#it's so novel to answer a shippy thing here

[heartlurch]

hello heart! how are you ?? i was wondering with the bakaneko ryokan au… if nene was to go into cat heat like normal cats do.. how would she act?? would she temporarily just stay in a room until it goes away.. or would amane tempt her into getting rid of it?

mfw I get this ask and I get to talk about Bakeneko Ryokan AU and also hananene cat sex~ 😇 Heehoo...

Let's start out with, I do genuinely think Nene-chan experiences heat cycles in this world. My overall HC for the bakeneko is that they're behaviorally identical to normal cats, as a bakeneko starts their life as ordinary cats before essentially aging into a proper yokai. For a lot of Nene's life, she was a normal domestic girlie, eating kibbles, playing with her touys. I think the transition into bakeneko status grants more human-level sapience, magical qualities, kind of elevating them.

This creates an interesting creature, as I do not think bakeneko themselves identify as humans, but they are now a bit different from their fellow cats. I imagine they feel a sort of superiority above both species, basically like if a cat had access to human commodities and magic, feeling beyond the capabilities of both. Yet able to still indulge in batting a toy mouse around or eating treats from squeeze-tube. A funny life, in that way. Best of both worlds?

Soo, I do not think Nene is ashamed of her heat cycle, as it's something she's lived with for years by now. Though I think it is perhaps inconvenient, and potentially a little embarrassing at times, as she IS seeking to be famous, draw in ikeman toms. Ideally, Nene would want to come off as cool, mature, elegant. A seductress... Maybe it is hard to feel that way when dealing with the urge to yowl and scrabble along the ground. Confidence takes time. Perhaps in her wildest fantasies, she's at the center of a frenzy, with toms circling around her and taking turns, but I don't think she's close to achieving anything like that yet lol. She just got here. All in due time, she might think. (Not quite, sweetie.) But in the meantime...

Sakura is an experienced bakeneko and has long run this establishment. There seems to be a casual mix of regular cats (?) and bakeneko... I think she is quite aware of her species predilections, is generous about time off. Nene could request that within reason and just be granted some time to, do whatever she has to. So the next step is to hole herself up and try to ride it out. Being a bakeneko might lend enough self-control to isolate and take precautions, not wanting to get entangled with just anyone.

Now the devil in the room here is 1. heat makes you crazy and just want to have sex whatever the cost 2. you have a pervert coworker that is explicitly interested in you, hovering within your vicinity.

IMO Amane's personality works heinously well as a tomcat, wielding a sort of terrible charm along with being jealous and clingy, the type to harass... More unleashed than canon boy, able to express himself in things such as marking territory. Doesn't help that Amane seems to be a nekomata, something more powerful and insidious than the bakeneko — easy to think he imagines himself really controlling this space. (Much like he is the leader of the mysteries.) I really think of him obsessively patrolling, spraying against all sorts of features of the ryokan, fences, the rocks, trees, out and about. High tail as he trots around in feral form.

As is often the case with HanaNene I feel as though Amane being some. Scrappy, scraggly little black cat, with such a shitty demeanor is like, not, what Nene envisions as 'her type'. He's not quite, impressive or gentlemanly enough to make her want to give in to his flirting. A bit kimochi warui... But ultimately she does like him, they have their little joint routines to welcome guests, doing dances, they can roll around and play with toys together, heh.

It's emphasized Nene is a new hostess here, in-training, likely with Amane himself overseeing her integration into the ryokan. I don't get the impression they've known each other very long. We're seeing a girl pretty early on in the wear-down arc that Iro-sensei likes to write (lol.) So I feel as though their closeness is progressing at a steady rate... It's a playful dynamic, currently, but hasn't escalated to something more intimate. Perhaps they are on the cusp of 'something more'...

Beyond that though there's a weird contingency in this AU where Amane is fanning Nene-chan's bloodlust for humans. Psychologically this is madness because he has a secret human 'brother' here. It makes me feel like Nene is being messed with, unbeknownst to her... Whatever his motives are, they are bad. She sounds impatient, needy and demanding, wanting to eat a human, and Amane is there like rubbing her shoulders about it, IDK, this is really weird. I do not think this is quite the same as wanting to eat food, I think it is perhaps more comparable to a supernatural, magnetic pull, the way a vampire craves human blood for example. (At least, that's more likely to be depicted as an affinity beyond liking, sushi, yk?)

How to say... Amane feels like he is 'in charge' of Nene, guiding her, mentoring her, and kind of predatory about it... He is a more powerful, long-lived entity, and has more experience than she does with things. I feel as though he regards her as something he will eventually conquer — it's not about 'if' she'll have him, just When. He's also just a nasty guy so I do think he is very keyed into her physical status, awaiting her heat, intending to to intercept her once it commences. Certainly, Amane isn't going to let anyone else make a move... A guy with a plan.

Right before Nene would take time off, I think Amane would kind of catch wind of something, just ah, attuned to a shift in scent. (He smells her frequently, rudely.) This is like ✔Amane will remember that. Bookmarks you in my mind. Once informed she will not be working for a while it's like naruhodo... Now a smarter girlie would perhaps leave the premises, to not be accessible by This Guy Specifically, but alas. I don't think it occurs to her... So I think it's really easy for Amane to swoop in. Whether he directly knocks on her door, or stakes out her room until she leaves it, follows her on her way to the mess hall or the baths... Anything like that. (Though amusingly enough, if he was at her door, I feel like Nene would hide under a cabinet all wide-eyed. N-no, not him... *licks lips nervously*) Once she actually comes into contact with him, it's a quick descent — not able to meaningfully resist... You know, suddenly that smooth, low purr of a voice is hypnotic, the invasive touches on her shoulder prickle heat. Mrrarhhh...

Now what I like about ♀️cats is their fussiness, how they're attitude gets like... [yowls] [running up against, tail pushed to the side invitingly] [but like HISSES... SLAPS!!] As needy as Nene is, I think she will not like being messed with too long, like don't play with my hair and make eyes at me, this is serious-!! She'll be like ONEGAI!! I'm... CAN'T TAKE IT!! Cries!! Baps your face. Which only fuels Amane's condescension, now it's like oooh she's got it bad, poor thing clicks tongue... You really need my help... Well, OK, even when you act like that, I can be nice to you. ❤ He would just enjoy feeling so in control, here to alleviate a girl, shh shhh... You can rely on me. ❤ I'll treat you reeeeal nice...❤❤

For first times I like to think about human forms, almost for the most finesse, Amane fingering her a lil, penetrating, messing with loosening her yukata and undoing her hair, all these things he's wanted to do but hasn't been able to. Show, me your boobs, thanks... Rarar. But I think there's a basic satisfaction in feral sex that they'd both enjoy, alternating between sex, grooming, rolling around, flirting. Hissing, slap slap slap, purr purr...

I also like thinking about interactions between feral and human form, but that would take more trust in their dynamic. I think Nene has a little bit of dignity, if Amane holds her as a kittycat she like is difficult about it lol, I can imagine like. Letting you touch her pussy like that, is kinda, off-limits, but when accessed it's quite blissful... Able to lounge in lap, get massaged across her body, smackled a bit on her sides. I THINK her size even means some penetration can happen in this state, get a fingertip in, bump sheath against. (I'm INDULGENCE, I like to think of cat pp even in human form...) On the flip side I think Amane is quite open to being messed with as a cat, though honestly because I feel as though he's soo comfortable with Tsukasa and they are already interspecies freaks doing god knows what. Amane perhaps far too ready to hump your face, like this. Hm... Well whenever you're ready, Nene.

Naturally they'd tend to be inclined to have sex in short bursts, taking breaks between, which I think they'd enjoy, but I also think there'd be a point of wanting to push past the simple biological imperative. I kind of think of Amane as a fetishistic weirdo, too used to his human and into human behaviors... Doesn't want to only mess with Nene when she is heat, it'd actually be sad to him, if she always needed like, a biological trigger. Can be FUN, enjoy interfacing with it, but definitely intends to go beyond that, as they get closer. As a result I think Nene will be really taken on a ride, it'd feel like marathon sex with this creep. The event horizon is Tsukasa gets involved and that's... going to be weird, what with the prey-drive firing of. ? Food ? Sex ? At once ? ?? ? How strange... (All subconscious though, I think Nene would be kept in the dark for a while. And she is like not so, smart, in this world, I thinks.)

And those are... my little thoughts. :3c

[13eyond13]

Hello, new Death Note fan here. First, thanks so much for this blog of yours. Because it came out 10+ years ago, I'm afraid will hard to find any active DN acc until I came to your blog. I understand more about Death Note's characters and story thanks to you...💐

I just start DN anime and manga last year (I know it's so late), because many people said in reviews that DN is not that good and mostly overrated. After finishing it, I think, how wrong that opinion was....

Do you mind if I ask some questions :

- Is Beyond Birthday became like that because of A's suicide?

- I read somewhere that Death Note (especially L and Light's relationship) is subtext mlm like Hannibal NBC & Merlin BBC, do you agree?

- One of my friend is DN fan since 2008, and every time she watched (more than 100x) L's death, she still cried. And coping it with read L/Light fics, are you like that too?

- "L and Light are both ace and aromantic", do you agree?

- Until the end, does L figure out it was Light = Kira the whole time?

- If Mello and Near work together from the start, can Light got captured more early?

- If Light were female, do you think L/Light ship will be more common?

- Until now, have you found any couple (canon or non canon) from any media (books, tv series, movies, anime/manga, etc) that the dynamics remind you of L/Light?

- "If Ryuk were an ikemen, than Light/Ryuk ship will be more popular than Light/L", do you agree?

- Do you prefer L as top or bottom or switch with Light? Why?

- In what moments that you start ship Light with L?

Sorry for my long ask (got too excited) feel free to answer whichever you want to. Thanks @13eyond13 ....

Hi! Aw, thanks for the kind words, and I'm so glad my blog is still helping new fans out that way somehow! 😊

Let me try to quickly answer your questions here (sorry if the answers aren't very in-depth, I don't have a computer with me currently and I'm just replying to you with my phone)

- Did Beyond Birthday become like that because of A's suicide?

This is not something that is commented on directly in the novel, so it's up to fan interpretation and headcanons for that! There is only one sentence about A, and we actually don't even know if A and B knew each other or interacted with each other in any way:

Personally I DO think it's fun to imagine it's part of B's past that he and A did know each other and that it did affect him somehow, but I'm not sure if his character was actually written with that notion in mind.

- I read somewhere that Death Note (especially L and Light's relationship) is subtext mlm like Hannibal NBC & Merlin BBC, do you agree?

I think you can definitely easily read homoerotic subtext into their relationship, but I also believe most of it was not really intentionally put there by the manga creators Ohba and Obata. I think SOMETIMES there were deliberate suggestive jokes and whatnot in the manga that indicated there was some level of awareness that things between them could be seen as suggestive – like when Matsuda is questioning them only sharing their cell phone numbers with each other, and when Misa questions L's orientation whenever he handcuffs himself to Light. That doesn't mean that reading them or their relationship in a shippy way isn't valid or legitimate or interesting to do! Just that I dont think it was written with the writer knowingly going into things like "ohoho time to slyly queerbait the audience!" or something. I think Hannibal's creators were extremely deliberate with everything homoerotic that goes on between Will and Hannibal for example, but I think it happened a bit more unintentionally in Death Note originally.

- One of my friend is DN fan since 2008, and every time she watched (more than 100x)  L's death, she still cried. And coping it with read L/Light fics, are you like that too?

