https://imgur.com/a/aNN3xLG
u/Moose-Maleficent x 2 Thank you so much for the super creative handmade Pi Day card! I adore your heart & am honestly not surprised you wouldn’t exact revenge against Bridezilla hahaha! Yessss I thought of “The Help” too lol!!! I’m also bananas for the insanely awesome Hot Cross Buns card - it’s sooooo my smile & makes me so happy when I look at it!!!! It’s heartbreakingly cute. I’m so happy to have met you & to remember you forevermore as my first recipient (or hopefully soon) of international mail - that’s the most excitement I’ve had in years hahaha!!!! u/thecaledonianrose x 2 OMG this cuuuute kitty birthday card is so sweet!!! I was especially touched by your beautiful words wishing me so many amazing things! What a kind soul you are - THANK YOU so much!!! I also love the fun stickers, the neat-o washi stamp style stickers, the mini thank-you, & the delicious passion flower tea!!! Thank you so much for the super precious Easter card of the bunny & the birds!! This bunny is just a sweetheart with that dreamy expression & smile! I just love the colors & the positive vibes jumping out at me from the card & your sweet thoughts! Yesssss, I’m really happy we sorta have a spring in my state - sadly it doesn’t last long. But I’m so grateful it’s not a billion degrees yet! Thank you also for the ****cuuuuute**** bunny & Easter stickers, the Perfect Peach tea (I’m so jazzed to try it - how perfect is that flavor for Spring?!?!?) & the pretty Flowers Bingo card with the too cute floral bingo mini placemarkers!!! Wishing you the sweetest Spring full of fanciful flowers! u/fightshrubb Thank you so much for the adorable handmade aliens-themed Pi Day card - soooo cute!!! I love your energy!! Also love that you used different fun & bright colors of ink to write! I so hear you with the endless array of craft supplies lol!! To answer your question…I love watercolor!!! I have zero skills & was trying to learn when I happily stumbled upon RAoC so watercolor took a backseat to carding. ;) Hope you had an awesome Pi Day full of pizza discounts haha! ;) u/emptyparkinglot Thanks for the Gauguin postcard with your hilarious observation, “Paul Gauguin was honestly a creep in his personal life but he sure did know how to use color.” Hahaha, right?!? I loved your thoughts on art & appreciate them especially because I have a deep desire to learn more about art & how to articulate artistic concepts. You did that so beautifully with your analysis of Gauguin’s work! Wishing you lots of bliss as you create your own works of art! =) u/o0oiwio0o Thank you for the awesome sassy slanderous card of the Bernadine Bridge over the Vilnia!!! Your handwriting - oh my GORGEOUS!!! It’s so classy! And I have NEVER seen more fun & vibrant punctuation marks!!! I love your style! And the slander about the National Stadium is truly hilarious. I love how you turned the slander into a motivational gem hahaha!!!! I just loved your creative prompt & felt so fortunate to be a recipient of such fresh, fancy slander LOL! I also love the adorable elephant sticker you included. Thank you. =) Wishing you infinite saucy slanderous thoughts because they are so fun & phenomenal!!! =) u/travel4me22 x 2 Thank you for WHAAAAT?!?!? This incredible, gorgeous postcard you upcycled from a Van Gogh paper bag!!!! So creative - I absolutely loooove it!!!! I appreciate your resourcefulness & creativity so much! Thank you for the *beautiful* illustrated card of the strong, powerful women!! The colors are so fun. This card & your kind affirmations are just brimming with so many positive vibes!! I’m also excited you share my thoughts on Helen Keller. Thank you for spreading awesome cheer on International Women’s Day & beyond! u/onlycompletely Thanks for the adorable “Espresso Yourself” postcard!! u/drivingogre Thank you so much for the cute bear doodle postcard with all the fun facts about Disney actors & cats! You have such sweet vibes!! u/TigerLady x 4 Thanks for the adorable bunny & flower Easter card! LOVE the stamp embellishments you included & the cute way you decorated the inside of the card with the cut out words. Thanks also for the hug in the mail “nothing new” card with the awesome passion clouds worksheet & delicious recipe - I’ll definitely try it. :) Thank you for the hilarious 100% organic gangster card! Loved hearing your BFF was about to visit. Hope y’all had a fabulous time together and that y’all will meet up again soon! You asked about my BFF. Thank you - we met at the University of Texas when she was a transfer student & I was a freshman. She boldly came right up to me as I was having lunch alone to ask if she could join me. It was so cool of her to be so brave! She lives hundreds of miles away & the pandemic has made it a pain to get together but we keep in touch. Wishing you a beautiful spring, beautiful friend! u/YuletideWitch Thank you for the adorable vintage Disney World postcard! I’m so sad you shot yourself in the head…I shouldn’t have given that to you as an option for the Macarena prompt. But I shall remember your bravery in the face of dance adversity forevermore! Haha, thank you for indulging me with the silly prompt :) u/royalewithtees Thanks for the awesome “Breaking Bad” postcard - I didn’t know that cool fact about the 62nd element…so awesome!!! Happy to have met someone who has awesome taste in shows like me hahahaha!!! And I LOVE the cool BB decorative stamp!!! Thank you!! u/mickey_is_bored Thank you so much to you & your sweet friends for cheering on complete strangers!!! I wish that back in college, I had the type of friend you & your pals are for carding crafternoons! So precious. Thinking of you & your friend & sending lots of healing vibes. Thanks for spreading cheer :) u/hato_mailing Thank you for the sweet wax seals on the lovely barnacle goose postcard - love the Denmark bird stamp embellishment! u/elliearbus Thank you so much for this AWESOME handmade watercolor card - you are so insanely talented!!! I love it!!!!! I’m a sucker for not only watercolor art, but illustrations of craft supplies so this card is absolutely a terrific treasure for me. It’s just adorable & brimming with energy! Thanks again. Wishing you endless joy as you create your wondrous watercolor work!! u/gillbhai x 2 I’m so happy & relieved I finally found you, my mystery sender! Thank you so much for both of the gorgeous floral cards in my favorite bright colors! The pinks, oranges, & blues are just so cheery & happy! I also love the book rec & the Sharif poetry you wonderfully shared with me. I’ll have to read & re-read it to truly understand all the layers as you & Sharif are so amazingly deep! I would highly recommend the historical fiction book “A Gentleman in Moscow” by Amor Towles. It’s the best book I’ve read in many years. Wishing you joyous reads & a peaceful rest of 2023. Thank you so much for brightening my day with your lovely thoughts & beautiful cards!! u/RoxanneBarton Thanks for the beautifully-illustrated pen & pencils “Snail Mail Club” postcard - I’m obsessed with illustrated cards & love it so much!!! I have to catch up with SG films too. LOVE your pretty handwriting! =) Wishing you fragrant bouquets of lilacs this spring, sweet friend. u/purpleteasoul x 2 Thanks for the sweet purple floral thank you card - it was my pleasure to send you birthday mail! Thanks also “Welcome book lover…” postcard! Hahaha yes you’re right, I read your postcard from my little nook at the library! Wishing you the best of reads!! u/littlehoneybeebuzz Thanks for the romantic Paris postcard! I love to read in dreary weather. Wishing you sunny skies this spring! =) u/brittybear94 x 2 How cute you are is so apparent from your extraordinarily cute mail!! Thanks so much for the fun RAoC b-day wishes!! I’m madly in LOVE with the cuuuutest little Peanuts “Nuts About You” card, the adorable Cookie Monster sticker, & the incredibly festive colorful RAoC personalized rainbow mail sticker…SO SO cuuute!! Even the envelope was decorated in one thing - CUTE. Thanks for gracing my mailbox with such pretty things!!! =) Wishing you the crunchiest & chewiest of chocolate chip cookies, my cute friend!!! u/Jane_Q Thanks for the lovely illustrated postcard of the Field Tulips in Holland! Even lovelier - how much you wrote on the back of the postcard! OMG my southern sensibilities woulda been smacked too had I gone through the nonsense you described! WTH?!? As Jerry Maguire would say, “These fish have manners.” Seriously whack!! But I was so happy you shared, thank you! Wishing you zero car issues so you never have to deal with mannerless buffoons ever again hahaha! u/OkayFlan Thanks for the sweet “I am Grateful” postcard - I sure am grateful to have met you here & hope you’re having tons of fun with all your cool new card tech supplies! u/falloutboy01 Thank you for the awesome handmade Easter card - the cutout with the hidden lime green layer is sooooo creative & pretty!!! I’m guessing you used Cricut - wow. The effect is amazing.The colors you used complement each other so well, especially for spring! Thanks also for the adorable stickers. Wishing you a splendid spring, kind friend!! u/sunfireninety9 - Thank you for the beautiful Asian art illustration postcard! I LOVE all the neat stamps you used on the card. Wow, that is so neat about the 1991 vintage rose stamp! I’m so sorry to learn the glue tasted icky - but you made so many people happy (including me) with your kind happy mail lol! Wishing you tastier stamps next time haha, maybe cupcake flavored ones? ;) u/feellikebeingajerk x 4 Thanks for the sweet handmade St. Patrick’s Day wishes & the cool President’s Day postcard of Monticello! It’s cool to appreciate our history & I’m glad you’re able to see historical figures through multiple lenses. I’m crazy about the pretty spring-y washi tape you used. Wishing you lots of pretty weather & sunny smiles this spring! THANKS a million for the awesome raspberry pie card & the throwback Holly Hobbie beauty (apologies no pics of these 2 sweeties - they’re elsewhere at the time I’m submitting this) - both of these sweeeeet cards made my day!!!! u/Soleiletta Thank you for the fabulous card from Wednesday Addams - you totally channeled her so awesomely! You should write for the show!! =) I loved the cute Tarot stickers you used to decorate the card. And that handwriting - it’s just glorious!!! It’s somehow both modern & vintage too?!?? Just gorgeous! Thank you for sharing your fun prompt creativity with me. =) u/1398_days Thank you for the pretty pastel thank you card!!! It was my absolute pleasure to think of you on your birthday & I’m so touched it cheered you up! Your kind thank you card lifted my spirits & made me feel super happy! It’s so bright & colorful - just my fave color palette! I sure hope you’ve been having cheerful days since your birthday & that you will remind me when it’s your big day next year for more birthday greetings!! =)
u/somedrawer Thanks for the adorable doggie Easter card! Such fun stamps & washi decorations on the card - the baked confectionaries washi is sooo delicious! Love the positive affirmation you wrote: “I am capable of creating positive change in the world.” So uplifting! Here’s one for you: “I am a creator. I create my reality.”
u/its_top_secret x 2 Thank you for the sweet Seigensha postcard! And I love your spirit - you wanting to dance no matter what is so inspiring! I also love your willingness to be brave & embellish when no one is watching hahaha! Thank you for the vintage-y shrine postcard with your beautiful handwriting! Love how you would have searched for legendary figures if you had the chance to time travel. =) Wishing you a happy future & past too if you dare to explore haha! u/aepeyc Thank you for the sweet Saint Patrick’s Day greetings with the pretty feather! Wishing you lots of luck not just on the 17th of each year, but each day as well. :) u/missnettiemoore Thank you so much for this GORGEOUS cartoon Saint Patrick’s Day card!!! The sweet smiling critters are so charming!!! I also love the fun fact you wrote: “The odds in finding a 4-leaf clover are about 1 in 10,000.” I had no idea - that’s so mindblowing!!! Thank you for brightening my day with your sweet card. Wishing you a breezy, beautiful spring & that you chance across those rare 4 leaf clovers for lots of luck! =) u/FollowingTheBeat You had me at the exquisite envelope decorated with your precious handmade cherry blossom tree! So pretty. I’m terrible at drawing trees so I’m especially excited by your talent. But that was just the appetizer. I’m in love with this gorgeous pink-themed floral feast of a card!!! Thank you! This card instantly makes me happy with all the bright colors & the pretty sticker you used to decorate it. This card is soooo beautiful, & so are you for including such sweet spring wishes for so many lovely things, including “beauty”! What an awesome wish. Wishing you a spring full of the same love & beautiful birds that serenade you & make you smile! u/RayneKitten Thank you so much for the beautiful postcard to color - it’ll be a joy! I also love the quote. I appreciate your kindness! Wishing you lots of masterpieces! u/PM_me_oak_trees Thank you for the *hilarious* April Fool’s Day card - the teaching English quip is priceless hahaha!!! I also love the awesome motivational quotes & funny jokes you wrote. OMG “I was going to write a time-travel joke, but you did not like it” - rahahahahahahaha! I’m so stealing that one! I really appreciated your creativity in sending “junk mail” - what a neato thing to do! Hope you had a beautiful April Fool’s Day - thanks for making mine special! u/FancyBeadedPlacemat Thank you so much for the potato postcard! I was laughing when I received it because I only tagged potato pals & didn’t request one since merely *looking* at potatoes makes me gain weight LOL! But I was so glad you sent it to me because I had no idea about the fun history fact!!! That’s so cool that Marie Antoinette would wear potato blossoms in her hair!!! So thank you for sharing that awesome historical gem with me!!! u/wabisabi_sf Thank you so much for this perfect postcard TREAT of Julia Child along with the fun facts about her life! It’s just a postcard dream as far as postcards go. I’m nuts for fun illustrations so this is a real treasure. I also love the fun vintage stamps you used. Thanks so much for thinking of me with your wonderful offer & for making me giddy by picking me to receive this scrumptious postcard!! =) u/orangewolpertinger x 2 Thank you for the absolutely precious homemade cards!!!! The cuuuute pink kawaii candy themed card just made me melt!!! I love the combo of black & pink colors along with the pink & red themed scrapbook paper! The fox Saint Patrick’s Day card is soooo adorable too! Love the fun stickers you used to decorate the card! I also love & appreciate the kind stamps you included. You’re also so cute to take that Squishmallow personality quiz hahaha! So you’re Hans the Hedgehog? Although I agree that Hans is cute, he doesn’t hold up a cute candle compared to you & your endless card love!!! Thank you so much for these sweet treats!!! Wishing you lots of love & joy! u/Bowies-solid-speech x 2 I’m so happy I found you, my fabulous obituary mystery sender!!!! I even tried looking for you with a search for “obituary” on Reddit but didn’t find any relevant hits…Reddit is so goofy. I loved your creative, thoughtful obituary so much! You have such a fun brain - thank you for brightening my day with the fake obit hahaha! Your creativity is so very charming!!! I also admired how eager you were to write in depth! I also LOVE the adorable postcard of the critter looking at himself in the mirror. Thank you! The pastel colors & illustration are awesome! I was drawn to it because of one of my favorite Kabir quotes: “But if a mirror ever makes you sad, you should know that it does not know you.” Wishing you lots of joy as you check your beautiful self out in the mirror!! u/Slavkan12 THANK you so much for this gorgeous handmade “Dream Space” postcard that’s so bright & bouncy with the gorgeous array of blooming plants!!! It’s so pretty & makes me ache to have my own “Dream Space”!!! I love how you upcycled the calendar to create it. So cool & creative. But the front of the card isn’t where the magic ends - WOW!! I was **blown away** by your amazing illustration inside the card with the stunning self-portrait & the pretty pink & green plant!!! Your art skills are sublime! I love all the colors you used (such pretty pink hair & I love the color of your shirt). I wish so much I could draw like you but am grateful that even though I can’t, I’m a lucky recipient of this super cool gift!!!! I also love all the festive stickers you included & how you decorated the envelope with the unique bird/owl stickers. =) Thank you so much for this magnificent, magical mail! Wishing you lots of success in your art & beyond, kind friend! u/jules_abroad How did you do it? Never before your gorgeous card would I have ever thought I would have called a card with toilet paper & poop on it “gorgeous”. But that’s what you did with your INSANE TALENT & ADORABLE poop & tp handmade wacky wonderful card!!! I’m honestly in awe even though poop & tp usually make me wanna throw up! I LOVE IT SO SO MUCH hahaha! Thank you for brightening my day with poop of all things! I’m including a highlighted picture of it with the link above. ;) I wish I could draw & watercolor like you do…this is so going in a frame in my future dream home bathroom!! =) Wishing you the softest, squishiest, most cloud-like tp ever, sweet friend!

