#but i assume when they put the headset on their bodies just vanish. because you can see that headset just sitting on the desk

[s0ckh3adstudios]

Something I'm wondering is like. what YEAR is the Amazing Digital Circus taking place in. Because like-

Pomni got here by putting on a HEADSET, probably a virtual reality headset that I think we can see on the desk in the ending shot. But the Digital Circus is clearly a game/program more reminiscent of old computer games from like- the 90's? or early 2000's?

And you especially have to wonder, going with the Kinger Is The Creator theory, just how LONG has that dude BEEN here then????? He's been here the longest and lost his marbles just a little, but like in what span of time? Even Jax has said they've been here years.

And if it HAS been that long, then how are people entering through a headset???? Did they have headsets like that back then??

[fillinforlater]

The Gamer and the Pornstar

Male Reader x Miyawaki Sakura, Song Hayoung

Length: 3725 words

Tags: one-night-stand turned porn turned friendship, gaming buddies, shy yet prepared, ANAL, missionary, GAPING, anal creampie, slow sex, love making, SLW, making out, extremely loud moaning, cumshots?

TW: barely edited, kind of rushed

Inspiration: @gangplanksorenji and @praeluxius because you know: GAPE KKURA and SLW gang

(A/N: This popped up in my mind and for some reason was easier to write than all my other drafts. An almost plotless mess mess mess mess mess, but I hope you enjoy it.)

“Hey, you wanna come over?”

It all started a couple of months ago, when an adorable young lady tapped on your shoulder. Her name was Hayoung and she immediately started to shower you with compliments. Your body's imminent reaction was to blush and increase your heart rate, but after a while you assumed there was a catch. Your intuition was right.

“Thank you for all the kind words,” you said. “But I bet you’re not doing this just to brighten my day at this boring-ass party.”

“You’re right,” Hayoung responds with a huge smile on her small face. “Let me be blunt—”

Oh, she was blunt. Hayoung, you see, is a self-made porn star, using a brand new site called Only Fans to promote her lewd, addictive videos (her words). However, she needs to spice things up, try different sizes and girths in her holes, so she is going around and finding attractive guys who’d like to help her (once again, her words).  

Hayoung, pretty and pure looking, it all changed with every new word dropping from her lips like the pin of a grenade before she exploded onto you, arms wrapped around your nape, her lips on yours. You turned into the Flash: in the blink of an eye you found yourself in her apartment, balls deep in her cunt, surrounded by two cameras. Hayoung loved to moan and scream over the top, the neighborhood surely knew of her new hobby right from the get go, and she had them all inside her (her words, her stupidly lewd words). 

Needless to say, you had a great time, and after wrapping up the shooting, you wanted to leave the apartment. The mind-blowing sex with Hayoung really had your mind blown, because instead of taking the exit, you entered another bedroom. Hayoung was sharing the apartment with someone else, a poor roommate who had to listen to the endless amounts of sex coming from the walls behind her.

To block off all the noise she was wearing a large headset and her entire focus was on this game, League of Legends. You were familiar with the game and started watching her. She must not have noticed you, even when you inched closer as the game got more intense. Her defense was on point, the towers did not fall until one of her chips-grease covered fingers slipped off and she eventually lost.

Both of you sighed—and then she started screaming as she finally noticed your presence. That’s how you met Sakura.

“I’ll be there in 10.”

#

You put your ear on the door. No screaming, no moaning. Either Hayoung is trying out choking or a ball gag or she is not shooting anything today. The last one is the least likely, yet you still give it a shot and knock a couple of times. Quick taps of tiny feet can be heard.

“Hello you guys—oh, it’s just you,” she sighs in disappointment, the horniness on her face vanishing in a moment's notice.

“Nice to see you, Hayoung,” you sarcastically respond and make your way past the small girl. “I see, you’re waiting for someone.”

“Yeah, but not for you. You’re only hanging around with Sakura-unnie all the damn time.”

“Hey! I thought you wanted to try new cocks all the time.”

Before you can reach the door to Sakura’s room, Hayoung grabs your wrist and stamps your foot. It does not hurt one bit, as her feet are naked (to be honest, she is almost fully naked, except for shorts that barely cover 80% of her ass and a bikini top to show of her small breasts) and you’re still wearing shoes.