Haha oh wow 100x! I'm not like that personally because I had L's death spoiled for me by a comment I saw on the very first episode of the anime, so I knew it was coming! I was still really upset about it of course, he IS my fave. But actually Light's death in the anime gets a stronger emotional reaction from me than L's. I think I only ever cried during Death Note at that part where Light is thinking about his younger innocent self while he's wounded and running away, something about it gets me every time... And yes, I definitely wanted to read a lot of fics to resolve all my messy feelings about the two of them afterwards!

- "L and Light are both ace and aromantic", do you agree?

I can see why people might see them that way, though it's not my personal headcanon for them! It's one of those things people can decide for themselves rather than something I think there is an objectively "correct" answer about, really.

- Until the end, does L figure out it was Light  = Kira the whole time?

I'm not 100% sure if I'm understanding your question correctly. But I think L is always something like "PRETTY DARN SURE" Light is Kira, though he also knows he needs to have the concrete proof to back that certainty of his up. He DOES know it without a doubt once he actually has his heart attack and sees the look on Light's face in the manga, though! He thinks something like "I knew it! I wasn't wrong..." before his eyes close. Which in some way is maybe a small comfort, to know that he was able to solve this ultimate mystery for himself and know he was definitely correct about it before he died.

- If Mello and Near had worked together from the start, could Light have been captured more early?

A very good question! I unfortunately feel a bit too rusty on my successor arc plot stuff to know how to answer this one well, but I do think that Near and Mello made a very effective team whenever they collaborated, for sure.

- If Light were female, do you think L/Light ship will be more common?

I don't know if it would be more COMMON necessarily, but perhaps it would just have a slightly different sort of fanbase and legacy as a ship? I think a lot of people kinda like, and have always liked, how gay it is though? and I don't know if that really hurt the ship's popularity so much as maybe increased it even. But I'm definitely not an expert on this stuff or anything, hahaha

- Until now, have you found any couple (canon or non canon) from any media (books, tv series, movies, anime/manga, etc) that the dynamics remind you of L/Light?

Not exactly like it, no! It's quite unique to me in many ways. MAYBE the closest thing I can think of right now is NBC Hannibal, simply because of the unresolved tension and morbid dark humour and constant innuendo and cop/criminal investigative sort of stuff going on between them? But I think canon Hannigram was darker in some ways than I find canon Lawlight to be, and the parallels aren't exact by any means...

- "If Ryuk were an ikemen, than Light/Ryuk ship will be more popular than Light/L", do you agree?

Hahaha, I feel like it would be more popular as a ship than it currently is, but I'm not sure it would eclipse Lawlight! I feel it's hard to beat the antagonistic chemistry L and Light have simply due to how their roles are set up in the story as the detective and the criminal and whatnot.

- Do you prefer L as top or bottom or switch with Light? Why?

I prefer it when they take turns in fics and don't stick rigidly to one thing or the other! I think maybe because it seems realistic to me that they'd want to experiment that way with each other, and also because I just find it more interesting to read smut if they're doing stuff in a variety of ways.

- In what moments that you start ship Light with L?

I think I basically immediately felt a strong tension and chemistry between them. But I was introduced to things via the anime, and the rain scene definitely seemed extremely shippy to me and like "there's no way they weren't into each other" hahah. I think the rain scene was the main reason I went looking for shippy content about them afterwards. But I find that the manga is actually shippier to me than the anime sometimes, even though that rain scene isn't in it. Maybe because to me it feels a bit more like they're mentally and emotionally on the same page about things more often in the manga, and both seem pretty aware of the sly mind games they're playing with each other the whole time. And Light stays very fixated on and oddly reverent towards L after his death in the manga as well, which ultimately remains probably the shippiest thing about them in canon to me...

[whathorselegs]

Hi.... If you don't mind, can I ask your top 5 (or top 3) favorite characters from Bungou Stray Dogs? And why you loved them? And your top 5 favorite moments from the series? Sorry if you've answered this before.....

No need to apologise, I’m happy to answer! :D 

Lets see, fave characters, it’s so hard to narrow it down to just five because I love most of the BSD characters

Surprise to no one, Chuuya. I love my scrunkly boy. For as little as he appears in the main story he steals every scene he’s in, his light novels have so much character to explore. His backstory is wild. There’s so much for me to sink my teeth into in terms of character and so little there’s a lot of room to theorise. He has a fun personality to attempt to write as well. I have a lot of Chuuya posts so I won’t rant too much about him here.

Kunikida was definitely my first favourite character. Strict but caring, follows the rules but they are his own rules, reluctant mentor figure, thrown into a high position at such a young age, really smart but such a dumbass. Dazai’s character in season 1 wouldn’t nearly be so enjoyable if he didn’t have Kunikida to reign him in. I love his dynamic with Atsushi, he doesn’t want to be a mentor, but he doesn’t want this kid to get hurt. So he tries to land somewhere in the middle. He tries to get Atsushi to arrive at the right conclusion himself, he wants him to grow on his own, but will be there for him when he needs it.

Yosano, BSD needs more Yosano content. Again, I loved her dynamic with Atsushi during the train heist. Her and Kaiji’s conflict of beliefs about the value of human life and death was so interesting. Her past with Mori was definitely interesting too, but I am much more interested in seeing more of the present day Yosano. I don’t want her to be forced out into the field, because that’s something she doesn’t want, but I would love to just know more about her role in the agency. Her day to day. More of her beliefs. More exploration of how her trauma affected her ability to heal people. Is she even a real qualified doctor?? Did she actually go to med school??? Because some part of me wouldn't be surprised she didn’t, given her history.

Akutagawa siblings. I’m putting them as one because a lot of what makes Akutagawa interesting to me is his relationship with Gin. I love main timeline Akutagawa and all his complexities but Beast!Aku is golden. I love the Beast movie so much that when I picture Akutagawa I picture the actor, not the cartoon man, haha. They are both little creatures to me, I wish their dynamic was more explored. I wish Gin was explored more in general, pretty sure we see them the least out of all of Black Lizard.

Dazai. Here’s the thing, originally, I wasn’t much of a Dazai fan. I didn’t not like him, but he wasn’t my favourite. BUT then I started reading the real Dazai Osamu’s works and I love his writing. Rewatching BSD and starting the manga, after I had read some of Dazai Osamu’s works, gave me a better appreciation for the BSD character. NLH, Setting Sun, Flowers of Buffoonery and Dazai Osamu’s fairytale retellings, all very much affect how I view Dazai and how I write his character. I have a very love/hate relationship with writing him though because I’m constantly questioning whether or not he would do X actions, but then I remember the characters in the books would, so I write it in anyways, haha.

Honourable mentions: Aya, Kenji, Kyouka, Atsushi, Bram, all of The Flags, Lucy (Okay I’m going to stop before I list them all)

Favourite moments:

It’s got to be Chuuya fighting a literal dragon, right? I’ve rewatched Dead Apple a lot, I never tire of Chuuya throwing a building down a dragon’s throat. And of course Chuuya screaming Dazai’s name in the midst of corruption. Not even in a shippy way, but in the context of Dazai should be dead, as far as anyone else knows he’s dead, but Chuuya believes in his ability to survive. He believes even when it’s supposed to be impossible, if he uses corruption, Dazai will be there to stop it. And if he’s wrong, he accepts dying alongside him. That’s about as ride or die as it gets and I love it.

Atsushi jumps to save Kyouka. He has no reason to, other than despite all he’s been through, he still believes people deserve to live, they deserve to be told that. Kyouka was willing to die to stop hurting people, to pay penance for an ability she had no control over and Atsushi was willing to die trying to save her. I don’t care what people say, Atsushi is a good main character, I don’t care that he cries a lot or that he needs saving and losses fights. I care about how much he cares. I care that he sees good in people like Kyouka and Dazai, he sees the good in Lucy. Moments like this make me love BSD.

Similar vein, Lucy frees Atsushi. Helping Atsushi is a lose/lose scenario in Lucy’s perspective. The guild is all she has, the only place that has ever given her some value. Atsushi is the man that robbed her of that value. But in this confrontation she learns Atsushi is a lot like her, that in this one conversation he has attempted to understand her pain better than anyone else in the guild and so she takes a chance on Atsushi. She chooses to help him and Yokohama despite knowing it will cost her everything she has. And she does it with a smile on her face like it’s nothing. Love Lucy so much.

Ranpo can’t ride public transport by himself. This one is a little silly, but you see I am a neurodivergent adult who also really struggles with public transport. Trains scare the heck out of me, so I don’t go on them alone. Ranpo is just like me for real and it gave me a silly little serotonin to see it.

Okay, I tried not doing two Chuuya scenes but Chuuya showing up to save the agency in a helicopter and throwing bullets at the Hunting Dogs is also one of my faves. Especially as he was sent there to save them and then Kunikida goes and jumps out the thing and blows himself up anyway, it’s just funny. BSD does a good job of balancing action and humour and serious moments very well. This is supposed to be an epic sacrifice for Kunikida, his friends all think he’s dead. But looking at it from Chuuya’s perspective is funny. People say “Oh, why didn’t Chuuya do anything” like Kunikida really gave him a chance to. Maybe he did have a plan and maybe he didn’t get a chance to do anything because Tall, Blond and Explody over there leapt out the door.

[autumnslance]

Prompt #17: Novel

Revised on Ao3.

((Of course it’s shippy nonsense that makes me finally hit 2k words during this year’s challenge. Borrows a line of click dialogue from the ARR patches to start, and vaguely references other things I’ve written over time. This came from a meta prompt response years ago and been percolating in an ideas notes file since, this prompt finally brought it to fruition.))

“Ballads of bloody battles, valiant knights, heroic sacrifice... Trite fare, but who am I to question the preferences of Ishgardian noblewomen?” Thancred said, skimming the small Coerthan collection on the Scions’ library shelves.

“Then why have I oft seen you borrow such books?” Aeryn asked, returning her own selection to its place.

Thancred watched from the corner of his eye. “If one is to understand a potential ally—or potential foe—one such avenue is through their current arts and literature.” He grinned and winked at her. “Besides; I did not say that I myself don’t occasionally enjoy a simple story now and then, to relax my mind.”

She shook her head and gazed over the collection. They had discussed such things before, when debating literature and songs. He always seemed to have a new answer to tease her with.

“Need something to read while in Ul’dah with the good Captain Ilberd?” Thancred asked. As she nodded he considered, then held up a finger. “Wait here a moment, if you please.”

Aeryn headtilted, watching as he walked toward the hall leading to their various rooms.

He returned a few moments later, carrying a book with a bright blue spine and crimson covers. “Here, I do believe this will be to your tastes.” He offered the novel to her.

Aeryn took it, raising a brow. Thancred shrugged. “While you enjoy romantic tales, they tend to not be of the…tawdry persuasion. That one is a typical story from a popular author; sisters of good family fallen onto hard times, and so must marry well to secure their fortunes and virtues.”

“One of your favorites, too?” Aeryn asked, grinning.

He gave her an exaggerated frown. “I’ll thank you to not wound my reputation so, my lady.”

She giggled, and thanked him, tucking the book into her pack. It did sound like a decent light read.

—

Aeryn took a deep breath and finally opened the door to her room.

She slumped in relief when she saw it was intact; after what the common areas had looked like, she had been afraid the traitorous Braves had ransacked her quarters as well.

But all seemed to be as she had left it, if colder and darker than the last time she had been here, to prepare for That Banquet.

She lit the lamps and wrinkled her nose. A fine layer of dust lay over every surface. Laundry never picked up stewed in the basket in the corner. A plate with pebbly crumbs and a stained teacup still sat upon her desk, next to…

Aeryn picked up the red-and-blue-bound novel, idly flipping through its pages. She had finished it quickly, and then had reread it to better grasp the surprisingly deep story and characters, meaning to talk it over with Thancred when she returned it to him.

But she never had the chance. And there had been no sign or word of the rogue, nor the other archons, since that awful night.

