#it was interesting tho there really was a v brief moment there where in the dream i occupied 2 consciousnesses at once

[amygdalae]

Had a dream once where a scary faceless woman in lingerie tried to seduce me into killing a rat for her, and I felt too awkward to mention that the rat was also me, I had been switching perspectives between the human and the rat throughout the entire dream, then I watched through the rats eyes as my human self try to kill me with a knife like in ratatouille

[aimwigs]

hey I've been listening to the yard for about a year and a half and I want to get more into it ifywim do I just start watching old vods to catch up or is there any content u can recommend as a baseline must-watch

this is by no means a comprehensive list because i've only really been watching the yard since dec 2022 and my 2021 stint in lud viewing was brief and casual (didn't know what i had) but it is a fucking long list so i'll keep it under the cut. included stuff that maybe i wouldn't classify as a must watch but i wanted to include it so you can pick and choose what interests you

PODCASTS - I know for a fact there are other podcast appearances out there that I don't know of but here are a few:

the yard x wine about it - it's just the four of them and qt which means good times! this is an essential imo

there are a few eps of fear& that they appear on! specifically rec the ep with nick and aiden and the ep with ludwig and aiden. there are also a few eps with ludwig and slime (not at the same time) if you're interested in those

i've watched aiden on three different interview podcasts all are worth a watch to me: karat interview, across the bar, and good griefed (audio a little scuffed on this one but it's cute)

fucking loved nick's ep of across the bar because his outlook on creativity is super relatable to me. he also did something with safety third that i've been meaning to watch but haven't yet!

VIDEOS AND STREAMS - there's a lot here but i'll try to describe what's what

mogul money ft the yard - this is the full vod, there's also a cut down video. extremely fun watch

nick was also on mogul money live (first game specifically) and he and aiden appear in the bts video a little bit

qt posted vlogs from italy! they're all fun watches and there's some good moments. one, two, three, four

qt and aiden halloween gingerbread house video. ludwig and aiden kiss in this one. i think the full vod is in god's hands unfortunately

qt and aiden make shit in an ezbake oven and make the guys eat it. fun little video. idk if the vod is out there somewhere or not

there's a cut down version of this too but the full stream of qt having all the guys do a gingerbread house competition is very peak

lud did a shit load of taste test videos with the guys for a slim jim sponsor. this might not be all of them but here are the ones i cold find off rip (fruit, cheese, chocolate, water, steak)

ludwig has done a shitload of ylyl streams with slime that you can find and honestly i have a horrible mediashare allergy so i haven't watched a lot of them but i have watched the one they did with aiden and the one with everyone but idk where the full vod is for the latter

from ludwig's fortnite mondays, there was a week where slime and nick played with jerma and sapnap. idk if any of the others posted the vod but here's sapnap's

the subathon has a shitload of stuff that i can't even begin to link but if you want the experience of the dcom series without subbing to tier 2 they watched the truman show starting about an hour thirty into this vod, tho it takes a hot minute to get everything lined up with the time stamps

halloween po unboxing where them + qt dress up as characters from scooby doo. nick looks frankly obscene as velma this is a great vod

how many flashlights does it take to cook an egg is exactly what it sounds like. it's lud slime and nick ft a little bit of yingo

they play the family feud game together in these two vods: just them and against miz/otk (can't stand miz but it was still good)

RECENT STUFF - aka stuff you probably know about or have seen because you've been around a year and a half but i figured i'd include them anyway since they happened off the pod

two months ago they all played fortnite on lud's stream and it was awesome

both the show matches of the ludwig tarik invitationals are worth watching if you're into valo! the first one is team mogul v otv and they're split up in the second. if the timestamps are broken it's 2h30 in both vods

the rivals 2 tournament is fun! i don't understand shit about fighting games but i love to see the boys play

cdawgva ski vod with lud and aiden from the japan trip! there's also a cut down version of youtube but i found it a fun watch

recency bias alert: they all played in creator dodgeball

the qt and aiden winter cocktail tierlist stream was so good like genuinely a stream of all time to me. ludwig hangs around for parts of it

the yard doing the dougdoug fast food challenge is a MUST WATCH! they celebrate and they suffer what could be more beautiful

otv's fear pong video with them is so fucking good. SO GOOD!

and finally i guess i should mention beerio because it just happened LOL

[ganondoodle]

I recently just found your art (im loving and drowning in all of it)

Wanted to ask have you ever thought about the seal in which demise was kept in durring SS. I been replaying it and kind of thinking about, well, if Hylia created the seal, she made that sealscape/spiritprison(?) a very peaceful environment. Calming clear skys reflected in still waters. This only changes once the battle w Demise starts (makes me think the space is just very reflective/responsive of prisoners mind/emotions)

Anyhow! If Hylia was the one to make the seal what do you think she had in mind, how she was feeling ? W ur ship art of them in mind, I kinda get mercy vibes despite what she'd eventually have to do to him, but not wanting to put him through anymore pain? A sad goodbye moment. A sort of final resting place, maybe this space was an origin point of their first encounter w one another and its a recreationof it? Id love to see your ideas/character feels interpretations. Also sorry if this was asked or talked about previously im v new here ;v;

that is a very interesting thought, and not far actually from my plan for “destiny”, im really glad people seem to enjoy my art, even when its shippy or not fanart at all :D tho i am not sure how to answer this since, well, its a bit difficult, even knowing how everything in the story will go, i cant decide really. is it an intentionally “nice” place for a prison ? is in reality much more of a torture having to be there all alone ? was he even conscious in it ? was his very being scattered into a thousand pieces within it ? was he even able to feel any pain ? or was he in constant pain trying to recollect himself ? how does one know what happens to someone that gets sealed ? it always seems like whenever someone is sealed, they come back more ful of anger and hatred ? in what kind of hell does one get send when they get sealed away ? it might seem silly thinking so much about a game and its lore but i cant help it, i always wonder what must have happened to make the villains a villain ? people arent born evil ... and i just cant accept the answer of someone just “being” evil without an explanation ?? well im writing a story about that. in some part at least, i know its taking me a long time but this fancomic has taken me a lot of thought and work already even if you haven seen much of it yet, i will both explore the relationship between hylia demise and others, but a big part will be demises origin, i really hope you guys are going to like it sinceim very invested into everything SO i am not sure how much you know so ill talk a bit about the end of “destiny”, so SPOILERS FOR DESTINY AHEAD: i had made a post about demises origin/backstory a while back, crudely summarized bc i just typed it out to remember it properly, im not sure if you have seen it but it shouldnt be too far back somewhere on my blog if you want to take a look, tho things will still change, its base will stay the same, im leaving out pretty the whole story, so maybe, i hope, you will still be interested in reading it once i get it all drawn out, or maybe not, im not the one to decide that .. ANYWAY at the end of it, hylia will be ordered one last time to finally do her duty and seal demise away, she will try to talk to her gods that there is another way to solve everything, but they will not listen. hylia then refuses to do as she was ordered, even tho demise had warned her not to do that and that she instead should just go and kill him; if hes dead he at least wont have to get to know whatever happens to someone that gets sealed, hed much prefer never finding out; but she is too determined to give up the thought of another possibillity and thus the gods have to take things into their own hands and take control over her, forcing her to watch as her body acts on their will and not hers anymore. there will be a brief moment where demise gets to free her of them, since in that last fight hes much less fighting for his own survival, which he knows is impossible, but for hylia not to die from being in the gods control for too long. besides, he very much wants to fight the gods themselves, but he wants to do that with only him involved and them, and not someone else; thus he regains his previous, pure form from back when he was just like her, only for a short moment tho and in the end he will be sealed away by the gods acting through hylia. while she dies after the deed is done, hes sealed away yes, but although shattered, not quite dead yet, and his hatred towards the gods will burn much stronger now than it ever had before, not just because of what they did to him and his world but to her now as well.

WELL THEN that was alot and probably not even a glimpse as interesting as i hope it will be in the finished comic, with all the context in all regards.  i apologize for the length of this, and this possibly unwated and uninteresting spoiler part about this damn story that i cant get out of my head anymore. (also for .. the typos .. im writing this at 1am and it took me like an hour bc i just didnt know how to write it out) sorry, i just care alot about this.... too much probablyヾ(*′○`)ﾟ.+:｡ﾟ☆

[typewriterghcst]

Title: The Willow Bud Processional

Fandom: The Cat Returns

Characters: The Cat King, Natori, brief mentions of others

Summary: The Cat King discovers that in all his time in court, Natori has never learned to dance, and heroically takes up the position of dance instructor for himself. It’s about damn time he got to feel like the smart one.

Notes: hi i’m here to regale you all with a tale of two old dumb cats interacting with each other like they think the other one will spontaneously combust at some point even tho they know each other so gd well they could probably quote each other word by word :v

i will say this one is Unfinished, but the missing parts are explained orz i’ve honestly just run out of steam on this one. me writing this was like ‘oh two characters dancing together in a casual setting? excellent my favorite’ and then the slow, sad realization that i’d have to actually write The Dancing and slowly losing that motivation until i was a dehydrated husk lying on the floor

i also listened to this song like. Way Too Much while writing this

[ insert a beginning Narration detailing that this is some nice party probably celebrating lune and yuki’s wedding or something SHHH the king is feeling weirdly down, lacks the emotional intelligence to put a word to What He’s Feeling, so wanders out onto a balcony to sulk, and is eventually followed by natori jfjfkd; ]

It doesn’t take long at all for him to be followed, of course. He hears Natori’s arrival not as a patter of careful footsteps, but as a slight, brief increase in the music volume through an opened door, one that is just as quickly diminished. And he knows his visitor must be Natori— no one else will so consistently come looking for him.

“Did you find yourself needing some fresh air, sire?”

“Yeh,” the king decides to agree, turning to look at his new companion. Natori almost always appears quite polished, those moments he’s comically caught off-guard aside, but there’s something implicitly different about him when he’s clad not in his usual dark linen, but what looks to be plum-colored silk. Were he feeling slightly more charitable, he’d most likely mention to his advisor that the color was appealing on him.

Instead, the indistinct melody he catches from indoors hogs all his attention.

“...eh? Is that the Willow Bud Procession they’re starting up again? They already did that one tonight.”

Natori, surreptitiously glancing back through the glass doors to the dancing pairs inside, responds, “Yes, but I’m led to believe a striking number of the courtiers are quite proud of their costumes tonight. I assume they all wished for another opportunity to show them off.”

“Oh, yeah? If that’s the case, I’m surprised you’re not out there with them— that shiny stuff you’re wearing had to set you back a pretty penny.” It comes out perhaps more sullen than he’d intended, and he can’t quite place why. 

Regardless, he makes no move to amend his tone.

Natori turns a studying look to him, one paw still on the frame of the door. The king shares his gaze for only a few seconds before he hastily looks away, back out into the sun-drenched hills of the Cat Kingdom, where his attention falls on Little Sister Lake. There’s birds there now, cranes— tall, white. Formless. Hm, he thinks then, perhaps they’re not birds, after all. They’re occasional visitors, but no cat in the kingdom has yet been stealthy enough to see them up close.

Natori has remained silent for so long, he’d almost forgotten his advisor had joined him. Nevertheless, he eventually says, “...I might say the same for you, sire. You seemed quite enthused about your crown’s replacement earlier tonight.”

The reminder brightens the king’s mood a little.

“Yeh— Natoru did a top-notch job on it, didn’t she? I’d give her a promotion if I could remember what her position actually was. An’... you know, if I wasn’t retired.” And there, remembering what the original topic was, he follows that up with a more subdued, “Eh, but everyone’s already seen it. Also, I never liked that stuffy procession, to tell you the truth. ‘Willow Bud Processional’ is a pretty whimsical name for what amounts to shuffling rhythmically around the dance floor. Drove me up a wall having to practice it all the time as a kitten.”

Were he facing Natori, he’d see the other cat visibly relax. Alas, he only turns to face his advisor after the revelation Natori sees fit to offhandedly drop on him.

“I’ve never actually learned the steps to it, myself.”

He turns back to survey Natori with some measure of disbelief. “You don’t know how to do the Willow Bud Procession? How have you survived all the parties without knowing?”

Natori hesitates here, and the king reads a definite embarrassment in it, as if the other cat is uncertain what he should admit to. It seems he does settle on honesty, however, as he soon after offers the king a rueful smile and an apologetic tilt of his head.

“I’m afraid I don’t often do much dancing during them, ha.” Too focused on keeping you out of trouble, he doesn’t say, but they both know.

The Cat King thinks on this for a long moment or two, gaze drawn back out to the distant white birds bathing in the kingdom’s cherished lake, the Not-Cranes.  In silence, casually, Natori joins him there at the balustrade, and the air is distinctly companionable until the king speaks up again, distracted.

“It’s not hard. You’d probably pick it up in no time, babe.”

“Perhaps you might teach me, then, sire? It sounds as if you’re quite the expert.”

The king pauses, trying to ignore the bloom of smug delight that comes with being referred to as an expert of anything, but, of course, not very diligently. It’s not like he’ll correct anyone who wishes to feed his ego, least of all Natori.

He looks to Natori and finds that his advisor is regarding him with an expression he can’t quite define. Concerned? Affable? Sly? It’s somehow all of them. Not for the first time, he finds himself wondering if Natori has some obtuse plan he’s orchestrating in subtle ways the king himself can’t quite catch. He’s been proven wrong in this line of thinking so many times before and yet still can’t shake its occasional return in those times when his advisor seems particularly unreachable.

“Hmm. Yeah, babe, I can do that.” The idea of teaching his ostensibly better-read advisor anything is perhaps unsurprisingly enticing. He gives the empty balcony behind them a cursory inspection. “We can have a lesson here. There’s space.”

