#and so far all the characters ive thought of are just based off my friends in my irl institute class / student ward lol
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mocumentary-style sitcom about an LDS institute class / student ward about all the shenanigans the YSAs get into. featured arcs include general conference viewing party, attending trek with the stake youth, returned missionaries adjusting to being off the mission, road trips to church historical sites, The Wedding Episode, someone invited their non-member roommate and the talks are kind of weird/its Fast Sunday, Baptism Episode, etc. would ideally include lots of references to LDS cult classics such as The Best Two Years, the singles ward, and such. also one character would have a Tumblrstake / Queerstake blog
working title is just "The Student Ward" but im open to suggestions lol
EDIT: IM SO SORRY I DIDNT MEAN TO TAG THIS AS LDSHADOWLADY I THOUGHT I DELETED THAT ACCIDENTAL AUTO-TAG LMAO THATS MY BAD
fun fact I used to watch Lizzie all the time as a kid (still occasionally do) and I used to think she was Mormon because... LDS hadowLady lol
#tumblrstake#queerstake#is this is appealing ideal to anyone else#its something ive been daydreaming about for a little while now#will probably definitely never happen but its fun to think about lol#The Student Ward#dream casting: Andrew Garfield as the ward bishop#he needs to be in some positive church media after being in Under the Banner of Heaven#and so far all the characters ive thought of are just based off my friends in my irl institute class / student ward lol#would be mostly humor but would also have like. heartfelt and spiritual moments probably#like Once I Was A Beehive#idk if anyone on here has watched it but its a top tier church-y movie its very funny#ldsblr#pro LDS#Tumblr ward#mormonism#sorry to any mcyters that saw this post because of my mistag
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It’s All Ending Now | N.RK
Pairing: nishimura riki x kumiho!reader (fem)
Genre: written for @svngcore‘s ‘so ends the myth’ collab; fluff, angst, fantasy, based on a myth (kumiho)
Warnings: minor character death, blood, wounds, violence, weapons, kissing, hints at misogyny, heeseung being slightly insane, near death experiences, large timeskips
Word Count: 10k (10,883)
Synopsis: As a kumiho, it was only natural that you would kill. However, you put limits and standards on who you took the hearts off. You only messed with boys who showed blatant disrespect for the world around them and gave them what they deserved. All of them turned out to be the same in the end, they always did. But when you lock eyes with a boy through your window, you get a sense that something is different. Will this be the exception you have silently wished for? Or will both your hearts end up crushed, hopeless against the winds of fate?
Author’s Note: guys i really procrastinated this one BUT i’m actually quite happy with how it turned out. it is by far the longest fic ive written, my previous longest one was only 3k,,, so um yea i kinda had a field day. but thank you soul for hosting this collab, i had so much fun writing this even if i struggled a bit to meet the deadline due to me procrastinating (i literally had the idea for this since the beginning of the collab and only started actually writing it like a week ago HA...) i hope you all enjoy !!
“What’s a pretty girl like you doing out here in the woods?”
You turned your head towards the voice, meeting the eyes of a brunette boy hovering over you. You quickly scrambled up, dropping your hands away from the berries you had been picking. Of course, you hadn’t actually planned on picking them, but you needed something as an excuse to lead him away.
You stifled your giggle as you watched the boy stare at you in what could only be described as awe. You feigned surprise at having been seen and looked around in worry, leaning closer to call to him.
“Please don’t tell anyone, I just wanted to pick some berries as a gift for my mother. She really loves them, but she’s too sick to get them herself, so I thought I could pick some for her.”
You took a second to admire the boy’s features. His face was gently round with small and soft features, almost delicate. His eyes were framed by long, feathery eyelashes, yet they still held a certain glint of mischief. His lips formed a natural pout, and you watched as they turned into an easy smile.
“Don’t worry, I wouldn’t tell. I’m not really supposed to be here either, my mom says it’s too dangerous. But I want to hunt, so I snuck out.” The boy claimed proudly, his eyes crinkling a little at the corners as his smirk grew wider.
Of course, he would want to hunt. No matter how pretty a boy is, they all still want to ruin everything natural and innocent.
You gasped in mock surprise and let a small smile grace your lips. You looked over your shoulder once more before taking a step closer to him.
“What’s your name?”
“Beomgyu.”
You smiled again and watched as he returned it effortlessly.
“Has anyone seen Beomgyu lately? We were supposed to go fishing yesterday but he never showed up.” Jake asked, poking at his lunch with his fork before looking up at the others.
Niki and his friends were sitting where they always did, under the big oak tree near the forest, a little ways away from their village. It was their place to retreat from everyone else, a place for only them. They saw it as a much-needed break, especially since they were growing older and girls had begun to fling themselves at them more and more as their parents pushed them to find a girl and get married. Sure, the boys had never been opposed to the attention they got from the girls in the village, but Niki guessed the thought of having to settle down and marry one of them someday soon became a little too much sometimes. Luckily, Niki was the youngest of their group and his parents had not yet brought up that topic to him, so he was still free to mess around as the rest of them had done before.
“You haven’t heard, Jake?” Jungwon gasped.
Jake tilted his head, confused.
“Heard what?”
“Beomgyu’s dead. He was killed.” Jay said. He paused for a moment before speaking again, “I heard some of the townspeople saying it was a kumiho.”
Jake’s face morphed into something similar to horror, whether at the fact his friend was dead or the prospect that a kumiho killed him, Niki wasn’t sure. In all honesty, he didn’t know how the news had managed to escape Jake. The whole town had been talking about the murder and the possibility of a kumiho for the past few days. Niki had even heard his mother talking about it, and she wasn’t even positive creatures like that existed. But after all, this was the third boy killed in the span of a month. All the boys had gone into the woods the night they disappeared, then turned up a couple of days later with their hearts missing. Many people didn’t think it was just a coincidence.
An unsettling silence washed over the group. Heeseung frowned before his eyes lit up, an idea popping into his head.
“Hey, why don’t we go into the woods tonight as a group?”
Sunoo looked at him in shock, his mouth falling open, “Are you crazy? What if the kumiho’s real? Do you want to get killed?”
“Of course not,” Heeseung scoffed, “But if it is real, it can’t kill seven of us, right? We can just fight it off or something. And if it isn’t real, then we can put an end to all those rumors going around about it.”
Sunghoon was the first to agree, an affirming word leaving his mouth. Heeseung smiled before asking the others. One by one, they all agreed, albeit a few a bit more hesitantly. When Heeseung looked at Niki, he out a small chuckle at the younger boy’s quick agreement. All of them knew that Niki was rather dependent on them, having grown up practically attached to the rest of them at the hip.
Finally, Heeseung turned back to Sunoo, a sly grin plastered on his lips. The two stared at each other for a few moments before Sunoo sighed, reluctantly agreeing. Heeseung let out a small cheer before clapping his hands together.
“Alright, let’s meet back here tonight at eight.”
Niki trudged towards the tree with Sunoo at his side, the rest of their friends already waiting, their figures illuminated by the lantern one of them was holding. Sunoo breathed out a sigh, and Niki tilted his head to glance at him. The boy still didn’t seem very enthusiastic about this whole ordeal. Niki couldn’t help but feel a little rustled by his friend’s uneasiness, and silently nudged Sunoo’s hand with his own. When Sunoo looked at him, Niki gave him a soft smile.
“Are you scared?” Niki questioned.
“No,” the older sighed, “I just think it’s a bit silly to be doing this.”
“Silly?”
Sunoo stopped for a moment and met Niki’s gaze. “Don’t you? Even if there isn’t a kumiho, it’s late and we won’t be able to see well. The forest is full of wild animals and poisonous plants that we aren’t familiar with. If someone does get hurt, it’s gonna be hard to find our way out of the forest quickly and without other incidents.”
Niki stilled. In truth, he hadn’t really put much thought behind his decision. If everyone else had said yes, then he would too. Niki didn’t consider himself a follower, in fact, he was rather the opposite. But he trusted his friends and would follow them in whatever they chose. Sunoo watched Niki as he thought, before taking another breath and starting to walk towards their friends again.
“It doesn’t matter, I’m sure we’ll be fine. Besides, I'll be there to keep everyone out of trouble.” Sunoo said as he turned back to him with a light smile on his lips. Niki nodded, following the boy.
Jake was the first to notice them, calling out with a bright grin. Jay quickly quieted him, reminding him that it was in fact late at night and people might get suspicious if they heard yelling. Sunghoon joined in, although his remarks toward Jake were a little more snarky. The two were still arguing by the time Niki and Sunoo reached them, Heeseung slinging an arm around their shoulders with a broad grin on his face.
“Now that everyone’s here, should we get going?” He asked. The group nodded as one, as they set off into the forest with only the small oil lamp to light their way.
It was relatively silent for the first few minutes, each of them carefully not to be too loud in order not to awaken their drowsy town, as well as to not accidentally scare each other in the process. The seven boys moved relatively slowly, the one measly light between them halting them from progressing quickly. A silence drifted over them as they ventured further in, every now and then someone would snap a twig and their soft footsteps would freeze. Niki wondered if they were really scared of something being out here. After all, no one would be able to hear a single twig cracking all the way from town.
Eventually, they stumbled into a small clearing. Well, about as clear as it had been so far. There were still trees littered around and shrubbery to shove aside, but it wasn't nearly as dense as the woods they had traveled through prior. The boys drifted from their single-file line and glanced around as best they could in the dark. Suddenly, a hand was pointing toward something near the edge of the clearing.
“Hey, is that a house?” A voice Niki recognized as Jungwon called out from beside him. Following the boy’s hand and peering past it, Niki saw a small building. It seems rugged and hollow, but nonetheless, it did look like a cabin.
“Do you think the kumiho lives there?” Jake asked, his voice a little breathy.
“I mean, who else lives in the woods” Heeseung replied, stepping over a tree root to cross towards the structure. Sunoo reached out to grab his wrist, an almost pleading look in his eye.
“What if someone lives there? You can’t just break in!”
“If a person lived in there, they would take better care of it,” Heeseung scoffed, turning away and resuming his way over, “come on, guys!”
Niki watched Jay give Sunoo an apologetic look, patting him once on the back before following Heeseung. The others trailed behind the two oldest until it was Niki and Sunoo alone again. Niki fixed him with a questioning look, but Sunoo simply sighed, gesturing to the youngest before setting off to catch up with the rest.
When Niki arrived at the front of the house, Heeseung and Jake were already attempting to get in. Heeseung had a shoulder against the door, trying to forcefully knock it down. Jake was kicking at the bottom of the wood, although both boys’ attempts seemed to prove futile. Sunghoon spoke up, pointing to the handle on the door.
“Doesn’t work. It’s stuck or something,” Heeseung gritted out, pulling back before slamming his body against the door. It seemed to rattle the frail house, and the sound of something crashing came from inside the cabin. The wooden door trembled against his weight but held firm nonetheless. Jake looked at the boy with widened eyes, and slowly backed out of his way. Heeseung rammed into the door over and over, grunts leaving his mouth with each collision. The rest of the boys simply watched him, the forest silent save for the thuds and creaking of the house. Niki glanced over at Sunoo, seeing the boy’s face scrunch up in a wince every time Heeseung’s body collided with the wood.
Eventually, Heeseung sunk down in front of the jammed door, his steadfast resolve cracking. His head leaned back to rest against the wood, a sigh slipping past his lips. Niki stared at him before his eyes drifted to look at the house. The wood was splintering in some places, and the wood pillars at the corners of the house looked close to falling apart. The windows were hidden by shutters, although one was hanging off by the hinges, allowing Niki to see the glass behind it. It was surprisingly clear, and he didn’t see any cracks at all. The seemingly pristine condition of the window was in direct contrast with the withering state of the rest of the cabin. The building was obviously abandoned, and yet the window’s glass seemed to be kept clean and cared for. Niki leaned forward a tiny bit to look closer at the window, attempting to make out the inside of the house, only to see a figure blocking his view.
Wait, what?
Niki froze, blinking a few times. Perhaps he was simply imagining things. Yet still, a pair of eyes met his through the window. Inside the cabin, a girl stood in front of the window, peering at Niki with a curious glint in her eyes. Niki’s gaze flickered toward Heeseung in a panic, but when he looked back at the window, the girl and her inquisitive eyes were gone. Niki felt an unsettling dread build in his gut, the desperate urge to leave filling his body. A small voice in the back of his mind wanted to push further, to know more, but his innate instincts won. The realization hit him all at once: that it was almost midnight, they were in the middle of the forest, outside a strange cabin, with a peculiar girl watching them from the window, and Heeseung was sitting right beside the door.
“It’s probably abandoned, it looks pretty rundown. I don’t think there is any use in trying to get inside,” Niki rushed out, “we should probably start heading back anyways.”
Heeseung slowly pushed himself to his feet, a grin spreading across his face.
“What is it, getting cold feet?” He mocked, his tone light.
“I agree with Niki, let’s go home,” Jungwon yawned, “I’m getting tired.”
The seven of them begin to make their way back towards the village, leaving the cabin behind. Niki swears he hears Sunoo breathe a sigh of relief but chooses not to comment on it, still a little stunned by the perplexing girl through the glass. Niki glances at the empty window once more, only the darkness meeting him now.
“Hey, Niki! Hurry up, man!” Jake calls out. Niki shakes his head, turning and trailing after his friends. It was silent as they followed the path they took to the cabin, a lingering feeling of unease followed him until they exited the forest. The boys bid each other goodnight, small smiles exchanged, some pulled a little too tight around the edges.
Although Niki still felt apprehensive as he snuck back into bed that night, a peculiar wonder began to eat at him. Why was that girl living in the woods? Where is her family? Why didn’t she do anything? Question after question flittered through his mind, not a single one was he able to answer. But Niki wanted to know. He felt a desire to learn about whoever it was he saw that night, and it unsettled him almost as much as actually seeing her did. Adrenaline was still running through his veins, and with that alone keeping him awake, he formed a plan.
The next night, Niki snuck out through his bedroom window again, carefully shutting it behind him when his feet hit the dirt. It was a little bit more difficult tonight, however, because not only was Niki carrying his own oil lamp, but draped around his wrist was a basket, a white cloth carefully wrapped around the contents inside.
That morning, Niki had taken a bit more for breakfast than he usually did, claiming he would eat it for lunch as well. On top of his usual bread and jam, he also grabbed another serving of both, and a bit of cheese to go with it. Then, under the pretense of having forgotten something in his room, he quickly stashed the loaf of milk bread, the jar of strawberry jam, and the cheese block in the basket, tying a knot at the top of the cloth to keep ants away, and shoved it under his bed. He didn’t get to eat much that day, but honestly, Niki didn’t think he would be able to stomach it anyways. Worry was eating at him for most of the day, the thought of being completely alone in the forest, unable to call for anyone if something went awry. But Niki shook it off, his eagerness keeping him going.
