teddog

[teddog]

When your faves barely have any content

[teddog]

Toronto’s legendary Hospital Row Hasty Market, a store known to many a healthcare worker in Toronto. I painted this for a friend ‘s birthday, based on the building’s appearance before the 2019 renovation. It’s still iconic now, but more sterile.

I now know too much of this building’s history, including past lives and importance to the local arts scene. More art of it coming eventually— I’m fascinating by the liminal formal cafe/current hotel space on the side of the building.

[teddog]

Happy May Day! Remember the reason for the season and sabotage some corporate elites!

[teddog]

Are you a Fate fanfic writer? Come join us at the Fate Fanfic Cafe, a Discord for Fate fanfic writers and fans to hang out, discuss writing and story ideas, and share their latest works!

Working on a story and want to bounce ideas off other writers? Considering starting a fic and need inspiration? Come join us!

PLEASE NOTE: This is strictly an 18+ only server.

[teddog]

Me: I need someone to ELI5 a particular international crisis so I can flesh out an OC better.

Rob: Allow me to help with YouTube links!

(One workout spent watching videos later)

Me: I am now unsure why this other OC hasn’t murdered the first OC.

[teddog]

Went looking for lounge music to listen to while editing fic tonight. 1 play?!

[teddog]

New kit, who this?

[teddog]

New Fic Day!

Title: Cute and Cozy Date Ideas For Pumpkin Season

Fandom: The Vampire Dies in No Time (main timeline)

Pairing: Kantarou/Nagiri

Rating: T

Word Count: 1276

Content Warning: Ableist Language (canon typical)

Kantarou has elaborate plans for the Halloween Tsujigiri Patrol. Nagiri, understandably, wants nothing to do with them.

@ficwip All-Ships Ship Week- Tuesday: Double Life

[teddog]

New Fic Day!

Title: Listen: There's a Hell of a Good Universe Next Door

Fandom: Fate/Grand Order and Fate/Extra

Pairing: Charles-Henri Sanson/Robin Hood

Rating: G

Words: 1133

In an impossible forest at the bottom of the Moon Cell, Robin Hood ponders his next steps as a Rogue Servant.

@ficwip All-Ships Ship Week- Monday: “I didn’t know where else to go.”

[teddog]

I FINALLY GET TO MOVE ON WITH MY LIFE.

WHAT DO YOU MEAN THERE’S A FANDOM CHALLENGE TOMORROW.

[teddog]

Backstitching changes the asethics considerably

[teddog]

There’s a bunch of backstitch to do but the full coverage is done.

[teddog]

OCtober 2024 Day 14: Who or What Inspired Your OC

I promised my friends an interesting context to an important myth in the Fate fandom, so here we are.

Curtis is based a little bit on a historical figure named Galen. Not Aelius Galenus, but an obscure figure connected to figures that would later inspire parts of Nibelungenlied.

Content Warning: there is an event within this series of events that can be read as an incestuous marriage between non-blood related relatives. There’s also a lot of violence, murder, and an event that can be seen as self harm. These are historical events, please be thoughtful with how you engage with them.

A lot of what survives from this situation comes from Gregory of Tours. Look, I read a decent amount of Decem Libri Historiarum for this, which I wouldn’t recommend for researching OCs.

In the 500s, the Franks were in a civil war after Chlothar I died and split his kingdom between his four sons. Two of them, Chilperic I and Sigebert I, immediately went to war with each other. In the middle of this civil war, Sigebert marries Brunhilda of Austrasia.

This causes much drama amongst the brothers given Brunhilda’s status as an educated woman, which is atypical for the brothers’ spouses. Chilperic claims to want to marry Brunhilda’s sister, Galswintha, possibly out of jealousy. This relationship is short lived, however, as Galswintha is murdered by Chilperic and his favourite mistress, Fredegund.

You should start to notice some familiar names. Features of Fredegund and Brunhilda are both considered inspirations for Brunhild and Kriemhild. Sigebert probably inspired Sigurd. But where does Galen fit in? Let me get to that.

Sigebert tries to avenge Galswintha, but gets murdered by assassins from Fredegund. Brunhilda is still alive, which will become important later.

Meanwhile, Chilperic naturally has some kids across his various marriages. One of the kids from his first wife, Audovera, had a son named Merovech. What happened to Audovera? Don’t worry, Fredegund had her murdered too.

Merovech has enough sense to realize this situation is terrible for everyone involved. This is where Galen shows up as well. Galen is mentioned as Merovech’s servant, but you can kinda read him as Merovech’s accomplice in what’s about to go down. There’s also a bit of a “Historians think they were roommates” energy.