[ insert the cat king teaching the steps to the ‘willow bud processional.’ if you’re really curious what this might look like, pls feel free to look up ‘pavane’ on youtube. at some point, the king still feels Ignored (or, more accurately, like he’s not Truly Connecting and Socializing with someone), so like a sullen two-year-old he gets natori’s attention by tossing a wrench into his plan ]

“I want to hear a story,” the king says airily.

Natori, who had been gazing down at his feet with a faraway stare, looks back up to him with a raised eyebrow, and somewhere inside, the king whoops at his tiny victory. “Now..?”

“Yeh. Now.” The Cat King takes Natori’s apparent break in concentration as an opportunity to spin the two of them across the balcony, as if they were hapless passengers on a carnival ride as opposed to two old friends trying to have an impromptu dance lesson. Natori stumbles but doesn’t fall, righting himself with a deceptively practiced air, even if his grip is noticeably tighter than before. “Tell me a story, Natty.”

Natori, feeling the situation so characteristically slip from his grasp, glances down to his feet again to gather his thoughts.

“Well…” He eventually starts. “What kind of a story, sire?”

“Hmm. I dunno.” Another too-fast spin. He’s fairly certain he’d seen both Natori’s feet leave the ground for a fleeting second. The other cat definitely looks a touch aggravated now, though he’s trying bravely to hide it. “Tell me one you might have told to your sisters once upon a time.”

It isn’t often the topic of Natori’s family arises between them. The boundary between his advisor’s working family and his personal one often feels like an insurmountable wall at times, one which he doesn’t always possess the interest or fortitude to scale. The oddness of it seems to add only more tinder to Natori’s uncertainty, but in his usual way, he manages to sidle past it. In the meantime, also, the king slows their pace, this time only holding their joined paws in the air and waiting (Natori seems to twirl under their ‘canopy’ without thinking, still too engrossed in choosing a suitable story.)

After a long couple of moments waiting, the king finally speaks up again. “There were that many?”

Natori laughs, genuinely (the king can tell by the way it —). “It’s been a long time since I was the storyteller, sire. Lune always did prefer Natoru’s stories to mine.”

“Hers always involved more explosions and punching. You were outgunned.”

The king watches Natori’s eyelids flutter slightly from long-cold exasperation.  “...Indeed.”

“So tell me one of your favorites. One you never did get to tell Lune.”

Natori doesn’t say that he has the less-than-flattering suspicion the king’s attention span and his appreciation for fairy tales are about on par with his son’s as a restless, curious child, but he’s certainly thinking it quite loudly. If the Cat King has even an inkling of the same thought, he’s for once discreet enough not to mention it.

Natori blows out a breath and an uncomfortable laugh with it, and starts. “...I suppose my favorite was always the one that explained why the sun lived in the sky.”

The faint strings of the Willow Bud Processional from the open door leading onto the balcony begin to fade, and instead revive themselves as another familiar dance, a much slower, more intimate one (one Natori recognizes as the charmingly-named Lilycat Waltz). The king wonders if perhaps the bride and groom had requested a quiet moment. He and Natori move away from each other, standing across from the other in apparent uncertainty over what to do next.

“...You know how to do a waltz?” The king finally asks Natori, though he’s already guessed what the answer will be.

“You’ll have to show me, sire.” As expected. Yet with a bit of good humor mixed in. The king thinks to himself that the two of them are sharing an inside joke neither has yet spoken aloud, and it’s a familiar and comfortable nook they’ve settled into.

“Alright, babe, alright. So stand here�� give me your paw—”

Natori complies with both directions with little hesitation, and he raises no protests when he’s pulled close or when he’s otherwise (perhaps less-than-gently at some points) guided into the right stance and position.

And when they’ve gotten situated into another habitual nook, this time closer together in the easy, thoughtless way only the oldest of friends can manage, the king speaks up again.

“You took right to it, babe. Said you’d be a fast study— didn’t I tell you so?”

“You did tell me so, sire,” Natori replies indulgently. Seemingly as a consolatory afterthought, he then adds, “Are my feet in the right position? It feels off.”

“That’s ‘cause you’re new to it.”

Their words, now, feel like a recital, a carefully-rehearsed script. The king thinks it’s about time they broke away from it.

“I have a question for you, Natori.”

“Oh? If it’s important, there’s no need to keep it to yourself, then, Your Majesty.”

“Why does the sun live in the sky?”

Natori laughs. Surprised, perhaps, self-effacing, because he’d been waiting for the question on both their minds, not a request for the continuation of a story he’d assumed had been forgotten.

“His Majesty has a long memory.”

“But you already knew that about me, babe.”

"So I did." Yet Natori continues where he left off readily enough. “The story goes that once, long before the world as we know it was formed, the sun and the water were close friends. Inseparable, one might say— and both lived on the earth, of course. The sun would make frequent visits to his friend, but the water never once returned the favor.”

“Hmph.” The king sounds somewhat discomfited by this beginning, and the intense contemplation Natori spies in his expression tugs at an unexplained apprehension within him. He doesn’t otherwise respond, however. Natori continues, perhaps more gingerly than before.

“Well, of course the sun would find himself curious, if… ah, perhaps suspicious, over this odd discrepancy. He finally saw fit to go to the water themselves for an explanation.”

“That was an awkward conversation.”

“Ha— I always thought so, too, as a child. When my—” Here Natori stumbles just slightly, and the king has little reason to wonder why. “--my mother used to tell the story to me, I always thought of it as the worst part. I always thought… well, if I ever did end up in the same situation, then nothing in all of the kingdom could get me to approach this friend of mine.”

“Were you expecting to make friends with the lake, or…”

“I was five, sire,” Natori deadpans in response to the king’s jest seamlessly.

“Oh, so you definitely were.”

Natori doesn’t answer— he’s too distracted by the faint increase in pressure where the king’s paw is holding his waist, and how the cat suddenly spins them around and then leans the both of them forward, to the degree that Natori’s balance is compromised. In the heat of the moment, he can’t decide whether crashing to the floor or clinging to his self-proclaimed teacher will prove to be the most embarrassing option, and in the end is relegated only to grasping his partner by the arms, stiffly holding one leg outwards in a weak attempt at a counterbalance. (He does not have the core strength to keep this up for long, he can tell that already.)

He’s been exceedingly patient before now, Natori thinks, in dealing with the king’s antics, but this finally proves too much.

When he speaks, it’s softly, but there’s an undercurrent of resigned exasperation, and his expression, he knows, must fail to belie his chagrin.  “...sire, I’m not certain how being tossed across the, er, balcony like a bag of rice is going to teach me any of these dances.”

The king snorts in apparent amusement as he pulls the two of them back upright, much to Natori’s relief. “What’s the matter? You don’t trust me to hold you up..?”

You don’t have the most promising track record runs through Natori’s mind, but it’s gone so quickly it might as well have stayed obscured, he thinks in light resentment. 

“Sorry, Your Majesty,” is what he says, but his grip hasn’t yet slackened.

The king doesn’t respond for a concerningly long time, staring at Natori for so long, and in such a sour manner that speaks of stewing rumination, that the other cat finds himself feeling distantly nervous. Yet, ultimately, he seems to decide against speaking entirely, gently prying Natori’s paws away and back into the air beside them (the other resting quite naturally along the king’s arm).

Without another word on the matter, he compels the two of them to start the dance all over again. And Natori lets him. After a lengthy minute of this loaded silence, the king’s gaze distant from morose thought and Natori’s eyes averted elsewhere, Claudius finally speaks up again.

“So, the sun went to bug the water about the situation. What was the water’s excuse?”

Natori appears surprised, but duly grateful, to be given this escape from the awkward energy that now smolders between them. Given time and distraction, it will die back down again, as it always does. He clears his throat.

“The water’s excuse— y-yes. The water... expressed their sincerest apologies, but explained also that the sun’s house was not big enough for them and all their people to visit, and to do so without heeding that fact would be to drive the sun from his own home. ‘If you do so truly wish for me to visit, then you must build a house large enough to hold me,’ in the water’s own words. But, they warned also, it must be quite substantial, as the water was immense and their people were many.”

“Sounds like too much work if you ask me. Might as well just keep the same old setup.” Seems the king is still feeling a touch cross.

“To travel a great distance, and to always be the one to make that trip, might prove tiring after so many times, as well, sire. Don’t you think?”

The Cat King frowns, more pensive deliberation, but this time he speaks up. “...I don’t think it would.” Then, in a lighter, more promising manner, “He’s gonna do it, though, isn’t he? The sun?”

Natori nods once with a permissive blink.

“Indeed. The sun agreed to the challenge and waved off his friend’s warnings.”

“Think I see where this is going, babe,” the king says lowly as they spin lazy circles across the balcony.

Natori laughs again. “It’s not quite a mystery epic, is it?”

“Alright, so how does the sun mess this up?”

“Well. The sun built himself an enormously vast house. There’s no telling how long it took him. But when it stood finally finished, he invited the water to tea and waited. And when the water arrived, one of their people called up to the sun— ‘We are here! Is there room for us all?’ Of course, the sun, being the passionate host he was, again told his friend not to worry and invited them in.”

The king snorts. “Here we go.”

Natori smiles. His eyes are still closed. The king thinks he looks oddly content like that. He scarcely remembers the frustrated betrayal he’d been afflicted with just moments earlier, and the abrupt, brisk spin he’d been on the verge of executing also fades before it’d even legitimately formulated.

“The water began to flow in, of course, and with them, all the creatures of the seas and the rivers and the lakes. It didn’t take long, now, for the water to fill the sun’s great house to a depth that would easily surge far over a cat’s head.”

“And the sun just let it keep happening without a word, I’m guessing.”

“He didn’t know any better,” Natori attempts to clarify, eyes opening now to fix his companion with a rueful look, one side of his muzzle quirked so that he looks vaguely hapless. “His assumptions were woefully imprecise because of it. It’s a misfortune.”

“Hmm. Up for another spin, babe? They’re my favorite part.”

Natori’s startled confusion is evident, but the sudden change in subject registers soon enough. Something else lingers, though, echoes of a rapt surprise.

“I don’t mind, sire.”

“Good, ‘cause I was gonna do it no matter what, heh.”

“Hm. I appreciate the considerate word of warning, then.” Spoken dryly, but it lacks the exasperation the Cat King had been expecting.

Natori is clearly preparing for the breakneck whirlwinds he’d endured earlier in their ‘lesson’, but it’s not what he receives— the king is sure of that this time.  The music which had begun as an overtly intimate, if not downright romantic, waltz now boasts a noticeable bounce and pep in its tempo, and to himself Natori gives some silent thanks for the shift. This soft, slow dance would be quite hard to justify were he still hearing those faint notes of sweetness from the barely-open door.

He’s struggling already to justify the warmth of his companion’s paw, again settled loosely at his waist, and the perfect fit of the king’s other paw which folds mildly, tenderly, over his own— all have been present for some time now, since they began their so-called waltz, yet Natori is only just now noticing them.

Staring up at the sun-streaked sky of their kingdom, swaying idly side to side under the king’s lead, he continues then, unprompted. “...To the water’s credit, they did ask for reassurance that the situation was still acceptable time and time again. But even by the time the house was crowded with so much of the water and their people that he was forced to sit on the roof of his own home, the sun refused to withdraw his invitation.”

“Why would he do that?” The king sounds baffled.

“I don’t know,” Natori admits. Then, gently, thoughtfully, “...I suppose if one truly wants something, and has their heart set on it, they might be quite amenable to bearing more hardship for it than others might feel is strictly necessary or appropriate…”

The king doesn’t respond to that, and Natori feels perhaps rather oddly like he’s crossed too far over an invisible line, and nervously, resolutely, says no more.  What had been a companionable air now lies stretched too thin over the pair, teeming with uneasiness. Eventually, the king does speak up again, and his voice is too low for Natori to discern his mood with any measure of accuracy.

“Gonna take a stab at guessing the ending to this one, babe.”

“...please do, sire.” It’s a near whisper.

“The sun never told his friend ‘no, that’s enough’, so the water never stopped, and the house flooded so much the sun had nowhere left to sit. So he went up into the sky and never came back down. And I guess never did speak up, either.”

Natori smiles, weakly. “You guessed it.”

“The water, too, never put two and two together, huh..? I’m not the most sensitive of the bunch, but I think even I’d know something was up by the time a friend of mine had to hang around in the sky because I was taking up too much space.” The king snorts.

“Do you?” Natori’s voice remains faint, timid, even; he feels still like he stands at the edge of a great crevice, and he’s not yet sure what lies at the bottom. The king seems also surprisingly fazed or rattled by the further, simple question.

Gently, so much so Natori almost doesn’t notice, he rests his chin on his companion’s shoulder.

“...well. Maybe not,” he eventually says, nonplussed.

They lapse into another silence, then, one that doesn’t quite recapture their earlier easy comfort, but neither does it feel intrinsically charged, either. Natori finally turns his gaze from the unchanging sky to their other surroundings.  They’ve been out here together, away from the other guests, for some time now. He’s surprised no one else has come searching for the two of them yet.

He’s just about to echo the king’s movement and lay his head down when the other cat suddenly speaks up again.

“I’ll tell you one thing I do notice, babe.”

“Mm? What’s that?”

“When someone who obviously knows how to dance says they can’t.”