She pulled the book against her chest and tried to shut out the roar of falling stones in her ears.

After a deep breath, Aeryn set the book aside to clean. Dusting, sweeping, throwing out the ruined laundry, taking dishes to the kitchen, getting clean sheets for her bed. Magic helped make the task less impossible.

It was quite late before the room met her standards well enough to retire. She picked up the novel from the desk and took it with her, to read its comfortably familiar story again until she fell asleep.

She dreamed once more of the tunnel.

—

Aeryn ached as she returned to her room. The conference had again been a disaster with Nidhogg’s appearance. What he had done to Estinien tore at her—as did Aymeric’s vow to free his friend from this torment by whatever means necessary, after he had tried to shoot the creature.

I can’t accept that.

Not after everything they had been through. She had lost so much, too much. Minfilia, Ysayle, Haurchefant…to lose Estinien as well?

She feared it would break Alphinaud. She feared it would break her.

On top of all of that was the strange matter of the so-called Warrior of Darkness. Arbert, he had called himself, in their brief conversation outside Falcon’s Nest. He looked like a pale copy of her brother, but the intensity of the man’s blue eyes…Aeryn shivered.

He claimed she resembled his late sister in many ways. A poor joke, if their paths were inevitably entwined in some manner, but she hoped it would not be as enemies. She had more than enough of those.

Especially Nidhogg.

There had been reasons her mother hadn’t wanted Aeryn and Zaine to return to Eorzea, had taken them far from Ishgard’s unending war.

And yet here Aeryn was regardless.

She began to shuck her gear as she considered; she desperately needed a bath and to sleep in her own bed, far from the Holy See and its despairing anger. Far from Aymeric’s vow and the expectations to help see it through.

She hung her coat, and as she turned, her eyes caught on a familiar blue spine on her bookshelves, laying atop other books.

“Dammit,” she muttered; she had forgotten, again, to return the novel to Thancred, and he was now off to who knew where, leaving only a short, cryptic note behind.

Things had been difficult since the Antitower. There was no dancing, or singing, or discussing books between them recently; only strange, awkward, or even temperamental interactions. Their friendship was slowly rebuilding, especially after the tournament, but they were still not as they had been Before.

Aeryn picked up the book, smoothing her hand over the cover.

They had thought Thancred lost to an ancient evil once, too, yet she had been able to recover him, with Hydaelyn’s aid. And while the Crystal had been silent even with their connection re-established, Aeryn was not without help now.

She took the book with her to the bath, careful of the water as she reread the comfortable tale. She’d have to remember to give it back when Thancred returned from his mission. Maybe discussing literature again would help ease the tension between them.

—

“I hope you brought something interesting to read while we’re at sea,” Alphinaud teased his sister as the Misery pulled out of Limsa’s port, Urianger barely visible on the pier.

“Sonuvabitch,” Aeryn muttered, startling the twins.

“Aeryn?” Alisaie eyed her.

“I forgot to return that book again.”

“What?” Alphinaud frowned.

Aeryn shook her head. “It’s nothing, honestly. Just…with everything that’s happened recently I forgot a book that Thancred had loaned me.” She laughed sheepishly. “As I said, nothing to worry about, until we return from the Far East.”

Unless Thancred noted it on the shelf in her room, as he finished sweeping up the utter mess from her pack he had assisted her in cleaning out. She could even see in her mind’s eye where she had left it, on the table before her fireplace, its red cover standing out so she would notice and remember this time, for certain, but…

She realized she was idly rubbing the bandages under her jacket that wrapped around her torso and supported the healing for the injury the Legatus had dealt her.

There had been quite a few more important things recently to keep track of than a long-borrowed novel, though at least she and Thancred were getting along again.

—

It felt like it had been ages since she had been in the Rising Stones. Between Ala Mhigo and Doma, trips to Mor Dhona had been few and far between.

She had returned with bad news. It had to be an Ascian parading about in Zenos’s body. A horrifying prospect in many ways, though somehow less terrifying than the man being alive after all. She felt she could deal with an Ascian better than the late prince.

Yet information had to be gathered, intelligence gleaned, research done. And so Thancred and Y’shtola were off. 

Aeryn hoped Thancred came home soon, as this new dynamic to their relationship still felt rather tentative, given how their duties too often separated them. She very much wished to explore more facets of this shift. She was surprised again by how much more of him she wished to explore as well, in more ways than one.

Face burning at such thoughts, Aeryn entered her room, grateful their comrades’ efforts kept it warm and clean even during extended absences. She hung up her jacket, placed her sword on its rack, took off her boots, and ran the bath.

As Aeryn readied for bed, she paused at the sight of the familiar red-and-blue-bound novel upon the table where she often kept her paints and sketchpads.

Except she thought she had not left the book there, the last time she had been home. It was difficult to recall exactly but she was almost certain it had been on her desk, near to the door so as not to forget again to return it, though of course she had.

Aeryn picked up the book, smoothing her hands over the familiar covers, certain of each inlay and scuff. Well, even if she was misremembering, there was no opportunity now to return it, with the original owner off on a mission.

Instead of in this room with her…Her face flushed again and she finished preparing for bed.

She ended up rereading the familiar tale late into the night.

—

Aeryn read the novel again while sitting at his bedside in Dawn’s Respite. Even if he wasn’t truly there, the familiar story and its characters, bound in faded, well-worn red and blue, were a comfort as she wondered what was happening to her friends.

—

“This is an old favorite, perhaps we could read this one,” Thancred said, standing before the bookshelves.

Aeryn glanced over from where she was attempting to fit a few new outfits into the closet. “Now you’re teasing me,” she said.

He lifted a brow as he crossed the room, holding the blue-and-red-bound novel in hand. “How so?”

“I’ve been meaning to return that to you for ages.”

Now he frowned, a puzzled look on his face. “I’m…not following. If anything, I must confess I once borrowed it without asking, during one of your missions to Doma, as I was pleased to see you had a copy. I was even more cautious than you claim I normally am with books, and put it right back when finished with it.”

Aeryn blinked. “But…Thancred, you loaned me this book!”

“I did? Are you certain?”

“Yes! Back when we were first getting tangled up in Ishgard, before the Banquet. I didn’t have a chance to return it, and every time I think of it, something happens to drive it from my mind again.”

Thancred thought for a moment; the additional years he had spent in the First made those memories even hazier, she knew. “I know I had owned a copy at one time, but thought I had lost it on a mission. I had entirely forgotten I’d loaned it out.”

“You forgot?”

“And you’ve been fretting about it all this time whenever you see it, haven’t you?”

“Well, yes, I mean—“

He laughed, and she crossed her arms. “It’s not that funny.”

“Oh yes it is,” he answered, setting the book aside to cup her face in his hands. “And utterly adorable.”

She wrinkled her nose, trying not to give him that satisfaction but the simultaneously soft yet also wickedly amused look—how the hells did he do that?—was difficult as ever to resist.

Aeryn finally sniffed. “I suppose I can’t fault you for not keeping track, given you are hard on books, and the poor thing’s lasted longer than it would have otherwise in your care.”

“I’m not that bad.”

“Yes you are! Coffee stains and folded corners if not whole pages, and—“

Thancred stopped her with a kiss, and while she enjoyed it, she still huffed afterward.

“The point is,” he said, forestalling further debate. “Doesn’t quite matter which of us it belongs to now, does it?”

“I…suppose not,” she replied, knowing she was blushing again.

“Good. Then let’s enjoy it together; a familiar story like this may yet have new insights for us, and I’d truly love to hear your thoughts on some points.”

Aeryn conceded, and they soon retired to bed, curled up together with the old novel, comfortably rereading together late into the night.

[2af-afterdark]

Book Club

Rating: Mature

Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply

Category: Gen

Fandom: Shall We Date?: Obey Me!

Characters: Satan, Asmodeus, Solomon, Simeon

Additional Tags: slice of life, Book club gone wrong (right?), not meant to be shippy but I guess it can come off like that at some points, author thinks they are funny (they aren’t), some sexual descriptions but not actually smut

Summary: Stan’s book club read a dirty scene. Satan has feelings about it.

A/N: This is more a weird slice of life with slightly mature themes than anything. Not sexually explicit, but they do talk about it.

Word Count: 665

Satan closed the book abruptly, shutting his eyes so he didn’t have to look at any of the others, “I believe that is enough. Perhaps we should skip this week and choose something more appropriate next time.”

“Oh no, please keep reading. This is amusing.” Solomon leaned back with a smirk, waiting for anyone to comment on what they had all just heard and the words they had seen.

“I do not think so!” Satan exclaimed.

“I am confused,” Simeon interjected, “What made you so upset?”

A cat-like smile crossed Asmo’s face, “Well, you see, the protagonist was about to-”

“Do NOT finish that statement!” Satan warns.

“Why not? Simeon asked.”

“Because he clearly doesn’t know what is about to happen!”

“And you do? My, my~ I didn’t realize you had such a dirty mind, Satan.” The lust demon teased with a knowing smirk, “I am just trying to make sure he understands the book. Don’t you think it’s only fair? Agree with me here, Solomon.”

The wizard shrugged, “I think this is hilarious.” And that was as much as he cared to get involved.

Asmo hummed with a tiny pout, “Shouldn’t an author know about these kinds of situations?”

“Not for fantasy novels!” Why was Satan yelling so much?

“I am still confused.” Simeon finally cut in again, “Why are you so upset by the fact that the protagonist was about to masturbate? Is it because they were fantasizing about someone they had just met? Or was it the flowery language? I personally thought it was handled decently considering they were trying to avoid an explicit rating. Though, I do think they should have faded to black a little earlier than they did.”

Satan and Asmo looked at Simeon dumbfounded while Solomon burst into laughter.

“Did I say something weird?”

“No, no,” Solomon tried to speak through his continuous merriment, “I just think they didn’t expect you to have that kind of opinion.”

“Oh? I apologize. It’s clear that Satan is uncomfortable so perhaps I should not have said anything.” He didn’t mean to ruin the atmosphere.

All Satan could do was stare on and blush, trying to find the words to deny that he had been uncomfortable but also knowing that he didn’t particularly want to keep reading, “How can you all handle this so casually.”

“It’s hot.” Asmo.

“I wrote worse than this back in my days.” Solomon.

“It’s only sex, even if it is a fantasy.” Simeon, “The only thing is that the other person didn’t consent to be a part of it, but they are clearly the love interest so I assume that they will be enamored once they discover that fact. Also, the poetry you wrote back then is still quite enchanting, Solomon.”

“Thank you, Simeon.” Solomon turned back to the page where they had left off and stared down at the words before him, “Can I keep going now or are you going to cancel the rest of the day?”

This was supposed to be a post-apocalyptic dystopian novel, so who in their right mind would include such a scene? And, out of all of them, only Satan seemed to be bothered by it, “Can we just skip those scenes for now?”

“Oh, Satan~” Asmo scooted closer to his brother and wrapped a single arm around his shoulder, “Of course we can. Those are more fun to read in private, anyway. Especially if that private is you and someone you want to reenact them with~” Okay, now he was just picking on Satan. Only a little though.

“Don’t tease him too much, Asmo.” Solomon cleared his throat, “Now, where were we?”

Simeon answered, “Somewhere around the phrase ‘My hand brushed between my legs, gliding as light as a feather against my sex’ if I recall correctly.”

Asmo and Satan, once again, looked at Simeon in confusion, wondering how he said that line so easily, from memory, without the faintest hint of embarrassment or fascination. Angels really were strange.

[aberooski]

writer emoji ask!! 🤭🎉🌞✨🥺

Oh boy, here we go!! Thanks for the ask, pal!! 😄

🤭 - I think my favorite tag would have to be Never let Chazz go into the woods alone akakak I mean it's my number 1 rule after all lol. Of course the running bit is that it happens all the time and it really never goes well for him now does it?

