#i love seeing individual competitors kill it!!

[fictional-orphan-smackdown]

BOOK ORPHAN VS BOOK ORPHAN, GO!

All propaganda and what each competitor is from under the cut (tw for suicide mentions in Harrowhark's propaganda)

Harrowhark Nonagesimus (The Locked Tomb)

She is literally so powerful okay. Like she's a huge bitch and I love her. She knows how strong her necromancy powers are. To be able to control not one but TWO adult corpses for YEARS from the time she was like? 9 years old!? There is so much more to her but I don't wanna get too spoilerly but uhg I love this little gay necromancer

IS SHE REALLY IN LOVE WITH A CORPSE??

Harrowhark is a necromancer and nun on Pluto where they pray about a tomb remaining closed and not releasing the body inside that could kill their god, but Harrow opens said tomb when she was 10 so her parents commit suicide and help her tie her own noose. They die in front of her and she doesn't follow through, so seven years later she's still alive to torment the only other child around (also an orphan) while running the planet through the puppeted corpses of her parents, who the rest of the population are led to believe are alive (but no, it's a 10-17 year old doing incredibly advanced necromancy, this is fine)

Unlike most orphans, Harrow has been keeping her status secret. After her parents committed suicide, she told everyone they had taken a permanent vow of silence and started puppeting their bodies around with her necromantic powers. She has been doing a Weekend at Bernies for the past eight years.

The Baudelaire Orphans (A Series of Unfortunate Events)

The epitome of orphans, they’re the best

“I’m having a very terrible childhood right now”-Klaus

The story deadass begins with them being told that their parents died in a fire and that they're orphans now. They then bounce from guardian to guardian who tend to always meet a gruesome fate at the hands of Count Olaf. Not only have they been orphaned once, but have been orphaned multiple times and are called "The Baudelaire Orphans" by not only characters in the book but by the narrator himself. They're called "The Baudelaire Orphans" so many times that it might as well be a defining character trait of theirs, and honestly it sort've is. The series doesn't even end with them finding a home or guardians of any kind, it ends with the Baudelaires fate being completely ambiguous with them literally sailing away from the island they were stranded on in the final book (yeah this series is quite the journey, I highly suggest it). These poor three kids are probably the most orphaned kids of all time since their orphaned in a new way almost every book and they deserve at least one win in their unfortunate tale.

These guys are like the poster-child of orphaning, we open the series with them finding out that they're orphans and also have no access to their money so now they hop around from place to place from weirdo caretaker to another weird/crazy/murderous caretaker and it's all fun and games and murder and decieving and surviving and thriving and---my point is, these three are a wonderful trio of siblings who love and rely on one another through all their trials and tribulations.

Literally every single one of their problems come from being orphans. They’re continually referred to as orphans and the plot of the first half of the series is them being shuffled around to guardians.

These kids are so orphaned they never even get a found family outside themselves. At least most stories featuring orphaned kids see them fulfill some sorta epic destiny or have them find a new home or set of loved ones of sorts. The Baudelaires? They're thrown from one fucking failure of a home into the next, ignored, hunted, etc.. It's been years but like, even in the end, they still have to set sail alone. As individual characters, they aren't bad either. Violet's the dependable big sister who's knack for inventions comes in handy, Klaus is a well-read chap and Sunny is a lovely gremlin. They make a good trio.

Every single guardian they try to obtain throughout the series turns out to be someone who wants the large inheritance left for them and is willing to do whatever it takes to get it.

They basically fend for themselves the whole series when no adult will listern to them. The whole series is them being resourceful and clever the whole series despite the misfortune. Violet is a brilliant inventor, Klaus reads and collects knowledge, and Sunny learns to be a good cook over the series

their parents die tragically in a fire and then everything awful proceeds to happen to them

I haven't read these books in years but if any orphans deserve to win a smackdown it's these fools, they are constantly in the trenches in those books goddamn. Also that baby is like a shredder they have that on their side, I think that beast literally solo'd a snake?

(This one was specifically for Klaus, but I'll put it here still) He and his sisters being orphans is kinda the point. As in many books, it's the trigger for them to change lives and navigating hardships. The thing is, their hardships just grow worse and "unfortunate" (read "dreadful") events keep happening to them as they stick together instead of the story getting better. Klaus and Violet become Sunny's subtitute parents and get through their more and more miserable lives together keeping hope things would eventually get better

Arguably more famously orphaned than Bruce Wayne, if not for how their story happens while they’re orphaned children versus an orphaned adult. Definitely have the most famously tragic post-orphaning story. All three are incredibly brilliant in their own way, including the literal baby. Pursued relentlessly by the leader of a maniacal theater troupe and letdown by a slew of adults, so it’s all the more impressive how amazing they each turned out to be. Book series was so good it got turned into a pretty great movie and then a successful TV show years later. Also can’t forget how these three are orphaned repeatedly as the distant relatives who take them in get killed off in increasingly inventive manners. Let’s be honest, ain’t no characters out here orphaning like the Baudelaire orphans.

this series taught me so many cool words and phrases and I love each of the 3 main characters so much

Violet, Klaus, and Sunny are peddled from caretaker to caretaker over the course of 13 books, always being chased by the evil Count Olaf who wants to steal the Baudelaire fortune that the children are meant to inherit once they reach a certain age.

Spoilers ahead, the Baudelaires siblings story starts with them going from being the Baudelaire kids to the Baudelaire orphans, after their parents pass away in a mysterious fire. But they arent the only paternal figures that they lost, they go from tutor to tutor, almost all the good ones dying in front of them, and even the ones that survive at first their future is uncertain since the last time the kids see them they are blindfolded in a burnind building, and we never found out who make it out alive and who didnt. Even the main villian, Count Olaf their first tutor, and the only constant adult in their life after their parents death ends up dying in front of them. These three are orphans ten times over.

They are THE orphans. They have lost not only their parents but multiple guardians that they went to live with as well.

They're THE Orphans. The childhood book orphans we all read, Orphans Prime if you will. They lose their parents, every caregiver who's ever kind to them, then say fuck it and live on a deserted island on their own to raise themselves abd fully embrace their orphan status. On the island, they learn their parents survived the shipwreck then died again - double orphaning even.

OH MY SWEET LITTLE CHILDREN THAT FUELED MY LOVE FOR READING AND THE MACABRE Violet- Won her first of many invention competitions when she was five with an automatic rolling pin (comprised of a window shade and six pairs of roller skates). Extremely innovative and genius, foiled by her kindness to others. And she knows how to make a Molotov cocktail. Klaus- Absolute monster of a bibliophile, conducts research for fun, and has a photographic memory. He is known to want nothing more than "a good book, a comfy chair, and the warm glow of a reading lamp". He also is a Herman Melville fan, which is points for him in my book. Sunny- Most people know her only for her penchant for biting, but Sunny is a distinctly distinguished character. She has sharp wit (as long as you can read it through her babbles), her poker skills are phenomenal for a baby, and she has quite the knack for cooking! Also yeah, the teeth. She climbed an elevator shaft with them once.

They are constantly going through it, give these kids a break for real

[quoteablebooks]

Genre: Fiction, Adult, Science-Fiction, Fantasy,

Rating: 4 out of 5

Content Warning: Violence, Murder, Death, Sexual content, Child death

Summary:

Every year, thousands in the kingdom of Talin will flock to its capital twin cities, San-Er, where the palace hosts a set of games. For those confident enough in their ability to jump between bodies, competitors across San-Er fight to the death to win unimaginable riches.

Princess Calla Tuoleimi lurks in hiding. Five years ago, a massacre killed her parents and left the palace of Er empty…and she was the one who did it. Before King Kasa’s forces in San can catch her, she plans to finish the job and bring down the monarchy. Her reclusive uncle always greets the victor of the games, so if she wins, she gets her opportunity at last to kill him.

Enter Anton Makusa, an exiled aristocrat. His childhood love has lain in a coma since they were both ousted from the palace, and he’s deep in debt trying to keep her alive. Thankfully, he’s one of the best jumpers in the kingdom, flitting from body to body at will. His last chance at saving her is entering the games and winning.

Calla finds both an unexpected alliance with Anton and help from King Kasa’s adopted son, August, who wants to mend Talin’s ills. But the three of them have very different goals, even as Calla and Anton’s partnership spirals into something all-consuming. Before the games close, Calla must decide what she’s playing for—her lover or her kingdom.

*Opinions*

So this is one of the books that I got through my Adult-Book-only Fairyloot subscription, and I will admit that I was a little skeptical. I had heard some middling reviews about Chole Gong’s Young Adult Romeo and Juliette retelling, so I wasn’t sure how I would get on with this novel inspired by Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra. I am happy to inform you that I really enjoyed my time with this novel, though it took some time to collect my feelings on this story and the characters that Gong introduces us to. While I will admit that the scaffolding of the plot was not original, I enjoyed the setting and characters enough that I kept turning the pages to see how this set-up we had seen before would play out. 

The plot of this novel is rather simple at its core and something that has been used before. Two competitors enter a tournament to the death for different reasons, but both have no option but to win. There is an individual behind the scenes pulling the strings, other disruptive forces at work, and an uneasy alliance between the two competitors might turn into something more. After the success of The Hunger Games, and Battle Royal before that, competition to the death is a very common plot in novels and a few of the lower-rated reviews complained about this scaffolding for the story. However, while Gong does make a number of comments about capitalism, the 1%, and social ills, there is a very different tone than The Hunger Games. Everyone enters the games willingly, even paying an entry fee, instead of being forced to fight to the death. They can also leave the games of their own accord at any time without fighting or killing. The society in San-Er has a lot of problems, which Princess Calla Tuoleimi and Prince August Shenzhi want to change in their own ways, but it is managed in a different way than that of The Hunger Games, so I don’t think it’s a fair comparison.   

I have seen a number of reviews complaining about the lack of solid world-building and that things are just said are happening in San-Er without any explanation. While I think some of that is due to not picking up subtle hints that Gong left throughout the story, some of it is that this is the first novel in a trilogy. Now, I will admit that at the back of the Fairyloot edition, there was a printed conversation with Gong, in which she stated that this first novel was very self-contained, but the world would expand in the rest of the series. While I am a strong believer that the story should stand on its own without reading author interviews or blog posts, I didn’t have any issue with the world-building. This novel was about the games and that is what it is focused on, with the rules or lack of them clearly defined. The rules of qi were also explained and then challenged without the context of this novel in a way that made sense to me. Perhaps I was just too enamored with the setting to be bothered by things that were grating to other people. I am also a reader who appreciates character work over plot so that probably contributes to it. 

Speaking of the setting, Gong did a very good job of making the city of San-Er a living breathing character in this novel. You can easily visualize the neon lights, the mass of humanity that is constantly on top of each other, and the smells and sounds that are constant throughout the novel. Gong also makes the reader feel the absence of these things when there are scenes in the Palace of Union or outside of the wall. While at times all the chaos in the city made it hard to track the action that was happening, which added to the chaotic nature of the action sequences in this novel. Still, the setting was a large reason why I enjoyed this novel as much as I did, I really got immersed into the world that Gong created and the constant struggle that the characters and citizens were facing. 

There are three main characters in this novel, Princess Calla Tuolemi, Prince August Shenzhi, and Anton Makusa. Now I don’t know if any of them can be called likable, but I find Calla the most sympathetic of the bunch. What drives her in the games is a naive notion that King Kasa is the reason for all the horrors and tragedy within the city and if she could just remove him from his reign, things would improve for the citizens of Talin. Now Calla is such a practical character that this thought that removing Kasa would start the country toward the path of healing or trusting August who wants the same thing was a little odd to me. However, her thought process usually makes sense, even if she makes decisions that aren’t the smartest. Given the ending of the novel, I am interested in seeing how her character is going to be in the sequel. 

Anton Makusa grows on you as the story progresses, but he doesn’t change, he just becomes obsessed with something new and does whatever possible to keep it. I think what keeps him from being completely unlikable is the fact that he is aware that he can be insufferable at times. I also enjoyed when he is around Calla and the balance they strike between competitors and whatever else is blooming between them. I will admit that the use of “I love you” in this novel was far too quick, especially given the circumstances, but I also have not read the source material so perhaps that is the reason. 

Prince August is the least likable, but the most interesting. Much like Anton, your opinion of him shifts throughout the novel, but he does not get enough screen time to really draw any conclusions about his character. Instead, you get the way that numerous people react to August, especially those who are closest to him. While Calla has naivety and Anton has confidence that is warranted, it is hard to get a read on August. Given the events at the end of the novel, it is unclear if we are going to get a better idea about him as the trilogy continues, but I am excited to get answers if they are provided. 

Overall, I enjoyed this novel a lot more than I expected and it is a 4-star read. However, if someone asked me why I liked the novel I would have a hard time pinpointing something other than the setting. While this is a full arc of a story, telling what happened during the games, the plot and the characters aren’t sitting in my feelings. That being said, I keep thinking about this novel and will pick up the sequel when it comes out.

[lastfrontierh]

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[livmoorez]

Favourite moments of the 2022 NCAA gymnastics season:

Iowa sophomore Adeline Kenlin scores a 9.950 to tie for second place on beam at the national championships. This is the highest a Hawkeye has ever finished at national championships and she was one of only two individual competitors to place in the top three on any event this year.

[saltyinternetflower]

NO I wasn't prepared for this!!

The more I watch "Drive to Survive" (Yelp l can't stop), the less I trust it 🤐, but THE M0RE I fall in love with DANIEL RICCIARDO aka Danny Ric🙈😊.

That SPECIMEN has got a smile that can literally cure depression 😁😁 People who can smile like that arrest my heart instantly. And then I saw Danny said that Max Verstappen is NOT an undeserving champion, and I'm like...

*broooo I'll probably give my ex a second chance if Danny Ric tells me so!*

That's why I'm kind of keeping my heart open to see Max for the way he actually is. He does seem like a cutthroat competitor on track, a reckless, young, arrogant, extremely talented but unpredictable individual, but there's definitely more to him! I can't bring myself to loath him after watching those Max & Ric videos.

Feels like I'm still living in 2018, but is it too late to project a thought like these two need be teammates again? 😋 This has been a time of soul-bros reuniting (cough *NeyMessi* cough) but there's a great amount of bromance right there AND I WASN'T PREPARED TO FEEL THAT... NO WAYYY!

I don't want to go down this rabbit hole, but these Maxiel stuff is killing me, send help 🥺 They even shared some weird @$$ "ki ki aye aye" Velociraptor language which literally makes zero fooking sense 😂😂😂.

If someone had told me earlier there's a sport gayer than football (soccer), then I'd probably scoff at them 😏😏 THAT'S UNTIL I STARTED WATCHING F1 !!!😅

I want my mutuals here to tell me if I'm being an absolute idiot for feeling like this? Also, what would be some must watch videos of Lewis Hamilton (apart from his racing videos) because I can't wait to experience the best Lewis moments!

