crazy thang is whenever someone makes a post talkng about how xyz thing annoys them someone will always go 'oh so we're not even allowed to do [thing] anymore??' like no you literally can. that person just will not like you. if that is enough to stop you then its not that youre not allowed its that you are not capable of existing outside of the approval of others
Peeling off the broken breastplate of a stoic knight who only fights and never speaks, just to realize there’s nothing in there. Not metaphorically—the armor is literally empty. It doesn’t appear to affect him. If the armor stays mostly in the shape of a knight, he just gets back up to keep fighting. But with the chest plate off he just sits there, equally impervious to curiosity as I reach up into the cavity where his body might’ve gone. Stubbornly, no answers are found anywhere in there.
So I forge him a new breastplate and on the inside, because I know he has plenty of room, I put a little pocket. Not big enough to hold anything functional of course. Just a little extra piece to see what he’ll do with it.
He comes back next time with some grievous injury to his nothing, presumably from the massive shredded gash across his thigh plates. He sits and waits. I fix it for him. He is still nothing in there. I decide to add a drawing on the inside, of the type of beast I imagine could rend metal into scraps with a single blow. He puts it back on. He no longer moves as if he is injured.
Over time the interior of the knight becomes decorated with whatever odds and ends I could think to attach to the inside of a guy who’s got room to carry it. What really gets me is that he never removes any of it. Never requests a change. Not even when I installed a curtain rod for a small tapestry, or a bud vase to carry roses for his beloved, or an accordion folder for letters. He didn’t say a word for any of the many, many drawings of mythical beasts that now fight forever inside of his shell.
There are plenty of other forges. I’m not entirely sure why he keeps coming back here anyway. We’re pretty popular, but he could get his armor fixed a lot quicker (and with fewer ridiculous modifications) literally anywhere else. I asked him if I could get a look at his nothing again. He flipped up his visor and nodded his head so I could take a look. It was the same as it had been, filled with drawings and trinkets and weird little fixtures I’d put in there. I asked if he was annoyed by it, or liked it, or felt anything at all, but he literally only ever says nothing, so I’m not sure why I asked.
There’s not much room left in his nothing now. When he comes back for repairs I’ve had to fix my own foolish additions. Some of these pieces are intricate and irritating to repair, but I fix them anyway. It feels wrong to take any of it away from him now, even though I’ve been rudely encroaching on his nothingness to the point where it’s barely even there. How he squeezes his nothing back into a body so full, I’ll never understand. But it’s a game to me now, finding a spot not yet filled and putting something there. A dark part of me wonders if he ever gets filled up completely, if whatever sorcery holds the nothing-knight together may break, and it will all clatter unceremoniously to the floor.
When he hands me his breastplate yet again, it is so shockingly disfigured that I wonder if being made of nothing has somehow kept him alive. No ordinary knight could sustain such injuries. So I fix it. And he waits, unmoving, in a quiet corner of the forge. It’s like he’s watching, even though I know the reading glasses I put inside his helmet were just for fun. I’m careful to put it all back exactly the way it was when he last left. There’s no room to add more this time.
He examines the breastplate, and pauses before putting it back on, like he’s looking for something. Is he worried about the fit? But it suits him just as it always did. He calmly points to a little space, about an inch, between a miniature shelf and one of many pockets. There’s nothing there. I ask him what’s wrong, and again he points. It’s the most emotion I’ve ever seen from him, and it’s barely anything at all. I take it to mean he wants something there.
I spend some time engraving a little snail in the gap. He watches, as much as nothing can watch. When I’m finished he holds the breastplate, but he doesn’t put it on right away. I ask him if something’s still wrong. He says nothing, and puts it on. I tell him I can’t add anything else. Even if he could ask, there’s no room left.
Next time he comes back, there’s nothing wrong with his armor—he lets me check to make sure. I ask him what he’s doing here. Out from one of many pockets, he retrieves a tiny rusted knife. It’s in miserable condition, barely worth saving. I tell him I could make him a nice new one, but I’ll fix it if he likes. He puts it away and reaches around to find something else, a needle and thread. Better condition, but I’m not a sewist and I tell him as much. He puts them away. He then retrieves a little twisted piece of wax paper. I open it. It’s candy. I ask if I can eat it. He says nothing. I eat it. It’s flavored with cinnamon. I’m surprised he let me take it.
He keeps bringing me candy now. His armor is the most laborious to repair out of every client my forge serves, but it’s my own fault so I can’t complain. Sometimes he keeps me company while I work. I wonder if he is trying to tell me something when he hands me mints. I wonder again at the lemon lozenges. He stares at me when I eat, as much as nothing can stare.
One day he brings me a little jar of honey. I thank him, I tell him I’ll save it for dinner. He watches me work, he puts his repaired armor back on, and he stays. My shift passes slowly, and when I finally pack up to leave it’s dark outside. He follows me out of the forge. I ask him where he’s going. He points to the jar in my hand. I ask him if he wants to watch me eat it. He says nothing, but the nothing-knight clearly wants something, so I open the lid and dunk my finger in the honey. I try not to get any on my chin. He stands there, inches away, watching me try to consume this jar of honey without a utensil. It tastes like clovers. About half the jar is left when I’ve finally had enough of pretending to be a bear, but he doesn’t move to leave.