🌞 - Do I have a preferred time of the day to write? Not really, I just kinda write when the desire strikes. Could be the day, could be 3 am, who knows? But I am more of a night owl, my brain kinda wakes up when I'm supposed to be sleeping so I guess in that sense I do write more during the evening/nighttime than any other time of day.

🥺 - Oh boy I could write a novel about moments and interactions that put me in my feels you have no idea 😭

This question's gonna turn this answer into a novel I'm so sorry akskskak

I think if I had to narrow it down to maybe a few things I could probably say akaksk

As far as interactions go, like ones that happen a lot every single time Hassleberry specifically is protective of or exhibits concern for Syrus I get very emo. Like I added more of those moments to the SBH re-release because I loved the moments I'd done in newer fics so much. But the one specifically that always gets me is the moment in chapter 11 of OUAD where Hassleberry goes to check on Syrus after coming out of his berserked state.

Also the entirety of Salt In the Wound. Hassleberry being worried that just touching him will hurt him because he's so strong and Syrus trying to reach/call for Hassleberry to reassure him but he's too weak and hurt but then Hassleberry says fuck it and grabs Sy's hand while he's just lying there hurt in Jaden's arms 😭 and Hassleberry being upset seeing Sy's scar from the duplicate Camula bite a personal headcanon of mine a moment shared in the re-release of Sustained by Hate that I love

Of course all the copious amounts of moments like that between Jay and Sy make me fuckin cry but when those two have moments like that it hits DIFFERENT and like not even in a shippy way I don't view their relationship that way, they're just cute 😭

And really just SITW in general. Sy is my baby, he's my favorite character and I've never felt more that I was the same person as a character before. Zane needed social consequences for hurting him so deliberately and I wouldn't be able to sleep at night if I didn't defend Sy's honor. But also the fact that after all of that Syrus still loves his brother and calls out to him when he walks away despite everything just shatters my heart.

And speaking of moments between Jay and Sy I cry over them constantly but there's one moment in particular that kills me man.

There's this one specific moment in chapter 20 of Sons of The Stars where Jaden and the squad, with Axel's help, break into Viper's fortress and sneak into the dungeon to rescue Syrus, who was kidnapped by Axel in chapter 17. And when they get there and break open Sy's cell they have this moment:

It's the "They didn't hurt you, did they?" for me 😭😭😭

Oh yes and literally any Dad Crowler(tm) moment makes me cry. And I exclusively write Dad Crowler(tm) so I'm dead.

I'm almost done with this question bear with me a sec akskak

A moment I've done twice now in slightly different ways that makes me sob my eyes out is that I've given Chazz and Alexis a variation of this 7R Cloti moment in both SoTS and SBH

Of course for Chazz and Alexis the intent is purely platonic whereas I'm screaming and crying and foaming at the mouth because Cloti for life 😤 but tender, vulnerable moments between Chazz and Alexis kill me. I love seeing her caring for him because well, in the show their dynamic is......

But I've always loved the idea of them being close. They're platonic soulmates and she's his found family sister 😭

Also any and all moments where Alexis is protecting Atticus, I'm not okay. That is my favorite Alexis.

Also the entire scene with Chazz and Atticus in chapter 11 of SBH leading up to them holding hands that 😩😭

And real quick before I finally move on to the next question I'm so sorry the NUMBER ONE! Stormshipping moment that gets me all kinds of fucked up!

In OUAD. In chapter 5. We all know what I'm talking about.

🎉 - I honestly have had very unhealthy thoughts about what makes me consider a fic successful. I've felt at one time or another that every single thing I've done was a failure. That it was a flop and I wasted all this time and effort and brain power on ideas that no one but me gives a damn about. I attach so much of my own personal value to how many views and likes and comments my fics get, which isn't really a lot. So I get super bummed out all the time and it makes me not wanna write. But lately I've been trying to climb out of that hole and I've told myself this.

As chessey as it is to say, as long as one person finds enjoyment in something I do, then it wasn't a waste of time. If I find enjoyment in something I've created, it wasn't a waste of time. It was worth it. It was a success because I saw it through and I did it.

I still get bummed out when my stuff doesn't perform super well, well because I'm really excited about what I do and I want to share it with people and have people like my work. But I'm trying to be more optimistic about what constitutes success or not. Of course I still love comments and likes, they make my day and I get so few of them. But when I get sad I look back at the ones I have gotten and I remember that there are people who really do like my work besides me, and that makes me feel a lot better about it all. 😊

✨ - and finally, the hardest thing for me to do 😅

If I had to give myself a compliment for my work, I kinda have 2 I suppose. The first one is kinda a back-handed compliment but the second one is legit so it evens out I guess.

I legitimately think my ideas are good. My concepts for my plots and fics are great.

Camula coming back for revenge? Amazing. Stormshipping Sleeping Beauty adaptation? S+ tier. Whole ass fantasy au I built from the ground up?? Wow. Chazzerella??????? Inspired.

Crossover with GX and Fatal Frame 5???? And Stormshipping + Alexis Mario crossover??????? Literal galaxy brain.

And so on. But I also feel like my ideas are better than my ability to execute them. So I often feel like they're better in my head than how they actually turn out. And I'm sure I'm not the only one who has that problem with their work. And in that vein I also do the most approximately all of the time and it's kinda to my detriment. I could make writing so much easier on myself and not burn myself out every time I write a fic if I just allowed myself not to include every single tiny little thing. This is why I have such a hard time writing one shots and shorter fics akskksks

But okay, time for a legitimate compliment I guess 😅

I legitimately feel like when I write a character, I'm doing right by them. Like I feel like I do characterization really well, and every Fandom I've written for I've had at least 1 person tell me I wrote the characters really well.

I also think I write some pretty damn good dialog sometimes, and occasionally I'm actually funny or convey romance somewhat okay.

Like I'm good at writing villains. I really enjoy writing mean characters or just generally characters that speak more formally whether they're villains or not. I think that comes from my love of Final Fantasy 12 and how they like exclusively wax poetic in that game akskskka

I've still got a lot of areas I could improve on though, but I think I've at least nailed down a few 😅

[lowlights]

FIRST OF ALL, hello ily. second of all, i am here for shippy things and i'll make this brief ok: i'm in my 30s, i have two cats who are basically my children, i write A LOT, i am easily distracted by almost anything, i play video games in my free time. i'm 5'5", long brown hair, green eyes, a chunky queen. my favorite thing to do is sit next to someone and scroll tiktok while they're ignoring me for their own activity while also maintaining physical contact. ok ily thank u BYE.

My darlingest Birdie.

Believe me when I say I could pair you with about six different Pedro boys and make the case for each. But in the end, there can only be one.

It was always going to be Dinjamin D. Djarin.

Your wit would attract him first. Your snark would make him chuckle under his helmet, and he would be grateful that you couldn't see his smile or the way he can't take his eyes off of you. Because right after he notices your sharp mind, he's taking in your soft curves. He would watch you reach for something up high and mutter dank farrik as your shirt would ride up, before walking over and getting it for you himself.

He knows you could do it by yourself, but he wants to help you so badly- this is our acts of service boy. Of course he's going to reach that thing for you, he loves you. Of course he bought you a weapon, he loves you. Of course he is going to go without meals without telling you when the food runs low, he loves you.

Words are a funny thing for Din. He still isn't used to a lot of them coming out of his mouth in any great quantity, but for some reason he feels compelled to share more things with you than he ever has before. You would ask him questions and be truly interested in the answers, and he wouldn't have to wonder what your motives were. He also wouldn't have to worry about you taking offense to how blunt he is sometimes, you just get each other. Din doesn't need words to make you realize how much he loves you- he will worship your body given any chance.

I think Din would love how you care for and adore the creatures around you. No animal or person is lesser-than (unless it's a human being a real dbag- you don't stand for those), and Din appreciates that quality so much.

Din would love, love, love how you can spend time doing your own thing with him. I feel like he would be so smitten with how you're happy leaning against him while you play oh a holopad while he cleans his weapons or something like that. You also definitely sat back to back to eat food together before he took his helmet off for you, which he would confess later was when he fell in love with you.

Din is the person you need when there's a storm- or any sort of crisis, small or big. He wouldn't make fun of you for being afraid of something. He promised to protect you and take care of you- that means throwing himself in front of you when needed, but also holding your hand when you're scared or flying you across the galaxy to get you the baked good you're craving.

He's going to beg for you to read him your novel and ramble about your niche character HCs. He would be so proud of you. I'm sorry to ramble on about you and Din, but I've been thinking about this for days and I'm so excited. I hope you like. ILY.

[awkwardnoob]

hi yes hello i would like to hear you talk about the parallels between Alfyn and Darius please

O_O I never expected an ask like this, so it kind of sucker punched me and I'm in shock. I was expecting anon hate or something because that's what usually happens when I get asks out of the blue. Thank you anon you're so sweet!

Warning: Possible Spoilers

Okay, so first off, the best part: A lot of this has a decent chance of being entirely intentional because of how Octopath handles its storytelling, which I'll get to later.

Also, getting the most obvious parallel out of the way: They both wear green. Which seems silly and like a coincidence, but when you look at the other stuff it becomes suspiciousTM.

The biggest thing, obviously, is their personalities and relationship to Therion. Even if you don't believe Therion's relationship with either is shippy and are entirely platonic, Therion is still a key component of why they parallel. (Speaking of, Therion also parallels Miguel a little bit, which is some minor evidence to why this whole thing was intentional)

Darius doesn't trust anyone, he's shady, he's dishonest, disloyal, and he threw Therion off a cliff after acting like they were brothers for years. Anytime Darius opens his mouth and seems friendly, he's just trying to use that person. When they're no longer useful, or something better comes along, he throws people away. He's greedy to the 10th power and beyond.

Alfyn though? He doesn't have a dishonest bone in his body. Anytime someone mentions that he could get more by taking advantage, or hell, even just doing the bare minimum and making all his patients pay him, he just goes "but why tho" like this is some foreign concept to him. Even the customers he does charge (which he does occasionally, when they're not poor), he still undercharges them. He attaches himself to people like the most clingy of puppies and people happily accept him with open arms. That's how his 'inquire' skill works. Even having Therion tell Alfyn during his chap 1 all about his plans to rob Ravus is justified, because Alfyn can inquire shady criminals too! Cyrus' works kinda like he's being sneaky with his questions and interrogating people into spilling the beans, but Alfyn's is literally just 'I'm nice and lovable, answer all my questions'. Alfyn's 'worst' behavior was just pricking Venessa with slumber thorn and giving her horrible guilt induced nightmares, which is just mildly mischievous compared to her crime of knowingly almost murdering several people including children, or Darius' crime of getting close to Therion (for years!) only to throw him off a cliff for money.

Also, here is the thing: Most of the travelers have dialogue in their travel banters with Therion that denounce his life as a thief in some way. The ones who don't are A) Primrose, who is out to murder some fuckers and would be a hypocrite, and B) Alfyn. He's wholesome and supportive to Therion in every damn banter. He tells Therion he has his back in both Therion's chap 3 and 4 banters. Unlike Darius, he means it. Even in Therion's chapter 2, Alfyn is impressed by Therion and trying to crack into that prickly, chestnut like exterior, not denouncing his occupation (and in chap 3 Alfyn says Therion/Therion's job has a time and place in the world too, while Darius told Therion he wasn't useful and was meant to be thrown away)

Now we get into how I know all of this shit is likely entirely intentional: Octopath puts passive character behavior into fucking everything. Have Olberic challenge most of the people in his starting town, and instead of reacting in terror or being confused, they know who Olberic is and most are like "sure dude let's tussle". Cyrus believes knowledge is to be shared. His special ability has him figure out an enemies weakness because he's such a smarty, and what does he do? He immediately shares this knowledge with the party.