Am I Maxiel-ed? Is that even legal? I've no clueee...I wasn't even planning to like Verstappen but! Lololol help me out besties 🥰😍

[docholligay]

The Youths want to know what f/f couples you would put in a March Madness-esque bracket. It is specifically couples not individuals, there is a similar Yaoi bracket going on right now. Competitors do not have to be anime thats just what its called, and they do not need to be canon either. You can have multiple competitors from the same fandom but try to keep it balanced

Boy am I the wrong person to bring this question to ahaha. I am the MARIANAS TRENCH of yuri couples. I love VERY DEEPLY, but not broadly. I don’t skip around in my interests and my ships! There are only a handful of f/f couples, of couples at all, really, that I would say I care about in any meaningful way. Even properties I really enjoy, a lot of the time, it isn’t about the lesbian pairing for me. That’s why I often ask if people want me to watch a show because it is TRULY GOOD, or because lesbians appear. I’m an old married lesbian. I have a fair amount of married lesbian friends. I enjoy having them! I don’t need to go to fiction to find the reality that lesbians can exist and have relationships. 

BUT, if we are setting up this bracket. 

Harumichi will win every time. 

Because if I’m taking this as i understand it, it’s not about how I feel about any individual character in a couple, but how I feel about the couple as its own character, how their romantic relationship moves in its own way and affects them both and the people around them in its own way. For me, harumichi is the slam dunk for that. I am very very fond of Reinako, but I think of rei and Minako as two interesting and independent people hwo happen to end up together and if they didn’t, well, that would also be fine. I love them as a couple but it doesn’t feel like its own force of nature for me the way harumichi does. In the same way i adore Lena, she is one of favorite characters of all time, but she is essentially fully formed when she and emily get together and while they make each other happy and their relationship is lovely in the light of all that, and I enjoy writing it, it’s not the same. 

I would probably place Pharah/Mercy in my slot two, but it’s mostly being carried by the fact that I think of Fareeha as being a huge mess in her very own way before she meets Angela, and even then it’s not just Angela’s love that changes her and moves her, it’s the family and camaraderie and very real love she finds within the new OW she helps create. It’s her CHOOSING to be better, as well, and I won’t take that from her and give it all to Angela. (While I absolutely WILL take that from Ms. Michiru Kaioh.) 

Anyway, as far as I’m concerned, the best I could come up with would be an elite eight: 

harumichi

pharah/mercy

reinako

lena/emily

lena/amelie (mostly for the horrific potential) 

Okay i realize that is five, but as I sit here thinking about it…as far as relationships run this is the small handful that I really feel in my bones. There are relationships I really do like and often include, and very much consider my canon (Seiya/Usagi, Hana/Brigitte) and there are relatkionships I am fine with and am happy enough to include but its whatever (Makoami, Amelie/Sombra) but only a very small handful would I say belong on a greatest list in my heart at all. 

Also, I’m not an ANTI-romance writer by any stretch of the imagination, but I wouldn’t say it’s a focus of what I write, either. I love to write romantic relationships! I think they are great, this is not at all me going “why can’t anyone write about friendshiiiiiiip??” i just in fact, do that. Because I love how Mina and Mcihiru chip away at each other as much as I love how Michiru would die, or kill, whichever is fine, for Haruka. I love that Angela teaches Fareeha that there is safety in love but I also want to see that reflected in the ways she and Lena play off each other. I think Haruka’s death is a tragedy for Mina as much as it is for Michiru. I think Lena’s great love for Winston is as moving as hers for Emily. 

I’m more interested the art that people are in the reflections of all the people who love them. We are all kaleidoscopes, and one mirror can’t make that. 

So i’m just not the right person to ask about all this. 

But, you may say, Holligay you are way fucking overthinking this, all I meant was if you had any perspective as an old as to the couples you’d put on a fucking bracket for other people jesus Christ why is everything a fucking Annie Dillard essay with you. Okay, fair. 

For the sake of brevity let’s call it a sweet sixteen, knowing that this is colored by my age and my exposure. These aren’t listed in any kind of order and it should be noted that plenty of these are couples I don’t like particularly or don’t care about, just what I think might rightly BE on a best of list. 

Harumichi

Xena/Gabrielle

Willow/Whatever the name of her girlfriend is, I can’t remember

Utena/Anthy

Catra/Adora

Cagney/Lacey

Korra/the other one, you who know who I mean

Lena/Kara

Harley/Ivy 

Eve/Villanelle

Ruby/Sapphire

Did people ship Elphaba and Glinda? I feel like they MUST have. Though I just googled Elphaba slashfic and it was inconclusive. The kids today don’t say slashfic, do they? I’m old

Pharah/Mercy

Bette/Tina

Santana/Brittany

Me/A bowl of soup

I don’t know who would reign triumphant, it would depend on how we were voting. I mean if I put it on tumblr it would be one of the contemporary couples like Korra and whoever she is, but I don’t know that I think that’s fair to the sheer historical value of, say, Xena and Gabrielle, or even, though Glee became a joke, the way Santana and Brittany were at the time. It’s hard to evaluate things that bridge something like what, forty years on this list? But this is what I would put it out as, if I had to do it right now, gun to my head

[potter-imagines]

Flowers in Braids (Fred Weasley)

Pairing: Fred Weasley x Reader

Request: Could I request something please? 🧡 I just had a thought, a concept if you will, okay, so, Goblet of Fire Fred, and his gf y/n braiding his hair? 👉🏻👈🏻

Warning: None, just fluff

Word Count: 3k (short n sweet, hope you guys enjoy!)

Cloudy rays poured into the windows of Hogwarta giving a small glimpse to the declining temperatures outside. Crowds of students jogged out beyond the castle grounds all meeting up in the small village outside Hogwarts. Hogsmeade was buzzing with life as where the castle was empty besides the students who had yet to reach the age of permission to even enter Hogsmeade. Despite the younger kids cooped up inside their dorm rooms and wandering around the grounds, your boyfriend, Fred Weasley, and yourself had chosen to skip out.

The two of you were locked away in his dorm room, chatting amongst yourself as you kneeled over him, eyes trained on his hair. After working him in for quite some time, you managed to convince Fred to let you give him two French braids. His hair had finally reached the perfectly length and you had been itching for months to try different braids in it.

“Does that feel good, Freddie?”

Your fingertips raked against the skin of his scalp as you reached for another strand. The long orange strands slipped like buttermilk through your grasp. Braiding the outside piece of hair in, you tied it under the middle section of his hair, pulling tightly. Fred jerked back at your force causing his spine to smack against your knee. You mumbled a quick apology, having lost yourself in the rhythm of the weaving pattern. When you braid your own hair, you had conditioned yourself to the scalp piercing pulls. Fred was new to this, so you had to take it easy so he’d let you braid his beautiful locks again. Your boyfriend just smiled smugly with his eyes drawn shut and hummed.

“Mmmhhh.”

Taking a small section of his hair, you braid it into the pile of fiery hair and gave a softer pull to tighten it lightly. The further down you got, the faster your finger moved. Sitting on your knees, you continued weaving while taking a peek at his face. Fred looked half asleep, a small smile displayed across his face. You paused your work to leave a chaste kiss to the side of his rosy cheek. Fred’s eyes pried open by the touch and gazed up at you.

“Is that a yes?” You asked, giggling like a child. Your boyfriend just melted into your touch as you ran your free hand through the left side of his head that wasn’t braided yet. Tracing your fingers through his free strands, Fred leaned further in your touch. He was always a sucker for having you play with his hair.

“Hmmm.”

His hands were folded in his lap, thumbs fiddling quietly. This was by far the most relaxed you had seen him- besides when he was snoring in slumber. Fred was your crazy, energetic, childlike, prankster boyfriend. Although now, he was the exact opposite to his normal demeanor. He hardly uttered a word, basking in the sensation of your touch and pull. His breathing deepened, heavy puffs falling from his chest. You stared for a moment longer then wrapped your hand around the side of his face, other hand holding the end of the braid. Leaning him back a tip, you leaned down to plant a kiss to his lips. Fred grinned against your lips, but soon enough kissed you back sweetly. Whispering you used your hand to guide his head away, closer to the blanket resting on the bed.

“Tilt your head down, love.” You directed him. His ginger hair was as soft as silk, draping over your knuckles with every twist. As your fingers brushed against his neck, you could feel the vibrations of his soothing hums. Reaching around his tall frame, you grabbed a small rubber band and scrunched it around your hand. Hitting the end of the braid, you wrapped the band around the bottom of his hair with ease. Giving one last pull, you took a look at the first finished braid.

“Lemme see, darling.” Fred made grabby hands behind his back motioning for the mirror. You handed him the oval shaped pastel pink mirror and watched on in anticipation. Fred’s eyes roamed your work, examining every detail of your nearly perfectly french braid. He reached up in surprise and lightly tapped the tight weaves. 

“Wicked. Are you planning on finishing the otherside or am I meant to walk around like this?” He asked laughing. Handing the mirror back to you, Fred settled into his previous spot, his back pressed to your knees. You giggled at the sight of him. One braid was secured stiffly on one side of his head while his strawberry locks laid past his shoulder on the other side. You rose up so you were kneeling. Fred was quite tall, his towering height made it difficult to see over the top of his head. Grabbing your comb from the mattress, you curled your fingers around the top section, dividing it into three equal strands. You brushed through the pillow soft mane, another hum sounding from Fred.

“What do you think the next task is gonna be? The dragons were terrifying! Still can’t believe you were cheering for the killer dragons over our own friend.” The recollection earned a mental scoff. Remembering the events of last week, you wondered about the upcoming second task. The first task was not exactly your cup of tea. Despite your boyfriend’s astonishment and eagerness over the deathly dragons, you were petrified. Fred kept his hand laced in yours for the entirety of the task. As he cheered crazily with George, he’d squeeze your hand in reassurance to let you know he was still paying attention to you. George would give you hugs every few minutes- half to calm you and the other half to piss his twin off.

Fred chuckled again, leaning his head back so he was looking at you from an upside down view. He puckered his lips causing you to roll his eyes but reluctantly gave in and left a kiss to his ready lips.

“I think you mean amazing, love. Harry’s dragon was by far the best!” His thunderous roar filled the room. George and Lee were out at Hogsmeade, joining the rest of your friends for the day. Any other night Fred and yourself would be taking the long stroll to the village with the group. Hogsmeade trips were highly anticipated but for some reason, neither one of you really felt up for the trip. When Fred woke up, his only plan for the day was to remain attached to his bed. Not having any desires for a busy day, you decided to join him.

“Doesn’t mean you have to cheer for it, Fred.” You commented, snickering to yourself. During the first match, you sat in the stands of the Quidditch Pitch- now dragon arena- in between Fred and George. The twins hollered in excitement when the task was announced. Each competitor that came out, the twins looked through and waited anxiously for the reveal of the dragon. In all honesty, they couldn’t care less about who won or who was competing, they only wanted to see the dragons and their mass destruction. Even when your dear friend was almost killed by the fire breathing monster, Fred and George jumped up and down in delight, clapping their hands and screaming happily, “Go, dragon!”. It was a bit embarrassing to be sitting with them as other students sent dirty looks, especially the Hufflepuffs cheering on Cedric. Fred merely shrugged as you threaded the end of his hair,

“But I wanted to. Anyhow, Harry said it’s got something to do with water and George and I saw Dumbledore and Snape out on the Black Lake so I’d say it’ll be some task out there. Now let me see!” Fred whipped around as lightning speed, looking for the handheld mirror. You could see the excitement on his face. Dragging the mirror towards himself, Fred lifted the glass but just as he did, you snatched the mirror away from him.

“Wait, Freddie, I’m not finished. The flowers, remember? I picked out the purple and white ones just for you.” You squeaked. Fred had promised he’d let you stick some flowers in his braid once you finished. With everything inside of him, Fred desperately wanted to scream no. It already took you months to convince

“But… I wanna go show George my braids and if I have flowers in my hair…” He stopped mid thought when he saw your pouty expression. Puppy dog eyes and a puff out bottom lip, you gazed up at Fred with a begging stare. A smile hit his lips immediately as rolled his eyes. “Okay, fine. But I only want the little white ones.”

Grinning in victory you started separating the stems from the petals. Getting the flowers laid out on the large bed, your eyes darted up to Fred in question.

“The daisies?” Holding up the delicate flowers, you raised your brow to Fred. His doe gleam hit yours then down to the miniature flowers. A cheeky smirk flashed across Fred’s face as he flirted,

“The only flower I know is you, darling.”

Your face went deadpan as you shot your giggling boyfriend a playful glare, feigning unamusement. Fred could be extremely sweet when he wants to do and today, that seems to be his main motive. Rolling your e/c eyes you resumed your concentration on his braided hair and the generous pile of daisies laying next to your thigh. Carefully, one by one, you twist the flowers to snap the excess stem off. Then you individually tucked each petallful bud into his locks, cautious not to go overboard like you would in your own binding braids.

The pale petals poked out, It was the kind of brilliant white that would even make new snow look grey, the kind of white that sears into your retinas and makes you temporarily blind. The bright contrast made the pumpkin orange shade of his hair pop in the light. Smoothing your hand over the bumps, you gazed upon your work. Handing the mirror back to Fred, you informed him that you had finished.

“Do you like it, Freddie?” You placed your hands together, hiding your face behind them. This was the first time Fred ever let you even attempt to style his hair, and to Fred Weasley, his hair meant everything. Now in your sixth year, it has reached its peak. Fred and George were very proud of their shoulder length orange locks, and you could understand why. Dating for already three years, you could confidently declare this style was your favorite. This being the reason you yelled in horror after the stunt Fred and George pulled during their entry, or attempt of an entry, for the Tri-Wizard tournament. After he finished tousling and rolling around on the floor with his twin, Fred ran up to you for help. Much to his surprise, you took off like a rocket in the opposite direction. Your friends all laughed at the sight of the twins until tears were streaming down their cheeks. His aged state, and frizzed crazy white hair was too much for you to process all at once. You nearly cried in joy when the prankster came knocking on your door hours later back to his normal state. Back again were his beloved ginger locks. The traumatic event still haunted you. Since then, you never missed a moment to admire his beautiful long hair.

One thing Fred loved was your need to constantly touch his locks. Sitting in class, Fred will lean his head on your shoulder as the professor drones one. Muscle memory kicks in and your free hand will sneak up his back and start running your runnings through his hair. When names were being drawn out of the flaming goblet, Fred sat in front of you with George. He squeezed himself between your legs, his arms resting on your knees. While the headmasters snatched their slips of papers falling from the fire, you’d be fiddling with strands of his hair, petting over the velvet like hair. To Fred, it was always comforting to sense your hands on him, no matter where.

