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maddiviner · 4 years

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Could studyblogging jumpstart your personal grimoire?

A witch should be a lifelong learner. To practice effective magic, you must grow in new directions at a constant pace. A witch should approach magic with a sense of devotion to their own growth.

I’ve practiced magic and divination for two decades now. The most solid advice I can give? Start journaling. Start keeping a notebook. Start studying.

Witches who keep a notebook record their research and ideas about the Craft. This helps them build a wide repository of knowledge, right there when they need it.

The format and content of my notebooks changed a lot over the years. But they all helped me become the witch I am today. I devoted the bulk of these notebooks to my journey in magic, techniques to try, and lessons learned.

There are few people who haven’t studied. In school, we pore over geometry and classic literature in hot pursuit of elusive high marks. We spent time learning about our interests. Whether that’s witchcraft, philosophy, or astronomy, notes are helpful.

Everyone learns in a different fashion. Still, studying and learning about the world remains with us from our first breath, to the last. My Craft took leaps forward when this dawned on me. I’d always enjoyed school. I realized that I could apply the same study techniques to witchcraft and the occult.

What’s studyblogging?!

As a regular user of both Tumblr and Instagram, I soon came across the studyblogging trend.

Caitlyn Tiffany of The Verge describes the studyblogging phenomenon as “a beautiful, stressful wonderland.” An apt description! But what is a studyblog?

Studyblogging hashtags like #studyblr and #studygram are popular (on Tumblr and Instagram, respectively).

For someone just coming across the phenomenon, though? It can be difficult to penetrate this strange world. Expect calligraphic chaos, a plethora of highlighters, and fine-tuned aesthetics.

Studyblogging focuses on the quest for knowledge. In practice, studyblogs share tips and handwritten notes on various subjects. Studybloggers encourage each other to be the best learners they can be.

The photos of notes, assignments, and other tasks make up the bulk of the phenomenon. Studyblogs often feature photos of elaborate calligraphy and heavy illustration in note form.

Expect to see self-made diagrams of mitochondria. Essay outlines on postcolonial theory with nigh-perfect bubble lettering. Vast, illustrated mind-maps of Shakespearean themes. It's a big community, and there's room for a lot. Room for witches? I think so!

Studyblogging for Witches

In witchcraft, our grimoires function much like a non-magical student's study notes. The content, and some of the form, may differ, but the principles are the same.

The quest for an aesthetically-pleasing grimoire stymies many a beginner (and not-so-beginner) witch. The wise remind us that our grimoires needn’t be complex. Functionality is more important than aesthetics in most cases.

That said, there is something worthwhile about keeping a grimoire that suits you. A grimoire can speak to your soul, both by way of aesthetic appeal and your own abilities. For some of us, this might mean a lavishly-illustrated tome. Others might find minimalist styles more resonating. It varies.

The truth is that yes, your grimoire needn’t look a certain way or be perfect. Still, a level of aesthetic appeal can help with information retention. It can also boost your magical productivity. Humans respond in an intuitive fashion to that which they consider beautiful.

Aesthetics can help to put you into a liminal state. Liminality can be a powerful tool in self-improvement. This, in turn, is useful not only for normal studying, but also for the Craft itself.

If you see art as part of your life path, you might find that approaching your grimoire as a work of art helpful. Part of this means realizing that it won’t be perfect, but also always striving to learn and grow.

Studyblogging, as a community, showcases a lot of excellent notebook and journal-keeping techniques. Studybloggers often provide tutorials and guides to effective learning methods.

This is, of course, all while celebrating the joy of learning itself. Traditional studying methods can apply to magical topics. I have found that the techniques of the studyblogger can help with keeping a useful grimoire.

Ask your intuition if studyblogging is right for you!

Will studyblogging help you? For some students, lurking or keeping a studyblog inspires and motivates them. It also increases accountability. By posting their goals and progress, studybloggers have an impetus to progress.

In a way, it’s a bit like livestreaming a video game - it makes the experience more challenging, and also more exciting. The difference, of course, is that, in this case, your game is learning!

And the notes? Many find the calligraphy, fancy scripts, and illustration soothing. It can be a way of making otherwise impenetrable subjects more captivating.

Without a doubt, aesthetic presentation improves information retention for some people. Humans have a positive response to beautiful imagery.

Some folks find the gorgeous landscape of studygram and studyblr overwhelming and anxiety-inducing. Gorgeous calligraphy notes, after all, aren't easy for most people.

For some, posting about your studies on a blog might only increase worry. We're all different, and studyblog techniques are hardly universal in form.

You should use your intuition to decide whether to dip into this community. Ask yourself whether an audience will help your quest for deeper knowledge.

Will you feel empowered, or nervous about it? If you struggle with comparing yourself to others, you might find studyblogging discouraging.

I myself am somewhat of a perfectionist. For me, though, the artistic aspects of note taking and information illustration soothe me. Studyblogging suits me, but will it help you?

You should tailor your learning experience to your own strengths. If that means studyblogging won’t help you, be honest with yourself and don’t chase the anxiety of it all. Find another method of learning.

Browse some existing studyblogs - I recommend EmmaStudies and StudyQuill. Ask yourself how it makes you feel. Do the images and writing seems inspirational?

Would you enjoy sharing your work with the world? Studyblogging might become an ally on your magical path!

Taking the Plunge

So, how do you start a studyblog? How do you get involved in the community?

The most popular studyblogging platforms are Instagram and Tumblr. Instagram lends itself to posting tons of pictures and very short-form posts. Tumblr favors longer prose.

When I started studyblogging, I created both a studyblr and a studygram. I recommend starting a new account on the site of your preference for studyblogging.

Follow some existing studybloggers as a way of introducing yourself to the community! Also, follow the hashtags #studyblr and #studygram, to start.

What to study?

Studyblogging features students focused on all kinds of topics. I’ve been studyblogging for over a year. In case you’re wondering, it's rare for someone to complain about my witchy take on studyblogging.

You’ll find the studyblogging community very welcoming in most cases. But what will you study? I always recommend witches focus on only one or two things they’d most like to learn at a time.

Studyblogging lends itself well to in-depth topical research. This can mean learning the signs and language of astrology or the basics of gemstone magic.

Topics like shadow work or personal Tarot readings might be a bit too personal to blog about. Those might be better suited to normal, private journaling rather than a blog. My own studyblogging tends to focus on my writing preparation, astrology, and Tarot.

Though I’ve been reading for over twenty years, there is always something new to learn about Tarot. Astrology, like Tarot, is a lifelong discipline. Though I’ve only recently made my first steps into it, there is much to learn. My writing, especially the book I’m working on, has its own notebook.

Possible topics include, but are in no way limited to:

Crystals and gemstones

Astrology

Spellcraft

Mythology and legends

Magical history

Energy work techniques

Seasonal and Lunar cycles

Herbology

Tarot, Lenormand, or oracle deck divination!

It is important to choose topics that interest you in a personal way. At the same time, try not to get distracted. Witchcraft includes many paths of study. Try not to jump from topic to topic - finish what you start!

Supplies

If you’re in school, you may already have a lot of the tools necessary for studying. If not, you can get them for an affordable price in most cases.

Paper matters! You'll want a notebook or loose leaf binder paper. For hardbound notebooks, you can’t go wrong with a Leuchtturm 1917. That popular notebook boasts dot grid paper, includes page numbers and a place for an index.

Seeking something more aesthetic? Check out the Paperblanks series from Peter Pauper Press. You might also like the notebooks you can order from Citrus Bookbindery. For me, a binder (I use A5 size) works best, because I can add and remove pages as necessary.

You can find some great guides out there about organizing grimoires. Much of that advice applies here. Your notebooks will soon fill the role of a grimoire. They will contain your notes, research, and more.

It is usually best to have one notebook (or binder) for each subject you’re studying. As you move forward, you’ll have a collection of grimoire notebooks on different topics.

You’ll also need pens or pencils. Really, you only need one. If you feel like getting fancy, you can get multicolored fineliners. I prefer Sakura Micron pens. They use waterproof micropigments that don't bleed when you highlight over your writing.

Highlighters are fun! These add color to your notes and help emphasize the important things. If you want nice highlighters, I recommend Mildliners. Any highlighters will do, though - choose colors that appeal to you. I recommend several different colors, because that allows you to color-code your notes.

Plan!

Plan out, at least in a rough fashion, how you’d like to organize your notes. This can be rather freeform, or complex, depending on your preference.

When I began my astrology journey, I knew what sections I would include in my stars grimoire. I also created a rough map of the path I’d take in my research.

I began with the simple Zodiac signs. I then moved forward through the planets, houses, aspects and transits. My organization, loose though it was, benefited from my use of a binder which allowed me to add and remove pages.

No matter the notebook, it is important to have, somewhere, a rough idea of where you’re going.

You will also find it important to set attainable, realistic, and measurable goals. For me, this was things like memorizing the astrological house system. I set the goal of reading my astrology textbooks completely and summarizing them. This kind of goal leads to personal accountability.

I also created a set of astrological flashcards for my Tarot-related work. It can be motivational to post your goals on your studyblog in some form. Then, you can provide your followers with regular updates on your progress.

Start posting!

Once you feel ready, go ahead and introduce yourself to the studyblogging community! An introductory post, explaining who you are, your goals, and methods, will help others get to know you.

I recommend tagging your posts with studyblogging hashtags (mentioned above). Also include some witchcraft-related tags! This will help you connect with other witches who might be helpful on your journey.

Don’t be shy when it comes to posting photographs (taken with a phone or other camera) of your notes! You might not feel that your notes are as neat or pretty as other bloggers. Regardless, they’re unique and might resonate with others!

If you’re taking notes about a very personal topic, like shadow work, you might want to forgo the pictures. Some bloggers obfuscate or blur potentially sensitive parts of their notes. You’ll likely find nothing but encouragement for sharing your research topics, though!

Some studybloggers will also photograph their study space. Some of us even use photos of fun things like their breakfast or pets to illustrate their updates. If pictures don’t suit you, post regular bits about your life and your progress towards your goals.

Get to know other bloggers! This is important, whether they’re witches or from the studyblogging community. Both can be helpful!

Watch or read some of the tutorials you’ll find in the studyblogging community. These focus on things like calligraphy, organization, and memory techniques.

While your notes needn’t have fancy headings, calligraphy can be fun to learn. I don’t currently use calligraphy in my notes, but am learning it on the side, so to speak.

I find it relaxing, and you might enjoy it too. If not, don't feel bad - not everyone uses fancy handwriting, and that's okay!

Moving Forward

If, after a few weeks, you find yourself really vibing with studyblogging, stick with it! Most witches would agree that there’s no real wrong way to be a witch. To me, though, there are wrong (and right) ways for you yourself to learn and grow in your craft.

You need to find what works for you, what adheres to your soul and keeps you connected. If studyblogging ends up helping you, and I hope it will, keep going!

After a while you might find yourself ready to move onto another topic. We all end up “graduating” forward onto other subjects. You’ll quickly find that your grimoires will be an invaluable record.

They will contain not just your gathered information, but also your intuition, insight, and more. Cherish your notebooks - they will come to reflect your essence!

#magic #witchcraft #witchblr #witch #studyblr #occult #pagan #journal #book of shadows #grimoire #eliza.txt #eliza reads

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felassan · 3 years

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Highlights and insights from the MELE launch cast & crew reunion panel

[rewatch link] [highlights & insights from the N7 Day 2020 reunion]

In case a text format is better for anyone (in terms of accessibility for example). Cut for length.

Some paraphrasing.

If anyone’s interested in just the line-reading session, it starts at timestamp ~1:04:45.

In addition to the cast and crew from the N7 Day reunion, at this reunion also in attendance were:

Mac Walters (Project Director for MELE, Lead Writer of the og MET)

Melanie Faulknor (Lead Producer for MELE)

Crystal McCord (Producer for MELE)

Fred Tatasciore (Saren)

Seth Green (Joker)

Kimberly Brooks (Ash)

Ash Sroka (Tali)

This was the biggest reunion / meetup of the cast so far, and some of the cast and crew were meeting for the first time here.

It’s been so long since the og MET that PW & KW are getting to watch their kids experience playing it for the first time

JHale doesn’t play but since MELE she’s been sneaking around Twitch jumping into peoples’ MELE livestreams to lurk, watch and comment a bit

What drew Seth to the character of Joker? The whole concept of the game. He likes games and MET’s mechanics (different trees of adventure, stacking reputation, choices carrying between games) at the time were the most sophisticated that he’d ever heard pitched. He thought this was new and exciting and wanted to be a part of it. For the character they cast him based on his personality traits (i.e. he sounds quite similar to Joker personality-wise)

Would Seth ever want to play Joker again if the opportunity presented itself? Sure, he loves the character, and if the writers ever had more things to explore/expand with Joker he’d be down for it.