Gripping the lantern tighter, Niki began his journey to their tree and the forest beyond. He followed the path the seven of them took the night before, retracing their steps a little slower than before, keeping a careful watch on his surroundings. He arrived at the cabin without any adversities, swiveling his head once more before walking to the front steps. Niki carefully set the basket in front of the door, the wood seeming sturdy even after all Heeseung did to it the previous night.
Niki’s eyes flickered to the windows, the single shutter still hanging loosely. He refused to look too closely this time, quickly slipping away from the house without lingering too long. He felt much more vulnerable without the assurance of the other boys beside him. Niki ran all the way back through the forest, leaves whipping against his skin and the gentle breeze turning fierce as he pushed out of the forest. He didn’t stop running until he reached the safety of their looming oak tree, feeling its embrace as his feet hit its roots. Niki paused for a moment, his breath coming out in quick pants. After catching his breath, Niki turned to look over his shoulder, a small grin forming on his face.
Now all he had to do was wait.
“Niki! Are you listening?” Jake waved his hand in front of Niki’s face, successfully pulling him from his daze. The seven boys were currently sitting around Sunghoon’s room listening to Jake tell them about his most recent catch from the lake and how his mother was complaining he spent too much time fishing. Jake shook his head at Niki before continuing his rant.
“And she kept going on about how I needed to start focusing more on finding someone to marry and settling down,” he rolled his eyes, lifting a hand to rest his chin on, “like I need to find someone, we all know that any of the girls in town would be kill to end up marrying one of us.”
Although there were some scoffs from the older boys at Jake’s confidence, it wasn’t as if he was wrong. They were popular in their village, and especially popular among the girls. Before Heeseung and Jay finally decided on one girl, they typically had a new one hanging off their arm every week. The rest of them always had girls giving them gifts and whatnot, vying for their attention. More often than not, girls would give them gifts in the form of food, such as pies or freshly baked bread.
Like the bread Niki gave to the girl in the forest.
He quickly shot up from his spot on the floor, muttering an apology about not feeling well and going home early. Niki ignored the weird looks the other boys gave him, walking out the door and away from their prying eyes. All he could think about was that girl. He had visited her cabin again last night, only to find the food was gone. And not only was that gone, but so was the entire basket, meaning that a human had to have taken it. An animal would have no need for a basket, and it was unlikely that it would even attempt to take it. The fact that it was gone confirmed his suspicion that someone lived in that cabin. He hadn’t been seeing things when he saw the figure in the window. But what should he do now? Was he supposed to tell his friends?
Lost in his thoughts, Niki didn’t pay attention to what he was doing or where he was going. He was only pulled back into reality when he felt a sharp sting on the side of his arm. He looked down to see blood beginning to trickle from a cut on his bicep. He winced, feeling the cloth of his shirt brushing against the wound. He glanced around him for the cause of the injury when he spotted someone crouching down near him. He paused, surprised to find someone else out here. He took a few steps closer, trying to get a better glimpse of the mysterious person.
The person seemed to be a girl, and she was crouched down beside a thin red fox, feeding it something out of the palm of her hand. Niki was a little shocked, everyone knew it was dangerous to go in the woods in general but to get that close to the unpredictable wildlife? It was essentially begging to get attacked. Niki craned his neck, peering at the girl’s hand, where a small piece of cheese sat being offered to the fox. With a start, Niki realized that could be the cheese he gave to the girl in the cabin, and this might just be that girl.
“Hey, you!” Niki yelled, wincing at his own volume. The fox jerked its head up before darting off deeper into the woods, leaving the girl and her bit of cheese behind. She turned to where Niki stood, a scowl on her face. Even with her expression distorting her features, Niki could tell she was beautiful. Niki didn’t get to admire the girl for long before she was stomping over to him, calling out as she did so.
“You scared the fox away! He has to eat too, you know,” she snapped at him, waving her hands around for emphasis, “Do you always just go around yelling in the woods, huh?”
Niki rubbed the back of his neck, a little sheepish at being scolded by a girl he didn’t even know. He mumbled an apology, speaking up once her temper had quelled.
“But you know, it’s dangerous in the forest. You really shouldn’t be out here.”
She wouldn’t quite meet his gaze, but he saw her roll her eyes anyways, “Oh yeah? Then what are you doing out here?”
Niki was taken aback by this, not expecting her to rebut him. He fumbled over his words, claiming that he was just looking for something, a certain kind of berry. When questioned why, Niki made up some random nonsense about how if you see those berries, it brings you good luck. Niki didn’t know anything about berries, nor did he care for superstitious myths like that, but he couldn’t tell her that he was trying to find a random girl he saw in the window of an abandoned cabin that he didn’t even know what she looked like besides a brief glimpse.
“Is that so?” the girl questioned, clearly unconvinced by his ramblings. She finally lifted her head enough to meet Niki’s gaze, and he sucked in a breath out of shock.
Niki recognized those eyes, he doesn’t think he would ever be able to forget them. Her eyes were the most memorable thing about her, shining through the glass. They held the same curious tinge as they had the night he first saw her, and Niki’s chest suddenly felt lighter and eerily dense at the same time. He wasn’t even able to reply to the girl, stuck staring at her eyes as they flickered down to his arm, widening at some point below his shoulder.
“What happened?” She yelped, reaching out to examine his arm. Niki hissed when her fingers made contact with his wound, the pain flaring up even though the barrier of his sleeve prevented direct contact. The girl’s eyebrows furrowed, and she looked up at him, inquiring for permission to look at his injury. He nodded dumbly, almost hypnotized by her gaze, and suppressed a shiver at the feeling of her cold fingers brushing against his arm.
Niki peered down at his arm, surprised to find a patch of blood soaked through his sleeve. He watched as the girl gently lifted the fabric up and away from the rest of his arm, bunching it up at his shoulder. The wound itself seemed to have gotten worse, red flaring up around the injury, blood continuing to leak from the cut. It didn’t look infected, but it was clear that it would likely be soon if it wasn’t properly attended to. The girl seemed to realize this too and turned her gaze back toward him.
“Let me clean that for you, I have some bandages at my cabin,” She told him, moving her hand away from his arm to let it fall at her side. She held a sort of determination in her gaze, and although he knew he shouldn’t follow a stranger deeper into the forest, something in his gut spurred him to trust her. Niki bobbed his head, trailing after the girl as she sharply turned on her heel and walked confidently into the trees.
As Niki tailed behind her, he noticed she moved through the forest with a sort of learned elegance, as if she could find her way around even if she was blindfolded. She knew which trees had hidden roots, knew which shrubs and plants were poisonous, knew when there was an animal nearby, and warned Niki of all of this before he had even considered it a possibility. To be this well-versed in the forest, Niki thought she must have lived here for a long time. The thought both intrigued and saddened him. He wondered what must have happened to her to force her into living in such conditions for as long as she likely had.
If she was a kumiho, it would make sense that she’s lived in the woods her whole life.
Niki stilled at the notion, that looming dread creeping back. The girl must have noticed his pause, looking back to give him an inquiring stare.
“What is it?”
Niki opened his mouth but no words came out. He shook his head, forcing a small smile across his lips.
“Nothing.”
She didn’t seem convinced, but he caught her gaze flicker to his arm and she nodded, quickly turning back. The rest of the walk to her cabin was silent, Niki’s thoughts swirling around his head like smoke, slowly suffocating him with their fumes.
If Niki hadn’t recognized the girl before, he definitely would have when they reached her house. It was the exact same cabin Niki and his friends had found nights prior, and it was still in the same poor condition as it had been. The girl seemed to only now realize this, and Niki saw a flush creep up her neck. She didn’t mention it, however, her strides assured as she pushed open the door with ease. Niki almost wanted to laugh, imagining Heeseung’s face if he saw this after he had so much trouble with the dreaded door.
She sat him down at a small table beside the kitchen, telling him to wait there while she went to go get supplies. Niki took the opportunity to observe the girl’s home. Contrary to the outside of the cabin, the inside was well-kept and nicely decorated. The walls held a multitude of framed flowers, each one labeled beneath in skillful ink. There were potted plants in most corners of the home, ranging from petite ones sitting on the counter to vast plants reaching to the ceiling. The walls were solid, it seemed as if there was a separate wall for the inside and outside of the house. The furniture was sparse and simple, but the abundance of plants easily made up for the empty space. Niki found the cabin rather cozy, almost warm, a stark contrast from the cold and menacing exterior.
The girl returned with gauze and two small bottles of liquid. Niki assumed one was water, but wasn't quite sure what the other was. She sat down beside him and got to work silently. She peeled off a section of gauze, dousing it in water before lifting Niki’s sleeve again, carefully pressing the damp cloth against his cut. She was gentle enough for it to not hurt much as she wiped away the blood surrounding it. Once the girl deemed it sufficient, she tore off more gauze and soaked it in the other liquid. Niki was curious, but he refrained from asking, opting to let her work instead. She turned back to him but hesitated a little before pressing the soaked gauze against his wound.
“This might sting a little.” She added, settling the cloth on the gash. Niki hissed, retracting his arm from his grip. Sure, she had given him a warning, but it still hurt, and it stung more than just a little. She also moved her hand away, peering up at him with concern.
“I’m sorry, did it hurt?” The girl worried. Niki shook his head, even though he could still feel it burning a bit.
“No, just caught me off guard,” He grunted. She nodded, pressing the cloth lighter this time, brushing it over the wound. Niki gritted his teeth, the burning lessening the more he got used to it. He spoke up again, partly to distract himself.
“What is this stuff anyways?”
“It’s diluted vinegar. It helps with disinfecting wounds, but you shouldn’t leave it on for too long. It could end up harming more than helping.” She answered, her voice smooth. It wasn’t long before she withdrew the cloth, and Niki let out a small sigh. He saw the corners of the girl’s mouth twitch up, but she spoke before he could say anything.
“Don’t worry, I never liked it much either.” She took the dry gauze and began to wrap it around his arm. Her touch was delicate like he was something fragile. He almost disliked it, but at the same time, it felt nice to have someone take care of him for once. As Niki watched her, he wondered if she recognized him too. She had to, right? Surely you wouldn’t forget a boy who had tried to break into your house in the middle of the night. But then again, perhaps she had mistaken the incident for a dream. For some reason, Niki wanted her to know that it wasn't.
“I know you.” He announced, his voice much calmer than he felt. In reality, his heart was pounding, his eyes a little too wide as he watched for her reaction. The only affirmation he got that she had heard him at all was her pulling his gauze a tiny bit too tight, pausing for only an instant before resuming her work.
“What do you mean?”
“I saw you a few nights ago when I was with my friends,” Niki began, his pulse creeping up his throat, “through the window.”
She finished wrapping his wound, tying it off at the side in a simple knot. He almost wanted to admire her work, the wrapping far better than he could have ever done, but he kept his eyes trained on the girl. She leaned back, looking him in the eye.
“I remember now, your friend kept banging against the door. I was woken up and took a look outside, thinking it was one of the wild animals I feed wanting food.”
Niki restrained a wince. After that disaster of a first impression, it was a miracle she even let him near her house. He felt the need to explain himself, but he quickly lost his composure, beginning to ramble and stumble over his words.
“We weren’t trying to break in! Well, we kinda were, but we didn’t think anyone lived here! I mean, from the outside, it looked pretty abandoned. Not to say you don’t take enough care of it, it just seemed a bit unkempt! That’s why we tried to get in! Wouldn’t you do the same thing? I mean, come on, it’s not every day you find a house in the middle of the woods, we just wanted to take a look inside!”
The girl suddenly laughed, her joyful expression catching Niki off guard. Her laugh was sweet, the sound easing the tension Niki had slowly built in his shoulders. She smiled at him, a soft easy-going one, and the sun caught in her eyes from the window, giving them a dazzling shine.
“Hey, don’t worry about it. You were just curious. Like you said, I would have done the same thing.” She teased, giving him a playful wink. Niki flushed, muttering a shy apology. He looked back up at her, feeling his own lips tug up at her contagious smile.
“What’s your name?” He asked. The girl seemed to stop for a moment, her gaze meeting his. There was something there that he couldn’t quite place, but it made him feel warm and safe and nervous all at the same time. She seemed conflicted for a second, before letting her mouth rest into a serene smile.
“Y/n. It’s y/n.”
You weren’t exactly sure what to make of Niki. He didn’t seem to have the same intentions as the boys who you met before, didn’t have the same hungry gaze. Instead, he seemed curious, a desire to learn more about you as a person, not just for your appearance. It caught you off guard, especially since despite this curiosity, he still remained cautious of your presence. While the other boys were always smug, and overly confident in their abilities, Niki retained some humility. It honestly astonished you, knowing the crowd he hung around. You didn’t know most of their names, but you had heard about one in particular, the oldest of their group.
When you first arrived in this town a few months ago, you saw a boy who would always wander around the forest, often killing rabbits and other small rodents. It pissed you off. You snuck around town sometimes after that, trying to see what he did besides killing wildlife. You watched him for a few weeks, watched as he went through girl after girl, watched as he corrupted their minds and ruined their reputations. It brought him a sick satisfaction, and you wanted more than anything to give him a taste of his own medicine.
You purposely walked along the path he liked to hunt on, waiting for him. He responded about how you expected, all charming smiles and coy winks. You lured him in, purring your words and sweetening your tone. You acted like every one of the girls he had ruined, except this time it would be him.
You had known you had when his hands got a little too touchy and his glances lingered on you a little too long. His sweet words did nothing to mask the fervent hunger. He looked at you like he did the animals he killed. It sickened you, and you knew it was time. You teased him with a honeyed grin and watched his eyes widen in disbelief when you sunk claws into his heart.
You don’t remember his name, but you knew he had a brother. You saw him at the funeral, a deep frown decorating his face and fresh tears streaking his face. You suppose you shouldn’t have expected anything different from the boy, seeing as he was your most recent kill’s brother. He played girls the same way his brother did, although not to the same extent. He only seemed to do it after his brother was gone, perhaps in his memory in some sick sense. But he settled down, found a girl, and committed fully, treating her as gold. Perhaps that is why you left him alone. Perhaps letting him live when his brother was gone was more punishment than simply killing him.
When Niki came along, he took the time to tell you all about his friends. You learned the oldest of their group was called Heeseung, and was finally able to put a name to his face. When Niki mentioned Heeseung’s brother, you struggled to keep your face neutral, desperate to not let recognition show in your eyes. You swore you did a horribly poor job, but if Niki noticed, he said nothing.