Hello there! I’m 31/m living on the east coast of the United States, looking to make a close friend
I’m looking for a friend that can hold an actual conversation and that hopefully doesn’t ghost! I’d love to share travel pics and experiences, favorite recipes and meals that you still think about, beer recommendations, and songs that help you get through the day. I’d love to find a friend to share accomplishments and milestones with, exchange silly stories and good ideas, and the curveballs life can throw!
A bit about me: I love checking out breweries with my dogs, trying new food, Lego, pop punk, and going to concerts and live sports. Growing up I had pet frogs (like a lot of them). I love reading longform articles before bed. Hogwarts is home. Traveling is my favorite thing, and I love exploring new states and countries as often as I can! Up next for me: Montreal, Iceland, and Italy, recently visited: Puerto Rico, Belgium, Portugal, Spain.
My fun fact is that I don’t know how to ride a bike.
Bonus points if you play MTGA.
Can’t wait to get to know you!

Hello there! I’m 31/m living on the east coast of the United States, looking to make a close friend
I’m looking for a friend that can hold an actual conversation and that hopefully doesn’t ghost! I’d love to share travel pics and experiences, favorite recipes and meals that you still think about, beer recommendations, and songs that help you get through the day. I’d love to find a friend to share accomplishments and milestones with, exchange silly stories and good ideas, and the curveballs life can throw!
A bit about me: I love checking out breweries with my dogs, trying new food, Lego, pop punk, and going to concerts and live sports. Growing up I had pet frogs (like a lot of them). I love reading longform articles before bed. Hogwarts is home. Traveling is my favorite thing, and I love exploring new states and countries as often as I can! Up next for me: Montreal, Iceland, and Italy, recently visited: Puerto Rico, Belgium, Portugal, Spain.
My fun fact is that I don’t know how to ride a bike.
Bonus points if you play MTGA.
Can’t wait to get to know you!

