Order deadmau5 mask
Awarded… posthumously.
2020.09.21 02:24 FBAHobo Awarded… posthumously.
Nominees have made public declaration of their anti-mask, anti-vax, or Covid-hoax views, followed by admission to hospital for Covid. The Award is granted upon the nominee's release from their Earthly shackles
2014.07.11 16:41 Thinkalil Far East Mention Mannequins
Subreddit for everything concerning Japanese Duo - FEMM (FAR EAST MENTION MANNEQUINS).
2016.10.27 06:29 KingSteezie RuneScape 3 - IronScape Reddit
Home for all RS3 Ironmen and Ironwomen. Ask for advice, share your insights, and more!
2024.05.29 09:17 Witty-Razzmatazz-355 [Product Question]Just bought Megelin & Currentbody of red light mask. Acne off but scars on. Any Suggestion？
![[Product Question]Just bought Megelin & Currentbody of red light mask. Acne off but scars on. Any Suggestion？](https://b.thumbs.redditmedia.com/y2ZtAooCc7rPw8GwMaLkT7tCfdMa3LpSrD3yj2QwPFI.jpg "[Product Question]Just bought Megelin & Currentbody of red light mask. Acne off but scars on. Any Suggestion？") | I've been dealing with acne, and a friend suggested trying a red light mask. I first ordered one from CurrentBody, but it had some issues, so I returned it. And I got the Megelin mask, and I've been using it for a week. It’s helped with the acne, but I still have a lot of acne scars. Can anyone who’s used these masks tell me if I should follow up with blue light or red light for scars off? submitted by Witty-Razzmatazz-355 to redlighttherapy [link] [comments] https://preview.redd.it/w94jc25bgb3d1.jpg?width=1280&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ff8fa20ad558ace514ebcc026a118fea181c5aab https://preview.redd.it/ukt1925bgb3d1.jpg?width=1280&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5bf560999396004ae17f32e4458db3ea78215edf https://preview.redd.it/pz6vt3jcgb3d1.jpg?width=1179&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=6a2b927cf7e45aee9bca18bdaf5db159eea4a856 |
2024.05.29 09:11 carrot-parent H: Weenie Wagon W: to build it at your camp for free! Or come do my scavenger hunt and win my extra plan for free!!
Mission One: Finding Richie’s beloved balls!
Difficulty? Very Easy/Easy
How many? 8 sports balls of various sizes
Reward? 250 caps to the first 20 people to find them all
Mission Two: Crocolossus wandered into and lost himself in the Pleasure Dome, and now he needs to be rescued! (NSFW and 18+ only)
Where? Vault Lobby Shelter
Difficulty? Easy/Medium
How Many? Just 1
Reward? 250 caps to first 20 people to find him
Mission Three: Finding the forgotten Easter Eggs!
Difficulty? Medium/Hard
How many? 7 + 1 in my Utility Shelter
Reward? First Place wins their choice of a Crazy Guy, Winter Man, Raven Mask, OR Weenie Wagon Plan + 250 Copper + 250 Nuclear Waste + 125 Oil + 25 of each flux
Second Place wins 125 Copper + 125 Nuclear Waste + 75 Oil + 10 of each flux
Third Place wins 100 Copper + 100 Nuclear Waste + 50 Oil + 10 of each flux
Mission Four: Finding my Cold Deck of Cards
Difficulty: Hard/Very Hard
How Many? 5 Cards and 1 Poker Chip
Reward? First Place wins a Fiend Mask + 3000 Copper + 3000 Nuclear Waste + 1000 Oil + 250 of each flux
Second Place wins a Demon Mask + 1500 Copper + 1500 Nuclear Waste + 500 Oil + 100 of each flux
Third Place wins their choice of a CG, WM, OR RM + 500 Copper + 500 Nuclear Waste + 250 Oil + 50 of each flux
Requirements and Rules:
Solo only, or let me know you’re wanting to team up with someone and you guys can just split the rewards (for fairness towards other participants)
Missions 3 and/or 4 require a couple of different later game mechanics such as marsupial in order to be completed. This is not only a scavenger hunt, but a puzzle at times.
Junk may be substituted. Win and we can talk.
When you find an item, send a screenshot of it to me to confirm (am also curious as to see which are more difficult than others)
All missions are located in my camp unless stated otherwise
I’ll be on as long as people are playing!
My Psn is Shippeishiki, so send me a friend request and you can begin as soon as you would like! And good luck!
submitted by carrot-parent to Market76 [link] [comments]
Difficulty? Very Easy/Easy
How many? 8 sports balls of various sizes
Reward? 250 caps to the first 20 people to find them all
Mission Two: Crocolossus wandered into and lost himself in the Pleasure Dome, and now he needs to be rescued! (NSFW and 18+ only)
Where? Vault Lobby Shelter
Difficulty? Easy/Medium
How Many? Just 1
Reward? 250 caps to first 20 people to find him
Mission Three: Finding the forgotten Easter Eggs!
Difficulty? Medium/Hard
How many? 7 + 1 in my Utility Shelter
Reward? First Place wins their choice of a Crazy Guy, Winter Man, Raven Mask, OR Weenie Wagon Plan + 250 Copper + 250 Nuclear Waste + 125 Oil + 25 of each flux
Second Place wins 125 Copper + 125 Nuclear Waste + 75 Oil + 10 of each flux
Third Place wins 100 Copper + 100 Nuclear Waste + 50 Oil + 10 of each flux
Mission Four: Finding my Cold Deck of Cards
Difficulty: Hard/Very Hard
How Many? 5 Cards and 1 Poker Chip
Reward? First Place wins a Fiend Mask + 3000 Copper + 3000 Nuclear Waste + 1000 Oil + 250 of each flux
Second Place wins a Demon Mask + 1500 Copper + 1500 Nuclear Waste + 500 Oil + 100 of each flux
Third Place wins their choice of a CG, WM, OR RM + 500 Copper + 500 Nuclear Waste + 250 Oil + 50 of each flux
Requirements and Rules:
Solo only, or let me know you’re wanting to team up with someone and you guys can just split the rewards (for fairness towards other participants)
Missions 3 and/or 4 require a couple of different later game mechanics such as marsupial in order to be completed. This is not only a scavenger hunt, but a puzzle at times.
Junk may be substituted. Win and we can talk.
When you find an item, send a screenshot of it to me to confirm (am also curious as to see which are more difficult than others)
All missions are located in my camp unless stated otherwise
I’ll be on as long as people are playing!
My Psn is Shippeishiki, so send me a friend request and you can begin as soon as you would like! And good luck!
2024.05.29 08:48 moondreamer96 Golden order fundamentalism was Miquella's doing and what he learned during that period lead him to the realm of shadow
I believe Leyndell was a very different place before Miquella, his handiwork, trinkets,blessed armors and weapons made of unalloyed gold and phylosophy realy makes me think he was the one who brought(at least tried to) reason to a borderline barbaric religion, but ended up learning its true terrible nature. There are many signs of subtle rebelion or stretching the rules that might be his doing, The biggest one is the statue that may turn into Marika by performing law of regression, I highly doubt the sculptor hired just saw him turn into Marika from a window, I suspect Miquella told them about Radagon's true nature, and before that Radagon explained EVERYTHING to Miquella. Miquella growing the Haligtree and learning more and more about the nature of their world in order to heal Malenia looks like the most likely scenario, but its still hard to determine if Mohg kidnapping him was part of the plan or Mohg is just a weirdo.
Smaller possible changes brought by Miquella:
the perfumers, they use alchemy and herbs to heal, Miquella must have passed on many of his studies when he tried to at least make pain killers for Malenia or those inflicted by rot
Miquella's lilies being cultivated in the capitol, those lilies are both very valuable and religious symbols so its hard to determine why were they cultivated there, their pressence suggests that Miquella was loved by many and his lilies are considered truly sacred by anyone. St Trina's lilies are a bit more complex but I think the same is true for them, intresstingly they often grow in places where great tragedies happened. I suspect these lilies are the same as Malenia's flower buds, unleashing their magic makes flowers grow.
White masks, they are mercy killers, and strangely drawn to Mohg, its not that big of a stretch that at some point they were Miquella's followers or just respected him in some way. The allure of a swift death or eternal sleep kind of come from the same place
Possible reason on why Miquella could have went along with Mohg kidnapping him:
I don't think he was powerless or needed the protection of Malenia at any point, he accepted her dedication as her sign of love. When we enter Malenia is asleep, possibly an enchantment put on her by Miquella/St Trina. Once Miquella foound some sort of conclusion he might have reached out for Mohg who communed with the formless mother. The formless mother could be related to that massive pile of corpses from the trailer, or the true nature of erdtrees. Its important to mention that Miquella knew more than us, he saw the whole picture, this may be an unreasonable conclusion from our limited perspective, but huge masses of bloody flesh and corpses are being fed to erdtrees, they need human flesh and blood. This conclusion might be justified by Law of regression, Miquella going back to the source of everything, the source was rivers of blood and mountains of corpses. Receiving omen blood could be a way to exit the cycle, discard his golden flesh. I like to think Mohg is actually a good guy framed as a weirdo who likes his little brother way too much.
As a conclusion I'd say we can expect to meet a benevolent mastermind in Miquella who is a lot like Goldmask but actually speaks, neither are afraid to face dire truths about their world, like gods themselves being a "fly in the ointment", or look for the truth no matter how dark it is
submitted by moondreamer96 to Eldenring [link] [comments]
Smaller possible changes brought by Miquella:
the perfumers, they use alchemy and herbs to heal, Miquella must have passed on many of his studies when he tried to at least make pain killers for Malenia or those inflicted by rot
Miquella's lilies being cultivated in the capitol, those lilies are both very valuable and religious symbols so its hard to determine why were they cultivated there, their pressence suggests that Miquella was loved by many and his lilies are considered truly sacred by anyone. St Trina's lilies are a bit more complex but I think the same is true for them, intresstingly they often grow in places where great tragedies happened. I suspect these lilies are the same as Malenia's flower buds, unleashing their magic makes flowers grow.
White masks, they are mercy killers, and strangely drawn to Mohg, its not that big of a stretch that at some point they were Miquella's followers or just respected him in some way. The allure of a swift death or eternal sleep kind of come from the same place
Possible reason on why Miquella could have went along with Mohg kidnapping him:
I don't think he was powerless or needed the protection of Malenia at any point, he accepted her dedication as her sign of love. When we enter Malenia is asleep, possibly an enchantment put on her by Miquella/St Trina. Once Miquella foound some sort of conclusion he might have reached out for Mohg who communed with the formless mother. The formless mother could be related to that massive pile of corpses from the trailer, or the true nature of erdtrees. Its important to mention that Miquella knew more than us, he saw the whole picture, this may be an unreasonable conclusion from our limited perspective, but huge masses of bloody flesh and corpses are being fed to erdtrees, they need human flesh and blood. This conclusion might be justified by Law of regression, Miquella going back to the source of everything, the source was rivers of blood and mountains of corpses. Receiving omen blood could be a way to exit the cycle, discard his golden flesh. I like to think Mohg is actually a good guy framed as a weirdo who likes his little brother way too much.
As a conclusion I'd say we can expect to meet a benevolent mastermind in Miquella who is a lot like Goldmask but actually speaks, neither are afraid to face dire truths about their world, like gods themselves being a "fly in the ointment", or look for the truth no matter how dark it is
2024.05.29 08:32 MarvelousMaReesha Purchase New from Meta and received a clearly used one
Has anyone else experienced this? I have wanted an Oculus Quest 2 for sooo long. Finally got one ordered new from Meta with a warranty just to be safe and when I opened it it is very clearly used. Like dead skin smudges on the mask had to pull hair out of the foam like this hair was stuck in. There is brown gunk on the controllers and there wasn't any protective stickers to pull off like normal? This just seems ridiculous and curious if this is common? My husband is currently reaching out to Meta because we are definitely not happy.
submitted by MarvelousMaReesha to OculusQuest2 [link] [comments]
2024.05.29 07:35 wofchristian Journalism, Autism and hopelessness - a long and complicated question/rant
I am in dire need to speak to someone about what has been going through my head, but I have no one, so I'm posting this on Reddit. This is being cross posted on both aspergers and journalism to get insights from different perspectives.
Hello there, I am a 22 year old living in the USA. Over the last couple of weeks, a strong feeling of hopelessness has overtaken me regarding my future. In 2020, I went to community college immediately after high school to major in Meteorology. I shortly found out about how math intensive the major is, and being that I'm terrible at math, I changed to an undecided major. Talking with an career Councelor at the school, we found out that what I loved being in front of the camera. We zeroed in on Broadcast Journalism as a perfect career, so I changed my major to journalism. My comm college only offered a print journalism class, and at first I was worried that I would be terrible at writing articles, but I soon found out that was false. I ended up winning 6 awards in a state journalism competition, and started to enjoy what I was doing. Last week, I graduated from comm college, and am transferring to a four year college to get a bachelors in Broadcast Journalism.
All seemed so good until a few weeks ago when I began looking up more about this major. I am constantly seeing people saying not to get into it as news anchor jobs only pay $30K-$40k, have long and arduous hours, has a high turnover rate, and are extremely hard to get into.
I am also starting to believe that my autism will make it nearly impossible to me to get into the career. In my view, I feel like I am able to mask my autistic traits quite well. That is until I watch back videos of myself talking and realize just how bad I sound. And not to mention, the part I have struggled the most with in journalism is interviewing people. I get anxious very quickly when trying to come up with questions and responding in a way that makes it seem like I actually care. I've also gotten some real life experience, though it be basic, with being a host at my job. I frequently get odd stares from customers and afterwards I realize how awkward I was greeting them and such. I've tried my absolute best to improve on my social skills, but it is exhausting and I don't know if I would want to mask my autistic traits like that in order to be good in my career.
So now, I am regretting everything I've done over the last few years and what's to come. I think I'm going to try at least one semester, but after that I don't know what to do. I don't want to waste money on a degree that I can't use. My dad was so ecastatic after I won those awards, and I know I would devastate him if I told him I don't want to do journalism anymore.
Let me make this clear; it's not that I don't want to do broadcast journalism, it's that I think I don't have the ability to. My autistic treated are just too strong. But what is making me the most hopeless is that I don't know what I'll do if I don't go into broadcast journalism. I have no other aspirations, and I don't feel like starting college all over again. I worry that I'll never be able to make a living, and I'll be stuck with my parents my whole life. Most of my former classmates from my autistic support classes have either dropped out, are working jobs that won't get you anywhere, or haven't held a job in a while. It's a miracle that I have my job at the restaurant; it took me three years to even get it! The only reason I still have it is because my boss is also autistic. But it doesn't pay good, so it's not a job for a life time. I am just so scared that I'm about to end up like all of my former classmates.
So I am just asking for some advice. Any advice. I feel absolutely hopeless, and like I made a big mistake not realizing my abilities earlier on. Please help.
submitted by wofchristian to Journalism [link] [comments]
All seemed so good until a few weeks ago when I began looking up more about this major. I am constantly seeing people saying not to get into it as news anchor jobs only pay $30K-$40k, have long and arduous hours, has a high turnover rate, and are extremely hard to get into.
I am also starting to believe that my autism will make it nearly impossible to me to get into the career. In my view, I feel like I am able to mask my autistic traits quite well. That is until I watch back videos of myself talking and realize just how bad I sound. And not to mention, the part I have struggled the most with in journalism is interviewing people. I get anxious very quickly when trying to come up with questions and responding in a way that makes it seem like I actually care. I've also gotten some real life experience, though it be basic, with being a host at my job. I frequently get odd stares from customers and afterwards I realize how awkward I was greeting them and such. I've tried my absolute best to improve on my social skills, but it is exhausting and I don't know if I would want to mask my autistic traits like that in order to be good in my career.
So now, I am regretting everything I've done over the last few years and what's to come. I think I'm going to try at least one semester, but after that I don't know what to do. I don't want to waste money on a degree that I can't use. My dad was so ecastatic after I won those awards, and I know I would devastate him if I told him I don't want to do journalism anymore.
Let me make this clear; it's not that I don't want to do broadcast journalism, it's that I think I don't have the ability to. My autistic treated are just too strong. But what is making me the most hopeless is that I don't know what I'll do if I don't go into broadcast journalism. I have no other aspirations, and I don't feel like starting college all over again. I worry that I'll never be able to make a living, and I'll be stuck with my parents my whole life. Most of my former classmates from my autistic support classes have either dropped out, are working jobs that won't get you anywhere, or haven't held a job in a while. It's a miracle that I have my job at the restaurant; it took me three years to even get it! The only reason I still have it is because my boss is also autistic. But it doesn't pay good, so it's not a job for a life time. I am just so scared that I'm about to end up like all of my former classmates.
So I am just asking for some advice. Any advice. I feel absolutely hopeless, and like I made a big mistake not realizing my abilities earlier on. Please help.
2024.05.29 07:30 wofchristian Autism, Journalism and hopelessness - a long and complicated question/rant
I am in dire need to speak to someone about what has been going through my head, but I have no one, so I'm posting this on Reddit. This is being cross posted on both aspergers and journalism to get insights from different perspectives.
Hello there, I am a 22 year old living in the USA. Over the last couple of weeks, a strong feeling of hopelessness has overtaken me regarding my future. In 2020, I went to community college immediately after high school to major in Meteorology. I shortly found out about how math intensive the major is, and being that I'm terrible at math, I changed to an undecided major. Talking with an career Councelor at the school, we found out that what I loved being in front of the camera. We zeroed in on Broadcast Journalism as a perfect career, so I changed my major to journalism. My comm college only offered a print journalism class, and at first I was worried that I would be terrible at writing articles, but I soon found out that was false. I ended up winning 6 awards in a state journalism competition, and started to enjoy what I was doing. Last week, I graduated from comm college, and am transferring to a four year college to get a bachelors in Broadcast Journalism.
All seemed so good until a few weeks ago when I began looking up more about this major. I am constantly seeing people saying not to get into it as news anchor jobs only pay $30K-$40k, have long and arduous hours, has a high turnover rate, and are extremely hard to get into.
I am also starting to believe that my autism will make it nearly impossible to me to get into the career. In my view, I feel like I am able to mask my autistic traits quite well. That is until I watch back videos of myself talking and realize just how bad I sound. And not to mention, the part I have struggled the most with in journalism is interviewing people. I get anxious very quickly when trying to come up with questions and responding in a way that makes it seem like I actually care. I've also gotten some real life experience, though it be basic, with being a host at my job. I frequently get odd stares from customers and afterwards I realize how awkward I was greeting them and such. I've tried my absolute best to improve on my social skills, but it is exhausting and I don't know if I would want to mask my autistic traits like that in order to be good in my career.
So now, I am regretting everything I've done over the last few years and what's to come. I think I'm going to try at least one semester, but after that I don't know what to do. I don't want to waste money on a degree that I can't use. My dad was so ecastatic after I won those awards, and I know I would devastate him if I told him I don't want to do journalism anymore.
Let me make this clear; it's not that I don't want to do broadcast journalism, it's that I think I don't have the ability to. My autistic treated are just too strong. But what is making me the most hopeless is that I don't know what I'll do if I don't go into broadcast journalism. I have no other aspirations, and I don't feel like starting college all over again. I worry that I'll never be able to make a living, and I'll be stuck with my parents my whole life. Most of my former classmates from my autistic support classes have either dropped out, are working jobs that won't get you anywhere, or haven't held a job in a while. It's a miracle that I have my job at the restaurant; it took me three years to even get it! The only reason I still have it is because my boss is also autistic. But it doesn't pay good, so it's not a job for a life time. I am just so scared that I'm about to end up like all of my former classmates.
So I am just asking for some advice. Any advice. I feel absolutely hopeless, and like I made a big mistake not realizing my abilities earlier on. Please help.
submitted by wofchristian to aspergers [link] [comments]
All seemed so good until a few weeks ago when I began looking up more about this major. I am constantly seeing people saying not to get into it as news anchor jobs only pay $30K-$40k, have long and arduous hours, has a high turnover rate, and are extremely hard to get into.
I am also starting to believe that my autism will make it nearly impossible to me to get into the career. In my view, I feel like I am able to mask my autistic traits quite well. That is until I watch back videos of myself talking and realize just how bad I sound. And not to mention, the part I have struggled the most with in journalism is interviewing people. I get anxious very quickly when trying to come up with questions and responding in a way that makes it seem like I actually care. I've also gotten some real life experience, though it be basic, with being a host at my job. I frequently get odd stares from customers and afterwards I realize how awkward I was greeting them and such. I've tried my absolute best to improve on my social skills, but it is exhausting and I don't know if I would want to mask my autistic traits like that in order to be good in my career.
So now, I am regretting everything I've done over the last few years and what's to come. I think I'm going to try at least one semester, but after that I don't know what to do. I don't want to waste money on a degree that I can't use. My dad was so ecastatic after I won those awards, and I know I would devastate him if I told him I don't want to do journalism anymore.
Let me make this clear; it's not that I don't want to do broadcast journalism, it's that I think I don't have the ability to. My autistic treated are just too strong. But what is making me the most hopeless is that I don't know what I'll do if I don't go into broadcast journalism. I have no other aspirations, and I don't feel like starting college all over again. I worry that I'll never be able to make a living, and I'll be stuck with my parents my whole life. Most of my former classmates from my autistic support classes have either dropped out, are working jobs that won't get you anywhere, or haven't held a job in a while. It's a miracle that I have my job at the restaurant; it took me three years to even get it! The only reason I still have it is because my boss is also autistic. But it doesn't pay good, so it's not a job for a life time. I am just so scared that I'm about to end up like all of my former classmates.
So I am just asking for some advice. Any advice. I feel absolutely hopeless, and like I made a big mistake not realizing my abilities earlier on. Please help.
2024.05.29 06:47 featherwinglove Tightniks Run Two: ...where the concept of *furnaces doesn't exist...
[Let me know if a chapter a week is okay; I'm thinking it might be a bit too often. Run Zero: https://redd.it/1csb71x Run One: https://redd.it/1cwxbsg]
The mining foreman refused to go to sleep, and watched intently as Tightniks finally reached over and set it home with one hand. Its last nervous little sigh was the only thing he remembered-
The ship is without power, and Tightniks can't run the radar much without draining the batteries...
32s: First trap.
He built it big this time, and there are six trimps in there. They look familiar somehow, the light one with dark hair and an unusually short and broad tail compared to the rest, a big-eared green one, a grey one, a yellow one, and a red one with big paws and "XIII" on its rump, and a brown one with pink ears that takes the lead and cheers, "Kakka!" Once he lets them out, they all follow him intently around like just-hatched birds do their mother. He shows them the busted off cockpit and forward cabin of the ship he just crashed and they get inside and start da- ...nope, sticking with "dancing". He busies himself looking for the survival pad.
Until he hears the squeak of a baby trimp. They're feeding it- ...rocks. Carefully selected, aluminate rocks. What the heck are they doing? Whatever, I've got to get some conventional food for- What's that? He's got the survival pad already, but this was outside the ship, it must have materialized when he descended through that glowing grey mist getting out. He gets it flipped over and turned on.
"Manual portal activation 2 successful:" it displays, "rare shield equipped 54%Stg 14%Atk MT 0 Nu loaded / 399 He loaded / Metal challenge active / Total portal activation 956"
Metal challenge? The human selects it.
"You have the Metal challenge active. Tweak the portal to bring you to an alternate reality, where the concept of Miners does not exist, to force yourself to become frugal with equipment crafting strategies. If you complete The Dimension Of Anger without disabling the challenge, miners will re-unlock."
He's so confused, What the Loy is a Dimension of Anger? I think I have a headache from this high gravity. Sits down for a moment.
Notices that one of the trimps is sleeping in a small deep hole just at the edge of the garden, apparently to have a nap in standing upright.
I don't believe you, "portal". I'm training that one first chance I get!
56s: Pop full.
There are ten of them already?? I'm still working this derpy little potato patch to get enough food to bulk up just ONE of the- He looks at the portal pad and blurts out loud, "Fifty-six SECONDS??" He postulates that he's in a time-dilated environment, and that the portal is measuring time somewhere "out there", this "map frame" environment. It's like those Star Trek episodes he can't remember "Wink of an Eye" and "Blink of an Eye" that he can't quite remember. [One of them is Star Trek TOS, and one of them is Star Trek: Voyager and I forget which one came from where.]
1m57s: Arable in Z1c13.
The human walks along and one of the trimps viciously fights the various hostiles that try to come at him, staying ahead. Just behind, he finds that hole-digger busted into a cave big enough for 9 of them, and they start raising babies to fill it up.
3m37s: Miners in Z1c30.
It's broken! he notices of the data card he just picked up. It's one of the ones that flew out of the ship when he undogged the ship's side hatch, but it didn't survive. What was on it? He's got a vague memory of a big tanuki-tailed trimp, much bigger than the- Wait! This memory is of hole-digger all grown up. So this is- he looks at the smashed data card in his hand, ...this is the Miners card. At least there's some lying about so we're not totally deprived of metal.
That's odd. I'm sure I spent longer training this little guy than "one second map frame." The human looks at the black trimp with the grey head fur and silvery eyes, "So, can you say something yet?"
"Shijou." [Takane and Takanya are not black, it is their favorite clothing color.]
"Okay, can you say something else?"
9m12s: Zone 1, 40 pop, 3.5s RC with Z0/1, 13m19s turkimp. 12m55s: First scientist.
"Tai," his first scientist waves at him.
"Hmm," the human tries to think of a better test, "What color is the sky?"
"Shijou." The exasperated human is about to sigh in despair when he notices a card in its hands, with one word on it, "Blue."
"What?" he takes it, "You can't speak but you can write, huh?"
"Shijou," it twirls its paw off the end of the card in his hand. The human turns it over, and in small writing, it has "Technically, the sky isn't blue, it's a foible of Rayleigh scattering in an oxygen/nitrogen atmosphere. And you have 'TIGHTNIKS' embroidered on the left side of your uniform."
A look of astonishment sweeps over the human. I never taught it about Rayleigh scattering. Apparently, the scientist training has unlocked its brain to access the collected knowledge of a previous life! Then he looks at his uniform and groans, spanking his eyebrows in realization. The trimp had apparently noticed him wandering around the camp wracking his brain and talking to himself trying to remember his own name, and it's right there the whole time! He spanks his eyebrows again.
The very well fed grey-headed trimp starts doing experiments, leaving him to take the turkimp back to his farmers. Too bad it's only a quarter as fast at it as he is.
32m25s: Zone 3, 79 pop, 4.5s RC with Z1/2; c16, 79 pop, 6.8s RC with Z2/3.
"Nano! Nano, nano, nano." The D&B (that's dodge and block) foreman has an impressive yellow mane, light face, green body, and brown hind limbs, and moves like a blur when it decides to. When asleep, it's as unarousable as an exhumed fossil, except with the food article Yellow the scientist calls an "owny geary". [Puchim@s Afuu]
Helping it out is a brown-maned white trenching expert Tightniks finds oddly familiar. It has no problem mining, but couldn't start a fire if its life depended on it, so smelting is out of the question.
I guess that's how the Metal challenge really works. Too bad I suck at it. Tightniks is spending all his smelting time smacking out nails and joist hangers for the houses, and has nothing left for fighting gear.
1h53m25s: Zone 9, 306 pop, 7.9s RC with Z8/15, no turkimp.
The white trimp with the brown head fur- ...whichever one it is because it, or one that looks just like it, sometimes (apparently) burns itself up or blows itself up trying to build a metallurgical furnace. This one is digging a hole right now, into the concrete of some ruined building's foundation. It hits some strapping and rebar, makes a happy sound, follows it along and gets it sorta clear of the concrete bonded to it, and rips it out of the ground to throw on the metal pile. It now seems content to do that instead of trying to smelt ores.
"Red?" Tightniks glances at one of his scientists, "Do you think we could take it to- What's that place you said you visited five hundred years after some misty fight or-"
"Cloudy strife," it says, "Yeah, Midgimp is like that, we could probably map a route through there. Lots of metal. Especially the part that had an avalanche happen and fell down. Broke all that stuff out of the ground already." [Final Fantasy VII and Advent Children cinematic and Sector 7 collapse.]
"Okay," Tightniks says, "Let's do that."
5h32m02s: Zone 21, 2042 pop, 14.9s RC with Z20/232, no turkimp.
"Ooooookay," Tightniks growls, "There is something off about this thing."
"Shijou?" the grey one looks at the yellow one with concern about their human starship pilot friend.
The human stoops, picks up the little green gem on the ridge between Zone 20 and 21, looks at it, huffs, and asks, "Any idea where this comes from?"
"Err..." the red one seems hesitant to say, "I think you made it."
"Really?" the human huffs, "How could that be?" Then he tosses it at Red, "See if anything reacts to it. It might be radioactive, so we should take turns to minimize exposure."
"Really?" Red's holding it now, "What makes you say that?"
"Because I'm pissed off for no reason I can figure out," the human says, "I think it's coming from-" he gasps, "Waitamint!" He starts searching for the portal pad.
"Frags," the red one says quickly, "I think it's arranging a route. You're good with maps," it tosses the gem to the grey scientist.
The human has his portal pad up and reads aloud, "You have the Metal challenge active. Tweak the portal to- yada yada yada. Tiss tiss t- complete The Dimension Of Anger without disabling- miners will re-unlock."
\BOOM\** They turn to see (another of) the white brown-haired trimp'/s' attempts at a metallurgical furnace explode, and it seems both very frustrated and has really hurt its toe.
He snaps his fingers, "That's gotta be it. Although, does it mean 'miners' or 'furnaces'?" He re-reads the portal pad while the scientists shrug.
"Shijou," the grey one has just finished tracing the route map the gem was showing.
"Are we going any faster than on previous cycles, you think?" he asks Red.
"What's a cycle?" Red asks.
"We're stuck in time loop, you realize?" the human says.
"Well," the yellow one jumps off a little rock spire it was using to see farther ahead, directly into a seated position on the ground with an impressive thump the human can both hear with his ears and feel through the ground of the more-than-Earth gravity planet, "that explains a few things." The little scientist trimp seems quite morose at the news.
"This thing says the fastest we've ever got this 'anger' map done is ten hours, thirty-five, but the clock right now is at five hours, thirty-four." Tightniks tilts his head, frowns one eyebrow, and taps, "Getting it done faster increases attack damage somehow, and oh-"
"What now?" the yellow one asks, still seated beside the spire.
"It says we already got a 2.5%-er for having a million traps," the human says, "I don't remember doing that. Maybe..." he sighs, "Maybe that's a good thing, 'cus I'd probably go insane building them all. Still though, it says we're going faster, but it doesn't feel like it."