You waited patiently, nervous for his reaction. Fred’s large hands moved the mirror in various spots, trying to get a peek from every possible angle. Eyes raking over the braids, a twinkle beamed on Fred’s lips as he exclaimed,

“It looks wonderful, sweetheart. I’m so proud of you, I love it!” Your heart jumped with happiness at his approval. Throwing your arms around him, Fred maneuvered so he was fully facing you. He returned the hug, gripping your body tightly in his arms. His lips sneaked a quick kiss to your blushing cheek.

“Serious? Or are you just being nice?” You asked softly.

Pulling away, Fred slid you forward so you were sitting practically in his lap. Once more he sealed a peck to your lips, then left a lingering kiss on the tip of your nose.

“No, really, I honestly love it. We gotta go find George and Lee! They should be back soon. But if they ask for you to braid their hair, please say no, darling. I only want you braiding my hair, not George’s. He won’t shut up about it if you do.” His tone was a facade of chaff, a hint of seriousness shining through. It was clear he was pretending to be all jokes but the sincerity lingered. You rolled your eyes overtly and smacked his chest like a child.

“You’re so dramatic, Freddie. I won’t touch your brother’s hair, Merlin’s sake.”

Just as you went to stand up, a pair of strong arms wrapped around your frame and yanked you to your previous position.

“Where are you going?”

“I thought we were gonna show George and Lee-”

The warmth of his breath smacked against the chilling skin of your neck. His arms were stiff around your waist, not even giving you a chance to escape. Giggles stormed through you at the feeling. Fred’s fingers poked and probed at your sides, starting an attack of tickles. You tried to pin his hands down although he overpowered you in seconds. He paused his tickle war not long after, allowing you to catch a gasp of air. Smiling brightly at you, Fred extended his legs out so you were placed between them.

“But I haven’t gotten to braid your hair yet! Now, turn around for me, darling. Hand me the brush please. Your braid is gonna be all flowers, no hair.” The contagious laughter of Fred encapsulated the atmosphere. Your hands shot up to cover your face in embarrassment. Fred had tried- at least ten times- to get a braid to stick in your hair and he had yet to succeed. His idea of a braid was starting with holding all three strands of hair at once and just twisting them in a repetitive cycle. The thought of grabbing pieces of hair to braid in was just another level of hair styling to Fred. Glancing up at Fred you gave him an unsure gaze.

“I’m gonna look like a clown, Freddie.”

Not missing a beat, your gentleman of a boyfriend just smirked, replying,

“A cute clown, love. A cute flower clown. You’ll have people thinking Halloween came early!” Already expecting what was to come, Fred cowered behind his arms, using them as shield from your hits. You didn’t strike to hurt, just to sting. Part of dating Fred was falling victim to his teasing. As close as you were, his jokes never truly offended you. There was a line drawn years ago and his toes never even grazed it. Crossing your arms over your chest you scrunch your nose in pretend annoyance.

“Freddie! Not nice.”

Your boyfriend laughed gently then reached over to pick up your basket of flowers on the ground. Sifting his hands through the pile, Fred was deep in concentration as he plucked out about five flowers of various shapes. The thing that stood out to you was the color. Although different in type, all the flowers were a pretty lilac tone. You assumed he had chosen flowers for your hair until he spoke. 

“I’ll let you put some purple flowers in my hair, if you’d like? Would that make it up to you?” He asked you sweetly. Fred knew you weren’t actually mad, a small part of him wanted pastel purple flowers to begin with. He just didn’t want you telling everyone he chose them himself- this way he could say he had to, in order to make you happy. The words lit a spark behind your eyes and you eagerly pivoted on the bed so your back was against his front. Nodding to yourself you agreed to his offer, trying not to show your excitement too much.

“Now face the wall, love. I’m gonna give you a Italian braid so sit still.” Your eyes widen in confusion as you whip around to face him. Fred grinned enthusiastically, holding a small portion of your hair in his hands. Squinting your eyes, you laugh a bit at him.

“An Italian- Freddie, no, darling. It’s called a French braid!”

His saucer like eyes just stared at you, the terminology flying straight over his head. He flickered between your gape, then down to your hair, then back up. Bobbing his head he seemed to agree with you. He grabbed your shoulders gingerly and positioned you so you were looking at the wall again. Mumbling to himself, Fred whispered words of encouragement earning a chuckle from you.

“Oh, yeah… a French braid.” His hands roamed through your hair, fingers brushing against your scalp. Nimbly he separated your strands into small portions. You felt the strong tug on your hair when he suddenly stopped abruptly and asked faintly, “Sweetheart… how do you braid hair?”

[impishglee]

Angels as Eusocial Insects: Caste Determination and Task Allocation

hey guys im back at it again with the applying my studies to xenobiology and my cringe interests <3 and im here to talk abt the angels of supernatural bc i saw this post and it made my brain start zooming. i don’t know shit abt christian or jewish mythology nor will i be digging into it bc thats just not what this is about. im explicitly treating angels basically as a species of alien and only working w what is provided by supernatural itself.

In Supernatural it’s implied that angels are separated into predetermined ranks, largely determined by how powerful they are as a function of their grace, as well as having several specialized angels such as cupids, rit zien and grigori. You know what else experiences a similar phenomena? 

(image source)

ANTS!! As well as other eusocial species like some bees, wasps, all termites and weirdly, naked mole rats. I’m going to be focusing on ants primarily bc that is what i know best. i’m going to be breaking down angels as eusocial insects in two topics:

CASTE: what are the castes and how are they determined, and what are analogous biological examples?

TASK ALLOCATION: on a smaller scale, how do angels divide work among the same caste?

Before we get into it, let’s just get a definition of eusociality out of the way and see if angels check the requirements: Eusociality is the most “advanced” or “complex” form of sociality, defined by:

• Cooperative brood care - we know basically very very little about how angels are “raised” and they more or less seem to be created fully matured, but from the vibes it seems like younger angels are taught and accountable to a variety of older angels. 

• Multiple generations living in the same colony - eyup. 

• Division of labor into reproductive and nonreproductive groups - I would argue yes! In this case I am defining angelic reproduction as the ability to make more angels (excluding nephilim, we are just. ignoring nephilim for the purposes of this meta). In this case God and Archangels are our reproductive castes. 

o Angels reproduce asexually, so we thankfully don’t have to worry abt sex determination. There are no drone/male equivalents.

Stunning. Incredible. Angels are eusocial. MOVING ON!

CASTE:

Caste in eusocial organisms is a morphological category that is roughly split into the queen(reproductive female), workers(nonreproductive females) and drones(male reproductives.) These are not harshly defined in all species and you can get intermediate forms, as well as highly specialized subcastes of workers. If I were to apply these castes to supernatural angels I would sort them like this.

Queen: Chuck lmao

Intermediates: Archangels

Workers: Basically everyone else

• Some specialized sub castes of worker would be the cupids, rit ziens and grigori. Examples of some cool specialized ant castes are twig nesting ant soldiers who have a big flat head they use to plug the entrances to their nests and honeypot ant repletes who basically just eat a bunch of food and hang around and feed other ants through trophallaxis(regurgitate into other ants mouths)

Now castes are morphologically distinct, and these morphological differences are determined by a combination of genetics and environmental factors. In many eusocial insects, reproductive caste determination is a product of how much they are fed in the larval stage, quantity over quality, royal jelly is fake and doesn’t actually affect the development of queens.

In some eusocial species(some wasps, naked mole rats) the reproductive queen is determined by who can beat everyone else up. If the current queen/alpha female dies or is removed from the colony, the strongest females will then enter a period of conflict where they will beat each other up, sometimes even killing competitors. I think this is basically how spn angels work and why the archangels are at eachothers throats as soon as God dips.

In summary: angel caste is determined by “genetics” aka how they were initially made, how much power they obtain, and dominance.

TASK ALLOCATION:

So! If 90% of angels are the same caste, how to they decide who does the smiting and who gives the heavenly lobotomies? 

In social insects there are a couple theories and it varies by species, but in the case of angels I think the two that align the best are morphological and spatio-temporal task allocation. 

Morphological Task Allocation: 

This one is pretty straight forward. In social insects, often bigger, burlier workers will do more dangerous/physically demanding jobs, like defending the nest, foraging and scouting for resources. Smaller ants will be in charge of tasks like tending brood and queen, cleaning the nest, and nest construction.

Bigger, stronger angels will be in charge of more dangerous jobs like smiting demons, fishing the michael sword out of hell, etc and weaker angels will be in charge of maintaining heaven and it’s souls and ambiguous corporate angel duties. Also the lobotomies. 

Spatio-Temporal Task Allocation:

This theory on task allocation is the idea that as an individual gets older they do progressively more dangerous tasks, a good example of this is honeybees! When a bee pupates into a bee, it’s first job is tending brood, then it moves on to nest maintenance/construction, then nest defense, and then the last thing it does before it dies is scouting/foraging. This is the temporal aspect. It’s basically to maximize the efficiency of a lifespan. 

The “spatio” aspect is that ants are essentially doing whatever job needs doing wherever they are, so when they are born they tend the the brood, then other ants pupate and they run out of work, so they move further out in the nest to see what else needs doing like nest maintenance, then more ants start doing that job, so they go further out to forage. 

I think there’s decent enough evidence for this for angels. The temporal aspect is less strong admittedly, though I do think younger angels are probably more relegated to working in heaven instead of going to earth or hell. A strong piece of evidence to me is that Metatron gets saddled with the job of being God’s scribe just because he was there, he was just a random worker in proximity to a job that needed doing, so he did it. 

SUMMARY: Bigger angels do more dangerous jobs, stronger angels also do more dangerous jobs, older angels do more dangerous jobs, and also angels just do whatever job is in front of them.

WOW I THINK I’VE SAID EVERYTHING I HAVE TO SAY ON THIS TOPIC! THIS WAS SO LONG! IF YOU’VE MADE IT THIS FAR, I LOVE YOU <3 I LOVE ANGELS AND ALSO ANTS!

[ilovejevsjeans]

Daniel Ricciardo on his passion for combat sports, a walkout song and the time he asked Lewis Hamilton to ‘fight’

McLaren Formula One driver Daniel Ricciardo, who currently sits seventh in the driver standings heading into this weekend’s Spanish Grand Prix, is among the world’s best behind a steering wheel. But how would he fare if he swapped his racing gloves for boxing or MMA gloves?

“I’d love to do a charity boxing match or something just to feel that adrenaline of walking to a ring,” Ricciardo said. “It’s on my to-do list for sure. At school I had a few little fights but nothing crazy. Nothing I’d brag about here.”

Ricciardo says he learned the sport of boxing from a friend who fought as an amateur growing up. However in recent years his love of combat shifted more toward mixed martial arts, a sport that is “quite beautiful. It’s an art form and I was just taken by it.”

The Australian — who boasts 4.6 million followers on Instagram — rarely misses a fight night, whether that’s a small card or pay-per-view. Every Monday he gears up for multiple MMA podcasts to hear analysis on what just took place in the cage.

In an exclusive interview with The Athletic, Ricciardo opened up about his love for fighting, which driver would make the best opponent and why Lewis Hamilton turned down an opportunity to get in the ring against him.

You’re an avid fight fan. How did this passion for the sport start?

One of my best friends growing up, when he was growing up, he was doing amateur boxing and got very good at it. I was then doing my racing and he was doing his boxing. We were both on a bit of an unconventional path — both individual sports, not really the typical sports the kids at school were doing. We had that in common. Once I started taking my racing more seriously I began taking my fitness more seriously. So I started going to his gym to just train. I really enjoyed doing it. But the truth is — I don’t want to lie to anyone. I’m not a fighter. As much as I would picture beating the bully up at school, it’s not me. But I just fell in love with not only doing it but also watching it.

I enjoyed watching boxing but it was really when I got exposed to MMA … It just had me. It was back in 2011 when I started properly getting into it. It was the quickest sport I had ever been absorbed by. I was all in.

My whole YouTube feed is just all MMA shows, whether it’s press conferences, interviews, podcasts. It’s just full of MMA stuff. I’m a full nerd now.

Being in Australia and traveling a lot, are you forced to get up at weird times for fights?

The beauty was I was in LA when (Conor McGregor vs. Dustin Poirier 2) was on so it was prime time and I was happy. But normally in Europe, it’s 4 a.m. or 5 a.m., which isn’t as good. Any kind of sporting event that you look forward to, it’s always cool when it’s in the evening because you have all day to get ready and talk about it. If you wake up at 4 a.m. it’s like “ugh,” and then you’re straight into it so there’s not as much of a build-up. But it’s all good.

So do you still train at all?

No. To races, my trainer carries some pads and gloves just to stay a little sharp and change it up. If I’m getting my reflexes with some tennis balls, maybe I throw in a bit of a boxing combination or something. Again, I’m not saying I’m good or anything. But I just enjoy the whole movement part of it.

Boxing was cool and I enjoyed watching it growing up. But there was something with MMA where there’s just so many different disciplines and the matchups … as a contest it was so much more open and for that, exciting. I feel — I know it’s not always the case — you can kind of tell in boxing if someone is getting momentum, the advantage. It’s like “this guy is going to win the fight.” But in MMA, it’s like “this guy is winning standing but if this goes to the ground, it’s back to square one.” So I just loved it. I was really immersed by it all.

Did you have a particular fighter or fight that got you hooked early on?

One of the first events I watched was UFC 116. Chris Leben was on the card and I think he was losing the fight. And then he got a triangle with probably 20 seconds to go in the third round, so that was really exciting. Stephan Bonnar was also on that card and he got a really cool finish on “The Polish Experiment” Krzysztof Soszynski. That was a card for me where I was very taken from that. Then I discovered “The Ultimate Fighter.” I just binge-watched all of those (seasons).

In terms of fighters, Leben was a character, I liked him. Carlos Condit. I’d say Condit and Cub Swanson were two guys I got behind early on. Condit, I love his style and the way he carries himself.

Have you been to a lot of cards in person?

The very first one I did was the best for me personally. To this day, it’s my favorite sporting event I’ve ever been to: (Conor) McGregor-(Chad) Mendes. Vegas in July 2015. Obviously McGregor, but he wasn’t yet a champion and still kind of on the rise. It was the energy and atmosphere. It was just wild.

The whole event too. (Robbie) Lawler-(Rory) MacDonald, which had the fight of the year. Every fight on the main card I think was a finish, so I got very lucky at my first event.

I’ve done (Michael) Bisping-(Anderson) Silva in the UK. That was a great contest as well.

There are a lot of great fighters from Australia and New Zealand like Israel Adesanya, Alexander Volkanovski and Robert Whittaker. Have you had a chance to meet any of them?

I haven’t met them. A couple of them I’ve had interactions with on social media. But I love Whittaker, obviously Volkanovski is killing it. I’m fairly patriotic to the Aussie fighters. If they are fighting, 99 percent of the time I’ll be supporting them. But one of my good buddies is roommates with Luke Rockhold, so I got to know Luke the last couple of years. I was trying to do some training over Christmas with him but it didn’t end up working out.