Really enjoyed writing Ashe, but didn't like the title or how short it was and wanted to expand upon it. So I C/Ped the extremely short chapter here, made a lot changes, and resumed where I left off. So this is the new and official Chapter 1\. Changed the title too! Once this goes up, I might just delete* Ashe altogether we'll see. Until then, here's another for you guys. A proper chapter. Longer too. Back on the computer, so that's fun. Enjoy!*
Title subject to change!
Read Ashe here (unless it's gone lol): https://www.reddit.com/HFY/comments/13mkfre/comment/jkvjcro/?context=3
///
The dead stare of a long-disintegrated child looked up at them. Remnants frozen in time as a monument of ruin to the wasteland before her. A lifeless, shattered. Echos of what used to be. It used to beautiful. Maybe in memory, it stays there. Isolated, but perfect. Perhaps, in another lifetime, they could have considered such a sight tragic.
But now? Now, it was simply a byproduct. One of many at that.
Oblivion wondered if it was a form of hypocrisy. To care for their own children, the ones they were responsible for feeding and caring for. The very same children who required the life-filling nutritional energy only essence, only Souls, could provide in sufficient quantity and quality. At least, until they found a long-term alternative. How then, was it fair, that they could stare into the monuments of ash and brimstone without remorse? To sleep well in the void of space as the killed world after world? To render galaxies extinct and universes as little more than drifting debris of dead space?
As it turned out, Oblivion didn't care to find the answer.
In truth, they didn't actually care to answer a question they'd already established an answer for. The thought experiment was simply that. An experiment. Something to do, at best. The attention upkeep for a Living Extinction class such as themself rarely warranted such self-scrutiny, but times could be dull, seeing as the bare minimum of effort that it took to kill planet after planet after planet bore no grief to their heart not any guilt over the lives violently ripped away.
"Yo." A voice cried out. In response, the bored decimator tilted their head up to see their one and only partner hovering above them, floating in the shattered sky just a few feet above. They wondered if it was weird to take note that their friend's feet were remarkably clean. "You okay?"
Oblivion nodded. Their eyes glazed back down at the ashen remains of the child. It's face frozen in fear, their dreams, hopes and ideas dashed away. All so that their own children could have dreams, hopes and ideas on their own. Cataclysm, their partner, drifted down next to the standing red-skinned killer. Both Soul Rippers stood side-by-side amidst a lifeless chunk of what used to be Callus II, a world once renowned for its natural beauty. Destroying it hadn't actual yielded much Soulfood, or essence, as it was already halfway evacuated before their arrival. But once they did arrive, escape was impossible, not that it stopped the local resistance from, well, resisting. No, the planet's destruction was intended to damage moral moreso than it was to yield any form of "economic" bounty. Not that it didn't of course, food was food afterall, but it was an already sparsely populated planet. Since it was strongly suggested that the destruction of Callus II would cause significant unrest, maybe even rebellion in the remaining population centers, Oblivion figured it only fair they do their duty. Hence, another byproduct of a looong list that kept expanding, unlikely to end anytime soon.
"We got new orders from the ladies up top. Wanna guess what?" Oblivion's head tilted up, eyes gleaming with a current of curiosity. She gestured with her hand towards the broken debris scattered about. Of a long-dead world around them.
Cataclysm smirked as she shook her head. "Nah, nothin' too crazy. Got something new this time." She paused. 'Word is... we got allies now. Real, honest folks that wanna, and get this, work with us this time around."
A frown creased the white-haired woman's features. She turned to look at her partner's increasingly grinning expression.
Oblivion asked the obvious question without words. Mute as she was, it'd taken some time for Cataclysm to get a proper read on her partner's flow with any accuracy. Maybe it was because she was one of the not-quite-insignificant few that carried whatever gene caused the highbreds to be amquadsinistrous instead of the standard amquaddextrious. Which, naturally, caused her childhood to be filled with more than a few hiccups when you're a part of a species that heralds 4 arms to 1 torso. But the challenge was welcomed. It allowed her to be the Soul Ripper she is today. Her upper-hand twirled its index finger into a speedy frenzy, purple Vydent energy streaming from the tip into a swirling tight ball barely half the size of her thumb. The casual level of control over her Vydent flow made Cataclysm's partner wonder if it was weird that they noticed that, in addition to her feet, their friend's nails were also very clean.
Oblivion, for her part, remained focused on the current revelation. Confused at their friend's wording more than anything. Vassals that chose submission, to forgo their freedom and independence and live as official dependence of the Highbred Collective was the standard play-by-play. The trade-off, of course, being that in exchange for willingly allowing oneself to live as, essentially, glorified cattle for food and breeding purposes for denizens the Highbred Collective, the said cattle, referred to as thralls, would be legally protected under relatively well-regulated supervision and oversight in order to protect both their privacy and livelihood. The Gyfolten Principle in particular ensured, under extremely strict law and application, that humane treatment be provided in abundance for all enthralled vassals, unless otherwise specified by the vassals themselves. It was one of the very few choices offered to any and all opposition they defeated, excluding special exceptions naturally. The decision to live was choice often preferred, typically over those whose only other option was watch hard-won territories be conquered, captured, destroyed or a mixture of all three.
That was the only form 'allies' her people took. For a species to be able enter an honest partnership with the highbred race was... nearly unheard of.
Only one race had ever managed such a feat, and they were long extinct. The white-haired decimator pointed as her own head in a clawing motion, its question clear.
"Nope, not enthrallment." Cataclysm responded, still grinning even when she popped the 'P'. "Like I said. Full on allyship. Partners even!" The excitement in her voice was evident. Almost infectious. Oblivion's frown only deepened, confusion warring with contemplation before her eyes suddenly widened as the realization hit her. Cataclysm took the moment to mentally pat herself on the back for being able to translate the powerful mute's particular form of communication.
"Yep. There it is. It's aaaallll over your face BeeBee. No thralls, no vassals, no crazy shit. We got ourselves real volunteers this time around. People who wanna actually negotiate and even talk with us. Heh, three guesses as to who just got sattled to provide 'security' for the upcoming 'diplomatic mission'." She used air-quotes. "And the first two don't count."
Oblivion blinked.
Somehow, her partner's smile split her face even wider, a dance of mischievousness flashed through her glowing purple beacons. She slowly started to rise higher into the ruined sky moments later.
"Well! Guess you'll just have to fiiiind out when we get there. Planet we're going to is called 'Earth' by rest of the galaxy. So... ready for a lil' road trip?" /// The journey to Earth was a rather uneventful.
Surrounding her was a comfortable dome of dark red vydent energy, solidified into a comfortable hardlight seat that was easy on the eyes. It surrounded her like those capsules she'd seen on TV, forming both a protective barrier between herself and the vacuum of space as they traveled through FTL. Spacious too. She even had a nice comfy pillow and the 'chair' reclined as high or low as she pleased.
So, while uneventful, it most certainly a comfortable experience.
Pinelock was their assigned Solar Soother, an Energizer whose sole job was to provide speedy and smooth transportation for Decimators like Oblivion and herself when they didn't want to enter FTL themselves. Cataclysm remembered being in such a role eons ago, using her own vydent energy to ferry bigger and better Decimators from star system to star system. It paid decently, but she wasn't in it for the essence. The job was, at best, a luxury afforded for the powerful. Like being a limousine driver for an excessively wealthy businessman. It helped her connect with those powerful killers back in the day, helped her better understand their motivations beyond the barebone necessity of "kill or be killed".
With that thought in mind, the blonde Soul Ripper made a mental reminder to tip their chauffeur when they arrived at Earth as she leaned back into the provided pillow. Just as her eyes closed, she began thinking about her partner.
She remembered feeling incredibly nervous when upon first meeting her. The stories surrounding the then average Soul Ripper, wondering which ones were true and which ones were just hearsay from her various obsessors. Oblivion was a living legend, both inside and out. A genius and warrior both in fact. Back then, Cataclysm admired their tenacity. She read their info-profile. How Oblivion heralded many obsessors in her early days, rising to prominence primarily through utilizing some seriously impressive enthrallment tactics, drowning her would-be killers in a sea of bodies by utilizing some prolific insect race to force them to expend their vydent energy reserves. After that, it was a simple matter of killing off whatever opposition remained, though mercifully chose to personally spare or adopt many of the children of the deceased. All-in-all, it was a typical power story, up until the moment the Red Bastion, the main governing body of Highbred at the time, attempted to recruit her to their cause once she'd grown beyond their means of subjugation. And when their efforts ended in futility, Oblivion remained standing, the Red Bastion did not. Without leadership, the remaining populace moved on, formed their own groups, established a new primary Obelisk of Dominion, and the events were eventually relegated to the history logs. Whatever obsessors didn't try to outright kill the white-haired Soul Ripper decided to become dedicated housewives, pledging their hearts and mind to Oblivion and only her. Which was standard Obsessor behavior. What got her popular was the sheer volume of subsequent Supplicants that followed, asking to join her harem. Oblivion declined, of course, but the aftermath of so many offers are ultimately what rocketed her to the position she has today.
"A relatively bloodless rise to power really." Cataclysm though to herself. "Though I gotta wonder how she felt back then. What made her want to be a Soul Ripper in the first place? And why?" Even today, Cataclysm still didn't know. It was one of the few things she decided she'd have to be okay with never knowing. Over the years, as their bond grew, she thought she had a pretty good grasp on why her partner did what she did back then. But in truth? She still had no clue. And likely never would. What she figured she should know, however, is a little information on the race they were visiting. The humans of planet Earth.
"Speak?" Oblivion's voice gently echoed in the blonde Soul Ripper's mindscape, her voice somehow a whisper carried with all the authority of a command. But it was a genuine question, and Cataclysm was happy to answer honestly. She was a master at filling in the gaps by now. "Well, you just did, but shoot. What's on that mind o' yours?"
It was always an exceptionally rare moment with an even shorter timeframe that Oblivion chose to speak, and even when they did it was always, always through their telepathic connection. So, whenever they did offer to speak, Cataclysm vowed to always make time to truly listen. And as she waited for the powerful decimator to speak their piece, the blonde Soul Ripper also found herself wondering about the new world they would be shortly arriving at. About what made this 'Earth' so special. And most importantly, what made its denizens so different from the rest of the galaxy?
For the first time in a long time, Cataclysm knew she finally had something to look forward to.
​
///
Thank you so much for reading, Chapter will be far longer as they progress, haven't quite settled on a word count just yet. When Chapter 2 is up, it will be posted either at the top or the bottom, here. This is really my first real time posting here and, unlike previous unposted projects, I really want to improve my consistency in writing and craft a fun story while doing so. Until then, thank you for reading, please feel free to leave constructive criticism or feedback at your leisure, and I hope you have a great day!
-Highlord V.

Hi everyone, I wanted to reach out and see if anyone here has any experience with these birth injuries?
(content warning: birth trauma, birth injuries)
5 months ago I gave birth to my happy, healthy baby girl. She is awesome- I truly feel like I won the lottery. I am completely in love with her and am loving motherhood more than I ever could have expected.
However, I did have a traumatic birth (vaginal delivery) with her which left me with some pretty serious birth injuries, one of which is permanent. My daughter had to be resuscitated at birth and thankfully is perfectly healthy today.
I won’t go into detail re: my birth story but in the past 5 months I have dealt with: 1) pubic symphysis diastasis (mine was severe enough that I would scream when lifting my foot one inch off the ground while in the hospital- and I had SPD in my third trimester so I’m no stranger to pelvic pain), 2) super painful muscle spasms in my pelvic floor, 3) what we suspect are torn pelvic floor muscles or ligaments stretched beyond rebound limits- hard to tell, 4) stubborn scar tissue on one of my two internal second degree tears, 5) a hematoma on said scar tissue which has since popped (that was fun), and 6) stage 2/3 bladder prolapse.
I had kidney stones while pregnant and did 12 hours of unmediated back labor before I got my epidural so I know what extreme pain feels like and the pain from these postpartum complications- it didn’t even register on a pain scale for me. I remember trying to walk from the bathroom to the bedroom 5 days postpartum and just being absolutely stunned that you can experience that level of pain and still be conscious. It was the worst pain of my entire life.
I have been in pelvic floor PT since 6 weeks postpartum and I do my home exercise program daily. I am religious about doing all the things I need to do to keep my symptoms manageable (using proper technique when lifting objects, etc). Most of the above issues have resolved aside from the prolapse but I am becoming very disheartened by the reality that the prolapse is something I’ll have to try to manage lifelong. It is really negatively affecting my quality of life. I had 2-3 good days so I pushed myself too far by allowing myself to hold my daughter for longer periods while standing/walking and dancing to music while holding her which caused a major exacerbation in prolapse symptoms which I am still recovering from. I haven’t even thought about running, jumping, or lifting anything heavier than my daughter as the little I try to venture out and do seems to cause a major symptom flare up.
I’m only 5 months pp so of course there is time left to improve, but I’m discouraged that my symptoms are still this bothersome this far out despite me doing my PT exercises religiously and being very careful about what I do throughout the day. There isn’t an hour during the day that I don’t have to think about what I’m doing/ how I’m doing it and how it will affect my symptoms.
Is there anyone else on here going through this? My husband and I had always planned on two kids but the thought of enduring another recovery anything similar to this is just not something I can fathom doing. How careful I am about lifting things and how religiously I do my PT exercises not to mention all the follow-up appts I’ve had for postpartum complications is something I don’t think is even possible to manage while caring for two young kids.
Obviously, if we ever had a second, I would go for an elective c-section, but a subsequent pregnancy itself would put a lot of strain on my pelvic floor. I just don’t think I’m willing to risk my quality of life for a hypothetical second child. I’m only 27 so I have time to decide (but on the other hand, if I recovered this poorly at 27 I can’t imagine how bad another postpartum recovery would be for me years from now). My pelvic floor PT has also commented that the ability to “bounce back” from pelvic floor trauma significant decreases starting mid to late 30’s in her clinical experience. That fact alone puts me off from trying to do this again too far in the future.
I apologize for the wall of text here. I’m just hoping to find someone who can relate to this and be my crystal ball so to speak. If you endured something similar, what did your recovery look like 1-2 years down the road?
I’m so sorry if any of you can relate to my experience- it is truly unbelievable what we go through physically and emotionally to bring these babies into the world.
To anyone reading this in the future- I’m more than happy to circle back around and update on my postpartum recovery progress.
And I cannot recommend pelvic floor PT enough- we have resolved all issues above (except for the prolapse) with PT alone and are still working on muscle strengthening to alleviate prolapse symptoms. PT has been life changing!

