#i've tried to write this thrice before and failed

[starrynightarchive]

how do you make pinned posts about yourself

[azrielslightintheshadows]

Hello :) I've recently found your blog and read everything AT LEAST thrice. I adore your writing <3 May I request a one-short, Azriel and Reader being Wayyy too into PDA, like pausing training to cuddle standing up while everyone else is training in front of them, and Azriel is kissing up her neck n all.

Reader sitting in his lap during dinner with the inner circle while they feed each other, giggling, whispering sweet nothings, stealing kisses with each other in front of everyone and Azriel has a wing around her to keep her warm.

Like they just have to be touching each other all the time.

Also, Cass is fake-gagging at them while he is training others. And Rhys is traumatized cause they didn't put their mental shield up, and he can hear all the *dirty* thoughts they are having for each other. Those thoughts are loud as hell and he is basically like, "Really? In front of my dinner?" While side-eyeing them through dinner. That was a long one heh. Fingers crossed I sparked an idea for you and it wasn't just me rambling

Honeymoon phase.

Azriel x f!Reader.

Warnings; suggestive

Masterlist

Thank you so much! I hope this is what you had in mind! Please let me know if you want me to rewrite it.

“Lift your elbow” Azriel ordered and ducked when you threw a punch.

You were on the roof of the house of wind training with your mate while Cassian was training the Valkyries on the other side.

“That’s it! Very well” he praised you.

You smiled proudly and he engulfed you in his arms. You pressed your cheek on his chest and rubbed his back as he held you. Your mate sighed and leaned down and started kissing your neck making you leave a small moan.

“Oh come on we are training” Cassian exclaimed and made a gagging noise.

“Sorry Cassie” you shouted and pushed your mate away but quickly grabbed the collar of his shirt and pulled him for a last sloppy kiss.

You and Azriel met 70 years ago so the mating bond wasn’t new, but you never left the honeymoon phase. You couldn’t stay away from each other, if you could become one you probably would.

You finished training and left hand in hand making Cassian snort. After bathing together, you enjoyed your lunch and went to the river house, Azriel had to brief Rhysand on some mission, and you wanted to hang out with Feyre and Mor.

“Have fun” he told you and captured your lips with his own before climbing up the stairs that led to Rhysand’s office.

“I can’t get used to this side of him” Mor spoke from behind you.

“He is the sweetest” you smiled and took a seat on the big couch.

“He is desperately in love” Feyre said and giggled.

“Girl, trust me when I say that this man looked like he was going to murder everyone all the time. I don’t think that I ever saw him smile before he met y/n.” Mor exclaimed.

You tried to hide your grin but failed miserably making Feyre and Mor burst into laughter.

“And let’s not get started on the PDA” Mor shook her head.

“Enough! Let’s talk about something else.” You whined and the girls began teasing you even more.

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

Feyre was talking about her new painting when a pair of hands covered your eyes, the spicy yet sweet scent of your mate clouded your senses and you shuddered.

“Hey love” you giggled, and he removed his hands.

“Hey” he grinned and leaned down to kiss you.

“Who are you and what did you do to Azriel?” Mor shouted and Azriel gave her a vulgar gesture.

“See? He wouldn’t even acknowledge me before” she threw her hands in the air.

You shook your head and got up. “See you at dinner”.

Your mate placed his hand on your waist and guided you outside.

You spent the rest of the day cuddling in bed enjoying each other’s company. Days like this were rare, most of the time Azriel was away because of his missions and you helped Madja at her infirmary, so when you had free time you made sure to spend every second together.

“We have to get ready for dinner” you whispered and tried to push him off you.

“We still have a few minutes” he mumbled and kissed your naked chest before going further down.

“We will be late” you hummed.

“Let me just have a taste” he whined.

“I will let you do anything you want when we come back” you cupped his jaw and pulled him up giving him a soft kiss.

“Anything?” he quirked a brow.

“Anything” you nodded, and he jumped out of bed.

“Let’s go” he said and opened the closet to find an outfit for dinner making you laugh and shake your head.

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

You walked in the dining room and Cassian’s eyes flashed with mischief.

“What?” you asked, and he sat on your usual seat next to Azriel’s ,leaving his own on the other side of the table free.

Azriel rolled his eyes and grabbed your hand, leading you to his seat and pulling you on his lap and draping a protective wing around you.

