wall of the breakroom, carried out unprompted by an individual worker who left the bookstore shortly thereafter, set off an incredible wave of community-building that connected the booksellers at Labyrinth Books with Princeton community members, union organizers across the country, and most importantly each other. Through tenacity, resilience, and the enduring power of solidarity, this plucky group of Princeton organizers has secured for their colleagues all of the benefits afforded a unionized workplace. 

Want to improve your workplace? Contact an EWOC organizer now!

[macrolit]

Forbes article: "How Struggling College Bookstores Found A Way To Beat Amazon"

Oct 20, 2023,06:30am EDT

A new sales model adopted by hundreds of universities limits students’ ability to shop around for textbooks.

By Lauren Debter, Forbes Staff

As fall semester dawned at Texas Christian University in Fort Worth, senior Olivia McFall turned to Amazon to shop for books — not only because its prices were better for certain titles, but so she could get her course materials quickly. The campus bookstore could sometimes take a week or two. Unacceptable.

“Teachers will start assigning reading on the first day,” McFall, a 22-year-old fashion-merchandising major, told Forbes. “You get behind if you don’t have that textbook. If I buy it on [Amazon], it’s usually because I can get it faster than the bookstore.”

For decades, Amazon’s lower prices and speedier delivery have blown a crater in the college bookstore business. Given the option to shop around, students only buy about one-third of their course materials at the campus store.

Now the bookstores are fighting back. They say they’ve hit on a plan that would, almost magically, quash competition from online rivals like Amazon. T.C.U. is among the colleges considering a model that would automatically charge students for textbooks on their tuition bills, which can be covered by financial aid, and get them to students by the time classes begin. Books are typically discounted 30% or more, said the bookstores, who negotiate volume discounts. Students must return materials at the end of the semester.

Despite reservations from education advocates who worry it limits purchasing options for students, the plan, dubbed Inclusive Access, is spreading like kudzu. It rose out of a 2015 rule from the U.S. Department of Education that permitted universities to include the cost of textbooks with tuition, as long as prices were under competitive market rates and students could opt out.

Bookstores latched onto the idea during the pandemic. They were looking to boost sales at a time when they were hamstrung by closures, declining enrollment numbers and the seismic shift to digital textbooks — and still are.

In the 2022-23 academic year, Inclusive Access already captured the business of 44% of students, worth an estimated $1.4 billion annually, according to the National Association of College Stores.

Illinois-based Follett Corp., a privately held company (annual sales: $1.6 billion) that operates roughly one-third of college bookstores, said the number of its campuses that have adopted the Inclusive Access model has tripled to 450 since 2019. New Jersey-based Barnes & Noble Education (annual sales: $1.5 billion), which spun out of the bookseller chain in 2015 and also runs a third of campus bookstores, said it has over 150 schools signed up for Inclusive Access, up from just four in 2019. (The colleges themselves operate the other one-third of campus bookstores.)

Overnight, schools that switched to Inclusive Access brought guaranteed revenue to booksellers. Sell-through rates, which measure the percentage of course materials students purchase at the campus bookstore, skyrocketed from about 30% before Inclusive Access to north of 80 or 90%, according to Follett and Barnes & Noble Education. Few students opt out, the companies said, because they like the prices and convenience.

It’s a clever way to beat Amazon. Unable to compete, Follett and Barnes & Noble Education separated their customers from the open marketplace and bundled their products with something Amazon couldn’t sell — college tuition. The bookstore gets the customer without ever having to go up against the online behemoth, which is currently being sued by the Federal Trade Commission for its own alleged anti-competitive practices. (Amazon has said it disagrees with the allegations, and will contest the lawsuit.)

“It’s a significant volume increase because you’re capturing all of the course material market share in an institution,” Jonathan Shar, who oversees campus stores operated by Barnes & Noble Education, told Forbes. “Plus, it’s much more predictable.”

Amazon Prices

An Amazon spokesperson declined to comment on the impact Inclusive Access is having on its textbook sales. Amazon said it may offer discounts to schools that buy books in bulk, but it’s been winding down certain aspects of its textbook business. In April, it stopped renting physical textbooks to students and in 2020 it stopped buying textbooks back from students.

Last year, 37% of students purchased books from Amazon. That’s down from 46% in 2019, according to the National Association of College Stores.

Selling textbooks isn’t the business it used to be. A decade ago, students spent $4.8 billion a year on textbooks, according to research firm Words Rated. Today, it’s about $3.2 billion. During the 2022-23 school year, students spent an average of $285 on course materials, the lowest figure since the National Association of College Stores began tracking spending 16 years ago.

That’s partly the result of a rapid shift to lower-cost digital textbooks, with 55% of course materials now digital, up sharply from 15% prior to the pandemic, according to Emmanuel Kolady, Follett’s CEO. More textbooks are being made available online for free from sites like OpenStax, too. Nearly three-quarters of students say they were assigned at least one free course material in the latest academic year, according to the National Association of College Stores.