So what does that have to do with Darius and Alfyn? Easy, Darius' weaknesses as a boss. Darius is weak to both Axes and Ice, the things Alfyn can use without subclassing. Sure, Cyrus can use ice and H'aanit can use axes, but neither have both unless they subclass.

But we're not done with that yet! Because his OTHER weaknesses are spears and wind. Tressa's natural abilities. The other natural parallel to thieves are merchants (so Tressa parallels both Therion and Darius). Why choose Alfyn's natural weakness exploits if Tressa was the only parallel? Because Alfyn is a parallel too! To Darius specifically. Alfyn has been supporting Therion this whole time, being exactly the kind of honest and loyal person Therion needs after being betrayed. You think it was Cordelia and Heathcote doing that? Fuck no, they interacted like 6 times tops for 5 minutes his entire story. It was Alfyn and the other travelers who defrosted Therion, and Alfyn being a natural counter to Darius in the boss fight, plus all this other shit, tells me Alfyn had a lot to do with it. If they just wanted you to bring a healer, they could have had Darius be weak to staves and/or light too, but no, they picked both weakness exploits of the healer who already has parallels him. You're meant to bring Alfyn.

They also get paired up often in outside material. They're together as a spirit in smash bros, white day had Therion comforting Alfyn, there is an entire novel with side stories that group up the travelers into 2s, and Alfyn and Therion are their own group, in a chapter titled 'trust and betrayal' with an illustration to boot, and there is a group art where Alfyn has his arm around Therion and Therion seems to passively accept this rather than being angry or trying to shove him off. Outside material stresses their bond with each other, and the other person Therion was shown to have a strong bond with (tho unknowingly one sided) was Darius. It's all clearly very intentional that Darius and Alfyn are meant to parallel each other, even if they don't properly interact in game.

Hopefully this pleases you anon. I tried to remember everything.

[my-mt-heart]

Hello, wonderful person! I feel like you are always answering questions about ship rumors, drama, and putting out ship related fires so often that we never get to hear your opinions on fun shippy things anymore! As such, I have some questions for you!

1) What are some of your favorite Caryl headcanons?(Example: Daryl is an absolute bookworm & has been since he was a kid. The man will read anything you put in front of him, from instruction manuals to sci-fi novels. Carol knows this & would bring him books to keep him company while he was off being a hermit in the woods.)

2) What is an overused trope that you wouldn't mind Caryl stumbling into on the way to them going canon during the remainder of the show?

3) What is one(or some?!) thing (conversation, event, or item) that helped build Caryl's relationship that you felt like was underutilized that you'd like to see as a callback either before the end of TWD or in the spinoff?(besides what happened to Lizzie and Mika, cuz I feel like we all want them to acknowledge that and have Carol try to heal that wound)?

Sorry if the questions were stale or have been answered before. I just value your brain so much & feel like so many people are wrapped up in the negatives lately! I appreciate you!

Aww, babe. I appreciate you too and I love these questions. Okay here it goes.

1. I've decided that Carol and Daryl did not meet for the first time at the quarry. Oh, no. Actually, they had a random cross as teenagers where one of them did something nice for the other. For example, Teenage Daryl was at the grocery store when he noticed Teenage Carol at the next register, unable to purchase something because she didn't have enough money. Her family was pretty poor too. About to be turned away, Teenage Daryl kindly gave her the crumpled dollar bills he was going to use to buy his dad a pack of smokes and beer (fake ID). Merle was right. Daryl's always been the sweet one. Teenage Carol is grateful. They share a charged look. Outside the store, Teenage Carol thanks a bashful teenage Daryl again and they have a short, but sweet conversation, though they never reveal their names to each other. Boom. Fate sealed.

P.S. I'm so with you on the book thing. I think Daryl probably learned a lot of what he knows from reading. Aside from instruction manuals, I bet his favorite stuff to read includes historical fiction and non-fiction, plus mythology and folklore. Also, anything that would impress Carol i.e. The Golden Age of Piracy ;)

2. The thing is, they're already stumbling through several overused tropes which is fine if they're nuanced. For example, explicitly stating that they're best friends (the A side of the best friends to lovers trope), establishing Ezekiel and Connie as foils to make them feel less worthy of each other, tearing down their relationship so it can be built back up, one of them (Carol) thinking they're too broken and the other one (Daryl) having to tell them otherwise, a nightmarish ex-gf, Leah, who shares qualities with the endgame gf. I could go on.

A couple tropes we haven't seen from them yet, but could work really well are confessing in the middle of a heated argument and/or sealing the relationship with a big, emotional kiss after a grueling battle where they almost lost each other.

3. Definitely the grove convo because, like you said, it's critical to Carol's healing process. Another obvious one, though not underutilized, is the Cherokee rose. That symbolizes the very thing that bound Daryl and Carol in the first place, which is hope. It just has to come up again somehow.

"Man of honor" would be an interesting callback since S11 is dealing with Daryl's hero complex. I want him to admit to Carol that he's been trying to live by it ever since she said it, and then she can reassure him he doesn't have to save anyone. He's already the most honorable man she knows.

S7/S8 totally skipped over a conversation where they address the lie Daryl told Carol about defeating the Saviors before they had a chance to hurt anyone. It probably has no relevance now, but I still wish we would've gotten that. I know a lot of people also wanted Daryl to tell Carol about Negan torturing him. For some reason, that doesn't bother me so much. I imagine he did tell her off screen.

I'm not holding my breath but it'd be great if the double capper and Leah's knife came up again at some point too. I know the jasper stone also never got any payoff, though I've never been sure if that relates to Caryl or not (someone convince me!!)

Anyways, this was super fun and refreshing. Let's do it again soon.

[chacusha]

I just want to talk about one of my favorite Quodo scenes. You know, as I do. So S2 E18 Profit and Loss, for all that it’s focused on a one-episode love interest for Quark (and a romance with Natima so intense that it makes Quark very uncharacteristically be willing to risk his life and even give up the bar for the sake of pursuing it), it has some really amazing Quodo scenes. In particular, it has a really lengthy conversation between Quark and Odo that features some great things like (1) establishing important aspects of both of their characters and their relationship, (2) lots of intimate leaning over each other and casual touches, and (3) a flirtatious and shippy dynamic.

Let me walk through the whole scene because there’s a lot to analyze here.

The scene opens with Quark coming to talk to Odo about the urgent need to release Natima rather than handing her over to the Cardassian government who will execute her. Quark tries multiple tacks, all of which fail:

First, he tries to make the appeal that releasing the Cardassian dissidents would lead to a better, brighter Cardassia, which obviously Odo doesn’t buy. Quark doesn’t care about that.

Quark immediately pivots to spinning that change as one that would lead to him getting more profits -- more plausible, at least, but Odo is still skeptical. In response, knowing that Odo doesn’t find benefiting Quark financially to be a worthy cause, Quark impishly says, “Now Odo... don’t allow my greed to keep you from doing the right thing.” Here he’s making a small appeal to Odo’s moral system rather than Quark’s.

But that’s not the reason why Odo was skeptical. He’s skeptical because Quark isn’t being honest about his motivations.

“I know you better than you think, Quark.” - Moment #1 in this scene where the long history and enefriend relationship between Quark and Odo is highlighted.

Odo prompts Quark to bring up the third and more honest consideration: that Quark is in love with Natima. Odo asks Quark why he didn’t just say that from the start, which prompts Quark to go into a long rant about how Odo is incapable of understanding his feelings while Odo listens awkwardly: “What was I supposed to say? That I love her? That I would do anything for her? That without her my life would be meaningless. Sure, I could say those things, but what good would it do? How could I expect you to understand? You’ve never had those feelings. You don’t know what it means to really care about another person. You’ve never been in love. You’ve got all the emotions of a stone. (pause) No offense.”

None is taken, because that is the image that Odo has carefully crafted for himself, which doesn’t in actuality line up with who he is, but he’s happy for others to believe that is how he is like. So even though Quark realizes how harsh his words are and walks it back, Odo is not offended, but nor does he find it entirely convincing either. It’s one of this scene’s many ways of illustrating the conflicting moral codes between Quark and Odo: Quark may view doing things out of love as legitimate, but he knows that Odo can’t enter into that mindset.

(It's not text, but Quark's speech could also be read as Quark expressing his frustration that his own attempts to court Odo have ended in failure -- Quark angsting that he is barking up the wrong tree, so to speak.)

Quark then tries a fourth tack: Making an exchange instead of putting forward logical arguments and appeals. He begins to offer information on the various deals he’s involved in ("Listen to me, Odo. You do this for me, and I promise there'll be no more secrets between us") -- this momentarily catches Odo’s interest -- before Quark chickens out and instead offers information on Rom’s activities instead, which is, well, worthless, lol. Odo isn’t interested in your brother, Quark, he’s interested in you. Quark does have something of value to Odo but he’s not willing to offer it up because, well, he's just not THAT good of a person.

Seeing this fourth try has failed, Quark then makes a fifth appeal:

Quark’s fifth try involves directly leveraging Quark and Odo’s relationship and involves Quark asking Odo to do this as a personal favor to him. Here is moment #2 where Quark and Odo’s longstanding relationship is highlighted, with Quark turning what Odo said earlier back on him:

(Technically, Odo didn’t say he knew Quark better than anyone else; he said he knew Quark better than Quark thought. But Quark is speaking the truth in any case.) Quark actually just spells out their relationship a bit anviliciously: “Sure, sometimes we’re on opposite sides, but that doesn’t mean that we aren’t close. I never told you this, Odo, but I consider you as dear to me as my brother.” Again, Odo is unimpressed given that Quark literally just tried to sell out his brother. One can’t help but feel like Quark’s fifth appeal failed for the same reason his fourth one failed: Like with the fourth appeal, Quark began to show some vulnerability here which actually interested Odo, but chickened out at the end. He did have something valuable to bargain with (his relationship with Odo) but wasn’t willing to pay the price it would require (being fully open and vulnerable with Odo about the value of that relationship) -- instead, he deflects at the last moment with something joking and ironic.

Finally, Quark makes his sixth and last appeal. “Odo, look at me. Look at me. I’m on my knees. I’m begging you. I don’t care why you do it. Pick any reason you want. But please, let Natima and the others go.”

On his knees, he makes the Ferengi gesture of supplication. With this attempt, Quark does two things: One, he sacrifices his pride for the first time by openly begging -- in his other appeals, he protected his pride by couching it in logical appeal, anger/disapproval at Odo, irony, or jokes. But here, for the first time, he displays humility, desperation, vulnerability, etc. Second, he lets Odo pick the reason, which allows Odo to also intervene without having to lose his own pride.

The reason Odo picks in the end is (what else) justice.

"Justice," Quark says. "That was going to be my next suggestion."

And then (after being on his knees begging, etc.) Quark slowly gets to his feet, and it’s framed like this:

THIS. IS SO. SUGGESTIVE.

I’m... I'm dying. Definitely a "getting shit past the censors" moment.

Anyway, moving swiftly along, now that Quark has gotten what he wants, it's back to the old light-hearted and flirty dynamic they always have. Now assured Odo definitely isn't doing this as a personal favor to Quark, Quark gleefully declares himself debt-free to Odo. He hugs him and Odo pretends to dislike it.

The scene ends with Odo asking how Quark plans to sneak the dissidents past the Cardassian warship hovering outside DS9. By the way he asks the question and is able to guess just by Quark's mischievous smile, Odo already knows the answer, bringing the episode back full circle from its opening where Odo was investigating Quark for having an illegal cloaking device.