I know you’re a big shoey guy. What do you think of Tai Tuivasa doing it after wins?

I’ve had a bit of contact with Tuivasa as well. It’s obviously great. But one thing I can’t get behind is spitting. That’s a little extra.

Plus he’ll grab some random fan’s shoe.

He definitely takes it to the next level. It’s cool that — as disgusting as it is — we have some traditions like this.

Shifting a bit to F1, have you ever gotten into any big fights on the track? What was the worst fight you’ve gotten in?

Earlier in go-karting there was a bit more. Unfortunately in F1, I guess because you’re on the world’s stage, even if you push someone you probably are going to get a fine or get penalized. At times it’s a little too clean. But I’m still waiting for the day that someone confronts me and I just lay them out (laughs).

You also just seem a lot more laid back than a lot of other drivers, so you’d probably not be my first choice of someone getting into a fight soon.

I’m all talk, it would be nice obviously to not have to fight anyone. But no one would expect it from me. Even when I tell people I’m a fight fan, people are like “oh really? You’re into that? You seem too nice to like that.”

But to get where I have in the sport, you need a bit of a killer streak in you. I do have it, but don’t always show it.

What other driver would make the best fighter?

I know some guys have done — for fitness — hit some pads. Randomly, he doesn’t have a seat this year, but Daniil Kvyat started doing quite a lot of boxing last year for his training. I saw a few clips and it started to look like he knew what he was doing. I would say he would be the guy who has the most idea. I’d put him and myself up there. The rest I don’t think stand a chance.

So if you had a charity event, you don’t have anyone in particular you’d want to go against?

To be honest, I actually asked Lewis Hamilton. At the beginning of 2016, he posted a video on his Instagram hitting pads. I was as well at the time, so I was like “hey, let’s do a charity fight.” I asked him in person. But he didn’t bite on that one so I was a little sad.

I might re-ask the question.

What about Max Verstappen? For people who watched the first season of the F1 show “Drive to Survive” on Netflix, I’m sure they would love to see you guys throw down at some point.

That would have been cool as well (laughs). Max would be a good competitor in the ring. The way he drives, he’s quite stubborn. He’d be a hard guy to put away. He’s probably the guy that you’d choke him and he’s going to sleep and not tapping. That would make an interesting one.

In contrast, is there an MMA fighter you’d like to race on the track?

An obvious one would be Conor McGregor. To hear in his Irish accent all kinds of things, that would make pretty good television. And he loves his cars. It’s obvious, but that would probably be the best.

How often would you say you watch fights now? Not just PPVs, right?

Unless I have something like work or another commitment, I’m watching it every week. Mondays I’m getting ready for every podcast. I sound like a real nerd but it’s just an addiction. I love it. Anyone doing that for Formula 1, I’d be like “you’re such a nerd,” but here I am doing it with MMA.

Is it hard to follow everything during the race season?

If I can’t see it live, then 100 percent I’m going to watch the replay or buy it later. But it’s also a good escape. If I’m traveling and I’m in between races, to get my mind away from my competition, I like to watch it. I also try to pick up things as well. Whether it’s from a mental point of view … I’ll look at the walkouts and how they are behaving. I try to figure out if they are really as calm and collected as they are portraying or if it’s a bit of a facade. I’m trying to work out what I can use in my events.

Do you have a walkout song prepared if you were to fight?

I’ve thought about it. The short answer is no. You typically have to have something heavy and fast, but I fell in love with Chris Weidman’s “Won’t Back Down.” It’s not typically a song that will pump you up but it’s so iconic and now it’s his, it’s very fitting.

I’d go for something more lyrically powerful as opposed to instrumental. I loved Max Holloway’s, I think it’s called Mount Everest (by Labrinth). (X)

[quazartranslates]

Welcome to the Nightmare Game II - CH50

**This is an edited machine translation. For more information, please [click here]**

[<<< Previous Chapter | Table of Contents | Next Chapter >>>]

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Chapter 50: Purgatory Reunion (II) {cw: misgendering}

Qi Leren slept for eight hours, and when he was woken up by the alarm clock, he roughly pressed it off, wishing to close his eyes and fall back into the darkness of sleep.

His head was still aching, and the blood vessels near his temples were throbbing, making Qi Leren wonder if they were going to burst open. As well, his body felt uncomfortable. It was like he had been curled up in a narrow box all night, and none of his parts were intact.

This shouldn't be. When he was training with Chen Baiqi before, he’d woken up alive and kicking. Why was he so tired this time?

Away from the borders of the Village of Dusk, the outside world changed between day and night. Now it was morning, and warm sunlight shone through the window pane. Qi Leren sat up and stretched, and his bones made a frightening crack sound, startling him.

"You up? Come and have breakfast, then," the Illusionist said with a dull tone from behind the curtain.

Qi Leren got up and took two pieces of bread coated with jam from the Illusionist: "How long before we can get to the Underground Ant City?"

"Landing in three hours, then walking into the Dragon Ant Queen’s sphere of influence. If it goes well, it will take two days," said the Illusionist lazily.

"It’ll take that long?" Qi Leren was in a hurry. Today was the 25th day since completing the Holy City task. In the game, Ning Zhou had been on the 29th day when...

Even if they crossed the desert smoothly, that would leave him with only two days!

In the huge Underground Ant City, amidst the vast crowd of people, this was too little time.

Fortunately... Fortunately, he wasn’t without any leads.

Qi Leren recalled the information gathered from the game and his dream. He knew where the flowing red magma was. It was a lake of fire in the depths of Purgatory. Legend had it that it was a projection in the human world of Hell’s own lake of fire. On the last day of Ning Zhou's life, he would be there...

Qi Leren couldn't think. When he thought about Ning Zhou, his mind would become blank from the uncontrollable fear. He didn't dare to think about what kind of mood Ning Zhou was in as he was gradually awakening to his demonic power. He didn’t dare to think about how whose death had led to this. He didn’t dare to think about whether he was full of disappointment and despondency with the world at the last moment of his life, and whether he... whether he remembered his dead lover?

Qi Leren tried to find a reason for why Ning Zhou still lingered in this world. He had suffered too much in his life: his only relative had died long ago, and his lover whom he had not yet had time to confess to was buried in the Holy City. His holy land had exiled him and no longer recognized his piety, and even his last faith could not be preserved—he became the devil he hated most.

Perhaps for the present Ning Zhou, death was a relief.

"Hey," the Illusionist suddenly called.

Qi Leren turned to look at him: "What is it?"

The Illusionist looked at him with a strange and slightly disgusted expression: "Your expression just now… I really can't stand it."

Saying this, he exaggeratedly rubbed his arms.

Qi Leren: ???

"I think being in love is too hard for you. It's better to be single than to chase after your husband to Purgatory." The Illusionist, dressed as a professional woman, pushed the women's glasses up the bridge of his nose as he spoke.

"It's good to be single, but what's the difference between being single and being widowed?" Qi Leren said. In the days before he’d met Ning Zhou, he had lived very well. If he hadn't met Ning Zhou, this kind of life could be regarded as happiness. But after meeting Ning Zhou, he missed him, and he couldn't let go for the rest of his life.

The Illusionist felt that he had been gloated to.

Qi Leren couldn't feel the Illusionist’s resentment. He continued to flip through the information about the Underground Ant City. When he saw something he questioned, he asked, "’The Dragon Ant Queen’s field.’ Is the Underground Ant City also a field?"

"Oh, yes, it's the same as the Village of Dusk... You don't know, do you?" The Illusionist gave him a disdainful oblique look.

In fact, Qi Leren, who had only learned about this during the last copy, could avoid making a fool of himself. He calmly asked, "I know, but why are the Village of Dusk and the Village of Dawn so similar? Is it because the original force of these two fields are both time?"

The Illusionist changed his expression and asked angrily, "You know too much. Who told you that? Chen Baiqi? She shouldn’t know this information."

"It wasn’t her." Qi Leren knew that Chen Baiqi didn't have this information. When she had learned that Su He came from the Village of Dawn, she’d respected him.

"Don't ask, this isn’t something you should know," the Illusionist said, glancing at him.

Qi Leren still has a lot of questions, but the Illusionist stated that he wouldn’t reveal any information to him, so he had to forget about it. The two people then talked about some things about the Underground Ant City: there was the Dragon Ant Queen's sphere of influence—although it was also a field, it was not a normal field. The dragon ant queen was not an individual person, but a name passed down from generation to generation.

Every Dragon Ant Queen would choose her successor after she grew old, and pass on the Underground Ant City’s field to the next one through a special means. This inherited field was different from other fields, and had natural defects inside it.

In the ancient legend, the original Underground Ant City was created by a group of queens who had led their people. In the giant cave deep within the Sea of Tranquility desert, there was a natural gap between the two worlds, which connected the underworld and the human world. However, the seal was still firm at that time, and most demons could not pass through this gap. Only the dragon ants gnawed through the gap with their own talents and were able to move between the two worlds.

The demon queens, who had been excluded by the underworld, were very satisfied with this underground cave which had accumulated water for millions of years. They led their people to settle here and decided to create the glory of dragon ants here.

The initial establishment was very difficult, but they soon gained a firm foothold. Once the external crisis was lifted, the queens began to fight cruelly for power. Finally, a powerful queen killed her competitors and became the Dragon Ant Queen.

After the first Dragon Ant Queen ascended to the throne, she led the dragon ant demons to expand wildly, and brought the Sea of Tranquility desert’s parish under the demons’ rule. This move angered the Holy See, which surrounded this group of unscrupulous demons. Finally, the Dragon Ant Queen decided to retreat back to the underground of the Sea of Tranquility desert—a huge underground cave with an underground network extending in all directions, just like ants' nests.

The wonderful thing was that the entrance to this nest was narrow and led straight down. The army couldn't enter here without having to parachute down at the mouth of the cave. This terrain blocked the Holy See and allowed this group of demons to thrive in this area.

After weighing the losses, the Holy See decided to give up the encirclement and suppression, and the two sides signed a peace treaty. The Dragon Ant Queen promised not to slaughter human beings, and to never leave the Underground Ant City’s sphere of influence, and ensured that all intelligent life such as human beings and demons would be treated equally in the Underground Ant City.

So this time, the small-scale conflict subsided. Before the death of the first Dragon Ant Queen, she passed on her field to her successor in a way that has not yet been declassified. Since then, the Dragon Ant Queens had passed on this ancient field in the same way. Until 22 years ago—when the first war of demons invading the human world had broken out, and the Destroyer led the demon army to break through the gap between the two worlds and come to the peaceful and rich human world...

"The Dragon Ant Queen is still alive?" Qi Leren asked, looking through the information.

"Yeah, but she's almost dead," the Illusionist said.

"Generally speaking, the Dragon Ant Queen represents the neutral force among demons, which is determined by her original force... But the Dragon Ant Queen has an obvious tendentiousness..." Qi Leren said. His eyes fell on a certain line of words in the data, and she looked at it for a long time.

"She’s a follower of the Lord of Destruction, but her own strength is contradictory to him. We also don’t know why she would follow a Devil King who was contrary to her own original force. Maybe the new Dragon Ant Queen will change her allegiance. After all, 'power' is the most worthy for 'order' to follow," said the Illusionist.

It was no secret that the Dragon Ant Queen’s original force was quite neutral, and could even be assumed to be on the side of the holy camp, because she represented "order".

However, even though this demon’s original force was order, she had followed the Destroyer without hesitation more than 20 years ago.

Qi Leren still knew little about "original force". Before he left, Chen Baiqi had given him an urgent remedial lesson, but couldn’t say too much because of the limited time. He only knew that the precondition for field condensation was to condense a half field, and before half field condensation, he had to find his own original force first.

Qi Leren was very lucky. Although he had had a narrow escape… No, he really had died once, but at the moment before his death, he had found his original force and received the law’s reward, which pulled him back from the edge of death.

This power was called "rebirth".

Thinking carefully, he had actually been reborn countless times. Every time he saved and loaded S/L Data, he was reborn. Otherwise, how could he explain the countless tombstones on the Undead Island? Those tombstones were born perhaps because every time, he really was "dead", but he was born again and returned to the moment he had saved.

In this regard, Chen Baiqi said to him: "The door to the new world has been opened to you. Take a peek at the magic of the other side from the gap. It’s great luck to see the wonder of that realm with your own eyes, because most people are too weak to push this unique door open."

Qi Leren could read a kind of faint loss and melancholy from her face. He couldn't help but wonder about Chen Baiqi's experience of condensing a half field only to break it. When she stepped up that step, how high-spirited was she? How painful had it been when she fell down? And Ning Zhou... His half field was also broken.

Was it different? Once upon a time, Qi Leren hadn't even thought about it.

He had always felt that he was a very ordinary person, with the advantages and disadvantages of ordinary people, and that human weakness and compromise are equally indispensable to him. He didn't have much initiative, and he didn't want to make a huge leap, but just wanted to live his life in an ordinary way.

If he had stayed in the real world, maybe this ordinary and mediocre ideal could be realized, but here…

It was doomed to be impossible.

"What if… What if I say I want to push this door open?" Qi Leren had suddenly asked.

Chen Baiqi paused for a cigarette, and the flame of the match shone a little light in her hand blocking the wind, which lit up her slender eyebrows. As if she had seen him for the first time, this woman carefully examined his expression. Qi Leren looked at her without shying away, eager to get an answer from her mouth.

"Oh, why?" Chen Baiqi asked.

Qi Leren laughed, firm, but shy, and his earnest eyes seemed to shine.

"Because I want to protect him."

-----

[<<< Previous Chapter | Table of Contents | Next Chapter >>>]

[lovesanmotion]

yandere!ateez fanboy series: seonghwa

When Seonghwa graduated high school, his parents asked him what he wanted as a graduation gift. Coming from a wealthy family, his parents could give him whatever he wanted. But he asked for a camera instead. His parents didn’t know why or what was a camera for, but they gave it to him without a doubt. 

And lo and behold, in Seonghwa’s hands, a Canon EOS 850D. 

He open his box of savings and bought more equipment such as lenses, speedlite, battery grip and ring mount adapter. Testing a couple of shots around his room, the flowers in his mother’s garden and the collection of his father’s wines before he was satisfied with his photos and he was set to set himself out. 

The night before Starlight’s debut, he opened his own website YNbyHwaLight.co.kr and made a profile tab for you provided by your company - VS Media. Ever since your reveal to the world that you are debuting in Starlight as the final member, Seonghwa couldn’t get his eyes off of you. He couldn’t wait for your debut as he camped on Youtube and Naver everyday by watching past videos of you - Introduction Video, Make Meringue Cookies with Y/N and your own choreography of Streets by Doja Cat. To which he proudly beat his cock every night to. 

