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#while I like the horror aspect more
folksy · 1 year
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have played some of re5 and literally like 5 minutes of re6 and then was like well fuck it. started re7 and well this is the stuff
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novella-november · 7 days
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Is this fanfic friendly? I feel like an outlier.
I guess this is my sign it's time to throw together a FAQ post to link to lol.
Yes, every event for this blog is fanfic friendly :D
Though as I mentioned on my Ominous October post, for events that include multiple short stories, I encourage everyone to flex their creativity and take one of their planned short story fanfics, and at least *attempt* to turn one of them into something entirely original; rebuilding a character and story from the ground up to stand on its own two legs is no easy feat, and that is what makes it so fun!
It really gets your creative gears turning, to make an "au of an existing material" to be something entirely original, and you can be pleasantly surprised about the things you come up with!
As a few people say, its not just a matter of "filing the serial numbers off" -- you have to add in just as much *or more* as what you take out when you are turning a fanfiction into something that is original and completely divorced from its original source material / inspiration, and that is a hard, but very rewarding challenge!
Obviously, this is not a requirement (there's no hard requirements for any of the challenges, other than no cheating, including no using AI),
but if you would like an extra challenge for the short story events and you're planning on doing entirely fan-fiction, I highly recommend trying it out at least once, and seeing where it leads you--
you may find yourself pleasantly surprised by what you find down that rabbit hole!
#replies#novella november#long rambly tags to follow lol#including anti royalist / anti billionaire shit#ominous october#this is what my novella november is going to be#something that WAS a huge earth-shattering fanfic AU#but before I even got past a WIP Oneshot I'd already realized that what I was planning was going to turn canon so far on its head it would#be unrecognizable and it would be much better off and more coherent if I made it entirely original#so now it is!#not only does this involve changing every single characters name#everyone is now a completely different species other than human because thats always fun#and of course we're also tackling all the issues that had annoyed me in omega verse fics since I was like 14 and liked the#creature aspects but hated the biological essentialism and misogny / caste systems#if your fantasy people have an enforced caste system you gotta actually treat that like the horror and systemic oppression it is#not just say 'biological = right' like dude what do you think people have been saying about real women this whole time????#people literally insist women are biologically inferior to men do you really think supporting that idea is going to make you sound#progressive just because your main character is a tomboy independant woman?#also like she lost all her independence as soon as she found a man to marry so uhhhhh#what happened to being ready and willing to hit the bricks if people kept talking down to you and condescending you for being a woman????#why did you go from independant badass tomboy to fainting damsel who spends all her time worrying about failing to produce an heir#so her husband can take power#instead of just straight up telling your husband#'hey I don't want to deal with the bullshit from your father how about we do the-#- socially acceptable thing and just go off to make our own independant settlement with some of the villagers who are on your side'#like your husband would literally be escstatic about this idea of finally getting out from under his dad's tyrannical thumb#and its more like way more than half the villagers would go with you not just a handful#theyve been sick of the kings shit for years and only your husband's potential rise to rule kept them in check#cus he actually cares about the villagers and goes among them#while still clearly having some biases to work through when it comes to class and gender equality
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syekick-powers · 3 months
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honestly. being real. ive looked into a lot of various indie ttrpgs that haven't spoken to me, and i end up just coming back to D&D over and over. and i think i finally fully understand why that is.
D&D is very heavy on rules for what can happen in combat, but fairly light on rules for when it comes to story structure and roleplay. as a result, roleplay scenes feel a bit more natural and flowing, with the only mechanical aspect being the occasional skill check for like, intimidation / deception / persuasion / etc. but then, unlike the roleplay, the things that can be achieved in combat are pretty strictly regulated. this is fun for how i like to roleplay, as someone who used to do a lot of freeform RP--the problem with freeform RP style combat sometimes is that if you're RPing combat with someone who gets really wound up about making their characters always win, it can be really fucking hard to counteract the shit they have their characters pull out of their back pocket. having a VERY clearly defined and strict set of rules for specifically combat makes it so that when combat DOES happen, people can't just Say Shit about what they have their characters do--they have a limited character framework to work in and a limited set of tools that they can work with, and enjoyable combats come from using those tools in that framework creatively, effectively, and excitingly. this makes combat feel like it has genuine stakes, and when done right can be very intense and exciting. and then when you do actual like, character interaction and story building? there's just not a lot of strictly defined rules for what can and can't be done in those realms, both for a player and the DM. there aren't any constraints on the structure of the narrative that the DM presents, which means it's fairly easy to rip out the pre-packaged D&D lore, re-fluff a few things that heavily reference that lore, and just homebrew your own story structure and lore and world and characters and pantheons and the like.