Hi everyone, I wanted to reach out and see if anyone here is one and done due to permanent birth injuries?
(content warning: birth trauma, birth injuries)
5 months ago I gave birth to my happy, healthy baby girl. She is awesome- I truly feel like I won the lottery. I am completely in love with her and am loving motherhood more than I ever could have expected.
However, I did have a traumatic birth (vaginal delivery) with her which left me with some pretty serious birth injuries, one of which is permanent. My daughter had to be resuscitated at birth and thankfully is perfectly healthy today.
I won’t go into detail re: my birth story but in the past 5 months I have dealt with: 1) pubic symphysis diastasis (mine was severe enough that I would scream when lifting my foot one inch off the ground while in the hospital- and I had SPD in my third trimester so I’m no stranger to pelvic pain), 2) super painful muscle spasms in my pelvic floor, 3) what we suspect are torn pelvic floor muscles or ligaments stretched beyond rebound limits- hard to tell, 4) stubborn scar tissue on one of my two internal second degree tears, 5) a hematoma on said scar tissue which has since popped (that was fun), and 6) stage 2/3 bladder prolapse.
I had kidney stones while pregnant and did 12 hours of unmediated back labor before I got my epidural so I know what extreme pain feels like and the pain from these postpartum complications- it didn’t even register on a pain scale for me. I remember trying to walk from the bathroom to the bedroom 5 days postpartum and just being absolutely stunned that you can experience that level of pain and still be conscious. It was the worst pain of my entire life.
I have been in pelvic floor PT since 6 weeks postpartum and I do my home exercise program daily. I am religious about doing all the things I need to do to keep my symptoms manageable (using proper technique when lifting objects, etc). Most of the above issues have resolved aside from the prolapse but I am becoming very disheartened by the reality that the prolapse is something I’ll have to try to manage lifelong. It is really negatively affecting my quality of life. I had 2-3 good days so I pushed myself too far by allowing myself to hold my daughter for longer periods while standing/walking and dancing to music while holding her which caused a major exacerbation in prolapse symptoms which I am still recovering from. I haven’t even thought about running, jumping, or lifting anything heavier than my daughter as the little I try to venture out and do seems to cause a major symptom flare up.
I’m only 5 months pp so of course there is time left to improve, but I’m discouraged that my symptoms are still this bothersome this far out despite me doing my PT exercises religiously and being very careful about what I do throughout the day. There isn’t an hour during the day that I don’t have to think about what I’m doing/ how I’m doing it and how it will affect my symptoms.
Is there anyone else on here going through this? My husband and I had always planned on two kids but the thought of enduring another recovery anything similar to this is just not something I can fathom doing. How careful I am about lifting things and how religiously I do my PT exercises not to mention all the follow-up appts I’ve had for postpartum complications is something I don’t think is even possible to manage while caring for two young kids.
Obviously, if we ever had a second, I would go for an elective c-section, but a subsequent pregnancy itself would put a lot of strain on my pelvic floor. I just don’t think I’m willing to risk my quality of life for a hypothetical second child. I’m only 27 so I have time to decide (but on the other hand, if I recovered this poorly at 27 I can’t imagine how bad another postpartum recovery would be for me years from now). My pelvic floor PT has also commented that the ability to “bounce back” from pelvic floor trauma significant decreases starting mid to late 30’s in her clinical experience. That fact alone puts me off from trying to do this again too far in the future.
I apologize for the wall of text here. I’m just hoping to find someone who can relate to this and be my crystal ball so to speak. If you endured something similar, what did your recovery look like 1-2 years down the road?
I have so appreciated all the posts on this subreddit detailing the positives of raising an only child- it has been a great source of encouragement when I was in a very dark place earlier on postpartum. Y’all seem like a very fun group of devoted parents. I’m so sorry if any of you can relate to my experience- it is truly unbelievable what we go through physically and emotionally to bring these babies into the world.
To anyone reading this in the future- I’m more than happy to circle back around and update on my postpartum recovery progress. And I cannot recommend pelvic floor PT enough- we have resolved all issues above (except for the prolapse) with PT alone and are still working on muscle strengthening to alleviate prolapse symptoms. PT has been life changing!

Allhackgecko.com ----------------------- Is it possible to track phone calls and text messages? Well, yes, it is, in fact, practically possible. However, the big question is, do you know how to track messages and calls from another phone?
How do I spy on another cell phone’s message and calls from my device
Tracking is a common thing nowadays. You can track your location; you can track your order, you can track your fitness progress, etc. Just name it – you can track anything. And so, tracking calls and messages from another phone is becoming a common practice too.
For example, let's say you want to know who your spouse has been talking and chatting with in secret; you can look for tracking software. As of now, many tracking devices can help you achieve this.
Let's start by showing you how to track messages and calls from another phone.
Apps to Track Calls and Texts from Another Phone
Before we dive into highlighting and discussing ways to track calls and texts, it is essential to keep in mind that each app has its pros and cons. Some tracking apps are good at one thing, while others are good at another. However, finding an application that offers the most benefits is the key to achieving your tracking goals.
Contact us at Allhackgecko.com for technical problems about your task or issue regarding hacking services.
And so, to help you do this, we recommend Allhackgecko.comas the best apps that can help you track messages and call .
How Does the Allhackgecko Track Cell Phone Calls and Texts from Another Phone?
This tracking app is designed in that it allows you to do remote monitoring without the person using the other phone knowing. It can only be achieved by ensuring that the phone you intend to track aspires to this app, which will be installed only on your phone.
All the tracked details will be delivered to you as a daily and weekly report. Therefore, you don't need to keep constantly looking and monitoring that phone for fear that they will delete the conversation. All the activities completed on the other phone will be captured by this app and stored in different spaces so that even if they delete their calls or messages history, you can still see them.
Bottom line
To track cell phone calls and texts is available, but it is important to note that those apps aren't good. Instead, you can opt for other apps like Allhackgecko.com that will give you a trial to see if it works before committing to it. The free app can be full of hidden and malicious algorithms that can be harmful to your device, as well as the fact that it can collect important personal information from your device.
How to track calls and texts from another phone is as simple as the monitoring tool you are using. You will struggle if you choose to use a user-friendly tool that doesn't have a user-friendly interface. So, pick the best choice possible to make your user experience easy and fun.
For further information about How do I spy on another cell phone’s message and calls from my device and other related hacking services, contact us on Allhackgecko.com

Dear L, I woke up today and did a few chores and ran errands I'd been putting off for the last few days. Tiff called just a few minutes ago and asked if I would babysit her daughter savanna tomorrow night. I realized then that you hadn't crossed my mind before that very moment. Usually I wake up thinking about you and your memory haunts me constantly throuought the day. Thats how it's been for 16 months now.

 When the realization of ta hit me, I felt hopeful again. Like I might actually be okay. Maybe I'll be able to look forward a time that I won't spend longing to have you back in my life. That I won't feel like I will spend life alone looking toward a bleak and empty future, forever searching for a presence kept just out of my reach. I met a couple recently that have been taking up a lot of my time and energy. They are fun and interesting and more than a handful when it comes to navigating the kind of friendship we are attempting to pursue. They know about you, that I still have feelings for you and are understanding of the fact that I might hold on to hopes that I might feel your arms around me again someday. He is tall and good looking with a dark kind of raunchy sense of humor and she is super smart cutie that is a little klutzy and likes to play scrabble. We play together online and she hasn't beat me yet but she never loses by much. I don't miss you quite as much when I'm with them but still.... I'm going to wrap this up now. I just wanted you to know that I'm OK and that I'm going to be OK and that loving you isn't going to hurt forever. Always, K 

Hey everyone
Here is a little about me,
My name is Marcus i am 20 and I come from the United Kingdom, I'm a pretty big gamer and I play on Xbox/pc I play a wide variety of games, MW2, Roblox, Minecraft, Fifa, Battlefield, DoS2 and a personal favourite Rocket League! (I'm awful at it) if any of these interests you please just hmu I'm more than happy to play with you!
I have quite a large array of hobbies some of my favourites are; Space, I love the mystery of it 🎇 Socialising, I love getting to know and meet new people! Driving the country and Highlands are some of my favourite to explore Travelling, I love an adventure Just ask and I'll be happy to share more hobbies!
I'm quite haply to share pictures of myself once we have spoken for awhile just let me know!
Tell me something interesting or a fun fact!
Anyone can message me I don't discriminate please just send me a message!
I hope we can speak soon!

Me (F20) and my boyfriend (M25) have been together for little bit over a year. We are eachother’s first loves and the way this man makes me feel (how safe and loved and understood) is out of this world. I know most redditors say “he’s so amazing but” and list many reasons why their partner is in fact not “so amazing” but I do think he is a phenomenal person. Anyhow. Sometimes I feel like I want him more than he wants me, that i’m a burden as he’d rather spend time doing something else instead of me (hah).
We spend 2-3 days a week together and i initiate most of it, he doesn’t really take me on dates or plans things and that wouldn’t really bother me as i am not much of a dates/events person but I do want to feel like a priority, like I matter, like I’m not an afterthought. He doesn’t like texting (however at the beginning we texted non stop) and it’s very common for him to not respond for almost the entire day. We’ve talked about this before and now he calls me everyday (unless he forgets because he’s a pretty disorganized person, we also assume he has ADHD) on his way to work, so that I feel wanted and he doesn’t feel pressured to text as much. He doesn’t live in my city and I don’t have a license yet so he has to pick me up whenever we hang out at his place or go somewhere (he claims this doesn’t bother him at all and he actually enjoys him and I had decided to trust him on that) so it’s impossible for me to drive up to him by myself (but I have proposed I take a bus to get to him if that’s what it takes to see him and he declined) just to spend and hour together, however, I need more. I need for him to want to hang out with me without me having to ask, I’d love to be with him whenever I have the time, he’s not like that. For example: tomorrow I start work at 4 pm, he at 5pm and it would never cross his mind to ask me to hang out till then, he’d rather spend it alone/with his roomate/playing video games or whatever else. I understand he needs alone time (so do I, as I have many side hobbies) but the day after that is similar and then again: he won’t ask to hang out and if i offer he’ll probably say he can’t as he’s busy. He won’t look at my texts until he feels like it, making me feel extremely neglected. Rarely are the days we spend together full days with a sleepover, they’re maybe a few hours here and there if i’m lucky. He very rarely sees a chunk of free time and thinks of me, he doesn’t really look at our work schedules and sees which days both of us are free. He wants me to move in with him as that way we’ll be able to spend more time together but that’s not an option for me yet.
I have many mental health issues and am going to therapy (so working on it) so consequentially I (a lot of the time) can’t really differentiate between my problems with him being a reflection of my poor mental health and many issues or are they actually valid.
I have asked him before if he could take more time for me and plan things, he is making progress but I fear it’s not enough. He said he’s now afraid to tell me that he wants to spend time alone because then I’ll feel like he’s not attentive enough, even though that’s not true at all. I want him to have free time and time with friends, all I wish is for him to squeeze me in between that and not for me to feel like I’m forcing my own boyfriend to spend time with me. I am now at a point where I’m borderline afraid to even propose any time together because I cannot escape the feeling that he only does it to please me (he says that’s not true).
When we’re together his attention is all mine, he’s attentive and caring, touchy and complementary, we laugh and we cry together, he is an amazing listener and knows how to calm me down. When we’ve traveled together we had a great time, we work amazingly as a team, have fun etc. I feel no doubts when I’m actually with him in person but if I don’t see him for an extended period of time (let’s say a week) I start to doubt his feelings and care for me. He doesn’t respond to my texts for a whole day (and I send him maybe one two to texts, sometimes a meme, I wouldn’t say I’m overbearing at all), forgets to call, doesn’t look at his timetable and mine to plan something, he just goes living his life as if I didn’t exist. Sometimes I fear that if I don’t ask to see him, we won’t hang out for a month before he remembers he has a girlfriend.
Am I expecting too much of him or is he giving me too little?