When the sun came up the following day, Seonghwa adjusted his black face mask to perfectly conceal half of his face. He woke an all black clothing and had his equipment safely tucked inside his backpack. When he was done, he set off to the concert hall for your debut concert. 

Starlight kicks off 2021 US promotions 

Starlight’s Y/N tops January Brand Rankings 

Starlight’s Y/N hailed as No.1 Kpop Girl Group Member For 2021 

Jennie, Joy, Y/N and more: Korean Outlet Media Mentions Stars Who Sported Top Luxury Clothes For 2020 

Starlight’s Y/N Glowing As New Campaign Model For Nike Air Max 

Seonghwa chugged down the last of his coffee before throwing it in the bin. His third cup of coffee to be exact. 4:06 am he is still situated in his old study desk, editing your photos from yesterday’s joint concert. Adding his fansite name ‘HwaLight_Y/N’ before uploading them. 

After he graduated high school, he decluttered old items that he no longer needed and are now replaced with more equipment and the albums that Starlight released. On his walls that were once adorned with his favorite rock band posters, baseball banners and his high school basketball jersey were now replaced with your individual posters. His bookshelves before were filled with his textbooks and comic books which he gushed over with his old friend. He doesn’t have friends anymore. Now, they are filled with Starlight’s albums that comes with all the different versions, the photobooks that VS Media released, the latest 2021 Seasons Greetings and his selfmade own copy of ‘ With Love, Y/N ‘ photobook which he sold over 100,000 copies. Unusual for a fansite photobook to reach its mark compared to companies. 

Ever since the day Seonghwa stepped into the debut concert hall to see you, he made everyone turn their heads and stare at him. It was a fandom joke that Seonghwa made his own fangirls that day. Along the way, they would pluch up their courage and ask to go on a date with him, but Seonghwa would politely decline their offer. As he only has eyes for Y/N, who else? 

After Staright debuted, the fandom continued to increase. It brought irritation to Seonghwa how he felt like he had many competitors to compete for your attention. But that theory was tried and tested when Starlight was at Incheon Airport headed to Jeju. The girls were posing for the hundreds of cameras in front of them, Seonghwa positioned somewhere in the middle. 

Through his camera lens, he watched as Y/N stand in her tiptoes, looking through the crowd as if she was searching for someone. His blood began to boil on who could possibly stole your worthy attention that isn’t him. But he immediately soften when Y/N’s eyes landed on his camera, flashing a sweet smile before eagerly waving her hands at him. 

Click! Click! Click! Click! Click! Click! Click! Click! Click! Click! Click! 

His insides were instantly filled with warmth as Y/N had her eyes on his camera. Smiling cutely and making little hearts in his direction. From that day on, Seonghwa submitted himself to you wholeheartedly. The best part? Seonghwa is also a passenger with you to Jeju! Surely seeing Seonghwa before the gates is not the last time you’d see him. As he boarded the plane, he sat down on the seat two rows in front of you. Heart beating fast at the feeling. 

The hour flight to Jeju quickly came by and they all boarded down. Seonghwa noticed how you and the rest of the members took the back door. Two black vans parked at the back door rather than being parked at the main extrance and exit. Lifting the car he rented to place his equipment and backpack safely at the back before following the second van where you are. Heading to the same hotel your manager booked because that’s where he booked himself too. 

Sometime later after checking in to the hotel and fixing his camera, he listened to the footsteps of VS staffs and any Starlight member heading to the elevator and disappearing. Once the coast is clear, he left his room and welcomed himself to Room 1117 - the room you share with the leader of Starlight. 

With his camera in hand, he went over to the second bed as he noticed your luggage was placed on top of it. Slowly, he bent down and inhaled the mattress and cushion. Faint scent of apples and honey. Laying down on the spot whereyou layed down earlier, a soft sigh escapes his lips before turning his attention to your luggage. 

Slowly, he unzips it open and then turning it open. The first thing his eyes lands on is the red lingerie that was placed on top as if it was welcoming him. Slowly he took hold of your bra, touching and feeling the cups. Were your boobs always this big? Blood rushed into him as he brought the cups to his nose, inhaling the scent of your raw flesh. Seonghwa sets the bra down before lifting the underwear next. He closely examined the lacy underwear, grazing his fingertips before slowly bringing it to his face. Were underwears supposed to smell sweet? This was an unexplainable one before something clicked in his mind. 

You could have worn it. 

He brought your underwear more closer to his face while his free hand unzips his pants, freeing his cock and then beating it around his hand, imagining it was your sweet tight hole instead. Shamelessly, he came. 

Pocketing your underwear, he quickly set his plan. He placed small cameras inside the electricity extensions in the room and bathroom and on the lamp stands before exiting. Leaving in time before a VS staff came into the same floor they are at. Once he gets back in his hotel room, he took out your underwear in his pocket and decided to kill time by playing with this. 

“See! I told you, you must have dropped your underwear under the bed.” Yikyung, the leader of Starlight said. I brought the underwear up and noticed how it had a huge white stain. I shook my head, probably a discharge before placing it on a plastic bag filled with my other used clothes. 

“Also, Y/N please put some clothes on while you sleep! My eyes are burning everytime I see you walking around her naked!” Yikyung laughs before throwing a pillow at him. It became a habit of time to sleep and walk around the dorm naked. I felt comfortable around the other members and decided to slowly reveal my habits. As Yikyung and I cleaned up our room, I unplugged my phone from its charger. But the little red light is still beaming. 

“Is it always like this?” I asked, pointing at the socket as I faced Yikyung. 

“Well at least you know that this socket is working. C’mon, were already late. Manager Min is already expecting us.” She says, grabbing my hand as we ran out our room, ending our MV film shoot in Jeju. 

[sanstropfremir]

by request, the first post-kingdom stage roundup! this one is a best to worst by group!

some introductory notes:

i’m not going to be ranking the 100sec stages in here because they are too different of a scale. but i will be talking about them as a part of the process. i’m not going to be including the team stages here either, since i talked about them in my episode seven and eight reviews and i do think they stand separately from the individual group stages, because we don’t know who the creative teams were behind them. this is not meant to be an overall best of all the performances, i’m intending this more to be a look each of the groups’ stages overall; seeing how they adapted and improved and how effective the trajectory of their journey as a whole was. also, a very important definition to make right at the start so i don't have to explain it every time: by ‘worst’ i do not mean the stage was actually bad. by ‘worst’ i literally mean ‘not the best.’ if i break it down, i’m ranking these by ‘most amount of successful components’ to ‘least amount of successful components.’ there were no stages that were actually bad or unwatchable; they were all successful in one way or another, but some of them more so. i’m ordering these in my own personal ranking of reverse who did the best overall, which obviously is not how the actual show rankings went down, but we all know my thoughts on the official rankings.

in case you want to catch up and read my more in depth thoughts, here’s all of my episode reviews: one, two (with added tbz costume breakdown), three, four, five, seven, eight, nine, ten! oh and also here’s my very first review of the dance solo performance film, since i’m also going to be referencing this a bit.

tbz

monster - the least involved with their overarching story concept and it’s stylistically the most interesting because it’s a departure from the glittery royalty concept we have primarily seen them in. it also helps that it’s a great song that they did a relatively good cover of.

kingdom come - the solidity of the choreo is the thing that puts this stage up here, because it’s some of their best. and it’s not as explicitly reliant on the game of thrones theme as their other stages.

o sole mio - this has real potential as a good small concept vaudeville themed stage; it starts off really strong and then they blow it by shoehorning in the unnecessary lore.

no air - they tried to start off with a big conceptual bang in the first round with a semi-explicit narrative, but it relies entirely too much on the viewers knowing the references for it to make any sense.

to be honest, i’m not that surprised about how tbz constructed their stages and how they turned out. i know a lot of people have been disappointed with how lackluster their stages have felt in comparison to their rtk ones, and i think that’s fair because i agree, i don’t think they ever captured the same energy they did for danger or for shangri-la. if you’ve been following along (or have just read all my reviews now) than you know most of my complaints about how tbz have been working with their lore and concepts, so i won’t rehash them here. but i do think it’s warranted to point out that theoretically, being first in rtk would logistically put you at the bottom of the initial ranking for kingdom. i know they’re not technically the youngest group, but in the execution of their stages in comparison, it does make sense to me that they come out looking as the most inexperienced group. even though they were intending to have a similar overarching story like they did on rtk, it was not at all very fleshed out and there wasn’t a strong enough connection between that story, the themes of their stages, and the narrative shapes of those stages. which is a shame because they are not unskilled performers, and they have the most members of all of the groups on the show, so they had a lot of opportunity to be doing interesting choreo and blocking work that never seemed to materialize. i also think they never truly got used to the size of the stage in comparison to the rtk stage, and they were always struggling to fill it in an intentional way. they tried valiantly to recoup their ground and bring everything together in a full circle for their last stage, and even though they somehow came in second, i think by the finale they had been worn down and lost a lot of their steam. it also doesn’t help that they lost a member to injury right near the end, which can be very demotivating, especially for a young group.

skz

god’s ddu du ddu du - the most stylistically different and interesting of the bunch, with a lot of interesting elements and well designed movement, even if the overall arc was half baked and lackluster

i’ll be your man - this was an actual attempt at a departure from their normal bluster and even though it never makes it all the way there and they don’t do that great of a cover, it’s different enough.

wolfgang - although watchable for hilarity and/or cringe value, nothing about this stage demonstrates a significant amount of growth from the first one. it fact it just feels like they injected a load more money and time into the premise of their 100sec stage, without any of the reflection that this kind of circular final stage concept should have. it’s exactly the stage of a group that’s been propelled to first in every round through an artificially inflated system.

god’s menu/side effects - the most scattered of all their stages. there’s not quite enough material to tie everything together and it feels underformed.

we all knew what the outcome of the show was going to be the moment that very first round of fan voting came in. now i don’t actually care about final outcome of the show, because the most valuable experience of a show like this is learning from what your competitors around you are doing and how to improve your work for further rounds. if the ranking system had been solely expert + judges based, all of the weekly rankings would have looked a lot different and skz would have actually had a chance to grow from this experience. but because they have the biggest and most aggressive fandom, their stages constantly ended up in first place and they never actually had the opportunity to sit back and reflect on their performances to figure out how they can do better. because the truth of the matter is that they did not have the best performances on the show. they consistently made stylistically stagnant stages and never managed to correct any of the issues that have been plaguing them since the 100sec round. the closest they got was god’s ddu du ddu du, which was aesthetically the most different and had the most interesting subversions of the stage format, even if it ultimately fell flat because they still missed the mark on managing the shape of the narrative. if you watch all their stages back to back you’ll see that there’s an overreliance on the same types of stylistic decisions and thematic elements, including in the sound and feel of the work. this is a bit hard to explain, but even though the stages all look different, they don’t convey any nuanced emotion or intention other than ‘stray kids world domination.’ now nuanced intention is not necessary for a kpop song performance, but skz took it upon themselves to try and tackle some fairly complex thematic ideas, which is commendable, but they fall flat because the members themselves don’t know how to act. and acting is supremely important when you are doing themed stages. i talked about this same principle in this response about orange caramel and wjsn chocome, but most newer idols don’t approach performing as a character, they approach performing as themselves, and skz are big victims of this. that’s why even i’ll be your man, where they do actually attempt to be a bit more nuanced in their delivery, still comes off like all their other stages. they don’t ever push themselves beyond their performance boundaries (physically yes, obviously. i mean mentally) and so every stage has a little checklist of skz-specific personality traits that round out in the bigger picture to the same general feel. this kind of strategy works great for music shows and for general promotion because it’s super marketable, but in this particular setting, where we spend an extended amount of time with all the groups, it doesn’t facilitate the same amount of growth that letting those of personas go would.

ikon

at ease - really clear cumulation of their performance, group colour, and design elements over the entire show.

classy savage - well designed and decorated with an interesting concept, but has a few flaws that keep it from being their best work.

inception - again, very well designed; the set is so inventive and features a lot of carefully blocked movement, plus the colour palette is tight and used effectively, it just doesn’t reach the same scale as the latter two stages.

love scenario/killing me - it’s the first stage and it clearly suffers from a bit of underd evelopment as they were getting used to the format of the show. it’s still an interesting and well performed stage with the start of elements that we can see them develop further in the next rounds.

ikon had the most lackadaisical attitude toward the whole show, which i think was the best way to approach it, but also they didn’t really push much beyond their boundaries as performers. i’m not faulting them for not wanting to, they’re a very well established group and honestly don’t really need improve on anything. they did however, do a really great job of improving on their design quality and intergration after the first round, which is the one thing that this program definitely facilitates for. they’re also the only group where their finale stage was demonstrably their best stage, so they really did nail that slow improvement progression. they got what they wanted out of the show, which was new friends and a chance to make some fun stages that they wouldn’t have otherwise been able to. like i think i’ve said in every other review, there’s not that much to say about them as a whole because they just put their noses to the grindstone and did the work while maintaining a chill and fun demeanour, and those efforts paid off even if they didn’t end up ranking very high.

sf9

the stealer - great integration of theme into narrative and design, small scale concept with big impact.

believer - smart use of camera work and choreography in conjunction with the design elements. although not very narrative focused, it’s a clear and thoughtful elaboration on their intro stage that’s very well executed.

move - a risky choice that pays off fairly well for them, even if it doesn’t capture all the depth that it could have.

jealous - it’s their first stage of the competition and the first time they had worked on something of this scale before, so it only makes sense that it’s the weakest of their run. despite that, it shows a strong understanding of an unusual concept and it still holds up.

sf9 were the clear underdogs of everyone and the rankings pretty clearly reflected that. but as a group they really put in the work to improve their skills and i think they showed the most dramatic improvement of everyone, especially between the first and second rounds. they repeatedly made comments about how they were focused on creating good stages and it paid off. their stages were all conceptually and visually interesting without relying on much external lore or overly dense themes, even if some of them were more effective than others. they had a lot of strong emphasis on costume in particular and they were very well styled. their finale stage was a very clear synthesis of all of the experience and knowledge they gained over the course of the show and it wraps a neat aesthetic and thematic bow on their journey. they absolutely did not deserve last place; they were the ones hardest hit by the fan voting system and i hope that the group doesn’t internalize the official outcome too much, because they did a lot of good work that they should be proud of and deserves a higher due than it was given.

ateez

rhythm ta - simple concept with a clear narrative that uses a lot of visual referencing as exposition without being cluttered and too reliant on the source material. impeccable use of limited design elements to create atmosphere and it’s a strong reinvention of the song.

wonderland - an absolute banger of a first stage that does all the same things as rhythm ta just to a slightly less polished scale.

ode to joy - both stylistically and tonally a departure, this stage relies a lot on group lore but also has a very clear message that was surprising for its maturity and temerity.

the real - purposefully pulled back in scale and ambition as a pointed critique of the competition as a whole. looser in design aesthetic synthesis but has more freedom for the members to show more dynamism in the group’s abilities and colour.