Yeah, bickering, casual touching, their cat-and-mouse relationship, flirtatious dialogue, even Odo grudgingly letting Quark get away with crimes because they're a reluctant team with aligned interests now -- it's all here.

Anyway, I love this scene because it's an extended look at how Quark's moral system and Odo's don't really line up with each other (Quark valuing things like love and profit and not valuing abstract things like justice or order, and vice versa for Odo) to the point where it's actively hard for Quark to convince Odo to do something he's inclined/sympathetic to doing anyway. At the same time, they also have some shared interests (in Quark's dealings, in their relationship with each other) while being engaged in a complex dance where neither of them can quite acknowledge it. For example, Odo says he will release the prisoners solely out of his own sense of justice, but if so, why did it take Quark begging him to move him to act? Before Quark came to his office, he was reading a detective novel, suggesting that Quark's appeal is at least one part of Odo's decision to act, despite what they both say. But it serves Quark's purposes to let this slide ("So, you're not really doing this for me?" "That's right." "Then I don't owe you a thing. Thank you!") and let Odo keep his pride, so he does.

Anyway, I just love how much Quodo there is in an episode that's entirely dedicated to Quark's love for a different woman entirely. That's how powerful the relationship between these two is.

[lilydalexf]

Old School X is a project interviewing X-Files fanfic authors who were posting fic  during the original run of the show. New interviews are posted every Tuesday.

Interview with Dreamshaper

Dreamshaper has 54 stories at Gossamer. Her stories often feature Mulder and Scully exploring their feelings in ways you really, really wish you could’ve seen on the show. I’ve recced some of my favorites of her stories here before, including Found in Memory, Just By Existing, Purpose, and Promise. Big thanks to Dreamshaper for doing this interview.

Does it surprise you that people are still interested in reading your X-Files fanfics and others that were posted during the original run of the show (1993-2002)?

I'm not at all surprised people are still reading X-Files fanfic! There's a deep catalogue of good and interesting fiction there, and the X-Files still has cultural significance. And of course there were the recent seasons to bring it back to mind. I think if you had asked me in 2000, I might not have supposed that it had this kind of staying power. So now I'm thinking of this interview as a time capsule--what will my answer be in 2040?

My own fic was not designed to have staying power. If anyone is reading it now, bless them, they are kind and patient. I would only recommend probably reading the first and last things I posted just to see what kind of growth is possible. The first time I ever posted fic, someone told me to never write again. I was a teenager. I was crushed but I went on writing anyway, and I worked hard to improve.

What do you think of when you think about your X-Files fandom experience? What did you take away from it?

I think of two things. As for the show itself, I still think of Mulder/Scully as the ultimate in romance. I can still picture certain moments from the episodes, from the movie. I look for pairings with tension that reminds me of theirs--an almost-regency level of UST, but with a modern element of danger.

As for the fandom itself, I grew up in it. My entire online life and the core of how I participate in fandom was formed here. I was 17 or so when I started writing and posting MSR. I was 18 or 19 when I started meeting fans in real life. I was fortunate enough to fall in with people who were equal parts gracious and nerdy, and while my own nerdiness is innate, I remember and emulate the kindness which was shown to me.

I have an entire side post to this question about how strongly I disagree with the current age stratification in fandom--this idea of not interacting across artificial age divides is tragic to me.

Social media didn't really exist during the show's original run. How were you most involved with the X-Files online (atxc, message board, email mailing list, etc.)?

ATXC, and mailing lists. I don't actually remember the names of all the mailing lists! I can picture myself sitting in my kitchen on my computer, and what the emails looked like--the font, the signature lines--but not the names. I can even remember specific conversations we had! One of them must have been Scullyfic, because I remember the first meetup being planned. Is that right? Was it the Scullyfic meetup? [Lilydale note: Probably was Scullyfic. There was a big email flurry when the first Scullyfic mailing list meetup was being planned.] My mind was absolutely blown by the idea of a fan con. Now I've led panels at a dozen of them.

I remember some of the arguments, too. It's funny that some of them are the same arguments I still see here and there, like whether or not criticism of a fanwork is valid. Real Person Fic being this unbelievably shameful thing you had to ask to be shown, and the doyennes of the fandom would have given you the cut direct at Almack's if they'd found out, you know?

This was also the era of AIM and ICQ. mIRC too, right? I spent a lot of time in channels. I absolutely loved when people started to be more open about themselves in chats. I was always so interested in how fandom fit into people's lives. Some people I talked to were moms, college students, people who had interesting careers, and they all just found ways to make fandom work for them. They had a need and were meeting it, despite the pressures of their offline life.

I don't know how to explain the impression that made on me, but--it normalized fandom. That seems obvious, maybe, but I hadn't known this was something you could integrate into your everyday life.

It also normalized the idea of women taking their own needs as primary, in a way that went beyond what I was exposed to in my home life, or through the feminism of the 1990s. There was this wild intersection of the--the domestic and intellectual life of women, and the playful life of women, just making itself known to me in a way I'd never seen before. That was enormous. Absolutely a foundational experience for me.

My experience was that ATXC and email lists were like, these surface-level interactions where people figured out, roughly, if your mind ran on a similar track to theirs, and then you were invited to make deeper relationships in more private corners of the internet. Social media filled both functions at once, I think, for a while. But the privacy was missing. I'm not surprised that Slack and Discord are starting to fill that private corner gap--everything old becomes new, etc.

What was it that got you hooked on the X-Files as a show?

UST and monsters. This is still an unbeatable combination for me!

What got you involved with X-Files fanfic?

I loved romance novels--I read so many of them. Somehow, before we even had a computer at home, I started to tell myself romance novel stories with Mulder and Scully as the lead characters. This was how I talked myself to sleep--I wasn't a good sleeper. Then when I got online and did whatever search led me to ATXC, I was just shocked. Shocked! Can't do the surprise justice, in this era where fanfic is relatively mainstream. Other people had also independently invented this thing I loved! But they wrote their ideas down! I jumped on the bandwagon immediately.

What is your relationship like now to X-Files fandom?

It's like my relationship to my childhood, frankly. Foundational, but I don't think about it all that much on a daily basis, right? I smile and reblog gif sets. I get nostalgic. I get embarrassed by social mistakes I made. I feel the way many of us do about memories from our teenage years. I wouldn't be who I was without it, but I'm not still in it.

Were you involved with any fandoms after the X-Files? If so, what was it like compared to X-Files?

I was. I've spent 20 years in fandom! I did some beta work for someone who'd started writing slash--The Sentinel. The actual Sentinel, not just an endless loop of Sentinel AUs based on Sentinel AUs based on etc. I had some idea at the time that I was queer, but this was my first real exposure to romances that weren't straight. So I tore my way through the early 2000s slash fandoms as they developed: The Sentinel, Due South, Stargate Atlantis. Popslash, where a mix of good writing and absurdity ruled. Bandom, where I met my wife. Since then, many smaller fandoms.

It's hard to compare any of these things to each other, let alone to the X-Files. In each one, I was lucky enough to find a circle of women who were strong beta readers and good friends. I never wrote as much or for as long as I did in the X-Files.

Do you ever still watch The X-Files or think about Mulder and Scully?

I watched the new episodes. I've shown friends important episodes--I remember that a few years ago, another friend and I tried to hook a third friend on the show by binging some favorites--mostly shippy MOTW, so it was like, Arcadia, Triangle, Bad Blood. Fun stuff!

We finish watching and I'm like, well? And? And she says, that was fine, but I'm more of a man-pain, secret babies kind of person? I'll never forget it. She had no idea but she'd hit the nail on the head! We were wheezing with laughter. We went back and watched mytharc episodes, which was much less fun for me, but much more interesting to her.

Do you ever still read X-Files fic? Fic in another fandom?

I don't read X-Files fic often. I look at new things sometimes, and I've reread a few old classics, but my reading taste has changed so much. I still love straight romance, but it needs to be fast and sharp in a way that is hard to find.

I read fic in other fandoms when I have time. In the past few years, I've finished a degree, had a daughter, renovated a small Victorian and then sold it and bought another one during this pandemic--so time has been short. Currently I read some Untamed fic, some Good Omens fic, Magicians, Schitt's Creek...a sampler. Whatever friends are writing, whatever they recommend.

What is your favorite of your own fics, X-Files and/or otherwise?

I never have a favorite of my own fics. I'm never satisfied. The second I post something, I'm always full of regrets. I've written fics that did very well and still hated them a month later. People have asked me over the years to move more of my stuff off Livejournal and onto ao3, but I do it really reluctantly and only by specific request. Everything's ephemeral! Let the old works diminish, and go into the West!

Do you think you'll ever write another X-Files story? Or dust off and post an oldie that for whatever reason never made it online?

I have no oldies to dust off. I do periodically think of X-Files stories I would tell, but I don't have enough time for current interests--and so it goes.

Do you still write fic now? Or other creative work?

I do. I was most recently writing in The Magicians fandom. I posted a couple new stories in an old fandom last year--I'd written Good Omens fic fifteen years ago, and then again for the Amazon adaptation. I have a pile of original novels in various stages of completion, but I'm never happy with them. One day I'll figure myself out, perhaps, or I'll just keep writing myself this and that and leaving it all in a drawer.

What's the story behind your pen name?

So AOL had a character limit for user names--I think it was 10. I was a teenager at the time I was coming up with the one I'd use for fandom, so I went with Dreamshaper. It was kind of literal, in the sense that I was going to share the stories I'd been telling myself to help me sleep. But the character limit meant I went with Dreamshpr, which I later liked because of the alternate reading of Dream*shipper*. A reminder to the younger fans that we were the original shippers!

I would also come up with new pen names when I wanted to experiment with a fic that didn't fit my usual style. I don't remember any of them. I probably did that a dozen times, so, sorry to those poor completely abandoned stories.

Is there a place online (tumblr, twitter, AO3, etc.) where people can find you and/or your stories now?

Giddygeek on tumblr and ao3. I'm most active on twitter, but largely about my domestic life with dips into fandoms or original writing; message me on tumblr if you're an old friend who'd like to reconnect elsewhere.

Is there anything else you'd like to share with fans of X-Files fic?

Just gratitude--I'm so glad that I found people to share an obsession with, and that they were good people, at a time in my life where that made a significant difference to me. I don't know where I'd be now without my time and my growth in this fandom!

(Posted by Lilydale on December 22, 2020)

[my-otp-list]

Is this a BL Novel?

Hi,

I keep hearing different stories which makes no sense. Since you've read them, I was wondering if you can answer. I know that the series isn't a bl but bromance. Is the novel BL or bromance as well?

Thanks

M

-

My-otp-list’s response:

Hi M, thanks for the ask and I’m gonna assume you’re talking about Daomu Biji.

I only have one answer for this:

Certainly not BL. Not even close. ^^

On the occasion of this ask, there are a few things I’d like to clarify and to share from my own experience:

I’m completely aware of how ‘shippy’ the drama adaptations make Daomu Biji appear to be. The amount of times Xiao Ge lock eyes with Wu Xie, those slo-mo scenes that are occasionally enough to send everyone into secondhand embarassment, all the jokes about Pangzi being the most enthusiastic PingXie shipper and the most unfortunate third wheel, etc and etc. And the very fact that PingXie is a gigantic ship with uncountable fanarts and fanfics.

But here’s the catch: The books are rather different. You’ll be surprised.

Daomu Biji The Novel is, in essence, a shounen novel. We have buckets of bromance and camaraderie, comradeship and nakama power. But the amount of so-called ‘shippy’ PingXie moments that you could quote from 1400 chapters till date can probably be counted on 2 hands (3 hands if you squint harder). That’s all we have.