Waking up next to Stanton, our clothes were all over the floor. Blushing at last night’s activity, I checked the time. A loud scream burst from my lips, the book club was in ten minutes. Crashing to the floor, Stanton stirred awake. Panicking at the time, the floor shook as he crashed to the floor. Searching for anything to wear, he was already tugging on a black band t-shirt and ripped jeans. Fixing his hair, my hand settled on a black and white striped swing dress. Slipping my feet into my boots, he brushed my wild hair into a simple side bun. Kissing me on the forehead, he dropped a random book into my palm.
“I will hang out with the husbands to analyze their behavior. Get those hens talking about their men.” He said simply, ignoring what we did last night. “Try and drink some coffee with them. Tell them that you have a stomach sensitivity.” Focusing on the book, scarlet colored my cheeks. It was one I had written and published fifty years ago, his brows furrowing.
“You’re telling me that I have to go and sit with a bunch of women while they misinterpret what I wrote.” I groaned bitterly, wishing that he would acknowledge last night. “Whatever. At least I know the plot.” Hooking his elbow into mine, we walked across the street. The husbands welcomed him with open arms, Susie yanking me in. Pulling me into the kitchen, she slid me a cup of coffee, my stomach churning. While most vampires enjoyed it, I despised it with a burning passion. Taking a sip, the pungent taste reminded me of a bunch of pennies.
“Tell me about sleeping with him. Was it fun? My husband is so boring.” She pleaded desperately, pressing her palms together. “I also asked for you to come because you look a lot like my favorite author.” Hitting the wall, a secret shelf with every single book I wrote covered every inch of the damn space. Think of an excuse, you idiot. Stanton looked up from his own conversation outside, my lips pressing into a thin line.
“My mother wrote them.” I lied seamlessly, Susie buying into it. “She was a lovely woman.” Lie, that was a lie. My mother was a poor Irish vampire who ditched me at the ripe age of three, her next question causing me to spit my coffee out.
“When is the sound of tiny feet entering your home?” She trilled sweetly, cupping my hands. “You are the first to know that I am pregnant now. I have been trying for years. Maybe you can get pregnant soon and we can have them be best friends.” Horror hid behind my polite smile, a long squeal escaping my lips. Like hell I would go along with her sick little plan. Something felt off, my vision blurred. A purple liquid swirled on top of the coffee, my body hitting the floor. A rough darkness devoured me as coffee pooled around my head.
A yellow light swung over my head, something else feeling off. Clammy sweat drenched my skin, a fever burning my cheeks. Susie towered over me, a spike spinning in her palm. Attempting to crawl away, her heel dug into my back. Unable to move, this felt like something else. The desire to take Stanton nearly controlled my mind, the claws extended from my fingernails. Spinning another needle of the liquid in her palm, she jammed it into my leg. Extreme nausea wracked my body, the beginning of a heat cycle disabling me. Parting my lips to speak, I needed his blood to survive or that was what it felt like. Only wheezes poured from my lips, she jammed another needle into my leg. Sending me into the next stage, every touch raised an incredible amount of goosebumps. Shivering in my spot, the last time I felt this was one hundred years ago when a handsome stranger caught my eye.
“I used to be a hunter.” She bragged gleefully, sitting down on top of me. “We have to finish before the book club arrives, you fucking idiot. I meant what I said about you getting pregnant around the same time. I know the serial killer lives among us. You have to trust me with that.” My eyebrow twitched with a mixture of bewilderment and irritation, a snarl curling on my lips. All of this was too much, my knee meeting her face. Crawling onto the living room floor, my legs felt like rubber. If she hit me with another needle of that liquid I would be pregnant within the next few days. At the current level in mine, three months remained before anything had to be done about that. Stumbling out, blood poured from her nose. Struggling to my feet, my shaking fingers opened her fridge to see what I needed. The process had already begun but I could delay it for a while. Pulling out a needle full of a milky liquid, she cried out as I jammed it into my thigh.
“I am not ready for that quite yet, Miss hunter!” I shouted vehemently, fuming darkly on the stool. “How can I know that you aren’t the serial killer?” Pausing in her spot, her slender hands jammed her nose back into place. Wiping the blood out from underneath her nose, she sat down across from me. Chuckling softly to herself, her fingers drummed on the stainless steel counter top.
“They killed my sister and her family a couple of weeks ago. I have nothing to gain from this.” She informed me briskly, holding her stomach. “I am the neighborhood watch and I can’t stand that someone is slicing their way through our little piece of paradise. Revenge is in my plan but now I have to be careful.” Seeing things through her point of view, the fact that she sped up my natural reproductive cycle ticked me off.
“I figured I might kick start things for your body. The sooner you get pregnant the happier Stanley will be. I always catch him watching the families walking by with a longing look. I am only doing it because he doesn’t suck up to me which makes him my favorite stranger.” She expressed with her real smile, pointing to me. “You are a purebred vampire. Such luck should be blessed in your eyes. You can give birth without dying. I met you once when my old man came to talk to you in your jail cell. I don’t know if you don’t remember him but his name is Father Rowell.” All of my breath escaped my lungs at the mention of his name, my mind flicking through the memories of every person who had visited me. Come to think of it, a redheaded woman did accompany a priest that one time. How did I not make the connection? Laying my head on the table, several women ran in. My eyebrow twitched, the perfectly dressed woman interrupted our conversation. A sea of blonde haired women shoved me aside, a couple of them shooting daggers from their eyes. Stepping back, Susie tugged me close to her. A bout of nausea wracked me, the combination of the potion she had injected with me mixed poorly with my sudden social anxiety. Dropping a tray into my palm, her gentle touch dragged me to the four ivory walls she called her living room. A brown leather set reminded me of my cell, the tray crashing to the floor. Glass shattered everywhere, my immediate response was to run. Apologizing profusely, I bolted out the door. Ignoring their looks, I ripped off my boots. Sprinting down the street, a masked individual slammed into me. Crashing to the ground, the pavement felt cool against my face. Still weak from earlier, I couldn’t just fight them off like normal. Quivering on the pavement, a disguised voice sent chills up my spine.
“Goodnight, my dear!” The robotic voice laughed evilly, a knife slamming into my body repeatedly.” Copper poisoned my taste buds, the person whistling. A rusting van pulled up, the license plate number 568 4325 stuck into my memory while my blood pooled underneath me. Tossing me into the van, Stanton barely made it onto the street. Locking the door behind me, I leaned against the wall. Pulling out my silenced phone, my vision blurred as I turned on my location. Hiding my phone behind a dusty box, a darkness swallowed me alive.
Jerking awake once more, this trend had to stop. Groaning in pain, a yellow light swung over my head, a rough rope cut into my wrists. Struggling only made the knot tighter, the killers having to be boat owners, hunters or some sort of boy scout. Glancing around, no weapons lay around. Talk about being professional. Muffled yelling stole my attention, a filthy redhead tugged on chains against the wall. Two small children hugged her side tightly, silent tears staining their cheeks. One, a pair of worn steel toe boots came into view. Two, the other shoe appeared. Three, his masked face poked around the corner. Four, Five, Six, one of the killers were at the bottom of the stairs. Seven, he towered over me at six foot seven. Lifting up his mask, relief crashed over me at the sight of an anxious Stanton. Seconds from cutting her rope, the boss stomped down the stairs. Pulling his mask down, the boss cleared his throat.
“Cut off her fingers until she talks about how she found us.” He demanded via a thick distorted voice. “Never mind, give me the knife.” Snatching it from Stanton, he could only watch with horror as the man held my finger straight. Three red dots blinked in the corner of my eyes, the operation making sense. This asshole was running a torture to murder show, a lump forming in my throat.
“Thank you for your payment of a million dollars. We shall gut her like a deer.” He mused darkly, tracing the knife along my flat stomach. “Then I will play with the guts to please you.” A scream burst from my lips the moment the blade glided across my stomach. Fighting the urge to vomit, my steaming guts poured out onto my lap. Playing with my intestines, the money began to pour in. Choking on the blood building up in my throat, a hack sent it all over his mask. The questions were sick, a clammy sweat drenching my skin.
“We have a vampire.” He announced with wicked laughter, my heart sinking in my chest. “This is going to be fun.” Stanton held his composure, the back of the metal chair bending underneath his grip. The heat potion kicked in, one accidental touch clouding up my mind for a moment. Bending down to my level, his next words sent chills up my spine.
“The boys are coming. We have to keep him occupied for about thirty minutes.” He growled through gritted teeth, the man asking him to run the computers. Touching my shoulder one last time, the chair squealed the moment he sank down into the chair. Shoving a slender flash drive into the USB hole, he was gathering the IP addresses. Shoving my guts back in, childlike wonder brightened the killer’s tone at my wound sealing shut. Susie’s sister held her hands over her kid’s eyes, the knife sliding in and out of me. The wet noise did little to help me, the potion making my stomach churn worse than normal. The money kept pouring in, the welcome sound of chaos woke me up from my sickly state. The agents from before piled down the stairs, Stanton ripping off his mask. Cutting the rope, his touch made me jump a couple of feet into the air. Popping to my feet, every footfall echoed in the concrete cell. Assisting Susie’s sister, her arms embraced me desperately. Every emotion soaked my shoulder, another touch from Stanton resulted in a tender blush on my cheeks. Shooting me a thumbs up, his lips brushed against the top of my head. Helping the woman to her feet, Stanton scooped up the children. Bright flashes blinded me, the news crew attempting to speak to us. Climbing into a tinted SUV, the children bounced into their mother’s arm. Fishing around a bag, he held out packages of cheddar crackers. The boys accepted them graciously, the car heading towards the hospital. The door ripped open, nurses ushering the family inside. Scanning me up and down, Stanton held me by my hips. Sniffing me real quick, fear flashed on his face. Not having time, Susie smashed into me. Desperate tears flooded from her cheeks, her quaking hands cupping my face. A deep crimson painted my cheeks, a newfound respect for me glowed in her eyes.
“Thank you so much for saving them. I don’t know how I could ever thank y-” She blubbered uncontrollably, my hand raising to stop her. Smiling brightly in her direction, this reaction made it all worth it. My lips parted to speak, a nurse dragging her off before I could explain myself. Stanton dragged me back to the car, a snarl twitching on his lips. Slamming me down into my seat, the partition hummed its way up.
“Your heat is supposed to be for another year! Why do you smell like you are three months away?” He demanded hotly, the crack of my hand meeting his cheeks stunning the both of us. How dare he ask after not talking about last night! Clenching my fists into a ball, I turned my back.
“You haven’t talked about last night. We had fun and you acted like nothing happened!” I blurted out venomously, happy to have it off of my chest. “You already forced me into a marriage, and now you want me to ignore what happened last night. Fuck you. I had fun but here you are. Was it that bad? Susie sped me up so we could be pregnant around the same fucking time. Did you know she used to be a hunter? She opened right up to me. In fact she knew me.” Spinning me around to face him, an apologetic smile dimmed his features. A piece of hair fell in front of his left eye, his hands rubbing my shoulder.
“I can’t tell you why that all scares me.” He mumbled under his breath, sliding me a large emerald box. “You need to get changed into your uniform to enter the facility.” Peeling off my destroyed dress, his eyes couldn’t leave the angry scars covering my body. Flipping the box open, I pulled out a lightly armored leather number. Tugging it over my head, the onyx leather covered my arms. Hiding my bloody hands underneath the bell sleeves, the deep v-neck showed off my ample breasts. Sitting back in the seat, the A-line skirt floated away from my body. Scooting closer to me, he offered me his neck. Sinking my fangs into his tender flesh, every gulp revived my health. Curling my arms around his neck, he drank away. This time a wave of euphoria crashed over me, a long sigh pouring from my lips. Unable to stop, fright rounded my eyes the moment his hand curled around my neck. A muffled protest stopped him, an oppressive silence hung between us. The car skidded to a halt, an impressive navy marble building towered over us. Helping me out, the numb look on his face scared the shit out of me. Marching in aggressively, the way he was acting reminded me of the first time I met Father Powell. Hugging him from behind, his muscles relaxed.
“We all lose control at times.” I assured him lovingly, the tone taking over my voice for the first time. “If I can gain control, you can do it.” Cupping my trembling hands, an agent was attempting to remember the plate number. Typing it in for them with my free hand, a grateful expression met my exhausted face. My legs gave out, Stanton placing me on his back. Ignoring the jeering whispers, the rumors spread within minutes. Bursting into the interrogation room, a shaggy haired man with angry dark eyes watched him set me down in the chair across from him. An unkempt beard danced with every growl in his throat, his scarred face informing me of a rough life.
“I am not the only one in this plot. Do you remember that serial killer club on the news a couple of years ago? I am the bottom tier.” He bragged gleefully, the sweet smell of poison wafting from his mouth. “We must all die with honor.” His heart beat one last time, Stanton calling for help. Help wouldn’t come soon enough, this was a magical poison. Dragging him out of the room, I climbed into the driver’s seat. A skill I had learned the moment cars had been invented, the modern car proving far easier to drive than those things. Stanton hopped into the passenger seat, my fingers typing in an address into the GPS. Driving for too long, the brakes squealed to a halt in front of a bustling night club. Taking off his tie, the poor thing floated to the back. Roughing up his suit, he protested as I messed up his hair. Letting my hair down, a familiar face had to be spoken to. Sauntering up the door, the bouncer let us both in. Loud music worsened my migraine, a scantily clad blond guided us up to the office. Opening the door, my fingers curled around the neck of my old friend. Pinning him to the wall, his scarlet curls bounced around. Ruby eyes glowered back at me, his garish velvet suit irritating me further.
“Who are you selling your poison to, you fucking idiot?” I interrogated him intensely, Stanton yelling at me to calm down. “I know what you sold to Susie. That I can let go but sell some sort of poison to a serial killer after school club! You are playing with fire.” Cocking his brows, he slammed his knee into my chest. Every rib shattered upon impact, all the breath leaving my body. Coughing on the floor, he picked me up by my hair.
“I refuse to let a runt like you run my life. I sell my magical drugs and that is that.” He snapped hotly, my bones fusing back together. “I don’t know or care what they do with them.” Wicked laughter rumbled in my throat, the heel of my bare feet slamming into his jaw. Raw energy built around my fist, his bones shattered upon the impact of my fist. Sliding down the wall, my bruising fingers picked him up by his collar.
“I don’t care that you make drugs. That isn’t my department but when they are used for suicide I have an issue. Who ordered it!” I screamed furiously, a glob of spit landing on my face. “Just answer the fucking question. I will break every bone in your body. You still owe me for you selling me out. I fucking let you keep the reward money.” Clicking his bones back into place, he struggled to his feet. Unlocking his cabinet, he pulled out an ancient ledger. Dropping it into my palms, he sulked to his desk.
“Take it. I have to start another one anyway. I will call you if somebody uber weird pops up.” He commented kindly, pulling out a new one. “Don’t charge me, ‘kay. I provide loads of hunger suppressants for the monsters in the area. I also help monsters get pregnant faster. The poison was only meant to be sold for someone who was going to die. You know that I can see reapers as well as you can. Watch your temper with that heat potion coursing through you. Your powers are going to be a little wacky for a bit.” Mouthing a silent thanks, a triumphant grin spread cheek to cheek. Walking through the club, another discussion had to be had once we got into the car. Climbing in, dread bubbled in my gut.
“Give up why you were in prison.” I demanded sternly, leaning on the steering wheel. “Don’t lie. I can sniff that shit out.” Tears welled up in his eyes, a lump forming in his throat. Storm clouds rumbled to life, heavy raindrops crashed to the top of the vehicle.
“You weren’t my first partner.” He uttered bitterly, chewing on his lips. “I had a romantic relationship with her and she turned out to be the serial killer. The bodies piled up behind me, and I didn’t even know. We were incredibly intimate. She lied with the biggest smile on her face. I enjoyed our evening together and that you only drank from the serial killers to survive. She was what the agency calls a binge eater. Devouring person after person and I was the one to put her down. The difference was that I didn’t love her like I love you.” Covering his mouth, a further explanation needed to be heard.
“What do you mean by love me?” I asked politely, attempting not to lose my cool while pulling into a Cally’s. “Don’t lie to me. I have been through enough hell today.” Refusing to look in my direction, my hands cupped his face. Gritting his teeth, his hands cupped mine.
“I observed you for months and fell in love with the way you helped the prison when you could. I loved it when you would spend weeks buried into an inhumanly huge pile of books.” He choked out awkwardly, fresh tears flowing from his eyes. “I sound like a creepy stalker but I needed to make you my mate from the instant you met me.” Nodding my head, my lips kissed his hungrily. Scarlet colored his cheeks, his hands falling to my flat stomach.
“I love you too.” I choked out just as awkwardly, hoping not to upset him further. “Watch this book, I will be right back.” Swiping his wallet, I ran into the department store. Ignoring the bright lights and horrid smells, I paused in the baby section. Closing my eyes, the sweet sound of my mother singing an Irish lullaby soothed my nerves. Snapping awake, a tiny girl had crashed into my legs. Instead of crying out in fear, she began to giggle.
“You are so pretty.” She sang adorably, her horrified mother scooping her up and running away. Getting a couple of packages of toy cars and a beautiful bouquet of white roses, hurt dimmed my eyes at the cashier watching me in pure terror. Paying for the items, silent tears stained my cheeks. Not saying a word, I punched in the address for the hospital. Cursing to myself, we were four hours away. Setting the stuff in the back, I chose to turn on the radio to drown out the chaos in my mind. Sobbing the whole way back, this world was no different. The only thing missing was the torches that had hunted my mother down. Getting there in record time, I ditched my partner to catch up to me later. Stopping at the desk, the nurse didn’t show the same fear as the people in the store. Tucking a loose piece of caramel hair behind her ears, her gray eyes twinkling with joy.
“Thank you for bringing them in.” She returned with a genuine smile, pointing to the last room down the hall. “Visiting hours are over. Surely, they want to see their hero. I will pretend I looked the other way.” Winking in my direction, she turned her back to me. Running to their room, an exhausted Susie lay on her sister’s bed. The children perked up at me, smashing into my legs. Crouching down at their level, I presented the packages of cars. Pecking my cheeks, they ran off to go play with them. Rising to my feet, I presented her with the flowers.
“How does your sister like her coffee?” I inquired with my genuine smile, the mother’s expression softening into a gracious smile. My lips parted to speak, the woman’s head shaking. Coughing a bit, blood covered her hand. Seconds from pushing the nurse button, her raspy voice stole my attention. Stanton hovered in the door, the mother’s heart monitor going nuts. Looking closer, a bony hand rested on her shoulder. Following the arm, a reaper held her shoulder. Death had come to her, the option not working for me.
“Is there anything I can give you in return?” I begged with my palms pressed together, knowing that those kiddos needed their mother. “How about this?” Snapping my fingers, my stolen reaper’s scythe rested in my palms. Snatching it from me, the cold hand curled around my neck. Gasping for air, his yellowed skull hovered inches from my face. Biting down on my arm, he gulped down enough to figure out who I was.
“I recognize your stupid face.” A chilly voice thundered evilly, the other finger playing with my hair. “You vampires are the bane of my existence. I can’t take your souls when there's none to take. I will spare her this one time but she will have to go next time regardless of what you have.” Dropping me to the floor, he was gone. Coughing up a storm, one of the kids hit the button. A look of horror dawned on his face, his tiny body smashing into my legs. Crouching down to his level, he shivered in my arms.
“Was that a reaper?” He stuttered brokenly, my head nodding. “Will they ever hurt me?” His tight red curls tickled my face, the other twin watching from a distance. Their emerald green eyes watched me as the nurse brushed past me.
“No, they won’t.” I promised them warmly, taking him to the waiting room. “Let’s go play while they take care of your mom, ‘kay.” Susie snapped awake, picking up her other nephew. Crashing into the nearest chairs, they played with their cars. Susie rested her head on my shoulder, snores echoing in my ear. Letting her sleep, I was thankful for my current life.