[ and here we see that i ran out of steam before writing the ending rip natori admits he already knew the steps to the dances, the cat king has long since come to the conclusion that natori lied in order to have this long dance together (also briefly joking that natori clearly just wanted a romantic moment, which natori will vehemently deny) and that it speaks to a kind of comforting Idea that natori knows him Very Well, being aware that the easiest way to cheer him up would have been to Make Him Feel Smart ]

[01010010-posts]

I need headcanons about your human rk900 pronto. He sounds delightful!

i have a lot of asks to reply to but i couldn’t sleep today because i was already answering to this in my head THANK U to give me this opportunity to talk about my bitch™we’ll break him down point by point slowly:he’s the youngest of the trio, born probably after a year or two. he’s a little prince. connor&60 are twins, yes, they experienced some ‘childish rivarly’ but never jealousy. they’re the same. maybe without RK900′s birth they would have hated each other in some weird and difficult way but he’s here, so they form a coalition against this ‘change’ (more connor than 60, he’s the mischievous one when little). connor&60 relationship gets kinda morbid. they tease him a lot because they’re older and because he has all the attention. nothing new in babye’s behaviour, just something that will go away when they all grow up. except it doesn’t. and really it’s not their fault, most of the time kids aren’t inherently evil but adults are. well, if you want to call amanda ‘evil’. because she’s not inherently evil either– she’s just herself. which is a kind of bad self towards connor&60&RK900 but i think, i guess, i hope, she never meant harm to them. anyway. she adopts them at some point. (are their parents dead? is she their aunt? distant relative?) 5 for the twins and 3 / 4 for RK900 would make sense. it’s a trauma of course. connor&60 lash out at any given time, they don’t want to be there. they’re moody, connor is somewhat violent with others, 60 cries a lot. RK900 is…. nothing. at 3 you haven’t even properly started to be a person yet. you’re aware of yourself in the moment but that doesn’t count, since usually ‘memory’ and ‘the awareness of self’ are kinda the same, and at 3 there’s very few things you remember in retrospective. especially at 4, for some reason, it’s difficult to remember when you were 4. (for the records infantile amnesia & false memories are v interesting things!). tho that depends on person and on events (deaths should be well carved in your brain, even at a chemical level). and were RK900 to remember these fragments it is said that the emotional attachment would be very low. (see?? im studying for my kids exam!!! im that bitch!!).amanda cares for them, though her ‘idea’ of caring never includes emotional support. which should never lack to anyone, less to three kids without their parents. she tries to raise them to her best (amanda as a ‘mother’ is a nice comparison to her game’s role imo, there too she acts as someone who watches over connor) but kinda takes connor&60 for ‘lost causes’ pretty soon. they remember their parents, she will never be a replacement for them. they know. she knows. RK900 doesn’t know. he can’t. never got to know them enough. they don’t know. she knows. she focuses much more on RK900, shaping him right from the start into what she thinks is one should be. he doesn’t mind, amanda’s all he gets to call ‘mother’. he feels that he’s doing something wrong, his brothers make him understand that. they don’t want to play with him, don’t want to talk with him, they ignore him. connor blames him for everything as a scapegoat, he says caustic things to him. ‘look at your eyes.’ ‘i don’t have a brother, i don’t know you.’ ‘you’re probably someone else’s and i hate you.’ 60 does too until he realizes that RK900 doesn’t deserve this. he concludes that, were they to hate someone, it should be amanda. but never says so. they grow up. there’s lots of negative feelings. connor hates amanda and RK900, hardly stands 60. 60 would like to adapt and learn to love everyone in this ‘family’ but it’s impossible in this environment. RK900 has self-esteem and guilt problems, he obeys whatever amanda says because he knows no better and gains the only name connor will call him for a long time ‘pet’. amanda is: a rather complicated character here. she’s somewhat neutral, she doesn’t hate connor nor 60 nor RK900, her actions are never dictated by resentment, despite these children were basically dumped in front of her home. but then again she’s not guided by love either. i think her only fault was not picking a side (sloth?). but then again this is not a ‘fault’ at the 100%. can’t force someone to love someone they don’t, especially in such situation. which is why, in some way, even when openly against her, connor&60 still seek her approval. probably, if she recognized their efforts without betting everything on RK900 and comparing him to them they would have been more at peace.during their high-school/college years connor decides to cut off ties. he’s going to be free. leaving everything behind. 60 is torn. he can be with amanda and RK900, accepting his never-ending future of being second. or he can be what he’s always been, connor’s shadow. but at least connor lets him do what he wants. one night connor has a bad argument with amanda (no, she never raises her voice, but he sure does) and storms off into his room. (they have 3 rooms but 60 can’t really sleep when alone so he’s almost always in connor’s, begging him to sleep together, that he will be invisible, that he will put his pillow at the end of the bed and be quiet and rest in the opposite position as connor. connor is lowkey annoyed but he has nightmares often (which get worse after cole) and 60 is a nice presence so he just says ‘you’re a hopeless gay AND if you touch my dick i’ll kill you’) 60 goes to him to talk but sees that he’s putting clean clothes in a bag. 60′s able to convince him to not be so stupid but connor warns him ‘as soon as a i can i’ll leave this place and you’ll have to decide, either you’re with me or you’re with them’. 60 knows he’s not joking. and the day connor’s ready to go away and start college he follows him. they live together for some time. connor has always wanted to be a detective (a child’s dream, pure). he puts everything he’s got. he’s good. 60 is lost. finds himself in clubs and with ‘bad’ people. he earns some easy money. he thinks he can live a carefree life forever. he starts to bring weird guests to his and connor’s apartment. smokes pot few times. connor is slowly back on being a person without problems (in his mind, since amanda&RK900 were the problems) so he doesn’t want to put up with his twin’s antics. he kinda kicks him out. 60 gets a little worse. more lost. gets a place with two sex workers (a drag and a prostitute). they take care of him in some ways. he understands that this is not how he should behave. he attempts to be better. he’s still lost. he realizes how his life has always been ‘connor is selfish but he’s good, so i will protect him’ and how little he knows of himself. he has…. been erasing himself more and more in connor’s favor. he has subconciously been the wall between his rage and amanda’s nothing. he’s still lost. he starts his rapport with connor again. he’s in awe at how good his twin has become. he has friends. he has good grades. 60′s happy that he has finally become the person he should have been. he’s so content he decides he wants to be a detective too. connor’s this close to punch him and probably does at some point since every one of them has a different perception of physical contact (connor’s one is angry, 60′s is sensual, RK900′s nonexistent). but 60′s okay with that. he’s always been someone that gets hurt and smiles. it’s just another of their rocky beginnings. 60 is almost found.RK900 in the meanwhile…. is both alone & lonely. he has a hard understanding of the world; he knows everything– in theory. but practical? none. his hands don’t do much if not writing and typing long essays. he studies a lot. that’s all he’s allowed to do and all he does. eventually he becomes detached. we’ll skip the evangelion part about his sexual needs and sexuality but to make it brief he’s not accustomed to himself. his body is too big, his shoulders too broad, his height too much. he loathes himself. he’s scared of himself. whenever someone compliments him about anything other than his grades he gets disgusted because in his brain is ingrained that that’s a lie. he hates his eyes more than anything. he wonders where he got them from. they’re his own personal curse. always reminding him his isolation. without brother, without twin, without mother. no one has blue in them. he never gets a girlfriend (not that he wouldn’t have a boyfriend, but even if he’s so huge he’s lowkey scared because he has not forgotten the bruises of connor’s fury on him and others) and keeps being a virgin (not even a first kiss) despite having many trying their luck with him, too sure he’s unlovable, too sure he’s somewhat bearing mankind first sin. he contemplated suicide. he’s insecure to the max. he finishes high-school. he could go to the best of colleges. he has a fine scholarship. amanda lets him know that the best option would be a very profitable profession. either politician or lawyer mhh no, no, prosecutor, judge? surgeon? he thinks about it. for a long time. 60, who kinda felt guilty about leaving like this and about not telling connor to stop with bullying him, texts him sometimes. he tells RK900 that connor wants to be a detective. he didn’t know. something happens. it’s a small thing. stupid, even. amanda probably makes a snide comment about connor. or wants to throw away what he left. he snaps. doesn’t say a thing but enrolls in the same cheap college as connor’s&60′s. he never felt anything until that moment. the feeling of being his own person, maker of his destiny; is both thrilling & frightful. amanda discovers when she asks him what he chose. he waits for a slap that never comes. it would have been cathartic. to finally be free, to rebel, and to be disowned and rejected. but amanda’s not stupid. while he closes his eyes she doesn’t hurt him. she only says ‘i’m disappointed’. that…. that doesn’t feel good as a slap would’ve. he’s terrified. but he can’t come back now. can’t rely on her anymore as she tells him he has two days to go away. he has done the wrong thing again. it’s not easy to accept that. he dies a little. he contemplates suicide again. he has his college tuition paid and his slice of his parents’ inheritance. he calls 60 crying. he can’t go to their apartment because connor would kill him. he’s alone. 60 tells him that there’s a cheap place where he can sleep. he goes there for a couple of days, 60 visits him, they have a chat, RK900 cries again and 60′s heart is so sad in seeing his red puffy eyes. he concludes that life’s not been so fair with them but they all made it more difficult by creating fake enemies in themselves. they search for an apartment together. RK900 settles his few things in there, it’s not the best and he has trouble being with other people but it’s okay for now. he starts to build his persona, he tries contacts, fake glasses, hobbies. he sees connor from time to time, but hides as soon as he comes near. he watches him from afar. for this reason he ends up attending a lot of crime-law related courses. he might as well take those exams since he still doesn’t know what to do. he gets good grades. he starts to like it. connor’s center of gravity is so heavy they all…. kinda copy him and become detectives. connor, at some point, gets 60 to spill the bean and acknowledges RK900 existence. he doesn’t care about him anymore. he’s a new person, he’s better, he’s free. RK900 never was his brother from day one. 60 is not okay with the whole situation but doesn’t think it’s a big thing, at least connor’s not livid and RK900 is fine.they all get to the DPD. it irks connor but he has an objective and he’s going to do whatever it takes, he’s going to be something. RK900 is pleased to be nothing. an ordinary detective, a police officer, whatever. he wants to take his time in living. peaceful. years pass & im very ignorant about police things in the usa so may have gotten the timeline wrong but i tried&searched believe me. they become detectives. connor always strives for a higher position. cole happens. cole dies. this happens. they continue their lives. RK900 gets promoted lieutenant instead of him. it’s hell.connor sees red. RK900 never wanted that. connor can’t think straight and in his mind it’s all his fault again, he wanted to ruin even this for him, never leaving him his piece of heaven for god knows why. RK900 tries to refuse, to explain to connor that he only wants to be some low rank and nothing else, he never meant to, to explain that connor’s the one who needs, who deserves this promotion. it’s no use. they get into a fight. well. connor gets into a fight. he punches RK900. RK900 falls to the ground. connor goes on top of him. 60 is distraught. attempts to stop connor the first time of his life because this, this is understandable but this is too much. it’s not his fault this time, it never was, and connor needs to grow the fuck up and forgive whatever has been eating him for decades. RK900 never reacted. but this time. this time he remembers, he knows. this time is not his fault. not the one to blame. sure, fate’s the one. but connor’s too, he too has the blame in his own destruction. these are the fruits. the catharsis that never came with amanda comes with him. RK900 punches connor back. time stops. everyone stop. he know what to do with his hands finally. then. times resumes. and they punch each other until they’re no longer able to stand. 60 cries. they’re kids still. and they’re all grounded. the punishment is: being themselves.RK900 has the habit of eating and spending his lunch break in the old archive. nobody uses it. there’s mostly file cases from long long time ago, still on paper. it’s quiet. and nobody looks at him. one day he’s taken aback because there’s someone else. he’s a bit annoyed he will have to find another place. he gets kindly informed that they’re the new part-timer that’s going to transfer these paper files into computer’s one. an android would have been too pricey. humans are the only thing one’s can afford sometimes. he asks if it’s okay for him to eat his lunch there that day. he’s welcome whenever he wants. he’s shy at first but does so. especially because there’s not another place calm enough. at some point they start to chat, he brings in work to share insights and so on. it’s his first friend. 60 discovers it. he pushes his brother to ditch the ‘i have a friend’ story, of course he’s in love. he isn’t. he doesn’t know what love means and he doesn’t want to know. 60 gives himself the role of cupid. of course he flirts with them. of course he does it only when RK900 is watching. it begins to be annoying. 60 doesn’t stop. RK900 is afraid that his only friend will become his brother’s partner or worse, his brother’s friend. and he knows that they won’t spend time with him again. and he’s sort of mad because he had one thing and everything was going fine. he was handling it alone. and nobody told him what to do for the first time. he doesn’t eat in the archive anymore. he spends his lunch break at the nearby park. nothing feels real. he contemplates suicide. his hands, his eyes, him. everything is wrong with him. he’s unable to ‘look’, just ‘watch’. in his vision things seem just faraway objects. he’s unable to ‘touch’, just ‘feel’. the sensations he gets aren’t his. they go to 60 and asks him if they ever did something bad because RK900 is avoiding them. 60 doesn’t know what to say, really. maybe he was the one to be wrong. 60 stops being 60. says to RK900 that he won’t bother him on this topic and please, please, forget about it and continue having whatever he was having. RK900 ponders about it for a while. his fragile friendship is destroyed. he can’t trust. but the next time he sees them he realizes that yes, he doesn’t think of friendship but something more. is this what 60 was talking about? love? he was jealous the whole time? yes, that, of course. but he was jealous in a romantic way? that shocks him. he’s an awkward mess of a man but they end up together and he’s happy for the first time. he doesn’t really love sex and he’s not used to it but it’s okay, it’s not an important thing in his relationship. probably will write something about him and his s/o and 60 asap. now i’m going to write nsfw and eat chips since this thing’s already 3000 words and tumblr’s crashing.

[undeadwicchan]

Rewatching RWBY: Volume 1, Episodes 1-5 [Live Blog]

Let’s get started.

[Episode 1]

Hello Salem. I wonder who is she explaining all of this to before Ozpin interrupted her?