Company’s ‘Cornerstone’

Barnes & Noble Education, a publicly traded company that runs 800 campus bookstores, has described Inclusive Access to investors as a “cornerstone” of its plan to return to profitable growth, noting that course-material revenue rises more than 80% and gross profit nearly doubles after schools switch to the new model.

The company has lost a cumulative $600 million since 2018. Last year’s sales were 23% below pre-pandemic levels. This summer, it had to negotiate an extension on its loan payments because it couldn’t come up with enough cash. As part of the deal, it gave up two board seats and said it would explore selling the company. Its stock price has lost 90% of its value in the last two years, tumbling to less than $1 a share.

“It feels like this is their first, second and third priority,” said Ryan MacDonald, an analyst at Needham who covers Barnes & Noble Education, referring to Inclusive Access, which the company calls “First Day Complete.”

Benefits For Students

The booksellers claim the program saves students money. Follett said that students spend an average of 30% less than if they were to buy new books and are better equipped for classes as Inclusive Access gets them their materials before the semester begins.

At New York University, for instance, where Follett runs bookselling, students are automatically billed for books unless they opt out. Most are digital rentals. A textbook for an introductory biology class is priced at $36.75, which gives students access to a digital copy for the semester. That’s 20% less than if they went directly to the publisher’s website and rented it for the term. It’s 40% less than on Amazon, which only offers the option to buy the digital version, not rent it.

The math, however, is not always transparent. According to a report from the U.S. PIRG Education Fund, which analyzed 52 book-buying contracts, it’s “hard, if not impossible” to figure out how deep the discounts are because schools don’t make it clear what the discount is based on.

Savings can be less meaningful for students who would have otherwise bought used books or borrowed books, said Nicole Allen, director of open education at SPARC, a nonprofit that advocates for more course materials to be free. The one-quarter of students who intentionally skip buying certain books each semester, usually because they don’t think they need it, are also charged, she said. As more schools migrate to Inclusive Access, Allen questions whether discounts will disappear since publishers have a long history of raising prices.

“This is already a captive market because students are told what to buy,” Allen told Forbes. “Inclusive Access makes it an even more captive market by telling students how they’re going to buy it.”

Even without Inclusive Access, students can be limited in their comparison shopping. More and more professors are assigning books with single-use access codes, available for an additional fee, which students use to access quizzes, homework and other materials online. Promoted by publishers who benefit from the new revenue stream, they’re often sold exclusively by the campus bookstore and cannot be resold.

Follett’s president Ryan Petersen predicts that a newer variant of the model called Equitable Access, where students pay a flat fee for their materials regardless of the courses they’re taking, will be adopted by most schools in the next five years.

“We’re having this conversation with every campus we can,” Petersen told Forbes, “potentially even to campuses who are sick of hearing about it.”

[prkwook]

CUPID 💌 🏹

PROFILES 🎧 barnes and noble DUPE

KIM YN — 05 liner. computer science major at YSU. part-timer at The Nest, a local bookstore. spends shifts either reading or hanging out with taerae. #1 hopeless romantic.

KIM TAERAE — 03 liner. literature major at YSU. a barista at Bluebird, the café inside of The Nest. the lead vocalist and guitarist in a band called The Invincibles. always begs matthew to let his band play at the café.

KIM JIWOONG — 01 liner. acting major at YSU. yn’s older brother. goes to the book store so often he knows more about it than yn. protective older brother™️

SEOK MATTHEW — 03 liner. dance major at YSU. a member of Tidal Wave, YSU’s dance team. manager at The Nest. dgaf about what his employees do as long as they're not burning down the store.

ZHANG HAO — 01 liner. music major at YSU with a specialty in violin. was invited to play at one of the open mic nights. quickly became friends with the staff of The Nest. is now a regular.

🔭 ★ mlist. next.

☆★ TAGLIST: want to join? -> taglist form . 🫀

[thedurvin]

Had some more people hear I used to be a librarian and sigh about how they thought it must be a fun easy great job. I finally have a good analogy: imagine working at a Barnes & Noble that is also a mental-health-and-poverty crisis center. You never know when someone asks for help which side of the business they’re there for, management expects you to give equal time and energy to both, and the Barnes & Noble customers get upset and complain to management if the mental health crisis customers cause any disturbances or delays in services. Management is confused by the idea that one organization could have two distinct user populations and makes all decisions based on customer feedback they receive through online comment forms, and only one of those user populations has the free time and personal computer access to provide it.

(Only speaking for the two counties I’ve worked for and this is about being professional staff—I still think if you’re gonna work a min wage customer service job, Library Assistant is one of the best out there)

[tracichee]

I'm so excited to announce that KINDLING is an Indigo Staff Pick for the month of March! Canadian readers, pick it up at your local store or order it online!

