#i haven't actually read a lot from the foxes but from what i've seen they seem really cool. the whole family i mean

[telffiin]

tim drake is NOT underrated/underappreciated 😭😭😭 he's literally the fandom's darling boy. and i'm not even trying to be a hater. it's literally true.

you know who is underrated? duke thomas. and the foxes.

[factual-fantasy]

26 ASKS!! :DD THANK YALL!! 🎉🎂🎉

@ardent-38 @lime-ether @piperjistic @elegysonnet @storylover2 @forestrests

AAAAAA THANK YALL SO MUCH!! :DDD YALL ARE THE BEST!! :}} 💖💖💖

(Sorry I'm a bit late!)

:DD Thank you!! My favorite might be plain vanilla 😋💖

@unpopularartist14

I have definitely heard of it and seen it around. :0 And I got a good taste of it from SMG4s video on it XDD I've thought about watching it in the past. Though hearing about that widely accepted ship.. Ehhh,, I'm not so sure now.. <XD

@sunshine-vr6

@wdillustration

:DD THANK YOU!! :}}}

@badlyblurry (Post in question)

XDD It really has. The poor guy is so conflicted. This really seems like a romantic moment. But surly she's just excited about her new form and doesn't understand the typical boundaries friends have.

Surly someone as beautiful and desirable as Blue.. wouldn't be interested in a old cookie like him.

..Right??

@jesterpiecethejester

They're still on my blog, I never deleted them or anything. You just gotta go to my #undertale tag and scroll down a bit-

@minnesotamedic186 (Post in question)

AWW!! Its might be a bit out of character for Blue, but its still a cute scene!! :DD

@keakruiser (Sorry for replying a bit late!)

:DDD THANK YOU!! I had some giant cookies and cream cupcakes! 😋😋

Huh, suprising!

....now what does Urchin taste like.. 🍴🍪

@edgywithaheart

Ooooo interesting!! :DD Though I wonder if this would change Barnaby and Howdy at all <XDD

GASP!! Nooo not my boy! He would never do a crime. XD

@jenny-the-fox

XD I think I have a couple of OCs that belong there--

(Post in question)

Oh! Thank you for the info! :DD

@candyglumboy (Post in question)

That could be an interpretation of it yeah :00 but to be totally honest, I haven't thought it all through yet..

The intention behind that comic is its showing that Eddie used to be a human. And now he's.. well. He's Eddie.

The comic was trying to show that there was someone he used to know when he was human. His sister? His mother? Someone.. He knew someone. And now that he's in the neighborhood.. she's gone. What happened to her? Who was she? Why do I miss her so much?.. Why.. am I crying? Why am I shaking?

"..What was I talking about.?"

@astaherussy

EATING THIS SCENARIO LIKE GARLIC BREAD FR!!! AAAAA JUST IMAGINE EVERYONE'S REACTIONS!!

I think the 3 of them are no strangers to bloody scenes, but that wouldn't make seeing their Octokids so hurt any easier.. <:(( Now I'm not much of a writer, and idk if this is the kind of response you were expecting.. but none the less you have inspired me! :}}

I can see them offering their services if needed, but mostly just staying out of Peso's way and letting him do his thing. when everything winds down and they're able to see each other.. it would be tough. :((

Kwazii would be in high spirits as always despite the injuries. He would proudly tell Calico Jack about how he was bravely able to fend off multiple sharks! He expected a lot of enthusiasm from his Grandad.. "..Y-Ye did great Kwazii, ye protected yer crew well. I'm real proud of ya for that.." Instead he got a more.. somber response.

With the time Kwazii has spent with the Octonauts, he's gotten a lot better at reading people. Its not hard to tell when someone is shaken. His ears are pinned back, his tail is puffed up and flicking back and fourth.. its clear that Jack isn't taking this sight well.

Kwazii would probably sit up straighter. "Hey,, Grandad I'm.. I'm alright, ye don't need to worry." He'd gently grab Jacks arm, getting his attention. "I'll be alright, this isn't a big deal! Really, I'm ok! It looks a lot worse than it actually is."

Jack might take a deep breath and nod "..I know. I know you'll be alright, lad.." His ears were still pinned back. Kwazii frowns. "..I'm alright now Grandad. This is small, trust me.." Jack would pause.. but then nod. Seeing Kwazii so beaten is hard for Jack to stomach. But Kwazii is one tough cookie.. Just like him. He knows that things will be ok. Kwazii will be ok.. They're both ok..

~~~

When Marsh came in to see Tweak, he almost lost his composure. He knows Tweak is tough. And she's gotten hurt a lot growin up, this ain't nothin she cant handle. But gosh, this hurts. That's his little girl. It hurts so much to see her like this. She's collapsed in medbay, and has her leg all bound up in a cast.

"Pa! Heh, uh- sorry about all this. You an I were supposed to go out swimmin after that mission. I guess uh.. it'll have to wait.. heh.."

A deep breath, "Now don't chu worry bout none of that," He sat down beside her bed and pat her on the shoulder. "You just put all yer energy into gettin better. Ok? We can always go see the reef another time." His droopy ears and shaky voice wasn't helping his tough façade..

Tweaks pauses for a moment. But then offers her hand to Marsh. He takes it, confused at first.

"..I'm sorry I scared you pa.. I'll be ok.."

...Unable to reply, Marsh just nods. He sighs and wipes his tears away. Gripping Tweaks hand tighter. He sniffles, and just nods..

~~~

Natquik's meeting with Barnacles went a little smoother than the others. He is no stranger to the sight of blood. And knowing that Barnacles is tough as nails, he wasn't too worried about him.. but still. Seeing Barnacles in such a state.. it wasn't easy.

When Natquik came in, he placed a gentle paw on the bears shoulder. "Barnacles, how do you feel? Are your wounds bad..?" Barnacles' voice was gravelly and slow. He had a nasty headache after that facial injury.. "..Oh.. I'll be alright.. its nothing I.. cant recover from.."

Natquik pulls up a stool and sits beside him. "You gave me a big scare, you know. You must not do that to me! No more dangerous missions for you!" He said wagging his finger.

Barnacles chuckled. "That wasn't meant to.. be a dangerous mission. Things just.. got out of hand." Natquik nods. "Yes yes, I can see.." His tone seemed off at the end there..