"How'd you know how it feels," Red asks, "if you don't remember it?"
"'Day jaw voo' I think is the term," the human says, "or something. The sense that all this has happened before, but I'm not quite remembering and there's no physical evidence of it."
"Shijooooooooooo..." the grey one moans, waving a card at him. On it:
"In order, but we don't know if that means chronological order or frequency/proportion of memories:
"- The ship crashes (pretty sure that happens every time) "- The human builds huts "- The human teaches some trimps to speak and do science "- The human builds houses "- The human makes maps "- The human builds mansions "- The human blows up and gets himself killed somewhere around Z17 to Z21, often on a dragimp "- The human only recently/occasionally builds hotels "- The human only recently/rarely tamed a dragimp "- The human only recently/rarely mapped the Dimension of Anger"
Tightniks sits down and offers it back.
"Tai," it flatly refuses to take it back, paws up and eyes closed.
"It's kind of a relief," Tightniks rubs his temples, then looks at it again, "knowing it ain't just me."
6h17m43s: Portal PB, 1% AP for sub-8h, 45 He, 7.149 He/hr, 2209 pop, 13.6s RC.
The last head of the map's boss monster goes limp as one of the fighting trimps' dagger points goes into it, and the huge thing settles on its tail, resting on the package that seems to be the prize of this map. And there's a popping sound, and then something mechanical.
Is that a scroll compressor? Tightniks looks at the package. The deflating monster's lifting envelope material drapes over everything underneath it. "Yellow, Shijou!" he snaps and points, "roll up that side of it. Keep this part from sucking down on the extractor nozzle!"
All ten of the scientists jump in, literally, pushing the gas in the bag towards the compressor. Tightniks as well, rolling up the front.
Until he kicks, and nearly trips over, a smaller package that might be the explanation for the reason why the center of the monster's defense seemed to be a little away from the big package he could see. It's in the right place, he realizes. He gets it uncovered and reads stenciled-and-sprayed block letters on it:
"DT TIME PORTAL / THIS SIDE DOWN"
Perhaps the Dimension of Anger is so named because of the rage suddenly rising up in Tightniks' throat. It isn't so much as the free-floating aggression suddenly has an answer, there is definitely a fresh batch of rage and anger as he grips the nearest Dagger V, Mark 2 with both hands-
Refocusing on surviving the next few seconds, the pilot turns on the radar for the final approach and takes a last look around, then straight ahead at his forward camera and primary flight display...
He crouches, sets the dagger down gently, then starts clearing the debris from the box's grab iron. He tries to lift it- Damn, this is heavy! As he gets it turned over, gravity finishes the job, and it shakes the ground with an impressive thud as it falls right side up.
"DT TIME PORTAL / THIS SIDE UP" There's a square cutout in the middle of one side of it, with a sliding cover at the bottom of it.
"Get the pad!" he screams, seeing that his scientists are almost done rolling up the megablimp.
The grey one already has the survival data pad and offers it to him.
"The big one," Tightniks clarifies, "The big one." he picks up wide flat rainbow cable and its edge socket in one hand, "It goes here," he points at it with the other. "It must have come with me-" He had taken the small survival data pad and notices something, "Oh?" He starts looking around, "Hey!"
The white trimp with the brown hair is napping in a hole next to the smouldering remains of its latest attempt at a smelting furnace.
"Hey, mining buddy!" he whistles at it, "Mining buddy!"
It wakes with a start and rushes over, but doesn't seem to be in a good mood. But as soon as Tightnik shows it the survival pad, with all of the mining data installed just as if all those broken data cards and scorched scrolls were intact when he found them, fireworks goes off in the little trimp's eyes and it rushes off with the pad. Within minutes, the first furnace that works is chugging away at some ore and it returns to give the survival data pad back to Tightniks.
7h24m49s: Fresh turkimp; 7h25m30s: Labor reallocated.
The big-eared green lumber foreman's mood fell much further than the mining foreman's mood was before Tightniks packed up the turkimp roaster and moved just about everyone over to the smeltery.
The brown-haired, big-tailed white mining foreman was surprised at the change, and very happy. It had climbed up onto the helium compressor cart to check something on the pad a couple cells into the zone.
"Are you upset with me?" the red one asks the human.
"No, not at all," Tightniks says, "Are you getting the feeling that we had an upset at this point last cycle?"
"How would you know it was only the last?" Yellow asks, "Your memory's no better than ours."
"Right," the human sews another patch into his uniform, "However, I've only actually hit the switch on the portal twice, the first one on a challenge called Discipline, and the second on a challenge called Metal, which we just finished. It's easy to sort out from the statistics. I'm nervous it'll get harder to sort out when we're up to, oh," done fixing his uniform, he pops a bit of turkimp into his mouth and chews a couple times, "a few dozen or hundred manual cycles."
"Friggin' solve this faster than that, please," Red grumbles, "I know the emergency counter got to nearly a thousand, but..." he kinda trails off. Finally, he says, "I think we're remembering more cycle to cycle as we get more helium into it. I mean, I'm glad that isn't the only mechanic."
"Can't miss the supernova if it is," the human ponders.
"What?" Yellow chuckles.
"I'm remembering something from before all this, I think it was called a video game, where you'd go forward real-world in the simulation of a time loop, and your real-life head remembering what you did on previous cycles was the only mechanic," the human takes another bite, then dons his uniform shirt while chewing it. After his head pops out of the not-so-crisp-and-fresh uniform neck hole, buttons still done up, he finishes, "one of them had a supernova." [That would be Outer Wilds among the bunch of games with this mechanic, er, Minnit (I know it's spelled differently than "minute"), 12 Minutes, The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, and- ...I'm sure there are more.]
11h19m28s: Starting void 1 (L30).
With the thermal gloves on, Tightniks gets the void map into the portal device slot. It dematerializes and his fingers close where it used to be in his hands, then he yelps, stands up and starts dancing, "Oh crap, it's cold!" He quickly starts looking for stuff to bundle up. Once not too uncomfortable, he notices something, "You're having trouble, too?"
"No," Yellow and Red look at each other, "Well, not with the cold; this route has a poisonous atmosphere, slows down our young assimilating aluminum at the proper rate."
"Manning the traps will work at full speed, right?" Tightniks says.
"Should if your fingers can handle it," Red confirms.
11h33m57s: Void 1c100.
"You are one ugly muthaf[garble]!" he says when he sees the void boss, "Stay here, I'll be back." Runs some traps, grabs a couple helmets for the fresh volunteers, "Put these on."
"Shijou?" the grey one looks at the red one, really rather perplexed.
"I agree, that's not his usual accent," Red tilts his head, "Tightniks, what has gotten in to you?"
"Stop cheering me up," the human grumbles, "You think this is the real Quaid?"
"I think the cold is affecting him more than he realizes," Yellow offers.
"Phased plasma rifle in the forty watt range," but what the dizzy pilot actually throws at the zone boss is a Mace V-4, "and then I was thinking of breaking your neck."
[Felt like some- "Arnie? Well, the union is pulling out all the big guns today, huh?" (Tom Hanks as Sully) ...no, brain, Arnold Schwarzenegger, not Arnie Gentile (it was really funny to background Sully and listen to that line instead of "That's definitely you" in Terminator 2 while he's posing with the Minigun.) Arnie lines from Predator, Terminator 2, True Lies, Total Recall and The Terminator.]
"Tweak the portal," reads Tightniks from the portal controller aloud, but quietly, "to bring you to an alternate reality, where Trimps are bigger and stronger, to force yourself to figure out a way to build larger housing. Your Trimps will gather 50% more resources, but your housing will fit 50% fewer Trimps. If you complete The Dimension of Anger without disabling the challenge, your stats will return to normal."
"You will also open a new memory coolant unit," Yellow reads, "You think that'll cause a housing bonus?"
"Shijou," the grey one hands him a card saying "We have enough for another gateway."
"Oh, good," Tightniks hands it back after signing it, "Yes, build it."
"We're doing that next?" Yellow asks.
Tightniks sees the little fellow sitting on top of a mound that the human thought was a bowel movement pile from Draglimp, but it must be something more geological if trimps can climb it, let alone want to. "Yeah, I guess," the human answers, "It kinda scares me, I mean I'm going back, but what happens to you guys?"
"We have too much day javo or whatever you called it," Red says. He's usually on all fours, shakes his left hind leg as though something got stuck to his foot, "This isn't incrementing, I'm sure. 13 is less than 956."
"According to this, you'll be twice as big," Tightniks sets down the portal controller pad and stands up from the cart, "It's hard to imagine, especially for Shijou and Diggy. We'll clear thirty-six, that's it."
14h04m37s: Z33c95, IC.
"Are you sure we can make Zone 37 start?" the red one asks.
The yellow one is standing on Red's shoulders.
"It said we did last time," Tightniks taps on the crude leather bag strapped to his back, the portal pad inside it, "though maybe..." he tilts his head, rolls whatever he was sucking on in his mouth for a moment, "it just happened while I was building those traps. No, I'm sticking with that plan."
"If it's going to take that long," Red grinds its jaws sideways for a moment and lets its eyelids get lazy, frustration clear in its tone, "why do it again?"
"Because I've got a bad feeling about this 'Size' thing," Tightniks says, "it drops our resourcing by 75% assuming we build the same amount of housing as before, which we won't because of the reduced resourcing. We needed 65 capacity in the cabin and huts before we could do run the gypsum/paper wall machine we found. I have a funny feeling that never changes."
"We don't need 65 trimps to run it," Yellow says, "just three."
"Yeah," Tightniks says, "but a particular three that know what they're doing, and my day javoo is telling me the last of those is always the sixty-fifth."
"Shijou," the grey one moans from the other side of Tightniks. Didn't have a note this time, just kicking a little rock along as it walks.
"It thinks you're right," the red one growls forlornly, "Hating to say it, but I do too."
14h16m06s: Skel in c1, 50 bones purchased whipimp.
There's a thump at the cart, and then some commotion around it that's noticable enough for Tightniks to come over and take a look. The bone box is empty, all forty-nine titanium bones in it are gone. Tightiks brings his right hand up in front of him, and it's just a balled fist, the bone he was holding a moment ago is gone. As he starts looking for where he must have dropped it, he realizes maybe it's all related. Looking in the bottom of the empty bone box, he finds a note.
"I got you the whipimp. This new Bad Guy will begin spawning in your next zone at an average of 3 spawns per 100 enemies. I hope it helps, but I can't tell yet."
The note is in Tightniks' own handwriting, although lazy but with more consistent kerning. Is this from an older version of myself? Friggin' time travel.
14h18m48s: This L34 moun 160/27/79 calls itself "Magical Mountain" - I can't remember whether the Disney trademark is that or "Magic Mountain" ...I've seen a "Black Mesa" before, that's a Half-Life thing, and somebody on Reddit made pretend that "Dank Hill" was a King of the Hill thing (which is actually *Hank Hill, I think - it's hard to remember, it wasn't very good and I haven't watched it since the 1990s.)
19h32m00s: Doom/AT, 12816 pop, 80N, 37.7s RC with Z34/5298.
"Okay, we got that friggin' thing chocked," Yellow wipes its brow and almost bonks itself with the Mace VI-2 that it's holding, puts it down and makes sure the wedges are secure.
Grey, Red, and Green are packing more stuff around the huge boulder that chased them down a tunnel to make sure it doesn't do that again.
"Getting any day javoo?" Tightniks pants, hands on his knees, but apparently uninjured, or nearly so.
"Not at all," Yellow vehemently responds, slashing the air with its paw, "You?"
"Oh," Tightniks gets his breathing under control, "I think it was a human movie."
"Like a video on that pad?" it gestures at the human's pocket with the small one.
"No, a bigger screen," the human says.
"Fifty-five inches?" the trimp scientist chuckles.
"More like fifty-five feet," the human rubs the sweat out of his eyes, "Lots of people watching. It was called a sin."
"Ah," the trimp ponders, "Like a crime, vice, psychopathy or bad habit?"
"Er..." the human taps his forehead trying to remember, "Sorry, a cinema."
[The whole thing is obviously an homage to something I remember only slightly better than Tightniks, I think it was Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. As I'm posting this, I sadly realize that Nick Rekieta's arrest was between when I wrote this and now.]
19h58m55s: Zone 37, 473 He, 23.67 He/hr, 13088 pop, 81N, 32.1s RC with Z34/5298, 2806 pop short, no turkimp.
The ship is without power, and Tightniks can't run the radar much without draining the batteries...
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The mining foreman refused to go to sleep, and watched intently as Tightniks finally reached over and set it home with one hand. Its last nervous little sigh was the only thing he remembered-
The ship is without power, and Tightniks can't run the radar much without draining the batteries...
32s: First trap.
He built it big this time, and there are six trimps in there. They look familiar somehow, the light one with dark hair and an unusually short and broad tail compared to the rest, a big-eared green one, a grey one, a yellow one, and a red one with big paws and "XIII" on its rump, and a brown one with pink ears that takes the lead and cheers, "Kakka!" Once he lets them out, they all follow him intently around like just-hatched birds do their mother. He shows them the busted off cockpit and forward cabin of the ship he just crashed and they get inside and start da- ...nope, sticking with "dancing". He busies himself looking for the survival pad.
Until he hears the squeak of a baby trimp. They're feeding it- ...rocks. Carefully selected, aluminate rocks. What the heck are they doing? Whatever, I've got to get some conventional food for- What's that? He's got the survival pad already, but this was outside the ship, it must have materialized when he descended through that glowing grey mist getting out. He gets it flipped over and turned on.
"Manual portal activation 2 successful:" it displays, "rare shield equipped 54%Stg 14%Atk MT 0 Nu loaded / 399 He loaded / Metal challenge active / Total portal activation 956"
Metal challenge? The human selects it.
"You have the Metal challenge active. Tweak the portal to bring you to an alternate reality, where the concept of Miners does not exist, to force yourself to become frugal with equipment crafting strategies. If you complete The Dimension Of Anger without disabling the challenge, miners will re-unlock."
He's so confused, What the Loy is a Dimension of Anger? I think I have a headache from this high gravity. Sits down for a moment.
Notices that one of the trimps is sleeping in a small deep hole just at the edge of the garden, apparently to have a nap in standing upright.
I don't believe you, "portal". I'm training that one first chance I get!
56s: Pop full.
There are ten of them already?? I'm still working this derpy little potato patch to get enough food to bulk up just ONE of the- He looks at the portal pad and blurts out loud, "Fifty-six SECONDS??" He postulates that he's in a time-dilated environment, and that the portal is measuring time somewhere "out there", this "map frame" environment. It's like those Star Trek episodes he can't remember "Wink of an Eye" and "Blink of an Eye" that he can't quite remember. [One of them is Star Trek TOS, and one of them is Star Trek: Voyager and I forget which one came from where.]
1m57s: Arable in Z1c13.
The human walks along and one of the trimps viciously fights the various hostiles that try to come at him, staying ahead. Just behind, he finds that hole-digger busted into a cave big enough for 9 of them, and they start raising babies to fill it up.
3m37s: Miners in Z1c30.
It's broken! he notices of the data card he just picked up. It's one of the ones that flew out of the ship when he undogged the ship's side hatch, but it didn't survive. What was on it? He's got a vague memory of a big tanuki-tailed trimp, much bigger than the- Wait! This memory is of hole-digger all grown up. So this is- he looks at the smashed data card in his hand, ...this is the Miners card. At least there's some lying about so we're not totally deprived of metal.
That's odd. I'm sure I spent longer training this little guy than "one second map frame." The human looks at the black trimp with the grey head fur and silvery eyes, "So, can you say something yet?"
"Shijou." [Takane and Takanya are not black, it is their favorite clothing color.]
"Okay, can you say something else?"
9m12s: Zone 1, 40 pop, 3.5s RC with Z0/1, 13m19s turkimp. 12m55s: First scientist.
"Tai," his first scientist waves at him.
"Hmm," the human tries to think of a better test, "What color is the sky?"
"Shijou." The exasperated human is about to sigh in despair when he notices a card in its hands, with one word on it, "Blue."
"What?" he takes it, "You can't speak but you can write, huh?"
"Shijou," it twirls its paw off the end of the card in his hand. The human turns it over, and in small writing, it has "Technically, the sky isn't blue, it's a foible of Rayleigh scattering in an oxygen/nitrogen atmosphere. And you have 'TIGHTNIKS' embroidered on the left side of your uniform."
A look of astonishment sweeps over the human. I never taught it about Rayleigh scattering. Apparently, the scientist training has unlocked its brain to access the collected knowledge of a previous life! Then he looks at his uniform and groans, spanking his eyebrows in realization. The trimp had apparently noticed him wandering around the camp wracking his brain and talking to himself trying to remember his own name, and it's right there the whole time! He spanks his eyebrows again.
The very well fed grey-headed trimp starts doing experiments, leaving him to take the turkimp back to his farmers. Too bad it's only a quarter as fast at it as he is.
32m25s: Zone 3, 79 pop, 4.5s RC with Z1/2; c16, 79 pop, 6.8s RC with Z2/3.
"Nano! Nano, nano, nano." The D&B (that's dodge and block) foreman has an impressive yellow mane, light face, green body, and brown hind limbs, and moves like a blur when it decides to. When asleep, it's as unarousable as an exhumed fossil, except with the food article Yellow the scientist calls an "owny geary". [Puchim@s Afuu]
Helping it out is a brown-maned white trenching expert Tightniks finds oddly familiar. It has no problem mining, but couldn't start a fire if its life depended on it, so smelting is out of the question.
I guess that's how the Metal challenge really works. Too bad I suck at it. Tightniks is spending all his smelting time smacking out nails and joist hangers for the houses, and has nothing left for fighting gear.
1h53m25s: Zone 9, 306 pop, 7.9s RC with Z8/15, no turkimp.
The white trimp with the brown head fur- ...whichever one it is because it, or one that looks just like it, sometimes (apparently) burns itself up or blows itself up trying to build a metallurgical furnace. This one is digging a hole right now, into the concrete of some ruined building's foundation. It hits some strapping and rebar, makes a happy sound, follows it along and gets it sorta clear of the concrete bonded to it, and rips it out of the ground to throw on the metal pile. It now seems content to do that instead of trying to smelt ores.
"Red?" Tightniks glances at one of his scientists, "Do you think we could take it to- What's that place you said you visited five hundred years after some misty fight or-"
"Cloudy strife," it says, "Yeah, Midgimp is like that, we could probably map a route through there. Lots of metal. Especially the part that had an avalanche happen and fell down. Broke all that stuff out of the ground already." [Final Fantasy VII and Advent Children cinematic and Sector 7 collapse.]
"Okay," Tightniks says, "Let's do that."
5h32m02s: Zone 21, 2042 pop, 14.9s RC with Z20/232, no turkimp.
"Ooooookay," Tightniks growls, "There is something off about this thing."
"Shijou?" the grey one looks at the yellow one with concern about their human starship pilot friend.
The human stoops, picks up the little green gem on the ridge between Zone 20 and 21, looks at it, huffs, and asks, "Any idea where this comes from?"
"Err..." the red one seems hesitant to say, "I think you made it."
"Really?" the human huffs, "How could that be?" Then he tosses it at Red, "See if anything reacts to it. It might be radioactive, so we should take turns to minimize exposure."
"Really?" Red's holding it now, "What makes you say that?"
"Because I'm pissed off for no reason I can figure out," the human says, "I think it's coming from-" he gasps, "Waitamint!" He starts searching for the portal pad.
"Frags," the red one says quickly, "I think it's arranging a route. You're good with maps," it tosses the gem to the grey scientist.
The human has his portal pad up and reads aloud, "You have the Metal challenge active. Tweak the portal to- yada yada yada. Tiss tiss t- complete The Dimension Of Anger without disabling- miners will re-unlock."
\BOOM\** They turn to see (another of) the white brown-haired trimp'/s' attempts at a metallurgical furnace explode, and it seems both very frustrated and has really hurt its toe.
He snaps his fingers, "That's gotta be it. Although, does it mean 'miners' or 'furnaces'?" He re-reads the portal pad while the scientists shrug.
"Shijou," the grey one has just finished tracing the route map the gem was showing.
"Are we going any faster than on previous cycles, you think?" he asks Red.
"What's a cycle?" Red asks.
"We're stuck in time loop, you realize?" the human says.
"Well," the yellow one jumps off a little rock spire it was using to see farther ahead, directly into a seated position on the ground with an impressive thump the human can both hear with his ears and feel through the ground of the more-than-Earth gravity planet, "that explains a few things." The little scientist trimp seems quite morose at the news.
"This thing says the fastest we've ever got this 'anger' map done is ten hours, thirty-five, but the clock right now is at five hours, thirty-four." Tightniks tilts his head, frowns one eyebrow, and taps, "Getting it done faster increases attack damage somehow, and oh-"
"What now?" the yellow one asks, still seated beside the spire.
"It says we already got a 2.5%-er for having a million traps," the human says, "I don't remember doing that. Maybe..." he sighs, "Maybe that's a good thing, 'cus I'd probably go insane building them all. Still though, it says we're going faster, but it doesn't feel like it."
"How'd you know how it feels," Red asks, "if you don't remember it?"
"'Day jaw voo' I think is the term," the human says, "or something. The sense that all this has happened before, but I'm not quite remembering and there's no physical evidence of it."
"Shijooooooooooo..." the grey one moans, waving a card at him. On it:
"In order, but we don't know if that means chronological order or frequency/proportion of memories:
"- The ship crashes (pretty sure that happens every time) "- The human builds huts "- The human teaches some trimps to speak and do science "- The human builds houses "- The human makes maps "- The human builds mansions "- The human blows up and gets himself killed somewhere around Z17 to Z21, often on a dragimp "- The human only recently/occasionally builds hotels "- The human only recently/rarely tamed a dragimp "- The human only recently/rarely mapped the Dimension of Anger"
Tightniks sits down and offers it back.
"Tai," it flatly refuses to take it back, paws up and eyes closed.
"It's kind of a relief," Tightniks rubs his temples, then looks at it again, "knowing it ain't just me."
6h17m43s: Portal PB, 1% AP for sub-8h, 45 He, 7.149 He/hr, 2209 pop, 13.6s RC.
The last head of the map's boss monster goes limp as one of the fighting trimps' dagger points goes into it, and the huge thing settles on its tail, resting on the package that seems to be the prize of this map. And there's a popping sound, and then something mechanical.
Is that a scroll compressor? Tightniks looks at the package. The deflating monster's lifting envelope material drapes over everything underneath it. "Yellow, Shijou!" he snaps and points, "roll up that side of it. Keep this part from sucking down on the extractor nozzle!"
All ten of the scientists jump in, literally, pushing the gas in the bag towards the compressor. Tightniks as well, rolling up the front.
Until he kicks, and nearly trips over, a smaller package that might be the explanation for the reason why the center of the monster's defense seemed to be a little away from the big package he could see. It's in the right place, he realizes. He gets it uncovered and reads stenciled-and-sprayed block letters on it:
"DT TIME PORTAL / THIS SIDE DOWN"
Perhaps the Dimension of Anger is so named because of the rage suddenly rising up in Tightniks' throat. It isn't so much as the free-floating aggression suddenly has an answer, there is definitely a fresh batch of rage and anger as he grips the nearest Dagger V, Mark 2 with both hands-
Refocusing on surviving the next few seconds, the pilot turns on the radar for the final approach and takes a last look around, then straight ahead at his forward camera and primary flight display...
He crouches, sets the dagger down gently, then starts clearing the debris from the box's grab iron. He tries to lift it- Damn, this is heavy! As he gets it turned over, gravity finishes the job, and it shakes the ground with an impressive thud as it falls right side up.
"DT TIME PORTAL / THIS SIDE UP" There's a square cutout in the middle of one side of it, with a sliding cover at the bottom of it.
"Get the pad!" he screams, seeing that his scientists are almost done rolling up the megablimp.
The grey one already has the survival data pad and offers it to him.
"The big one," Tightniks clarifies, "The big one." he picks up wide flat rainbow cable and its edge socket in one hand, "It goes here," he points at it with the other. "It must have come with me-" He had taken the small survival data pad and notices something, "Oh?" He starts looking around, "Hey!"
The white trimp with the brown hair is napping in a hole next to the smouldering remains of its latest attempt at a smelting furnace.
"Hey, mining buddy!" he whistles at it, "Mining buddy!"
It wakes with a start and rushes over, but doesn't seem to be in a good mood. But as soon as Tightnik shows it the survival pad, with all of the mining data installed just as if all those broken data cards and scorched scrolls were intact when he found them, fireworks goes off in the little trimp's eyes and it rushes off with the pad. Within minutes, the first furnace that works is chugging away at some ore and it returns to give the survival data pad back to Tightniks.
7h24m49s: Fresh turkimp; 7h25m30s: Labor reallocated.
The big-eared green lumber foreman's mood fell much further than the mining foreman's mood was before Tightniks packed up the turkimp roaster and moved just about everyone over to the smeltery.
The brown-haired, big-tailed white mining foreman was surprised at the change, and very happy. It had climbed up onto the helium compressor cart to check something on the pad a couple cells into the zone.
"Are you upset with me?" the red one asks the human.
"No, not at all," Tightniks says, "Are you getting the feeling that we had an upset at this point last cycle?"
"How would you know it was only the last?" Yellow asks, "Your memory's no better than ours."
"Right," the human sews another patch into his uniform, "However, I've only actually hit the switch on the portal twice, the first one on a challenge called Discipline, and the second on a challenge called Metal, which we just finished. It's easy to sort out from the statistics. I'm nervous it'll get harder to sort out when we're up to, oh," done fixing his uniform, he pops a bit of turkimp into his mouth and chews a couple times, "a few dozen or hundred manual cycles."
"Friggin' solve this faster than that, please," Red grumbles, "I know the emergency counter got to nearly a thousand, but..." he kinda trails off. Finally, he says, "I think we're remembering more cycle to cycle as we get more helium into it. I mean, I'm glad that isn't the only mechanic."
"Can't miss the supernova if it is," the human ponders.
"What?" Yellow chuckles.
"I'm remembering something from before all this, I think it was called a video game, where you'd go forward real-world in the simulation of a time loop, and your real-life head remembering what you did on previous cycles was the only mechanic," the human takes another bite, then dons his uniform shirt while chewing it. After his head pops out of the not-so-crisp-and-fresh uniform neck hole, buttons still done up, he finishes, "one of them had a supernova." [That would be Outer Wilds among the bunch of games with this mechanic, er, Minnit (I know it's spelled differently than "minute"), 12 Minutes, The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, and- ...I'm sure there are more.]
11h19m28s: Starting void 1 (L30).
With the thermal gloves on, Tightniks gets the void map into the portal device slot. It dematerializes and his fingers close where it used to be in his hands, then he yelps, stands up and starts dancing, "Oh crap, it's cold!" He quickly starts looking for stuff to bundle up. Once not too uncomfortable, he notices something, "You're having trouble, too?"
"No," Yellow and Red look at each other, "Well, not with the cold; this route has a poisonous atmosphere, slows down our young assimilating aluminum at the proper rate."
"Manning the traps will work at full speed, right?" Tightniks says.
"Should if your fingers can handle it," Red confirms.
11h33m57s: Void 1c100.
"You are one ugly muthaf[garble]!" he says when he sees the void boss, "Stay here, I'll be back." Runs some traps, grabs a couple helmets for the fresh volunteers, "Put these on."
"Shijou?" the grey one looks at the red one, really rather perplexed.
"I agree, that's not his usual accent," Red tilts his head, "Tightniks, what has gotten in to you?"
"Stop cheering me up," the human grumbles, "You think this is the real Quaid?"
"I think the cold is affecting him more than he realizes," Yellow offers.
"Phased plasma rifle in the forty watt range," but what the dizzy pilot actually throws at the zone boss is a Mace V-4, "and then I was thinking of breaking your neck."
[Felt like some- "Arnie? Well, the union is pulling out all the big guns today, huh?" (Tom Hanks as Sully) ...no, brain, Arnold Schwarzenegger, not Arnie Gentile (it was really funny to background Sully and listen to that line instead of "That's definitely you" in Terminator 2 while he's posing with the Minigun.) Arnie lines from Predator, Terminator 2, True Lies, Total Recall and The Terminator.]
"Tweak the portal," reads Tightniks from the portal controller aloud, but quietly, "to bring you to an alternate reality, where Trimps are bigger and stronger, to force yourself to figure out a way to build larger housing. Your Trimps will gather 50% more resources, but your housing will fit 50% fewer Trimps. If you complete The Dimension of Anger without disabling the challenge, your stats will return to normal."
"You will also open a new memory coolant unit," Yellow reads, "You think that'll cause a housing bonus?"
"Shijou," the grey one hands him a card saying "We have enough for another gateway."
"Oh, good," Tightniks hands it back after signing it, "Yes, build it."
"We're doing that next?" Yellow asks.
Tightniks sees the little fellow sitting on top of a mound that the human thought was a bowel movement pile from Draglimp, but it must be something more geological if trimps can climb it, let alone want to. "Yeah, I guess," the human answers, "It kinda scares me, I mean I'm going back, but what happens to you guys?"
"We have too much day javo or whatever you called it," Red says. He's usually on all fours, shakes his left hind leg as though something got stuck to his foot, "This isn't incrementing, I'm sure. 13 is less than 956."
"According to this, you'll be twice as big," Tightniks sets down the portal controller pad and stands up from the cart, "It's hard to imagine, especially for Shijou and Diggy. We'll clear thirty-six, that's it."
14h04m37s: Z33c95, IC.
"Are you sure we can make Zone 37 start?" the red one asks.
The yellow one is standing on Red's shoulders.
"It said we did last time," Tightniks taps on the crude leather bag strapped to his back, the portal pad inside it, "though maybe..." he tilts his head, rolls whatever he was sucking on in his mouth for a moment, "it just happened while I was building those traps. No, I'm sticking with that plan."
"If it's going to take that long," Red grinds its jaws sideways for a moment and lets its eyelids get lazy, frustration clear in its tone, "why do it again?"
"Because I've got a bad feeling about this 'Size' thing," Tightniks says, "it drops our resourcing by 75% assuming we build the same amount of housing as before, which we won't because of the reduced resourcing. We needed 65 capacity in the cabin and huts before we could do run the gypsum/paper wall machine we found. I have a funny feeling that never changes."
"We don't need 65 trimps to run it," Yellow says, "just three."
"Yeah," Tightniks says, "but a particular three that know what they're doing, and my day javoo is telling me the last of those is always the sixty-fifth."
"Shijou," the grey one moans from the other side of Tightniks. Didn't have a note this time, just kicking a little rock along as it walks.
"It thinks you're right," the red one growls forlornly, "Hating to say it, but I do too."