“That does not mean you couldn’t be useful to me,” Hayoung whispers sultrily, her fingers fiddling with your zipper, pulling it down and up. 

“I think I’ll pass for now. Don’t wanna keep your Unnie waiting,” you respond and remove her hand without resisting the temptation to feel more of the silky smooth skin on her arm.

“If you’re not gonna undress for me, at least take off your shoes for her.”

“S-sure, sorry.”

Kick them off then kick in the door. The way Sakura jumps always amuses you. Her shocked expression with huge, round eyes and a wide open mouth is just gold.

"Stop doing that!" she shouts and quickly turns back to her game. Sakura looks tiny in the gaming chair, the black fabric swallowing both her pale skin and white outfit. Her raven hair is a tangled mess, weaving through every possible opening of her pink headphones. 

"How is it going?" you ask and lean onto the table, something she despises and you know that. Luckily, there are no more snacks next to her colorful keyboard. Living off of chips and chocolate could have really ruined her health, so you had to help her get rid of this habit.

What she won't get rid of is the large bottle of Pepsi. You tried to convince her of drinking water, but she wouldn’t budge a centimeter on that. Even Pepsi Maxx seems to be a no-go for her, so the dark, sugary liquid still sits on her table—until you close the lit and hide it behind your back.

“Put it back,” Sakura barks, eyes switching in between your face and the match in rapid intervals. She taps her feet in annoyance, you grin.

“Only if you answer me~” you tease her.

“It’s been going good, until you joined. We are four thousand gold ahead, everything is working, so please, don’t ruin this for me.”

You put your hands up in defeat and place the bottle back down. Then everything happens rather quickly: Sakura stands up and you immediately get on her chair, spread your legs far enough so the japanese girl can get in between them and she does so. Just a second, Sakura’s rhythm is not interrupted as the team fight starts. 

“Let’s get it,” you whisper, while Sakura still adjusts herself on your lap. The two of you, though there might be a lot of bickering on the outside, have become a coordinated team. After that fateful incident a couple of months ago, you came over more often to watch Sakura play. She was very talented, but her erratic behavior has led to her losing games she should have won, so you started to assist her.

Sakura sits on your lap. This has multiple reasons. One is that you can easily hand her something to drink while she still has both her hands occupied with the game. The second is that you can easily grab her and keep her down when she has one of her outbursts again. Sakura is used to jumping up from her chair and then lose control and focus on her character. To prevent that, you can hold her light frame down. The final reason is that after a while, Sakura finds your lap more comfortable than the chair. 

Why did you agree to taming this small lioness during her gaming sessions? For starters, Sakura is gorgeous. Her face, her body, everything is pretty and basically perfect, Who wouldn’t like to have her sit on their lap? Then comes her impeccable smell. Ever since you got rid of the greasy snacks, Sakura’s true odor of sweet sweat and even sweeter cherries has you in a dazed state.

This is your favorite job. You can’t help but smile stupidly while handing Sakura another drink or adjusting her posture, while watching an intense match of your favorite game. It’s literally perfect. If only someone could turn down the volume of Hayoungs porny moans coming from her room—who are you kidding, she sounds hot. 

“Okay, let’s go to the base. Thirty more seconds of buff, go go!”

Sakura is winning. You try everything in your power to keep it that way. Your hands find their way to her slim waist, holding it firmly so she doesn’t stand up. On some days, she wears a crop top, exposing her amazing midriff, which makes holding onto her like an ascend to heaven. Sadly, she only wears a pretty, yet modest dress so you have to live with feeling silk rather than silky skin.

“A couple more hits, come one!” 

Wrap your arms around Sakura as she almost flies off the chair in enthusiasm. Even as her teammates die at the hits of the enemy, she is able to close out the game with fantastic gameplay. Although you could let her go the second she closed out the game, you still hold her tight and she falls backwards onto your chest.

“Good job, Kkura,” you say with a smile as she struggles to get her headphones off. Her messy black hair falls over her face like drapes and the way she frees her vision is beyond beautiful. Sakura is a goddess, she plays, looks and smells like one. 

“You weren’t so bad either. Thank you,” she responds and stays. She does not stand up or shift away. She stays in your tight embrace. 

“S-so shall we—”

“Fuck, yes! Fill my pussy with your big cocks, ah!”