Seth said that it’s a different kind of fan that approach him about this project. The fans have spent many many hours in an intimate exchange with “him” that he hasn’t been a part of, but they experienced it nonetheless. “I’ve hugged a lot of strangers, you know what I’m saying? It’s great, you get an interaction with fans that you never get as a performer in any other experience”

Seth has been a space guy since he was little, it inspires him

With the state of the world the way it is now [covid, masks etc], does Ash think Tali’s story will be more impactful now than it was before? Ash hopes so, and that anything they do here will have a positive impact on a bigger level. Ultimately that’s why most of them do what they do, they want to reach people in deep ways. She hopes Tali is an inspiration in courage, bravery, standing up for what’s right and thinking about the greater good

The [MELE I think] dev team had a last team meeting with Greg Zeschuk, one of the founders of BioWare, who they had invited to it. He was regaling them with stories of the inception of Mass Effect. “You would imagine this sort of well-laid out, drawing boards everywhere... [but] it was basically just a napkin sketch in a Greek taverna with him and Casey going ‘We wanna do a space opera’, and then it took off”

The process of creating lore through development is very organic. A lot of it comes from character and story development. It builds up over the course of the game’s development. They did the codex entries at the end, the idea being that if they saved them for as late as they could, then they could pull from the story, characters and meaningful moments, and build them from there

PW wrote a bunch of the codex entries, elevator banter & lots of little bits of lore. They describe their time on the og MET as being a “baby writer”. They originally came in after Mac had back surgery and a junior writer was needed to fill in. “It was really fun, it was us sitting in a room together going ‘What do you think a hanar or a krogan thinks about this or that’?” For a first project for them this was an amazing experience - the world building itself creatively with all these awesome people

They tried to add multiplayer in every game but only got it to work in ME3

They had a lot of plots laid out in ME1 that they called “global plots”. These were outside the core critical path and would take players from planet to planet, and were sprawling stories. They pulled out a lot of really interesting concepts and ideas from these that did make it into the game, but all of the global plots ended up getting cut due to time. Mac still has old diagrams and spreadsheets which detailed how all of these would have come together

Q. If you all had to take a long-distance road-trip with two squadmates, who would you take and why? PW: “Jack and Mordin. Mordin because the drive would never lack for things to talk about at length quickly, Jack because you know you wouldn’t pay for the room. You wouldn’t know how you’d get the room, but you wouldn’t be paying for it.” Courtenay: “I’d take Mordin because there’d be singing, and FemShep just to have this thing - happen. In the room that I get for free.” JHale at this point fistpumped while saying “Yeess” [then I think what she said was “steaming hot”]

Seeing as asari are long-lived, how open is Ali to one day reprising her role as Liara? “She’s a character very close to my heart, it was such a great opportunity. In some games that we work on the character has already been created or voiced by someone else, but this was really a group effort. When I first went into the booth, the only thing I’d seen of her was a sort of like, rendering, and we slowly kind of came to her voice and presence. I would love to bring Liara back any time... hey, she can live a really long time guys. :D”

Caroline and people who do what she does (Creative Performance Director) are so critical to the quality of games. Caroline: “This group of people are extraordinary. We were lucky to have such an extraordinary cast. Every [recording] session was new and challenging. It was a labor of love. I’m tearing up right now thinking about it. I’m remembering my last session with Jen, she was the last session, just sobbing and sobbing”. When JHale was trying to say the lines of Shepard’s goodbye with Garrus, a line hit her like a tonne of bricks and she was in tears and was like “Shepard does not cry”. “It took me a second, I got it out and took another run at it, it was in there but stuffed down as it should have been, and I finished the line [and there was silence in the booth when usually Caroline would have been talking to give direction or instruction] Did we lose her? Did Skype crash?” and it transpired that what had happened was that Caroline was in floods of tears

ME was the first time Keythe had ever come across branching dialogue. “Normally when we work on a script and it’s from page 1 to 100. In this it was get to page 5, then go back to page 2 and play it a little differently. The skill and the fun and joy of it was to be able to go back and play a scene in a different way, with different writing, with different outcomes. This was not only a challenge but a real treat. So to all the writers who dreamed up how this build-your-own-adventure plays out, you have my undying respect. It was a real pleasure”

VEDA is a proprietary system that BW use to record the dialogue, which is the closest way of having it feel like having people in the booth together (it’s all digital and VAs get to hear the line someone else has done in that scene). Caroline really pushed for this because of the amount of time etc that was wasted due to lack of this sort of thing on ME1. William: “It was a god send for me, thank you, getting to hear a cue from Jen or Mark.” Ali: “Us being able to bounce off each other helps make it more real. This for me was the most real acting experience on a game I had ever had - the writing being so good, Caroline helping us through, being able to hear each other.” JHale was always early coming in to record relative to the others so only got to use VEDA a few times - a bit of Liara content and the scene with Anderson towards the end. “Those two times, oh my god it was amazing”. VEDA being a thing also helps from a scheduling standpoint

Seth and Tricia Helfer (EDI) only got to be in the booth actually together 1 time, to record/shoot a piece of promotional video. “We actually got to record a scene together and we were like ‘oh my god this is the best thing ever’. It was great, even though I had to stand on a stool. She’s the best”

Seth: “As an actor, the kind of opportunity to do this kind of material in games just didn’t exist.” Fred: “Oh, never! I had never had a villain part that was complicated like that. In a game? Never before, it was really interesting”

Raphael always goes back to the fact that ME brought more women into gaming than any other game before it. “The writing and the complexity of the relationships gave us so much ballast”. “This set this apart from running, shooting, gunning, looting”

JHale: “What I noticed in the times before when I got to be around fans, there was a huge hunger among women in the gaming world for something they could really jump into. They were starving for something which fed them what they deserved and needed”

Mac: “[praising Caroline] Caroline would often come to us as writers and challenge us and say, as an example, ‘Do we really need another male character to do this? Why are we writing another male character for this?’ She pushed that very early and to the betterment of everything we created”

PW: “Karin and Cookie and all of the editors across the trilogy, [were critical in] making sure that Shepard sounded consistent - [especially since] we had a large writing team, writers came and went, Mac is the only one with a significant writing contribution on each of the games”

PW: “[on game dev] It’s a process of getting hundreds of people pointed in the same direction, all believing that this is something worth doing”

Ash: “Having all the different possibilities and avenues, going back to play them all out in the different ways [really helped to round the character of Tali out and make her feel like a natural person]”.

VAs only get paid for the original recording sessions, not again (as in they don’t any royalties or anything from something like the remaster)

In MELE, they left all the original credits at the end of each game in

Fred: “It’s creating in five dimensions [because of all the outcomes and relationships etc]”. Seth: “The cool thing is that the audience feels that. They’re immediately struck by how dense, thought-out, prepared and planned the entire universe is”

How was it for the new MELE devs coming onto this? Crystal: “I knew it [the series and fans’ love for it] was big, but I didn’t know it was BIG! Working on MELE there was this infectious excitement. Being part of it was so exciting.” Melanie: “I came on at ME3, I had a 3 or 4 year honeymoon period with BioWare. Coming onto MELE, I’m getting really emotional. One of my first meetings originally was going into a cinematic review for an epic Tali scene in ME3”. Crystal: “On MELE, we had an hour or 2 every day where the team came together to play the game. In those reviews, a lot of the devs who worked on the original would tell all these stories. It was really fun to hear all the inside stories on ME’s creation and be a part of that”

DC: “Should this unit get vaccinated?” Ash: “Of course”

How do they think ME will be viewed in the next 10-20 years, what do they think its legacy will be? A piece of history, ground-breaking. It broke down some barriers and opened doors for people. It’s a powerful, powerful community. It’ll continue to age quite well and be enjoyed by a new generation, it’s original and evergreen and there’s a lot in it that people go back to. There’s a lot of universal things in it (personal experiences, like there will always be love, people fighting to belong, trying to make sense of their pasts etc)

JHale and Alix did the “I love you Shepard, now go save the world again” Shep-Sam exchange and both got teary. It was then Seth’s turn to line-read: “Jesus Christ, now that I’m good and choked up, fucking mess”. Ali was also actually crying from it

Seth: “It can’t be overstated, this community is so large and global, it is one of the most powerful fandoms that I’ve ever been greeted with. Thank you”. Ash: “It’s the most amazing group of fans ever. We’re all so grateful”

Some funny anecdotes/stories:

PW didn’t realize that Alix could do different accents. They remember a time when they were listening in the booth and an Alliance soldier was complaining about the gear had been given. They said “Wow that’s really good, who is that?” and the VO producer said “That’s Alix, Patrick”, “because she wasn’t doing her [normal British accent but was doing a Californian accent instead]. Alix roasted me later for not recognizing her voice and never let me heard the end of it”

Alix: “[on Sam’s toothbrush] Caroline’s like, ‘So then she pulls her toothbrush’ and I’m like ‘What? Sorry? A toothbrush?’ and obviously it’s funny now as everyone knows that Sam’s thing is her toothbrush. Caroline’s like ‘Yeah, you’ve gotta like, flirt, over the toothbrush’ and I’m like ‘Who wrote this - a frickin toothbrush, are you kidding me? Really guys?’ ANYWAY. I was wrong and it worked. :D”

Fred: “I remember a 12 year old kid coming up to me and being like [flat tone] ‘Oh yeah. I killed you’.”

Keythe: “The other assasin I play is Kellogg in Fallout 4. People come up to me like ‘Omg. I love you so much. And then I fucking KILLED you!’”

Courtenay once went out to dinner in NZ with a few prominent people from the Game of Thrones cast. “Everyone around was making a big deal out of it like ‘Omg, it’s so-and-so from GoT’. I was feeling a bit like ‘Hi, I’m here, just nobody’. And I looked around in the restaurant and there's one guy in the corner and he’s got an N7 shirt on and he’s just looking at me like [knowing look, does a peace sign]. And I’m like ‘I got one! I love you guys!’”

PW: “I have a question for the cast members, because I don’t know if JHale has done this to all of you or if she just does it to the devs. Show of hands if Jen has ever made you do push-ups.” JHale: “It’s just you guys”

Karin: “One of my favorite editing files that I ever had was a ME file. It was before Seth was coming in for a session. I opened it up and it was just 20, 25 lines with the word ‘Shit’, over and over again, and I was like, ‘This file is perfect, I don’t need to do anything to it, have fun!’”

Seth: “Didn’t we do a track that’s like 60 seconds of laughing? Escalating laughing? I don’t know about other actors but for me getting into a laughing fit is kind of like trying to get into a crying fit, it takes the same level of commitment, you start to follow a path until like you’re hysterically uncontrollably laughing. I remember looking through the glass, and I’m deep in it at this point, and I make eye contact, and I can see from the other side of the booth and they’re like [making ‘okay you can stop’ now gestures] - ‘Like that’s plenty, we got it’ and I was like ‘okay, okay [dying]’”

JHale: “The craziest thing Mark and I had to deal with was how many times we had to say ‘I should go’”. Mark: “We also, Caroline and I tended to use that as short hand when I needed to go to the bathroom”

The panel host: “The first time I interviewed Ali was a decade ago. She did the ‘I’ll flay you alive with my mind’ line halfway through, it was my first interview and I literally fell out of my seat [from being star-struck]”

Ash line-read Tali’s drunk omni-tattoo scene and in response DC said “I totally get why people wanna romanticize all these characters :D”. Karin: “We’ve had more than one person come up to us and show us actual tattoos that looked like that”

[source]

#bioware #mass effect #video games #covid mention #long post #longpost #garrus vakarian #best boy #feels #lul

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voicesofchaos · 3 years

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Zexal Month 2021 - Week 1

I feel like i have been doing @zexalmonth for many years and I don’t really have anything new or interesting to say besides saying I want to work on the same fanfic I have been saying I have wanted to work on for several years but only ever make minimal progress on. But I still want to participate. So I am condensing all of week 1 into 1 post that I will keep short, sweet, and to the point!

Day 1 = Who are you? Introduce yourself! When did you get into Zexal? What Fandom are you in at the moment?

I am Kevin Jeremy Ross, known online as VoiceOfChaos. I livestreamed Zexal during the end of its run, written a few fanfics, and have cosplayed Yuma, Kaito, Shark, and Nasch at anime conventions around the Midwest USA. I started with Zexal when the fansubs first came out but I know episode 33 was when my interest in it spiked! Then later around the time of Zexal II I discovered the livestreams and I fell deep the fandom rabbit hole. I’m always in more fandoms than I can count but I will say I am enjoying Sevens and if anything I feel like people rejecting Sevens will make people brushed off Zexal before will give it another chance.

Day 2: Who would you be in Zexal? Champion? Alien? Tomato? Alternatively, what part of Heartland City’s society do you find interesting?

Umm, that is a good question LOL I would love to be a card designer but I guess in Zexal that would mean having Reconstruct Universe teeheehee. Something I find interesting about Heartland is that dueling is very important to life there but we do see that not all aspects of life revolve around dueling like in other Yugioh series. Some of the more plot-heavy episodes, especially the earlier ones, have a lot of side-characters who are not duelists. It adds a strange unexpected level of realism to Zexal that is missing from other Yugioh series.

Day 3: What’s your favourite moment or favourite episode in the series?

It is probably cliché or at least a popular answer but favorite episode is 80. Yes for all the reasons most people like, Alit’s flaming bisexuality, Angel Yuma, and just the amazing humor! But my actual favorite part of the episode is the fact that Yuma won the duel by not listening to Astral and would have lost if he did. This is such a giant level-up moment for Yuma that haters overlook when they say Yuma is a bad duelist because Astral does all the work. I honestly think someone who has never watched Zexal before can enjoy episode 80 all by itself! Some of my favorite moments from the whole series though seem to have a running theme. The finale of the Yuma VS Nasch duel, Yuma trying to save Vector from being absorbed, and Yuma trying to save Tron from being absorbed. These really stand out as moments that show Yuma’s strength of character and why he stands out as a main protagonist different from the rest. His ability to empathize with his enemies is amazing and respectable.!

Day 4: Who’s your favourite character? Which Zexal Characters would you like to meet?

I mean as you can already tell from this, I love Yuma a lot! But on the flip side I also love Vector a lot for all the many emotional reactions he caused. He is such a great blend of a villain, able to wear many hats from comic relief to genuinely terrifying. I’m not sure I would want to meet any of them as they are all really crazy LOL III might be cool to chill with. Alit seems like he would be a lot of fun. Anna would be dangerous but might a wild adventure. And I have a soft spot for Cathy.

Day 5: Zexal has so many cool locations and backdrops. Where would you want to go in Zexal?

Not Astral World or Barian World. They look pretty but are probably really dangerous and not much to actually do. Same with the Number ruins too. So just Heartland City. I’m a city person (who lives in the suburbs) so I would love just explorign all the technological marvels of Heartland!

Happy Zexal Month everyone! Kattobingu da!

#Zexal Month #Zexal Month 2021 #Zexal #Yugioh Zexal

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rainofaugustsith · 3 years

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SWTOR: Season of (Galactic) Change?

So I've had time to contemplate some of the information about 6.3 from the livestream. There will be no story spoilers, just the announcement of the format of 6.3.

Complete honesty: I'm very disappointed it's another flashpoint.

Complete reality: I don't think we're ever going to see a stand alone flashpoint again. For most of SWTOR's history, from Ilum onward, flashpoints have always been incorporated into main story. They don't want people to do what they were able to do in the class story, which was to stroll past all of the flashpoints (solo or not) without a second thought - missing some key story content in the process. I personally feel that is also one reason we aren't seeing planetary arcs anymore. There are surely reasons of economy, yes, but I think they also want to ensure that all players have all story information. The planetary arcs and bonus series were again optional, and players could and did walk right past them if they pleased, missing everything from background to major plot points on Revan, the Dread Masters, the fate of Corellia, and the factions' roles on various planets.

Having said that, the issues with flashpoints have been described many times by many players. They can be really long and really tedious. None of the flashpoints from Umbara onward allow use of the combat assistance droid. There aren't any save points so you can't stop for the day and come back later.