Ever since the day you had cleaned his wound for him in your cabin, he visited you as often as he could. Some days he couldn’t find you, and you simply took the chance to watch him from afar. You wanted to see if he was as gentle with the wildlife as he was with you. You had seen boys that treated you with care but blatantly disrespected the nature beneath their feet. A voice in the back of your head was hoping he would mess up, hoping that your previous view could be restored. But he always stepped with care, never intruding on any wild animal’s personal space. You ruled out the possibility of him simply being scared, as he often excitedly chattered to you about how pretty the foxes and deer were, and how he wished he could touch them. He brought more cheese with him, and you taught him how to feed the foxes. Niki seemed entranced by them, carefully reaching his hand out, palm open, with a bit of cheese. His mouth opened in a small gasp the first time a fox took the cheese, and when it scampered off, he turned to you with a bright smile and wide eyes. You had burned the image into your mind and secretly traced it into your heart.
You were quickly coming to realize it was difficult to lie to Niki. Not because he could read you easily, in fact, he was rather dense when it came to understanding your inner thoughts, but due to some odd moral dilemma. He had shattered your previous perception. His gaze wasn’t a tiger’s or a lion’s, it wasn’t a hungry beast waiting for the chance to strike. It was like a gentle breeze, light touches and dancing around, softly encouraging you onward.
You simply couldn’t bring yourself to lie to Niki. Even on the first day, you couldn’t lie to him. Whenever a boy had asked for your name, you either made one up or simply refused to tell them, playing it off with a sly smirk and a wink. But somehow, Niki was able to make you let your guard down. Your name was rolling off your tongue before you could even think of the consequences. His tender smile as he told you his name made any thoughts or regrets evaporate.
You still remember how soft his voice sounded when he asked about your parents one night. The two of you were laying on your backs in the clearing, gazing up at the stars. He pointed out all the constellations he knew, chirping about how his mom had taught them to him when he was younger. His voice had gotten faint once he asked, and he shifted himself up on his elbows to better look at your face.
“You don’t have to answer.” He added in a quiet voice, harmless and unassuming like a rabbit.
“No, it’s alright,” You said. You thought for a moment about what to tell him and settled on the closest thing to the truth you could get, “I never knew them. They probably died soon after I was born.” You watched the stars, keeping your eyes away from Niki. Part of you knew that if you held his gaze for too long you might spill everything to him. And while you desperately wanted to trust him, you weren’t sure you could. Out of the corner of your eye, you saw Niki slowly nod, processing what you told him.
“Do you,” He started cautiously, “ever wish you didn’t have to be alone?”
You stared straight ahead, silently stunned. You pulled yourself out of it, thinking over his question. You didn’t have a time when you weren’t alone, so it wasn’t like you really had something to compare it to. But you weren’t alone, you knew that.
“Sometimes, sure. But I have the forest. I have the deer, and the rabbits, and the foxes to keep me company. We look out for each other, we keep each other safe.” A small smile graced your lips, an honest one, not for show or anything else. You basked in the silence for a moment, listening to the wind as it brushed over the two of you.
“And you have me.” Niki declared. You looked at him, your expression confused, and Niki cleared his throat before repeating himself.
“You have me, too. We can look out for each other. Even if we feel alone, we will be here for each other, okay?” He had a determination in his eyes that you wanted to coo at, but you felt breathless. You simply stared at him for a few seconds, silence drifting between you, but Niki’s expression stayed resolute. A tranquil feeling danced over your body, and you let yourself relax into the grass.
“Okay. We have each other.” He smiled, content, and laid back down beside you, the dewy grass tickling your bodies.
You knew then that you couldn’t deceive him any longer.
When Niki visited you the next day, you had a sinking feeling. It was as if you were swimming towards safety but the closer to shore you swam the further away it got. You could feel your mind slowly getting tired, limbs numb as you pressed on. You prayed that Niki wouldn’t notice. You had promised yourself that you would tell him, but you wanted to decide that on your own, not because you were urged into it.
Of course, you should have known it wouldn’t happen the way you wanted. Niki had a way of making you open up. You found yourself carving spaces for him deep inside of you, time and time again, and now was no different. His eyes were considerate as they watched you, and his voice was small when he spoke.
“Are you alright? You seem on edge,” Niki coaxed, “Did something happen?”
You had never been able to lie to Niki. Even now, when faced with a question where you should have responded with a well-practiced lie, your breath caught in your throat. It was simple, you should never tell anyone about what you were, not unless you planned on them being dead within the next 5 minutes. And yet here you were, ready to spill out your heart to the boy with a gaze as gentle as the wind. In his eyes, you saw the shore you desperately needed to reach.
“I need to tell you something.”
He nodded, letting you take his hand and lead him back inside your cabin. You sat him down at the small table, taking the seat beside him. You remembered the very first time the two of you sat here, and you felt an urge to reach out for his arm, to look for the wound even though the scar had long faded. You felt Niki squeeze your still intertwined hands, and you took a breath before you spoke.
“I’m a kumiho.” You gulped, the feeling of dread building up again. It threatened to drown you, an overwhelming force pushing over your head. You braced yourself for him to attack you, ripping his hand away with a disgusted expression, using whatever was closest to him to strike you with. Or perhaps it would be worse, his gaze would turn fearful, his mouth dropping in a silent scream, and he would bolt away from you, taking the shore, taking your safety with him.
“I know,” Niki said finally. You stared at him, astonished.
“You.. know?”
He nodded, a simple thing, but to you, it felt like you had finally reached safety. Your aching body collapsed against the sand, feeling the grains stick against your soaked skin.
“I’ve had a feeling since I first saw you,” He let a light chuckle slip through, the sound feeling foreign in the current situation. Niki hesitated for a second, before grasping your other hand as well, eyes piercing through you.
“Can I ask you something?”
You nodded dumbly, far too shocked to be able to think clearly.
“Why didn’t you kill me?”
His eyes held a million questions, but he had settled on this one. You didn’t know how to explain it to yourself, let alone him You felt lost and yet seen, you were about to sink but he was keeping you afloat. When you were seconds from burning out, he lit you aflame.
“You were just… different.”
“Why? What did they do?” His tone wasn’t critical or condemning, it was simply curious. His gaze was humane, bordering on sympathetic, and you almost wanted to cry.
“They didn’t care about anyone else but themselves. They would kill wildlife and laugh about it. They destroyed and corrupted girls and got satisfaction from it. It made me sick, Niki.”
His gaze softened as you spoke, and he let go of one of your hands to reach out, brushing against your face delicately. It was only then you realized there were tears running down your face. You began to cry harder at the recognition, feeling Niki’s hands wipe away your tears as they fell, consoling you. You murmured about how you wished they would do such things, and he quieted your blubbering with soothing hands.
You blinked away the rest of the tears, peering at him in a mixture of shame and awe. He stared back with what could only be described as adoration, a tender smile painting his lips. Niki waited until your tears had stopped falling, reduced to small sniffles before he spoke.
“Is it true that if a kumiho doesn’t kill anyone for a thousand days, then they will become human?” He asked, a glimmer of something you couldn’t place in his eyes.
“Yes, it is.” You responded slowly, doubtful of where exactly he was going with this.
“How long has it been since you last,” Niki paused for a moment before steeling himself, “since you last killed someone?”
Your voice caught in your throat, the words like a vice grip around you. Niki clasped your hands tightly, whispers of “It’s okay” and “They weren’t innocent” in his soft voice reaching your ears.
“His name was Beomgyu,” You hiccupped, “It was a week before I saw you for the first time.” The only thing keeping you steady was Niki’s secure hold.
“So it’s been a couple months?”
You nodded gently, not quite looking him in the eye. You felt ashamed, a feeling you had never had about what you did to those boys before you met Niki.
“Do you think you can do it?” He asked faintly. You looked at him then, a question written in your gaze.
“Can you not hurt anyone for the rest of the thousand days?” He coaxed, “Then you would be human, you wouldn’t have to worry anymore.”
You almost broke out into tears again from his words. Never had you thought you would open up to someone this much, your heart in your hands, practically begging him to take it. You felt selfish, selfish for wanting to have him, selfish for tainting him with your previous actions. A part of you told you to refuse, that you had already gone too far. This was your only chance to attempt to fix things, to save him from yourself.
“I’ll wait for you, y/n, I promise. I’ll wait for as long as it takes.”
You closed your eyes then, desperately willing the tears pooling up to disappear. A single one fell down your cheek anyway, and a pitiful gasp escaped you.
“You don’t have to, Niki.”
“I want to.” He assured, taking your face in his hands. The two of you stared at each other for what felt like ages, before he spoke again, never taking his eyes off yours.
“Can I kiss you?”
You nodded as best you could with his hands around your face, and waited for the press of his lips against yours. When it finally came, only then did you allow your eyes to close, breaking the gaze between you.
It wasn’t anything like you had experienced before. It wasn’t rough, it wasn’t hungry, it wasn’t the beast you had come to anticipate. His kiss was just as gentle as he was, a soft, sweet breeze picking you up. It made you feel as light as the sky and brought you back down to Earth at the same time. It made you feel human.
Niki pulled back after a few seconds, resting his forehead against yours, a serene smile playing on his lips. You felt your own lips tugging upwards to match his, a silent wish to be able to live like him. It hit you then that you could.
“I’m scared, Niki.” you whispered in the space between you, “What if it hurts? What if I can’t do it?”
What if it doesn’t work?
“I believe in you. I’ll be by your side the whole way, I promise you.” He soothed.
The two of you stayed like that for a while, just holding each other. You decided to trust in him. You had already given him the most intricate parts of who you were, you wanted him to have everything.
Tonight was the end of the thousandth day, and you were finally going to be human. In all honestly, you were terrified. And you were upset too. Niki hadn’t visited you for an entire week now. You knew Niki had grown up some, and gained more responsibilities, but that didn’t make it hurt any less. You should have known he would have less time for you as the two of you grew older, it had almost been 3 years since you first met each other, and his town and family were calling on him to settle down. But you refused to acknowledge that until it hit you in the face.
Despite these new duties, Niki hadn’t changed as a person. He was still sweet, still gentle when he held you and gentle with your home. He still had the same beaming smile whenever a fox ate from his hand or curled up at his feet. Niki was still your tranquil breeze, the wind brushing through your hair and guiding you along.
You had learned more about him over the past few years, and under the cover of night, even gotten to visit his village a few times. His bubbly tone as he showed you around overshadowed the consequences if you were caught.
Thinking about all the experiences you had with him only made you more irritated that he wasn’t here with you now. He had promised you, and Niki was never one to break his promises. You had seen that time and time again, which made his absence all the more distressing. But perhaps he had simply forgotten, after all, it is difficult to keep track of every single day. You secretly prayed that he had just forgotten and that nothing else had happened.
That night, when you finally became human, it wasn’t anything grand or spectacular like you had often joked. It wasn’t the deadly pain you had expected either. Instead, when midnight arrived, you simply blacked out. The next thing you remember was waking up in the morning, sore all over your body, especially on the sides of your head, hands, feet, and lower back. You felt a rush of hopefulness wash over you when you realized those were the areas your kumiho nature was most likely to show through, whether that be fox ears, claws, or the easily recognizable nine tales. In a daze, you attempted to change fully into a kumiho, ecstatic to find that you couldn’t, no matter how hard you tried. With wide eyes and a blissful smile, you began jumping around your small cabin out of pure joy.
Your first instinct was to find Niki, only to remember you hadn’t seen him in over a week. With a newfound confidence in your humanity, you began walking down to his town, intent on finding him. You still feel a little hesitant walking around in broad daylight, but to your surprise, there isn’t anyone around. Assuming they must be working inside or resting, you head to Niki’s home. You creep around the back, to where his bedroom window is. However, when you get there, you were puzzled to find wood boarded up over where his window should be.
You curiously examine it, finding a small sliver near the bottom where the planks didn’t quite reach. You peer through, seeing Niki pacing around his room. You call out to him, watching as his head snaps toward where you are in a panic. He checks over his shoulder at the door before rushing over, crouching down until he is faced with the small gap.
“Y/n? You need to run, now.” Niki insisted, his voice strained, “I don’t know how, but the town found out about us, about how you’re a kumiho.”
“But I’m not a kumiho anymore! It worked, Niki, I’m human now.”
He paused for a moment, breathing out what you could only call a sigh of relief.
“That’s amazing, really.” He answered, his tone breathy, “But right now, you have to get out of here. They don’t care if you’re human now.”
“I can’t just leave you here.” You responded. You couldn’t, not after everything he had done for you.
“Y/n, if you don’t leave now, they are going to kill you.”
You wouldn’t leave him now. Niki had shown you what it meant to live, to be alive. You would never leave him in a thousand years.
“I’ll be back to get you out of here. We are leaving together.” You rushed out against his pleas. You heard shouts, and snuck over to the side of his house, peeking out. There you saw what seemed to be the majority of the town, standing around with torches and a variety of weapons, ranging from swords to spears to axes. You suppressed a shudder, catching sight of Heeseung and what you assumed to be the rest of Niki’s friends. While they all looked varying degrees of upset, Heeseung looked downright furious. You briefly wondered if this was how he looked when he first learned of his brother’s death.
Before you could think about that any further, you quickly retreated back behind Niki’s house. After taking a deep breath, you began sprinting back toward your cabin. You felt the wind whipping against your face, and the leaves thrashing by your skin, but you paid it no mind. You reached your home quicker than you ever had before, throwing open the door and hurriedly flying around, tossing whatever you deemed necessary in a bag. You doubted you would be able to come back here again, so you put extra food and water than you would normally bring, multiple changes of clothes for the both of you, blankets, other basic survival equipment, and the music box Niki had gifted you last year. You slung the bag over your shoulder, checking its weight before rushing back out the door. You flew through the forest, desperate to get back to Niki before anything else could happen.
You slow your pace as you reach the outskirts of town, carefully creeping around until you reach Niki’s bedroom window again. You call out to him again, watching through the gap until you see him appear. You gently tell him to stand back and he nods, moving away. You tested the durability of the wood, pressing on it with your hand. It had more leeway than you expected, and you pull back your arm, preparing to smash against it with your bicep. Just before you were about to slam against the wood, you hear a shout near you.
“The kumiho is here! It’s trying to get to Niki!”
You turned toward the voice, spotting a woman you didn’t recognize holding a torch, pointing her free hand at you as she cried out. You took off in a flurry, your instincts sharp from living in the forest for so long. You heard Niki yell something behind you, but you were already too far to be able to clearly make out what he said. You run as fast as you are able to, taking difficult twists and turns through the forest in a frantic attempt to lose your pursuers. Soon you are only able to hear one set of footsteps behind you, and in an effort to look behind you to see who it is, you trip, falling to the ground.