You can feel your cheeks burning. Sakura’s are doing the same. Hayoungs never ending screams of pleasure make the two of you tense up in awkwardness. You’d love to say something witty, but everything feels so wrong, especially with how your fantasy leaps into dangerous territory.

“Sh-she is unbelievable,” Sakura laughs awkwardly. “She said something about inviting t-t-ten guys a-and… yeah.”

“She is crazy.”

More silence from you and Sakura, while a whole choir of guys starts to groan in the background, only interrupted by Hayoungs demand for rougher, faster, deeper sex.

“Yes, fuck my ass! Stretch my hole with your—yes, right there! I’m cumming!”

Sakura melts in your grip. The word cumming has her dazed, you can see it in her expression when she looks up at you. Her round, puppy eyes have narrowed in desire and you feel her butt rub over your crotch, intentionally feeling more of your cock and making it erect.

“I-I always wondered,” she suddenly whispers, unable to hold eye contact with you. “How this w-would feel.”

“How what f-feels?” you ask her, unable to focus as she suddenly starts to face you and reveals a lot of cleavage. Wait, is she even wearing a—

“L-like… ha-having sex in th-the—

“In my b-butt…”

You have never seen Sakura so abashed, so uncertain about something. She looks fragile, a shy girl who is incapable of asking for what she really wants because it’s so lewd, so wrong. At the same time, she is already all over you, not even wearing a bra. Her hands are on your chest, you can easily pull her closer, yet your heart forces you to ask away.

“Why… why are you thinking that?”

“I-I just wondered because… when I lost my vi-virginity… Hayoung showed me how to ride th-this guy. My-my first was not that big, b-but Hayoung couldn’t stop. I-it was very… and then he put it in her… butt.”

Sakura hides her flushed face, but continues nonetheless.

“I have never s-seen a girl c-cum s-so hard.”

“So… you want to t-try it?” you carefully ask, hands still on her waist, eyes fixed on the opening of her dress. Her small, bare breasts with dark pink areolae look like a feast and her also small, not (yet) bare waist fits perfectly into your hands.

Sakura peeks through the gaps in between her fingers and takes deep breaths. “Yes, I want to try it. With you. I-I don’t want to wait any longer, please… say yes.”

You try not to smile stupidly and carefully nod. Sakura lowers both her hands, one weakly squeezes the growing bulge in your pants, while the other reaches for her drawer. In it you eye a surprising amount of condoms, douching devices and lube containers. Sakura reaches for one of them. 

“D-don’t worry,” she stutters. “I did s-some preparation.”

“Can I see?” you ask without thinking. Rationale is a steadily decreasing factor in your decision making, especially because Hayoung continues to moan with all the power her vocal cords have. She could have been a great singer—

“S-sure.” Sakura gets off of you and reaches underneath her dress. She pulls down slutty, soaked panties that only Hayoung would wear (if she wears any underwear at all). Hesitantly, she spins around and her fingers dig into the hem of her dress, her knuckles turning white.

“You don’t have to, you know?” you chuckle and take the container before any of the clear liquid will be spilled out through Sakura’s digits. Your attempt to relieve her of some pressure seems laughable with Hayoung’s crescendo reaching yet another overhyped climax.

“No!” Sakura rebuts, a pull sending her dress up and exposing her most private part, a smooth, shaven nether region and a firm, spreadable butt. Why spreadable? Because even a somewhat timid Sakura can’t help but pull apart her ass cheeks to show you what’s in between. “My-my fingers, the toys—they are not enough. I-I need you.”

Your cock threatens to break through your pants at the sight, the smell, the absurdity. Is this the b-plot to Hayoung’s porn? A slow burn scene only now reaching its final destination? Things developing at a snail's pace and now the tip of your fingers are almost in her flesh and your tip is almost in her lubed rear end? You can’t complain about this movie. 

“Now?” you ask, a final stern facade to hide your desire.

“Yes, please,” Sakura’s last, final, ultimate whimper, her lower lip tucked underneath her teeth in a bite to sever all doubts—

Wrap an arm around Sakura, her slutty little waist perfect in your hold before you let go and send her backwards on her bed. The disconnect between your bodies is not for long; one hand is already hiking up her dress further, the other is in her marvelous strands while your knees only start to make contact with the mattress.