"..Are you alright, Professor?" It takes Natquik a second to respond.. Seeming to think over his words. "Don't worry for me, Barnacles. I am better now that I have seen you. And you will heal fine, yes? So all is ok." His hesitation wasn't reassuring.. But he knows how Natquik is. So doesn't push it further. "Yes, despite the scene we caused.. most of these injuries are minor. We'll be.. alright." Natquik puts on a smile that cant truly be read. "That is all that matters, my friend."

~~~

ALSO WAAHAGA THANK YOU SO MUCH!! :DDD I'm so glad to hear you like my stuff!! And you're interested even when you don't know thE CANON? BESTIE I AM HONORED!! 😭😭💖💖😭💖💖

And of course I would respond! :DD I LOVE receiving comments/interaction with my work. Its the #1 thing I hope my posts receive! Now I cant respond to every single one unfortunately, but I do read them all and respond to as many as I possibly can!! :D I'll take this moment to give a big thank you to all that leave me messages/comments/asks! They're my favorite thing!! 💖💖🥰💖

@couchwow

Thank you! :D Also OOOO CREATRURES! :DDD

@peaspods

I don't have a master post for those, no.. it would take a ton of effort for me to comb through my entire blog to compile it all so I haven't done it..

You can find all/most of that stuff under my #octonauts tag and my #deltarune tag. I hope this helps!

I did have a blue blanket for a time.. though that blanket doesn't actually exist irl-

Also man, that would take me forever to make. Bibi and the other's quilts were really small and easy to work with. I cant imagine all the time it would take for me in this state to make a full human sized quilt-

Plus I would have to draw the quilt with me whenever I draw my sona. Which would suck because then it would take longer for me to draw myself <XDD

XD Thank you!! :D I'm so glad you like them! :}}

WAAAAA THATS SO GOOODD!! 😭😭😭😭

[universitysunflowers]

I rewatched Merlin for the first time in years and collected my thoughts.

Merlin was such a baby in the first season I forget just how tiny and innocent he was.

The number of times Merlin has been suspected of witchcraft and then got out of it is so hilarious like yea here’s this actual wizard but don’t worry he’s been cleared of all charges nothing to worry about here haha

accused by the witchfinder

sentenced to death as old man sorcerer

straight up confessing to Uther in order to save Gwen

Gaius is to old for this

Sir Leon puts up with so much shit from the Pendragon family

Somebody please give him a vacation he does not get paid enough for this (having to tell his boss that he married a troll was a real low point you can see him losing the will to live)

He's running on three hours of sleep and six cups of coffee

Corrie guard commander Fox reincarnated as a knight of Camelot (working for a maniacal tyrant in the most dramatic political court the world has ever seen will take a lot out of you)

King Cenred is the medieval embodiment of the King of Hybern like that is exactly how I imagine him when I read ACOTAR (Tom Ellis, as always, was a great casting choice)

Freya deserved better Ik she had to die to keep the Excalibur storyline going but she could have been such a great character (merlin was so sad bring his gf back poor baby)

Lancelot my wholesome baby you are to precious for this world you deserved so much better

I can't explain it but I just know Gwaine would have done well on book tok

Ok I know Morgana was a terrible queen and burned the crops but honestly props to her for paying attention to the paperwork

I can’t tell if Agravaine looked at Morgana like a daughter or if he was falling in love with her and honestly both are very disturbing to me.

Aithusa is the most adorable dragon look at his little face Ik he gets attached to Morgana but seriously I can’t not love him.

seeing him so beaten and abused is so sad please get him some help

We should have seen more of him with Merlin

How Kilgharra hasn't cooked Merlin like a costco roast chicken is beyond me, this dragon must have some sort of immortality driven godlike patience in order to put up with that boy as long as he has.

Gaius please get a hair cut

I’m a few episodes into season five and I hit that point where I know what’s coming and it’s making me not want to finish the show. I don’t want to but I feel like I should.

I crapped out. I made it to the episode where Gwen uses the stable boy to try and kill Arthur and then never finished the season. I knew this was going to happen I haven't made it all the way through the series in years. If I ever make it through the end of season five again I'll be sure to give my thoughts but for now I've fallen back into a Gossip Girl rewatch.

Sometimes I forgot to write things then wrote it down later so it might be out of order but whatever enjoy my musings.

[miiilowo]

honestly id love if you talked about williams personality i havent read the books and only have that weird ending in the vr game to go off of lol

okay time to go silly mode

I'm gonna say first off I haven't really read the books, and that's where most of the information on his personality is, of course. The best source I've found regarding him is the @canon-william-afton blog- it's currently inactive, for what I fear are very unfortunate reasons, but there's a good backlog of content there with little to no fandomy sort of objections-Just pure analysis. It's rather sexy of them

When it comes to Williams personality, it's important to try and push the child murder thing out of mind for a minute I find. Mostly because serial killers tend to have a set personality in media-While William does have some of those traits, he doesn't conform to any particular stereotype or trope

He's a businessman! While he's still a very skilled engineer, he primarily took up the charismatic and.. Yknow, business, side of things, while henry stayed behind to be the ideas man with the creativity and animatronics. William can certainly use that charisma to his advantage like your average killer character might, but his charisma isn't your standard "I'm hot and sly so people like me" sorta vibe as much as it is "he's likable because he is goofy as shit"

He's a children's entertainer. You can't be a children's entertainer and have a high standard for what keeps your dignity intact. Hes very theatrical and expressive- The books and graphic novels tend to make note of this. Talking about magic and the supernatural while waggling his fingers, making big dramatic bows upon entering a room, stuff like that. I think one of the better examples of this is glitchtrap and vanny and how they're animated. I bring up vanny since glitchtrap is controlling her and all. They both dance and skip around over walking, make a show of expressing their intentions through body language, and make these big sweeping movements for no real reason beyond the fact that it's probably fun

Another thing to mention is that, in the books, he views both Dave and Springtrap as characters he plays over forms or aliases he's taken. He mentions it pretty explicitly, explaining how he viewed them as roles instead of disguises or otherwise- and that Springtrap was specifically supposed to be a comical, over the top villain. Which I appreciate. So much.

You can only be so normal and start up a restaurant wear you wear a bunny costume, yknow? Getting a job as a mascot is one thing, but starting the whole thing up??? And making trans and genderfluid fox robots in the 80s? (Canon) Come on. Come on now

While that's the more lighthearted stuff, William is obviously very fucked up for a myriad of reasons. Primarily, he deals with a lot of envy directed toward Henry-He thinks he's better at robotics, better than him in general, and it really gets under his skin. It's not just admiration and jealousy, it's hatred and envy. In the books it mentions him having stacks of journals, many of the entries raving about him-If I recall correctly, something along the lines of "admiration to near obsession".

The books also mention him being incredibly paranoid and jumpy-Skittish. I don't remember any explicit examples from the books, but it adds up with what we know about his character in-game too, which makes for a decent transition because I wanted to get over to analyzing what we get from the games anyway.

As for the evidence of it in-game, the first example that pops up is him freaking out when the kids corner him in the back room. I'm not sure if this is paranoia as much as it is cowardice, but we both already know he is because he killed children and is a loser

In my mind, the actual fnaf timeline is Wendigoons over on YouTube. It's fantastic, it explains almost everything (up to ucn-he doesn't get into vr or sb) and provides some really interesting insight on Williams character that I hadn't really seen brought up prior to that. But, the run down regarding his interpretation of william is:

William and henry start fredbears. Evan gets chomped because of Michael. He starts to resent Michael for it, but notices Evan is possessing Fredbear. From here, he becomes obsessed with figuring out how to bring his son back because he loved him so much, and it begins the spiral that'll eventually turn him into a monster.

And I do think William cared for his kids. A lot. If Wendigoons right, then he ruined his life attempting to save one of his kids. He designed baby after Elizabeth (canon), even if it ended poorly. In fact, I think he loved them so much it was a little overbearing, given the security cameras in his house and the fact he talked to Evan when he was away through the Fredbear plushie (which also has cameras installed.) It's almost obsessive, don't you think?

That's something else I wanna touch on: Obsessiveness. William was obsessed with Henry for all the wrong reasons, which backfires horribly later down the line for him in the game universe. But that's not the key point, really: It's his obsession with his work-with remnant and trying to bring his kids back-That would get so bad (combined with other elements and perceived betrayal from Henry) that he would completely become lost in it, leading to:

- intentional murder robots

- unintentional murder robots (x2)

- semi-intentional murder robots

- Killing Charlie (Henry's daughter)

- Elizabeth dying

- Killing 5 kids

- his death

- Michaels death

And so on and so forth. You get the point

William got so into his work that he lost all semblance of his humanity and took humanity from countless others. If that's not an example of negative obsession idk what possibly could be

I also think his ego is massive, but that's just kind of an observable fact. It's fragile, he's wimpy and pathetic, but I think he thinks very highly of himself and when someone (Henry) comes along and shatters that perception he kinda goes koo koo bonkers maybe

He is, of course, also a very determined figure-Something he and Michael have in common. I think his hatred for Michael kind of turns into a rage that fuels him later down the line since he wants to Kill Him so Fucking Bad. You can kind of see this in the hidden minigame in midnight motorist-its more than likely that you're William, and the kid in his room is Michael. Right off the bat who we can assume to be Williams wife tells him to leave him alone, implying it's a common occurrence that he's an ass to his kid. Immediately he goes to his room anyway, yells at him, says he's gonna be sorry, then finds out he ran off-Which he isn't too pleased with either.

William refuses to die, and he will do anything in his power to keep that from happening-including manipulating random gamer women

hooah! Vanessa! I don't think him doing the glitchtrap mind control thing is an example of how good of a manipulator he is as much as it is a show of how smart he is-Though, he obviously is a skilled manipulator in one way or another, considering.. Everything. At the very least, his unassuming personality and interest in acting makes it easy for him to get away with lying. But that's not the point. When glitchtrap shows up, he's not really manipulating anyone like people like to say he does-He just had a solid plan that worked. He IS smart, he is incredibly smart, and it usually works very well in his favor.

You may bring up that he isn't so smart maybe since he moves toward the BB voice in fnaf 3, but Im relatively sure that he's fighting against the suit the whole time. Its likely programmed to follow kids voices, and since the locks snapped shut on him, would be in animatronic mode and not suit mode-, meaning, it's not him approaching the BB voice, but spring bonnie. It also leads me to believe he gets angrier on the later nights, since he gets faster and more efficient-Working against it with more determination than before.

I think that's all I have for now, but for more information, I would recommend:

- The Wendigoon FNaF timeline

- This interview with Williams voice actor (he mentions taking inspiration from Hannibal Lecter and the idea of a snake oil salesman)

- And, of course, the @canon-william-afton blog for a metric shitton of genuine facts and analysis

[imnotsorryforanyofthis]

Quirkless Advantage

Chapter forty-five: You Owe Me

Warning: Lots and lots of cussing…..

———

These chapters are going to be stupid and short. Enjoy reading! ——— "Wait... so I have to live in a dorm with my class?" I ask as I go back and forth between my room, the bathroom, and the living room.

"You already know about this. I don't know why you are so surprised," Aizawa says, zipping up his suitcase.

"Well, yeah...but I didn't think I had to do it," I say, walking to Aizawa's room.

"You're a UA student so of course you are going to have to," Aizawa says, sitting on his bed after he's done zipping up the suitcase. I sigh and walk out of the room and into mine.