ROMAN. MY BOI. ;__;

The return of the shadow people!

By the way, has it ever been explained why Roman was collecting all of this Dust for Cinder?

RUBYYYY Omg, I am so used to her Maya model and her V4-V6 clothes. The outfit is iconic though!

Asdfjgk MONTYYYY ;___; I miss your fighting style!

Ruby’s voice is considerably deeper in the beginning….

GYLNDAAAAAA

Oh hi Cinder.

So I’m gonna go with a gambit and say that first shot Cinder went for and used was her Semblance….

Okay so I know Maidens weren’t even a thing until like between Volume 2 and Volume 3 but, does that mean what we’ve seen with Cinder was actually her semblance??

“Can I have your autograph” Omg Rubes

I didn’t notice until now, but are they at an interrogation room?

OZPIN. OZ. I LOVE YOU. ;w;

“You have… Silver eyes,” anyone want to bet Oz said the same thing to Summer at some point?

I love how Ozpin baked cookies for Ruby while she was getting scolded by Glynda it really shows how total opposite Oz and Glyn can be towards each other.

Omg Oz’s eyebrow raise when Ruby was talking with food in her mouth.

If you haven’t met me yet, I’ll say this now… I am a Ozpin stan so uh, you’ll be seeing me freak out over Oz a lot here lmao.

I’m thinking we’re seeing Ozma in control here, not Ozpin.

Ruby you’re so pure and innocent and I’m not looking forward to seeing you get traumatized.

Ozpin’s smile after she’s done talking is just aaa.

Glynda’s judgement look at Ozpin when he was considering enrolling her early. “Ozpin no.” “Ozpin yes”

Y A N G

“I just want to be a normal girl,” *laughs in silver eyes*

Adam you prick, that was a peaceful protest c’mon.

“Incredible time of peace” *cries in post Volume 3*

JAUNE BOY

Lmao that ending tho

THIS WILL BE THE DAY WE WAITED FOR. GOD I HAVEN’T HEARD THAT SONG IN AWHILE.

I just noticed after S I X years that Adam pops in this opening lmfao. It’s kinda creepy he’s still there even after Blake vanishes.

Those silhouettes do not look like Mercury or Emerald lmao. Okay, kinda, but not much.

PYRRHA. MY EYES ARE ALREADY WATERING. AAAAHHHA

The Nostalgia… Onto Episode 2.

[Episode 2]

Beacon Academy is fucking huge, and I do feel Ozpin based it’s design off of the castle he went in to free Salem. I can’t wait to see Beacon in Maya.

Ruby is weaponsexual, fight me.

The return of the shadow people lmao.

W E I S S

I forgot she's a bit of a bitch in Volume 1 omg. That just goes to show how much she’s grown since then.

B L A K E

TEAR THAT PIECE OF SHIT COMPANY APART BLAKE.

“Controversial Labor Forces” Yeah Adam would know….

“I’m Jaune” “Ruby” Ah yes, the moment I started shipping Lancaster was that very moment lmao.

I love them so much ;-;

I wonder if King of Vale (Oz) and Jaune’s Grandfather interacted…

Let’s play I spy a main character in this crowd.

“Where am I supposed to find a nice quirky girl to talk to?!” Pyrrha is RIGHT THERE JAUNE.

Yang’s expression when she realizes Ruby was being honest lmao

And so it begins with Jaune and Weiss.

That was so Ozma talking, and that foreshadowing for that moment in Volume 6 oof.  

Oh right the moment where I see people and homophobes argue that Yang isn’t into girls. Yeah, no I call BS because as we see later, Yang is into girls too.

“You’ve got friends all around you, you just haven’t met them yet,” FORESHADOWING.

I love Blake’s pajamas out of the RWBY girls. It seems very… Mistral like.

“It’s about a man with two souls” There is so much foreshadowing in this episode it’s not even funny… okay it is lol.

I love this moment between Ruby and Blake, and I think Blake sees a bit of what she used to be in Ruby and perhaps what Adam originally was to her. :c I made myself sad again gdi…

Those girls are going to love each other and treat each other like family…  

[Episode 3]

And here’s Ren and Nora!

I’m so used to hearing Neath voice Ren, but hearing Monty voice Ren and just overall hearing Monty… I love that man…

Ruby x Crescent Rose is the real endgame pairing.

PYRRHA I LOVE YOU ;A;

Omg Weiss and the return of her derp face.

I can see how Volume 1 Jaune is insufferable.

LET’S SAIL ARKOS. LET’S SAIL!

And Lancaster too!

That’s probably Ozpin talking, not Ozma.

Poor Ruby lol

Poor Jaune lmao

I think Ozpin might be enjoying this.

I remember reading a comic where that bird was actually Qrow that Ruby flew into lmao.

Man… it’s weird seeing Yang without a prosthetic for her arm…

I missed Pyrrha have I mention that before?

I remember that art style, it’s used in those RT animation skits.

That music that plays as they made eye contact gives me chills and I hear Mirror Mirror in it too.

IS THAT FOREVER FALL I’M HEARING IN THE BACKGROUND DURING PYRRHA’S AND JAUNE’S CONVERSATION. RT STOP YOU’RE GONNA MAKE ME CRY. I’m probably going to bawl my eyes one when the full version comes out.

I can see why people ship White Rose, and I do too. It’s cute.

[Episode 4]

Alright Goldilocks and the… Two Bears?

Oh right Yang values her hair a lot back during the early volumes.

That smirk from Blake. Also I’m going to be paying more close attention to Yang’s and Blake’s bond and also Sun’s and Blake’s bond here.

Ah, setting something on fire. Now that’s the RWBY I know.

Oof… yeah it was rough for Weiss and Ruby early…

Oh… I didn’t get that foreshadowing with the Nevermore fight until now!

Vol 1 RWBY has a lot of derp faces.

You know it’s been awhile since seeing someone use aura defensively like Ren does here.

Unlocking someone’s Aura seems very intimate at times.

Boop.

Oz keeping an eye out for Ruby, it is interesting because I made post where Summer’s death is what led to Ozpin being protective of Ruby during Volumes 1 and 2.

Omg Ruby is letting it all out on Weiss.

“Not yet” that was a dark mutter… referencing how her father is with her perhaps?

I feel like those chess pieces they pick are of importance in later volumes

“Some girl is in trouble” LMAO

And Ruby is falling.

Alright I know what happens next episode, and I can’t wait if I remember correctly.

[Episode 5]

Lol I love their banter

Blake’s ears twitched, that’s how early the speculation of Blake having cat ears have started… actually it might when the Black Trailer was released.

Blake is just... experiencing so much wacky shit that she would never experience seeing in the White Fang

There’s so many anime tropes in this episode lmao.

Lmao, it was heroic for a brief moment Jaune.

#EveryoneIsHere

Ruby was so reckless early volumes damn.

Omg that must have been terrifying for Yang especially.

Weiss to the rescue!

With that character development too!

Ah yes, that small Lancaster moment.

Something tells me in the Final Battle against Salem we’re going to see a more older, wiser, and harden Ruby perched on that rock and turning to her friends and allies as a callback to this.

Alright time for RWBY & JNPR VS Death Stalker & Nevermore.

I miss Monty’s fight choreography. ;v;

The start of JNPR. And Jaune being a strategist.  

The start of RWBY, and Ruby being a leader.

That’s probably one of the most iconic moments in RWBY.

Omg Pyrrha and Nora are so happy.

This is definitely going to be an interesting year Oz…

“We’re going to need more men…” Here comes the White Fang..

All in all I miss seeing Pyrrha and Ozpin in the flesh especially, and I feel like I’m 16-17 again. This is great!

[brothermouzongaming]

Cyberpunk gameplay thots

Obviously, this is a vertical slice of the game, something where CDPR can show off how the game works while making sure nothing is stressed too hard or explored too deeply. That being said, sonofabitch what a way to present your game. I’m going to gloss over my favorite parts and things I noticed because honestly, a play by play won’t do it justice. Please go watch it.

MadWorld (or “City” in this case)

I don’t need the sprawling landscapes and varied vistas of The Witcher 3. CDPR did an incredible job making every acre feel lived in. The landscape of Night City allows them to hone the focus of detail on a singular city. The touch of every NPCs class or sect hanging over their heads is nice, but I look forward to turning that option off and just enjoying the crowded streets for what they are. Gorgeous. The level of detail presented was just staggering, I couldn’t look at one thing for too long or I’d miss something. The lighting is sharp and accentuates how the world sits between impoverished dirty and futuristic shine. Even the ‘natural’ lighting in the apartment gunfight really cuts through and actually is worth noticing when LEDs and neon lights are almost all we get down on street level. The rooms are very well detailed, looking lived in, the clutter is not just assets but seemingly hand-picked to a certain extent. Night City is somehow seedy and luxurious, something made clear with every area we visited in the demo. 

RPGesus Christ

I can only imagine this had to have somewhat silenced the “it’s gonna be a FPS, not an RPG” crowd. Everything from the guns, the gear, and even the biometrics to some degree (that humanity cost tho). It really looks like it feels like a tabletop game especially when you get to the character creator. When V goes to pick up the pistol in her apartment, the green bar (to me at least) indicates a rarity level. Especially when later in the video another gun is seen with a purple bar.  Loot was an aspect of gameplay I didn’t foresee at all. I thought it’d be a merchant system. Loot, however, makes things a bit more interesting in my opinion. The ability to find something out in the world as opposed to coming to a market every time is always more immersive and overall fun in my opinion. The dialogue options are interesting and often, which is exactly as it should be. I’m not sure if this was intended but V even interrupts the Corpo woman and you can actually see a physical reaction though brief. Which has really interesting implications if used properly. It didn’t seem like the “shut up” button you’re given in Fallout that just silences the NPC. This actually seemed to be an active decision the player makes that the other character actually observes or at least understands. 

Movement Overhaul is Very Enticing

Doom Eternal is the closest thing I can think of when I see such quick and nimble movements from a character in an FP game. A sense of control and dynamism that will allow and encourage those to play as they wish. Dashing, sliding, and sticking to walls with mantis blades; all of it will only be enhanced with what appears to be well-designed levels and environments. I wasn’t sure if I’d talk about this in the movement section or the world section but to me; this specific demo shows how these parts of the level (and hopefully others) seek to facilitate combat. Not just exist in the same space to build the world or just because.

Guns and Their Play

We only saw four guns and one melee weapon, a handgun, the bullet curving submachine gun, a double barrel shotgun, some kind of gauss rifle, and the signature mantis blades. Both were very interesting in their functions. Enemies appear a little spongey, but I’m willing to chalk it up to augmentations but I do hope it gets a touched up a bit. None of that Division shit, I cannot stand that. No one has to go down in one shot but once I’m half a mag in...maybe they should be dead...? Later in the demo you do see the double barrel put people down left and right as well as the bullet curving gun. It’s a step up from the Titanfall pistol and an idea that lets you kind of peek behind the curtain as to what kind of tech we’ll be dealing with. The rifle shown is also again, very cool and makes me wonder what other high-concept weaponry is in store. I can’t comment on the feel obviously but I hope that the guns feel heavy to kind of play off how quick your character is/ can be. 

Deliberate Dialogue 

I very much enjoyed the ‘buddy-cop’ conversations between V and Jackie. I’m getting shallow but purposeful bits, most likely to avoid spoilers and things of that sort. Nothing too significant but it’s very well voice acted and that drives the tense moments and lets the lighter ones land regardless of how ‘deep’ the writing is. Then there's the Maelstrom scene, V and Jackie have a chat with a fine gentleman by the name of DumDum. The performance is phenomenal. The writing is good and houses the cliche dick measuring contest between DumDum and Jackie. It’s how Dum Dum carries himself and speaks that made me believe we had found the boss of the Maelstroms. Only for the big bearded fuck to storm in and start questioning what’s going on. Long story short, everyone dies and Dum Dum was nothing more than a passerby, practically an NPC in the open world. I was impressed how in that one scene, an absolute no one could leave such an impression on me. That doesn’t happen in most games, not for me at least. If this is something I can expect from even a handful of NPCs I’ll be floored and beside myself.

I know I’m fanboying but let me enjoy something dammit!!

[kingofattolia]

a list of things about Star Wars: The Last Jedi

TLJ felt like watching two completely separate movies. .. .  one i deliriously LOVED and one i spit upon and shake its profane dust off my sandals

THE GOOD

“ive got an urgent message for General Hux” “YOUR REBELLION IS DOOMED” “yeah... im holding for General Hux”

it straight up took me a minute and a half of this scene to figure out this was actually the start of the movie. it felt like one of those pre-movie skits where it seems like a movie but then anthropomorphic M&Ms tell you to turn your cell phone off. was it just me or were there a LOT more comic moments in TLJ compared to almost every other star wars movie? anyway i loved it even tho it gave the movie a slight someone-made-this-while-high-on-LSD feel 

Leia USING THE FORCE AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

R2 playing Luke the “you’re my only hope” recording of Leia, i almost died

FORCE SHENANIGANS. we saw more powerful, dramatic, and varied uses of the Force in TLJ than we have ever before seen in a live action media and i was L I V I N G

“you’ve closed yourself off from the Force”

Rey and Kylo’s foRCE BOND TALKING like this.. . . is so interesting .. .  and it wasn’t only Snoke doing it because they did it again after he’s dead...

Rey lifting 30 giant fricken boulders without even breaking a sweat after having one (1) single “training” session

Kylo remotely activating Anakins lightsaber

projecting himself........ across the entire galaxy. . ..

