#(the fic)

[honesttaffy]

moon and stars

Also, the starts on the mask were so fun to draw :D

[masterofthewarcry]

Diomedes story could SO be about giving up toxic masculinity if you pitch it right. he's steeped in this warrior culture since birth basically, and he goes to war again and again and again and again until he gets home from Troy and just gives up. he's so tired and he wont fight his best friends son and he doesn't even want to rule Argos anyway, he just wants to rest. AND THEN, if he goes to Ithaca and lives there but DOESNT marry Penelope?? it's so anti-greek masculinity but it makes so much sense for his character. OF COURSE he's too loyal to even think about doing what any of the suitors would HE CANT do that to Odysseus. and the suitors would call him all sorts of names! but he just takes it because he's used to that anyway (cough, Agamemnon and Nestor cough). and then when Odysseus comes back?? if hes HAPPY to let Odysseus take his throne and his wife and son back because Diomedes loves him? it doesn't even have to be romantic love! its SO anti-masculinity but everything about him is so masculine at the same time you cannot convince me this narrative is not what the culture NEEDS

[crimsonsphinxes]

@particle90272 Incoming fanart of the princess carry HC subjected SY to in book 1!! I’m frothing at the mouth for anything and everything in which Shen Yuan interacts with HuaLian soo I'll (probably) have the other scene—where XL swooped up SY in the sandstorm—drawn out too. At some point. In the not-so-distant future.

CW: Sort of trypophobia/meat/blood/weird faces warning for the last image, since I did try to make it look like a bunch of little ghost things were being diffused all at once!

I just realized that I may be misremebering and HC never actually showed this form to SY there but...it's probably still good. Everyone loves HC's real form anyways!

[late2lunch]

Aaaaand 🥁🥁🥁 THIS is a gift for the honestly super cool really nice totally awesome sauce @stupidsillykoko !!! GO FOLLOW THEM THEYRE TOTALLY SICKK

GUITAAAAAAAAAAA

[sweeneydino]

Rainbow @vanillavengeance

Finally, some Over The Rainbow fanart before I get sucker punched in the feels again /silly

Ive got more sketches, but i felt i should post this cause happy bb :’D

Fic here of course vvv

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

🫵READ

[faziiku]

It's as a switch either Michael Afton is a horrible monster not deserving of any forgiveness or he's a little angel who did nothing wrong and that it was all an accident and there's no in between 💀🙏

ONG i swear someone posted something about this on twt this morning, fnaf fans dont understand the concept of people being morally grey 😭

even when someone is actually a GOOD person, the community finds some say to demonize them like crazy, its insane help

genuinely some ppl cant bare to admit their favorite character isnt the greatest person, like some william afton fans want to defend him so bad, like how do you even enjoy him if you take away all his flaws bro. theyre the same people trying to paint mike as evil incarnate too like whatt did we play the same games

same with michael afton fans, its a bit less common but there are so many people who try really hard to overly justify the bad things he's done and it feels like theyre infantilizing him sometimes??? like yeah what he did was an accident, but we can at least admit it *was* out of malicious intent (but definitely not with the intent of causing something permanent ofc) he didn't 'accidentally' put his own brother's head in an animatronic's mouth, ive seen so much fan content where he's written as his perfect, misunderstood kid who never bullied his brother and like. i get that you want to see the best in this guy but he is a much better character with a more impactful arc if you look at him as someone who changed for the better rather than someone who has never done anything wrong, but thats just imho i guess 😭

[optimisticgrey]

Longfic author interview

Tagged by @shandoratheexplorer, their post about their story, Broken Mirrors, is here.

and @alliskit, with her fic, The Grand Design, and the interview.

Thank you 🥰

@saylofwaterdeep did one for her story, Amnesia Red. The post is here.

no pressure tag for @tociminna, @defira85 and @lucretiouswept

*deep breath* Okay. Here goes nothing. i decided to have already entered 2026, which will be centered around self-indulgence.

The fic

Hell is empty, and all the devils are here

Rating/Pairing/Completion Status

Rating: Explicit. This will be the story of a Bhaalist’s life — draped in shadow, lies, deception, failure, heartbreak, hope, love and an unbearably vast amount of blood.

Pairing: DarkUrge/Gale, DarkUrge/Halsin, some Durgetash.

It's tricky, I am still contemplating. It will feature the game events and companions at one point, obviously including her relationships with the others. But large parts of this will be centered around her life before the game events.