🎁 I'm also extending my pre-order offer through next Tuesday, March 5, so now's the time to nab your copy! Send in your receipt or library request to chee.preorders@gmail.com and receive three "Polaroids" of the seven kindlings, beautifully illustrated by Naomi Giddings! This offer remains open internationally until 3/5/24 at 11:59pm PT or while supplies last.

Linden Tree Books | Bookshop.org | Barnes & Noble | Amazon | Indigo

[scalamore]

Social FYI post: Kakaopage

So I see on various social media spaces the immense hatred of KKP lately, because their anti-piracy task force, P.cok is going around and throwing DMCAs at scanlation and translation groups. There's been more anger towards them lately because every time a series is axed or unexpectedly cancelled, western readers have a tendency to blame everything on kakaopage.

So this is an information post!

Misinformation: KKP axes series Answer: The publisher axes series Kakaopage is an online distributor, not a publisher (although they do have some shares/involvement in some series) and are for the most part, an online platform to share content. They're a platform that allows anyone, from novices to big publishing houses to post their content in an easy and accessible way. Other such platforms include Naver or Ridi.

To give an example, Kakaopage is like Amazon, or Barnes and Nobles (USA bookstore), or even wattpad. They host a ton of stuff, but don't necessarily own it. Back in 2017, it was reported that for all content sold, the revenue is shared between Google Play (30 %), Kakao (20 %), and the publisher (50 %). The publisher then distributes those profits to the manhwa teams.

As part of their agreements with various publishers, the p.cok anti-piracy task force was created to stop piracy and illegal distribution. Their intent is purely to keep things to the official sources, to make sure the publishers (like DAON, D&C, Carrotoon etc) get paid to pass on to the manhwa teams.

As such, over the past few years, Kakaopage has invested tremendously in legal ways to read their stories in various countries:

Korea

China (Podo, Lehzin)

USA or "english speaking countries" (Tapas, Tappytoon, Radish, Webtoon, manta etc)

Indonesia (KKP indonesia)

Japan (Piccoma)

Thailand

Tappy France

Tappy Germany

etc Misinformation: Kakaopage doesn't care about your language/country Answer: Slight truth, but the more accurate answer is "the publishers don't care about your language/country" As one might notice, this isn't a very comprehensive list of countries. That's the point. Kakaopage and the Korean publishers don't care about their readers in low-readership countries (or continents) like South America, Africa, the middle east, India, Vietnam, or the Phillipines. Because simply, it's too much to invest in countries/languages that won't have high enough readership. So they focus on the "richer" countries to invest in, with translations and localization. They literally do not care about readers not in their list of localization/countries, as these readers would not pay for their services in the first place. Capitalist societies do not want their products out there for free, and that's what piracy is - people reading for free when they could be paying to support the original authors. Misinformation: Supporting officially is expensive!! Answer: Not really When you break it down, not really. on the KKP app, if you want to rent a chapter for 72 hrs, it's 200 coins. If you want to permanently buy a chapter "collect", it's 500 coins. 5000 coins = $4 on the app store 10000 coins = $9 on the app store, etc. Basically, if you want to collect a chapter, with the lowest tier = 5000 coins = 10 chapters = $4 ----> 25 cents per chapter. If you purchase on Tappytoon, I believe it comes out to about 35 cents per chapter If you purchase on Tapas, I heard it's around 30-40 cents per chapter? back to KKP: Now, as each chapter is 25 cents, imagine how that's distributed: 12.5 cents to the publisher, and 5 cents to KKP to host it. For each YM chapter purchased on KKP, which costs a reader 25 cents, DAON Entertainment gets 12.5 cents to split amongst Hayeonnim, Hyeyongnim, and the other staff. Yikes. For a 100 chapter series --> $25 to read it on kakaopage --> $12.5 goes to DAON to distribute to the manhwa team. That's not much per person. If we're lucky to get a physical release, I believe it's about $10 USD for 12 chapters for the YM physicals in KR. For Villains are Destined to Die, or Stepmothers Marchen, who have physical ENG releases, someone told me it's about $15 for 6-8 chapters (needs verification) Back to the webtoons: imagine, 100 people read 100 chapters on aggregate sites instead of one of the official routes: Hayeonnim and Hyeyongnim have already lost $1,250 in royalties/income from the series. from bato alone i see a chapter can have about 55K views. I'm not sure how to translate "views" to "readers", so lets arbitrarily say each chapter is read by 10,000 people internationally who for whatever reason, don't read officially. So 10,000 readers x 100 chapters at 0.12 cents each = loss of $125,000 of income for the manhwa teams for a series with 3 seasons released. Bottom line is, if you can support and want to support, it would be a good idea to. No one's forcing you to, but think of your favorite authors and artists ---!

Sources: https://www.techinasia.com/kakaotalk-launches-kakaopage-digital-content-marketplace

[afipiafelis]

Now serving the romance of your nightmares:

Maid For Your Master - Now Available

A Reader Insert Horror Romance - (CW list here)

Rumors ruin reputations. For a maid, they can be maddening.