Yoda. in the former EU the Force ghosts had a non-negotiable expiration date a certain time after their deaths. Obi-Wan couldnt just come back and visit Luke forever, he faded away at some point. is this no longer true??? DOES THIS MEAN ANYONE CAN COME BACK IF THEY WANT??? why was yoda so physical even as a ghost that he could whack luke on the head

summoning lightning like alright this is a new Jedi power im adding to my arsenal

Leia’s mary poppins action

Luke vaulting across the cliff to stab fish

POE'S CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT he turned from a kamikaze into a leader who's able to see the big picture and walk away, im so proud

everyone..... messing with Hux...... i loved this

Snoke smacking him into the floor

Kylo smacking him into the wall

Kylo force choking him

slowly taking gun out. . . . . HES AWAKE ABORT ABORT... slowly putting gun back . . . Hux is going spend every waking moment wishing he took that shot

Finn's character arc, like what an awesome Slytherin. the contrast between him and the codebreaker 👌👌👌👌 & where he makes the choice REBEL scum 👌👌👌

LET'S GO, CHROME DOME

i cant believe Phasma died again lol. her backstory novel was SO DRAMATIC and she just dies over and over

when Kylo does that little skid out into the hallway to look for Rey

Chewy breaking down Luke's door

when Luke kisses Leia on the forehead . . . .

kylo KILLING SNOKE I AM LITERALLY SO HAPPY. I AM SO HAPPY. IM SO

this had to happen, it was so obvious but i didnt think they would actually do it, Snoke was so boring and useless, i am SO GLAD they didnt drag him out..... I AM SO HAPPY HES DEAD

it was truly awesome... i couldnt stop grinning it seeing it the 2nd time... "I CANNOT BE BETRAYED, I CANNOT BE BEATEN, I CAN SEE HIS MIND" & then he narrates the entire process of Kylo killing him i was LIVING. everyone theorized for so loooooong and so hard about what form Snoke's control over Kylo took and how it would be possible for him to break it,, , , and then he just DOES IT JUST LIKE THAT by SHEER MISDIRECTION FOLKS I AM SO ALIVE

THE TEAM UP FIGHT

i love lightsaber fights so much i would very nearly give up my critical integrity for a single awesome duel and this was,,, so awesome

when Rey drops her lightsaber to catch it again and cut that guys knees out from under him

when Snoke is cut in half and then the lightsaber rockets towards Kylo and Rey's hand SHOOTS INTO THE FRAME to catch it 👌👌👌

when Kylo takes on FOUR OF THEM AT ONCE

"THE SUPREME LEADER IS DEAD" "long live. . . the supreme leader .. "

not gonna lie, i am such a huge fan of supreme leader!Kylo. CAN HE EVEN LEAD ANYONE??? DOES HE HAVE THE CAPABILITY?? HONESTLY WHAT DOES HE WANT TO DO? WHAT WILL HIS SELF-DIRECTED MISSION BE? VADER NEVER GOT TO BE ANYTHING BUT AN ATTACK DOG, WHAT ON EARTH IS GOING TO HAPPEN

I HONESTLY HAVE NO IDEA BUT IM SO HYPE TO FIND OUT

THIS IS BRAND NEW

"finn! rose! you're not dead! where's my droid"

the little slave kids from Canto Bight. did the kid at the end use the Force to pull his broom!??!

"that library did not contain anything the girl Rey does not already possess" Yoda thinks hes so funny. REY STOLE THE LIBRARY LMAO... thanks Rey... im glad someone around here has a brain...

the Falcon swooping in to draw off the TIEs on Crait

"OH, THEY HATE THAT SHIP"

Vice Admiral Holdo's lightspeed kamikaze. . . aside from the drama of the moment & making Hux look stupid, just visually it was awesome

absolutely every single thing said by either Hux or Kylo in Kylo's command shuttle above Crait

"i want every gun we have to fire on that man"

"blow that PIECE OF JUNK oUT OF THE SKY"

when kylo's like "concentrate all fire on the speeders" and then Hux immediately shrieks "CONCENTRATE ALL FIRE ON THE SPEEDERS" and Kylo looks at him like 🤔

"do you think you got him?"

when Luke faces Kylo

WHEN LUKE FACES KYLO

this scene makes the movie for me honestly. as of now im in a state of uneasy ceasefire with TLJ and the sequel trilogy as a whole. if the scene of Luke facing Kylo did not exist, TLJ would probably be dead to me

"did you come to SAVE MY SOUL" "no."

absolutely everything about Luke was so completely epic in this scene. even though he barely said anything, even the way he stood was epic. im not sure how Hamill did this but it was everything i ever wanted

"i failed you, Ben. I'm sorry." "i'm sURE YOU ARE"

the contrast between Kylo's fighting stance and Luke's

when Luke steps out from the massive cloud and duSTS OFF HIS SHOULDER

this fills me with so much pure glee i could literally ascend

"if you strike me down in anger, i'll always be with you. like your father."

the slow, dawning horror when Kylo starts realizing Luke's not actually there

"see you around, kid"

"SEE YOU AROUND, KID"

"SEE YOU AROUND, KID"

my favorite line in the WHOLE THING i could Scream

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

AHHHHHHHHHH AHHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH

"SEE YOU AROUND, KID"

when Rey slams the door in Kylo's face

THE BAD

Luke should have LIFTED HIS X WING OUT OF THE WATER WITH THE FORCE AT SOME POINT GOSH DARN. i knew from the moment we saw the submerged x wing that this moment was meant to happen.... but then it DIDN’T. like PLEASE. IT WOULD HAVE BEEN SO GOOD I NEED TO SEE THIS

the casino subplot. . .  it was awesome for Finns character development but couldn’t he have developed character over an actually materially relevant story arc.. . .

BB-8 didn’t fight Dark BB-8 like what the hell honestly

for what earthly reason does Kylo need to wear his pants up to his armpits. is he TRYING to look like a doofus

why wasn't Lando the master codebreaker. like quite frankly, give me one good reason. why. no. there are no good reasons. when is Lando going to come into it you cowards

honestly....... what the FRICK was that horrible backstory behind what caused Kylo to turn

WHAT THE FRICK

im trying to keep my cool but this is a huge, enormous, and vital problem i have with this movie and whoever came up with that should be shot

Luke, in a brief moment of insanity, ignited his lightsaber over his sleeping nephew's bed to assassinate him because of a vision

LUKE SKYWALKER the guy who wouldnt believe that DARTH VADER, ENSLAVER OF WORLDS, SLAUGHTERER OF CHILDREN, MASS MURDERER OF THOUSANDS, was a lost cause and who refused to kill him, TRIED TO KILL HIS APPRENTICE IN HIS SLEEP

like... do you see my problem?

character assassination. it is ludicrously greater-than-Anakin Skywalker levels of overreaction to a Force premonition that Luke would see a vision of darkness and instantly move to slice his sleeping, defenseless nephew in half, and even in Luke's version of the story Luke is legitimatly the bad guy. he brought about the future he was afraid of, just like Anakin

because of this background, every interpretation is blown wide open to reasonably see Kylo as the victim and Luke's actions as those of a villain. of course he had to defend himself? it's legitimately possible to construe the subsequent killing of the other students as self-defense as well. if they wake up to find Ben having "killed" Luke? anything could have happened, Kylo could honestly have done barely anything bad up to this point and have been driven to the dark side on that one night

it's going to take.... so much work.... to walk this back. obviously Kylo's a villain now, because of what he's chosen to do since then, but for Luke to come out of this not looking like trash, they would have to provide SO MUCH more backstory including the "dark" things Kylo had done to make Luke suspect him, and have him probably be actively seeking darkness while under Luke's tutelage. and then Luke still seems like a fool and a betrayor

maybe they WANT Luke to come off as a legitimately bad person? i've seen some interpretations of TLJ as tearing down "legends" by showing everyone as flawed people, teaching the lesson of not deifying people to Rey AND the audience as well. if thats true and they actually want me to believe Luke is not worth believing in, i'm sorry but i reject that

luke skywalker is not a bad person

rey said "you didnt fail Kylo, Kylo failed you" WHICH... its true that Kylo failed in all his actions after this. but if this is the unmitigated truth about what happened that day, Luke definitely failed Kylo, thats not really arguable

i spit this backstory out of my mouth and stomp on it

bye felicia

"the legacy of the jedi is failure and hypocrisy. at the height of their power they allowed darth sidious to come to power and wipe them out" ok true. "it was a jedi master who was responsible for the training and creation of darth vader" YOU TAKE THAT BACK

a related point..... Luke is a coward.

i'm not saying that the only kind of Luke i would accept is HEROIC LEGEND LUKE WHO BURSTS FORTH FROM HIS ISOLATION AND SINGLE HANDEDLY DEVASTATES THE FIRST ORDER. but at the same time, his isolation is NOT in any way comparable to Obi-Wan's. "i came here to die" ok buddy.

dying is all well and good, hiding from your failures, being broken for a while after taking a hit like that

what i am NOT able to forgive is how he abandoned Leia

???? the frick???

"so many losses, i can't take any more" "sure you can" STORY OF LEIA'S LIFE

"im from the resistance, your sister Leia sent me" boy when she says jump you better say "how high?" honestly YOU OWE IT AT LEAST TO YOUR GUILT TO DO THAT FOR HER

HE SHOULD HAVE BEEN THERE? SHE'S ON HER OWN DEALING WITH EVERY PROBLEM IN THE WHOLE GALAXY AND HE'S DOING WHAT? YOU'RE TELLING ME LUKE WOULD HAVE ABANDONED HIS SISTER LIKE THAT??? AND WHEN SHE SPECIFICALLY ASKS FOR HIM HE SAYS "no frick u" ?!?!?

if that's Luke Skywalker then Luke Skywalker is a useless coward

that is not Luke Skywalker

honestly everything Rey said was spot on "Leia sent me here with hope. if she's wrong then she deserves to know why. we all do"

the overall thesis of the sequel trilogy seems to be "there's no point to any of this"

a powerful student turns to the dark side and destroys the Jedi Order. an authoritarian regime destroys the republic and takes over. a small band of resistance fighters rallies against great odds. a Force sensitive from a desert planet teaches herself the Force from old Jedi books after her teacher evaporates into the Force after teaching like 1 lesson. everyone Leia loves dies

guys... i'm tired

it's just exhausting. what is the point? in the sequel trilogy we've seen the republic destroyed, the resistance decimated and harried from place to place until theyre down to 12 people on the millennium falcom. there's only one movie left. they're going to come back from nothing and destroy the first order and then smile at each other in the ashes?

why?>??? what are they going to do? build a republic again? is rey going to build a new jedi order? we've seen how that worked out

there's nothing to believe in here. HOPE is such a strong theme in the sequel trilogy. "as long as there's light we've got a chance" "leia sent me here with hope" "the galaxy has lost its hope, the spark is out." "hope is like the sun, if you only believe in it when you can see it you'll never make it through the night." like good grief. constantly hammering on the need to have hope, but WHY?

what's the point of defeating the imperials, spending your life trying to build something good in the galaxy, trying to build a family, when you're only going to have to do it all again in your old age, when everyone you love is dead?

i cant see any hope if this is the ending for the OT characters, so i powerfully struggle to care about and cheer for Rey, Poe, and Finn. what's the point in anything they're doing? what's the point in the sacrifices they're making? it might turn out just exactly like it did for Luke, Leia, and Han, spending their old age in loneliness, sorrow, and violence

if this is the way history repeats itself, you probably should just make out like the stuttering codebreaker. "dont join"

[clementineverett]

IN LIGHT OF TELLTALE’S SEASON 4 ANNOUNCEMENT, PLEASE ENJOY SOME POST-SEASON 4 HEADCANONS:

E V E R Y O N E  L I V E S

Board game night with the Garcias where Clem and Gabe team up to destroy Javi at Monopoly

Kate is not only the banker but also the diplomat when the three of them start bickering

Javi finding a tee-ball set and teaching AJ how to play tee-ball

Clementine grows a small garden filled with daffodils and tulips

She has to stop Kate from helping because David wasn’t the only Garcia who’s great at unintentionally murdering plants

AJ and bubble baths!!!!!!!!!

Cute bonfire sing-alongs with Javi on the guitar

Gabe pulling Javi aside and asking him to teach him some chords and simple love songs to play

But for science of course, and not because Gabe is trying to impress a certain someone, despite the fact that he’s only now taking interest in learning how to play the guitar even tho Javi kept offering to teach him over the years

Javi becomes the ultimate go-to person for repairs and DIY things

The window won’t open? The door hinges are a little too squeaky? Javi can fix that

Got a tear in your pants? Your shirt doesn’t fit right? Javi can fix that too (he’s great at sewing)

But not really for plumbing though, that’s Kate’s department

Clem and the Garcias bringing back books they find on supply runs and starting a small library

Clem tucking AJ in bed and reading him cute bedtime stories!

Javi, Kate, and Gabe also participate: sometimes they sit with AJ and listen to Clem read, other times they pass the book around to read and play-act as other characters (complete with top-notch voice acting!!)