What do the flashpoints mean for the game overall? I personally think we're going to keep seeing the pattern of flashpoints alternating with more conventional story. What I also feel, though, is that there's a greater chance we may be getting more of that story.

Before the recent shakeup at EA/BW, I wouldn't have thought things looked good for solo, story-based or more casual players.

The harbinger? Treatment of companions in gameplay. I'm not getting into story because I really am not up for that shit at this time of night, so please don't. But let's talk the combat settings. Companions were deliberately nerfed so they healed less. This wasn't conjecture, the devs said it was working as intended. Players started having to use forced "guest companions" in difficult flashpoints. This was something previously restricted only to story chapters, in both the class stories and KOTFE/KOTET. I personally do not think this was bad in Umbara or Nathema. Both required the player to use Lana and Theron, who were companions they knew and had likely leveled up, at least a little, through the previous story chapters. But then on Copero we were forced to use Raina Temple, who was level 1 for anyone other than Imperial Agents who had previously leveled up her influence. In both Meridian and Spirit of Vengeance players going through the story were also forced to work with one or two companions they had not leveled. The takeaway? They perhaps want players to lean less on companions, which is a common complaint among some endgame types.

It wasn't just companions, either. Between the re-tuning of the Uprisings, the daily area and heroics of Dantooine that favored grouping, the difficulty at the end of Echoes of Oblivion and the mess that was Spirit of Vengeance, as well as the mats for new augments locked behind ranked group PvP and NiM Ops, I think the writing was on the wall. It was clear that they were going in a direction that favored raiders, as the main story became unplayable. Players were told they should just get 306-ranked gear to complete SOV, when they had only earned 268 gear by the end of Onslaught, something that's really not been necessary in the previous expansions (at least from KOTFE onward).

But then Anthem folded. At the same time, it was noted that the single-player Star Wars: Fallen Order game had done exceptionally well. And then came the news that Dragon Age 4, which had been inexplicably developed as multi-player, would no longer have that format. Around the same time, SWTOR started soliciting suggestions for improved accessibility on the official forums.

I think this may bode well for SWTOR. It may have finally gotten across the message that players are here for stories, and players come in many ability levels and game play preferences. Or from a more stark economic perspective, it may have clued them in that driving away everyone but the hardcore raiders does have negative outcomes.

The fact that they even had a livestream for 6.3 was shocking to me. It's been about three months since 6.2 was released, and for some video games that might be a long time ago. But in SWTOR land that's an achievement. The most recent time the game had what could be considered regular updates throughout the year was 2017, when there were roughly three months between KOTET, Iokath, Umbara and Copero, respectively.

Maybe they really are committed to doing better this year. I'd certainly like to think so.

IMHO this next flashpoint will be a good barometer for the devs' intentions. They have a choice - they can do a repeat of SOV or they can make positive changes. Given that we seem to have two companions during the flashpoint, maybe they are already making those positive changes. On the other hand the companions are still "mandatory guests" rather than companions we really want to bring, and for all we know, the PC won't be questing with both of them simultaneously.

I'd personally like to continue my characters' stories, but I won't do it if it's going to be all tedious flashpoints that take hours and require endgame gear. So I really hope they are changing to a kinder and more open and accessible path, instead of just making "play your way" a really bad joke.

#swtor #rain talks swtor #swtor critical #swtor 6.3 #6.3

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franklyshipping · 4 years

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Cyber-Flustering ~ A Markiplier and Jacksepticeye Ego Fanfic

HERE WE HAVE ANOTHER WONDERFUL AND JAZZY ANONYMOUS PROMPT WITH OUR FAVOURITE GLITCHY BOY HECKIN GETTING IT! LET’S DO THIS!

TAGGING: @anti-switch-glitch and @googlee-oliver

This was it for Anti. He had five minutes. Five minutes left to figure out who was doing this to him. Three weeks ago, someone had set up an Instagram account. Anti knew it had to be an ego, because only someone he lived with could have gotten the videos and pictures that ended up being posted. Pictures of him smiling or mid-sneeze or interacting with Gab’s cat, and videos of him snort-laughing or giggling or crafting with Robbie or napping with three blankets wrapped around him. And everything was captioned with something calling out how cute he was being…..and in the bio of the account, was a message directly to him. Anti blushed as he looked at his phone, re-reading the bio for the millionth time.

“Hey Anti! I’m sure this account documenting all your cutest moments is flustering enough for you….but let’s take it up a level, shall we? If in three weeks to the day you still haven’t figured out who I am….then I’m going to find you, and tickle you on a lovely livestream for aaall the followers of this account to see! That’ll round off the content nicely, don’t you think? Can’t wait to see if you find me out or not, good luck!”

Anti tossed his phone on his bed and buried his face in his hands, whining as a flustered smile spread across his face. In the first week of the account being up he’d been like Sherlock Holmes, trying to analyse every single ego out of embarrassment at the world seeing all this content. However, he soon came to realise that the account was only letting fellow egos follow it and see the content, which made Anti feel far better about it. Also, as the days continued to go by…..though it was all still flustering, Anti at the same time felt more loved than he’d ever felt before. Not just from the complimentary captions, but the comments from the other egos were so….kind and sweet. He didn’t feel belittled or mocked, he just felt surrounded by love.

So, in the third week especially….Anti had kinda stopped trying to figure out who the person was. Frankly, the thought of being tickled with the egos as an audience made him kinda excited, especially with how he knew they all cared about him and still respected him and his strength whilst he still liked things like tickling. So Anti was now just waiting….and soon enough, the time flicked to 8pm…...and he got a message on Instagram….from the account itself. He nibbled his lip as he opened it and read it.

“Uh oh, looks like your time is up! If I’m honest, I’m glad that this is the outcome…..now, come to the main living room, it’s time for our little livestream!”

Anti gulped, but took a breath and hurriedly replied.

“I’m on my way.”

Thus, he got up, and headed to the living room….and as soon as he crossed the threshold, he got chills down his spine. The lights were dimmed, the main couch was very obviously set up with a pillow, and there was a phone set up on a tripod….already streaming. Anti tentatively walked in front of the camera, glancing at the screen, before looking around and calling out.

‘Alright….I-I’m here, you win….who are ya?’

Anti gulped when he suddenly heard a little giggle from the darkness….but NOTHING could have prepared him for who actually stepped out of the shadows. Anti gawked, gobsmacked as he looked the person up and down, before whispering in disbelief.

‘…..O-Oliver?’

The kind-hearted, sweet android with golden eyes giggled and grinned, his tongue poking out through his teeth as he sauntered to Anti, cooing to him.

‘Hey there GlitchyKitchy.’

Anti blushed….the damned name of the account was flustering enough by itself. Anti was astonished. Out of everyone that it could have been, Oliver was the literally the LAST person he would ever have suspected doing anything like this! It was so mischievous and sneaky, and now all Anti wanted to know was why the heck Oliver decided to take it upon himself to start this teasy vendetta against him.

‘I-I….I-….I-I don’t understand….why?’

Oliver grinned fondly at Anti. It was true, mischief and secrecy weren’t things that came naturally to Oliver, and he had to muster up some courage and determination to actually do all this….but he had a very compelling reason driving him. A reason which he now revealed to Anti with a sweet, affectionate smile.

‘Well…..almost everyday people tell me I’m sweet, or cute, or adorable. And every time I hear something like that it always just….lifts me up. It gives me butterflies, no matter how hard a day I’m having, hearing stuff like that from people makes me so happy. I wanted you to feel that too, because I think you deserve it.’

Anti blinked. He was just….lost for words. Oliver did this, made a secret account and spent all that time and effort collating flustering pictures and videos of him….just to try and make him happy? The usually wild man was struck silent with bashfulness, because this was literally the kindest, sweetest thing that anybody had ever done for him…..ever. Oliver’s internal processors whirred and warmed affectionately at seeing Anti be so struck and bashful and happy, and Oliver was so happy that he’d done this for the guy, because Oliver knew that behind the knife-play and wildness….Anti was a good person who deserved sweet attention like everyone else. Oliver went up to him, and Anti shivered at the android’s gentle smirk.

‘Now then, why don’t you have a little lie down?’

Anti nibbled his lip as he glanced to the couch, before clearing his throat and replying challengingly.

‘And if I don’t?’

Oliver giggled. It was a sweet sound, but it gave Anti chills, especially with what Oliver said next.

‘Oh Anti, don’t forget that I’m an android. I am just as strong as my brothers, and I could make you lie down with only one hand if I really wanted to. I want to be nice to you Anti….do you want me to be nice to you?’

Anti got more chills. He never thought he’d see the day where Oliver, the sweetest of them all, made him feel flustered and intimidated. Anti nibbled his lip lightly, before averting his gaze with a nervous smile.

‘Y-Yeah….I guess….’

‘Good, now get yourself comfy!’

Anti bashfully lay down on the couch on his back, squirming as he get comfortable, trying to school himself and at least make it look like he had at least SOME resolve to be working with. Alas, this was foiled when Oliver sat on the edge of the couch and gasped brightly as he gestured to the livestream.

‘Oh look, there’s so many people watching already! Everyone must reeeally wanna see you get tickled Anti.’

Anti ended up smiling a shaky smile and letting out a quiet whine as he look anywhere he could except for the livestream. It was a noise which the ordinary person probably wouldn’t hear, but with Oliver being a Google, he heard it alright. The first cute noise of many. Oliver giggled, wasting no more time as he straddled Anti’s legs and kept Anti’s arms pinned beneath his knees, and Anti let him, because he knew that Oliver was the one with the power here. The squirming man let out another quiet whine as Oliver lightly cracked his knuckles, before waggling his eyebrows and wiggling his fingers in the air playfully.

‘Oh where oh where to tickle first! You’ve got so many sweet spots to choose from!’

Anti pursed his lips as he retorted embarrassedly.

‘I-I do not!’

Oliver raised an eyebrow as he giggled affectionately.

‘Oh yeah? You sure about that? Because I’ve already spied two cute lil tickle spots riiight….here!’

Anti gasped and yelped as Oliver reached and started gently scratching behind his (small, elf-like and adorable) ears, and the poor guy just burst into jittery giggles. Oliver felt like he was going to melt, because Anti’s natural non-maniacal giggles were the sweetest things ever.

‘AGH! N-Nahahat gehehet ahahaway!’

Oliver grinned at his cute protests, and kept softly scratching as he cooed.

‘Awww but your little ears are so cuuute, I can’t not tickle them! Plus, these are your consequences for not figuring out who I was.’

Anti kept giggling as he tossed his head about, but nothing could dislodge the gentle tickling. So, through pinker cheeks and splutters, Anti tried a threat out for size.

‘I-Ihihihi’ll b-bihihite yohohou!’

Oliver giggled at the threat, because when it came from someone consumed by bouncy giggles it didn’t exactly fill Oliver with fear. On the contrary, it gave him some inspiration. Allow me to present to you, the biggest backfire in tickling history.

‘Not if I bite you first!’

Oliver purred, before eagerly diving down and nibbling the shell of one of Anti’s ears, making him squeal in ticklish shock and kick his feet at the new, evil sensation. His giggles reached a much higher pitch too, and he realised that he’d literally just brought that on himself.

‘Nahahaha ohohoho my gahahahad!!’

‘Mmmmm nummyyy!’

Oliver hummed, making Anti squeak more and blush harder as the goofy android made the silliest nomming noises that he possibly could as he nibbled all over Anti’s ear. The fact that Oliver was being so silly rather than sinister with his tickling affected Anti more, it made him giddier. Usually if someone tried to intimidate im amidst tickling, it hardened his resolve because he could bite back, but with silliness it just turned him into happy mush.

‘S-Stahahahap wihihith the nohohohisehes yohou gohohoof!!’

‘But I can’t help it! It’s in my programing to make noises when I eat!’

Oliver retorted to Anti’s exclamation, making Anti snort and shake his head at this absolute gooby goofer of an android.

‘Thahahat ihihihis suhuhuch buhuhullshit!’

Oliver gasped. Oh he was NOT having that kind of language!

‘Hey! Don’t be so rude!’

Oliver nipped right behind Anti’s ear, making Anti yelp and jerk his head to the side adorably as he exclaimed VERY quickly.

‘Ohohohokahay okAHAY! Ihihi’m sohohorry!’

Oliver giggled, and leant up because he was always nice at heart, and he ruffled Anti’s already messy hair gently as he replied.

‘Apology accepted! Now then, where to tickle next?’

Oliver started tapping his chin in thought as his eyes flicked down over Anti’s body, which made the man squirm in adorable anticipation. You know when a tickler is looking all over your body, trying to decide where to go, and it feels like you’re being scanned? Well, this time it was literal, which made it all the more flustering for Anti because he knew Oliver could see ever little nerve in his body. Oliver giggled amusedly at Anti’s restlessness.

‘Yohou’re such a cute lil wriggler!’

Anti pursed his lips, and ended up letting out a half-growl half-whine sort of noise as he replied.

‘O-Only cuz you’re t-teasin’!’

Oliver giggled again, before beaming brightly as he replied.

‘Ahaawww I’m sorry, would you rather I just got on with it? Okey dokey! Let’s try these ribs shall we?’

Anti spluttered at the sudden shift, which meant he couldn’t prepare any defence as Oliver’s fingers darted to his ribcage, scratching light and fast in the most diabolical way. Anti was a mess of cackles in seconds, arching his back as he babbled.

‘NAHAHA NAHA W-WAHAHAIT OHOHLIII!’

Oliver put on a mock innocent expression, cocking his head down at Anti like butter wouldn’t freakin’ melt.

‘But you wanted me to just get on with it didn’t you?’

Anti whined through his cackles, and as he tried to retort, Oliver picked that moment to spontaneously pinch his uppermost ribs. Let’s just say that as a result, Anti didn’t get across everything that he wanted to say.

‘IHIHI NEHEHEVER SAHAHAID-EEEK!’

‘Never said what? Sorry bud, I don’t think even my sensors could catch that!’

Oliver replied with a teasy giggle, and decided to keep pinching the new sweet spots which had Anti thrashing and yipping amidst his open mouthed cackling fit. He was so flustered and giddy and loving how playful the tickling was, he’d never admit it obviously, but he was loving it none the less, despite his faux protests.

‘NAHAHAT THEHEHERE NAHAT THEHEHEEEERE!’

Oliver grinned fondly, and lean down nice and close to him so he could croon as he kept tickling him.

‘Awww this is another sweet spot isn’t it? Riiight at the top of the ribbies!’