Your pursuer caught up to you before you are able to get up, flipping you on your back and pining you there. You felt the cold metal of a blade pressed up against your neck, stinging as it lightly breaks the skin. You met the eyes of the person and felt a tremble run through you as you met Heeseung’s gaze. His eyes are cold, and his mouth is curled into a mocking smirk.
“I thought kumihos were supposed to be agile, hm?” He starts, feigning innocence, “I was hoping for a bit more of a chase, too bad.” He traced his sword up towards your chin, lips quirking down into a taunting frown.
“I’m.. not a… kumiho anymore.” You gritted out, unable to talk properly due to Heeseung’s blade under your chin. He scoffed, peering down at you with hatred. He opened his mouth to speak again but was cut off by the sound of someone shouting behind him.
“Heeseung!”
You watched as the boy’s eyes widened, a deep scowl crossing his face. You recognized that voice, you knew it better than you knew your own.
“Stay out of this, Niki,” Heeseung ordered, voice bordering on a growl.
“Heeseung, please, just listen to me. She’s human now! It’s been almost three years since she hurt anyone, please don’t do this.” Niki begged. You couldn’t see him, but from the sound of his voice, it seemed like he was crying. The thought tugged at your heart despite the precarious situation you currently were in.
“I don’t care how long it’s been, this… thing will never be human. Not after it killed my brother.” Heeseung instinctively pressed the sword further against your neck, a wild look in his eyes.
“He.. wasn’t a good.. person.. your brother… hurt.. people..” You rasped out, wincing at Heeseung’s glare.
“I don’t give a damn what you think about him. He was my brother.”
“You don’t… know what he was.. capable of…” You croaked, feeling blood begin to trickle down the side of your neck from the small cut Heeseung’s blade made. The boy snarled at you, his dark expression causing you to shiver.
“Maybe I don’t,” Heeseung seethed, a sinister grin creeping up his face, “but I do know what I am capable of.” He drew the sword high above his head, ready to strike it down into your heart. You closed your eyes, waiting for the searing pain to arrive.
Instead, you heard a shout, feeling the weight on top of you lighten. Your eyes snapped open, darting around until they landed on the two boys. Niki jumped at Heeseung as soon as he saw the boy lift his sword, tackling him to the ground. Heeseung’s sword had sunk into his own skin when he fell over, the deep gash on his left arm making him cry out in pain. He ripped the blade out, tossing it to the side, a deep grimace painting his features. Niki halted for a moment, shocked at his own actions. His pause gave Heeseung enough time to reach into his own pocket, pull out a small silver knife, and slash it against Niki’s shoulder. It wasn’t nearly as deep as Heeseung’s wound, but Niki yelped out in pain nonetheless.
You scrambled to your feet, grabbing the sword Heeseung had thrown aside and pulling Niki up and behind you, pointing the sword at Heeseung. He stared at you, clutching his arm in agony. A small voice told you to just kill him, to make sure he wouldn’t follow you, to make sure he wouldn’t tell the others where you had gone. The thought of hurting him made you feel sickened, even after what he had just done to you. You gave Heeseung one last glance before you grabbed Niki’s hand and ran.
The two of you kept running until you reached a section deep inside the woods. After checking the surrounding area to make sure no one had followed you, you pulled out the gauze and diluted vinegar you had brought with you. There was a small lake here, and you dipped a piece of gauze into the water, not wanting to use up water that the two of you could drink. Niki had removed his shirt, allowing you easy access to the wound. You thoroughly cleaned his wound, before repeating the process with the diluted vinegar. Niki still flinched, even after almost three years. It made a fond smile decorate your face, even as the two of you sat in the woods after nearly being killed by one of Niki’s closest friends.
You wrap his injury in silence, the two of you listening to the water and the wind, quiet and mild, blissfully unaware of the danger outside of its own bubble. Once you finish, you help Niki put his shirt back on without further injuring himself or disturbing the gauze. You sit back a little, guilt swelling inside of you.
“I’m sorry.” You apologized. Out of the corner of your eye, you saw Niki turn to you, confused.
“Why are you sorry?”
“You can’t go back to your home now, and you even got hurt because of me.” You set your head in your hands, the day’s events finally catching up with you. Niki slowly pried your hands away, taking them in his.
“Y/n, you are my home. I never want to live without you,” He lightly smiled, and it made your stomach fill up with warmth as he continued, “I don’t care if we have to survive on our own in the woods or worry about where our next meal is gonna come from as long as I can be with you. I would risk my life over and over again if it meant keeping you safe.”
You blinked at him before pulling him towards you, pressing your lips against his in a soft kiss. He responded immediately, letting out a pleased hum at your actions. You pulled back, pressing your forehead against yours, mirroring what he did after your first kiss. He realized this after a second, a contented laugh leaving his lips. You felt his warm breath against your mouth and leaned in to press another peck against his lips.
“I love you, Niki.” You confessed.
“I’ve always loved you.” He cooed, an honest smile brightening his expression, “All our hardships are over now, I promise you.”
And even though that wasn’t something either of you could control, you believed him.
As Sunoo wandered aimlessly around the forest with his lantern, he had never felt more ashamed in his life. He never meant for it to happen this way, truly. When he saw Niki hanging out with this girl in the woods, he originally assumed it was a girl from the next town over. But when he saw the nine tails sprouting from her backside, he froze. Sunoo hadn’t known what to do. He ran back to town without a word, and couldn’t sleep that night. He was terrified for Niki, worried that the boy might end up dead any day. He had to tell someone.
So the next morning, he knocked on Heeseung’s door and told him everything. Sunoo didn’t see Heeseung’s eyes darken, and he didn’t see how Heeseung’s jaw clenched. The next thing he knew, Heeseung was calling all the other townspeople for a search party, telling them they were going to kill the kumiho. Sunoo had no choice but to join in.
Lost in his thoughts, he almost didn’t see them. But after looking again, sure enough, there sat Niki and the girl he had seen before, sitting together on the other side of the lake. She looked a little different, less fox-like, and more human now, but it was the same girl. Sunoo wasn’t really sure what to do. He knew what most of his friends would do, they would find backup and then attack them. He knew what Heeseung would do, he would go in alone, killing the girl at any cost. But he wasn’t his friends, and he wasn’t Heeseung. So instead Sunoo stayed still, and he simply watched them. He watched as the girl pulled what looked like bread out of her bread and offered it to Niki. He watched as they ate together, and he watched as they laughed. If he strained his ears, he could almost hear the sound.
After a few minutes, a fox pranced up beside him and sat down near his feet. Sunoo was a bit startled, but when the fox looked up at him and met his gaze, all Sunoo could do was sigh. He looked back across the lake at Niki and the girl, and he knew that he couldn’t fix what he’d done, but maybe he could give them a second chance. Sunoo peered back down at the fox, and in a soft voice, he spoke.
“Take care of them for me, okay?” Sunoo knew the fox couldn’t have understood him, but for some reason, he felt assured that the fox would stay there to watch over his friend. Sunoo glanced back at the two one more time, and with his heavy heart a little bit lighter, he turned on his heel and headed back to the village.
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Signalis Post (barely coherent thought vomit)
So I finished signalis on Monday and i think ive just about recovered enough for me to make a gush post about it on tumblr dot com, which i think i have to do cause i dont think any other game has really hit me as hard as this one. Spoilers obvs.
Being pre-transion, with that associated depression and closing off from oneself, ive always found it difficult to get out my feelings, even in private with just myself, and yet signalis has filled me throughout with its beautiful romantic melancholy and left me genuinely sobbing for the gay robot and her space girlfriend (almost worried that if id played this game on estrogen it might actually have just killed me on the spot). the only other times i can think of where i really cried were playing We Know The Devil near the beginning of the year, which really fkin hit the part of me that struggles to accept myself, and that time i rewatched the last episode of she-ra after reading the ‘Word War Etheria’ fanfic, which brings the characters so much more to life i fell for them all over again.
Signalis is a game that calls back to a lot of classic horror like resident evil and silent hill, which i havent got round to playing any of yet, but i think nostalgia works both ways sometimes and i’ll be playing them sooner now. sometimes horror gets stereotyped as all death and violence, some games fill themselves with skulls and corpses, and big ugly monsters and basically shout ‘DEATH!’ in your face repeatedly and it all just comes off as a bit garish and ridiculous and not actually very scary really. Signalis sits at the other end of that scale (with some of my other fav horror games like soma, cry of fear) where its environs are most usually just… quiet. Still. Muffled. Sad. just as often as theres tension or creeping fear because of this i find theres a strange kind of comfort too. Maybe its just that in most other genres of games theres so much of music, UI elements, pickups and interactibles with vibrant design. Here, theres room for your mind to just occupy the space. A soft fog. A dimly lit room. An empty train. Snow out a window. Liminal spaces that dont expect anything from you.
Signalis is a game thats just simply, unapologetically gay, and i dont think i would have been quite so invested in Elster and Ariane’s relationship if they were a straight couple. Its why representation is important, if art’s way for us to explore our emotions then its important to have media that we can relate to. Even Adler’s role isnt typically masculine. Our replika characters are manufactured, designed for certain roles in the base. Notes from the tough Stars and Storchs in the shooting range, the dollish Eules with the fairy lights and music player in the dorm. I couldnt help but think of groups of Eules sat around chatting, together, and im yearning for that feeling of togetherness, of understanding a friend that closely. I somehow missed the couple in the mineshaft (next playthough, ill find you v_v ). Despite the harshness of life in the Eusan nation (especially for the gestalts) the characters in it are defined by their feelings of belonging and hope. With the obvious parallels to east germany, i think of posters of cosmonauts and space travel from the time. Propaganda, sure but also made with the genuine belief in something greater. When the events of the game take this away, well, we find the last Kolibri, whod rather lose herself than lose her [ah. Im not sure theres a word here to properly describe the relationship they embody]. Its a game defined by loneliness.
We dont lie up at night scared by some corrupted android. We arent stuck with horror at the flesh everywhere, not on its own. We lie awake thinking about Elster and Ariane’s love for each other, the horror of their decline, the futility of trying to hold on forever. Its existential horror done perfectly. It shows an ending postponed and stretched far beyond its limits, and so squarely reminds you that you do, in fact, have to die one day. You’ll break down. One day you’ll say your last words to the people you love and you wont even know you have. Ariane’s final few diaries arrive with the full force of the narrative behind it, like a spear through my heart. For the record, I got the promise ending. Im still sad. It's a game about raging desperately against an unfair ending. I might think about this game for the rest of my life. I would sincerely say its an artistic masterpiece, by the sure definition of video games as art.
I like that the story leaves a lot open and abstract. I think it makes the emotional themes takes centre stage more. And i havent had nearly enough time to sift through it and come up with my own takes, we’ll need a few more playthroughs for that. And theres so much more to say that cant go in just these few paragraphs! Signalis is a game about two girls who had to run away from everything to find someone they belonged with. The universe may be cold and bleak, but you have to try, you might just find something beautiful, even if it doesnt last forever. I think if anything, we should all have the chance to find love and happiness like that, and we shouldnt have abandon a world that doesnt work for us to do it.
#signalis#lgbt#lesbian#long ass emotional ramble post#fuck im nearly crying again#horror#liminal#signalis spoilers#elster#ariane yeong
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I accidentally drew the same goddamn pose 3 times lmao. Why is posing legs so hard i always fall back on posing them in the shape of a 4. Also, new freak!! Her name is Jerryjack. More about her + individual images + couple other things below the cut vvv
I don’t think I’ve posted any drawings of her other than her first, but i’ve been drawing rig a lot more like this rather than that first one. More graphic head shape, more upright ears, one eye hidden, mouth hidden by scarf, what have you. I think she looks cooler and is way easier to draw like this, but is a little less sonicy, im sure I’ll find a balance sometime. Rare carrion non-blep, this pose is cool but i did not even try cleaning this up lol.
And jerryjack!! She sucks so bad i love her. They’re Rig’s best friend, known each other since they were kids and learned the trade (killing) under the same mentor. She’s 11 months older than Rig, so she’s about 25ish. She hates consistency, commitment, seriousness, kids, stagnation, compassion, anything boring, and many many other things. She loves anything fun, stirring shit, lying, inflicting blunt force trauma, herself, lockpicking, and money. She’s purely self-interested and does everything she does for funsies. She’s not a part of the postal crew cause she thinks it’s boring and is allergic to commitment but hangs around and ‘helps out’ sometimes. She’s a hitman on her own, and has way more connections through that than rig, occasionally floats jobs her way. Also sometimes places bounties on her when shes mad. Or just cause.
Unlike Jerry, Rig is a very routine and organized person. She wakes up every morning at 6 sharp despite not being a morning person. Miraculously, she and jerry lived together for 2 years and during that time rig ate microwaved oatmeal every single morning and got groceries on tuesdays. All this is to say Rig is very methodical and likes routing and things that are expected. So Jerry lost their shit when rig called them randomly and casually told them that she’s starting a non-euphemistic postal service and also spontaneously took in a couple kids. Naturally, she’s very wary of squabble and carrion, especially the latter. Assassin recognizes assassin, silly recognizes silly, they try to kill each other and then become besties (who still periodically attempt to kill each other). As for squabble, she’s surprisingly fun to interact with, so jerry warms up fairly quick and becomes a truly awful influence on her.
Here’s the first drafts and base. She’s obviously a jackalope but calls herself a hare for some reason. Is part of that reason because i couldn’t think of a pun name other than jack like jackrabbit and ‘jack the jackalope’ sounded a little too stupid for my taste (as if ‘jerryjack’ isn’t stupider)? Ummmmmmm.
Anyway, i decided to nix the asymmetrical antlers cause theres a limit to how much asymmetry i should stuff into a set of characters, carrion’s already got the lopped off ear and etc. the back and tail marking is supposed to emulate ribs
I’m still super duper undecided on jerry’s outfit and colour scheme. Every outfit ive thought up so far feels way too simple or untethered to reality in comparison to the postal crew’s, however i think the postal crew is a bit too complicated (or way too complicated in squabble’s case) and too grounded for sonic, so. Idk what to do abt that. And as for their colour scheme, as seen above her first drafts have the same red and green of the postal crew, but seeing as she doesn’t work with them it’s definitely the better choice to diverge from that. Saturated orange is the most tense and unsettling colour to me so i think it suits her off putting nature, but the white and orange combo reminds me intensely of like. 1960s egg chairs. WAIT and ulala space channel 5. And various stupid tech startup kitchen gadgets. Just generally a combo with a lot of nonthreatening and safe associations rather than the warning sign i want. Idk man i’ll workshop it eventually.