Sakura sinks back, laying down into her pillows and your hands exploring everywhere but her stimulating spots, yet your touch and longing alone make her feel a bliss that numbs her feet, her legs, her arms. They all become idle as you spread apart her knees and get in between them, still fully clothed. 

When your lips suddenly initiate a feverish attack on her jaw, she can’t hold back. More of you, more of you—her dizzy eyes jump open and her fingers find ways to permanently reveal your body. Your bare chest is only a breath away from hers, her crotch almost on yours. You smile down at her.

“You want me this badly, Kkura~?” you tease and rub a circle on her thigh with your stupidly hard cockhead. Sakura’s soles swirl in the air, her entire body flooding with heat.

“Be careful, please.”

Her fingers sneak to her ass once more, this time showing off exactly where she wants it. The puckered entrance is not only clean, hell, even prepared would be an understatement to how inviting her hole is. Sure, the pussy above it looks fabulous, oh-so tempting to fill up and make endless love to, but the there is an unbridled thrill to the way Sakura’s asshole lightly clenches and relaxes and clenches and relaxes and—

Align yourself. Stop yourself. Sakura’s lips tremble more than the rest of her small frame. Place your elbows on each side of her head to gaze at her beauty, maybe find out what’s wrong by the glassiness of her eyes. 

“Kiss me already,” she husks.

“But I want to see your face while I do it,” you whisper.

Sakura mewls, all ten of her sweaty fingers on your lower back as she locks eyes with you. No further instructions, this is where all your knowledge ends and you can only act due to instinct. Push your hips forward, slowly, but with force to get your swollen tip into the tight hole. 

Sakura’s lips part wide open, her eyes are even wider. Her short, yet pointy nails find their way under your skin, creating a pool of pain in your lower back that you have to push through. The way she wraps snuggly around your cock negates all the pain elsewhere. Half way in, you grit your teeth and see Sakura doing the same. She is certainly in pain.

“Relax,” you whisper between profound breaths.

“K-kiss me!” she demands and you let your face finally sink to hers. In wanton need she offers her tongue and you take it for a ride, pushing it around in her mouth in a tornado-like kiss. The torrential pace tears out tension from Sakura’s body, first her limbs, then her face and finally, her insides relax. It’s a gradual process in which you become well acquainted with Sakura’s mouth, making it entirely yours.

“You feel so good,” you compliment her when your lips disconnect. “Did I ever tell you that—”

“Shh, not now,” Sakura interjects with a smile. “C-can you start… now?”

“Sure~”

For the first time since the initial penetration, you move your hips backwards, dragging your cock alongside Sakura’s lubed walls. It’s a lewd sound, a sound only the two of you can hear because Hayoung once again trumps it with her scream, though there is clearly a cock in her mouth. 

When only your tip remains inside her, you gently grab her tiny waist and begin to both push in and pull her towards you. Sakura melts into the mattress, her sweaty body becoming one with it, one with yours when you gradually fill her with more of your inches. You stop before the final one and the two of you groan straight into the other's face, eyes closed, deeply satisfied.

Or not?

“M-more,” Sakura whispers, one of her arms loosely around your nape, the other moving over her midriff to her pussy. “I want all of you.”

And you want all of her all over your dick. So you push in, further than any of her toys, girthy, pulsating; you’re close to losing your mind over her incredible body and marvelous insides. Sakura gets everything she asked for, your sack is already crazing her buttocks and in a drawn out moan, you know that she does not regret asking. 

“Kkura, I can’t—”

“D-don’t stop, fill me aga—”

She gives you a hint of permission and you take it. Like her body is just a light fleshlight, you take her slutty little waist and slam her slutty little asshole on your length to force screams from her slutty little mouth. You want Sakura to succumb to the same pleasure as you, yet she still finds a way to give you more leverage, an easier time to fuck her rear end. 

Hayoung’s porny sounds are nothing anymore to the sheer lewdness of you pistoning back and forth along lubed walls and Sakura rubbing her clit manically. You and Sakura suddenly start to lick all over the other person. It’s devouring the other without hurting them, consuming more of them without having to stop the grabbing and thrusting, both increasing their pace. 