“Oh no” Cassian mumbled and got up. Azriel’s shadows grabbed the empty chair and removed it from the room.

“I guess you have to sit next to us” your mate smiled at the warlord who paled.

Everyone looked at Cassian and burst into laughter knowing that soon enough you two would start touching each other and he would have to eat with the scent of your arousal.

Azriel was lost deep in his conversation with Rhys and you feared that his food would get cold so you grabbed his fork and stabbed a piece of steak.

“Here baby” you said and brought it to his lips.

“Thank you” he smiled and gave you a quick kiss before eating.

You watched his full lips and the way his jaw flexed as he chewed and almost moaned. Azriel noticed and smirked before moving his hand to rest it on your thigh and rub small circles. You kept feeding him and kissing him between bites. Every time you stared at his face while he ate his hand moved higher making you squirm on his lap and ground on his bulge. He quickly covered the moan that escaped with a cough and Cassian almost spat his wine.

Your arousal was evident and as both of you stripped each other with your eyes Rhysand gagged.

“Are you serious? Here?” he groaned and grabbed his head.

You stared at him wide-eyed and Azriel chuckled.

“I’m so happy for your creative sex life but please stop thinking about it on my dinner table” he whined, and Feyre caressed his arm.

You stopped grinding your hips and focused on your food before Azriel leaned forward and whispered in your ear.

“So anything huh?”

Rhysand’s eyes snapped to you and Cassian tensed.

“Yes my love” you whispered back and kissed his neck making Rhys scoff.

Azriel kissed your shoulder and pushed you off him before getting up too.

“Well next time don’t get offended if we don’t join you for dinner.” He said and slapped your ass as you hurried to your room.

“If you don’t want to hear them having sex I think we should move to the river house” Cassian mumbled and everyone jumped on their feet.

[lazyliars]

A Theory on Canon Lives

Canon lives have always been a subject for debate, both within the story and in the meta around it. The idea has received mixed responses from fans; criticism for how it confuses the storytelling (namely, what constitutes a “canon” death, versus a normal one) and punishes non-PVPers, who need to walk on eggshells when dealing with geared people, and praise for adding a heightened sense of stakes and weight to character’s decisions.

However, I’ve been sitting on a theory about canon lives since they were confirmed by Wilbur, and recent events have me re-evaluating it’s relevancy in the current story-line.

So, lets start by looking at the two* canonically dead characters we have so far.

Schlatt: Jschlatt was the first person to lose all three lives and die.  His first death came from Techno at the festival, in the crossfire of Tubbo’s execution. His second, from Quackity after Schlatt basically disowned him. His final death was via heart attack or stroke, when he was alone and surrounded by the people he’d hurt and failed.

Wilbur: Our second canon death was Wilbur. He lost his first life in the same place the rest of the L’manberg OG’s did, the final control room, with Eret. His second was by Punz during his escape from Schlatt at the election. His third was by Philza, after he’d blown up L’manberg, begging his dad to kill him for what he’d done.

*(Note; Mexican Dream and Jack Manifold have also lost all three canon lives, and Jack came back again with all three lives restored.

However, the validity of considering them canon with regards to this theory is uncertain, for two separate reasons:

Mexican Dream because his existence is one of the most enigmatic on the server and his life and deaths follow suit,

And Jack because he hasn’t to my knowledge been involved with the writing of the greater SMP story-line, so his take on canon lives might only apply to himself. )

The pattern remains consistent throughout – the final death occurs at a moment of hopelessness, when the character in question cannot imagine a way out. Neither of them technically die to suicide, but they both lose the will to continue living - Wilbur actually begging for death.

So, I propose that third canon deaths cannot occur unless a person wants to stop living. This would mean that for a bulk of the server, canon deaths functionally do not exist.

But this would make the entire cast basically immortal! Why would they treat their lives as precious if they only risk dying when they actually want to?

And that brings me into the second half of this theory – that NO ONE on the server knows that canon deaths are optional, except for Dream.

Now how would Dream learn about the canon lives? How would he know that they weren't real, even after death was demonstrated in front of him just as clearly as the rest of the SMP?

Jschlatt was the first Canon Death. Before he died, he made a deal with Dream; In return for fighting alongside him, Schlatt gave Dream a book containing information that Dream believed was dangerous even to him. The contents of that book are still unknown to this day, and we still don't have a good grasp on what someone like Schlatt could've possibly had to tempt someone like Dream.