Clem and Gabe finding a book on constellations and the legends behind them

The two of them looking at the stars and identifying which constellations are which

Eventually it just dissolves into them just talking and laughing and sharing inside jokes

They stay up for so long that the sun rises

Clementine feeling completely at peace, embracing the cold morning chill and admiring how the pinks and oranges streak vividly across the sky

Clementine realizing that she’s seen many sunrises before, but this is the first time she’s stopped to appreciate them

That cliche where Clem goes “wow what a view” and Gabe’s lowkey staring at her and the way the sun plays in her hair and makes her eyes glow impossibly bright and is like: “yea”

The moment is just too perfect and Gabe f i n a l l y decides to not be a chickenshit anymore and tells Clementine how much he cares about her

with lots of stammering and blushing, of course

Clementine also lowkey blushing when she admits she cares about him too

Both of them smiling really wide

Clem shyly looking away

and Gabe has melted into a puddle can someone pls help this poor boy

They both finally meet each other’s gaze and slowly lean in

“DIOS MIOS, LOOK AT THAT VIEW!” Javi loudly declares as he barges in yawning and not realizing he’s sort of interrupting a moment

And then when he does realize there’s a brief pause where everyone freezes in sheer embarrassment

Javi straight up runs out of there trying to stifle his laughter (and absolutely fails, cmon dude)

Gabe maybe wants to crawl in a hole and die rn

Clem sighs and is just like “ah fuck it” and gives him a quick peck on the lips before running off

Gabriel Garcia’s soul has officially transcended this dimension, rest in peace you lucky boy

[isabelle-scheinberg-blog]

( GAL GADOT, twenty five, female, she/her ) – ISABELLE SCHEINBERG is a TEACHER and is described as COMPASSIONATE & FILIAL, but can also be OVERLY-FORGIVING & SLIGHTLY NAIVE, which is why they are known as the ABANDONED DIAMOND. They are FOR this marriage because SHE HAS TO PROTECT HER FAMILY’S REPUTATION & SAVE HER HALF-SISTER BY TAKING HER HALF-SISTER’S PLACE IN THIS MARRIAGE ARRANGEMENT DUE TO HER HALF-SISTER SECRETLY RUNNING AWAY A WEEK BEFORE THE WEDDING. Congratulations on your marriage - Your nation thanks you.

She as of now is currently married to Samuel DeLuca for  3 weeks and has also only moved in to Harmonia when she got married 3 weeks ago.

Hi lovelies!! Under the cut, is bio/background on Isa as well as the full backstory of what happened with her family’s secret that they’re all currently keeping. I ABSOLUTELY LOVEEEE PLOTS & CONNECTIONS FOR HER, SO DO HMU OR LIKE THIS POST AND I’LL IM YA ASAP!!

So I haven;t fully decided where exactly is her hometown or rather the city which her dad’s family lived and the smaller city where she and her biological mom lived. But I’m imagining that her dad’s family which includes his legal wife, her half-sister, her paternal grandmother and her paternal widowed aunt lived in a highly elite, upper-class, super expensive neighbourhood in a shiny high-tech city akin to Manhattan? While she and her mom & maternal grandma lived in a rather small city a couple of states away, in middle-class neighbourhood. Her mom and her maternal grandma were actually working class ppl, but due to her dad paying a decent sum of money for all their living expenses, house and  including her education, they were able to live as comfortable middle class small family instead of being in a small rented apartment. 

So yeah, back to how she was born.. She was born a healthy beautiful baby girl and given the name  Isadora by her blissful and devoted mother who loved her with every inch of her being the moment she was born. Her conception howver wasnt a very beautiful story. Her disgustingly rich dad, Gersham Scheinberg  ( HE IS DAMN SUPER WEALTHY AND HAS PRETTY WELL-KNOWN STORIES OF THEIR FAMILY FLAUNTING THEIR WELATH WITH SEVERAL PRIVATE HOMES, THEIR PRACTICALLY GILDED IN GOLD MANSION/ESTATE/PENTHOUSE THEY WERE ALL CURRENTLY STAYING IN) was already married with another equally high-born upper-society socialite who had a bit of blue blood from her family but yet, he had a secret wandering eye, and loved to secretly flirt and have secret liasions with several women withou this wife’s & society’s knowledge ofc. He then speedily charmed, flirted and romanced Isa’s naive young mother who was of the working class and really didnt know who he was at that time since she wasn;’t interested at all in reading society pages and was living several states away from him and his family, till he finally managed to seduce her into sleeping with him after some months of being in a close relationship with her. However, to his shock, she unexpectedly fell pregnant, something he thought unlikely to happen since he had a bit of a fertility problem and it took him and his wife several years before his wife finally fell pregnant. His first option, was to ask her to get an abortion, but Isa’s mother was quite  religious and had already wholly loved the embryo she was carrying as she believed her baby  was a product of love.He then broke her heart by revealing the truth about his identity and the fact that his wife was already currently 5 months pregnant at that time with his first child. Nevertheless she was adamant and stubbornly wanted to give birth and raise her love child. She tried.  her best to convince him that she would go far away and he would never see her or their baby in his lifetime and she would nvr disturb him or his family since she wasn’t a gold digger at all, and honestly didn’t want to cause any  trouble or grief to his wife. But he was still slightly paranoid about it and didn’t believe her thus he forced her to stay a couple of states away from his family , so he could keep an eye on them and he would secretly pay for all their living expenses for the rest of their lives including his illegitimate daughter’s education, in exchange for her silence.  Faced with an offer she couldn’t refuse despite how much her principles hated it, for she rationally knew how hard and extremely difficult  it would be to raise her child up happy, healthy and extremely well-provided for and taken care of with her very low wages, she had no choice but to agree to the deal.

Thus once Isa was born, she and her mother moved to comfortable middle class neighbourhood in a small, moderate but comfortable house chosen by him. With pure love and strong motherly devotion, she raised up Isa with good moral values and plenty of happiness and love. She also didnt want to withhold the truth from her daughter about her true biological father for very long, so once Isa was about 7 or 8, she gently explained to her the truth. However, she constantly expressed and stressed on Isa to not hold any grudges but be dutiful daughter to him and tried to tell her of some of his few merits as well as tell her that he did love her deep down somewhere in his heart (tho he only visited them once a year and even then he was a lil amiable but also quite brief and distant with isa to an extent). Thus despite the shock, Isa then tried her hardest to believe and listen to her mother and held no bad thoughts towards her dad despite her longing for more of his show of parental love . Over the years Isa thus grew up to be  beautiful, healthy, happy, optimistic, extremely kind and good hearted person, full of compassion towards everyone she met, overly-generous, loyal and a v devoted daughter and granddaugther. She was also a fair and open-minded person and VERY JUST. She was also pretty naive , sometimes susceptible to strong manipulation,, a little dis-organised at times, overly -helpful, a lil innocent and overly-forgiving (strongly influenced by her mother in that area, eventhough Isa sometimes had to swallow her hurt at ppl who had wronged her(no matter how difficult it was) and stay quiet and move on and her damnest best to forget due to keeping in mind her mother;s strict teachings.) She was also quite innocent on sexual matters and till now her sexual/sensual nature hadn’t really been wholly awakened yet due to her over-protective mom and grandma. Thus she can be a bit of a prude and she had vowed to remain a virgin till she got married due to her mother’s experience and also cos she was purely romantic at heart. 

However, tragedy struck when her grandma died to an accident when she was 12 and then later on when she was 14, he mom also died due to liver failure. Devastated and in complete grief and shock, she was then forced to secretly move into her biological dad’s home due to his urgent insistence. His reasons were because he was afraid of Social Services digging onto her past and thus exposing the whole secret illegitimate child he had and marring his perfect and polished reputation. His wife was then told the truth and despite her anger and bitterness, she had to keep her mouth shut as she also wanted to uphold their family’s golden reputation and name. For the Scheinberg’s were a very highly respected, reputable and well known crystal-clear family name. Throughout the past few decades, they had maintained a shiny and well known reputation by using their wealth to help grow up the biz economy( due Gersham’s cunning and enterprising nature as well as his dad’s intelligence in the past generation) , helped many startup businesses, and was very philanthropic by establishing many large charities. So despite some stories of them living quite extravagantly in their lifestyle, since they had done so much benefits and good towards society, ppl dared not really spread any bad rumors against them and some parts of the population even revered them. 

So in her father house, she was subjected to become a maid in order to cover up her identity and as often as possible kept out of view from any  outsiders or visitors to the mansion. Her father’s wife, Anyx Queen-Scheinberg, a  vindictive and callous woman took her revenge on her husband’s infidelity but treating poor Isa very harshly and sometimes cruelly, by constantly scolding her, subjecting her to all sorts of tedious labor work, tossing scornful and untrue remarks about Isa’s mom and Isa, and once in while even manipulated Isa to doing an activity that would end up injuring Isa a little bit. Poor Isa had to endure this harsh living environment for the next 4 years, and bite her tongue for a few reasons: one; due to her personality I mentioned above, two; because her mom made her promise to be dutiful daugther to her dad’s family no matter what (poor woman was oblivious to how shallow and self-absorbed the Scheinberg’s really were and the true nature of Anyx as she had nvr met the woman in her life and only knew her though media’s picture-perfect stories about her), and three; because it’d be pointless to argue back or show resistance as that would only lead to more harsher punishments from Mrs.Scheinberg. Her shallow, self-indulgent, pampered and narcissistic half-sister Isabelle, who surprisingly was almost identical to Isa in looks, barely spared a thought for Isa and sailed through the next few years carefreely ignoring her, though she wasn’t really unkind to her like her mother was.

When she was 18, a small event happened that got her kicked out from her father’s house. Mrs Scheinberg had been in  very bad and irritated mood that day coming home, and had lashed out at kitchen maid for a small mistake she had done and falsely blame her for omsething the poor female was hardly at fault for. She had harshly slapped her and accused her stealing a  piece of jewellery in her bedroom. When the maid actually dared speak  and protested her innocence, Mrs Scheinberg saw red and actually picked up a red hot fireplace poker to use on her! isa who had been at first watching the whole situation in utter dismay and complete shock, then for the first time in her life couldn;t control her disgust for her father’s wife upon seeing her about to advance and hurt the poor maid with the poker, then instantly sprang foward and pushed the other maid out of the way and instd recived a bad burn on her upper left arm from the poker. Biting back the painful tears, she then shouted back and scolded the horrified Anyx Queen-Scheinberg, using just, truthful and intelligent words and nvr once resorted to cursing or foul language(cos she had been deeply and strictly ingrained by her mom to use proper language and its too soon for my baby to lose total control and curse anywayXD hehe) despite her anger towards her father’s wife. Outraged and once overcome from her shock  that her husband’s bastard actually dared to give her a proper telling-off, she then struck Isa several times despite having already burned my poor baby’s upper arm, and then threw her out of the house, claiming that she was old enough now to live on her own and she was pretty sure that fillial Isa would never let out her father’s secret. 

Despite her pain, Isa was finally relieved and felt almost happy at finally being free from her father’s home. Excited with her newfound freedom, she then went on to study a BSN on a college scholarship she had obtained earlier due to her smarts, as she had long wanted to become good nurse as her future job and actually completed her degree within 3 years with extreme hard work. Her dad then paid for her to continue with a  master's  Nurse Practitioner program which she then diligently completed within 2 years and when she was 24, had started working as a nurse in a local small hospital. However her happy life was disrupted again when a week before her half-sister’s arranged wedding, she was called up by her dad and told the news that her half-sister had thoughtlessly and recklessly ran away. He then manipulated and relentlessly guilt-tripped her to taking her half-sister’s place by stressing on how she could save her half-blood sibling’s life and their whole family from possible Govt. punishments due to them unable to prevent  this awful thing from happening. Isa finally accuiqsed to the plan though her heart broke about her dad’s obvious prferential love for her half-sister instead of her  and the thought of her own wasted oppurtunity at beaing able to escape from this govt. program herself. For lately, Isa had been thinking of faking her death and running away secretly to find her chance at marrying for love being the aboslute  romantic and optimist that she was.

Small Scheinberg PLAN execution to cover everything flawlessly: Both her dad and his wife made a complete fake story about Mrs Scheinberg wanting to apologize to her “former maid” for accidentally burning her upper arm and firing her badly, and make amends by welcoming her back into one of their country homes and doing the apology reconciliation there. Unfortunately, an “accidental” and rapid house fire happened while they were all there, and unfortunately the “poor maid” Isadora got trapped by a crushing beam after having saved her former mistress life by pushing her out of the way and thus couldn’t escape and was died in that awful fast house fire. And that was the story they told to the authorities ir order to fake Isa’s death and prevent the goverment from placing Isa into the arranged marriage program for alas that poor girl was dead. Till this day, no one had really investigated Isa’s true father’s identity as Isa’s mom had written her dad’s name as unknown on the birth certificate and claimed it to be a very drunken one-night stand conception. With “Isadora’s unfortunate demise” this lead the path free and easy for Isa to take the real Isabelle Scheinberg’s place in the upcoming wedding and thus cleanly covering up her half-sister escapade. Oh and this crafty Scheinberg couple also managed to use Isa’s former job as a nurse(despite her distress over it) and with some bribery of a few of the hospital’s medical staff they managed to steal a freshly new cadaver from the hospital morgue and placed it properly in the house before the fire started so as to produce a burned grotesquely burned dead  body when the fireman hosed the place down and went in.

Thus the whole plan went smoothly despite how last-min it was and it was easy to trick ppl into believing that Isa was the real Isabelle as they were almost identical and she could also just lie and say that marriage had matured her a little and she had decided to to try turn over a new leaf as a grownup if Isa were to accidentally meet any of Isabelle’s old friends in Harmonia (FOR THE REAL ISABELLE AND ISADORA HAD COMPLETELY DIFFERENT PERSONALITIES! xD) There was a tiny problem of the real isabelle having a slightly different nose and smaller and slightly different shaped eyes as well as a very lighter brown hair compared to Isa but both Mr and Mrs. Scheinberg constantly convinced Isa that she could just bluff her way through if any close and sharp -eyed ppl who knew the real Isabelle were to notice this tiny changes. For it was a known fact that Isabelle had done a lil plastic surgery before (tho it was a cheekbone structure thing and not the nose) and real Isabelle had loved putting on very heavy makeup and sometimes coloring her hair in different shades. the only giveway would be now would be Isa’s small lingering white burn scar mark on her upper left arm. that and if any truly suspicious and nosy person were to really dig into “the dead Isadora’s” past life history and put in a VERY  thorough investigation on that house fire accident. Which till now, no one did...yet. (heheXD)

[leo-dale19]

Where dreams lead

The Serotonin God has led me down many a winding road - I have followed him to the point of exhaustion, he cannot escape me, he is by no means out of sight but he repeatedly disappears and reappears from behind the trees that are the various obstacles of unlucky fate that separate me from permanent reunion with him. Unless I get permanent brain damage, we will meet again and be united with the present moment anew. This lesson goes to show you should never let go of your loved ones, because you have no idea where you’ll end up without them and there are no guarantees. Well, there are, but merely on a divine level.

