Vertraue niemals einem Stollentroll

The name’s Keeks and I was sent by the Netherworldian monarchy to spread the Gospel of Moers. Auch auf Deutsch verfügbar. Icon by @mozania-naf

[hansdampfinallengassen]

Groot und Zille. Ein Schweinsbarbar und ein Hempelchen. Aus “Die dreizehneinhalb Leben des Käpt’n Blaubär”. Von Walter Moers. Meine Version. Die letzten ihrer Art. Und ein Versuch von mir.

[pant--eater]

Babe: i'm coming over, you better not be a cunty Zamonia villain when I get there

Me:

[friftar]

Hello! I've been a fan of Zamonien/Zamonia ever since I first listened to the audiobook version of "The 13 1/2 Lives of Captain Bluebear", and when I first read "Rumo" as a teenager, it quickly became my favourite book. Lately I've been coming back to Walter Moers and his writings, and I was delighted to find other fans here on this website <3 And when I found out about Frifnab, I was like, why didn't I think about it? That's such an obvious queer ship that apparently sailed straight over my head for such a long time xD Point is, I've read up on the translations of your fanfiction "The Gornab of all Gornabs" and it's amazing! All the characters are wonderfully in-character and even the dialect of Gornab the Ninetyninth is spot-on.

I'm aware that you privated your Zamonien/Zamonia works on AO3, a decision I completely understand. So, being able to read your fic on Tumblr as an alternative is great! But I'd love to read even more, and as english isn't my native language (german is) the translation thing is a non-issue. I just wanted to ask whether it's difficult to get an account on AO3 and if it's worth it! You can answer in english or german, both options are fine with me :) Please, take your time and don't feel stressed to reply quickly, we're all humans with our own lives to live here, and I understand that <3 With adoration for what you do and how you write themasteofruins17

Hello hello! I'll try answering in English so everyone can understand :D

I'M SO HAPPY TO HEAR YOU LIKE MY FIC! It's been a work I've dedicated a crazy amount to, so to hear it get some love always makes me very giddy. Thank you for that! :D

It is not difficult to get an AO3 account - I thiiiiink these days you have to get into the queue, but the "old" way of doing it is having someone send you an invitation, which gets send to your email right away.

Of course, it depends whether you are cool with sending your mail to a stranger online (there's a reason my AO3 mail is a non-descriptive one), other than that, the invitation queue takes like, ah, eleven days if I remember correctly? But yeah. It's very simple at the end of it.

As for Frifnab, YES! It's just so in the face. These guys kissed and banged - or at least they wanted too but are too fucking repressed and emotionally constipated to consider their feeeeeeelings and desires. Who knows, maybe Hel would've been a better place if these two had gotten over themselves. Or it'd be worse. Might as well be that, considering everything else we know of them.

UND JETZT KURZ AUF DEUTSCH!

Ich hab die Original-FF auf Deutsch sogar auf 'ner öffentlichen Seite, nämlich auf Fanfiktion.de, HIER um ganz genau zu sein. Etwas simpleres Format als AO3, ohne horizontale Linie und so, aber es tut seine Aufgabe.

Ich weis darauf hin, nicht weil ich meine eigene Übersetzung so mangelhaft finde (obwohl ich die Kapitel jeweils in recht kurzer Zeit abgearbeitet habe, ohne Korrekturlesung durch irgendwen), aber ich leg wirklich allen, die das Original als solches gut verstehen können, ans Herz, dieses auch zu lesen.

Oder vielleicht bin ich auch einfach viel zu festgefahren darin, Rumo immer auf Deutsch zu lesen 😅

Danke für den lieben Ask!!!! 🩷🩷🩷

[pant--eater]

Local ouppy about to go and experience the world (and horrors) <3

not my best fake screencap but I felt the giga need to try doodling something different after a long week of work :''D

[pant--eater]

goodness knows i will NOT have time during the time being to turn this into a full-on illustration, because rn I gotta work on my comic and artist alley prints/stickers etc. So TEEHEE in the meantime have this wip :]

sort of a "cover" for my ongoing multichapter Frifnab fanfiction An Igneous Echo, which has 6 chapters as we speak and will MOST LIKELY break the 100K barrier :'''DDDD No really it's already the longest piece of fanfiction that I have ever written, and it's not even close to its ending LMFAOOOOO, I have legit no idea where this sudden gigantic rush of inspiration to write rarefandom fic came to me during this summer (be mindful though if you read it, because it's E rated for graphic violence, horror and sexual themes. so minors dni!!)

lgbt people are THRIVING in the Zamonian underground (aka: killing each other and scheming)

[puppygirlmoans]

*3 drinks in voice* you wanna test each other's pain tolerance?

[feldsparred-zamonia]

Reblog this with your Zamonia related hot take in the tags. I need the tea

[pant--eater]

so that Hildegunst in Hel AU by @friftar huh 🫦🫦🫦🫦🫦

[friftar]

hi (it's glowingtitle)!! 👑🪐⚔️ please, + 1 additional emoji of your choice for any other question you would like to cover (it's optional, no pressure)!!

hullo hullo! :D

👑 - Favorite character?

