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I love the way Bdubs talks it’s like he has absolutely no control over what order the words are going to come out of his mouth in

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the worst part of being a non-american on the internet is statistically you're probably going to make a lot of friends who ARE american and then you start getting crazy thoughts like "i should take a vacation to buttfuck tennessee" or "i wish i could immigrate to new jersey"

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in the carrot fields

some 3L treebark sparring for @treebarkweek day one: fight/flight!

The first time they spar, Martyn wins easily, and Ren laughs, flat on his back among the new carrots. Maybe no one else has beat him yet. Maybe everybody lets him win. He is the king, after all. He says, You’re good.

Martyn shrugs. He knows he’s good. That’s why he’s still here, still green. You’re just a slouch. And he takes Ren’s hand and helps him up.

*

When they have a rematch Martyn goes slow, uses his eyes, pays attention to Ren’s favourite guards and counters. Someday he’ll need to anticipate them, to get around them one way or another. And for now—well, it’s a bit of fun, isn’t it? He likes Ren’s theatrical flurries, his fluid shifting stances. The chagrin of an unexpected parry. There’s not much to do in the death game besides fighting and fucking. They’ve done plenty of the former, and Martyn reads his king well enough to see they’re getting to the latter.

He still wins, but Ren’s good too. He’s red. He’s been red a long time.

(I could kill you, Ren whispers, teeth bared, when Martyn knocks him over and lands on his chest. Don’t you think so?

Nah, probably not, Martyn says. He helps Ren up. They’re both smiling.)

*

Next time he won’t help, maybe. Maybe next time he’ll put his boot on Ren’s chest and hold him down while he slits Ren’s throat and calls it self-defence. Green and red. They’re not enemies yet, but why wait?

He’ll do it quick, he thinks. Quicker than the other time. No squirmy conscience to stay his hand. Quick enough that he won’t have to see the smile drop from Ren’s face, when he realises they’re not playing any more.

*

Or maybe he’ll wait to see if Ren puts up a fight. Don’t they owe it to each other, after everything they’ve been through: the spectacle, the drama? Martyn’s seen his king tail a wounded foe through the forest, fingers poised on the bowstring, relentless once he’d scented blood. How his eyes drank the moonlight. How hunger pulled taut all the lean muscles of his frame, so his whole body trembled with anticipation of the kill. Hasn’t Martyn earned it, Ren stalking him down, bending to sup like no other prey will serve?

But on the carrot fields Ren lets Martyn’s sword clip his pauldron rather than dodge, even though he’ll bruise later, and Martyn will have to pack snow on his blue-black shoulder. Lets Martyn roll them around in the dirt till they both have grass in their hair, and there’s a pretty flush creeping up Ren’s face. You’re so good.

Martyn feels himself unfurl, uncontrollably: every cold and broken part of him giving way like a flower turning to greet the sun. It frightens him, makes him brusque. Do better.

I like seeing you in action, Ren says. I like watching you win.

*

Martyn throws next time, out of spite.

Or he gets distracted by the scarlet sheen of Ren’s eyes, the bunch and ripple of sinew and muscle when his king swings his sword. Breathless and off-kilter, his own hands shaky on the hilt—but he throws, he’ll tell himself and anyone who’ll listen. Ren holds him down on the frost beneath the bare-branched elms, and when the roots catch at his hair Martyn pretends those are his king’s nails on his scalp, pulling his head back for the blade.

You got sloppy, Ren says.

I did, Martyn agrees.

There are ways to get out of a hold like this. He doesn’t move. He feels the tip of Ren’s blade move in feathery swirls, back and forth, back and forth along his jugular. He wonders if Ren will look at him the same way, after this.

Now what shall I do with you, says Ren.

He smells like snow and steel and softer things, flowers sleeping beneath the soil, dreaming of the spring. Martyn shuts his eyes. You tell me.

*

Ren doesn’t tell him but shows him, there in the shelter of a cold slate sky: slow and lazy, infinitely gentle.

*

The last time they spar, Martyn wins easily, and Ren laughs, flat on his back on the fallow earth. The carrots are long gone; only frost remains. Go on, he says. Do what you planned.

