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#like you guys have no idea how bad i want to play this!!!
stunie · 2 days
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UMEMIYA’S SHAZAM! — sfw ノ fluff ノ umemiya hajime x f!reader ノ entry for @melon-fodder / bofurin brothel’s music collab!! ノ in which a certain white haired stranger comes to you for some help…
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Your routine has stayed the same from the day you moved to Makochi. You’d say good morning to Kotoha at 7:30 AM. Eat breakfast at Pothos and enjoy a quick cup of coffee. And by 8:30, you’re already out the door and heading to work.
It’s not every day that a stranger startles you the way this one did. Your headphones are dangling around your neck now, hands lingering over them as you stare back at him. Wide-eyed and taken aback. Your music continues playing, and you can still hear it.
Maybe that’s why you didn’t hear him approach you.
“I really, really need your help!” He sits beside you, hands clasping together to plead. “You heard it, right?”
“Y-you scared me.” Your brows furrow. “My heart’s racing— you shouldn’t run up to people with headphones in and yell for help! I thought you were hurt.”
It seems to dawn on him suddenly. “Oh, you do have headphones in! No wonder you didn’t hear me earlier.” He lets out a sheepish laugh and rubs the back of his neck. “Sorry! I didn’t notice. You look so pretty— I completely missed it.”
You blink. “Me? Pretty?”
“Yeah.” He tilts his head a bit and looks at you. “Pretty.”
He says it so matter-of-factly that you’re not even sure how to respond. “O-oh. Thank you.”
The man in front of you gives you a bright smile at this. A little too wide— as if he’s confused as to what you’re even thanking him for.
“So..” you fiddle with your headphones. “What did you need help with? It sounded urgent.”
“Ah!” He perks up again. “I almost forgot. I really liked the last song that was playing. Did you hear it? I can’t find it..”
“Oh,” you almost laugh at how he’s already forgotten that you had headphones in for the second time that morning. “Sorry. I didn’t hear it. Did you catch any of the lyrics? I can try to guess.. if you want.”
“Eh? You can do that?”
You nod.
“I’ll sing it!” He’s much closer to you now. If he notices, he doesn’t seem to acknowledge it. You start to think he’s just a really oblivious guy, but it’s not a bad thing.
You think he’s cute.
You watch him with a small smile when he clears his throat, humming in thought as he tries to recall the lyrics of the song he heard. “Hm.. okay, okay. I remember.”
“Listen closely,” he smiles. “It goes like… mmmm. mmmm mmm… and I’ll sacrifice!”
Sacrifice? That doesn’t sound like Kotoha’s playlist.
The laugh slips past your lips before you even realize it. It catches you off guard— and the confused look he gives you only makes you laugh even harder. “Sorry, sorry, ah!” You cover your mouth with the back of your hand when it comes back ten times worse.
You’re forced to hunch over the table now. Completely oblivious to the way his eyes widen at how cute you sound. You look even prettier when you’re like this. But he doesn’t need to tell you that, does he?
It’s so obvious. That’s why he was confused earlier. You already know all this, don’t you? Warmth starts creeping up his cheeks the longer you laugh at him, and his lips feel a little wobbly now.
“Hey…” a crooked smile tugs at his lips when you try to apologize through a giggle again. “How mean. And here I was asking for help!”
You weakly slide your phone in his direction. “I think this should be the song…otherwise,” your voice cracks and you take in a sharp inhale to resist the urge to laugh again. “Otherwise I really have no idea.”
“Ah, so you do know! Old Love? By… hm… Putri Dahlia and Yuji. Okay. Old Love. Old Love!” He nods before standing up abruptly. “You’re the best, you know that? Thank you!”
“You’re welcome.” It’s the calmest your voice has sounded in the last two minutes. “Don’t scare other people on your way out.”
He gives you an eager nod before leaving, and you slip your headphones back on. He never even gave you his name, did he? You’re also not entirely certain if he would be taking your advice, but at least this time it wouldn’t be you getting jumpscar—
“Hey!” You almost spit out your food. “No way. I scared you again? You scare pretty easily, huh?”
This time, it’s his turn to start laughing, and you note that this is the third time he’s forgotten about your headphones in the span of fifteen minutes. Not that telling him again would help.
“This is for you. I almost forgot.” He drops a folded piece of paper into your hands. “My number! Oh- you can call me Umemiya.”
He points to the paper. “So you can help me find more songs. I’ll text you the lyrics this time.”
So now he’s expecting you to know what he’s singing over text too. It sounds impossible, but it wouldn’t hurt to try. It’s not like it you would get jumpscared over text, anyway.
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kingdomvel · 2 days
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Steddie | 2.3k | first part
“Okay, what was that?” Gareth asks the moment they are inside the room they are using as a dressing room for tonight.
“What was what,” Eddie answers.
“You know damn well what I mean.”
Eddie doesn’t answer, putting his best poker face on.
“That weird mating ritual you have been performing with the boy in the front row the whole night, maybe?” Jeff adds.
“I have no idea what you are talking about.” Eddie says, his voice flat as he tries to avoid the other’s gazes. He takes a towel to dab at his forehead.
“Come on, man,” Freak butts in, “you told him to stay after the concert, you have told Chrissy to get them here. We said we were not going to be that kind of band, that we were going to be like My Chemical Romance: no groupies and after concert dnd sessions.”
“Yeah, if you go with that guy what happens to our dnd session.”
“We can play dnd any other day, okay?” Eddie snaps, his hands stretched in front of him. A part of him thinks he looks like that meme of Chris Pratt in front of the dinosaurs, the other part of him detests that he thought of him. “I will make it up to you.”
“Who are you and what have you done to our DM?” Freak asks, his voice serious.
“Yeah, what is this talk about postponing dnd for some boy?” Gareth adds, there is something in his tone Eddie doesn’t like.
“Some boy? Some boy? Am I the only one with eyes in this fucking band? He is the hottest person that has laid eyes on me and I’m not letting you fuckers take that opportunity from me for one session of dnd or I swear to God I am killing every one of your characters.”
The boys don’t answer, they look at him with wide eyes and raised eyebrows.
“Wow” a voice says from behind Eddie.
He doesn’t recognize the voice but the expressions on the rest of the band in front of him make him freeze. They go from slightly annoyed to wary and to bemused. Mainly a mix of all at the same time.
The sounds of steps approaching them break the silence that had fallen in the room, before a voice finishes breaking it.
“How does dnd work with you nerds anyway, are you all bards or what?”
The boys drop their mouths open. Eddie still doesn’t recognize the voice, but there is only one person it can belong to. He sounds just as good as he had imagined. Eddie is honestly afraid of turning around after what the boy- Steve- has surely heard.
“Don’t pay attention to him,” a woman’s voice says. There’s the sound of a hit and a quiet ‘ow’ from Steve under it. “He is just trying to sound all confident after whining-“
“Robin.”
“Telling me to not get my hopes up because he probably wasn’t anyone important and you just did this every concert-“
“Robin.”
“But of course he is the luckiest bitch in this planet and has his instant crush reciprocated and-“
“Enough!”
There are some muffled noises that Eddie can only guess are the girl trying to continue speaking. He wishes she wouldn’t stop. His knight in shining armour may be embarrassed, but the rant has put a smile on Eddie’s face, has given him confidence again. He crosses his legs and turns around slowly, his hands coming up beside him.
“By all means, let her continue.”
The adonis, the hottest man that has laid eyes on him, his knight in shining armour, Steve takes his hand away from the girl’s mouth and rubs it on his jeans. Eddie can only guess the girl has licked it. God he wants to be her so bad right now.
“Hey,” Steve says, his hand coming up for a small wave. “Sorry about Robin.”
“No need for that. I’m Eddie.”
“I know,” Steve answers with a cocky smile as he crosses his arms.
“Oh and now you are acting all full of yourself as if you didn’t ask for the name of the band like 20 times 2 hours ago.” Robin says.
“Will you please just shut the fuck up?” Steve asks with the confidence only a best friend can have.  
“Not a fan then?” Eddie asks amused.
“Not really my scene,” Steve answers. There is a scoff behind Eddie, and if he wasn’t so lost in Steve’s brown eyes, he may have moved to swat whoever it was. “But I sure am a fan now.”
There is now a groan behind Eddie, but he can only focus on the way his heart jumps at the words, the way Steve’s mouth lifts in one side in a smirk, how his eyes spark.  
“I can get you front row tickets to all the gigs, baby.”
There’s a gagging noise being Eddie, and this time he does turn around to swat at Gareth. The little shit just laughs at him.
When he turns back towards Steve he is looking between them with a smile on his lips and he looks- damn- he’s been looking beautiful since he saw him at the beginning of the concert that night, but now his hair is a mess from the almost two hours of sweating and moving around and Eddie’s on stage confidence is slowly being replaced by his fast beating heart.
“Look man I-“ Steve starts, “I don’t want to be a problem,” he adds, glancing behind Eddie as he bites his lip. The girl next to him- Robin- turns to him with an incredulous look on her eyes that Eddie is sure mirrors his own. “But you are hot, I want to take you on a date, and the others wanted to meet you.”
Robin rolls her eyes and looks at Eddie with an eyebrow up.
“The others?” Eddie manages to say, just before he remembers the teenagers around Steve all night.
“Yeah, they are with Chrissy, I asked them to give us five minutes before coming.”
Eddie is about to say something, maybe ask about the date Steve mentioned, but in a second the door is filled with said teenagers, the one with the curly hair in the middle of it.
“YOU GUYS ARE LEGENDS!” he exclaims. It makes Eddie less annoyed about being interrupted. No one has really called them legends before, they have just surpassed 150k listeners in Spotify.
It feels good hearing it.
The dressing room fills with chatter fast, the boys and the teenagers getting along without problem. They take photos, talk about music, about their instruments, about their dnd tradition. The bad part of it all is that Eddie gets separated from Steve. He catches his eye at some point and Steve sends a little wave his way that he answers. He is talking with Robin and Chrissy and, by what Eddie can hear, Chrissy is getting every video Robin has managed to get of Eddie’s and Steve’s interactions through the concert, even a closer video of the kiss than the one Chrissy managed to get. From what he can hear, she wants to post everything on their social media before ‘someone else does and steals the chance at going viral from them’.
Eddie doesn’t know how he feels about posting Steve like that, Eddie should have probably thought, about that before making out with the guy in front of all their audience. But he seems completely comfortable with all of it. Eddie guesses that comes with being as hot as Steve is and knowing it.
It’s some time later, enough that Eddie knows they won’t be able to stay much longer in the venue, that he finally has a chance to slip away. It’s perfect, he has just seen Steve leave the dressing room, probably in search of the toilet, and Gareth and the curly hair boy he has learned is called Dustin are so deep in conversation they don’t notice him stepping away from them and leaving too.
He catches Steve just as he is leaving the toilet. Eddie doesn’t stop to answer Steve’s surprised ‘oh, hey’ that turns into a more surprised ‘woah’ as Eddie pushes him back into the toilet and closes the door behind him.
“Hey” Eddie finally greets. Steve only looks at the closed door behind Eddie and then at him again with what Eddie hopes is amusement. God, he really hopes it’s amusement, he is just not realising how creepy this looks. “So, about that date.”
“Couldn’t wait until I came back?”
“No. I mean, yes.” Why is it so difficult to talk with a pretty boy? Eddie takes a deep breath, composes himself. Theatrics, he is good with those, they make him confident. “I was suffering, being deprived from your company by your companions, and didn’t have another option.”
Steve squints his eyes, “so you decided to have the date in the toilet?”
“What? No.”
Steve takes a step closer to Eddie so now their chests are almost touching. It hadn’t downed on Eddie before how they are almost the same height. It feels very important now when he has Steve’s face right in front of him, when he can look directly at his eyes, at how they drift down to Eddie’s lips. When his inevitably drift to Steve’s lips, the boy is biting his lower lip. “Eager.”
Eddie’s breath hitches in his throat, he may have miscalculated this. There’s something he wanted to say. “No, I-“
Steve chuckles, takes a step back. “Relax dude. I know you haven’t really agreed to the date yet, we got interrupted and all that.” Eddie is about to speak, to agree a thousand times to the date, but Steve keeps talking. “You just offered to buy me a couple of drinks and called me hot,” he smiles when he says that.
“I want the date.” Eddie says before Steve can keep talking, “as soon as possible.”
Steve steps back closer. “Eager.”
“We are leaving on tour, won’t be back for three months.” Eddie explains before all his brain functions completely shut down.
“I can wait three months.”
“I can’t.”
The next second Steve’s lips are on his, his hands are on his hair, and it only takes a second for Eddie’s to do the same. Steve is even a better kisser than he was in front of the audience. Steve pushes him against the door, brings a hand to his hip, pushes one of his legs between Eddie’s. Eddie just groans and lets himself be pushed and moved. Kissed. “Fuck,” he whispers when Steve pulls away for breath. Steve smiles, takes one of Eddie’s hands in his, and kisses him again. It’s so sweet and filthy at the same time Eddie might cry, but he just moves his hips forward, and Steve answers in kind, grinding against him and getting a groan out of both of them. Maybe the rockstars that hook up with people after concerts are onto something. Though Eddie doubts he would want to do this with someone that is not Steve.
A knock on the door startles them both, Robin’s voice coming from the other side.
“Steve?” Steve and Eddie stop kissing to look at each other in silence, their eyes wide. “Chrissy said we need to leave already and you’ve been in there so long I started to worry you were kidnapped. Wait, you are in there, right? Also, have you seen Eddie? He disappeared.” Steve moves, an innocent thing that has his groin brushing against Eddie’s. And he is only a man. He moans. “WAIT! Are you both in there? GROSS.”
Steve snorts, making Eddie smile. They can hear a couple of steps moving away from the door before they come back and there is a bang on the door.
“Steve! Come out you dingus, have you forgotten about your pack of kids?”
Steve lets out a whispered ‘fuck’ before he looks at Eddie with an apology in his eyes. Eddie lets himself be moved away from the door so Steve can open it to talk to his friend outside.
“Hey.”
Eddie opens the door more so he can also fit in the gap, Steve sends him a look, smiles at his appearance, and then looks at Robin again.
“Hey” Eddie greets too. Robin is looking at them and there is no hiding what they have been doing. She can surely see their bruised lips, their wild hair. Eddie just prays she doesn’t look down and sees the bulge in his pants.
“You two are gross, was making me see that once tonight not enough?”
“You have not really seen it this time,” Steve points.
“Still.”
“You are the one that came to interrupt.”
“And for a good reason! Your kids.”
“What about the kids,” Eddie asks.
“He promised to take them home.” Robin says.