Completion status: not yet posted, roughly 100k words for first draft

Plot Summary

Seated in the study of the cottage she shares with her two husbands, their additional partners, and a tiefling woman she took in when she herself was still little more than a child, Celeste Dekarios—one of the heroes of Baldur’s Gate—sets quill to paper. She writes of the events that shaped her life: her upbringing by an Elven mother, her adoption by a kind and generous couple in Baldur’s Gate, and, ultimately, her transformation into Bhaal’s Chosen.

The ✨viibees✨

Well, at some point I was called the golden queen of angst, and I do derive a rather morbid thrill from putting the poor woman who became my OC through the wringer. Given that this is a dark and harrowing story, there will be extensive content warnings.

I’m aiming to explore the dark, the ugly, and the unspoken parts of Celeste’s life, but also the moments that planted hope, love, laughter, and kindness along the way.

Short snippet

I followed the sound without a sound of my own, bare feet finding the stone by instinct. When I eased my way toward the doorway I was certain the noise came from, I saw him. He was—jarringly—beautiful. Long blond hair clung damply to his neck, blue eyes too bright for the pallor of his skin. His face was almost painfully symmetrical, made uncanny by how white he had gone, how slick with sweat. A torch burned above him, its light catching on the blood streaking down his side. His armor lay discarded. He clutched his left flank, fingers soaked through, breath shallow and uneven. When he noticed me, his eyes widened—not with surprise alone, but with resolve sharpened by fear. “Don’t come any closer,” he warned, lifting his right arm. Runes flared around it, a spell matrix trembling into being. I took him in more carefully then. Multiple stab wounds. Deep. Poorly treated. He was bleeding far too quickly. I stepped into the room slowly, deliberately, my hands raised, my gaze steady on his. He swallowed, his arm shaking now, exhaustion gnawing at whatever strength he had left. I lowered myself and set my sword on the stone between us. “I mean you no harm." He gave a breathless huff. “So you frequent places like this for entertainment?” I smirked despite myself. “If the shoe fits.” His gaze dropped to my feet and snapped back up. “You’re not wearing any shoes.” “Your powers of observation won’t save you,” I noted calmly. “You’re bleeding out.”

What other media inspired this fic?

I read a great deal of Anne Rice in my youth and always found the perspective she offered deeply thrilling.... a complete immersion into a character’s inner world, their beliefs and traits, alongside glimpses of how the world perceives them despite the limited point of view. It’s an ambitious approach, I’ll readily admit, but one I find endlessly compelling.

What character trait did you amplify or minimise to make your version of a character work for your story?

None. I intend to include everything — the good, the bad, the most viscerally ugly, as well as the kind and loving moments.

How did your understanding of the characters change while writing this?

Celeste is deeply multifaceted, and avoiding turning her into a Mary Sue is a genuine challenge. She has a surprisingly large number of flaws, and I fully intend to highlight every one of them. That said, through this process I’ve gained a much clearer understanding of who she is — as a person, a fighter, a lover, and a partner.

What’s one thing you put in—trope, character beat, scene—that was just extra shamelessly self-indulgent?

All of it. Nobody needs this story, I still want to tell it. It is 100% pure self-indulgence. And I love it.

What’s the structural choice you made on purpose—POV, timeline, chaptering—that most shaped the story?

Despite the outcome of the poll, I needed wise @aerin67's advice to remind me who I am as a writer — and why I do this at all. Why I started not just writing, but talking about it, sharing it, posting in the first place. I tell the story I want to read.

I want to talk about Celeste’s life: why she is as broken and messed up as she is, and why she still chooses kindness and love when she defies Bhaal. How someone raised in such cruelty can emerge battered and bruised — and still loving.

Which theme emerged accidentally, and which one did you pursue deliberately?

I’m about 100k words into the first draft now, so at this point most of this feels very deliberate — I’ll admit that. I never intended to write a full novelization of the game’s events, but it quickly became clear that three chapters, one for each act, wouldn’t be enough. Most of her character development happens within those chapters, so in the end, it doesn’t really feel like a choice at all

What was the biggest risk you took with this fic?

I’m telling you about it now, very deliberately — forcing myself to follow through instead of overthinking it and chickening out.

I’ve also signed a blood oath binding me to finishing my other stories first.

In a hypothetical scenario where you are forced to rewrite the whole story from scratch, what would you do differently?

I haven't finished yet. Ask me again in a year.