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noirleo · 11 months

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Did someone say gush about your self-insert?! *taps on microphone*

Beatrice exists in every Turtle-verse in some shape or form, but I have had Bayverse on the brain lately! Not an exact self-insert, but I never or rarely see characters in media that look like me (plus-size) or live my neurodivergent and disabled experiences (fibromyalgia), so I pour a lot of myself into her. It feels nice to have the hero fall in love with the parts of myself that I'm still exploring and unpacking.

She meets the boys when she and the four of them are in their late teens and she is some weeks away from graduating high school. Bea is really friendly with a lot of her neighbors, including a family that owns a restaurant and likes to serve food to the homeless. Some cops come by to harass them and the brothers step in. The boys are all charmed by the five foot nothing woman threatening to swing her cane at one of the officers. They start to get to know her and Bea moves into the lair not long after once her grandmother passes and she can no longer keep the apartment.

Found family is the biggest cornerstone in her life. April and Casey and Splinter become surrogate parents to Bea and she gains three protective teddy bears of turtle big brothers in Mikey, Donnie, and especially Raph. But she and Leo fall in love and thinking about it just turns me to mush.

She is a humongous dork. A human disaster. Clumsy as heck and will info dump on you about Pokemon or her art or her passion for marine biology for hours if you let her. After college, she will work at a zoo in the aquarium as a tour guide and keeper. Bea and Leo bond a lot when Splinter asks her to teach him how to cook (the poor toaster could not take much more) and it is a slow and deep burn from then on out. He is so patient with her and she him and at the core of their love is a strong friendship and understanding and tender vulnerability. They accept each other for everything the other is and feel at home and safe when they're together.

Eventually Bea is hit with mutagen and turns into a GIANT alligator snapping turtle mutant. She is as tall as Donnie and never remembers to duck before entering a room. There is also at least one adopted turtle baby in her and Leo's future. 💙 I hope to post some fics soon.

Thanks for letting me dump all my turtle love on you! This was a lot of fun!

see you get it. you understand that leo is fatally attracted to human disasters, its his achilles heel in any universe

she seems like so much fun and such a well rounded oc, i bet she and mikey totally bonded over a love for pokemon and video games:) and i can totally see raph taking one look at her and her tiny grandma and thinking “yeah we’re keeping them” akdjfjs

i want to hear all about beatrice’s adventures in trying to teach leo to cook bc i just know it was a trauma bonding event

#asks #anon #oc sharing circle #thank u for sharing i love her!!#its always nice to meet a fellow leo gal

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aros001 · 3 years

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Read through light novel vol. 15. Random thoughts.

Well, I just found one of my favorite volumes of this series. For all the right and wrong reasons.

There is a certain trope or term I've heard of for comedy. Where a joke or skit can be really funny but can also go a little too far with the performance to where it can be a little annoying. But there are also plenty of times where the joke/skit takes it even FURTHER than that and it circles back around to being funny again. Naofumi with Raph-chan is a little like that. His love for the little furball was cute and funny at first, then it became a little odd and maybe a little cringey, and now it's gone to such an extreme that it's circled back to funny again, with the Shield hero now commanding a legion of Raph-chans. Also, Naofumi and Ruft bonding over Raph-chan is genuinely really sweet. Between that, how much he clings to Naofumi (or Raph-chan) when he's scared, and just the liking he's taken to the kid, I think Naofumi has definitely found his son figure. Honestly their relationship feels a little more parent and child than even Naofumi and child Raphtalia's was and it took me a bit before I figured out why that was, at least for me.

Naofumi was very parental to Raphtalia and does still somewhat think of her as his daughter. However, when they first met it was also a situation where Raphtalia had to grow up very quickly, and not just physically through leveling. She was bought as a slave and didn't want to go back to the trader. She wanted to fight back against the things that took her family and village from her. She wanted to be Naofumi's sword. She was the sole reason he could gain any significant experience and level up into the Shield Hero he needed to be. The romantic feelings she gained for him were almost certainly a factor but overall, for her sake and his, staying a child, staying as someone's daughter, was not an option. What Naofumi needed wasn't a daughter but a partner. Someone he could lean on and trust.