I should probably tell Dabi.

You know what... No, I won't

It's been a couple of weeks since he's contacted me.

Why should I contact him first if he's not going to?

Well... I should just in case he comes here when I'm not here but Aizawa is...

Fine!

I'll tell him.

I grab my phone off of my nightstand and clicked on 'Dumb Fox.'

I start to text him but stop when I see him texting.

"Hiya Bunny, what are you doing tomorrow?" Dabi's text says.

"Stop calling me that and I'm busy. That's actually the reason I was going to text you. UA is making us live in dorms so I'm just going to let you know ahead of time. I'm actually going there tomorrow to bring my stuff there," I text back.

"Oh damn, I was hoping that I could sneak through the window again... Oh well, we'll just have to have a place to meet up," Dabi responds.

"Yup! I have to go actually," I text.

"Wait! When will you be free?" Dabi texts.

"Why?" I ask.

"Because we haven't seen each other in a while. I've been busy with The League and you are going to be busy," Dabi texts.

"I don't know. I might be free September 18th. I'm thinking of not going to school that day," I text.

"Fine, I'll see if I can be free. What do you want to do?" Dabi texts.

"Let's just wait until then. It's a surprise!" I text but then I start up again before he can respond, "Remember you owe me $50."

He leaves me on read.

Asshole. — "Sasaki! Good morning!" I hear Haru yell from down the hallway in our dorm.

I groan.

My god! Why the fuck does he have to be so loud in the morning?!

I don't even want to get up this early but I promised Aizawa.

I stop walking and turn around, "Can you not be loud when it is so early in the morning?"

"Oh.. sorry," Haru whispers, walking right next to me pouting.

"Good morning to you too," I sigh, shaking my head because of his ridiculousness.

"Let's go to class together," Haru says, walking next to me as we continue to go down the hallway.

We stop at the elevators and get in.

"Actually, I'm not going to school today," I say, looking over at his confused face.

"Why?" He asks.

"It's my birthday today so I asked Aizawa if I could skip school and he said yes. I'm going to the coffee shop with him for breakfast and then he's going to go to work and I'm going to do whatever my heart desires," I say, walking out of the elevators.

"Oh... Well, happy birthday!" Haru says as I walk past him towards the door.

"Thanks!" I yell, putting on my yellow rain boots and walking out the door.

I walk to Aizawa's car and see him exiting the teacher's dorm.

"You're actually on time," I say, opening the car door.

Aizawa only rolls his eyes, getting in the car.

"Happy birthday, Tsuna," Aizawa says, starting the car and driving towards the coffee shop.

One we arrived, we got out of the car and walked in.

We order our coffees and pastries and sit down at a table in the back.

"What are you going to do for the rest of the day?" Aizawa asks.

I shrug, "I don't really know yet. I always thought about getting a tattoo once I turned 18."

Aizawa raises an eyebrow, "Why?"

"I don't know. I just always liked them," I say.

Our order was called and Aizawa gets up first to go get it.

As he walks over to the counter to get it, I hear my phone go off.

Who is texting me this early in the morning?

I look at my phone and see 'Dumb Fox.'

Oh, yeah... I forgot that I told him that we might do something today.

At the time I didn't know if Aizawa would let me skip.

I click on the notification to read what he sent me.

"Hiya Bunbun, I don't know if you're awake this early or not but I was wondering if you are actually free today... I'll let you pick where we are going this time," The text message says.

I glare at the word 'Bunbun' and type.

"If you call me another one of those stupid nicknames of yours then I will change your name from 'Dumb Fox' to 'Crispy.' Don't test me," I angrily text and send it.

"What's wrong with you?" Aizawa asks, sitting down and handing me my food and coffee.

"Oh nothing... Just an annoying friend," I say, looking up at him and picking up my coffee, taking a sip.

I look at my phone and see Dabi texted, "Fine... Are you free though?"

"Yes, meet me at my work in about 30 minutes. I want to go through each aisle and maybe buy a few things. Then we can go somewhere else," I text back.

He leaves me on read.

"That motherfucker," I say out loud.

"Language," Aizawa says.

"Sorry," I say, turning my phone upside down on the table. — Aizawa had to leave 20 minutes later and I walked towards my work since I had about 10 minutes.

I got there in 7.

"You're here early," I hear someone say to the left of me.

I look over and see Dabi standing near the entrance of the bookstore.

I walk up to him and smirk, "You're here early too."

Dabi walks past me and opens the door, "You coming?"

"Yup!" I say, excitedly skipping through the door.

Dabi chuckles, following me in, "Why are you so happy today?"

I stop for a second so he can walk next to me and I look over at him, "Today's my birthday."

Dabi looks over at me, "Oh, happy birthday... I guess."

I roll my eyes, "Wow, thanks."

We walk through an aisle and I stop to look at books that catch my eye.

"Wait...How old are you?" Dabi asks.

I move my gaze from the books over at him, "I turned 18 today."

Dabi is quiet the whole time I look through the aisles until we go towards the manga.

Suddenly I hear Dabi say something under his breath next to me.

"What did you say?" I ask, looking over at him.

"Well...even though I didn't really say it directly to you... I said that I just realized that I've been dating someone that was a minor," Dabi says.

"Yup," I say, turning to face him, "And that's illegal."

Dabi rolls his eyes, "That's not the worst thing I've done."

"Oh, I know," I say, moving towards him.

"How old are you right now? I know you're either 23 or 24 but I don't know exactly," I say.

"I'm 23 and before you ask... I know you will... my birthday is January 18th," Dabi says.

"So... we're about... 5 years and 8 months by the day," I say, looking back at the manga and grabbing the next volume of the one that I have been reading since I've gotten here.

"You're very...precise," Dabi laughs.

"Yup, now let's go check out... unless you want to look at anything," I say and he shakes his head no.

We walk towards the cash register but Dabi stops, grabbing my upper arm to stop me with him.

"I'll wait outside," Dabi says.

I look at him and nod. I go over to the cash register and say hi to my coworker. She checks me out, we say our goodbyes, and I walk out.

"Where do you want to go next?" Dabi asks, walking up to me.

I continue walking down the street with Dabi following next to me.

I look over at him, "I'm going to get a tattoo and I want you to pay for it since you owe me $50 still."

Dabi looks over at me and shakes his head, "No... I'll buy you something else."

"Why?" I ask.

"Because you're doing this because you just turned 18. You're going to get something stupid and then regret it," Dabi says.

I gasp in fake shock, "I would never."

"Yes, you would and you know you would. Don't do something that you would later regret," Dabi says, rolling his eyes.

"Well... I'm in a relationship with you," I whisper under my breath.

Dabi stops walking and grabs my hand, "What was that?"

I look away from him, "Nothing."

Dabi pulls me closer to him, near the wall of a building so we are out of the way. "No... You basically said you're going to regret our relationship later," Dabi says and I just laugh.

"Well... I should but I won't...I regret nothing," I say smirking, continuing to walk and dragging an annoyed Dabi behind me with our hands intertwined. — "You weren't kidding," Dabi says as we walk into a tattoo shop.

"Nope," I say going over to the counter.

"I'm not paying for this shit," Dabi says, crossing his arms.

"Please! It's my birthday!" I whine, grabbing onto his arm, "I'll even let you choose it."

Dabi sighs, nodding his head, finally giving in.

"Yay!" I say, excitingly jumping up and down. — It didn't hurt.

It honestly felt like little needles poking me.

Ok.. it hurt a tiny bit.

Dabi didn't let me see what he picked me until it was done.

"Can I see it now?" I ask, trying to look over at my outer thigh.

Yeah... I also let him pick where it went.

"Yes," Dabi says.

I move my body in a more comfortable position so I can see better.

"Hey... isn't that the symbol that was on the chain over the front view mirror?" I ask, looking at it, "You know... the fire symbol."

"Yup," Dabi says as I get up.

"And before you ask me... because I know you will... Yes, I did pay for it," Dabi says.

"With money?" I ask, finally standing up.

"What else would I use?" Dabi asks, shaking his head.

"Well... fake money... or... other things," I say, shrugging and picking up my bag full of books that I bought.

Dabi doesn't say anything, opens the door and lets me go through it first. He looks down at my new tattoo as I walk past him.

"Do you like it?" Dabi asks, as we walk to nowhere in particular.

I look down to look at the blue fire symbol, "Yes."

The Japanese symbol for fire.

Fire... really Dabi?

Blue fire.

Do you realize you basically marked me?

What are you? A werewolf from a very bad wattpad story?

---

Here is the link to all of the chapters

Link to next: Chapter forty-six: Text message...again

[look-i-love-u]

Interview Tagging Game

So many questions... O.o I got tagged to do this by the great @energievie, @shinygalaxyperson, @suzy-queued and @ian-galagher and @vintagelacerosette

Okay. Let's do this...

What are some movie/tv quotes that you quote often?

"I'm not good at the advice. Can I interest you in a sarcastic comment?"

"I don't know what's going on but I'm excited!"

"I just realised I can sleep with my eyes open."

Any and all by Chandler Bing/Friends.

What is your favorite flower?

Tulips

If you were in Avatar the Last Airbender what element would you want to bend? Earth, fire, water or air?

I've never seen it, but I'm gonna say water.-

What was your first job?

Watching/Babysitting our neighbours' kids. One with special needs and helping the other with his homework.

What is your favorite breakfast?

The one I had today. Fresh veggies, great cheese, prosecco.

What's a meal from childhood that you love?

My mom's dumplings with roast and sauerkraut.

What's your favorite joke to tell?

Wie nennt man schlecht gelaunte Pasta? Meckeroni.

What's your favorite animal to see at the zoo?

Giraffes

What's your go to quick meal to cook/make at home?

Rice with veggies

What's your go to meal to cook someone to impress them?

Lasagne

What's something you want to do better?

Asking for help.

If you're working do you like your job?

I do most of the time. Some aspects I could do without though. But I guess that's normal.

Do you collect anything? What?

Books I buy and never read. Jigsaws.

If you were trapped in a kids tv show, what show would you be okay with being trapped in?

Kinder vom Süderhof. About a family living their best life on a farm. No real drama ever happened there and there were lots of cute animals.

An adults tv show?

Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I just want to hang out with Giles in the library and read old books, do research, watch Buffy kick ass and maybe seduce a cute witch.

What kind of job did you want as a child?

Teacher. And later the one I'm doing now.

Do you follow any sports? What team do you root for?

Not really. But always cheering for the German womens' football team.

If you could be any animal what would you be and why?

A dog. Getting cuddles, getting played with, going on walks, sleeping the day away, just being loved.

If you could be any mythological creature what would you be and why?

A werwolf. Would feel so good to let my inner beast and frustrations out once a month.

What's the most obscure thing you've had to google for a fanfic you were writing/reading?

Haven't done it yet but about to google 80s radio stations in Indiana

What Milkovich do you identify with most?

Lou.

Which one are you actually like the most?

Mickey. Quick to fly off the handle, ball of sarcasm and snark, ready to fight for the ones I love.

What Gallagher do you identify with most?

Lip.

Which one are you actually like the most?

Ian. Which makes me even more annoyed about some of his descisions. I know I would to the exact same shit.

I'm tagging: @ardent-fox, @mikhailoisbaby, @surviving-maybe, @xninetiestrendx, @depressedstressedlemonzest, @milkovetti, @smokey-mickey, @sickness-health-all-that-shit, @shameless-notashamed

[fourseasonsfigs]

Yuechu Yin Yang Landscape Figures

It's been a while since we spent some time in the Junzhe Extended Universe, so this week is going to be all JZEU!

We're kicking off this week with this incredible fig set. It took some wrangling to assemble, but it was worth it - it's absolutely gorgeous!

The actual name of this fig set is 国风晕染款小道士, which machine translates into something like, small Daoist priests of the national style smudged style. The national style refers to traditional Chinese painting, and the smudged style refers to a painting technique of washes of watercolor paint. The small Daoist priest refers to Gong Jun's character Dong Fang Yuechu from the upcoming Fox Spirit Matchmaker: Yue Hong. Priests is plural, because we get two of them!

This set arrived in an enormous plain white box. I had my China warehouse air column wrap this box before mailing it out. I've been lucky enough that my non-air-wrapped figs have been sailing through sea shipping without damage, so I've been foregoing the air wrapping more and more. But some I still air-wrap! This was definitely one of them. There's just too much going on with this set, and a friend of mine recently had hers break in numerous parts during shipping, so you can't be too careful on something this complex.