“I promised to take them home.” Steve says at the same time, a resigned tone in his voice. He turns to Eddie, his brown eyes sad, and pinches his nose.
“Can’t she take them home?” Eddie points to Robin, and they both turn towards her again.
Robin takes a breath, stops, looks at them, looks at them, sees the tent in Eddie’s pants. Grimaces.
“FINE,” she agrees, and Eddie grins. “But you owe me. Big time.” She adds pointing at Steve.
“I’ll give you ice cream for life.” Steve says. It must be an inside joke because it makes Robin roll her eyes.
“Give me your car keys at least. Rockstar here can drive you home, can’t he?”
“I’ll have him home before eleven.” Eddie swears with a hand on his chest. The other two stare at him in silence. “A.m.” he adds.
“You heard him.” Steve says while handing Robin his keys.
“Okay,” Robin answers. She takes a step back. “Have fun.” She takes a couple of steps away before she turns around. “Use protection, he is a rockstar, we don’t know where his thing has been.”
“Hey,” Eddie protests, but Robin is already running away.
“She is kinda right.” Steve says with a shrug. Eddie purses his lips. “But I have an idea on where it can be in the near future.”
“Lead the way.”
Steve slips his hand into Eddie’s.
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talenlee · 2 days
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Game Pile: Kentucky Route 0, One of Three Games About America
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Script and Thumbnail below the fold!
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Kentucky Route Zero is a magical realist point and click game of what I’d normally call Narrative Adventure, which came to kickstarter in 2011, then came out in 2013, 2014, 2016, and 2020, because you can’t have nothing for free, even things you pay for. The game is a text-driven game without any of the trappings of your typical point-and-clicker where you jam a ladder in your pants and try to work out why you want to put green dye in the water fountain. Instead it follows the haunted mind of Conway, a trucky driver and his interactions with small handful of people on a part of the Kentucky Interstate, while he to find the place he needs to do his delivery, despite being utterly lost.
I enjoyed what of Kentucky Route Zero I played, but the thing that stands out to me in hindsight is its sound design. It’s a beautifully defined game, audio-wise, with all sorts of thoughtful foley for its environments, and the way that even the pieces of the interface that Conway interacts with have their own sort of specific authentic sounds, chonks and thunks and ch-zzzzses.
It’s also visually splendid, beautiful in what it tries to represent in the heightened reality of its setting but also the format of a videogame. These places look good from the angle that’s chosen, creating lines of artwork and bars of cages, depending on what you’re focusing on, and by being a fixed-camera story of its type, Kentucky Route Zero takes on traits of theatre, with blocking and careful positioning and timing all making up part of how the story unfolds.
A story I haven’t finished.
See, I don’t feel like playing Kentucky Route Zero Act V.
Sit down, traveller. Let me tell you a story.
There’s a chance you’ve heard this story before. I’ve anonymised it here, not because I think you shouldn’t be able to work out who it is, but because the idea of focusing on the who runs the risk of ignoring the what. Plus, I don’t want to direct anyone to a person who said something stupid and encourage fights. That’s not the important issue.
This is the story of when someone perfectly represented something, and probably never realised it.
You will sometimes hear me talk about the take that ‘there are three games about America,’ with a tone of utter revulsion and derision. This is from an incident back in 2020, when a game developer and advocate for inclusive games, had an opinion, on the internet. This advocate is well-established and has a big audience, but also, he’s crucially, not a white guy, not a Christian guy, and not an American guy. These are factors that play into what he said, which was, in summary, that while Kentucky Route 0 was no doubt phenomenal, he wasn’t interested in playing it right now.
To this, an actual adult responded with:
This is legitimately the worst take you’ve ever had. There are only about three games that are actually American, and this is one of them. Everything else is designed for export. Kr0 is a precious and valuable thing. It is of immense and intense personal importance.
Now, resisting the urge to argue with a tweet, which is just generally a bad practice that leads to doing things like wanting to be on twitter, and setting aside this tweet conflating ‘this is of personal importance to me’ and ‘this should be of importance to you,’ this position describes the idea that there are only three games that are ‘actually American.’
What does it mean to be ‘actually American?’
America is a pretty pervasive presence, if you’re not aware of it. Most people in the world have to know about what’s going on in America. We know about your Presidents and your Senators and your Constitution, to the point where people can be more aware of how your country’s laws work than their own country’s laws. I’ve often seen it held up as an example of how poorly educated people in say, Canada and Australia are that we believe we have, say, a ‘first amendment right,’ but the thing is you have to ask why there is that.
We watch so much American TV.
We listen to American music.
We try to make our news broadcasts look like yours, because that’s what real and legitimate news looks like. We try to retell your stories in our local languages because that’s what real media looks like. Our children sing songs in your accents because that’s the culture that a multi-trillion dollar economy has pumped into the whole world.
America demands we attend their wars and surrender our living to become their dead and when we are done America sells the survivors a cheeseburger.
This is not a remarkable or controversial statement. You must know, this is not even vaguely challenging to know about. Everywhere in the world is replicating parts of the American empire, because America exports and enforces the vision of the American empire. McDonalds may sell curry in India, but it’s very important that the curry being sold is McDonalds curry because that is how you know it’s an American style curry.
What this means is when someone tries to assert there are only really three games about America, that’s a kind of specialised brain rot that requires you to consider games that are very much about America as not being really about America. And thus we see the other thing about America, which is it’s not enough for America to be the most important place in the world that everyone else in the world needs to recognise, but also, most of America is inadequately America for this vision of America. You saw this in the wake of 9/11, and the election of Barack Obama: huge amounts of American media resurged in extolling the values of ‘real’ America, as opposed to the parts of America where the vast majority of Americans lived, which just so happened to paint a lot of marginalised people living in the cities as ‘fake Americans.’
I am not bringing you unique information. This is just obviously true things if you don’t live within the boundaries of an environment that flatters you as the most normal thing in the world. The vast majority of the world is not America. There are eight billion people in the world, more or less, meaning that America is about 4% of the world, and yet, it is catastrophically, overwhelmingly, deleritously the common touchstone for how things are ‘supposed’ to work. This is through media imperialism, which is mostly supported by American companies exporting all their media to foreign markets extremely cheaply.
‘about three games that are actually American.’
This fascinating piece of doofusry still, even now leaves me agog. ‘Actually American.’ Kentucky Route 0 is actually American, you see, as opposed to… what? Is America’s Army one of them? You know, the game financed by the American Army? What about Call of Duty, a franchise that is in part subsidised by American military complex manufacturers? What about Grand Theft Auto, a videogame that tells the rags-to-riches story of American excess in criminality, setting aside the way it’s made by a Scottish company. Actually American, because American doesn’t mean America, it means one tiny little pool of ‘America’ where the speaker can imagine there’s a realness and an authenticity to the America-ness that doesn’t involve all the messy realities of what it is to be America. It’s the towns of hard-working people, that suffer under your particular description of oppression, whether that’s cities full of nonwhite people or corporations bleeding the country dry, always eliding the social cruelties and terribleness of these places, as if giving people money stops them from being bigoted (for example).
This is then used to recruit these poor, superior Americans, the you know, America Americans, whose sufferings are noble and whose authenticity cannot be impeached and they are then used as a defense against criticism of, you know, America. It’s the same speech Charlie Daniels gave about how foreigners may think they could push around Barack Obama (a dude who bombed a lot of shepherds with the most elaborate and brutal military ordinance in the world) but they were going to have a harder time taking on Americans who wrestled alligators, who at this point have exactly zero recorded drone strike kills.
This is because America America isn’t real.
‘Real’ America is a nebulous nothing that you can project whatever you want onto, and which is also not responsible for anything terrible that America does. It’s not the American Empire, it’s not the exporter of culture, it’s somehow purer, better, a sort of individualised folk who are to be protected and extolled, shriven of all the things about America that make it anything but its perfect idealised form of America.
I could go on.
I really could.
This is something that defines the world I have to live in. I speak English. I’m white. I’m from a coloniser state. I should be able to integrate easily and smoothly into the white supremacist capitalist hierarchy of American culture, but we are told, that no, we are not acceptable. We are only valid as long as our differences are invisible. We, a real people, do not get to have opinions on America, because we do not know True America. When you spell colour wrong in a chat message, when your accent isn’t quite right, when you don’t know the difference between junior and sophomore year of high school, then you are shown, you are evinced, and you are made very aware that you are other, you are outside, you are wrong.
And really, there’s no good reason for it. We send our soldiers to America’s wars, we buy America’s submarines, and we sing your songs. Our currency mimics America’s, our culture permeats with America’s, we even have such a crushing inferiority complex about the empire that there’s an academic term for what we feel about our own media compared to the media of the truer, proper empire to which we are vassal.
The term is ‘cultural cringe,’ and it was coined by Henry Lawson, who you, odds on, have never heard of. In 1894, he wrote:
The Australian writer, until he gets a “London hearing,” is only accepted as an imitator of some recognized English or American author; and, as soon as he shows signs of coming to the front, he is labelled “The Australian Southey,” “The Australian Burns,” or “The Australian Bret Harte,” and lately, “The Australian Kipling.” Thus no matter how original he may be, he is branded, at the very start, as a plagiarist, and by his own country, which thinks, no doubt, that it is paying him a compliment and encouraging him, while it is really doing him a cruel and an almost irreparable injury. But mark! As soon as the Southern writer goes “home” and gets some recognition in England, he is “So-and-So, the well-known Australian author whose work has attracted so much attention in London lately”; and we first hear of him by cable, even though he might have been writing at his best for ten years in Australia.
This is imperialism. This is a way in which we have been induced and brought by the empires around us to accept their ways as correct, as the normal, as default. And that is the mindset you must have if you want to look at the breadth of videogames, with their American ideas like health insurance, readily available guns, the importance of freedom, the ubiquity of air travel, the branding and iconography of types of food and the sports metaphors and then say ‘yeah, this doesn’t have anything to do with America, not really.’
Anyway, this thread, this incident, was a big deal at the time, in that there were a lot of people from within the community of game developers and journalists who seemed very happy to line up and get mad at a brown foreigner for being inadequately enthusiastic about the possibility of playing a videogame. But don’t worry, after a day or two, an apology was forthcoming for all of this fracas, by which I mean, the original developer apologised for being so thoughtless as to, again, express honest lack of enthusiasm in a videogame.
For me, this was a kind of break point, where I started just blocking indie devs on sight. I don’t want to know what they’re involved in, I don’t want to promote their work, and I will hold tiny grudges against them that I do not seek to transfer or encourage in others. This was one silly incident in which a lot of people said something silly because they don’t know better, or they’re arseholes.
None of this is fair to Kentucky Route 0. It’s a game with its own intentions and its own perspective. It’s not trying to make this conversation happen. Kentucky Route 0 has been choked and gripped by this position around it, where to talk about an American game, someone put a cross on it that made it the avatar for All Things America. The wild thing to me is that I had, prior to this point, played two episodes of Kentucky Route 0. I thought it was pretty good, and I liked what it did with the negative space of dialogue options – when a character you’re controlling makes excuses, the excuses you choose show you other things you could be making excuses about that you, the player, didn’t know beforehand. That’s some good Narrative Storytelling Design, I like that a lot. But now I can’t really engage with Kentucky Route Zero because the main thing it makes me think about is how this final chapter, meant to round out the game’s story and present a conclusion and a point, became this flashpoint for a lot of people to be very casually racist.
Which kinda poisons the whole thing for me. It’s an authentic thing, I’m sure, it’s a thoughtful thing, too, but the people stepping up to say I should care about it did so in a way that made me hate them.
Any time you see me say ‘three games about America’ I’m talking about this, and the attitude of a particular kind of American that America is, as always, exceptional. It’s real easy to not realise when you’re just voicing your self-centeredness and how easy that is to ignore the opinions of people around you and what they’re saying. This is what I’m talking about when I mention ‘the three games about America.’
[fade for credit text]
By the way, the three games about America are Crash Bandicoot, Sam & Max Hit The Road, and Bust A Move.
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coffeegnomee · 2 days
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I wanted to write about how far Zam has come with his character for like a week now and now he’s acknowledged it himself so I finally grabbed all the quotes.
Let’s go down memory lane shall we? 
DAY 1 
24:00 “There’s a ghost that haunts my dreams [...] I see him in my sleep. He tells me to kill people. But I don’t want to kill anyone”
“I have to hold it in.. [...] I wish I had like horror sound effects to play and images of every lifesteal member dead and I could flash them across the screen” does that. 
ZAM: “*lights armadillo on fire* “give it a slow, painful death” PENTAR: “for someone against the whole idea of killing, you seem to have a gruesome way around killing things.” ZAM “I’m still me” [armadillo dies.] “I can only resist the urges so much [evil giggle]”
10:07:00 after Pentar kills him “It’s not about being above anyone by not killing people, I would just prefer not to. Because last season I feel like I was.. Something else. And I don’t want to do that again. I don’t want to be that again. You know?”
“Because it’s not supposed to be some morality, ‘I’m better than you’ kind of thing, you know? I don’t want to be on some like high horse. It’s more of like, I just don’t wanna let the demon out, you know, that type of thing”
Reflecting on the first two days, I wrote this about Zam: This season looks like an internal battle of his personal desire to complete a minecraft challenge™ (no kills) vs his desire to do lore and change his character multiple times. And I just don’t think the challenge wins long term. A challenge isn’t what makes him love lifesteal, it’s the lore. 
Day 4 7/9/24
1:01:05 “‘zam has no enemies’ no, it’s not that I have no enemies, it’s just that if I kill people, I’m going to become like a monster. Like way worse than anyone else on the server. You know? And I like don’t want that reputation if I’m like just peacefully building. [...] ‘oh bro’s scared to hurt others then?’ yup! [...] ‘bad things will happen…. (meep)’ yea last time I hurt someone, last time i tried to hurt someone, bad things happened. And i just… can’t do that again, you know?”