There is a perfect rhythm, which is no rhythm at all. Switch from slow thrusts and biting her collarbone to stopping it all together and just feeling her flex and struggle around to suddenly go all out for dozens of hits that make her eyes disappear in the back of her head. Sakura is the same, her fingers rubbing her clit then two of them disappearing into her pussy for a quick double penetration, before suddenly invading your mouth. She tastes even better than she smells. Impossible.

“I’m—”

Sakura’s moan is cut short by you jerking her clit side to side. Her orgasm pulsates through her body, initiated from both her deeply penetrated asshole and her continuously flicked nub. To your surprise, she is rather quiet, unlike her roommate who never stops shouting out her pleasure. Sakura instead goes for your lips, loving biting your lower lip, evoking groans out of you. 

You realize there is nowhere to go, it’s either you cum now or you’ll be painfully blueballed, so you fold Sakura further, slam down harder and watch her narrow eyes release tears of pleasure. Everything goes quiet, except for skin slapping on skin and you groaning your final words right into her ear:

“F-fuck, I’ll fill you up, Kkura. I’m gon—”

Your vision blurs to white lick a bad transition during a powerpoint presentation. You feel Sakura’s butt squeezing out your sperm in multiple massive dumps that make her warm deep inside. But that’s not the only thing she squeezes tightly: her arms are wrapped around your upper body, forcing it onto her sweaty tits and you want to mold into her, to become one. 

Only after your final droplet of cum is inside Sakura’s ass, you slowly pull and while caressing her buttocks, you feel a lot of you running out of her. She giggles in embarrassment.

“Gu-guess you spread me pretty good.”

“Ye-yeah.”

You can’t help yourself but look at the mess you made out of her hole. It’s utterly gaped, endlessly oozing your load onto the bedsheets with her body only supported by your arms on her thighs. 

“That was great,” Sakura sighs, still out of breath. “We need to clean up though.”

Suddenly, someone goes apeshit on Sakura’s door, banging it like the drumset of a metal band.

“Hey! Hey! I know you’re inside there! I need your help, quick!” Hayoung shouts at the top of her lungs. It baffles you how she still can after all the ‘performing’ she’s been doing in the last couple of minutes.

“Uhm… bad timing,” you respond and quickly cover Sakura with a blanket. “U-unless the house is burning down, I won’t open this—”

“I need someone to cum on me, for a cumshot scene! I know you have one in you for me, please, quick!” Hayoung begs. In front of your inner eye you can see her, glazed in cum running down her entire lewd body, yet there is one part of her face not yet properly covered. Maybe one of the guy shot blanks—

You look at Sakura, her gaping hole, your thick creamy load on the bed sheets. 

Yeah, you won’t be of any help for her today.

[belgrade25]

The Swamp Map Ch.1

Foxxay: The two witches find themselves lost in the swamp they were supposed to know well.

---

“I think it’s this way.” Misty looked up from a map and pointed to her right. Her feet didn’t move, however. She instead turned around to seek approval from her companion.

Cordelia came to stand next to her, a little out of breath. “Are you sure? You said the same thing twenty minutes ago, and I feel like we’re only going deeper.”

She looked back. The tall grass and sloshy ground of the swamp concealed their footsteps, keeping them from going back. There was no way of calling for help. Her smartphone had turned into a non-smart, non-phone machine when they stepped into the swamp. The pedometer indicated that she had already achieved her daily activity goals, giving her celebratory and inspirational words. Push the limits! Go farther! She’d really rather not.

The phone beeped, and she turned the sound off without looking.

“I thought the phone didn’t work?” Misty said with a hint of hope.

Cordelia shook her head. “It’s just the alarm for the lunch meeting. Well, at this rate, I’m standing the Mayor up.”

It had started when Misty insisted on stopping by the shack on their drive home from grocery shopping. It was going to be a short stop. They would’ve had plenty of time before the Supreme had to leave the academy for the meeting.

The fault was on Cordelia’s part. She didn’t want to make a detour to their usual path to the shack, which was far from where they were driving. There didn’t seem to be enough time for that. So, they had entered the swamp from an unfamiliar spot.

What a terrible lack of foresight that had been. Haste makes waste. Or, as Myrtle liked to put, premature orgasming pleases none.

“I’m sorry.” Misty ducked her head. “It’s all because I dragged you out here, Miss Cordelia.”