Also, cloak rig. Her previous red coat was stupid. Not sure how much smarter this is but it looks cooler. Still doesn’t usually wear it other than in towns to hide her wings or when it’s cold. Also also this is the same fucking pose again
#Sooooooo sleepy rn#so if anything is incoherent it’s cause i’m so sleepy always and forever#doodles#ocs#oc posting#sonic oc#rig the fox-bat#carrion the cat#jerryjack the hare#super awful at getting stuff out of my head so idk how well i explained them or got across their vibe#i like my ocs so much man. so much#i need to post about them more#my art
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Brace yourselves Stolitz fans, I think it’s gonna get bumpy. We kind of already knew that but I think it might go longer than we hoped?
So last night I shared my Stolitz pic with my DnD group, I’m doing art for their characters and we have an art space in our game discord and a few of them watch Hazbin and HB. An IRL friend who is also an HB fan asked about the OC in the pic and I shared it was based on the rumor that Stolas is getting a new boyfriend, they could be a parrot potentially voiced by Harvey Guillen but that this was not confirmed or anything. He said “HMMMM that jives with what her assistant told us.”
I’m like “What! Tell me. “
I guess while waiting in line for her to sign for the person in front of them at Mega they were chatting with an assistant and said they loved Look My Way and were interested in where the Stolas and Blitzø story was going. The assistant said they had seen the rest of Season 2 and “You may not love the way it goes if you like the coupling”.
I spiraled immediately, like full on upset. Bitch I cried. I’ve spent hours analyzing this cartoon and that broke me a bit. I’m not necessarily concerned with my ships being “endgame”, I’ve shipped lots of couples that rarely interact just for interesting dynamics. Or couples where one half is literally dead in canon, where they are mortal enemies and not in an enemies to lovers way etc. It just seemed so final and is contradictory to everything the show has setup so far and what I’ve been enjoying about the show and it really fucked me up if I’m honest. I also have a really bad brain though and I know this. I’m not equipped to rationally think about it.
I hesitated to even share what was said because I dislike bumming anyone out but as a speculation and spoiler goblin I’d also like people to share with me so I can prepare myself?
Ive had some time to sit and process and cope a bit “is that information really that different than what we have already?” And the short answer is no, not really. It’s also like their job to tease fans. It was also one sentence I didn’t even actually hear with my own ears lol. My brain just did what it does and took it to the worst place. I took it as “they are killing it completely” and are about to destroy the only reason I enjoy this show so much. Which maaaaay have been an over reaction but I can’t like, help that.
I just honestly cannot fathom how they could so sharply pivot at this point and have it make sense? I can’t fathom why they even would. I don’t even know what role Stolas could possibly have in that scenario. I think that was what upset me the most, Stolas is my favorite and his entire character within the world of the show is completely dependent on his ties to Blitzø to be part of the narrative because he has no ties to IMP outside of it. The idea of him being shelved, even temporarily, is upsetting to me. The show so far is not setup to view characters lives outside of Blitzø and IMP so I can’t see them having Stolas go off and do his own thing without removing him from the narrative completely.
I’m just sad about it and I think I’m putting too much thought into it. Maybe they just meant what we’ve thought all along and that we wouldn’t be happy because of the boyfriend character, and as I’ve said before the split up absolutely has to happen for them to reconcile and come back together. It is actually a good thing story wise for that to happen but the phrasing (though second hand) just depressed the fuck out of me so I wanted to vent a bit and maybe get some outside perspective from people who’s brains work better than mine. It’s possible this is a situation where i know a thing “Stolas is getting a new boyfriend” because I am terminally online and gobble up every like react and ambiguous emoji and assign meaning to it, and the assistant was just talking about that same information assuming my friend didn’t know that (he didn’t) but because I already knew it I’m assigning new meaning to it as if it’s additional different information. That’s a distinct possibility.
Even if it’s the worst case scenario, I’m not a hate watcher, if I don’t like the direction something is going I bitch a bit in mourning and then remove myself completely. So I’ll see how it plays out and see if it makes sense narratively. Maybe I’ll love the direction, who knows. If it what’s we originally speculated based on the narrative setup so far, the boyfriend character is a catalyst to help Blitzø reconcile his feelings and to let Stolas do his own healing and character development but it all that leads to the completion of the story they’ve been telling up to this point that’s perfect. If it leads to less Stolas and a completely different direction than what we’ve spent 1.5 seasons on so far, I don’t know how I would feel about that. I want it clear though I wouldn’t be mad at the creators, it’s their story they can do what they want, and I’m sure others will enjoy whatever they offer up but I personally would just quietly move on to something else.
I’m interested in how others view the response. Just a tease about the boyfriend, and thinking we’ll be unhappy because of that but ultimately it’s going how its been setup? Or should I break out my violin and start up “Nearer, my God, to thee”. I just really need some better brains to give me some perspective,
#helluva boss spoilers#Stolitz#Stolitz spoilers#this was more to share an additional piece of evidence#but also to work through my feelings about it#if you have a perspective I’d love to hear it
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ROUND 1B! MATCH 4 OUT OF 8
Propaganda Under the Cut:
Ruby Lucas:
she's cool, and a werewolf!
She's a red/big bad wolf combo, she's bi, she gets tragically underused like so many OUaT characters
She’s a werewolf :)
We first see her as Ruby in Storybrooke where she's initially depicted as a fun-loving flirt who spends her nights most likely in a bar while wearing revealing clothes that her grandma disapproves of (and is all in red. Absolutely everything). She lives with her grandma who runs a diner and that's where Ruby works. When Emma wakes up the sleeping town, she tries to leave Granny's and ends up helping in a case that Emma's working on by following her nose. That episode also has her backstory, but when we first see her as Red in the Enchanted Forest, she's confident and helpful and not afraid to use her lycanthropy. But the start of her story has her being an innocent young woman with a love for discovering the world and her boyfriend Peter (of Peter and the Wolf, I guess). She meets Snow while still living with her Granny in her cabin in the woods and takes her in. She's so hopeful - and then she turns into a werewolf and kills Peter (after they all thought he was the werewolf and had chained him to a tree). She is obviously quite traumatized by this and takes off with Snow. But that and her subsequent adventures gives her the growth she needs to be comfortable in her own skin, whether human or wolf. And, when the curse breaks completely, you can see the change in her - she would absolutely walk through fire to help Snow and the other good guys.
Another version where Red Riding Hood also ends up being the Big Bad Wolf. She eats her boyfriend which is sad but she falls in love with Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz in like Season 5. Her red cloak is what keeps her in human form which I think is neat. When all the storybook characters are transported to the modern world, she runs a diner with Granny.
She's one of my favorite characters from Once Upon a Time. She's a cool Red Riding hood wolf girl who is bi and has seen like 3 of her love interests and her mother die. She slays very hard so I nominate her. (Also I used to have a crush on her as a kid)
VOTE RUBY LUCAS FROM ONCE UPON A TIME. SHE WAS IGNORED BY THE WRITERS SO MUCH SHE DESERVES THIS SO MUCH. QUEER ICON!!!
Ruby Rose:
She has a scythe that is also a high-impact sniper rifle.
She is literally just based on Red Riding Hood and she's such an amazing character holy heck
Red Riding Hood but with a gun. (Specifically a combination scythe/high-impact sniper rifle called Crescent Rose). Also she's gone through so much she deserves it. She's trying to save the world and keep going despite all the people she's lost. Grew up dreaming of being a hero who fights monsters. She knows life isn't a fairy tale and wants to make it better. Just went through a mental health arc where she had depression from trying to live up to her (presumed dead) mom and from her friend dying for the second time. Killed the Big Bad Wolf with her magic eye powers. Her sister is Goldilocks and her friends are Beauty and Snow White. also I love her <3
She’s the little red riding hood but also a powerful fighter with a massive fucking scythe that is also a sniper rifle and she’s so skrunkly and so gender. Also RWBY’s whole thing (well one of them) is that their characters are all inspired by pre-existing ones from older stories and Ruby’s the main character so like, poster child of ‘character based off [insert relevant fairytale here]’ so I think she deserves to at least get pretty far
Aesthetics, themes, meta, personality and raw coolness.
She is the main character of her show. The most common monster they fight is a type of wolf (its been a while since ive seen it). Her job is to hunt them down before they can eat her. this story is very much about failed fairy tales, many of the side character's inspired arcs end in failure, but (having not seen the most recent bits) Ruby is still going strong, and i really like her cape, rose petals, and use of a scythe.
She is THE RRH character of all time. She has a scythe that's also a gun and she has to be the hero because she's got super rare main character powers. She is my happy girl. Also her mom was Sleeping Beauty and her sister is Goldilocks, and she fights to stop Rapunzel from destroying everything on the world, the gods, and then herself.
Ruby as a character is literally based on little red riding hood! She has a red cape with a hood
the Red trailer is better propaganda than I could ever write
She is a badass with a scythe, inspired by her uncle and fueled by her mother's death and her sense of righteousness
She has a giant scythe
#red riding poll#round 1#round 1b#ruby rose#rwby#ruby lucas#once upon a time#red riding hood#little red riding hood#polls#poll bracket#poll tournament#character polls#battle of the rubys!#ouat#meghan ory
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I absolutely adore all of your analysis so far, they are so indepth and it feels like you’re able to explain stuff that I’m only able to vaguely think in an abstract sense when it comes to ddlc and dhdhdj so so good
I do wanna say that for you mc analysis, there’s one thing missing. I’m someone who got into ddlc cause of plus so I have hyperfixated on all the lore. While the employees imply that Monika made MC, I don’t think that’s actually true based on what we know about Monika. If she could make a whole character then why couldn’t she make herself a route? Heck in one of her act 3 convos, she can barely change the music before saying “well I just break everything anyway”.
So I believe based on other emails, that it was Ive Laster who made MC since they were the one who wanted to make ddlc a game. In the first meeting notes, we are told that Ive tends to ramble a lot. But in the next one when MC is mentioned in a meeting, they are silent. Another thing is that in one of the ddlc plus trailers, ive is the name of the MC.
It could be said that Ive based it on the stuff in the control group, but the control group was made AFTER the main vm (That’s not how a science experiment should work but ya know, I don’t think they are smart). So really the control group is based on main game first. Honestly so much of the issue of the plus lore is how it’s so convoluted to get, but reading it all on the wiki helped me alot.
Plus seemed to add a new sense of horror to the og, the horror of knowledge that one plagued Monika is now plaguing the player as we have all this information but can do nothing to help them. I think the idea of MC being made by someone else adds this new layer to him along with this new layer of horror. But that’s more just my own thoughts on it that I thought you may find interesting along with all the lore from above.
Anyway, I hope you have a good day! Your post are great and I’ll make sure to keep up with coil more!
aw, thanks anon! i often find it difficult to find the exact way to explain what i'm thinking when i do analysis like i have on this blog, so i'm glad i can at least help to put it into words for other people who have even more trouble with it than i do.
as for the rest of your statement...i think you make a compelling point. full disclaimer; a lot of my knowledge on what's presented in + outside of the full text of the side stories is secondhand, and when talking about the original game, i think it's important to keep in mind that my reference for most of this is my playthrough with my friends back in like...2017-18ish a little after the game came out...? aheh, i won't lie, though i am rather obsessive in the course of scouring information i remember via the wiki/elsewhere to verify i'm not just making it up, putting off my replay of the og game has not been helpful for me.
i think it's very much up in the air as to how much influence that Monika actually has over the game, which is something i talked about in my analysis of Natsuki in the Side Stories. in my opinion, what + demonstrates more than anything is that in whatever she DID do in the main game, she mostly worked with material that was already there to make things easier on her. one of the things i based that claim on was the reference of the Protagonist in the Side Stories, but it's not a necessary claim, and in fact, i think you do make a good point in how it's unlikely that she'd be able to do this (at the very least, by herself) based on what's been shown of her ability in the game.
i think, in regards to your comment on the reference to MC in the Side Stories, it's important to consider the wider conceit of DDLC--i have a deeper analysis i'm tinkering around with on terms of it as an exploration of fiction vs the concept within the "universe", but that's another story--namely, all of the girls aren't (or at least, are heavily implied not to be) just static fictional characters following a pre-written script, they're genuine artificial intelligence!
this is part of what i meant when i said that the Side Stories demonstrate the raw character of each of the girls independently of any 4th wall shenanigans--within the world of Doki Doki Literature Club, they're essentially just people living in the confines of a computer, and therefore have essential, largely immutable character traits which exist within some fundamental essence of what makes them who they are. i think there are a shitload of really, really terrifying things this opens the door to if you really think about its nature (independently of DDLC, i've personally had longform discussions with a friend about the morality and potential horrors which would exist within a similar universe concept, and it's somewhat ubiquitous in a lot of sci-fi universes), but like i said, that's a different discussion entirely!
what i'm trying to suggest here is that it's likely that Sayori's relationship to the Protagonist is something inherent to her character, so it doesn't necessarily have to be something gleaned entirely from the Side Stories.
of course, this is all post hoc reasoning with what we're given! occam's razor suggests that it's actually just likely that (given that DDLC was written and released a long while prior to the Side Stories) they didn't necessarily plan every part of this from the outset, so some things just naturally seem to fit together a little weirdly, with little details added here and there just for flavor! i think that given the nature of the entire thing (and how Dan Salvato has talked about DDLC and the statements he's given with about in universe details in the past), it's unlikely that every single element of this was planned out from the word go.
this might be a bit of a controversial opinion, but there's a lot about how + handles the lore of ddlc that i didn't really like, just because it adds a whole new layer of lore and context, which soured a lot of my impressions, because the original game really flourished in its simplicity. that said, with all that's been given in the Side Stories and the deeper layers to the actual horror which are now visible in the original game, i think it pretty well makes up for it!
awa, i didn't plan for this to become an entire essay in itself...but i do appreciate this kind of thing! i really like digging deep into what's explicitly provided in canon to get a deeper understanding of the characters and universe as it's actually been shown, so any encouragement and correspondence related to either my analysis or my opinions in general are welcome! honestly, i'm also welcome to read others' analysis like this, because i like to see when people read deep into it like i do! typically it ends up reshaping how i see the entire thing, and it sorta just makes my heart happy to get people thinking about this stuff!
i think, as a last thought, if MC is actually conscious in any way similar to the other girls (which I think is a definite possibility, given his ability to respond in contexts impacted by Monika's manipulation, even if barebones), it actually makes him a very interesting character in his simplicity. i know that Dan Salvato doesn't see him as one, but i think it'd make for an interesting study in a fanfic or something.