1:21:40 killing bogged in trial chamber. “It feels nice cutting things down, I don’t think I’ve been doing enough of this. [...] I’m going to kill all of you, I’m going to kill every single one of you. [...] is it weird to say that I’ve missed this? Even though ‘this’ is just cutting down a bunch of skeletons, just jumping up and down and left clicking [...]  [evil giggles (and not to anything in chat)] [...] my sword might say “im so sorry’ but I’m not sorry, I’m not even a little sorry right now” 
2:19:05 “”also Zam is emo’ (chips) “no i’m not! I’m so happy! I’m the happiest i've been in a long time. That’s why I have my nipple out. That’s not true why did i say that” 
4:04:50 Wemmbu killed Spoke. ZAM: “[opens statistics] it still says zero. It still says zero. It still says zero it still says zero. So I’m fine. I’m fine. Cause it still says zero.. [walks around base] I’m fine. It’s perfectly fine. ‘0 plants potted’ (arch) okay actually that’s what I got the clay for so.. Thank you for saying that actually, very convenient timing. [goes to shed to smelt] [blows out breath] I’m just gonna chop down trees. I’m just gonna chop down trees and I’m just gonna leave this group and I’m gonna chop down trees and I’m gonna have a fun time and nothing bad’s gonna happen. And everything’s gonna be a-okay [hannah logged on] I thought Mapicc logged on I cannot lie. Okay maybe I’m scared. [Mapicc logs on] [gasp, crouches] motherfucker. Motherfucker [under breath]”
Dies to Mapicc three times. 
5:26:00 is thinking about how he’s doing a character nobody else on lifesteal has done before. Puts on a lore song. “‘If there’s one thing you’ve been consistent in the last two seasons, it’s been steady in your morals until the end’ (chips) yea. But here’s the thing though [giggle] does it matter? Or like, what’s it called. Am I restricting myself? Do you guys think? Most definitely, right. And it’s like. I dunno, a big part of me feels like it would be nice to like, let go, and just like, join in on all the violence, and everything, and all that stuff. You know? Like it would be nice. It would be nice, I think. Maybe. Maybe not, I don't know… [evil giggle] ahhh. [long pause, arch in chat said ‘once you do it you can’t go back though’ he doesn’t read it out] [lore music cuts out] [very seriously] no that’s stupid. No. I’m not gonna. I’m not gonna. [blows breath] I’m not gonna let myself go as far as I did last season. I’m not gonna let myself do anything like that again [tehe giggle] [huffs out breath]”
5:28:18 “‘it was fun tho’ (chips) it was, but it was fun at the expense of others. It was fun… but it was damaging to the server.. It was. I dunno. I don’t think it’s who I want to be. I don’t think I was born to be…That. you know? I don’t know. I feel like that’s not who I am. I feel like that was never who I was.” 
7/13/24 end fight day 
~2:38:00 ZAM: “‘its not ok to kill people but it's ok to ask people really nicely to kill people you don't like’ I’m allowed to persuade people’s opinions, I think, and I can only do that when I’m really really mad. [...] But i dunno. [sigh] I’ve messaged both opposing teams so i dunno, I don’t care enough though. Whatever. This is beyond me."
“Joker zam went back into his closet’ (meep) that’s true. I was possessed for a second there. [messages MC chat saying that] ‘my evil self wishes for me to kill everyone. I won’t tho.' 
7/14/24 day he kills planet
Hour and half of Pangi messing with him while he gets more and more frustrated at the shulker farm. 
1:28:50 Zam flies after Pangi and crits him out, but he stops. “I can’t crit him out like that, I’m gonna get my first player kill and it’s gonna ruin all my lore” 
1:40:00 pangi is still singing, Zam bows him, then tries fishing rodding him. He comes up the farm PANGI: “hey PrinceZam, do you need therapy?” ZAM: “shut up you always got some noise to make, shut up. [...] I bet you’re my first kill this season” PANGI: “BAHAHAA” ZAM: “just kidding I won’t kill anyone. Just kidding. Just kidding just kidding. That was a joke. That was a joke. I won’t kill anyone. [blows out breath]” PANGI: “okay PrinceZam.” 
1:47:00 ZAM: “what the fuck just happened to me. Dude, I need to stop. He keeps, he keeps trying to get me to get my first kill, bro. He’s trying to get me to get my first kill. I can’t. I can’t do it. I can’t do it. It’s getting harder and harder, with each and every day, to hold back [sigh] oooh kay. ‘Why aren’t you killing anybody’ because as soon as I kill one person, I go down a dark dark path. And you don’t want to see that dark dark path. ‘WE DO’ I don’t. K fine, maybe you do. I don’t. A great darkness lurks within me. A great darkness lurks within me. It’s consumed me, ever since, ever since I was young. ‘Your dark side is banging on the door, let the poor guy in’ no. noo. I’m gonna build a closet in my house. ‘PLEASE DO IT’ where could I even, oh I know where I could actually build a closet right now, let’s do that right now actually hold on. Unironically lets do that right now” 
6:24:44 zam goes to bacon in his base, “Whenever I sleep, he comes to me. So i try not to sleep in that bed anymore” BACON: “[baffled] how did that even start. Like how did you even, what, how did this even become a thing in your head” ZAM: “[ignoring] there’s a demon in my closet, any time, any time I die he comes closer to possessing me.” BACON: “okay what is the demon trying to get you to do.” ZAM: “kill everyone” BACON: “oooohhh. Oh I like that. Okay okay” ` 
Then there’s the fated Bacon stream 
2:39:00 bacon and planet meme around about the build battle rules and Zam snaps, “if you want to be a bitch about it you don’t have to fucking play, goddamm. Dumbass fucking planetlord and baconnwaffles. I hate both of you. Fuck you guys. I’m going back into the house… i’m going into my closet” 
They clean up spawn a bit, he comes back out swinging at them. Then goes on top of the lighthouse and starts shooting them from a distance. 
Planet takes off all his armor and pops like a grape.
Then on Spep’s stream he stalks Spep around to the End islands, generally just looks really threatening. Says he won’t remember this when he wakes up, but Spep will. 
7/15/24 
~14:00 ZAM: “[strained] dude, pangi I killed planet” PANGI: “[strained too]I know. Hey, it wasn’t your fault” ZAM: “i shouldn’t have even had a bow” 
He builds the tree and writes his first oath 
In the first draft he wrote “I cannot do anything that goes against the interest of the entire server”
he changed “entire server” to “majority of players” to “most players” 
And changed “attack any player” because chat went crazy about him not being able to punch anyone, to “kill any other players” 
7/18/24 
Flame and mapicc start fighting
22:40 ZAM: “dude I did give mapicc a heads up there, I can’t lie. [realizing] I’ve been playing all sides, I can’t lie. This is interesting. I’m just chummy with everyone, I dunno, i don't do it intentionally. I do it a little intentionally, i can’t lie, but not like, intentionally”
33:20 ZAM: “I really don’t like the idea of playing both sides, but like, like- I’m trying my hardest not to, [...] Like if you shove 100 dollars in my face like I’m probably gonna take it right? Like like [giggling], it’s just like, ugh, it’s so stupid [laughing] i don’t like this. I don't know, I’m opportunist I guess. I’m just an opportunist I guess because I'm pacifist and I don't wanna die." So. But like also I really just don’t like the idea of being someone who plays both sides, it’s so awkward” while watching the fight from a distance. "
7/20/24 
From 2:43:00 to 3:15:00 hops between group chats and instinctively gets information and relays it to everyone else. Actually just leaks every word he hears lol. 
4:51:10 “imagine flame goes on a killing spree just so he can pay you to make more builds lol’ (citrus) dude. Is the blood on my hands then? That’s something I was wondering, what if this becomes bad. To where they’re like murdering people just for the sake of like, whats it called, paying me. ‘Yes you're evil then’ (sin) aw shit. It’s my fault. I mean I guess it depends on how bad it gets. I felt really bad when they killed jepex for me. I can’t lie, in the moment I thought it was really funny but looking back, it’s literally the same as like. Like I think me asking them to kill someone is the same as me killing them myself, it lowkey does not matter. So I’m lowkey like having another moral dilemma right there, on that one. ”
“I’m gonna stop asking people to fucking kill people for me that’s stupid, i don’t want to do that anymore”
This is so interesting, because day 1 he just wanted the statistic, and it was okay for him to do traps or gaslight people and all that. Then it was no traps, no violence. Then it was it’s okay to influence the opinions of people who already want to kill the people I want dead. Now it’s like, even that is not okay.
7/21/24 building Flame’s volcano in one day
45:00 [unprompted] “do you know something I was thinking of, which like, i just feel like it would be so easy to turn like, any tree, at spawn, into a trap. It would be so easy right? [...] I’m not gonna do it! Just like a fun idea. [..] [starts making the trap] but then it would make it real. I shouldn’t do this actually. I- i shouldn’t do this. This isn’t a good idea. Nevermind. Nevermind. [rubs face] Ooh my god, back to building back to building. I’m building I’m just building. [puffs out breath] I’m just building. I’m building a castle. I’m not why would I - why would i even make a [giggles] why did I even do that in the first place.” 
2:43:00 breaking the bedrock of the end fountain to make a concrete duper “i feel really good at this. Like too good at this. It’s just holding down q, it’s not that special. But fuck. ‘It’s in your blood’ I don't want to be the guy that left behind, that broke all that bedrock, you know? I don’t want that to be my legacy, I don't want that to be my reputation. I don’t want that to be what I leave behind. Aw geeze. [breaks last bedrock] oh my god. [frustrated] That was effortless”
7:31:30 “‘it’s ok you can blame all your blunders on the demon’ (seri) [lore] what if there was no demon. [not lore] new headcanon. Just me trying to justify my acts. [soft giggle] waittt.. [pause] thank goodness the demon is real, so. the demon is real. Only i can see him” 
8:23:00 crashout over not being “able” to defend himself.  “‘its okay zam we saw how you are at the end of every single season’ (citrus) yea, you guys have. The deep darkness that’s within me, [giggle] ugh. ‘They’ll see… one day’ (mer) I don’t want them to see, no, that’s the thing, i don’t want them to see. [..] It’s just like, like I Could fight, it’s just such a hassle, to like, get into it, and then not, you know. Cause like, okay, okay, here here, let’s envision it, lets say I do want to fight people, right? theoretically, but, I don’t want to let out the evil evil darkness that’s within me, right? How the hell am I gonna do that when I’m constantly taking fights, constantly losing, constantly getting overly attached, overly invested in conflict, like how am i gonna, how am I gonna contain the demon within, if I, what’s it called, if I, if I’m constantly getting myself into fights? You know? ‘Getting good’ (chips) no but like I’m being dead serious, like cause, what’s it called, eventually they’re gonna hit me in a way that is gonna make me want to go full force, there’s no point in trying to fight if I’m not gonna go 100% all in, you know? So. I dunno. Maybe if I get better at my self control and discipline” 
So there’s two things. One, “it’s a hassle” is classic burnout. And you just have to wait for burnout to leave. And two, he is very self aware that someone will do something that will make him get invested. But he won’t flip that switch until that happens because there is no point. Which is very valid and wise. 
It’s such an interesting conversation, because it’s the first time he hasn’t made breaking his oath into a silly lore moment. It’s really settling into being a real part of him. He’s being honest about what fighting would actually do.
10:36:00 talks to jumper about his pacifism and their parallels. He tells her about how he knows he’ll get too invested and he wont want to hold back. As opposed to being unable. 
7/24/24 
53:10 Zam goes to the trial chambers again “dude wait these slimes have strength, are they gonna kill me? Dude I wanted to feel something but now I’m just not feeling anything actually. I was, I was, I was expecting more of a challenge”
7/25/24 day 1 peace trials
16:30 “do you think SB737 is going to kill me if he finds me? His layer’s off, I think he ran away from spawn after that one. I could see him trying though. I’ve lowkey, dude, lowkey i've been wishing someone would kill me, unfortunately I did starve to death, so now I don’t wish someone would kill me anymore. But like, it’s just been sooo peaceful, building these past few days you know? Like i haven’t ran into any kind of metal peril in soooo long like that’s crazy you know. It’s been a hot minute.”
First time he talks about wanting to be chased. 
37:00 annoyed about SB butting him in D teir for how easy he would be killed.  “‘zam is the most aggressive pacifist’ yea! Cause I mean how else am I supposed to let my anger out other than with my words. I still have emotions. They're still there” 
7/29/24 
1:07:24 still ignoring Bacon “If I’m gonna be a pacifist and not kill people, I should be able to hold a grudge somehow” “my only fighting method” 
Plotting the shift in zam’s mindset is like making a color spectrum and it’s just ever so slightly gradient-ed and before you know it it’s just all red.
8/17/24 
58:00  MANE: “but think about how many hearts I’ve given you before Zam”  ASH: “WAIT. ZAm is accepting hearts from people That Kill? That’s not very peaceful of you zam. That goes against your oath. You’re just accepting heart that has, that puts blood on your hands. I’m not even joking about this” ZAM: “I-, I don’t. I don’t think it does.” ASH: “You’re benefiting from the spoils of the death that you claim to be so against”  Zam jumps away from the conversation at the same time. nervously? 
ZAM: “[calmly] if kills have already happened what am I supposed to do to stop it. I only care about myself not killing people” [parkouring over to the roof of the house] ASH: “You literally” ZAM: “not other people. The server can do whatever the fuck it wants. I don’t care” PANGI” aaahhhhh” ASH: “That’s the most. That’s the most selfish view” 
ZAM: “I learned from you! The best side to play is all sides, right? That’s what you said [...] hypocrytical as fuck” ASH: “I mean, I’m not claiming to be any good person, I’m just saying your whole oath and code of honor is” ZAM: “I’m not either. I’m trying to be a good person but, hey” PANGI: “You’re doing a really bad job I can tell you that, Zam” ZAM: “yea. [swings around to look at pangi] coming from you is crazy” 
1:03:00 “‘you’ve only done build commissions for incredibly violent people huh’ (arch) that is something to consider huh, am I [sharp breath in] let me put on the lore music hold on. Am I. and I, I don’t think I’m the worst person to- okay. No. you know what? It doesn’t matter. Because there are worse people on this server. So I’m not that bad by comparison [...] You know I’m doing better than I did last season [...] So I’m okay. I’m happy with my choices I feel like. I dunno. I mean like gaining, gaining hearts is not the worst thing in the world, it’s kind of like the point of the server is it not? I dunno. Hmmm ‘i mean violent people are the ones who have the hearts’ (citrus) exactly! Yea, my only, the only people I CAN do business with is the violent people”
“But by taking hearts from them am I not encouraging them to kill more? Yea, that’s something to consider as well, you know? Cause, but it’s like. Ugggghhh let me read through the oath again. ‘Are they killing other violent people or innocents’ (arch) that’s true! I mean. They kill innocents when they feel like killing innocents it depends on the person i’m dealing with. [...]  I can’t control what other people do. It’s not selfish [heavy emphasis. Meaning ashsawg’s comment] it’s just like, me controlling what I can control. You can only control, you should only worry about what you can control, and what I can control is limiting myself.”