The sharp-tongued Professor Campbell, your employer, is dead. Insinuations about your “nightly duties” make finding a new position impossible. Just as you exhaust the last of your options, an unexpected offer of employment comes from a man you’ve never met: Sicarius Estrova – shipping magnate, eligible bachelor, and an old friend of the professor.

His household, Gravelorne Manor, is far from the picture-perfect image it projects. The staff are rowdy, the mansion is bizarrely furnished, and your beguiling master seems to delight in playing calculating mind games. Too old for the nonsense, you meet his perverse teasing with biting wit and pernicious poise. However, when his endless taunts turn into a sudden proposal, you cannot help but feel something is amiss.

Seduced by his amorous attentions and the promise of financial security, you enter into a marriage where the only certainty is Sicarius’s obsessive desire to mold you into his world. As your husband flip-flops between hopeless romantic and shameless devil, you begin to wonder what wicked schemes hide behind that charming smile.

Reader Character Description: She/her pronouns, female anatomy, approx age late twenties to mid-forties.

Purchase your paperback or ebook copy at:

Barnes and Noble

Amazon US/CA/UK/DE/AU/BR/JP

Target

Bookdepository.com

Booktopia AU

Imusic.co EU

Hugendubel.de EU

Google Play

Also available by special order at Indie Booksellers:

Carmicheal's Bookstore (Kentucky, USA)

Sundog Independent Books (Florida, USA)

Prince Books (Vermont, USA)

Waterstreet Bookstore (New Hampshire, USA)

Annie Bloom Books (Oregon, USA)

Penguin Bookshop (Pennsylvania, USA)

Fireside Books (Alaska, USA)

Better Read Than Dead (New South Wales, AU)

Paperback Size: 178mm x 108 mm/4.25″x7″, Weight 257g/9oz

Paperback Price: 14.99 USD

Ebook Price: 4.99 USD (available at these retailers)

For those with limited finances: Talk to your local librarian to request the book! Print copies are available for order through the Ingram catalogue and digital library access is available through Overdrive/Hoopla upon your request!

[thirtyskeletons]

every time i go to my favorite barnes and noble and i wander into the graphic novel section i get gobsmacked by the little staff pick card describing homestuck as the neon genesis evangelion of graphic novels. it’s been there for as long as i can remember and i forget every time

[bluejay-writes]

Mystictober 2023: Day 4 - About the Barn Cat...

You can read this fic on Ao3 if that’s more your speed!

Rating: Teen.

Prompt: Rebel / Royal

Pairing: Jumin/MC

Wordcount: 2546

Summary: Crown Prince Jumin Han needs a wife, but mostly he needs a partner to lessen his work load. Almost all these ladies at this afternoon tea want the job. One of them just wants to get her embroidery done.

Author's Notes: This fic was written for Mystictober 2023, Day 4. I'll be writing for the whole month, so if you have any requests, hit up that ask box. (The full prompt list is at the bottom of this post!)

Jaehee is referred to here as Mrs. Kang - the Mrs. designation is because she is the head of the serving staff for the entire palace, as Housekeeper, she is Mrs., regardless of her marital status. If I write more in this AU, however... :D got plans for Miss Jaehee.

Please enjoy some classic Jumin being bad at feelings.

(Did I just post this on the old blog? I sure did. You saw nothing.)

“Stop fidgeting.”

The sharp voice made Emme’s hands still where they had been picking at the over-embellished dress she was wearing. She knew better than to fidget, had been trained better, to stand still and simper and be otherwise indistinguishable from a noblewoman. But she hated it. She’d rather be out in the fields with her sheep. The very sheep that her brother was now probably tending to inappropriately.

But it had been decided. The rebellion needed an inside voice with the monarchy, and with the prince’s hand in marriage up for whomever could grab his attention, they’d put all their effort into training Emme for just that purpose. Did she want to be a princess? No one ever asked her, not even herself. The rebellion was her family. Ever since her father had been killed for supposedly ogling a noblewoman, and her mother had followed him into death via her own grief, the rebels had taken care of Emme and her brother, so at the very least she could give this her best attempt.

It was possible that the prince was gay. As far as everyone said, he’d never even looked at a woman twice. He might not even be interested in women, at which point this whole farce would have been useless, but she still had to try.

“If you’re done woolgathering, the carriage has arrived.” The blonde woman smirked at her, but mostly at her own joke since Emme was a shepherdess before she became a faux noble.

Emme didn’t voice a response, knowing that was what was expected of her. She simply got into the carriage and wondered how she could get out of this uncomfortable situation without disappointing literally everyone.

“Your highness, it is time for Afternoon Tea.”

His Highness, Crown Prince Jumin, looked up from the paperwork covering his desk and sighed.

“Mrs. Kang, you know I don’t have time for this.”

“I know, your highness.”