14h16m06s: Skel in c1, 50 bones purchased whipimp.
There's a thump at the cart, and then some commotion around it that's noticable enough for Tightniks to come over and take a look. The bone box is empty, all forty-nine titanium bones in it are gone. Tightiks brings his right hand up in front of him, and it's just a balled fist, the bone he was holding a moment ago is gone. As he starts looking for where he must have dropped it, he realizes maybe it's all related. Looking in the bottom of the empty bone box, he finds a note.
"I got you the whipimp. This new Bad Guy will begin spawning in your next zone at an average of 3 spawns per 100 enemies. I hope it helps, but I can't tell yet."
The note is in Tightniks' own handwriting, although lazy but with more consistent kerning. Is this from an older version of myself? Friggin' time travel.
14h18m48s: This L34 moun 160/27/79 calls itself "Magical Mountain" - I can't remember whether the Disney trademark is that or "Magic Mountain" ...I've seen a "Black Mesa" before, that's a Half-Life thing, and somebody on Reddit made pretend that "Dank Hill" was a King of the Hill thing (which is actually *Hank Hill, I think - it's hard to remember, it wasn't very good and I haven't watched it since the 1990s.)
19h32m00s: Doom/AT, 12816 pop, 80N, 37.7s RC with Z34/5298.
"Okay, we got that friggin' thing chocked," Yellow wipes its brow and almost bonks itself with the Mace VI-2 that it's holding, puts it down and makes sure the wedges are secure.
Grey, Red, and Green are packing more stuff around the huge boulder that chased them down a tunnel to make sure it doesn't do that again.
"Getting any day javoo?" Tightniks pants, hands on his knees, but apparently uninjured, or nearly so.
"Not at all," Yellow vehemently responds, slashing the air with its paw, "You?"
"Oh," Tightniks gets his breathing under control, "I think it was a human movie."
"Like a video on that pad?" it gestures at the human's pocket with the small one.
"No, a bigger screen," the human says.
"Fifty-five inches?" the trimp scientist chuckles.
"More like fifty-five feet," the human rubs the sweat out of his eyes, "Lots of people watching. It was called a sin."
"Ah," the trimp ponders, "Like a crime, vice, psychopathy or bad habit?"
"Er..." the human taps his forehead trying to remember, "Sorry, a cinema."
[The whole thing is obviously an homage to something I remember only slightly better than Tightniks, I think it was Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. As I'm posting this, I sadly realize that Nick Rekieta's arrest was between when I wrote this and now.]
19h58m55s: Zone 37, 473 He, 23.67 He/hr, 13088 pop, 81N, 32.1s RC with Z34/5298, 2806 pop short, no turkimp.
The ship is without power, and Tightniks can't run the radar much without draining the batteries...
2024.05.29 06:08 YourNameNameName SHM is closing the Mainstage for Ultra Korea on June 9th 🇰🇷🇰🇷🇰🇷
 | submitted by YourNameNameName to SwedishHouseMafia [link] [comments] |
2024.05.29 05:03 hamcycle 10 Ways Narcissists Use Religion to Serve Their Own Purpose
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aUOUAr-WvFk
1:37 - Traits of a Narcissist
A narcissist has an insatiable need for admiration, affirmation, and validation, all of which are their drug of narcissistic supply. They believe themselves to be superior and grandiose, they're arrogant, they lack empathy, they're exploitative, they have unreasonable demands of people. These are all traits that are opposite from the traits of Jesus Christ and yet a religious context is often the most optimal place for a narcissist to freely practice their narcissism while appearing virtuous or pious. So I'm going to share with you 10 insights into why narcissists love religion and how they use it to serve their own purposes.
2:22 - Why It's Important to Understand Why Narcissists Love Religion
It's important to understand these things because Jesus warns his followers to beware of false prophets which come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. Hopefully these 10 insights will help you hack into whether or not you're dealing with a true follower or true shepherd or minister of Christ or a narcissist who is posing as one of these roles instead of being there to serve.
2:51 - #1 - The Abundance of Narcissistic Supply to be Had
The first reason why narcissists love religion is because of the abundance of narcissistic supply that could be had. It's a reality there is so much narcissistic supply to be had in religious settings. And narcissistic supply, as I mentioned before, is the praise, admiration, validation, honor, sense of significance that a narcissist is addicted to in order to regulate their negative emotions. So a religious context provides an easy platform for a narcissist because they could get access to a stage or a pulpit or a mic or some means to exert influence where they can gain all of that admiration and praise or a sense of superiority where they can present themselves as godly or pious individuals or chosen by God or specially anointed, all of this to gain validation and attention from people. And like I mentioned all of these things are a drug that a narcissist is addicted to and it is what actually feeds them, more than actually being in a relationship with God but to the pure all things are pure so there are many people in church and religious contexts who are honest good-hearted who believe the best about others and so they can be gullible to the narcissists around them who have disguised themselves as pious people for the sake of getting narcissistic supply and this is truly an evil because a narcissist pursuit of narcissistic supply comes at the cost of destroying and stepping on other people without any regard for their welfare.
4:32 - #2 - The Allure of Control and Power
The second reason why narcissists love religion is because of the alert of control and power. Religion offers a structure of beliefs and practices that can be manipulated by narcissists to exert control over others. For example a narcissist may twist and distort doctrines and scriptures to justify their authority and demand obedience from followers they could create God in their own image, which a lot of them do rather than follow and conform themselves to the God of the Bible. This kind of control feeds into the narcissist need for domination and power and it can get to a dangerous point where religious narcissist replaces God with themselves where they subtly over time position themselves as intermediaries between individuals and God. A narcissist might manipulate followers into believing that they alone possess the ability to interpret God's will or to speak on his behalf a narcissist does this whether consciously or unconsciously to elevate themselves to a divine status in the eyes of their followers and they may never say that they are doing this outright because no person would ever accept a human saying that you have to worship them like a god but a narcissist will certainly have structures and systems in place to make this a reality. And a follower or member of that religious context might not even realize what is happening until one day they notice that this narcissist has taken on an increasingly central role in their life and is dictating their decisions and their behaviors as if they were the ultimate authority.
6:47 - #3 - Camouflage for Manipulation
The third reason why narcissists love religion is because it serves as a camouflage for manipulation. Religious contexts serve as a perfect camouflage for narcissist to disguise their true intentions these are places where it's easy for narcissists to cloak their behaviors and demands in spiritual language where they can manipulate and exploit others while appearing righteous and virtuous at the same time. And what better setup could there be for a covert narcissist who can continue acting narcissistic while appearing like a saint in the process there's no other place except churches and ministries and religious environments.
7:29 - #4 - Their ability to exploit certain teachings for personal gain
The fourth reason why narcissists are drawn to religion is because of their ability to exploit certain teachings for personal gain. Many religious communities emphasize principles like forgiveness, redemption, giving a second chance, reconciling, turning the other cheek, submitting to authority, and narcissists exploit these teachings extensively. They may present themselves as repentant as enlightened or they could be demanding forgiveness and reconciliation from others while refusing to cultivate Christ-like virtues within themselves so all this manipulation allows them to continue exploiting others behind this facade of being Godly.
8:15 - #5 - It allows them to Idolize their Self-Image
The fifth reason why narcissists love religion is because it allows them to idolize their self-image. Narcissists often have an inflated sense of self-importance and believe that they are special or unique so religion can offer a platform to reinforce this idealized self-image where they can portray themselves as chosen by God or having special spiritual gifts or insights or anointing.
8:44 - #6 - The Lack of Accountability
The sixth reason why narcissists love religion is because of the lack of accountability. Some denominations or churches or contacts might have more accountability than others but narcissist tend to gravitate towards those religious contexts that don't have much or have very little. Many religious narcissists exploit religious settings because they perceive them to be environments where their behaviors are less likely to be questioned or challenged so this lack of accountability allows them to continue their manipulative tactics without being questioned or challenged.
9:23 - #7 - It Gives Them a Get-Out-of-Jail Free Card from Having to Self-Reflect
The seventh reason why narcissists love religion is because it gives them a get out of jail free card from having to self-reflect. Narcissists typically struggle with self-awareness and introspection so religion offers a way for them to avoid confronting their own wounds or trauma or shortcomings by focusing on outward religious performance or acquiring religious knowledge, all this outward stuff that they can focus on. It's like Jesus saying to the Pharisees they're like these whitewashed tombs; they look beautiful and nice on the outside but inside they're full of dead man's bones. The attraction to religion allows a narcissist to spiritually bypass themselves where they can use all kinds of spiritual language like it's all washed by the blood or things like that to avoid dealing with deeper unresolved trauma within themselves and getting healed from it because there is power in Christ for healing but you have to do the work.
10:26 - #8 - Entitled and Exploit People in those Contexts
The eighth reason why narcissists love religion is is because it's easy for them to be entitled and to exploit people in these contexts in religious settings. Narcissists may feel entitled to special treatment or privileges due to their perceived spiritual status they might exploit others trust and vulnerability for their own personal gain and control. Narcissists may expect people to serve them, like a slave, free of charge. For instance, because they believe that they have a God-like status or they might expect people to hand their wealth over to them or neglect their own families in order to put the narcissist first all in the name of God.
11:09 - #9 - They Can Create a God in Their Own Image
The ninth reason why narcissists love religion is because they can create a god in their own image. Narcissists are not interested in cultivating godly virtues within themselves as I mentioned before they would rather project their own traits onto God viewing Him as judgmental, angry, or traits that resonate more with their narcissistic personality, more than who God actually is. And this kind of behavior allows narcissists to maintain a sense of superiority and justification for their actions.
11:43 - #10 - The Facade of Moral Superiority
The 10th reason why narcissist love religion is the facade of moral superiority religion provides narcissists with this platform to project a false sense of being moral or virtuous or Godly. And they can create this facade by practicing all the religious rituals and portray themselves in a certain way in front of people like this upstanding citizen, but in reality they could be practicing all kinds of dark deeds in private without people knowing hiding their true intentions all with this mask of piety and so that can serve very well for many narcissists and to enable them to continue their dark practices in secret while people are believing that they are this godly pious person and that is actually a very hypocritical way to live and Jesus actually condemned these kinds of practices because that is what the religious leaders were doing in Biblical times but many narcissists gravitate towards religious settings in order to be able to continue living out this hypocritical lifestyle.
So understanding why narcissists are drawn to religion is really important in order to recognize and address the manipulation that can happen in churches and ministries while many churches and ministries promote cultivating Christ-like qualities. Sadly those same places attract narcissist to them because of opportunities it presents for control and admiration and validation but hopefully by being aware of these dynamics we can hopefully discern between genuine spiritual leaders and those who are using religion to drive their own ego-driven motives. Remember Jesus warned against the false prophets so hopefully by applying these insights we can navigate relationships in churches and ministries and operate with God's wisdom and discernment where we can be as shrewd as a snake and as innocent as a dove.
*Thanks to u/Jdub20202 for the video recommendation.
submitted by hamcycle to GracepointChurch [link] [comments]
1:37 - Traits of a Narcissist
A narcissist has an insatiable need for admiration, affirmation, and validation, all of which are their drug of narcissistic supply. They believe themselves to be superior and grandiose, they're arrogant, they lack empathy, they're exploitative, they have unreasonable demands of people. These are all traits that are opposite from the traits of Jesus Christ and yet a religious context is often the most optimal place for a narcissist to freely practice their narcissism while appearing virtuous or pious. So I'm going to share with you 10 insights into why narcissists love religion and how they use it to serve their own purposes.
2:22 - Why It's Important to Understand Why Narcissists Love Religion
It's important to understand these things because Jesus warns his followers to beware of false prophets which come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. Hopefully these 10 insights will help you hack into whether or not you're dealing with a true follower or true shepherd or minister of Christ or a narcissist who is posing as one of these roles instead of being there to serve.
2:51 - #1 - The Abundance of Narcissistic Supply to be Had
The first reason why narcissists love religion is because of the abundance of narcissistic supply that could be had. It's a reality there is so much narcissistic supply to be had in religious settings. And narcissistic supply, as I mentioned before, is the praise, admiration, validation, honor, sense of significance that a narcissist is addicted to in order to regulate their negative emotions. So a religious context provides an easy platform for a narcissist because they could get access to a stage or a pulpit or a mic or some means to exert influence where they can gain all of that admiration and praise or a sense of superiority where they can present themselves as godly or pious individuals or chosen by God or specially anointed, all of this to gain validation and attention from people. And like I mentioned all of these things are a drug that a narcissist is addicted to and it is what actually feeds them, more than actually being in a relationship with God but to the pure all things are pure so there are many people in church and religious contexts who are honest good-hearted who believe the best about others and so they can be gullible to the narcissists around them who have disguised themselves as pious people for the sake of getting narcissistic supply and this is truly an evil because a narcissist pursuit of narcissistic supply comes at the cost of destroying and stepping on other people without any regard for their welfare.
4:32 - #2 - The Allure of Control and Power
The second reason why narcissists love religion is because of the alert of control and power. Religion offers a structure of beliefs and practices that can be manipulated by narcissists to exert control over others. For example a narcissist may twist and distort doctrines and scriptures to justify their authority and demand obedience from followers they could create God in their own image, which a lot of them do rather than follow and conform themselves to the God of the Bible. This kind of control feeds into the narcissist need for domination and power and it can get to a dangerous point where religious narcissist replaces God with themselves where they subtly over time position themselves as intermediaries between individuals and God. A narcissist might manipulate followers into believing that they alone possess the ability to interpret God's will or to speak on his behalf a narcissist does this whether consciously or unconsciously to elevate themselves to a divine status in the eyes of their followers and they may never say that they are doing this outright because no person would ever accept a human saying that you have to worship them like a god but a narcissist will certainly have structures and systems in place to make this a reality. And a follower or member of that religious context might not even realize what is happening until one day they notice that this narcissist has taken on an increasingly central role in their life and is dictating their decisions and their behaviors as if they were the ultimate authority.
6:47 - #3 - Camouflage for Manipulation
The third reason why narcissists love religion is because it serves as a camouflage for manipulation. Religious contexts serve as a perfect camouflage for narcissist to disguise their true intentions these are places where it's easy for narcissists to cloak their behaviors and demands in spiritual language where they can manipulate and exploit others while appearing righteous and virtuous at the same time. And what better setup could there be for a covert narcissist who can continue acting narcissistic while appearing like a saint in the process there's no other place except churches and ministries and religious environments.
7:29 - #4 - Their ability to exploit certain teachings for personal gain
The fourth reason why narcissists are drawn to religion is because of their ability to exploit certain teachings for personal gain. Many religious communities emphasize principles like forgiveness, redemption, giving a second chance, reconciling, turning the other cheek, submitting to authority, and narcissists exploit these teachings extensively. They may present themselves as repentant as enlightened or they could be demanding forgiveness and reconciliation from others while refusing to cultivate Christ-like virtues within themselves so all this manipulation allows them to continue exploiting others behind this facade of being Godly.
8:15 - #5 - It allows them to Idolize their Self-Image
The fifth reason why narcissists love religion is because it allows them to idolize their self-image. Narcissists often have an inflated sense of self-importance and believe that they are special or unique so religion can offer a platform to reinforce this idealized self-image where they can portray themselves as chosen by God or having special spiritual gifts or insights or anointing.
8:44 - #6 - The Lack of Accountability
The sixth reason why narcissists love religion is because of the lack of accountability. Some denominations or churches or contacts might have more accountability than others but narcissist tend to gravitate towards those religious contexts that don't have much or have very little. Many religious narcissists exploit religious settings because they perceive them to be environments where their behaviors are less likely to be questioned or challenged so this lack of accountability allows them to continue their manipulative tactics without being questioned or challenged.
9:23 - #7 - It Gives Them a Get-Out-of-Jail Free Card from Having to Self-Reflect
The seventh reason why narcissists love religion is because it gives them a get out of jail free card from having to self-reflect. Narcissists typically struggle with self-awareness and introspection so religion offers a way for them to avoid confronting their own wounds or trauma or shortcomings by focusing on outward religious performance or acquiring religious knowledge, all this outward stuff that they can focus on. It's like Jesus saying to the Pharisees they're like these whitewashed tombs; they look beautiful and nice on the outside but inside they're full of dead man's bones. The attraction to religion allows a narcissist to spiritually bypass themselves where they can use all kinds of spiritual language like it's all washed by the blood or things like that to avoid dealing with deeper unresolved trauma within themselves and getting healed from it because there is power in Christ for healing but you have to do the work.
10:26 - #8 - Entitled and Exploit People in those Contexts
The eighth reason why narcissists love religion is is because it's easy for them to be entitled and to exploit people in these contexts in religious settings. Narcissists may feel entitled to special treatment or privileges due to their perceived spiritual status they might exploit others trust and vulnerability for their own personal gain and control. Narcissists may expect people to serve them, like a slave, free of charge. For instance, because they believe that they have a God-like status or they might expect people to hand their wealth over to them or neglect their own families in order to put the narcissist first all in the name of God.
11:09 - #9 - They Can Create a God in Their Own Image
The ninth reason why narcissists love religion is because they can create a god in their own image. Narcissists are not interested in cultivating godly virtues within themselves as I mentioned before they would rather project their own traits onto God viewing Him as judgmental, angry, or traits that resonate more with their narcissistic personality, more than who God actually is. And this kind of behavior allows narcissists to maintain a sense of superiority and justification for their actions.
11:43 - #10 - The Facade of Moral Superiority
The 10th reason why narcissist love religion is the facade of moral superiority religion provides narcissists with this platform to project a false sense of being moral or virtuous or Godly. And they can create this facade by practicing all the religious rituals and portray themselves in a certain way in front of people like this upstanding citizen, but in reality they could be practicing all kinds of dark deeds in private without people knowing hiding their true intentions all with this mask of piety and so that can serve very well for many narcissists and to enable them to continue their dark practices in secret while people are believing that they are this godly pious person and that is actually a very hypocritical way to live and Jesus actually condemned these kinds of practices because that is what the religious leaders were doing in Biblical times but many narcissists gravitate towards religious settings in order to be able to continue living out this hypocritical lifestyle.
So understanding why narcissists are drawn to religion is really important in order to recognize and address the manipulation that can happen in churches and ministries while many churches and ministries promote cultivating Christ-like qualities. Sadly those same places attract narcissist to them because of opportunities it presents for control and admiration and validation but hopefully by being aware of these dynamics we can hopefully discern between genuine spiritual leaders and those who are using religion to drive their own ego-driven motives. Remember Jesus warned against the false prophets so hopefully by applying these insights we can navigate relationships in churches and ministries and operate with God's wisdom and discernment where we can be as shrewd as a snake and as innocent as a dove.
*Thanks to u/Jdub20202 for the video recommendation.
2024.05.29 04:46 Micateam [Neural Cloud] 5/28 Server Maintenance Announcement
Dear Professor,
In order to provide players with a better game experience, we will be performing server maintenance for Neural Cloud May 28, 2024.
You will not be able to log into the game during the maintenance and the exact end time may be subject to change.
Maintenance Time: 2024/5/28 18:30 - 19:30 (UTC-8)
Maintenance Type: Server Shutdown Maintenance
[Contents]
・ Class: Specialist
・ Company: Universal Anything Services
・The probability of obtaining the ★3 Dupin will be increased.
[Duration] 5/28 After Maint - 6/25 18:29 (UTC-8)
▼ Special Search
・While Special Search is open, Professors have one chance to use Quartz to "Search 10x", with a guarantee to obtain at least 1 ★3 Doll!
[Duration] 5/28 After Maint - 6/4 18:29 (UTC-8)
▼ Targeted Search - Dawning Enlightenment
・The probability of obtaining the ★3 Turing will be increased.
[Duration] 5/28 After Maint - 6/11 18:29 (UTC-8)
▼ Targeted Search - To Seek Enlightenment
・The probability of obtaining the ★3 Hannah will be increased.
[Duration] 5/28 After Maint - 6/11 18:29 (UTC-8)
▼ Limited-Time Event - L.A.D. Riddle
・During this time, you can play through event stages and complete event missions for rewards.
[Unlock Conditions] Clear Cyclopes Sector Standard Mode Stage 2-15
[Duration] 5/28 After Maint - 6/18 18:29 (UTC-8)
[Redemption Deadline] 6/25 18:29 (UTC-8)
▼ Neural Cloud Projection - [First Bloom] Series
[Duration] 5/28 After Maint - 6/25 18:29 (UTC-8)
▼ Neural Cloud Projection - [Splendid Evening], [Providential Evening] and [Snowy Spring] Series Limited-Time Rerun
[Duration] 5/28 After Maint - 6/25 18:29 (UTC-8)
▼X2 Drop in [Fragment Search]
・During the event, Neural Fragments gained in [Fragment Search] (excluding the first-clear Bonus) will be doubled.
[Duration] 5/30 05:00 - 6/6 04:59 (UTC-8)
▼ Limited-Time Event - X2 Drop in [Algorithm Collection]
・During the event, X2 Drop Rewards for the first 8 clears of [Algorithm Collection] every day.
[Duration] 6/5 5:00 - 6/12 04:59 (UTC-8)
▼ Magrasea Battle Pass - Season 21
・Complete Daily Missions for [Magrasea Battle Pass] Activity Points and level up the pass for generous item rewards.
[Duration] 6/10 05:00 - 7/8 03:59 (UTC-8)
▼ Neural Cloud Projection - [Awakening] Series Limited-Time Rerun
・During this period, Daiyan's [Vernal Chords] from the [Awakening] series will go on sale in the [Projection Repository] section of the Magrasea Battle Pass. You can use [Gestalt Aspect] to gain it.
[Duration] 6/10 05:00 - 8/5 03:59 (UTC-8)
・[First Bloom] Series: Turing - [Fragrant Encounter] (Live2D), Hannah - [Overflowing Scent], Dupin - [Spring Invitation] and Sueyoi - [Evening Confidant] will go on sale in the Neural Cloud Projection section of the Supplies Shop.
・[Fighting Spirit] series: Nascita - [Ballistic Dash] can be obtained by activating the [Multichannel Battle Pass] and raising it to a certain level.
▼ Furniture
・Furniture Piece [Nascita's Mask] can be obtained by activating the [Multichannel Battle Pass Plus].
▼ Arma Inscripta
・Croque - Reforged Aegis-Ez4
▼ Resource
・After maintenance, [Vulnerability Check] Ter VI will be available.
▼ Main Storyline
・After maintenance, [Entropic Dichotomy]'s Dark and Endless mode will be available.
* The [Spirit] items obtained in the mode can be used in subsequent versions after the implementation of the Spirit System.
・[ Weekly Supplies Voucher]
▼5/28 After Maint - 6/5 04:59 (UTC-8)
・[Misty Mystery Search Pack]
・[Ashen Pursuit Search Pack]
・[Blooming Blush Algorithm Pack]
・[Twilight Glory Reconfig Pack]
・[A-la-carte Fragment Pack]
・[Arma Inscripta Pack]
・[Special Offer Search Pack]
▼5/28 After Maint - 6/25 18:29 (UTC-8)
・[Dupin Neural Expansion Pack]
▼6/5 05:00 - 6/12 04:59 (UTC-8)
・[Ethereal Melody Pack]
・[Sapphire Horizon Pack]
*The 2 packs are purchasable in a sequential order.
▼6/5 05:00 - 6/12 04:59 (UTC-8)
・[Pure Obsidian Search Pack]
・[Untainted Onyx Search Pack]
*All packs can be purchased through the Shop, which can be accessed by going from the Main Screen → Supplies → Packs.
Once the server maintenance is complete, we will send you a mail with Quartz Sand*150 attached. Please stay tuned to our official social media accounts for any updates, and thank you for your understanding and cooperation.
[Neural Cloud] Operations Team
submitted by Micateam to GFLNeuralCloud [link] [comments]
In order to provide players with a better game experience, we will be performing server maintenance for Neural Cloud May 28, 2024.
You will not be able to log into the game during the maintenance and the exact end time may be subject to change.
Maintenance Time: 2024/5/28 18:30 - 19:30 (UTC-8)
Maintenance Type: Server Shutdown Maintenance
[Contents]
- New Doll -
・ Class: Specialist
・ Company: Universal Anything Services
- For a Limited Time Only -
・The probability of obtaining the ★3 Dupin will be increased.
[Duration] 5/28 After Maint - 6/25 18:29 (UTC-8)
▼ Special Search
・While Special Search is open, Professors have one chance to use Quartz to "Search 10x", with a guarantee to obtain at least 1 ★3 Doll!
[Duration] 5/28 After Maint - 6/4 18:29 (UTC-8)
▼ Targeted Search - Dawning Enlightenment
・The probability of obtaining the ★3 Turing will be increased.
[Duration] 5/28 After Maint - 6/11 18:29 (UTC-8)
▼ Targeted Search - To Seek Enlightenment
・The probability of obtaining the ★3 Hannah will be increased.
[Duration] 5/28 After Maint - 6/11 18:29 (UTC-8)
▼ Limited-Time Event - L.A.D. Riddle
・During this time, you can play through event stages and complete event missions for rewards.
[Unlock Conditions] Clear Cyclopes Sector Standard Mode Stage 2-15
[Duration] 5/28 After Maint - 6/18 18:29 (UTC-8)
[Redemption Deadline] 6/25 18:29 (UTC-8)
▼ Neural Cloud Projection - [First Bloom] Series
[Duration] 5/28 After Maint - 6/25 18:29 (UTC-8)
▼ Neural Cloud Projection - [Splendid Evening], [Providential Evening] and [Snowy Spring] Series Limited-Time Rerun
[Duration] 5/28 After Maint - 6/25 18:29 (UTC-8)
▼X2 Drop in [Fragment Search]
・During the event, Neural Fragments gained in [Fragment Search] (excluding the first-clear Bonus) will be doubled.
[Duration] 5/30 05:00 - 6/6 04:59 (UTC-8)
▼ Limited-Time Event - X2 Drop in [Algorithm Collection]
・During the event, X2 Drop Rewards for the first 8 clears of [Algorithm Collection] every day.
[Duration] 6/5 5:00 - 6/12 04:59 (UTC-8)
▼ Magrasea Battle Pass - Season 21
・Complete Daily Missions for [Magrasea Battle Pass] Activity Points and level up the pass for generous item rewards.
[Duration] 6/10 05:00 - 7/8 03:59 (UTC-8)
▼ Neural Cloud Projection - [Awakening] Series Limited-Time Rerun
・During this period, Daiyan's [Vernal Chords] from the [Awakening] series will go on sale in the [Projection Repository] section of the Magrasea Battle Pass. You can use [Gestalt Aspect] to gain it.
[Duration] 6/10 05:00 - 8/5 03:59 (UTC-8)
- New Content -
・[First Bloom] Series: Turing - [Fragrant Encounter] (Live2D), Hannah - [Overflowing Scent], Dupin - [Spring Invitation] and Sueyoi - [Evening Confidant] will go on sale in the Neural Cloud Projection section of the Supplies Shop.
・[Fighting Spirit] series: Nascita - [Ballistic Dash] can be obtained by activating the [Multichannel Battle Pass] and raising it to a certain level.
▼ Furniture
・Furniture Piece [Nascita's Mask] can be obtained by activating the [Multichannel Battle Pass Plus].
▼ Arma Inscripta
・Croque - Reforged Aegis-Ez4
▼ Resource
・After maintenance, [Vulnerability Check] Ter VI will be available.
▼ Main Storyline
・After maintenance, [Entropic Dichotomy]'s Dark and Endless mode will be available.
* The [Spirit] items obtained in the mode can be used in subsequent versions after the implementation of the Spirit System.
- Limited-Offer Packages -
・[ Weekly Supplies Voucher]
▼5/28 After Maint - 6/5 04:59 (UTC-8)
・[Misty Mystery Search Pack]
・[Ashen Pursuit Search Pack]
・[Blooming Blush Algorithm Pack]
・[Twilight Glory Reconfig Pack]
・[A-la-carte Fragment Pack]
・[Arma Inscripta Pack]
・[Special Offer Search Pack]
▼5/28 After Maint - 6/25 18:29 (UTC-8)
・[Dupin Neural Expansion Pack]
▼6/5 05:00 - 6/12 04:59 (UTC-8)
・[Ethereal Melody Pack]
・[Sapphire Horizon Pack]
*The 2 packs are purchasable in a sequential order.
▼6/5 05:00 - 6/12 04:59 (UTC-8)
・[Pure Obsidian Search Pack]
・[Untainted Onyx Search Pack]
*All packs can be purchased through the Shop, which can be accessed by going from the Main Screen → Supplies → Packs.
- Fixes -
- Fixed certain issues with the texts and UI.
- Fixed the [Divergent Neural Cloud] event missions display issue in Main Story of [Mission].
Once the server maintenance is complete, we will send you a mail with Quartz Sand*150 attached. Please stay tuned to our official social media accounts for any updates, and thank you for your understanding and cooperation.