Ironic I’m posting this during Pride month lol. My family is heavily religious (Muslims specifically), so my parents especially are extremely homophobic. Thankfully, while I was growing up they never were truly vocal about it except for some offhand comments here and there that I mostly ignored because I ended up educating myself a lot, so none of their ideology was particularly forced onto me.
However, one of our family friends recently became a heavy protestor against the LGBTQ+ community, talking about how that is being “shoved down our throats” (:/) despite that not being true at all. Their daughter is also incredibly homophobic and when I tried having a conversation with her about it she shut me down real fast, spouting the typical religious bullshit. (Her mom is even going as far as refusing to revote in our prime minister due to his heavy advocacy for LGBTQ+.) Because of this, my parents have also become a lot more involved in being homophobic, going as far as to keep my siblings home from school as a protest on June 1st, sending an email to the school and meeting with the principal to argue about this. I hate being in this kind of environment and not being able to speak up on it knowing how fast I’ll be shot down and reprimanded. What’s even more heartbreaking is how my siblings are being affected by this.
They’ve become so hateful of the LGBTQ+ community in these past few weeks, and I have no idea how I can stop it. Just a few days ago my sister was talking about how her classmates were laughing about a girl coming out and making fun of her, and it absolutely broke my heart for that girl and the fact that my sister was okay with this. I know that middle school edginess is a thing, but this is taking it way too far. There’s no way I can even talk to them about this. I told my brother a while ago to not take what my parents say as the truth, not to be against the LGBTQ+ community and that everyone deserves love, and that everyone deserves to love anyone they want, identify any way that want. Then comes and tells my mom that I’m not homophobic which made her angry at me and earned me a whole lecture.
Just yesterday, he was complaining about how his school is going to raise the pride flag in front of their school and how it’s wrong and wasting of his time. He’s only in grade 5.
They’re indoctrinating kids into this. I hate how brainwashed they’ve become against LGBTQ+ only because of a religion that proclaims to be loving and peaceful, but promotes this type of hate to this community. I desperately want some way to reach out to my siblings and get them to stop thinking this way, get them to be more accepting and loving and not grow up this hateful, but I have no idea how to do that. I don’t want them to grow up like this. They’re so young and are already so brainwashed into this hate, and it hurts so much that I don’t know how to stop it.
I don’t know how to follow a religion that causes people to believe they’re justified in such hate. I want my little brother and sister to grow up right—I just wish I knew how.