With Ruft, there is no need for him to grow up quite yet. Yes, Naofumi took him to the village so he could get some experience with the real world and he does plan on toughening him up, but Naofumi is not dependent on Ruft like he was Raphtalia. There's no pressure for Ruft to grow up because Naofumi and everyone else will be fine regardless, so he has more freedom to be a kid. And unlike Filo and the village kids, he doesn't have the added complication of also being Naofumi's slave. Naofumi can treat him and care for him like a kid.

Side note, but is it weird that, even though I know he's related to Raphtalia, before I finally was given an image of him I kept on imagining Ruft looking like Gohan from the very beginning of Dragon Ball Z? Chinese Emperor clothes and all. It feels a little unintentionally racist of me given that Q'ten Lo is meant to resemble isolationist period Japan.

“The Bow Hero mentioned that he has a skill which allows him to scout out the surrounding area from a higher vantage point,” Raphtalia recalled. Itsuki said that? I mean, he was the Bow Hero. It wouldn’t be strange for him to have a skill that allowed him to search for distant targets. That sounded like quite a convenient skill too.

I'm glad about this little detail. I was just saying in the last volume that it felt like the other three heroes didn't seem to have any abilities that weren't directly attack-based. And then later with the hero conference we get even more added to their arsenals beyond just "attack, big attack, and bigger attack" like they'd been showing up until now. Before it felt like the other three could be a bit interchangeable in battle with Naofumi, as it's three attackers and one defender, with range being the only difference. But now, between the four of them, it's a good mix of attack, defense, support, healing, and debuffs. The Four Holy Heroes actually work as a party together.

“R-Raphtalia. Brother. I just want to go and see Master Naofumi! Move aside,” Atla stated.

“No,” Raphtalia replied.

“Never,” replied her brother.

“Raph!” barked a horde of Raphs.

I can hear the freaking echo! I'm dying!

“To be more accurate, they are filolials who act like mountain bandits, attacking wagons carrying off goods and stuff like that,” Melty continued.

...

“Hold on a moment. What the hell is going on then? And—” I finished my thought in my head. If this was the issue that Fitoria wanted help with, then . . . “You’re telling me filolials fight over wagons?”

“Yes. That’s what I’ve been told,” Melty confirmed. Uwah! So she wanted me to resolve some kind of turf war? If these were wild filolials, they weren’t going to go down without a fight.

“The loser has to give their wagon to the winner,” Melty explained. “Also, if it’s the season of love, they can only find love by defeating their opponent.” What were they, hermit crabs?

This is going exactly where I think it's going, isn't it?

[Two chapters later]

“It’s been a while, father-in-law. It’s me, I say, Motoyasu the street racer!”

F******************************************K!

I get Motoyasu is under the effect of his curse series but...it's just so hard to like this guy. It was even before Witch betrayed him and his curse activated. Especially when he uses his Temptation ability to "show Filo his love", basically trying to force her into loving him. Thank goodness it didn't work and that Raph-chan can clear away the effects it did have. Naofumi could stand to be more considerate of Raphtalia when it comes to the Raphs but Motoyasu has been straight up harassing Filo. He tried to keep her trapped in her "angel" form when rescuing her from Naofumi's "brainwashing" and probably was going to keep her that way forever if Witch didn't have her "accidentally" killed along with Melty when removing the brainwashing. I'm pretty sure she was the main person he wanted to peep on in the baths at Cal Mira. He stole her favorite wagon and transformed it into...that. And then there's the shape of...

No...

No!

I'd heard a rumor but...

NO!

I thought it was a web novel thing!

WHY DOES MOTOYASU HAVE A DILDO SPEAR?!?!

Or...god, what if it's not a dildo?!