my problem with a lot of indie TTRPGs is that a lot of them are married to either a very specific story structure that the system mandates that you follow, or a very specific pre-made world that the system is mechanically built to form around, and that level of pre-determination doesn't interest me either as a player OR as a GM. like these are fundamental rules in these systems that would gut it if you tore them out and replaced them with something else, which means that if you tried to go against those premade structures/settings, you would basically have to homebrew the entire goddamn thing from scratch anyway. D&D's relative rules-heaviness of combat and rules-lightness of roleplay makes it easier for D&D to provide me the kinds of stories that i actually want to participate in, even if people insist it's not as "flexible" as many people think it is. like. yes. don't run a regency romance game in D&D, obviously. but if ur running a high fantasy type of game focused on adventuring, D&D can be adapted pretty well to a homebrew setting and world with minimal effort.
and tbh, i really think that's why it has the cultural dominance that it does, and why i personally keep engaging with it as a ttrpg even as people yell from all sides to play something else. "just do freeform RP!" ive done freeform RP. it's good for character building and dialogue and intrigue and sex but it fucking sucks when characters have to fight. i fucking hate it when im trying to RP fighting in freeform RP and whatever person im fighting against just keeps fucking kicking my ass no matter what i have my character do because my RP partner is so invested in forcing me to lose or give up that they just pull whatever the hell they can think of out of their back pocket to beat my character into submission. at least with an incredibly well-defined set of rules for how combat works, your opponents are also working in a limited framework with limited tools, so even if they do fucking kick your ass, it doesn't feel completely stupid and arbitrary, and since opponents' attacks are governed by dice rolls almost as much as players' attacks are, the amount of arbitrariness in the combat is not wholly stacked against you unless you're fighting against something that's WAY out of your party's league--and even then, those creatures and people are still going to be bound by their dice rolls as much as you are, they might just have better bonuses and/or fewer penalties to make things a bit more favorable for them. that horrifying fucking monster you're fighting may have an insane bonus to attack, but it could still roll a critical fail when it tries to attack you, just as much as you might roll a critical fail to attack it in turn. everyone operates under the same rules and will have similar limitations placed on them by those rules, and participants have much less leeway to make their characters' combat prowess be whatever the hell they want whenever anything even mildly threatening happens.
#sye's babbles#i also think that people who holler about 'forcing D&D to tell unfitting stories' are seriously overestimating how many ppl actually do tha#like. D&D has certain aspects of how it works that are pretty useful building blocks!#i like the idea of the six ability scores and the skill system!#im not super fond of how magic works in D&D though#which is why one of my projects of trying to homebrew my own TTRPG game was like#taking some of D&D's fundamental building blocks and then remaking the magic system how i personally wanted it to work#because there are certain elements of D&D i do LIKE a LOT!#and i dont think there's anything wrong with borrowing some of those elements to build off of when you're making a homebrew system#like i understand the desire to encourage people to play something other than D&D#but some of us have looked into the systems you're recommending and just.... didn't like them!#like a lot of the time the shit people recommend are not what i am looking for in a TTRPG#and a lot of people seem to misunderstand that#the basic idea of Adventuring as presented in D&D is a fun baseline to work with!!!#and while i understand some people might be more interested in trying out other story structures or genres......#i like the genre trappings of D&D and adventuring and doing quests and shit like that.#i really do enjoy it as a genre of storytelling on its own.#i get that some people want to do horror or other shit like that#but please understand that i just want to toss 3-6 gay little dudes me n my friends create into a group#and watch them battle monsters and solve problems and buy magic items and shit.#stop assuming that everyone who plays D&D only does so because they dont know any better#i play D&D because i enjoy it!!! ive been playing TTRPG since i was in middle school and i've enjoyed it this entire time!!!!#if you wanna play other indie RPGs thats totally fine but ive seen other systems and they just dont interest me#and it's NOT because i am inexperienced with TTRPG in general#the first ever TTRPG i played wasn't even IN D&D it was in BESM#my formative TTRPG experience was NOT D&D and i still choose to engage with it because it makes my brain go brrr while other systems do not#[old man voice] get off my fucking porch and let me enjoy my day
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halfbit · 3 months
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me staring at this stupid ai website google led me to while i was trying to find references/tutorials. incoherently. tempted to log into instagram again just to get inspiration from my old horror art mutuals but i also do not care about digging up my password again and i wouldn't be surprised if some of them have moved stuff off there by now
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aimfor-theheart · 7 months
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What’s your fave mythological story? Like the story of Hades and Persephone in greek myth for example
omg what a good question….