Considering Schlatt was the first to die, It's possible that his death itself was part of the deal; a deal made by an alcoholic man with nothing to live for, willing to die to spite the people who would survive him, and leave them under the thumb of an even bigger tyrant than him.

Wilbur too, made a deal with Dream just before he died. Both the people who made deals with Dream died soon after, one entirely of his accord, permanently. Something that had never happened before on the server.

People have criticized the Canon Life System for unfairly favoring the PVPers, perhaps none more than Dream himself – and it's true, after canon lives were introduced, Dream suddenly became an even bigger threat. But if canon lives are a lie? Then a huge portion of the power Dream holds over the server is also a lie.

Dream's goals always orient around gaining control over others, to what ends we still don't know. But his go-to method of dealing with rebellious groups and individuals has always been to contain and threaten important objects. He threatens to kill only when his other methods fail. We see this most obviously with Tommy's Exile.

During the exile, Dream constantly focuses on punishing Tommy using things – his armor, his builds, Logstedshire – and only ever threatens death when Tommy asks to go back to the SMP. He also stops Tommy from Looking Menacingly Into Lava, which could actually kill him; but if canon lives aren't set in stone, and Tommy wasn't far gone enough for the death to actually take? The ruse would be up, and Dream's power would be drastically diminished.

There are many times that killing someone outright would be easier for Dream; Exiling Tommy in the first place could have been replaced with taking his last life. Or threatening to kill him, or Tubbo or any of the Cabinet. But instead, Dream opts to build a wall around L'manberg. It's almost like Dream has a vested interest in no one losing their third life.

Cat and Mellohi alone are basically Dream’s main method of controlling Tommy and Tubbo, who are both on their last life and have little means to defend themselves. He could threaten to kill them in order to assert control, but what if they called his bluff? Would he actually kill them?

It also makes sense why Tommy is so frustrating to Dream; he’s the worst combination of suicidally reckless and unendingly determined, that if he died there’s no way he wouldn’t come back, and there is also every chance he’ll get himself killed. He’s the most likely person to see through the lie.

And in my opinion, that's the lens through which Dream's actions make the most sense; if he's doing everything he can to prevent anyone from learning that he isn't the only immortal, it puts all of his actions into perspective.

...

So, if this earth-shattering, red-string, challenge-the-fundamental-rules-of-the-story type theory turned out to be true, what would that mean for the future of the server?

Well, it comes back to the Status Quo. Control. Chaos. Amusement. For the server to be one big happy family. Each of these pillars is benefited by people living in fear of death. It makes them easy to control, makes them run like mice in the face of the powerful, and can end with them growing closer due to the shared trauma.

But what if someone learned the truth? What if someone was killed in a way that couldn't be anything but canon, and came back anyway?

Then there would be need of a place to put those people. Somewhere secure, isolated. Somewhere they couldn't ever spread the word and disrupt the game. Somewhere that could house people who can't die.

Somewhere with enough room to hold an entire server of people who can't die.

[gayregis]

I've listened to the part where Geralt talks with a very ill Cahir about Ciri and vengeance... it was one of the most emotional parts of the book by itself but also thanks to your take about the lost innocence of Ciri ! I felt it thrice hard in the feelings! Also, do you have thoughts on the declared love of Cahir for Ciri? Personally I see it as disturbingly romantic, let's say. Thank you for your commitment to the books and sorry to bother you

omg thank you for the ask. first of all i have to say you’re not bothering me!! tbh i have been loving getting asks because it gives me an opportunity to like bring more discussion to the witcher community... 

i feel like although reblogging pretty gifs of characters/landscapes from tw3 and any good fanart i can find is nice, my FAVORITE thing to do is write or read a really long textpost about the witcher books, i really like the discussion aspect of fandoms where people post their reactions and opinions to the content they like, because you get a bunch of shared reactions and differing opinions.

so no this is NOT a bother at all, and its nice especially to get asks about topics that i have strong feelings about but have not made posts about yet, like this one

ok, as for the actual topic: i hate forced heterosexuality, so you KNOW i hate that canon cahiri! it was out of line from sapkowski and imo, it came out of absolutely nowhere in tower of the swallow, it wasn’t something built up to or foreshadowed at all, so it felt not only weird in context but weird for sapkowski as an author.