If I’m to be honest, PingXie is one of the most special ships I’ve ever encountered. They become a phenomenon not because the novel has them constantly giving out fanservice (there’s barely any in the first place). In fact, I think many shippers actually see the ship to be beyond ‘romantic’. Between Men You Ping and Wu Xie is what you probably call a very special connection created due to an enormously complex web of conspriracies, schemes, favours, debts, and likely, fate.

All in all, no, it’s not BL. It is truly shounen it its purest form. But, you’re welcome to check it out for the hope of seeing PingXie. I know, I entered this novel for that exact purpose.

But by the time you reach the end, you might actually forget that purpose and have a whole new perspective on quality content and get stuck eternally in this abyss.

Have fun! (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧

[clownao]

Rereading Korosuu Chapter 4 (the ChibaHaya chapter) from the perspective that Hayami has feelings for Chiba

And boy, is it a ride.

Check out the previous post

Listen, I’m a big ChibaHaya shipper but I never believed they liked each other romantically in canon. One of things I like the most about their dynamic is how great they are even without the typical shippy stuff like blushing, stammering etc. They work well both platonically and romantically.

So I never tried to go MiDDLe ScHOoL cHiBaHaYa is CanOn but then I read the Chinese translation Ch4 of Korosuu. And boy oh boy did it make me think Hayami has ✨feelings✨ for Chiba. (And he doesn’t.) I literally did not expect that, but once I saw things from that perspective, I can’t stop lol.

Keep in mind I’m analysing a Japanese -> Chinese translation in English, and I don’t have the Japanese raws, so the word choices may be off. And I am probably overanalysing but yes, I will eat these ChibaHaya crumbs for the tiniest bit of information.

Also keep in mind manga Chiba is more social than Hayami (you can check Fumiko’s posts for more information, she’s the Chiba expert haha). So while these two may have the same responses (eg. smiling because of what the other said), it weighs differently.

So Hayami was originally going home, but stopped when she saw Chiba trying to figure out a problem. And so she helped him pump the balloons to act as Chiba’s targets. They discussed for a bit, then they both said they were surely getting closer to their “answer”.

And then they both smiled. The translation is “速水露齒而笑。千葉也回以微笑。” which is “Hayami grinned, and Chiba returned with a smile”. But notably, the translator used “露齒而笑” (literally: grinning with teeth) for Hayami and just “笑” (smile) for Chiba. “笑” and “微笑” (which also means smile, but a little softer) are used five times in total, and considering they’re interchangeable in Chinese, the translator probably used them to add variety. But “露齒而笑”? That’s different. That’s the only time the translator used this term to describe someone smiling. And “grinning (with teeth)” feels more joyful than “smiling”. And it’s used to describe Hayami’s reaction.

Hmm.

By the way, let’s count how many times they smiled in this chapter. Hayami smiled 3 times, Chiba also 3. And literally every time they smile it’s in response to something the other did/said. Chiba smiles more than Hayami in the manga, so the fact that Hayami is smiling so much in front of Chiba... hmmm...

As mentioned before, Hayami stuttered when Chiba praised her. In the translation, she barely stuttered anywhere else. Hmm.

After a very long time, Chiba lifted his head and turned to Hayami.

“Hayami, you’re brilliant! So it was like this all along! Why have I never noticed something so simple?”

“Wh-what?”

Yeah. She stuttered after Chiba called her brilliant/amazing.

And then, of course, the most telling paragraph follows.

Hayami felt bewildered upon seeing the suddenly agitated Chiba. Even though she had always been looking at him in E class, she hardly recalled seeing him so delighted.

She had always been looking at him. Whoa.

The Chinese translation is “雖然一直在E班看著他”, special focus on “一直” (always) and “看” (look). Like, okay, it could mean “from her daily observations, she didn’t recall seeing such an expression” or “looking after him” or “knowing him from school” but this phrasing just makes me think she’s staring at him in class. And you know what, Chiba actually sits behind Hayami in another row. So she has to turn around to “look” at him, which is a deliberate action. Of course the translation used “E class”, which also means training and other misc stuff and not just conventional lessons.

Either way, she’s been observing him. She’s ALWAYS been observing him. Continuously. And she knows she’s never seen him so joyful. And the translator (and maybe Matsui?) felt the urge to point it out.

After complimenting Hayami, Chiba proceeds to explain his new theory. And thus the passage:

“So what do you think?”

Chiba turned to Hayami, a smile quirking on his lips. He lightly prodded the pages of his notebook with his mechanical pencil.

“That’s brilliant!” Hayami also used an excited tone to reply as she looked down at the diagram.

“If you weren’t there, I probably wouldn’t have thought of it. Even though it’s really simple once you notice it...”

Hayami used a smile to respond to his words.

The word “也” (also) is used in Hayami’s happy response to China. Granted, it may be a translator thing, to add word variety and connectives, but the sentence makes perfect sense without the 也.

From this we can infer Hayami’s mood is affected by Chiba’s, and probably vice versa, but Hayami’s case is specifically mentioned.

Next day, Chiba stays behind to practice again. And he looks sad because he’s failing.

Hayami thinks “I suppose even people like Chiba will feel uneasy when thinking about official operations” (一旦設想正式行動，即使是千葉這樣的人類也會感到不安吧。) This makes me !!!! because it sort of implies Hayami thought Chiba won’t be nervous. She thought of him in a positive light, only for him to disprove it. Also, the use of “吧”. “吧” is commonly used in dialogue, so here it implies Hayami is thinking the whole line despite the lack of speech bubbles, not some omniscient narrator saying it.

Then Hayami tries to encourage him.

“Relax. If you think it’s right, then it has to be.”

“Even though hearing you say that makes me happy...”

^ this is one of the most mutual shippy moments in my opinion. Hayami has total faith and trust in Chiba, and Chiba literally told her that her trust in him makes him happy. It just feels... kinda shipbaity. The sentence structure “雖然你這麼說讓我很開心啊……” (Even though hearing you say that makes me happy...) feels like something out of a romance novel (especially in Chinese), even though the words don’t exactly have a romantic meaning.

Chiba says Hayami’s words makes him “happy”, but he’s still troubled by the shooting problem. Hayami trusting Chiba despite Chiba not trusting himself makes him happy. Oho. That... can be interpreted in a shippy way.

When Hayami sees that Chiba is still troubled, she “nonchalantly” says “to fill in the gaps using intuition” (看著無法消除不安情緒的千葉，速水若無其事地說。”無法確定的地方，用直覺填補就好了喲。”)

I believe there’s a typo here, since the next line is “千葉帶著的表情抬頭看著速水”, which is “Chiba lifted his head to look at Hayami with a xxx expression”. So the translator accidentally left out his expression (the sentence doesn’t make sense otherwise), but we can easily infer Chiba’s feelings from the following lines.

Chiba basically thinks “Intuition? What? She’s talking about things unrelated to this shooting problem again.” He doesn’t say it out loud (no speech bubbles), but he probably shows his doubt through his facial expression that the translator unfortunately left out.

And Hayami wants to prove him wrong.

So Hayami roughly glanced around the classroom, and quietly uttered, “Vase, tape, Korosensei.”

Before Chiba could ask “what are you talking about?”, Hayami swiftly pulled out a pistol from her thigh and shot three bullets with surprising speed.

Hayami hits all three targets without aiming precisely. Naturally, Chiba is in awe, calling it a “miracle”. Chiba says even though he, out of everyone in 3-E. can shoot the furthest target using calculations, he can’t imitate Hayami’s perceptual(?) type of shooting.

And then:

Hayami shot a stunned Chiba a smile.

The word for “stunned” (目瞪口呆) literally means “eyes wide, mouth frozen”, but that’s just a Chinese phrase for being stunned.

Honestly, to me, I feel:

Hayami wants to help Chiba -> Chiba is in doubt -> Hayami wants to prove him wrong and show off -> she quickly shoots her targets based on intuition/emotion, not even waiting to hear what Chiba has to ask -> (she wants to show off lol) -> when she sees he’s in awe, she smiles (smugly?)

ALSO, Hayami may have gained confidence after Chiba praised her by saying she’s brilliant, and that may be why she shot so quickly (since the adrenaline rush or something.)

Hayami then says something:

“And if at that time, you’re not confident in your theories, in the end, I’ll still shoot according to my gut feelings. (Basically saying if you can’t do it, I can do it for you.) We can do what the other cannot do. If we team up and become partners, there’s no target we cannot hit.”

Chiba gazed at Hayami’s face for a moment, then smiled and said, “Thanks.”

Wow. What surprised me is that Hayami’s the one with the speech— she’s the more serious and reserved out of the two. For her to say something so “sentimental” when she’s usually like “I respect you”, wow...

By the way, “凝視” (gaze) is used. It can mean stare, but it usually means gaze. Also he gazed at her face (臉). This is specifically mentioned. Mmmmm.

And I can’t get over “將兩者合為一體的話一定能順利地進行”. It means “if we combine two into one, it’ll definitely proceed smoothly”. They’re... MERGING lmao. It’s so shipbaity.

There’s also more stuff, like how they agree on something without speaking, but that’s... typical ChibaHaya stuff. And that’s it.

SO:

Possible hints of Hayami’s feelings towards Chiba:

1. Hayami immediately helped Chiba with practice even though she was intending to go home

2. SHE LOOKS AT HIM IN CLASS. Bro. I can’t make this up.

3. Hayami is happy when Chiba is

4. SHE STUTTERED WHEN HE SAID SHE’S BRILLIANT

5. She wanted to prove him wrong by showing off (this is a stretch)

6. She low-key put him on a pedestal (?) because she thought he won’t be nervous (this is also a stretch)

Possible hints of Chiba’s feelings towards Hayami:

1. He was very noticeably happy, perhaps a side he only shows to people close to him

2. Chiba says Hayami praising him makes him happy

3. He gazed at her face. Yes, her face.

But I don’t think Chiba likes Hayami that way. Like, he didn’t stutter when she praised him, he just said he’s happy. Hayami is usually very chill and calm, and even quieter than Chiba, so when she stutters because of Chiba, hmm...

Of course all of this is immediately disproven by the mini comic, with Ritsu claiming they reply to their emails a day late and their heart rates don’t go up when next to each other. Psssh. Okay, Ritsu. I mean, we can always hc Ritsu is protecting her friends’ privacy by lying about them. And of course Chiba and Hayami can stay as purely friends. I like their dynamic either way.

This concludes my rambling overanalysis of them. If you read till this point, I congratulate you <3 also reblogs appreciated :DD

[spockandawe]

What are your favorite chinese webnovels? What are some of the differences youve noticed between cnovels and other types of novels?

That second question is really, REALLY interesting, and I really want to answer it well, and I am REALLY sure I’m going to do a bad job of answering it, so let me just noodle about that first question for a minute while I try to think XD

I went through some of my TOP-top favorite novels in more detail yesterday, but generally speaking, mxtx and meatbun are both at the top of the pack. They’re really good at writing compelling main characters and balancing piles of angst with plenty of humor and pulling everything together into a very satisfying ending (which is something I don’t alwaysssss see, even in some of the novels I really like). After them, The Disabled Tyrant’s Pet Palm Fish (transmigration, ancient chinese prince falls in love with pet fish) and Golden Stage (ancient chinese gay arranged marriage between bitter enemies(?)) are two novels that I love a lot, which both have very cute romances and go a bit lighter on the main character suffering front, and which I broadly recommend to anyone who’s interested in the genre. They didn’t end stick the landing QUITE as hard as an svsss or tgcf, but they still were very nice.