‘OHOHOHOLIHI C’MOHOHOON!’

Anti wailed at the teasing, which made Oliver hum down at him with playful nonchalance.

‘Well, where is it you’d rather I tickle?’

Anti’s blush was creeping down his neck now, and he threw his head back with all his mind-swirling flusteredness as he exclaimed cutely.

‘IHIHIHI DUHUHUNNOHOOO!’

Oliver couldn’t keep the grin off his face now, Anti was just too endearing and perfect not to constantly smile at. Oliver kept up the tickling as he subtly glanced over Anti’s body again….before spying that Anti’s t-shirt had had ridden up, thus exposing a rather precious little button. Oliver chuckled, before cocking his head at Anti.

‘Are you sure you want me to stop tickling your ribs?’

Amidst his mirth, Anti hadn’t noticed Oliver’s little ploy, and he didn’t think….he just nodded.

‘YESYESYESYESYEHEHEHES!’

‘Okey dokey!’

Oliver let up with a bright smile, and let Anti gasp and pant for a few moments, since he was a sweet tickler like that. Anti was relieved for the time Oli gave him to get his breath back, and he slowly refocused on the android….but then his eyes widened as he watched where Oliver was headed. The android had shifted a little further down, and now had his lips hovering over Anti’s bellybutton. The poor glitch was speechless, which allowed Oliver to grin, wink, and then blow a rippling raspberry right onto his navel. Anti just absolutely screamed with laughter.

‘AAAAAHHHHHHH!!! OHOHOHOLIHIHIHAHAHAHA!!!’

Oliver gasped in amazement at Anti’s strong reaction, and eagerly blew another raspberry to make Anti shriek before he teased.

‘How’s this Anti? Do you like this better? I think I do!’

Anti was shrieking with wild laughter, kicking his legs and arching his back sharply at each raspberry, and the poor man as just becoming more and more incoherent by the second.

‘OLIHIHIHIIIII IHIHIHIT TIHIHIHICKAHAHAHA!!!’

‘Wohoah, it must really tickle if you can’t finish your words! I’m so glad I did this, you look like you’re having lots of fun!’

Of course, despite how mad and intense it was, this was the truth. Anti was loving the hell out of every tickly and torturous second, and in all honesty this was probably going to end up being the highlight of Anti’s whole freakin’ month.

‘SHUHUHUHUT UHUHUHUHAHAHA!!!’

Oliver giggled, and nuzzled his nose into Anti’s navel as he cooed.

‘Oops, did I fluster you a lil bit there?’

Anti had tears in his eyes as he writhed about…..before his laughter went silent. Oliver smiled fondly and leant up, having mercy properly now because he could see that Anti had taken as much as he could take. The android carefully released Anti’s arms as the man panted and caught his breath, but then Oliver’s felt his heart-core swell when Anti grinned up at him and spoke amidst giggles.

‘Yohou….ahare the mohost mischiehevous cute person….Ihi’ve ever mehet….oho jeez….’

Anti hugged his middle, rubbing it as Oliver beamed bashfully, before replying brightly.

‘Well I could say the same about you!’

Anti giggled, and smiled when Oliver helped him sit up, as well as promptly giving him a loving cuddle. Then though, Anti’s blush bloomed once more when Oliver turned to the still-going livestream, and he hid his face in his hands when he suddenly remembered that every ego had been watching all of that. He whined as Oliver grinned and addressed it.

‘Well, I think we can all agree that this was pretty freakin’ cute! Now, if any of you guys wanna give our trooper here a cuddle then you’d better get down here quick before I take over!’

Anti snorted and giggled embarrassedly at first…but then, he nearly got new tears in his eyes when he suddenly heard sounds of stampeding, hurrying footsteps throughout the whole of the manor. Anti smiled, and Oliver grinned, satisfied that he’d completed his mission…..because Anti definitely felt happy, and oh so loved.

WOOOO HOPE YOU ALL LIKED THIS FIC LEMME KNOW IF YA DID WOOOO LUV YOUS XX

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bangwoolofbangtan · 3 years

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TIME

ENTERTAINER of the year

BTS

[Time magazine BTS interview ]

It’s late October, and Suga is sitting on a couch strumming a guitar. His feet are bare, his long hair falling over his eyes. He noodles around, testing out chords and muttering softly to himself, silver hoop earrings glinting in the light. “I just started learning a few months ago,” he says. It’s an intimate moment, the kind you’d spend with a new crush in a college dorm room while they confess rock-star ambitions. But Suga is one-seventh of the Korean pop band BTS, which means I’m just one of millions of fans watching, savoring the moment.

BTS isn’t just the biggest K-pop act on the charts. They’ve become the biggest band in the world—full stop. Between releasing multiple albums, breaking every type of record and appearing in these extemporaneous livestreams in 2020, BTS ascended to the zenith of pop stardom. And they did it in a year defined by setbacks, one in which the world hit pause and everyone struggled to maintain their connections. Other celebrities tried to leverage this year’s challenges; most failed. (Remember that star-studded “Imagine” video?) But BTS’s bonds to their international fan base, called ARMY, deepened amid the pandemic, a global racial reckoning and worldwide shutdowns. “There are times when I’m still taken aback by all the unimaginable things that are happening,” Suga tells TIME later. “But I ask myself, Who’s going to do this, if not us?”

Today, K-pop is a multibillion-dollar business, but for decades the gatekeepers of the music world—the Western radio moguls, media outlets and number-crunchers—treated it as a novelty. BTS hits the expected high notes of traditional K-pop: sharp outfits, crisp choreography and dazzling videos. But they’ve matched that superstar shine with a surprising level of honesty about the hard work that goes into it. BTS meets the demands of Top 40’s authenticity era without sacrificing any of the gloss that’s made K-pop a cultural force. It doesn’t hurt that their songs are irresistible: polished confections that are dense with hooks and sit comfortably on any mainstream playlist.

BTS is not the first Korean act to establish a secure foothold in the West, yet their outsize success today is indicative of a sea change in the inner workings of fandom and how music is consumed. From propelling their label to a $7.5 billion IPO valuation to inspiring fans to match their $1 million donation to Black Lives Matter, BTS is a case study in music-industry dominance through human connection. Once Suga masters the guitar, there won’t be much left for them to conquer.

In an alternate universe where COVID-19 didn’t exist, BTS’s 2020 would likely have looked much like the years that came before. The group got its start in 2010, after K-pop mastermind and Big Hit Entertainment founder Bang Si-hyuk recruited RM, 26, from Seoul’s underground rap scene. He was soon joined by Jin, 28; Suga, 27; J-Hope, 26; Jimin, 25; V, 24; and Jung Kook, 23, selected for their dancing, rapping and singing talents.

But unlike their peers, BTS had an antiestablishment streak, both in their activism and in the way they contributed to their songwriting and production—which was then rare in K-pop, although that’s started to change. In BTS’s debut 2013 single, “No More Dream,” they critiqued Korean social pressures, like the high expectations placed on schoolkids. They have been open about their own challenges with mental health and spoken publicly about their support for LGBTQ+ rights. (Same-sex marriage is still not legally recognized in South Korea.) And they’ve modeled a form of gentler, more neutral masculinity, whether dyeing their hair pastel shades or draping their arms lovingly over one another. All this has made them unique not just in K-pop but also in the global pop marketplace.

In March, BTS was prepping for a global tour. Instead, they stayed in Seoul to wait out the pandemic. For the group, life didn’t feel too different: “We always spend 30 days a month together, 10 hours a day,” Jin says. But with their plans upended, they had to pivot. In August, BTS dropped an English-language single, “Dynamite,” that topped the charts in the U.S.—a first for an all-Korean act. With their latest album this year, Be, they’ve become the first band in history to debut a song and album at No. 1 on Billboard’s charts in the same week. “We never expected that we would release another album,” says RM. “Life is a trade-off.”

Their triumphs this year weren’t just about the music. In October, they put on perhaps the biggest virtual ticketed show of all time, selling nearly a million tickets to the two-night event. Their management company went public in Korea, turning Bang into a billionaire and each of the members into millionaires, a rarity in an industry where the spoils often go to the distributors, not the creators. And they were finally rewarded with a Grammy nomination. On YouTube, where their Big Hit Labels is one of the top 10 most subscribed music accounts (with over 13 billion views by this year), their only real competition is themselves, says YouTube’s music-trends manager Kevin Meenan. The “Dynamite” video racked up 101 million views in under 24 hours, a first for the platform. “They’ve beaten all their own records,” he says.

Not that the glory comes without drawbacks: namely, lack of free time. It’s nearing midnight in Seoul in late November, and BTS, sans Suga, who’s recovering from shoulder surgery, are fitting in another interview—this time, just with me. V, Jimin and J-Hope spontaneously burst into song as they discuss Jin’s upcoming birthday. “Love, love, love,” they harmonize, making good use of the Beatles’ chorus, turning to their bandmate and crossing their fingers in the Korean version of the heart symbol.

Comparisons to that epoch-defining group are inevitable. “What’s different is that we’re seven, and we also dance,” says V. “It’s kind of like a cliché when big boy bands are coming up: ‘Oh, there’s another Beatles!’” says RM. I’ve interviewed BTS five times, and in every interaction, they are polite to a fault. But by now they must be weary of revisiting these comparisons, just as they must be tired of explaining their success. RM says it’s a mix of luck, timing and mood. “I’m not 100% sure,” he says.

They’ve matured into smart celebrities: focused and cautious, they’re both more ready for the questions and more hesitant to make big statements. When you ask BTS about their landmark year, for once they’re not exactly chipper; J-Hope wryly calls it a “roller coaster.” “Sh-t happens,” says RM. “It was a year that we struggled a lot,” says Jimin. Usually a showman, on this point he seems more introspective than usual. “We might look like we’re doing well on the outside with the numbers, but we do go through a hard time ourselves,” he says. For a group whose purpose is truly defined by their fans, the lack of human interaction has been stifling. Still, they’ve made it a point to represent optimism. “I always wanted to become an artist that can provide comfort, relief and positive energy to people,” says J-Hope. “That intent harmonized with the sincerity of our group and led us to who we are today.”

In an era marked by so much anguish and cynicism, BTS has stayed true to their message of kindness, connection and self-acceptance. That’s the foundation of their relationship with their fans. South Korean philosopher and author Dr. Jiyoung Lee describes the passion of BTS’s fandom as a phenomenon called “horizontality,” a mutual exchange between artists and their fans. As opposed to top-down instruction from an icon to their followers, BTS has built a true community. “Us and our fans are a great influence on each other,” says J-Hope. “We learn through the process of making music and receiving feedback.” The BTS fandom isn’t just about ensuring the band’s primacy—it’s also about extending the band’s message of positivity into the world. “BTS and ARMY are a symbol of change in zeitgeist, not just of generational change,” says Lee.

And in June, BTS became a symbol of youth activism worldwide after they donated $1 million to the Black Lives Matter movement amid major protests in the U.S. (They have a long track record of supporting initiatives like UNICEF and school programs.) BTS says now it was simply in support of human rights. “That was not politics. It was related to racism,” Jin says. “We believe everyone deserves to be respected. That’s why we made that decision.”

That proved meaningful for fans like Yassin Adam, 20, an ARMY from Georgia who runs popular BTS social media accounts sharing news and updates, and who is Black. “It will bring more awareness to this issue people like me face in this country,” he says. “I see myself in them, or at least a version of myself.” In May and June, a broad coalition of K-pop fans made headlines for interfering with a police app and buying out tickets for a Trump campaign rally, depleting the in-person attendance. Later that summer, ARMY’s grassroots fundraising effort matched BTS’s $1 million donation to Black Lives Matter within 24 hours.

For 28-year-old Nicole Santero, who is Asian American, their success in the U.S. is also a triumph of representation: “I never really saw people like myself on such a mainstream stage,” Santero says. She’s writing her doctoral dissertation on the culture of BTS fandom, and she runs a popular Twitter account that analyzes and shares BTS data. “Anytime I’m awake, I’m doing something related to BTS,” she says. “This is a deeper kind of love.”

Devotion like that is a point of pride for BTS, particularly in a year when so much has felt uncertain. “We’re not sure if we’ve actually earned respect,” RM says. “But one thing for sure is that [people] feel like, O.K., this is not just some kind of a syndrome, a phenomenon.” He searches for the right words. “These little boys from Korea are doing this.” —With reporting by Aria Chen/Hong Kong; Mariah Espada/Washington; Sangsuk Sylvia Kang and Kat Moon/New York

FASHION CREDITS

RM: Jacket, shirt, pants and shoes HERMES; SUGA: Jacket, shirt and necklace CELINE. Pants GIVENCHY. Shoes LOUIS VUITTON; Jung Kook: Jacket, shirt, pants and shoes FENDI; J-Hope: Jacket, shirt, pants and shoes LOUIS VUITTON. Necklace HERMES; Jin: Suit, knit top and shoes BALENCIAGA; Jimin: Jacket, silk shirt, pants and shoes CELINE; V: Suit, shirt and shoes ALEXANDER McQUEEN. Tie THOM BROWNE.

#bts #kim taehyung #bts update #kim namjoon #park jimin #kim seokjin #jeon jungkook #jung hoseok #min yoongi #bts time magazine #bts time 2020 #bts time #bts entertainer of the year #bts interview #bts time photoshoot #bts photoshoot #bts group photo #bts achievements #bts article

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ts-unpopular-opinions · 4 years

Note

if you don’t mind me asking why don’t you respect thomas as a person anymore? i’m not trying to be rude or jump to anyone’s defense, i’m just genuinely curious.

I have been getting a lot of asks like these since I mentioned that I’m still upset with Thomas and although I’ve covered it multiple times on this blog, I will go ahead an explain it again because I’m tired of people telling me how to feel.

Here I will complie a list of all of the reasons why Thomas just does not rub me the right way sometimes. That being said, i recognize that Thomas is a very good actor and is a very talented man. He may have things going on in his life that I don’t know about, but the opinion I’ve formed of him is simply based on what I’ve observed and I am willing to change that if he shows reasons for the things that he does. I’m in no way trying to “demonize” Thomas here or make him out to be some crazy, rutheless being. I simply just dont vibe with some of the choices he makes and things he does. So here we go...

1) Thomas appears to have a pretty big ego. He constantly posts pictures of himself on his social media instead of using the platforms as most youtubers would: to communicate with fans about his content. He is okay with fans contantly worshipping him like a god and living off his every word. Even during his birthday he would retweet videos of people literally cellebratig his birthday with cake and candles, and that is just so odd to me... Theres nothing wrong with having a lot of confidence in yourself, but its simply something that rubs me the wrong way.