i do have a fondness for hades and persephone’s story….
but i think my fav would be osiris/set/isis/nephthys myth. or the version where nephthys disguised herself as isis and slept with osiris, which propelled set into a rage and was the last straw before he killed osiris, and then the sisters worked to resurrect him, etc.
i also love the greek heroes….specifically electra and antigone.
get to know the blogger! (ask me an anonymous question)
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vampirecatprince · 10 months
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I really need to step back and replay MOTHER 3 from a more analytical lens, bc it's balance of goofyness and oddly intense psychological and cosmic horror elements are something I love so fucking much and wanna try to emulate in my current project?
It finds a very specific and delicate balance that I see a lot of the games that were inspired by it skew in different directions that don't quite scratch that itch for me ngl?
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tiarnanabhfainni · 1 year
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It’s incredible how everything I learn about Irish, Welsh and Manx history makes me wish the entirety of the parliament would collapse into a sinkhole and flood from the Thames with all those cunts in it and that Buckingham would collapse with that entire lineage of shit inside
yeah basically 👍
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alteredphoenix · 1 year
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Thinking about that one YT video that goes in-depth about liminal spaces in video gaming by sorbino, and how people that view them fall into one of two categories: those that are endowed with nostalgia and the sense that they've been there before (regardless as to whether or not they were born in the era those spaces originated from), and those that feel the looming dread and fear and the hint of otherness, that sensation of wrongness that scrapes along the surface of your brain just looking upon them.
I guess I would fall into the first camp, although not so much with the familiarity and nostalgia; it's more like I can relax and put my guard down when I see them. It reminds me how, as silly and goofy some of these places used to look, they at least had heart to them. Not like today, how you'd look at them from your window out of the car you're in and see the buildings that once were colorful and bombastic are now just redesigned to have the same cold, sterile, corporate aesthetic.
(That's a deeper dive I can get into that sort of goes outside of the bounds of this topic, but I think you get where I'm going with it.)
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thatlesbiancrow · 1 year
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ah shit. i spent most of my day looking into a disturbing game, and foolishly thought i would be just fine heading to bed!
i got scared when i turned my light off >:(
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tatioone · 1 year
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i dont like the whole general idea/association that men have to be white or blonde in order to be “golden retrievers” or be associated with the sun / light / goodness 🙄 my rendition of luke being brown shoudlnt take away from the fact that he is the same character, with the same mannerisms, with the same GOODNESS instilled within his soul
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myrfing · 1 year
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you ever give someones video essay you sort of disagree with a shot and then You still disagree with them. Thats crazy
#she said Us was a movie about middle class fears of the envy of the working class. which yes. but no. but that like.#it cant be about the working class because of its depiction of them as growling horror villains#which. also removing the aspect of. the tenderness and understanding in the film between the protagonist and the supposed antagonist#and the narrative weirdness that makes you question who is who and who was there first being a thing#to feed into the argument that contempt is the sublimation of envy and Explains a lot about society.com#anyway this is just one part of the video and other bits actively spun the is this ME question i kept afloat while watching it#but is it the truth that envy drives moralistic thinking just because it sounds more self aware and enlightened 6_9#after all even before religion and before masters and slaves people did have a sense of good or bad#based more around pain pleasure and functionality right#and can envy explain the contempt of people who dont want what they contempt.#i think its easy for some people in some positions to say like oh well they’re just envious and lying to themselves to feel better about it#and it’s hard for these same people to imagine i guess the depth of a contempt without desire. they must not truly hate me#they only want what I have and bemoan their lack of it.#but does everyone want the same thing. i.e. if you are disgusted by extravagance consumption opulence whatever is it always just envy#if you believe wealth and excess power robs everyone within it of something you actually desire#or is that just envious self-delusion. who knows#in this way of thinking some things are never possible or mutable because once the tables are turned and the envious desire is fulfilled#then people only will ever become corrupt because the substance of it always mattered less than emotional gratification#which maybe has been the pattern but is that it is that just ze human condition forever#?_?. i get the video wants to focus so it discards a lot of these things but i just dont think they can be extricable#also she said flaunting wealth is an american phenomenon LMAO. I was chinese once#also that black swan was about the sublimation of envy into artistic perfection (yes) but also not about the humanity it robs#in the proccess.