“I’m taking your daughter. Using my Lust Envy Spear IV,” Motoyasu exclaimed. God. This was all depressing me intently.

“Filo-tan! I will stop you and take your purity!” Motoyasu thrust his spear at Filo.

“Boo!” She wasn’t interested. Then I noticed what he was pointing at. Below the waist, shall we say.

....................Kill him. Kill him. F**king kill him. I don't care about the consequences to the world. Kill him. Kill him now. Have Aura and Mare come over from Overlord and Iris come over from Konosuba. They'll all team up with Filo so that the lolis he loves so much can snap his f**king neck.

I get he's under the effects of a curse (two curses even; lust and envy) but he's almost everything he and Witch accused Naofumi of being. He's brainwashing people and an attempted rapist. All he's missing is abusing his slaves and kidnapping Melty.

...F**k. Okay, back to reality.

So Quirks exist in Itsuki's universe? Last volume I made a comparison between Motoyasu #2 and Bakugo from My Hero Academia because they fit similar tropes for me, but in terms of actual backstory and character, Itsuki is definitely the better comparison. Thought he was special in elementary school because of his powers but got slapped with a bit of reality upon entering the special school for powers. For both of them, this fed into an inferiority complex. It does also add more to Itsuki's hero complex. Bakugo's Quirk and natural talents had him overpraised from youth, leading him to fear the failure of living up to expectations of him. For Itsuki, it goes a little the other way, where his expectations for himself were high, got shattered because the powers above his level were much greater and thus nothing was expected to become of him in comparison, and so he fell into console games where he could be important and the main character for once.

None of this forgives how he treated Rishia but I'd still rather have this understanding and explanation of his character than not. He and Trash have a slightly similar problem for me, and it's not the story's fault. Itsuki's curse has left him pretty fried and emotionless, though it's slowly coming back to him. He hasn't really had a chance to redeem himself. He's working to better himself, yes, but he's also in a state where he'll do everything he's told. He had a nice, split-second apology to Rishia he managed to get out but that's about it. Similarly with Trash, he and Itsuki have sympathetic backstories but he is so lost in his hatred the Shield Hero, Siltvelt, and a few other things that he has not taken responsibility or shown remorse for any of the things that had happened because of him, including his youngest daughter nearly being killed multiple times. Before he was half-crazy and now after meeting Alta and Fohl he just seems withered away and beaten. Trash and Itsuki's situations are sympathetic but they've yet to do anything that puts me on their side beyond basic human empathy and pity.

Compare that to Ren, whom I'm glad I quite like now. He never did anything as bad as Trash or Itsuki, nor does he have as tragic a backstory as either (that's been told to us yet anyway), but he still felt remorse for the bad things he did do and has actively worked to try and make up for them or make certain they don't happen again, because he knows he screwed up. I'm not just supposed to pity him. Like with Naofumi, I'm supposed to see him rise and he does, at several points in this volume being very helpful to very heroic. And I like how he and Naofumi contrast with each other without completely butting heads like stubborn bulls, like over the bandits for justice. They're both heroes but Ren is working hard to be a real hero to make up for the lack of one he was before, while Naofumi outright sees himself as a bad person, that all his good deeds are for selfish motivations and that he's not deserving of being hailed as a hero to begin with.

Well, I think that was all I was going to talk about. Yes sir.

...

.......

.................

.....................

..............................Alta on the cover. Alta on the inner art and quote page. Most of this book being about Fohl's fear over Alta's safety. There were so many red flags you'd think the Phoenix's explosion broke the fourth wall and set fire to the pages themselves.