It was good. Not amazing, but certainly not terrible.
The cgi was funky at times (Noah's head looks like it's floating in the mirage suit), but it didn't really take me out of movie. It was solid for the most part.
The score was okay. Better than the BB movie score, but not nearly as amazing as Steve Jablonsky's scores for the 5 Bay scores. Also, if you don't like rap music then you might not be the biggest fan of the soundtrack.
This might be a hot take, but the action wasn't really anything special most of the time. Don't get me wrong, it was fun, just not really spectacular. The final battle felt slightly voide of stakes.
I do think that some of the wonder has been lost due to the new framing techniques and the fact that the bots are all significantly smaller than in the bayverse, but this will probably come down to personal preferance.
Most of the jokes landed. The movie was pretty funny in the conventional way (as opposed to the Bay movies, which have a more specific sense of humour).
Now lets talk about the autobot cast. I honestly thought Arcee and Pablo would get a little bit more screen time, since they didn't really get an exclusive moment to shine on their own (something similar to Sideswipe's introduction in ROTF would've been nice, or really anything at all, since Pablo did practically nothing).
Mirage was fun as heck. I did not expect to like him as much as I did. Bee was also fun, but was kinda reduced to movie quotes, which I guess is what's he's always been, but this time it felt like something was missing (then again he also didn't get that much screen time).
I'm not sure how to feel about this Optimus Prime. He still kills bots in a rather brutal fashion (which I love), but he's kinda lacking his usual wisdom. I know this was the point, but I'm not sure whether his arc fully works. It's a bit heavy-handed at times.
The Maximals didn't get too much screen time. We don't really have a moment to appreciate how they look in their normal mode. There's not really too much to say about them. Airazor's death scene was really good tho.
Scourge was an okay villain. He was hella threatening in the opening scene, and his design worked well, but he wasn't really fleshed out at all. He reminds me of The Fallen, except Scourge got more screen time. He's definately not on par with Lockdown and Sentinel Prime.
Nightbird and Battletrap also didn't do too much and had little to no personality.
The human protagonists were fine. They're not really as memorable as someone like Agent Simmons, and I still probably prefer Sam (unpopular, I know), but I liked them nonetheless.
There were a few too many fake-out deaths, which kinda lowered the stakes, but my biggest complaint with the movie is that it moves too fast. Not in a sense that I don't know what's going on, but in a sense that there's not much room to breathe or get to know some of the characters. ROTB would've definately bennefited from an extra 15 minutes or so.
I know it may seem like I'm complaining a lot, but overall I really did like the movie (it's just easier to critique than to praise). It doesn't quite reach the heights of 2007 and DOTM, but it's very entertaining, and I just want to know what are all of your thoughts on this film?
P.S.The Arrival To Earth scene nearly made me squeel.