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cuz-reasons · 3 months
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Why must every other conversation I gave with my brother feel like a debate
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mochinomnoms · 10 months
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Please share the lewd interspecies romance.
Okay so mostly I have thoughts over the Octavinelle trio, especially the twins 🫣 but i wrote a lil something for most of them! also this was not meant to be so long idk what happened
[tags] - nsfw, AFAB-implied reader, but written gender-neutral, mentions of ruts/heats, breeding, etc
nsfw under read-more, minors DNI!
If you really compare humans to the nonhuman population of Twisted Wonderland, there's are some small physiological differences between species. Fae, surprisingly, don't differ from humans all too much. Land dwellers in general don't have anything too significant, though all of nonhuman species retain aspects of their animal counterparts.
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Most of Savanaclaw goes through some sort of rut/heat during various times in the year, primarily early spring and summer. There's no logical reason for them to retain that aspect of their mating cycle anymore, not for a sentient species that have skills of logic and reasoning. Unfortunately, they didn't get to choose how their evolution worked, and so they have to deal with it in anyway they can.
They get a lot more irritable, they have throbbing headaches, their abdomen hurts, and the scent of their mate is a lot more enticing than normal. Jack probably has it the worst of them, as a wolf beastmen. Not only does he have to deal with a fever-inducing rut that will put him out of commission for a week, afterwards he has to deal with the a/b/o jokes from his classmates too, oh the horror. It is really a horror though when he's able to bend you over his bed, bite marks aligned your neck and back as his dick pounds into you till his knot swells and locks you in for at least an hour. Jack's incredibly embarrassed afterwards, though he manages to be incredibly sweet even after rearranging your guts. Wolf beastmen are one of the most affectionate partners to have with a reputation providing some of the best aftercare for their species. It's most likely to make up for their week-long copulation, stretching and tiring out their sweet little mates. Ooooh, but they'll so very sweet: cleaning up the sticky mess of fluids between your legs with their tongue, careful to not overstimulate you (unless you ask), tending to the mating mark they placed on the back of your neck with soft kisses and licks, and making sure to prop your lower half up to that your chances of taking their seed increases.
Lacking the annual rut/heat that other variants of beastmen have, lion and hyena beastmen are more similar is this regard, as they don't have the same issue of long copulations as wolf beastmen. Neither will initiate sex, rather they'll rely on their mates to do so. Ruggie, in particular, is rather reluctant initiating sex, as male hyenas are typically more submissive, so if you're shy you'll have to get over it. But once you do, Ruggie is ever so happy to service you if you're happy to give him praise. Run your hands through his hair and ears as he eats you out, he'll let out the cutest whimpers and groans as you do. Just, expect to be jellyboned by the time he's done with you, as a hyena he needs to make sure his mate won't snip back at him and you can't exactly do that if your fucked out. While he may not have the same stamina as Jack for week-long fuck session, he has a particularly short refractory period and can have several short sessions in a single night.
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Leona also won't typically initiate sex on his own, it happens very sporadically, and he his the image of the lazy lion. While he never wants to do anything particularly extraneous, who is he to deny you needs? You'll have to do some preparing though, as while the barbs on his dick aren't as bad as they are in his animal variant, they will hurt if you're not wet and pliable enough. Be sure to sit on his face, don't worry you won't suffocate him and it's better you cum a few times first before taking him. Unless you want it to hurt? Once you've cum enough times, you can ride him to your heart's content. He only asks that you don't mention how he rubs his head into the crook of your neck, marking you so that if everyone couldn't tell by the sounds coming from his room, they'd know you're his from his scent. Lions are quite protective with their territory and pride after all.
Merfolk have the most extreme physiological differences between them and...any land dweller really. It comes with the territory of being suited for a completely different environment. They also behave a lot more similarly to their animal counterparts, which can be both delicious and exhausting for their humans.