Martyn lifts his sword. Sees again, as if in a dream, the perfect arc of Ren’s blood spray across the altar. Sees him laughing with the red leaves in his hair and the tender violence in his eyes: king of winter and the spring, king of the battlefield even when the battlefield is Martyn.

(They’re still not enemies. If not now: when?)

The sword slips from Martyn’s grasp. He lays himself down next to Ren in the soil they once tilled together. This is what I planned, he lies.

He knows Ren doesn’t believe him, but tomorrow or next week the earth will rise to cover them both, and in the meantime his mouth still tastes the same.

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Bdubs. Tennis.

Tennis transcript:

((each > indicates a new clip))

>> [Bdubs] There was a sport called... ~Tennis~

>Tennis >Tennis court >Tennis >When you're playing tennis

>Tennis court >Tennis in Minecraft >*laughing* Tennis >Real tennis

>YOU EVER PLAYED TENNIS IN YOUR LIFE??

>So it looks like tennis might not be possible >Tennis

>[Etho] Tennis >[Bdubs] This has to be tennis!

>Tennis >Tennis IS going to work >Tennis

>[Bdubs] Tennis! [Etho] Tennis, real tennis

>[Bdubs] It's a pompous game called "tennis" >Good tennis

>This pompous game called ~tennis~

>For a pompous game steeped in tradition like tennis

>^TENNIS^ >TENNUS >t e n n i s

>~I~ make tennis! >yyyus! Tennis! >So in tennis

>Te- this tennis is already hard enough

>Tennis >TENNIS

>[Bdubs] Tennis [Etho] *laughs* Tennis >:) [Bdubs] Tennis *laughs*

>Tennis science! >You wanna play tennis? Here's tennis

>There's some tennis >Tennis >TENNIS IS FUN! I like tennis!

>Anything is- TENNIS is possible! >~Tennis~

>Tennis :) And we'll see you in the next episooode. *to ghast* Come on baby

>[Etho] tennis >:) <<

Compiled from Bdubs' video, "TENNIS! in minecraft :: Minecraft Hermitcraft"

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how it feels going from a bdubs hermitcraft episode and to a joel hermitcraft episode

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Small process video of Etho!

Music: C418 - Strad

I love this way of working because it doesn’t kill the energy of the sketch and I avoid lineart altogether. I do maybe 10 quick stick figures and pick the one I like.

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more shadowtimes vampire yuri YAYYY ,,^___^,, !!!

close up Waow !! GNIGHT 🦈🦈

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hello????? hello??????????? the eye? Grian???

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minecraft made me bisexual and evil

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i’ve had this thought dozens of times over the last two years i’ve been a treebarker, but i would love to find something to call Dogwarts that isn’t “Dogwarts”

w shit like the recent shit like a scotland court ruling that they’ll define women biologically in part due to JKR funding transphobic charities in the UK, as well as JKR saying she considers ANY support of her work to be support of her ideology, i honestly dont really want to reference her work even tangentially anymore

so i am opening the floor to the collective treebark fans i have gathered on this blog: anyone have any good ideas for alternate kingdom names? i think it would be fun if we could pick one and have it catch on, but even just spreading the idea of using alternate names to not reference HP would make me happy

for my own thoughts: i used Hound’s Haven once in place of Dogwarts when i filed the MCYT serial numbers off of Lamplight to show it to my cousin, so that’s what i’m personally throwing into the ring. my personal leaning would be to keep “Dog” in the name tho somehow, but i also think any name which plays on the Red Army/Red Banners, Red King, or Red Winter could also be fun

when i suggested this to a mostly treebark based server im in, suggested guidelines included keeping the kingdom name one word or finding a different piece of pop culture to base it off of, like LOTR. the names Dogskeep and Dogsgard were suggested, which i also really liked (thank you anpan and ghast)

if other people have suggestions, i would love to hear them!

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The King and his right-hand men.

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knight gem

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false: hey i took a cute vacation picture :)

ren: *smacks desk* CAN I GET A HOLLA BACK FROM THE GAYS