Then, let me see. I’m trying to remember which books I’ve read in the last year, and am doing a terrible job, haha. I will say that a book I enjoyed for like... eighty percent of it and then the ending let me down terribly was The Dreamer In The Spring Boudoir (modern day career woman transmigrates into barely-fantasy ancient china novel as the disliked primary wife of a nobleman), which is also the only straight webnovel I’ve read so far. The main character and romance were delightful, but that ending... haha, wow, I felt betrayed. But I did like the first half very much!! I’m idly contemplating a deliberately-partial reread. Then I’m currently like two chapters away from catching up with the current translation of The Wife Is First (ancient chinese prince lives out time travel fixit fic, determined to treat his spouse better this time around). I’m also catching up on Heroic Death System (transmigration, across MANY universes, where the goal is to die heroically in each one, and also maybeeeee to find his boyfriend in each one. this shit gets fucking bananas. in one of them, he emotionally seduces his boyfriend while he’s a dolphin. in another one, he’s a sentient mushroom. i’m in the middle of a section titled ‘I Am An Evil Pen’. yes, like a writing utensil type of pen. this is the weirdest book I’ve read so far). Oh, and Thousand Autumns (righteous sect leader gets sabotaged and loses a fight, wakes up blind and amnesiac, demonic sect leader is like ‘lol i bet i can turn him evil’ and accidentally catches feelings along the way).

What else... I’m keeping up with (but behind on) some others. First, there’s How To Survive As A Villain (modern terminally ill CEO transmigrates into stallion novel, wakes up as villain, accidentally seduces hero). Then, we’ve got Transmigrating Into The Body Of The Heartthrob’s Cannon Fodder Childhood Friend (only modern webnovel I’ve read, young man transmigrates into beginning of gratuitous whump book, back in high school, and is determined to protect the protagonist from all the canonical suffering). Then there’s Pulling Together A Villain Reformation Strategy (guy transmigrates into story as the hero’s childhood friend who will eventually become his enemy and get killed, successfully acts out his part and dies, completely fails to realize he’s broken his friend’s heart in the process... and then wakes up in another character’s body). And then there’s The Villain’s White Lotus Halo (a transmigrator keeps bouncing from universe to universe as a cannon fodder villain, who gets like half a line before being killed. he tries to purchase an upgrade package so he can be a COOL villain instead, but accidentally gets sold a ‘white lotus halo’ package instead, so that no matter what he does, everyone is just DEEPLY moved by his appearance and is positive he did nothing wrong). All of those are EXTREMELY delightful. You may notice a running transmigration theme, which....... yeah, I think there are a TON of delightful stories in the webnovel scene that deal with this genre, which seem so rare in English language media.

Which makes a good transition point to what’s different about the cnovel scene! I’ve seen hardly any transmigration stories in English, and I’ve got a couple go-to examples for when I’m trying to explain it, but like. Only a couple. Which is such a shame! Like, there’s the default idea of ‘I was reading this book and then I woke up inside the book!!’ but it’s clearly such an established genre that people are playing with it in all kinds of interesting ways, like in The Villain’s White Lotus Halo or Heroic Death System setups. It’s kind of wild to me, because it seems like such a gimme for a nice easy story structure? Whatever kind of world you want to present, there’s no need to introduce it to the reader from the ground up, or find a good way to hook them in. Either the main character read the book in question and can explain the premise and why we should care in pov, or the main character is new to the universe too, and trying to find their own footing. I enjoy it a lot! I’ve sampled transmigration books that didn’t grab me, but I’ve sampled way more that did. 

And then, the one semi-technical answer I thought of to this question was the way that these novels tend to handle pov. It’s not a hard-and-fast rule that regular novels are restricted to one pov, or that pov can only change at hard breaks in the story, but if I saw a bog-standard american novel glide from pov to pov the way these novels regularly do, I would tend to wonder if it was sloppiness or a mistake, or I would grump to myself about how I don’t like omniscient third person pov. And I still don’t know exactly what I think about this, or why it’s different in here, but I’m pretty sure I like it a lot, especially for stories where the romance tends to play a large part :V 

I used to read a lot of Books About Writing, and read plenty of stuff about why you don’t DO this, but.... I like it! In dtppf, Jing-wang can’t talk, and when Li Yu is a fish, he can’t talk, and drifting from one of their perspectives to the other gives me lots of useful information about how they’re both feeling. Could that be conveyed through restricted pov? Maybe! But I’m typesetting the svsss extras right now, and I’m in the bing-ge vs bing-mei section, and we get a few brief flashes of bing-ge’s thoughts, and it’s so NICE. It’s information I would not have otherwise received, because Shen Qingqiu sure wasn’t going to notice it. But early in the story, that pov was withheld from me, which also made sense (or hua cheng’s pov was withheld from me FOREVER, which makes me so sad ;u;). There don’t seem to be any hard and fast rules, which makes me really nervous about writing fic and trying to match the style, but I do like it a lot! 

And I’m definitely not able to articulate this in the way that I would like to, or speak with any real authority (I’m not that widely read in the cnovel scene, and i’m not very genre-adventurous in english), but there’s something about the role that the romances play in these stories that’s different from what I’m used to expecting, and it’s VERY tasty to me. I only rarely read romance novels, because I’m not often interested in the romance as a primary plot driver, but the romances in these books play a more substantial role than I’m used to expecting. And I’m into it! It’s a balance closer to what I’d expect from, like, a shippy longform fanfic. Which covers a lot of ground and is NOT a precise measure, but there’s more emotional weight given to the romance than I would expect, but without the romance carrying ALL of the emotional weight, and it strikes a perfect balance for me in a way I’m not used to encountering. Now, some of this could definitely be due to me not finding the right authors, or right subgenres, or whatever. But in the genres I inhabit, it’s a subtle difference, but one I find compelling.

Oh, one last thing. The cultural differences, duh :P I’m only familiar with things like, say, ancient chinese court etiquette through a lens of fan-translated novels like these, and I didn’t grow up steeped in the culture in a way I’m used to the trappings of something like medieval european courts. But there’s a distinct flavor to the social dynamics of these novels, from the formal levels down to the casual, and I know it’s super intricate and detailed and that authors play with differing degrees of historical accuracy vs fictional fun, and I wish I was better equipped to speak to the nature of any of this. But I find it really compelling! I recognize that it’s only new to ME because I didn’t seek out chinese media before now. And, the point that I originally wanted to get to before I got super distracted: the flirting. The flirting and teasing are a very different flavor from what I would expect in most english language media, and I love it, even if I can’t speak to how much of that is purely cultural, and how much of it is like... the conventions of How Fiction Is Written varying by culture, if that makes sense. I adore seeing what flirting and affection and indulgence and attentiveness look like in different settings, and these books, with their heavy romantic focus, absolutely deliver.

[dancingstarsbornfromchaos]

4. What is/are your favorite trope(s)? 5. What is/are your least favorite trope(s)?

Shipping Asks

4. What is/are your favorite trope(s)?

Oh gee. I have a quite a few tropes that I really enjoy when it comes to ships. I guess they can all be considered more or less “popular” ones in general too, but hey. It’s good shit, so it deserves to be popular, if you ask me.

I’ll list a few and spend just two words on each of them, because otherwise this answer would turn in a novel. Alphabetically:

Enemies to Lovers: This sums up a lot of my ships, tbh. I thrive in seeing the contrast between two characters and all the feelings and situations that can come into play starting from that. There’s a lot of potential for angst, character study and introspection, relationship development, and it leaves that bittersweet taste on your tongue that it’s just my jam. I could put the Hero/Villain ship trope in this category too.

Fake Dating (that then turns into the real shit): I always find stories that involve fake relationships funny, especially if then an unexpected spark happens and makes it all awkward. This is one of my go-to when I’m looking for some humour.

First Kiss: At the cost of sounding cheesy as hell, I’m weak for first kiss stories. Aside from the variety of situations that can contain this, I enjoy it because it’s usually the culmination of something bigger that unravelled before, so I particularly like the build-up to the kiss, more than the kiss scene in itself. The Love Confession trope fits right next to this one.

Mutual Pining: This is one of the things I’ll never get tired of. I like seeing a relationship being built way more than an established one and the pining is an essential phase in my eyes xD

Power Couple: At times I just love seeing two characters that are badass on their own and even more badass together, you know?

Rivals Team-up: This one has a similar appeal to the “Enemies to Lovers” one for me, but with a more humourous twist.

Sex Pollen, Aliens (or who else for them) Made Them Do It, Fuck or Die & Co: I’m not huge on smut, but these are some situations that can turn really interesting when handled right. There can be a lot of really good shit built around the sex scene itself, both concerning what leads to it and, even more, the aftermath (which is often left untold and that’s a real pity because it’s a total waste of potential!). Of course, the scene in itself can offer you a lot in terms of feeling and introspection too, and that’s something I like to explore.

Soulmates AU: There are just so many cool ideas in this category! Some are funny, some are heartbreaking and there’s every shade in-between. I find this trope very inspiring in its complexity and in all the openings it offers. It’s a multiverse in itself.

The Matchmaker: Again, the humour of this idea really gets me. Moreover, I love the idea of having one character who’s forced to deal with all the others’ crap, as some sort of unofficial therapist. Idk, maybe it’s because, in way, we shippers are like the Matchmaker in a story, but I always connect with whoever is in this role in a story xD

Specialy mention: Found Family. It’s not a strictly shippy trope, but it’s perhaps my number one fave.

5. What is/are your least favorite trope(s)?

The list here it’s shorter bcause I have quite a few tropes I enjoy, a lot that I can take or leave and few I don’t like.

Most of the tropes I don’t like are “daily life AUs” (like Coffee Shop AU, High School AU, etc). I guess I’ve read enough of them that they have stopped being original, so I get bored pretty quickly with them (of course there are exceptions, but they are rare).

The whole “Girls like Bad Boys (or vice versa or with genders mixed up)” thing is also something I’m not too fond off. It’s become too clichéd and the characters end up being so stereotyped that it makes me wanna roll my eyes.

I’m a bit iffy about the whole Major Character Death trope. As much as I love angst, I want my fiction to have a happy ending or at least a hopeful one. We already get enough bad ending IRL, so I want my fantasy worlds to skip them, when possible. It’s the same reason why I’m not extremely fond of Unrequited Love (between the characters that make up the ship, I mean) that never becomes requited.

Also, I never understood what is the big deal about heigh difference. It’s not that I dislike it or anything, but...I just don’t get it??

[agxthahxrkness]

Hi! I wanna make a Melina Vostokoff rp acc but im new to rp and am not quite sure what to do.

Do you have any advice?

//so I'm better at answering these things as they come over DM but let me think....

Here are quick bullet points for you, Hon.

Pick a username (this is the hardest part lol) to use for your blog or sideblog. (My Agatha is a sidebog)

Make a pinned post or link in your bio with some info (you can check out mine if you like, but I'd say toss some rules up and maybe some age info. Mine says 18+ because I do NSFW threads)

Follow some people! Check the MCU RP tag or Black Widow RP or anything else you like (I use the MCU and Wandavision RP tags depending on what I'm looking for)

Interacting can be scary, but an Ask Meme or Starter Meme someone posts is the easiest way to start an interaction.

Don't be afraid to just drop someone a Message. I know I do and I'm always up to discuss plots behind the scenes. (I often ask what vibe my partner wants to go with so I know if it'll turn shippy)

I am a paragraph RP writer (so one to "here's a novel" in length) but you don't have to be.

Some people use gifs and icons to add flavor to threads. (I do that on occasion since I rarely have time to make these assets for myself)

Pick a theme for your page. It can be simple or detailed but that's personal preference.

//this is all I can think of without a specific question but I hope it helps. Feel free to drop me a message if you don't feel like asking on Anon. I will say tho, I hope to see your Melina harass Agatha soon 💜💜💜