Moray eels don't have a set time of the year they mate, but rather the water must be warm and plenty of food must be ready to provide to their mate. When the spring time weather above the sea starts transitioning from crisp to blazing, don't be too surprised when the twins start handfeeding you meals and snacks throughout the week, they want to make sure you're happy and full for them, getting you in the mood with a sweet, dizzying underwater dance to initiate until they get the okay from you. What's that 'okay' though? You know that yawning I mentioned before? You'll get your answer from them now, as they take your open mouth yawn as an invitation rather than a sign of tiredness. Floyd, in particular, is ready to drag you into the deep part of the pool before remembering that you need to breathe somehow. Not a problem. He'll keep your pretty head above water. You'll still have trouble breathing as his long tapered tongue worms his way in your mouth. No matter, you'll be gasping for breath as he bullies this cock into your hole, large enough that you can physically feel the bump on your stomach. Morays are awfully fond of wrapping themselves around their mates, seeing as Floyd will do his best to tangle his tail around your body and squeezing you as you squeeze down his dick. He loves the physical contact between you two, and is amused how your nails try to dig into his shoulders seeing as the mucus on his skin makes it near impossible to have a steady grasp. You're completely dependent on Floyd as you drool and cry out for relief from the overstimulation, which is oh so ever exciting.
Jade is equally as cruel when it comes to mating. Unlike the others, merfolk tend to mate with the intention to, well, mate. He prefers you to be soft and pliant for him, as well as wholly depending as you two fuck. So, he'll happily brew you a water-breathing potion so he can actually drag you into the deep, where he found a secluded, warm grotto that will allow him to keep you to himself for hours, but close enough to the surface that he can continuously grab you food to eat between sessions. Not that those sessions will be short either. Like his brother, Jade is content to wrap himself around your body as he cooed honeyed words into your ears about how you'll make a wet, warm, soft hole for breeding. It's not like he'll have to do much either, his dick is prehensile and he can wrap himself around you, swiping kisses and nuzzling into the crook of your very sensitive neck while his thick cock continuously pounds into you with a bruising pace. He's so mean!! He likes seeing you cry from overstimulation too, and Jade will continuously scoot down to clean you up with his tongue, only to claim that too much of his seed was gone and he needed to fill you up again for another few hours. He's truly quite incorrigible, especially when he bites into your neck and shoulders to make his claim on you. Don't worry, most morays' bites aren't venomous, and even if they are, you have him to care for you. You're going to be depending on him in the water anyway, so there's no need to worry about it too much.
Something that neither probably won't mention, probably because they won't realize it's something you should know, is that they can change their sex under the right conditions. If you're ever so inclined in the future to test the waters out, the twins might be so generous to let you eat them out instead.
Of the trio, Azul's the only one with an established mating season, two actually: one in the late spring and the other in the early fall. Respectively, one during finals and the other during orientation. He's already so incredibly stressed, and he has the need to breed too? Downright atrocious. It's wonderful that you're so kind that he can take refuge in you and use you like a new octopot, so tell him how pretty he is and how much you love him and only him, so that you have the privilege fucking his merform. The moment you're entering the water, he'll unconsciously display mating signals by flashing soft lilacs and blues, a beautiful display of his need for you. He's rather large, even bigger than the twins, in his merform, so you'll need preparation as well; have no fear, his tentacles are wrapping and kneading the squishiest parts of you. I mentioned before that he can taste the salt on your skin and pulse through your wrist via his suckers. He can taste the slick from your walls, too, without even having to use his mouth as the suckers massage you from the inside. If you'd like, he technically could give you a full flavor profile afterward, though he'll probably be a bit mortified to do so. The biggest difference is his dick, or lack thereof. Instead of a dick, Azul has a hectocotylus, which is a modified, slightly shorter arm of his with a thicker spade-shaped tip that he can practically rearrange your guts with, with little effort on his part really. Most octo-mer variants will keep their mate at a distance, eons of instinct hard to forget. Azul's variant, though, will keep you close, almost dancing with you in a sweet, sensual twirl as he places sweet kissing and bites on your neck, arms, and chest. Octopi are, in fact, venomous, however, so you will be feeling a bit of a lustful high, paralyzed, and a bit helpless to the whims of a needy octopus. He's quite good at aftercare though, making sure you get an antidote and handfeeding you calorie-rich snacks to energize you back up (again, he's aware that you won't eat him, but instinct dictates that he keeps you full with both food and cum to make you a happy mate).
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*collapses into heap on floor* thoughts....full.....ahahaha breeding kink go burrrrr. i was not meant to write this much and then it escaped me. also i hate tagging
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lassieposting · 11 months
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Been thinking a lot lately about romanced Astarion post-spawn ending.