2) Thomas is a really awful business man. As I have mentioned time and time again, Thomas is running a business here, just like most youtubers with his level of fame. He has merch, a huge following, and a membership program. Despite this, Thomas continues to act as if his youtube channel is just a fun past time for him. His schedule for video releases is atrocious and I’d be surpised to find out that the team even schedules dates for things at this point. To an outside fan it just seems like they release a video whenever they want to or whenever they finish it, with no prior end goal in mind. Thomas treats his job as if it is an opinional past time, and as someone who is in college, works in a fast food job, and has an internship I cannot respect that. The man has no work-life/personal-life separation and it shows... He’s hired all of his friends to work for him and gets work done at a snails pace because of it. He always says that the team is working hard and getting things done, but never has anything to show for it...

3) Thomas is very bad at communicating with his fans. For having such an outstanding and die-hard fanbase, Thomas takes them for granted. Instead of giving fans insight on video release dates and production, he opts to say nothing simply because he doesnt “want people to get mad at him for being wrong”. I don’t know about anyone else, but that is just so messed up to me... You keep all of your adoring fans in the dark simply because you dont want to face the concequences of you not getting your work done is a timely manner? This bothers me a lot... especially when a lot of fanders are paying to get “extra information” when in fact the livestreams are simple Joan and Thomas hanging out and joking around with a very rare, almost completely absent mention of future videos.

4) The babying issue. Thomas has to recognize that his fans baby him and treat him like a breakable doll all the time. This not only makes him incapable of taking and responding to criticism, but it makes him shrug off responsibility all together. If his fans never give him concequences for his actions and simply praise him to no end, then he just keeps going what he’s doing and ignores any ouce of negativity because of it. The fanbase has babied thomas into thinking that he can do no wrong and will never be criticized, and it shows. Never once has he formally sat down and just talked about the concerns people like me and the anons that come to my blog have.

5) This is a newer one I realized with the most recent episode. The whole Trump joke threw me off guard because, while I don’t support Trump, I KNOW there must be fanders who do. And Thomas must have known this when allowing the joke into the show. It’s very inconsiderate to subtly manipulate your fans like that when this show has frankly nothing to do with politics. Had a fan been watching that who has their reasons to support trump, they may have felt alienated and hated by Thomas and that just insnt cool. This isnt the only instance of Thomas being manipulative with his fanbase. He constantly thanks and praises those of his fans who baby him and worship him while ignoring and never talking about those who have criticisms. This make fans who have concerns feel as though their worries make them terrible people and they shouldnt say them. Is this blog is anything to show for it, fanders are scared to speak about how they feel. Thi has created an extremely toxic environment for open discussion, but thomas continues to let it go on.

6) Money. Everyone, believe it or not, but Thomas makes a LOT of money. He is not an independent creator that films and edits videos all by himself simply for the fun of it and not for the money. This is his career. He is a business man and the owner of this company. His goal is to not only produce content, but to make money. And boy does he make a lot of it... Here is some math i did on my own to figure out just how much (granted it is not perfect, but it should give everyone a realization that Thomas is nowhere near the independent artists and authors that they constantly compare him to...):

-The average youtuber with 1m subscribers makes $57,200 a year from ad revenue. Thomas has 3.36 million subscribers so 3.36*57,200 is $192,192.

-The last member livestream has 1.5k views and each member is giving thomas $5.29 per month. So per month thomas is making 5.29*1,500 from members, or $7,935. Per year, Thomas the recieves 7,935*12 from members, or $95220 (obviously this number could be a little smaller because I’m sure youtube takes some of that money)

-Apart from this, Thomas also sponsors nearly every video on his channel that is a decent length. (I’ll admit that the math for this part is up to a lot of interpretation because I have no idea how Thomas sponsorships are handled, but I will do my best). Alright so, youtubers charge brands anywhere from $10 to $50 per 1,000 views, to be forgiving I’ll do the math using the lowest price. On Thomas’ most recent blooper video, he had 736k views. If we divide that by 1000 thats 736. So 736*10 is 7,360. And that is just one sponsorship at the lowest price. I’m not really sure how many sponsorships thomas has done, but in the last year it seems like about 5 (the blooper, asides episode, gay disney prince, intrisive thoughts, and SvS). So that is 5 sponsorships per year, 7,350*5 or $36,800.

-So total income before considering merch sales and by assuming the lowest numbers for some areas is $36,800 + $95,220 + $192,192 = $324,212

Now with all of this in mind... Thomas makes so much money. Money that I could never even dream of coming by. And he does this with minimal uploads and scamming his members into continuing to pay him even through month long periods of no content. Thomas doesn’t even need to make videos at this point, the money that he drags out of his fans is already plenty. And then, not only does he have all of this money, but he uses it for fun trips and adventures those of which he brags about on his social media. He went to new york and saw three broadway shows, he went to vidcon and took a weeklong vaction there. He bought from what I saw, at least three playstations and games for different friend and family members. He is in no way struggling for money... and instead takes money from his adoring fans when he has no content to show for it.

#thomas sanders #ts unpopular opinions #ts unpopular answers #ts discourse

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because-jim-cares · 5 years

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Why “Damien” is a fucking masterpiece

Disclaimer: This is super indulgent and by no means supported by any actual literary theories I just had a lot of thoughts after Mark’s stream and wanted to type them out before I lost motivation to do so. Also this is a very long post.

I gotta say I absolutely love damien and wkm and all the amazing content mark has put out recently, I have such a deep appreciation for the amount of effort he puts into these projects. However, after I heard mark speak about Damien in todays livestream I’ve realized how absolutely genius the wkm saga really is for so many reasons and since the stream seemed to confuse a lot of people (including me) I wanted to put some of my thoughts and ideas on paper to discuss them.

Three layers of narrative

So what makes “the wkm saga” so much more brilliant than I previously realized? It's incredibly layered narrative. Now let me explain. What often differentiates fiction from literature are the deeper, underlying themes, criticisms and ideas that are represented through the fictional narrative. This is often done by three metaphorical “layers.” (1) The actual story, (2) the meaning and themes and (3) the meta narrative.

Lets take “the stranger” by albert camus as an example, a very classic and respected literary piece. We have the actual content or story told in the book (the main character kills a man on a beach, gets sentenced to death and finds inner peace and happiness after a heated discussion with a priest in his cell). Then there’s the meaning and themes. What does it all mean? Why did the author write this story? In “the stranger” the content serves as a metaphor for the struggle between existentialism and christianity, while also criticizing the close minded nature of christian french society. The third layer is the meta narrative, basically how the story relates to the author or real world events, in Camus’ case, “the stranger” was written so camus could literally create a cage fight between his very conflicting ideals and feel secure in his existentialist beliefs. On the meta narrative, the main character serves as a version of the author, while on the story narrative, the protagonist is it's own separate entity.

How does this relate to damien and wkm you ask? Well wkm uses this exact same three layer format, and honestly i think it's freaking brilliant.

On the content narrative we have the actual story of wkm; damien and celine get broken and trapped in a body, actor mark takes damiens body and wilford “motherloving” warfstache goes insane after he sees the laws of life and death get broken and breaks every rule of physics, reality and everything in retaliation. This is already an awesome and complex narrative that Mark has given us and can and should be appreciated as such, but it's only the first layer.

On the themes, metaphors and meanings narrative, we can see how the story serves as a way to show the harms of “assuming a role” effectively criticizing the need for society and people to force others to assume their respective “roles” in society. Actor mark shows the dangers of forcing others unwillingly into these categories, damien represents a victim of this, literally being broken in order to shove him into the “villain” role he never wanted to be, the detective becomes so reliant on his “role” that his entire world view is shattered when he realizes the limitations of it, and wilford represents breaking free of these societal expectations, an act that causes him to be completely detached from society itself and all it's rules. An outcast from all rules both physically and emotionally. Every video is structured after a different cliché, (wkm is a traditional murder mystery, wmw is a classic noir film and damien your stereotypical horror film), the characters however, inevitably end up going “off script” and “breaking their roles” showcasing the unpredictability of reality over the rigid unrealistic expectations of conforming to any one role. Theres plenty of other meanings and metaphors you can probably derive on this narrative but this post is already ridiculously long and I havent even gotten to the good stuff.

And last but certainly not least, the meta narrative. The house is representative of Marks thoughts and the stories. The characters representing different facets of his personality. Viewing the story from this narrative, reveals the effort, heart and soul mark has poured into these characters, it represents a relationship between creator and creation, the imperfections, the unlimited imagination and how a little bit of the creator goes into everything they create. This in and of itself is already amazing and beautiful and (in my humble opinion) deserves as much praise as any good work of literature but mark brings this meta narrative to a whole new level.

By having the wkm storyline complete, he can pull these characters out of the “story” narrative basically completely disconnecting them from the first layer and let them continue their stories on the meta narrative. That's a confusing ass sentence, let me try to explain,

In the first narrative layer of “The Stranger” the protagonist serves as a main character meant to criticize french colonialist culture and christianity. He kills a man, can not cry at his mothers funeral and does a whole bunch of “bad” stuff with no remorse. This is meant to challenge our ideas of right and wrong. On a meta narrative however, the protagonist serves as a version of the author himself, using the events of the strory as a metaphor to understand his own doubt about his religion and secure his beliefs in existentialism. This does not mean that the author has killed a man and did not cry at his mothers funeral, it just means the main character represents something different depending on how (or from what layer) you look at the narrative. Same can be said for darkiplier and wilford warfstache. They represent a part of mark, while also being completely seperate characters with their own motivations. In Markiplier TV, for example these characters are no longer completely seperate entitites, they are aware of their existence as “egos” and are as such a part of mark. Therefore, you can not look at markiplier tv or a date with markiplier as a continuation of the (first layer) narrative, instead they are a continuation of the third layer (meta) narrative.

TL;DR: Whether mark intended it or not, the story he made through wkm is fuckin genius and should be appreciated as such. The characters in wkm act as both meta “egos” who are extensions of mark as well as their own seperate entities completely distinguished from mark. When looking at them as egos, the events of wkm could be seen as a metaphor for marks brain and passion for story telling. When looking at them as characters, the events of wkm could be seen as real, concrete events that had effects on our characters.

Does that make sense? Probably not. This post is way too long and i should go to bed. Good night.

#markiplier #damien #wkm #WHO KILLED MARKIPLIER #darkiplier #markiplier egos #wilford warfstache #wilford motherloving warfstache #the detective #celine #celine the seer #mark fischbach #wmw

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minyoongijjangjjangmanboongboong · 5 years

Text

Ephemera Chapter Nineteen (END)

Ephemera: In art, transitory written and printed matter (receipts, notes, tickets, clippings, etc.) not originally intended to be kept or preserved.

Alternatively, things that exist or are used for only a short time.

Description: Nobody knows who Vante really is. Everything about the popular artist is shrouded in secrecy: from his face to his name to everything in between. After years of working for his art gallery, Y/N feels she may just be the closest thing he has to a friend. Between her success at work and her relationship with campus hot-shot Jeon Jungkook, Y/N’s life has never been better. But is Jungkook truly who he says he is? And who will Y/N protect now that she knows Vante’s livelihood may be on the line?

Genre: Romance, Drama, Fluff, Angst

Pairing: Jungkook x (f) Reader x Taehyung

Word Count: 7.0k

Tags: Non-Idol!Au, Gang!Au, Art History Student!Reader, Film Student!Jungkook, Art Student!Taehyung

Warnings: Swearing and mentions of alcohol, although infrequently

A/N: GUYS THE ALBUM!! THE MV!! JAMAIS VU, MAKE IT RIGHT, DIONYSUS!! TRULY THE BOPS OF ALL BOPS I CANNOT BELIEVE THE LEVEL OF ARTISTRY! EVERY TIME I THINK THEY’VE GOTTEN AS GOOD AS IS HUMANLY POSSIBLE, THE DO SOMETHING BETTER!! God, I loved it. Anyway, this chapter! Haha we’ve finally reached the end of our journey! I can’t believe it, really. Anyway, please don’t be shy and send feedback, critique, questions, theories, and comments my way. I’ll be sure to respond to all asks I receive within a day of receiving them! Links will be added later, so for now check my masterlist to find previous chapters!

And again, if you want to follow my Twitter, my username is @/plzpunchmebts. I’m super active over there and hopefully in the future I’ll do some livestreams/chats with you all! And concert videos!!

ALSO BIG UPDATE: I’ll be taking a couple weeks off from writing series’ until after the BTS concert on May 4. I don’t want to get into a posting routine only to have to throw it off for that weekend. That said, I’ll be working on finishing REALLY OLD requests that I haven’t gotten to yet, so I’ll be posting! Just not series. (Although, I do have my next series planned and started. If you guys want spoilers for that, plz send me an ask hehe)

- Mercury

Previous Chapter – Next Chapter

Masterlist

Weekly updates: Sunday, 1PM (PST)

My daughter,

I’m sure this letter comes as a bit of a shock to you. It’s a bit of a shock to me as well. I don’t know exactly where to start.

Leaving you was the hardest decision I ever had to make. But now that you’re older, I hope you can understand me. Even just a little. You were the biggest hope in my life, but I didn’t feel worthy of you. I didn’t want to raise a daughter whose only mother was dependent on someone else to support her. I didn’t have any options in the countryside, but I thought if I went to Seoul and came home successful…maybe you’d grow to respect me.

It sounds selfish writing it down. It was selfish. I am selfish.

To be honest, I didn’t intend on reaching out to you. As it stands, I’m working for a small company as a web designer. Not exactly the lofty dream I had when I left. I didn’t want to face you until I’d made something of myself, so you’d understand why I had to leave. But…well, things change over time I suppose.

I keep a close eye on the tabloids in Seoul because of my job, and when the news about Vante dropped I was intrigued. Truthfully, I’d been trying to get in with him for years. Ever since he showed up in the art scene. I wanted to help him market himself online.

I was perplexed, however, considering the fact that he seems quite reclusive and yet had a female companion with him in almost every photo. For a while, I was trying to figure out who that girl was so I could reach out to her. And as it turns out…you know the rest.

I don’t want you to think I’m exploiting you. I’d never want to do something like that. I’m really glad you were the girl, and not just for career aspects. I was shocked when I found out, and I immediately called a PI to find your address. It wasn’t cheap. But being able to speak with you after so long is a blessing.