And complex it is. We have a yin-yang black-white base, the two figs, and their accessories.

Here is our outstandingly beautiful base. The white side is a mountain, and the other side a beautiful tree. Both landscape elements are permanently affixed to the base (thank goodness).

Here's the tree side. This smudged style is just gorgeous.

Our two little Daoists and their accoutrements. You can see how their feet have pegs to go into the base. You can also see the assembly task ahead of me! If you haven't read my infamous (to my own self) Hanye with Sword post, well, I could just have easily named it Lelanthe Struggles (and then Struggles Some More) with Basic Fig Assembly, Part 1 instead. If fitting Hanye's sword into his little hand was Fig Assembly 101, this seemed very much like 201, or maybe even graduate school 301.

Normally, I rise to a challenge like this by putting it off until a braver date, or at least until I have enough energy, time, and patience to swear endlessly go for the gusto. This time, though, there were a lot of pieces just lying about, and I had a looming business trip ahead of me, so I wanted to have it sorted before I left.

This had no instructions, and if the seller had given any to the group, I had missed it, so I was on my own. First order of business was figuring out the accessories, since I figured I would need to put those on first before I put the figs in the base.

So the sword fit into the Yin-side Yuechu's delicate little hand just fine. I was very pleased, actually - it's nice and secure without being too tight. I was also really happy that the umbrella handle for the Yang-side Yuechu slid very easily in from the bottom up through his hand. What a good sign this is starting so easily!

Before I went any further, I went ahead and took some bottoms-up angles, since those angles wouldn't be available to us when the set was all assembled.

I went ahead and did the same bottoms-up angle on the base too, very, very gently:

Such beautiful detail. I'm impressed by the scope of this fig maker's vision - this is by far the most complex set I've seen before.

Alright! On to the base!

I could see where there were those bubbles in the base, and they matched up to the pegs on the figs, so it made sense that the pegs would fit in the holes hiding under that thin membrane. But what to do without accidentally ripping it?

I got a sharp new blade for my craft knife and very carefully cut an 'X' right in the center of each of those holes. It doesn't look very much like an X, does it? Well, I was very careful.

Too careful, it turned out. It didn't take long before I realized I had a major problem. The pegs were too large for the holes. I thought that perhaps the edges of the membrane that wrapped down the side of the holes were the problem - they were taking up a crucial millimeter or so of space. So I carefully used my craft knife to trim off the membrane around the hole. And the pegs still didn't fit. Like not even close.

Oh no. This was turning out to be more of A Thing than I expected. A Thing that already seemed rapidly outside my very limited capacity.

I was pretty stumped. The accessories had fit so perfectly, I just felt like there had to be something I was missing. The fig engineering had been too good so far. Maybe, I thought, the fig maker / factory had engineered the pegs for exactly the width of the holes, but they hadn't counted on the pegs being painted. So maybe the paint was the critical millimeter that was keeping them from fitting.

So out came my Tamiya file set. And my mask! My fig friend had strictly warned me when I was wrestling with the Hanye with Sword figure to be sure to not inhale the dust particles. It was a good thing she told me too, otherwise I would just have gone to town on that figure and this one with the cheery abandon of the totally ignorant.

So mask on, I carefully filed down the sides, trying to get just the paint off and nothing else. I tried one peg at first, and knew I was on the right track when it went into the hole while the other one still could not. So I filed down the paint on the other peg too. Being mindful of the fact that I had sanded off a little too much of Hanye's fingers, I tried to err on the side of not taking off very much.

It was still a bit of a tight fit when I put the figs on the base, but the pegs went in, and went all the way to the bottom of their boots. Hooray! Flush with my success, I was sure I just needed to put the umbrella top on and be ready to take the full suite of normal pictures.

I took the Yang figure off the base, put a drop of glue on the little umbrella center hole, slid the handle up to the bottom of his hand and prepared to sit there holding it in place for a few minutes while it set.

And then wait a minute. The umbrella handle wasn't long enough. The top of the umbrella angled off his little tufts of hair on his topknot, and slanted down at like a 30 degree angle. I went back and stared at it in disbelief - was the thick part of the umbrella handle supposed to go in his hand? I mean, look at it. There's clearly room there in his middle of his hand, but do you see any space between his pinky finger and his sleeve for that big part of the handle? And also, look at his thumb and finger - it seems to hold the thin part of the handle just perfectly, doesn't it?

Well, clearly it was meant to slide up into his hand somehow, because the umbrella wasn't going to have any prayer of working otherwise. I very gently tried pulling the handle up, pressing the handle up, kind of rotating the handle up... nothing.

Cue the swearing.

It's been a stressful last couple of years! I really, really can't take breaking a fig finger. I tried wiggling it a bit more, and it was not budging for anything. Then suddenly - I kind of angled it a bit to the side, and it slid right in. I could not believe it.

You see how happy he looks? I looked happier than that! But seriously, look how snug his thumb and forefinger are against that handle. No wonder I was sweating, right?

You may notice, though, that the handle is right up against his hair. It does bow out the tiniest bit from that, but there's really nothing to be done about that. It's barely noticeable though - when we do a spin around this set you can see for yourself.

Once the handle was up higher in his hand like that, the top of the umbrella fit just fine. Not a ton of room between it and his head, but enough.

The glue had long dried by now, so I dropped another drop in, and held the umbrella on top of the little tiny handle piece. Now, I've never been able to see all that straight - if I cut a loaf of bread, for example, my cut will be very thin on one side and get really large (or vice versa!) towards the end. So I wasn't convinced I'd be able to get the umbrella top on level without a couple different angles. So I held the two pieces together upside down long enough to get a tacky bond, then flipped it over and carefully poked at the top of the umbrella until the top end lined up with the pole under it, then held that in place for several minutes.

Then, I carefully put the two figs in the holes, and success! I took a few deep breaths to let the adrenaline settle, then took a little video. It's choppy, because my turntable is not motorized, so it only turns on one-handed Lelanthe power.

It's a little hard to see details from a video, so here's some stills:

And now the top of the fig set:

There was no printed box, and no box card (and I'm out of my 30 picture slots!) so that's all the pictures for today. I'll breathe another big sigh of relief that this all worked out so well. I was worried there for a bit, I have to say.

A few vital statistics on this before we go. The figures themselves are standard fig size - 8 cm each, or about 3.2 inches. The entire set itself from top to bottom is 18 cm in height, or about 7 inches. The diameter of the base is 9.5 cm, which is 3.75 inches - but keep in mind the tree extends out past that. The entire fig set weighs about 1 and a half pounds, so it's substantial!

Material: Resin

Fig Count: 207

Scene Count: 29

Rating: Absolutely gorgeous!

[link back to Master Fig Index for more posts]

[fjadwrites]

crunch reading just to be back on track

Good afternoon!

Yes, I know. This is a lot later than my usual blogging time. You could say things had gotten busier around here since I woke up this morning. It's 3:46 PM here as I'm writing here. But I did read for today. I think that's a good thing. I tried to read as much as I can while doing things around here.

As for my reading update from yesterday,  I got to finish reading several books! What do you know? Then again, three of them were just the shortest books from my old currently reading list that were added since the early 2024, to be honest. You could say I'm in a hurry to be on track with my Goodreads Reading Challenge for this year. And what better for me to do that?

Read short books. But three out of the four books I've finished reading yesterday were self-help books. And one of them has something to do with writing. And obviously, since I did crunch reading (as I'd like to call it) yesterday, it was obvious that I surpassed my page count quota yesterday. With this, now I'm thinking of raising the maximum number of pages for me to read to either 80 or 90. Definitely not 100 as it was still too much for my brain.

Let me rate the books I've read yesterday. I mean, I know I did it in Goodreads already. But I also want to do it here.

"The 12 Week Year" by Brian P. Moran and Michael Lennington - ⭐⭐⭐, but only because it only made my brain like a mush and maybe I just felt pressured in a way as I was reading the whole thing. I mean, the idea was great that you can actually do a lot of things in about 3 months. But maybe I wasn't in the right mindset just yet to implement the process to myself at the moment. For now, I would consider doing the process in the future, especially since I do view myself a failure at my age of 33.

"5,000 Words Per Hour: Write Faster, Write Smarter" by Chris Fox - ⭐⭐⭐, but the idea was definitely something I can do when I'm writing. I actually first heard about this book because of Kate Cavanaugh's video when she tried to write 5,000 words an hour like Chris Fox. But it actually took me a while to finish reading the whole thing. I don't know what made me stop reading this, to be honest. And I know it's other than my reading slump. Should I blame my writing slump/writer's block on that, as well? But yes, I know I can only write around 3,000 words maximum in one day. Why? I tend to write my stories by hand first. It has been a habit since high school and I don't think I've ever outgrown that. But I could still do the practices here in this book in my writing just so I can use that as a reason to discipline my writer self. So the books still helped me in some way.

"Romancing The Beats: Story Structure for Romance Novels" by Gwen Hayes - This one was a definite ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ for me, only because it does provided me more insight than I ever thought I needed when it comes to writing romance stories. I mean, you could say that romance is sort of my forte in writing stories. It was the genre that I started writing back in high school. Yes, I'm thanking Kate Cavanaugh once again for me discovering this book for writers. And I think she outlined her first romance novel with this as a guide. I still haven't started outlining any romance stories with the beats in this book. But I will get to that ㅡ once I managed to get my writing groove back.

The second volume of "By The Grace Of The Gods" is also done, and I've rated it ⭐⭐⭐⭐ in Goodreads. Hmm... Maybe because I wasn't some of the characters to appear here early that I've only seen on the second season of the anime version. Another thing that could've affected the original 5 stars rating was the initial assumption I had that anime version encompassed the first two volumes of the light novel. I was wrong. This volume seemed to be encompassing only 3 episodes since it has something to do with the continuation of the monster subjugation and starting the laundry store. The real problem for me? Information overload on the store building part.

That's a lot for me to even write here, you know. But I thought I should add my comments (even if it's short) on each of the book I would finish reading. Yes, even my own ratings on the books done reading.

It's currently raining hard as I write here, but let's get on with the next part. As for th book I continued reading, I actually read 18 pages of the fifth volume of "The Most Heretical Last Boss Queen" at past midnight, as I've mentioned in my blog entry yesterday. I didn't add more pages done reading on that book after that since I concentrated reading more on the other books. So no comments and ratings just yet.

I really should try raising the maximum number for a bit, but I would definitely not let it reach 100 for my brain's sake. But with all that I've read today, I think I already reached this page count quota today. I'll let you know about the books I read tomorrow. 

Just to give you a heads up ㅡ they were mainly novellas. Blame my frustration for constantly seeing the number of books behind schedule in my Goodreads Reading Challenge. So this was my solution to finally beat that.

Yes, I know this entry is already way too late than my usual posting time. But it's only past 5 in the afternoon here in 🇵🇭, so it's still within the day.