Because like. The Funnest™ thing about cptsd is how much of it gets delayed. When you're trapped in a lengthy, ongoing traumatic situation, you do not have the ability to process and start healing your mental wounds. Your brain and body go into survival mode, and all that matters in the moment is that you somehow cope with the horrors. He wouldn't have been able to even begin dealing with the physical, mental and emotional toll of two hundred years of torture, brutalization and dehumanization while he was under Cazador's control; he is in constant danger, surrounded by sharks in the water, and survival means not letting them smell blood. He can't afford to fall apart, to show weakness. He is shockingly functional and competent in-game, partly because he has to be to work as a game character, but also partly because...it do be like that, to some degree. When death, for whatever reason, is not an option, you just have to shut down and keep going. People adapt in order to survive, and when we learn that showing an "injury" (physical or psychological) only gets us punished, we learn to hide it.
Early-game Astarion is terrified - of Cazador, of Godey, of being hunted down by his siblings, of being staked or sold off at the first opportunity by Tav and the other companions, of turning into a mindflayer, of another painful transformation, of losing himself when he's only just regained his autonomy after two centuries, of what Cazador will do to him if he ever finds him - the man is overwhelmed by fear. He's on thin ice as a vampire, and he's not going to give them any more reason to want him gone. Survival instinct is still in control, and in this new situation, crafting some fragile safety for himself means not only selling his body for protection, but also being useful. Clear-headed. Good in a fight.
Endgame Astarion finds himself in a completely different situation. The time-sensitive overarching threats - Cazador and impending ceremorphosis - have been dealt with. He has a loving, supportive partner he's really starting to feel safe with - Tav/Durge has proved that they're on his side, that their affection is genuine, that they don't just want him for the one thing he's been told he's good for. They've told him they're going to help him find a workaround for his sun allergy. He's getting fed regularly. He has time to stop, and breathe, and just. Recuperate.
For the first time in 200 years, he is safe.
And it will probably take a while to catch up, during which time he will seem to be coping really well, but at some point, his brain is going to realise that he's safe, and it's going to finally start processing the sheer fucking horror he's been through. Since I haven't seen anyone talking about this particular fun aspect of cptsd, allow me to offer u some thoughts on issues Astarion and Tav might end up dealing with in the months/years postgame, during the
✨ Delayed Trauma Response ✨
Memory Gaps: Astarion realising, as he opens up to Tav, that there are entire years or decades of his life from which he has only a handful of memories. Great big blank stretches where he has no idea where he was, who he was with, what was happening to him. Some of the gaps cover years at a time where he was so dissociated and shut down that he just didn't retain any memories of what was going on around him. Some are shorter periods of particularly horrific torture that his brain has deliberately blocked out to protect him.
Recovered Memories: At some point, years into the future when he's done A Lot of healing, he might find that every now and then, a fragment of those lost memories will unexpectedly come back to him. He'll catch a particular scent on the breeze, or overhear a specific phrase in the street, or cross paths with someone whose face is oddly familiar, and he'll get a glimpse of an acute horror he'd filed neatly away where it couldn't hurt him anymore. He very rarely remembers all the context to those flashes of his past. He might recall that he was punished, but not what he was punished for, or he might remember words spoken by a greedy conquest, but be unable to recall the man's face.
Dissociation: Tav knows going into this relationship that Astarion has basically made an art out of dissociating during sex. They also know, from their shared encounter with the drow twins, that he's not great at enforcing his own boundaries - he'll always say he'll speak up and back out if he stops having fun, but in practice he rarely does; he's not used to having the option of saying no to his partner, and being punished if he tries. So they know there's going to be some practice and experimentation and negotiation necessary there, to figure out the rough limits of his comfort zone. But once he starts really processing, there may be days where he just checks out completely. Tav will touch his shoulder, and he'll startle and apologise - "Terribly sorry, darling, I was miles away for a moment there." And Tav will gently point out that he's been sat in the same spot vacantly staring into the middle distance for hours. They've been checking in on him occasionally and this is the first time he's responded. It's unsettling, to say the least.
Lost Time: Astarion was very young when he was turned, physically mature but emotionally juvenile. He was basically an overgrown teenager, in the phase of life where elves are just starting to learn who they are and what they want, and figure out their place in the world. But he never got to do that, because he spent his formative young adult years in a world where everyone became an abuser, where his only means of surviving was to smile and charm and obey while even his basic human dignity was stripped away. He learned that communication is based on manipulation. He learned that the powerful can do whatever they like to the weak. He learned an incredibly toxic, abusive way of life, and that was his family dynamic, his everyday life, for as long as he can remember. Now that he's free and safe, he's realising that the world doesn't actually work that way and that he's now far behind even shorter-lived races in social/emotional development. He's grieving for the person he could've been. He's grieving for the life he could've lived. He's grieving for all the years he already lost, and the ones he'll lose in the future as he flounders to catch up. A decent chunk of his life was stolen from him, and that's time he will never get back.