my main problem with canon cahiri: i think it’s super creepy!

first of all, let’s discuss the age difference. cahir in baptism of fire is estimated to be “not over 25,” which i see as putting him around 20 to 25 years old, and i usually take the median of this which is around 23. while this “not over 25″ comment is said in the context of the hansa to remark upon how young cahir is (i believe it’s thought of by either geralt or dandelion, and geralt is around 60 years old and as a witcher he looks 45, and dandelion is 38 in tower of the swallow), and how cahir is described as a young man in time of contempt to illustrate that he has a sense of innocence to him as ciri cuts him down, his age gap with ciri is super innappropriate for anything to occur between them, since she is 10 or 11 during the massacre of cintra (as stated by geralt in something more), so she would be around 14 at thanedd, and 15-16 during baptism of fire to lady of the lake. so sapkowski deemed it fit to pair a 23 year old man with a 16 year old girl. this isn’t the first time he’s done something like this, what with essi being “not over 18″ and shani also bein around 18 / college age, and yennefer canonically looking around 20. listen, the man has some messed up values when it comes to women’s ages. we have to take it upon ourselves as people who like the not-weird parts of canon to understand how worldviews and personal biases affect one’s writing, and change it for ourselves to make it right so we can continue interacting with it, if we so choose (tldr: retcon some shit when it’s fucked up in canon).

now, before someone argues that “it’s fantasy medieval world, medieval relationships between men and women were just like that,” believe me, i am aware. i study ancient greece/rome and men who were in their 30s were most often paired with women in their teens as part of their arranged marriages. that is how their ancient societies functioned more than 2000 years ago. the issue is that this is a fantasy world, in which societal norms and laws do not have to conform to real-life earth history, and this is the work of a modern writer writing in the 1990s. it’s not “just how the times were,” it’s deliberately choosing to include an age gap like that to be something canonically acceptable by their society/ies.

also, one could argue that the age gap would be fine once they are older, like, when ciri becomes an adult she is already medievally-style betrothed to cahir so they start dating when she’s like 20 and he’s like 27. eh... that’s still an uncomfortable age gap, at least for when they’re in their 20s. people in their older 20s have more life experience than people in their younger 20s. but at least it wouldn’t land cahir in modern-day jail.

it’s still just an uncomfortably large age gap, and if you think about it, it’s even creepier considering that cahir met ciri when she was a helpless child around 10 - 11 and it just makes the bathing scene excruciatingly creepy too if you put it in the context that he eventually would fall in love with her. it even begins to not be about strictly age, but about life experience, development, and power imbalance within the relationship. i mean, he did literally kidnap her.

cahir in tos calls ciri a “woman” when she is like, 15 or 16 (with the rose tattoo) (to anyone reading, please don’t come at me with that “the age of consent is 15 in poland, just because it’s 18 in the US doesn’t mean your laws and culture apply to everyone” ... please do not try and justify this with laws, legality is not morality. only saying this because i’ve seen it in other posts). like.... hm! don’t like that! she is a teenager... he is in his 20s... this should not be occuring.

sorry for the loooong explanation, but every time someone brings up the subject of age gaps on tumblr it turns into crazy discourse with everyone trying to justify it.

but yeah, CANONICALLY cahir would have been 16-21 (median 18) when he met ciri at 10-11, and 20-25 (median 23) when he declares his love for her at 15-16. that’s ... not good ... to put it more into perspective, these are their ages on a traditional school system path: a 18 year old is a high school senior, an 11 year old is a 6th grader. a 23 year old has been out of college for 2 years, a 16 year old is a high school sophomore. ITS NOT GOOD

my other problem with canon cahiri: it’s boring and contradicts sapkowski at his own game.

all of the witcher is about taking fantasy tropes and inverting them, like you can’t have some random peasant kill a dragon, you’d need a professional, and also guess what, the dragon isn’t evil but a dad trying to protect his wife and child.