i hope you also have a good day anon (even though it's 2 am here as i'm writing this...) and you BETTER KEEP UP W/IT I PUT MY HEART N SOUUL INTO THAT BABY (/lh /hj i'm just glad other people are liking it, even if it's just silent kudos :))
#coil is still on the backburner but i have been doing some work on actually finishing it after not touching it for like a week and a half#i'll elaborate more on why it's a bit of a struggle to write it when i actually upload the last part but needless to say i will finish it#anyway ily guys it's fun to talk to people who are as passionate about this stuff as me#i kinda feel like making a discord server for mutual discussion of this stuff would be fun#but i also know like 2 people would join it or too MANY people would join it#as a happy medium i think keeping my askbox (specifically anons lmao) & dms is a good option#asks#ddlc#doki doki literature club#musings
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oc spotlight: patoto (villainverse)
oh man ok. villainverse patoto. probably one of my favorite ocs ive ever made tbh
he started out as a joke almost, a sort of "what if?" au sorta deal. what if patoto was a villainous saiyan? it sounded like such a fun concept i just had to explore it. and then i came up with this design
which was just SO cool to me i couldnt stop thinking about it. and then before i knew it he became his own character--a patoto from a parallel universe where he was a ruthless warrior, totally opposite from his mainverse counterpart
he developed so fast from there. i gave him a companion that ended up being kinpa, and he developed into kinpa's bodyguard. i gave him a rival that ended up being calabris. i gave him a complicated relationship with his parents, one of which he thought was dead for most of his life (his armor is actually based off of hers to remember her by). his universe grew and his story basically wrote itself i was so obsessed with him and still am
here's his current ref showing how much he's grown
even today im still giving him more development and story! as of right now in the timeline (post-mirrors and post-facets), he has a child with his partner kinpa and his family has grown from just him to a group of six including himself! he's learned to have friends and open his heart to others, and he's gotten so strong im so proud of him.
mirrors would have never existed had i not ran with his concept like i did. his character and story contrasting with mainverse patoto's is just so fun and awesome to me and i've always had fun with it and i feel like i'll continue to have fun with it as well!!
i could honestly keep going about some specific details abt him like his relationship with kinpa and zumeg (both of them) and his father and his kid and. yknow what i will LOL
his relationship with kinpa started as just a bodyguard situation but OF COURSE that developed into an actual partnership bc i love that shit. he was this cold and frankly mean guy that wanted nothing to do with kinpa or being his bodyguard--he hated it. but after getting trapped on earth in a parallel universe, he learned to open up to the idea of having at least one friend and letting himself care about someone for the first time since he was a child.
as for his parents...thats complicated lol. (facets spoilers ahead !!!) his mother zumeg was presumed dead when she didnt return from a battle when he was just a boy, and his father left some time before that, so he was basically raised in an orphanage into adulthood (or at least until he could join the army). he met the mainverse zumeg and that shook him to his core bc she was not only so different but she still cared about him and reminded him what it was like to be loved by his own mother. it wasnt until way later, many many years later, that he decided he wanted to find his father and find out why he left them. after getting that clarification, he chose to give his father a second chance at being part of his life--more for himself than his father, really--and then not long after that he discovered his mother was actually alive, just under someone's control. he saved her, and suddenly he had a family again.
i havent quite developed his story with his kid just yet, but so far what i figure is that he isnt experienced with children at all so he does have a hard time balancing the tough parenting act and the gentle, kind parenting. snake (his son) does feel a pressure to be as great as his father, since he's heard the stories of how he saved the universe before and how he continues to fight and reach new heights. patoto is a little awkward at handling this and has a hard time showing that he's proud of his son and that sort of causes a little tension between them but it eventually works out
basically i love villainverse patoto. a lot. i would die for him actually
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hello!! ive seen a lot about the recent discourse on sumeru and all it's characters, most especially kusanali nowadays, and felt the need to clear some things up for my own peace of mind. though i should put a disclaimer that i'm in no way from any of the countries or cultures sumeru was originaly intended to represent, though i am a POC who knows what colorism, orientalism, and blatant lack of representation feels like. if anyone from the real cultures finds something wrong in whatever i say, please point it out and educate me so i can adjust! I might not be in a place to speak and have a very little platform, but I promise you, a few minutes of research and a little empathy can go a very long way.
cw for the topics i mentioned above (orientalism, colorism, subtle racism, etc etc.) very long discussion utc!
A common excuse I see people making for aspects of Kusanali's design (her skin color, her size, etc.) is that she's allegedly based off of Kusanali Jataka, from a Buddhist collection of poems as a fairy living in a clump of grass. This much is true, she very much is named after that, and the nature-esque inspiration matches up. However, that changes when many fans on tiktok, twitter, etc. have been claiming the original poem to mention that Kusanali Jataka had "skin as pale as the light of the moon."
This specific description pertains to an entirely different diety, one going all the way to Hinduism backgrounds. She who that quote was originally used for is known as Sarswati, the Hindu goddess of knowledge, wisdom, art, speech, music, aesthetics, and learning. For the record, here is what common portrayals of her look like, as well as the description of her appearance:
See? Sound familiar? To compare, here is what a portrayal of Kusanali Jataka looks like:
These two very separate dieties were definitely mixed up, most likely in a way to simply excuse how utterly far away the dendro archon looks from the real life people her country is meant to represent. Previously we've had Zhongli and Ei, a dragon accurate to real Chinese myths, and a samurai with cultural ties even to her name, her titles, and other various inspirations such as from the Vision Hunt Decree. Yunjin proves that Hoyoverse is capable of making accurate and in depth research of real life cultural aspects. Kusanali, however, has no obvious cultural background to her design except her name and perhaps the quote of "Let great and small." Other than that? You could've told me that she's just another kid from Mondstadt and I'd believe you entirely.
It's one thing to like a characters design, but another thing to entirely erase the problems there are with representation, among other things. The problem in her is not that she has a child model, it's that she, as Sumeru's archon, is meant to represent their whole country, but at the same time she has no indications of references to SWANA or ME culture what so ever.
To add onto that, the argument of "but im from this race and im pale" is not valid at all, because just because you or your family or friends are not, doesn't mean the rest of your people don't either. In my country, we were taught as kids to bathe with some kind of papaya whitening soap, not to stay in the sun too long or we'll get tanned, that we need go "stay indoors more to get whiter," and I'm sure this isn't only a problem in mine. The few times that the people of these underrepresented cultures get a chance at the spotlight, the very least Hoyoverse can do when they'll make truckloads of money from them either way is to do it right. They deserve that much.
Hoyoverse is a multi million dollar company that is perfectly capable of making designs that aren't stereotypical and all lightskin if not paper white. They honestly dug their own grave by making the exact mistake many have made before when it comes to representation specifically in these regions, such as Aladdin, where they threw many different and diverse cultures together and thought it would end up nicely without either five different things happening at once, or an entirely whitewashed version of everything. They should not be able to cherrypick and make money out of whatever bits of these cultures they want only to leave out the outward appearances of the people that they belong to. That is colorism.
I am making this post to at least try to raise awareness on the misinformation going around about Kusanali, as well as shed light on how condescending all the pale and at most light brown characters feel as a POC. That said, however, I can't speak for the people from South Asia/North Africa/Middle East on this issue, and therefore if you have time I'm *begging* you to listen to what they have to say. If you're from those cultures and don't have any problems with Sumeru, thats okay! But it doesn't mean that everyone else doesn't either. If you're white or from a different culture and are therefore unaffected by all of this? If you want to ignore, don't say a word. Don't shut the voices of the POC that should be in the spotlight in the first place. But if you want to help? Do your research. Uplift the voices of those who are affected. Listen to what they have to say. Orientalism and colorism aren't easy topics to be brushed off easily, and they have every right to be reacting in opposition to what Hoyoverse currently has to offer.
If you're interested in what I've just mentioned, here are a few links I've found of people from these cultures that you should consider checking out ::
https://twitter.com/dorobor1/status/1553151372308135938?t=QfJI9jXKDVvPO86eqGgyGw&s=19
https://vt.tiktok.com/ZSR2pcbVC/?k=1
https://twitter.com/dailynahida/status/1538609206621790209?t=JRPUQ5Z8kn_nJJ2McShbag&s=19
https://twitter.com/Altochameleon/status/1553623114650509313?t=nDhSJyZ167HqP_eR4byqEg&s=19
And many more! So many SWANA & ME people are speaking up about this but get drowned out in all the arguing when they are the ones in the right. The goal isn't to speak over them, it's to let their words be heard. So please, stop the unnecessary ignorance and disrespect in every aspect of all that's going on with the discourse going around about this topic. It isn't hard to be respectful, it isn't hard to research, it isn't hard to be decent human beings.
https://vt.tiktok.com/ZSR2pT61E/?k=1
https://twitter.com/Bitanees/status/1562903344553013252?t=CyBbIxBG3IFGWM98bZYADw&s=19
#genshin impact#genshin impact sumeru#genshin sumeru#genshin kusanali#genshin impact kusanali#genshin nahida#genshin impact nahida#genshin tighnari#genshin impact tighnari#genshin cyno#genshin impact cyno#genshin dehya#genshin impacy dehya#genshin nilou#genshin impact nilou
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i post about hazel a lot but
i think my fursona RGB is like. such a winner because specifically she is both a blorbo and also "ohhhh my god she's so me"
id been struggling on settling on a fursona for so long before i hit upon RGB- who wasn't even initially??? supposed to be my fursona????? at all?????????
just a random protogen design that like, ended up sticking
for years after the fact. and now i have a 3D model of her steadily in the works and plushie of her that is like, half as big as me
what is wrong with her. i love her so much. if i didnt spend so much money on the plush i'd pour milk on her and throw her at a wall. (i wont though)
and well like, i think the secret of her lasting so long is i finally figured out the ideal blend of fictional character to oh that's just straight up me TM
my first two fursonas kinda flopped and ended up as OCs because they were too distant from me- karra's really serious at this point and has siblings (i'm an only child) and while comet's actually not too far off from RGB personality-wise, she's also developed as a character in away (again with siblings, i don't have any) that differs too much from me- but i value them both as OCs, so this isn't a loss by any measure
then came nova, who doesn't really look or act like me, but i thought at the time that if i adamantly didn't give her any backstory, she'd stick. and she did stick for a while! but for varying reasons, i ended up dropping her (but i might give her a lite redesign sometime- keep her as an OC or little mascot either way) and in hindsight- she never really felt like me, even if i liked her
there was a time before nova and after nova where i didn't have a fursona- i had hazel off and on in varying forms as a representation of me, but she was only made official a little before nova was a thing- and while hazel is solid "oh yeah that's me babey" department, and i have Fursona Edition Hazel, she doesn't really cover the base of "having a fursona" for me
does that make sense???? i cannot explain to you why i need so many fursonas. it's so hard to explain but hazel and RGB fulfill two separate ecological niches.
i had some misc fursonas that lasted maybe a year at maximum, but usually like. a few months, spread over the course of a few years before RGB came about
RGB wasn't even immediate. it was kind of a slow roll of a headworld kinda failing to make any traction, my previous fursona at the time not really sticking but me having cool ideas on having an interdimensional traveler on purpose OC- i kept designing and accumulating characters that i wanted to use but had no use for
and then RGB suddenly clicked with me, i settled on the DIMENSION/CROSS concept, and i've been chipping away at developing it through just. thinking really hard about my guys & roleplaying with them. (the delight of having OCs that can visit friends' OCs any time they want for any reason)
and i keep waiting to fall out of love with her but it just.
hasn't happened yet!
i actually came close because some part of me feels like RGB's design isn't actually that great and got worried she's just kind of a visual mess. but i dunno, some really kickass art i've received made me feel better. i started drawing her consistently the way i want too, so i feel like. a lot more solidified in loving her and enjoying her as a character!!!
it's weird, because RGB has a lot of story. backstory, even. distinct from me as a person. she's a lot more boisterous and loud and irresponsible. dare i say cool when she's not being a little stupid. but, a lot of that's a veneer- that's what she wants you to see. inside, when all that's stripped away, she's still just me. she's the 8ft tall space captain on a road trip with her friends that i wish i could be! but despite that, ive never felt closer to any character i've ever come up with before and that makes me really happy
she is SO fun to write. she has like, so much emotional baggage she's running away from because she doesn't want to be compared to hazel (who is soggy and miserable and 🥺 and a nerd) but we all know they are the same.
tl;dr i love my fursona. she's a loser. this post is really long.
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16. How many fic ideas are you nurturing right now? Share one of them? 32. Name three of your favorite fanfic writers. 55. Of the characters you write for, which is your favorite? Has that choice been swayed at all by your followers/readers’ reactions to certain ones?
16. How many fic ideas are you nurturing right now? Share one of them?
So I have like…. 15 (!!!!!!!) fic ideas sitting in my WIP google doc where I list all my stuff so I dont lose track of them. 3 of those I have actually started in some form or fashion.
As for sharing; I think Ive shared all the ideas in some form or fashion but I am incapable of keeping my wips to myself so here is the start to the “Price thinks he caught his wife cheating but actually she’s just masturbating” fic lmao
The lines in John Price's face testify to the worry that nags him every day.
He’s paid to worry. His men rely on it to stay safe- not that they so much as actively do, but it’s the fear of failure -of one of them not coming home- that drives Johnto account for every possible course of action during an op, and come up with three additional back up plans for each initial potential course.
He accounts for everything. No detail goes unnoticed, no stone goes unturned. He doesn’t have the option of making a mistake. If a clerk files a paper wrong, worse case scenario John resubmits a report. If he does his job wrong? Someone very likely will die.
There’s many, many things in the day that worry John but you are not one of them.
Not usually, anyway. And the slight nagging sensation as he pulls down the street that you two live on is easily accounted to him projecting and empathizing with the plight of a young soldier John had come across while getting ready to leave base.
One of the corporals under Soap had left the day before once placed on leave, only to be back on base this morning.
John hadn’t commented on the corporal's red, puffy eyes. The man’s ego’s already suffered a terrible blow, and his crying being acknowledged by his captain would not have helped matters.
The poor sod had walked in on his girlfriend in the act with another man. Not so much as a Dear John letter, but letting him find out in the worst way possible.
And so John brushes off the nagging in the back of his brain. He’s a worrier, and apparently his brain feels like torturing himself with thoughts of how absolutely wrecked he would be if he found himself in the same position as the corporal.
He leaves his bags in the car as he parks, too eager to see you to bother with them. He can unpack later.
The house is quiet when he first steps in. “Darling? I’m home.”
He expects to hear an excitable “John!” and you scrambling to him from whatever room you’re in. Your usual routine ending with you flinging yourself into his arms.
