Combo
| they/them | queer | 30s |
Horse Girl (gender neutral)
Dragon Age sleeper agent
overall reasonably friendly unless hungry
I used to be a fandom creator just like you, but then I took a demyelinating disease to the central nervous system and what do you MEAN that joke hasn't been funny in over a DECADE?? W-what. WHAT YEAR IS THIS D:
Now, I know Blorbo has committed... various crimes, some of which I support, and some I'm like, eeeh bro really about. He wasn't at his most stable for all of them, though.
But to me, the worst one? Is him spreading misinformation about horses.
Maybe you're like, "Combo, what" (normal reaction), but when he was stalling (heheheh) for time and having his little (frankly justified) rant about his sorry excuse for a father, and compared him to a rutting stallion?
Factually incorrect.
Horses don't go into rut! Mares will go into heat, which can, uh, get some nearby stallions going, but stallions don't go into rut. That's not a thing. That's just not how horse biology works. They aren't like deer.
He knows almost everything, remembers everything, but apparently he never learned anything about horses. A shame, as it has made his metaphors as well as me, personally, suffer. It would have be-hooved him to read up on these majestic creatures, so he could have nailed it.
The reblog chain is one of the things that makes Tumblr unlike anywhere else. All the notes on reblogs are attributed to the original post, no matter which branch people actually liked or reblogged. We want to keep encouraging conversations, and give contributors the recognition they deserve.
Soon, you'll be able to like, reblog, or reply to any part of a reblog chain, and that note will go to that reblog's author. Each reblog will have its own counts, instead of one aggregated number from every version of the post. And yes, you’ll be able to like multiple posts in one chain.
If a reblog doesn't add anything, the love flows up to the last person in the chain who did. Your post doesn't lose notes just because people spread it quietly.
Past notes will stay on the original post — we're only changing what happens from here on out. Retroactively re-attributing all of them would be... a lot.
This is just the beginning. More changes are coming as we keep building this out – stay tuned!
It’s very clear that you all have strong feelings about Tumblr and about this change. We hear you. The passion people have for how Tumblr works is one of the things that makes this place special.
As this rolls out over the next few days and you explore it, we’ll keep reading your replies and reblogs, so please keep sharing your questions, concerns, and ideas.
Your creativity has always been the heart of Tumblr, whether you’re the original poster or adding something brilliant in the reblogs, and nothing about this change is meant to limit that.
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here at the sandwich shop, we’ve started to notice some people who are new to sandwiches aren’t used to meat and cheese between two slices of bread. they find this practice strange and confusing. that’s why we’ve decided to cut the bread out all together. from now on, we’ll just serve slices of meat and cheese on a plate.
we know that many of our loyal sandwich shop customers have been coming here for years to buy our delicious sandwiches. but some people don’t “get” sandwiches, and we need to try and appeal to them with an easier-to-understand meal format. we will no longer be serving sandwiches. all of our food will just be cold cuts on a paper plate. we love our customers and appreciate your understanding <3
Yes we know Craig's Cold Cuts down the street does cold cuts better than we do and has millions of customers. That's why we need to switch to cold cuts, to get their customers. We hope that our long-time sandwich loving customer base will be patient in this transition to cold cuts and welcome the certain influx of Craig's Cold Cut customers who will surely come here to enjoy our worse cold cuts with you, our sandwich-deprived customer base, whom we value so much.
This might require some background info about horse obsession life to make sense! I'm pretty sure it makes sense. Just... lean into it.
I have been a Horse Girl (gender neutral) since the first time I ever laid my eyes upon a horse/pony, and so, I have read a lot of Horse Girl Books in my days. We are talking hundreds, like just. Insane amounts of horse books. I have written an alarming amount of essays and papers on the subject of horse books, many about how they very, very often are, at their core, a power fantasy. Someone downtrodden is lifted up by their special ability to form an unbreakable bond with a powerful or even dangerous animal, finally earning admiration and respect from others. Sounds like something someone we know would enjoy, right?
A very common premise of a Horse Girl Book (which is different from just a Horse Book) is that a lonely, often socially isolated young girl encounters a horse that others consider difficult, and bonds with it. Very often The Girl is in some way different from others. She might be poor, she might be awkward, she might be new in town, or she might be some sort of stable outcast just because a lot of horse girls are a bit evil and prone to psychological mind games. It's very common for her to have to work hard to afford doing Horse Things while the others just coast along, which is looked down upon for Class Reasons. SOUNDS FAMILIAR? As she and the horse learn to work well together, her confidence grows, but so does the resentment of some of her fellow horse girls (often a rich or otherwise privileged one), who are jealous of her special abilities and quick learning curve. Sounds familiar!?
(I realised this got insanely long and so, I am putting a read more here, before we even get to Meng Yao and his Horse. My horse thoughts, my horse feelings... Anyway I swear there is some fic down there.)
Usually, no one except for maybe one mentor figure believe in them, so it's a huge surprise to everyone when the bond between The Girl and The Difficult Horse enables them to do amazing things, like winning an important competition or performing some kind of Feat that Saves The Day. Sometimes they, as a unit, are basically Lassie. This can open doors for The Girl to find acceptance and friendship among her peers, who suddenly aren't dicks anymore.
(In real life Horse Girls often have this weird and competitive homoerotic tension with their Sworn Rival? It's not really relevant here, just sharing. Very intense things goes on with horse girls.)