“I mean shit. What do I even want these hearts for” 
“‘you got one kill’ ‘you killed planet’ okay okay okay you killed planet okay. I hate how many people are talking about that. [..]  ‘YOU CANNOT DENY IT ZAM’ yes I fucking can! Yes I fucking can! Because I shot at him as a fucking like bit, because was obviously never to kill him, and he took off all his fucking armor. I’ve been over it! I have been over it like a million times it’s insane! I gave back the heart too like what. [opens statistics] Like it doesn’t even count. [closes statistics] It does not count. ‘You’re still killing’ [mocking] you're still killing. Okay actual like bot opinion. Bot take. Actual bot take is what this is. Insane. Like actually insane. The fact that people are still on this is craaaazy like actually crazy. ‘PANGI HASN’T’ oohhhh that’s what this is about. That’s what this is about. That’s what this is about, it’s about pangi, and and pangi being better than me okay.” 
“That’s what this is about. It means nothing to me. Means nothing to me. I don’t care. PANGI LITERALLY- okay. Okay. okay. Okay. okay. Okay. okay. Okay. [giggle laugh] pangi is a pacifist because he wants to be. But that’s like. Dude, woogie 1 for 1 took my thing. Dude, it’s crazy how many people are pacifist why did everyone like take my thing I mean like the whole point is proof of concept is prove that it’s possible, right, but like heh heh. It’s also lame that other people are taking my thing. [more deranged leaning giggles] ‘everybody wants to be princezam.’ (mer) oh my god. “
8/19/24 
~1:11:00 found Mapicc in his base. MAPICC: “and i just like, when are you gonna kill people” ZAM: “pppffff [mocking/flabberghasted] ‘when are you going to kill people?’ [reduced to laughter] MAPCIC: ”mmhmm” ZAM: “I’m not!” MAPICC: “see that's so weird.” [...] ZAM: “you start critting me out I don’t fight back” MAPICC: “actually?” ZAM: “no like genuinely, yea” MPAICC: “wait. Okay [pots up and takes all armor off but helmet and boots]” 
1:34:00 “a little terrifying i can’t lie. it’s weird. I feel like after an encounter like that I’d have a teammate to go talk to about this. But there really isn't anyone like that this time around”
8/22/24 
3:30 about the mapicc infestation “It was a very interesting fight. Honestly one of my favorite fights of the season” 
19:40 “ohh ‘kaboodle the pacifist’ (evi4) Wait kaboodle the pacifist? Are we fucking serious. Yo. okay. Okay.  i’m not even going to say nothing bro. I’m not even going to say nothing. I’m. I’m not even going to say nothing. I’m not even going to say nothing. I’m not. I’m not even [starting to laugh]  going to say nothing, bro [deep breath in and out] how come the one season. Like the one season, that i do it and it’s like interesting, everyone else decides to do it. In season 4 no one copied subz. Everyone made fun of him. But now, but now i do it and everyone wants to fucking be me okay. Okay. no okay. No okay. No like. Bro. [so sad] [...] ‘Everyone is just scared of the big pvp-ers’ (arch) that’s true. It’s not even. It’s not even like me. Oh my god. It’s not even because i’m cool. No it’s not even because of me, it’s just they don’t want to get killed”
27:00 kab asks if she can talk to zam and get advice “oh bet. Oh i love giving advice to my fellow pacifists. My favorite thing to do ever” /sarcastic
31:40 Woogie drops in “Zam is amazing at making people peaceful”
34:00 “if your goal is pacifism, then yea, he’s passing, but if your goal is to not get murdered by people then you probably shouldn’t be destroying other people’s builds, you know. That’s how you start wars” about pangi’s pacifism. 
Which is ALSO interesting. Because zam cares about not starting wars because he doesn't want to get emotionally pulled into a fight.
ZAM: “its like i’m in a skit. And like, as soon as i start questioning one character, and another character comes out and is like “ooh i’m also a remake of you!” what the fuck is happening” 
“You know what’s keeping me going is that i’ll probably outlast them” 
42:40 “is this a bad thing? Am i bad for not wanting them to be a, [laugh] to be peaceful like me? Is that a bad thing? I mean like, i feel like, uhg. But it’s like, they- [sharp breath in] what is- what have THEY gone through? To want this change” 
“Like kaboodle is doing it to save her skin. Woogie is doing it to save his skin, like. It’s very different i feel like. It’s just very different. I [whispers] oh  my god. [spins around] what did. What do they know! What do they know. Oh my god. Fuck damn. I think that’s why i’m upset. It’s not that like, [long pause] bruh.” 
“How can i rise about the rest. That's what i want to do now. That’s what I wanna do now. I want to rise above the rest. That’s what i’m thinking about right now, i’ll be honest. How do I [sharp breath in] [blows air out] like. This is-. [grumble] this is stupid. This is dumb. I shouldn't even think about this. You know what this is dumb."
48:00 “it’s not like a fun thing to do. Like. I- being a pacifist has been like, it’s it’s had its moments i guess. I dunno though. Definitely, i’ll admit it, not the most.. fun. But uh. Thats. that’s besides the point. That’s okay. That’s.. that’s fine [deep breath in and out]” 
“‘being a pacifist isn't for everyone, you have to truly believe in the rules and know your own limits so you can be pacifist’ (hexlarry) but like that’s the thing, do i even like, fully believe in it? Cause now i’m starting to question myself. I mean I did it not so that i could save my own skin. I did it so that i could, i dunno, just avoid repeating prior mistakes. And things like that. Sooo. because getting myself into fights would probably lead me down a very very dark path and i don't want to [sharp breath] i don't wanna do all that so by avoiding conflict at all costs I, I can, what’s it called, hmmm [spins around] fuck [princezam distress noises] [...] ‘has something changed’ i dunno. I’d hope not”
“‘it feels like they’re mocking you a little’ (evu) a little bit! I guess so. That’s kind of true as well honestly. I dunno. Hmmm, it’s very. Very interesting. Very interesting turn of events. I dunno. It’s not that i feel like it’s my thing. I feel like everyone should be allowed to do it, it just feels like the way that they’re doing it kind of is like, i guess it is, i dunno. It’s a little bit like.. Hmm yea ‘it’s an easy way out to them’ (arch) to them, to them it doesn't have any of the same significance it does to me. They're doing it because they want to live longer, they want to hold onto their hearts longer, i’m doing it because I like- i essentially need to- ugh. I dunno. I’m doing it- hrmmm. No, i’m doing it because… Because i want to. Because I want to. I want to. It’s my decision. I want to do it. I dunno [jumps around thinking for a while]�� 
The last part is said in the same tone he used during the Abyss arc when his team wasn't logging on to help him.
“It’s not about what other people have done though. It’s about me upholding an oath i guess. Me.. avoiding [giggle] repeating mistakes and stuff. Umm. i dunno ‘it’s a conflict with myself’ (mer) exactly. It’s entirely. Entirely within me. And that was a situation that, admittedly, I had control over. I could have just not shot my bow at him. It’s a lesson learned i guess. But. I dunno. I- I just hate it. I hate it so much because that was not meant to happen at all. Like. it’s ridiculous. Its just ridiculous i feel like. I dunno. ‘Bro is still talking about this’ yea because I care about it.”
8/23/24
5:38:00  WEMMBU: “you’re profiting off the economy of people being murdered” ZAM: “I don’t know if that’s true at all even. That’s just. [trying to talk while wemmbu is talking over him] Anyone who lives on this server is profiting off the economy bro. I don't know what you’re talking about. [...] That that’s like breathing air on this server is benefitting form the economy bro” WEMMBU: “and you’re the one that’s saying you’re and innocent soul bruh” ZAM: “i’m, somewhat innocent. I’m innocent to the point where I won’t lure someone to spawn so you guys can kill them. That's how innocent I am” WEMMBU: “wah wahh wah” 
And he leaves the group
ZAM: “Get me the fuck out of here. I simply participate in society. All i do is live and breathe air and try to live an honest to god living.”
~5:51:00 “‘Oh so you agree you’d be responsible in that scenario’ (arch) yea! If he’s going out of his way to kill people For That [the build he wanted to commission], like to pay For That, I feel like yea, I feel like then I’m definitely responsible. [...] But mane, flame, mapicc, they already have the hearts, I know they withdrew them from their hotbar, they did in front of me, it did the sound. So, yea. And flame just had a heart bank that he went and grabbed. So. yea no, those hearts were already acquired. They were, like, those kills happened, it’s over. It’s good.” 
8/24/24
2:13:00 “that was interesting. What a day. I almost hopped into a fight. Probably wont do it again, that was a one time offer. But. i dunno. I was willing to die for a cause. I wasn’t going to hit him.” 
“Maybe i faltered. Did I falter? By willing to fight? I wouldn’t hit him. I don’t think. Maybe I’d hit him. I don’t- [scoff] would it be fine as long as i don't kill him?” “it’s my rules” 
“Yea mapicc did get really excited when i mentioned pvp. That was really interesting. That was cool. I do have no critting yea. Hmmm. i dunno. I did just want to support my friend flame ‘you're just helping out a friend i think thats in the servers best interests’ (arch) that’s true. Yea. if i, i dunno, cause like the main goal is to just work in the server’s best interests. And i guess in that situation that, specific, little situation, fighting flame was actually in everyone, everyone who’s online’s best interests. Ironically. So yea. Despite it normally being the wrong answer, violence was kind of the answer to fixing that problem there. ” 
2:18:00  “I’m worried though. Like I feel like the lack of violence encourages me to like, i dunno” 
“I think people should be more violent, i think that’s fair, that’s what this server is about. I haven't changed my stance on that, the server is about killing people. It’s not about [giggle] the atrocities I’ve committed, that’s for sure” 
“‘That’s not very pacifist I mean’ like that’s whatever, it’s princezam then. It doesn’t matter. Pacifist is just the moniker I chose, but if it’s not fitting it’s not fitting. I’m doing whatever I believe” 
“‘the blowing up builds and killing weaklings was your more problem. not your violence inherently’ (arch) exactly. And unfortunately I feel like with any sort of violence [tsht] unfortunately all paths lead to that road. You know? Everything will just eventually get me there. I think it’s better to swear it off, you know. It’s just, It’s just for the better”
Flame blows up spawn.
2:52:00 “And my heart count too. I was trying to get to 20 but like - what does that even do, what is that even good for, if i can't do anythin- if i’m powerless to stuff like this, if i’m powerless to this. This. Like what’s the point, even like what’s-... I feel like everything I’ve done is just like actually completely futile now. Like, none of it matters. NONE of it matters, not even a little, if other people are just going to take up the mantle. What like, what’s the POINT?... I don't get it. I mean holding out, not giving in, despite all of this, would prove me as a way stronger player than him, but WHAT GOOD DOES THAT ACCOMPLISH. SO WHAT?! Like, he’s just going to do this again, like why does it matter? Why does it even matter? What the- what does moral highground get me? What does moral high ground even get me. Why did i think this was even a good idea even a little bit, [so loud] OH MY GOD. [pause] ‘It doesn't even mean anything to anyone but me’ (arch) exactly. This. oh my god. It’s not just to myself though (arch) it’s ahhh Fuck. It’s supposed to make up for everything I did- For just everything I did in general really. That’s what it’s supposed to be, but, like ah, does anyone care really? Does anyone care? Other than me? At this point I don't think so. There’s bigger problems. ‘Spawn looked the best this season’ it did. It really did. It really really did. It really did. [tabs out for a long time, just silent] i can't’ believe this. I can’t believe this. [sigh] oh my god. [leaning head back] Dude. and like. Oh my god. Yea no one is going to do anything that’s true. The fact of the matter is [laughing as talking] no one is going to do anything about this. Because no one cares. And that’s what he’s going to realize. [...] That’s all fine to me, it doesn't matter. It doesn’t matter. This is definitely the furthest I’ve wavered, on this path of mine. Dear god. [blows out breath] and i was the only one here to do anything about it oh my god [silence] ‘they did call me ground zero’ [puts head in hands while reading it] is it my fault? Is it my- wait you’re right. [breathing heavily] it kind of in a, in a weird, fucked up twisted way, it kind of is my fault. Because my stupid pacifism stuff it it spiraled out of control and got to woogie, got to pangi, it’s it’s like [grrr grumble] (all of chat is screaming that it isn't his fault.) I, oh my god. Oh my god. Dude like. I actually feel so dumb. I feel like I’ve wasted the past month or two. I’ve actually just feel like I’ve been wasting my time. Like, like none of that matters. Actually none of that matters, I feel like, anymore. And like, because I did all that, everyone else copied me. Everyone copied me, they were right! No, they were right. That’s the messed up part of this, is that they’re Right. And that they probably will get a fight out of this, that’s the Fucked up part of this” 
3:04:00 “If I fight them I give them exactly what they want. It’s so fucked up. There’s no, there's no winning option here. There’s nothing I can do to win” 
Realizes he can just rebuild. Rejuvenated in one second flat. 
“Do I just keep rebuilding it over and over? [...]  But I don’t care! I’m not giving up. I don't care, I don't care!” “this is literally what I do. What am I tripping for? This is literally what I do”
3:35:30 “I feel like most people would not have the mental fortitude to experience what I just experienced and then Not Fight. Like that is an absurd thing to do. But it’s a me thing to do. So” 
3:37:00 “i know i don't have all of my screws together, but i definitely, i think i could win a battle of mental fortitude if I wanted”
Talks to everyone and forms Gaia’s Hand
5:46:00 wrapping up stream along “dude I know like, i’m real confident and real happy and shit, but I , I am terrified. I am terrified [stares into a big cave thinking] i dunno. I'm not gonna second guess myself but. It’s just- it’s a scary battle. It’s a very scary battle. I dunno”
“Mean, I’m not alone. That's true. That definitely helps [...] I feel like the last time I spent a lot of time repairing spawn it didn't end too well. Lowkey that’s when everything went horribly wrong, actually. i feel like it’s just been downhill since there.”
“I am doing this to spite flame, but at the same time the thing I care about the most is just having the server where spawn can't just get destroyed. I dunno. That’s what I care about the most”
5:53:40 “‘you and your attachments to spawn’ (seri) [wistful] it’s, it’s the heart of the server. It’s the heart of the server. And, i dunno, I can’t, i can’t help myself but protect it. In every way that I can. I dunno. It’s just in my nature. Which is ironic, considering the atrocities I’ve committed.” 