He’s greeted with more silence. Maybe you’re in the shower? John has text you on base that he was coming back. But the house isn’t all that far from base. Maybe you haven’t seen the message if you haven’t looked at your phone.
He makes his way up the stairs, grinning slightly at the thought of catching you in the shower. He’ll need to be careful- that he doesn’t spook you thinking you’re alone in the house only to be found naked and wet. He would feel terrible if you slipped from fright.
No sooner does John reach the top of the stairs does his stomach drop clear to the floor.
He can hear the mattress squeaking.
32. Name three of your favorite fanfic writers
I can only pick 3?? 🥺🥺
Well, you of course 💕💕 I am forever and will always be obsessed with Dita, and now Izzie (any anyone else you write because I am obsessed with your writing and it is wild to me still that we are friends!! I have been reading your stuff since you were writing for skyrim!!)
@kneelingshadowsalome I am literally so obsessed with how poetic Salome’s writing is. It’s just *chef’s kiss* absolutely incredible. Literally any and of it is just so good.
@embossross we all saw my public meltdown over my upset of not ever finding her again when my computer kicked the bucket and like a dummy I hadn’t followed/saved the fic I was reading in any way. Her writing is so good and Im still working my way through the fic of hers I am reading but fr fr y’all if you have even the slightest interest in bdsm dynamics I know absolutely nothing about the tr fandom so idk how close it follows anything canon but it flows so nice aaHHHHHH
55. Of the characters you write for, which is your favorite? Has that choice been swayed at all by your followers/readers’ reactions to certain ones?
Lowkey the characters I always love most typically fit the same archetype (for whatever reason I huff the “traumatized soldier” trope like it’s blow and I cannot stop myself).
I can’t pick just one so Imma ramble
Like Ghost is just delightfully traumatized and I wanna snuggle him and make things okay for him going forward.
And the ghost fics/ideas are definitely the ones I get more notes on but lowkey Ive been feeling Price lately and while the price snippets/fics have gotten good responses they haven’t pulled near the numbers as the ghost ones but I do not care lmao literally if anyone comments anything nice on my stuff Im so happy but I’m not like…. Gonna cater my writer with the purpose of getting the most notes (tho I am pleasantly surprised when something blows up) so whoever my flavor of the month is, isn’t particularly swayed by reader response.
And of course Jacob will always have a special place in my heart because I have simped for that man since 2018 and I *will* excuse the kidnapping, brainwashing, and cannibalism. Because he is my babygirl.
For my actual OCs, while I haven’t written very much for her yet I just love Honey so so so much any time I do a snippet for her she just writes so easy for me.
Like I love CC still and they have their similarities in certain aspects of disposition/motivations but sometimes I gotta wrestle her down lmao
Get to Know Your Fic Writer
#i smooch you 💕💕💕#thank you for sending!!!#i ramble because I am incapable of following directions#ask game
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okay bestie I have an actual question for you about writing, because I always just have so many ideas but don't know where to start/never complete them. so like how do you start do you plot everything out and then start writing or are you writing and figure it out during? and like how do you keep motivated writing every chapter? omg and what do you do when something you had in mind doesn't work out with the plot? help pls
hi bestie!! i talk a lot so imma put a break for others to scroll past lol
so, ideas. inspiration. motivation. plot. it comes and goes. movies, music, random quotes, plot ideas/requests come from like anywhere for me. what i tend to do is name the project, write a basic summary and what character it’s for, and see what happens. i don’t force myself to finish any one project (hence the abandoned SOUR miniseries and recently revisited sin miedo). that’s in part why WCS and MAG have been such long running sagas here, bc i don’t force myself to write anymore.
when i did, i produced content that i didn’t love. i was posting stories that i wasn’t confident in and that i read and am embarrassed to have put that out.
typically, it starts with a bit of dialogue that comes to me in the shower or when i’m daydreaming at work. from there, i kinda work backwards. how’d they get to that conversation? what are the implications? what’s the setting? what do they know? all that world building fills itself in and sometimes i pick stuff for the fun of it.
when something doesn’t work, i change something. for example, mag s1 has some stuff that doesn’t match the canon timeline bc one, i didn’t plan on extending the series so far so i was nitpicking what i wanted and two i didn’t have the episodes in front of me bc i wasn’t planning a whole canon journey. i took out some relationships (matt x claire for example) bc it didn’t serve my plot.
i’ve also rewritten plots bc i just didn’t like them. i have a project where the reader is matt’s gf and is meeting foggy/karen but matt has the idea for a game where they just flirt with each other till his friends figure it out. initially i had it to where foggy starts flirting with her and introduces her and she plays along till matt gets too jealous but i didn’t like the way it was turning out. so i scrapped it and started over.
a big part of writing, in my opinion, is drafts and edits. ultimately, whatever your writing, it’s your universe. it’s your project. if something isn’t working, you are well within your rights to change it. it’s not canon until you post it so rewrite it as many times as you have to. no one said you have to immediately post what you write. it’s a little different with mag since i’ve established her entire dd canon and hinted her punisher canon so i have to fill the gaps of what ive already made so i have to keep referencing what ive posted to make sure she’s consistent but that’s it own thing.
lastly, let’s talk motivation. girly pop, it’s gonna come and go. i take so many breaks in posting or writing just bc im at a part that i don’t wanna write but i have to for plot purposes. sometimes i hate the exposition of a piece but i just wanna do the actual important scenes. so i lag and avoid it until im like ‘yknow what, let’s just do it’ and this is where the edits and drafts come in. usually, it’s just a ‘let’s throw some words on the page and come back to it’ situation. sometimes i rewrite all of it, sometimes i don’t, other times it’s just a few edits here or there.
the base of writing as i understand it is trusting yourself and your ideas. some stuff is gonna take off, like woman, others will fall flat like dirty thoughts (i think that’s what i called it, a marc spector piece). it’s also your blog so as long as it feels genuine to you and your abilities, go for it :)
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Its my city now ive been thinking about oc dynamics for the other brothers. I decided toto recycle some old fandom ocs from my preteen years bc its both funny and thematically appropriate.
The only new ones are like wendy and suzi. Suzi is sorta not new but so completely revamped and wasn’t ever really developed anyways.
I have to figure out like actual names for two bc they’ve only gone by nicknames. I also thought it would be fun to have more cartoonish/surreal characters instead of just regular people.
Kitti (nickname)- when i made her, she originally was a Boy Scout and kinda based off of spongebob. Now ive changed her to like a big sister like character except she really ISN’T. She’s the younger sister of twins, neither the brain or muscle behind their duo. She’s sweet, dense, and a stickler for order. She’s a mycologist and likes to hang out in the woods. She is dating oso im still working on their dynamic but theyre definitely childhood friends who find each other again in adulthood oso confuses her for her twin sister and is like: whoa, so you decided to become a girl!! Thats so cool can i see ur boobs since we’re old friends?? She meets oso thru totty who shes friends with bc theyre both girls.
Wendy - basically a small, loud little henchman or hypeman. She’s so so small in height and so round. She looks like a shark, has very pointy teeth, beady lil teeth, and is very scary except her voice is really adorable. She is karamatsu’s biggest fucking fan, and hyped him up as much as he does to the point where sometimes he’s embarrassed. I think she’s weird and funny bc she has a rich inner world completely detached from him that she never tells him about except for concerning bits and pieces. So far theyre my favorite bc i drew her telling kara when hes not there she goes to nurtitionland and hangs out with talking carrots. Kara absolutely adores her and tries to explain her appeal constantly but everyone side eyes him.
Sindri - I haven’t really figured it out yet bc Sindri was an oc i used to really adore. I remember having like a really lavish and dramatic backstory for him that was super serious but i kinda don’t wanna do all of that anymore but dont wanna erase all of it either. Slowly rebuilding him. I ship him w choro tho
Esaias- another recycled but kinda loved oc. He was like one of my least favorites but I had developed him a loooot. Almost all of his original characterization and background are the same, so he grew up in a paramilitary Christian cult ran by his step father and mother that only consisted of his immediate family. His childhood sucked but you wouldn’t know it bc he was the blacksheep, and thoroughly ignored but a lot of the family politics bc hes considered the illegitimate eldest. He’s actually really normal and nice and in Japan for grad school and to train under Fighting Yowai. He makes Ichi really nervous bc he’s like a normie or something but he also is really strange. They have a really funny dynamic to me but eventually hes kinda like a security blanket ichi carries and he is there basically like “damn bitch you live like this? Thats so cool can you teach me?”
Suzi - she didn’t have a very thick background, I made her when I was like literally 12 and didn’t like her very much to the point where her entire narrative was that i killed off her sister. Which is funny bc i love her now and so I killed her off too. She’s a ghost! Like a sadako/okiku type of ghost. Looks very scary and only jyushi can see her and at first he’s terrified of her but it’s really actually lighthearted and silly. His brothers are all weirded out by jyushi’s new imaginary friend but they are a loveydovey couple even tho shes dead and he aint.
And then tottys still mine
Oh i forgot nom (another nickname)
I ship her with nyaa. She’s a tsundere who is obsessed with looking cool, she’s the older twin sister of kitti and she is the biggest softie ever. Literally the brain and the brawn, she’s in love w nyaa and is a crybaby. She’s really moody too, friends with ichi and kara. She wants to be goth and alt so bad but shes just shein. The tallest of my ocs. She can only handle the responsibility of taking care of Kitti, so she cant cook or clean (kitti must) but she does everything else. She’s a drop out fashion student, and a cringefail girl. The only one who can make kitti, who comes across as a big sister character be a whiny baby. I ship her with nyaa bc i think itd be funny
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for the ask game: 2, 4, 5, 9, 17, 24, 29, 35
OOHHH THIS GONNA BE LONG under cut immediately
2. Least favorite main title?
i think this may upset some people but just of the games that i have finished (i havent played or finished every single fire emblem game… i know i know bad fan shut up) it’s prooobably fe7??? not because it’s bad. i do love that game. i just love it the least of every other game i played? i love all three of the lords a lot!! theyre just not my super favorites. i like the story fine, just not as much as other games. the gameplay is alright, but i dont think it’s anything to write home about. it’s a perfectly average fire emblem game all across the board i think. and that’s probably why i dont think about it too much? though, admittedly, ive only played through it fully once and that was like. five years ago? i could give it another run. i never did try hector hard mode, tbf… also huge shoutout to my lovelies sain and serra i love them so much…
4. What games do you wish to play next?
i dont know how often i mentioned it but i had a computer a while ago that just stopped working. like completely. the hardware is fine it just stopped functioning properly and ive taken it to literally every tech place and handed it to every computer junkie friend i have and nothing can fix it. and very unfortunately, it broke while i was in the middle of playing path of radiance. i dont really have anything else i can emulate it on right now, but if i could it’d be that. and of course, radiant dawn right after :)
5. What games would you reccomend to someone new?
toss up between 7, 8, and 13. they all have their strengths and weaknesses as entry points, but theyre all fairly simple in difficulty, and 7 and 13 were entry points for a lot of people who still love the game today, so theyre pretty easy to reccomend. 7 and 8 are easily accessible being able to emulate on like. most things?? even iphones with little hassle. 13 was also, up until very recently, very easy to grab off the eshop. i guess if someone asked me now compared to last year maybe i wouldnt say 13 for that reason? idk. 16* is also an option though, if only because it’s on the switch and while fairly different from the main fire emblem formula, it is VERY good at grabbing attention. im biased because i have used it to drag a friend into fire emblem hell so. i know it works. personally i’d probably go 7/13, 8, 16*, {the rest} but yeah. those four. move awakening down if hardware is an issue.
9. Least favorite character?
IN THE WHOLE SERIES??????? man… i dont know i dont really dislike a whole lot of characters? i guess the first one that comes to mind is gilbert three houses?? i understand why hes like that for sure and can sympathize but i dont know. everytime that hes on screen i just frustrated. the fact that he treats annette the way that he does bothers me a lot even if i understand why, but then theres also the added fact that he only becomes story relevant to replace dedue, who was a MUCH better and far less ANNOYING character to listen to all the time. like why would you replace one of my favorite students/retainers with this stupid little old man who i really have no reason to be attached to? you cant even recruit him during white clouds! not to mention, hes force deployed with the most garbage base stats (THAT YOU CANT CHANGE. BECAUSE. HE WASNT RECRUITABLE IN WHITE CLOUDS!!) in one of the hardest maps in the whole game in a position you CANNOT EDIT. like just GIVE ME DEDUE??????? you know, the CHARACTER I TRAINED??????? god… anyways so its probably him. this felt good actually i dislike him much more than i thought i did.
17. How did you get into Fire Emblem?
this is really embarrassing actually but when i was younger i was really into kid icarus uprising (i still am but like less so) and i reeeally loved pit like you see me with inigo now? that was pit for me back then. and i wanted more of him but nintendo was not giving me any kid icarus content, so what i looked up his voice actor instead, and i went through a lot of medias just to listen to him (did you know antony del rio did this live performance of maroon 5’s “This Love” that’s actually way better than the original? look it up) (no i dont like adam levine) but the one that stuck the most was this silly little game… you mightve heard of it its called Fire Emblem Fates. and i saw silas fire emblem and i was like WOAHHH. HES CUTE and did a ton of research on the series, having only vaguely known of it from smash bros. bought birthright, having learned it was the easier of the two paths, and then i just. entire life changed immediately and i didnt even know.
24. An FE title you wish would be remade?
all of them in order, which is what they already seem to be doing! so, ideally, fe4 next? of course my bias would LOVE an awakening remake but i dont think thats fair to skip all the other games. plus, i think there are other games that need a gameplay overhaul more. …like fe4.
29. Avatars: yay or nay?
i cant fucking stand the concept of avatars in fire emblem. i like all of them as characters. i think robin, corrin, byleth, and alear as characters (i havent played shadow dragon and new mystery sorry kris!) are fine. but i hate how theyre all implemented into all of their games, to the point where the words “byleth” and “alear” are never spoken in their mostly fully voiced games. its so fucking stupid. and then you have writing problems, like other playable characters not being able to have meaningful and lasting conflicts with the avatars because you have to be able to fuck them when the games over, or even during the game in robin and corrins case. and also the weird incest that has to happen if you want your avatar to have familial ties? god forbid people who just think camilla or ryoma are hot have to justify incest to themselves and read some the dumbest fucking s support bullshit just to have their little otome romance. and then the plot bending around them? robin i give a pass because i dont think awakening was annoyingly centered on them (the grima thing was close but for the most part the focus stays on chrom and i think thats a good thing) but as much as i love these games, fates, three houses, and engage all suffer from being a little TOO player pandering. making your character a god? really? especially when the avatar takes focus away from other potential story drivers (xander/takumi, 3h lords, engage royals) and like for what? i like all of the “avatars” as characters. but the way that theyre used and what little that usage does for any positive story impact is just frustrating!