Yeah, this death was better than Ost's. Ost's death still worked despite her short time with Naofumi's party because there was still emotion during that time and she still is often referenced, remembered, and mourned for even in volumes well after her death, so it feels less cheap and manipulative and more like it actually meant something. With Alta though, it's not just better just because we knew her longer (though that's certainly a factor) but because of the effect on the main characters, especially Naofumi. The raw pain, the denial, the begging, the self-blame, the sheer seething anger, the emptiness. Even the way it's written when she first jumps in the way and after the attack finally ends, it feels like the aftermath of a grenade. Everything is blurred and shaky, everything is silenced except for the ringing in his ears and its not entirely clear what's going on, only that something bad just happened. Naofumi runs through every emotion you'd want from someone like him and it has an even more personal meaning than that. Alta sacrificing herself for him gave Naofumi a bit of a hard slap in the face as to what everyone he cares about would feel if he sacrificed himself for them, which he's tried doing a few time already. It was a very good send-off for Alta.

This was also both the best and worst time for Naofumi to finally be told outright that Raphtalia loves him. Looking forward to either loving or being very frustrated with where this goes. Though regardless, that final art of them just hugging and crying it out is going to hold a special place in my heart.

Trash was apparently the Seven Star Staff Hero. I’d never seen him holding the staff and honestly wondered if the original king was dead and this was just a doppelganger.

Just where was he hiding the Seven Star Staff?

After the dildo spear, please don't ask me to imagine where Trash hides his staff.

Original Reddit post: https://www.reddit.com/r/shieldbro/comments/fndipx/read_through_light_novel_vol_15_random_thoughts/

#rising of the shield hero #random thoughts #reddit repost

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tmnt-spear-verse · 6 years

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Spear-Verse: Hamato Leonardo

He is their leader, both nominally and in fact, but his leadership is a relaxed one. He knows his family, his team, well enough to trust in their abilities— just as they trust in him to strategize and know how to move the pieces to make certain they all come out alive. Hunting has honed them, honed him into knowing their quirks— their harshness, their sharp edges, the ways they move, their sounds —and that he can trust that they will be where he expects them to be in a fight. Not because he has ordered them there, although he does use his knowledge of them to put them where they’re most effective, but because he has learned how to play to their strengths without demanding they do things his way.

There is a sense of relief for him, a weight off his shoulders, in knowing that his brothers are perfectly capable of handling themselves and that all he has to do is move the pieces to where they each can be the most effective and then just let them go. He leads, but he doesn’t control.

Why try to exert control or enforce some hierarchy when they have all learned the lessons that come from being a pack on the hunt? Hamato Leonardo learned early on that hierarchy and leadership didn’t matter in the hunt; what mattered was coordination, trust, and letting whoever was closest to their prey be the first to engage to take it down. He learned through the exhilaration of swinging and leaping through treetops after prey, the heart-pounding near-misses, the overwhelming joy singing in his veins as he or one of his brothers caught up to land the first strike, and the blood-rush that made celebratory calls bubble up from his chest and pour forth from his throat as they successfully took their prey down. Perfect control and behavior don’t count for much when it might cost them being able to eat, and so Leonardo has learned to be their brother first and their leader second.

Learning that has paid off. It opened him up to learn the value in his brothers’ ways of being— to see how Raph’s strength and carefully wielded anger was shaped by his need to be their wall, their protector, the one to scare off threats before they could even get started; how Donnie’s technical and medical interests, as well as his dedication to knowledge that might have been lost, is driven by his need to keep them healthy and sate his never-ending curiosity; how Mikey’s need to goof around and play softens his sharp edges and keeps the world bright when there is so much that could have made it dark and unbearable. Learning from them opened him to later learning from April and Casey— how her sharp wit and careful words can cut through so much unstated nonsense to get to the heart of a matter, diffusing fights and preventing problems before they can get started, almost like the verbal counterpoint to Raph; and how Casey, for all of his chaotic loudness, seems to have the bizarre ability to know exactly when to say ‘fuck it’ to being tactful and go all-in.

His pack, his team, his clan are everything to him. They are his family and he trusts them with everything. Hamato Leonardo is a ninja and the leader of his small clan, but he’s so much more than that.