[Neural Cloud] Operations Team
2024.05.29 04:40 FallGuy1602 My first night out drinking!!
 | This is the story of my first night out lol before I start I wasnt fully out at this point, even now I've gotten far more confident but I still have not gotten over coming out at work... it feels silly still having to mask at work but whatever that's another rant aha this one is about the time I literally had to face every single one of my fears! It was my first night out at a bar as April! submitted by FallGuy1602 to trans [link] [comments] It was a trans friendly night at a dingy bar right downtown and i got talked into coming along by a friend I met at a kink positive group aha. She was greaaat but she was intense!! And I was terrified.. I walked in and I realized I had to show the bouncer my ID... shit... in my ID I have a beard... kinda a big one... it was years old and I immediately panic... the big bald tattood dude looks at the ID... looks at my dolled up face shrugs and let's me in... at this point I wanted to bail so bad. I think the only reason I stayed is because the dude had my ID lol... anyways I make it in... well actually I think it was more people were coming down the street and I didnt wanna be perceived so I ran inside aha First dude I see in like this dark dingy lighting looks like someone I knew. A friend I cowrote a paper with in grad school and I go all white... like fuck fuvk fyvk fuvkkkk I rush to the bathroom and break down crying aha... before I realized I was in a stall in the womens bathroom... I've literally never been in a womens bathroom ever... girls were doing their make up and chatting outside my stall and I froze and couldn't get myself to leave... I've been told by many at this point that I was really passable but still the thought of someone calling me out made me wanna cry and I did and I called an uber and when it got quiet in the bathroom i ran out the back and went home... I had a full blown panic attack.... even the uber was a mistake a aha bc I realized my picture on the app had me as a guy too and the guy didnt believe me till he spun around and got a good look at me lol fun... anyways I'm home now crying... I felt so so stipid... but i also worked reallly reallly reallly realllllly hard on my outfit aha so I wanted to salvage the night. I took a chance i figured if my friend saw me all dressed up he'd say something right... so I called him. I said he buddy I'm over at ---- come grab a drink and he says hey buddy no I'm at home with a broken arm so maybe another time. I let out suuuuch a deep sigh. Even he was like are you alright buddy... and I tried to recover and say yea sorryy not related aha I dont think I did but he didnt bring it up so I let it go. I eventually said fuck this and booked an old school cab back to the bar like I did the first time and walked back in and ordered like 3 shots immediately! My friend sees me and shes so so excited and I go on to meet the coolest people ever!!!!!!! Turns out the guy i thought was my friend was I'm fact a trans man with a glorious beard aha and i felt so so stupid. I even chatted with some new friends in the womens bathroom about the whole ordeal earlier and it kinda felt natural. Everyone was so nice and inviting and I had a great time!!! Oh by the way I sang Tennessee whiskey and nailed it aha and even had my new friends walk me home 😊 Moral of the story... make up is too fuvking expensive to waste aha take a shot and go make some new friends |
2024.05.29 04:07 apehasreturned Booking the AEW World Title in 2024 - Part Two: The Master
 | Part One Here! submitted by apehasreturned to FantasyBookingElite [link] [comments] We pick up following Blood and Guts, where AEW Champion Swerve Strickland led his team to victory over the Elite. It’s been an insanely brutal and bloody reign for Swerve so far, and with enemies and allies alike climbing the ladder towards a shot at the gold, he’s starting to grow slightly paranoid. With a second trip to Wembley approaching, the talk of the town is who’s going to win the Owen and go for AEW’s top title at Wembley - if Swerve even makes it there, the fans knowing that his wars of attrition are leaving him worse for wear with each passing defence. Road to All In London The lineup for the Owen is being narrowed down coming out of Blood and Guts, with MJF, Jay White, Bryan Danielson, Will Ospreay, Darby Allin, Hangman Page, Konosuke Takeshita and Katsuyori Shibata all in the running. With blockbuster match after blockbuster match being fought to determine the finalists for Calgary, we eventually come down to two: MJF and Will Ospreay, set on a collision course for the ages. Swerve’s troubles don’t end there, though - after leaving the Mogul Embassy, his old allies smell blood in the water, and the EVPs are all too happy to make Strickland’s life more miserable by announcing a title match with Brian Cage for the Dynamite opener in Alberta’s largest city. AEW World Title: Swerve Strickland (c) vs. Brian Cage Cage gets a good showing in here, using his remarkable athleticism to nearly put the champion away early, but once Swerve gets rolling, it’s clear that there are levels to this game. The Machine goes for a Liger Bomb, Swerve reversing into a hurricanrana to leave him prone for a HOUSE CALL, FOLLOWED BY A SWERVE STOMP! ONE! TWO! THREE! Swerve Strickland def. Brian Cage (11:51) to retain the AEW World Title After the bout, Swerve’s handed his title, and he keeps it hugged tight to his chest as he grabs a microphone. He says everyone’s been working their asses off around him to try and take this from him, but the champion promises he’s not afraid. He welcomes the challenge, because there ain’t nobody like Swerve Strickland in SWERVE’S HOUSE. He says he’s looking forward to seeing who comes out on top in the main event, and heads off backstage to watch it with Prince Nana. Owen Hart Foundation Tournament Final: MJF vs. Will Ospreay This gets a lot of time, with no limit on a tournament final. Let them cook. MJF is in worse shape than Ospreay, having been flung straight into a tournament after a series of surgeries left him held together with duct tape, but Ospreay’s in a worse headspace, his typical unending confidence hampered by a few narrow wins en route to the final. However, it’s two spectacular in-ring talents, and they go ham in pursuit of victory, MJF wanting to headline Wembley for the second straight year and Ospreay looking to win the AEW World Title in a stadium in his home country. The back-and-forth gives way to MJF getting control, working the arm extensively to warm Ospreay up for the Salt of the Earth. However, an appearance by Adam Cole gives an unknowing Ospreay the opportunity to turn the tables with a handstand reversal to a Heatseeker, following it with a Hidden Blade for two. Ospreay considers working on the shoulder, MJF crying out in agony with each blow to the surgically repaired joint, and eventually, Will has him in perfect position for the Storm Driver 93. He knows MJF’s neck and shoulder are in such a state that this would be an automatic victory, but he hesitates just long enough for MJF to roll him up… ONE! TWO! THRE-KICKOUT! MJF grabs the arm to go for a Salt of the Earth, Ospreay rolling him back into a pin of his own, followed by another HIDDEN BLADE! STORMBREAKER! ONE! TWO! THREE! OSPREAY’S GOING TO WEMBLEY! Will Ospreay def. MJF (31:02) to win the Owen Hart Foundation Tournament Out comes Swerve, standing toe to toe with his challenger as confetti falls around them. Ospreay leans on his trophy, grabbing a microphone as it becomes rapidly apparent his confidence is back. He says that All In is on the horizon, and last time AEW was at Wembley Stadium, he won as an outsider… yet Swerve lost. Now, Ospreay’s in AEW full time, mowing through all the competition, and now it’s time that the Kingpin get a shot at the crown. Swerve chuckles before his smile turns into a sneer, growling under his breath that Ospreay will have to kill him to take the AEW Title away - and he’s seen that despite being called the Assassin, he can’t do that. The next week on Dynamite, Ospreay and Swerve are scheduled for a face to face promo in the ring, the title match official for All In. It’s electric as they stand opposite one another in the squared circle, trading some quick verbal barbs that they both brush off before getting down to brass tacks, Swerve holding the microphone and beginning to speak. “Will, you’re impressive, man. You can be as athletic as the day is long, but it’s not ‘heavy is the body that wears the crown,’ it’s ‘heavy is the head,’ and there ain’t nobody like me. This is a mental game, and you don’t have what it takes there. You blew yourself up and broke your own neck when you went for the IWGP Title. You were betrayed by the Don Callis Family and somehow didn’t see it coming. You were beaten on your home turf by your sworn enemy because you got in your own head. You had the win of a lifetime against Bryan, and then you felt so bad about it that you neutered your arsenal. You don’t have what it takes… in your head or in your guts. There’s only one head fit for this crown, and it’s mine.” Ospreay scoffs, trying to keep his cool, but he doesn’t wait long before grabbing the microphone out of Swerve’s hand to an “oooh,” from the crowd. “Ain’t nobody like you, bruv? How dare you talk down to me. How dare you condescend me, belittle me, you arrogant bastard? I came here to AEW and started taking heads, just like I did in Japan, and there were people there just like you. People who said ‘ah, he’s not got it in him to be the next big gaijin. He’ll never be the champion,’ and now there’s you, saying I don’t have what it takes because I don’t have the mentality. YOU don’t have the mentality to do what I do. To fly from the UK to here twice a week, to raise a family, to spend a whole career an ocean away from home, to wear the crown on your head that says you’re the greatest wrestler on Earth. Nobody’s done that but ME, and when that championship’s fastened around my waist, mate, it’s going to prove what everyone already knows - that Will Ospreay’s on another level, and Swerve Strickland… he’s punching up.” Now it’s Strickland’s turn to try and keep a lid on his anger, stepping toe to toe with his challenger and holding the title inches from his face. He tells Ospreay to listen close, before saying that the years of hard work Ospreay put in everywhere but home aren’t gonna be enough to help. He’s gonna be in front of his family, he’s gonna be in front of his friends, he’s gonna be in front of his people, and he’s going to let them all down, because he’s an impressive athlete, but he’s not the guy. Finally, Ospreay snaps, throwing a SHORT HEADBUTT, AND NOW BOTH MEN ARE THROWING FISTS! IT’S UTTER BEDLAM! The bell starts ringing to try and encourage them to break it up, but neither man is stepping down now, furiously exchanging blows as security rushes to the ring to divide them. Swerve grabs the championship, hoisting it high as he spits venom at Ospreay, the challenger spewing a string of words that probably won’t make air. They keep trying to break free and take another swing, commentary asking what on Earth they’ll do when they’re finally let loose at Wembley Stadium, pride and the promotion’s top prize on the line. Swerve Strickland (c) vs. Will Ospreay All In London Wembley Stadium is packed to the gills as All In goes on the air, and they’re fit to burst as the first theme they hear is that of the Commonwealth Kingpin. Justin Roberts announces that our opening match is for the AEW World Title, and Ospreay receives plenty of fanfare and fireworks as he makes his way to the ring, looking more motivated than ever. He’s clearly jonesing in the ring, eagerly awaiting Swerve’s arrival as his compatriots cheer him on… and then Chaka Khan hits. Strickland may be in enemy territory, but the crowd can't help but sing. Oozing charisma as he enters the squared circle, the AEW Champion seems more than ready to put the Assassin down, the electric crowd letting both men soak in the moment as the bell rings. HERE WE GO! SWERVE VS. OSPREAY, LIVE FROM WEMBLEY, AEW TITLE ON THE LINE! AEW World Title: Swerve Strickland (c) vs. Will Ospreay From the bell, Strickland and Ospreay are exchanging words as they gravitate towards one another, Ospreay calling for a lockup. They settle into a collar and elbow, Ospreay using his size to his advantage to try and muscle Swerve into the ropes, but Strickland reversing the momentum to cinch in a side headlock. Will still drives Swerve into the ropes, eventually breaking free and whipping Strickland across the ring, the champion building up speed as he ducks a clothesline attempt from the challenger and nails a Tijeras to send Ospreay flying. Ospreay’s quickly back up to his feet, Swerve attempting a slip behind for a German Suplex, but Will countering with a headlock takeover, kipping up and throwing a superkick that’s narrowly avoided by Swerve, who drops flat to his back, picking Ospreay’s leg and floating into a handstand to bring Ospreay down with a headscissors. Will kips up once more to break free, Swerve scrambling to stand up before OSPREAY THROWS A HIDDEN BLADE, SWERVE DIVING OUT OF THE WAY AT THE LAST MOMENT BEFORE CATASTROPHE! Strickland quickly pivots as Will looks to get to his feet, attempting a HOUSE CALL, BUT NOW IT’S OSPREAY’S TURN TO DODGE AS BOTH MEN END UP STANDING! Gritting his teeth, Swerve goes for another lockup with Ospreay, this time quickly kicking him in the gut for a snapmare, cinching in a chinlock to talk some smack. The Aerial Assassin lands a few elbows to the body as he strives to get back to his feet, finally breaking free before being grounded again by a Tijeras from Swerve. Strickland grabs hold of his challenger again, Ospreay furiously backpedaling into the corner to avoid a lifting inverted DDT, only for Swerve to send him through the ropes for a HANGING NECKBREAKER! Ospreay rolls out to the apron instinctively, Swerve kicking out one of his legs and stepping through the middle rope to SLINGSHOT INTO A DDT ON THE APRON, BUT OSPREAY HANDSPRINGS STRAIGHT TO HIS FEET ON THE FLOOR! Strickland gets cocky, thinking he landed the shot, and turns around to see Ospreay charging at his legs. Swerve leaps up, still on the apron as Will overshoots, the champion pivoting for an APRON PUMP KICK, OSPREAY DUCKING IT AND LEAPING BACK ONTO THE APRON! SWERVE TURNS AROUND ONCE AGAIN… AND OSPREAY FLIES IN WITH AN APRON OSCUTTER! Tumbling to the floor, Swerve tries to get to his senses and figure out how he came out on the rough end of the sequence on the apron, but Ospreay gives him no time to think with a ROBINSON SPECIAL OFF THE APRON, STRAIGHT THROUGH THE BACK OF HIS HEAD! He props Swerve against the barricade, chopping him across the chest before scrambling to the top rope for a SKY TWISTER PRESS TO THE OUTSIDE - ONLY FOR SWERVE TO AVOID IT, NAILING OSPREAY WITH A GERMAN SUPLEX ONTO THE FLOOR! With Ospreay stunned, Strickland slides back in to break the count, measuring his man before effortlessly delivering a FOSBURY FLOP OUT TO RINGSIDE, WIPING OUT THE CHALLENGER! Turning the tables on Ospreay, now it’s Swerve’s turn to lay in some chops against the barricade, only for Will to dump him over the barrier and into the crowd. He follows it up with a hook kick over the guardrail to stagger the champion, running the length of ringside and LAUNCHING HIMSELF STRAIGHT INTO A PUMP KICK FROM THE CHAMPION! Swerve hops up onto the barricade, grabbing hold of Ospreay in a front facelock before MUSCLING HIM UP AND OVER WITH A BRAINBUSTER, OFF OF THE BARRICADE AND RIGHT DOWN ONTO THE FLOOR AT RINGSIDE! He rushes to roll Will back between the ropes, hooking both legs… ONE! TWO! TH-NOOO! Swerve jumps to the middle rope to deliver a diving European Uppercut to the back of the head before Ospreay can quite get to his feet, following it up with a DISCUS LARIAT! The assault on the head is relentless, Swerve looking for a DDT before being driven into the ropes, Will trying to earn a momentary reprieve. Instead, Strickland pummels him with Muay Thai knees to the body, heaving him up for a LIGER BOMB! ONE! TWO! THRE-KICKOUT ONCE MORE! Swerve lets out a frustrated roar, deadlift Ospreay up to attempt another powerbomb, but Ospreay manages to drop to the apron for a gamengiri, followed by a PIP PIP CHEERIO! ONE! TWO! KICKOUT! Desperate to keep momentum on his side, Ospreay quickly delivers a rolling elbow, following it up with a SNAP DRAGON SUPLEX, BUT SWERVE RIGHT BACK UP TO HIS FEET, NAILING A GERMAN! He swivels around, only to see Ospreay landed on his feet, BOTH MEN THROWING HIGH KICKS BEFORE COLLAPSING TO THE CANVAS! Wembley rallies behind Ospreay as both men struggle to get to their feet, barely stirring before the challenger begins pounding the mat, leaning back onto his hands for a kip-up before Swerve simply spins to punt him in the face and bring him back to the mat. Strickland rises to his feet, looking for the House Call, but OSPREAY HAS NONE OF IT, CATCHING THE LEG FOR A STYLES CLASH! ONE! TWO! THR-NOO! Following through, Ospreay attempts a Hidden Blade, Swerve ducking it before rushing towards his opponent and INTO A SPANISH FLY FOR A NEARFALL! Ospreay grabs the back of Swerve’s head, paying him back for the focused assault with a flurry of Kawada Kicks to the face, followed by an attempt at a delayed vertical suplex, Strickland floating over and landing on his feet. The champion runs the ropes, Ospreay stopping him in his tracks with a dropsault and an enziguri, continuously building momentum with a STUNDOG MILLIONAIRE TO FINALLY DROP SWERVE TO HIS BACK! Unleashing a war cry, Ospreay has a gleam in his eyes as he looks towards the top turnbuckle, dragging himself through the ropes to the apron before clambering up to the high rent district, turning his back to Swerve for another SKY TWISTER PRESS, SWERVE ONCE AGAIN ROLLING IN TOWARDS THE TURNBUCKLES… BUT OSPREAY ROLLS STRAIGHT THROUGH TO HIS FEET! Strickland flashes his grill to the camera in the corner with a smile, Ospreay looming behind him before BLASTING STRAIGHT THROUGH HIM WITH A HIDDEN BLADE! ONE! TWO! THRE-SWERVE POWERS OUT! It’s been just over fifteen minutes of insanity as Ospreay smells blood in the water, knowing if he connects with a Stormbreaker, he can wrap this up. However, that certainty would only be cemented if he were to nail a Storm Driver 93, but he refuses to go to such lengths, hooking the arms… BUT SWERVE COUNTERS WITH A BACK BODY DROP, ONLY FOR OSPREAY TO LAND ON HIS FEET! HE BREAKS INTO A SPRINT, REBOUNDING OFF THE ROPES FOR A SPRINGBOARD OSCUTTER - STRAIGHT INTO A HOUSE CALL! SWERVE INTERCEPTED HIM! ONE! TWO! THRE-NOOOO! Strickland can’t believe it, but he’s got Ospreay dead to rights, spinning him around into position for a Tombstone. Strickland looks to the hard cam, a smug sneer on his face as OSPREAY REVERSES WITH A SEGA MEGA DRIVER, SPIKING HIM DOWN ON HIS HEAD! ONE! TWO! THRE-NOOOO! Ospreay is in disbelief, even a tribute to Mad Kurt not being enough to put Swerve down, but he’s staying on the ball as he hooks Swerve’s arms to go for a STORMBREAKER, ONLY FOR SWERVE TO FLOAT OVER FOR A LIFTING INVERTED DDT! Will’s rally wasn’t enough to get him out of trouble, and STRICKLAND FOLLOWS IT UP WITH A SECOND HOUSE CALL! SWERVE IMMEDIATELY ON THE ATTACK ONCE MORE, POSITIONING OSPREAY FOR A JML DRIVER… BUT WILL CLEARS HIS HEAD, COUNTERING WITH A POISON RANA! SWERVE UP TO HIS KNEES, BUT OSPREAY FOLLOWS IT WITH A SPRINGBOARD OSCUTTER! HIDDEN BLADE TO THE BASE OF THE SKULL, AND NOW… STORMBREAKER! ONE! TWO! THREE! WILL OSPREAY IS THE AEW WORLD CHAMPION! Will Ospreay def. Swerve Strickland (20:10) to win the AEW World Title Later in the night, Kazuchika Okada defeats Kenny Omega to win their fifth encounter, establishing himself firmly as the Number One Contender to the AEW World Title, giving the new champion only two weeks to prepare to face off with one of his greatest foes - a foe he’s only managed to beat cleanly once, while falling to the Rainmaker eight times. Road to All Out Ospreay gets to celebrate on Dynamite, cutting a promo saying he’s geared up to finally put this to bed. He says he’s glad he’s starting his title reign like this, because he’s certain he can beat Okada, and he’ll not have to worry about the spectre looming over him anymore. Every time there was a title on the line, every time the stakes were high, he failed against the Rainmaker - but the stakes were high at Wembley, and he won. He proved Swerve Strickland wrong, and now it’s time to prove Kazuchika Okada wrong. Out steps the Rainmaker, taking the EVP Elevator up onto the stage to say that Ospreay has already proven him wrong; he thought, years ago, that Ospreay was a talent worthy of being in Okada’s stable of CHAOS, and Ospreay proved him wrong when he betrayed his leader, only for Okada to beat the brakes off him at the Tokyo Dome. Okada says that Ospreay should be all too familiar with Okada being the top champion, the Ace, and he plans to finally bring that vision to AEW by restoring the world to its natural order and beating the Aerial Assassin for a ninth time. The Rainmaker’s ego is peaking, having avenged his loss to Kenny Omega just a few days prior, and he says that Omega’s a taller mountain to climb than Ospreay. However, he says he’s sure there’ll be room in the Elite’s ranks for Ospreay, should he come to his senses and want to fall back in line behind the Rainmaker. Ospreay declares that at All Out, he’ll prove to Okada and the world that he’s eclipsed the onetime Ace, while Okada insists that Omega was just the beginning - in just a few days, it’ll be time for the Rainmaker Era to start back up. All Out With All In having just occurred recently, All Out is a package deal with the Wembley show, ensuring a huge audience for what’s certain to be an all-timer main event between the Rainmaker and the Assassin. Both men want to walk out with the gold more than anything in the world, making an already personal rivalry all the more exciting as the coin drops for the last match of the night. Okada appears in a new robe, debuted two weeks prior at Wembley, and as he rises from the Elite Elevator, he’s looking more daunting than ever. There’s only one feud the man had ever lost, and he’d just avenged it against Kenny Omega - this is the most dangerous he’s ever been, and as Will Ospreay makes his way to the ring, Okada doesn’t even turn to face him. The champion is furious, but the challenger sees him as a formality standing between him and another epic World Title reign, refusing to even acknowledge him as they’re both introduced by Justin Roberts. They head to their respective corners, and THE BELL RINGS! IT’S OKADA AND OSPREAY, WORLD TITLE ON THE LINE! AEW World Title: Will Ospreay (c) vs. Kazuchika Okada Both men are hesitant to open themselves up to a big counter in the early goings, especially given how well they know each other, so they try and psych each other out a different way - by waiting. The crowd greets them with a deafening reception as they slowly circle the centre of the ring, eventually meeting with a lockup that sees Okada immediately put his height to good use, bearing down on Ospreay with an attempt at a test of strength. He pushes Ospreay down to the mat, even getting his shoulders down for a moment, but the champion bridges up off the canvas. Okada jumps up and drives his legs down into Ospreay’s body, but Ospreay maintains the bridge with both men’s weight, Okada getting back up and shooting for a lateral press that gets a one count. Transitioning into a side headlock, Okada talks some smack, the Young Bucks supporting him at ringside while taunting the champion. However, Ospreay’s put on plenty of muscle mass over the years, making it all the easier for him to slowly make his way to his feet, twisting free and securing a side headlock of his own on the Rainmaker. Okada sends him into the ropes, Ospreay clinging to the top as Okada instinctively goes for a flapjack. Momentarily confused, Okada gives Will the opening to run in for a dropsault, attempting to follow it with an enziguri that’s ducked, Ospreay springing up… and into a flapjack, the inevitability of the Rainmaker’s plans coming to fruition putting the champion in a bad spot early. Continuing with his somewhat lackadaisical pace, Okada keeps treating Ospreay like he’s not that big of a deal, shoving him into the corner for a double pat on the chest, followed by a stiff forearm across the jaw as the referee steps in. Ospreay lunges at him, Okada grabbing the arm for an Irish Whip into the opposite corner, rushing the champion with a big boot, but Ospreay SLINGSHOTS RIGHT OVER HIM, LANDING ON HIS FEET BEHIND THE RAINMAKER FOR A KICK TO THE HAMSTRING! Ospreay hones in with a swift roundhouse to Okada’s other leg, trying to take out his base, but Okada shrugs it off by catching the leg on a third kick attempt before driving his shoulder straight into the bridge of Ospreay’s nose, following it with a DDT that makes it look like Ospreay just died. The champion goes full scorpion, folding over himself like PAC as Okada grabs hold of the wrist to attempt an early Rainmaker. He gets Ospreay up to his feet, a smirk on his face as he winds him up, but Ospreay cuts through his grip with a sharp elbow before rolling Okada up with a victory roll reversal, straight into a DOUBLE STOMP TO THE GUT! Okada rolls right out of the ring and into the waiting arms of the Elite, Ospreay lining up to try and take him out with a dive before being halted by the Bucks, who leap into the way with their hands up. Ospreay shouts at them to move before going for it anyway, launching himself with a PESCADO, STRAIGHT INTO A BOOT TO THE STOMACH BY THE RAINMAKER! THE BUCKS GAVE HIM TIME TO RECOVER! Taking advantage immediately, Okada sends Ospreay crashing into the barricade, Ospreay crying out before Okada sends him into the aisle on the crowd side of the barrier. He measures his man as he heads to the opposite end of ringside, the Bucks gassing him up as he takes a running start for a CROSSBODY OVER THE GUARDRAIL, LANDING ON HIS FEET AFTER TAKING OUT THE AERIAL ASSASSIN! Okada dusts himself off, his signature look of superiority clearer than ever as he drags Ospreay back to ringside, laying in a few boots to the body before spitefully laying in another DDT, this time on the floor. He breaks the count before continuing to pummel Ospreay at ringside, the Bucks taunting the champion with each consecutive shot he takes. Okada works over the champion’s neck, digging a knee into the back of it as he postures with his stablemates before securing a waistlock for a GERMAN SUPLEX ON THE FLOOR, BUT OSPREAY FLIPS OUT OF IT! He flings himself at Okada with a Hidden Blade attempt from behind, the seemingly omniscient Okada ducking at just the right moment before throwing a boot - but Ospreay’s just too quick, slipping under it and LAYING IN A HOOK KICK, FOLLOWED BY A BACK SUPLEX ON THE OUTSIDE TO THE RAINMAKER! Ospreay backs the Bucks away, threatening to put their faces through the back of their heads before sliding back into the ring and EFFORTLESSLY SOARING THROUGH THE AIR WITH A SKY TWISTER PRESS TO THE FLOOR! He sends Okada back between the ropes, following him with a PIP PIP CHEERIO, BUT OKADA CUTS HIM OFF AGAIN BY KICKING OUT THE ROPES! Ospreay is left hung up on the top, Okada turning him over for a DRAPING NECKBREAKER OFF THE TOP! ONE! TWO! THR-KICKOUT! It’s been virtually all Okada thus far, and he continues to methodically wear Ospreay down with a targeted offensive on the neck of the AEW World Champion. Whenever Ospreay tries to get some momentum going, Okada’s able to reverse it, the style Ospreay honed in New Japan having paid dividends against plenty of other AEW talents, but not the man who defined the style for over a decade. Soon enough, Okada looks for the Rainmaker again, and Ospreay finds his opening by reversing it into a SPANISH FLY! ONE! TWO! KICKOUT! Ospreay looks like a bullet fired from a gun the second Okada’s constant pressure is taken off his shoulders, the champion bolting out to the apron to connect with a PIP PIP CHEERIO, NAILING IT BEFORE OKADA HAS TIME TO REALIZE WHAT HIT HIM! Okada tries to evacuate out the other side of the ring, but Ospreay’s having none of it, grabbing him by the trunks and pulling him back in for a SNAP DRAGON SUPLEX! ONE! TWO! TH-NOOO! Okada sits back up just in time for Ospreay to strike him with a standing round kick to the ear, filling the Rainmaker’s head with cobwebs before flattening him to the canvas with a superkick, finishing the sequence with a RUNNING SHOOTING STAR PRESS! ONE! TWO! THR-ANOTHER KICKOUT, BUT OSPREAY’S FINALLY GOTTEN CONTROL AWAY FROM THE CHALLENGER! With the Chicago crowd rallying behind him, Ospreay struggles to get to his feet, the twenty straight minutes of punishment taking a heavy toll on the champion. However, he’s certainly up before the stunned Okada, with the challenger still attempting to get his wits about him when Ospreay charges with a ROBINSON SPECIAL, STRAIGHT TO THE BASE OF THE SKULL! Okada gets to his feet on instinct alone, the Assassin positioning himself behind his prey and circling him before running the ropes for an OSCUTTER! ONE! TWO! THR-NOOO! Ospreay unleashes some Kawada Kicks on the challenger, letting out his aggression before lighting him up with a flurry of chops, Okada attempting to stand on business and throw some of his own, only for Ospreay to obliterate him with a superkick. Okada is left leaning on the ropes, Ospreay beckoning him towards the centre of the ring before attempting a SHOTGUN DROPKICK, SENDING HIM STRAIGHT THROUGH TO THE APRON! With Okada prone, Ospreay looks for the OSCUTTER ON THE APRON, BUT OKADA CATCHES HIM IN A STRAITJACKET! He attempts a Straitjacket German Suplex on the apron, Ospreay avoiding catastrophe with a back headbutt to the bridge of the nose, followed by a stiff back elbow to send Okada tumbling to the floor. Ospreay vaults over the ropes to break the count, finding himself in the perfect spot for an old favourite as Okada gets to his feet at the base of the ramp. Measuring his man, Ospreay leaps into motion with a SASUKE SPECIAL, BUT OKADA CATCHES HIM! WHAT STRENGTH FROM THE RAINMAKER, AND NOW… OH MY GOD, A TOMBSTONE PILEDRIVER ON THE FLOOR! Okada’s confidence is peaking, the Tombstone on the floor having been a hallmark of so many of his defining victories and none of his defeats. Knowing this, he rolls Ospreay straight back into the ring, the work on the neck having paid dividends as he immediately secures wrist control, hoisting Ospreay up into position for a RAIIIINMAKERRRRRR! HE GOT ALL OF IT! ONE! TWO! THRE-OSPREAY SOMEHOW LIFTS THE SHOULDER UP! Frustrated, Okada hurls Ospreay’s lifeless corpse into the corner and simply starts stomping a mudhole in his face, grinding his boot into the champion’s features before the referee pulls him away. Okada bickers with the ref as the Bucks sneak up on each side of Ospreay, Will instinctively grabbing a hold of Matthew, who scrambles backwards. However, Will stays latched onto him, forming a fist around Matthew’s tie and being pulled through the ropes… ONLY FOR NICHOLAS TO SUPERKICK OSPREAY STRAIGHT INTO THE RING POST, SPARING HIS OLDER BROTHER! Blood begins to spill from the side of Ospreay’s head, dripping onto the ring post and ring skirt as it becomes clear he hit his head damn hard against the steel. Okada pushes past the referee and continues to beat Ospreay down, relishing each moment of offence as he sends the champion packing to the outside with a petulant boot to the side of the head. He rolls out to the floor, the Bucks handing him a bottle of water to cool himself off with after such a brutal match, and now Okada gets to admire the Elite’s handiwork as crimson teardrops start dotting ringside, a bloody mask obscuring Ospreay’s face. Okada keeps beating ass, commentary noting that this is now the longest we’ve seen these two duke it out for, nearly 40 minutes having elapsed. Excalibur notes Ospreay seems harder than ever to put down, but Okada’s showing the same sort of dominance he has in the past, with Schiavone sounding worried that it might just be a matter of time. Looking to finally put an end to things, Okada starts raining closed fists on Ospreay’s head wound, hurling him into the timekeeper’s table. Eventually, he lays Ospreay out on it, clambering up with him before flipping off the camera and calling for another Tombstone. He flips Ospreay around… but Ospreay drops to the floor behind him, sweeping out Okada’s legs before nailing a CHEEKY NANDO’S AGAINST THE GUARDRAIL, LEAVING OKADA SPLAYED OUT ON THE TABLE! Ospreay scrambles towards the ring post, blood pouring down onto his chest as he makes the long climb up the turnbuckles for a FROG SPLASH THROUGH THE TABLE, AND THROUGH OKADA! The count was broken by him hitting the top rope, sparing both men the risk of being counted out as they lie their motionless. Chicago wills them to their feet, Ospreay sending Okada back into the ring before using the surge of energy and momentum to get the challenger up for a STORMBREAKER! HE GOT HIM! OSPREAY’S GONNA DO IT! Ospreay leaps atop Okada, grabbing the leg and leaning back into a deep cover, putting all his weight across the challenger’s shoulders… ONE! TWO! THRE-OKADA’S FOOT IS HOVERING OVER THE BOTTOM ROPE, OSPREAY TOO ENTHUSIASTIC WITH HIS PIN! The Bucks look like they’re about to have panic attacks as an exasperated, mentally battered Ospreay fights back tears, a fraction of an inch away from redemption. However, he knows he’s got control, so all he has to do is take this one home. Both men are in deep waters now, and with both being renowned for their gas tanks, it’s clearly come down to a war of attrition, both men knowing that it’ll all come down to landing the one big move that’ll keep one of them down. They’ve both sustained plenty of damage, but as Ospreay staggers over to the downed Okada, he gets this look in his eyes - the look of a man who has the chance to do the funniest thing ever against a man he resents oh so much. Ospreay grabs Okada’s wrist, the crowd letting out an “oooh” as it becomes clear he’s going for his own parody of the Rainmaker, traditionally a ripcord Spanish Fly. Okada is on dream street as Ospreay positions him, pulling the wrist to whip Okada around… but the Rainmaker is still wise to Ospreay’s moveset, keeping an arm near his side to stop Ospreay from latching on for a Spanish Fly. However, he wasn’t wise enough, Ospreay digging into Kenny Omega’s toolkit with a RAIN TRIGGER, BLINDSIDING OKADA WITH A HUGE HIT HE DIDN’T SEE COMING! Okada falls into the ropes, trying to keep himself upright by keeping a firm grip on the top rope, only to be uprooted by a POISON RANA, OSPREAY SPIKING THE CHALLENGER RIGHT ON HIS HEAD! He stumbles to the corner, Okada looking to find his footing as he gets to his knees… AND EATS A HIDDEN BLADE STRAIGHT TO THE FACE, OSPREAY MOWING STRAIGHT THROUGH HIS CHALLENGER! ONE! TWO! THRE-OKADA GETS THE SHOULDER UP, AND THE GRUELLING BOUT CONTINUES! Justin Roberts is starting to sound pretty nervous as he makes the 50 minute time call, informing both competitors that there’s only ten minutes left in their longest bout against one another to date. Ospreay crawls towards the ropes, driven by pure determination as he peels off his elbow pad, winding up for the Hidden Blade of a lifetime as Okada slowly starts to stir. Both men have taken each other’s biggest shots, but Okada’s in the champion’s sights now, Ospreay waiting until he’s in the perfect position before CHARGING AT FULL TILT INTO A DROPKICK FROM OKADA! Somehow, Okada’s still got pristine form this late into the match, but there’s no time to linger on his magnificence as he rises to his feet, dazed and confused, in desperate need of a dagger against Ospreay. He leans over to hook Ospreay’s wrist, calling for a second Rainmaker, and now he ripcords him in, ONLY FOR OSPREAY TO BLAST HIM WITH A HIDDEN BLADE TO THE FACE ONCE AGAIN ON THE REBOUND! Okada somehow keeps hold of Ospreay’s wrist, tumbling into the ropes and dragging the champion with him, gritting his teeth and letting out a primal roar before CLOBBERING OSPREAY WITH A SHORT ARM LARIAT, BRINGING THEM BOTH DOWN TO THE MAT! Ospreay gets the slightly better landing tactically, turned completely inside out and managing to drape an arm over… ONE! TWO! THRE-NOO! Okada’s kickout flips Ospreay onto his back, the Rainmaker now making an exhausted pinfall attempt… ONE! TWO! THRE-KICKOUT! WHAT’S IT GOING TO TAKE FOR ONE OF THESE MEN TO STAY DOWN? Puddles of Ospreay’s blood stain the canvas as both men lie there, the unimaginable exhaustion washing over both of them as they fight to be the first man to a vertical base. Commentary discusses the importance of securing the upper hand at this moment, and somehow, it’s Ospreay who’s up first, although only by a matter of seconds. Okada decks him with a forearm, the Rainmaker doubled over trying to catch his breath, but Ospreay clocks him with one of his own, followed by a ROLLING ELBOW TO DROP OKADA TO A KNEE! Ospreay ponders a moment, considering going for a Storm Driver 93, and as Justin Roberts says there’s five minutes remaining, he goes for it. He hooks Okada’s arms in a butterfly, muscling him up off his feet… but Okada drops down to his knees, Ospreay too exhausted to lift 250 pounds into position if that 250 pounds is still fighting back. The champion knees Okada in the face before going for it again, but this time, Okada shifts his weight back and SWINGS OSPREAY OVER HIS OWN SHOULDER FOR AN AIR RAID CRASH NECKBREAKER! Ospreay goes down like a sack of potatoes, clutching the back of his neck in pure agony, unable to function properly as Okada scrapes him off the canvas and positions him for an EMPHATIC COBRA FLOWSION, DRIVING OSPREAY’S NECK INTO THE MAT ONCE AGAIN WITH A RESOUNDING THUD! The challenger rises to his feet behind his foe… AND SPREADS HIS ARMS, THE CAMERA ZOOMING OUT TO ENCOMPASS THE CHICAGO CROWD! OKADA HITS THE RAINMAKER POSE, AND HE’S READY TO STUNT ON OSPREAY ONCE MORE! Ospreay’s in the perfect position for the Rainmaker, only a few minutes left on the clock, but both men’s movements have become lethargic and feeble after all they’ve been through. Matthew and Nicholas pound the mat to encourage Okada as he painstakingly leans over to latch on to Ospreay’s wrist, the champion fighting as best he can with a few back elbows, all of which miss the mark. Okada drives a forearm into the back of Ospreay’s neck, dropping him to his knees again before finally heaving him up for the Rainmaker, winding up… AND WHIZZING RIGHT BY OSPREAY, WHO COLLAPSES FROM EXHAUSTION! Okada falls in a heap behind him, but he’s still in better shape than Ospreay with moments remaining. With the last of his adrenaline, Okada scrambles up and picks Ospreay up once more, positioning him for a Rainmaker… BUT OSPREAY DUCKS, THIS TIME BREAKING INTO A SPRINT TO GET OUT OF THE WRISTLOCK! HE BOUNCES OFF THE ROPES, OKADA TOO TIRED TO SPIN AROUND IN TIME, AND NOW OSPREAY NAILS AN UNPROTECTED HIDDEN BLADE TO THE BACK OF THE HEAD! He’s got to roll him over, the seconds counting down as Ospreay simply digs his shoulder into the Rainmaker’s arm to slowly turn him onto his back, struggling to hook the leg… ONE! TWO! THRE-KICKOUT! OKADA GOT THE SHOULDER UP! Ospreay can’t believe it, fighting to get his feet under him, frantically attempting to hook Okada’s arms to get him into position for a Storm… ding ding ding. Will Ospreay and Kazuchika Okada fought to a draw (60:00), for Ospreay to retain the AEW World Title Road to WrestleDream With Ospreay having been unable to put away the Rainmaker within an hour, it’s pretty clear that a rematch has to be on the horizon, but the question is where. Both Grand Slam and WrestleDream are coming up, and on Dynamite, Okada lays down the gauntlet for the PPV, saying that he intends to win the AEW Title at a show paying tribute to one of his idols in Antonio Inoki. However, Ospreay’s not off the hook until October just yet - Grand Slam still stands in the way, and a battle between two of his fantastic previous opponents is set to determine his challenger for the event. Those opponents? Swerve Strickland and MJF. In the end, MJF manages to pull out the win, securing a title challenge right next door to his home at Grand Slam. Ospreay walks in insecure, just as he did in the Owen Finals, but this time with good reason - his first title defence was hardly a successful one, and he might not even have the chance to make up for it if he doesn’t manage to put away the longest-reigning AEW World Champion ever, in their home state. The pressure’s on for the Assassin, and with challengers hounding him, all he can do is try and build momentum with wins week over week. He doesn’t bother trying to match MJF on the stick, the next challenger eviscerating the champion with promo after promo until the go-home show, where a fed up Ospreay simply snipes him with a Hidden Blade to cut him off. Grabbing the microphone, Will promises to prove the title belongs around his waist, telling MJF that he wants the same Max who dominated the AEW main event scene for over a year. (Cont'd in Comments) |
2024.05.29 03:49 SnooHabits4803 What Order Did the Early Deaths Happen In?(Fnaf Lore Part 2)
This post would not have come to my mind had it not been for this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJbYgqlH6H4
The important parts are essentially just a rehash of the main point of that video. I highly recommend watching it, it is very well made.