the youngest of the six groups, i don’t think anyone was expecting ateez to come out swinging in the way that they did. oh, we were all expecting them to put up a fight, but i know that i wasn’t expecting much beyond the capabilities of what we’d seen from skz and tbz, since they all share the dubious honour of being similar aesthetic performance based fourth gen groups. but oh baby did they prove us all wrong. the fact that they have incredible performance abilities and stage presence is what carried them half of the way, but they also proved to have a top notch creative team working behind them that knew how to visually craft a great performance. wonderland and rhythm ta are two of the smartest designed stages, and i’d put rhythm ta as the best designed stage, because it does so much in such a small amount of time. this ranking was tough because all of their stages intentionally prove a point and i dont think there are any that are demonstrably weaker. wonderland and rhythm ta served to prove that they had the capacity to keep up with their seniors, and that they were ambitious and hungry and had a solid team foundation. both stages ranked them first in non-fan judging and once they saw how the fan judging skews the final results, they smartly and ambitiously made a choice in the round BEFORE the finale to make a stage that rebuffs the laurels of the competition show they were at the pinnacle of, specifically for their fans. there is so much care and thought put into the ode to joy stage that it feels wrong to rank it as their third best, especially when it also contains one of the greatest 40 seconds of acting i’ve ever seen on a kpop stage. just the dichotomy of the stage’s melancholy feel with the choice of song is so compelling, and in its context as a part of the whole now the show is over.... i’m out of words. the brain on the person who came up with this, i would LOVE to talk to them. and having the real as a followup stage? where they have the freedom to have fun and be stylistically themselves while thumbing their noses at the show? a perfect follow up and rounding out of the expression of their abilities.

btob

back door - perfect. simple concept and simple narrative extremely well executed. excellent attention to detail and atmosphere.

show and prove - perfect reflection of their journey on the show as a whole.

blue moon - same as back door, just with a slightly larger scale.

missing you - only last because it doesn’t have the same strength of narrative and design concept as the other three stages. it’s still a better stage than 80% of the stages on the show.

we all know this, but btob are the real kings. all of their stages were phenomenal and they all hit my personal top ten, so this ranking is more of a ‘which stage was the best of the best.’ they did an incredible job of playing to their strengths and they knew exactly what they needed to do in order to craft the best performance. this was actually very difficult for me to decide because they never fucking missed. watching missing you for the first time in like two months smacked me right upside the head because that stage is beautiful. the intro in the forest with changsub and eunkwang is fucking gorgeous; the lighting and atmospherics are so effective and the trees do an incredible job of obscuring the stage architecture. and their costumes. this stage screams elegance in a way that no other stage managed to capture and this was the first round. and i’m putting last on this list, which should be telling about the quality of their work. and honestly it only goes up from here. they took that one maybe valid expert critique that they got of utilizing more narrative and they RAN with it. i put back door as first because it juuuuust inches out blue moon and show and prove for smart camera work, but honestly all three of these stages could take top spot, they’re of equal rank.

btob came into this show at a pretty distinct disadvantage: they’re old, and there’s only four of them. and as we know, thanks to rtk and the fourth gen groups, this show has a reputation for big acrobatic blowout spectacles, which is just not something they can do. but they also had a distinct advantage: they’re old and there’s only four of them. they very smartly foresaw that they wouldn’t be able to compete with the fourth gen groups in athletic ability, so they specifically chose to highlight the areas they were the strongest in, which you can see right from the start. their intro stage specifically highlights their vocals, and even in minhyuk’s dance solo the design is music show themed, as a gentle reminder that they know how to work a stage. and as the show progressed they started to solidify that assumption. they used narrative extremely well to give their stages an element of emotional investment that kept the audience engaged without banking on individual idols’ popularity to keep them afloat, and spent their time on the show being gracious and generous competitors, intent on being as watchable offstage as they were on. and it worked. by the time the finale rolled around, we knew who these men were and we had seen them be individuals, so they were able to cast off the need to play to narrative and to character and instead they were able to loop back around to that very first stage; simple, clean, emphasis on vocals, with a very important addition of uniformity. the current trend in kpop costuming is to have group members dressed similarly, but not exactly the same, partially in order to be able to everyone apart, but also because the ‘sameness’ of the boy band model has fallen by the wayside. btob took all their previous stages where they had clearly been individuals and as the culmination of their journey they chose to look exactly the same, to clearly send a message that they are a singular unit and they are proud of that. and they absolutely stuck the landing. this was a perfect run for btob, they should be really fucking proud of the work they did.

[richincolor]

New Releases

A whole slew of books coming out this week, many we've been looking forward to for a while. I can't wait to add some of these to my TBR pile.

Perfectly Parvin (Perfectly Parvin #1) by Olivia Abtahi G.P. Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers

Parvin has just had her heart broken when she meets the cutest boy at her new high school, Matty Fumero–with an emphasis on fumero, because he might be the smoking hot cure to all of her boy troubles. If Parvin can get Matty to ask her to homecoming, she’s positive it will erase all the awful and embarrassing feelings He Who Will Not Be Named left her with after the summer. The only problem is Matty is definitely too cool for bassoon-playing, frizzy-haired, Cheeto-eating Parvin. Since being herself has not worked for her in the past (see aforementioned relationship), she decides that to be the girl who finally gets the guy, she should start acting like the women in her favorite rom-coms. Those girls aren’t loud, they certainly don’t cackle when they laugh, and they smile much more than they talk. Easy enough, right?

But as Parvin struggles through her parent-mandated Farsi lessons on the weekends, a budding friendship with a boy she can’t help but be her unfiltered self with, and dealing with the ramifications of the Muslim Ban on her family in Iran, she realizes that being herself might just be the perfect thing after all.

The Marvelous Mirza Girls by Sheba Karim Quill Tree Books

To cure her post–senior year slump, made worse by the loss of her aunt Sonia, Noreen is ready to follow her mom on a gap year trip to New Delhi, hoping India can lessen her grief and bring her voice back.

In the world’s most polluted city, Noreen soon meets kind, handsome Kabir, who introduces her to the wonders of this magical, complicated place. With Kabir’s help—plus Bollywood celebrities, fourteenth-century ruins, karaoke parties, and Sufi saints—Noreen begins to rediscover her joyful voice.

But when a family scandal erupts, Noreen and Kabir must face complicated questions in their own relationship: What does it mean to truly stand by someone—and what are the boundaries of love?

Check out Crystal's Review: The Marvelous Mirza Girls

Made in Korea by Sarah Suk Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers

There’s nothing Valerie Kwon loves more than making a good sale. Together with her cousin Charlie, they run V&C K-BEAUTY, their school’s most successful student-run enterprise. With each sale, Valerie gets closer to taking her beloved and adventurous halmeoni to her dream city, Paris.

Enter the new kid in class, Wes Jung, who is determined to pursue music after graduation despite his parents’ major disapproval. When his classmates clamor to buy the K-pop branded beauty products his mom gave him to “make new friends,” he sees an opportunity—one that may be the key to help him pay for the music school tuition he knows his parents won’t cover…

What he doesn’t realize, though, is that he is now V&C K-BEAUTY’s biggest competitor.

Stakes are high as Valerie and Wes try to outsell each other, make the most money, and take the throne for the best business in school—all while trying to resist the undeniable spark that’s crackling between them. From hiring spies to all-or-nothing bets, the competition is much more than either of them bargained for.

But one thing is clear: only one Korean business can come out on top.

Tokyo Ever After by Emiko Jean Flatiron Books

Izumi Tanaka has never really felt like she fit in—it isn’t easy being Japanese American in her small, mostly white, northern California town. Raised by a single mother, it’s always been Izumi—or Izzy, because “It’s easier this way”—and her mom against the world. But then Izzy discovers a clue to her previously unknown father’s identity…and he’s none other than the Crown Prince of Japan. Which means outspoken, irreverent Izzy is literally a princess.

In a whirlwind, Izzy travels to Japan to meet the father she never knew and discover the country she always dreamed of. But being a princess isn’t all ball gowns and tiaras. There are conniving cousins, a hungry press, a scowling but handsome bodyguard who just might be her soulmate, and thousands of years of tradition and customs to learn practically overnight.

Izzy soon finds herself caught between worlds, and between versions of herself—back home, she was never “American” enough, and in Japan, she must prove she’s “Japanese” enough. Will Izumi crumble under the weight of the crown, or will she live out her fairytale, happily ever after?

On the Hook by Francisco X. Stork Scholastic Press

Hector has always minded his own business, working hard to make his way to a better life someday. He’s the chess team champion, helps the family with his job at the grocery, and teaches his little sister to shoot hoops overhand.

Until Joey singles him out. Joey, whose older brother, Chavo, is head of the Discípulos gang, tells Hector that he’s going to kill him: maybe not today, or tomorrow, but someday. And Hector, frozen with fear, does nothing. From that day forward, Hector’s death is hanging over his head every time he leaves the house. He tries to fade into the shadows – to drop off Joey’s radar – to become no one.

But when a fight between Chavo and Hector’s brother Fili escalates, Hector is left with no choice but to take a stand.

The violent confrontation will take Hector places he never expected, including a reform school where he has to live side-by-side with his enemy, Joey. It’s up to Hector to choose whether he’s going to lose himself to revenge or get back to the hard work of living.

Enduring Freedom by Jawad Arash & Trent Reedy Algonquin Young Readers

On September 11, 2001, the lives of two boys on opposite sides of the world are changed in an instant.

Baheer, a studious Afghan teen, sees his family’s life turned upside down when they lose their livelihood as war rocks the country.

A world away, Joe, a young American army private, has to put aside his dreams of becoming a journalist when he’s shipped out to Afghanistan.

When Joe’s unit arrives in Baheer’s town, Baheer is wary of the Americans, but sees an opportunity: Not only can he practice his English with the soldiers, his family can make money delivering their supplies. At first, Joe doesn’t trust Baheer, or any of the locals, but Baheer keeps showing up. As Joe and Baheer get to know each other, to see each other as individuals, they realize they have a lot more in common than they ever could have realized. But can they get past the deep differences in their lives and beliefs to become true friends and allies?

Off the Record by Camryn Garrett Knopf Books for Young Readers

Ever since seventeen-year-old Josie Wright can remember, writing has been her identity, the thing that grounds her when everything else is a garbage fire. So when she wins a contest to write a celebrity profile for Deep Focus magazine, she’s equal parts excited and scared, but also ready. She’s got this.

Soon Josie is jetting off on a multi-city tour, rubbing elbows with sparkly celebrities, frenetic handlers, stone-faced producers, and eccentric stylists. She even finds herself catching feelings for the subject of her profile, dazzling young newcomer Marius Canet. Josie’s world is expanding so rapidly, she doesn’t know whether she’s flying or falling. But when a young actress lets her in on a terrible secret, the answer is clear: she’s in over her head.

One woman’s account leads to another and another. Josie wants to expose the man responsible, but she’s reluctant to speak up, unsure if this is her story to tell. What if she lets down the women who have entrusted her with their stories? What if this ends her writing career before it even begins? There are so many reasons not to go ahead, but if Josie doesn’t step up, who will?

[thesedangeroustemptations]

Decided to post one of my OC’s on here, so I hope y’all like her

(        the devil's match        )          ┊     ❛  ya know, being a dick will not make yours any bigger, so can we skip that step and get to the part where I break your neck? ❜

   character name   . .  kyomi tausa'afia ka'uhane.

   title / ring name   . .  ms. ka'uhane / 'the goddess of volcanoes and destruction, pele!'

   meaning of names   . .   

kyomi:  "pure and beautiful, to cleanse." named after her paternal grandmother, it was one handed down every few generations to those who seemed to shine bright with purity from birth, which was exactly what she appeared to have done. as she grew, she always had a shining glint in her eye, though many would say it's one of mischief while others see differently.

tausa'afia:  " pleasant, lovable " in the first few days of her life, she didn't have a middle name as their family reserved it for when their personality began to shine through, that way they had a name that fit them that emerged later on. kyomi was a sweet and adorable baby, capturing the hearts of anyone who held or even looked at her, hence why her middle names meaning reflects just that. 

ka'uhane : " soul, spirit " the surname is from her father's family line, having been derived 1500 years ago to distinguish his family's martial arts as users of spirit and soul, versus just muscle and occasional mind.

  nicknames   . .  

" i can't believe you'd put yourself in danger like this, kyo, do you thrive on getting your head kicked in that badly? "  —  wakatsuki takeshi, seething, after winning her battle against saw paing but sustaining major injuries.

" pele, you'd better not fucking lose, fuck him up!  "  —  adam dudley and cosmo imai yelling at her from the stands during her match.

" the strength of your spirit never ceases to amaze me, tausa, but remember, even the strong need to rest sometimes, and you need to realize that doesn't make you weak. rest now, get your revenge when you're healed. "  — sawada keizaburo, attempting to comfort his best friend after being unsure of whether her unborn child will survive due to being forced to fight in the kengan annihilation matches despite her condition.

" you still haven't figured it out yet, 'omi? you cannot love both of us and act like it's fine and dandy. fucking pick or i'll kill him right now.  "  —  ohma tokita confronting kyomi after finding out that she's been sharing a bed with Ichiro Nakata as well as him, ready to kill the supposed 'superman'.

   age   . .   kyomi is is twenty years of age

   gender   . .   she was born of the female gender.

   height/weight   . .   she stands at 5'2'' while weighing 155lbs of pure muscle.

   appearance   . .    " oh, but that's the irony, broken people like her are not fragile. "

                                                         

  

   kengan match records   . .   46 wins, 0 loses.

   physical scent   . .   kyomi's natural scent is one of the saltwater and sandalwood, with hints of plumeria flower.

   sexual orientation   . .  she is bisexual, biromantic.

   marital status   . .   currently not married.

   

 

  " i can't believe your sweet-tempered father was reincarnated into that girl. she's tough as nails. "

   occupation   . .   kengan fighter, personal body guard / assassin, head of the ka'uhane clan with the inherited abilities of her ancestors. *

   personality type   . .   enfj-t  —  the protagonist.

