Ute Nagat was a man not often defied. As one with the stature of a giant he received the obedience of those cowed by physique alone. As a member of the Society of Yern Hunters he received the submission of those willing to bow to authority and experience. As a member of the Nagat line he was served by those respecting his long and storied lineage. There was no doubt in his mind that he would be the one to find the city lost to the teeming jungle centuries ago, a self-assurance that made his failure to date all the more galling. After his last expedition returned with vast treasures but no new knowledge of the lost city, he had immersed himself in the archives of his order. He searched through vault after vault of painstakingly collected knowledge about the vast swathe of the world hostile to human life itself. In endless stacks of shipping manifests, historical accounts of petty deeds, and overwhelming numbers of death receipts, he eventually found a single, solitary, solid lead to follow. In this, as in all things, Ute had no plans on being defied.
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“You’re one of the hopeless hunters, yeah?” said the girl, glancing down at the muscled fist Ute was clenching the collar of her fur-lined coat with. He dangled her off the edge of the human world, far above the writhing Madlands and the monstrosities they contained. It was where something like her belonged in the first place, and Ute had no qualms about returning the lost monster. She yawned wide enough for sunlight to shine to the back of her throat. “I hate to say it like this, but don’t you know who I am? You’re lucky you’ve still got that hand attached.”
i want to be good. and do good. and be nice to people. and make people happy. and have good and healthy relationships with people. i want to learn to forgive and i want to understand other people. i want to be loved and adored and i want to love and adore
i realized after i posted that that it sounds as if the pickles started speaking to me rather than my mum and her boyfriend, but y'know what, i'm not going to correct it
earlier today i zoned out listening to music in front of the big container of gifted pickles and they asked if i was feeling well so i told them "well i was in a bit of a pickle but it'll be okay"
today, a food delivery guy, delivers stuff to restaurants and all, he came by and asked if he could buy some of our bamboo to use for gardening or whatever, and we get that question so often we just give it away for free cause why not, right well, i guess he felt bad just taking it, because he gave us a big jar of sliced pickles in exchange
me, discussing rp with randoms: i've reached this sense of not caring what these people i hate think of me ooc. now i'm just enjoying it, somehow. like i hate them, but the hate fuels me me, later: ...oh my god, i've reached the brii stage
if your friends make you feel like you don't matter, or that your appreciation of them doesn't matter, maybe it's time for friends that don't make you feel bad.
i’ve finally, finally, FINALLY finished chapter 9, at least superficially. so. novel excerpt time? novel excerpt time!!
Collapse of the Shieldwall Empire, book 1, the very end chapter 8
“Now I got another question for you,” he snapped. “And you’re gonna stop playin’ stupid and answer it. Why aren’t you dead?”
Anberlin opened and closed her mouth. “What sort of sick game are you trying to play?” she replied.
Their banter had barely distracted him. Redros grit his teeth, but all Anberlin heard was his frustrated snarl. “You died. Nobody gets shot through the chest like that in a fuckin’ - in a nightie and lives! Nobody does!”
“I wasn’t shot,” she said honestly, “the bullet merely scraped me.”
“Scraped you!” Redros exclaimed incredulously. “I’m sorry, that’s a scrape to you? Betcha’ve got a gaping hole here-” Frustration boiled his blood, and he stepped to her and ripped her shirt collar down to bare her chest. Behind his mask, his eyes widened.
Nothing. Nothing but smooth brown skin. She immediately backhanded him.
Even a magical healing would have left a scar, Redros had seen it happen before with a gunshot would to Ezekiel’s arm. He knew he wasn’t so drunk that he hallucinated the entire thing - before the incident, he’d barely been drunk at all.
Anberlin, on the other hand, wasn’t sure if she felt scandalized or confused. Redros stank of alcohol and what he insisted were nonsensical inventions of an addled mind, surely. She swallowed and rubbed her aching knuckles. While her slap didn’t stagger him, it seemed something had, as he stood with his hands lifted defensively for some time.
“I’m not a mage,” she told him, “but you are a drunkard.”
His response was surprisingly vicious. “This right’ere,” he pointed furiously to a browned splatter on his armguard, “is your blood. I got more if you don’t wanna believe that one. How ‘bout this here? Here? Maybe there’s still some on my face,” he added. “You died, and before you get all weird again, I don’t fuckin’ care, but that guard turned you into a bagel and maybe,” his voice jumped a pitch higher and cracked in the process, “you should ask yourself about that before you come buggin’ me about your weird sex fantasies or whatever! Stop followin’ me.”
Despite herself, Anberlin shouted after him. “I haven’t got any sexual fantasies about anyone at all, especially not you!” He was already long gone, and she knew it. “I was only joking!”
A chill bit through her wet clothing, and her soaked hair hung heavy down her back. The thief had, again, gone without giving her answers, but this time she’d ended up with even more questions than she’d started with. Not long after the doctor and Silas were gone, her father had detailed her on what had happened: ‘Though we aren’t sure whether or not the Masked Thief was present, someone had startled Silas enough to think you were under attack. We don’t know if you were pulled into his line of fire or not. Luckily, his bullet missed. You fainted from shock.’ It had seemed a bit suspicious to her. She remembered an immense pain and a pressure in her chest, and even now she could recall a distinct feeling of blood in her mouth when she thought back to that evening.
Perhaps she had been shot through, as Redros had said, but that meant her father was lying. She knew her mother had been a mage, a powerful mage, but it was insisted upon repeatedly that neither of her children were magi. It was the ‘fact’ her entire thesis had been based on, that magic was not inherited by blood.
If I am a mage after all…
She was only afraid of losing her credibility as a scholar, despite knowing the penalty for unrecorded use of magic. Being a registered mage didn’t sound so terrible to her based on her knowledge, and her father would defend her innocence of any life-altering magical use. Besides, and more importantly, what would the Chancellor say if she knew that Anberlin’s thesis had been built upon her own ignorance? Upon lies? So went all of her credibility in every field.
For the upteenth time, Anberlin needed answers. For the first time, she was too scared to find them.
There is a member of my family who is very supportive of my writing. She reads early drafts of my books and gives me very useful advice on how to improve them (she’s very good at spotting plot holes). She is complimentary about my books - saying she enjoys them more than most other books she reads, praising my plotting, etc.
But she also calls my books, “Rubbish.” To my face.
What she means by this is that they’re not great literature. They’re fun adventures you can read quite quickly - I’ve known several people who read my Codename Omega books in a single night. They’re enjoyable action. The term I occasionally use is “holiday reading.” Something to read when you want to have fun with a book instead of struggling through something difficult because it’s supposed to be a great work.
But why should a book being a fun adventure make it “rubbish?”
I know when it comes to fanfiction, this is a word that gets used a lot. “Why are you writing that rubbish when you could be writing a real story?” So I wanted to say a few words in defense of rubbish.
If your story made someone smile when they were having a bad day… it’s valuable and therefore not rubbish
If your story made you smile while you were writing it… it’s valuable and therefore not rubbish
If someone saw a character like themselves and felt validated… it’s valuable and therefore not rubbish
If you were able to explore your feelings about an issue through fiction … it’s valuable and therefore not rubbish
If a person didn’t get bored on a long journey because they were reading your story … it’s valuable and therefore not rubbish
If someone (even if it’s a single person, even if it’s just you) enjoyed the story … it’s valuable and therefore not rubbish
If writing this story helped you improve your skills and become a better writer … it’s valuable and therefore not rubbish
Don’t be disheartened if anyone calls your writing rubbish or a waste of time. Keep writing anyway. There will be someone for whom it won’t be rubbish.
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