Jumin didn’t argue, he simply stood, smoothed the wrinkles from sitting out of his attire, and waved for the Housekeeper to proceed.  He knew that this afternoon tea was planned out by his father to find him a wife.  It wasn’t that he was against finding a wife, but most of the details of running the kingdom were already his responsibility while his father spent most of his time attending social functions or consorting with his harem.

“As you’re aware, Highness, you will be expected to pick at least one of these women to court.  I recommend spending some time talking with each of them to get a feeling for their work ethic.”

Jumin chuckled. Trust Mrs. Kang to understand exactly the sort of thing he was thinking.  She truly was the perfect Housekeeper, and he never regretted having her take over the butler’s duties when he retired. The woman was impeccable at her job, which he appreciated more than anything.

He wouldn’t mind having a Queen, or even just a Princess Consort if they were willing and capable of sharing in his workload.  But he knew the noblewomen his father would have invited didn’t know the meaning of the word. Most of them had been raised to be nothing but arm candy, because that’s the sort of woman the King preferred. Maybe he should just give in to the rumors and tell everyone he was only interested in men.  It wasn’t true.  Not that he was any more interested in men than he was in women, but it would at least stop this marriage farce.

Walking into the hall, he could immediately tell that this was going to be a most uncomfortable few hours of social effort.

Emme twitched.  When it was clear that the prince was making his way table-by-table, everyone had flocked to sit as close to the front as possible, leaving her alone at her table to drink her tea.  She had no reason to try to get closer.  Either the prince would take the time to reach every table, or he wouldn’t, and no matter where she sat, it wouldn’t make a difference.

This tea was already proving to be a trial, even without company to chat with. She was likely to leave the event hungry, which went against her better judgment, given how used to going hungry she was. She couldn’t afford to be picky, but a noblewoman in her position couldn’t afford not to be picky. She wasn’t interested in the sweet pastries, instead preferring savory accompaniments, and everything they’d provided was sweet. She considered this an oversight on the part of the staff, not that she would ever speak her mind about it. She was taught better.

Knowing that if word of her behavior got back to her handler in the rebellion she would get no end of grief, Emme still slipped her embroidery out of her bag to work on, once she had finished a second cup of tea.  She’d been working stitching a scene of her own design, one she’d sketched out of a barn cat asleep on a windowsill.  She thought it would be a lovely handkerchief, or perhaps a scarf, once it was completed.  With a small smile pinned on her face, mostly from nostalgia about the barn cat, but also her training to ‘always be pleasant’, Emme got to work on her embroidery, paying little attention to the rest of the room.

As predicted, Prince Jumin was bored.  He had thought he might have to answer the same question repeatedly, but instead these women were only interested in talking up their own supposed achievements and desirability as a potential princess candidate.

Once, during a shift from one table full of insufferable women to the next, Jumin noticed one of the women, at the farthest table, sitting quietly by herself working on her embroidery.  She seemed quietly pleased, and it immediately drew his attention.  Of course, his attention was immediately followed by the next table of women being even more oppressive, and even underhandedly catty about the woman who was sitting alone, as though they thought that was what he wanted to hear.

His mind was filled with thoughts about this woman, using time that would otherwise have been wasted on useless social interactions to complete work. He moved almost as a marionette through the last few tables of women, none of whom stood a chance of catching his attention and taking it away from the woman at the last table.

Finally, Finally, he went to sit with her, to meet her, and she continued to surprise him. As he sat down, she held up a hand as though to forestall his greeting as she finished one last stitch, and tucked her embroidery safely back in her bag.

“I’m sorry for the delay.” Emme said, smiling. “I wanted to get that stitch finished.”

“It was no issue. I am a fan of embroidery, myself.” He said, sharing the first piece of information about himself all afternoon. “May I see what you were working on?”

“Truly?” Jumin felt blinded by her smile, lighting up her face like the bright rays of dawn.  She took out her embroidery frame, showing off the sleeping cat, as far as she’d gotten him done so far. “Did you design this yourself?” He asked, eying the hand-drawn lining underlying the stitches.

“I did. It’s our barn cat—“ She bit her lip. Noble Ladies don’t consort with barn cats.

Jumin didn’t seem to care that she shouldn’t have been anywhere near a barn, or consorted with barn cats. “Would you ever be willing to design one for me?”

Emme tipped her head to the side in curiosity, reminding Jumin of his Elizabeth the 3rd. “Of what, if I may ask?”

“Of my darling cat, of course.” he smiled. “My Elizabeth the 3rd would make an excellent subject for your embroidery, I am certain.”

“Oh.” Emme said, drawn in by the warmth of his smile. She had expected the prince to be cold, and boring, and nothing at all like he was. “Well, yes, I think that would be a fun challenge.”

“If you’d like, then, I shall invite you back for a private luncheon where you can meet Miss Elizabeth.”

“That sounds marvelous, I—“

Emme was cut off by one of the guards walking hurriedly over to Jumin and whispering in his ear. He paled, and turned to her in apology.