all of the characters in the hansa (as well as the four main characters of geralt, yennefer, ciri, and dandelion) are inversions of the tropes they represent. for some examples, milva’s trope is something like the hot action girl who only exists to be the only girl in the company and to be sexy eye candy. instead of falling into this, she is actually an action girl, not bothering with sexiness and appeal to the gaze of a male audience but a “get shit done” type, who also dresses and acts “like a man.” regis’ trope is all vampire tropes ever. he/vampires in the witcher doesn’t/don’t fall into any of the traditional european vampire myths like burning in sunlight, needing to drink blood to stay alive, being disdainful of humanity, having aversions to garlic, belonging to a super-secret orderful society that lurks in the shadows and controls everything like puppetmasters, etc... instead, he is the epitome of redemption arcs and overall “goody-goodiness,” understands humanity perfectly and does things out of his good nature. i already talk about regis too much, so i’ll quit it. 

cahir is an inversion of every knight trope ever, particularly the evil knight. he scars ciri’s memory as a night terror, but actually is not ... a bad person. he’s just some guy, pressured by his family and his society to do what he saw as an assignment like a college kid might see their final essay assignment posted on canvas. except you know. the final exam was to kidnap a girl. and he got an F on that and failed the course (ie got thrown in prison). ANYWAYS, cahir is meant to be this inversion of the knight tropes, so WHY, WHY, WHY make him become the knight trope of being the one to romance and to save a hapless princess? if we’ve learned anything about ciri, it’s that she’s the inversion of the princess trope! she KILLS PEOPLE. she ALMOST KILLED CAHIR. she can defend herself and kill for herself, she doesn’t need the knight trope going to protect her! 

heterosexual romance as the Big Reason and Motivation behind all of a character’s actions is tiring, annoying, boring, and not well-thought out. it’s so base and not unique, it doesn’t fit in with everything else about the witcher.

how i would fix it: not make them fall in love.

cahir already HAS a motivation to find ciri and to help her. he needs to APOLOGIZE. he needs to say, hey, i’m sorry i kidnapped you and ruined your life, i made peace with your dad, he doesn’t wanna kill me anymore, i can only hope that you can forgive me too after i SET THINGS RIGHT. 

as opposed to regis’s arc (i swear i am not playing favorites with regis, i just tend to compare and contrast regis and cahir’s redemptions because they are quite different yet they join the hansa side by side so they’re bound to be compared), cahir actually can find the one (not many) people he wronged, and set things right on his own accord, not go forth with a larger mission to assist all humanity, or whatever.

i think cahir also had this WONDERFULLY UNDERUTILIZED anti-imperialist message as part of his character that pains me to see being swept under the rug for some cheap lame romance story. sapkowski already created some anti-war sentiments with the battle of the bridge in baptism of fire, and he tried to create anti-racism sentiments throughout the book/at the end of lady of the lake. anti-imperialism fits with the rest of the saga as a message.

the fact that cahir was instructed by his family to hate the northern kingdoms, despite the fact that they were related to northerners, is really profound as something to happen to a character, and holds a lot of meaning in today’s society. the fact that he broke, finally, after he lost ciri, just completely lost his mind and had to be restrained because he was wailing so hard, because of the pressure that this society put him under to succeed and achieve pride for his family, is such a great example of the tragedies of society. then he speaks out against his leader and is jailed... and yet, after this, he gets to learn from his mistakes and redeem himself as a good person, and his character has developed SO much. he is not doing what his country wants him to do, he is not doing what his family wants him to do. he is doing what he wants to do because it is the RIGHT thing to do. that already is such a powerful message, he doesn’t need anymore character motivation!

so yep that’s my thoughts on why cahir is a good character asides from all that forced romance biz

[bartochicken]

Artur explained exactly why I fail to support original release and will likely continue to do so. Aside from everything mentioned in the text, I want to leave my point of view somewhere so I'm writing this.

I've been reading great quality scans for years (in my first language) and I see no benefit in switching to an ugly English translation because it is the official one. When I saw Mangaplus was going to release OP in my region for free I thought I'd be able to support the official release of my favourite manga and finally be guilt free, but they offer a terrible product and it ruins a lot of the excitement to me. Honestly I've turned to piracy for years out of a number of reasons, many times I have illegally downloaded a game or movie, enjoyed it and later bought the original media and merchandise. I'm not financially stable so I can't just buy everything I'm slightly interested in, I have to actually think thrice before spending my money, and that's mainly why I turn to piracy in many things. In this particular case, it is free but I just can't read it. I've tried to adapt to Mangaplus this year at different times but I just can't come around. I'm slowly building my One Piece collection with the original volumes to support Oda, but I don't want to ruin my weekly experience in behalf of a company that is not improving it's service to readers.