8/29/24
44:30 “support the people trying to ban them and the builds won’t get destroyed anymore’ (chips) that’s true. But do the ends justify the means? Like sure I will get spawn builds being safe, but I’m, I also am taking some part in someone getting banned off the server. which, i dunno. I feel like i don't want to be a part of” 
45:00 “Is it for the greater good, or it for my greater good. It has to be objective, it can’t be a skewed biased point of view” 
1:05:20 “i can only control myself, and only the small few who have joined me” “kaboodle and woogie” “Ironically they’re truly the only ones who are part of gaia’s hand”
Week long break for MMCR
9/9/24
11:40 ZAM: “I’ve kind of realigned my look on the server [...] Everyone’s goal goes back to, like, killing. So I feel like if I help anyone I’m like sort of contributing to the violence on the server, which is something I- which I can’t prevent obviously but it’s not also something I’d like to contribute to. The whole point is I don't want to contribute to violence and you know, kill people I guess. I dunno” 
How far princezam has come. It was never about actual pacifism… except now it is. He truly is a pacifist now. He used to be a bad pacifist and now he’s just a pacifist for real. How interesting. 
19:00 “That’s just the spite and hatred in my heart. I’m full of hatred recently, that’s something i’ve noticed as well. Definitely something i’ve noticed” 
44:00 “I feel like nothing accomplishes anything. I feel like anything I would do would just make things worse. I dunno. Maybe that’s just me though. Maybe that's just me and the way I feel. I dunno” 
“I just want to win. You know? But how do I go about that even? There’s nothing to win against."
~1:27:00 “An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind” “interesting phrase considering the circumstance I’m in. [...] yea i mean violence is good to those who love it. I’m just unfortunately not one of those people. At least at the moment. [pause] Well I wouldn't say at the moment actually. I would say I’m not one of those people. For sure. Used to be. Not anymore.” 
1:53:00  “when i think of goals, the first thing that comes to mind is like, laying in a field of flowers. That’s what I want to do. That’s what I want to do. I dunno”
9/11/24
~40:00 “it makes me question what my path is, cause i’m not, i’m not i’m not i’m not  i’m not a killer or anything at least i don't want to kill anyone, i don't want to be doing that. Soo where does that leave me?  What am I gonna do, what am I princezam gonna do.” 
26 notes · View notes
papergirllife · 7 hours
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Lee Taeyong (M)
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‘I beg you don't embarrass me, motherfucker.’ But there's always exceptions when it comes to love right?
Taeyong x Bartender! Reader
Wordcount: 6.7k
Warnings: in this fic Taeyong has impulsive tendencies and physical aggression (not towards reader), light b*ndage, or*l play, slight or*l fixation, grinding, penetrati*on, Taeyong is very much down bad in this fic so lots of fluff.
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The party is so boring, no one’s dancing even though they’re dressed to the nines in this extravagant hotel ballroom that could rival any celebrity’s expensive wedding, but instead all they’re doing is talking business, but the worst of them, are gossiping, and of course, to your downtrodden luck, you’re the gossip of the night.
“He’s going to be bored of her soon, I just know it, just look at her, so different from his ex and usual type.”
You’re not the type to be affected by being shit talked, however, you do have your worries, and frankly, heartbreak is one thing, but your ego? That’s another, you think to yourself as you sip on your glass of scotch. You sigh as you recall how you ended up in this predicament in the first place.
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Maybe you should’ve thought through this more thoroughly, you think to yourself after seeing people go in and out of the supply closet, which is obviously a disguise for the illegal casino beneath the pub you’re working at, though, some people do really come for just drinks, but most of them are customers of both businesses under this roof and since you’ve been here for a week plus now, you recognise some of the regulars by now, but a man you don’t recognise is suddenly taking a seat right in front of you, usually customers prefer to go to your colleagues who have been here far longer and know what customers want, only helping out more on weekends where more people come in for a drink.
You rise from your stool, yes, one great thing about working here means workers don’t have to meaninglessly stand the whole night.
“You’re new here?” the man asks, and if you were being honest, he’s probably the prettiest man you’ve seen, but you screw a neutral expression on your face, one should never let their guard down around a man of all things.
“Yup, what can I get you to drink?” you ask as you take in his appearance, dripping in designer, a pretty loose blouse that accentuates his sharp facial features, earrings hanging off his earlobes, the designs feminine compared to what most men wear.
“Scotch on the rocks, please,” he says while he leans back to make himself comfortable, his arms crossed, usually clients would be looking around for someone to take home by now, the usual ‘pub guard’ scanning, you like to call it, but for the ones that want a drink before going down to gamble, they usually have this impatient look in their eyes, not that it affects you, your skin is as thick as a cheese wheel.
However, this man just sits and observes you. Is he part of the mafia and is scared that someone’s going to poison him at any moment? Or is he a cop and is trying to make you cave to tell him about the illegal casino downstairs? You’re just going to act like you had no idea, you’re not working in the casino itself, they can’t charge you on any terms as long as your boss has an alcohol licence, which is what they promised you when you interviewed, if they’re lying you’re gonna have to kick someone’s ass.
When you pass him his drink, he just sits back and takes a sip, his obnoxiously large eyes still looking at you, they’re pretty eyes, but you’ve never kept someone’s attention for this long, though, in most cases, you could walk away, like those creepy men on the subway, you’re not sure if this guy’s a creepy guy, he hasn’t tried grabbing your hand yet, if he did then you’re viable to call security, but he’s just watching you.
“So, what brings you here?” he asks, a hand mindlessly swirling the glass in his hand.
“Needed money, Seoul isn’t getting cheaper by the day,” you say, a general answer.
“How old are you?” he asks, prodding, why is he still prodding?
“In my early twenties, above the legal age to serve you drinks, what about you?” it’s time for you to prod, engage with customers a bit, your manager always tells you, be a little friendlier.
“28. You look older than early twenties, not that it’s a bad thing, of course,” he says, and with the way he says it, you know he doesn’t mean it in a demeaning way, not that you mind, you swore off men long ago, people always tell you there’s better fish in the sea, but all you manage to fish are trash.
“Thanks, I did my makeup to look older,” you reply as out of the corner of your eye you catch a group of men walking in the pub.
“Why?” he asks, oh men, they’re so innocent to the things women go through everyday.
“So people would take me seriously,” you answer honestly before you excuse yourself to make drinks for the customers, you don’t want your manager to think you’re slacking off within a month.
However, after only finishing their second order, your colleague says she’d take over from you, thinking the customers are her regulars, you move away without questioning.
So you go back to talking to the man, this time round, he finally reveals his name to be Taeyong, he even orders a second drink of your choice.
“A negroni?” he asks with the expression of a kicked puppy, smacking his lips distastefully before he requests for a glass of water.
“Wanted to try it out myself one of these days, but I was unsure, guess I’m quite certain I won’t ever try it now I guess,” you say with a shrug and a chuckle at how comical his expressions are, a little bit of betrayal and a tinge of shock, which makes him look more human in your eyes.
A new customer makes his way to the bar in the meantime, but Taeyong’s brows scrunch up when he sees you’re about to step away to serve the customer.
“Let other people handle him, you just stay here with me,” he suggests.
“Taeyong, as nice it is talking to you, I’d like to remind you that this is a strictly professional relationship, please respect the boundaries between a bartender and a customer-
“Missy, who do you think you are talking to him like that, do you know who he is-
“It’s fine Ms Choi, she’s right, I’m merely a regular, I need to respect her boundaries,” Taeyong says, cutting off your manager.
Your manager looks flabbergasted before she composes herself, bowing to Taeyong before she drags you away from the bar to the small staff area on the side.
“I'm warning you since you're new here, Mr Lee is a VIP, don't do anything stupid, he's not the type to pull dumb shit, so you have nothing to worry about. Alright, that's all, get back to work,” she says before dismissing you.
“If you're worried about getting less tips then you don't have to worry, I'll tip you accordingly for the time spent talking to me,” Taeyong says when you get back to your spot.
“It's not that, I’m getting paid anyways, tips are just an extra, I'm still getting paid a base salary talking to you and not doing anything, so a win is a win, I guess,” you brush off, it's not that busy today anyways.
“No, I'm a responsible customer, how about you make me another drink? One that you fancy?” Taeyong suggests.
Hence for the whole night, you indulge in the lengthy conversation the two of you share, and with every night he comes in, you find comfort in this growing friendship, the only hiccup being that he tips you too much money and he won't take no for an answer.
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Months go by and the lines between you and Taeyong start to blur, but you're still quite hesitant, you haven't committed in a relationship since a long time ago and if you're honest, you don't know much about Taeyong other than the fact that he's a businessman, but of what sort of business? You don't have the foggiest idea.
Tonight is a Friday night, which means the bar is busier than usual. Surprisingly enough, Taeyong hasn't dropped in tonight, he doesn't come in every night, but he'd never miss Friday nights.
“Hey, can we get two martinis,” a customer asks, distracting you from your wandering thoughts, and you quickly get to work, but out of the corner of your eye, you see a familiar silhouette heading towards the direction of the fake storage room where the underground casino entrance is located, but the customers asked for something on top of their drinks and you were distracted once again.
After a few more customers, Jiun, a bottle girl and your fellow colleague, rushes to your area of the counter in distress.
“Table 5 wants 6 Coronas in a bucket but I think I just got my period, is it okay if you bring it to them?” she asks, and how can you say no to a woman who's in need of help?
“Sure thing, do you need a pad?” you ask, just in case, you're sure you have some in your locker if she doesn't.
“No, I have one on me, but thank you so much,” she says before scurrying off to the direction of the bathroom.
After putting together the order, you quickly make your way to the table with the customers’ drinks, placing down the bucket on the table.
“You new here, pretty girl? Never seen you around before?” one of the men at the table asks.
“Nope, just helping out my coworker,” you replied as you began to make your way back to the counter.
“What a shame, a pretty face like yours should be admired more, why grind behind a boring counter?” another asks, this one's nearer to you, standing up from his seat to get closer to you.
“Sorry, I have to get back to my job now,” you say, trying to excuse yourself, but the man grabs your arm, telling you to not rush and sit down and have a bottle.
Suddenly, you feel a presence behind you and then you feel someone pulling you by the strap of your money pouch.
“She said no, unhand her,” you'd recognise that voice anywhere, and looking to your side, you see Taeyong next to you, his usually round boba eyes now appearing in a sharp warning stare.
“Fuck off, dude, we were here first, shouldn't we have first dibs on her-
Before you could react to being demeaned in such a way, Taeyong's fist connects with his ugly face, and to your horror, both of them start fighting.
You quickly try pulling them apart but Taeyong pushes himself and the man out of your way, telling you to get security, you didn't want to leave his side, but thankfully, security were already making their way to your direction, blocked by a few drunken customers, his friend, takes the chance to jump in on the fight, and who are you to stand there and do nothing? Taeyong might be handling one guy on his own just fine, but you can't watch him get beaten to a pulp in your name, and you did the most logical thing you could think of by kicking the guy's head with your thick heeled boots and to your astonishment, he seems a bit disorientated by the ordeal, security finally made their way to Taeyong to pull the guy off him and escort him out the pub.
“Are you okay?” you ask Taeyong, but when you inspect his condition a bit closer, you cringe at his busted lip and bruised cheek.
However, before you could suggest accompanying him to the hospital, police arrive at the scene and next thing you know, you’re being escorted to the police station for questioning along with the asshole and Taeyong.
They finished up with you quick, they were a bit sceptical about Taeyong merely defending you, but you played it up a little by lying about how scared you were and maybe you chalked up a little bit on how his hands felt like they were everywhere on you, but it's the least you can do for Taeyong, and it's not like there were cameras anywhere.
“How long is he going to be questioned, officer?” you ask the policeman who had questioned you.
“Probably not long, seeing that his lawyer is here,” he points to the entrance, where a tall man in a suit walks in and follows the lead of an officer into the room Taeyong is being questioned in.
Knowing that he has a lawyer with him, you sigh a breath of relief and sit down on a nearby bench, the coolness of the plastic material digging into your skin, you regret wearing your beloved black velvet shorts now.
Fortunately, true to his words, Taeyong came out soon after, heading to a nearby desk to finish up some paperwork with his lawyer, so you get to your feet and head over to him.
“Brawling in your own pub is a new low, Lee, just let your boys handle shit like this next time,” the officer says.
“Wait, what do you mean your own pub?” the question flies out of your lips and Taeyong looks up, stunned, not knowing that you were still here.
“Leave the questions for later, just finish signing the papers and head out,” the officer orders, with a roll of your eyes, you stand right there, waiting for Taeyong to explain himself, his lawyer trying his best not to laugh.
“So? Care to explain yourself why you've been lying to me this whole time? Regular my ass,” you mutter the last part to yourself as you walk out the police station, cursing when you realise you don't have your coat with you, it's bearable now that it's creeping into June, but you've always preferred being warm.
“I'm going to get going, my cab's here,” his lawyer says, grasping this small window to leave before he gets caught up in a lover's quarrel, passing Taeyong something, to which you identify as car keys.
“Thank you, Johnny,” he says before turning to you with a sigh, his lips sit in a thin line, looking a bit lost at the sight of you, your usual smile wiped from your face as your pretty eyes stare daggers into his face, arms folded, and that's when he notices the goosebumps littering your arm.
“I didn't tell you that I was the boss because I wanted to get to know you without the label and pressure of me being your boss,” Taeyong explains as he shrugs off his coat to hang it on your shoulders before he directs you to a luxury SUV parked nearby.
“You could've told me sooner, asshole. And, why did you pull that shit tonight? You could've gotten yourself beaten to a pulp if I didn't literally step in and step on his head,” you lament, expressing your dissatisfaction with your entire body to the point of swinging your beloved Coach bag that you told Taeyong you were saving up weeks for, and Taeyong thinks you're so cute when you're angry, but he does have to make an effort to dodge the angry swing of your bag as he helps you climb up the passenger seat of his car.
“I know, and thank you for saving my ass but I need to shut the door and get going now, princess,” Taeyong says and does so before you could protest his usage of endearments when you're mad at him.
“How about we get some food before I drive you back to your place?” he suggest when he starts the car, seeing that you're now giving him the silent treatment, face turned to the side to look out to not see him, but the word ‘fine’ uttered from your lips has Taeyong breathing a sigh of relief as he confidently drives into a familiar street where he knows a convenience store is located.
After getting and heating up noodles and onigiris to share, the two of you take a seat in the empty store.
“Don't do embarrassing shit like this on my behalf ever again,” you warn before digging into your cup noodles, the spicy warm soup bringing instant comfort and familiarity after such a hectic night.
“It doesn't matter if it's on your behalf, that fucker deserved it,” Taeyong reasoned as he peels off the plastic wrapping of his onigiri, taking a huge bite of the delicious rice ball he was craving.
“Just don't do anything stupid anymore, if I couldn't handle myself I could've called security, you doing something stupid embarrasses me too, you know, I don't want to end up in the police station with you ever again, my friends are going to think I'm dating a crook,” you say offhandedly, but Taeyong’s eyes are as wide as saucers as he takes in your words.