   [   positive   ]

‣  motivational, inspirational; bring out the best in others

‣  very perceptive about people's thoughts and motives 

‣  fun to be with - lively sense of humor, dramatic, energetic, optimistic

‣  strive for "win-win" situation  

‣  loyal and committed

‣  warmly affectionate and affirming

   [   negative   ]

‣  tendency to be smothering and over-protective/manipulative and controlling

‣  doesn't pay enough attention to her own needs 

‣  critical of opinions and attitudes which don't match her own/sometimes unaware of social appropriateness or protocol

‣  extremely sensitive to conflict, with a tendency to sweep things under the rug as an avoidance tactic/blames herself when things go wrong, and not give themselves credit when things go right  

‣  her sharply defined value systems make her unbending in some areas/she may be so attuned to what is socially accepted or expected that she's unable to assess whether something is "right" or "wrong" outside of what her social circle expects

   personality description   . .   ❛   part of her mystery is how she is calm in the storm and anxious in the quiet.  ❜

         ‣  kyomi is a typically bright, energetic and friendly individual, radiating warmth and acceptance to all those who come in contact with her. her kindness is talked of in abundance with her people, as well as her humor that can at times have the entire tribe rolling about with laughter. exceptionally considerate of others feelings, she will often force hers down to where she no longer has to deal with them so she can focus on the tasks/needs of others at hand. despite all of this, she is a skilled warrior who’s talents outshine those who are double her age and trained every moment of the time, leading to her confidence in her abilities to border on cocky. with these abilities however, she is able to defend her tribe and grow an ever expanding bodyguard service from those she’s trained, hiring them out to the highest bidder with these skills. her intelligence is what helped her launch the idea, her mistrust and misjudgement will end up being her downfall; getting her into situations where she’s forced to be the compeditor for Omni Air International, who threatened to level her village if she didn’t comply. over her family and fellow villagers she is fiercely protective and thoughtful, willing to lay down her life if need be for them so they could continue to live in peace. aside from that, she at times can be extremely angry and resentful of the hand she had been dealt, knowing that it was beyond her control and that was what bothered her the most. in competition, she is a blood thirsty and calculating competitor, who would rather break necks than ask or answer any questions directed at her. when pushed to it, she will shut down the side that everyone knows and loves entirely, revealing a murdeous monster who would tear down anyone in her path. 

   likes   . .   relaxing in the sun, training, eating exotic and new foods, spending time with her twin children. 

  dislikes   . .   being told what to do/forced into situations where she has no control, arrogant people, disloyalty, early mornings.

   skills   . .   healing by meditation, knive throwing, rock/ice climbing, cooking, drawing/painting, ballet, hula dance. 

   any flaws   . .  she can be very critical of others with no real cause, her jealousy is out of control, she’s got a large scar on her back, left hip and left thigh from when she was attacked by a shark at the age of 12.

  personal phobias   . . deep bodies of water, dark spaces, being alone, 

  habits   . .  nail biting, smoking, constantly triple checking her surroundings, self isolation when feeling vulnerable.

   weapons   . .  seismic senescing through her hands and feet, pressure point and medical knowledge, garrote, knive throwing, judo, kenpo, jujitsu, grappling, wrestling.

   family or blood relatives   . .   —   akela ka’uhane  |  father, 39 years old  |  alive  |  intermediate chief along side his wife in his daughters absence/guardian of his grandchildren.

                                                 —   makani ka’uhane |  mother, 37 years old  |  alive  |   intermediate chieftess alongside her husband in her daughters absence/guardian of her granddaughter/healer

                                                 —   noe olina ka’uhane  |  daughter, 3 years old  |  alive  |  living with her grandparents while her mother is away, training in meditation and energy control with her grandfather.

                                                —-   kanoa haikili ka’uhane | son, 3 years old | alive | living with his grandparents while his mother is away, training in meditation and energy control with his grandfather. 

   affiliated company / empoleeyer   . .    omni air international 

    friends   . .  —  miyuki dotokayashi |  best friend | alive | daughter of naga dotokayashi, ceo of Omni air international  

                      — sawada keizaburo | best friend/unofficial bodyguard & uncle to her children | alive | kengan fighter/employed                             by murder music.

                      — wakatsuki takashi | best friend/father figure | alive | kengan fighter/empoyed by furumi pharmaceuticals.

                      — saw paing yoroizuka  | close friend | alive | kengan fighter/employed by village of the dawn.

                      — adam dudley | close friend | alive | kengan fighter/employed by boss burger.

                      — imai cosmo | close friend/brother figure | alive | kengan fighter / employed by nishihonji security services.

                      — okubo naoya | close friend/ex-lover | alive | kengan fighter.

                      — himuro ryo | close friend | alive | kengan fighter. 

                     —  kaneda suekichi | close friend | alive | kengan fighter.

                     —  gaolang wongsawat | close friend | alive | kengan fighter.

   romantic interest(s)   . .  ohma tokita & ichiro 'lihito' nakata  —  ❛  you’re selfish, is what you are. making us both love you and then refusing to choose, what the fuck is your game? ❜

        

          —  ohma 'the ashura' tokita : my, oh my. the relationship between ohma and kyomi began when they first encountered each other during her first trip to japan 2 years prior, representing Omni Air International and winning 27 consecutive matches before the annihilation tournament took place. they met in a coffee shop, he decided to stop in and devour whatever pastries they had on display for the day, and due to his large, intimidating frame, most people were afraid of him and kept his distance; not kyomi. she found his seemingly brooding and potentially aggressive nature comical in contrast to the sweet treats he was eating, so she being the outgoing individual she was, went up to him and asked him how the desserts tasted now that he'd robbed everyone else of the chance. her boldness and confidence in the way she carried herself was enough to catch his attention and intrigue, so he invited her to sit with him and try the remains of what he hadn't inhaled just yet. it was in that sit down, taste testing the different assortments that laid in front of them, that a bond was formed and only grew with the more time they spent together, finding more commonalities than initially suspected. as close as they got, there was still a wall put up between the two of them, set up unintentionally by both parties to refrain from either getting hurt. this didn't stop jealousy and possessiveness to overwhelm the 'relationship' that they had developed, resulting in it's momentary end in an explosive way. now, two months later, they met once again at the kengan annihilation tournament representing their respective companies, which was a shock to them both, especially on her end. the greatest shock for ohma was when the new 'superhuman' he had been introduced to a little while prior to this, was now following around his woman like a puppy, only sparking the killer instinct within him that lie just beneath the surface. that, and the hickies and love marks that covered her body in the most obvious and infuriating places. now aggressive and hostile toward the woman who somehow held a vice grip on his heart, he couldn't help but blame himself at the same time for allowing her to slip through his fingers, however he will be damned if he lets 'lihito' steal what's his. with kyomi seeming to decide that she was fine with loving the both of them, fucking the both of the, that was when he snapped and would become a much more outwardly angry person than his usual calm demeanor, lashing out at any person who happened to make the wrong comment in his presence. despite his feelings of rage and hostility toward the situation, he couldn't help the fact that he loved her, and he would continue to love her even if he hated the choices that she was making, and the fact that even though he knew her for two years time now, it still felt as though she was hiding a part of herself from him, which was frustrating for the fighter, because in their long nights together, he had spilled his guts to her, given her every part of him, and he was met with this. 

         —  ichiro ‘lihito’ nakata : meeting this goddess was a complete accident, one that ichiro was more grateful for than he cared to admit out loud- scratch that, he'd happily yell it from whatever roof top she requested. having met after he was observing his competition for the next few matches, he quickly took notice of the seemingly unbeatable 'pele', swiftly deciding two things: that she would soon be his, and he did not want to fight her in any upcoming matches, because he knew he would get his ass handed to him, and that wasn't something the self proclaimed superhuman could afford to his ego or image. after she mopped the floor with her opponent, he approached her and asked if she would like to get something to eat, explaining he knew just how strenuous and appetite increasing these matches could be, it didn't take much pressure to get her to agree. the two went to an authentic japanese ramen shop, as she had never been before and had only been in japan for a few days, which was mostly spent fighting or training, this being the first time she actually had a moment to herself to breath. they ate bowl after bowl, stacking the piles high as they could go before ichiro realized that this woman had not only stolen his heart, but emptied his wallet as well, not that he minded. her smile and full belly was all he cared about at that moment. over the next few months, the two became closer and closer, though there was weeks where she would pull away and disappear, for reasons he did not know of; come to find out much later, she was spending the other parts of her time with the infamous ohma tokita, his self decided rival in the kengan matches. this discovery once they had arrived at the tournament only fueled ichiro's rage and desire to win, to prove that he was the better man, the stronger man, the one for her. though the two decided amongst themselves that they would compete for her heart, they were infuriated to see that she decided that it was fine to simply love them both, which wouldn't have been too terrible for him if it wasn't for the fact that ohma made it abundantly clear that he wasn't okay with that, and would repeatedly threaten ichiro's life, which was met with the response of 'try it' every single time. the relationship that they have is a rather lax and easy going one, though at times he can be a bit smothering and over-protective, that's only because he doesn't want to lose out on what he sees as his one chance at happiness. 

   backstory   . .   kyomi was born the only child to a long line of renowned martial artists, one that had developed it's own style that included many aspects that weren't included in the traditional way of teaching. over 1500 years ago, her ancestors figured out how to manipulate matter and atoms, giving them partial manipulation over their surroundings as well as a physical power up. they also figured out the ability to heal themselves faster through the power of meditation, which came in handy for those who chose to be warriors, such as kyo.  the longer the line, the more ancestors that could be called upon for assistance in a fight, using their knowledge and own distinct styles of fighting, the stronger the power up, making kyomi at the time, the strongest ever of her line, surpassing that of her past life and previous tribal chief by what seemed like miles. from a young age, she displayed strong discipline and technique, mastering things thrown at her within a few days time and leaving her teachers in absolute awe, as well as her parents, though they also beamed with happiness. the ancestral spirit didn't manifest in every generation, it only happened when the current host dies, so it can be passed to the new one, which so happened to be a feisty, strong-willed and opinionated young woman who was more than willing to kill for her goals and those she cares for. at the age of 16, she made the mistake of getting too attached to a tourist visiting one of the vacation spots on the main parts of her island, resulting in her losing her virginity and discovering she was pregnant a few months later. with the support of her family and village, she had her children and would not have been able to handle it without the backing that she had. as chieftess in training, her father and mother handled most things for her while she focused on her own children, but also growing up still given she had them so young. it was during this time that it became apparent that she was suffering from post-partum-rage, which was honed and harnessed into a deadly weapon to add precision and greater force behind her strikes. at the age of 18, she was brought to omni air international headquarters by her best friend, being told that her father wanted someone strong to represent his company in what was known as the kengan matches in japan. this didn't appeal to her too much, initially she refused, but when her home and tribe were threatened with extinction, her own children who were innocent, she had no choice but to comply. her best friend had no knowledge of this, and was unable to stop her father from forcing her companions hand, but it was no use, he would not budge on his decision. she was the strongest by far that he had come across, and he wouldn't let her slip through his fingers when he had the power to bend her to his will, no matter the rage and resentment he was building within his fighter. after saying her goodbyes to her one and a half year olds, her parents and her village, she set off to japan, where she found it hard to adjust to the culture and the language, resulting in many fights and brawls due to misunderstandings. it was during this time that she met several people who would become close friends and mentors to her, the relationships forming due to their close proximity from the kengan matches, as they were all participants in some way or another. the romantic relationships she did not plan for, and being the privileged person that she was, assumed that she would just be able to have both of the people who had captured her heart, not taking their feelings into consideration whatsoever. this was a result of no one taking hers into consideration for bringing her there in the first place, forcing her to fight for the lives of her people and not being allowed to lose no matter what. she cared very little for what people viewed as 'fair', even if she did love them.  

extra   . .       —  kyomi is ambidextrous, though the punches from her left hand hurt far more than the ones from her right, she believes most of her past lives were prodominantly left handed, which she finds awesome as hell.

—  even after two years, the people closest to her, aside from sawada and wakatsuki, known nothing about her life back in hawaii, which is something that she prefers to keep due to her not knowing who she can truly trust anymore.  

—  though both ohma tokita and ichiro nakata have perminent places in her heart, if she was forced to choose, she would have to drop them both because she couldn't bear hurting one by choosing the other

—  sawada interestingly enough knew kyomi before she came to japan, having met her a few times when he and his employer made trips to hawaii to open new stores there for murder music, as he was her body guard as well as fighter. the two clicked while she was pregnant, he was very kind and thoughtful when interacting with her, never once judged her and was there when her twins were born. he's a brother that she never had, acting as her protector and best friend all at the same time; the relationship she has with lihito makes him sick to his stomach but it's her life, and he refuses to say anything for fear of getting his face kicked in.

—  she and raian have an unspoken rivalry, due to them both having destructive power, and her being referred to as 'the devil's match'. kyomi finds his blood lust entertaining and would love to fight him, him feeling the same with her, but having a bordering obsession with her as well, having to keep constant tabs on her and be aware of where she is at all times, something he does his best to keep hidden from everyone, including those in the kure clan. If anyone is going to beat her for good it would be him.

[gofancyninjaworld]

Underappreciated themes in OPM. 1: The Curse of Gamification

One-Punch Man is only partially a parody.  At times it is a satire, and in the instance of the points-based system the Hero Association uses to manage its heroes, it is a sharp one on the subject of gamification.  While treating non-games as games has been around since the 19th century, the 2010s is when it really took off, round about when ONE started writing OPM.

Since then, it’s only become more pervasive: you can set objectives, quests, and get rewards for just about anything.  Eating, sleeping, completing in-work induction, delivering packages, you name it, someone has gamified it. It delivers regular little hits of gratification, bigger hits when you rank up, and rivalry when there’s a leaderboard.

The way the Hero Association has implemented it, it’s a straight up gaming system.   We got introduced to their game system right at the newcomer's welcome lecture, where Snek explains that misbehaving heroes can lose points and thus rank.

How to win the Hero Association game?  Well, obviously, you can gets points for fighting monsters, but that's not the only thing they take into consideration.  You can get points for doing good deeds, for being active, all sorts of things.  So much so that the manga notes that 'if you keep active and play to your strengths, you can hang onto quite high rankings within a class' using Mumen Rider as a poster boy for a hero who does just that.

The good thing about Mumen Rider is that he doesn't try to stop other heroes from briefly occupying rank C-1 so they have a chance to be promoted

Furthermore, the points the Hero Association awards can be divided between heroes... and the points split gets decided between the heroes themselves. This is where the likes of the Blizzard Group really come into play.   However, it goes further than that: since all heroes in a group of heroes get at least some credit for killing a monster, it benefits lower-ranked heroes to hang around a powerful one.  That's why the Tank Toppers get so mad at Saitama, they think he's playing the leech off the S-Class game (and doing it better than they are).

Points-chasing is so much safer than monster-chasing

What's in it for the Hero Association?  By their very nature, heroes need to be highly self-directed and self-motivated people: if you don't have the initiative to find trouble and the courage to stand up to it, even if no one else has your back, you have no business being a hero.  The points-based system allows heroes to more or less manage themselves, motivate and push themselves with minimal input from the Hero Association. The good side of it for heroes is that they get a lot of freedom as to how they conduct themselves, which allows some real oddballs to thrive.

There are three big problems with the Hero Association game that the story has been showing us.

Problem 0: The game itself is unnecessary.  Monsters don't know and don't give a crap about how heroes organize themselves, or whether they're nice or cooperative.  They only care about whether or not anyone is able to stop them.  Same goes for criminals.