I ask if he’s going to follow me home. He says nothing. I tell him he can if he wants to. Again, nothing. I start walking, and he follows at my side. I know he’s not going to say anything ever, so I fill the silence. I tell him I’m grateful for the sweets, I tell him about how his various components are made, I tell him I’ve never met anyone made of nothing before. I tell him it’s a rare opportunity for a smith to work so much on the inside of something. He says nothing. I tell him again how much I like the candy.
It occurs to me that maybe filling me with sugar is as close as he can get to filling someone else’s empty armor with trinkets. I’m not sure if that’s really why he does it. I tell him I don’t have room to be filled with anything on the inside, not like him. I’m not a container for much besides food. He offers me another piece of candy. Maybe he likes containing something, the way I like to feel full. Maybe it’s nothing at all.
—
I didn’t edit this even a little bit. Thanks for reading!
Hey btw if you don’t know how to program, you should check out [novelty], which is a free Visual Novel creation software. Absolutely no programming required, and it’s super easy to use, I played with it some when I was a teen but the only reason I didn’t do much with it is cuz I made my story complicated and had like 5000 different branching routes that kept spawning new routes and made myself confused LMAO
But yeah, it’s a WYSIWYG with a really straight-forward GUI, if I remember correctly.
It even comes with some free backgrounds and characters and stuff, and this is what it looks like:
Did I mention it’s super duper free? It hasn’t been updated since 2010, but it has basically all you’d need to make a simple visual novel.
Just make sure your DirectX runtime is updated, cuz it can act buggy if it’s outdated, but this program is so old that I doubt it’d even be an issue lol
@becausedragonage @ashidoodle can I recommend Choice Script? It’s like a choose your own adventure coding program. The finished product looks like this, where every option sends you down a different path:
They are literally books you can play. You can even insert your own character’s name and pronouns and that would make writing reader inserts so much easier And as a writer who can not art, writing and making dating sims and games is more convenient.
The coding is also super simple and easy to learn and all it requires other than the program files is a text editor. And just like that you can start typing up like you would your own fanfics or stories. Plus it’s very versatile so you can make your game/book as simple or as complicated as you want, and even implement stats and inventory systems.
AND CHOICE SCRIPT IS ALSO SUPER DUPER FREE. THE COMPANY EVEN PUBLISHES YOUR FINISHED GAME FOR YOU AND GIVES YOU ROYALTIES IF YOU CHOOSE TO SELL IT. THE PROGRAM STILL GETS UPDATED AND THE COMPANY PUBLISHES BOOKS EVERY MONTH INCLUDING THE FANMADE ONES. THERE’S ALSO A FORUM FOR PEOPLE TO POST WIPS AND TALK ABOUT CHOICE SCRIPT AND GET HELP.
Also good ol’ Twine is incredibly easy to learn for text games with multiple choices! You don’t even need to deal with images if you don’t want to and it works in the browser (there’s also a downloadable version) and it generates html files that you can play in your browser.
Anyway if you want excuses/community for making visual novels NaNoRenO is about to start (March2022 for those reading this message in the future.) on itch.io (like nanowrimo, but about visual novels!)
'minion' -too closely associated with those yellow things
'goon' -linguistic drift gave her a new meaning. i hope her new life is good for her. i miss her.
'henchman' -too gendered. can be shortened to 'hench' in a pinch, but lacks punch.
'servant' -too domestic to apply to all those who serve evil.
'underling, subordinate' -this one only works if they get off on being beneath you and/or you don't properly pay your workers.
'associate' -this one's good for grizzled mercenaries or lone agents but doesn't work good for broad swathes of an organization.
'slave' -same as underling but more intense. really fun for some of the group. unsavory for others in a way that limits the scope of the thing.
'thrall' -only really applies if you're brainwashing them and that's not something i've learned how to do en masse yet
'flunky, toady, stooge, lackey' -these are just insulting, and that isn't conducive to a healthy work environment. imagine going to work and your job title is 'stooge'.
'acolyte' -works for those that worship you, but again. lacks the scope.
'supporter, follower' -unspecific and vague
'assistant, helper, aide' -not sinister at all. just means you're doing things for me. swagless in this manner. could be good if used to describe someone who's so clearly more that as a way to emphasize their obedience via understatement, but that's only useful for a few members of the organization. and even then, 'associate' works better.
'cohort' -untested in the field. suggests an equal footing in the affair, ideal for post-structuralist evil organizations with a bottom-up power structure that's held in the hands of the evil workers themselves. perhaps we'll explore it together?
may I suggest: 'grunt' – time-tested by crime bosses with a variety of goals and organizational mandates. implies a subservient position with none of the innate baggage of lackey et al.
Random thing for people to consider is that since Laika is the saint of one way trips should Felicette be known as the saint of safe landings since she did make it back to the ground safely
tu LANCES félicette ? tu lances son corps comme la fusée ? oh ! oh ! prison pour les scientifiques ! prison pour les scientifiques pendant Un Mille Ans !
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