“Wait, what do you mean dating?” he asks with the biggest smile on his face, onigiri placed on the side, suddenly he's not hungry anymore.
“Don't tell me you're not taking responsibility, I'm literally wearing your jacket and risked jail time for your ass,” you say so casually that Taeyong feels like he's having a fever dream, not even his best fantasies would he ever depict himself being labelled as your significant other.
“No, never, I'm definitely taking full responsibility, and I promise, no more doing stupid shit to embarrass you, I swear,” Taeyong pledges, his hand coming up to salute you, the goofy gesture finally getting the first laugh out of you for the night.
“Though, to prevent me from doing stupid shit, I have a proposition, you have a marketing degree right? I know you said you're against working for big corps cause you hate how they practically steal money off of people's needs, but I do have a few establishments, restaurants of a few cuisines, that need a proper marketer to oversee and promote, so if you're not opposed to letting go your bartending job…” and before Taeyong could finish, you were quick to say yes.
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Boy, do the days go by so fast after that, your new job is mostly online, you have two coworkers, a graphic designer –Mark Lee and a social media manager, or better known as the restaurants’ staffs’ biggest fear, Lee Haechan. A small department compared to the two finance departments, one for clean money and one for dirty money, but if anyone asks, you'd say you didn’t have a clue.
Starting out a new job wasn't easy, nor was it too difficult, being a ‘quite fresh’ graduate meant you still recall plenty of the knowledge you've studied in college, but the huge funds you had was of great assistance, which brings you to this party hosted by his friend.
Taeyong said he wanted to bring Yuta, his omakase chef who had just earned his first three Michelin stars under his new restaurant, thanks to your hard work in marketing to attract new rich customers and food critics.
However, people on the top of the food chain always had a reputation of being absolute dickheads.
“She’s literally younger than him, his ex was older by five years at least, and she was one of us, I did some digging, this girl isn’t even from one of the SKY universities,” one of them comments, and it’s true, you’re not that smart and you weren’t born with a silver spoon in your mouth, but what has you freezing in your spot is what comes out of their mouths next.
“I heard he got into a fight at his own bar for her and ended up getting detained for a bit, she’s just going to have him end up locked up if he stays with her, people like her bring nothing but bad omens.”
“Don’t tell me you’re letting their words get to you,” Yuta says, popping out of nowhere beside you.
“Even the strongest trees waver under the pressure of the winds, Yuta,” you say before finishing your glass.
Yuta and you have grown close after you had worked closely to promote the restaurant, and he values your opinion of which presentation you prefer, which is rare for chefs, especially the ones you've worked with with many years of experience and a reputation.
“Yeah, but who gives a fuck about some shitty pretentious university, that shit don’t matter as long as you land a job, plus, their faces are so botched, you look way better, Taeyong would never pick these shitty pick mes over you,” Yuta comments way too loudly for your comfort, but thankfully the girls were loudly squealing at the fact that their friend is finally here, welcoming her, unbeknownst of Yuta’s lethal words.
“Pick who over my sweetheart?” Taeyong asks, a hand coming to rest around your waist.
“I said you wouldn't, but someone’s doubting after hearing a few snarky remarks,” Yuta says, which has you freezing in your spot, Taeyong’s always been very protective and defensive about you, you don’t want to witness him fucking someone up tonight at such a prestigious party.
“Yeah, trust me, man to man, he’s definitely just fucking her on the down low, he’d never go for someone lower class, she’s most probably just a cheap fuck,” you look over Yuta’s shoulder to see a man standing next to one of the girls who were talking shit about you, two people were blocking their sight of your little group, so they hadn’t seen Taeyong coming back.
And to your horror, Taeyong leaves your side, walking up to the little clique.
“Oh god, he’s going to embarrass me,” you say with a groan before you quickly follow Taeyong as fast as you can in your Louboutins.
With a swing and the cracking of bones, you see the guy hunched over immediately, cursing as he holds his bloodied nose in his hand, when you finally got to the scene, the music had been cut, the place drowning in shocked silence no thanks to your heels, sue you, but you didn’t expect to need to run tonight, it was just two feet but these heels are so unwalkable.
“Don’t let me catch you assholes talking about my girlfriend ever again, you don’t want to know what I can do beyond breaking your nose,” Taeyong threatens as the guy quickly cowers on his spot on the floor.
“I wouldn’t mess with him if I were you,” someone says as they walk towards the scene, his name is Woozi, Taeyong had told you about the host of this party being a close friend of his who he had helped out when he had just taken over his father’s empire, you had no idea how much that meant to Woozi, but seeing them interacting now, you understand that if you mess with one of them, the other one immediately retaliates, “you wouldn’t want to go against him or me,” he says, elaborating no further, you hadn’t ask Taeyong what Woozi’s empire entails, but you think the less you know, the better.
“No, no, please, I was stupid, I’m sorry, miss,” he apologises to you before quickly escaping the scene, the girls leaving as well, tails tucked between their legs as they scramble, it’s quite an amusing scene.
“Thank you for standing up for me, Woozi, it’s nice to finally meet the host of this amazing party,” you say before sticking out your hand for him to shake.
“The honour’s all mine,” Woozi says as he takes your hand, “and nice to finally meet you, it’s nice to finally put a face to the person hyung’s been gushing about nonstop,” Woozi teases, which then earns him a light playful slap from Taeyong.
“Gushing is perfectly fine, I just wish he’d stop embarrassing himself and me on my behalf,” you say with an annoyed sigh as you turn to stare daggers into your boyfriend.
“Oh come on, I couldn’t just stand them and let them belittle you, what kind of man would I be if I didn’t do anything?” Taeyong retorts with a sheepish expression, he knows you don’t like it when he goes out of his way for you to this point, but he couldn’t help it, he loves you so dearly.
“You’re just proving them right by reacting, Yong, we talked about this,” you say, exasperated as you toss your arms up in defeat, you don’t know how to get this through his head at all.
“Proving what? Baby,” Taeyong calls out as you take off to the exit too, you have decided that tonight has been too much for you, you're tired of all this glitz and glamour with this thick layer of utter bullshit with their grade school playground gimmicks.
“Help me keep an eye on Yuta, I need to talk to her,” Taeyong quickly says to Woozi before he picks up the pace to follow you, ending up out at the lobby of the hotel, you were talking to the valet, and he distantly hears you asking for the keys.
“Baby, come on, don’t be mad, I’m sorry, I was stupidly acting on impulse, you know how defensive I get when it comes to you,” Taeyong reasons, but you keep quiet, trying to compose your thoughts, your car that you share with Taeyong pulls up, and immediately Taeyong tries taking the keys from the valet.
“You drank,” you say before pushing his hand away to retrieve your key, you did too, but Taeyong’s alcohol tolerance is much lower than yours, god knows he shouldn’t be driving.
Taeyong’s heart warms when he registers the chastise from you, you still care about him, you still love him, and so with a love stricken smile on his face and a slight bounce in his step, he's a giggly drunk so this happens all the time, though when he gets in the car, he worries once more when he sees how you chose to not play any music nor talk whilst driving.
When the two of you finally reached home, you immediately retreated into your shared bedroom, not sparing Taeyong a glance, not even when he offered to remove your heels for you.
Taeyong sighs to himself as he follows you upstairs, you had locked yourself in the bathroom as of now, probably cleaning your face free off makeup, he knows how you much you hate the texture of it on your skin despite loving to doll up, and he can’t blame you, even bb cream feels a tad bit too thick for Taeyong when you had applied it on him for fun.
Taeyong quickly changes into his house clothes and leaves the bedroom, just in case you need more space, he never wants to intrude when you want some alone time, even if he craves your affection, you’ll come around soon, you always do, Taeyong reassures himself.
When Taeyong was about to turn on the telly to kill some time, he hears you walking down the stairs, turning back to look over the sofa, Taeyong’s jaw drops at the sight of you.
Adorned in a beautiful lingerie set with a delicate crystal chain hanging around your upper left thigh, your face without a smidge of product, but he thinks you look best like this, but what finally has his cock twitching was what you had in your hold, a familiar pair of handcuffs.
“Sweetheart…” Taeyong mutters as thoughts of endless possibilities of how the night would play out runs through his head, but you silence him with the tip of your finger placed on his lips.
“Just let me do my thing, sit back and enjoy,” you say before you drop to your knees, your sultry eyes watching Taeyong’s every expression, and the sight of his Adam's apple bobbing has you cracking a smile as you lock his hand into the handcuffs.
Taeyong feels like he’s being hypnotised when your eyes stay on his whilst sliding his pants and boxers down, he almost didn’t feel his cock twitching from the cold air, but before he could even register the cold in its entirety, you take him into your mouth, the sudden action has Taeyong cursing, he would’ve bucked into your mouth if it wasn’t for your hands holding his hips down, he breathes a slightly frustrated sigh from the restriction, but like the little minx you are, you quickly hollow your cheeks after sinking in deeper, the tip of his length hitting the back of your throat.
“Fuck!” Taeyong curses as he grows tense at your ministrations, he swears he almost came right then and there when he felt the constriction of your throat, his fingers turn white from grasping against the cuffs to anchor himself.
You take in the sight of him struggling to not cum and take pity on him, your mouth leaving his cock with a pop with a sly smile on your lips before your hands grasp him tightly, making sure he doesn’t cum too soon, the pressure sending a jolt down Taeyong’s spine, his usual round boba eyes now hooded but he scrunches them shut on impulse when you push back the foreskin, exposing the sensitive tip, giving it quick kitten licks before you suck on it like a lollipop, your tongue placed underneath his tip and you suck hard, and that’s when Taeyong goes over the edge, his body seizing up, you quickly take him down your throat, smiling around the edges of his cock when you feel the familiar warmth running down your throat, you keep him in your mouth until he stops, pulling off of him with a slight giggle when you see his chest heaving, limp against the couch, all from your undoing, and what a power trip that gives you, a rich and powerful man succumbing to your actions.
“How are you holding up, baby? Need a break?” you ask as you straddle him, tossing over your leg to situate yourself perfectly between his thighs, the lace material coming into contact with his cock, twitching back to life when it feels the slight warmth and moisture of your heat.
“More, please,” Taeyong utters as he tries his best to move his hips, and so you indulge him, rotating your hips until he hardens underneath you again.
You hear the clinks of his cuffs when you stand up, ceasing all physical contact, giggling when you hear him beg for you to come back, but he goes mute when he sees you shift the crotch of your lingerie to the side, climbing back into his embrace.
“You’re gonna ride me all dressed up prettily, sweetheart?” Taeyong asks, head tilted to the side as he takes in the sight of you, eyes locked onto his as you stare down at him, and he can’t help himself, lowering his head to litter kisses on your arm as he inhales your scent, call him a madman, but your scent might as well be as addictive as nicotine itself, the way he can’t seem to get enough of it.
Taeyong then shifts his head to the valley of your breasts, mouthing at your cleavage, pulling down the flimsy coverage by its thin straps to gain access to your bare chest, goosebumps rise on your skin when he finally takes a nipple into his mouth, his cheeks hollowing as he sucks on it like his life depends on it, like he really wants to eat you up, the action has you chasing for more pleasure, grinding your clit on the tip of his length before you can't take it anymore, reaching down with shaking hands to position him to your core, moaning his name as you finally slide down, slowly taking him inside you inch by inch, Taeyong's succumbed to the sweet feeling of your warm walls, giving up on worshipping your boobs, instead he's gripping onto your hips hard as he focuses on being engulfed in your heat, he's kind of slobbering on your right boob, but you find it arousing, the way he's so lost in pleasure, his eyes shut, brows furrowed as he mutters a string of sweet nothings as you make your way down to the hilt.
An almost delirious smile makes its way onto Taeyong’s face when you squeeze around him, head dipped low as he curses from your actions, you tilt his chin up with your fingertips, ego inflating at the sight of how wrecked he is and you barely even started.
“It’s been so long and you’re still reacting this way,” you noted as you caressed the side of his face.
“For you? Forever,” Taeyong says with full honesty, eyes overflowing with lust as he confesses, looking so vulnerable, underneath you like you’re his god, and in a way, you might just be, if Taeyong had it his way, he’d build a palace just for you and dedicate his life to you.
“I know,” you say with a row of your hips, cursing in unison with your lover when you feel him penetrate the deepest parts of your heat, that sensitive spot that has your toes curling.
Spurred on by Taeyong’s ever vocal devotion towards you, you raise your hips before slamming down once again, and the moan of your name escaping his lips has you doing it again and again, the quick drag of his length against your flesh has the whole house filled with the sound of sex resonating within its walls, you’re grateful Taeyong’s unit is the penthouse, because Taeyong’s always been so vocal in bed, his voice pitched much higher than it usually is, and as much as you revel in the feeling of people admiring your man, you don’t want anyone else hearing how beautiful he sounds when he’s laid bare underneath you.
With how fast you’re going, you’re sure there’s indentations of the sofa’s legs on the expensive wooden flooring, but fuck it, you’re so close, but you’re to blame for that, clenching on him every time you sink down, just so you could see the way he tries the very hardest not to cum way too early, not that you’d mind, it happened many times before, and you still find it so hot.
Deciding to not prolong the torture any longer, you reach down to rub quick circles on your clit as you grind the tip of his cock to that one spot deep inside, that perfect 12 o'clock angle that has your legs turning jelly, with a hiss of Taeyong’s name and a spasm of your walls from the shocks of pleasure coursing through your entire body, you finally reach your peak, your body sagging in sweet relief, your sensitive nipples feel so good against his skin, but after having a quick moment to yourself, you quickly slide off of him with a loud squelch that got a giggle out of you even in this heated state, getting down on your knees and take him in your mouth, hollowing your cheeks and suck, lips stretched, with his dick lodge at the back of your throat when you see his legs buckle and soon after, splashes of his warm release drip down your throat once again, when the flow ceases, you pull off of him with a deafening pop.
“Good boy,” you say after getting up brushing his cheek softly with those tender eyes that make Taeyong weak in the knees, only he gets to see this tender side of you, and it drives him mad sometimes, that it’s only reserve for him, of everyone you could choose to dote on, you chose him, and he hopes you’ll keep choosing him till the end of time.
With a quick click, he feels the cuffs being loosened and tossed away, instantly his arms are around your figure, pulling you into a deep kiss, the taste of himself on your lips spurs him on, but he wills himself to get his shit together, he knows you must be tired from doing all the work tonight, and there’s something that needs to be addressed soon, and so he pulls away from your lips, his hand placed on your right cheek, thumb brushing against the curvature of your cheek bone.