You will not see one main timeline post from this little series I have going here, as I think posts like that are filled with fluff and waste time. When reviewing timelines, people really only care about a few key issues, and I will only care to discuss those issues that are actually relevant. If you want a summary of the general series of events, there are millions ready to be read/watched.
Here is everything I plan to talk about in my little ramblings:
Death Order(This post)
Midnight Motorist
Book Canonicity
Golden Freddy(And by proxy, The One, Cassidy, and Andrew)
Crying Child
The Mimic
I feel this is the best order in which to tackle the main points of contention which currently plague the community, while also wasting the least time covering topics that mostly everyone already agrees upon.
Here is the order in which I believe the early deaths of the series happen:
Crying Child, Elizabeth, The Missing Children, Charlotte
When looking at this issue, I found that analyzing how the novels depict this early segment of the timeline provides a nice baseline. The novels are very specific about William's motivations when it comes to almost every death in the series. In fairness, I have not read them in a while, but as I recall his motivation for killing Charlotte is never properly said. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, though.
Novels' William's Story
Since many people completely misunderstand Afton's motives in these books, thanks in part to not having read them, I will quickly lay out William's story arc; the parts of his arc that are not relevant to this post will not be included.
After seeing Henry's newly created Robot Charlie, William becomes obsessed with recreating the spark that had resulted in Robot Charlie's creation. That spark of life that made her so real is what Afton wanted for the duration of the book trilogy. It is why he stole the final, adult Robot Charlie and crafted her into Circus Baby. But, after Elizabeth's death at the hands of Baby, William noticed her consciousness was preserved in the robot, and she was able to think as herself freely. This made William take a detour in his research, as he wanted to now recreate the "accident" of Baby's possession. This is why he killed the missing children, and stuffed their bodies into the animatronics.
This also connects to why Afton wants to become one of the animatronics; they represent his end goal. He wants his consciousness to be preserved in an immortal animatronic body, he's just too much of a pussy to do it himself. That's why he has Elizabeth slowly removing chunks of his body and inserting them into the amalgamation in The Fourth Closet.
With that quick summary out of the way, you can hopefully see why this provides such an important context for the death order in the games. Assuming Games' William has a similar story arc, we can actually confidently place many of the early deaths.
In the novels, William was attempting to recreate Charlie's spark, while in the games he was attempting to recreate the events leading to Crying Child's death in order to put him back together. I'll talk more about what that even means when I discuss the Crying Child, but for now it's just important to acknowedge that Crying Child's death is what caused the gas chambers and nightmare experiments to begin, which would coincide with the creation of the Funtime animatronics as there are no other experiments we know of that would require kidnapping kids. This follows the novels' series of events nicely, as Elizabeth's death to the Funtime animatronics would redirect William's studies into remnant and recreating possession, just like it did in the novels, and lead to the MCI.
This is, of course, all speculation, but it fits nicely with the fact that Circus Baby's existed at a time when springlock suits were still around, thanks to the suit on night 4 of that game. The timeline in general fits together very cleanly with this novel-based theory model, and you could even argue that the suit on night 4 is the one that caused the multiple simultaneous springlock failures.
The first point of Charlotte dying in the novels is easy enough to counter. This theory model already posits that Crying Child dying first ticks off all the narrative boxes that Charlotte dying first in the novels does. I think the theory so far should show that the story is actually closer to the novels' narrative if Crying Child dies first. You could argue that Charlotte dying before Crying Child doesn't affect this theory, and you'd be mostly right, but at that point her dying first would be pointless. There's no reason to assume she dies before Crying Child, so I'm not going to assume that she does without evidence(I know Midnight Motorist could be used as a point if certain theories are true, but Midnight Motorist is getting its own post).
The major piece of evidence that many fans point to which "proves" Charlotte is William's first victim is the aforementioned line from Henry's speech in the Insanity Ending. I will counter this evidence with evidence of my own, suggesting that Susie was actually William's first kill.
As I'm sure you know, in Ultimate Custom Night Withered Chica can sometimes say "I was the first, I have seen everything" when she kills you. Many people write this off as her just being the first MCI victim, but I don't buy that. Knowing that would be useless to fans' understanding of the narrative at that time. Knowing that she was William's first victim overall, however, is much more impactful to the story, and is frankly a much more meaningful and intuitive interpretation of that line. With Henry's line, it can be easily interpreted to be referencing between William and Henry personally rather than having to be an indirect wound on Henry caused from Charlotte's death. The alternative explanation for that line is much easier to get behind than the alternative explanation for Chica's line.
Additionally, Help Wanted 2 recently gave us another hint at a potential death order. In Princess Quest 4, lighting the 6 graves in the correct order leads to the Bonnie mask secret. Charlotte's grave is the last to be lit, and Susie's is the first to be lit. I don't think that it's a coincidence that Susie is the first once again.
That sums up my thoughts on the early death order. I'll get to work on verbalizing my thoughts on Midnight Motorist soon.
(Reddit was being fucky and irritating when writing this and stuff got deleted a lot, apologies if parts don't make sense as a result of that)
submitted by SnooHabits4803 to fnaftheories [link] [comments]
The important parts are essentially just a rehash of the main point of that video. I highly recommend watching it, it is very well made.
You will not see one main timeline post from this little series I have going here, as I think posts like that are filled with fluff and waste time. When reviewing timelines, people really only care about a few key issues, and I will only care to discuss those issues that are actually relevant. If you want a summary of the general series of events, there are millions ready to be read/watched.
Here is everything I plan to talk about in my little ramblings:
Death Order(This post)
Midnight Motorist
Book Canonicity
Golden Freddy(And by proxy, The One, Cassidy, and Andrew)
Crying Child
The Mimic
I feel this is the best order in which to tackle the main points of contention which currently plague the community, while also wasting the least time covering topics that mostly everyone already agrees upon.
Here is the order in which I believe the early deaths of the series happen:
Crying Child, Elizabeth, The Missing Children, Charlotte
When looking at this issue, I found that analyzing how the novels depict this early segment of the timeline provides a nice baseline. The novels are very specific about William's motivations when it comes to almost every death in the series. In fairness, I have not read them in a while, but as I recall his motivation for killing Charlotte is never properly said. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, though.
Novels' William's Story
Since many people completely misunderstand Afton's motives in these books, thanks in part to not having read them, I will quickly lay out William's story arc; the parts of his arc that are not relevant to this post will not be included.
After seeing Henry's newly created Robot Charlie, William becomes obsessed with recreating the spark that had resulted in Robot Charlie's creation. That spark of life that made her so real is what Afton wanted for the duration of the book trilogy. It is why he stole the final, adult Robot Charlie and crafted her into Circus Baby. But, after Elizabeth's death at the hands of Baby, William noticed her consciousness was preserved in the robot, and she was able to think as herself freely. This made William take a detour in his research, as he wanted to now recreate the "accident" of Baby's possession. This is why he killed the missing children, and stuffed their bodies into the animatronics.
This also connects to why Afton wants to become one of the animatronics; they represent his end goal. He wants his consciousness to be preserved in an immortal animatronic body, he's just too much of a pussy to do it himself. That's why he has Elizabeth slowly removing chunks of his body and inserting them into the amalgamation in The Fourth Closet.
With that quick summary out of the way, you can hopefully see why this provides such an important context for the death order in the games. Assuming Games' William has a similar story arc, we can actually confidently place many of the early deaths.
The Afton Deaths
I think I can confidently say Crying Child dies first. Since Robot Charlie isn't a game character, William would need that initial motivation into the spark of life, or some sort of similar concept. Crying Child fits that perfectly, as we know William was attempting to recreate his experiences with the nightmare chambers depicted in Sister Location and Dittophobia. Dittophobia further tells us that William was specifically analyzing fear, most likely as a result of his observations of Crying Child's intense fear leading up to his death. Assuming William is the Fredbear Plush, or is in some way connected to him on a symbolic level, he would've seen everything that had happened to the Crying Child leading up to his death and his promise to put him back together. We know that line in particular originates from William in the games, as Michael states that William asked him to do the same thing to Elizabeth at the end of Sister Location.In the novels, William was attempting to recreate Charlie's spark, while in the games he was attempting to recreate the events leading to Crying Child's death in order to put him back together. I'll talk more about what that even means when I discuss the Crying Child, but for now it's just important to acknowedge that Crying Child's death is what caused the gas chambers and nightmare experiments to begin, which would coincide with the creation of the Funtime animatronics as there are no other experiments we know of that would require kidnapping kids. This follows the novels' series of events nicely, as Elizabeth's death to the Funtime animatronics would redirect William's studies into remnant and recreating possession, just like it did in the novels, and lead to the MCI.
This is, of course, all speculation, but it fits nicely with the fact that Circus Baby's existed at a time when springlock suits were still around, thanks to the suit on night 4 of that game. The timeline in general fits together very cleanly with this novel-based theory model, and you could even argue that the suit on night 4 is the one that caused the multiple simultaneous springlock failures.
Charlotte, and "a wound first inflicted on me"
The main criticism that I'm sure this order is going to get is the widely held belief that Charlotte was William's first victim. This is what happens in the novels, and Henry states that the wound William inflicted on the world was "first inflicted on [Henry]." I have thoughts about both of these pieces of evidence, as well as my own evidence suggesting Charlotte is the last death of the games. There's an extremely good chance you've heard all of this before, but I hope to present my case in as thorough and convincing a way as possible regardless.The first point of Charlotte dying in the novels is easy enough to counter. This theory model already posits that Crying Child dying first ticks off all the narrative boxes that Charlotte dying first in the novels does. I think the theory so far should show that the story is actually closer to the novels' narrative if Crying Child dies first. You could argue that Charlotte dying before Crying Child doesn't affect this theory, and you'd be mostly right, but at that point her dying first would be pointless. There's no reason to assume she dies before Crying Child, so I'm not going to assume that she does without evidence(I know Midnight Motorist could be used as a point if certain theories are true, but Midnight Motorist is getting its own post).
The major piece of evidence that many fans point to which "proves" Charlotte is William's first victim is the aforementioned line from Henry's speech in the Insanity Ending. I will counter this evidence with evidence of my own, suggesting that Susie was actually William's first kill.
As I'm sure you know, in Ultimate Custom Night Withered Chica can sometimes say "I was the first, I have seen everything" when she kills you. Many people write this off as her just being the first MCI victim, but I don't buy that. Knowing that would be useless to fans' understanding of the narrative at that time. Knowing that she was William's first victim overall, however, is much more impactful to the story, and is frankly a much more meaningful and intuitive interpretation of that line. With Henry's line, it can be easily interpreted to be referencing between William and Henry personally rather than having to be an indirect wound on Henry caused from Charlotte's death. The alternative explanation for that line is much easier to get behind than the alternative explanation for Chica's line.
Additionally, Help Wanted 2 recently gave us another hint at a potential death order. In Princess Quest 4, lighting the 6 graves in the correct order leads to the Bonnie mask secret. Charlotte's grave is the last to be lit, and Susie's is the first to be lit. I don't think that it's a coincidence that Susie is the first once again.
That sums up my thoughts on the early death order. I'll get to work on verbalizing my thoughts on Midnight Motorist soon.
(Reddit was being fucky and irritating when writing this and stuff got deleted a lot, apologies if parts don't make sense as a result of that)
2024.05.29 03:37 No_Reception_6330 Toxic Leadership in the CAF
The Canadian Armed Forces do not have a monopoly on foolish leaders, sociopaths, tyrants, or people lacking emotional intelligence. They can be found leading large companies, directing schools, heading major hospitals, and even within the church, basically wherever they can climb the ranks. The Canadian Armed Forces are not exempt from this problem of toxic leadership. I would even argue that the Canadian Armed Forces, due to their strict and highly regimented nature, provide an environment conducive to toxic leadership.
For the first time on this blog, I took the time to interview several people in order to write this article. The process was easy: everyone wants to talk about their experience under a toxic leader. Through these testimonials, I tried to better define what is meant by toxic leadership. I also wondered what causes a leader to become toxic. Finally, I attempt to provide some solutions to eliminate this scourge.
Defining Toxic Leadership
Leadership can be defined as the art of influencing human behavior. There are formal leaders (those who have received « authority ») and informal leaders (those who have charisma or a natural gift for influencing others). There are positive leaders and negative leaders.
« A positive leadership attempts to maintain a friendly and warm working climate within the team in order to bring out the best in each of its members. Negative leadership, on the other hand, influences the members of his team through judgment, negativity, opposition, or disinterest in the project. » (source: HEC).
At one end of the positive-negative leadership spectrum is the toxic leader. What distinguishes them from negative leaders? In my interpretation, a leader becomes toxic when the unhealthy influence they have on their personnel has severe impacts outside the workplace.
The Dark Triad
Psychologists have identified three traits that make up the sinister « dark triad of toxicity »: narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy.
The Narcissist
Narcissists need to see themselves as the best in everything. They don’t seek to elevate the people around them; they only seek to elevate themselves by belittling others. Despite this, they are convinced that they are good leaders, that they are humane. To convince themselves of their benevolence, they sometimes say good words to their staff. They do it because they keep what I call « the book of the perfect platoon commander » closely guarded. They have learned what they should say – « take care of yourself, seek a good work-life balance, it’s not a sprint but a marathon, you need to think about yourself too, etc. » – but they are fundamentally incapable of applying these fine principles. They are tyrants, their true nature remains. Narcissists don’t end up in therapy: they send others to therapy.
The intelligent toxic leader know that they need certain key people to achieve their goals: these are often their inner circle. To ensure their loyalty, they charm them, cajole them, they treat them like royalty. But these people can never leave the organization because they are responsible for the tyrant’s success. In the long run, they too must forget their dreams and ambitions. This is commonly called a « punishment for success ».
The Machiavellian
The Machiavellian leader – an adjective derived from Niccolò Machiavelli’s work « The Prince, » published in the 16th century – uses multiple stratagems to achieve their ends. For them, the end justifies the means entirely. They will not hesitate to regularly throw their colleagues or subordinates under the bus. Why do they target their peers and subordinates? Because they pose direct threats to their power; these are the men and women who could want to take their place or, worse, snatch away the position they covet at the higher level.
Machiavellian leaders tend to assess the people they work with very quickly. Like on the Tinder app, they quickly swipe left or right depending on whether they judge a person competent or incompetent, or rather, useful or detrimental to their goals. And they don’t spare those who swipe the wrong way. Some will even go to great lengths to ensure that those they consider weak or detrimental are not considered for promotion. They won’t hesitate to call their superiors about them to ensure they don’t have an equal chance compared to their peers. They engage in a real undermining, which is defined by actions carried out more or less secretly to destroy someone.
The Psychopath
« The personality traits associated with psychopathy include a lack of empathy or remorse, antisocial behavior, and being manipulative and unstable. It is important to note that there is a distinction between psychopathic traits and being a psychopath, commonly associated with criminal violence » (Source: MindTools). There are psychopaths in all armies, but generally, we do a pretty good job of identifying and eliminating them. Nevertheless, some leaders exhibit the personality traits mentioned above. When we think of a psychopathic leader in uniform, we generally think of a sergeant yelling in a soldier’s face, but it’s much more insidious.The toxic leader denigrates, belittles, plays on emotions, and erodes trust slowly. They don’t just shout once; they consistently rant. For those who constantly receive their insults, it’s death by a thousand cuts.
Beyond the character traits associated with the dark triad, there are other characteristics of toxic leaders. For example, some toxic leaders hide a significant lack of self-confidence under their tyrant facade. To mask their fear, they constantly yell, without realizing that yelling is losing one’s composure, a sign of weakness. They believe they are protected by a shell, but in reality, they wear a tactical vest filled with mines and grenades that sow chaos in the ranks. It’s not an armor they wear; it’s an arsenal.
In light of what we’ve seen, it appears that toxic leaders need to feel better than others, they need attention, they need to belittle, or even crush. In short, they don’t just break careers; they go as far as breaking lives.
Impact on the Organization
A toxic leader gets results quickly, which reinforces their belief that they are using the right approach. In the short term, the technique works, that’s undeniable. However, in the long run, they cause immeasurable damage, leaving behind what I call a « trail of destruction »: shattered careers, personnel in therapy, individuals completely jaded and cynical, and sometimes shattered lives. To quote a friend who is an officer, a toxic leader:
Toxic leaders eventually establish an unhealthy climate within their team, a climate of « every man for himself. » This leads subordinates to experience anxiety and, sometimes, depression. Peers no longer take the time to inquire about the mental health of their teammates because there is no team spirit. Sometimes, there isn’t even a team. Like the leader who is the chief intimidator, some subordinates become bullies themselves. You quickly choose your side: the strong weigh down on the weak. Everyone says to themselves, « I won’t let myself be trampled on anymore; now I’ll be the one trampling on others. »
Why Are Toxic Leaders Sometimes Rewarded?
Why, knowing all this, are toxic leaders rewarded? Firstly, part of the blame must be attributed to the regimental system (or its equivalent in other services/environments). Regiments quickly identify their favorites, the chosen ones, those who will rise to the rank of general. These individuals are identified very early, even during training phases. Too often, those selected are the ones who speak loudly, have attitude, a big ego, in short, those considered to have « the look for the job. » Then, the regiment pushes them forward and, if necessary, sweeps their small missteps under the rug. What happens if the regiment is wrong? It still pushes forward because admitting you’re wrong is worse than pulling a candidate out of the race.
Toxic leaders are also pushed upward because they are generally effective, very effective even. With a toxic leader, you walk on eggshells. You strive to give 100% of yourself, especially at the beginning, because you want to avoid the ground suddenly disappearing from beneath you. But these leaders are not just demanding; you can be demanding without being a jerk. No, they don’t just demand; they break their personnel to a point of no return. They squeeze the fruit until the seeds and core are crushed.
In the long run, the entire organization loses out. Firstly, the toxic leader exhausts their personnel. Secondly, without necessarily rebelling openly, subordinates increasingly keep their good ideas to themselves. A good leader fosters ideas, while a bad leader believes they have a monopoly on good ideas. Over time, their staff engage in what I call « passive resistance. » Some will even go as far as sabotaging a project if they believe they can do so with impunity. The toxic leader thinks they are getting the most juice possible when, in reality, they are shooting themselves in the foot. Instead of seeing effectiveness in toxic leadership, the chain of command should realize that tyrants don’t think about common success; they only envision their own success. The institutional problem with this approach is that another leader will succeed the toxic one and inherit a completely drained and demoralized unit.
I am aware that much more is demanded of military personnel than civilians; in fact, it’s one of the few areas of employment where the ultimate sacrifice can be asked. I am also aware that troops must be toughened to prepare them for the brutality of combat, a concept called toughening. I believe strongly in toughening. It’s an essential process for creating fighters. Troops are toughened through training and exercises; the leadership model exercised during these trainings and exercises is necessarily tough, severe, and intense. But it’s possible to be very demanding without falling into abuse, denigration, and harassment. The line between severe authority and abuse is thin, but it exists, and one must always be aware of it. You can be feared and respected as a leader without being hated (for those who appreciate the teachings of Machiavelli).
How to Prevent Toxic Leadership
How can toxic leadership be prevented? Here is a non-exhaustive list:
Initially, supervisors who become aware of a toxic leader under their command must show managerial courage and take the necessary steps to restore the climate.
Conduct more psychometric assessments and 360-degree evaluations where subordinates are asked to assess leadership.
Assign caring mentors to promising officers and non-commissioned officers to help them develop suitable leadership styles.
Conduct organizational climate surveys to obtain employees’ perceptions and perspectives. These surveys address attitudes and concerns that help the organization work with employees to bring about positive changes.
Invest in personal development (soft skills) and raise awareness among leaders about emotional intelligence.
Bring in leaders from outside at various ranks (for example, a business leader becomes a lieutenant colonel), an idea from retired American General Stanley McChrystal that remains quite controversial but is worth considering.
Integrate unions into the ranks, as done by the police and some foreign armies, to prevent abuses and avoid rash decisions. Another controversial but certainly effective proposal.
Conclusion
When I went through my infantry officer training, I was instilled with this simple phrase: Mission First, Men Second. Toxic leaders only apply the first half of this motto. Fortunately, mindsets have changed over time. We now say Mission First, People Always. One of the undisputed « truths » of special forces is that « humans are more important than equipment. » We realized that humans were central to the enterprise and that they could break like a piece of equipment.
Once, narcissism was sometimes confused with efficiency and arrogance with leadership. Fortunately, times are changing. Trainings on diversity, harassment, and concerns about integrating LGBTQ+ members, for example, are being provided. In recent years, people have also become more outspoken. There is less hesitation to escalate abuses of toxic leaders to higher levels of command.
The more these leaders are eliminated, at all levels, the fewer bad role models are offered to junior officers and non-commissioned officers. There is hope.
submitted by No_Reception_6330 to army [link] [comments]
For the first time on this blog, I took the time to interview several people in order to write this article. The process was easy: everyone wants to talk about their experience under a toxic leader. Through these testimonials, I tried to better define what is meant by toxic leadership. I also wondered what causes a leader to become toxic. Finally, I attempt to provide some solutions to eliminate this scourge.
Defining Toxic Leadership
Leadership can be defined as the art of influencing human behavior. There are formal leaders (those who have received « authority ») and informal leaders (those who have charisma or a natural gift for influencing others). There are positive leaders and negative leaders.
« A positive leadership attempts to maintain a friendly and warm working climate within the team in order to bring out the best in each of its members. Negative leadership, on the other hand, influences the members of his team through judgment, negativity, opposition, or disinterest in the project. » (source: HEC).
At one end of the positive-negative leadership spectrum is the toxic leader. What distinguishes them from negative leaders? In my interpretation, a leader becomes toxic when the unhealthy influence they have on their personnel has severe impacts outside the workplace.
The Dark Triad
Psychologists have identified three traits that make up the sinister « dark triad of toxicity »: narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy.
The Narcissist
Narcissists need to see themselves as the best in everything. They don’t seek to elevate the people around them; they only seek to elevate themselves by belittling others. Despite this, they are convinced that they are good leaders, that they are humane. To convince themselves of their benevolence, they sometimes say good words to their staff. They do it because they keep what I call « the book of the perfect platoon commander » closely guarded. They have learned what they should say – « take care of yourself, seek a good work-life balance, it’s not a sprint but a marathon, you need to think about yourself too, etc. » – but they are fundamentally incapable of applying these fine principles. They are tyrants, their true nature remains. Narcissists don’t end up in therapy: they send others to therapy.
The intelligent toxic leader know that they need certain key people to achieve their goals: these are often their inner circle. To ensure their loyalty, they charm them, cajole them, they treat them like royalty. But these people can never leave the organization because they are responsible for the tyrant’s success. In the long run, they too must forget their dreams and ambitions. This is commonly called a « punishment for success ».
