Read II
England Lionesses x Child!Reader
Mary Earps x Child!Reader
Summary: There's a reason you don't have sugar
You hold reading lessons every day at camp because you want the rest of the England team to not be knuckleheads anymore and to prove Mikey from school wrong.
It's not easy to learn how to read so you know you need to come back to make sure everyone has been keeping up with their learning because that's what Mummy and Daddy do to you.
They started teaching you how to read very early so you were fairly advanced when you went to school.
You think Mikey's just jealous because you're a good reader and he's a bad one but, still, you want to make sure to prove him wrong.
Mary always says the best revenge is proving haters wrong. You don't know if Mikey's a hater but you'll assume he is because better safe than sorry.
You've done a good job at teaching everyone though because Maya, Millie T and Tooney all give you some sherbet sweets. They make your mouth go a little tingly when you try them but you like that feeling so the three of them keep feeding you more.
They're responsible for you while Mary's getting the last bit of treatment before you all get on the coach to go to the stadium. Usually, someone else is responsible for you but you did a quick reading lesson for Maya and Millie with Tooney as your assistant so they're supervising you before the journey.
You decide that you really like the sherbet straws they give you and Maya dares you to see how many you can finish before you have to go.
You don't count but it's definitely a lot.
Enough for you to feel super hyped when you're finally reunited with Mary. She's picked out a set of four seats with a table and she's already got your rucksack full of books open for you to pick from.
You're very advanced in your reading for such a young kid but even you struggle a little bit. Now that you've taught Mary to read, she can read very well from the books that are a bit too complicated for you right now so she's in charge of reading them to you as you drive to the pitch.
"Er..." You say as you look at the selection," That one."
"Alright," Mary says, cracking open the book and clearing her throat. She gets about halfway through before she notices how wiggly you're being. "Hey, rugrat, do you need the toilet?"
You frown. "No. Keep reading, Mary."
"Are you sure? I can take you."
"No, Mary. My book, please."
"Alright." Mary keeps reading but she's acutely aware of the way you keep wiggling in your seat.
You seem to think you're fine though. Or, at least, you don't think you need the toilet which is Mary's main worry.
"Okay," She says finally," Go and find someone to hang out with. I need to talk to Tooney."
You seem all too happy to scamper off, practically throwing yourself at Beth across the aisle.
"Tooney!" Mary snaps, interrupting the conversation she and Alessia are having.
"Jesus, Mary! You scared me there!"
"What did you give my sister?" Mary demands," She's never been like this before."
"Like what?"
"Like that!"
Mary points over to where you've decided it's a funny idea to crowd surf over the girls at the front, who are bouncing you a bit as they pass you off to the girls sitting behind them.
"She doesn't do that! She's also not wiggly on the bus! What did you give her?"
Tooney winces. "I gave her nothing!"
Mary narrows her eyes. "What did you let Millie and Maya give her?"
Tooney's eyes dart to them quickly before she clears her throat. "I've got the right to remain silent! Anything I say or do can be used against me in a court of-"
Mary's already moved off before Tooney can finish and she crosses the coach to confront the other two. "I'm not interested in excuses. Tell me what you've given my sister."
Her gaze is clearly intimidating because Maya and Millie fold instantly and Mary's on her way back to her seat, easily plucking you from someone's arms to set you back down next to her.
It seems most of the sugar rush has disappeared now but then another problem makes itself known.
The bus goes over a series of bumps and you make a little aborted movement forward.
Mary recognises the action and whips out a plastic bag. "Here, rugrat," She says," Let it out. Let it all out."
She rubs your back as you throw up. It takes a lot longer than usual to hurl up your guts and Mary narrows her eyes over the top of her seat to look at Millie and Maya.
This is all their fault, Mary knows it.
It's because of all of the sugar you've consumed that you've thrown up so bad and, as she ties the bag shut, Mary briefly contemplates throwing it at Millie and Maya.
"Juice, please," You say and Mary hands it to you," Sorry, Mary."
"It's okay," She says," It's not your fault. Do you want to continue your book?"
You nod, leaning against your sister, energy drained. "Yes, please."
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do you like totk or botw better?
In short: Yes, I like botw better.
Here are my reasons, though!
I know a lot of people view it as the better experience, which is completely subjective and valid if you do and like it better, but I just view botw as being better in almost every way.
I will give it to totk. The dungeons have a lot better atmosphere. The game has some extremely high highs with the build-up to the wind temple, the whole great sky island segment, and the final boss is a much better fight (though dark beast ganon has a better theme song imo).