Cordelia put her comforting hand on her shoulder. “Let’s focus on finding our way for now, okay?”

But there seemed no path --not even an animal trail-- to be found around them. The thick clouds hid the sun, and it was impossible for them to even get a sense of direction.

“Oh, I know!” Misty said. “We could use teleportation. Go to the shack, and you could even make it to the meeting in time.”

“It wouldn’t work. To use teleportation, it’s crucial to know one’s location in relation to where you wish to go. Witchcraft 101, Misty.”

“I may or may not have skipped that class.”

“It’s also in the textbook.”

“Never opened it before.”

“Misty--”

“Hey, so, can we teleport back to the car, then?” Misty sounded extra cheerful, dodging further lecturing. “We know where we parked the car.”

“But we don’t know where we are. So, no.”

Misty sighed and buried her nose back in the map. “What if we have walked through a portal to another dimension without knowing? Maybe that’s why everything looks strange.”

“Well, that would be a nice excuse to tell the Mayor, at least,” Cordelia said. She knew that when Misty began talking nonsense like this, she was either hungry or sleepy. Considering the time, it was most likely the hunger.

Misty nodded and hummed, lost in thought. Then, she made up her mind and started walking. Cordelia tried her hardest to walk on the less muddy part of the ground as she followed.

“What do you think lives in other dimensions, Miss Cordelia?”

Cordelia shrugged, only taking a side-glance at her. “I don’t know. It has never occurred to me.”

“Do you believe in aliens?”

“The universe is immeasurable. The size and the age. It’d be ignorant to assume we are the only living organism.”

“I think they are already here on Earth,” Misty said. “But they are so common that we don’t realize they’ve come from other planets.”

“Is that right?”

Misty noddeed with a proud grin. “The octopus. They’re so intelligent, Miss Cordelia. And, they may not use spoken words like us, but they can communicate through their skin color. Humans can’t do that. And the dragonfly-- Did you know these suckers have zero blind spot?”

Despite their situation, Cordelia couldn’t help her smile. “Someone has been binge watching nature documentaries.”

“I swear, I never thought I’d like that tiny computer. I always get the heebie-jeebies around all those machines.” She shrugged. “But it’s nice, getting to learn about the animals I’ve never known before.”

“I’m glad,” Cordelia said. “Perhaps I should give you a VR set for your next birthday so you could go to the safari or the Papua New Guinea jungles.”

“What’s VR mean?”

“Virtual reality. You wear a headset like giant goggles and immerse yourself in the digital world-”

The moment Misty heard the word digital, her curious eyes clouded with doubt mixed with slight disgust. “That means they are fake, though. Nature can’t be controlled. It’s fun because it can only be observed. That's where happy accidents come from.”

“Oh, like getting lost?”

Misty gave her a guilty glance, which made her laugh.

“I agree with you, Misty. But this better be over soon.” Cordelia looked up at the grey sky through the naked branches. “The forecast said it would rain around noon.”

Although this uncalled-for exercise was keeping them warm for now, the air was crisp. It would be freezing in the rain.

Misty wrapped her shawl tighter around her shoulders. “The girls must be chilling in front of the fireplace now, with hot cocoa . . . and s’mores . . . Hollywood is maybe taking a warm, candlelit bath.”

This made both of them shiver even more.

As they kept walking, they stumbled upon what looked to be a huhman trail. Misty opened the map again. Cordelia, on the other hand, looked at the trail in suspicion.

“Misty, I think we are going in circles.”

“What are you talking about? We’ve been walking in a straight line.”

“But, look--” Cordelia neared the biggest tree  in their vicinity and pointed at the small pile of stones at the root. “I put them up in place of footprints.”

Misty’s hesitant gaze travelled back and forth between the stones and the map. “How’d you know it’s your doing, though? Maybe some people got lost before us and did that.”

“With my magical signature in it?” Cordelia picked up the stone at the top, pushing it into Misty’s palm.

The doubt on Misty’s face vanished in an instant. The trace of the Supreme power was too evident to ignore.

“Right?” Cordelia said.

With tight lips, Misty sighed through the nose. “Alright, Miss Gretel. You’re right. We’ve been going in circles.”

“Hansel. It's the brother who leaves a trail of breadcrumbs. Not the sister.”