I like Friftar, who's my icon and my url and makes up 80% of this very blog and stars in at least one of my fanfiction epics, a perfectly normal amount.

🪐 - A question you've always had about one of the books?

Yes, this is boring, but I would love an actual timeline, even if it spans fifteen thousand years. Yes, I know that the timeline technically does Not matter, in a similar way that scale doesn't, it's very maximalist worldbuilding and "weird fantasy", but PLEASE. I wanna untangle it so badly.

⚔️ - Best fight/battle?

The final battle on the S.S. Moloch! As a whole, the chapter is just the perfect mix of bleak and fun; the reveal of the Zamonium, Groot and Zille being there again as the silliest guys, the troll being his usual chaotic unlovable rogue self, the whole story getting a nice little bow on top, everything.

My choice: (BECAUSE OF COURSE) 🫎 - A take you think the fandom isn't ready for?

Others said it better than me that sections of this fandom (read: reddit, facebook, the smarmy old school nerds who think transformative works is for teenage girls [SIC BIG TIME]) will boast about how "the continent is the ONLY relevant character of these books" while turning their nose up at people who enjoy individual characters and love analysing them is annoying.

That's that.

I personally would love it if people would stop commenting under every single news about Zamonia that they finally want Castle of Dreaming Books. It's annoying when people pester GRRM about Winds of Winter and it's annoying with Moers as well. Writers, be they hobbyist fic writers or published famous authors who will fill convention halls aren't content mills. Yes, it's a novel people have been waiting for for over a decade now but when people reacted to the book in 2023 not being Castle but Island, it was a barrage of "wah wah, but we want Castle, not this shit! GIVE US CASTLE!!!", I was so pissed and annoyed. Have you tried enjoying the book you are getting? Rereading the old books?

I get the base sentiment, I really do, so I say this in the nicest way ever as I take your collective hands and maintain eye contact with you: you're being an impatient whiny baby.

[pant--eater]

OK OK NOW I AM INTERESTED

🐖🫎🪐

The other two I answered! :]

🫎 - A take you think the fandom isn't ready for?

Oh boi okay! A lot of people in their asks have already given good points (lack of active female characters/overall heteronormativity. And the way some of the fan communities think the characters matter less than the actual locations, and are kinda rude towards the more "fangirly" content like shipping.)

As for myself I think its often overlooked that Zamonia itself has a LOOOT of in-universe racism and species-wide prejudices going on, like not just Hel or the way Ugglies get the short end and are genocided on the regular. But f.ex. Atlantis that has straight up classified humans as outsiders, not allowed to enter their city. Or heck, the way Vulpheads are treated, like what we discussed earlier! I think it adds a really interesting aspect when it comes to writing Zamonia in fanworks etc. Same with Wolperting that on ONE HAND is a socialist paradise, but also an ethnostate.

One thing that comes to mind is also Nocturnomaths - the way their amount of brains at birth pretty much dictates how far theyre gonna be allowed to make it as scientists in society, which lowkey makes me wonder if there happens like. selective breeding and straight up eugenics among them.

Kibitzer feels insecure for his humble amount of 3 brains, Kolibril mentions he will never live up to Nightingale - and Nightingale himself?? He openly boasts his superior brain amount :DDD As smart as he is and as many inventions as he has done, it's largely been because of the lucky deal of 7 that he got at birth. (I DO WONDER how Nocturnomath biology works and what aspects influence the brain amounts! I like to think that theyre born from eggs because...those big ass heads would be hard to squeeze out yknow...... but also because of the bird themes that Nocturnomaths in general share :DD)

And Nightingale has done absolutely fuckall to work against these biases in the academia world despite his millennia-long power and influence. which makes him a multidimensional flawed guy in my eyes!

[feldsparred-mo]

"He was a legend, a genius, the Nightingale of the sport of lying"

[pant--eater]

Gornab is hot and i'm tired of pretending he is not *Jojo music plays as I turn into a werewolf lion hybrid mix and ascend and laser beams come from my eyes and i got a sixpack and my eyes got sixpacks too*

Feat. Igneous Echo ch 6 spoilers in the last doodle :D

[friftar]

answering this here and not on my main 😅 thanks @imaproperstranger !

🍖 - Zamonian food you'd love to try?

Already answered!

🦖 - Least favorite character?

Okay, I had to seriously wreck my brain for this one, because I tend to at least find characters fascinating even if they are evil or utter douchebags.

But. Uh.

I really couldn't stand the "Classics", the five booklings named after Ancient Greek philosophers from "The Book Dragon". It didn't help that they ended up befriending Hildegunst Two at the end of the book, I just found them so annoying by then that I hope we don't have to see them in Castle of Dreaming Books by the time that one drops.

[nyanakin]

the type of ship i fuck with the most

[rockthistowninsideout]

🐖🫎🍖!!

🍖 - Zamonian food you'd love to try

I was hoping to get this prompt!

The way Urs raves on about mousebladders makes them really appealing to me, not gonna lie. Since I'm not opposed to eating other intestines of animals it wouldn't even bother me that it's a bladder, you know?