Other than that, I prefer botw. Totk has a much grander story, but it's completely mishandled. You can argue that totk has a great story but has poor execution, and to me, execution plays a big role in what makes a story good. You can have good ideas bit it all falls apart if they aren't executed well which ends up making the story bad. It's not that totk has a good story with poor execution, it has good ideas but the bad execution leads to a poorly told story. (I hope that makes sense). Botw has less of a story and is more like a set of events. Botw has history and backstory that is told more organically. Link has amnesia so he slowly regains some of his memories of the past with some people trying to help fill him in. It feels more real...in a weird fantasy way. I guess totk is similar with how we see Zelda's memories, but not really? It's weird to explain. Everything 100 years ago is felt in present day botw while in totk most of those things don't really matter as it happened so long ago. Things only start to resurge because Zelda wanted to investigate under the castle. Totk also has twists like a story. Idk if this is making sense but that's how I feel on their stories. There was just not much botw could mess up on story wise as the way it was presented.
Gameplay wise I can not lie totk is technical marvel with the zonai tech. That's the most impressive thing about it. Tbh building contraptions isn't my thing though, it takes too long to make and experiment with a machine when I can just do whatever that machine was gonna do much faster. I see why people have a lot of fun with it though, it just isn't my thing. One thing I HATE in totk though is the amount of menuing I have to do. Elemental arrows had a serious downgrade. Yeah it's cool to fuse stuff to arrows, but not when I have to do it to ever single individual arrow and if I want to try something new I have to scroll past 50 other items in a single line. It's just tedious. If I want to use a good weapon I have to go to the menu, drop an item, and menu again to fuse it to a weapon that will still break. Item breaking is still an issue but it's more annoying and the weapons no longer look cool. Totk has some cool abilities, but idk I'd trade them all for remote bombs lmao. I hate going through caves, especially early game, and having to deal with the rock walls where they want me to fuse a rock to a stick 10 times to get through one cave. There's just a lot of little things gameplay wise that bug me. They doubled down on botws gameplay issues and added some more annoying ones. I don't even have to mention the sages abilities, that's a whole mess.
On the topic of gameplay, botw just has the better world. Idc, exploring that world for the first time is an unforgettable experience. Totks main world is too similar so the magic is gone. The sky and depths are also unimpressive and repetitive. Botw also has the benefit on how the word felt so lonely yet alive. Everything had a purpose or a story. The world has a history. And totk just doesn't have that. Outside of the upheaval, totk doesn't really build on botws world that much. I was hoping to see if they would've added new towns or see how they'd rebuild hyrule, but they really didn't do that. We only got lookout landing, which doesn't really count as a town, and a bunch of building stuff lying around which is cool I guess. Hateno has a school and Terry Town expanded a little, but with the estimate of about 5 years since botw it makes you wonder...what have these people been doing? We can theoretically build Terry Town in one day. There could be new towns.
Totk is a sequel that doesn't really acknowledge it's predecessor which is so odd. Botw stands on its own and is an overall more cohesive experience. Everything in the world feels purposefully crafted for that world while totk just slaps things on top of it with not much thought. Botw has some amazing world building while for totk it's either "the Zonai did it" or has some contradictory world building. For example, the old sages lifted up the sky islands so that Link would be protected from Ganondorf shenanigans, but then other sky islands suggest how they've been around long before Rauru since young Zonai used to train in them or something. There is also how Zelda says Link never leaves her side, but people she interacts with on an almost daily basis do not recognize him and how even treat as if he doesn't know some facts about her. So either she is overexaggerating by a lot and/or lying in her own diary or that people in hyrule have the collective memory of a rock. There's also Zelda supposedly never giving Link the champions leathers yet as a gift, but we see him wearing it in the beginning. Idk there's more contradictories, but I haven't experienced this for botw??? Totk is so disconnected and disjointed in comparison.
I'm trying to be vague but there's a lot to say, I'm sorry. I really was enjoying this game at the beginning but the more I played the more I noticed or saw things that bugged me and just kept adding up and up on each other. Botw was never like this for me. It's just more cohesive and I like that. There are so many other things I haven't brought up like the repetitive cutscenes, or missing characters/characters that SHOULD know Link but don't (namely Bolson and Hestu). But this post is long. I can't keep complaining about this game. Botw really is that one of a kind experience, and totk tries to replicate it but worse. Botw had a vine that totk lacks. You feel so alone, but you meet knew people and make friends. You build connections as you learn about the past and help those around you. There is no story, you're just a person going through the motions and exploring the vast world around you. Totk can't replace that for me. I'm the main character playing a side role in a disjointed world where not much makes sense. Everything is similar in all the wrong ways.
And most important of all, they took away Link's fun dialogue and personality now he really is bland asf and used to defend that he wasn't.
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