Misty’s sigh turned into a groan. She sat on the protruding root, folding up the map in surrender. “I wish I had a bagel right now.”

They had bought blueberry bagels at the supermarket along with her favorite sesame ones. But everything was left in the car.

“Why isn’t there a spell for conjuring food up?” Misty said.

“Witchcraft doesn’t work miracles, as regular people think. It has to abide by the law of the universe like everything else. You can’t create something out of nothing.”

“We make fire out of nothing.”

Cordelia smiled. “Not exactly. There are certain molecules in the air that produce heat. Magic just helps you collect those molecules, pack them so dense that they start to combust.”

“I understood none of that.” Her stomach grumbled as if in agreement. “Are there molecules that could produce food?”

“No.” Cordelia sat next to her on the root. Her hand reached for the folded map in Misty’s hands. “May I?”

Misty obliged to the request without a word, too tired and hopeless. It pained Cordelia to see her like that. It was way better when Misty was rambling on all gibberish.

Cordelia ran her hand up and down her shawl-clad back. “It’ll be alright, Mist. I promise. Now, can you tell me where we might be?”

It goes without saying that the swamp map didn’t compare to the sophistication of the city map. It only had a few markings here and there. But it still showed the circumventing highways and the bodies of water spread across the place. Until now, it was more than enough.

Near the center of the map was a cross mark.

Misty’s index finger hovered over the area between the cross and the south-east edge of the swamp. “Around here, I think. The car is parked somewhere here, because this is the road we were driving on, and--”

“Wait, no.” Cordelia’s index finger joined over the map. Her eyes scrutinized it as if it was a Latin spell book. “No, Misty. This is our highway”--She pointed at the one almost on the opposite side of the map--“We were supposed to go east. But we’ve been . . . going west.”

Misty held the map closer to her face, turned it upside-down, and looked at Cordelia with deer-in-the-headlights eyes.

“Misty.”

“Hmm?”

“Have you been reading the map upside-down this whole time?”

In grave silence, Misty gave a slow, thoughtful nod. “It appears that it is the case.”

It was Cordelia's turn to let out a groan.

“I’m sorry, Miss Cordelia.” Misty took her hands and blinked her puppy eyes. “Please, don’t be mad at me.”

Cordelia swore Misty knew that look could get her away with anything, at least, as long as the Supreme was concerned.

“I’m not mad, Misty. Everyone makes mistakes sometimes.” She gave gentle pats on the back of Misty’s hand before returning her attention to the map. “Okay, so, the river we walked by earlier is not this one, but more likely this one. If we follow the water, we may be able to get out.”

But the look on Misty’s face betrayed her apprehension. “What if-- Not that I doubt you, but what if the water led us deeper instead of out? How’d we know if we should go upstream or downstream?”

“Shit, you have a point.” That was a possibility that Cordelia didn't like to dwell on. “But you know what? Either way, the swamp would end if we kept walking.”

Misty’s stomach grumbled again as her expression turned into that of despair. “I should’ve had an extra begel this morning,” she said, standing on her weakening feet.

Cordelia wrapped her arm around her waist in support. “You can have as many bagels as you want when we get home. I won’t stop you.”

[ramialkarmi]

The smartphone is eventually going to die, and then things are going to get really crazy (AAPL, GOOG, GOOGL, MSFT)

One day, not too soon — but still sooner than you think — the smartphone will all but vanish, like beepers and fax machines before it. 

Make no mistake, we're still probably at least a decade away from any kind of meaningful shift away from the smartphone. (And if we're all cyborgs by 2027, I'll happily eat my words. Assuming we're still eating at all, I guess.)

Yet, piece by piece, the groundwork for the eventual demise of the smartphone is being laid by Elon Musk, by Microsoft, by Facebook, by Amazon, and a countless number of startups that still have a part to play.

And, let me tell you: If and when the smartphone does die, that's when things are going to get really weird for everybody. Not just in terms of individual products, but in terms of how we actually live our everyday lives and maybe our humanity itself.

Here's a brief look at the slow, ceaseless march towards the death of the smartphone — and what the post-smartphone world is shaping up to look like. 

The short term

People think of the iPhone and the smartphones it inspired as revolutionary devices — small enough to carry everywhere, hefty enough to handle an increasingly large number of our daily tasks, and packed full of the right mix cameras and GPS sensors to make apps like Snapchat and Uber uniquely possible. 