For example, there’s one incident Gregory of Tours talks about where Chilperic realizes that Merovech poses an actual threat, so he has the prince shipped off to a monastery. Galen breaks in and smuggles him out.

Merovech realizes the only way he will amass enough power to overthrow his dad is to marry into it, so he contacts the woman who hates his father the most— Brunhilda. This marriage is incredibly scandalous and done in secret by the bishop Prætextatus. Due to his involvement with this marriage, Prætextatus was exiled briefly and later assassinated allegedly under Fredegund’s orders.

In the aftermath we have the “shipped to a monastery” event, which was an attempt to nullify the marriage. Merovech gets out with Galen’s help and the two live on the run for several years while trying to overthrow Chilperic. They’re eventually sieged in a town and, realizing there was no escape, Merovech asked Galen to kill him. Galen was captured in the aftermath and was tortured to death by Fredegund.

To tie up the loose ends, Chilperic was eventually eventually assassinated on a hunting trip, Fredegund shockingly dies of natural causes, and Brunhilda was executed by Fredegund’s son, Chlothar II.

This is a very streamlined retelling of these events and if you’re curious about this clusterfuck, I encouraged you to do some deeper reading. Gregory of Tours is a sarcastic, bitter menace about this situation. Just look at this piece of art at the end of this post, reflecting the relationship between him and Chilperic!

As a final note, Gregory felt that Prince Merovech was morally correct to attempt a rebellion against Chilperic, but his youth and inexperience in an already fraught situation meant there was no way Merovech could have succeeded.

As for how this inspired Curtis, my partner’s OC is inspired in part on King Merovech. Merov is the dragon and Curtis is the dragon slayer, you see. But I kept bumping into Prince Merovech while doing research and his grim fate with Galen felt like a tragic past lifetime where the dragon and the dragon slayer teamed up to try to save the world and failed against impossible odds.

[teddog]

Me: Dimensions Gold Collection Petites?! That sounds like a quick project!

(Weeks pass)

Me: S C R E A M I N G

[teddog]

OCtober 2024 Day 7: Likes

Curtis likes coffee. I think this is reflection of myself as a Weird Coffee Person.

He’s also a remarkably social person who enjoys spending time with people. This gets him into trouble sometimes, as he finds himself often in complicated relationships and trying to do The Right Thing for others. This is the pattern that usually starts his adventures.

An odd complication of this is that I like to think Curtis is a strange positive influence on others through this enjoyment of relationships. More about that on Day 9.

[teddog]

OCtober 2024 Day 6: Past

Technically speaking, Curtis is originally from somewhere in Colorado. Jokingly, possibly Denver’s airport.

(Anyone else play that DramaSystem setting Terminal X? With the airport that’s totally Denver’s airport but it’s all transdimensional travel? Only me?)

However, the Colorado Curtis is from is not our Colorado, but rather one that saw the end of the world in a dead timeline. It’s complicated.

There is a side tangent here that Curtis is also from 400s AD Gaul. Maybe. Depending on how his brain is working that day. I’ll probably touch upon this in more detail on the Inspiration day (day 14).

As a kid, he was a nice and polite child and not really too remarkable. Most of his defining events happened as an adult.

[teddog]

OCtober 2024 Day 5: Re-Designed OC

Happy New Year, we have a new Valberg!

I redesigned Valberg for @sabusthings’s Geist game, taking him from an Urban Shadows NPC to a Fate Master Candidate. GET READY, WE HAVE A FATE OC TO TALK ABOUT NOW!

Valberg is interesting to redesign, because his inciting incident is always around 2008. That means Valberg both grows older with redesigns and also manages to evade punishment for his crimes for longer with each passing evolution. He still looks similar but some of his out looks are different.

One of the things I wanted to play around with in this “redesign” was the Icelandic Witch Trials. As a Fate Grand Order Salem fan, I think the witch trials are a horrific aspect of history that ends up being downplayed by modern discussion and must have been a terrifying period for Type-Moon canon mages and witches.

In Iceland, most of the victims accused of witchcraft were men. To this point, Valberg had potential to be a decent mage but his Icelandic family tradition dictated that men couldn’t practice magecraft. Why invest in men when there was a higher risk of them being killed? He knows a lot about the mage world, existing as someone who isn’t quite mortal given his experience and bloodline but also simply doesn’t practice being a mage. Well, for now, at least.

He’s still a cunning white collar criminal, although now manipulating mages as well as financial institutions. I’m very curious where his morals will take him. Valberg’s moral compass is always slightly off— he’s not so much an anti-hero more than a jerk who occasionally will do the right thing depending on factors. Those morals are intense and occasionally altruistic in comparison to how selfish mages often act. He also often has strong opinions on familiars and other created beings, seeing them as being just as “real” as normal people.