So I know this sounds insane, but hear me out:
The Nie gives me strong Horse Girl vibes. They have devoted their lives to their dangerous weapons, ignoring the advice of anyone who is like, "hey that seems unreasonably dangerous?" (I love them with all my soul but you can get very badly hurt doing horse stuff) because their souls are entwined and nothing can break their bond except the destruction of the blade itself, which will then destroy the blade's owner. The bond wasn't truly broken, it just took the user down with it, as one does. Horse girls are so obsessive, this cannot be understated, and the Nie's entire thing just screams Horse Girl to me. Baxia in particular is very Difficult Horse-coded. She is a famous, dangerous weapon, and only someone as powerful as Nie Mingjue can handle such a blade, he is so impressive! Look at him and his very impressive sword that haunts his every thought, probably! Extremely Horse Girl of them.
SO ANYWAY, now we actually get to the story: this is an AU where everything is basically the same, except the Nie are clearly Horse Girls (gender neutral). They are just extremely into horses, almost as much as they are into cultivating resentful energy that will one day consume them in a violent, bloody mess, which is honestly a hazard for real life horse girls too.
So, in the spirit of Take Your Fandom To Work day (my first job was horse) and my lifelong devotion to horses, I decided that hey, you know what Blorbo should have? A horse. Petting the soft, soft muzzle of a horse would be good for him. He needs to live through roughly five hundred horse book tropes.
And so, we finally get to a snippet of Meng Yao encountering a horse and deciding that horses? Pretty neat!
Behold:
"Anyway", said Nie Huaisang after catching one quick solitary breath after his tirade, "I think there is someone you should meet!"
Meng Yao, head politely bowed; always, always bowed under that invisible and almost impossibly heavy weight, did not ask "In the stables, Young Master?" but simply kept his smile in place and followed. "I see, Young Master."
Nie Huaisang sighed, needlessly dramatic in the manner of someone not well acquainted with the word no. "Huaisang, I keep telling you, you can call me Huaisang!"
"This one wouldn't dare be so improper, Young Master", Meng Yao not quite protested; he had been with the Nie, and bestowed with Nie Huaisang's attention for long enough to be used to this little song and dance. Nie Huaisang insisting on abandoning almost all pretence of social protocol, and Meng Yao carefully, carefully not protesting as much as he should. Nie Huaisang had assured him over and over that the Nie were different and that no one much cared for rigid etiquette, but Meng Yao knew bitterly well it wasn't true. He knew he wasn't lying; he had just never been in a position to notice or know.
Nie Huaisang sighed louder, and stopped and swung his left arm out in a gesture of behold! "Look up, at least. Here!"
Meng Yao looked up in the direction of Nie Huaisang's arm.
A very small horse looked back.
She was a pretty colour, a very dark and slightly reddish brown, but her mane looked unkempt compared to the other horses, somehow both coarser and thinner. Unlike the others, she stood out not due to beauty, but the ways she was different. Shorter legs, a short neck and a head that seemed slightly too big.
He decided not to think about what her teeth might look like. Being smaller, he knew very well, did not mean one couldn't be dangerous, and he had seen what an infected bite from a much smaller animal could do.
Meng Yao hadn't had much reason to interact with horses of any kind before coming to the Nie and couldn't claim to know much about their body language. Aside from ears tucked back and a raised hoof being a bad sign, he was more in the dark than he liked to be.
Still, he was under the distinct impression that this one looked a bit bored and vaguely unimpressed with the general state of the day.
It wasn't entirely off-putting.
"Here she is!" Nie Huaisang added with an unwarranted level of enthusiasm. "I think you'll like each other. You can pet her, I don't think she'll bite!"
Meng Yao briefly looked back at him. "Very reassuring. Young Master." But he did reach his hand out towards the little horse's muzzle, fingers carefully curled inwards as to not be easy to bite, just in case.
She carefully nibbled on them, as if searching for a treat.
Very briefly, Meng Yao wished he had one to give her.
"Her name is Cheerful Defiance In The Face Of Death", said Nie Huaisang proudly.
Rules: make a new post with the names of all the files in your WIP folder, regardless of how non-descriptive or ridiculous, and tag as many people as you have WIPs. People send an ask with the title that most intrigues them, then you post a snippet or tell them something about it!
Ahahaha so after looking at my WIP folder I realised I have more works in progress than I know people (some are over a decade old, please send help), so I'm just gonna put in the ones I have worked on most recently:
A whole new mess
Meng Yao's horse girl adventures
hayloft seduction fic (OG)
3zun eventual hayloft antics
hat blorbo EATS A HEART
arm-stealing fierce corpse xiyao
random DA alphabets
tender leg prosthetic moment
Five lonely roads
All but the last three are Xiyao or Xiyao-adjacent, but there is some variety in there!
I'm tagging some people I hope are working on something they'd like to share/talk about, whether it's writing or art: @kradogsrats, @kiss-like-a-bruise, @lurkingteapot, @ladymodina, @thatswhatsushesaid, @astrinde, @luanna801, @spikeymarshmallows, @eldritchjackalope
every time I go on tumblr I have to physically fight myself to not just become an angel olsen fan blog and force-feed everyone my every thought about how the tiniest seed is the realest song in all the world and my every feeling