But consider the smartphone from another perspective. The desktop PC and the laptop are made up of some combination of a mouse, keyboard, and monitor. The smartphone just took that model, shrunk it down, and made the input virtual and touch-based. 

So take, for example, the Samsung Galaxy S8, unveiled this week. It's gorgeous with an amazing bezel-less screen and some real power under the hood. It's impressive, but it's more refinement than revolution.

Tellingly, though, the Galaxy S8 ships with Bixby, a new virtual assistant that Samsung promises will one day let you control every single feature and app with just your voice. It will also ship with a new version of the Gear VR virtual reality headset, developed in conjunction with Facebook's Oculus.

The next iPhone, too, is said to be shipping with upgrades to the Siri assistant, along with features aimed at bringing augmented reality into the mainstream. 

And as devices like the Amazon Echo, Sony PlayStation VR, and the Apple Watch continue to enjoy limited but substantial success, expect to see a lot more tech companies large and small taking more gambles and making more experiments on the next big wave in computing interfaces. 

The medium term

In the medium-term, all of these various experimental and first-stage technologies are going to start to congeal into something familiar, but bizarre. 

Microsoft, Facebook, Google and the Google-backed Magic Leap are all working to build standalone augmented reality headsets, which project detailed 3D images straight into your eyes. Even Apple is rumored to be working on this, too.

Microsoft's Alex Kipman recently told Business Insider that augmented reality could flat-out replace the smartphone, the TV, and anything else with a screen. There's not much use for a separate device sitting in your pocket or on your entertainment center, if all your calls, chats, movies, and games are beamed into your eyes and overlaid on the world around you. 

Meanwhile, gadgetry like the Amazon Echo or Apple's own AirPods become more and more important in this world. As artificial intelligence systems like Apple's Siri, Amazon's Alexa, Samsung's Bixby, and Microsoft's Cortana get smarter, there's going to be a rise not just in talking to computers, but having them talk back.

In other words, computers are going to hijack your senses, more so than they already do, with your sight and your hearing intermediated by technology. It's a little scary. Think of what Facebook glitches could mean in a world where it doesn't just control what you read on your phone, but what you see in the world around you.

The promise, though, is a world where real life and technology blend more seamlessly. The major tech companies promise that this future means a world of fewer technological distractions and more balance, as the physical and digital world become the same thing. You decide how you feel about that.

The really crazy future

Still, all those decade-plus investments in the future still rely on gadgetry that you have to wear on you, even if it's only a pair of glasses. Some of the craziest, most forward-looking, most unpredictable advancements go even further — provided you're willing to wait a few extra decades, that is.

This week, we got our first look at Neuralink, a new company cofounded by Elon Musk with a goal of building computers into our brains by way of "neural lace," a very early-stage technology that lays on your brain and bridges it to a computer. It's the next step beyond even that blending of the digital and physical worlds, as man and machine become one. 

Assuming the science works — and lots of smart people believe that it will —  this is the logical endpoint of the road that smartphones started us on. If smartphones gave us access to information and augmented reality puts that information in front of us when we need it, then putting neural lace in our brains just closes the gap.

Musk has said that this is because the rise of artificial intelligence — which underpins a lot of the other technologies, including voice assistants and virtual reality — means that humans are going to have to augment themselves just to keep up with the machines. If you're really curious about this idea, futurist Ray Kurzweil is the leading voice on the topic. 

The idea of man/machine fusion is a terrifying one, with science fiction writers, technologists, and philosophers alike having very good cause to ask what even makes us human in the first place. At the same time, the idea is so new that nobody really knows what this world would look like in practice.

So if and when the smartphone dies, it'll actually be the end of an era in more ways than one. It'll be the end of machines that we carry with us passively and the beginning of something that bridges our bodies straight into the ebb and flow of digital information. It's going to get weird. 

And yet, lots of technologists already say that smartphones give us superpowers with access to knowledge, wisdom, and abilities beyond anything nature gave us. In some ways, augmenting the human mind would be the ultimate superpower. Then again, maybe I'm just an optimist.

SEE ALSO: How Apple can silence the haters, crush Google and Microsoft, and build a thousand-year empire

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