I would be highly intrigued to know what is currently happening on a subconscious level, what canals of my birth trauma am I currently unconsciously passing through again amidst the current everyday chaos. On saturday night I had the interesting return of 2001: A Space Odyssey into my conscious space. More precisely, I suddenly remembered Peter Hyam’s sequel to Kubrick’s masterpiece, the tight associations it holds with January/February 2012, the longest, grayest, winter I could remember, literally a pale shadow of its 2011 predecessor (although that comparison mainly refers to March and its 2011 analogue). I was convinced that 2001 world of eternal ectasy was truly eternal, I didn’t see how it was subject to physical laws of what chemicals I may or may not have ingested into my body. But God works in strange ways. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V68pnTJwjQU

For the first time in a very long time, I took advantage of a sudden moment of mental lucidity to take pictures of myself looking more or less presentable. This is a rare occurence, as although I do not consider myself unattractive, I have one of the main distinguishing features of a paranoid schizophrenic - I am very, very bad at regularly taking care of myself. One can deifnitely argue that self-absorbedness is more frequent in moments of mental insecurity, which I agree with, but my paranoias go to such extents that I get states where I am totally unaware of myself as “really being there”. Like I am so absorbed in my ego that all I feel is merely my mental image of myself, rather than what I actually look like to other people. So on Saturday I actually had the luck to experience a brief moment of mental lucidity where I was somewhat in limbo between two states - being paranoically anxious and being self-aware enough to realise what I seem like to the outside world. And so I decided a little cam-whoring was necessary, as I could indulge in some potentially constructive self-loving. That is, undeniably still a state of mental insecurity, but not as detached from reality.

Vkontakte has become a bizarre obsession. I plan on keeping my russian interest going for as long as possible, but the group of people I have come to know on Vkontakte know nothing of who I really am and I shamelessly take liberties in the image I create of myself to them. I am aware it is an escape. I often wondered whether they could realise that too, but people aren’t stupid - I know they do, although they obviously can’t complete the rest of the picture as they lack the facts and can only guess at what my true essence is. I think they are strangely tolerant or just bizarrely intrigued - or perhaps quite simply both - by this foreigner who speaks perfect russian, which, if they are to believe him, he learned all by himself. I also suspect life in russia is quite drab so there is no real time to reproach other people for not getting on with their life (although there probably is but more within the social-status confines of their own everyday society) or quite simply to be picky about fantastically weird occurences that you come across: my mum mentioned the USSR made you appreciate the simple things a lot more, and a an anglo-german russian-speaker who lives in france is more bizarre and interesting than it is worthy of cynically questioning. Although those russians are not a rarity either, I can feel a lot of what I was convinced for many years was unique to the English - a merciless contempt for those more talented than one’s self (although the english, as far as I can tell, are still worse and generally obnoxious about it, since it isn’t merely a petty character trait but a whole institutionalised social class mentality). I’ve already come across a few people on my adventures who I plan to never trust or have any serious dealings with, as, I kid you not, it would not surprise me that if we were to meet, they would give me away to the secret police or some shit because of their immature teenage jealousy, making up some pretext to have me taken away for good, away from the world where I may potentially humble them. Russia, I feel,  is one of those countries where truth is a very, very bizarre phenomenon and it is very hard to establish what it is in a country so vast and so varied, the accounts I get of life in Russia differ so much among themselves that it’s impossible to know what really goes on, although inevitably I have been able to attribute certain views to certain precise character types, for example a common archetype is that of the Denial russian: these are generally reasonable looking types, not necessarily extreme-oriented, however they have no interest in a free society, justify the authoritarian regimes they’ve lived through, blatantly deny the existence of certain horrors of russian society to the point where talking to them feels more like reading  a history book on Soviet Propaganda than it does like getting an objective view on what’s going on in the country. I accentuate “reasonable-looking” as I feel in the western world we immediately imagine anybody who supports anything totalitarian as a raving fanatic, but we’ve become quite desensitised and we must remember that evil in the vast majority of cases is criminally banal; and if one gives it some serious thought, it could never be any other way, since evil can only be committed by superficial people for superficial motivations. It is destructive and intentionally illusory, whereas love allows life to grow. It is therefore intriguing to see very ordinary people supporting such great evil in such a petty manner; would they maybe be more worthy of respect if they at least had some finesse to their wrong-doing? These people generally have a very strong vanity streak and there are more pictures of them on their pages than ther are of anything else. One could say I am the last person to judge, but I’ve realised my narcissism is quite often merely a by product of my unstable state of mind, an energy that stabilises me so as not to go fully psychotic, but then again, it is possible I am more truly vain than I think. And even then, or rather, especially then, it is a sort of pseudo-narcissism, i.e a hypersensorial daydream, not an actual philosophy to life that I put into action and impose on people around me, I have gained too much self-awareness for that. It is merely an energy that takes hold of my present moment awareness.  But on top of that, in the depths of universal love something tells me that I cannot really be a narcissist. Dave Bowman powering through the red Stargate, the light reaching 6 year old me on the grass next to lake Divonne tells me that my mind is blessed with forces too great and beautiful to truly have narcissism at the core of its inner essence. It is a symptom of my illness, and Universal Love is with me. The Consciousness Network knows of me and I have experience in accessing it.  It just blows my mind that I have managed to lose touch with it, as this seems unthinkable every time I come in conatct with it. Sand, trickle not through my fingers but shape into an empire!  

I am having a sudden OCD panic attack so will have to take a break from writing this (there is still more). The sudden lucidity that allowed me to write everything above is dissipating. It will return. I must believe.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RR98qq9iHmw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pi9buHnx9rU

Underworld are a recent revelation; not a discovery, as I have known of them for several years. It is just that something has grasped me in their music of late, something very homely, friendly to Karl Hyde’s voice combined with their sound textures. Songs like Bird One are moments where, much like I had at times in the past about russians, I catch glimpses (of a man, moving uphill) of hope for english and anglosaxons, that is in a Eugenics sort of way, namely that, despite their general contempt for all things rational, their anarchic spirit gives them a raw spirituality that I find mainland europeans can tend to lack once taken over by their abstract concepts. There is a certain finesse to the constant crescendo that is Bird One that I feel could only come from the souls of a couple of english blokes, a certain friendly naivety that gets lost when for example their mainland european counterparts try to emulate it; although I generally tend to prefer the French to the English, I know from personal experience that the latter have more of a natural feel for making music. I have started to take racial theories seriously recently - not in the sense that I feel they are truly grounded in reality or are necessarily of any value, but in the sense that I believe that people don’t just make these things up, and in our distinct social groups prevalent energy trends can be mutually communicated in a deeply profound way, creating a mystical sense of unity, for better or for worse. I am admittedly highly untypical for an englishman, for various reasons, but even though I have never lived there I feel a sort of strange sentimental attachment to certain things english, things that speak very directly to my immediate behaviour and personality, more so than many french things, although I do still have a special connection with various of the latter having grown up with them and all. I found that for a long time the way I thought in Russian was more cloesly linked to the english part of my brain than to the french part. 

Underworld give me hope for the english. That the english are more than the friday night pub-drunkards, or the social-status obsessed sociopaths that populate the country, that they really have a Weltanschauung within their character that is worth sharing. The english generally seem like uncivilised barbarians compared to their european neighbours, and there have been points where I may have considered the possibility that they were quite simply an inferior nation with lower capacities. They have no real sense of culture, any idea of what it is to be human, what it is to be. I feel they are liberal in a way that other european countries aren’t - whereas in France people, I feel, are truly concerned about democracy and freedom, in England liberal mentality seems nothing more than a social trend that shifts according to the tide, for example english people are traditionally the worst homophobes I have ever met, back in the 60′s  they effectively condemned one of the world’s greatest minds, Alan Turing,  to death for his sexual orientation, and suddenly as of a few years ago it became socially accepted that sexual equality was a thing and now everyone goes along with it likes it’s totally normal. The english have no real values. They are an entertainment culture like the americans. I even find the russians are sometimes more respectable in their fierce respect for their culture, (although I do find them very superficial themselves of late and appreciate the english’s basic niceness which I think is more profound than the paranoid frown russians greet everyone with). But they produce wonders of art that make me think twice. There is something godly in that fuck-off anarchy. Yes, I am a hopeless romantic. But by God does the world need us. It is hopeless without us.

A maintes reprises over the past days I have been convinced that my brain is gone for good and that my Odyssey will have no stargate ending, i.e a banal end in which the computer actually manages to kill me because I forgot my space helmet. This is all because this time last week, I ate about 12 entire packets of ham within the space of 3/4 days, since I realised it had a great capacity for digesting serotonin, i.e to end my current mental drought. I went a bit too full retard on this one though and have been feeling what I believe are the effects of excess serotonin: headache, confusion, trouble with memory, slight depressin etc. I pray to god and have not lost hope that my mind will gradually stabilise, but I will say one thing - there is no worse fate in this world than being boring and superficial. I have felt states of mind so dull these past days I became terrified at the prospect I may never rediscover my former psychotic Eden, but also horrified at the idea that people actually live in such limited states of consciousness. No fucking wonder there is so much evil in our world, I certainly don’t blame anyone for resorting to it. I would literally rather die than live in those states for the rest of my life and so keep going merely in the hope that this is all purely temporary, which I tend to truly believe. Moral of the story is, kids, don’t eat 9 packets of ham within the space of two days, cus y’all might fuck up yo brains in doing so. A worthy death is worth far more than a meaningless existence.

To elaborate on 2001 - Kubrick’s 2001 is more than just a film for me, for many many years, until the wonders of modern psychiatry altered Universal Love’s playing fields, that world was a crucial part of my general life perception. It was an energy that flowed like a river underneath all occurences of the physical world, reminding me of the divine and greater good in this life. It is something supernatural, on a heightened sensory level, where my inner world mixes ecstatically with the ouer. It is when I lost those sensations that I inherently started to become a disgustingly superficial person. Religious faith in such things is crucial, as life may take them away.

[porpentyna]

I was tagged by the lovely @luneclair !! <3 Thanks, love.

R U L E S: tag 10 people

A - AGE: 25 (I feel like i’m one of the eldest around goodness am I the Professor McGonagall to all you lovely kiddos)

B - BIGGEST FEAR: Not enough time to do the things I enjoy.

C - CURRENT TIME: 2:07AM (oops i should probably sleep...)

D - DRINK YOU LAST HAD: Green tea, burning hot whew

E - EVERY DAY STARTS WITH: Waking up to 6AM alarm, spend 30mins on the phone to scroll through everything and anything before groaning in utter annoyance while getting dressed for work.

F - FAVORITE SONG: Recently been looping “Say you won’t let go” by James Arthur and “Little Talks” by Of Monsters and Men (omg I know it’s such an old song but it’s stuck in my head ahh)

G - GHOSTS, ARE THEY REAL: I... do think it’s possible yeah! Normally I don’t really worry about it but I do have this most irrational fear about swimming at night. (can’t do it even it’s in indoor, fully lit swimming pool)

H - HOMETOWN: Taiwan

I - IN LOVE WITH: The idea and possibility of magic.

J - JEALOUS OF: Children! They see things in the most innocent and wonderful ways and I want to try and keep some part of that in me.

K - KILLED SOMEONE: Not...that I’m aware of oops

L - LAST TIME YOU CRIED: Earlier today actually. Had a brief moment where a close family member made me doubt myself. I made peace with it, I think.

M - MIDDLE NAME: Don’t have one! Even though I’m always fascinated by the idea.

N - NUMBER OF SIBLINGS: 1

O - ONE WISH: Be a wizard. (<-- this is @luneclair ‘s answer but WHO CAN POSSIBLY DISAGREE)

P - PERSON YOU LAST CALLED/TEXTED: My sister! :) 

Q- QUESTION YOU’RE ALWAYS ASKED: Uhhh recently it’s been “Why don’t you have a boyfriend yet?” (well, you can start by answering me why Newt Scamander or Sirius Black or Percival Graves are not real cos like????why?? huh? that’s why)

R - REASON TO SMILE: Many many things! Coffee, good music, fics, chatting with family and friends :) Simple and everyday thing, really.

S - SONG LAST SANG: “Let Her Go” by Passenger (omg i love this song too but I’m starting to have this haunting feelings that my music taste is very different from all you young kids’  help)

T - TIME YOU WOKE UP: Usually 6- 6:30AM, I’m currently on holiday tho so woke up at 7:30AM today

U - UNDERWEAR COLOR: I’m--- pardon?

V - VACATION DESTINATION: Home. God I love staying in and just....have lazy morning lazy day just chill and catch up on all the things I couldn’t during weekdays.

W - WORST HABIT: Laziness. Like literally do you know how it feels like to sometimes feel too lazy to eat. (Liz, plz)

X - X-RAYS YOU’VE HAD: Uhhh my chest.