Flashbacks & Night Terrors: Specifically the kind where your brain convinces you that an injury you had a long time ago is actually an injury you have (or are receiving) right now. There are nights where he'll wake Tav in a panic, because his back feels like it's on fire, he can feel every freshly-carved wound dripping blood and he's in so much pain he doesn't know what else to do. If Tav looks, they see nothing out of the ordinary - old, long-healed scars, same as always. But the pain and the fear and the distress are all very real to him, and all they can do is try to comfort him, cover his back with cool damp cloths or healing salves, remind him he's safe now and they're not leaving him.
Boundary Shifting: Sometimes, Tav can come up and hug him from behind, and he'll melt into them a little bit and go all soft and happy. Other times, he might flinch away or go rigid at the same gesture. A lot of the time, it really depends on how he's feeling on the day, but at least a little bit of it is deliberate - he's pushing to find the limit of just how much autonomy Tav is willing to give him. He wants to know at what point they'll stop respecting his "no". Will they accept it if he doesn't want a hug? If he wants to sleep in his own room tonight? At what point will understanding turn to anger at being rejected? From the drow twins four/fivesome, we also know he's got a tendency to push his own boundaries, and jump into things he's actually not ready for, and Tav would be the one holding his hand through the fallout as he tries to figure out what his own boundaries even are.
Frustration! So, so much frustration. He wants to be Over It already. He wants to move past everything that ever happened to him and never think about it again. He hates that Cazador still has a grip on him, even in death - he doesn't want to give the bastard the satisfaction of dwelling on all his punishments, his cruelties. Sometimes, that frustration is going to explode outwards at Tav - he'll get angry at them for coddling him, or find something small to start a fight over, or he'll set an unreasonable boundary and try to defend it because he's still learning what healthy boundaries look like. Sometimes, it will implode inwards, and that won't be about Tav at all, but they'll get the brunt of it all the same - it might come out as self-loathing or self-punishment, and he'll react by doing something stupid, like trying to drive them away, because having a secure, relatively healthy relationship is terrifying and the instinct is to destroy it before Tav can. There will be yelling and angry tears and deeply unhealthy coping mechanisms, and they'd have to work through that. Trauma is ugly, and Astarion is right at the beginning of a very long journey towards healing.
Abandonment Issues: Astarion wants the relationship to be one between equals, but he's kind of got Tav on a pedestal all the same. They saved him. They helped him get rid of Cazador for good. They chose him and love him despite a wealth of better (in his eyes) options, and all his baggage. They stayed with him even when he has very little to offer them. We know his vanity and obnoxious self-absorption is a fragile attempt to obscure the fact that his self-esteem is in the dirt and he has virtually no self-worth, and there are a couple of occasions in-game where it becomes clear that he's afraid of losing the one person who somehow considers him lovable. After seeing Sebastian and all the other conquests, he begs Tav not to hate him, saying that he did what he had to. If he has a rival for Tav's affections, and Tav informs him that they broke up with the rival to be with Astarion, he's shocked and the first thing out of his mouth is, "You ended things with them for me? Why?" And if Durge tries to break up with him for his own safety, his facade drops and he immediately asks if he did something wrong. So while he's not afraid to argue with Tav, if something happens - like an angry outburst - that upsets or angers them, and he thinks he's at risk of losing that one steady, stable person in his life, he might well cling and overcompensate to try and repair what he thinks is a fracture in their relationship. He'll fawn or beg or crawl into Tav's bed to "apologise" and "make it up to them" because, well, very occasionally it worked on Cazador. With patience and good communication and lots of repeatedly driving the lesson home to overcome 200 years of education to the contrary, he will eventually start to believe that "I'm really pissed off at you right now," does not equate to, "You are the worst mistake I've ever made and I am leaving you."
Panic Attacks: I feel like honestly he'd get some symptoms of these on a fairly regular basis, but he's never been given any option other than just trying to power through them. He's used to realising he's shaking, he's used to feeling like he's watching himself from outside his body, or like he can't breathe even though he doesn't need to. He's very familiar with the sickening fear in his gut, so intense it makes his head spin. He's not used to being comforted or reassured about them - he thinks they're normal. Tav disagrees.
Anyway, cptsd is messy and complicated and often looks very different from person to person so these will not represent everyone's but these are just some ideas for what the ongoing recovery process might make them work through, based on the aspects I'm most familiar with.