Let's see if I can post here during my usual early posting time. See you tomorrow! Happy reading. 😊✌️💕📚📖

[muscicallyattracted]

fall break debrief

Hey yall my fall break is up tomorrow so here is a brief overview of everything I did

Nothing.

Mostly

I did a lot of sitting in bed or on the couch resting, reading, crocheting, or watching something on the tv. I watched a lot of really good stuff for the first time! I've never seen The Fantastic Mr. Fox or Edward Scissor Hands before and holy shit they are so good I have been living under a rock. I also watched Blue Eye Samurai on Netflix and it was gorgeous! I hope it gets picked up for more seasons. I spent a lot of my time watching Markiplier's playthrough of RDR2 and my god he is frustrating to watch play that game haha.

I should have spent my time working on my program notes project or my professional ensemble reflection papers or literally any of my other assignments, but I just couldn't be bothered. I did do one assignment for my elementary music methods class!

Throughout most of this break I have been dealing with a lot of body pain! Particularly in my shoulder, but it made it incredibly difficult to feel motivated to do anything. I couldn't help my family decorate for christmas, I've had a headache most of the week and I've been moody. I just haven't been a fun person to be around and I feel really bad about that. I really hope that I get some good news from my doctors soon and we can start moving in the right direction.

Okay enough about that back to what I did

I also babysat my youngest baby cousin over the break (there are three infants in my extended family right now. Thanksgiving was chaotic). I think she is my favorite of the three, though she's not even two months old yet so I should give her time to irritate me.

Today I cleaned and organized my desk like a mad man. I ripped apart my drawers, the surface, I threw so much stuff away, and it looks so nice. I'm actually sitting at my desk right now! I also went after my jewlery and makeup and sorted everything and set it up in a clean, easily accesible place.

Now I just gotta make it through the next three weeks of classes and I'll be free! (until january). I have almost all of my christmas shopping/crafting done. I did get scammed by an etsy seller, but I will be getting a refund! Only things left I need to do are sew on some buttons and make a trip to costco :)

[whoaskedgottem]

My take on Deltarune and its connection to Undertale.

i am a funny man. i make funny pictures. but sometimes, i'm not so funny, and i make theories and fanfiction fuel instead. this is gonna be a long read, okay?

I've seen multiple ideas flying around on the significance of the Undertale/Deltarune parallels and what they mean for the story, and how these two games connect together. I'll do my best to present something new to the table, while organizing disparate factoids and thoughts into a well-formatted outline for the timeline of what could've been a kick-ass fanfiction or fan comic if I actually had the drive to be a Real Artist.

Please note that I don't think this is really a proper 'theory' or 'prediction' as much as it is what I would do if I had to write the rest of Deltarune, with what Toby Fox has already made.

That [sweet, sweet] [Freedom Sauce.]

Let's start with a quick recap so I can give you a little concept I haven't seen anyone bring up yet.

Deltarune has a pretty heavy handed approach to communicate its themes. Toby Fox has come out and said that it'll only have one ending, throughout Chapter 1 you're constantly reminded of a very central concept to the story:

"Your choices don't matter."

In fact, throughout that first chapter, the game's mechanics reflect this at nearly every step of the way. Your vessel is discarded, your choices are constantly disregarded or skipped over by the characters in fake-out sequences, the game's entire battle system and ending hinges on the fact that no matter whether you spared your enemies or not, it all still ends in much the same way, with only minor changes to show for it.

No one really missed this. Every single person discussing the themes and significance of Deltarune has brought this up before. Boring, I know. Stay with me.

Chapter 2 expands on this concept in an unexpected way. The game actually opens up. A lot. We're given plenty of chances to make choices that do matter. Mechanically, battles matter again. If you spare enemies, you can turn them into friends and bring them to your own town. If you don't, they'll be gone forever. If you're particularly chilly, you can make some [Frozen Chicken] with your [Hochi Mama.] More interestingly, though, we're introduced (well, we're shown that it's actually important and not just crazy rambling, because we had seen it in Chapter 1 with snippets of Jevil's dialogue that seemed like madman ramblings at the time,) to the concept of freedom.

The resident trashman, tiny awful gremlin, trade deal extraordinaire, needs no introduction. Nor do his themes of seeking freedom. We don't have to touch on this much just yet, but keep this idea in your mind that, thanks to Spamton, we now have a very defined idea of what the Tumblr Sexymen of each chapter in Deltarune have in common with each other.

Arcane, mysterious knowledge of their own existence, and their (lack of) freedom.

Now. Let's recall back to Undertale, because this talk of Freedom and being trapped remind me of something.

The Delta Rune in Undertale is said to be long lost imagery for an ancient Prophecy in which an angel will descend from the surface and bring freedom to the monsters.

We can start drawing parallels in Undertale and Deltarune's themes now. Or rather, name an overarching concept that's being explored in both games. The characters in both games are trapped in their own sets of boundaries. Whether that be imposed by the player, humanity's barrier, the knowledge of their limited existence in a game, a time loop, monsterkind's king's plan, or the closed doors and cut-off internet of a town, everyone is trapped in one way or another.

And everyone wants some freedom.

"hey. i know the feeling, buddo."

Let's move on. The games can be thematically connected, but that's lame. We're looking for some answer to what the hell's going on. We know the obvious things, like this being a 'parallel story,' an AU of sorts, separate from Undertale. We know the characters in Deltarune seem to lead separate lives, not having much knowledge of certain things we'd take from granted in Undertale. And despite broad strokes still being there-- their personalities are still left mostly the same, nobody seems to be exactly the same in this world.

Well, almost nobody. We don't have to get into how Sans doesn't seem to fit in with everything else in the game, everyone's already walked that path already. We also don't need to analyze too deep into his dialogue in Undertale, so let's paste it in for the sake of really good looking formatting.

Yeah, we've all seen it a million times. Sans seems to come from somewhere else, his circumstances in the Underground being something he wanted to escape from to go back to that "somewhere (or 'sometime,') else," and the world of Deltarune seems to be the most likely answer to that whole mystery.

So, mystery solved, right? Sans Undertale is ACTUALLY Sans Deltarune, and we're looking at the alternate timeline from which Sans came from, with a whole new storyline to give us context to this new world. A prequel of sorts, while still being separate.

I'm not sure about that.

The man who speaks in hands.

The presence of Gaster is obviously the biggest piece in this whole puzzle, and ignoring it would be foolish. I'm going to assume everyone's already poured as many hours as I did theorizing and reading up on as much about the bastard goop man as I have, so let's skip over defining who he is, his connection to Jevil and Spamton, his possible second identity gig as a Knight, and get to the heart of the matter.

I believe that the 'timeline' for these games is a little trickier than what someone might think at first, and far more connected than what Toby Fox lets on; while still most definitely being able to be seen as two separate worlds.

Deltarune is both the prequel and the sequel to Undertale.

The world of Deltarune, with its prophecies and characters and story is, chronologically, the prequel. After all, Sans (and Papyrus?) needs to have come from it, and for lack of a better option for his mysterious origin, the world of Deltarune is the best fit for said origin.

That said, that doesn't make sense with what we see in the game. His store is very clearly Grillby's, scribbled over. His house is very clearly the one from Snowdin. It doesn't look like he came from here. In fact, it looks like it's the other way around. And, although this doesn't prove anything, he's the only one that has just moved into town in the game, in a small community in which most people know each other.

Funny how we, the players, just got there too.

Now, I get that it sounds like some weird Schrodinger's Sequel conundrum when I put it like this, so let's revisit some previous dialogue and try to make sense of the whole thing.

HOW LONG IT HAS BEEN.

It's important that we fully understand that Gaster seems to know of our presence and contact us directly. Whenever a new Deltarune chapter comes out, it's Gaster that hijacks the Twitter account, and Gaster that links us to the file to connect into the game. The very SOUL we control in the game only appears once we 'establish a connection' with him at the start of the entire game.

The reason why is it's important, is that once we establish that he's responsible for our presence in this world, we can look into Gaster's tweets to see a very specific line that I need to highlight for the timeline to make sense.

This is the closest thing we have to Gaster's motivations in the entire narrative. This single tweet.

Creating a new future.

It sounds like a slogan, but mind the wording. A 'new' future. Obviously pedantic to write down, but that implies the existence of an old future. Or would that be the past?

What exactly is the future we're trying to create in Deltarune? why a new one? did something go wrong?

Speaking of which, why did Sans get stuck in Undertale's situation?something must have driven him out to get him stuck there, wishing to go back.

What if the original world of Deltarune fell prey to The Roaring?

Even in Ralsei's prophecy, The Roaring does happen. The Earth draws her final breath. Only after it do the 'three heroes' show up to save the day.

How about this: Gaster's motivation is creating a new future in which The Roaring doesn't destroy the world for good.

Entry Number 17.

(Or, how I ran out of image slots for this post and learned to write the rest of this out.)

It's a cool motivation, but there's a problem with it.

If he wanted to do that, then it'd be awkward that he's simultaneously the Knight. Why would he go around opening fountains, potentially causing The Roaring, if he wanted to prevent it?

This is where it gets a little weird. I'm relatively confident of everything up until this point being... fairly natural or obvious to follow a plot thread on without straying too far from what might feasibly happen in the game. Gaster's plans and motivations are a complete mystery, and most likely key to the entire game's unreleased story. To be honest, I've no idea.

I can make a guess, though. Take it as less of a prediction or theory and more of a fanfiction. What I would do with this as a writer if Deltarune was a writing prompt.

DARK. DARKER. YET DARKER. THE DARKNESS KEEPS GROWING. THE SHADOWS CUTTING DEEPER. PHOTON READINGS: NEGATIVE. THIS NEXT EXPERIMENT. SEEMS. VERY. VERY. INTERESTING.

WHAT DO YOU TWO THINK?

Gaster exists as a character in the world of Deltarune, and came to Undertale along with Sans and Papyrus. In the 'original' timeline, he experimented with the Dark World, opening fountains left and right in some arcane research he was conducting. My best guess is that, as a clueless Lightner who'd only just now discovered the Dark World and its properties, Gaster became the Knight without knowing the full extent of what his actions were doing. He told different people about his knowledge of the Lightner world in which they were toys in a game, and carelessly created fountains everywhere he found interesting. This eventually catches up with him, and the world is then enveloped in Darkness, causing The Roaring. Three heroes stand up to the catastrophe, but they either fail, or their fate is left unanswered. They seem to have been important, so Sans (or Gaster) keeps a note of them. A reminder for some other time, where maybe they can help.

This is when him and the others escape to (or the Darkness creates the world of--) Undertale. We learn through Queen in Chapter 2 that the power that allows Lightners to open Dark Fountains is Determination. The DT Extraction machine's blueprints and the mysterious machine in Sans' basement were designed to investigate and extract Determination from humans so as to find out the mechanics of the Darkness, Determination, and quite possibly find a way to return to their previous lives. In the process, they discover the timeline anomalies and other mechanics of Undertale. Whether the CORE was related to this or just another creation made by Gaster in his time in Undertale, which machine he fell into, and what follows is up in the air and more in the realm of Undertale theories than anything else.