The Machiavellian
The Machiavellian leader – an adjective derived from Niccolò Machiavelli’s work « The Prince, » published in the 16th century – uses multiple stratagems to achieve their ends. For them, the end justifies the means entirely. They will not hesitate to regularly throw their colleagues or subordinates under the bus. Why do they target their peers and subordinates? Because they pose direct threats to their power; these are the men and women who could want to take their place or, worse, snatch away the position they covet at the higher level.
Machiavellian leaders tend to assess the people they work with very quickly. Like on the Tinder app, they quickly swipe left or right depending on whether they judge a person competent or incompetent, or rather, useful or detrimental to their goals. And they don’t spare those who swipe the wrong way. Some will even go to great lengths to ensure that those they consider weak or detrimental are not considered for promotion. They won’t hesitate to call their superiors about them to ensure they don’t have an equal chance compared to their peers. They engage in a real undermining, which is defined by actions carried out more or less secretly to destroy someone.
The Psychopath
« The personality traits associated with psychopathy include a lack of empathy or remorse, antisocial behavior, and being manipulative and unstable. It is important to note that there is a distinction between psychopathic traits and being a psychopath, commonly associated with criminal violence » (Source: MindTools). There are psychopaths in all armies, but generally, we do a pretty good job of identifying and eliminating them. Nevertheless, some leaders exhibit the personality traits mentioned above. When we think of a psychopathic leader in uniform, we generally think of a sergeant yelling in a soldier’s face, but it’s much more insidious.The toxic leader denigrates, belittles, plays on emotions, and erodes trust slowly. They don’t just shout once; they consistently rant. For those who constantly receive their insults, it’s death by a thousand cuts.
Beyond the character traits associated with the dark triad, there are other characteristics of toxic leaders. For example, some toxic leaders hide a significant lack of self-confidence under their tyrant facade. To mask their fear, they constantly yell, without realizing that yelling is losing one’s composure, a sign of weakness. They believe they are protected by a shell, but in reality, they wear a tactical vest filled with mines and grenades that sow chaos in the ranks. It’s not an armor they wear; it’s an arsenal.
In light of what we’ve seen, it appears that toxic leaders need to feel better than others, they need attention, they need to belittle, or even crush. In short, they don’t just break careers; they go as far as breaking lives.
Impact on the Organization
A toxic leader gets results quickly, which reinforces their belief that they are using the right approach. In the short term, the technique works, that’s undeniable. However, in the long run, they cause immeasurable damage, leaving behind what I call a « trail of destruction »: shattered careers, personnel in therapy, individuals completely jaded and cynical, and sometimes shattered lives. To quote a friend who is an officer, a toxic leader:
Another friend wrote to me that, during his deployment in Afghanistan, his superior « tested and broke his resilience. » These are strong words, coming from a senior officer in combat arms. We are taught everywhere to create an environment where subordinates can develop. Nevertheless, there are still leaders who seek to demolish those they deem lacking the necessary skills to lead.
Toxic leaders eventually establish an unhealthy climate within their team, a climate of « every man for himself. » This leads subordinates to experience anxiety and, sometimes, depression. Peers no longer take the time to inquire about the mental health of their teammates because there is no team spirit. Sometimes, there isn’t even a team. Like the leader who is the chief intimidator, some subordinates become bullies themselves. You quickly choose your side: the strong weigh down on the weak. Everyone says to themselves, « I won’t let myself be trampled on anymore; now I’ll be the one trampling on others. »
Why Are Toxic Leaders Sometimes Rewarded?
Why, knowing all this, are toxic leaders rewarded? Firstly, part of the blame must be attributed to the regimental system (or its equivalent in other services/environments). Regiments quickly identify their favorites, the chosen ones, those who will rise to the rank of general. These individuals are identified very early, even during training phases. Too often, those selected are the ones who speak loudly, have attitude, a big ego, in short, those considered to have « the look for the job. » Then, the regiment pushes them forward and, if necessary, sweeps their small missteps under the rug. What happens if the regiment is wrong? It still pushes forward because admitting you’re wrong is worse than pulling a candidate out of the race.
Toxic leaders are also pushed upward because they are generally effective, very effective even. With a toxic leader, you walk on eggshells. You strive to give 100% of yourself, especially at the beginning, because you want to avoid the ground suddenly disappearing from beneath you. But these leaders are not just demanding; you can be demanding without being a jerk. No, they don’t just demand; they break their personnel to a point of no return. They squeeze the fruit until the seeds and core are crushed.
In the long run, the entire organization loses out. Firstly, the toxic leader exhausts their personnel. Secondly, without necessarily rebelling openly, subordinates increasingly keep their good ideas to themselves. A good leader fosters ideas, while a bad leader believes they have a monopoly on good ideas. Over time, their staff engage in what I call « passive resistance. » Some will even go as far as sabotaging a project if they believe they can do so with impunity. The toxic leader thinks they are getting the most juice possible when, in reality, they are shooting themselves in the foot. Instead of seeing effectiveness in toxic leadership, the chain of command should realize that tyrants don’t think about common success; they only envision their own success. The institutional problem with this approach is that another leader will succeed the toxic one and inherit a completely drained and demoralized unit.
I am aware that much more is demanded of military personnel than civilians; in fact, it’s one of the few areas of employment where the ultimate sacrifice can be asked. I am also aware that troops must be toughened to prepare them for the brutality of combat, a concept called toughening. I believe strongly in toughening. It’s an essential process for creating fighters. Troops are toughened through training and exercises; the leadership model exercised during these trainings and exercises is necessarily tough, severe, and intense. But it’s possible to be very demanding without falling into abuse, denigration, and harassment. The line between severe authority and abuse is thin, but it exists, and one must always be aware of it. You can be feared and respected as a leader without being hated (for those who appreciate the teachings of Machiavelli).
How to Prevent Toxic Leadership
How can toxic leadership be prevented? Here is a non-exhaustive list:
Initially, supervisors who become aware of a toxic leader under their command must show managerial courage and take the necessary steps to restore the climate.
Conduct more psychometric assessments and 360-degree evaluations where subordinates are asked to assess leadership.
Assign caring mentors to promising officers and non-commissioned officers to help them develop suitable leadership styles.
Conduct organizational climate surveys to obtain employees’ perceptions and perspectives. These surveys address attitudes and concerns that help the organization work with employees to bring about positive changes.
Invest in personal development (soft skills) and raise awareness among leaders about emotional intelligence.
Bring in leaders from outside at various ranks (for example, a business leader becomes a lieutenant colonel), an idea from retired American General Stanley McChrystal that remains quite controversial but is worth considering.
Integrate unions into the ranks, as done by the police and some foreign armies, to prevent abuses and avoid rash decisions. Another controversial but certainly effective proposal.
Conclusion
When I went through my infantry officer training, I was instilled with this simple phrase: Mission First, Men Second. Toxic leaders only apply the first half of this motto. Fortunately, mindsets have changed over time. We now say Mission First, People Always. One of the undisputed « truths » of special forces is that « humans are more important than equipment. » We realized that humans were central to the enterprise and that they could break like a piece of equipment.
Once, narcissism was sometimes confused with efficiency and arrogance with leadership. Fortunately, times are changing. Trainings on diversity, harassment, and concerns about integrating LGBTQ+ members, for example, are being provided. In recent years, people have also become more outspoken. There is less hesitation to escalate abuses of toxic leaders to higher levels of command.
The more these leaders are eliminated, at all levels, the fewer bad role models are offered to junior officers and non-commissioned officers. There is hope.
2024.05.29 03:10 QuietAffectionate498 ENFP ENTP or INTP
He followed me about a year ago after I created a new social media account (I had told an acquaintance two years ago that I thought he was cute, she told him that I thought so.) He also followed my private spam account, and continues to even though we have now been out of high school for nearly a year. He has never asked me out. I stared at him once or twice in the hallways, and I know that he knew this (looked a bit thrown off, maybe a bit uncomfortable or surprised by it,) yet never confronted me about it.
He has “any pronouns” in his profile, and that he is bisexual. He has posted: “idk if there’s a term for this already but I’ve observed two sorts of categories of jobs. there are jobs that provide a service which would still be necessary or beneficial in a context other than the current society (eg: farmer, doctor, builder) and there are some ‘that don’t fiat jobs’ (eg; passport checker; me)” and “we’re in such a bullshit era for tech rn” and “the scale of life is really starting to hit me and I don’t think that I have that many years left in my soul” and “what if there was a race of cosmic beings out there that had survived many heat deaths, hopping between universes and settling in ones with lifespan orders of magnitudes greater than ours, and what if the reason they never visit is because they perceive time on such a scale that to them our universe will be gone before they can leave? What if they exist on a physical scale much larger than ours, universes to us are subatomic to them, each universes governing laws defining its particle properties?” and “I just want to be observed on purpose every now and then and left completely alone the rest of the time” and “I think I have to become a different person to be happy. Recently I’ve been realizing how deep the roots of my mental health issues go like there’s all these weird conflicting systems in my brain that make it hard to think ‘normally’ and it gets really intense and stressful, but those same weird systems also govern so much of my outwards behavior that I think to change any amount. Of them would be to change something fundamental about who I am”
I actually had Pre Calculus with him in 11th grade. I remember I suspected he was cute underneath his mask (liked his eyes, he had blonde hair.) He liked to play around with his graphing calculator, and see what he could create. We did talk - he didn’t necessarily seem shy, yet also didn’t strike me as an overly enthusiastic person. I remember he told me that he had come close every year to not passing whichever math class he was taking, and that he’d almost failed the one he took the year prior, but had finished off the semester with a C (I think he mentioned that he didn’t tend to do homework.)
I’m quite confident that he remembers that I called him cute, hence why he has tended to vote “white” when I posted polls in the past asking followers of mine what they think my preference is and who they think I’m the most likely to end up with. Although I actually think that my preference has changed, which he may have not been able to predict. And voted “yes” when I posted asking if you think someone’s had a crush on me.
He dated an acquaintance of mine (xNFP) who may be a little below average (I suspect, based upon vibes, that our peers made fun of her for being overweight.) They dated in 8th grade and she apparently broke up with harshly (as someone who had issues with her communication sometimes, I believe that. She could be very blunt,) though they follow each other and I remember her suggesting that he forgave her.
Another acquaintance of mine (IxFP or ISFJ) mentioned not liking him when I said I thought he was cute - she said he’d posted something homophobic during the pandemic, which surprised me/was interesting to me seeing as how he identifies as bisexual. She also, I think, said he was arrogant.
View Poll
submitted by QuietAffectionate498 to MbtiTypeMe [link] [comments]
He has “any pronouns” in his profile, and that he is bisexual. He has posted: “idk if there’s a term for this already but I’ve observed two sorts of categories of jobs. there are jobs that provide a service which would still be necessary or beneficial in a context other than the current society (eg: farmer, doctor, builder) and there are some ‘that don’t fiat jobs’ (eg; passport checker; me)” and “we’re in such a bullshit era for tech rn” and “the scale of life is really starting to hit me and I don’t think that I have that many years left in my soul” and “what if there was a race of cosmic beings out there that had survived many heat deaths, hopping between universes and settling in ones with lifespan orders of magnitudes greater than ours, and what if the reason they never visit is because they perceive time on such a scale that to them our universe will be gone before they can leave? What if they exist on a physical scale much larger than ours, universes to us are subatomic to them, each universes governing laws defining its particle properties?” and “I just want to be observed on purpose every now and then and left completely alone the rest of the time” and “I think I have to become a different person to be happy. Recently I’ve been realizing how deep the roots of my mental health issues go like there’s all these weird conflicting systems in my brain that make it hard to think ‘normally’ and it gets really intense and stressful, but those same weird systems also govern so much of my outwards behavior that I think to change any amount. Of them would be to change something fundamental about who I am”
I actually had Pre Calculus with him in 11th grade. I remember I suspected he was cute underneath his mask (liked his eyes, he had blonde hair.) He liked to play around with his graphing calculator, and see what he could create. We did talk - he didn’t necessarily seem shy, yet also didn’t strike me as an overly enthusiastic person. I remember he told me that he had come close every year to not passing whichever math class he was taking, and that he’d almost failed the one he took the year prior, but had finished off the semester with a C (I think he mentioned that he didn’t tend to do homework.)
I’m quite confident that he remembers that I called him cute, hence why he has tended to vote “white” when I posted polls in the past asking followers of mine what they think my preference is and who they think I’m the most likely to end up with. Although I actually think that my preference has changed, which he may have not been able to predict. And voted “yes” when I posted asking if you think someone’s had a crush on me.
He dated an acquaintance of mine (xNFP) who may be a little below average (I suspect, based upon vibes, that our peers made fun of her for being overweight.) They dated in 8th grade and she apparently broke up with harshly (as someone who had issues with her communication sometimes, I believe that. She could be very blunt,) though they follow each other and I remember her suggesting that he forgave her.
Another acquaintance of mine (IxFP or ISFJ) mentioned not liking him when I said I thought he was cute - she said he’d posted something homophobic during the pandemic, which surprised me/was interesting to me seeing as how he identifies as bisexual. She also, I think, said he was arrogant.
View Poll
2024.05.29 03:01 AsherTheLion M4M - My Villain Academia
Hello, its Magnus once more. Today, we're going to go down a different path and search for something a little more specific than my usual ad. I'm interested in a MHA roleplay, or as I have affectionately titled it, a villain based story.
The characters I'm interested in playing for this are as followed, Dabi, Hawks, Shigaraki, Overhaul, Aizawa, and maybe Present Mic. You can play whoever you would like, a canon or an oc. If you'd rather just use the verse, I can play an oc as well. I'm even open to cross overs if that suits your fancy.
As usual, I am looking for 21+ partners who are on relatively the same level as I am. I tend to lean more towards a novella level, but I am willing to match that of my partner. The one thing I refuse to do is one-liners, however. I would prefer at least a 3-5 paragraph minimum, but more is always welcome. Currently located in the eastern time zone. A writing sample is included this time around to demonstrate my ability. Though it is a sample, you can count it as a plot as well. It's from Shigaraki's POV and about the Paranormal Liberation Front. I’d say it’s AU-ish? Take it how you will and if you like it, we can use it.
I don't have any solid plots in mind, but I do have some vague ideas. They're as simple as Aizawa secretly working with/for the LOV. Perhaps Mic finds out and actively tries to stop him. Or perhaps Mic joins in as well. The more the merrier. Or perhaps an AU where everything switches sides. I'm open to an assortment of AU ideas which can be discussed. I have a few more in mind, it just depends on characters used.
Discord is my preferred method of roleplay. So once we get things all hashed out we can move over to discord and we can get started there!
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-
They say it's lonely at the top. It has also been said that with great power comes great responsibility. A great many things have been said about power and its relation to the world around it. There have been other things said about the defeat of a greater power, too. Even if one took everything like that into consideration, they would be too distracted from the enemy coming straight at them. Then everyone would have "Oh how the mighty have fallen" things to say.
This was not a problem that Shigaraki Tomura had.
It was lonely at the top though. Even if sitting on that throne and overlooking the masses of villains below gave him a euphoria like one wouldn't believe. To think that he had been chosen for such greatness. His lieutenants flanked him on either side, each having their own conversations. The event hadn't started yet, they were permitted freedom to do as they wished for the time being.
A slight buzzing in his left pocket drew his attention and he was shifting in his seat to reach for it. Everyone he knew was here, who could be wanting to talk to him now? A glance down at the awakened screen told him it was just a notification for one of his idle games. What time was it? Did he have a few brief moments of relaxation left that he could check on it?
Oh, who the fuck was he kidding? He was the power that be here. His thumb danced along the pattern to unlock the phone and he thumbed around until he found the game. A little tap and it was opening. Collecting resources, powering up a few things. Advancing certain story aspects along and setting a course for the next advancement. Finishing up, he clicked the phone screen off and put it back into his pocket. One of his people was leaning over his shoulder, whispering in his ear that it was time to begin.
There was a nod of acknowledgment and his lieutenant stood up, taking their place. Though they had gone silent at the top, the rest of the peasants were still rambling like nothing was happening. So that's when he stood up and walked to the edge. No one had noticed just yet. Even after clearing his throat, a majority of them were still talking. He was moments away from ordering Dabi to incinerate half of them when a silence started to fall over the room. Oh, good.
As a sickeningly sweet smile fell upon his masked face, his eyes widened slightly. Another throat clear that was less dramatic than the first, and his lips were finally parting,
"I gather you all know why you're here. Why you've chosen to be here." He began, letting his voice carry and the message sink in. "Our goal may be simple, but the means of which to achieve it are not. That is why I've gathered the lot of you here. It's an opportunity to bolster your importance in this life. To get ahead. To take down the heroes that put you in this mess, to begin with, and . . . Make your place in it better."
submitted by AsherTheLion to RoleplayPartnerSearch [link] [comments]
The characters I'm interested in playing for this are as followed, Dabi, Hawks, Shigaraki, Overhaul, Aizawa, and maybe Present Mic. You can play whoever you would like, a canon or an oc. If you'd rather just use the verse, I can play an oc as well. I'm even open to cross overs if that suits your fancy.
As usual, I am looking for 21+ partners who are on relatively the same level as I am. I tend to lean more towards a novella level, but I am willing to match that of my partner. The one thing I refuse to do is one-liners, however. I would prefer at least a 3-5 paragraph minimum, but more is always welcome. Currently located in the eastern time zone. A writing sample is included this time around to demonstrate my ability. Though it is a sample, you can count it as a plot as well. It's from Shigaraki's POV and about the Paranormal Liberation Front. I’d say it’s AU-ish? Take it how you will and if you like it, we can use it.
I don't have any solid plots in mind, but I do have some vague ideas. They're as simple as Aizawa secretly working with/for the LOV. Perhaps Mic finds out and actively tries to stop him. Or perhaps Mic joins in as well. The more the merrier. Or perhaps an AU where everything switches sides. I'm open to an assortment of AU ideas which can be discussed. I have a few more in mind, it just depends on characters used.
Discord is my preferred method of roleplay. So once we get things all hashed out we can move over to discord and we can get started there!
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-
They say it's lonely at the top. It has also been said that with great power comes great responsibility. A great many things have been said about power and its relation to the world around it. There have been other things said about the defeat of a greater power, too. Even if one took everything like that into consideration, they would be too distracted from the enemy coming straight at them. Then everyone would have "Oh how the mighty have fallen" things to say.
This was not a problem that Shigaraki Tomura had.
It was lonely at the top though. Even if sitting on that throne and overlooking the masses of villains below gave him a euphoria like one wouldn't believe. To think that he had been chosen for such greatness. His lieutenants flanked him on either side, each having their own conversations. The event hadn't started yet, they were permitted freedom to do as they wished for the time being.
A slight buzzing in his left pocket drew his attention and he was shifting in his seat to reach for it. Everyone he knew was here, who could be wanting to talk to him now? A glance down at the awakened screen told him it was just a notification for one of his idle games. What time was it? Did he have a few brief moments of relaxation left that he could check on it?
Oh, who the fuck was he kidding? He was the power that be here. His thumb danced along the pattern to unlock the phone and he thumbed around until he found the game. A little tap and it was opening. Collecting resources, powering up a few things. Advancing certain story aspects along and setting a course for the next advancement. Finishing up, he clicked the phone screen off and put it back into his pocket. One of his people was leaning over his shoulder, whispering in his ear that it was time to begin.
There was a nod of acknowledgment and his lieutenant stood up, taking their place. Though they had gone silent at the top, the rest of the peasants were still rambling like nothing was happening. So that's when he stood up and walked to the edge. No one had noticed just yet. Even after clearing his throat, a majority of them were still talking. He was moments away from ordering Dabi to incinerate half of them when a silence started to fall over the room. Oh, good.
As a sickeningly sweet smile fell upon his masked face, his eyes widened slightly. Another throat clear that was less dramatic than the first, and his lips were finally parting,
"I gather you all know why you're here. Why you've chosen to be here." He began, letting his voice carry and the message sink in. "Our goal may be simple, but the means of which to achieve it are not. That is why I've gathered the lot of you here. It's an opportunity to bolster your importance in this life. To get ahead. To take down the heroes that put you in this mess, to begin with, and . . . Make your place in it better."
2024.05.29 02:34 Estel-3032 Deck variety on the casual mode
Hello!
I've been thinking about how the game differs from ranked to casual lately. After reaching Master league I decided to step away from the ladder a bit and figure out how casual mode is adapting to Twilight Masquerade.
For this experiment I decided to play something incredibly silly (4x Teal Mask Ogerpon with 35 energies), partly because I thought that people would be playing silly/experimental/unoptimized things in casual and partly to save me some braincells since this deck is just attach/attach and dunk so matches go quickly on my way or against it. I had very little experience with casual before as I usually just sit on ladder with whatever things seem to be working in a given week.
Some of these matches were against players that were clearly new or unfamiliar with how their decks worked, their sequencing was all over the place and in quite a few occasions I could not make sense of what their plans were. But mostly games went on just fine.
Some considerations about the data:
1 - The silly deck I was playing can farm charizard all day long and zard still seems to be very popular in casual.
2 - Dragapult requires some brainpower to play and I think I faced a lot of people that were still figuring out how the cards interact
3 - I faced like 3 mimikyus (twice against gardevoir, once against unfezant) and 1 cornerstone ogerpon during testing which were basically auto-losses. I tried to boss them around for a bit, but the deck just wasnt cut to deal with the little fellow.
4 - sometimes people automatically concede before I can figure out what they are trying to do when they lead with something niche/weird, I haven't added them to the data below
5 - a lot of decks seem to be heavy on disruption so they end up with many dead cards in hand if there's nothing worth disrupting
6 - greninja (with and without frostlass) seems to be ridiculously good and consistent. Loved both my matches against them.
7 - On average I had only one mullingan per match. Once I had 11 and proceeded to be absolutely stomped by dialga + arceus. Good times.
8 - I saw a few weird/niche pokemon here and there but most decks I faced seemed to be somewhat functional. I imagine that a lot of people were testing stuff in there and that some bricked hands must have held them back, but overall, only a few of the matches were free wins (mostly against zards).
9 - I was surprised to see 4 Maccargo lists being played. That card seems to be soo bad. Still ripped holes in a few of my teal masks on occasion tho.
10 - I'm not an extremely competitive person, but I will try to write down results like this once the ladder resets to see how they differ from casual mode.
Today matches played: 50
Wins: 35
Losses: 15
meta decks (27)
tord Charizard (pidgey+bibarel):6 (6w)
dragapult + pidgeot: 6 (2w/4l)
dragapult + xatu:5 (5w)
chien pao:2 (2w)
miraidon: 2(2w)
lost box: 1(1w)
raging bolt + ogerpon: 2 (2l)
greninja ex + pidgeot:1 (1l)
greninja ex + frostlass: 1(1l)
gardevoir+monkey:1 (1l)
non-meta (23)
charizard + magcargo:4(4w)
future box:2(2w)
ancient box:2(2w)
blyssey ex:1(1w)
palafin:1(1w)
festival grounds:1(1w)
sinistcha + ogerpon:1(1w)
zoroark v-star:1(1w)
decidueye ex: 1(1w)
arceus+pikachu v:1(1w)
klawf/conkeldurr+bonnet: 1(1w)
toadscruel + ogerpon:1(1w)
Gardevoir + arceus:1(1l)
unfezant:1(1l)
dialga+arceus:1 (1l)
roaring moon + ogerpon:1(1l)
aegislash ex:1(1l)
cornerstone ogerpon ex: 1(1l)
This is the decklist I've used for this:
Pokémon: 2
4 Teal Mask Ogerpon ex TWM 211
Trainer: 8
1 Hisuian Heavy Ball ASR 146
3 Penny SVI 183
4 Nest Ball SVI 181
4 Gardenia's Vigor ASR 143
4 Bug Catching Set TWM 143
4 Boss's Orders PAL 265
1 Hero's Cape TEF 152
Energy: 1
35 Basic {G} Energy SVE 1
Total Cards: 60
submitted by Estel-3032 to PTCGL [link] [comments]
Hello!
I've been thinking about how the game differs from ranked to casual lately. After reaching Master league I decided to step away from the ladder a bit and figure out how casual mode is adapting to Twilight Masquerade.
For this experiment I decided to play something incredibly silly (4x Teal Mask Ogerpon with 35 energies), partly because I thought that people would be playing silly/experimental/unoptimized things in casual and partly to save me some braincells since this deck is just attach/attach and dunk so matches go quickly on my way or against it. I had very little experience with casual before as I usually just sit on ladder with whatever things seem to be working in a given week.
Some of these matches were against players that were clearly new or unfamiliar with how their decks worked, their sequencing was all over the place and in quite a few occasions I could not make sense of what their plans were. But mostly games went on just fine.
Some considerations about the data:
1 - The silly deck I was playing can farm charizard all day long and zard still seems to be very popular in casual.
2 - Dragapult requires some brainpower to play and I think I faced a lot of people that were still figuring out how the cards interact
3 - I faced like 3 mimikyus (twice against gardevoir, once against unfezant) and 1 cornerstone ogerpon during testing which were basically auto-losses. I tried to boss them around for a bit, but the deck just wasnt cut to deal with the little fellow.
4 - sometimes people automatically concede before I can figure out what they are trying to do when they lead with something niche/weird, I haven't added them to the data below
5 - a lot of decks seem to be heavy on disruption so they end up with many dead cards in hand if there's nothing worth disrupting
6 - greninja (with and without frostlass) seems to be ridiculously good and consistent. Loved both my matches against them.
7 - On average I had only one mullingan per match. Once I had 11 and proceeded to be absolutely stomped by dialga + arceus. Good times.
8 - I saw a few weird/niche pokemon here and there but most decks I faced seemed to be somewhat functional. I imagine that a lot of people were testing stuff in there and that some bricked hands must have held them back, but overall, only a few of the matches were free wins (mostly against zards).
9 - I was surprised to see 4 Maccargo lists being played. That card seems to be soo bad. Still ripped holes in a few of my teal masks on occasion tho.
10 - I'm not an extremely competitive person, but I will try to write down results like this once the ladder resets to see how they differ from casual mode.
Today matches played: 50
Wins: 35
Losses: 15
meta decks (27)
tord Charizard (pidgey+bibarel):6 (6w)
dragapult + pidgeot: 6 (2w/4l)
dragapult + xatu:5 (5w)
chien pao:2 (2w)
miraidon: 2(2w)
lost box: 1(1w)
raging bolt + ogerpon: 2 (2l)
greninja ex + pidgeot:1 (1l)
greninja ex + frostlass: 1(1l)
gardevoir+monkey:1 (1l)
non-meta (23)
charizard + magcargo:4(4w)
future box:2(2w)
ancient box:2(2w)
blyssey ex:1(1w)
palafin:1(1w)
festival grounds:1(1w)
sinistcha + ogerpon:1(1w)
zoroark v-star:1(1w)
decidueye ex: 1(1w)
arceus+pikachu v:1(1w)
klawf/conkeldurr+bonnet: 1(1w)
toadscruel + ogerpon:1(1w)
Gardevoir + arceus:1(1l)
unfezant:1(1l)
dialga+arceus:1 (1l)
roaring moon + ogerpon:1(1l)
aegislash ex:1(1l)
cornerstone ogerpon ex: 1(1l)
This is the decklist I've used for this:
Pokémon: 2
4 Teal Mask Ogerpon ex TWM 211
Trainer: 8
1 Hisuian Heavy Ball ASR 146
3 Penny SVI 183
4 Nest Ball SVI 181
4 Gardenia's Vigor ASR 143
4 Bug Catching Set TWM 143
4 Boss's Orders PAL 265
1 Hero's Cape TEF 152
Energy: 1
35 Basic {G} Energy SVE 1
Total Cards: 60
2024.05.29 02:18 MacMain49 My friend sent this to me while he playing Splatoon
 | submitted by MacMain49 to tf2 [link] [comments] |
2024.05.29 01:46 cgstories Odd Pete (part 2)
Previous part
Before I go on with the story, I wanted to mention that I finally got around to checking my text messages. I shouldn’t be surprised that all of them were furious. I don’t blame them. I’m still distraught about the whole situation. I pretty much lost all of my friends in one day; all because I thought that a little boy’s doll would come to life and... well...
Just, listen to me.
I know that all of this will sound insane. But everything I am about to tell you happened before. I feel like I can’t bring myself to even think of the moment, let alone tell you, but I need to press on. It is time that you understand the moment that everything changed forever—Pete's 11th birthday party.
What happened on that day plays over and over again in my mind. It doesn’t matter that 30 years have passed. Not a night goes by where I am wrenched from my beleaguered sleep and find myself gasping for air in a pool of my own sweat. Years of broken sleep will get to a person over time. And so, I grew agitated and depressed. I was on and off on medication, and in and out of therapy.
Now, I don’t always freak out when I see them in pictures or on display in a shop’s front window. If I keep my distance and they keep theirs, I am fine. I mean, my breathing would quicken, and my heart would pump hard, but the moment would pass, and I’d come back to some level of normalcy. I’ve got my own way to deal with such a situation. I’d close my eyes and count from 100 to zero, deeply breathing in through my nose and out through my mouth, before slowly turning and walking away.
Oh, right. I guess you want to hear what happened.
XXXXX
Pete and his family lived in a massive two-story house with an acre of forestry within their property line. The house was miles outside of town. It was cozy but isolated.
I carpooled with Andy and his parents. We met up with Mark and his dad in the house. Our jaws dropped at how beautiful the house and their property were; none of us had ever been to such a fancy place.
Andy’s mom mentioned in the car that what she heard from the other moms was that Pete’s dad, George, worked as an inventor and toymaker for a company that no one had heard of, and his mom, Wendy, was a stay-at-home mom. She had tried to invite her out for coffee with the other moms. In the end she decided not to. Wendy’s presence was just too off-putting.
“She wouldn’t stop smiling,” Andy’s mom recalled, “and she’d just nod her head without saying anything. Not a word. And she moved in this very odd, kind of funny way, too. Like she didn’t know how to use her arms or legs.”
Kind of like how Pete was on his first day of class.
The family greeted the guests in the foyer with excited eyes and gaping smiles. They were the picture perfect of a 1950s TV sitcom family. Pete had on a blue and yellow checkered suit with a yellow bowtie. George also wore the same style of suit but with a blue tie. His outfit was topped with a tobacco pipe hanging at the side of his mouth. Wendy had on a yellow dress with a blue ribbon tied around her waist, and her flaming red hair rolled up in a bouffant hairstyle.
There were a couple of dozens of us that showed up to the party. Most of the parents came along, too. My mom couldn’t come; she was stuck at the restaurant picking up someone else’s shift. That was to say nothing of her continued fear and suspicion about the whole kidnapper situation. She believed they were still out there, and that the cops had gotten the wrong person.