Projecting? Who's projecting? I'm not projecting. Shut up.
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slvttyplum · 5 months
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suguru hated how infatuated you were with satoru, even though he knew you meant no harm whenever you spoke about him, it still made him upset. you were supposed to be paying attention to him not satoru and the more you spoke about hm, the more suguru went out of his way to prove to you that he was better than him in all aspects.
including sex.
there was no better way to prove that you were better than someone than to prove how good you were at sex, and that's exactly what suguru did. was this petty? yes, but he wasn't going to have you drooling out the mouth about satoru so he did the only thing he could think of.
“do you want to fuck satoru?” bouncing his leg while you were on his lap, this wasn't a joke or a trick, he wanted a genuine answer. horror coating your face as you look at him, no smirk or sadness on his expression, just his regular resting face, his arm wrapped around your waist, his thumb rubbing over your hip.
“no.” just a one word answer hoping he won't dig deeper into it, and he didn't, instead he did what he had to do to prove to you that he was better than satoru, the no showed him everything he needed to see. taking the rubber band that he had resting on his wrist and tying his hair back and grabbing you by the neck, giving you a kiss.
his hand sliding to the back of your neck, resting as you fully emerge into the kiss, his sweet taste on yours. once you closed your eyes to kiss him, the next time you opened them you were on the bed and holding up your legs for suguru so that he could fuck you.
“i want you to know… that you'll always be mine okay?” and with that he lined himself up and pushed into you, letting out a groan of pleasure, your walls wrapped around him and squeezing him.
suguru proving to you that he was the overall better choice than satoru went on for two weeks straight, him beating your pussy in until he was physically tumbling over from how weak your pussy got him. you didn't know why he was fucking you the way he was, but you weren't complaining, it was like getting a reward every time you came home to suguru bending you over the counter and sliding down your panties just to eat your pussy from the back.
he knew he shouldn't have been jealous but the line of you going out to actually fuck satoru was too thin, so he had to make you fucked out for you not to do that and he succeeded. by the end of every night, the sheets were drenched with three different fluids, and you were asleep beside him as he cleaned you up, mumbling to yourself in your sleep his name.
maybe this wasn't about satoru but more about him wanting to fuck you to sleep every night, either way he loved to please you so that's what he was going to do.
“no one else can fuck you the way i fuck you… say it.” while pushing your thighs into your chest and kissing you, tears in the corner of your eyes as he pushes deep inside of you, the tip of his dick pressing on your sweet spot making your heart beat faster and pleasure jolt throughout your body. that's all suguru wanted, he wanted to hear you say those words.
to hear you say that his dick was better than anyone else's and that he's the only one who could make you cum, and all of that was true, so he wanted to hear you blabber that while he pushed his dick inside of you with no mercy.
“mm, no one else can fuck me like you suguru.” the way you said his name sent tingles throughout his spine, he didn't want to slide out of you. he wanted to stay buried deep inside of you until your pussy remembered his shape, and only he could slide into you with ease.
“there we go. that's my good girl.”
after two full weeks of fucking you nonstop with no breaks, you never brought up satoru again, suguru knew all he needed to do was fuck him out of your mind.
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neil-gaiman · 6 months
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Gosh, I hope no one's asked this already but...
After watching The Sandman together, my husband and I are looking forward to watching Dead Boy Detectives. I've just watched the trailer and while I'm excited at the prospect of snuggling up with hubby to enjoy more of your creative genius, I'm really nervous that this show will be too much for me. While I can manage blood spurting and can even appreciate the occasional jump scare, the horror aspect is making me more than a little nervous.
Which leads me to ask...
On a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being "Hey, let's pop some popcorn and gather the kids around the television," and 10 being "Watch in broad daylight with every curtain in your house open and every light in the house on or you'll never sleep again," how would you gauge the show and its episodes as a whole, horror-wise?
Yes, I apologize for being a wimp, (I blame my big sister for intentional exposure to "The Shining" as a 5-year old.) but I'm pretty certain you've answered a question like this kindly in the past, and I'd be most grateful.
Regardless, even if you only read this in passing and don't answer, please know that even though I'm just finding the time to get to know your work now, I have been fan of you as a human being for a long time. Thank you for all you contribute to the human race, Mr. Gaiman. There aren't enough kind people in the world.
Honestly, I'd say mostly it doesn't get scarier than a 4. It's not a horror series. It's very funny, very sweet, romantic and loving and human, sometimes painful and always weird.
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