I’d love to meet with you in person. Catch up. Talk about what you’ve been up to all these years. You’ve grown into such a beautiful young lady, and you’re doing so many exciting things. I’d love to hear all about them.

Please meet me at the address below on Sunday at 1 PM if you can. It’s a little coffee shop I like. I think it might be a nice place to reunite.

And I apologize for not writing a return address. I’m not sure how you’ll receive this, and I don’t want any legal trouble should you decide this letter is worth litigation.

Hoping to see you there.

Sincerely,

Mom

I’d read and reread the letter enough times to burn the script into my mind forever. If I shut my eyes, her words still floated around on the blacks of my lids. I’d never expected to hear from her again, and was content living my life independently from hers. Perhaps some deep, dark part of me was hoping to rub my success in her nose somehow, but…not like this. The nerve of her. To reach out to me after all these years…

Just because I knew Taehyung.

Something about that stung me in a place that was too tender to look at closely. I didn’t know why the pain was so visceral, but it felt deeper than just a blow to the ego.

I stared at the letter sitting on my coffee table, wrinkled and worn from my chronic folding and unfolding. It had only been a day, and my mind was still swimming in the letter. What right did she have to disrupt my life this way? Who was she to me anyway to be able to affect my waking hours? To consume my thoughts?

I sighed and flipped it over so I only saw my address. What a joke. She thought I might hand over the letter to the police or something? Everything about the letter disgusted me.

So why was that address now burned in the back of my mind?

I touched my pointer finger to my necklace, the ruby one Taehyung had given me so long ago, as I waited in the Sanyo Industries reception room. Yoongi sat beside me, playing with his hands. As decided during our meeting, Yoongi and I were dressed sharp: him in a nice pair of slacks and a pressed button-down, and me in my work skirt and a blouse I had to steam to get the wrinkles out. The reception area was vast, a wide room with wide windows and lots of empty space. The employee behind the desk eyed us now and then, and it was clear by the way she’d received us that she knew exactly who Yoongi was. She’d practically stuttered out her greeting as we entered the modern-looking office.

“Why should the son of a CEO have to wait in the reception office?” I mumbled under my breath with a sigh.

I hadn’t bothered asking Yoongi if he’d gone to meet Nara like I suggested, mostly for his own sake. Emanating from Yoongi’s very core was a jittery sense of anticipation. His eyes flashed wildly around the room, toward the elevators, toward the front doors, toward the marble floor. I’d never seen him so visibly nervous. He was always like Troy, impregnable. But it seemed his father was his own Trojan Horse, his undoing. I eyed him, awaiting a reaction, but none came. Almost like he didn’t hear me at all.

I gave his arm a poke and raised my brows as he jumped and looked at me with wide eyes. “Huh?” he asked, swallowing hard.

I sighed and crossed my arms. “Yoongi, you don’t look so good,” I said, tone softening as I watched him with furrowed brow.

He inhaled sharply and held his breath for a few seconds before letting it out in a puff that startled the receptionist. “Sorry,” he said quietly.

I smiled, attempting a gentle pat, but he was so jumpy that the touch of my palm on his shoulder almost made him shout. “If this is too much, you can go. Honestly, we mostly needed you to get me inside,” I said, then rolled my eyes and glanced out onto the street where Namjoon stood, smoking a cigarette. “Well, me and that idiot.”

Yoongi shook his head and braced himself on his knees, knuckles white as he held on to the tops of his knees. “No,” he said, shutting his eyes with a steadying breath. “I’m not here just to help you guys.”

I nodded. “Listen…you wanting to take responsibility — for yourself and for Nara — it’s really noble. I respect it. But…well, if you don’t mind me being a little nosy, you seem super rattled. I don’t know if this is the best move for your sake,” I said, watching him for any reaction.

He only opened his eyes and nodded, somber. “It’s probably stupid,” he said with a humorless laugh. “But…after spending so long with my head in the sand, I guess the guilt of it is catching up with me.”

“Guilt?”

He shrugged. “How many innocent people have had their lives ruined by my dad’s business? How many people like Nara have I just…left behind? Because it was too much responsibility?”

I raised my brows. “This is the first time I’ve heard you talking about reformation. You seemed a bit ambivalent,” I said, then shrugged. “Like Seokjin.”

“Neither of us are ambivalent, Y/N,” he said seriously, finally meeting my eyes head-on. “We both grew up seeing all the corruption and didn’t see any ways of making it better. Rather than ambivalent…we became cynical.”

I smoothed down my skirt, thinking. “I bet you’re not the only ones to become disillusioned,” I said, recalling that letter on my coffee table with a scowl. “Sometimes all we can do is accept that things are messed up and try to do the right thing on our own.”

He shook his head. “But what if I can’t accept that anymore?” he asked, brows knit as he implored me with his tender gaze. “What if I’ve been accepting it to avoid doing the right thing? Because the right thing is hard?”

I blinked at him, disarmed by the vulnerability in his eyes. “Yoongi…”

“I don’t deserve a free pass,” he said, serious as he scanned me. “Not when people are getting hurt.”

“What do you plan on doing?” I asked, raising my brows.

He settled back against his seat and his jitters slowed, knees stopping their anxious bounce. He anchored his gaze on something far away, perhaps something not physically here at all. “I’m gonna fix it.”

“Fix it?”

“The company,” he said with a steady nod. “From the inside. I’m gonna make it so that people don’t get hurt anymore. Like Ori.”

I watched him for a long moment, watched the way his jaw went staunch against his neck, and couldn’t help but admire his determination. Righteous outrage and a little bit of guilt. I exhaled in a puff and smirked, eyeing him sidelong. “Min Yoongi,” I said, and he glanced at me. There was an innocence in the rounds of his eyes, in the expectation in his parted lips. “You’ll do great,” I finished with a smile. I gave his shoulder a pat and nodded once.

He met my eyes and, slowly, a halfway there smile touched his features and he returned my nod. “Thanks,” he said, chuckling once, sharp.

“Excuse me?” called the receptionist, sounding uncertain. She had risen to her feet and was staring at us with her hands clasped in front of her stomach. She gave a smile I recognized from wearing it myself at work. “Mr. Min is ready to see you.”

I nodded and gave her a bow before catching Namjoon’s eye outside and jerking my head toward the elevator. He quickly stomped out his cigarette and rushed inside, smelling strongly of nicotine. I gave him a grimace and he responded with a smile, resting his hand on the small of my back and leading me down the hallway toward the elevator.

“Ah! Do you need help finding the office?” the receptionist called, craning her neck to peer after us.

Yoongi chuckled and shook his head, waving at her as he called for the elevator. “I think we’ll be okay. Thank you,” he said with a smile her way.

She blinked a few times before adjusting her hair and bowing, her head disappearing back around the corner. And, in silence, the three of us entered the elevator.

The CEO of Sanyo Industries was not the imposing man I was expecting. Perhaps I’d built him up as some sort of malevolent deity, but looking at him sitting in a chair that looked several inches too big for him, glasses slipping down the bridge of his nose, it was hard to see Mr. Min as the ruthless businessman I knew he was.

The office was spacious, like the reception area, and decorated with classic mahogany browns and deep reds. It looked like the sort of office you’d see in a rich man’s mansion. But Mr. Min himself didn’t quite match it. Mousy in the face with sallow skin and salt-and-pepper hair, he looked like someone’s quiet uncle, the one you only see at family get-togethers who you have trouble even making small talk with.

He cleared his throat and stared up at Yoongi and I, raising his brows. “Son,” he began, then chuckled, rubbing his nose bridge and shutting his eyes. “Is this some sort of marriage announcement?”

Yoongi sighed. “You’d know about any marriage before I would, Dad,” he said, eyes going dull.

“Well then, what brings you two here?” he asked, eyeing me. “And furthermore, who are you if not a fiancé?”

I glanced at Yoongi, waiting for him to speak. But he simply kept his eyes ahead, perhaps trying to tether himself to reality somehow. It wasn’t a part of the plan for me to be too vocal. And besides, I wasn’t so sure it was safe to speak much. If what yoongi said about his father was anything to go by, I’d be smart not to oppose him.

Namjoon had planned everything pretty meticulously. For the first time since arriving, I felt concerned that I’d mess up my role. And with Namjoon himself waiting outside the office so as not to spook Mr. Min right off the bat, I felt ill at ease with all of his attention squarely on me.

I played with the pendant on my necklace. “Uh,” I began, meeting the CEO’s eyes once more. “I’m, uh…I…work with Yoongi.”

He cocked a brow and smirked. “Ah, another criminal?” he asked, scoffing. “Really, Yoongi, when are you going to come to your senses and get serious?” His tone had taken a shift. Gone were the fleeting moments of jest and teasing. In its place was nothing short of frightful intensity, his gaze on Yoongi, boring into him through thin-rimmed glasses.

“Today,” said Yoongi, facing his father. “If things go well.”

Mr. Min leaned back and coughed a little, one of those innocuous old-man sounds that once again threw me for a loop. Was he any suburban dad you might see at the Han River or was he a cutthroat criminal?

“That’s…very good news,” he said, then eyed me with a scowl. “Although if you’re looking to get your friend a job, I can confidently say not a chance.”

I was nearly hurt by his comment before remembering just what sort of company he ran. I took my bruised pride and, clearing my throat, crossed my arms. “I’m not looking for work,” I said.

He hummed. “Well, Yoongi, I can’t say I’m unhappy to hear about your change of heart,” he said, giving Yoongi the ghost of a smile.

Yoongi cleared his throat and rubbed his palms together. “There’s a condition.”

“Condition?” asked Mr. Min, his expression darkening.

“Call off your hit on Ori.”

He chuckled. “You think having you under my wing is worth letting my biggest competitor go?” he asked, raising his brows. “That’s shockingly confident. Even for you.”

Yoongi shook his head. “No,” he said, locking eyes with his father. “I know that’s not enough.”

“Then what’s the rest of your bid?” he asked with a smirk. “You know you can’t prove I’ve got a hit on Ori.”

I cleared my throat and took a step forward, rifling through my bag to grab my phone. “That’s,” I began, but had to pause since my phone was hidden beneath my wallet. I chuckled to myself, nervous, and continued once I had my cell phone in my hand. “That’s where I come in.”

Mr. Min stared at me, but his teasing once again halted. Quietly, I pressed play on my cell phone. The recording played and I took the moment of respite to lean back, inelegant and unceremonious, to knock on the door twice, alerting Namjoon to his cue.

Mr. Min’s gaze went hard like obsidian and it locked on me. “That’s Kim Seokjin?”

Yoongi stepped forward, crossing his arms. “Take action against Jin and we’ll release the recording and tell the press. You might not be aware, but Y/N has become pretty intimately familiar with news outlets these days, being Vante’s secret woman and everything.”

Mr. Min’s face flushed and his eyes skittered between us like a cornered animal. “You’re her…,” he said with a nod. He rubbed his temples and an almost childish smile touched his face. Shutting his eyes, he nodded again as the door opened and Namjoon stepped inside. “You’ve outplayed me, haven’t you?”

Yoongi adjusted his cuffs and cleared his throat. “Sorry, Dad,” he said, sighing. “But I can’t sit back and watch you ruin people’s lives anymore.”

His father opened his eyes and they were sharp, angry, but there was a margin of respect in them. “So this is your offer? You come on under me and you don’t air Sanyo’s dirty laundry?”

Yoongi nodded once sharply. “Yes.”

He smirked and glanced at Namjoon who had taken the spot at my other side. “I suppose you’re here to discuss the logistics,” he said, chuckling. “You two can leave. This is a discussion between businessmen.”

Namjoon grinned and pulled out the plush chair in front of Mr. Min’s desk before settling in. “It is,” he said, turning around to smile at Yoongi and me. “I’ll meet you two downstairs when we’re done here,” he continued. Yoongi and I each turned halfway toward the door, and as my fingers clasped around the doorknob, Namjoon called, “Oh and Y/N?”

I glanced at him over my shoulder. “Yes?” I asked, eager to leave the intimidating place.

He smirked. “Have your friend send her resume to my secretary. She’ll schedule her for an interview with my hiring department.”

A small smile spread across my face as I opened the door. I nodded and he returned it, grinning. “I will,” I said, leading Yoongi out into the hallway once more.

I awoke to pounding at my front door. Groaning, I rubbed my eyes and pushed myself upright on the couch. I must have fallen asleep shortly after returning home from Sanyo. Namjoon had emerged two hours later with a big grin and a new contract with Yoongi’s father stating neither company would attack the other moving forward. And although Namjoon hadn’t been the one to strike first, his strategic prowess had proven extremely useful as by the end Mr. Min was offering a collaborative project. Namjoon wouldn’t tell me whether he’d accepted the project or not, but I suspected I knew his principles well enough to know exactly where he’d told Mr. Min to shove that offer.

Yoongi had stayed behind to hash things out with his dad, and he told me not to worry about him. Of course, I worried anyway, because as his back retreated back toward the elevator, he looked so small. Too small for this big corporate world.

But my worries were quickly assuaged as he turned slightly before entering the elevator and shot me a playful smirk and a wink. As I moved to respond, he quickly hopped into the elevator and that was the last I saw of him.

Once I’d gotten home, I’d practically fallen into a puddle on the couch, turning on the TV and letting whatever cable show was on play as my mind wandered away from me. I wasn’t sure when I’d fallen asleep or how long I’d been out, but the knocking was incessant and demanding.

Groggy, I wandered toward the door and opened it without checking the peephole, rubbing the back of my head with a groan. “Hello?”

“Why the hell didn’t you tell me?”

I pried my eyes open and saw Taehyung fuming in the doorway. I furrowed my brow and blinked at him. “What time is it?”

He sighed. “It’s midnight. Why are you still dressed up?” he asked, finally scanning me before shaking his head and waving his hands. “No, that’s not important! Why did you keep this whole plan from me? Don’t I have the right to know?”

My senses had returned to me and, gently, I took his forearm and led him inside the apartment. He followed, albeit unwillingly, and pouted down at me. He was dressed in leisure wear, likely having run here from his apartment once Namjoon told him what happened without so much as grabbing a jacket.

I sat him down on the couch and smiled. “I’m sorry,” I said.

He opened his mouth to say something but shut it quickly with a sigh, gripping his nose bridge. “Shit,” he mumbled. “I can’t scold you if you apologize first.”

I laughed and nodded. “I know,” I said, then shook my head. “I really am sorry, for what it’s worth.”

He eyed me from between his fingers and cocked a brow. “Why didn’t you tell me, though? Really?”