Everyone was led into a banquet hall where a great feast waited for us. We stuffed ourselves until the buttons on our pants threatened to burst. Fat roasted turkey thighs, mince pies, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes smothered in gravy, a mountain of steaming sweet biscuits. The choices were endless. And the moms and dads enjoyed themselves, drinking the wine that Wendy, smiling emptily and silently, served.
George went around telling stories to anyone who’d be willing to listen. He was incredibly intelligent with a wide breadth of knowledge of world history. He spoke about historical events as if he’d been there himself, describing in such vivid detail of the event’s atmosphere like how the heaviness of grief weighed in the air at Alexander the Great’s funeral procession, and how frigid cold the Russian winter was in 1812 when Napoleon Bonaparte’s army marched towards Moscow.
He showed us a room filled with his collection of ancient artifacts, even an American Civil War-era musket rifle with a Minie ball still lodged inside. But what caught my attention and raised the hairs on my body were three mummies behind a glass case. They were about my height and, judging by the smallness of their faces, they had died as children.
“Why do you have those?” I asked.
George grinned. “Well, why not?”
“Where’d you get them from?” asked Andy.
“Far and near...”
Squinting, Mark stepped up closer to the glass. “Are they real?”
“What do your eyes tell you?”
Together, we pressed our noses to the glass, staring hard at these mummies. Their skin was withered brown, and parts of their yellowed bone were exposed. They stared back at us with dark empty sockets and twisted mouths as though they’d come face to face with something more terrifying and terrible than death. None of the adults with us thought it weird that this family had such a collection. The moms and dads were starting to act a bit giddy and silly; it was the generous amount of wine they’d drunk, probably.
After a tour of George’s mini-home museum, we were led into an adjacent room filled with toys, clowns, dolls, and a bizarre collection of crossbred animals. A full train set wound about the length of the room and over our heads. This was Pete’s playroom, and George had designed every toy. This massive room with all the toys and games was more than what a child could dream of.
Unable to control ourselves, we got our hands on everything; we were a bunch of 10-year-olds after all. We played with the toys and shrieked with laughter. The moms and dads watched us as they drank the wine Wendy was serving them. Before we knew it, time flew by, and the sun had long since gone down. The grandfather clock struck 9 o’clock. But we weren’t tired; we wanted to play some more. So, we were thrilled when the grown-ups nodded and agreed to let us go on.
Shining with happiness, Pete announced that we were to play a special game, even the grown-ups would be involved.
“This game is called Catch the Souls!” he said. “The rules are quite simple. There are two types of players: souls and catchers. The game will be played both in the dark and in the light. Souls are safe in the light and the catchers won’t be able to move. But when the lights are off, souls better find a place to hide for the catchers will hunt you down and bring you to the king—me!"
“Then, how do we know if we’ve won?” I asked.
His eyes darkened as the pupils enlarged. “Well, when you see the sun rise, then you’ll know.” My stomach sank.
Were we really going to play all night?
I looked at the others to see if they also thought this was a ridiculous idea. Much to my surprise, the others buzzed with excitement, even the adults were eager to play. No one wanted to go home just yet. They wanted to play more. And, surprisingly, I wasn’t at all that tired or sleepy either. George ordered for the moms and dads to follow him into another room; they were to put on their “catcher” costumes.
Mark, Andy, and I decided to stick together. We figured that if we could find a good spot to hide out in, we could wait there until the game was over. At the beginning of the game, all the lights were on in every room and hallway, and Pete counted backwards from 100.
My friends and I bolted. We didn’t realize how huge the house was. It was like a never-ending labyrinth. One door would lead to nowhere except a brick wall, or a sudden drop into what looked like a bottomless pit. Andy had nearly fallen into one and was only saved when Mark and I caught him by the arms as he fell and clung desperately to the doorknob.
The hallways echoed with giggles of excitement. But once the lights began to flicker, the whole house plunged into darkness. We hurried into another room. I hid behind a desk, Mark behind a big tapestry, and Andy in the corner of the room squatting behind a tall vase.
We waited.
We held our breath.
A hair-raising scream erupted in another room. Followed by another, then another. Three in succession.
“What was that?” I heard Mark ask, shakily.
“What are you doing?” Andy cried.
Peeking around the corner of the desk, I spotted Mark out from his hiding spot and poking his head out the door. He quickly shut the door and scrambled back behind the tapestry. Before I could ask him what he saw, the door opened. My body instantly went rigid. I was terrified that if I were to move or breathe, I’d get caught. I certainly didn’t want to find out what Pete would do to me.
A tall, shadowy figure with two long pointed ears entered the room. It was a Catcher. It hopped slowly around the room like a rabbit, playing with the leaves of the plants in the tall vase and sniffing around the tapestry. Then it turned its attention to the desk. I scooted back underneath the desk and slapped my hand over my mouth, desperate not to make a sound. I heard it hop into the air before its feet landed gently on the floor right next to the desk. It took a step closer to the spot where I lay in a fetal position. I hoped that I was small enough that it wouldn’t notice me.
Light swept throughout the room. And I let out a breath of relief. We were safe when the lights were on. That was the rule of the game, I reminded myself. I crawled out from underneath the desk and froze as I came face to face with a giant pink bunny. I knew that inside the costume was a classmate’s parent. But there was something off about it, like it had no good intentions. It stared back with large black orbs for eyes. Its large buck teeth dripped droplets of red on the white carpet. Dark red chunks like mushed up beets fell from its mouth.
“Benjie! Don’t just stand there!” Mark pulled me out of the trance, and I ran out with them. At the end of the hallway, we saw another Catcher dressed in a court blue and yellow jester suit and mask.
The lights flickered; one minute warning for us to find another hiding spot. Without looking back, we ran and tried getting into another room. With utter mortification I learned that most of the doors were locked. Not only that, but others only led to dead ends. We went through one door that led to another hallway that stretched on endlessly with rows of doors on either side of us.
Behind us, the bells jingled on the dangling sleeves of the jester’s cap ‘n’ bells. It got closer and closer. Of course, I stupidly looked back. One by one the wall lights went out, and the laughing jester twirled and leapt its way to us.
We came to a door at the end of the hallway, but it wouldn’t budge. Andy banged on it and twisted the knob as hard as he could.
“I want to stop playing this game,” Mark sobbed. He backed into the corner, trembling and crying. A dark wet spot appeared in front of his pants. I also felt something wet and warm trickling down my pants.
The jester was approaching, inching closer and closer by the second. And then, it stopped. It squatted in the dark with its hands under its chin, gazing at us with its harrowing black eyes. The only thing keeping it from capturing us was that the light from a single wall lamp shielded us. Sniffling and wiping his tears away, Mark squeaked, “Dad?” He took a step forward with an outreached hand seeking a sliver of comfort.
“I don’t think he’s your dad,” I said, but my words didn’t reach him. The jester gestured with a single finger for him to come closer.
“I got it! Come on, guys!” Andy cried, happily, as the door finally swung inward with a hard kick revealing a lighted room. I grabbed hold of Mark’s arm, but he shook me off. And I watched in horror as he tugged on the jester’s mask and pulled it off.
It was Mark’s dad behind the mask. His smile was split so wide, I could see his gums bleed and the skin at the corners of his lips had torn. He was foaming heavily at the mouth like a rabid dog.
“Dad...” Mark uttered.
The wall light went out. And that was the last I saw of him.
XXXXX
I’ll have to continue with my story later. I need to eat something. I can’t remember the last time I did. The hunger is gnawing my stomach. There’s nothing in the fridge. I didn’t even get leftovers from my friend’s birthday party. It’s okay. All I need now is to feed this body.
submitted by cgstories to Odd_directions [link] [comments]
Before I go on with the story, I wanted to mention that I finally got around to checking my text messages. I shouldn’t be surprised that all of them were furious. I don’t blame them. I’m still distraught about the whole situation. I pretty much lost all of my friends in one day; all because I thought that a little boy’s doll would come to life and... well...
Just, listen to me.
I know that all of this will sound insane. But everything I am about to tell you happened before. I feel like I can’t bring myself to even think of the moment, let alone tell you, but I need to press on. It is time that you understand the moment that everything changed forever—Pete's 11th birthday party.
What happened on that day plays over and over again in my mind. It doesn’t matter that 30 years have passed. Not a night goes by where I am wrenched from my beleaguered sleep and find myself gasping for air in a pool of my own sweat. Years of broken sleep will get to a person over time. And so, I grew agitated and depressed. I was on and off on medication, and in and out of therapy.
Now, I don’t always freak out when I see them in pictures or on display in a shop’s front window. If I keep my distance and they keep theirs, I am fine. I mean, my breathing would quicken, and my heart would pump hard, but the moment would pass, and I’d come back to some level of normalcy. I’ve got my own way to deal with such a situation. I’d close my eyes and count from 100 to zero, deeply breathing in through my nose and out through my mouth, before slowly turning and walking away.
Oh, right. I guess you want to hear what happened.
XXXXX
Pete and his family lived in a massive two-story house with an acre of forestry within their property line. The house was miles outside of town. It was cozy but isolated.
I carpooled with Andy and his parents. We met up with Mark and his dad in the house. Our jaws dropped at how beautiful the house and their property were; none of us had ever been to such a fancy place.
Andy’s mom mentioned in the car that what she heard from the other moms was that Pete’s dad, George, worked as an inventor and toymaker for a company that no one had heard of, and his mom, Wendy, was a stay-at-home mom. She had tried to invite her out for coffee with the other moms. In the end she decided not to. Wendy’s presence was just too off-putting.
“She wouldn’t stop smiling,” Andy’s mom recalled, “and she’d just nod her head without saying anything. Not a word. And she moved in this very odd, kind of funny way, too. Like she didn’t know how to use her arms or legs.”
Kind of like how Pete was on his first day of class.
The family greeted the guests in the foyer with excited eyes and gaping smiles. They were the picture perfect of a 1950s TV sitcom family. Pete had on a blue and yellow checkered suit with a yellow bowtie. George also wore the same style of suit but with a blue tie. His outfit was topped with a tobacco pipe hanging at the side of his mouth. Wendy had on a yellow dress with a blue ribbon tied around her waist, and her flaming red hair rolled up in a bouffant hairstyle.
There were a couple of dozens of us that showed up to the party. Most of the parents came along, too. My mom couldn’t come; she was stuck at the restaurant picking up someone else’s shift. That was to say nothing of her continued fear and suspicion about the whole kidnapper situation. She believed they were still out there, and that the cops had gotten the wrong person.
Everyone was led into a banquet hall where a great feast waited for us. We stuffed ourselves until the buttons on our pants threatened to burst. Fat roasted turkey thighs, mince pies, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes smothered in gravy, a mountain of steaming sweet biscuits. The choices were endless. And the moms and dads enjoyed themselves, drinking the wine that Wendy, smiling emptily and silently, served.
George went around telling stories to anyone who’d be willing to listen. He was incredibly intelligent with a wide breadth of knowledge of world history. He spoke about historical events as if he’d been there himself, describing in such vivid detail of the event’s atmosphere like how the heaviness of grief weighed in the air at Alexander the Great’s funeral procession, and how frigid cold the Russian winter was in 1812 when Napoleon Bonaparte’s army marched towards Moscow.
He showed us a room filled with his collection of ancient artifacts, even an American Civil War-era musket rifle with a Minie ball still lodged inside. But what caught my attention and raised the hairs on my body were three mummies behind a glass case. They were about my height and, judging by the smallness of their faces, they had died as children.
“Why do you have those?” I asked.
George grinned. “Well, why not?”
“Where’d you get them from?” asked Andy.
“Far and near...”
Squinting, Mark stepped up closer to the glass. “Are they real?”
“What do your eyes tell you?”
Together, we pressed our noses to the glass, staring hard at these mummies. Their skin was withered brown, and parts of their yellowed bone were exposed. They stared back at us with dark empty sockets and twisted mouths as though they’d come face to face with something more terrifying and terrible than death. None of the adults with us thought it weird that this family had such a collection. The moms and dads were starting to act a bit giddy and silly; it was the generous amount of wine they’d drunk, probably.
After a tour of George’s mini-home museum, we were led into an adjacent room filled with toys, clowns, dolls, and a bizarre collection of crossbred animals. A full train set wound about the length of the room and over our heads. This was Pete’s playroom, and George had designed every toy. This massive room with all the toys and games was more than what a child could dream of.
Unable to control ourselves, we got our hands on everything; we were a bunch of 10-year-olds after all. We played with the toys and shrieked with laughter. The moms and dads watched us as they drank the wine Wendy was serving them. Before we knew it, time flew by, and the sun had long since gone down. The grandfather clock struck 9 o’clock. But we weren’t tired; we wanted to play some more. So, we were thrilled when the grown-ups nodded and agreed to let us go on.
Shining with happiness, Pete announced that we were to play a special game, even the grown-ups would be involved.
“This game is called Catch the Souls!” he said. “The rules are quite simple. There are two types of players: souls and catchers. The game will be played both in the dark and in the light. Souls are safe in the light and the catchers won’t be able to move. But when the lights are off, souls better find a place to hide for the catchers will hunt you down and bring you to the king—me!"
“Then, how do we know if we’ve won?” I asked.
His eyes darkened as the pupils enlarged. “Well, when you see the sun rise, then you’ll know.” My stomach sank.
Were we really going to play all night?
I looked at the others to see if they also thought this was a ridiculous idea. Much to my surprise, the others buzzed with excitement, even the adults were eager to play. No one wanted to go home just yet. They wanted to play more. And, surprisingly, I wasn’t at all that tired or sleepy either. George ordered for the moms and dads to follow him into another room; they were to put on their “catcher” costumes.
Mark, Andy, and I decided to stick together. We figured that if we could find a good spot to hide out in, we could wait there until the game was over. At the beginning of the game, all the lights were on in every room and hallway, and Pete counted backwards from 100.
My friends and I bolted. We didn’t realize how huge the house was. It was like a never-ending labyrinth. One door would lead to nowhere except a brick wall, or a sudden drop into what looked like a bottomless pit. Andy had nearly fallen into one and was only saved when Mark and I caught him by the arms as he fell and clung desperately to the doorknob.
The hallways echoed with giggles of excitement. But once the lights began to flicker, the whole house plunged into darkness. We hurried into another room. I hid behind a desk, Mark behind a big tapestry, and Andy in the corner of the room squatting behind a tall vase.
We waited.
We held our breath.
A hair-raising scream erupted in another room. Followed by another, then another. Three in succession.
“What was that?” I heard Mark ask, shakily.
“What are you doing?” Andy cried.
Peeking around the corner of the desk, I spotted Mark out from his hiding spot and poking his head out the door. He quickly shut the door and scrambled back behind the tapestry. Before I could ask him what he saw, the door opened. My body instantly went rigid. I was terrified that if I were to move or breathe, I’d get caught. I certainly didn’t want to find out what Pete would do to me.
A tall, shadowy figure with two long pointed ears entered the room. It was a Catcher. It hopped slowly around the room like a rabbit, playing with the leaves of the plants in the tall vase and sniffing around the tapestry. Then it turned its attention to the desk. I scooted back underneath the desk and slapped my hand over my mouth, desperate not to make a sound. I heard it hop into the air before its feet landed gently on the floor right next to the desk. It took a step closer to the spot where I lay in a fetal position. I hoped that I was small enough that it wouldn’t notice me.
Light swept throughout the room. And I let out a breath of relief. We were safe when the lights were on. That was the rule of the game, I reminded myself. I crawled out from underneath the desk and froze as I came face to face with a giant pink bunny. I knew that inside the costume was a classmate’s parent. But there was something off about it, like it had no good intentions. It stared back with large black orbs for eyes. Its large buck teeth dripped droplets of red on the white carpet. Dark red chunks like mushed up beets fell from its mouth.
“Benjie! Don’t just stand there!” Mark pulled me out of the trance, and I ran out with them. At the end of the hallway, we saw another Catcher dressed in a court blue and yellow jester suit and mask.
The lights flickered; one minute warning for us to find another hiding spot. Without looking back, we ran and tried getting into another room. With utter mortification I learned that most of the doors were locked. Not only that, but others only led to dead ends. We went through one door that led to another hallway that stretched on endlessly with rows of doors on either side of us.
Behind us, the bells jingled on the dangling sleeves of the jester’s cap ‘n’ bells. It got closer and closer. Of course, I stupidly looked back. One by one the wall lights went out, and the laughing jester twirled and leapt its way to us.
We came to a door at the end of the hallway, but it wouldn’t budge. Andy banged on it and twisted the knob as hard as he could.
“I want to stop playing this game,” Mark sobbed. He backed into the corner, trembling and crying. A dark wet spot appeared in front of his pants. I also felt something wet and warm trickling down my pants.
The jester was approaching, inching closer and closer by the second. And then, it stopped. It squatted in the dark with its hands under its chin, gazing at us with its harrowing black eyes. The only thing keeping it from capturing us was that the light from a single wall lamp shielded us. Sniffling and wiping his tears away, Mark squeaked, “Dad?” He took a step forward with an outreached hand seeking a sliver of comfort.
“I don’t think he’s your dad,” I said, but my words didn’t reach him. The jester gestured with a single finger for him to come closer.
“I got it! Come on, guys!” Andy cried, happily, as the door finally swung inward with a hard kick revealing a lighted room. I grabbed hold of Mark’s arm, but he shook me off. And I watched in horror as he tugged on the jester’s mask and pulled it off.
It was Mark’s dad behind the mask. His smile was split so wide, I could see his gums bleed and the skin at the corners of his lips had torn. He was foaming heavily at the mouth like a rabid dog.
“Dad...” Mark uttered.
The wall light went out. And that was the last I saw of him.
XXXXX
I’ll have to continue with my story later. I need to eat something. I can’t remember the last time I did. The hunger is gnawing my stomach. There’s nothing in the fridge. I didn’t even get leftovers from my friend’s birthday party. It’s okay. All I need now is to feed this body.
2024.05.29 01:42 MGK_2 Who's Your Mother?
Though she is a drug, she ain't like all the rest.
She was born to heal, unlike the others born to steal.
Big Pharma is a System. But this System is about to sprout forth something unfamiliar.
The world knows nothing but Big Pharma's concoctions. The world is drunk with her wine.
Her wine of course is her drugs. Every approved drug embodies her teachings and her doctrines.
But these doctrines go against the doctrines of leronlimab.
After all, what other drug modulates CCR5? I don't know of another monoclonal antibody that blocks CCR5 other than leronlimab. There are a few small molecule drugs like maraviroc, centriviroc and vicriviroc that do it, but I believe that only maraviroc is approved and despite that, it remains a poor blockade of CCR5.
So, because we stand alone as a large molecule CCR5 blockade, we are unfamiliar to Big Pharma. In general, intracellular communication is a foreign language to them. Therefore, we are like a black sheep. They don't know what to do with us. They are unfamiliar with this Cytokine business.
Everything we can do, they cannot. And everything they do, we do not.
We are multimodal, they are unimodal.
We are multifunctional, they are singularly functional.
We are healing, they are hiding or masking.
They sicken with side effects; we have none.
They address in part, while we address in full.
They leave in dissatisfaction while we leave satisfied.
Why are we so different when we were created by one of their own? Because we are one of a kind. There is no one like us. We are unlike any other, that operates at the heart of intra-cellular communication. And because this communication controls the behavior of the entire immune system, the methods that the immune system takes to overcome any one disease is directly affected when the intra-cellular communication channels are disrupted by this molecule. The one molecule affects the manner by which the immune system goes about overcoming every single disease and it is because of this reason why leronlimab is a multimodal drug.
But how can we have been born out of the mono-clonal antibodies? Well, it is true, that we are a mono-clonal antibody and there ain't anything on Earth that fits better than leronlimab into the CCR5 receptor. Leronlimab has even greater affinity for that receptor than its own ligand, CCL5 or RANTES. Yes, leronlimab pushes RANTES out of the CCR5 receptor and takes the place of RANTES because of its higher affinity. But the inventors thought they were only constructing a drug that would only treat HIV and prevent AIDS. Well, this monoclonal antibody, though it fits precisely into only one protein in the entire human body, and the only thing that it attaches to there in is CCR5, well, the inventors had no idea that what they were inventing by choosing that one receptor protein, that instead of overcoming the treatment of just one disease namely HIV, they in fact had developed a single antibody that treats the gamut of disease processes across the Inflammation and Immune Activation spectrum.
The majority of BP drugs handle one disease and one disease only. Penicillin treats gram positive bacteria. Acetaminophen treats pain. Aspirin reduces inflammation and also thins the blood. That one has 2 modalities.
This is how BP has operated for years and years. Well, things are about to morph, and they have been fighting this change for years already, but when things got to change, they will finally come to the point where there are no other choices, and they have to bite the bullet.
I believe, when BP tried drugs in the past with multiple indications, these drugs usually were plagued with multiple side effects. So, by zeroing in on only one indication, most of the side effects could be weeded out to the point that the drug could become FDA approved. The name of the game of course was to make money, but they couldn't make money if they couldn't get their drugs approved. So that led to the preponderance of single use drugs. And this is exactly how they wanted the playing field to remain, because they need to make money. To them it does not matter how many drugs are out there. All that matters is that they make money on every single unimodal drug ever invented.
But leronlimab was created and found to treat a myriad of disease processes superbly well and free from any side effects. It was found to be very well tolerated and found to heal in the face of many disease states where no other unimodal drug would do. Despite all the odds against it, leronlimab, though only binding to a single solitary CCR5 protein, was found to be treating HIV, all kinds of Tumors, allowing patients stricken with COVID 19 and on respirators for weeks and weeks to be taken off respiratory therapy after only one day of use. It was found to reduce Steatosis and Fibrosis in patients with MASH while in all of BP, there was not even one drug that treats MASH until very recently.
Tremendous resistance came upon this drug leronlimab and upon the company developing it CytoDyn, possibly because of the unorthodox mechanism of action that blocks CCR5 and by doing so, is capable of treating the myriad of disease processes across the board of Inflammation and Immune Activation. The drug was put on hold by the FDA and a warning letter hung to prevent its use.
Over the course of 2.5 years, a man by the name of Cyrus Arman was very instrumental in his work towards getting that hold removed. Later on, towards the end of those years, another man by the name of Jacob Lalezari, MD was the CEO in charge of CytoDyn at the time when the hold was finally lifted and was probably done largely because of his cooperation with the FDA. Well, both of these men remain with CytoDyn to this day. Both of these men are staunch believers in the mechanism of action of leronlimab.
Well, even though the hold was lifted, a period of about 6 months followed that required much hand holding, as if the company forgot how to ride a bike and the training wheels needed to be placed again so it could learn how to ride and, on every ride, somebody would always run up to them and taunt them, intentionally trying to make them fall. For some reason, nobody cared that CytoDyn should succeed. It really appeared that the many out there hoped and prayed for its demise.
But a time came, when a decision became necessary as to what to do with CytoDyn. After all, they in fact owned a Wonderdrug. A drug that when combined with their own drug could make their own drug perform twice as good. It could provide them with the means by which to treat a myriad of diseases that remain currently untreatable. A drug that would open up for them hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue that currently remain untapped.
In their consideration of CytoDyn, they took into account the myriad of peer reviewed research papers that proclaim the tremendous benefits on the use of CCR5 blockade in the treatment of so many diseases. They have reviewed the results of the various CytoDyn trials in HIV, in COVID and in Oncology. And these results are forthcoming, but these CytoDyn partners have already seen what we are about to see.
So, they came to a decision to unite together to keep hope alive for the people they treat as well as for their own shareholders. In addition, they are sure to gain the monetary benefits that comes along with the ability to treat 85% of the tumors that remain untreatable today. So, despite the contempt and original rejection of their very own brother, in the end, they have come together united with their brother so that both might benefit by their symbiotic relationship.
And why do these brothers behave as such? Well, so as to please their same Mother. And who is their Mother? The FDA. All play by the same book of rules. The FDA knows of the myriad of indications that leronlimab shall treat. They know of the revenues that shall come on behalf of this drug and they have opened up the highways for this drug to pass on through. Both we and our brother have seen and heard what our Mother, the FDA wants, and both of us follow those orders.
Later, once well known in the land of which it treats, leronlimab becomes a household name, then it becomes understood, that no other drug really is necessary.
submitted by MGK_2 to Livimmune [link] [comments]
She was born to heal, unlike the others born to steal.
Big Pharma is a System. But this System is about to sprout forth something unfamiliar.
The world knows nothing but Big Pharma's concoctions. The world is drunk with her wine.
Her wine of course is her drugs. Every approved drug embodies her teachings and her doctrines.
But these doctrines go against the doctrines of leronlimab.
After all, what other drug modulates CCR5? I don't know of another monoclonal antibody that blocks CCR5 other than leronlimab. There are a few small molecule drugs like maraviroc, centriviroc and vicriviroc that do it, but I believe that only maraviroc is approved and despite that, it remains a poor blockade of CCR5.
So, because we stand alone as a large molecule CCR5 blockade, we are unfamiliar to Big Pharma. In general, intracellular communication is a foreign language to them. Therefore, we are like a black sheep. They don't know what to do with us. They are unfamiliar with this Cytokine business.
Everything we can do, they cannot. And everything they do, we do not.
We are multimodal, they are unimodal.
We are multifunctional, they are singularly functional.
We are healing, they are hiding or masking.
They sicken with side effects; we have none.
They address in part, while we address in full.
They leave in dissatisfaction while we leave satisfied.
Why are we so different when we were created by one of their own? Because we are one of a kind. There is no one like us. We are unlike any other, that operates at the heart of intra-cellular communication. And because this communication controls the behavior of the entire immune system, the methods that the immune system takes to overcome any one disease is directly affected when the intra-cellular communication channels are disrupted by this molecule. The one molecule affects the manner by which the immune system goes about overcoming every single disease and it is because of this reason why leronlimab is a multimodal drug.
But how can we have been born out of the mono-clonal antibodies? Well, it is true, that we are a mono-clonal antibody and there ain't anything on Earth that fits better than leronlimab into the CCR5 receptor. Leronlimab has even greater affinity for that receptor than its own ligand, CCL5 or RANTES. Yes, leronlimab pushes RANTES out of the CCR5 receptor and takes the place of RANTES because of its higher affinity. But the inventors thought they were only constructing a drug that would only treat HIV and prevent AIDS. Well, this monoclonal antibody, though it fits precisely into only one protein in the entire human body, and the only thing that it attaches to there in is CCR5, well, the inventors had no idea that what they were inventing by choosing that one receptor protein, that instead of overcoming the treatment of just one disease namely HIV, they in fact had developed a single antibody that treats the gamut of disease processes across the Inflammation and Immune Activation spectrum.
The majority of BP drugs handle one disease and one disease only. Penicillin treats gram positive bacteria. Acetaminophen treats pain. Aspirin reduces inflammation and also thins the blood. That one has 2 modalities.
This is how BP has operated for years and years. Well, things are about to morph, and they have been fighting this change for years already, but when things got to change, they will finally come to the point where there are no other choices, and they have to bite the bullet.
I believe, when BP tried drugs in the past with multiple indications, these drugs usually were plagued with multiple side effects. So, by zeroing in on only one indication, most of the side effects could be weeded out to the point that the drug could become FDA approved. The name of the game of course was to make money, but they couldn't make money if they couldn't get their drugs approved. So that led to the preponderance of single use drugs. And this is exactly how they wanted the playing field to remain, because they need to make money. To them it does not matter how many drugs are out there. All that matters is that they make money on every single unimodal drug ever invented.
But leronlimab was created and found to treat a myriad of disease processes superbly well and free from any side effects. It was found to be very well tolerated and found to heal in the face of many disease states where no other unimodal drug would do. Despite all the odds against it, leronlimab, though only binding to a single solitary CCR5 protein, was found to be treating HIV, all kinds of Tumors, allowing patients stricken with COVID 19 and on respirators for weeks and weeks to be taken off respiratory therapy after only one day of use. It was found to reduce Steatosis and Fibrosis in patients with MASH while in all of BP, there was not even one drug that treats MASH until very recently.
Tremendous resistance came upon this drug leronlimab and upon the company developing it CytoDyn, possibly because of the unorthodox mechanism of action that blocks CCR5 and by doing so, is capable of treating the myriad of disease processes across the board of Inflammation and Immune Activation. The drug was put on hold by the FDA and a warning letter hung to prevent its use.
Over the course of 2.5 years, a man by the name of Cyrus Arman was very instrumental in his work towards getting that hold removed. Later on, towards the end of those years, another man by the name of Jacob Lalezari, MD was the CEO in charge of CytoDyn at the time when the hold was finally lifted and was probably done largely because of his cooperation with the FDA. Well, both of these men remain with CytoDyn to this day. Both of these men are staunch believers in the mechanism of action of leronlimab.
Well, even though the hold was lifted, a period of about 6 months followed that required much hand holding, as if the company forgot how to ride a bike and the training wheels needed to be placed again so it could learn how to ride and, on every ride, somebody would always run up to them and taunt them, intentionally trying to make them fall. For some reason, nobody cared that CytoDyn should succeed. It really appeared that the many out there hoped and prayed for its demise.
But a time came, when a decision became necessary as to what to do with CytoDyn. After all, they in fact owned a Wonderdrug. A drug that when combined with their own drug could make their own drug perform twice as good. It could provide them with the means by which to treat a myriad of diseases that remain currently untreatable. A drug that would open up for them hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue that currently remain untapped.
In their consideration of CytoDyn, they took into account the myriad of peer reviewed research papers that proclaim the tremendous benefits on the use of CCR5 blockade in the treatment of so many diseases. They have reviewed the results of the various CytoDyn trials in HIV, in COVID and in Oncology. And these results are forthcoming, but these CytoDyn partners have already seen what we are about to see.
So, they came to a decision to unite together to keep hope alive for the people they treat as well as for their own shareholders. In addition, they are sure to gain the monetary benefits that comes along with the ability to treat 85% of the tumors that remain untreatable today. So, despite the contempt and original rejection of their very own brother, in the end, they have come together united with their brother so that both might benefit by their symbiotic relationship.
And why do these brothers behave as such? Well, so as to please their same Mother. And who is their Mother? The FDA. All play by the same book of rules. The FDA knows of the myriad of indications that leronlimab shall treat. They know of the revenues that shall come on behalf of this drug and they have opened up the highways for this drug to pass on through. Both we and our brother have seen and heard what our Mother, the FDA wants, and both of us follow those orders.
Later, once well known in the land of which it treats, leronlimab becomes a household name, then it becomes understood, that no other drug really is necessary.
2024.05.29 01:27 goBerserk_ Project Napoleon - Chapter 6
First Previous Next
Mike tossed and turned in his bed. He mumbled in his sleep. He was trapped in a memory.