On the less, let's say, frowned-upon side of food there are the baked goods in Bookholm. Be it Dichterlocke or bookling, I cannot wait to have them with a cup of cocoa on a foggy fall afternoon (the bookling I might actually make soon since I plan on hosting a baking class with cozy recipes from fantasy books and the bookling is one of them. It's just that attendance numbers look dreary atm.)

🫎 - A take you think the fandom isn't ready for?

As you said in your post, the fandom loves to cling to the statement that "the continent is the main character" which leads to ignoring the great characters populating the stories. But it also eases glossing over the "white man" flaws Moers has in his writing, most notably the lack of female characters and queer characters.

🐖 - Favorite half-serious idea/headcanon?

Recently developed by @friftar and @pant--eater, Hildegunst going down to Hel and becoming not only the sole respected novelist in Netherworld, but also having something(?) with Friftar, the details are somewhere lost in a murky haze. I'd never considered this before but it makes sense that Hilde is so ubiquitous he even reaches down to Hel. And with his numerous experiences in the subterranean it's only a matter of time until he finds himself down there as well.

[friftar]

Mousebladders sound like one hell of a snack.

And WHEEEEE, I'm glad the thought-of-on-a-whim idea of "lmfao, imagine Hildegunst in Hel, how would be survive in there since he ALWAYS survives" struck a chord 🥲🥰

[friftar]

🕯🪨!

🕯- What spin-off would you 100% read?

Ukobach and Ribesehl's life on Overworld and what adventures they are up to, or rather, what trouble is bound to find them. I think it would be fun to see Zamonia from their eyes as a place they know about in theory but through very warped reports.

Or anything set in Gralsund.

🪨 - Most underrated quote?

Man, all of these are in German and I have no idea about the official translations, so here goes nothing.

"Zum Irren langte es nicht ganz. Nur zum Dichter." ("It wasn't enough to be considered a madman. Only a poet.")

"Warum lassen wir unsere Kinder nicht einfach das lernen, was sie lernen wollen? Wollen sie zamonische Urmathematik lernen, werden sie vielleicht zamonische Urmathematiker. Wollen sie kochen lernen, werden sie Köche. Wollen sie schreiben lernen, werden sie bestenfalls Schriftsteller und schlimmstenfalls Drohbriefschreiber. Wollen sie gar nichts lernen, bleiben sie eben dämlich oder werden Literaturkritiker." ([big sigh]. "Why don't we just let our children learn what they want to learn? If they want to learn about Zamonian proto-mathematics, maybe they'll become Zamonian proto-mathematicians. If they want to learn how to cook, they'll become cooks. If they want to learn how to write, in the best case they'll become authors and in the worst case they'll write hate mail. If they don't want to learn anything, they'll simply stay stupid or become literary critics.")

Are these underrated? Either way, they're very high up there in "favourite quotes" both because they ring true and are funny.

[friftar]

🐛🍖!!

🐛 - Favorite species/creature?

Oh my god. I am not being surprising with this with this when I say: Murkholmers.

Sike, lol, we all know the answer although I DO love the Murkholmers. Former scavengers and pirates who allied themselves with the (literally) dark forces below out of pure greed? They are super into music and managed to weaponise that as well and hypnotise people with their trombones? Their almost ridiculous and over-the-top affinity for cruelty? And yet, they are somehow charismatic enough for their home city to be considered a semi popular tourist spot? Insane. I want an entire novel about a Murkholmer and whatever heinous-as-fuck shenanigans they are up to.

No, but yeah, it's Those Guys. The fucking Hellings, the weird evil rich cave-dwellers in their depressing city ruled by an insane dynasty with a racist caste system, where looking unhealthy has been or was en vogue, and murdering people is entertainment. I love when a strange and shitty little guy or gal is an absolute cunt because there's little more I enjoy than exploring their psyches and the "why" of it all, and Moers went ahead and wrote an entire city full of them? Man, you sure know how to treat a girl, Walter!

The Hel chapter in Rumo was pretty much what sparked my obsession with them because I love a good infodump and this bit infodumped so wonderfully about their history and that of their rulers spanning over millenia and how their culture came to be in a way that stuck so well that it rewired my brain chemistry. Otherwise I wouldn't be sitting here with the most elaborate headcanons about them in all departments of their species and crafting on far too self-indulgent fanfictions that miraculously primarily feature Helling protagonists and villains and supporting characters.

Maybe I'd just really like sharkgrubs but be comparatively normal about them (or not).

As for critters, I really liked the flightless seagulls (Strandlööper in the original, which might be a tad hard to translate... beach trodders?)

🍖 - Zamonian food you'd love to try?

Gimp, to get, y'know, ZOOTED AS FUCK IN THE DESERT.

Eydernornian Torchfish, it sounds mad good according to Hildegunst.

Murkholmian Fogfish with suffocated smoked eels, more for curiosity's sake. Plus, I do like seafood.

Comet wine, to get, y'know, DRUNK AS FUCK IN THE CATACOMBS.