I rubbed his arm with a smile. “I didn’t want you to take this on too,” I said. “With everything that happened with the gala…I figured you’d do something unnecessary again. You’d handle things on your own and demand I stay out of it,” I began, pausing to rub my hands together. “I know it’s annoying, but I thought that there had to be a way to fix things without someone sacrificing themselves.”

“What about your friend? That Yoongi kid? Didn’t he sacrifice himself?” he asked.

I chuckled, remembering that mischievous wink, that boy with his head in his computer, that guy who saved a stray dog and bought expensive food for it. “No,” I said, smiling. “He’s found something new to be passionate about.”

Taehyung sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “I hate that I can see your point,” he said, shaking his head. “I wish I could’ve helped you more.”

Gently, I touched the pendant on my collarbone and smiled at him. “You did help, Taehyung,” I said, and his eyes flashed toward me. “More than you can possibly know. You showed me that I’m stronger when I speak out. That I have what it takes to advocate for myself.”

His shoulders slumped with a sigh and he glanced toward the coffee table where Mom’s letter still sat, wrinkled. “You would’ve figured it out on your own eventually,” said Taehyung with a pout.

I smiled. “No,” I said, shaking my head. “I don’t think I would have.” I sighed and watched the letter as if it might change the longer I looked at it. “It took you to shake it out of me.”

“Well…that’s one contribution at least,” he said with a sigh.

“It bothers me.”

He sat upright and stared at me wide-eyed. “Huh?”

I shook my head. “Not that you’ve been helping me, but that it took someone else pushing me for me to finally get myself together,” I said, brow furrowed as I leaned back against the couch cushions. I crossed my arms and stewed over it, still staring at the letter. “I feel like everything I’ve done has been because of either you or Jungkook.”

Taehyung stiffened. “Wait, what?”

I sat up and frowned. “Yeah. The more I think about it, the more annoyed I get,” I said, thinking about that stupid letter. If not for Taehyung, I probably would never have heard from my mom again.

“Y/N, you just got home from blackmailing a billionaire CEO,” he said, raising his brows. “I don’t think any of that had to do with me or Jungkook.”

I shook my head. “I dunno,” I said, trying to name the gnawing feeling in the pit of my stomach.

Taehyung sighed and leaned into the couch, glancing up toward the TV. “What’re you watching?”

“I’m not sure,” I said, reclining beside him albeit uneasily as my thoughts kept swirling.

We both watched the screen for a moment and I felt the call of sleep beckoning again. Why with Taehyung did I always fall asleep? Perhaps he was a comfortable person. Our relationship had after all began when he left me trinkets while I slept at work.

“My agent wants me to start thinking about doing a documentary,” he said, like the thought couldn’t remain in his head.

I hummed. “Weird,” I said with a nod. “About you?”

“Yeah. Since public interest is so high right now, she thinks it might be a good time to start working on something,” he said, then shook his head. “But I don’t wanna be followed by a big film crew that I don’t know and everyone she’s suggested has been awkward.”

“Hm,” I said, resting my head against the back of the couch, eyes fluttering shut.

“I just want a small company, you know? If I’m going to do it, that is,” he continued, but his voice was growing more and more distant.

And before I knew it, I was asleep.

“Hey-wait, what the fuck?”

“Oh…sorry.”

“I…you…what are you even doing here?”

“I fell asleep.”

“Why were you here late?”

“Because I-…ah, forget it.”

I groaned and rolled over, tumbling off the couch and onto the rug. I stared up at the front door, the source of the noise, and saw Jungkook in the doorway. Smiling, I gave him a wave and pushed up to my bottom.

“Morning,” I mumbled, rubbing my eyes.

Jungkook gave me a pout. “Don’t give me that cute face,” he said, jerking a thumb at Taehyung who, by that point, I’d only just begun to register as being in my apartment at all. “What’s he doing here?”

“He came over last night to scold me,” I said, standing to my feet with the help of the coffee table. My fingers brushed Mom’s letter and I recoiled like I’d touched a hot stove.

“Scold you?” asked Jungkook, eyes round. He tuned to Taehyung and frowned. “Why were you scolding her? And why didn’t you do it during business hours?”

“Jungkook,” I said, laughing as I approached. I gave his shoulder a pat before breezing past him into the bathroom to brush my teeth. I’d slept in my work skirt and blouse, so both were horribly wrinkled now. Great, and I still had to get to work in a few hours. “What are you doing here, Kook?” I called out into the hallway.

But to my surprise, both boys had followed me in to the bathroom and were beginning to cram themselves into the small space with me. I shouted as Jungkook shoved my pelvis into the countertop with his hip so he could perch on the toilet seat. Taehyung left a more reasonable distance between us and lingered in the doorway.

“I heard about what happened with Yoongi. Jin told me Yoongi’s leaving Bangtan and gave me an out too,” he said, then gave Taehyung a cautious look. “Can I talk about this with him?”

I chuckled and nodded, swishing my mouth with water. “Mhm,” I said.

Taehyung hummed. “So you’re leaving the shady business?”

Jungkook, his defenses lowering, nodded and returned his eyes to me. “Yeah. I want to do what I love instead.”

“What do you love?” asked Taehyung.

“I wanna make movies,” said Jungkook with a soft smile. “I bet you’d get it, being an artist and everything.”

Taehyung smiled and nodded. “Boy do I,” he said with a sigh. “Deciding to leave home and go it alone was really tough, but once I did it I never regretted it. Not even for a second.”

Jungkook grinned. “That’s comforting to hear, at least.”

I glanced between them a few times as the beginnings of a scheme began working in my brain. “You two are actually really similar, now that I think about it,” I said with a nod.

Jungkook scoffed. “No way,” he said with a snort.

I shot a warning glance at him and he quieted down. “I mean it,” I said. “You both see beauty in the ordinary and want to capture that.”

Taehyung raised his brows. “Is that something you’re interested in, Jungkook?”

He pouted and shrugged, watching the floor. “Yeah, I guess.”

Taehyung chuckled. “Man, I wish I would’ve known sooner! I take photos, so if you ever want to go and get some material, I’m free.”

Jungkook glanced up with wide eyes. “Huh?” he asked.

Taehyung nodded. “Yeah. Video is really dynamic, but I don’t have an eye for it. I’d love to see your process.”

Jungkook smiled, just a little, and sat up straighter. “Wait, you mean it?”

“Yeah, of course,” said Taehyung with a laugh. “Give me your number and we can plan something.”

I smiled knowingly and leaned back against the wall so the two could exchange contact information. “You know,” I began, rubbing Jungkook’s shoulder. “Jungkook’s working for a film company now.”

Jungkook stiffened. “N-Not yet! I just sent off my video, but-,”

“But you’re in. I saw that video, Kook. And, as an art curator, I’m telling you it’s good,” I said.

Taehyung’s eyes went wide. “For real?” he asked.

Jungkook shrugged, his knees spread wide as he sat slumped slightly. “Yeah. Probably, anyway.”

Taehyung scoffed. “Well…I might have a really big project for you guys if you’re interested.”

Jungkook stiffened. “What?”

“Let’s chat about it today. Y/N, do you mind if I steal him for a while?” asked Taehyung.

I smiled and gestured toward Jungkook with both hands. “He’s all yours.”

Jungkook glanced up at me, wide-eyed. “Wait, what’s happening?”

I chuckled. “Meet me after work, okay?” I asked with a smile, patting his shoulder as I slid past both of them to get ready for my shift.

As I was getting ready to leave work, I noticed a few text messages on my phone from while I was working. Smiling, I unlocked it and read over the text.

Nararawr: I’ve got an interview with Ori.

Nararawr: The receptionist said I had to interview properly if I wanted the job, no handouts.

Nararawr: IDK you did, but…thank you. I’ll be sure to do my best!

Nararawr: Yoongi came by my class on Monday. I assume that’s also your doing :P

Nararawr: He said he had some things to explain to me, so we’re meeting up on Friday to talk about everything. Methinks it’s a…*gasp*…DATE?!

Nararawr: At any rate, thank you. I won’t waste this opportunity. Thank you for letting me get this myself. I appreciate you more than I say.

I ran a finger along my screen and chuckled. Of course he’d gone. I knew he would. Gently, I typed out a response.

Y/N: Hey, I didn’t do much. I’m just glad everything worked out. Let’s meet up on Saturday to chat! I’ve also got some things to explain to you. And besides I wanna hear about you…*gasp*…DATE?!

I smiled and slid my phone into my purse, removing my ascot and stuffing it inside along with it. The shift was quick, quicker than usual as I’d been scheduled during a busier time of day. The midday rush had died down by the end, and Areum gave me a four-fingered wave goodbye as I made my way back toward the exit from the break room. But as I stepped into the hall, Mr. Kwon jogged up behind me and grabbed my shoulder. I jumped a little and spun around to face him.

“Y/N! Thank God I caught you,” he said with a breathless laugh.

I smiled and gave him a bow. “Is there anything I can help you with, Sir?” I asked.

“If you have time, I’d love you to join me for a meeting right now,” he said.

“With who?” I asked.

“It’s-,” he began, but paused with a chuckle.

He grinned and glanced over my shoulder as the elevator dinged and out walked a few familiar faces. No way. Two of the Japanese philanthropists I’d sold paintings to all those weeks ago. It felt like a lifetime. I bowed deeply at each of them.

“Hello,” I said once I stood upright once more.

“Ah! Are you going to be in the meeting as well?” asked one man with a smile.

I took a peek at Mr. Kwon who gave me an encouraging nod and a smile, and turned back to the philanthropists. “Um…yes,” I said with a smile.

“Wonderful!” he said. “I was telling Mr. Kwon that we’d love to have you.”

“Have me…?” I began, but Mr. Kwon simply laughed and shuffled me back into the gallery, leading all of us to his office.

I stared at the letter on my coffee table, now dressed in my favorite turtleneck and the same skirt I’d worn to meet Jungkook for our study date, months and months ago. Any minute, he’d show up in his car, awaiting my arrival so we could go somewhere. Anywhere.

And still, here I was. Staring at that stupid letter. What did I think would happen if I kept looking at it? Would it suddenly sprout wings and fly away? Would it burn up in flames?

My phone buzzed and I knew he was here. I leapt to my feet and, without thinking, swiped the letter and pocketed it before rushing out the front door to meet Jungkook downstairs.

Jungkook and I sat beneath the dome stars, resting on a blanket in the grass at a park by my apartment. One I hadn’t been to in a long time. Neither of us was saying much, not after the initial flood of information exchange. How he was going to be in touch with Taehyung regarding that documentary, how the two are actually pretty compatible, how everything had gone with Yoongi at Sanyo.

Now there was just silence. The comfortable kind.

I knew I had to tell him about what had happened in the meeting today. If anyone needed to know, it was him.

But I let myself indulge in the silence for a moment longer. “My mom wrote to me,” I said, resting on my palms as I stared up at the fresh, cloudless autumn night sky. Stars splayed out like paint splatters.

Jungkook glanced at me, eyes wide. “She did?” he asked.

I nodded. “Yeah. She wants to meet me.”

“She…she does?”

“Yeah,” I said with a chuckle. “I thought…I thought I might feel really vindicated when this moment finally came, but I kinda just feel…empty.”

“Empty…,” repeated Jungkook softly.

I nodded. “Because she wants to meet with me to get to Taehyung,” I said with a nod. “Isn’t it a little pathetic? Reaching out to your estranged daughter once she can benefit you?” I chuckled. “And what’s more pathetic is that I’m actually considering going.”

“Y/N,” said Jungkook softly, chiding. “I’ll support whatever choice you make,” he said, eyes boring into me intently.

I smiled and leaned toward him, giving him a chaste peck, and nodded. “Thank you,” I said with a sigh. “You know, it’s been bothering me for a while now,” I said, touching the ruby necklace where it met my skin. “I wonder what I’d be on my own. Who I’d be. Without you or Taehyung or Dad or Nara or anyone supporting me.”

“That’s a sad thought,” said Jungkook softly.

I shook my head. “It’s not,” I said. “I wanna know, Jungkook. All my life…I’ve been holding on to people so tight that I forgot I’m also a person worth holding on to. I forgot that I’m a person at all.”

Jungkook reached out and laced our fingers gently, inching closer. “I understand.”

“And I appreciate you for that,” I said, chuckling. “But…I wanna know what I’m made of when I’m on my own. Up until now, the only thing making me move forward has been circumstance. I haven’t done anything by myself. I haven't grown because I actively wanted to become better, but because I’ve been forced to through my relationships with you. With Taehyung. With Namjoon. With…everyone.”

Jungkook nodded. “You wanna stand on your own two feet.”

“Yeah.”

“You wanna see what you’re capable of,” he said, smiling.

I smiled too. “Which is why I’m gonna take a job offer in Japan.”

Jungkook coughed a little, sputtering, before staring down at me with wide eyes. “Wait, what? Where the hell did that come from?”

I laughed. “Today, my boss at the gallery offered me a year-long position at a new gallery they’re opening in Tokyo. He’s been having these talks with a bunch of philanthropists who I sold paintings to. I guess they really wanted to have me on the team at least for the first year to train new employees. I’ll be done with my degree in a few months anyway and I’ll be a manager,” I said, watching his expression change from shock to something like respect, mingling with a tinge of sadness.

“I…Y/N, that’s incredible,” Jungkook said, laughing as he swept me up in his arms. “I mean, I’ll miss you like hell but this is an amazing opportunity. You’d be crazy not to take it.”

I smiled and held on to him tightly, inhaling the sweet, gentle scent of his cologne, feeling the firm expanse of his chest. He rubbed my side, tender, and pulled back to press his palm against my cheek, smiling. ��Let’s call it…our test period,” I said with a grin. He raised his brows. “After everything that happened, I can’t say I trust you one-hundred percent.”

He nodded. “I get it.”

“So…this year abroad,” I began, resting my hand atop his as he smoothed his fingers against my cheek. “If we still feel the same way about each other when I get home, then we can start again. For real this time.”

He swallowed hard and smiled, his thumb rubbing circles into my warm skin. “A test period,” he repeated with a nod. “I know I’ll pass.”

I laughed and gave his stomach a poke. “Don’t get cocky. I also have to pass,” I said with a smile.

“I’ll make sure you pass,” he said with a wink.

I shoved him away and stuck out my tongue, miming gagging. “We’ll see,” I teased.

He smiled. “I’m really proud of you,” he said.

I raised my brows. “You are?”