Mike's feet pounded the concrete, and wind rushed in his ears. He was sprinting through a railyard in Philadelphia, away from the scene of his first kill. He was halfway to HQ when he met a squad. They have to be investigating the shots. “HALT! STOP RUNNING GODDAMNIT!” Mike stopped a few feet in front of the squad of soldiers; their weapons were pointed at him.
Mike was struggling to breathe.
The point man asked, “Identify yourself.”
Mike answered, pausing between breaths. “2nd Lieutenant Mike Anderson. C company. 2nd platoon.” He patted his pistol as he inhaled. “I shot to warn. We’ve been infiltrated. They are bulletproof. I killed one. Its body is 500 meters.” He pointed behind him, “that way.” He turned around, “Call in the contact.”
One of the men began to reach for his radio before the point man interjected. “Hold on that.”
Fucking dickhead.
Mike angrily said, “That was a fucking order.”
The point man, a sergeant, was unfazed. He asked, “How did you kill one if they’re bulletproof?”
Mike answered, “I stabbed it.”
The sergeant frowned and paused for a moment. “Take us to the body.”
This motherfucker...
“Look at me with your flashlight.” The sergeant started to open his mouth; Mike cut him off furiously. “DO IT GODDAMNIT!”
The sergeant acquiesced. He turned on his weapon light and flipped up his NODs. As soon as he saw Mike in color, his eyes widened, and he slowly bleated out, “Jesus H Christ.”
Mike growled, “Give me a fucking radio.”
If you want something done, you gotta do it yourself.
Without any more hesitation, a private unplugged his headset and tossed his radio over. Mike started to jog at an easy pace. He looked behind him and shouted, “With me!”
The men looked at the sergeant, who stood for a moment and then started scrambling after him. Mike was headed for the motor pool. He started calling on the radio.
Alarm first…
“All stations, this is Charlie-2-6. Flash message. Hostile infantry have infiltrated the AO. I repeat, hostile infantry have infiltrated the AO. Be advised, hostile infantry are hard targets; they are bulletproof but can be stabbed. I repeat, hostile infantry are hard targets; they are bulletproof but can be stabbed. Out.”
Now the contact…
He got on battalion HQ’s frequency.
“Warchief 6, this is Charlie-2-6. Contact, one hostile infiltrator. In the storage lot, aisle three, row forty-niner. About six mikes ago. The hostile had full coverage armor that was resistant to rifle fire, but I was able to stab through it. Intel should send someone to pick up the corpse. Over.”
The radio cackled back to life. “Charlie 2-6, this is Warchief 6. SITREP. Over.”
“Warchief 6, This is Charlie-2-6. Wait, over.”
Mike turned to the sergeant, “Unit?”
The sergeant answered, “Squad 4, 1st platoon, Bravo company.”
Mike brought the radio back up to his face and said, “Warchief 6, this is Charlie-2-6. I grabbed Bravo-1-4 and am Oscar Mike to the ASP to get AT weapons for Charlie. Relay to Charlie-2-7 for SITREP on Charlie 2. More to follow, over.”
Mike had a plan hatching in his head.
Mike turned to the squad he’d requisitioned and asked, “How many of you can drive stick?”
Three men piped up.
Mike was relieved; he couldn’t drive a manual, and his plan wouldn’t have worked for the whole battalion with only JLTVs.
“Warchief 6, this is Charlie-2-6. Request permission to make a new ASP and start AT resupply for the whole AO. Over.”
Before he got his answer Mike shouted, “DOWN!” as he heard a scraping hiss. He dove into prone and heard grunts as the rest of the squad did the same. Just moments later, Mike was deafened by ear-shattering booms. The ground shook as the railyard was rocked with explosions.
Mike cringed as his ears rang and small debris rained down on top of him. The barrage lasted thirty seconds. After it stopped he quickly asked, “Anyone hit?”
The sergeant looked around and answered, “No. We're good.”
Mike sighed in relief and keyed his radio. “Warchief 6, this is Charlie 2-6, acknowledge. Over”
He waited for a minute.
Shit… Not this…
“Warchief 6, this is Charlie 2-6, acknowledge. Over.”
He was met with no response.
“Charlie 6, this is 2-6, acknowledge. Over”
Nothing but static. Despair started to settle over Mike.
Mike switched to the open channel and asked, “This is Charlie 2-6, is there anyone out there? Acknowledge, please. Over.”
After what felt like an eternity of waiting, Mike slammed his fist into the ground and screamed, “FUCK!”
Mike took a deep breath. He got up. “Let’s move!”
No matter what happens, we’re fucked if we can’t shoot back. Mike prayed that the lack of secondary explosions meant that the ammo dump hadn’t been blown to hell.
Mike and his commandeered squad raced to the motor pool. Thankfully, it was still intact.
Mike stopped and turned, “Hold here.”
Mike flipped up his NODs and marched inside the little brick building with a sheet metal roof like he owned the place.
“Wha-”
The Motor Sergeant started to talk, but Mike didn’t have the time nor the inclination to listen. The tall lieutenant leaned on the desk and peered down at the motor sergeant. His gore-spattered jaw was clenched, and his stormy blue eyes were locked onto the sergeant. His stare bore a hole into the poor sergeant's soul. “Three trucks, now.”
Mike didn’t explain why he needed the trucks or who gave him permission to take them, but something about his presence exuded enough authority to get the Motor Sergeant to obey without question. Perhaps it was the commanding tone he took or the way he carried himself. Maybe it was his height, piercing stare, or the blue blood that caked most of his body. Something told the motor sergeant that this was not a man whose patience should be tested.
The motor sergeant meekly said, “Yes, sir.” His hands even shook a little as he produced three sets of keys.
Mike's convoy skidded to a halt just outside the old warehouse that was packed to the gills with ordinance. He leapt from his truck and ran inside, followed by his commandeered squad. A little bit of weight left Mike's shoulders when he saw Martinez and Decker leaning up against a wall.
The S-4 ran to Mike and asked, “What's happening?”
Mike responded, “We got hit, radios are jammed. Help me load up these trucks with AT. After that’s done, I want you to start moving all the AT we have into the row of shipping containers on the edge of the lot.”
The S-4 nodded and started shouting orders. He had heard Mike's earlier call about the enemy being hard targets. Forklifts began to zip through the isles of the ammo dump, ferrying AT weapons by the pallet.
Mike shouted, “Decker! Martinez! With me!” as he ran to help load the trucks.
Mike was back in the cab of the lead truck in his little convoy. It was soon to be broken up; Mike was in front, going to Charlie 2 with Decker and Martinez.
Mike started ditching his rifle and ammunition.
I won’t need these; I might as well save some weight.
As he was setting his last magazine aside, he was nearly deafened by the roar of hundreds of explosions.
Martinez bellowed, “CHRIST!” as he swerved to dodge a flying container, scraping Mike's side of the truck against the wall of containers with an awful screech.
Martinez screamed, “THE FUCK DID THAT COME FROM?!”
The container must have been thrown from an explosion in front of them somewhere.
Mike roared back, “JUST KEEP FUCKING DRIVING!”
Another huge explosion rang out, followed by dozens of smaller explosions, ripping into the night like a Chinese firecracker.
That was the ammo dump…
Sweat ran down the lieutenant's brow as he stared out the windshield, counting the seconds. He could hear the supersonic cracks of suppressed rifle fire.
“STOP HERE!”
Martinez slammed his foot on the brake, and the truck came to a screeching halt inside the perimeter of Squad 1. Mike hopped out of the cab, slamming his NODs back down over his eyes midair.
It was chaos.
Mike nearly gagged at the stench of scorched flesh and burnt hair. He could smell the wounded far more clearly than he could hear them. The hisses of steam from enemy fire and the bubbling splats of molten metal from impacts on the containers almost entirely masked their screams.
Mike shouted, “RESUPPLY!” as he hustled to help Decker get the truck unloaded. He climbed up as the first members of Squad One approached the truck. Mike started chucking AT4s out onto the ground. Sergeant Williams, the squad leader, peered into the truck and frantically said, “Orders, sir?!”
“SITREP?” Mike replied.
The sergeant was a nervous wreck, literally shaking as he spoke. A far cry from the confident man he had given a Kit Kat to earlier. “Contacts across the river. Two dead, four wounded. Mech suit things strafed us and flew to the west. Chang hit one with a stinger, but it didn’t go down.”
“OK. I want you to hold here. If you see a red flare, fall back into the tunnels. Don’t bother shooting them with your rifles. Use AT.”
The sergeant nearly jumped out of his boots as a stack of containers collapsed.
Mike continued, unfazed by the interruption, “Fall back a row if the one in front gets shot apart. Got it?”
Williams stared blankly at him.
Mike hopped down from the truck and asked a nearby private, “Whose 2nd in command?”
The private shrugged, “I have no idea.”
Shit!
Mike led the sergeant away from the others. He grabbed the shell-shocked sergeant’s shoulders. “Keep it together, man. They can die. I’ve already killed one.”
No reaction. Mike cursed and shook the man's shoulders. “WAKE UP! I just need you to keep it together for a few more hours!”
The sergeant looked down and sobbed, “I can’t.”
Fuck! What do I do!?
Sergeant Williams slid down against the wall of the container.
Mike stuffed the string of expletives he had on his mind. It would do no good. Instead, he said, “Just stay here.”
Mike ran back to the truck. “Decker, I need you to take this squad. You hear what I told Williams earlier?”
Decker nodded. “Yeah. Hold, stay in cover, rally at the tunnels at the red flare.”
“OK, good.”
Mike shouted, “DECKERS IN CHARGE!” and hopped back into the truck.
Mike turned to Martinez and said, “Let's go.”
submitted by goBerserk_ to HFY [link] [comments]
Mike tossed and turned in his bed. He mumbled in his sleep. He was trapped in a memory.
Mike's feet pounded the concrete, and wind rushed in his ears. He was sprinting through a railyard in Philadelphia, away from the scene of his first kill. He was halfway to HQ when he met a squad. They have to be investigating the shots. “HALT! STOP RUNNING GODDAMNIT!” Mike stopped a few feet in front of the squad of soldiers; their weapons were pointed at him.
Mike was struggling to breathe.
The point man asked, “Identify yourself.”
Mike answered, pausing between breaths. “2nd Lieutenant Mike Anderson. C company. 2nd platoon.” He patted his pistol as he inhaled. “I shot to warn. We’ve been infiltrated. They are bulletproof. I killed one. Its body is 500 meters.” He pointed behind him, “that way.” He turned around, “Call in the contact.”
One of the men began to reach for his radio before the point man interjected. “Hold on that.”
Fucking dickhead.
Mike angrily said, “That was a fucking order.”
The point man, a sergeant, was unfazed. He asked, “How did you kill one if they’re bulletproof?”
Mike answered, “I stabbed it.”
The sergeant frowned and paused for a moment. “Take us to the body.”
This motherfucker...
“Look at me with your flashlight.” The sergeant started to open his mouth; Mike cut him off furiously. “DO IT GODDAMNIT!”
The sergeant acquiesced. He turned on his weapon light and flipped up his NODs. As soon as he saw Mike in color, his eyes widened, and he slowly bleated out, “Jesus H Christ.”
Mike growled, “Give me a fucking radio.”
If you want something done, you gotta do it yourself.
Without any more hesitation, a private unplugged his headset and tossed his radio over. Mike started to jog at an easy pace. He looked behind him and shouted, “With me!”
The men looked at the sergeant, who stood for a moment and then started scrambling after him. Mike was headed for the motor pool. He started calling on the radio.
Alarm first…
“All stations, this is Charlie-2-6. Flash message. Hostile infantry have infiltrated the AO. I repeat, hostile infantry have infiltrated the AO. Be advised, hostile infantry are hard targets; they are bulletproof but can be stabbed. I repeat, hostile infantry are hard targets; they are bulletproof but can be stabbed. Out.”
Now the contact…
He got on battalion HQ’s frequency.
“Warchief 6, this is Charlie-2-6. Contact, one hostile infiltrator. In the storage lot, aisle three, row forty-niner. About six mikes ago. The hostile had full coverage armor that was resistant to rifle fire, but I was able to stab through it. Intel should send someone to pick up the corpse. Over.”
The radio cackled back to life. “Charlie 2-6, this is Warchief 6. SITREP. Over.”
“Warchief 6, This is Charlie-2-6. Wait, over.”
Mike turned to the sergeant, “Unit?”
The sergeant answered, “Squad 4, 1st platoon, Bravo company.”
Mike brought the radio back up to his face and said, “Warchief 6, this is Charlie-2-6. I grabbed Bravo-1-4 and am Oscar Mike to the ASP to get AT weapons for Charlie. Relay to Charlie-2-7 for SITREP on Charlie 2. More to follow, over.”
Mike had a plan hatching in his head.
Mike turned to the squad he’d requisitioned and asked, “How many of you can drive stick?”
Three men piped up.
Mike was relieved; he couldn’t drive a manual, and his plan wouldn’t have worked for the whole battalion with only JLTVs.
“Warchief 6, this is Charlie-2-6. Request permission to make a new ASP and start AT resupply for the whole AO. Over.”
Before he got his answer Mike shouted, “DOWN!” as he heard a scraping hiss. He dove into prone and heard grunts as the rest of the squad did the same. Just moments later, Mike was deafened by ear-shattering booms. The ground shook as the railyard was rocked with explosions.
Mike cringed as his ears rang and small debris rained down on top of him. The barrage lasted thirty seconds. After it stopped he quickly asked, “Anyone hit?”
The sergeant looked around and answered, “No. We're good.”
Mike sighed in relief and keyed his radio. “Warchief 6, this is Charlie 2-6, acknowledge. Over”
He waited for a minute.
Shit… Not this…
“Warchief 6, this is Charlie 2-6, acknowledge. Over.”
He was met with no response.
“Charlie 6, this is 2-6, acknowledge. Over”
Nothing but static. Despair started to settle over Mike.
Mike switched to the open channel and asked, “This is Charlie 2-6, is there anyone out there? Acknowledge, please. Over.”
After what felt like an eternity of waiting, Mike slammed his fist into the ground and screamed, “FUCK!”
Mike took a deep breath. He got up. “Let’s move!”
No matter what happens, we’re fucked if we can’t shoot back. Mike prayed that the lack of secondary explosions meant that the ammo dump hadn’t been blown to hell.
Mike and his commandeered squad raced to the motor pool. Thankfully, it was still intact.
Mike stopped and turned, “Hold here.”
Mike flipped up his NODs and marched inside the little brick building with a sheet metal roof like he owned the place.
“Wha-”
The Motor Sergeant started to talk, but Mike didn’t have the time nor the inclination to listen. The tall lieutenant leaned on the desk and peered down at the motor sergeant. His gore-spattered jaw was clenched, and his stormy blue eyes were locked onto the sergeant. His stare bore a hole into the poor sergeant's soul. “Three trucks, now.”
Mike didn’t explain why he needed the trucks or who gave him permission to take them, but something about his presence exuded enough authority to get the Motor Sergeant to obey without question. Perhaps it was the commanding tone he took or the way he carried himself. Maybe it was his height, piercing stare, or the blue blood that caked most of his body. Something told the motor sergeant that this was not a man whose patience should be tested.
The motor sergeant meekly said, “Yes, sir.” His hands even shook a little as he produced three sets of keys.
The S-4 ran to Mike and asked, “What's happening?”
Mike responded, “We got hit, radios are jammed. Help me load up these trucks with AT. After that’s done, I want you to start moving all the AT we have into the row of shipping containers on the edge of the lot.”
The S-4 nodded and started shouting orders. He had heard Mike's earlier call about the enemy being hard targets. Forklifts began to zip through the isles of the ammo dump, ferrying AT weapons by the pallet.
Mike shouted, “Decker! Martinez! With me!” as he ran to help load the trucks.
Mike started ditching his rifle and ammunition.
I won’t need these; I might as well save some weight.
As he was setting his last magazine aside, he was nearly deafened by the roar of hundreds of explosions.
Martinez bellowed, “CHRIST!” as he swerved to dodge a flying container, scraping Mike's side of the truck against the wall of containers with an awful screech.
Martinez screamed, “THE FUCK DID THAT COME FROM?!”
The container must have been thrown from an explosion in front of them somewhere.
Mike roared back, “JUST KEEP FUCKING DRIVING!”
Another huge explosion rang out, followed by dozens of smaller explosions, ripping into the night like a Chinese firecracker.
That was the ammo dump…
Sweat ran down the lieutenant's brow as he stared out the windshield, counting the seconds. He could hear the supersonic cracks of suppressed rifle fire.
“STOP HERE!”
Martinez slammed his foot on the brake, and the truck came to a screeching halt inside the perimeter of Squad 1. Mike hopped out of the cab, slamming his NODs back down over his eyes midair.
It was chaos.
Mike nearly gagged at the stench of scorched flesh and burnt hair. He could smell the wounded far more clearly than he could hear them. The hisses of steam from enemy fire and the bubbling splats of molten metal from impacts on the containers almost entirely masked their screams.
Mike shouted, “RESUPPLY!” as he hustled to help Decker get the truck unloaded. He climbed up as the first members of Squad One approached the truck. Mike started chucking AT4s out onto the ground. Sergeant Williams, the squad leader, peered into the truck and frantically said, “Orders, sir?!”
“SITREP?” Mike replied.
The sergeant was a nervous wreck, literally shaking as he spoke. A far cry from the confident man he had given a Kit Kat to earlier. “Contacts across the river. Two dead, four wounded. Mech suit things strafed us and flew to the west. Chang hit one with a stinger, but it didn’t go down.”
“OK. I want you to hold here. If you see a red flare, fall back into the tunnels. Don’t bother shooting them with your rifles. Use AT.”
The sergeant nearly jumped out of his boots as a stack of containers collapsed.
Mike continued, unfazed by the interruption, “Fall back a row if the one in front gets shot apart. Got it?”
Williams stared blankly at him.
Mike hopped down from the truck and asked a nearby private, “Whose 2nd in command?”
The private shrugged, “I have no idea.”
Shit!
Mike led the sergeant away from the others. He grabbed the shell-shocked sergeant’s shoulders. “Keep it together, man. They can die. I’ve already killed one.”
No reaction. Mike cursed and shook the man's shoulders. “WAKE UP! I just need you to keep it together for a few more hours!”
The sergeant looked down and sobbed, “I can’t.”
Fuck! What do I do!?
Sergeant Williams slid down against the wall of the container.
Mike stuffed the string of expletives he had on his mind. It would do no good. Instead, he said, “Just stay here.”
Mike ran back to the truck. “Decker, I need you to take this squad. You hear what I told Williams earlier?”
Decker nodded. “Yeah. Hold, stay in cover, rally at the tunnels at the red flare.”
“OK, good.”
Mike shouted, “DECKERS IN CHARGE!” and hopped back into the truck.
Mike turned to Martinez and said, “Let's go.”
2024.05.28 23:50 No_Pride_88 The 100 girlfriends who really, really, really, really, really love you across the stars.
I’m back with another one of these and this time we’re doing a crossover where I will attempt to explain how Rentarou and his 100 girlfriends’ story could happen in the Honkai Star Rail universe, starting with a brief introduction on some of the terms:
The Imaginary Tree is a conceptual tree that all of existence supposedly sprang from and is a well of infinite imaginary energy. The Aeons are then ones who carve immense paths directly onto the tree, gaining access to that infinite imaginary energy, but in turn being restricted by their Primum Mobile aka the principles of their paths. For example Nanook the Destruction could never veer off the path of Destruction that THEY laid out otherwise they would cease to exist, as would any other Aeon should THEY commit actions or have thoughts that defy their Primum Mobile.
People can also have limited access in one of two ways. Either one could have a strong will and conduct themselves in accordance to the principles of their desired path in order to become a Pathstrider or they could be gazed upon by an Aeon to become an Emanator with the latter being way more powerful than the former.
Now that we have that out of the way let’s get to the juicy details. I will throw around many other factions and paths and if you have any lore questions about my choices then feel free to comment.
Rentarou : Now while it is tempting to give him main character treatment and have him be part of the Nameless of the Trailblaze (aka our main cast) not only does it not make sense in lore, but the express also most definitely doesn’t 101 extra rooms for his entire family. Instead Rentarou would be a layman who became a Galaxy Ranger (i.e. a Pathstrider of the Hunt) out of necessity as his home planet, whatever that may be, became unlivable and his people willingly migrated to work under the IPC. During his early travels he fell in love 100 times and got rejected 100 times, but that was when he would meet with one of the Omen Vanguards, Emanators of the Finality who decipher the Aeon Terminus’ cryptic, backwards messages of the future that Terminus tends mumble as a being who was born at the end of the universe and is chronically moving backwards in time. That Omen Vanguard would essentially be a stand in for the love god, giving Rentarou a list of cryptic hints he was able to piece together and telling Rentarou about his 100 girlfriends to set him off on an adventure to find them all.
Hakari : Hakari would be an IPC worker at the Herta Space Station and a Pathstrider of the Preservation for reasons I’ll get to when you know who’s turn comes. For now all you need to know is that she’s just a run of the mill young intern.
Karane : Another run of the mill intern at the Station and a Pathstrider of the Preservation, but that’s because she has her whole family that she’s ought to help look after.
She and Hakari have been working there for a few years, but miraculously never bumped into each other until Rentarou came along as his first hint was to visit the Herta Space Station and then ZINGGGGGGG !!!!
Shizuka : A smol and unassuming librarian at the IPC affiliated Intelligensia Guild, but an avid consumer of not only fiction, but also history and philosophy who would be a debate monster if not for her being a selective mute, but instead she has a dream of writing fiction just like her favorite storybooks. She’d be a Pathstrider of the Erudition.
Nano : Also a Pathstrider of the Erudition and a member of the Intelligensia Guild. Unlike Shizuka Nano consumes practical and scientific knowledge nonstop, so much so that it’s a very common option that Nous the Erudition made a mistake in not branding her a genius. That’s because unlike the Genius Society Nano only consumes knowledge and keeps endlessly storing it in her naturally powerful brain with only the desire to accumulate for the sake of a stable future which actually goes against Nous’ creed of not having the answer to an infinite number questions as most assume, but having the ability to keep asking an infinite number of questions instead.
Kusuri : We have ourselves our first Emanator with Kusuri whose canon drugs are so ridiculous that I’d bet she would indeed earn the gaze of Nous for her reality bending concoctions, becoming either member 84#, taking Stephen Lloyd’s place, or member 85# depending on who Nous gazed upon first (the numbers are purely based on the order of joining the Society).
Hahari : Now we have ourselves another Emanator in Hahari. Now the IPC, the main faction that follows Qlipoth the Preservation, accumulates countless resources to give to the cosmic wall builder, but Qlipoth has never taken a single glance at those materials. That’s why Hahari takes as many resources as she can legally have and sends it to the other group that worships Qlipoth, the Architects, who would make way better use of it. This dutiful aid in preserving the worlds of the Architects would actually win her the gaze of Qlipoth, branding her as one of the less than half a dozen confirmed Emanators or Preservation in the ranks of the IPC.
Kurumi: Now Kurumi is a confusing case since her stomach seems to have some characteristics of being connected to Oroboros the Voracity, except as far as I know there are no Pathstriders nor Emanators on the path of Voracity so here’s a spitball backstory. Now Oroboros has been gone for so long that some might begin to worship THEM and Kurumi would be a girl kidnapped and brought into isolation to become a potential vessel for Oroboros by a crazed faction who experimented on her during infancy to increase her metabolism. Shortly after however she would be rescued and raised by Galaxy Rangers, eventually becoming one to pay for her vast appetite as a Pathstrider of the Hunt, just like Rentarou.
Mei : Hahari’s dutiful secretary and maidservant whose life she saved on one of the many needing planets she assisted. Mei’s devotion to serving Hahari and most importantly annihilating every single obstacle in Hahari’s sight is so intense that she actually won the gaze of Lan the Hunt, granting her the power of an Emanator that she needed to stand by Hahari without being a burden.
Iku : Now here’s a curve ball for you. Iku would be an Emanator of the Elation, not as a member of the Masked Fools or the Mourning Actors, but as her otherwise pretty normal self. That’s because Aha thought her masochism is hilarious and THEY just want how far she’ll go before she breaks.
Mimimi : Our first and probably most obvious path pick. Mimimi would obviously be a Pathstrider of the Beauty who dedicates her life to offering her own beauty for all to witness in hopes that it would attract Idrila, wherever THEY may be. As a Knight of Beauty she would dedicate herself to helping all that she comes across in becoming more beautiful inside and out for the sake of her Aeon’s potential return.
Meme : This may not be possible, but I believe the best choice for Meme is for her to become a Pathstrider of the Remembrance, sporting the very limited abilities of misdirection and making others forget specifically about what’s under her bangs since she’s so shy (Though she keeps Rentarou and Mimimi’s memories out of love).
I’ll update if there’s demand !
submitted by No_Pride_88 to 100Kanojo [link] [comments]
The Imaginary Tree is a conceptual tree that all of existence supposedly sprang from and is a well of infinite imaginary energy. The Aeons are then ones who carve immense paths directly onto the tree, gaining access to that infinite imaginary energy, but in turn being restricted by their Primum Mobile aka the principles of their paths. For example Nanook the Destruction could never veer off the path of Destruction that THEY laid out otherwise they would cease to exist, as would any other Aeon should THEY commit actions or have thoughts that defy their Primum Mobile.
People can also have limited access in one of two ways. Either one could have a strong will and conduct themselves in accordance to the principles of their desired path in order to become a Pathstrider or they could be gazed upon by an Aeon to become an Emanator with the latter being way more powerful than the former.
Now that we have that out of the way let’s get to the juicy details. I will throw around many other factions and paths and if you have any lore questions about my choices then feel free to comment.
Rentarou : Now while it is tempting to give him main character treatment and have him be part of the Nameless of the Trailblaze (aka our main cast) not only does it not make sense in lore, but the express also most definitely doesn’t 101 extra rooms for his entire family. Instead Rentarou would be a layman who became a Galaxy Ranger (i.e. a Pathstrider of the Hunt) out of necessity as his home planet, whatever that may be, became unlivable and his people willingly migrated to work under the IPC. During his early travels he fell in love 100 times and got rejected 100 times, but that was when he would meet with one of the Omen Vanguards, Emanators of the Finality who decipher the Aeon Terminus’ cryptic, backwards messages of the future that Terminus tends mumble as a being who was born at the end of the universe and is chronically moving backwards in time. That Omen Vanguard would essentially be a stand in for the love god, giving Rentarou a list of cryptic hints he was able to piece together and telling Rentarou about his 100 girlfriends to set him off on an adventure to find them all.
Hakari : Hakari would be an IPC worker at the Herta Space Station and a Pathstrider of the Preservation for reasons I’ll get to when you know who’s turn comes. For now all you need to know is that she’s just a run of the mill young intern.
Karane : Another run of the mill intern at the Station and a Pathstrider of the Preservation, but that’s because she has her whole family that she’s ought to help look after.
She and Hakari have been working there for a few years, but miraculously never bumped into each other until Rentarou came along as his first hint was to visit the Herta Space Station and then ZINGGGGGGG !!!!
Shizuka : A smol and unassuming librarian at the IPC affiliated Intelligensia Guild, but an avid consumer of not only fiction, but also history and philosophy who would be a debate monster if not for her being a selective mute, but instead she has a dream of writing fiction just like her favorite storybooks. She’d be a Pathstrider of the Erudition.
Nano : Also a Pathstrider of the Erudition and a member of the Intelligensia Guild. Unlike Shizuka Nano consumes practical and scientific knowledge nonstop, so much so that it’s a very common option that Nous the Erudition made a mistake in not branding her a genius. That’s because unlike the Genius Society Nano only consumes knowledge and keeps endlessly storing it in her naturally powerful brain with only the desire to accumulate for the sake of a stable future which actually goes against Nous’ creed of not having the answer to an infinite number questions as most assume, but having the ability to keep asking an infinite number of questions instead.
Kusuri : We have ourselves our first Emanator with Kusuri whose canon drugs are so ridiculous that I’d bet she would indeed earn the gaze of Nous for her reality bending concoctions, becoming either member 84#, taking Stephen Lloyd’s place, or member 85# depending on who Nous gazed upon first (the numbers are purely based on the order of joining the Society).
Hahari : Now we have ourselves another Emanator in Hahari. Now the IPC, the main faction that follows Qlipoth the Preservation, accumulates countless resources to give to the cosmic wall builder, but Qlipoth has never taken a single glance at those materials. That’s why Hahari takes as many resources as she can legally have and sends it to the other group that worships Qlipoth, the Architects, who would make way better use of it. This dutiful aid in preserving the worlds of the Architects would actually win her the gaze of Qlipoth, branding her as one of the less than half a dozen confirmed Emanators or Preservation in the ranks of the IPC.
Kurumi: Now Kurumi is a confusing case since her stomach seems to have some characteristics of being connected to Oroboros the Voracity, except as far as I know there are no Pathstriders nor Emanators on the path of Voracity so here’s a spitball backstory. Now Oroboros has been gone for so long that some might begin to worship THEM and Kurumi would be a girl kidnapped and brought into isolation to become a potential vessel for Oroboros by a crazed faction who experimented on her during infancy to increase her metabolism. Shortly after however she would be rescued and raised by Galaxy Rangers, eventually becoming one to pay for her vast appetite as a Pathstrider of the Hunt, just like Rentarou.
Mei : Hahari’s dutiful secretary and maidservant whose life she saved on one of the many needing planets she assisted. Mei’s devotion to serving Hahari and most importantly annihilating every single obstacle in Hahari’s sight is so intense that she actually won the gaze of Lan the Hunt, granting her the power of an Emanator that she needed to stand by Hahari without being a burden.
Iku : Now here’s a curve ball for you. Iku would be an Emanator of the Elation, not as a member of the Masked Fools or the Mourning Actors, but as her otherwise pretty normal self. That’s because Aha thought her masochism is hilarious and THEY just want how far she’ll go before she breaks.
Mimimi : Our first and probably most obvious path pick. Mimimi would obviously be a Pathstrider of the Beauty who dedicates her life to offering her own beauty for all to witness in hopes that it would attract Idrila, wherever THEY may be. As a Knight of Beauty she would dedicate herself to helping all that she comes across in becoming more beautiful inside and out for the sake of her Aeon’s potential return.
Meme : This may not be possible, but I believe the best choice for Meme is for her to become a Pathstrider of the Remembrance, sporting the very limited abilities of misdirection and making others forget specifically about what’s under her bangs since she’s so shy (Though she keeps Rentarou and Mimimi’s memories out of love).
I’ll update if there’s demand !