“It seems I must cut our tea short. I will see you again, miss.” He nodded to her, and followed his guard out. Emme just stared after him, and tried to stifle a laugh. He’d never even asked her name, how was he supposed to invite her to lunch?

Jumin was pacing.  The alarm from the guards had been nothing of note. His father had been demanding his presence, in fact to ascertain which women he wanted to court.  If only he’d known that he’d pulled Jumin away from a conversation with the only person, gender irrelevant, who had ever caught his attention.  It wasn’t romantic, what he felt for her, but… it was certainly a pull.  A desire to befriend her and keep her forever, like he felt with his Elizabeth.  Maybe that was enough for a wife, after all.  She certainly seemed diligent, working on her stitching rather than gossiping with the other noblewomen.

If only he’d had the presence of mind to ask the girl her name.  This slip in etiquette was plaguing him, as all he could tell his aides of her was her long dark hair, golden eyes, and penchant for embroidery.  Also, that she apparently had a barn cat.

A knock at his door startled him out of his thoughts, and at his call, Mrs. Kang entered the room.

“Excuse me, your Highness, I have located your mystery noblewoman.”

“You have?” He gestured for her to approach, and she did, moving silently as usual, his favorite thing about her which was also the most unnerving.

“Yes, though there is a bit of an issue. It appears that while she appears noble, and on the surface her credentials are from a noble family, she herself was born a commoner, and has been raised primarily by the rebellion.”

“Ah, so you think she’s a spy, or an assassin?”

“No, unlikely. It seems they’ve groomed her to be a noblewoman to try and get a voice in amongst the nobles.  They’re dissatisfied with her because she refuses to involve herself in unnecessary gossip, and thus doesn’t bring back information the way they hoped.  And after being called away from her at Tea, they are assuming she made a poor impression on you. It is unlikely you will need to deal with her at future events.”

“She would have been the only bright point in those events.” Jumin said, with more than a hint of melancholy. He considered discarding his fancy then and there, but found that it pained him to even consider it.

“Mrs. Kang, what is her name?”

“Emme, your Highness.”

“Emme. What a lovely name.” Jumin smiled, and added the name to the letter in front of him. “Mrs. Kang, please see this letter delivered to Miss Emme. We shall be having lunch on the morrow.”

Emme was, once again, fidgeting. Her dress today was much simpler - She’d been summoned to the palace to have lunch with the prince and discuss embroidery.  The letter had been delivered to her actual home, and not to the address she was beholden to as a supposed noble. This meant that the palace knew exactly who she was, and were in no way fooled by her assumed identity.

Her handler warned her that going to the palace again would be a trap, that they meant to arrest her for treason, and that if she were to do this, they would wash their hands of her. There would be no help coming.  Emme wanted to believe that his highness was truly interested in her embroidery, truly wanted to speak with her, and perhaps request her work as they had discussed. She wanted to believe in him, because he seemed to truly see her, not just what he wanted to see.

And so, here she stood in front of the palace gates in her simple blue dress, its hem dust-stained from the walk across the city, her embroidery bag slung over her shoulder.  At least it hadn’t been raining.

“Who goes there?” The guard called, and she paused, taking a deep breath before responding.

“Emme, sir. Here at the invitation of His Highness Prince Jumin.”  She held out the invitation, which the guard took from her, and then smiled.

“Ah, the embroidress.  Welcome, miss!” The guard winked at her, and handed the invitation back. “Mrs. Kang should be out to escort you soon, you’re a bit early.”

“Yes, I am.” Emme said with a nod. “Better early and waiting than late and keeping His Highness waiting.”

The guard nodded, and in mere moments a severe-looking woman in glasses walked out, took one look at her, and smiled slightly.

“Miss Emme, if you’ll follow me?”

The way to Jumin’s private lounge was twisting, and Emme knew that she would not be able to leave the palace without assistance.  The way the guard and the housekeeper had been treating her didn’t imply that she was to be arrested, and so her hopes of having a peaceful lunch with discussion of shared interests rose steadily.

Jumin was, of course, ready for Emme when she arrived.  He’d been standing by the window petting Miss Elizabeth the 3rd, and turned with a smile when Mrs. Kang showed her into the room before shutting the door to give them privacy.  It was false privacy, as Jumin’s valet stood against one wall, ready to serve any need they may have during the luncheon, all but unnoticed.

“Miss Emme.” He said, greeting her with a smile and a kiss on the hand. “How lovely to see you again. You look more comfortable today.”

Emme chuckled. “You weren’t upset to discover I was but a simple commoner in noble’s clothes? I am sorry for deceiving you, Your Highness.”

“Not at all, actually. You’re a breath of fresh air, and as hypocritical as it may sound, I don’t care one whit about nobility.”

Emme chuckled, and settled into the chair he motioned her to. “I brought some of my other embroidery for you to look over, since you mentioned it was also a hobby you enjoyed.”