Deltarune, the game we play today, is Gaster's recreation of this world after spending years spread across Undertale's code and in whatever meta-space Toby Fox has created in which the guy can post tweets and speak with the players. A world in which Kris, one of the three heroes, is controlled by the player. An attempt at creating a new future in which The Roaring is stopped with our help, reversing the mess that Gaster once made. Even if Kris has no idea what's happening, and is terrified at this weird presence suddenly possessing them and taking their free will from them.

Also I guess Sans got carried over to... like... oversee this whole thing and make sure the kids don't get lost eating chalk or stuck in a fridge somewhere.

Bonus Meme:

There's also a fun idea to play with that could be the fact that Gaster's actions as the Knight, despite being counter-intuitive, actually help us achieve the best ending. Even messing with Jevil and Spamton, teaching them of the game mechanics and instilling the concept of freedom in their minds, could be argued to be all for the goal of giving us powerful Darkners to get Shadow Crystals from. Whatever is made from them could be the key to defeating the Ultimate Enemy. Or he could just not be the Knight at all.

Also, the idea that Undertale is what could become of the world of Deltarune if it were to be shrouded in Darkness is quite a fun idea for me as well. A fantastical version of the world in which all the bits and pieces of the 'real world' of Deltarune get turned into a whole ass indie game darling hit from 2015.

[kilannad]

First thoughts on Campaign three

I LOVE them, your honor. That's all you need to know.

Okay but seriously;

Let's start with Ashton and FCG (and no, I cannot believe we have a he/they robit that goes by Fresh Cut Grass. Sam and Liam--what the actual fuck?)

I really enjoy the thought that FCG met Ashton and was like "yes, I like your gender, I'll do the same." These people also have such a cool dynamic. Ashton will be the Beau of this campaign--constantly saying fuck, absolutely zero shits, vague morality that will one day show a marshmallow center. Pairing this with a legit therapy robot that seems to have been created for the purpose of helping people is fantastic. Big asshole enjoys tiny friendly BFF. I love them.

The fact that FCG seems to have given us his sad backstory in the first episode just convinces me that Sam has something incredible in the works. Also, whatever subclass--clearly homebrewed from what i can tell--apparently has the ability to take half pain from others which is wild and has such angst potential, I'm ready to cry already. (Also, from a mechanical standpoint its WILD. The half damage is first moved to temp hit points and then, from what I can guess, whatever of those t.h.p don't get used after a certain length of time--maybe a minute?--give FCG damage from their actual hp. So weird, I love it)

Ashton...I'm not sure where they're going. Something wild, considering Tal. Tho, honestly, how has this eldritch horror given us a literal Punk Rock that is a Gender??? Apparently they have a dunamantic subclass, also clearly homebrewed. Or maybe just wild magic barbarian. Something like that, which is also WILD. Makes me wonder where they learned their abilities.

Alright, let's hit the next two: lesbian queens Imogen and Laudna. First, I feel like I should say I would absolutely offer my heart to either of them and have never been so horny at a creepy undead in my entire life.

Let's hit southern bell, Imogen, first since we know the least here: young, polite, southern girl just wants to figure out where her powers came from. Honestly, loving the callbacks to Fjord and it's a really sweet first layer of what I'm sure will turn out to be a more complicated backstory. And, oh yeah, she can READ MINDS. I don't know anything about the psionic subclass, but I'm excited to see where Laura goes with it. Seems like a lot of opportunity for shenanigans, though this might turn out to be a 'discover your roots' kind of story, which I support.

Now: Laudna.

I've gotta say, my first instinct was De Rollo, and I'm sticking to it. That, or a Briarwood. Maybe one of Percy's sisters got killed/turned. I've seen a lot of dhampir/undead floating around. I saw one post that said one of the Briarwoods is her warlock patron which would be SO COOL. Maybe Marisha is just fucking with us, which is a possibility. Thus far, we haven't really seen any of the PCs with close ties to PCs from another campaign except Orym, and even that seems to just be a simple working relationship. It would be really cool to see what can be done with this connection if it does exist.

As for Laudna herself--she's so freaking cool. I love how she's naturally so creepy and off-putting but just doesn't seem to notice. Carries a dead rat on her belt, asks FCG if they kept the bodies of their fallen comrades, and is surprised when children run. It's amazing and I have no idea where she's going or how she possibly met Imogen. I expect fantastic dynamics from these two.

Next, let's talk about everyone's favorite silver fox; Bertrand Bell

I should prefix by saying I haven't seen either of the one-shots he appears in. He is also an easy way to address all of the negative comments which seem to derive from the cast reusing old characters--I have no idea who this fucker is. Didn't even know he'd shown up before until I saw a post about it. That being said; within that first episode I got a really good look into his character and I was instantly caught by his personality and how well Travis plays him. I don't know shit about the one-shots but I know Bertrand Bell and I think if Travis wants to explore him more then he should be able to.

That being said:

I agree with a lot of people that he doesn't seem like a permanent character. The fact that he's two levels above the rest of the group, plus that he's apparently gone back in levels in the last thirty years doesn't show great things. The fact that he's also apparently the first quest giver instead of an NPC is also really strange and doesn't seem to indicate he'll be a recurring character for long. Maybe Travis is just going to appear as a series of new characters instead of sticking with just one. Maybe his real character will show up later. Either way, I'm all for it. I think this is a really cool new way to start a campaign.

Now, probably the most controversial part of the party: Dorian, Orym, and Fern.

Now, I LOVE the Crownkeepers. Adore them. And I'm also super excited for them to show up here for a few reasons. Liam and Ashley both expressed desires to further explore these characters and I'm vibrating to do the same. We got such hints of little pieces of them in EXU and I want more. Of the Crownkeepers, they are also the most likely to split off from the group--Orym because he only went to Emon for Keyleth in the first place, and Fern because she always said she "had things to do". So, no, I don't think Fern and Orym are temp characters like some people are suggesting. Especially not since, as Matt said on twitter, they had the opportunity to re-roll their stats, tho Orym didn't take the option.

The fact that, if Bertrand indeed is only temporary, it means Orym at 13 has the highest INT is hilarious. He thought the Crownkeepers were the exception, but Nah, they were the rule.

Dorian...is different. We just learned that he's apparently from Marquet in the first place, which is really interesting and explains why he didn't seem to know anything about Tal'Dorei. It does make me wonder how long he'll stick around for--will he just go back to Tal'Dorei? Will some crazy part of his backstory show up and take him away and thus be the next EXU plotline? I'm not sure, but it'll be interesting.

What's even more interesting is how, exactly, this new campaign fits with the EXU storyline. It's been a year since the events of EXU and Matt said Orym was contacted while the Crownkeepers were in Byroaden. Now, last we saw them they were about to go south into Betrayer cult territory, tho they discussed going to Byroaden after for Opal to look into her family some more. My guess is that we WILL get a season two of EXU to finish the Tetrarchs stuff and that campaign three takes place after that season two. Maybe. It does beg the question of if the Crownkeepers ever went back to Emon to speak with Gilmore which was the original goal that they never finished.

The reason I see so many people complaining, I think, is partly because one: EXU was pretty controversial on it's own because of it's guided style which is different then the freeform of the main campaigns. I disagree, but that's a different post. The second reason is that people wanted to be able to start this with no needed knowledge about past campaigns. I still think this holds true. I mean, heck, not watching EXU might make it more interesting to see these three interact. I mean, we don't know how Imogen or Laudna met, or Ashton and FCG. We aren't complaining about that, so simply watch Orym, Fearn, and Dorian and enjoy the mysteries of their pasts.

The fact that this group started at level three and the WILD twists we've already seen within the first episode alone really tells me that CR is going all in here. The set, the characters, whatever wild story they're about to tell--it's going to be amazing. I trust in the CR team and cannot wait to watch them go on this adventure together, wherever it may lead.

[meggie-stardust]

Top 5 Steter fics to rec

(I will also accept Stargent or Stetopher!)

This is such a hard ask... Ok, I want to go deep. No offense to anyone in the fandom, but I get tired of seeing the same fics rec'd over and over, even when they are wonderful. So, I'm going to try to pull some I haven't seen making the rounds as often.

In no particular order:

Keep On the Sunny Side by GiggleSnortBangDead: It's like a Tarantino revenge flick, but worse. It's all a little cliche but, hey, they gotta kill Kate Argent.

This has way more than just Steter, and whole bunch of warnings (so read at your own risk)... but man this fic (and it's sequel) are just what I love about the Steter dynamic.

Too Many War Wounds, But Not Enough Wars by neglectedtuesday: The Nematon is dying. The once bountiful tree is withering, a husk of it’s former glory. It’s skeletal, shrunken and wilted and no one knows how to fix it. It’s supposed to be the height of summer but you wouldn’t know it. The Nematon isn’t the only tree that’s falling apart. Peter folds his arms. His eyes narrow as Jennifer, the emissary from Kali’s pack, tries to communicate with the sentient tree. She’s waving her arms around and chanting but so far all she’s managed to do is look like a complete imbecile. She’s the sixth emissary in as many months and still the tree decays.

This is nearly my ideal Steter fic. It hits a lot of the intrigue I liked about the show, and explores things I wanted to see actually happen, and has an amazing Steter dynamic at the same time (and it has sequel that is basically the same story but from Stiles' perspective)

Sweeter Than Gingerbread by taylorpotato The saying goes that lovers who commit suicide together start their next life as twins. Perhaps that's why Stiles and Ally feel the way they do about each other.

OK the first warning is that this is Stiles/Allison/Peter and Stiles and Allison are twins, and if that is not your jam, fair enough, but oh man, I love this one. It has the tag twisted and fluffy, and that is accurate.

An echo in the void by Canis_chimera (Canis_cosmos) Canon diverges between s03 and s04.

Stiles isn't the same after the Nogitsune, a danger to his family and friends. Pieces of the void fox still permeate him, his thoughts winding down paths scored by that other consciousness. He left Beacon Hills to start a new life, alone by choice, alone by necessity. Alone.

Six years of relative stability later, two werewolves bring it all crashing down.

This is another one that is both Steter and Sterek (with a sequel being Steterek), but this has such hot Steter moments, I just couldn't keep it off my list. I discovered this fic as they were posting the last few chapters of the sequel and so I got to indulge all at once.

Better the Devil You Know by dracoismytrashson (JGogoboots) "I’m not that fucking naive. Believe me, I have no illusions about who you are. I just… everything is terrible, and I want to feel like I did that night… with you."

Somehow, saying it out loud makes everything click into place. Maybe, in all the overwrought complication that is Peter and his past and the way it fits into Stiles’ life, this simple thing can still be true. Maybe sometimes it’s just nice to dive into distraction, and we can’t always choose who or what that distraction is. Maybe the distraction chooses us.

Or: the one where Stiles sleeps with Peter instead of Malia, making both of their lives a bit more complicated.

I am not just saying this because I have wormed my way into being friends with @punchedbymarkesmith but this is one of the best Steter fics I've ever read, and it rejuvenated me when I had been finding myself a little bored with the direction some of the other fics around this time were taking...

Again, I tried to steer away from the ones that are rec'd on every steter list, even tho I love so many of those fics. A few honorable mentions because they seem to be abandoned WIPs:

Memento Mori by HDHale To save Stiles being stuck at home, isolated all summer, and stewing on his recent possession and the deaths he’d caused, he agreed to the unexpected offer of joining Chris Argent for a retreat in France.

What good Peter’s exile would do, Stiles was clueless.

(This one is Stetopher)

The Foul Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart by Hexandecimal “Stiles. Did I just watch you sell that man a hex-bag full of crushed caffeine pills and rocks from our own parking lot?”