He nodded. “A few months ago, you wouldn’t be able to take this opportunity. You would have held yourself back and let it go to someone else.”

I blinked at my lap as I thought. “I…I guess so, huh?”

“The you from before…I don’t think the you today would like her much,” he said with a chuckle. “Do you?”

The letter suddenly felt heavy in my pocket, like it was burning a hole. Without another word, I pulled it out and stared at it, off-white, worn at the corners. And I took it in both hands before yanking each corner, tearing it clean in half. And again. And again. And again and again until the pieces were small as confetti. Then I opened my palm and let the gentle, chilly breeze carry the scraps away, gone forever into the streets of Seoul.

“That was brave,” said Jungkook from beside me, rubbing my back.

I smiled, a sense of ease washing over me, and turned to him. “I’m about to do something braver,” I said, meeting his curious eyes with a smirk.

I reached out and clamped both hands on his cheeks. He gasped a little as I yanked his face down to meet mine. I tried to convey with a kiss exactly what I needed him to understand. That he wasn’t a bad person, just lost for a while. That he deserved to be happy. That he was strong and smart and talented and so full of potential. That what I felt for him wasn’t something transient, like receipts, like a memo. That it was forever.

He leaned into the kiss, deepening it slightly with a tilt of his head. His lips were sweet with chapstick and soft, never pushy, gentle always. And as I slowly let my fingers play with the hair at the nape of his neck, I felt him growing flushed, the heat from his face reaching mine through the small fraction of space between us.

Slowly, I pulled away and met his eyes, smiling. “I love you, too,” I said finally.

His eyes glittered with growing moisture and he smiled slightly, scoffing. “Jeez, baby,” he said, wiping his eyes. “You surprised me,” he mumbled.

I chuckled and reached around to the clasp on my necklace, removing it and holding it in my fingers. Slowly, I took his hand and flipped it palm up. I dropped the necklace and smiled at him.

“What’s this about?” he asked, eyeing me.

I closed his fingers around the necklace and patted his fist. “Hold on to that for me,” I said. “And don’t give it back to me until I come back from Japan.”

“Huh?”

“I’ll only take it back when I’ve proven that I can stand on my own two feet,” I said with a nod.

He furrowed his brow before meeting my gaze once more. “You want me to keep this for a year?”

I smirked. “It’ll also keep other girls from getting too cozy if they see that in your room.”

He gaped. “Y/N!” he shouted. “You really think I’m gonna be seeing other people while you’re gone?!”

I shrugged. “I dunno.”

“Wait…are you gonna see other people?!” he shouted, pointing an accusing finger my way.

“I dunno,” I repeated, giggling.

He frowned and leaned down to press a pouty kiss to my lips. “You’d better not or I’ll fly over there give you an earful.”

I laughed, ruffling his hair. “One year…are you sure you like me enough to hold out that long?”

His expression softened and he took my hand in his, pressing a kiss to my palm. “That much and more,” he said gently. “I’ll wait as long as I have to.”

And with that, I smiled and gave his hand a squeeze. I didn’t know where life would lead us, or what might change in a year. I wasn’t sure how I’d tell Dad, how I’d tell Nara. But I knew enough. I knew that the people in my life were good, that they deserved to be beside me. I knew that the ones who walked away from me weren’t meant to stay, and that they weren’t meant to come back either. I knew that the person I was becoming was someone I could finally believe in. And I knew that I could trust the people I loved to be there, always.

#jungkook fluff #jungkook angst #jungkook fanfic #taehyung fluff #taehyung angst #taehyung fanfic #jungkook fanfiction #taehyung fanfiction #bts fanfic #bts fanfiction #bts ot7 au #bts series #bts fluff #bts angst #bts reactions #bts imagines #bts reader insert

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patrickbrewerisgay · 5 years

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It’s been — checks watch — 43 years since Second City Television first aired, and Catherine O’Hara and Eugene Levy are still flexing their comedic skills in made-up towns in 2019. With Schitt’s Creek, the show created by Levy and his son, Dan, they’ve revived that familiar slow burn: The show premiered on the CBC in 2015, but it wasn’t until the fourth season that the fever spread. This year, Schitt’s Creek received four Emmy nominations, including acting nominations for Levy (as patriarch Johnny Rose) and O’Hara (his wife, Moira), costumes, and Outstanding Comedy Series. In a three-way phone call, we discussed their respective nominations, their teary final days shooting on set, and whether we can expect to see Moira during her favorite season.

Congratulations to you both. Did you talk yesterday?

Eugene Levy: Yes, we did. We were actually on the phone. [The publicist] Gab was watching the live feed and I guess my category came up first, and she phoned me to say that I’d been nominated, and right after that Catherine’s category came up, so I just heard, “You and Catherine have been nominated.” And then she tagged Catherine in on the phone call and we were actually on the phone while they were watching the livestream.

Catherine O’Hara: And that’s when they announced Best Show!

EL: And then we heard, “Well, the show got nominated.” And that was the best of all worlds. That was like really exciting news, because that really gives a nod of recognition to every single person that works on the show. It was actually a very exciting call.

COH: [laughs] It was. We were kind of stunned. We were just stunned and laughing.

Did you do anything to celebrate?

EL: I went out with my brother, who’s one of our producers, Andrew Barnsley; Deb, my wife; and Sally Catto, who runs CBC up here, and we went down to Soho and had a little celebratory dinner.

COH: That’s lovely. My husband, Bo [Welch, a production designer], is nominated for production design for A Series of Unfortunate Events, but here we are in cottage country, where it’s the last concern of anyone, what’s going on with the Emmys. But we’re excited at our cottage, and we toasted each other and the shows. But today we kind of said, “Okay, we’ve got to stop talking.”

Both of you have been at this for a couple of years, and I was wondering, is it still exciting?

EL: Well, it was exciting yesterday on the phone. It was a pretty exciting day, don’t you think, Catherine?

COH: Absolutely. Anytime anyone pats you on the head and says, “Good job,” it’s always nice, and I’m especially happy for Daniel. This was his baby to begin with. It’s a lovely thing to have anything to celebrate in life. I’m happy.

EL: It’s actually more exciting that it’s happening now in our fifth season on the show. I keep thinking, had this happened after our first season, it could have been a lot tougher to maintain this caliber over the next four or five seasons. But the show has built so nicely in terms of following and viewership, and how it’s been embraced by the critics. I mean, it was an exciting year after our fourth season when we end the year making a lot of top-ten lists; that itself was incredibly exciting, where you get the feeling that your show is being recognized for the first time. Now in our fifth season, we get the Emmy nominations, and we still have one more season to go, so I just love the arc here and how the show has caught on. I’d rather have it this way than starting off like a bat out of hell and then trying to hang on.

COH: Yeah, it’s almost like we got to do the show in an old TV–world way before the internet, where you just build the show according to your own instincts and develop the characters and try to make the best show you can make. It was so nice to not feel like you were too affected by outside sources or outside opinions. We were on our own to build the show, in a way that TV shows used to get to do.

It feels increasingly rare to make TV outside of the rapid-fire response of social media. Schitt’s Creek feels like the little show that could, and because of that, was preserved on its own island that people discovered slowly.

EL: Yeah, I don’t know if that has to do with shooting the show in Toronto. It reminds me of when we were doing SCTV and how removed you are from the mainstream of show business, so you’re relatively unaffected by it. You just get the feeling you’re going into the studio, you’re going to work and then you’re going home and having dinner. And SCTV as well had a nice build to it over the years, where it caught on with fans and critics. You really just get to focus on the work and eventually the work kind of speaks for itself.

COH: I think it works for shows or movies that get to go to remote locations, too. They get away from the head office and focus only on the work, and you have a better chance of succeeding at what you’re attempting.

Do you think that might be a benefit to being a Canadian production?

EL: I think so. With our show, I guess you can prove that you can work and produce a show here in Canada that can get the same kind of recognition that any other show can get — mainly, I guess, getting Emmy nods. I got an email from Rick Moranis. It said, “Congratulations. 37 years between Emmy nominations, not bad.”

COH: [laughs] That’s great.

EL: Yeah, I think it helps to be able to focus on the work just shooting away from the mainstream of the business and avoiding getting caught up in the hype.

You also just wrapped shooting the final season. What was the last day on set like?

COH: I think back to the table read. I think we got a lot of the good weeping out of our systems at the table read for the last two episodes. At lunch hour while you’re shooting, you do a table read for the upcoming episodes, and the upcoming episodes that day were the last two episodes of the sixth season, and when you shoot your scenes, you’re not in every scene with everybody, so you don’t get to see everything get shot, but we got to see everybody read their last scenes and it was really emotional. I mean, there were lots of laughs, because the scripts were great and funny, but oh my god, they were also so heart-wrenching for us. I had to go back to shoot that afternoon, and Moira wears a lot of makeup, so I looked like Alice Cooper.

The last day was just, “Oh.” Every moment is like, “This is the last time we’re going to do this. This is the last time we’re going to stand here,” but it was sweet. It really felt like I was part of a really lovely, talented family. It was hard to say goodbye, but the last episodes are really a lovely goodbye.

EL: Catherine’s right, it really started with the table read, where you got to lose a few pounds in tears. And then as we wound down, we would be wrapping certain sets: wrapping the town hall set, and then wrapping Café Tropical, and then we were wrapping the motel set, so every last scene in all these sets, there also was a nice emotional moment between characters. A lot of tears. And then we get to the last day, and once again it was quite emotional. Although there was a lot to do. On the one hand, you know that if you’re breaking down for 20 minutes having a nice sob-fest, then you’re adding 20 minutes on to the day. It was a very sweet, rewarding way to end the series.

Moira Rose, of course, is an actress. What would she say in this scenario, if she got a surprise nomination?

COH: [laughs] I went to the Tonys a month ago. I got to present a musical number for Beetlejuice, and my husband said that Moira would have called them ‘the Anthonys.’ [does Moira’s voice] “So lovely to be here at the Anthonys.” So now I’m trying to think of what it would be for [the Emmys]. I was thinking ‘Emily,’ then I was like no, it should be ‘Emmanuel.’ [does Moira’s voice again] “It’s so exciting to be nominated for an Emmanuel. Finally, they got it right,” Moira would say, to be clear. I would not say such a thing.

EL: Didn’t Dan tweet something about, “Finally, Moira —”

COH: [laughs] “— gets her Emmy,” or something, yeah. Oh, who would care more for this? I try to keep a level head here, and thank goodness I’m a Canadian, so I’m raised to not take show business all that seriously. But Moira, oh my lord. This is it. The Crows Have Eyes, she was already seeing Oscars for that. So this is a win. This is a win for Moira.

EL: Well, it would be great to see Moira at the podium.

COH: [laughs] I already did that in Canada, though. I did that for the Canadian awards.

Would you ever consider doing it in character again?

COH: Well, I’m not gonna talk about getting up on the podium. Don’t get me sucked in. But it’d be fun to present an award, let’s put that out.

EL: How about doing the carpet as Moira?

COH: The carpet as Moira! Yeah, I usually can’t help myself. If I’m answering questions about Moira, I can’t help myself. I go in the Moira zone, yeah. She’ll probably leak out. She’ll be dying to be there.

And both of you have already satirized this whole awards campaign with For Your Consideration.

COH: Yeah, that’s why I say, please don’t suck me in.

EL: That’s just how it starts, it’s the what if, “What if? What will you do if?” And the more that gets planted, the more it becomes just like, “Ahhh!” Yeah, that’s what For Your Consideration was all about. You know every single twitch that signals falling into that trap, so you’re extremely defensive about it for all those reasons.

COH: I remember for my character, it was also, “Why not? They have to nominate someone, why not me? Someone has to win, why not me?” Let’s remember that movie. Let’s keep it in mind.

EL: I have to watch that again, actually.

COH: Yeah, this is good timing for it.

EL: I haven’t seen it since it came out.

COH: Yeah, it’s a good reminder. It’s a cautionary tale.

But also, these things happen, and are happening!

COH: Yeah, it’s fun. All good fun.

EL: Well, you know, to be honest, the most fun aspects of this thing are moments like yesterday, being on that phone call when it first happens and experiencing that excitement and surprise. And then just getting to go to the party. Whether you walk out with a statue or not is really not the thing. The fact that you’re there with everybody else pouring their heart and soul into whatever shows they’re working on, and you’re there at the party with some lovely, talented people who you respect and admire. You’re on the same team, so to speak, with the other nominees, and that’s really the joyous part of it all.

COH: You’re right. I was reading the nominees yesterday and saying, “Oh, I get to see them, I’ll get to meet them, I’ll get to tell them how much I love their show.”

Like who?

COH: Patricia Arquette, love her. Love Escape at Dannemora. And Ben Stiller, who directed it. Yeah, I’m happy for them. Benicio del Toro and Paul Dano, I love that series, amazing. Love Succession.

It’s so good.

COH: Oh my lord, yes. It’s just so much good material. So much talent. Laura Linney, Ozark, everyone. John Oliver. Everyone! I’m excited to see everyone. And Eugene! I’m very excited to see Eugene again. In a tux, no less.

EL: Yes, in a tux.

You’ve known each other for over 40 years. What do you think makes a working friendship like that last?

EL: I don’t know how that works. I think we’re probably two of the un-show-busiest, un-show-business-iest kinds of people. I think we’ve always taken our work seriously, but you know, Catherine’s just a regular person. Like, you don’t get caught up in the trappings of the business that you’re actually in. And nothing has really changed in all of these years. Catherine hasn’t changed at all.

COH: No, and you haven’t.

EL: At all. And you get to enjoy what you’re doing in a very real way, the way other people get to enjoy what they’re doing. And it’s just fun to be around, it’s been that way since the very beginning.

COH: Yeah, same for me. I respect Eugene, I trust Eugene, and I know that when we talk about the work, it’s about the work. But I say, “Eugene’s a gentleman,” and what comes with that is a certain lovely amount of diplomacy, or gentlemanly behavior, good manners. It counts for a lot when you’re working day-to-day. Since SCTV, this is the most amount of time we’ve spent together. We see each other periodically through our mutual friends — Martin Short, especially. It feels like family who live in different cities. You know, you don’t see each other all the time, but when we do, we pick up where we left off. It helps that Eugene keeps giving me jobs, so thank you, Eugene. [laughs] I think that’s probably the main thing that keeps us together.

EL: Excellent work, Catherine’s done.

COH: Thank you, Eugene.

#schitt's creek #eugene levy #catherine o'hara

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