The moment she sat down, Elizabeth the 3rd perked up from her window seat. She stretched leisurely, then trotted over to Emme, and after a casual appraisal, jumped up into her lap and curled up to go back to sleep.

Emme was startled, and looked to Jumin and then back down at Elizabeth multiple times, with hearts in her eyes.

“Is this Miss Elizabeth the 3rd? She’s so lovely!”

Jumin simply stared. Miss Elizabeth did not tolerate anyone but himself, often going so far as to scratch Mrs. Kang, and hiss at his Valet, V, if he got too close. But here she was, declaring her preference for the lap of this girl she’d just met over his own.

“Emme.” Jumin said, his voice full of an emotion he couldn’t place. “Marry me.”

[cartograffiti]

Thank you Claire from Schuler Books: some data for Queen's Thief fans

The tl;dr of this post is that QT is having an unprecedented surge of interest right now, and I used GoodReads to deliver some facts and figures to the Discord (The Geninsula), and now to Tumblr!

Under the cut: sources of the uptick, beautiful numbers, and a couple fun excerpts from recent reviews.

Part 1: selling out is good

We can actually track the start of the surge back to 2020's publication of Return of the Thief, because the series being complete got it a lot of positive press, but the activity of the past couple months (especially February-now, I'm writing on May 31 2022), has been another thing entirely.

RotT, and Disney+ optioning The Thief, has meant we're getting a lot of new international editions. The UK is getting a beautiful release of new editions in paperback and audiobook. The series is being translated into Spanish and Italian for the first time, and we know in The Geninsula of translations underway into Hebrew and Bangla. (Parts of the series have previously been released in at least 15 languages, but until now only Romanian had kept up with the whole set.) MWT is currently on a tour of Italy and the UK to promote these new editions, and a number of giveaways and influencer spotlights were arranged by publishers to get The Thief | Il ladro in readers' hands.

In March, the independent bookstore Schuler Books (not, as it has often been misreported, a library or Barnes & Noble) *posted a TikTok* of some of their staff showing off books they wish they could read for the first time, again. (It's adorable, click the link if you haven't seen it.) This TikTok went viral, now with 17.5 million views, and it opens with Claire talking about The Thief.

Only two weeks later, The Thief was sold out in US paperback. I'm talking gone. Even Amazon cannot get you a new copy of either the 2017 (Joel Tippie) or 2005 (Vince Natale) covers anymore, previously readily available, let alone older ones. They have to reprint it! In the meantime, the Steve West audiobook seems to be doing very well, and the hardcover unremarkably. Several Geninsula members who are members of large library systems have reported long waitlists typical of bestsellers. I wholly attribute this attention to Claire. Claire is the best, our hero!

Lots of recent reviews (see below) also said Laini Taylor suggested it, but if there's a specific recent source for that (she's a known fan of long standing), I can't find it. Let me know if you know!

Part 2: GoodReads is useful sometimes

So GoodReads *has this nice feature* where they rank the top 200 books from each publishing year, with #1 being the one their users have most interacted with, and refresh it monthly [Edit: this was a mistype, it’s weekly]--so you can see which books of the same age have remained or become popular as of this month [Edit: week]. This does not mean it only accounts for what was interacted with within that month [Edit: week], just that it's that up to date.

Right now, The Thief is number 14 out of all of 1996. The books that beat it are all truly famous things like Bridget Jones's Diary, Angela's Ashes, Fight Club, and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. (The only book ranked above it that hasn't been adapted for film is Neverwhere, which has received a radio play with a high-profile cast. [Edit: ...And is itself a novelization of a TV series.] [Edit: Infinite Jest has been a play, but not filmed.] I am making direct eye contact with Mickey Mouse.) Some of the other series marketed as fantasy it beats out include entries from Tortall, Discworld, The Witcher, and Redwall.

The Queen of Attolia is the only other one that is currently on the top 200 list for its year, but it's 77, above more Tamora Pierce, a boxset of A Song of Ice and Fire, and buzzy authors like Julia Quinn and Junji Ito.

The fact that a second book is ranking this high tells us people are currently working their way through the series in honestly what has to be large numbers. I won't be surprised if later books start ranking in the coming months.

It also tells us people really are actively reading them, not just marking the first one as possibly interesting--lots of users don't mark sequels as to-read until they've read the first, or the preceding one, etc.

Now, with the books ranked this high, how much interaction does that represent? Well, The Thief has 77,921 ratings, and 236,000+ shelvings, and considering that finishing without rating is somewhat uncommon…that's about 150,000 users who are planning to read, or currently reading, this book. The same math for QoA is less dramatic--about 20k people have it on the agenda--but when 20k is 50% of its all-time ratings, that's...still an explosion.

This of course only represents the people who a) use GoodReads and b) keep up with their to-be-read list there, so this is only a fraction of readers in general who are likely to read it in the near future.