“I threw in some sage too.”

-

Stiles may have lost his job and his place as Alan's Mastery student, but at least his former teacher had the decency to set up an introduction to Peter Hale, werewolf and necromancer.

It looked like Stiles wasn't as done forming impossible infatuations on his teachers as he thought.

(At least this time he's legal.)

[topweeklyupdate]

TØP Weekly Update #142: A Formidable Album (5/21/21)

So... how 'bout that album release week?

There's so much to cover; the release of nine new songs, the hype that's building for the World's Best Band to return to the stage, and (if we're able to come up for air) the massive speculation of what the future brings for our band.

I'm gonna get right into it, laying out my thoughts regarding this bold new album and covering all the most notable news from the week. I'll be sharing my (mostly) positive opinions about Scaled and Icy under the Read More line; I hope they're the start of a fun conversation with all of y'all who have stuck around through this last year.

Scaled and Icy Review

First, my general thoughts on the album: It's good! Really good. Do I think it's a no-skip like Vessel or a cohesive piece of art like Trench? Absolutely not! But it's also not the potential misfire that I worried that we might be getting when I first heard "Saturday" (more on that later); I think all of the songs are at least good, and some of them are downright great tracks that hold up with anything else that our band has ever released. It is also indisputably very different, but I think that generally works pretty well. Many of the songs evoke '60s rock or Britpop sounds and structures that you can tell Tyler is still trying to navigate, but I think he does a very solid job at adapting them to suit his strengths- namely his lyricism and knack for melody- rather than change to suit them. Unfortunately, this does result in a bit of square-peg-in-round-hole syndrome at times; most of the rap verses on the album feel like they're here just to fulfill an obligation to fans who would be mad if they weren't here, and most of the songs that use them are the weakest ones in the project.

"Good Day" plays a major role in getting the rest of the album to work as well as it does. Its gradual ramp-up, introducing the sound that will be used throughout the rest of the album. Its playfulness belies its message about how one can project a somewhat false optimism for oneself in the midst of tragedy: the type of dark stuff in a bright package that Tyler is so so good at. It's perhaps not an instant classic, but I am excited to see how it comes across when it's eventually used as a show-opener. 9/10

I've of course already discussed "Shy Away"; an anthemic, inimitably catchy track that I just wish had a bit more going on under the hood. Still going to be so good to hear thousands of voices scream "An 'I LOVE YOU' that isn't words!" someday. 9.5/10

"Choker" definitely took a little bit to grow on me. I think part of that was a bit of disappointment from over-inflated expectations and the environment I was in when I first heard it. With further listens, I fall more and more in love with the melody of the song... well, most of it. Like the rest of this album, the biggest weakness in the song is when Tyler tries to tick the box of having a rap verse; it just feels really out of place, unfinished, and almost amateurish, and it doesn't end the song on the note that it really should. Without it, it'd be one of my favorites on the album; with it, "Choker" is a solid 8.5/10.

Speaking of unfinished-sounding songs really hurt by their rap verse: "The Outside". There's a definite something to the vibe of the song, but that seemingly nonsensical verse is one of the two weakest parts of the entire project for me. The way the song meanders only adds to the feeling that there wasn't as much energy and attention paid to it compared to other parts of the project. It's pretty easily my least favorite track on Scaled and Icy, and the only one I might regularly skip. I've also seen plenty of people saying it's the best song on the album, so please tell me why I'm wrong! 6.5/10

"Saturday", as mentioned above, had me really nervous about this album. Like "Choker", it's grown on me a bit since I first heard it, in part because it fits better with the context of the rest of the album. However, this one really does feel undercooked lyrically and overreliant on the novelty of using a disco-inspired sound that seems to chase trends more than almost any other TØP track. The inclusion of that very sweet audio clip from Jenna boosts the song in some ways, but also adds to the disappointment in others; there are many other songs on this project that would be more worth surrendering time watching Friends. Thankfully, those come next. 7/10

"Never Take It" is fascinating. I never thought I'd hear a Rolling Stones-style song from Tyler Joseph featuring a gd guitar solo of all things, and it actually sounds pretty great. However, I also predict that this song will see some of the greatest critical scrutiny out of all the songs on the album. The lyrics seem to be Tyler's criticism of the media for playing up division in our society, but he's extremely vague when discussing which entities are spreading said division and ultimately recommends that people "educate yourself, but never too much". I'll be honest: maybe it's the fact that it sounds like something my dad would listen to, but it feels like this would get tons of play on Fox News. Since it makes specific reference to the events of last summer, it's hard not to feel like song is at least partially inspired by Tyler's brush with cancellation last year. Maybe I'm reading too deeply into it, but those reservations come from the song's lack of specificity, which is an issue of songwriting more than politics. They hold me back from truly loving a song that still manages to be one of the most exciting the band has ever put out. 8.5/10

"Mulberry Street" seems like the perfect realization of the entire album's intended tone. It is so pleasant, so lush while also simply produced, full of great lyrics, metaphors, and imagery. It really brings the whole project together, even if it's missing That One Line to really move this up to the top tier of the canon. 9.5/10

"Formidable" is the best song on the album and one of two songs I would truly rank in the top tier of the band's canon. Extremely pleasant and brimming with well-crafted lines to make your heart swoon. Jenna (and Rosie) is (are) a lucky gal(s). Or is it about Josh? Who's to say? 10/10

"Bounce Man" is just plain wild. I think Tyler's smuggling someone to Mexico to escape the feds? The playfulness of it all really covers up any frustration I might have with the clarity; it makes it clear that there's not really stakes here, just vibes. 8.5/10

"No Chances" sees the album take a turn that I'm sure the Reddit Clique is going to have an absolute field day with; it and "Redecorate" both sound quite different from the rest of the album and evoke enough elements of Trench to make me think that's it's actually possible that all this 'SAI is Propaganda' stuff might actually have something to it... until I actually pick apart the lyrics, then I'm even more confused. The song has some of the best rapping on the album, though that's not saying much (the feng shui line is a groaner right out the gate) and the gentle pre-chorus is really pleasant. I still haven't made up my mind on whether the chorus is effective or just plain goofy. This one might get worse or better on repeat listens, impossible to say for now. 7.5/10

"Redecorate" rounds out the album by opening with a Clancy quote (Tyler, you bastard), firmly setting this as a coda to Trench more than the album we just listened to. The rest of the song is really storytelling, with Tyler describing a bunch of people who are struggling deeply. The idea of "redecorating" here stands for how they are faced with the option to clean and resort their own spaces and lives or leave that to their loved ones to do after they're gone. By the time it gets to the album's name drop, you begin to wonder how much of this is potential autobiographical of the last year. It's moving stuff, a callback to some of the great strengths of the band's discography. 10/10

If I average those scores all up, this project ranks below almost every album among the Pilots discography on my rating scale, very narrowly edging out Self-Titled. That's still a very solid 8.6. Scaled and Icy is a very good album on first listen. We'll see how I feel about it after having a little more time to sit with it, but I've rambled enough: let's move through the rest of the week's news.

Other News

Of course, there was a lot else going on this week! To accompany the release of "Saturday", Zane Lowe over at Apple Music dropped an interview with Tyler. As usual, Zane did a pretty solid job of getting to the heart of the craft and the creation process. However, Tyler also wound up skirting a lot of the questions to just talk more about how much he loves being a dad, which makes me happy; if the cost of getting a little less attention and mental energy devoted to the music is that little girl getting all of his attention, that's honestly preferable for me.

The album rollout is not even close to over. Later today, the concert will be streamed live. It's our first real performance that we've gotten from the band since 2019, but the previews that we've seen have completely exceeded any of my expectations, and really anything that we've seen from the band. It appears that they've transformed the entire arena (which I think is the ol' Schott at Ohio State) into a whole TØP world, with different sets laden with Easter eggs and a cast of backup dancers. If the website can hold up to the traffic (and I acknowledge that might be a big ask), this could really live up to Tyler's promise of this being the best livestreamed concert ever.

Oh, and this guy dyed his hair pink.

What a time to be a fan. Catch you all tomorrow.

Power to the local dreamer.

|-/

[bearpillowmonster]

What I don't like about Sonic

So, I like Sonic. Heck, my first Mario game was Mario Party (3 I think) and my first Sonic game was Sonic Gems and I think technically Sonic came first. But even before that, for some reason Adventure for Dreamcast swirls around in my memory, I'm just not sure how when I didn't have a Dreamcast?? Anyway, point taken, Sonic is cool, I grew up with him, big deal, so did a lot of others.

But here's the thing, I liked Sonic Gems but I only got the actual concept of Sonic AFTER playing it. The idea of playing a game where you're fast is appealing to me, it's like a game for the impatient…except it's not.

When I play Sonic, I want to run but instead it seems like there's a lot of puzzles and figuring out where to go and man do I hate the water levels. And I don't expect it to just be a straight shot with little ramps and loop-de-loops every now and then but it just doesn't scream what I imagine when I think of Sonic. So, okay, maybe the 2D games just aren't for me. I do prefer 3D platformers after all. I like Adventure, in fact, it's my favorite of the franchise but I still feel a sense of "Where am I going again?" Yeah you finish the beach level and then you go and get the shoes "Well how do you get the shoes?" "Well what's after the shoes?" "WHERE ARE THE SHOES?" obviously now and days we have the internet and I can just look up what I need to but it's mildly infuriating because there's a semi open world but there's only one viable place you can go, it's just a matter of finding it. Well, what about the OTHER 3D games. I can't speak for many but here's the list that I've compiled of all the Sonic games that I've played, what I think about them and such.

Sonic 1 - Alright Sonic 2 - Decent Sonic 3 and Knuckles - Good Mean Bean - Fun Sonic 4 - Yuck Sonic CD - Second favorite of the 2D Sonic Mania - Favorite of the 2D games Sonic Adventure DX - Favorite Sonic Adventure 2 Battle - Alright (Sonic X kinda ruined it for me) Shadow the Hedgehog - Annoying Sonic Heroes - Broken Sonic Gems - Fun Sonic Unleashed - Day is good, night is not Sonic Generations - Great but just a 'best of' collection Sonic Dash - do you even count that?

And you know what? That's 15 games (I guess Gems is a collection though) and I didn't finish any one of them (started by a habit my kid self had with games). Why keep buying Sonic games if I don't finish them? Because Sonic is cool. The characters are cool. The stories are cool. The gameplay…can use some work. I was one of the ones who was excited for Boom because I thought a reinvention would be beneficial AND that really worked didn't it? It looks more monotonous than ever. I've seen an array of cartoon and they're on par, there's nothing wrong with them but they don't scratch the same itch. I haven't read the comics because there's so many to choose from and

These games come out consistently, practically every year and I get that there are multiple teams but sheesh, look at Pokemon, it's the same deal. We all know what happens to games that come out on a yearly basis, they eventually repeat each other or lose quality therefore interest. Assassin's Creed, Call of Duty, it's all been proven and I get it's apart of the hype in order to keep the train moving but look at Undertale. If that wasn't a game of its time, I don't know what is but then Toby Fox comes out with Deltarune and it's like the fandom never left. Take years for a chapter 2 and it's the same deal. Sonic has a dedicated fanbase so they can live through it. But Sonic is a little unique in this situation because it actually reminds me of the fast food place.