Problem 1:  Wherever there is a game, there are people who try to win it strategically.  It creates incentives to win points by means other than fighting monsters or criminals too dangerous for the police to handle.  A lot of the nonsense we see, like rookie crushing, forming factions,   refusing promotions to a higher class since they mean more responsibility and less recognition, chicanery, and going for cheap gimmicks to try to gain points through popularity all stem from the game.

games-playing makes a mockery of heroism

Problem 2:  Picking the right fight.  The special chapter 'Disaster Levels' makes mention of some heroes pushing themselves to fight high-level monsters, but Season 2's OAV 2 really hones in on that problem.  We see Bang and Atomic Samurai discussing the problems with the Hero Association.  They single out the Hero Association’s points-based system for especial censure, both being of the opinion that it encourages heroes to take unnecessary risks.  And case in point, we see Mumen Rider and Chain n' Toad take on far too much monster for them and need bailing out.   It was very good to hear Atomic scold them for relying on guts rather than making sure they also had the strength to back it up.

Taking unnecessary risks may be flashy but it's bad for hero health

Problem 3 (and the biggest one):  By its very existence, it turns fellow heroes from colleagues into competitors.  The webcomic is really going to town on this issue, but I don't need to go that far to illustrate it.

A system that rewards individualism makes for reluctant team-building.   Nurturing leaders? That implies group-formation, so we see very few heroes lead.   We see pointless divisions between classes as S-Class heroes get lionized (and over-worked), while good lower-ranking heroes get overlooked.  It's a situation made even more pernicious by the Hero Association being perfectly aware that there are many promising lower-ranked heroes who could do with development.

This resentment is completely unnecessary

More seriously, it means that failures can be individualised -- it’s your fault if you’re struggling rather than the system as a whole.  If you're competing, it's harder to compare notes to realise that you are all suffering in the same way.   Pro-heroes are actually in a very strong bargaining position: despite running Hero Tests year round, for free, in multiple locations, the Hero Association has never succeeded in having more than 600 heroes on its books at any one time.  Pro-heroes aren't easily replaced.  Things like decent pay, accommodation, help with equipment, and access to training facilities should not be privileges reserved for Class A and S heroes and held out as a carrot for lower-ranked heroes.  They should be a matter of course, that would make heroes much more effective.  Which is what the public and major donors are paying for.

The concept of the game system with its someone-must-win-someone-must-lose ethos blocks a lot of innovation.  Training:  they make it a matter of duty for A-Class heroes to orient new  recruits, but also having a buddy to look out for new heroes for the  first few weeks would be a huge help.  Having strong heroes take at least one student to bring on would make a huge difference.  And someone like Bang would love it as he's always looking for dojo members.  They could get rid of a lot of the infighting by  getting rid of ranks within a class and instead having brackets  according to how effective heroes are within that class and make it clear that there's no absolute size for any bracket: they'll leave a  bracket empty if there's no one deserving of it.  Anyone in the top  bracket can apply to go to the next class if they can convince the  promotion team that they can hack it in the next class up  -- no more  value in camping the top spot and trying to suppress other heroes.  Better data sharing.  Pastoral care: it's tough being a hero even if everything's going right, but a competitive system means that heroes hide their woes until they can't stand it any longer and quit.  And so on.

If heroes are so precious, why aren't they being looked after better?

If you're looking for the thesis of this to be that gamification is bad, that's not it.  Rather, it's that all things have their appropriate place and when misused, bad things happen.  Gamifying running a marathon?  Awesome.  Be the fastest delivery man in the tri-state area? Knock yourself out.  Sales targets?  Fantastic! Those are situations games work very well for.  Gamifying a hero group, where people should be ready to work together and help fight the increasing and increasingly complex threats that blow up out of nowhere, it's idiocy.

Idiocy the rest of the world is paying for.

[spiders-hth-is-an-outlier]

Today in Strongly Worded Opinions (That You Didn't Ask For), I'm going to assert that there are too objective ways to measure whether or not a relationship is strong in story terms – by which I mean, unrelated to whether or not readers/viewers personally like the dynamic or the chemistry of the actors (in such cases as there are actors involved).

So for the sake of clarity, be ye advised: this isn't about shipping, fuck it, ship whatever you want idc.  Shipping a strong relationship isn't inherently better than shipping a weak one – heck, you could just as easily argue that it's the lazier, less creative route.  Also, I don't care?  I don't care, it's just fandom.  Follow your arrow.  This is about ways to discuss whether or not a relationship introduced into a text succeeds or fails as an element of the story – or really as I'm going to prefer calling it, if a given relationship forms a strong or weak story element.

For this I'm presuming that you're creating a relationship between a protagonist and a secondary character introduced as a piece of the protagonist's overall story – protagonist/protagonist relationships aren't really a different situation, but they do have more moving parts, so for simplicity's sake, let's   stick with a Main Character (we'll call that M) and a Significant Other (S for short).  Also, these relationships by no means have to be romantic; any relationship can be measured as weak or strong in story terms.

Also, I'm going to say everything here as though it were factually true, even though it's just my opinion, which is correct, but if you disagree then it's only my opinion, but I am correct.  Ready?  Okay!

Strong relationships have story functions; in reality nothing means anything and people just like each other because they do, but fuck reality, it's a huge narrative mess.  And my basic premise here is that the story function of a strong relationship falls under one (or more, if you wanna get real fancy) of these three categories:

The relationship can unlock under-explored elements of M's story or character through mirroring or intimacy (often shows up as “friends to lovers”).  There is backstory that hasn't been unearthed yet, or some reaction or experience in M's life that could advance the story, and S can serve as a means to get at it.  Maybe M and S share a similar trauma or life story; maybe S is the first person M feels able to open up to about something profound and relevant.  Maybe part of M's story is a conflict between how they seem to others and how they see themselves or their own potential; maybe S is the person who sees them the way they see themselves...or sees M as the person they're afraid they'll never be.  The story goal being met here is giving M a boost toward successful completion of their story arc, so even though there could be conflict, S is fundamentally pulling on the same side as M in the major story conflicts, in such a way that by the end, the reader should feel like M's success is at least in part because of what they gain from their relationship with S.

The relationship can function as a piece of the story's overall conflict, or as a secondary subplot conflict (often shows up as “enemies to lovers”). Traditional romance novel plotting effectively slots the love interest into the role of “antagonist,” because the romance's conflict is generally driven by people not getting what they want from each other until certain win conditions are met.  In this kind of relationship, M and S might be actual-facts competitors, or be divided by ideological concerns, or they might be forced into proximity by the plot but clash on some personality level.  The arc of this relationship is typically going to be about the M softening up as the relationship develops – if M starts out ruthlessly single-minded, maybe realizing that they're running roughshod over S in the process is part of their character breakthrough; if the story is about M realizing that they've underestimated the complexity of the world around them, maybe coming to recognize S as an equal is how that gets concretized for the reader.  Basically this is a story where S presents a problem that M has to solve, and the more central to the narrative solving that problem is, the stronger the relationship is.

The relationship can serve to divide M's goals (often shows up as “love versus duty”).  This is a story where M has to accomplish two separate things in order to fulfill their arc, but those two things aren't easily integrated. One of M's goals might be fulfilling a vow, or filial duty, or seeking revenge, and the other goal is some form of protecting or obtaining S.  If the story puts M in a position of having to choose, then the relationship is inherently strong; it's providing narrative drive, whether or not S is especially well-developed as an individual character.  This one can be tricky, because a very weak relationship can serve a superficially similar purpose, by demonstrating M's devotion to duty or obsessive pursuit of whatever when M rebuffs S to keep them out of harm's way or to avoid distraction or whatever. The difference is that in those superficial cases, the audience is meant to recognize that aw, that's sad, M has really had to Make Sacrifices – but there's really no dramatic tension involved; we know all along that M is going to Make Sacrifices in purusit of the real goal.  When this is done seriously with a strong relationship, the audience is meant to feel divided as well; Romeo and Juliet just doesn't work as a story unless the audience likes Juliet and Mercutio, unless they fully identify with the dilemma that Romeo is in when he has to either avenge Mercutio's death or spare Tybalt for Juliet's sake and the sake of their future together. That's a big fucking story moment, and it only works because the audience buys both relationships – Romeo's with Mercutio and with Juliet – as narratively strong, to the point where Romeo's choice is not a forgone conclusion.  This one is much easier to get wrong, I think, than the other two are!

What I'm saying here is that a strong relationship isn't really determined by how personally compatible two characters seem to be; a lot of movies that fridge a character's wife, for example, rely on actors convincingly portraying, in a brief window of time, two compatible people who care for each other – I'm thinking of, like, Richard Kimble and his wife in The Fugitive, who I think do sell the idea of a loving and happy marriage, but the relationship itself is a weak one.  The story only really needs the bare fact of it – “Kimble had a wife that he loved and then this happened” – to kick off the actual story; the relationship between Kimble and Gerard is a stronger one narratively, because much of the emotional tension of the movie, what makes it more effective than just a series of chase scenes, is the way their mutual respect evolves as they compete against each other, and the story question of “Kimble really needs an ally, is this the right person for him to trust?”  It's such a strong relationship that it comes as a huge relief of tension when he does make that gesture of trust and it turns out to be the right choice.  The audience is happy that Kimble will be exonerated, but the audience is equally happy that the conflict between these two charcters is over – we didn't like them being at odds because we didn't want either of them to lose!  Now, would these two people ever be close friends, let alone come to love each other?  No? Yes? Who cares?  Kimble loves his wife more, but has a stronger relationship in this story with Gerard. From a writing perspective, it's trivially easy to introduce an S and say “M loves this person,” but it means relatively little.  It's harder to introduce an S and say “some part of this story now hinges on how M navigates knowing this person,” but that's kind of what has to happen in order to create a payoff that's worth the effort.  A strong relationship provides skeletal structure for the story; it can't be stitched on at the margins.

This is an even tougher sell in something like a television series, where the introduction of S may come in well after the story is underway and the bulk of M's characterization is already in place.  That's why introducing a late-season love interest is a notoriously dodgy proposition!  To demonstrate weak vs strong relationship in action, I'm going to take an example of what I think was a failed attempt and pitch some ways to doctor it up into a strong relationship: Sam Winchester and Eileen Leahy.

This is objectively a weak relationship.  She doesn't materially affect the metaplot of the series, or drive any major choices, or reveal anything about Sam's character.  She's just, you know, generally nice and attractive and Sam likes her, which is a fine start, but then the writers just leave her idling in the garage forever.  But it didn't have to be that way! Say we wanted to make it a Type 1 relationship: super easy, barely an inconvenience!  Eileen is very like Sam, actually, in that she lost her parents as an infant and then had the entire rest of her life shaped by the trauma and the pursuit of revenge.  That's amazing.  How many other people, even hunters, share that specific experience with Sam Winchester?  Sam was physically changed by drinking demon blood in infancy; Eileen was physically changed by being deafened by the banshee or whatever it was in infancy.  Even just allowing them to talk about that would have made the relationship stronger.  Sam is affected by the fact that there is no Before Time for him; even now that they've long since had their revenge on ol' Yellow Eyes himself, he grapples with the fact that he's forever robbed of any memories of innocence or safety or a life that wasn't lived in the shadow of this killing.  Eileen also has had her life's quest for revenge fulfilled, and also has to reckon with the fact that it doesn't actually give her access to the innocence that was stolen from her.  Maybe she struggles with that.  Maybe Sam can open up to her because she knows what it's like to look back on your child self and feel that however strong you've made yourself, you're never strong enough to protect that child.

What if you want to write something spicier than Sam and Eileen talking about their sad feelings?  Okay, let's take a Type 2 story.  Eileen has been a lone hunter with a disability all her life; it's fair to guess that even if she can't match Sam's physical strength, the fact that she's survived at all means that she's pretty indomitable.  Maybe she's had to be ruthless, even brutal in her hunting style; maybe she has a shoot-first-ask-questions-never approach to hunting that she credits with her very survival, but that Sam finds excessively rash and bloody.  Maybe they fight about it.  Have her kill some ambiguous, maybe-not-dangerous monstery types, a werewolf or something, and Sam's like, hey, we really can't just-- and Eileen is like, look, I hunt how I hunt, come with me or don't.  I mean, this is a retread in some ways of early season conflicts about who to kill and when, but everything in the latter seasons is a retread anyway, so whatever, and it provides something interesting to have Sam deal with this whiplash of how there seem to be two Eileens, the smiley, jocular sweetheart who eats pancakes with him and the one who kills like she's swatting flies.  What if he wants one but not the other?  It doesn't really work that way, does it?  Is this something he can dismiss as a foible, or is this a dealbreaker? The dude is almost forty, if he distances himself from Eileen, how many more hunters does he think he has a chance to meet and marry?  If she won't even listen to his concerns seriously, is it really a good relationship anyway, or will Sam's needs always end up taking a backseat to Eileen's?

A Type 3 fix could just come down quite plainly to, what if Eileen is ready to retire?  She's had her revenge.  She's lived her life on the hunt.  Maybe she's done, and maybe she wants Sam to be done with her.  Doing this in season 15 would circle Sam back to his season 1 story conflicts in a nice way, I think – why does Sam do this at all, if it's not for revenge any longer?  Does he feel personally responsible for every dead person he could've saved but didn't – is that a reasonable boundary, or lack thereof, to set?  Is a compromise possible – could he continue to coordinate hunts while also getting out of the field and starting a family, or is that still putting his family in the shadow of too much violence and danger to tolerate?  What's Dean going to say?  He's pitched a fit in the past when Sam said he wanted out, but he's mellowed with age, hasn't he?  Maybe he'll get it now?  But maybe Sam also feels guilty and fearful, because he knows Dean will hunt without him, so now he's in more danger because of Sam's choices, if Sam makes this choice.  It's a little heteronormative, as story conflicts go, but it's thematically appropriate to Supernatural, and the fact that Eileen isn't speaking out of timidity but out of the same weariness that Sam has so often felt about the whole endless cycle makes it feel a little less “the little lady won't let me go on adventures anymore.”  This might not be my pick of the three, but the point is that it makes for a strong conflict, a legitimate divided loyalty for Sam to wrestle with, and one that doesn't have a clear right answer.

Anyway, hopefully that helps illustrate what I mean when I say that the narrative strength of a relationship doesn't have anything to do with how likeable an S character is – Eileen is very likeable! But that doesn't substitute for building her into the fabric of the story in some way.  My expectation is that a serious protagonist relationship should bend the story arc in a way that requires response, and if it doesn't, I don't take that relationship particularly seriously.  Canon can declare a relationship real by fiat, but it can't automatically declare a relationship meaningful without, you know, making meaning of it.

Oh, and there's not anything really wrong with weak relationships – most M's are going to have several in the story.  My point is just that the difference between a weak relationship and a strong one isn't really a matter of taste or preference, but has a functional meaning that can be tested and measured, and if there's argument to be had about it, the argument can take place on evidentiary grounds.  Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.