WARNING: SPOILERS GALORE IN HERE, IF YOU HAVEN'T PLAYED ALL THESE GAMES AND DON'T WANT TO BE SPOILED, DO NOT READ!
I've always liked KH, since I first saw Cloud in a KH1 commercial as a kid (I was obsessed with FF7 as a small child), I knew I had to play it.
So I played KH1 religiously in elementary school, heard about CoM but didn't have a gameboy advance so I ignored it, then played KH2, barely understood what was going on, but enjoyed it thoroughly. Continued to ignore the 'spinoffs' because my family was poor and there was no way I could afford all the different portable consoles they were putting these damn games on. Then, finally, bought and played KH3 on release, with my wife.
fast forward to a couple months ago, and after a few debates with my coworkers about the 'quality' of KH3 (I kinda hated it), I decided to sit down and play through the entire series properly, because it was VERY apparent I was missing too much context, and thankfully, 1.5+2.5 final mix, and 2.8 are things that exist now, and are free on PSPlus, so why not? Besides, my wife's ONLY exposure to the series was KH3, so I owed her some context.
Kingdom Hearts 1: What can I say? It's KH1, it's Simple, it's Clean, it's a good fuckin' game when nothing like it really existed at the time. I played on Normal because my wife was watching along, and I didn't want the plot progression to get hung up on me dying to the same boss 25 times. In hindsight, maybe I should've picked a harder difficulty, because I remember spending hours on Maleficent's dragon form as a kid. Hiding out in the bramble where none of her attacks reached me, just chipping away at her HP, but now, I just kinda walked right through her. My biggest complaint with KH1 was against bosses like Ansem's second phase (when you're fighting him 1v1), that KH1's lack of gap-closing options becomes apparent. Bosses like Ansem will frequently blink to the opposite side of the arena, and it takes Sora so long to close the distance, that they've already moved into an attack with i-frames before you can reach them, leading to a lot of missed opportunities for punishes, in my opinion. It didn't help that I accidentally put myself in a sort of 'hard mode' by choosing the Dream Sword, and discarding the Dream Shield, making Sora a glass cannon. But on the flip side, in comparison to later entries the franchise, I really like KH1's more grounded movement, but I'll get more into that later.
I beat the game pretty quickly, so I farmed for Ultima Weapon, as I'd never gotten it as a kid, and then kinda... walked right through Sephiroth, Hooded Figure, Phantom, and Kurt Ziza with little to no effort. Hell, I beat Seph first try, so that was a bit disappointing but I think I did it to myself by grinding out Ultima Weapon first.
Chain of Memories: This was it, my first proper "spinoff" title and I was very excited to get into it, and discover new pieces of the story I missed, and it did NOT disappoint! being properly introduced to the Organization members prior to KH2, finally understanding why Namine is a thing, memories, heart's memories, etc. All to culminate in a proper setup for KH2's opening and to explain why Sora was in a giant flower, etc.
Gameplay however... I knew it was card based because I remember my friend as a kid briefly showing me the game, so that was no surprise, and I honestly did enjoy it enough, the card-based combat was fleshed out enough to give players plenty of room to develop strategies and that's really all I needed from it. What I didn't like, however, was the gameplay loop. It simply got repetitive, and it was obvious that this game was a reskin of a GBA game, hardware limitations included. Every cutscene at the beginning and end of a floor was great, especially towards the end when the climax starts to really ramp up, but getting to those moments was such a slog, so by halfway through the game, I was over it and just wanted the game to end.
Marluxia... omfg. Okay so I played this game on normal, but I guess I screwed up and spent too many levels on max HP, and not enough on deck size, this fight took me for-fucking-ever to beat, I genuinely hated this game by the end, and to top it all off, I misread the endgame prompt and didn't create a "completed save", so I couldn't start Riku's chapter, unless I went back and beat Marluxia again...
358 Days/2: Moving on, even though I own a DS, I'm not buying a copy of this, so I watched the included movie in 1.5+2.5, and honestly, it was great. It added SO MUCH more context to KH2, and it was fun to try and piece together at what moments during KH1 or CoM that certain things were happening in Days. Axel's outright bizarre motives in KH2 finally make sense, Roxas's memories, etc. I will say, though, that Xion confuses me, I really don't understand how Vexen, who constantly talked about his replicas being incomplete, imperfect, etc, was able to make something so powerful, and unique, as Xion. Total outlier of his skills and it never feels properly explained but oh well.
Gameplay's a little light, though.
Kingdom Hearts 2: I was REALLY excited to get back into this one, and it didn't disappoint. With the proper context from CoM and Days, the beginning FINALLY made sense and by the end of Twilight Town, my wife said "Roxas really got done dirty, and I'm mad." To which I agree. Going through this entire game with the intended amount of context was like playing a whole new game, it made a game I already consider to be great, even better. What else can I really say?
When I got control of my character the first thing I remember saying was "jesus christ was the camera always this far away?" I guess I never really noticed it, but with combat being so much more aerial focused, it makes sense. I had never played the Final Mix version of this game, so the Limit Form was a welcome sight, even if it is hilariously broken. Overall, watching Sora's moveset expand as his skills with the Keyblade do, is neat, and reaction commands are a fun mechanic to play with, personally.
However, I did not like how 'floaty' Sora is, and it's a theme that continues through the rest of the series. I died a lot due to getting knocked into the air by a hit, and then just never getting the chance to touch the ground again because Sora takes 10,000 years to float back down to the ground. With no aerial blocking, and air dodging having a longer cooldown then dodge roll, it led to a lot of frustration. Also, special shout-out to "YoU ClEvEr LiTtLe SnEaK!", honestly, fuck Xigbar, I don't know why, but his fight gave me more trouble than any other boss in the entire game. I struggled so much to find an opening to punish him and spent 90% of the fight swinging at the air then getting hit in the back because of how much he blinked around.
I never got around to getting ultima weapon, or beating any secret bosses in KH2, although I did visit Lingering Will and Sephiroth just to see what they were like. I remember I beat Seph as a kid at lvl 65 specifically because of MP Berserk, so maybe I'll go back and try it sometime.
Birth By Sleep: I heard so much about this game as a kid, and even recently, and I knew during my first playthrough of KH3 that Terra, Aqua and Ventus were from BBS, and that they were pretty important characters, but I could've never guessed just how important until I finally played this game. The story for this game was simply great, I started off thinking Terra was the most bland, uninteresting character I'd ever seen (his VO's flat delivery of dialogue didn't help), but by the end, he was my favourite, and honestly, Aqua felt like the third wheel to me, by the end. Like sure, after completing the 4th 5th and 6th episodes, I felt bad for her, as she was clearing going through A LOT, but while Terra and Ventus both had VERY clear stakes in the story, Aqua just felt kind of... there. Her ties to the plot weren't nearly as strong and her story was more relegated to "watching her 2 friends get fucked by destiny and plot". However, Aqua at the end being responsible for Castle Oblivion, along with the clarification on what Org. 13 was looking for in CoM, was such an awesome reveal and my wife and I were losing our collective shit over it.
Oh, and of course, finding out what exactly the Lingering Will was, was pretty damn cool, too!
Fun fact, this is the first game I played on Critical, everything was on Normal until this point. I heard it was one of the easier games to play on Critical, so I figured why not. By the time I finished Terra's arc, I was begging to go back to CoM to fight Marluxia. I cannot express enough just how much I DESPISE this game, in a gameplay sense. Ignoring the obvious things like playing through the same worlds 3 different times and how tiresome that gets, the combat was so blood-boilingly infuriating, I wondered if I was going to actually finish the game. The command system, I hate it. "What? You wanted to cast Cure because you're about to die? Well, too bad, the enemy with 0 warm up frames in his attack just hit you at the same time you pressed X, so your Cure goes on cooldown now, fuck you." That's not even getting into the terrible end-lag in your own attacks, and just how sluggish everything feels. Critical mode aside, this game even on Normal would've pissed me off for all the same reasons, I was so relieved to be done with it.
Re:Coded:>! I was told this one wasn't necessary, and almost skipped it, but decided against it and I'm kinda glad I did. I only watched the movie, but I hear the gameplay itself is pretty solid, so maybe one day I'll check it out. The plot is self-contained, and interesting to watch, and it does get referenced a few times in KH3, so it didn't really feel like a waste.!<
Dream Drop Distance: I was genuinely lost for a while, plotwise, in this game. I felt like I'd missed an entry somewhere that'd apply context, but no, Yen Sid is just not great at explaining things. By about halfway through the game I was caught up and understood what was going on, but the first hour or so I was just along for the ride, hoping I'd understand it later. I enjoyed what DDD was doing, and it felt like, had it been a console release, this could've easily been KH3 with just how much direct impact it has on the plot compared to other entries. Honestly, watching Riku slowly, but surely, get his act together throughout the series has been a treat, and it all comes to a head in this game, he finally moves on from rival/edgebaby to a proper equal to Sora, so much so that if they were to have a gentleman's duel just to test their strength, I couldn't confidently say who would win.
The worlds were hit or miss, seeing Notre Dame was cool, but honestly who the hell asked for Tron: Legacy? I will note that, especially for worlds like Tron, I didn't really feel like I was part of the plot like in KH1 and 2, but more like I was just watching the plot progress from the sidelines. It was jarring.
But the biggest disappointment by FAR was Fantasia. Before I even booted up this game, I was talking about how cool it would be if KH ever visited the world of Fantasia just due to how unique of an experience it would be. I imagined something along the lines of a rhythm game like Crypt of the Necrodancer or Metal Hellsinger, just a neat gimmick tied to that world's music that kept you in line with the beat of the song. So, when I watched the opening to DDD and saw the very clear reference to Fantasia, I got excited, only to be completely let down by it being just another world, except your hits play random instrument noises, and essentially a barebones prototype to Melody of Memory as a reaction command. Honestly, this world was completely wasted on a portable KH entry, it should've been saved for a console entry where it could've been realized more fully, rather than confined to the limitations of a portable console. Oh well, maybe in KH4.
I also played this game on Critical and hooboy did I feel it, but first, the basics. Flowmotion sucks. Thanks for coming to my TED talk. Seriously, I get what they were going for, but I honestly hated how disruptive flowmotion ended up being. Air dodge out of the way of something, well, you touched a wall, so now you gotta brace against it and get ready to bounce off. It's not that it was ruining my gameplay or anything, it was just annoying because it'd remind me of its existence at the most inconvenient times, and it was broken, like, hilariously broken. I definitely abused flowmotion to get through some encounters early on, when I didn't have many tools at my disposal yet, and even in the World that Never Was, I managed to use flowmotion to get ontop of, and over a building to get to the other side, which triggered a cutscene I don't think I was supposed to see yet, because suddenly I was talking to Roxas with NO context, so there's a good chance I skipped a scene or two by doing this purely because the game let me, and I wanted to see what was at the top, if anything (I originally thought I was gonna find some way out of bounds or something).
The Dreameaters genuinely don't bother me. I actually kind of enjoyed levelling them up as a means to acquire abilities and passives. The only thing that unironically kept me from grinding their stats more is that irritating fucking song that plays whenever you play minigames with them. I despise it. With all my heart.
The drop-out mechanic was annoying as hell in some instances, especially when, towards the end of the game, I did a TON of farming on Sora for Droplets, to give Riku a ton of bonuses to help with progression, only for the game to immediately FORCE me to drop from Riku, back to Sora, just as soon as I got control of him, causing me to hard reset the game, reload my save, and actively backtrack as Riku to get an actual use out of the bonuses I saved up for him.
The combat was, well, I wasn't enthused to see the Command List back, and I suffered all the same frustrations that BBS gave me, with only MARGINAL improvements in gameplay. The only saving grace was enemies actually had warm-up animations on attacks, giving you a brief head's up instead of just randomly bursting into a combo with no warning.
Anti-Nightmare Sora was the first fight that I genuinely gave up on. even Xigbar in KH2, Terranort in BBS, Terranort again in BBS, Vanitas, all of them I managed to push through. But this fucker? No, I had to walk away for a day, come back, grind my eyes out, and when I FINALLY beat him, the game then beat me over the head with Young Xehanort...
...Then I discovered Balloonra and slept through the rest of game.
Fragmentary Passage: Not much to say other than it's a tech demo for KH3, plot wise, it was interesting to see where Aqua's story lines up with the end of KH1, and where she's at both literally, and mentally, by KH3.
X: Back Cover: Whoever wrote the dialogue for Master of Master's needs a raise and a personal statue outside SE HQ because this guy is hilarious! His deliveries are genuine, quick, witty, and not at all the stilted, oddly paced dialogue I've come to expect from the KH series, and well, everything Square does outside of FF14 and 16. I would not be surprised to find out his dialogue was written in English first, rather than Japanese.
Anyway, I'm really mad I have to either play, or watch someone else play, a gatcha game to get the rest of the context here, because this movie was fascinating, and these characters all seem to be pretty damn important to KH4, so it's a shame.
Kingdom Hearts 3: Back (almost) full circle! Just like with KH2, coming into KH3 was full context was such a breath of fresh air! Everything made more sense, and I had a clear understanding of the character's motives and goals throughout the story. Again, what's there to say, really?
Well... the worlds kinda suck. Olympus being relegated to a tutorial felt like a slap in the face, and overall, the entire world felt bland. It looked like a generic Unreal Engine open world environment, with Hercules pasted in it. Nothing about the open wilderness outside the city really looked like it belonged there, it didn't fit Hercules' art style in the slightest. Compared to, say, Kingdom of Corona, where everything felt more visually on brand, granted, Tangled is a CGI movie, Hercules isn't, I understand that the translation is harder to make but it really didn't look like much effort was taken at all for 2/3rds of Olympus.
Arendelle was "Fall of a mountain simulator" and I was absolutely sick of it. It also epitomized my problems with DDD's worlds in that, when you really think about it, you do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING in Frozen's plot. You are sidelined the entire time, with Sora and the gang essentially climbing back up a mountain, being told "hey here's what you missed, okay bye!" Before being yeeted back off again, to rinse and repeat ad nauseum until you fight a boss that just doesn't feel earned, which is a damn shame because Skoll is one of the coolest looking fights in the game. There's no participation, the plot simply ignores you the whole time and does it's own thing until you leave.
Pirates and Big Hero 6 felt hilariously short. If you have no intention to explore the open world (there is nothing worth exploring in Sanfransokyo, so this doesn't help) The worlds feel like you're in and out in 20 minutes.
Shoutout to Monsters Inc and Toy Story, you definitely felt like you were a part of the world, and a part of the story happening within it.
The end of this game was phenomenal, seeing everything you've been watching build up, finally come all together, the reunions, the realizations, the callbacks, all of it was such a MASSIVE payoff that was completely lost on me the first time, when the only games I had played were KH1 and KH2, and not since they were new.
So, as with every other game after BBS, I played this one on critical, as I was told it was simply a more rewarding experience, and I honestly agree. Sure, I had a lot of frustrations (Sora's floatiness being paramount) but you can finally BLOCK IN MIDAIR, and BLOCK OR DODGE MID COMBO! If KH2 had these mechanics, it'd be hands down the best game in the whole series, period. I wish they'd thought of it sooner, almost every entry in the series would have benefited from this.
I did spend my fair share of time absolutely raging at the final boss gauntlet, however, and really, my biggest issue was just visual clarity (if you remember Xehanort's meteor attack, then you probably know). But I beat it and was very satisfied with how Xehanort's arc turned out. KH3 is a great game.
Re:Mind: I got this DLC half off, and even still, I'm a little mad I spent money to spend most of my time rewatching the cutscenes I JUST WATCHED from the maingame. The game reached a point where it started truncating the cutscenes to get to the new info quicker and I couldn't help but wonder why the hell they didn't do that to begin with... but ultimately, the DLC was good, a glorified boss gauntlet, sure, but good. Explaining Sora's disappearance was welcome and started setting up context for KH4.
The data fights... as of writing this, I have completed 11/13 of the fights. I'm missing Xion, Xehanort, and of course, Yozora. Only reason I haven't done more is a sudden lack of free time to do so. To reiterate, I'm on Critical, and these fights, while some have absolutely pissed me off to no end (lookin' at you, Vanitas), these fights have solidified KH3 as probably my favourite game in the franchise, purely on gameplay alone, and one of my favourites of all time. The combat FEELS rewarding, (usually) failure doesn't feel like you were cheated by some BS mechanic, but feels like something you know YOU did wrong, and need to correct for the next attempt. I will be going back to do the rest of the fights, as terrifying as they look, because so far, it's been genuinely fun to figure out the puzzles behind these fights and put my skills to the test.
Melody of Memory: Kingdom Hearts rhythm game! Neat!
Well, kinda. It wasn't a very satisfying game to play in comparison to something like Guitar Hero, but it was enjoyable to listen to my favourite KH songs (shout out to The Encounter! Don't care how bullshit the boss is, if it's using that song, I can't even get mad, it's just too much of a bop!) But I did not appreciate yet another rehash of the plot as the main gameplay incentive.
Thankfully that game is pretty damn short, so getting to the end, where the actual meat and potatoes is, in terms of new plot, was pretty painless and overall, worth it. More context for KH4, Kairi deciding to train under Aqua(!), and the somewhat harrowing implications that Xehanort knew about the 'unreality'.
And that's it. I guess I'm done with KH until 4 releases, or that AR mobile game. I've been typing for a very long time now and I'm not sure how to close this out other than... uh, thank for reading, can't wait to hear all about how wrong or right I am about your favourite entries!

I just a Reddit post of a Muslim woman who said she's in a relationship with a man and he told her he wouldn't ask for her hand in marriage unless she starts wearing dresses and skirts instead of pants, and mum was beside me and I told her about this story and she said he does have a right to it because he's "jealous" over her. Okay but what sort of authority does that give to him over her?
Nothing.
No rights at all, I said this exactly, she said noans that it's a protection for her from other men, okay then why don't men keep their eyes to themselves, she said well woman don't listen to god's order why should men Do as well, well dearest mama, it's called basic manners that a man shouldn't check a girl out when she is just minding her own damn business, of course I didn't say the last part.
She went on and on about how god is as fair as it could get (fun fact, if god chooses who to give more hasanat to and who not to just Bec he wants to, is what u call being bias and is definitely not fairness.
After all this ordeal was over with she called me to her room and started lecturing me about...I honestly don't know what, but about different stuff mostly how allah could never be wrong, the change in her tone of voice from talking to me about how mindset is stupid to talking about allah made me almost believe in Islam again, almost.
All it took me was to step out of the room for me to go to believing more about how messed up this religion is, if it got her this brainwashed to the point she doesn't care about anything but him

I'm from a small town in Canada and hoping to find some people who don't mind that I have a busy schedule and can't talk everyday. I work full time at a hospital and live alone so have housework to do on my time off. I do lack social interaction a lot bc I've been told I'm kind of weird lol so if you're the same, we'd get along great I think.
I spend a lot of time working on math (current subject) and science studies, learning about the economy and politics (I enjoy political quizzes to learn more about my stances), music discovery, and drinking alone lol. I wouldn't consider myself a gamer but I occasionally play minecraft, animal crossing, realm of the mad god, and old school runescape. I enjoy camping, fishing, and generally just spending time outdoors.
Based on my previous responses from my posts on here, I want to clarify that I'm not interested in anything sexual or romantic. I just want to find friends to shoot the shit with, joke around and have fun, interesting conversations with.
Some fun facts:
My favourite colour is pink
Im an INTJ-T
My favourite movie is american psycho
My favourite food is sushi
My favourite musicians are alex g, weezer, and drain gang
I have a dog named bladee lol