I don't like Sonic the restaurant BUT they have an amazing variety and neat gimmicks that keep bringing me back to try them anyway. Sonic is the same way. Sonic is a werehog now? Sign me up! Sonic is designed by people who worked on Jak and Daxter? Sign me up! Sonic wants to go dark with a spinoff about Shadow? Sign me up! And it works, it brings people like me in. I do find that what's advertised is a little lacking in gameplay though. Look at the comparison between in game graphics and cutscenes for just about any of them but Sonic Riders is a good example. I know that games do that, not just Sonic and games aren't about graphics most of the time but it just tells me that the game was rushed. And with Sonic, that seems to be the case more than not, I can make exceptions for the 2D games because, well, they're 2D and are now handled by a specific other studio that does good with those types of games, because they're FANS! And a 2D game doesn't come out nearly as much anymore therefore the pressure isn't riding on them as hard.

This is why I'm still a Sonic fan. This is why I have hope for the next game (Frontiers) and probably the next game after that. Maybe I'll go and actually finish one of them some day but I just want Sega to hear me out. Take your time. I know that Sonic is all about going fast, that's rad, but that doesn't mean the games have to come out just as quick. For gameplay, bring it back to the basics, if you want to make a game based on Sat, I'm here for it. If you want to make a Sonic 64, I'm here for it. Give me a camera where a third of the screen is taken up by Sonic's back like a Batman game, I'm cool with that. But I ask this. Just please be something cool without the 2D or 2.5D levels. Sonic 06 did bad (was rushed), I get that but really I think what would make it all work is an Adventure style game like that.

[cosmo-era-yuto]

The Yuto-Wooseok-Yanan triangle is so great ;w; And the raw talent of Jinho and Hui <3 I agree, Shinwon is such a wild card!

tbh I legit cannot pick a bias, I love them all. I could go on a mini essay for each member about how much I love them. I love them loving each other!

Thanks for your b-side breakdown! It's exactly what I wanted to hear. And don't apologize for writing something lengthy! I'm the same, and I love to read everything, so it's really nice to find a kindred spirit! Give me those essays!

"Lose Yourself"-- I love this song a lot and I'm glad someone else does too. That's funny, liking "Like This" too much! But yeah, it goes hard and makes you Feel Things, hence it being probably my fav PTG song. And I agree, Shinwon needs to write more music! "Worship U" is so good, it could have been a title track if it had been on another album. I keep forgetting to put "Dazzling" on my ipod, so I haven't listened to it very much. I should rectify this. You seem to favor the Japanese tracks, haha! Do you speak it, or is it just coincidence?

You know what's funny, I didn't really like any Triple H stuff...I'm sorry Hui and Dawn...but I'm glad that it was a gateway to PTG for you!

I really applaud you for giving Pentagon a second chance and trying a second song. So many people out there would only listen to one track and then drop the group if they hated it. I can see how past you hated "Humph!," it's got a very simple melody with a basic repeated motif.

omg, "Can You Feel It" also made me a PTG convert! At least, music-wise. The decision to stan Pentagon as people/a group came after that. Summer 2020, some friends were visiting me and they were playing a bunch of k-pop, which was something I hadn't been into for years. So I was like, "Yeah, maybe I should get back into this, can you make me a rec list?" So one friend made me a playlist and I played it at work on YT for like 3 months. Ironically, there was no Pentagon on there, but PTG was connected to a bunch of other groups on the rec list, plus RTK had just happened, so PTG kept showing up on the suggested videos list on the side. I don't know what song I listened to first, but I remember "Violet" was one of the first ones, and I wasn't into it. But once I listened to "Can You Feel It," it was all over. I must have listened to that song like 5 times in a row at work (I usually hate listening to a song on repeat) and actually started searching out their music instead of just casually picking them out from the suggested videos. But then one day I saw the performance video for "Shine," and my life changed. They looked so happy! They were actually enjoying themselves and having fun! They were shouting along with the music and laughing with each other! It was so different from all the other groups I had seen in their performance/dance practice videos. Like, Pentagon members were *real people,* not just performers. And that's when I fell in love and actually started stanning them. I immediately started watching all content I could find of them on YT and began to memorize their faces and names. And now here we are, hahaha!

(I like plenty of other groups' music, but I don't try to learn members' names or watch their non-MV content. That's the difference for me.)

So in the continued string of coincidences, I think we both became Unis around the same time XD

Maybe I'll get into the b-side question another time, I feel like I've gone on long enough already, haha

Yes we seem really similar, maybe too similar

Nah I’m kidding! It’s actually a really neat surprise

My favoring the Japanese tracks may have to do with the fact that I like the sound of J-pop music or maybe the fact that I’m half Japanese 🤠 As for my speaking it, hahahaha funny you should ask 😅 So my mother never taught me Japanese or spoke it around me because she didn’t know that I’d be able to learn it alongside English. She thought I would get confused and that it would hinder my own English. She’s trying to teach me now as a teenager but it’s a very slow process. However I will admit that I get ecstatic when I’m able to read a sentence written in the language (albeit a really short sentence with basic Kanji characters)

Oh that’s interesting, I actually love 365 Fresh and Retro Future is good as well, I haven’t heard any other song from them, though. Even so, the music can never compare to how Hui looked. OH HOW I MISS TRIPLE H HUI SO

And thank you! That’s what I usually do when it comes to listening to new groups. If I hear a song a like I need to hear other songs to see if I actually like the group’s music, or just that one song. Same with if I don’t like the first song I hear.

Yessssss Can You Feel It was the moment. I also remember not vibing with Violet the first time I heard it. Once again I’m fine with it now, but I might skip it if it comes on the playlist 😬

Can I just say that Pentagon was the first group with a lot of members I tried to stan, so learning their faces was so hard 😭 Blackpink is what got me into Kpop in 2019 and they were the only group I listened to before Pentagon. I, for the life of me, could not stop mixing up Hyunggu and Hongseok. The only way I could tell them apart was because Hongseok was tanner, so if the lighting in a video was weird it was all over for me. Then I realized that Hongseok had a longer neck, so that helped. On the other hand Shinwon, Hui, Dawn, and Wooseok I could identify right away. Shinwon has a fox like face, Hui has a very straight (almost Greek) nose, almost every time I saw Dawn he had bleach blond hair, and Wooseok has wide eyes and a bigger nose. I would actually like to know, if you remember, who you had trouble identifying and who were easy for you? I always find that different people have have trouble with different Kpop idols which is interesting.

I actually don’t really indulge myself with content from other groups. Sometimes I’ll listen to songs from other groups, for example God’s Menu by Stray Kids is staying on my playlist even though all I know about the group is that there’s a guy named Felix. Also while we’re on the topic, who else do you listen to? I consider myself stans of girl groups Blackpink, Wooah, StayC, and Twice (I just started getting into the last two), boy groups TO1 and Kingdom, and I go HARD FOR KARD!!! Pentagon happens to be my ult group, though.

Anyhow, I can’t wait to hear your answers for the b-side questions! I hope you have a good rest of your day and until next time 👾

[fjadwrites]

Good afternoon!

Yes, I know. This is a lot later than my usual blogging time. You could say things had gotten busier around here since I woke up this morning. It's 3:46 PM here as I'm writing here. But I did read for today. I think that's a good thing. I tried to read as much as I can while doing things around here.

As for my reading update from yesterday,  I got to finish reading several books! What do you know? Then again, three of them were just the shortest books from my old currently reading list that were added since the early 2024, to be honest. You could say I'm in a hurry to be on track with my Goodreads Reading Challenge for this year. And what better for me to do that?Read short books. But three out of the four books I've finished reading yesterday were self-help books. And one of them has something to do with writing. And obviously, since I did crunch reading (as I'd like to call it) yesterday, it was obvious that I surpassed my page count quota yesterday. With this, now I'm thinking of raising the maximum number of pages for me to read to either 80 or 90. Definitely not 100 as it was still too much for my brain.

Let me rate the books I've read yesterday. I mean, I know I did it in Goodreads already. But I also want to do it here.

"The 12 Week Year" by Brian P. Moran and Michael Lennington - ⭐⭐⭐, but only because it only made my brain like a mush and maybe I just felt pressured in a way as I was reading the whole thing. I mean, the idea was great that you can actually do a lot of things in about 3 months. But maybe I wasn't in the right mindset just yet to implement the process to myself at the moment. For now, I would consider doing the process in the future, especially since I do view myself a failure at my age of 33.

"5,000 Words Per Hour: Write Faster, Write Smarter" by Chris Fox - ⭐⭐⭐, but the idea was definitely something I can do when I'm writing. I actually first heard about this book because of Kate Cavanaugh's video when she tried to write 5,000 words an hour like Chris Fox. But it actually took me a while to finish reading the whole thing. I don't know what made me stop reading this, to be honest. And I know it's other than my reading slump. Should I blame my writing slump/writer's block on that, as well? But yes, I know I can only write around 3,000 words maximum in one day. Why? I tend to write my stories by hand first. It has been a habit since high school and I don't think I've ever outgrown that. But I could still do the practices here in this book in my writing just so I can use that as a reason to discipline my writer self. So the books still helped me in some way.

"Romancing The Beats: Story Structure for Romance Novels" by Gwen Hayes - This one was a definite ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ for me, only because it does provided me more insight than I ever thought I needed when it comes to writing romance stories. I mean, you could say that romance is sort of my forte in writing stories. It was the genre that I started writing back in high school. Yes, I'm thanking Kate Cavanaugh once again for me discovering this book for writers. And I think she outlined her first romance novel with this as a guide. I still haven't started outlining any romance stories with the beats in this book. But I will get to that ㅡ once I managed to get my writing groove back.

The second volume of "By The Grace Of The Gods" is also done, and I've rated it ⭐⭐⭐⭐ in Goodreads. Hmm... Maybe because I wasn't some of the characters to appear here early that I've only seen on the second season of the anime version. Another thing that could've affected the original 5 stars rating was the initial assumption I had that anime version encompassed the first two volumes of the light novel. I was wrong. This volume seemed to be encompassing only 3 episodes since it has something to do with the continuation of the monster subjugation and starting the laundry store. The real problem for me? Information overload on the store building part.

That's a lot for me to even write here, you know. But I thought I should add my comments (even if it's short) on each of the book I would finish reading. Yes, even my own ratings on the books done reading.

It's currently raining hard as I write here, but let's get on with the next part. As for th book I continued reading, I actually read 18 pages of the fifth volume of "The Most Heretical Last Boss Queen" at past midnight, as I've mentioned in my blog entry yesterday. I didn't add more pages done reading on that book after that since I concentrated reading more on the other books. So no comments and ratings just yet.

I really should try raising the maximum number for a bit, but I would definitely not let it reach 100 for my brain's sake. But with all that I've read today, I think I already reached this page count quota today. I'll let you know about the books I read tomorrow. 

Just to give you a heads up ㅡ they were mainly novellas. Blame my frustration for constantly seeing the number of books behind schedule in my Goodreads Reading Challenge. So this was my solution to finally beat that.

Yes, I know this entry is already way too late than my usual posting time. But it's only past 5 in the afternoon here in 🇵🇭, so it's still within the day.

Let's see if I can post here during my usual early posting time. See you tomorrow! Happy reading. 😊✌️💕📚📖