35. What’s something you wish Intsys would just stop doing?
avatars.
#hi stedy :3 thanks for the hater questions that was actually really fun#i dont normally like being too pissy about things but god sometimes it is fun to just hate#asks#*editing bc i wrote 17 instead of 16 intitially i think three houses is the better starting point i just cant count
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hunger games anon here and yes!!! so many connections and references it was so overwhelming when the dots connected. i loved lucy gray so much (and im a long time fan of rachel zegler (since she was a junior in hs making yt covers in her bedroom lol) so i am so excited to see her play lucy (and it feels like the PERFECT casting, even just reading the book she is who i pictured).
spoiler for the hanging scene as well but i thought there was absolutely nooo way snow would let it happen. but then again i also thought surely he wouldnt ever ACTUALLY record and send the audio off to the capitol, either. :/. and when he took advantage of the plinths and their money at the end???? ouchhhh.
and when sejanus cried out for his mom..... oh it basically killed me. i put my book down for a good 30 minutes and just processed it.
honestly tbosas might be my fave in the entire series (with catching fire being second). but arguably my favorite thing abt ballad is that we can see snows actual descent into evil, into the snow thats present in the main series.
the way it starts off with him as just a poor, scared kid trying to make his dead parents proud and him having to make sacrifices to get there, to the way he took such pride in his capitol and home without ever realizing it was the capitols fault he was poor and scared and without parents in the first place.
then the way it shifts to him realizing using people to get what he wants is the *only* way to get what he wants, and seeing him accept that, and seeing him use it to his advantage.... sickening.
maybe because its so realistic in the sense that i understand what his thought process was and it really shows that under correct circumstances, that type of thing could happen to anybody.
literally just bone chilling idk.
sorry for writing an actual essay in ur inbox, none of my friends are into thg so this is basically all the thoughts ive kept to myself abt this book for like a year LMAO
yess rachel is great casting!!! unsure about snow's casting bc i dont know the guy, but i'm sure he'll be great! i am very excited about hunter schafer as tigris!!!!
i actually meant the first hanging scene, the one the song is based on!! that connection was just, it overwhelmed me. but yes, i did not expect that for sejanus </3 snow taking advantage of his parents at the end really did sum up how far he had fallen. there was also a line about how he'd taken back the money he sent to tigris and the grandmama, which just summed it up for me. i'd honestly love just a whole book dedicated to tigris because her line about 'be kind coryo, try not to look down on people who had to choose between death and disgrace' hit really hard, and implied so much about her character. how did she go from his most beloved cousin, to helping the mockingjay? i would love that story.
also never ever apologise for an essay in my inbox, i love it!!!!
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Scream VI (2023)
Guess who's back, back again.
Ghostface's back, call a friend.
The iconic, and my personal favorite, slasher franchise returns to the big screen in the shortest turnaround between films since the original Scream and Scream 2. Breaking the recent trend of taking a decade break between installments, Scream IV arrives just thirteen months after Scream (2022) AKA Scream 5. Sight unseen I would have petitioned to title this time out Ghostface Takes Manhattan, but for some reason Hollywood hasn't started taking my calls.
The original Scream released in 1996 was the first true horror film I saw, with all of the lights out next to my father on our attached recliners in rural South Carolina. I was in high school, and never had the desire beforehand to dive into scary movies. When I was younger, even trailers for horror movies in the theaters would give me nightmares, and I had maxed out with thrillers for years. However, I had heard so much about Scream and it being a meta-horror with dark comedy and one that was lighter on the brutality than similar franchises like Friday the 13th and Texas Chainsaw Massacre. So I figured I would give it a shot to see if I really could handle horror, and it has been off to the races ever since.
In fact, just in the past two years I have caught up on nearly a hundred horror movies I missed when I was younger, vowing to see every classic and even the unheralded cult icons. One of my future blogs may be dedicated to the scores of horror I indulged in as part of a pretty cool scratch-off poster I bought from Pop Charts (linked here) to keep myself honest. Even after all of those being checked off my watchlist, Scream remains as my all-time favorite.
Our long-running heroine of the series is Sydney Prescott, portrayed by Neve Campbell, and boy has she been through a lot of shit.
First, we hear Sydney's mother was killed a year before we meet her, and her friends and community of Woodsboro begin to get the sharp end of the blade of a masked serial killer Ghostface. In the climax, we learn that her boyfriend Billy Loomis and his friend Stu have been responsible for the killings. Billy wants to get back at the Prescott family since Sydney's mother had an affair with Billy's father, which led to his parents' divorce. Stu is just a psycho. With the help of her friend Randy, Sheriff Dewey Riley, and local investigative journalist Gale Weathers, Sydney turns the tables on the killers and whack Billy and Stu.
Sure, on paper Scream is just a slasher movie, but the real notoriety the series carries is its perfect commentary and skewering of horror movies, especially slashers, that came before. Jamie Kennedy's whole role as Randy is to advise the group of the tropes and pitfalls of horror movie characters so the teens can avoid getting butchered. The film is full of classic scenes, including Drew Barrymore in the cold open, Randy screaming at Jamie Lee Curtis in Halloween to turn around to see Michael Myers while he himself is being stalked by Ghostface, and plenty of quotable lines (LIVER alone!).
Scream 2 picks up with Sydney attending college alongside other survivor Randy, and in my opinion is just a hair below the original in kills, humor, and twists. Scream 3 is a snooze-fest and the worst of the series by far, where the filming of a movie called 'Stab' is taking place based on Sydney's experience in Woodsboro. This is the one where the killer is revealed to be Sydney's long lost brother in the most who gives a shit reveal. Scream 4 takes place 10 years later, and recaptures what I found to be the best parts of the first two films.
At this point, I thought the franchise was dead and over, and I was happy for it to have ended on such a strong note as Scream 4. I especially thought it was a fitting end when the creator of the franchise and director over each installment Wes Craven passed away sadly in 2015. He had created and directed other iconic horror movie films like A Nightmare on Elm Street.
However, Scream 5 was announced to be released 25 years later to the month from it's inspiring original. When I heard the announcement, I was extremely upset and skeptical about the movie. Why should I trust an installment in a beloved franchise directed by anyone besides the creator? And with the cash grabs coming from Hollywood by way of unnecessary sequels, why can't they just let this one alone?
I can admit when I am wrong, and I was wrong about being skeptical of Scream 5. I thought it was a worthy sequel, paid respect to the characters and movies that came before, and kept the commentary of modern horror sharp and relevant. I even liked the newly casted heroines in the film, played by Jenna Ortega and Melissa Barrera. Although I'm getting a little sick of seeing Jenna Ortega everywhere already. **SPOILER** It was sad to see Dewey die, but I understood the reasoning and why they did it per the Requel rules covered by newcomer character Mindy Meeks-Martin (a descendant of Randy's family).
The connection of Sam Carpenter being Billy Loomis' illegitimate child and channeling his psycho-powers for her to turn the tables on her own Ghostface was batshit crazy, but I loved it.
Despite really enjoying the 5th installment in the Scream series, I was hesitant once again when they announced a sequel would be released a year later, and this time taking place in the Big Apple. I immediately was reminded of the TERRIBLE horror movie sequel to take place in New York City- Jason Takes Manhattan. But you know I still had to buy a ticket and sit down to indulge in another offering that asks, what's your favorite scary movie?
And finally, we arrive at the sixth installment in the self-described slasher franchise Scream VI.
The movie opens up on Samara Weaving sitting in a hip New York City bar, who is waiting for and texting with a dating app match. Her match mentions he is lost trying to find the bar and asks if he can call her. The voice on the other end of the phone is NOT the Ghostface voice we've come to love, but instead is just a regular guy's voice who eventually asks her to come outside so he can determine if he is on the correct street.
Weaving ventures further and further outside the bar looking for her match when she is led to walk into a nearby alley (dumb dumb), and her match's voice changes from the slight British accent to the menacing Ghostface effect. Ghostface pops out, stab stab stab, and then pulls off his mask to reveal new character Jason (Tony Revolori)????? That's a first, and at this moment I didn't know what to think about this movie breaking tradition of never seeing the killer until the climax. He trashes the costume in a nearby dumpster, keeps the mask, and heads back to his apartment, momentarily bumping into the movie's heroine Tara Carpenter before she heads off to a party.
Once Revolori gets back to his apartment, he gets a call from his friend Greg who he is planning Ghostface murders with, who asks him to describe how alive he felt murdering Samara Weaving. "Greg" speaks in the Ghostface voice and lures Revolori to eventually open the fridge where he finds the dismembered body of actual Greg. The Ghostface we'll be seeing the rest of the movie jumps out and kills Revolori.
TITLE SCREEN
Not a bad kind of double opening to the film, and it was tense in the moments that Jason is taken around his apartment by the killer playing the Warmer/Colder game. Nothing will ever top the opening sequence in the original film, but I give credit for these movies never phoning it in (pun very much intended) on the introductions.
We are then reintroduced to our surviving cast from the previous film, which initiated my frustrations with this movie. Of course you have Tara and Sam Carpenter as the returning heroines, but then we have Mindy and Chad Meeks-Martin coming back after being severely stabbed and left for dead at the house party in the finale of Scream 5. This trend comes up again multiple times in this movie, and I really hate it when horror films cheapen the 'kills' by just having everyone's favorite characters end up surviving. It removes the stakes, takes away any tension or fear we have that our beloved leads may be murdered, and makes the whole thing rather pointless.
We'll get to all that again. However, in this re-introduction to what they dub the 'Core 4' - Tara, Sam, Chad, and Mindy - we see that Sam is dealing with her issues with a counselor, who immediately drops her and threatens to call the cops when she says she kinda enjoyed pin-cushioning the killer Richie in Scream 5, and Tara is dealing with it by drinking. They then force an out of nowhere romantic tension between Tara and Chad which feels so creepy and dumb that I rolled my eyes both times they try and pass it off in the runtime.
Anyways, Tara lives with Sam while she goes to college with their new roommate character Quinn Bailey, and the whole group has a new friend Ethan Landry who seems like a geeky innocent addition. Mindy will then hammer you over the head for the next two hours on how he seems too nice to actually be innocent of any of the Ghostface killings. There is also a neighbor across the hall that Sam seemingly has a crush on, and then reveals is having a secret affair with that she hides from the rest of the cast. Sam is overbearing for Tara who just wants to have a good time.
And there's the setup- phone calls begin, stabby stabby, strap in for another edition of Scream where we try to figure out who the killer(s) is.
Let us start with the positive for Scream 6. First, this is by far the goriest and most brutal movie in the series as far as the kills go. The twisting of the knife in the gut, Anika falling to her death and banging her face on the dumpster, Greg's dismembered body in the fridge, etc. are all the most gruesome murders we've seen in the franchise. And I ain't mad at it, as it makes each sequential death that much more powerful and painful to watch and makes you fear for whoever is next.
I also enjoyed seeing Hayden Panetierre reprise her role as Kirby from Scream 4. Although I found the idea that she is/was an FBI agent to be ridiculous and just a convenient plot point, it was still nice to see a legacy character besides Sydney or Gale make an appearance. Otherwise, she doesn't make that much of an impact in this movie.
Now, let's get to my gripes, of which I have MANY but will cover the two main ones.
The Killers
I don't know about you (who I'm assuming is a Scream fan if you've stuck with this franchise for 6 films), but part of what I love in these movies is trying to guess who the killer will be and still be somewhat surprised at the ending. I won't lie, there is one aspect of the ending of Scream 6 that I didn't see coming, but it's also a cheat and nothing you could have suspected anyways.
Due to the amount of times Ghostface mentions his plan to punish Sam for her past deeds and expose her as a killer, I knew whoever was the murderer in these movies was related to the killer in Scream 5 - Richie Kirsch. Then it hit me. When Quinn seemingly gets butchered, her father who is a police officer comes out and offhand mentions how he can't believe both of his kids are gone now. It clicked for me immediately, his son was Richie and he is at least one of what I assumed would be multiple killers. Then I knew if there was a second killer it would be someone else in their family unit.
Then, when it is revealed that is exactly what is going on, I was pretty disappointed and underwhelmed. The only thing I didn't see coming was that Quinn didn't actually get killed and the cop swapped out her body for another when they faked her death. Pretty stupid in my opinion, and cheated the mystery out as much as Glass Onion (which I severely disliked). Cool that this is the first movie to have 3 killers instead of the classic 2, but something I found wasted on the laziness of the plot.
I have to mention at this point that I really do like Dermot Mulroney, and found him to be a good addition when he played the dutiful cop assisting the Carpenters in finding their stalker. HOWEVER, when he makes the turn to psychopathic killer, it is an embarrassing and frankly ridiculous performance. I have to assume the production kept a stockpile of eye drops on set since his peepers bug out of his head while he dances around revealing his master plan for minutes on end.
Mindy also calls out Ethan as the probable killer to an exhaustive extreme throughout that when it turns out he is one of the vengeful family members, I have a hard time believing you're actually shocked or care.
2. The Lack of Stakes
My gripe in the beginning of the film in seeing, specifically, Chad return after being what we all assumed was fatally stabbed in Scream 5 happens so many times in this movie that I can't understand why the filmmakers expect us to get any tension out of these new sequels.
Starting with Gale Weathers. Gale is stabbed multiple times in her apartment before eventually being found by Sam and Tara, but your sorrow in seeing a beloved character die is immediately dispelled when an EMT announces that she still has a pulse and she's saved. Alright, then why even have her get brutally stabbed?
Then, we move to Chad AGAIN! When the remaining survivors try to draw in the killer to the shrine/movie theater Gale discovered earlier in the movie, Chad gets stabbed several times in the chest and stomach by two killers at the same time. Go fuck yourself if you think that I buy him living through that, and why can we not have one person who returns get killed? They mention earlier in the film that one of the rules of a franchise is everyone is fair game to be murdered, and then nobody actually gets killed? BOOOOO, THAT'S WHAT WE'RE HERE FOR.
Look, I can't say this film isn't entertaining as it keeps the pace up, the kills coming, and the New York set pieces bloody. However, if I'm ranking it in the catalogue I only enjoy this time out more than the abomination that is Scream 3, because it introduces nothing new besides more gore, has the most predictable outcome of all the predecessors, and cheapens the kills to a ridiculous degree. Sure, I'm going to buy it when it gets released since I own the rest, but I imagine it's going to collect some dust over the years.
Scream VI - 6.0/10
#scream#scream 6#scream vi#scream 2#scream 3#scream 4#scream 5#horror#horror films#horror blog#horror fans#scary movies#scary#slasher
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