“Do you feel better now? Are you still angry at me or do I need to do more than letting you ravage my body like that?” Taeyong jokes with a laugh, but he immediately sobers up when he sees you sigh and climb off his sturdy legs.
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have gotten mad like that,” you say as you cringe as you recall how you acted out earlier today, you know no one’s perfect, but when you slip up, it reminds you too much of your own mother, throwing a tantrum and running away, and you swear you’d never be like her, but at the end of the day, you’re a work of progress, and fortunately, Taeyong understands.
“Do you want to tell me what triggered you?” Taeyong asks, his tone gentle, he never directs his aggression at you, no matter the situation, he loves you too much to ever even think of doing that.
“They said some things, and they’re not entirely wrong-” but you’re being cut off by an irritated sigh, Taeyong hates it when you demean yourself this way. “Before you get mad, hear me out, they said how I’d always get you in trouble, and when you think about it, they’re not wrong, I literally landed you in jail the first night we got together, Yong, and the shit they said about me not being from one of the prestigious universities, they’re not wrong about that, it’s just facts, I’m just not part of this elite social ladder, that isn’t the point. The point is that I feel like I’m tarnishing your reputation and in relation, your businesses,” you finish off with another sigh, you haven’t been sighing this much these days, so this feels oddly familiar in the worst ways possible, Taeyong’s been making your life more comfortable every single day, but you on the other hand, are contributing to his troubles.
“Don’t let them get to your head, you’re literally bringing in so much profit for me, sweetheart, next time I’ll throw a party just to show everyone how our numbers are doing, it’ll blow them away, also, you’re doing all that without a goddamn degree from those snobbish colleges. Lastly, you don’t get me in trouble, it’s just part and parcel of protecting the person I love, something they’d never understand with how shallow they are, don’t let people with an EQ of 0 determine how you live, and I know what you want to say,” Taeyong says when he sees you open your mouth to protest, “I’ll try my best to not get in trouble and keep my temper in check, but I do hope you understand that if it isn’t me, I’m just gonna have someone else do the dirty job of beating them up,” Taeyong says, compromising, that’s how his father and mother did it, he always believes that’s the key to a long lasting marriage, which is something he’d want with you in the near future.
“Fine,” you say with a sigh, but he sees the ghost of a smile on your face as you lean down to rest your head on his broad shoulder, littering kisses from his neck to the end of his shoulder, Taeyong lets himself bask in your affection for a bit, knowing that you thrive off giving physical affection, but he's a clean freak at the end of the day, getting the both of you clean is still a priority.
“Come, let’s have a bath, my love,” Taeyong suggests as he carries you the direction of your bedroom, and you let him, soaking up the feeling of being loved, maybe Taeyong’s right, nothing matters when you have a love as cosmic as the one you share with Taeyong.
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justkennadi · 2 days
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No title😭
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Content: Nerd!Armin x Blk!Fem Reader.
Nerd Armin who has never felt the touch of a woman gets ummmm touched 😋
Notes: I’m not obsessing over this man anymore or anything like that but i just saw this sitting in my notes app since JANUARYYY😭👎🏾 so here it is just copied and pasted. So probably my last Armin post sorry😭
Warnings: Smut/Nsfw
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You and Armin have been keeping things lowkey for a while now. Basically being each others sneaky link with out the “fun” in a way?
You’ve made out with him dozens of times and he’s felt up on you a couple of times but that’s it.
Never anything more..
He was your typical nerd boy. Scrawny. Glasses. Weird interests. And you loved it all. All the quirkiness that came with Armin.
He was really awkward around you and at first you thought he was tryna be funny but then you noticed how he’s turn red around you and you soon realized the poor boy actually had a crush on you.
You thought he was cute and especially with his intelligence you found yourself interested in him too.
It was the oddest and most unexpected couple ever. The world will be shook at the two of you.
So that’s why for now you two keep things under the wraps.
Tonight, you’re spending the night with Armin watching him play games on his computer. He looked so cute with his headphones on and the concentrated look on his face.
“You so fine, Min min.” You said starring at him.
He just smiled at you and blushed. “Thanks…..”
You sat next to him with a tight tank top and some shorts. Everything hugged you nicely and showed your shape off well. So well that Armin couldn’t help but stare a few more seconds at your body before looking away quickly.
You soon got an idea…
“Min…look..” You say as you start to push a strap of your tank top of your shoulder. You started to tease him as a joke and because you loved seeing him all nervous.
“Oh! Um..oh what are you..doing..” He said gulping. He paused his game to watch what you did next.
You started to pull your tank top off and soon your f/c bra was showing. You squeezed your breasts and watched as Armin turned beet red.
Then you started to pull your shorts off to reveal your f/c panties and Armin’s eyes nearly popped out his skull.
“What are you doing y/n..?” Armin asked eyeing you up.
For weeks you’ve been wanting to do Armin. So so bad and ruin his innocence but you never thought the time was right. You decided if you ever were gonna get to do this now is the best time.
“I want you Armin.”
“Oh.”
“I’m ready to take the next step….”
“Well…if you’re ready…” Armin looks away nervously. “Let’s go to my bed though ok?”
You guys move to his bed and you lay on your back after undoing the back of your bra. Armin starts to remove his shirt but then he stops.
“Sorry, i’ve never done this before…i’m so nervous and you’re…so pretty..” Armin says pulling his shirt off after saying that.
“That’s ok just take your time.” You say smiling. Armin was so sweet and cute. You got so so lucky with him.
You notice the tent in his pants and joke, “You seem pretty excited though i know that..”
Armin looks away quickly after noticing you were staring at his hard on. “Gosh…y/n…”
“Pull my bra off, Min.”
“Oh..um..ok…”
Armin nervously pulls your bra and reveals your breasts. “Oh wow..”
“You can touch them if you want…” You say fondling your boobs but Armin just whimpers and freezes.
“Come on, don’t be shyyyyy!”
“Ok…” Armin says as he gently holds your boobs. “They’re really soft and squishy.”
“Y’like em?”
“Yeah..i really do…”
You let him play with your breasts for a bit and then you guided his hands to your hips where your underwear were.
“Pull them off baby…” You look at him through your long lashes. His face is a burning red but his eyes are filled with lust and need.
He pulls your underwear off slowly and slides them off your legs. You notice how awfully hard he is after you’re completely bare. You giggle and he looks away.
“Minnnnn…i can’t be the only one naked.” You playfully whined.
“Ok, ok..it’s just…you’re so pretty.” The blond says quietly. He starts to pull his shirt off and you see his slight abs.
He throws his shirt on the ground next to your clothes and he gets up and starts to take his pants off. After he was in everything but his underwear he goes to his nightstand and pulls out a condom.
“Why do you have that in there, Min?” You ask.
He looks at you and winks. Now it was your turn to blush.
He climbs on the bed and admires your body once more. You eyeball the tent in his underwear. He reads your mind and starts to slowly pulls his underwear down. He springs out and you gasp.
“What…” He whispered.
“You’re so…oh my..”
He was way bigger than you thought. About a good 7 inches with some girth. Would he even fit?
“It’s ok if you don’t wanna… we can like watch a movie or-“
“No, it’s ok. You’re just bigger than i thought. I trust you though..” You smile at him. There is no one else you’d wanna do this with honestly.
He smiles back and opens the condom wrapper to put it on. He gets between your legs and starts to kiss you. He moves to suck and lick your neck and that really started to get you going.
It seemed like he feed off your moans and your body moving in reaction to his touches and kisses. He moves his hands to hold your hips in place continues to mark you on your neck.
A finger of his slips down between your legs and to where your pussy was. “Oh, wow…you’re really wet. Like slick.” He says looking at his now glistening finger.
“Stop, Minnnn” You whine hiding behind your hands.
“Sorry..Are you ready now?” His eyes are now soft as he waits for your consent.
You nod and so he lines himself up with your entrance and teases a bit before slipping the head in your pink and brown folds. As he going in it really stretches you as it was your first time and it did hurt a bit so Armin stopped once he was halfway in after seeing you wince in pain. He kissed your forehead and apologized softly.
Then when it was ok he started to move again but slowly. Once he was all the way inside he would slowly pull out and when you nodded he thrusted back in. It took a few thrusts for you both to get used to it as it was new for him too and once it felt really good he had gotten a good speed going.
“Minnnnn, my God please don’t stop!” You moaned and gripped the sheets under you. For a virgin he was really good at this even though he was awkward as hell doing literally anything else.
He continued to fuck you like this for the next 5 minutes. The room was filled with sounds of skin slapping, moaning and Armin's bed squeaking. He started to groan about how he was getting close and you felt like you were getting close too. He moves a hand better your legs to rub your clit which only made you feel closer to finishing.
Then suddenly you feel your body shaking and pure euphoria. You grip Armins shoulders has his thrusts become shaky and slowed. You can tell he finished too by how he thrown his head back and slowed to a stop. He lays on top of you huffing and puffing. You guys sweat combines as his naked body lays on top of yours and he stays like this for the next few minutes.
“That was…so fucking good. Sex is amazing.” Armin says into your shoulder.
You busted out laughing but only because of how he said it. “You are so cute, Min. I love you.”
He smiles as he gets off of you and gets rid of the condom as he starts to help you clean up. You guys washed the clothes and changed the sheets and once everything was done and y’all were clean you guys cuddled up in Armins bed.
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skyloftian-nutcase · 6 months
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TotK DLC idea!
The screen is black. You don’t hear anything for a long time. Then, faintly, in the distance, you can hear it.
Link. Link. Open your eyes.
While the line echoes familiarity, the voice does not.
Or. Well. It does. Because while it isn’t Zelda, it’s a familiar man’s voice speaking gently, so gently you almost don’t recognize it because there’s no way he ever spoke like this in the main game.
But he is now. And instead of a golden light being the first image you see before the screen shows Link awakening… you see gloom floating in the air. The image cuts to a Hylian waking up who… doesn’t look like Link from TotK?? He’s different, still small in stature, with slightly tanner skin, platinum light blonde hair, and red eyes. But… something’s wrong with his forehead. There’s a weird line on it.
This new character you apparently are gonna be playing in the DLC blearily blinks his eyes open, clearly groggy and too weak to really move. But then that line on his forehead moves a hair, it splits apart, and you realize it’s a freaking eye, red and yellow and it’s like the ones on gloom hands and oh gosh what the hell is it doing on his forehead—
Link realizes something is off and his eyes blow wide, his hands reach for his forehead and he screams in agony and terror, only for someone to scoop him into a hug to soothe him.
And suddenly you realize why that voice was eerily familiar.
It’s Ganondorf. He resurrected you from the era of the Imprisoning War. You, who have a history with him and his family. You, who he wants to protect, who he views as his kid, who he calls a prince and says he’ll keep you safe by controlling your body with his dark magic if he has to.
Welcome to Tears of the Kingdom: Hero’s Shadow.
You have to play a long gone Hero who was resurrected. Ganondorf, who is still recovering his strength in preparation for killing the current Hero, tasks you with finding your betrothed, his daughter, as well as his wife. They’re buried somewhere in the Depths like you were. He wants you to find their burial sites so he can use his secret stone to resurrect them like he did you, and control them as well. Which is doubly bad when you realize his wife was the original Sage of Lightning. He gives you free reign to wander once you go through a tutorial (he tests you to see if you’ve recovered enough strength), because he knows you love wandering and collecting things. Your own personal objective, however, is trying to help Hyrule from the Depths, to break free from Ganondorf’s control, because Link would rather set himself on fire than let Ganondorf resurrect and control the love of his life and his mother-in-law. Your best hope is to find shards of the shattered Master Sword to try and stab the eye on Dark Link’s forehead and break the control Ganondorf has on you. Until you can, though, the monsters are your allies, you can teleport across the Depths by manifesting out of the gloom created by gloom hands (just like what Phantom Ganon does), and the world below is your oyster. If you get too close to sword shards when gloom hands are nearby, Ganondorf can see your attempt and immediately takes control of your body, and no matter what button you press Link just walks back to Ganondorf’s location and stays there until you get a chance to try again.
You start with three hearts, all empty looking like when gloom hurts you, and if you get injured they just shatter. Whenever they all shatter, you respawn at Ganondorf’s location because his gloom hands came and rescued you from dying. The only way you can get more hearts is by collecting poes and offering them to the statues in the Depths. You can communicate with the spirits of soldiers, who may give you combat tips or info about the area. If you gain enough of Ganondorf’s trust, he’ll let you command monsters, and he might even let you wander the Surface (under his supervision) during a blood moon.
You learn of Link’s and Ganondorf’s history through discovering ancient relics/texts that trigger memories. This connection between you and Ganondorf stems back to time before the war, well over ten thousand years ago. Link was engaged to Ganondorf’s daughter, but during the Imprisoning War the family fought against the demon king. Ganondorf did love his family, but he loved power more. Link sacrificed himself, letting himself get mortally wounded to save Rauru from a killing blow. Gan held him as he died, and it allowed Link to both beg him to stop and stab him in the heart with a light shard. The shard didn’t kill him, but it was what Rauru connected with when he hit him in the chest, allowing him to seal Ganondorf away. Ganondorf still wants the world, but his love for his family is still present, though now twisted, so he thinks he can control Link and everyone else with his dark magic in order to keep them safe and in line. Once the threat of the current Hero is eliminated, the world will be his, and his family will be safe. As such, he treats you, Link, the player, like a stubborn child, reeling you in, but does so in a horrific way, torturing Link by controlling him.
You have to break free of this and stop him, and the only hope you have is the distant call of a sword spirit…
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sciencelings-speaks · 2 months
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I love that even with all the lengths Stronghart went through to hide Kazuma's identity (using a mask to hide his eyes and a cloak to cover everything else, banning him from even speaking), the minute Ryunosuke saw him for the first time he suspected it. From his posture alone, they knew each other for about a year and were separated for like eight months and Ryunosuke could still identify his bbf from the way he stood like... Kazuma lost his memory, his identity, his... everything and Ryunosuke still clocked it, even though he literally thinks Kazuma is dead, that the prosecutor's masked apprentice is the whole reason he's even there at all.
Literally what else could Stronghart have done to hide Kazuma's presence from Ryunosuke, he did as much as he could but still Ryunosuke felt it immediately. This feels gayer than most of the yaoi I've come across, this is a major plot point in a romantic drama, this can't not be a trope in one of the kdramas my dad likes to watch on Netflix.
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triglycercule · 2 months
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they're a bit dumb
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kingbeeleth · 3 months
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just picked up video games for the first time ever yesterday who is this “Astrology” dude from “Bill Gates 3”?