In recognizing Raph’s need to protect them he was able to step back and accept the help— adopting the leather sleeves and lower-leg guards almost as soon as Raph finished the first sets. They’re effective; it’s much harder to end up with gashes or ripped-up scales on their arms or legs since they started using them. The same with the carved-bone breastplate that Raph strung together and presented to him after a particularly bad night that had resulted in Leo getting a nasty gouge in his plastron. A little deeper, with a little more force, and Leo might not have walked away from that fight— and thanks to some human-supremacists his family might have been down by one. It’s an injury that has since healed up and all physical signs of it had been shed, but the memory of it still lingers. Wearing the breastplate has become an ingrained habit.

In recognizing Donnie’s need to learn more he was able to stop and listen— accepting that where there are things he doesn’t or can’t see the value in, Donnie can and is more than capable of bringing what’s in his mind into the world. There’s so much that they’ve gained and learned how to do thanks to Donnie’s perpetual curiosity and enthusiasm for recovering information that might otherwise have been lost to them that it’s almost impossible to quantify. They’ve come so far from the rough home of woven branches covering the entrance of a hole in the ground that Splinter had scrambled to create when they first arrived in the forest, and it’s in large part thanks to Donnie and his persistence. Given enough time and resources, Leo wouldn’t be surprised if Donnie manages to give them their own contained electrical system with a functioning computer to go along with it. Maybe a functioning refrigerator while he’s at it. As it is, even with the tech limitations they have to live with, Donnie has still managed to be one of the most effective medics in the area— which has certainly kept Leo from dying more times than he cares to think about.

In recognizing Mikey’s need to play he was able to let go and be in the moment— enjoying humor, silliness, and opportunities for bonding moments that he might otherwise have let slip by without even noticing what he’d missed. Affection came easier, made it easier to read the others, made it easier to avoid unnecessary fights and work things out. Mikey’s humor and play kept all of them from giving in to the knife-edge bare-bones approach to the world that so many had after the collapse had happened. His playfulness was a constant reminder that there was still joy and happiness to be found in the world, even if they occasionally had to tip into the knife-edge viewpoint in order to survive— it was a reminder that even as bad as things were or could be, that the bad things didn’t have to be their entire lives. Even as obnoxious as Mikey could be at times, his usual cheer kept them from ever falling into depression.

April and Casey both had taught him the necessity at times of getting to the point within seconds. Negotiations, haggling, niceties— none of it matters when a resolution is needed as soon as possible, and in their time since others in the area gradually became aware of them it’s become a skill he’s learned to lean on time and time again. Other versions of him, he knows, aren’t as used to having to directly negotiate and work out boundaries with ‘neighbors,’ traders, and a whole host of other people who occasionally wander through his family’s home territory, but thanks to April and Casey’s guidance it’s a skill he’s learned in spades. It’s led to his family largely going un-harassed, but it’s also resulted in some unexpected friendships and instances of being called on by their ‘neighbors’ for help. Their closest ‘neighbors’ might be several miles away, but the friendships and alliances that have resulted have strengthened the net of safety around his family considerably.

Hamato Leonardo has learned to be confident, relaxed, and unapologetic about who and what he is. He is a ninja; his calm and poise are unrivaled when necessary, his swords an extension of himself, a fierce opponent who knows how to use shadows and subtlety to his advantage. He is a predator; familiarity with being able to track visually and at times with scent renders him unsettling, the reverberating calls and battle-cry howls he can emit as he races through the treetops induce panic in others and render him terrifying, to say nothing of how familiar he is with blood and death. He is a mutant turtle; chirps, hisses, growls, and other sounds are par for the course and he has come to refuse the idea of behaving ‘more human’ to make himself more palatable for others. He is a brother and son; his loyalty and affection for his family is unwavering and unbreakable, and he’ll continue his easy affection with them for as long as they live— and if it results in him and his brothers occasionally sleeping in a pile even when they’re in their 80s or older, then so be it. He is a leader, and because of what he’s capable of and has accomplished, he has become trusted far beyond what he would have imagined possible.

#TMNT #Leo #Leonardo #Leonardo Hamato #spear verse #character study #writing #long post

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