Part 3: The reviews are in

Giveaways of advance reader copies in the UK led to a burst of reviews in February, which were a bit puzzling to read through, as a number of them seemed to me to have come from people who did not know the genre or even the age market for the book when they entered for it, and hadn't actually been drawn to the story therefore.

A much more striking wave of reviews came later, as the UK, Spanish, and Italian readers began to interact with it organically, and a large burst of people who specifically said they'd picked it up because of Claire from Schuler Books. (Or, more often, "A TikTok with a cute librarian [sic].") These reviews have the usual range of reactions, but an overall level of enthusiasm I feel is high.

Laini Taylor was the second-most successful recommender. Many people compared The Thief favorably to Rick Riordan, Leigh Bardugo, GRR Martin, and Sarah J. Maas. (This was the first time I'd seen the series pitched to SJM's fans! I haven't read her work, but hadn't thought it was in a similar niche.) I was delighted to see several people calling it the best fantasy of travel and landscape they've read since JRR Tolkien!

The apparent age range of reviewers is quite wide, which reflects my experience of the fandom, where I've regularly chatted with people from 13 to their 60s, and likely older. There were some very cute reactions from reviewing tweens and teenagers who said that they were surprised such an OLD book from the nineties held up.

Some other book trend remarks I found interesting: lots of surprise there was no romance, including some people who, looking for a potential romance among the traveling party, proposed both Gen/Sophos (fine) and Gen/the magus (insane, thank you so much, I have questions.) A number of people who remarked that they were pleased to find a fantasy that wasn't "too fantastical," lots of positivity about feeling it had a "timeless" style, and one person who said they have found it difficult to find engaging recent YA books with boy protagonists.

Delightful excerpts from reviews of TT:

a novel that is a credit to the English language.

I loved the world MWT created, had it been an artwork it would perhaps have been more Claude Monet than Michelangelo

[Original review in Spanish, from Argentina] Gen is the best thing that has ever happened to me

The Thief also pairs very nicely with cheese and dried fruit.

The importance of narrators:

I'm giving this a 5 star rating because I listened to it as an audiobook and the narrator sounds like Henry Cavill and I have a crush on him. So, 5 stars.

And my favorite reaction to The Queen of Attolia:

This is shockingly...kinky???

Okay, thanks for reading! I'm really excited, since it looks like the fandom is in the process of...tripling? Something like that. If you have news about how the book is being promoted, or new translations/re-releases, I'd love to hear!

[tobiasdrake]

Dear goddess, I hope my ward isn't just like me.

We're really doing this. All of us. In an infinite loop of the same noble quest, maintaining the same cycles that screwed us. Does the Demon King know that he's a prop? We don't even fight him; He just shows up to burn the village and set the wheel in motion.

Or is he the one doing this? Because the Time Shards cry Resh'an but the corrupted flesh abominations of Butt Gravy and the Acolytes cry Aephorul. But also, this could just be another one of their "games".

Oh. I mean, I guess it was surprising that he--

Oh, fuck. He died, huh? It got too hard so he gave up and let death take him.

HOLD UP WHAT

YOU were sending Quarble to me!? I thought that just. Like. Happened automatically.

...

So. Level with me. How hard was it to refrain from laughing hysterically when I introduced Quarble to you way back when?

I mean, it's been more than ten seconds so I'm sure we have time to shoot the shit. Soldier Boy's roasty-toasty by now. Not like it matters. He's not the first Messenger to meet a terrible fate; Monkshroom didn't exactly finish her journey. So there has to be a system for replacing them.

Okay, but. Hear me out here: Do we? What is even being accomplished here? Is this just, like, a Time Prison to keep the Demon King in? Do we even know? Does anybody know?

My dude, that ship sailed the moment I found out you were a previous incarnation of my dumb ass.

Would it even still be there? Barn Door Tazers was pretty adamant about wanting to claim it for the Demon King.

Again, this situation has happened before. I don't know why we wouldn't--

Yep, Scroll's gone. Is anything even written on it to begin with? It's not like anything matters. Can't we pick some guy at random and give him... Hm....

That staff with the purple orb looks neat. Let's give him that and call it the Wand of Infinite Bullshit. We can cook up some lore about the wand empowering him to receive all these powerups I have in jars under the desk.

Trust me, these fucking rubes don't question shit.

Fuck me. Of course the guy not present for the meeting is the one getting volun-told. Should have seen that coming a mile away. That is, like, Playground Rules 101.

You're just mad that I wanted to tell Luana stories instead of your philosophical ramblings, aren't you?

It's a good fable, and a strong spiritual successor to some of the greatest myths in the history of party-based adventure tales!

Oh, you did find it. Weird that the Demon King's minions would just leave it there. I guess they really are just playing their part.

That's fine. I hated the blue robe look anyway. I'm supposed to dress just like everyone else at this party when I have a cool hat going unworn? Fuck no.