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vammieposts · 7 days
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I am going fucking insane do they make drivers ed intentionally brain melting??
Everytime i hear this mans voice i feel like im watching honey crystalize or paint dry or cheese Very Slowly grow moldy
Like i know im overreacting but i cant focus on this?? I have to do 30 hours and its like every time i start watching one of the videos my brain turns off and i cant focus on what hes saying i hate online learning stuff so much
i dont care if i have to go to a classroom just make me learn this in literally any other way than listening to this man reading aloud multiple choice questions from a weirdly formatted slideshow for 30 minutes straight with the crunchiest audio known to man
#i know online learning is probably cheaper#but do you want me to be good at driving or not??#this is kinda important#IF I HEAR THIS GUY GO#And#the correct answer is#C#ONE MORE TIME#vammieposts#i sit in apush lectures for forty minutes everyday and im able to focus#clearly theres a wY to do this so its not so dull#JUST STOP WITH THE MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESITONS I BEF#like who decided this was a good idea?? multiple choice stuff is so repetitibe it all blends togther#and now i remember the wrong answers more often than the cofrect answers!’#drivers ed#i have 25 more hours of this i really dont think i can handle it#yes im overreacting but i cant do busywork i cant focus on dull things i really want to learn this and its not being taught well and that#upsets me a lot#its so so frustrating when theres an easy solution to bad systems and formats#and people dont see it??#it upsets me that so many things are being switched to online when that more often than not makes it MORE difficult??#my schools digital hallpass things??#unique apps to pay for parking in each coty??#digital doesnt automaticaly meant more efficient or convinient#its helpful in some areas#and much worse in others#this drivers ed is the worse end of the spectrum#because instead of being like oh heres the slideshow read it and take the test#it gives you a specific amount of hours you have to spend watching videos#i could just walk away and let the bideo play! like how does that prove that i know anything thats being tuaght??
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Dysprosium, Mary Soon Lee
dysprosium, AN 66, is a silvery-white rare earth metal. its name is derived from the greek dysprositos, meaning “hard to get at”, owing to the difficulty in separating and isolating this rare earth element. dysprosium is used to measure neutron flux, to fuel reactors, and to activate phosphors. terfenol-d is a magnetorestrictive alloy, meaning that it changes shape when a magnetic field is applied, and is used to manufacture underwater acoustic systems.
jason “robo” robertson, dallas stars #21 for @simmyfrobby’s nhl periodic table poems <3
#i had a couple different ideas for poems that were taken by the time i could go deranged for a couple hours to make this but as I looked#i was like WAIT NONE OF YOU KNOW HOW MUCH I LOVE JASON ROBERTSON YOU HAVEN’T SEEN MY TEXAS CAM and had to do it. also was STRUCK with the#sudden immaculate vision of the Dallas D as part of terfenol-D and could not get it out & robo is the most dance! person i know on the team#liv in the replies#dallas stars#jason robertson#nhl periodic table poems#guys i am plagued with visions and no execution skills!! every day i come here and learn one new skill on GIMP the way god intended!!!#today it was emboss. also cannot claim any credit for the pulse to the magnetic beat photo which is so cool that was one where i had a#couple and was like maybe i can do like crayon shockwaves like the art process video kasper showed? and then found that picture and was#like thank you lord stanley for knowing my limitations. thank you for your understanding in this moment it was a trial enough to make#expand contract dance and one would THINK i would have fucking learned from the claude animorphs tragedy!! i did not. but i did use the#shear tool and 3D rotate so at least if we’re animorphing it’s SLIGHTLY better. anyway me frantically doing this like WAIT WAIT WAIT WAIT#WAIT FOR ME YOU GUYS ARE SO FAST i keep seeing all of these and just spinning around in circles until i get dizzy & fall down I’m so happy#the drive folder for this is just called joy!!!!! because joy this is such a cool idea but now because it brings me so much joy#i just saw the Travis dermott one and burst into tears super normal AND someone did exactly what i wanted with hydrogen which was the water#the ice!!!!! it’s so perfect!!! and cody ofc did silver lord stanley. like does it ever make you cry how beautiful & creative everyone is?#anyway if you see me post and delete this and then update it or change it no you didn’t it’s fine. but i wanted to be included#if i could make the dysprosium letters not have a white background i would I simply could not fuck with it at 1AM. we are hitting send#it may not look like it but i queue#pretend i spoke at length about the reasons why i picked all the pictures & the element just know that it’s there inside my brain u can ask#GUYS I TAKE IT ALL BACK I SAW NEONFRETRA’S ISOTOPES AND I COULD MAKE THE EDITS EVEN THOUGH THEY’RE THERE!! ISOTOPES!!!! YOU GUYS!!!!!!#get ready for the edits then. dylan magnesium my beloved child of stars who can never return… like i wish i could say anyone else but it’s#i KNOW number nineteens bismuth don’t make me Google how many years nolan played hockey but also there’s ej for stable so.. also half-life#actinium claude giroux my beloved… when i saw there already was a claude i thought maybe Brady too for that#I don’t know how but flerovium doubled magic is percolating in my brain as was promethium bad boy because I was like hmmm. tyler. but#couldn’t commit and THEN SOMEONE DID BAD BAD LEROY BROWN TYLER BERTUZZI TO PROMETHIUM AND BESTIE I AM KISSING YOU ON THE MOUTH!!! with cons#anyway shane wright germanium with juraj slafkovský but showing him very obviously not missing it. if jack eichel was not an asshole#the narratives WOULD be narrativing. you could argue for a sidovi here with the calder cup and potentially a best friend stealing narrative#(the most recent is cam yorke’s acquisition of jamie d from trevor zegras which would then require a yorkie one for silicon the other side)
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hecksupremechips · 6 months
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Honestly though I think it’s really a bad sign when I look at Shin Tsukimi and literally feel like he’s a self insert 😩
#the klock keeps ticking#yttd#i wanna replay yttd so bad but i also like Gotta play other stuff with the time i have akskks#but yeah the brainrot this specific character has given me idk if I ever really talked about it but it was BAD#i like obsessively played the game in like 3 days and it was not a good idea lol but just like shin#i had to take like a week to recover from this guy cuz i couldnt stop thinking about him and how hes just like me fr#first off just the very inconsistent personality hes got going on that is very me he has these different personalities he wears to cope with#all the traumatic shit happening hes both so helpless its comical and so manipulative its terrifying#and idk its really interesting how like good and bad he is at being manipulative like hes very smart and can analyze weaknesses and lie so#good not even he knows the truth but hes also grasping at straws he doesnt think things through at all#like the second main game he just didnt prepare at all hes fumbling his way through everything its going so bad#he just wants to go home he wants to outdo the game makers but hes being used by them so bad he wants it to STOP#and its just the way that like. it hits so hard cuz you know hes really not a bad person not at all he doesnt want any of this hes just#being horribly manipulated and doing whatever he can to survive but its also really scary how#well hes able to lie and manipulate and claw his way through but hes also weaker than a grade schooler#and you never forget that either and as much as he cheated his way through he still failed it was all just a cheap trick in the end#and all of this hits very hard like his personality is eerily similar to mine and just the way he thinks and acts#cuz im the same like im weak and a dweeb who likes funny cats but im also emotionally detached and observant and selfish#but where it hits the hardest is his relationship with midori like oooof that one was too real just like#the first person who was ever his friend was horribly abusive and treated him like a child and didnt respect any boundaries#and he just got sick pleasure out of seeing shin be upset and he was like. a groomer#and shin was fucking relieved when he died but also kept his scarf and adopted his personality to survive#and still goes by sou after ch2 and the scene that gets me the most is when shin ai is asked about his relationship with midori#and you can just SEE how horrified shin is because his deepest shame his abuse is being shared to everyone without his consent#and hes reliving it all in that moment and literally seeing who he used to be experiencing the abuse#he just curls into himself and like covers his ears and pulls his hair thats literally what i do AAAAAA#im just so grateful for the direction they took this character kokichi ouma wishes he was shin tsukimi so bad#and yeah just like damn. its scary how similar i am to shin like damn i really am going through it huh oof#I LOVE HIM I LOVE HIM I WILL DEFEND HIM WITH MY LIFE HE DID ALL OF THAT STUFF YOUR HONOR BUT LISTENNNN#have you considered that hes cute and smart and weird and maybe just needs friends who arent assholes
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ruvviks · 3 months
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made the realization my vampire story would work best as a video game and now i can't stop thinking about it
#personal#like. vtm meets cyberponk. do you understand#it would be very focused on prioritizing... because you do play as a fully established character#but you get a bunch of jobs to take care of and you have to decide what you do first and most importantly how you solve it#you can combine certain jobs to do at once to save yourself time and effort but everything you do comes with consequences#if you ignore a problem for too long or deal with it poorly it will come back to bite you in the ass later. you can lose friends and such#basically you have it all from the start and then gradually like. work your way towards a single ending#locking yourself out of other paths because of the choices that you make etc etc and so on#friendships can help you out but they can also get in the way of other things so you have to think about like#how far you're willing to let yourself get distracted. but also no distractions is also a bad way to go at it because you'll end up alone#it would have a wide variety of endings but i suppose the 'canon' one would be the one where everything works out#because of the whole already established character thing. and also this is not real this is my story so i can do what i want#if it was an actual video game it wouldn't have a canon ending but it's never gonna happen so i can say it has a canon ending#but yeah you can play as heavenly the vampire hunter or as sun the vampire and then you get cool vampire abilities :]#i do like the idea of romance availability but they're different depending on who you play as#valentine can be romanced by both but he's a little brat so idk if you'd want that#isaac can only be romanced by heavenly because isaac is a gay man. valeska can be romanced by sun only because#valeska and heavenly are exes. so you can have a one night stand with her as heavenly and then she ghosts you LMAO#you can go into clubs... you can play carousel with npcs. it would be a very immersive experience#if you hang out at certain clubs too much then other vampire factions will be warier of you when you visit their club instead#you can forge alliances to be allowed into certain areas in town. you can disguise yourself. you have to hide your weapons#there's actual ways you can research locations or people involved in gigs so you can prepare yourself properly and potentially like#learn new things that open up a new way to deal with a situation#sometimes you have to wait until nighttime to be able to go somewhere because it's quieter around those hours. or vice versa#sometimes you have to wait a few days before someone can meet with you but if you miss the meeting you have to reschedule#and then you have to wait even longer. and some quests don't give you that much time so then you'd have to improvise#being spotted in a location can be dealt with by wiping security footage / killing the person who saw you. or just reloading your save#but if you've been spotted and you don't take care of it then that will ALSO have consequences. etc etc and so on#difficulty level in the game would determine how generous the game is surrounding stealth / time for quests / resilience of the guy you pla#and it wouldn't like. necessarily turn enemies into bullet sponges because that's lazy. it's much more fun to change other things
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waywardsalt · 1 year
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mmmgh
#salty talks#this one is personal but not in a scary just in a i need to say this shit somewhere way#botw/totk… i do not fucking like th. like gameplay is fun puzzles are cool world is cool but like.#the lackluster story and characters honest to god drag it the fuck down for me#none of the characters are actuslly interesting and ganondorf is the only one i want to see in totk#like i got the master sword. i got it and its like whatever. i know whats up with the light dragon and i dont care#totk is making me start to dislike this version of zelda and idk how to feel abt that#no one feels like. interesting. everyone is either good or evil or a fucking side character with a paper thin life#and totk with its fucking no-nuance go kill ganondorf plot is just. stop making half of the plot take place in the fucking past#i havent really done much story stuff but like. GOD. no one in totk is meant to be morally gray its all so fucking black and white#what happened to having major characters who were morally dubious and were actually fascinating to watch#i dont like that most of the major characters in totk/botw are Good Guys and Nice To Link nobody actually interests me#i was SO excited that the lurelin pirates would be a new group of characters to contend with but no. monsters. fuck#they had a chance to maybe get into the kingdoms more dubious past concerning the sheikah and then made the sheikah barely important#and then made the yiga more of a joke instead of like. doing anything with their interesting past#no fuck you heres some all new shit that has nothing to do with what came before and the same shallow conflict and characters#theyve dipped their toes into morally dubious characters and genuinely fascinating characters and the idea that the kingdom of hyrule isnt#all that and gave more room for drawing your own conclusions and totk just hands over the most black and white experience#im playing to finish the story and finish the game i actively do not care or expect much from these characters#and it just seems like the narrative is going to bend over backwards to put hyrule as the ultimate moral good and any opposition as bad#and all but force you to accept that because it just proves that sentiment correct over and over again and its fucking bland#idk. aomething about the writing of this game fucking frustrates me esp when i think abt how past games were written#imperialist shit aside this game’s story and characters are so fucking. par for the course bland. i dont care beyond ‘oh thata charming’#i dont think about this game’s story. it doesnt make me think it just shoves events and character actions at me and moves on#fuck.#it feels like its just. telling me shit. not giving me much room to really decide for myself. zelda is good ganondorf is bad fuck nuance ig#it seems so fucking scared of being a little bit complex. this is why i say 'i miss linebeck' i miss complicated ideas and characters#just. totk seems like it REALLY wants you to have specific thoughts about these events and characters. doing everything it can to prove#the good guys right and the bad guys wrong and having pretty much no one be in between or like. anything. its all standard
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mmmthornton · 2 years
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youtube
She was so real for this
#that *AHAHAHAHA.. Stupid. >:( *#what a queen#<3#life things#inspiration#i looked up this interview again because i was thinking about how bad the Death on the Nile remake was AGAIN#and i thought the choice to make Otterborne into like#Sister Rosetta Tharpe ISH#like they used her music and superficially made her character into a rockstar while also taking away any personality or drama or like...#personality in the character lol like what a disappointment#Angela Lansbury in the old version is HAMMING it UP like can you imagine showing up to a movie thinking that THATs the character you -#- get to have fun with only to be told most of your scenes are sitting quietly listening to Branagh talk? BOO#anyway if they wanted to do a (roughly) time appropriate singer and that's not a terrible idea....and if they wanted to have a cool -#- real black creative woman inspo which is ALSO not a bad idea... why wouldn't you make her character more like Eartha Kitt?#some disctinctive way of speaking that's sort of recognizably old fashioned while being vivacious and the life of the party?#yeah thats what works for that character AND it'd be a fun inspiration for her as a singer#its so baffling that they just...straight up played the audio tracks of Sister Rosetta Tharpe singing while also not adding anything -#- to her character that was relevant and in fact just took away stuff about the character that made her an actual part of the mystery#they gave her narrative purpose to a white guy who wants to eat people irl ffs if that's not women being passed over for mediocre#white men idk what is#Youtube
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