Y - YOUR FAVORITE FOOD: Now, despite I said sometimes I’m too lazy to eat but this doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy eating. I LOVE food it’s just impossible for me to pick one like SRSLY I can’t-- I love fried things in general, also pasta, chocolate, dumplings-- (the list goes on but it’s middle of the night I should stop here)

Z - ZODIAC SIGN: Taurus. (Personally I’m not such an expert in zodiac sign traits and all, but according to everyone around me, I’m a very “Taurus” Taurus, whatever that means.)

to be honest I’m always so self conscious about tagging people ahh;;// I’d like to tag @fjrebolt @thesniffler @narcsisa @ncwtscmander @aurorpercival @ickle-ronniekins @sociopuff @pensieveforyourthoughts @rvnclawss and @dxmbledoresarmy (PLZ feel free to ignore if you’re already tagged/done this or don’t feel comfortable/interested in doing!)

Love you all <3

[miyaio]

desu2!!

desu 2 meta brings out the tl;dr beast in me b/c i’m always thirsty to talk excessively abt this game.

My favorite parent-child relationship

- i think otome and koharu win by default, tho io’s brief scene w/her mother and the background we get on her relationship w/her parents is v heart-wrenching.  i love the way otome’s single mom status is depicted–it feels very nuanced and sympathetic, without shying away from the way having parenthood thrust upon her would realistically impact otome’s life and koharu’s.  when otome mentions in tri arc that she misses being koharu’s mother, despite how selfish that would be (as it would come in exchange for her cousins’ lives), i teared up, ngl.  koharu herself is also really precious, tho i wish we had a consistent appearance for her–it seems to change between vanilla desu 2, ds2a, and tri arc?  

runner-up goes to airi and her dad, despite the fact that she thinks he’s dead.  the dera-deka sub-arc is well-worth doing at least once, imo.  it made me bawl, and it’s also necessary for 100% compendium completion.

My favorite sibling relationship

- can i say saiduq and the other septentriones?  yamato and miyako are the only sibs we see onscreen (tho airi mentions having a little brother), but tbh, i’m more interested in miyako’s side than i am in yamato’s.  what goes on in the septentriones’ minds–if they even have “minds” as people would perceive the concept–is fascinating to me, and i really wonder what saiduq thinks abt his former “siblings”.  does he simultaneously pity and envy them for lacking his autonomy?  does he see them as extensions of polaris’ will that deserve to be beaten down by humans?  the denizens of the akasha stratum are one of my fav aspects of desu 2′s worldbuilding, so i’m always hungry for meta on them.

My favorite family relationship (other)

- airi and ronaldo in a found family situation………  i love the way their dynamic develops, w/neither one aware of how strong a connection they really share.  i do wish we’d had more of them bonding over their memories of airi’s dad (which i’ve always hc’d as happening at least on egalitarian route), but seeing how similar the two of them really are is always cute.  airi loves her gay uncle 2k17

My favorite friendship between two people

- uffff this is so hard b/c i like a lot of my ships b/c of their friendships……..  ig i’d make it a tie between hibiki + daichi and jp’s trio’s dynamic as a whole?  even tho jp’s trio isn’t two people, haha.  one thing i really like abt hibiki in comparison to like, every male protag ever, is that it’s p heavily implied that he’s not popular at all.  the one thing ds2a did right was hibiki’s backstory, which i think still fits in w/gameverse!hibiki’s description as someone w/a “blank” past.  his friendship w/daichi and the relationships he forms w/the main cast mean a lot more in the context of daichi really being his only close friend at the start of the game, imo.  s/t i love abt hibiki + both daichi and io is that their friendships are based on equity, abt hibiki supporting the others and working w/them as equals to help them realize what wonderful ppl they are in their own right, rather than him being the ultra-charismatic authority who’s always Cool and in control.  like, this is the guy who has such Serious dialogue options as “RAINBOOOOOOW!!” and “tell everyone yr gay for yamato”.  hibiki being really isolated from most ppl aside from daichi feeding into his decision to pursue the human admin end of br is a meta for another time, ig.

jp’s trio’s various relationships are all v interesting, in terms of the spokes of the triangle and all three of them together.  it’s really refreshing to see that kind of dynamic between adult women who are professionals–their bond feels a lot less??  transient than it might between yet another group of high schoolers.  you get the sense that all three of them being adults is what lets their friendships bloom and be so important to them, as the people they were in high school are hardly the same people they are now.  the event in tri arc where fumi and makoto take care of a fatigued otome and tell her that she can lean on them, too, really made an impact on me.  all three of them play off of each other so well in a variety of settings, and it lends a v mature, multifaceted air to their dynamic.  otome taking a different faction than fumi and makoto, and how different fumi and makoto’s own reasons for joining yamato are, is also worth mentioning in that the three of them aren’t always in agreement, and that’s a part of friendship, too.  

My favorite friendship between a group

- team nagoya………  i’ll be the first to say that i dislike both the extremist routes.  whether or not the writers intended to make the player feel that way is subjective, and may well depend on where a player falls on the smt alignment continuum, or even on desu 2′s version of that continuum.  either way, i at least liked egalitarian better than meritorious b/c team nagoya has such a strong rapport w/one another, compared to the cognitive dissonance-riddled mess that is team osaka.  based on their dialogue from any daichi route, the members of team nagoya definitely know they’re not necessarily vying for the best solution to their very legitimate concerns.  they’re a lot easier to sympathize with b/c their grievances are very real–as joe says in “dream’s end”, while society may be growing less prejudiced over time, for many people, there is no time to “wait for things to get better”.  the problem lies much more in going thru polaris to make a change, as the ending p clearly (and horrifyingly) demonstrates that polaris just uses team nagoya’s passion for its own ends.  

at any rate, the interactions between the four of them are great, from ronaldo and airi’s aforementioned dynamic, to joe and otome’s complimentary playful attitudes, to how airi represents the future that all three adults are fighting for.  it’s really telling that team nagoya consists of three adults and one teenager–otome puts it most clearly in her post-defeat dialogue on daichi routes when she says that she was fighting desperately (yet short-sightedly) for the future of the world’s children.  imo, airi really represents that future to the three adults, as a teenager who has already had so many doors closed in her face due to inequity.  airi’s own stubbornness, selective self-flagellation, and issues w/moving on aside, schooling in particular really is s/t that can shape a child’s entire life, and i’m sure ronaldo, joe, and otome realize that.  so seeing how well all four of them interact w/each other and how airi represents both the best and the worst of team nagoya’s ideals def makes them my fav faction.

My favorite mentorship

- speaking of airi’s interactions w/the adult cast, makoto + airi is so good…..  i love how constructive makoto is w/airi, giving her the tools she needs to move forward in life w/o telling her to get over it, or denying that airi’s been screwed over by forces well beyond her control.  makoto’s not a perfect mentor, but (as her name suggests), she’s honest w/airi, and owns up to it when she reacts too harshly.  i think it’s great to see makoto helping someone in a way she knows for sure is right, in contrast to how uncertain her cognitive dissonance abt other issues in sep arc must be making her feel.  on the flipside, airi gets to begin moving forward w/life again, which in turn contributes to helping her reconsider her own alienating abrasiveness (can you tell i like airi b/c she and severa are so similar……).  the moral of airi and makoto’s mentorship isn’t “never ever give up on yr dreams b/c you can only ever have one True goal in life”, nor is it “there’s no need to challenge injustices done unto you b/c if you don’t rock the boat, life will move on eventually”.  airi’s sub-arc comes to a more nuanced conclusion, and i don’t think she could’ve gotten there w/o makoto’s influence.

My favorite rivalry

- does hinako and yamato count?  i love how often she calls him out, and how she’s not afraid of him in the least.  while i doubt yamato sees hinako as much of consequence, she makes her beef w/him plain, w/o going “DIE HOUTSUIN MY JUSTICE IS SCREAMING” ala ronaldo www  her voice is much-needed in a lot of situations, too.  her confrontation w/yamato over whether or not he cherrypicked the results of the medium compatibility tests to get rid of io is really well-done, esp if you infer that hinako knows abt io’s own disastrous confrontation w/yamato earlier on friday.

My favorite hatred/antipathy

- while i know miyako and yamato don’t straight-up hate each other, their dynamic as enemies (or at least in opposition to one another) is great.  i’m not just saying this b/c i love seeing yamato get dragged, i promise–there really is just s/t satisfying abt miyako not taking his shit at all, despite her own cognitive dissonance and his valid points abt the futility of her plan.  yamato -> saiduq is also fairly interesting, tho ds2a bloated itself so much w/a tepid exploration of how their dynamic could potentially be explored that i’m not too keen on meta-ing it more.  yamato is kind of a hate sink amongst the cast, tbh www  saiduq’s own rebel angel-turned-usurper dynamic w/polaris is p unambiguous hatred, but it’s v interesting, given how saiduq feels he has no choice but to die as polaris’ sword on every other route.  really seeing him shuck that alcor designation (ppl who call saiduq by that name when he explicitly says he dislikes it still drive me bonkers in 2017) and take up heaven’s throne is v satisfying.

My favorite potential relationship between characters who never talk in canon

- do u have a moment to talk abt how we were robbed of more io-joe interactions………  if anyone’s actually read this far, you probably do lmao  in any event, i think this is mostly a limitation of how the fate system is constructed, and you can see the writers stretching and experimenting w/it in tri arc.  if future desu games expand into s/t like fe’s support system, where you can see the fate system-equivalents between all characters, sometimes w/o the protag even present, i think that’d be a great step forward.  i bring this up for one area in particular where i really wanted to see more joe-io interactions: on tuesday, after io’s parents die.  joe has a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it line in his own fate system w/hibiki abt how his own parents are dead, but it’s not framed in a more genre-typical “tragic orphan backstory” way.  it really raises the question about when someone whose parents have died is too old to be called an orphan, given that joe is only 25.  

this dialogue suggests that the losses are then fairly recent, tho joe writes them off w/his patent-pending brand of escape-avoidance.  for all his flakiness (his term), tho, joe really does try to fill a big brother role for tokyo trio, and this is where i think he and io could have some v fruitful interactions.  i think that most of the cast isn’t really faced w/the immediacy of the high likelihood that their families are dead, w/the exception of chars like joe, jungo, airi, and keita, who all lose parents prior to the game.  io, on the other hand, watches her mother die in her arms.  she displays astounding resilience and focus in how quickly she draws herself back together after the loss, despite her r5 confirming that she had pretty constant suicidal ideation throughout the rest of the week (and quite possibly before the game, too).  as joe is the closest to io out of the four aforementioned characters at that point in the game, i really, really would’ve loved to see his take on providing her comfort and guidance in the wake of her sudden loss.  i think it would’ve been a good set of conversations for both of them, especially if you buy into the reading that both joe and io let themselves die should the player fail to prevent their death clips.  in this respect, i’m interested in the similarities between joe and io, and i think a good heart-to-heart between them early on in the game would’ve led to a variety of other interactions.

[birbycakes]

Muriel, Lucio, Portia for the Arcana ask😁

AAAA THANK U!!! v

I feel like I should spare you all with a readmore since I am about to talk a LOT (very uncharacteristic of me, I know, but)

Muriel - is your MC observant? likes to keep an eye on stuff?

Yeah! She’s quiet and shy, so she tends to observe things while trying to make herself fade into the background.

Lucio - what do you think of every character in game? give your honest opinion of each one of them

I wanna start off with this: My fav characters change a lot (besides my main fav, the second place fav is always shifting lol) but this is how I feel as of now:

Nadia: She’s so sweet and adoring to the MC! And of course, gorgeous! Also I like the whole “teasing” thing, it’s so cute, I also like how it has to do with her sisters. I hope we get to meet some of her sisters! Also I love the kiss scene for her in the latest update, it made me love her a lot more and I’m excited for her route >//v//

Julian: He was my second fav character at first, and I still really like him, but he’s kinda faded from my interest. Maybe it’s cuz he’s everyone’s fav, I dunno. I love how flustered he gets, his blushing face is SOOO CUUUTE! Othwerwise his personality is a little ??? I need to see more of his route first lol.

Asra: I LOVE HIM A LOT! My love for him like, shot up after the one fountain scene where he confessed. I wanna run my fingers through his fluffy hair and give him lotsa kisses >//v//

Portia: SWEET SWEET GIRL! I LOVE HER!!! I love how friendly she is, she is super super nice and cute and sweet. I knew when I first saw her on the poster I was gonna like her, but after the pomegranate scene, I KNEW I was gonna LOVE HER. She’s just... aaaAAAA OKAY. I love this other datesim called 7KPP, and my WIFE is Ria, who is a cute redhead maid with freckles who is sweet and friendly. Not saying they are the same character, cuz Ria is super shy and Portia is NOT shy, but yeah. I love these cuties >//v//

Muriel: OH MY GOD!!!! OH MY GOD IM LOVE HIM S O MUCH AAAA!!!! I loved Muriel the moment I laid eyes on him. Yes, the small pic of him hiding in the back of the main poster, and the brief flash of his face in the moving version. I knew he was the one. A shy gentle giant!? I mean, that is my JAM! And his design is so unique, I don’t see that kind of appearance in datesims and since it’s my fav look I was immediately attached. And while we know little of him, the more I find out the more I am SURE he is my favorite, not just in The Arcana, but in any datesim ever. Heck, even in anything ever! BEST HUSBAND. LOVE THIS SOFT SWEET GIANT >//v//

Lucio: I Hate Him.

Okay, okay, let me elaborate.

My little sister LOVES his guy, and from what we know of him, he is not someone I would want anywhere NEAR her. So my hate is mostly overprotective big sister instincts, lol. But I mean, he is coming off as a jerk, and I don’t tend to favor jerk characters. He’ll have to have one hell of a redemption arc for me to love him, haha.

Portia - who’s hair is your favorite? from Julian’s wavy curly hair to Lucio’s slicked back hair

OH GOSH... they all have such gorgeous hair ToT I mean, how can I NOT say Nadia’s tho!? I love long hair and I love the color purple >v